Chapter Text
“This young lady’s name is Collei?” asks the fox man — Tighnari, Cyno called him. Collei anchors her gaze firmly on her shoes, because if she looks at the man, she’ll stare rudely at his ears, and if not the silky ears, then the extremely fluffy tail. Her eyes like to wander. This world is a minefield.
“Yes. She isn’t talkative.”
“Nothing I’m not used to. I’m more than willing to shelter her, but as I mentioned in my letter, I’m not equipped to develop literacy from . . . well, illiteracy. Are you sure you haven’t walked through the wrong door here?”
“You’re one of the most patient teachers I know,” says Cyno. “With this, I trust nobody more than I trust you.”
A violent swish draws her attention back to the tail, and from there Collei pushes herself to look up at Tighnari’s ears — eyes. She looks up at the man’s eyes.
“Is that so . . . ?” Tighnari mutters, his ears (Silky!) undergoing little flustered flicks every now and then. “Ah, I’ll put in my most honest effort, of course, but I do think she deserves better.”
Deserves better? This is already too much. She considers voicing it, thinking maybe it would put his worries in perspective, knowing she’s already more than grateful he hasn’t kicked her off the raised wooden platforms of Gandharva. She’ll be bumming off his kindness for a very long time. The fact he accepted at all still baffles her.
She reluctantly picks out a couple of words for her comment, pretty good ones too, but by the time she opens her mouth for it, the conversation moves on.
“If you need additional resources, you can go directly through me. If anybody bothers you about ‘dissemination of knowledge,’ there is precedent to avoid prosecution here.”
“I’d assume so. If there weren’t, every parent in Sumeru would be shaken down for reading to their own children. Besides,” says Tighnari, “you know I don’t fear the Akademiya. They can come lock me up. I’d like to see them try.”
Ah. It looks like she isn’t expected to talk here. The air leaving her lungs feels like relief.
The two men trade words for some hours after. Occasionally one of them throws a look her way, and she wonders if they expect her to join in on this conversation, but really she’s just happy to sit in the corner listening in. Her feet ache.
After discussions of leaf pressing and whatever a “Genius Invokation booster pack” is, the sound of chairs scraping across the floor rouses Collei from her trance. And there’s the other source of her dour mood.
“I’ll be on my way then,” Cyno says, clasping his cloak around his neck. He slings a bag over his shoulder, no doubt filled with bedroll, tarp, and tasteless provisions. “You can stay and settle in, Collei.”
Tighnari’s ears perk. “Hold on a moment. I think I have some mushroom and pork stew that you can bring with you. You’d think the Akademiya would spend more on their lead enforcer . . .”
Once the other man leaves the room, Collei finds herself slowly scooting over to Cyno’s side. She rests her head on the table, rubbing a hand over the twinging pain in the back of her neck as she watches him refasten his footwraps. The dread of him leaving is an oddly familiar sensation, the image of his back silhouetting against the doorframe doubly so. It’s reminiscent of when her parents unwittingly left her in the hands of a psychotic madman, and then when they left her alone in this life in general.
Permanence is altogether unfamiliar. Even Amber, who remains the focal point of her entire life, feels more like a memory than an actual person she might see again.
“How long until you come back?” she asks. She asks it like, How long until the sky shatters? or, How long until the rivers turn into cheese?
“Anywhere between a week to a month,” Cyno says. “I’ll try to be quick about it.”
She purses her lips in doubt. “Promise?”
She realizes then how weird that sounds. She’s asking him to . . . promise to be quick about it? No, he must realize what she really means, because when he glances down at her, he doesn’t look the slightest bit annoyed.
“I vow to return within the given time frame,” he responds solemnly.
“ . . . unharmed?” she adds. Feeling a bit greedy today, aren’t we, brat?
“Unscathed,” he appends.
“Cool,” she says. “Thanks.”
She’s watching him, so she sees every movement as he turns around and lifts a hand. He moves very slowly, exaggeratedly slow, bringing his palm closer and closer to Collei’s resting head, and it’s clear that he’s expecting her to move away from it from how much he hesitates, but she doesn’t. For some reason, she isn’t afraid.
Maybe it’s because of how unsure his movements are. It’s kind of pathetic, really.
Eventually, he rests his hand awkwardly atop her head. He doesn’t ruffle or anything, the way Collei’s seen brothers do to their sisters. Y’know, people who actually care about each other. She gets the feeling he has no idea what he’s doing. It doesn’t really feel like anything special, just a light pressure on her head.
After a long, long moment, he snatches his hand back and sighs. Looks like they’d both rather forget that happened.
But then Collei hears chuckles from the kitchen.
“I’m sorry,” Tighnari says, sounding not very sorry at all, “I just had to watch that play out. It’s okay, Cyno. You tried. Here, have a home cooked meal as an apology.”
Collei trails after them to see Cyno off at the gates. She doesn’t have much else to say to him, but she can’t help the impression that the longer she keeps him in her sights, the longer she gets to have him in her life. As far as she knows, he’ll become nothing but a memory the moment he crests the horizon.
So she stands there at the gate for far too long. Tighnari’s periodic side-eyes tell her that he would’ve probably left a while ago, but she can still see faux jackal ears bobbing on the road so she’d regret it if she left now.
She squints a little and sees Cyno turning around. Also too far out to be looking back, but he does so anyway.
She sees a tiny hand wave goodbye in the distance.
She shrugs, and then waves back.
Tighnari shows her around, eventually dropping her off at her new room. It’s a hut, really. A small, one room affair with strangely high shelves, a single-person bed off to the side, and a sturdy-looking desk sitting next to the window. It’s a lot, actually. If she remembers correctly, it’s a bit bigger than what her parents had back before . . . everything happened, and she gets it all to herself.
He gives her a lot of time. Maybe he expects she’s unpacking, but she really doesn’t have a lot to unpack. A set of clothes in the dresser, bedroll in the closet, Cyno’s tarp painstakingly considered and then also stuffed into the closet, and then she’s done.
Now what?
She gets the feeling that her time should be spent introducing herself, but she’s never really had to do that before. People tend to just insert themselves into her life, so how does she meet new people?
If she doesn’t get this right, Tighnari might get annoyed with her. Then where will she stay to wait for Cyno?
She lays back on her bed scheming up different ways to trick her new host that she’s already normal and worth a damn. She’s somewhere on her fifth scrapped idea when she hears a knock on the door.
She stares at the door like a startled baby fox.
The knock comes again.
“Collei? I have dinner here for you.”
Oh Archons, does she answer back? Is it too late? She’s spent too long thinking about this already, and the image of the man standing outside her door, bowl in hand, waiting for her response, kills her a little more with each passing second.
She tries to scramble to her feet, but the sudden numbness in her left leg throws her immediately to the floor. Her knees hit the wood with a loud bang, and the pain has her cursing colorfully.
“Are you okay? Collei, I’m coming in —”
“No!” she says through gritted teeth. She can’t let him see her like this. If she’s going to learn and become a . . . a doctor or something, she can’t be this pathetic. “No, I’m okay! I’m coming!”
She manages to stumble to her feet. Her left leg is still shaky and numb, but she hobbles on it like it’s a peg leg to get to the door. She’s huffing a bit when she swings it open.
“Thanks,” she manages.
Tighnari stands staring at her on the other side, ears swiveling atop his head in a way that makes her anxious.The smell of food tears her eyes away from the fox ears and onto the bowl of piping hot stew.
“If you don’t mind me asking, what happened?” he asks. “You look pained.”
“Um! I . . .” She glances down shamefacedly. Might as well come clean. “My leg went completely numb.” She winces as her leg muscles spasm, because apparently they like to prove a point. “So when I tried to get up, it didn’t go well.”
“Ah. Say no more, I understand.” Collei blinks. That easy? “I have some Nilotpala tea here to help with that very thing. Cyno let me know your situation beforehand, so if you need anything for your Eleazar, we should be stocked.”
“Oh. That’s, um . . .” Why did she open her mouth before figuring out what to say? Her flailing lands on a pretty safe response. “Thank you!”
Tighnari chuckles. “You’re very welcome, Collei. Here, I’ll leave these with you for now. Take your time eating and bring the dishes over when you’re done.” He pushes the bowl and tea into her hands, sending plumes of aromatic steam to rise straight into her face. “I’m sorry, I don’t have much time to cook tonight, so we’ll be having leftovers. That’s the same dish I sent our friend Cyno off with earlier.”
It smells divine. A rich, savory base, lightly spiced, and is that a hint of Rukkhashava Mushroom? When she looks down, she sees chunks of stewed pork glistening in the low evening light, and then the tell-tale frilled shape of the Rukkhashava. That, along with the warming, homy scent, makes Collei drool a little. She could stand here sniffing the stew for hours.
Except other people wouldn’t really appreciate that. She hears a footstep, and the fear of having messed up that interaction nearly bowls her over if not for Tighnari’s small chuckle as he turns away. “Wait! Don’t you wanna — talk or something?” Isn’t that what I’m supposed to do?
He tilts his head, ears flicking. “Do you want to?”
Collei has her mouth open in a wordless “o.” She doesn’t really have a polite answer to that.
“That’s what I thought,” he says laughingly. “It’s okay to rest for the day. You can worry about that later. If you’d like to put a time on it, how about tomorrow morning at around nine? I’ll bring breakfast, and we can eat together. Does that sound better?”
Collei nods sheepishly. She really just wants to eat right now.
“Alright. Enjoy!”
“Thank you! Er, bye!”
After she shuts the door, she slides down it into a sit. That was exhausting. She keeps thinking about foxes and their silky ears for some reason.
Not wanting to spill her stew with her limping, she eats her dinner right there on the floor, and she’s perfectly happy with it.
The next morning, Tighnari brings her and a still steaming basket of pita bread out into the forest to watch the wildlife. Having the conversation previously scheduled somehow eases Collei’s anxiety about how to start, when to stop, what to talk about; Tighnari guides her very carefully through every topic.
“Well, I graduated from Amurta with a degree in botany, specializing in conservation. Now I’m a Forest Watcher. This forest is my home, so I’d risk life and limb to protect it,” he says, giving her a moment to eat. “By the way, the others in the Watch are eager to meet you. Whenever you’re ready, that is, they can wait however long,” he tacks on at her alarmed look.
“I mean, yeah, I wanna meet them too. Just maybe not . . . today?” She actually doesn’t want to meet them, really. She didn’t even really want to meet Tighnari, she just knew she had to. Wanting things besides survival or revenge — as of right now, she doesn’t know much about how that feels. She wants to learn to read, maybe?
“Then they can wait. No problem,” Tighnari says, smiling. He smiles a lot, Collei notes. And not like that skeevy Cavalry Captain. More like Amber, like he’s genuinely that positive, or like he’s genuinely that happy that she’s talking to him. His smiles aren’t as wide as Amber’s though. “That aside, it’s okay if you don’t really have a reason, but I’m curious: why do you want to learn how to read?”
“I . . . I want to learn more about things . . . everything in this world,” she answers haltingly. “All the things I don’t know about. I just want to learn. I never had a chance to . . . learn before.” When she peers up from her pita bread, she finds Tighnari watching her intensely, his ears turned to point directly at her. It makes her self conscious. “Er . . . and then! And then, after I learn enough, I’d like to help myself. And other people. I’d like to cure Eleazar,” she says. And then, matter-of-factly, “Actually, I will cure Eleazar.” For a moment, she sees Amber. ”I’m going to kick its butt.”
Tighnari continues to stare. Collei wonders if she said something wrong. Maybe it’s arrogant to say she’s going to “cure Eleazar” like that when so many smarter people have tried and failed? She begins crafting an apology for her rudeness, eyes darting back towards the older scholar to check if his reaction has changed, but even by the time he speaks, his attentive stare has not wavered.
“Collei, I will be candid with you. Your path is a very difficult one,” he says. Collei slumps. “Make no mistake, there’s a reason a cure has not been found yet. However,” he straightens, and his eyes hold only kindness, “what I believe is impossible might be very probable. What I see in you is very promising, so I will offer you any assistance you require to help you achieve your goal. I believe in the future you see for yourself.”
“Ah? I . . . thanks?” she squeaks. She’s not even sure about this herself! “I mean, thank you!”
“Of course,” he says. She thinks he and Cyno are very similar. They both say that a lot, “of course,” like their generosity should be expected and not treated like the dying hallucinations of a wounded animal. “Collei, did you know in academia, we treat the relationship between academic advisors and their students like the bond between family? There are scholarly ancestries. My academic father is Naphis, the current Sage of Amurta,” he muses absently, a tinge of turmoil creeping into his voice at the statement, but when he turns to look at her, that turmoil is all gone. “As you’re under my tutelage, please know that my support is as unconditional as that of a parent.”
Oh. Oh.
She sees only the departing backs of her mother and father. But it wasn’t their backs, was it? They were being escorted out of the room, so they were turning to face her as the guards dragged them away. Tears rolled down her mother’s dirt-caked face, those tear tracks clearer in Collei’s memory than any single feature of her face. They never wanted to leave. They kept coming back for her, kept coming back to check on her until the Fatui made it so they never could again.
She sniffles, swiping hot tears off her chin.
“Th-thank you,” she whispers. This time the phrase feels less like a social routine and more like her heart’s fit to burst soon if she doesn’t say it. “Thank you very, very much.”
“Of course, Collei.”
“May I . . . call you Master then?” she asks quietly. “That’s what people call their teachers, right? I’ve never had a teacher before.”
Tighnari smiles. “You may call me anything you want. Up to and including Master.”
“Alright,” she says. “Thank you, then, Master!”
Later that day, Tighnari sits at his desk furiously penning a letter to the General Mahamatra:
Cyno,
You are more infuriating than a cloud of buzzing Cicins. You knew I’d get unreasonably attached to her. “Trust,” you said before you departed, and today I learned you trusted in nothing more than my hemorrhaging heart. Now that you have me invested, I’d sooner tear my ears out than watch her fail.
His tail swishes agitatedly behind him as he squints at the parchment.
I hope you’re satisfied with yourself. I hope sand gets stuck in your underclothes.
He ends up crumpling the letter. It’s no less cathartic.