The villain kids were beautiful, all of them. They were radiant and Ben had always seen it, it was why he'd brought them over. He had been watching the Isle of the Lost for years, watching, seeing what he could improve when he became king.

At least, that was his excuse.

He was eleven when he first saw them. He'd fallen in love with Evie first. It wasn't even her external beauty, as most would assume. Sure, she was gorgeous. Long dark hair, lips painted red and mischief sparkled in her eyes. But the first time he'd watched her trick a man into giving her a bottle of expensive brandy (the kind his father kept for cabinet meetings) that was actually full, that was when he first fell in love with her. He fell in love with the girl with bright eyes and knee-high socks, and a pendant around her neck that claimed her, even if he didn't know that at the time.

He was thirteen when he fell in love with Jay and Carlos. It happened at the same time, as best he could figure, and that made perfect sense because the two of them were always together. Jay was the brawn and Carlos was the brain, but neither of them treated the other like less. They were equal, together, brothers bonded by hardships and the same {collars} necklaces that Evie wore, and although Evie's was more ornate, people shied away from the boys when they caught a glimpse of their necklaces, respected them and gave them whatever they wanted. And Ben was infatuated with Jay's tattoos, swirling around his biceps, accentuating his muscles and recording his fights. He was infatuated with Carlos's thin, lean muscle, with his thick lips, with the freckles that splattered across his cheeks and body like constellations. And so Ben fell deeper still, and no one noticed ('Oh, Ben is such a good boy! Such a darling, working so hard to improve the lives of the Isle children. So dedicated to being a hero in his own way.').

He fell in love with Mal last, because he saw her last, but he fell hardest for her. Mal was evil, and he knew it. She didn't try to hide it, revelled in it, actually, let it consume her and harnessed it and let it make her more powerful than ever. He fell in love with Mal and the evil that blazed through her like a forest fire. He fell in love with her and the books filled with scribbled spells to make men burn and bleed. He fell in love with Mal and the velvet chokers she locked around Evie and Carlos and Jay's necks, marking them as hers. He fell in love with Mal's anger and her passion and her willingness to deceive and kill. He fell in love with the evil they embodied, and so he fell in love with them, and their collars, and her fire.

He loved them, so he 'decided' on his first official proclamation (he'd known what it would be since he'd first seen Evie as an eleven-year-old boy who didn't know what he was missing). And finally, finally, they came to him, his beautiful people, but they didn't know who he was, didn't know how he worshipped them and loved them, so when he was pushed forward by Audrey and the Fairy Godmother, he put on his perfect, good smile and welcomed them to Auradon, playing the part he had been playing for years, keeping his longing glances to a minimum (but Mal had seen, Mal saw everything, and he couldn't keep anything from her, not from his beautiful avenging angel, and so his smiles lingered just too long, and and he tried to touch as much as he could through simple actions, when all he really wanted to do was touch and touch and worship them, but he couldn't, and he'd never hated Auradon more in that moment {you could touch people on the Isle, wherever you wanted, whenever you wanted, as long as they said yes}).

And so he was nice about it, acted innocent, as though he hadn't been watching them , wishing to be there, with them, since the beginning, and he introduced himself politely, and kept up with Auradon decorum and greeted the men first, because, in Auradon, the men were in charge (but not on the Isle. And he could feel the fire that flashed in Mal's eyes when he didn't automatically defer to her, and he saw the dawning realisation that this was how it would always be, as long as she stayed in Auradon {the moment that cemented it in her mind- Auradon would feel the plagues, would suffer and burn and bleed for thinking of her as anything less than a Queen.})

"It is so, so, so good

to finally me... meet you all.

This is a momentous occasion,

and one that I hope

will go down in history…"

They had no idea how much he wanted them to go down in history.

When Audrey tried to drag him away from them, he nearly tore her heart out, then and there. How dare she? She, who was no one, who was worth less than the dirt on the bottom of Evie's red-soled heels, try to dictate what he did- what any of them did. But he gritted his teeth, and smiled once more, and let himself be dragged away to kiss the little whore, the good-for-nothing slut that he sullied himself with for the sake of image (and inside, he ached for the Isle, for the freedom and the power within the walls, {because Magic wanted to be there, and so who was King Adam to keep it out?}). And while he kissed her, he thought of Evie's red lips, leaving marks around his- and Carlos's lithe limbs writhing against Jay's thick muscles, and Mal's bright eyes and the nights she'd laid with other men, and he decided there was nothing in the world he liked less than Audrey and her mother, her mother that kept Mal away from him for so long.

He was alerted to the alarm going off that night, and he knew what everyone was thinking. The VKs were taking advantage of his hospitality. But really, they weren't, because he wanted them to take anything ad everything they wanted. So when his father called a meeting, begged him to reconsider, said everyone would just forget about it, he said no, because these gods and goddesses were his {or maybe he was theirs} and they would stay until they finally set themselves free, and then he would follow them to the ends of the earth.

At school the next day, when he could really examine them for the first time, he was enthralled. His eyes caught on everything, from their Evie-designed clothing to their hair to their stark cheekbones and unblemished what caught him most of all were Evie's and Jay's and Carlos's necklaces, thick ribbons of velvet wrapped around their throats, each with a different stone hanging off the end, sparkling the way only those infused with magick do. Evie's, for example, was a deep blue, set in a platinum frame {blue diamond, his mind whispered, infinitely more precious that sapphire}. Carlos's gem was pitch black, set in a silver lining, attached to a red collar. Iconic. Jay's was bright red and set in gold, and the desert winds of Agrabah seemed to sweep through it, and the pendant was cracked in two {the stones from the eyes of Jafar's staff}. Mal wore no collar, but she wore three rings, each corresponding with one of her friend's necklaces. They are under my protection, it screamed, never try and cross them.

And when Fairy Godmother was so proud of them, because "they really seem to be improving. Oh, Ben, you've done a wonderful thing!" and he just laughed, because these were the most manipulative people in all of Auradon, including the Isle of the Lost, so whatever you thought was what they wanted you to think. This theory of his was proved, once again, by tourney practice, because no one who ever watched them in tourney would believe that the two of them were closer than brothers, would believe that Carlos could bench press 250 pounds. Underestimation is the best disguise of all, Mal had whispered to them once, when they were young and Jay didn't understand why he couldn't also get good grades like Carlos. And they'd taken that sentiment to heart, and so and Ben. Now he had a defence. Look good. Say nothing. Follow the rules. And it became his greatest weapon because no one on the council ever believed it was Ben when a man who disagreed with his plans disappeared, no one thought him capable of independent thought. They just saw him as an easy-to-manipulate tool that sat on the throne. And they would regret that.