Chapter Text
Chapter I: Now, I fear I have fallen from grace.
Alex
There is something about Henry. Alex doesn’t know when things changed between them. Before, he would cuddle in Alex’s arms and eagerly let the former First Son of the U.S. spoon him. He would give Alex a deep morning kiss, bad breath be damned. He would step inside the kitchen of their brownstone and make coffee for his fiancé before putting the kettle on and make himself a cup of tea. He would tease Alex from time to time about their wedding night “underwear”, and it would probably end with one of them on his knees, succumbing to love, lust, and pleasure altogether. But those are just a few of the moments missing from their domestic life in New York.
Alex didn’t know what to think of it. He was well-aware of Henry’s bad days. The afternoons and evenings spent inside bed and covered with blankets or just leaning on his right side at the window seat of their bedroom, with his hazel eyes staring up at the stars on the sky. After four years together, Alex learnt to give him space but without letting his prince neglect his basic needs like eating or having a proper rest. Alex was always there to support him unconditionally. Two weeks have passed since Alex began to worry about the situation, and the brunette was certain this wasn’t it.
On top of that, Henry was required to visit England for nothing less that almost a whole month to assist royal events and tie up loose ends. It was part of the sealed deal he and his mother Princess Catherine had made with Mary, the (“not for long” as Alex liked to point out with a smirk) Queen of England. The agreement’s final goal for the blonde prince was his freedom away from the British Crown. The abdication process had been a long and dreadful one, but they were finally seeing the light behind the tunnel, although Alex was hoping there wasn’t a train at the end of the path giving the late circumstances. He wanted to put off Henry’s trip to England to have more time to try and talk things through with Henry, but his fiancé refused to extend his ties to the Crown. The night before Henry’s departure, Alex tried again.
“Henry, I can’t do this anymore,” Alex said with a tired voice. He was sitting on a stool beside the kitchen table, with a cup of lukewarm coffee cradled between his hands. Henry was sitting across the table looking at him with a pale expression and Alex realized what he sounded like. His anxiety took over and didn’t give Henry a chance to reply. “No. I didn’t mean it like that, baby. I’m— I’m worried. About you. About what the whole abdication thing is doing to us. About…” He hesitated, and after a minute Henry finally spoke.
“Dear. It’s alright. What are you on about?” Henry furrowed his brows. He had dark circles under his eyes, and he looked almost sick. However, Alex couldn’t keep his brewing thoughts coming out of his mouth. He snapped.
“What am I on about?” He scoffed. “I’ve asked myself the same question about you, Henry. You don’t talk to me anymore. Not about the important things anyway, and you don’t even let me touch you anymore. I don’t know what I did wrong, and I don’t think a fucking long trip to London is going to help us out here!” Alex didn’t realize when he had stand up in frustration. He was a grown man who knew better than to resort to yelling at the love of his life as a petulant child. But Henry’s silence was killing him from the inside. Henry looked mortified for a few seconds, then suddenly his face changed for a blank bored one and steeled himself. It was a stance he had barely seen around him for a long time. His public mask was up. What the hell is happening? Alex asked himself, helpless. That look made him step back and take a breath. When Henry talked back, nothing prepared the brunette for what was coming to him.
“Christ. Is that what’s this is about? Your need for a hole to put your cock in?” Henry’s tone was icy, matching his glacial stare. Alex for once in his life was lost for words and frozen in place. “I’m so sorry I’ve been so busy trying to juggle with the work at the shelter, planning the wedding with Bea and June and trying to appease my bloody grandmother to be free from her shackles. It must have been so hard for you.” After punctuating the last sentence, the prince stood up with his tea in one hand and was about to leave the kitchen when he heard Alex behind him with a thin voice.
“Then maybe we should call it off.” Alex fidgeted with his engagement ring; a scuffed but recently polished gold band which belonged to Henry’s late beloved father, Arthur Fox. He felt so honored to wear such a significant symbol of Arthur’s love for the one who bore his children. His Henry.
“What?” Henry didn’t turn around to face Alex. But the former First Son believed he heard Henry’s voice crack. Please, don’t go. Let’s talk about this, Hen. That’s what Alex wanted to say. But instead, he cleared his throat and went with it again.
“Maybe we shouldn’t get married right now. To take something off your plate.” Alex didn’t mean a word he was saying, but the upset part of him won’t shut up. Henry didn’t turn around. He didn’t answer him. He didn’t say he was being ridiculous. He stood there, letting the words settle for a moment, then walked away, and went upstairs to their bedroom without a second glance back at his other half.
The morning after, around 9,30 am, Alex woke up to discover Henry’s side of the bed cold and empty. He looked around and saw his suitcase and travel bag were gone and Alex brought his hand to his face, trying to choke out a sob. His mind was racing, and his body started to tremble. A panic attack, sure why not. He thought. He shuddered and curled himself with his head down, his knees close to his chest and his hands bracing his legs. He tried to make a list on his mind to calm his agitated breath.
One. Henry was gone. And probably on his way to London.
Two. Alex fucked up the chance to fix things up. Big time.
Three. He didn’t know if Henry wanted to get married anymore.
Four. Were Henry’s feelings for him fading?
Five. Why did Henry act that way? Something was clearly wrong.
Alex looked up with red rimmed eyes and took a deep breath with his eyes closed. When he opened them, he saw from the corner or his eye a piece of white paper at his bedside table beside his glasses. He took another breath and pick it up. Henry’s beautiful calligraphy pierced his stomach like a knife.
If I loved you less,
I might be able to talk about it more.
Yrs, H.
Alex recognized the quote; it was from Jane Austen’s Emma. Henry always have had a flair for the dramatic. Although what struck him was the familiar parting words. The abbreviation. Alex’s heart held tight on to those three letters.
Henry
Two weeks ago
“Your Royal Highness, may I be honest with you?” The royal doctor’s appointment was supposed to be routine, another little box checked to add to all the paperwork he had had to do to reconcile a successful agreement with the Crown. Well, with his grandmother. Now the doctor was looking at Prince Henry as if he had grown two heads in a matter of seconds. The blonde prince swallowed the lump in his throat. His worry beginning to churn his stomach.
“Is there anything wrong?” He asked with hesitance.
“Not at all.” The royal doctor, a woman in her mid-thirties called Dr. Matthews, answered a little too quickly. She leaned her body forward with her hands on the table. She grabbed some of the medical papers from Henry’s recent analyses. “We have done all the bloodwork you, Sir, and Your Majesty had solicited. Everything is quite alright, but uhm…” The doctor didn’t look directly at Henry while uttering her next words. Henry raised an eyebrow in confusion. “One of the tests was made per Princess Catherine’s request. I’m guessing you weren’t aware of—”
“What is it, Dr. Matthews?” Henry couldn’t stand more stalling and cut in. The doctor looked up at him and took a breath.
“Sir, the analysis in question was about the carrier gene.” Henry froze. “You are a carrier.”
“T-that…” Henry’s voice wobbled. “That’s not possible.”
“I’m afraid it is, Your Royal Highness. Though, it’s most likely something meant to be bypassed given the circumstances.” The doctor looked like he wanted to say something more, but he took a pause to evaluate the prince’s reaction.
“But I’ve been with men since I was 17, without the adequate precautions, and nothing ever happened in 10 years” Henry spoke bluntly, he couldn’t care less about decorum in that moment, besides it was nothing the whole bloody world didn’t know about already. Henry’s hands were shaking on his lap, and he tried fidgeting with his pinky finger, a residual tic from when he wore his signet ring, now in Alex’s possession. “You said it was my mother who gave the order?”
“That’s correct.” Dr. Matthews’ gaze gave her away. There was more to the story. “I’ve personally talked to her. Sir, there is a reason why you haven’t got pregnant in all these years, or at least for the past eight years. Princess Catherine reached out to me personally for this analysis and she let me know you’ve been ingesting a type of drug, specific for carriers, it is a hormone blocker. It prevents the user from getting pregnant and it is untraceable in a general blood test, especially if you don’t know what you’re looking for. It’s not something available for everyone, and it was an experimental drug a few years back.”
Henry was stunned in his seat. He was processing the fact that he was a carrier but adding up to that the idea that he had been poisoned all these years was something else entirely. Who could have done such a hideous, invasive thing? Although…
“It was my grandmother’s doing, isn’t it?” Henry asked with a defeated tone.
“I’m afraid so, Sir” The doctor answered sympathetically, and added “Your Majesty made sure you were in contact with those blockers for years through food or beverages, until you started your relationship with Mr. Claremont-Diaz, that is. It came to Her Royal Highness’ knowledge that it became quite a difficult task and the administrations stopped when you moved to America.”
The prince felt numb. A chill run all over his body. Henry compartmentalized the news and shoved them inside a box in his mind for later. If this was a nightmare, he wanted to wake up. He wanted to be in Alex’s secured arms. Alex. He looked down at the results that Dr. Matthews had in her hand and looked up again to the doctor with utter concern. “Am I… am I pregnant now?”
“Oh no, Sir. I was very thorough with the analysis, and it came up negative every time.” She smiled shyly at Henry and added “However, I strongly recommend beginning to take precautions, I’ll give you a prescription for male birth control and if you start to feel some mood changes or just nauseous, please do not hesitate to contact me. Also, if you have noticed any body changes or…”
Her doctor kept talking about contraceptives and their effectiveness, but the sounds were like white noise in Henry’s ears, and his heart and mind was elsewhere in a cozy brownstone in New York. He had to tell Alex. But how? How could he drop this news to him and expect things not to change between them. Would Alex even want him anymore? Would he still want to get married? Christ. He was drowning on his own thoughts. He was beginning to spiral. Henry’s knowledge about carriers was limited, it wasn’t a thing “a prince should be bothered with” as some royal assistants said here and there. But what Henry did know was that carriers were largely persecuted by media outlets and frowned upon at best by society. It wasn’t something you discussed on a trivial conversation. If his traumatic public coming out was any indication, the press was going to have a fucking field day from this.
At the end of the appointment, Henry absentmindedly took Dr. Matthews’ birth control prescription and slipped it inside his navy blue peacoat’s pocket. He shook the doctor’s hand goodbye and left the room. His personal equerry and close friend, Shaan Srivastava, was outside Dr. Matthews’ office waiting for him alongside two protection officers and when their eyes met, Shaan’s regular stoic expression turned worried. The equerry reached for Henry’s elbow when the blonde walked past them to exit the premises, but with only one short silent glance Shaan knew what his charge meant. Not here. Shaan slightly nodded and they resumed their walk to the car waiting at the secured backside of the hospital. The front was crowded with noisy reporters. Henry got into the right back seat of the black SUV with Shaan following behind him. Both PPO’s took the front seats and set out their way back to Kensington Palace.
Henry began talking without moving his gaze from the afternoon’s busy streets outside the window. His hands tight together around his phone.
“Shaan, could you call my mother and tell her she is needed at Kensington?”
“Certainly, Sir.” Shaan took out his own phone from the inside of his suit jacket. Before dialing, he glanced at the men silent in the driver’s seat and then took another look at the prince. “It’s everything alright?”
Henry turned his head to face his equerry with glassy eyes but a timid shuddery smile. “Quite. I just feel like sharing a cup of earl grey. Please, take her to the tearoom when she arrives.” Henry didn’t talk again for the rest of the drive to the palace and Shaan decided not to push any further.
Princess Catherine was sitting across the tea table on one of the antique golden gilded chairs with a distraught expression. Shaan quietly opened the door and let Henry enter to greet his mother. She stood up.
“I’m sorry you found out that way.” Her mother started with a wary demeanor. Shaan’s head leaned at Henry’s right side.
“I’ll see you outside, Sir.” He whispered.
“There’s no need. I want you to hear this, Shaan.” The equerry’s eyes softened and with a nod followed him inside and closed the door. Henry turned to face his mother.
“I want to believe you, mom. But I don’t understand why you couldn’t tell me something so important as this yourself.” Henry wasn’t mad at her mother, but he felt a little betrayed. The blonde thought Catherine had left her stillness behind after his and Alex’s public outing three years ago.
“I’ve only known about it for a couple of weeks, dear. And I wanted you to hear it from Susan— from Dr. Matthews first, with hard proof evidence. I’m sorry any of this happened.” The daughter of the Queen pleaded looking into her son’s eyes. She reached for Henry’s hand and squeezed it. Henry’s eyes had the same hazelnut shade as her late husband’s, although his similarities with Arthur didn’t end there, he also had the same sandy hair and delicate features. Sometimes Catherine stared at Henry as if she had seen a ghost. However, now she only saw her baby boy with a scared look. Henry squeezed back and let her wrap him in a hug. They parted after a moment and took a seat one in front of the other across the tea table.
“Tell me, how did you find out?” Henry felt the tension on his chest lose a little. He was decided to get to the bottom of her grandmother’s schemes. Catherine took a breath.
“One day I was supposed to accompany her and Phillip for afternoon tea, but she canceled on me that very same morning. I was already in London to do some errands with your sister. So, I went to Buckingham Palace to see if everything was alright. I heard voices coming from the meeting room and as I didn’t want to disturb, I was about to turn back when I heard your name. I approached the ajar door and stood there. At first, they were talking about abdication bureaucracy, but then your grandmother mentioned she was ‘rather pleased you would no longer be a royal soon’.” Suddenly she stopped talking, afraid to say more out loud. She tugged at one hem of her tan jumper’s sleeve, with her sky-blue eyes beginning to cloud with unshed tears. Shaan approached them and handed her his embroidered handkerchief. Henry recalled it was a gift from her wife, Zahra.
“Thank you, Shaan.” Catherine took it with a shaky smile and lowered her gaze while wiping his tears. The equerry didn’t step back this time in case she needed something else.
“It’s okay, mom.” I can take it. Henry implied. He endured years of his Gran’s homophobic lectures and berating behavior towards him. The blonde prince was in a different mental state than three years ago. He had a steady work alongside his best friend, Pez, at New York’s LGTBIQ+ shelter, he wrote a published collection of short stories, and most importantly, he had Alex. But for how long? He’ll be disgusted when he finds out what you are. A little voice whispered in his head. Catherine pulled herself together with a sigh and resumed her story.
“Mary, she… she stated her regret about her inability to keep using hormone blockers on you now that you were out of the country. She also said that it was a matter of time ‘that vulgar American knocked you up’ and that ‘no half-breed carrier’s offspring will be a part of this family’.” The words were like daggers piercing into Henry’s unprotected heart. Not because of Gran’s plain racism or what she thought of him. Those things were to be expected from her. It was because Henry knew that’s what others will see. A freak of nature. Catherine stood up at the sight of her son in distress and seated beside him. “But Henry, my sweet baby boy. You will always be part of my family, no matter what.”
That’s all it took. Henry crumbled down. He wept into his mother’s arms looking for a shred of solace. Catherine kept whispering in his ear. “Everything will be alright, my love.” Once recovered from the surprising reveal, Shaan placed a comforting hand on Henry’s right shoulder without taking a step back.