At worst, Darius seems to be a villain with principles; Which compared to the genocidal Belos and his constant gaslighting and manipulations, is too much even for him! And again that’s at worst. So it stands to reason that the previous Golden Guard (whom we’ll refer to as such, while Hunter is simply Hunter) was along those lines, given how Darius fondly remembers him, and judges Hunter by the standards of his predecessor. And what alleviates Darius’ disapproval is Hunter learning to think for himself, even at the apparent cost of the coven; Something Darius believes would make the Golden Guard proud.
And as others have pointed out, Darius doesn’t necessarily know of Hunter’s abuse, or at least doesn’t know he goes through more than that of the typical covenscout. And Hunter being the Emperor’s nephew might be a VERY recent reveal in-universe, or not; Lilith didn’t know, but with what we know of Philip, it makes even more sense for Belos to keep her in the dark about a lot of things as just a figurehead who has a ‘destiny’ to fulfill. Regardless, it makes sense for the Coven Heads to know more than your typical covenscout, but after Hunting Palismen, Hunter seems to have revealed his face to prevent another situation like that.
So from Darius’ perspective, he grows up in a coven system that believes in order but is still reasonable and has SOME principles, because Belos hasn’t tightened his control yet. It helps that his Golden Guard is actually a principled dude by comparison, and seems to have actual magic to an extent. But after Darius becomes Coven Head and the Golden Guard is put out of commission for unknown circumstances, Belos starts to tighten his grip on the isles. More and more witches are forcibly bound, and nobody’s speaking out against him.
Darius isn’t actively spreading the coven at this point, but he will do his job of at least defending it against direct traitors and the like. Then this freaking teenager shows up, the barest minimum age to even join a coven; And he’s higher-ranked than everyone else?! He doesn’t even have magic, and seems to be a pitiful yes-man to the Emperor, who is his uncle... Ah. That explains why he keeps being given the time of day. If Darius doesn’t know of Hunter’s abuse, then he has more reason to be critical of the kid as an unthinking brat who has literally nothing to deserve this title except his uncle’s nepotism.
SCREAMING SOBBING hunter has a PHONE NOW AUGHGHHGHGH
Darius is SO GENDER and he’s also a lot nicer than I thought he’d be :’)))) I LOVE HIMMmMGMGmgg and what about the fuckinn??? predecessors??? previous golden guards??? what happened to them???
Can we talk about how different Odalia and Darius are when they’re around kids?
Like seriously, we have Odalia, a psychologically abusive mother who would put her children into positions that they don’t want to be put in rather than let them discover what they want to do on their own…
…and then you have Darius, although not necessarily an actual dad (that we know of in canon yet), his response to Hunter defending the Emerald Entrails and treating him more like the kid he should be speaks volumes on how drastically different they are around kids!
Like seriously, why did Alador marry Odalia instead of Darius?
Not only is Alador recently realizing how crappy of a father he is for neglecting his children, but he straight-up gets told by his youngest child that he just follows whatever Odalia wants him to do
If he married Darius, he probably would’ve been a better father and be more involved with his kids rather than neglecting their problems
But, of course, that’s just a theory from my shipping ass
Because I’m ✨fruity✨ my theory is that Darius and Alador use to be best friends. Darius developed a crush on Alador and Alador was probs too oblivious to notice. Then here comes the bitch from hell-I mean Odalia. We all know she loves power and to be at the top. These two guys were probably the strongest witches in their track, thus Odalia wanted one of them. My guess is maybe Darius at first but he saw through her bs. So she went after Alador instead, it worked obviously. Darius tried to tell him but Alador didn’t want to hear any of it. Darius didn’t want to see his friend, and crush, with someone who doesn’t actually care for him. So instead, Darius pushed him away and they became rivals.
Thank you for coming to my Ted Talk
Additional, the boring, non fruity way: they both wanted Odalia and somehow Alador won. Darius was mad and now they rivals
