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The clicks of his heels against the tiled floor and the rattling of the chains hanging off of the handcuffs keeping his hands bound together echoed through the empty halls of Zapolyarny Palace. The wind was howling outside, a blizzard raging through Snezhnaya in the process. The white snow buried everything beneath it, the citizens were struggling.
He saw it all outside, how awful they looked compared to the Fatui scum hiding away in the Palace.
“Lord Pierro requested your presence in his office. Consider yourself lucky, prisoner,” The agent in front of him spoke coldly, Diluc decidedly ignored him in favor of keeping his eyes to the ground.
His wrists hurt, the wounds covering his body ached with each step he was forced to take. Any hesitation would be met with a knife to his back, and harsh words telling him to keep moving. It was insufferable. He shouldn’t have let himself get caught, not like this.
He heard a door creak in front of him. The agent in front of him stopped, stepping aside and grabbing his shoulder, shoving him forward. Diluc stumbled, nearly falling over while he turned his head to glare at the agent that now stood behind him.
“My lord, I have brought the prisoner.” The agent quickly placed a hand over the left side of his chest as a sign of respect, bowing slightly towards the man sitting in front of him.
Diluc shifted his gaze, and that’s when he noticed it.
First, it was the chessboard. Some pieces were already missing, the places of the ones on the board strange and unnatural. It didn’t appear to look like a normal game of chess, not to his standards. If anything, it looked like something Kaeya would attempt to do in order to throw him off.
Second, it was Pierro himself. Through the few rays of light coming from the window to their left, he could see the shine on the gold of his clothes. The bright, star-shaped pupil that stared at him with interest. The same star-shaped pupil that Kaeya had. The intense gaze this man had on the chessboard in front of him spoke volumes about his character. He was a strategist, a dangerous thinker that Diluc shouldn’t underestimate.
Diluc clenched his fists tightly, narrowing his eyes. This man looked eerily like Kaeya. Far older and more mature in appearance, sure, but Kaeya nonetheless. Was Father’s death really Kaeya’s fault after all? Did Kaeya lie about being an agent for Khaenri’ah, too?
He hated that star-shaped pupil. It spoke of deception.
The office itself was decorated with shelf after shelf of books, each from different regions around Teyvat. Some bore the star of Khaenri’ah, others shared the insignia of the Fatui, some he recognized from Mondstadt. But what stood out among them all was a sword resting against one of the bookcases, collecting dust and seemingly unused for a while.
“It is said… How one plays chess can reveal much about their personality.” The harbinger picked up a knight, inspecting it between his thumb and index finger carefully.
Diluc’s attention was snapped back to Pierro, his gaze falling down to the chess piece in the other man’s hand. It was a black knight, belonging to Pierro’s side of the board. Something about this felt off to Diluc. It wasn’t right.
Pierro then wrapped his hand around it, holding it tightly before looking up to Diluc with an intense gaze that bore down on him, “Care to join me for a game… Diluc Ragnvindr?”
The door shut behind him, the agent already retreating away from Pierro’s small office. It was just him and the harbinger now, separated only by the chessboard in front of them. Pierro was already rearranging the pieces, white on Diluc’s side, black on his side while Diluc pulled a chair out to sit on.
His hands being cuffed didn’t make things easy, not when Pierro seemed to have no intention to free his wrists.
“How do you know my name?” Diluc growled, glaring at the other man.
He was met with an uninterested look, and a simple, “I believe you were close to a certain Kaeya Alberich. That boy is my grandson.”
Grandson. So Kaeya wasn’t left in Mondstadt by the man in front of him.
White moves first.
“Your grandson ?” Diluc looked at him with bewilderment, picking up one of the pieces on the board, “And what of his father, then?”
Diluc moved the pawn in front of the king two spaces, starting his line of attack. To him, a strong attack is what will eventually win against the defenses brought on by Pierro. That’s always how he won against Kaeya, after all.
Pierro picked up the pawn in front of his queen, moving it forward two spaces, “His father acts on his own volition. What he does is to support Khaenri’ah, not the Fatui.”
Kaeya’s father does not associate with the Fatui, Diluc made a mental note of this information and continued on, moving the pawn in front of the queen one space to defend his other one from being taken. To play chess against a far older opponent was certainly intimidating.
“So, I want answers. Why is it that you decided to drag me out of prison to see you? It certainly can’t because you just want to play chess.” Diluc watched Pierro skeptically, waiting for his next move.
He moved a knight forward, in line to attack his pawn. Diluc bit his lip, scanning over the board for a possible move he could make.
“You intrigue me, Ragnvindr. That’s simply all. It takes a lot of nerve to attack multiple Fatui strongholds and believe you can get out of it unscathed.” He spoke calmly, though it unsettled Diluc even more.
The calm persona of this man only amplified the tension in the room.
Diluc moved the right bishop forward, to which Pierro responded with his bishop. It was a back and forth, Diluc taking pieces, Pierro reacting with a similar amount of pieces taken from him. Diluc could feel his head start to ache from the amount of careful thinking he had to do.
Was this next move his last?
“And I have remained unscathed, up until you sent one of your harbingers after me. Quite a strange move, isn’t it?” Diluc argued, capturing Pierro’s queen with a knight.
“Not at all. When posed with a threat, the most important course of action is a countermeasure. Isn’t that right, Ragnvindr? Faced with the same situation, I’m sure you would have thought the same.” Pierro moved a rook to take his knight, and the silent battle continued.
He’s right. When fighting against Ursa, their countermeasure was Father’s delusion. Wasn’t it? Diluc could feel his blood boil, his fists tightening. He blinked, taking a sharp inhale at the realization of what he was doing. He needed to control his temper, now wasn’t the time to lose control.
“Have you ever considered, for a moment, that you are but a pawn to the archons? A plaything for their amusement?” Pierro frowned, watching Diluc use a rook to prepare a checkmate.
“No. I don’t see why I should trust a word coming from your mouth, considering your status,” Diluc hissed back, his gaze fixed on the board.
“People who obtain visions lose their sense of self when it’s taken away from them. They’ll lose memories, their hopes, aspirations. They become an empty shell of who they once were.” Pierro eyed his king, moving it over one space, “You are also without your vision. Have you not experienced that feeling of emptiness in your heart? That is what the archons want. A means to incapacitate threats.”
He knew that feeling Pierro was talking about. The void in his heart, the emptiness that grew with each passing day he spent away from his vision, away from Mondstadt. There were growing lapses in his memory, of Kaeya, of his Father, of that night. He fought the Fatui in a blind rage, sometimes seemingly for no reason while he struggled to remember.
Pierro was right. But it wasn’t like he was going to simply admit it without being skeptical.
“Why are you telling me this?” Diluc pushed his rook forward, narrowing his crimson eyes, “What goal are you aiming for here?”
“You’re an interesting boy, Ragnvindr. I find myself captivated by your perseverance to push forward through the harsh blizzard in search of answers. Many souls who lose their visions don’t have the nerve to do so.” Pierro smirked, moving his last bishop over.
Check. Diluc’s in trouble, the board was no longer in his favor. He had too few pieces to properly fight back, the most he could do is move away and figure out a strategy then.
He moved his king over, out of the way from Pierro’s blatant attack.
“I can see why my grandson has taken such a liking towards you. I’ve watched his progress from the shadows, seen everything that happened. He takes after your father, rather than his own.” Check again.
There wasn’t anything Diluc could do besides sacrifice his rook.
“What are you getting at, here? Stop talking about that traitor and tell me.” Diluc was beginning to grow frustrated with Pierro and his words, slowly but surely taking its toll on his moves as well.
“I don’t see Kaeya siding with Khaenri’ah when the time comes for him to pick a side. He cares too much about that nation. That is why I have a humble request for you.” Pierro picked up his bishop, and it was over.
“Checkmate. I’ll allow you to leave Snezhnaya unscathed under two conditions.” Pierro leaned back in his chair, crossing his legs while waiting for Diluc’s response.
Diluc fell silent, thinking over Pierro’s words before answering. It was once again suspicious to him, how merciful Pierro was towards him. The other harbinger he met, Capitano, was far from kind during their battle outside Snezhnaya’s border. The wounds that were hastily bandaged up after their fight still stung.
“What are these conditions?” Diluc sighed, slumping his shoulders.
“First, I don’t want to see you here again. If I learn of you returning to Snezhnaya, I won’t be so merciful.” Pierro started to rearrange the board to how it used to be, the pieces once again in bizarre locations, “Second, you’ll watch over Kaeya Alberich. His father would give me an earful if something… Dreadful… happened to that boy.”
Diluc once again looked at him with raised eyebrows, unsure of how to respond to that. Watch over Kaeya? After everything he’s done to his ex-brother? All of the wounds, the injured eye, the burns. Why would Pierro want somebody like him to watch over Kaeya in exchange for his freedom from the Fatui?
“...Very well. I accept your terms.” Diluc lowered his head, watching as the cuffs that bound his wrists together quickly unclasped, freeing him.
“Leave. If people try to stop you, show them this paper.” Pierro quickly scribbled down some words on a piece of paper and sealed it, handing it to him shortly after.
Diluc held it tightly in one hand, scanning over the words before standing up from his seat. The lettering was messy, written in Teyvat’s common language with some few grammatical errors. Almost as though Teyvat’s common language wasn’t his first.
Just like Kaeya.
“I don’t understand why somebody like you would work under the cryo archon,” Diluc admitted quietly before leaving the room, closing the door behind him.
Pierro watched his back, smiling softly as the door clicked shut. The papers on his desk were shuffled and stacked neatly into place, the chessboard sitting still. A pawn fell, the white knight moving on its own to replace its spot. The fights were continuing, and the harbingers were doing well to handle the situation at hand.
“Perhaps, it’s because I simply have the same goal as Her Majesty,” He looked at the board solemnly, resting his cheek on his fist as he watched with interest, “To take revenge against Celestia for their transgressions.”