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In the days that followed Vranik, Henry spent his time slowly piecing himself together. The ache that plagued him was more than skin rubbed raw, angry braids of red circling his wrists. The medic could do away with his fever and bandage his wounds just fine, but something crawled under Henry's skin still.
It was also the first time Henry had nothing at all to do. Since Skalitz, there’d always been one thing after the other, with no room to rest and therefore no room to think. He would rest once everything was over, and think about the ambiguity of what “over” meant if he died along the way.
On the third day of his recovery, Henry awoke to the sounds of incessant, annoying knocking at his door. There was perhaps one person on this Earth that had been born with the singular purpose of annoying him, and that man opened the door to his chamber with a flourish. Hans stepped inside and kicked the door closed. His golden hair bounced, turned gold by the sunset filtering in through the window as he set a silver tray of food on the makeshift table left by Henry’s bed. As for himself, the lordling collapsed dramatically on the foot of Henry’s bed, molding himself around Henry’s blanketed legs like loyal Mutt.
“This is your own room, you know. I don’t see why you felt the need to knock.” Henry glanced over at the tray. His appetite was coming back, but damn if he wasn’t getting tired of herbal porridge. Hans propped his head up on his hand.
In his deceptively short time in knowing Hans Capon and his penchant for juvenile behaviors, Henry found that the lord was actually quite different when he didn’t feel the need to put on a show. It turned out that over the months, Henry was the exception to that rule. As Hans had quite recently drunkenly confided in him, Henry was perhaps the first boy he felt could be his friend, the most vulnerable Hans had probably ever been. Of course, Hans made sure to remind Henry after a beat that this was a huge honor considering that he was but a lowly blacksmith’s son, but the overall sentiment was quite comforting.
Hans snorted. “I was being courteous to the ill and infirm, thank you very much.” He rolled onto his back. “And now you’re…” he waved his hand vaguely at Henry, at the ceiling, at the room around them, at the world beyond the window. “And now you’re a nobleman’s son, through some horrible twist of fate. A near-equal.” Hans sat up to look at Henry, who looked back at him. Nausea threatened to overtake him as he continued to think about it. He was Henry of Skalitz, but now Skalitz was actually his, in a sense more real than simply being his former home.
“Do you ever sit still?” Henry said, instead of everything else that was on his mind. Hans huffed and fell onto his back again. Uncharacteristically, Hans listened and didn’t shift any more, and opted instead to trace patterns on the blanket. It was a blissful few minutes in that quiet where Henry felt the warm presence by his bruised legs and the pressure on the blanket as Hans’ finger drifted closer and closer.
The physicality of male friendship was something Henry wasn’t unfamiliar with. Growing up he’d had many a friend with whom he could touch and be touched by. From a shove to an embrace, anything went. With Hans, who’d never had much of anything substantial in the way of human relationships before Henry, there was a physical boundary he seemed too timid to cross. He had no problem being in Henry’s space, but couldn’t allow them to even brush shoulders. At first, Henry chalked it up to Hans going through some confusing self-discovery moment of realizing that maybe even peasants like Henry could be people with actual thoughts and feelings and heaven forbid, personalities.
But time wore on and Hans got more comfortable in an uncomfortable way that frustrated Henry to no end. They were stuck in a limbo of close-but-not-touching. Hans would get as close as he dared and Henry would provide no resistance and no acknowledgement, treating Hans the way he would an easily-spooked cat. But always right before the point of contact, Hans would stop, leaving a breath of space between them.
It was maddening for no reason to Henry, yet was at the same time the other thing he was not allowing himself to think about.
“Don’t let it get to your head.” Hans murmured, breaking their fragile silence. When Henry made no move to respond, Hans’ eyes flickered up to meet him. “You’re still my man.” And Henry’s stomach twisted again, but not from nausea. Gratitude, perhaps, at this arrogant boy laid at his feet. For the man he felt he could call his friend. In his own constipated way, Hans tried to make Henry feel better. And perhaps Hans was right, and nothing would really change, and that nothing had been changed. Henry would recover to his full strength within a few days and be sent out again. Radzig would treat him no differently than he always had. Henry nodded, once, and finally reached out to chew on the bread Hans had so kindly delivered.
Hans stayed long enough for Henry to eat part of the bread roll and half the apple he had brought and pick through the porridge he’d been forced to bring. After sensing Henry’s dejection at the leafy mush, Hans declared that he would go find someone to find them some real food and suggested in his suspiciously bossy courteous way that perhaps in the meantime his loyal servant Henry should sponge off and shave? And so a few maids and servants came and went and cleaned Henry up. They replaced the sweat-stained underclothes he’d been sporting with refreshingly soft ones that didn’t quite feel new (the likelihood they had belonged to Hans at one point was strong, considering they were tighter and longer than what would comfortably fit Henry normally), sponged him off delicately, and left him with a finely polished silver mirror, a small cloth, a small bowl of warm water, and a sharpened blade to shave himself.
The mirror had nary a scratch or a fingerprint and reflected Henry’s face in its entirety. It was a crystal-clear recounting of the torture suffered at Vranik, shown in the violet bruising under his left eye from getting punched by Erik and the swollen skin around his jaw on his right side from the pommel of someone’s sword. His stubble had grown back patchy, appearing sporadically around the dark bruise and making him look much worse than he felt.
Truthfully, Henry had not ever paid too much attention to his looks. There was an empirical truth that he was at least somewhat handsome; if being told so and wanted by Bianca, along with other girls and even some boys was any evidence.
There was also an understanding that he shared his mother’s face. It brought a small comfort to Henry as he inspected his downtrodden eyes and his (now-split) lips that his mother was with him. When Henry was still a boy in Skalitz, he’d been teased for his apple-cheeked smile that was identical to his ma. Now, through a combination of exercise and the passage of time, his cheeks had hardened considerably. Gone was his biggest insecurity, leaving behind an aching loss in its wake. His skin crawled.
The soft creak of the door opening interrupted his thoughts. “Your face isn’t that ugly,” scoffed Hans as he swept back into the room. This time around there was a deliciously-smelling bowl in his hands. “Chicken and rabbit stew,” he declared, again leaving it at the bedside. Henry’s stomach rumbled loudly in response. “You know,” Hans said, as he sat down on the stool by the bed in an almost childlike manner. His knees brushed the edge of the mattress, close but not touching Henry’s folded knee. “There was no one in the kitchens! I had to make that myself.” He pointed at the stew, still steaming next to Henry. “Imagine that! Me, Hans Capon! Making stew for some commoner!” He shook his head playfully.
Henry managed a smile back. “I’ll consider it thanks for getting beat up in your name at the Rattay tourney.” He shoveled stew into his mouth. Either Hans had a sorely hidden talent or Henry had become too familiar with bland porridge, but he couldn’t stop eating as Hans frowned at him.
“I thought I already paid you for that,” Hans said.
Henry moved the bowl up to drink the rest of it. “I said I’d take it as your thanks, not payment.” Finished, he wiped his mouth with the back of his hand.
“Fucking–Fine.” Hans acquiesced. He raised an eyebrow at the empty bowl as Henry set it back on the nightstand. “Already? Christ. Henry, you would’ve thought we were starving you up here.”
“You were!” Henry complained. “The porridge I’ve been eating’s been nothing but sawdust and water.” Hans laughed, a clear and uninhibited sound that sent a bittersweet pang through Henry. The buzz under Henry’s skin suddenly became too much to bear.
“Did you know?” The words escaped his throat before he could think. Henry clapped a hand to his mouth as Hans’ expression froze. He backtracked immediately. “I’m sorry, sir.” Hans looked at him with an expression that looked an awful lot like pity and he really didn’t have time for the thought that maybe his friend could have known such an earth-shattering secret and not tell him. “Never mind that,” he said desperately, picking up the mirror again with shaking hands. This wasn’t like him. There was something hysterical about risking his life to seek revenge on his mother and the blacksmith she’d married. Because wasn’t that all Martin was now?
Beyond the mirror, Henry could see Hans hesitating. Henry reached for the blade to shave his face. “I didn’t know, Henry. I promise you.” It was Henry’s turn to freeze. Hans bit his lip and looked at him head on, his blue eyes darkened under the shadow of his strong brow. He placed his warm hand on Henry’s blanketed knee, squeezing it gently. “I promise.” Henry’s heart beat in his ears.
Servants shuffling beyond the closed door ended the moment. Hans withdrew, and Henry exhaled. His cheeks burned and Hans looked away. Suddenly thankful for the bruises that already discolored his face, Henry finally started the arduous task of shaving.
Hans had moved to stare out of the window by the time Henry was halfway. He was saying something about the preparations they were making to storm Vranik, their conversation long past. “Hanush and uh, Radzig sent another spy out to see if that lot were all still there.”
Henry didn’t comment. “Privately, I asked Hanush if I could lead. But of course, I was denied,” Hans groused, accompanied by the drumming of his fingers against the sill. “More of his usual blathering about me being the heir and whatnot. And then he called me irresponsible and useless.” Henry saw through the mirror’s reflection as Hans leaned on his elbows to stare out the window more fully. “Obviously not in those exact words, because your…Sir Radzig was there.” His shoulders hunched.
“My father.” Henry corrected. He was almost done shaving.
Hans glanced back. “I was going to say liege lord, but yes. I suppose he’s your father now.” Their eyes met in the mirror.
“Everybody knew, Hans,” Henry said bitterly. “Everyone but me.” Hans’ eyes softened, but he said nothing. Henry continued. “I feel like such a fool. Toth stripped me and strung me up but that wasn’t nearly as humiliating as him telling me that I’ve been lied to my whole life.” It was painful when he’d trudged back to Rattay after. Henry’d always thought he’d been his father’s son, but now he didn’t even know his real father. He didn’t even know himself anymore.
He shook his head as a hollow laugh escaped him. His gaze drifted back to the reflection in the mirror. His brows, the inlay of his eyes, his damned ears. Features he’d once upon a time naively attributed to Martin.
Hans cleared his throat. “Not everyone.” He came around and sat cross-legged on the bed across from Henry. “Really, Henry. It’s horrible he lied, but is having Radzig as a father so bad? You could’ve had someone like Hanush.”
Henry sighed. “It’s not–you’re right. I just want to know why.” It was frustrating, not knowing if Radzig was ever going to tell him otherwise. “Fuck. It’s no wonder he was always so fond of me, even before Skalitz burned.”
Hans nodded. “At least now, you have two fathers?” he ventured. “And both actually care about you.”
“Can’t imagine why. I’ve managed to somehow be inadequate for every mission I’ve ever been sent on. And I never quite wanted to be a blacksmith in Skalitz.”
“I can. You always get back up again. The devil himself couldn’t stop you.”
Henry didn’t know what to say to that. Hans was looking at him in the softest way that did terrible things to his heart and saying these things that gave him all the wrong ideas of things that he really didn’t have the time to think about. But maybe he was right.
“Do I look like him?”
“I think you look like you,” Hans said, so earnestly that Henry had to laugh.
Hans looked affronted. “I was being honest. I suppose you do look a little similar to Radzig, but that’s not all who you are. You were you before he was your father, and you’ll be you after.”
By God, he was going to be the death of Henry. Somehow Hans had managed to see through Henry. He always had, even when they’d just met and spat all kinds of vitriol at each other. Henry closed his eyes and leaned back, dizzy with it all. “Aye.” He swallowed, opening his eyes again. Hans had leaned with him so their faces were still an arm-length apart. “Aye, perhaps you’re right.” Henry offered a smile, a halfway-there thing. Hans beamed back, radiant.
Henry couldn’t resist. “I didn’t know you were so wise. Maybe Hanush isn’t wrong about you.” Hans’ smile dropped from his face. “That’s the last time I do anything nice for you,” he grumbled, shoving Henry’s legs lightly.
Henry threw his head back and laughed.