Work Text:
Sometimes he dreams of her.
He dreams of back when they were both naive apprentices, their workspaces cramped into the same corner. Nothing mattered to either of them back then, except the clothes they stitched with their own hands and a dream that burned brightly in the distant horizon.
Once upon a time, Chiori had looked at him with wine red eyes that sparkled in the warm lamplight. Her cheeks were as red as a tomato, flushed from the cheap liquor they bought at the épicerie.
She cried into the dark night "I, Chiori!!! Will become the best seamstress there is!!! And my fashion — " and briefly hiccuped before continuing "— my... Brand... WILL BE FAMOUS ALL OVER TEYVAT!"
He couldn't help but be captivated by her passion as blinding as the lightning from her homeland. Her convictions were infectious, and her words reached deep into his heart like a needle piercing through cloth.
So too did he bare his dreams for the whole world to see.
"And I, Uther! I... Will be the best designer in all of Fontaine!!" He proudly declared like a fool.
Several passserbys looked towards them in irritation, and...
So did Chiori.
She grabbed him by the collar and gave him no choice but to stare straight into her wine red eyes.
Her brows were stitched into a disgruntled frown and Uther can't help but wonder what he did wrong.
"Just. Fontaine?" She said those words like they're a crime. Uther was used to Chiori's strong personality. It was just a matter of when he could get a word in.
"W— what's wrong with that?" He asked her even as his words started to slur together.
Her lips formed into a rather adorable furious pout. "Friends like mine sh— shouldn't settle for less," she declared amidst her intoxicated mutterings.
Uther gasped scandalously and tears began to well up in his eyes. "Y—you shitting on m—my dreams, Chiori?!" He cried so emotionally that passerbys would swear that he had been sobbing.
Chiori growled at him, "What I'm saying!! Shtupid!! Is that you're better than just Fontaine!!!" She said as she drew him even closer.
Her hands are small, steady, and elegant. The same hands he'd seen diligently draw patterns and stitch cloth holds him so tightly as if they don't want to let go. The same hands that grip his collar firmly even when she's practically wasted.
It was an awkward position.
A tiny Inazuman girl in a modest yellow kimono manhandling a towering Fontainian boy dressed in simple clothes. Their foreheads were knocked together in an intimate scene. The boy awkwardly hunched over to accommodate the girl's short height and Uther couldn't help but think that they both made for a ridiculous sight.
"Come with me." She solemnly said.
"Wuh?" He dumbly replied.
Her wine red eyes stared into his own, as blue as the mists that cover Fontaine. It is only then that he realized she had never once looked away from him.
"Come with me, Uther. And everyone in Teyvat will know our names."
Caught in her gaze, he looked back at her with clear blue eyes. Free from veiled mists and the fog of doubt.
And he replied.
"Alright."
And that's where the dream ends.
How that particular night ended, he didn't know. All he knows is that their master had been greatly displeased with them the following day and that they both received an immense workload as punishment.
The Uther back then had believed in that bright shining future. One where he and Chiori stitched it together with their own hands, building a stairway to the heavens with shining Inazuman silk and golden Fontainian thread.
The Uther of those days is long gone, replaced with an embittered husk of a man. Petty. Jealous. Devoid of the hopes and dreams of his youth.
He built his wings of feathered wax, only to fall in the face of the blazing scorching sun.
He'd fallen once.
He'd fallen twice.
He fell a dozen —
No.
Hundreds of times.
And if he had fallen. So did Chiori.
For they were the same two reckless fools reaching for the sky in harmony.
Together their sights were set to gaze at the distant horizon.
Her gaze remained unwavering.
His gaze...
Faltered.
And that made all the difference.
— / —
"That's the fifth time you've upset Master today, hothead. Are you sure you have a geo vision and not a pyro vision?" a young Uther once told a young Chiori. His golden curls which were gathered into ponytail held together by a blue ribbon swung teasingly over Chiori’s face.
Chiori scoffed as her frown knitted her dark eyebrows together.
"I refuse to compromise,” she said. “Not when it comes to my artistic vision."
Uther raised his own eyebrows as if he was surprised. Though in truth, he was half expecting this outcome.
"Ah... I apologize. You're as stubborn as rock! A geo vision does suit you indeed," he jested.
Chiori simply huffed and lazily peered through her dark lashes.
"And you could stand to have a bit more spine, you know,” she scolded him in turn. “Your works are wonderful! Even if Master says otherwise."
But even Chiori's fiercest encouragements could not lift the fog that obscured Uther's sight.
"Heh. Thanks, Chiori. But I'm just saying that it wouldn't hurt to listen to Master for a while. Isn't the whole point of apprenticeship to learn from those more experienced than us?"
"Hmph... I'll concede to your point."
— / —
"You're... Quitting?!"
Her hands slammed down on his workspace, making the tools rattle in their place. The expression on her face showed nothing but utter betrayal. Uther tsked in disapproval. Chiori's hot temper would be her downfall one of these days.
And Uther refused to stay to witness it.
"Look at me, Uther! Why are you doing this, when Fontaine Fashion Week is just seven days away?!" Chiori demanded. But even so, he kept his gaze downward. Too afraid to look back at her out of fear that he may be foolishly pulled back into chasing a dream that had long since crushed his spirit.
This was not the first time they came into conflict, but perhaps the first time his words had cut her deeply. The words he said to her back then... How he wished to take them back.
"It's all pointless, Chiori! Can't you see it? Or are you just too blockheaded to see the damn truth! Our work... Everything we've done... It's all worthless!"
"Don't say that, Uther!" She desperately insisted. "Our works aren't inferior just because they're different. You and I, we can still change the fashion world. Not just in Fontaine, but for all of Teyvat."
Uther laughed bitterly. "Still clinging to that pipe dream, then? Well, I wish you the best of luck, Chiori."
He packed his tools, designs, fabric scraps, his whole life into one cardboard box and took it into his arms and out the door.
But before he could truly take his final step out the shop that had held the brightest moments of his life, he just had to give one last bitter goodbye.
To the girl who still believed in him.
Even when he no longer believed in himself.
"Don't come crying to me when Fontaine tears you apart."
And just like that.
The thread that had bound their fates together for several long years was gone in a single snip.
— / —
Five days before fashion week, Uther found himself a job at a clothing factory in the depths of the Fleuve Cendre.
It was difficult work and it wasn't necessarily comfortable. But it paid the bills and it was enough.
Being a leading fashion designer... Changing the world... These were all dreams far too out of reach for someone like him.
But soon, whispers came back to him like the cold biting wind.
.
.
.
"Have you heard? That Chioriya girl's designs were absolutely fantastic!"
"Chiori, you mean. Chioriya is the brand. Chiori is the designer."
"Whatever! Oh... She was like a breath of fresh air in this... Stagnant fashion industry. I can't wait to see what she'll do next!"
Uther couldn't believe it.
Chiori...
Succeeded?
— / —
A fire had lit within him.
But this one was not like the fire Chiori had once lit in his heart so many years ago.
Back then, that fire burned warmly and comfortingly. Like a shining star in the night sky.
This new flame that he fed and nurtured... It ate away at his very soul. The pieces of his past dreams and aspirations now merely kindling to fuel his jealousy and hatred.
— / —
It was a lazy afternoon. The 3 o'clock sun shone warmly through the windows and fashion displays of their boutique. At this hour that flows like syrup over hotcakes, no customers are interested in perusing their designs.
"That's an interesting silhouette you've got there... But what exactly is going on with it?" Uther asked as he looked over Chiori's new sketches.
Chiori stopped chewing on her pencil to reply for a moment. Her eyes remained focused on the paper before her. "I've been trying to come up with a design that blends both Inazuman and Fontainian aesthetics. What do you think?"
Uther hummed contemplatively. "It could work, but I think we should do something about the fabric."
"Oh? Please elaborate." She looked at him curiously, and Uther couldn't help but secretly preen at her attention.
"You're from Inazuma right?" He said and returned her gaze. "It makes sense that you wouldn't really be familiar with the feel and weight of Fontainian fabrics yet. I know a supplier around here that could get you fabrics with decent quality... AND at a good deal!" He grinned at her confidently. "If you're willing, I could show you around."
Chiori smiled at him gently.
"I would greatly appreciate that."
— / —
"Uther? Good to see you, lad! And where's Chiori? I thought you two were practically attached at the hip!" Mister Venger cheerfully greeted him one beautiful clear morning. Not a single dark cloud in sight of Fontaine's lovely blue sky. But Uther didn't feel quite as lovely or cheerful these days, for those days of lazy afternoons and warm golden light were things he had long since left behind.
"Ah... Mister Venger, Chiori and I..." Uther tried to admit, but only wound up making himself look quite pathetic.
Mister Venger briefly gaped at him in surprise and nodded grimly.
"I see," he said in a deep voice. "So the rumours are true then."
Uther could only stay silent.
Mister Venger tried to comfort Uther with a firm pat on his shoulder.
"There is no shame in giving up, Uther," the old man wisely said. "Everyone has got a different course in life. Trust me. I know what I'm talking about."
Uther awkwardly looked away and longingly gazed at Fontaine bathed in the golden sunlight.
"I know Mister Venger, I just..."
If I hadn't left...
Would things have turned out differently for me?
— / —
Uther watched as the blonde haired Traveler and the flying silver fairy leave his factory in a rush.
Now the only ones left in this wretched place are Chiori and him.
"We were friends once, Uther. But I'm afraid this is where we part ways." Chiori stubbornly declared as she pointed one of her fine swords at his face.
Those words stung like a needle to his heart. For in Uther's mind, they had severed their ties a long time ago.
Yet it seems that all this time...
Chiori had kept holding on to her end of their broken thread.
Now, it was her turn to let go.
"Surrender," she spat. "Or do I have to use force on you again?"
It mattered not. For Uther's pistol had been a flintlock and he had thrown away his only shot.
He let his pistol drop to the ground and he raised his arms in defeat.
"I surrender, Chiori."
— / —
The iron handcuffs clink on his wrists as Captain Chevreuse binds him at the front with cuffs. Her eye follows Uther's longing gaze and then lands on Chiori giving her testimony to a garde. While her side profile is visible, she pointedly avoids glancing in his direction.
While Uther cannot see where Chevreuse's eye lands, he can feel the weight of her judgement.
"Something on your mind?" Captain Chevreuse asks him in a sharp voice.
But Uther cannot find it in himself to look away.
"I was just thinking that..."
He can keep looking all he wants. Not that it will earn him her forgiveness.
"... This is the first time she's ever refused to look at me."
Captain Chevreuse lets out a long and tired sigh.
"You've had years to make it up to her, pal. You can pity yourself when you're in Meropide," she tells him.
Then she turns him around and marches him away from the factory. For a brief moment, he thinks he spies Chiori's wine red eyes curiously darting towards him to look back just once more.
Alas, Uther does not truly know. For he cannot look back either.
As the gardes escort him away from the slums of the Fleuve Cendre, strangely enough Uther feels no fear.
Rather, the light shining down the sewers feels like the first ray of hope he's had in a long time.