Xie Yi-jun

1302 years after The Long Night

Wúmeng

“Xie Yi-jun, what are you doing?”

“I don’t know! Am I holding it wrong?!”

The young doctor managed somehow to keep from smiling, instead carefully adjusting the panicking King’s grip on the baby.

“There like that,” he whispered. “See? Support her head,”

Yi-jun was almost frozen in fear. The little creature he was holding weighed almost nothing, seeming far too small to be a human being, yet it was!

The child’s parents stood beside them, watching fondly, and Yi-jun was embarrassed to have offered to do this just to impress Songcai, when the man had to instruct him on everything-

“Ah,” he blinked, startled as the baby opened its eyes. “What do I do?”

This time Songcai did laugh. It was the first time Yi-jun had ever heard it, the sound like an arrow piercing his heart. The sweetest thing…

Jin Songcai was standing very close to him now, looking down at the baby. The King was awestruck at the shade of the man’s eyes, as lost in them as the child was.

“She likes you!” The mother smiled. “Look how she stares at you-”

“Everyone likes Songcai,” Yi-jun blurted suddenly.

At that, the man’s crystal blue eyes flickered up to his.

Yi-jun’s breath stopped.

How can he look like that? Like an Angel… with no wings-

In the silence between them, Xie Yi-jun had no choice but to accept his fate. Like everyone who’d met him, he had fallen in love with Jin Songcai. He watched it happen everyday. Patients falling in love with the man’s gentle voice, his caring nature. Children following him through the forest as he told them the different names of plants, their starry eyes wide as if being shown a brand new world.

Xie Yi-jun even saw the way complete strangers, people who would never see him again, gravitated toward Songcai. The man’s aura was simply that beautiful. Like refined silver, while everyone else was scuffed-up tin.

Just like the masses, Yi-jun had fallen too. Staring now into Songcai’s eyes, it was painfully obvious that the man did not love him in return.

Of course not! He’s known me for not even two months-

Despite that, Yi-jun was sure of his feelings.

Even if Songcai never thinks of me like that, I will still love him. I will still love him even if he never thinks of me at all… does that make me naive or romantic?

As Xie Yi-jun pondered the ramifications of his love, he felt Songcai’s arm come up, hand on Yi-jun’s shoulder as he helped cradle the baby...

He watched Songcai smile softly, nodding; “Look, she’s looking at you now.”

“What?!”

Sure enough the child was staring at him, big brown eyes wide and full of innocence. The idea that a little being like this had such potential, such a future ahead of it, and yet it depended so fully on others to ease it into this harsh world, made Yi-jun incredibly uncomfortable.

He knew at one time he too was that young, but having no control over oneself was almost unbearable to imagine for the young King at this point in his life. All he had was his freedom. He was even fighting this insane war just for his and his people’s right to choose their way of life.

The option to forsake one path over another simply because it is what you desire. Being able to live by the direction of your heart, it was all he wanted. He could picture too vividly the consequences of having that autonomy stripped away. It was not something he wanted to experience ever again.

“Why is she looking at me?” Yi-jun pouted. “Am I that ugly?”

Hoping to hear Songcai’s laugh again, the King was delighted when the man giggled softly and then sighed.

“Perhaps… perhaps she is thinking; why of all Kings did you have to hand me to this very ugly one?”

Xie Yi-jun was smiling too, and it was several moments before the poor fool regained any sense at all.