Chapter Text
The next day seems gloomier. He should be taking a breath of relief, celebrating even, yet the looming dread seems to overtake his entire being. He needs to make calls again, and he’s entirely tired again.
This time, the calls aren’t of desperation and intent, they are confession and the bearer of the trepidation. Philip hates confrontations, never honing the skill to face the aftermath of his actions. He just doesn’t know how to do it right.
He might not have been behind the atrocities that his brother went through entirely, but he has enabled it to a certain extent. There’s no easy way around it, no denying it. Henry might be alive and still be broken beyond repair, and it’s all going to be his fault.
The first call, the first person to be called, should be their mother, but he is clueless on how to reach her without sounding either like a jerk or an indifferent tyrant. He can call her as son, inform her that her other son is on the deathbed, or he can call her as future king, inform her of the events formally.
He opts for someone who’d care for sure, someone whose reaction he can predict. Beatrice.
“Your Highness,” She greets in a perfect political tone, as if talking to the position, not her brother.
“Bea, I have informed your guards, they’re coming to get you. You need to be here.”
“That’s a vague order, Your Highness. May I know what the visit entails, without prior information? My apologies, I don’t suppose I am expected to abandon my schedule?”
“Bea, it’s Henry, he needs you here.”
The reaction is immediate, she asks a million questions per minute, all of which he can’t answer right now. He insists on waiting for her to reach the hospital before telling her the details.
He waits, alone in the room, dismissing all his security and his equerry for a few hours. He knows they’re lingering just outside the gate, around the hospital, yet he can’t face them as of now.
He doesn’t know how long it takes, it may be a few minutes or maybe even hours, but the second the door is slammed open, he knows the hatred his siblings have harboured towards him is going to boil over and burn through his existence.
“Why is he here, Philip? What happened?”
He notes her frizzled state, her hair held together by a small clutcher, has managed to run out in all directions. She’s wearing a floral knee-length dress paired with flip flops, the one she usually can’t wear outside of her wing in the palace.
“He’s in surgery, and the doctors are working on him. He sustained some serious injuries, but the worst is his rib bones. One of them has been broken and bent inward, healing incorrectly. They’re working on it. It’s grievous, but they can fix it. That’s all I know.”
How do you describe a nightmare? One that feels like it’s clawing your soul right out of your body, sucking it out of every orfices, every pore, and you have no choice but to sit through it and wait for it to be over.
Philip wonders if this is all but a nightmare; maybe he’ll wake up in another reality where Arthur is alive, Henry isn’t depressed, and Bea isn’t an addict. Maybe he’ll wake up in an alternate reality where he isn’t the heir apparent, his Gran isn’t obsessed with the monarch rule, and he hasn’t abandoned the only two people he can truly call family. Not because of blood but because it’s what they are.
The metaphorical family of royalty is somewhat the reason behind his predicament today, and he has no one to blame but himself.
“Why, Philip, I also asked you why Henry is here. Why is he hurt?” The hint of accusation in the tone isn’t missed. She is and will always be a fierce protector of the youngest.
“The military camp wasn’t service-based; it was a conversion therapy for him. The Queen gave the orders to get him straight, to ensure that he bides by the royal protocols.”
The answer is mechanical, but it sounds awful, even to him. He wonders, not for the first time in the last whole week, how he thought all these horrendous things were a necessity before. How did he justify this inhumane behaviour in the name of family?
“I’m giving you the benefit of the doubt, Your Royal Highness, just this once, tell me you didn’t know and approve of the orders of the Crown. For once, I’ll believe you without an ounce of hesitation. The obliviousness bled through the reality once again, and I’d appreciate it if you again didn’t know a single thing.”
It is the sheer desperation gripping her through her scruff to determine, to ensure that the bigotry blinding their brother hasn’t taken away his rationality to the point that he justifies the murder attempt made on Henry. He can’t possibly think this is also the right thing to do because the Crown believes so.
“I didn’t know Bea, I didn’t. I couldn’t possibly have known and stayed compliant. I would have stopped it right next second, but I didn’t know. A lot had been going on with the leak, and that American-”
In his rambling frenzy, he slips.
“The American you all hate to the core for no reason is the man our brother loves to death, Philip, so don’t you dare. Nothing is stopping that American boy from waging a war alone against the whole empire but the knowledge that Henry won’t approve. He needs to know now, and he needs to be here when Hen wakes up.”
And God, doesn’t Philip know that already? He knows Alex stopped camping outside the palace just because of Shaan’s intervention. Shaan, Philip needs to inform him, too. He is the only equerry among the three who was hired by their parents. He wasn’t just an employee.
He’ll be disappointed in Philip, too. He has managed to lose his face to just about everyone who matters in his life. He can’t even fathom standing in front of Mazzy and confessing to the shame of his existence now.
“I don’t know how to call him.” He meekly admits. This one’s easier to confess. He has no contact with the white house or the First Son. He can use his position, he can give orders, but he can’t be the King right now. He can’t make any of these conversations as the heir, and as just Philip, he is clueless about how to call a lover and inform him that the love of his life is almost dead.
“I will call him, and you make sure no one gets in his way once he arrives. He’ll tear down the place.” It’s not a threat, he notes. It’s not a warning, even, just a statement from someone who knows Alex on a personal level.
He has no chance to dignify her with a response; she’s already out of the room.
The next person he should reach out to should be Shaan; he has always been Henry’s first shield, up until the Crown had ripped him away from the Prince and forced him to handle the relationship with the political heads.
But he is desperate, the comfort he had been denying himself for almost a week now, he can no longer live without. Your lover is the one who you lay yourself bare in front of, the person you fear losing the most, and the person who witnesses the worst of your soul and still stays.
He had felt almost… disgusted with himself. He had let all this happen because Henry found a lover, who was he to find comfort in Martha’s embrace now? It almost feels like the guilt of taking away your sibling’s favourite toy and playing with it while they cry. Except, then you can give them the toy back and they become happy. Philip can’t give Alex back to Henry and be done with it.
Yet it all feels suffocating, the room is gradually going cold around him, and he feels like his lungs are freezing. In sheer desperation, as it feels like he is dying too, he calls the person he has been avoiding since he found out the consequences of his actions.
“Mazzy, please…. I can’t do this anymore.”
________
Alex has been counting days like a prisoner with false hope of gaining freedom. Every day he wakes up knowing he won’t escape the reality, yet he prays and hopes with every fibre of his body.
He has regular nightmares, the ones he doesn’t remember. But he wakes up with the name of his lover on the tip of his tongue. He had lost count of the number of times he had reached for his phone in the haze of panic, laced with aching need to listen to Henry’s voice, just to realise that he can’t do this anymore.
In the worst days, it’s hard to grasp that the forever he had been steadily building up for almost a year has been snatched away overnight just because the idiotic wicked witch of the west made a failed attempt to win the election.
He remembers feeling almost…. Disappointed when his mother won the election again. If she had to win anyway, why did the politics rob him of his very reason to be alive? It all feels unfair and almost unreal. But then he remembers.
The last day in the palace, when Shaan came to get him out. He had planted the seed of false hope.
“Every second you spend protesting and visibly antagonising the Crown is every hour added to the exile His Highness has been assigned to. You can’t fight them when they have Henry hidden away, Alex. They won’t spare a single thought before holding him accountable for your decisions. Your best shot at bringing him back is to stay put in America and convince them that you’ve given up.”
Alex understood Shaan was serious when he took Henry’s name instead of calling his designation. Shaan knew the Crown and their mindset better than Alex did, and he couldn’t afford to let his recklessness cost Henry his safety.
But that was 5 and a half months ago, and his patience is running thin. There has been radio silence on the Crown’s part, except for a single official statement that made the public aware of Henry’s whereabouts.
The Crown didn’t address the email leak, nor did they contact the white house. Nothing.
It all feels like a cruel joke. No one knew they were together, and when they were exposed, Henry had been whipped out of his life as if he didn’t exist at all. The phantom presence had him in a chokehold. Henry was laced in every aspect of Alex’s life irrevocably. And without a single contact, every day felt like someone was physically trying to pull apart Alex’s life.
He constantly feels exhausted, snappy, and the joy of meeting anyone is extinct. Not even his family can pull him out of his reverie. There’s this constant fear of not knowing what’s happening with Henry.
In the year they’ve been not-dating/dating. He had almost lived Henry’s life with him through the emails, as Henry lived his life. He feels lost without the daily journaling in their shared emails.
He misses Henry like a lost limb. The constant state of loss is slowly killing him.
Then, as if to mock him for even assuming that this is the worst life can get, Bea calls. The Crown, those absolute monsters… have almost succeeded in murdering the love of his life in a slow, torturous death, and he has no idea.
They were killing him, they had almost killed him, maybe they did kill him in every way except demise in its literal sense, and Alex can’t do anything about it. The rage he feels overcomes every other feeling.
The flight to Heathrow is numb, he’s shaky, fidgeting with Henry’s signet ring, the only tangible proof he has of their love, and he barely registers June beside him. It’s Shaan who receives them once they land, but he barely speaks past the common courtesy and the single line; he was kept in the dark, too.
The hospital is not far, or maybe Alex has dissociated the whole ride. They’re led to the private quarters in the VIP wing. He sees the light of the ICU flashing, giving away the exact location of his sweetheart, but he’s not allowed inside.
They’re led to the adjacent waiting room, where Bea is sitting, along with Martha and Philip. Alex mutters a small request, “Shaan, lock the door, please,” and he charges straight towards the heir apparent.
Alex pulls up Philip by his collar, backing him up against the wall by his neck. Philip struggles in his hold, but he’s got nothing on Alex, who is currently driven by serious feelings and blind rage.
“When I first heard about you through him, he was the only reason I didn’t touch a single hair on you. He protected you for whatever reasons, they aren’t important now. You’ve managed to ruin your protection. Tell me why I shouldn’t kill you?”
Shaan blocks the door, ensuring that the security doesn’t know what is going on. He knows this can get him arrested, but he doesn’t care anymore. Bea tries to talk to Alex, whereas Martha tries to pull him away, but it does nothing to deter him.
“I…. I didn’t know… I swear I didn’t know.. Please. Let me explain.” Philip forces out, barely managing to breathe as the grip tightens around his neck.
Alex has this urge, he finally has the chance, and he wants to act. The chance of talking, of pleading, has long gone; he’s past all the efforts of peace and symphony. But a voice in his head, that vaguely resembles Henry, warns him. This isn’t how he should be acting.
“You had a long time to explain, when Arthur died, when Catherine disappeared, when Mary decided that Henry’s existence was an abomination, when Henry begged Bea to stay, when Mary forced him to go to the military. Every single time you had a chance to speak, to do better, and maybe to look at your brother as a person instead of the Throne’s puppet.”
It’s devastatingly beautiful, the silent tears cascading down Alex’s face. But no one mistakes it as a weakness; they are the sign of the intensity of the feelings coursing through him. If it wasn’t for his hold on Philip, he would be shaking. Vibrating with the inability to control his emotions,
“Alex, please, I know he made a mistake, but this is not the time or place to fight. Let him go, please.” Martha pleads, she has spent the last 8 hours knowing everything Philip has done intentionally or unintentionally, and knowing that it’s going to cost him much more than he can ever pay.
“I don’t know how to let him go, Martha. If Henry dies, so do I. No questions asked, but I will make sure that this monarch, this Throne is demolished, I’ll watch its ruins fading away in the ashes before I burn down myself with it.”
Beatrice can’t help the sob that leaves her body, the implication of what this all can lead to, the weight of the possibility she doesn’t want to consider. It all becomes too real suddenly.
Reluctantly, she makes an effort to make Alex face her, focus on her.
“Henry isn’t dying, Alex. He’s hurt, barely there, but he is still with us. Listen to me. Henry. Is. here.”
Something snapped in him, and he fell back, falling on his knees. He was gasping, visibly dragging air inside to breathe, but it was hardly working. Bea tried to hold him, but that did so much to help.
What no one expected was Shaan taking charge. He firmly took hold of both of Alex’s hands and guided him through box breathing and grounding techniques. Alex was grateful to have him; he was the only close connection to Henry right now. One that felt like tangible proof of everything that had happened.
“Shaan..Shaan, you told me right. You told me I have to wait. I did. I made everyone believe Henry wasn’t the reason for my existence; I did it. You told me they’ll give him back, give him back to me now. Give me my Henry back, or take me to him, there’s nowhere he can go that I won’t follow. I promised him forever. Please, Shaan-”
It was a grueling and horrifying experience altogether. Philip, to his horror, couldn’t begin to fathom what exactly he could do to make it all better. HE did this. He did this to his brother, and his brother was his responsibility, just like the whole country would be one day. Is he capable of taking care of anyone at this point?
They soon sedate Alex to get him to calm down. Shaan tells them in a catatonic haze that he had experience in handling such situations due to Henry. He speaks of how he regrets leaving Henry to the crown, how he is scared that there was no one in the military to hold him every time his breathing went out of control.
And it isn’t the worst thing that could have happened with all the torture, but somehow it stings. Because it was Shaan’s job to make sure Henry doesn’t lose himself in his panic attacks and anxiety, it was his job to ensure Henry is breathing properly. His job, no one else’s.
And without a single word, he is assigned to Henry as his equerry again.
The next time Alex wakes up, he doesn’t speak. Not to the royal family members, not to his family, that is constantly trying to get to him through texts and messages. He doesn’t speak, he no longer has any words left for others, Henry, Henry, Henry, his Henry, his brain seems to chant his lover's name, hoping that the voiceless prayer somehow reaches him.
But it doesn’t. It does nothing.
The doctor informs them about the complications of the surgery. Due to the limited expansion and inflammation in the lungs, Henry needs to be kept on a ventilator. They had to file to remove the protruding bone and stabilize it with titanium bars. Lastly, they’re putting him on medically induced coma to avoid possible rejection of the treatment from the body, as well as Henry, as an outcome of prolonged Trauma.
What Alex hears is that they think Henry might not want to recover, that he might have given up on Alex, on everything. And he feels like he is going to throw up, but it doesn’t happen because, of course, it doesn’t. All the pain, all the adversities, God has cruelly assigned it to Henry’s fate and made Alex sit through the torture, watch him perish. His fate, his punishment, is to stay alive and witness it all happening.
__________
Dear Alex,
My love. You have no idea how excruciating time has been without you, as if each second needs a moment itself to gather its thought to pass by. It doesn’t make much sense, I suppose, I’ve lost my senses to all these special treatments here that are designed for me.
Love, Alex, will you find it in yourself to mayhaps.. Forgive me one last time for leaving you behind? This time, it truly isn’t my intention or will for this to happen, but I’m bound to the shackles I can no longer escape from.
I want you to move on, love, I want you to find your happiness again. In something, or maybe someone who isn’t a prisoner of a throne, someone who isn’t a prisoner of life itself. My time with you has been the only source of comfort these days, but it has been slipping through my fingers no matter how hard I try to hold onto it. The sand has run out, Alex.
I don’t know if you’re getting these letters, most probably you aren’t, so I’m writing this here, in the hopes that the world never finds out my pathetic self begging to be exempt from the punishment I’ve been getting for being who I am.
For once, I believe I would have begged on my knees to escape this place. But I don’t think that they plan on letting me out of here. This might be my last letter. I can’t hold on any longer. I’ll try writing to Pip, to ensure that you get the message, not of my perilous adventure, but of my regretful demise. I didn’t want us to end like this, my Love. Forgive me.
I hope that if the afterlife exists, we may unite again in a timeless dimension. I love you. I’ve loved you till my death, and sorrowfully, ‘till death do us part’ is the only vow I would be able to fulfill.
Eternally yours.