Fic: Homecoming
Dec. 9th, 2008 12:12 pm![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
nfe-gremlin.livejournal.com posting in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png){kind=small}
narniaexchangeTitle: Homecoming
Author:![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
lettersandliars
Recipient:bantha_fodder
Rating: PG-13
Possible Spoilers/Warnings: The Last Battle, Peter/Susan-ness
Summary: "My queen," he says to her, after the halls of Cair Paravel are empty, and the echoes seem to fill the room. He bows formally, eyes on the ground. She catches his chin, soft cool fingers around his jaw, and pulls him up slowly.
Original Prompt that we sent you: What I want: Edmund and Lucy, warriors together (either in England or in Narnia); or Peter and Susan, that homesickness that curls in your stomach.
In the daytime, Queen Susan is without a doubt the most beautiful woman in Narnia; frolicking in the gardens with a motley crew of fauns and dryads, she looks like a rose herself, a rare flower amongst the twisting vines of violets and bushes of azaleas. She'll return to the castle around the evening and stun all the courtiers, with her earth-stained hands and pink cheeks, every slight breeze catching in her hair and swirling it around her face ("For surely it is a true Queen that can command the wind," Tumnus says with fond familiarity, and everyone eagerly agrees).
It's not long until they discover that she is the most beautiful woman in Calormen and Archenland, too, and it remains a subject of Lucy's teasing for many, many years. Susan is startled by the way people flock the streets to look at her when she visits the dusty cities of Calormen, clamoring for a glimpse of her dressed in the intricate garments of their own country. She shivers, and her bare arms prickle against the wind.
Peter gets worried when Susan starts getting as many marriage proposals as diplomatic propositions. But every time, she turns them down gently but firmly, and she leaves Peter endlessly amazed at her strength.
"My queen," he says to her, after the halls of Cair Paravel are empty, and the echoes seem to fill the room. He bows formally, eyes on the ground. She catches his chin, soft cool fingers around his jaw, and pulls him up slowly.
"You bow to no one," she says sternly, and he smiles at the light hidden in her eyes.
-
The night is different.
Susan has dreams about lions that claw through her chest and freeze her breath into icicles that cut her throat. She runs to Peter's chambers, stands shaking and sobbing in the doorway with her arms folded around herself, and Peter beckons her inside. (He's never really asleep until she's there, anyway.)
She trembles, frightened, underneath the blankets, pulling at the sheets and Peter's shirt until the whimpering stops. Sometimes words are discernable among the animalistic cries, words like 'oh god, oh peter,' and 'i can't bear it any longer,' but Peter always quiets her, and she's always asleep before he is.
After she is still and her breathing is deep, Peter touches the wetness trailed down her cheek. It's warm. She has one leg hitched up over his waist, so that her knee is actually digging into his kidneys a bit, but he doesn't mind, doesn't dare move. He falls asleep to the steady rhythm of her heartbeat, the gust of her wheezing breaths over his chest.
(It's not much in the way of defense, Peter knows, but her lips are so soft, and they look so much prettier chapped and pink.)
-
Wardrobes open, children fall out and skin their knees. These things happen all the time, sometimes with more than a few scratches and pulled hair, but this occasion will not be duplicated. Susan is the first one to breathe--Susan with her hair pinned back and her cardigan on and a disbelieving smile. That first shaky exhalation, before Peter pounds the floor with his fist and Lucy wipes away a tear and Edmund shakes his head, not knowing who to comfort.
-
"It's so cold," Peter says, digging his hands further into his pockets.
"We had snow in--we had snow there, too, you know," Susan says bitterly, and traipses through the slush.
-
Peter doesn't sleep often, just shivers under bed sheets. He'll never get used to English weather, doesn't know how he stood it the first time. Sometimes he remembers nights in Narnia, the warmth of other bodies next to him. He used to wonder if Susan missed it, too, and one night he creeps up to her door, and peers in through the crack at her body under blankets, sleeping sound and dreaming, with a sheet pooled around her head so that she looked like a saint, pale and solemn (he never thinks about beautiful. After a lifetime of her beauty being a fact rather than an opinion, he doesn't think she should need reminding. She does).
He doesn't talk about the old days around her. She never brings up the subject.
-
Peter's not sure that he felt anything, when it happened. He supposes it must have been an awful sight, with fire and blood and screaming, but all he remembers is Lucy's breath catching to his right and the sharp whistle of the train fading into silence, and the Narnian sun beginning to slice through the foggy windows.
He is grown again, but not quite as old as when they left the first time; strong and broad, the perfect king. The sky is blue, so blue it burns, and it reminds him of an indiscernibly familiar pair of eyes. It seems that the wine is flowing down the rivers, everyone around him dancing and laughing. He stiffens when someone asks about Susan, but Lucy handles it easily, with a snort and an airy laugh, maybe says something about lipstick and nylons.
Peter finds the Lion close to daybreak, the navy sky paling against the moon. He doesn't speak at first, just sits alongside it, relishing the warmth of a god. He is almost asleep, breathing shallow and lethargic, when Aslan speaks.
"You did not come here for the pleasure of my company, Son of Adam."
Peter sighs. "You knew all along, didn't you?"
Aslan shakes his mane, vivid next to the washed-out sky. "Would it make anything better if I said I did not?"
"What, that you were ignorant to everything? That Destiny had its own grand plans you knew nothing about?" Peter scoffs. "You've never lied to me before."
"Perhaps not telling you everything is the worse crime."
Peter nods. He opens his mouth for a moment, then shuts it promptly, thinking. "Here's what I don't understand. Why even bring her here in the first place? If you knew what was going to happen."
"She was offered a chance. Sometimes even what is writ in stone can be prevented. This could not."
The king swallows, and lays his head in his hands. "Why, though?" he asks, pensively. "I know she was vain, I'll give you that, and skeptical, but, Aslan, she was good. Her heart--she was a good queen, wasn't she? Well?" He isn't asking anymore; this is a demand.
"It was not enough," Aslan says, and when Peter looks up, he is gone.
He finds Lucy and Edmund not long after, the stains of a night well spent wrought on their faces. Lucy still holds a bottle in her fist, her dress falling off her shoulder, and Edmund trails behind, apologizing to every creature she bumps into. She laughs at him and tugs on Peter's hand, and he falls to the ground beside her. Edmund sits down cautiously, shaking his head. They sit that way for a long time, watching the sun come up over the trees, light and free. Edmund is the first to speak.
"Would I be wrong to assume," he chooses his words carefully, "that a king or queen of Narnia is always a king or queen of Narnia?"
"Quite wrong, I should think," Peter says faintly, his voice high. Lucy groans quietly.
"Well, then," she says in a pragmatic way, "we've got to make up for her in drink." She tips her head back and puts the bottle to her lips.
"That really won't help, Lu," Edmund says, prying fresh bottle out of the grip of a slumbering faun, "here, that one's about empty."
"I know," she says after a greedy sip, "but it gives us something to do in the meantime."
"Hear, hear," Peter agrees, and Lucy passes him the bottle.
-
When Susan hears the news, she does not cry. Her mother clutches at her arm, but she does not cry. The policeman offers her a handkerchief, but she does not cry. Instead, she takes her mother's hand and squeezes, pressing her lips to it briefly before she leaves the room.
Susan's nightstand is more cluttered than one would expect, especially in contrast to her neatly-made bed. There are a few wasted tubes of lipstick, a bottle of perfume, and a cluster of tissues from where she caught cold last week. On top of all this, there is an ornate rosary, and framed photo of her brothers and sister, taken some time before the war. She kneels in front of it, hands resting on the edge like a child at the market, and sighs.
"My lord," she says, and bows her head, so slightly.
Author:
lettersandliarsRecipient:
bantha_fodderRating: PG-13
Possible Spoilers/Warnings: The Last Battle, Peter/Susan-ness
Summary: "My queen," he says to her, after the halls of Cair Paravel are empty, and the echoes seem to fill the room. He bows formally, eyes on the ground. She catches his chin, soft cool fingers around his jaw, and pulls him up slowly.
Original Prompt that we sent you: What I want: Edmund and Lucy, warriors together (either in England or in Narnia); or Peter and Susan, that homesickness that curls in your stomach.
In the daytime, Queen Susan is without a doubt the most beautiful woman in Narnia; frolicking in the gardens with a motley crew of fauns and dryads, she looks like a rose herself, a rare flower amongst the twisting vines of violets and bushes of azaleas. She'll return to the castle around the evening and stun all the courtiers, with her earth-stained hands and pink cheeks, every slight breeze catching in her hair and swirling it around her face ("For surely it is a true Queen that can command the wind," Tumnus says with fond familiarity, and everyone eagerly agrees).
It's not long until they discover that she is the most beautiful woman in Calormen and Archenland, too, and it remains a subject of Lucy's teasing for many, many years. Susan is startled by the way people flock the streets to look at her when she visits the dusty cities of Calormen, clamoring for a glimpse of her dressed in the intricate garments of their own country. She shivers, and her bare arms prickle against the wind.
Peter gets worried when Susan starts getting as many marriage proposals as diplomatic propositions. But every time, she turns them down gently but firmly, and she leaves Peter endlessly amazed at her strength.
"My queen," he says to her, after the halls of Cair Paravel are empty, and the echoes seem to fill the room. He bows formally, eyes on the ground. She catches his chin, soft cool fingers around his jaw, and pulls him up slowly.
"You bow to no one," she says sternly, and he smiles at the light hidden in her eyes.
-
The night is different.
Susan has dreams about lions that claw through her chest and freeze her breath into icicles that cut her throat. She runs to Peter's chambers, stands shaking and sobbing in the doorway with her arms folded around herself, and Peter beckons her inside. (He's never really asleep until she's there, anyway.)
She trembles, frightened, underneath the blankets, pulling at the sheets and Peter's shirt until the whimpering stops. Sometimes words are discernable among the animalistic cries, words like 'oh god, oh peter,' and 'i can't bear it any longer,' but Peter always quiets her, and she's always asleep before he is.
After she is still and her breathing is deep, Peter touches the wetness trailed down her cheek. It's warm. She has one leg hitched up over his waist, so that her knee is actually digging into his kidneys a bit, but he doesn't mind, doesn't dare move. He falls asleep to the steady rhythm of her heartbeat, the gust of her wheezing breaths over his chest.
(It's not much in the way of defense, Peter knows, but her lips are so soft, and they look so much prettier chapped and pink.)
-
Wardrobes open, children fall out and skin their knees. These things happen all the time, sometimes with more than a few scratches and pulled hair, but this occasion will not be duplicated. Susan is the first one to breathe--Susan with her hair pinned back and her cardigan on and a disbelieving smile. That first shaky exhalation, before Peter pounds the floor with his fist and Lucy wipes away a tear and Edmund shakes his head, not knowing who to comfort.
-
"It's so cold," Peter says, digging his hands further into his pockets.
"We had snow in--we had snow there, too, you know," Susan says bitterly, and traipses through the slush.
-
Peter doesn't sleep often, just shivers under bed sheets. He'll never get used to English weather, doesn't know how he stood it the first time. Sometimes he remembers nights in Narnia, the warmth of other bodies next to him. He used to wonder if Susan missed it, too, and one night he creeps up to her door, and peers in through the crack at her body under blankets, sleeping sound and dreaming, with a sheet pooled around her head so that she looked like a saint, pale and solemn (he never thinks about beautiful. After a lifetime of her beauty being a fact rather than an opinion, he doesn't think she should need reminding. She does).
He doesn't talk about the old days around her. She never brings up the subject.
-
Peter's not sure that he felt anything, when it happened. He supposes it must have been an awful sight, with fire and blood and screaming, but all he remembers is Lucy's breath catching to his right and the sharp whistle of the train fading into silence, and the Narnian sun beginning to slice through the foggy windows.
He is grown again, but not quite as old as when they left the first time; strong and broad, the perfect king. The sky is blue, so blue it burns, and it reminds him of an indiscernibly familiar pair of eyes. It seems that the wine is flowing down the rivers, everyone around him dancing and laughing. He stiffens when someone asks about Susan, but Lucy handles it easily, with a snort and an airy laugh, maybe says something about lipstick and nylons.
Peter finds the Lion close to daybreak, the navy sky paling against the moon. He doesn't speak at first, just sits alongside it, relishing the warmth of a god. He is almost asleep, breathing shallow and lethargic, when Aslan speaks.
"You did not come here for the pleasure of my company, Son of Adam."
Peter sighs. "You knew all along, didn't you?"
Aslan shakes his mane, vivid next to the washed-out sky. "Would it make anything better if I said I did not?"
"What, that you were ignorant to everything? That Destiny had its own grand plans you knew nothing about?" Peter scoffs. "You've never lied to me before."
"Perhaps not telling you everything is the worse crime."
Peter nods. He opens his mouth for a moment, then shuts it promptly, thinking. "Here's what I don't understand. Why even bring her here in the first place? If you knew what was going to happen."
"She was offered a chance. Sometimes even what is writ in stone can be prevented. This could not."
The king swallows, and lays his head in his hands. "Why, though?" he asks, pensively. "I know she was vain, I'll give you that, and skeptical, but, Aslan, she was good. Her heart--she was a good queen, wasn't she? Well?" He isn't asking anymore; this is a demand.
"It was not enough," Aslan says, and when Peter looks up, he is gone.
He finds Lucy and Edmund not long after, the stains of a night well spent wrought on their faces. Lucy still holds a bottle in her fist, her dress falling off her shoulder, and Edmund trails behind, apologizing to every creature she bumps into. She laughs at him and tugs on Peter's hand, and he falls to the ground beside her. Edmund sits down cautiously, shaking his head. They sit that way for a long time, watching the sun come up over the trees, light and free. Edmund is the first to speak.
"Would I be wrong to assume," he chooses his words carefully, "that a king or queen of Narnia is always a king or queen of Narnia?"
"Quite wrong, I should think," Peter says faintly, his voice high. Lucy groans quietly.
"Well, then," she says in a pragmatic way, "we've got to make up for her in drink." She tips her head back and puts the bottle to her lips.
"That really won't help, Lu," Edmund says, prying fresh bottle out of the grip of a slumbering faun, "here, that one's about empty."
"I know," she says after a greedy sip, "but it gives us something to do in the meantime."
"Hear, hear," Peter agrees, and Lucy passes him the bottle.
-
When Susan hears the news, she does not cry. Her mother clutches at her arm, but she does not cry. The policeman offers her a handkerchief, but she does not cry. Instead, she takes her mother's hand and squeezes, pressing her lips to it briefly before she leaves the room.
Susan's nightstand is more cluttered than one would expect, especially in contrast to her neatly-made bed. There are a few wasted tubes of lipstick, a bottle of perfume, and a cluster of tissues from where she caught cold last week. On top of all this, there is an ornate rosary, and framed photo of her brothers and sister, taken some time before the war. She kneels in front of it, hands resting on the edge like a child at the market, and sighs.
"My lord," she says, and bows her head, so slightly.
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