Archive of Our Own ^beta

It isn't a surprise that, when taking human guise, Lord Barbatos presents as an alpha. He needs a scent to cover his tracks, and most bards are alphas--dramatic, charismatic, attention-grabbing, flighty, inconstant without the tie of a bond, prone to wandering. It fits 'Venti the bard' perfectly.

The archon of the City of Freedom would never be a dull and staid beta like Jean.

He is exceptionally gracious for an alpha, easy-going and without a trace of true arrogance, playfully as he might claim to be the best of bards. His ability to evade the challenges of other alphas is impressive, turning them to drinking contests or bardic competitions if he can't defuse them entirely; Jean sees him engage only once, and on his own terms, when a drunk she was halfway to her feet to arrest attempts to grab Diona on the deck of the Cat's Tail.

Venti wins that challenge, of course. Jean has to smile when he drops the man at her feet with a sweeping bow and such effusive praise for the Acting Grand Master that he makes it sound as if she had been the one to wrap a wind around his opponent's legs and turn him upside-down.

He's equally gracious with omegas, flattering but never overbearing. He seems, in fact, to lack all interest. At first Jean assumes that it's because the human guise is only a guise; then, during a rare evening at the Angel's Share, she discovers the true reason why.

Barbatos is six songs into his set when he sees her and Diluc at the bar. In the months since Dvalin's restoration, they have been learning how to be friends again, and their talk tonight is easy enough that they're both relaxed and smiling. Jean smiles all the more warmly when Venti turns to wave at them, though Diluc, as is his nature, promptly folds his smile away.

"Aha! Our honorable host, and the noble Dandelion Knight!" Barbatos sets his fingers to the lyre, his eyes alight. "What a perfect occasion to debut my new song. Listen closely, my friends, to the tale of heroism I have to recount!"

His song is light on the true details of the past few months, but generous in the tale it spins of their role in defending against the Abyss Order's assault. Jean finds herself blushing at the heroism she herself is attributed with. There's fewer verses he can weave Diluc into without revealing his secret second role, but Jean watches him step and turn, almost dancing, as he sings, and sees his smile turn again and again to them, and she knows what this song is truly about.

"He's displaying for you," Jean tells Diluc, delighted for him, even if she has to suppress a touch of jealousy. "Lord Barbatos himself."

Diluc looks at her as if she's grown a second head. "He's not displaying for me. I'd throw him out of the tavern if he did."

Perhaps he does it so often that Diluc doesn't realize. Jean doesn't come here often enough to see how he behaves on a typical night. Or perhaps Diluc is guarding himself, as he always has, afraid of the being stripped vulnerably bare as are all the omegas in Jean's romantic novels when they come under an alpha's eye.

As betas never are. She's read those passages over and over again until the pages fall out, imagining herself in those omegas' place, the center of someone's attention, the focus of all the intensity an alpha can bring to bear--knowing as she does that it's only a fantasy, that in real life, betas are simply unable by their very physiology to inspire such passion in anyone else. Jean bites down again on the jealousy and smiles at Diluc.

"He's-" she drops her voice, staying under the music "-Barbatos, Diluc. We both have seen how kind he is. He wouldn't press anyone beyond what they desired."

"He presses plenty about extending his tab every night." Diluc snorts, then looks at her again, thoughtfully. "But no. He wouldn't press anyone like that. You could do worse."

"You could," Jean agrees, determining not to press any further herself, and turns back to enjoy the rest of her archon's song.

There's a secret delight, though, under her breast, a secondhand pleasure on Diluc's behalf. An alpha might never display so for a beta, but she can be happy for her friend, happy to be even in the presence of such romance.

***

The next time she sees Barbatos, he's sitting in one of her cells. Jean is mortified, and her first thought is to get him out--yet she realizes, as she strides down the stairs with the arrest report in hand, that to do so would reveal him to be other than the simple bard he claims to be. And he is, it turns out, quite as drunk as he's said to be in that report.

Or appears to be drunk, at least. This is another area where it might well be a mere pretense of humanity. Though if it's sincere, he's as easy-going a drunk as he is an alpha, and manages to be as bright-eyed and friendly as he is in any other state.

"Here we are! The lovely Master Jean," he says, sitting up in the cell and running his fingers over the strings of his lyre. Even the simple strumming rouses a sweet murmur of song. "I was trying to play a song for you! But, haha, it seems your knights took some offense."

"According to this report, you were standing on the roof of the Ordo, in the belltower. Which should only be accessible from the inside, unless you were gliding in an unauthorized zone. I don't wish to question how you arrived there, but you understand why my knights would feel this worthy of arrest?"

"You know the laws better than I do," Barbatos says, laughing. "Not that I'm surprised, coming from you! That's always been a Gunnhildr gift. Never fear, I won't take offense to the Ordo doing its job."

That does take a weight off Jean's shoulders. "I am glad to hear it. And I am sorry to put you in this position, but I do not have a good reason to release you without proper processing. I will make sure to mark this as a minor offense, so you will be released in the morning, but I can let you go no sooner than that without showing partiality."

"You can't let me out for a song?" He winks.

Jean winces, but shakes her head. "I am sorry, but as the Acting Grand Master, I must be an example to the other knights. We have had... issues, in the near past, with misconduct regarding prisoners-" and oh, the burn of shame is just as strong now as it had been three years past, when she dug past Eroch's false reports to ferret out those particular crimes "-and I cannot give any sign that such would be permissible again."

His expression has gentled at whatever he sees in her own. "No worries! It's a comfortable enough cell in which to spend the night. Far better than Lawrence accommodations, that's for sure. But can I talk you into the song anyway? Since I'm already doing the time, I might as well carry out the crime!"

She can laugh at that. "Yes, if you wish for me to hear it so badly."

"I always do," he says, rising with a flourishing bow that belies his supposedly drunken state, and launches into a truly quite beautiful song. It's one of Vennessa, but not one Jean has heard before; it sings not of her rebellious life but of her as the Falcon of the West, casting eternal rest in Celestia aside to return faithfully to Mondstadt, and soaring above it as guardian of all those below. Jean has a tear in her eye by the final chorus.

"It's beautiful," she says, when it comes to an end, and then, "Master Diluc does love falcons. He will like that very much."

"Oh? Are you implying I might earn a discount?"

"Not that much. But he will like it," Jean adds. For who else can it be for? Few know of Diluc's own falcon, the messenger-bird that he loves and cossets far more than he would admit, but if anyone would know all about a bird often on the wing then it would be Lord Barbatos, who knows every wind.

"I'm glad to hear it! But what about you? You are my first audience, after all."

"I like it very much too," Jean assures him. "Thank you for playing it for me."

"Then it was worth a night in a cell." Barbatos grins. "Sweet dreams, Jean."

"And you," Jean says, inexplicably flustered--he has every right, of course, to use her name alone, especially in private, yet the way he says it is.... No. He is perhaps a little drunk in truth, and thinking of Diluc, and that is what had brought the unexpected alpha rumble from his chest. She hadn't thought that such a small frame could produce such a deep sound.

It's not as if she could react to it properly; she can give no answering purr. He must indeed be thinking of Diluc. For lack of a better farewell, she salutes him, and wishes him well, and makes her way back to her office to adjust the report while swallowing down her wistfulness. She is happy for Diluc. It would be wrong to resent him for attracting the alpha that she cannot.

Not just any alpha, a little voice whispers, and Jean hastily buries it. Her empty dreams would be even emptier if she fixed her sights so high as that.

***

"Did you like Venti's new song?" Jean asks Diluc later, telling herself that she's happy for her friend, knowing that she's gnawing at her own yearning like a worm at an apple.

He shrugs, pouring out a customer's wine and passing it across the bar to them. "It was a little too romantic for my tastes. I told him it would fit yours perfectly."

"Diluc," Jean says, laughing at him, aching within, "he is making the utmost effort."

"He is," Diluc says, oddly dry. "I'm still not giving him any discounts."

Taking the hint, Jean changes the subject. She tries not to let herself be too exasperated, because beneath that, she fears, might lie resentment. Diluc is allowed to say no, even if it is to something she has always wished for. Even if, perhaps, it is to someone she would only be honored to receive such attention from herself.

***

The next time she sees Barbatos at the Angel's Share, he isn't singing.

"I have to give the other bards some time to shine," he tells her, taking the seat at her side. "Though if I'd known you were coming, I might have told them they had to wait and shine tomorrow. Oh, well! Can I at least buy you a drink?"

"Allow me," Jean says quickly. The idea of Barbatos himself offering her wine is--blasphemous. Enough so to make crystalflies flutter through her stomach.

"I have the credit," he protests. "Don't I, Master Diluc?"

Jean expects Diluc to roll his eyes and rebuff him; she's heard complaints enough about the tab he's built up, and Diluc's dim expectations of ever seeing him pay it. He talks as if Barbatos is truly a drunken bard, and not their archon. To her surprise, though, Diluc nods and reaches for a glass.

"You do tonight," he says, with an odd warning look.

However he may complain, he must be bending to Barbatos' attentions at least a little. Of course he is; when their archon himself is making such a show of being an alpha just to win him over, how could he not? Jean can't imagine being the object of such cheerful courtship and doing any less.

It is a bit difficult to make small talk with him at first; Jean's instinct is still to genuflect, to show her respect, but she cannot do any such thing and keep his cover within the crowded tavern. With effort, she reminds herself that he wants to be treated as a common bard, the human he pretends to be. He enjoys that, she reminds herself, and it helps to think that she's pleasing him by playing along with his act. He certainly seems pleased, from the amount that he smiles.

One drink becomes two, and then three, which is one more than the point at which Jean always cuts herself off. Barbatos attempts to cozen her into more, but Diluc does have her back in this, and he gives in and insists on buying her elaborate cocktails of juices instead, fancier and fancier as he gets deeper into his cups. Jean has to laugh at some of the creations he comes up with, and laugh all the harder when they start to horrify poor Diluc.

At last, though, closing time arrives. She rarely stays so late. For all his complaints, Diluc shows his partiality by shooing everyone out the door first, and by not giving them half as pointed a look as Jean had expected when he returns to the bar to clean up.

"Ah," Barbatos sighs, turning Jean's last abandoned glass in his hand. The mix had been atrocious, so it swirls still within, a lurid purple-green that he studies with a small smile. "I've been playing an alpha for so long, I'd forgotten that beta courtship follows different rules. It isn't as much my style, but I don't mind!"

"Courtship?" Jean repeats. Mortification burns sudden and hot in her breast. Had she betrayed herself, victim of that one extra drink and Barbatos' friendly manner? No, she can't claim herself the victim--she's been the one who's let herself nurse these feelings, knowing what a betrayal they were to her friend and her archon both.

"Don't tell me I got it wrong. I wasn't showing off at all!"

"You weren't showing off as much," Diluc tells him. "Don't pretend you weren't displaying by the end. No one actually thinks lavender melon juice and pressed calla lily go together."

"But! It made Jean laugh."

"Exactly."

Jean looks between them, as confused now as she is mortified. "Is that...." A thought begins to occur to her. Diluc has always disdained alpha displays, always looked away, always preferred quiet talk. Maybe he's always wanted a lower-key approach, after all. "Were you practicing that? Beta courtship?"

"It wasn't meant to be practice, but we can call it that!" He grins at her. Then, as he looks at her longer--Jean hopes, prays, that her feelings aren't showing on her face, then flinches from the thought that Barbatos might actually hear the prayer--his smile slips. "Ehehe.... Jean? Are you all right?"

She summons a smile. "It's fine. I should be in bed now, though. I'll leave you and Diluc alone."

"Are you sure you want to walk home alone?" Diluc asks.

"It was one extra drink two hours ago, Diluc. I'm sure I'll be all right."

Physically, at least. Jean has no grounds to feel disappointed, when she had had no expectations in the first place. She knows better than that. If Barbatos has chosen to switch modes, to slip into the behavior of another dynamic--the one she's meant to match to--simply to please Diluc, then... she is glad that he's so attentive to Diluc's desires. She truly is.

***

"I think we've both gotten a little confused," Barbatos says, from atop her gable, when Jean steps outside the next morning.

Jean jumps a foot, then belatedly re-sheathes her sword when she realizes who had spoken to her. "Lord- Venti, what are you doing here?"

"I wanted to clear the air. And apologize, if I have to," he says, dropping from the gable to land lightly beside her on the garden path. "Though I am hoping that I won't."

"No apologies are necessary," Jean assures him. "I was- I may have been tipsier than I thought last night. I am grateful, for Diluc's sake, that you are making such an effort for him. I am sure he is too, even if he won't say it."

"Master Diluc all but boxed my ears after you left," Barbatos says, cheerfully. "And it turns out he was exactly right. Did you think I was courting him all this time?"

"I- of course you are," Jean says. She feels confusion rolling over her, without even last night's the wine to justify it. "The displays at the Angel's Share, that song about a falcon, and... changing courtship styles entirely...."

"I was trying out courting as a beta because that's what you are, Jean." He's smiling, gentle and warm and, unexpectedly, hopeful, as if he's uncertain of himself, archon and all. "Though Master Diluc did tell me I was doing better without it, ehehe. Something about romance novels?"

"I told him that in confidence," Jean blurts out, mortified all over again. True, that had been ten years ago, but she would have expected even more discretion of Diluc now than she had at fourteen.

"He cares about you quite a lot. As do I, but not in the same way." Venti takes a step back, then takes off his hat and falls into a flourishing, sweeping bow, every bit an alpha's gesture. "Let me try again from the beginning. Jean, might I play you a song? I composed this one for you." His eyes sparkle as he straighten. "As a good old-fashioned alpha display."

Jean stares at him, lips parted, trying to square what he's just said with what she's known all her life about herself, her options, what she's allowed, as a beta, to ever have. Alphas are drawn to omegas, omegas to them, and betas are left to work out passionless lives among themselves. He can't possibly--but then, can she truly assume what the God of Freedom can and can't do?

"You might," she says carefully, and swallows hard. "As a display."

"Then here you go," he says, bouncing on his toes and strumming his lyre. "I call it Lionfang's Valor, and I was up all last night composing it! You'll have to let me know if it's any good."

Then he launches into song, and Jean can only listen and watch, entranced, as the romantic ballad sweeps her away.