tiltingwithlips | The Battle of Shrewsbury [Werewolf AU]

Hal did not expect to be so shaken to see Harry Percy laid low -- the Hotspur of the North, wearing that common whoreson confusion.

"Ah, Harry," he gasps, fumbling at his side. Blood is leaking from his mouth. "Thou hast robbed me of my youth--"

Something howls in the trees.

And then a hundred and twenty pounds of enraged, snarling wolf slam into Hal.

(The sound of that growl is enough to raise the dead -- or at least the seeming dead. Falstaff cracks one eye open to see what fresh terrors Hotspur has unleashed. Has he revealed himself to be actually the Devil?

. . . Well, apparently he has a wolf on his side, which is definitely bad enough.)

Hal has--

Hal has no idea how to process what is happening, only that he has only his dagger and his limbs to protect himself, and the fresh terror of facing teeth instead of a sword.

He cries out, and amidst trying to escape this hellhound, makes an attempt to crawl toward his sword, just there--

Growling, she tackles him again, away from his sword, and snaps at the hand holding the dagger. She'll bite his hand off if she has to, he will not get back up to attack her or her husband, he will not--

In the cold, rational, calculating part of him that he keeps locked away from everything else, a wild thought occurs to Hal.

Even before, when they were all young and coming up together, there were whispers about odd happenings in Herefordshire, in Monmouth, in Usk, where the Mortimers lived. Hal heard less of it as they grew older, but other acquaintances -- from York, from Durham, from Alnwick itself -- there were mutterings. They were always mutterings, though, fancies and gossip and rumor.

Yet, scrabbling away on his back from this creature, Hal -- cannot avoid looking into its face, stricken, and wondering --

--if he should say her name--

If there is a woman in there, behind the bared teeth and the wild eyes, she doesn't appear to be in much of a mood to listen to her name.

She stalks towards him, head down and hackles raised, growling unceasingly.

He glances past her as much as he dares. Hotspur is not going to live long; he's gurgling and uncoordinated, supine in the snow. There is little to gain from acts of bravery now: he has done the hard thing, and better to claim the prize with help.

He couldn't carry the body because of his own wound. He needs the help. That is not so strange.

Hal crab-crawls backwards as fast as he dares, desperately aware of his unwillingness to turn his back.

She snaps after his feet, still keeping herself between him and Harry -- and when he's not moving fast enough for her taste, she throws caution to the wind and lunges forward to sink her teeth into his boot.

He drops to the ground again, thrown, and kicks as much as he can.

"I know thee!" he cries. "I know what you are!"

His voice cracks -- anyone's would, and let that man who would deny it be given the chance to demonstrate. Hal's heart thrashes within him. Let her not pierce the skin!

Snarling, she shies back and snaps her teeth on the air. (There might be a bit of leather caught between them.)

Hal needs no further encouragement. He must have faith in the length of his legs, and so he scrambles upright and, with powerful strides, turns tail, back toward the battle, where at least he knows and can match his foe.

Good. Good.

Kate turns towards Harry, and her snarling dies down to desperate whimpers.

The smell of a dying human is not that different from the smell of any other dying beast.

Even now, he's fighting it, but his limbs grow weak: he can do little more than clench his fists and move his head a little. The breath comes but haltingly, and blood is pooling inside and over him.

He tracks her with his eyes. Even voiceless and without words, all he can say is her name. Oh Kate.

Whining, she noses at his face, licking blood off his cheeks and mouth. There has to be something that can be done, there must--

--Oh.

It's an awful, terrifying idea.

(Falstaff has long since abandoned pretending to be dead -- although he's not entirely sure he's awake. God's blood, even in his wildest, drunkest dreams, he never thought to see anything like this!)

Harry has long known otherwise, that the ends men make are rarely of their choosing.

But of all the ways he ever imagined himself dying on the battlefield, none of them have been so slow.

There is nothing left for him to do, lying here heaving in the mud, and if the end would just -- come, with Kate here -- oh, but if she would show him her face again --

Something in his chest begins to rattle.

If there's to be any hope, do it, and pray.

She bares her teeth and sinks them into the thick leather collar around his neck, ripping it away; it's tough material, and her yanking jars him more than she'd like.

But his throat is exposed, that's the important part.

Because then -- with an apologetic nudge of her nose under his chin -- she can open her jaws and bite him.

This must be the end. This must be where the world slips away and he's brought to his eternal reward half a heartbeat later. His limbs are cold and heavy and numb, and if the last thing he feels is her teeth in his throat -- if this is mercy--

Harry's heart begins to race. His eyes shoot open: he knows that shock of adrenaline, but he's never felt this -- this scream in every last fiber of his body. Something is -- warring in him.

His fingers curl and scrabble against the ground; now he fights for breath, and a frightened moan builds where Kate holds him.

When she tastes blood, she lets go and latches onto his shoulder instead, heedless of the way the mail jolts her teeth. This is not a good place for this to happen; from what little she remembers of the experience, it isn't pleasant, and she didn't have a deathly wound in her side as well.

'Swounds, but he's heavy to drag, though. If she can get him out of plain sight, she'll settle. It won't do to have anyone coming along to finish the job Hal started, though.

Near deadweight, to be sure, and also a mess: he's not bleeding much from the neck god god what is happening oh christ and the devil but he is starting to cough. As he expels the blood from his lungs, the wordless terror-noises grow louder (and perhaps Harry Percy might have been more stoic under different circumstances, but that's by no means guaranteed, and his body is wracked not only with wounds, but with a deeper, more fundamental pain, and even he will start to twist and kick and arch his back as he's dragged, oh god oh heaven Kate what is Kate please Kate oh god).

This would be easier if he would lie still, curse him. Growling in frustration, she digs her paws into the mud and pulls harder.

At long, long last she has him at the edge of the tree, and she stops there, panting. Is the battle ending or simply moving away? She can't tell.

She bends her head and licks Harry's cheek. It's all the comfort she can think to give him right now.

He's grown quiet, but his breath is little more than shallow panting, and his eyes stare at nothing, glazed and unfocused. Even if he comes back, he will not be able to say where he is at this moment. Not a soul on earth, himself least of all, could say how long this will last.

Was it like this for her the first time? It was so long ago, she hardly remembers--

A sound behind them makes her turn.

And who should be clambering to his feet and trying to sneak across the clearing but one fat, armored fool name of Sir John Falstaff?

When he spies her, he freezes. "A-avaunt! Avaunt, I say!" He makes a hasty Sign of the Cross. "Take thy Hotspur, and to Hell with him -- but I am an honest man, unless to be fat be sin--"

Kate curls her lips and snarls at him, beginning to stalk forward.

"Avaunt!" Falstaff tries again. The wolf snaps its jaws, and Falstaff abruptly decides that devils and demons are surely better left to priests than to him. And that being the case, he had better go find a priest as quickly as possible.

Kate barks once after him as he turns tail, slipping in the mud, and flees.

How the word spreads on a battlefield, in the thick of combat, is a mystery fit for church; yet within the hour, as sure as the armies know it's cold, every soldier in Shrewsbury knows that Hotspur is lost. How he's died, no one's certain, but his absence is keenly felt, for the king's men gain heart, suddenly, and the rebels begin to flee. The Earl of Worcester is taken prisoner, and the king passes death upon him, and Sir Richard Vernon. The Douglas flees pell-mell with his Scots, and neither Northumberland nor Glendower are within five counties of the fray.

The Prince of Wales, thanks be to God, has found his brother, John of Lancaster, and both hobble over the field toward King Henry's camp. John frowns, not only at Hal's weight slung about his shoulders, but at the figure that swift approaches. "Did you not tell me this fat man was dead?"

"I did," says Hal slowly, staring. "I saw him dead, breathless and bleeding on the ground." He halts, and hails the monstrous knight, moving at speed towards them. "Art thou alive? I prithee, speak: we will not trust our eyes without our ears!"

Edited 2012-11-15 22:25 (UTC)

"Hal!" Falstaff cries, slowing to a stop and puffing for breath. "No, that's certain; I am not a double man: but if I be not Jack Falstaff, then am I a Jack. An honest Jack, sirs! And let no man gainsay it, for I have had the grace of Heaven shine upon me, and never doubt it!"

Despite -- all the hardship of the day, Hal finds his mouth is twitching. "Hath Heaven had a dram's worth of dealings with thee today? Lord, we must all start small, even him."

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