Chapter 47 Quiet Room
As the night deepened, the candlelight in the quiet room remained bright. Wei Wuxian sat cross-legged on the couch, fiddling with the jade pendant with the Chinese character "Jun" (Lord). The jade pendant shone with a warm luster in the candlelight, and the blood-red marks on the broken part had faded so much that they looked almost like natural patterns.
Lan Wangji sat across from him, adjusting the strings of his zither. He carefully wiped his dust-proof blanket clean and leaned against the zither table. He watched Wei Wuxian repeatedly stroking the jade pendant with his fingertips and whispered, "Still thinking about the Jun family?"
Wei Wuxian looked up and smiled. "It's not that I'm thinking about it, I just find it a little strange. After living for so long, suddenly realizing I might still have relatives, it's a strange feeling." He placed the jade pendant in his palm, holding it up to the light. "Tell me, did my mother really want to take me back to Junwu Mountain back then? Did she know all along that there was danger there?"
Lan Wangji put down the strings, walked over and sat beside him, reaching out to pull him into his arms. "Whatever her plan was back then, it must have been to keep you alive and well." He looked down at the jade pendant, "Just like us now."
Wei Wuxian leaned on his shoulder, inhaling the faint sandalwood scent on him, and the confusion in his heart gradually dissipated. Indeed, no matter how many secrets his mother's past held, she had ultimately protected him in her own way. And now, he had Lan Wangji, Sizhui, and the Cloud Recesses as his home. That was enough.
"Oh, right," Wei Wuxian suddenly remembered something and took out a small cloth bag from his arms, "This is for you." In the cloth bag were a few lotus seed candies wrapped in candy paper. Jiang Cheng had stuffed them into his hands before he left Lotus Pier, saying that they were "for silencing him on the road."
Lan Wangji picked up one, peeled it, and put it in his mouth. The sweet taste spread on the tip of his tongue. Wei Wuxian leaned over and gently bit his lips, then took half of the candy into his mouth, smiling with his eyebrows curved: "Is it sweet?"
Warm breath brushed the corner of his lips, and Lan Wangji's ears turned slightly red. He reached out and pressed his restless shoulders: "Behave yourself."
“No.” Wei WuXian snuggled into his arms like a spoiled child, “It’s just the two of us here anyway.”
The moonlight outside the window shines through the bamboo curtains, casting mottled shadows on the ground. In the quiet room, the only sounds that can be heard are each other's breathing and the occasional sound of the bamboo curtains being blown by the wind.
Si Zhui, on the small couch in the corner, wasn't asleep yet. He'd been running all day and should have been tired enough to fall asleep right away, but the quiet laughter and whispers outside the couch kept him awake. He quietly lifted the covers a little and saw his father lying in his father's arms, their heads leaning against each other, talking incoherently. His father's profile looked especially gentle in the candlelight, and even the corners of his usually tightly pursed mouth were slightly smiling.
Si Zhui suddenly remembered the look his uncle Jiang Cheng had given him, his father, and his father back at Lotus Pier. There was envy, helplessness, and a certain inexplicable tenderness in those eyes. He hadn't understood it then, but now he seemed to understand a little—it turns out that a peaceful life is when someone talks to you, someone keeps the lights on for you, and someone shares half of their sweetest sugar with you.
He rolled over and buried his face in the soft quilt, which smelled faintly of sandalwood, the same scent as his father's, making him feel at ease. Tomorrow he had to get up early to practice swordplay, listen to his teacher's lectures, and wait for Jingyi to finish copying the books so they could fly kites together... As he thought about it, his eyelids gradually grew heavy, and he soon fell into a deep sleep.
The next morning, Si Zhui was awakened by the chirping of birds outside the window. Rubbing his eyes, he sat up and found that no one was outside the couch. Only a neatly folded school uniform was placed on the table, and next to it was a bowl of warm lotus seed soup.
"Awake?" Lan Wangji walked in with a basin of water. "After washing up, go to the front yard to practice swordplay."
Sizhui nodded, picked up the lotus seed soup and took a sip. The sweet taste spread on his tongue, which was his favorite taste. He knew that this must have been made by his father early in the morning.
As expected, Lan Jingyi was already waiting in the sword training field. His face didn't look good, and the dark shadows under his eyes had deepened, as if he hadn't slept all night. "Sizhui!" He waved, sword still in hand. "Come on, come on! I'm telling you, I copied until midnight last night and finally finished copying the Yazheng Collection!"
Si Zhui walked over and couldn't help asking, "Did you really copy it forty times?"
"What else?" Lan Jingyi's face fell. "Grandun said that if a single word is missing, we have to rewrite it. But luckily, when I finished copying, it was daybreak, and I saw Han Guang-jun combing Senior Wei's hair!" He moved closer and lowered his voice. "Don't you think they are a little too affectionate? Han Guang-jun is such a refined man, and yet he combs someone else's hair..."
Si Zhui recalled the scene in the quiet room last night and couldn't help laughing: "Daddy said this is called taking care of each other."
"Does it take that long to take care of each other?" Lan Jingyi curled his lips. "I think Senior Wei is just being lazy on purpose." Even so, a smile played on his face. "But to be honest, seeing them like that is quite enviable."
As they were talking, Wei Wuxian and Lan Wangji walked over side by side. Wei Wuxian was holding a kite, which he had made overnight. It had a majestic phoenix painted on it, with a few colorful feathers on its wings. "Sizhui, Jingyi, do you want to fly a kite?"
"Yes!" Lan Jingyi immediately raised his hand, his eyes shining like stars. "I saw yesterday that the lawn on the back mountain is especially suitable for flying kites!"
Sizhui also nodded. He had never flown such a beautiful kite before.
Lan Wangji looked at the kite in Wei Wuxian's hand and shook his head helplessly, but still turned around to get the spool of string. Wei Wuxian smiled and made a face at him, then grabbed Sizhui and Lan Jingyi and ran towards the back mountain: "Let's go! Let's fly the kite!"
The sun was shining brightly, the breeze was gentle, the lawns on the hillside behind were covered in lush green grass, and the bamboo forest in the distance rustled in the wind. Wei Wuxian raised his kite and ran a few steps. The phoenix kite slowly rose on the wind, soaring higher and higher, drawing a graceful arc in the azure sky.
Sizhui and Lan Jingyi ran across the lawn, laughing as they pulled the spools of string. The kite string trembled gently in their hands, as if they were holding a flowing cloud. Wei Wuxian leaned against Lan Wangji, watching the two children, and suddenly felt that this was probably what the so-called peaceful years were like.
Lan Wangji held his hand, the warmth in his palm reassuring. Wei Wuxian turned to look at him, meeting his gentle gaze. They smiled at each other, saying nothing, yet it felt as if they had said everything.
The phoenix kite in the sky is still flying high, the laughter on the ground is still echoing, and the time in the deep clouds is like this slowly flowing stream, calm and warm, with a hint of sweetness, slowly moving forward.
The jade pendant with the Chinese character "Jun" resting quietly in Wei Wuxian's brocade pouch seemed to sense this peace, gleaming warmly in the sunlight, as if guarding this hard-earned, ordinary happiness. As for the secrets of the Jun family, and the "time not yet right" for the White-Robed Divine Soldier, perhaps, as Lan Qiren said, there was no need to rush into the search; answers would naturally emerge when the time came. For now, they simply needed to live well and savor the peaceful present.
Continue read on readnovelmtl.com
