#everyone is small next to emperor Belos not everyone is too young to legally operate heavy construction spells

[villainihavedonethymotheronao3]

It would actually be soooo funny if prev!Golden Guard was younger than Darius. Maybe Darius doesn’t even know at first.

27 year old Darius, finally rising in the ranks of the Abomination coven and realizing that this politics thing is a little cut throat! Meeting 20 year old Golden Guard, who is insecure about his age and power, who always keeps his mask on and wears heeled boots and pitches his voice low and has never told a soul that Emperor Belos raised him, but who was weaned on power struggles. He used to hide behind the throne and watch the early coven heads tussle for power. He saw his first assassination attempt at the age of six. And the Golden Guard likes this Abomination prodigy, he’s earnest behind the smarm (he reminds him a little of the older brother he barely remembers, the first Golden Guard of Belos’ reign). So he gives him some pointers. Offers some key information. Gets him up to date on all the gossip.

Darius is head over heels and determined to impress this all knowing stranger at the head of the Emperor’s Coven. The Golden Guard is struggling with his first friend even vaguely his age (coven scouts don’t count, he throws them into death traps and they resent him for it). They develop a secret rapport, a mentorship.

And then three years later the Golden Guard is dead, and it’s strange. They bury him (he isn’t named a traitor in death though Darius knows he was getting suspicious of Belos—there was something complicated between them) and in the coffin he looks so diminished. He does some digging, asks around, interrogates castle insiders and kisses up to the oldest coven heads, and realizes to his horror that the man he so respected was young, much younger than him. A kid was slyly advising him about avoiding poisonings. A kid telling him about secret abomination techniques he’d discovered in old books. He was still his mentor, he still respects him (arguably more now) but he ought to have been attending the Bonesborough Brawl or making out with his exes at parties. All the silly stuff Darius took for granted, denied to one of the people he loved most.

Three years later he’s somewhere he oughtn’t be (someone has to carry on his mentor’s legacy of snooping) and there’s a little boy. He never saw the Golden Guard’s face but he knows that hair, knows those red eyes as seen through the slits in a mask. The first time he didn’t know he needed to be protecting anyone and this time he can’t do a thing to help.

#the owl house #Darius toh #the golden guard #the golden guard is also trans which doesn’t help their horrifying insecurity #in terms of baby face + permanently five foot three #but the age issue is much more pressing #everyone is small next to emperor Belos not everyone is too young to legally operate heavy construction spells