Lan Zhan's face is impassive, as Uncle Qiren agrees to his request.
"Tell XiChen, he will help. Inform the blacksmiths in town." His voice is muffled under waterfalls of cascading thick hair.
They have pruned back the gorgeous locks eight times already since Wei Ying left with his brother.
"Mn."
The door bursts open and he's delighted to see Wei Ying and their children enter. Rumi runs straight into his arms as Wei Ying starts talking.
"Little Rabbit found a cure!" He pushed the book into Lan Zhan's free hand. "Look, my love!"
His enthusiastic excitement is contagious and Lan Zhan smiles in that quiet way of his, earning a gasp from his own husband.
"I don't think you smile enough, Sweetheart." Wei Ying declares breathlessly, leaning it.
"The CURE!" Li XiWang doesn't shout it exactly, but she feels this is necessary before her parents get distracted again.
Jiang Cheng shoots her a grateful look.
There's been many embarrassing moments when he or XiChen have inadvertently walked into something they deeply regretted, immediately.
"A Phoenix feather?" Lan Zhan says, raising a brow.
"Where are we supposed to get that from?" Jiang Cheng throws out his trademark scowl.
"That's the fun part!" Wei Ying tells him, wrapping an arm around his beautiful husband.
"DON'T TELL ME YOU'RE GOING ON ANOTHER TRIP!" Jiang Cheng yells.
Wei Ying is already shaking his head, as XiChen takes over, shearing Uncle Qiren like an overgrown, oversized sheep.
"We've already got one. Well, Li XiWang has! Go on, show them!" He tells his daughter.
Li XiWang retrieves the qiankun pouch from the sleeve of her robes and pulls out a long narrow cherry wood box.
"Where did you get that?" Jiang Cheng's voice has turned into one of wonder.
"Remember when we had gone to see the Dragons of the Sea? And they called their Father-in-Bond? We asked him if he knew where the Jiyi huifu grew, the memory restoring plant. And when he flew away, he dropped one of his beautiful feathers. Li XiWang picked it up and he winked at her, so clearly a gift." Wei Ying explains triumphantly, grinning all the while.
Lan Zhan is making a mental tally of how many times he's going to kiss those beautiful lips.
Wei Ying looks particularly gorgeous today, like a flower in full bloom. The fresh mountain air has done him a wealth of wonder and his face is glowing with health and vitality.
He is an attractive man anyway, but today? He is ravishing in his beauty.
"I'm just glad she found those notes, otherwise I was thinking about singeing the hair, you know, with our respective fires." Wei Ying carries on, oblivious to the horrified look on Uncle Qiren's face under all that hair. "They say that burning the ends prevents growth."
"Who says, idiot?" Jiang Cheng steps forward to shove Wei Ying, but meets with a solid white-robed chest in his way.
He steps back enough when Lan Zhan is satisfied with his distance. Wei Ying sticks his tongue out at him, and then kisses his wonderfully heroic husband's cheek gratefully.
"You can ask the Healers, if you don't believe me. Anyway, it's a moot point now."
They all watch Li XiWang slide the slim wooden lid from the grooves on the inside of the box to hold the lid in place.
And then they all gasp.
The Phoenix feather is incomparably beautiful, shining with an inner magic lost to the world now. Its stem is a shimmering gold colour that reminds Wei Ying of Lan Zhan's beautiful eyes. Little red wisps cover the stem, getting bigger and stronger as they reach the head, a bright flame of yellow, orange and red.
It is similar to a peacock feather, but so much more illuminating.
"What should I do?" Li XiWang asks her fathers, uncertainly.
And then, before they can answer, her eyes become the silvery white of Bai Hua, the Celestial Healer of the Heavens. The one white lock of her beautiful hair wriggles out of the confines of her ponytail, floating around her face.
With the confidence and grace of one many years older than she is now, Li XiWang picks up the golden stem of the feather in her right hand.
It flares up like a torch, a brilliant flame of incandescent light, bathing the room in yellow. It's as if the sun itself has chosen to rise in here, this small abode tucked away in the high peaks of Cloud Recesses.
Li XiWang walks towards Uncle Qiren, who has parted his hair so he can see past the thick curtain of dark, luxurious strands weighing him down.
Li XiWang closes her eyes and begins to chant, an old spell of many moons ago, and then, when she opens them, they shine gold like Lan Zhan's eyes.
She touches the feather to Uncle Qiren's head, and then to his eyebrows and chin.
The light is blinding now, and an aura fills the room. It is impossible to see anything.
It is many moments later that suddenly, Hui Gai and Zago appear, the former just in time to catch Li XiWang as she passes out.
As the light dims and everyone gets used to the natural light, Wei Ying goes to hug his friend.
"PengYou!" Hui Gai wraps him in a side hug, nodding at Lan Zhan. "What happened?"
Everything is explained to him, and then they look at Uncle Qiren.
He has for the most part returned to normal. If his eyebrows are slightly bushier than usual, no one mentions it, because for the first time in a few days, they can finally see his face. His moustache is just as long as before, but it's his beard which still retains the residual effects of overgrowing. One lock, dead centre in the middle of his chin, is growing like a wayward bamboo stem, all sorts of curly wurly at the bottom.
XiChen hides the mirror.
"So, Hui Gai, how do you feel about taking a road trip with us?" Wei Ying says, brightly.
YOU ARE READING
WangXian Forever Book 9: The Flower Demon
RomanceThings have settled down for our favourite couple and they're just getting used to living in the domestic bliss that Wei Ying always dreamed of. However, there is still the question of Jiang Cheng and his mysterious curse, the JingLing that can't re...
