(no subject)
Title: Richer Dust
Author: gileonnen
Play: Richard II
Characters: Hotspur, Richard II, Anne; mentions of Isabella, Hal, Mortimer, and Northumberland
Rating: PG-13
Warnings: Daddy issues and other uncomfortable dynamics. Because Shakespeare has essentially pushed Hotspur back a generation, I've really got no idea how old Shakespeare meant him to be during his rebellion--Hal was sixteen-ish at the time. Therefore, because Shakespeare did it and because this is the Big Historical AU where the dates don't have to match up perfectly, I've decided that Hotspur is eighteen-soon-to-be-nineteen when Richard is deposed. This makes him about twenty-two-soon-to-be-twenty-three when Slovenly Unhandsome takes place. I've also played with Hal's age a bit, making him seventeen rather than thirteen when Richard is deposed. He is therefore around twenty-one(ish) in The Moon's Men. If this bothers anyone ... I'm sorry? Richard, however, I have left as-is.
Summary: When he fences before the king, he is young and invincible.
Notes: While this AU is open, I would prefer to discuss additions to the AU rather than seeing them drop in unannounced.
When he fences before the king, he is young and invincible--quicker with a foil than Henry Bolingbroke's son and quicker on his feet than young Mortimer, sportsmanlike in victory and a stranger to defeat. His form is lean, spare, nothing extraneous about it; he will grow into his father's broad shoulders and heavy brows and his own hot blood. He is a creature of legend and legerdemain, of poetry and pantomime at once.
Richard's applause is no more than appropriate, no more than politely appreciative as the match concludes. His cheeks are flushed, but that might be the sherry; his eyes are bright, but that might be the incomparable brightness of the hall at Christmas. Housman has written poems about just such bright young men as this, and Brooke has memorialized them forever in verse--and he thinks then that their brave boys are not only beautiful because they are forever lost.
Harry Percy makes his salute, as gracefully as though he understands the queer stagecraft of the display.
They dine at a great, round table as though they were knights from a picture-book; it pleases Richard to play the egalitarian ruler, the benevolent king, the hero of Britain. Perhaps next Christmas he will be King Alfred, or Queen Boudica, or Good King Richard who taxed the hell out of the peasantry and let his brother take the blame--certainly he will not be Richard the Second.
There is a wide, open space in the centre of their round table, in which servingmen move to refresh glasses or to offer slices of fine roast duck or hothouse grapes or oranges imported from the Mediterranean. Richard does not forget that this hollow place allows them to dine with ease, although he imagines the others will.
For his performance upon the piste, the Northumbrian lordling sits at the king's right hand (and he should have sat at the queen's right, but it is Richard's whim to have him close, and so little Isabella will laugh and charm Bolingbroke's boy). Harry jostles the royal arm a little when he reaches for the roast beef or the gravy; he has clearly been instructed to keep his elbows down and to let the servants serve him rather than take the gravy boat in his own hands, but the lesson has never adhered, and for tonight his rough edges are charming. "You fence beautifully," says Richard; "Thanks--sir," answers Harry. He knows no more of governing his speech than of governing his elbows.
He remembers the young man laughing on a foxhunt, belling like a hound at the sight of the quarry; he remembers him holding up a pair of grouse with a wide grin, proud that he has killed them and that he will kill many more. He remembers Harry as a boy, wrestling gleefully with the dogs on the floor of Warkworth House and falling asleep on his mother's shoulder at a play at Drury-Lane.
"We ought to have gone to see a pantomime," muses Richard, as though confiding a secret, "But I'm far too fond of the pageantry of combat. The sparse heat of it--"
"Oh, aye, the heat," Harry answers readily, looking up from his food for the first time. His eyes are pale and green and very bright. "When you can feel his eyes on you, even through both masks, and you don't dare drop your gaze--do you fence? Sir?"
"Not since I was a boy. I couldn't bear it when they let me win, you see, but nor could I bear to lose ... and so I simply gave it up." He smiles, letting his hand fall warm against the napkin folded on the boy's thigh. "There's a lesson in that, if you care to see it."
"I'm not keen to start fencing with kings," answers Harry. "It's bad enough fencing with nobles--Dad's always trying to fix the matches, you see, flatter this one and show the other who's in power--and it's not right. It's not right at all."
"Not honourable."
"No, sir."
Richard has to laugh at that, if only to see Harry's brows draw down and his hand grip his knife. "Lower your weapon," he says, and at once Harry lowers his knife. "That's better. We'll have no regicide at the table--and on Christmas, of all days!"
Harry says nothing of the economy (as Gaunt would), nor of all those who cannot afford a Christmas--especially a fine one with servants at the centre of the table and eight different meat dishes and everywhere lights and green boughs; Richard wonders if Harry has ever met such people, or if he cares to. For boys like Henry Bolingbroke's son, the poor hold a queer fascination--but neither Harry would share his plate with a beggar, Richard wagers. Neither would surrender his luxury for the sake of a starving man.
When he removes his hand from Harry's thigh, the young man pays it no mind. Perhaps his father had said a few words to him about the king's predilections, schooling him to the necessity of appeasing the man in power; he would not put it past old Northumberland to whore out his own son for a pleasant little parcel of land in the Borders, a neat annuity or a ministerial position in trade or colonial affairs.
Perhaps it is only that Harry knows nothing of untoward advances or how to read them, and so it does him neither offence nor pleasure to be touched.
It does him good to think that some children have been permitted to grown up innocent.
He remembers a thunderstorm that rattled the windows of his great, empty palace; he remembers Anne tossing in their bed, drawing the covers away and murmuring uneasily in her sleep. He is eighteen, and he has been married for three years, but his wife is still a foreign presence in his bed and he has not yet learned how to soothe her dreams. At midnight he paces endless passages, watching the rain hammer at the windows and the wind tear the rose blossoms to pieces.
He remembers a lost little boy wandering the halls in a nightshirt, his hair washed white with every flash of lightning and his eyes wide. Where's the kitchen? he asks, drawing himself up with a lord's bearing--and then, right on the heels of it, Are you a ghost?
I am a ghost, Richard answers, laughing. But I'll take you to the kitchens if you like.
That is how he would like to remember Henry Percy, he thinks--young, and invincible.
Author: gileonnen
Play: Richard II
Characters: Hotspur, Richard II, Anne; mentions of Isabella, Hal, Mortimer, and Northumberland
Rating: PG-13
Warnings: Daddy issues and other uncomfortable dynamics. Because Shakespeare has essentially pushed Hotspur back a generation, I've really got no idea how old Shakespeare meant him to be during his rebellion--Hal was sixteen-ish at the time. Therefore, because Shakespeare did it and because this is the Big Historical AU where the dates don't have to match up perfectly, I've decided that Hotspur is eighteen-soon-to-be-nineteen when Richard is deposed. This makes him about twenty-two-soon-to-be-twenty-three when Slovenly Unhandsome takes place. I've also played with Hal's age a bit, making him seventeen rather than thirteen when Richard is deposed. He is therefore around twenty-one(ish) in The Moon's Men. If this bothers anyone ... I'm sorry? Richard, however, I have left as-is.
Summary: When he fences before the king, he is young and invincible.
Notes: While this AU is open, I would prefer to discuss additions to the AU rather than seeing them drop in unannounced.
When he fences before the king, he is young and invincible--quicker with a foil than Henry Bolingbroke's son and quicker on his feet than young Mortimer, sportsmanlike in victory and a stranger to defeat. His form is lean, spare, nothing extraneous about it; he will grow into his father's broad shoulders and heavy brows and his own hot blood. He is a creature of legend and legerdemain, of poetry and pantomime at once.
Richard's applause is no more than appropriate, no more than politely appreciative as the match concludes. His cheeks are flushed, but that might be the sherry; his eyes are bright, but that might be the incomparable brightness of the hall at Christmas. Housman has written poems about just such bright young men as this, and Brooke has memorialized them forever in verse--and he thinks then that their brave boys are not only beautiful because they are forever lost.
Harry Percy makes his salute, as gracefully as though he understands the queer stagecraft of the display.
They dine at a great, round table as though they were knights from a picture-book; it pleases Richard to play the egalitarian ruler, the benevolent king, the hero of Britain. Perhaps next Christmas he will be King Alfred, or Queen Boudica, or Good King Richard who taxed the hell out of the peasantry and let his brother take the blame--certainly he will not be Richard the Second.
There is a wide, open space in the centre of their round table, in which servingmen move to refresh glasses or to offer slices of fine roast duck or hothouse grapes or oranges imported from the Mediterranean. Richard does not forget that this hollow place allows them to dine with ease, although he imagines the others will.
For his performance upon the piste, the Northumbrian lordling sits at the king's right hand (and he should have sat at the queen's right, but it is Richard's whim to have him close, and so little Isabella will laugh and charm Bolingbroke's boy). Harry jostles the royal arm a little when he reaches for the roast beef or the gravy; he has clearly been instructed to keep his elbows down and to let the servants serve him rather than take the gravy boat in his own hands, but the lesson has never adhered, and for tonight his rough edges are charming. "You fence beautifully," says Richard; "Thanks--sir," answers Harry. He knows no more of governing his speech than of governing his elbows.
He remembers the young man laughing on a foxhunt, belling like a hound at the sight of the quarry; he remembers him holding up a pair of grouse with a wide grin, proud that he has killed them and that he will kill many more. He remembers Harry as a boy, wrestling gleefully with the dogs on the floor of Warkworth House and falling asleep on his mother's shoulder at a play at Drury-Lane.
"We ought to have gone to see a pantomime," muses Richard, as though confiding a secret, "But I'm far too fond of the pageantry of combat. The sparse heat of it--"
"Oh, aye, the heat," Harry answers readily, looking up from his food for the first time. His eyes are pale and green and very bright. "When you can feel his eyes on you, even through both masks, and you don't dare drop your gaze--do you fence? Sir?"
"Not since I was a boy. I couldn't bear it when they let me win, you see, but nor could I bear to lose ... and so I simply gave it up." He smiles, letting his hand fall warm against the napkin folded on the boy's thigh. "There's a lesson in that, if you care to see it."
"I'm not keen to start fencing with kings," answers Harry. "It's bad enough fencing with nobles--Dad's always trying to fix the matches, you see, flatter this one and show the other who's in power--and it's not right. It's not right at all."
"Not honourable."
"No, sir."
Richard has to laugh at that, if only to see Harry's brows draw down and his hand grip his knife. "Lower your weapon," he says, and at once Harry lowers his knife. "That's better. We'll have no regicide at the table--and on Christmas, of all days!"
Harry says nothing of the economy (as Gaunt would), nor of all those who cannot afford a Christmas--especially a fine one with servants at the centre of the table and eight different meat dishes and everywhere lights and green boughs; Richard wonders if Harry has ever met such people, or if he cares to. For boys like Henry Bolingbroke's son, the poor hold a queer fascination--but neither Harry would share his plate with a beggar, Richard wagers. Neither would surrender his luxury for the sake of a starving man.
When he removes his hand from Harry's thigh, the young man pays it no mind. Perhaps his father had said a few words to him about the king's predilections, schooling him to the necessity of appeasing the man in power; he would not put it past old Northumberland to whore out his own son for a pleasant little parcel of land in the Borders, a neat annuity or a ministerial position in trade or colonial affairs.
Perhaps it is only that Harry knows nothing of untoward advances or how to read them, and so it does him neither offence nor pleasure to be touched.
It does him good to think that some children have been permitted to grown up innocent.
He remembers a thunderstorm that rattled the windows of his great, empty palace; he remembers Anne tossing in their bed, drawing the covers away and murmuring uneasily in her sleep. He is eighteen, and he has been married for three years, but his wife is still a foreign presence in his bed and he has not yet learned how to soothe her dreams. At midnight he paces endless passages, watching the rain hammer at the windows and the wind tear the rose blossoms to pieces.
He remembers a lost little boy wandering the halls in a nightshirt, his hair washed white with every flash of lightning and his eyes wide. Where's the kitchen? he asks, drawing himself up with a lord's bearing--and then, right on the heels of it, Are you a ghost?
I am a ghost, Richard answers, laughing. But I'll take you to the kitchens if you like.
That is how he would like to remember Henry Percy, he thinks--young, and invincible.