Chapter Text
“Gongzi.”
An elderly villager with a beard the color of dust and a back bowed with age approached Wangji from behind the rough structure of the home he was helping to rebuild. Wangji adjusted the timber log resting on his shoulder as he turned to face him.
The old man extended his arm towards a patch of shadowed forest. “A leopard spirit lurks within the boughs of a willow tree. Ever since my nephew was attacked, the men have been too frightened to enter.” He lifted his hands helplessly and shook his head. “I do not fear death, gongzi, but I am not as strong as I once was.” Fatigue made the old man’s hands tremble. “Please. Help us.”
Wangji didn’t need to hear anymore. He inclined his head, then bent to rest the timber log on the pile of wood he’d managed to gather on his own for the village’s reconstruction efforts. He could hear the sound of children playing on the dirt road as the elder led him to his home, one of the few remaining that had escaped the fire the Wens had spread from one village to the next. They’d sought out to conquer the cultivation world by forcing every man, woman, and child to bend the knee, and made sure that those who refused would have nowhere to run to.
But old, blackened beams were being replaced by freshly cut wood as wounds gradually turned to scars. The shadow of Wen Ruohan was nothing more now than a storm that had briefly obscured the open sky, and like all storms, it had passed.
Those who lost their homes were taken in by their neighbors, and so this village on the outskirts of Qinghe had managed to survive without reinforcements from the clans. They hadn’t deliberately been abandoned, but the Cloud Recesses and Lotus Pier were in no position to offer aid, and those within the Iron Fortress had turned their focus inward after so many disciples had been lost. That left only Lanling Jin, and their services were beyond anything these humble farmers could afford.
It was fortunate that Wangji had discovered this village during his travels.
The old man led him to a cottage with a thatched roof that bore scorch marks and one collapsed stone wall. Bamboo shoots held together with rope provided temporary shelter from the elements, but such conditions were hardly optimal. Wangji stepped inside, taking in the dried healing herbs that dangled from the ceiling and the smell of fresh soup that wafted from the pot in the kitchen.
On the sole bed, his pillow soaked with sweat, was the old man’s nephew. Formerly young and strong, the leopard spirit’s curse had stolen much of his vitality. His sallow skin hung loosely on his bones as he stared sightlessly up at the rafters. Veins stained black, as though with ink or oil, spread from the jagged gouges in his stomach.
Wangji drew a purifying talisman from his sleeve and placed it on a central pillar within the cottage, then summoned his guqin and, with a single chord, cleansed the home of its resentment. It wouldn’t be enough to save the young man - that would require dealing with the spirit directly - but it would keep the effects of the curse from spreading to the villagers or their crops.
Already, the oppressive atmosphere within the cottage had lightened, and the old man sighed with relief. “I hadn’t realized,” he said, his voice filled with awe, “how long it’s been since I’ve drawn a full breath.” He clasped his hands together. “Thank you, gongzi.”
Wangji accepted his gratitude, though in his heart he was not sure if he deserved it. He’d only done what any cultivator should have done in his place, after all. But when there was so little left to give, even gratitude was a priceless gift. And as Wangji left the cottage, he was met with a crowd of villagers, their faces pitched with hunger and worry. They scrambled away at the sight of him, leaving only a woman, dressed in a straw hat and a long-sleeved tunic, and her young daughter, who looked up at Wangji with round, tear-streaked cheeks.
“Hanguang-jun,” the woman said breathlessly, holding her daughter close, “my husband did not mean to offend the spirit. He only wanted to help.”
If Wei Ying were here, he would lift their spirits with comforting nonsense, but such things did not come naturally to Wangji. Instead, he reached inside his sleeve, retrieved another talisman, and offered it to the girl, who warily accepted it. “It’s an evil-warding talisman,” he explained simply. Then to her mother, he said, “I will attempt to pacify the spirit. You have my word.” Pacification was always the first step to exorcism. If he could not pacify it, he would attempt to seal it, and if that failed, he would have to eliminate it.
It was not the yaogui’s fault that humans were encroaching on its territory. Without night hunts, spirits and other creatures were growing emboldened, while the remnants of Wen Ruohan’s destruction drove villagers and townsfolk to seek more resources out of desperation.
Wangji had a responsibility to protect the lives in front of him, but he would spare the leopard spirit if it allowed him to do so. It was not, after all, evil or unnatural, as a resentful ghost or a fierce corpse would be.
With a wave of his hand, Wangji dismissed his guqin and made his way to the path the old man had indicated that would lead him to the willow tree and its guardian spirit. It was nearing twilight, the time when night creatures would grow the most active, but Wangji was accustomed to hunting in the dark.
He moved swiftly over weeds and gnarled roots, his senses extended to his surroundings, where the trees themselves seemed to begrudge his presence. The delicate equilibrium between humans and nature had been thrown out of balance, and this was the result. It would take time to restore what once had been, but that was a problem for another day.
Wangji unsheathed his sword, clearing the path ahead with a stroke that sliced the thorny brambles obstructing his way. Though he couldn’t see the willow, he could sense a malevolent energy further ahead that was clearly aware of his presence, and that told him that he was close.
As the willow tree came into view, its branches dangling and swaying like wind chimes, his mind drifted briefly to his mother, who’d once told him that the branch of a willow tree, when broken, could grant any wish. Her golden eyes, which were so often distant, would grow suddenly focused, as though she’d woken up after a long slumber, but her touch was always gentle and her smile was always kind as she told him the tale of a willow tree, its trunk bent with sorrow, that could grant the deepest desire of the heart.
“But you must be careful, A-Zhan,” she would whisper, “for the tree cannot choose the wishes it grants, and a wish that changes the heart could only ever be a curse.” And she would frown, her expression growing thoughtful. “Perhaps that is why the willow is always bowing.”
Wangji looked up at the willow’s boughs and thought of Qingheng-jun, secluded and wasting away in his sorrow, leaving the responsibilities of his sect to his younger brother. Who had his self-inflicted punishment helped, in the end?
Wangji didn’t understand it. And now that Qingheng-jun was dead, he never would. His parents had taken their story with them to their graves.
A pair of glowing eyes from a perch within the branches twinkled like stars in the dusk. Wangji gripped the hilt of Bichen, ready for the spirit to pounce. His heart beat a steady rhythm in his chest. “The villagers meant you no harm. They are desperate. I have come to beg your forgiveness on their behalf.”
The lithe spirit crawled with liquid grace down the branch and into the center of the willow, where a gouge in the tree’s trunk wept fresh sap. Wangji could not heal the willow’s wound, yet he carefully approached, never removing his gaze from the leopard spirit. He placed a hand over the gash and poured his energy into it, seeking the tree’s forgiveness, as well as the spirit’s, as he coaxed new growth from the bark. Green shoots curled over the ax mark.
It didn’t erase the wound the old man’s nephew had left, but it would accelerate the willow’s healing.
The leopard spirit stared intently at Wangji. When Wangji met the spirit’s scrutiny without fear or doubt, the spirit, a creature of time, feeling, and shadow, as fathomless as space, gradually inclined its head.
A voice, though it was more intent than words, whispered in Wangji’s mind. The willow is grateful to you, young one. As am I. In exchange, your heart’s desire will be granted.
Wangji withdrew his hand from the willow. “No need,” he said bluntly. “I only ask that you lift your curse.” Even as he spoke, his heart felt noticeably lighter than before, as though a weight had been lifted from it. He frowned, examining the sensation, but it is far more difficult to identify the absence of something than the presence of something that was not there before.
What had he been thinking about when the willow peered into his heart?
As the leopard spirit climbed up into the boughs, it peered down once more, as its form slowly melded with the leaves.
Wangji clasped his hands and bowed, then turned his back on the willow and followed the path that would return him to the village. Though he did not doubt the spirit’s word, Wangji could not move on from this place until the nephew’s recovery was confirmed.
And as for his heart’s desire… The only thing Wangji truly desired was for Wei Ying to come with him to Gusu of his own choosing, but that was a wish not even a willow could grant.