Archive of Our Own

Other dancers may be on the floor, dear,
But my eyes will see only you.

--

“Oh no, what is he doing here??”

Lumine turns to look, but it’s not easy to tell what Paimon means at first.  The place is crowded, and the lights shift and spin across myriad smiling faces.  Actually, when she finally sees what is amiss, she thinks her eyes must be deceiving her.  It’s not like his looks are distinctive.  In this light, he could be just like anyone else.

You must be seeing things, she almost accuses, even though she doesn’t really believe it.  But the crowd shifts, and Childe looks up, and when their eyes meet, there can be no question.

“Man, Paimon thought this was supposed to be a relaxing night.”

“Well,” Lumine hedges, “he could just be here to enjoy the party, the same as us.”

“Do you really think so?”

Childe raises a hand in a subtle wave.  He smiles.

“Not for a second,” says Lumine with a frown.

Childe isn’t someone you just run into on a normal day.  Childe is someone who shows up right before bad things happen.

Well, maybe that’s not always true.  Sometimes he can be sweet, in a weird way, and even genuinely helpful when he feels like it.

The thing is, there’s no predicting what he’ll feel like doing, and he is alarmingly powerful.  If he feels like causing trouble, things can escalate rapidly.  There is something ever so slightly unhinged about him, something dark and deadened just behind his piercing blue eyes that Lumine cannot fully understand.

Even if Childe is only here to enjoy the party, that definitely doesn’t mean it’s safe.

“Well, whatever he’s here for, he’d better—wait, where are you going??”

It’s almost a relief to have a mission in mind.  The thought of being invited to a party was nice, but the reality has been a little awkward.  Lumine doesn’t really know any of these people, and they definitely don’t know her.  She knows how to make conversation when she is in the middle of something, or when someone needs her help.  Less so, when she is just…standing around, fidgeting with the fabric of a pretty dress she feels silly for even wearing.

She weaves her way through people drinking and people dancing, all of them loud and happy, but no one pays her any mind.  No one, that is, apart from Childe.  He hasn’t looked away from her for an instant.

There’s a memory she can’t seem to shake, a moment that replays in her mind no matter how hard she tries to push it aside.

I had my eye on you the whole time, he had said when they first met.

At the time, it had been disconcerting.  He had just revealed himself to be a member of the Fatui, and not only that, but one of its Harbingers.  She didn’t want him watching her, didn’t want him anywhere near her, no matter how affable he seemed, or what kind of help he had to offer.

But for some reason, ever since their last meeting, (a bizarre series of events involving, of all things, Childe’s younger brother), all their previous interactions have taken on an entirely different character in her mind.

Did she misjudge him?

“Long time no see, girlie.”

No, she tells herself firmly, for perhaps the dozenth time.  She definitely didn’t misjudge him.

Lumine folds her arms, instantly on her guard.  “Not long enough,” she scoffs.  “What are you doing here?”

Childe feigns surprise.  Like every other emotion, it does not quite reach his eyes.  “Why so suspicious?” he simpers, gesturing vaguely to the room behind her.  “It’s hardly a private event.”

“That’s obviously not what I meant,” Lumine digs her nails into her arm.

Childe laughs, a hollow, affected sound, and still somehow Lumine’s treacherous heart dares to skip a beat.  He is undeniably handsome, in a particularly infuriating kind of way.  Perhaps it’s just that she really wishes he weren’t.  “Maybe not,” Childe lifts a shoulder amicably, “but it’s the answer, nonetheless.  If you don’t mind my saying so, you don’t seem to be enjoying yourself.”

“Only because I’m talking to you,” Lumine huffs coldly.

Childe laughs again, unfazed as ever.  “Oh, but I’ve been watching you for awhile already.  Whoever invited you is being a poor host.”

Lumine feels her cheeks flush hot, and hates him all the more for it.  Again those words echo in the back of her mind, I had my eye on you the whole time.

If she were smarter, maybe she would tell him to keep his eyes to himself.  “And who invited you?” she tries to accuse, but there is no bite in her words.

She’s not sure she wants the answer.  Whatever she thinks of Childe, and even in spite of his recent actions, his position commands a certain level of respect in Liyue.  There are probably lots of people who want to invite him places.

And, well.  He isn’t altogether unpleasant.  Lumine has suffered far worse company, if she’s being honest.  Maybe someone else—someone who hasn’t seen firsthand what the Fatui get up to, or someone who hasn’t had the misfortune of facing him in battle—looks at him and sees nothing more than an accomplished, handsome, genial young man.

(Maybe he teases her and calls her girlie, too.  And maybe that’s something Lumine just simply doesn’t want to know.  For completely normal reasons.)

“No one of any import,” says Childe amiably.  “At least, not compared to you.”

Lumine feels like she’s been dropped in ice water.  The lights and noise of the party fade to an inconsequential din, and she sees nothing but piercing blue eyes and an easy smile.

Surely he didn’t mean anything by it.  He meant important like her reputation.  Yes.  That makes sense.  Still, she hesitates a moment too long, and Childe does not afford her the courtesy of pretending not to notice.

He laughs again as he moves away from the wall, and draws himself up to his full height.  He’s dressed more or less the same as always, minus the jacket and Fatui mask.  If Lumine were in her right mind, she might ask him about the battle advantages of owning so many shirts that don’t button all the way down, but at the moment she is trying very hard to pretend that she hasn’t noticed the exposed skin of his midriff.

“For an accomplished warrior,” says Childe, too close and too quiet, “you’re remarkably easy to fluster.”

He holds out his hand.

Lumine looks up into his eyes, stunned and floundering yet again.  She feels her own hand move without her permission, long before she has wrapped her head around the unspoken question.

By the time she thinks to deny him, her hand is already resting in his.

“Does the legendary Traveler know how to dance?” Childe asks her, and though his tone is ever playful, it is somehow different than before.

“Do you?” Lumine fires back.  She doesn’t pull away.

Childe laughs.  He leads her out into the center of the room.

Lumine knows how to dance the way she knows how to do a lot of things—she can’t remember ever learning, and she couldn’t have told him she knew how until they began.  Her body knows the moves, but her memory is as a heavy fog, dense and dizzying.

Childe, too, dances like he does everything else.  Though he is graceful, and though his hand upon the small of her back is surprisingly gentle, it still feels a little like an act of aggression.  There is practiced precision in even the most casual of movements, an unspoken challenge in the subtle smile upon his features.

He leads her in a turn and pulls her close against him, and Lumine tries very hard to swallow down a shock of something inexplicable.  It’s not like there’s anything special about his body, she tells herself firmly.  Lots of people are strong, well-muscled, handsome, warm.

“You seem tense, girlie,” he teases.

Lumine scoffs.  “I still don’t know what your game is.”

Childe laughs.  “Am I not allowed to have a free evening once in awhile?”

“You are,” says Lumine, “but I don’t think you do.”

“I see,” says Childe, in mocking thoughtfulness.  “You think this is connected to my work somehow.”

He says it like it should sound ridiculous, like the entirety of their friendship was not once built upon a delicate tapestry of easy half-truths.  “Actually,” says Lumine icily, “I think that even if it weren’t, you still wouldn’t know how to turn it off and act normal.”

Another chuckle, quieter and less affected.  He leads her in another turn and leans in close when they come back together.  “You might be right about that,” he says.

If he weren’t so irritatingly cavalier, Lumine might have felt just the slightest bit sorry for what she said.  What was he like before he became a Harbinger?  Or was he so young when he joined that he wouldn’t know how to be anything else even if he tried?  Even if he wanted to?

But he doesn’t want to, she reminds herself.  Picking fights and collecting debts and terrifying people is what he likes doing, and he is exceptionally good at it.  And that is why, even if there is a part of her that likes him, that feels sorry for him, that wants…well.  She’s not even going to acknowledge that one.

Even if she wishes things could be different between them, they aren’t, and they can’t be.  She can spar with him, she can even dance with him, but that is as far as it goes.

“What if I told you,” says Childe, ducking his head so that his lips almost brush her ear, “that I came because I heard you might be here, and I wanted to see you?”

The words send such a shock through her that she misses a step.  Childe catches her by the waist and holds her steady, and the dance continues.  “Why?” she asks him, but her voice comes out thin and breathless.  “We don’t have any business with each other anymore.”

“No?” says Childe.  “Then why did you come over to talk to me?”

“Because…”

Because she was worried, yes, about why he was here or what he might do, but in truth that’s not really any of her business anymore.  She came over to talk to him because she couldn’t have ignored him if she tried.  Because seeing him felt like being alive again.  Because when she set eyes upon him, everything else ceased to matter.

But she can’t tell him that.

Anyway, she’s already hesitated too long.  Childe leads her in a turn, and Lumine lets out a breath she didn’t realize she was holding.  She looks up with a gasp as he pulls her close again, and somehow she can’t even bring herself to feel irritated by the smugness of his smile.  He’s won this round, and he knows it.

“What if I told you I wanted to see you because I missed you?” he asks her.  “Would you believe me?  Would you admit you missed me, too?”  He leans in close—dangerously so.  “Even just a little?”

Lumine’s head lolls to one side without her permission.  She pushes herself up onto her tiptoes, cranes her neck to get closer, secure in the feeling of Childe’s hand at her back.  She can feel his warm breath upon her own lips, hear her heartbeat hammering in her ears, see through heavy-lidded eyes the way his lips part subtly as they draw nearer.

The music ends, and the spell is broken.  Lumine’s eyes fly wide open, and she might have jumped a foot backward if Childe weren’t holding her there.

Childe is, as ever, utterly unfazed.  His gaze is soft, and his smile is warm.  “Another?”

She shouldn’t.  She can’t.

“All right,” she says.

The next song is lighter, far less sensual, but still Lumine’s head is spinning.  “Did your brother make it home?” Lumine asks him, grasping for some fleeting wisp of her sanity.

“He did,” says Childe.  “Now my family has two sons who won’t shut up about the famous Traveler,” he adds with a wink.

Lumine tries to shove him, but he is ready for her.  He dips her low over his knee, forcing her to hold onto him rather than push him away.  “You really are something,” she complains, once she has caught her breath.  “How did Teucer even manage to get here?  Weren’t your parents worried?”

It’s always a little jarring to catch Childe off his guard, but that question seems to do it.  His smile falls, and he has to think about his answer for a moment.  “Going places you shouldn’t runs in the family, I guess,” he says at last.

She waits for him to continue.  He doesn’t.

“What about your other siblings?” Lumine tries instead.  “Anthon and Tonia, right?”

Childe lights up again, and Lumine is surprised by how relieved it makes her feel.  “They’re a little older.  And a lot less…adventurous, shall we say.  I can’t imagine either of them pulling a stunt like that.  If you want to meet them, I’m afraid you’ll have to come to Snezhnaya for yourself.”

“Homeland of the Fatui Harbingers?” Lumine says skeptically.  “I’m not sure I’d be welcome.”

Childe chuckles.  “You won’t be welcomed in Inazuma, either, but word on the street is that you intend to go, anyway.”

“I have to,” Lumine averts her eyes.  Then again, if she doesn’t find some kind of answer in Inazuma…

“Don’t misunderstand me,” says Childe, “I only mean that if you’re on a mission, it’s rarely practical to go only where others want you to go.”

“Oh?” Lumine deflects.  “Is that why you’re still in Liyue?”

His answering chuckle is…surprisingly sheepish.  “Well.  I haven’t quite reached the point where there’s no one left who wants me here.  But in the end it’s not really up to me when I get to leave.”

Lumine shivers involuntarily.  She keenly remembers the speech Childe was making to the newest Fatui recruits before his little brother intervened.  “Right.”

“And what about you, Traveler?” asks Childe.  “What’s keeping you in Liyue?”

Lumine thinks.  Surely there must be something.  Loose ends to tie up before she moves on, maybe.  Little things like food she’s yet to try.  Supplies she isn’t sure she’ll be able to come by elsewhere.  The occasional nook or cranny she has somehow failed to explore.

But she doesn’t really have any close friends here.  Definitely not like in Mondstadt.  There’s no one at this party she wants to talk to, and certainly no one she wants to dance with, apart from Childe, who isn’t exactly her friend, but who isn’t exactly her enemy, either.

(Childe, who came here because he heard she’d be here, because he wanted to see her.)

“Nothing in particular, I guess,” says Lumine at last, but she wraps her arm a little tighter around his shoulders, and slides the sturdy fabric of his collar between her fingers.  “Once I find a way to get to Inazuma, I’ll go.”

“Hm.”  Childe considers her for what feels like a long and heavy moment.  The music is winding down.  All too soon, they’ll both have another choice to make.  “Well.  I hope you’ll favour me with one last sparring match before we say our goodbyes.”

In spite of herself, Lumine almost laughs.  “Is fighting all you ever think about?”

“No,” says Childe.  “But I already tried to tell you I missed you, and you didn’t seem to care for that.”  He turns her under his arm and pulls her back in.  “At least now you’re smiling.”

The song ends, and for a moment Lumine could swear she hears nothing.  There might as well be no one else in the room, in the entire world.

Something registers in the back of her mind.  A distant din of happy chattering, and one voice that has a way of piercing through any crowd.  Paimon is talking to someone, she realizes vaguely, or more likely at someone.  Lumine can only imagine the earful she’d be in for if Paimon saw—

She looks up at Childe, and they pull apart by a fraction.  But he doesn’t let go of her hand, or perhaps she doesn’t let go of his.

“Your call, girlie.”

She should leave, right now—or better yet, five minutes ago.  Instead, she hears herself saying, as though from very far away, “Can we…go outside for a minute?”

This seems to genuinely surprise him, because he doesn’t say anything.  He just nods, and follows her to a side door in the corner where he was standing earlier.

Once she is outside, Lumine sucks in a deep breath.  There’s a chill in the night air, a stark contrast to the warmth of a room full of dancing partygoers, but it’s not nearly as refreshing as she’d hoped it would be.  There’s too much she’s not saying, too much she’s afraid to even think, and soon she’ll leave or Childe will leave and then there’s no telling when they’ll see each other again.

There’s no telling how they’ll meet again.

She can feel him hovering just behind her, though not close enough to touch by accident.  A month ago at most, she’d have dismissed Childe as little more than a lunatic.  Sometimes sweet, in a weird way, and sometimes genuinely helpful if he felt like it, but definitely not someone she could trust, let alone someone she could actually talk to.

And what if she was right to think so?  What if she tells him a fraction of what’s on her mind, and his game is won the moment she stops playing?  What if he laughs at her?

“Are you all right?”

She feels the barest brush of his gloved fingers against her shoulder.

“I will miss you,” Lumine confesses.  The words come out all in a rush, long before she has fully decided to speak them.  “I do miss you.  I wish…”

“What?”

Too close, and his hand settles too gently upon her shoulder.  Lumine wraps her arms around herself and turns her gaze to the stars.

“I wish things could be different between us.”

Childe pulls gently on her shoulder, willing her to turn around.  “How?”

“What do you mean, how?” Lumine whirls around, and shoves him so hard he stumbles backward.  “I wish we didn’t have to be enemies!  I wish we didn’t have to keep hurting each other!  I wish you didn’t feel like you had to fight me just to…to spend time with me!  I wish—“

She grabs fistfuls of his shirt, braces her fists against the unyielding muscle of his exposed abdomen, and tries—oh, by the very stars, she tries—not to let her emotions get the best of her.  Childe is watching her in stunned silence, his hands held out at odd angles, his piercing eyes strangely dark even beneath the twinkling city lights.

“I wish I didn’t feel that way about you,” Lumine finishes at last.

It is strange to think of what follows as silence.  There is still the music from inside, the happy voices of the partygoers, and some chatter from passers-by on the street.  But somehow the silence that falls between them is all Lumine can focus on, and it is deafening.

It’s not long before profound embarrassment sets in.  Childe hasn’t moved at all, and he is still staring down at her like she’d slapped him.  Actually, that’s not even an apt comparison.  She can imagine exactly how Childe would look if she’d slapped him.  He is looking at her like she has said something horrifying—whatever it is that could possibly horrify a Fatui Harbinger—and Lumine is left with nothing but to wonder why he doesn’t just break and laugh in her face already.

He’s won the game.  She is humiliated.  Let him take his prize and be done with it.

“Are you going to say anything?” Lumine snaps.  Belatedly, she realizes she is still clutching onto his shirt.

“I—uh—“ Childe stammers.

“Forget it.”  Lumine fully intends to let go, with one last shove for good measure.

“Wait!”  Childe catches onto her arms.  She almost pushes him, anyway.  “We don’t have to be enemies.  We’re not.  At least…I don’t think so.”

It almost aches to look at him.  Lumine swallows hard against the question she doesn’t want to ask.  Maybe they’re not enemies now, but what about later?  What happens if she gets in his way again?  What happens if…

Without meaning to, she has pulled him closer.  Then again, she doubts she could pull Childe anywhere he didn’t want to go.  If she pushed herself onto her tiptoes again like before, she could almost—

Lumine’s fingers curl tighter in the fabric of Childe’s shirt.  Childe’s eyelashes flutter.  He is not holding her as steadily as he was before.  He is barely touching her at all, like she might shatter between his fingers.

Maybe he’s right to think so.

Their lips brush, and Childe somehow manages to tense even further.  It is barely even a kiss, certainly nothing like what her heart yearns to do, but Lumine waits to see how he will react.  She would never have expected someone like Childe to be so…shy.

It feels like an eternity passes before he moves at all.  Slowly, painstakingly, she feels him begin to relax against her.  His fingers curl around her arms, and he eases forward to kiss her again.

If she ever had imagined kissing him—and she is not admitting that she has—it could not have been more different.  In her mind she had envisioned a lightning bolt, or maybe a dam breaking.  Months upon months of building tension, their opposing allegiances, their irreconcilable values, their undeniable chemistry, all bubbling over in one beautiful, disastrous moment.  They would have come at one another with force and passion and violence, not very different at all from the way they are on the battlefield.

Instead, Childe’s kiss is…soft.  Hesitant, and sweet—so sweet it threatens to rend Lumine’s heart in her chest.  He is a little clumsy, even, like he’s not used to kissing, though he catches on quickly.

And when he stops, when she leans as far forward as she can go and he does not come back to meet her, Lumine considers that no dream, however enticing, could hold a candle to this reality.  It is a dangerous thing to think.  Now that she knows, she fears no substitution will ever satisfy her again.

She still has his shirt bunched up in her hands.  He is trying to take slow, measured breaths, but she can feel the ragged rise and fall of his ribcage beneath her fists.  She is afraid to open her eyes.  She relinquishes her hold on his shirt in fractions, and flattens her palm against his abdomen, instead.

“You,” she says, for want of anything better to say, “are too tall.”

She feels more than she hears his surprised stutter of laughter.  “And…what am I to do about that?”

“Sit down,” says Lumine.  “I can’t reach.”

It’s a little dizzying, the way he so readily complies.  He doesn’t tease her or mock her.  He doesn’t even pretend to fight back.  He just…sits, on the street, with his back against the side of the building.  It doesn’t look comfortable, or particularly clean.  He’ll get his clothes filthy sitting like that, but he doesn’t even seem to pay it any mind.  He looks up at her and holds out his hands, beckoning her to join him.

Lumine blinks, and in sharp contrast imagines him as he is in battle.  She feels heat rising to her cheeks as she takes his outstretched hands to help herself down.  It’s unnerving to see him so contrite.  She can’t help wondering whether this is just another game, whether he knows she hasn’t quite let down her guard yet, and he is just waiting, waiting until—

Why are you being so nice all of a sudden?  She almost asks him, because settling into his lap like this feels a lot more intimate than she had anticipated.  But what kind of question is that, really, and what could he even say in response?

She rests her hands on his shoulders, lets her eyes fall to his lips.  She wants to kiss him again, but if she moves any closer…

A flicker of movement catches her eye.  Childe takes a lock of her hair between his fingers and arranges it carefully upon her shoulder.  It draws her attention to his other hand, which is sort of clutched awkwardly against the side of his leg.

Lumine feels herself beginning to smile.  The way Childe is, she’d half-expected him to have his hands all over her at the slightest invitation.

Expected, maybe...or hoped.

She reaches for his hand, and he offers it without hesitation.  She guides it to her waist.

Childe’s eyes are shockingly blue, and always somehow darker than Lumine remembers.  Strangely, the reddish-gold of his lashes seems to catch the light far more than his eyes ever do.  Sometimes it’s like he’s not all there, like some crucial piece of him is buried too deep, forever unreachable.  Lumine doesn’t quite know how to read the expression he wears now, because she doesn’t know how to read him at all.  There is never any predicting what he will do, let alone what he is thinking.

Childe watches her carefully as he rests his hand where she has placed it, and slowly brings the other to mirror it.  Lumine takes in a sharp breath.

“What is it?” he asks in a whisper.

Lumine almost laughs.  “Nothing,” she assures him, and finally allows herself to move closer.  “It feels good.”

Childe nods his understanding, eyes still wide as though with worry, hands still resting at her waist as though she were something breakable.  Lumine wraps her arms tightly around his shoulders and leans in to kiss him again.  She allows her body to press flush against his, so much closer than they ever were on the dance floor, and she shivers when Childe makes a soft noise against her lips.

Actually, it’s kind of a relief that Childe is acting so hesitant.  Part of the reason Lumine was so insistent that she wouldn’t even think about him like this was because she feared that once she put so much as a toe over that line, there would be no turning back.  She would be swept up in his maelstrom before she even had time to doubt herself, flung entirely off her course before she had time to regret.

She pulls back by a fraction, maybe just to prove that she can.  Though he chases after her, once he understands she intended to stop, he stops in turn.

It feels nice, being held like this.  When was the last time anyone just…held her?  If she had a million guesses, she’d never have imagined Childe being the one to do it.

“What are you thinking?”

“Just…” Lumine tries, “…that I’d never have expected this.”

Childe lets out a breathless chuckle.  “Yeah,” he agrees.  “Do you…want to stop?”

“No,” says Lumine.

“Good,” says Childe.

Lightning strikes.  The dam breaks.  He kisses her like he will never get another chance.

Somewhere far away, there is a change in the music.  A cool breeze passes over Lumine’s bare shoulders, and she pulls herself impossibly tighter against Childe.  His hands slide just a little, from her waist to her hips.  It’s probably an accident, but pure impulse drives Lumine to rock her hips forward.

They both take in a ragged gasp.  Childe’s kissing grows suddenly hesitant, but his fingers dig into her hips.

Somewhere far away, a tiny, nagging voice is trying desperately to tell her what a terrible idea this is.  She should stop now before this goes too far, assuming it hasn’t already.  Even if she wishes things could be different between them—

She cannot help herself—she rocks forward again before she can finish the thought, and this time Childe makes a strangled noise against her lips.

Things could be different.  They could.

They could.

Lumine doesn’t try to fight herself any longer.  She clutches a fistful of Childe’s shirt and threads her fingers through his hair as she kisses him more deeply, grinds herself against him again and again until he starts to guide her movements subtly with his hands.  She can feel the telltale evidence of his enjoyment now, and it only heightens her own.

It does occur to her, fleetingly, that if anyone else decided to step outside for a moment, this would be profoundly inappropriate.  It occurs to her, too, that if that someone happened to be someone she knew, or even just someone who knew her as the famous Traveler, she would be mortified.

Somehow, she cannot bring herself to care.

Childe pulls back from her suddenly, trying very hard to steady his ragged breathing.  His grip on her is so strong that she cannot move, bringing into sharp focus how gentle he has been thus far.

“Do you, uh…want to…go somewhere else?” he asks her.

Yes.

“I can’t.”

She could.

“Right.  Of course.  Sorry.”

Lumine takes in a deep breath.  When that one doesn't do anything, she tries another.  There is still a fire burning in her lower belly, a near-overwhelming desire to return to their previous activities, or better yet, to forego all common sense and leave with him.

Instead, she resettles herself in his lap so that she can rest her head against his chest.  She moves until she can most clearly hear his heartbeat, loud and a little erratic.  Childe relinquishes his grip upon her slowly, as though with great difficulty, and wraps his arms around her shoulders.

Lumine closes her eyes, and tries to think of something to say.  Well, something besides, I changed my mind, let’s go.

“Why did you join the Fatui, Childe?”

Childe doesn’t answer right away.  “It’s…a long story,” he says at last, slowly, like no one has ever asked him before.  “Suffice to say, it wasn’t exactly my choice.”

Lumine frowns.  “Couldn’t you leave?”

Childe inhales, hesitates.  His hand strays to her hair, idly drawing individual strands between his fingers.  “I guess I could,” he says at last.  “But what would I do instead?”

Lumine, in turn, draws the fabric of Childe’s shirt between her fingers.  “I’m sure you could do lots of other things,” she says.  Then, before she can stop herself, “You could always come with me.”

A long silence follows.  Even the music inside has stopped playing.

“That’s a big ask, Traveler.”

“After what we just—“ Lumine huffs, unthinking.  “I have a name, you know.”

She could swear she feels Childe’s breath hitch.  “All right,” he says.  “Lumine.”

He’s never said her name before.  She doesn’t know why she asked.  Now she’ll never be able to get it out of her mind.

“You want me to betray the Fatui?  Betray the Tsaritsa, betray my country, and travel with you?  Knowing that you have…mixed feelings about me, to say the least, and that the offer might not stand for very long, if at all?”

Lumine pulls away to look at him.  “I want you to betray the Fatui because it would be the right thing to do,” she says simply.  “You’re not—I mean…”

Childe doesn’t respond, even though Lumine can imagine what he wants to say.  Instead, he offers her a lopsided smile, and Lumine is very nearly overcome by the treacherous urge to kiss him again.

“You know,” says Childe, reaching up to brush her hair needlessly from her face, “if it were just me, I might take that risk.  I probably would, actually.”

His hand falls to her shoulder, and he averts his gaze.  When next he speaks, all that warmth, that gentleness, has fled his voice.  “But I have my family to worry about,” he says, cold and sharp.  “What do you think would happen to them if I disappeared?”

A soft noise escapes her lips, a contrite and miserable little, “Oh.”  She hadn’t thought of it that way.

Childe lets out a little huff of melancholy laughter, and his smile returns as quickly as it left.  He looks up at her and cups her cheek in his hand.  “We’d better get you back to the party.”

Lumine doesn’t want to go back.  She wants to stay here.  Better yet, she wants to go somewhere else, like he asked her before.  She wants to pretend that none of it matters, that she doesn’t have a brother to find who doesn’t want to be found, that Childe isn’t a high-ranking member of an organization that would hurt his family if he left, that the two of them aren’t destined to clash, destined to hurt one another, destined to go their separate ways again and again and again, until one day…

But, “Right,” she says.  “Of course.”

She pushes herself to her feet and sets about fixing her dress.  If she has to explain why she looks so disheveled to Paimon—to anyone—she might actually die of embarrassment.

Past the crack in the door, the lights shift and the music changes.  It is slow and sweet now, a dance meant for lovers.  Lumine tries very hard to focus her attention on her dress, even though it looks more or less the way it did before.

“It’s a nice dress, by the way,” says Childe quietly.

Lumine looks up, surprised by the hesitance in his tone.

He smiles and lifts a shoulder, still looking charmingly awkward.  “You look beautiful, of course, though I expect you must get tired of hearing it.”

Perhaps a little in spite of herself, Lumine smiles back.  “I don’t hear that much at all.  Thank you.”

“No?” Childe startles.  “Well.  Only because everyone assumes someone else has told you already.”

“Why are you being so nice?” Lumine squints at him, only half-joking.

“Nice?” Childe raises an eyebrow.  “I say only what I see, Comrade.  Surely you know by now that lying in the interest of diplomacy has never been my preference.”

“Oh, so being nice always equates to lying?” Lumine teases, daring a few steps closer.  “Yeah, that sounds about right for you.”

She is stalling, a little, because this moment has to end, and she wonders whether she will ever see Childe like this again.  He reaches out for her, draws a lock of her hair between his fingers and needlessly arranges it upon her bare shoulder.

"I said it because it's true, and I wanted to," he says quietly.  "No other reason."

The music swells, and something about the sound startles Lumine into motion.  If she doesn’t move now, she thinks, she might never find it in her to look away.

Childe opens the door for her, but he doesn’t follow.

“Aren’t you coming?” Lumine turns back.

“Not unless you want me to,” says Childe, in an echo of his usual easy manner.  “I only came to see you, remember?”

“Oh.”

Lumine doesn’t know what to say.  She doesn’t know what she expected.

“This doesn’t excuse you from our sparring match, by the way,” says Childe with a wink.

Lumine turns away, with something between a groan and a poorly-stifled laugh.  “Do you always have to be so—“

But by the time she turns back, the doorway is empty.  Childe is gone.

It’s almost embarrassing how that emptiness makes her heart ache.  She didn’t know it would end so soon.  If she’d known, she wouldn’t have let him out of her sight.  She is halfway to rushing out the door to yell after him when—

“There you are!!”

Lumine whirls around, feeling very much like she’s been caught doing something she shouldn’t.

“You know, it’s pretty insensitive, leaving Paimon all alone at a party where she doesn’t know anyone!”

Lumine takes in a deep breath.  She unclenches her hands against her sides.  “Sorry, Paimon.”

Paimon considers her a moment.  “Where did you disappear to, anyway?  Did you find out what Childe was up to?”

Lumine glances over her shoulder, half-hoping to find that he has returned.  “Sort of.”

“’Sort of?’” Paimon complains.  “What’s that supposed to mean?”

Lumine sighs.  “Oh, I don’t know.  You never know with Childe, right?”

Paimon groans dramatically, apparently giving up hope that Lumine will give her a satisfactory answer.  “I guess.  Anyway, have you been to the snack table yet?  They have these little cakes—”

With one last glance over her shoulder, Lumine follows where Paimon leads.