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Hunter knew nothing is ever perfect. Even then, following Belos, blinded by the golden shine of his own mask, Hunter knew that perfection is ambiguous. He knew that closed doors turn perfection into another flaw to point out after some weird-ass punishment where emotional and physical abuse mold together into the upbringing of a better person Hunter could’ve been if he wasn’t that weeping mess on the stone-cold floor.
Well, shit. But what if he is that weeping mess?
Even months after the reconstruction of the Boiling Isles had started and the wizard world was introduced to a system too similar to human democracy to not be a rip-off, Hunter couldn’t look Darius in the eyes. It’s not that he felt guilty in any way, shape or form. Hunter had a pretty clear idea of how rudely he was deprived of a “normal person life” by now, thanks to constant care from Camila and Luz’s chattering about what it's like to not be abused half of your natural life (He’d meant to ask Amity, since she’s a witch like him, but she had no idea). Okay, maybe just a quarter of his life… there was no way of knowing the natural lifespan of a grimwalker, because, - surprise! - the ones with any written records had been brutally murdered by Hunter’s uncle. But now, after it was Hunter’s uncle's turn to be brutally murdered, everything seemed to come to its senses. There was no way to return Hunter’s childhood, but, as he later found out from the palace’s records, he was the first grimwalker to be created as a kid and allowed to grow. Many of Hunter’s predecessors never got to see Belos with a toddler in a mile radius, but here Hunter was. Unique and imperfect. Unfixable. And so was Darius.
Even after months of shearing a two-flour house with Darius he could not look him in the eyes. Because what was the point if both of them were already broken. What was the point if there was no need to close a door to point out how badly Hunter was at washing dishes or what a shitty guardian Darius turned out to be. Emperor Belos played his part flawlessly and encouraged Hunter to do the same. So what if “incureging” meant hitting? It worked!
Darius had no idea how to execute his role and could not possibly give Hunter something to improvise from. Luz said that’s because the world isn’t some kind of twisted theatrics where survival and pride and honor are the only priorities out there. Hunter said it’s because the world is full of shit.
Alright. So that’s what Hunter had to work with, sitting on the couch like he owned it, because Darius wouldn’t tell him where he went in the middle of the night. He was pissed. To be frank, he was pissed at Darius almost constantly, except the times when he was waking up scared of every dust drop and let broken, clueless and annoyed Darius to settle him down to sleep as if he was a toddler waking up from a mild nightmare instead of a fifteen-year-old, shaking in place like he invented earthquakes. Hunter knew it wasn’t working out. He knew that this guardianship was like a burden to Darius, especially with him being the leading force of all the reconstructions around the Isles. And every time Darius was leaving the house Hunter knew that they both had a thought about Darius not coming back. Ever. Just leaving, because there was nothing to get out of adopting Hunter.
Darius always comes back, though. Because he just can’t give up, apparently. Because when he sees a supermassive black hole he tries to fight it instead of turning away the ship. A metaphor Hunter made up, cuz with Darius often out, Hunter developed a taste for reading human junk Darius would bring sometimes “for research purposes.” A pile of magazines, featuring stories about stars, planets with fun comix inside, similar to ones Hunter read at Mrs. Noceda’s.
One of those Hunter held close, crossing his arms over his chest with the magazine cooling him a bit. Many things Hunter noticed after leaving the castle, one of them being the way his body couldn’t quite adjust to the temperature around him. It wasn’t a real body after all, so there was no point in complaining, Hunter supposed, but it still annoyed him enough to huff as he sat on the couch, feeling too warm for comfort.
Hunter really didn’t know what was so different this time. He thought Darius valued his beauty sleep too much to storm out of the house at 2am, but there he was - out. And here Hunter was - in. He was tired after school and flying derby training, but didn’t feel like going to sleep. He felt like thinking. Thinking long and shattered thoughts, feeling nothing but emptiness too busy listening to every sound and hoping to hear his heart beating. It wasn’t really possible, though. Just a little ritual Hunter started following after Flapjack molded into his chest. He felt almost guilty that he could not preserve the little heartbeat of his best friend. Maybe if Flapjack was here, he’d know what to do. He always did, pushing Hunter’s eyes wide open to the Emperor’s lies. Too bad Hunter is a shitty listener.
Nights like this one gave Hunter something to work with and around 3am his brain came up with top ten reasons why he’d be better off dying around the same time Belos did. Luz would be horrified if she saw Hunter rationalizing things like that, but it made sense! He did die in a way, his life became something it was never meant to become and he is fucking it up. Because what’s the point, if he can’t start from scratch? He already had fifteen years of this circus, but maybe if he stayed in the human realm he’d be better off?
Hunter could not bear the thought of having Darius know who he had been. Darius had seen him as the Golden Guard. Darius had been there and did nothing. Darius was part of the system that made Hunter’s stomach twist like he’s going to throw up any minute now. They both were the system. So what else could they be? Him adopting Hunter? Who are you kidding right now!
However ridiculous, but sometimes Hunter felt like Darius really believed that this mockery of guardianship was going to work. However ridiculous, but sometimes Hunter wanted Darius to believe, because someone had to and Hunter could not bring himself to do that.
The door opened at 5:06 in the morning. Hunter raised himself from the couch, elbows pushing the sofa pillows down. He wrinkles his nose, keeping his eyes open only on pure rage and blurts out: “Where’ve you been at?”
Darius doesn’t answer. He turns straight to the kitchen and Hunter follows, tossing the magazine away.
“Did you even sleep?” Darius asks, his voice hoarse.
Hunter doesn’t answer. He doesn’t want to upset Darius even further, but lying only makes everything worse. Because, apparently, you are not supposed to lie to get out of whatever punishment you are to get. Darius never punished Hunter, though.
“Why did you leave?” He can’t stop himself from asking questions, he needs to know asap.
“I didn’t leave .”
Darius’s fingers again press on his nose bridge, telling Hunter everything he needs to know about the man’s mood.
“They just had to ambush the main office. And this time it wasn’t Eda,” He scoffs and falls down on the chair. Hunter stands in the other corner of the kitchen.
“They?”
“Followers. Your followers, apparently.”
“My followers?”
If there was a voice to a phrase “froze in place” it’d be Hunter’s voice. Kind of squeaky and uncertain.
“They believe you are the only true ruler of the Boiling Isles.”
Hunter frowns, pursing his lips. Is he accusing him, or what?
“Bullshit.”
“That’s what I said!” Darius snorts and pushes his shoulder cloak - always so particular with fashion choices - out of the way to show his left arm. “But they got pissed for some reason.”
Hunter makes two big steps closer, only now realizing that the distance he held was too long to be just a distance between a guardian and an adoptee. More like a guard and an emperor, shit. Habits die hard, Hunter guessed. “ Awesome” he thought to himself sarcastically, looking at the way Darius got injured. Injured by people claiming to follow in Hunter’s footsteps, such an irony.
“I can’t imagine why.” Hunter muttered under his breath, holding the arm in a way to not hurt Darius further. “I suck at healer magic.” he warns, just so Darius doesn’t have the grounds to complain.
Darius laughs.
“I’m aware. Who do you think signs your report card every three weeks?” He smiles and Hunter can’t quite figure out why. What’s so funny about being injured and stuck in your own kitchen with a half-witch who has little to no knowledge about open wounds caused by some weird-ass altered magic?
“We should get someone to heal you.” he says confidently, but loses half of his spirit when Darius yawns.
“In the morning.” Darius brashes off.
“It is morning!”
“ My mornin’, little prince.”
But Hunter wasn’t going to wait for Darius to bleed out! Did he want to die or what? What the fuck with this calm demeanor!?
It wasn’t hard to read whatever Hunter was thinking, because nobody ever told the poor boy that his face comes with full-on subtitles since he never learned to control facial expressions properly. Darius’s gaze softened as he muttered, rolling his eyes: “I’ll call someone. Don’t make this face.”
Hunter blurted out that he doesn’t make any faces at all, but got only a second more of attention from Darius before he got up and made an abomination to help him with breakfast. Hunter sucked at cooking, but it was still kinda offencive that Darius didn’t even ask for help.
Hunter stomped out of the kitchen, leaving Darius with his thoughts and an upsetting feeling of unsettled business that appeared every time he would talk to Hunter. They did have history after all, so Darius tried to not act like they didn’t, but it still buzzed him that they could not talk about it. At all. Hunter seemed happy to live with Darius at first, but now Darius wondered that maybe Hunter was happy to be taken in by someone at all. Knowing Hunter, he probably thought that the likelihood of him getting abandoned after Belos’ death is way too high.
Darius yawned again, watching abomination-help at the stove. The sun was just settling in the window opening as Darius yelled: “Hunter! Breakfast!” and walked out of the kitchen to find Hunter.
The boy was already skipping down the stairs with a book in his hand. “Okay, I found a spell.” he announced, pushing the book into Darius’s hands.
“That’s nice. Do you want something to drink?”
“No! So, this spell is kinda hard but it is supposed to heal. I think?”
Thay sat at the table, the book beside Darius as Hunter explained the details of his discovery.
“You think? Does it say “healing spell” in the name?” Darius chuckled at the way Hunter rushed when he spoke.
“Yes!” Hunter nodded, helping himself for some pancakes. “Also, I want cherry juice.”
“Then it’s a healing spell.” Darius scoffed, yawning again and spreading jam on a toast. “The fuck is a cherry?”
“Language.” Hunter teased, getting nothing but a snort from Darius. “Cherry is a berry.”
“No, it’s not. From the human realm?” Hunter nodded, making Darius only sigh deeply. “It’s six in the mornin’. I’m not going to Eda’s to get cherry juice.”
“Okay.”
Titan. This kid gave up too easily for comfort. Darius bets Belos taught the fighting spirit out of Hunter many years ago and it made him wrinkle his nose, announcing: “I’ll do it today. Later.”
“Okay.” and the witty smile showing off his teeth was worth it.
Well, it didn’t seem so bad. Hunter thought that this was a pretty nice conversation. He also thought that Darius doesn’t use his right hand. He wasn’t used to someone being hurt, if that someone wasn’t himself, so it made him worry even more. If anyone, out of the two of them in the room, Hunter should’ve been injured. His face showed it all, so it was no surprise to hear an annoyed “What?” from the other side of the table.
“Can I try the spell? I promise I won’t mess up!”
Darius gave him a measuring look and sighed. “You won’t leave me be, will ya?” Naturally, Hunter wasn’t gonna stop with his attempts to help. “Sure, prince, do whatever makes you happy.”
Hunter looked at Darius dead in the eyes and said, as if he was just asking how’s the weather: “You do know you suck at parenting,” he moved his chair closer to Darius and sneered “don’t you?”
Darius really had nothing to say to that. Sure, he was a thousand times better then Belos, but it’s not like he was being a parent to Hunter in any way. He did help enroll him to school and made sure to keep a couple of magazines on sci-fi in the house, but it was all mostly thanks to the advice from both Camila and Eda.
But, honestly, was Hunter a parenting material? He didn’t need to be reminded to not misbehave, he was polite (most of the time, expert when he was swearing up and down) and educated, thanks to the Emperor’s coven, so what was left for Darius to do anyway? It sucked that Hunter had to be taught manners the hard way, but there was no changing it now. And, frankly, Darius didn’t know what parents do. He had a couple of his own, sure, but they were distant and aristocratically cold, like in all those shitty romance books.
“Heal already, or I’m going to bed”
Hunter stares him down in disbelief “You aren’t gonna sleep with an open wound, are you?”
Darius humed, agreeing. It’s not like he wasn’t in the mood for a fight, it’s more that he tried to not freak Hunter out further, cuz he already seemed freaked.
“Irrisponsible.” Hunter mutters, reading the healing spell again to make sure he won’t mess up the words.
“I know it’s safe. For a witch, that is.”
“What? Now a witch can’t blead out to death?” his eyes perk up from the book, burning with annoyance.
“It’s just a scratch.”
“You weren’t using your right hand!”
“I’m left-handed, Hunter. It’s natural for me.”
Hunter all buzzing with anger. At first at the thought of how irresponsible Darius is, but with each passing in silence second he realizes that Darius is calm. So calm that there is no way he’s lying. So Hunter gets even angier, as he comes to an understanding that all of it was just his nerves and nothing more. He just can’t see anyone getting hurt. Not again, not ever. Not Darius, for titan’s sake, Darius doesn’t deserve to get hurt. Hunter pushes his brows closer to the nose bridge and stands up so fast like he’s never ment to sit there in the first place.
“Whatever. Good night.”
He attempted to get away without saying another word, but the simple “Hunter” got him turning all 180 to face Darius again.
“I appreciate the effort.”
“The fuck effort matters if I got mad for no reason?” Hunter spited out, almos…pouting? No, that can’t be right.
“It’s the thought that counts.” Darius chuckles. “You mind chatting for a second?”
Hunter seemes alert, but still makes a step closer. “I guess,”
“Did anything happen at school today?”
“No.”
“Did you see someone you don’t know, perhaps?”
“I’m pretty sure I’d recognize Belos’ fanatic if I see one” what he isn’t adding is that it’s like looking in the mirror from the perspective of his past self.
“I don’t doubt your skills. I also don’t want you to get hurt.”
“Cuz I’m your responsibility now?”
Darius stared at Hunter blankly, but it was obvious he was holding an eyeroll with all of his strength. He got up and moved to the couch pushing Hunter lightly to go with him.
“Sit, please.” Darius threw a blanket at Hunter and put his feet up on the coffee table, waiting for the boy to settle. “Hunter, for Titans’s sake! You are great and I don’t want you getting hurt, because I care about you. Are we clear?”
Hunter wrapped himself in a cocoon with a fluffy blanket and suddenly looked even more childish than seconds ago. “Not… necessarily.”
Titan. There was no mistake now, the kid was most certainly pouting.
“Will we be clear if you sleep on the couch today and I’ll watch that weird cartoon you’re so obsessed about?”
“Maybe.” Hunter sniffed. “It’s annoying how bad you are at being a parent.”
“In what way?”
“I can’t look up to you and get a clear picture of what I’m supposed to be doing, maybe? You are pretty cool, but I don’t think you are a good parent.”
“I don’t think I’m a good one either.”
They stay silent for a moment and Hunter probably feels guilty, because the next thing he says is: “Better then Belos though.”
“Figured that one out, yeah.”
“Maybe you should tell me what to do?” Hunter suggests.
“What for, little prince? Don’t you already know everything?” And Hunter would think it sounds rude, but there is nothing behind Darius’s voice but warmth.
“I do. Don’t you?”
“I do, too. Maybe you don’t need a parent at all?”
Hunter lights up, like when he comes up with a crazy theory and bubbles about it with shining eyes “Maybe it’s a grimwalker thing! Or maybe Belos was such a nuisance of a guardian that there is no point in trying to fix my view of the world?”
Darius stays quiet for a while before suggesting: “Maybe there is a point?”
“Oh, come on! Why did you wanna adopt me? Is this some kind of redemption arc of yours?”
“Titan, you even talk like Luz now…” Darius sighs.
“Maybe you should ban me from seeing her?” another brilliant suggestion in the pit.
“Why?”
“I don’t know. Belos would!”
Darius rolls his eyes with an annoyed growl. “Is it the ‘testing boundaries’ bullshit Camila was talking about?”
“What? That one time she was talking about adopted kids for no reason?”
“I guess the reason was you. Are you trying to annoy me? Because I am annoyed, and my hand hurts and I do want to sleep for at least a couple hours.”
“I don’t seem annoyed.”
Darius stares Hunter down again. It’s hard to be serious enough to not chuckle at the boy wrapped in a blanket like a burrito, but Darius always was talented with holding his cool.
“What you mean is, I’m not throwing hands like Belos therefore I’m not being a guardian?”
Hunter frowns, because, well, Darius explains it like it’s so simple. But it’s really not, is it! He stares at Darius back, but doesn’t come up with anything more redeemable than “Duh, basically.”
Darius sighs again, barely keeping himself together. “I see. I will continue to be a bad guardian then.”
Hunter hums, not really getting where Darius is coming from. “Ya sure?”
“Yeah.”
Darius turns on the TV looking screen, similar to once in the human realm, because it wasn’t long after the exchange student’s program when the tech also became necessary to keep that many humans in the right place at the right time. TV was just something Boiling Isles borrowed from humans, basically. “Titan, don’t tell me this show you are watching is about princesses.”
“There is also a lot of space!”
“Then I guess I can handle it.” Darius chuckles.
And truly, for no reason at all, spends the early morning watching cartoons with Hunter and listening to the boy ramble in his half-sleep facts about all of the characters.
And that wasn’t too bad. Sure, Darius was an awful guardian. So awful that Hunter sometimes wished that he’d never known what kind of parent Belos was, just always living with Darius and maybe watching cartoons more often. And maybe, in a couple more months this routinely burdening guardianship would make both of them happier, than they’ve ever been in the Castle.