Archive of Our Own

Over time, the passing of the seasons—like so many other things—has become mundane to Xiao.

He supposes it would to anyone, really; a thousand years and a thousand respective shifts in climate make it difficult to enjoy the beauty that comes with each one. After all, he’s seen everything: he was there the spring torrential rain caused the plains in Guili to flood all the way up to his waist, the summer it was so hot the streams running through Nantianmen dried up completely, the fall Ganyu took her first (and, to date, only) vacation—which was nothing short of a miracle. (And the winters during the Archon wars, of course—though those memories aren’t nearly as fond.)

But this year, the newfound spring season feels gentler: welcoming, almost, for the first time. Xiao balances on the edges of Jueyun Karst’s cliffs, fashions a haphazard bouquet of qingxins for the inn’s entrance hall, and wonders what’s got him in such high spirits.

Maybe it’s because the sunny weather—a rarity during Liyue’s usually rainy season—has helped clear his head. Maybe it’s because Aether is here, this time around.

Aether’s fallen into an unfortunate habit of bringing Xiao lunch.

It’s not an arrangement they’ve planned out at any point in time; Aether just stops by the inn to pick the silk flowers growing around, drives back any nearby hilichurl camps as per Hau’ian’s request, and hands Xiao a serving of almond tofu.

Because Wangshu Inn is a breeding ground for all things inexplicable and unnatural, Xiao’s long since noticed: plants sprout and grow in a matter of days; Verr Goldet, a Mondsadter unknown to her people, is shrouded in secrecy and hushed whispers; someone cares enough about Xiao to make him a homemade meal, all for himself.

“Do you want to eat together?” Aether asks every time, handing over a carefully-wrapped parcel.

“I’m accustomed to eating alone,” he replies evenly, and turns to leave—only to have Aether shove the food into his hands anyways. Every time.

Xiao figures Aether should’ve dropped it by now, but he’s never once been let down by it, at least outwardly—just lets out a see you later, Xiao!, gathers his forage, and drags a whining Paimon out by the tail of her coat, with a sweep of his cape and a quirk of his lips. (Smiling. Always smiling.)

Xiao would love to say the habit is a nuisance—a low point of his otherwise normal day. Mostly, he’d love to say it to Aether’s face, to shut him out once and for all—but he can never seem to find the right words. And, infuriatingly, the food is always delicious.

“You know, Xiao,” Goldet says, perched at reception, a hint of amusement in her voice, “you’ll have to eat with him eventually.”

Xiao finds himself thinking, not for the first time, that he should stop eating lunch at the inn—or, at least, anywhere that’s near Goldet. In place of a response, he just glares at his food as if it’s done him a personal offense.

She tries again: “I mean, you’d like that, right?”

He ignores her again, opting to bring a chunk of tofu up to his lips. “You think I can’t tell,” she grins, “but you are happy to see him. Two minutes’ worth of conversation, and you’re looking more relaxed than I’ve ever seen you. And you feel guilty—”

“—I don’t feel anything,” he finally snaps. “I could care less if Aether wants to bring me food twice a week or not. I’ll live if he—”

“—you feel guilty because you don’t think you deserve to feel that way.”

He glares at her. “It’s tofu.”

“I’m not wrong, though.”

He scoffs. “Shut it. Not only are you embarrassingly wrong, but you’re pestering me while I’m trying to eat my food. I’d prefer to enjoy it in silence.”

She doesn’t say anything else. Out of the corner of his eye, though, he can see the smug little smirk playing on her face as she goes back to work, like she knows something he doesn’t.

She’s so sure of herself. Xiao thinks he might explode.

The worst part, he figures, is that she’s right.

Xiao has seen many things during his years upon Teyvat. He’s seen families dig into traditional plates spilling off the sides of their tables during the Moonchase festival, seen lovers share a drink of dandelion wine on Mondstadt’s Starsnatch Cliff, seen friends split a plate of sakura mochi watching Nagonohara Fireworks’ annual summer display perched on Inazuma’s Amakame Island.

He recalls something Zhongli once told him, in years past: that he believes sharing food is the simplest act of love. Because doing so means to share a little piece of yourself, as well: to share the hard work poured into the hours spent making your spouse’s favorite dessert for their birthday, or the warm meal for your elderly father after a long day at work; to share all of the tenderness and care put into the process.

And out of all the human emotions, Xiao thinks, love is the one that’s most difficult for him to understand. It’s an alien concept, the idea of devoting yourself wholly to another person, of willing to sacrifice everything for them; love is an affection rooted in the very depths of your heart, in the core of your being.

Such sweet feelings aren’t befitting of a monster such as himself, after all. And he thinks of Aether’s smile, and his warm hands, and how that kind of connection with somebody else—that just isn’t something he can let himself have.

“How did you learn to cook so well?” he asks Aether, on one occasion.

They’re not at the inn; rather, today, Xiao’s stumbled across Aether gathering sunsettieas near Mingyun Village’s outskirts. The sun shines bright, and there’s Xiao—and there’s Aether, braid loose around his shoulders, face flushed and perspiration dotting his forehead. Xiao probably looks stupid, all sweat and stickiness and trembling hands, and he figures the day’s heat can’t be what’s making his heart beat so irrationally fast.

“Oh,” Aether says. “I used to make meals for me and my sister.”
Xiao crouches down and sits next to him, where he’s tucked himself away beneath the stooped shade of a merciful tree. Aether had set his basket down at his feet, it seems, but it’s since tipped and the fruits have spilled out across the ground. Xiao rights the basket and hands him an apple, a silent affirmation to continue.

“Mm,” Aether hums, and inspects the fruit, turning it over in his fingers. “She was always hopeless at cooking; everything was either burnt or undercooked,” he laughs. “And I always hated wasting ingredients. So I guess I just picked it up along the way.”

Aether returns the apple to the basket and looks up to watch a crane fly overhead, moving his hand to twist a stem of grass around his pointer finger. “I did miss the routine of cooking for others after I got separated from her, though. I started making food for my friends every once in a while—to stay used to it.”

At that, he shoots him a smile. “Like I do for you, Xiao.”

Xiao’s breath seems to catch instinctively, at that; Aether, noticing him tense up, gives him a curious glance.

“What’s wrong?”

“I—”

Xiao clenches his fist tight enough to hurt, nails digging into the skin at the palm of his hand. “...It’s nothing.”

Then: “You must really love your sister, is all.”

Aether smiles, in that modest way of his, and rips out the grass.

“Of course.”

He called him his friend.

He called him his friend—and a small, pathetic part of Xiao, one buried deep within himself, hates the way that makes him feel.

“Do you—are we really friends?”

It’s blurted out, both their hands still tightened around Aether’s gift of lunch. Xiao feels nearly-instant white-hot shame crawl up himself, and he does the impossible to look at anything but Aether, whose confusion is clear from the way his brow furrows together just so.

“Yes, of course,” he says anyway, like it’s the simplest thing in the world. “Yes, Xiao. You’re my friend.”

Xiao’s stomach twists into knots, and he doesn’t say anything else. He doesn’t think he could, anyway—even if he wanted to.

(So Xiao is Aether’s friend—that much is true. But then the question remains: what, then, is Aether to Xiao?)

Zhongli is Xiao’s most trusted associate. That’d happen naturally after fighting a thousand years’ war side-by-side, he figures.

Together upon Mount Aozang, Zhongl’is taking periodic drinks of mint tea out of a cup, while Xiao just spectates quietly. The wind atop the mountains is gentle today—a pleasant breeze at most—and the only sounds accompanying them are the occasional distant call of a bird or the stirring of leaves on trees. That’s another thing Xiao likes about Zhongli: in his company, talking is not a requirement for comfort—merely an accessory to it.

He takes another drink. “You’re tense, Xiao.”

…Though the absence of conversation leaves much more time to be scrutinized under Zhongli’s quiet, watchful gaze, of course. Whilst Xiao is an enigma to those disconnected from him, Zhongli has always been able to read him like an open book. When little else can, it makes him feel rather small.

He opts for brushing it off. “It’s nothing.”

“If it’s got you out of anyone troubled, Xiao,” Zhongli chuckles, “I’m rather sure it’s a little more than just ‘nothing.’”

(Well, it isn’t like he expected that to work in the first place.)

He’s silent for a long while, clenching and unclenching his hands where they’re tucked tightly in his lap. When he finally speaks, his words are slow and chosen carefully: “I’ve gotten…weaker.”

Zhongli takes another drink and says nothing: just shoots him a look over the rim of his cup, his own unspoken way of saying continue.

Xiao swallows thickly. “I’m letting things get to me. I haven’t been able to stop thinking about someone. It’s—” He exhales shakily and looks away from Zhongli. “—It’s confusing. I’ve never—I’ve never felt this way before.”

It’s useless. He can tell Zhongli knows. He doesn’t think he’s felt more humiliated in his entire life.

The silence stretches between them for a few long seconds before Zhongli speaks: “What do you want to do?”

Xiao’s answer is almost robotic: “I can’t.”

Zhongli laughs again and takes another long drink. “I didn’t ask what you can do. I asked what you wanted to do.”

He averts his gaze again—because not once, ever, has it been about what Xiao wants.

“I don’t know,” he says, finally. “I don’t know what I want.”

…But that’s a lie.

Xiao knows; Xiao knows what he wants more than anything. Xiao wants this: badly-wrapped homemade tofu, ugly doodles scrawled on paper stuck onto cloth—wants the stability that comes with it. Wants Aether.

He wants so badly that it hurts, deep in his chest, a sort of constant clawing away at his self different from any pain he’s ever felt before. Xiao’s always lived in a near-constant state of desire: one where everything he longs for is obtainable, but where he must live with the knowledge that he’ll never be able to allow himself to reach out and get it.

Because Xiao is a weapon crafted for war. He is a monster, a murderer, a killer; his hands are rough and stained red with blood. He kills and kills and reeks of death, with each murder serving as a reminder: one that he has not been deserving of love in a very, very long time.

Aether, in contrast, is everything that Xiao is not. He is a kind soul, and a good friend—and though he’d search for his sister to the ends of the world, he would never turn away from someone in a time of need. And what’s Xiao, bringing nothing but destruction and suffering in his wake, to do in comparison to someone like that?

Xiao reaches a desperate hand out into the darkness for salvation, and always comes out empty-handed. There are days when the pain is so unbearable he can hardly breathe; when he hates himself so strongly he fears he may finally slip away, no longer strong enough to cling onto sanity any longer. When he feels as though, were he to let himself go, he could bring all of Liyue down with him.

But Aether—Aether takes Xiao’s hand in his, and he does not mind the blood; he looks at Xiao with a tenderness he has not felt since he was small, and he does not see a monster. He does not see a killer. Rather: Aether looks at Xiao, and he sees someone worth loving.

And that, he supposes, is what terrifies him most of all.

(In the end, of course, the answer is simple—as most things are. To Xiao, Aether is—)

“Doing anything for your birthday?”

Xiao looks up from his tofu at Goldet, who’s immersed in the finances spent over the previous month. “No,” he replies instantaneously. “I’ll just go about my day. That’s what I’ve always done.”

She clicks her tongue and frowns, though at him or at something she’s read, he isn’t sure. “Come on, Xiao. Don’t you ever get bored of doing the same things all the time?”

He’s not sure if a twenty-something human being should be lecturing a centuries-old adeptus on how to deal with boredom, but he can’t be bothered to argue back. It’ll just be more of what she usually says, anyway, so he turns back to his food.

“All I’m saying is,” she sighs, “you should really take a leap of faith once in a while. If you don’t actually do anything while you stay alive—well, then, aren’t you just letting them win?”

That makes him angry, and he lifts his head up to look at her, a dangerous edge in his eyes.

“You’re ridiculous,” he growls. “I do this of my own volition. I can’t believe you’d insinuate that I’d let anyone—”

“—Well, it’s not coming through that way,” she cuts in with a huff, and draws a thick cross in ink through everything she’s written so far.

Once again—to his chagrin—Xiao can’t help but find himself thinking that she may be right.

But Xiao isn’t wrong, either. He’ll never let anyone triumph over him—not even if it kills him.

And—fueled by resolve and a spark of determination he hasn’t felt within himself in years—that’s when he gets an idea.

After Zhongli carved the stone with nothing but bare hands and resolve, Guyun’s irregular cliffs have been nothing if not a pain. Xiao grips rock beneath his fingertips, swipes fragile crystal wings out of the air, and keeps at it again and again. Keeps asking himself: what’s happened to me?

Back at the inn, he silently borrows an ink brush from Goldet’s office. He writes and rewrites and writes again, scratches out words upon words with a shaky hand before finally deciding on:

Aether,

There was nothing for me to do today. So, I decided I would find a crystalfly for you—to put in your hair…

It rains on his birthday. Fitting.

He waits it out sat in the mouth of a cave hidden by foliage near the base of Mount Hulao. This connection of tunnels runs deep, down to the heart of Liyue, and a warmth that envelops the space in a comfortable temperature has always emerged from the inside. Plus, it’s dry; all in all, an ideal resting place to wait out the cold.

Xiao’s thoughts end up drifting back to the letter he sent Aether. It would be nice, he thinks. To see him on his birthday.

But it’s not like that’ll happen. The rain isn’t going to clear up for at least a few more hours. And it’s not like they’ll be able to do much, anyway—

“—Xiao?”

He looks up, and fails to resist the smile tugging at his lips.

“Aether.”

Aether’s sopping wet. His hair and clothes are drenched and the ink on a note reading happy birthday, Xiao! stuck onto a familiar package of wrapped food has bled onto the all-but-ruined cloth, but he’s happy and he’s here and Xiao couldn’t complain—not even if he tried to.

“I asked Goldet where you were, and she said you were going to train around here, so I came looking for you,” he laughs. “But I didn’t expect for the rain to start so suddenly. I hope the food isn’t ruined.”

Xiao cracks open the container. Aether’s usual, simple almond tofu smells of citrus and is topped with fruits arranged in an intricate design. “I tried to make it extra-special,” he smiles, “just for today. I hope you like it.”

When Xiao doesn’t say anything, he keeps going, twisting his hands together: “I’m sorry I didn’t get you anything else. I only found out it was your birthday once I got your letter, and that was just this morning. Ugh, I’m so sorry, I really should’ve asked sooner, and written it down, or something—it’s just, I’ve been so busy and it slipped my mind, is all—”

“Aether.”

His mouth closes, eyes snapping up from where they’re fixed on his hands. “Huh?”

Something’s caught his eye. “You’re—wearing it.”

“What?”

Xiao swallows. “The, uh. Crystalfly.”

Realization dawns over his face, and he moves his hand to touch at the core weaved into the hair at the side of his head. “Oh, yeah. You said you got it for me, so I, um, put it on…but it got all wet while I was coming over here. It looked nicer before…”

He trails off, and averts his eyes. Red quickly creeps up the back of his neck and up to his face, and Xiao hates how it all makes him feel just the smallest bit hopeful.

“I was right.” It comes out of his mouth before he can process what he’s saying. “It does look good on you.”

Aether’s eyes go wide as plates, and Xiao, realizing what he’s said, finds himself wishing—not for the first time, recently—that he could disappear on the spot. Aether looks away again, Xiao pulls at a frayed string on his glove, and uncomfortable silence stretches between them for a while.

“Let’s share,” Xiao says, suddenly. “The tofu, I mean.”

“Really?” Aether blinks. “But I only made one serving. You’ll be hung—”

Xiao tosses him a sunsettia from his pack, and he’s cut off as he fumbles to catch it.

“Just be quiet and eat before I change my mind.”

Aether looks surprised for a second more, but his face settles into a soft smile.

“Thanks, Xiao. For everything.”

(A lot goes unspoken; Xiao can tell. He’s just the same, after all.)

After a moment: “No—thank you.”

“Thank you again,” Xiao mutters, once they’re done eating.

Aether doesn’t hear him; he’s dozing, propped up against the side of the cave, one arm curled around his stomach and the other sprawled on the ground next to him. He snores quietly, chest heaving in rhythm, and Xiao’s heart feels awfully tight. He leans back up against the wall and, before he’s quite sure of what he’s doing, slips his hand into Aether’s. It’s warm.

“I hope... ” he breathes, and lets his eyes fall shut with a sigh, “I hope that you understand what I’m trying to say to you.”

And so Xiao thinks. Thinks about the years of solitude, of the pain, of all the times he’s longed to be finally, finally, dead; of evil, of redemption, of salvation; of Aether, and how love is still needlessly alien and all too far to touch.

(And how maybe, just maybe, with time, he could come to learn what it really means.)

(He does kiss Aether, eventually. Does let his heart spill out of his chest, does cup Aether’s face in his hands, does tremble ever so slightly. They’re both absolutely terrible at it—Aether bites down on Xiao’s bottom lip hard enough to bleed and Xiao can’t seem to find a good angle for the life of him—and it rains that day, too, a tempest raging all around them, but he doesn’t care; not in the slightest.

That isn’t for a while, though. Now, he drifts off in the embrace of a warm cave, feeling the gentleness of a warm hand; and just before he does, he may see Aether’s lips twitch up just so, into the smallest of smiles.)

…and you’re trying not to tell him that you love him, and you’re trying to choke down the feeling, and you’re trembling, but he reaches over and he touches you, like a prayer for which no words exist, and you feel your heart taking root in your body, like you’ve discovered something you don’t even have a name for.

—Richard Siken, You Are Jeff