Author's Note: So royal-tutoring on Tumblr has been posting the Leonhard Diaries, and when I saw the one where Leonhard is bitching about Licht mixing bell peppers into his food, I had an idea for a vignette.
He sits and stares balefully at his plate. If looks could kill, the vegetables before him would be a smouldering pile of ash.
"Come on, Leo, they're just bell peppers."
"WHICH… I… DESPISE," Leonhard growls as he shifts his glare from his plate to Licht. The younger prince blithely ignores the hostility, neatly spearing a slice of bell pepper onto his fork and waving it around Leonhard's face.
"Come on… open wide… it's just an itty bitty bell pepper…"
"DAMN IT, LICHT, I DON'T WANT TO EAT THAT!"
"Licht, leave Leonhard alone," Bruno snaps from the other side of the table. "There is no need to compound his immaturity with your own."
"I am NOT immature!" Leonhard howls, stamping his feet under the dinner table, but then immediately claps his hand over his mouth as everyone turns to give him a derisive look.
"Oh, really?" Licht drawls, continuing to poke the pepper in the direction of Leonhard's mouth, and Leonhard growls at him once more before yanking the fork out of his brother's grasp.
"Leo, give me back my fork!" Licht's wail is cut off by Bruno's snort.
"You have two other forks in front of you, brother, use one."
"It is the height of uncouth to use one's dessert fork for the main course, Brunie. Even YOU should know THAT."
Bruno drops his own silverware, and pinches the bridge of his nose in frustration.
"Are you seriously going to sit there and lecture me about being uncouth when you were just waving a bell pepper in front of Leonhard's face?!"
"Yeah, Licht, it's not like you have room to talk!" Leonhard grumbles as he continues industriously separating the bell peppers out of his food to avoid contaminating the venison. Only the risk of soiling the damask tablecloth keeps him from outright shoving them off his plate.
A low growl from Bruno's other side is all it takes to indicate Kai's displeasure, and the three other princes quickly subside into a brief silence. A silence punctuated by Leonhard's sotto voce grumbling, Licht's whispered demands for the return of his fork, and Bruno's long-suffering sigh.
The silence lasts for a couple of minutes before Leonhard speaks up again.
"Bruno, you know everything - can dogs eat bell peppers?"
"Oh for heaven's sake, Leonhard, just leave them on the side of your plate!"