#scaramouche au

LIVE

Note:This will be my last update for a bit, I’ll be focusing on some events for work next week so I’ll be off tumblr. Not to worry, I still am working on everyone’s requests, and I see all your lovely comments and asks! Just need some time to sort them out <3

Summary: When Prince Scaramouche picks you out of a random group of commoners to marry, your life is turned upside down. He’s mean, snarky, condescending and he doesn’t act like a proper husband or prince at all. However, when Prince Tartaglia from the neighbouring kingdom takes an interest in you, Prince Scaramouche finds himself even more annoyed than usual. This is the story of him and you navigating this roller coaster of a relationship.

Warnings: slow burn, does not exactly follow the genshin lore, AU, tw: blood, injury

Word Count: 2.2k words

Summary and a recap on the Royal AU plots are here.

Read other parts: (Ruthless Prince Masterlist)

A silent week.

If you thought that life had been miserable ever since you came here, it doesn’t compare to this week. You haven’t seen Scaramouche. Not before you sleep, not when you wake up, not even during your meals: breakfast, lunch or dinner.

The only time you saw him was when you woke up in the middle of the night, groggy with sleep and eyes blurred with drowsiness. All you could see of him was his back, the gentle rise and fall of it. When you woke the next morning, he wouldn’t be there anymore, and wouldn’t show up for breakfast, Kuni would say that he was in his study, busy with papers first thing in the morning.

That was a lie, and you knew it.

You spent the week painting and drawing in the art room. Not only did you have no events this week, but you even declined Duchess Kokomi’s invitation to have tea with her. Somehow, last week’s events at the ball just left a sour taste in your mouth, you weren’t in the mood to see anyone.

As you settle in front of the easel on a Friday morning, your hand on the brush making big, upward strokes on the painting you were working on, your mind wanders yet again, causing your hand to stop and stall.

“What I did back there had nothing to do with you, in fact you can go right ahead and kiss him in private.”

Scaramouche was out of line, or so you thought. It hit you all over again, as you blankly stare forward.

He.didn’t.care.

Not one smidgen of understanding and love for you. You never asked for his heart, you knew you couldn’t have it. But, at the very least, some type of companionship, even something less than friendship, just civility towards each other and yet…it was so hard to obtain.

A week ago you were still grasping at hope. You were going to spend the rest of your life with him, there must have been some way to see eye to eye, to understand him a bit better. You thought that all you needed was time and perseverance, and at some point, you’d felt as if you were finally able to reach a little bit of him, finally able to see a part of him that wasn’t callous or self-centred.

But now, where there was once hope, there was nothing but despair.

You were wrong. Time or perseverance was not going to change anything. He made it very clear that night, scowling at you, ordering you to play your part, using you as an accessory.

You sigh, setting your paintbrush down when you notice that you’ve stopped painting altogether. Your head turns towards the large lattice windows, the light streaming through it drawing criss-cross patterns on your canvas. It was such a nice day out, and yet you sat in here on the inside gathering dust just as all the books on the shelves have.

The door clicking open nearly scared you to death. There was no knock, no announcements whatsoever, and Scaramouche just walks into the art room, arms crossed as your mouth falls agape. You hadn’t seen him in a whole week, and he decides to show up just like that.

The Ruthless Prince walks over to the armchair that he usually occupied on Fridays, and realizes that the tea you usually brew for him was not ready.

He doesn’t say anything for a moment, and you feel as if you’ve held your breath, wondering if you’re in trouble for not getting it out earlier. You just didn’t think he was going to show up, after all of that.

“…Where’s the tea?” He doesn’t look at you as he asks this, as if his eyes could only be glued to the table and were allergic to you. You let silence curtain the two of you, your body relaxes, yet it relaxes in a way that shows defeat. Your eyes linger on him, before you finally exclaim. “I didn’t prepare any.”

Quiet, and timid.

There’s a thin veil of uneasiness between the two of you, an awkwardness that was new. You hadn’t realized that those four weeks of him enjoying tea in the art room was already a glimpse of comfort with him. Now it was back to that painful and glaring silence.

“…You better go and make some then,” he huffs to himself, sinking into the armchair as if it was any Friday beforehand. You stand, with your feet heavy, you drag them all the way to the middle of the room, facing him, a few steps away from the armchair he sat on. “…I’m not preparing it for you,” you started, seeing him tense up a little, and his head finally moves the slightest bit, turning towards your voice, yet not daring to look at you fully.

“…I don’t feel like preparing it for you…It’s my free and private time so…I’ll do what I want with it,” was it petty? You immediately ask yourself. To take the words he threw at you and throw it back at him? The only difference was the eerie calmness in your tone. Scaramouche recognizes it, and when he turns his head to finally look at you, you can’t read his expression.

There’s no scowl, no glare, no smirk nor a grin. Just him, looking at you and waiting for what else you have to say.

“…I’ll teach Kuni and the maids how to brew it, you can ask them to prepare it for you,” Then, like a mechanical being, you stroll out of the art room quietly, but you walk out with a realization in mind:

I liked brewing it for you, I liked watching you drink it.

And he sits at the armchair, unmoving as the door clicks close, having a thought that he had already known for weeks on end:

I liked it when you brewed it for me.

The following day of Saturday had the two of you struggling to even look at each other during the ball you attended, and still, in front of all the others, you were the stellar conversationalist and everything seemed as it was.

Play the part, as he said.

Kokomi had been there, and it was your one saving grace during that ball, having her to really converse and catch up with. You’d left Scaramouche’s side to greet her, and stayed to talk to her for the most part.

Scaramouche didn’t stop you, but he did watch you from one of the various drinks table. You looked so…animated. So different from when you stood next to him. What did he expect, after that tirade last week? Why was it affecting him so much? How did it change your attitude towards him so drastically? Why was he only seeing it now? Was this the cold shoulder? And he thought it was bad before, now it was just…

Unbearable…

He downs the drink he has in his hand, just in time for the arrival of Prince Tartaglia to be announced. He half grunts and half growls under his breath, as if things weren’t bad enough already. He picks up another drink and starts on it, not even bothering to clap or turn around when the Snezhnayan Prince arrives.

Come to think of it, Tartaglia was supposed to be here for a few weeks. It wasn’t often he came around, but when he did, it was usually to check on the trading agreements and to make sure his imports and exports were in order. And of course, Scaramouche had an impression that Tartaglia just loved to annoy him, so, instead of the actual king coming to check, it’d always been Tartaglia.

When the applause settles down and when a few minutes pass, Scaramouche yet again opts to scan the room for you. As he suspected, Tartaglia now joins your group of two with Kokomi. Nevermind that Kokomi looks just as amused as you at whatever story Tartaglia’s performing, but you looked as if new life had just been breathed on to you, listening to and laughing at the Snezhnayan prince’s comedies.

Scaramouche catches his own frustrated sigh, holding it in and just…trying to let everything go.

When did it become like this?

He wonders.

Not the fact that you had gone cold and wary of him–he knew exactly when that started–but when did he start feeling a sense of unease whenever you weren’t by his side? When did he start wanting for you to look at him like that too? He’s inclined to believe that his outburst last week…was not all that it seemed to be. He felt ridiculed, he felt that his sense of authority was threatened, but…could there be any other reason he felt angered like he did?

It takes seconds for him to realize that you’re back at his side. He blinks, and raises his eyes to look around, seeing Kokomi and Tartaglia still engaged in their small talk, then his eyes drop to you. You looked…absolutely miserable next to him, forced smile and tense shoulders and all.

How can I make this bearable again?

He suddenly asks himself, then instinctively passes a drink to you. You casually receive it with a small thank you, but other than that, there were no other words from you.

The night goes on as such, more small talk with the nobles, more of you conversing with people he didn’t even want to look at, up until it was time for the two of you to leave.

Briefly, just before the two of you depart, you find yourself seeking out Kokomi and Tartaglia again, saying a brief goodbye to the two people who have made the night the slightest bit enjoyable. Scaramouche observes as you do so, but doesn’t say anything about it.

He doesn’t say anything at all, as usual, on the carriage back. You, on the other hand, perhaps because your mood was a little better than it was after talking to Kokomi and Tartaglia, and maybe because you thought that this cold war had been going on for too long, a casual “Are you having dinner with me today?” slipped past your lips.

Though, there was no expectation laced with it at all. Just a question, no desire whatsoever for him to join you, nor a trace of hope for him to reply nicely. Merely to ask if he was going to leave you alone for the rest of the night.

His head jerks towards you at the sudden question…the first thing you had uttered to him in a week. Well, the first semi-nice thing, after that incident with the tea. He’s confused as to how to answer. Does he ignore the question, and continue with this strange atmosphere or does he say–

“Yes,” he says it before thinking about it fully, as if it was the only sensible answer. From his peripheral vision, he sees you nod, and that was the only conversation you had with him in the vicinity of the carriage.

Scaramouche doesn’t offer his hand when you step down the carriage at arrival. He hasn’t done that in a while. However, a strange feeling overcomes you as you step down, a prickling at the back of your neck urging you to turn around, just as the carriage leaves, giving you a clear view of the deep forest surrounding the castle edges.

What possessed you or told you to turn around, you’d never know. Instinct, you might call it. A gut feeling. You thought that your eyes were playing tricks on you, when you see a slight billow of black among the trees. It’s dark, but there was movement and there was enough moonlight for you to catch it.

“Scara–” a cloak, that’s what it was. A glint and the sound of something snapping through the air had you clumsily tackling Scaramouche down to the pavement leading up to the castle. He falls on all fours, shocked at the action and finally thinking to himself ‘Are you that mad at me?’

He’s had enough. He turns toward you with the same snarl as last week, looking like a lion devouring his prey. “What the hell do you think you’re–”

Blood.

Soaking through the dress from your left chest, an arrow sticking out from your front. You, just kneeling there and looking at it, startled and unable to grasp the severity of the situation. Everything is so hazy now.

“Y/N–” Scaramouche’s voice mixed into one of confusion and horror, his eyes tacked on to the way the arrow pierces through your dress, sinks into your flesh and blooms red dangerously close to your left breast.

Scaramouche snaps out of it when you start to fall backwards onto the pavement, he jolts forward and catches you. His eyes dart up towards the trees, purple veins of electricity on his free arm, a loud, thunderous crash of lightning decimating a whole portion of trees, painting the area purple for a split second before the trees caught fire with a raging orange, hoping to catch the perpetrator off guard.

The knights were alerted by now, and Scaramouche doesn’t quite remember what orders he barks at them.

All he can remember was the trembling of his breath as he hoists you up into his arms.

All he remembers is the unfamiliar feeling of dread introducing itself to him for the first time.