#i have another venti angst i need to write too so. our fella boutta be Real Sad too.

[m1d-45]

(what about me?)

summary: even gods get lonely, it just takes them a bit longer than most. but when it hits, it hurts, and hard.

word count: 1.1k

-> warnings: major spoilers for mondstat archon quest, mentions of wine, little guy is sad and alone about it :(

-> gn reader (you/yours)

taglist: @samarill || @thenyxsky || @valeriele3 || @shizunxie || @boba-is-a-soup || @yuus3n || @esthelily || @turningfrogsgay

< masterlist >

starsnatch cliff is empty more times than it isn’t.

it was a common destination for couples, the silence a welcome break from the bustle of the city of freedom. the stars up above were unblocked, bright, the full rotation of constellations visible by just tilting one’s head to the sky. two majors, twin sets of stars, the three minors orbiting, staring down, watching. the same form, night after night, a bard in green driving away the aspiring couples often enough they learnt to stop trying. a body is there, physically occupying the space, but with how little is being done, the cliff still feels empty. the stars watch, seeing all, as the same body comes and sits, as the same eyes turn to the sky, vacant with memory.

venti didn’t know which constellations were in rotation—he did, that was a lie, he knew every single one and their owners—nor how long they’d be up—liar, liar, liar—but he watched the sky anyway, spinning a cecelia in his hand. the stem was worn, some of the juice clinging to his fingers, but he didn’t set it down. to the left, to the right, the six petals twisting outside of his field of view.

the god of freedom found himself coming back to the same cliff every night, sometimes leaving the angels share earlier to get there quicker. he walked, picking a cecelia as he did, and sat in the same spot at the peak of the cliff.

was he truly free, he wondered, if the stars kept calling him back?

(he knew he was. it was his choice to return, his choice to stay until the sun rose, to take naps in the afternoon to make up for the sleep before coming back, back, back, night after day after night)

the galaxy streaking its way across the sky, blue and purple and greens mixing and blurring, broken only by the bright shine of stars. planets, all locked in their own orbit, worlds he’d never be able to see, all within his sight yet all out of his grasp.

his eyes fell on a star at random.

who lived there, he wondered? what was beyond the atmosphere he knew? how far was the next planet? was there even intelligent life? surely, there must be—you wouldn’t create only one planet with life on it, right? you’d create many races, aliens he couldn’t imagine, all created to thrive on their world and serve under you.

(were they treating you better? had you exited your resting world already, and found another planet to keep you occupied? was teyvat not enough for you? you… you’d tell them if they weren’t doing enough, right? you’d say? you wouldn’t just leave them in the dark, right?)

he wondered how far away you’d gone. he remembered you—of course he did, your visage was engraved in his mind, miles deep and never to erode—and your last moments on teyvat, how you’d promised the archons that you would return soon. that you wouldn’t be far.

of course, ‘far’ was relative. and what was time to a god? how long was ‘soon’ for you? how long would it be until he could be blessed with your presence again? the little of your aura that bled through your vessels wasn’t enough- it wasn’t, and he was horribly selfish for thinking so, but it wasn’t. not when he’d been able to lay his eyes upon your true form, not when he’d felt your skin beneath his as he led you through mondstat for the first time. the small glimpse of you that seeped into the air around your vessels may be enough to rest weary souls, but for a god?

you were the shining light of teyvat, always everywhere. traveling from nation to nation, occasionally visiting off-world but never for long, never, he never had to go without you for more than a year or two at a time, he never had to feel erosion start to sap at his life-

the stars grew blurry, and venti hastily wiped the tears away, continuing to search the sky.

he knew he was eroding. every god was. memories, resilience, patience, all of it fading. mortals (part of his mind flinched, but he was right, he was mortal, he could die) weren’t meant for the power of the divine, the gnoses grating against the walls of their soul. it was never a problem before, not when they had you, you to temper the flame of creation, you to brush your hand over a wayward god and breathe life back into their heart, you with your endless compassion, to accept what felt like overwhelming and discard it as trivial.

barbatos was eroding without you. every god was. the ley lines were acting up, the abyss growing stronger, the eons without your presence turning teyvat into a hollow husk. and yet, the pathetic little he discarded from your vessels had begun to heal it anyway.

why did you use vessels? you had to know it was easier to descend yourself, right? to let flowers bloom in your wake and the breeze brush grass from your clothes, to tuck ei’s hair behind her ear and let empathy back into her mind. your vessels did a lot, but they could not manage all- murata, focalors, the tsaritsa and her wretched fatui- you could fix it all, all with a blink and a smile, a gentle hand across the earth to sew it at the seams.

he was being idealistic. he knew he was. and yet, he could not help but to wish—wish, he wanted to laugh at the irony—that your return ‘soon’ would be within his lifetime.

he wanted to see you again. he wanted the scars across his soul to heal, for his empty, cracked cup to be filled with you. he wanted to go back to how it was, when ei could smile freely and the tsaritsa wasn’t so cold, when the wind blew softly, carrying the sound of laughter. time only turned one way, yet he wanted to reverse it, to force the universe in rewind, to when his greatest worry was which song to play you at lunch. he wanted to bring a bottle of dandelion wine and watch as morax insisted upon osmanthus, as rukkhadevata rolled her eyes with a smile and suggested how about tea instead, it’s barely noon.

he was selfish. every god was, to an extent, but he…

as venti looked up at the stars, he couldn’t help but pray that one of them was you.