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After their opening set for the party, Mavuika leaned down as the band left the stage, whispering into Venti’s ear: “I’ve asked Ororon not to drink so that he can help us later tonight.”
Venti nodded in reply and then sought out his next drink. He was not mortal. It took only a small part of his will to brush his hangovers away, though he usually let this body run its natural human courses to keep up appearances.
Tonight, however, he would need a clear head.
That tonight was more accurately that very next early morning. As the Traveller and their other companions crawled into their hotel suites, Venti and Ororon followed Mavuika back to hers. They stepped into a large suite designed for the Pyro Archon herself, and full of what Venti’s untrained eyes could term as ‘a bunch of stuff.’
“Ororon, I sent supplies ahead.”
The Hero of the Masters of the Night-Wind slipped his way between the two Archons on the doorstep and began picking through dried herbs, bottles, and various other containers. If he was tired, it wasn’t showing, his movements swift and confident. He didn’t turn back to face them as he worked, but his voice was loud enough. “So, your artistic skills are awesome, but what is a bard here to help with?”
Venti forced amusement into his voice. “Oh, you’ll see!” There was no avoiding it, Ororon would have to learn his true nature. Barbatos was going to see the return of the souls of Mare Jivari through, and see it through properly. A shaman would be proper to welcome them home, and he trusted Mavuika’s judgement.
He could feel the smile in her own voice. “You will find his knowledge valuable Ororon, more than you might even hope.”
That got the young man to turn around, a slight frown on his face. He went back to work when Mavuika said no more. After a couple more minutes, he had three bowls of dried herbs prepared, bunched together and set gently alight so they were smoldering and smoking. Then, he took a piece of obsidian. The names “Kiongozi--Mavuika” and “Bidii--Ororon” were already neatly scratched into the surface. “Your name won’t be pretty, but what am I writing? Our true names together will help it so that we not only travel to the Night Kingdom together, but so that we will find each other again if for some reason we become separated.”
Ororon was kneeling over the low table where he had everything set up. Venti took the position to his right, settling in crosslegged on the floor. He leaned back, his arms outstretched behind himself to casually prop himself up. “Barbatos, One of the Thousand Winds. Yohualtecuhtin will recognize that one best.”
The young man’s response came out as a squeaked “oh.” Then he set out to his rushed carving.
Mavuika released a quiet but amused huff as she also sat. “Take us in as soon as you can, Ororon.”
“Done.” His eyes were shifting rapidly between Venti and the table; Venti would guess that Ororon was re-evaluating him. However, there was no true distraction from his work, the hand that placed the obsidian was steady. Ororon motioned towards the bowls. “We each grab one. Bring it underneath your nose and breathe deep. Close your eyes and breathe deep again. Listen to my voice and I’ll take us into the Night Kingdom.”
Venti reached forward, following the instructions. He began to listen.
The three of them appeared immediately before the Lord of the Night. Though Venti was confident he could find himself a way here on his own, the immediate abilities of this shaman of the Night-Wind was far more convenient.
“Good. You have arrived. I have everyone you retrieved waiting here.”
Venti should have given a proper greeting to Yohualtecuhtin, but instead: “Mavuika, is that a Harbinger?” The Fatui had a distinctive sense of style, and the helm of the man sat on a throne of obsidian in the Night Kingdom was clearly ornate, suggesting importance.
Ororon was the one to answer. “The Captain hosts the Lord of the Night.”
“Riiight.”
The Lord of the Night’s voice was its usual even tone, but an angel’s true language was on the wind, so Venti could hear the amusement underlining it when others could not. “There is much that needs to be told to you.”
“Apparently!” Venti continued to eye the Harbinger on a throne as he spoke. “We’ll have to come back to that, lots of spirits to sort.”
“Sort?” Ororon asked. “I’ve never been instructed on how to sort them before. We only help guide them forward.”
Venti finally turned around from the throne/Harbinger/Lord of the Night situation. “Mare Jivari has captivated adventurers from all over Teyvat for years now. There are many Natlanese that you and Mavuika will deal with, and there are those that I will return to their respective homes. And hopefully I can spread the warnings about the windless land again.”
“Warnings?”
Mavuika answered for him. “Every citizen in Mondstadt trusts in the promise that Barbatos will guide their spirit home after death, as long as the wind can reach them. He’s long discouraged travel to Mare Jivari, not that he can fully prevent it.”
Sighing before rolling his shoulders, Venti then squared them as his hair began to glow. “They always get to choose. Now, for more appropriate attire.”
A gust of wind and a flash of light and he switched from Venti the bard to Barbatos, his wings eerily white and his tattoos glowing fiercely in the lowlight of the Night Kingdom.
“Oh, they’re so much larger than mine.”
It was Mavuika’s turn to sigh as Barbatos laughed at the slip of Ororon’s tongue. “Impressive, eh?”
“Boys.”
Barbatos huffed. “If you had wings, you would make them larger than mine if you could.”
She cleared her throat. “To sorting?”
Some of the spirits had already noticed their group standing by Yohualtecuhtin. Warmth filled Barbatos as he noticed that the first spirits to drift towards their group were Mondstadters.
One woman stepped forward even further, not in the usual colours of the Adventurer’s Guild, but in an adventurer’s outfit in the stark contrasting colours of the Church of Favonius. There was a wide smile on her face, splitting as she opened her mouth to sing:
When the breath leaves my body, up into the wind,
When the next step of my rounding journey begins,
Let this song leave upon my breath from me to you,
And let me give you advice that now I know to be true.
Oh, my dear, we all are right to fear dying in a windless land,
Oh, my dear, do take care, to meet Barbatos’ hand,
By wing and wit, please see fit to die beneath his gaze,
Do not become lost amongst that dour haze.
Not even to my enemies do I wish the curse,
Of becoming lost amongst Mare Jivari’s bleak hearse,
Still, my heart longs for the unknown and for tales bold,
So, still I risked that perilous trail sought by adventurers of old.
Oh, my dear, I died amongst our fears,
Do not follow me to that windless land.
Barbatos glided out to meet the woman as she sang, reaching out to gently grasp the hands she had clasped in front of her chest. “Sister Elenor! Sister Yvonne made it back and made sure to share your song. Though, I’m sure you can tell right now.”
As the spirit had sung the final verse, a few other spirits had picked up that verse in round, “Oh, my dear, I died amongst our fears / Do not follow me to that windless land,” flowing through the odd voices behind her like its own kind of breeze. Members of other nations were all following them, staring up in awe at the Anemo Archon, and the Natlanese amongst them then noticing the Pyro Archon behind him.
Sister Eleanor gently pulled her hand from Barbatos’ and curtsied. “We knew the risks, but I think many of us still knew in our hearts that the wind favours all of its children. It’s an honour to sing one last time for you.”
“Not just for me, but for everyone here! But that’s also quite the dire song, hm?” He swept an arm out towards the crowd. “May I request you send them off with another?”
Eleanor smiled wide again before beginning:
North, south, west, and east, winds from every direction,
My heart and soul both so brightly singing with every inflection,
The sun, the moon, and the stars above keeping passage of time,
Joy, sadness, ambition, and courage, colouring my every rhyme.
Freedom sweet we all must meet and cherish in our wills,
That which Barbatos as gifted now we must attend with skill,
From life to death with every breath we guarantee for every man,
That every hope that you hold close shall be at a hand.
Freedom of choice, freedom to act, freedom to come and go as you please,
It is what the Anemo Archon promises with his everlasting breeze,
And when our time is up and mortal body no longer holds sway,
On that gentle breeze I ask you please, Barbatos, carry me away.
Sister Eleanor curtsied again, this time towards the crowd, some of whom gave her applause in return. Many, especially those spirits from other nations in Teyvat other than Mondstadt, looked unsure, a little shellshocked, as if they couldn’t believe that there were Archons in front of them. But there was also a hopeful look emerging on many of those faces as they began to accept that their fellow spirit wasn’t overreacting, that Barbatos was in fact in front of them.
They had all been cut off from whatever idea of the afterlife they had grown up with when they had died in Mare Jivari. Barbatos decided it was kindest not to dally longer even if Sister Eleanor had a lovely voice.
“For all of you who have travelled from afar, I will take you home, if you will.” Wind rose, sweeping over the spirits of the Mondstadters that had gathered in front of Barbatos, and over the members of other nations that had begun to wander forward. All across Teyvat they might have joked about the absent Archon, but here in an afterlife not meant for them, the children of the other five nations drifted towards his white wings and the promise of flight.
They melted, condensing into small motes of light. The wind carried them forward, Barbatos heard Ororon’s intake of breath as four more wings unfurled behind him. Barbartos stretched out all six wings to their limits, the wind gently placing the motes of souls on his plumage like plant burrs ready to journey to their next life on an animal’s fur.
Carefully, Barbatos retracted all six wings, bringing them back into his power, hiding them to offer the souls further protection until he delivered them to the ley lines they belonged to. “Now, if I can watch you two deal with yours?”
Ororon looked to his Archon. Mavuika smiled. “As if a seelie hasn’t told you the process already at some point. For all that they quietly float around, at least myself and Morax know they enjoy talking to you.”
“The wind, my dear, the wind! I can teach you to listen to it, you know. Someone as powerful as you could manage. Your little shaman here too, most likely.”
Ororon’s whole body lifted with his surprise, his ear going stiff and straight. “Me?”
“Well, you are a Master of the Night-Wind, right? It’s just a step further to listen to the true wind. If I may, without offense, your emptiness would even help in that regard. The issues with most mortals is how attached to everything they are. You’re more… free-floating.”
“Oh… like a seelie?”
“Sure, that’s one way to think of it.”
He raised his hand to his mouth. “I’ve never considered that I might be part seelie.”
“Well, I wouldn’t go that far, but anyways. The ghosts?”
Mavuika rested a hand on Ororon’s shoulder to bring his attention back to their task. “Guide them, shaman.”
Ororon nodded. “Everyone, please come forward, and one at a time greet the Lord of the Night. Let Yohualtecuhtin welcome you home.”
There was a smile on his face as reached for the spirit of an older gentleman whose limp had followed him into death. Ororon offered his arm as if the spirit was any other elder of his tribe, a brace for the man as Ororon helped him forward, steadying the spirit’s gait. He led the spirit towards the throne.
Barbatos squinted as the old spirit failed to acknowledge the still man upon the throne. Instead, without hesitation, the spirit kept walking forward, Ororon stepping around the throne to continue helping, until suddenly the spirit seemed to diminish in form and melt away. “What does he see?”
“The Lord of the Night has told me they see a doorway. That that is a comfortable image for us humans to pass through. Before, they went through a piece of obsidian that represented Yohualtecuhtin. Now, that is the Captain’s job as his body currently supports Natlan’s new ley lines.”
Barbatos’ eyes narrowed. “His body?”
Mavuika sighed. “Well, maybe. I hope.” She crossed her arms in her usual fashion, but there was obvious tension in her shoulders. “As I hope you will take a closer look at him before you return to your beloved nation.”
Ororon was still calling forth spirits. He welcomed them forward one at a time while beside the throne and the Harbinger. Barbatos noticed his hand not resting on the back of the seat, but on the shoulder of the man.
Seelies came forward, whispering in Barbatos’ ear. As the Lord of the Night had mentioned earlier, there was much to catch up on and the small guides were very much willing to share.
And there were some things that were naturally easier for Barbatos to understand over Mavuika, even if they were in lands under her control. The Night-Wind was a wind after all. He could see the ease of which it moved through the Harbinger’s body as the spirits passed on through it, just how he could see how it partially passed through Ororon’s half soul.
And as he looked more closely, he could see the soul of the Harbinger tethered not to the throne, and not even to his own body, but to nothing. Which couldn’t have been right, not when the Night-Wind was flowing through both as it guided the newly returned spirits back to Natlan’s ley lines. The Harbinger’s spirit should have been tethered, or long gone with the wind.
“A closer look is definitely needed.”
Barbatos could feel Mavuika’s gaze sharpen upon himself at the seriousness of his tone. He didn’t say anything more for now. It would do no good to interrupt Ororon’s work. He let the shaman finish.
After the last Natlanese spirit passed on into the Night Kingdom, Ororon turned back to them. He had been warm and encouraging to the deceased and Barbatos took no offense as he watched Ororon’s expression fall, betraying how tired he was after performing all night long, and then having to spend his morning conducting proper ritual. Barbatos wondered if Ororon knew he was leaning on the Captain’s body even harder now.
The young shaman didn’t strike Barbatos as one to completely forgo propriety in his position; he surmised it was a familiarity that already existed between the two that made it so Ororon wasn’t even thinking about lightly manhandling what some might considered a dead body. And which properly now for sure at least counted as a holy relic.
Damn it, they’re cute. A Harbinger shouldn’t be cute!
Barbatos looked to Mauvika and inclined his head towards the two. “I can look now, if that was your plan?”
“Well, I didn’t want to push, but since we’re already here.” She held out her arm to let Barbatos take the lead.
As they approached, Mavuika’s voice was warm, the gentle heat of her element that welcomed warriors home to rest. “Ororon, take a moment to rest. I’ve asked Barbatos to see what he thinks of the Captain’s situation.
For all that the man seemed lackadaisical at the party, his mannerisms proved him every bit the warrior Barbatos expected of anyone Named a Hero of Natlan. At Mavuika’s words, his spine straightened and his eyes focused and narrowed at Barbatos with a second wind of energy that was battle-trained. He seemed to think for a moment, and then he acquiesced, stepping slightly to the side before folding to the ground so that he could sit with his back resting against the throne.
Barbatos approached not by himself, but with three seelies in tow, all of them whispering in his ears. They didn’t have much more to add to the situation other than what Venti could already see. Ronova had left the Captain’s soul untethered. He wasn’t like any other soul here; the seelies told Barbatos that even the Khaenri’ahn souls the Captain (“Thrain” they informed him with a calm deference) had carried for centuries had been properly weaved into Natlan’s new ley lines.
But his was not. It was not even tied to his own body, it held no sway over that frozen piece of meat, not here in the metaphysical sense, and so Barbatos could assume the same was true in the literal, physical sense back in the waking Teyvat. Instead, his spirit was just trapped in that physical cage, not able to do nothing at all.
It was a punishment enacted by Ronova, and Barbatos felt a curl of anger grow in his gut as he realized the Shade of Death may have managed to cut off a spirit from holding any sense of time without consulting a power of Time.
Technically, this situation was an affront, not that Barbatos thought that Isaroth would care. That was his job after all, the unnamed intention Isaroth had beset him with when she had shared her power with one of her winds. An actor who understood her values and rules from a different angle.
The opposite of unending Time, that which flowed without consideration for anything else. The Time that acted with perfection, that happened in the nick of.
He peered closely at Thrain’s soul, doublechecking his suspicions. Barbatos smiled wide and sharp as he deemed this a situation he could interfere in.
First, he needed an opinion from Mavuika. He signalled her over, floating up to whisper directly in his ear, hoping that the little bat on the ground wouldn’t hear them. “How close are those two?”
She whispered in his in kind. “Well, Ororon sided with the Captain over me when Ororon thought that his plan had a better chance of saving Natlan. And they snuck off together after the victory feast. The better question is, how close do you need them to be?”
“To trust each other with their lives.”
Ororon’s voice betrayed how he was practically half asleep on the ground now. “Yes.”
Barbatos just laughed. “Oh those ears are more than just adorable! Well, cup-half-empty, how do you feel about it being your turn to host a roommate?”
Ororon jolted back awake at that question. “Bro, I’m too tired for Granny-level questions.”
“It’s his body that hosts the Lord of the Night, not his soul. I could make it so that any time you’re in the Night Kingdom, his temporal existence becomes attached to yours, and so he’ll be able to converse and move around with you here.”
This time Ororon jolted so hard he banged his head on the throne. His cry at the pain was half screech. Then he seemed to process what Barbatos had said, his head whipping around to stare at the god so quickly that his hood fell off. “Do it.”
“No questions?”
“Well, is there some like shitty side effect I should know about?”
“He’ll always be at your side while you’re in the Night Kingdom, well, unless I come untie you two. So, if there’s ceremonies where you need to be utterly alone here, you will no longer be able to perform them.”
“That’s fine. Do it.”
Barbatos glanced at Mavuika. She nodded.
In the way it came with individual souls—individal instances of time—there was no grand show of power. This was far more simple than blowing Mare Jivari off the timeline, and far more simple than bringing all of its trapped souls back.
The body of the Captain and Ororon glowed Anemo green for a moment. As the power faded, a ghost freed from the curse Ronova had originally placed on him, and now at least a little bit freed from the new one that had happened upon him, stumbled up and out from a body on a throne.
Barbatos laughed loud at the utter confusion on the Captain’s face as the Khaenri’ahn man and spirit turned to look at the Anemo god. The manifestation was stronger than any other spirit they had encountered that night, since Thrain was only technically disembodied, not dead. Here in the Night Kingdom, he looked as if he was uncursed flesh and blood again.
That excited Ororon. Barbatos laughed even harder, doubling over as the spirit was then tackled by the shaman who had seemingly shot up from the ground. “I need to visit more often!”
Mavuika laughed with him. “As if you don’t spend most of your time sleeping.”
Barbatos ignored the moment the two men were having on the ground. “It rests my vocal cords. I have a reputation to maintain.”
The two managed to stand back up, but Ororon was still desperately close, holding Thrain’s face. His comment was directed at Barbatos. “You changed his face.”
“Well, Ronova’s curse of immortality works by affecting the body, mostly. His soul has more agency, and gets to reflect himself a bit more now that it’s unshackled from his body.” He made sure to meet the Captain’s eyes. “You can look as you were, if you wish it hard enough. It’s all about… personal understanding. Inner reflection of the dear heart and soul spared / no matter if the body is beyond repair / memory sees deeper than the unclouded mind / and so one’s spiritual appearance molds itself in kind.”
The Captain seemed to not be as concerned with his appearance as Ororon was. Instead, his gaze fixed on the Anemo Archon while his hands had clutched back at the man holding him. “You’re… Barbatos.” For all that he must have been shocked at returning to consciousness, Capitano forced his voice flat and cold as he said Barbatos’ name.
“And you’re quite the conundrum, but I am glad that I could lend a slightly helping hand.”
His voice may have been flat, but the helmet on the body had not followed the spirit, and so Barbatos watched as a myriad of emotions seemed to flicker through Thrain’s various expressions. Ororon cleared his throat. “You’re not masked.”
Capitano jolted, forcing his expression blank before sighing. “Well, it has been quite a time since I’ve had to bother thinking about that.” Capitano straightened, and Ororon and himself distangled from each other, though they still stood in each other’s personal space.
Barbatos could make an educated guess of how a Khaenri’ahn might feel about himself. This was a day for righting wrongs, but that was one that could not be undone. He tilted his head towards Thrain as an acknowledgement before turning to Mavuika. “Anything else you would like me to manage before I go?”
She in turn gave Barbatos a contemplative look before shaking her head. “No, that is all. Thank you for all that you’ve done.”
“The spirits of Mare Jivari were my mess to clean even if I do not regret my actions at the threat that the land posed. And you,” Barbatos turned to grin at the Captain, “it’s a bonus to help one who could so rightfully challenge Ronova. Even the Shades need to be humbled.” The Captain couldn’t keep surprise from showing on his face at the compliment and accompanying statement.
Barbatos took a deep breath than exhaled, light seeming to flow out of his body along with the air as he shifted from his winged form back to Venti the bard. Then he stretched before placing his hands on his hips. “Now, Mavuika! Ororon may be half asleep but he’s young and fit and I’m sure Yohualtecuhtin will get used to turning a blind eye, so how ‘bout we scram and let the two love birds catch up?”
Thrain’s cheeks flustered red while Ororon simply nodded beside him. Venti and Mavuika cackled in unison as they melted back away into the waking world.