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When there is a loud, shattering thud on the roof that startles him enough to make the tea in his hand tremble, Zhongli does not question it. He is calm when he puts the teacup down, gets on his feet, and steps outside to inspect the damage.
The moon swells bright in the sky. Qingce Village is quieter than the rustling of bamboo leaves and often leaves Zhongli to his thoughts on these nights. Wrapping the corner of his home, he cups his chin to ponder. It sounded oddly heavy. Some stones? A tree from the cliffs?
When he finds a wingless bird, tattered and frail, sprawled on the ground, Zhongli does not question it either.
The bird’s eyes glow in amber.
“Xiao?”
There is no response.
Instead, Xiao squirms. He tries to push himself up off the ground, but it is a weak and pathetic attempt that results in a muted cry rippling out of his throat. Zhongli does not overlook the stains of blood in spite of the darkness. Stark against his pale skin, faintly wafting in the air. Some parts caked onto his body, other parts a fresh spill.
Something has maimed him greatly. Over an extended period, too. Not even in the ancient wars did this adeptus ever allow anything to harm himself to such degree, let alone display his suffering so openly. No, not since the day he was freed.
Zhongli kneels before Xiao. He holds out his hand. Like a fearful animal, Xiao shivers and merely blinks at the offering. But Zhongli is patient. He waits. It doesn't take long for Xiao to eventually grasp and squeeze his hand, his grip tight and cold. Zhongli helps him up, one arm over his tense shoulders. Xiao flinches, yet he says nothing.
Blood trickles down Xiao’s back. The stain is incredibly dark, absorbed by his worn shirt. Xiao avoids Zhongli’s gaze. He only stares at his feet — bare and dirty, toes hugging the ground.
Zhongli considers it, but decides not to question anything after all.
“Come inside,” he says. “You must be cold.”
Many things come and go over each year. Zhongli wishes he could spend his days reminiscing each moment. Everything to him is a precious memory regardless of how cruel or tender they are. He supposes it’s only natural for a being as ancient as himself, but he also thinks of those who have seen and heard more than enough in their lives. Those who would rather forget, either by the gentle erosion of passing time or by force.
Maybe he wasn’t too surprised by the time he and the others realized Xiao was missing. The realization came to everyone gradually, but his disappearance had likely occurred over a quick blur. He was gone, not a trace of him left in the winds of Liyue — and Zhongli never thought too much about it. Xiao had his reasons to both linger and vanish. Either way it would be by his own will, so Zhongli never thought it necessary to raise concerns.
The years passed.
Zhongli met countless new faces at Liyue Harbor. Said his goodbyes to just as many, including the traveler. They’d never really gotten over Xiao’s disappearance. They had no intention of forcing him back, though; they only wanted to see his face once more before moving on to the next world. The traveler had confided in Zhongli about their last wish the day of their departure.
He didn’t have much to tell them. Only that he felt the same — but not even that simple thought was put to words in the consideration that Xiao could be listening somewhere.
He always had the hunch that Xiao was distant, though not impossibly far.
Wherever the yaksha found himself, it was volatile. That much he knew.
“I’ve run a bath for you.”
There has never been anything so clearly out of place than Xiao standing in the center of the living room, a towel thrown over his hunched back, his trembling feet leaving faint dirt prints on the floor.
Xiao startles simply at Zhongli’s voice. He turns a small angle towards him. Each movement is cautious, a sign of his inner apprehension from absorbing the fact that he is in Zhongli’s home. The place where his god spends his days and sleeps away. He hardly moves and simultaneously cannot manage to stay still.
When Zhongli steps closer to Xiao, the latter inches away, most likely as a reflex.
“Is something the matter?” Zhongli asks, gentle as possible. He approaches with observant care. Xiao was born a creature of brute strength, and Zhongli knows that makes him all the more delicate.
Xiao grips his own arm. “I…” he croaks, “do not wish for you to see me like this.”
Sighing, he takes Xiao’s face into his palms, rubbing the smudge of blood and other dark matter from his cheek. Xiao’s lip quivers, but he keeps his gaze equal to Zhongli’s.
How would Zhongli describe that look? Something of pure dread, comfort, and an agonizing guilt… Frowning, he presses a kiss to the fullest curve of Xiao’s cheek.
Xiao physically freezes, save for his hand that tugs on the hem of Zhongli’s shirt.
“You mustn’t,” he whispers in a shaky breath. “I—I am filthy.”
Zhongli stares at him, quiet. There is more to the meaning of what Xiao says to deprecate himself, evident in how his eyes avoid the light and shoulders sink. It is nothing new to hear from him after all that’s happened, but the feeling Zhongli gets is akin to pressing hard on a bruise.
That is to say, it still aches.
“Then you must bathe and wash off the grime. You are covered in it,” Zhongli says, holding Xiao’s wrist. He touches the way his veins run thick, impressively bold for such a thin limb connected to a thinner body. “You are injured too, are you not?”
Xiao’s silence is a telling answer.
Zhongli smiles faintly.
“Will you allow me to take care of you, Xiao?”
Xiao lifts his chin. The flickering lights of the room illuminate his face — the splashes of dirt and dust, the flesh-red cuts, his glossy eyes. By definition he is tainted, but Zhongli finds him nevertheless beautiful.
To him, that is the very essence of Xiao’s beauty.
“Yes,” Xiao answers. “…Please.”
Zhongli caresses the back of Xiao’s head, carding through disheveled locks. Nodding, he pulls Xiao towards him. Xiao nestles in the broadness of his chest, and he melts in the embrace like a candle who'd waited centuries to be snuffed out once and for all.
“Alright,” Zhongli says.
I’m sorry for taking so long to ask, he thinks.
Xiao’s body, for the most part, is as Zhongli remembers it. He is lithe, toned mainly above his waist, and gracefully untouched. Sleeves rolled up to his elbows, Zhongli works the bathwater over every curve and groove of Xiao’s body. He starts in smaller places — letting Xiao splash the water over his face, while Zhongli dutifully rubs a drenched cloth over his neck and shoulders. He’s sure Xiao would have more shy complaints about sitting so politely in his bathtub, if this were an earlier time. He didn’t think some short years would affect him much. Xiao does not say a word but his body is lax and giving, which on its own must be a great effort for him.
Xiao is soft and supple. Zhongli thinks it a miracle considering how everything else about Xiao has been hardened by the years. Where he comes off as a brandished weapon to the people — sharp, untouchable, a threat waiting to be fulfilled — Zhongli sees the opposite. He lifts Xiao’s arms, cupping and pouring warm water over him. Aside from quiet hisses when the water touches open wounds, Xiao is still.
The water is a faint, muddy pink. Zhongli wrings the cloth, dunks it in the water, and shifts to Xiao’s backside. When he does, Xiao winces from nothing in particular. His back hunches and he holds his arms like a child shivering in the cold, and Zhongli sees why when he crouches behind him.
It’s hard to watch, but Zhongli cannot look away either.
Two deep, unsightly gashes, one for each shoulder blade. Though they no longer bleed, they still glow in crimson. Zhongli has never seen anything like it. If he had to make a comparison, he would say it’s as if someone dug their nails into Xiao’s back and ripped out a fistful of flesh, then gouged out some more when they decided it wasn’t enough.
Zhongli has tended to many of Xiao’s grotesque wounds before, but this… nothing has quite disturbed him as this does. Even thinking about touching the edges of his jagged, torn skin makes Zhongli’s hand tremble. He swallows.
He was dewinged.
“Who did this?”
It isn’t Zhongli’s intention, but it comes out in a low, commanding voice. And that compels Xiao to answer — except it’s difficult to admit who exactly did this to him.
Xiao turns over his shoulder, gazing at Zhongli solemnly. He does not say a name, nails digging into his arms. His lips part like he’s trying, but all that comes out is empty air. In the end, Xiao merely lowers his head in shame.
Zhongli aches.
“Oh, my dearest,” he mumbles, dropping the cloth. “Come here.”
And Xiao listens, diligent as he always is — their foreheads pressed together, Zhongli dearly holding Xiao’s jawline, the water warmest between their skin.
“I’m sorry, Zhongli-daren,” whispers Xiao.
“No, no. Don’t apologize,” Zhongli replies. He kisses Xiao on the forehead, lips brushing against him when he speaks again. “What led you to this?”
“I cannot say,” Xiao answers, practically wailing. “I cannot say, my lord. But it’s my fault.”
“I don’t believe that.”
“I… I…” Xiao’s direction shifts so he can cling onto Zhongli, voice no more than a hoarse whisper. Zhongli would return the embrace if he didn’t worry about touching Xiao where it hurts most. “While I was gone, I saw…”
Zhongli puts his thumb to Xiao’s lips. “No more. I do not want to hear this.”
Xiao’s wet hands soak into Zhongli’s shirt.
“I couldn’t… resist,” he whispers.
“I understand,” Zhongli says. “But you will speak of this no further. It is in the past. It’s not like you to dwell on these things, Xiao.”
“I fear that I lost part of myself to it,” Xiao shakily admits. He braces his hands upon Zhongli’s neck. From his expression it’s impossible to discern if he is on the verge of tears or fury. Perhaps both, or neither at all. “My lord, I am pitifully weak.”
Zhongli sighs. He combs Xiao’s dampened locks behind his ear. “Have I not told you this before?” he says. “It’s alright to be weak. I am neither invincible nor undefeated, just like you.”
Xiao’s eyes flit from Zhongli’s face to the ambling bathwater. “But I am not the same as you. You have defeated the evils that I could not. I am here because you selflessly saved me.”
“Xiao. Quiet,” Zhongli says. A kiss on Xiao’s lips, to make true his demand. “Tell me. Did it hurt?”
There is no direct answer. Xiao whimpers, so Zhongli presses their lips together again. After they part, Xiao’s chest rises. His fingers burrow themselves in Zhongli’s dark hair. For once, he forgets his obligation to be distant, and Zhongli is glad.
“Will it heal?” Xiao timidly asks.
“Eventually,” Zhongli tells him. “This, too, will be a memory.”
But some things do not, and that is why you are endlessly beautiful to me.
The warm water trickles down Zhongli’s neck from where Xiao kisses him.
“Zhongli-daren… If I am permitted an indulgence,” he says, “I have one request.”
“Yes?”
“I wish to stay. Here, with you. Just… for a bit.”
Zhongli shakes his head, and smiles. “You need not ask.”