to whose sound chaste wings obey

The fat old man has wings, they say – rat-gray and dusty, and when his whore caresses his bald pate they puff their sad feathers and shake off a great cloud of lice. The whore has wings of her own, white plump wings with the smallest softest feathers, and no doubt a trail of ageing bravos in her wake will wake and find themselves with a tickling itch between their shoulder blades. It is the itch of enlightenment, the germinating seed of the knowledge of things nature only winks at.

Cuckolds have their horns and fornicators their wings – it is an Italian fashion imported alongside other monsters like the too-long rapier and the blue starch ruff. The one to blame, when at length it is set down in books, will be a certain Venetian merchant: a generous man ready to open his purse to any Christian and to kiss any kinsman, however distant. Such borrowing and lending has brought a new currency to England. Now on both banks of the Thames go strolling sailors like seabirds, and sumptuous bona-robas hold court in tinseled feathers of indigo. The lowest tapster can wear crimson and sable on his back; hostlers and porters sprout splendid feathers, and the number who still wear the raiment of the chaste is dwindling.

The Prince of Wales has wings; this is an inconvenient fact. He is clad all in scarlet like the god of love but his slashed doublet hangs down unlaced and the white linen is wadded around his waist to catch the iridescent barbs as they fall. His wings are tawny brown checkered with white, pale where they join the shoulder and russet at the tip. Every fledge is like an arrow; the span spreads like an arm, and hooks back like a scythe, not a tame display but a hunter’s plumage fitted to soar and dive. Their strength is formidable and their dignity has a suitable span, but such a proud display of nature’s colors is distasteful outside of the lowest company. Their strength must be curbed and their beauty must be curtailed. It is a terrible thing, to have a hawk’s wings and yet not a hawk’s talons.

The prince spreads his wingspan and measures for his business. For all their splendor his wings are too-new and too quick with fresh growth; he has adapted to this new fashion as if he’s worn it all his life, but this airy development does not suit the gravity of royal blood. That same blood quakes beneath the surface of the feather’s shaft, stiff as horn and brittle as fingernail. Five straight proud feathers on each side like the fingers of a hand – the prince cuts them back himself, five and five again for an even trim, and they shear through resistantly, like cutting a new pen. If these members are sensible to pain, Hal sets his face and doesn’t show it.

The cut ends run freely until they are stopped up with beeswax – Poins’ hand is steadier to that end. (Ned Poins is wingless and envious, but he covets more than flight; he has never been shy to wield his own blade.) The mistress of the house frets and stanches the flow of royal blood with her swan-white apron, and the upper room is filled with the unseemly rustling of feathers.

Having clipped his wings, the Prince of Wales is decent again; but new feathers grow again in little more than a turn of the seasons. Every pigeon-fancier and goose-driver knows this much, but the old king will be so busy fingering the hollow stumps of his son’s lost pinions to think so far ahead – not when a wet winter or an unseasonable autumn could finish him off and marry falcon’s wings with golden crowns. The king must be satisfied with such passing proof of tame obedience.

Earthbound again in the hostess’ chamber and flat on his feet, the prince is pale with pain and fierce with pride. He may make a jest of his own cropped glories but he will remember the pain – and he will walk from Eastcheap to Eltham like a new cripple, loping bravely forward to find the new balance of himself.