Chapter Text
squeeze a little tighter 'til we can't breathe
what can I say, what can I do?
the monster in me loves the monster in you.
Somewhere deep inside his chest, where his gnosis used to burn, the god Rex Lapis roars, as the man Zhongli stares blankly at the orange and yellow flower fields of Qingce Village, trying to spot the faint glow of a single glaze lily. He knows there are glaze lilies here, but, as always, he doesn’t know how to properly look for them.
Far from this place, all the way back in Liyue Harbour, there’s a ship waiting, in a few days it will sail across the sea to a land of snow and cold that knows nothing about summer, a land where Zhongli, a man of earth, heat and stone, cannot follow.
In that ship, a few days from now, will be a man. A man of fake smiles and masks and a laughter that glitters like the sun over the waves, and it’s that thought, the thought of that man sailing away to places too far for him to reach, what makes the god Rex Lapis roar, and the man Zhongli look for answers in the flowers that a beloved friend once loved, but he is unable to find.
If I see one, he thinks to himself, a contract made by the god of contracts with himself, I will go find him.
“I’ve been looking everywhere for you!”
The voice is light and lively like a summer breeze, and Zhongli recognizes it instantly.
“It has been a long time, Barbatos.” He greets, tilling his head slightly to the side to look at the young man that is now standing beside him.
“A long time indeed!” Venti looks up at him with a grin. “You look as handsome as ever, mortality suits you just as well as godhood did. I’m so jealous.”
Zhongli closes his eyes and takes a deep breath. For person as small as he is, the anemo archon’s presence is loud and all consuming, like a tornado.
“What brings you so far away from home?”
“Ah! Our common friend the Traveler told me you seemed kind of off the last time they saw you, so I came to make sure you were all right.”
“They are very perceptive.” Zhongli tilts his head to the side, lips lifting ever so slightly.
“Yes, they are.” Venti’s smile grows, words dripping with fondness. “They said it looked like you missed someone.”
The wind picks up and breezes past the fields of flowers below them. Out of the corner of his eye, Zhongli catches a small spark of ice blue.
“I am looking for advice.” He says.
“If I remember correctly, this is not the place you usually come when you’re in need of guidance, ne?”
Zhongli turns fully to the smaller male then, eyes glowing warm and welcoming like a sunset.
“It is not, but it is here where her flowers bloom now, and I hoped I could find… answers here. Even if she can no longer guide me herself.”
Venti hums, nodding. He can feel the sadness emanating from the other man, dense and dry like a cloud of dust. How someone who looks so imposing can be so utterly vulnerable, he has no idea, but it stirs in him a desire to protect that is so strong, he can barely refrain from looping his arms around him and never letting go.
“Maybe I can help?” He offers instead. “I have walked among mortals for a lot longer than you have, after all.”
“How do you know this is about a mortal?”
Venti winks at him and grins.
“Lucky guess. Let’s see. You’re sad because you haven’t seen your fatui friend since the aftermath of all that drama, am I wrong?”
Zhongli frowns, eyes crinkling ever so slightly. For a moment, he seems utterly confused.
“I am surprised.” He admits finally. “Your guess is extremely accurate.”
Venti sighs. Until this very moment, he hadn’t realized how dense the oldest of the seven could be, but if Zhongli is not aware of how incredibly obvious (not to mention public) his story with the fatui harbinger had been, he sure as hell is not going to be the one to burst his bubble.
“How long has it been since you last saw him?” He asks.
Zhongli hums, turning back to scan the flower fields below.
“I don’t know.” He admits. “Time has never been of concern to me before. And now that it is…. limited, I struggle to comprehend how it works. Nevertheless, I find myself…longing for his company.”
Venti’s smile grows impossibly wide, eyes shimmering with excitement. He clasps his hands together loudly and bounces.
“You need to ask him to take you back!”
Zhongli turns to stare at him, brows furrowed in confusion and lips slightly parted.
“Where shall I ask him to take me back to?”
“Oh.” Venti gapes at his friend for a split second, then doubles over with laughter. “Oh, Morax, you’re too much.”
“I fail to see why you find my question amusing. Is it some…common knowledge that I lack?”
“You could say that, yes.” Venti nods, inhaling profoundly to try and calm his breathing. “It means you need to ask him to allow you back into his life.”
Zhongli raises his eyebrows.
“Ah, I see. That would be ideal, yes.”
“Okay. Then you need a plan. Do you have a plan?”
“I came here in the hopes to find a glaze lily. If I found one, I would go find him.”
The explanation is delivered with such a serious tone that Venti can’t help but think that, when it comes to human relations, Zhongli has the brain of a five-year-old child.
“Okay, we can…start there. Flowers are the best apology gift.” Venti speaks with absolute certainty, even if he himself has no idea if what he’s saying is true.
“Will he accept me back into his life if I present hi with a flower, then?”
Venti sighs.
“Well, it’s not infallible, but you can keep giving him things until he does.”
“That is most logical.”
“Of course, it is!” Venti beams. “I have been walking among mortals for a while longer than you, so you can trust my knowledge on this!”
Zhongli nods solemnly, turns to fully face Venti, and extends his hand.
“You do seem extremely knowledgeable on these matters, so I shall take your advice. It is a contract, then.”
Venti shakes his hand enthusiastically, brimming with excitement.
“This is going to be so much fun!” He grows quiet for a moment, then looks at the older male with all the seriousness his lively, childish eyes can carry. “You do know he is not a good person, ne?”
“I am aware.” Zhongli nods.
“You’re also aware of everything he did.”
“Yes.”
“And you still want to go on with this?”
Zhongli nods. For a moment, his expression softens, his eyes glow warm like the sun shinning on the sand, there is a fondness to his voice that Venti hadn’t heard for a very long time.
“I find his mischievousness… endearing.”
Venti looks blankly at him.
“Well, it makes sense that the God of war is a little insane.”
The man before him laughs, deep and soft and… somehow light.
“So.” Venti starts, trying to dissipate the strange change of mood. “You’ve been here a while, no? Did you find the flower you wanted?”
“I did not look for it.”
“What?”
“I was waiting for Guizhong to send me one as a sign that I should, indeed, go look for him.”
Venti’s shoulders drop.
“Maybe this is not going to be so fun after all…”
Four hours into walking around the flower fields of Qingce Village, looking under every bush, behind every tree, a warm gust of wind breezes past them, picking up leaves and petals, and stirring the flowers until the sweet, familiar scent, directs them to what they were looking for.
Venti glares at the sky and frowns.
“You’re enjoying this, aren’t you?”
He swears he can hear Guizhong’s bubbly laughter in the wind.
*
“Master Childe, your friend came looking for you today.”
Childe, hand on the knob of his office door, turns to look at Ekaterina, confused.
“My friend?”
“Yes, the consultant from the funeral parlor.”
Childe’s stomach does a backflip and he can feel the bile rising, leaving a burning trail up his throat.
“Did he…?”
“He left something for you. It’s in your office.”
Childe turns to look at the knob he’s currently grasping and releases immediately as if it burned. He shakes his head and takes a deep breath. They haven’t seen each other in two months, it would make no sense for Zhongli to come looking for revenge now. And even if he did, he would have a approached him directly, leaving something in his office is not… not like him at all.
He grabs the knob again, takes a deep breath, turns it, and pushes the door with extreme care. He scans the room for anything strange or unfamiliar, but the object is so small, so delicate, that he almost misses it: There, in the middle of his desk, there’s a golden pot containing a single, ice-blue, glaze lily.
Carefully, he picks up the small, neatly folded note that lays on the desk next to the flower. He recognizes the writing instantly and something stirs heavily in his chest. Because of course, of course, something as stupid as a handwriting will make him nostalgic.
My dearest Childe,
I am sincerely sorry for upsetting you. It was not my intention at all.
Please, consider this flower as a gift that carries my apologies.
I would be extremely glad if you accepted them.
Zhongli.
“What the fuck.”