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Sometimes, the nights in Sumeru could get unexpectedly cold.
Kintsugi had not anticipated this. The nation was covered in rainforest and desert, climates known for their humid and dry heat, respectively – but for the desert, this was only true during the day, and when the wind came from the west just so, fronts of cold air could come whistling through gaps in the Wall of Samiel, cutting through the Fane of Ashvattha and Apam Woods, flowing up the river Ardravi to chill even the Divine Tree itself. The Sumeran people were adept at weaving intricately patterned blankets and brewing warm coffee and tea, lighting lanterns and braziers to stave off the cold.
Tonight was one such night, the lofty Sanctuary of Surasthana being fully immersed in one such desert chill.
The cold should not bother him. He could feel it, but it didn’t impair him in any way. He should be used to it, in fact; when in Snezhnaya, he’d often forgone wearing his heavy, furred Fatui coat, making a display of his inhuman strength and constitution, the jarring effect of his unprotected frame more than making up for his diminished stature.
The cold should not bother him, but he was about to do something about it anyway. Why, he couldn’t say. Maybe because the option was right there in a corner of his room.
…No, it went further than that. The option was there at all because he’d personally requested it, and he’d done so because the option to do that had been there.
Lesser Lord Kusanali had been inordinately enthusiastic about it all when he’d officially moved in, taking up the room where he’d woken from his coma and slipped right into imprisonment in her nation.
You’ll have to tell me all about your preferences for furnishings. If you want, we could even import some Inazuman materials and articles. I’d love to see them for myself, and you could teach me more about Inazuman culture!
He could barely put a name to the reasons he’d taken a room in the Sanctuary. His reasons for requesting an Inazuman kotatsu table, covered in blankets and with an inbuilt stove underneath, even less. Some perverted sentimentality, a twisted curiosity to experience comforts he didn’t need or truly deserve.
Still, he slid out of bed where he hadn’t been able to find any rest – he didn’t produce any body heat, so there was no point in covering himself with more blankets. If the air was uncomfortable, he was uncomfortable.
He moved over and lit the little stove under the table, huddling up his entire body under the heavy draped blankets, looking up at the stars outside his window as his upper back rested on his supportive cushion. He’d taken his little doll, resting it against the carved pot holding the viparyas flower the Aranara had gifted him.
Comforts he didn’t need or deserve, the lot of them – yet welcome nonetheless. He felt his joints and expression relaxing.
They were here, he might as well make use of them.
He was here, he might as well make use of that, too. No sense in using this new shot at life just to feel miserable.
He frowned at the stars, his mind wandering, thoughts unraveling into spidersilk-thin strands, idly drifting through his mind and everything he’d had thrown at him the past few weeks – everything he’d had to make sense of.
A new life. A revised history. A shattered and reformed worldview. New allies, new enemies. A different nation to call home. New, barely tapped powers, surging through that gleaming, smug, unruly Vision on his chest. A new name, one he’d voluntarily shared only once, barely beginning to reconcile with it.
A diminutive young Archon who’d seen fit to let him live under her roof – who’d seen fit to let him live at all. Twice, now.
She’d had the chance to let him die twice, and twice over she’d chosen not to.
Well. He supposed the second time around, she’d merely undone it, instead of preventing it, in a way.
The second time around, she’d actually directly caused him to unmake himself.
His wandering thoughts lingered on that one, for a moment, examining how that made him feel.
Then he blinked, looking up. His sharp hearing had picked up familiar little footsteps outside his door. A gentle knock followed, then a muted voice like a little silver bell.
“…Kintsugi? Can I come in?”
Speak of the gods.
He glared at the door, refusing to reply.
“I know you’re awake. I know you’re stewing over something. Your thoughts are like an icky storm cloud in there.”
“Stay out of my head.”
“I’m sorry, I couldn’t help it! The cold woke me, and then I subconsciously reached out right after –”
He rolled his eyes. “Spare me the excuses.”
“…I brought tea. Yours is really bitter. Please drink it so I don’t have to keep breathing it in.”
“Ugh.” He paused one more moment. “Alright, get in here.”
The door opened, slowly, clumsily. Nahida came staggering in, carrying a round copper tray bearing two steaming clay cups. “Thank you!” She smiled as she caught his eye, still glaring at her from under the heated blankets, the flower and doll gathered on the table in a clear display of self-soothing. “…Oh! That looks very comfortable. Can I join you under there?”
His lips pressed together in a little grimace as he narrowed his eyes. “…It’s your palace. You have the prerogative.”
“If I thought like that, I wouldn’t ask.” So patient, as always. Infuriatingly so. She set the tea down on the kotatsu, waiting – shivering a little, rubbing her little hands together. He grit his teeth, nodding at the other cushion. For some unfathomable reason he’d found himself requesting two for his room, and laying them both out as well.
He watched as she quickly and happily scooted herself under the blankets just around the table’s corner, her little body coming to a rest not far from his. He turned his head to the side to keep looking at her.
It was ridiculous. Two divine beings, up to their necks under the kotatsu together. Like children.
He sat up, reaching out for his tea and blowing into it. Nahida eyed it, leaning away a little as the steam wafted towards her. He gave a little chuckle at that. “Come on, it’s not that bad.”
She scrunched up her face a little, playful. “I don’t know how you can stand it,” she remarked with a little grin.
He took a careful sip, letting the scalding heat flow through him, heating his body inside and out against the night’s chill. “I just like bitter tastes. Preferences differ. Just the way it is.”
She remained quiet. As he glanced at her, he found her still looking at him, eyes vaguely luminous in the dimly lit room. There was a question in her eyes she refused to utter aloud. He’d tell her to spit it out already if he didn’t already know exactly what it was. He heaved a sigh, putting the cup down. “…Look. It’s just an asinine memory. Tatarasuna’s bladesmiths offered me my first cup of tea, and that one was bitter. I grew to associate it with them.” He pointedly looked away. “After… thinking they’d betrayed me, I appreciated the reminder of the lesson I learned the hard way. Life was bitter, I couldn’t trust anyone.” He paused for a moment. He’d been proud, then. Proud of having learned that lesson and not crumbling under its weight. Proud to be bearing the reminder again and again.
“And now?” Nahida asked quietly.
“Now… it reminds me of the fact they were always genuine.” His own voice had gone quiet too. “Their care was… the truth. A bitter truth, but just as important as I thought the harsh lesson was.”
Nahida looked up at him in wonder from under the kotatsu blanket. “So… this warm and bitter cup… it symbolizes care to you.”
He looked back at her. Obviously. You thought to bring it. To bring me warmth and remember my preferences even though you personally hate bitter things. “I suppose,” he said instead. Then, after a beat, figuring he might as well rip off the bandaid: “…You also seem to care an awful lot.”
Her eyes went brighter, and she sat up a little. “Yeah! I do,” she beamed, happy and visibly proud of him for voicing it. “I really do.”
“I can’t imagine why, though.” It wasn’t sarcasm. He genuinely didn’t. He’d tried to dethrone her and engulf Irminsul in forbidden knowledge. He might’ve killed her that way. He’d certainly wanted to steal her authority and her people, keep her locked away forever if he hadn’t killed her. He did not deserve her care, compassion or consideration, and couldn’t figure out why she was doing any of this. Not that he’d be spending his energy figuring that out, tonight. Tonight he had a different question on his mind.
“…We’ll get there yet,” she chuckled, picking up her own tea now it’d cooled a little.
He huffed another sigh, just a little exasperated. Then he pushed on. “If you really do care so much, though…”
She looked up, wreathed in steam. “Hm?”
“…why did you knowingly put me in a situation that’d make me kill myself?”
She widened her eyes, expression freezing, the cup faltering in her little hands.
“I mean,” he went on, laying his head back against the cushion and staring at the ceiling, holding the cup. “It’s not like I cared, at the moment. About myself, I mean.”
Gentle warmth surrounded him, suffused him. The kotatsu, the cup. Thoughtful, caring comforts he didn’t need or deserve. “…I didn’t even care enough to keep existing. But it just doesn’t make sense to me. I can’t figure out why you did what you did.” He looked back at her, eyes flicking down without the rest of him moving a muscle. “You knowingly sent me into Irminsul, knowing I’d come across that memory, knowing what it would do to me. You safeguarded my memory in a fairytale beforehand. You sent the Traveler along as a witness so that I might be recovered. You knew. You knew everything.” He was just curious. This had nothing to do with distress, or nagging thoughts, or fears that this little goddess really was no better than the Doctor or his creator. He hadn’t cared enough to live. This had nothing to do with him. Just a seeming lapse in logic to be resolved.
He’d never gotten the sense she’d actively wanted to make him suffer; not after she’d taken the Gnosis from him, anyway.
“…I see now why you stayed away from the city, and from me, for weeks on end after you recovered your memory,” she murmured, quietly gazing into her tea. “I thought it might be something like this. It’s why I stayed away from your dreams when you were away, too.”
“I had many reasons for that.” Almost too many to count. So many that he was only now getting to this. “…Well?”
Nahida met his eyes, setting down the cup, sitting up a little bit as if to seem more serious. They were still sharing the same warm blanket, however, watched over by the viparyas flower and the doll like some infantile slumber party. Still, the look in her eyes was serious enough. “I simply wanted to gift you the truth,” she spoke softly. “I’m not proud of it, but I considered no cost too high in exchange. Costs… to you.”
“So, this was a calculated choice? As befits the God of Wisdom.”
“I wanted to build something real, lasting and reliable between us,” she elaborated, still in that quiet, soft little voice. “Something like that can only be built on the full truth. I only hoped I could rebuild what I’d have to destroy first, in time.”
“You decided it was time for me to know, and that thought overruled all else.”
A nod, no trace of doubt in those clover-pupil eyes. “That’s right.”
“You decided. No matter if I was ready or not.” What was he saying? It hadn’t mattered that he wasn’t ready. He’d been ready to bid this world goodbye long before, and many times over. He’d been ready to lose everything he was to a flood of divinity. Why was he demanding justification now?
The kotatsu was warm. His body was comfortable. The tea was just right. His time away in the forest had brought him peace with himself, with existence. Existing wasn’t as hard as it used to be, anymore.
He was glad he existed.
He was glad he existed, and all too aware he almost hadn’t. A chill ran down his back despite the warmth of the stove. “…I wasn’t ready.” He’d snapped to unmaking himself in the blink of an eye. He’d been eager for it – a simple solution, everything resolved in one fell swoop. And she’d known that.
“I thought I was doing you a kindness,” she stated quietly.
“A kindness. Really.”
“I myself didn’t know anything for the longest time,” she explained. “I was abandoned for it, for being a child instead of an all-knowing god. I didn’t want to leave you guessing, stumbling in the dark like I did. I wanted to give you the lantern I had to light myself.”
He stroked his chin in thought. “…You did trade the Dendro Gnosis for knowledge, didn’t you. You fear uncertainty and gaps in your knowledge more than anything. I suppose I can see where you’re coming from.”
“Knowledge was my… ‘blessing’, to you,” she murmured. “But I see now, more clearly than ever, that knowledge and wisdom are two different things. I could have been more gentle. But.” And here her eyes pierced straight through him, demanding honesty over all. “If I had simply told you what I’d seen in the Doctor’s memory, you’d never have believed me. Am I wrong?”
He shook his head. “No.”
“You needed to see it with your own eyes. Feel it.”
He shuddered. He could still feel it.
“I knew you might try to erase yourself. But I had a failsafe, and when I’d have used that, at least you would have the full truth. A new foundation to rebuild from. A place to start healing.” She looked up at him, this little girl under her blanket, this ancient deity reborn into a body just barely older than his own. This avatar of Irminsul, connected to all the knowledge in the world, some of which she’d seen fit to impart to him. “It was like removing a knife from a festering wound, even though it would cause more bleeding in the moment itself; only when removed can the wound finally start to close.”
He briefly closed his eyes, scoffing quietly to himself in the darkened room. Sumeru City was asleep, huddled in their blankets and at their braziers far below, unaware of the tension in their lofty Sanctuary. “That’s all well and good, but it was still incredibly uncalled for to knowingly trick me into that with the Traveler there to see it. It was a nice show for you both, wasn’t it? And the little floating thing, too. A funny little puppet for you to yank around.”
This was unfair, and he knew it. He’d been the only one yanking himself around – all the way out of reality. Nahida had shown him the memory, but he’d been the one to immediately jump to conclusions before all the implications had even settled. Still, he had to press her like this. There were things he needed to hear.
He knew he was only proving her point, proving how much he, too, valued the truth.
“It was uncalled for,” she agreed. “Yet it was also uncalled for to usurp my position as Archon, tie yourself to Irminsul and infuse yourself with forbidden knowledge, threatening all of Teyvat and leaving me and my nation to the Withering.”
Completely correct yet again. Both their hands were dirty. His moreso than hers. He’d had so many chances to see the world with different, more gentle eyes, and yet he’d always clung to his anger and self-righteousness. “…I thought we wouldn’t bring that up anymore.” He smirked as he caught the glint in her eye. “Anyway, don’t deflect, Kusanali. It’s not a good look.”
She reached over, surprising him by taking his hand between both of hers. He didn’t pull away. He only looked at the point of contact, not acting rashly and impulsively for once. “I’m sorry,” she told him genuinely. “I had my reasons, and I honestly could not see another way at the time. However, now that I’ve seen it happen, I will never knowingly do anything like it again.”
“Tch, look at you getting all sentimental.”
“Kintsugi, we just established I care about you at the start of this conversation. Enough to bring you your icky tea.”
“…I hoped you’d forgotten about that.”
She gave him a cheeky smile. “You haven’t finished it. It’s hard to forget when the air is still full of bitterness.”
He took a bigger gulp of his now much cooler tea, taking away some of that bitterness, and then scowling. “…Don’t tell me that’s some sort of metaphor, too.”
“It’s only there if you choose to see it.”
“Stop that.”
Her smile widened, eyes glinting brighter. “Stop what?”
“You – ugh –” He looked away, scowling harder, drinking his tea and trying his best not to smile, too. “All you gods are insufferable…”
“You’re welcome to stay anywhere in the city, you know. You don’t have to live in the Sanctuary with me.”
He glanced around his room, basking in the kotatsu’s warmth. He gave a noncommittal shrug. “Eh. We’ve just set it up. Waste of time and effort to dismantle it again now.”
She pressed a little hand to her mouth at that, chuckling ever so quietly. “Of course.”
“…Thank you for only going through with it when you were certain you could bring me back.” I like being me. He couldn’t say it. He didn’t have to.
“I was always planning to see it through the whole way,” she told him, subdued and serious once more. “To be there for you, ever since you fell. I didn’t like that, either.”
“I get it. I wasn’t having the best day. Knocking me out was a mercy for everyone involved.”
“I vowed that would be the last cruelty,” she insisted. “I’m sorry I couldn’t make good on that.”
“I’m sorry for erasing myself,” he offered up in return.
She smiled. “You had to see it for yourself. Now you know you’ve done all you could, every possible outcome. I hope that brought you some peace.”
“More than I’ve ever had. More than I know what to do with.” He was so comfortable. Body and mind. Finally. He hoped he could be done with the endless questions and adjustments – no more world-altering revelations for a bit. Just quiet. Just warmth. Just rest. He finished his tea, snuggling back under the kotatsu up to his neck, folding his hands over his chest. He ruminated for a moment, eyes half-closed like a contented cat. “…You said the cold woke you.”
“Ah… yes…”
“You don’t have enough blankets.”
“I suppose not.”
He huffed. “I’ll go to the Bazaar tomorrow, then.” He turned over on his side, facing away from her. The corner of his mouth quirked ever so slightly as he sensed her fretting, growing a little bewildered at this seeming end to their conversation. “…Kintsugi…?”
“Shush. Go to sleep.” He scoffed a little. “…What, can’t fall asleep with me around?”
Another jolt coursed through the little body barely a foot away from him under the blankets. She did him the courtesy of not stammering out any questions or asking for any reassurances. She knew he meant what he said. He felt her settling, truly snuggling in, sensed her quiet joy in the very air. “…Thank you.”
A slumber party after all. He supposed he could deal with it. If he was going to take care of a puny, childlike Archon like her, he’d have to get used to a bit of childishness.
Another thing he didn’t need or deserve – yet welcome nonetheless.
And slowly, steadily, comfortably, despite the chill of the night around them, two lost children – once again found – slipped into restful slumber, under the watchful eye of a small soft doll, and a vibrant purple dream flower suddenly blooming just a bit more brightly.
