"Xiangge, you're crossing a line." His knuckles went white around Xiangge's throat. His grip tightened.
Pain shot through Xiangge's spine where the wall had shattered against it. Each shallow breath sent grinding agony through his back.
He raised his chin, jaw trembling from the effort. Lips pressed together, teeth biting the inner flesh to keep from crying out.
He forced qi through his meridians, a desperate flood of energy that numbed the worst of the pain. It wouldn't last long, but it would hold.
"Mercy?" He laughed bitterly. "If you had it, you should have killed me with them!"
The words choked off. Blood welled in his mouth, spilling past his lips as he coughed.
That warm blood veined down Mingxuan's wrist, stark against the pale skin.
For a moment, Mingxuan went utterly still. The magnolia scent grew stronger.
His gaze fixed on the blood, not with disgust, but something far more complex. His jaw tightened almost imperceptibly.
The cold mask held, but his eyes darkened, pupils contracting as if struck by a memory he couldn't name.
Mingxuan's lips parted. No sound emerged.
"My blood." Xiangge's voice was brittle. "Does it remind you?"
Mingxuan jerked his hand back as if scalded. His breath hitched.
The instant his grip released, Xiangge collapsed to his knees.
His knees struck stone with brutal force, the impact jolting up through his injured spine. Another wracking cough tore from his chest, speckling the wet ground with red.
His vision swam, darkness creeping at the edges. He braced one palm against the cold stone, nails scraping against grit, and forced his head up.
Mingxuan stood above him, austere and imposing, carved from winter itself. Rain slid down the sides of his face, but nothing softened that ruthless expression.
Xiangge pursed his lips. Everything blurred. Not just from rain. Not just from pain.
But from the weight of all of it, every stolen future, every truth twisted into a lie, every night he woke with a scream trapped in his throat, choking on the ghost of a warmth he could no longer name.
Hatred surged through him like a tide held back too long, finally breaking free.
Instinct took over. In a flash, he reached for his boot and drew a dagger from its hidden sheath.
Stormlight caught the crystal edge, runes and dragons glinting along its length.
Then, like lightning ripping through the storm, he lunged.
The sound that followed was sickening: silk tearing, then the wet resistance of flesh parting.
The blade sank deep into Mingxuan's chest.
Mingxuan inhaled sharply, biting back the groan threatening to escape, but blood oozed from the corner of his mouth.
For the first time, that perfect mask cracked.
Pain flashed across his face before it quickly vanished like mist.
But his eyes, always so cold and merciless, reddened at the edges. Not with tears. With something raw, like a wound laid open.
That gaze never wavered from Xiangge's face.
Before Xiangge could pull away, his hand moved. His fingers coiled around Xiangge's trembling hand, pressing it firmly against the hilt.
Then he drove the blade deeper.
Blood poured from the deep wound, trailing between their interlocked fingers.
Color drained from Xiangge's face. His breath came in short, desperate gasps. Everything shifted, hushing the sound of wind and thunder.
For a moment, he only felt Mingxuan's heartbeat through the hilt, the shudder that ran through that powerful frame, the warmth of blood trailing down his own wrist, like poison running beneath porcelain.
Reality crashed over him in waves.
Mingxuan hadn't dodged.
He could have. His cultivation surpassed Xiangge's by realms. This attack had been clumsy, born of desperation and pain.
Mingxuan should have stepped aside without effort, should have caught his wrist before the blade even left its sheath. But he didn't.
Mingxuan... had done this intentionally.
A violent chill tore through Xiangge's spine. The world narrowed, everything outside this instant fading to gray. With shaking hands, he jerked the blade free.
The crystal edge came away slick and dark, gleaming in the dim light. Mingxuan staggered, one hand moving to his chest. Then he coughed.
Black blood spilled from his lips.
Xiangge's heart raced like thunder. His legs trembled beneath him. The strength drained from his limbs as if the blood pouring from Mingxuan were his own.
Black blood.
The realization struck like ice water. Jinghuo.
The dagger was poisoned with Jinghuo.
The hilt slipped through his hand and fell onto the damp floor with a clank.
Jinghuo was lethal. Even for someone with Mingxuan's cultivation, even as the strongest man in the empire, this poison was still a death sentence if untreated.
And he had just driven it directly into Mingxuan's chest.
He took a step back, his face drawing even paler.
Something inside him gave way, as if it were his heart that had been pierced.
His heart slammed against his ribs, wild and frantic.
No.
He had to stay indifferent.
He couldn't let Mingxuan see that he cared.
Summoning all control, Xiangge dragged a mask of indifference over the storm raging inside him. But his hands shook. He clenched them into fists until his nails bit into his palms.
"Why didn't you dodge?"
Mingxuan didn't answer.
The cold mask settled back into place as if it had never cracked at all.
He took one step forward.
"Don't–" His voice cracked. "The dagger. It's poisoned. You'll... you'll–"
But Mingxuan closed the distance anyway.
It was as if pain were nothing more than a distant memory. The rain no longer felt cold. It was only heavy, falling soundless against silk soaked in blood.
Mingxuan took another step closer and clasped his palm with Xiangge's. The touch was deadly cold.
"Xiangge. That dagger... it was Zhen's gift to you on your seventh birthday."
The words struck harder than any blade.
Time fractured. The world tilted beneath Xiangge's feet.
Memories crashed over him in waves. Memories of his younger self reaching up his small hands to accept a wrapped bundle.
Mingxuan kneeling before him beneath the magnolia tree, under a rain of magnolia petals, eyes soft with something that might have been affection.
The weight of the dagger in his palm, the promise that he would never need to fear again because Mingxuan would always protect him.
That same dagger now dripped with Mingxuan's blood.
Xiangge's lips parted, but no sound emerged. His throat locked tight, seized by an ache so fierce it threatened to tear him apart from within.
He should move. He should seal Mingxuan's meridians, stop the poison from spreading. His hands knew the pressure points, the touch needed to slow the flow of qi through corrupted channels.
But he couldn't.
A scream died in his throat, tears scalded his eyes, his knees begged to buckle, every instinct screamed to fall and beg for forgiveness.
But his body was a statue of ice.
Rationality fought desperation. His hands hung at his sides, shaking violently.
Tears poured down his red eyes. But his expression stayed frozen.
"Jinghuo is lethal," he said expressionlessly. "You need the antidote. Go."
The drizzle thickened to rain. Xiangge did not know if they were water drops or tears that were dripping down Mingxuan's face.
But Mingxuan said nothing.
Instead, he pulled Xiangge into his cold embrace.
The world stopped.
Warmth flooded Xiangge's senses. The familiar scent of sandalwood assailed his nose, wrapping around his shattered thoughts like the first breath after drowning.
But beneath that fragrance lingered something else. Something raw and metallic that made his stomach churn.
Blood.
Mingxuan's blood.
The lapels of his robe, pressed tight against Mingxuan's chest, grew warm and wet with blood.
The heat of it seeped through silk, wrapping Xiangge's skin in guilt he could never wash away.
That final touch was the last straw that burned Xiangge's rationality.
The walls he had built so carefully over years, the layers of defence he'd wrapped around his heart to survive, all of it crumbled to dust, laying bare the trembling soul beneath.
A choked sob escaped from his throat.
He tried to hold it back, tried to swallow the grief tearing its way up from his chest, but it was useless.
Tears poured now, hot against his cold skin, mixing with rain and blood.
He couldn't stop. He couldn't breathe. He couldn't think. All he could do was stand there, in Mingxuan's arms, like a fragile reed caught in waves.
Somewhere beyond the storm, a temple bell tolled.
The sound rang out once, hollow and mournful. It echoed through the empty streets.
Mingxuan drew Xiangge closer and brushed his fingertips along his hairline.
The gesture was achingly slow. Unbearably gentle. Like coaxing a weeping child who just had a frightening nightmare.
The same way he used to soothe that small child who cried over a dead dragonfly in a spring long gone.
Then he gently pressed his bloodstained lips against Xiangge's head and closed his eyes.
So warm, painfully fleeting.
So under the gentle drizzle of the cold night, by the damp roadside stood one Emperor hugging one crying prince, amid the blowing winds.
The bell rang again, fainter now, swallowed by rain and silence. Dying lanterns swung, veiled by mist and darkness.
But they never spoke of how they felt.