ofwalcs:
It occurred to Henry that if there was anyone (outside his own immediate family) who needed no reminder that the last year had been difficult, it would be the members of the Cavendish clan. They were together in having suffered through the losses of the last year in an unavoidably public way. Henry felt a bit bad for even hinting to it with Bobby standing so close, but he nodded regardless, raising his own glass in a toast.
“Indeed. Queen and country.” It was a term that somehow left a slightly bitter taste in his mouth - one of the old traditions that had given Henry pause for years now, though he wouldn’t let on about it in mixed company. Swallowing the last remnants of the champagne in his glass, he huffed a humorless laugh. “I’m afraid not, Cavendish. At least not anywhere that’s easy to access for sharing. But it might be nice. I don’t know that anyone truly enjoys champagne if they can help it.” He cleared his throat, loosening the bowtie at the base of his throat. “Are you very much enjoying the festivities, apart from the unfavorable beverages?”
Born into the second year of Queen Margaret’s then diffident reign, Bobby was reared with the notion that Henry would one day become king––it was never a question of if he would inherit, as the monarch’s eldest son, but if he could. He was not his mother; he was not the superbly scrupulous Duke of Clarence, and he wasn’t Duke of York either (although one could certainly argue that not being Philip would likely help him, not hurt him.) Robert wasn’t entirely certain what to make of him, how to parcel the rumors from reality and make sense of the man who existed somewhere in the chasms thereof, and he supposed much of the country thought the same.
“A Windsor without a taste for champagne.” Bobby feigned a shudder, mouth unflinching as it lay horizontal and humorless, though his eyes flickered with a lighthearted tease. “Let me hazard a guess, then... whiskey? Better yet, make that Scotch whiskey. Am I getting warmer?” As he spoke, he could recall a time when Caroline smuggled a bottle of spirits from Balmoral that Prince Ralph kept under lock and key for him. It was now cleverly stowed in a supply cabinet in Bobby’s London flat, the note still attached: Think he’ll notice? “Does one ever enjoy such events, or is it sufficient if we simply endure them?”
