#yerrr

it was supposed to be a study session with the scholar, but due to your exhaustion and unwillingness to do anything remotely constructive in the presence of your favorite person, you found yourself a little distracted. not that you had any care in the world.

you hear him huff and mutter under his breath. you think you heard him say something along the lines of, ‘gods help me’. you snicker at his annoyed expression and remembered why he is in your top 5 people to be with.

“if you didn’t come here to study,” zandiks beady eyes find yours,

“then why are you here?” the pencil he held in his hand was placed onto the hard cover of his book creating a quiet thud. you scoff at his stupidity, though something tells you he already had the idea why, he just wanted to here it from you.

sighing dramatically—you reply, “if you don’t want me here, i’ll just leave,” you make no move to get up. neither does he.

“i never said that.”

you hum condescendingly, “you implied it.”

“i did not.”

“you thought it.” the back and forth bantering between you two was more than common. it was genuinely how you were able to communicate with the stand-offish man.

you hear him groan in annoyance which makes you laugh again. you watch him resume with writing in a his small blue notebook. you never asked what he wrote in there because he never really brought it up, so you could only assume it’s some sort of diary. but why would he write in it in front of you? crawling off of him, you sit with your legs underneath your self and your hands on top of your thighs.

“what are you doing?” you ask, you expect him to roll his eyes and tell you it was nothing, instead he stares at you blankly. you recognize this face as the one when he’s deciding something. is he deciding to lie or to tell you the truth?

after a moment of silence he finally speaks,

“this notebook,” he closes the book shut, holding it in front of you for you to take, “is my own research.”

with the notebook in your grasp, you skim through some pages, taking in the information.

“what if i told you, that humans aren’t reaching their full potential?” zandik points both his fingers out, as if trying to pitch a sales idea (which he technically was). your eyes trace along the drawings, scribbles comprised of his messy handwriting. the drawings are sketches of human anatomy. their hearts, bones, nerves. you make a humming sound, absentmindedly listening to whatever he was saying while mainly being focused of flipping through the pages. your eyes widen after stopping on a certain page.

“khaneriah..” whispering as your finger traces the familiar lost nations title. enrolled as a spantamad student, khaneriah was always bound to pop up in certain lectures of yours. you always had a nagging need to correct others when they claim that khaneriah was at fault for what happened to them and their people. that something horrible must’ve happened there that caused a domino effect on the rest of teyvat. the cataclysm, king deshret and the forbidden knowledge that plagued the desert. you had almost proposed a thesis on the ley lines and their connection with the abyssal corruption—

“are you listening to me?” you startle back to the present and look up at zandik, expecting to see annoyance, you instead see intrigue. you can feel the corners of your mouth twitch.

“your thoughts are loud,” he says quietly, observing the tiny reactions you might’ve had when reading his entries. “what did you just realize?”

you think again. you’ve worked so hard in the akademiya, you are no fool to how strict they are with their rules. the sins already engraved in your mind,

interfering with human evolution.

“i realized..” you trail off, your eyes finding the open notebook again.

tampering with life and death.

once again your body refuses to speak, but your mind was creating so many connections, so many of the missing pieces fitting into the puzzle,

delving beyond the universe.

zandik squints his eyes. this was a mistake, he thinks. were you going to reject him like the rest of the world has?

investigating the origin of words.

he rushes to snatch his notebook from your hands but finds himself stunned when you grasp it like a vice.

revering gods without acts of devotion.

“do you know what will happen if you get caught with this?” you whisper, not as harshly as he thought you’d be. he nods, he already knew of the consequences if the akademiya—or anyone with the wrong intentions—would do if they found out he had been..

attempting the forbidden and fearing none.

you let go of the notebook, but zandik just continues staring at you, his eyes widening in surprise. you were smiling. a smile that spread across your face, like you just made a groundbreaking discovery.

“zandik, i am so glad you are my fucking friend.” he shakes his head in complete confusion, before he can muster up a response, you speak,

“everyone here.. even the sages, they never understood the true meaning of knowledge,” you lean in closer to him, “what’s the point in calling yourself a scholar when you don’t understand the workings of this world?” zandik feels like he could cry tears of complete joy.

“if you are going to continue researching the forbidden,” making your way off his bed to stand, you offer the flat of your hand toward him. “you’re going to need a partner who is part of that forbidden.”

who are sages to tell you to deny a part of yourself? who..

“who are the gods to tell me.. that i can’t understand my homelands history?”

you watch zandiks eyes widening in realization,

“you’re..”

“yes.”

his jaw goes slack. were you ever going to tell him that your true heritage was of the lost land? almost 100 years ago..but how?

“i’ll explain it later.” you read his mind, like always. you flex your hand again towards him, ushering him to take it. he grins, baring his sharp canines,

“this will be the ultimate partnership, you and i.” he takes your hand.

——