★ for holding out for a hero, hooked on a feeling, and camelot, and ✿ for camelot and worth a thousand words, please :)
★ - sad headcanon
For Holding Out For a Hero
the reason Zayn finally really stops bodyguarding is because he’s injured. He’d been planning to get out for a while, but then he’s on a job with someone else, and he takes a bullet. He’s fine, in the end, but it’s a scare, and when he wakes up and sees Harry’s white face next to him, clutching his hand with Laela on his lap, he knows he’s done.
For Hooked on a Feeling
Harry’s mom gets seriously injured a few months into their relationship. It’s the first time Zayn’s ever seen Harry properly thrown, seen all his prepossession fade away into a vague panic that has Zayn taking care of him for once, getting them to the hospital and making sure Harry sleeps and eats and cries. He even bakes him something, some brownies that Harry’d been coaching him through, and that wins him a watery smile when he brings them to the hospital.
For Camelot
It’s not easy, being king, and Zayn has to make hard decisions that he hates. Decisions that kill people. Wrong decisions that result in deaths, and worse, right decisions that result in deaths, of his people. Decisions that leave him going over them a thousand times, trying to figure out what else he could do, until Liam gently draws him away from it, tells him that he did the best he could; until Niall bundles him into bed and makes him laugh and Harry reminds him that this is the price of ruling and Louis comes in with cool eyes and asks if he thinks this is the worst he could do. It doesn’t fix it, of course. It still haunts Zayn. But it helps. They help.
✿ - Sex headcanon
For Camelot
Sometimes, when they have sex, there’s a moment--or really, after they have sex, when the afterglow is fizzing between them--that Harry wonders where Zayn’s gone. It’s not every time, or even often, but sometimes it seems like he goes far away, like he’s thinking of something else. Harry's considered asking about it, but he’s decided he doesn’t want to know. He doesn’t doubt Zayn’s faithfulness, not his so honorable husband, and it’s not like Harry’s even sure he is thinking of someone else, and not of his kingdom, of the weight of his crown. And if Zayn thinks of someone else, Harry’s the one who can chase away those thoughts with a kiss. Who has learned Zayn’s body in a way no one else has, who rules beside him. That’s what matters, in the end.
For Worth a Thousand Words
Harry’s favorite place to have sex with Zayn will always be a bed. It’s surprisingly vanilla for him, but he will never not love how Zayn looks naked against the sheets, how they can have space to move and the contrast of the softness of the mattress against the angles of Zayn’s body. He likes other places too, of course. But a nice big bed with lush sheets will always be his favorite.