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The moon cast her gentle illumination on the pair settled beneath the sprawling branches and elegant leaves of the Windrise tree.
Tonight, she was merciful, allowing soft shadows to cast their faces and the ways the two shared stories with each other. A loving respite from the harshness of their lives when they were away from each other.
Childe told tales of his homeland as requested, seeming to have a surplus of them always at the ready. His hands lovingly braided soft blue hair.
He spoke of Ajax as if he was a completely separate person, someone who existed only in memories and fragmented childhood stories.
"Is he gone?" Kaeya asked, softly, tentatively. His hands sat in his own lap, gently tracing scarred flesh and torn skin.
Childe was quiet for a long moment, but Kaeya could feel the way his callous and battle worn fingers were so delicately intertwined in his hair.
Surely, Ajax could not be completely gone. Tartaglia: the Tsaritsa's beloved weapon of war, Childe: 11th of the Fatui Harbingers -- neither of them could love him in such a beautifully, tragically human way.
"I think-" he buried his face in the crook of Kaeya's neck "-you make me wish I could be him again."
"You don't think you can be him again?"
"No, I don't think I can ever be him again. I can pretend that I am, when I'm at home with my family and I'm braiding my sister's hair or playing with my brother or cooking sweets with my mother. I can pretend, but I can't be him. Not like they want me to."
He spoke against his pulse, chapped lips brushing his skin in pastel kisses. Childe touched him like he was made of glass, so easily broken if not handled with caution.
"Do you want to be him again? Like they want you to?"
"I don't know what I want anymore. I only know that I want to love you. I want to love you like he would have loved you."
His words were bare and earnest, shaky under his breath. His hands moved away from the braid he had created and wrapped around Kaeya's torso. He pulled him back against his chest and clung to him so desperately, as if he were the threads that held him together and tethered to this world. Maybe he was.
"I want you to love me like you would have loved him." Childe sounded almost like he was begging, on the cusp of a cacophonic shattering.
Kaeya could feel Childe's heartbeat against his back; it was a reminder of how painfully human he was. The way his hands clutched the fabrics of Kaeya's shirt was more than enough proof. He held him like a lifeline, not like a predator toying with its prey, not like a blood starved beast. No, he held him like a human, confused and scared and desperate for purchase.
"Schatz, I can't do that," he murmured, leaning his head back against Childe's shoulder. "I never knew him. I can only love the you that I know, the same way I always have loved you."
His hands moved from his lap to cover Childe's own, intertwining their fingers. The gentle squeeze he gave felt like he was trying to stitch him back together.
"Would you love me if I was him?"
"I would love you no matter who you were." It was a fragile promise, but one he would willingly die to keep.
Childe lifted his face from Kaeya's neck and pressed a tender, chaste kiss to his crown.
"You're too good for me."
"No, I'm not. Every kindness I've shown you has been one you have deserved. And you deserve every love I have given you and all of the ones I will."
He straightened himself in Childe's embrace and turned his head to press a gentle loving kiss into the soft flesh of his cheek.
"You are more than a beast. You are deserving of love and happiness."
He temporarily removed himself from Childe's arms to turn around and face him. The gentle moon turned the tumultuous seas in his eyes into nothing more than calm shallow pools, reflecting her soft light. Childe's hands found his once again, weaving together war scarred fingers and resting them between their chests.
"Can you call me by his name?"
"Is that what you want?"
"I want to be him for you."
Childe's face rested against his neck once again, finding comfort in the muted scent of Calla Lilies.
"Do you want to be him or pretend to be him?"
"I want you to pretend I'm him. Then maybe," he paused and Kaeya could feel the way his hands squeezed just a little bit tighter. "Maybe one day I can be him again."
His hands find Kaeya's legs, pulling him closer, closer, closer until finally their chests are flush against each other and Kaeya is sure if they were any closer they would meld into one person. Hands wrap around his back and he felt he could weep. An unnatural tenderness had taken the place of battle trained hands.
He held him close.
"Tell me you love him, please."
Kaeya acquiesced.
"I love you, Ajax."
A broken sob wracked his chest and ever so timidly he begged, "again."
Kaeya repeated the phrase again.
And again.
And again.
Against his pulse, against his lips, until nothing more remained of the man but a broken sobbing husk, begging, pleading, desperate for him to say it again.
And Kaeya continued to give in, allowing his companion to be fragile in his embrace and all he can do is whisper "I love you's" and shallow promises of forever.
A fleeting fragility, to promise eternity when they both knew it could never happen. But for now, under the moonlight and the protective canopy of the Windrise tree, it was not a glass assurance; it was steel woven into their tender embraces and every "I love you" they spoke.
No tsaritsa to heel to, no archons forsaken palace waiting for its prince's return, no battles set to mark their permanent place on skin.
For now, this was their forever.