Chapter Text
Crepus POV:
Crepus tapped his foot on the rotten wood plank. He had been waiting for hours for Fatui to show up. He had left Diluc at the manor with Adelinde, but he still wished to be home reasonably to give him a goodnight. The boy still had trouble with him being away for a longer time.
Movement caught his eye, and he lifted his head to see two Pyroslinger brancer and a Mirror Maiden in the middle, roaming their way over. He was standing on a little deck in the whispering woods.
“My, my, my if it isn’t Master Ragnvindr himself.” The Mirror Maiden snickered, lifting an eyebrow “Taken an enjoyable night stroll?”
Crepus gave an unimpressed glare. His foot stopped trapping.
He sighed. “ Let’s get this over with, I have places I would rather be than skimming with thrifts” Crepus was in the gesture of pulling his pocketbook out when the Mirror Maiden laughed, cursing him to look sharp up at her.
“Oh you must be mistaking Master Ragnvindr” When Crepus only gave her a confused look, she laughed again with a more vile tune to it than before. “We are not here to deal tonight” She was moving closer, a sway in her hips. “You could have imagined our surprise when no other than the great Master Ragnvindr contacted us about a deal , he wanted to make with the Fatui …. The world surely is full of surprises”.
The Mirror Maiden was now only a few meters away from Crepus. His face stayed the same, only a small twitch in his eyebrow gave an impression of how truly uncombable he felt at the moment.
She flashed him a deadly smile.
“If you weren’t gonna give me the merchandise, then what was the point of this meeting?” Crepus snapped at her. He didn’t have time for this.
She laughed again. “You don’t trust us, and we don’t trust you” She looked him dead in the eyes. A smirk replaced her smile. “The Fatui had to be sure that you weren’t shelling us out, so we came to see if it was a ruse or real. Guess you did mean business”
The tycoon was starting to understand, but he had hoped he would just be over and done with it today. He didn’t want to meet up with them again but he didn’t have a choice now, did he?
“Okay,” Crepus started. “When shall we make the deal then?” He just needed this to be over. No need to beat around the bushes.
“Eager are we?” The Maiden questioned, smirk still intact “Let’s meet up again a week from now, bring your mora and we will bring your product Master Ragnvindr”.
Before he could even give her an answer, she turned around and started walking away. The two Pyroslingers never left her side.
He stood there, standing in the dark alone.
This whole ordeal was starting to get on his nerves.
*
*
*
Later that same night
The rain had started picking up a few minutes ago.
It had been a good two hours, since his “little” meeting in the woods, now on the way home to the manor. The carriage bumbled on the uneven ground, due to the rain-affected dirt, jolting the Ragnvindr Master in his seat. Crepus was still aggrieved by the whole ordeal, he just couldn’t get it out of his head, but he had made up his mind. It was to protect Diluc.
There was still a long way back to the manor. He would arrive later than he anticipated but if he was lucky, he could still give Diluc a goodnight kiss.
The tycoon was tried.
He was undeniably tired, but no matter how tired he felt, his body wouldn’t let him rest. So he gave up on trying to sleep quite some time ago.
Now looking out of the window in the carriage, elbow on the ledge, cheek in hand.
It was dark, Crepus couldn’t see anything other than the water droplets on the window glass. The evening sky flashed as a bright lighting strike struck the ground, deeper in the woods.
Crepus startled back, he had been so lost in his thoughts that he hadn’t noticed that the light rain was rapidly turning into a storm. The sound of the rain hitting the roof of the carriage was so loud that it sounded like a group of people was banging all of the wagon’s sides.
The wine master sat back, a small sigh left his mouth.
It was gonna be a long way back home.
Just as Crepus had closed his eyes, the carriage jolted to a stop so hard that he was thrown forward. He quickly placed a hand on the seat in front of him to steady his fall as he hurried up. The tycoon was at the carriage door in a second, in the movement of getting out when he heard the driver call out to him.
“Mater Ragnvindr” The coachman yelled. Already on the ground making his way over to Crepus. “ Are you alright Sir? Am so sorry, something just ran in front of the c-carriage and I tried to avoid it b-but the horses slipped and and-”
“Is quite alright, Kain '' Crepus interrupted, holding up a hand to silence the rambling boy. A smile played on his lips. “Am fine, did you see what it was?”.
The two men were walking to the front, up to the horses to look at the damage.
The horses that had slipped were standing up again. Looking a little distressed but alright.
“Will I didn’t get a good look, Master Ragnvindr,” Kain frowned, looking around the area. “But it looked like a person. Not very big, possibly a child but what on earth is a kid doing in a storm like this?”.
Indeed, if it was a child why were they out here? A sense of panic flooded his veins. They needed to find the plausible kid, check up if they were alright or in need of help. Crepus hadn’t got an idea how long the child could have been out here.
The tycoon looked around into the dark woods with a tense alarm. He couldn’t see anything in this darkness, and the rain didn’t make it better. He stayed on the road, walking up to the tree lines and looking around just to see something. Anything other than the darkness.
The sound of a twig breaking caught his attention. Crepus’s head whipped to the right side of the road. There were two large trees close to the road line, and in between the trees was a snub brush. On closer inspection, the small brush was rustling unnaturally. The wine master slowly made his way over to the tree line, paying attraction to stay silent in his steps.
Kain stood with the horses, patting them gently while looking at Crepus walking to the side of the road. He too was, being quiet.
Standing in front of the brush, Crepus crouched and reached out to part the leaves. A wide lavender eye looked back at him. The star pupil was as bright as the night sky. The child scuttled back with a scared yelp.
Before the child could get too far away, Crepus held out a hand in a try to comfort the little kid. It had the unfortunately opposite effect as the blue-haired child struggled to get away faster, a distressed little squeal could barely be heard over the loud rain.
“Hey, hey, Is okay. Am not gonna hurt you, young one.” The tycoon sat down on his knees, he didn’t care that the mud-soaking water was going through his trousers.
Crepus had put his hand down when he noticed the child was entirely focused with petrified eyes on it, to even concentrate on anything he was saying.
The kid finally stopped scrubbing away when his back hit a nearby tree. A tiny grunt came out at the impact.
There was a moment where they both just stared at each other.
One with red worried eyes, the other with one terrified star pupil.
“Are you lost?” It was Crepus who broke the silence first. He tilted his head to the side as he took in the kid. He was covered in filth. Ragged torn clothes that were either too big on him or he was simply too small . He was malnourished, at every limb a bone could be seen poking out, and his face was hallowed in, dull thin blue hair that looked like it hadn’t been brushed. Ever.
How is it possible that a child this small can look so torn?
The kid looked like he was a little younger than Diluc, but it was hard to tell with all that grime and dirt on him. And with a body as small as his. Too small.
The child said nothing when Crepus asked him the question. His small chest heaving with labored breathing. He was shaking like a leaf, knees drawn up to his chest and arms wrapped around himself, making him look even smaller.
Crepus took notice that his right eye was covered in a bandage. He hadn’t seen it before due to the long bangs that hung over the child's forehead.
“Are you out here alone, or is your family nearby?” The wine master turned his head around like the parents would just materialize out of thin air as he asked, but as expected nothing but darkness and heavy rain were to be found. A sneeze brought his attention back to a child.
Crepus didn’t know how long he had been out here, but the longer he stayed the more likely the child would get a mendacious cold. He needed to get him back to the manor as fast as possible.
The tycoon slowly crept forward, careful not to raise a hand to scare the kid even more. The blue-haired boy looked up as the Crepus moved closer to him. His one eye looked a little glazed over, the fever already sitting in. He was still violently shaking but he didn’t back up when the wine master was right in front of him.
“I’ll take you somewhere warm, is okay, am not gonna hurt you. You’re okay” Crepus tried to keep his voice calm and soothing, identical to when he comforted Diluc after he accidentally got hurt doing something careless. The blue-haired boy let out a small whimper when The wine tycoon picked him up. He was cold. So, so cold. Almost like a corpse.
His shiver went through Crepus. This wasn’t right. It wasn’t fair. How can a child be so neglected, how can a parent care so little about their kid that it would be so bad?
Almost everything wrong with this small boy couldn’t possibly be over just one night, the heavy storm. No, this was a period that covered a substantial amount. The weight, gods, he was so light. The disheveled hair, the clothes he wore, if you could even call it that. No, everything was abandoned.
He shushed the child, keeping a firm hand around him while walking back to the carriage, the small boy mumbled incoherently with a thick accent he did not recognize. Foreigner? Perhaps but how the boy ended up in Mondstadt, he couldn’t fathom. The coachman didn’t say anything when getting up on his seat again, noticing the urgency in Crepus’s eyes and the hurried strides.
“Is okay, I got you. Don’t worry, you’re safe now.” The tycoon held a hand over the little child’s head when the lighting stuck down, the bundling light shining the night darkness up. At every thunder bash, the boy flinched violently.
Crepus had taken off his coat, putting it over the kid’s small frame. Still, the shivers didn’t stop. The red-haired man rocked back and forth, trying with all his might to get the boy to calm down.
The wine master kept murmuring comforting words to the child throughout the whole carriage ride. After an hour, the kid’s breath evened out and sleep took over. He was warming up a little due to the jacket hanging over his shoulders. The first time the boy didn’t look terrified but quite peaceful, a face so young.
Now with the child asleep, Crepus started viewing him over. It was right then, he noticed the big red stain on his shirt, hanging right over his right hip bone. Dread filled the man’s stomach when he shifted the boy in his lap, trying to get a more clear view of the severity of the injury.
With a quavery hand, he pulled the shirt up barely, revealing a large laceration, going from presumably mide-ish thigh to the bone-visible ribs, based on how oblong the blood stains were.
Crepus inhaled tight at the sight, the gash was ireful with yellow puss fuming out, it was a ragged cut, crooking all over the boy's small frame. It looked like a doll sword or knife had narrowly broken the skin, but the moving around and the muddy water had doubtless made the cut inferior.
It was a miracle that the young lad was still alive, somehow. Well for now.
The tycoon moved at an urgent matter, carefully placing the blue-haired boy on the carriage seat, the boy still fast asleep. The Tycoon looked around in the small space for something, anything that could help cleaning or covering the wound inadequately until they arrived at the manor. Hopefully getting help before it would be too late.
Crepus kneeled before the carriage seat opposite of the boy, moving to remove the top, to reveal a hidden compartment under the seat. Eksta clothing was piled up in a small stack, a pair of rubber boots placed neatly to the side. The red-haired man swept around to look for anything helpful, when his eyes fell on a hygiene basket shoved all the way to the corner of the cavity.
The tycoon pulled the basket out and moved it to the floor of the carriage.
It was filled with towels, some clothes, a few water bottles, and a countable scent fragrance for when he had to get to a meeting but didn’t have time to prepare at home before he left. The basket had saved him many times, when an importing meeting took place and the wine tycoon had confined time for something as simple as a bath, or when a venture Diluc had gotten himself dirty while playing before the festivity.
Crepus took a handful of towels and clothes out, placing them next to the sleeping boy. The wine master grabbed a water bottle, opening it before pouring the water on one of the clothes. Crepus shifted himself closer to the boy before pulling his diluted tunic op, so the gash was fully visible for the man to see. Rightfully trying to ignore how skinny the young boy was.
Crepus meticulously dragged the cloth across the inflamed wound. A small whimper broke out from the still-sleeping boy. The tycoon moved his other hand to the kid’s forehead when he did not stir awake at the pain. As he expected, a fever had broken fully out. Cost by the storm and undoubtedly the mired laceration.
Crepus continued to clean the wound to the best of his abilities. The small child numerously made tiny pained sounds through the whole cleaning process but stayed slumbering on the seat.
When the wound was relatively washed, Crepus took one of the bigger towels to wrap it around to stop the newfound bleeding, due to the wine master accidentally reopening the cut while cleaning it.
The carriage came to a stop, and Crepus looked up to see that they were indeed at the manor. The storm slowly came to an end and small drizzles had started. The tycoon turned back to the boy, starting to haul the boy into his arms and standing up.
The carriage door opened, and the coachman stood a bit uncertain at the door.
“Master Ragnvindr, are you in need of anything?” Kain stated, still lingering by the door. “I could bring the boy in, or fetch someone to help?”.
“It's all right, Kain” The wine tycoon nodded and smiled at the younger man. The child tucked tightly into his chest. “Adelinde should still be up so there is really no problem. If you could just kindly unsaddle the horses and clean up in here, it would be lovely.”.
Kain straightened up at the request, proud to be of help with anything.
“Of course Master Ragnvindr, It would be my pleasure”. The younger man hurried to fulfill the quest.
The tycoon rushed to the door to the manor, shielding the boy from the weather.
Crepus opened the door in a hustle. Quickly pulled his boots off before dashing to the hearth in the parlor. Thankfully still lit.
“ Adelinde! ” Crepus yelled, laying the boy down, next to the fireplace. The child’s breath was ragged, with small wheezing sounds from time to time. His small face was tight in pain.
A young maid came bolting from the kitchen. Her face sat in panic, as her eyes landed on the housemaster.
“M-master Ragnvindr!” Adelinde came to an absurd stop next to the tycoon. “What’s wron-” Her eyes widened when they fell on the unconscious boy on the carpet. “Oh lord, barbatos, w-hat happened?” The maid dropped to her knees, her delicate hands hovering over the boy’s face.
“We found him out in the storm on the way back, he has a fever and a substantial cut on his right side.” The wine master’s eyes never left the fever-shivering boy. He turned the child, so the right side rested upwards. The towels were still sturdily in place. He tugged the blood-stained towel aside, revealing the clean ragged wound.
The young maid gasped at the sight. Her hands covered her mouth in shock.
“Oh dear lord, what happened to this poor boy?”. Adelinde suddenly got back up, rushing into the kitchen again. Not even a minute went by before she was back at the house master’s side. Now with a medical emergency kit.
“Am afraid I do not know…” The tycoon whispered, looking down at the boy with clear concern between his frowned brows. The man bugged his larger hand to reach the boy’s smaller one to his own. The small limp was burning up due to the fever-induced sickness.
Adelinde made quick work with the suture needle, lapping the deeper part of the slit but putting medical tape around the part smaller of the cut. Crepus wanted dearly to get a healer out here with all haste but consequential to the storm and the late hour it would be unlikely. So they would just do what they could in the meantime, hoping the boy would survive through the night.
When the maid was done closing the wound, she wrapped it in unworn bandages. She gracefully moved to the mud-covered bandages over the boy’s right eye. She frowned upon removing the filthy bind, noticing the eye was in perfect condition except the smudged dirt surrounding it.
Crepus caught her eye, with his own confused frown.
The tycoon tardily moved his hands to the boy’s right eye, pushing the small eyelid back.
The maid and the wine master gasped rhythmically.
A golden star-shaped pupil was evident, the brightness alone outshined the fire’s dancing small flames in the hearth. It was mesmerizing to look at, so omniscient it was hard to glaze away for the golden orb.
“It's beautiful…” Adelinde breathed out in awe.
Crepus pulled his hand away. Contemplation over the importance of keeping the golden hidden. The child obviously wore the bandage to obscure the eye, so the wine tycoon was still highly inquisitive about the boy’s reasoning. Maybe he could strike up a conversion with him when he wasn’t deadly ill. ( If the boy lived ).
The wine master locked eyes with Adelinde again.
“Let’s not ponder over it, cover it up for now and we can discuss his reasoning when he is no longer sick.”. The housemaster offered her a small smile. “Let’s get him washed and in clean warm clothes.”.
The maid nodded along, cleaning the area around the right eye before putting a fresh bind on. Covering the boy’s eye again.
Adelinde worked carefully around the sickly child, humming a small tune.
“Don’t worry Master Ragnvindr, I got it from here. You’re also soaked to the bone, Master Diluc would be incredibly worried should you also catch a fever”. Adelinde hafted the blue-haired boy up in her motherly arms, carefully not to jolt the sewn laceration on his right side.
The tycoon breathed out a small laugh, Diluc would indeed be worried but at the time his only concern had been the boy, and getting him to the manor. “Thank you Adelinde, You deserve a raise for aiding me through the years, and once again tonight.”
“Nonsense, master Ragnvindr. Am glad to be of service.” The maid had a small smile, moving towards the stairs leading to the spar boudoir. The small child sleeping more peacefully now with the wound treated. “Also master Ragnvindr, I believe Master Diluc is still awake, waiting for your return. He was very persistent at staying up until you came home.”.
Crepus smiled at her. “Thank you Adelinde, I will be sure to check on him before I retire for the night. Let me know if anything happens, please.”. The wine master was getting worried again, but he had to keep in mind that the boy was treated and Adelinde would be taking care of him should there be an issue.
“Of course, master Ragnvindr. I shall get you right away should anything happen. Now, I bid you goodnight, Sir.”. Adelinde smiled before strolling down the hallway, with the little child in her arms.
“Goodnight Adelinde,” Crepus said, going up the stairs. He turned in the direction of Diluc’s bedroom.
The wine master cautiously pushed the door open. He didn’t want to wake Diluc should he have fallen asleep while waiting. The door was barely opened before a loud “Dad!” could be heard through the quiet room.
Diluc leaped at his dad in a dash. His small arms tighten around Crepus' waist.
The red-haired boy quickly retreated, with a wrinkled nose.
“Ugh, you are soaking wet dad!” The boy yelped in startlement.
Crepus just laughed and reached down to ruffle his son’s hair, who giggled at the movement.
“Well it was storming when I left, so of course your old dad is wet you silly boy.”. The tycoon moved to one of the chairs next to Diluc’s bed. Diluc trotted to his bed, crawled up and pulled the duvet over himself.
A comfortable silence fell.
“Diluc, I am sorry but I will be quite busy tomorrow. I know I promised to spend more time with you at home and trust me, I will but it can’t be prolonged…” Crepus lowered his head in shame. He kept breaking his promise to his own son, how good of a father was he really?…
“...Is about that boy you brought home, right?...” Diluc’s whisper was barely audible but the tycoon heard him clear as day. Crepus' head snapped at his son, bewildered that Diluc knew about the smaller boy. “He looked really sick, you and Addy sounded worried… Is he gonna die, dad?.” Oh the poor boy had in all likelihood stood at the top of the stairs when he had called for Adelinde...
Diluc’s small red orbs were full of unshed tears, his lower lip wobbling.
The tycoon hurled his son into a tight hug. Rubbing small circles on his son’s back.
“Hey, hey, hey, is okay, Adelinde is taking care of him right now. He is in good care, Diluc, don’t worry. My boy” Crepus mumbled into Diluc’s bright red hair, trying not to promise anything in case the sickly boy did not make it through the night, but also did not want his son to worry over such matters. Diluc was far too young to burden such things.
"Okay, dad..." The trifling mumble could almost not be heard with the red-haired boy's face pressed into his fathers chest.
Diluc didn’t cry but his small shoulders couldn’t stop shaking.
Crepus sat with Diluc until his breath evened out and he was fast asleep. The tycoon carefully placed his son under the covers again, before kissing his forehead and closing the door to the boy’s room.
The wine master’s back hit the door, a tired sigh escaped his lips.
Now the question was.
Will the boy live… Crepus prayed for one last miracle.
The first; finding the boy, the second giving him a chance.