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Dust was flung from its gathering places as Diluc's brisk entrance set the stale air into motion. Countless specks appeared as they crossed through beams of sunlight, disappearing again where the blinds guarded the windows.
He could not bring himself to breathe, at first, and could not bring himself to ask whether it was the dust or the nostalgia that stopped him.
It was just as he recalled it. His memories of life before eighteen were foggy, almost completely concealed in some places, but this one was clear. He had stormed up to Kaeya's room shortly after their fight, soaked through with rain and ready to burn, and the sight of Kaeya's bedroom had stopped him dead in his tracks.
A neatly made bed was pushed against the far wall, just under the window, with a small bookshelf beside it serving as a bedside table. His wardrobe was ajar, occupied by several button-ups and turtlenecks and waistcoats and slacks, all similar if not exactly the same. His desk sat to the right of the door, strewn with papers of all sorts.
He recalled the box under the bed that he believed was still there, containing wooden blocks of various shapes and sizes, and in turn recalled a very small Kaeya playing with them. He was so new, still thin and jumpy and hesitant. He liked the wooden blocks, likely for their simplicity, and would spend hours building with them. Strangely enough, his structures often appeared to be built upside-down.
He recalled times when Kaeya was sick and would sit in bed and read all day. Even when he could barely read common tongue, he would fight his way through whatever books were on his bookshelf. Considering how easily he fell ill, especially as a child, it was unsurprising that his ability to read common improved rapidly, and soon he was breezing through books that Diluc couldn't read.
He recalled peeking around the door as Crepus held a small and screaming Kaeya, riding out the tail end of a nightmare. He recalled holding the hand of a larger, sobbing Kaeya while Crepus stroked his hair. He recalled crushing a preteen Kaeya between Crepus and himself in a double bear hug as he cried silently, and recalled simply sitting beside him not a week before while Kaeya fought valiantly to hide how badly he was shaking.
He recalled shuffling to the bathroom late at night and catching a glimmer of moonlight through the slightly open door, and peering in to see Kaeya sitting impossibly still on the window sill, his legs hanging out over the ground two floors down.
He recalled flinging open the wardrobe doors with a shout to find a little Kaeya hiding behind hung up hand-me-down clothes, fear flashing over his face before he seemed to remember that they were playing a game and broke into a fit of giggles.
And now, just about three years later, he recalled standing there, staring, until his breathing had long slowed down from puffs of anger to its normal rhythm. He recalled turning on his heel and slamming the door behind him.
Now it was finally time to deal with Kaeya's bedroom.
It clearly hadn't been touched since he slammed the door shut that night, and it would be courteous of him to call in Adelinde for a thorough dusting, but a traitor did not deserve courtesy. He was being more than nice enough just by doing this in the first place.
That's what he told himself, at least, as he stepped out to retrieve the small wooden crates he'd brought up.
First he opened the wardrobe. Kaeya had grown several inches taller in his absence, because of course he had, as well as gaining a good deal of muscle mass, so these clothes most likely wouldn't fit him anymore. Well, maybe they would fit, actually; Kaeya had been fond of looser clothing back in the day, so maybe he would've simply grown into them, instead of grown out. Even if they did, though, based on the skin-tight riding pants and embellished corsets and fitted, frilly blouses he'd seen Kaeya wearing, he probably wouldn't have much use for the simple, boxy attire of his teenage years. He started pulling out the hung up items and tossing them in a crate. He'd donate them to Mondstadt's community service organization, which would surely find a use for them among the poor or orphaned.
Next he went to the bed. He knew for a fact that Kaeya was paid quite well, so he could only assume that he had his own sheets and blankets and pillows, so those went in the crate with the clothes. He tried not to inhale as he pulled the thick comforter away from its long-term resting place and sent the heavy layer of dust into the air. He felt a little bad for not dusting, as he folded up the blanket, realizing he'd be sending the community service people a bunch of stuff caked in dust. Oh well, it would be an anonymous donation anyways, and he was sure they were planning on washing all of it regardless.
The sheets and pillows were packed away in a similar fashion, and he moved on to the box underneath the bed. As he suspected, the wooden blocks were still there, even dustier than the rest of the room since they hadn't been used in probably ten years or so. He sifted through them as he considered what to do with them. Some formed arches, others stairs, some had windows, some had ramps. They would certainly have no practical purpose for an adult, but he'd caught wind of a small child often seen with Kaeya. He supposed that even if they turned out to be useless to Kaeya, the man could get rid of them himself. The box went in a different crate.
He sorted through the bookshelf next, which was difficult since he hadn't read hardly any of the books residing on it. How old was the little girl he'd heard about? Was Kaeya involved enough in her life to read her books? Were the children's books the right difficulty level? If they weren't, would they have nostalgic value? Did Kaeya deserve nostalgia? Were the more adult books anything he couldn't just check out at the library?
He eventually settled on donating the children's books and returning anything else to Kaeya. If he had no use for them, he could get rid of them himself.
His hands shook as they ran down the spine of a book titled "Hilichurl Cultural Customs," suddenly recalling walking into Kaeya's room to see him crying openly over a page with illustrations of hilichurls dancing. He'd thought it silly at the time; what kind of fifteen-year-old cries over a book about hilichurls? He still wondered what it was that was so tragic about a hilichurl dancing, though he would never dare to ask.
Once the bookshelf was clear, he tackled the top of it. A few small trinkets were scattered across it. A bottle of painkillers, his special migraine stuff that was now undoubtedly expired. A little contraption of gears that he knew would slot into the one in his own bedroom and the one in father's to collectively form a heart, something Crepus had brought home from a business trip in Fontaine. A potted succulent, long dead now, in hard, dry soil, both the pottery and the plant bought in Sumeru if he had to guess. Schneznayan nesting dolls, a little blonde lady in a blue cloak that grew smaller and simpler the deeper you went. A mortar and pestle, likely from Sumeru. Another contraption from Fontaine, a lovely little jewelery box, and when he opened it a ballerina spun slowly to the song of an out-of-tune music box. It was full of dry, dead ley line branches, varying in size, a strange collection he was choosing not to question.
Kaeya really hadn't taken anything. Adelinde had told him as much when he informed her of his intentions for the manor, saying that Kaeya's room was essentially untouched, but it hadn't really sunk in. After he deposited the bookshelf's residents into the box for Kaeya - except for the medication bottle, which went promptly in the trash - he looked around and found that Kaeya's dress shoes and riding boots sat beside the door, his coat and even his armor hanging from the back of it. He had gone to Diluc's room in his regular shoes and civilian clothes, his sword sheath hooked to his belt, and he had walked away from their fight with his regular shoes and civilian clothes, his sword sheath hooked to his belt, and a Vision in his hands. He had brought nothing, nothing but the clothes on his back and the weapons that were rightfully his.
The shoes and coat and armor went to Kaeya. He had no idea if any of it would fit, but at this point he didn't care. They were Kaeya's to deal with now.
Or, they would be, as soon as he found enough balls to take the crate to his house.
-
Kaeya bit back a curse as his headache pulsed. He liked Vile, really, he did; she was one of his favorite informants, for a lot of reasons. For one thing, she did not like him, and was not afraid to tell him or anyone else how much she didn't like him. Making sure that nobody liked him was something he put a lot of time and energy into, so he always appreciated the people who made it easy for him. For another thing, she was exclusive. She wasn't exactly in the business of information; she didn't like the work she did for him, she just so happened to be observant and eidetic and reported suspicious findings to him because she owed him and he paid her. That meant that he had her all to himself. Vile's information was good and it stayed between her and Kaeya.
Her handwriting was, unfortunately, not one of the reasons Kaeya liked Vile.
It was about as well-spaced as a Church hymn, pushing and pulling like a dying caterpillar, crowding together then stretching unnaturally in all the wrong places. He could barely recognize some of the letters, misshapen seemingly at random so there was no pattern to recognize. She'd handed him six sheets of paper, filled front and back with notes, and after an hour of reading he was almost done. He felt like an old man reading the daily news as he slouched in his office chair and squinted at the papers while intermittently sipping the coffee he'd picked up from Good Hunter's.
An unwelcome thought telling Kaeya that Master Crepus would likely be doing just that if he'd just kicked his horse a little harder made him nearly drop his cup.
He'd be needing to get a little more than tipsy if he wanted to sleep tonight, it seemed.
Back to Vile's horrendous handwriting. He was on what looked to be the last of her observations, concerning... an unusual amount of activity surrounding... somebody's manor. Kaeya stared intently at what he could only assume to be a family name, but he couldn't for the life of him figure out which. He'd get back to that. The unusual activity included the removal of a large number of... boxes... many of which were being sent by... carriage to the headquarters of Mond's... community service organization. Archons, just one sentence and he'd been staring at it for a solid three minutes.
He went back to squinting at the family name. Only a noble family would still have a manor, but what noble family stubborn enough to stick around this long would be finally moving out now? And donating their things, for that matter? It couldn't possibly be the Lawrences, but who else-
Oh.
A cold pit of some awful unnamed emotion opened like a sinkhole in his stomach. He wanted so terribly to be wrong, the strength of it almost startling. Giving the scrawling print one last look, it finally took shape, the letters clarifying to form Ragnvindr.
He felt genuine, physical pain, like a gaping wound deep in his chest. It scared him how badly it hurt. There was a sickening sense of dread, and fear at the sheer intensity. What could possibly be so special about a house he didn't belong in - never did belong in - and hadn't even laid eyes on in years? What reason - no, what right did he have to be hurt by what Diluc Ragnvindr did with the Ragnvindr manor that he had rightfully inherited?
The paper was hastily shoved into a desk drawer. Kaeya took back his earlier decision. He would not be going to the tavern tonight. Angel's Share was out of the question, he didn't want to be anywhere near Diluc, anywhere near the possibility of being anywhere near Diluc, and while the Cat's Tail was an option he honestly wasn't sure he could handle being anywhere near Diona either. She was a child, a child he related to so heavily that it hurt to look at her, to see beyond her face and into the mirror behind her eyes. He could not handle the way the other drunks would look at her, no different than the cats that lounged around the tavern. Just a cute little kitty. Something to look at, to play with, something fascinating and exotic and helpless. He couldn't handle the urge to hold her, so strong it ached in every part of his body and mind.
Oh, and now he was upset about everything. Old life, older life, all burned to the ground by one thing or another, stitched into his skin by the heartstrings of everyone he was supposed to kill. Maybe he wouldn't be getting drunk tonight at all, not even at home. Alcohol was really just a bad idea right now, all things considered. It helped him get to sleep when his thoughts got too loud, but at this point, it would only make them louder.
He was done for the day, all his assignments long dealt with; he only had informant reports to review, and he'd saved Vile's for last. He would just... go home.
It felt almost wrong, as he stood up, pushed his chair in, blew out the candles, opened the door, locked it behind him. It felt wrong to behave normally and professionally, as if he wasn't actively sinking in a pit of despair and reprimanding himself for falling into it.
He touched the nameplate beside his door, to remind himself of his surname. Diluc Ragnvindr was selling off the Ragnvindr manor. He was Kaeya Alberich, what reason did he have to concern himself with the affairs of Diluc Ragnvindr and the ownership of the Ragnvindr manor? None, that's what; he had no reason whatsoever to be even vaguely interested in the matter, let alone distraught. Alberich, Alberich, Alberich, an outsider and nothing more.
He spent his walk home mindlessly waving at anyone who greeted him and forcefully reminding himself that when they called out his name there was an unspoken Alberich right after it, that they didn't think of Diluc Ragnvindr or Crepus Ragnvindr or the Ragnvindr manor when they saw him, didn't associate him with the name Ragnvindr in any way, because there was no association. He told himself that when news of the Ragnvindr manor being sold off entered the rumor mill and eventually became common knowledge, they would not wonder about his reaction or think of his name written beside Diluc's on Crepus' last will and testament because there was no reason for him to have a reaction and no reason for his name to be on Crepus' will.
He slid quietly into the foyer of the old manor-turned-apartment-building, pulling out his keys and reminding himself that he owned his apartment, and the papers read Alberich. He reached the third door down and unlocked it, stepping into his apartment and making sure to pointedly think of it as home.
His apartment was dark, all moonlight trapped behind thick curtains and locked shutters. His night vision was rather pitiful, but he knew his way around his apartment well enough and cared about running into anything little enough that he found himself quite uncompelled to light any candles. It was late, and he hadn't eaten since lunch, and he should really get into his nightclothes and sleep in his bed, but he found himself rather uncompelled to do any of those things either.
He shed his jacket, hanging it on the back of a chair at his dinner table. The table itself was currently covered with the remnants of an active investigation, maps and letters and registers and pictures and random scribbles, all of which he'd have to clean up before Albedo left for Dragonspine again and Klee started joining him for dinner. He then approached his couch with purposeful strides and promptly collapsed onto it.
Sleeping on the couch fully clothed was probably not going to help him shut down the little voice in his head telling him this wasn't home. But it wasn't as if the manor had ever been home, either. He had been welcomed, and loved, but he had never belonged, no matter how much Crepus insisted. Mondstadt was not home, the cold dirt paths he had spent six years traveling were not home, nor were any of the many inns they'd stayed in.
Not even Khaenri'ah, for whose name he'd lost everything, was home, for he had no memory of it and certainly no allegiance to it. His father was not home, his father never loved him, never cared about him. His father had watched him fall into the world already dying, and had rooted him to a life that wasn't his, the divine knowledge of who he would've been, bringing forbidden prophecy to life. He had stitched him together with the intangible branches of memory. He had dragged him countless miles across desert and jungle and rock and prairie, hardwiring his body and mind to lie and cheat and steal, to survive and most of all to kill, all so he could beat a long-dead horse on behalf of a fallen nation too far gone to ever rise again, no matter how many god-killing children it's remaining citizens created.
A loud, singular bang that sounded an awful lot like somebody trying to kick down his door harshly threw him from the depths of his mind, and he scrambled to his feet, pressing his entire body weight against the door at inhuman speeds. When no more kicking ensued and he was decently sure it was not someone trying to brute-force their way in, he peered into the peephole, expecting Jean, or Rosa, or Albedo, or anyone else who had been to his apartment and had any plausible reason to be there in the middle of the night. He was instead surprised to find a certain redhead standing in front of his door, and he quickly sighted the reason he'd been kicking instead of knocking: his hands were occupied by a wooden crate.
The adrenaline rush that had been thrust upon him by the possibility of somebody busting down his door was beginning to wane, the sharp clarity of fight-or-flight blurring as his thoughts began to race. What the fuck was Diluc doing at his apartment at Archons knew what time of night, and what the fuck was in that-
Oh.
Oh.
Right.
He turned the deadbolt, pulled out the latch, turned the lock of the doorknob, and swung the door open with as much poise as he could muster, striking out with a carefully sharpened tongue before Diluc could even open his mouth.
"Master Diluc," he addressed, the name a lilting sing-song he hoped was infuriating, "did you ask someone which apartment is mine or did you just kick down every door in the hallway until you reached this one?"
"Sir Kaeya," Diluc returned, "I asked someone." He stepped forward, pushing the crate towards Kaeya. "I'm here to return your things from the manor."
"Ah." Just as he'd suspected. He reached out, placing both hands under the crate bracing for the weight. "You have my sincerest gratitude."
"Of course." Diluc let go, stepping away from the door. "Good night, Sir Kaeya."
"Good night to you, Master Diluc. Would you mind terribly if I asked you to close the door?"
"Not at all." The door swung shut.
Kaeya stood in the darkness, dazed from the encounter. A bright flare in an otherwise lightless evening, the outline of it seemed burned into his eyes, floating across his vision like a ghost.
Slowly, feeling as if he was trapped in a stained glass window and afraid he might break it if he moved, Kaeya turned around, acutely aware of each minute movement of his body, and walked away. Robotically, he brought the crate to his bedroom, and placed it on the floor. He stood there a while, just staring at it. He considered opening it and found himself struck with the profound belief that he would literally die if he opened it. Just pass away right then and there. Or cry until he died of dehydration. Something along those lines.
He pushed the box into his closet and closed the door.