Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

The Traveller. The Traveller. Lumine.
She was all Mizuki could think about. Her glistening golden eyes, her kind smile, her soft blonde hair, her rosy cheeks, her pink lips…

She snapped herself out of the daze, trying to focus on her work again. She was writing client files, filling out paperwork and organising the sheets.
But every time she set her pen to the paper, her mind wandered.

Back to Lumine.

She flushed, she had told her that she was her medicine. That Lumine was enough to keep her grounded. That was over three months ago, but she couldn’t shake the feeling.
Mizuki knew what that feeling was, the feeling welling in her chest.

With a sigh, she cast the papers aside, she wasn’t managing to get any work done tonight.

She silently cursed herself. In all her years roaming Teyvat, she had never felt any emotions like this.
Slumping in her chair, she barely even noticed the dull thud of rain beginning to fall. That was, until a violent crash of thunder snapped her out of it.

Mizuki gently slapped herself. Snap out of it!
She bit her lip. Don't be stupid, Mizuki, she thought, Lumine probaby hadn’t given her a second thought. The woman probably had lots of people throwing themselves at her. Why would she spare a thought for someone she just met?

She set her head in her hands, squeezing her pinky-purple eyes shut. She gently dug her fingernails into her scalp, scratching, sinking her nails into her skin.

The way Lumine looked at her - like she wasn’t just a yumekui-baku whose only purpose was to eat nightmares, when she had blown her that air-kiss, Lumine had turned pink from head to toe when it connected with her lips.

A bright white light flashed by the window - lightning. She paused counting: one, two–
Until she heard the familiar rumble of thunder. The lightning wasn’t far.
She wondered if Lumine got caught up in the storm. She had told Mizuki she was heading back to Sumeru for a bit, murmuring about how it had been a long time since she’d seen some friends over there.

Sumeru.

Sumeru was so far away, a thousand miles - give or take. She wondered how long it would take for Lumine to come and visit. If she ever did. Mizuki couldn’t look for her herself, not with her responsibilities at the bathhouse. Plus, Lumine was a traveller, she would never know where to look.
She wondered how long it would take for Lumine to forget her entirely.

Mizuki didn’t even realise she was crying until she felt her teardrops fall onto her hands.

She needed some air.
Mizuki got up, wiping her tears away. She encountered Murasaki in the main entryway. Murasaki didn’t seem to care about Mizuki going out in the middle of a thunderstorm, or that it was growing late. She was probably just going to use it as a chance to slack off.

Marching towards the doorway, Mizuki pulled the door open to be met with someone on the outside, trying to get in.

“Sorry, we’re clo–” Mizuki fell short, her eyes taking in the figure in front of her.
Her golden hair was darker due to it being dripping wet, rainwater was running down her body, sticking her clothes to her body and hair to her face.
The traveller’s expression of shock, quickly morphed into a beaming smile. She gave a gentle wave, tucking a strand of hair behind her ear, ignoring the protests of her flying companion - who was sopping wet.

“You’re here…”
“Hey… Mizuki.”

Chapter Text

Travelling in Sumeru had it's ups and downs, but something Lumine particularly hated was the hot, arid landscape of the desert. The heat just didn't agree with her and led to the abundant stock of water she always kept in the pocket dimension of her backpack. On the other hand, although the dense, lush, green forest was just as hot, it provided ample relief - the rain.
The sheer amount of rain blew Yashiori Island out of the water (before she helped clear the storm, that is).
Lumine had never felt more soaked to the skin in all her years! So when she finally decided to go back to Inazuma after a few months, she could bid farewell to peeling her soggy underwear off of her body within the safe confines of her teapot; Paimon howling with laughter when she came back looking like a drowned rat after a food run; and the humid air make her hair puff up like a dandelion.

Good riddance!

But that wasn't the only reason Lumine desired to return to Inazuma - a certain person had been weighing on their mind ever since their first meeting.

Yumemizuki Mizuki.

The feeling was not foreign to her, but she had only met a few people on Teyvat who were so dead set on helping her instead of the other way around.
She was tired of picking up other people's messes, and whilst Mizuki, didn't have a 'mess' per say, she still provided generous compensation for all of her troubles in the form of therapy and taking steps to help cure her insomnia - and for that Lumine was grateful. She hadn't had a peaceful sleep in months and as soon as she started seeing Mizuki, the quantity and quality of her sleep improved tenfold.

When she met Yumemizuki Mizuki she felt she had never met anyone like her before.
From when they first met, in Mizuki’s dream, on a beach near Byakko Plain, Mizuki had been apologising profusely for eating one of her good dreams, to giving her an abundance of VIP passes to the Aisa bathhouse.
Mizuki had said to her, “The moon is beautiful tonight, isn’t it?”

Now Lumine wasn’t very well versed in Inazuman culture, but she did know that little tidbit after she had said those words to Kamisato Ayaka one night - blissfully unaware of their second meaning. But from then on, Lumine couldn’t help but overthink every single little thing that Mizuki had said to her.
Staring up at the ceiling of her hot and stuffy room at a well-respected Sumeru inn, her thoughts were all over the place. It really didn’t help that Paimon refused to cuddle down, constantly complaining about the heat. Lumine had simply told her to crack a window if it bothered her so much and if she continued to complain, she could sleep outside. At this, Paimon had promptly shut her mouth, but also had flung open every window that wasn’t already open - completely forgetting to pull the bug mesh down over the window.

Convenient.

Sumeru’s bugs were particularly nasty, Lumine had found this out from experience after she had had a huge welt of a bug bite on the back of her forearm for the best part of four months. She’d stepped into Avidya Forest for the first time and immediately got smacked by a bug about the size of her fist. She was not looking to repeat that incident.

She drowsily got to her feet gently setting a now asleep Paimon into a more comfortable sleeping position.
She clipped the bug mesh at the bottom of the windows, staring out through the criss-crossing fibres into the heart of Sumeru city.

The clouds were growing dark above, she didn’t doubt an onslaught of rain would catch them when they set off in the morning, or provide a nice little gift of mildly waterlogged streets for them.
Whatever, Lumine had dealt with worse.

A gentle rumble of thunder shook the sky. Great!
Lumine silently cursed the Raiden Shogun. If only to make her life easier.
It had been a few months since she’d visited Inazuma. She was craving miso soup terribly, and the kind you get anywhere other than Inazuma just didn’t hit the same.

She’d probably go back soon. It hadn’t been long, but there were people she wanted to see.

She wanted to see Mizuki.

The thunder was picking up, and a light spattering of rain started to patter down through the trees. Ugh. It was almost as if it was calling her back to Inazuma.

Not to Inazuma.
To Mizuki.

Guess there was a change of plans for the morning. She just hoped the rain would clear up for the trip. She doubted it would. The clouds were low and the sky was dark.

She was right. By the time morning came, the rain hadn’t relented at all. Lumine could already hear Paimon’s complaints.

It was going to be an extremely long trip.