pro_patria_mortuus | (no subject)

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Bahorel was volubly gleeful at the prospect of learning swordfighting from a genuine medieval English knight who lived and made war with his longsword, and equally gleeful at the prospect of teaching him canne de combat. Enjolras isn't surprised at all by this; it's why he felt comfortable making the offer to Harry Percy in the first place.

This would probably be true even without Bahorel's current level of boredom. As it is, he'd probably leap at the chance to teach canne de combat to a dressmaker's dummy.

(A poor analogy. He's probably already done that, too.)

At any rate, the idea being mutually agreeable and their schedules being largely free, Enjolras and Bahorel and Harry have made their way together to the practice room upstairs.

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Bahorel laughs. "Then at your pleasure, Sir Percy!" If it's teasing to use his title, it's entirely friendly. And hey, Harry'll get to hit him with a stick soon!

Well, in that case, he'll take no offense.

He takes a moment or two to settle himself-- remember the weight of the cane, how it moves-- before giving Bahorel the nod that he's ready to begin.

While his quick reflexes and instinct for the general movements of a fight serve him well, and while he does seem to have remembered the things Enjolras taught him quite well, they can only get him so far when set against Bahorel's vastly superior skill and size.

In a real fight, Enjolras would have kicked the cane away. (In a real fight, the amount of damage both of them would have taken from some of those blows would have shortened the fight significantly -- although the winner would very likely have been facing other people too, during and after, in a general mêlée.) Here and now, he's scooped Bahorel's cane up instead, in order to pass it back to him.

"In the next match, he'd likely have been winner instead."

Percy doubtless knows this, Bahorel certainly does, but it's worth saying all the same.

Anyway. He steps back to watch, out of the way.

Bahorel takes the cane from Enjolras with a nod of thanks, and waits for Percy to signal ready, then leads off with a couple of simple feints; enough to let Percy strike back, and give Bahorel some idea of what the skill level is in this match.

His skill in canne de combat is-- well, rudimentary.

But his skill in combat broad applies: he can dodge a blow and strike one too, and he's fairly quick and very strong (though of course he also knows better than to strike hard enough to cause real harm). He can hold his own, at least, and plainly knows enough to keep himself safe should Bahorel pick up the pace.

All right, then! Bahorel grins, and does pick up the speed-- considerably. Watch your head, Harry!

..And everything else, too. It's really not a very refined style of fighting.

He doesn't last a great while longer after that: the speed, and the quick shifts of weight particularly are the things least similar to his usual armor-clad style. A quick series of blows makes him stumble and lose his grip, sending both Harry and the cane to the ground.

"Well done!" Bahorel means it; Harry is learning fast, to keep up even that long. He offers a hand to help him up, not because Harry likely needs it-- really, he probably doesn't-- but because it's the natural thing to do, in a practice bout.

Harry takes it-- and doesn't need it, but he recognizes the purpose of the gesture.

"I shall need a fair deal of practice yet," he says, bending to retrieve the cane.

"Thou hast the idea, though," Enjolras points out, from the sidelines. "Not yet put in practice always, but already thou'rt improved from last time."

He's got an idea of what the cane and his feet are supposed to be doing, even if making sure they actually do that at speed is a work very much in progress.

And said work does progress, at least a little, as the afternoon does. For all that he recognizes and accepts the hard work necessary to become good at anything physical-- certainly more than he understands that the same principles must be applied to ideas-- it's been a long time since he's been a beginner. Though his immense respect for Enjolras (and Bahorel, too, increasingly) goes far to curb his natural impatience, and certainly any that does sneak through is directed only at himself.

It isn't all matches. There's plenty of drill-work too, for Harry's sake, to teach him good habits instead of only improvisational approximations, and towards the end a two-against-one bout. Harry, of course, takes to that far better than most; his tutor was the chaos of the battlefield, not a fencing-master teaching the rules of dueling.

By the time they break for good, instead of only for a quick gulp of water or one person's turn to watch, all three of them are sweaty, somewhat bruised, and looking their own individual variations on tiredly cheerful. (Some of these variations are more obvious and exuberant than others.)

Obvious who's obvious, Bahorel is always bouncing on his heels like that(What? All right, very often. Especially after a fight, or a lot of them.).

But yes fine, it's probably time for a real break. "If we must stop, I'm taking lunch; you're both welcome to join me." He considers the state of everyone in the room. " --And to clean up, too; my rooms have space enough. And if we make ourselves convincingly presentable, we may avoid alarming any of our good doctors."

Though a fussing-over from Joly is probably guaranteed by a few of the more obvious bruises.

Edited 2015-08-27 02:56 (UTC)

It's only the fact that Enjolras and Bahorel are nowhere near the same size that saves him from a dry comment about attempted makeovers on both of them. (Enjolras is well aware that if he ever hinted that he was willing to take fashion advice, he'd have a measuring tape around him and Bahorel rummaging through his closet before he could blink. He has no intention of ever inviting this.) But a shirt or a cravat is about the only thing either of them could borrow from the other.

Lunch with friends, and the use of a sink with soap and water, sounds like an excellent plan, though.

"Gladly," he says with a smile, and glances at Harry. Percy, you in?

Edited 2015-08-27 03:58 (UTC)

Harry, who's definitely closer to Bahorel's end of the post-fight exuberance scale, nods.

"Ay, that sounds very well."

Yeah, this seems like it might be the sort of break that still involves a certain amount of cheerful violence.

But then Bahorel picked his current rooms largely because they're nearly made for that! The rock walls and general Red Everything have been covered since with multiple overlapping murals, various swathes and swatches of fabric draped around furniture, and books scattered on everything. There's a small woodpile by the fireplace and what might look like a clumsy lean-to of untrimmed branches and a blanket over by the bed.

He waves a hand towards a small shrine out of the way. "Don't knock that over, it's Jehan's. Or Djehuty's, however that works. Leave the books in the fridge and don't step on the cat if you see her, most of the books are from the Library so be careful of those, use whatever else you like. If you don't grab the shower first, I will." The speech is entirely for Harry's benefit, of course; Enjolras knows the anarchical tendencies of Bahorel's housekeeping.

It is... a room.

Harry has experienced some of the monstrosities that the Bar has to offer in terms of alternate rooms, but he just assumed no one actually chose to live in them.

"Go first, by all means," he says, a bit dazed. Why is there a lean-to? What does it have to do with bird-head-man whose name he still can't pronounce?

But why would someone ever not take one of the interesting rooms?

Bahorel can make an all-day project out of cleaning up--Harry may be a bit confused by just how many bottles and jars and brushes can exist in one bathroom-- but he doesn't have to, and this time he's out in a couple of minutes, even if he is still half-wearing a towel instead of a new shirt yet.

" Yours, then-- did anyone order anything yet?" Since the answer is almost certainly no, he's already making a note for the rats.

(If Harry asks, Bahorel will explain that no, of course the lean-to isn't for Djehuty, he's a god and has like a palace and gardens and stuff apparently, the little shrined over next to it is for the god, it's got incense, see? The lean to is for reading in. Obviously.)

Harry might ask later-- for the present he is still in the phase of silent confusion.

"I thank thee," he says, moving slowly towards the washroom. What could one person do with all these books?

Two people! And the difference that makes in options for Things To Do About Books, when it's the right people, is something Bahorel can and has written articles about.

But right now he's just down taking lunch orders. "Found anything you'd favor from the Bar, Enjolras?" Hey, it's a new land of wonders! Possibly even including Enjolras caring about food!

They're artistic was the sum total of Enjolras's explanation of the room.

They're also Romantics, and that matters. But he suspects Percy doesn't know the word, not in this context, and Bahorel will do an explanation much better justice.

He did, of course, make free with some glassware he was pretty certain was clean to pour three waters, and give Harry one. There's familiarity in the way he sorted (only a little bemusedly) through the collection of mysterious bottles of mysterious liquids to find a water pitcher.

"No, we haven't ordered," he says to Bahorel's question. And to the second question, a look of faint amusement; he knows the teasing that's going unsaid (for the moment) there. "Something with meat, nothing too peculiar. Beyond that, order what you like."

Harry emerges from the washroom, hair even more tousled than usual.

"It is only thine, this room?" he asks, moving away from the door so Enjolras can go in.

Enjolras has, in the meantime, borrowed a clean shirt. He didn't ask to borrow it, only because he knows Bahorel would be mortally offended by a friend standing on such bourgeois ceremony, but he did have to request a little assistance in finding one, with the increasing variety of weird future varieties. Enjolras does not want to wear a 20th century poet shirt, let alone something covered in sequins.

He will, however, take the opportunity to sluice off with a quick shower. (Showers are still kind of weird to him; there's a convenience to them, but they just don't feel as clean as a bath. But the speed is undeniable, especially when you really just want to wash off the sweat of a workout.)

He'll emerge in only a few minutes, damp and cleaner and wearing his own trousers and waistcoat with the borrowed shirt. In the meantime: enjoy this decorative explosion of a room with its co-occupant, Harry.

Bahorel shrugs. "Jehan's living here too, at the moment. You've met him, I think--Prouvaire? Tall fellow, particular dress, blushes for no reason anyone could guess, eyes like he's looking somewhere far off and right into you at the same time?-- The tent's his idea. And the shrine--" Bahorel nods to it, maybe a little more clearly "that's to his god-friend. So it's his place as much as mine, for now."

"Yes, yes, I have met him indeed," Harry says. "He did speak most highly of you. --why has he need of a tent indoors..?"