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1
You know him from the first moment, even as he is a stranger.
The Knights of Favonius have been short a skilled alchemist for some time. Though they have members capable of basic transmutations, no one among their ranks can be called an expert at the art.
Alice is the one to recommend someone to fill the gap. She introduces him as the student of a friend, someone with the knowledge and expertise they require.
Knowing the sort of company Alice keeps, only a fool wouldn’t have jumped at the chance to recruit a student of one of her associates.
Him getting the job is essentially guaranteed by the strength of that recommendation alone, but still, the formalities must be observed and Jean calls him in for a job interview.
You sit in on it. If asked, you would chalk it up to your curious nature. Most others would chalk it up to you being a nosy ass. Jean would chalk it up to you being her spymaster.
Multiple things can be true at the same time.
Jean sits behind her desk, pose and expression professional. You slouch against a wall with a lazy smirk. A knock sounds, and the door is opened.
His eyes, for all the color is unusual, declare nothing of him to the world. This is something you verify later, when the opportunity arises to make prolonged eye contact, but the brief glances you’re able to steal during the interview are enough for you to suspect he is not quite like you.
No, you and he are not the same, but there are things you hold in common regardless.
His eyes are not the first thing you note upon him entering the room. The only reason you bother to look at them at all is because of what is.
The first thing about Albedo that you see is the star upon his breast, rendered in gold and used as adornment upon his sash. Your eyes flicker, then, to the stars upon his shirt, his gloves, his coat.
His throat.
From head to toe, he is utterly covered in symbols of Khaenri’ah. It does not feel like hyperbole to say that your heart skips a beat. Multiple beats, even.
It takes some effort not to immediately reach for your sword, but Alice is the one who brought him here. Her reputation is too powerful for you to attack a ward of hers for his fashion choices alone.
Perhaps a greater influence on your decision to wait before taking action: if you attack him for the stars he bears, you will be asked how you know what they mean. You will be asked about the ones that adorn your own clothing.
You have not seen Diluc since that awful day, years ago. His vision lies abandoned upon your nightstand. He missed his own father’s funeral on the strength of how much he did not wish to see you there.
For such a strong reaction, he could at least have had the courtesy to kill you properly, rather than leave you alone with the consequences of your actions. His vision is the only reason you even know him to be alive.
Sometimes it flickers at night, and you stay awake watching it, waiting for it to go out. You wonder what he’s killing himself for, out there.
——
2
The new Chief Alchemist is an odd man.
He wears the symbol of Khaenri’ah, but his pupils are round. You wonder if perhaps he was adopted, in some strange inversion of your own origins.
He clearly recognizes the significance of the stars he wears, because his eyes linger on the ones that adorn your own clothing and you sometimes catch him watching you the same way you watch him.
Neither of you comment on it.
He’s often in headquarters at odd hours, long past the time everyone else has gone to sleep, but never seems tired at meetings, even when they’re early enough that everyone else is struggling not to nod off.
He handles Klee like he’s never met a child before, when you encounter him off-duty. Alice corrects him each time, and you’ve yet to catch him repeating a mistake, but that only further serves to indicate that this isn’t a case of him simply being poor with children - rather, he seems to entirely lack even the slightest amount of prior experience with them.
Even things you’d expect him to know from, presumably, having once been one himself.
He introduces himself as an expert in the art of khemia without a hint of fear. It’s a bold move, and one that relies upon no one in Mondstadt knowing enough about Khaenri’ah to find it suspicious. The first time he spoke of his craft in Lisa’s hearing, a contemplative look crossed her face. You saw her, later, looking through old references, likely trying to verify where she’d heard the term before.
You would offer something to point her in the right direction, the way you usually do when you catch a co-worker investigating something you have prior knowledge about, but on this topic…
No, better to stay silent. You don’t have plausible excuses for the things you know, and you aren’t willing to bluff your way through dodging suspicion without them.
Jean likes to say that honesty is the best policy. Personally, you’ve never gotten the appeal.
What’s the saying, again…? “Once burned, twice shy”?
Diluc’s vision flickers on your nightstand. You’d say it’s his way of laughing, but he never had much in the way of a sense of humor.
——
3
Albedo’s skin is strangely cold, the first time you brush against him by chance in a hallway. It prompts you to make a habit of touching him, fleeting moments of contact as you brush a strand of hair from his eyes or a leftover crumb from his lip.
Almost all of his exposed skin is on his face. It lends a certain intimate flavor to the whole thing.
You wonder if he thinks you’re flirting with him.
One day, when you and he are alone, you place a thumb against his throat, touching the golden star that adorns it.
“I had wondered,” You say. “But I believe this confirms it.”
He asks, “Oh?”
His voice is as calm as it always is, but there’s a note of panic in his eyes as you lean closer, letting your breath mingle with the scentless air that comes from his mouth.
Albedo’s lips part just slightly as you say, “You don’t generate body heat.” There’s no difference in texture between the star and the rest of his skin, but you trace the outline with your thumbnail anyways. He shivers under your grasp the way you’ve never seen him do on Dragonspine. “Your skin is like ice, Albedo, it’s quite galling to touch.” You say it with the tone of a tease, but you know no one in this room is fooled by that.
“If you find physical contact with me so unbearable, there’s little need for you to seek it out.” He says. “Some people simply don’t generate much heat.”
You smirk at the deflection. Hum, and continue, “I’ve never seen you sweat, either. Even after a spar! With you wearing that coat of yours everywhere, that’s quite odd, don’t you think?”
Your thumb remains on the hollow of his neck, but you allow the rest of your hand to settle below it, sitting on his collarbone. As usual, his skin is so dry it feels almost chalky.
Albedo is, again, quick in his rejoinder. “While I admit it to be a rather petty use of the art, it isn’t terribly complex to utilize khemia to transmute one’s sweat into air.” His soft, even smile is ever-present as always, despite the note of tension hiding beneath his placid facade. “It’s rather an aid to hygiene, as well.”
You chuckle. “How ingenious!” You say, and let him pretend you’re referring to the alchemy. “Is that the technique you use for your breath, too? I’ve never noticed any scent to it, even after a meal!”
“Is that why you always lean so close when we eat together?” He asks. “To smell my breath? I will admit to not being the best-versed in social graces, but that strikes me as rather odd behavior.”
Oh, he’s delightful. This is the most entertaining conversation you’ve had this week. You chuckle again, and move on without acknowledging his response. “Speaking of eating, your portions are always so small! I can’t imagine how you sustain yourself on so little, especially leading an active lifestyle as you do. Malnourishment is no joke, you know!”
Even at this, he fails to falter. You have to admire his wit. “I can see how you would get that impression. The truth is, I’ve never been able to stomach large portions. I typically eat small, calorie-rich snacks throughout the day to make up the difference.”
That one, you could verify by simply forcing him to empty his pockets. You let it slide. “I’ve never found you asleep, either. It’s quite odd. No matter how late or early the hour, you always seem to be as fresh as a daisy! As an insomniac myself, I simply must ask you what your secret is.”
Though you suspect wresting said secret from him will take at least one more push.
He proves you right when he says, simply, “Caffeine.”
“You really have an answer for everything, don’t you?” You ask, leaning in close. “But Albedo, I do believe there’s still one thing you can’t account for quite so easily.”
There’s fear in his eyes, if you know how to look for it. He says, “Oh?”
You smile. “I’ve had my hand on your neck for this whole conversation, and I’ve yet to find a pulse.” You shift the hand in question, leaving your thumb on his throat and curling your fingers around the back of his neck, the tips of them tangling into his scalp.
To an outside viewer, you must look like lovers sharing a kiss as you whisper, so quiet that he’ll have to strain for it even at this distance, “You aren’t human.”
Alone in his office, late enough that no one else is in the building and with you blocking the room’s exit and holding him in place besides, he has nowhere to run and no one to call for help.
Instead, his eyes meet yours, his pupils like lonely islands in an endless sky, implacable and unreachable even as they widen just slightly in fear, even as he says, “No.” Quietly, tone almost defeated. “No, I’m not.”
This close together, the chill he gives off is impossible to ignore. If you placed a hand on the stone wall beside you, it would be only slightly chillier than his neck beneath your palm.
He’s leaning away from you, ever so slightly. You lean further forwards to make up the difference. “You’re one of hers, aren’t you?” You muse. “One of Gold’s monsters.”
He flinches, and you think, Got you.
——
4
Venti isn’t subtle about his true nature. His disguise relies on people failing to consider the possibility that someone like him could be a god.
His fecklessness, his humor, his alcoholism, his bumbling… All of these serve to make any worshiper of Barbatos laugh at the thought that he and Venti could be one and the same.
Your upbringing did not predispose you to that sort of thinking.
For someone who isn’t you, perhaps, it’s easy to dismiss his physical similarities to the statues of Barbatos littering the region as him simply being a certain flavor of devoted acolyte.
Easy to miss the way the “vision” at his hip remains dark even as he summons the wind to aid in the ambiance of one of his songs.
Easy to dismiss how many of said songs are ones you’ll hear from no other bard in Mondstadt until they’ve heard the melodies from him.
There are a thousand little details that give him away to a discerning eye. The trick is only in thinking to look for them in the first place.
They say Barbatos hears every secret the wind does, carried to him on the breeze.
One night, you are either foolish or brave enough to ask aloud, “Why am I still alive?”
You don’t bother to directly address him. He’ll hear you or he won’t. You’ve never been the sort to pray.
“You must know what I am from my eyes alone. They’re hardly subtle to those few who remember what they mean.” You say. “And I struggle to imagine you’re unaware of what I was sent here for.”
“It would hardly have been difficult,” You say, “To drop a hint to Jean, or Grandmaster Varka, or even to-“ You swallow. “To master Crepus, back at the beginning of it all.”
You doubt he’ll answer you, even if he’s listening. He is a god, after all. Aren’t they supposed to be above explaining themselves to anyone?
But that makes it easier, in a way, to say it. It’s less fearsome, knowing you’re probably speaking only to the wind.
“I represent nothing but danger to your people. My position in the Knights only exacerbates it.” You say. “Why let a threat lie?”
The wind kicks up, and you regret speaking in the same instant that your entire body goes taught at the prospect of an answer to the question you’ve been asking yourself since your birth father left you outside a winery in the rain.
He says, from behind you, “I’ve always preferred to allow my people to manage their own affairs.”
It’s not a satisfying answer at all. “Even when they’d have no means of identifying the threat before it hit them?” You ask. “You wouldn’t even offer a warning? Do you care for them so little?”
He sighs, and soft footsteps approach until he’s sitting by your side. “Do you think yourself something that ought to be warned for?”
You ask, “Do you not?” In a more incredulous tone than you usually allow yourself to slip into.
“Well,” He says, “Do you want to be a threat? Do you intend to cause harm?”
“What does that have to do with it?”
He says, “Everything.”
You don’t understand, and he must pick up on that, because he says, “No one chooses to be born. Nor do they choose where, or to whom.” He smiles, soft and a bit sad. “The only crime you’ve committed was to be born Khaenri’ahn. What kind of god of freedom would I be if I shackled you to that your whole life?”
“Even if my birthplace marks me an enemy of Celestia?”
“Celestia’s decisions aren’t without flaw.” He says, with a distant look in his eyes. “And besides, don’t sinners deserve a shot at freedom too?”
You don’t know how to respond to that, so you remain silent.
Eventually, he continues, “And even should we dismiss all of that, I wouldn’t presume you a danger to Mondstadt.”
“No?”
He taps your vision with a fingernail. “They used to call cryo the element of love, you know.” He says. “Do you think I don’t know how you got this?”
From telling your brother something you knew would destroy any love at all between you on the worst night of both your lives. From willfully ruining anything good you’d ever had.
From chickening out.
Venti says, “You wanted him to kill you, right? But you realized that would destroy him, and so your will to spare him that fate granted you a vision.”
——
5
He takes you to Dragonspine. You make at least one joke about meeting the family, and he laughs.
Durin’s veins pulse blood red in the pale snow, and Albedo’s hand in yours is like ice.
Diluc’s vision is burning a hole in your pocket, which is pretty funny considering it’s not even there.
You don’t laugh.
”All jests aside,” You say, “Why bring me here? I can’t imagine it’s the first place that came to mind as an ideal location for a date.”
He chuckles, though his eyes stay distant. “No, I suppose not. Even with a cryo vision, you’re still susceptible to frostbite, correct? I imagine that would put something of a damper on things.”
Compared to any human who doesn’t share your vision, you’re essentially immune to the cold. Compared to Albedo, though… Any degree of temperature intolerance likely registers about the same to him. He must think humans very fragile, to be susceptible to such things.
“How sweet of you to worry for my health.” You tease. “Fear not, I’ll be fine so long as you didn’t take us here with the intention of going for a swim in the river.”
It’s odd of him to care. You’ve given him little reason to prioritize your well-being, and no shortage of reasons not to.
You’ve told him you’ll give him a chance, but you’ve made no pretense of hiding exactly what you’ll do to him should he prove to be a threat.
“Your previous jokes about ‘meeting the family’ were not entirely off-base.” He says. “There’s something here I wish to show you.”
He’s been leading you to Durin’s corpse, and you pass, now, under the shadows of those great ribs jutting out of the snow.
No matter how many times you see this place, the sheer size of them never fails to stun you. What Durin must have looked like in life… It’s beyond imagining.
If you keep looking at them, you’re going to get a crick in your neck. You turn your gaze back down to see that Albedo is leading you towards the mouth of a cave you haven’t entered before.
As you pass the threshold, you’re hit with a blast of incongruously warm, humid air. Combined with the pulsating veins and ominous red glow emanating from deeper in, it feels like nothing moreso than walking directly into the maw of the beast.
“What is this place?” You ask.
He leads you a bit further, and you see it. Albedo says, “The heart of Durin.”
“Is it…” You look closer. “Beating?”
“Yes.” He says. “I don’t believe it ever stopped.”
“We only just walked under his bones, long rendered bare of flesh.” You say. “How is this possible?”
His expression is unreadable as he tells you, “Master has always built her creations to last.” Despite the warmth of the cave, his hand is still cold in yours. “I do not know if there is anything capable of truly killing him. As things stand, he is merely asleep, and one day, he will wake up.”
You don’t ask what will happen then. It’s fairly easy to guess.
Instead, you say, “What do you suppose he dreams of?”
Albedo’s smile is distant. “What do any of us dream of?” He asks. “He dreams of her. He dreams of seeing her again, and of being seen in return, and of her being proud of what he’s done in her absence.”
He shakes his head abruptly, as if to break whatever spell of reverie he’s fallen under, and turns to face you.
He takes both of your hands in his, and his eyes are vibrant and focused as he says, “I came here to ask a great favor of you. Something that I cannot entrust to anyone else.”
“A favor?”
“Yes.” He says. This is, perhaps, the most intense you have ever seen him. It makes you uneasy. “Should I ever show signs of falling prey to the same corruption as my siblings, I want you to kill me.”
Ah.
“Why?” You ask. “And why me, specifically?”
“I trust you.” He says, bafflingly. He must read the confusion from your face, because he clarifies, “I trust your powers of observation. I also trust your paranoia. You aren’t the sort to let your guard down. I trust you not to hesitate, if it comes to that.”
“And,” He says, more hesitantly, “I trust you to stay your hand unless there is truly no other choice.”
The first half of his reasoning demonstrates a fairly accurate assessment of your character. More accurate than most of the knights could offer.
That’s hardly surprising, though. You tend to let more of yourself through around potential threats than with anyone else. Intimidation is a useful thing, after all.
The second half of his reasoning is… Bold. You wonder what about you has given him that impression.
You leave his reasoning to itself. “You only answered half of my question. Why would you want to be stopped in the first place, let alone at the cost of your life? What makes you different from any of her other monsters?”
It’s a cruel way to phrase it, but he already knows you are not kind.
Finally, he breaks eye-contact, sagging a bit in your grasp as whatever desperate fervor previously gripped him fades. He says, quietly, speaking to the ground, “I don’t know.”
“I don’t know whether something was different between my creation and that of the others, to make me as I am, or if it was a matter of circumstance in my upbringing, or even if the others started like me and only later became the disasters they are remembered for today.”
He says, “All I know is that I have grown to care for the people of Mondstadt, and I do not wish to see them hurt.”
Resolutely, you resist the urge to empathize.
He says, “I don’t want to be the monster in Klee’s nightmares.”
Your fingers twitch like they’re trying to reach for something, but Diluc’s vision sits at his hip back in Mondstadt and you will never again spend your nights watching it flicker and always, always, refuse to go out.
You don’t want to think about this anymore. Instead, you disentangle your fingers from his and use them to force his head up until he is looking at you once more.
Then you kiss him like you’re dying, like you’re drowning and he is the last repository of oxygen in the world, and you think no more of flickering visions and no more of weapons who fell in love with the place they exist to destroy.
Even the inside of his mouth is room temperature. It’s good that this cave is so warm, or you’d have to fear getting frostbite on your tongue.
That would certainly be an interesting injury to explain to Barbara.
Because Albedo is more alike to you than you prefer to acknowledge, he kisses back.
Your vision, as always, is an icy burden upon your hip. Some days it seems to weigh more than an anchor.
——
6
“Did you love her?” You ask him, one night.
You’re running your fingers through his hair. It’s soft and silky, and he’s confessed to you that he has to wash it regularly not only to keep it clean, but also because his skin doesn’t naturally produce any oils, causing it to become dry and brittle if he doesn’t regularly apply conditioner.
The ends are perfectly even. He told you once that it doesn’t grow on its own unless he aids the process alchemically, which he only does if it’s damaged because he likes the length he has now.
“Who?” He asks, voice soft.
He used to spend these nighttime meetings struggling to hide his fear of you as you poked and prodded at his weak points, eyes flickering to follow your every movement like a cornered animal.
Unlike a cornered animal, he’s never tried to bite back. Some part of him surrendered to you in that very first meeting, and he has only ever allowed his fear to show in his eyes.
You know, now, that it’s because he believes he deserves this. To be constantly watched, constantly observed, never quite trusted, tested again and again.
Or perhaps it’s not quite that he believes he deserves it. Maybe he just thinks it’s the only way to be sure.
You’ve always hated mirrors.
More recently, he relaxes into your touch without hesitation.
Odd, how swearing to kill him if circumstances demand it is what’s made him truly trust you. You wish you didn’t understand.
You wish you didn’t envy him, just a little, for having the courage to ask that of someone.
“Your master.” You say. “Did you love her?”
His expression turns contemplative. “A simple question, but one that does not have a simple answer.”
You gather a few strands of his hair together and begin a braid, mimicking his usual style. You’ve gotten rather good at it by now.
At the start, you hadn’t known how to braid hair at all. Why would you? You’ve never had to do anything more complicated than a ponytail for yourself.
“It is inarguable,” He says, “That my master is an easy woman to hate.”
Albedo’s hair is one of your favorite parts of him, second only to his eyes. Each strand is like gossamer, so thin and light it’s a wonder his head doesn’t just float entirely away in the breeze. It shines like gold in the sun, as if the heavens themselves can’t help but love him.
That’s only a figure of speech, of course. The heavens hate you both.
“Her children ravaged the world. They breathed disease, bled poison, and their every step was a scar unto the Earth.” He says. “Through them, she caused untold suffering to the people of Teyvat, and when Celestia itself took notice of her sins she left the people of Khaenri’ah to take the fall in her stead.”
You finish the first braid and begin work on the second.
“There are many, I think, who would say only a monster could love such a woman.” He says.
The silence hangs.
You finish the second braid and tie it off, and he turns to face you. “But am I not one of her monsters?”
“That remains to be seen.” You say, and he laughs without much humor.
“Yes, it does, doesn’t it?” He says. “The very fact that it was her hands that created me means I will never quite be sure. It’s impossible to prove a negative, after all.”
“So,” You ask, “Did you love her? Even knowing you’re the only thing she ever made that’s not a monster? Even knowing that the very fact that it was her who created you means you can never be sure that won’t change? Do you love her, even knowing that only her monsters do?”
Albedo leans into you. “How could I not? She created me.”
He asks, “Kaeya, did you love your father?”
“Crepus? Of course I did.” He died without ever seeing you as you truly are. He died trusting you unconditionally.
The person he thought you were died when he did, and you’ve mourned that false portrait of yourself every day since as a symbol of the future you threw away.
You threw that future away because he died. Because he would never know the truth, and someone had to, and you wanted to be punished for not being who he thought you were, because that version of you was better and you’ve never been able to live up to it.
How could you not love him? He saw you and thought you were something good.
But Albedo is shaking his head, and you realize that’s not who he was asking about.
“Oh, the other one?” He nods. “No.”
Breathe in. “No, I don’t.”
Albedo asks, “Why not?”
“How could I? He created me.”
——
7
Not long after Diluc returns, you claim a seat at the bar of the Angel’s Share. He slides you your glass of death after noon with an air of resignation.
“Have you met the new chief alchemist?” You ask.
“I don’t make a habit of tracking every little thing that happens within the Knight of Favonius.” He says the name like a curse. It’s funny. You lie so much more than he does that it leads people to assume he doesn’t lie at all.
You let it slide. “So you haven’t, then?”
His vision must be at his hip, now, but you can’t see it over the bar. Sometimes you wake up and don’t see that steady red light on your nightstand and it takes you a moment to remember how to breathe.
Your palms itch for the slight warmth it gives off, but you know you’ll never hold it again.
Diluc says, “I believe I’ve met him in passing. A blonde in a white coat, correct?”
“Yes. His name is Albedo.” You say it like a secret, but you haven’t gotten to those yet.
Maybe you won’t. Albedo’s secrets have been stunningly harmless thus far.
But the havoc his siblings wreaked renders him a hazard even if he hasn’t yet offered any indication towards possessing either the inclination or ability to repeat their feats.
The hands of Gold are soaked with blood, and they stain all she touches. And chalk is so very easy to stain.
“Did you see his throat?” You ask.
Diluc shakes his head.
“He wears a star there.” You say. Diluc’s eyes flicker to the glove holding your drink and the identical symbol adorning it. “You won’t see eyes like mine in Mondstadt, even with him here.”
You take a sip. “But if his master ever pays him a visit, that will change.”
Khaenri’ah is a name you have not spoken aloud since the day you got your vision. In a crowded bar like this, that isn’t about to change.
But Diluc understands subtext, when he cares to. He knows what you’re telling him.
Albedo isn’t from Khaenri’ah, but he wears its crest. Albedo isn’t from Khaenri’ah, but his master is.
You say, “My homeland had a lot of alchemists, but only one of them is really known today.”
Gold’s name hangs in the air between you, unspoken.
You say, “But don’t be too hard on him. We can’t choose our mothers.”
Diluc’s eyes widen for a moment.
Then, his expression turns thoughtful and he says, “No, we can’t, can we?”
When you don’t immediately respond, he says, “I’ll keep your words in mind. As I’ve grown older, I’ve increasingly found judging others for their origins alone to be… Cruel.” He looks away. You can’t quite make yourself do the same. “On the occasions I did so in the past, I later came to regret it.”
“Did you?” You ask.
“Yes.”
——
8
You think that it might be alright to forgive yourself, one day.