un: absterge | video

[downswing]

( Dark and damp and Lan Wangji's pallor strained under moonlight. Behind him, flickers of broad, long temple columns — and the smoke smears of... ghosts, gathered. He seems short of breath, the silvered sheen of his sword half drawn from her scabbard, a spate of parchment papers littering the walls: active talismans. )

They have crowded their halls of the dead, to excess.

Here, the key withholds itself. Who hunts the other locations?

( And a pause, hesitant — whether to find his words or, absently, slap another talisman on the spirit that looms with a gaping maw behind him. ) Ke-Waihu stands safe?

( ooc: forwarded dated to the group's incursions in Ke-Waicai. Feel free to run into him in person, if you're also chasing the haunted temple key! )

Comments

[weifinder]

( he raises his brows. )

Have faith.

[downswing]

Wei Ying is able.

[weifinder]

Nothing unliving will haunt our resting places.

... The grandfathers of Taravast nonewithstanding.

[downswing]

And the sleeper you ferried.

[weifinder]

( he snorts, lips quirking up again, in spite of his whole face being tired. )

He's not a haunt, Lan Zhan, or at least not presently.

Though Asgeirr is, so that's true, I suppose.

[downswing]

Wei Ying.

How many dead elders crowd beneath your roof?

[weifinder]

All of them.

[downswing]

( oh for — )

Bid them other sanctuary.

[weifinder]

One sleeps so far unending, the other sleeps in cloak and wakes periodically. They hardly share my pallet, Lan Zhan.

[downswing]

( The blandest: )

I am not unaware.

[weifinder]

You're hardly unaware of my nature, either.

[downswing]

You crave death.

[weifinder]

Uncalled for.

[downswing]

Resentment. Spirits.

You resonate. I speak falsehood?

[weifinder]

You speak misleadingly. I understand them, not crave them. I don't crave death. I don't crave a family full of dead elders. It's what the worlds delivered, unasked, several times over. And I'm hardly unique in that.

( said levelly, no heat, not even chill in his voice. too factual. these are the things which have happened. )

What was my justice, when I was younger and prideful enough to believe I had to hold it all on my own?

[downswing]

They spared you only lashed cruelty. Indignity. Violation. Scorn.

[weifinder]

Lan Zhan.

[downswing]

Am I mistaken? Were they kind?

[weifinder]

I speak also of the Dafan Mountain Wens!

( he cannot argue filial piety: they simply know what that is. )

Anyway, once we solve the sleeper's slumber, he'll do as he wishes. Once the scholar determines his course, I'll facilitate as I can. What would you have me say?

[downswing]

Nothing. Unto no man.

Your reasons are your own.

[weifinder]

( he breathes out in a sigh, one hand rubbing at his face. )

Then I'll find myself a woman to explain to, if it'll help solve things.

[downswing]

Will it?

[weifinder]

( a cluck of his tongue. )

Women tend to pin down whatever I've been missing, or trying not to see. Which as you didn't have the immense pleasure of a sister to keep you civil, let me tell you, it's an uncanny ability.

[downswing]

A sister.

( The wheels, turning. ) Mistress Wen.

[weifinder]

( said more softly, with depth of feeling, and an awareness of the loss it likewise contains. )

The second time I've been so blessed.