Archive of Our Own

It starts with a house. Most stories like this do, she thinks in hindsight, and so she can do nothing but sigh at her own naivety. 

There is much more than a house, evidently, because Mona is nothing if not proud, and she is well aware that her preferred order of events is not always the most accurate one.

Her pride will bend the truth any which way it desires, it seems. And perhaps, then, she is not as unaffected as she says she is. 

The two of them each have their own reasons for coming to Seirai Island, of course, and she has not the slightest interest in learning his. Regardless of Scaramouche’s newfound Vision and apparent “redemption”, she finds him to still be quite insufferable. They’re simply traveling together out of convenience, and nothing more. 

For the sake of that ‘nothing more’ bit, there are several unsavory interactions she cannot go on to mention. Given that she cannot control her own thoughts, there are several unsavory interactions that continue to keep her up at night. 

• The first night. They fall asleep on their separate cots, fresh out of an argument on the length of their journey. (Or rather, he pretends to fall asleep so he won’t have to engage in conversation with her. She eventually tires of trying to crack his facade, and falls asleep herself.) The air is cold, and her cape is not doing her much justice. She wakes up in his arms. They do not speak about it for the rest of the day.

• The third morning. She is awoken to the sound of…sobbing? She sits up abruptly, and spots him asleep beside her, none the wiser. Tears are streaming down his face. He wakes up— shoves her away, and stares at the floor for a long time. They do not speak. 

• The inn. They stop at Wangshu Inn, because of course they do, and ignore the suspicious looks that are sent their way. They both know how it must look. To their chagrin, there is also, coincidentally, only a single bedroom available. She is unwilling to sleep outside again, so they attempt to share it. It goes just about as well as expected, which is to say, not at all. 

• The nightmares. She knows he has them, and she knows that he reaches out for someone to hold on to about the same time every night. She hasn’t yet deciphered if it’s part of his dream, or not, and the longer she tells herself she does not wish to offer her hand to him, the less she believes it. 

• Last night. Sometimes, on rare nights when they are much too tired to keep pretending there is nothing between them, he will willingly allow her to lean into his arms, and she will comply, acting as if they know what keeps the other awake at night, as if she knows the woman he refers to when he calls out for his mother in a grief-stricken slumber, and as if he knows what she is so desperately searching for in the stars above.

There is all that, and there is the way she still doesn’t understand the odd looks she’d received from both him and the Traveler when she’d recognized him, even adorned in his new attire of blues and whites. Seriously, did they think a change of outfit would hinder her basic face-recognition abilities?

She ignores the hushed whispers the two exchange afterwards. So be it if they want to whisper— she’s well used to being ostracized, although perhaps not for something as standard as this. 

Naturally, it’s while exploring that they come across an abandoned village, as is the norm for an abandoned island. All the houses are in various states of disarray, some suffering from roof cave-ins, signs of forced entry, and the like. 

“How old did you say this place was?” 

“About 400 years, give or take. A housing area for some Tatarasuna workers, I believe.” 

She doesn’t express how eerie it is that he knows the exact details. She doesn’t have to, what with how he’s looking at her. He’s perfectly aware of what she thinks of him. She’s almost certain he’s even done that on purpose. 

Well, far be it from her to judge him. As if she wouldn’t be just as precise with her own history, given the circumstances. 

They continue on their way, leaving the village for the cliff sides in the distance, her reluctantly allowing him to lead the way. A few words are exchanged, mostly varying between insults and sarcasm, as is their usual. It’s when they come across the house that things get weird. For one, unlike the village they’d seen earlier, the house is in pristine condition, not a speck of dust visible. Or at least from where she’s standing, anyway. 

He’s frozen in front of her— again, practically unheard of, but it seems different than before, when he’d paused to observe their surroundings, as usual. 

She walks ahead to get a glance at his face, and— he seems scared. 

Should she be worried? 

She isn’t given more time to think on it, as he shakes himself out of his trance, turning to her. 

“I’m going inside. Come if you want.” 

He leaves no room for arguments— he is going into that house, regardless of what she or anyone else might have to say. 

“Is something bothering you?” 

It comes out seeming more concerned than she’d like. No, she wasn’t concerned, not for someone like him, but more.. intrigued. He was not easily moved. She wasn’t sure what was putting him so on edge, but she’d much like to figure that out, preferably before anything unexpected happens.

He doesn’t spare her the convenience of an answer, however, forcing the door open with little effort and stepping inside, storming ahead without a word. 

Well, there goes her last hope of figuring out what might’ve gotten him so distracted. If he was going so far as to hide his expression from her, she was going to guess it had to do with something he didn’t want her knowing about. 

He is not the first to try and decide for her— to try and determine what she deserves to know and what she doesn’t. That honor would belong to her master. 

She hasn’t seen the old hag in almost two years, now. 

She catches up to him without much trouble, shoving the lantern they’d been sharing into his hands. 

“Here. I’ll lead, and you’ll light the way, yes?” 

He doesn’t offer any protest— doesn’t say much of anything, actually, which really isn’t normal, so she turns her back on him and continues forward, trudging through the darkened rooms with a semi-present sense of caution. With the way he’d looked at the house as if it were going to disappear the second he blinked, she didn’t want to take any risks. 

It’s a relatively small building, probably belonging to one of the less fortunate families of the island. That on its own is unnerving– if built for a relatively average family, why place it so far away from the rest? She’s no architect, of course, but it still struck her as odd. 

There is a deliberate lack of furniture, she’s noticed. Almost close to no decorations or personal touches of any kind. The one thing she does find is a hand-sewn doll, thrown in the corner as if abandoned. 

…It almost looks a bit like the man holding up the light behind her. 

Before she can think to ask him about it, she hears a crash from above— the sound is sudden, shattering the solemn silence they’d been trapped in since they stepped through the front door. 

She’s almost thankful for the intrusion. Really, she doesn’t think she could go on much longer with this quiet, cold facade of his. He’s much more himself when he’s angry— when he cares about something enough to get angry. 

The strange scent of fresh ashes is in the air.

Without so much as a glance behind her, she’s dashing for the ladder, shoving open the attic door and pushing herself up. It’s dimly lit, with a couple lanterns on the walls being her only source of light.

She comes across a broken mirror, shards of glass scattered across the floor. Normally, she’d want to mind her step and avoid the sharp pieces, but her intrigue gets the better of her. 

That’s most likely what made the noise, she’s sure, but what exactly would have caused it to fall?

She turns her back, mouth opening to ask him if he’s seen anything, but— 

He’s gone.

She is alone. Alone in this dark, dingy attic, with the floor and the very air caked in dust, ashes, and soot, maybe alone in this entire house— he had looked more disturbed than she’d ever seen him at just coming upon the house to begin with, and maybe even people like him knew when to run, and he’d left her here alone, and there is still that odd, odd scent in the air, and the feeling of dread— 

Archons. She hates being alone. She hates not knowing if she’s alone. She needs to back up against a wall, or a surface or— she needs a vantage point, standing in the open attic makes her feel like she’s open from all sides, like anything could come stalking out of the dark and claw at her. 

(She smells ash all around her.)

She’s being silly. Inazuma had ghost stories, sure, but— she’d never seen an actual ghost. She was a vision user, for Celestia’s sake. She had nothing to be afraid of. Surely she could scry her way out of this. It’s just a house.

“Scaramouche?” 

Her voice comes out timid and shaky anyway. She hates it. 

No snarky answer comes out of the darkness to greet her— nothing comes out of the darkness at all, actually. 

A gust of wind blows through the open— open? Open window. She can’t remember if the window had been open before or not. 

The lanterns along the walls are all blown out, and Mona sits in complete darkness. She hates it. She always has, and she stumbles around like a fool, moving on pure dread, and she’s not sure what she’s trying to get away from. From whatever might be in the darkness with her, most likely, but that’s the thing about darkness. She’ll never know if she’s stumbling her way to safety, or right into the jaws of the beast. 

The theoretical beast, of course. Because this house has no beasts. No ghosts, no demons, no youkai, no anything of the sort. 

She spots a lantern flicker on over by what she thinks is the ladder, and lets out a huff of relief. There he is. Where’d he run off to, at a time like this? She had more than enough reason to tell him off for that, she thinks, and he probably has his own share of insults to offer about the way she’d scrambled around blindly, looking like an absolute fool. 

“It’s not funny to run off on people like that, you know? Seriously, what is wrong with—“

The light drops, and shatters, breaking into little tiny pieces of sunlight on the floor. She’s stepping on glass again. 

It is decidedly him, but not . She can see him clearly now, now that her eyes have adjusted to the dark. 

It looks like him, but it most certainly is not. It is more like something that is him in all the wrong ways, that she cannot help but fear it and worry for it all the same. It looks so much like him that for a second, she doesn’t think to scream for help. To plead for mercy. 

It has him down to an art, almost. Even his mannerisms are the same, with that sick tilt of the head, and the sadistic grin that seems to grace his face almost every hour of the day. He is just as she remembers— just as before , when he’d donned a mask and a veil, when he’d carried with him the promise of an electrifying, painful death, as opposed to the mellowed— yet still insistent— scent of the wind. 

The intruder has missed small, insignificant details, but they build, enough that she is absolutely sure it is not him, and that is what terrifies her. 

His eyes are not bright purple. They’re more of an indigo, really, and quite similar to the night sky, and— ah. She’s getting ahead of herself again.

The skin is stretched too far, the eyes carry neither a hint life within them nor bear the same depth as his own did, and his joints are angled in all the wrong , wrong ways, and gods, his neck is not supposed to bend that way, and never has she been more petrified in her life—

“ Mona .”

It’s the voice that gets her moving again. It’s horribly warped, as if he’s speaking to her with four voices at once, or rather, through four different levels of reality, or some other horrific explanation that she can come up with to placate herself from screaming her throat hoarse. 

Somewhere among her various observations, she notes he is not in his usual attire. He’s substituted his usual hat for a simple straw one, with red strings hanging off of it, and is missing his usual socks and gold embellishments. Somehow, despite the lack of flashy outfit, she finds him significantly more intimidating like this. 

“ You’re so naive, it kills me .” 

Gods, she can hear him in her head , and even as she’s scrambling to get away, she can hear his every move, as if he’s deliberately giving away his intentions, as if he wants her to know that no level of skill will matter, that even if he was blindfolded, he could still sink his claws into her with ease. 

She looks behind her— a big mistake, really, and sees that there is no way it could possibly be him, for if it were really him, his head would be at her level and not brushing up against the roof, and he would not pace towards her like that, dragging his legs along as his bones crack, as if they were mere hindrances. If it were really him, he’d strut.

She trips over something, because of course she does, and falls back, turning to face the thing — because she cannot say that it is him. She can’t. It is so evidently nonhuman— and she knows he is, she does, but she cannot bring herself to align whatever monstrosity that is in front of her with him. It’s simply impossible. 

“ Hoax .”

It’s mocking her now, is it? That’s something like the Scaramouche she knows. 

This does not allocate for her fear, however. Try as she might, she cannot throw aside that irrelevant, irrelevant emotion. She scrambles back, thinking to herself that it cannot touch her, she is not trapped here, and if she hopes enough, she will wake up in her soft, warm bed. 

Her hopes are thrown to the wind when she feels it’s cold, sharp claws wrap around her, pulling her up like a rag doll. She writhes around and— unexpectedly, screams— in its hold, as is expected of her. She doesn't know if this creature has a shred of sentience within it, but she does know for certain that it cannot grasp what she’s thinking. 

She is not afraid. Not of death. Of this thing, maybe, but more so she is afraid of what will become of her. Will her remains be left to rot on this archon forsaken island, so far from the land she calls home? Will anyone ever find out? Would anyone care? 

Death under unexpected circumstances. Unexplainable, even. 

Would he care? 

She thinks both of them knew. This was not simply a trip of convenience. 

She squirms in the thing’s hold, desperately prying at its fingers to try and unlatch them from wrapping around her. She is not thinking of him, or thinking of home, or thinking of any of the things they say come to your mind when the sword finally swings. She is thinking of getting out . She is thinking of being free , of not having this odd creature chasing after her, and the longer she is deprived of that, the worse she feels. 

“ Witch .” 

How fitting. He’d called her that, too. 

It is the last thing she hears before she is thrown like a ragdoll— almost like the one downstairs, thrown into the corner and left to burn— and her head hits the wall hard enough to blur her vision— which probably isn’t good, but her consciousness slips away from her before she can do anything more. A strong gust of wind rushes in through the open window, blowing the hair out of her face. 

She wonders how far gone she must be, to be hallucinating the sound of his voice— his real one— even now. 

-

She wakes up to a claw gripping her face— cold, thin fingers grasping at her, and makes something like a scream— intended to be a cry for help, but the noise comes out much more like a gasp for air. No one within miles would be able to hear something as quiet as that , so she tries again, this time squirming to get away from whatever ungodly beast has her in its hold. 

“Mona.” 

She jolts in the other direction, head turning away from the hand that is so desperately trying to direct it towards him— and what for, she asks herself, too frightened to speak the words aloud and be met with that horrible, horrible voice. 

She thinks she must still be half-asleep, stuck in a dream that takes advantage of her current state of consciousness— she cannot tell what is real and what parts are all in her mind. She flickers between reality and illusion, unable to determine whether there is a cold palm cupping her face or sharp talons poised to rip her apart. 

She does not know which one she would consider more of a nightmare.

“Stop moving around so much. I need to check your head.”

Blunt and straight to the point, as always. Her eyes shoot open, all traces of fear gone. It is not because of him, she tells herself, but instead because she cannot afford to look weak in front of a person as prideful as he is– he will never let her live it down, her mind insists, and yet at the same time his hands are running gently across her scalp. 

She blinks, and imagines a world where he is doing this out of the kindness of his heart, and her face visibly colors at the thought, imagining him frowning down at her with fervent concern, or maybe even brushing a hand through her hair– and even she cannot suppress the laugh that she coughs out at that– really, he’s only trying to check if she has a concussion, and with thoughts like that running through her head, maybe he’s got good reason to. 

Of course, all that coughed up laughter earns her is a scolding from him, warning her not to overwork herself in her current condition. 

On another note, he doesn’t think he’s heard her laugh like that before. It’s not an unpleasant sound. 

(Distantly, he hopes— an ironic thing for someone like him, he knows— that he will remember it when she leaves.)

He also hopes he’ll be able to avoid her ceaseless questions about whatever had happened to her. He doesn’t want to see the expression on her face when she connects the dots. He is a fool to have brought her here. No doubt, it’d have been better to come alone. Or maybe even better— to have not come at all. To have let this side of his past fester, and burn, and rot. To leave it on the side of the road and walk on, to avert his eyes and look away, and pretend as if it does not exist. 

He is becoming too much like his mother, he thinks.

She, too, sought to push everything out of sight and out of mind, for fear of what that horrible thing— emotion— would do to her. He has told himself time and time again he would just as soon die as become anything like her. 

His Vision glows incessantly. He suspects it’s doing it on purpose. 

“We shouldn’t stay here. It’s been infected with the Tatarigami.” 

She doesn’t ask what the word means. He guesses she might already know, probably having done her research beforehand. He thinks that might be one of the reasons they fight so often. She’s right far too frequently for his liking, and the way she seems to know far too much for someone of her caliber frightens him a bit. It’d gotten to a point, once, where he wondered if she were an immortal herself. 

(He did not ask. Someone like him does not dare to dream. She is beautiful in a way only plausible by the passing of time, and he doesn’t think he’d know what to do with himself if he were to find that he is once again an anomaly. )

“Here. Get up.” 

His words remain cold and calloused, as always, and he hopes she cannot see through it as usual, all the way to the simple emotion that lies beneath— concern. He gives away no hint of it, of course, for he is nothing if not skilled at hiding things, and surmises she can tell what’s on his mind anyway. Were they in different circumstances, she’d probably tell him about it, to which he’d call her a witch again, and their decades-old bickering would begin once again. 

Neither of them speak. This is different, he notices. More like that first night, probably. With that realization, he’s confused as to why his first instinct isn’t to recoil away from her, like being near her for another second will irrevocably scar his skin and gouge out his eyes, as if she is his very own fiery pit of hell, a burning star sent from above for him to die on. 

Mona, ever so insistent on resisting him in every aspect of the word, does not transform into a blinding beam of light, does not rain hellfire upon him the second he looks back down at her, and does not reveal her true nature as an emissary from the gods, sent to punish Scaramouche for his sins. In fact, he’s beginning to think that maybe, just maybe, he might be wrong. He frowns. 

“Well, are you going to help me up?” 

He blinks. A heavenly being descended from the gates of Celestia likely wouldn’t need help to stand on her own two feet. That settles it, then. He makes another tally on the left side of the mental scoreboard in his head. Point, Mona . Cause: for not being a hellish, hyper-realistic angel of death and destruction. If he had to take a guess, he’d say that sounded more like it'd be something right up Columbina’s alley than anyone else’s. 

What was he doing here, again? 

“Quit zoning out. You said we need to get out of here, right?” 

Right. He did say that. He didn't know she was actually paying attention, although he supposes she doesn't really have any other options, seeing as there's nothing of interest to focus on for miles. 

(There is a domain, a temple as ancient as the ground it is built upon– it sits beneath layers and layers of vines and foliage, and is buried almost as deep as his own heart. Scattered around the place are red maple trees, bright and brilliant as the sun. They are dotted with blazing warm leaves, which bask in what little amount of light is able to peek through the run-down rooftop. They, just like him, will never be able to die. It's just on the other side of the island, and he suspects it's something that might interest her. He will not tell her about it.) 

He chooses not to provide her with a reply, as she’d probably been expecting– he’s got a bit more on his mind than he’s decided is good for him, and he doesn’t want to deal with the feeling of knowing she can see right through whatever empty words he might come up with. He could say anything, and regardless of just what that anything might be, he will never be able to rest peacefully knowing he’d given her a clear and concise response. 

Scaramouche’s second conclusion of the day: Humans are frustrating. They place much importance in words, in verbally phrasing each and every thought aloud to the world. His sincerest apologies, humanity, but words are never enough, and the ones he wants to say most only ever come to mind after everyone else is gone. 

She’s still here , his brain reminds him. His brain is not always the most reliable. 

(His brain, once, had told him to become a god. In hindsight, that had led him here, sitting on the grass of his birthplace with a freshly awakened Anemo Vision in hand, so he supposes he owes himself credit where credit is due.)

“Well, since you’re so intent on taking your sweet time, give me a moment, will you?” 

He blinks, and she’s summoned one of those familiar star charts of hers, adorned with those mysterious blue symbols, and glowing astrological circle, spinning as she fiddles with it. It’s practically etched into the purple sky, gleaming almost like those constellations she so adores. He hasn’t the faintest idea what he’s looking at, nor can he read whatever language its written in (which is a shocker– he’s been alive long enough to learn most of Teyvat’s written alphabets, after all), but before long, her hand lifts, marking out lines between the stars she’s chosen to focus on today. 

Being the traveling companion of an astrologist would never be something he’d brag about, given his own personal beliefs, but he thinks he’s picked up a thing or two by now, having watched her do this a couple times. The lines she’s drawn mark out the shape of a human figure, its arms resting at its side, and what seems to be a heart nestled in the middle. She’d showed him this one before, and–

Ah, right. It’s his. 

…His?

“Hey, what do you think you’re-”

A finger is shoved to his mouth, efficiently shushing him. He has half a mind to bite it right off, his lost-in-thought demeanor quickly replaced with suspicion. 

“It wouldn’t kill you to take a minute to think, would it? Look.”

She directs the circle to rise up into the sky, marking out where his stars– his stars – sit above them. They’re sitting right above where he’d woken, he notices, where’d he come into being as that quiet, thoughtful puppet. Of the many years that came soon after, he can no longer remember which ones are his. 

“You’re due good fortune.”

Due good fortune. Fortune that is to come– good luck that hasn’t hit him just yet, but someday, maybe tomorrow, or maybe years in the future, will make its grand entrance. It could be something new, or it could be something good, and all he knows is that whatever it is, it’s not quite here . 

Promises like that have always been tentative for an immortal being like him. They sit on a tight string, one that could snap with any sudden movement. 

“They’re lying, then.” 

She whips around to face him, reasonably affronted at his choice of words, most likely about to spit at him whatever insult she can come up with off the top of her head. He doesn’t let her start, continuing before she can open her mouth. 

“I’ve got enough good fortune. Tell the stars their pity is unnecessary. A certain destitute astrologist could see more use out of said fortune than me.” 

She rolls her eyes, and turns back to her stars. To each their own, he supposes.

At least, with her eyes glued to the heavens, she will not notice the way he’s staring— he is no Endymion, of course, but the thought that she just might be giving the moon a run for her money suddenly comes to mind. 

And for a split second, he thinks he understands his mother. 

There is beauty in transience, unattainable, forever-out-of-reach beauty, and it is that which his mother pursues. She wants to last forever, to still be exactly as she is, always, even after everyone she knows has long since died and been forgotten. And for a while, perhaps he’d felt like she would. He finds he doesn’t care much, now, in hindsight. He has much more intriguing things to be concerned with. 

He knows his mother has found her peace, and he wishes that he can do the same. 

He wishes that this— this small moment, irrelevant and meaningless when compared with the span of his long, long life— but this, he hopes, will be his eternity. His very own euthymia, maybe, where it is just him, and her, and the sky above him. 

There are much worse things for him to ask for, after all. His divinity. His innocence. His fledgling. 

The heavens took those things from him. The stars took those things from him, and for that, he doesn’t think he’ll ever be able to forgive them. 

The stars, it seems, have changed. 

The stars do not return to him that which he has lost. The stars do not send him financial compensation for his losses. He thinks that would’ve insulted him more than anything. The stars do not send a handmade apology letter, written in blank ink and with an earnest heart. 

The stars send her.