Heavy is the Head That Wears the Crown

viii

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"So, Rath's a matriarchal Kingdom?" Eijirou inquired, sounding genuinely interested as he took a sip of the apple cider in his goblet, and turned to Katsuki as he awaited a response, who nodded. "Huh. What are some of the differences you've noticed between Rath and Valor?"

"Well, for starters, that absolute fucking dumbass is the Captain of your Guard," snorted Katsuki, jerking his chin up to gesture at the orangey-blond who was currently drinking from two goblets at once with Ashido and the black-haired Knight (who Eijirou introduced as Sero Hanta about halfway through dinner) cheering him on. Beside him, the now goblet-less purple-haired Knight (Shinsou Hitoshi) watched half-disgusted and half-amused. "In Rath, the Captain is an actually competent warrior even I have trouble beating sometimes. Your Captain wouldn't stand a chance against her."

"Even you? So you're the best fighter in all of Rath?" Eijirou had his chin propped up by his elbow, his hand cupped his cheek as he listened to Katsuki, absolutely enthralled with every word he had to say judging by the absentminded smile on his face.

"Of course I am," Katsuki scoffed. It was all thanks to Inko. He ran his gloved fingertips (the same pair from before the pier incident, as the golden gauntlets were so tight and form-fitting barely any water had seeped through them) over the memento she had given him, which he still kept in his pocket. The ash blond had silently thanked the Gods when he remembered the water wouldn't do anything to it. Even though Katsuki didn't need it to remember Inko, he wouldn't just discard it like it was trash. It came from the Knight that taught him almost everything he knew when it came to fighting. That automatically made the memento precious to him.

"Well, I guess we'll see who the best fighter in all of Valor is after dinner, won't we?" teased Eijirou. He winked at the ash blond, his toothy grin lopsided. To that, Katsuki only rolled his eyes. But on the inside, he was stuck in a perpetual scream.

"Hold on, you two are fighting after dinner?" Jirou inquired, turning back around to face them from chatting with Shinsou, with an imperious curve of her brow. "Do neither of you know how to flirt like normal people?" Katsuki's face fell flat.

"There's nothing more romantic than duking it out under the stars, Jirou!" scoffed Tetsutetsu, injecting himself into the conversation as well. "Good idea, Eijibro."

"Thanks, Tets, but it's not exactly supposed to be romantic. After Katsuki kicked Monoma's ass—" Eijirou leaned closer to whisper in the aforementioned ash blond's ear, "good job, by the way—we started talking about what his gauntlets could do and the different techniques between Princes and Knights, then Katsuki said he could beat me, I doubted it, and he challenged me." He shrugged, leaning back in his seat. "No big deal."

Katsuki, however, was not that nonchalant in the slightest. Just the mere feeling of Eijirou's baritone scorch the shell of his ear, sounding so close to him and so deep and mesmerizing, like honey being poured over gravel, left him even more a mess than he was before. He had wondered this before but, Gods above, Eijirou really just wasn't fair. And the praise? That was something Katsuki would never be fully immune to. 

"Hey, Princey, are you even listening?" cut in Jirou's voice, along with repeated swipes at his arm. Katsuki shoved her away.

"What?" he sighed aggressively, not exactly being so hostile on purpose but certainly not not feeling that way at the moment.

She rolled her eyes and crossed her arms over her chest. "I was just telling Kirishima here about other/better ways to flirt. Like serenading them at the beach, or serenading them with the sunset in the background, or serenadi—"