Chapter Text
Or, if you want, fasten your lips,
while letting me share in your loves.
—Catullus 55
The warmth that graced Alfred's study was never natural. The hand of the man always had to partake in it, hands reaching for more logs to feed the hearth constantly, flames illuminating the evening-bathed room as winter came defeated at once.
And that was how that evening felt.
Alfred's fingers were busy holding the one quill that had never seemed to waste in all the years Uhtred had known him, ink feeding its tip with each stroke of the king's hand.
"Shouldn't have they beaten you up for writing with your left hand?"
Rewarded with a glare, Uhtred chuckled from his spot next to him.
"I had the luck of a good instructor that didn't believe in the evil associated with it."
"Yeah, and how many did it take? You learned when you were what? Twelve?"
The quill was gracefully placed on the top of the piece of parchment, careful to make sure it rested far away from the fresh words it bore.
Alfred turned in his seat and stared at him for a moment.
Uhtred did not move, neither body nor eyes.
He was used to this—Alfred's quiet observation. When he had been younger it had been something that had always unnerved him—impetuous as he was in quick disdain—and even just the possibility of judgment from those he deemed unworthy of such gratuitous condemnation irked easily at his guts. But that was the thing: that derision had always come out of arrogance then, merely out of an utter belief that he was better than others.
Yet with Alfred the rage burned somewhere deeper, from a place that made his heart beat faster—an ambition he could never admit.
That he would never admit.
"I might have started later than most princes, but at least I have retained my learning," Alfred started, right before making his tone more pointed. "Unlike some others."
"At least I write with my right hand."
"And that will clearly save you from Hell, Uhtred. I am sure."
The sarcasm in his voice made Uhtred laugh out loud, a joyful sound that filled the room and that made Alfred's lips twitch slightly, a movement so hastily concealed, but that still Uhtred caught regardless—right before the man looked back to that scholarly inked-skin in front of him, a dead lamb or sheep sacrificed for the sole purpose of recording—always remembering even the things that seemed the most unnecessary.
Alfred's hands twitched in unrest on the pale yellow material, and Uhtred leaned further on his palm, his eyes not moving from the side of the king's face.
"Beocca used to complain that my thorns were prickly and my ashes spindly, you know," Uhtred told him, so that the embarrassment of allowing himself to almost smile could have left him in peace.
But now it was another sound—one much less expected—that filled the air, lunging itself hard within his veins. A guffaw escaped Alfred's throat, so sudden that Uhtred immediately chuckled back as the ever-serious man in front of him kept laughing—seemingly unable to stop.
And for such a stupid joke too.
He could count on two fingers the times he had heard Alfred laugh, a sight to behold for how rare it was—and now his fingers turned up to three.
He believed he loved it.
Of course, he was familiar with chuckling, for that was always the noise that joined each evening spent with his men, and every moment lived with his family. His brother Ragnar used to say that if you didn't laugh at least once a day then you weren't truly living, and he believed that to be true. Always had.
Happiness was what kept you alive, and Alfred never laughed, but for that Uhtred blamed his position as king rather than an absence of humour. Showing any sight of hilarity would have been unbecoming in his mind, but even the time he had spent with Prince Alfred had never dared to be graced with that kind of music, so incapable he was of parting himself from his responsibilities even at a time he had almost none—a sense of duty that was so close to his heart altogether, and the real reason for the sombre eyes that always found cause to meet the mirth in his.
No moment of joy could be allowed to last within his body, but in others? That he could live perhaps—with judgment and good measure, surely, but still he could experience it.
God forbid that a man could find happiness in the idle.
And soon indeed, He made sure that shame would have put a stop to the seemingly foolish behaviour, and with laughter spent in silence, the eternally penitent man recovered with a slight red on his cheeks, a claim from the higher being above, one that made him abandon that lingering sign of humanity.
A most jealous God.
One nervous glance met Uhtred before the king cleared his throat to compose himself.
"I gather that your letters are much better now," Alfred told him soberly, still not looking at him, eyes fixated instead on his own fingers. One digit tried to erase a smear of dark liquid that had been left on the skin, and for some reason Uhtred found himself swallowing at the sight of those steady, repetitive, harsh strokes on his flesh, thoughts wandering way beyond the realm of writing.
"What did you want to become when you were child?" he suddenly found himself asking.
Alfred turned to look at him the moment the unexpected question was uttered.
That had been a curiosity that had plagued Uhtred's mind for a few years now, ever since the time Alfred had shown his precious red book to him, that beautiful collection of poems that had been given to him by his late mother Osburh.
It had been a late evening then, one in which he had found himself walking around the courtyard of the palace. Unable to sleep, Uhtred had been wandering along the old memory path of the tiles beneath his feet that a long time before had led him to the same man still in front of him to this day.
At the time, Alfred had just returned from his habitual contemplation in the great hall, the night habit he had always had ever since he had taken the crown. The blue robes wrapped around his slight waist had bounced with each step he took, and Uhtred had noticed for the first time then that he was getting thinner.
"You are not sleeping well, Uhtred?" he had asked him, and at once they had found themselves in the exact positions they had been in when both were just aethelings oblivious to the destiny that lured behind the door Alfred had come from—a walk the man had unknowingly taken to tempt him to his side.
"I haven't been sleeping at all, lord."
A smile graced Alfred's mouth at the answer, and remained until the king sat on the ledge under the cloister. His face fell upwards towards the Heavens, a place that became ever dearer to him the longer he lived on the earth that had given him such an important cause to fight for.
Uhtred followed his gaze to see that the sky was brightly covered with stars.
"Tonight is the feast of Saint Lawrence," Alfred informed him, sounding more serene than he had ever heard him. "When I was a child my mother used to take me here—in this courtyard—to watch his tears fall from above."
From his standing spot, Uhtred turned to look at him confused.
"His tears?"
"The stars, Uhtred. On Saint Lawrence there are always so many, have you not noticed?"
An amused chuckle ran through his throat as he stepped forward. "The pagans believe that those are stray embers from Muspelheim."
Alfred's eyes regarded his approaching body with curiosity. "The pagans? You are not part of them any longer, Lord Uhtred?"
Rolling his eyes he ignored the pounce and sat down next to him instead—shoulders almost touching but not quite.
Still to this day he could feel the gaze that had kept burning his skin then, eyes searching for a truth that Alfred had believed to have caught after that perceived slip up, but thankfully that inspection did not last long, for the king relented in his challenge and showed the most unexpected of mercies.
"We could say that us Christians believe quite the same," he had started, the emphasis on the word us not casual. His gaze fixed on one particularly bright star above. "Lawrence was burnt by the Romans, thus the stars are not tears of the body, but rather the tears of the fire that took his life."
Uhtred smiled at the words, an almost grin simmering on his lips. "Christians are not so boring after all."
"Is fire the only thing you care for?"
He shrugged at the question. "I love burning things."
Alfred scoffed and his knuckles whitened as his grip tightened onto something that was as red as the blood of those dooming flames.
"You always have that book with you," Uhtred noticed, nodding at the culprit.
Looking like a child caught stealing more sweets than he should have done, Alfred's hands stumbled a bit as he bashfully showed the book to him, almost as if it were of no importance whatsoever, and that was when Uhtred knew for certain that it meant a great deal to him. Whilst Alfred was someone who would give in charity anything he owned if he could, his façade of carelessness when it came to the fate of that particular book betrayed that he would have been capable of killing, if it meant never parting from it.
Yet, at that moment, he entrusted it in Uhtred's warrior palms.
"It was given to me by my mother," the king started slowly, hesitantly sharing such a precious reminiscence, one that needed to be shielded by the knowledge of others, a part of his heart that had to belong to him and only him, utterly protecting the memory from anyone unworthy.
And indeed soon, a soft, sad smile appeared on his lips as he recalled his gentle mother.
"She was wearing a beautiful purple dress that day. My father was away to battle, and only Aethelred and I remained at the palace. My brother was eager to spar with—with Odda, right here in this courtyard… They used to do that a lot when I was growing up."
The king had almost choked on that name, the ealdorman's suicide still too alive in his mind. He said nothing as his eyelids flickered, clearly trying his best to push his own tears of fire away. When he had finally felt the betrayal leaving him, he went on. "She kept us for a while in the great hall, and showed this book to us. It has Saxon poetry—mainly pagan, so wholly to your liking—"
"That's for certain," he smoothly interrupted him.
Alfred glared at him before continuing. Opening the first page, his arm slightly rested on Uhtred's leg as he was taken by the same sight that had captivated him as a child. "I was fascinated by the illumination here. So elegant and full of delicacy… She told us that she would have given the book to anyone who would have learnt its words by heart. I believe that she did that so that my brother could be more interested in his studies, but as soon as she said it, he only nodded that he would have done it that afternoon and then rushed to Odda. I, on the other hand, took the book and ran to my instructor, but before leaving her I asked her if she would have truly gifted us the book if we had succeeded. She ruffled my hair and promised that she would have had."
Uhtred remembered that he had smiled then.
"How old were you?"
"Around four winters, I believe."
An image of a little Alfred having his hair ruffled by his mother appeared before his eyes and made his smile widen. "And she kept the promise?" he had asked him, gaze falling on those same perfect strands of hair that were never left uncouth even throughout war.
His head whipped towards him when the question was asked.
"My mother never broke her promises."
Eager to protect her honour at all cost, it was an almost aggressive tone that had answered him, but it was one with a hint of sadness hidden behind it, and when Alfred had realized how the words had landed in their defensive task, his eyes had turned more dour than Uhtred had ever even witnessed in the marshes, at the time Edward had been ill. Shame had caught Alfred off guard, and, straightening his back in attempted composure, his knuckles had gripped the flesh tighter—holding onto it in need of a touch that had long abandoned him.
The one of his mother.
But in the process his fingers touched Uhtred's instead.
Alfred may have not noticed, but he certainly did.
"She was the one who taught me how important it is to keep the promises that we make, and to always entrust others to do the same."
"So she's the one I have to blame?"
At once, the same fingers that had been touched by his king suddenly found themselves between a closed book—Alfred's hand quickly slamming its pages onto them. Uhtred pretended to squeak in pain at the expected attack. "That is my sword hand!"
"A horse ran into your face the last time you went into battle, Uhtred. You will survive."
"The horse might have paved the way for easier damage."
"Yes, of course. To your head."
When the words left Alfred's mouth, Uhtred's face got closer to his, his eyes falling onto those same venom-filled lips that were always oh so eager to shut him up with a quick whip of his sharp tongue. He kept on smiling as his eyes didn't leave the glorious sight, one that was joined by that of an Adam's apple moving in a choked answer.
"I could prove to you how fine my head is, if you wish."
The king stared at him without moving an inch—the throat that had betrayed his feelings quite present in his mind. Perfectly knowing the double meaning behind Uhtred's words, he had stared at him somewhat speechless, but before he could even master to give him a reply of any kind, a loud noise of a door closing somewhere inside the palace broke the moment. Within a second, Alfred came back from his near insanity, and rose to his feet at once—book safely secured underneath the clasped hands in front of his cloak.
"Goodnight, Uhtred."
"Goodnight, lord," he had chuckled, satisfied enough for now to have embarrassed him.
"I do not see how that could be of any importance, Uhtred."
Brought back from his daydreaming, Uhtred easily replied, "It would satisfy my curiosity."
Alfred glowered at him before turning once more to his parchment, a letter to Haesten of all people. His fingers brushed the fresh ink to check if the liquid had dried out completely by the time the warrior had been in his head and the king had tried to find an answer to that foolish question. From his spot Uhtred watched as black smears joined the flesh in a barely existent shadow now, sere but still undoubtedly humid.
Hesitantly, satisfaction met him again.
"I wanted to be a teacher."
Uhtred's gaze fell on an absent one—royal eyes fixed on the pigment as he finally confessed to him.
The voice had been soft, almost a whisper, and as so it continued.
"You remember my mother's book?"
"I do."
"After that time she had started to show me more. Beautiful pages full of words that whenever they were pronounced by her, they became ever more mesmerizing," Alfred turned his face to look at him, and that was when Uhtred noticed how there were tears in his eyes, one that at last he did not hide. "She used to call me her little scholar, and after she passed there was nothing more I wanted than to be worthy of that name."
"So not for yourself but for her—"
"No," Alfred cut him off, almost seemingly scared at the thought of his mother ever forcing him to be someone he wasn't, the only one who did so. "Books were my safe space almost. I was often sick as a child, and looking at all the letters I still couldn't read made me feel like I was living in some world only I could understand… that solely my mother and I could understand. Being a teacher is the only path that I ever felt was right for me."
"Then you should do that."
"What?"
Uhtred sat upright, leaving his slouched position to lean closer to him, his whole body uncaring of how looking so near the king would hurt any man as one who dared to look at the sun. "You should be a teacher."
"Uhtred, I am king."
"And?"
"It's self-explanatory."
"You are king, and for that reason alone you can do as you wish. Especially now that there's peace."
"I cannot, Uhtred."
Without thinking he took his hand to call to his attention, and Alfred's words died on his lips as the still fresh ink on his skin now stained Uhtred's own.
Uhtred ignored both his heart's reaction at the daring touch he had tried, but especially he did his utmost to overlook the way Alfred's eyes had not moved from their joined hands ever since he had touched him.
"You can. Perhaps not an actual teacher, but a scholar, yes."
Alfred looked up to him at that, blue on blue, and in the silence that followed, Uhtred felt for the first time a thumb stroking his own, a movement so willing that his heart skipped a beat of its dancing.
"How?" the king asked him quietly, a vulnerability he rarely saw in his stare.
"I don't know… Some writings of your own?"
The hand loosened as Alfred's mind turned and turned to think of something worthy, and after a while the gentle strokes came to a stop as well as that gaze brightened, the wetness in it no longer the only source of shining.
"Translations."
The fire burned, leaving a smell of smoke lingering in the air, and Uhtred looked at him trying to understand his thinking. His brain was slower than his when it came to these things, but before he even had the time to think about any possible reasons for that choice, Alfred turned completely on his seat to face him wholly, his hand no longer in his but rather on Uhtred's thigh—almost as an afterthought, one only used to shake him and make him focus.
His eyes screamed that he could understand, and that was another thing he believed he loved about him.
Alfred's hand looked so perfectly placed on his leg, just as his arm had done all those evenings before, but now the touch was more dangerous—his fingers curling on his hidden skin, not only as if they belonged there, but to claim their ownership.
And now it was Uhtred's turn to swallow, his stomach retreating in itself as he took a breath his king didn't even notice so focused he was on his new idea.
"Most of the monks in this land barely know Latin, translations in English would be helpful not only to them but for any man! Do you understand how important that would be? It could save us from the pagans, even."
Before he could stop it, Uhtred scoffed at him, instantly glad to have a distraction from their joined bodies. "Do you plan to kill Danes by throwing books at them?" he joked, pitifully avoiding looking at those damn fingers.
Alfred glanced upwards in exasperation, Uhtred's insolence getting at him despite his excitement, and Uhtred licked his lips to keep himself from smiling too cheekily at the sight. "If the Danes came, it is because we neglected wisdom, Uhtred."
"Not because of the wealth of the churches?"
"There can be more than one truth, one doesn't erase the other." And with that the king had no more intention to continue that peculiar quarrel, for instead he continued onto sharing more important reasons, some that now made more sense to his oathman as well. "English would be the written language of knowledge in every kingdom. The language of culture."
There it was.
"And the unification of England would be accepted more easily by the men in power."
Alfred nodded. "Not only by the men in power, but by everyone."
"You would be doing it more for others than for yourself, though," he reasoned back, seeing the duty past his childhood dream.
Alfred looked down at that, and his hand slowly slid off his thigh, but before he could do that, Uhtred kept it there for a while longer. The king's eyes looked up to try to find the meaning of that act, but Uhtred offered nothing in return—his face an unbreakable shield wall.
And to be fair he didn't know either why he did that, he just knew that he wanted that hand to remain there.
He wasn't entirely certain of everything, but of a few things he was and that was one.
The other he definitely knew was that Alfred was incapable of thinking of himself, and thus even becoming a scholar had to serve his purpose of being king, his goal always the one of saving his people from damnation—not himself.
Always on the look for an excuse to do something that could benefit his heart as well.
"I would be the one choosing which works to translate, and as a result I would also derive my own contentment from it."
The warrior yielded, the tone from his king too defeating to sustain an argument. "Which works?" he asked instead, giving him an excuse to support his lie.
"I would have to think more about it, but I already know that I want to work on Augustine—by my own hand—I am able to do that."
"You know Latin?"
"I would need a bit of practice with reading it, but yes," Alfred told him, seemingly sure of himself, but soon a hint of shyness appeared on his cheeks as his mind formed a thought. With an awkward smile, he added, "But I won't need to look much at the original work, if I have my own thoughts to share…"
"That is not a translation then."
Alfred straightened his back and with a raise of his eyebrow he looked as solemn as ever, the king in all his glory shadowed by dying candles—the grey in his beard ever closer to white in the darkness of the room. "It is a translation on my terms."
Uhtred laughed out loud, his head shaking in disbelief at Alfred's boldness—his plans to already manipulate texts he hadn't even decided upon, already running through the wheels of his mind.
Gods.
When he calmed down and turned to look at him, Uhtred saw that Alfred was already staring at him, his mouth slightly open as he didn't stop.
No sound came to interrupt the moment this time.
Except that of the king's voice.
"What about you?" he asked, quietly, not daring to disrupt the peace.
"What about me?" he asked back, matching his volume.
"What did you want to be when you were a child?"
Oh.
And what did Uhtred wish to be when he was younger? He was the second son of a lord of the north—the spare. His father did not care for him, only Beocca did, but even with him, he had never spoken of what he could have become. This was the first time he was asked what he wanted to be and not what he was supposed to be.
From somewhere afar he could see himself sitting at night at the sea gate of Bebbanburg, imagining his future.
A mere child.
He knew what had been on his mind at the time, and Uhtred smiled at how destiny always seemed to work at the end.
"I wanted to serve a great lord, somewhere far away from Bebbanburg," he told him, the words he had never believed he would have ever uttered finally out of his mind and heart.
Everyone knew him as the man who only wanted to live by his own rules, a man who had kings as his ancestors, one who wanted to reclaim his lands.
And that was true.
Almost.
"You are the Lord of Bebbanburg," Alfred rightfully said, wholly perplexed.
"At the time I wasn't."
When the hand that was on his thigh left him to join Alfred's other lonely one, Uhtred allowed it, rather busying himself with the quill left untouched on the table.
The ink was entirely dry now, but when he touched his fingertip with the quill's own tip, it still left a small mark.
One that belonged to the man in front of him.
Claiming him with his greatest weapon, and by Uhtred's own design.
"Bebbanburg never felt like home," he admitted, his voice even quieter than the one Alfred had used. Without meeting his gaze, he could see from the corner of his eye that the man was following each one of the movements he was making on his own skin with his feather, that comforting caress so soft that it could be felt both through touch and sight.
"I wasn't a good warrior then," he continued. "My father never failed to remind me of that. The other kids also hated me, but that was mainly because no one likes the youngest son of a king."
Alfred smiled and joined in his miserable snort, their fates more similar than they ever truly realised.
"I was a dreamer, and when everything felt so bleak, all I liked to do was imagining myself as a great warrior in a great king's hall."
The quill fell on the table once more, and together they watched it stain its wood.
"You are a great warrior," Alfred said, his eyes falling on him once more and this time he met his gaze, saying his next words without hesitation.
"And I'm serving a great king."
This time, he was the one unable to read Alfred's reaction. His eyes searched for clues but found none.
He told the truth, he meant what he said and did not regret saying it. But Alfred never liked praise, and Uhtred knew just how little he believed to be a great king. Yes, he did believe that he made the right decisions for his people, but he had made mistakes in the past and those haunted him like a great stain of ink that could never be cleansed.
But it was in those imperfections that his goodness laid, because Alfred never stopped trying to be better than the day before.
That was the thing Uhtred admired the most about him, something he wasn't quite capable of.
He never wished for Bebbanburg, that was just a matter of honour for him—he wanted it because his father wanted him to have it, but not because his father had any faith in him, but because Uhtred was the only heir he had left, thus he had to trust him.
Alfred on the other hand believed in him, despite everything he had ever done, and whilst Uhtred knew that he wasn't an easy person to deal with, Alfred had never left him.
"I would never have given you up." That's what Alfred had told Uhtred so many years before—before all the oaths.
And he never did.
Never.
They fought, they screamed at each other, they couldn't see eye to eye most of the time, but they had never abandoned one another, and that's what made the relationship between them theirs.
That's all Uhtred had ever truly known and he wouldn't exchange it for anything.
He would be an annoying arseling about it, yes, but serving the man in front of him was an honour, one he was deeply aware of.
"You do not need to praise me, Uhtred," Alfred said after a while, his eyes not meeting him.
"I do not intend to, I only said what I thought."
"Perhaps you would have wished for a king you agreed more with—"
"No," Uhtred cut him off. "I wouldn't wish for any other."
And there it was again, that one unmoving stare that did not leave his face, except that now his eyes were observing everything—from the scar that ran from his temple to the gap above his upper lip.
Before he knew it, Alfred grabbed his cheek with his left hand, the strength of those fingers that never stopped writing now ready to write one more chapter, one that brought his face closer to his, their lips closer than they had ever been. Instinctively, Uhtred closed his eyes to finally taste the mouth he had been waiting to taste for—
"Lord King?" Steapa called from outside the study, knocking loudly on the door that separated them from the rest of the world.
Fuck.
Immediately, they both parted in time for Steapa to enter, his position as protector allowing him to do that without waiting for permission.
Uhtred leaned lazily against the table as his heart ran a thousand fields over and over again, his body telling a different story now that another was in their presence. From the corner of his eye, he could see Alfred's hand shaking as it took hold of the feather once more—the position expected from him, and the chest beneath that heavy cloak fell quick but steady as he tried to catch his breath from what would have almost happened had Steapa not interrupted.
The fearsome warrior nodded at Uhtred as he took in the scene that most likely did not even reach the understanding part of his brain, and in answer he barely gave a nod back, still too focused onto his need to appear as nonchalant as he could, but that did not matter, for Steapa only turned towards their shared lord to tell him what he had come to say.
"I apologise, lord," he started dutifully. Alfred was giving him his back, barely acknowledging him—or anyone in the room for all that mattered. "I was told that the brother Asser will be arriving in Winchester by the end of the week, he wished to be known that he hoped that his early arrival will not be causing any trouble for the servants."
The king nodded, and licking his lips he got up from the table. Uhtred watched as he calmly walked towards the window at the far end of the study, the left hand that had been on his cheek just a few moments before, now quietening a pain in his bowels as he faked a control he had almost lost.
"Very good," the voice was a silent tremble, and in there laid the truth he had just seen beneath the pretence. Steapa paid it no mind, undoubtedly blaming it on the illness that plagued him day and night rather than something he simply did not witness, but that certainly made the king feel like he had anyway. But before his mind could grasp anything, Alfred continued, finishing his speech with a blow he could have avoided. "I was just discussing with the ealdorman Uhtred something I wanted to talk about with Asser as well. I would certainly be needing his help, his early coming is a blessing."
Uhtred's lips tightened at the words, his skin prickling around his veins as his blood pounded. The stain left by Alfred's hand on his face now burned so hard that he feared he would end up like Saint Lawrence—the tears of fire taking hold of his soul, as instead it wished to be burning someone else.
Ealdorman Uhtred.
Asser.
A blessing.
Bastard.
Getting up from his seat, he slowly walked towards Steapa—his steps not daring showing emotion.
The king did not move, but Uhtred knew he had heard his movements.
Alfred wanted to annoy him, so he would annoy him just as much.
"Is Aethelwold at the Two Cranes Inn?" he asked, completely unbothered.
"Last time I heard he was trying to lure Finan to arm wrestle him," Steapa told him, nodding with a small snicker, the thought of that weasel trying to beat the Irishman in a battle of strength entirely amusing to him.
Uhtred smiled back and patted him on his chest.
"Good, I do need a good time tonight."
And with that he left, no pleasantries offered to the king whatsoever.
As he walked out of the door, he could feel Alfred's eyes on him now.