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“Nowhere to run, girlie.”
The Abyss Princess stands at the dead end of an alleyway, her expression blank as the waves of her midnight dress shift like a moving sky. She’s a petite woman, soft-featured and far more delicate looking than what he would expect from the leader of one of the biggest crime syndicates in Teyvat — but appearances can be deceiving, right?
Childe adjusts the grip on his daggers and hopes so.
The girl cocks her head to the side. She’s led him on a chase through the city for the past ten minutes, but doesn’t have a single sign of exhaustion to show for it. “Did you think I was running from you?”
She flicks her wrist, and there’s a flash of steel before she’s wielding a blade, a sleek, silvery thing that she points in his direction with much purpose. “I’m sure a warrior like yourself can appreciate the beauty in a fair fight. No one will be interrupting us here.”
Oh, a woman after his own heart. Childe grins, all teeth and aching for a challenge.
“I’ve heard stories about you.” He takes a step forward, “The Abyss Princess, a force unbeatable in both mind and strength. I’m excited to see if they hold any weight.”
“What an honour, coming from the Eleventh Harbinger of the Fatui,” she smiles. “Well then, there’s no need for delay — show me what you can do.”
Childe gladly obliges.
-
“I win,” Lumine declares, her voice glowing with a breathless sort of pride. Childe slumps against the wall, bruised and battered and smearing a little too much red across the brick as his daggers lay on the ground — but he feels amazing.
Since when has a target themselves fought back this fiercely? Since when was one able to give Childe this much trouble, even? Dazed, he looks at the Princess, blood crusting her face from the gash he’d given her above her brow and his heart starts to pound as hard as his head.
Then she presses one of his own daggers against his throat, and that feels slightly less amazing.
Childe supposes he shouldn’t be too surprised. It’s only natural that Lumine would kill her own hitman, really, and it’s not like Childe is afraid of death either — it’s just something that comes with the Harbinger job. As soon as he knelt before that throne with a hand upon his heart, he’d given his oath that he’d lay down his life for the Tsaritsa’s cause in whatever form it may take.
So this was bound to happen, but… man. He just didn’t think he’d be done in this soon. Ah, well. At the very least, he’ll end at the hands of an opponent so beautifully capable.
He closes his eyes, waiting for the blade to make its final swipe against skin —
But it never comes.
Instead, it lifts, and along with is it a question:
“This was fun. Can we do this again sometime?”
Childe blinks. “...Pardon?”
-
He has the Abyss Princess’ number now. And the address of her headquarters. And an appointment scheduled for Monday where he’ll get a second chance at killing her in said headquarters.
The girl herself has long departed from the scene, and sitting there, dazed and alone at the end of an alleyway, Childe doesn’t know what to think.
-
“You failed?”
The Tsaritsa’s brows are furrowed deeper than Childe has ever seen them, the frost of her eyes mirroring surprise and maybe just a hint of disappointment as she gives him a once-over from the foot of his cot. She must’ve had a lot of faith in her Eleventh to look so worked up at the sight of him in the infirmary — this is the first time in his Harbinger career that he’s messed up a hit.
Childe fiddles with his sheets. Unspoken sort-of-favourite of hers and still high off the feeling of an incredible battle or not, the Tsaritsa remains daunting enough for Childe to choose his next words carefully.
“The Abyss Princess… she just got lucky, Your Majesty,” Childe says. “But rest assured, I’m on her tail. I’ve already got information on her whereabouts — reliable information.” Technically not a lie . “So there’s no need to waste anymore men on her. I’ll have her out of your hair soon.”
There’s no way he’ll let the Tsaritsa think he can’t handle this on his own. One, because that’d be a serious blow to his pride as a Harbinger, and two, the thought of any of his colleagues getting a part in hunting down Lumine makes something awful twist in his chest. Fighting has always been one of his greatest loves in life, and with her, it felt — novel, somehow. More thrilling, more exhilarating, a hundred times better than usual. Every strike and swing of her blade is another step in a dance that Childe wants to know by heart, and not a shred of him wants to share this with anyone else.
He stares at his fingers curled into the sheets, calloused and sporting fresh new scars from the blade of a golden-haired girl. His mind still a mess, but he knows one thing is for sure:
This target is his, and his alone.
-
He fails, several times, and it begins to feel familiar in a way it shouldn’t.
“I win,” she says, laughing, “Again.”
Childe snorts. “And you’re as humble as ever about it.”
Lumine shrugs as she rolls off of him from where they lie on her office floor, the sharp sting of steel leaving his neck before she tosses her blade to the side. “Only because I have the right to be. This is, what, the fourth time you’ve lost?”
“Third.” His ribs hurt. She probably broke a few. Why is his stomach so fluttery about it?
“The third time, then. Three wins against one of the Tsaritsa’s fiercest lapdogs, and I’m not allowed to celebrate? Come on now.”
“Watch your tongue,” he warns, but the corner of his lips are twitching into a smile and it’s terrible, terrible, terrible. “If I were one second faster with that kick I would’ve won.”
“Resorting to excuses, I see.” Lumine yawns, raising her arms into a stretch. “Oh well. Better luck next time, Eleventh — otherwise, how many more visits are you going to have to pay me? You’ve already kept the Tsaritsa waiting for a week, haven’t you?”
There’s a beat before Childe sighs. “...I have.”
He runs a finger over the edge of his own dagger, feeling the giddiness still stirring in his chest that he wants to keep, wants to feel over and over again and he wonders if he’s in trouble.
-
“Ajax? Ajax, are you listening to me?”
“Hmm?” Childe blinks, snapped out of a reverie, and he realises he’s been sitting frozen with laundry in his hands and his family waiting on a video call for the past two minutes. “Ah, sorry, mama. Didn’t mean to zone out there.”
“You seem in good spirits,” his mother remarks, shuffling closer to the screen to squint at him with no small amount of suspicion. “Did something happen recently, dear?”
“Oh… oh, no, no. Nothing you need to worry about.” Childe folds the dress pants in his hold with more force than necessary. “I’m just thinking about some things, that’s all.” And that is true. He’s thinking about things. Things that involve blonde hair, a wisp of a smile, brilliant diamond eyes and the promise of blades and battle and always getting stronger —
“Ajax!” His mother screeches, and he jolts. “You’re zoning out again!”
His father shakes his head. “Something must’ve happened. A promotion?”
“Or a termination,” One of his older brothers snickers.
“Ooh, ooh! I know!” Tonia shoves her face into view, eyes sparkling, “Maybe he’s got someone. ”
Get real, Childe hears someone say to that, but the words are far away as he stiffens in his seat. Because he technically does have someone who’s been occupying his brainspace 24/7 that he finds wonderful company (and those are bad, awful, horrendous thoughts) — but said company always involves knives and fists and several trips to the nearest doctor. Not exactly family video call material.
And yet. There’s just something about her — something about Lumine that makes a funny sort of pressure build in his chest, so strong that Childe feels he might burst if he tries to keep it bottled up any longer.
So he takes a deep breath, and starts very, very slowly. “There is… a girl.”
Silence.
Then someone — he can’t tell who, probably Tonia — unleashes an ear-shattering squeal that absolutely fries his phone speakers to hell and back.
-
“She sounds beautiful!” His mother gushes. “Oh, Ajax, you must bring Lumine to visit sometime. We have to meet your first partner!”
“Um.” Childe doesn’t know how he managed to ramble about Lumine for a whole half hour, but he did, somehow. It just… kinda happened. And now this is happening, too. “I — I don’t know, mama. I guess I’ll see.”
Sure he left out all the nasty bits about his relationship with Lumine. Sure he might’ve gotten a little carried away talking about her wit and her strength and the way her hair looks like a wave of spun gold under the right lighting, but Childe didn’t want to give his family the impression that they were, like, a thing. He’s still on a contract to off the girl, for fuck’s sake.
But at the same time, his parents look so happy…
“We’ll be looking forward to it,” His father says, smiling, and Childe can only respond with a nervous laugh.
-
“That was a close one!”
Childe flops back onto the floor with a groan. His blood still roars in his ears, limbs numb from the strain, and Lumine collapses next to him, her chest heaving. “You almost got me there. You’re getting faster.”
“Or you’re just getting more predictable,” Childe grins through wheezing breaths, “Come on, that last feint was way too easy to read.”
Lumine only laughs at that. She swipes a hand across her split lip, painting a streak of red against porcelain skin — and Childe can’t help but stare.
Lumine wears a different smile when she wins.
He noticed it the first time he fought her, and it’s more apparent than ever here, in the aftermath of their seventh battle. The Abyss Princess isn’t known to be cheerful. All the photos Childe had been provided by the Fatui only ever showed her stone-faced, a lovely visage of venom cooled into a blank slate. An air befitting the head of the Order.
But when she triumphs over him, blade at his throat and the tip of her nose hovering inches above his, the smile that takes Lumine’s lips is playful. Unguarded. Real. It doesn’t fit the title of the Abyss Princess, then, and to Childe, it’s —
It’s —
“Something wrong?”
Childe starts. Lumine peers at him through pale lashes, head tilted as she waves a hand in front of his face. “Hello? Earth to the Eleventh? Tartaglia? Childe?”
He swats her away, clearing his throat. “Sorry. Wasn’t listening.”
“Yeah, I noticed. Too busy staring at me, huh?” Lumine teases, smiling that smile again and Childe has to resist the urge to avert his eyes.
“Keep flattering yourself, girlie.”
-
It’s only when the Tsaritsa raises a perfectly sculpted brow at his appearance that Childe realises he’s forgotten to clean himself up before the Harbinger meeting.
Pantalone is nice enough to lend (read: loan) him a comb to straighten out his hair, and he receives a few dirty looks around the table as he works on untangling a particularly matted clump of auburn locks at the same time Arlecchino reads out her weekly report. Nothing can be done about the cuts and bloodstains littering the fabric of his clothes, unfortunately.
But everything goes fine and dandy — up until it comes to the topic of Childe actually doing his job. “Tartaglia,” the Tsaritsa asks right as he finishes up, “what of the Abyss Princess?”
Childe stills.
Her Majesty looks on expectantly. Ten other pairs of eyes turn to fix on him, scheming, scrutinising, and he does not want to meet their gaze.
“I — ” he says. Stops. Then after a beat, “I need more time.”
Scaramouche does a very undignified show of throwing his hands into the air and groaning. Sighs, scowls and all other matters of grumbling resound about the table, paying no heed to the Tsaritsa’s presence or the way Pulcinella desperately tries to shush all of them.
“I have given you time. Two week’s worth of it, in fact.” The Tsaritsa leans forward, steepling her hands together, her voice steel and dangerous. “Yet you never have anything to show for it. I had faith that you could carry this out on your own, but perhaps it’s high time I open this contract to the other Harbingers —”
“No!”
Oh, hell. He really just interrupted the Tsaritsa mid-sentence. Childe claps a hand over his mouth and wishes he had a micro-ounce of tact or a verbal filter sometimes. A good half of the Harbingers are gaping at him with a you’re so fucked sort of look in their eyes, but the Tsaritsa seems more annoyed than ready to smite him in his seat which he’ll take as a win.
“You may speak, Tartaglia.”
“I, um — apologies, Your Majesty,” Childe starts off, sheepish, before his expression turns serious, “but please, let me handle this alone. The Abyss Princess is one of the strongest targets I’ve ever faced. I want to do this job properly .” Surely the Tsaritsa must know by now, how important battle is to her Eleventh. How he lives for the thrill of crossing swords with powerful foes, his pride as an individual tied to who he bests with his blade. “I’m making good progress. As your best assassin, I’ve never failed you, have I?”
This target is his. His.
The moment that passes as the Tsaritsa’s gaze bores into his soul feels like it stretches out into eternity — then, finally, she lets out a long drawn sigh.
“One more week,” she says.
-
“You’re distracted,” Lumine frowns, lowering her blade. “Any other day, you would’ve parried that no problem. Is something on your mind?”
Childe grimaces. “Nothing you need to concern yourself with.” Right now, the score is ten to zero. Their fights are getting closer. Does he want it to be?
He picks up his dagger. “Let’s go again.”
Lumine doesn’t smile much that day.
-
The next morning, he gets a call from his frantic mother. Teucer is missing, she tells him, his little brother had gone out to play four hours ago and hasn’t come back since. No one in the neighbourhood has seen him. It’s as if he’d disappeared without a trace.
Not an hour later, a message from the Abyss Princess reaches Childe’s phone:
Are you looking for someone?
-
He’s foolish.
They’re still enemies. When have they ever not been? Lumine is still supposed to die by his hand. Childe is still supposed to kill her. That’s the way things are — the way they will be. Just because they’ve come to develop a rapport of sorts over the weeks doesn’t mean anything.
Childe pushes past a pair of Herald guards as he storms into the Abyss Order’s headquarters, the grip on his daggers white-knuckled and his heart twisting in a way he can’t understand. They don’t try to stop him.
He doesn’t know why he thought Lumine would be above the sorts of schemes the other Harbingers love so much. Of course she would use his loved ones against him. Of course she would get back at her own assassin without hesitation. Why wouldn’t she?
He sees the door to her office, a grand thing carved from mahogany that casts a laughing shadow.
What was he even trying to achieve with all this? Why did a part of him hope for something more?
Foolish. He’s foolish, foolish, foolish —
He kicks open the door.
“Oh, hey, big brother!”
— And then he blinks. Because Teucer is playing video games on the couch, gorging himself on a bag of gummy bears and looking decidedly not distressed like a kidnapped child would be. Snacks and video game cases litter the space around him, and seated at the desk at the end of the room is Lumine, who only arches an eyebrow at Childe’s haggard appearance.
“Good afternoon to you too, Tartaglia,” she says. “I was under the impression that people knocked on doors.”
Childe opens his mouth. Closes it. Then, when he finally finds his voice: “...What?”
As it turns out, five minutes of explanations later, there was no kidnapping involved on anyone’s part. Teucer had just hopped onto a train because 1) it happened to be bound for Childe’s part of the city, 2) he missed him, and 3) he was confident he would be fine on his own with the tried-and-tested give a nice person Mora and they’ll take care of you plan.
And sure enough, once Teucer was there he wandered off to the nearest building to ask for directions to his brother’s house with more than enough financial compensation — a building that just so happened to be owned by the Abyss Order.
Lumine looks to Childe with a smile. “It’s a happy coincidence that one of my Heralds noticed the resemblance between you and Teucer.”
Teucer cheers, “So they sent me here to meet Miss Nice Lady! And she’s really cool and bought me all this stuff!”
“Aw, you’re too kind.”
Childe feels himself practically deflate , every ounce of energy leaving his body with the knowledge that his brother is, against all odds, safe. “Teucer… I'm so happy to see you, I really am. But please promise me you won't do this ever again. Who knows what could’ve happened to you if Miss Nice Lady wasn’t there?”
Teucer’s shoulders shrink. “Okay… Sorry, I promise…”
“Good. I’m not mad, I just want you to be safe.” Childe turns to Lumine and offers her a sheepish smile. “Sorry for the trouble, Lumine. And thank you. Seriously. I’ll pay back whatever you spent on him, and we can just — ”
“Lumine?”
Childe stops. Teucer’s face is suddenly eerily clear of guilt, eyes laser-focused on the woman at the desk. “She’s Lumine?”
Childe furrows his brows. “Um… yeah?”
It takes exactly one second for the realisation to hit him and for the blood to drain from his face, but it’s already too late.
“OH MY GOD!” Teucer screeches at the top of his lungs, “You’re the one big brother keeps telling us about!” And fuck fuck fuck fuck , why can’t Childe keep his big fat stupid mouth shut for once. “He talks about you all the time over the phone and says you’re always so cool and pretty a-and — !”
There’s a split second where Lumine looks taken aback — and maybe it’s a trick of the light, but her cheeks seem to tinge the slightest shade of pink — then she grins, absolutely delighted. “Oh, does he now?”
“He does!” Teucer yells, and Childe tries to clap a hand over his mouth but the little gremlin dodges it and keeps going.
By the time Childe manages to wrangle Teucer into his arms and out the door, he doesn’t think he’s ever felt such an intense need to crawl into a hole and die. He barely hears the cheerful goodbye Lumine calls out behind them, his heart roaring in his ears and face aflame.
-
Thank you again, he texts her that night.
Don’t mention it. Concern for family is one thing I can understand, she replies.
Childe’s mind goes back to that afternoon, clinging to that snapshot of a memory like glue. The flash of surprise that overtook her features, her doe golden eyes, the flush that painted her skin, the smile that followed beaming bright and open and all of it, all of it is impossible to shake off.
He buries his face into his pillow.
-
Childe isn’t sure if his heart is really in it anymore.
“Hey.” Lumine scowls when she manages to nick his shoulder, “I can tell you’re not focusing on the fight. It’s insulting, you know.”
“Sorry, girlie,” Childe darts to the side as her blade whistles past his ear. “Guess I’m not in tip-top shape today.”
“You haven’t been for a while, honestly,” she sighs. “You fought fiercer and dirtier the first time we met.”
The first time they met feels like ages ago. Childe remembers rushing towards her, his grin ravenous as his daggers aimed straight for her jugular, his mind whipped into a frenzy. He still feels the same high that he did back then, but the thought of landing a blow like that on Lumine now makes the pit of his stomach sink.
“Childe,” Lumine says. Her voice is softer than usual. “Are you still thinking about Teucer? I didn’t tell him anything regarding you or the Fatui, I’m serious. You don’t need to worry.”
“...Why would you do that for me?”
Lumine blinks. “Huh?”
His movements slow, his brow knitted tight. “I don’t know — I don’t understand why you’d help me like that. I mean, our situation, all of this —” he waves a hand at the both of them, weapons drawn and wounds bared, “is just… it’s ridiculous. Why would you go so far for someone who’s been trying to kill you?”
Lumine is quiet for a moment, before she shrugs. “It’s just as I told you. Concern for family is one thing I can understand. You have Teucer, and I, too, have someone I want to protect.” Her lips pull into a wistful smile. “Aether’s the same age as I am — older by a few minutes, though, and he never lets me forget it. He’s kind, bright, loyal to a fault, always a ball of sunshine and with a world of potential in front of him. He deserves to live a life without any worries. Someone has to support that.”
Childe lets out a chuckle. “That sounds… awfully familiar.”
“Heh, doesn’t it? You and I hold a lot of the same things dear. Which is why…” Lumine’s expression takes on a hint of bashfulness, and Childe feels his heart skip a beat. “When I first asked to meet again, I really just saw you as a way to kill time. This job can get so tedious sometimes, and, well, fighting you was the most fun I'd had in a while.”
She looks up at him, golden eyes luminous and deep enough to drown in.
“But as I’ve gotten to know you better, that’s changed. It’s… nice to have something to fall back onto every day. It’s nice to have someone who understands. So I know it sounds silly, but — Childe, I want to keep what we have right now.”
And it really, truly hits him that he wants this.
Wants this thrill. These fights. These talks.
Wants her.
Something tremendous swells up from within Childe’s heart, and all of a sudden he surges forward with more speed than he’s ever had, his body moving before his mind can.
Lumine yelps, caught off guard for the first time as he snatches her by the wrists, and they both go tumbling down onto the ground. Childe hovers over her. She meets his eyes, stunned.
I win, he should say.
Instead he blurts out, “Can I take you to meet my family sometime?”
Lumine just gapes at him, wide-eyed. Then she bursts into laughter.
It’s not soft or smug or coloured in any trace of the Abyss Princess — it’s just Lumine’s laughter, warm and loud and wonderfully clear. And this time, lying there on her office floor, Childe has no problem admitting that she looks beautiful.
“Come here, you,” she says, before pulling him down for a kiss.
-
“Your Majesty, you are aware that Tartaglia is never going to get around to killing the Abyss Princess, right?”
“Oh, I know,” the Tsaritsa sighs. “But I’ll think of something. At the very least, he’s keeping her and the Order busy.”