Chapter Text
Linhardt was bored. This wasn’t unusual for him; he’d been confined to bed for the better part of the month, and it was the third time this year already he’d been bedridden for this long. The doctor had come by earlier, to perform yet another examination, and worse, take another blood sample.
Afterwards, she had talked to his father in the hallway. They had forgotten to close the door completely, and Linhardt had heard them.
“You still haven’t found out what’s wrong?” asked his father, sounding agitated.
“Well, there’s more tests...” said the doctor.
“Run them then,” snapped his father.
“Yes, of course,” said the doctor.
Now, alone in the room, watching the dust motes drift in the thin shaft of sunlight peeking through the curtained window, Linhardt leaned his head back against the pillow and sighed. More tests. Always more tests.
He wondered if he was always going to be stuck in bed like this.
It wasn’t like he hated it. Sleeping was one of his favorite things to do, after all, and you didn’t need to go outside to read books. Although, it would be nice to sit in the sun and read...
He glanced towards the bookshelf in the corner. He’d already finished the books on his bedside table, and nobody had come by his room to bring him new ones since the doctor left. The servants were all busy; somebody important was supposedly coming to the manor today, to visit his father. It suited Linhardt just fine that he was too sick to be subjected to an introduction—it was terribly boring to have to listen to guests talk while he had to pretend to be polite and listen.
But it did mean that there probably wouldn’t be anybody to check on him until evening. He weighed his choices. He could get up and go retrieve new books himself, but...honestly, he wasn’t sure he could make it all the way across the room and back without fainting. Having his blood taken always made him dizzy. He could also just sleep. Sleeping was nice. But he’d been sleeping for so much of the day already...
He didn’t get a chance to think further than this, because the sound of shouting and running footsteps reached his ears from beyond the still cracked open door to the room.
“What’s going on?!” said the voice of one of the servants.
“Fire in the kitchen! We need hands!” called back another.
“Did anybody see where that kid went?” said somebody else.
“Check the east wing!”
The sounds were already starting to move away from the corridor—towards the kitchen, probably. A fire? For a moment, Linhardt worried that his books might be in danger, but, if the fire was threatening, surely somebody would have come to retrieve him. It would be taken care of, and the day would go on, just as boring as—
The door creaked as somebody slipped inside the room.
It was a boy, perhaps Linhardt’s age. He’d turned his back on the room almost as soon as he’d stepped inside it to per back into the corridor; he must not have noticed Linhardt in the bed. All Linhardt could tell from this angle was that he had blue hair and his clothes were rumpled—they seemed too fine to be a servant’s, but he wasn’t sure if they were a noble’s clothes, either. A merchant’s son, perhaps? Was that the guest his father was entertaining?
“Excuse me,” he said, after a moment passed and the boy still hadn’t turned around.
Now he did, and quickly, raising his fists in front of his face. “Who’s there?! I—oh.” He relaxed, and Linhardt could see his face now: wide eyes, snub nose. He shifted his weight from foot to foot, looking sheepish. “Um, sorry, did I wake you up?”
“Yes,” said Linhardt, because he was already annoyed at the unwanted intrusion, and he was hoping it would make the boy go away quicker.
“How come you were asleep?” the boy said instead. “It’s the middle of the day. Oh! Are you like, um, one of those sleeping princesses? In the stories?” he stepped towards the bed eagerly.
Linhardt’s hands clutched at his blankets. “I’m not a girl,” he said.
“Huh? But your hair’s all long...” said the boy, stopping too close for comfort. He peered more closely at Linhardt’s face. “Hmm, okay, I guess you could be a boy.”
“I am Linhardt von Hevring,” said Linhardt, sitting up straighter in the bed. Maybe if the boy knew who he was, he would understand that he should leave.
“I’m Caspar,” said the boy. “So, if you’re not a princess, how come you’re in bed?”
Ugh. It wasn’t working. “I’m sick,” said Linhardt irritably.
“Oh,” said the boy, Caspar. “Sorry.”
More footsteps sounded in the hallway, and Caspar jumped, looking back towards the door. “Don’t tell me you’re the one they’re looking for?” said Linhardt.
Caspar turned towards him again, looking guilty. “Y-yeah...I didn’t mean to do it, honest! My father said not to get in the way, so I was just looking around, and I smelled something really good and I was hungry and they were making those really good sweet buns in the kitchen and I was only gonna take one, but then I knocked a bunch of stuff over, and um, yeah. Sorry.” He stood by the bedside, head hanging down like one of the puppies at the stable when they made a mess where they weren’t allowed.
Linhardt stared at him. Why was this boy apologizing to him, of all people? Well, there were a lot of reasons why he should be, but this wasn’t one of them. “It’s my father you should be worrying about, not me,” he said eventually.
Caspar winced. “He’s not gonna be half as mad as my father if he finds out,” he said.
“You haven’t heard my father tell somebody off before,” said Linhardt. “It goes on for ages. It’s dreadfully boring.”
“Yeah, well, you haven’t seen my father get so mad he punches a hole through the wall.”
Linhardt blinked. “I wouldn’t like to see that,” he said.
“Didn’t think so. Hey, um, so, can I stay here for a bit? If they can’t find me maybe they’ll forget about me being there.”
Linhardt sincerely doubted the kitchen staff would forget, but found himself strangely hesitant to say no. “All right,” he said, sighing. “You can stay.”
Caspar brightened. “Really? Thanks! You wanna play a game or something?”
“No,” said Linhardt. “I want you to get me some books, so I can read them while you go sit in the corner or something. Quietly.”
“That sounds boring,” said Caspar, but drifted towards the bookshelf regardless. He picked a book seemingly at random and took it down, inspecting the cover and then opening it. “Whoa. Can you read these?”
“Of course,” said Linhardt. “You can’t?”
“I-I can read!” said Caspar defensively. “Mostly. A little. But this stuff is really hard! Books are better with pictures, anyway.”
“Picture books are for infants,” said Linhardt.
“Hey! I’m not an infant! I’m almost seven.”
“Really? And you can’t read?”
“I just said—“ the boy’s voice was rising in agitation. Well, good. Served him right for barging in here, anyways.
“Are you going to bring me a book or not?” said Linhardt, interrupting him.
“Fine,” said Caspar, turning back to the shelf. He scanned the shelves—it took him much longer than it would have taken Linhardt, of course. Finally, he took one down. “Oh, I know this one! Goneril and the Green Knight!”
“Yes, I’ve read it before. Although it’s been a while...”
Caspar opened the book, scanning the pages. “Father was reading it to us, but he never finished ‘cause he got really busy. I really wanted to know how it ended, too.”
“Well,” said Linhardt, “At the end, the Green Knight turns out to be—“
“Hey! Don’t tell me! That’s no fair!” said Caspar.
“I thought you wanted to know,” said Linhardt.
“I do, but...oh, hey, I know! You can read it to me!” Caspar beamed as if he’d just come up with a brilliant idea.
Linhardt stared at him. “Why would I do that?”
“Because...uh...” he shrunk a little. “I don’t know. I just thought...”
Linhardt watched him for a moment. As annoying as this whole disturbance was, it had at least broken up the monotony of the day. So...perhaps it wouldn’t be so terrible. He sighed again. “All right. Give it here.”
“Huh?” Caspar looked up, surprised. “Really? Are you sure?”
“I suppose,” said Linhardt grudgingly.
Caspar smiled again, so brightly it was like the light of the sun. Linhardt wasn’t sure he’d ever made anybody smile like that before. Usually they were frowning. Because he was ill, or because he’d fallen asleep somewhere strange, or because he wasn’t acting enough like a noble child ought to. But Caspar was smiling. “Thanks!” he said cheerfully, and brought the book over to the bed.
Linhardt took it from him. “Which part were you at?”
“Uh, oh, I think it was after the lord gave Goneril the boar’s head on the third night,” said Caspar.
“I’ll start there, then,” said Linhardt, flipping through the pages until he got to that part, then cleared his throat. He hadn’t read aloud in a long time—his mother used to sit with him sometimes, when he was still learning. For some reason, he was a little nervous. “Here we are... ‘The lord, with merry jest, and laugh of gladsome glee...’”
It took him nearly an hour to finish the tale, and Caspar sat in the chair next to the bed, raptly attentive, for all of it.
“So they didn’t have a big fight after all?” said Caspar, when it was done. “Aww...I was really looking forward to that!”
“It’s a fable,” said Linhardt. “It’s not supposed to...” a yawn cut off the rest of his sentence. He hadn’t realized how tired he’d gotten.
“Ugh, that’s no good,” said Caspar. “Stories about fighting are way better. Someday, I’m gonna be a knight, and I’m gonna go on all kinds of adventures! And fight a bunch of evil guys.”
“Mm-hmm,” said Linhardt sleepily. “You have fun with that.”
“Beats sitting around in a stuffy old room all day,” said Caspar.
That roused Linhardt slightly. “I’m sick,” he said.
“You can’t be sick forever,” said Caspar. “That’s stupid.”
“The doctor said I might be,” said Linhardt.
“Well, the doctor is stupid, then,” said Caspar. “Everybody knows all you need to do to get better is get lots of sleep and some fresh air. And soup.”
“If it was that easy, I'd have been cured a long time ago,” said Linhardt sourly.
“S-sorry,” said Caspar, looking sheepish. “I didn’t mean...uh, sorry.”
Linhardt shook his head. “Never mind. Just...I’m tired. You should go.”
“Okay...” said Caspar. “Um...thanks for letting me stay in here. And reading. You’re really good at it.”
“It was no trouble,” said Linhardt, a little surprised by his own response. It really hadn’t felt like so much of a hassle. He was almost sorry that he couldn’t keep his eyes open much longer.
Caspar looked towards the door, hopping down from the chair. “I haven’t heard anybody out there for a while. So hopefully everything’s all calmed down. Alright. I’m gonna go. Nice to meet you, Linhardt!”
“Bye...” said Linhardt, eyes already drifting shut.
It was night by the time he woke up again, and somebody was in his room. A servant. She was over by the bookshelf, replacing the books that had been on his bedside table. And... Goneril and the Green Knight.
“Oh! Master Linhardt,” she said, turning to face the bed when she heard the bedsheets rustle. “You’re awake.”
“Yes,” he said. “What time is it?”
“It’s well past dinner,” she said, “But I’m sure I can have something—well, there was a disturbance in the kitchen earlier, but if you’re hungry...”
“What happened in the kitchen?" he asked.
“There was a small fire,” she said. “Nothing to worry about though! It was taken care of right away. One of the knights thought they had seen Count Bergliez’s son hanging around there before it happened, but we couldn’t find him after...oh, I’m so sorry, I didn’t mean to go on like that...”
“I don’t mind,” said Linhardt, slowly beginning to understand. Count Bergliez. Linhardt had met him once, not so long ago...the old Count had passed away, his father had said, and this was the new one. “The Count’s son. What was his name?”
“I believe it started with a C...” said the servant. “I’m sorry, I don’t quite remember.”
“It's all right,” said Linhardt. “Thank you. If there’s any food left in the kitchen, I wouldn’t mind it.”
“Yes, Master Linhardt,” said the servant, bowing before she left the room, and leaving Linhardt alone with his thoughts.
So it had been him. Caspar...he was a noble, after all. He hadn’t acted much like other noble children Linhardt had met, but then again, Linhardt didn’t either.
Maybe...maybe it would be nice, if they met again. He wouldn’t mind that.