Chapter Text
By the end of the first week, Cuno had become more than comfortable with his new accommodations. Comfortable enough to snoop. Though he found it hard to think of it as snooping when it was all out in the open.
From his spot on the most comfortable armchair in the house - perhaps even in Revachol - he asked, “What’s with all the horses?” and motioned to the general living room area.
Jean had taken up the couch in order to get the most of the mild spring air from the open patio. He lifted his gaze to Cuno when he’d spoken and kept it up long enough to see him motion to the horses in question. Not that he needed to be reminded of how many fucking ponies he had in this room alone. He looked back down and continued with his original task: a light tailoring job on Cuno’s uniform to account for the kid’s proportions a little better. “They’re gifts, mostly,” he explained in a deadpan manner that let Cuno know that he would need to find another topic to bully him over if embarrassment was his goal. “Judit’s daughter likes them, heard I used to work with them, and I just became the horse guy. Other people saw the ponies she gave me and thought it was hilarious, so they got me more.” He shifted in his seat now that the ache in his back had begun to bother him a little too much, and looked up with an amused little smile as he did, “Joke’s on them, though. I think they’re cute and fun and really tie the room together.”
There was definitely no room for bullying here. The ponies weren’t a source of embarrassment or some kind of ironic shield for fragile masculinity that crumbled the moment they were pointed out. Cuno would have to find another soft spot if he wanted a reaction, but he was tactical in his assaults; he wouldn’t start a new observation so quickly, because then it would be obvious he was just looking for that.
But also, he was genuinely interested now.
“Were you a farmer?” he asked, then, with far more joyous wonder, “Were you a boiadero?!”
Jean almost considered lying, just for the sake of that excitement and keeping it ignited, but he didn’t know enough about boiaderos to keep up a lie like that, and someone would no doubt ruin it anyway. Instead, he shook his head and looked halfway apologetic. “Nothing so glamorous. Sorry. I was one of those officers you see on horseback.”
Cuno’s excitement only slightly dimmed, still kept slight by the mental image of that. Jean was one of the top three biggest sons of bitches Cuno knew, right up there with Titus Hardie, who were both slightly above Mack Torson. Horses were also pretty fucking big, and riding one was known to make anyone look cool as hell. With all of that in mind, he could imagine Jean on horseback looking pretty fucking scary in the coolest possible way. The type of cop you wouldn’t even consider fucking with, because if the horse didn’t stomp you out, the guy riding it would.
He tipped his chin up slightly as a show of respect to Jean, “That’s fucking cool.”
Jean raised an eyebrow, but didn’t say anything. He was smiling though. Humble, perhaps? Even cooler.
(Jean was only quiet because whatever the kid was thinking was still far better than the truth, and he’d already denied him one dose of magic today.)
“Why’d you stop?”
Jean shrugged a shoulder, still working on the fabric with such intense focus that Cuno was worried it would crumble under the weight. “Harry wanted an MC. We couldn’t have both.”
“Oh my god…” Cuno sat up straighter with a look of horrified interest, “what happened to your horse?”
Jean lifted his gaze to look him in the eye. “How do you think they made the glue to hold the MC together?”
The wide-eyed, horrified stare was completely worth it, and Jean wasn’t trying hard at all to keep his composure. He shook his head with a rough chuckle. “Sorry, that was cruel, she didn’t become glue.” (he paused for a second to hear the sigh of relief. Still funny.) “She’s still at the precinct, it just didn’t make any sense to have me on her if I had an MC. Someone else would be able to ride her while I wasn’t.”
Cuno was quiet then, just for a handful of seconds, and then his mental maths problem fell into place: “If Old Major fucked the whip, does that mean you get her back?” he asked, then clarified, “The horse, I mean,” and Jean wasn’t sure what else he could have meant but didn’t think to ask.
“There’s nothing stopping me, as far as I know. It’s just more of a patrol officer thing. I’m doing desk work, more often than not.”
Cuno only replied ‘huh’, then went quiet again. Jean was focusing on the uniform, but there was a question hanging in the air between them that started to lay too heavy on his shoulders to continue. He looked up to see Cuno pointedly avoiding looking at him, concentrating hard on nothing in particular on the wall in front. He seemed to ignore Jean even harder when he felt his eyes on him.
“Do you want to meet—“
“Yeah!”
//
Cuno had never met a horse. He knew they were big, but he didn’t know they were big. His pride was the only thing keeping him moving toward the beast instead of being rooted to the ground or just straight up turning around and leaving. His pride and Jean’s gruff encouragement, though that also fed back into his pride anyway. He’d managed to make the jog to the precinct that morning with only one stop to rest, and Jean had put his arm around his shoulders to pat him with the slightest pull toward him while he told him he’d done a great job — so, yes, he was riding a high far more potent than he knew what to do with, and he didn’t want to fuck it up by giving himself an excuse to feel like a failure.
When he got close enough, Jean held out a wrapped candy for him to take. “Here. Like all good RCM officers, she loves bribes.”
Cuno took the candy, eyed it like he was expecting it to start hissing at him, then nodded at Jean. “So… ?” he lifted his hand, palm up, and held it there expectantly. When Jean didn’t move, he curled his fingers inward impatiently- just as impatiently as the horse pawed at the stable floor while the humans wasted time giving her the treats she knew they had. Finally, Jean relented and handed another bit of candy over with a quiet mutter of ‘fucker’ under his breath. Cuno wasn’t above seeking a bribe from another officer in order to bribe a horse. Or, another officer, to continue the joke, in which case he’d have to consider the corruption going on here later.
He unwrapped one and popped it in his mouth - butterscotch, the kind that grandparents seemed to conjure from thin air - then unwrapped the other to lay back into his palm. He took a step toward the horse, then looked at Jean who encouraged him with a nod toward the horse, and that was all he needed to hold his hand out to the animal. She didn’t waste any time in shoving her nose into his palm to get the candy, since they’d spent far too much time taunting her with it already. Cuno exhaled out tension he didn’t even know he was holding and looked back to Jean, who he’d quickly learned had a tense relationship with emoting, so the half-smile he had on was about as close as he’d get to straight up beaming right now.
It was nice. He’d keep riding that high, it seemed. He felt bolder now, bold enough to lift his hand and carefully lay it on the horse’s soft nose to give her a few gentle pets on it, and he didn’t get bitten or scare her off, so it just kept rising in potency. Was this dangerous? Would he die?
Did people often worry for their health because they felt too good?
”Shit, I didn’t even ask her name,” he suddenly realised and looked to Jean like he’d just realised he had left the stove on, “do I call her Officer?”
Jean scoffed, “No. Her name is Teyssier. She’s one of the nicest mares in here,” he reached out to pet between her ears, “usually they’re more…” he looked over his shoulder at the rest of the stables, then back, “… she’s less of a character, let’s put it that way.”
He undid the bolt on the stable door and pulled it open, revealing the rest of the horse to Cuno, reminding him of just what he was currently petting like a standard house cat. “What are you doing?” He tried to keep his voice level, but this was a little further into the deep end than he’d planned to go. He couldn’t see Jean around the horse and didn’t want to move more than necessary, but he could hear him rummaging around inside.
“Junior officers are allowed to ride the horses as long as there’s a trained superior present - that’s me, by the way - but it never said anything about those officers having to be on duty.” He re-appeared brandishing a saddle. “Only if you want to, though. I just figured, we’ve got time…”
Cuno couldn’t answer right away. There was too much excitement wrestling with nervousness for how he should feel. In the end, the excitement won, and he couldn’t help grinning as he nodded enthusiastically.
/
Jean Vicquemare was the worst fucking person alive. Cuno had told him this, and he’d just laughed and agreed without any shame or apology in his voice.
Here’s what had happened: He’d convinced Cuno to get on a fucking horse, he’d got on the horse too, made sure Cuno wasn’t in danger of falling off or thinking he was able to fall off, and things had been fairly fucking simple. Fun, even! Teyssier was more than happy to tote them from stable to small path that one could describe as scenic- about as scenic as Jamrock got, anyway; just overgrown enough to be pretty, used frequently enough to be traversable without much issue.
The first red flag was Jean saying, “This looks good,” but Cuno ignored it. The second was Jean saying, “You won’t fall unless you really fuck up somehow, so try not to really fuck up somehow,” which Cuno had simply replied with ‘huh?’ and then ‘right, yeah!’
Apparently that’s all the permission Jean needed to send their steed into maximum fucking overdrive.
He made a short little whistling sound, and Teyssier began to jog, or whatever horses called it. Cuno’s heart started racing, but he wasn’t too worried at all- he was under no illusion about his size and how Jean currently boxed him in, his hands covered Cuno’s on the reins for extra security, and he really would have to work hard to fuck up somehow. They continued at that pace for about a minute, then Jean had asked him if he was all good, and he was, so he said ‘you fuckin’ know it!’ like some sort of idiot.
Because then Jean made another short whistling sound that was slightly different this time, and Teyssier started to fucking gallop because of course that’s what a horse would do. Cuno’s hands were white-knuckling the reins and he couldn’t hold in the weird, embarrassing little whimper-yell that came out of him. Jean was quick to grab on to that, asking if he was still good, and of course Cuno said yes again because the adrenaline was making him stupid.
“She’s just- fucking fast!” Was all he could say to explain himself, yelled over the sound of wind and hooves, and he felt less stupid when he felt Jean laugh more than he heard it.
Then, without warning, another shrill whistle broke through the blood rushing in his ears, and he didn’t know what the fuck the horse was doing now, but it definitely broke the fucking sound barrier. It was bordering on too much; the adrenaline was turning into something less fun, like panic, but he still hears himself laughing and yelling just to get some of the emotion out. He didn’t realise they’d slowed down until they were back to the light jog, and only really came back to his senses when they’d stopped entirely. End of the road. Time to turn back.
Jean tugged the reins and Teyssier turned around to start walking back down the way they’d come. “Still good?” He asked Cuno, who could actually hear him now that the wind had stopped drowning everything out, “Too much?” He placed a hand on Cuno’s shoulder in a small show of concern. He didn’t want to kill the kid.
Naturally, Cuno’s ego got the better of him. “‘Course not! Time of my fucking life!” He pried his now free hand from the reins to pat Jean’s condescendingly, “Takes more than a pony ride to rough me up!”
Here’s where Jean became the worst person alive: Instead of letting himself be a spoilsport, he chose to listen to the kid’s obvious ego speaking. Accepting his role as bringer of humility, he just said, “Oh,” with vague intrigue, then all but cemented Cuno’s hand back down onto the reins with his own, and asked without actually asking, “so you don’t mind if I do this-?”
And he did that one whistle that meant they’d soon be breaking the sound barrier again. Teyssier didn’t need much time to go from a leisurely stroll to whatever the fuck this was, so Cuno barely had a moment between then and now to regret being so pig-headed.
His voice was hoarse and wavering by the time they’d returned to the stable, and his legs were still trembling from the adrenaline by the time they’d entered the precinct proper. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d had as much fun- genuine fun, at the expense of no one. Nor could he remember ever feeling so awake in the morning without speed in his system.
So, okay, maybe ‘worst person in the world’ was out of line- a complete lie, in fact. He’d apologised to Jean for it, because he could tell that it had begun to gnaw at him after his own adrenaline had settled down. Jean couldn’t ever settle with the idea that he’d taken a joke too far and ended up doing more harm than good — especially to Cuno, who, through all his bravado, was still just a kid that he’d found and decided he had the ability to do him any good.
Still, there were easier ways to teach lessons — not to mention Cuno hadn’t learned shit except horses were faster and larger than he’d realised. Go figure.