“I swear if you make a fool of yourself-“ 

Anthony sighed heavily. “Yes, father, I get it. I’ll be on my best behaviour, whatever you want.” Over the years, he’d found it was easier to just go along with his father’s wishes, no matter how much he personally disagreed with them. And it wasn’t often that he agreed with his father. “We’ve had this conversation a million times, I know what I’m doing.” It wasn’t a surprise that his father would have little faith in him, as Anthony had been clear that he wasn’t happy with this arrangement, and… well, he’d never been brilliant around people in the first place, although it wasn’t as if the same couldn’t be said about his father, albeit for different reasons. 

But thankfully, that did shut King Richard up, and their journey returned to relative peace, moving through the vast fields of their kingdom, up towards the neutral meeting point. Once they arrived, Anthony still stayed in the carriage for a few moments longer, sort of wanting to delay this as long as possible, though soon enough Richard was moaning at him to get out, and he supposed there was no delaying the inevitable. He got out, though still stayed a good few paces behind as the king moved over to the centre table, ready to start the negotiations. 

He, of course, wouldn’t be involved too much in the actual negotiations himself - even if he wanted to be, he doubted that he’d get single word in with his father around. So instead, he stayed back, standing with his arms folded over his chest and trying to not stare too hard at the Fae Prince, though it wasn’t as though he could help it, really not interested at all in whatever politics were going on and at least wanted to get a feel for the person he’d likely be spending a significant amount of time around in the future. 

The prince… didn’t look too bad, Anthony thought. And by the looks of it, he seemed just as unhappy to be there as Anthony was, which was probably a good sign. If he was lucky, they could just get this over with and then agree that it was all just for business and move on. Anthony could focus on his studies, the Fae Prince could… do whatever Fae prince’s do, there would be no war in either of their kingdoms and everything could be right back to normal. 

He shifted on the spot slightly, gaze falling down to the floor as he realised that he wasn’t doing as well in the no staring department as he had thought. His father’s voice faded into background noise as discussions began, Anthony instead trying to think about anything else other than the situation at hand. Still, he found himself glancing up at the Fae Prince every ten seconds or so, as much as he tried not to.