Chapter Text
How long has it been since Diluc died?
He didn't know. He didn't want to know. Crepus Ragnvindr didn't want to count the days since they took away his boy.
Kaeya didn't either. He didn't want to know how many days had passed since they killed his brother. They poisoned him. Assassinated him.
Kaeya was just fifteen when he found his father laying on the floor with a bloodied body, gruesome choking sounds coming from it.
Kaeya was just fifteen when he realized the bloodied body in question was his own brother.
Here lays Diluc Ragnvindr, 1030-1046. Beloved Son, Brother, Friend and Knight.
Kaeya wasn't crying at his funeral. He was just staring at the casket being lowered into the ground. His eyes were deprived of any emotions, any tears. He was thinking he cried all his tears out in the last two weeks, when Ragnvindr mansion fell in deep grief.
He wasn't even seventeen! He remembered himself crying into Elzer’ shoulder. That's not fair!
It is not, Young Master Kaeya said Elzer with a sad tone. It is not.
He walked through the city gates. The whole city mourned the loss of his brother, of his other half, of his soulmate. Jean once said soulmates don't need to be focused on romantic relationships, they can as well be platonic or familial. She was right.
Since Diluc died there was something missing. He was excused from his duty as a Knight to rest up, without any date to come back. It was almost like Varka was wordlessly saying, You're not okay. You need to grieve too.
And oh boy, he needed to grieve.
Except he didn't want to. He didn't want to sit on the couch and cry for hours like his father. He didn't want to trying to focus on his daily work, but his mind would wander back to Diluc's face, and then he would have to discreetly wipe the tears out of his face, just like Adelinde was doing for the past weeks. He didn't want to be lost in his thoughts and then realize he shed a tear or two like Elzer.
He felt like a terrible brother, but he didn't want to think about Diluc.
He just wanted to move on. Desperately pretend that everything is okay, and his brother is back home, eating dinner when Kaeya still has his patrol to finish.
Except he couldn't move on. Whenever he tried to go back to work he had to pass Diluc's old office, and that was bringing him to pathetic tears in seconds.
Kaeya tried to be strong. But he couldn't.
It didn't take long for Elzer and Tunner to almost run the business for Crepus. They both knew the man was going through a heavy grief, not being able to wake up from bed by himself, most of the time just staring blankly at the ceiling, and the other time he was just crying.
Kaeya caught him in Diluc's bedroom once, hugging his brother's favorite childhood plushie. His father was begging Barbatos to bring back his son.
People in Angel's Share asked Charles how Kaeya and Crepus were dealing with the grief. He couldn't answer.
They were both suffering. That's all he knew.
„I miss you, you idiot.” said Kaeya, sitting before his brother's grave. „Dad’s doing better, though. He moved on, you'll be happy about that, I'm sure.” he said bitterly, hearing only silence as a response. „He still misses you, you know? All those fresh flowers here are from him.”
Varka and other knights suspected Ralph for a long time, and since they couldn't arrest him without solid proof, the public took the matter into their own hands.
No one saw Ralph for a month now.
„Your bedroom is still intact, you know.” he smiled sadly. „Adelinde says that if your soul is somewhere here, wandering among us, it needs to have a place to stay and rest.” he was crying already. Before he could break into pathetic sobs he rose from the ground.
„Happy eighteenth birthday, brother.” he said, voice squeezed because of the tears.
With that, he left the graveyard.
Here lays Diluc Ragnvindr, 1030-1046. Beloved Son, Brother, Friend and Knight.