Chapter Text
On top of a large hill stood a beautiful castle. Big white walls with colorful flowers climbing up its walls. Gardens that stretched as far as the eye could see.
Statues of various animals. The people of the kingdom loved the castle and weren’t afraid to go there. Even though they knew the royal family lived there.
Speaking of the royal family, one of the princes was quite rudely woken up by the sunrays entering his room. With a groan Dream sat up and he squinted at the curtains that weren’t fully closed. He wanted to blame it on the maids, but in reality he damn well knew he forgot to close them properly after looking at the stars the night before.
Dream sighed and got out of bed, walking over to his closet. He quickly got dressed in a tunic, a pair of pants specifically for horse riding, and a dark green coat. Quickly he put on his boots, checked if his hair wasn’t a bird’s nest…. spoiler alert, it was, and after taking care of that he left his room.
Slowly he made his way to the royal dining hall. He pushed the door open and as expected his mother, older brother and younger sister were already there.
“Well, well, look what the cat dragged out of bed.”
“Shut up, Drista.” Dream grumbled as he sat down next to his little sister.
“Dear, why are you already awake? You don’t have lessons until later today. I know how much you love sleeping in.” Puffy asked.
“Got woken up by the sun. It’s fine.” Dream said as he put some food on his plate.
Foolish, Dream’s older brother, whispered something under his breath.
“What was that?” Dream snapped.
“I called you an idiot. Forgot to close your curtains again, didn’t you.” Foolish said.
“Fu-”
“Dream, watch your language.”
“I was gonna say ‘funny to say that.’” Dream grumbled.
Puffy nodded, though it was clear she didn’t believe him.
Dream rolled his eyes and continued eating in silence.
After breakfast Dream walked through the castle. He didn’t really know what to do actually. Maybe he could practice some fighting or something. While he was thinking he passed by one of the smaller courtyards and something, or rather someone, caught his eye. Slowly he walked a few steps back and looked if he had seen it correctly.
On the edge of the fountain sat one of his best friends, George.
As silently as possible he walked over and quickly sat down next to him. “Boo!”
George startled and almost dropped his book in the fountain.
“YOU ABSOLUTE DICKHEAD! That book is important. My dad would murder me if I damaged it.” George yelled.
“Ah, don’t sweat it. We probably have like 10 copies in the library.” Dream said.
“What are you even reading?” He asked as he snatched the book from George’s hands.
It just appeared to be a boring book about the start of the kingdom.
“History of the kingdom? Boring, I already know that.”
“Yeah, because you were taught that stuff since you could talk. I spent the first 5 years of my life just being a child and playing.”
“Wauw, imagine.”
At that moment a third person joined them.
“Guess who just got done with training again?!” Sapnap said as he tackle-hugged both of them.
“I think it was Punz.” Dream says as he rolls his eyes.
“Fuck that pretentious fucker. Only because he comes from a high class mercenary family he thinks he is all that. But I am so much better than him.” Sapnap complained.
Dream laughed. “We will definitely see that some day. I think Punz is better. Maybe even Purpled.”
Sapnap huffed and attempted to push Dream in the fountain, but George stopped him. “You can’t do that Sapnap. You would get charged with attempted murder of the prince.”
“Lucky bastard with real life plot armour.” Sapnap huffs while Dream is still wheezing.
“I’m so sorry you can’t murder me without repercussions.” Dream wheezed.
George looked up at the clocktower and sighed. “I have to go to my lesson. I will talk to you two soon. That is if they don’t give me too much work.” He stood up and started to walk away.
“Wait!” Dream quickly got up and walked over to him. “Can I not go with you? They wouldn’t mind me having a few more lessons, I am the prince after all.”
George looked at him in confusion. “It’s history. You just said you knew all of that.”
“That…. means I can help you with it. Come on, let’s go. Bye Sapnap! See you later!”
George rolled his eyes, but walked towards his classroom. He wouldn’t mind Dream coming with. Normally George’s lessons were all private, and he had to fight to stay awake. So maybe Dream could help with that.
Luckily the tutor didn’t mind that Dream was there. So now Dream was sitting next to him at the desk, while the tutor was writing something on the board at the front of the class.
George was slowly starting to doze off again. This class was just so boring.
Suddenly he got an elbow in the ribs. “All these old kings are so stupid. I mean, there is a reason they are dead right?” Dream said jokingly.
George tried to stifle his laugh. “Dream, half of them died of natural causes. What do you mean?!”
“I am just saying.” Dream said with a laugh.
The tutor turned around and glared at them. “Your highness, with all due respect, if you are only here to make jokes I will have to ask you to leave. It’s important for Lord George to learn this and you joking around won’t help him.”
Dream stared at the ground. “My apologies, sir. I just saw that George was starting to doze off and wanted to keep him awake. But it won’t happen again.”
It was almost the end of the lesson. Dream noticed that George was dozing off again. This time instead of waking him up with a joke, Dream gently pulled George closer and let George’s head rest on his shoulder.
When the tutor turned around and saw it he sighed. “George, you have to stay awake. What would your father think if he were to come in and you are asleep? On the prince’s shoulder for crying out loud.”
“With all due respect sir, I have seen George the last few weeks and he has been overworked for weeks. Every hour of the day he is busy studying, reading, learning and working. No wonder he is tired.” Dream argued.
“It’s important for his future. His dad insisted he study this much, because it’s needed to run his family company.”
“I don’t believe for a second that this is helping George in any way.” Dream said.
“Your Highness, if you keep complaining like this I will have to report to your mother.”
“Go for it! I want to see what she thinks of this.”
George had woken up again and looked at Dream with sleepy eyes.
“Prince Dream, leave.”
“Fine!” Dream stood up and grabbed George’s hand. “Come on, George.”
“George stays, the lesson isn’t done.”
“There is literally 2 more minutes, there is nothing you are going to get done.” Dream said and with that he left and pulled George along.
Dream smiled at George as he walked him back to his room. “You didn’t have to defend me, Dream. My tutor and dad are right. I need to know everything if I want to be able to do my job efficiently.” George said as he put his hand on the doorknob.
“George, you are being overworked. You can’t learn everything if you are exhausted. I am going to talk about this with Puffy. She is the queen after all, she can fix this.”
George sighed. “Dream, it’s okay. I am going to take a nap now, before my next lesson.”
“Need me to wake you up in time?”
“I got it, Dream. Really." George said and he went into his room.
Dream sighed as he heard the door close.
He made up his mind and quickly walked towards his mother’s office. He knocked on the door, short and firm.
“Come in darling.” Puffy’s voice called out. And of course she recognized him from his knock.
Calmly Dream entered the office.
“Hi Dream, what’s up?” Puffy asked as she sorted a pile of papers.
“George is being overworked by his dad and his tutors. And considering he is studying in our castle, I believe you can do something about it.” Dream said.
“What do you mean he is overworked?”
Dream looks at his mother. “He is so tired, mom. He is always sleeping, or looking sleepy. Every time I see him he is learning or reading or something. He has like 10 lessons in a day. He has no time for himself.” He explains.
Puffy hesitated for a moment. “Thank you, Dream. I will look into it. Now, don’t you have to get ready for your riding lesson?”
“Yes mom. I will go.”
Dream quickly made his way down to the stables. The servants there looked up when he entered. “Your highness, which of your horses do we need to saddle for this riding lesson?” One of them asked.
“Spirit.” Dream said.
The servants bowed and quickly went to get Dream´s horse ready, while Dream walked to the room where his riding stuff was stored. He put on his riding boots and spurs. He checked all the straps and zippers from his boots one more time and then he went out to check how far they were with tacking up Spirit.
Spirit was Dream´s favorite horse. His mother had bought the horse for him when he was 12. Back then it had been a little foal, not even a week old. Dream had been able to train since that first day. Eventually Spirit grew into a beautiful white stallion. The stable masters helped Dream prepare Spirit for riding and ever since then Dream has been riding and training with Spirit. It’s his horse that will be by his side for parades and battles if he ever needed to fight them.
Beside Spirit Dream had three more horses, but he liked to keep those for free time activities and for his friend’s George and Sapnap to ride considering they don’t have their own horse.
“Spirit is ready, your highness.” The stable boy walked the horse over to the prince.
“Thank you very much. “ Dream took the reins of his horse and put his foot in the stirrup. Smoothly he pulled himself up into the saddle, as Spirit impatiently shook his head and started to walk away.
Dream quickly picked up the reins. “That is not how we do this, Spirit. You have to wait.”
When Dream arrived at the riding arena, his trainer was already waiting for him. His trainer was an old stable master. He was actually retired already, but stayed around just to train Dream.
“I see you have brought Spirit with you again? How is he today?”
“Impatient.” Dream huffed. “Was barely seated in the saddle when he already started to walk off.”
“Well, then start working with him a lot. You can start the warm up on your own. I will come back to you once you think your horse is fully warmed up and ready to work.” the trainer said and then he walked out of the arena to grab some fighting dummy’s. Dream rolled his eyes. Of course his trainer decided that fight training would be the best right when Spirit was a wild thing.
But Dream just went with it and started to work Spirit. He did gait changes, rode figures and made sure Spirit was flexible before he started to trot.
His trainer put the last dummy down and then he walked to the middle of the arena.
“Go ride Spirit close past the dummy, just to make sure he won’t spook. Though I don’t think he will. Spirit is as brave as his rider after all.”
Dream nodded and started to do as his trainer told him.
Half way through the lesson, Dream was cantering around the arena with a sword in his hand. He looked towards the dummy and steered Spirit towards it. Right as he was about to swing the sword down and hit the dummy he spotted George on the sideline. Dream missed his swing and huffed.
“What happened there?” His trainer asked.
“Nothing, sir. Can I get a small break?” Dream asked.
“Go ahead, your highness.”
Dream trotted over to George.
“What are you doing here?” Dream asked.
George smiled. “I woke up from my nap, and my tutor came in and told me he needed to have a meeting with my dad. So, all my lessons for the rest of the day are canceled.”
“Really? What did they need to talk about?” Dream asked.
“Just something about my study I believe. Your mother also seemed to be there. So probably just about the course of my study.” George said with a knowing smile.
Dream smiled back.
“Spirit really suits you.” George said.
“What?” Dream asked, confused.
“Spirit is a big, muscular horse and that really fi-”
“Your highness! Do you still have time to finish this lesson or is your chat with young Lord George more important?” Dream’s trainer asked.
“Sorry sir. I’m coming. hold on.” Dream turned his horse around and rode back to his trainer.
At the end of the lesson, Dream took his horse back to a walk and gave it a pet. “Well done Spirit.” He said.
“That went very well, your highness. I will see you next time.” His trainer said and then left.
Dream looked back to George, who was still watching from the sideline. “Come on, come into the arena.”
George did as Dream asked and went to walk next to him.
“What did you want to say about Spirit before?” Dream asked.
“Oh, just that he is such a strong horse and it really suits you. It makes you look like a strong powerful ruler.” George said.
“Really?” Dream asked.
“Yeah. It looks really good.”
“I mean, I think you would also look really good on Spirit.”
“Dream, we all know I will look like a fly on that horse.” George complained.
“No, come on.” Dream halted Spirit and jumped off. “Get up there.”
Dream helped George in the saddle and then took Spirit’s reins and started walking. He looked back at George and smiled. George was holding on to the front of the saddle.
“This is so different from the horse I usually ride.” George said.
“Yeah, Spirit takes much longer strides.” Dream explained.
Eventually Dream walked Spirit back to the stable, George still in the saddle. He helped George to the ground with a smile and then went to look for a stable boy that could take care of his horse.
He didn’t have to look for long, because soon Purpled walked up to him. Purpled was the younger brother of one Punz, one of the knights at the palace. Purpled was still a squire, learning to become a knight.
“Your highness, Punz told me I could help you with your horse.” Purpled said as he bowed.
“That would be very nice of you.” Dream handed him the reins of Spirit. “Do be aware, he has quite an attitude. Just be strict with him.” he quickly added.
Then he walked back to George’s side and smiled. “How about we spend the rest of the afternoon just hanging out together? It has been a while since we’ve done that.”
George smiled. “That would be nice.”