[ there's quiet, then, for a little while. the warmth from her touch seeps into his pressure points, helps to soothe some of that pounding, aching migraine. there's a reason why he was laying here in the dark - the further off he is from the memory that jolted him off of his guard, the harsher the pain comes back, a reminder that he shouldn't even be trying to think at all.
he's never had the luxury of being spoiled. not really. it was there, a path he could have taken, especially after the old marquis passed away, but gu yun never allowed himself a second of it. his own stubbornness led him down the path to become the person who he is today; knowing some of the things that hold him back are what makes it more obvious why he has that golden crown, glowing on the back of his hand.
slowly, slowly, some of the tension in his shoulders comes down. his lashes flutter, briefly, at the kiss, and the way the warmth radiates off of his always too cold skin. ]
...You can ask. [ he says, eventually, voice quiet. it's vulnerability, or vulnerability. a rock and a hard place. ] I'd rather do it now.
[ because ultimately, he knows himself. gu yun knows he'll wheedle out of it otherwise, and he doesn't - he doesn't want there to be any misconception, any confusion - but he's not nearly ready enough to return to this conversation and re-expose his vulnerabilities all over again. ]
[she shifts, first. pulls blankets up to warm his feet, and then lays down next to him, willing herself to calm. she's hot, maybe uncomfortably so, but at least it'll make him feel less like a corpse. she knows how that feels.]
I think... I think I get the gist of what happened. [she says finally.] What happens with the medicine? What does it do for you? What's the extent of the damage? Tell me what I need to be looking out for.
[because obviously now she's going to play support, the best she can.]
It's poison. [ he says this pretty much point blank, keeping his eyes closed. ] Most of the ingredients are poisonous. The formula restores the function to my nervous system and attacks the rest of my body. The first time I took it, it almost killed me, but I've built up a resistance to it, since.
[ which... that resistance comes with a faded timeline of how long it works, too. it started that he'd take a dose once a year. now, he's down to three weeks, at best, with the number ticking down every day. if you think about it, that means gu yun has been poisoning himself since he was eight years old. ]
Taking it gives me a severe migraine. [ see, now. his voice is still quiet, his eyes still closed, and if she still touches spots on his head, gu yun lets himself shift into them, just barely. ] Dizzy. Nauseous. I can barely think. I usually sleep it off, or drink until I can't feel it. It lasts a few hours.
...Normally, it doesn't also make me ill. I don't feel well - I assume it's likely a function of this place. [ he lifts a hand and waves it in the general direction of the base. ] If someone tried to poison me, in my normal life, I would survive it. Here, I don't think that's the case.
he does notice, because, it's gu yun, and he mutters a swear and reaches for the covers on the bed to reach over and pat out the fire before it's like. incinerating his entire bedside table.
while he's patting out the flames itself, that's when wrath gets her answer. ]
...Three weeks. Maybe less. And it wears off over time.
[ alright, alright. yeah, he was about four seconds from swooning over and fainting with how quickly the world around him started to spin, so. it's really only his pride that kept him up, and once wrath fusses at him, he does scooch to lay back down, leaning back into the pillows and closing his eyes to keep the dizziness and the nausea at bay.
gu yun didn't throw up on wrath when he was toleranceless, he'd like to keep that streak going. for a while, he's quiet, letting wrath stroke their fingers through his hair - it brings a gentle tingle to his scalp, to the wracking pain in his head, and he sighs.
...when she says that, though, he huffs a little laugh, opening an eye. ] Oh?
[ when he laughs, this time, it's quieter instead of his typical gremlin snickering, but just as warm. gu yun lets her cover his eyes again, the smile still remaining. ]
Well, it is a poison. Suppose I couldn't receive that as a little reward. [ instead of the black iron emblem! which is useless! ]
another inhale and exhale, deep and measured. he reaches up for the hand on his eyes with his own, fingers ice cold, and lifts it, briefly. ]
...What I told you the other day was true - I was in disguise as a fragrant master, but I didn't have to pretend.
[ he lifts his other hand, and... with careful, measured strokes, begins to spell something in her palm, speaking as he spells the letters. ]
T-H-E-R-E A-R-E W-A-Y-S.
[ gu yun won't be broken apart as his sight starts to leave him. it will leave him strongly disadvantaged, if too many people find out - but he's been coping with it for so long, it doesn't matter. he will survive. he always does. ]
Edited (hit enter too fast aaa) 2021-02-24 01:42 (UTC)
I kind of thought that might be the case. [she says, after a moment, biting her bottom lip. she has to take all this in stride so she doesn't get angry again. she can't control it very well anymore.
but she closes her eyes, and lets him spell into her hand. listens, in a sense, to what he's telling her. and she nods.
there's something about this that does it. he traces words against her palm and she thinks - there are always ways. there are ways to save people. there's always a third option.
she thinks, you won't get hurt, not because of me, and it kickstarts them both right into a memory. just until 4:34.
the echo of it - of her desperate, wild desire to reach for her brother, to get to him, to tell him she was there, she's here, she's here -- it leaves her gasping.]
[ magic is still a mostly new thing, for gu yun. when he sees the world through wrath's eyes, he sees hands that aren't marked by flames - doesn't feel the flicker of it up his skin - but perhaps what he feels is a lot worse.
when the memory finishes, gu yun releases a breath he didn't realize he was holding. his headache rewards him with a screaming jolt of pain, and he keeps his eyes shut, firmly tight, the hand that was spelling letters into her palm now grabbing onto it and holding for the sake of anchoring to reality. he's not an emotional person. he's not someone who reacts, someone who shares anything along the lines of vulnerability, and to be intimately buried into someone else's story is a lot.
so magic, magic is new. (it's not, really. not from experiencing other people's memories - the world outside of wrath's eyes looks a lot like molly's, actually, in more ways than he's really expecting.) but the feeling of poison in your back feels so familiar that he knows it, and maybe his containment hadn't been so literal, but - it was a containment all the same. having to reconnect yourself with the world, moment by moment. having to force yourself with every amount of spite you have in your body to be a functioning thing.
mollymauk said it to him, earlier, when gu yun ran into him in the hour of clarity before the migraine hit. it sticks with him now - he drums up the persona he puts on every day, shoves the pain aside, and says, clear as a bell, almost a command - ] Tell me you're here.
[ the hand stays. squeezing, tight. tell me you're here, in this plane, in this reality, right in this second, not caught up in a memory. ]
[by comparison wrath is someone who reacts, first, before anything else, and maybe that's why she works so well with fire. it's easy to burn. it's easy to lose your mind to emotion, even if you try to bury it with jokes and deflection, and she's had such a hard time with even that, lately. she's forgetting how to stay calm. and she'd forgotten, a little, what it was like to be trapped in that fucking umbrella, and so relieving it makes her furious, makes her want to set the room alight, makes her want to scream and feel, just because she can.
but he holds her hand, and he speaks, clear and bright, and it knocks her out of it.
she's here. not there, with her brother, her twin, her heart.]
Y - yeah. [she manages, opening her eyes. she shudders, horribly, feeling sick.]
feeling like he’s going to pass out from thinking too hard is at least keeping him from pondering those deeper questions, at least for now. it maybe keeps his usual panic response to someone feeling too much in his general vicinity muted, keeps him from saying something more immeasurably stupid to make it worse. there’s a brief moment where he’s reminded of the screaming nightmare he’d awoken chang geng from, the night before he left for the western frontier, and ...
he keeps her hand, and uses his other arm to reach out and catch the back of her neck. His fingers are cold as ever, especially like this - but he gives a gentle tug, to pull her closer into his chest. even like this, a part of him will always be the protector, the strong one, marquis with a spine made of steel.
they can just lay there, for a minute. that’s fine, too. ]
she curls close, when he pulls, and wraps her arms around him. focuses. the way his body feels, the way he smells, the way he is present keeps her grounded. she can touch, she can see, she can hear - she can match him. she can warm him up. and she will, she tangles their legs and just lays with him for a while, letting him soak in her body heat, intensified by the flame inside her.
just for a little bit, she thinks, they can have this. this peach blossom spring.]
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
no subject
he's never had the luxury of being spoiled. not really. it was there, a path he could have taken, especially after the old marquis passed away, but gu yun never allowed himself a second of it. his own stubbornness led him down the path to become the person who he is today; knowing some of the things that hold him back are what makes it more obvious why he has that golden crown, glowing on the back of his hand.
slowly, slowly, some of the tension in his shoulders comes down. his lashes flutter, briefly, at the kiss, and the way the warmth radiates off of his always too cold skin. ]
...You can ask. [ he says, eventually, voice quiet. it's vulnerability, or vulnerability. a rock and a hard place. ] I'd rather do it now.
[ because ultimately, he knows himself. gu yun knows he'll wheedle out of it otherwise, and he doesn't - he doesn't want there to be any misconception, any confusion - but he's not nearly ready enough to return to this conversation and re-expose his vulnerabilities all over again. ]
no subject
I think... I think I get the gist of what happened. [she says finally.] What happens with the medicine? What does it do for you? What's the extent of the damage? Tell me what I need to be looking out for.
[because obviously now she's going to play support, the best she can.]
no subject
[ which... that resistance comes with a faded timeline of how long it works, too. it started that he'd take a dose once a year. now, he's down to three weeks, at best, with the number ticking down every day. if you think about it, that means gu yun has been poisoning himself since he was eight years old. ]
Taking it gives me a severe migraine. [ see, now. his voice is still quiet, his eyes still closed, and if she still touches spots on his head, gu yun lets himself shift into them, just barely. ] Dizzy. Nauseous. I can barely think. I usually sleep it off, or drink until I can't feel it. It lasts a few hours.
...Normally, it doesn't also make me ill. I don't feel well - I assume it's likely a function of this place. [ he lifts a hand and waves it in the general direction of the base. ] If someone tried to poison me, in my normal life, I would survive it. Here, I don't think that's the case.
no subject
I think you're pretty nerfed, yeah. [she says, quietly.] Okay, so... how much of that medicine do you have now?
[she shifts, pulling him a little into her lap so that she can press her warm hands wherever she thinks it'll help.]
no subject
gu yun's silent. longer, this time. ]
...I only had one dose. [ and. he took it. ]
no subject
well, okay, so the bedside table bursts into flames. a little. just on the top. she doesn't seem to notice.]
And how long does the dose last for?
no subject
he does notice, because, it's gu yun, and he mutters a swear and reaches for the covers on the bed to reach over and pat out the fire before it's like. incinerating his entire bedside table.
while he's patting out the flames itself, that's when wrath gets her answer. ]
...Three weeks. Maybe less. And it wears off over time.
no subject
when they go out, though, she fusses at him. lay down.]
... Right. [she says, finally, stroking his hair back.] Okay, well. That gives me three weeks to come up with a solution.
no subject
gu yun didn't throw up on wrath when he was toleranceless, he'd like to keep that streak going. for a while, he's quiet, letting wrath stroke their fingers through his hair - it brings a gentle tingle to his scalp, to the wracking pain in his head, and he sighs.
...when she says that, though, he huffs a little laugh, opening an eye. ] Oh?
no subject
Don't oh. Yes. I'll figure something out.
no subject
Well, it is a poison. Suppose I couldn't receive that as a little reward. [ instead of the black iron emblem! which is useless! ]
no subject
I wouldn't worry too much about it. [she says, firmly. like she's decided something.] Tell me when it starts to get bad again.
no subject
[ will he? we will see! (gy voice) i'm fine.
another inhale and exhale, deep and measured. he reaches up for the hand on his eyes with his own, fingers ice cold, and lifts it, briefly. ]
...What I told you the other day was true - I was in disguise as a fragrant master, but I didn't have to pretend.
[ he lifts his other hand, and... with careful, measured strokes, begins to spell something in her palm, speaking as he spells the letters. ]
T-H-E-R-E
A-R-E
W-A-Y-S.
[ gu yun won't be broken apart as his sight starts to leave him. it will leave him strongly disadvantaged, if too many people find out - but he's been coping with it for so long, it doesn't matter. he will survive. he always does. ]
no subject
but she closes her eyes, and lets him spell into her hand. listens, in a sense, to what he's telling her. and she nods.
there's something about this that does it. he traces words against her palm and she thinks - there are always ways. there are ways to save people. there's always a third option.
she thinks, you won't get hurt, not because of me, and it kickstarts them both right into a memory. just until 4:34.
the echo of it - of her desperate, wild desire to reach for her brother, to get to him, to tell him she was there, she's here, she's here -- it leaves her gasping.]
no subject
when the memory finishes, gu yun releases a breath he didn't realize he was holding. his headache rewards him with a screaming jolt of pain, and he keeps his eyes shut, firmly tight, the hand that was spelling letters into her palm now grabbing onto it and holding for the sake of anchoring to reality. he's not an emotional person. he's not someone who reacts, someone who shares anything along the lines of vulnerability, and to be intimately buried into someone else's story is a lot.
so magic, magic is new. (it's not, really. not from experiencing other people's memories - the world outside of wrath's eyes looks a lot like molly's, actually, in more ways than he's really expecting.) but the feeling of poison in your back feels so familiar that he knows it, and maybe his containment hadn't been so literal, but - it was a containment all the same. having to reconnect yourself with the world, moment by moment. having to force yourself with every amount of spite you have in your body to be a functioning thing.
mollymauk said it to him, earlier, when gu yun ran into him in the hour of clarity before the migraine hit. it sticks with him now - he drums up the persona he puts on every day, shoves the pain aside, and says, clear as a bell, almost a command - ] Tell me you're here.
[ the hand stays. squeezing, tight. tell me you're here, in this plane, in this reality, right in this second, not caught up in a memory. ]
no subject
but he holds her hand, and he speaks, clear and bright, and it knocks her out of it.
she's here. not there, with her brother, her twin, her heart.]
Y - yeah. [she manages, opening her eyes. she shudders, horribly, feeling sick.]
... I'm here. I'm here.
no subject
feeling like he’s going to pass out from thinking too hard is at least keeping him from pondering those deeper questions, at least for now. it maybe keeps his usual panic response to someone feeling too much in his general vicinity muted, keeps him from saying something more immeasurably stupid to make it worse. there’s a brief moment where he’s reminded of the screaming nightmare he’d awoken chang geng from, the night before he left for the western frontier, and ...
he keeps her hand, and uses his other arm to reach out and catch the back of her neck. His fingers are cold as ever, especially like this - but he gives a gentle tug, to pull her closer into his chest. even like this, a part of him will always be the protector, the strong one, marquis with a spine made of steel.
they can just lay there, for a minute. that’s fine, too. ]
no subject
she curls close, when he pulls, and wraps her arms around him. focuses. the way his body feels, the way he smells, the way he is present keeps her grounded. she can touch, she can see, she can hear - she can match him. she can warm him up. and she will, she tangles their legs and just lays with him for a while, letting him soak in her body heat, intensified by the flame inside her.
just for a little bit, she thinks, they can have this. this peach blossom spring.]