Archive of Our Own

Contrary to popular belief, Kaveh is not entirely unopposed to the general populus of Sumeru City knowing about his housing situation; namely, that the fabled Light of Kshahrewar is (reluctant) roommates with the Akademiya’s enigmatic Acting Grand Sage. 

Perhaps even more surprisingly, Alhaitham isn’t the issue in this scenario, unlike the books strewn all over the divan or the dust mites all over the office or the ugliest, most garish vase Kaveh thinks he’s ever seen fucking up the vibes in Kaveh’s otherwise meticulously coordinated and well-kept living room (yes, his, thank you very much, because who else dusts every weekend and makes sure the pillows match the rug and organizes every stupid little trinket Alhaitham brings home into something semi-presentable?).

Of course, Kaveh is stuck eating dinner almost every night with the most aggravating, insulting, unfeeling asshole of a human being to ever grace Teyvat, but it’s not like there’s anyone in Sumeru City who thinks he actually enjoys living with the man, or that he would actively choose to do so if not deprived of any other option. Anyone who’s even read a discussion board outside of Puspa Cafe knows how much he despises Alhaitham, with his smug little lilt of the head or the way he hardly shows any emotion on a daily basis but still teasingly enunciates when speaking with Kaveh like he’s a child who’s hardly learned his words. As embarrassing as it could be for people to think he’s friends with Alhaitham, he’s sure that’s not the case for the average Sumerian at this point. 

(Instead the issue lies with his pride. How he came to live with Alhaitham, crippling debt and destructive habits and “realizing his ideals” and all, is something that he doesn’t regret, but is still… ashamed to say out loud. Kaveh loathes to say it, but maybe he is thankful to Alhaitham for allowing him to pretend that he was just claiming his rightful place to a two-bedroom house the Akademiya gifted both of them, even though he forfeited that place long ago. Even if Alhaitham hardly has to go out of his way to let him, the little prick.)

But the point is, Kaveh’s not ashamed to be roommates with Alhaitham specifically. If he was, he’d hardly talk to the man at all! But he does, in public even, like when they’re wandering around the Grand Bazaar bickering over groceries and how exotic of a fish Alhaitham will buy for Kaveh to cook tonight. Or when Kaveh storms the Grand Sage’s office among the whispering of students in the House of Daena, throwing a fit over his missing keys before Alhaitham makes him sit and wait for him to finish his work so they can walk home together, the nerve! 

(Or even when they’re arguing on the way back home from Lambad’s and Kaveh’s voice raises enough for a light to turn on in a nearby window, and they scurry away as Kaveh murmurs curses all the while, and Alhaitham gets this look on his face that’s almost younger in the low lights, like he’s smiling just for Kaveh. 

Whatever.)

However, this living situation is temporary. It was always meant to be temporary, and while Kaveh’s grown used to (fond of, maybe, secretly) Alhaitham’s house and the Alhaitham in it, he won’t overstay his welcome with his once-junior who, above all, has always enjoyed his own space. He makes semi-regular rent payments, but he’s entirely and embarrassingly aware it’s nowhere near the transactional value that Alhaitham would get out of a different roommate, though Kaveh doubts he would seek another one once this ends; especially with Alhaitham paying for most of their food and footing Kaveh’s tab when he’s a little too out of it at Lambad’s, which Alhaitham always says he’s going to collect in Kaveh’s next rent payment but never does. Even with his financial ruin, Kaveh has enough pride to realize that he’s still freeloading on his apathetic jerk of a junior, even if the man can’t be a proper roommate to save his life. 

(And it’s not like Alhaitham isn’t constantly reminding him that his house is under his name, as if Kaveh was some unwelcome intruder who never belonged in the first place! Kaveh is sure Alhaitham would have no qualms about him packing up and disappearing any day of the week, and Kaveh would be exultant to have a living room with no ugly carvings on the shelves. Probably. Maybe just one, for decoration. To ease the transition.)

All to say, through his first stroke of luck in an agonizingly long time, he finds a decent place for cheap through a long-time client bemoaning the loss of one of their tenants, some artist who moved to Fontaine to chase her dreams (must be nice, Kaveh practically simpers). It’s hardly a choice, to leave or to stay; not when Alhaitham is as smug and annoying as he is, and Kaveh has never allowed himself to imagine Alhaitham’s home being anything more than a temporary stop with an occupant who hates to share. 

It’s also easier than the alternative, which is confronting the fact that Alhaitham never wanted him here anyway and is probably fulfilling the only good deed he thinks he needs to justify being even more lazy in the next samsara. Kaveh is abrasive, and loud, and hopelessly idealistic, and nitpicks everything Alhaitham does in the house, even though he’s sure the man does half of it just to piss him off. 

(And Kaveh can acknowledge he’s also… everything else. Everything he can’t say out loud without a sobbing episode or a few drinks in him, at least.)

Somehow, it’s still slightly embarrassing when Alhaitham wanders in—at 5:20 exactly, since the acting Grand Sage’s working hours only extend to 5:00 in the afternoon and it takes him 20 minutes to pack up and then walk home—to Kaveh kneeling in front of a wooden crate on the floor, sweaty and covered in a fine layer of dust from packing away all his mugs and kitchenware between decorative pillows that Alhaitham calls frivolous every other week (really, how ungrateful can you get, it’d look like a matra bunk in here if he didn’t intervene). The Alhaitham in question gives him a look with furrowed brows and narrowed eyes like he’s grown a third head or stripped naked in front of him. 

“What,” he says, and it’s not even a question. Just what, period.

Kaveh bristles. “I’m packing,” he snips, wiping sweat off of his chin, “obviously.” Even with a single word, Alhaitham has already managed to piss him off. 

Alhaitham gives him a flat look; well, flatter than usual. “Don’t tell me you’re going on another impromptu expedition to a construction site with…” He peers inside the crate, indifferent. “Five pillows and a juicer. Kaveh.”

Kaveh’s cheeks splotch red as he scoffs loudly. He cannot be serious! “Packing to move out! Do you really take me for such a fool?” he snaps, both of his hands landing on his waist as he cocks his hip. 

The impassioned words seem to fall flat between him and Alhaitham, like they were traveling on an invisible path through the air before tumbling into a ditch somewhere near the divan closest to the door. Alhaitham just blinks, like Kaveh started speaking a language separate from the 20 that he knows or like the syllables coming out of his mouth are all out of order and he’s trying to decode them in his head. 

“What?” Alhaitham says, the loudest Kaveh thinks he’s heard him since he accidentally spilled coffee on Alhaitham’s copy of Ayn Al-Ahmar. He says nothing else, and Kaveh rolls his eyes.

“Does Haravatat only teach their graduates a single word?” Kaveh practically sneers, even though the words have no bite. “I found another place to stay through a client. I’ll be out of your hair by next week. I know you’re biting back your good riddances.” 

But Alhaitham doesn’t say that. In fact, he doesn’t say anything. Just stares at Kaveh, his usually oh-so-controlled expression frozen in something between shock and maybe… Kaveh doesn’t know. For all the ways he’s learned to interpret every twitch of Alhaitham’s stone facade over the years, he doesn’t think he’s ever seen something quite like this. 

And then, Alhaitham just wanders away towards his room. Kaveh hears his door clack decisively shut deeper in the house, vermillion eyes following him until he disappears.

“Archons,” he finally murmurs to himself, trying not to feel a little lost, trying to feel properly annoyed like he should be and not like the wind is knocked out of him from Alhaitham’s characteristic silence even when confronted with Kaveh leaving; his unwillingness even now to waste energy saying anything at all. 

.

It’s not until the sun has set and Kaveh has finished plating dinner for two when Alhaitham emerges from his room again like a man on a mission, clutching a thick book his nose is uncommonly not buried in.

He throws the book on the divan, but Kaveh can’t even get a word of protest in before he slaps a hand on the table.

“You can’t move out.” Kaveh’s words grind to a halt halfway up his throat. Alhaitham gestures towards the forgotten tome behind him. “I just filed our taxes together. Yesterday.”

Kaveh blinks. Now it’s his turn. “What?”

“I filed our taxes together,” Alhaitham repeats, more insistent this time, like he’s not sure what Kaveh's not understanding. “Sumeru City code states that neither of us can move within six months of joint filing. Section 27-11…”

“What?” Kaveh sputters with more emphasis this time, one hand flicking a blond lock of bangs away from his widened eyes. “What do you mean, you filed our taxes together? When did I give you permission to—”

“Do you have any property to your name, senior? And it’s not like there’s any part of your finances that aren’t privy to me. I know that your income is classified as case-basis, so—”

“That doesn’t matter,” Kaveh practically snarls, eyes glinting red. “What gives you the right when you didn’t even tell—”

“Your name is still on the deed,” Alhaitham finishes with a vague air of finality, and Kaveh’s words sputter out like a firework dying midair.

Despite all his emotional shortcomings, Alhaitham seems to sense that Kaveh’s silence is stone-cold shock, so he inhales deeply before continuing, hoarse yet steady. “I filed our taxes together,” he repeats slowly, “because I never took your name off of the deed. The spot is yours, Kaveh. It always was.”

Kaveh swallows hard. “I never told you to do that,” he mumbles, but it sounds weak and tremulous to his own ears. “And why, when I…” he swallows his next words, heavy like stones in his mouth. When I finally made up my mind to go? 

Alhaitham’s brow furrows, like he’s not sure which part of this Kaveh isn’t getting. “It’s not as if it was hard,” he mutters, and Kaveh’s infuriatingly pompous roommate and the infamous acting Grand Sage of Sumeru almost sounds… defensive, for once. “Your name had already appeared on the preliminary deed before the house passed to me, and I didn’t find it bothersome enough to—”

Kaveh waves furiously, like he could physically bat Alhaitham’s words out of the air. “Stop, stop,” he interrupts, voice raising incredulously; “you never told me! You don’t see an issue with never even…” 

Alhaitham falls silent as well, and Kaveh expects some offhandedly smug, smooth remark about how Kaveh’s his senior but never acts like it, or how it was the most logical outcome given the circumstances and he’s being a child for debating with him about it. But he just mumbles, low and almost petulant, “It is what it is.” He won’t meet Kaveh’s eyes. “You can’t move out.” 

Kaveh balks at him before rubbing at his face furiously. “You can’t be serious. You can’t be serious,” he laughs, almost delirious. There’s no way his luck has reached this new low. He knows the ascended heroes on Celestia are guffawing at his misfortune. “Why would you file our taxes together when you’ve always wanted me to leave anyway?” 

Alhaitham stares at him for a long moment before sighing, slipping into his seat and sliding his plate of Kaveh’s carefully constructed Fatteh towards him primly. “Why indeed,” he drones, sounding exhausted. “Why indeed.”

.

So Kaveh doesn’t move out. He brings it up, chagrined, the next time he meets with his client, and she’s dubious about holding the place for him for six months; understandably so, for a relatively cheap apartment in the heart of the city that surely has mountains of demand. In hindsight, it’s just predictable that everything in his life goes wrong at the very last moment, giving him just enough space to hope before it all comes crashing down.

He drops by the House of Daena to double-check the city code, but all twelve copies of this term’s amendments are conveniently out of commission, and the librarian on duty seems just as confused as he is on the matter. He thinks of borrowing Alhaitham’s copy, but scouring the countless books in their shared office space and living room yields nothing, and like hell he’s going to ask the man, after the stunt he pulled without even a word. 

He’s also willfully ignoring the man nowadays, though Alhaitham doesn’t make it hard; for the first time since the job was thrust upon him, Alhaitham seems to be mighty willing to stay after his allotted work hours in the Grand Sage’s office. At first, Kaveh had thought (with a slight queasiness in his stomach) that Alhaitham had gone and gotten himself a bunch of secret friends who somehow perfectly matched that awful personality and penchant for silence even after trapping Kaveh here in a house he seems to have less and less interest in cohabiting, but dinner with Tighnari and Cyno yields different news.

“No, he’s actually working,” Cyno grunts around a ferocious bite of his Sunsettia, flicking a food card from his stack one-handedly with an expertise that no one should possibly acquire through Genius Invokation TCG. “I went to his office to leave something with his attendants yesterday at eight in the evening, but he was still there. Some important legislative changes, apparently.” He slurps up another bite. “He was cagey with what the whole thing was about, though. Insisted he didn’t need any help from the matra.”

Kaveh hums consideringly, brow furrowed as he studies his own hand of buffs. Must be why all the city codebooks are missing from the House of Daena. Amendments to something as banal as city legislature are usually small and far in-between; what’s so important that it requires concealment from even the Akademiya’s enforcers? Perhaps even more surprising is that it’s important enough to be Alhaitham’s priority even after hours. His eyes flick to the door of Lambad’s, and as if reading his thoughts, Tighnari speaks up, those inquisitive eyes tracing Kaveh’s face. “He’s late,” the fox notes. “Almost half an hour.”

Cyno lets out a noncommittal noise, and Tighnari looks up from his drink with wide eyes, as if sensing an impending natural disaster. “I suppose that Alhaitham is… Al-late-then.”

A pregnant pause. “You see, it is a farcical play on the syllables in Alhaitham’s—”

“Yes,” Tighnari says loudly. “Alright. Well, it’s strange nonetheless.” 

“Ugh,” Kaveh groans with feeling, putting his head down on the table and splaying his arms out over the cards dramatically. “Who, what, why, why me… As soon as I can finally move out, he files our taxes together, and now he hardly even lives in the house.” Tighnari lets out a sympathetic hum. “Why, why, why…”

“Don’t pretend like it’s not a bad deal for you, senior,” a soft, low, achingly familiar voice murmurs behind him over the din of the tavern, accompanied by a shadow falling over him and a calloused finger dragging inexplicably down the cartilage of his ear, causing warm, warm static to take over his brain before Alhaitham gently flicks the geometrical shape of his dangling earring. Kaveh practically shoots up in his chair, lifting his chin until he’s staring at Alhaitham’s looming figure upside down with wide eyes, a flush spreading unbidden on his slack cheeks.

“What did you do that for,” Kaveh snaps (squeaks) in fury (embarrassment), his lips parted as he blinks owlishly up at his eternally apathetic junior, delicate fingers slapping against his lobe to still his earring’s movements. And then, for a lack of anything else to say, “You’re late!”

Alhaitham lets out a hum before moving away from behind Kaveh, letting the light reach him again around Alhaitham’s infuriatingly broad figure. “Sorry,” he admits easily, though the apology is directed solely to Tighnari and Cyno by way of his apathetic stare. “I was working.” He turns back to Kaveh as he slips into his seat. “You may as well surrender now, by the way. You never learn; your entire deck consisting of health buffs is no use if you can’t strike enough to kill a single character in the process.” Kaveh throws a dice at him.

Once they’ve acquired the dice back, Kaveh surrenders without much fanfare and they reshuffle to accommodate Alhaitham joining in a four-way duel. “How magnanimous of you to join us for a humble tavern dinner, oh majestic Grand Sage,” Kaveh mutters, flush remaining high on his cheeks as he studies his cards, if only to keep his eyes trained on something besides Alhaitham. “I assumed something like this would be beneath you.”

“I said I would be here,” Alhaitham replies flat as always. “What kind of reflection is cast upon Sumeru for the majestic Grand Sage to retract on his word? Your electro fungus card is dead now, by the way.” Kaveh squawks. 

“We’re happy you’re here, Alhaitham,” Tighnari cuts in, ever the mediator. “We heard from Cyno that your office has been busy lately. I may not live in Sumeru City anymore, but I don’t think the city code has ever required such a drastic overhaul.” Alhaitham’s face doesn’t change, at least to the untrained eye, but Kaveh can see the slight stiffening of his shoulders; from the reminder of the amount of work that’s been thrust upon him unwillingly, Kaveh can only assume. 

“Ugh,” Kaveh mutters, his cheek pressed against his fist as he studies his useless hand of Sweet Madame cards. “While you’re doing… whatever that is, can’t you remove that ridiculous clause about… moving while filing taxes together? It’ll get me out of your dungeon of a house within half the time.”

Alhaitham gives him a flat look. “No,” he mutters, almost petulant, and Kaveh prays to Lesser Lord Kusanali for the discipline to resist reaching across the table and pulling that stupidly wavy grey tuft of hair straight out of the top of his scalp. 

They play and chat until Cyno and Alhaitham are the only two left, locked in a stalemate and forced to reshuffle their decks of buff cards at least twice. All the while, Kaveh has nothing to do with his hands but drink, so he makes it through about three more glasses of wine until he’s practically nodding off at the table. “I’m gonna… get another,” Kaveh mumbles to Tighnari as their conversation dwindles, his vision blurry enough that he doesn’t feel guilty about the concerned look the fox casts his way. He stumbles up from the table, ambling to the bar and pressing two elbows down on the counter to support himself.

“Another?” Lambad greets as he cleans out a glass, equal parts amused and concerned; the age-old word Kaveh’s heard a million times before. “Are you sure, Kaveh? A little unsteady on your feet there.” Kaveh just nods, which is really just his head hanging low as he flashes a weak thumbs-up. 

“Let me pay you just for this… drink…” Kaveh insists clumsily, knowing full well the tab for their table is under Cyno’s name tonight; it wouldn’t do for him to overdrink on the General Mahamatra’s dime. He fumbles for the Mora pouch tied on the belt cinching his waist, neck twisting uncomfortably as he tries to look, until he’s stopped by a soft but unfamiliar hand on his arm. 

“Please,” an eager voice Kaveh doesn’t recognize rings out. He looks up to see a dark-haired man with his hair pulled in a low ponytail, only slightly taller than Kaveh, with soft-set features and a charming smile. “On me,” the man insists, his hand sliding up Kaveh’s bicep. 

“Uh…” Kaveh says dumbly, leaning away from him slightly and squinting to see better. What’s this guy’s deal? Lambad looks equally surprised, his eyes flickering from Kaveh to the mystery man.

“I’m Chandra,” the man introduces himself, looking a little flustered as he smiles earnestly at Kaveh, his brows slightly furrowed. He removes his hand from Kaveh’s arm to press it over his admittedly well-built chest. “I’m a Haravatat scholar at the Akademiya.” Ugh. Haravatat. “Kaveh, right? Your reputation precedes you, Light of Kshahrewar!”

“Um.” Kaveh’s sure he looks a little stupid right now, so he just swings his jaw closed and swallows before bobbing his head quickly. The embarrassment of being recognized snaps him into a relatively more sober state, and he pinches his arm to focus better on not making a fool of himself. “Right. Hello. Nice to meet you. Paying for my drink is… completely unnecessary…”

“Oh, no, no,” Chandra laughs, clearly flustered, a ruddy color high on his cheeks that Kaveh suspects has nothing to do with alcohol. “It’s hardly a worthy expense for a few moments of your time!” Chandra stops, his smile turning eager as he leans slightly into Kaveh’s space, making him blanch. “Wow. Wow. You really are as exquisite as they say…”

“Uh,” Kaveh repeats uselessly, blinking. “As who says?”

“Why, everyone in the Akademiya!” Chandra insists, nodding furiously, his hair swinging like a puppy’s tail. “You are a jewel to behold. Your face shines just as eminently as your work. And those eyes…” Chandra leans deeper into Kaveh’s space, prompting Kaveh to lean farther away from him in surprise.

Except he can’t.

He can’t, because his back hits a hard surface behind him before a solid hand wraps around his waist, making his stomach tingle like he’s at the top of a very steep cliff. 

“Chandra,” Alhaitham’s voice rumbles, low and almost dangerous, and the man’s expression instantly switches from overeager to terrified as he looks up to find the acting Grand Sage of Sumeru’s shadow looming over the both of them. “If nowadays’ Haravatat scholars have so many pretty words to spend on useless endeavors, perhaps more of them should be spent on the project proposals that are so late to my office.” 

Kaveh just stares up at Alhaitham’s stormy expression with parted lips and wide eyes, barely able to process any part of the situation. When did Haitham get here? “You’re a Haravatat scholar,” Kaveh mumbles as he blinks up at Alhaitham through his lashes, and those mesmerizing eyes flicker down to meet his. A pregnant pause passes between the three men. 

“I’m not a foolish one,” Alhaitham mutters, defensive. “Pragmatism is the root of all progress.” Kaveh’s brow twitches at that, feeling one of their age-old arguments coming on (imagination is the root of all progress, thank you very much), but before he can, Alhaitham’s eyes flash back to a stiff Chandra. “If you have time to be milling about in the tavern, you have time to write. I’ll expect your revised proposal on my desk by the day after tomorrow.” Chandra’s eyes practically bulge out of his head.

“But—Grand Sage—” Alhaitham just throws down a tidy sum of mora for Lambad before grabbing Kaveh’s drink, his hand wrapping tighter around Kaveh’s waist and tugging him, stumbling, away from the counter. 

“Hey, wait,” Kaveh squeaks, stumbling as Alhaitham bodily drags him back towards their table. “I was paying for that!” 

Alhaitham just turns, handing the drink back to him, staring Kaveh down accusingly like he was the one acting out of his mind back there. “I’ll take it out of your next rent payment,” Alhaitham mutters, and Kaveh glares, because he knows he won’t.

“What’s up with you and Chin… Chandra, or whatever?” Kaveh retorts immediately. “You were acting like such a jerk back there! He was just offering to pay for a drink since he recognized me.”

“Recognized you?” Alhaitham practically scoffs in response. “People can recognize you without being close enough to breathe your air.”

“Well, I didn’t tell him to do that!” Kaveh defends himself. Alhaitham pulls his chair out for him as he plops down, his wine sloshing. “He just said that my face… something. I forgot.”

Alhaitham slips into his own chair, giving him a flat look before casting that same look to a silent Tighnari and Cyno. “I doubt any wall you’ve built in the past ten years is thicker than your head, senior.” Kaveh gasps before passionately raising a choice finger at him.

“Oh, no,” says Tighnari. “Was someone flirting with Kaveh at the bar again?”

“No!” 

“Yes,” Alhaitham deadpans. 

“Whatever,” Kaveh interjects in a flushed sputter. “So what? He can flirt if he wants to! Not like I can bring him home, can I, with the Grand Sage milling about in my living room!” 

“My living room,” Alhaitham corrects him, and Kaveh’s subsequent lunge for his throat is only stopped by Tighnari gripping the scruff of his collar. 

When he’s properly re-seated, Tighnari gives him a look of complete and utter exhaustion; over what, he can only guess. “Can we resume,” Cyno says through a particularly big bite of yet another Sunsettia (where is he getting these?). “It’s your turn, Alhaitham.” Kaveh blinks. The game’s still not over? Why did Alhaitham leave for the bar, then?

“Game’s over,” Alhaitham replies shortly, immediately dashing that train of thought. “I should get Kaveh home.”

Cyno studies him, squinting, and he looks like he wants to say something more before he carefully places his cards face-down on the table. “So you surrender.”

Alhaitham rolls his eyes. “Yes, fine, I surrender. Kaveh, finish your wine and get up.” What an awful brute.

He does, but not because Alhaitham told him to, and he’s led by Alhaitham’s hand grasping his wrist all the way from the din of the tavern to the quiet world outside. Kaveh shivers, the sudden cold prickling the bare skin at the divot of his white blouse, before he’s immediately swaddled in a cape that smells just like Alhaitham: piney, woodsy, with a layer of musk that’s distinctly human, like the older scrolls in the House of Daena. 

He looks up, his vision just clear enough to make out the outline of Alhaitham’s infuriatingly meaty arms (feeble scholar his ass), his gaze tracing Alhaitham’s collarbone down to the defined curves of his pectorals before he buries his face in Alhaitham’s cloak and squeezes his eyes shut. “You’ll be cold,” Kaveh mumbles weakly, his mouth obscured by the thick fabric.

Alhaitham just looms for a moment, his gaze unreadable, all the shades in his irises blending together in Kaveh’s drunken state. His jaw works for a few moments like he’s going to say something purposefully obtuse to rile Kaveh up again before he finally mutters, “I’ll be fine, senior.” Then, “Let’s go home.”

Kaveh, in a moment of weakness, wraps himself around one of Alhaitham’s humongous arms like a limpet, his eyes fluttering halfway closed again as Alhaitham leads him along. He was right; Alhaitham’s skin is cool to the touch. “The lady who owns the apartment I was going to rent…” Kaveh whispers into Alhaitham’s arm, missing the way Alhaitham stiffens. “She says it’s impossible to reserve it for six months. She’s giving the lease to someone else. So I might be your burden for a little while longer.”

A long silence passes between them. “Burden?” Alhaitham echoes in that low timbre, and Kaveh feels the vibrations more than he hears it. He says nothing for a while, and then, “I would assume that I was the burden, with how eager you were to vacate the house at the first opportunity.”

Kaveh sniffles a little, tucking himself closer to Alhaitham’s arm as he shivers. “Well. I know how much my junior enjoys his space.” A little hypocritical to say at the moment when he’s practically trying to claw his way into Alhaitham’s skin, but whatever. 

That makes Alhaitham stop in the middle of the empty street, and Kaveh picks his head up from Alhaitham’s shoulder, blinking up at him blearily. Even in his drunken haze with only the streetlights to illuminate them, Kaveh can see the shadows in Alhaitham’s clenched jaw, the pronounced furrow of his brow as he stares forward at nothing. Alhaitham really is quite good looking, when he’s not speaking. That much has always been true.

“Even I like to walk in the sunlight sometimes, senior,” Alhaitham finally settles on, and Kaveh hardly has any time to consider what that might mean before their feet are moving towards home again, one after the other after the other.

.

Kaveh wakes up the next morning, hungover and grumpy, to the smell of fresh coffee in the kitchen. Alhaitham has already left for work, his shoes notably absent in the space beside the door, but he’s left a mug of the good blend they purchased from the Bazaar last week in Kaveh’s red mug on the table. He sips at it slowly, waking himself up in increments, before heading back into his room to freshen up. 

Something has shifted since last night. Not a new book on the divan or a new carpet in the hall; no, something in the mechanisms of his chest has fundamentally altered, like all of the cogs were turned inside out right under his nose. 

It takes him twice as long to tame his mane of blond hair into something presentable with the way his fingers fumble. He’s fixing a hairclip with one hand and holding Mehrak in the other as he leaves his room again, looking up to find… huh. Alhaitham’s in the kitchen, turned towards the counter until Kaveh carefully walks into his frame of view, giving him a weak wave. 

“Ah,” Alhaitham says, reaching up to flick his headphones back on. “I bought tulumba.” Sure enough, there’s an empty paper bag branded with the Puspa Cafe logo, and Alhaitham has unceremoniously dumped what must be two servings of the sweet pastry onto a medium-sized plate. Extra syrup, just like Kaveh prefers. Alhaitham must have gone out of his way to ask for it. The cogs in Kaveh’s chest sputter and clank before spinning onwards.

Kaveh blinks, wrapping his shawl tighter around himself. “Oh,” he says, soft and breathy, unable to meet Alhaitham’s eyes. And then, uselessly, “For me?”

It’s a stupid question, Kaveh knows. Alhaitham doesn’t like the texture of tulumba; it’s annoyingly sticky, especially with too much syrup. “Who else?”

Another malfunction. “Oh,” Kaveh repeats. “Um. Thanks.” He walks to the counter until he’s side by side with Alhaitham with their shoulders almost brushing, eyes trained on the table as he picks up a piece with two careful fingers. “I thought you’d left for work.”

“I’ve worked too hard recently. I’m taking a break,” Alhaitham says, flat as a stone tablet, utterly predictable. Kaveh wants to make a remark about it, something snappy and argumentative, but the words stick to the syrup in his throat as he swallows. The moment passes, and Alhaitham mutters, “We need groceries.”

“I have a client meeting,” Kaveh mumbles around a bite of dough, practically fumbling for the words. He’s not used to this; normal. A conversation a regular pair of roommates, or maybe an average couple living together, might engage in.

Hold on. What?

Kaveh coughs around a swallow, hardly aided by the way Alhaitham immediately gives his back a gentle hit with his calloused palm. Once he’s flushed the offending bite down with a gulp of Alhaitham’s coffee, Alhaitham’s hand remains against the bare skin of his spine, which should steady him in theory but ends up completely fucking with his breathing in reality. Electricity travels up and down his spine to the tips of his fingers and his toes. 

“Um.” Kaveh coughs again, unable to meet Alhaitham’s gaze, but his awkward shuffle from one foot to the other seems to be enough for Alhaitham’s hand to automatically drop from his back. A couple? Kaveh must be going insane. Someone must have drugged his wine last night, or his coffee this morning, or…

“We’ll go after your client meeting,” Alhaitham says easily, simply, his voice just as even and unaffected as always. “When will it end?”

Kaveh flushes deep, glancing at Alhaitham out of the corner of his eye before quickly stuffing another piece of tulumba into his cheek. “Noon,” he says, hushed and hoarse. 

“Okay,” Alhaitham says. “We’ll get lunch too, then. Where will you be? I’ll pick you up.”

Kaveh swallows hard. Pick him up? What is this, some kind of… no. No. Don’t even think of it, Kaveh. “At that new coffee place with the fancy Rose Custard. Near the Corps of Thirty headquarters.” Alhaitham grunts in acknowledgement. 

He finishes the rest of the tulumba in silence, and Alhaitham takes the plate from him. He reaches out to protest that he’ll clean it himself, but Alhaitham just waves him off. “Go to your meeting,” Alhaitham insists, raising a cool brow. “You don’t want to be late, do you, senior? Just because you’re not paid by the hour doesn’t mean it’s not good practice to be on time.”

Kaveh knows Alhaitham is goading him, saying something smart just to piss him off, just like he usually is when he calls Kaveh senior in that slow, overly-enunciated tone of his. But he doesn’t have it in himself to take the bait like he usually does, just bobs his head quickly before scurrying away, grabbing Mehrak and his sketches off of the divan and clumsily toeing his shoes on at the door. “Bye, Hayi,” he calls over his shoulder as he hurries outside, paying no mind to Alhaitham’s gaze on his back or the nickname from a decade ago that leaves his lips as the door slams behind him. 

Kaveh practically sprints down the curved walkways away from the house and towards Treasures Street, his face aflame. Fuck. Fuck. For something so achingly humiliating, something that will literally haunt his days from now forevermore, it’s surprisingly easy to piece it all together in the context of the last twenty four hours. Kaveh feels possessed; he feels insane. He needs to shave his head, or… or get laid, probably, or do anything it takes to get rid of this awful, awful feeling. 

Shit. He’s in love with Alhaitham. 

.

Kaveh spends his entire appointment in a daze, all of his client’s words going in one ear and out the other. He looks decently happy about whatever sketches Kaveh managed to nab before he left the house, so that’s good, because Kaveh finds he can’t think about much else besides his elaborate escape plan to Inazuma, an ocean away from the kaleidoscopic eyes and low voice of the interim Grand Sage of Sumeru. He’ll change his name, dye his hair; whatever it takes so that he never has to face any mention of Alhaitham again. 

The minutes count down to his inevitable doom, and by noon on the dot, Kaveh is following his client back outside with all the excitement of a man being led to the gallows. Sure enough (because Alhaitham never goes back on his word, the awful bastard), Kaveh’s number-one BANE OF HIS EXISTENCE, all-caps, italicized, is reading a book while leaning against the wooden gate of the cafe, headphones turned all the way up to ignore the whispers and stares by passersby. Unfortunately, Kaveh doesn’t merit the same treatment, because Alhaitham looks up as soon as he and his client step onto the street, his book snapping closed as he reaches up to dial down his headphones. 

“Kaveh.” Kaveh stiffens. Alhaitham’s familiar footsteps, agile and sure, approach behind him. “Are you done?” 

Kaveh’s neck creaks as he turns over his shoulder, vermillion clashing with teal-green, and he swallows hard before letting out a laugh that sounds high-pitched and stupid even to his own ears. “Ah, Alhaitham! I didn’t… see you there…” Is that the Grand Sage? Kaveh’s client murmurs behind him, and his cheeks go aflame.

“Don’t lie, senior,” Alhaitham replies dryly, before his gaze flickers to Kaveh’s client, Behrouz; a wealthy merchant from Port Ormos looking to build a family home in Sumeru City. “Ah.”

Behrouz just reaches out to shake hands enthusiastically, flinging Alhaitham’s muscular arm like a rope. Kaveh snorts. “You’re Grand Sage Alhaitham, aren’t you? Haha! Must be my lucky day!” Behrouz jerks a thumb towards Kaveh. “It was already a boon to have the Light of Kshahrewar makin’ the house; my wife was real excited about it. She was a Kshahrewar graduate too, you see. Man, oh, man. Guess the rumors are true; you guys are close!”

Kaveh freezes. Rumors? Let alone rumors that have made it to Port Ormos? He may need a place farther than Inazuma to escape to; maybe some ancient underground civilization, or a temple in the sky, or… He casts a nervous glance at Alhaitham, who crosses his arms, seemingly unaffected by the whole thing. “Rumors?” he repeats out loud, his voice weak. 

“Oh, yeah; that you guys are Akademiya buddies and everything, you know! And you’re always around each other.”

“Those are truths,” Alhaitham corrects Behrouz, and Kaveh’s gaze snaps towards Alhaitham, who just gives him a cool lift of his brow. “What, senior?” 

Behrouz chuckles. “Aw, how adorable,” he laughs. “Well, you clearly have plans; I won’t take up more of your day. I’ll see you next week for the updates, right, Kaveh? Thanks again!” Kaveh just waves as the man bustles off, his leftovers clutched in hand for his wife and kids. 

“He seemed personable,” Alhaitham comments, and Kaveh huffs, whirling towards him again. 

“You didn’t have to just—” Kaveh blurts before pressing his fingertips to his scalp. “Ugh! Don’t just go along with whatever anyone says for the sake of convenience, Alhaitham. Or truth, for that matter.”

“I’m not having the same argument with you ad nauseam,” Alhaitham replies, which is so ridiculous, because that’s literally all he’s ever done since the Akademiya. 

“Why, you—”

The two of them continue bickering all the way down the ramp and into the Grand Bazaar, Alhaitham’s hand resting on the small of Kaveh’s back to guide him around fellow shoppers and stalls as he rants at him. They make the customary stop at their favorite produce stall with the old auntie that Kaveh always spends way too long talking with, and Alhaitham disappears and miraculously reappears to pay when Kaveh’s finally picked whatever looks sweetest. 

Kaveh sneaks a Zaytun Peach out of the bag, taking a bite and savoring it. He offers the uneaten side to Alhaitham, who chomps so hard that juice begins running in rivulets, and Kaveh complains as he always does. Alhaitham drags a finger up the inside of his wrist and collects the stray liquid, licking it away, and that makes him shut up, flushing down to his very toes. 

“Where do you want to eat?” Alhaitham says as he tosses the stem of the peach in a waste basket. 

Kaveh just shrugs. “Anything is alright,” he says softly.

Alhaitham turns, studying him for a long moment. “Did that client of yours not like it?” he asks evenly, and Kaveh creases a brow at him questioningly. “Your proposal.” Infuriatingly observant bastard.

Kaveh’s brow twitches. “He loved it, for your information. Some people appreciate art when they see it,” he snips, and Alhaitham hums noncommittally, apparently reassured enough that Kaveh’s mood is no different than usual. 

They end up taking an outdoor table at one of the small family restaurants close to the Bazaar, and Alhaitham pulls Kaveh’s chair out for him again, except now he’s sober enough to be flustered about it. “People are going to get ideas,” Kaveh warns, all hushed and embarrassed, but Alhaitham just stares at him as he slips into his own seat.

“What ideas?” asks Alhaitham. Kaveh declines to answer.

They’ve put in their orders and are waiting for their food when Alhaitham slides something across the table. A small box. It may as well have been a bottle of live gunpowder, with the way Alhaitham huffs at Kaveh’s expression of utter perturbation. 

“It’s not as if the contents will leap at you,” Alhaitham mutters as he crosses his arms with an almost cartoonish little frown on his lips. It’s cute. Archons, Kaveh needs to die. “Just open it.”

“What is it?” Alhaitham doesn’t answer, so Kaveh prepares for the worst and reaches for the box like it’s a live scorpion, gingerly picking it up with his thin fingers and squeezing one eye shut as he slowly cracks the top open.

There’s no spider. There’s also no bomb. Instead, there’s a little velvet cushion inside that’s the same shade of the box, and encircling it is… oh. 

A pretty chain to clasp around the wrist, made of what looks like pure gold molded into tastefully asymmetrical beads that are strung between pearls. There’s a small pendant—a ruby, cut in the shape of a fan—dangling in the center of the cushion. It’s exquisite. It takes Kaveh’s breath away. 

His eyes flicker up to Alhaitham. And then, because he’s stupid, he murmurs, soft and breathless, “Huh?”

Alhaitham’s brow twitches, and Kaveh must be hallucinating with the same drug that made him cling to Alhaitham’s bicep the whole way home last night, because there’s a flush high on his precious junior’s cheeks, one that he leans forward to conceal with the swoop of his grey hair. “For you,” he says. 

Kaveh swallows. “Me?”

“You’re very parrot-like today, senior,” comments Alhaitham, his eyes trained resolutely sideways. “Yes, for you. I purchased it while you were speaking with Auntie Kareena.”

Kaveh balks. “Wh—Why?” he leans forward to whisper, his voice cracking slightly. Then, with dawning horror, “How much did this cost?”

Alhaitham just keeps his arms crossed and his back rigid. “Because I saw it and I believed you would enjoy it,” he says, a little too enunciated to be normal. “The cost is irrelevant. But if you really must know, the merchant recognized me as the Acting Grand Sage and was willing to halve the price.”

Kaveh elects to ignore Alhaitham’s answer to his first question for the sake of his own peace and sanity. His fingers run reverently along the pretty golden beads of the bracelet, and his throat tightens. He must be sick. “Is that not an abuse of power,” he whispers weakly. And then, because he can’t help it, “Since when have you done things I enjoy?”

Alhaitham just tilts his head, studying him, and that age-old buzz in the pit of Kaveh’s stomach awakens again, only recently recognized and labeled for what it is. Fuck. Fuck, fuck. “You’re not very aware, are you, senior,” Alhaitham says quietly, and Kaveh doesn’t hear it well enough to comment on it, lest he embarrass himself.

He swallows hard. “How much do I owe you?”

“It’s a gift,” Alhaitham replies evenly.

“Why?” It’s not Kaveh’s birthday anytime soon, and even so, it’d hardly merit something so expensive, especially not when Kaveh is already living with Alhaitham for free.

“The charm isn’t awfully long. It won’t get in your way while sketching.”

“That’s not—” Tears well up in Kaveh’s eyes for no reason, but he wills them back. “I mean, why purchase it?”

Alhaitham shifts in his seat. “Didn’t I already answer that?” 

Kaveh opens his mouth to respond, but the words hiccup in his throat as someone stops at their table; a young woman, no older than Alhaitham, dressed in standard Akademiya robes with her brown hair cut in a sensible bob. 

“Grand Sage Alhaitham! What a pleasure to see you on your day off!” She smiles, hands clasped in front of her. Kaveh thinks she looks vaguely familiar; one of the secretaries who works in Alhaitham’s office, most likely, who he’s bumped into while badgering Alhaitham for his keys. She turns towards Kaveh. “Ah, and hello; you’re Kaveh, I recognize you! I’m Hajanad, one of the secretaries in the Grand Sage’s office.” Her eyes go wide. “Oh, I’m sorry. I hope I’m not interrupting anything! I was just shopping over there with my girlfriend and wanted to come greet you.”

“It’s alright,” Kaveh says distantly, but he’s unable to say anything more before she leans down, studying the bracelet in its pristine box. 

“Woooow,” she gasps softly. “How beautiful! Grand Sage, is this a wed—”

“No,” Alhaitham says with sudden force, stopping both Hajanad and Kaveh in their tracks. His eyes snap from Hajanad to Kaveh before he’s back to hiding behind his grey swoop of hair, his face sinking right back into impassivity, like nothing happened at all. “It’s just… something I saw on the street.”

“...Oh,” Hajanad laughs nervously after a silence lengthy enough to be awkward. “Well. It’s beautiful. Wow. It suits you, Mr. Kaveh.”

“Thank you,” Alhaitham and Kaveh say at the same time, and Kaveh blinks, not sure why he felt compelled to say it in the first place. It seems like Hajanad wants to make a hasty getaway, because she lets out an awkward little farewell before scurrying away to rejoin her girlfriend near one of the trinket stands. 

“Thank you,” Kaveh repeats weakly, unsure whether to stare at the red pendant on the bracelet or up into Alhaitham’s steady gaze; neither feels like a particularly safe choice right now. And then, just because he doesn’t know how to act any other way when it comes to Alhaitham, “I didn’t know you would have such an eye for aesthetics, with the way you treat the house. Or was it just a lucky guess?”

“Lucky guess,” Alhaitham answers, unreadable as always. Kaveh will tear every last hair from his scalp at the very roots if it’ll get him to stop feeling like this. 

.

And so, life goes on as it usually does, except for the Earth practically spinning upside down and in the opposite direction. Kaveh is in love with Alhaitham. It’s groundbreaking; it’s shifted everything Kaveh’s ever knew, as if the sky was fake or the earth was flat. 

And the whole… living together… it’s of no help, not even in the slightest. Alhaitham keeps on picking him up from his client meetings to go grocery shopping, or leaving an extra mug of coffee out in the mornings when he makes a blend he knows Kaveh likes, or making Kaveh storm into the Grand Sage’s office for his keys so often, his secretaries have just left a chair next to Alhaitham’s desk for him. Kaveh doesn’t know what it all means, can’t even process it when Alhaitham is in his orbit all of the time, with those eyes and that voice and that terrifying tendency to remember everything Kaveh says. 

He’s had enough. He needs to move out. If not for the sake of how painfully obvious he’s sure his changes in behavior are, then because the threat that living with Alhaitham imposes on his sanity has only increased tenfold after his series of earth-shattering realizations.

Under the guise of another client meeting, he practically tiptoes out of the house and flies down the street to the House of Daena, following the signs and people’s bewildered directions as he skulks like a criminal towards the Office of Municipal Affairs. The girl manning the counter inside can’t be older than twenty, and she looks up from whatever she’s doodling on a random piece of parchment to smile brightly at him as he approaches. 

“Hello! How can I help you?” she asks eagerly, and he leans over the counter, pressing one hand to the wood as he pants. Loudly.

“Hi,” he says, as cordially as possible considering how crazy he must look right now, all sweaty and out of breath with his hair completely askew. “I just wanted to ask about, um. My taxes.” The girl nods politely, more patient than he probably deserves. 

Kaveh takes a deep gulp of air. “My, um, the person I live with—he told me he filed us together, and I just—apparently there’s some sort of law? Where I can’t move out if he does that? Or maybe it’s because my name is also on the deed for the house we live in, I’m not sure what the exact law is, because I tried to find a copy of the city code but I just—well, there’s this big overhaul thing happening, and it wasn’t available. So.” He swallows, inhaling sharply. “Sorry.”

The desk girl, to her credit, tries to understand as best she can. “Oh,” she says, her brow furrowing like this is the first she’s heard of such a law, and her mouth lifts into a well-meaning but clearly nervous smile. “Um. I’m not sure, since I’ve never heard of a situation like that before. Why don’t I go find your taxation documents and your house deed? So we can figure it out together!” He nods thankfully, giving her their address, before she disappears into the back, presumably to look through their aisles of dusty shelves.

She returns after a few minutes with an armful of scrolls, looking even more confused than when she left. She places them down gingerly on the counter before spreading them out before him. “Kaveh, right? I’m so sorry for not recognizing you! I realized it when I saw Grand Sage Alhaitham’s name on the deed alongside yours…” She rolls open one of the parchments, revealing—as Kaveh expected—the deed of the house, dated back to and unchanged from eight years ago, when the Akademiya had bequeathed it to them as equal owners of the property. Alhaitham and Kaveh. The next is a taxation form dated to a few months ago in Alaitham’s handwriting, angular and dark, each stroke as sure of itself as the last. He’s listed Kaveh as a joint filer, along with an estimated sum of his earnings from the past year (that he undershot, apparently, and Kaveh will take that up with him as soon as he’s home). Apparently being the Acting Grand Sage has its perks, because the document has a stamp of approval from the Office of Municipal Affairs despite the error. 

Kaveh glances back up at the girl—Sanjna, her deskplate clarifies. “So is it the deed that’s stopping me from moving out? Or the taxes? Or… what do I need to change?”

“Um…” Sanjna looks extraordinarily hesitant all of a sudden, her eyes flickering every which way, and Kaveh can’t exactly discern what was so complicated about his question. “Well, you’ll have to go to the civil court first, beforehand. To, you know, split up the assets.”

Kaveh blinks dumbly. “Split up what assets?”

Sanjna just stares back, like Kaveh’s the idiot in this situation. “Your shared assets,” she clarifies slowly. “And you’d either have to clarify why you and Grand Sage Alhaitham want to live apart after marriage, or divorce, if that’s the path that the two of you have decided on…”

Kaveh’s eyes practically bug out of his head. Marriage? Divorce? What does she mean, divorce? “Oh, no, no, no,” he laughs, waving his arms wildly as he flushes deeply. “Alhaitham and I aren’t married. We’re just roommates. Roommates. Unwilling ones, might I add! We… No. Yeah. He wouldn’t… We wouldn’t… anyways. We’re not married.” He trails off, his voice small and unsure.

Then, like something out of a dramatic novel, time seems to slow and the tepid strings begin to play. Sanjna gazes intently at him with a furrowed brow, her gaze some mix of confusion and… pity? “I’m so sorry,” she breathes, her expression one of dawning horror. “You don’t… He didn’t tell you?”

“Didn’t tell me what?” Kaveh feels nearly hysterical at this point, like the room is going to start spinning before he passes out and wakes up in the Sanctuary of Surasthana with thirty ley lines poking out his head, simulating what has to be his ultimate nightmare. 

Sanjna bites her lip nervously as she hands him a piece of parchment with nervous hands. “Four months ago, Grand Sage Alhaitham signed into effect your common law marriage,” she says gently, like Kaveh’s going to shatter into pieces over the newfound information; which, honestly, he just might. “The new Sumeru City code clarifies that any pair that lives together, files taxes together, and presents as a couple can apply for a common law marriage. Grand Sage Alhaitham was approved as quickly as possible. He asked for the case to be expedited, you see.” Kaveh’s shaky hands scrabble clumsily with the edges of the parchment before pulling it open.

It’s a marriage certificate. A marriage certificate, filled out in Alhaitham’s achingly familiar script: Alhaitham on one line, Kaveh on the other. Alhaitham’s signature, and the signature of a witness attesting to their relationship: General Mahamatra Cyno. That fucking traitor. That two-faced, cruel, inconsiderate—

“Bastard,” Kaveh breathes, his voice wobbly. Absolute fucking bastard.

He only realizes he’s crushed the edges of the parchment in his hands, effectively wrinkling the entire scroll, when Sanjna makes a nervous sound. “Um… Mister Kaveh,” she says gingerly like she’s trying to coax a lion, “You can… take that one. The civil court has copies.”

“I will,” he croaks. “Thank you.” And then, as if in a daze, he slowly rolls it up and tucks it under his arm, vacating the office with the gait of a zombie.

He’s married. Alhaitham is married to him. The whole reason he couldn’t move out, the whole reason Alhaitham filed their taxes jointly in the first place; for a sham of a marriage that didn’t really exist. Alhaitham had lowballed his yearly income on the taxation document; maybe it was for some sort of tax break? Maybe it was for some other married benefit offered by the Office of Municipal Affairs, or maybe it was truly, truly just for the efficiency Alhaitham prides himself in so dearly. Regardless, Kaveh is married and didn’t even know it, on account of some cruel, heartless scheme by the one man Kaveh knows will never, ever actually love him. It feels like salt in a wound, or the twist of a knife. All these years, all this hurt, and this is the first time since that disastrous Akademiya project where Kaveh has felt well and truly betrayed by Alhaitham, like he forced his fingers into Kaveh’s stitching just to pull them open and rend him apart, wrecked and bleeding.

Before he realizes it, his feet take him home—home, is it really? He hesitates at that dark green door for more than a few minutes, unable to tear his eyes from the familiar notches in the wood. What does he say? What string of words could he possibly look into Alhaitham’s eyes and express that could even encapsulate the feeling in his chest right now? He thinks he’s going to be sick.

After he struggles with the key and enters, Alhaitham is sitting on the divan, legs crossed leisurely as he peruses a small book. He looks up when Kaveh stumbles in like a corpse pulled along by a string, practically catatonic, the door slamming shut behind him.

“You look like death,” Alhaitham remarks mildly, his book remaining open in front of his face, completely unbothered. “Did your client meeting involve an unforeseen leap into poisonous mushrooms? Or are your ill-advised nights of all work and no sleep finally catching up to you?” 

Kaveh stills in the doorway, staring at Alhaitham blankly. 

Then, unable to help it, he bursts into tears.

He distantly processes Alhaitham quickly snapping his book shut and standing, crossing the room in just a few strides. “Kaveh,” he says, soft and bewildered, “What…” His free arm raises slowly, as if to touch Kaveh, but Kaveh just shoves him backwards with an unexpected force that makes him stumble.

“You bastard,” Kaveh spits, his voice a broken thing that forces its way out of his throat, the tears marring his vision and making him choke on each breath. “Alhaitham, you fucking bastard. How dare you. How dare you, you absolute—” 

Alhaitham stands, his hands hovering halfway in midair, lost and unsure. “Kaveh,” he says, low and even. “You should sit down. Are you—” But he stumbles back again as Kaveh shoves the scroll into his chest, clutching it to him before lifting it and unfurling it slowly.

Kaveh’s vision might be blurry, but he sees enough to watch Alhaitham’s stone expression shift from surprise to abject guilt within seconds. “You bastard,” he repeats, wet and out of breath, so quiet it’s barely audible. “You married me. And you never told me.”

Alhaitham looks up at him, his chin dipped, hair almost covering his eyes; as if he were trying to make himself smaller, something he never did. “Kaveh,” he says, quiet and low but with just the smallest hint of desperation. “I was going to. I—”

“No,” Kaveh interrupts, his voice cracking as he steps forward unsteadily. “No, you weren’t. All that bullshit about filing us together and, and the deed, it was all for this, wasn’t it?” He jabs his finger through the parchment and into Alhaitham’s chest. “For what, some ridiculous convenience? Marital tax rates, maybe? No, our living situation just isn’t enough for you; go ahead and throw in my marriage as another unwitting tool to make your life easier, huh?”

“Kaveh,” Alhaitham repeats, caught out, but he’s not finished.

“No,” he repeats, stronger. Alhaitham doesn't get to weasel his way out of this one. “No. You didn’t think that I’d… I’d ever want to get married for real? Huh? What would happen then? I may be unrealistic, and I may struggle, I might be broke and gullible and a drunkard, but even I have a chance at—at romance, and passion, and love, and a soulmate. Even I want those things. You bastard.” Kaveh lets out a breathless sob before inhaling sharply, looking up towards the ceiling, as if Celestia could strike him down now before he says anything else and ruins his life even more than it already is.

“But I… my ideals are just some joke to you,” he whispers finally, his tears finally running dry as he wipes at his face with the back of his sleeve. “Always have been, always will be. And now I…” he hiccups wetly. He's married, with no ring and no ceremony, to some cruel asshole who will never feel the same way he does. He can’t get the words out around the lump in his throat, but he tries his best before Alhaitham opens his mouth again.

“Kaveh,” Alhaitham rasps in a way that makes time go still, using a voice Kaveh doesn’t think he’s ever heard Alhaitham utter a single word in. The syllables of Kaveh’s name leave his lips like they’re torn from him, hoarse and brittle and desperate in a way oh-so-secure Grand Scribe Alhaitham never is. Kaveh raises his head, murky vermillion clashing with iridescent green, and Alhaitham’s hand doesn’t pass quick enough over his face for Kaveh not to see the inexplicable tremble of his lower lip, the spark in his eyes reminiscent of that of a creature caught in a trap. 

“What,” Kaveh says, his voice wobbly but otherwise carefully blank. 

Alhaitham exhales unsteadily into his hand. “I didn’t—” He inhales, just as shaky. “You always think the worst of me, don’t you, senior?”

Despite himself, Kaveh can practically feel a vein pop in his forehead as he falls into his same old baseline irritation with Alhaitham’s stupid little comments. “Are you serious?” he scoffs, his voice still wet and clogged. “Marrying me without my knowledge or consent is quite possibly the worst—”

“I didn’t do it for convenience,” Alhaitham interjects in that new, raspy timbre of his, still unable to meet Kaveh’s eyes. “Obviously. I disregard your rent and I pay for our necessities, so any markdown in taxes I would earn by being married to you is either equalized or overtaken by that expense.”

Kaveh sniffles before wiping at his cheek harshly. “So why do it,” he mumbles, his voice wavering. “To humiliate me?”

Alhaitham lets out a ragged noise from the back of his throat as he tilts his head, his brows slanting desperately. “You’re a smart man, senior,” he whispers. Cajoling. 

“Why would I marry you? Why would I file our taxes together the moment you told me you’d leave? Why would I buy your useless seasonal ingredients from the market and cover your drinks and carry you on my back when you can no longer find your way home? Why would I ask you to live under my roof when you… when you know how much your junior loves his space?” Alhaitham swallows heavily. “It’s always the same answer, Kaveh.”

It doesn’t make any sense. It shouldn’t. And yet the only answer left is the most impossible one, the one Kaveh never allowed himself for a moment to think was even a possibility. But just like always, Alhaitham gives him no time to deliberate for himself before butting in.

“I… have loved you,” Alhaitham admits, hoarser than Kaveh has ever heard him, “since the day you first came to me, in the House of Daena. I loved you even deeper the day you left, and I have spent every waking minute,” he rasps as his voice falls weaker, “...ensuring that whenever you come ashore again, I am the only place you can return to. I have waited and waited as you left again and again, and I wouldn’t have it again, Kaveh. I couldn’t. Despite what you seem to think, I can be driven by passion just as you can, and I…”

Kaveh can’t trust his eyes or ears or hands as Alhaitham’s breath hiccups, stuttering physically in the bob of his throat. “I love you,” Alhaitham repeats, barer than a gust of wind, more fragile than Kaveh’s thin glass vases that take up nearly half of their shared shelf space. “You wanted to leave, and I wanted you with me. That is all.”

Kaveh feels it again. The world shifting. Cogs inside out, upside down, turned right side up again. Alhaitham is carefully rolling up the parchment like nothing happened at all, like they can go back to the way they were before air was water and water was grass and Alhaitham told him he was in love with him. 

There is a marriage certificate at the civil court and a pearl bracelet on top of his dresser because Alhaitham is in love with him. There is a house with an eight-year-old deed and useless spices in the kitchen because Alhaitham waited for him all this time. 

“You may move out still, if you wish,” Alhaitham continues flatly, like his voice isn’t raw and his hands aren’t shaking. “I can annul the marriage on my own, since I was the one at fault. I understand that my unsolicited feelings may cause even more animosity between us, so I—”

“No,” Kaveh interrupts, and Alhaitham looks up at him with those eyes. Fuck, that’s really not fair, is it? “I’m not moving out,” he practically snarls. “You think I just do everything you think I should do? Clearly not, you inconsiderate asshole.” 

Alhaitham inches backward slowly like he’s face-to-face with a growling lion and is trying his best not to get mauled, but that just provokes Kaveh further. “Don’t run away from me,” he demands, and Alhaitham freezes in place like a disobedient child. “You bastard. This whole city code overhaul, that was you too, wasn’t it? You ridiculous man.” 

Kaveh stops in his tracks and then whispers, softer, “was it really so hard to just ask me?” Alhaitham’s eyes snap to his, searching, and Kaveh figures that if the lazy Grand Sage can admit to working three extra hours a day for some elaborate plan to keep him, he can lower himself just a little. “Because I would’ve said yes. And you wouldn’t have had to change the law to do it.”

A rock may as well have fallen from Celestia directly onto Alhaitham’s cranium based on the look in his eyes, and Kaveh huffs impatiently. “I love you too, you absolute moron,” he clarifies, crossing his arms. “And I’m not moving out. Against all of my better judgement. Because you’re not forgiven, either, for all these stunts you pulled—and Cyno, really? You—”

But Alhaitham just surges forward, stealing the very words from Kaveh’s mouth. His hand is warm and calloused on the side of Kaveh’s neck, gently steadying his head, and then his lips are on Kaveh’s, warm and chapped and tasting of salt and cocoa. It’s unfortunately very clear that the Grand Sage is not kissing people very often, with the way that he overshoots a little and almost bruises Kaveh’s cheek with his nose before evening out, and he’s not exactly a rhythm master, either; but Kaveh finds that he doesn’t mind as he melts against Alhaitham’s hold like warm honey, shivering in pleasure as his arms slowly wind around Alhaitham’s neck. 

There’s a distinct thunk as Alhaitham drops his book on the floor, which is something Kaveh once thought impossible of him, but then Alhaitham’s fingers dip under the low-cut fabric covering Kaveh’s spine, cradling him like something precious, and all thoughts leave Kaveh’s mind. 

Alhaitham chases Kaveh dazedly as he pulls away, and Kaveh takes pity on the poor man, giving him two more pecks. The sight that greets him is worthy of a coliseum in its honor; Alhaitham with his eyes closed, hair askew, cheeks a ruddy pink and lips parted enough to be almost comical. Alhaitham’s eyes flutter open when Kaveh giggles, and he frees one hand to poke at the newly embarrassed furrow in Alhaitham’s brow.

“You’re kind of useless, you know that?” Kaveh murmurs, his warm breath echoing off of Alhaitham’s mouth. “And you piss me off. You owe me a wedding. And a ceremony. How many people know we’re married?”

Alhaitham pouts slightly, and Kaveh bites his lip with the urge to kiss it away, lest the Acting Grand Sage get distracted again. “You'll get your ceremony, don't worry," he grumbles, sheepish. "As for who knows, Cyno, obviously. But he just found out last week. I didn’t tell him what the document was when he signed as the witness.” Alhaitham won’t make eye contact with him. Cute, Kaveh nearly croons. “Cyno told Tighnari yesterday. Tighnari told Collei, and now most of the forest watchers know. Most people in the Grand Sage’s office know. Most of the bastards in Haravatat know, since I brought it up during my guest lecture. Lord Kusanali knows.”

Kaveh, appalled, smacks Alhaitham’s chest. “Our archon knows about your schemes of entrapment? And you’re still Grand Sage? Sumeru cannot be so hopeless.”

Alhaitham shrugs wryly. “She allowed it. I believe she was simply… amused that I would go to such lengths, is all.” Kaveh snorts. 

“Even Lord Kusanali knows what a lazy bastard you are. Won’t even stay a minute past your mandatory hours, will you?”

“I just like coming home,” Alhaitham admits, boyishly honest, and Kaveh melts again, his forehead pressed to Alhaitham’s broad shoulder to hide his widening grin.

.

In the grand scheme of things, not much changes. (Kaveh figures that they did present as a couple after all; go figure.) They still bicker over groceries at the bazaar, Alhaitham standing around behind Kaveh holding their produce bags as he chats with every auntie and uncle he recognizes; they still pick fights on announcement boards at Puspa Cafe and in the Grand Sage’s office when Alhaitham steals Kaveh’s house key. The only real difference is the rings, exchanged one late afternoon in their newly shared bedroom in the house that was always theirs; Alhaitham’s in silver and Kaveh’s in gold, encrusted with rubies and diamonds because Alhaitham will indulge in frivolities if it’s for Kaveh’s sake. Well, there are other differences too, the kissing and the… other stuff, but none of it compares to the days that go by where Kaveh increasingly realizes that Alhaitham’s carefully structured life has always, always been made to include him, right by Alhaitham’s side.

Alhaitham’s last deed as Acting Grand Sage is approving a monumentally inconvenient reservation request for the very first wedding hosted in the House of Daena, for the union of one newly ordinary Scribe to the radiant Light of Kshahrewar. Kaveh supposes there’s some romance in Alhaitham’s heart after all.

.