Work Text:
Some time after completing the reconstruction of the forge, Henry made his way to Kolín.
He wanted to tell Sam and Sarah. He did not know whether it would please them. They had already spent more than a decade without Martin. It might be too late to bring it up now. And after everything that had happened in Kuttenberg—having witnessed the massacre in the Jewish quarter and the people driven out and killed—he could not tell whether what he was about to share would be a comfort or only reopen wounds.
But without hearing from Sarah that Martin had once dreamed of opening a workshop in Kuttenberg, he did not think he could have endured all this hardship.
In his letters, Sam always took Henry’s work as if it were his own concern, treating it with earnest seriousness. In his most recent letter, he had written that there now seemed to be a prospect of Sam being able to open a tavern again in Kolín.
He felt as if all his worrying had been for nothing.
The mother and son who came out to greet him were overjoyed at Henry’s success—Sarah even in tears—and welcomed him from the bottom of their hearts. There was no trace left of the shadow of those days; if anything, they looked more resilient than he did.
Sam, with his perpetually sharp gaze, still looked the same, but that restless glint softened in front of his mother. He wore an honest, boyish smile.
It was truly a relief.
People in Kuttenberg kept silent about that day’s massacre. Neighbour had killed neighbour, and yet no one spoke of it. But Henry had seen it with his own eyes—the screams echoing through the streets, blades striking down those who had no means to defend themselves, people who had lost everything standing in silent ruin. He remembered it all.
Thinking it might be a little premature, he gave Sam a small knife engraved for the occasion of the tavern’s opening. Sam was delighted, proudly declaring that he would not use it, but display it in the most prominent place in the tavern.
He arrived at night.
They went out for dinner, but Sarah warned them, just in case, not to drink too much.
However, with John of Liechtenstein joining them, that warning became completely meaningless.
He arrived without his usual golden ornaments or deep blue Pourpoint.
Instead, he wore a soft white shirt with neatly fitted cuffs, the collar loosely open. Slightly longer hair replaced the former ornate adornments, resting against his neck.
Just by unfastening what had once been buttoned up to his throat, he looked like a completely different person.
The tense, sorrow-laden atmosphere that had clung to him was gone, replaced by something much gentler.
Each time the candlelight flickered, his white sleeves caught the light quietly.
Stripped of ornament, his splendour should have faded, yet he still drew the eye in a way that was hard to define.
He had always seemed somewhat detached from the world, but that refined elegance stood out all the more in this soot-stained place.
He did not look like someone displaced or persecuted—there was nothing in his bearing that suggested hardship or exile. By rights, a man of his wealth and noble standing should have felt out of place among those who had fled with little more than what they could carry. And yet no one seemed to find it objectionable. Instead, he was accepted, as though any distance that might have existed had been quietly dissolved by his own efforts for the community.
Each time Liechtenstein raised his cup, those beside him responded with laughter and a friendly slap on the back. It was clear enough from that alone how much he had done for them.
Sam spoke to him with an ease that would have seemed inappropriate toward a nobleman, yet there was a quiet pride in his voice. Watching them, Henry felt a small, quiet sense of relief settle in his chest.
The following morning, Henry decided to take Sam up on his offer to show him around the district. They could have breakfast together while they were at it.
Though they had made plans, Henry had neglected to ask where Sam actually lived. After stopping several residents to ask for directions, he finally found himself outside the right door.
After all they had drunk the night before, Sam might well have forgotten their arrangement. Thinking he might give him a small surprise, Henry quietly pushed the door open.
The first thing that caught his eye was the bedding—a deep crimson, likely silk.
It was unexpected. That corner alone looked fit for a nobleman's chamber. As far as Henry remembered, even in his former lodgings Sam had slept on a far plainer bed. Had Liechtenstein donated it?
The man in question lay asleep beneath the sheets, wrapped up to the top of his head. Perhaps the morning sun was too much for a hangover.
“Sam! I came as promised!”
He deliberately raised his voice. A muffled groan answered from the bundle of blankets.
“Come on, don't tell me you can't get up. I even brought you a remedy.”
“You are remarkably lively this early in the morning, Sa—”
The occupant of the bed finally poked his head out from beneath the covers and looked up at him.
Henry froze.
Then, with considerable effort, he suppressed what might otherwise have become an undignified shriek, placed a hand over his chest, and bowed deeply.
“M-My apologies! I seem to have entered the wrong room, Sir John!”
Unless he had somehow mistaken a failed alchemical concoction for a hangover cure, he could not possibly be seeing things.
When he looked up again, Liechtenstein had pushed himself upright and appeared entirely untroubled by the situation.
“No, this is Sam's room. You have done nothing wrong. Good morning, Henry.”
If he had not entered the wrong room, then the situation felt considerably worse.
Liechtenstein's bare upper body was exposed above the sheets. Beneath the folds gathered around his waist, a glimpse of naked thigh could be seen. He was probably wearing no undergarments at all.
There was a discarded pair lying on the floor.
“Looking for Sam?”
In sharp contrast to Henry's speechless horror, Liechtenstein spoke as though nothing were amiss, punctuating the question with a sleepy yawn.
Perhaps he was reading too much into it.
Perhaps his relationship with Hans had simply made him prone to such assumptions. Maybe the two of them had merely found themselves a woman after leaving the tavern. That would still be somewhat scandalous, but it was at least easier to explain.
“He said... he would show me around the district today...”
“Ah. Yes, I believe he did.”
While Henry struggled to form a coherent sentence, Liechtenstein stretched out comfortably across the bed and propped himself up on one elbow.
Those large eyes revealed nothing of what lay beneath.
Whether from lingering wine or lingering sleep, there was a languid heaviness to his expression.
Several marks remained visible across his chest.
It was obvious they were not something he had been born with.
They were familiar marks. Henry had noticed similar ones on Hans's chest more than once.
Liechtenstein rested a hand against his chin and raised a brow.
“Are you troubled because you've seen me naked? Or because you've just discovered that you and your brother may have rather similar tastes?”
“What are you—”
“You and—”
He lifted a finger and pointed at Henry, then directed it somewhere off to the side, as though indicating a second person standing there.
“Capon.”
The blood drained from Henry’s face.
“Did Sam tell you?”
The moment the words left his mouth, he knew he had made a mistake.
He had walked straight into it.
The laugh that followed was light and utterly unbothered.
“Not him. I rather doubt he's noticed anything at all. You know as well as anyone that, by necessity, I've become quite good at hearing what lies beneath people's words. From what Sam told me of your time under Žižka, and from the look on your face whenever you speak of Capon…”
Liechtenstein shifted position with a faint sound of discomfort. Drawing the sheets higher to cover legs that had previously been far too exposed, he smiled.
“…it becomes obvious soon enough.”
Henry's head was spinning too badly to think clearly.
Instead, his attention followed the movement.
The line of a leg visible beneath a single layer of cloth seemed more suggestive than bare skin might have been. His gaze drifted from ankle to thigh, then higher still.
And then—
Henry jerked his eyes away.
He had never imagined himself looking at another man that way.
Not anyone other than Hans.
More importantly, this was hardly the time for such thoughts.
A relationship that could never be allowed into the open had been uncovered by the very last person he would have chosen to know about it: a former spymaster.
And if Liechtenstein was bringing it up, then that meant—
Sam and he were also—
The realization left Henry reeling.
“This… this matter…”
Keep it secret.
Could he even ask that?
With a man like this, it would feel less like a request and more like handing over a weapon.
The words refused to come.
Only his trembling lips moved.
“Calm yourself. I have no intention of doing anything. I am far too busy to concern myself with the love affairs of young men. Though, of course, that would be another matter if you intended to blackmail me.”
For the briefest instant, something changed in his eyes.
It was the same look Henry had seen in Jobst and Sigismund—a look belonging to those who had ruled others with words alone. Cold. Calculating.
Henry straightened at once and shook his head.
“I would never speak of you and Sam to anyone.”
“Hah. I was only teasing.”
Just as quickly, the tension vanished. Liechtenstein relaxed back into his usual, almost languid expression.
Henry felt himself breathe again.
If anything were to happen to Hans, he did not know how he would endure it.
“Be that as it may, Sam has probably gone in search of breakfast. You should try the tavern from last night.”
“Thank you, Sir John.”
With every intention of making a swift retreat, Henry turned toward the door.
“Henry.”
The voice that stopped him was gentle.
Gone was the teasing. Gone was the rebuke.
Henry paused.
“The world is broader—and far more complicated—than you think.”
Liechtenstein's gaze settled on him.
“You will find a way through it.”
Henry turned back at those words.
Liechtenstein was still reclining in the same scandalously relaxed position, the morning light falling across his shoulders. Yet there was something undeniably noble in him.
Like a tree that remained unmoved no matter how fiercely the storm raged around it.
“…And if I don't?”
The question slipped out before he could stop it, touched with bitter self-mockery.
For the first time, Liechtenstein lowered his voice.
“Then come to me.”
A faint smile touched his lips.
“I will help you.”
Henry found himself at a loss for words.
He could only stare.
How much suffering had this man endured to stand before the world like this?
His very existence seemed proof that one could survive its cruelties without surrendering to them.
Seeing the look on Henry's face, Liechtenstein's smile deepened.
Following Liechtenstein's advice, Henry headed to the tavern.
Sure enough, Sam was there.
Part of him resented the man for being absent and leaving him to stumble into that situation. Then again, if he had walked in on the two of them together, he wasn't sure the outcome would have been any less disastrous.
The thought alone made him shudder.
Dropping heavily onto the bench beside Sam, who was leisurely eating an apple, Henry folded his arms.
“Henry! Where've you been? I went to your room. I thought we'd have breakfast together.”
Apparently, they had both had exactly the same idea.
There was something oddly fateful about that.
Still looking disgruntled, Henry replied,
“I went to yours.”
A long sigh escaped Sam before he could take a second bite.
He turned toward Henry with the expression of a man already fearing the answer.
“We talked.”
The color rushed into Sam's face so quickly it reached his ears.
In any case, Liechtenstein would probably tell him once he returned to the room.
“You can't be serious.”
Sam covered his face with one hand and groaned.
“How was John?”
Henry blinked. Yesterday, Sam had called him nothing but Liechtenstein.
“The same as always.”
Sam let out a deep sigh.
The sigh of someone who knew Liechtenstein all too well.
Henry stole a piece of bread from Sam's plate and, as a gesture of comfort, leaned lightly against his shoulder without looking directly at him.
“It doesn't bother me.”
That was a lie.
There were a hundred things he wanted to ask.
He had never imagined someone in such similar circumstances could be so close at hand.
For that matter, what had drawn Sam to Liechtenstein in the first place?
Liechtenstein was apparently unmarried, though he seemed several years older than Sam. Their stations in life could hardly have been more different. It was difficult to imagine them sharing the sort of easy companionship Henry had with Hans.
Like many men of the court, he lacked the hard edges of a soldier. There was something softer about him, in both bearing and form. He was nothing like Hans—neither tall and lithe nor possessed of that bright, effortless vitality.
If Hans was the sun, then Liechtenstein was the moon.
Quiet.
Touched by shadow.
Had it been inevitable for them as well?
Henry found himself wondering.
His thoughts drifted elsewhere.
He imagined carrying breakfast up to the second floor of their hideout.
Hans stirred awake in the bed at the far end of the room.
“Good morning, Henry.”
His eyes were still soft with sleep.
That fond voice.
The flash of white teeth behind an easy smile.
Golden hair, still tousled from sleep.
A sheet tangled around pale skin.
No.
Absolutely not.
What in God's name am I thinking?
Henry quickly looked away from Sam, suddenly far too aware of his own reaction.
Sam immediately leaned forward and seized him by the shoulders.
“Did he seduce you?”
“What? No! What are you talking about?”
“Then what's with that look on your face?”
“I wasn't making any face! And he didn't! I swear before God.”
“Which one? Mine or yours?”
That finally broke Henry.
He burst out laughing.
Sam grinned back at him.
Then he tossed the half-eaten apple to Henry, grabbed the basket from the table, and rose to his feet.
“Wait here a while. I need to bring breakfast to him before he starves to death.”
“You always bring him his meals?”
“No.”
“Then why today?”
A bad habit.
Questions always seemed to leave Henry's mouth before he had time to think better of them.
The look Sam shot him over his shoulder stopped him cold.
His face had gone bright red.
“Last night…”
Sam muttered the words, avoiding Henry's eyes.
"Last night... I may have been a little too rough on him. He's not likely to leave that bed anytime soon."
With that, he hurried off.
Henry could only stare after him in stunned silence.
You'll find a way through it.
Liechtenstein had smiled when he said it.
Perhaps he was right.
Perhaps things really could work out.
His more immediate problem was figuring out how to banish the image of a freshly awakened Hans from his mind.