Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

In hindsight, this whole mess could have been avoided if Ajax had only listened to his master’s rather peaceful order to go home. 

And maybe, in another world, he would have. He’d have bowed to his master, saying no words to relay his gratitude because that’s how much she’d understood him, and went his merry way into the portal where the merciless winter of Snezhnaya would be waiting for him.

Where his family would be waiting for him, welcoming him with loving hugs and warm milk because they couldn’t afford the good cocoa sold on Saturday markets.

However, one look at his hands—the callouses that had formed from tightly gripping his sword, the scrapes on his palms, the bents in some of his fingers from how much they’d been broken—made something click in his mind.

The greedy part of him, the one that had always resided in his heart and reared its ugly head whenever he’d spot families wearing much more layers than his did, told him this:

You could have more.

Like the child he’d been, the child he still is, who’d ached for more, Ajax had believed it.

Skirk had only a second to catch the bright blue glow to the tips of his fingers before she was forced to parry his attack. 

He’d seen how her eyes had widened for a moment before they steeled into something tougher, something dangerous, and he knew then that he’d either beat her once and for all or get dragged, kicking and screaming, to the ominously-glowing portal 

Ajax might have been a tad too confident this round.

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His hands still shake from the remnants of electro.

He swears loudly, uncaring of his surroundings that were distinctly missing the one element that made Snezhnaya, well, Snezhnaya.

Snezhnaya, which he definitely isn’t at, judging by the crisp green and orange leaves of the trees littering the whole area.

Great.

His stomach rumbles.

Just fucking great.

The only thing Ajax is honestly grateful for is that it’s night, meaning that it would be easier for him to sneak through in case there were any enemies loitering the place.

Yet, to his suspicion, nothing comes by his path as he makes his trek through the eerily quiet forest. He’s five seconds away from being convinced that this might be a dream before he catches something interesting.

Something destructive.

Instinctively, his spine straightens at the scent of smoke, reminded of the time Tonia had tried cooking unsupervised and nearly burned the house down.

Before he knows it, Ajax is running towards the origin, trusting his senses to guide him. In his haste, he passes by a group of hydro slimes that he decides to spare for now. This is more important.

He comes to a stop by those annoyingly striped trees, right in front of a clearing that had definitely seen better days.

Long stretches of grasses are on fire, several patches of blackened grass here and there, and hardly anything salvageable. He notices a group of trees having been burned down with a body on the ground just a few meters away, and it takes but a few seconds for him to connect the dots.

A Pyro Vision Holder had done this. One with a vendetta, he internally claims, eyeing the utter destruction that seemed to be emotional. Or, at least, emotional because of the dead body at the side.

Were any member of his family here, Ajax would have definitely scurried along with them to somewhere safer, to somewhere with people so they could notify them of the body.

But this wasn’t Snezhnaya, where people could freeze to death if they weren’t careful, and his family wasn’t here.

He’s alone. 

Without Skirk this time.

Truly alone.

And so, because he’s alone, Ajax grabs a nearby stick. One with a pretty little flower blooming at the edge, probably days away from becoming a fruit, and goes to poke the body with it.

“Huh,” Ajax mutters, having never seen somebody like this.

For one, this person is wearing significantly fewer layers of clothing than normal that’s sadly torn at many places, but that could be attributed to the warmer climate. And two—

He’s wearing an eyepatch, what the fuck.

Curious, since the person’s dead and it’s not like he cares, he reaches out to slip his fingers underneath the blood-soaked eyepatch.

He gets the biggest fucking surprise of his life when the body’s other eye, the one that isn’t covered, opens.

For a moment, Ajax has a staring contest with the dead-but-not-really-man.

It’s only broken when the man looks away and closes his eyes.

Ajax is snapped out of his internal screaming by a rather wet cough from the man.

As he waits for the man to obviously ask him for help that he could cash in later, Ajax inspects the man’s current condition. 

Yeah, he nods his head, proud of his original assessment. Somebody was trying to kill him.

Splotches of blue settling into purple are covering what skin that isn’t bleeding or, Ajax whistles lowly, burned. It doesn’t take a genius to figure out that whoever left the nasty burn mark on most of the man’s lower torso had been out to hurt. 

Ajax can hardly perceive the slow rise and fall of the man’s chest, but he waits a few more minutes for the man to say anything.

“You’re going to die,” Ajax informs him, in case he didn’t notice. When the man doesn’t respond, he picks up his stick and pokes him right on the burn mark. “Hey.”

At the third poke, the man opens his eye. 

Ajax pokes him again.

“...Ow,” is the only word that comes out of the bastard’s mouth and makes no move to talk more.

Ajax’s brow twitches.

“You’re dying,” he makes sure to put emphasis on the word, but the man only blinks languidly at him. 

Oh, Tsaritsa, Ajax thinks, getting up from his crouch because clearly, there’s no use helping him. 

It’s already too late, after all. 

He moves to walk away, stick with a bloodied end in hand, and he’s all too intent to get the fuck out of here and back home.

Already several steps back into the trees, Ajax stops.

He re-evaluates his situation—what he has on right now, and what opportunities he can take.

He turns around and walks right back to the injured man.

Dammit, dammit, dammit. 

Chapter Text

There are times that Ajax can’t help but pat himself on the back for a damn good job.

This is one such time, no matter how much the one-eyed bastard looks at him all apathetically with the gaze of someone who’s clearly seen other people do better.

“This’ll hold until I get you to a proper healer.” Ajax wipes his sticky and slimy hands on the bastard’s clothes, or at least what was left of it, after having applied it to the pretty impressive burn wounds. “We’re lucky there were hydro slimes nearby.”

One eye stares at him. Ajax gets the feeling this man doesn’t really appreciate having what remained of dead slimes on him, and he ignores it. 

Slime essence, after all, has an anaesthetic effect and Skirk had taught him how to apply it when he’d once gotten into a fight with a group of Pyro Abyss Mages.

“Can you stand?” Ajax asks, raising his brows. 

Like an uncooperative two-year old, the bastard turns his face away.

So you wanna play it like this, Ajax thinks, a none too kind smile slipping on his lips. 

Normally, in the face of such stubbornness, Ajax would have drawn out his hydro blades by now; however, he forces himself to calm down from the urge to fucking maime this bastard so hard he could never have the same amount of children his parents had.

You’re alone. Ajax unfurls his fists and, after a moment to himself, goes to try and help the bastard in standing up. Act nice. He, or at least his family, could give you some information to your current whereabouts and how far you are from Snezhnaya.

It’s the only thought that consoles him.

The sorry bastard is, to his advantage, light for his build and so it’s hardly a bother for Ajax to carry him on his back. It’s oddly reminiscent of those times when he’d be trudging back home with an entire basket of wood strapped to his back.

“Choke me, and I’ll stab you between your ribs,” Ajax warns, making sure that the man’s arms are hanging over his shoulders, before he secures his grip on the back of the man’s knees and begins to look for any sign of civilization.

It takes a while, but he eventually emerges free from the line of trees and comes across what appears to be a canyon of sorts. Fortunately, he’s above the cliffs making up a valley in between, but what catches his attention is what sits over the horizon.

A city with these large contraptions of sorts, resembling a flower whose gigantic petals appear to...rotate?

Huh.

This definitely isn’t Snezhnaya, that’s for sure. Unless there was a uniquely temperate area in Snezhnaya, but Ajax doubts it.

No land in Snezhnaya could be easy to live in.

The city is his last option, considering how far it is, but he notices what appears to be a farm with a large house to his left. Taking his chances, he moves to trek towards it, but a startlingly sharp pain to his scalp stops him.

“What?” Ajax snaps, eyes on the bastard’s other hand resting against his collarbone. 

A pathetic sound leaves the incapacitated man’s throat and this close, Ajax can feel the minute tremble of his body pressed against his back. 

“Huh.” Ajax looks back at the farm, yet he doesn’t take any more steps towards it. “Then what’s the next nearest place we can go to?” Ajax asks, honestly not expecting any answers from the man what with his track record so far.

Which is why, when the man utters a weak and hoarse, “Oppo...site direc...tion”, Ajax flinches so hard that he nearly drops the poor bastard.

Of course, he manages to catch himself before he breaks any more of the man’s bones. He has no idea just what kind of place the man is directing him to, but Ajax nods stiffly and turns on his heel.

He doesn’t bother asking any questions.

It’s none of his business, after all.

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A guttural scream rips through the dark and silent night, alerting any citizens awake at this hour of the commotion that had befallen their quaint village.

As windows began to light up from what candles had been lit, Ajax stands there at the very center of Springvale, as the sign out front had said, wondering just why did he get such a dramatic reaction.

Oh, Tsaritsa, he internally bemoans whilst the once empty clearing is gradually filled with wary adults carrying a variety of weapons, obviously eyeing the injured man on his back whose blood is seeping into the back of his clothes.

This is what Ajax gets for being nice!

“Uhhh, good evening,” he says intelligently, mustering what social skills he has left. The Abyss had made him tougher, sure, but it had done nothing for him in making friends, if his fallen opponents were anything to go by. “Can we get some help here?” He asks, cocking his head towards his almost-dead weight.

Although most of the people gathered here lower their weapons, there are still a scarce few whose grip only tightens and Ajax makes sure to keep an eye on them. 

However, his attention is momentarily caught by a man with an impressive moustache— non-human , Ajax takes note of the man’s cat ears—steps forward from the crowd.

By the panicked realization that settles on his face, Ajax supposes that the man must know the one on his back.

“Isn’t that Sir Kaeya?” Mr. Moustache asks, eyes as wide as his open mouth. 

“Sir Kaeya?” Ajax parrots back, blinking.

...Had he picked up somebody important?

“Young Kaeya?” An elderly woman ambles slowly away from the crowd, swatting away at the hands stopping her. Though her gait is a bit wobbly, she makes up for it in confidence as she leans in and, though Ajax can’t see, appears to sweep away the hair covering the face of the man on his back.

She inhales sharply.

“Is it him, Mrs. Paisley?” One of the young men in the crowd asks, as anxious as everyone else.

However, instead of answering him immediately, Mrs. Paisley turns to face the crowd with a look that makes them tense up.

“Somebody go prepare a cot and Davy, wake up your wife,” she orders. Then, as if it wasn’t obvious anymore, she says, “It’s Sir Kaeya.”

That seems to spur everybody into action.

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“Sorry ‘bout a while ago. We thought you were one of those pesky treasure hoarders,” Brook, one of the people who’d smartly thought to bring a knife last night, tells him as she hands him a stick of chicken-mushroom skewer that melts deliciously in his mouth. “The Knights have done well in scaring them off, but there’ll always be a few brave ones,” she says with a hum.

As much as Ajax doesn’t want to appear like an uncouth barbarian that his mother had definitely not raised, he can’t help it!

It’s been so long since he’s had normal food! 

He hardly registers the rest of Brook’s words, much too distracted with his meal.

Ajax sticks his hand out, silently asking for more, and he lights up when he gets another stick.

A soft laugh reaches his ears and he does not flush.

“You’re a hungry one, aren’t you?” Brook muses and there’s a smile on her face when he looks up. It’s a smile as warm as the chicken on his tongue. 

Ajax can’t help but feel warm on the inside as well.

“Can I ask where you’re from?” Brook’s smile only widens when he gives her a startled look. “You don’t look like you're from Monstadt,” is the answer she gives as she gestures at her hair.

It takes an embarrassingly long minute for Ajax to process her point.

Monstadt… His mind wanders off to. He can vaguely recall there being a country named that on the world map his eldest brother had brought home, but his memory fails him when he tries to remember just where it is on the map.

“Snezhnaya,” Ajax finally responds.

Brook’s eyebrows rise and Ajax’s gut drops in turn.

“Why, you’re a long ways from home then. Snezhnaya’s on the other side of the continent,” 

What.

“What.” Ajax stares at her, unable to believe it.

He still can’t bring himself to, even after she brings out a map from inside her home and shows it to him, the evidence just inches from his nose.

He makes a sound in his throat.

What the fuck, Skirk, he thinks, feeling as woozy as he did when he’d accidentally inhaled the pollen from those anemo whopperflowers in the Abyss.

Chapter Text

Ajax learns quite a number of things as he sits by the poor bastard’s bedside.

The poor bastard, which he should really stop calling him as, is actually a fancy bastard. The villagers had been surprisingly generous when he’d asked just who the man was, the elderly in particular had been quite ecstatic to regale him with stories of the man’s deeds as a “Knight of Favonius”, which is an organization that was built kind of similar to the Fatui.

From what he’s pieced together, Kaeya Alberich —fancy name to a fancy bastard—is the adopted son of a pretty wealthy family here in Monstadt. A family whose name Ajax can’t quite pronounce properly, so the family was most likely an important one too. 

Apparently, the man who’d taken Kaeya in was the head of the household. Master Crepus, a pretty easy name for Ajax, had died just yesterday, and yeah. 

Ajax understands now just why some of the villagers told him that he’d arrived at a rather precarious time despite him saving Sir Kaeya.

With a noncommittal hum, Ajax turns the two objects in his hands, smoothing his thumbs over the surfaces of what is undeniably Visions. One with a luminously blue crystal whose frost seems to seep beneath his skin, and the other a blazing red that’s just a shade darker than his blood and feels like nothing.

“If you’re wondering, the Pyro Vision belongs to the young master Diluc. He’s Master Crepus’s only son,” Draff, the man with cat ears and supposedly the head hunter of this village, supplies him with. Right in front of a recovering Kaeya who’s yet to open his eyes. “I hope the young lad is alright. He’d just turned eighteen, and already his birthday…” He doesn’t finish his sentence, a grim twist to his lips informing Ajax of what was necessary.

Ajax’s gaze is on the Pyro Vision when he asks, “Were this young master Diluc and Sir Kaeya close?” He makes sure to remember these people’s honorifics. Titles, in a way, had their own power and Ajax uses that to his own benefit.

As expected, Draff smiles fondly at Ajax for being polite then begins to weave a rather interesting tale.

A tale about two knights, practically a half to each other with how close they were, and how their deeds had brought everything and honor to the Knights of Favonius and helped the citizens sleep better at night.

Once he gets the information he needs, Ajax listens with half an ear to Draff’s stories as he wonders.

He wonders, then thinks, the thoughts mulling in his head until it forms an idea.

He quietly keeps that idea to himself. 

It wouldn’t do him any good to talk about it for now.

In a bid to change the conversation, Ajax looks back at the Cryo Vision in his hand and inquires what appears to be the obvious to him.

Yet, the response he gets from Draff makes him pause.

“Hmmmmm, I don’t know,” the man says as he rubs his chin, looking thoughtful. “This couldn’t belong to Sir Kaeya, since he didn’t have a Vision. It must belong to somebody else,” he says.

Ajax doubts that.

Cryo energy sticks to Kaeya like a second skin, unwilling to fade even as Ajax had secretly tried to mark a patch of skin that wasn’t covered in bandages with his Hydro energy. As if protective of its owner, Cryo had expelled his Hydro energy in a burst of blue that only those with Elemental Sight could see.

Newly-received or hidden is all Ajax can come up with in concern to Kaeya’s vision and stops it at there.

Though, he can’t help but mull over the irony that his Archon had blessed a Vision of her own element to the first person Ajax had stumbled upon in this...seemingly kind land.

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Nobody from the Knights of Favonius has yet to arrive, despite a messenger having been dispatched a day ago.

Ajax doubts that the travel time would be long. From what he’d seen, it would be hours at most from Springvale to the city he’d seen, but never an entire day itself.

Or maybe the messenger is a slow runner, Ajax entertains the idea. If that were the case, then he wonders about the competency of this village’s warriors.

Within that timespan, Ajax has taken a surprisingly warm bath after who knows how many months within the Abyss and has changed into a fresh set of clothes from one of the villagers who’d outgrown them. Everything he wears is gifted, aside from the torn red scarf that he keeps wrapped around his neck.

The best he’d done for it had been to allow Brook to wash it so that it didn’t smell like a used rag; even then, Ajax had taken it immediately when it stopped dropping and is currently wearing it, despite it being moist.

This scarf, after all, is Ajax’s only memento of his family.

He tightens his grip on it.

He should probably go ask what that large flower-like contraption that sits in the middle of the village is.

And maybe that weird thing that lives in the pond.

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Ajax is munching on something called a “Pile ‘Em Up” that’s really just a load of meat and cheese that could be shared with his family when he hears something.

Pausing, he flicks his gaze to the door, but no.

The sound hadn’t come from there, and it’s not like there was anybody else in the room aside from him and—

He snaps his head to Kaeya who, to his expectations, is still unconscious with not a care in the world.

Ajax stares. 

It’s unusual for him to distrust his senses who've saved him multiple times; yet, in the midst of his loud chewing and nothing happens, he wonders if perhaps he’d been hearing things.

He promptly swallows his words when he sees Kaeya’s face suddenly scrunch up, the peaceful placidness transforming into something upsetting and chaotic. He’s able to catch how Kaeya parts his lips to say one word.

“Luc…” The sheer yearning in Kaeya’s hoarse voice makes Ajax raise his brows.

Luck? Ajax thinks, curious. Is he talking about a lucky item?

He remembers his old man having one. An axe. One that he’d used to apparently scare away a hulking mitachurl when it had gotten too close to their house. 

Ajax hopes that his dad is doing alright.

At the feeling of a stare boring holes into his body, Ajax promptly snaps out of his thoughts and locks gazes with this Kaeya Alberich.

For a while, the two of them stare at each other. In that time, Ajax is able to properly see how the man’s visible eye is the same purple color as the charm that Tonia had been eyeing last he’d gone out to the market with them.

A specific detail catches his eye but he stays quiet about this.

There’s no use fighting a man at bedrest, after all.

Maybe later, he considers, fingers yearning to brandish out his hydro blades. Once more, he’s gettig that urge for a fight.

“...It’s you,” Kaeya rasps, recognizing him. 

Ajax tilts his head, but his attention is soon garnered by the front door slamming open and in walking the elderly lady, Mrs. Paisley.

“Oh, there you are, dear,” she speaks warmly to Ajax. Were it not for the heavy-looking basin full of water in her arms, Ajax assumes that she’d have patted his cheek. “I’m just here to—”

The elderly woman stares at the newly awakened Kaeya.

Ajax only catches the minute confusion, then relief, then something sad twisting the features of Kaeya’s face before it evens out into something placid.

“Mrs. Paisley,” Kaeya greets, sounding tired, but there’s a smirk that climbs up to his lips, as if it was meant to be there all along. “How have you been?”

Ajax narrows his eyes.

Though, he can’t bring himself to think any more than that when Mrs. Paisley decides to respond, dropping the basin in her hands and splashing water everywhere just so she can hurry over to Kaeya’s side.

Perturbed, Ajax stares at his soaked shoes.

Again, he gets that itch in his fingers.

Chapter Text

Were one to ask Ajax just what he was doing, the boy in question would smile and cheerfully exclaim. “Out on a stroll!” 

Were one to ask just about anybody else the same question, the response they’d give would be a shifty-eyed glance around before telling you, “He knocked the Dandelion Knight right off her horse and nearly killed her!”

If Ajax was anywhere nearby to hear this statement, he’d immediately look aghast because, him? Try to kill this person?

Why on earth would he kill off a prey with such potential?

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In hindsight, Ajax really did start off with the intention to stroll around. He’d been antsy staying cooped up within a village for so long.

After all, good food can only distract him for so long.

Ajax had been meaning to eliminate whatever slimes or Hilichurls he could find in the area, wondering if there was any difference between the species here and the ones back at home.

However, as he kneels on the forest ground behind the foliage and begins to summon his Hydro to his palms for the Geo Slimes bouncing about, Ajax is captivated by something that skirts almost quietly by the edges of his elemental vision.

Captivated, he loses control of his focus and water immediately splashes to the ground, startling his targets, but it’s no matter.

Ajax has just found better prey.

Following the trace of Anemo is an easy enough feat. He’s had time to hone his skill in that particular area of expertise, and he soon finds himself overlooking a relatively short cliff, gaze trailing off to where the glowing lilt of Anemo leads to.

Even from this distance, he’s able to discern two individuals riding horseback and seemingly in a hurry.

Yet, in spite of their urgency, Ajax can’t help the hungry grin that slides onto his lips when he sees that the thick Anemo trail belongs to one of them, the one riding a white horse.

Finally. He swallows, quickly getting into position and waiting for the opportune time. A strong opponent.

With that thought, Ajax excitedly takes a running leap off of the cliff, Hydro instinctively surging up so as to coat his legs in case he’d missed his aim.

Fortunately for him, and unfortunately for his target, his mark hits true.

His target, a girl with eyes the color of Snezhanaya’s skies, more so feels his rapid approach rather than sees; however, when she does, her eyes widen and she barely brings up a luminous shield of air to bear the brunt of his weight.

It does, and were it not for his Hydro protecting his legs, Ajax would have surely felt more than a sudden pain from his feet up.

Undeterred, Ajax rears his arm back then slams his fist as hard as he can against the shield, sending vibrations everywhere.

His grin widens when the shield cracks, revealing the startled expression on the girl's face, before it bursts in a shower of white and light green.

Leaving her wide open.

Ajax lunges for her shoulders, intending to shove her off.

What he doesn’t expect is for her to grab his arms and pull her with him.

The both of them tumble to the ground with a loud oof! rattling their lungs, but it doesn’t end.

Ajax may have not accounted for something.

That something being the rather steep slope of the hill they’re currently on.

With the sudden force of momentum, the two of them go spinning down the hill, clutching desperately onto each other as if that would lessen the damage.

When they finally come to a stop, heads spinning, Ajax tiringly untangles himself from the girl’s limbs and lays flat on the ground, trying to catch his bearings because fuck, definitely not the best of his ideas, that’s for sure.

A movement to his peripheral vision makes him look, and he sees the girl struggling to sit up, probably either to get away from him or get the upper hand.

Ajax, however, hadn’t spent so long training in the Abyss for nothing.

Although his body loudly protests, Ajax continues to drag himself towards the girl, grinning at her, a challenge to fight on the tip of his tongue, before he feels something explode against his gut and he’s flying.

He spins in the air like some kind of rag doll, thoughts a blur, but his body knows what to do and instincts force him upright so he lands on the ground feet first, skidding through the grass before he comes to a stop.

His hands stray to his midsection and he winces. By the damage done on his stomach, the skin there already a pale yellow threatening to turn blue at the edges, Ajax supposes the girl must have released some sort of elemental burst on him.

When next he looks up, Ajax blinks at the sight of the girl’s companion, a young woman dressed in purple, is helping her stand up.

The woman, one with a ridiculously large hat, must have felt his stare because she snaps her head to him and ah.

Ajax smiles in the face of such a vicious glare.

“I mean no harm,” he says, as if really means anything at this point, but he still raises his hands to show the lack of physical weapons on him. “I just wanted a fight.”

“A fight? ” Big hat woman looks at him with such incredulity that Ajax has to swallow his laugh. 

“Really badly!” He adds. “It’s been a while since I traded blows with someone,” he muses, reminiscing on his fight with Skirk less than a handful of days ago and seeing the errors in his attacks back then. 

The woman looks even more bewildered, yet she turns away from him—wrong mistake, he thinks but makes no move to lunge at her. He doesn’t think killing someone in this nation would be a good second step after saving one—and makes sure that the girl is able to stand on her own.

“A child…?” His target observes of him.

Ajax’s smile tightens at the corner. She’s one to talk. The girl herself barely looks older than him.

However, appraisal rings true in the back of his head when he sees her hand fall to the hilt of her sword.

“Who are you?” She immediately demands of him, the confusion wiping clean off her face to instead be replaced with solemnity. “You don’t look like you’re from around here. State your name” Her gaze stays steady to meet his own.

Ajax doesn’t even have to mull over the question.

“Hmmm.” He rubs his chin, faking a thoughtful look. “I’d rather hear yours first, before I give mine.”

Ajax catches the slight rise in the big hat woman’s shoulders, and he tries to keep the smirk building up on his lips down.

His target, on the other hand, merely continues to stare at him. It’s clear that she’s assessing him, to see if he’s going to pull out any tricks out of his sleeves.

A couple of moments pass in silence, before his target exhales a quite lengthy sigh. 

“I am Jean Gunhildr, a Knight of Favonius.” She inclines her head over so slightly. “May I get your name?” 

Ajax is impressed. He’d expected either a teaspoon or cup of sarcasm, but all he gets is nonplussed politeness.

Well, he thinks. A deal is a deal.

“Ah, my name’s—” The words get stuck in his throat when he realizes something. “Wait. Knight of Favonius?” He blinks.

Jean blinks back at him. “Yes,” she confirms.

Oh, Tsaritsa. He nearly bounces on the balls of his feet. Should he tell or not? 

“Is there a problem?” Jean asks him, both of her brows raised, and there goes her hand to wrap around the hilt of her sword.

“Uh…” Ajax trails off, not really knowing how to put this. “Do you know a Kaeya Alberich?”

From the way her eyes widen, he believes she does.

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Ajax’s assumptions are proven correct when a tiny crack appears in the placidness of Kaeya’s smile, making way for relief that gathers in the softness of his eyes.

It lingers for but a while, before disappearing like a gust of wind.

“Dame Jean, Miss Lisa,” greets Kaeya, his undertone laced with cadence. “What brings the esteemed Dandelion Knight and the order’s most loved librarian to my bedside, hm?” 

The tight knot that seems to hold Lisa—the big hat woman—tense unwinds just enough for amusement to flicker on her face.

“There’s hardly any competition, considering I’m the only one,” Lisa muses in a voice much kinder than the one she’d used towards Ajax. “It’s nice to see you're doing well, Kaeya,” she says warmly.

Feeling out of place in a room full of members of the Knights of Favonius, Ajax takes a few quiet steps back and tries his best to blend well with the corner of the room.

He regrets not taking the entire roasted chicken that Brook had left out for him.

“Why, of course.” Kaeya pressed a hand against his chest. “A couple of treasure hunters is nothing against me, of course,” he tells them with a kind of bravado that Ajax isn’t quite sure if it’s real or not.

“Still.” Jean takes the seat by Kaeya’s bedside, hesitating for a moment before holding her hand out.

Bemused, Kaeya slips his hand into hers.

“It’s a great relief to know that you’re truly alright,” Jean tells him with such care in her voice, rubbing her thumb over the back of his hand as if to make sure that he’s well and alive. “I...A lot of things have happened to the order lately, and I’m...I’d thought that something had happened to you.”

For the first time in Ajax’s eyes, Kaeya furrows his brows into a look of concern.

“Did something happen while I was...” Kaeya gestures to himself at the end.

“You see…” Jean pauses, having suddenly remembered herself. 

Ajax isn’t really surprised when she turns her gaze on him. He quirks an innocent smile at her, but he makes no move to actually refute the implication in her eyes.

“I think Brook’s calling for me outside,” Ajax beams, the white lie sliding off easily from his tongue. “I’ll come back tonight. This is where I sleep, you know.” He waves a two-fingered salute to them before making his way out.

As curious as he is to know what information is being exchanged in there, Ajax would rather go to Brook’s and get his chicken.