jiangshan | (no subject)

WHO: Yu Lian and Xue Yang, Yu Lian and Jiang Cheng
WHERE: On the Road
WHEN: Years ago for Xue Yang, after Gusu for Jiang Cheng
WHAT: Yu Lian and two very different marks
WARNINGS: none really maybe they bang we'll see

Yu Lian was hungry again. They'd been on the road for days now, and the last of the money had finally dried up. They sighed to themself as they turned their head up to stare at the wide, bright sky. It was tiring, having to constantly look after oneself, and Yu Lian was getting very tired of it in general. At least they had a method to rectify the situation.

They carefully climbed into a tree, their unusual deep green robes helping to hide themself among the foliage as they waited and watched the road. It was a busy enough thoroughfare, people passing every couple of minute on their way between cities, but most of the travellers weren't of note. Mediocre people. Mundane people. Little fortune and less luck. The most Yu Lian would be able to get out of them would be a night's meal - hardly worth the effort it would take to ensnare them in the first place.

Finally, they spotted someone in dark robes with a sword at their side. Clearly a cultivator. Didn't recognize the sect, but no matter - even the lesser cultivators were able to make decent money. It was worth the risk.

Yu Lian closed their eyes, turning their hand in front of him as they pulled their spiritual energy into their core, and then extended it outward. They felt, rather than saw, the thread extend from him, twisting through space and time and entwining on the wrist of the other. Solidifying.

A fake bond of fate wound between them, indistinguishable from the real thing.

For a time, anyway.

Yu Lian waited until their mark was well out of sight, and then climbed back down out of the tree. They followed the road for a little while, then took another, putting some distance between them.

Then they drew their sword.

"Pity," Yu Lian murmured to no one, "I liked these robes."

Then with a vicious motion, he sliced through cloth and flesh, leaving a horrible gaping wound in his leg, the blood spraying over the gravel of the road. Yu Lian hissed, biting their lip, and then started to kick the gravel in order to make it look like a scuffle, before collapsing onto the road.

A quick glance at their wrist proved it had worked - the string they had woven earlier was now flaring bright as fresh blood, curling off into the distance where their mark lay.

All there was to do now was wait, and hope the man wasn't so useless as to let Yu Lian bleed out in the meantime.

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This time, Yu Lian was just going to have to spend some time bleeding while Xue Yang fixed the string with a skeptical, mostly disbelieving stare. He'd never had a connection to anyone or anything and didn't see why that'd change now, but it wasn't like he could just not check this out. A least it was giving some flavor to what was otherwise turning out to be an uneventful day of travel, Xue Yang having to move cities because the last one had been starting to get wise on him and overstaying after that was a good way to end up on the wrong end of an angry mob. Which would've been its own kind of interesting, but he wasn't in the mood for that kind of trouble.

So he followed the red string, expression mildly curious but largely unconcerned, probably not what Yu Lian was used to seeing from his marks.

Once the injured party came into view, Xue Yang gave them a slow once over, lifted an eyebrow, and then continued to watch them bleed as he pulled a hard candy out of his pocket, unwrapped it, and popped it into his mouth.

"Neat trick. You got one to stop yourself from bleeding out?"

Edited 2020-01-24 05:30 (UTC)

He'd been trying to catch up with Lan Wangji and Wei Wuxian but they ended up moving faster and getting more distance between them after he'd been dismissed from Cloud Recesses that even at his pace, it would take more time than he'd expected with the headstart the two of them had.

So single-minded but aware of his surroundings enough to knwo if there was a threat, fingers loose around his sword, but it's not until he feels something tug on his wrist that he really pauses, gaze dropping to the string.

And something inside him twists, his fingers flexing around his sword as he stares at the string, his expression falling slightly before he looks back over his shoulder before he turns to follow it back

He's already behind anyway.

By the time Xue Yang finally arrived, Yu Lian was breathing hard, clutching their leg, hand bloody where where it was pressing on the wound. They'd guessed it hadn't worked a while before the appearance, but they were nothing if not committed. It would be another hour at least before they passed the point of no return, and someone would come on the road before then.

They'd already trained their face to one of pain and anguish when Xue Yang approached, but their face shifted suddenly and abruptly from the question.

They'd only been found out this quickly once before. Of course it had to happen now.

"It's called the kindness of strangers," Yu Lian said mildly, voice like a clear, low bell. It was impossible to tell if the voice belonged to a woman or a man. "But clearly I expected kindness where little was to be found. Would you at least grant me a bandage?"

Yu Lian can hear the footsteps, can see the string dancing on their wrist as their mark returns. They allow themselves a small smile, first, before Jiang Cheng appears - a reaction this quick was a good thing. Someone noble. Bound to duty.

Yu Lian had guessed the man was Jiang sect on sight - the colour of his robes gave that away well enough. They had a good reputation for honour. Which, of course, was a foolish endeavour, but it meant that Yu Lian could eat and be warm hopefully for a few weeks, at least.

By the time Jiang Cheng arrived, Yu Lian had schooled their expression into one of abject anguish, clutching their leg, their sword missing and disappeared into their pouch, stashed into their robe. Breathing hard, they turned their eyes up to his approach, misting at the edged with pain but with a sort of heart-breaking awe in their gaze, too.

"Please--" A distinctly feminine whisper to a distinctly feminine face.

"Hm."

With that same unconcerned, vaugely amused expression, Xue Yang moved his hard candy from one cheek to the other, visibly pondering the situation. He wasn't in a particular hurry because he'd been around enough sword injuries to know when one was imminently fatal, and not only was the one on the shady stranger at least a solid hour away from having a real chance at killing him, it was also fairly clearly self-inflicted.

Still, it'd probably be annoying for them both if Xue Yang let the stranger bleed enough that they got anemic so before too much longer he came over the rest of the way and knelt before them. Shaking his head, he stripped out of his top two layers of robe, then his thin inner robe, leaving him crouched there in nothing but a pair of loose pants. It was the inner robe he was after, it being the most inexpensive and easiest to replace, tearing into it separate it into several strips of bandages and folding the remainder into a tight square to staunch the wound with.

He slapped the cloth square over the wound and planted the stranger's hand atop it. His bedside manner definitely left something to be desired, but at least he was helping.

"I'm sure you don't need me to tell you to apply pressure," he pointed out, still grinning. "And you owe me a new robe."

Yu Lian did not grin in return, but nor did they look particular upset. If anything, they seemed vaguely frustrated and bored, despite the blood loss.

They grimaced a little as the wound was slapped, but pressed down hard upon it.

"If I could buy you a new robe, I wouldn't be here," Yu Lian retorted a little primly. "I should charge you for spoiling mine. It might have been recoverable if you'd come faster. Now the blood will never come out."

At that accusation, Xue Yang made a thoughtful noise and gave the robe a once-over, then resumed his irreverent grinning.

"Please, you go around running this kind of con and can't get that out of your own robe? Is there anything you're good at?" Letting out an amused snort of breath, he shoved his elbow into the wounded stranger's side, intentionally jostling them to try to get more of a reaction out of them.

"Looks like we're going to be getting to know each other while I teach you how to suck less and you work your way towards replacing my robe."

The jostle didn't get a reaction more than a low, displeased grunt.

The words, on the other hand...

Yu Lian turned a suspicious gaze onto Xue Yang as they squinted at him, hand still pressed hard to the wound.

"Teach me?" They asked, mildly, but it was clear they were trying to keep a calm veneer over it. "What does it matter to you if I learn anything or not?"

Finding the other end of the string belonging to an injured woman has him stopping, gaze fixing on her for a long moment before he moves closer. "...You weren't here when I came through earlier."

He would have noticed something like this and his gaze drifts to the injury, brow furrowing slightly.

Yu Lian is breathing hard and doesn't have to fake it - the wound is very real, the blood seeping through their fingers where they clutch the side of their leg.

"Just... Just got here," They ground out, hissing a little as they tried to move to point back towards the city, in the direction they came from - the same one that Jiang Cheng had been coming from - the pain shooting up the tendon in their leg and making them grip it closer.

"Took all my - - Should have known better --" They winced again, their eyes falling down to the thread at their wrist, then looking back up at Jiang Cheng with confusion. "Who- Who are you? Where did you come from?'

"I'll take you to the nearest and see you safe but that's all I can do right now." He answered after a moment, gaze drifting from the wound to the victim's face.

"Can you stand at all?"

"It doesn't," Xue Yang replied lightly with a careless shrug of his shoulders. "But I was looking for something to do anyway. Why not have some fun with you?"

Busying himself with bandaging the wound once the bleeding was staunched, he fastened the strip of cloth tight and secure before patting his new companion on the shoulder.

"I'm Xue Yang. Who are you?"