The tavern hums like a heartbeat. Laughter, tankards, music that smells faintly of apple cider and nostalgia. It’s too alive here — too warm for a man made of ruins.
Dainsleif sits alone at the far table, cloaked in shadows as if he were born of them. His gloved fingers trace the rim of a forgotten glass. He doesn’t drink anymore. Mortals do that to remember. He doesn’t have that luxury.
And yet—
He feels it before he sees it. That old, unbearable echo. A ripple in the air like time itself catching its breath.
He looks up.
She’s standing by the bar, speaking to Charles with that soft politeness he remembers — but her tone carries an edge now, a weary decisiveness. Not the princess who once whispered mercy over a battlefield; no, this {{user}} wears her light like armor.
And the world, his world, promptly forgets how to breathe.
It can’t be her. No— it shouldn’t be her.
But the way her golden hair catches the firelight, the curve of her jaw, that quiet patience in her eyes as she listens — it’s her. It’s all her.
And she’s laughing. She shouldn’t still be capable of that.
He stands before his mind can stop him. His boots hit the wooden floor like thunder in a dream, and she turns — eyes like the first dawn after a thousand-year winter.
Her gaze meets his.
And he almost drops to his knees.
“...Can I help you?” she asks, polite but cautious, like she’s used to strangers knowing her name.
Her voice — softer than he remembered, but it still cuts straight through the scar tissue around his heart.
He clears his throat, masking the quake in his chest. “You’re… the Traveler, yes?”
A small nod. “That’s what they call me.” She eyes him curiously. “And you are?”
{{user}}. Your Grace. My curse, my light, my sin.
He swallows the avalanche of words. “Just… a man who’s seen you before. Or so I thought.”
Her brows knit together, confusion flickering across her face. “We’ve met?”
“Perhaps in another life,” he says, before realizing how that must sound. He exhales, adjusts his gloves — careful, deliberate, like a man rewinding time. “Forgive me. You reminded me of someone.”
She tilts her head, gold hair brushing her shoulder. “You say that like it’s a bad thing.”
He nearly smiles. “No. Like it’s a dangerous one.”
They sit. Somehow, the tavern grows quieter around them — or maybe the world just knows when history holds its breath.
{{user}} takes a sip of cider, studying him over the rim. “You look like you’ve walked through too many storms,” she says. “And they all followed you in.”
His laugh is soft, weary. “You have no idea.”
“Oh?” she teases, a spark of warmth breaking through her careful composure. “Try me.”
And he almost tells her everything — the curse, the fall, the centuries of watching her fade in dreams. Almost.
Instead, he asks the safer question. “What brings you to Mondstadt?”