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The Traveler had been in Fontaine for less than a day when a familiar voice carried over the crowd ahead.
"Now, now. Surely we can settle this without making a scene."
Lumine stopped. She knew that voice before Beaumont Workshop came fully into view.
Childe stood between Estelle and four members of the Confrérie of Cabrière. Estelle remained behind her worktable, her jaw tight. Truand, the group's leader, faced Childe while three henchmen closed in from either side. The men had him surrounded. Judging by his expression, Childe believed this arrangement favored him. He rested one hand near the Hydro Vision at his hip. "You haven’t forgotten what you owe the Northland Bank, have you?"
Truand’s face darkened. "The deadline isn’t until next month.
"So is hers." Childe smiled. "Interesting how deadlines matter only when the debt is owed to you."
One of the henchmen stepped closer. Childe’s smile sharpened with anticipation.
Lumine’s hand moved toward her sword. Paimon made a startled noise behind Lumine.
Childe glanced toward the edge of the street, his gaze finding hers.
The easy amusement vanished from his face. Not completely, but enough for Lumine to see the moment recognition struck and everything around him became unimportant. "Lumine?"
Her name sounded different without paper between them. For months, Childe had existed in ink. His voice had arrived folded between pages from Snezhnaya, carried through camps, cities, and long roads. Sometimes his letters had made her laugh where no one else understood the joke. Sometimes one line followed her for days.
Now he was here in person, sunlight catching in his hair, wearing the same infuriating confidence she remembered.
Paimon floated up beside Lumine and folded her arms. "Paimon is starting to think we can’t enter a new nation without finding Childe causing trouble."
"I’m only here to collect a debt," Childe said.
"By starting another fight."
"Only if they insist. It would be rude to disappoint them."
Truand cleared his throat loudly. Childe did not look away from Lumine. "Give me a moment. An old friend has just arrived."
Old friend
The words were ordinary enough. Even so, Lumine found herself holding on to them. She stepped closer and noticed the ribbon when he lifted a hand in greeting. Violet showed beneath his glove. The braid she had given him in Ritou had faded, the sakura bead bore a thin scratch, and one section had been repaired with thread that did not quite match.
He had mended it.
His eyes dropped at the same moment. The blue-glass charm still hung from her travel pouch. It had acquired a scratch of its own during Sumeru, but it caught Fontaine’s light as brightly as it had in Ritou. Childe’s expression softened. Lumine touched the charm without thinking. Neither spoke. Somehow, the greeting had already happened.
Then Truand seized Childe by the shoulder.
What followed was brief, loud, and deeply embarrassing for the Confrérie of Cabrière. Childe sent two men sprawling. Paimon offered commentary no one had requested. Estelle retreated behind her worktable with the air of someone determined to keep armed men away from expensive machinery. Childe ducked a punch and turned. Hydro gathered in his hand, then vanished. The blades dissolved before they fully formed. His Vision flickered and went dull. Childe froze, and Truand mistook his surprise for weakness and lunged.
Lumine moved first. Her sword stopped a breath from his throat. "That is enough."
Childe laughed from somewhere behind her.. "Stealing my fights now, comrade?"
"You were taking too long."
"I was making it entertaining."
Once Truand and his companions had been driven off, the three of them stepped outside the workshop. Childe leaned against a railing, and Lumine stopped in front of him. "Your Vision."
"Hello to you too."
"We already said hello."
"Did we?" His eyes flicked toward her charm. "I must have missed it."
Lumine only squinted at him.
His mouth curved. Months of letters stood between them, except they no longer felt like distance. They felt like a bridge neither had acknowledged building.
Paimon planted both hands on her hips. "The Vision?"
Childe looked down at the dark glass. "It has been... temperamental lately."
"Visions are not supposed to be temperamental," Lumine said.
"Maybe mine has spent too much time with me." She waited.
His smile thinned. Jokes rarely rescued him when Lumine refused to be distracted. "It's not only the Vision," he admitted. He told them about the restlessness that had followed him to Fontaine, the unease beneath his skin. Something old stirring where he could not reach it.
Then he told them about the Abyss. About being fourteen, falling somewhere no child should have survived. Three months beneath a foreign sky while only three days passed above. About Skirk, who taught him to fight because fighting was the only language that place respected. Lumine listened. She had known pieces of him.
Tartaglia, the Harbinger.
Childe, the adversary who kept turning up beside her.
Ajax, the loving brother who filled his letters with stories of Teucer, Tonia, Anthon, and the rest of his family.
The boy who crawled out of the Abyss was another piece, sharp-edged and carefully hidden. When he finished, Childe looked toward Fontaine’s rooftops. "Anyway. That’s enough gloomy conversation for one afternoon."
"You cannot tell us you fell into the Abyss at fourteen and then say 'anyway,'" Lumine said.
"Paimon agrees. That is not how conversations work."
"Then we need a better conversation." He pushed away from the railing. "How much of Fontaine have you seen?"
"We only just arrived." Lumine answered
"Perfect."
"For what?"
"For discovering whether Fontaine deserves its reputation. The nation of justice, art, fashion, and manners should be experienced properly. You need an experienced guide."
Paimon looked doubtful. "Uh-huh."
Childe almost looked offended. "Have some faith in me, Paimon." Childe glanced toward the passing crowds. "Let’s make this interesting. We’ll pretend to be proper Fontainian nobles for the afternoon."
Lumine looked at him. "Why would we?"
"Come on, comrade. Have some fun with me." His smile sharpened into a challenge. "Unless Lady Lumine is worried she can’t keep up?"
Paimon's eyes moved between them with dangerous interest.
Lumine lifted her chin. "Lady Lumine doubts Monsieur Ajax knows what a proper afternoon looks like."
"Then Monsieur Ajax will have to prove himself."
Paimon pointed at herself. “And what about Paimon?”
He considered her. Paimon narrowed her eyes. "Our highly distinguished chaperone."
"Paimon doesn't know whether that was a compliment."
"It was extremely Fontainian."
Lumine stepped past him toward the Court. "Try to keep up, Monsieur Ajax."
His delighted laugh followed her.
Childe's first act as a proper Fontainian gentleman was to lead them into the wrong street.
His second was to insist the street had moved.
By the time they found the clothing shop, Paimon had begun counting how many times they had gotten lost.
"Four," she announced.
"Two," Childe corrected.
"Both of you are wrong. Five," Lumine said. "Also, you walked past this shop multiple times."
Childe pressed a hand to his heart. "And here I thought Lady Lumine would protect my reputation."
They agreed to choose clothes for one another because Childe declared trust fundamental to civilized society and Lumine accused him of fearing her taste. He selected a pale dress with fitted sleeves, a short blue jacket, and gold details. It was elegant without restricting movement.|
"You chose something practical," Lumine said.
"I've seen you fight across nations. I know better than to put you in anything you cannot draw a sword in."
She retaliated with a dark navy coat, silver embroidery, a formal vest, and a cravat suspiciously close to the color of his eyes.
"Very restrained," he said.
Paimon chose an enormous hat with a feather almost as long as she was tall. The shopkeeper refused to sell it after she knocked over a display while turning around.
When Lumine emerged from behind the changing screen, Childe was already dressed.
She stopped.
The coat made him look less like a Harbinger and more like someone who belonged beneath chandeliers, smiling through conversations where everyone knew he was dangerous and invited him anyway. He was adjusting one glove.
Childe looked up. Whatever he meant to say disappeared. His gaze moved over her slowly, respectful but unmistakably appreciative.
Paimon floated between them. "Well? Does she look like a Fontainian lady?"
His eyes returned to Lumine. "She looks like Lumine."
The answer should not have affected her as much as it did. Lumine busied herself with one of her cuffs, suddenly unwilling to meet his eyes. Then she stepped closer and straightened his cravat, though it did not need straightening. "And he almost looks respectable."
"Almost?"
"The expression ruins it."
"Come on, I just look pleased. Why wouldn’t I? I am standing beside a beautiful lady who chose my clothes."
Her fingers stopped against the knot.
His smile turned victorious.
Lumine tightened it enough to make him cough.
Paimon groaned. "This is going to be a very long afternoon."
They boarded the Aquabus with Paimon seated between them. Childe pretended to listen to the Melusine guide while studying the machinery beneath the track.
"You are not listening, Monsieur Ajax," Lumine said.
"I'm listening."
"What did she say?"
"Something historically significant."
"About?"
"Fontaine."
The guide glanced back at him. Paimon covered her face, overcome by secondhand embarrassment at the terrible excuse. Lumine laughed.
Childe turned toward her and simply looked. Letters could carry words across nations. They could make Snezhnayan snow exist beneath Sumeru’s heat and turn a lonely camp into somewhere another person’s voice almost reached. They could not reproduce the way her eyes narrowed before she laughed, or the quick changes in her expression that ink left him to imagine.
Her laughter faded when she noticed his expression. "What?"
"Nothing, my lady."
"That looked like something."
"Dangerously observant."
Paimon leaned around them. "Paimon is also observant."
They turned to her together.
"No," they said together, smiling teasingly
Paimon gasped. "You two are impossible."
A bell chimed as the Aquabus eased to a stop beside the station. Childe stepped onto the platform first, then turned and offered one hand to Paimon and his other arm to Lumine.
Paimon blinked. "What’s this?"
"Fontainian etiquette," he explained.
"You invented that," Lumine accused.
"Can you prove it?"
Paimon took his hand despite being perfectly capable of floating onto the platform. Lumine took his arm before either of them could argue further. Childe's teasing faltered for half a heartbeat. Then they continued walking. Neither mentioned that Lumine did not release him when the crowd thinned.
They stopped at Café Lutece, where Paimon ordered enough food for a banquet and informed Childe that a gentleman traditionally paid for his chaperone.
"Is that true?" he asked.
"Extremely Fontainian," Lumine said.
Paimon grinned. Childe paused, realizing Lumine had just used his own invented rules against him.
Their performance grew elaborate. Monsieur Ajax opened doors with extravagant bows. Lady Lumine thanked him so solemnly that passing Fontainians assumed they were serious. Whenever Paimon complained, they addressed Paimon as Lady Paimon until she became suspicious that they were actually teasing her.
In a bookshop, Childe selected a mystery by its dramatic cover. Lumine opened to the final page and threatened to reveal the culprit.
He caught her wrist. "Dishonorable."
"You challenged me."
"To judge the book, not destroy it."
"Are you conceding?"
"Never." His hand remained around her wrist.
Lumine looked down. He released her, more slowly than necessary.
Paimon watched over a stack of detective stories. "Paimon is beginning to think neither of you knows how normal friends spend an afternoon."
"We are conducting a cultural study," Childe said.
"Of course," Paimon said, rolling her eyes. "Paimon is already regretting agreeing to this tour."
Near the Court's edge, the avenues opened toward the sea. They settled beside the water, where the view stretched past the pale stone railings to the blue horizon. Sunlight scattered across the surface.
Childe rested his arms on the railing. The Vision at his hip flickered. Lumine saw it and so did he.
For a moment, Childe stared at the darkened glass. His hand flexed once at his side. Before Lumine could say anything about the flickering Vision, he looked at Paimon. "You still carry that Kamera everywhere, don't you?"
Paimon blinked at the change of subject. "Of course! Why?"
"We went to all the trouble of looking respectable. We should have proof."
Paimon brightened immediately and pulled the Kamera from her bag.
Their first picture included all three of them. A passing Fontainian agreed to take it, catching Paimon in mid-wave, Lumine smiling beside her, and Childe leaning into the frame at the last moment.
For the next photograph, Paimon took command. "Stand properly," she instructed. "You're supposed to be the honorable Lady Lumine and Monsieur Ajax." Childe offered Lumine his arm with exaggerated dignity. Lumine rested her hand upon it, both of them facing the Kamera with expressions so solemn they might have been posing for an official portrait. The shutter clicked. "Too stiff," Paimon declared.
"That was extremely respectable," Childe protested.
For the second pose, Childe leaned closer just as Paimon pressed the shutter.
Lumine turned to glare at him.
The Kamera captured his grin and her narrowed eyes.
For the third, Lumine retaliated by catching hold of his cravat and drawing him closer. Then she faced the Kamera with perfect sweetness. For one startled heartbeat, the look caught Childe completely off guard. The shutter clicked, capturing Lumine’s innocent expression and Childe staring at her instead of the lens.
Before she could release his cravat, Childe leaned close enough to murmur, "You know, most people would consider that attempted murder."
Lumine laughed. "Most people wouldn’t lean closer."
"Maybe I was giving my attacker a chance to reconsider."
Paimon lifted the Kamera. "One more! What pose should you..."
Neither of them listened.
"Try looking threatened," Lumine told him.
"I would, but you keep laughing."
Lumine laughed a little bit harder "Hey, You're laughing too!"
He was.
The shutter clicked again. The last picture caught them laughing as they looked at each other, both of them having forgotten the Kamera entirely.
Childe looked down at the last photograph for a quiet moment. "Can I keep this one?"
Paimon grinned. "Paimon was going to give it to you anyway."
Music was already playing when they crossed the next plaza. A violinist and an accordion player had gathered a small audience, and several couples were turning beneath the lamps.
Childe noticed the look Lumine gave them. "That looks very Fontainian," he said.
"That sounds like a challenge."
"It was an invitation, Lady Lumine."
He offered his hand. Lumine looked from it to the couples turning beneath the lamps. "I don’t dance."
"That sounds like hesitation, Lady Lumine."
Paimon floated closer. "Go on! You can’t spend the whole afternoon pretending to be Fontainian nobles and skip the dancing part."
Lumine continued to study his hand.
"And Paimon will judge which of you does it better!"
That earned Paimon a look. Then Lumine finally placed her hand in his. Paimon rummaged through her bag and emerged wearing round spectacles and a false mustache.
Childe stared. "What is that?"
"A judge must look distinguished."
"You look like a detective," Lumine said.
"Paimon looks authoritative!" She adjusted the mustache.
"All right, all right," Childe said.
"There is no winning a dance," Lumine said.
"That sounds like something the losing side would say," Childe replied.
Lumine’s eyes narrowed. "Lead, then."
His smile flashed. "Gladly."
The dance was brief and far from flawless. Childe knew how to move, but Lumine refused to let him control every turn. Her hand rested in his, his other hand settled at her waist, and twice she deliberately changed the rhythm to catch him off guard. He adjusted both times without missing a step.
"Trying to make me stumble?" He raised his eyebrows.
"Is it working?"
"Not yet."
When the musicians reached the final note, Childe guided her through one last turn and released her hand.
Paimon pushed the spectacles higher on her nose. "Paimon has reached a verdict."
Childe folded his arms. "Well?"
"Neither of you wins."
Lumine blinked. "Why not?"
"Because you spent the whole dance trying to defeat each other." After a moment, Paimon pulled off the spectacles. "Can we stop fooling around now and get a snack?"
Lumine spotted a pastry stall across the plaza. Childe followed her gaze.
"Last one there buys," he said.
They moved at the same time.
"Hey! You two are unfair!" Paimon tore off the mustache and raced after them.
Evening found them on an upper terrace at Hotel Debord. Fontaine shone beneath them. Waterways carried lamplight between pale buildings like flowing gold. Somewhere below, a restaurant hummed with conversation and the soft clink of glassware.
Paimon sat with the last of her dessert while Childe leaned against the terrace railing.
"Well?" Childe asked. "Did Lady Lumine enjoy her afternoon?"
"It was... acceptable."
"Acceptable?"
"You invented half the rules."
"And you followed every one."
Paimon swallowed a bite of cake. "Of course she did. Didn't you see her smiling all throughout the aquabus ride, the library, and basically everywhere we went?"
Childe looked unbearably smug.
"Whose side are you on?" Lumine protested.
"Paimon is on the side of truth!"
"Then the evidence is conclusive," Childe chimed in.
"It proves nothing," Lumine said.
"It proves you had fun with me."
Lumine turned toward the city before her expression could give her away. "Perhaps a little."
For a while, none of them spoke. The silence was comfortable in a way letters never managed to be. Paper always demanded words. Standing beside him did not.
"I missed this," Childe said.
Lumine turned.
He looked toward the lights below. "Trouble. Fun. Watching you pretend you enjoyed neither."
Coward, Lumine thought. She could have given him the same escape. Instead, she looked directly at him. "I missed you too."
Childe went completely still. No clever answer came. A faint warmth rose across his cheeks, visible even beneath the evening light.
Then his expression softened into something quieter than his usual smile. He looked at her as though he intended to remember exactly how she had said it. "Lumine..."
Then the Vision at his hip flickered again. The moment broke, but not the warmth in his eyes. Childe looked down. This time, he did not dismiss it immediately. He turned the Vision over in his hand, studying the dull glass while something thoughtful settled across his face. Then he seemed to reach a decision. He removed it slowly.
"What are you doing?" Paimon asked.
Childe held it toward Lumine. "Keep this for me."
"Why?"
"I have a duel tomorrow. I would rather not discover halfway through that my Vision has developed a sense of humor."
Something shifted in Lumine’s expression. Childe noticed.
"Just a friendly match," he assured her. "One of Fontaine’s Champion Duelists agreed to spar with me."
"Your idea of friendly is questionable," Lumine said.
"Then it is fortunate she shares it."
"Then don't even think about using Foul Legacy."
His expression softened. "Worried about me?"
"I'm worried about whoever has to patch you up afterward."
He tilted his head. "Then perhaps I should make sure it's you."
"That was not an offer."
"Pity. You did excellent work last time."
"Ahem." Paimon floated pointedly between them. "You know you could leave the Vision at the Northland Bank, right?"
"I could."
"Or with one of your agents." Paimon added
"Also true."
Lumine did not reach for it. "Then why me?"
His gaze settled on hers. "Because I know you'll keep it safe." The answer came without hesitation. Trust given so simply should not have felt heavier than the Vision in his hand.
Lumine reached for it.
Their fingers touched.
Once, in Ritou, that would have made both of them freeze. Now Childe turned his hand beneath hers, letting the Vision settle into her palm while his fingers closed briefly around the back of her hand.
Neither pulled away at once.
Paimon's eyes narrowed.
Lumine curled her fingers around the Vision. "How long?"
"Hm?"
"How long am I keeping it?"
"Until I come get it." His voice softened. "Just take care of it for me."
Paimon cleared her throat. "So after making Paimon chaperone whatever this was, Childe is giving Lumine his Vision so he has to see her again?"
Silence. Lumine looked at Childe, and he looked at Paimon.
"An interesting theory," Childe said.
"Is Paimon wrong?"
He considered it seriously. "I wish I'd thought of that."
Lumine pushed away from the railing. "Leave before I throw your Vision into the waters."
"You wouldn't."
The corner of her mouth betrayed her. Childe sees it, and his reaction became tender.
"Goodnight, Lady Lumine." The title no longer sounded like part of a game.
"Goodnight, Monsieur Ajax."
He stepped backward. "Don't lose it."
"I won't."
"Don't sell it."
"Go."
"Don't let Paimon eat it."
"Paimon doesn’t eat just anything, you know!" Paimon protested.
Lumine laughed and followed him as far as the stairs, his Vision secure in her care. She watched until he disappeared into Fontaine's lights.
Then she opened her hand. His Hydro Vision rested in her palm. In Ritou, they had left carrying small pieces of one another because neither knew when they would meet again.
This was different.
This was not a souvenir or something meant only to remember him by.
It was something he expected back.
Something that required another meeting.
A reason to return.
A promise disguised as safekeeping.
"He really did find a convenient excuse," Paimon said.
Lumine closed her fingers around the Vision. "Maybe."
"You're smiling."
"No, I'm not."
"You definitely are."
Lumine started walking. "Come on."
"Where are we going?"
"Anywhere you're not talking."
"Hey!"
Behind them, Fontaine’s lights shimmered across the waterways. In Lumine’s hand, the Vision remained dark, but somehow felt warm.