There had been a moment, a split second when he'd watched Wei Ying be shoved onto the thorn that it had felt as if he were right back on the cliff, watching him fall. That same feeling of being too slow, too weak to stop it. He's waited for years for that moment to stop playing so vividly in his mind but it seems to be going nowhere, never more vivid now than when Wei Ying is hurt.

"Love you," he murmurs, wishing there was a better way to say, better way to encompass years of affection and longing into a few words. "Wei Ying is precious to me."