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The night sky is clear. It’s already late, but with a book in his hands that’s never mattered to Xingqiu.
A lamp by his feet on the windowsill where he’s sitting provides him with the light that the stars fail to give him. They’re faint, but there. Bright little things that flicker where the halo of light that the streets of Liyue Harbor emanate can’t reach. The moon is there too, looming over the Guyun Stone Forest, full and casting shadows over the rock formations in the remoteness. Covering the rooftops of the city in a white light that clashes with the warm one that paints every corner of the city.
He turns a page and scans the characters over it, with the sounds of the frogs in a nearby pond as background music, Xingqiu’s eyes turn to the sky again. He wonders if Chongyun is seeing the moon too, wherever he is. If he’s passed out for the night on some hill hidden from the roads, blades of grass stroking his cheeks as he dozes off, or if he’s finally listened to Xingqiu and rented a room in Wangshu Inn, or if maybe someone offered him a bed in Qingce village after a job well done.
He said he would be back in fifteen days at most. Not that Xingqiu has been counting, but that means there’s still one more day to go. Two, if the weather worsens.
But, quite the opposite. To Chongyun’s dismay, the days are slowly but surely growing longer and warmer. Xingqiu has started to feel it during these days in which his friend has been gone. Once the door to his bedroom closes behind him, and he doesn't have to keep up appearances as the well-mannered second son of the Feiyun Guild, Xingqiu indulges in getting rid of his jacket, which is intricate and elegant yet extremely thick. These days, too, the frogs sing more during the night, the hustle and bustle of the city lasts into deeper hours, and the voices sound louder, more lively, filled with the excitement of the incoming festivals.
He’s lightly dozing off to the deep, windborne voice of a man narrating the feats of Rex Lapis, his book rising and falling on his chest, when voices from inside the house awaken him. Xingqiu tries to ignore them. He’s already lost track of the tale so he tries to resume reading his book. But there’s frantic steps going left and right in front of his door, up and down the corridor, and up and down again. Xingqiu can see the shadows under the crack of the door.
He’s not worried about the servants entering his room. They never do, not without his permission. But something feels off, especially so late into the night. So Xingqiu turns around and places his socked feet on the floor, eyes not leaving the door for a second while wondering why the bustle has stopped so suddenly.
He peeks his head into the corridor and he can hear the voices again, downstairs.
“Someone bring bandages,” he hears. “He’s bleeding from the head.”
That growing feeling in his chest plummets into his stomach. He swallows down a gasp and tightens the hold on the book in his hand. They’re not a farmacy, nor a hospital. Why would someone come to the Feiyun Commerce Guild to ask for help? Xingqiu doesn’t want to think about it. He can hear the urgency in the words, so he rushes down the stairs with temptative, delicate steps.
Immediately, he hears his name being called.
“Young master Xingqiu”, Xu says. “I didn’t think you would still be awake.” His head is turned to him, but all Xingqiu sees is the boy that’s lying on the floor.
“Chongyun?” He asks.
Chongyun tries to smile at him from where he’s kneeling down on the floor. It doesn’t reach his eyes. He’s barely past the entrance of the Guild and being held up by Lian, a young maid who is pressing a rag against his forehead. Her eyes keep looking between the boy on the floor, Xu and Xingqiu.
Xingqiu sees the way Chongyun opens his mouth in an attempt to speak, but no sound comes out. His chest rises and falls erratically, he has a layer of sweat covering his skin and an eye covered by that stream of blood that Lian is trying to stop. It looks bad, even to Xingqiu’s inexpert eyes. Really bad.
Xingqiu can’t see anything else as he falls to his knees. Not the way Xu is commanding the other servants, either to help or to do other tasks so that they don’t interfere. Not their gazes as they walk around him, dissecting his every move now that he’s not as composed and serene as he normally is. He doesn’t feel the weight on his arms, suspended in the air as they extend towards the other boy, not reaching him from where he’s stuck to the floor. He doesn’t feel the hand on the shoulder that holds him back from crawling towards Chongyun.
Xingqiu can’t tear his gaze away from the blood on his face and all over his white clothes in splotches, some of which he can’t figure out the origin of. But there’s no doubt that it is his own blood. Some other stains, though, it’s evident. Like the tears in his robes, in the knees and the elbows, which look like they were made by rolling all over the floor. Or the ones on his torso too, straight cuts in multiple directions with the seams stained in red. The palms of his hands are covered in scratches and blisters, and the eye that Chongyun can open is watching him and nothing else. The pupil is visible through a thin slit. Dilated, surrounded by a ring of sky blue, the gaze frantic as he looks a bit out of it.
And then he breathes one last frenzied breath and his eye closes. His head falls back onto the arm holding him up and Xingqiu rids himself of the hand holding him still, expecting the worst and refusing to believe what he’s seeing. He thinks he shouts his name. He can feel the gazes on the nape of his neck. No, no, no.
Two hands stop him, across his chest and grabbing his elbow. They call his name.
“Master Xingqiu,” he hears, somewhere deep in his head. He feels like he’s underwater. How can he hear anything in the first place if all of his brain is working on processing what his eyes are seeing? “Young master, look at me.” But he can’t. He can’t. His best friend is lying limp on the floor. His cryo vision is covered in crimson red. The tassel hanging from it is dripping onto the floor. “Xingqiu.”
And it’s only when Xu drops the titles and honorifics that he reacts. Not master Xingqiu , not young master .
He closes his eyes and turns his head, and when he opens them Xu is in front of him.
“I need you to breathe,” he hears, and it takes him a while to register the words. He thinks Xu repeats them a few more times until he finally nods. Xu places a hand on his chest to remind him that he has a body, a pair of lungs. “Breathe”, he says, applying a gentle pressure that forces him to take a breath. It feels like the first intake he has ever taken and it makes him realize that maybe his head is spinning because he forgot that he needed air and a bunch of other things which didn’t feel as important at the moment.
“Again,” Xu says. He moves his hand away and grabs one of Xingqiu’s. The hand is placed over Xu’s chest. “With me,” he hears. And it’s easier now that he can just imitate what Xu is doing. One intake. Where is Chongyun. Hold in. Chongyun. An exhale. I need to breathe. Another inhale.
After some time that feels like minutes and eons at the same time, breathing becomes an unconscious task once again. His chest still hurts and his hands tremble, and when he looks around, he realizes they’re alone in the entrance save for two servants wiping the floor clean. The rags are red. Xingqiu looks away.
“He’s fine,” Xu says.
Xingqiu looks at him, at his deep brown eyes, for lies. “Is he?” He asks with a thin voice, the most his throat allows him. Every word scratches and claws its nails all the way up inside of him.
Xu nods slowly, like he’s helping Xingqiu interiorise what he’s saying. “His yang energy made him pass out. You know how that happens to him sometimes, right?” He says with a nod that Xingqiu copies as he remembers the few times he made Chongyun eat Jueyun Chillis by accident. Accident . Or when they had to get out of Xinyan’s concert. Or when he shelters himself from the sun under his umbrellas that he sometimes shares with Xingqiu on incredibly hot days, even though their shared body heat kind of counters the one they avoid from the sun.
“His yang energy gets out of control when he’s excited or stressed,” he explains.
“Exactly,” Xu conveys.
Xingqiu nods again. It takes him a while, like almost everything at the moment, but the next time Xu places a hand on his shoulder, he snaps out of whatever he was thinking about. He feels the pages of the book he finds after moving his hands around him on the floor, still trying to center himself, to find some sort of anchor to the present. The edges are rounded from the fall.
“You should sleep,” Xu says. His hand has retired from his shoulder, and Xingqiu won’t say anything about it but he’s relieved. He feels like any sort of contact will startle him. Xu doesn’t deserve a rejection after everything he’s always done for him.
Xingqiu tries to smile. A soft, candid thing. But Xu’s eyebrows remain furrowed, and Xingqiu thinks his are too. Oh.
Xu sighs. “You will feel better in the morning.”
Xingqiu wants to ask about Chongyun. He wants to know where he is, how he is feeling, who is taking care of him. He needs to see him.
The words burn on the tip of his tongue, but he closes his mouth upon seeing the two servants openly watching him. They look worried. He sees pity in their faces. So Xingqiu nods courteously as a parting and gets up from the floor.
He doesn’t look back as he goes up the stairs, one of his hands sliding over the railing and the other holding the battered book close to his chest. He can feel the frenetic rhythm of his heart against the front cover.
When the door closes behind his back, he throws the novel on the growing pile by his bed.
His bed. He eyes it for a bit before deciding that he won’t be getting any sleep tonight and lets himself fall to his knees and rest his back against the wall under the window. The frogs still sing and the moon is looming even higher.
The streets of Liyue are quiet now, the legend that the storyteller was narrating long since finished. The lighted up houses now a scarce occurrence, remote focuses that flicker off one by one with the passing of time, leaving Xingqiu progressively more and more in the dark. The moon is his only companion, just like every night. He can feel its crisp caress on his nape.
Xingqiu brings his legs to his chest and limits himself to watching the shadows stretch over the walls of his bedroom. He can still see the light blue vision covered in red behind his eyelids. He sighs and hides his face between his arms. His neck hurts, his eyes feel heavy and the fringe of his own tassel caresses his thigh as he eventually gets up.
He leaves his room on light tiptoes. The household is silent by now. The entrance clean and every worker in their respective quarters, sleeping the night away. Xingqiu can hear some constant sets of breathings as he roams a hall of closed doors. He slips through the only one that matters to him.
He can hear his soft breathing too. Sleeping on his back, a bandage covering his forehead. And when he sees the way Chongyun’s chest rises and falls in deep, calm breaths, he finally feels like his lungs open once again. Like a weight raising off his chest and shoulders and flying away. Xingqiu is quick in lifting the covers and slipping under them.
He’s careful in touching Chongyun. Even though he’s now wearing some navy blue t-shirt, Xingqiu can perfectly point the places and directions of the cuts he saw earlier. So he covers them both up to their chests and rests his head against Chongyun’s shoulder, not on it but lying on the pillow with his forehead touching his warm skin.
He’s always warm. Chongyun says it’s because of his yang energy and Xingqiu believes him because he has seen him peacefully soaking under the Chi of Guyun waterfalls while he felt like freezing to death inside his warmest coat by the river shore.
One of his fingers traces the edges of a bandage on his forearm, careful of not waking him. The material is rough to the touch in comparison to the skin surrounding it. Chongyun looks calm and relaxed, as Xingqiu notices thanks to the silver light entering through the open curtains. But he still feels so far away from him, traveling to other realms while Xingqiu is stuck here, awake and filled to the brim with worry, relief, endearment and a whole bunch of emotions he doesn’t have the strength to label right now.
Chongyun doesn’t seem like he’s hurting that much anymore, at least not at this moment. Xingqiu is sure they treated his wounds and then helped him drink the same herbal tea they gave Xingqiu when he couldn't sleep on some nights when he was a child. When his father and brother were out on a business trip, the house felt too big for a little kid and some of the family servants. Xingqiu remembers that the tea tasted sweet, floral with a light pinch of something sour which left a pleasant tingly sensation on the tongue. It worked wonders and he always slept the whole night and felt oddly rested in the morning.
He has to admit it was a bit of a risky move. Chongyun can’t eat things that have strong tastes or smells because that too can trigger his yang energy, but it seems the trick worked the right way, relaxing him before it could cause the opposite effect. They probably served it cold too.
Xingqiu can feel his body becoming lax and with it, his muscles untightening as a light buzz of pain starts to set through his whole being due to the tension finally fading. And it’s dragging him down, down, down. So he doesn’t resist it. He nuzzles his face against Chongyun’s shoulder, grabs one of his hands and rests still until the tendrils of sleep swaddle him.
When he wakes up again some time later, the room is still dark for the most part. Some birds have joined the frogs, yet the sun still isn’t going to make its timid appearance over the horizon in quite some time. He feels it again, that soft feeling on his hand, the thing that woke him up. Subtle caresses that trace his knuckles in back and forth swipes. Xingqiu sighs, a mixture of relief and fondness that instead of startling him, grows from his insides like an old friend.
“I’m sorry,” says Chongyun and Xingqiu will never admit the joy he feels from hearing him once again. He also can’t believe that he’s apologizing and, in normal circumstances, he would punch him. Tough, maybe now it’s not the right moment for it. Xingqiu chuckles a bit as he imagines Chongyun crumbling down to pieces from a single slap on the arm through all the places where he’s been bandaged and stitched up.
“What?” He asks.
Xingqiu shakes his head against him and Chongyun feels it, instead of seeing it. “Also, don’t apologize.” Xingqiu tightens his hold on Chongyun’s hand.
Chongyun hums in agreement, stroking his knuckles again like it was an unconscious action at this point. “I’m still sorry, though. You looked so worried.”
“And I was,” Xingqiu answers as he raises his body over his friend, looming over him and watching him for the first time in all his tired, beaten and wrapped up glory. “I still am,” he says in a low voice he’s sure Chongyun catches. Xingqiu brings one hand to his face and places a strand of his bangs over the bandage under which it was stuck. Still, the rest of his hair is tousled from sleep and not only sleep.
“I’m fine now,” Chongyun answers. Xingqiu watches the sea of Liyue Harbor dance inside his light blue eyes. The skies of Nantianmen. The ice of Dragonspine.
Xingqiu looks at the pillow instead and nods in an attempt to convince Chongyun and maybe himself. He is reminded of last night, when he felt like it was his own life that was ending at the sight of Chongyun’s eyes closing.
“I thought you were dead, you know?” He comments in a tone that tries to be lighter than the sentence he’s pronouncing, but that ends up reflecting the raw fear he felt.
“I’m sorry,” Chongyun repeats once again and Xingqiu knows that Chongyun is that type of person. That he doesn’t want to worry the ones he cares about and that he will apologize a hundred thousand times until the word loses its meaning, with both of them getting sick of it and the discussion fading into nothing.
Chongyun releases their joined fingers to bring them to Xinqiu’s head, to entangle them in his hair, placing a longer strand behind his ear and pulling slightly to bring Xingqiu closer to his shoulder. An invitation for him to lay on it, like he has yearned to do since he got inside the bed. His head is just a light press on him and when Chongyun realises he’s holding back, he surrounds him with an arm until Xingqiu is leaning more firmly on him, against him.
“I don’t want to hurt you,” Xingqiu says.
Chongyun just shakes his head. “It’s okay.”
Xingqiu then holds an arm above Chongyun’s torso, lowering it with hesitation until it lays against him. Chongyun grabs his thin wrist around his fingers, completely enveloping it, and moves his arm a bit lower, closer to his middle than to his ribs.
“There,” he says, and smiles lightly. Perhaps he moved it because of the pain, or maybe he just did it so that Xingqiu thought that this newer position was better, and so his worry lifted a bit. He notices Xingqiu relax against him, his body flush against his side, his head a firm weight on his good shoulder.
“How did this happen?” He asks, his voice sounding less hesitant. More Xingqiu.
Chongyun sighs. “I was coming back to Liyue already, and I was traveling at night because I wanted to get back before dawn. I wasn’t careful. I couldn't see well and I accidentally awakened three ruin guards. I hardly got them down. Then, a ruin hunter appeared but I was already too exhausted and... I knew I wouldn’t be able to win from the beginning.”
Xingqiu hums, worried and angry, but not as much as if he weren’t lying here with him now, knowing that he’s fine and recovering.
“But I got rid of it in the end. I still don’t know how, to be honest.”
“Maybe you triggered your yang energy?” Xingqiu suggests.
Chongyun lightly raises the shoulder he’s resting his head on. “It could be, because I was running on adrenaline like I’ve never been in my life, I swear.”
Xingqiu gently pats his stomach as he himself tries to stop thinking about all the possible outcomes of that scene. Playing in his head like one of those “choose your adventure” novels. Xingqiu used to read those as a kid. He often found the stories intriguing although too short, so he usually went back and read every possible outcome they could offer him.
“It’s okay, you’re fine now,” he replies. Chongyun hums a soft sound of agreement, ignoring the rising warmth on his cheeks. He knows it’s not the fever acting up. “That doesn’t matter anymore. How was your trip?”
Chongyun’s chest deflates at the change of topic. From where he’s lying, Xingqiu discerns a tired smile that wrinkles the bandage on his cheek. “I got to Qingce Village two days after I left.”
“Two days?” Xingqiu asks with a frown. “But when we went it took us a day at most to get there. A day because we stopped by the Luhua Pools to nap, but we would have arrived in like half a day.”
Chongyun chuckles nervously as he scratches the cheek with the bandage, picking at its edge. Xingqiu grabs his hand before he can peel the entire thing off and doesn’t let go, just sets it close to his body. Chongyun has this habit of picking at his nails, at the peach fuzz on his face or at the skin of his lips when he’s either distracted or thinking really hard. Xingqiu has seen him tear napkins to shreds, tap fountain pens against all types of surfaces, roll things around in his hands until he polished them. His body just has the bad luck of always being within reach. Sometimes Xingqiu feels like he’s three quarter parts of his best friend’s self-control, while at the same time being the enabler of such behaviours.
“I may or may not have stopped by Wangshu Inn to complete a commission,” he replies.
Xingqiu sighs, and he already knows the answer to the questions he’s about to ask. “What type of commision?”
“A minor exorcism.”
“Did they pay you?”
Chongyun hesitates. “It was really easy, I just had to sit there for a while.”
“Did they pay you, Chongyun?” He insists, his tone sounding less patient as the seconds tick by. At this point he’s used to this, but his faith in finally convincing him seems to be stronger.
There’s a longer silence before he replies. “No.”
Now Xingqiu really wants to punch him in the arm, which he totally would have done any other day, or his leg, or his side. Not today, though. Still, Chongyun can’t escape Xingqiu’s grip on his undamaged cheek.
Xingqiu pushes his friend’s arm away from where it rests around his back so that he can lift himself to hover over Chongyun, one hand holding his body up, the other firm on his cheek, pinching it like the exorcist had any chance to escape in the first place. “Stop working for free,” he scolds over Chongyun’s complaining. “And stop undervaluing your work.”
When Xingqiu finally releases him, Chongyun whines some more as he caresses the abused red cheek. There’s maybe a tear in his eye. Xingqiu doesn’t pity him, he doesn’t deserve it. “What value is there to sitting on a chair without doing anything for some time?”
“I don’t think the one asking for your help really cares about the method as long as the spirit is gone.”
Chongyun looks to the side and pouts before snorting. “Well, I do. I care.”
Xingqiu sighs. He eyes him for some time, during which Chongyun’s gaze keeps roaming around the room, his cheeks slightly rosy in the low light of the morning. Everything but his friend’s face seems ridiculously interesting. In the pursuit of catching his attention, Xingqiu combs his fingers through his hair in an attempt to tame the tousled locks. One of them falls to its right place, but it still doesn’t clear the nest that’s on his head right now, so he desists. When his eyes come down, Chongyun is finally looking at him again.
“One day you’ll get there, I know it,” he says while sticking the edges of the bandage that he attempted to pick at against his cheek again. He wonders why it is that today he can’t seem to keep his hands to himself. “But that doesn’t mean that you have to hate the process. You’re still exorcising spirits, still helping people. I know the excess of yang energy doesn’t make things easy, but you will get there.”
Xingqiu smiles at him, bright and casual, and Chongyun almost feels like he has to cover his face to block the light. So he just diverts his gaze, away from his friend’s eyes that look at him like he is something worth admiring, away from those flush cheeks that look like they feel as hot as his own.
“Still,” Xingqiu says after coughing for a bit, “doesn’t adeptus Xiao reside in Wangshu Inn? The “Vigilant Yaksha”? The “Conqueror of Demons”?”
Xingqiu smiles, amused at the way Chongyun seems to light up at the mention of that name.
“Well, yeah. It would have been an easy job for him, but he wasn’t there. I asked, but it seems like he had been running some errands for a few days and I couldn’t wait there till he came back because I needed to be at Qingce Village in less than a day.”
“The next time, maybe,” Xingqiu provides.
Chongyun chuckles, like little chimes in the wind. “Not really, I visited again on the way back and he was still out. And even so, I wouldn’t want to disturb him either.”
“Of course you visited on the way back too,” Xingqiu ignores Chongyun’s complaints about him being laughed at. “Then, next, next time.”
Chongyun agrees with a nod of his head.
Xingqiu then lowers his body again, lying on his shoulder, against him, and grabbing the hand that had been around him to rest over Xingqiu’s middle again. This isn’t something they often do. Cuddling doesn’t fit in their busy schedules of running around, escaping through windows and exploring every corner of Liyue that’s waiting for them. Not under the shade of some tree where enemies appear even from under the rocks, neither on some lazy afternoon because in a house as big as this one no one can have a moment alone. And what would the maids say? But now, the house is asleep, the sun is low and Xingqiu is warm and tired and as comfortable as one can be lying on the bony shoulder of his favorite person in the world.
Chongyun’s arm around him tightens, his nose buried in his deep blue hair, and Xingqiu thinks this is as much of a hug as one can get out of Chongyun. Sweet and shy Chongyun, who sometimes feels like a time bomb, one tick away from blowing up.
“Then, I got to Qingce Village,” he keeps narrating in a low voice. The same one would use to read bedtime stories, so different from the one Xingqiu could hear from his window yesterday. Xingqiu closes his eyes and imagines Chongyun has his closed too. “After I finished the job, they invited me to stay for a few days, even offered me a bed and food. They wanted to make sure it was really gone. Apparently, this spirit had been roaming the village for some years and no one had been able to get rid of it.”
“See?” Xingqiu says, poking him in the tummy. Too light of a touch to really be felt. Still, the intention is there. “Best exorcist in Liyue.”
“Shut up,” Chongyun giggles. “During my stay, I helped with some other tasks in the village. Moving things around, helping in the crops… I went to bed so tired every night, I couldn't even think about my training. And, no, I didn’t get paid for all of this because this old lady was already giving me a bed and meals everyday.”
“I didn’t say anything,” Xingqiu complains.
“Just in case,” he answers. “She said I reminded him of his grandson who now lives in Inazuma and I didn’t mind keeping her company for a few days.”
“That’s so cute, I hope she’s doing well now.”
Chongyun exhales a laugh through gritted teeth. Sometimes he forgets that he’s healing and certain moves still hurt. He can feel the aftermath of a series of pricks on his ribs like an echo. “I told her I’d visit again soon. Maybe after the Moonchase Festival.”
Xingqiu is again reminded that the summer and fall festivals are right around the corner. He sighs. The Feiyun Guild uses these dates to welcome foreign clients into the city for extended negotiations. It’s probably the busiest months of the year and although Xingqiu is excluded from these activities, he still feels the responsibility to participate. He’s good with words, so he might as well lend a hand to his family.
“How much time did you stay in the end?” He asks.
“One week, more or less. More than a week, I think. I left once we made sure that the spirit was truly gone from the village,” he says with a bashful smile. Xingqiu knows he won’t say it outloud, but he’s still proud of the help he can offer. “Then, because I still had some days to spare, I decided to head to Mondstadt.”
Xingqiu raises his head with a gasp, looking at him. “Mondstadt? Really?”
“Yeah,” he replies with a giggle. “I couldn’t get really far, though. I just reached Wolvedom, that’s right past a place called Dawn Winery. It’s really beautiful, so green and fresh. Even the wind feels different there. Anyway, I was just stepping into Wolvedom when two boys stopped me.”
“Two boys?” Xingqiu asks and, okay, he’s intrigued now.
“Yeah, they were… interesting, I guess. I swear one of them looked like a wolf,” he stops at Xingqiu’s chuckle to laugh too. “Even the clothes and the way he spoke. His name’s Razor, and he spoke about the wolves like family.”
“Family?” He tilts his head in wonder.
Chongyun hums an affirmative. “Bennett —the other boy— said that the wolves were lupical, which is like a way of referring to family and close people, but between wolves.”
Xingqiu hums. “That’s interesting.” He’s never seen anything like it in any of his books.
“The other one, Bennett, is from Mondstadt. He told me really cool things, and he spoke a lot,” Chongyun chuckles.
Xingqiu smiles to himself. “What were they doing out in the forest, though?”
“Razor lives there, with the wolves. They were hanging out and they invited me to stay.”
“They seem really nice to be around,” Xingqiu comments.
“Right? They were. It was fun, they told me to bring you next time.”
Xingqiu raises an eyebrow but remains still, lying on him and hiding from the look on Chongyun’s face. “Oh? How so?” He asks. “What did you guys talk about?”
But Xingqiu is a curious person, sometimes too much for his own good, and so he raises again to look his friend in the face. He’s avoiding him again. Cute.
Chongyun stutters. “Nothing.” He replies. “Bennett said that Razor was his best friend and— you know, one thing led to another...”
Xingqiu smiles and something warm blooms in his chest, that same feeling from before, cozy and familiar, leaking through the gaps in his ribcage, drowning his lungs in the best of ways, threatening to spill out of his mouth. Xingqiu doesn’t let that happen, because his tongue is sharper and always ready to not let Chongyun catch a break.
“Oh?” He says with a mischievous smile that it's maybe a little bit too soft. “Did Yunyun miss me?” He thinks it doesn’t sound like he’s cooing, but he’s not entirely sure.
Chongyun’s flush rises all the way to his ears. His silence is maybe a little bit too long. “No,” he says in the end.
And now Xingqiu does coo at him. “Oh, it’s okay Chongyun, I missed you too,” he says in that teasing, shameless tone Xingqiu reserves exclusively for his friend and for his own amusement. It also serves as a wonderful way to hide just how much truth his words tend to hold.
And no matter how many times Chongyun has fallen victim to Xingqiu’s antics, there’s some things he just can’t get used to. Even after so many years.
Xingqiu watches with delight as his friend dissolves into a fit of whines as he covers his face with his hand, turning his face to the side. Maybe that’s why Xingqiu doesn’t expect the hand that comes flying to his face, which covers it in all its span and that pushes him until he is sprawled on his back. Xingqiu just lays there as he too laughs as quietly as he can in the early dawn of morning, from the surprise and the shock, from having the air knocked out of him, from Chongyun’s face. He feels like maybe he just needed a good laugh to get rid of this worry and weight he still could feel on his shoulders, pressing against his ribs.
Chongyun’s head brushes his after some time spent in silence, time that they use to regain their breaths, to soak in the lingering gleam that fills the room. There’s this flickering thing in the air that dances between the speckles of dust, floating inside the light.
“Hey,” Chongyun’s voice is low as if his words weighted worlds and could break spells.
Xingqiu hums in return. He turns his head slightly and their hair strands mingle together like the sea.
“Next time, come with me?”
Xingqiu furrows his eyebrows. “You know I can’t,” he replies. “I have responsibilities within the Guild, my brother needs me. My father too.”
“They’d manage… Eventually,” he says in an ascending tone that makes it sound like a question.
An exhaled laugh leaves Xingqiu without permission and when he opens his eyes, Chongyun is already looking at him and he’s searching for an answer in his expression.
“Wait, you are serious?” He asks.
Chongyun blinks a couple of times. “Yeah?” His eyebrows furrow. “That’s why I’m asking”.
“Oh,” he exhales in a whisper, and with it he feels every last wisp of air leave his body. The only thing remaining inside him is a warmth in his chest that makes his skin tingle and his heart hammer. "Where would we be going first?" He decides to play along, to let his mind wander to all the places he's always dreamed of seeing with his own eyes.
Chongyun's hand flies to his chin, humming in deep thought. "I will let you decide."
Xingqiu grins with a nod. "That's very chivalrous of you, dear Chongyun," his tone is every bit pretentious and dramatic just in the way he knows it makes Chongyun laugh. And laughing he does, a subtle chuckle that raises a rosy blush on his cheeks and makes his eyes sparkle like the reflection of light on a crystalline lake.
At that sight, Xingqiu starts to feel his skin turning red. He turns on his back to look at the ceiling. Archons, how many times is he going to lose it today. He isn’t sure. He just knows that being here by Chongyun feels right, like the side of his body was made for him and him only to lay against. Last night, something changed in the way he viewed his best friend. He knew Chongyun was one of the only people that truly understood him, the one with whom he had always been the most comfortable, who made him feel like it was okay to just be himself. The one always in his head, occupying his every thought when the exorcist was away in yet another one of his trips. It was inevitable, Chongyun was a boy of the lands and paths of Liyue. Always on the go, here today, who knows where tomorrow. His home was only where he was (even though Xingqiu liked to believe his house was a little bit of his friend’s too).
As he turns to his side again, he realises he’s seeing Chongyun in a brand new light. “I want to see the places from your stories,” he answers, and there’s not a hint of a joke or a mocking tone in his voice. Chongyun’s hot cheeks spread to his ears and ah, there’s that tug again in Xingqiu’s chest. He had always taken great pleasure in bothering him and his reactions amused Xingqiu to no end, but now he just feels like all the teasing is backfiring. The way his hair spikes in every direction is endearing, the light in his eyes is like a magnet, his soft laugh reminds him of the wind and the sun and the fields of Liyue and everything that is Chongyun.
At the same time that he realises that at some point their legs have ended up entangled like vines on a tree, Chongyun raises a hand to Xingqiu’s flaming cheeks. They’re still just a mere reflection of the exorcist’s ones, the blush bright and high on his cheekbones. A shaky finger traces the shape of his features and Xingqiu forgets how to breathe, eyes fix on Chongyun’s analyzing ones, completely set on the path his finger is tracing.
“Careful,” Chongyun says, “or you might boil to death,” he adds with a chuckle as he blows a gust of winter air over his burning face. Xingqiu wants to complain at this sudden burst of braveness when he himself feels a second away from collapsing and turning around and leaving the room and maybe the city forever. In a moment of clarity he thinks of maybe splashing some water on him in return, but he left his vision in his room and all he can do is remain still as every word he’s ever learned leaves his head. Just like that, every book he has devoured, forgotten for good.
Chongyun has the decency to look a bit embarrassed as he examines Xingqiu’s expression with the attention of a person that's sure the other isn’t looking at them. But Xingqiu is and he quite literally can’t tear his eyes away.
“I would take you to the peaks of the Huaguang Stone Forest because the sunset there is a sight of another world,” he starts with a slight tremble on his voice that eventually vanishes as his eyes stop seeing the boy in front of him in favor of bringing back these pieces of heaven he holds so close to his heart. “Actually, to the highest point of Qingyun Peak, where the clouds look like a blanket you can step on and hug every mountain within sight.”
“I would like to see that,” Xingqiu’s curiosity wins over his momentary collapse. “They say that at the highest of Liyue one can reach, the Gods’ abode awaits,” he recites with the melodious voice of a person that shares secrets from ancient times.
“Then we’ll go,” Chongyun says with a resolution firmer than any rock in Liyue. “To all of these amazing places.”
“They sound a bit dangerous.”
“It’s okay, we’ll be together.”
Xingqiu can’t wrap his head around the way his friend sometimes is gullible and innocent to the point of seeming too dumb for his own good and, others, so full of determination and confidence with his eyes ablaze and looking like he just aged ten years in one second. Xingqiu likes both of them.
“So I can save you ass, you mean,” he raises to loom over him again with an arched eyebrow and a stolen certainty he totally didn’t have a second before looking into Chongyun’s face.
Chongyun flicks him in the forehead, but the touch is so light he would have been a victim of Xingqiu’s antics on every other occasion. Today though, his mind is full of his friend and the paintings he put behind his eyes, his body careful of where he is touching him, meticulous in his ministrations to avoid every injury like it was the single most important thing in the world.
“Hey,” Chongyun complains with a crease in his brow and a subtle pout. “I’m the one doing the freezing.”
Xingqiu clicks his tongue in exaggerated retaliation as he shakes his head in an effort to rile his friend up. “Dear Chongyun, how would you freeze anything without my hydro?”
“By a lake,” he deadpans.
Xingqiu gasps. “Would you change me for a lifeless mass of water? You hurt me, Chongyun. I would have never expected this from you.”
Chongyun’s chuckle is followed by a whimper as one of his hands flies to the side of his ribcage. Xingqiu’s hand can’t help but lightly brush his fingers over the place, light as a feather, just the touch of his thumb over his shirt that covers the mass of bandages that is his chest.
It can’t be helped when his voice turns soft. “Are you okay?”
Chongyun just hums in confirmation, eyes closed and a sweet smile on his face. “I’m good,” he later adds once the pain recedes. He squeezes the hand caressing his side to ease Xingqiu.
Xingqiu is reminded of the way he woke up this morning, snug against a warm body to the feeling of a soft thumb tracing his knuckles.
“Let’s just say we make a good team,” he concedes to which Chongyun hums in agreement, nodding his head with conviction.
The sun has started to enter the room, dying everything a warm orange hue from where it filters across the swaying curtains. The breeze on his hair and the golden tint of his skin makes Chongyun look more alive than ever and Xingqiu, from where he hovers over him, can’t help but smile and slide his fingers across his fringe. It’s soft and untamable. The look on Chongyun’s face is one of calm that resembles the usual collected look he often wears in an effort to keep any strong feeling at bay, but to Xingqiu this one looks completely different. His eyes are slightly downturned and a content expression can be discerned from his straight eyebrows and mouth. It would be easy to overlook the faint smile he’s wearing. A subtle little thing so obvious to Xingqiu it hurts him in the best of ways. He feels it like a squeeze in his chest, a subtle reminder that he’s alive too.
“We are a good team,” Xingqiu agrees some time later, though he’s not sure how much. It’s not like Chongyun was keeping track of time either with how fixated his gaze is on Xingqiu’s blue locks which shine in the morning light as they dance with the breeze.
Chongyun places the longer part of Xingqiu’s confusing hair behind his ear. His hand slides until it strokes the ends of it, watching in delight the way it catches the early sun rays, blue and gold and brown and orange, an amalgamation of colors Chongyun is pretty sure not even Xingqiu would know how to put into words.
“So when are we leaving?” Asks Chongyun in a whisper that Xingqiu catches loud and clear.
He caresses the edges of the bandages that cover Chongyun’s forehead. “You’re literally bedridden. Please, rest.”
All Chongyun manages to listen to is the lack of a refusal in Xingqiu’s words, but he can’t think about it anymore once Xingqiu’s eyebrows frown and the hand playing with his bandage rests flat against his forehead.
“Are you running a fever?” His hand moves around his face to feel his cheeks too.
“No.”
The feeling of warm fingertips on his already hot cheeks is not helping his cause, as he can feel the temperature rise in seconds. Xingqiu’s eyes squint at him but Chongyun doesn’t have the guts to say that no, it is not a fever. It’s just all of that blushing and his yang energy acting up and messing with his brain. Fortunately, he’s still in control enough to know when to keep his mouth shut. Now, for example.
“I’ve been better, but I’m doing fine,” Xingqiu doesn’t look all that convinced and Chongyun swears if he ever dares to sit up and go ask for help, he’ll go after him. He always returns to where Xingqiu is, after all. “Please, don’t leave,” he says in a weaker voice and he flushes instantly. Now he does feel that characteristic and very known heat in his head, although he thinks it is still manageable. He’s got himself pretty calibrated over the years and by now he’s pretty sure of where his limits lay.
Xingqiu caresses the cheek under his palm. “I’m not leaving,” he says, watching his friend as he lies under him with his eyes closed, taking in the soft ministrations. “If you’re hurting or you need anything, let me know.”
Chongyun focuses all of his energy in calming himself and just feeling Xingqiu’s fingers against his skin, the cold morning breeze that brushes over his heated skin like a balm, the presence of Xingqiu’s body over him trying his hardest not to pin him down and harm him in any way. He can feel his eyes boring into him like Xingqiu’s thinking really hard about something Chongyun doesn’t have the ability or the energy to guess. He takes in a deep breath that goes through him like steam in a hot spring and hums in affirmation.
He’s a little bit dizzy, but it’s the good kind. The one that is freeing and fills you with confidence and a speck too much of joy.
“My head hurts,” he says.
Chongyun chuckles at Xingqiu’s face, who doesn’t know what to make of his flushed cheeks and a frown accompanied by a soft smile of bliss. He must be wondering if he’s a masochist (he might be, for all the suffering he gladly endures on the daily everytime he looks at Xingqiu in the face). Xingqiu gapes, in search of words that help him understand something. Anything.
Then, in a moment of clarity, Chongyun speaks. “Maybe you should kiss it better,” he says, eyes shining and fixed on Xingqiu’s warm ones.
His determination fades away as quickly as the high had arrived, but before he can cover his face and maybe wish for Rex Lapis to open the ground for it to swallow him whole, Xingqiu sets his lips into a straight line that doesn’t do much to hide a smile.
Instead of rewarding him with a biting response to his foolish act of bravery, Xingqiu threads his fingers again through his fringe, untangling it softly before leaning his body over to lightly press his lips over his burning skin in the thin space between the bandage and his hairline. Chongyun’s heart is about to leave his chest and he prays that Xingqiu doesn’t feel each painful beat against his own body. He relaxes a bit at Xingqiu’s nervous, irregular exhale over his hairline just as he pulls back.
Chongyun expected himself to maybe lose it the moment he looked Xingqiu in the face. Why did he ask him to do that? Rather than overheat to death, he finds he is completely enraptured by the sight of his best friend, who is looking at him with golden eyes that shine like the stars, his hand shily covering his mouth and red cheeks. They look so bright in contrast with his hair, Chongyun finds himself unable to look away.
His eyes fly to his hand again, imagining that Xingqiu is biting his lips just in the way he always stops Chongyun from doing. “Xingqiu… I—”
“Does it still hurt?”
Chongyun blinks once, twice. He shakes his head. “What?”
“Is your head still hurting?” He repeats, his tone not wavering.
The pieces fall together all at the same time in Chongyun’s brain. “Oh…” He whispers. He takes a deep breath and tries not to think about it much more. “Yeah.”
“Where?”
He points a finger to his cheek and he can feel the heat that rises from the skin there. “Here.” He ends up looking to the side, afraid to see Xingqiu’s reaction and finding brief comfort in the clouds of all shades of pink moving across the sky, beyond the green rooftops and mountain peaks.
Xingqiu’s soft gasp is followed by a pair of lips gently pressing over his unharmed cheek for an instant, a soft hand cupping his other cheek, brushing the edge of the bandage with utmost care. Halfway between making sure it doesn’t unstick and a sweet caress.
When he pulls back, he doesn’t completely back off. He stays within Chongyun’s field of vision, right before their noses brush. A breath and a half away.
Chongyun brings a hand to his mouth. “And here.”
Xingqiu smiles warmly at him and then his eyes flick down with that look full of wonder that makes Chongyun forget how to speak. Interlacing their fingers as he moves forward, with a last shaky inhale full of anticipation, Xingqiu presses his lips against Chongyun’s soft ones.
It’s just an innocent press of lips on lips, an awkward try at something new and equally foreign to them both. It really shouldn’t be as mind-blowing as it feels. To close his eyelids and sense the warmth of Chongyun’s mouth against his, the occasional tremble of it, maybe due to nerves, maybe excitement. In the beginning it is a bit awkward, Xingqiu’s body stiff in fear of crushing Chongyun’s middle in a moment of frenzy, Chongyun unsure of where to place his hands, their cheeks all blushed when their noses collide. Then, Chongyun’s free hand finally slides to the back of Xingqiu’s neck and they figure it out. A slight turn of their heads is all it takes. Xingqiu feels Chongyun’s soft smile against his own.
After what feels like too short, they break apart. Xingqiu wants to tease Chongyun, get at him for his blush that goes beyond the collar of his t-shirt and pours out of his sleeves, but he can’t. Because he can feel his head boiling by the second, the slight dizziness from all his blood flow pumping to his face and that squeezing in his chest he has felt before when looking at his friend. An uncontrollable, wonderful thing that threatens to burst out of him in the form of fireworks with an unreckoned force unknown even to him.
“I really, really like you,” Chongyun says, looking into his eyes as if they were the only thing left in this world. Then, he feels the need to add. “As… more than a friend.”
Xingqiu chuckles. “Thank Gods, because I was about to ask if I can kiss you again.”
Chongyun’s breath hitches and, eyes wide open, he nods his head with enough energy to dislodge it from his neck. Before Chongyun has the chance to sit upright, Xingqiu presses a firm palm against his shoulder.
“For Morax’s sake, please stay still, you have two broken ribs,” even Xingqiu can hear how tired his own voice sounds but, who can blame him, Chongyun might be one of the worst patients medicine has ever witnessed. “I will do the work, just— Relax.”
Chongyun nods and his cheeks suddenly redden another notch. Whatever is going through his brain, Xingqiu doesn’t want to know. He’s got more important matters in his hands, for example, Chongyun’s cheeks which he is cupping and pressing lightly so that Chongyun’s mouth compresses into a pout.
Chongyun whines as his eyebrows furrow, which only serves to crumple up his whole face even more. Xingqiu swears he can feel his heart skip a beat, and it makes him think how he did not realise until tonight how absolutely head over heels he is for his best friend. But at the same time, it’s as if he already knew, as if the only thing missing was naming these things he feels all the time around Chongyun.
“Eager, are we?” He says, in response to Chongyun’s uneasiness.
Still, he cannot resist teasing him a bit more. It also hits him how little things between them have changed in essence. Every unsaid feeling has laid a foundation in their relationship since the beginning and just the action of voicing them is not going to shake it.
He presses a kiss that’s more sound than feeling against Chongyun’s pout. “For a speedy recovery,” he says, easing the hold on his cheeks so that he can stroke them with the soft pads of his thumbs.
“Thank you, o’ great doctor Xingqiu.”
Xingqiu chuckles and his eyes squint like waning suns. The second time their lips meet is in a less hesitant kiss. The initial touch of innocence gradually fading into something a little more enthusiastic in the way their lips dance on the other’s, in the soft gasps exhaled into each other’s mouths when they separate during an inch of a second to tilt their heads this way or the other. Xingqiu’s heart somersaults each time Chongyun’s lips fit against his like like they were made in the shape of each other’s.
He doesn’t want to say that it saddens him that he can’t get any closer to him, but it does. Right now, he would give anything to be able to lower his body and lay on top of Chongyun, to feel his adorable whole body blush radiating against him, into his clothes and his very being.
Chongyun pulls away for a second and Xingqiu opens his eyes to look at him. There’s a wide smile of bliss on his face, his eyes closed as his hands roam Xingqiu’s back along the patterns of his intricate, silky shirt. “This feels good,” he says.
Xingqiu’s fingers slip to the back of his head, threading through the short strands as he places a kiss on the corner of his mouth. “Yeah,” he gasps, leaving a trail of sweet kisses on his soft skin until reaching his jawline, which is sharper to the touch than it looks.
He tries his hardest not to think about the fact that he could have lost him on that field full of ancient machines, that he could have gone to sleep in hopes of getting up on the day of his arrival to see him again, only to be kept waiting while his lifeless body laid in a secluded plain, hugged by the grass blades and kissed by the sun instead of him.
Xingqiu shakes his head. He’s fine, they’re fine. It’s okay. He continues on his task of covering the entire length of Chongyun’s jawline in kisses as he goes down, down, down until his lips press against the pulse point on his neck.
Chongyun’s breath hitches and Xingqiu sees from the corner of his eye how his adam’s apple bobs. Under his lips, Chongyun’s skin erupts in goosebumps. His heartbeat quickens. Xingqiu smiles and exhales a hot puff of air on his skin, just to see him react, to see him gasp and his brow furrow. One of Chongyun’s hands slides down his body until it settles on Xingqiu’s thigh, aimlessly roaming it up and down.
Xingqiu can feel the rough fingers of someone who has wielded a claymore since they learned how to grab things, a hand that’s bigger than his and that covers an impressively great part of his bare thighs, hands he knows so well even when they’re usually covered by a pair of dark, fingerless gloves.
While the timid pads of Chongyun’s fingers trace patterns along his fair skin, only bold enough to caress until the hem of his very short pants, Xingqiu focuses again on that spot on his neck, the one that pulsates against his lips. It makes his chest hurt everytime he feels the soft beating of his heart, strong and steady, his breathing and his soft gasps, his touch on him.
So to stop thinking so much, because it seems like the only thing Xingqiu knows how to do recently, he focuses all of his attention on kissing Chongyun, placing special attention in that part of his neck that he finds he likes so much. Not only because it’s a reminder that he’s still with him, but also because it makes Chongyun gasp and squirm and move around, even though he shouldn’t be doing that. He should be resting and sleeping and focusing on healing his wounded body.
Given that he’s not complaining, Xingqiu considers that this is a form of relaxing too.
Xingqiu tries swapping his light kisses for a sudden suction on the soft skin of his neck and Chongyun has to bring a hand to his mouth to swallow down his gasp. “Xingqiu!” He complains, even though he can feel goosebumps rising till the very ends of his hair.
Xingqiu smirks, and does it again, and again and again and Chongyun’s soft caresses on his thigh turn into a firm grip around it. Xingqiu wonders if he would be able to circle it completely with his two hands.
And just because he finds that he likes annoying Chongyun as much as making him feel good, he decides it’s a great idea to softly drag his teeth over the sensitive skin he just spent Gods know how much time kissing and venerating. The sound Chongyun emits draws a smile of satisfaction on Xingqiu’s flushed face. A mixture between a gasp and a whine that, were it not for Xingqiu’s hand on his chest, would have had him arching his back.
“Okay,” Chongyun says, still breathing hard, eyes shut tight. “Okay, enough, too much. I feel like I’m gonna combust. Please, stop.”
Xingqiu might find great joy in nagging him, but he still knows when to cut it off. And while he normally pushes him until his limits, he’s aware that this time it’s different. Sometimes Chongyun’s anxiety spikes in moments of stress when he really doesn’t want to trigger his yang spirit and over the years Xingqiu has quietly learnt to anticipate these moments and guide him through them, with patience and a great amount of fondness for his most precious friend.
“Are you okay?” He asks as he runs a hand through his forehead and combs back his sweat-drenched bangs.
“Yeah,” he whispers as his eyes remain closed and his fingers draw shapes in Xingqiu’s thigh. “Give me a second.”
Xingqiu hums. His hand moves to the rest of his hair, raking his fingers through the locks, untangling it and scratching his nails against his scalp in the way he knows it helps Chongyun calm down. Normally, Chongyun doesn’t allow other people to touch him or get too close to him in order to keep himself under control more easily. But, that’s never been the case around Xingqiu. Huh. Guess the evidence had always been there and he just decided to be blind and deaf and plain dumb about it.
“A second has passed.”
“Then give me another.”
“Done, again.”
Chongyun smiles and it’s fairly obvious that he’s feeling better already. At least it is in Xingqiu’s eyes. He’s not sweating anymore, his chest doesn’t rise and fall like he’s at the brink of spitting out a lung and his face has gone from fiery red to a faint rosy blush high on his cheeks.
“Kiss me again?”
Xingqiu breaks into a full body laugh that has him trying his best not to crush Chongyun from the momentum. “I see you’re fine.”
“As much as one can be,” his eyes shine against the morning light.
The sun is up and entering the bedroom in bright reminders that the day has already started. Once they emerge from their own little world, Xingqiu can hear the sounds of footsteps over their heads, out in the corridors, and vivacious voices accompanying them. The maids giving orders to one another, chatting and gossiping about whoever crosses their minds while executing their tasks with diligence. A soft breeze rustles their hair and escapes through the gap under the door, crisp and pleasant.
The house is up and alive and at any moment now someone’s going to come crashing in, carrying bandages and towels and asking how the injured one spent the night.
“Shouldn't you go back to your room?” Chongyun asks.
Xingqiu’s gaze drifts to the wooden clock on the wall. “They know I’m here. It’s well past time for me to wake up.” He even skipped today’s morning sword training.
Suddenly, as if the world worked in inefable ways to make Xingqiu look smart and interesting, someone knocks on the door. “Young master Xingqiu, are you in there? Breakfast is ready, your father is waiting for you.”
Xingqiu arches an eyebrow in Chongyun’s direction, who quietly smirks while playing with the fingers of his hand.
“Does he need anything?”
He can sense the maid’s fidgeting at the other side of the door. If Xingqiu had to make a guess, he’d say it’s Mei Ling, the young girl who recently joined them. “Master Zhao said he needed to discuss some affairs about the incoming meetings to be held during the festival.”
Xingqiu takes a deep breath that he’s pretty sure doesn’t trespass the door. “I will be there soon, thank you.”
They remain still as they listen to the light tapping of feet on the wooden floor fading away under the growing bustle down in the city.
Xingqiu sighs as he gazes out of the window and into the vastness of the mountains in the horizon. “I need to go.”
“Duty needs you,” Chongyun’s eyes look bright and awake, not as feverishly shiny anymore. He looks like a patient that just needs lots of resting, instead of the dying sack of limbs he resembled yesterday at his front door.
“I’ll be back, you stay here and sleep a lot.”
“It’s not like I can go anywhere.”
Xingqiu hums. “Good,” a smirk breaks through his face at Chongyun’s hurt expression. “Good that you can rest, not that you’re hurt, for Morax’s sake.”
Chongyun’s lips curve into a soft smile that Xingqiu ends up reflecting by instinct. “And when I recover, we will be able to travel.”
“Exactly,” Xingqiu answers in a voice tone as soft as the fingers that sweep his fringe away to leave a soft kiss over the white bandage. “Where do you want to go first?”
Chongyun’s eyebrows furrow for an instant, his mouth in a pout as he hums, deep in thought. “Mondstadt. Bennett said to come visit them during the Ludi Harpastum. He said it’s pretty soon.”
“Fine by me,” Xingqiu agrees. “Think about that. Think of Mondstadt.”
His hand lowers to his cheek and he leans in for a soft kiss, a short sweet thing that ends sooner than he would have liked and with Chongyun placing his hair behind his ear. Before he can think about throwing his responsibilities out the window and spending the day laying with Chongyun, listening to more of his stories and reveling in their usual banter, he gets up from the bed.
“I will think of us in Mondstadt,” is the last thing Xingqiu hears as he turns the handle and closes the door behind himself with a ridiculous smile full of fondness and adoration, coupled with a growing pinch of love.