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Crepus woke up in his bed at the winery, sunlight streaming through familiar windows. For a moment, everything was normal.
Then he realized he couldn't remember going to sleep. Couldn't remember the previous day at all. The last thing he remembered was... what? Diluc's eighteenth birthday celebration? That felt like it should have been weeks ago. How long had passed?
He sat up slowly, noting he was in his nightclothes but feeling oddly disoriented. Tired in a way that went bone-deep, like he'd been asleep for far too long.
The house was quiet. Too quiet for mid-morning with his boys.
He got dressed and made his way downstairs, following the sound of voices to the dining room.
"--Don't have time for this discussion," a voice was saying. Diluc's voice, but harder than Crepus remembered. Colder.
"I'm not asking for your time. I'm informing you of the patrol schedule." Kaeya's voice, equally cold. Formal.
Crepus pushed open the door.
Both young men turned, and the expressions that crossed their faces were identical: shock, disbelief, and something that looked almost like fear.
"Father?" Diluc's voice cracked. He looked older than Crepus remembered. Sharper, harder around the edges. His hair was longer, pulled back. When had he started wearing it like that?
"Good morning," Crepus said, confused by their reactions. "Why are you both looking at me like you've seen a ghost?"
Kaeya's face had completely drained of blood. He was gripping the edge of the table like it was the only thing keeping him upright. He looked different too. Older, and that haunted look in his eye that Crepus had worked so hard to erase was far more prominent.
"You're..." Kaeya couldn't seem to finish the sentence. He seemed to choke on his own air.
"I'm what? Did I oversleep? What day is it?" Crepus moved further into the room, and both young men actually took a step back. "What's wrong with you two?"
"What's wrong with us?" Diluc's voice rose, sharp with emotion. "Father, you're- You were-" He stopped, running a hand through his hair in a gesture of frustration Crepus recognized. "How are you here?"
"I live here. Where else would I be?" Crepus was getting worried now. "Boys, what's going on? You're acting very strange."
They exchanged a look, but not the warm, conspiratorial glances Crepus was used to. This was wary, uncertain, bordering on hostile.
When had his boys started looking at each other like that?
"What's the last thing you remember?" Kaeya asked carefully, voice shaking.
"Diluc's birthday celebration. The party at the winery. Both of you were there, Kaeya was making everyone laugh with his impression of me you all find so amusing," Crepus smiled at the memory, then stopped, studying them. "Why? What happened after that?"
Another loaded glance between them.
"Father," Diluc said slowly, "My eighteenth birthday was four years ago."
The words didn't make sense. "What?"
"Four years. It's been four years since then."
"That's impossible. I don't- I can't have lost four years. It was just-," Crepus sat down heavily. "What happened?"
Silence. Long, terrible silence.
"Someone needs to explain. Now." Crepus used his father-voice, the one that always got results.
"You died," Kaeya said bluntly. "Four years ago today. You died, and we didn't even have a body to bury, and I don't know how or why you're here, but you were dead."
The words hung in the air, impossible and terrible.
"I'm clearly not dead," Crepus said, but his hands were shaking. "I'm right here. I'm," He stopped. Four years. They'd said four years. "Tell me what happened. All of it."
------
They told him, haltingly, taking turns. A Delusion Crepus was positive neither of them should've ever known about. An Ursa. Trying to protect Diluc. The fight. The fatal wounds.
Crepus listened, feeling cold spread through his body. He'd died. He'd actually died, leaving his boys alone.
"I'm sorry," he said when they finished. "I'm so sorry you had to go through that."
"It's not your fault," Diluc said automatically, but there was something hollow in his voice.
"And after? What happened after?" Because something had clearly happened. The distance between them was wrong, unnatural.
"We buried nothing and had a small memorial," Kaeya said quietly. "At the estate. Under the tree where you used to read to us."
"And then?"
More silence.
"We dealt with it," Diluc said flatly. "We grieved. We moved on."
"Moved on," Crepus repeated, looking between them. "Is that why you're speaking to each other like strangers? Why you look at each other like you're enemies?"
"We're not enemies," Kaeya said, but his voice lacked conviction.
"Then what are you? Because four years ago- or what feels like yesterday to me- you were brothers. Close as any siblings I'd ever seen. And now you look like you can barely stand to be in the same room together." Crepus stood. "What happened between you?"
"Nothing," Diluc said.
"Everything," Kaeya said at the same time.
They glared at each other.
"One of you start talking. Now." Crepus' voice was sharp. "I may have missed four years, but I know my kids. And something is very wrong here."
"It's complicated," Diluc said.
"I have time. Apparently, I have all the time in the world, having been dead and somehow returned." Crepus crossed his arms. "Explain."
Kaeya looked at Diluc. Diluc looked at the floor.
"I told him the truth," Kaeya finally said. "About myself. Something I never told either of you."
"And that would be?" Crepus prompted.
Kaeya went dead quiet. Diluc glared at his brother with an expression Crepus had never seen from his older son.
"The night you died." Kaeya's voice was barely a whisper. "After. During the- during the fight. I told him that-."
"What fight?"
Neither spoke.
"What. Fight." Crepus' voice was harder now.
"We had a confrontation," Diluc said stiffly. "About his lies. About his mission. About everything. It got... physical."
"Physical," Crepus repeated, ice in his voice. "You fought each other? While grieving? While I was-He stopped, taking a breath. "Tell me exactly what happened."
The story came out in pieces. Kaeya's confession, driven by guilt and grief. Diluc's rage and the feeling of betrayal. The fight that had nearly killed them both. The Cryo Vision that had manifested in the middle of it all.
And then Diluc leaving for a year without his vision or a word. Four years of barely speaking. Of working around each other. Of their family broken beyond repair.
By the time they finished, Crepus was gripping the back of a chair so hard his knuckles were white.
"Let me see if I understand this correctly," he said, voice dangerously calm. "The night I died, the worst night of all our lives, you two decided to have a physical altercation that could have resulted in both your deaths."
"Father," Diluc started.
"I'm not finished. You fought each other, nearly killed each other, and then instead of working through it, you've spent four years avoiding each other. Treating each other like strangers. Throwing away everything we built as a family because you were both too proud or too hurt to actually talk."
"It wasn't that simple-" Kaeya tried.
"It never is. But you made it more complicated than it needed to be." Crepus looked between them. "Sit down. Both of you."
"Father, we're adults now-" Diluc began.
"I said sit down!"
The command in his voice was absolute. Both young men sat.
Crepus paced for a moment, trying to process everything. Four years. Four years of his sons suffering alone, growing apart, becoming these harder, colder versions of themselves.
"Kaeya," he said finally. "You never told me your origins. You said you weren't ready the last time I asked. Do you remember what I told you?"
"That where ever I came from didn't change anything. That you loved me regardless." Kaeya whispered, voice tight.
"And did you think that was a lie?"
"No, but-"
"But nothing. I meant it. Every word." Crepus turned to Diluc. "And you. Did I ever give you the impression that Kaeya's origins mattered more than who he was as a person?"
"No," Diluc said quietly.
"Then why did you let it destroy your relationship with your brother?"
"Because he lied!" Diluc's voice rose. "For years, he lied to us! He was sent here as a spy, to-"
"He was a child!" Crepus' voice matched his volume. "A terrified child, placed in an impossible situation, trying to survive! Did you think about that? Did you consider what it must have been like for him?"
"I considered that he lied to you until the day you died!" Diluc was on his feet now. "That you died never knowing what he was."
"I knew," Crepus said firmly. "I've known for years that he wasn't exactly as he said he was. Kaeya and I discussed it when he was fourteen. I knew, and I chose to love him anyway. Because that's what family does."
Diluc stared at him. "You knew?"
"Yes. And I was waiting for him to tell you, to tell me, when he was ready. But I never imagined-" Crepus' voice cracked. "I never imagined you'd respond with violence. That you'd let it tear you apart like this."
"He betrayed us," Diluc said, but there was less heat in it now.
"He was a scared child trying to navigate an impossible situation. Yes, he should have told you sooner. Yes, the lies hurt. But Diluc," Crepus moved closer. "He's your brother. Your little brother, who looked up to you, who loved you more than anything. And you threw that away because you were hurt and angry."
"I had a right to be hurt and angry!"
"Yes, you did. But you didn't have a right to cut him out of your life completely. To spend four years treating him like a stranger." Crepus turned to Kaeya. "And you. You let him. You accepted this distance like it was what you deserved."
"It was what I deserved," Kaeya said quietly. "I lied to you both. I was sent here to betray you. Of course he was upset."
"No." Crepus' voice was firm. "You were a child following orders you didn't understand, trying to survive in a foreign land. Did you ever actually intend to betray us?"
"I- no. I couldn't. I loved you both."
"Then you didn't betray us. You were caught between two impossible loyalties, and you chose us."
Kaeya's eye was bright with unshed tears.
"Both of you have spent four years punishing yourselves and each other for circumstances largely outside your control. And I'm putting a stop to it." Crepus looked between them. "I don't know why I'm back. I don't know if this is permanent or temporary or what's happening. But I'll be damned if I waste whatever time I have watching you two destroy yourselves over this."
"Father-" Diluc tried.
"You're going to fix this. Both of you. I don't care how long it takes or how difficult it is. You're going to talk, really talk, and work through this like the brothers you are."
"It's been four years," Kaeya said. "Too much has happened. We can't just go back to normal."
"Yes, you can. Because the alternative is continuing this way. And I refuse to accept that." Crepus sat down, looking tired. "I raised you both to be better than this."
"We tried," Diluc said quietly. "In the beginning. But every time we talked, it just- it hurt too much. It was easier to stop trying."
"Easier isn't better. Easier is how you end up four years later, strangers to your own family." Crepus looked at them both. "I'm going to ask you a question, and I want honest answers. Do you love each other?"
Silence.
"Diluc?"
"I..." Diluc's voice was rough. "I don't know. I'm just... I'm just so angry at him. I've been angry for years."
"Anger and love aren't mutually exclusive. Do you love your brother?"
More silence. Then, barely audible: "Yes."
"Kaeya?"
"Of course I love him." Kaeya's voice broke. "I never stopped. Even when he hated me. Even when we fought like that-."
"I don't hate you," Diluc said suddenly. "I never- I was angry, I am angry, but I don't hate you."
"Then why are you acting like you do?"
Diluc choked on a breath of air. "Because I didn't know how else to act! You lied to me, to Father, about everything, and then he died, and I couldn't-," Diluc stopped, breathing hard. "I couldn't process it. Any of it. So I shut down."
"For four years."
"Yes. For four years."
Crepus watched them carefully. This was the most honest communication they'd had in years, he could tell.
"You're both hurting," he said quietly. "You've both been hurting for four years, dealing with grief and betrayal and loss alone instead of together. And that ends now."
"How?" Kaeya asked. "How do we fix- Well, this?"
"One step at a time. Starting with honesty. Real honesty, not the careful politeness you've been using." Crepus stood. "You're going to talk. Today. All of it. The hurt, the anger, the grief, everything you've been holding back. And you're going to listen to each other. Really listen."
"And if we can't?" Diluc asked. "If it's too broken?"
"Then we work on it until it's not. Because you're brothers, and I won't accept anything less than you treating each other like family." Crepus' voice was firm. "But first, we're going to address the elephant in the room."
Both young men looked at him warily.
"You fought each other. Physically. The night I died." Crepus' voice hardened. "That is unacceptable. I don't care how angry you were, how hurt, how betrayed you felt. You don't raise hands to each other. Ever. That's a rule I thought I'd drilled into you since childhood."
"We were out of control," Kaeya said quietly. "Both of us. The grief, the shock, everything. It... It just exploded."
"That's an explanation, not an excuse." Crepus said, still stern, then looked at Diluc. "You're the older one. You should have walked away."
"I couldn't. I was too-" Diluc stopped at the look in his father's eyes. He lowered his head. "You're right. I should have. But I wanted to hurt him the way he'd hurt me."
"And did it help? Did hurting him make you feel better?"
"No," Diluc admitted, sounding choked. "It made everything worse."
"And you." Crepus turned to Kaeya. "You were within your right to fight back, but hurting one another this badly?"
Kaeya's lip wobbled. "I know. But he wouldn't listen, and I was so scared, and I just reacted."
"Fear isn't an excuse for violence either."
Both young men looked at the floor.
"Here's what's going to happen," Crepus said. "You're both grounded."
Diluc's head shot up. "We're adults!"
"I don't care if you're both fifty years old. You live in my house, you're my children, you follow my rules. And you'll both remember that one of my rules was that you don't physically assault each other."
Crepus' voice rose in volume and he watched as both of his boys winced back from it. He took a deep breath, reeled himself back in.
"Neither of you get to let hurt fester for four years, and you don't treat each other like strangers." Crepus' voice was stern. "Two months. No leaving the estate except for essential duties. And you're going to spend that time talking. Really talking. None of this polite distance. Working through everything that's happened."
"Father, I have responsibilities with the Knights," Kaeya protested.
"Which can be handled by someone else for two months. I suppose I can't speak to anyone myself in this... Scenario," Crepus cleared his throat. "But you're going to write a very politely worded letter to the Grandmaster explaining that you have family matters to attend to and need the next two months to yourself."
"We're too old for this," Diluc said, but there was no real conviction in his voice.
"Ah-ah," Crepus said sharply. "Enough of that. You're my boys, I don't care how old you are. I'm here to help and that's exactly what I'm going to do."
Crepus shook his head, massaging his temples with his thumbs. "Honestly, the both of you, letting hurt feelings drive this big of a wedge between you."
"It was more than hurt feelings," Kaeya said quietly.
Crepus softened at that. "I know. But it's also not insurmountable. Not if you both actually try." Crepus sighed. "I love you both. More than you will ever know. If you think you can just exist in this cold distance forever and I would just accept it, I won't. I didn't raise you this way."
Silence fell, heavy and loaded.
"Now," Crepus said, voice softer, "I'm going to give you both time to process this. But tomorrow, we start working through it. Together. Understood?"
"Yes, sir," they mumbled in unison, sounding exactly like they had as children.
"Good. Diluc, go check on the vineyard. Kaeya, help Adelinde with inventory. And tonight, we're having dinner together as a family. No excuses, no avoiding each other. Understood?"
"Yes, Father."
They left, and Crepus sat down heavily, trying to process everything.
He'd been dead. For four years. His sons had been alone, grieving, and had let their relationship shatter under the weight of secrets and hurt.
And now he was back, somehow, with a chance to fix it.
He didn't know why or how. Didn't know if this was permanent.
But he'd be damned if he wasted this opportunity.
------
That evening, dinner was awkward. Both young men sat at their usual places, muscle memory from years of family meals, but they didn't speak to each other. Only to Crepus, and only when directly addressed.
"This needs to stop," Crepus said halfway through the meal. "The silent treatment. The avoidance. If you have something to say to each other, say it."
Neither spoke.
"Diluc, look at your brother and tell him one thing you're feeling right now."
Diluc's jaw tightened. "Father-."
"One thing. That's all I'm asking."
Diluc finally looked at Kaeya. "I'm angry that you lied."
"Good." Crepus turned to Kaeya. "Your turn. Look at Diluc and tell him one thing you're feeling."
Kaeya met Diluc's eyes. "I'm sorry I hurt you."
"Better. Now we're getting somewhere." Crepus took a breath. "This is how we started. We'll build from here. I can work with this, but I can't work with you two intentionally avoiding everything."
The rest of dinner continued in the same vein. Crepus prompting, his sons reluctantly responding, slowly breaking through the walls they'd built.
It wasn't comfortable. It wasn't easy.
But it was a start.
------
That night, Crepus couldn't sleep. Too many thoughts, too many emotions, too much to process.
He got up and wandered the house, touching familiar objects, grounding himself in the reality that he was somehow here and apparently hadn't been in nearly half a decade.
He passed Diluc's room and heard movement. Then Kaeya's room, also awake.
Seems his sons couldn't sleep either.
On impulse, he knocked on Diluc's door. "Can I come in?"
A pause, then, "Yes."
Diluc was sitting at his desk, staring at nothing. He looked up when Crepus entered, and his expression was raw, vulnerable in a way it hadn't been since he was a child.
"I don't know how to do this," Diluc said quietly. "How to fix things with him."
"One day at a time. One conversation at a time." Crepus sat on the bed. "Talk to me. Really talk. What are you feeling?"
And Diluc did. Talked about the anger, the betrayal, the grief of losing his father and his brother in the same night. The four years of trying to move on while carrying all that weight alone.
Crepus listened, held him when he inevitably broke down, and promised they'd work through it together.
Then he went to Kaeya's room and had a similar conversation. Heard about the guilt, the self-hatred, the loneliness of being shut out by the person he loved most.
Both his sons, suffering alone, when they should have been supporting each other.
By the time he returned to his own room, Crepus was exhausted himself, but determined. .
He had work to do. His boys needed him.
And somehow, impossibly, he'd been given a second chance to help them heal.
He refused to waste it.
------
The next weeks were beyond difficult. Crepus structured their days carefully as though they were little children again. Time apart to process, time together to talk, time for all three of them to rebuild what had been lost.
There were breakdowns. Arguments. Moments where both young men wanted to give up and retreat to their separate corner, though Crepus never let them. Pushed them to keep trying, keep talking, keep working through the hurt.
And slowly, so slowly, things began to shift.
Diluc started asking questions instead of assuming the worst. Kaeya started being honest instead of deflecting with humor. They started remembering how to be brothers again.
It wasn't the same as it had been. Too much had happened, too many years had passed.
But it was something promising. Something honest. Something built on truth instead of secrets.
On the tenth day, Crepus found them in the sitting room, actually talking. Not at his prompting, but on their own.
He stood in the doorway, watching, and felt something in his chest ease.
They were going to be okay. Not today, maybe not even this year. But eventually.
His boys were finding their way back to each other.
And that made everything worth it.
------
On the fourteenth night of their grounding, both young men appeared at Crepus' door.
He looked up from his book. "Can't sleep?"
"Can we..." Diluc gestured vaguely.
Crepus smiled and pulled back the covers.
They climbed in on either side of him, just like they had as children. Twenty-two and twenty-one years old, but still his boys, still seeking comfort in his presence.
"I missed this," Kaeya said quietly. "Missed you. So much."
"I missed you too. Both of you." Crepus put an arm around each of them. "And I'm sorry I left you alone to deal with everything."
"It wasn't your fault," Diluc said, voice hoarse, tucked into Crepus' side.
"Maybe not. But I'm still sorry." Crepus was quiet for a moment. "I'm proud of you both. For trying, these past two weeks. I know it wasn't easy."
"It's still not easy," Kaeya admitted. "We're still figuring out how to be brothers again."
"That's okay. These things take time." Crepus kissed each of their heads. "The important thing is you're trying. Together."
They lay in comfortable silence for a while. Then Diluc said, "Father? Do you know why you're back?"
"No."
"Are you going to... disappear again?"
"I don't know that either."
"I don't want you to," Kaeya whispered. "We just got you back. I can't... We can't lose you again."
"Then we make the most of whatever time we have," Crepus murmured in response. "We don't waste it. We don't take it for granted and we rebuild this family together."
"Together?" Diluc said.
"Together," Crepus agreed. "Always."
They fell asleep like that, tangled together like no time at all had passed.
And in the morning, they'd start again. Keep working, keep healing.
For however long they had.