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heartofstanding · 5 years

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150 word meme

Since I’m currently bouncing between fics (I’ve had 8 Word documents open over the last few days) and it’s been driving me mad, I’m going to do this meme and hope it lets me focus.

Rules: send me a number or three from the list below the cut and I will write 150 words in that fic.

1. which death could scarce disgrace (Edward takes Hal to view Richard’s corpse)

Edward had a choice.

A choice that made him ill, that robbed him of sleep and appetite. He made excuses where he could and spent hours pacing his room or hunched over a basin, heaving. His father remarked that he looked pale and recommended a physician, his sister asked if he had lost weight. He almost told them but could not bring himself to – he did not trust them to give a fair answer or even to understand his dilemma.

2. and all this light (Mary gives birth to John of Lancaster, Hal has night terrors)

Mary rolls over onto her side, hugs a pillow to her chest. She closes her eyes and tries to empty her mind or at least distract it. Remembers her boys running in the grass in the evening, dusk in their hair and how it was so clear she thought she could see forever, that the moment would last forever. Her eyes are heavy, her thoughts slow. Sleep, she’s going to sleep—

The door creaks open. Mary frowns and pushes herself up in bed just as a little terrified voice calls out for her. Harry. She pulls open the hangings, squinting to make out his face and then hastily lights a candle, seeing the glimmer of tears on his face.

‘Oh love, again?’

3. the light of hidden flowers (Humphrey and Eleanor Cobham visit 4-year-old Henry VI at Easter)

‘It won’t be like you want,’ she said. ‘I have no reason to be at your side. Everyone knows what I am. And it’s one thing to be it here – but in the king’s household? In front of the dowager queen?’

He frowned, reaching out to cup her cheek. ‘We can sort that. You can come as Antigone’s maid.’

‘‘And, what, I just happen to sleep in your bed every night?’’ she said. ‘You don’t understand. They already know. There’s no point in trying to pretend my position is respectable.’

4. bird bones (Henry VI and Humphrey Duke of Gloucester’s death)

‘Henry,’ Margaret says. ‘You did not eat. You need to eat.’

He thought he had fooled them, moving food around on his plate, raising his hand to his mouth – he has a vague memory of his uncle reading something while eating once, barely noticing what he put in his mouth and Arthur – his uncle’s bastard – laughingly said that you could put anything in front of him when he was reading and he’d eat it without even noticing. He dared Henry to put a live frog on Gloucester’s plate but Henry had refused.

He wonders if Arthur is with Gloucester’s men, if he still tries to put frogs on his father’s plate in hope they’ll be eaten.

He wonders if Arthur hates him now, if Gloucester’s intransigence and quarrelsome nature has been inherited. Arthur had always seemed too kindly-natured to have been Gloucester’s son but once Gloucester was kind.

5. the quintain (another story about the Black Prince and Richard II)

It’s a good day for Edward. Which means that he’s successfully bullied his doctors into letting him out of bed and actually managed to get out of his room and into the free air. Of course, that will only last as long as it takes them to find Joan and appeal to her to send him to bed but in the meantime, he will enjoy the air and the sun and the sight of his son practicing his riding.

6. crowned with roses (Joanna of Navarre meets her new stepsons)

Joanna squeezed her eyes shut. These were definitely brothers. She stood, going to the window where she could look down into the courtyard. Humphrey was clinging to the person who must be Harry, an older boy - lean and broad-shouldered, his hair cropped in a circle around the top of his skull and sun-darkened - while another, sturdily built boy with an unfortunate nose who must be John, tried to pull Humphrey away.

‘John, leave it,’ said Harry.

John’s face darkened. ‘He always gets his way. Just once, why can’t I get to pick?’

Joanna stifled her giggles. Such waring boys, strong boys. And they were hers now,

7. The Brittle Crown (Hal’s year with Richard II, intended to be a novel)

Thomas shoves Harry. Harry shoves him back. They wrestle for a moment, Harry pins Thomas before deciding it’s too much effort.

‘You have your own room and your own bed, why are you trying to steal mine?’

‘We’re leaving tomorrow,’ Thomas says. He goes quiet, lips pressing firmly together. He nudges Harry. ‘Will you be alright?’

Harry scoffs. Of course he will. What kind of question is that? He’s always alright. Thomas rolls over, dropping his head onto Harry’s belly heavily. Harry swats at him.

‘Why did the king call you Hal?’

‘How should I know? Get off.’

‘It’s not a bad name.’

‘Father hates it.’

‘He just hates that the king called you it,’ Thomas says. ‘I think he hates the king more than he hates you.’

8. important pegging fic #2 (Joan of Kent pegs The Black Prince because of course she does)

#writing memes #ask me stuff #please and thank you #(titles are always subject to change)

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