Chapter Text
Crowley’s favorite argument to give his endless tutors was that he was already technically king, so they were compelled, by law, to do whatever he demanded of them. This, of course, wasn’t quite true and his tutors knew so. Crowley’s father had died a decade ago, leaving Crowley as the only male heir at the age of seven. The kingdom had scrambled for a new ruler for about a day and a half before Queen Beelzebub took the role. A queen had never been the ruling monarch before, but no one could deny that Beelzebub was an intelligent and competent leader, having taken a large part of the role when her husband was still alive. So, it was agreed that she would hold the throne until her son came of age. That event that had seemed so far in the future was now only a year away.
And the boy was nowhere near ready.
Crowley had known from a young age that he would one day be king. He was the first and only son of his father, so his future had always been heading in that direction. However, he knew that he wouldn’t take the throne until his father died, and that would be ages away. Indeed, his father hadn’t been crowned until he was thirty, so, at the age of six, Crowley felt he had an entire lifetime before he was ever saddled with any real responsibility and found it truly easy to get out of his tutoring lessons whenever he felt like it.
The next year, King Lucifer had been assassinated.
Crowley suddenly found that his teaching was being taken much more seriously, and the lifetime he had seen for himself before he would be King was rapidly shrinking before his eyes. So he did the only thing a seven-year-old could do in this situation: he threw a tantrum.
And then he threw a tantrum the next day.
And the next day.
And he kept doing this until eventually, the tutor quit, claiming that she was a tutor, not a nanny. But then, something marvelous happened: he was set loose. In the week that it took for the palace to find a new tutor, Crowley was practically unsupervised. The kingdom was still in the aftermath of his father’s death, so no one had the spare time or energy to look after the prince. And this is how Crown Prince Crowley’s reputation as an untutorable child began.
Crowley became very good at driving away his tutors. He would be good for a couple of days, quietly observing, then by the third day he would launch his attack. He was usually successful after a week or two and no one had lasted longer than a month. Crowley would scream, break things, set traps, feign deafness, copy every word in a mocking tone, chant ominously, bring in bugs and animals he’d found in the garden, hide away in secret rooms where no one could find him, throw chunks of chalk, speak in made up languages, and any other number of irritating tactics to get out of his lessons. When he got older, one of his favorite tactics had become flirting with his male tutors. This only backfired once, a fact that Anathema would never let him forget. This was especially rich considering it had been Anathema’s idea, when she was thirteen, for Crowley to make use of his devilish charm rather than just his devilish mischief.
“You’re starting to get too good at this,” said the brunette, sweeping into the room with her long flowing skirt. She had spent most of her life adamantly refusing to ever wear a petticoat and her parents, as well as the castle staff, had all learned to give it up as a lost cause. She flopped down on the sofa next to Crowley, tossing him an apple from the bowl beside her before grabbing one for herself and taking a large bite. “That last one actually looked heartbroken while they were dragging him away. You know, underneath all the burning fury.” Crowley hummed half-heartedly through his own mouthful of apple. “What on Earth is it that you do to them?”
“Wouldn’t you like to know?” the prince answered, his red eyebrows dancing over the rim of his dark glasses. Anathema swatted the lanky leg stretched out next to her and he let out a small chuckle. “It’s nothing, really. The bookish ones are easy ‘cause they’re all romantics, and the scientists are easy ‘cause they’re all so damn prideful. Everyone in between just doesn’t have the patience.” He took another bite of apple. “Pa’hetic, really.”
Anathema nodded. They both fell silent, the sound of apple-crunching providing the only soundtrack for the sunny salon. Anathema began absent-mindedly petting the snakeskin boot rested in her lap. Crowley took note of her nervous energy but he didn’t do anything about it. She wasn’t like this often, but when she was, it was best to wait it out. She would talk when she was ready.
“Crowley, as much as I love hearing about your wiles, and you know I do… You’re seventeen.” She glanced over at dark lenses, red eyebrows raised in an expression that clearly said And? “You will need to know these things. You know, leader things… Kingly things…” Crowley’s expression didn’t change and Anathema couldn’t help but let out a frustrated sigh. “Crowley, you will be King in less than a year, and frankly, that’s not a lot of time to get your shit together. You need to start taking your lessons seriously. I know you’re smart but that doesn’t make up for a lack of education. If you’re going to rule and rule well… then you need to know these things.”
Anathema was his best friend. They had been promised to each other the day Anathema had been born and so were allowed to spend quite a bit of time with each other as children. They had grown very close, both choosing not to think of the eventual nature of their relationship.
A couple years after Crowley had started his tutor charades, Anathema had started helping him think of tactics. She was two years younger than him and so hadn’t been much use as more than an accomplice in the early days, but they soon discovered that they made a magnificently devious team. Crowley trusted Anathema more than anyone else in the world. She was the first (and only) person he told of his interest in men, the only person he could confide in, the only person he could be wholly himself with.
And he’d never felt more betrayed in his life.
“Are you seriously taking their side?”
“I’m not taking anyone’s side, Crowley. I’m worried about you.”
“Where is this even coming from?” the prince asked, harshly pulling his feet from his friend’s lap. “Since when do you care about my education?”
“Since that education affects more than just you.” Anathema’s look was stern, frustrated. Sometimes it was easy to forget how young she was. “The entire kingdom is going to be depending on you to know what you’re doing, and no matter how much you hate it, you owe them the effort.”
Crowley glared back at the girl’s round spectacles, giving her his practiced Intimidation Look, but her firm gaze didn’t waver. Suddenly, Crowley was on his feet, pacing agitatedly in front of the sofa, boots clicking softly against the smooth stone floor. “I never asked for this, you know. I never wanted any of this.”
“I know. Neither did I.” Anathema’s voice was soft but Crowley could hear the edge underneath it. He spent so much time trying to forget the fact that he was being forced into leading a kingdom that he almost never remembered that she was supposed to be queen. There was a slight pang of guilt in his stomach but he ignored it.
“Maybe if they sent any competent tutors my way, it would be less of a problem, but they’re all complete knobs. And, like, a thousand years old.”
Anathema raised an eyebrow. “Your complaint is that they’re too old?”
“Well it’s not my only complaint, is it? But it doesn’t help.” Crowley went to run a hand through his curls before remembering that it was half up. Instead, he frustratedly rubbed the back of his head, tousling the otherwise neatly combed hair. “What use is it to learn about what the kingdom was like generations ago? That’s not the world I’ll be looking after.”
“What do you mean?”
Crowley stopped his pacing and turned to look at his friend. “I mean that I shouldn’t be wasting my time learning my family tree for the last thousand years, or improving my handwriting, or riding horses ‘properly,’ whatever that’s supposed to mean. I should be learning about my people, right? Right?” Anathema slowly nodded. “Right. But they never want to spend time on that stuff. That’s the real problem, Anathema. They’re not training me to be a leader, they’re training me to be some compliant gentleman and I hate it. ”
Anathema looked up at him from her place on the sofa. His breathing was slightly heavy and his hair was starting to stick up weird, and if he hadn’t been wearing his glasses, she would see a look in his eyes that could be mistaken for pleading. “Have you told anyone? I mean, the tutors or the Queen or anyone?”
There was a small mirthless laugh as Crowley shook his head. “They don’t listen to me. For the crown prince I have an astonishingly small amount of power. If I start asking too many of the wrong questions…” Crowley cleared his throat. “Anyway, at this point, I figure this is the only way to claim any bit of control over my life. So let me have this, yeah?”
The afternoon sunlight shone through his glasses, giving Anathema a hint of the gold she knew to be hidden underneath. God, he had such expressive eyes. She knew it to be one of the reasons he covered them. “I’ll talk to my mother, see if she can’t talk some sense into the Queen.”
Crowley snorted. “Fat chance. What’s she going to say? ‘Hey there, Bee, old gal. How about you let your son learn something useful so he can actually take over for you when he’s supposed to?’ I don’t really see that happening.”
“You know the Lords will never let her continue to rule. They had a deal.”
Crowley threw his arms in the air. They’d had this argument many times before. “Why shouldn’t they let her? She’s good at it! Sure, she’s a bit of a bitch-”
“ Crowley -”
“-but that doesn’t mean they should just give the job to a kid. Cause that’s what I am, Anathema. I’m a kid. She’s good at her job and I am perfectly happy waiting to rule. For, say, another lifetime or so.”
The room was quiet, both looking at each other, knowing exactly where this argument was going. Anathema’s voice was very soft. “She’s a woman.”
Crowley’s lips were pulled tight over his teeth. “I know she is.”
“Women aren’t allowed to rule. She’s only taking over until your training is done.”
“Says who? Who decided women weren’t allowed to rule?”
“Everyone.”
“Well, it’s stupid.”
“I know.”
They continued to stare at each other. Then all the fight seemed to leave Crowley’s shoulders. He flopped back down next to Anathema, laying his head on her shoulder. She gently threaded her fingers through his hair. “I know,” she whispered again.
“Do you think it would make a difference? You know, if you talked to your mother?”
Crowley’s head bobbed as Anathema shrugged. “It couldn’t hurt. She probably can’t completely fix the problem but it’s not like it can get a lot worse, can it?” Crowley grunted and Anathema glanced sideways at him. “I’ll only do it if you promise to make an effort, though. I won’t waste my time if you’re just going to chase away whoever else they come up with.
Crowley let out a long sigh, but Anathema just waited for his response. “Yeah. All right.”