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It’s a beautiful Saturday morning when he finally makes his way past the snowy slopes of Dragonspine and the verdant Mondstadt countryside to reach the city proper. It’s been quite some time since he was back here—proper observation of an alchemical subject is just so time-sensitive, and science waits for no one—so he takes a few minutes at first to amble around the cobbled streets. It feels good to refamiliarize himself with the area, take in the aroma of Flora’s newest offerings and eye the dessert of the day at Good Hunter, but he’s here on a mission.
This is where he finds himself now, steadying his breath at the doorstep of Sir Kaeya Alberich, the Ordo’s own cavalry captain. Albedo is not usually an anxious sort of person, but he still catches himself scrutinizing his own reflection in the windows of the stone apartment. He gives up pretty quickly: he learned a long time ago that trying to tame the errant mess that is his hair is a fruitless endeavor, so it’s not like fussing now will make any difference.
Besides, Kaeya thinks it’s charming.
He clears his throat and knocks once, twice, thrice on the oak wood of the front door. The usual. It takes a few moments of waiting before he hears a distant groan and a “Be right there!” from somewhere in the apartment.
Saturday morning means that last night was Friday night, so he’s not surprised by the latency of the response. If past behavior is any reliable predictor of future conduct, then Kaeya probably spent it drinking at the Angel’s Share until late.
True to form, the Kaeya that opens the door is still dressed in loose sleep garments. He’s in the middle of stretching back into a yawn, reaching his arms up and back like an overlarge, particularly sinuous housecat, but as soon as he recognizes Albedo’s visage at the door, he immediately claps his hands together, exposed eye lighting up in excitement.
It’s Kaeya, so there’s no doubt that he’s actually more awake than he looks, but something still flutters in his chest to see the other man presented in this way, looking so…unpolished. Softer than he usually shows himself to the rest of the world.
“Why, if it isn’t the Chief Alchemist himself! To what do I owe the pleasure?” The cavalry captain repositions himself so he’s leaning in the doorway, hand on one hip. He resembles a caricature.
(Of what, it’s hard to say. Certainly something more foolish than Albedo has ever drawn before.)
“Just felt like stopping by,” he replies lightly. “It appears that I have been far more occupied these past few weeks than I realized, and…I thought it might be nice to see you.”
“Besides. You, ah, left something with me. Last time you visited, a few weeks ago.”
From his pocket, he withdraws an eyepatch—smooth black silk, held together with fine navy thread at the edges. It feels extraordinarily soft against his skin as he holds it out to the other man.
Kaeya, already clad in a different discrete eyepatch, squints at it with his one visible eye. Ah. Probably still hungover. “There it is. I knew you had an ulterior motive for coming here.”
He averts his eyes. “Well…if I’m being honest, that was mostly an excuse.”
Albedo is not usually so forthcoming about this kind of thing, especially not when it comes to their particular…arrangement, in all its newness. Kaeya seems to think so, too, if the visible eyebrow rising up his face is any indication. Still. He’s trying to be better, so when Kaeya takes the eyepatch, steps back across the threshold, and gestures for him to enter, he follows suit.
His host shuts the door behind him and then wanders off elsewhere, presumably to freshen himself up for company. He’s in the midst of pulling off his boots (damned straps) when Kaeya’s voice comes floating towards him: “Say, you wouldn’t have bothered to eat breakfast any time between traipsing down the mountain and arriving here, would you?”
“No?” he tries.
Kaeya’s reply is distinctly unimpressed. “Genius, my ass.”
A second later, his head pokes around the corner. He still looks bleary-eyed and a bit drowsy, but he’s tied back his hair, and smells clean, like soap. “I’m making pancakes and you will help. Freeloader.”
He can’t help but smile at that, following Kaeya into the sunlit kitchen, where he’s already hauled out a sack of flour and several bowls.
“Alchemy and cooking aren’t so different, you know. I have it on good faith that I’m a fine chef.”
“Lumine doesn’t count,” Kaeya fires back, already cracking eggs into one of the bowls. “She’ll eat anything and you know it.”
He tosses the shells into a wastebin in the corner and gestures with his head towards a cabinet across the room. “Sugar and baking powder are in there.”
While Kaeya fiddles with something on the stove, he opens the doors to the pantry. It’s fuller than he expected, given how often the cavalry captain seems to eat out. Well, he supposes it’s unsurprising that one would tire of bar food and sticky honey roast eventually. As Kaeya seems to hail from beyond Mondstadt, perhaps he’s comforted by making dishes from his place of origin. Albedo might, too. If Rhinedottir had bothered to teach that sort of skill, that is.
He’s dawdled long enough. The sugar and baking powder are easy enough to locate—embarrassingly, they are located on one of the higher shelves, so he has to stand on tiptoes to reach high enough, a feat which does not escape Kaeya’s notice, if the poorly muffled snicker behind him is any indication.
Albedo is the Chief Alchemist of the Knights of Favonius as well as Captain of the Investigation Team. This makes him Kaeya’s equal. Which is why he strides forward and delivers the requested ingredients with all the dignity befitting someone of his status, and definitely does not sulk when Kaeya easily reaches up, up, and over his head for a wooden spoon hanging on the wall to mix the batter.
Ugh.
He’s quiet for a bit as the other man heats up the stove. The butter smells wonderful as it melts in the pan. It’s a familiar scent, one that emanates from the lab at Dragonspine quite regularly. Klee offers her fishy spoils of war often (probably more than Jean would like), and dairy products keep for longer in the cold of the mountain, so Albedo can often be found doing just as Kaeya is now, watching the pat of butter swirl around and around until it’s melted into nothing.
Kaeya pours the batter in with the deft hand of someone who knows what they’re doing. He sings a wordless tune to himself under his breath, dancing a little bit in place as they wait for the batter to cook. It’s impossible to smother the fondness that rises up at the sight, especially when Kaeya flips the pancake over and does a little ta-da!, complete with jazz hands, when it lands perfectly face down back in the pan.
“Sorry,” he says, sounding as genuinely bashful as someone like Kaeya can get. “I’ve done this a lot for Klee by now. Force of habit.”
“Do you look after her often? I thought she was with Jean most nights.”
“Well, yes,” Kaeya says, waving a hand. “But Lisa has been coming over to her place more often since the whole Stormterror incident. Says that our dear Acting Grandmaster has no idea when to take a break with all the stress.”
He snorts. “At this rate, I’m the only thing standing between those two and Klee getting the ‘birds and the bees’ talk—sorry, the birds and the birds? Bees and bees?—about five years too early.”
The first pancake is done. Kaeya reaches above his head again (annoying) for a plate and slides it on neatly; after a moment’s thought, he rummages around the countertop and returns triumphantly with whipped cream and a handful of berries, which he applies generously to the top of the pancake with gusto (not annoying).
“There’s plenty more where that came from,” he announces, pouring more batter into the pan. “But seeing as I’m not the one who scaled a mountain to get here, I can wait a few more minutes for mine.”
Well, it’s not like he’s going to complain that he gets pancakes first. His excitement must show, because Kaeya gives up on shooting him the stink eye, emphasis on the singular, and instead shoos him off to the kitchen island in the middle of the room.
Spectacular. Now he can eat freshly made pancakes and observe unimpeded. He roots around in a few drawers before successfully locating the cutlery—the rattling must irritate Kaeya, because he frowns a little before turning back to the stovetop—and settles on top of one of the stools with fork and knife in hand.
Kaeya probably knows Albedo is not human (or suspects it, at least; the alchemist isn’t exactly subtle about it most of the time, especially as far as his personal health and safety are concerned). If that’s the case, then he’s likely guessed that the chalk-formed vessel has generally lower energy requirements than a genuine organic body. Albedo still eats and drinks and sleeps, because his conscious mind needs time to recover, but with much lower frequency than the average human.
It’s nice, and he seems to enjoy the experiences, but his body simply has a lower basal metabolic rate. It’s not necessary like it is for most people. So it’s…touching, that Kaeya would still go to such lengths to provide for Albedo.
This is the thought that permeates his conscious mind as he cuts into the pancake. Given the sudden rush of affection, he thinks it’s perfectly reasonable that he can’t stop himself from letting out a giddy little moan at the actual taste and texture hits his mouth. They’re damn good pancakes: soft and fluffy at the center, with a satisfying denseness as he chews and just a hint of crunch when his teeth breach the surface. Closing his eyes, he relishes the sugary sweetness of the cream and the burst of sharp flavor from the berries that follow.
Distantly, he hears the sound of Kaeya serving himself up the second pancake, and then the quiet hiss of butter being applied to the pan again. When he opens his eyes, still riding the high of home-cooked sweets, the other man has stopped cooking. The spatula and bowl of batter sit untouched on the counter.
“You’re so much like him,” Kaeya says softly. He doesn’t make any moves to come closer, or defend himself, or leap out the window and alert the Acting Grand Master. Instead he just tilts the pan to spread the butter, and waits for his companion to speak.
He puts another bite of pancake into his mouth—just as splendid as the first. Albedo has chosen a good partner to become entangled with, if he gets to eat like this on the regular.
“How did you know?”
“Not going to try and deny it, huh?” The blue-haired man shakes his head. “I should’ve known. Albedo’s not the type to beat around the bush about anything. Well, as long as he’s not so oblivious that he doesn’t notice to begin with. Given the accuracy of your imitation, he may be a bad point of comparison for your powers of observation.”
He finishes his pancake while Kaeya is talking. Normally he has a hard time keeping down large portions of anything, even sweets, but it’s good enough that he actually considers asking for more. Fortunately, Kaeya seems to anticipate this, because he just sighs and tops off his own plate with whipped cream and berries before sliding it over in offering.
He will be spectacularly unhappy if Albedo does not maintain this relationship in the long term. Based on his observations so far, Kaeya is a very good boyfriend. “Observation is the key to scientific inquiry. Every experiment must begin with the observation of a phenomenon of interest. From this, a question can be established, and then a set of hypotheses that address the possible answers.”
“Celestia, you even sound like him,” Kaeya groans. He tilts his head skyward until he’s staring directly at the wooden ceiling of his kitchen. “It’s Saturday morning. My boyfriend’s evil imposter clone is explaining the scientific method to me while I cook him pancakes.”
He wants very badly to finish the second pancake, but the butter is starting to smell like it’ll burn and Kaeya is showing no sign of moving from his position of despair. So, he sets down his utensils to trot over to the stovetop and pour some of the batter into the pan himself. It makes a satisfying sound as it makes contact with the hot metal.
“Do you think of me as evil, Kaeya?” he asks.
The other man exhales harshly. “Yes. No. I have no idea.”
He casts Not-Albedo a considering look. “You certainly don’t want me dead. It would be a bold move for you to come down here in broad daylight if you planned to kill me here and now, and you’ve had plenty of opportunities otherwise. Besides, if you really are anything like him, then I’d imagine your assassination plot would have a little more…tact.”
This much is true. He and all his brethren have always had a flair for the dramatic. Blame Rhinedottir.
(After all, her namesake is from an opera.)
The third pancake is cooked through on this side. He slides the spatula underneath and does his best to flip it, but he doesn’t have as much experience as Kaeya, and it folds in on itself halfway through. The resulting half-moon shape looks ugly and irregular in the pan. The remaining raw batter will be cooking alongside the folded-over part that is already done. How troublesome.
“I sent Albedo a letter asking if he had seen an eyepatch I had left at his place the last time we had a, hm, rendezvous. Contrary to popular belief, I don’t have an unlimited stock, and this one is rather special to me.”
Leaning forward, Kaeya lays the eyepatch down on the counter. “It was a gift from Klee on my last birthday. Quite practical, if you ask me. I imagine she came up with the idea herself, but left the execution to Noelle. Otherwise I’d assume there would be more red.
“Albedo wrote back recently informing he had not, in fact, located one. He also told me that the usual state of his laboratory is disarray and the only person who has ever been able to successfully locate something in it is Lumine, who has defeated two Fatui Harbingers by now, so.” He rests his chin on his hands. “Imagine my surprise when he arrived at my very doorstep, eyepatch in hand, looking so beautifully flustered.”
Damn. He was overeager, then. Being Chief Alchemist as well as a captain in the Ordo, Albedo receives a fair amount of correspondence, especially when he’s been on Dragonspine for prolonged periods of time. There’s only so many letters he can steal, strategically “misplace”, or survey from a distance without being identified. He’d thought that the eyepatch would be innocuous enough, something Albedo wouldn’t miss and just coquettish enough an excuse for visiting to curry Kaeya’s romantic favor. If he played his cards right, maybe it would even be enough to cloud the underlying reality of the situation, the corrupted dragon’s blood that runs through his veins, the conspicuously empty space at the base of his throat.
He should have known better. Albedo only likes to involve himself with intelligent people. And he and Kaeya are…involved. No matter how coy the cavalry captain likes to play, it was foolish to believe that he could get away with a ploy like this.
This complicates things. Kaeya is an additional liability—like the Traveler, he is now privy to the knowledge of his existence. He doubts Kaeya knows as much as Lumine, if Albedo has indulged his usual tendency to forego all pretenses and dump highly classified information about his origins. Still, it makes him uneasy, even if the other man seems unlikely to inform anyone else. Kaeya, too, knows the price of keeping a secret. More than that, he knows the price of divulging one—his current relationship with Diluc Ragnvindr is testament to the fact.
He’s gotten lost in thought again. Kaeya stands and takes the spatula from his hand, easily sliding the misshapen pancake onto a new plate before it has the chance to burn. “I’ll take this one.”
“You don’t mind its distortion.”
Kaeya shrugs. “It’ll still taste the same to me.” Turning off the stove, he procures a bottle of syrup, which he drizzles lightly over his plate before digging in.
The blue-haired man eats heartily, with none of the hesitance that one might expect from being watched, or being watched by your partner’s failed experiment body double. After a moment’s hesitance, he follows suit. The second pancake is just as good as the first, albeit a bit colder now that he’s waited a few minutes before indulging. No matter; he doesn’t spend all his time on Dragonspine because he minds the temperature.
He’s dipping the last berry in the remaining whipped cream when Kaeya speaks again. “Do you have a name other than ‘Not Albedo’ that I can address you by?”
What a strange inquiry. “As I was not a favored creation, I did not receive the honor of a name. I believe Albedo simply refers to me as ‘Subject Two’.”
Kaeya snorts. “Yeah, he’s sentimental like that. I would really miss him if you killed him, you know.” He taps his fork against his plate, now empty. Clink-clink-clink. “How about something alchemy-related? Seems fitting.”
It seems strange that Kaeya would be willing to dedicate so much thought to something like this. Though…for the purposes of distinguishing between the Albedo that everyone in Mondstadt knows and the Albedo that has shown up this morning…he supposes he can understand the practicality of it. From a narrative standpoint, it’s a sympathetic enough position.
He shrugs to show his indifference. “I would not concern myself with such a thing either way. Names may possess some degree of inherent meaning, but—”
“—their true value lies in what we as humans assign to them, defying even the will of the gods, yeah, yeah, I got it,” Kaeya gestures with his fork in the universal sign for I’ve heard this speech before, don’t worry your chalky little head about it. “If that’s the case, then how about…Rubedo?”
It catches him off guard, and something about his expression must give him away, because the cavalry captain only gives him a wry smile before standing and returning to the stovetop. There is still batter left in the bowl—enough for one more pancake, maybe, if Kaeya scrapes it clean. They are very sizable in diameter.
“Surprised? I actually listen when y—when Albedo gives his alchemy talks, you know. I did some research in the library when I started having suspicions about his identity, too, so I was already familiar with the concept. Magnum opus, yes?”
His heart flutters at the thought, and it hurts, and it’s annoying, that he’s feeling second-hand infatuation at the notion that this very handsome man cares when Albedo talks.
“Rubedo,” he says, turning the idea of it over and over in his head. “The reddening.” Red like Durin’s blood. Like Dvalin’s tears, Klee’s dress, a raging fire, freshly-picked apples. It fits, he thinks.
“Albedo,” Kaeya replies. “The whitening.” He flips his pancake. “Man, am I glad that you’re both made of chalk and that’s not actually a weird racial purity thing.”
What. “What?”
“Nothing.”
Fascinating. Absolutely fascinating. He can see why Albedo is so transfixed by this one.
“Also, Albedo knows where the forks are,” Kaeya adds, a moment later. “He’s stayed for meals a few times before. Cooked for me once, even.” The final pancake slides neatly onto his plate, and he seats himself across the kitchen island without preamble after turning off the heat. “I would actually agree with your assessment that alchemy and cooking aren’t so different, if his skill is any indicator.”
Ah, fuck. Well. No way around that one, he supposes. “I don’t suppose you’re providing me pointers to improve my mimicry out of the goodness of your heart.”
Kaeya shrugs. “I don’t intend to turn you in to anyone, but…” He looks away, and for a moment there is no sound but the clink of metal on porcelain as he cuts cleanly through his food. “I also don’t intend to see you again after this. So I figured, you know, why not.”
Rubedo stares. It’s not like he was expecting for Kaeya to keep him around, like some kind of dirty secret—a secondary lover, inferior to the first in all imaginable ways. Obviously, the logistics of the situation would be completely infallible; aside from his colleagues recently being on the lookout for strange behavior in their fellow Knights, Kaeya’s not exactly a low-profile figure in Mondstadt. Even casting aside the matter of the real Albedo, Subject One, it would be near-impossible for him to slip in and out of Kaeya’s home undetected in the long run. With Klee and other members of the Ordo making regular house calls, there would be no way for him to lay low in the Alberich household, either.
Beyond the matter of practicality, he can imagine that it would be strange to take Kaeya on as a partner while the other man was still…entangled with his precursor, and without Albedo’s knowledge, to boot. Undoubtedly the chalk prince himself would destroy Rubedo without a second thought if given the chance. If Albedo were ever to find out that Kaeya knew of his existence, and let him slip away, well…suffice it to say that the destruction of Mondstadt might finally be catalyzed.
Kaeya’s silence, as it stands, comes at a steep price, and he can see it clearly for what it is: Mercy. Clemency. The chance to pack up and leave Mondstadt. Go somewhere else, be someone else, someone who is not Albedo, a person beyond Subject Two. Leave behind the confines of a dragon’s belly and the art of Khemia, and learn to live like—like Albedo does. Freely, loving and loved, in pursuit of the truth without ever having to wonder whether there will be others waiting for him when he returns from the cold of the mountains.
He wasn’t expecting clandestine meetings in the moonlight, or an illicit affair with his lookalike’s beloved. Still. It just stings, to be reminded. Even in pursuing the shape of Albedo’s life, he will never have this.
Eyes stinging, he rubs at his face with the back of his gloved palm. He can feel the thick fabric starting to dampen with tears, and he tosses his head back, willing himself to stop crying. When he stops, Kaeya doesn’t say anything, just offers him a handkerchief with an outstretched hand. His expression doesn’t look pitying, just softer, as he collects their dirty dishes and places them into the sink.
He doesn’t have to say anything for them to come to an understanding. Rubedo came here searching for love, or an imitation of it, maybe. A creature who has lived his life in darkness stumbling towards the warmth of the sun. Kaeya has offered him more kindness than he deserves, letting him feel the light on his face, but it can’t last. He is not Albedo. And Kaeya is not the type of man who can’t tell the difference.
While the other man’s back is still turned, Rubedo dabs at his eyes. The handkerchief he has been handed is of no particular quality. It has no monogrammed initials in the corner embroidered in fine thread, as he might expect to see if Eula Lawrence or Jean Gunnhildr had witnessed him sneeze. Just plain white cloth, hemmed neatly at the edges, with dark spots where his tears have collected.
He turns it over in his hands a few times, then folds it neatly and deposits it into his pocket. Kaeya busies himself with applying soap and warm water to the plates, wordlessly giving him the opportunity to collect himself before he speaks.
“Thank you.”
“For brunch, your new name, or saving your ass?” Kaeya teases, and his chest twinges with something like relief as that undercurrent of banter resurges again, making the room seem a hundred times brighter.
He pretends to think about it as he stands, assuming a comically pensive pose with chin in hand. “I daresay the pancakes were the most noteworthy occurrence in the listed series of events.”
“Yeouch. Careful, or I might just reconsider my offer. I’m on good terms with the Captain of the Investigation Team, you know.”
He’s joking, of course, but Kaeya does not touch him as he moves back towards the front hall to retrieve his coat and boots. Nor does he press Rubedo’s face close to his chest, or smack a cartoonish kiss to his cheek as he stands in the doorway, as he tends to do with Albedo.
Instead he watches, single visible eye steady and cool as ice, as Rubedo tugs on his shoes again. Opens the door, like a good host, and observes his silhouette down the cobbled streets of Mondstadt until it disappears through some back alley.
Kaeya shuts the door and locks it behind him. Then he goes to finish washing the dishes. Klee is coming over tonight, and she’ll be telling him all about how much she misses her big brother.