[ Oriphi hums, fingers curling and tightening around fabric on his back at his words. Even before Thoma’s birthday, before they saw the worst of each other in their nightmares, before even the mistletoe gumdrops forced them closer together… She has always been drawn to him. She hadn’t known, when amber first met scarlet in an innocuous meeting over tea, that their paths would be irrevocably entwined from that moment on, that he would change her life so wholly. After all, she was simply meeting Diluc. Not Diluc of Mondstadt, or Diluc Ragnvindr of Dawn Winery, or the Darknight Hero. Just Diluc, a man who likes his tea plain sometimes, but quite sweet other times. Who likes birds of prey. Who stays up late and wakes up early. Who fights and fights and fights to protect. Who wants nothing more than to bear the darkness so that others may live in the light.

Who, in spite of that, became her moonlight, guiding her through the dark of the night so that she could see dawn.

She can’t help but think of what she had seen of Eustace and Tifa tonight. Their pledge to one another - though twisted it became in the waking nightmare - to always keep each other safe. And of Eustace’s dream…

There’s no small part of her who, in that moment, wants to look into Diluc’s eyes and find that same devotion. She knows she would, with all of her heart, and she would give him the same. And she would make the same pledge. She’s sure of it, now more than ever. Then, when they find Thoma again somehow, someway, he would, too— ]

Diluc…?

[ —but her moonlight forges on. Her eyes widen and although they cannot see each other’s faces positioned as they are, her gaze falls on each and every single reminder of their life together here in this home as he speaks. Their boots by the door, the scarves Thoma had made them hanging on a rack. Plants everywhere, flowers that remind him of Mondstadt growing in pots and kept in vases everywhere. His books and paperwork and her journals of pressed flowers on the table. Of course he has been thinking about how to protect all of this, and even beyond that— how to chase this dream even once they’ve woken up from it. Thinking of that eventuality twists at her heart and she exhales a quivering breath as she nuzzles into his shoulder again. ]

…Me, too. No matter what. We’ll find each other.

[ Which is to say, she has very much been drowning in her own thoughts on the matter, albeit differently. She has no concrete intentions to find or fight gods. But she does intend to grow stronger, however she can, so that she can harness the kind of magical energy that she knows would make what they both want possible. But if they are to have any hope of succeeding… ]

We have to figure it out together, okay…? Please don’t run off on your own. If something were to happen to you like last time, or like what happened to Eustace tonight… I don’t know if I would be strong enough, moonlight. I don’t want to see you in that much pain…