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They make their first promises when Henry is twelve years old.
His parents are very recently dead, and Henry has been Sir Radzig's ward for three months. Henry no longer awakes screaming from dreams filled with blades and blood, of his mother's body and his father's eyes, but he feels sometimes like a frightened, feral horse, and sometimes like a tired, broken one. But today Sir Radzig has, in a rare move, called for him. Today, there are visitors.
Lord Capon is ten, and sulking. He's dressed in fine clothing and is scrubbed clean, plump and shining like a newly minted coin. But he has a haughty little turn to his head and a lazy, cruel look in his bright blue eyes. They’re the eyes of a boy who has never been hungry and who is often bored.
Henry is still raw with grief from the death of his parents, and it makes him flinching and spiteful. He takes one look at Capon and wants to claw those blue eyes out.
Sir Radzig puts his hand on Henry's shoulder, and squeezes. It's a warm touch, and has been warm even since Henry came to live under his protection, but it's a strange thing; inconsistent and distant, but familiar and assuming, all at once. Henry doesn't understand his lord, or his whims, very much at all.
"This is Henry. I think he should be up to the task."
A big man has a hand on Lord Capon's shoulder, too. Capon visibly bristles at it. "A troublesome charge, this one," the man says, booming and irreverent. It's the kind of voice that Henry has learned to duck his head in the presence of. "He'll have his work cut out for him."
"Henry will look after him quite well, while we see to our business. Won't you, Henry?"
Henry glances up at Sir Radzig in surprise. "Yes, my lord," he says, instinctively and without hesitation. But it makes sense, and his mind catches up bitterly: even a discarded orphan like himself has a use, even if only as a distraction, or a minder, for boys higher born than himself.
If Henry's thoughts show on his face, Sir Radzig doesn't mention it. "Promise to keep him out of trouble?" he prompts.
Henry looks back to Capon, and the boy looks expectant, and arrogant, and annoyed. "I promise," Henry says, because he hasn't yet learned how to be disobedient. But he says it with an undercurrent of hatred, because the pain inside him has nowhere else to go but onto this stupid, well-fed, well-loved lordling.
The men don't catch his tone, but little Lord Capon does. He narrows those blue eyes at Henry, and his mouth twists sourly. But he says nothing, and the promise of revenge in his gaze is a new secret between the two of them.
It won't be the last.
–
Henry makes a bad show of being a protector at his first attempt. It takes less than two hours for him and Capon to attack one another, and they roll and scuffle clumsily in the mud, no better than the lowest village boys. Henry is almost two years older and just slightly taller, but Capon is mean – he snarls, he pulls at Henry’s hair, and at one point, he bites him. Henry yelps and jerks away, and Capon takes the opportunity to push him as hard as he can. Henry goes sprawling and Capon clamors on top of him.
“Yield!” Capon shouts, in a petulant child-voice that is a poor imitation of a man’s demand. Behind it Henry hears both indignantion and desperation, and he latches onto that weakness like a starving dog with a rat.
Henry brings his knee up into Capon’s stomach, and knocks the young lord onto his back. Henry pins him back down before he can catch his breath, and grabs a handful of mud to shove and smear all over Capon’s face while he’s at it.
“You can’t do that!” Capon wails, shrill with anger. “You can’t! It’s dishonorable in a fight!”
“You bit me!”
Capon kicks and writhes, and Henry presses his wrists deeper and deeper into the muck beneath them. It must be hurting him. Henry has never – he’s never been a boy who wanted to hurt anyone. He wasn’t this boy before. His eyes start burning. “You’ve got no honor! You’re a spoiled, stupid – ”
“I am not!” Capon’s voice shoots so high that it could crack glass. “I am not! Everyone thinks I’m stupid, but I’m not! You’re the stupid peasant and you don’t know anything and I’ll have you whipped for it, I will, I will, I will!”
“I’m not afraid of you!” Henry shouts. His voice cracks.
“Let me go , you awful wretched blacksmith’s boy!”
Capon spits it like a curse. It sends Henry reeling, because…because…
He was the blacksmith’s boy.
And then he’s back there . He doesn’t know why, but for a single, awful moment he’s back, in one of his nightmares. Pa is grasping him by the arms and telling him to run, and Henry is screaming, because they have to find Ma, they can’t leave without her – and Pa picks him up and carries him, as he hasn’t done since Henry was very small. That frightens Henry more than anything, because though he thrashes and is too old and too big to be carried, Pa does it anyway, with a single-minded force of will. And Henry’s mind is full of wool and he hardly knows what he remembers, but in his nightmare Pa places him directly into Sir Radzig’s own arms.
You owe me this. You owe him this.
Is that what Pa said? Is that what he sounded like? What if Henry forgets him, and forgets Ma, too? What if one day he can’t remember Pa’s voice or Ma’s smile at all?
Henry comes out of the nightmare, and realizes that he’s crying. Even as he still pins Capon into the mud, hot, fat tears roll from his eyes and over his nose.
“You should,” he says, his voice warbling. “You should whip me, and then I’ll – I’ll – I’ll die like I should have.”
Henry hardly knows what he’s saying, and his breath comes too fast. It’s humiliating. Henry is the victor on the field, but it’s a bitter and dirty victory with no honor, and Henry weeps like a girl. He releases Capon’s wrists and sits back, trying furiously to wipe his face and only making himself filthier, but the other boy doesn’t move. When Henry looks back at him at last, Capon’s mud smeared expression isn’t quite so pinched with rage.
“Oh,” Capon says. His voice has changed. He sounds like he’s discovered an answer to a question. “Mine are dead, too.”
Henry, feeling suddenly exhausted, pushes himself off of Capon and sits down in the mud next to him. A long, wary silence stretches between them. “I’m sorry,” Henry says at last, meaning it. “I shouldn’t have hurt you.”
Capon says nothing. He sits up, and studies Henry, tilting his head to the side like an inquisitive bird. Even covered in mud, with snot and tears running down his face, the look he gives Henry is closer to curiosity than anger. When their respective guardians arrive, exasperated, the boys are still sitting there in the mud; and Capon hasn’t stopped looking at Henry.
-
They write to each other, at first under protest. Sir Radzig, whose whims currently seem fixated on Henry’s improvement, says that the letters will be good practice for Henry as he learns to read and write. When Henry sees the looping handwriting of little Capon, he blushes with shame, knowing how clumsy his own hand looks in comparison.
So that is how it begins. Henry practices vigorously, and every time another letter arrives, insipid and saying nothing of value, Henry commits himself to a scholar’s work with stubborn focus.
It won't occur to him until later that this determination is the first thing he has felt beyond sadness, anger, and numbing grief. It breaks through all else like a rock thrown upon a river of ice.
When Sir Radzig visits Rattay, Henry doesn't question why he's brought along. He has his suspicions, and swallows his protests. Sure enough, when they arrive, his role is made quite clear. Capon’s guardian, Sir Hanush, claps Henry on the shoulder so hard that he buckles a little.
“It’s done him some good, to have a rival. Who’d’ve thought that the blacksmith’s boy of all boys would be the one to show our young lord some humility?” He shoots Sir Radzig a grin. “Your lad has some hidden talents, wouldn’t you say?”
Sir Radzig frowns. “Run along, Henry,” he says, oddly quiet.
It’s been long enough that Capon is a little taller and a little less plump, and most importantly, Henry’s handwriting is better than his. Capon tells him so, with a surprising lack of venom.
“My tutor says that you must be working very hard,” Capon says. “He says that you apply yourself much more than I do, and that if I were any lazier I would be dead in the ground.”
“I’m…sorry,” Henry offers awkwardly, because that seems like a cruel thing to tell a child.
Capon blinks owlishly at him. “Oh. Don’t be.” Then Capon smiles. “I’ve decided that this makes you my enemy, and I must surpass you.”
“It does?”
“Oh, yes. Hanush says that it would be a shame to let a blacksmith's boy best me. So don't stop writing, or I will stop caring.” Capon makes a lordly, dismissive little gesture with his hand that makes Henry scowl. “I’ll have your promise now.”
Henry stays for a week. Capon is childish and contradictory, unable to bear boredom and constantly demanding Henry’s attention, attaching himself like a burr. But because Capon is with Henry everywhere he goes, there's an unexpected comfort growing with his company. Capon never stops talking, a bubbling mess of observations and complaints, and it fills all the spaces and echoing silences. Even at his most aggravating, Capon always looks into Henry’s eyes when he speaks. Henry becomes less like a ghost, imprisoned in memories, and something more like the boy he had been.
And because the boy he had been was kind, he finds that he can’t help being kind to Capon in turn. It’s small things: a smile, or an extra sweet bun snatched from the kitchen. They come as naturally and thoughtlessly to Henry as breathing, but Capon clings to each kindness with a startled, urgent greed.
By the end of the week, Henry has taken to calling him Hans when they are alone, and not my lord anymore. Hans acts offended at first, but Henry is beginning to see through his moods and his fancies, and can see that he is pretending.
“You will write, won’t you?” Hans insists on the last day, anxious. “Like you promised me?”
Technically Henry has not promised, and Hans only presumed that his wish would be granted. It's a nobleman's presumption, but with a child’s wide-eyed eagerness. Henry, unwilling to make Hans frown, decides to agree. “I promised,” he says. “So I will.”
-
When Hans is thirteen years old and Henry is not yet fifteen, a minstrel comes to Rattay.
Henry has been spending more and more time there. It’s been strangely unofficial, and it’s unclear whether he is intended as a companion to Hans, some sort of bodyguard in training, or perhaps given as a pet.
Henry doesn't mind being at Rattay, because the truth is that there’s no one he would rather spend time with than Hans, but he does mind the presumption of it, and minds most of all the whispers that follow him. The worst are the whispers that include Sir Radzig, because some make Henry feel protective of his patron, and some make him angry at him.
“It’ll be good for both of you,” Sir Radzig has told him, more than once. In his words, Henry hears, It’ll be good for me, too , but he hasn’t yet been able to figure out why, and it makes him uneasy. Despite himself, Henry remains a boy who is eager to please.
Thankfully, Hans is nothing if not the ideal distraction. Whatever Henry’s official role, he does seem to spend a lot of time yanking Hans out of trouble. Hans is, above all, a whirlwind. He has recruited Henry into elaborate escape attempts from the castle at least twice. When he is given a fine new horse instead of a child’s pony, he rides off on it so far and fast that no one can catch him. For over two years now, Henry has spent every moment they are together desperately trying to prevent Hans from breaking his neck. It’s also the most fun he’s ever had.
Hans insists that Henry should join him everywhere. They train at skills of arms with wooden swords, until they are bruised and winded; Hans drags Henry with him to his tutor, where they kick each other under the table in order to stay awake; they practice archery, and while Henry is passable, Hans already shows the signs of a prodigy, his eyes flashing with dangerous delight every time he hits a target dead-on.
Henry slowly realizes how lonely Hans must have been; he has no siblings or companions, and the village children scatter when he and Henry come into view. Henry himself hardly misses his old friends, who were separated from him first by grief and then by distance. Why would he miss them, when he has never had a friend like Hans before?
Late into the night, Henry and Hans stay up whispering about everything and nothing. And while Hans talks over Henry often enough, with his infuriating and carefully cultivated arrogance, he always turns to Henry afterward. “What do you think, Hal?” he always asks, truly wanting an answer. “What do you think?”
Hans is still spoiled and selfish, but oddly fragile and easily pleased. There are times when Henry wants to box his ears, but he can’t imagine ever being angry with him for long. The truth is that, while Hans is prone to childish commands and likes to order Henry about, he reserves his ire and his worst self for everyone but Henry.
It’s an intoxicating realization, to know that in some way, Henry is held above all others. It makes Henry feel like some sort of cheat, because he gets so much back for so little. Henry does the smallest things for Hans, and every time the little lord’s eyes go wide and his smile goes giddy.
“How did you know what I wanted?” Hans asks, as if it’s a great secret to learn.
Henry can’t explain that he doesn’t know anything. These are acts of instinct: You would like this, so I’ll do it.
On this night, the minstrel is untested and quite young. He is also French, and his accent is heavy, at times comically so. Henry and Hans spend the first few moments catching each other’s eye and trying so hard not to laugh that their faces turn red. But slowly, carefully, the passion of the minstrel’s song and the flickering candlelight transform him into the perfect storyteller.
It is a tale of two knights, bound together by an oath of brotherhood, engaging in marvelous adventures and meeting a tragic end. Hans presses his mouth to Henry’s ear to whisper at the most thrilling moments, breathless and excited. On more than one occasion they get a glare or two when Hans grows too loud, but neither of them can bring themselves to care. By the end of the tale, Henry and Hans are enthralled, and clap louder than anyone.
Later that night, Hans sneaks out of bed and slips into Henry’s small room, and they retell the story for hours in hushed delight. They add their own variations and imagine more adventures that the knights might have had together, and though they have grown too old for children’s dreams, they can’t resist comparing themselves.
Naturally, the conversation eventually devolves into an argument, over which of them is which.
“I should be Lancelot!” Hans says. He’s claimed Henry’s soft bed for his seat, and has exiled Henry to the hard chair beside it. “Everyone knows that Lancelot was the most famous knight who ever lived and the strongest in skills of arms.”
“Aye, and I’m the better fighter,” Henry points out, and laughs when Hans kicks his chair. “But Galehaut was a great king of men, and of high rank. You wouldn't want to rank lower than me, my lord .”
“You’re trying to trick me,” Hans sulks, petulant. “I see right through your plots, Hal. You’re clever and devilish and scheming but you can’t fool me.”
“You’re the scheming one. Besides, you’d never have to disguise yourself as a black knight. I'd have to.” Henry grins, lost in the daydream for a moment, letting himself imagine. “Then I could win a tourney in disguise.”
Hans kicks his chair again. “Don’t be so stupid. You’d fight in my honor and win for me.”
Henry laughs again. “Maybe we’re both a little of each, then.”
Hans waves that away. “No, no, you convinced me,” he says, quickly forgetting an old insult to move on to a new interest. It’s a habit of his that Henry has always found endearing.
Hans seems to think for a moment, and then gasps, jumping out of his seat. Henry watches, perplexed, as Hans kneels on the floor.
“Come! Kneel with me!” Hans demands.
He holds out an expectant hand, and when Henry takes it, he tugs Henry impatiently to join him on the ground. Henry goes without protest, because he would follow Hans anywhere, settling onto his knees on the cold stone.
“We’ll make our own oath,” Hans declares. “I shall swear it in my body and my spirit.” He takes Henry’s hand, and presses it over his own heart. “You must swear it too!”
The enthusiasm that radiates off of Hans is infectious, and those blue eyes of his are shining with determination, and fierce pride. It is the same look Henry has glimpsed, briefly, when he fights Hans to a standstill in the practice yard with their wooden swords, or at archery when Hans hits the center of the target. It is a look of exhilaration that exhausts all other emotions. It is as if, when Henry spies a glimpse of the true Hans at the deepest core of himself, he shines.
Henry’s chest swells with a sudden fire. He can only describe it as how saints must feel, when God whispers to them. He takes Hans's other hand and presses it over his own heart, so that they mirror one another.
“I’ll swear it,” Henry says. “I’ll swear it in blood if you want me to.”
Hans grins so widely that it must ache.
Henry suddenly wonders if he ought to be kneeling, and Hans the one standing, as a knight kneels to his lord. But Hans hasn’t asked him to do that, and something in his chest grows tight and warm at that thought. He and Hans have always done things differently: halfway, and more honest.
He ducks his head, at least. He thinks for a moment, and then says, “I will shield your back, keep your council and give you mine, and give my life for yours if need be. I swear it before God.” His voice, even to himself, sounds unfamiliar. It resonates in the room, as if it is God Himself who speaks through him. “I am yours until death. My lord, and my friend.”
When he looks back up, Hans is flushed with excitement and his gaze lights up the dark. “Yours until death,” Hans whispers back.
-
Henry’s sixteenth birthday arrives with little fanfare. Henry lies in a little longer than usual, indulging himself for once. His bed, once perfectly suitable for a young boy, is starting to feel cramped; Henry is filling out his frame, noticing that he builds muscle more easily and has to duck through small doorways. He can’t enjoy it as much as he would like, because Hans shot up like a weed the year before and is now the taller of them by a good inch or so. But Hans is long limbed and gangly like a young foal, not yet grown into his height; so, for now, Henry has that advantage.
Despite his late start to the morning, the girls in the kitchen, who have always been fond of him, save him a choice bite or two. Sir Hanush claps him on the shoulder good-naturedly and remarks that he's on the way to becoming a man, and best of all, Hans gives him a very fine hunting bow, arguably too fine for Henry’s low-born hands. Beyond its obvious value, it's exactly the kind of gift that Hans himself would want. Hunting is his favorite pastime and the bow his favorite weapon.
But Henry is touched by the gift, all the same. Like all things between them, it’s a treasured glance behind the walls of ego to see Hans for who he really is. Hans finds delight when out in nature, free of the burden of stone walls, and he’s made it abundantly clear that Henry belongs there, with him.
But Henry is surprised when Sir Hanush summons him, late in the afternoon. Henry is rarely called to an audience by himself; usually, he and Hans are a matched pair, scolded for their antics and ordered about in equal measure.
To his even greater surprise, he arrives in the chamber to find Sir Radzig there. His back is to the door as he speaks with Sir Hanush, and Henry hasn’t seen him in almost two years, but he recognizes him at once. Something about it – the way that Sir Radzig stands, and the frame of his shoulders – is vaguely familiar to Henry in a way he can’t place.
Sir Radzig turns, and his expression does an odd jolt at the sight of Henry in the doorway. Something in Henry does a jolt, too, like a fishing hook in his stomach. Why should Sir Radzig, a man Henry has known all his life, suddenly look more familiar to him now then he has before?
Sir Hanush, visible over Sir Radzig’s shoulder, looks amused.
“Ride out with me, won’t you, Hal?” Sir Radzig says, skipping formalities completely. He’s never called Henry Hal before.
“I – of course, my lord,” Henry answers, bewildered. He follows Sir Radzig out of the chamber in obedient confusion, to prepare for what will turn out to be the most enlightening horse ride of his life. Behind him, he hears Sir Hanush snort out a laugh.
Hours later, Henry is hiding in the kitchen storeroom, his mind a tangle. He hasn’t hidden like this since he was a very small child, when he would do something he knew was wrong and then tuck himself in small, dark places to escape judgement. But Pa would eventually find him, because in those days it seemed like Pa knew everything. Pa was never angry with Henry, though. That wasn’t his way. Pa was stern, but his disapproval came with disappointment, not with anger; and Henry, who would not have wanted to disappoint Pa for all the world, would commit himself to being a better, more obedient child, so that everyone could know that the blacksmith had raised a fine boy.
Back in the present, tears prickle behind Henry’s eyes, pulling him out of the memory. Sir Ra… he had said that Pa knew, and had always known. Henry doesn't know why, but that makes him feel worse.
You owe me this. You owe him this. Henry’s old nightmares snap at his heels like wolves, and he shudders.
Henry is still sitting there, head on his knees, when the door creaks open, and Hans pokes his head inside.
“There you are!” Hans says, annoyed. “You’ve sent me on a wretched hunt all over, looking for you!” Hans doesn’t wait for an invitation before slipping inside the storeroom to join him.
Henry thinks about telling him to leave, but is distracted by what appears to be a wriggling bag in Hans’s arms. That’s odd enough for Henry to momentarily forget his misery and shoot Hans an incredulous look.
“Do I want to know what you’ve done?”
“Yes, you do,” Hans replies, sounding very proud of himself. He kneels on the ground, and turns the bag upside down; and out of it tumbles a small, plump, big-eyed puppy.
Henry stares at it for the space of a long, shocked breath, before the puppy looks up at him and begins to wag its tiny tail. Henry doesn’t cry, but it’s a near thing; he loves dogs, and has always loved dogs, and he scoops the pup up into his arms without even thinking about it.
“What’s a dog doing here?” he asks stupidly. He looks down at the small, wriggling, wonderful beast and scratches behind its ears, and is rewarded with a happy whine and more wriggling.
Hans scoffs. “What a question! He’s for you. I have my dogs when we go hunting together and you need one, too.”
Henry’s head shoots up. “Me?”
“I couldn’t convince Hanush to let me give you one of our fine hounds,” Hans says, sulking. “But one of the village bitches had a litter recently, and I thought…this little mutt might do, for now. At least until I can find you a better dog.”
Henry shakes his head at Hans, and then shakes his head at the pup. “But you already…”
“Am I so paltry a lord that I can only afford one gift for my dearest friend?” Hans snaps, like it’s a genuine insult. His face gets a little sour look to it, and after all these years all it only makes Henry feel affectionate.
Henry chuckles, smiling for the first time in hours. “Thank you.”
Hans brightens, and his face loses the sour look. “So you like him?”
“Of course I like him, you idiot.”
Hans breaks into one of his sun-bright smiles and sits down next to Henry, his pique disappearing at once. “Good,” he says. He nods his head, quite lordly, and reaches over to pet the pup, too. He’s a delightfully distracting little creature, and for a time the two boys observe him with some fascination as he sniffs the corners of the storeroom curiously.
Hans sighs. “I can’t wait to be sixteen. I’m sick of being called young lord .”
Henry snorts, and nudges Hans’s shoulder. “You’ll get there one day.”
Hans punches Henry’s shoulder. “Don’t suddenly act like you’re a man and I’m a boy.”
“I am older.”
“Only by a year! ”
“And a half.”
Hans whines and throws himself back, lying spread-eagle on the floor. “Just wait. In four months I'll be fifteen and I'll close the gap again.” Hans frowns at the ceiling in frustration. “But I feel like I can never catch up to you. You're like a gyrfalcon who's slipped the tether and flown away from me, and I'm forever chasing after you.” He shoots a determined gaze Henry’s way. “I won’t be daunted, I’ll have you know!”
A gyrfalcon? Henry has heard whispers for years that he is a dog , brought to heel at Hans's knee. It makes his gut twist angrily every time he thinks of it. But a hunting bird, held tight and tamed in Hans’s fist and poised to strike? That feels different, and true.
Henry feels a painful twinge of guilt. Hans is so dear to him; his dearest friend in all the world, just as Hans said. Hans should know. It feels wrong that Hanush, of all people, knows, and that Hans does not.
Henry licks his lips, and his voice comes out small. “Hans, I..”
His tone must be worse than he thought, because Hans sits up immediately. “What’s wrong?” His gaze darts over Henry anxiously. “Is it the dog? I know he’s a mangy thing, but I promise – ”
“Hans.”
“Shush! I promise that you may have all the fine hounds you want once I have my lands. You could even be the kennel master if you’d like, although I couldn’t bear something so lowly for you – “
“ Hans .”
“Hush now! Maybe we could steal one and hope no one notices. It can’t be that hard. Can you pick locks? Maybe – ”
“Sir Radzig is my father!” Henry blurts out.
Hans and Henry stare at one another in the gloom of the storeroom, while the little dog rolls around on the floor, oblivious.
Then Hans says, “I know.”
Henry’s mind goes completely blank. “What?”
Hans shrugs. “I thought you’d tell me eventually .” He’s putting on an odd bit of bravado, as if there’s real hurt behind his words. “Why did you wait so long?”
“I didn’t – I wasn’t – ” Henry’s head is spinning. “What do you mean?”
“I figured it out when you visited for the first time. I asked Hanush to be sure and he thought it was funny that I’d spotted it.”
Henry gapes, as a terrible pit grows in his stomach, full of pitch. “You knew? Why didn't you tell me?”
Hans’s eyes widen in understanding. “I thought you knew!” He shakes his head. “God's Teeth, Hal, you look just like him.”
Henry’s face burns with shame. It all seems so obvious now, and he’s been the fool in the middle of it. He turns away, consumed by another wave of tangled thoughts: that Pa didn’t love him, that he now has two fathers to fail, that his mother lies dead forever, and that everyone, even Hans, has judged him by another man’s merit.
“Henry.” Hans sounds uneasy, and Henry knows without looking that he is worrying his bottom lip between his teeth. It’s a childish habit that he should have outgrown by now. “I – I would have told you. I promise I would have. I didn’t think – look at me right now!”
Henry sighs, powerless, and turns back. Hans’s expression is fretful and urgent. “I would have,” Hans insists. “You’re my friend. I know that I – I’m beastly to you and I can’t show you properly, but I would tell you anything you wanted me to.”
An apology like that from Hans is no small thing. Henry wants to give in instantly, and to make Hans smile again and smooth the furrow from his brow. It would be easy to. But there’s an aching question burning a hole in his throat, and he needs to ask it.
“Would you have been my friend at all if I really was just the blacksmith’s boy? ” He can't keep the bitterness from his voice. “Or is my father the reason?”
Hans looks astonished. “We were already friends before I knew anything about it.”
Henry’s thoughts stop spiralling into dark places, and settle into confusion. “The first day? When I shoved mud in your face and made you cry?”
“Well, yes.” Hans suddenly looks uncertain, his brow puckering. “I mean…weren’t we friends?”
Henry opens his mouth, and closes it again. He remembers that terrible little boy in the mud, and the equally terrible boy who pinned him down. If he had to pinpoint the moment when color had returned to his life, after Ma and Pa…
“Aye,” Henry replies, realizing it as he says so. “We were.”
Hans’s expression clears like a fine spring day. “And now we’re friends again,” he declares, a done thing.
Henry huffs out an amused breath. He might have known. They’ve never truly had a fight that lasted longer than half an hour. The little dog has begun to chase his own tail in a slow, bumbling circle, and the two of them return to watching him, as intently as they might watch a player in a masque.
“So,” Henry says, after a moment of quiet. “A gyrfalcon, am I?”
Hans hums. “A poorly trained one. Still half wild, you know.”
Henry raises his brows. “And am I expected on every hunt, my young lord, to catch your kills for you?”
“ Hal! Don’t insult me so! I’m the better shot between us by far.” And then Hans gives him a very knowing, arrogant smile. “But you would, if I asked you to. Don’t pretend you wouldn’t.”
Henry laughs, and gives Hans a shove. “You're a brat.”
Hans gasps in mock, playful outrage, and shoves him right back. It escalates quickly from there; Henry catches Hans by the wrist and yanks at him, and Hans pushes at him, and their laughter grows louder. Henry tries to use his strength to hold Hans down and halt him, but Hans pivots at the last second, and they tumble over the floor, dislodging apples and wheels of cheese, as the pup barks in shared excitement. It’s a mindless tangle of limbs and breathless giggles, as they romp like unruly children. At one point Henry hits his face on the floor and splits his lip, tasting blood, but he hardly cares and barely feels it. He’s laughing too much, feeling like himself again at last.
Henry finally manages to flip Hans deftly over, pressing him to the ground with the entire length and full weight of his body. He pins Hans’s hands above his head, and grins. “ Yield,” he teases. Hans grins back, and Henry knows they are both thinking of the fight they once had, on the first day they met.
But Henry doesn’t want to hurt him, and loosens his grip, lifting off some of his weight. Hans locks onto his moment of weakness and lets out a high, merry laugh, and then twists, slipping out of Henry’s grip like an adder. He’s always been the faster of the two of them, and the room spins and now it’s Henry who lands flat on his back.
Hans pounces on him with a cackle. He doesn’t have Henry’s weight, but he’s always been cruel in a fight, and doesn’t hesitate to throw his full strength into pinning Henry’s wrists. He straddles Henry to restrain him, and his nails dig into Henry’s bare skin.
“You would,” Hans repeats, panting. “You’d do anything for me.”
In the darkness, his eyes are shining like stars. Both of them are breathing heavily, still caught in laughter, and Henry’s blood is high; he can’t seem to stop smiling, even as the world seems to narrow, as if it might contain only the two of them.
Hans shifts. His thighs, strong from all the horses he rides, cage Henry’s body, and he leans so closely over Henry that their chests brush with each heaving breath. Henry can take in every detail of his face: his healing sunburn, his blonde eyelashes, and every freckle that dances across his long nose.
Something formless stirs. It’s some nameless warning, as Henry’s heartbeat begins to pound in his ears. Hans is flushed, and his breath takes on a different shape as his gaze darts to Henry’s mouth and back again, with a sincere, addled hunger.
The understanding comes before the words do. With a jolt of mingled panic and relief, Henry thinks: I’m going to - we’re going to - !
He protects Hans. He was born for it. He must be stronger than this. But if anyone in all the world makes Henry weak, it is Hans, and Henry can only surrender. And when Hans says, “Hal,” sounding as helpless as Henry feels, it’s like falling from a great height without the danger.
Hans lets go of Henry’s wrists. He draws a hand down Henry’s arm, his fingers trailing very gently. His eyes are blown wide, and he brushes at the junction between Henry’s jaw and neck, where he can feel the pulse. It must be hammering like a hare’s.
Henry swallows, and pushes himself up.
The kiss is tentative, and shy. Henry has kissed a few girls, pretty maids all, but those bubbles of flustered excitement were nothing to how kissing Hans feels. The world is made new in it. Hans has soft, chapped lips, and as Henry presses the kiss further, both he and Hans make identical, soft sounds, muffled against their mouths. Henry gently clasps Hans by the back of his neck and draws him closer, and Hans grasps Henry’s face with a feather-soft touch, as they meld and melt together.
When they pull away, Henry is lightheaded. Hans is looking at him with a dreamy gaze, and there’s blood on his mouth, from Henry’s own split lip. As Henry watches, Hans's clever tongue darts out to taste it.
“I didn’t know,” Hans whispers, astonished.
Henry shakes his head in wonder. “I didn’t know, either.”
Vaguely, he knows he should be feeling scared. But his heart is chanting a battle cry, one that must have been there all along. Him. Him. Yes. Him.
Hans has pierced and pinned him like prey in a snare, and he doesn’t know how to feel anything else.
Hans ducks his head, which is unlike him. He still half-straddles Henry’s legs, and even so he curls his fingers into Henry’s sleeves, as if keeping him from moving by any means necessary. “No more secrets between us. Promise me.”
“I promise,” Henry says. He hooks a finger under Hans’s chin, and urges him to look up again. “But I think that you were my last secret.”
Hans huffs out a breath, satisfied. He looks just as Henry feels: completely unafraid.
–
It’s fumbling and clumsy, and it’s perfect.
They grow from boys to men. Hans fills out his frame with an archer’s body, tall, slender, and strong, though he never grows as broad as Henry. Henry takes joy in it. Not only can he protect Hans and keep him safe, cradle and carry him if need be, but it also seems clear that they fit together. They fill the gaps the other leaves, a push and pull: agile and broad, steady and flighty.
What astounds Henry the most is how little has changed between them. Hans is still Henry’s companion and friend, and Henry is still always at his side. When they romp and tease and fight, it’s all the same. That's the miracle. Nothing has been lost. There's just so much more now.
They become quick studies in stealth, grabbing stolen moments wherever they can. They kiss in dark alcoves and deserted hallways; in Henry's room or Hans's room, in the dead of night, stifling each other's laughter; and of course, outside when they can manage it, where Hans is at his happiest and where Henry chases after him.
When they ride together, Hans takes off at a gallop and cries, “The winner gets a kiss!” Henry is a good rider, but a more cautious one, and he chases and chases and can only watch as Hans stands in the stirrups and stretches his arms out, reckless and foolish, laughing with delight. When Henry gallops in his wake, as fast as he can, he feels like they're flying. He thinks of gyrfalcons.
Henry wishes he could kiss Hans openly, and hold him openly. Henry will catch sight of Hans smiling and reach for him unconsciously before he can stop himself. Hans is even worse. He sometimes gazes at Henry in public like he's a ripe apple, and sometimes fixes Henry with an expression that ought to belong at prayer, if Hans had ever cared for such a thing. It occurs to Henry that no one has noticed the change because Hans must have always looked at him this way. No one else knows what it really means, or what has changed, except for the two of them, and God.
When Henry kneels in prayer, he doesn't feel the threat of damnation. He prays for Hans and his health as he always has. Maybe it’s because this wondrous thing has been growing inside of him for so long, taking root before he knew it was there. All his life he had stretched towards this light, like a sapling in a wood. How could a mortal sin, so awful that severed the friendship of God, be something that was a part of you?
He tells Hans this. Hans has a very simple explanation. “God made you for me,” he says, in the easy way of spoiled boys. “And I for you. Have you considered that?”
–
By the time Hans turns nineteen and Henry is still twenty, Henry is so desperately, hopeless in love that it makes him feel drunk.
Outwardly, Hans behaves exactly as a young, carefree lord is expected to. He ignores his responsibilities, and spends his days indulging himself in hunting, in wine, and in pleasurable company. Henry, his closest companion, is with him everywhere he goes, as expected. Who’s to know that on their hunting trips, they spend more time rolling in the grass and pleasuring each other under the stars than hunting game? Who’s to know that, after a night of raucous drinking, when they stumble home their hands wander over one another? Who’s to know what when they run off for a bit of whoring, they simply pay for a bath and send the girls away, and spend their time playfully bathing each other?
They could, perhaps, stand to be a bit more careful about it. But they are both young, both lusty, and both proud. If the maids who tend the baths suspect anything, they haven’t made it obvious. Henry and Hans pay them good coin, after all, and on the whole they are sensible girls.
Hans makes Henry so happy that some nights, Henry can do nothing but lie awake, enchanted, with a hand pressed over his smiling mouth. But it’s not entirely without problems. Over the years, Hanush and Henry have started to regard each other more and more suspiciously, especially as time passes without any talk of Hans coming into his inheritance. His love may be a secret, but any fool could see that although Henry wears Rattay's colors, he is sworn to Hans alone, heart and soul. If Hanush will not give Hans what he is owed, Henry is prepared to go to war for it, and Henry is sure that Hanush knows that.
“I don’t trust him,” Henry says, more than once.
Hans snorts and shrugs, too dismissive for Henry’s liking. “Who would?”
One evening, a week after Hans’s nineteenth birthday, Hans and Hanush speak in private for hours. Henry spends the time in a state of heightened agitation, and keeps himself busy as best he can. Mutt, who is now both grown and as loyal as his master, eases his heart a bit with his companionship, but as the night stretches on and on Henry’s restlessness only increases. It's long past midnight, with Mutt sleeping and curled up at the foot of Henry’s bed, when Henry hears footsteps that he would know anywhere outside his room. He jumps up, not even waiting for a knock.
He throws open the door to find Hans standing there, arms crossed. Henry can tell from his stance alone that something is wrong. Without a word, Hans jerks his head slightly to the side, in a silent request that Henry follow. It’s presumptive, but Henry’s in no mood to tease or scold Hans over it at the moment. Hans is clearly stiff with tension, and Henry follows him back to his chamber, keeping his eyes on the hard line where Hans is clenching his jaw.
Once they are inside and Henry closes the door behind them, Hans wraps his arms around himself, glances at Henry, and sighs. “He says that I’m to be betrothed now.”
Henry’s heart plummets to the floor. “So soon?”
Hans waves a hand tiredly. “Oh, there’s no girl picked out yet. But there will be, and it’s very clear that I’m to have no say in the matter.” He wrinkles his nose, as if at a foul smell. “Not that I’d want any of them – but I feel like such a pawn on a board. And even if they choose a stupid slip of a thing that will leave me alone, it’ll probably be because she has some powerful father who would rule me through her.” Hans groans and runs a hand through his hair, messing it. “It’s not fair.”
Henry swallows past the dread in his throat. “We’ll figure something out,” he says, sounding more certain than he feels.
Hans groans, dramatic and long-suffering, and flops onto his bed. After a moment, Henry sits on the edge next to him, and the two of them stare into the flames of the hearth in silence.
Hans turns to look up at Henry, twisting onto his back to do it. The firelight makes it look like his eyes are dancing, and something vulnerable and tremulous flashes across his expression. Very quietly, he breathes, “I wish it could be you.”
Henry’s heart gives an unsteady thump in his chest. “I wish that, too,” he says. “You must know that.”
Hans smiles sadly, and turns his face away. Silence stretches again, long and heavy, and Henry puts a comforting hand on Hans’s shoulder, squeezing. Hans sighs again, and without looking, he brushes his fingers gently across Henry’s wrist. An ember on the fire gives a loud crack. “I don’t want to cage you, Hal,” Hans murmurs.
Henry stares at him blankly. “You don’t. You couldn’t.” When Hans says nothing, Henry presses. “Look at me.”
Hans glances back, a little wary and quite weary, and Henry’s heart clenches. “You could never cage me. I’m… myself , with you. That’s freedom, isn’t it?”
Hans huffs out a laugh, without mirth. “Freedom. What an idea.”
Henry frowns. It’s never been ordinary, earthly danger that Hans fears. He fears confinement.
Henry has one job on God’s earth, and that is to protect Hans, even from heartache, and even if only for just this night. So he stands, crosses the room, and locks the door, sliding the bolt.
Hans perks up. “Oh, I see,” he coos, playful now. He sits up, and holds out his arms. “Is my knight going to make it all better?”
“He’s going to try,” Henry says. He smiles, but there’s no jest in his voice, and Hans catches it.
“So serious ,” he chides. “No time to waste on play?”
Henry crosses back, with long, sure strides, and kneels at the side of the bed. Hans leans over, eyes sparkling again, as they always should. Henry reaches out to trace his fingers over the brow, the cheeks, the smiling mouth. “You’ve never been a game to me,” he replies.
Hans leans into Henry’s touch, draws one of Henry’s fingers into his mouth, and bites.
Henry sits up on his knees, and leans forward. Hans meets him halfway; his hand moves to cradle Henry’s cheek, and Henry kisses him. Hans opens his mouth to him immediately, yielding and eager, and they kiss with a slow, insistent passion.
Henry rises, pressing Hans further onto the bed and settling on his side beside him. He runs his hands down the front of him, the side, over the curve of his slim waist. Hans sucks Henry’s bottom lip into his mouth and bites down gently, and Henry’s pleased groan rumbles from his chest. He pulls back, only to start kissing and gently biting his way down Hans’s neck. His fingers, usually clumsy, make quick work of all the infuriating little buttons, and he begins to strip Hans of his clothing. He runs his hands over the plains of Hans’s chest, and his lips follow.
Hans licks his lips and sits up on his elbows, and reaches for Henry. “Hal, let me…”
Henry puts a hand on his chest and pushes Hans back down, gentle but firm. Hans scowls at him, but goes anyway, and the obedience makes something roar to life in Henry’s heart. “Let me touch you,” Henry says.
“You are touching me – ”
“Let me touch you,” Henry repeats. Christ, his voice is wrecked already. “Let me watch you.”
Henry undresses Hans until he is bare before him, and pauses to take in the sight. Though Hans is softer than Henry will ever be, he’s no untouched idol, either. He’s masculine in a way that Henry is not, both lithe and strong, with light curls of hair on his chest and arms, nearly white in the firelight. His skin is dusted with freckles over his shoulders and nose, and there is a scar on his knee and one on his elbow, both from the same tumble from a horse. His lovely cock, not as long as Henry’s but thicker in his hand, is already hard, just from Henry’s kisses. Hans is, as always, the most beautiful thing Henry has ever seen, and Henry reaches out to run a hand, slow and deliberate, down the length of him, from collarbone to hips, and back. Hans, ever sensitive, gives a quiet whine of frustrated desire. It makes Henry’s blood sing.
“Look at you,” Henry sighs, and Hans makes a scoffing, sputtering sort of noise, as if he thinks that’s foolish, even as a flush spreads from his cheeks down to his chest.
Henry touches Hans everywhere with slow caresses, and his lips follow, in every spot, every inch that is his to touch, and his alone. Hans is squirming, a hand tangled in Henry’s hair, biting back gasps and impatient little whines.
“More ,” Hans demands. “I want more.”
Henry has never refused him anything, and never will. He pulls back almost embarrassingly quickly, and licks his own hand. Hans lets out a surprised laugh, which Henry swallows with a consuming kiss; he takes Hans’s cock in hand, smearing the wetness until the glide of his touch is hot and silken, and begins to stroke.
Hans lets out a moan that is almost too loud, and Henry shushes him gently, even as he bites his lip to stop from moaning himself. Hans begins to shake with silent laughter, in the way he can’t help when he is deeply happy, and Henry’s own happiness bubbles up from his chest like a balm, summer-warm. He laughs too, and he leans down to press their foreheads together. They kiss, smiling too widely to do it well, meeting in a messy clash of tongue and teeth. It’s fumbling, and overeager, as they always are together; Henry laughs into Hans’s smiling open mouth, held safe in their sanctuary, illuminated by light.
Henry draws back, and watches, drinking in his fill like a man parched for water. Hans smiles up at him, sinking into his pleasure with a delighted hunger. Henry tries to draw it out, so that he can gaze and gaze at Hans as long as he can. But he knows what Hans looks like when he comes, and it’s an irresistible fantasy. Pleasing Hans comes very naturally to him, and he can’t help but pursue it.
Henry knows that Hans is close when his smile fades, and he begins to make breathless, broken gasps. Hans reaches up to grip Henry’s sleeve, and his thrusts into Henry’s hand become slower, deeper, as he languidly rolls his whole body unconsciously. His eyes go hazy, the greed and eagerness giving way to soft, aching desire, and utter trust.
Henry has never seen the sea, but he knows intimately what it looks like, reflected in Han's clever, wanting eyes. How can Henry long so deeply for someone whom he has so utterly?
“Hal,” Hans breathes out. The firelight has turned his skin to gold. Under Henry’s touch he is pliant and gentle, beautiful and glowing. Henry looks at that treasured face and sees Hans beginning to drift someplace beyond himself. Henry has done that; he has been given such a gift, and he is knocked breathless and awestruck every time.
“Please,” Hans whispers. His blue eyes slip closed, and then open again. He grips Henry’s sleeve so hard that his knuckles turn white, and he throws his other hand back to brace himself against the headboard. “Please, Hal, Henry, please.”
Henry tightens his grip ever so slightly, but slows down, intent on wringing every ounce of pleasure out of Hans that he can. He brushes Hans’s golden hair back from his face, dragging his fingers gently through the sweaty, silken strands. “I have you,” he says. His voice rumbles from his chest, more feeling than sound, and Hans bites back a small, anguished cry.
“Henry,” Hans gasps. He thrusts mindlessly into Henry’s touch, chasing his pleasure, writhing in the firelight. His expression shatters open, leaving him bare before Henry at last: aching, wanting, and so beloved. “Henry, please, Henry, please, please Henry…”
“Don’t look away,” Henry whispers. He twists his hand on the upstroke, and Hans comes with a soundless wail, arching wildly. His mouth is open and red and wet, and his gaze stays locked on Henry, his eyes blown and shining with a rapture that borders on the divine, as he spills and spills over Henry’s hand.
For a while they lay silently, Hans panting heavily, dazed, as Henry continues to stroke his hair. Henry feels weightless, and breathless, as if he is floating in the same place that Hans is. He grounds them both with his touch, until Hans comes back into his body, blinks a few times, and then smiles an utterly satisfied smile at Henry, looking for all the world like a spoiled cat.
Henry is struck with a sudden, nameless need, burning and insistent. Unthinking, he brings his hand, covered in the evidence of Hans’s pleasure, up to Hans’s parted lips. Hans doesn’t even hesitate. He opens his mouth at once, and Henry mindlessly slips his fingers inside the warm wetness. Hans moans around his fingers and sucks Henry in deeper, lifting a hand to grip Henry’s wrist. Henry, in a trance, watches as Hans licks him clean, making soft, pleased noises all the while.
Henry is on fire.
When he’s finished, Hans glances up from beneath his lashes, and his eyes have gone greedy and sharp once again. They are his hunter’s eyes, and Henry feels nothing less than claimed . “I don’t suppose you’d let me have a turn, now.”
“It won’t take much,” Henry admits, his voice downright strangled. Hans laughs, and it is a sound like a bell.
Tomorrow, and in all the days after, there will be time to consider plans, and move through politics, and endure what awaits them. But there will also be more nights like this.
I love him, Henry thinks. That will be enough.
-
As the world becomes more violent, so too does Henry. It's not from a desire to be, or even, he hopes, from natural inclination. But it comes distressingly easily to him.
When he kills his first man – a bandit on the road – Henry can't sleep for dreaming of him, but by the tenth, blood and blades in his old nightmares are replacing Pa’s voice and Ma’s smile, as he had once feared. Thank God Hans has not shied away from him for the blood on his hands. After all, Hans has been bloodied, too. Henry slowly realizes that just as he finds joy in Hans's contradictions, Hans must love the hypocrisies that Henry holds within himself.
Hans, who would bite and claw to keep him close. “My Henry,” he calls him, as he clings to Henry ravenously, smile growing sharp. “Mine alone to know, and mine alone to keep. No one has claim to your soul but me."
That is true enough. “My gold,” Henry calls him in return, to watch him blush. “My brightness.”
Henry’s hair begins to smell like cloves, from the wash that Hans himself uses, and the scent lingers on him at all hours. Hans's deft and greedy touches linger on him, too, in secret marks and secret aches that Henry carries with him. Henry could have Hans every day for the rest of their lives and still never tire of him. He knows that lithe archer’s body almost as well as he knows his own. Hans knows Henry's, too, and with a covetous force of will and cruelty knows exactly where to twist and bite and touch to break Henry apart in his hands. It drives Henry to a unique madness. Sometimes he fucks Hans until both of them scream. Sometimes Hans is the one who fucks him.
Henry wishes for impossible things. He thinks of dancing openly with Hans, hand clasped with him and laughing. He thinks of pledging himself to Hans before God. Once, he dreams of a babe, a little boy with a whip-crack laugh, Henry's dark hair, and Hans's summer sky eyes. But he cannot imagine the two of them as other than they are. He doesn't want a version of Hans in another life – he wants his Hans, shaped by years of Henry's touch.
He is my match , Henry thinks, but does not say. He doesn’t need to.
-
On a morning when Hans is twenty and Henry is still twenty one, they wake in the same bed together.
It’s an indulgence that they don’t often allow themselves, but to Henry, the feeling of waking with Hans in his arms is worth the price of risk. He takes Hans again in the first light of the morning, and watches Hans come awake and alive under his mouth and his hands, until Hans throws his head back and mouths Henry’s name in helpless, rapturous silence. Then Hans rewards him with a hungry grin, and pushes Henry onto his back, kissing his way down and pleasuring him until Henry throws a hand over his mouth and sees stars bursting behind his eyelids.
Afterwards, with Hans curled smug and satisfied around him, Henry lets his mind slip away. Peace falls upon him like a dusting of early snow, and everything in the world becomes soft and quiet.
Hans hums lightly against Henry’s chest, where his dear head rests. “What are you thinking of, my gyrfalcon?” he asks.
Henry comes back to himself, and looks down. Hans is illuminated by the morning dawn from the window, and it sets his hair to spun gold. Henry is careful, as always, not to leave any marks above the chest, so there will be no evidence of their lovemaking to suspicious eyes; but even so, because Henry knows Hans as he knows his own heart, he can tell. The looseness of Hans's pleasure lingers in his warm gaze, in the flush of his cheeks, in the ease of his breathing. No one else will ever know how Hans looks with everything else stripped away, when he is laid bare and naked in soul and body before Henry and God alone. No one else will ever know what Hans looks like when he is content, nor what it takes to quiet his buzzing mind. It is just how no one else will ever know what it takes to calm the tempest in Henry’s chest; his anxious desire to always accomplish more, to always provide more, to always be more, soothed by one person in all the world.
Henry thinks of sunrises, and of the moment of waking from a dream. He thinks of the heart-piercing clearness of a vast, bright blue sky, where a gyrfalcon might soar forever.
“Thinking of you, is all.”
-
In the end, when the land has fallen to war and the world is ripped apart by battle and blood, it is Henry who cannot keep his promises.
Even in war Henry and Hans are inseparable. It has been raining for three days without end, and they wade through what feels like a sea of mud and blood. After a particularly hard battle, their group of fighters have taken refuge in a clearing surrounded by trees on all sides. It is, in retrospect, a foolish decision, made by overconfident men.
Henry’s soul is weighing heavily upon him, as it often does these days. He’s skilled at killing people, and in particularly brutal ways. Whispers are following him again, this time all to do with his supposed fearsome nature and lack of remorse, and the horror he strikes in their enemies.
Hans, at least, is unchanged towards him. If anything, Hans preens, as if Henry’s reputation is an accomplishment that Hans himself can be proud of. “Lancelot!” he still calls him, as if Henry’s soul could ever be virtuous again, if it ever was.
“They'd be fools not to knight you after this,” Hans says now. They’ve removed their helms, and check each other over for injuries as the men around them lick their wounds. They stand slightly apart from the rest, up against the tree line.
Henry cringes, even as his childish heart thrills at the thought, as if being knighted could ever make clean the actions he’s already taken. “I doubt it.”
Hans rolls his eyes. “Where is my Lancelot’s ambition? I'll make everyone's lives hell until they agree, rest assured.”
Despite himself, Henry smiles. It’s always been easy to smile in the face of Hans and his enthusiasm. “ All that trouble for me, my Galehaut?”
Hans tilts his chin up haughtily, every inch the young lord. “Certainly. I could and would do anything for you, you clothead boy.” Hans takes a step closer and lowers his voice, smiling knowingly. “But you must give me a hundred kisses after, as payment.”
Henry gives a performative glance around, though no one is listening. “ Hans.”
Hans pouts. “Oh? No kisses? You'd rather spend all night on your knees in a vigil for God?” He clutches his chest, as if gravely offended. “Am I such a poor substitute? Am I not your gold and your brightness, your pagan sun god to worship on your knees?”
“Blasphemer,” Henry chides, amusement and affection warming his voice. He steps closer, too, until he and Hans are nearly chest to chest; too close, by far, for propriety’s sake. He murmurs, “And now on top of everything else I want to take you to bed.”
“Exhausted enough for bed already, after one skirmish?” Hans replies, in a voice like honeyed wine. Henry would give anything to kiss him. “ Hal , I’m disappointed in you.”
“I want to take you to bed so I can have you on my cock, you damn tease.”
As he has a thousand times before, Hans rewards Henry by laughing at him. It lights up his whole face. “You know me so – ”
To their left, a man screams.
Henry and Hans whirl in unison in time to see the soldier fall, an arrow in his neck. Three things become sharply clear: they are surrounded, they are in the open, and their enemy has the high ground.
Hans snaps his gaze back to Henry, and his blue eyes go wide. In an instant, he pushes Henry as hard as he can, and Henry goes sprawling into the mud. The impact knocks all the breath out of him, and he can’t get his bearings before Hans is on top of him, shielding him with his body.
Chaos erupts around them, and Henry hears the telltale thwack of arrows as they strike into shields and tree trunks, and howls and cries when they impale themselves into men. Every part of Henry is screaming to get up and roll over, to cover Hans in turn, to protect him, but his armor is heavy and Hans holds him down too securely. Hans tangles his legs with Henry’s so that Henry can’t even get his knees under himself, pinning him utterly; later, Henry will wonder at the cleverness of it. Were Henry covering Hans, he would have simply relied on his weight.
Hans jerks a little and makes a strange gasp, like he’s suddenly offended. There is a lull in the wave of arrows and he rolls off of Henry at last, and Henry is on his feet instantly, snatching up his sword. He keeps his eyes locked on the tree line even as he kneels and reaches down, instinctive and only by touch, to put a hand on Hans's shoulder, and squeeze.
“I’ll scold you for that later,” he snaps. Hans will hear the undercurrent of fear in his voice, and know that he isn’t truly angry.
Hans doesn’t say anything.
Henry turns and looks down at Hans, and sees –
-
When Henry is six years old, Pa takes him to watch their neighbors slaughter a pig. Something goes wrong, and the pig thrashes at the last moment. It isn’t clean. As the pig writhes in a bloodied frenzy, it makes a sound that Henry will never forget: a high, tear-flesh wrenching shriek, primal in its violence, that shocks Henry down to the marrow of his bones.
Pa takes him home, but later, Henry slips away and goes back alone. He stares at the spot on the ground where the blood had been, swept away now under a layer of dust. But the destruction of a thing cannot erase the scar of it, and to Henry the air still reeks with the scent of death. He sits down and looks at the ground for hours, trembling like a leaf, until he can swear that he sees the blood pooling again, rising up from the soil.
-
Hans is covered with mud. It coats his face, mingling with a hateful, spreading redness. There is something – something sticks from his neck, something – Henry gathers Hans into his arms and tries to wipe the mud away, and makes it worse with his clumsy, searching fingers.
Henry’s throat is raw. A terrible sound fills the air, close by, as though an animal is dying; the pig, cut open from neck to belly, screaming. Henry’s mind is in pieces.
Hans is ten years old again and Henry is twelve and Henry smeared the mud there himself and now Hans won’t be clean no matter how much Henry tries –
Hans is thirteen and his eyes are blazing as he pledges himself to Henry in the dark, and those eyes are wide open but they are lifeless and unseeing and gray –
Little Lord Capon glares at Henry and Hans smiles at Henry and his expression promises revenge, and blood pours from his mouth –
Hands are grasping at Henry, tugging at his shoulders and arms. Voices surrounded him, fearful and urgent. They try to wrench him away, and try to take Hans from his grip. The screaming changes to a roar. Maybe Henry is making it. He can’t see. He can’t breathe.
It takes three men to part them, and Henry thrashes as a man does during an amputation of a limb. The world tumbles out of alignment and the ground churns beneath Henry’s feet, and as he struggles, he catches a glimpse of Hans, on the ground, tended to by other hands than his.
The gap has already widened between them. They will never again be a year and a half apart. Hans will never see twenty one. The enormity of a world without Hans erupts and shatters what remains of Henry, and the space between them stretches into a deep, yawning abyss, and Henry screams and screams and screams until he falls into a blessed and consuming unconsciousness.
-
When there is no one left to kill, Henry stops eating for five days.
There is no more light and no more sound, no more taste and no more color. Henry wakes in the morning, and Hans is dead. The sun rises and sets, and Hans is dead. The world has taken on a new, muted shape, with one truth at its festering center. Hans is dead. That is the beginning and the end of it.
Henry is left alone for the most part, but Father has come to see him at least twice. He may have come more than that, but some of the days are so clouded with pain that Henry can’t bring himself to remember or care. If Father spoke to him, Henry recalls little of their conversations. It seems mainly that Father has been sitting in the same room as him, in silence, as if that could be a comfort in itself.
In what might be a dream or a memory, Father’s hand falls upon Henry’s head, and passes through his hair, with a foreign gentleness. It makes Henry feel very young.
“Give me the word, and I will take you home.”
Home? Henry knows what Father means, and there’s part of him, faithless and weak, that wishes he could find comfort in those warm words. It means a place at Father’s side; it means another way to live, and another direction.
But Henry never says anything, and eventually, Father leaves. It’s a more natural parting than Pa and Ma’s, but no less final.
A dog might find a new master, and be retrained, finding love at another’s table. The love of a dog might be bought with tenderness. But Henry has never been a dog, and his love has always been of a wilder nature. It is the sacrifice of a love given utterly, just as Christ upon the cross.
Henry has grown weaker, and far slower. But there are always more battles to fight, and he prepares to throw himself into the next one as readily as ever. It will not take much: a careless moment in the fray, a shield raised too slowly, a strike parried too weakly. Something will take him. Henry’s choice would be a lucky archer, catching him in the soft hollow of his neck. Hans's kill; Hans's end.
Henry wonders if yearning so keenly for death is the same as willing it; if willing it is the same mortal sin as acting upon it. He is too tired to contemplate the doctrine to any great length. In Henry’s prayers, such as they are, he can only beg that it isn’t – if not for his own sake, then for the sake of Hans, who might be waiting for him, somewhere.
Henry has failed Hans in every way a man can be failed. He must not fail him again. If there is a Heaven, then Hans will be there, because he would shine too brightly for Hell.
In the solitude of his room, Henry takes up his sword. Despite the pain of his weakened body, he kneels in a fluid motion, with the point of the blade pointed towards the ground. He bows his head in reverence, as a knight to his lord.
I’ll follow you soon , he thinks.
Henry is twenty two years old. It is the last promise, ten years to the day from the first.
I’ll follow you soon.
–
“But, in the end, I only want you to know that if I should lose your company, the world shall lose mine.” - Lancelot and the Lord of the Distant Isles: Or, the Book of Galehaut Retold (2006)