[ ah, and there he goes disappointing the noble young master again. there's a vindictive twist in his gut, dark and hot with loathing and bitter satisfaction, as he once again exposes the rotten core of himself to the blazing fires of diluc's judgment. serves the guy right for expecting anything but the worst out of him, serves him right for reaching out to a viper in the dark. he laughs, bright and glittering and brittle as the shards of ice he wields. ]

Don't worry, I would never expect anything from you, Master Diluc.

[ poison drips from his lips, frost from his smile. for a moment, kaeya's breath seems near visible in the sudden temperature drop of the air around him - and then he blinks and suddenly snaps back to mischievous cheer again, mercurial as the shifting tides. he's never been able to ever get truly angry at diluc, after all - not in their youth and certainly not now, when he's lost all right to it - and this is hardly anger he's emanating off in cold waves. just a warning, that's all; the baring of teeth from a wounded creature, the rattling of a snake, the thorns surrounding a beautiful flower: do not come too close.

really, it's for diluc's own good. he should know what happens, entrusting any portion of himself into kaeya's hands. ]

And come on, don't be such a stick in the mud! [ 'come on, luc' echoes across the sands of time, the vines of the winery, across training fields and mountainsides and dark alleyways long past curfew - that strange foreign boy dragging mondstadt's young prince into trouble again and again, and then dragging him right back out. ] Don't you want to know who else is on this ship with us?