Chapter [B5] 21 — What Cannot Be Done

Chapter [B5] 21 — What Cannot Be Done

Liuxiang sat on the low stool beside the bed, spine straight, ankles tucked neatly under the hem of her robe. She looked at her grandmother defiantly, fingers folded tight in her lap to keep from trembling.

Zhi Zhu spoke in her mind, trying to persuade her. Liuxiang, you’re being very stubborn right now. You’re hurting, but inflicting that pain on others—

No. The spirit’s assessment may have been well-meant, but it was the last thing she wanted to hear right now. Stop. I can’t… Please, Zhi Zhu. Leave it.

Her spirit obeyed her request, and that only made her feel more terrible. She didn’t know how it was possible to hold this much dread and have it continue to compound, how it was she lived and hadn’t disappeared under her own inner pressure. She narrowed her eyes a fraction, just enough to focus on the old woman’s face and not on the ache that still hadn’t stopped building under her sternum.

Matriarch Shie had propped herself higher on the pillows than usual today, a small effort that had surprised even her earlier, and now watched Liuxiang with a gaze that was gentle but unyielding. “Do you really think your sacrifice means anything?”

The question, however calmly delivered, took all of Liuxiang’s breath. She stared blankly, mouth parting, then closing again. The answers she’d prepared for questions she’d expected dissolved into nothing, her arguments rendered irrelevant by the simple confidence in the old woman’s voice.

The bedclothes rustled as Matriarch Shie adjusted her hand by an inch, careful and steady, as if she did not want to shake Liuxiang more than the words already had.

For a long moment neither of them spoke. The kettle clicked softly as a bubble broke and settled.

Her grandmother still maintained a gentle expression, even as she drove the nail deeper and deeper into Liuxiang’s heart. “The only reason that Lu Jie’s sacrifice matters is because he’s chosen by fate, chosen by a divine beast, chosen by destiny itself. He has only one choice in this, whether he will die alongside the world or if he will shield us from this suffering with his own soul. It does not matter if you throw yourself into the flames. Your death would change nothing, Liuxiang. Only make the world an emptier place.”

He had told them what Ki had said. He had said he would be the one to go. It had to be this way. He’d spoken with that steadiness that made resistance feel like a child’s refusal.

So why was it she could not let go of that refusal?

“You are not helpless,” Matriarch Shie continued when Liuxiang didn’t speak. “There are more people you can save, other people you can help. But you will not be able to save Lu Jie with any sacrifice, only hurt him more by forcing him to watch those he cares about suffer alongside him. He has made himself into what he must be to save us all, and there is neither time nor resources for another to do the same. Can you say you would choose any different?”

Liuxiang flinched. She had seen enough to understand what Matriarch Shie meant. She had watched Lu Jie carry more than a single person should carry, had watched him move through decisions none of them could make for him, had watched him come back from places none of them could follow.

Her bottom lip wanted to tremble. She pressed it flat against her teeth, tasted copper where she had bitten it earlier and not noticed. She tried to look away and found there was nowhere in the room that would not reflect her back at herself. The water in the cup, the dark wood of the table, the small mirror half-turned toward the wall.

“Perhaps this is a form of rebellion of yours. Against the heavens, against Lu Jie himself, maybe. But it is pointless. The situation is not in his control, nor even in the heavens’ control.” A part of Liuxiang just wished her grandmother would stop speaking. But that wish didn’t leave her lips, so her grandmother did not wait for her to regain her bearings, only continued relentlessly. “This is the only path we have to save everyone. And the more that you struggle like this, the more that you argue with him, the more you’re inflicting pain upon him due to your selfishness.”

She tried to argue, tried to line up reasons. If she pushed hard enough now, if she refused the plan, if she took on some part of the danger instead, if she found another path, any path… if she could bear the cost, not him.

Each line of thought ended in the same place. He’d been marked for this from the moment the divine chose him. The Divine Tree stood because he carried it, and the thing beneath the roots had to be ended, and that ending would demand so much more than courage . She did not want to accept it. She did not want to accept that her strength, gathered for so many years under training that had cut off all softness, could not even take this burden from him. He had so much life left to be lived. To lose him twice was too cruel to be borne.

The spider spirit shifted again. Zhi Zhu’s tone was low, not scornful. Listen to the Matriarch, Liuxiang. She is right in telling you to spend the time you have. To use it without wasting it on a struggle that is more about rejecting pain than from any true hope of changing the outcome.

Matriarch Shie sighed. “I understand how you’re feeling. I understand how painful loss is. But I’ve done exactly what you’re doing, Liuxiang, and trust this old woman’s words when I say you will regret it for the rest of your life if you behave this way. You have to understand, Liuxiang. Every second you’re wasting now is a moment you’ll look back on a few weeks later… and hate yourself for. You know that, yes? You’d never be able to forgive yourself for wasting it, would beg for just a single moment longer with that boy. One more peaceful conversation, for a moment of laughter, for anything at all. Appreciate him while you have him. Do not waste the miracle of these days you have remaining. Do not throw them away in chasing what cannot be changed.”

The Matriarch fell silent, then, staring at her granddaughter. Perhaps she understood what Liuxiang needed at that moment, because for the first time since she’d lost her cultivation, she tried to move towards her, to truly stand.

Matriarch Shie slid one hand toward the edge of the bed, pressed her palm to the mattress to steady herself, then gathered her legs under her and raised her body the way Liuxiang had taught her after asking the healers about it herself, careful not to twist.

The old woman’s breath became labored as she shifted her weight to her feet, but she ignored it. The tremor that used to run through her fingers had lessened in the past few days—Liuxiang had noticed and had tried not to show how much relief that small change had brought her—but now the tremor was back in full force.

Before Liuxiang could convince herself to show concern, to ask for the Matriarch to not strain herself, the old woman’s arms came around Liuxiang, the pressure light.

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It was like the Matriarch was being careful to not break her, with how gentle her touch was. Liuxiang’s head found the hollow between shoulder and neck without thinking. In that simple contact, everything she had packed away pushed forward at once.

There was no shape to the sound at first. Her shoulders shook without rhythm. Her breath hitched and caught and then forced itself out in brief, harsh bursts. Her cheeks went hot. Her nose burned. She pressed her face into the coarse weave of the shawl and was aware of absurd small details in the middle of it—the way a thread scratched her skin, the smell of clean wool, the faint herbal heat that clung to the Matriarch’s clothes.

Liuxiang’s hands, which had been knots in her lap for so long, lifted and clutched at the back of the shawl because there was nothing else to hold.

She had cried as a child when the Matriarch’s training had left her with bruises she wasn’t allowed to mention. She had cried alone later, after missions that had required things that had changed her.

She had not cried like this in years, especially where someone else could hear her.

“Let it all out,” Matriarch Shie instructed. “Better to let it out than lash out.”

Liuxiang could only sob in response.

But the old woman did not rush her, or shush her, or do any of the dismissive things Liuxiang would’ve expected from her, when she’d been a divinity. She stood, spine straight, the effort of it irrelevant in that moment. Her grandmother just held her in her arms, letting Liuxiang let it all out.

She did not sit until Liuxiang’s sobs began to grow weaker, the initial outpouring of emotion worn out and leaving only the impossible grief that she could no longer deny. Then the Matriarch eased them both back to the bed and sat with Liuxiang still leaning into her shoulder.

“You’re not alone in all this. Whatever happens, you’re not alone.” She kept one hand at the back of Liuxiang’s head and the other around her shoulders. When Liuxiang’s breathing stumbled again, she rubbed a small circle at the base of her neck.

Liuxiang had never experienced this before, the love of a parent. It seemed to fill all the hollow parts in her heart she’d never noticed, fill them just enough that she could deal with the maelstrom of emotions raging in her heart.

And when she thought about Lu Jie, those feelings weren’t so absolutely overwhelming any more, as she begin to process them just the slightest.

Liuxiang’s sobs thinned to hiccups. When she wiped her face, the sleeve came away wet and a little gritty from salt and cloth. She didn’t know how long they stood like that and she didn’t ask.

“Drink,” the Matriarch said after a moment, voice as even as before. “Small sips.”

Liuxiang reached for the cup. Her hands were unsteady, but not so unsteady she could not take the handle and bring it to the Matriarch’s lips first in case the old woman needed it. The Matriarch shook her head, then nodded to Liuxiang’s own mouth. Liuxiang paused, then obeyed and took a sip herself. The water was warm and plain. It washed the tightness from the back of her throat and made it easier to pull a full breath without it catching on the edges left by tears. She sniffed once, a soft, embarrassing sound she would have tried to hide any other day, and set the cup back on the tray.

Matriarch Shie moved the pillow behind her back by an inch, then another, until her shoulders were supported properly when she leant back. It was a small act, but earlier that week, she had needed help to make the same adjustment. Today she did it on her own. Even the Matriarch looked a little surprised at that fact, that her body had made the decision to cooperate without her having to try for it repeatedly.

“I ask you to think about what you will wish you had done when there is no more time to change it,” the Matriarch finally said. “Will you wish you shouted more? Or will you wish to have sat and spoken with him about ordinary things for one more hour?”

Liuxiang looked down at her hands. The knuckles were red. She flexed her fingers once, then stilled them again. “I do not want him to go. I do not want him to choose pain again. I do not want to watch him walk toward it and keep walking because we cannot stop him.”

The Matriarch’s mouth softened. “You don’t have to want it. You will not make it happen by wanting it, nor will you stop it by not wanting it. But you can choose how you will be with him before it happens.”

Liuxiang swallowed. She thought of the way Lu Jie had smiled at her when he had left the room earlier, a small, quick shape of his mouth that had tried to reassure and had only made her chest hurt more. She had almost asked him not to go in, had almost told him that she didn’t want to face the Matriarch when she was feeling so… unstable, but she hadn’t because it felt painful to talk to him.

“Will you try?”

Liuxiang nodded. The motion was small at first, then firmer. “I will try.” Her throat felt raw, so the words came out rough and hoarse, but… They felt right. She took another sip of water because the action gave her something to do.

They sat like that for a few breaths longer. Matriarch Shie’s hand stayed warm at Liuxiang’s shoulder. The kettle’s soft warmth calmed her. Outside, a pair of footsteps passed, paused by the door, then moved away again. Lu Jie was probably pacing around the door, knowing him. His presence reassured her, even if she would only have it for a few days more. He could have gone back to the others, but instead he was waiting here for her.

When Liuxiang finally stepped back from the hug, she kept her hands on her grandmother’s forearms for a moment to make sure the old woman hadn’t pushed her body too much. “Do you feel dizzy?” she asked, the question automatic from days of paying attention to such signs.

The Matriarch shook her head. “No. I’m fine.”

And for once, Liuxiang believed her.

“I feel better, in fact.” Matriarch Shie let her hands fall to her lap and looked at Liuxiang in a way that reminded her of the first time she had been praised for getting a formation right, back when praise had been scarce and had meant you had met a standard, not earned affection. “You shine the brightest when you’re true to yourself, Liuxiang, and… it makes me happy to see you shine. I hope to see it many times again.”

Liuxiang did not know what to say to that, so she inclined her head in gratitude. She stayed there another minute, breathed slow and even until the last of the shaking in her chest settled.

“I will not keep you. He is probably waiting.”

Liuxiang nodded again. She reached for the blanket and smoothed the corner out of reflex, then checked the cup’s position on the tray and the angle of the pillow, small tasks that kept her hands steady and let her eyes clear. She looked at the Matriarch once more, and the old woman’s gaze was steady and kind in a way Liuxiang was still getting used to.

“Thank you,” Liuxiang said, quiet.

“For what?” Matriarch Shie asked, a small line of humor at the edge of the words.

“For telling me the thing I did not want to acknowledge, for saying what I needed to hear.”

The Matriarch dipped her chin in acceptance. “Then go. You needn’t leave him to wait alone.”

Liuxiang stood, surprised by how steady her knees remained. She wiped her face with the dry part of her sleeve and flexed her fingers once more to make sure they would not shake when she opened the door. Then she moved to the threshold.

—

It only took me a few seconds to realize the house didn’t have a silencing formation set to it. I’d gotten so used to having Sheldon set those automatically. I immediately withdrew my Chi to the best of my extent, muffling the sounds within the house, because I did not want to intrude on their conversation.

Even despite all that, however, Liuxiang’s sobs were loud enough for me to hear them when they started. My chest tightened in sympathy. Pain does not need words to make itself understood. My gaze fixed itself to the door, and I couldn’t tear it away.

It only took a minute, before Liuxiang left the room, making my heart clench. For a second, I was worried she’d not say anything; the next second, I was worried she’d still insist on sacrificing herself, doing something, anything.

Instead, she bowed. “I’m sorry, and thank you.”

I could see the place on her sleeve where she had wiped her face. I could see how her eyes were red around the rims and I let out the breath I was holding.

I pulled Liuxiang into a hug, feeling my own eyes redden at the thought of how much my friends were suffering. Labby, Yan Yun, Old Man, Granny Lang, Ash, Sheldon, Zhang, and Liuxiang…

“There is nothing to apologize for, silly,” was all he could get himself to say without his voice cracking, “And thank you too, for being my friend.”