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“Well, don’t you look terrible.”
The heavy oak doors of Malleus’s dorm room opened with a creak. Vil could make out a vaguely human-shaped form lying almost motionless on the bed, other than a steady rise and fall that signaled breath. The figure had a long ridged tail that wrapped around its hunched form, and a large pair of dark, leathery wings that covered most of its head and body—as if it were trying to hide from something.
The draconic creature was of no doubt Malleus, made clear when a single reptilian eye peered out from behind the curtain of wings, seemingly glowing green.
Malleus raised his wings further away from his face, getting a better look at his visitor. “Schoenheit…” The voice was raspy, more akin to a growl. Perhaps it was a growl, considering his current state.
Standing at the doorway was Vil, who was already dressed in his Vampiric costume, with his thigh-high heels, and slicked back hair done as immaculately as usual. Malleus had to admit that it looked good on his fellow dorm leader. After all, it did take him a good few seconds to collect himself when he first saw Vil in the costume. Only he could make a tacky print look fashionable, elegant even.
Vil closed the door behind him, before slowly approaching Malleus’s bed, as if he were approaching a wild beast, his heels clacking on the marble-tiled floors. “You weren’t at the meeting today.”
Unsteadily, Malleus raised himself up, folding his wings behind him. Where were Sebek and Silver? He highly doubted that they would have just let anyone enter his room, knowing that he wanted some time to cool off. Though then again, he did tell them to tone down their protectiveness over him, after a certain event where the Pomefiore dorm leader nearly lost his mind and temper after relentless questioning from Sebek about his, “intentions on approaching the young master!”
“Did Lilia not tell—”
“Oh no, he did,” Vil interrupted, stopping in front of Malleus’s bed, and crossing his arms. “That’s why I’m here. To check up on you.”
Ah… so Vil was worried. You’ve gone and troubled him. Malleus let himself drop backwards onto his bed, one hand brushing his hair back, and the other covering his eyes, as if trying to dispel a bad headache, though truly he was trying to hide a blush.
“... you shouldn’t be wasting time here, I can take care of myself.”
“Well looking at you right now I find that hard to believe.”
His current state… he must really look like a mess, with his wings and tail out, and patches of obsidian scales peppering his body. Malleus then remembers a mortifying detail, that he neglected to put on a proper robe the night before, and was currently, right in front of the always neatly dressed Vil—painfully underdressed.
No literally, he was shirtless.
“I… I don’t want you to see me like this,” he mumbles, hastily sitting up so that he could cover himself up the best he could with his draconic wings. If Vil noticed his odd behaviour or unkempt appearance, he certainly didn’t let it show.
“Like what?” Vil questioned. “There’s nothing wrong with looking more… scaly than usual.”
Oh. So he did notice.
“It’s unbecoming of me, the prince of the valley of thorns, to lose my composure this way,” He remarked, trying to keep his Royal image with a dignified tone.
(It wasn’t working)
“Unbecoming?” Vil nudged Malleus’s tail away, making space to sit by the dragon.
“I heard about what happened—it’s not unusual to lose your temper at something like that.”
“You wouldn’t have,” Malleus muttered, voice even more muffled behind his wings.
“Hm?”
“You wouldn’t have done what I did. I was being irresponsible.”
“Oh please. I just have extra experience. I’m used to dealing with rabid fans. You learn how to react when they cross the line like that eventually.”
Malleus tried not to dwell on how sad that statement was. He couldn’t imagine growing up for most of his life in the spotlight, and having to deal with dozens of those akin to the Magicam monsters. Even as a prince, he was rather isolated from other children, even those of higher ranking nobles.
“Even still,” Malleus sighed, “they were simply humans. If Lilia and Silver hadn’t done anything I…” Malleus’s tail flicked, a nervous tic that he thought he was rid of years ago. “I could have hurt them.”
He refrained from saying anything about the fragility of humans, seeing as Vil was also a human but… different. Resilient, thick-skinned—he was far from, “fragile.”
Vil absentmindedly stroked the length of his tail, as if trying to calm him down. Well, it did, but now that he’s thinking of the way he let someone (his crush) so casually touch his tail, he might just combust.
“True. But nothing happened in the end now did it?”
“It’s useless to think of situations that never happened, Malleus,” he continued, reaching over to try and move Malleus’s wings away from his face.
“... They touched me so fearlessly,” he stared down at his bed. “I’m much more used to people being scared of me that I just didn’t know what to do.”
“Should I have been happy?”
“That’s ridiculous,” Vil scoffed. “Being happy that they were invading your personal space? You’re wiser than that.”
Was he really? When Vil acted so much more mature than he. There he went, calmly dealing with the rowdy guests and handling much of the logistics of the event at the same time, while Malleus moped in his room like a moody teenager.
“... I’ve scared them away.” Malleus’s eyes widened as a momentary panic rushed through him as he remembered, “If they were recording it as well then—”
“I highly doubt they had it in their brains to be scared of you, “ Vil scoffed. “There’s a fine line between bravery and stupidity and they’re part of the latter.”
“Hm… maybe,” Malleus chuckled, his wings gradually opening up.
“There we go,” Vil smiled at him, with that sweet, darling smile of his—hold on, were those fangs—
“Now you’re laughing. Feeling better?”
“J-just slightly so,” he replied, pointedly looking away from Vil’s gorgeous purple eyes. He cleared his throat, suavely saying, “You make for good conversation, Schoenheit.”
Or at least he sounded suave, and not like a smug asshole.
“... take some time off today. I’ll be back again later.”
“You will?” ah, you replied far too quickly...
“Now don’t you sound like an eager puppy’” the elegant blonde teased.
“Of course I will. I’ll have to fill you in about today as well, Malleus, as a fellow dorm leader and the head of the planning committee.”
“Ah. Right.”
“Well, I’m glad you’re feeling much better. We wouldn’t want thunderstorms or any natural disasters today, now do we?” Vil joked, getting up from Malleus’s bed, and making his way towards the door. “Well now, I’ll be off.”
Malleus watched Vil walk away. Was his room always this cold? Or was it only warm just now, when Vil was next to him? The sound of the door opening startled him out of his thoughts.
“Wait.”
“Hm?” Vil turned his head to the side, one amethyst eye glancing back at Malleus, and, oh great seven was his jawline always that attractive . Since when did Malleus find himself attracted to jawlines anyway?
“Before you go…” Malleus gave the vampire by his doorway the most genuine smile he could muster, “thank you… Vil.”
“... it’s nothing,” Vil gripped the doorknob tighter, and walking out—was that a blush on Vil’s face? No, it was probably just the lighting of his room.
“It was the least I could…” Vil turned to face him, and oh, that was a blush. Vil Schoenheit. The Vil Schoenheit blushing. Wow.
“It was the least I could do…Malleus.”
And with that, Vil turned away, closing the door on a starry eyed, heart-racing Malleus.
To think that I’ve found someone who can bring me to my knees with no effort, he thought, collapsing onto his pillows. His tail flicked back and forth, like that of a happy pup. Malleus doesn’t notice how most of his scales had disappeared, nor that his wings had also done the same.
I want to court him… would Vil prefer the diamond necklace, or the ruby tiara? Maybe I should start practicing my courting dances as well…