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Hunter didn’t have a normal childhood. To call it childhood was an overstatement, actually. He’d train and study, then study and train, and so on. It was mostly a blur, really. He remembered everything he learned in excruciating detail, of course, but when nothing else is going on in your life, it’s easy to forget the memories.
So he had never been allowed to be a kid. Confined within the walls of the castle, there was nothing much to do besides explore the endless rooms of the edifice and read every book in the library. He had memorized each and every room, and assimilated the most information he could grasp at his young age.
Given the circumstances, all the long, boring days felt the same and the restless nights didn’t feel like much of a break. Did time move slowly or quickly? He couldn’t tell. He only knew it was a relief when he became the Golden Guard because he finally got to go out on weekends. For missions for the Emperor, obviously, but he still got to step outside the castle, so it was a win.
He felt accomplished being the youngest guard to wear that title. His uncle seemed proud of him for once. Most of the time. Well, scratch that, only sometimes. It was still an improvement, though, because disappointing him always hurt. And he didn’t want it to hurt anymore, not like before.
Now, he had some authority over the guards. People couldn’t look down on him, he was their superior! Plus, he didn’t feel as magicless with the artificial staff. And best of all, he liked wearing the mask. All of these things gave him the confidence he needed. He felt important. His uncle always said the Titan had great plans for him, even. Things were finally looking up for him.
Or so he thought, until a certain human nuisance came into his life and changed everything he knew.
He thought very poorly of her at first, even before their first encounter. Given the ever present influence of his uncle in his way of thinking, he really thought she was a criminal, a wild witch, a menace. But he kinda liked messing with her, though. Not that he would ever admit it out loud.
Oh, but how had that changed, almost completely, in one afternoon. The palismen thing that happened with the human in Latissa had changed his views in more than one way.
First, he had always been enchanted by wild magic, dangerous and forbidden. But the human used it skillfully and with purpose, yet he never felt like she was a threat. She harnessed it thoughtfully and beautifully. He now resented the limitations of his artificial staff. He could no longer paint the human in a negative light. She was just a teen. Like him.
What drew him to save her from Kikimora and let her escape, fully knowing he would fail his uncle and suffer the consequences? He didn’t know, not a clue. He just knew something inside him couldn’t let her get hurt. He just… trusted his instincts. Which meant going against his uncle’s wishes, but that was only a one time thing, right?
Wrong, very wrong. If it had been her instead of the youngest Blight in Eclipse Lake, he knows he would have given the portal door key to her. No fight, no complaints, no questions asked. She can’t possibly find out she has this effect on him. They should be enemies. She should hate his guts. But a new thing also hurts, and it’s called caring so much.
And most importantly, he was never the same when he got into the Emperor’s head (he was no longer uncle to him, he never was to begin with). He didn’t even know which one was the most painful thing about all the things they figured out that night.
What an identity crisis. If he was questioning everything beforehand, thanks to Luz, now he straight up knew nothing. The only thing he knew for sure is that Luz cared for him. She fought for him. Cried for him. She was and always had been on his side.
She tore his mask apart without even trying, she probably didn’t even mean to in the first. But she had done it, nonetheless. And the truth hurt. It stung. It was too much, that’s why he had to run away. He couldn’t face her, not like this.
He could only hope it would only hurt this much right now.
It was morning in the Noceda household. The sun had risen up, but the young couple hadn’t yet. It was Saturday, thankfully. It would be a perfectly calm and peaceful morning if their friends weren’t making a racket in the kitchen, which was considerably close to the comfortable nest made of pillows and blankets he and his girlfriend had on the living room floor.
Fridays were their movie nights, so they ate candy until their teeth ached and they would binge watch movies until they couldn’t stay awake. Last night, though, they had fallen asleep and spent the night in their improvised fort. He didn’t mind sleeping on the floor at all, it was the most comfortable he’d ever been because he got to wrap his arms around Luz the whole night.
She used him like a body pillow and clung to him all night, her head resting on his chest. Naturally, he had no complaints. He was a little embarrassed Camila and the rest of their friends had all probably seen them like this by now, but he didn’t care.
Luz was his lifeline, his anchor. She was the light of his life, the fire of his loins. He would give up anything to stay like this forever, but they couldn’t, so a few more minutes will have to do.
He ignored the chatter going on in the kitchen, a breakfast for seven in the making. They would contribute by washing the dishes later, no doubt. Fine with him as long as he could stay a little longer like this.
He contemplated her serene expression on her face, undisturbed by the noise. If someone had told him a few months ago that he would be madly in love with Luz Noceda, the human witch of The Boiling Isles, and that the feeling would be requited, he would have never believed it. But now, he couldn’t imagine his life without Luz. It would be pretty dark, probably.
So, he only wished it would continue to be so bright forever.