| Bouquet of Lilies | SBI Royalty AU | written by Lav |

01- The perfect family

            The royal family seemed perfect. But it wasn't. Well, you could consider part of it perfect. The part without Theseus.

             Ever since his mother died shortly after giving birth to him, he's been an outcast. Only seen at important events, and even then his family ignored him. So two servants of the castle raised him; Puffy and Sam. He considered them his family, as his biological family never really got to know him or meet him.

             Well, that was until today. A few days after Theseus' sixteenth birthday. A maid came to his room to tell him that his father, the king, requested his presence. This had never happened to Theseus. Not in all his years of life.

He couldn't tell if he should be nervous or excited, after so many years of wishing that his family would acknowledge him, it was happening.

              So he quickly changed into appropriate clothing for a prince and rushed out his chambers and down the stairs. The servants bowed slightly to him as he went through the halls and stairs.  

             Marble stairs, golden railings, pillars through the halls, and high ceilings with windows at the top. In short, it was what you expected a castle to look like. Expensive, grand and beautiful.

             He went down a particularly long hall, with portraits. The first, of King Phil, Queen Kristen, and the twin princes. The next few had only the king and princes, Theseus nowhere to be seen. Like always.

             He stopped in front of the big double doors of the throne room. Tall, designed intricately with wood and accents of gold. He took a deep breath in, then out, and pushed the doors open.

            The king sat on the throne, looking quite bored. He glanced up when Theseus walked in and watched as Theseus walked up on the red carpet leading up to the throne before bowing.

           "What is it that you requested me for, my King?" He said politely, before picking himself up from the bow and looking expectantly at him.

           "Hello, Theseus. I've requested your presence because of the ball in a few weeks. I wanted to ask you to come to the ball."

          Theseus furrowed his eyebrows a little at this, the king had never requested his presence to just ask him to go to the balls or parties. Usually, an invitation was sent up to Theseus' room.

          "With all due respect, my king-" 

           "Father." The king interrupts

           "I- what?" Theseus was confused now. Did he really mean what Theseus thought he did?

           "Call me father." Theseus failed to hide his surprise, his father had never shown interest in him before this.

            "Alright. With all due respect, Father, but you've never requested my presence before to invite me to a ball." His father seemed surprised by this as if he didn't expect his son to question him.

However, he didn't acknowledge what he said. "Will you be going Theseus?"

"Yes," he glanced behind him at the big doors leading out of the room and to his freedom from this conversation. "May I be dismissed now?" The king nodded as a yes.

              With that, Theseus left the room. Once the doors closed behind him, he was confused. Why now? It was a very weird thing to be acknowledged after so long.

He shrugged it off and went back down the long hallway, avoiding looking at the portraits. As he walked, he decided he would go to the library. It was always quiet there, and the librarian was nice. Plenty of time and space to read or think.

Once he reached the doors, he pushed them open. He said a small hello to the librarian before moving past her and into the library.

He'd always liked fairytales and had read every fairytale he could get his hands on dozens of times. They showed him that there was always hope, and anything could happen. No matter how crazy. Like what happened today.

Today, he decided to read one of his favorites. Alice in Wonderland. Once he found the book, he took it and found his favorite armchair in the corner of the library.

He sat there for a while, reading to his heart's content until he heard a voice. The library was quite echoey so it wasn't hard to hear the conversation.

"Did Theseus come in here?"

"Yes, the prince came in here." That was the librarian. But he couldn't tell who the other person was. It had to be one of his family members, no one else would Adress him as Theseus but them.

Then there were footsteps. Theseus didn't feel like talking to whoever it was so he started reading again, hoping whoever it was would leave him alone.

He was wrong to hope. The footsteps stopped in front of him, and the person reached their hand out and tapped on his book. He looked up to see Wilbur.

"Hello, Theseus."

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Hello!

Have a wonderful day! :D

-Lav