Chapter Text
The noise of Puspa Café stops for a moment as the wooden doors close behind the latest customer. It’s a balm to Tighnari’s ears, which have been hurting all day. His lectures were full of loud and obnoxious students who spoke only to hear themselves speak and the noise of Sumeru City felt particularly stifling, echoing in his head with a throbbing pain.
Unfortunately, the chatter picks back up almost immediately. Tighnari winces and turns to the next page of the Akademiya’s Amurta Journal of Botanical Research. He has published papers in the journal himself, but also enjoys keeping up to date with his peers.
ABSTRACT:
Variations in seed and seedling traits determines how Sumeru flora interact with their environment at their point of generation: a crucial point in their development and establishment. This study details and quantifies genetic-based variations in seed and seedling traits in populations of the Sumeru begonia peltatifolia (Sumeru Rose) across a natural aridity gradient found in soils near Aaru Village, leveraging natural intraspecific variation to predict how populations might evolve in response to increasing aridity associated with Withering Zones in the Dharma Forests (Apam Woods, Mawtiyama Forest, Gandha Hill).
The words begin to swim in front of his eyes.
There’s only one person who could walk into Puspa Café and cause that type of reaction and silence — albeit only for a few minutes — in the General Mahamatra.
Or Cyno, as the general asked Tighnari to call him by his given name last week.
Cyno has been the bane of Tighnari’s existence these past few weeks. He shows up conveniently wherever Tighnari is and Tighnari has no idea why. If the General Mahamatra wanted to arrest him for some perceived slight or suspicion of illegal activity towards the Akademiya, Tighnari assumes that he would have done so by now.
Instead, Cyno sits next to Tighnari while he does his own work or, more often than not, plays both sides of a Genius Invokation card game and tells terrible jokes.
Tighnari asked the general why he plays both sides of a multiplayer game rather than challenging one of the many customers who would likely love to challenge the reigning Genius Invokation champion, but Cyno had smirked and said that this gave him the greatest challenge and practice.
He hasn’t yet asked Cyno about the jokes. It’s become a bit of a war of attrition, where Tighnari can tell that Cyno wants him to ask about them, which makes Tighnari want to stubbornly avoid reacting to them at all.
Sighing, Tighnari motions to move over slightly and allow Cyno to sit, but finds that he’s already automatically left room for the general as if he expected his arrival.
Tighnari scowls down at the cushion beside him as Cyno sits, placing a steaming mug of coffee on the table with care, avoiding Tighnari’s research materials that are again strewn across it.
“Local adaptation of seed and seedling traits in Sumeru begonia peltatifolia along a natural aridity gradient may both predict and constrain adaptive responses to Withering Zones,” Cyno reads over Tighnari’s shoulder. “Another article about Sumeru Roses?”
Tighnari sniffs, a bit annoyed that Cyno can so easily parse articles from all six Darshans, regardless of specialty.
“Another article about Sumeru Roses,” he echoes.
Frowning, Cyno stares at him, eyes narrowed as if Tighnari is his next research subject.
Tighnari realizes that Cyno hasn’t stared at him like this since the day they met. Maybe Cyno is finally about to tell him why he’s been following him for almost three weeks.
“You’re sick,” Cyno says. His usually-hoarse rasp pitches up as he says this, making it sound like a question.
“I just have a headache,” Tighnari says quickly. “The noise in the city hurts my ears sometimes.”
Cyno nods seriously and taps the handle of Tighnari’s almost-empty mug on the table.
“Sounds like you have a latte problems.”
Biting his lip, Tighnari wills himself not to say anything in response.
Cyno tilts his head to the side. “You know, because we’re in a coffee shop. A latte problems. A lot of problems.”
“Yeah, I got it,” Tighnari says.
“But you didn’t laugh.”
Tighnari tastes the iron tang of blood in his mouth as he bites the inside of his lip harder. The General Mahamatra almost looks sad that Tighnari didn’t laugh at his dumb joke.
Somewhere across the café, a woman laughs loudly and soon a chorus of voices from a few tables over are laughing in unison. Tighnari steels himself and hopes that his ears aren’t twitching.
Sometimes they give him away.
“It wasn’t funny,” Tighnari finally says after another moment of Cyno staring at him with a pout from underneath his jackal cape. He looks anything but formidable right now.
Cyno hums and takes a sip of his coffee. “Affogato my other coffee jokes. Sorry this one wasn’t brewed long enough.”
Tighnari snorts and quickly tries to cover his mouth to stifle the sound but Cyno is already grinning at him widely. The General Mahamatra looks almost shy as his eyes dart up to Tighnari’s ears and then back to Tighnari’s eyes. He flushes a bit against the darkness of his cheeks, a stark contrast to the white hair that falls in front of his face.
“That’s terrible,” Tighnari chokes out between stifled chuckles.
“But it made you laugh,” Cyno says, a triumphant note in his voice. “It can’t have been that bad.”
Tighnari sighs and returns to reading the Amurta Journal of Botanical Research.
It’s not until later that evening that Tighnari realizes that his headache has gone away.