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When Albedo first learned mercy through his master, it came in the form of words he did not understand: “One day, you will find people who you wish to call your own.”
He did not understand them—and so he thought they were a riddle, perhaps a curse upon him. Even with the passage of time, to understand these words has remained a difficult task. Albedo was one of the unfortunate results of an experiment conducted with the best of hopes. No—he did not hate his master, nor was his life so pitiful that he could not live it. Yet the emptiness in his chest left a gaping hole in his thoughts and subconscious and he would wonder…
Research Question: Is it possible to love without a heart?
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And in fact, even without love, it seems that attachment can exist without a heart.
Albedo was taught his place in the world since however little he was. Mortals, the humans who know the earth to expanses that he could not fathom with his artificial nature—they are impure, contaminated beings. He, as jealous as he was of those who were unique, was pure. He, under the cover of a false sky and with the hands of a master craftsman and inventor, was birthed without a single flaw. Rhinedottir was a cold, stern woman who taught him more through a regime than lessons, and she would say to him: “You are what I define you to be. You must not fail; and should it ever happen, you would be nothing. You must be good. You must be perfect.”
And when Rhinedottir abandoned—no, punished, left—him, he truly became nothing at all. He could not use the word ‘abandoned’ because it would mean he had done nothing to warrant the decision, but he asked too many questions and he was spoiled—his master would tell him, and he could not listen.
Rhinedottir leaves with Albedo only one sentence that he remembers, and an absence that is so large that it leaves him far emptier than before. He does not feel an ache in his chest, but the epiphany of it all washes over him in tides, overwhelming waves of silence that pass over time. Yet they would go by, and they would continue pushing him under, and he would stay damp because the goosebumps never left his skin. So when she is gone, he wonders: ‘Do I have a purpose in life?’ Because what would he do when the sole reason for his existence has vanished, leaving an empty space in his life largely vacated and consumed with nothing at all?
Enough time made him only surer that he would not find the ‘people’ that Rhinedottir spoke of, the ones that would make him want their presence. All in the name of research, Albedo moved to a city by the name of ‘Mondstadt’, and the various areas around the region. Science was his first love since the beginning of his birth, and he would dedicate his time to it to fill the chasm that Rhinedottir left within him, though he would soon learn that it is truly impossible.
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Nothing is truly ‘impossible’. In Albedo’s case, to forget Rhinedottir is a difficult process but not one that is completely out of his hands. With only a single visit, he is so swiftly appointed as the Chief Alchemist of the Knights of Favonius that he is given no time to refuse, nor accept. Varka is a boisterous man who talks with his chest puffed out and hands flailing through the air as though they do in cartoons, and it is Albedo’s first impression of a man so loud and bright. He is the opposite of Rhinedottir, as far as he could possibly get.
The comparison never truly left his mind and to see Varka was a reminder of Rhinedottir, so Albedo would never visit him in his office. “You’re not scared of Varka, are you? That’s… not uncommon,” is what he is first told when he meets the Cavalry Captain of the Knights outside Varka’s office on his first day. The captain slings his arm around Albedo’s shoulder and he knows enough to take it as a friendly gesture, although it is one that is much unwelcome.
“I have no such issue. He set me to work immediately, to which I don’t have much of a complaint,” Albedo replies calmly, shrugging off the latter’s arm. He has tried not to show his obvious discomfort on his face, nor flinch at the touch of another person. He is aware that at the core of his nature, he is unnatural and soon, his colleagues would notice. “I appreciate the warm welcome,” he continues, but his monotony reads to the stranger as mild sarcasm.
“Kaeya Alberich,” the other man introduces, stepping backwards to extend a friendly hand. Albedo meets his eye, only one because the other is hidden behind a dark leather eyepatch. It is the colour of a dark, stormy sky, twinkling with amusement and there is a look in them—one that Albedo knows all too well, that there is something he is hiding. Something he isn’t saying. “Care for a drink?” he suggests, burying the same extended hand in his pocket when Albedo doesn’t take it. The newly-appointed alchemist hesitates before reluctantly accepting the offer.
“Do not make this a routine in your mind, captain,” Albedo warns, flickering his eyes away from the taller, notorious male. His chest clenches as he walks at the side of his new acquaintance— that’s what he’ll call it—and Albedo later learns that it is yearning.
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Albedo finds happiness for the first time in Kaeya and a half-charred bouquet of flowers.
He has told Kaeya on many occasions that his presence is not required, especially on days where he is swamped with work and does not require further interaction to muddy his plans. Albedo knows that he cannot keep to himself forever, and that he would someday have to learn how to be human, however adverse the thought may be. But Kaeya—he is difficult. He is an exceptional case, a person too unpredictable and untrustworthy. His colleagues would disagree, saying that Kaeya is a good man regardless of his often surreptitious behaviour.
Though, Kaeya makes up for only part of the decision as to why Albedo has tried to shoo him away. A large part of it falls back on the fact that he, himself, is bombarded by an odd myriad of emotions that is too difficult for him to fathom. But Kaeya has never listened, continuing to welcome himself into Albedo’s office at odd hours in the day, knowing the alchemist never leaves his place. “Albedo,” he calls out, and he lacks breath as though he had been running.
“Have you dropped the formalities?” Albedo raises an eyebrow, not lifting his gaze from his notes. It’s only until, seconds later, his nose catches the sensitive smell of char—or smoke—the particularly sweet pungence of Whopperflowers. He lifts his head out of confusion this time, and sees Kaeya pressed up against the open spruce door, trying to catch his breath. He purses his lips.
“What are you thinking so hard about?” the captain asks, although his hair is in a disarray and his clothes are stained with mud and dirt. Albedo taps his pen against the table.
“Whether or not it’s worth it to ask for context.”
Kaeya strides closer to the table, and proceeds to hold a bouquet of cecilias to Albedo’s nose. The alchemist hadn’t noticed him holding them when he walked in, perhaps because he was too busy trying to make sense of Kaeya’s shabby appearance out of the blue. His initial reaction to the gesture is to furrow his eyebrows, remaining stiffly seated back in his chair. “Accept it, won’t you? You’ll have me waiting for you forever,” the captain sighs, turning his face away. Albedo lifts his head and… Oh? The captain’s olive skin has flushed a gentle shade of red.
“What’s the occasion?” Albedo questions, accepting the flowers as he is told. “And I suppose going into battle to retrieve flowers for me wouldn’t have been entirely necessary,” he teases and Kaeya rubs the back of his neck awkwardly. The alchemist flicks his thumb against the petal of the cecilia, scattered ashes rubbing off onto his thumb. Amusing, he notes.
“Are you fond of them—? Cecilias, I mean,” Kaeya stutters, and this unexpected shift in his usually calm and collected demeanour is what makes Albedo interested. He sits forward in his chair, subconsciously leaning his cheek against his palm as he waits expectantly for the latter to continue. He realises with time that he is meant to provide an answer, to which he feigns a look of thought and drums his fingers against the table to aid his thinking process.
“They are fine, I suppose. I don’t hold strong opinions on flowers,” he responds. Kaeya sulks, in the sense that his shoulders sag ever so slightly and Albedo would not have noticed had he not been staring so intently at the captain. Something about this sight makes him vaguely uncomfortable, leaving words bubbling at the very tip of his tongue, edging for him to continue. He had spoken in a complete sentence, but it feels as though his message is wholly incomplete. “I do like them. And your gift,” he clarifies, this time mustering a small, but awkward smile.
The sheer joy on Kaeya’s face that follows his response fills the gaping emptiness in Albedo’s heart like a thousand blooming Cecilias on Starsnatch Cliff, and suddenly, Albedo feels that his impossible pursuit is, perhaps, just a little less urgent and a little more bearable; the emotion that washes over him, gentle like Mondstadt’s summer winds, is what he’ll come to realise is happiness.
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Love does not always come with happiness, and happiness is not love. It is not something that can be recorded, noted as though it is a scientific breakthrough but when it happens to Albedo—he knows precisely what it is, and he fears it.
Albedo finds it oddly disconcerting as Mondtsadt’s streets are completely silent as he’s strolling through them at dawn, walking the way to the Adventurer’s Guild to redeem rewards for an expedition. Most of the knights rise even before himself, though he finds no one in sight at all. He does not pay much heed to the thought until, later, he is interrupted by a cocky voice and light, rapid footsteps. A rambunctious girl comes running towards him with arms swinging as she runs, “Big brother!” she squeals, larger-than-life and he turns immediately to the sound.
“Klee? You can’t be yelling like this when the city’s still asleep,” he tries to scold, but still accepts the little girl into his embrace with a smile. Klee wraps her arms around her brother’s neck and allows him to hoist her up in the air, waving a paper in her hands. Albedo isn’t Klee’s biological brother, though most would say that they could pass off as biological siblings easily. He had first gotten to know her through Alice, who left her daughter behind to further her studies and in a way, Alice is a lot like Rhinedottir. Albedo scowls at the fact, still, but has since promised to be a guiding figure to the young Klee so she’ll have home to come back to.
“Klee’s sorry,” the young girl pouts, and even though Albedo would like to lift a hand to her face and hold her closer, holding her with both arms and enough support is as far as his strength goes. “Klee missed Albedo,” she mumbles, hiding her face in his chest. Klee is not the shy type—in fact, she is fiery and bold, always leaping across fields with her small legs, tossing her Dodoco bombs everywhere.
“Who brought you here?” he asks, and the question answers itself as the voice he heard briefly before returns and just beyond Klee, his gaze falls upon Kaeya strolling calmly towards them with both hands in his pockets. He gulps, and in some way it is nervousness, but there is no right name to the emotion. Albedo has been taught that emotions are imperfect, and they are impure, because they taint a man’s mind and remove the factor of control. Unlearning it isn’t easy. He’s not sure he wishes to, yet.
“Thought I’d bring your sister to see you before you vanish elsewhere into Teyvat,” the captain chortles, bearing flowers in his hands once more. They are different this time, calla lillies that only grow at the very edges of ponds—and sometimes they dip into the water too. They are versatile flowers, but they are not as sensitive as cecilias are. Albedo has never cared for them much. “Flowers for the gentleman?” Kaeya grins, curtseying in the middle of the empty road.
Albedo lowers Klee onto her feet, and in the drawing that’s now in his hands—there are three figures, him, her and Kaeya, together on a vast, open field. “Special occasion?” the alchemist questions, humoured by the captain’s sudden appearance. The flowers are a common occurrence, nothing to be questioned, and sometimes he sees them more than Kaeya himself, especially on days where they are both busy. He has never received calla lillies previously as a gift.
“Seeing you is special enough. After all, you’re always missing in action,” Kaeya chuckles, plucking a single flower from his bouquet. Tucking a strand of Albedo’s fringe behind his ear, he rests the lily at the tip of his ear and hides it gently behind locks of platinum hair. Klee exchanges an eager gaze between the two men, tightening her grip around Albedo’s hand which has gotten clammy from the heat of the moment. He starts to wonder—with concerning levels of body heat, could he simply vanish on the spot? Vanishing may not be his main concern but the way his face has heated up is… terrible.
“Bold remark, Alberich.”
“Is that the first you’ve ever used my name?”
“It’ll suffice,” Albedo hums. And it is gentle, like the faint click of a pen or the shiver of a flower bud, but he feels something move in his chest. It tremors, and then it beats, like a clockwork of gears whirring into life. As he meets Kaeya’s lilac eye and the gentle glimmer in them like the stars, the emptiness within him wilts with the replacement of a thousand blooming flowers, the life of a flowing stream, a terror of ten thousand and a love so strong that a sigh leaves his lips.
Result: It is, indeed, possible to love without a heart.