Chapter Text
✧ I ✧
Domains had long been among Kaeya’s interests. Sometimes their entrances were grand and ornate and sometimes the knight could stumble upon one hidden among the bushes. Some domains teemed with all kinds of monsters. Ordinary hilichurls, abyss mages or slimes. Kaeya had dealt with them all. Occasionally, he’d leave the beasts alone, or even approach to exchange a few words in a long-forgotten language. A muscle that isn’t exercised grows weak, so although the hilichurls spoke only a crude version of khaenri’ahn, Alberich still liked to engage in small conversations with them from time to time.
At present, the Cavalry Captain was walking through one of the more hidden domains. He’d discovered it purely by accident during a patrol and he was certain it hadn’t been there before. Such unstable domains weren’t uncommon. Only a week ago, one of Kaeya’s favorite domains, which he often frequented because of the marvelous landscape inside, had vanished without a trace. Strangely, this new one was very empty and very long. His footsteps echoed through the entire structure as he walked along its narrow blue corridor. Not a single monster in sight. The only sound was the steady rhythm of his boots striking the smooth floor.
After a while, he stopped and leaned against the wall. He’d wanted to find a beautiful domain to show Neuvillette. The one he’d planned to take him to had disappeared, so now he spent his free time searching for something equally spectacular. Neuvillette had never had the chance to visit his beloved in Mondstadt. Kaeya traveled to Fontaine rather often. Whether for diplomatic or personal reasons, but as the Chief Justice and the person holding the authority of Fontaine, Neuvillette couldn’t easily leave his nation. Yet after months of preparation, they had finally managed to arrange his visit to Mondstadt. Kaeya was overjoyed. In his letters, he’d listed countless things he wanted to show his beloved. Among them was an excursion, an unforgettable adventure. Alberich sighed and glanced around. He could keep moving forward in the hope of finding something worthwhile, or he could turn back. Considering he’d already been there for at least two hours and everything around him still looked the same… Kaeya was ready to retreat. But then he heard a metallic screech like a blade scraping against stone. So maybe this domain had some residents after all?
Slowly and carefully, the knight drew his sword. He started walking again. The corridor suddenly widened. Alberich frowned. When he’d looked ahead earlier, the narrow corridor had seemed to stretch into infinity...
Finally, Kaeya reached a chamber. Its floor was entirely made of mirrors, and in the center stood Diluc, trying to dispose of a Pyro Abyss Mage. Of course Ragvindr would be here. During his carefree explorations, Kaeya often ran into the so-called “Darknight Hero,” who always mumbled something about safety or threats from the Abyss Order. For a moment, Kaeya had almost believed he’d found something truly rare. Well, despite his slight disappointment, the knight decided to graciously assist Diluc. Moments later, the monster fell, impaled by a precise shard of ice. Ragvindr’s head snapped toward Kaeya.
“Well, look who we have here.” Alberich sheathed his weapon with deliberate slowness.
Diluc blinked twice, as if he couldn’t quite believe Kaeya was really standing before him. His fingers were still clenched around the hilt of his claymore.
“I know, I know… you prefer to work alone, but a little help every now and then doesn’t hurt, right? Don’t worry, I swear I wasn’t following you this time. I just happened to stumble upon this place.” Kaeya looked around the chamber. Huh, he hadn’t noticed the chandelier hanging so close to the ceiling before. In fact, it was rather beautiful here, though didn’t the whole place look too much like those formal banquets that tired Neuvillette? Maybe this domain wasn’t the right choice after all...
“I know you’re not following me. because I came here after you.” Diluc mumbled. Alberich smirked mockingly.
“You came after me but arrived here before me?” Kaeya laughed lightly. “There’s only one narrow corridor here. I think I’d notice if you passed me, no? Against these blue walls, your red hair would’ve stood out quite a bit.”
“I tried to call you, but you suddenly disappeared, and...” Ragvindr paused. “The walls in the corridor were red.”
This time it was Kaeya who looked confused. Either Diluc was pulling his leg or something was truly wrong. Domains could change their layout, but never so abruptly while someone was inside.
“Red? Look, they’re—” Kaeya turned toward the corridor he’d come from. Its walls were now neither red nor blue. “—purple?”
The two men exchanged glances. Both knew something was off. Each felt that strange chill beneath the skin that never meant anything good. Diluc grabbed Kaeya by the wrist.
“Let’s go,” Ragvindr said, pulling him toward the corridor, glancing back now and then to make sure the knight was still there.
Their quickened pace soon turned into a run. The chamber suddenly tripled in size, and so did the distance to the exit. The chandelier above began to sway from side to side, and the mirrored floor became treacherously slippery. Kaeya felt as if he were standing on ice. He glanced down. Had the floor changed? No, still mirrored, but... something wasn’t right. Though their reflections seemed accurate, in the mirror beside Diluc’s twin, a black creature was preparing to attack. Kaeya looked up. They were alone here. Alone yet… He looked down again. The creature bared razor-sharp teeth and lunged. There was no time to think about whether what was happening in the mirror was real. He wouldn’t let anything tear his brother to shreds. Kaeya shoved Diluc aside, Ragvindr’s grip on his wrist slipped. In the next instant, the black monster burst from the floor right where Diluc had been standing if not for Kaeya’s quick intervention.
“What the—” before Ragvindr could end his sentence, the creature let out a shrill screech and then smoothly dove back into the mirrored surface.
“It’s under us. Watch out,” Kaeya warned.
They were close to the exit now. Just a little further. So close.
Another black creature appeared in the mirror, its teeth just as sharp. Diluc froze. He’d never seen anything like it. The beings shifted between forms at times they looked like liquid darkness, at others their edges were almost too sharp. The only constant were those teeth. Were those monsters from the depths of the abyss? Was the Abyss Order behind this? He didn’t have time to ponder. They were nearing the violet corridor, which… which suddenly switched colours again. It was red once more? Diluc turned to Kaeya and stopped dead. Kaeya was gone. He knew he shouldn’t have let go but he did so anyway.
“Diluc! Diluc!” He heard shouting, but where was its source? And then he saw Kaeya on the other side of the mirror, with two of those creatures.
Despite their size, the black entities moved with unsettling grace. Kaeya was surprised the glass didn’t shatter beneath them. They advanced toward him slowly, and Alberich was about to sprint into the corridor when he noticed the walls had turned blue again and Diluc had vanished. Kaeya stopped and shouted his name, desperate for a reply. And he got one, but from within the mirror.
“Kaeya! I’m here, on the other side!” Kaeya exhaled in relief, but there was no time to celebrate. One of the monsters lunged at him.
Alberich barely managed to draw his sword. The black creature seemed unfazed by a weapon. The blade sank into its body, swallowed whole. Kaeya leapt back and conjured a new sword of Cryo. This time the second creature attacked. Kaeya sent a flurry of icy shards toward it, sharp enough to cut through flesh, but on the creature’s black skin(?), fur(?), feathers(?) they had no effect. Then the knight realized he had only one option left: run.
“Run for the exit on your side and I’ll do the same!” Judging by Diluc’s expression, he didn’t like that plan, but he nodded anyway. He couldn’t help Kaeya from behind the barrier.
Even though Kaeya sprinted down the corridor, the floor remained mirrored. It hadn’t been before, had it? He was sure it hadn’t been this slippery.
His lungs burned from running, and he was in good shape. Was the domain stretching the distance between the hall and the exit again? He couldn’t tell. His ears rang, and he could still hear the twin creatures pursuing him. Diluc was saying something or rather screaming from the other side, but Kaeya focused on running. He was used to balancing on ice, having often taken Klee for walks on water, yet the mirrored surface still felt so unstable it was hard to stay upright.
Finally, he saw the exit. The brass doors seemed to be waiting for him. Kaeya could only hope that Ragvindr was already outside. He hadn’t heard his urging yells for a while. It didn’t matter. Diluc was safe. He had to be. He always survived in one piece.
Then his foot slipped. Kaeya cursed as he hit the ground. He was ready to get up quickly. He was so close! But as his body struck the floor, the solid surface turned liquid. The knight plunged under the mirror’s surface as though it were a lake.
He didn’t remember what happened next. Everything was blurred, and he couldn’t keep his eyes open for more than a second. The only thing that stayed with him was the strange dampness on his skin. His body seemed to drift, to sink, but never touched the bottom. Maybe the black creatures were still nearby or maybe they’d left after he’d been swallowed by the mirror. Maybe that wetness on his skin was their long tongues in reality. No, no. Abyssal monsters didn’t play with their food. At least, that’s what he thought. Kaeya hadn’t been down there for a very, very long time, but some lessons from his father he still carried in his heart.
***
Sunlight warmed his face. Kaeya slowly opened one eye and stretched out his limbs on the green grass. He was in Mondstadt. He had to be. Nowhere else did the wind sound quite like this. For a fleeting moment, Alberich could almost believe that the whole domain had been nothing but a dream brought on by nerves. He still hadn’t found a truly beautiful, breathtaking place that would impress Neuvillette. Apparently, he was more anxious about the whole thing than he’d thought.
“Kaeya?” came Diluc’s uncertain voice, and the knight quickly sat up.
Not far off, by a nearby tree, sat a far too familiar figure. The same dark-blue hair, the same caramel skin… The only difference was age. The anomaly looked exactly like Kaeya once had, years ago. The child pressed himself against the trunk, pulling his bruised knees close to his chest, trying to make himself small, unnoticeable, if not invisible.
“What is it?” Kaeya stood and approached the child. In a split second, a sharp shard of ice formed in his hand. Diluc grimaced slightly at the use of ‘it’. It was clearly a boy and one that looked so familiar. One eye, two legs, two arms. The most ordinary child in utterly extraordinary circumstances.
‘It’ lifted its head, studying the man before it. The boy seemed to recognize… something, when he saw the single eye in Kaeya’s face.
“I am the Last Hope,” the child said in a long-forgotten tongue. The knight instantly pressed the ice shard to the boy’s throat.
They were face to face. A pitiful imitation of his childhood self. Hollow cheeks, limbs too thin. Someone had done their homework, hadn’t they? The monsters from the domain must have dug into his memories to mold… this. A small, bony creature whose mere appearance inspired revulsion. Maybe Kaeya shouldn’t be surprised that his father had sometimes looked at him with such unbearable disgust or that nearly every worker at the winery had avoided him during those first few months with the Ragnvindrs. The boy didn’t even flinch under the blade. Anyone could tell there was something off about him. A normal child would have screamed, would have fought for his life. But this one only stared blankly at the four-pointed star in Kaeya’s eye.
Familiar hands seized Kaeya by the shoulders and yanked him back before he could fully slice the boy’s throat. Diluc stepped between them.
“He’s a child,” Ragnvindr snarled. He stood tall, ready to fight. Fight for what, though? That disgusting little thing?
“It’s a monster,” Kaeya corrected coldly, glancing at the horrid anomaly.
The boy touched his neck lightly. A thin line of blood trickled down. Diluc stood firm for a moment, serving as a living shield. Only when he was sure Alberich wouldn’t strike again did he kneel beside the child. He hadn’t understood a word the boy had said earlier. The guttural sounds had no discernible structure but they had thrown Kaeya into a silent rage.
“What’s your name?” Diluc asked, though they both knew what the answer would be. It was so obvious, so unnecessary that Kaeya nearly scoffed. Master Ragnvindr, not one for idle chit chat? Well, apparently that principle vanished in the face of a possibly human-shaped beast.
“K…” The boy coughed, which caused a worried crease to form on Diluc’s forehead. “Kaeya. I’m from Ragnvindr Household and I think I got lost… Are you from the Ragnvindr family too, sir? I—I don’t know all of Diluc’s cousins yet. They showed me portraits, and I know I’m supposed to remember them, but” young Kaeya lowered his voice to a whisper, “I haven’t learned them all yet.”
It was a lie. Kaeya remembered perfectly the long nights spent poring over portraits of the family, analyzing every face in detail. That was why he’d been sent there, wasn’t it? To be a living vessel of information. And he had done his job flawlessly. His younger knockoff simply didn’t recognize Diluc’s adult face because, back then, it hadn’t yet existed in any painting, not because he hadn’t memorized the family tree.
“Mhm… you see, this is a rather strange situation,” Diluc began, sounding calm, his expression softer than usual. “I’m Diluc, and this is Kaeya.” He gestured toward the knight, who still held his sharp icicle. “The domain we entered experienced some… irregularities. Somehow, you’re here, though you really shouldn’t be.”
“‘Luc?” the boy raised his eyebrows and scooted closer to the man. His tension had melted away just a bit. “So that’s why you wanted to kill me?” he asked, looking at his older self.
The way the child spoke of killing so naturally sent a chill down Diluc’s spine. He carried in his memories some moments when young Kaeya had seemed unsettling, but back then, he had been a child himself, so at that time such abnormal behavior did not make such an impression on him. His innocence had blinded him from noticing the wrongness.
“Yes. You’re not needed here,” Kaeya sighed, twirling the ice shard in his hand.
“I understand.” To Diluc’s surprise, the boy remained calm. He stood up, his shaky legs carrying him closer to the older Kaeya. “I’m sorry for disturbing your mission.” Again, that cursed language. Couldn’t he see who was listening?
“Not another word,” Kaeya hissed in the same tongue, raising the shard again to–
Diluc scooped the boy into his arms. He held him so tightly against his chest the child’s face turned nearly blue.
“What the hell is wrong with you? It’s a child. Shall I spell it out? A child!” Ragnvindr loosened his grip, smoothing a hand over the boy’s hair in apology.
“You’re the last person I’d accuse of sympathizing with a domain construct probably corrupted by abyssal corrosion,” Kaeya laughed. “Weren’t you the one who disapproved of my little linguistic experiments? And now you’re chatting so fondly with that thing.”
Normally, Kaeya wasn’t this vicious. Oh, he had some sadistic traits. He enjoyed testing people in various environments, watching them lose control. However, this was something else entirely. It was fueled by cold, cruel anger, not his usual sardonic amusement.
“This is different,” Ragnvindr muttered, to which Kaeya only laughed harder. “Besides, we don’t know if you’d die, if you killed your past self.”
That argument was enough to make Alberich drop the shard. It shattered against the ground. Kaeya couldn’t die now. Not when Neuvillette’s visit was so close. He’d promised too much for his love to arrive in town that was absent of his presence. Diplomatic relations, trade routes - all important matters, but in the end Neuvillette was coming here for him because somehow, impossibly, Kaeya had won his heart. He had no right to disappoint him now.
“Fine. Then give me the little creature. I’ll make sure it doesn’t cause any trouble.” Diluc tightened his grip on small Kaeya.
“I can take care of him. It’s no problem,” Diluc said firmly. Leaving children with Kaeya had never been an issue before. Well, Klee might cause a bit of chaos under his watch, sure, but otherwise he was perfectly capable. And yet, right now, Diluc was afraid to let the boy out of his sight.
“I insist.” Alberich smiled, reaching out to his younger self and gently patting his head, mimicking Diluc’s earlier gesture.
Ragnvindr was just about to refuse when the boy suddenly spoke.
“I can go… with myself,” he whispered and Diluc only nodded.
He set the young Kaeya back down, and when he saw Alberich take the child’s hand with almost theatrical gentleness, an uneasy feeling twisted in his chest.
***
Most of the time, little Kaeya spent locked inside an unremarkable, small house on the outskirts of the city. Was this where his older counterpart lived? He wouldn’t be so sure. The man never came back for the night, but maybe that didn’t mean anything? Underground, many men didn’t return for the night, or its equivalent in the abyss, his father used to say that if you were handsome, you couldn’t fend off the ladies. He said it with a half-smile and a faint spark in his eye, as if reminiscing about the time before Khaenri’ah fell. Then he would add that it was one of the few things left to the immortals - “pleasure without cost,” he called it. Maybe the older Kaeya could be called handsome. He was tall, even taller than Diluc! Slim, broad-shouldered. Maybe he really couldn’t fend off the ladies, the same way you couldn’t fend off wasps when eating something sweet on the Ragnvindr’s front porch. In truth, Kaeya didn’t just disappear for the night, he barely stayed in the small house at all. He appeared three times a day, bringing food and that was it. He treated him like air, though the boy could see through the window how kindly he behaved toward other children.
Of course, little Kaeya knew he wasn’t like the children of Mondstadt. They laughed and played carefree through the capital and he? He was afraid of the water in the bathtub. Yet the adult Kaeya must have remembered that from his own childhood, because he stayed with him in the bathroom when he bathed. He was even kind enough to wash his younger counterpart’s hair. The man’s grim face reflected in the water. He wasn’t gentle in the slightest. His movements seemed mechanical, stripped of the fluidity with which he gestured when around others. Would he ever learn to be like him? To stand straight, chest out, confidence spilling from every word? People seemed to like him that way. Well they had to, or at least they respected him, since after all, he carried the title of Cavalry Captain. No one had admired him when he was quiet, following his brother step by step. The boy wondered what their relationship looked like in that strange future. It had always been Diluc who wanted to be a knight, that was his dream, or rather, Master Crepus’s dream. If Kaeya was the Cavalry Captain, then Diluc must have become something even greater. Maybe Varka had retired, and Diluc had taken over the highest position among the knights? Young Kaeya had far more questions than answers and judging by how he’d been treated so far, he could well believe that no one would ever tell him anything, at least not directly.
In a way, he understood why older Kaeya didn’t want anything to do with him. He had appeared out of nowhere and could potentially threaten the mission, so keeping him isolated was a good strategy that certainly made sure no one asked unnecessary questions, but even so, the child still felt a pang in his chest whenever the older one treated him so coldly. The boy often found himself sitting by the window behind a white curtain, scanning for Kaeya. He felt pitiful, like an animal waiting for its master to return because it couldn’t occupy itself otherwise. Not that there was anything to do in that house anyway. There wasn’t a single book on the shelf in the bedroom. All the drawers were empty, so little Kaeya couldn’t even grab a pencil and a scrap of paper to doodle something to pass the time. And when, after yet another day, he grew particularly bored and frustrated, he decided to search the house more thoroughly. He looked for everything and nothing at once. Something that might help him understand the future, or the future version of himself. But just when he thought he’d found something buried in the ashes of the fireplace, something important, meaningful, he was met with disappointment. A small piece of paper, with only a few words written on it. And yet, those words made the child shiver.
Stop snooping. I know your true nature.
That message from his older self filled him with shame, because Kaeya knew he would search his house. He was aware of it and that was probably why the entire space was so empty. By acting this way, the child had only proven him right. If little Kaeya ever had the chance to snoop around, he’d flip through the documents and memorize the names in an instant. That was simply his nature. From birth, he was meant to be a spy and habits are hard to break. Had the older Kaeya gotten rid of them completely? No, definitely not. The little one knew himself too well. He couldn’t imagine a world where he would stop gathering information if it was within reach.
The boy placed the paper back where he found it. For a long minute, he stared at the ashes before deciding to light the fireplace. If Diluc had been there, the task would have been much easier. His brother had a Pyro Vision, after all, but little Kaeya was sure he’d manage just fine on his own. Soon, the paper caught fire and the child sat by the hearth with soot-covered hands.
***
Neuvillette was simply standing before the gates of Mondstadt, as if the sight of him in these parts was something ordinary. That living image of the judge: tired, a little worse for wear after yesterday, yet smiling because he saw his beloved, filled Kaeya with delight. Neuvillette was here. He was truly here and although the long journey had clearly left its mark on him, he still stood upright, straight as a string. Naturally, a certain degree of composure had to be maintained, right? He had come here on diplomatic matters, though they were mostly private reasons that had pushed him beyond the borders of his own nation. For a second, Kaeya tried to act at least half as professional as his boyfriend, but he barely stopped himself from leaping straight into the Iudex’s arms.
“Captain Alberich, I am most pleased that you and your delegation came to greet me,” he said. The ‘delegation’ consisted of a few randomly assigned knights chosen by Jean, who were now yawning and shifting from foot to foot. It was already late. Mondstadt had sunk into that blissful quiet that follows around two in the morning, when drunkards finally fall asleep. In half an hour, they would rise again, and the streets would be full of noise. Neuvillette had arrived in a rare window of peace.
“The pleasure is all mine,” Kaeya replied stiffly, still trying to play the diligent Cavalry Captain. But when Neuvillette’s smile grew even wider at the sound of his voice… how could he resist?
Kaeya caught his lover’s face in his hands and pressed a soft kiss to his lips. They would have time later for the hotter, more passionate touches, right now he just wanted to show him his longing and his joy that he had come here just for him. The tender scene must have somewhat roused the drowsy knights, because suddenly every one of them had their eyes and ears wide open.
“Come, I’ll help you check in,” Alberich said, taking Neuvillette’s travel bag, though the judge could certainly have managed it perfectly well himself.
In truth, ‘checking in’ meant nothing more than bringing Neuvillette to his quarters among the knights’ barracks. The entire Goth Grand Hotel was currently rented out by the Fatui, so the judge couldn’t stay there. Of course, Mondstadt’s officials could have arranged a small house for him somewhere else, but Kaeya wanted his lover close by. He had promised Jean he’d find a suitable place for Neuvillette and he had kept that promise. Well—almost. His quarters, as befitted the barracks, were hardly luxurious. Kaeya did own a modest property on the outskirts of the city, but at the moment it was occupied by that small, miserable creature he preferred not to think about.
“My humble abode,” he said, gesturing toward the bare, almost austere interior of his room.
The first thing Neuvillette noticed upon crossing the threshold was the vast, all-encompassing emptiness. The walls were smooth and white, while the floor was some shade of dull brown. In his mind, he had imagined a completely different space. After all, Alberich was such a wonderfully colorful personality, yet everything around him failed to reflect that. Neuvillette had thought his own apartment was sparsely decorated, but compared to Kaeya’s, his gray striped wallpaper felt like the height of expressionism.
The deeper he went, the worse it got. Every room looked practically identical. White walls, brown floors, and some nondescript piece of furniture. Perhaps he should have asked Kaeya about it, but exhaustion from the long journey was already pulling at him. When the other man merely showed him the bedroom, the Iudex immediately shed his robes and burrowed under the blanket. His eyelids were already falling shut. Alberich chuckled softly and soon joined him.
Oh, how they both had missed holding each other in their arms…
***
Something hung in the air. Neuvillette felt the same sensation that came over him in court, right before the final, most damning piece of evidence was brought forth. A few times during the day, Kaeya would simply disappear, only to return moments later with an excellent excuse ready on his lips. The Iudex trusted the knight. He was certain it wasn’t infidelity or anything of that kind, yet Kaeya’s behavior still seemed strange. Did the people of Mondstadt truly require his beloved’s assistance so often?
Neuvillette had been on the verge of asking, perhaps even conducting a small investigation, something he was so very good at, when Kaeya’s disappearances suddenly halted. For the first five days of his stay in the City of Freedom, Kaeya had needed to leave three times a day like clockwork, but then, without warning, the citizens no longer seemed to need his urgent, irreplaceable help. Of course, the Iudex knew there must be something behind it, he wasn’t a fool, but should he really trouble himself with his lover’s mysterious absences? Here in Mondstadt, he was no judge, so why did his mind insist on reshaping the situation into some sort of legal proceeding? After all, Alberich’s occasional disappearances could easily be attributed to knightly duties - secret missions, classified meetings, anything of that sort. All perfectly plausible.
The unease remained buried deep within him as he tried to enjoy the pleasures of his stay in Mondstadt. The food was undeniably different from Fontaine’s, yet in its own way, quite similar with their cuisine rich in poultry, turkey and chicken above all. Unfortunately, the dishes lacked the sauce that, in Neuvillette’s opinion, was the finest element of any meal, he often found himself eating sauce with some cutlet, rather than a cutlet with some sauce.He liked dishes that were not so much aromatic and rich as fluid, though he still found Mondstadt’s culinary style charming enough. In truth, it wasn’t the food that delighted him most, but the water from the famed Cider Lake that was said to never freeze. Kaeya had always brought him a bottle of that wondrous liquid whenever he visited Fontaine, but now Neuvillette could taste it whenever he pleased, without restraint. The water of Mondstadt was pure and had a crisp flavor that once evoked nothing in particular, yet now it reminded him of his lover’s lips. Was it because Kaeya so often drank beverages made with Mondstadt’s water that his kisses carried that same refreshing note? Neuvillette couldn’t yet confirm the correlation, but ever since noticing it, he found himself reaching for Mondstadt’s water more often when alone in Fontaine, missing the warmth of his knight’s presence.
Luckily, Kaeya was right here beside him now and the Cavalry Captain showed no reluctance in offering him all the affection he could manage, even in places like Angel’s Share.
“Your finest, purest water in the most splendid glass you can find for my beautiful Neuvillette,” Kaeya said to the bartender, smiling while keeping his lover’s hand in his own.
In Fontaine, they would never have displayed their affection so openly, but here in Mondstadt, the rules seemed different. Of course, people were curious about the “outsider” who’d captured the attention of one of their most prominent public figures, but at least here his presence didn’t immediately spark twenty gossip columns filled with wild conspiracy theories, as it had when their relationship became public in the Nation of Justice…
“Thank you,” the Iudex nodded politely at the bartender as he handed him a glass of water, crystalline and pristine.
“You might take a page from your comrade,” the bartender replied coldly. “A knight ought to keep a clear head at all times though, of course, what else should I expect from the Cavalry Captain of such a wonderful institution as the Knights of Favonius.” Diluc shot Kaeya a hostile glance. Neuvillette blinked a few times, uncertain how to react.
“Diluuc! Don’t be such a downer,” Alberich laughed, shaking his head. “Besides, he’s not my comrade, as you so delicately put it, but my partner, my lover, my beloved.” He lifted Neuvillette’s hand and kissed it three times in neat succession. “And ‘comrade’? You sound like you’re working with the Fatui!” Kaeya laughed.
Perhaps someday Diluc would have acted in some special way towards Kaeya's partner. He would have tried to make the right impression. In the present, Ragvindr didn't bother with such performances. Too many faces had come and gone through Alberich’s romantic life for him to believe in any of them. To someone like Kaeya, affection seemed merely another tool to manipulate, to control. How else could three of his previous ‘boyfriends’ all have turned out to be leaders of criminal organizations under the Ordo’s investigation? And that’s not even counting the women who were connected to something dubious. Diluc had no idea what was Kaeya’s benefit in dating such a respected figure from Fontaine, and honestly he didn’t care to find out. What concerned him most these days was little Kaeya. Who was looking after the boy now that the adult seemed entirely absorbed in Neuvillette? Of course, he couldn’t ask outright. Not now when Alberich was tipsy and basking in the presence of his new… friend.
“And you sound like you’ve had quite enough,” Diluc growled, snatching the bottle of wine from the bar counter and moving it out of Kaeya’s reach.
Kaeya was about to say something back, but the Iudex gently squeezed his hand, attracting his attention.
“Perhaps Mister Diluc is right. That’s enough for tonight,” Neuvillette said as he stood from his stool, steadying Kaeya as he helped him up. “Thank you for bringing me here,” he added softly, kissing his lover’s cheek.
Diluc had to admit that it was a pretty picture. Neuvillette seemed unlike Kaeya’s usual partners calmer, more dignified, less coarse. And Kaeya looked at him with something that almost resembled trust, though Diluc was certain the Iudex didn’t know the full story.
“Will you manage with him? He can be quite unpleasant, in that state,” Diluc asked, folding his arms.
“Unpleasant?” Neuvillette looked at Kaeya, who was sweetly clinging to his waist. “I’ve seen him like this before, and he’s never struck me as unpleasant.”
“I’d never be unpleasant to you, darling,” the knight murmured, yawning as he rested his head against his lover’s chest. The corners of Neuvillette’s lips lifted slightly, and suddenly he lifted Kaeya off the ground. The knight giggled, while Diluc frowned.
“Keep your hands to yourself, alright?” Ragvindr warned, glaring at the Iudex. “He’s far too—”
“I would never even think of that, while he’s in such state,” Neuvillette interrupted, his tone sounding genuinely appalled. Strangely enough, his indignation was oddly comforting to Diluc. “In Fontaine, such behavior is punishable by law. I trust that here, too, those who would commit such acts are brought to justice.”
With that, the pair left the tavern. Diluc watched the door for a moment before turning back to his work.