Chapter Text
Kaveh had a habit of lounging at Lambad’s Tavern. Whether alone or with joyful company, one is sure to find Kaveh somewhere in the room, a bottle of alcohol tightly clasped in his hand. The young man frequents this place often, mind meandering off somewhere as he drowns whatever ounce of emotion he has down the drain, taking swig after swig from the bottle in his hands.
Sometimes when he has the craving and the money to satiate said craving, he’d also buy a light snack to accompany his drink. Kaveh almost exclusively never buys food or eats outside, if you asked him, his answer would be something along the lines of ‘cooking food at home’ or ‘food tastes better when it's cooked by yourself’, but if you ask him on a deeper level, he simply just has no means of purchasing the food wafting that tantalizing smell far across the room. That, and he can never finish a whole meal by himself, if he gets more than what he asks for, he simply asks for the remaining food to be bagged so he can bring some home to his roommate.
He’d go home, a half-serving of Lambad Fish Roll neatly tucked between his arms as he navigated his way back. The warmth still pulsing quietly between the safety of his flesh, warming just a small part of his body as he trudged through the night.
Sumeru is just as lively in the night as it is in the daytime, maybe even more so. The winding streets curved and twisted as merchants and performers and people with their own lives passed and phased by, blurring the spacious area with colors and culture and earthly delights. Lanterns and lights would guide his way home, sparkling and dancing as the wind breezed past them.
He’d reach for the door, search his pockets for the keys and— oh, there they are, Kaveh thought that he’d lost them again, trying to wake up Alhaitham this late into the night is a sight not to behold, unless he yearns to incur the vengeful wrath of his roomates’ tongue. Carefully, he slides the key in, twists the lock before stepping inside to their humble abode.
Once inside, he’d sit down, take his shoes off, and set it near a spot past the doorway, making sure that they’re snug against Alhaitham’s pair because apparently, the man is oh-so picky about anything going out of place and things not being in their rightful places. ‘
Yeah right’
, Kaveh scoffs, looking at the bunch of books still left unattended and messily piled on top of each other, so much for being a stickler to the rules. He once scolded Alhaitham for leaving his things anywhere and everywhere he could find an empty space before making a point at how hard it is to manage his things and do his side of the housekeeping all the while his roommate continued to ignore and snap back at his quote unquote ‘stupid argument’.
“Alhaitham, I already told you to put these books away! If you can’t manage to declutter your space, at least bring it with you and store it at The Akademiya!” Kaveh knitted his brows together as sweat began forming at his forehead, wiping it with his sleeve as he dusted the shelves. “Your research materials are blocking the wall accents I bought and paid for— with my own money!”
Kaveh sat down at the sofa, his bones creaking and snapping as his body sagged into the plush, green cushions— the exhaustion of the entire day slowly weighing his body down. A yawn escapes him as he stretches his limbs, similar to that of a house cat as he relaxes in the comfort of the small pillows that litter the sofa.
The young man has been working at his new project for a couple of days now, a medium-sized yet ornately decorated pavilion commissioned by the Akademiya itself for the Land of Wisdom’s archon, Lesser Lord Kusanali. Kaveh has been working day and night to prepare each and every single thing he might need for the upcoming project. He had to admit though, he didn’t expect his blueprint to be immediately approved by both the Akademiya and Lesser Lord Kusanali herself, she even made sure to consult him and to treat him to a meal as they went over the project details together. Lesser Lord Kusanali— or Nahida as she insisted to be called on less formal occasions is a kind and gentle soul, Sumeru is extremely lucky to have an understanding and wise archon to lead the nation forward.
Nahida herself told the young architect to never fuss about the details, claiming that she understood the pressure that the whole project has on the young man, seeing as he’s the lead architect for the project. She made sure to give Kaveh complete and unfettered artistic freedom to do whatever he pleases with the whole project— a perk not given to him freely by his clients.
Every single time, Kaveh struggles to find the balance between the client’s needs and his own artistic choice. The client pays Kaveh to get the project done, and so, they have every right to call the shots— the right to change the material, the design, the workers hired to do the project, and many more. The young architect is expected to do whatever the client wants to do, move the wall a few spaces away, change the paint to a more appropriate color, incorporate whatever gibberdoodle schizaminger they want— that’s perfectly alright in a sense but something about it always feels ‘too restricting’ to Kaveh.
In every project he offers countless alterations to try and meet the client somewhere in the middle, to do something both parties agree on, even if it means that he has to stay up late at night to sketch a whole new blueprint just to satisfy the customers’ needs and wants. That alone brings him back to when he was hired under Dori to create what he considered to be his magnum opus,
The Palace of Alcazarzaray
.
For that one, Kaveh was instructed by Dori to build a place to call her own, somewhere she, a merchant, can do her business privately. The man was given two criterias for his newest work; ‘big’, and ‘extravagant’. With Kaveh coming from a very long vacation to relieve him of the stress from his mid-life crisis following his career, this sounded like the perfect way to jump back into being an architect once again. When Kaveh worked on this project, he poured every single ounce of his being into it— even seeking out a friend of his, Tighnari, in regards to decorative and ornamental plants to incorporate into the building itself.
Somehow, fate really has a way of screwing over everyone as a
Withering Zone
decimated the project, leaving an extremely angry Dori telling Kaveh to leave. Kaveh, too indulged in his pursuit of completing the project, insisted on continuing it himself— he sold all of his belongings, even the house he lived in to fix the damages the Withering Zone has left, with the latter half being paid by Dori instead. Even though the palace was the talk of the town, the defining point of Kaveh’s career, he was left broke and penniless, and in the end, he even owed Dori some Mora to make up for the damages.
The blonde man felt chills crawl upwards his spine when recalled that particular chapter in his life— what if the same thing happens this time? He was just an architect hired by a merchant when the palace was constructed and now to be thrust the responsibility of leading the pavilion’s construction— by
The Akademiya
no less -- is by no means one simple task. He’d have to give it all again, pour his entire soul as an artist, exhaust the pipes once more to pump out the most magnificent spectacle ever erected in the Land of Wisdom, to represent the
Kshashrewar Darshan
again as the Darshan’s most prominent and celebrated architect.
“
No pressure,”
Kaveh thought— he wasn’t called The Light of Kshashrewar for nothing.
He’d prove himself again, wipe that smug smirk off Alhaitham’s face and—
“What are you doing there?” Alhaitham’s voice catches Kaveh by surprise, with the latter watching the other man walk past the doorway to raise an eyebrow at him.
“I—” Kaveh was caught off guard, perhaps Alhaitham has been there all along as he zoned out— another reminder of his exhaustion, the soft mattress he purchased months ago sounds very enticing at the moment.
Alhaitham sighed, walking past him towards the kitchen.
“I bought food,” Kaveh mentions, remembering the fish rolls he bought at Lambad’s.
The sound of dishes clattering stopped.
“Hmm,” Alhaitham halted his search for a glass to put water in. “Of course you’re from the tavern, how surprising.”
Kaveh raised an eyebrow towards Alhaitham’s direction, the back of his roommate meeting his gaze instead.
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“Whatever, I’m going to sleep,” Kaveh stretched as he made his way to his side of the house.
Alhaitham poured a glass of water for himself, stopping his roomate dead on his tracks.
“Did you lock the door?”
“Urgh,” Kaveh rolls his eyes at his roommate.