This is NOT how things were supposed to go

Chapter 2

Chapter 2

This was not how things were supposed to go.

This was the first solo night hunt that his Lan Sizhui was to be leading. He was not supposed to be seeing the Lan distress signal illuminating the night sky. Letting Sizhui go off on his own hunt was difficult enough, letting his last piece of Wei Ying out of his sight. But Sizhui was 19 years old now and he had to let him go. Lan Wangji had already been fighting wars at that age.

While racing to reach his son, Lan Wangji ran through all the possible tragedies that could have happened to cause someone to release the signal. All the different ways his child could have been hurt or killed. He already lost the man he loved; he could not lose his child too. But, of all the things he imagined, hearing their song had not been one of them. Seeing a woman that looked exactly like Wei Ying was not one of them either. Hearing his birth name, a name that only one person besides his mother had ever called him, lit a fire in his heart that had long gone out.

"Lan Zhan"

Next to his precious son, stood his love. A love he had thought long lost, dead in every meaning of the word. He looked so different but so much the same. There was a look of longing on the woman's face that Lan Wangji felt pulling deep in his soul. However, the moment was brief, for his love collapsed into his son's arms.

He quickly used the chord assassination of his guqin to subdue the arm and remaining corpses to keep his juniors from getting hurt. Coming down from the roof he tossed Lan Jingyi a warded qiankun pouch. "Contain the arm, quickly."

He rushed to his son and knelt, carefully taking the woman into his arms. "Are you alright A'Yuan? What happened?" he asked in a choked voice.

"I'm alright Baba. There was a ferocious arm and it killed the main family here. The corpses we were sent to find weren't here" he said quickly. Lan Sizhui looked around to make sure no one was near, "Baba, this woman played our song. I thought you said that only our family knew this song, me and you! And how does she know your name?!" Sizhui whispered quickly to not be overheard by the others.

Lan Wangji looked down at the woman in his arms and gently ran a hand down her bruised cheek. This was his Wei Ying. There was no possible doubt. He had only played that song for two people in his life: his love and their child. How he was alive...and a woman; he would have to find out later. From the looks of it, his Wei Ying needed to be tended to quickly.

Lan Sizhui watched his father cradle Mo Xianli in his arms like she was the most precious thing in his world. He wasn't even sure his father had heard his questions about how she knew their song. He watched his father run a hand down her cheek as tears ran down his own.

"Wei Ying, I'm here." He whispered. Now that...that was a name that Lan Sizhui knew. Knew from hearing his father yell it out in his nightmares. Knew from the endless times of listening to his father play inquiry. A name he knew was the reason his father only ever wore mourning white as long as he could remember. He had never asked his father about it before, afraid to bring his father more pain. But now he had so many more questions to ask later.

Lan Wangji stood up hoisting the woman into a bridal carry. "Lan Jingyi" he called. "Please bring me the qiankun pouch. Sizhui, have the disciples set everything in order and update the villagers. Meet at the inn when you are finished. I need to get...her...medical attention."

The flight to the inn felt like an eternity and complete bliss at the same time. After 16 years, he was holding his love in his arms.

As he entered the inn, there was only the owner's wife in the lobby as all the patrons had gone to bed.