Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

The forest was stirred, a particularly conspicuous red streak being the cause of it all.

"SPARK KNIGHT KLEE—"

Everywhere the streak went, flashes followed, until the already sparse forest was flushed with flames.

"—OF THE KNIGHTS OF FAVONIUS! REPORTING FOR DUTY~!"

The streak stopped in the heart of a clearing, seemingly oblivious to the destruction she had caused. Humming happily, Klee followed grass trails that had long since begun to melt in the heat. The whopper flowers that she was after were nothing more than a warm up, like an icy breeze that only lasted for a few moments.

"Hehehe!"

Twirling in a sea of her misdoings, Klee finally turned towards a large tree that had escaped her brutal explosions. Like a challenge, it stood within the flames, adamant and proud. She pouted, thinking. Would she be able to defeat it today?

“Hiss~”

Before Klee could make a move, the fires around her started to struggle, fighting feebly against the oncoming rain. It was like this every time. Klee would make a move to destroy the forest, and the rain would answer in turn, salvaging the ashes and bringing her back to the start.

“It’s raining again, Dodoco…”

Looking up through leaking branches, Klee gazed at the unforgiving sky as it delivered judgment against her freedom. Her flames spluttered and choked, hanging onto nothing before disappearing like wishes in the wind.

As she stood, puddles forming around her muddied feet, Klee was reminded of the event that started it all. Thirty years ago, Stormterror’s final attack.

High above Mondstadt, the clouds had bubbled and boiled, wind howling as if threatening to tear the city apart. A figure burst through the mayhem, revealing itself with a move too violent to be called a wing’s flutter.

The dragon roared, its malicious intent conveyed along with the anguish in its heart. The city’s residents had long since been evacuated to the plains outside, though it wouldn’t matter if the Favonius Knights could not stop the dragon here.

Klee was no exception. She had been on the far side of the island when the dragon descended, but the distance was not a challenge.

“Dear Anemo god, please make Klee's bombs blow in the right direction and only blow up the bad guy. Please.”

She breathed a quick prayer to the relentless winds. Their howling didn’t stop, so Klee wasn’t sure if she had been heard. She rushed onward.

"Explosion inside city wall, grounded be thy woe,"

It didn’t matter. Wall after wall crumbled as Klee forced her way to Barbatos’ statue. She had to get there in time. She had to.

"Mondstadt be bombed, Klee be doomed."

She didn’t care. Her thoughts were drowned out by the roaring of the god-forsaken dragon. If it no longer abided by the rule to “protect”, then neither did she.

"Explosions can hurt people, Jean can be dreadful,"

She hadn’t seen Jean yet. She hoped she could see her once more. Mustering up as much power as her little legs could, with red hot tears staining her cheeks, Klee ran.

Eventually she could see nothing but the deviant dragon, hear nothing but its roars, feel nothing but the searing heat of her explosions as she fought to win. Klee knew she would win, for she was the Knight order’s precious Spark Knight. Nothing had ever escaped her bombs. She felt powerful. Her actions became more and more reckless, until no one could be sure whether the collateral damage had been caused by her or Stormterror.

She felt free as she laughed, the heat of her flames soaring.

It wasn’t until afterwards, when Dvalin’s lifeless body had fallen, breaking Barbatos’ arms in its descent, that Klee’s vision returned. There were scorch marks everywhere and she couldn’t feel her hands. Her hat was missing, her hair had been singed… but those weren’t important.

“Master Jean! I did—”

She couldn’t finish the sentence. There, holding onto her dandelion sword, her once reliable back bent and burned, Jean stared at Klee in silence. The smile that usually adorned the Acting Grandmaster’s face was nowhere to be seen. Her prayer hadn’t been heard after all.

“Monster…”

Klee didn’t need to hear the whisper to understand. The eyes full of terror, of pure shock and horror, were enough for her to know that the Jean in front of her would never be the same. Those eyes that had twinkled so kindly at her in the past now only looked at her coldly, as though she was a beast, a scourge who had betrayed the city instead of saving it.

“Jean!”

Kaeya appeared, out of breath and limping. Klee turned to him with newfound resolution. She knew he could never abandon her. After all, he was always there to help Klee when something big happened. But the eye she saw today was different. It was like Jean’s eyes, and in all three of them, among the ruined buildings and dragon’s corpse, there was no place for her. It was a newfound feeling that struck Klee at this moment. Tears fell, heavy like the rain that accompanied them, heavy as they carried her heart up, out of her eyes, onto the blood stained and broken ground, heavy as the crushing weight of those damning gazes.

Klee couldn’t bear it. She ran.

She ran and ran until she could run no more. But nothing would stop her. The walls she had broken carefully before were now reduced to dust. Even in the pouring rain, there was nothing to stop her from leaving. On the bridge, Favonius Knights were still stationed, fending off the hilichurls who had come to lay siege to Mond, but she couldn’t see them. Brisk as the wind, she flew past former friend and foe alike, tears joining the rain’s parade.

She ran, and ran, and ran. Further and further from what she once called home, further from where she once found joy, further from everything she had come to know. Further still, until she reached a place she could not run across. So she built a boat. Klee had already resolved herself… with the same iron will that had blown up Stormterror, she decided to never look back.

Where did she end up going? Where did Spark Knight Klee, youngest of the Knights of Favonius, estranged Dragon Slayer, and the Burny Red Girl, go? She didn’t have a plan. She left, her only thoughts to find a place for herself again, a place where she and Dodoco would never again be looked at with those eyes. Over land, through forests, over water and through open sea, Klee fled until she found it. The land her mother had given her was hers once more. For the first three years, she stopped using fire, blaming herself. For the next seven years, she did her best to forget about everything. Eventually, her vision started to dim, the light in her eyes also fading. It took nineteen more years for her to find her beloved flame again. And on days like today, when the rain fell slowly like blood on the ground, with dull, uneven thumps, she was reminded of the day she failed to save everyone.

Unbeknownst to Klee, Mondstandt didn’t fall because of her. Although the shock of losing Dvalin was great, it wasn’t enough. This was the City of Freedom after all. Countless people had suffered, and they didn’t all hold the same sentiments that Jean did.

Even so, happy endings don’t always come because the dragon has been slain. Heroes aren’t always acknowledged, and salvation isn’t always the end. Sometimes, a more fearsome dragon appears to take the original’s place. Sometimes, the heroes’ companion returns to lay waste to the ungrateful. Sometimes, the ending is both.

Two years after “that day”, sir Albedo reached a bottleneck in his research. Upon returning from Dragonspine, he learned about the situation and went berserk.

He was patient at first. The city was a wreck, Jean was recovering, and it looked like Kaeya didn’t want to talk about what had happened. He was understanding at first. It was only natural for them to want to avoid reliving the moment. But he didn’t have time to pity them, because he was also in a difficult spot. His sister was missing. So he started looking. There was elegance in his methods at first. It proved that he was still aware of his duties to the city, to the people, as a member of the Knight’s order. But all good things must come to an end.

Weeks turned into months, and the aggrieved older brother scoured the land for his sibling, turning the area upside down in the process.

“Once you establish a relation with someone, you must continue to maintain it; if you lose contact, you must reestablish the relation.”

He would mutter that phrase over and over again, sometimes with tears of distress, other times in bouts of despair. He held onto this woe like an unspoken promise, shackled by the belief that he would be reunited with her soon.

Albedo was worried. He had even made sure the sign was off his laboratory door, in case Klee had seen it. He couldn’t understand why she would choose to leave after defeating Dvalin. Mondstadt could always be rebuilt… but there would never be a replacement for her. Miss— no, mother Alice had entrusted him with Klee’s care. What if she was hurt? There was no time, he had to find her. Albedo would use any means necessary to do so, even if it meant destroying the city again.

Years went by for the desolate homunculus. The city could no longer be rebuilt, or rather, there was no one left to rebuild it. Back then, he had changed himself to search for Klee. He had become corrupt, holding onto what little reason he had left. When he found out the true reason for Klee’s departure, he let go.

In the end, as the rain fell, Mondstadt’s fate was sealed.

But he couldn’t leave. Although there was now no real home for Klee to return to, Albedo felt that if he left the city to search the world for her, but still didn’t find her, he would really lose control.

So he waited.

The City of Freedom was now nothing but a sunken graveyard, surrounded by devastated forests, testimonies to his actions. Overlooking it all on the peak of Starsnatch Cliff, Albedo gazed into the distant sky, his eyes calm, hosting shreds of hope. She had always come back before. Believing she would come back once more, he waited for the rest of his life.

After fleeing from Mondstadt, Klee had gone through a myriad of experiences. She believed it was her fault, but eventually stopped thinking about that day. Occasionally she would hear a dragon-like, anguished scream in the distance. She’d grown familiar with the sound during the fight with Dvalin. She could almost resonate with it, and on some days it felt as though the dragon was calling her name. Of course, from her utopia, there was no way to tell.
Still, she was reminded of a man she was close enough to to call her brother. Klee often wondered what had happened to him. Did Albedo miss her? Would he be worried? She had left before thinking about all this, partly because she didn’t want to think about what would happen if brother Albedo’s eyes changed. If instead of his usually kind, patient eyes, he looked at her the same way Jean and Kaeya had?

Even Kaeya had looked at her strangely. Kaeya, who had never seriously chastised her for her actions. What if her dearly beloved brother had done the same?

She had spent the last year wondering about this, and she couldn’t bear that possibility. Other than not knowing the way back, it was the reason why she couldn’t return.

So today too, instead of pondering difficult things, Klee pretended she had returned to thirty years ago, back before the attack had happened, back when she was still a knight beloved by the city and its people. Klee found comfort in this, though she could never truly forget those eyes. They often appeared in her dreams, threatening to drown her in a whirlpool of desperate emotions, never leaving her side even when she stopped sleeping.

Despite it all, Klee could smile, knowing that Dodoco was still by her side. If her time as a knight had taught her how she should live, then the last few decades had given her the freedom to live as she pleased.

No matter what happened, Klee was determined to keep living, to survive, to find solace. Sitting underneath the tree she had tried to blow up moments earlier, she noticed that the rain had begun to falter.

“Hup~ Dodo, it’s time for fish blasting!”

With a small smile, she dusted herself off and ran through the thinning rain, towards her new home.

“Hahaha, lucky all my new bombs are waterproof!”

The fish always tasted best after rainfall.

Chapter Text

Twenty-eight years ago.
…

Jean’s migraines occurred much more frequently nowadays, with a particularly annoying one smugly seated across from her.

“I’m aware that we don’t have the best reputation, but it’s all for the good of Mondstadt.”

The ache—no, the Fatuus diplomat murmured, feigned meekness slithering out of their visor.

“After all, Grand—”

“Acting Grand Master.”

A sudden silence descended. Jean stared with narrowed eyes at the Fatuus diplomat, who hesitantly rolled their shoulders. What went unsaid was clear to both of them: the Fatui want to sell Jean a bridge by using Mondstadt as a smokescreen, but she isn’t buying.

“…”

“…”

Coughing lightly, they continued, “…We’re only here to help, so consider it carefully.”

Jean didn’t answer, dismissing the figure with a measured nod. Shortly after they left, she raised a hand to her forehead.

Mond, trying to rebuild after the disaster, was in enough of a difficult situation already. There have been sightings of elemental lifeforms outside of their usual areas, and some elite hilichurls’ have either become elusive or disappeared completely. It was obvious to anyone that something suspicious was going on, but there was only so much the Knights could do. Not to mention Albedo, who had recently returned… With the Fatui slinking closer, any misstep could result in their unbalanced peace tilting entirely.

Frustrated, Jean’s thoughts were too occupied to notice the newcomer.

“Oh my, frowning like that, aren’t you afraid of wrinkles?”

Jean sighed, relief belying her stern tone.

“You should have knocked.”

A faint smile graced Lisa’s lips as she crossed the room’s threshold. Her stiletto heels clinked on the stone floor, soft rings turning to sweet whispers as she crossed the rug.

“I wanted to surprise you.” Lisa mused, her fingertips drawing light shadows on Jean’s desk. She slowed down deliberately, coming to a halt by her seat.

Jean stared, and Lisa stared back, smiling.

She leaned in, reducing the distance between them until Jean glanced away, huffing slightly as her reddened ears revealed clear embarrassment.

A laugh, as light and melodic as a small bell, neared Jean’s ears as Lisa gently held her chin, bringing them face to face once more.

“Surprise~ Shall we go for a walk?”

Stunned by the faint scent of cecilias, Jean blinked. Nodding lightly, she rose from her seat without a second glance at the tilting heaps of documents on her desk.

“We can, but I won’t humor you for long.” Jean said, though her eager steps suggested the opposite. With Lisa’s tinkling laugh following closely behind, their hands intertwined, the two quickly left the room.

…

Jean stood on a short cliff in the whispering woods, looking towards Mondstadt. It was just before dawn, and the city seemed to weep with the glistening morning dew. Although it still showed scars from the battle three years prior, the city was healing. The people too, had found the courage to chase freedom again. Jean smiled slightly, thinking of a particularly carefree individual. It was thanks to her and Kaeya that Jean could find the time to overlook her city, and things were getting better.

As Jean closed her eyes, the air seemed to still.

“—BURST FORTH!!”

Accompanying the shout came a rushing wind roaring across the meadows, scattering the clouds and waking flocks of birds in the surrounding forests. Jean raised her head sharply, eyes widening to their limits in shock.

What went wrong was obvious. She knew it was only a matter of time until Albedo demanded an explanation, but she had taken his silence for patience.

She knew Klee’s disappearance couldn’t be hidden forever, but she had already scoured every inch of the surrounding lands. Every one of the Knights had upturned every stone and bowed every tree. Their search had only stopped a thousand paces from the shoreline, including the seabed underneath, but Klee was not found.

Should she have accepted the Fatuus' offer at that time? Jean dismissed the thought almost immediately. Even for Klee, even as her heart twisted, she would never hand the city over to them. No matter what happened, that would never change.

The dragon’s roars echoed, piercing and thunderous as he took to the city’s skies. There was anger there, Jean recognised, a rage both filled with hate and self-blame.

Forward. That was the only way. As the Acting Grand Master, as the people’s Dandelion Knight, it was her duty alone to face Mond’s danger head-on.

Narrowing her eyes with resolution, the wind paving her path, she ran towards the gates.

…

Jean felt the urge to curse, to vent her frustration as she raced through the streets. High in the air, surrounded by large, summoned geodes, her sword would not reach him. Her winds could not carry her, and she was not proficient with a bow. She could only stand tall, defending her crumbling city from flying rocks and debris, praying she could minimize the damage as the others were evacuated.

"I’m sorry, Varka.”

Each house she passed had figures scrambling around, leaving possessions behind and alerting their neighbours. The Knights were already on the rooftops, launching signal flares and drawing attention to hastily-prepared exits.

“But as long as the wind blows… For Mondstadt, as always…”

Leaping from the ground and onto emptied buildings, Jean continued to advance. In the distance, frost, lightning and fire told her she was not alone. Sparing only a single glance, she continued. Looking up, she could not see the figure clearly, and she didn’t know why he was so much stronger than before, but she could tell their time was limited.

“I, Jean Gunnhildr—”

She ran with the howling wind, faster and faster, until the surroundings were only a blur.

“I will protect the hopes of my people!”

Crack!

Time seemed to still, dampening everything from the howling winds to the bristling rain. Suddenly Jean stilled, her thoughts drifting alongside traces of frost.

“—…?”

Just like that fateful day, she had once more found herself running across this square, blocking fatal attacks with feigned ease. A rebounding piece had sliced past her brow, leaving a bloody trail dripping down in its wake.

“—…!”

That’s when she saw her. The weary eyes on her teasing face sparkled like gems in the rain. Her hat had vanished, leaving glossy, auburn hair to billow in the cursing winds. Her dress had torn at its edges, but she paid it no mind as she gently urged someone out from beneath the tempting rubble.

She shouldn’t have, but Jean faltered. Her grip tightened, but her shoulders drooped, a tension she hadn’t realized quickly slipping away. For a moment, just a moment, they were standing together again, the distance between them mere centimeters, the winds little more than those cast by intermingling breaths.

She sighed, that radiant figure reflected clearly in her reddening eyes. She witnessed Lisa’s veiled frustration turn to genuine joy as the child crawled out, clinging to her in fear. She watched as their eyes met, the determination in Lisa’s soon softening into recognition, then shock.

Jean slipped, and a boulder whistled through the air.

“—JEAN!”

Crack!

It was a cruel, shrill sound. It bit and bit and bit through Jean’s sword, faster and louder and sharper until it reached her pommel.

With a bang, her blade shattered.

Only a fraction of the boulder had been deflected, leaving Jean to bear the rest. She dropped like a millstone in water, her bounding winds hushed and muffled.

“No—Stay with me!”

A current surged towards Jean as she fell, reforming as soft hands that swiftly cradled her. Like a lantern swaying in a blizzard, the warmth of Lisa’s embrace tingled Jean’s stiffening limbs. Like an aging train, her heart rumbled, swells and furrows visible through the tatters in her armour. Steam curled around her lips, and rose-bud eyes stared blankly at the sky. Despite the deepening darkness, Jean could see her clearly.

“…Li…sa…”

Time suddenly quickened, turning the rumbling rain into a resounding hail. Lisa—as though she only now felt the cold—instinctively searched for cover, but the boulder that took half of her beloved had also levelled their surroundings.

She could only crouch lower, until they were close again. Her hands trembled for the first time, fumbling as she stuffed calla lilies into the wound.

For a moment, just a moment, the distance between them disappeared. Her breaths hitched, eyes wide in hopes Jean would smile in reassurance, eyes unblinking for fear she would miss it.

They were deaf to the wailing winds, impervious to the elements that sizzled and swirled around them. Their breaths became one, flickering embers, fizzling out for the last time.

Lisa felt a small, shaking hand on her back, begging her to save it in all but sound. The lilies were soaked in red.

Listless, she parted with her beloved, lingering wisps of steam tracing an unseen path towards the brightening sky.

She followed it with her gaze, a final send-off for a woman who was so much more than the many titles and regrets that she had borne.

She looked down now, closing Jean’s eyes amidst the tinkling sounds of hail on her armour. She stared at her beloved’s face, tracing lines that would have become wrinkles. She heard the distant hum of laughter that would have been, and drew her hand through hair that would have grayed. Lisa shut her eyes, holding onto the hand that mirrored hers, silver rings clinking as she held it.

Breathing deeply, Lisa stood, lifting Jean’s body in her arms. Opening her eyes with a resolute expression, she destroyed two pillars a short distance away, blocking the child behind her as they collapsed. They formed a small, broken arch together, the space between them just enough.

She laid her lover down, one last time, tucking her into a bed of rubble. By her feet sat a patch of disturbed earth, a bruised, yet unbroken dandelion swaying gently at its center.

“…Good morning, Jean. You’ve worked hard, so rest for a while. I’ll be back soon.”

Numbed from the electro-charge, she opened and closed her mouth, mulling over words unsaid.

“I will always be with you.”

Holding tightly onto the child, whose tremors had since quieted, Lisa turned. She took a step, then another, and another. Her surroundings were a blur, warm tears mingling with cold ones falling from above, the depths of her sorrow rivalling that of the rampaging dragon.

…

He screamed amidst the raging silence, empathy shed like tears by pale blue eyes. Wearing the wings of a dragon long-felled, inheriting the cursed blessing of life, he descended from the heavens. Jagged rocks rained down, deflected or dodged by those capable, and flattening those who got unlucky.

Lisa’s lips quivered, her hand tightening around the hilt of a broken sword. Electricity arced through the air with growing ferocity, wailing at the figure, demanding justice.

A white streak flashed by, freezing a geode long enough for others to dodge. Shot after flaming shot pierced through the air as the one who was Albedo responded in kind.

…

Back to the present.
…

“…Lisa?” Klee heard herself whisper.

She knelt in a shallow pool, one of many eddies formed by the recent rains. Klee trembled, not from the cold, but from an emotion she couldn’t quite place. Her hair hung limply around her, small sparks laden with a resurfaced guilt.

Klee stared blankly at the body before her. Her thoughts thrashed quickly, in stark contrast with the intruder’s shallow breaths.

Why now, when Klee had already decided to leave everything behind, had a piece of that city drifted out to her? When Klee had already found a new life? What was she to do with this ragged stranger?

Klee stared, shock and anger dissipating into stillness in her heart. The emptiness she felt, was it loss? Why did it feel like her dream was coming to an abrupt end?

Why couldn’t she just watch as she sank beneath these waves?

A crack formed on her face, squeezing out a smile. No, Klee knew why. Klee had never stopped knowing, the same way she had never stopped thinking about the day she ran, and the people she left behind. Klee was, is, and would forever be a knight of Favonius.

Even though she had abandoned them once, she was still a Knight. A Knight would never turn a blind eye to those in need.

Klee sat there for a long time, watching Lisa as the waves receded, reddish-pink lights slowly dancing towards distant shores.