Warning: Contains slash, male/male pairing, please don't read further if you find it offending.

Pairings: Charles/OMC; Charles/Margaret

Special Thank You to ladyredvelvet and Aesthetic Narcissist for inspiring me to write!

The title of the story is inspired by a hauntingly beautiful song about soldiers, The Storks by Mark Almond, from his album Heart on Snow

March, AD 1523. English occupied territory, north of Calais, France

Deep blue eyes open slowly. Only to be reflected in the equal blueness. No bewilderment, he knows exactly where he is. Sixty leagues away from Suffolk, on the other side of the Chunnel, waking up to yet another blistering windy grey day outside, wrapped in countryside that is slightly flatter and slightly browner than he had left behind. And yet he's never felt more at home.

Lost in the pool of another's eyes, like mesmerizing tidal waves on the seaside of Calais. A broad grin spreads across his lips as he arches up, brushing against the warm, taut, welcoming body hovering above him.

Their lips meet again. Tongues probing. Hands grasping. Teasing. Exploring. Finger tips tracing familiar patterns on skin. Bodies writhing. Clinging to one another. Like they had always done. Inseparable. Like that first time they fought together, side by side, swishing and slashing high and low, for England, for what they believed in. This is also a battle of sorts. Their tongues are the warriors, their mouths the battlefield. Only this time, it is a war that they would both win.

Sweating. Gasping. Murmurs of empty promises. Silent screams of pleasure. A delicate balance between softness and hardness. Between desperation and desire.

Faster. Rhythmic. A pulsating ache that threatens to send both of them over the edge. Frenzy. Gazes meeting. Eyes expressing what words never could. Hearts pounding. A quick inhale of breath. Oblivion. Bedsheets entwining them. Still entangled in their embrace. Panting. Numb.

_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _

Six years later. Suffolk estate.

A loud voice of his wife yelling orders and clanking sounds of pottery being moved in the kitchen drifted his way informing Charles of Margaret's whereabouts and the aroma of herbs and spices wafting up the stairs told him that she must be in the process of preparing their supper. He stopped at the threshold of the kitchen and watched her absently for a moment, before entering. The fire was cracking in the hearth of the stove casting merry shadows that danced and jumped across the portraits on the walls, quite in discordance with a rather glum and sour expression on the face of Henry VIII's sister. A flagon and a goblet on the table beside her and a flush blossoming on her slightly gaunt cheeks told him that she has been drinking. Charles tried to suppress a sigh but failed instead closing his eyes and leaning back against the wall, letting Margaret's maids brush past him. They curtsied on their way out of the kitchen, and left the two spouses alone. They had served her for many years and were used to her temper by now, her reknown Tudor temper that flared often and especially when Charles would return home from London, bringing his wife the news of her royal brother. Like today. Charles should have been used to it for she never really bothered holding back. There was a time, when they were newly-wed and Margaret yelled at him, it made him yearn for their nights together and he would shut her up with kisses, silence her with his adoration. How long ago it seemed. How simple, how uncomplicated a time it was. How like a fairy tale that had gone wrong. Charles swallowed hard. Deep inside, he knew without a doubt that every time she would scream at him now, he deserved it. Every slap, every shove was his fault, for he knew the truth.

He took a few strides to reach the chair, seating himself at the table furthest away from the fire, yet near Margaret. It had been a long day. A very long, painful, and difficult day. Something he didn't want to have to go through again in a long time. Although he knew, as the King's loyal confidante and friend, that he would be experiencing a day similar to this one for at least a few weeks. Henry's irritation with Rome, and his dissatisfaction with the way his "Great" matter was being handled, began to make itself felt on those closest to him.

Of course, it hadn't helped that although she heard her husband's footsteps enter from the hall, Margaret didn't even raise her eyes to look at him as she sat there. She had just shrugged her shoulders and continued to stare at her plate and roughly chop her roots and beets.

Charles leaned his head against the back of his chair. He could feel it inside, feel the emptiness, the apathy, growing into a void between them, and he didn't know what he could do about it. He wasn't even sure that he wanted to do anything. It was only a matter of time before there were no feelings left.

An uncomfortable silence filled the kitchen. He'd had it all figured out, exactly what he would say, how he would say it, but now, sitting across the table from her, he didn't quite know how to begin. He stared at the ceiling as if praying for patience. Every time he would bring up the subject, Margaret would cut him off. Still, he knew his King's indulgence wouldn't last forever. And what then?

He looked at the Princess. Her eyes were darting restlessly around the room, everywhere, it seemed, except in his direction.

"Henry wants you back at court," Charles' voice was measured and calm when he at last spoke, "you are his sister afterall."

Leaning her chin on her hand, Margaret looked at him a moment before she decided to indulge him with an answer. "How can I return when he flaunts himself with his slut." She looked incredulous. Her mouth was twisted in it's usual curl of disdain. "I would be seen to be approving of his ridiculous liaison."

Charles expected no less but with every word she spoke, he could feel the frustration rising inside him. "Margaret, you and I must stay in the king's good graces or we are nothing. Let him marry who he wishes." He shifted in his chair impatiently, gazing at his wife as though appealing to her common sense in the matter, and to her understanding of both his and her situation. Margaret's eyes did not meet his. They looked away, down at the vegetables she was cutting.

"That was always your philosophy, wasn't it Charles?" she asked with more than a hint of reproach in her voice, shrugging her shoulders. "So very cynical." Finally their eyes met, and their life together ran through both their minds. "Is that why you keep company with that devil Boleyn?"

Charles frowned. No, that wasn't the reason and she ought to know him better than that. He took a deep breath and briefly closed his eyes. He wasn't cynical, at least not cynical enough to think that Henry had chosen this course simply to get his way, and he was resigned to stand by his King no matter what.

"You liked him enough once, when he helped us back to court..." he retorted, his voice as sharp and defying as hers now, a wry grin on his face at her hypocrisy. "Or were you just being cynical?"

Margaret reached for the flagon of wine, refilled her cup and took a deep swallow."I didn't see all of his game." Her speech was becoming slurred. "Now I do. I despise him."

"So do I." Charles grunted truthfully. The stale smell of alcohol drifted to him easily, and he could feel his own mouth become dry, his pulse pounding in his temples. "But I hate Wolsey more...It's a marriage of expedience."

"Rather like ours."

He didn't expect these words to come out of her mouth, at least not then. He could tell by the look on Margaret's face she was waiting for some kind of response. He could not bear the vast amount of pain in her eyes. He could not bear the fact that he was the one who caused her all this agony. But there was nothing he could do to help it, to make things better. His passion for her was dead. It had existed, surely, when he first married her, those looks of his, the sudden violence of his touch when there was any excuse for the slightest contact with her, or had it all been some curious dream?

"No, I loved you," he edged closer to her, neither of them flinching at the past tense he used. And then, the sight of tears in her eyes, of so much hurt, made him remember more, although it was painful. Memories of that one defining moment, when the love he bore her switched from present to past, and the memory of the person who caused it. The memory so deep that it was embedded into his very soul, gashed upon his heart like a battle scar.