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The first time Rosaria had sex with Kaeya, he was eighteen.
If she was being honest with herself—and she usually tried to be, because she was a bad liar and hated herself more when she tried—she hadn’t had sex with him with the intention of fixing him. Perhaps that might have been the kinder approach, because at eighteen Kaeya had looked like he was walking around with half of himself missing, a broken boy with a scarecrow smile pasted over his pain. But mostly Rosaria had sex with him because she was curious and he was willing to be a test subject, and she knew what it was like to be that kind of apathetic and wanted to see how it felt from the other side.
The sex hadn’t come until later. First had come Barbara, knocking on Rosaria’s door while she was unlacing her shoes. “Come in,” Rosaria said briskly. Only one person ever knocked on her door.
“Sister Rosaria?” Barbara said uncertainly. Like it would be anyone else. “Could I ask you for a favour?”
“Depends on what kind,” Rosaria said, kicking her shoes aside and hopping to her feet to pull off the stockings. “And close the door, will you?”
Barbara closed the door and leaned against it, hands held neatly behind her back. She looked at Rosaria with ill-disguised interest, and Rosaria took her shirt off just to see the way Barbara blushed and looked away. It was too easy to fuck with the sisters, prudes that they were, but Barbara’s reactions might have been fun. In another life. “You’re good with a spear,” Barbara started. “And you have a Cryo Vision. I was wondering if you would be willing to, uh—”
Rosaria threw her bra onto the bed and said, “Willing to?”
Barbara gaped for a solid minute before recollecting herself enough to say, “Sister Rosaria, please put some clothes on?”
There was a shirt under her bed. Rosaria shrugged it on and buttoned it up to some semblance of modesty. “Continue.”
“If you’d be willing to train a Knight?”
“Don’t they have Knights for that?”
“Kaeya just received a Cryo Vision,” Barbara continued. “And he needs help.”
Rosaria considered this. “Isn’t there another Knight with a Cryo Vision? That Lawrence girl?”
“...I don’t think they’re on good terms,” Barbara said. “Please, Rosaria?”
Barbara only dropped the sister when she was being serious. Rosaria sighed. “I’ll see what I can do.” She sat down heavily on the bed. “And Barbara?”
“Yes?”
“I’m taking Sundays off for this.”
Barbara smiled. “You take Sundays off anyway, Sister Rosaria,” she chirped. “I’ll tell him to meet you in the courtyard.”
❆
Kaeya showed up sober, which was a miracle Rosaria didn’t yet appreciate. He grinned, sleazy and half-hearted, when he saw her. Even his leer lacked bite so she ignored it, tossing him a practice staff and pointing him towards one end of the yard. “I’m assuming you stretched already.”
“Sure did,” Kaeya said. “What’s your name?”
“Rosaria.”
“Cool,” Kaeya said listlessly. “I’m Kaeya.”
“I know,” Rosaria said flatly. “Do you know how to fight with a spear?”
“Only the basics.” Kaeya’s gaze wandered around the courtyard, lingering on the practice dummies and the trees and the statue of Vennessa and the dandelions without seeming to take any of them in. “The Knights think polearms are for commoners.” He waved a hand. “Pitchforks and torches, that sort of thing.”
Rosaria snorted. “Polearms have reach,” she said. “I’ll take an enemy at the end of a long pointy stick before I waste time waving around swords the way you lot do.” She considered her options. “Show me what you do with a sword.”
Kaeya had brought his own sword. He hadn’t yet learnt the Vision trick of dismissing his blade into the ether and summoning it out when he needed it—that he’d pick up in his own time. Three things, however, became quickly obvious: the first was that he was good with a sword. The second was that he had the most uselessly fancy bladework she’d ever seen a man perform—he looked like a peacock, all flourish and waste. The third was that he left his blind side gaping wide open.
“I see,” Rosaria said eventually. “Care to spar a round?”
He blinked at her like he’d forgotten she was there. “Why not.”
She spent a few minutes selecting the shortest staves, the ones that were most like a sword, and let him pick one. “I’m doing this without my Vision,” she said. “You can use yours, if you figure out how.”
He looked at her doubtfully. “I get the feeling you don’t think much of my swordwork.”
“I don’t,” Rosaria said flatly. “I’ll show you why.”
She did. She beat him hollow five rounds out of five without breaking a sweat. He was smiling slightly by the end of it, flushed and slightly more alive.
“You keep leaving your right side open,” she told him. “And you waste time on those flourishes when you’re fighting. That kind of thing could get you killed out in the field.”
“I have been on a field,” Kaeya said. “I’m still alive, aren’t I?” He didn’t sound petulant, though, mostly factual. “Those flourishes are good against Hilichurls—it confuses them, they follow the blade and get distracted.”
“You’re not supposed to be trying to distract them,” Rosaria snapped. “You’re supposed to kill them and move on.”
Kaeya went quiet like she’d punched him somewhere soft. Rosaria huffed, irritated. “Stop leaving your side open. We’ll work on the rest.”
“I thought you’d be training me to use my Vision.”
“I thought so too,” Rosaria pulled the stave out of his hands and gave him one of the longer ones. “Seems I have to start with the basics. And Kaeya? If you’re fighting against a person, that fancy shit isn’t going to save you. People are better at thinking on their feet than Hilichurls are.”
He inclined his head and accepted the staff.
About an hour of beating him Rosaria realized that he wasn’t paying attention. He dodged her attacks, learnt what she explicitly taught, and favored guarding his left side over his right. But she’d gotten the impression from the rumors floating around that he was smart, and he wasn’t being smart right now. He was barely getting by and didn’t seem to care.
“If you’re not going to learn, I’ll stop wasting my time,” she snapped.
Kaeya paused and cocked his head. “I am learning.”
“You’re barely keeping your eye on me.” Rosaria pointed her staff at him. “And you aren’t doing what I told you to do, which is to watch out for your blind side. What the fuck is your deal?”
“Nothing,” Kaeya said. “I had a late night, that’s all.”
“Are you hungover?”
“Yes,” Kaeya said. “Is it that obvious?”
It hadn’t been, but only because Rosaria hadn’t thought to look for it. “Go drink some water,” she said shortly.
She stalked into the Cathedral to find Barbara. The morning service was just wrapping up, and the Deaconess was busy handing out blessings in the form of moon pies and her hands, healing ailments. “Barbara, a moment when you’re done.”
“Almost, Sister,” Barbara said absently. Rosaria waited another ten minutes before Barbara turned to her. “How can I help?”
She led Barbara back to the courtyard, where Kaeya had frozen a patch of grass by, apparently, pouring water onto it and then freezing it. He’d also frozen his shoes. It was snowing. Pathetic, really, but not so pathetic that Rosaria wasted time feeling bad for him.
Okay, she felt a little bad. It was hard not to.
“He’s got a hangover,” she told Barbara. “Heal him.”
“A hangover,” Barbara said flatly.
“Hello,” Kaeya said. “Deaconess.”
“You called me here for a hangover?”
“You’ve healed my hangovers before,” Rosaria pointed out, mildly confused by this reaction.
Barbara huffed. “You’re not—that’s not something I do for everyone.”
“Oh.” Rosaria frowned. “Well, I can’t teach him if he has a hangover. Heal him.”
“What do we say when we want something?” Barbara said snottily, because she was secretly a child and determined to embarrass Rosaria whenever possible.
Rosaria rolled her eyes. “Please,” she drawled.
“Hmph.” Barbara wiggled her fingers at Kaeya. “Are you hurt anywhere else?”
“I’m fine,” Kaeya said. “It’s not even that bad of a hangover.”
“Your fighting says otherwise.”
“Maybe I’m just bad at it.”
“You’re not.” Rosaria shoved Barbara forward. “Sometime before lunch, please.”
“I’m fine,” Kaeya insisted. “Really, there’s no need for all this fuss—”
A horrible suspicion struck Rosaria. “Take your shirt off.”
“Ah—what?”
“Take your shirt off,” Rosaria repeated.
“She’s right,” Barbara said surprisingly. “If you’re really fine, there should be nothing wrong with taking your shirt off.”
Kaeya sputtered. “Have I gotten lost? Is this the setting of some erotic novel? I’m not taking off my shirt because you’re both sisters and the Seneschal will flog me if he finds me here with my shirt off!”
“The Seneschal is busy,” Barbara said. “No one’s coming.”
“Oh, this just took a dark turn,” Kaeya muttered.
“Yeah,” Rosaria said. “It did. And it’s going to get darker if you don’t do as I say.”
Kaeya looked hunted as he unbuttoned his shirt, tugging it off with faintly trembling fingers.
Rosaria told herself not to look, then looked anyway. Most of Kaeya’s left side—from his shoulder down to around his ribs—was burnt, the skin seared red and raw. There was an odd pattern to the intensity of the burn, akin to feathers, but she didn’t know anything that could hurt like that. She didn’t think she wanted to know. The sight of Kaeya, hunched over his side and more vulnerable than anyone should have to be in front of near-strangers, was going to stick in Rosaria’s mind longer after this moment was over. She wished she’d never forced the matter.
Barbara, to her credit, didn’t even wince. Rosaria had seen her knit together broken bones and mangled hands without blinking. This was no different to her, perhaps, than that child with the sickness that made her bleed when struck by light. “You really shouldn’t be walking around like that,” she said severely, then walked forward and knelt to put her small pale hands on Kaeya’s skin.
She hummed as she healed, water weaving between her fingers and sinking into his skin. He looked down at her like she was taking something from him, then up at Rosaria like he hated her too. She didn’t blame him. She would have hated herself in his place.
“All done,” Barbara said a few minutes later, then tilted her head and thumbed at his skin. “It shouldn’t have scarred. I don’t know what I did wrong.”
“Nothing,” Kaeya said. “Thanks for the healing. Guess I’d better go.”
He sounded dead and didn’t move. The pattern of the burn was clearer in the scars than it had been as charred flesh—feathers, yes, a shape like one wing drawn into his skin in light lines.
Barbara pushed another wave of healing into his skin. He jerked back and froze it before it landed, leaving ice on his lap. Barbara was starting to look upset, and Kaeya was starting to look murderous. “That’s enough,” Rosaria said. “Thanks, Barbara. You can leave.”
“If you’re sure,” Barbara pouted. “I could figure it out.”
“I’ll keep the scars,” Kaeya sneered. “Not like anyone’s going to see them, anyway.”
Barbara rose to her feet primly. “Goodbye,” she said, walking around him and stalking off.
“Don’t tell Jean about this,” Kaeya said suddenly.
“I won’t,” Barbara called. “Doctor-patient confidentiality.”
Kaeya twisted around and stared after her. Rosaria snapped her fingers. “Button your shirt.”
His hands were shaking too much. She sighed and did it for him, because the Seneschal would have him flogged and she really didn’t want to see that.
They wouldn’t get any work done after this even if they tried. She put the staves away and he followed her like a lost dog, all the way to her room in the attic. He looked around himself curiously when she let him in, but wisely said nothing.
Her room was nice in the way Rosaria liked and had worked for, strangely sparse despite the ceramic figurines along one shelf and the books below it. She’d saved up her stipend for rugs because the floor was cold. The curtains were blue and yellow and rather ugly. Everything here belonged to her, and nobody else—nobody except Barbara and now Kaeya—had come up here in years. It was the closest thing to home she’d ever had.
Her stash of alcohol was under the bed, lazily hidden. She uncorked a bottle of dandelion wine and waved it at him. “Care for some?”
“Oh, please,” Kaeya said fervently, dropping into the faded single-person sofa. Rosaria took the bed, watching the bob of his throat as he took a long swig before handing it back to her. “She didn’t even heal the hangover, you know.”
“That’s Barbara for you,” Rosaria replied. She took a quick, small sip, pulling up courage from that well inside her that she mostly didn’t need and said, “Did somebody do that to you?”
Kaeya didn’t reply for so long that Rosaria wished she hadn’t asked, then wished she’d drowned herself instead. “You could say that.”
“Either they did or they didn’t,” Rosaria said. “It’s not like you can go halfway on something like this.”
“I could be dead,” Kaeya said brightly, and snatched the bottle from her hand.
A heavy blade twisted in Rosaria’s heart. “Well, you’re not. You saved yourself.”
“The gods saved me,” Kaeya corrected. “Aren’t you a sister?”
“Not a very good one.” She shrugged. “Did the gods save you or did they see in you the will to save yourself, and simply provide the means?”
“The former.” Kaeya held his Vision up against the window, letting the light sparkling through the snowflake caught inside.
“You sound sure—”
“I am.”
Rosaria had nothing to say to that. She’d never been the kind of sister who excelled at wisdom or comfort or faith. She couldn’t believe; it still seemed like a cosmic joke that the Church had found a place for her, no matter how shadowy. Religion would always feel like a hand on her throat, forcing her to swallow.
“I wasn’t always such a believer, if it makes you feel better,” Kaeya said softly. “It was only after I came to Mondstadt that I realized why people believe in gods.”
“I still don’t understand that,” Rosaria confessed. They’d been passing the bottle back and forth as they spoke. When Rosaria took it back from him this time, it was empty, and she didn’t uncork another. He was drunk enough. She was drunk enough, though she didn’t really feel it. Alcohol mostly felt like warmth and pleasantness.
“All rivers flow into the ocean, don’t they? People think love and faith and ambition will always find their way to the gods. We may never see them, but it’s reassuring to know that it’s not all pointless.”
“Is it reassuring?” Blasphemy, obviously, not that Rosaria cared.
“Haven’t you ever loved someone who didn’t love you back?”
“It never felt like faith.”
Kaeya sighed. “I don’t think we’ll ever agree on this, Sister Rosaria.”
No, probably not. Rosaria had never been someone to love without reservations. Perhaps she had been, once. Strange to think of a little girl who had held more love in her hands than she knew what to do with before it was eaten away in hunger and constant fear. And now there was more terror than love, too much terror to ever be love again.
“Were they the one who burnt you?” she asked. “You… don’t have to answer that.”
“No, it’s fine,” Kaeya didn’t sound like it was fine. “And yes. Disregard everything else I said, though. I don’t really believe it.”
The thought of knowing what it felt like to love someone who would burn you was horrifying. Somehow, Rosaria couldn’t bring herself to pity Kaeya for it. He didn’t sound like he had any regrets, and that was something Rosaria could respect. “What do you believe, then?”
“I believe,” Kaeya began. “Oh, nothing, really. The gods—I’m sure they’re real. It doesn’t inspire much faith.”
It was nice to hear blasphemy in someone else’s voice for once.
“What do you believe, Sister Rosaria?”
“That we save ourselves,” Rosaria said unhesitatingly. “That we don’t have to rely on the gods.”
Snow drifted onto her lap. She carefully avoided looking at Kaeya. “I want to believe that,” Kaeya said, soft and cracked. “Mostly I want to believe that you can love something and still leave it behind.”
Rosaria didn’t reply. She’d always been the one leaving everyone else behind. The guilt of that would eat her alive if she let it—sometimes it still did. She couldn’t run from her regrets. She couldn’t even make sure she didn’t have any. And she didn’t understand what made someone like Kaeya—how it felt to love enough to want to keep the scars they left.
“Nevermind,” Kaeya sighed. “He probably shouldn’t love me anyway.”
When she looked at him, finally, he was asleep. The Vision glowed in his hand.
❆
They had sex in winter, when Kaeya could freeze water and keep it frozen for long enough to run across and freeze it again before being dumped into the lake. He grinned at her when she managed it. She grinned back, helpless.
He had no gravity. He still looked like he was missing more than half of himself. But he touched her like she was made of the same things he was made of—ice and bitterness and a capacity for love that would never be unleashed—and she didn’t want to wait until he froze all that over. So what if they both had nightmares all the time? She wanted to know him while he still smiled like that, and she couldn’t run from the feeling that it would all be over soon.
Rosaria had lived under a sense of impending doom for as long as she could remember. She’d never been wrong.
The first time she’d done it out of curiosity, because he looked hollow and cold and she ached with the need to know what that felt like under her. The first time he’d looked up at her like he couldn’t believe this was happening. His helplessness was a salve. She’d been helpless like that once. She’d accepted things she wished she’d never allowed. He didn’t expect to be hurt the way she had but he craved it. He craved everything she gave him. It made her skin burn.
After that, though, he forced her to take it slow, to let him take his time with her body where she would have hurried him along without pause. He pressed cool fingers into her and kissed her and asked her if she liked this, if she could come like this, and it was astonishing how many times she could say yes in one night.
She touched the shape of the wing on his body, tracing the feathers with her hands and then her mouth and then her tongue, until he gasped and caught her shoulders. He couldn’t come like that. He could come from her kissing his neck while he ground against her.
It was fun to discover that. She loved the way it felt like a game—she’d had sex before, just never with someone she’d have trusted to hold her down. Kaeya knew her body like he’d spent the past eight months figuring out how to fuck her from the way she fought, and he let her tie him up and rub herself against him until the pleasure shredded her mind and she wanted to cry. It felt like enough.
Nothing was satisfying quite like this.
It was late one night in early spring, with rain pouring into the city—not so much that he'd cry, but enough that he didn't want to leave the bed—that Rosaria asked, “Am I just replacing him for you?”
He twisted her hair gently around his fingers, scratching at her scalp. “Nothing could replace him.”
“Good,” she said, and meant it. “One love like that is quite sufficient.”
“Rosaria,” he snorted, affection bleeding through. “So practical.”
She smiled at him. It was easy to smile at him. “Aren’t you glad you’re not in love with me?”
He made a disagreeing noise. She waited. It was easier to wait than ask.
“I’m glad we’re friends,” he said finally. “That’s love too.”
Oh.
She’d never thought of it like that; the possibility was as distant as the sun on a rainy day. But even the skies could clear unexpectedly; it was like he’d opened a window in her heart, and she would someday be used to it. For now there was warmth, his body alive against hers.
Rosaria had never had a friend before.