Like a single darkening cloud at the edge of the horizon, he'd seen it coming. He'd felt the gale rising, tasted the sharpness on the air that always preceded a storm, but ignored it. Horatio wasn't usually one to hide from danger. On all accounts he was a brave and brash young man, but then the midshipman had never feared anything more in his entire life. So he counted the beats between the thunderclaps. Now he would face the lightning.
It all began on that carriage ride from the docks of Portsmouth. It was a cold and wet December when Midshipman Hornblower and Midshipman Kennedy began their first day of shore leave since their transferal to the HMS Indefatigable. Another dry spell with the French had permitted the men a brief reprieve in England and a chance to spend the holidays with their families. Snow fell in fat, damp flurries as the shipmates slid across the cobbles and hailed a cab at the edge of the boatyard. Inside the carriage Horatio strained to look out the window one last time at the Indie, but the gray clouds hung heavy and low over the water, and nothing could be seen but the choppy waves and the scurrying men on the docks.
Archie wasn't perturbed by the weather, or leaving behind his ship. The man was all aglow with the promise of Christmas, and the cold had bitten his cheeks the colour of a Turkish delight. He smiled a dimpled smile as he took off his hat, revealing a head of unapologetically dishevelled hair. Despite the disconcertion that came with leaving the ocean, Horatio couldn't help but smile too. Archie's shoulder was warm as it pressed up against his, solid and comfortable through the layers of uniform. His breath unfurled into the crowded space in lazy, hot puffs, heating Horatio down into the bone. He should have realized it then, tracing with his eyes the rhythm of Kennedy's parted lips as he breathed in and out. The carriage was small, but not so small. They needn't have sat so close. There were tales the sailors told: bawdy bits and pieces and ragged ends of strange tales; rough half-truths that grazed Horatio's mind before he was jolted from his thoughts as the carriage clattered into motion.
The inn was tucked away on the high street between two shopfronts spangled with tinsel. It wasn't poorly, but not so lavish that it was beyond their humble wages. Horatio and Archie split the cost of a single room between them. The sky was brewing darker and colder by the minute, and soon the early winter night would fall over Portsmouth. They'd spend the night there and go their separate ways the next afternoon: Horatio to his father, and Archie to, well, he never did say. Hornblower reminded himself, fighting the urge to look over his shoulder, that it was completely commonplace for two bachelors to share a bed in order to make ends meet.
The room was not fancy by any stretch of the imagination, but it beat the hammocks of the Indie. Evergreen boughs had been hung in the hallway, and their spicy-brisk scent permeated the room. Archie lasted all of five seconds before flinging himself at the cheap mattress and gobbling up the space with his arms and legs. "Look, Horatio!" he chimed "it's a Christmas miracle! A real bed!" Hornblower tried to muster some military disapproval in response to his shipmate's impropriety, but couldn't help but grin. He called for a bath.
It was not as though Horatio had enjoyed any privacy aboard ship. It was not as though he was a bashful person. Yet what might have been an inconsequential shedding of clothes turned into a calibrated mission, performed with as much swiftness and efficiency as any of the assignments executed under the scrutiny of his captain. Horatio turned to face the wardrobe as he unlaced his shirt in three sharp tugs, and pulled down his breeches with equal clinicality. He stooped down into the shallow basin the innkeeper's daughter had put in the middle of the floor. The water was good and hot, but the body folded up before him seemed disconnected and unattractive, too pale and too thin. Horatio used a rough cloth to lathe up and down his skin, up and down, up and down, like a limp handshake with a stranger, shoring away the lingering stenches of gunpowder and salt. It was quiet. Horatio could hear the muddled murmur of the people downstairs in the tavern, a distant thunder he wished would take over the hostile silence. He didn't know where to look. He settled on staring at his toes, scrunched and wrinkled at the edge of the tub. There were no hollered commands, no hustling sailors, no reassuring rock of the ship to fill the space between his naked body and the man lying on the bed.
"What are you reading?" he asked suddenly, turning around in the water to face Archie. There was nothing wrong as long as he acted like there wasn't.
Archie startled. In waiting for his turn he'd begun to read one of the volumes of Shakespeare from his sea chest. The man averted his eyes into the book in his hands, fingers bruising the soft blue binding. "Hamlet" he said finally. Horatio chuckled. "Mustn't it be hard to read when it's upside down like that?" Archie turned as white as the bedsheets and gave a spiritless laugh. He turned it right side round. "I must be more tired than I thought!"
The bath ended quickly. Kennedy's turn came round, but Horatio went down to the tavern, saying the muggy air in the bedroom had made him lightheaded.
The man inhaled reverentially as he breached the dining room's orange revelry. The fog of tobacco hanging in the rafters was like a halo of cannon smoke, calmingly dangerous. Big fishermen with gnarled knuckles exchanged loud stories and complained about the French. Young sailors with speckled faces slopped their beers and twittered at barmaids. In the ruckus of the crowd Horatio melted into a state of fabricated oblivion.
By the time Kennedy joined him, the midshipman was already in the heady dregs of his first mulled wine, thoughts too muddled to catch on any perturbation. They called through the din for another round and some supper. Archie was sure he could never go back to wartime rations the moment he took his first spoonful of pea soup. It was far from elegant, but he might as well have been at the King's table after months of salt pork and stinging rum. Archie was so enthusiastic about his raisin pudding he could hardly get through his funny story about Midshipman Cleveland.
Drunkenness was not something Horatio endorsed, but he gave himself up willingly to three full flagons and sailed through the night on waves of India Pale Ale. Before long a pair of gentlemen challenged them to a game of whist. Horatio was still conscious enough to shield his hand from his friend and take out his opponents with relentless finesse. At some point a blond woman too underdressed for too harsh a winter floated by and flitted around the men, perfumed salesmanship. One of their challengers called out a colourful invitation, Horatio turned beet red, and Archie laughed, thumping him on the shoulder with one strong hand. Kennedy's golden hair and blue eyes were found, then lost, then found, then slipped away, bobbing in and out of Hornblower's liquid consciousness. Gold and blue and gold and blue. Archie's knee bumped against Horatio's under the table. He withdrew, then settled against him, then slid away, then roved back again. Coarse and booming songs surged up from the carousers in random pulses, peppering the night with fresh distractions.
Eventually their competitors realised they'd gamble away all they had unless they ended the game, and wandered back out onto the dark street with their purses suitably lighter. The lamps were burning on the last of their oil and wavered sleepily in the cutting wind that rushed in as they left. Archie and Horatio had the sense to call it quits. They leaned against each other as they navigated themselves across the tavern and up the steep stairs. The buckles of their shoes jangled as they tripped over one another's feet. Kennedy landed against Horatio's neck and stayed there, his incessant laughter sending goosebumps up Hornblower's skin.
"J is for the jouncing we'll do in her bed!" the older sang, lips buzzing and tickling.
Horatio swatted him as they lurched towards the bedroom door. "Why, Mr. Kennedy! What a dirty song!"
"K is! K… What's K for, Horatio?"
"K's for her centre."
"Centre… Centre doesn't start with a K…"
They crashed down on the bed in a knot of arms and legs. Enough of Horatio's etiquette had survived that he felt compelled to light the lamp and rip off he and Archie's shoes. Kennedy watched with fascination as he sent them thudding to the floor.
"L is the lavender she uses for scent," Hornblower said matter-of-factly. He flopped down on the pillows. His queue had come undone and his dark hair spilt over the white of his rumpled shirt.
Archie had twin red blotches on his round cheeks. "S is the stick up Pellew's ass!"
They burst into a fit of giggles.
"No, no!" Horatio protested breathlessly. "Captain Pellew! Captain Pellew is an excellent Captain!"
"Will you have to arrest me now, for treason?"
Gold and blue.
"I might!"
"Alright."
He ate up the space between them.
Horatio could only manage to think that his shipmate's mouth tasted like ale, and that everything was so warm and damp. Ale and heat and skin.
His eyes were closed. Had he shut them?
Determined hands were on his shoulders, strong but not forceful, pushing him down into the mattress.
It was only when he felt the weight of a body on top of him that the evicted parts of Horatio's mind hurled to the forefront and met in a violent collision. The pool of contentment building in his belly was shocked cold.
He tore his mouth from Archie's and shoved him away in panic. Archie fell backwards and landed between the younger's legs. "Mr. Kennedy!" Horatio cried, voice commanding but jagged, "what in God's name do you think you're doing?"
The kissing had left him airless. He was wild-eyed and panting.
Archie stared at his shipmate for a long, long moment. His face was still flushed from the lovemaking that didn't come. Shock drained from his bright eyes as Horatio's breathing evened. He looked down sharply into his lap.
"Will you have to arrest me now?"
The jubilant haze of drunkenness was shattered.
"You kissed me back. You liked it. I can see that well enough."
Horatio's head was alight with gunfire. He was naked without his uniform.
"Archie, please!" The midshipman put his face in his hands. "I – I don't know what I was doing! I don't know what to do with myself!"
Archie's eyes were red and sad as he chuckled. "Give him a sinking ship full smarmy Frenchmen, all he'll navigate himself home without a compass! But give him a heart and he'll have no idea what to do with it!"
Horatio dropped his hands in his lap. Where was his hat? Where was his pistol?
"It's all wrong! It's unnatural! It's ungentlemanly! I knew this would happen! We should never have taken this room! I'm an officer! I shouldn't love you!"
Hornblower's eyes widened in horror.
Kennedy's insides were suddenly on fire. He leant closer to his friend and slid one hand over Horatio's, fisted in the white bedding.
"And do you?"
Horatio wouldn't meet his eye. He would rather take a Spanish armada.
"Horatio," Kennedy implored, rubbing his thumb in soothing circles over the back of the other's hand. "Horatio, ever since you came aboard the Justinian I've wanted to be near you. The world was so dark, and I thought I deserved it. God, I can't tell you how many times… But then you decided to risk your own life to try to save us from Simpson. You were so brave. And I thought, I thought, I want to be as brave as Horatio. I admire you in everything you do. But it's more than admiration now."
Horatio was trying desperately to keep himself under control, but Archie's bare honesty forced a choked noise from his throat, like he was smothering an emotion fighting to be free. He buried his head against Kennedy's shoulder to hide his face. Archie understandingly allowed him his crisis; he'd had his fair share. The man rested a hand on the other's back and was glad when it wasn't rejected. He had to fight his words through his aching throat.
"I used to be so afraid of myself. But you know, God wants all His children to love one another, and – and this is the only way He made me able to love. And I love you, Horatio."
Hornblower jerked against Archie, trying to contain his silenced sob.
He didn't know if he believed in God. His father was a widower and a doctor, too full of death to know the love of a Creator. Even so, the lurking promise of damnation never faltered in its crusade against the deepest parts of his mind. Keeping his heart from his sleeve and disappearing into his regalia had helped Horatio from facing the forbidden parts of himself, but now, in the arms of this man, he wondered how he could continue to dismiss the rightness that he told himself was wrong. He'd met many kind men without incident, and still didn't know why Archie had to be different, had to make him so very happy that he was in danger of losing himself. He'd ruined it all now. Archie loved him, and there was nowhere left to hide.
"I'm sorry," Horatio said in hitching stumbles, "I'm sorry, Archie. Archie, I love you."
Kennedy sniffled and laughed. "You have nothing to be sorry for."
Horatio felt the smile on his friend's lips as he charted a line from his neck all the way to his mouth. He hadn't given many kisses, but he found it easier and easier the longer they embraced. He couldn't quite believe he was doing this, knotting his hands in Archie's hair, making noises he didn't know he could make, but he couldn't quite bring himself to regret it. Suddenly Archie began to tremble and Horatio pulled back, afraid for a moment he was having a fit, but the midshipman was still smiling. "Oh, Archie" Horatio whispered into his cheek, running a hand between his shoulder blades. "Nothing's ever gone right for me," said Kennedy, eyes red but happy. He felt so vulnerable with Horatio, but knew that in the morning there would be no need for bandages, and that was the best feeling in the world.
The going was slow and sweet, and Archie was honoured to be the one to teach Horatio to love. There he was, the midshipman that seemed to know everything, his infallible Horatio Hornblower, undeniably an inexperienced boy of eighteen. If would have almost been funny, if it wasn't so endearing.
"Just don't tell the men I cried" he said seriously as Archie kissed a trail from the hem of his trousers to his smooth chest.
Archie took off his shirt and tossed it on the floor with the boots. "Your secret is safe with me."
Lightning filled the room as the blizzard outside reached its fever pitch.
War was for Napoleon, not for themselves or for each other. Behind closed doors the heart of an officer is just the heart of a man, and men with hearts know that love is far greater than any winter storm.
The "Horatio Hornblower" novels are a creation of C. S. Forester, and the TV series based off his books is a creation of Andrew Grieve. I do not claim to own the stories on which this fan fiction is based. This fan fiction is not written for profit, but for amusement and out of appreciation for the original content on which it is based.