Fandom: Narnia

Written for: Roz McClure in the Yuletide 2003 Challenge

by Angel

"I say, Lu, you're not crying are you?" It was a sign of how much Narnia had changed him that Edmund said it with concern instead of gloating.

His younger sister wiped her eyes and sat up in the window-seat. "Yes."

Edmund sat beside her. "What wrong?"

"Ca-Ca-Caspian!" Lucy was off again with great gulping sobs, burying her face in her arms on the windowsill.

There was nothing to do, then, but wait it out, since, as you may know, it is quite impossible to get someone to stop crying before he is good and ready. Edmund sat with Lucy stroking her hair and staring out at their Aunt Alberta's soggy garden. There was nothing much to see, as Aunt Alberta didn't believe in flowers and couldn't make vegetables grow.

When she had died down to hitching and gasping, punctuated by many deep breaths as she struggled to regain control of herself, Lucy explained. "Time runs so differently in Narnia. And Aslan said we were never to go back. Even if we did return, it's likely Caspian would be a de-dead legend." More tears slipped down her face.

"Why, Lucy. I never saw you make such a fuss. Not over the Beavers or Mr. Tumnus or any of the other Narnia people you loved." What he had said struck Edmund. "You didn't just love Caspian, did you, Lu?" He put a comforting arm around her. "You were in love."

"We were in love, Edmund. Caspian loved me as well. I may be a child here, but in Narnia, I was a queen. I had suitors from Archenland and the Lone Islands."

"And not a one of them good enough for you, Lu."

"I was a woman, or on the brink of being, in Narnia. And Caspian saw it and loved me."

"He didn't take advantage of you, did he?" Edmund was still worried over the amount of tears his sister had shed. He knew she hadn't been herself since they returned, but he assumed the quiet grief was from being told she'd never see her beloved Narnia again. And it was, in part.

"Edmund!" Lucy was horrified at the mere suggestion. "As if a king of Narnia would dare be so unchivalrous."

"Just asking. I still remember Rabadash."

"Rabadash was a Calormene, not a Narnian. And he never loved Susan, but wanted her as a trophy: Queen Susan the Beautiful." The way Lucy said it, Edmund could almost see his lovely sister as a museum exhibit with a small plaque. "Caspian loved me."

"I know, Lucy."

"And now, I'll never see him again!" The thought brought a flood of fresh tears that ended quickly. Lucy was cried out. Her nose was red, and her eyes were swollen, and she ached all over. "He'll marry Ramandu's daughter like he should, and I'll grow up, get old and marry someone who has never heard of Narnia and wouldn't care about my childhood dreamworld if he did."

Edmund had no words for that. Lucy's dire prediction of her own life echoed much of what he'd been thinking already. They would grow up, take ordinary jobs, marry ordinary people and eventually forget their extraordinary childhood. The thought made Edmund worry sometimes. He would have to ask Peter after the summer was over.

Lucy got up and left Edmund sitting on the window-seat. She hurried to her room, feeling decidedly sick. Aunt Alberta would dose her with the Plumptree's Vitaminised Nerve Food and feed her nasty vegetable marrow soup, so she hid herself away.

After the slave market incident in the Lone Islands, Caspian had paid more attention to her, watching her play chess with Reepicheep the mouse or climb the rigging for her turn in the crow's nest. It had taken her a while to notice, and longer for them to do anything. The Dawn Treader was a very small ship, after all.

But they stole what moments they could, a glance, a word, and never enough to raise anyone's suspicions. Especially after Ramandu's Island. Caspian had been very taken with the Star's Daughter, and Lucy had realized it was the beginning of the end.

As she had gone into the cabin to get the last of her things at the End of the World, Caspian had come to her, with many fine words. Astonished at her own boldness, Lucy had laid one finger across his lips to silence him. Then she had kissed him. Her first kiss and if she had her say, her last. One moment of perfect, utter sweetness: the warmth of Caspian's lips, the strength of his arms around her. They stood beneath the painted Lion and sealed their hearts with it.

She had spoken of Ramandu's daughter and the four sleeping Lords of Narnia, and Caspian agreed to return since the enchantment was broken. And then she and Edmund and Eustace had found their way back to their own world, bearing Aslan's news that they would never return and his promise they would learn his name in their world.

Lucy quit pacing, and flung herself on the bed. This was love. Was this why Susan was so silly and unable to hold a thought in her head? Did she hurt all the time? Did she think constantly about a kiss? Lucy decided she would have to ask.

She lay and watched the light turn golden and fall across the furniture. This room was furnished with things Aunt Alberta loathed but couldn't give away. Lucy stared at the picture of the Dawn Treader and let herself sob a bit more. But they were dry and hitchy, with no tears left in them. A ray of waning sun picked out a detail on the armoire.

"Why, I never noticed a lion there before," Lucy said, startled out of her sobs.

There was a lion carved into the foliage of every baroque corner of the armoire. It wasn't her grand old wardrobe through which she had first found Narnia, just a small corner chest for clothes. Lucy got up and ran her fingers over the carving.

It moved. Which was the sort of thing she expected in Narnia, but not in Cambridge and most certainly not in this most prosaic of houses. Lucy listened intently, and yes, she could hear a faint sound.

"Dear heart." Even Edmund would have said it was no more than the wind, but Lucy knew better. "Dear heart."

"Aslan?" she whispered.

"The same, child. Weep no more for your Caspian. Know me in your own world, and he shall await you in My Country."

"But the Star's Daughter?" Lucy asked.

"She is as her father, a star. And Caspian is a man. He awaits you. And you shall spend all time living the story you loved so well from the Magician's Book."

Lucy could find no words to express her joy at the thought. Caspian awaited her. She would wait for him. She stroked the carved lion once more.

"Once a king or queen of Narnia, always a king or queen of Narnia. Know me here, dear heart and come to love our world as you loved Narnia."

"Good-bye Aslan."

Lucy dried her eyes, had a drink, and went downstairs to supper. She held the knowledge of Caspian close. It would warm her through the years to come. And at the end of them all, he and Aslan awaited her.