Archive of Our Own

Kaveh is covered in cold sweat when he jolts awake. The nightmare is already fleeing, too quick for him to grasp, but its echo carries the fading whisper of Sachin’s voice in his ear. It’s become something of a regular occurrence, in the week since the Championship and the whole debacle with the diadem.

The first few days of having his sleep disrupted had been manageable, his body too drained from the Championship to deny him a swift and largely dreamless return to bed. It’s different now that he’s rested for a few days—his mind is idle for a lack of projects, and his body is no longer worn down by exhaustion. Nor is his usual insomnia fix an option, since he’s decided to stay away from alcohol for the immediate future, as some kind of… payback for Alhaitham’s help during the tournament. It would be unseemly for him to give up on that vow less than a week after making it.

Heaving a sigh, he drags himself out of bed. He’s too restless to draw, so he abandons the option without even considering it. He doesn’t want to wake Alhaitham and earn a lecture either, which rules out stress baking or doing anything else in the common areas of the house. Do they even have ingredients for him to stress bake with? Kaveh doesn’t remember the last time either of them dropped by the market.

That’s it. Fresh air. Fresh air and a walk would be good.

Mind made up, he changes out of his sleeping attire and throws on a cadebi for good measure, before grabbing his keys and slipping out of the house.

Sumeru nights are chilly. The wind nips at his cheeks as he strolls up the slope towards the Akademiya. To say he doesn’t have a destination in mind would be a lie, though the choice is not one he makes with much conscious thought. Even as a freshman, he would gravitate towards the serenity of Razan Garden’s upper gazebos when he needed a break. Its proximity to the House of Daena made it convenient, and its location right before the Sanctuary of Surasthana ensured that few archon-fearing student couples would sneak away to the higher gazebos.

At this hour, Razan Garden will be empty.

…Or so he thinks. When he arrives at Razan Garden, his favourite gazebo is occupied by an unexpected visitor.

“...Hat Guy?”

Hat Guy looks up at his arrival, the overhead lights illuminating his face. He is alone, sitting on the specific branch of the Divine Tree that looks across Sumeru. Kaveh is well-acquainted with the view; he has sat in that exact space too many times to count, gazing all the way out to Port Ormos.

“Architect of Kshahrewar,” Hat Guy says. Kaveh, frankly, had not expected Hat Guy to recognise him at all. Although both of them were in the Championship, they hadn’t spoken to each other past the initial introductions. Despite Kaveh being awarded the championship, Hat Guy doesn’t strike him as one to care too much about the accolade.

“What a surprise to see you here,” Kaveh says, trying for a smile. “Mind if I join you?” Having some company will be a good distraction from his restless thoughts.

Hat Guy shrugs and makes no move to offer him space, but he doesn’t do anything else either. “Do whatever you want.”

“Couldn’t sleep?” Kaveh asks, settling himself on the far side of the branch.

“Something like that,” Hat Guy shrugs again, looking out through the opening in the Divine Tree’s bark.

They sit in awkward silence for a while, long enough that Kaveh is beginning to think that it was a mistake to join Hat Guy. They’re not well-acquainted, and the other man clearly likes his own space. It was preposterous of Kaveh to intrude.

He’s surprised when Hat Guy is the one to break the silence. “How are your injuries?”

Injuries? Kaveh blinks. Hat Guy clicks his tongue. “You took a rough landing on your back during the finals, didn’t you?”

“Right,” Kaveh says dumbly. He’s nearly forgotten about it—he’d gone to the Bimarstan right after the final round at Tighnari’s behest to have it treated. Then the nightmares had started and distracted him from most of the physical pain. “Yeah. It’s recovering well. Some bruising, but it’ll pass.”

Hat Guy’s face is warped into a grimace when Kaveh glances at him. Right. Kaveh thinks back to the blur of the final round. Madam Faruzan’s runaway polyhedron that had sent him flailing through the air, until an also-airborne Hat Guy knocked it out of his hands so that he was back on the ground. Grabbing the diadem with Mehrak, then the subsequent collision of the diadem, Mehrak and himself. The diadem… Realisation slides into place. Hat Guy had been holding the diadem, and Kaveh had seized it while Hat Guy was helping him.

Something sick twists in his stomach, like a blunt knife. How had he not thought about this before? His attention had been so focused on Sachin’s voice inside his head that he’d overlooked all of the events that led up to it.

“You saved me during the tournament,” he says. “I should be thanking you. And apologising.”

Hat Guy stares at him like he’s out of his mind. “What?”

“You saved me, and I took the win from you,” Kaveh says. Guilt weighs heavy on his heart. He suddenly regrets leaving the house at all. It had taken him so long to thank Hat Guy. Worse, it had taken him so long to apologise. “And it didn’t occur to me until… right now.”

Hat Guy rolls his eyes. Hard.

“Are you seriously throwing a pity party here?” he says. “I’d have gotten back that crown if it mattered that much.”

The man they call the Light of Kshahrewar is unbelievable. Man gets blasted in the side with a gust of Anemo, gets a gut punch from a possessed diadem, then promptly gets possessed by said diadem. And yet the first thing he thinks of is how he’s taken the win from the wanderer, instead of blaming him for his injuries?

The wanderer had been doubtful of the man at first, when Buer issued him his mission. Oh, Hat Guy, go babysit a bunch of mortals and keep an eye out for the Kshahrewar representative, would you?

The last time he interacted with anyone from that school was the Doctor. So pardon the wanderer for not having a favourable opinion of its alumni.

As it turns out, Buer was right and the Kshahrewar representative is nothing like the Doctor. In fact, they could well be the two people furthest apart in personality and attitude that the wanderer has ever seen.

And said Kshahrewar representative is now here apologising to and thanking him in the same breath. The wanderer has no frame of reference for this. Nobody has ever apologised for taking something from him. And certainly nobody has ever thanked him for something as absurd as saving them.

He’s a destroyer; it’s in his name—it was. Saving people isn’t in his nature.

“Look,” he attempts with as much neutrality as possible. If he’s too harsh, the man might just start apologising all over again and the wanderer absolutely does not want that. “You don’t owe me anything. I wasn’t there to win, so you didn’t take anything from me.”

The man is watching him intently now, and the wanderer regrets having said so much.

“You didn’t seem very interested in the results of the championship,” the man says. “But you don’t look the type who would take part simply because your Darshan nominated you.”

What an astute observation. The wanderer wants to snort out loud. He can’t possibly say that he was there under Buer’s orders now, can he?

“So it must have meant something to you, to have joined it anyway,” the man continues musing, more to himself than to the wanderer. “Tighnari joined because he wanted to promote his lectures. Did you achieve what you were there for?”

To keep you safe from a phantom of the past that you saved yourself from? The wanderer thinks in wordless answer, but he finds himself considering the question seriously. What did he get out of the entire spectacle, besides upholding his agreement with Buer?

The memory of Sachin washes over him in waves. He’d held the diadem for as long as he could, ensuring it was out of reach of the humans, and he’d felt it all. Despair at the state of the world. Anger at humans and their selfishness. Despondency at the helplessness of a singular human. The wanderer had understood. Those thoughts and feelings were no stranger to him; he had thought them for years upon decades upon centuries. The world was full of hurt and cruelty, far beyond any one individual’s control.

But that wasn’t all. He got to witness the agonising, foolish selflessness of mortal hearts up close. The Kshahrewar representative, with his unnecessary mercy to the desert foxes, and his stubborn pride that threw a lifetime’s fortune and a man’s lifetime of despair into shards on the ground. The Grand Scribe, embarking on such an arduous undertaking with all its toils, for nothing more than his roommate’s peace of mind. The wanderer has not forgotten the look in the Grand Scribe’s eyes when they crossed paths at the ruins of Vissudha. He worked with the other man before when he still held his role as Acting Grand Sage, and… that look in his eyes was not one he recognised.

Is that what kindness means? Is that what humanity entails? Is that what Buer had wanted him to see, when she sent him to the Championship?

“You could say so,” he says without elaborating. “Did you?”

Perhaps that’s cruel, even for him. He’d heard about the man’s plans to use the prize money and move out, which have clearly gone up in smoke.

It doesn’t seem to bother the man. He leans back against the branch they’re seated on and taps his chin thoughtfully, his golden hair falling around to frame his face.

“Not what I expected, I suppose,” he says, and the smile that he curves his lips into is strangely sad around the edges. “But I got answers I didn’t think I would ever learn. Life’s like that, though. There’s always something unexpected, isn’t there?”

“Hm,” the wanderer answers. Rich, coming from the most unexpected variable of this whole experience.

Kaveh wakes up to find himself in his own bed the next day, with no memory of how he’d returned. All he remembers is a discussion about nocturnal creatures that was sparked by a stray firefly (thanks, Cyno) and convincing Hat Guy to let Kaveh treat him a meal as thanks for the help during the Championship (Hat Guy had grumbled and groaned about it, but he’d ultimately given in. Kaveh remembers the small, warm curl of satisfaction in his chest.).

Alhaitham levels him an odd look when he asks, and says that Hat Guy had knocked on their door in the morning with Kaveh asleep on his shoulder. How did Hat Guy know he lives here?!

The man is an enigma in many ways. Kaveh has heard of him—the rising star of a Vahumana in slow decline—but he knows close to nothing of him beyond their conversation last night. It was as if he had simply appeared in Sumeru one day and stayed, with no traces of where he’d come from. There is no way Kaveh would not have noticed him before, with his obvious Inazuman heritage, sharp tongue, and fair appearance. Kaveh would have remembered him; of this he is certain.

In any case, learning more about Hat Guy is something that he intends to rectify as soon as possible, and so he finds himself tearing through the papers that the man has written. They are all centred around Inazuma and span an impressive range, from historical incidents to sociopolitical observations.

What strikes him as curious, though, is the tone of Hat Guy’s writing. He’s brusque with his analyses and terrifyingly thorough, but his papers aren’t written in the traditional academic style. From Kaveh’s past experience as an adjunct lecturer, this usually points to a lack of formal academic exposure. Yet his degree of eloquence in presenting his arguments, and the level of detail in each of his points… Few scholars, no matter how passionate about their subject, manage to convey such strong feelings in their papers.

Which brings him back to the initial question: Who is Hat Guy, and where did he come from?

At least this is a start, Kaveh decides as he sets down the last paper he’s reading. The next time they meet, he’ll have some conversation topics prepared.

This is absurd, the wanderer tells himself as he sits down at the table that the Kshahrewar architect has dragged him to. At least this spot is conveniently hidden behind a pillar on the second floor of the cafe they're in, giving them some semblance of space from the rest of the customers.

He doesn't even know why he'd let himself be talked into this. The architect was half asleep when he'd gotten it into his head that he definitely wanted to treat the wanderer to a meal as thanks or whatever. The wanderer had been fully awake, he could have turned him down if he'd tried.

It's even more of an annoyance that the architect had remembered this agreement at all. Weren't mortals supposed to be more forgetful right before they fell asleep? The architect had literally fallen asleep right after the wanderer gave in. On his shoulder!

Ridiculous. And then he'd somehow managed to locate the wanderer and dragged him here. The nerve!

Maybe you don't mind as much as you think, a traitorous voice that sounds disturbingly like Buer's says in his head. He mentally swats it away.

"Drinks?" the architect asks, oblivious to the wanderer's inner dialogue. "Any dietary preferences?"

"Tea, as bitter as they make it," the wanderer says. "Food's whatever, I don't know what's good."

He finds out a moment later that that is the wrong thing to say, because the architect perks up. "Right, you've probably not tried a ton of Sumerian food. Time to fix that!"

The architect proceeds to wave down a server and orders, alongside the wanderer's bitter tea, what seems like enough food to feed a small army.

They are only two people, and the wanderer doesn't even have a real stomach. Or much of an appetite, for that matter.

He points this logistical disparity out to the architect, who merely waves it off as their food arrives, plates and goblets covering every inch of their table. "We can pack the leftovers to go," he says. "I want to find out which Sumerian foods you like. And this is my way of thanking you, so eat up."

The wanderer bites his tongue. What does this even matter. Who am I for you to care?

"What's your favourite Inazuman dish, anyway? The one thing you'd recommend to anyone who visits?"

"Unagi chazuke." The real answer is a meal that no longer can be eaten, swallowed up by the flames of Tatarasuna.

"Oh, I've heard of that. It's a traditional home dish in Inazuma, isn't it?" the architect asks, gaze drifting over the wanderer's face. He's being observed. "It does sound like something you'd like. Can't be easy to find around here, though."

The wanderer shrugs and busies himself with his food. He can make it himself if he's so inclined, though it usually involves a fair bit of ingredient substitution.

"I read your papers, by the way," the architect continues, paying no heed to the wanderer's silence. That catches the wanderer by surprise, his head whipping up to gawk at the architect.

"What for?"

"Do I need a reason to read a peer's work for anything more than knowledge itself?" the architect grins, cupping his face with his palm as he stirs idly at his drink.

The wanderer rolls his eyes, but in the hollow space where his heart should be, something trembles on the knife-edge of anticipation. What did the architect think of what he'd read? It's not like his opinion matters, but… The wanderer wants to know.

"Anyway," the architect continues with a smile, as if he knows exactly what the wanderer is thinking. “I was reading your commentary on how the multipurpose workshops of Tatarasuna contributed to…”

Somehow, these encounters with the architect continue. If anything, they increase.

They start when the architect chances upon him in the secluded alcove of the House of Daena where he’s taken to doing his work when Buer has no need of him.

As a being created in the pursuit of eternity, the wanderer is a creature of habit. Or so he reasons, when he does not change his favoured working location despite the architect knowing where it is.

When the architect asks to join him in his alcove, the wanderer doesn't tell him not to. It would be too much effort to protest, because he’s found out the hard way that the architect is annoyingly stubborn when he wants to be. He learns that the architect has terrible posture, hunching and slouching as he bends over his blueprints. The wanderer jabs him in the back where it hurts. The architect protests but sits up straighter.

It's not a regular thing, until it is.

Then the architect seems to take it upon himself to start bringing him food. It starts off small, with extra samosas or salads that he claims are “left over from lunch prep and would be a waste to throw away since I can’t finish them all by myself”. Then it turns into snacks, from walnut cookies to saffron syrup cakes that he offers to the wanderer when he shows up at the House of Daena.

One day, the architect comes bustling in with a wide grin on his face, holding a meal box and what looks like a takeout cup of the wanderer’s usual tea. The wanderer stares at him in suspicion, wary of whatever he might be plotting.

“Good, you’re here! I finally did it!” the architect says as he pushes the meal box and cup into the wanderer’s hands. “Here, try this.”

The way the architect says it, like he’d never considered the wanderer being anywhere else, makes the wanderer vaguely wonder what he would have done if he wasn’t here today. If he had, on some whim, decided to head off on some patrol, or if Buer had assigned him some task.

Opening the box with trepidation, he finds six pastries covered with green icing. As far as first impressions go, they remind him of Inazuman gyoza with a very different shell.

“They go well with tea,” the architect says, shooting a pointed look at the takeout cup he’s offered. “Try it.”

He’s right. The pastry tastes like cinnamon and nuts, with a trace of sugar and something spicy. Even though the wanderer hates sweet food, the balance of flavours in the pastry isn’t cloying and washes down well with the tea.

“What do you think?” the architect asks eagerly. Just like he had during that first meal they shared at the cafe, he’s been observing the wanderer all this time. It makes the wanderer’s skin crawl with unwanted memories of having all of his responses and reactions catalogued.

“What am I, your pet experiment for food?”

The architect’s face falls. “Did you not like it?”

“I’m asking why you’re so dead set on giving me food,” the wanderer says. He averts his eyes, unable to look at the architect’s crestfallen expression.

“I thought it would be nice to find out what kind of local foods you like,” the architect says. “It’s got to be pretty scary, being this far from home and not having any food you’re used to. But if it bothers you, I’ll stop. I didn’t mean to make you uncomfortable.”

Why does he have to phrase it like that? Home? The wanderer doesn’t have one. By now, he’s spent more of his life outside of his birthplace than he has inside of it.

But the architect had made this for him. When was the last time anyone made food for him?

“What’s it called?” he asks gruffly, jerking his head towards the box of pastries. The architect perks up again.

“We call it qottab,” he says. “It can get pretty sweet if you order it outside, but I used less sugar since I know you’re not fond of sweet things—”

How had he known? The wanderer has never told him anything about his dislike for sweet food. It wasn’t like the architect had given him many sweet things to try since the baklava he hadn’t been able to stomach. He’d ended up bringing it back for Buer with some poorly-made excuse; she, on the other hand, had loved it.

“—Anyway, I thought you might like it since we pair it with tea. I’ve been trying for a few days to figure out a good thickness for the dough so it doesn’t tear the moment I fold it.”

There it is again. The architect says it as though he’s talking about the weather—the sky is blue, the grass is green, he’d made this for him, knowing what he liked.

As if it’s that easy. It never is.

“It’s acceptable,” he says, looking away. The words feel clumsy on his tongue. It’s a foreign sensation. He wants to rip the feeling out of his throat like a weed. “Goes fine with the tea. Add less sugar next time.”

He ducks his head under the shadow of his hat to avoid the weight of the architect’s smile.

Kaveh sniffles as he trudges northwards in the direction of Sumeru City. It's pouring, one of Sumeru's torrential showers, and the ground is waterlogged.

He'd seen a mādar in thin clothes taking shelter under one of the caves near Pardis Dhyai earlier. She had been caught by the rain when she went for her daily walk, and was waiting for it to stop.

Everyone knows it’s dangerous to be out in the wilderness past dusk without a Vision, much less for someone of her age. If he weren’t in a rush to return to Sumeru City, Kaveh would have walked her to Pardis Dhyai. Instead, he had given her his umbrella, and watched her leave with it in the opposite direction.

The raindrops lash harshly at his cheeks and every exposed inch of skin. He hopes that mādar has made her way to safety by now. She said she ran a fruit stall in Port Ormos; maybe he can pay her a visit the next time he's there for work.

Alas, Alhaitham is absolutely going to kick up a fuss when he gets home and soaks the wooden floors, but it's not the first time he's returned home like this. It's nothing new. So he's musing as he arrives at the Vimara Basin, where he needs to cross the river.

But the Vimara River is swollen, and it would be plain foolish to attempt a crossing without any aids like his umbrella. Kaveh sighs. Just his luck. He probably won't be able to make it back to Sumeru City tonight. Maybe he should have gone with the mādar to Pardis Dhyai to wait out the storm. He's about to turn back in the direction of Vimara Village, when he senses a presence descend next to him.

Before he can use Mehrak to deflect his ambusher, there's a hiss in his ear. "Are you stupid?"

Hat Guy.

"Fancy seeing you here," Kaveh says, and attempts a wan smile. He must look like a bedraggled river rat.

"You really are stupid," Hat Guy says. "Why the hell are you out here without an umbrella?"

"I gave it to a mādar who was caught in the rain," Kaveh says. "She needed it more than me."

Hat Guy looks like he's about to make another biting remark, but it never comes. What he does is to grab Kaveh's soaked collar and, without any warning, yank both of them airborne.

"What are you doing?!" Kaveh flails, suddenly terrified. He's used to gliding, not being held stationary midair by his limp shirt collar.

"Stop moving unless you want me to drop you," Hat Guy snarls, his grip shockingly firm for his slight frame. Kaveh stops struggling immediately, because Hat Guy certainly seems the kind to make good on the threat.

Then Hat Guy is speeding them across the river, down familiar dirt (now muddy ones) roads, and they're in front of the entrance to Sumeru City.

"Do you have no sense of self-preservation?” Hat Guy says as he drops Kaveh unceremoniously onto the gravel path.

Kaveh has to hold back a laugh. Alhaitham asked the same of him multiple times. It's not like he wants to be this way on purpose. But how else is he supposed to live, when he's never known any other way?

He keeps the thought to himself. There's a large wet patch on Hat Guy’s pristine clothes where he'd held on to Kaveh. The other is still scowling at him, which curbs the apology on the tip of Kaveh's tongue.

"A word of advice," he says, his arms crossed over his chest. "Use that brain of yours to think of the people who care about you, before you do stupid shit like that again."

Kaveh can only gape dumbly as the other man disappears in a rush of Anemo. He hadn't even had the chance to thank him.

Despite everything, Hat Guy is kind. The knowledge settles warmly in Kaveh's chest as he makes his way home in the freezing rain.

It isn't until later, when he's taken a hot shower and dried off, that he wonders how Hat Guy had found him there.

The encounter in the rain ends up becoming the catalyst that draws the wanderer’s attention to the architect’s seemingly bottomless well of… niceness. There’s an inclination towards generosity that extends beyond physical gifts to include his time and attention. Scholars frequently approach the architect when he appears in the House of Daena, all wide-eyed and nervous. No matter how busy he is, the architect never turns them away. Sometimes he joins them at their desks, writing on their notes; other times he beams and promises to follow up on their questions when he’s had time to look into it himself.

“He’s so nice,” some of the people he helps gush afterwards. “He’s super kind and always willing to help!”

At first glance, it’s easy to see how the architect’s actions look like kindness.

But after finding the architect in front of a bursting Vimara River without an umbrella and looking as though he was ready to step into its rushing waters, the wanderer is swiftly approaching the conclusion that there’s more to the architect’s kindness than it seems. Something more insidious—something more destructive that borders on martyrdom.

It’s… disturbing. Unnatural. It’s as if the architect doesn’t ever say no. Doesn’t ever turn his back on anyone. Maybe he doesn’t even know how to—only knows to give, and give, and give, and smile through it all.

He can’t help but wonder if one day the architect will end up giving all of himself away, and leave behind nothing but an empty husk.

It is a vile thought to consider.

He arrives at his usual table one day to find a bag of trinkets on it. The architect is definitely in the area, from the way his items are spread out on the table, but his person is nowhere in sight.

Curiosity piqued, the wanderer takes a look at the assortment of items inside. Among them are a keychain in the shape of a Liyue-style lantern, a small clay figurine that vaguely resembles a cat, and a cheap-looking paperweight.

The wanderer furrows his brow in confusion, but pushes the bag to the side. The architect can explain when he returns.

It’s a whole two hours later that the architect returns. He looks frazzled, but the stress lines on his face disappear when he grins at the wanderer and sinks into his own chair. “Hey.”

Something about his smile doesn’t seem right—it looks practised and wrong.

"Kshahrewar," he says in greeting. "What is the meaning of this?"

"Archons, you sound like Alhaitham when you call me that," the architect groans, picking up his pen. "I know you go by Hat Guy, but isn't it about time you start calling me by name?"

"Kaveh," the wanderer amends, feeling the way the name fits in his mouth and deciding he quite likes the shape of it. He tips his head towards the bag on the table, and repeats himself. “What’s that?”

Kaveh’s free hand tears into his hair. “I was stopped by a child when I went to the Grand Bazaar today. She was selling these… what did she call them, grab bags to raise money for her family.”

The wanderer raises an eyebrow. “What’s wrong with her family?”

“Father walked out on them, mother’s out of work. She has a younger sibling who’s seriously ill and needs medication, so she sells these grab bags in between her classes at school.”

“How much was one?”

The figure Kaveh quotes him makes even the wanderer wince. The items within the bag very obviously don’t come close to a fraction of that price.

All things considered, it is a plausible tale of poverty. Or so it would be, if they weren’t in Sumeru. In some ironic joke Buer had decided to play, the wanderer was the one to oversee the redevelopment of the family support policies. This girl would have the model family for receiving financial and social support from said policy.

The key phrase being, would. This smells like some kind of illegal syndicate that’s using children as its cover. The wanderer makes a note to himself to bring this up to Buer when he can. Maybe she’ll get the matra to look into it.

“You’re wearing the same look that Alhaitham does when he wants to comment on my spending habits,” Kaveh says. He’s placed his pen down now, his mouth set in a firm line. “I don’t think I want to hear it.”

“Did she tell you where they were from?”

“Liyue.” Kaveh shoots him a defiant look, as though daring the wanderer to challenge him.

“How did she get access to such a range of mass-produced items from Liyue, if she’s only a child?”

Kaveh glares at him. “Does it matter?”

The answer that surfaces first in the wanderer’s is that yes, it does.

“Why would you buy it from her even if you knew something was wrong?” He doesn’t know why he’s so bothered by this. What Kaveh does with his finances is none of his business. But Kaveh’s financial situation was almost the entire reason why he’d joined the Championship. Nothing about what Kaveh is doing with his money makes sense.

“Was I supposed to assume that she was lying?” Kaveh retorts. “For all I know, she might be telling the truth and her sister could be on her deathbed! What if I was the only one to buy anything from her today, and that money could help her feed her family for another day? How could I live with myself if I didn’t do something to help her when I could?”

Ah.

The wanderer is beginning to understand. To Kaveh, it is not so much about helping, as it is the consequence of not helping, no matter how hypothetical that might be. Where Sachin had gazed upon the world and despaired at his helplessness, Kaveh is the opposite. Any form of help rendered, whether appropriate or not, is help regardless. It is proof that he can still do something for someone.

“Don’t lecture me on this,” Kaveh says warily.

“I’m not going to,” the wanderer answers shortly, returning his attention to his paper. “Do whatever you want.”

Mortals are so odd, and the one before him particularly so. Is such behaviour a learned consequence of the man’s own loss?

Kaveh only has himself to blame for this pickle he's found himself in. He usually informs either Alhaitham or Cyno when he has to make an impromptu trip into the desert, but neither of them had been in their offices when he left. He'd had no choice but to leave a written note on Alhaitham's desk instead.

At least his roommate, pain in the ass he may be, will know to come look for him if he isn't back when the day is over. Unfortunately, Kaveh’s current concern is whether he’ll manage to survive that long.

The trip had been going fine, as it usually does when he travels alone, up until he'd arrived at the site of the ruin collapse he'd been commissioned to inspect on short notice. It was intended to be a simple first visit to visually review the structural damage, before he made his way back to Aaru Village.

He hadn’t expected his arrival to stir a number of primal constructs from slumber. Then, as he was busy deactivating them (easier said than done when he had no electro potions on hand), the commotion made him the perfect ambush target for a group of Eremites and treasure hoarders camping in the ruins.

Well, at least that was proof that the collapse was only partial and the foundation was likely still intact—something Kaveh confirms after the group backs him into an underground chamber with a tall ceiling that seems entirely undamaged by the collapse above ground.

He’s doomed no matter what option he chooses. Doing battle with next to nothing for his element to react with puts him at an inherent disadvantage against such a large group of opponents. They have potioneers among them, who might throw some electro or hydro potions that he can take advantage of if he's lucky. That means poison, if he isn't. Fleeing doesn't increase his odds by much, since he's outnumbered and unfamiliar with the area. If he's being rational about it, surrendering would be his best chance at survival.

Perfect. He grimaces as a spear nicks his left arm, then holds up Mehrak's back as a shield to fend off another attack. Ignoring the pulsing pain, he swings his claymore at the Eremite who's engaged him in combat. Wielding a claymore one-handed is easily the worst thing he's done to his body in recent days.

He's weighing the pros and cons of holding up both hands when a voice rings out from the side of the chamber. "Started the fun already?" The laugh is mocking, but it sounds like music to Kaveh’s ears. Kaveh turns, baffled. There's no way, why would he be—

Hat Guy grins down at him, already summoning a gust of Anemo in his hand. There's a wildness to his eyes, some kind of mad fury that looks out of place on his cherubic features. "Need a hand?"

He doesn't wait for a response before launching himself into the fray, slinging swift Anemo blades at the group of men surrounding Kaveh. Kaveh wonders faintly if the air from his lungs has been concentrated in the palm of Hat Guy’s hand. He has not seen Hat Guy engaged in combat aside from the final round of the Championship, and it is now plain to see that he was hardly putting in any effort then.

Unleashed like this, Hat Guy is breathtaking to watch.

His claymore has no chance of keeping up with Hat Guy’s speed, so Kaveh busies himself with knocking out the stragglers that manage to dodge Hat Guy’s attacks as he mows through the area.

Eventually, the last few opponents who aren’t injured or unconscious make a break for it, leaving their brethren to fend for themselves. Kaveh’s lip curls at the sight, but he stays silent as he examines the carnage Hat Guy has left. Most of the men, while injured or immobilised, are merely out cold; Hat Guy had left all of them alive despite how merciless his attacks looked. It’s an astounding display of control and finesse that boggles Kaveh’s mind.

Hat Guy, who has landed on the ground, comes up to him. “Are you injured,” he asks—demands, really.

“Nothing major,” Kaveh reassures him. “Thank you for saving me.” Again. How many times does this make?

Hat Guy dismisses it with a flippant shake of his head, and turns towards the chamber’s exit. As he’s following the path Hat Guy has cut through the bodies strewn on the ground, Kaveh notices the light from the dimming torches glint off something sharp as it flies towards Hat Guy. He doesn’t have time to react—

There’s the telltale sound of something making contact with flesh. Hat Guy halts. Then he turns with a snarl and in the same movement shoots off a blast of Anemo at the culprit lying on the floor.

Blood splatters, and all is silent. Kaveh does not look back as he follows Hat Guy out.

The moon is high in the sky by the time they find an oasis and unanimously decide to stay for the night. Open as it is to the elements, it’s not ideal, but to journey across the desert at night is far more dangerous.

On the bright side, at least he’s no longer alone; despite the impromptu circumstances, Kaveh’s glad to have Hat Guy with him.

Hat Guy, who despite the snippy personality, turns out to be surprisingly cute when he frets. He demands to examine and attend to Kaveh’s injuries first, and only tends to his own when Kaveh has reassured him for the third time that he really is unscathed besides the wound on his arm and some small scrapes.

When Hat Guy rips off his arm covering and pulls out the dart that had been embedded in his arm, Kaveh has to hold back a poorly disguised wince. Hat Guy, on the other hand, doesn’t so much as flinch at the action. Even when Kaveh scoops up handfuls of cold water to pour over the wound, then slathers some medical ointment on it, he stays as still as a doll.

Kaveh moves to tear his cape off to use as a makeshift bandage, but Hat Guy waves him off. “Leave it be,” he says nonchalantly.

“It might get infected,” Kaveh argues. “They have a tendency to poison those darts. You need to keep it covered, at least.”

“I’ll bandage it later if I need to, but it’ll be fine,” Hat Guy says, an edge of impatience creeping into his voice. “What were you doing out there?”

After Kaveh has explained the whole series of events, Hat Guy merely pinches the space between his eyebrows and leans back against the tall palm tree.

“How did you know where I was?” Kaveh finally asks. The question has been niggling at him since Hat Guy first showed up in that underground chamber. Alhaitham couldn’t have known he was in trouble so soon, and Alhaitham wouldn’t have asked Hat Guy to search for Kaveh on his behalf; he would have turned to Cyno instead.

“What, you mean a Vahumana scholar isn’t allowed to go on expeditions to the ruins?” Hat Guy asks. “Think of it as a happy coincidence. Or take it as me repaying a favour, or something.”

Confused, Kaveh frowns. “You don’t owe me anything. Is this about the food I’ve been giving you? There’s nothing for you to repay. I’m the one who owes you my life.”

“Don’t bother yourself about it,” Hat Guy says, once again waving the topic away like it is an especially annoying sandfly.

Kaveh opens his mouth to protest the logic, but closes it when Hat Guy lifts his head to stare at him unimpressed. “Are you seriously going to argue with me when you’re shivering so badly?”

Truth be told, Kaveh hadn’t even noticed, but now that it has been brought to his attention, he realises how cold it is. Hat Guy heaves a sigh and, to Kaveh’s shock, tears off the long blue sleeve from his tunic, which he throws at Kaveh with clear intent. The rich material is thicker than Kaveh’s own cape.

“You are being unreasonable,” Kaveh protests. He inches closer to settle down by Hat Guy’s uninjured side, and drapes the sleeve over both of them as best as he can. Hat Guy scoffs lightly, but allows it. For how cold his words can be, his slight frame is unexpectedly warm against Kaveh.

“I’ll take the first watch,” Kaveh tells him. “Because I know you’ll give me the entire sleeve the moment I fall asleep.”

That drags a loud snort out of Hat Guy. “You think you know me so well,” he says, amusement palpable in his voice.

“I’d like to think I know you better than most by now,” Kaveh says honestly. “I’ll wake you up later, so get some rest.”

Obviously, the wanderer doesn’t need to sleep. He merely closes his eyes in mimicry and takes the chance to listen to the sound of Kaveh’s breathing. It feels like a sin, indulging in something he is not allowed to have. But this whole trip has been an indulgence for him, a passing fancy sparked when he saw Kaveh enter the Grand Scribe’s office with a slip of paper and leave in a rush. He doesn’t want to think about the kind of impulse that led him to follow the man into the desert, doesn’t want to identify the bile that rises in his throat at the thought of almost being too late once again.

This time, he’d made it. Kaveh is safe. The wanderer repeats it to himself like a mantra inside his head. Kaveh is safe. He is alive.

If he focuses on the steady rhythm of Kaveh’s heartbeat, maybe he can ignore the burning sensation radiating from his arm.

They arrive at Aaru Village early the next morning, where Kaveh asks Candace to send a message onwards to Alhaitham. They have breakfast with her and Uncle Anpu (mainly Kaveh; Hat Guy is, as usual, reticent and focused on his food) before bidding them farewell to make their way onwards to Caravan Ribat. With luck, they’ll arrive in Sumeru City by the end of the day.

Luck runs out before they get there.

More accurately, Hat Guy’s body gives out.

Kaveh wants to say that it was his fault: that he hadn’t made sure Hat Guy wasn’t running a fever, that his wound wasn’t infected, that he was fine. But the truth is that he had checked, multiple times. From when he woke up before dawn at the oasis, to when they arrived in Aaru Village, to when they left. Hat Guy’s temperature had been regular; he had moved normally and finished all of his breakfast. He had seemed as fine as he could physically be.

There was no way he could have foreseen Hat Guy collapsing right outside the entrance to Caravan Ribat, nor the way he would collapse, like a puppet with all its strings cut, a crumpled pile of blue and white falling in the gusts of sand and dust.

For an awful, fleeting moment, Kaveh can't move. He stares at Hat Guy’s limp, unmoving form, and thinks: he can’t let the desert take anyone else he loves.

Kaveh half-drags, half-carries Hat Guy into a hastily booked room at Caravan Ribat’s hotel, and is about to rush back out in search of a doctor when a weak voice from the bed stops him.

“Don’t,” Hat Guy rasps. “Don’t get a doctor. I’ll tell you what to do. Just. Don’t get a doctor.”

A beat of silence.

“Please.”

Of all things, that is what makes Kaveh freeze. Hat Guy, with his insurmountable pride, saying please?

Turned away from him, there’s a deathlike pallor to Hat Guy’s face that makes it look bloodless. In spite of the state of his body, his jaw is clenched, as are his fists.

Kaveh takes a deep breath. In, out, in, out. “Okay,” he says. “Okay. No doctors. Okay. But if I can’t help you, I’ll have to. Forgive me if it comes to that.”

Hat Guy tilts his head to look at Kaveh, eyes terrifyingly bright with the fever he’s burning up with. The corners of his mouth twitch mirthlessly. “You will,” he says. “You’re from Kshahrewar.”

It’s a good few hours later by the time Kaveh is done. Hat Guy was right and he hadn’t had to call a doctor. Though he seemed to be in a daze for most of it, Hat Guy had managed to give him instructions on removing his… chest plate. The rest of it was instinctive for Kaveh, terrifyingly so: there was a mass obstructing part of Hat Guy’s inner mechanisms, where his system had presumably identified and isolated the poison in his body with something like a clot. Not dissimilar to the workings of the human immune system.

All Kaveh had to do was to extract the clot from Hat Guy’s body. A simple task, though Kaveh did find it curious how the clot had grown so big; the self-regulatory mechanism in his chest cavity should have been able to handle it without overheating as much as it had. Hat Guy had heaved a sigh of relief once he was done, and slid into unconsciousness.

But therein lies the problem. Kaveh stares at the man, who he’s tucked in under the blankets to keep warm despite his fever having long broken.

Chest plate that blends seamlessly into the rest of his body. Self-regulatory inner mechanisms.

Hat Guy is a puppet. Of Inazuman origin. A magnificently crafted one that must have been in existence for centuries, at least. Some of the elaborate mechanisms inside Hat Guy’s body are long-defunct—Kaveh has only ever seen them in his History of Inazuman Machinery textbooks and papers back at the Akademiya.

It’s as if the last piece of the puzzle has slid into place, the answer to all of Kaveh’s unasked questions. All of Hat Guy’s papers—they weren’t theories or conjectures; they were more than likely his lived experiences. He was writing papers about his life story.

The room is dark but for a small oil lamp on the wall when the wanderer comes to. His body feels… better. Of course Kaveh had figured out how to fix him once he understood what was wrong.

He was a fool. In the end, his body was still too fragile to be anything but weak. So much for overriding the temperature regulators so that he could feign normalcy and keep Kaveh from worrying. It had broken down worse than it should have, and all his lies had come crashing down.

The wanderer feels like throwing up. Has Kaveh left him behind here, now that he knows the truth about him? Is that why he’s woken up alone?

He clenches his fists in the blanket Kaveh has laid over him, like a death shroud over a corpse. How had he gone and made the same mistake yet again? He should know better. How many times would he let a mortal so close? Mortals were nothing but trouble. They meant nothing but hurt would follow. They would never stay once they discovered the ugly truth was not what they wanted it to be.

Why had he expected Kaveh to be any different?

The door clicks, a sliver of light appearing from the doorway as it eases open. The wanderer narrowly avoids sending a blast of Anemo at the intruder before he identifies them.

Kaveh.

“Ah, you’re awake,” Kaveh says. There’s rustling as he sets something down and flicks on the standing lamp. The light that fills the room catches on his hair, blinding even to the wanderer’s inhuman eyes. “I went to get food.”

He crosses the room in two strides, and the wanderer notices then the chair that had been pulled up next to the bed. “Can I check your temperature?” Kaveh asks quietly, the same way he had when they were in the desert. As though the wanderer’s body were something to be respected, as though the wanderer’s opinion on it mattered at all. The Doctor had never cared enough to ask.

“Whatever.”

Kaveh is frowning even before he places his hand on the wanderer’s forehead. His touch is cool, and the wanderer has to restrain himself from seeking it out. He’s not forcibly regulating his body temperature any more. There is no reason for Kaveh to look at him with such wariness—

There is.

There is.

There is.

It’s only natural that he be looked at like that by a human. Tatarasuna had taught him that already. He’s not human. Will never be human. Can never be human. Why does he never learn?

“...Hat Guy?” Kaveh’s voice filters back into his consciousness, the frown now morphed into some twisted, ugly thing that doesn’t suit his features. He feels his hand be grasped, pulled away from himself and placed onto something warm. Something rises and falls underneath his fingertips. “Hey, breathe with me, Hat Guy.”

Ironically, that drags him slightly back to the surface.

“Breathe?” the wanderer sneers. “I don’t need to breathe. You should know that now, Kshahrewar.”

If Kaveh flinches, he doesn’t show it. His fingers around the wanderer’s wrist tighten instead. “You’re my friend. I don’t like to see my friends in pain. Here… in, out, in, out…”

Loathe as he is to admit it, the breathing helps.

He blinks to find Kaveh peering at him, so close that he could count the other’s lashes.

“Better?” Kaveh asks.

The wanderer’s mouth twitches unhappily in lieu of an answer.

“Is this about me learning that you’re not a human?” Kaveh asks, so tenderly that it makes the wanderer want to wrap his hands around Kaveh’s throat and choke him, make him shut up, stop talking—

“I understand why you didn’t want me to find out,” Kaveh says. “And I’m sorry I did, but this isn’t changing anything. You’re Hat Guy. You’re my friend. This doesn’t make me think any differently about you.”

He runs a thumb over the wanderer’s hand, the motion almost absentminded—why is his hand still in Kaveh’s, the wanderer wonders in barely suppressed horror. “You run warm in the desert nights. You tear off your own sleeve to keep me warm. You like bitter tea and hate sweets, but you like eating bastani when the weather gets hot. You don’t chase off the finches when they land on your hat. You kick me under the table when I distract you while you’re working. You bleed, you hurt, you laugh, and you fear. I don’t see how any of that makes you any different from me, or anyone else.”

What is this man saying. What the hell is he saying. It’s so obvious that— that Kaveh has no idea what he’s talking about.

“You talk a big game for someone who knows nothing about me,” he snaps. Kaveh’s gaze falters at the tone. “You—”

You don’t know how it feels to have centuries of blood on your hands. You don't know how I tried to take over your god. You don’t know how it is to be unwanted by your own mother. You don’t—

“You don’t know anything about what I’ve done,” he spits, all the fire suddenly leaving him. He can’t say any of that. He isn’t allowed to. “I spent my whole existence trying to prove that I was worth something, that I wasn't a mistake." All those years, and what did they leave him with? Nothing. A failure. A god's prisoner.

Kaveh looks at him with something like understanding in his eyes. He hates the look of it. He hates the idea that Kaveh could be anything as fucked up as he is.

"My maker made me to be beautiful, but there’s nothing inside me except rot.” Not like you, not like you, not like you.

“Don't say that of yourself," Kaveh says, voice surprisingly harsh. "I don't know everything you've done, but I do know what you’ve done for me. If you've touched at least one person's life… Isn’t that enough?”

Is that enough? How is he to know? Who is holding his ledger, and who will tally the balances at the end?

“Why aren’t you afraid of me?” he asks, hating how small his voice sounds. He feels like a lost child, staring down at the red blankets and his hand in Kaveh’s. “Haven’t you ever wondered where I came from? How there’s no record of my past? I could be a mass murderer for all you know.”

To his surprise, that drags a laugh out of Kaveh. “Then it’d be up to Alhaitham and Cyno to apprehend you if something did happen to me. But you’ve shown me nothing but kindness. Whatever you’ve done in the past is over, and you’ve moved past it to be beating yourself up over it like this. I don’t think there’s anything for me to be afraid of.” He pauses, and adds, “You’re as deserving of kindness and forgiveness as anyone else.”

Aren’t they two peas in a pod? Something seizes in his chest at the irony of Kaveh's words. “So if I, potential-mass-murderer, am worthy of forgiveness, why not yourself, Light of Kshahrewar?”

That stuns Kaveh into silence, eyes wide as he stares at the wanderer. Perhaps the wanderer is being unfair, turning it on him out of the blue.

“It was never your fault,” the wanderer says, the words spilling from him as something cracks in his hollow chest. A young Kabukimono had not known that it was not his fault, had not understood that fate was beyond anyone’s control, whether mortal or god. Nobody had ever told him otherwise. The wanderer cannot tell Kabukimono that any longer, cannot save Kabukimono from the destiny he has doomed himself to. But to Kaveh, Kaveh who refuses to think ill of the world where Kunikuzushi had chosen to forsake it, he can. He will say the words he had wanted so desperately to hear, all his life.

Sachin’s voice echoes dully in his mind once more, that immeasurable anger and despair and sadness at the state of the world. Yet the man before him, not even a tenth of the wanderer’s age, had the strength and belief to not only withstand, but overcome the sheer force of it. The wanderer finds himself wholly weak in the face of him. “If you think that even I deserve your kindness, then who are you to deny it of yourself?”

Kaveh's expression crumples right before his eyes.

Something changes between them after the incident at Caravan Ribat, but Kaveh doesn’t place what it is until one weekend when he’s sketching in Alcazarzaray’s garden pavilion. A gentle breeze is stroking the faces of the cultivated padisarahs around the pavilion, and the shadow of Alcazarzaray is beginning to fall over them as the sun starts to set.

His keen focus is disrupted momentarily by movement, as a familiar presence settles on the bench next to him.

"You're here," Kaveh says, looking up to smile at his companion. In recent days it feels like Hat Guy has begun seeking him out more. They’ve been crossing paths more often—Hat Guy seems to have an uncanny knack of knowing where Kaveh is, though Kaveh isn’t sure if it’s more telling of his routine or one of Hat Guy’s quirks.

“I was passing by,” Hat Guy says by way of explanation as he leans over to peer at Kaveh’s sketch.

“The weather was good, so I decided to drop by,” Kaveh says. Despite everything, Alcazarzaray and its surroundings remain one of his favourite places in Sumeru.

“You built this place,” Hat Guy says. It’s not quite a question.

“Yeah, I’d call it my magnum opus.” Kaveh says, as he outlines the thick trunks of the Gloomy Glamour plants that run along the garden pathway. Wryly, he adds, “It cost me a lot, so to speak.”

Burnout, bankruptcy, homelessness, and a yawning chasm of grief and guilt.

“Huh,” Hat Guy says. “But you did it anyway.”

“I did,” Kaveh says. He has thought back to Alcazarzaray often, tracing the choices he had made and picking at the poorly scabbed wounds it left. Everything he had done for it was because he wanted to prove that his ideals were worth it. That he would, and could, pay any cost they demanded.

“Do you think it was stupid of me?”

“You’re asking me?” Hat Guy asks incredulously.

Kaveh pauses to glance at him meaningfully. Hat Guy holds the gaze for a moment, then looks away. “I told you, I was willing to do anything to prove myself,” Hat Guy says, voice glum. “I threw everything away, and I let things be done to me that you couldn’t even dream of in your worst nightmares.” An unhappy laugh. “All that for nothing.”

“Would you do it again, if it would succeed the next time you tried?” Kaveh asks, curiosity now piqued. “Most people don’t know this, but I failed with building Alcazarzaray the first time.”

“No,” Hat Guy says, the answer swift and cutting. “I’m not the person I was anymore.”

The tone brooks no further question, and Kaveh leaves it be. “If I had the choice,” he muses as he scrutinises his sketch one last time before setting down his reed pen, “I’d still have chosen to rebuild Alcazarzaray. I don’t think I could have lived with myself if I hadn’t.”

“Sounds like you,” Hat Guy says. He’s looking up at Alcazarzaray. Kaveh wonders what he sees.

“Recently I’ve started dreaming again,” Kaveh offers. “One day I’ll build something far bigger and grander than this. I won’t let Alcazarzaray be the only thing to my name, when it’s taken so much from me.”

Hat Guy turns to look at him then, sharp eyes boring into Kaveh’s. To Kaveh’s surprise, the corners of Hat Guy’s lip turn upwards. “Sure,” he says.

The expression throws Kaveh a little off-kilter, like something has shifted a few degrees to the left. Scrambling to regain his bearings, he fumbles for the first thing he can think of and blurts, “I’ve never asked, but now’s as good a time as any. Why ‘Hat Guy’?”

Hat Guy squints at him, the small smile (?) vanishing in a flash. At first, Kaveh thinks he’s not going to answer for how long the silence sits, but eventually Hat Guy sighs.

“For lack of a better name,” he says.

Another pregnant pause. “...I don’t have a name, if that’s what you’re asking. They called me ████, but I left that behind long ago. Someone named me Hat Guy when I came here, and it stuck.”

Mischief curls his lip again, his eyes clearly dancing. ”I’m taking suggestions, if you have any.”

Though the words are light, Kaveh hears the hesitation behind them. He quite likes this Hat Guy—he’s more expressive, and far less guarded. It reminds him of Cyno and Collei when he first met them, like a stray cat slowly warming up to a stranger.

A name, huh… “Let me think about it,” he grins.

“You’ve grown rather acquainted with Hat Guy,” Alhaitham observes apropos of nothing while they’re having dinner at home one day.

“What’s it matter to you?” Kaveh asks, feeling oddly defensive.

Alhaitham shrugs. “It’s interesting that Lesser Lord Kusanali’s assistant would spare time for anyone at all. But I suppose it’s to be expected of the Light of Kshahrewar.”

“What, are you jealous?” Kaveh retorts, before his mind catches up with Alhaitham’s words. “Wait. Go back, say that again? He’s Lesser Lord Kusanali’s what?”

“I cannot believe you never said a word of this to me,” he huffs at Hat Guy the following week. “I found out from Alhaitham of all people!”

“You never asked,” his dinner companion deadpans.

“I had no reason to!”

Looking very much like a cat that's got the cream, Hat Guy takes a sip from his cup. “Well, cat’s out of the bag. It doesn’t change anything, does it?”

Oh, the audacity of this man to use Kaveh’s words against him when he already knows the answer! “It doesn’t, but now I’ve made up my mind. You’re coming along with me for my next expedition into Khaj-Nisut to make it up to me.”

“You’re making demands of me to compensate for your own ignorance?” Hat Guy asks in disbelief, but Kaveh can read the amused quirk to his lips.

As Kaveh takes a mouthful of his rose custard, Hat Guy suddenly asks: “Why do you keep going back to the desert?”

The shift in topic is abrupt, but the unspoken question is plain as day. Why do you keep returning to the place where you lost so much?

Kaveh chews on it for a while. He’d asked that of himself too, for most of his young adult life. The calling of the cruel, endless sands that had robbed him of everything. At first it had felt like just punishment, for him to be retracing his father’s footsteps in the searing heat. He had once thought that the desert too, would swallow him like it had his father.

But recently, it’s started feeling different. Since the Championship and everything it had uncovered, visiting the desert has made him feel a little more at ease.

“It helps, I think,” he says slowly, considering his words. “Knowing what I know now of my father’s last days, and what he had set out to do… Knowing that my work there can bring about change he would have liked to see.”

Hat Guy is staring intently into his cup when Kaveh looks up at him.

“What about you?” Kaveh asks, unable to resist the question. “Will you ever return to Inazuma?”

He doesn’t get a response.

It’s past midnight by the time Kaveh makes his way out of Lambad’s. He’s only had a couple of drinks tonight, not enough to knock him out, but enough to leave him pleasantly buzzed and warm all over.

He’s humming to himself as he ambles through an empty Treasures Street, when he spots a familiar silhouette ahead of him. Hat Guy is a sight for sore eyes at such a late hour, but something about him seems… off.

Breaking into a small jog, he catches up to Hat Guy. “Evening walk?”

“You stink,” Hat Guy says, turning his nose up in disgust. Kaveh takes the chance to give him a onceover; his jaw is clenched and his shoulders are tense.

Not a great sign. Despite his generally abrasive personality, it’s rare that Hat Guy closes himself off nowadays. They’ve long moved past this. Something must have happened.

He reaches out and casually loops his arm through Hat Guy's. That Hat Guy allows it and doesn't pull away is a privilege Kaveh doesn't appreciate as much as he should. “Well, since we're both here, let’s go get some fresh air.”

"We're already outdoors," Hat Guy says, pedantic on purpose.

"Fresher," Kaveh corrects. Briskly, he marches them back through Treasures Street, past the Adventurer's Guild and the tavern, and follows the path down to the pier. The Yazadaha lighthouse gleams brightly at the very end, cutting through the pale mist that has settled over Yazadaha Pool following the evening rain.

It’s a quiet night, with only a few dhows out on the water. There are some crates scattered about the pier near the lighthouse’s entrance, so he settles himself on one and nudges Hat Guy to do the same.

“Why are we here,” Hat Guy asks, sounding more bewildered than annoyed.

“Getting fresh air,” Kaveh replies. It’s evident Hat Guy isn’t going to talk about what’s bothering him. He watches Hat Guy’s gaze linger on a sanbuk pulling into one of the distant docks, as the water’s steady rhythm is interrupted by the weight of a vessel returning to shore. Quietly, he says, “Do you know how the sailors here navigate?”

Hat Guy shakes his head. Kaveh smiles, leaning slightly towards Hat Guy so that their shoulders bump against each other. “There’s this simple device we call the kamal. They use it to keep track of their coordinates by measuring it against Celestia’s height in the sky. No matter how far out they sail, they always know how to come back.”

Perhaps it’s human nature to always be looking for ways to return safely to shore and the people they’ve left behind, Kaveh muses out loud. Whether the kamal, the compass, or the lighthouse. The thought sparks a memory of a tale the Traveller had told him about the marvellous lighthouse they saw in another world, so he tells it to Hat Guy.

“Apparently, the king who ordered for that lighthouse’s construction refused to let the architect leave his name upon his work,” Kaveh says. “He wanted to only have his own name engraved upon it so that he would be recognised as its only creator.”

“Selfish,” mutters the man beside him. Keeping his face turned away, Kaveh can’t help but smile at the snide remark.

“But I suppose us architects are prideful, no matter which world we’re in,” he continues. “He left his name on the stone foundation of the lighthouse, and covered it with a layer of plaster where he engraved the king’s name. So as time passed, the layer of plaster crumbled but the stone foundation did not, taking with it the king’s name and leaving only the architect’s behind.”

“Serves him right,” Hat Guy says blithely. "Countries are built on the backs of their people. It's a foolish leader who forgets that." Kaveh glances at him for the first time since he started talking, and is pleased to see that most of the tension has disappeared from his body.

Hat Guy meets his gaze, and flushes. “What?”

There he is. The proud and demanding Hat Guy he knows. Kaveh stares at him, helplessly drawn like a moth to flame. His eyes are glowing, his hair like liquid midnight. If Kaveh looks hard enough, he’s sure the moonlight would illuminate the band of waves around his neck.

“Thinking about how pretty you are,” he says, words leaving him in a rush. Oh… That isn’t quite what he intended to say. But it’s the truth, so he’s not going to take it back. He blinks, and tries foggily to trace how they’d ended up here. Something’s started burning in his chest, painful enough that he wishes he could rip his heart out and shove it into Hat Guy’s hands. Maybe it’s been burning all this while, but he’d grown so accustomed to its warmth that he simply never noticed.

Hat Guy chokes. “You— what are you saying—”

“You once told me your maker made you to be beautiful, but that there was nothing inside.” That day in Caravan Ribat, Hat Guy had described himself as nothing but rot. How could Kaveh ever say that? Those hands might have taken lives in the past. But they are also hands that have only protected Kaveh, time and time again. How could he ever be anything less than— “But the you I’ve known has always had a beautiful heart.”

Kaveh reaches out to cup his face. Hat Guy doesn’t pull away. He’s staring at Kaveh with wide eyes, the expression making him look infinitely young. “Blast a hole through me if I shouldn’t do this,” he murmurs. Hat Guy would do it, if he wanted to.

But Hat Guy doesn’t. Affection blazing through his veins, Kaveh slides his hand back to cradle Hat Guy’s head, and presses their lips together.

The wounded noise that emerges from the wanderer’s throat is more instinct than conscious response. His head is reeling. One moment he was thinking to himself how he would listen to Kaveh tell stories for as long as he could, the next moment Kaveh was saying all of that— and then he was—

Kissing him.

Kaveh tastes like liquor and ajilenakh nuts. And he is so warm that the wanderer thinks he could burn up together with him.

Then it’s suddenly cold, and the wanderer realises that Kaveh has pulled away, concern written over his features.

“You’re crying,” Kaveh says. “I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have—”

Stunned, the wanderer touches his hand to his own face to find that Kaveh is right. Tears are flowing from his eyes. Why? Why is he crying?

Forget that. Why is it so cold? Why is Kaveh not here—

He rubs roughly at his tears, knowing it is futile but too proud to admit otherwise, and yanks Kaveh back to himself. Kaveh falls into him without any resistance at all, his limbs falling awkwardly over the wanderer’s, crowding him against the crates. Water laps against the pillars of the pier. Kaveh’s heart beats under the palm of his hand, fluttering like the wings of a butterfly. Like this, they are not kissing so much as they are sharing breaths.

Sharing breaths. What a notion, for him who does not need to breathe.

Buer doesn’t ask him about it, though she must know. Even without mind-reading abilities, it's obvious that he’s been sleeping better recently, the nightmares haunting him less, though they’ll never fully go away. All she does is to cup his cheeks gently with her small childish hands one day when he’s sitting on the ground with her. He allows it.

“Are you happy?” she asks him quietly.

Not too long ago, he would have asked her what his happiness mattered. She was his captor, and he was nothing more than her prized prisoner.

Maybe she had known something would change.

He thinks about Kaveh’s warm touch, the smiles like fleeting sunlight that Kaveh sends his way. The scratch of a reed pen on parchment in the House of Daena. The laughter of the children in the Grand Bazaar. The birds that sing in the branches above the Sanctuary. The fireflies that flit about Razan Garden. The world that has felt a tad more bearable in recent days.

Is this what they call love?

“You could say so,” he hedges. Committing to it would make it real. Would make it hurt even more when inevitably, it all ends. Maybe one day, he will be able to say it. Maybe that’s what it means to be human: to know of loss, and still choose love.

Buer smiles, and says nothing more.

“Do you want to join us for dinner tomorrow?” Kaveh asks him one day.

“Us,” the wanderer intones flatly, knowing full well the answer. Tomorrow is Kaveh's monthly dinner with the General Mahamatra, the Grand Scribe, and the Forest Watchleader. Fine company he keeps.

“You don’t have to make small talk, Alhaitham hates doing that too,” Kaveh says. It’s almost irritating how he can predict the arguments the wanderer has in mind. “But I think it’d be nice if you got to spend time with other people once in a while. And you already work closely with Cyno and Alhaitham, don’t you?”

Which is how the wanderer finds himself in a very noisy tavern, nursing his own drink as he watches the General Mahamatra make a string of bad jokes he had never thought the man capable of. The Grand Scribe demolishes Kaveh at the card game they’ve all taken such a liking to, and the Forest Watchleader somehow drinks all the others under the table.

Forget whatever he’d thought mortals were. They’re full of mysteries.

One night, their stroll brings them back to Kaveh’s favourite gazebo in Razan Garden.

Just like that night, so many moons ago, they’re settled on the same tree branch that overlooks all of Sumeru. Kaveh’s gaze drifts to the lights of Port Ormos in the distance, and the faint shadow of the arch bridge. The first time he worked on the expansion of Port Ormos, it felt surreal. That his ideas, the lines he drew on paper, the measurements he painstakingly spent days and nights calculating, would be transformed into something so large. Something so real. Something that could change people’s lives.

It feels like that now with Hat Guy next to him, their pinkies hooked loosely together. It feels unreal that all of the days that have passed have brought him here, but he knows if he pinched himself with his free hand, it would hurt.

He turns back to Hat Guy, who’s looking at him with an inscrutable expression. His nose is scrunched up, like he wants to say something. Kaveh tilts his head, but opts to carefully bring their hands together and intertwine their fingers instead.

The action seems to soothe whatever unease Hat Guy had been debating with, because he says, oddly hesitant, “I've been thinking.”

“Mm,” Kaveh murmurs.

“What do you think of a field trip to study Inazuman architecture?”

The words take a while to fully sink in. Kaveh doesn’t gasp, but it’s a damn near thing. Hat Guy is looking away, avoiding Kaveh’s eyes in that way Kaveh knows means he’s terrified of being rejected.

So Kaveh brings their linked hands up to his lips, and whispers his agreement against their knuckles. When Hat Guy faces him again, his eyes are so bright they could have been stars from the sky itself.

Unable to find words for the whirlwind of emotions threatening to choke him, Kaveh pulls him into a firm embrace. Already, he is throwing together in his mind things for them to see and do, places for them to visit. Tatarasuna, the place that Hat Guy had written about so extensively in his papers, which had clearly been of great import to him. Watatsumi Island, with its coral-dyed houses and the ancient palace in the pool that the Traveller had told him about.

More importantly, they will go to reconcile the past, and maybe, just maybe, find a name for Hat Guy along the way.

They have a whole journey ahead of them.