Part I — The Return
Even gods who fall to earth still long for home.
The heavens remember their names not in judgment, but in silence—the kind that comes before dawn, when the stars dim so mortals may dream.
And sometimes, beneath that fragile quiet, a single flame returns to where it first began.
Not to conquer.
Not to burn.
But simply to be held.
The morning light had turned strange an hour before he landed.
Lady Yin had seen it first—distant flashes over the eastern sea, too bright for lightning, too sustained for storm. Fire and water colliding in bursts that lit the horizon like a second sun rising and dying, again and again.
The villagers had gathered at the shore, whispering. Monks murmured prayers. Children pointed at the sky with wide eyes.
Li Jing had stood silent at the edge of the water, watching, one hand on his sword though he knew no blade could reach that far. The years had etched new lines across his face, but his eyes were steady as ever—the eyes of a man who had learned to live with loss, or tried to.
He had known, somehow, what it meant.
The sea was taking its reckoning.
And when the light finally began to move—no longer fighting, but fleeing toward land—Lady Yin's basin slipped from her hands before she even saw his face.
She knew.
Two years had passed since the heavens claimed their son. Seven hundred mornings without his laughter. Seven hundred nights without his light.
But she would know that flame anywhere.
Her son was coming home.
A streak of fire tore across the morning sky.
Not a comet. Not lightning.
A boy.
The heavens burned where he passed, trailing embers that dissolved into wind. He descended slowly—too slowly—as if each movement cost him something he could barely afford to give.
Lady Yin ran before he touched the ground.
Li Jing followed, steady and fast, the soldier in him already cataloging what he saw: the uneven flight, the dimmed flames, the way the boy's shoulders curved inward as though bearing weight no child should carry.
Nezha landed in a gust of wind that smelled of storm and sea—and something else. Copper. Salt. Blood.
His Wind Fire Wheels flickered out, leaving only steam and the faint hiss of cooling air.
He stood there, swaying slightly, and for the first time, they truly *saw* him.
---
His robes were torn, singed dark at the edges and stained with something that gleamed faintly even in daylight—rust-red and black where seawater had dried, but luminous underneath, like oil catching firelight.
Divine ichor.
His hands were the worst. Stained to the wrists, knuckles split, palms marked with burns that looked half-healed and raw all at once.
His hair was longer now, wild and tangled with salt. His face—still a child's face, still seven years old—carried shadows that had not been there before. Eyes too old. Mouth too tight.
He looked at them, and there was something *broken* in his gaze.
Lady Yin froze mid-step, her breath catching.
"Nezha—" The word came out strangled. She saw the blood. The way he held himself too still, too careful, like someone who'd forgotten how to move without breaking.
"Whose blood is that?" Li Jing's voice was quiet, but sharp as a blade's edge.
Nezha looked down at his hands as if seeing them for the first time. His lips parted. Closed. No sound came.
Finally, barely a whisper:
"Not mine." He swallowed, and his voice cracked. "Not... all of it."
For a heartbeat, the world held its breath.
Then Lady Yin moved.
Her arms went around him before anyone could speak again.
She pulled him close—this blood-stained, trembling child who smelled of smoke and seawater and something sharp and wrong—and pressed her face to his shoulder.
"You're home," she said, voice breaking. "You're *home*."
Nezha stood rigid in her arms. Didn't move. Didn't breathe.
Li Jing stepped closer, slowly, as one approaches a wounded animal. His hand came to rest on Nezha's other shoulder—heavy, grounding—and he felt the boy flinch under his palm.
"It's all right," Li Jing said, though he didn't know if it was. "You're safe now."
That word—*safe*—seemed to undo something.
Nezha's breath hitched. Once. Twice. Then his arms came up, hesitant and shaking, and he gripped his mother as though she were the only thing keeping him from falling into an abyss.
"I didn't—" His voice broke. "I didn't want to—"
"I know," Lady Yin whispered, running her hands through his salt-tangled hair. "I know, my son. I know."
She didn't. She couldn't. But she held him anyway, and that was enough.
---
Li Jing stood close, one hand still on Nezha's shoulder, the other clenched at his side. He looked at the blood on the boy's hands, the burns, the way his whole body trembled like a plucked string still vibrating.
He had seen this before.
Not in a child. Not in his son.
But in soldiers after their first kill. The ones who came back different. The ones who couldn't speak of what they'd done.
*You've seen things no child should.*
He'd said that, hadn't he? Just a moment ago, in some other lifetime when he thought he understood.
He hadn't understood at all.
"Come inside," Li Jing said, voice steady despite the weight in his chest. "Let us tend to you."
Nezha didn't answer. Didn't let go of his mother.
But after a long moment, he nodded—small, fragile—and let them guide him toward the house.
They walked slowly across the courtyard, Lady Yin's arm around Nezha's shoulders, Li Jing a step behind with one hand hovering near the boy's back—not touching, but ready to catch him if he fell.
Villagers watched from windows and doorways, murmuring prayers, crossing themselves. Some bowed. Some fled.
Nezha kept his eyes down, watching his own feet as if balance required all his concentration.
The pond came into view—his mother's pond, where lotus flowers still bloomed despite the late season. The water caught the morning light and held it, shimmering and still.
Nezha stopped.
He stared at the water, at his own reflection broken and wavering on its surface. For a moment, he thought he saw someone else there—scales glinting, eyes like drowned moons, a shape sinking into darkness.
He turned away sharply, breath coming too fast.
"Nezha?" His mother's voice, soft and worried.
"I'm all right," he lied.
She didn't believe him. But she didn't press. Instead, she guided him past the pond, through the gate, into the house where the air smelled of sandalwood and home.
---
Inside, the light was gentler. Softer. The world felt smaller here, more manageable.
Lady Yin led him to the low table and eased him down onto a cushion. He sat stiffly, hands resting on his knees, staring at nothing.
Li Jing closed the door behind them, shutting out the watching eyes, the murmuring voices.
For a long moment, no one spoke.
Then Lady Yin knelt in front of her son and took his hands—those bloodied, trembling hands—in her own.
"Let me see," she said gently.
Nezha didn't resist. Didn't help. Just let her turn his palms upward, examining the burns, the splits in his knuckles, the stains that wouldn't come off with water alone.
She didn't ask what happened.
She already knew enough.
Instead, she reached for the basin Li Jing brought—clean water, still warm from the morning fire—and began to wash his hands.
The water turned faintly luminous as the divine ichor dissolved, then faded to pale red, then pink, then clear.
Lady Yin worked slowly, methodically, the way she might wash a child's scraped knee. Her hands were steady even though her heart was not.
Nezha watched her hands move—gentle, careful, loving—and felt something crack inside him.
"I killed someone," he whispered.
Her hands paused. Just for a heartbeat. Then continued their work.
"I know," she said softly.
"He didn't..." Nezha's voice wavered. "He didn't deserve to die like that. He was just—he was following orders. His father's orders. And I—"
His throat closed. The words wouldn't come.
Lady Yin set the cloth aside and cupped his face in her still-damp hands, forcing him to meet her eyes.
"Then carry that pain gently, my son," she said. "It means your heart is still your own."
Nezha's breath hitched. Tears burned at the edges of his vision, but they didn't fall—couldn't fall, as if even grief had been scorched out of him by divine fire.
"I was supposed to protect people," he said, voice breaking. "Not—not *this.*"
"You still can," Lady Yin said, and there was such fierce certainty in her voice that for a moment, Nezha almost believed her. "Starting with yourself."
She pulled him close again, cradling his head against her shoulder the way she had when he was small.
And this time, finally, Nezha let himself be held.
⸻
---
Li Jing stood by the window, watching them, one hand still resting on the hilt of his sword.
He thought about the distant battle he'd witnessed. The flashes of fire and water, light and darkness. The violence it must have taken to create that spectacle.
He thought about the dragon prince who must have fallen.
He thought about his son—seven years old and carrying the weight of a kill that would haunt grown warriors.
*The sea was taking its reckoning,* he'd thought, watching the battle from shore.
He'd been wrong.
The sea had *given* its reckoning.
And his son had paid the price.
Li Jing's jaw tightened. His hand fell from his sword.
When this was over—when the Dragon King came, and he would come—Li Jing would face him.
But for now, he turned away from the window and let his wife do what he could not:
Wash the blood from their son's hands, and pretend, for just a moment, that it could be that simple.
⸻
**End of Part I — The Return**