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Dear,
Ayaka
It’s been a while since I’ve visited Inazuma and I was wondering if you would be interested in visiting my home for a change. I have resided in the town of Morpesok in Snezhnaya. I would hope to meet you on the twelfth of this month four hours after noon.
Love,
Lumine
She invited her over for some one on one time, so it’s only fair to tell her that she loves her. Well Ayaka thinks she does at least, she doesn’t really know the difference between romantic or just deeply platonic love. Lumine was simply one of the most perfect people she has ever met, she fought gracefully, she was tasteful, and she didn’t treat her like the all powerful Shirasagi Himegimi. She was her first real friend, they went to the festival together, Ayaka even gave her a special hair pin, that has to mean something.
Ayaka hasn’t seen Lumine since she invited everyone who was involved with the war of Celestia to her teapot home. Unfortunately she couldn’t even get a word in as too many people crowded the traveler at all times. In her letter it said that she has settled in Snezhnaya for the time being, an odd choice of location considering most of her friends reside in Mondstadt and Liyue. Ayaka was almost hurt Lumine didn’t want to stay with her in Inazuma, but understandably it’s very remote from the rest of Teyvat, it’s not suited for a traveler like her. She didn’t even stay in the main city of Snezhnaya, instead she lives in a small fishing town, just off the coast of the country .
Once Ayaka had landed in the region of ice and snow she started to ask around for directions, Lumine wasn’t quite clear in her letter but she did state that they would meet in the fish market at around lunchtime. Ayaka tried to weave her way around crowds and try to stop people passing her, but they all ignored the clearly lost girl. She was really regretting not bringing Thoma or Ayato, they were always more comfortable with approaching people, unlike her. She also wished she brought something warmer, she knew what she was getting into coming here, but she didn’t think it would be this freezing.
Ayaka busied herself while waiting for noon, she checked out the clothing and garments sold in the area and she immediately bought a warm boar skin coat and swapped out her traditional shoes for boots that were more fitting for the Snezhnayan winter. She wandered over to a nearby lake where people were gathering, children were playing and singing some rather disturbing nursery rhymes, specifically one about breaking a pinky promise and getting thrown on the ice, along with other gruesome details. She shuffled herself into the crowd to see what they were watching. It seemed to be an ice fishing contest between a red haired man and an old man who looked like a near carbon copy of the other. That didn’t matter however when she spotted her beloved traveler, leaning against a tree and watching the competition contently. Her fear quickly shifts into excitement as that widest smile she had ever done is displayed on her face. “Lumine! Hi!” Heads turned at the sheer volume of her voice. In that moment Ayaka quickly composed herself, remembering she would’ve just been seen as a strange visitor to those around her. Lumine waved in return and it felt wonderful to be noticed by her again.
“Ayaka, you’re early, I haven't even started getting the ingredients for dinner yet.” She giggled and gestured to her empty bag.
“I’m quite sorry, I took an early ship. I wasn’t anticipating how quick the trop would be.”
The traveler waved it off. “It’s fine how about you grab us our lunch while I get the fish, we’ll meet again at my place.”
“Um, yes, where is that exactly?”
“Just over the hill, and to the right, not that deep into the woods.”
And then Lumine turned, being consumed by the crowd until she was no longer in sight.
As she browsed through the shops she passed by a stall that smelt eerily familiar. She smelt the mushrooms and the tomato paste, that specific cheese. It smelt almost like the pizza Lumine first made for her years ago.
She makes her way up to the vendor. “Excuse me, but could I buy this, please,” she points at the dish on the stand. “Oh, may as well get something for Piamon.” She thought a simple bread roll would suffice. “And that please.” She added timidly.
“Of course, that would be 2000 mora” replied the woman at the stall. “Excuse me for asking but I haven’t seen you around before, and in this
place everyone knows practically everyone else. Who are you?”
“I am Kamisato Ayaka of the yashiro commission,” she bends into a small curtsy. “I’ve come to visit the traveler for some… bonding?… time.”
“Oh? Ajax’s girl, funny, I was just talking to her about repairing the bridge that goes over the east river, she seems to have a knack for those types of odd jobs.”
There was something inexplicably strange about that sentence, other than the well known fact the traveler doesn’t really have a fondness for those types of labor-inducing commissions.
“Who exactly is-”
Ayaka was promptly cut off by a man who appeared next to the woman, large wooden crates in his arms “Sabrina, would you mind helping with these deliveries.”
The woman perked up and replied “of course, on my way.” Before dashing off.
Without attaining any answers, only pizza and a roll of bread, Ayaka proceeded to head straight for the traveler’s house.
As she padded her way through the snow, tightly clenching the box that contained her lunch, the warmth radiating off it, she spotted a cottage. It was designed in the same vein as Lumine’s teapot house, but with a Snezhnayan twist, and a little bit smaller.
She softly knocked on the door and was greeted with Lumine’s shining smile. “Just in time, come in I just got home and the table set.”
Ayaka plopped herself down in a chair and scanned the room, as one naturally does.
There were pictures of Lumine and her friends lining the walls, mostly set outside of restaurants, on top of mountains, or in the Cat’s Tail after a duel. There was a particular instance where a ginger haired man looked like he was fresh out of battle, blood in small dabs covering his face, however he seemed overjoyed. In fact he’s in quite a lot of photos, and in each one he has that same, almost punchable smile. Everytime she looked at it Ayaka could feel something welling inside her, something violent and vaguely stabby. She honestly has no idea what has gotten into her lately.
Lumine sat at the head of the table, just close enough for Ayaka’s comfort. That left the plate opposite her empty. Someone was missing.
“Where is Paimon? I haven’t seen her since the war, I even bought an extra snack for her.” Exclaimed Ayaka as she placed the bread roll on the table.
Lumine peered down at her pizza, picking at the mushrooms. She seemed saddened by the mere mention of the small pixie/emergency food, her face resting in a sullen expression.
“After the battle was over and my brother had disbanded the abyss order he wanted to leave and travel” she put down her dandelion wine on the counter, nursing it “ I knew at that point we still wanted different things, while yes I wanted to stay with him, I mean, I just got him back.”
“But you wanted to settle and he didn’t.” Ayaka was a sibling too and even if her and Ayato were both bound to the Yashiro commission, she knew what it was like to want to walk a different life to what she had known.
“Yes, I didn’t want to leave, Teyvat was where I was able to find who I was without him, I met people, I made friends…even more than just friends,” Lumine looks off as she gives a small chuckle. Was that a blush Ayaka saw creeping up on her face?
That phrasing seemed a little off to her. The same kind of off as when that lady mentioned someone she didn’t know, that gut twisting feeling of impending doom.
“He had no proper ties to this world so he left, I don’t know where, maybe around Teyvat or other worlds. I told Piamon to go with him, so he could have a guide, some company, a friend. She understood that I didn’t need her around but he did, so she also left.”
“Aren’t you lonely without them? They were, are, the most important people in your life. I know that without Ayato and Thoma,” Or you “I wouldn’t survive in this world.”
“Of course I do but sometimes you have to let go of those you hold dear, anyway I still have friends, I got you.” Lumine gently places her hand on top of Ayaka’s, carefully squeezing it as if, if she gave enough force it would break. “I actually haven’t told you something considering… circumstances that happened in Inazuma…” she got closer the further she explained and so did Ayaka as she listened more attentively “I don’t really know how to say this without you reacting weirdly but I have a-”
She was going to say “crush on you” right? Well it’s a little too late. Ayaka had already dived in to kiss her, too caught up in the adrenaline and wine. To be fair she thinks she might be a lightweight. While she was melting into the kiss, Lumine was stiff, unresponsive, that’s not what you do when you kiss someone you have been wanting for years.
And before Ayaka could put the pieces together there was the horrifying sound of a door opening and the voice of a man rounding the corner. “Girlie, you wouldn’t believe the size of the catch I caught, Papa said it could probably last us an entire week… Lumi?”
Ayaka quickly pulled herself back, but the man had already seen them kiss.
Lumine has a boyfriend. She should have guessed by the boots at the door or the pictures on the wall but she wanted to believe it was just a friend. Maybe it is just a roommate.
The man dropped the fish in favour of the hydro swords he materialised out of thin air.
Ok not just a roommate, definitely not just a roommate.
Ayaka tried to shift her focus and look at the floor, avoiding the man’s face. Now that she looks at it it was quite a big fish, must have taken some strength to have caught that, in fact it kinda looks like it has bloody indents in it. This guy probably caught it with his bare hands. Ayaka is so fucked.
Before he lunged at her, Lumine was able to scramble to the sword leaning against the counter and block his attack.
“Run!” She yelled, struggling to hold her stance. Ayaka did just that, she made a sprint out of the house. But she didn’t leave, instead she hid under the window that leads to the kitchen and peeks her head up. She was just worried for Lumine and wanted to check in.
She didn’t like what she witnessed.
It seemed the couple had already made up as the man held Lumine close and soothed her as she seemed to be doing that thing where she babbles when she cries.
Ayaka did that. Ayaka made the person she loved most in the world cry.
She immediately got on the next boat to Ritou and left the icey nation behind, hopefully to never see it again. When she does have the chance to look back though, her stomach decides to wrangle itself into a knot.
How could she really have been so naïve?
Of course the traveler didn’t want her.
What was she really expecting?
Clearly even she doesn’t really know.
So there she sat, huddled in the corner of her cabin, tucked between the wardrobe and the wood panelled wall.
It was quiet.
She can’t wait to go home and never leave again.
Once the ship had docked Ayaka was able to compose herself enough to be viewed by the public.
Like always Thoma waited on the pier of Ritou for her arrival. “Milady, welcome back, how was the trip?” His anticipation was apparent just from his smile, one so bright it would rival the Inazuman sun.
Fearing the expression she would make she raised her fan to just barely cover her nose. “It was… fine.”
“I see.” He replied almost somberley.
He seemed to always have a knack for reading the atmosphere as he opted to not press on the issue as they continued their trek to the estate.
Home, it was something Ayaka wanted most when back in an unfamiliar land, and now, she would want to be anywhere else. Everytime she passed a servant they would ask about the trip and how it went, how the traveler was, etc. Questions she did not want to answer.
She finally came face to face with her brother when he invited himself into her room. A place she locked herself in to avoid him seeing her in this sullen state. His stupid drink and a letter in hand and a small, almost comforting, smile on his face.
“Good to-”
He was immediately cut off by the force of his sister’s face barreling into his chest, and her arms almost squeezing the life out of him. He could already feel the tears soaking through his shirt. In return he gently put his arms around her and a hand came up to softly pet and stroke her hair.
“-See you have returned.”
He hesitated before bringing up what he wanted to tell her.
“I have a letter from the traveler, but since something clearly happened while you were gone, I’ll leave it with you for whatever you want to do with it.” He pulls away just slightly and lifts her chin up, wiping away her tears absently. “I’ll be back if you want, I just have some work to do and then I’m all yours.”
She nods slightly at this, believing that maybe she could use some good old sibling time, maybe a round of sparring or some poetry writing?
The door shuts behind him and it’s just Ayaka and the letter.
She stares at it for a good minute before finally letting go of her fear and dread as she begins to open it.
She was numbed to the core. She couldn’t even tell if her stomach dropped any further than it already had.
Dear,
Kamisato Ayaka
I know that we left things incomplete last time we saw each other and I just wanted to clear some things up. Before you acted recklessly I was about to tell you I was dating a former fatui harbinger. A topic that would have been a soft spot once it had gotten out what the Tenryou commission had done. As one of my closest friends I knew you were going to meet him eventually so I tried to let you know gently, and I believe you took my words the wrong way.
Before you could go blaming your timing, just know that it could never work, if you asked me before the war, I would have said I needed to focus on finding my brother, If you had told me during the war, than I would’ve told you to instead spend your efforts strategising, and if you told me after, I would have told you I had a promise to keep. It’s not that you shouldn’t of loved but the only mistake you made was choosing me.
From,
Lumine
She’s wrong. The only mistake she made was to love at all.
Ayaka now believed that nothing could ever make her smile the same way again.