Work Text:
Augustus
Augustus, the son of legendary Evers Tedros and Agatha, stood frozen and bewildered at the insanely large group of people gathered around him. Everyone was talking all at once and he couldn’t make out a single word. His pace of his breathing started to increase and the sound of his heart pounding in his ears drowned out the incessant chatter around him.
He took a deep breath trying to calm himself, and pasted a wide smile onto his face. If he had learned anything from his parents it was how to fake being happy. He tried his best to channel some of his father’s swagger, but he just didn’t understand how anyone could enjoy this much attention.
The fairies signaled the beginning of class, and Augustus pushed through the crowd eagerly, happy to have a reason to leave all his classmates behind. He entered the building and immediately his eyes widened and his jaw dropped. His parents' stories were nothing compared to the real thing.
The ceiling seemed to stretch on for miles, and beautiful murals covered the walls. The same regal blues and princessy pinks were plastered on every surface. He actually loved how much pink there was in the building, it reminded him of his aunt Sophie. Augustus gaped at the ‘Honor’ and ‘Valor’ towers, they were just like his mother had described. Part of his dread washed away while he stood marveling at the beauty of the school, he even thought that maybe it wouldn’t be so bad here.
Especially if they still had candy classrooms like when his parents were children.
As he headed up to the dorm area to find his room, he could still feel the stares of everyone around him, but he tried his best to ignore them. It wouldn’t do him any good to wonder what they were thinking about him, or to get upset that all they saw was who his parents are, not who he is. That thought made him cringe because of how much he sounded like his father.
Finally he arrived at his room, and stared at it longingly, wishing he could spend an hour or two alone. Even though there were two other beds in there, it was more privacy than he was bound to get outside of the room. He had to get to his first class: swordplay and weapons training with Professor Espada. A class he was sure he wasn’t going to like, but he knew the Professor would expect great things from him. All of his teachers would. He braced himself for what was to come, and headed off to his first class.
By the time lunch came around, Augustus had been assaulted by fanboys and girls around every corner. So much so that he had to try his best to blend in with the crowd, which was not an easy thing when everyone knows your face and the legend of your parents.
Augustus grabbed his lunch basket and fled to a corner of the picnic grove mostly hidden by trees. He collapsed against a tree, frantically looking around just in case someone had followed him there. He soon realized that from his vantage point, he could see most of the grove, but he was fairly hidden away by trees. It was clear that things were unmistakably different from when his parents were children. Evers and Nevers sat together in groups, giggling, and sharing lunches.
Sitting in the only silence and peace he’s gotten all day, Augustus’s shoulders relaxed and he ate his lunch happily. As a child, he would often be found playing alone or reading, rather than associating with other children, a trait that has only increased now that he was 16. The unwanted attention was sure to continue once lunch was over, which had Augustus tensing up with the thought.
He surveyed the field once more and this time his gaze locked on something. Amongst the crowds, there was a boy who stood out, purely because he was alone, and everyone was giving him a wide berth. He was leaning against a tree similar to Augustus, and he was absorbed in a book. He looked content, and part of Augustus made him want to walk over there and disturb the quiet air around him.
He knew that if someone did that to him, he’d be annoyed and upset, but he couldn’t look away from the boy. His attention would not waiver unless he actually got up and talked to him. Augustus sat restlessly for a few minutes, trying to decide whether he really wanted to give up his hiding spot to sate his growing curiosity. His interest eventually won and he stood up and walked across the grove to where the boy sat.
The closer he got to the boy, the more obvious it became that he was a Never. The tight, all-black uniform he wore was the most distinct giveaway, but he also had oily shoulder-length brown hair and a hooked beak-like nose. There was a deep frown on his face which contrasted with Augustus’s thought that he had looked content.
“Hi, I’m Augustus! What’s your name?” Augustus introduced himself cheerfully. The boy did not respond.
“What are you reading?” Augustus tried again. Still, the boy said nothing.
Augustus continued to hover awkwardly behind the boy until finally, he looked up. Augustus now found himself looking into eyes the color of wet pavement. There wasn’t anything very remarkable about those eyes, and yet Augustus found that there was so much emotion stored in them.
The boy cleared his throat and Augustus blushed, realizing he had been staring. “Don’t you have anything better to do, rather than stand here and pester me with inane and annoying questions? You must be a lot stupider than you look, and trust me, you look real stupid.” He stood up and glared at Augustus before stalking off to another tree and sitting there instead.
Augustus stood there, face burning in embarrassment. He had only meant to become friends with the boy, not annoy him. Something hot and heavy settled in his stomach when the boy had called him stupid, something that had the burning taste of shame.
“Oh Gussy, there you are~” singsonged a petite girl with smooth caramel skin. “Gussy I’ve been looking for you everywhere. I had been hoping you and I could have lunch together.”
Augustus must have looked confused, because the girl -- who he didn’t even know-- continued, “I can tell you and I are going to be great friends, Gussy. Maybe even more one day. A perfect prince like you deserves a perfect princess.”
Suddenly he felt sick, that word ‘perfect,’ like a slap across the face. His father is perfect, his mother is perfect. He was far from it. ‘Perfect’ hurt just as much as ‘stupid’ had. The girl in front of him was still chirping happily about something, and though he had no idea what she was actually saying, he quickly smiled and nodded along to her words.
Before he could say anything, another girl swooped in and hooked herself onto his arm. “That’s enough Milano. Go find some other prince to harass.” She said venomously. Milano huffed and skipped away, probably off in pursuit of another victim. Augustus was sure that wasn’t the last he’d see of her.
“Thanks, Nessa. I’ve been drowning in unwanted attention all day,” he said to his cousin Vanessa, daughter of the great witch Sophie and Hort.
Vanessa grinned and punched him in the shoulder. “Lucky you, I haven’t been getting enough attention. Why talk to the failure daughter of Sophie and Hort, when you can have the golden prince?”
“I’d gladly switch places with you,” He confessed. He was more comfortable here with Vanessa than he’d been with anyone else. He grew up with her and she was practically his best friend. They were attached at the hip the way their mothers had been when they were kids.
“Anyway, I saw you talking to Crow, what did you want with him?” She asked casually. Something about her tone though made it seem like there’s more to it than general curiosity.
Augustus thought for a second before responding, “Oh you know, he was just sitting by himself so I thought I’d go talk to him.” And he thought Crow was cute but that’s beside the point.
“Ok, well I just want you to be careful. There are things that people say about him, things that you don’t want to get yourself tangled up in. Don’t go putting yourself in danger just because you’re hopeless when it comes to cute guys.” Vanessa warned with a knowing smirk.
Augustus stood gaping at her, mouth opening and closing like a fish out of water. At this moment it appeared he had forgotten how to speak. After a couple seconds of staring dumbly, he finally managed to say something. “You...you know that I...that I like guys? And you...you don’t care?”
“What? No of course not. You do what you want. Why? Do your parents care?”
“I don’t know. It’s not like I plan to tell them anytime. Doubt they’d be too happy,” Gus sighed defeatedly. “ “Especially because I won’t be choosing a queen. It’s not like two kings can rule.”
All he wanted was to make his parents proud of him, to live up to their legacy, but he couldn’t change the way he felt. He had left Camelot in a fight with his father, he knew he was a disappointment.
Before Vanessa could respond, the fairies signaled that lunch had ended. The two had to split up and go back to their respective schools.
“We’ll talk more about this later, ok?” Vanessa squeezed his hand reassuringly and then joined the flow of students headed toward the School for Evil.
Augustus was swept into his own hurricane of cotton candy pinks and blues, back toward a school full of hope and expectations. It was a nightmare wrapped in the beautiful illusion of every Ever’s daydream. It would be a long long four years, and by the end of it who knew if he’d ever wake up.