Stardust

A L B E D O

500 years prior, Khanri'ah, Seat of the Eclipse Dynasty

The world ended impartially, a speech delivered without emotion or room to argue.

You who have walked the path of the gods, sought to obtain the gnosis of divinity, shall be punished. Nation of sinners bear the weight of your crimes. The curse of Khanri'ah.

For a moment there was silence. Then came the screams. Albedo read plenty of poems debating the end of the world–ice, fire, winds or rage. 

It was fire. It was freezing. It was inescapable.

Albedo stumbled to his feet as the ground quaked, tripping as he looked for an opening as the lab crumbled around him. Agony in the air, curling like smoke, and a pain in his throat Albedo could not name. Kaeya was not close to him. Kaeya was not here. Albedo could hear his feet slapping as he ran, tears of ash running down his face as he prayed. 'Just let him be okay,' Albedo thought.

For the first time, Albedo did not sense Kaeya's closeness. His eyes laid on that long black-blue hair, lit under the starlight and hellfire, on the bridge they used to hide under in the endless nights. Before he could scream, a hand jerked against his nape. A hand he knew the cruelty and kindness of down to his molecules. 'Master.'

"We must go," she said, voice strong even though there was a tremble there. Master was scared of very little, content to work in her lab with her creation, but even she could not escape the base instincts of all creatures born in Teyvat. A fear of Celestia she took great efforts to carve out of his creation.

"Kaeya," Albedo said, gasping, his chest collapsing from lack of oxygen. All the air in his lungs was burning–like he couldn't breathe. 

"The King is bringing him away," Gold assured him. "You cannot follow."

"I have to," Albedo said, kicking against Gold. She was more than twice his size, his little fists doing so little against her but he had to try.

"Celestia knows you, she knows all my abominations, and you are not yet fully grown. I can shield you, but without me you will deliver the Prince to their doorstep," Gold said. Her mouth was in a hard line as her hand brushed against the star pounding at his throat.

"They will curse us, child." Albedo wondered if he knew what a curse was, truly knew, before the moment he realized that bond might be at stake. "They are going to take the  marks that bind us and turn us into monsters."

Celestia's rage had nothing on Albedo as the pieces righted themselves in his mind. Divinity cared little for the mundane unless it sought to step on its toes. Boiling in his stomach, Albedo could not tell if it was the burning heavenly fires around him or one that was kindled inside his stomach at the sheer loss of it all, but for the first time in his life Albedo knew rage. It was a boiling fury that knew no bounds or reason. It must have come from Kaeya because he never felt such a fire all his life.

"Monsters like you created," Albedo said, energy in his hands, growing and growing. There was a sudden weight in his pocket, but couldn't pay it any mind.

"Morax was always the gutsy sort," Gold sighed, jerking him along. "Geo? How fitting." 

"You caused this," Albedo said, jerking against her grip. But his master was far stronger than she appeared and there was a method to her madness. She would never create something stronger than herself.

"You owe me everything, even him," Gold said. "You'll leave him behind. You'll wait or you'll forget, but Khanri'ah will not die because of the weak heart of a creature made of dust."