Chapter Text
Vodyanitsa has superfans, and it's never been a secret. Every performer in in the Korolevskiy Troupe has them, but being the Prima Soprano gives her significantly more than the others. Back when she first started gaining dedicated fans, she would write about them in her journal, tallying which came to which one of her shows. Some of them came every night, cheering her on unashamedly, while others came less often, but she still noticed them.
At first, she liked it when people wanted to meet her backstage. She ignored her colleagues warnings about creepy fans, but this only lasted a few days. Odette happened to find her journal and got concerned about how much she was writing about them. A week after she first agreed to talk to her most dedicated supporters she stopped doing it outside of specially arranged meetings and autograph signings. Now she only writes about them sometimes.
In recent times, an unkempt looking man had been appearing in the crowds of her shows more and more often. At first she didn't care, he was just another face she knew she would be seeing on most nights. But then she noticed that as he sat in his seat, he wasn't watching her perform. No, he seemed to be looking down at his lap. What in Teyvat he could possibly be doing was something she thought about often. That was until until one night, when he got a seat near the front of the stage and she saw that he was writing in a notebook.
That same night she ranted about it to Odette, and then the next day to Alyosha. His audacity sure was something. If she ever saw this man on the street she would make a scene, that's what told them. Alyosha shrugged it off, Odette advised her against it. But Vodyanitsa did not care. This man was going to get what he deserved.
But she never saw him. Not after shows, not on the street— only during her performances. When it was over, he would leave immediately, as if he wasn't supposed to be there in the first place. One time she asked Kulish to be on the lookout for him after one of her performances ended, but the man hurried off with such an urgency Kulish never had the chance to question him. It was so frustrating. Every white-haired man she saw on the street made her jump.
"Have you ever thought of going after him yourself?" Alyosha asked her one evening in the greenroom, having made himself comfortable on a couch. Today too had her mysterious fan disappeared the second her performance was over.
"And how would I do that? I'm still on stage when he's running out," Vodyanitsa stood up from her couch and began to pace the room, Tugarin following her while wagging his tail. "Ugh! How is he getting away with this! I swear, after I find him he won't have the audacity to enter this place again!"
Odette, who sat on the same couch as Vodyanitsa, spoke up. "Alyosha, why don't you chase him?"
"Yeah, Alyosha. You're a good hunter, you can definitely track this guy down!" The singer agreed, finally stopping her frantic movements around the room. Tugarin bumped into her legs.
Alyosha shrugged. "I don't get why you're so obsessed with this guy. You're making mora from his tickets, who cares what he's doing?"
Vodyanitsa threw a pillow at the hunter. "What he's doing is disrespecting my art! The tickets aren't cheap, you know that. I have a price and he's completely ignoring it!"
He caught the pillow and put it back on the couch she took it from. "Whatever you say."
Vodyanitsa was silent for a second before coming up with a, in her opinion, fitting hypothetical. "Imagine this: you have a client who paid you to hunt fifteen chimera bears, and once you're done they throw them all in a fire! Wouldn't you be insulted?"
"First, they're called chimeric horned bears. Second, why would I be? I got my mora, I can continue on with my life. Plus, those things aren't even supposed to exist, so I'd be doing Mother Nature a favor by killing fifteen of them," Alyosha stated.
Odette coughed, looking at him. Alyosha crossed his arms. "What? I said I'll do it."
Vodyanitsa surprised him with a cold kiss on the cheek. "Stay the night here, okay? We have to do some planning tomorrow. Oh, it'll be a sleepover! Right, Odette?" Tugarin joined them, licking Vodyanitsa happily.
Flustered, Alyosha pushed her away. "Yeah, yeah. Got it. Sleepover. Yay."
Vodyanitsa was clearly very excited about the idea of finally catching the man who had been tormenting her mind for weeks now. It had been affecting her singing, as Odette had pointed out just a few days prior. A few hours after her declaration, the three of them were still in the greenroom— everyone else had gone home by then. It was just them (mostly Alyosha and Vodyanitsa) brainstroming.
"I'll be at the entrance with Kulish and Tugarin will be situated at the back," Alyosha began, looking around the room. Vodyanitsa was lying down on the floor, petting Tugarin's head which was on her stomach. Odette was on a different couch now, looking at them from above. "Odette, you'll be watching him during the performance. Once you see him leave, go to Tugarin and him and I'll figure it out from there."
Odette nodded, Vodyanitsa had nothing against this plan.
"Well, if we're all on board then I'd like to get some sleep," Alyosha stood up and stretched, heading back to the couch. "I'll talk to Kulish tomorrow."
⊹₊˚‧︵‿₊୨.✦ ݁˖୧₊‿︵‧˚₊⊹
Alyosha was up early, as per usual. Early enough to see Rampana's horrified face at the sight of the two prima donnas of the theatre sleeping while he stood awake, next to them. Odette made up a white lie on the spot to calm her down, and she left.
Alyosha followed to walk Tugarin and explain to Kulish what was going to happen during one of Vodyanitsa's performances, leaving the two performers to get ready.
Singers and dancers filled the greenroom soon after. Vodyanitsa brushed her hair at one of the many vanities. "My first show is at two. Do you want to get breakfast?" She innocently asked Odette, who was powdering her face while looking in the same mirror Vodyanitsa was.
She thought for a second. About her infinitely packed schedule Vodyanitsa detested, most likely. "Hm. Sounds nice."
Vodyanista's face lit up. "Hurray! It's been so long since we've been out together. Your schedule's so packed, how do you manage all of that?"
The ballerina shrugged. "I got used to it, I guess."
"Ooh! And after that we'll go shopping. They released a new blind box series with Korolevskiy Theatre stars as little dolls! That's so adorable, I absolutely, definitely need to get mine!"
Surprised, Odette stopped powdering her face. "They did?"
"Yeah, they did a collaboration thing with the theatre. There's posters everywhere outside, didn't you see?"
She passed the powder to a performer. "No, I haven't." She reached for the coat stand next to the vanity and put on the one she wore yesterday, then handed Vodyanitsa's hers as well. "Let's go. I want to make it back in time for rehearsals." Vodyanitsa ran after her.
It was snowing outside, and by the time they reached Podvorye Restaurant a light layer of snowflakes had found a resting place on their clothes. Vodyanitsa wondered if it would ever stop snowing in Snezhnaya, but she realized that it was like asking if a dog will ever be able to walk on it's back legs. Not really.
The two sat at their table, one they'd always sit at whenever they went out— just the two of them. When Alyosha, or anyone else was joining, they'd move. Sometimes, Vodyanitsa looks at their table when she's not at the restaurant with Odette and it's occupied by other customers. It upsets her, in a way. "What are you getting?" she asked Odette. "I think I'll be getting dumplings and a beetroot salad."
Odette looked at the menu, something she had never done before. Every other time she would order the same thing; borscht, or hardboiled eggs. Or both, if she was feeling hungry. "The pancakes look good." She put the menu down and flagged the waiter.
Despite being caught off guard by her unusual order, Vodyanitsa went with it. "I've had those before, they're really good with maple syrup!"
The fae serving them must have overhead their conversation, because once they got their food he said something about it being specially made for Odette, the star ballerina of the amazing Korolevskiy Troupe! That made them both a little weary of the food in front of them… could it have been tainted with something? But Vodyanitsa wanted to see Odette eat. "Here, I'll try a piece, and if something happens to me you'll know not to eat it!" She leaned over their table and cut a piece of it, elegantly eating it with her fancy fork. When she looked up at Odette, she didn't look too amused at her joke. The expression on her face was more akin to horror, actually. "Okay, I'm sorry." Vodyanitsa backed up and began to eat her dumplings.
In the end, Odette finished most of what was on her plate. Thrilled by this, Vodyanitsa paid for both of their meals and left a generous tip.
The blind box spree also went surprisingly well; they both got their respective dolls early on and decided to put them in the greenroom once they got back. A great day so far. Vodyanitsa was giddy with excitement knowing that she'd get to yell at the man she'd been so curious about in just a few hours. On the way back to the theatre, they met Alyosha and Tugarin.
Odette nodded to him. "She looks real… jubilant," he said, looking at Vodyanitsa.
"Of course I am! Today is the day!" She twirled and slipped on the remnants of de-icing salt from earlier that morning, crashing into Odette.
"Calm down a little, we don't even know if he's coming today," Alyosha reminded her, though it didn't bring Vodyanitsa's hopes down in any way. "I spoke to Kulish, I'll be at the door and ready to chase him."
"Very well, we have to get going," Odette mumbled.
"Oh, right. We do have to get going," Vodyanitsa repeated, remembering what her friend had told her earlier about rehearsals. Alyosha nodded and resumed patroling the area for any dirty white-haired looking men.
The time went by excruciatingly slow until Vodyanitsa's first show. She had absolutely nothing to do other than write in her journal, but she couldn't do that too comfortably because her colleagues would constantly walk in and out of every room she tried to hide in. It might have been a busy day for them, but her mind was most definitely busier. And she couldn't talk to anyone about it, either. Based on Odette and Alyosha's reactions, she thought others would think she's way too excited and invested in this. But it did eventually pass, and after some powdering and brushing and perfuming, she was ready for the stage.
Her heart beat faster than it ever did for any performance as she walked on stage. She was smiling like a madman against her will and she was well aware of it. She forced herself to think about kittens with no mothers so her smile would fade— just in time for the curtains to be pulled back and for her show to begin.
She was calm for a few seconds. That was before her eyes adjusted to the lights shining down on her and she spotted her victim in the crowd. As usual, he wasn't looking at her. It infuriated her, but that only provided her with more adrenaline. At some point during the performance Vodyanitsa had to close her eyes and think about what she was actually doing instead of fantasizing about the aftershow. She did manage to calm down, and the performance went smoothly. She had successfully ignored the crowd up until the end, and once the curtains were back in place she rushed off of the stage to meet Odette in the greenroom.
Before Vodyanitsa could say anything, Odette nodded and smiled. Out of pure enthusiasm, she hugged her and almost forgot her coat when she rushed outside to meet Kulish.
"Which direction did they go?" She asked, clearly unable to contain her excitement about this.
"On the bridge, to the right. But I must advise you not to run, Miss Vodyanitsa, for it's colder than usual now. No one would want for you to hurt your voice."
"No, no, I'll be fine! Bye, Kulish!"
Vodyanitsa ran off.