Chapter Text
Falcon-Gentle
Disclaimer: Not mine, Shakespeare's and Renaissance Films'. Not making any money out of this and no offence intended.
Warnings: Non-graphic descriptions of hunting.
Thanks as always to my beta, Fiona Pickles.
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An eagle for an emperor
A gyrfalcon for a king
A falcon-gentle for a prince...
A peregrine for an earl...
A lanner for a squire
A merlin for a lady...
A goshawk for a yeoman...
Boke of St Albans, 1486
The castle of St-Quentin was all but still, this close to midnight. Somewhere up on the walls, and in the armed camp beyond, were sentries, bored but watchful; Henry could hear their tread above the courtyard, and the whicker of a horse, over in the pasture. A dog barked in the town hard by, but the people had long gone to their rest, content at the end of another day's work. This evening it had seemed to him that he was the only person in the world awake and active, with just the falcons for company; not true, of course, but Montjoy's return from Ghent had been a much-needed reminder of that fact.
Crossing the lantern-lit courtyard in a fine mist of rain to the range of outbuildings which contained the mews, Henry took the opportunity to consider the herald, who was now managing the gyrfalcon tiercel with the same air of careful concentration which Henry now realised had been employed on himself more often than not. So many times he'd been fully occupied with the message; challenge, negotiation, surrender, and had no time to see the messenger; liked him of course, since it was apparently impossible not to like him - and abruptly pulled up his thoughts there, since it seemed he had made up his mind about the Herald a while ago without even realising it.
Only a few minutes before, in his private quarters, he had made the gift of the tiercel. It had been an impulse, a response to the truth before his eyes, that the bird would tame itself to Montjoy's hand and no other. It was a royal gift and no mistake, and would be noted by watching eyes here and elsewhere, and conclusions would be drawn, given his own history with Lord Scroop; he would have to protect the Herald from wagging tongues and accusations of disloyalty as best he could. And that meant that though the hawk now gave him an opportunity to spend more time with this quiet and impressive man, he would have go slow and careful in furthering their acquaintance. Patient as a falconer, in fact.
But the Herald liked him, he thought; perhaps always had, through insult and rain and war.
He opened the door of the mews in the corner of the courtyard, and the serjeant-falconer stood up as the king came in, herald in his wake. The mews was quiet, lit with just a few candles, the half-dozen or so other birds sitting quiet on their perches down one side of the long, low room. Henry's great-grandfather had taken thirty falconers and a hundred or more birds with him on his campaigns; Henry was less concerned with show.
'We have found someone who can manage Loki at last, Geoffroi,' indicating Montjoy who stood a little apart, with the unhooded tiercel nervously alert on his fist. Montjoy had decided not to hood him, saying that he should associate the hood with quiet and calm at first, not change and movement: which flew in the face of all that Henry knew, but seemed to be effective.
'I'm very glad of it, Sire,' and Geoffroi did not add 'surprised' though it was evident in his voice; Montjoy was still wearing his tabard with the lilies of France plain upon it. But he bowed slightly in acknowledgement. 'I thought we'd never find someone who could handle him; wild and wilful to a fault. It would have been a pity to let him go. He'll make a brave hunter, with the right falconer.'
'Well, he's Montjoy's bird now. But then, he never was mine, I think,' and Geoffroi seemed a little taken aback; giving a man the use of a hawk was one thing, the gift of a gyrfalcon was quite another. But a falconer would understand that a bird had to go to the right man for it. They were no respecters of rank or dignity.
He waited for the man's 'Of course, Sire,' nodded at his response, then took Montjoy with him down the line of resting hawks to two empty perches at the end of the mews. Here he put Freya, the white gyrfalcon, down, and stood back to watch as Montjoy did the same to Loki, waiting until he had settled before hooding him. They turned back to find Geoffroi watching the proceedings with a professional eye and an air of 'you'll do.'
'Good night, Geoffroi, guard them well,' said Henry, and went back out into the cold night air.
He turned just outside the doorway to speak to the herald, but in the light of the lantern set over the archway he realised how exhausted the man looked, and changed his question to, 'I was forgetting that you've had a long ride today while I've been sitting in a warm room. I shouldn't have kept you up.' Seeing the demurral on Montjoy's face, he added, 'Go, get some rest. Can you be here tomorrow about three? Good, we'll take them down to the river and get them used to the outdoors.'
'I will be here. Good night to you, my lord.'
Henry watched as the herald re-crossed the cobbled courtyard to go in by a turret stair, and then finally took himself off to his own solitary bed.
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The next afternoon Henry crossed the courtyard again, with a couple of trusted attendants, Bartholomew and Floyd, in his wake, and found Montjoy already in the mews, Loki on his fist, talking quietly with the under-falconer on duty.
'Good day to you, Herald, Robert,' Henry greeted them briskly, and went into the mews and picked up Freya, who seemed pleased to see him. There were men who would have nothing to do with their birds except to take them from the falconers just before loosing them. Henry was not of their number, and most especially not where a royal lady like Freya was concerned. She should know who her lord was.
'Well, Herald, let us be off,' he said as he came back, and they left the castle, on foot, by a sally-port to be out of the busy courtyard as soon as possible. The guard there saluted, and swung the door to behind them, and they followed a little path which went sideways down the hillock on which the castle stood. Across the roadway leading up to the bridge, the tiercel glaring and starting from time to time at real or imagined slights. The first time this happened, Montjoy glanced at Henry for permission before stopping to allow him to settle, and thereafter the entire party came to a halt every time he went to bate. They made a slow progress to the old tourney-field, deserted and rather forlorn under gloomy skies, and beyond it to the small river fringed with alder and willow-trees. Here there were few people in sight and Loki looked distinctly happier; Montjoy actually smiled.
'I walked with him a few minutes this morning, while it was quiet,' he admitted, 'but I didn't think he would take a journey as long as this so well.'
'I saw you, going out of the courtyard,' Henry had been on the way back from arms-practice with his brothers John and Humphrey, Thomas being away on a mission to Austria, 'and you should surely have been asleep at that hour. You had a long journey of your own yesterday.'
'The roads are good, this last stretch of the journey from Ghent,' for that was where the Duke of Burgundy currently had his court, 'and I slept soundly.'
'Hm,' said Henry absently, busying himself with unhooding Freya, stood quiet while she glanced about her (he was picking up good habits from Montjoy) and pointed. 'If we take them over there, we can let them see downriver.' Past a row of pollarded willows, with just a few yellow leaves still hanging on their branches, and the river spread out before them into wide wetlands, glinting silvery here and there, and busy with wildfowl. Both gyrfalcons, being well-fed, ignored this abundance of prey, but Henry observed, 'This would be a good place to fly them at duck and heron.'
'I have hunted duck, but not often. I've rarely had the chance to fly a falcon bigger than a lanner.' Montjoy, ever the diplomat, falling easily into conversation.
'Yes, tell me, where did you learn your skill as a falconer?' asked Henry casually, still surveying the watery scene before them.
'My grandfather had several birds over the years. We'd stay at his manor sometimes when I was a child, and my mother had merlins, too. Grandpère said I should learn the art properly, and had me flying a goshawk every day for a fortnight. After that, everything else seemed easy.'
'Yes, it would! I've flown goshawks from time to time. Good hunters, but I was always glad to hand them back to the falconers at the end of the day.'
A gust of wind blew in across the marshes, bringing a scatter of raindrops with it. Both men turned their backs on it to protect the birds.
'Best take them back, I think,' said Henry, and began to lead the way back towards the palace, heading for the roadway that led up to it. Floyd hurried to open a gate in the wattle fence between it and the river-meads for them, and they went back up the little sloping path to the sally port, their expedition over for the day. In the mews, they put the birds back on their perches, and Henry said, 'That treaty. We'd best look at it again today. How about this evening?' and at the Herald's nod, went back in to his apartment, feeling rather more contented than he had done for a while.
-x-
The next day, and the day after that, they carried the hawks around quiet areas not far from the castle, in a snatched half-hour each afternoon. Henry rather suspected that Montjoy was doing the same early in the mornings too, for Loki was being manned more quickly than he had expected. It was fortunate that Freya did not require such attention from her master, for Henry had troops to marshal and reports to hear, and all the minutiae of planning for a winter campaign.
The strategy against the Philip the Wolf was being drawn up. This man, a minor noble said some, a renegade mercenary said others, had established himself in the Ardennes, and descended from the hills periodically to terrorise decent peasant folk both in eastern France and the borders of Burgundy. Nothing had been done about it before Henry had won his campaign in France, the French nobles being too concerned with their own private feuds, and the Burgundian lords apparently considering such things beneath their dignity.
Henry, however, would brook no such goings-on. Having won the kingdom in fair battle he would defend every village of it. His intelligencers were out, rewards offered for news of the Wolf's whereabouts, and his campaign almost ready. The Duke of Burgundy had allowed that as many knights of his own as wished might join him, though to be sure the pickings would be slim. Even a few knights of eastern France had joined the muster, having grown tired of the Wolf's depredations on their homeland, and the inertia of their own lords in the matter; hence Montjoy's presence on Henry's staff here at St-Quentin. But it would be Henry and his warlike kinsmen, and his English archers, who would form the bulk of the force.
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Two days later, the accord with Burgundy was ready to be taken to him, and that afternoon Henry went to the mews a little early. Finding Montjoy already there, with Loki sitting in a civilised manner on his fist, he asked, 'Will he let me hold him now, do you think?'
He moved in close behind Montjoy's arm, bringing his hand up next to the Herald's, and nudged Loki's legs gently. The tiercel stepped back onto his fist, and they manoeuvred the leash across between their gloves. Not for nothing was the art of falconry an accepted aspect of courtly love; it gave endless opportunities for closeness, of which he hoped to make full use. Montjoy had frozen for the barest fraction of a heartbeat as he got in close; Henry could have sworn that even his breathing stopped for an instant. He carried on talking, but to the tiercel this time; 'There, my lord fire-god, so you'll let me hold you if your master wills it? Take Freya, Montjoy, if you will; we'll try flying them on the creance.' Montjoy turned away and picked up the King's falcon without difficulty, regarding her with an appreciative eye, and collected the long line, wound on its stick, from the rack of equipment by the door.
They went down to the deserted tourney-ground again, Henry's guards following at a little distance, and hearing the noise of the troops from the marshalling-ground on the other side of the castle as they went. Shouts drifted across the intervening space. There was his uncle Exeter's voice, made small but somehow not diminished by distance, keeping the men at their practice.
Loki had a wary eye both on his master and his new handler, but behaved himself well enough. With one bird on the rails of the lists and the other on the creance, they made intermittent progress at training them to fly to the fist.
'If you wish it, I will fly him for you while you take my reply to the Duke, to keep him fit,' said Henry. 'He is still your bird, you understand.'
Montjoy gave him a surprised look, at a loss for words for a moment, before saying, 'Thank-you, sire. That would be a kindness.'
'It would be a pity to interrupt his training,' said Henry easily, which was true. It had been the point of his carrying the bird, after all; that, and the opportunity to get close to the Herald, of course. 'Take Freya now; I'll carry his lordship back. He may as well get used to me,' and with only an indignant squawk or two from Loki he did so.
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The next morning he saw Montjoy ride out of the courtyard in the half-light of dawn, back in the blue tabard and white cloak of his office, and smiled, remembering other times when he had seen the Herald so arrayed and generally carrying an insulting message; wondered at how far they had come towards friendship since then, and wondered how far they might still go.
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Montjoy was back a few days later, and Henry, who had quietly arranged for him to be brought up to his study straight away, looked up with a smile as he came in. 'Well?'
'The accord is signed, and the Comte d'Alsace says he'll send infantry to the campaign against Philip, too.'
'A pity he did not see fit to do so before. Never mind, the more men we have at our disposal the quicker we'll have the Wolf out of his lair.'
'And his grace of Burgundy has sent you a pair of peregrines.'
'Indeed!' Henry's eyebrows rose. 'And you rode back from Ghent with two falcons?'
'He gave me an escort.' Montjoy sounded faintly irked.
Henry, though, was not so displeased. 'That was a courtesy,' extended perhaps both because of Henry's interest in falcons, and perhaps also his increased interest in his herald; maybe word had filtered quietly through to Ghent. He wondered briefly whether there had been other marks of respect; was he seated higher at table, perhaps, or given better accommodation than before? He could hardly ask, but he could continue to give his own marks of favour. 'Have you eaten yet?' he enquired, and as Montjoy shook his head, said 'Nor have I. Stay a while; I'll have a meal sent in, and you can tell me what the Duke was thinking, as well as what he said.'
And Montjoy took the same chair he had occupied, that first evening when Henry had given him Loki, but with less diffidence this time. Henry smiled again, and called in a page to arrange for the food; plain fare, but welcome, he hoped.
Among the things that the Duke was thinking, it transpired, was that it would be a good plan to hold a grand tournament at his capital of Dijon the next spring, and should Henry and his kinsfolk wish to attend, they would be made most welcome.
'Who knows how long this campaign might take?' said my lord of Exeter, when this news was conveyed to him. 'But it's worth bearing in mind, nephew; half the nobility of Christendom will be there, and you may as well show your face too.'
His youngest brother Humphrey and my lord of Warwick, seemed partial to the idea too; something to be considered, then, once Philip had been tracked down and defeated. And also to be considered was the Duke's request that Montjoy King of Arms should be allowed to come to Dijon beforehand, to help with the organisation of so great a festival.
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The next afternoon, after several hours spent checking supplies of arrows and horseshoes and wagons, he allowed himself half an hour at the mews at the usual time. There was Montjoy, of course, talking to Loki with an expression of unguarded liking on his face which he almost recognised, but could not quite place.
Henry greeted Geoffroi, and said, 'Show me these new peregrines.'
A true pair, and they looked very small after the gyrfalcons.
'Fine birds, Sire, but one of them's damaged a feather; see.' The tiercel, a handsome bird with steely-blue plumage, had broken a pinion, perhaps unsettled at his journey and his new surroundings.
'I've another ready to imp in,' continued Geoffroi, and he gestured at an array of feathers, saved from other birds' moults, laid out on the work-bench under the window, with a bowl of brine and an imping-needle lying ready in it.
'I'll see if I can remember how,' said Henry. 'Montjoy, give me a hand, will you?' And the herald left Loki and came over. 'He knows you better than me or Geoffroi. Hold him for me, if you will.'
Montjoy walked quietly round in front of the peregrine, then his hands flashed out, neatly imprisoning wings and talons. An indignant squawking arose. Montjoy angled his arms away so the hooked beak could not reach his wrists, and opened the fingers of one hand slightly, allowing Henry to draw the wing out of his grasp. Henry carefully cut the damaged pinion above the break, and matched it with the replacement; picked up the imping-needle from its bowl of brine, and pushed it into the stub, then slid the new feather onto its other end and drew one finger slowly down the feather to knit the webbing together.
This action was rather wasted, because the peregrine made determined efforts to escape the while, and Montjoy, trying to hold him still without damaging him, did not notice because he was half-laughing, half-scolding. 'He's strong for his size!' he commented, and fell abruptly silent; Henry smiled, at his own foolishness and at Montjoy's confusion, and let the wing fold back against Montjoy's fingers. The repair was invisible, and soon the needle would rust into place and set it firm.
Now he took hold of the bird's leash - 'Ready to let go?' and Montjoy nodded; they both whipped their hands out of the way. The undignified squawking stopped abruptly, and the peregrine gave them both a resentful glare.
'We'd best stay out of his way for a day or two,' remarked Henry. The peregrine turned its back on them, and Geoffroi came forward to tie the leash to one of the legs of the bench. Montjoy, Henry noted, looked as ruffled as the bird. He took a moment to enjoy the sight of a ruffled Herald, and then turned away to pick up Freya.
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The next day they took the gyrfalcons down to the tourney-field again, and risked letting Freya off the creance. Without the trailing weight of the line, she flew uncertainly for a few minutes, before gaining confidence and speed.
'Ah, she's so quick,' said the Herald appreciatively as she circled up, swift and beautiful, into the grey sky.
'She'll be able to take geese and heron when she's fully trained,' agreed Henry, and began to swing the lure for her. 'Best not let her get too tired, first time out.'
Freya made a couple of half-hearted passes at the lure, then decided she needed a rest and angled in to perch on the roof of one of the stands; miscalculated her landing, and toppled off the roof-ridge to tumble down the further side in a flurry of wings. Both men doubled up with laughter, and tore round to the other side to pick her up if necessary. But she had scrabbled back up to the roof-ridge, and now sat with her back firmly turned to them.
'Oh, she doesn't like being laughed at,' gasped Montjoy.
'She'll be on her dignity for a while. Come on, we may as well be comfortable while we wait.'
Montjoy picked up Loki from where he was sitting on the rail, watching the proceedings with a distinct air of superiority. Together they climbed up into the stand, while Henry's guards waited stoically down in the lists.
Henry looked out past the castle to the marshalling-ground where he could see his troops, ready to depart as soon as they had word of Philip's whereabouts. He could see archers practising at the butts, and men exercising their horses. Soon they would grow stale, and doubtless fall to quarrelling amongst themselves, but he could not risk leaving straight away and running short of provisions.
'This campaign,' he began, and gestured at the small figures, 'it's not the sort of thing I'll need a herald for.' Montjoy, suddenly sober, turned towards him, but said nothing. 'There'll be no courtesy about it; he's a brigand, nothing more. We'll aim to destroy him once and for all. So there's no need for you to be present.'
'I understand,' said Montjoy, 'there are some situations where a herald is simply not needed.' He wasn't looking at Henry now, but down at Loki.
'Well. There's surely no need for you to endure a winter campaign along with the rest of us, as there's no work for you to do. So. You may stay here if you wish - the hawks will be here - or you have perhaps family. I would not keep you from them.'
'My father's manor is too far away to make the journey in less than a fortnight,' said Montjoy uncertainly; where was it then, down in the Languedoc, or furthest Brittany? He would find out at some point, but for now...
'I mean a family of your own. I have never asked if you have a wife, or children.' And he should have done, before he had let himself grow so close to the man, though he had always had a feeling that the herald was unattached. He looked round at Montjoy, uncertain now himself.
'No, I have none such. The position of King of Arms takes me too far afield, and when I was but a herald at court I had not the income to support a family. I am a third son.'
Did he live chaste, then, as Henry had since he became king? Or did he take his pleasure in some other way? Travelling so far and so often he would have plenty of opportunity, and surely there could be no-one who would not leap at the chance to lie with Montjoy King of Arms..! Certainly not Henry King of England.
But then he glanced again at that grave, reserved face and those clear grey eyes, and simply could not imagine Montjoy in licentious abandonment. Though Henry's body certainly liked the notion, but only if it were with one man, and only if true affection were its basis.
He dragged his mind back to the here and now. 'So. There's another thing you could be doing. There's the Duke of Burgundy's tournament, that he'll be holding down at Dijon. You know he's asked me for your presence there? The biggest tournament for years, and he needs someone with experience and authority to help organise it, and you have both a-plenty. Therefore, should you wish it - and only if you wish it - you may go to Dijon when we depart on campaign, and spend the next months in comfort while we're roughing it up in the hills. And he has issued an invitation to all of us, if we should be finished with the Wolf by then, to attend the tournament and festival; not quite in my style, I must admit, but it's the sort of thing I have to do from time to time. So we might meet again there, after the campaign.'
He fell quiet, leaving the Herald to make his own choice.
The Herald was silent for a few moments; then: 'I have been to Dijon a few times; it's a most pleasant city. And a tournament held by the Duke should be worth seeing; and to have a part in it... If you are sure that I can be of no further use to you here or on the campaign, your majesty, I'll go to Dijon and willingly.'
That was not quite the answer Henry had hoped for; quite what he had hoped for he did not know. He could not say outright, I wish you to come on campaign with me, though there will be no work for you to do other than to warm my bed. Nor could he say, but this parting will perhaps silence any talk about the king and the herald.
He shot Montjoy a glance, and after a heartbeat's pause, the Herald continued, 'And I will trust that God will send you a swift victory, and look to see you come safe to Dijon.'
It was said a little formally though, as if Montjoy had decided to step back slightly from the camaraderie that had grown between them over the falcons. Now what did the man expect, wondered Henry, resignedly; protestations of undying friendship, an outright statement I will miss you?
No, of course he didn't expect either, though both would have been true. 'I will look forward to it, then,' perhaps a shade too heartily. And feeling that he had handled this conversation maladroitly, and wishing to be done before he made a complete hash of it, he changed the subject abruptly. 'Well, shall we see whether Freya is ready to come down yet?' and got up and led the way out of the stands, sunk in sudden gloom.
In the early hours of the morning, news came in that Philip had fallen on a village away up in the hills, swept it clean of stores, butchered those who tried to resist and pillaged a small priory close by; and Henry and his forces departed at dawn, hot on the trail of the Wolf.
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Chapter 2 follows shortly.