Firelocke Royal/Knight AU
If anything seems familiar, it's because some of this has been posted previously as reblogs on a post from @trafficmouse. I've since edited some things around though and added onto it.
Royal Pyro and Knight Abolish
Pyro
Pyro was the heir to the throne. As in canon, Pyro gets suspected for a murder (possibly a noble or royal from a different kingdom) but disinheriting the heir to the kingdom is a lot more of a process with many more implications than just simple nobility so a compromise is made for the time being. While a cousin or some similar relation is properly trained on how to rule a country and the kingdom's stability is ensured, Pyro will not be disinherited officially. He is, however, expected to keep his head down until this can happen and abdicate the throne when the cousin/whoever, is fully ready for the role. This isn’t a closely kept secret amongst the kingdom’s nobility but for rather obvious diplomatic reasons it isn’t shared outside of those circles or spoken of too loudly. Did Pyro actually do it? Good question. Anyway.
A lot of privileges and freedoms they had previously have been revoked. Pyro is moved to a far less fancy living space that they're pretty sure nobody's lived in for decades. They previously had a group of guards, whose job was to prevent any harm from coming to the heir of the kingdom like getting assassinated or something, taken away and re-assigned to different roles. Their parents pretty much see their possible untimely death as a problem being solved. Pyro is instead assigned a single knight, Abolish.
Despite all of the issues with their family, Pyro does still want to help the kingdom and has been doing research into the infrastructure of the capital and its surrounding lands. He’s getting used to not having free reign of any information that he wants and is actually enjoying himself doing this research.
Pyro really doesn't have many survival/practical skills as this is pretty much the first time in his life he hasn't had other people to do it for him. Despite this, they are genuinely trying to learn things. Gardening ends up being something they're actually quite good at and he ends up growing a lot of roses. They're both deeply enjoying their new found freedom in life and deeply terrified of it (in addition to being deeply terrified of several different things)
Abolish
Abolish is an orphaned noble with a notable aversion for combat and violence, who instead tends to try to resolve issues using diplomacy or acts more defensively. Pyro does find, to his surprise, that Abolish is perfectly willing to participate in conversations with him, which is something of a rarity these days, and ends up genuinely enjoying his company even if he does think that Abolish is unlikely to be too useful at keeping them alive if a real threat appears. They do find out that Abolish is weirdly competent in a wide variety of areas though. Their initial meeting goes pretty much the exact same as canon, which is to say Pyro instantly commenting on how Abolish looks.
Overall, Pyro does see behind the mask Abolish puts in place pretty frequently due to them being basically required to spend so much time together. While Abolish does begin viewing being Pyro's assigned knight as just a job, he does end up viewing Pyro positively especially as they start to spend time together that’s not a necessity.
Abolish is a trained assassin though he’s not there to kill Pyro. The organisation that Abolish is a part of concerns themselves with severe and/or multi-kingdom threats. The organisation frequently has to go after rich nobles abusing their power and causing pretty severe destabilisation to kingdoms or mass harm to the common people for their own personal gain. A few sympathetic nobles and those from all walks of life are part of it.
Abolish's family is originally from the kingdom that Pyro's family rules so when the organisation was required to look into something there, Abolish made a lot of sense as the guy to send in. Him getting assigned to Pyro was not intentional and does actually make his job more difficult as he now has to worry about an entire person and one who has an uncanny ability to almost walk into a deathtrap at that. He’s mostly not annoyed about that. Abolish’s main goals are, in no particular order: honour his parents/bloodline, fulfill the organisation's goals and keep Pyro alive. He is genuinely doing his job of protecting Pyro and a pretty good go of it at that, it’s just that he has his own mission.
Despite Pyro's status/removal thereof being pretty much an open secret, Abolish doesn't actually know that much of the details. Abolish is unnervingly perceptive but he regularly decides he just doesn't care enough to find out what's going on in a situation and this ends up being one of those. He is aware that there is some kind of issue going on and Pyro is his responsibility and all, he just really doesn't care about random noble gossip as he doesn’t see it as relevant to his job.
General Things
In the kingdom, a plague has begun sweeping through the lower classes. While this can sometimes occur, it's notable in terms of its severity. Pyro's research regarding infrastructure and the sewer systems does make the plague an area of interest. It is also of concern to Abolish/the organisation.
For Pyro's research, they regularly explore underground areas of the city. Abolish never seems happy for them to be doing this but Pyro does just take that as a quite normal response to the situation. One day they accidentally stumble upon an area that appears to have some kind of structure built in it. Abolish immediately becomes very unnerved and asks for them to leave immediately. He mentions that something killed his parents to Pyro, who accepts that answer. In reality, Abolish realised that the structure seemed a bit too recently touched and wanted to get Pyro out. He didn't technically lie but is aware he's given Pyro the wrong impression.
Past a certain point, Abolish is probably about one bad day from committing treason in regards to Pyro's parents and is somehow managing to not make this blatantly obvious to anyone else. Pyro instead assumes that even if Abolish is kind to him, he's still loyal to the kingdom/the monarchy and would put that above Pyro if he had to.
One day Pyro gets attacked and finds out just how effective the Veylocke Murder Box™️is at dealing with threats.
Firelocke
Due to still technically being a Royal and heir to the kingdom, Pyro is still required to attend certain events and is pretty much threatened to behave at these. Abolish is also present at these as he is still a noble himself and it is still his job to keep Pyro alive. This is definitely not a flimsy justification for them to be at some sort of fancy ball where they dance together or anything.
Visiting nobles, who aren't really aware of what's happened/who they are, are eternally confused by this guy talking about the sewers with a rat on his shoulder and the immaculately dressed guy next to them and even more so when they find out who's the royal and who's the knight.
Pyro's fairly smitten early on, partly due to Abolish being one of the few people to still talk to him like a person. They fall a lot harder for him after the Veylocke Murder Box™️gets used and Pyro does slightly question what that means about themself.
Abolish watches Pyro burn a load of bread for the third time that week and has a horrifying realisation of how down bad he is from them.
Basically it's: Pyro looking at Abolish having killed some attempted assassins and thinking "Should it be that more appealing to see him covered in blood?" Abolish seeing Pyro smiling with his blackened piece of bread and thinking "Well I can't not fuck him" and experiencing realisation and then terror for himself.