Chapter Text
“Rain: a quiet tapping, then noiseless if you let it be. Like a heart, an accustomed half-aching.”
— Sophia Liu, “Heartache”
Keqing could already see the news on the Feiyun Slope Bulletin Board—“Yuehai Pavilion Announcement: Yuheng of the Liyue Qixing, Keqing, found dead in the middle of Huaguang Stone Forest. Cause of death: hubris and blunt force trauma.”
Her silk gloves were caked with dirt. Keqing wondered if she’d ever be able to restore them to the rich, dark purple or if she’d be stuck with brown-stained gloves for the rest of her trip. Maybe a two-day soak in a quick-flowing river would do the trick, but . . .
Keqing risked a glance down to where dark water pooled around the base of the stone pillars, barely visible through a growing layer of fog. It looked threatening and hungry like the water was prowling in circles and wanted to swallow the mountains and her along with them.
Shivering, Keqing turned her attention skyward and focused on digging her fingers deeper into the makeshift handholds, expensive gloves be damned. Clinging onto the side of a stone spire was hardly a place to rest.
She took her time as she began, very slowly, to continue her climb. Keqing’s forearms ached and her shoulders burned from holding all of her tension, but the real pain she tried desperately to ignore was the deep throbbing in her ankle.
Even shifting it slightly caused a cold sweat to break out across her forehead. Keqing didn’t need to look to know that it was swollen to the size of her fist; she could feel it rubbing against her tights, and that light pressure was enough to force her to swear under her breath.
Still, it was incontestable proof that she had been right to propose a complete overhaul regarding the infrastructure around Huaguang Stone Forest. The flimsy wood and rope bridges were weather-worn and battered by hilichurls and treasure hoarders alike, and even if travelers were few and far between in this region of Liyue, their lives were at risk.
Especially if they weren’t equipped with the Yuheng’s reflexes and a Lightning Stiletto that saved her when her foot went straight through a rotted board and sent her tumbling over the side of the suspension bridge.
Her aim was true—Keqing blinked to where she’d thrown her Stiletto Mark above the bridge, but a sudden gust of wind tangled in the wings of her glider. Unable to open it fully, she was tossed through the air like a bird with clipped wings until she slammed into the side of a mountain.
Keqing thoroughly twisted her ankle and hoped that it was just a sprain, but with the way her luck was going today, who knows? Maybe she’ll need an amputation and find herself bedridden for the next five years.
At least she was right. She’d proved her point. Keqing clung to this fact as tightly as her grip on the stone as she dragged herself to the nearest flat surface. At this point, even the crappy bridge would do.
The sun was starting to set on the horizon, reflecting bright, warm, and golden off the blanket of fog that had settled through the valley. Keqing hoped it wasn’t a metaphor for her life. Some cruel trick by some cruel Archon laughing down at her from Celestia.
She’d been saved by her Vision, though, so maybe not. Sweat trickled down her back as Keqing juggled clumsily between distracting herself from the jaw-clenching pain in her ankle and focusing on not falling to her untimely death.
Unless it was timely, but she refused to consider it. Point-blank.
Keqing’s hand landed on the grassy surface—a horizontal surface!—at the top of the stone spire and she heaved herself up, one leg dragging uselessly. She gingerly navigated the placement of her ankle to avoid the lancing pain that would shoot up her body at the smallest movement.
Finally out of immediate, mortal peril, Keqing flopped backward, crushing the tall grass beneath her back. She threw an arm over her eyes and groaned from a mix of exhaustion and pain as the adrenaline faded from her body. The sun was nearly fully set now, too.
It was supposed to be, at most, a two-day venture. Keqing had opted for going solo because she didn’t need anyone to slow her down, but the first day was already over and she’d barely gotten any work done. Now, with her injury, she wasn’t sure if she could continue.
She wasn’t even sure how she was going to get back.
There was only one person Keqing would’ve liked to work with, but Keqing knew that she’d have her own workload to contend with and Keqing didn’t want to be a bother. She also knew that that person would never tell her no, which stirred a pleasant warmth inside Keqing as much as it made her dread making any undue requests.
In fact, Keqing shouldn’t be thinking about her. Keqing needed to deal with her own problems, the most pressing one being her ankle that pulsed unhappily in time with her heartbeat.
She gave a deep sigh and sat up. Both legs were extended in front of her, so the difference between her normal ankle and the swollen one would’ve been comical if it didn’t hurt so badly.
“Well, shit,” Keqing muttered after tearing her stocking at mid-shin to peel it off her foot. She hadn’t bothered to use her hairpin to make a neat cut; the rest of her clothes were also scuffed, torn, and likely irreparable. Keqing felt as battered as she was sure she looked.
As far as she could tell, her ankle didn’t seem broken. The bruising had already spread across the area, coloring her skin an ugly, violent purple-red. “Not good,” Keqing said to herself. She hadn’t considered bringing any form of first-aid; all of her expeditions were accompanied only by her hairpin and sword. Excess equipment was left at her temporary camp.
Hopefully, the swelling would go down overnight if she kept it elevated, but there was little else Keqing could do but wait.
“And hope it doesn’t rain,” Keqing added as an afterthought as she looked up at the darkening sky.
“It won’t.”
Anyone else, any other voice, and Keqing would’ve had her sword out and Stiletto cast. Her body reacted to the speaker quicker than her mind could process that there was someone out there with her and she hadn’t noticed.
Heat rushed to the tips of her ears as she twisted at the waist to look behind her. “Ganyu?” Keqing gasped, too stunned to think of anything but the question, “What are you doing here?”
Ganyu looked taken aback but her eyes darted to Keqing’s ankle. She blinked where she crouched on one knee at the edge of the mountain, right where the grass stopped growing before a sheer drop. “I saw you fall, then climb, and now you’re injured.”
“I- But- How did you . . .” Keqing trailed off as she took in Ganyu’s appearance. She hadn’t seen the other woman in nearly a week and swore that she wasn’t trying to draw some distance between them—but Ganyu’s sudden reappearance still affected her just as badly, so it hadn’t worked anyway.
Grateful for the hair that covered her ears, Keqing held onto the small hope that the redness wouldn’t spread to her face. Ganyu’s unwavering stare made her nervous, but wait- When did Ganyu start to stare at people? Or at Keqing, of all people, the Yuheng she’d always deferred to?
All of Keqing’s instincts were put on high alert, like the moment right before she’d fallen off the bridge. “Ganyu,” she started hesitantly, “how did you know where to find me?”
“I saw you fall,” Ganyu repeated with the slow, gentle enunciation of someone talking to a person who might’ve hit their head.
“So you were here before I came? Is it a work assignment?” Keqing wracked her memory for any indication that Ganyu had been sent out to Huaguang Stone Forest. She would’ve jumped at the chance to head out together. Not for any reason other than the opportunity to hang out while working, of course. Two birds and one stone.
Ganyu drifted closer. “Work? No, I was just collecting dinner.” She held her arms out to show Keqing the small bundle of qingxin flowers cradled near her chest.
“. . . Right.” Ganyu was acting too . . . Strange wasn’t the word. Neither was standoffish, but Ganyu held Keqing’s eye contact like Ganyu didn’t recognize her, and the careful politeness in her tone filled Keqing with deep unease.
“Have you, um, eaten yet?” Ganyu asked, looking slightly put-out but not entirely unwilling to share her food.
“You know, I think I’m good. But can I ask for your help with something?” Keqing was rapidly calculating her chances if Ganyu turned out to be one of those bake-danuki she kept hearing creepy stories about from Inazuma, but she didn’t know how she could get off the spire otherwise.
Ganyu paused, unreadable microexpressions crossing her face before she said, “Sure.”
Did she just hesitate? Keqing brushed it aside and pressed on. “Would you be able to help me down? To the nearest platform or to the ground, whichever is easier for you. My ankle is . . .” Keqing gestured at it with a grimace.
Ganyu relaxed minutely. “Oh. Of course.” She stood so quickly that Keqing didn’t have a moment to register as Ganyu said, “If you’ll just hold this for me.”
The bundle of qingxin was dropped into Keqing’s lap while Ganyu’s arms slid behind her back and under her knees. An embarrassing squeak slipped from Keqing when she was lifted effortlessly.
“There we go,” Ganyu said. She stepped over to the edge and peered down while Keqing white-knuckled the qingxin bouquet, wrestling with herself to control her breathing.
Ganyu had never initiated closeness with Keqing before, and especially not to this degree. Keqing was tucked against Ganyu’s chest with the same care that she’d held her collected qingxin flowers; her hands were splayed against Keqing’s shoulder and knee, heat radiating through despite the barriers of clothing.
Keqing couldn’t summon the words to speak.
“I can’t leave you by yourself in your condition, so I can bring you to wherever you’re staying.”
Keqing took so long to reply that Ganyu peered down at her curiously, and her face was way too close. “Okay,” Keqing finally managed, trying and failing to look away. The darkness of night brought out the purple in Ganyu’s eyes; Keqing could pick out shades she’d never noticed before.
Keqing cleared her throat. “There’s a tent down by Qingyun Peak. I have medical supplies that should help with my ankle.”
Ganyu gave Keqing another odd look, shifting Keqing until she rested comfortably in Ganyu’s arms. “Very well.” Her glider materialized on her back, the sleek, broad feathers rippling in a gust of wind that tangled in Keqing’s hair.
“To Qingyun Peak,” Ganyu said as she made a graceful little hop in the direction of the mountain. Keqing stiffened when she felt that their descent was faster than normal, but Ganyu looked unbothered, her grip firm but relaxed.
“You’re familiar with the area?”
It took Keqing a moment to realize that Ganyu had asked her a question. Is she making small talk? They’d never exchanged more than polite cordialities if they weren't talking about work. Mystified but more than willing to play along, Keqing answered, “Yes. In theory, at least. On paper. It’s my job to know these things.”
“I hadn’t realized that human civilization had taken an interest in land so far from the Sea of Clouds,” Ganyu mused aloud. She looked straight ahead as she navigated carefully through the sudden updrafts and spires of stone, but Keqing’s jaw dropped in a stunned silence.
Keqing’s lips moved soundlessly while her mind worked overtime to comprehend what exactly Ganyu just said. “What . . . do you mean?”
Ganyu glanced down at Keqing with a raised eyebrow and a polite smile. “You’re human, aren’t you? And well-versed in the world of the adepti, it seems. Not many humans would know my name, so I figured you were special.”
Special. A traitorous blush crept across Keqing’s cheeks even as horror settled in the pit of her stomach. “Ganyu, I’m Keqing,” she said with emphasis.
Ganyu’s smile deepened, the soft amusement visible in the curve of her lips. “Keqing, well met.”
Maybe Keqing did fall and die, and her only consolation for passing too early into the afterlife was a hallucination of being carried in Ganyu’s arms. But Keqing recognized the look, now—Ganyu had always been kind and polite, but there was a guardedness in her eyes here that never existed before.
Like she was speaking to a stranger.
“Do the words ‘Yuheng’ or ‘Liyue Qixing’ mean anything to you?” Keqing asked as her gaze darted over all the areas of Ganyu’s head that were visible to her, looking for any sign of injury. The pale blue hair looked ruffled but untouched. If Ganyu was hurt, Keqing had no idea what she could do for her. The only thing she could think of would be to keep an eye on her until Keqing figured out what was wrong.
“I don’t think they do,” Ganyu said as they drifted lower, quickly approaching the outcropping of land between the foot of Qingyun Peak and Huaguang Stone Forest. “Should they?”
“Have you hit your head recently?”
“No.” Ganyu landed with a quiet grunt, arms flexing under Keqing’s weight and head swiveling for Keqing’s campsite. “Did you? I forgot to ask.”
Keqing pointed at the half-hidden tent tucked against the side of the mountain and tied between two trees. “Don’t worry, I didn’t. But Ganyu . . .” Keqing hesitated as she chewed on her words.
She wanted to approach the matter delicately, but not knowing what kind of memory loss Ganyu suffered from or how deep it went made Keqing apprehensive. Most worrying was the possibility that it was a consensual wipe of her memory. Had Ganyu gotten tired of living among the people of Liyue?
Then, an inexplicably selfish thought: had Ganyu gotten tired of her?
Keqing squashed that idea before it festered into something uncontrollable. They were just coworkers. They didn’t know each other that well at all.
“-kay?”
Keqing shook her head, catching only the tail end of whatever Ganyu was saying. “I’m sorry, I was lost in thought.”
“That’s fine. I was asking if here was okay.” Ganyu had brought Keqing right up to her tent, and the first-aid kit was visible, a corner of the box poking out from underneath her pile of spare clothes.
“Yes, this is perfect.”
Ganyu lowered Keqing gently to the ground. Keqing immediately shifted forward to swipe the box and rummaged through its contents. Her hand landed on the roll of bandage she could use to wrap her ankle, and as Keqing pulled it out with a victorious “Aha!” cool fingers brushed against the triangle of bare skin on her upper back.
Startled, Keqing twitched and dropped the bandage, but the touch didn’t pull away.
“You have a Vision,” Ganyu breathed, her voice low and awed. She pressed more firmly against Keqing’s back, her palm almost flat against Keqing.
“Yes?” Keqing hadn’t realized that Ganyu was standing right behind her and, flustered, she didn’t stop to consider her next words. “So do you.”
Ganyu responded with quiet laughter. “All adepti are illuminated by the light of the gods’ eyes. But you probably already knew that, Miss Keqing, a human who ventures into Minlin alone and knows the name of an obscure adeptus.” Thankfully, her hand withdrew. “You’ve been acknowledged by Celestia. I knew you were special.”
Keqing rolled her eyes and kept her head lowered. The fall of her hair hid the flush on her face. “I don’t need the approval of the gods,” she muttered, focused on wrapping her ankle. “My achievements are the product of my own hard work.”
Ganyu moved around Keqing to sit with her back against one of the trees. She curled her legs beneath herself and tilted her head as she watched Keqing with blatant curiosity.
The directness of her gaze was unnerving. Keqing didn’t dislike it, necessarily. But Ganyu had never been the type to stare at anything ever, and Keqing felt like she was being picked apart.
The differences between this version of Ganyu and the one Keqing had worked alongside were not so drastic after all because Keqing forgot herself when she finished adjusting the wrap to ensure it had the right amount of compression, hissing and huffing from the tenderness of the bruise all the while.
Exasperated and piqued by pain, she looked up to meet Ganyu’s stare. “What is it?”
Ganyu’s eyes widened and her gaze slid sideways guiltily. Finally, an expression Keqing recognized, but the knowledge made Keqing regret the sharpness of her tone. “Am I being a bother?” Ganyu asked. “I don’t want to force my company on you.”
“No, no,” Keqing said quickly, “in fact”—wouldn’t it be easier to keep an eye on Ganyu if she hung around?—“I would appreciate it if you could stay with me a little while longer.”
“Because of my condition,” Keqing added, echoing Ganyu’s words from earlier.
Ganyu smiled. “Certainly. If you’re finished, could I ask for my-” She pointed at the bundle of qingxin Keqing had tucked into her overcoat.
“Right, sorry.” Keqing handed them over, and the silence between them was interspersed with the sound of munching and the occasional crunch of a stem. It was too dark now to continue making any more notes in her journal, so Keqing had to mentally brainstorm solutions for both her and Ganyu’s predicament. How much did she know? How much did she remember?
Best case scenario: Ganyu regained all of her memories in the morning, Keqing’s ankle healed overnight, and they headed back to Liyue Harbor together.
Worst case scenario . . . Well, this was already pretty bad and outside any realm of expectation Keqing could’ve anticipated. At least Ganyu didn’t seem inclined to wandering off. Her open, obvious interest in Keqing was likely a clinical curiosity, but Keqing didn’t mind playing the special human with a Vision if it kept Ganyu nearby.
“Ganyu?”
“Mm?” Ganyu’s head turned toward Keqing, silver moonlight gleaming off her bright eyes. Her cheeks were slightly puffed out like she’d just taken a mouthful of her food.
“Can I ask why you approached me?”
Ganyu nodded slowly, considering. When she’d chewed enough to swallow, she said, “Humans are a very rare encounter in these parts. I grew up around here, you see.”
“Jueyun Karst,” Keqing supplied before she thought better of it.
Ganyu’s eyebrows shot up. “Y-yes. And, um, I couldn’t ignore an injured human in good conscience. It goes against my nature.”
The silence grew back thicker than before, and Ganyu had stopped eating. Keqing listened to the sounds of insects and nocturnal wildlife before taking a shot in the dark.
“What if I told you that I know you, but you seem to have forgotten me?”
A cloud passed in front of the moon, rendering Keqing no longer able to make out Ganyu’s expression, but the silhouette of her sat with perfect stillness.
When she spoke, her voice was soft and wondering, like she was half-asleep. “It would explain why so many things have . . . changed.”
“I don’t know what happened, but I only want to help.” Keqing was quick to reassure. “We were f-friends.” She winced at her hesitation and hoped Ganyu didn’t notice.
“I was friends with a human?”
Keqing nodded before she remembered that Ganyu probably couldn’t see her either. “Yes, and you had many other human friends, too. I just happened to be the one who found you out here today.”
Ganyu made a noise of discontent, a hum in the back of her throat. “I may have lied. It wasn’t only because you were hurt.” A gap in the clouds revealed a flash of the gold in her eyes before they disappeared again into the darkness. “You felt familiar. Were we very close?”
So she remembers some things! Keqing laughed, but an edge of nervousness crept in at the end and she cut off with a cough. “Um, we . . . worked together very closely.” In proximity. Sometimes.
The clouds passed, and the entire sky brightened from the light of the full moon. Ganyu’s blue hair pooled like liquid silver in her lap, where she played with the uneaten leaves from her qingxin flowers. “Mm,” Ganyu hummed after a long moment, “that makes sense. Every time you said my name, it felt like you knew me.”
Keqing smiled, small and wistful. I wish, I really do.
---
After that, Ganyu suddenly felt more comfortable peppering Keqing with questions about whatever struck her fancy. She seemed particularly hung up on human civilization, and Keqing took the opportunity to invite her back to Liyue Harbor.
“What’s it like?” Ganyu asked as Keqing was preparing to bed down for the night. She hovered by the tent entrance like an awkward guest who wouldn’t enter without an explicit invitation.
“Would you like to see?” I should check if Bubu Pharmacy might have anything for her memory, Keqing made a mental note.
“Are you sure that’s safe?”
Keqing turned at the surprise in her voice to see a wide-eyed Ganyu, hands clutched close to her chest. Yet another expression that Keqing found so dearly familiar that she had to look away. “Of course. You came from there yourself, you know.”
Ganyu stood in silence for so long that Keqing had to glance behind her to see if she was still there. Her hands had dropped down to her sides, the slump of her shoulders and downward tilt of her head making her look small.
“Would you like to sit?” Keqing ventured to ask. She shifted sideways on her bedroll and bit back a wince as she lifted her leg over to make room.
Ganyu dipped her head in a small nod and ducked into the tent, drawing her legs up to her chin as she sat right inside the entrance. It was too dark to make out any expressions and Ganyu had curled up on herself, so Keqing was at a loss. She had zero read on Ganyu, and the longer she had to wait for Ganyu to say something, the more nervous she got.
“You can, um,” Keqing floundered for the right words, the right tone, “you can ask me about anything.”
“I don’t understand.” There’s an edge of frustration in Ganyu’s voice that Keqing has never heard before. “This doesn’t make any sense.”
“How long have you been here?”
Ganyu’s head lifts, shadows curving around the outline of her horns in the darkness. “I was born here. I grew up here.”
Okay, not helpful. “Have you . . . have you seen any of the other adepti recently?”
“My kind tends toward a more solitary lifestyle,” Ganyu started slowly.
Keqing realized that she was picking her words carefully. “I know that you’re qilin. You don’t need to hide anything from me.”
Ganyu drew in an audible breath and exhaled with a shaky laugh. “It’s disorienting, to say the least, that you know more about me than I’ve ever told anyone.”
“It was shared in confidence. Only a select few know, and the rest of Liyue think that your horns are ornamental.”
Ganyu laughed again, but it was lighter and surer, tension loosening from the tight coil of her body. “Humans are really that gullible?”
“They really are,” Keqing muttered, grateful for the darkness that hid the blush warming her ears. “You’re well-known and well-liked in Liyue. I can assure you of your safety.”
“I trust you.”
The lack of hesitation, the complete conviction in Ganyu’s voice gave Keqing pause. “You do?”
“Of course.” Ganyu might have shrugged, a barely-there wiggle in her formless silhouette. Keqing was going cross-eyed trying to find the shape of her in the dark and decided to lie down to stare at the ceiling of her tent. There’s a quiet rustle of shifting cloth as Ganyu moved around, and Keqing started at the feeling of something brushing her knee.
“Sorry,” Ganyu said the moment Keqing twitched away, “I can sleep outside. I don’t want to bother you.”
Is she going to sleep by my feet like a dog? “Don’t worry about it. Do you usually sleep outside?” Keqing asked instead.
“. . . Sometimes.” It’s back again, the hesitant, not-so-subtle dancing around questions whose answer Keqing ought to know already if she and Ganyu were as close as she implied. The thought that Keqing might be lying by omission made guilt sit like bile on her tongue.
“You can- you can come up here. Next to me, I mean. It makes me nervous to have you so close to my bad ankle.” Keqing had it propped up on her bag and thought nothing of the offer for Ganyu to join her until Ganyu was already next to her.
Ganyu was so close that their elbows nearly brushed. Their combined body heat slowly warmed the cool night air inside the tent, and Keqing suddenly felt hyperaware of everything, from how much she kept shifting to get comfortable to the pace of her own breathing.
Ganyu’s breathing, as Keqing listened to it, deepened and evened out. Keqing smiled to herself in the dark. Regardless of deadlines or upcoming meetings throughout the day, Ganyu always managed to fall asleep so easily. She was as punctual with her regular naps as she was with everything else in her responsibility.
Keqing laced her fingers together and rested them on her stomach, wide awake and far too wired to sleep. Just what is going on with Ganyu? Keqing had more questions than she had words to put together, but as she closed her eyes to concentrate, she couldn’t get the sweetly bitter smell of qingxin out of her head.
---
Keqing woke up freezing. She immediately rolled onto her side and tried to curl up, but her ankle protested, the pain sharp enough to rip through her foggy half-consciousness.
Her first instinct was to cry out as both hands flew to the offending leg. Instead, Keqing gritted her teeth and let a hiss of pain escape her in a cloud of vapor. She blew the same warm breath into her hands and rubbed them together, glancing about as she took stock of her surroundings. Keqing was alone in her tent.
Keqing’s cloak had slipped off in the middle of the night, no doubt a consequence of the restless sleep that she now felt keenly. The ache in her body was from more than just sleeping on the ground—her amorphous dreams had been punctuated by flashes of a certain blue-haired co-worker.
It was not the first time Keqing had ever dreamt of Ganyu, but the careful curiosity in Ganyu’s eyes was very new and not entirely unwelcome. Keqing took a few moments before announcing that she was awake to steel herself for a day of more of the same.
When they got back to Liyue Harbor, Ganyu’s problem would be out of Keqing’s hands. She was the focus of Ganyu’s attention for now because she was the only other person there to focus on. All Keqing needed to concern herself with was how to get back.
Keqing repeated this to herself, running the same line over and over in her head as she slowly sat up and wrapped the cloak around her shoulders. She fiddled with the clasp and eyed the notebook she’d brought along to fill out with details for her report.
That was a better course of action: distracting herself with the work she’d come all the way out here to accomplish. The threat of failure had always been more than adequate at spurring Keqing into action; how could she spare the time entertaining fantasies of Ganyu having more than a temporary fascination with her when there was work to be done?
Keqing leaned forward and dragged the notebook over to her side. Through the gap between the tent flaps, Keqing caught a glimpse of movement that she resolutely ignored as she started to document exactly when and where her accident had occurred in Huaguang Stone Forest.
For a moment, Keqing’s tent was filled with the quiet scratching of pencil on paper as she made her notes, pausing only to cross-reference her loose sketch with the map she’d folded and tucked between the blank pages and the back cover.
The map offered Keqing a top-down view of the Minlin region of Liyue. She’d given each of the stone pillars an arbitrary letter and going off of that designation, Ganyu had found her on pillar E, the spire closest to Qingyun Peak and unconnected to any others by wooden suspension bridges.
Keqing was tracing a finger over the map to approximate where she’d fallen when her eyes fell on an annotation in her own distinct handwriting. A small arrowhead pointed to the bridge between pillars C and I, then a single, decisive line led to two bullet points: “extremely dilapidated” and “proceed with caution.”
So she’d known. Not only had Keqing ventured out here alone, but she’d also made the amateur mistake of forgetting about her own notes. The ones she’d done extensive research in advance for her solo venture.
Keqing drummed her fingers against the page splayed open in her lap before slamming the notebook shut with more force than necessary. It wasn’t like she was trying to prove herself or- or impress anyone at work. She was the Yuheng; she should’ve been more careful. If Keqing had had a team with her, this level of negligence was inexcusable.
“Miss Keqing?” A pause, followed by soft rustling outside. “Are you awake?”
Keqing swore under her breath and fastened the clasp on her cloak as she shifted onto her hands and knees to crawl out of the tent. Keqing emerged from the relative chill and into the biting cold, feeling her face already starting to numb from the crisp dawn air. A thick fog had rolled in during the night, and Keqing could see as far as the cliff’s edge before her line of sight met the shifting gray wall that swallowed all of Huaguang Stone Forest.
Ganyu stood a few paces away, clutching a handful of something close to her chest as she stared down at Keqing with wide eyes and parted lips, a poorly veiled mixture of amusement and surprise.
“Good morning,” Keqing said stiffly as she shuffled forward. The cold did little to help with the bolt of pain that pulsed through her ankle every time she shifted, but Keqing was not going to make a scene of it in front of Ganyu. She got far enough away from her tent to where she could start a small fire without burning all of her things down and settled for a moment to catch her breath, a light sheen of sweat coating her forehead.
“You’re awake,” Ganyu said, stepping up behind Keqing before crouching down beside her. When Keqing gave no reply, her focus on coaxing the sparks from her fingertips to catch on the dry tinder, Ganyu tried again. “It’s early,” she pointed out.
“I wake up earlier than this for work.” The sparks were starting to make Keqing’s wrist numb, and she shook her hand out, annoyed. “I should’ve been working hours ago. Preferably, even yesterday.”
Keqing gave it a few more attempts, then a tendril of violet energy finally cooperated—the tiny lick of warm, red flame swallowed the kindling in a rush and set upon the stack of wood. Keqing sat back with a quiet groan and stared at the growing fire.
“That’s impressive.”
Keqing listened for the sarcasm in her voice, but Ganyu sounded genuine. Still, Keqing could only bring herself to grunt in acknowledgment.
“You’re upset.” Keqing caught a swaying motion in her periphery like Ganyu was wavering between sitting down or moving away, and the reason why dawned on Keqing when Ganyu asked, “With me?”
Keqing’s head jerked sideways so quickly that she swore the movement almost put the fire out. “No, Ganyu, no. I’m sorry for being short with you, I’m just-” Keqing awkwardly waved her hands around like she could pull her words from the air before patting the ground next to her. “Please, sit.”
Ganyu watched her with a wary curiosity as she complied. Keqing froze at the brush of her arms and willed herself not to lean either closer or away, but Ganyu didn’t seem to notice.
“It’s, well, um, I’m—” Keqing was starting to ramble to distract herself from how close they were sitting next to each other when Ganyu placed her hand on Keqing’s wrist, bare where her cloak slid up her arm, and Keqing’s jaw snapped shut with a click.
She could feel the coolness of Ganyu’s skin through her glove, then even more so when Ganyu gave a light squeeze. “I’m sorry that my being here has burdened you,” Ganyu said.
“You’re not-” Keqing immediately started, only to fall back into silence when Ganyu fixed her with a look.
“I am. I’ve troubled you with my . . . condition.” Ganyu frowned at the word but pressed on. “And your injury has kept you from doing any of the work you’d set out here to do.”
Keqing nodded, lips thinning. Her usual retort of “Your point?” or “Spit it out.” was ready on the tip of her tongue, but this newly assertive version of Ganyu was so foreign that Keqing found herself intrigued by what Ganyu might say next.
Ganyu chose that moment to look away. She stared into the fire, expression darkening as she muttered, “Something’s wrong with me. I believe you.”
Keqing blinked in surprise. “You didn’t before?”
“Not to this extent, no.” Keqing realized that Ganyu’s hand was still on her arm when her fingers tightened fractionally before loosening. “I was awake last night, thinking. I’ve felt off-kilter for a while now. Like something’s missing, for lack of a better word.” Ganyu’s gaze slid sideways and she smiled, the suddenness of it enough for Keqing’s breath to catch, but her heart almost stopped with Ganyu’s next words.
“I feel it less when I’m with you. So, I believe you.”
Keqing cleared her throat and looked away, hoping that the heat from the fire could explain away the flush on her face if Ganyu asked. “I can’t offer you much in my current state.” Keqing gestured with a sweep of her hand at her leg stretched out to the side.
“I want to help you help me,” Ganyu said. The combination of the earnest, steady eye contact and the hand warming Keqing’s skin was suddenly too much, all at once, and Keqing wrenched herself away. She ignored the surprise and confusion flitting across Ganyu’s face as she half-crawled, half-dragged herself back to her makeshift campsite and began packing up her supplies.
“For that, we need to get back to the Harbor.” Keqing didn’t look up as she mindlessly shoved her notebooks and bedroll back into her pack, more focused on having her hands preoccupied than anything. “I need you to help me get there.”
“You’re upset again,” Ganyu pointed out, and Keqing gritted her teeth.
“I’m not,” Keqing said on an exhale that loosened the tense muscles in her back.
“Hmm, okay.”
Keqing shot Ganyu a look but relented when she noticed Ganyu’s carefully polite concern. Concern she’s having for a literal stranger, Keqing reminded herself as she pulled the straps of her backpack tighter than normal. The leather bit into her shoulders and she winced, loosening them a margin as she said, “I apologize. It’s been a long time since I’ve . . .” Keqing trailed off, unsure what was or wasn’t appropriate to say.
“Had to ask for help?” Ganyu offered helpfully as she held out a notebook that had slipped out during Keqing’s messy packing.
Since I’ve wanted to be close to anyone, Keqing’s brain supplied unhelpfully, and she blushed again when their hands brushed as she accepted the book. “I’m competent. That’s what people come to me for.”
“You are,” Ganyu agreed with a glance toward the fire that now crackled merrily. “I don’t doubt that. It’s still fine to have help. Humans aren’t meant to be solitary creatures.”
“You’re half-human yourself,” Keqing shot back. She only registered what she said when Ganyu’s lips parted in surprise as she stared at Keqing with wide eyes. Keqing was about to start on her third apology of the morning when the surprise morphed into a pleased amusement.
“I know that shouldn’t catch me off guard after everything else you’ve said, but it still does,” Ganyu said with a laugh, and Keqing tried her best to avoid staring at her lips as they twisted into a wry smile.
Keqing abruptly turned away before she started staring at anything else. As she struggled with the accidental mess of knots she’d made out of the ties that kept her things in her bag, Keqing asked over her shoulder, “Can you put the fire out? Might be best to get a move on quickly.”
Another cold meal, Keqing thought, weary. She didn’t have very high hopes for lunch, either, but Ganyu drew her back from getting peeved about another shortcoming of her day when Ganyu asked, “Do you have water?”
“What?” Keqing called back, distracted. The way she’d just shoved her bedroll inside was keeping her from being able to fit in the notebooks she’d brought along. “Can you just, you know, Frostflake Arrow?”
“A what arrow?”
Keqing tugged her bedroll out and began to reroll the entire mass. “A charged shot, Ganyu?”
“Hm?”
Keqing finally turned around at the perplexed noise to find Ganyu dumping the contents of Keqing’s water bottle out over the fire, which hissed as it slowly died out. It looked like the fog from Huaguang Stone Forest had reached out momentarily to envelop Ganyu in a tenuous grasp as wispy clouds of vapor rose from the remnants of Keqing’s fire.
They stared at each other through the steam, Ganyu’s eyes bright and guileless. “What are you talking about?” Ganyu asked as she screwed the cap back onto the bottle.
A chill worse than the time Keqing had gotten caught in the crossfire of Ganyu’s Frostflake Arrow stole over her, stilling her hands even as her heart rate picked up. “Do you . . . not have your bow?”
Ganyu stepped forward and offered the empty water bottle out with one hand as she reached up to the nape of her neck with the other. “What about my bow? Miss Keqing, you’re not making much sense.”
Keqing took the proffered bottle with unfeeling hands, and with hers freed, Ganyu twisted around and pulled up her hair to show Keqing the large, black bow that secured the top of her bodysuit around her collar.
Seeing the fully exposed stretch of skin and muscles flexing as Ganyu shifted to pull her long hair out of the way was bad. Keqing couldn’t help the way her jaw dropped as her eyes followed the slope of Ganyu’s spine, drifting down to the dip of her waist and lower, where the red ropes that held Ganyu’s Vision crisscrossed over her hips.
Except there was no Vision on her hip, and that was objectively worse.
“Ganyu, what happened to your Vision?” Keqing didn’t need to fake the shock in her face or the horror in her voice.
“We talked about this. All adepti are illuminated by . . .” Ganyu dropped her hands as she turned back and her hair drifted down, settling lazily over her shoulders. “You meant it.”
Keqing could only swallow and nod. “A Cryo Vision,” she whispered as Ganyu moved forward on silent feet, “here.” Keqing’s hand settled on Ganyu’s left hip, where a red cloverleaf knot would usually sit with a blue Vision at its center.
“That’s what’s missing,” Keqing breathed as the pieces finally clicked. Ganyu seemed like she was holding her breath as Keqing looked up at her, standing perfectly still beneath Keqing’s touch. “Your Vision and, for whatever reason, your memory.”