Linlang's patience ran out before Yu Mo even cleared the gate.
"Go then," she called after him, one hand pressed flat against her belly, voice carrying the full authority of a woman who had earned the right to make threats. "But if you miss Qixi Festival, I will find this child a different father."
Yan Dan bit back a smile. The cold look she got from two directions at once did nothing to stop it. She was past shame at this point, and besides, she had Yu Mo's leftover ink on her side.
"A few more days and it's Qixi Festival," Linlang said, almost to herself.
Yu Mo's mouth curved. "So what do you want?"
Yan Dan turned her hand over and caught his. Bold, even for her. "Anything is really possible?" She let the question sit a moment. "Actually — turn back into your original form. Let me keep you for a day."
The smile died at the corner of his mouth.
"Half a day," she offered.
He pulled his hand free. "Anything but that."
She pouted. "Fine. Then come back early."
Five or six days, she told herself. They hadn't seen each other every day before this anyway. It would feel normal.
It did not feel normal.
She sat with Danshu by his peach tree for a while. She combed the little fox's fur. She drifted toward the sound of voices and found a crowd of small monsters gathered around Liu Weiyang, who was apparently capable of drinking and gossiping and dispensing celestial wisdom all at the same time. Emperor Zixu, lazy to the bone and somehow still thriving.
She walked back. Lay down. Pulled the quilt over her head.
At least before, I didn't notice when he wasn't there.
She did not sleep. She just lay there being annoyed at him for not even offering one day in his original form as a peace offering. Infuriating man.
By the third day she was fully miserable. The heat didn't help. But that evening the rain came in heavy and sudden, breaking the temperature open, and she fell asleep to the sound of it drumming against the roof.
She was already half-dreaming when the door creaked.
She sat up fast.
Yu Mo's robes were soaked through, dark with rain, clinging. He moved to the cabinet without a word, pulled out clean clothes, spoke quietly without looking at her. "Go back to sleep. I'll wash up first."
Three days. She had expected at least five.
When he came back, dry and changed, he settled beside her with the ease of someone who had been doing it for years — hand finding her waist in the dark like it knew the way. "Did you sleep?"
She looked at him. Even in the darkness she could see the exhaustion in his face. "No. Sleep. You're tired."
His answer was something close to a sound, not quite a word. He shifted closer and was gone within a minute, breathing slow and even.
She listened until her own eyes closed.
She woke before him.
The tiredness was still on his face, softer now in sleep. She looked at him for a long moment. Then — because she had wanted to do this for longer than she would admit — she reached out and pinched his cheek.
He frowned faintly. Made a vague, drowsy sound.
She studied the way his face looked with his cheek pulled slightly out of shape and thought: he really is exhausted. She leaned in and checked his neck for any scent that wasn't his. Nothing. She pulled his collar open and checked his skin. Nothing. She was just easing the fabric back into place when she looked up and found him watching her.
"You're awake," she said, very naturally.
"Since you started going through my clothes." He pushed himself up on one arm, looking down at her from not very far away. "How many days did you miss me?"
She had heard worse lines. She held her ground. "I didn't. It was only three days. I'm not that fragile."
His eyes dropped. He smiled, quiet and sure. "I missed you."
She stared at him.
Had something happened to him out there?
She felt the warmth of the ink settle over her, familiar and unhurried. She could see herself reflected in his eyes — just her, nothing else — and something in her chest went sideways. She started talking to buy herself time: "Yu Mo, you came back in the rain last night and you were so tired, you should really just stay in bed today, I think that's the most sensible—"
He took off his outer robe and dropped it.
"I admit it," she said quickly, moving back. "I lied. I missed you the whole time. You don't have to—"
"I know you can't hide anything from me." He said it so calmly it was almost cruel.
"It's summer," she tried.
"Yes."
She ran out of options and went for chaos: "Yu Mo. Have you thought about what kind of creature we would produce — me being Hanlan, you being Jiufen—"
He paused for exactly one second.
"Whatever comes out," he said, "at worst it would be like you. I wouldn't mind."
She thought: we are so completely different from each other.
When he pressed her into the bed she dug her fingers into his shoulder hard enough to leave a mark. He didn't say anything. Just looked at her with those dark, clear eyes that held nothing but her.
By evening, Zilin was back.
He arrived a full day after Yu Mo, which Yan Dan felt accurately represented the difference between them.
He noticed, without her telling him, that something had shifted. She didn't flinch when he looked at her. "Yu Mo got back first?"
"Last night," she said.
He went still. Then, slowly: "Last night." A pause. "He would have had to fly the whole way without stopping. Continuous sorcery like that — it wears you down. Hurts your cultivation." He looked at her steadily. "Is he still in bed?"
She thought about three words she had said: come back early.
She said nothing.
Zilin studied her a moment, then spoke plainly. "I don't know what it is he sees in you. But whatever it is, it's real. You'll understand that better the longer this goes."
She looked away. "Zilin. Do you want to know how to make Linlang happy on Qixi Festival?"
He leaned in.
"Fireworks," she said. "She'll love them."
He left in a very good mood.
Two days to Qixi Festival. One ordinary mortal holiday that had somehow, without her permission, become significant.
Yu Mo, she thought. Soft underneath all that calm. Careful with everything. Thinks more than he shows. Exactly the kind of man worth keeping.
The holiday came in sunny and bright and slowly cooled toward evening. Yan Dan stood in the courtyard with a bowl of tremella and red date soup — cold from ice, sweet and faintly sour, raisins bobbing at the surface.
The sky broke open.
Fireworks climbed one after another, trailing light across the dark, burning so bright the night looked like noon for a moment at a time.
"Yan Dan."
She turned.
Yu Mo stood beneath the light of it. His face caught the color and glow of each burst. His eyes were dark and steady, watching only her.
She had seen him gentle. She had seen him handsome. Right now, in firelight, he was both at once.
"I still owe you something," he said. "I like you."
She smiled at him.
The fireworks were for everyone. That sentence was only for her.
Their fingers laced together. She stood shoulder to shoulder with him, both of them looking up at the sky, at light that burned itself out in the act of being beautiful.
"It's been hot," he said. "You'll probably want this."
She took what he held out. A round fan, painted with lotus flowers and fish, the brushwork easy and alive.
Zilin and Linlang stood together on the mountain. Danshu held his post beside his peach tree. The little fox, feeling neglected, glared at Danshu's back. The little tiger found a fallen peach, curled itself around it, and rolled quietly away.
Another firework broke across the sky.
Yan Dan turned the fan over. Along the edge of the painting, in handwriting she recognized: The painting reflects your wish.
Green reflections on the painting reflect your face.
She ran her thumb along the words. Looked at him. "It's definitely hot enough to use."
He said nothing. He was already looking at the sky.
She looked back up too, and held on.