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If he thinks too much more about this, Feuilly will think himself back into his room. Which explains at least some of the urgency with which Feuilly trots down the hall to Harry's door, and knocks.

Nothing except the history of their friendship explains why he's bringing his training sword. But it makes perfect sense to Feuilly. They might need to go hit things with swords! Possibly each other! A certain amount of judicious hitting-with-swords has always been an integral part of their friendship.

(...so, yes, to the outside observer, it might look like Feuilly is charging down the hallway with a look of determination, armed, and pounding on Harry Percy's door.)

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"But it is not for him I fought," Harry can't help but protest. "It was for England. And he is England, it is true, and-- and all in all a better man than first I took him for. But--" Augh. He shifts his feet, looks down. "--I little knew, ere I spoke with Joly, how much, perhaps-- how much mine own father was in my thoughts when I spoke to thee, though I knew it not. I once did think to be a Percy a surer bond than any vow, a stronger link than any chain, but-- methinks I hold it lighter now, though perhaps 'tis sin to think so, I know not--"

Harry Monmouth is not England, Feuilly wants to say. And he's not a good man, either. But that's not how to repair a friendship after a fight. It can wait.

Well. Maybe not altogether. "England is--is men's families, too, at least as much as it is Plantagenet." Much more so, dammit. "But oh. Harry." He rubs Harry's shoulder. "Your father."

"Well, thine as well-- thine and mine and-- and damn the lot of them!" He pulls away, embarrassed to be treading so near to sensitive territory, embarrassed that Feuilly can so easily tell.

But a thought occurs (it should have come sooner, probably), and he turns sharply back.

"But the cases are not alike. I have not done what-- by duty was I made to choose, and I left him not bereft, not alone. He hath all he needs, there is naught he doth require of me some other may no give him."

Yes, well, it's only the keen insight of a close friend that allows Feuilly to see how deeply Harry feels about the subject. (no)

"That's true," he agrees at once. "It's very true: your son has his mother, the--the family lands will come to him--all of that."

"Ay, ay. But--" He waves his hand impatiently. "It is not of myself I wished to speak, it is of thee, of--" But whatever he'd meant to say abandons him, and all that he can say instead is the only thing that comes to mind: "I have missed thee. Strange though it sounds for so brief a parting."

And Feuilly would prefer to talk about Harry than about himself--but here, this is something they can agree on. "I missed you too. --And these foolish dogs," he hurries to add, before anyone can get too uncomfortable. "I can't work without Hector sitting on my feet."

Harry laughs. "And I would protest he cannot sleep without thy work above him but-- thou canst see for thyself 'twould be a lie."

(Hector, far less interested in this conversation than the humans in the room, has indeed gone to sleep.)

He'd like very much to just continue talking about the dogs, brush all the rest aside, but it feels suspiciously like a retreat. And Harry Percy does not retreat unless forced.

"But I would-- I would make up this quarrel between us," he says. "If I knew but how."

Hector is a very old dog. He's earned it.

And Harry has probably earned some real conversation. Feuilly brushes his hand through his hair. "It's all right. I--of course I'm not happy about Monmouth's war in France. A cynical invasion, for--for nothing but profit. But I think I understand better why you went. And--"

He pulls a hand through his hair again, looking even more rueful. "I think even a day with your family would have made more difference than you think, but--it's not--your son is all right, it's not as if you've done him any kind of wrong."

"Then I do not understand," Harry says, looking incredulous. "Thou need'st must believe me scoundrel indeed, to think I would join such a fight. Wherefore would I do so? It was not, it was not indeed!"

Oh, for--

Feuilly holds up his hands. "I don't agree with Monmouth's war. Of course I don't: how can I? Invading France? On the flimsiest of pretexts? But to join your nation's army, outnumbered, suffering from, from hunger and disease--that's not precisely the same thing as joining in Monmouth's cause."

"I cannot see the difference," Harry says stubbornly. "I would not join a cause I thought unjust."

"No, I didn't think you would," Feuilly says levelly. "It's why I was so surprised. --I was surprised," he says, cutting off any interjection, "that you would fight in a campaign that seemed to me to be so--so corrupt. But you're a soldier, and I can see that fighting for England's army when they were so badly outnumbered, that can be an honorable duty."

Lady is whining anxiously; he bends to give her a perfunctory pat. Is this a fight they need to have out after all?

"Well-- well." It's hard to spark his temper against speech so sensible, and it's already starting to fizzle. "If so thou think'st it, I cannot marvel you were displeased. But if you may trust I did naught but what I thought honorable-- why, thou'rt French. I cannot beg thee applaud my country's fight."

"I know you wouldn't do anything you thought was dishonorable." He gives Lady another pat and straightens up. "But no, I can't really applaud Monmouth in this."

Reading more about the campaign hasn't made it sound any better. Killing the prisoners at Agincourt? The ruthlessness of the siege of Rouen? Maybe this isn't the same Monmouth in Feuilly's history books, but--the texts have been enough to take away any rose-tinted view of knightly warfare.

"Well-- well." His gaze drifts to the floor, then he looks up again. "And so shall this stand between us?"

"I hope not." He catches Harry's gaze, tries to hold it. "Not on my side."

"And I hope the same," he says. "And sure two hopes may make it so?"

"Absolutely." He offers his hand. Friends?

Harry seizes it with both of his.

"I-- I feel I can scarce call that honorable which thou mislikest."

Well--then Feuilly will wrap his other hand around Harry's. "Friends can disagree. Why--even Joly and Lesgle disagree sometimes." (They have to, right? Just don't ask him to name any specific examples.) "--And anyway, it's--there's hardly ever anything that's, that's so clear that there's only one way to see it. I wasn't thinking, then, how the choice seemed to you."

Edited 2016-04-01 22:49 (UTC)

He nods. "And I-- I may claim the same fault."

"It happens." He frees a hand to pull Harry close into a hug. That's all right then.

(One of the most obvious symptoms of love: Feuilly has no desire at the moment to present the detailed and reasoned argument that he could, on the subject of Henry V's war in France.)

He gladly returns the embrace, and with no less relief.

"Well-- well," he says at last. "I am most glad of this."

Whatever Feuilly says to that is muffled in Harry's shoulder, but it sounds like firm agreement. And he stays muffled up in Harry's shoulder for quite some time, before tugging Harry over to sit down on the bed. (Shoo, Lady, down.)

"It's been strange to, to be working on the stables, but not to be working with you."

"How goes that work?" Harry asks. "I have not attended to it as I should."