Not Yet A Faerie Queen

[i_am_elizabeth]

I am riding, the task to which I set most of my time here, and gladly so for the weather is fair and England has a lengthy stride and a constitution well suited to barreling both through jungle and over stretches of sand. Today we have been putting ourselves to the former, the abundant lengths of my wig tied in many tight loops at the back of my

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[withoutasea]

Not riding, but leading Lorica, bare footed and bare shouldered, hair hair pulled and twisted back from her face. After the light rain, the breeze was pleasant and the world smelled green and filled with possibility. A good day. A grand day to be going on with.

Another horse in the clearing, and a woman too. A rider, surely. Jenny let go off Lorica's reins.

"Eat, dearest heart. Rest."

[i_am_elizabeth]

England's noise of attention is enough to turn my own, and I take in the fey young woman her filly. Or I assume she is such- it is possible she's already a mare, but somehow her rider makes me doubtful.

"Good morrow."

[withoutasea]

"A good day to you, too, Lady," said Jenny, with a little bow of her head that had been the style in Camelot in her day, even if the Queen of Camelot had bowed to no man but her King and then only when in public.

"The rain has made the world new, has it not."

[i_am_elizabeth]

"It has certainly made it cooler," I agree wryly, with a glance at the sun.

"And reminded me of home. I would wish more of it, but in this place such wishes may be disastrously over-filled."

[strandedseaman]

"Majesty," Horatio said in surprise, springing up from the shade of the tree he'd been resting beneath. It'd taken him some time to rouse - the horse's steps were muted by the grass, and though Edward was growing with every day, there were still nights in which he kept both his fathers awake.

Horatio stifled a yawn and bowed to the best of his ability. "You've found the stage."

[i_am_elizabeth]

"Horatio," I return, pulling myself away from the stage to face him where he was so recently slumbering.

"It seems I have, and an officer of His Majesty's navy as well. How fortuitous an outing this is."

[strandedseaman]

Horatio coloured, though he suspected her words were polite at best, for who would be pleased at finding him there, yet unwashed from his morning patrol?

"Are you a fan of theatre, ma'am?" He seemed to be having some trouble with his feet and hands - where to put them in particular. At last Horatio decided on setting his feet apart, hands clasped smartly behind his back. There now. That was what Commodore Pellew would surely do.

[i_am_elizabeth]

"I've a mind to be," I say thoughtfully, standing back to take the stage in in as much of its entirety as I may.

"I have yet to feel truly moved, however, by anything that has been played for me. Amused, perhaps- the ardour of my academia pricked, but no more. Yourself?"

[palmthemoon]

There was a horse with him too, but this one was not for riding. ShorHor was mostly good for wandering about in his trainers looking long-suffering as he kept Karen company. Or, in this case, Shadow as he wandered into the clearing.

ShorHor noticed the other horse first and clomped over to look up at him speculatively. Up and up and up.

Shadow watched this exchange for a few seconds before glancing over at the horse's owner.

"Afternoon."

[i_am_elizabeth]

It's the sound of England's gentle outward huff before the stranger's voice that prevents me from being taken by surprise. My tin tilts immediately up- though at this distance it does not need to do so for me to take the man in in full, it is perhaps in anticipation.

"Good afternoon," I reply, walking nearer. England, massive a horse and the stranger is a man, has dropped his head the distance requisite to greet the pony.

[palmthemoon]

Shadow observed the two horses sizing each other up with a bit of a smile then glanced back at the woman. That was quite the hair she had going on, Shadow observed.

"That's quite the horse you've got," he said. "You get to ride here often?"

Small talk. He'd never been good at small talk.

[i_am_elizabeth]

"Since his arrival, yes, every day." I lift a hand to greet England's cheek with my palm as he lifts his head from the pony's level. The man has a deep calm about him, and it is intriguing.

"Though it is the first time I have come upon the stage. I did not know there were players, here."

[over_and_dunne]

Willie noticed the horse before he noticed its owner. It reminded him of the horse his father had been put up on when the King of England and Ireland came to inspect his Irish policemen. The finest man in God's own kingdom he had looked then and Willie smiled at the memory, approaching the horse with one hand held out carefully even though he had no sugar or treat to give it.

"Aren't you a big fella," he said, gently patting its nose. He had noticed the Queen by then, but he did not want to distract her from her own business and kept his voice down. "You must belong to someone important."

[i_am_elizabeth]

There is a gentle scraping of hoof against grass, and then only the faintest trace of a voice, but it is enough to turn my attention briefly from the stage and I am met with the most pleasing tableau of a gentle young man and a beast of a horse met in a moment of quiet greeting.

"I call him England," I say, lifting my voice to be heard across the distance between us as I start across the grass. "I fear it is a choice that makes plain my greatest heart ache, but I found I could call him nothing else."

[over_and_dunne]

When he saw the Queen coming his way he attempted a bow, though it really wasn't very good. He liked her quite a lot despite how awkward and uncultured she made him feel most of the time. Perhaps that was only how you were supposed to feel around royalty.

"It's a good name, your Highness. He looks like England. Well, not exactly... England isn't a horse and I wasn't there long, but he does remind me of England. In a queer sort of way." Willie looked down as his face coloured, reaching up to scratch behind the horse's ear. He got the strangest notions sometimes and they made sense in the privacy of his own mind, but they lost their meanings in words.

[i_am_elizabeth]

The hopeless lack of form does nothing by cause me to smile. Surely such souls are rare enough, that bare so noble a tenderness as to be a balm for the heart in every action no matter how clumsy or unconscious. England keeps his beautiful posture, the arc of his neck perfect and the flat of his nose pointed straight to the ground, but his head is tilted at the joint only so much as a flower may noticeably do toward the sun, toward William, and his hoof does not paw but gently crushes the grass beneath, a sure sign of his pleasure.

"Precisely why I call him so, Mr. Dunne. I do wholly agree."

[stoicsidekick]

The horse caught Bush's attention first, for he did not immediately see Her Majesty standing at the stage. He knew something of farm horses, the sort built to pull cart or plow, but little of ones like the creature he now spotted grazing in the field. Still, he could see it was a fine one, surely one of the many kept in the barn, perhaps wandered out of its own accord. It was only as Bush carefully approached with the intention of leading it home that he recognized it - and subsequently saw its owner close by. "Ah- ma'am. I did not see you there, forgive me."

[i_am_elizabeth]

"If I must, Lieutenant Bush," I say, smiling at the turn of the day and turning for the greeting.

"I should find no hardship in it."

[stoicsidekick]

Bush had the distinct suspicion that he was be mocked just a little. He inclined his head slightly all the same. "Yes, ma'am."

"Your horse, he seems to be doing well?"

[i_am_elizabeth]

"The rain was a boon," I say, moving to extend my arm that England may grace my palm with the soft of his nose. "The heat poses no hindrance for him at all and the cool merely invigorated his spirits which were already high, if impeccably well mannered."

I stroke his neck and let him back to his grazing.

"He fares very well, indeed. And you, lieutenant? How fare you?"