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[livinginmyglass]

Viola isn't sure whether she had that strange magic flu or just a nasty cold, but whatever it was, she slept for about three days straight and woke feeling much better.

(She thinks she was herself the whole time, but then again she has a hazy, feverish recollection of dreams of the shipwreck, of a rescue that was not her own-- of waking, and seeming to see the room through her brother's eyes before drifting to sleep again.)

But she's better now, so time to set all that aside (not least her encounter with Hal, which she blushes even thinking of. It was far less scandalous than kissing, of course, but somehow the memory of it-- of trailing his other self, of looking so wretched in front of him, of curling up on the couch at his side-- embarrasses her more.)

But setting that aside-- the library. That's always a safe, calming place.

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[never_promised]

The library, yes! Safe! Calm! Full of nice quiet books and peaceful little tables.

And someone sprawled on a couch, studying a tablet with music coming out of it at an unlibrary-like volume. ...knocking down tables in a restaurant in a West End town, call the police there's a madman around, running down underground to a dive bar in a West end town...

He has several books spread on the table at his elbow, but his attention is entirely taken up with the tablet. (But probably not so entirely that he'll miss Viola's appearance.)

[livinginmyglass]

...damn it. But she can't resist approaching.

"What noise is this?"

[never_promised]

His face had been slack, remote, a scholar dutifully putting his mind to his work; as soon as she speaks and he looks up, his face splits in a grin.

"Noise? Noise? What call you noise? Dost ramble through the woodlands green with spring, hear the thrush, and say Bah, what noise is this?"

[livinginmyglass]

"I know no bird that singeth so, nor hardly any man." She leans in close, as if expecting to see a tiny man there. "But how came you by this music?"

[never_promised]

There is, in fact, a tiny man there! Well, a picture of one on the screen, anyway. Hal passes it over to Viola without comment. "It was commended to me by an acquaintance of mine, one suffering from the same illness that took me."

[livinginmyglass]

Viola looks from the screen to Hal and back again with bewildered amusement.

"And thou didst think it needful to mind the counsel of one beside his wits?"

[never_promised]

"Indeed yes!" He laughs. Ouch, Viola, ouch. "For do they not say that in madness lies..." Shrug. "...something, I know not what? Nay, but in his right mind he had given me some music to listen to, taught me the use of this device; and so I had a mind to listen to what he said in his wrong mind. He bid me dress thus, as this Boy George, while I listened."

Which...he hasn't done. Yet.

[livinginmyglass]

She bites her lip, trying to keep a straight face as she says, "O, that would I gladly see."

[never_promised]

"Thou shalt, for I gave my word." He sprawls back on the couch, raising an eyebrow. "But I know not the method for such paints. Nor have I the hair for it. I would need a helper."

[livinginmyglass]

She does laugh at that. "I think thou hadst better find a lady's maid than a gentleman's servant to undertake such bedecking and face-painting!"

[never_promised]

Hal makes a face. "I know none. Dost thou?"

[livinginmyglass]

"None in this place. Indeed, it seems all do occupy a most lofty estate," she adds thoughtfully. "I had never thought of it before. If any others be servants, 'tis a title they claim not. Though in this, perhaps, they are wiser than I!"

[never_promised]

"Mm." Fine, Viola, go distract him from nonsensical excuses to get handsy with each other. Be that way. "I know not lofty. The Frenchman Bahorel will declaim loudly to any who will hear it, how his people are peasants, his parents farmers, he is sprung from the French mud itself, and so forth. But 'tis true he is no man's servant."

The music changes, and he stretches to look at the screen: a video now, with a crowned and ermined man trudging along a path carrying some sort of folded contraption. Okay, then.

[livinginmyglass]

"Why, sure thou hast such gown about you!" She grins. "Or is't not strange enough to fulfill thy promise?"

[never_promised]

"Nay, I brought not my ermines..." Just the extremely luxurious gown he'd worn to die in. And his crown. "The promise was to dress as Boy George, and this is some other man." He looks over at her, leaning on the back of the couch. "--Wilt sit with me?"

Probably she won't, without the excuse of illness.

[livinginmyglass]

"Why, 'twas thy promise to observe the doings of these strange men, not mine," she says.

But she sits. Not nearly as close as she did the other day.

[never_promised]

...fair enough. He doesn't do anything to close the distance; let her keep it if she wants. (If she wants.)

"I'll wait until I see that Jim again--again himself--before I try it," he says, continuing as if there had been no move. "For I would see whether he recalls aught of his time as another man. Myself, I do not."

[livinginmyglass]

The care with which she maintains it may suggest, in fact, that she does not want. But is very aware that she ought to want.

"Truly, nothing at all?" she tilts her head curiously. "I would have gladly known how 'twas, to be another, and to know it and yet not know it."

[never_promised]

He thinks it over, partly so as not to think about whether Viola wants to move closer.

"Thor was my brother," he says slowly. "I was sure of that, and the sureness remains to me. Thor was my brother, and the elder. Well, we were much of an age, but there was a throne meant for him and not for me."

[livinginmyglass]

"Why, thou shalt never be rid of thrones and kings," she teases-- or means to tease, but it doesn't come out quite right.

[never_promised]

"And brothers," he says mildly, letting that slide. "I recall some confusion, ere I was fully myself: if Thor was my brother, and Humphrey, and Thomas, and John, where was there room for poor Hal?"

[livinginmyglass]

"Poor Hal, indeed! Why, there was a time-- it must be many years ago, by thy reckoning-- thou wouldst, I think, have gladly doffed thy title." But maybe that's presuming too much. She quickly adds, "Or else it pleased thee to do so when idling here."

[never_promised]

"'Tis not a condition that can be set aside, once it is thine." He slouches forward, hands clasped between his knees, and looks down at the floor. "I may toss my crown to the floor, say The king is but a man and this man is Hal of London, but Hal of London will still have led England's armies and that crown will still have held King Henry's thoughts both high and low."

He glances sideways to Viola and smiles a tight little smile. "Didst thou prefer me with no title?"

[livinginmyglass]

"Oh, why--" She wants to look away, but feels she can't. "It is not for me to like nor dislike that which is so."

[never_promised]

He makes a small frustrated noise. "Come, thou'rt full of opinion, thought, feeling."