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"Did you know that the sky is actually another world's bottom of the ocean?"
Childe glances at her. His one hand dangles over a propped knee and the other digs into the sand behind him. Her side profile is bathed in warm light and golden irises glow bright. Two seconds passed then he turns away, following her gaze to the sky far above. It is endless.
"Really?" he asks.
He senses Lumine nodding.
"That's why it's blue," she continues. "That's why starconch has a star in them; because they originally came from that ocean and fell to this world as falling stars. Because they used to be a starconch of that other world while they used to be seen as stars by Teyvat's people."
Childe chuckles. It sounds ridiculous. "Really?" he repeats.
This time, Lumine turns to him, snorting. The ebbing glimmer in her golden irises intrigues him. "You don't believe me," she states.
"Am I supposed to? Hm?" And he likes the eye roll she does each time he teases her.
Funny how barely an hour ago they were exchanging blow after blow—him tossing taunts and letting her cold blade clash against his hydro spear—and now they are sitting comfortably on the sandy beach of Yaoguang Shoal. Two pairs of eyes are gazing at the blushing sky and the equally pink ocean, and maybe throwing some fleeting glances her way on Childe's part. His one stretched-out leg with bare foot touches the mushy overlap of water and sand while hers are all drawn to her chest with arms circling them. There is this small distance hanging between them. It feels weird.
"No," Lumine sweeps her eyes to the glimmering ocean then back at the sky, "it's just a stupid story, after all."
The last part comes in a barely audible whisper. One last glance at her profile half-hidden by her dancing hair, and Childe knows it is where their conversation ends.
***
This is how Childe realizes how it has become a silent agreement between them—the walk and rest on Yaoguang Shoal after their weekly spar, with Lumine constantly picking up each and every starconch she found, just the two of them:
- Paimon never comes along with her to the Golden House or anywhere their sparring ground is,
- she never complains or asks when he follows her, and
- he just knows.
The third one is purely gut feeling and never in his life did Childe listen to his gut feeling. It is always either his instinct or his logic. Mayhap it is because he does not consider this as a harmful thing so he went along with his gut feeling. After all, if the traveler wishes to fight, then he is more than ready to take her. But she does not, and he supposes having their weekly spar is more than enough for her.
But not for him, no.
Their short but intense fight is never enough because the traveler refuses to injure him, refuses to break some of his bones or impale that silvery sword of hers deep in his gut. They always end their spar with words of yield or anything that indicates one's surrender to the other. Mostly, it would be him breaking a laugh behind his Foul Legacy mask—the only thing that separates his face from the tip of her blade—as she puts one foot on his chest, demanding his surrender without words spoken. But sometimes, he would be one who stops things.
For her.
Childe never likes to surrender unless she has him rounded to the corner, but more than that, he hates half-assed battle. So when it's obviously a spar he can easily win because she is already too exhausted, perhaps, from working on her commissions, he will be one who calls things off.
Because Lumine knows no limits when they fight. Unfortunately, it applies to the way she pushes herself in order to gain victory. Technically, each time he does that, it is never her loss or his win—the battle simply ends.
"It wouldn't hurt to surrender," is what he would say each time she strains herself as they sit on the floor, with Lumine heaving heavy sighs and swallowing subdued frustrated noises. "It's a valid option."
Usually, she will not say anything to it other than grunting to let him know she hears it. However, one day, she replies, all quiet and muted movements.
"It'll hurt to surrender."
"Your pride?" he asks jokingly, one eyebrow raised.
"My conscience," she answers silently. Too silent. "Surrender isn't an option for me."
Then she leaves before Childe can ask why, only for him to find her later sitting under the lone maple tree in Yaoguang Shoal, staring at the endless sea with starconches scattered around her feet. He thought of it as a coincidence, but the next two times he follows her after their spar, they always end up there.
She never complains about it; or more like she barely acknowledges his presence at all. They sit together somewhere along the shore, sometimes under the maple tree or high on top of the rock. It does not matter where. What she does is all the same, like a mechanical movement set in tireless repetitions.
The sky and the ocean. Those sunny eyes are always looking at them.
But never at him.
Ocean breeze washes away the cry of seagulls high in the sky and words hanging by the tip of his tongue. Something heavy nestles over his shoulders but it is all imaginary. A shallow sigh is everything he has and just like that, their first three evenings together pass by without any of them exchanging words or even glances.
***
"I sense that you're searching for someone," a woman says to him when Childe stops to gaze at the faraway Guyun Stone Forest and Lumine paying a visit to the old lady at the conch house. It is somewhere around their fifth or sixth time going to the shoal together, and just now Childe realizes what Paimon said earlier about a house made from a gigantic conch is real.
The Harbinger turns to the woman. "No, I'm not."
She frowns. "Is that so? Then did you perhaps come here because of the legend?"
He is not looking for someone nor he is here for the legend. Childe does not even know what kind of legend that the woman is talking about. Though, it will not hurt to have some conversation while he waits for Lumine to finish whatever her business with the old lady is. A hand shoved into pocket while the other rests on his hip, he studies her briefly.
She does not look like a weirdo despite what Lumine said earlier about the old lady is living with a fortune teller. The woman looks just like any other Liyue citizen; a total opposite of what he has in mind when Lumine told him about her back in the Golden House.
"What legend?" Childe asks quickly before his stare is taken negatively.
"Why, the legend of the conch lodge, of course. Haven't you heard of it?" When he shakes his head lightly, she resumes, "You can hear the sound of the sea in conch shells. The same is true with the conch lodge."
A hum is all he replies the fortune teller with as ocean eyes lands on the conch house. Mondstadt's honorary knight is smiling as she talks with the old lady, an expression Childe rarely sees from her whenever he is with her. Smiling and laughing—between them, he is the one who mostly does those.
"Liyue sure has a lot of strange legend," Childe mumbles when Lumine approaches them and tells him she has finished her business.
The walk resuming to their usual spot in the shoal is another silent walk filled with the crunch of shoes against sand and gentle waves rolling to the shore. Childe walks several steps behind her, occasionally stopping to watch her picking up the blue-white conch. Now he wonders if she knows about the legend too.
His hand reaches to pick one resting near his feet, walks to her, and places it beside her ear. Gloved hand brushes golden hair and white feathers ornaments, all seems like a gentle caress that Childe wishes he could feel directly. Lumine turns and stares at him questioningly, blinking those deep, molten gold pools that reflect his figure.
"Did you hear it?" he smiles. "The sound of the sea."
Her eyes leave him to momentarily glance at the sea. Before a beat passes, she returns. "But we are by the sea," Lumine says flatly.
"Just humor me, comrade," Childe insists amidst small chuckles, then wonders to himself why is he doing this when they are one step away from the sea.
Contrary to what he expects of her pushing his hand away, brushing the silly antic he often made to her or Paimon, Lumine lets out a small laugh and leans closer to the starconch, closer to his hand. Pink lips tugged into the barest hint of a smile and brilliant sunny orbs lie hidden beneath pale eyelids. Everything moves at a slow pace to him, like a gentle flutter of silk blown by the wind. Childe takes in the sight.
She—
Then it breaks when her voice sails to him.
"The sky," Lumine says softly. "I hear the sky."
Childe retraces his steps as Lumine walks away with four or five starconches gathered. His hand grasps tight the empty shell before tossing it back to the sand. The noisy drum of his heartbeat eventually becomes irritating, but Childe does not push away the warmth that slowly spreads within him. His mind replays the scene captured by his eyes, frozen in place.
Her smile and laugh.
They are indeed rare sights, but he should not have think too much about them, fixate on them. One swift brush of his fingers through windswept hair and Childe shakes his head in disbelief. A pair of slow deep inhale and exhale has her images cleared from his mind.
But it cannot erase the smile his lips have transformed into.
***
The world feels like it is the emptiest and quietest when they are facing each other, weapon in hand, with him cracking a smirk and her throwing a calculating gaze at him. One swift arrow flying her way sounds like a gliss while her footsteps evading it echoes like a beating drum. A hand raised to swing metal blade and Childe kicks the ground. She chases and he dodges, he lunges and she holds her ground. It starts to feel like a dance.
Several days after Teucer returns to Snezhnaya, Childe thought he will find himself surrounded by snow and facing Her Majesty after years away from his homeland. But here he is in the land of rock, city of commerce, somehow keep postponing his return to Snezhnaya. The white color he often sees and often around is not the snow, but under the sun, it glows, still.
Especially this time.
It might be because of the small drain he feels for abusing his Foul Legacy or maybe because of the countless paperwork he needs to finish for staying instead of leaving, but each and every movement of hers is blinding. Swift and smooth, white dress sets aflutter with each movement, golden irises gleam in deep concentration. She overwhelms him.
Hydro daggers materialize in his hand, but the tip of her sword is already drawing out blood from his neck. Their heavy breaths fill the silence, the space between them, and her deep frown instills a laughter from him. His daggers melt away as Childe lifts his hand.
"You're unusually aggressive today, comrade," he says when her sword disappears and blood slides down his neck. "Maybe this is the quickest fight we've ever had."
Because he does not even get the chance to use his delusion—a way to make their spar far more interesting, a way to make his heart beats quicker. Their fight lasts for just few minutes and it is embarrassing for a Harbinger such as him to surrender so easily. The old Childe would never surrender and would do anything to win. The old Childe would not be satisfied with such a lousy fight.
Yet there he is; bow stored away, vision drips off, delusion untouched.
Since when exactly has he become so soft?
So he proposes, "Let's have a rematch—"
But she cuts him off, "No."
The noise of dragging footsteps cancel out protest at the base of his tongue. He let himself dragged by her to a corner where she placed her bag before their fight began. A small hand wrapped around his one, easily engulfed by his hand, looking weak and fragile, but Childe knows better than that. That same hand is used to wield a sword and release numerous blows, but now it cleans blood on his neck, dabs some medicine to it, and wraps it with bandage. All he does is sit quietly, shoulders in a slight slouch and back leaning against the wall, and watch.
Maybe tame suits him better rather than soft. The question of 'since when' and 'how' remains in his head.
"It wouldn't hurt to surrender," her voice softly breaks the silence. "You said so yourself."
A chuckle escapes him after a few blinks; the idea has just sunk in and it pulls in a memory from weeks ago. Back then, it was more like a taunt layered with warning for her. But coming from her, it sounds like a gentle reminder to him more than anything.
"Don't push yourself too hard," she adds as he mulls over the reason for a sudden clench emerging in his chest. Something cool touches his forehead briefly, brushing away hair clinging there, then covers his eyes.
It is her hand.
"Sleep, Childe."
Through the crack of her fingers, he can see her face. It has an indescribable look, something he wishes he knew why but his mind is already too hazy to think.
"Take a rest," her voice echoes in his ears, "I'll be here when you wake up."
Childe does not know if she knows about how tiring has it been for him lately or if it shows in his face, but he knows that those words are empty words. Yet he closes his eyes nonetheless. Her cool hand lingers and he leans to it before sleep captures him.
When he wakes up, the hall is empty and Lumine is nowhere around him. Perhaps she is off to the shoal like how it has always been after their spar. Her words are indeed empty, yet Childe strangely feels nothing bad from it.
Because there is a familiar white and blue shawl grasped tight in his hand.
***
It just comes to his attention that Liyue citizen are treating his comrade like an idol. A hero probably better suits her since technically she is the one who saves Liyue Harbor from drowning at the rage of ancient god Osial, but he doubts she likes to be treated special. She can wear that one story like a pride pinned on her chest, but never he thinks she would love to be treated as someone important.
Yet there she is, in the middle of the street leading from Feiyun Slope to the adventurer guild in Chihu Rock, being surrounded by children asking for her sign and men and women offering her discounts for their shop. The way she calmly responds to the rowdy bunch of kids and Paimon hovers around them with a wide grin tells him that this is not her first time.
But that is not what bothers him. He should not be feeling bothered in the first place, but the way some men watching her, specifically her bare shoulders and back, irks him. Her white shawl is nowhere flowing like a pair of wings behind her and Childe knows too well the reason of its absence.
Stored in his office, folded neatly into a pile of bright rectangle fabric is her shawl she left in his hand the other day. If only he knew he would be stumbling upon her, he would have brought it along to return it.
But he does not and his hands are now itching to slap those men across their head for shamelessly ogling at Lumine. The person in question and her floating companion, however, are blissfully unaware of such disgusting look.
Although his reputation among Liyue citizen has fallen quite a bit, it will always be better to regain their favor than further worsen it even if he has little to no care about it. He can always fight those treasure hoarders if he wants to fight. Just not the citizen.
So he steps into the crowd.
"Quite a famous person aren't you, comrade?" his casual greeting gained attention from her and the kids around her.
Lumine blinks at him. "Childe?"
"Oh! It's Mister Fatui!" And the kids are quick to swarm over him, one tugging at his sleeve and another one holding his hand. The rest are circling around him excitedly.
"You promised me you'll lend me your cool mask," the boy tugging on his sleeve frowns. "And you'll play as the ancient God trying to attack the city with me!"
Childe did make a promise about it; about playing with the kids whenever he is free and lending his mask for one of them to play the bad guy. It will be the reenactment of that day when his plan failed miserably, yet he takes no offense in it.
"Okay, alright, we'll play," he says, patting the boy's head gently, "but let me talk with Miss Traveler over there first, okay?"
The uniform reply of 'okaaay' sounds like a chorus as the kids scurries to the spot under golden ginkgo tree. Childe walks to Lumine and Paimon with Paimon giving him a somewhat incredulous look.
"Paimon doesn't know you're famous with the children, Mister Fatui," she snickers at the nickname. "But knowing Teucer, Paimon guesses it's nothing weird."
He laughs and shrugs a shoulder. "Somehow it turns out this way. Surely it's not all bad."
The look they give him instills another round of laughter. The floating pixie is easy to read as usual, but not so much with the traveler. She probably recalls the day when he had to act like a real toy-seller in front of Teucer and his subordinates.
"Childe, do you need something?" Lumine steps forward. "I actually have somewhere to go now, so if it's about a rematch..."
"No, no. It's nothing about that, just..." he takes off his red shawl and offers it to her, "I didn't bring yours, but maybe this can be a replacement. Temporary, of course."
Wide eyes blink at him, at it, then at him again. Childe whips a wide smile and turns her around. The small glare he gives to the men watching their exchange goes unseen by her.
"Here, I'll help you put it on," he says.
"Childe, what—"
"There you go," his smile widens in satisfaction. His red shawl dangles from the back of her neck, replacing her white one. It creates a weird contrast against her dress.
She turns to him. Silent question flies at him as she fingers the soft fabric and metal ornaments. Her eyes are thick with both confusion and suspicion. Childe laughs it off.
"I thought your back looks lonely without your wings, comrade."
***
"Thank you for your help, dear," Childe hears the old lady speaks as he once again gazes at the faraway Guyun Stone Forest with the addition of numerous orange light flying in the sky. "I have been wanting to celebrate this festival with my late husband, but neither I nor Miss Bu knows how to make a lantern, and traveling to the city is too much for this old woman."
It is the first day of Liyue's Lantern Rite Festival, the day where he orders all of his subordinates to take a break and enjoy the festival. He is supposed to be holed up in his office, working on everything left untouched by them, but there he is, back in Guili Plain on the strange conch house with the traveler who hands out a lantern.
"Xiao lantern carries a wish up to the sky," the old lady continues as she lights up the lantern. "My wish is for me and my husband to be reunited again."
"I'm sure you will," her voice has this tilt he never heard before. Like a weight riding it but too heavy to be carried on smoothly. It sounds like a crack.
"You should release one as well, dear."
A pause. Childe hears the shift of her shoes scrapping against the wooden floor. His eyes caught the nod and smile she offers for the old lady.
"I hope you have a good evening, ma'am," is all Lumine says before taking her leave. Her smile is quick to melt away. When she brushes past him and he falls into steps with her, there is a small tremble of lips forming a stiff straight line in the place of that smile. Childe pretends not noticing it.
Two feet follows small footsteps left in the sand, tracing her steps, collecting the pattern of her walk as he wonders if she has no intention of returning to the city after fulfilling the abrupt commission. The walk is filled with the same silence that always enshrouds them, with her once again collecting the newly-washed-ashore starconch. Gentle motion of the sea pulls away his attention from her and before he knows it, they are back in Yaoguang Shoal; with him standing under the maple tree and her standing a good distance away from him, closer to the sea. A lantern rests at her foot with starconches scattered around, dipped in sand.
A flicker of flame lights up to slowly burns soft wick. Orange glow casts a weird feeling stir somewhere inside him when he observes her gleaming eyes moisten into molten gold. There are stars dancing in her eyes. That, and something else he fails to put a name on.
He leans against the towering rock, one hand disappears behind the pocket and blue eyes tracing the coldness and rough contour of her outline. Bright red leaves fall around him like wisps of flame caged between her hand and lantern. Childe watches her staring at the orange glow, unmoving and mute. It feels like he is barging in on her private time—he probably does and maybe he should go away. Yet his legs make no effort to move; ocean eyes glued to her figure to get a clarity of whatever it is that swims inside those golden pool.
Perhaps, right now, he is hiding behind the excuse of her not making complaints about him following her. She never says anything about it; not when they are in the shoal and not when they are back in the city. Everything happened in the shoal goes unspoken the moment they step away—another silent agreement that, once again, he caught by his gut feeling and agreed in silence.
Even so, there should always be a line drawn somewhere between him and her. Hers is clear to see, something he finds unsurprising. What surprising is that he can barely find his and now he finds himself questioning his own standing. The silence surrounding him feels like a heap of brick falling to his shoulders. Childe shoves it away, together with the sudden outburst of a distorting self consciousness pushing into him.
Although his mind is buzzing with the idea of the papers he needs to review when he returns to his office and his eyes stray away from her, the ocean wind carries in something he probably should not have heard. A whisper, a plea or a promise like a swear to no one, sails to him through breezy air.
"We will be reunited, dear brother."
Blue eyes follow the lone lantern gently floating in the air, emitting a faint glow that is slowly engulfed by the night. He glances back at Lumine. White shawl flutters with the wind and ginkgo hair brushes the base of her neck. Her back looks smaller than it used to appear.
Pearly sand scrunches under his boots as Childe walks to her. He follows her gaze back into the silent sky. The lantern is no longer close to sight, but her eyes are still the same pool of liquid gold with too many muted emotions.
He stops to stand beside her quietly; not too far but not too close. There is this gap stretching between his arm and her shoulders. One gloved hand moves to reach for hers, only to fall back to his side in a tight clench.
Somehow it feels lonely.
***
"You seem to like starconch so much," Childe asks as he observes her fingers fiddling with one in her hand. The other five are piled up next to her, between them, and he wonders if she will leave it there again this time. Ocean eyes drift away to gaze at the gentle sway of water, ignoring the weird feeling he has for the small gap standing between them.
It is another bright dusk steadily rolling into night with not much of wound deep enough to form a scar on his skin from their spar two hours ago, another fight ended too fast. He should have asked for a rematch, but for some reason, he did not. It could be for the fact that he looks forward more to this... whatever this is supposed to be between them in the shoal instead of the fight itself. But he is quick to dismiss the thought.
"Is it because of the legend?" he asks again, partly to chase away that idea from advancing further than needed.
He recalls the encounter with the fortune teller from a couple of weeks ago in the conch house. Listen to the conch and he might hear the sea, she said. Childe tried it once and he heard nothing except echoing rumble that almost drowns out other sound. But Lumine heard the sky.
Childe hums a mutter. "I wonder what the sky sounds like."
A dull sound like something falling to the sand reached him and it is the starconch. Peripheral vision caught her shifting to hug knees drawn to chest. Bare feet dig deeper into the sand and Childe watches the slowly sinking sun.
"It's like the sea," she replies. "Like the deep ocean. Quiet. Soundless."
Peaceful. That word is left unsaid, but he caught it perfectly. A concise answer as usual and he thought their exchange would stop at that, but then she says, "Did you know that the sky is actually another world's bottom of the ocean?"
Childe glances at her. His one hand dangles over a propped knee and the other digs into the sand behind him. Her side profile is bathed in warm light and golden irises glow bright. Two seconds passed then he turns away, following her gaze to the sky far above. It is endless.
"Really?" he asks.
He senses Lumine nodding.
"That's why it's blue," she continues. "That's why starconch has a star in them. Because they originally came from that ocean and fell to this world as falling stars. Because they used to be a starconch of that other world while they used to be seen as stars by Teyvat's people."
Childe chuckles. It sounds ridiculous. "Really?" he repeats.
This time, Lumine turns to him, snorting. The ebbing glimmer in her golden irises intrigues him. "You don't believe me," she states.
"Am I supposed to? Hm?" And he likes the eye roll she does each time he teases her.
"No," Lumine sweeps her gaze to the glimmering ocean then back at the sky. "It's just a stupid story, after all."
The last part comes in a barely audible whisper. One last glance at her profile half-hidden by her dancing hair, and Childe knows it is where their conversation ends.
The weird feeling swirling inside him persists even after they part ways in Liyue Harbor.
***
"Say..."
"Hm?"
"Is it okay if I call you with something else?" Childe asks on one evening with Lumine's finger running along the protruding edge of a cracked starconch. "Like 'ojou-chan' for example."
Moonlight baths them with a silent white light, envelopes them in a cold yet peaceful air and Childe swears he does not know what came to him with that question. Perhaps it is just spoken on a whim at the notice of the shortened gap between their shoulders. He realizes the question a second too late, but before he can retract it, she replies him.
"Sure."
There is a small tug at the corner of her lips, a slight curve inching to a smile and Childe reasoned—'comrade' sounds too stiff, too formal. That is the reason. Nothing else.
A laugh rumbles across him like a shiver of the pleasant kind. He grasps a handful of sand in one hand, trying to contain this sudden surge of weird warmth and full happiness.
"Alright," his right hand runs through windswept hair then he looks her way, "it's going to be my call for you from now on, ojou-chan."
This time, a small chuckle came from her. "This is so unlike you, Childe."
"What is?"
"Asking first before actually doing it," she puts the starconch back to the sand, picking up another to lift it to the sky, then glances back at him, "teasing."
The laugh he lets out somehow sounds like a choked noise because air stuck somewhere in his throat the moment she looks his way. She tilts her head at him, probably questioning the slight delay in his answer and the strangled noise. Childe lost his composure.
"I'm a gentleman. Gotta respect the—"
Boundary.
"The... what?"
Does he even aware of their boundary? His own boundary?
He shakes his head. "Nothing."
He refuses to acknowledge the whispers saying he wants to close the gap between them.
***
Blue eyes reflect a figure swiftly avoiding the stomp of a ruin guard in its rage. The earth shakes but it is not from the mechanic monster, for a ringlet of sharp stones emerge from the sandy ground to pierce its legs. A stagger caused distorted noises to resound across what used to be a tranquil shoal; a cry of fury in its language, a grunt signaling revenge.
Perhaps Childe is too absorbed with the way Lumine moves—smooth footwork and calculated blows, unyielding eyes and concentrated deep frown—that he completely disregards anything else. Awareness is something a fighter needs to have, but this kind of awareness sure is not what he means to have.
Especially now.
A loud yell of his name barely registers to his head as pain shoots through his body; a punch to his chest and back probably bruised from hitting the rock none too gently. He is faced with a glowing red eye aiming at him just a small distance away. If those missiles are all hitting him, although it does not enough to kill him, it surely will hurt.
Twin hydro daggers materialize in his hand, then he throws one right at its eye, rendering it immobile with a loud groan and 'thump' to the ground. A split seconds later, it is completely dismembered with his hydro weapon drips away. He bends to pick up the chaos circuit and chaos core, holding it up her way.
"Here you go," he offers. "Isn't this what you've been looking for?"
Lumine says nothing. Her swords fades away and she walks up to him, somehow ignoring the items in his hand and stands close to him. He watches her, eyes following her movements and widens when her hand touches his chest. He stiffens, breathes hitched somewhere in the throat.
"Doesn't it hurt?"
By the multiple blink of eyes, only then he realizes what she means. "O-Oh, the attack from earlier? It's okay, ojou-chan. It's nothing."
The frown lingers. She says nothing to his reply and took the two items from him. Just when he thought there would be no continuation to it, she suddenly grabs his hand and pulls him away from the site to the usual place beneath the red maple tree.
"Take off your clothes," she says, and if the sudden contact of their hands earlier does not send his heart into a quicker pace, then her command surely does it.
His head rings an alarm, a voice yelling that she does not mean anything by it. Childe knows that. It just that he cannot help but feel self-conscious.
Thus, to wipe away the weird feeling, he jokes, "You know, ojou-chan, if you say that to any men, they'll take it the wrong way."
She glances at him, head tilting slightly to the side. "But you're not just any man, Childe."
The jacket he tries to open is stuck on his left arm, probably ripped at the seams from the sudden jolts of movement. The cool evening suddenly feels a little bit hotter than the usual. Childe ignores the tingles alight somewhere in his chest, the jumps in his shift, and says nothing to her reply that sounds too serious to be taken as a joke.
Silence pours over them like a gentle shower on one summer day, pools like puddles around them and rippling over tender touches. He treats one wound on his chest none too gently while she sits behind him. The Harbinger insists that she can just help him on those at the back since he cannot reach them, telling himself that it is the reason and nothing else in the process.
Again, her hand once again travels across his skin, dabbing medicine to bruised skin and, dare he imagines, traces numerous scars left on his back. Battle trophies, he dubs them as, but maybe to some people it looks like a collection of horrendous deed done in a bloodbath. They are not wrong and neither did he. It is just a matter of perspective.
A flinch broke when her hand applies the cool ointment somewhere around the left shoulder blade. A murmur of "Sorry..." rings louder than it is supposed to be, but pain is not what makes him flinch. It is simply her touch. Gentle as it is, it sends something, a wave, to travel all over him and elicits more tingle.
Somehow it feels more intense than what he felt when she treated the small cut on his neck.
"You have many scars," she says suddenly. "But considering your nature, I guess this isn't a big deal for you."
It is not, but it could be for someone else. Like his younger siblings, for example.
"They're my battle trophies," he replies smoothly, sorting out stutters and flutters in his chest. "You don't seem surprised, ojou-chan."
The sound of bandage snipped fills the gap between his statement and her reply. "I'm used to seeing wounds and scars."
He cocks his head backward. "Really?"
Maybe she nods at him, maybe his question recalls something she does not want to remember. Her hand falters a little. It becomes clear by her reply. "My brother often got injured. When he did, I'd be one who treat him."
Childe mulls over the picture of missing person poster glued at some corners of Liyue Harbor. Exotic clothes and long blonde hair, perhaps the same face too just a little bit leaning toward the masculine side. As much as he wished he ever encounter him so he could help her, he never did.
"How about you?" he asks, noticing the somber tone that nestles in her voice.
Lumine puts on a bandage on another bruise. "I can say I'm better at avoiding attacks."
Maybe she does; judging from her light footsteps and flighty movement whenever she fights. "I can see that," he says, but that is not what he means from his question. "I mean, if you're injured, who will treat you?"
There is a small sigh before she answers him, one that maybe she thought would go unheard but Childe caught it, nonetheless. "My brother and I took turns, usually," another soft dab of ointment on his lower back, "but now it's either Paimon or myself. Paimon does a floppy work on bandaging, though."
When small hands retracted and the quiet murmur of "It's done" reaches him, Childe puts on his maroon shirt then turns her way. Her lips pursed tight, erasing the frown but not quite a happy nor relaxed line graces it.
Smile. He wants to see her smile, even just for a crack.
A blob of water gathers on his hand, floats unsteadily, then swims away to swarm around her in a school of small fishes. The traveler lets out a startled gasp, a small squeak when one of them brushes on her skin, on her cheek, kissing her nose. She turns to him, eyes wide in surprise.
"Keep frowning," he says, drawing out a smile of his own, chin resting on a hand propped on knees, "and you'll turn into a grandma quicker than you thought, ojou-chan."
Wide golden pools blink slowly at him. Once, twice, thrice, before a small giggle errupts in a gentle rumble across the quiet space. "What was that?" she asks amidst laughter. "It's the first time I heard something like that."
It is a childish saying often said to him when he was a kid by his older siblings. And then he passed it on to Tonia, Anthon, and Teucer. And now he passed it on to her as well, to make her smile. Childe joins her small laughter.
Salty scent fills him together with the echo of her laughter. Translucent water fishes swarm around her as he sits next to her, somehow enjoying the small, accidental brushes of her finger against his hand resting on the sand. Blue eyes watch her trying to touch one of the water fishes, blinking those starry eyes each time they come close to her face, lips bloom into a full smile.
That evening, Childe decides that all the tingles and flutters, the flighty sensation and warmth that slowly spreads and grows in him does not feel bad at all.
***
Childe finds Lumine one rainy afternoon flowing into evening standing alone on the same spot in Yaoguang Shoal, with a remnant of dead cryo whopperflower slowly fades into salty, humid air. Her sword disappears from her hand and he wonders if that haphazard movement and sporadic chaos are all hers. She bends to take what is left of the plant, taking a starconch too and places it next to her ear.
"Did you hear it?" Childe asks as he continues watching her, picking up the trace of a frown in her profile. "The sky."
She hums lightly. Her hand then stretched to place it next to his ear. There is an indescribable flash in her eyes. "Did you?"
More than the gentle rumble he heard before, his ears capture more of the rain hitting the sea, the sand, his clothes. Childe shakes his head while she smiles thinly. Somehow that smile does not feel like it is directed at him.
"Neither did I," she says before retracting her hand and letting the conch fall back to the damp sand. "It's too noisy."
One eyebrow raised at that. "The rain?"
"That too."
"Too?"
Lumine turns around, her back facing him, and starts to walk. His question is left unanswered, but he feels as if it is better left that way. He then follows her, walking several steps away behind her, his mind recalling the number of their quiet walks along the shore after their weekly spar. This is their twelfth, except for the fact that she did not show up for their spar today and sometimes they just found each other in this place even not on the day of their spar.
Or more like him finding her in this place. It is never the other way around.
Childe peers at her figure walking slowly but steadily then at the footprints left on the sand. He erases them with footprints of his own and thought it starts to feel like a game of chase. Find her on the shoal where stars scatter as conchs, follow her, chase after her.
Stay by her side.
He did.
"I found him," is what Lumine says after a long silence filled with occasional rumble of thunder and rain hitting the sand like a never-ending round of applause. Childe cocks his head to the side, but quickly realizes she does not see that as he walks behind her.
His voice is light when raised, but he does not realize the weight his question brings; "Who?"
Lumine lets a few seconds pass while Childe waits until the swing of her arms come to a halt along with her steps. A hand clenches another that forms a fist and Childe wonders. There is this weird shift of air around her, a subtle jerky motion of shoulders growing tense, a lilt in her usually monotonous voice edging toward forced stoicism.
"My brother," her voice is a pitch off, "I found him."
Somehow it does not feel right to ask "Where is he now?" or to say "Congratulation". Something is off from the way those shoulders tense or how that hand clenches so tight her knuckle turns white. While Childe feels unsure of what to say, his hand reaches for her, slowly untangling the tight clasp, taking it in his. There is a tremble running across her skin.
"And then, poof," she laughs, yet it does not sound like a laugh either, "he disappeared behind the portal."
Childe does not know what portal she is talking about, but this much is enough to explain the lack of visit to the Golden House and Paimon losing her mind trying to find her. He has never seen the small floating companion of hers acting all panicked before hence his visit here.
A beat runs past them and Childe is now walking by her side with her hand engulfed in his. Cold and damp, tremulous and jittery. The crisp rain water meeting the sand echoes louder than his heartbeat and another deep sigh from her. He turns to her when she stops walking, with her head bowed slightly so that he can barely see the glimmer of golden orbs through her hair.
"You don't have to accompany me here," she murmurs. "If you happen to run into Paimon... please tell her I'll return late."
But he holds her hand tighter. "Actually, I'm here because she's looking for you. She looks like she's about to bust her head open from panicking."
"I want to stay here for some more time," a sigh follows the sentence in a flighty tone, and soon lost in the rain. "And I'm sorry for missing our spar, Childe. Maybe next time. Just... not now."
He frowns. Something is clearly wrong and it must be related to the way her brother 'disappeared behind the portal'. The rain grows heavier and each drop carries more weight to the skin. It does not show any hint of clearing any time soon.
"Then I'll stay here too," he says. Water droplets gather to slowly form a narwhal swimming in the air and rests beside them. Childe takes off his jacket and places it on her wet shoulders. One step forward is followed with a gentle brush of his thumb on rain droplets rolling down her cheek. He places a hand on her back to gently pulls her towards him.
Rain washes away stray thoughts lingering in his head and erases the salty scent mixed with a slight tremble of her shoulders. Her hand tugged the edge of his jacket while he captures every jolt and quiver of her small shoulders. The narwhal lifts its tail, hovering above them, absorbing rain water that falls to them and Childe knows the dampness that slowly forms on his shirt does not come from the rain.
"I'll stay here," he takes in her faint sniffles and batted breaths, "at least to provide a shelter from the rain."
*
When he returns to Liyue Harbor, with Lumine breaking a fever on his back and Paimon screaming "Where have you two been?! Why is Lumine unconscious?!" and "Paimon will go to Bubu Pharmacy!", he finds himself staring at her in a deep albeit restless sleep. Her wet dress is discarded by Paimon, leaving her in thin underclothes and equally thin blanket draped over heated body. She wears pale skin like an illness and he doubts this fever is all from the rain.
Cold sweat broke and he wonders if she has something he can use to wipe them off. His advance on finding a towel or the likes goes to a halt when a whisper sails to him. A call like a plea and Childe is left with holding her cold hands, blowing hot breaths over trembling fingers, murmuring her name when she calls for her lost brother in broken syllables.
Through the night, with Paimon falling asleep next to Lumine and him pulling a chair to her bedside, Childe realizes how he cares for her more than what he allows himself to be.
***
"You often look at the sky," Childe says on their fifteenth afternoon together. "Did you long for the sky?"
The day is inching steadily into dusk, with the sky painted blazing vermilion trailing into a soft blush of pink and Lumine standing a few distance away from him, bare feet submerged in the salt water and sand. Remnants of her muted vulnerability from two weeks ago approaches him, eliciting a throb from deep within and an odd urge to stand next to her and hold her hand.
"I do," her answer is a bit delayed as if she is considering it. The starconches she gathered are floating in the water around her to slowly sink. "I used to fly. Fly with my brother without limit, jumping from world to world, until one day we came here."
He never heard of this. Not from Paimon, not from her. What she tells him about her is always about the fact that she is looking for someone, for her brother that got separated from her when she first came to this world, to Teyvat. And apparently, she has found him, only for him to fly out of her grasp and disappear, leaving her alone all over again.
"I shouldn't have insisted on coming here. If we didn't come here, then I wouldn't have to be separated from my brother."
Regret is running deep and thick within those words. Childe's reply of "If you didn't come here, then we wouldn't have met " is washed away from his mind, from his tongue, materializes as a stiff nod and deep throb like a jab into his gut. It does not hurt that much. Maybe it is because something finally sinks in him.
More than anything, he wants to be with her—to chase away any frowns and return her smile.
So Childe walks up to her, bare feet digs into the sand and feels the cold salt water around him. He takes in her hand, unclenches it to slip his fingers between hers and completely engulfs it. And although he wished for her to look his way, she does not. Her eyes are locked to the endless sky, glimmering and shining brighter than the stars that started to appear. There is no more conversation shared between them after that. Only two pairs of eyes gazing deep into the slowly darkening sky.
But her hand; she clasps his hand just as tight.
***
Two weeks before his scheduled return to Snezhnaya, Childe finds Lumine standing a little bit too far from the shore, too deep into the ocean for his comfort that he approaches her without so much as thought. At the sound of his legs kicking the water and a touch to her shoulder, she whirls around to catch his eyes brimming in alarm.
"Childe?"
He holds her by her shoulder at arm-length, eyes studying her face that shows nothing but pure bewilderment. Relief washed over him at how there seems to be nothing of what his mind dreads. And yet, that relief comes in a yell, "What are you doing there?! You could've slipped and drowned!"
She blinks at him, probably waiting until his ragged breaths come to a rest. And when it does, she huffs half a sigh accompanied with a tilt of her head.
"But I'm not. See?" she responds, all calm and everything he is not. Her hand reaches for his hand gripping her shoulder, feels wet and cold but not unpleasant. "And I can just swim if I slipped. I won't drown."
Somehow, the idea that she could have just swim back to the shore is out of his head, a foreign idea, and when he hears her reasoning, embarrassment falls down like tons of brick. Still, it is a relief that she looks fine, better than the past few days. There is no longer shadows falling across her face or a look in daze. He let her take his hand, guiding him back to the shore, but they are not quite out of the water. She stares at the sea while he peers at her. Her smile has returned.
Yaoguang Shoal is always the same tranquil and stagnant water on good days. The moon has its quiet beam rains on them, reflected in the water to cast more of a gentle glimmer. Her shoulder brushes against his arm. There is no more space standing between them, although it is still the same (comfortable, always comfortable) silence encapsulates two souls.
"I thought you have something to do after our spar," she says eventually, a thumb tapping his gloved hand.
He did. And it was about things he needs to prepare for his return in two weeks. Permission and notice letters, documents and papers; stuff like that.
"It finished quicker than I thought," he laughs. "So here I am."
"Fatui matter?" she glances at him and he shakes his head slowly.
"I'm returning to Snezhnaya," somehow it is hard to tell her that, "in two weeks."
He hears her murmur of a small "Oh..." that got blown away by ocean wind too quick. There is silence filling the pause before finally she says, "I'll be going too. In two weeks."
Childe finds his hand tightens around hers. "Where to?"
"Inazuma."
He nods. The movement feels mechanical. "I see..."
The "We still have some time" is lost somewhere in his throat, caught by a small tug from his chest, and he settles with lips shut tight and eyes straying back to the ocean. Of course, his wish of being with her is an impossible wish. Maybe also a selfish one for he knows she wishes nothing more than her reunion with her brother.
Just like how it was during the quiet celebration of Lantern Rite Festival.
Speaking of wishes, Childe wishes many things both for himself and for her that he wonders if at least one of them will be granted. A quick reunion with her brother and her safety during her journey here in Teyvat, for him to be always by her side and to be able to keep her smile with him. His wishes for her are plausible, but not so much about his own.
Above all, Childe admits he wished more for them. For example, as they stand together hand-in-hand, he wishes for her to look his way for once and for he could have her in his arms. He also wishes for time to go on slower, for second to drags on and each minute to consist of more than sixty seconds, so they can go on like this a bit longer. And despite the objectivity of 'a bit', he accepts whatever the outcome is.
The outcome is that it is simply impossible. And so does his wish to be with her.
His feelings for her are hopeless too.
All is quiet with him stealing more than just twice or thrice a glance her way. He supposes it will be another evening spent without more than this kind of silence filling the gaps and crevices of their presence. That, until Lumine walks deeper into the sea, tugging him to go along with her. When the water reaches her waist and almost touches his hip, she stops to turn around and face him.
"Close your eyes," she tells him, "and don't try to peek."
He recalls the day when she first tended the small wound on his neck, a shallow cut made by the tip of her sword from a few weeks back. It was an empty word back then, and although he holds her hand, he is not convinced enough that it will not end like that time. But he learns the traveler is not a liar—she keeps a lot of things about her to herself, yes, but she never lies.
That day does not count as a lie. After all, he get to keep a part of her in his hands and this time, it will be the same.
So Childe closes his eyes, feeling her thin fingers drumming on the back of his hand. When she tells him to open his eyes, vivid blue light glows all around them inside the water and she is there in front of him; skin all pale, catching the gentle blue glow and making it her own. His eyes scan the whole thing, and amidst bewilderment, his mind can only conclude one thing: "The stars?"
And he can never get enough of her laugh. She lets go of his hand to falls back to the water in a noisy splash. Her eyes return to the sky then pale lids descend to hide brilliant orbs. "Feels like swimming in the sky with the stars, doesn't it?"
"Yeah." He can only sigh in amazement; his brain too dead to form words properly because Lumine looks like a fallen star herself amidst the blue glow. A beat runs past him then he averts his gaze at the blue stars. "Did you do this, ojou-chan?"
"Maybe?"
"No, you didn't," he chuckles at his stupid question.
Lumine floats closer to him, so close that her hair brushes him. "They are sea fireflies," she explains. "Their name is pretty explanatory on its own, but this doesn't occur often so lucky us to witness it."
He raised an eyebrow. "How did you know about them? About this?"
She opened her eyes. Golden clashes against dark blue, and Lumine smiles. "The worlds are connected. What knowledge I gain from another world can be relevant to another world. When I told you how starconch came from the sky, it wasn't a lie."
He supposes so, but it is also hard to believe it.
"Ocean sky. My brother and I call the tunnel to connect those worlds as ocean sky, because the ocean always looks at the sky and the sky always looks at the ocean. But dive deeper, then you might fall into another world because the bottom of the ocean is just another world's sky. Hence, starconch. It holds both the sky and the ocean with it, also a symbol of reunion long overdue and longing. The legend of the conch is true."
He is not sure if he caught all of it in him, but he sure captures the way her eyes light up when she talks about it and the way a glint of loneliness flashes through them. Childe bends to her, drawn to her almost naturally. Like a moth to a flame, her strength and muted fragility makes him reach out to her, searing the line he etched in this space between them. He wants to contain them in his grasp and preserve them all to himself.
So he kisses her, and both are too surprised to say anything when he pulls away.
"Come with me," is all he can say to break their silence and he hates how it sounds so desperate and weak. It does not sound like him. "Stay with me."
Lumine stands in front of him, within his reach, yet it feels like she is worlds away. Her head shakes slowly, her voice spilled in a tremble of a whisper. "I can't... we can't—"
He knows about this, about the fact that it is all hopeless between them. But he reaches for her, closing the gap stretching too big, too wide between them.
"One day, I'll return to the sky," she whispers, all bitter and raw, hot breaths spilled to brush against his chest and tremble breaks all over. "I'll leave this world and let go of every bonds I've made with everyone because I can't and shouldn't stay here. Teyvat is not home. The sky is my home because that's where Aether is. The sky is where I come to existence. I can't live in this 'ocean'."
Childe understands that all too well. Even if she wishes to live here in Teyvat, there is something that prevents her, something that will hurt her conscience and he does not want her to hurt or to separate her from her family.
"It doesn't have to be forever," he says, tremble riding over his voice, "just the present. Now. At least for now, will you stay with me?"
Childe swallows up the word "I like you" like a thorny lump grating against his throat.
***
This is how Childe realizes how it has become a silent agreement between them—the walk and rest on Yaoguang Shoal after their weekly spar, with Lumine constantly picking up each and every starconch she found, just the two of them:
- Paimon never comes along with her to the Golden House or anywhere their sparring ground is,
- she never complains or asks when he follows her, and
- he just knows.
The third one is purely gut feeling and never in his life did Childe listen to his gut feeling. It is always either his instinct or his logic. Mayhap it is because he does not consider this as a harmful thing so he went along with his gut feeling. And he is glad he went along.
Blazing sky reaches out to them in a silent but brilliant shower of vermilion dusting into a blush. They sit together somewhere along the shore, with starconches scattered around them singing muted songs of yearning and the ocean carrying gentle wind. It does not matter where they are. What she does is all the same, like a mechanical movement set in tireless repetitions.
The sky and the ocean. Those sunny eyes are always looking at them.
But now, their hands are joined and the distance between them is gone.
Ocean breeze washes away a cry of seagulls high in the sky and words of longing and heavy feelings hanging by the tip of his tongue. Something warm nestles over his chest and it all feels real. A shallow sigh is everything he has and just like that, their last evening together passes by without any of them exchanging words or even glances.
Farewell, Lumine—until we meet again, in Snezhnaya.