Log: Lan Xichen and William Laurence WHO: Lan Xichen and William Laurence WHAT: Sad music and sad conversation WHEN: Recently WHERE: Cloud Recesses, by the cold spring WARNINGS: TREASON
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There was little in Vallo that pleased Laurence more than passing an afternoon in conversation with Lan Xichen, and so, once he’d arrived at the Cloud Recesses and saw no sign of him, Laurence was disappointed, but willing to wait. Faint music, beautiful if not haunting, was filtering through the mists, and it helped make the wait a little more agreeable. He recognized the sound as something he’d heard in China, though he’d be hard pressed to put an image to the instrument, let alone a name.
As more time passed, however, he began to grow concerned, for he’d never known Lan Xichen to be late for tea. He hesitated, but then began to follow the music, wondering perhaps if there was some sort of small concert that Lan Xichen had forgotten to mention, and deciding that even if he didn’t find Lan Xichen at the other end of the sound, he’d find someone whom he could ask for his whereabouts.
Except, as he continued down the path, the music becoming clearer, Laurence realized that this was unlikely to be some sort of small concert at all, but something far more intimate, some private expression of emotion which Laurence had no business intruding upon. He should turn around and make his way back to the Elegant Room to continue to wait, but like the rats of Hamelin he found he couldn’t stop, compelled forward until he came across Lan Xichen, sitting near the spring surrounded by the mists, like some evocative painting come to life.
Laurence was intruding, there was no question of that now, violating Lan Xichen’s privacy in the most surreptitious way, except he couldn’t bring himself to leave, and he certainly couldn’t bring himself to interrupt; there was a tightness in his chest that made it difficult to breath at all.
And then, finally, there was a pause in the music, and Laurence cleared his throat, both to alert Lan Xichen to his presence in a way that, hopefully, wouldn’t startle him, and because he wasn’t sure if he could trust his own voice not to break if he hadn’t.
“That was quite lovely,” he said, and then, “I hope you don’t mind. I just…” There was no excuse for it, really, so he let the sentence die on his lips.
It was the sound of his voice that finally drew Lan Xichen’s focus away from his xiao. He had meant to be in the Elegant Room already, with tea already brewing, but a late start in the morning had turned into a melancholy midday and accordingly getting caught up in morose notes of mourning by the cold spring. He’d never really learned to talk about his feelings, or even feel his feelings, but the flute did well enough in the absence of either. He could put the sadness, the loss, the loneliness, the confusion, and the sense of failure all into a melody and wrap it up neatly to be considered dealt with whether it actually was or not. Closure hadn’t come so easily today, and thus absorbed he’d let his sense of the sun’s position in the sky slip, leaving him inconsiderately late.
“No, not at all,” Lan Xichen said, standing and stashing his flute in his sleeve in one fluid swirl of robes. “I apologize, time escaped me.”
“There’s nothing to apologize for. I understand what it’s like to lose track of time,” Laurence assured him, feeling a little awkward; the music was some of the finest he’d heard, but in the same vein, he was well aware that he should not have heard it at all. Which made his next question, entirely unplanned, even more appallingly inappropriate. “Were you thinking of home?”
“I was,” Lan Xichen admitted, because there seemed no reason to hide it. “Among other lost things.” Lost people, mostly, but Laurence had come for a social engagement, not to listen to his woes, Lan Xichen thought. He offered a faint smile. “Don’t worry, I’ll put myself in better spirits by the time we reach the hilltop. Thank you for coming to find me.”
Laurence gave Lan Xichen a sympathetic look, and then looked away, guilty. He was aware, terribly aware, of how much the betrayal in his past weighed on Lan Xichen, and was equally aware of how untruthful Laurence had been with him thus far, hiding his own betrayal of his country and all those he’d held dear, an untruth he’d only been successful in because they were in different worlds. It grew harder each time he saw Lan Xichen to mention it, and there was some small, insidious part of him that told him that he didn’t have to ever tell the other man what he’d done. No one else he’d told had been particularly bothered by it, so he could, sometimes, convince himself that it had only been a small matter, when, of course, it hadn’t been.
And Lan Xichen was already in a melancholic mood; it would hardly do to compound that by confessing a crime that had no real bearing on this world.
Except, of course, that that was just another excuse piled on top of a mountain of excuses: the mood was too light for something like that, the mood was too heavy for such a confession, it was a holiday, he didn’t want to disturb the evening. And except, of course, that to continue to hide it was a lie, albeit a lie that he could pretend was no such thing, and he had no wish to lie to Lan Xichen.
No, he had to say something, and if not now, then likely never. “Xichen,” he said, and then amended with, “Lan Xichen. Wait, there’s something I must tell you. Of things I’ve done back in my own world.”
The sudden shift caught Lan Xichen by surprise, but as per usual, he didn’t show it beyond a slight shift in his posture and a tilt of his head. As he took in the meaning, a cold rush of apprehension came over him. He’d quickly come to consider Laurence a friend, but oh, that had gone so terribly for him in the past. He couldn’t help but think of his sworn brothers, both lost to one’s treachery that Lan Xichen had never seen coming. Was he about to learn that he’d misplaced his affection once again? He wasn’t sure he could take a blow like that so soon without collapsing.
But then, Ah-Yao hadn’t told him the truth until he was forced to by outside circumstance. And even if Laurence had done wrong in the past, it could very well be something less awful than his worst fears could imagine. After all, what was the likelihood that he would manage to make a second friend who was consumed by greed and lust for power and willing to murder and marry his own family members to get what he wanted? It would be like lightning striking the same ground twice.
“We should sit, then,” Lan Xichen said, gesturing to the soft space of grass he’d recently occupied as he was playing, then heading toward it himself. “And I will listen.”
Laurence nodded, grimly, and sat in the indicated space, and took a moment to compose himself.
"I've mentioned before that in my world, my country is at war with another, France, led by Napoleon," he started. "During the fourth year of that war, I committed treason against my country. If you'd like to know my reasons for doing so, I will, of course, tell you." But they weren't what he was confessing. He still believed his reasons had been justified, and if he were given the choice a hundred times, he thought he'd make the same one every time, even if he might need some encouragement from Temeraire. "I did it expecting to be hanged, though in the end they couldn't, not without either killing Temeraire or having him defect to France, and so they kept me alive for his compliance in the breeding grounds.
"Because of my treason, however, Napoleon was able to invade England while she was at her weakest, and while I was released from the gaol to bring Temeraire to bear against him, I'm ashamed to admit that I conducted myself in a way which no decent man can be proud, by bringing a formation of combat dragons against lightly armed supply lines which had no chance of defending themselves. It took me far longer than I'd care to admit to come to my senses." He'd not done it by himself, either; it has taken Tharkay asking what he was doing to bring Laurence to his senses.
He wanted to apologize for keeping all of this from Lan Xichen for so long, for all but lying to him for the entire duration of their friendship, that he'd been afraid of losing his companionship. But it felt too much like playing to his sympathies, of begging for forgiveness that Laurence still wasn't sure if he deserved.
Through the whole story, Lan Xichen listened thoughtfully. He was, of course, missing much of the greater context, but he had been to war himself. He understood the basics of the matter: for some reason, Laurence had acted against the interests of his country, and in an attempt to right his wrong, he’d engaged in dishonorable combat.
Despite what he’d been through before, or perhaps because of it, the reasons for all that mattered to Lan Xichen. Some actions had no justification, but what Laurence described were acts that could be understandable mistakes, depending on why they were done. They were not small matters, certainly, but neither were they completely beyond the pale in every possible circumstance. Lan Wangji and Wei Wuxian had been called traitors, but in truth it was the rest of the jianghu that had betrayed them. During the Sunshot Campaign, Lan Xichen himself had crossed lines that he never would have outside of war. Reasons and circumstances and intentions mattered to him.
“What treason did you commit?” he asked. “And yes, I would like to know why, if you would tell me.”
Laurence nodded, almost a little relieved. Dorian, Sara, Eloise, none of them had asked for his reasons. They'd all just accepted his treason without question, which, while something of a relief had also been a little disconcerting. There was some part of Laurence that believed he should be judged harsher than that, that didn't believe he should receive unconditional forgiveness, if he should even receive forgiveness at all.
"There was a plague, brought over from the Americas, that ravaged England's dragon population. It was a slow, wasting illness, and some of the dragons held on longer than others, but none of them escaped once exposed or recovered once they fell ill. By the time Temeraire and I returned to England, the burial mounds were so great to as have changed the landscape.
"We were, eventually and by pure happenchance, able to find a cure. But no sooner had we found a cure than Government released a French dragon, who had been infected, back to France to infect their dragons. It wouldn't have only infected the French dragons, it would have infected all of Europe, and the trade lines through Africa and China. Eventually, it likely would have spread to the world entire, and Britain would have been master of the skies and the seas. But we - Temeraire and I, that is - we couldn't abide by it, so we stole some of the cure and flew it to France."
It had been Temeraire, more than Laurence, who'd known, without a doubt, what was right. Temeraire who'd offered to do it himself to save Laurence the dishonour.
Lan Xichen could understand why that was considered treason. Some would consider any available weapon properly used against an enemy, and they could broaden the term “enemy” considerably if it suited them. Laurence and Temeraire had brought aid to that enemy, and that was by definition treason. However, it sounded very much like what Wei Wuxian had done, protecting civilians who simply had the misfortune to be born under the wrong banner. Even when it had first happened, Lan Xichen hadn’t really thought Wei Wuxian was doing the wrong thing. Now, knowing the truth behind everything, Wei Wuxian was more than justified. Laurence appeared to have done something similar - he did what was wrong, by conventional rules, but what was right according to morality and the long-term good. Not to mention, the idea of defeating an enemy with a plague, a plague against celestial creatures, no less (because Lan Xichen could not think of dragons as anything else)...that was beyond dishonor. To act against that could not be called villainous.
Lan Xichen was quiet as he thought that through, processing the information and its parallels to his own experience. When he spoke at last, his voice was soft and his expression sympathetic.
“That must have been a difficult choice to make, to betray one loyalty in the name of honoring a greater one,” he said. “If I may be so bold...it sounds to me as though you did what was right, despite aiding your enemy being wrong in most cases. I’ve seen the damage an uncontrollable weapon can do, and a plague is certainly that.”
The longer the silence stretched, the more wretched Laurence felt. No matter his reasons - and he’d agree with Lan Xichen in that weaponizing a plague was beyond the pale - treason was still treason, a betrayal of all he’d ever fought for and all those who had ever fought by his side. He’d ruined not only his own life, but the lives of his crew - Ferris still weighed heavily upon him - and the reputation of those closest to him. The fact that men such as Granby could forgive him for such things spoke not against those that couldn’t, but only showed that Granby and Tharkay were built of different material.
He tried, very hard, not to let any of it show on his face though. He’d not sway Lan Xichen’s opinion by manipulating his sympathies.
Except when Lan Xichen did finally speak, it was not what Laurence thought, and for there was a moment when he was quite bereft of speech, unexpectedly overcome with emotion.
“A plague is certainly that,” he said, once he finally found the ability to speak again. “I don’t know if they’d simply not thought much further beyond decimating France’s aerial forces, or if they simply hadn’t cared what the long term consequences were.” He suspected the latter. “I couldn’t have made the choice without Temeraire though. I think I may have borne it if it weren’t for him.” He sometimes wondered if he’d have allowed Temeraire to go by himself if Jane accepted the proposal he’d made that evening.
“I’m sorry for keeping it from you,” he said, softer. “I know I should have told you long ago, and that keeping my betrayal from you was a betrayal in and of itself. But I’d come to quite enjoy your company, and I feared… I feared losing it.”
“Not for that,” Lan Xichen replied, and gave him a gentle, reassuring smile before continuing. “And I don’t see it as a betrayal. A confession like that isn’t easy to make, and our acquaintance is short. You can be forgiven for taking some time to bring up what must have been one of the worst times of your life, especially one so complicated to explain.”
Lan Xichen knew how that went, after all. Attempting to state the truth without sounding like he thought himself completely in the right but also acknowledging that he was not completely in the wrong was difficult. So, too, was trying to offer himself some grace and accept it from others without acting as though he expected it or felt he deserved it. He couldn’t imagine it was any easier for Laurence, given what he knew of his friend.
Laurence pursed his lips. As far as he was concerned, knowing whether or not someone was a traitor was something that should be brought up at the beginning of an acquaintanceship, so it didn’t come as an unpleasant surprise once it would be awkward to remove oneself from a relationship. He rarely needed to speak of it at home, but only because everyone already knew what he’d done and could make that decision before even introductions were made.
He was beginning to realize, however, that it needn’t, necessarily, define him here. In fact, it was a little disconcerting to realize that what had been the hardest decision of his life, a turning point, mattered very little at all, here in Vallo. Disconcerting maybe, but also a little comforting to know that he was once again nearly anonymous in the public eye, neither a hero nor a traitor.
“Thank you for your understanding,” Laurence said, and then smiled a little himself. “I am sorry if I’ve worsened your mood at all. I’ve brought some dessert cakes, which I’ve left back at the house.”
“Dessert cakes will nearly always improve my mood,” Lan Xichen warmly replied. It seemed Laurence was ready to leave this topic behind, and Lan Xichen was willing to do the same; there was no sense in pressing on a wound that was clearly only half healed. There was just one matter of the conversation that he felt still merited addressing, as it had been swept by so quickly.
“Earlier, you called me Xichen, then corrected yourself. I’ve learned that’s how friends call each other here, by personal names alone. I would be happy to have you address me as you would a friend, if you like.”
Laurence’s expression eased into a smile, whatever tension that remained in his shoulders melting away. “Thank you, Xichen, that means a great deal. I, of course, extend the same to you.”
“And that would be William?” Lan Xichen asked. The name felt strange to say, a collection of sounds that were meaningless to him. It didn’t really feel friendly to say, either, despite his academic knowledge that it was how things were done in Laurence’s culture. Knowing something and feeling it were so often worlds apart.
“Or Will, for short,” Laurence confirmed. In fact, it was generally Will among his friends. William was most often used by his family, and most everyone else used his family name. “But you’re, of course, welcome to use whatever you’d like, within reason. Temeraire, for instance, still calls me Laurence.” He’d never given it much thought - Iskierka called John “Granby” as well - though now that he thought about it, he knew some of the other dragons called their captains by their Christain names. He wondered if he should have given Temeraire the option; perhaps the dragon thought Laurence would be displeased if he called him by anything else.
"Will." Lan Xichen tested that out and found he liked it better. He bounced it around a bit more in his mind, trying it with some of the ways he might call a friend at home if they became closer. Ah-Will, Will-er, Will-ge...yes, Will would do, he decided with a smile. "Will is good. Or Lao Ren, I think - if I drop the last syllable, it already sounds like a way to call a friend."
Lao Ren was new, but Laurence mused on it and found that he didn’t dislike it, not in the least. “I think I would like either equally,” he said after a moment, and turned so that they might make their way back to the tea house. “The cakes I brought, they’re filled with custard, and I was told they’re supposed to be quite good.”
Lan Xichen inclined his head with another light smile and made a move toward the path. “Then we should go eat them before someone else finds them.”