Courtly Von Claire/Xerxes

XerxesCourtlyNate
### Confrontation

She shook her head. "Wait from inside if you are really that concerned. I can't let you fight all my battles."

He raised an eyebrow, "I don't fight any of your battles...I'm just your lowly soldier carrying out the violent parts."

"That's basically the same thing," she deadpanned. Courtly spun on her heel and walked out the door, not expecting a response from Nate.

He watched her go before shrugging, throwing himself onto the couch.

Courtly stepped out into the warm summer air with a blank face and her hands in the pockets of her jeans. A light breeze blew through her tangled blonde hair as she looked around for anyone that could fit the description for Xerxes.

Courtly didn't want to approach just any random person with brunette hair. It'd be strange and kind of rude. She decided to text the stranger to give her some type of way to identify him.

Nicholas caught her eye and immediately, and she knew it was him. She sighed and trudged over to him with narrowed, suspicious eyes.

"Yes, yes you can. I'm looking for someone you might know. Brown hair? Blue eyes? Creepy stalker tendencies? I think his name was Xerxes. Mind helping me?" she spat sarcastically.

"You literally sent me a video of me and a friend like five minutes ago. I'm not dense. Now can we move this along, I have things to do and people to expose."

"You are one hell of a nuisance, you know that?" she huffed.

She contemplated lying to him but decided against it, since she didn't know his stance on the whole thing. "None. Can't find any good times to snatch them, plus people would question my disappearance if I don't leave during the night."

"My life was threatened. Why would I not do it?"

She shuddered in distaste at the thought of even using Nate for ulterior motives. "Yeah... I'll make sure to take advantage of that when the time is right," she muttered.

"I haven't worked out the details," she replied with a subtle frown. "When I do... I'll make it a point to tell you."

"You're just such a cheerful messenger, aren't you?" she lamented in layers of sarcasm."

She blinked, not expecting the compliment. "I don't think it'd be appropriate for the king's daughter to be aligning with an organization trying to overthrow him, but I'll consider it," she added in response.

"You are the strangest person I have ever met in my life." She hook her head. "Nah, that's a lie. I've met weirder people."

She choked on the first words of her response. "M-My boyf-friend? What secret? What are you talking about?"

She was speechless. Courtly had no response to this. This mysterious Xerxes had a point. She knew next to nothing about Nate, which now that she thought about bothered her a lot. "...I won't."

Still momentarily stunned, it took a while before she turned around, returned her hands to the insides of her pockets in her own jeans and headed back inside the Dorm building and over to Nate's Dorm. "..."

He was watching a television show, throwing popcorn into his mouth, waiting for her.

She opened the door to his bedroom slowly and ambled in with a look displaying that she was in the middle of thinking at the moment.

He looked over to her and stood up, "hey...how was it?"

"Fine," Courtly mumbled, sitting down on his bed. "Nate..."

"Courtly..." he said with the same voice, "my, my, that's by bed by the way. Your not making a proposition, now are you?"

Her eyes widened and she stood up immediately. "What? No! No! No!" she complained. "I was just sitting down. Anywhere, you're not telling me something. Are you?"

He flashed a grin before pausing, his eyebrows furrowing, "what?" he asked, "tell you what?"

"I found out about something. You have something you're not telling me. I trust you with my secrets, but you haven't said a word to me about your life."

His face, usually friendly with Courtly, closed off, his signature scowl returning, "not much to tell," he said, rocking back on his heels, "I'm a prince. Grew up in a castle, went to the academy. Got into fighting. What's there to tell? "

Courtly crossed her arms, narrowing her eyes, exposing her disbelief of his answer. "You and I both know that's not what happened. If I can freely tell you about my life, I deserve to know something in return."

"Fine," he replied, "I helped down take Victoria. I was the one who brought the king and queen into it and gave them the evidence to take her down. Is that enough? Is that want you want to know?"

"I don't think that's all there is to it. Are you really sure there's nothing else to tell me?" she hissed back.

"Nothing important," he growled, "so I'd stop pressing at something that doesn't exist. Because it sounds to me they're trying to get into your head, making you paranoid and isolated."

She grit her teeth and glared at him. "Why can't you just *trust me*, Nate? Is that too much ask? Why won't you tell me? I'm trying my best, to understand your side of the situation but I can't if *I don't know if you trust me*!" Her voice raised volume as she spoke, and by the end, she was yelling.

He clenched his fists, breathing in deeply to not get angry, if it was anyone else, he would have thrown a punch, shoved them against a wall, or just left. "What situation! I'm not in this situation. I don't know these people. I'm not apart of this...*cult*...I don't have anything to do with it for gods sake, so what is there to understand!"

"This has nothing to do with them! This is about our—" she fell short of words. What was she supposed to call this? A friendship? It didn't feel like one. She huffed, dragging her fingers through her hair and turned on her heel. "Fine. Don't tell me. You don't need to tell me anything anymore because I'm not doing this with you. If we can't trust each other to share *backgrounds*, what else is there to trust you with? My life?" She took a step forward. "I have a feeling you won't come looking for me," she spat, before leaving and slamming the door behind her.

He stood in the middle of the room, listening only to his breathing, not understanding the hollowness in his stomach. He hadn't felt anything for years, let only this...need, this desperation. He didn't know what that word was. The word he was looking for, it was always at the tip of his tongue. Previously, it was there but he could never grab it but now...it was there. He could feel it. He turned on his heel, heading to the door, his hand hovering over the handle. Unsure if he should go.

Courtly stormed down the hall, gripping her arm so hard she'd be sure she would be seeing an ugly bruise tomorrow. There was a constant sense of frustration that was driving her outside and towards the gates, but behind it was a cold emptiness inside her she didn't want to acknowledge. It was the simple phrase she told herself that kept her moving and angry. *Screw this. Screw Xerxes. Screw the stupid White Roses and screw the world.* She wouldn't admit to the fact that she half wanted to check behind her, to see if Nate was following her but she refused to give into the temptation. *I don't that secretive ass. I'm fine. I'm okay.*

He slipped out of his room, turning his brain off, and wasn't hard to find Courtly. She was kind of loud in her storming off. "Courtly," he said, racing after, "don't you leave. Don't you dare leave me." He reached her, shoving her against the wall, her face level to his. "Screw you," he grunted out, "screw you."

She glowered at him fiercely, defiant to comply with his request but the emptiness was gone. For some reason, she hated herself for letting the emptiness disappear. "*Oh f\*ck off*, Edan!" she cried out in infuriation. "What do you want from me? I made it loud and clear that I don't want anything to do with you anymore so leave me alone!"

"I don't think you did," he snarled, "I came looking for you. I did. Your feelings were wrong and I'm not...I'm not fucking off. I don't fuck off." His grip tightened, "you don't get to leave. Not like that. Not like that."

"What do you mean I don't get to leave? You don't control what I do, Nate! I can leave whenever the hell I want, however, the hell I want, and you can't stop me!" she shouted at him, anger burning in her eyes. "My feelings are perfectly fine, thank you very f\*cking much."

He slammed her against the wall again in frustration, bowing his head down slightly, "what do you want me to do, damn it? Tell you..tell you how I was fucking...kept in a cage. Do you want me to tell you how I know exactly how much I'm worth?" He growled, stepping back, "500 thousand dollars. That's how much I'm worth. How much people would pay for me. Do you want me to tell you how I had people, prod, rape, burn, scar me, just to see how much pain I can endure? Is that what you want me to tell you? To show how much I trust you? Cause I don't see how that's relevant."

She coughed once her back hit the wall again, a breath forced out of her. "Yes, I would've appreciated that ten minutes ago when I asked you about it!" she screamed back at him. "I guess you don't understand how much that information means to me! I wanted to understand you, feel your pain, share your burden but you're so hellbent on keeping everything to yourself that I don't even know if it's worth trying anymore!"

He stared at her, with wide eyes, breathing hard, letting her go. He hadn't told anyone that. He never told anyone even a hint of what he went through. Was she deaf? Did she not hear him? He shoved his hands into his pockets, "yeah...I guess it's not."

She didn't realize the tears pooling in her eyes until she had slid down the wall and curled up into a ball, wrapping her arms around her legs.

"I didn't mean to hurt you," he forced out, looking at the ceiling.

"...I should've shut up and stopped asking," she sniffled, her words muffled by the position she sat in. "I really just don't know when to stop."

He paused, looking down at her in confusion, "what?" He asked, "oh, jesus christ, Courtly, don't cry because...ah, stop it. I didn't tell you that to fucking cry."

"What do you want me to do then?" she whined. "Congratulate you on having a horrible life?" she wailed. "Sorry, I'm a fucking mess and can't control my emotions."

He blinked, not sure how to deal with this, "please stop, do I look like someone who knows how to deal with this? It's not a big deal...it just happened."

She took a deep breath to calm herself down but didn't budge from the position she was in. She had stopped crying by this point and was just thinking, but saying anything to notify Nate of otherwise.

He scuffed his foot on the ground, "why'd I even come up? Like, why would an Air cult even care about me?"

Courtly looked up briefly and bit her lip, thinking about the boundaries of the threat Xerxes made. "Xerxes made a threat about revealing your secrets if I told you about what we discussed," she mumbled.

His eyes went cold and his hands turned into fists, his nails digging into his skin, "is that so?" He asked, his tone cold, "how the fuck did they find out?"

"I don't know," she answered, burying her head into her knees again.

He nudged her with his foot, "are you, like, broken or something? Do you need coffee to regenerate your battery?" He said, "and we should figure that out. I'm curious."

"I don't run on coffee," she retorted, shifting away from him. "I run on perserverance and motivation. Right now I have none of those."

"Well, uh, I can hook you up with a therapist? I hear they're good with motivation?"

"That's not funny," she deadpanned.

He grinned, "sorry," he said, not really though

Childishly, she stuck her tongue out at him. "Dummy."

"Seriously," he said the grin wiping off, "we need to start focussing. Figure out how to defeat them...unless you want the crowns."

"Actually..." she murmured, standing up. "Let's do exactly what they want," she said with a slow growing smirk. "Let's get the crowns."

He blinked, freezing, "what?" he asked, "I'm not a murderer, Courtly."

"Don't jump to conclusions, Nate. No one's going to die." She slipped her hands in her pockets and began to walk. "They just said steal the crowns, not kill anyone. Besides, we'll just borrow them for a while and return them. I'm sure they'll understand."

"How would we ensure that they return it?" He asked with a tugging mouth.

She shrugged, "We'll return it on their behalf."

"Oh, well, okay, I'd remind you though–if your kingdom tries to do something to me if we get in trouble, my parents won't be too happy. Might instigate a war."

"I'm very aware the threat of war exists, Nate," she pointed out. "That's why we need to do this right the first time."

"Do we get a second time if we fail?"

"Probably not... Unless death decides to give us a passing grade, which I doubt will happen."

"Death doesn't like me, every time I meet him he runs away. Hence why I'm still here," he mused, "it's very annoying."

"Huh, me and Death are like best friends. Wherever I go, it follows. Except it doesn't kill me. It's also very annoying."

He grinned, "come on, lets eat. I'm hungry."

"Alright, alright," she pouted. "What did you get and is it healthy? Actually it probably isn't so you don't need to answer that."

"You're right it's not," he said, turning to go back to his dorm, "i got hot chips and pizza. And Pasta."

She bit her lip. "What type of pizza?"

"Meat lover, of course."

"Explain to me again why the hell you got such meat lover pizza? What do you have against vegatables?"

"Not my fault mine's tastier," he said with a slow shrug, "why? Are you a vegetarian?"

"No. Meat Lover is too salty," she complained.

He snorted, "salty my ass. You're already full of it."

"Why do I put up with you again?"

"because I'm the only one you know who can actually understand?"

"Actually understand....?"

"The level of salt one needs," he replied, pushing the door open, not bothering to hold it open for her.

"Hey!" she complained, whacking him in the arm as she entered the room. "I am not salty. If anything you're the salty one."

He ducked his arm, away from her, and moved to the stacked boxes of food, "I'm not salty. I'm full of fire and rage. But not salt."

"More like cotton stuffing," she snorted. "You're anything but fire, rage I can see, but it'd be like watching an angry teddy bear."

## Timeskip

He was in his final class of the day, doodling on a piece of paper, a terrible drawing of rabbit with too large front teeth.

Courtly, who was sitting right next to him, was trying to focus on the teacher's honestly horrible lecture but Nate's even more horrible drawing skills was getting to her. "What even is that?" she whispered, leaning over.

He glanced over at her and grinned, "it's a rabbit," he answered before drawing some spikes over the bunny's head, "whose head is on fire, see?"

"Nate... Has anyone ever told you, you can't draw?" she asked him, raising an eyebrow at his alleged claim.

He looked at her with a frown. "Excuse me?" He asked, mock offended, "I can draw. Everyone tells me, the heir to the throne, that I'm an amazing artist. I reckon I could be the next Picasso."

"Has anyone ever told you that you have an over active imagination?" she continued, clicking her tongue.

"Nope," he said, "no one would ever dare to tell me that except you, props to you."

"Why are you congratulating me on talking to you like a normal human being?"

"Cause a lot of people don't," he said before waving her off, "but still: it's Picasso."

"No," she corrected. "Crappy art."

He breathed in sharply before the paper burst into flames, small enough that it didn't get noticed, and it crinkled into ashes. "Look at what you've done, ruin a future artist's work. That would have sold for billions, you know?"

She snorted, not impressed. "Maybe if you scowled hard enough at the buyers, they would."