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There’s a fond memory Kaeya holds of one of the first times he met Aether. When Diluc had first adopted the five year old child. The boy was skinny, still is, but he had a particular sunken look to his cheeks then that screamed to Kaeya about the possible neglect he withstood before his brother took him in.
He had been hiding around the corner of the kitchen entry. Peaking in at him and his brother but never coming in. Clearly he was hesitant about the ‘stranger’ in his house, despite Kaeya being introduced many times before.
“Do you need something Aether?” Diluc had asked after this had gone one for nearly ten minutes with the child showing no signs of coming in and talking to them.
Aether steps into view, face hidden behind a stuffed toy that Kaeya had seen him carrying before. The boy shakes his head. “No, but… Paimon wan’ed to ask if we could have a snack. She’s hungry.”
Diluc gives a fond huff. “Alright. And what would Paimon like to eat?”
“Umm, don’t care.”
“Paimon…?” Kaeya asked, casting a questioning glance towards his brother.
“Why don’t you tell him Ae? I know that Kaeya would love to meet your friend.”
The child stumbles into the kitchen and towards Diluc. He mutters something that Kaeya couldn’t catch into the fabric of Diluc’s coat.
“Go on. Show him.” Diluc said, with a soft nudge, and then softer, though Kaeya was still able to hear. “He won’t take her from you. I promise.”
That made something sharp sink to the pit of Keaya’s stomach. Why would anyone take away what clearly was the poor boy’s comfort item?
“’Tay…” Aether looks a bit miserable with himself as he complies, and Kaeya resolves himself to trying to look as least threatening as possible to the five year old.
Aether took step out from behind his dad. “Umm, dis is Paimon. She’s ‘m friend.” The boy holds out what Kaeya can now identify as a stuffed cat towards him.
It has a medium length white fur, with a navy blue scarf around it’s neck. A small pink crown is placed on the toy’s head, matching the pink paw like socks on it’s feet. A small golden symbol is inlaid on it’s chest that Kaeya swears he’s seen before but just can’t place.
He wonders briefly if the toy was something his brother had bought for Aether, or one of the few things he had managed to save from whatever previous placement situation.
“I see.” Kaeya says, mostly to himself, and with a smile he adds, “Well It’s lovely to meet you Paimon.” He gives a small bow, ever the entertainer, in greeting to the toy, watching as a soft smile appears on Aether’s face.
“Paimon would say hi, bu’ she doesn’ like talkin’ ‘round people.” Aether mumbles, holding the doll closer to his body.
“Oh?”
“She can talk but doesn’ do it a lot, only round Aether. An’ umm, an’ she is a fae, not a kittycat, even though she looks like a kitty. Aether knows this cause- cause Paimon told him an’…”
“He talks through the toy.” Diluc supplies, coming back with a plate of cut apple slices. Yeah, with what the kid has been through it tracks. Kaeya himself hadn’t talked for months after being taken in by Master Crepus. Then as a kid had only gone through Diluc in order to ask any questions or talk to anyone for years later until he had found his own voice.
“Is not Aether dada! Is Paimon talkin’!”
Kaeya can’t help but chuckle, children, and their imaginations. “Don’t worry snowflake, I believe you.” He winks mischievously.
Aether looks at him with a look of pure joy and giggles.
“Right. Enough of that- eat.” Diluc instructs, ruffling Aether’s messy hair.
Aether perks up a bit in thought after picking up an apple slice to munch on. “Oh! Forgot! Paimon loves food, ‘specially sweets, those are her favorites.”
“Well, I’ll have to bring you both some next time I visit.”
Aether cheers. Diluc groans besides him. “Please don’t encourage him. I’ve had enough sweets disappearing as it is.”
“Oh let the kid enjoy himself a little Diluc.”
“If he gets a stomach ache, I’m blaming you.”
.
.
.
The memory sits somewhere between being filled with a warm fondness and a bitter resolve. Kaeya isn’t sure which.
“Whatcha thinkin’ Uncle Kaeya?”
“Nothing Aether. Actually I was wondering if you would like to take a trip into the city? We haven’t been out in awhile.” The truth is they’ve both been holed up for the past few weeks. Aether seemed to hate the crowds and loud noises that came with public areas. Kaeya used it as an excuse to stay away from work and sharp judgmental questions he rather not be answering now.
Aether nods his head after a moment of thought. “Go grab Paimon. She can come too.” The child perks up at that and races off.
The stuffed cat sits on Aether’s bed on the off chance that he isn’t carrying her. Kaeya’s heard him talking to the cat, heard him pitch his voice higher to reply to himself. It’s sweet the way kids’ imaginations work.
“Paimon says that she wants to have lunch out today! Please Uncle Kae?”
“Sure. I think we can do that.”
He’s also glad that Aether feels comfortable enough to ask him things, even if it is ‘Paimon’ who is the one talking.
~~~
“Where did you get him that?” Venti asks having found the duo while walking around Mondstadt city.
The bard’s eyes are locked on Aether’s doll.
Aether shuffles away from the bard. Kaeya doesn’t blame him.
“What? The cat?” Venti nods. “He always had it. Since I met him.” Kaeya says shrugging. “Diluc must have commissioned it from somewhere.”
“Commissioned it?” Venti laughs. “Oh wait, your serious? I see, so you don’t know then? No of course you wouldn’t.”
And didn’t that have a lot for Kaeya to unpack.
“Tell me little one, do you know who your friend is?” Venti asks, bending down to Aether’s level.
“Is Paimon.”
“Well hello there Paimon. It’s lovely to meet a friend of Aether’s.”
Aether perks up slightly. “Wanna know somethin’?”
“Sure!”
“She’s a Fae! Bu’ she looks like a kitty cat.” Aether giggles.
“She must like you a lot to take on such a cute form.”
“Mhm!”
“Well, you let her know if she, or you, ever need help to come find me, alright little one?”
“Otay!”
“I would love to talk with her myself one day, think she would let me?”
“Maybe.” Aether shrugs, though there is a particular look to his smile that tells Kaeya that he’s missing something here.
“You do realize that it’s a stuffed animal… right?” Kaeya says warily.
“Of course you would think that.” Venti clicks his tongue. “No imagination Kaeya.”
Kaeya pauses for a moment before scowling. “What I think, is that you’ve had far too much to drink.”
.
.
.
Aether didn’t like other kids. He was small for his age, meek and out of place among the rough housing of other children so often liked to participate in. he was quite content to finish his food while his Uncle Kaeya worked on boring adult stuff, and whisper to Paimon, even if she didn’t respond to him now.
But his uncle had insisted he try and join in on the games some of the other children had been playing. Kicking a ball around up and down the city streets. It had looked like fun, and though his stomach turned in knots Aether reluctantly agreed.
“Umm.” He tries to speak up, hides his face behind Paimon’s fluffy body when three sets of eyes stop to land on him. “C-can Paimon and Aether join?” He asked.
“Huh? Why do you talk like that?” A girl asked, older than Aether by a good few years. She was the one kicking the ball, though she stopped to pick it up now, walking closer to Aether. “you said two names, so who are you?”
Aether opened his mouth to answer and found himself getting cut off.
“I heard of him,” A boy said in a stage whisper, shaking the girl’s arm to get her attention “My papa was complaining that his daddy was slacking off with the knights.”
“Not my dada.” Aether says with a huff.
“Then why are you with him?” The first girl asked.
“Umm…”
“Haven’t you heard?” A little girl in pigtails chimed in. “His daddy’s dead.”
Aether wants to run. To flee. Get away. He wants his dada to come and protect him, but he wasn’t here to do that and Uncle Kaeya was busy with work and-
“Wow you must have done something bad.” The leader of the group says.
“No…” Aether mutters, taking a step back. “‘M good.”
“You can’t be, otherwise Lord Barbatos wouldn’t have let your daddy die.” She giggles to herself as though she made a funny joke. “And no wonder, a baby like you still carrying around a stuffed toy, talking like a baby too. You’re daddy must have hated you, but here, let me help.”
She tosses the ball to the side and in its place snatches the stuffed animal from his hands.
“Paimon!” His fingers reaching for the stuffed cat desperately, closing in on nothing. Give her back.
“Crybaby! Keep away from the crybaby!” She tosses the stuffed animal in an arch over Aether’s head to one of her friends. “Go cry to your daddy. Oh right, you can’t.”
He tries to grab Paimon back out of the older girl’s hand. He gives a tug only to pause in shock as a loud rip sounds.
Stop that! Stop, stop, stop, just give her back! Aether wants to scream but can’t. Give her back, giver her back, give her back.
He thinks his word might be shattering as he watches Paimon’s front arm rip from the seam.
The other child drops the cat plush to the ground, a small look of shock on her face. She drops Paimon to the ground, stepping away, but not before taking a heel to it, staining pristine white fur a dust gray. “Don’t be such a baby and that wouldn’t happen.”
They run off, picking up their game as though nothing had happened.
‘Pai- is otay. Gonna be otay.’ Aether thinks, scooping up his friend with shaking hands. Her leg is torn, fluff seeping out from the tear, covering his fingers in star dust. ’No, no, no, no, can’t lose you too!’
With unstable legs he runs back to where his uncle is sitting still surrounded by paperwork.
He tugged on Kaeya’s jacket. He wants to go home now. He doesn’t like this place. Home. Go. Now, now, now, now.
“In a minute Aether!”
Aether flinches, tears that had been threatening to spill down his cheeks flowing freely. He hiccups, trying to not cry but unable to cover his mouth while making sure not to jostle Paimon in his hold.
“Hey- hey what’s wrong? Snowflake. I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to snap at you.”
Aether continues to whine, twisting his face away from Kaeya’s out stretched hands that try and wipe at the tears running down his face.
“Deep breaths. You’re alright. What happened baby?”
He wants to say what is wrong but he just can’t. He can’t get the words to work and he feels like he’s suffocating under the pressure to speak.
“Okay, it’s overwhelming here. I know. Let’s go home Aether. Does that sound alright?”
Aether frantically nods. He doesn’t want to ever come to this horrible city ever again! Never wants to make friends. Paimon is the only friend he needs and she’s now hurt- and- and-
Kaeya gathers up his papers, and Aether latches to his hand the moment that he’s done.
He holds Paimon protectively to his chest, flinching and tucking himself closer to Kaeya when he hears the sounds of children running by calling ‘crybaby’.
~~~
Paimon’s in pain. Aether knows she must be, because this is worse than the owies he’s gotten by what his dada had called ‘bad people’ and those had hurt terribly.
He wants to ask Kaeya for help, but he can’t. Uncle Kaeya wanted him to make friends, and probably leave him alone for a while, Aether isn’t stupid, and he’s going to be in so much trouble for hurting Paimon and not getting along with others and always starting fights and for being such a baby-
He doesn’t realize when his thoughts have spiraled enough to affect his breathing and how quickly his crying turned into wailing. All he knows is that he wants his dada, even if he wouldn’t have been able to heal Paimon either.
“Aether? What’s wrong what happened?!” Kaeya sounds worried.
The child doesn’t answer him. Only sobs louder.
It doesn’t take him long to find out what the problem is.
“How did this happen?”
Kaeya can pick out only a few words between the boy’s sobbing. It’s enough to make him see red. He has half a mind to go and seek out the children personally to have them apologize to Aether, a better idea to go and find their parents and have them explain their children’s actions. For the moment however.
“Uncle Ka-kaeya help?”
“Can I see it for a moment Aether?” Kaeya asks gently, holding out a hand.
Aether flinches away violently, shaking his head so quickly that his braid whips about behind him.
“I’m not going to hurt her. I can sew her up snowflake, but I can’t do that unless I can hold her.”
“No! Has to- has to be Ven’i!”
“Venti?”
“Mhm. Ven’i heal her.”
Kaeya closes his eyes and sighs. “Okay.”
.
.
.
“I’m sorry for bothering you, Venti.” Kaeya says, bowing his head slightly. He felt rather foolish showing up at the bard’s door out of the blue, with a request so absurd as fixing a stuffed animal.
“No, it’s alright.” Venti says, a small smile on his lips. “I had a funny feeling you two would be here. Come in.”
The two followed Venti inside of his house.
Kaeya would have thought that Aether would be biting at the bit to have his beloved toy fixed. And yet-
“Aether? What’s the matter little one?” Venti asked, crouching down to be eye level with the boy. He was hiding behind Kaeya’s pant leg. “you’re friend is hurt right? You want me to take a look?”
“You a good healer?” Aether asked softly.
“That I am.”
“Then…Ven’i fix?” Aether mumbled holding out the plush.
Venti sucked in a breath. “How did this happen?”
Aether whined.
“Kids are… unnecessarily cruel.” Kaeya supplies.
“I see.”
Venti casts a glance towards Keaya, back towards Aether, “Do you maybe want to go home for the night, I promise to have her healed by morning.”
“No. Aether ‘tay.”
“Alright…” He seemed hesitant, looking towards Kaeya.
“You can fix it then?”
“Of course. But I… Hmm, well I suppose there will be no helping it.”
They sit in the living room, Aether perched on his lap and watching carefully as Venti sets the stuffed cat on the small coffee table.
Kaeya is expecting Venti to pull out a needle and thread, not a harp.
A lullaby plays in the air. Kaeya watches as anemo swirls around the stuffed toy.
Kaeya had to rub his eyes from the bright burst of light. There sat on the table was no longer a stuffed animal, but a small girl with milky white hair.
“Ouch…” She rubbed at her wrist. “That hurt.
“Paimon!” Aether cheered and against Kaeya’s better judgement the child flung himself towards the strange creature. He was too slow to stop him, and simply watched as Aether crushed the pixie in a hug.
“Yes Paimon is okay, but Paimion is still cross. Paimon hates mean kids, she’s going to come up with ugly nicknames for all of them!” The girl pouted, clearly not fazed at being hugged so tightly by the child. “That was really stupid though Aether, you should have left before Paimon got hurt! Paimon should give you an ugly nickname too! But she won’t because Paimon likes you too much.”
Aether made a pitiful sound.
“Got any food tone deaf bard?” The girl asked.
“Really? Still the nickname after I saved your life?” Venti said with a pout, placing his harp away.
“What? Paimon’s had a terrible day and is hungry!”
“Fine. I’ll see what I can dig up.”
Aether’s eyes overflowed with tears and he pulled the fairy off of the coffee table and back over to Kaeya, content to simply snuggle with her for the time being.
“There, there.” Paimon said, patting the top of the child’s head, before locking eyes with Kaeya… “Oh. Hi there. Umm…”
Kaeya blinked. Then blinked again. Pressed a hand to his remaining visible eye and looked back again. Nope. Nothing changed.
“Is someone going to tell me what’s going on here?!”
“Aether told you, Paimon is a Fae!” Aether says, frowning a little as though he can’t see where this confusion is coming from.
“You mean- you- she- she’s actually a pixie?”
“So Aether did tell you.” Venti says, walking back into the room with a plate of apple dumplings. He sets it in front of Aether.
“Yeah, but- why would I have believed- oh this is giving me a headache. You mean this whole time?”
“I would have thought you known. Or maybe master Diluc had before…” Venti trailed off sullen looking.
“No. There is no way.” Kaeya says with a disbelieving laugh. “There is absolutely no way.”
He tried to imagine his brother knowing that his son’s ‘toy’ was actually a real fae and not just some imaginative friend. “It certainly explains a few things.”
Edit: Fanart of how Paimon looks plus a doodle of Aether after he found her hurt