(AU week)

[tu_vas_triompher]

Feuilly has been telling himself that it's all right to be bound here, after the bitter defeat to their cause. Time isn't passing in Paris--however that works--he's using the time to rest, to study, to learn for the republicans' next attempt--

--he's resting with Harry, Prince of Wales, and studying the swordsmanship of four hundred years ago, and learning how to communicate a few faint ideas of 1830 to a long-gone English kingdom.

So now, spurred by Bahorel's restless energy, the news of Joly's illness, he's pulled out the work he's neglected lately, a sort of extract or paraphrase or adaptation--whatever you want to call it--of the Communist Manifesto. It's challenging work, pulling it together in terms for 1830 Paris, but it's not so very far past their time as all that. It's not a moment too soon for socialism!

Comments

[harryhotspur]

Harry grins and claps him on the shoulder. "A fine gentleman, in truth. Thou wilt be soon freed, Emilia, for as I said, 'tis like enough we will see none will question us. Art ready? Shall we hence?"

[tu_vas_triompher]

Feuilly's hat rocks grumpily on his head, and he claps a hand to the brim. "We're ready."

...Perhaps Harry will not notice that he has again taken up his Communist Manifesto. He's quite sure that they won't be trapped in medieval England, quite sure, and yet.

He'll at least have some reading if they are.

[harryhotspur]

Right then! Harry sets off for the bar proper, where there is indeed now a door. He makes eagerly towards it, pushes it open-- and offers his hand to Feuilly. "I know not if thou needst must-- but I would not have thee somehow left behind."

[tu_vas_triompher]

"Not in these clothes!" He clasps Harry's hand, and braces himself for strangeness.

[harryhotspur]

He steps through.

The other side is-- not ostentatiously odd. It's a bed chamber, smaller than one might expect of a prince, amply supplied with tapestries and velvet hangings on the bed. The view through the window outside is quite grey, a nice English spring drizzle. Harry looks around and gives a laugh of disbelief.

"O, I half thought it would not work. Welcome, friend."

He opens up a trunk at the foot of the bed and starts digging through-- after a moment or two, he produces a sheathed dagger which he tosses to Feuilly.

[tu_vas_triompher]

Feuilly's eyes are wide. He too had half thought it wouldn't work. He takes in the room--rather, he takes in, first, that they're alone, and lets Emilia out from under the tall hat. She scrambles down to his shoulder instantly.

"This is--" Your room? Your castle? Your England? Feuilly goes to the window, stares at the English spring to absorb as much of it as he can. Which means that he misses the dagger, turning a little too late. Emilia flies down to it on the floor: so fierce.

[harryhotspur]

"My chamber. Emilia, look to--" But too late: in bustles a servant who stops short, evidently surprised not to find the chamber empty. His surprise resolves into further confusion: a guest? a bird?

"Go you, sirrah," Harry says abruptly, forcing his attention away from Feuilly and Emilia. "See my sword brought to me, and if I am away, trouble not, but leave it here."

The commands come quite naturally, the air of power that has no use in Milliways settling on him once again with some ease. He may not be accustomed yet to being prince, but he has been a nobleman all his life. The servant bows and retreats and once, and Harry turns to Feuilly with a satisfied expression that falters slightly when it occurs to him that such displays might very well be a topic upon which Feuilly has Opinions.

[tu_vas_triompher]

The abruptness doesn't bother Feuilly: they're both startled by the intrusion, and the man needs to get out. And it's not as though, say, Grantaire is any politer with the maids and waiters at cafés.

But.

He looks out the window a little while longer. Go you, sirrah. How easy it sounded. And give Harry another ten years, twenty years?

Emilia, sheepish, returns to Feuilly's shoulder. "So--now where do we go?" she asks quietly.

[harryhotspur]

Harry grins. "Why, what think you of a dog? I would fain bring a horse, but know not how to bring it to the door. But a dog will be as nothing, may run with us when we ride--"

[tu_vas_triompher]

"Ride?" Feuilly turns from the window. "Harry, I've been on a mule, twice in my life. I didn't fall off and it was a great victory. That's the extent of my riding, Harry."

Then he looks stricken at the tone of his voice, much closer to irritable than is at all usual for him. Emilia flutters and paces unhappily on his shoulder. "We like dogs," she says plaintively. "We do like dogs--and horses--"

[harryhotspur]

"I-- I would glad show thee how," he says, because he doesn't know what else to say. What a stupid thing to do, he thinks, to say put on these silks, here is my father's castle-- here is one of my father's castles--

"If thou wouldst not-- if thou likest it not--" How does one say 'if you want, you can go' and 'please, though, don't' at the same time?

[tu_vas_triompher]

"Ehhhh--" Feuilly scrubs a hand fiercely through his hair, all spikes, blushing. "Eh, I'm sorry if I was short. Yes, I'd like to know how to ride. And yes, let's see about a dog. And--" He gestures to the window, the rainy greens and greys beyond. "--And it's beautiful. Like I imagined, I guess, but it's so different to really see it."

We're all right?

[harryhotspur]

"Thou canst not see from here, but 'tis bordered nearly all around by a lake. Wouldst go below? And we might take to the walls and thou couldst see-- see the lake, better see the countryside beyond--"

(If he had his soul on the outside, too, he wonders, would she know the right things to say?)

[tu_vas_triompher]

"Bordered by a lake. So--is there a town, near? Or is the castle by itself?" He'd hoped to see a town. Of course it's a mad idea; how would they go into a town? He'd be unable to talk to anyone--their cobbled French and English seem to do well enough for the two of them, but he can imagine how different the court English and townsmen's English might be. But he'd hoped. A town, a farm, something of the people outside the castle.

Not that he's turning down the chance to see the castle, though. Feuilly nods firmly. "And yes, let's? Anything you think we can get away with. Is it--should Emilia keep hiding, do you think?"

He doesn't want to admit it, but he feels stupid, dazed, half blind, with his daemon shut up in the dark under a hat.

[harryhotspur]

"It is a castle prized for hunting, it is some distance to the nearest town. But come, let us to the court below, for 'tis not unlike a town, though a small one."

He looks to Emilia, considering. At last he says, "I will give out, should any inquire, she is some fashion, as ladies do keep monkeys. We will say thou'rt new come from France or Italy, and it will then be easily believed. If, good Emilia, thou dost not disdain to behave for this time as common birds do."

[tu_vas_triompher]

"That ought to work. Emilia, you can manage, come on, just stay on my shoulder. --Yes, I'm sure if you say I'm French, they'll--" Feuilly's mouth twitches into a smile, first small, then growing. "--I'm sure they'll believe any sort of foolish fashion. If you say I'm French. --I'm sorry, though; you went to such trouble to find me an elegant hat. Now, sir, let's see your hunting-castle?"

[harryhotspur]

"O, ay, we will believe anything of the French," he says cheerfully, making his way through the door. "Do but think of the foul depravities into which thou hast led me."

The chamber opens out into a larger one, a presence chamber of some kind, similarly decked with tapestries, also empty. His promise that the bulk of court would be away seems to be coming true.

[tu_vas_triompher]

"Oh, indeed." Feuilly, leader-into-foul-depravities, that's just how it's been. "Terrible people, the French."

He'd had the sense to leave his book behind--tucked under a fold of a blanket, where presumably no one will dig it up; and Emilia seems to have settled into her role as extravagant foreign pet. Or else she's just not talking to him now.

Feuilly slows to look at the tapestries. "If I had brought some paper--" When they get back he'll try to draw them, get down his impressions. Jean Prouvaire--Jehan Prouvaire--would be in agonies of delight. "Is this--what room is this?"

[harryhotspur]

"What?" He's simply been making his way across the room, paying no mind at all to tapestries the likes of which he sees every day: St. George and the Dragon, a maiden luring a unicorn, King Solomon. "It is the great chamber. It is not often so empty, but-- o! But sure they have all gone forth to hunt! We did intend it ere I-- left."

[tu_vas_triompher]

Feuilly lingers a little longer, because he can. And because he's a good copyist, who can see something good and make a poor-man's version, scaled to cheap fans: he wants at least to render something of this, he wants to absorb at least the way the maiden and the unicorn look at one another.

"--Sorry, I was just looking-- If my door appears again--ever--if you go to Paris, I can show you, what, an omnibus?"

[harryhotspur]

"An omnibus?" he echoes. "What is't? I would glad see one, or what else of Paris thou wouldst show me."

Once Feuilly is ready to follow, Harry's off down a closely winding staircase, which he clatters down at what is surely an unwise speed given the narrowness of the passage, the smallness of the steps themselves. But he manages not to break his neck before he reaches the bottom, and passes into the great hall.

Harry's grandfather was brother to a king, and liked to make sure no one could forget it. The hall is immense: six fireplaces; massive windows with elaborate tracery; a high, arched ceiling. And it is assuredly not empty. This is the hub and heart of the house. There are servants, there are ladies and gentlemen, all of whom seem to be about some business or other, even if it is only conversation.

[tu_vas_triompher]

"Oh, the omnibus is wonderful, really--it's--hm, it's a very large carriage that holds many people. You pay a fare, and it goes on a certain route through the city. It's not expensive, I take it myself if the weather is especially bad and I have far to go. You all jostle together--everyone is sitting on his neighbor's packages or coattails or dress, but it's an entertaining way to go about town. Someone started a company two years ago--"

But now they're at the stairs, and even if Harry manages to gallop down them every day without disaster, Feuilly is going to pick his way down at a sensible pace. Emilia grips his doublet tightly; there will be little holes in it.

And then there's a new hazard, a room of people. Feuilly, silent, stays close behind Harry. He does let himself look about, though: if he's a new visitor from France, a man of fashion with a parrot, surely he can stare just a bit?

[harryhotspur]

"O, I will gladly ride thy omnibus," Harry says when Feuilly is back at his side.

His confidence in the brilliant of their plan is not as absolute as he makes it seem, but he resists the urge to rush through the hall: calm and confident draws less attention. Or at least it ought to-- but a young man, about their own age, dressed for riding, breaks off from one of the groups and moves to intercept Harry on his way.

"Where have you been!" he cries. "We have been waiting for you this age! The sun will set ere we begin our hunt if you still linger so." His eye falls on Feuilly. "Who--?"

"A cousin of my mother, sure you met when he arrived," Harry says.

"I think not," the young man replies, looking at Feuilly with a direct, but carefully unreadable expression.

"Then I present my cousin-- John Feuilly." He pronounces it something like 'Fully,' as if it is a Norman name anglicized. "And this, Sir Ralph Neville."

Sir Ralph Neville bows-- Harry jerks his head in an attempt to indicate that Feuilly should follow suit.

[tu_vas_triompher]

Feuilly--bows? He's watched Harry enough to have a sense of how he moves, and he watches this Sir Ralph Neville's bow, but he's sure he has the gesture all wrong. Should he say anything? Yes? No? He ends up murmuring a few words, barely audible--lately come from France--

If no time passes while Harry's in Milliways--if it's the same day--has Sir Ralph Neville been waiting for their hunt for weeks?

[harryhotspur]

Harry's having the same thought. It has been weeks, and here Neville is, pestering him with plans they'd made as if no time has passed at all. Which apparently it hasn't. It takes some effort not to laugh at the thought of Ralph lounging around for weeks, waiting for Harry to emerge.

"Well, will you come?" Neville asks. "All stay for you."

"Then stay no longer," Harry says. "My cousin is somewhat jostled with his journey and does not wish to ride, so I will remain with him. Go!" he insists when Neville looks set to protest. "And it may be I will join you, but I would not spoil your sport with my delay."

"As it please you," Neville replies, looking himself distinctly displeased. He casts a last glance at Feuilly-- and a pointed one at Emilia-- and with another bow, turns away, calling out to someone as he goes, "He begs our pardon, he will not come--"

Harry looks to Feuilly. "We carried ourselves well, did we not?" he asks in an undertone.