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anteros_lmcTitle: Marie
Author: Anteros
Characters: Marie de Graçay / Horatio Hornblower, (Archie Kennedy)
Rating: R
Notes: It's Flying Colours but not as we know it! Dire, over wrought nonsense written when I was down under, for which I blame C.S. Forester and jetlag. 50% Forester, 50% Anteros, and if you listen carefully you can hear poor old Cecil spinning in his grave.
It took him half the morning to nerve himself for what he foresaw to be a very uncomfortable interview; it was only then that he tore himself away from a last inspection of the boat, in Bush's and Brown's company, and climbed the stairs to Marie's boudoir and tapped at the door. He entered when she called, and stood there in the room of so many memories — the golden chairs with their oval backs upholstered in pink and white, the windows looking out on the sunlit Loire, and Marie in the window-seat with her needlework.
"I wanted to say 'good morning'," he said at length, as Marie did nothing to help him out.
"Good morning," said Marie. She bent her head over her needlework; her hair was simply dressed, tied at the back of her pale neck with a black silk ribbon. "We only have to say 'good morning' to-day, and to-morrow we shall say 'goodbye'."
The sunshine lit her hair gloriously in shades of tawny gold tinged with auburn. Hornblower choked back the memory of another tawny head that had lain on the pillow beside him, glorious in the morning light.
"Yes," he said stupidly.
"If you loved me," said Marie, "it would be terrible for me to have you go, and to know that for years we should not meet again — perhaps for ever. But as you do not, then I am glad that you are going back to your wife and your child, and your ships, and your fighting. That is what you wanted, and I am pleased that you should have it all."
Hornblower grimaced. He could have it all; his wife and child, his rank and ship, his position on the hallowed captain’s list, his titled lover even, and still he would have nothing. Nothing that would fill the gaping void or ease the hollow suffocating pain that had been his constant companion since Retribution had carried him from Kingston. He had sought escape in “his fighting”, in the oblivion of war, but even in the height of battle he was aware of the crushing absence, the unwavering blue eyes that no longer met his through the smoke and the carnage and the chaos.
"Thank you," said Hornblower with contemptible insincerity. Still Marie did not look up.
“You are the sort of man," she went on, "whom women love very easily. I do not expect that I shall be the last.”
The simple revelation shocked Hornblower, assuming as he did that others saw him as he saw himself. His godlike superior officers undoubtedly saw a craven individual lacking in spirit, dignity and all the qualities required in an officer of His Majesty’s Royal Navy. Just as his men surely saw a weak indecisive captain, a captain to be ridiculed rather than one they would follow into battle and lay down their lives for. And women? How could they see anything other than a nervous, garrulous buffoon, insecure in his standing and awkward in his own skin? A man to be scorned and pitied rather than loved. Hornblower suspected that even Maria’s stolid devotion was tinged with pity. And surely it was the same boredom and desperation that had caused him to seek solace in Marie’s bed that had driven Lady Barbara into his arms on that mad Pacific cruise when the Lydia had played cat and mouse along the coast of South America with the Natividad? If they failed to see the contemptible creature he recognised, then Hornblower had no clue what picture he presented to the world. He had hidden behind the implacable façade of captain of His Britannic Majesty’s Royal Navy for so long that he no longer knew the man that lurked behind the mask. On the one hand there was the cold analytical tactician who commanded the quarter deck, a man in full possession of his own destiny; on the other there was the craven coward who had to steel himself at the sound of gun fire and flinched at the sight of an open wound. Between these two phantoms there had once been a real man of flesh and blood.
Marie was still speaking. “I don't think that you will ever love anybody, or know what it is to do so."
Hornblower could have said nothing in English in reply to these two astonishing statements, and in French he was perfectly helpless.
Worn down as he was by months of benign incarceration Hornblower wanted nothing more than to sink to his knees and implore the impassive heavens that it should be so. He would have offered up his standing, his commission, his freedom, his marriage, never to have known what it was to love. Never to have known the incomparable gift of love given freely, of courage in the face of unrelenting horror and of the unendurable burden of receiving the ultimate sacrifice.
Hornblower tore his eyes away from the familiar gleam of tawny hair escaping from its black ribbon and gazed out the window to the valley where the Loire flowed quietly between spring banks. The morning sun glanced off the glittering blue waters, recalling eyes of a brighter blue by far. But it was fathomless black eyes that met his and in them he saw not pity but understanding; the compassion of a fellow creature bereaved by war. And for once, just for once, Hornblower yearned to pour out his soul to another human being, to this passionate, generous woman in all her dignity and resignation. To avow that he knew what it was to love, to love joyfully, hopefully, helplessly. To have known, to know, a love that transgressed the law of God and man and transcended the credo of duty and honour. To have known Archie Kennedy.
But he could only stammer.
"Goodbye," said Marie.
"Goodbye, madame," said Hornblower, lamely.
Author: Anteros
Characters: Marie de Graçay / Horatio Hornblower, (Archie Kennedy)
Rating: R
Notes: It's Flying Colours but not as we know it! Dire, over wrought nonsense written when I was down under, for which I blame C.S. Forester and jetlag. 50% Forester, 50% Anteros, and if you listen carefully you can hear poor old Cecil spinning in his grave.
It took him half the morning to nerve himself for what he foresaw to be a very uncomfortable interview; it was only then that he tore himself away from a last inspection of the boat, in Bush's and Brown's company, and climbed the stairs to Marie's boudoir and tapped at the door. He entered when she called, and stood there in the room of so many memories — the golden chairs with their oval backs upholstered in pink and white, the windows looking out on the sunlit Loire, and Marie in the window-seat with her needlework.
"I wanted to say 'good morning'," he said at length, as Marie did nothing to help him out.
"Good morning," said Marie. She bent her head over her needlework; her hair was simply dressed, tied at the back of her pale neck with a black silk ribbon. "We only have to say 'good morning' to-day, and to-morrow we shall say 'goodbye'."
The sunshine lit her hair gloriously in shades of tawny gold tinged with auburn. Hornblower choked back the memory of another tawny head that had lain on the pillow beside him, glorious in the morning light.
"Yes," he said stupidly.
"If you loved me," said Marie, "it would be terrible for me to have you go, and to know that for years we should not meet again — perhaps for ever. But as you do not, then I am glad that you are going back to your wife and your child, and your ships, and your fighting. That is what you wanted, and I am pleased that you should have it all."
Hornblower grimaced. He could have it all; his wife and child, his rank and ship, his position on the hallowed captain’s list, his titled lover even, and still he would have nothing. Nothing that would fill the gaping void or ease the hollow suffocating pain that had been his constant companion since Retribution had carried him from Kingston. He had sought escape in “his fighting”, in the oblivion of war, but even in the height of battle he was aware of the crushing absence, the unwavering blue eyes that no longer met his through the smoke and the carnage and the chaos.
"Thank you," said Hornblower with contemptible insincerity. Still Marie did not look up.
“You are the sort of man," she went on, "whom women love very easily. I do not expect that I shall be the last.”
The simple revelation shocked Hornblower, assuming as he did that others saw him as he saw himself. His godlike superior officers undoubtedly saw a craven individual lacking in spirit, dignity and all the qualities required in an officer of His Majesty’s Royal Navy. Just as his men surely saw a weak indecisive captain, a captain to be ridiculed rather than one they would follow into battle and lay down their lives for. And women? How could they see anything other than a nervous, garrulous buffoon, insecure in his standing and awkward in his own skin? A man to be scorned and pitied rather than loved. Hornblower suspected that even Maria’s stolid devotion was tinged with pity. And surely it was the same boredom and desperation that had caused him to seek solace in Marie’s bed that had driven Lady Barbara into his arms on that mad Pacific cruise when the Lydia had played cat and mouse along the coast of South America with the Natividad? If they failed to see the contemptible creature he recognised, then Hornblower had no clue what picture he presented to the world. He had hidden behind the implacable façade of captain of His Britannic Majesty’s Royal Navy for so long that he no longer knew the man that lurked behind the mask. On the one hand there was the cold analytical tactician who commanded the quarter deck, a man in full possession of his own destiny; on the other there was the craven coward who had to steel himself at the sound of gun fire and flinched at the sight of an open wound. Between these two phantoms there had once been a real man of flesh and blood.
Marie was still speaking. “I don't think that you will ever love anybody, or know what it is to do so."
Hornblower could have said nothing in English in reply to these two astonishing statements, and in French he was perfectly helpless.
Worn down as he was by months of benign incarceration Hornblower wanted nothing more than to sink to his knees and implore the impassive heavens that it should be so. He would have offered up his standing, his commission, his freedom, his marriage, never to have known what it was to love. Never to have known the incomparable gift of love given freely, of courage in the face of unrelenting horror and of the unendurable burden of receiving the ultimate sacrifice.
Hornblower tore his eyes away from the familiar gleam of tawny hair escaping from its black ribbon and gazed out the window to the valley where the Loire flowed quietly between spring banks. The morning sun glanced off the glittering blue waters, recalling eyes of a brighter blue by far. But it was fathomless black eyes that met his and in them he saw not pity but understanding; the compassion of a fellow creature bereaved by war. And for once, just for once, Hornblower yearned to pour out his soul to another human being, to this passionate, generous woman in all her dignity and resignation. To avow that he knew what it was to love, to love joyfully, hopefully, helplessly. To have known, to know, a love that transgressed the law of God and man and transcended the credo of duty and honour. To have known Archie Kennedy.
But he could only stammer.
"Goodbye," said Marie.
"Goodbye, madame," said Hornblower, lamely.
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no subject
Date: 2011-04-24 12:27 am (UTC)Also, the more DKU I read, the more I am committed to the other path. (Hope you don't mind that!)
This is beautifully written. And you wrote in New Zealand, surrounded by cows...
no subject
Date: 2011-04-24 08:40 am (UTC)Every time I read the books I get these ridiculous book / DKU plot bunnies. I don't like writing the damn things and I am never convinced by the result. I always suspect they will annoy people!
the more DKU I read, the more I am committed to the other path. (Hope you don't mind that!)
Yay! I was kinda hoping you might come to that conclusion :) I think if I was writing sequentially I'd have to go down the LKU route too. Unfortunately I keep getting random DKU bunnies :/
no subject
Date: 2011-04-24 01:08 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-04-24 07:56 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-04-24 05:06 pm (UTC)Dave
no subject
Date: 2011-04-24 09:18 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-04-25 10:07 pm (UTC)Dave
no subject
Date: 2011-04-26 09:06 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-04-26 10:34 pm (UTC)Dave
no subject
Date: 2011-04-24 08:06 pm (UTC)“I don't think that you will ever love anybody, or know what it is to do so."
That's harsh, the kind of harsh you only use if your nose is seriously put out of joint!
there is no reason at all not to post this to Following Sea.
no subject
Date: 2011-04-24 09:26 pm (UTC)I know! It's almost like there's a space in the books that Archie just fits.
That's harsh, the kind of harsh you only use if your nose is seriously put out of joint!
It's a pretty devastating put down isn't it?
there is no reason at all not to post this to Following Sea.
Oh all right, I'll post it...
no subject
Date: 2011-04-25 03:51 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-04-25 07:00 pm (UTC)Poor miserable Horatio.
Unbearable isn't it? If you do go down the LKU route I for one will be very happy to follow you :)
no subject
Date: 2011-04-25 07:13 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-04-25 02:24 pm (UTC)but it is better than you think as comments prove
and if I had to start over again now I might be thinking of an LKU - but i have already got another world going on
still thanks for posting it and appreciated the intersting comments too
no subject
Date: 2011-04-25 07:12 pm (UTC)I kind of shy away from the wole DKU / LKU issue tbh. I keep getting these random DKU ploy bunnies but I certainly wouldn't rule out writing LKU if I could come up with a convincing scenario.
no subject
Date: 2011-04-26 02:32 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-04-26 09:00 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-04-27 04:28 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-04-27 10:42 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-04-27 07:47 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-04-27 10:26 pm (UTC)Thank you so much for stopping by to read and comment. I wasn't at all sure about this one but I'm very glad you liked it. I really must stop writing dead Archie though :(
no subject
Date: 2011-05-02 04:07 pm (UTC)Life and the boy are treating me well! Hope things are going great with you, saw that you went to NZ that must've been exciting! :D And dead Archie is sad, but then it does make for some excellent angst-bunny Horatio.
no subject
Date: 2011-05-06 07:49 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-04-28 06:02 pm (UTC)And this, this is absolutely wonderful:
He had hidden behind the implacable façade of captain of His Britannic Majesty’s Royal Navy for so long that he no longer knew the man that lurked behind the mask. On the one hand there was the cold analytical tactician who commanded the quarter deck, a man in full possession of his own destiny; on the other there was the craven coward who had to steel himself at the sound of gun fire and flinched at the sight of an open wound. Between these two phantoms there had once been a real man of flesh and blood.
Words CSF should have written!
no subject
Date: 2011-04-28 11:02 pm (UTC)I always worry it's a bit of a cheek to make Kennedy appear in book canon fic but to me there are some places where his absence just cries out. I thought Marie's crushing honesty in this scene was just awesome and it inevitably made me think of Kennedy.
I'm very glad you thought this worked as I wasn't at all sure about it :}