Tang Fan is looking at him — hasn't stopped looking at him once, really, in some way, since Sui Zhou stepped over the threshold and into his room — but he's looking at him, now, with a wonder so holy it's encroaching on worship. As though Sui Zhou has shot down a sun for him instead of something else infinitely less incredible.

Xue Ling should rightly leave it be. But: Sui da-ge had brought the magistrate here so he wouldn't be hurt, and he seems prone to injuring himself more than anything.

He feels Sui Zhou's smile unlace over his pulse, languid and nude in its amusement. "You've had the morning," he answers, unmoved. "The day won't keep for you."

Tang Fan returns early, only to arrive late.

"You would not hurt me," is what he says, careful, caged in. "You could never hurt me."

This, they have argued to a stalemate of irreconcilable disagreement; could so continue to press in unwinnability until the Heavens broke open overhead and the mountains crashed down astride them. But Sui Zhou serves to live as much as a man as he does a blade, and in that he is long intimated with the lay of blame for a tool in the wield of a hand.

Sui Zhou's WeChat starts firing off around midday, which does at least immediately pare down the pool of potential suspects.

"Tang Fan," she starts carefully.

Tang Fan has no such concern. "Sui Zhou," is her counter. She dumps their bag at her feet, where its gaped mouth is swiftly fed her belt and chopsticks. "Your poor delicate Qing'er," she complains. "I will find a man and his wife to show me the pity here that you won't."

After— after. When Tang Fan is home, and safe, Sui Zhou sees to it that he is comfortable, then moves to take leave of his imposition.

Just as it is apt for Sui Zhou to invite him, he has grown adept at telling what it is that he is inviting. This Tang Fan is real, tonight, and so Sui Zhou goes with him all the way into waking.

With their house's liveliness lapsed to quiet, and the looming summer rain hanging heavy in the air, Tang Fan seizes upon a temptingly rare proposition of opportunity.