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They found each other on the battlefield, like they always did. Two forces that pulled at each other like the opposing ends of a magnet, always so difficult to tear each other apart from each other when they were in the other’s vicinity. It was a disastrous magnetism, not only for their own sakes but also for several others’. Everyone around them would inevitably, at one time or another, be caught up in it.
England and France — forces not to be reckoned with — and in private discourse, Arthur Kirkland and Francis Bonnefoy. And they knew each other as privately as any two people — or beings with the appearance of humans — could as they had been stuck with each other for quite many years by now.
It had been one of the bloodier battles, and the ground littered with lifeless bodies both French and English alike attested to that. Arthur paid them no mind, even though the stench of death was heavy and infiltrated his nostrils. It wasn’t an unusual smell those days, though, and frankly England was used to it. The broken weapons on the charred grass he had to look out for. Pieces of axes stuck in one’s foot were rather a hindrance, if one stepped on them.
Francis looked worse for wear, and that was what Arthur’s eyes took in rather than their surroundings. The sight brought no joy to him, not really. As young and reckless as he still was, there were some aspects of war he had already grown weary of. The marches were long, and the armour heavy and stifling, and soldiers rather undignified. The battles were thrilling, still, but there was too much sorrow that paid for victory. Not that it wasn’t worth it to beat France up. It was. But this was a cycle, a vicious one, and after a few wars it was easy to see patterns in people’s actions and motives. In his own motives, too, which his kings cultivated and manipulated to match the royal family’s needs.
Arthur didn’t think too much about it.
“Francis,” he said as he halted his steps, the pieces of metal around his knees and calves weighing his steps. Chest plates he had already taken off, as well as the armour on his arms, but his need— no, not NEED to see Francis, more like… desire… ugh, that sounded just as bad — to see Francis again had driven Arthur to move.
Francis’s hair was damp, tangled, and a tousled mess that still looked good even with the stains of red that tainted the pure yellow-ish colour, but the more disconcerting aspect of his appearance was the glum, dull light in his eyes that Arthur was, after all the drama that had gone during the Hundred Years’ War, intimately familiar with.
Francis blinked up at him, eyelids droopy. There was some blood on his sun-kissed cheeks, Arthur noted, but he knew he too was a rather bloody sight. “Sourcils?”
“Just because you were born with delicate eyebrows—” Arthur grumbled, but his voice cracked and faded as he slid down to sit beside Francis on the ground. It had been once a meadow filled with dreams, naive and courageous ones. Arthur sighed, tilting his body towards Francis. “How long do you reckon this bout will go on this time?”
“Knowing you, mon cher, perhaps the next fifty years or so,” Francis replied, and leaned against Arthur. Both their uniforms and remaining pieces of armour were soiled as it was, but at least they were both equally as dirty and hurt. “You’re not here to finish the job, are you, Arthur?”
“Of course not,” Arthur sighed, carefully positioning himself against Francis’s shoulder so he wouldn’t look too enthusiastic for affection. Francis’s head already rested on him like Arthur was the last support he had. “I mean I could, but I shall spare you for now.”
“My hero,” Francis muttered, sarcastic.
“We don’t die easily, in the first place,” Arthur said, pressing his cheek against Francis’s head. “There’s only so much time I can spend on you.”
“Ah yes, I forget you’re busy dying yourself every few months or so.” Francis’s voice was strangely strangled and strained, as if breathing itself was draining his usually endless energy to be snarky with Arthur. “How many hangings has it been now? Fifteen?”
“It’s not dying if I’m still around regardless,” Arthur protested, hands coming to clutch at the elbows of his frilled shirt, the fabric clinging to his skin like the leeches used in medicine. “It’s been sixteen now.”
Thinking about it made Arthur’s shoulders sag, the all-too recent memories from the country villages of England flickering to life. He could still feel the rope around his neck, could recall the darkness behind the blindfold.
“One more since we last met?” Francis’s head shifted up, pushing Arthur’s away, and the blue eyes suddenly sharpened with alarming clarity. “You went and did something silly again, didn’t you, cher? I can’t believe you.”
“I can’t let them die, Francis,” Arthur said quietly as he turned his gaze towards the clearing, the meadow, and all the dead flowers beside human corpses. A sight for an artist to paint, he mused. “It’s not as though our kind has died from that sort of thing before, anyhow.”
“The Byzantine Empire,” Francis drawled. “Rome, too.”
“They had it coming,” Arthur retorted. “I’m still young. Still getting stronger. Maybe even stronger than you, now.”
“Even the most beautiful buds can wither away,” Francis drawled, mouth against Arthur’s cheek. All colour drained from Arthur’s face at the touch, and his shoulders tensed. Francis didn’t mind it, lips moving along the low whispers. “All it will take is a series of mistakes made by our peoples — and they are prone to those, are they not?”
Arthur couldn’t argue with that, having seen his fair share of rulers and their advisers that made the most horrid mistakes in the name of England’s glory.
And as a soldier, he had seen plenty of young lads lose their lives out of inexperience and recklessness.
“Are you implying you would miss me, Francis?” Arthur questioned, keeping his tone flippant even as his heart squeezed tightly beneath his figurative shields. “That’s very unlike you.”
“You would miss me too,” Francis said as he planted a kiss to Arthur’s cheek, smearing the yet undried blood stains. Arthur shuddered, feeling nauseated by the scent once more. Adding Francis’s fragrance into the mix, and Arthur’s senses were messed up. “After all, it is as you say — can’t live without the nuisance, can you?”
“What are you trying to achieve here?” Arthur turned his head towards Francis rather violently, eyes blazing. “To make me say that I would come for you regardless of our mutual feelings—”
“Or rather, because of those,” Francis interrupted, and his smile was a little less strained now. “Je t’adore, and you know you do as well.”
“Do I, truly?” Arthur rolled his eyes. Presumptuous arse. “Perhaps if you give me a few hundred years, I will help you out. It’ll come with a price, though.”
“Mm, I have just the perfect way I can pay you…” Francis crooned, and that tone was enough to have Arthur stand up in a rush, face a dark shade of red as he refused to look at Francis’s laughing face. “Come now, Arthur, I know you’re not as insulted as you’re acting.”
Francis knew him too well, that bastard. Arthur scowled as he returned his gaze on Francis and his disheveled appearance, blood and grime clinging to the man like one of his lovers. And yet this was the man Arthur’s existence was tied to in ways that he couldn’t begin to unravel.
Arthur really would do quite a lot for and against Francis if the situation called for it.
Starcrossed lovers they might not be, or maybe they were, but there was definite fatefulness to their encounters.
“Let’s meet again, Francis,” he said, softly. “Before either of us dies.”
“You can count on me for that,” Francis said as he took Arthur’s hand into his own, running his thumb over Arthur’s knuckled. Both their hands had grown rough and calloused, but one of them was still capable of gentle affection. Arthur marveled it, perhaps even admired it despite who he was. Kindness didn’t bring bread to people’s houses at times like these, but it certainly salvaged the soul.
“Of course,” Arthur managed, flustered. “I can count on you being a leech till the end of times.”
“And you wouldn’t have it any other way.”
Francis kissed his hand, a wordless goodbye to their wordy encounter, and something came back to life in Arthur. Something that hadn’t been alive for quite a while — ah, the result of all these wars and all this death! They killed the warmth of friendships that crossed through the superficial labels of nationalities, and gave romance the infamous genre of tragedy.
Maybe one day, it wouldn’t be so.