III.
Eduard certainly seemed to be enjoying his new spring raiments. Not even Easter and he was wearing them out of doors for all to see. "Strutting about like a cockerel who's just discovered his tail feathers."
"Saith the gentleman wearing a peacock's plumage on his doublet."
Stéphane grinned, even if it was at his own expense. "I suppose I deserve that," he said to his old squire, turning away from the office windows. "Unfortunately, ever since his return from Italy, Eduard has been insisting upon ever more ridiculous codpieces."
"Ah, the folly of youth. They believe themselves to be paragons of good taste, when to the rest of the world it appears as though they're merely compensating for some, er, personal lack."
"Then I can only hope compensation will be a short-lived fashion in this household," Stéphane said as a page handed him the day's correspondence, "as it is becoming quite an expensive one."
A brief leafing through the letters uncovered names that brought a different sort of smile to his lips, recalling fondly some new connections he had made during his last visit it court. As well as the pleasures he had enjoyed with said connections. . . .
Recognizing that look he knew so well, the former squire excused himself with a bow.
Only when he turned to leave did Stéphane notice he did so with a prominent limp. He called the man back. "Your leg, Honoré. Did you injure yourself?"
"Ah," the man laughed it off, "it's nothing, my lord—"
"It clearly isn't nothing. You can hardly walk."
"Just a scrape, my lord, an accident. It need hardly concern you."
He should have known, however, that Stéphane's concern would not be assuaged by those words. And he would not let his man off without an explanation.
"Master Eduard took a small hunting party out the other day and asked me to accompany him." By now a common occurrence. Stéphane was well aware it was Honoré who was in fact responsible for many of his son's supposed kills, though the man was far too decent to ever admit it. "He had sighted a stag, a twelve-pointer, he claimed, in a thicket on the other side of the hill, and when we went to follow on foot—"
"You followed a stag on foot?"
"Eduard thought the horses would make too much noise," Honoré said as though it were of little consequence, "and that the terrain was too unstable to give chase. At the time, I thought it harmless to humor him. He'd been away for so long and was eager to impress the others. Our party got separated in the underbrush, and when I stepped on a dry branch, Eduard mistook me for the stag behind the foliage—"
"He shot at you."
The man hesitated, but nodded. "It was an instinctive reaction. I do believe he realized his mistake the second he released, but by then it was in God's hands. The arrow glanced my thigh, gave me a nasty gash that needed stitching up and ruined a pair of breeches, but by the grace of God, that's all that came of it."
Lucky Eduard was such a poor shot, was more like.
"Please don't mention it to the boy, my lord," Honoré entreated him. "I assured him I held nothing against him, the fault was mine for being careless, but he was terribly unsettled by the whole affair."
Stéphane assured the man he would not betray his confidence.
As for confronting Eduard, that was another matter.
He brought it up matter-of-factly after dinner, how he had noticed Honoré walking with difficulty. "I know the two of you went hunting together not so long ago, so I wonder if you might be able to shed some light on the matter. I would ask the man myself, but . . . Well, a gentleman can be sensitive about these things."
"I'm sure he's too proud to mention it," Eduard said. Far from unsettled, his eyes met his father's calmly across the space that separated them. "We were pursuing a boar through the thicket on the other side of the hill when Honoré's horse lost its footing and he was thrown from the saddle. You know how uneven the terrain is in that area."
"Certainly," said Stéphane, as though it were his first time hearing the story. "A man of his experience should have known to be more cautious. And did you eventually catch the animal that was to blame for this misadventure? I mean, after all that trouble . . ." And Eduard was never one to take returning empty-handed gracefully.
But he only sighed in mock-disappointment. "I'm sorry to say we did not, as we had to abandon our pursuit and turn back early. Honoré landed against a jagged branch when he fell, and cut his leg. Fortunately the wound was not very deep, and once we stemmed the flow of blood he insisted we press on; but I thought it best to call off the hunt. I know how much his friendship has meant to you these many years, Father, and I did not want to risk his condition worsening."
"How considerate of you." And how bold, Stéphane thought, watching his son.
Recognizing the look that came over Eduard's eyes when he raised his goblet. The urge to quickly wash his satisfaction down, one Stéphane was quite familiar with himself:
Eduard believed he had gotten away with it, and that no-one was the wiser.
What puzzled Stéphane was why he chose not to correct his son in that belief.
Just a bit of trivia, but the peacock feather-patterned doublet is totally canon. And who doesn't love a little sartorial character development? ISWYDT, costume people. . . .