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You knew Sneznhaya would be cold. No one in Teyvat would let you forget that fact. Spending time in Dragonspine had taught you many ways to survive in icy climates, but somehow you had never realized just how comforting the freezing snow would make the safe warm indoors feel.
After spending too long travleing through the severe outside searching for leads and dealing with enemies, the sensation of warm air and dry ground makes you feel as though you have reached a sacred land. And so, you end up spending more time in the childhood home of the 11th Fatui Harbinger than in your Serenitea Pot. There you are safe under the protection of Childe and likely an agreement for his family to be left out of Fatui matters.
The solace of being around a loving family again shocks you at first, but before you realize you’ve grown close to Ajax’s parents and siblings. You’re mostly satisfied that they have accepted your relationship with open arms, but you never imagined they’d accept you too as their own.
And so, after long days and bitter cold, you find yourself trudging inside with Ajax beside you and a plan to crash in his bed as soon as humanly possible. Of course, that means your warrior has to nap as well, you need him to help warm your frosty fingers and be your personal heater.
His room is surprisingly small, the bed takes up most of the room. When you see it for the first time it strikes a little sorrow in your heart. Not because you pity him for modest living, but because it makes you think of a young Ajax never getting the chance to grow out of his boy-sized room at home. Instead, being thrown into life as a weapon.
But you have little time to linger on those feelings as you soon realize his small room forces you to stay close to each other. You don’t see a reason to complain after and if Ajax does he certainly doesn’t show it. Of course, he's always been more than happy to find every excuse there is to be close to you as though your touch sustains him.
At this moment, soft yellow light from the hallway fills the room. The thick curtains block out the gray afternoon sky and keep the frost on the windows at bay. It’s dark and warm and somehow with him, it feels like the whole world has been left behind. Any worries or stresses melt away with the snow on your boots discarded at the entryway.
You’ve ended up in his shirt somehow, leaving him without one (it’s entirely by your design, you would never miss a chance to see the adorable freckles dotting his shoulder or the scars lining his strong back). His sheets are soft and warm, but neither of you is really tucked in. You’re a little tangled in the sheets and entirely tangled up in each other’s bodies. Ajax is almost laying on his stomach with an arm thrown over your waist and one of your legs is crossed over and between his. He had been pressing soft chaste kisses to your jaw when he drifted off, but now you can feel his soft breathing on your neck with how his face is tucked against your shoulder.
The heat of his body thaws you out where you had been chilled outside, and the cold is replaced with a thrum of affection.
Soon you’re both lost to the world, Ajax sleeping lightly and you’re in that peaceful place in between being awake and slumber. It’s so easy to just bask in the weight of his body on yours, his warmth, the rhythm of his breathing, just everything. You’ve never been one to meditate having always been unable to silence your mind, but now as you lay in a blissfully thoughtless state, you know this is the closest you’ll ever get.
You also love how relaxed he gets when you play with Ajax's hair, absently petting through it in a calming manner. The motion always seems to comfort your love, so you continue with your free hand for a while. Running your fingers through his soft locks is second nature to you now.
When you hazily try to shift a little after the pressure of Ajax’s weight makes your arm go numb he shifts in his sleep too. Turning so he’s on his back, he pulls you against his side like you’re a plushie and promptly falls back asleep. He lets out a long contented sigh against your nape.
The muffled sounds of his family moving around the house are like a lullaby and eventually, you also fall asleep.
When you landed in this world and got separated from your brother, you never expected to find comfort in a family again until you were reunited. For a while, you didn’t even have your own bed to sleep in with a roof over your head. But now with Ajax and his family, you can feel the peace of having the safety of that bond again. You know nothing will ever replace your lost sibling and you never want to try to, but finding something similar to fill the cracks during your long exhausting journey has allowed you to keep going far further than you could have on your own.
You never had any idea you would fall in love with Ajax either, but you suppose it was due time as chaos seems to follow you, and those two come hand in hand.
The comforting smell of a hot meal wafts through to your consciousness when Teucer cracks open the bedroom door. You’re partially woken up by the light shining on your face when he opens the door, but aren’t able to open your eyes until you feel Teucer gently shaking you. “Psst… Miss, big brother. It’s dinner time. Wake up.” blearily, you sit up and squint at Teucer after trying to rub the sleep out of your eyes.
“What’s that dear? It’s dinner time?” You ask, trying hard to pull yourself out of your nap, but not really feeling like a person yet.
“Yeah, Ma said the stew will be ready in a few minutes.” The young boy is still whispering despite his job being to wake you up. He probably feels a little awkward about intruding, poor thing.
“Okay, thank you Teucer. I’ll wake the sleeping bear and we’ll be there in a minute.” You stretch your arm out and ruffle the little brother’s hair. He giggles at what you call Ajax as he leaves and you turn to your lover. Brushing his hair away from his face, you lean down and kiss his forehead. “Babe, are you awake?” Ajax stirs a little, letting out a sleepy sigh and nuzzling his face against your side.
Something swells in your heart when you see him so unguarded. You almost feel guilty for waking him when he looks so peaceful and safe.
Childe will always be a magnet to chaos, he lives for it. His desire for the rush of battle and for conflict will never burn out, so you can’t help but treasure these moments where things are simple. You love Childe for everything that he is and you love that you can give him peace at times. Just as Ajax will never give up his pursuit of strength, you will never give up being a home for him to return to and find comfort in.
For all that you’ve been through (all that you’ve put each other through), he offered you the same respite and has shared with you his most vulnerable side. Allowing you to be a part of his family for even a moment of your time on Teyvat has indebted you to him in a way he may never even realize.
Though right now you know that he will regret it if he doesn’t get a meal soon. “C’mon, dinner’s ready. We should get up.” His eye finally opens when you poke his cheek and once again you are struck by how much you love him. The warm light from the hallway casts a glow over his face, seeing those blue eyes and long lashes reminds you of how beautiful he is. Taken as you are by his beauty, you fail to notice the glint of mischief in his eye until it’s too late.
Too fast for you to react his arms tighten where they are around your waist and you’re pulled down beneath him with a yelp. “A-ajax what-” before you can protest, your shirt (his actually, as he would remind you) is rucked up to expose your stomach. Your undignified squeal turns into hysterical giggles when he blows a raspberry against your side. “Haha, oh c’mon! Stop it you big goof, haha!” Desperate to escape the tickling, you manage to lodge your hand in between his face and your stomach, pushing his head away with your palm against his mouth.
Even with his face half covered, you can see his grin glow, it crinkles at his eyes and brushes against your fingers. “You’re a menace, you know that?” you scold, not without love in your voice. And it must reach Ajax’s ears because they’re dusted red by a blush and the dopey look on his face.
“You love me anyway.” The feeling of his mouth moving the muffled words against your palm tickles you again and a delusional part of yourself imagines he’s pressing the feeling behind them into your skin, so that they may ring true within you as a promise. With a touch so gentle you could almost forget he’s the 11th Fatui Harbinger, Ajax pulls your hand away from his face and presses an even gentler kiss to your wrist like a seal.
Before you can get any sappier, your stomach lets out an embarrassingly loud growl breaking the moment. Ajax’s boyish laugh still makes your heart swell. “Come, родная. Let’s go get dinner before my siblings eat everything.”
You both eventually stumble down to the dining table, still a little bleary-eyed and with horrible bed heads, but first, you make sure to kiss Ajax with your own seal. Because he’s right, you do love him anyway.