#and he'd rather die than be attracted to killer in any way anyways. and killer's just there. unlabelled uncaring unknowing king

[triglycercule]

killer eating food in front of horror as a way to taunt him. duuuude do you see this delectable parfait he has in his hands right now. he just put a spoonful in his mouth. horror is scratching at his own arms right now (trying not to jump this bitchass). killer can't even taste it LMAOOO another bite ‼️ imagine not being able to eat food 🤣🤣🤣 killer can't even taste it and enjoy the food but horror can't even EAT food

then horror grabs the parfait glass out of his hands and oh killer you should probably teleport away before horror does to you what undyne did to his eye

[foxyatlas]

TW: canon compliant mention of sexual assault/non-con

Let's talk about this scene from the end of Captive Prince. Damen is trying to convince Laurent to take him with him to Delfeur, and he says this line, implying that Damen is the only person Laurent can trust. Which is ridiculous, because Damen is his slave, who Laurent has had beaten and abused, and because Damen tried to run away literally only a couple pages ago. But the crazy thing is that Damen is right, and Laurent knows it.

Damen is the only one who tells Laurent the truth, ever. He doesn't talk in riddles. He doesn't try to manipulate Laurent at any point. He just says the truth-- even when propriety would demand him to do otherwise. This is in part because Damen was also raised a Prince, so he never got in trouble for saying what he wanted, and I guess that's a hard habit for him to break. It's also part of his personality-- Damen just tells it like it is.

Anyways, Damen tells him that he needs to take him to Delfeur, because Damen is the only one Laurent can trust, and he's right, and the assassination attempt just proved that. Damen just showed, explicitly, that when push comes to shove he will be on Laurent's side, even when strategically it might make more sense for him to let Laurent die. During the assassination attempt, the assassins expected Damen to hate Laurent and want to let him die. They didn't account for the fact that Damen is way too caught up in his morals to let this happen, especially because it was an unfair fight (four against one).

When push came to shove, Damen did not let Laurent get murdered. He did not help the killers, or stand idly by, or anything like that-- he helped Laurent defend himself. And then, when they were alone, he STILL didn't try to hurt Laurent-- even though that would technically be a fair fight according to him, since it'd be one on one.

In one of the later books, I think I remember Laurent mentioning being scared of Damen. I think he was scared that Damen would try to kill him the first chance he got, but also that he would try to sexually assault him. Laurent knows that Damen is attracted to him-- which wouldn't come as a surprise, because Laurent definitely knows that most of the people in the palace are attracted to him-- and he has confirmation from the scene in the bath. Remember what got Damen whipped? It wasn't his disobedience. It wasn't him speaking out of turn. It was the fact that he grabbed Laurent's wrist, wouldn't let him go, and was looking at him lustfully, and that TERRIFIED Laurent.

I think Laurent would've been very worried that if Damen didn't try to kill him, he'd try to r*pe him. And then, the assassination attempt happened, and they were left alone together, and Laurent LITERALLY HAD APHRODISIACS IN HIS SYSTEM AND DAMEN KNEW. And what did Damen do?

He noped right out of there. Because at the end of the day, Damen didn't want revenge from Laurent, or sexual pleasure or whatever. He just wanted freedom.

You can tell how little Laurent expected this, too.

Laurent really hadn't considered the possibility of Damen using this excuse to make a run for it.

In this interaction, Damen played all his cards. He showed that he cared about Akeilos, he cared about fair fights, and he cared about his freedom. The one thing he didn't care about? Hurting or taking advantage of Laurent.

Now, Laurent knows exactly where Damen's motives lie, and that he isn't interested in the slightest in hurting him, even though he has plenty of reason to be. And that's what makes Laurent trust him. In a land of manipulation and deceit, Damen is the one person who Laurent can expect to find any sort of consistency from.

TLDR: Laurent trusts Damen because during the assassination attempt, Damen showed that he would rather run than get revenge, which makes him safe.