Title: To save a Knight
Author: The Somebody of Nobody
Summary: It's Gilbird's bedtime so Prussia tells him a story.
Warning: Slight mentions of abuse and very soft slash.
Disclaimer: We do not own Hetalia. This story was inspired by the photograph entitled APH: Once upon a time… by ~yiangillium which can be located on DeviantArt.
Word count: 560
Once upon a time, there lived a young Teutonic knight who wanted to be the best there ever was. He wanted to protect people and make the evil men go away. He wasn't quite able to do all that though.
See, this knight was different from all of the other Teutonic Knights. He had white hair and red eyes and was really pale. Not like all the others with their normal looks. To them, he was a demon who was just as evil as the men that they fought against.
The young knight didn't want to believe the others, but every day he would do something they did not like. He would cook wrong, pray wrong, fight wrong. Something. Then the others would hit him and say mean things.
After a while, he started to believe them.
One day, the knight was sent out to get firewood for the camp. He heard crying and went to see what it was. A boy, only a little bit younger than him, with dark hair and frightened violet eyes was being cornered by a giant angry boar. The knight drew his sword and chased the evil creature away.
Having defeated the enemy, he went to check on the boy. Instead of being scared or mad at him, the boy asked a question the knight had never heard before.
"Are you an angel?"
Not a demon, an angel.
The knight shook his head and smiled at the boy. He couldn't find his voice to speak, but he could and did kneel before the boy with his head bowed in a familiar sign of subservience.
It was not something commonly done, but the boy responded well.
"Rise, knight," he said. "Angel or no, you are a good person. I thank you for rescuing me."
The young knight stood up and smiled. With a small bow he ran away from the boy to find the firewood that had been his reason for being there in the first place.
It took a few years of replaying the violet-eyed boy's words in his mind for the knight to realize that his fellow knights might be wrong about him. Longer for him to see himself as a good person and even more years to meet that boy one more time.
He became the most awesome knight ever.
The end.
Gilbert Beilschmidt, also known as Prussia, smiled softly at the sleeping ball of yellow feathers in his palms. His little chick seemed to love hearing his stories. Of course, the bird did not know the truth of these tales.
Very carefully, Gilbert set his pet on a cushion and moved to leave the room, only to find his path through the door blocked by a tall body. Violet eyes framed by dark hair were gazing at his quite intensely.
"I didn't know that."
"Know what?" Gilbert asked with a cheeky grin.
The eyes softened as the person in the doorway responded. "I did not know that what I said meant so much to you."
Gilbert went over and wrapped two pale arms around the other's neck. He leaned up and pressed a rather chaste kiss to his companion's lips.
"They did."
Another, not-so-chaste, kiss was planted on Gilbert's lips in return. It lasted only a few seconds, but spoke volumes.
"Thank you, Roderich."
"You are most welcome, my brave knight."