tu_vas_triompher | (no subject)

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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From:

tu_vas_triompher

Feuilly shakes his head. From his face it's plain he doesn't know either. "What a wretched person. And I suppose he'll stay around just to needle everyone and watch them squirm."

He could go on, but that's probably a distraction, when he and Harry are supposed to be talking about something else. "I, um."

help a friend out here, harry

"--Did you get your armor cleaned up all right?"

From:

harryhotspur

"I did," Harry says. "Mistress Bar did provide all I required. I know not what use I shall make of it again, but-- in truth, I am glad to have it."

...right. Um.

"I did speak to Joly." There, that works! "And he did suggest that I-- that is to say, I would make plain-- I would have thee know how, how much I--" None of the words he used with Joly, none of the phrases he tried out in his head seem right, now.

From:

tu_vas_triompher

There, now Feuilly is turning pink. "I, um, I happened to speak to Joly too. And I was realizing that I--should probably explain--it's--"

He scrubs his fingers through his hair until it stands up in spikes. "I don't speak much about my parents--about not having them. But it's on my mind, still, and it's not something I set aside easily."

From:

harryhotspur

Harry nods, and frowns down at the floor. "Ay. Ay. And it was-- I was a fool, not to think how such a thing as I did might-- seem to thee."

From:

tu_vas_triompher

Well, yes, kind of, but Feuilly is smiling a fond and crooked smile at him. "It's--" He'd better just say it. "I used to think, when I was--was very young--that if my parents could write, they would have, you know--left something." His face is red and he's staring at the wagging tip of Lady's tail. "Even just a, a name they wanted me to be called. It--if you've never met your parents, it's--you like to, to think--to imagine--that they think about you sometimes. --But I should have realized that you--the army was outnumbered, and the men were sick, that was a clear duty."

From:

harryhotspur

And part of Harry wants to protest that he'll never know it, neither will ever know what I could have done, but-- Feuilly knows. And that's what matters here and now.

"I would call a man who did choose home and family above his duty coward," Harry says. "But I did not think-- I should have thought-- I pray thy pardon. For speaking so lightly of the matter."

From:

tu_vas_triompher

He nods. It seems silly to say thank you or it's all right, but he puts a tentative hand on Harry's shoulder. "I--it didn't seem to me that it was really your duty to be fighting in France to stretch Harry Monmouth's lands and power. But I wasn't thinking of the rest of the army."

It's on his tongue to ask if Harry doesn't think that family can be a duty as well, but he shies away from it for now.

From:

harryhotspur

"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--"

From:

tu_vas_triompher

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."

From:

harryhotspur

"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."

From:

tu_vas_triompher

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."

From:

harryhotspur

"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."

From:

tu_vas_triompher

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."

From:

harryhotspur

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."

From:

tu_vas_triompher

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."

From:

harryhotspur

"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!"

From:

tu_vas_triompher

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."

From:

harryhotspur

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

From:

tu_vas_triompher

"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?

From:

harryhotspur

"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."

From:

tu_vas_triompher

"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.