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Lan Wangji is exhausted. His back aches, and he can feel the ointment that his brother applied that afternoon dripping into the bandage covering his torso as it mixes with the blood slowly gushing past his newly-broken scabs. All he wants to do is lie down and cry, undignified as such a combination of activities might be.
A gentle, shaking pat on his knee reminds him that he cannot just lie down and ignore the child watching him warily next to his bed. He turns his head down toward the toddler; he cannot bring himself to bend down with his injuries. He smiles down at the child, as best he can. Based on the fear still on Wen Yuan's face, he doesn't think he did a very good job. He clears his throat.
"Hm?" he asks, raising his eyebrows a bit.
Before the child can respond, thunder shakes the Jingshi. Wen Yuan- Lan Yuan, Wangji reminds himself as he winces; the pain throbs as Lan Yuan unintentionally pulls on the skirt of Wangji's outer robe in response to the thunder. Though the boy can be no more than three years old, his grip was strong enough to tug down the robe over his bandages. Wangji closes his eyes for a moment. He takes a breath and forces himself to speak.
"Are you scared?"
"Hm," the child nods jerkily, looking somehow both fearful and untrusting. Wangji thinks it's the eyes- so full of knowledge, even if he has forgotten everything from before his fever. It has only been a few weeks since Wangji found him, after all. Though the child prefers him to Xichen, he clearly misses his family, even if he cannot remember them. He knows not what to say to comfort Lan Yuan, so he can only do as he wishes he could have done to Wei Ying and play away all the world's evils. Wangji sighs; he'll have to walk to his guqin.
He stands up, and the child stumbles back. Wangji stares resolutely at his guqin as he painstakingly moves, step by step, over to the cushion placed just behind the table with the instrument, perfectly tuned by his kind brother since Wangji cannot tend to it. He knows from the padding of socked feet behind him that Lan Yuan has begun to follow him. His back is on fire. The thunder clashes outside once again, and Lan Yuan whimpers. Wangji does not think about how long this must have been going on until the boy disturbed his thoughts.
He finally gets to the guqin and sits down; he hopes that the appearance is that of gracefully falling instead of hopelessly collapsing, but he also knows that little Lan Yuan probably gives no thought to how composed he is when trying to sit down while dealing with unbearable pain.
As he readjusts, sitting straight and placing his hands on the beautiful instrument, he takes a moment to feel the strings beneath the pads of his fingertips. They are smooth and sharp; he can almost hear the twang of the note as the silk digs into his skin. Lan Yuan plops down across from him, pulling his knees up towards his chest and tightening his hands around them. His eyes bore into Wangji, unblinking and serious in the lamplight. Another clap of thunder jolts the child, and he finally breaks his focus to glance around the room. Wangji feels the urge to cry for a moment once again.
He begins to play, slowly strumming out a soft, light melody that permeates through the room. He closes his eyes for a moment, letting the music relax him. When he opens his eyes, he can’t help the way his lips turn upward: Lan Yuan may still be clutching himself, but he’s closed his eyes to better listen to the music. Even as more thunder shakes the jingshi, the boy is no longer jumping with each boom. He’s listening raptly to the song. It grows, low and strong- like a hug, Wangji imagines. Since he cannot embrace this scared, precious little boy, his only remaining connection to Wei Ying, at least this song can.
His fingers race across the taut strings, bringing the notes back up so they are light and airy before the comforting motif returns. Lan Yuan scurries over to snuggle next to him, and he doesn’t even feel the strain of his wounded back. Instead, his mind is filled with the idea of ‘home’ as the jingshi has not been, truly, in over a decade. He remembers sitting snug against his mother’s side as he tried to brave the storm ravaging Cloud Recesses during one of his monthly visits; she simply patted his head and whispered to be brave. She had not known this song, but he liked to think she would have played it if she had known. Lan Yuan uses his new position to grab ahold of Lan Wangji’s outer robe once more, but he’s not squeezing anymore. Instead, the child’s hand is nestled into the fabric, comfortable and loose.
And despite the pain of his back, the pressure of his fingers as he desperately tries to rid this poor child of his fear and reluctance, and the ache in his chest where his Golden Core sits, Wangji can breathe calmly for the first time in what feels like forever. He finishes up the last new notes of the song, lingering on the slow, gentle ending as Lan Yuan’s head tilts onto Wangji’s lap. Wangji strokes Lan Yuan’s hair gently, feeling the knots and tangles accrued since Xichen combed it that morning. It is not as soft as he assumes- living in the burial mounds as a toddler does have its lasting effects, after all- but he continues to pat it, fingering out some of the less gnarled strands. The boy shifts a bit; Lan Wangji thinks he may be falling asleep at last.
Outside, the rain pounds on the roof of the Jingshi. It sounds to Wangji like a prayer.