About twenty minutes later Wen Qing appears, looking exhausted and displeased.

She enters the cell without ceremony, looking between all four prisoners. She was only ordered to make sure Wei Wuxian would live, but wow everyone here looks in really bad shape.

She avoids meeting Jiang Cheng's eyes and goes straight to her primary patient, putting two fingers to Wei Wuxian's neck. He's alive. His pulse is steady, nothing to suggest great internal damage or difficulty breathing. Relief washes over her instantly.

Wen Qing turns away to unpack her medicine kit. "Wei-gongzi is alive," she announces. "His pulse is normal; I will assess his other injuries. Is he the most badly hurt of all of you?"

"He is."

Jiang Cheng watches her anxiously.  He emits a strangled noise that might be "please help him."  It's... better that it's her than some strange Wen doctor.  Still, with her wearing the red robes of everyone else in her sect it's hard to trust her.  

She is going to help him.

She works quickly and deliberately, bandaging him up bit by bit. She decides that one cut needs to be sewn up, but most of his injuries are not severe enough to be dangerous. She announces as she tends to him that he is not in a coma; his arms have been torn up but she expects them to heal fully; his qi is still steady...

It's a while before she's done all that she can do. Wen Qing sighs. "He will be fine. If he continues angering Wen Chao, he will not be fine."

"I don't know how to manage that.  I'll try."

He'll just have to come up with more insults, and hope he can manage to be more of a target.  Not that he's ever managed to beat Wei Wuxian at anything.  It would be worth the pain to not see him unconscious like this again.

Sigh. She doesn't know if it can be managed, frankly, but it doesn't seem useful to say that. "I apologize that I cannot assist you more concretely."

She wipes her hands on her robes, fishes another roll of bandages from her kit. "Who's next?"

That is a good question.  

Jiang Cheng is in a lot of pain.  And his attempts to provoke Wen Chao to keep him away from Wei Wuxian will probably go better if he doesn't pass out halfway through.  

On the other hand, Lan Wangji seems to be in worse shape.  He did seem to be unusually concerned with Wei Wuxian's well-being, though Jiang Cheng has no idea why.  Can he trust that to continue?  

He'd also really rather not look that weak in front of the others.  In front of Wen Qing.

He fails to answer the question.  Is Lan Wangji still conscious?

Apparently not.

(Wangji passed out the moment he heard that Wei Ying was okay and his consciousness was no longer necessary.)

Fuck damn it.

It's unlikely to be catastrophic, but if any of Lan Wangji's vital organs were rapidly deteriorating and he chose not to say anything about it Wen Qing will be very annoyed.

She checks him. He is also alive, also badly hurt, probably not worse off for having just passed out. 

"Jiang-gongzi, Jin-gongzi, if either of you suspect you are on the verge of falling unconscious kindly say something first." She uses nimble, light fingers and the deeper reach of her spiritual energy to assess Lan Wangji's injuries. Broken leg of course, still, several broken ribs, his own share of unpleasant gashes... Wen Qing gets to work

There's a lot of work to get to. She finds older injuries from his session early this morning that no one told her about; she could have treated these hours ago if everyone were less idiotic. Burns on his side, those will probably scar but she does have an ointment for them...

Wen Qing has used enough spiritual energy on both patients to be exhausted by the time she's done with Lan Wangji, but she is a good doctor and she will not let that detract from her care of the others. Jin Zixuan is clearly the least injured; she gives him a painkiller in compensation for seeing to him last. Then she takes her kit over to Jiang Cheng.

"Jiang-gongzi, where are you most badly hurt?"

"My right shoulder," he says. 

Also his face; Wen Chao had been focusing on it.  At least that he isn't being held up by, so it's mostly terrible in being embarrassing.  That, and having to keep his left eye shut because blood from a slice on his eyebrow is dripping into it.

Wen Qing precess gauze to the cut on his eyebrow, holding it in place to stem the blood while she investigates his shoulder.

The shoulder is - really bad, this will require even more work using her spiritual energy. That's fine.

She spends another twenty minutes cleaning him up as gently as possible, then asks if he's still hurting anywhere she missed.

His first instinct is to pridefully refuse to admit weakness.  Then he remembers he's trying to be the reasonable one here.  Also, Wen Qing is very good at making people listen to her.  (Perhaps its a good thing the Wen never put her on interrogation duty.)  She can be informed of the smaller injuries too, with only a bit of noticable hesitation.

Wen Qing is surprised and delighted that at least one person has decided to be less of a stoic idiot than usual. All of Jiang Cheng's smaller injuries can be gently tended to with equal concentration.

When she is done with him she sees to Jin Zixuan.

Jin Zixuan is mostly fine, especially with the painkiller she already gave him. He is extremely bruised up, but nothing is broken and his cuts are minor.

Frankly it's a little insulting. Do the Wens think Jin Zixuan is so much easier to interrogate than a servant of the Jiang clan? Do they think he can't handle being stabbed in the shoulder a few times? They probably just considered Jin Zixuan less likely to have committed the crime, but he is still annoyed.

He thanks Lady Wen for her work.

They are both welcome.

It feels. Wrong. That the only thing she has left to do is leave. None of them have been fed, and none of them should be standing up or hanging from their arms, and - none of them should be getting tortured for a crime they couldn't have committed, none of the disciples should even be trapped here in Nightless City, it goes against all her wisdom as a doctor and as a decent person -- 

She needs to stop thinking like that. She knows better than to think like that.

She is not allowed to unchain them, and so she will not. She is not allowed to free them, and so she will not. She is a healer, she will heal them, and that is all. It is very simple.

She bows without making eye contact and exits the cell.

Jiang Cheng will arrange himself into the most comfortable position he can get into given the chains, and wait for Wei Wuxian to wake up.

It takes a few hours before Wei Wuxian wakes up.  When he does, he immediately stands so his arms are no longer holding his weight, and looks around to see what's going on, and if everyone else, and especially Lan Zhan, is okay.

Lan Zhan is moderately less unconscious than before. He’s still slumped against the wall in an uncharacteristic fashion, still alarmingly pale, but there are now bandages wrapped over his injuries and less blood splashed everywhere.

His eyes are cracked open but not currently in focus; he doesn’t immediately notice that Wei Wuxian is awake.

"Lan Zhan?" It's good he's recieved medical care.  How long has he even been out for.  He looks down and notices his own bandages.

He lifts his head and turns toward him, eyes widening urgently. "Wei Ying."

"Are you alright now? Did he beat you more after I passed out?"  He's actually contemplating apologizing for passing out, especially since he probably didn't manage to keep anyone safe after all.

Wangji ignores those questions. "We thought you might have died. Do not be so careless next time."

"But I did not die! Really, you think so lowly of me as to believe I would die from a little beating? Tch.  Are you okay?" Lan Zhan is obviously not okay but maybe he is okay enough to lie about it.

"Fine." That's a low bar, but he clears it.

"Good!"

It's still better than him not clearing the incredibly low bar.

"What happened after I passed out?"