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Princes, Chuuya thought, should be plump. All the rich people were always plump. Fed on meat and sweet pastries, they put on more weight than a peasant could ever wish for. Yet here Dazai was, thin as a twig, and probably just as breakable. Sometimes it seemed as if wind would be enough to spirit him away with a blow strong enough.
It wasn’t that nobody fed Dazai. He wasn’t on a diet either. The table was always full during meal times. Heavy from all the meats, pies and vegetables. Dazai just didn’t eat.
Should it concern Chuuya? The boy wondered. Technically, he lived in the castle as the king’s guest. Should he concern himself with the price’s well-being if his own father seemed unbothered? King Mori himself looked rather willowy. Maybe it was genetics, the thing His Majesty always mentioned while talking about his studies.
Yet, Dazai, like himself was only five. And Chuuya loved food. Ever since he came to the castle, it seemed as if he couldn’t stop eating. He had access to tasty meals, why wouldn’t he take advantage?
Of course, Chuuya wouldn’t eat with the royal family. He wouldn’t eat with the servants either. He didn’t eat with people around. He didn’t like them looking. Watching. Waiting.
Maybe that was Dazai’s problem as well. He didn’t eat enough even with the vast array of dishes on the table, because he didn’t like people looking.
It seemed quite possible – once Chuuya observed him, just stabbing a piece of rabbit on his plate while everyone else was enjoying the meal. Dazai left quickly, having eaten only one single potato that day.
There was only one way to check it.
As always during meal times, Chuuya sneaked into the kitchen. Servants were busy serving food to the royal family and their guests. Cooks made sure the dishes looked perfect on their plates. Nobody noticed a tiny shadow creeping its way along the walls towards as of yet untouched freshly baked rolls and sausages drying with herbs over the hot oven plates.
Normally, Chuuya would take a roll and a sausage for himself. Today, he took two of each. He sneaked out again, before anybody noticed him.
The hallways of the castle were always busy with people but Chuuya knew ways to avoid them. He hid behind curtains, used narrow corridors most people avoided and in a pinch, he would crawl on the ceiling.
Unnoticed he finally reached the prince’s bedroom. The door was locked.
Chuuya entered the room next to it and climbed out through the window. They were on the third floor and it was a hot summer. Dazai’s windows were wide open so Chuuya had no trouble entering the room through one.
Inside was cluttered with books and clothes, all strewn over the floor, bed and every other flat surface. Chuuya sat behind the bed, hiding from the view, and busied himself with his meal.
It didn’t take long for Dazai to come back. He must have left the meal early, again, probably having eaten barely anything. Again . Chuuya scowled. Hidden, the boy waited until the prince closed the door before revealing his presence.
“I brought you some food,” Chuuya said lifting himself ever so slightly from the floor, so that his face could be seen above the sheets.
Dazai’s eyes widened comically at the sight of an uninvited guest. He composed himself quickly and cleared his throat before saying:
“And why, pray tell, would you do that? I’m just coming back from the dinner. I don’t need food.”
Chuuya’s scowl deepened.
“You don’t eat,” the boy answered. “If you don’t eat, you’re going to wither away and die. I’ve seen that happen.”
“I don’t doubt you did, however, I don’t need your concern. I eat enough.”
“Enough. Barely enough to survive. You have food in the castle, plenty of it. You shouldn’t waste it.”
It was Dazai’s turn to scowl.
“Why? Because there are some poor children starving on the street and I should feel guilty about not appreciating what I have?” the prince asked mockingly.
Chuuya didn’t understand why the other boy would fight him over such a simple thing as food.
“Because it's tasty. You’ll feel stronger with a full stomach, your mind will work better and faster, it’s good for your body. A healthy body will heal faster.”
Bandages covered most of Dazai’s visible skin. There were probably more under the clothes. The price touched one covering his wrist, smoothing down the fabric.
“You will be faster, able to defend yourself better,” Chuuya continued, standing up. He walked around the bed and stopped in front of the other boy, pushing the roll and dried sausage into his unwilling hands. “One day, you’ll be able to fight back.”
Dazai looked at the food, still uncertain.
“It’s not poisoned?”
“No.”
“How would you know?” the prince sounded angry and Chuuya ignored his tone for the time being.
“I ate it and I’m fine. That’s what the servants eat. They don’t know I took it.”
It must have been enough to convince the other boy. Dazai put the roll to his mouth and started slowly munching on it.
Of course, Dazai feared poison. With so many assassination attempts, Chuuya was surprised he didn’t think about it sooner. He blamed his five year old body for thinking so slowly.
"It's not only the assassins," Dazai admitted when Chuuya shared hir reasoning. "It's my father."
Chuuya stayed in the room until Dazai finished most of his food. When the malnourished boy declared he couldn’t eat any more, Chuuya finished the rest of his meal. After all, the food was good and it would be a shame to waste it.
He returned later after supper with sweet cinnamon pastry. And the next day after breakfast with pockets full of hard boiled eggs. And again after lunch, and dinner and supper.
It became a routine for the boys to eat together in secret. Dazai never got plump and soft like other nobles but at least, after months of hard work on Chuuya’s part, he stopped looking like a twig ready to break.
Chuuya always stole his food. He had years of practice and was never caught though people probably figured by now he had to be doing it. After all, he was never present for any of the meals. Then again, he always ate in hiding so maybe people thought he didn’t need any food at all. As a child marked by Arahabaki, able to crawl the walls and ceiling, summon storms with his wails and earthquakes in his anger, human sustenance could be below him.
It was obviously wrong. Arahabaki or not, his body was still very much made of flesh and blood and like any other child he needed nourishment. He never accepted any food from any person, though. It felt like an offering and when people offer something to a god, they except something else in return. Chuuya hated feeling like he owed anything to people around him. So he refused Dazai the first time the prince offered him a snack.
They were in Dazai’s room. They usually spent their time there when together. Chuuya sneaked in secretly.
It wasn’t even meal time. Chuuya learned to spend his time with the other child whenever he could. He never had any friends his age and it was a strange new experience to actually play with the other. Strange but not unpleasant.
Dazai had cookies in his room. One of the maids gave him a whole pack.
“I fed one to the birds and waited a couple of hours,” Dazai said. “They’re not poisoned.”
His father kept exotic birds. If they died there would be hell to pay. Chuuya punched him in the arm.
“Are you stupid? If something happens to them, you’ll be punished.”
Dazai shrugged. “I don’t care. I have cookies. Here, have one.”
“No, thank you.”
“Why?”
How would he explain? Should he explain? Would Dazai use this logic against him? His father, the king, certainly would. Mori was not a person to be trusted, yet here Chuuya lived, in his castle.
The ancient god in him refused to answer, wanting to keep this a secret. The child wanted to share with the only friend he had. And the child won. It was a young body, after all, it didn’t know better yet.
The god growled in disappointment.
“I don’t accept offerings. I have nothing to give in return.”
“It’s not an offering. You bring me food. I want to pay you back. If anything, I am the one giving you something in return for your kindness.”
Chuuya hadn’t thought of it this way. Nobody ever p aid him back for anything he did for them. Numbly he accepted the cookie and nursed it the entire evening, savoring every bite.
It wasn’t the last time Dazai offered him food. The prince had a sweet tooth and he often managed to get them some cookies, cakes or pastries, which he swore were not poisoned. King Mori probably found out he fed them to his birds and forbid poisoning any of the sweets. (He also had a bit of a sweet tooth himself and probably didn’t want to ingest poison by accident when Dazai cleverly offered to share his stash with him a couple of times.)
“Why does your father try to poison you?” Chuuya asked one day.
After a year, they were both slowly getting plump like Chuuya imagined one would while living in a castle and eating what nobles do. It wasn’t such a bad thing and it didn’t make scaling the walls any more difficult. With Arahabaki’s power he never felt heavy. And it was nice to see Dazai finally not looking like a skeleton somebody draped a layer of human skin over, put a wig on and called it a child.
“To build up my immune system,” Dazai answered mechanically, as if it was drilled into him. “If my body is used to small doses of poison, it’ll fight it off when some assassin tries to poison me for real.”
Chuuya wasn’t sure if it was clever or really dumb, so he scowled and kept quiet. At least for a while.
“No assassin will be able to poison you, if you get your food from me.”
Dazai froze for a second and then smiled.
“And no human will use you if you accept offerings only from me.”
They were six. They didn’t realize how wrong those statements could turn out to be. After all, food wasn’t the only thing that could be poisoned, and you didn’t need to accept offerings to be used.
The strange child ki ng Mori took in never accepted any food the maids prepared for him and Kouyou, the daughter of the main cook, was growing worried. He seemed to avoid people, never spoke to any of the servants and his gaze was made of sharp daggers whenever someone touched him, even unintentionally.
He never accepted food unless, it seemed, it came from the price. The boys sometime s wandered the halls together when they thought nobody was looking and Kouyou was happy to see the child enjoying somebody else’s company while munching on a piece of chocolate.
King Mori tried to make his heir immune to poison. That plan failed when his son stopped eating anything the king offered. During meals he avoided dishes somebody else (Mori himself) hasn’t tried first. It was hard to sneak poison into his food but maybe it wasn’t necessary.
At some point, his son stopped eating altogether, yet he still seemed to put on some weight. It meant he found source of sustenance somewhere else. It meant he was resourceful in the face of danger. King Mori couldn’t be more proud of the six years old boy he raised.
As a reward he kept the poison away from his sweets. At least, for the time being.