To Falter (and to be Caught)
Brimsley had never been one to falter.
Up to this point in his life, he had only encountered two things that could make his step falter. One being dishonesty, and the other being a certain blonde-haired aide to the King.
In some ironic twist of fate, the prior had led him to discover the latter.
Brimsley goes off to wander in the rain after the passing of George's Father as he did when he was a child. Reynolds sees him leaving and decides to follow, concerned for the mysterious boy. Dancing in the rain, anxiety attacks, mild fevers and the coziest of delirium-induced conversations follow. This is my interpretation as to how these two fell for each other faster than you can imagine.
Brimsley had never been one to falter. When he was first assigned to his duty as Queen’s Man-in-Training, he stood tall and learned everything he possibly could, ignoring the judgemental gazes and expectations for him to fail until they eventually petered out into nothing. When he had been tasked with overseeing the hoards of servants in preparation for the King’s wedding for weeks on end with little to no rest, he had asked Teresa, one of the kitchen maids, to keep an extra pot of coffee nearby whenever possible and organized the crowds with the ease expected of his station. Even when he had first been called upon by Princess Augusta to report the details of his time with the Queen, he had kept his wits about him and protected the Queen’s privacy without much more than a brief pause to collect himself. Being honest and hardworking were two of the things Bartholomew excelled at in life, more so than most others in the kingdom.
Up to this point in his life, he had only encountered two things that could make his step falter. One being dishonesty, and the other being a certain blonde-haired aide to the King.
In some ironic twist of fate, the prior had led him to discover the latter.
As a boy, the other children had immediately caught on to the fact that he would never lie, be it to other children or, more worryingly, the adults. He had spent many years of his youth finding the quietest corners available to him and busying himself with whatever he could get his hands on, be it a scroll of parchment and some charcoal, a book he had traded his ration of bread for, or sometimes just the company of his own thoughts.
Sometimes, when his mother was too busy tending to her duties to the crown and he was tired of the different corners of the servant’s quarters, Brimsley would wander outside of the castle walls and explore the forests beyond the grounds. It was the closest to a rebellious action that the boy could even conceive of performing, even if it was simply wandering when all else in the castle were busy with their own duties and their children were all giggling together in some abandoned study or wherever it was that they scurried off to when not attending to their chores.
More often than not, Brimsley would hold out until the seemingly perpetually cloudy skies would let loose a torrent of droplets that would drive most of the possible prying eyes away from his path and into the warmth of the castle, allowing him to slip away unnoticed.
In Brimsley’s humble opinion, the best part of a rainy day was the freedom of walking, whether it be through the heavy, humid rain of July or the cool, often shiver-inducing drizzle of late September. Whenever the clouds gathered outside his window, Bartholomew would practically have to restrain himself to keep himself from making a beeline straight out into the fresh air, which was practically dripping of petrichor.
Sometimes he would disappear for hours at a time, wandering deep into the woods and, if the mood struck him, he would dance. There was never any music, no humming or singing, simply a boy, the sound of raindrops drip-drip-dripping surrounding him, and his imagination. One day he could be facing off against an adversary to the crown in the midst of a ball and the next he may be an overworked kitchen worker, dancing in the kitchen as he prepares the Queen’s dinner to the faint sound of the servants bustling by beneath the deafening roar of the ovens.
Most days, however, he was the royal librarian dancing with some made-up prince of the royal family. No matter how many times he tried to imagine the scenario with a fair princess or domineering queen, the steps never came to the young boy as when he imagined a fairytale worthy prince standing in front of him, mouth full of gleaming teeth and eyes so bright they nearly blinded him. He would spin and spring and do the best approximation of a waltz that a child who hadn’t been nearer to a ball than a few floors away or gazing at the crowds of elegant nobles through a window could do.
Brimsley didn’t care how odd it would look to some rogue pair of prying eyes when he was alone with the prince in his arms, the raindrops dampening his cloak and twigs crunching beneath his feet. In those moments, he was truly happy. He would spin himself sick and still have a smile on his face, too focused on his imagined partner to care about his slight snaggletooth that showed itself when he smiled too widely or the softness of his stomach, all too evident whenever he found himself in the bathhouse with the knights in training or, if he were honest with himself, even most of the other servant boys. Nothing could touch him when the rain drowned out any noise besides the rhythm of his own personal waltz.
With time, those days faded in his memory as they became more and more infrequent. His meetings with the prince were replaced with days crammed in his room, reading the newest collections of royal expectations for their servants, learning the unspoken rules of the palace, and training under the Princess Augusta’s right hand. Instead of expending his energy twirling amongst the raindrops, he was chasing after lost servants and containing all of his emotions into neatly labeled bottles to organize inside his head, ignoring the unfortunate loss of his mother in order to take up her place in serving the crown.
Sometimes, in the quiet moments between words on a page or pauses in the flow of the day, Bartholomew could swear he could feel a hand grasping his waist and was blinded momentarily by the mirth-filled eyes of his prince for a fleeting moment. But, like all things, it was just that. Fleeting.
It had been years since he had gone on one of his wandering walks in the rain but on the night that the late King passed, Brimsley allowed himself to once again step out into the strangely fitting downpour and simply wander.
It wasn’t long until his white shirt was soaked entirely through and he could care less about how the fabric clung to his skin, too deep in thought as his train of thought hopped between theories of the possible future awaiting him and the rest of the palace and nostalgic musings many nights and early mornings he had spent in these very same woods as a boy.
So deep, in fact, that he wasn’t even aware of the set of slate eyes observing him from the edge of the royal garden. He passed right by, on a mission to forget the crushing despair of the King’s passing and the implications it would have on his near future. The rain was heavy enough that it concealed the sound of his own footsteps but even without it, it is a near certainty that he wouldn’t have noticed the quieter pair only about 20 paces behind him.
The remains of the past autumn’s fallen leaves crumble beneath his boots as he finds the old path he has traversed time and time again, many of the old footholds, fox-holes, and stones of various sized right where they had been all those years prior, hidden beneath new layers of moss and occasionally a new branch or fallen tree. It was bittersweet, so much so that under the cover of the rain, the brunette allowed a few seldom shed tears to slip from his eyes. All this change… He swore that, for a moment, he could feel the gaze of his prince’s striking eyes on him, far too real to be in his head but, well, that was impossible! Even so, it pushed down on his shoulders as he sped up his pace, a particular destination in mind now with the reminder of his prince.
As the unaware Brimsley and his follower traveled deeper into the woods, the rain seemed to only grow heavier, the chill of the early spring air barely touching the soaking boy as he all but ran down the path that his feet remembered better than his mind. In what seemed like a flash to Brimsley but was, in reality, closer to a quarter of an hour, he broke through a line of low lying brush into a clearing blanketed in decadent moss and ivy covered trees, the thick canopy only allowing slivers of the remaining watery sunlight to fall in patches along the ground.
Oh, how many hours had Brimsley spent here, spinning in circles and imagining enchanting yet intimately familiar conversations with his prince. As a child, they had simply been moments born out of a yearning for companionship, the need to be understood. As he grew older and the dances became less frequent, Bartholomew realized that his visits had a deeper, more… well, improper undertone to them.
Although he had never understood how something so wonderful could be seen as taboo, he understood that his flights of fancy could be nothing more than that, no matter how much he yearned to truly share a dance with a man other than his phantom prince.
Absent-mindedly, Brimsley’s feet traced the steps of a waltz to a tune only he was privy to. Glimpses of striking eyes, warm light from dozens upon dozens of candles, a kind hand on his waist, the feeling of elation one can only feel when in the presence of their person all flittered beneath his closed eyelids, swathing him in a blanket of warmth that chased away the chill of the rain that surrounded him.
For a moment, all was calm for the first time in a long time.
For a moment, Brimsley considered what it would be like to be able to kiss the prince.
For a moment, he wondered whether he’d ever be able to–
A sudden snapping noise forced the boy from his revere, his eyes snapping open on instinct and for a moment, he didn’t understand what he was seeing.
There, a mere five paces ahead of him, cloak in hand, was a young boy with the brightest eyes, even beneath the layers of wariness and surprise and something the Queen’s man-in-training couldn’t seem to identify, and the sharpest jawline Brimsley had ever had the pleasure of laying his eyes upon.
Those eyes… So alike his princes but yet so, so different.
The boy’s lips parted as if he meant to say something and, in his moment of hesitation, the weight of the world crushed back down on Brimsley as if he were the titan Atlas reincarnated. This boy had followed him out here, witnessed him acting quite mad– god, what if he was sent to find him? Had someone finally questioned his whereabouts and sent after him? The boy was muscular enough, it seemed, to be a knight out of uniform…
Panic alighted in the dark haired boy’s heart and, as if he had stepped on hot coals, he raced off down the path he had come from, tearing up dirt and leaves alike as he went, breath heaving and heart shaking within the confines of his ribs,
Brimsley didn't go too far, to his chagrin, however. One moment, he was sprinting through the rapidly darkening woods, unable to hear much over the roar of the rain, wind, and the rapid thumping of his heartbeat in his ears, and the next he felt his feet being swept out from under himself. He found himself face first in a patch of soaking moss, his balance a victim of a wayward branch strewn across the path. Letting out a near delirious giggle in between heaving breaths, the boy rolled onto his back and pushed himself out of view of the path, behind the large oak tree that had dropped the branch.
Hopefully, his pursuer had already lost him… He couldn’t focus well enough to conceal himself any better, the panicked swirling of his thoughts in combination with the sudden awareness of the bone deep chill consuming his body sapping any remaining energy from his body.
After a while of waiting, Brimsley eventually concluded that he had, in fact, lost the blonde haired boy and felt some of the tension leaving his body like poisonous leeches detaching from his shaking form.
Even at the realization of his newly chattering teeth, Brimsley couldn’t bring himself to lever his way to his feet and continue his trek back to the palace. God knows what the boy would have the chance to speak about his condition before he got there… He’d be walking in blind!
“You’ll catch quite a nasty cold if you don’t get back to a fire soon, you know.” A murmur from Brimsley’s right intoned over the sound of the rain and chattering teeth.
“Good lord!” The servant exclaimed, certainly in a respectable volume and octave of someone of his station and not at all similar to a mouse with hypothermia.
“I beg you to not startle as you did last time. I do not wish to spend my night burdened with concern for your health as you ramble around out here in the rain, Mister…?” The boy crouched down, resting his arms on his knees and tilting his head slightly.
A prompt, Brimsley realizes.
“Br-Brimsley, Bartholomew Brimsley.”
“Francis Reynolds. Pleasure to meet you, although I do wish it wasn’t in the middle of such a heavy storm…”
Brimsley meets the gaze of the other boy (Francis, his traitorous mind hums pleasantly) for but a mere moment before he glances away, his face feeling oddly hot, especially for the weather. In doing so, he missed the glint that appeared in the mysterious boy’s eyes as he observed Brimsley closely.
“Brimsley, please tell me you have not developed a fever. It would not due for the Queen’s man to pass away before he has the chance to serve her.” Reynolds somehow managed to imbue his chiding words with an odd sort of kindness that threw Brimsley for a loop. The stranger seemed to pick up on this but, thankfully for his frazzled nerves, he mercifully didn’t comment on it.
“I assure you, I am q-quite fine. You’d best go along, I have… I know my way back to the castle on my own.” Brimsley pulled on his best impartial face, pulling himself upright against the tree and glaring at Reynolds with… questionable effectiveness, considering he was soaking wet and shaking like a leaf.
“Apologies but there is not a chance that I will be leaving you out here without someone to ensure your safe return to the palace.”
“That is entirely unnecessary. I am quite capable on my own!” Brimsley responded indignantly.
“I am not too sure about that, with all due respect, so I must insist.”
There was a moment of quiet as the two had a silent standoff, neither willing to budge on their resolve. Well, nearly silent– Brimsley’s teeth were causing quite a chattery ruckus, after all.
“Fine, if you can make it ten paces without collapsing or pausing, I will concede that perhaps you are more capable than I have judged you to be. Is that agreeable?” Reynolds quirked one of his well maintained eyebrows at the shorter boy, standing upright and taking a step back with a purposefully blank expression covering what Brimsley had a sinking feeling was a rather smug look.
From what he could tell, this Reynolds character was very smug and dangerously perceptive. In any other circumstance, he would consider those traits to be at worst a vague annoyance and at their best, quite (attractive) useful.
Right now, however, it was quite the curse considering he was quite sure his left leg was entirely numb and so much as one step sounded like a momentous task.
But Brimsley was never one to fumble, especially not in plain view of someone so obviously expecting him to fail, and so he nodded to Reynolds and grasped at the tree beside him to slowly pull himself to his feet, swaying in place but determinedly not looking at the blonde beside him as the world spun briefly around him, unintentionally dodging the hand that the other boy had tried to steady him with.
Fearing that if he hesitated much longer, Reynolds would take it upon himself to escort him back to the palace himself, Brimsley took one step towards the path, and then another. His leg was definitely numb to the bone, as was evidenced by the disconcerting sensation of his foot hitting the ground and yet his mind being completely unprepared for it to do so, sending him almost immediately into an almost comedic stumble.
Bracing for the impact of his face on an ill-placed stone or the muddy path that he had been traversing towards, Brimsley was entirely unprepared for the feeling of an arm wrapped around his waist from behind, tugging him back into a firm torso with an unfair amount of ease.
“I did tell you that this would be the case, did I not?” Reynolds’ warm breath as he spoke right into Brimsley’s right ear sent a shiver down the boy’s spine that was entirely improper, especially considering their… position.
Brimsley slumped into Reynolds’ hold, defeated but too proud to admit it.
“I am fine.” He grumbled, making a valiant effort to take some of his own weight back onto his shaky legs. Brimsley didn’t miss the chuckle Reynolds’ attempted to smother with his free hand but didn’t think his pride could survive him trying to address it.
“I am sure you are. Now come, take my cloak. I will escort you back but it will be all for naught if you manage to shake your soul from your body before I can get you before a hearth.” Before Brimsley could so much as open his mouth to protest, Reynolds was wrapping his traveling cloak around his slightly broader shoulders, tying it snugly before he shuffled them around so that the brunette’s arm was thrown around his neck and his own arm was wrapped tightly around the frigid boy’s torso, holding him close.
Thankfully for Brimsley but probably not for Reynolds, the cold had finally numbed not only Brimsley’s body but his mind as well, allowing for him to forget the heat that had been flaring through his cheeks just a moment prior at their situation.
All of his focus was split between trying desperately to burrow closer to the warmth that Reynolds and his thick cloak provided and not collapsing at the slow shuffle his companion had set for their pace as they made their way back towards the warmth and safety of the palace.
Reynolds seemed to be uneasy, glancing between Brimsley and the path like he couldn’t decide which to gaze upon. It was odd to him, being a contender for the forefront of someone’s attention. In the entirety of his ten and seven years of life, he had rarely been more than a fly on the wall of whatever room he was in. Even when he had been appointed the future Queen’s man, he had been second to the aide he had been appointed to train under for the foreseeable future. To have this near stranger show interest in him, even if it were born out of mere concern for his well being, filled a hole in Brimsley’s chest he hadn’t even known had been there until this very moment in time.
Some indiscernible amount of time later for Brimsley and the bright lights of the palace were finally within their field of view. Having made it this far, Brimsley was confident he would be let free to go lick his wounds in peace now that Reynolds had assuaged any possible guilt over his subpar condition.
But, if that were the case, why had the man beside him not withdrawn from his side? Perhaps he expected Brimsley to do so first, as it had been Reynolds to initiate the strange encounter in the first place? Yes, that must be it…
“Well, look-looks like yo-you have done it. I can take it from here, I assure y-you.” Brimsley tried to scrounge up any ounce of his remaining energy to straighten his posture and step away from the warmth of Reynold’s embrace.
“What are you going on about? I will see to it that you make it to a hearth and get out of these soaked clothes, at the least.” The blonde stepped back into Brimsley’s space, an incredulous look twisting upon his delicate features.
“Don’t be daft, yo-you have done your duty. Let me return you-your cloak and we shall part…” Brimsley clumsily slipped the cloak over his head, fingers too frigid to properly undo Reynolds’ knot, and handed it to the befuddled man before turning to go on with his night.
The last thing that he heard was a sudden influx of some high pitched ringing he had not the faintest clue where it originated from and, underneath it, Reynolds’ voice calling out a startled “Bartho- BRIMSLEY!”
And then, he was drifting.
Flashes of panicked bright blue eyes and being tousled around flowed through Brimsley’s consciousness, accompanied by a blanket of near unbearable heat descending upon him like hell upon earth had decided that one Bartholomew Brimsley was the perfect test subject for their upcoming reign.
Even in unconsciousness, Brimsley has always had a flair for the dramatics, it seemed.
As he mused to himself, he realized there was an odd weight surrounding his hand. Usually he slept on his side, curled around a spare pillow that he had never quite needed for his neck but found comfort in sleeping astride. Now, however, he was strewn on his back under an unseemly number of blankets and there was something warm encasing his right hand which was tingling as if being bitten by a hundred rogue fire ants.
The warmth removed itself from his right hand and before the half-aware Brimsley could mourn the loss of the pleasant balm for the tingling, it returned; this time, it surrounded his clammy left hand instead.
A soft, nearly animal noise sounded from somewhere in the room and it wasn’t until he processed the unnervingly familiar chuckle that he realized that the noise had been him.
Instead of studying the feeling of his rapidly multiplying mortification, Bartholomew tried to recall the source of the soft, raspy chuckle that had tugged at some invisible chord that ran throughout his body, sending his heart thudding against his ribcage.
As Brimsley sorted through the scrambled eggs that made up his memory, he processed the seemingly absentminded words of his companion as he mumbled beside the brunette.
“You daft idiot… what would you have done had I not been curious about your destination? I cannot believe you. If you were not so enthralling, you may have joined the spirits tonight, Bartholomew… That would be quite unfortunate.”
It hit him, then. Brimsley didn’t know how he could ever have forgotten the unusually helpful stranger. Later on, Brimsley would blame the following words that he spoke on the fever and nothing else (if that was the truth… well, that was his secret. One of them, at least).
“You think me ‘nthralling, Francis? Perhaps you ‘re the one who needs a doc’t’r. Seems your eyes may be’n ill condi’t’on… M’ quite unremark-...markable, y’see…” Brimsley managed to slur out, his mouth barely even half as responsive as his mind in the moment.
In the silence that followed his words, Brimsley found himself gripping the warmth surrounding his hand tighter and unknowingly nodding off yet again, his body having expended as much energy as it could spare for the moment.
Reynold’s soft response fell on deaf ears moments later.
Drifting back to consciousness was far less pleasant than its counterpart, Brimsley concluded, as he woke up from his slumber to the tolling of the servant’s bell with a crick in his neck, an unfortunately uncomfortable number of blankets bunched up in various positions across his body and a rapidly dwindling fire spitting useless sparks worryingly close to the aforementioned blankets atop him.
A stifled groan made its way past his lips as he began to shuck the blankets off of himself, desperate for a warm cup of tea and at least a quarter of an hour’s worth of stretches before reporting to his duties for the day. Hopefully his brash actions of the day before wouldn’t affect his work for today–
Suddenly, as if he’d been struck by lightning, Brimsley realized two very shocking things all at once. One, he was not in his bedchambers. Two, he was not alone. How did he come to this realization, exactly? Well, the fact that he was not in his own bed clothing and a very amused Reynolds’ sat at the foot of his own bed, watching the confused brunette practically fling himself to his feet in his rush to… well, he wasn’t really sure but lounging around in another man’s clothes under his blankets certainly was not it.
“I- I must apologize, I did not realize– you should have woken me and told me to return to my own quarters!” Brimsley stumbled in a quite uncharacteristic fashion, pulling at the hem of the soft shirt he’d never seen a day in his life, seemingly handcrafted and impossibly soft and hanging off his torso in ways he ensured none of his own clothing ever would.
“Woke you up? Brimsley, you came down with quite a fever. There was no “waking you up”, only waiting for your consciousness to return to you in its own time.” Reynolds’ voice was patient, as if speaking with a spooked animal rather than a man his own age.
“Still… You did not have to aid me. I’m sure you could have asked one of the night maids for the location of my quarters and dropped me off there instead. My goodness, how did you even get me back here? Surely you did not…?”
“Carry you? Yes, it was truly no trouble. And what part of a fever do you not grasp? You were not in any state to be left all by yourself.” The blonde rebuked, pulling on his boots absentmindedly as he watched Brimsley closely.
“How do you feel, by the way? Your color certainly has improved but that certainly doesn’t mean you aren’t still suffering from a low grade fever…” Reynolds’ intoned, eyes widening as he watches Brimsley practically dive for his own boots beside the hearth, shoving them on his feet with the grace of a particularly clumsy chicken.
“I feel absolutely fine and if you do not mind, I shall be returning to my own duties! Good day to you, Reynolds!” And with a quick dip of his head, Brimsley had vanished out the door, scampering out the door without any of his own clothing and still donning the loaned sleep clothing from the night before.
As the hasty footsteps recede down the hallway, Reynolds let out a sigh in the quiet of his room, silently slumping into his mattress and mourning the comfort that had come with the sound of Brimsley’s steady breathing throughout the night.
The week had been hectic– between preparations for the formal passing of power to the incumbent King George alongside his everyday duties, Reynolds barely had much more than a moment to himself each day. An unfortunate casualty of the position he holds as the King’s man but one that he would make every day for the rest of his life if needed to.
It had been yet another long day and Reynolds was prepared to fall into slumber the moment he returned to his too quiet chambers without much fanfare.
That was, until he opened his door and stopped right in his tracks because there, atop his carefully made sheets, was a small pile of clothes and a loose piece of parchment rolled atop them.
He would deny this until the day he died but, in his moment of elation and fervent curiosity, Francis tripped over himself as he attempted to kick off his shoes and (run) walk quickly over to sit on the edge of his bed. Carefully, he plucked the small roll of parchment off the top of the pile and steeled his nerves before carefully unrolling it.
There, in the most elegant handwriting he had seen from another servant, was a simple message from Brimsley, the boy who had not even a week ago been drenched, clinging to his side like a stray cat to the one who feeds them.
Thank you for your ineffable kindness to me the past week. You confound me in the most peculiar of ways. I washed your night garments that you so generously offered to me (and mended a hole in the right sleeve, as I happened to have a spare minute and a rudimentary knowledge of a needle and thread).
I suppose you were privy to this fact long before I but it seems as if we will be seeing much more of each other as time goes on, considering that you are the King’s man and I the Queen’s.
Again, my sincerest apologies and thanks to you.
I look forward to our next meeting. Hopefully this time, there will be less rain.
Reynolds read over the missive once, twice, and even thrice before finally setting down the parchment carefully on his bedside table. Turning, he picked up the recently washed and mended clothes and quickly swapped his daywear out for the far comfier nightwear, sinking into his mattress with an unconscious and entirely soft smile, finding himself curled onto his side, face buried in his sleeves.
Sleep claimed him quickly but even then, the blonde haired servant dreamed the same dream he had dreamt for a week straight.
After all, how else does one cope with the stress of one's own duties if not by replaying their happiest moment over and over within their own head? And if Reynolds spends his nights memorizing the feeling of Brimsley’s soft hand tightening around his own, burning the feeling of blossoming affection deep into his psyche so that he may never forget then, well… that’s for him and him alone to know.
