HEADCANONS

Claude x Lysithea

Lysithea hated Claude von Riegan from first glance.

The way the corner of his lips would twitch up in that stupid half-smirk, his ridiculous remarks, his innocuous exterior that only hid a scheming, intelligent, calculative interior— not to mention the way he flitted between teasing and genuine kindness towards her constantly. It was all too much. Her first instinct was to be as short as possible with him, despite his status as the Golden Deer's house leader. Unfortunately, that didn't work for long. It was as if his goal in life was simply to bother and inconvenience her at every turn. Each time she'd sit separately from the others, he incessantly encouraged her into joining the rest of the "herd" (as he affectionately deemed them). Then he'd have the audacity to tell her to put her studying on pause, just so she could eat a proper lunch. She hated how infuriating he was. How he treated her so childishly. Most of all, she hated how her stomach would twist into knots whenever he complimented her. Or how her face seemed to burn everytime he noticed her staring. Not to mention how sincere he seemed at the moments when he told her to take care of herself... It was all too much. Lysithea von Ordelia hated Claude von Riegan. She really, truly, utterly did.

Outside of the Professor, Claude was one of her biggest role models in Golden Deer. While he was (arguably) one of the most annoying, Lysithea valued his advice and guidance over nearly everything else (except cake, obviously). After missions, Lysithea would often go straight to Claude to ask how she fared, and how she should improve for their next task. She strived to be an equal to Claude, in all his ingenuitive glory, which led her to become even more short-tempered with his brotherly, patronizing treatment towards her. She admired his tactical skills and determination, growing even fonder of him after being reassured that he actually didn't view her as a child. Because of this admiration and fondness, Lysithea struggled with ever letting him in on her crippling secret. She didn't want to hurt, or possibly disappoint, him. And so, she resigned herself to keeping her secret private, until it was absolutely necessary, from her dear house

leader.⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀

Claude was the first person she had gotten drunk with. Despite having small tastes of alcohol here or there growing up, she never had the opportunity to overindulge. After the Golden Deer reunion 5 years later, Claude had offered to partake with her in light of Lysithea's 20th birthday. Lysithea never had much of a palette for non-sweet drinks, and had every intention of stopping after her first glass of wine— but after Claude had remarked that perhaps it was simply too "adult" for her, she found herself reaching for the entire bottle, heart dead set on proving how wrong he was.⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀

Lysithea attempted learning the Almyran language in her free time. After learning about Claude's origins and his feelings of being an outsider, Lysithea simply felt the urge to do so. Especially after seeing the way his face lit up when she first surprised him with it, her first words to him being a clumsily formulated "I love you". She tends to avoid speaking it around others (she hated how unnatural she sounded, and didn't want to butcher his mother's tongue), opting instead for a half-decent listening comprehension. While his sentences were often too quick and barely comprehensible to her amateur ears, she loved it when he spoke to her in Almyran all the same.⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀

Lysithea was the one who initiated their first kiss. It was all a blur, really. One moment, Claude was running her ragged with his nonstop teasing about how "cute" she was in the most annoying voice, and the next, she had roughly grabbed the edge of his face, nearly headbutting him in her hasty attempt at an anger-fueled first kiss. Despite being unromantic in hindsight, it was still useful— Lysithea had successfully managed to shut Claude up for five whole blissful seconds before he pulled away. With her face completely and utterly flushed, Lysithea opened her eyes to see Claude's shit-eating grin return once more. Lysithea then realized that, in fact, she hadn't managed to teach him a lesson— inadvertently, she had only encouraged him more.