that does remind me, did Qingge meet Meizhen already?
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Threads Of Destiny(Eastern Fantasy, Sequel to Forge of Destiny)
- Thread starter yrsillar
- Start date
- Original Users' Choice!
Voted best in category in the Users' Choice awards.
- Location
- Space between realms
- Pronouns
- He
I don't think Qingge's heart could survive such an encounter.
- Location
- Colorado
She's met Xiao Fen, but not Meizhen. She also never got to meet Gu Xiulan, which was pretty disappointing.
As the Wind
@yrsillar omake for the omake throne
As the Wind 1: Samara
To my Senior Sect Sister Bian Ya, greetings, and to Senior Brother Ruan Shen, who is doubtless reading over her shoulder, greetings also,
(How did she KNOW?
You are getting predictable, my dear.
She used to be so cute and so shy...
Hush, I'm reading. )
I am sure you have heard all kinds of rumors of the happenings down here. Looking back on my time in the south as I write this, it hardly seems real. Except for the thing with the Heron General. That hurt almost too much to be a dream, and the recovery was a miserable slog.
Large facts first: We have a treaty. We have a town. The treaty almost wasn't due to some treachery. I won't speak more of it. Those who need to know are informed and those who performed it are dead or being questioned. I nearly died, but for Sir Xuan's talisman work, and it was the single most painful and frightening thing I have ever done. Senior Brother, please stop fussing, I can hear you from here. It needed to be done so the fewest number of people would be hurt.
(I don't even get a minute? She keeps almost dying! Have a CARE, little sister!
I do wish she would be a little more aware of the danger she gets into. She has people who worry about her .... )
The lake spirit is awake and has been spoken to. A major vein of corruption that was coming up under one of our spiritual sites was dealt with and it was a delightful girls night out for Su Ling, Li Suyin and myself. Su Ling made sure that Gan Guanli came with us as well, and they stayed above while Suyin and I went underwater to deal with it. The spirit of the place, called the Harmonious Piper, is.... strange. I would welcome you both down to visit and to give your opinion.
My family and household is settling in well. My little sister wants a puppy, and my mother wants her house in order. One of these will be accomplished, to no one's satisfaction.
Enough procrastination. This next part, I have been trying to write for weeks, all the way through Her Grace's wedding. Senior Brother, if you are still reading this, take this opportunity to either stop reading or be sworn to secrecy for the rest of your life.
( Oh, I had hoped she would.
The whole of my life?
She means it, if what I think is happening truly is )
Senior Sister, you are, of course, aware that Bao Qian has presented his suit, as that occurred during my time at the sect before the war. In the course of the past few months, two more have expressed interest, with formalities to follow.
I am.... Flustered. And Mother's experiences do not lend themselves to approval in this arena. I cannot ask her how this is supposed to feel.
If it were only for politics or advantage or even physical appearance, I might understand more easily. Bao Qian is somewhat of this sort, but I have not had much opportunity to work with him outside of Hanyi's concert management and business prospects. The other two..... For lack of a better phrase, senior Sister, they seem to be interested in... me? As a person. And I have no idea why.
( Beloved, I am going to hit her upside the head.
I might follow suit, though I am more inclined to find a way to fix this lack of accurate self image.)
I don't want to hurt people, and someone is going to be hurt no matter what I choose. Xuan Shi is, now that I think on it, the closest male friend I have and I rely on him almost too much some days. Meng Dan is... Well, Senior Sister, I will introduce you to Sir Meng. I will only say he is intelligent and confident, which is apparently a very good combination for me. They are all good people and are investing much time and effort in me.
(XUAN??
He has carried a flame for her for years, my dear. It's hardly surprising.
How did I not see this?
...... )
To be frank, I almost hate it. Except for the fact that I do not. Which is, in itself, disconcerting. Even more, I think I hate how indecisive it makes me.
So, to come to a point. Senior Sister, how do you know who to choose? You know I am.... reticent on this sort of thing. What sort of things will they expect me to do or say? How much liberty am I allowed to take? How much will they expect me to take? How much are they expecting to take? How have the boundaries of our relationships changed, just by their asking?
Senior Sister, what does the right choice feel like? What does making the right choice feel like? Senior Sister, how am I supposed to know?
I am thankful I must write this in a letter, for I would never be able to say this aloud. I hope you find time to rest among your duties, and to play something simply for the sake of happiness,
Ling Qi
( I'm going south.
You can't, you are on duty tomorrow.
I'll be back in time.
No you won't!
Yes I will!
Just write her back!)
As the Wind 1: Samara
To my Senior Sect Sister Bian Ya, greetings, and to Senior Brother Ruan Shen, who is doubtless reading over her shoulder, greetings also,
(How did she KNOW?
You are getting predictable, my dear.
She used to be so cute and so shy...
Hush, I'm reading. )
I am sure you have heard all kinds of rumors of the happenings down here. Looking back on my time in the south as I write this, it hardly seems real. Except for the thing with the Heron General. That hurt almost too much to be a dream, and the recovery was a miserable slog.
Large facts first: We have a treaty. We have a town. The treaty almost wasn't due to some treachery. I won't speak more of it. Those who need to know are informed and those who performed it are dead or being questioned. I nearly died, but for Sir Xuan's talisman work, and it was the single most painful and frightening thing I have ever done. Senior Brother, please stop fussing, I can hear you from here. It needed to be done so the fewest number of people would be hurt.
(I don't even get a minute? She keeps almost dying! Have a CARE, little sister!
I do wish she would be a little more aware of the danger she gets into. She has people who worry about her .... )
The lake spirit is awake and has been spoken to. A major vein of corruption that was coming up under one of our spiritual sites was dealt with and it was a delightful girls night out for Su Ling, Li Suyin and myself. Su Ling made sure that Gan Guanli came with us as well, and they stayed above while Suyin and I went underwater to deal with it. The spirit of the place, called the Harmonious Piper, is.... strange. I would welcome you both down to visit and to give your opinion.
My family and household is settling in well. My little sister wants a puppy, and my mother wants her house in order. One of these will be accomplished, to no one's satisfaction.
Enough procrastination. This next part, I have been trying to write for weeks, all the way through Her Grace's wedding. Senior Brother, if you are still reading this, take this opportunity to either stop reading or be sworn to secrecy for the rest of your life.
( Oh, I had hoped she would.
The whole of my life?
She means it, if what I think is happening truly is )
Senior Sister, you are, of course, aware that Bao Qian has presented his suit, as that occurred during my time at the sect before the war. In the course of the past few months, two more have expressed interest, with formalities to follow.
I am.... Flustered. And Mother's experiences do not lend themselves to approval in this arena. I cannot ask her how this is supposed to feel.
If it were only for politics or advantage or even physical appearance, I might understand more easily. Bao Qian is somewhat of this sort, but I have not had much opportunity to work with him outside of Hanyi's concert management and business prospects. The other two..... For lack of a better phrase, senior Sister, they seem to be interested in... me? As a person. And I have no idea why.
( Beloved, I am going to hit her upside the head.
I might follow suit, though I am more inclined to find a way to fix this lack of accurate self image.)
I don't want to hurt people, and someone is going to be hurt no matter what I choose. Xuan Shi is, now that I think on it, the closest male friend I have and I rely on him almost too much some days. Meng Dan is... Well, Senior Sister, I will introduce you to Sir Meng. I will only say he is intelligent and confident, which is apparently a very good combination for me. They are all good people and are investing much time and effort in me.
(XUAN??
He has carried a flame for her for years, my dear. It's hardly surprising.
How did I not see this?
...... )
To be frank, I almost hate it. Except for the fact that I do not. Which is, in itself, disconcerting. Even more, I think I hate how indecisive it makes me.
So, to come to a point. Senior Sister, how do you know who to choose? You know I am.... reticent on this sort of thing. What sort of things will they expect me to do or say? How much liberty am I allowed to take? How much will they expect me to take? How much are they expecting to take? How have the boundaries of our relationships changed, just by their asking?
Senior Sister, what does the right choice feel like? What does making the right choice feel like? Senior Sister, how am I supposed to know?
I am thankful I must write this in a letter, for I would never be able to say this aloud. I hope you find time to rest among your duties, and to play something simply for the sake of happiness,
Ling Qi
( I'm going south.
You can't, you are on duty tomorrow.
I'll be back in time.
No you won't!
Yes I will!
Just write her back!)
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- Location
- the internet
This was great. The only correction I would make is that Ling Qi admitted to herself when beginning her Nightmare Tribulation that she's beautiful and that it scares her. So her denying in this letter that she's no beauty wouldn't make sense, she wouldn't be truthful in her letter to Bian Ya.
- Location
- FR
- Pronouns
- He/Him
That was awesome. My only question is... When did LQ write this letter ? It sounds like she sent it from Shenglu, but Meng dan only just presented his suite in Xiangmen... or is this supposed to be something that happens after the wedding, when LQ's back home ?
sometime in the future after the wedding. there might be edits later to include wedding shenanigans.
If Ling Qi had married into the Gu we could have had some Jamón ibérico-grade drama.
Karthak said:
Yrsillar said:
Karthak said:
Yrsillar said:
PowerLeca
Rapidly aging
- Pronouns
- She/Her
Great job @StainlessBlue ! I didn't know I was missing them so much, this letter was delightful.
Sirrocco
Pedantic
Also worth noting... Cai Shenhua is a White who embodies the pure burning light of truth. Like, it is literally impossible to lie to her, just for starters. It is impossible to promulgate lies in her presence. There is no person more capable of finding out exactly who committed a certain crime, given sufficient motivation, and quite possibly never has been.
So you're not going to be able to keep your involvement hidden, either.
- Location
- FR
- Pronouns
- He/Him
She doesn't even need to do much to solve the case... I think simply asking "Did you kill [insert victim's name here]" to her Court will be enough, since the only person who says "yes" or doesnt' answer (because they're strong enough to refuse answering her) is the guilty party.
- Location
- Staring into the void
Except all the Meng involved got found out.
If the Gu manage to produce Violets they are well positioned to expand rapidly, and to strengthen their ancestor.
- Location
- Finland
Or dead, those were the pawns.
We've asked before. Talent is a composite value of innate qi sensitivity talents, Destiny/Spirit attention and Drive.
Its entirely possible some Sect mooks were once Talent 7, but without the desperation of their original circumstances adding a large Drive element to it they might well be just 4-5 or so once they were guaranteed a safe job and social status.
Yrs said that this post on the discord was about right:
- Pronouns
- They/Them
What if anything do we know about Ling Qingge's parents, canonically?
I think, her mother died before all of this business with Liu Fong, though I do not remember where I got this info, I think it is a side comment in one of the side stories. We don't really have anything about her dad.
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In which chapter did Qingge tell Qi about how she ran away from home, got pregnant and then punished by the Liu? If she said anything about her parents it should be there.
Ling Qingge and the Dream Horse 5
- Pronouns
- They/Them
Ling Qingge and the Dream Horse, Gallop 5/Trot 2: The Yearling's Bridle
"How did you…" Ling Qingge began, clearing her throat and looking at her older self. She should not quite feel like it, but for a moment the question made her feel like nothing more than a child. Someone young and unstable and unready, someone who'd made a mistake, who should have done otherwise. She hated that feeling, because she knew it was not real, it was one of those illusions, one of those…
No, it was real. That was the problem.
She knew it.
If people were like animals, than the following insight made sense:
If you beat a dog or horse, first off you were deserving of worse yourself, but second they would learn to hide at a raised hand, they'd learn, their bodies and instincts would learn, just what it brought. If humans were also beasts in that sense, despite their differences, than this too was true. But a part of her hated what she knew to be true. A part of her had been taught too well to cringe.
"At fifteen, it was decided by the Young Master Liu Fong that I was beautiful and must be his concubine," Ling Qingge the Elder said, her voice soft and careful, as if she was holding a fatal wound closed with nothing more than her spread out hand. "Many things happened, including getting pregnant from the ministrations of a passing… caravaner, I suppose you'd call him, who I thought could get me out of the city, and I was forced to become a prostitute, and later tormented with false debts and worse, after I had Ling Qio and then later Ling Biyu." She did not say it matter of fact, but she realized that by now these horrifying details were the grim and simple reality of her past, something she could just… live past.
It's what she wanted so bad. Not the suffering, but she already had that. The after.
"What happened to you?" her other self asked, quietly.
"I thought I could just ignore them. I was the most talented member of the He, ever. If I decided to stay in the Argent Sect and do what I would, or joined in some other, larger effort to stamp out banditry… what could they say? I did not need their support, and I had found ways to survive without the Liu. But I knew the Liu were rotten, but I was too much of a coward to pick a fight with them, to stand against their evil before they hurt me." She hated to admit it, because what sort of hero of justice knew of evil and didn't charge after it? Who decided that however bad a situation may be, that it could simply… not be her problem. As if the world was not her problem and herself the world's problem. This was how it worked.
"When I was asked to return to visit, I thought it would be about setting the stage. I did not think they'd… I wasn't a member of the Outer Sect. I was rising quickly enough, and I didn't think it'd end poorly. I even let them stable Lightning. She doesn't like--"
"Lightning?"
"My horse."
"I see," the older Ling Qingge said with careful formality that seemed as much armor as anything she'd ever worn to a battle with bandits.
"They insisted I was marrying, and had forged documents stating this, and had a means to make me comply. At least long enough to try to lock me away, and I… when I finally got away it was…"
It had been almost a week, though thankfully nothing had yet happened in that sense. Intimations of it, a rough kiss or two, touches she still had nightmares about, but not…
And the threat looming overhead, the time advancing far too fast towards oblivion and suffering, and then a flight… she'd actually disguised herself as a washerwoman at one point and a prostitute at another, sneaking and slipping through the city like a terrified coward and fleeing accusations that she had gotten engaged and broken the engagement.
The back and forth continued now, though there was an investigation and she had to hope that the truth would out. But would it?
She'd felt and been nothing like a hero and bandit slayer, she'd been a fool and a weakling who'd gotten herself trapped in a bad situation and only discovered her morality when it affected her. If she'd turned against them as soon as she had any idea of how bad the Liu were, a year before that day, perhaps it never would have happened.
(Even the gaze of af man, if it looked as if it was a gaze of ownership and control, left her cold and frightened deep down. It was why it was far easier to lean into her love of wanderlust, of people who did not want to be tied down and did not want to tie others down. It was her type, but a most convenient type it was.)
"That was two years ago, by your reckoning?" the older her asked, curious.
"Yes," Ling Qingge admitted. "I've lived my life since then, and the Dream Horse was just going to be another adventure."
"Dream Horse?" she asked.
"There have been sightings of a Horse, some sort of strange Spirit, appearing and disappearing all over, and so many thought it had to be related to the Liminal, because that is what the liminally gifted can do, just appear and disappear. I was trying to track it down because hunters and bandits of all types had flocked to the area, as well as common Cultivators little better than criminals. I was not going to try to take the horse as my own if it did not want the trouble, but I thought I could settle things. I ran across the Dream Horse and then… and then… I'm not sure. A moment blurred together, and then I was in a very different part of the Emerald Seas. A part of the Emerald Seas that wasn't a part of the Emerald Seas last I remembered, or not really."
She considered the matter for a moment before shaking her head. It didn't matter. "So I've found myself here, and you had Ling Qi and…"
"Biyu, she's still young," Ling Qingge the Elder declared quietly, and firmly. "Young enough that in time the early years will fade."
"Years of privation, years of want," Ling Qingge said to herself, because what she'd experienced had been a short, sharp shock. It was not as if there hadn't been other moments of suffering, and she'd had to fight for everything against arrogant, spoiled nobles who assumed because of her family name that she would be happy to practice being their servant.
She'd like to say she thrashed and subverted their expectations every time, but in the first few months she'd been humiliated once or twice on her path to getting better… but by the time challenges could happen, she had grown enough to be able to give as good as she got, and then in time better.
"Yes," the older version of her, but also not her at all said. "But I've survived. Please, you should sit down. You are a guest."
"A guest?" she asked, frowning. "Really, a guest?"
"Am I to assume that it will take time before we find this Dream Horse, if it's the way for you to get back?"
She… wasn't sure, but she was sure she wanted to get back. She had a life on the other side, rather than this strange… everything. Standing in front of a version of her that was not her, that seemed so very different except in a similar trauma. Yes, she looked like her, but it was not the same body, and it was not the same life. The thought almost had her tearing at her skin in a sudden panic, but she reigned it in. She was not going to do something so weak as to lose any control.
But staying here, in the power of another, in the power of someone who could pretend to be her family?
"You like horses so, do you not? Have you ever broken one to bridle? Or are you one of those soft sorts that doesn't understand…"
"It will, but I can stand on my own," Ling Qingge insisted. "I have a tent, I'll find somewhere to camp out and keep in touch as needed." She thought this was thoroughly sensible, a good way to maintain her independence and not be either under the power or as a bother to anyone else. It was quite sensible, and she had gotten used to "roughing it" often enough.
"Camp out? I insist you reconsider, or at least think through it," her elder self declared quietly. "I do not want to put you on the spot, but I promise this is a safe place--"
As if she could guess. As if she knew. Perhaps she could. Perhaps she did. Ling Qingge grit her teeth and said, "No need to step out of your way on my behalf."
"The servants can easily prepare a guest room," she insisted, quietly.
Ling Qingge was certainly a horse clamping hard at a bit at that. "Servants? I do not make use of servants, nor am I a servant itself, to be thought biddable." She would stand up dramatically if she were not already standing up. "I can wash my own clothes, sew my own repairs if I need to, clean my own tent if it comes to that." She grinned, and she could not help the words that come out next, harsh and bitter, "I can wipe my own ass for that matter, and I do none of those for anyone else, asking nothing of the sort in return."
"Many of the servants are those I knew when I was forced into… my situation," the older version of her said. "Hiring them, having them help out, was a way to aid those who wished for it. Give them opportunities the world did not give them."
Ling Qingge kept her mouth shut, though a part of her both understood and was horrified. What friends she had, the idea of having them be beneath her in any way--beyond, with a lewd waggle of the eyebrow, that way--seemed like something of horror as much as hope. Yet, it was clearly a kind gesture, and perhaps she should be glad that this other her was kind. But she did not feel so glad. "I see."
"I promise it will be no trouble to simply add sheets to the bed of a guest room already prepared," the old Ling Qingge said. "It must have been a long day for you."
(One of the Aunties, a mortal but gently, looks in on her and begins to talk all the details of the wedding, with all that maternal concern that she's not had a chance to see since her Mom died. But a family like that, a clan like that, there were always aunties, many of them looking so similar to each other. She's gotten used to the diversity of faces and opinions, but they all blurred together and she could not quite… could not…)
So kind, so mothering, but Ling Qingge was sure that she didn't act that way around her daughter, a cultivator in her own right who was clearly doing something correct if she was rising so far and so fast from origins about as "lowly" as one could get. She was sure Ling Qingge respected that Ling Qi was practically an adult, and the one who was in charge of the family, so much as these customs should matter… but they did matter.
She hated how, despite the clear difference in power, and the fact that she'd clearly had a better time of it than this other her, she still felt just a little too much like a tantruming child in front of the calm, surprisingly in control woman in front of her, someone polite and restrained, refined and controlled.
Envy and distaste mixed together was a rotten brew, and one that only made her feel worse for feeling it.
"It has been. But I will handle and see to my own sleeping arrangements," she said, unable to help but slip into the politese that she's learned as she turned and swept out of the room in a hurry. She wasn't running away, she wasn't!
Ling Qingge watched herself go, and felt a strange sadness. She'd wanted to make this girl feel comfortable, because… she was her. There were differences, and many of them, but she saw just a little bit of herself. It made her want to protect herself, even though she also knew that this version of herself was stronger than her. She was not a mother who for a long time, for years, had been sure she'd failed. She could see what she'd done, that her words had opened some bleeding, pulsing wound. Something infected, something that had not been properly cleaned. She'd seen those kinds of wounds, and indeed all manner of vile diseases in her time forced into prostitution.
She felt bad, she felt very bad, but she knew in a moment like this that trying to force her to stay would be worse… even if she could manage it, and against a Baron she could not do so no matter what authority she wielded as a mother.
Ling Qingge… would have to be more careful in the future, and she hoped there was a future. She… liked it. Liked seeing some other version of her, more confident (most of the time), bolder (most of the time), and happier… or at least happier earlier.
It did not feel as if they were destined just to meet once and never again, it felt like there were things she could learn, and things this younger self could learn, but… for the moment, she'd need to tell her daughter that she 'lost' herself.
A/N: Ling Qingge absolutely does mother Ling Qi, but Baron Ling Qingge has her own way of thinking about things. This was a rough meeting, but it's going to keep on going and maybe get better later, you know how it is. Sometimes you meet yourself and the meeting's not quite what's expected. Also Liu Fong is fun in that you can make him the most unhinged monster imaginable and it's not even remotely close to beyond outside the Liu wheelhouse.
Also, @yrsillar , just to make sure!
"How did you…" Ling Qingge began, clearing her throat and looking at her older self. She should not quite feel like it, but for a moment the question made her feel like nothing more than a child. Someone young and unstable and unready, someone who'd made a mistake, who should have done otherwise. She hated that feeling, because she knew it was not real, it was one of those illusions, one of those…
No, it was real. That was the problem.
She knew it.
If people were like animals, than the following insight made sense:
If you beat a dog or horse, first off you were deserving of worse yourself, but second they would learn to hide at a raised hand, they'd learn, their bodies and instincts would learn, just what it brought. If humans were also beasts in that sense, despite their differences, than this too was true. But a part of her hated what she knew to be true. A part of her had been taught too well to cringe.
"At fifteen, it was decided by the Young Master Liu Fong that I was beautiful and must be his concubine," Ling Qingge the Elder said, her voice soft and careful, as if she was holding a fatal wound closed with nothing more than her spread out hand. "Many things happened, including getting pregnant from the ministrations of a passing… caravaner, I suppose you'd call him, who I thought could get me out of the city, and I was forced to become a prostitute, and later tormented with false debts and worse, after I had Ling Qio and then later Ling Biyu." She did not say it matter of fact, but she realized that by now these horrifying details were the grim and simple reality of her past, something she could just… live past.
It's what she wanted so bad. Not the suffering, but she already had that. The after.
"What happened to you?" her other self asked, quietly.
"I thought I could just ignore them. I was the most talented member of the He, ever. If I decided to stay in the Argent Sect and do what I would, or joined in some other, larger effort to stamp out banditry… what could they say? I did not need their support, and I had found ways to survive without the Liu. But I knew the Liu were rotten, but I was too much of a coward to pick a fight with them, to stand against their evil before they hurt me." She hated to admit it, because what sort of hero of justice knew of evil and didn't charge after it? Who decided that however bad a situation may be, that it could simply… not be her problem. As if the world was not her problem and herself the world's problem. This was how it worked.
"When I was asked to return to visit, I thought it would be about setting the stage. I did not think they'd… I wasn't a member of the Outer Sect. I was rising quickly enough, and I didn't think it'd end poorly. I even let them stable Lightning. She doesn't like--"
"Lightning?"
"My horse."
"I see," the older Ling Qingge said with careful formality that seemed as much armor as anything she'd ever worn to a battle with bandits.
"They insisted I was marrying, and had forged documents stating this, and had a means to make me comply. At least long enough to try to lock me away, and I… when I finally got away it was…"
It had been almost a week, though thankfully nothing had yet happened in that sense. Intimations of it, a rough kiss or two, touches she still had nightmares about, but not…
And the threat looming overhead, the time advancing far too fast towards oblivion and suffering, and then a flight… she'd actually disguised herself as a washerwoman at one point and a prostitute at another, sneaking and slipping through the city like a terrified coward and fleeing accusations that she had gotten engaged and broken the engagement.
The back and forth continued now, though there was an investigation and she had to hope that the truth would out. But would it?
She'd felt and been nothing like a hero and bandit slayer, she'd been a fool and a weakling who'd gotten herself trapped in a bad situation and only discovered her morality when it affected her. If she'd turned against them as soon as she had any idea of how bad the Liu were, a year before that day, perhaps it never would have happened.
(
"That was two years ago, by your reckoning?" the older her asked, curious.
"Yes," Ling Qingge admitted. "I've lived my life since then, and the Dream Horse was just going to be another adventure."
"Dream Horse?" she asked.
"There have been sightings of a Horse, some sort of strange Spirit, appearing and disappearing all over, and so many thought it had to be related to the Liminal, because that is what the liminally gifted can do, just appear and disappear. I was trying to track it down because hunters and bandits of all types had flocked to the area, as well as common Cultivators little better than criminals. I was not going to try to take the horse as my own if it did not want the trouble, but I thought I could settle things. I ran across the Dream Horse and then… and then… I'm not sure. A moment blurred together, and then I was in a very different part of the Emerald Seas. A part of the Emerald Seas that wasn't a part of the Emerald Seas last I remembered, or not really."
She considered the matter for a moment before shaking her head. It didn't matter. "So I've found myself here, and you had Ling Qi and…"
"Biyu, she's still young," Ling Qingge the Elder declared quietly, and firmly. "Young enough that in time the early years will fade."
"Years of privation, years of want," Ling Qingge said to herself, because what she'd experienced had been a short, sharp shock. It was not as if there hadn't been other moments of suffering, and she'd had to fight for everything against arrogant, spoiled nobles who assumed because of her family name that she would be happy to practice being their servant.
She'd like to say she thrashed and subverted their expectations every time, but in the first few months she'd been humiliated once or twice on her path to getting better… but by the time challenges could happen, she had grown enough to be able to give as good as she got, and then in time better.
"Yes," the older version of her, but also not her at all said. "But I've survived. Please, you should sit down. You are a guest."
"A guest?" she asked, frowning. "Really, a guest?"
"Am I to assume that it will take time before we find this Dream Horse, if it's the way for you to get back?"
She… wasn't sure, but she was sure she wanted to get back. She had a life on the other side, rather than this strange… everything. Standing in front of a version of her that was not her, that seemed so very different except in a similar trauma. Yes, she looked like her, but it was not the same body, and it was not the same life. The thought almost had her tearing at her skin in a sudden panic, but she reigned it in. She was not going to do something so weak as to lose any control.
But staying here, in the power of another, in the power of someone who could pretend to be her family?
"It will, but I can stand on my own," Ling Qingge insisted. "I have a tent, I'll find somewhere to camp out and keep in touch as needed." She thought this was thoroughly sensible, a good way to maintain her independence and not be either under the power or as a bother to anyone else. It was quite sensible, and she had gotten used to "roughing it" often enough.
"Camp out? I insist you reconsider, or at least think through it," her elder self declared quietly. "I do not want to put you on the spot, but I promise this is a safe place--"
As if she could guess. As if she knew. Perhaps she could. Perhaps she did. Ling Qingge grit her teeth and said, "No need to step out of your way on my behalf."
"The servants can easily prepare a guest room," she insisted, quietly.
Ling Qingge was certainly a horse clamping hard at a bit at that. "Servants? I do not make use of servants, nor am I a servant itself, to be thought biddable." She would stand up dramatically if she were not already standing up. "I can wash my own clothes, sew my own repairs if I need to, clean my own tent if it comes to that." She grinned, and she could not help the words that come out next, harsh and bitter, "I can wipe my own ass for that matter, and I do none of those for anyone else, asking nothing of the sort in return."
"Many of the servants are those I knew when I was forced into… my situation," the older version of her said. "Hiring them, having them help out, was a way to aid those who wished for it. Give them opportunities the world did not give them."
Ling Qingge kept her mouth shut, though a part of her both understood and was horrified. What friends she had, the idea of having them be beneath her in any way--beyond, with a lewd waggle of the eyebrow, that way--seemed like something of horror as much as hope. Yet, it was clearly a kind gesture, and perhaps she should be glad that this other her was kind. But she did not feel so glad. "I see."
"I promise it will be no trouble to simply add sheets to the bed of a guest room already prepared," the old Ling Qingge said. "It must have been a long day for you."
So kind, so mothering, but Ling Qingge was sure that she didn't act that way around her daughter, a cultivator in her own right who was clearly doing something correct if she was rising so far and so fast from origins about as "lowly" as one could get. She was sure Ling Qingge respected that Ling Qi was practically an adult, and the one who was in charge of the family, so much as these customs should matter… but they did matter.
She hated how, despite the clear difference in power, and the fact that she'd clearly had a better time of it than this other her, she still felt just a little too much like a tantruming child in front of the calm, surprisingly in control woman in front of her, someone polite and restrained, refined and controlled.
Envy and distaste mixed together was a rotten brew, and one that only made her feel worse for feeling it.
"It has been. But I will handle and see to my own sleeping arrangements," she said, unable to help but slip into the politese that she's learned as she turned and swept out of the room in a hurry. She wasn't running away, she wasn't!
Ling Qingge watched herself go, and felt a strange sadness. She'd wanted to make this girl feel comfortable, because… she was her. There were differences, and many of them, but she saw just a little bit of herself. It made her want to protect herself, even though she also knew that this version of herself was stronger than her. She was not a mother who for a long time, for years, had been sure she'd failed. She could see what she'd done, that her words had opened some bleeding, pulsing wound. Something infected, something that had not been properly cleaned. She'd seen those kinds of wounds, and indeed all manner of vile diseases in her time forced into prostitution.
She felt bad, she felt very bad, but she knew in a moment like this that trying to force her to stay would be worse… even if she could manage it, and against a Baron she could not do so no matter what authority she wielded as a mother.
Ling Qingge… would have to be more careful in the future, and she hoped there was a future. She… liked it. Liked seeing some other version of her, more confident (most of the time), bolder (most of the time), and happier… or at least happier earlier.
It did not feel as if they were destined just to meet once and never again, it felt like there were things she could learn, and things this younger self could learn, but… for the moment, she'd need to tell her daughter that she 'lost' herself.
A/N: Ling Qingge absolutely does mother Ling Qi, but Baron Ling Qingge has her own way of thinking about things. This was a rough meeting, but it's going to keep on going and maybe get better later, you know how it is. Sometimes you meet yourself and the meeting's not quite what's expected. Also Liu Fong is fun in that you can make him the most unhinged monster imaginable and it's not even remotely close to beyond outside the Liu wheelhouse.
Also, @yrsillar , just to make sure!
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Really do enjoy these.
And apologies for the delay in giving notice here too, but I will be resuming updates come tuesday for you guys. Get ready for Xiangmen and more shipping
Give me handholding And my life is yours YRSSSSS