The Call

by lunar_valleysinmymind

Summary:

There’s quite a lot about the four siblings Caspian's dying to know. Like if King Peter actually hates him, if Queen Susan can actually hit a mark from over fifty yards, and if the stories on the younger King's preference in consorts was still correct.

And can Queen Lucy actually speak to the trees?

----

Prince Caspian AU in which the the Pevensies's and Caspian's traumas are properly unpacked with a healthy dose of gay pinning between two idiots.

Back to updating every Sunday at 6pm CT!

Chapter 1: It Started Out as a Feeling

Notes:

Caspian almost becomes a chew toy and Edmund thinks he looks pretty when he blushes.
-
Ages are like, Pete 19, Susan 18, Ed 17 and Lu 16 physically.

The stream is cool and its water clean but Caspian isn't thirsty. It weaves unbothered through the great western woods, bubbling quietly between the trees. It's almost a white noise, reflecting and rippling and peaceful as it flows through his fingers, and a complete opposite to Caspian's torrent thoughts. 

Yesterday, he walked side by side with the creatures from his childhood stories, keeping a polite pace with dwarves, making small talk with talking animals. Just that was enough to set his heading spinning; actual Narnians, actual centaurs and fauns. Living proof that the professor’s stories and legends were real.

Then this morning, he crossed blades with an actual legend, and made an absolute fool of himself. 

In the stories, the kings and queens of old Narnia were wise warriors and benevolent rulers. Golden crowns atop tall figures on horseback, strong and wise and, well, adult. 

Caspian wasn't expecting High King Peter to be the same age as him. Especially considering it has been over a millennium since his reign ended. But he couldn't deny that it was truly them. The weight of a lifetime's experience was in all of their eyes, in a way that made him feel small in comparison. 

High King Peter spoke easily of events Caspian just barely recalled from fairy tales. He held a sword with the steady hand of a seasoned knight, walking with a confidence he'd never seen in another teenager before, because that confidence was truly earned.

Queen Susan reminded him of his aunt. She carried herself with an effortless but calculated poise, gaze sharp and all seeing. So different from the fluttering, blushing daughters of lords who were her physical age. 

Only Queen Lucy held any resemblance to her age, and that was because of the pure, childlike smiles she gave so freely. But even she bore the demeanor of a soul far too old for her body, evident with every thousand mile stare into the woods she took when she thought no one was looking, like she's trying to look back in time to see where it all went wrong. 

King Edmund was different. 

His stare seemed to cut through Caspian like he was made of glass. His expression was always unreadable, voice low and rumbling when he spoke, discussing battle strategies and tactics with their pros and cons like he invented them. Which, if the stories were true, he probably had. 

But the problem wasn't the brilliant and decades older mind the king possessed. The problem was the stories never did justice to how ridiculously handsome King Edmund the Just was. 

Caspian sighs, sitting in the gravel by the babbling stream and rubbing his eyes. Often he felt like a child when interacting with his new allies, he was sure they saw him as one too, and this proved his point. Only a child would be faced with a war and be juvenile enough to develop a crush.

I've been shot at, chased by my own guards, declared the leader of mythical creatures my ancestors tried to exterminate, and met rulers from over a thousand years ago and that's what I'm focused on, he thought bitterly. The Narnians would never have put their faith in me if they knew…

But surely Narnians could see what he did. 

Dark, almost black hair and darker eyes. Pale skin that only made his barely blushed lips more noticeable and desirable. The beginnings of a sharp jawline and cheekbones growing into his features, he was just so taking, so captivating. 

So distracting that Caspian didn't see the yellow eyes watching him in the trees. Didn't hear the rustle of fur brushing against leaves over the bubbling stream. He never saw the wolves until they were mere feet from him, snarling and snapping their teeth. 

Caspian falls back, legs pushing against the gravel and hands grappling for his sword, but even more are approaching out of the woods, prowling, encircling him. 

He'd walked far from the group on purpose. No one was nearby, I'm all alone. 

The largest wolf’s growls rumble higher, ears flat and body lowering, readying to strike. He couldn't get his sword out fast enough–

“Stoyte!” a deep voice boomed.

Boots slid on the gravel beside him. Suddenly a figure was shielding him from the wolf’s fangs and holding out their arms, halting the creatures.

“Ty pomnish' staryye slova?” The voice spoke again, and Caspian realized who had come to his aid. 

-

Edmund wasn't sure it would work. The bear Trumpkin shot during their journey was as wild as the beasts in England, but he saw a glint of recognition in the wolf's eyes when he shouted for them to wait. 

So he asks, “Do you recall the old words?” 

The predator’s ears rose, furrowed brows loosening just a little. 

“How does a human know our ancient language?” The She Wolf asks, growls reverberating off each syllable.

“I am King Edmund the Just,” her eyes widen, ”and I and my siblings have returned at the call of–”  he gestures behind him to Caspian “–he who has been promised the throne of this land, and has promised to give this land back to you.” 

Yellow eyes flicker from his own to the Prince, distrustful. 

“He has gathered the Narnians of old to take back our kingdom. And he welcomes all who share his goal, a Narnia that is free for all again.”

“I don't care what his goals are, he's trespassing in our territory.” A series of snarls and warning barks echo from her pack. The She Wolf’s hackles rise again. “I will allow you to leave, but we will not die for humans or their schemes.”

“Then we will go in peace, and may the moon be full on your next hunt.” 

The formal farewell, one only a pack member uses, seems to shock her coming from Ed's mouth. The She Wolf stares him down a few moments more, deliberating, before huffing and withdrawing her warriors. 

Edmund stays still until the last of them have slunk away back into the woods. But he knows they will still be watching. 

“My King, I was, that was-”

Oh yeah, Ed turns and finds a wide eyed Caspian still on the ground behind him, my diplomacy mission.

Peter could be bullheaded sometimes (most of the time) and Edmund was no stranger to smoothing things over and apologizing for him. He could sense the tension still between Pete and the Prince they were supposed to be helping; how he'd hunched his shoulders like he was trying to make himself smaller every time his brother spoke. And that wouldn't do. 

They needed to be on good terms, to have an open line of communication with the new leader of the Narnians, and Peter did a marvelous job messing it up with a single eye roll. So he'd noticed when Prince Caspian drifted away when they breaked for a rest and followed him deeper into the woods, running through his head the draft of the apology he would say and how he would say it. 

And then he saw the wolves. 

Thank Aslan I still remember how to speak in wolf tongue.

“Are you alright, Prince Caspian?” He offers a hand, pulling up the other young man to his feet. 

“I-, yes, yes I'm alright, thank you,” the Prince stutters, his accent curling his vowels like ivy. “You saved me from becoming an early lunch.”

Ed tries to smile comfortingly, the way Lucy always does. “They weren't hungry, just cross that you'd unknowingly wandered into their territory. Wolves are always sensitive about things like that.”

“I see,” Caspian still had a dazed look about him. “That was incredible what you–I didn't know different animals spoke different languages.” 

“They used to. I'm bloody awful at badger though, so I'm glad Trufflehunter speaks common tongue easily enough.”

Ed clears his throat. “I wanted to apologize to you about earlier,” he begins, ignoring Caspian's confused expression. “I know we weren't at all what you were expecting, and then we didn't really make a great first impression. But my siblings and I are truly grateful to be here and to help you restore peace. We just...well, I guess we all have a lot to get used to.” 

Caspian shakes his head, “I am the one who is grateful, and who made a bad impression. I'm sincerely glad to have you all as allies, King Edmund.”

“Please, you don't have to call me that,” he smiles, “just Edmund or Ed is fine. After all, we're here to make you king.”

Something flashes across the prince's face.

Disbelief, insecurity?

Interesting.

He files that away for later. 

“Well, the wolves are most definitely still watching us, shall we?” Ed gestures back the way they came, and Caspian nods before following him, blushing and flustered. 

He's pretty when he's blushing, get filed away too. But he can't linger on the thought for long. They have an army to get weapons for. 

-

“They're going to see us,” Caspian whispers, trying to crouch lower behind the wagon. 

“They won't,” is all King Edmund says, but Caspian doesn't have his confidence.

The Telmarine guards are wandering closer to them, to the handful of Narnians they'd taken to steal weapons and supplies from Miraz's army. So close Caspian can hear one of the soldiers' yawn. 

He shifts, trying to get his sword out, but King Edmund grips his arm. Those dark eyes are perfectly calm as he shakes his head, telling Caspian to wait. Even as the soldier's steps clunk closer, and closer, and the King's hand is still firm and warm on his skin and everything in Caspian screams to move-

A wailing howl rings out in the night, eerie and frighteningly close. 

The prince jumps, but King Edmund is still perfectly calm and smiling. The guards walks away to investigate the sound. Caspian lets out the breath he’s been holding. 

“They've been following us since the stream,” the King explains as they get up, “watching us to see if we were actually planning to fight.

“You knew?” Caspian follows him around the wagon, mind racing. “How did you know they'd help us?”

King Edmund starts carving something into the wagon’s door, a smirk pulling his lips. “Wolves are loyal, and they don't forget easily.” 

He steps back, admiring his work before offering the dagger to Caspian. “Care to leave your signature?”

And Caspian realizes why the stories always called him King Edmund the Strategist, the Cunning, as he signs the message with an X for Caspian the Tenth. 

‘You were right to fear the woods.’

.

The wolves approach them as they trek back to the rest of the group, ghostly eyes manifesting out of the shadows. 

"Spasibo,” says Edmund in that strange, coiling language that turns his already deep voice into a spine tingling rumbling. 

The large, gray wolf who’d spoken at the stream steps forward, head lowering in respect. 

“We have not forgotten the redemption and forgiveness you offered us long ago, your majesty,” she says, “and we ask for forgiveness again for doubting your intentions.”

“We've been gone a long while, no offense is taken,” the King replies. “And please, I hold no claim to the throne anymore, just Edmund is fine.” He steps back, letting Caspian take the forefront. “Your true king stands here.”

“Then we will ask you-,” the She Wolf hesitates, and he suddenly realizes he's never properly introduced himself. 

“Prince Caspian,” he says, holding out a hand in greeting, only to be embarrassed and quickly retract it. 

But the wolf just smiles, eyes surprisingly gentle. “Caspian, rightful ruler of this land, we ask for the honor to once again serve the throne that showed us mercy when we did not deserve it.” 

“Of course, all should be welcomed in Narnia, especially those who are the true people of this nation.” 

He glances back at King Edmund, who gives him an approving nod. Caspian hopes it's dark enough to hide the burning blush rising up his cheeks.

They begin walking again, the pack of wolves surrounding the two humans like a protective ring. They ask how the Kings and Queens of Old returned, curious tails wagging as they listen with attentive ears to the tale. 

Caspian doesn't recall any stories about the relationship between the Wolves of Narnia and King Edmund, but it's clear to see in the She Wolf’s eyes that she considers him as one of their own. A deep history lies between her kind and the king, one he is dying to know. 

There’s actually quite a lot about the four siblings he's dying to know. Like if King Peter actually hates him, if Queen Susan can actually hit a mark from over fifty yards, and if the stories on the younger King's preference in consorts was still correct.

And can Queen Lucy actually speak to the trees?

Notes:

I made the wolves speak Russian because if I was Caspian, I would also be flustered hearing my crush speak it fluently. **Big thank you to commenter Teen_Fox_Sam for correcting my Google translated.Russian! ❤️

Ed is 100% the type to play mind games and that note left in the Telemarine camp is just the beginning.

Very stoked to be writing for yet another niche ship, drop a kudo if the fandom is still alive and the next chapter will be posted next Sunday!

Chapter 2: A Quiet Thought

Notes:

Edmund reflects on the last five years and tries to tell Caspian the truth.

Aslan’s How rose over the treeline as a monument against the tests of time, a symbol of the greatest gift Edmund ever received and his greatest shame. Inside was the beginnings of a base of operation. It was rather poetic; the Narnians building for their future in the crypt of their past. 

“Right,” Peter turns to the Prince. “So here's what I'm thinking. We got a lot to do, so let's divide and conquer. I'll help you with finding all the remaining Narnians we can and planning for our next steps.”

He gestures behind Caspian to his siblings. “Sue can train your soldiers, I can help too. Ed will organize us, and Lu can manage our supplies and make preparations for a medical unit. Sound good?”

The other siblings nod in agreement. Edmund notices the tension melting out of Caspian's shoulders. It was no small task to lead, but Ed always had his siblings to rely on when they once carried the responsibility. Leading alone had to be awfully overwhelming.

“Thank you,” Caspian breathes, smiling at them all. “I've–well, I've never led an uprising before.”

“Lucky for you, we're veterans at it,” Ed says, and Caspian smiles even brighter. 

Peter straightens up and for a moment, Edmund sees the tall, broad man his brother had once been as he says, “then let's get to work.”

 

 

–

Ed creates an adequate office in one of the rooms, compiling charts and the rare few books that survived among the Narnians. He asks the griffins to help the dwarves make maps of the area, but what interests him most are the underground tunnels Trufflehunter told him about. 

So with the help of a few wolves, he began exploring the place. 

He shines his electric torch (something the wolves found so fascinating their tails would wag just at the sight of it) ahead of him and wanders, occasionally hearing the footsteps of the wolves. They echo off the maze of stone pillars as they fan out around him, checking back to let him know which tunnels continued on and which were dead ends.

In the quiet dark, he could let his mind settle and allow it to sink in that he was here, that they were back, after five years of heartache and struggling to adapt back to their old lives. 

Those five years hadn't been kind to any of them.

Peter battled with an angry phase fueled by having been flung back through a second puberty. All raw frustration, and hurt, and anger. During their first year back in school, it was rare to see him without bruised knuckles or a bloody nose; a temperamental, grieving man trapped inside the body of a preteen. 

He'd cooled down (eventually) but even now, he walks around like he's got something to prove. It worries Edmund. 

Surprisingly, he's not worried about Susan. 

She’d immersed herself into their old identities back in England, acting like it was the only world she'd ever known. Rarely did she talk about their past lives, like if she didn't speak its name, she could pretend Narnia never happened. 

Sue worked so hard to forget, but it turns out, she never really did. After the initial excitement of realizing they'd returned, she slipped back into her old life easily and comfortably, commanding squadrons of archers and teaching them with a gentle hand. It suited her much better than pretending to care about lipstick and nylons and invitations. 

And Lucy, by the Lion’s mane, it was like she was back from the dead. 

They all shed tears when they returned through the wardrobe, but Lucy sobbed nightly. Utterly inconsolable for weeks, and it broke Edmund's heart. They wrote letters almost daily when they went back to school. Lucy knew it hurt Susan too much to talk about it, but she had to talk to someone, and for months those letters had dried tears smearing the ink. Now, her smile was radiant and her laughter came easily just like it used to. 

It may have only been five years for them, but it felt like a thousand since he'd seen Lucy so like herself. 

“Your majesty?”

Ed turns to the She Wolf they met at the stream, raising his eyebrow. “Anya, please just call me Ed.”

Her ears droop down. “Forgive me, it's difficult to speak with the Wolf King of Old and not call him by his title.” 

“Tell you what, I'll settle for moy korol,” he says, and smiles when Anya’s ears perk back up. 

“I have found another tunnel that goes deeper, moy korol.”

“Lead the way.”

He follows her towards the mouth of a dark entrance, his torch lighting the way as they walk in comfortable silence. 

Edmund had mixed feelings when they returned to England. He felt the same anger as Peter, albeit a quieter, colder one. He tried to follow Susan's example of settling back into the skin of his old self, but could never pretend as well as her that it fit right. He wished he could have cried it out like Lucy. Instead he ended up holding it all in until it turned him hollow with grief. 

But he had one comfort the others didn't.

The comfort of being in a world he had never betrayed and nearly doomed. 

A thousand years may have passed, but some still remembered. The wolves, clearly, still remembered. But his work to include them back into Narnian society all those years ago seemed to outshined any memory of his treachery. They were loyal to a fault, after all. 

He'd received a nod from Nikabrik when they met, his eyes respectful but knowing. It was the same look the minotaurs gave him when they passed each other in the halls. Some tipped their horned heads and said ‘Polemistís tou Cheimóna,’ their words for Warrior of Winter, the title they had bestowed on him a millennia ago. 

Ed knew the other species didn't remember the full story though. The side glances and suspicious whispers didn't haunt his steps like they used to when the world was younger and he was older. In a selfish way, he almost wished that they did, growing weary of waiting for the other shoe to drop. For the smiles to turn forced and for heads to turn when he walked in a room like a bad omen. 

Years of being a diplomat, a politician in a sense, taught him to always control how negative information is spread. Rumors could kill peace just as quick as a blade. He'd have to tell them.

And that meant he'd also have to tell Caspian.

–

The How was quickly becoming cramped as more and more Narnians gathered to answer the call, but Edmund managed to find Caspian by himself one morning in the ruins outside, practicing his sword fighting. 

“Fancy a partner?” He calls, wincing when he startles the Prince. “Sorry, just me.”

“King Edmund!” Caspian's entire face lights up. “Certainly, it would be an honor.” 

Ed cracks his neck, intending to have a quick round, then see if he could get them somewhere more private, somewhere less ears might hear any shouts of betrayer and coward.  

That's usually how people reacted during this conversation. It's what Edmund expected. 

What he hadn't expected was for Caspian to be so good at dueling.  

He held his sword in a different style, angling it in one hand when at rest instead of straight at his opponent. His hold lacked the power of a double grip like Edmund's, but it allowed him to dodge and weave like a snake, striking fast and slipping away even faster. And sure, Ed was rusty, but he found his strength returning with every breath, Narnian air fillings his lungs and igniting decades of muscle memory. 

“The legends are true then,” Caspian pants, still smiling.

“What legends?”

“That you were so skilled with a sword, negotiators were terrified to disagree with you.”

Ed laughs, certain the blood rushing to his cheeks is from the exercise, and nothing else. 

“Flattery won't get you an easy win,” he says.

Caspian just shrugs. “Worth a shot.”

And then he was upon him. 

Ed leaps back, grounding his left foot as he swings up to curl away Caspian's blade. He lunges forward but the Prince spins away, trying to get behind him. Ed keeps up with him, forcing them closer.

Every fight has an endgame where single, strong blows dissolve into flurries of quick clashes, a dance to the death, and Caspian initiated it with an arching swing and smile so stunning, Ed almost didn't move fast enough to deflect it. 

Their swords ring in a building rhythm as they both push closer for control until they catch close to the hilts, locking them in place. His muscles burn to keep his blade from giving way. Caspian smiles down at him, just inches away, and suddenly Ed doesn't want to tell him. 

A chill goes down his spine because all at once, Ed's desperate for Caspian to like him.

He doesn't ever want to cause Caspian to stop looking at him like this. To have strained, polite grins instead of these starry smiles that reach sparkling eyes…

No one liked him once he told them the truth.

But I have too, Ed reasons, better he hears it from me than from someone else. He's going to find out eventually. 

Just rip the bandage off. 

Ed opens his mouth, but Caspian's so close he can feel him breathing hard, can smell the sword oil and sweat and scent he vaguely remembers as a cologne from Calorman and it's so distracting-

“Oy!”

Both of them instantly loosen their hold, looking back towards the How to see Peter walking towards them.

“There you are, I was looking for you Ed. Did you get a map together yet? I'm tired of not knowing where anything is.” 

“Yeah,” Ed clears his throat. “Yeah, I got it, did you finally accept the world's changed in the last few hundred years?”

It's reflex, Ed tells himself. Whenever Ed wants something Peter is trying to take, he snaps first to try and deter him away. He wants a moment alone with Caspian, so he can tell him something important, and Peter is interrupting that. 

Ed looks meaningfully at his brother, gesturing back to the How with his eyes. 

Go away, give us a moment so I can rip off the bandage. 

But Peter doesn't take it that way. 

His brother's eyes narrow, looking between him and the Prince, before his expression changes into something smug. 

Peter raises an eyebrow in Caspian's direction. 

No, wait no, not like that -

“Sorry Eddie, am I interrupting?”

“Actually,” he steps away from the Prince, not giving Peter the satisfaction of looking back to see if he's disappointed, “I'll just go get it, you'll make a mess.”

Caspian clears his throat awkwardly. “Thank you for the duel, my King. I hope we can have a rematch soon.”

Edmund just raises a hand in acknowledgement, glaring ahead. 

“Oh, were you dueling?” Peter starts, “mind if I jump in–ow Ed!”

Ed just yanks his arm harder, dragging his menace of a brother inside. 

“Shut up, and don't fucking call me Eddie.” 

Peter has the audacity to laugh. 

–

Despite what Lucy says, he is not sulking, he's thinking. 

His sister lingers by his side as they listen to Peter's plan. He understands why he thinks a raid on Miraz's Castle is a good idea. They're small in numbers, have no real chance in an all out battle, and they can't stay here in the How indefinitely. 

But a million little things can go wrong in a blitz strike. 

They'd be putting their lives on a gamble, a wish, that they can take Miraz hostage and his men will stand down. They'd be invading a building that none of them knew, trusting instinct and expected to work flawlessly with people they'd just met.

Caspian's plan wasn't great either, to be fair. 

Peter was right, they couldn't stay here forever. This monument wasn't built with battles in mind, and the ruins of Cair Paravel stood as a grim reminder that the Telemarines had catapults. But they wouldn't even have to use them if they just starved them out, which Ed said aloud.

Lucy wanted to try and find Aslan, to find a way to wake the forest. But Peter said they couldn't afford to wait, looking to Edmund for support, but Ed didn't really feel like giving any. 

“I can teach you all I know of the castle,” Caspian says, “I can show you the way inside, but how can we be sure Miraz's army will just surrender?”

The Prince turns towards Ed and he really wishes Caspian didn't have such a sweet, pretty face when he was looking for help in his argument. “Like you said, the Telemarines could just starve us out here, what's to stop them from doing the same if we take the castle?”

Ed can't help but nod in agreement, ignoring Peter's scowl.

“The Telemarines are terrified of the woods, they're spending all their time right now constructing a bridge because they're afraid of the water. I know this place isn't ideal, but we'd be forcing them to fight on our own terms,” Caspian says before pausing. “But, if you really think trying to take the castle is better-”

“Ed, what do you think?” 

Edmund glares at Peter. He didn't have to cut Caspian off like that. 

Peter just rolls his eyes. 

Ed sighs. His brother's need to prove something (what exactly, Ed wasn't sure) was driving him to make rash decisions. He couldn't endorse this plan, not without ensuring that Peter truly understood the risks and had actually thought this through. 

“...Are you sure this isn't going to end up being another Thompson?” he asks. 

Murmurs went around the room. Caspian looks between them, confused, but Peter knows exactly what he is referring to. 

Henry Thompson, a thick headed bully that used to pick on the other boys at their school. He'd never once bothered Peter or Ed, but Peter still took every opportunity to get in his way and provoke a fight. 

 

“What exactly are you trying to prove here?” Edmund asked, sitting with a tissue box on his brother's bed. “That you're bigger and stronger than him?”

Peter glared at him from behind the handful of tissues stopping up his bloody nose. “He can't pick on people like he does. It isn't right.”

“So report him, tell the teachers.”

Peter rolled his eyes. “That won't do anything, the grown ups here never really help-”

“But this helps?” Ed countered. “Beating the shit out of him and getting yourself black and blue in the process?”

Peter didn't talk to him for the rest of the day. 

“No, this is not.” Peter says firmly, “so what do you think we should do, Ed? Or do you have a better idea?”

Everyone looks at him; Peter expectedly and more than a little irritated, Lucy imploringly, and Caspian with his big, puppy-like brown eyes that he has to look away from. 

Ed looks at Susan. The only one he trusts to have a level head when emotions are running high in their ranks. 

She sighs, long and heavy, weighing their options. The entire room seems to be holding their breathe.

Finally, Susan nods, and that was that. 

“Alright then, let's go with your plan,” Ed says, pulling out his electric torch, “but I have some ideas about getting us in there.” 

Time to teach the Narnians morse code. 

Notes:

Peter: 🤨
Lucy: 😟
Susan: 😒
Caspian: 🥺🥺🥺🥺
Ed: 😮‍💨

 

moy korol’ = my king (according to google translate). I used Greek for the minotaurs because, well, they're minotaurs.

Thank you so much for all the love!! I would love to hear what your favorite scenes are and thank you for the comments on the last chapter, they made my day!

Chapter 3: A Quiet Word

Notes:

Caspian has some big feelings and also has his first pillow fight.

“Tell me about Miraz's supporters–the lords you mentioned,” King Edmund asks. “Are any of them jealous of his power?”

Caspian bites his lip, thinking. “I wouldn't say jealous, more frustrated with his actions. Especially Lord Sopespian.”

“Tell me about him.”

Caspian does, watching the King write down notes in a style he's never seen before, lines short and to the point on paper but fast, somehow able to move the quill in time with his thoughts. 

“So he's not exactly jealous, but he thinks he can do better,” the King says. 

“I…never thought of it like that, but yes.”

“Okay, what about his captain, what was his name?”

“Captain Glozelle. He's loyal to Miraz-”

“But?”

Caspian pauses. “But, his loyalty is to the people. Whoever sits on the throne is just a means to an end.”

“Good, we can use that.”

He can't help but wonder, “how can you already know so much about them?”

King Edmund shrugs. “There's always the same cast of characters in a court. Their motivations are either for power, money, or duty. Every man has a tell when you know what to look for.”

“...Even me?” 

“Even you.” 

He shifts to face Caspian, the two sitting side by side in the small crypt room that had turned into his sort of office. Caspian feels his cheeks heating, not at all prepared for the full weight of King Edmund’s attention or for those brown eyes to stare straight through him like he's an open book. 

“I don't think you really even want the throne, not like Miraz does,” he says. “You want your countrymen and the Narnians to live in peace together, and fate just happened to make you the crowned prince with the power to make a difference. And you took it without hesitation.

“But you're not overly keen to have that power, in fact, you make a face every time one of us calls you king–exactly that one, yes–but it's not about money either. Most princes don't take to sleeping in caves as well as you.” 

His lips twitch into a grin. “So your motivation is duty. And that's exactly what makes you perfect to be a ruler.”

Caspian thanks every lucky star in the sky when the King looks back down to his notes, letting him blush furiously in relative private.

He'd been disappointed when the King never returned to the sparring ring, apparently only dueling his brother whenever Caspian happened to be busy with something else. So of course he got excited when Edmund asked him to come to the meeting early to go over plans. They'd spent all morning together, Caspian helping him draw detailed diagrams of the castle and surrounding landscape, answering every question his brilliant mind requested. 

But he wasn't prepared to get so flustered going over court politics.

“Thank you, your majesty.” He finally manages. 

“It's just Edmund,” a playful look accompanies his teasing tone, “or can you not pronounce it?”

It's bait, but Caspian falls for it. Edmund feels too personal, too intimate on his tongue, but it makes dark eyes shine in delight when he says it aloud. 

“There you go,” Edmund smiles. “I knew you could do it.”

A light hearted joke, but the praise burns Caspian from the inside out.

“Alright, last question.”

Edmund is leaning forward, expression softer and totally oblivious to how it makes Caspian’s stomach flutter. 

“Tell me about Miraz.”

His stomach drops like a rock and Caspian looks away. 

“There's not much to know,” he deflects, suddenly finding his scuffed boots very interesting. 

“I'm sorry, I know it can't be easy to talk about someone who was cruel to you-” Caspian looks up because how can he know that, he's never told anyone that, “-but half of the battle is in the mind, and I need to know how he thinks.”

Edmund is painfully patient while Caspian struggles to find where to begin.

“He's…jaded, I suppose,” he starts carefully. “He always said I was soft, like my father. He doesn't hesitate to take a cutthroat approach to anything. I mean, his son was just born and if my professor hadn't woken me…”

Flashes of crossbows in the moonlight, arrows piercing fabric still warm from his slumber. 

Fireworks celebrating his cousin’s birth, illuminating the courtyard and revealing his escape. 

The terror of racing blindly into unknown terrain on horseback, running away from everything he'd ever known, running for his life-

“Hey, it's okay, just take a deep breath.” 

Edmund's tone is gentle, like the hand he puts on Caspian's shoulder. There's so much compassion for the unspoken hurt Caspian carries in Edmund's eyes, he can't hope to do anything but surrender his racing thoughts to the baritone of his voice. 

He takes a deep breath. It's fluttering and difficult but it makes his companion break into a soft smile. 

“This Professor you talked about, tell me about him,” Edmund asks. 

“But I thought you wanted to hear about Miraz?” 

“I think I get the picture, he's bitter, power hungry, a complete and total shithead-” Caspian chokes on a laugh, “-your regular evil wannabe-king the world has seen a hundred times, nothing special. Not like your professor sounds.”

That pulls a smile out of the prince. “He's definitely different. Stubborn on spelling, a huge fanatic of stars and constellations–that's how he taught me about Narnia’s past. Showing me the stories Telemarines saw in the heavens, but also the ancient ones, stories about you and your siblings.”

Edmund tilts his head, surprised. “They made us— all of us, into constellations?” 

“Oh yes! I'll show you sometime, there are ones of the victory against the Giants of the North, the White Witch-”

Edmund stiffens. 

“-or, well I know you're busy. We're all busy and looking at the stars isn't a great use of time-”

“I’d…like to see them.” He's hesitant, something Caspian can't name clouding his expression, but sincere. “I’d like to meet your professor, too.”

Edmund looks like he wants to say something else but is choosing his words carefully, brows drawing together. 

His hand is still on Caspian's shoulder. 

“Listen, there's something I need to tell you…”

Caspian waits with bated breath, hoping he isn't imagining it when Edmund’s eyes dilate and seem to become impossibly darker, like the clearest night before the stars come out. 

I could write poems about just his eyes…

“Met who?”

They both jump. 

Queen Susan saunters in, looking at them expectantly when no one answers. “I heard you say something about meeting someone, met who?”

“Oh, um,” Caspian tries to not look when Edmund’s hand pulls away from his shoulder, but Susan's eyes briefly leave his own to track the movement. “We were just-”

“You really have the worst timing, Sue.” Edmund grumbles, standing up. “Don't you know it's rude to eavesdrop?”

She frowns. “It's not eavesdropping when your voices echo down the hallway-” 

“Caspian, I'm so sorry for my sister,” Edmund turns back to him, completely ignoring the Queen. “She can be quite rude when she doesn't feel included and-”

“I was not being rude, Ed!”

It took a few days, but Caspian learned these arguments weren't actually serious ones, not like the fights he used to hear through the walls from his uncle's and aunt's room. So it doesn't surprise him when the Queen whacks her brother in the arm, calling down the hallway for Peter to tell Edmund off for being a beast to her. 

The High King walks in, posture regal and grand. He completely ignores Susan, asking his brother if he heard something, before also getting whacked by her. 

“Ow, Susan!”

“Don't pretend you can't hear me!”

Caspian tries to hide his grin behind a cough. As an only child, he has no idea what it's like to have brothers and sisters, but he's learning from watching them. Apparently, having siblings means arguing over seating arrangements at the table and threatening small acts of domestic terrorism should your claimed seat be “stolen”. Trying to trip each other in the halls (for no reason Caspian could detect) and making faces when they thought no one was looking. 

But it also means having someone to ask for help, like when your sword gets stuck in your belt. To catch you when you stumble (only sometimes, Susan was more than happy to laugh the one time Peter lost his footing in the dew-wet grass) and to back you up in an argument.

Like how Edmund backs up Peter's plan to raid the castle. 

Caspian doesn't understand it. He just doesn't. He can't see the advantages or the big picture that Peter claims will bring them victory. But he's slowly swallowing his own opinions on the matter. Who is he to question the man who won wars against witches and giants? 

Who is Caspian compared to any of them?

“-and I didn't steal your bloody pen last year-”

“Well someone did, Ed-”

“You lot do realize we're meeting in the other room, right?” 

Queen Lucy is suddenly standing in the entrance, trying not to smile and tapping her foot. “We're all waiting for you.”

“...Oh,” Peter says. “Right, then let's go. But seriously Ed, I know you took it-”

"For Aslan's sake, it was just a pen!”

“I knew it!”

Susan lingers behind her brothers, falling into step with Caspian and giving him a sheepish smile. “I can't promise they will get any better, but you do get used to it.”

Caspian smiles back. He may not have a family like theirs, but he's grateful to be given the chance to observe one. To bask in their glow from the outside, to stare up at their constellations from the ground, like he has for years. 

“Stars may be the most beautiful thing in creation, but sadly, they're not meant for mortals to hold and touch," his professor once said. "We can only marvel up at beauty.”

His gaze lingers on Edmund as they begin the meeting, wondering if that's what makes him so alluring. If like the constellations of his legacy, he's made out of stars too.

 

-

 

They’ve only been here a week and already Lucy is starting to regret agreeing to share a room with her siblings. 

“I just think we can wait a few more days, that's all.” Susan says, fluffing her pillow. “We still haven't heard back from all the messengers. There might be more troops out there.”

Peter sighs, laying out his own bedroll. “We've been over this Sue, the longer we wait, the less of a surprise it'll be. We have to do something.”

Lucy looks over at Edmund, already sitting on his makeshift bed and purposefully keeping his eyes fixed on his book, trying to avoid being roped into the conversation. She can't blame him. She's tired of hashing out this argument too, still believing they should be looking for Aslan. 

Edmund believed her when she explained the pull she felt to the woods, like the dreams of a sleeping giant were calling to her, whispering for her to wake them up. But Peter refused to let her go answer the call on her own.

As if leaving me behind while they go attack the castle is any better, she thinks sullenly. 

“At least consider running a practice of some kind, let them get their nerves out before the real thing,” Susan reasons, but Peter isn't listening. “Are you ignoring me? Peter?”

Her eyes narrow, too far away to smack him with her hands, so she does the next best thing. 

“Peter, I'm talking to you-”

She throws her pillow just as he turns, hitting him square in the face. 

They all freeze. 

The argument, the plans, the war, all of it ceases to exist. Their eyes light up, even Edmund's, and suddenly they're scrambling for pillows. 

It used to be a regular occurrence, even well into their adulthood. Feathers flying through the halls of Cair Paravel, an abundance of cushions at their disposal, and most importantly, no one to stop them. When they returned to England however, none of them ever felt happy enough, playful enough, to instigate the decades old tradition. 

But now they're back.

They're home. 

It's been five years, but none of the Pevensie’s are ones to back down from a pillow fight. 

Peter immediately chases Susan, holding his fluffy weapon high above his head while she shrieks and scampers behind Edmund. Ed blocks the blow with his book, telling Peter to knock it off, this is over a hundred years old, only to uppercut him with his own pillow, allowing Susan time to smash hers down.

But she misses (except she never really misses) and lands the hit directly on Edmund's head. 

“Hey!” Ed spins around. ”I was defending you!”

“Sorry, didn't see you there,” Susan winks, “you're awfully short again.”

“I am not short-”

Lucy's pillow whacks him in the stomach. The look of betrayal on his face is over exaggerated and ridiculous and she laughs.

She almost forgot how good it feels to laugh. 

“Being short has its advantages,” she says, before yelping as Ed’s pillow clocks her in the shoulder.

Alliances form and dissolve in the blink of an eye, starting with Peter on her side until he turns on her, then it's the girls versus the boys until Lucy takes a cheap shot at Susan, and now they're all after her. 

She runs, swinging her pillow savagely until it explodes in a flurry of white, blinding her attackers. She turns to flee while they're spitting out feathers-

“Oof!” She collides with someone, but they catch her before she can fall. 

It's Caspian.

The whole room stills. 

He looks incredibly awkward and apologetic, mouth opening and closing.

Feathers float down around them. 

But Lucy knows an opportunity when she sees it. 

Grabbing two more pillows, she shoves one in the prince's hand before declaring, “none would dare attack the future King of Narnia!”

All three of her siblings look at him, grinning. 

Caspian gulps.

But when they charge, Lucy is pleased to see that his skills with a sword transfer easily to a pillow. He defends her with the same elegance she's seen him display in the practice ring, and it all begins anew.

There's a beat of tension between him and Peter, but it melts away when she gets her brother in the stomach, leaving his back open for Caspian. He drops to his knees, groaning dramatically before succumbing to his imaginary wounds. 

She laughs when Caspian hesitates to hit Susan, only to get a mouth full of fluff and Lucy must come to his defense. Luring away her sister is as easy as sticking out her tongue and shouting you can't catch me, you tall, old woman! 

Even as she battles Susan, Lucy keeps her eyes on the dance between Ed and Caspian. There's a different kind of tension between them, the way they circle around each other perfectly, smiles so big and eyes so bright and–oh.

Wait a minute. 

She stops, catching Susan's eye and nodding her head towards the two. Susan grins, raising her eyebrows suggestively. She sees it too. 

It's just enough of a distraction for Lucy to deliver the killing blow. 

As Susan falls in the most dramatic fashion, Lucy leaps over Peter (who's still playing dead) and lets out a war cry as she takes the two other boys by surprise, so focused on each other that they never saw her coming. 

 

When the feathers settle again, she stands undefeated and declares herself the winner. 

Everyone is laughing, even Caspian, and she plops down next to the prince with a crafty grin. 

“Sorry for double crossing you, I had a point to prove about being short.”

“Not a problem,” he chuckles, looking around at the chaos. “Is…this how you all normally prepare for battle?”

Peter shrugs, still lying on his back. “Pretty much, although of course I normally win-”

“Since when?!” Both Ed and Sue say. 

“Did you forget the pillow fight after Ed’s twentieth birthday? The one where that ambassador from the Lone Islands came and he-”

Ed grabs a handful of feathers and shoves it in Peter's face, trying to stuff it in his big mouth. Lucy laughs because Edmunds’s ears are turning red. 

Caspian looks confused, but the rest of them all clearly remember the night Ed was officially deflowered. 

“I'm going to kill you, I swear to god Pete-”

Peter swings his pillow. Everyone scrambles again to arm themselves. 

Ed wins the second round.

“I think there's hope for him yet,” Peter says, after they cleaned up the feathers and Caspian bid them all a good night.

“Only took you a whole week,” Ed mutters, going around the room to blow out the candles. 

“Oh? What was that, dear brother?” Peter grins up at him. “You're rather quick to come to his defense.”

“I don't know what you're talking about.”

But Peter isn't looking at him anymore, turning on his stomach to address his sisters. “Did I tell you two about the other morning? When Ed and Caspian were sparring?”

Ed kicks him as he walks by but Peter is unbothered. 

“They were practically in their own little world, I had to call out three times before either of them noticed me," he says.

“Oh really?” Susan shoots a wicked smirk at her little brother. “Now that you mention it, I did interrupt the two holding hands-”

“We weren't holding hands-”

“-and Mr Grumbles here accused me of having the ‘worst timing', rather odd, don't you think?”

Peter rubs his chin. “Hmm, I did seem to notice how Ed always ends up sitting near Caspian during our meetings, almost like Caspian seeks him out on purpose. Lu, what do you think?”

Lucy can't pretend as well as her older siblings, giggling as she adds, “well, I don't know about Ed, but I did see that lingering, lovesick look Caspian just gave a certain someone while wishing them a good night. Reminded me of how Susan used to look at the Queen of Archenland, all doe-eyed-”

“I did not look at Fiona like that.”

“You still remember her name?” 

Lucy laughs at Susan's frowning face, loud and with her head thrown back because she knew it, but they all still hear Edmund's quiet whisper. 

“...Does he really tend to sit near me?”

“Aww,” Lucy coos, “did you really not notice?”

“He’s practically writing poetry about you Ed,” Peter holds his hands over his heart, swooning, “oh my dearest Ed, with hair so dark and face forever scowling-”

“Guys wait a minute.” Susan interrupts, “I just want to point out that we were wrong, as it seems I won't be the first in the family to marry after all!”

“I hate all of you, you're all the absolute worst,” comes muffled from under Edmund's blanket, and Lucy laughs. 

It felt so good to laugh again.

Notes:

Peter, Susan and Lucy: 😏😏🤭
Ed: 💀

 

I didn't expect to unlock Caspian's praise kink in the first scene but I mean–

I'm utterly in love writing for the Pevensies. I have adoption papers and I'm ready to be a single mother for these absolute hobgoblins. What headcannons do you have for the Pevensies? I'm brainstorming for future chapters and would love to hear from y'all your ideas!

Chapter 4: 'Til it was a Battle Cry

Notes:

Everything goes wrong and winter comes early to Narnia.

TW: Blood and injury

The moment the bells echoed off the cold stone walls of Miraz's Castle, Edmund knew the plan had failed.

He drags himself up over the roof of the inner walls and looks down into the courtyard. Peter's blonde hair catches what little light there is, his sword flashing and cutting down soldiers, but there's too many. He can't see Susan or Caspian, the upper terraces are filling with Telemarine archers-

There's one below Ed, following Peter's movements with his crossbow. 

Ed doesn't think, he just jumps, and the soldier crashes below into the courtyard.

The clash of swords is so much louder from here. He still can't see Susan, but Peter wouldn't leave her behind. He searches for red tipped arrows but he can't see anything, where is she, where is she, where where-

“Ed!” Peter's voice rings out above the chaos.

And Edmund remembers the archers. 

He runs, crashing through a door as crossbows fire. He hears arrows hit stone. He kicks the door shut, hears the wood splinter under their force. 

He doesn't have time to think about the arrow that hit him. 

The hallways are even darker, leaving him to blindly limp forward. Ed tries to envision the maps Caspian helped him make, remembering he's in the eastern wing, there should be stairs to his right-

Caspian.

Ed didn't see him. 

He could be dead. 

The door crashes open behind him. Heavy boots are chasing him up the stairs. He's starting to feel the pain, burning up his thigh and slowing his steps. The arrow catches on the stone wall, grinding and pulling, a gush of hot blood making him grit his teeth. 

Ed sees a door. 

He pushes it open, slams it shut with his back. He can see the arrow now, sticking out from his right leg. It hurts. Seeing it makes it hurt more. He looks away-

To nothing but empty air. A sheer drop down the gorge surrounding the castle. Wind whips around the tower and turns his pant leg cold, but he can feel warm blood pooling in his boot. 

Artery wound. 

He has to stop the bleeding, make a tourniquet out of–something. It doesn't matter he might lose the leg. 

Cut your losses, that's what Susan always said.

But Susan could be dead. Peter could be dead. Half of his family wiped out. He struggles with his belt because his hands are shaking and they could all be dead because of this stupid, stupid plan, why didn't I say something?

Ed pulls the leather tight just above the arrow, choking on a scream. He has to stay quiet. More blood pools out, too much for the fabric of his pants to absorb. It's too much pain. He pulls the belt tighter anyways, twisting the end in a knot while biting his tongue until it bleeds too.

“Fucking fuck.” 

He has to think. Where's his torch? The griffin who carried him in should be nearby, he just has to signal him. The silver metal slips in his bloodied hands, he can't get a grip on the switch-

The door slams against his spine, knocking his head back into the wood. Men are shouting from inside and Ed barely has time to plant his feet against them. He looks down, sees the latch shaking with every impact, and pushes his torch between the groves. 

It works. It takes the brunt of the next slam, but he's still trapped. 

Edmund tries to walk. His feet slip in the mess of his own blood. He curses, twisting to land on his uninjured leg, but it still hurts enough to knock the wind out of him. The best he can do is crawl away. 

He hopes the others got away, prays that Peter called for retreat. 

His torch shakes in the latch. It's loud, louder than the grunting soldiers breaking down the door. 

But not as loud as when it finally bends and shatters. 

Ed hopes his family made it out alive. 

Please, please let them be alive. 

-

 

 

It's quiet, the walk back to the How. Defeat is bitter in all their mouths, holding their tongues hostage, but Caspian can only taste cold fury. 

 

“We Telemarines would have nothing if we had not taken it. Your father knew that as well as anyone.”

 

But Miraz only took from Caspian. His home, his throne, his father. He took everything and left Caspian's with nothing. 

It was easier to call life unfair for taking his father, a mysterious act of fate that no one could have predicted or prevented. Calling his uncle unfair for killing his father just feels childish. 

But he was just a child when they laid Caspian the Ninth in the ground. He didn't understand at the time that his father was gone, wandering the halls of the castle night after night looking for him, for just one more hug so tight it kept the monsters away. Chasing dream fueled phantoms well past the witching hour to hear the voice of his father, full of warmth and love, to say his name one more time.

It isn't fair that Caspian can't recall his father's face anymore, but can see his uncle's so clearly. He remembers every time he called Caspian soft, weak, disappointing, spineless, nothing like the kings who came before you. He can see every harsh line and cold stare in his mind and it's not fair because now he knows what could have been.

He could still have his father. Someone who truly loved him by his side instead of the man who’d only tolerated him for a chance to steal his throne. 

But would your father even want a son like you, a voice says, a soft, spineless, worthless heir?   Would Caspian even deserve to have his name spoken with affection after his failure today, and not disdain and disappointment? 

Do I even deserve to be here?

Something stronger than the wind rustles the branches above them. Caspian tenses, hand gripping his sword hilt before golden feathers break through the leaves. The griffin Longclaw lands before them. 

Edmund road in on Longclaw. 

Longclaw is riderless.

Caspian's stomach drops.

The griffin bows. “My Prince…”

“Where's Ed?” Peter is suddenly next to him, eyes wide and fearful. Susan flanks him, but she sees what Longclaw carries in his arms before they do.

“Lay him down,” she commands, “let me see.”

Then Caspian sees him. Limp and lifeless, covered in so much blood that it's staining the griffin’s feathers black and suddenly the night feels so, so cold. 

“Is he…?” He can't bring himself to finish the thought, frozen stiff as the King's siblings rush to his side.

“He's breathing,” Susan gasps, “he's–Peter help me, I need something to stop the bleeding.”

Peter rips something, probably his undershirt, and Susan is pressing it down on Edmund's leg, around the Telemarine arrow embedded in his thigh. Caspian has to look away. 

Coward, the voice says. Can't even look at the consequences of your actions? 

A faint groan makes the voice pause, makes all their hearts stop. 

Susan leans closer. “Ed?”

“Ow, Sue…” His voice is small and raspy, almost whining, and the queen seems to choke on a sob.

“I've got you, little beastie, just be still.” 

Edmund's eyes open. His pupils are blown wide and glassy as he looks up at the trees, a blood-crusted hand pawing at the grass next to him. 

“Pete?”

“I'm here, I'm right here," Peter grabs Ed’s hand, holding it tight.

“Not hurt?” 

“Not hurt, we're okay. You're gonna be okay-”

“Where’s Caspian?”

His name is full of warmth and concern coming from Edmund’s lips. It floods all feeling back into his body and Caspian realizes he's shaking. He can't speak. 

Peter speaks for him, saying he's fine too. And if it's curt and cold, Caspian doesn't register it, because dark eyes find him and Edmund somehow has the strength to smile, soft and brighter than all the stars in the heavens. But that smile turns into a pained grimace.

He groans when Susan pulls the cloth tighter around his leg. “It's still attached to me, Sue,” he snarks, but it's slurred around the edges and his eyes are growing heavy.

“Sorry Ed, just trying to save you,” she answers, but there's no humor, no life to her voice. She looks up, “Longclaw, can you carry him back to the How?”

The griffin nods, “Of course, my Queen, but it's cold in the skies-”

“Here,” Caspian shrugs off his cloak and steps closer. 

He almost wished he hadn't. 

Edmund's skin is pale and glistening with sweat, pain etched into his features that he's powerless to ease. He's close enough to hear his teeth start to chatter and smell the cloying copper blood that saturates him, sticking to Susan's hands, the grass, there's so much blood-

His cloak covers it from view as Peter and Susan wrap it around Ed, as gentle as they can be with their shaking hands. 

“Pete,” Ed murmurs, “I've got to tell you something…”

“You can tell me later, just hang tight-”

“My torch is gone.”

Peter laughs, but it's broken and fragile. 

“That's okay, Ed.”

“I liked my torch.”

“I know, Ed.”

A nod from Peter, and Longclaw picks Edmund back up and lifts him up into the sky, into the stars. 

And then it's quiet in the woods again. 

Susan's hands are still shaking but Peter's curl into fists, his shoulders tensing as he turns to Caspian.

“This is all your fault,” he says, unspoken terror and red hot anger burning in his eyes. 

Caspian's anger is black. A blinding void consuming him with the sinking feeling that Peter's right. He's quick to snap back, a fuse that's been lit between them for days finally igniting the powder. Their guilt disguised as ego rearing up their ugly heads, clashing with bitter accusations. 

Soon their swords clash too, and the woods are no longer quiet.

“Stop it!” Susan shouts. “Both of you, stop!” 

But their swords are slicing through air, avatars for even sharper words and frustration and broken trust. Caspian's teeth are bared and Peter's mouth is twisted in a hateful snarl as he brings his sword back-

“This won't help Edmund!”

Both their blades freeze.

Susan steps between them, unafraid and so, so angry. 

“We all made the wrong calls tonight,” her eyes are cutting as she hisses “and we all lost. Just because Ed and our troops paid the price for our mistakes, that doesn't give you a pass to have a go at each other. Knock it off.”

Peter lowers his sword, shame slowly creeping into his face. 

But Caspian can't feel anything anymore, except how cold he is. An awful emptiness has settled in his chest, carved out its home where his beating heart should be. 

It's quiet, the rest of the march back to the How. With every step, that voice grows louder in Caspian's head. With every step, he believes more and more that the voice is right. 

It's all your fault.

 

 

-

 

 

“Ed's okay,” Lucy says, and everyone breathes out in relief. “He's lost a lot of blood and is unconscious.”

Susan has tears running down her cheeks, pulling her sister into a crushing hug. Peter buries his head in his hands, starting to pull at his hair before his sisters envelope him into their embrace too.

Caspian walks away. 

He doesn't respond when Lucy calls out to him, not even when Peter does, letting their voices fade as he retreats deeper into the twisting stone halls. He walks until that voice in his head is loud enough for him to identify, loud enough to recognize.

You're a coward. Why don't you just run away already?

It's what you're good at.

The voice sounds like Miraz, and Caspian doesn't have the strength to argue with it anymore.

Edmund’s face, pale as death with a Telemarine arrow in his leg, flashes in Caspian's mind. 

It's all your fault. 

It was a mistake to trust the impulse to go find his professor. A mistake to go confront Miraz before they'd even called in the troops. Maybe it was a mistake to even think he had a say in the first place. With the return of the Kings and Queens of Old, what authority does he have? What use is he to them?

Aside from ruining their plans and costing us lives. 

And getting one of them mortally wounded. 

So when Nikabrik finds him alone staring at the engravings of the four rulers of the golden age, he doesn't have the energy to argue with him over his failure. He doesn't understand what power the dwarf is alluding to, but he doesn't understand half of what Peter says, so what does it matter? What does he know compared to any of them? His entire life was built on lies, his very existence a pawn in a game of power his uncle has already won. And he's just a child in this game, naive enough to trust a monster just because they were related. 

So who is he to judge the cloaked creatures who met them at the Stone Table? Their appearances are strange, different, but so are all the Narnians he's met. Who is he to call a talking wolf normal and trustworthy but not a werewolf? He's just a child compared to them all.  

And like a child, he's tricked.

He doesn't recall that magic had both a good and an evil side until it's too late. 

He forgets that the very creatures who surround him now once worshiped a false god.

He forgets about the Witch Witch, until she stands before him, eyes spellbinding and hand outstretched, asking for his help, his hate, and his blood. 

Notes:

The tag about Caspian being confused 999% of the time is no joke, buddy is going through it.

I tend to write in flowery, long sentences so action scenes like the one at the beginning are hard for me. I'd love any and all feedback on how the scene read (tbh that goes for all of em) so let me know if it felt rough or clunky.

RIP Ed’s torch. Maybe I should update the warnings to major character death. And yes I named the griffin Longclaw from the sonic the hedgehog movies I couldn't think of anything else to name him lol.

Thank you SO MUCH for all the wonderful comments, you have no idea how much they mean to me. I reply to all of them when I post a new chapter, so keep your eyes peeled next Sunday for when it drops!

Chapter 5: When You Call Me

Notes:

Caspian understands why stars aren't meant to be touched.
-
TW: brief homophobic language

Caspian barely hears the fighting behind him. The snarls and screams and clash of iron against claws fading away, frozen stiff under the spell of the White Witch. 

“Your heart bleeds for revenge. I can give you Miraz's suffering. I can bring you his head.”

He can hear her inside his head, voice clawing behind his eyes as she pulls him in closer. Her lips curl into a venomous smirk. Caspian’s feet shuffle forward. Resisting each step feels like dragging his boots through deep snow. 

“But there's more you desire, isn't there?” Her magic that once felt like frostbite is warming into something else, something gentle and almost maternal. “You want your father back, you want his love again,” she whispers. “I can give that to you.”

He's inches away now, that warmth burning under his frozen skin.

“You want a family again. I can be your family.”

She's so much more beautiful than the stories said. She reaches out to him, promising to pull him out of his misery and loneliness and failures. Why wouldn't he trust her? She's benevolent, and comforting, and kind, and so, so beautiful-

He reaches for her.

A hand pushes him off balance. His head spins, he can feel his limbs again. Caspian collapses to the ground. And he remembers that not once, in his entire life, has he ever felt attraction like that towards a woman before. 

The spell breaks and he looks up. 

High King Peter holds his sword, Rhindon, edge gleaming with blood and pointing at the Witch. But Peter's eyes are conflicted, cautious, afraid. He's frozen stiff—He's falling under her spell.

Stories from his childhood break through the fog and Caspian remembers that the White Witch could do more than make winter last a hundred years. She could whisper in the hearts of men, twist them with their deepest desires to her will. She'd done it before, the stories said, once to trick King Edmund; now to ensnare Caspian, and even High King Peter.

And they were powerless to stop her.

“Peter, dear…” the Witch says aloud. “I've missed you, come-” she held out her hand to him, skin as pale and lifeless as a corpse, “-just one drop.”

Caspian sees the King's sword waver. 

He tries to call out for Peter to stop, to fight her, but can't get the words out, teeth clenched and chattering. He's never felt so cold in his life, so bitterly cold and useless and stupid-

“You know you can't do this alone,” her eyes flicker between them both. “Let me help you.”  

Caspian can't get up, can't move, he can't save anyone. He's doomed them all. 

A crack splits down the ice. 

Her eyes widen as the woman looks down, a sword tip jutting out through her stomach. It twists savagely. More cracks spider across her frosted reflection. She throws her head back in an ear piercing scream, and the ice wall comes down with a burst of glass-shattering magic. 

The White Witch is gone.

Edmund stands before them.

Caspian would've dropped to his knees if he wasn't already on them. He's okay, he breathes, he's okay like Lucy said he would be, he's not dead. I didn't kill him.

Oh thank Aslan, I didn't kill Edmund.

Edmund mutters something, something only Peter seems to hear. The High King makes a step towards his brother, but stops at the “don't” snarled at him, something raising Edmund's hackles in a way Caspian doesn't understand. Peter flinches back like the word bit him. 

“Lucy!” Susan's voice echoes off the cavern walls, “what happened? I felt this terrible chill and-”

Caspian turns to see the younger queen run to her sister, hiding her face in a tight hug as she drops her dagger. It's dripping with blood. 

Nikabrik lies dead at Trumpkin’s feet, but the dwarf’s blade is clean. The bodies of the werewolf and hag lie nearby, the last defiant cries of death frozen into their faces. 

“Caspian,” Peter is beside him, offering him his hand. The Prince looks up, expecting anger and frustration but is shocked to see tearful blue eyes looking back down at him. “I’m-I’m so sorry. For all of it, I'm just, I'm so sorry...” 

Caspian takes the King's hand. “I'm sorry too,” he says. “During the raid, I was being impulsive and stupid-”

“I'm the one that's been acting impulsive and stupid,” Peter interrupts, but then looks sheepish, “and I'm sorry for always cutting you off like that.” 

“It's okay,” Caspian manages a smile. 

Their forgiveness is warm and glowing after the White Witch’s spell, and the last of the ice between them melts away.

A thud turns their attention towards the two queen’s, but they're also looking around with Trumpkin. 

Susan takes them both in, then the ice that's slowly dripping down the archway. “Where's Ed?” 

Caspian looks back, but Edmund's gone.

Susan lets go of Lucy, peering behind one of the broken columns. Her expression stills into shock. She whispers Peter's name and disappears, they all follow her around the corner and–

Caspian’s breath is stolen in the worst way. 

Edmund lies crumpled on the floor. One leg wrapped in bandages and bent out awkwardly. His hands are clawing at his hair, pressed around his ears like he's trying to block out the world.

Like he's still trying to block out her.

“Ed?” Susan hovers close but without touching, like she's waiting for permission. 

Lucy hesitates only for a second before she carefully moves forward too. Peter follows his sister and they encircle their brother, and Caspian realizes he's seen this exact picture before—it's how the wolves walked around Edmund in the woods, making a protective ring around a member of their pack. A member of their family.

“Ed, can you hear us?” Peter asks. 

Edmund's chest is rising and falling too rapidly, his breathing becoming ragged and loud enough to hear. 

But he nods.

“Okay,” Peter nods back, “that's good, okay, stick to the plan then. Ed, what color is Lu’s dress?” 

It takes a moment, like the word is fighting to be free between sharp, strangled gasps, before Edmund can rasp out “red.”

Caspian and Trumpkin watch as Peter asks his brother to name four other objects in the room, then to name four things he can touch. After choking out my hair, the floor, and my sword, he holds out a hand—Peter takes it without hesitation—and says, you. 

“Can I hug you?” Lucy whispers.

It's seconds, but it feels like hours with how fast Edmund’s breathing is, how hard he's beginning to shake, when he finally nods yes.

Lucy flings herself around her brother so fast Peter has to hold them up to keep from tipping over. There are tears in Susan's eyes as she looks up at Caspian and asks if he can get Ed water.

Caspian runs.

-

Her voice is as chilling as he remembers, like wind chimes made from icicles in his head, but Peter never remembered the White Witch being this beautiful.

“Hello again, Peter,” she says, but her mouth stays closed in a smirk. “Look at how tall you've grown.”

She's dead. Aslan killed her. He saw it happen right in front of his eyes and that was over a thousand years ago, she's dead-

“Peter dear,” the Witch speaks aloud this time, commanding back his attention. “I've missed you.”

It's a lie and he knows it is. All she wants is his blood, his help in escaping death. 

“But that's not what you want.”

Her eyes are as black as he remembers, but something else is there, something burning and toxic. 

“Do you really think a Telemarine usurper, who stole your rightful kingdom, is capable of being a better king than you?”

The clang of the draw bridge slamming shut echoes alongside her voice in his mind, their troops, his troops, doomed behind iron bars at Miraz's castle as arrows fly–

“You want to be king again, don't you? To be a man again.”

The Witch’s hand is reaching for him, offering him an opportunity.

“I can give you that. Aren't you tired of being powerless? Of not getting the respect you deserve?”

Memories of bloody knuckles and split lips in the school’s locker room, his own voice screaming for Thompson to say it again, say that again to my face you fucking coward–

“Wouldn't the realm fit better in your hands?” Her voice twists deeper into his mind, soft as fresh snow, leaving his thoughts numb in its wake. “Don't you want your throne back?”

But it's not his throne anymore. Peter never wanted a crown, but can't seem to remember why. He can't tell his desires from hers anymore, can't feel his arms or legs. He can't remember why he ever wanted to take her throne, her crown, in the first place. 

The Witch is still reaching out, leaning as close as she can from behind the wall of ice as she whispers the final nail in the coffin. “You know you can't do this alone.”

And he's frozen stiff because deep down, Peter knows she's right.

But when the wall and the Witch come crashing down with a shattering scream, Peter remembers the real reason he agreed to become king. 

The real reason why he beat Henry Thompson to a pulp every chance he got.

To protect Edmund.

Aslan led the rescue from the Witch’s camp on the condition that he consider his request of wearing the crown. When Edmund returned to them, Peter saw how some of the troops looked at his brother like he was a traitor and not a victim, and knew they wouldn't dare do so again if he commanded it as king.  

He knew Thompson never once laid hands on Edmund, but Peter heard what he said in the locker rooms and whispered to the other boys in class. Don't get too close, you might catch it from him and turn into a fairy yourself.

Peter could threaten exile to those of his court who dared to call his brother a traitor. He could make sure Thompson regretted every last word that left his miserable mouth before he broke it, but when he needed to protect Edmund the most, Ed ended up saving him instead.

“I know, you had it sorted.” His brother's voice is flat and quiet as he repeats his words from what feels like a lifetime ago. 

Peter steps forward, arms ready to catch his brother who's teetering and trying to keep weight off his injured leg. He shouldn't be here, still far too pale-

“Don't,” Ed snarls.

Peter winces, takes a step back. Ed's always been one to lashed out when he's hurting, teeth snapping and hackles raised like a cornered animal. Peter's own brute force method of confrontation once caused them to be constantly fighting; Ed would snap, Peter would roar, neither would listen.

It took Peter far too long to understand it just meant Ed needed space. So he tempers his tongue and says nothing, lets Ed go. 

Instead he apologizes to Caspian, the weight of all the ways he has failed to help him nearly swallowing him whole. But Caspian is a better man than Peter ever was and forgives him easily, a warm smile chasing away the cold left behind by the Witch.

Then Edmund collapses, and his instincts kick in.

He's helped him through these nerve attacks the most. Countless hours soothing his brother's breathing when Christmas bells sounded too similar to Her sleigh, or late at night, when the dreams of a woman in white came back to haunt him in the dormitories. 

Susan found a method that works best from her research. Lucy taught him how to keep his voice gentle and grounding. He guides Ed through the steps, and slowly, Edmund's eyes focus again.

He reaches for Peter, like he always does when he's scared. When he starts to sob, it sinks in that yet again, Peter has failed to protect his little brother.

-

Caspian doesn't mean to eavesdrop, but Susan was right. Voices travel easily through the stone hallways. He's still around the corner when he hears it, a sound he's unfamiliar with that causes him to stop and listen.

The sound is of broken words in between sobs, and it breaks Caspian into a million pieces.

“It’s stupid,” Ed says, voice trembling. “I shouldn't be crying over something as stupid as her-”

“Ed, you're okay, it's okay to cry,” Susan's voice is gentle but heavy with sorrow.

“It's not, it's stupid,” he repeats, but it's muffled and dissolves into shuttering sobs.

“I'm so sorry Ed, I'm such an idiot to have listened to her.” Peter's voice is wavering, he's close to tears too. “I'm so sorry I didn't protect you again, it's all my fault.”

But Peter's wrong. 

Caspian was the one who allowed the White Witch to be summoned. He's the reason why the plan for the raid failed and got Edmund shot. He's the coward, the betrayer, who brought an enemy into their midst. 

“It's not your fault, Pete.” Edmund says, but it's muted, like he's saying it into Peter's shoulder.

“How did this happen?” Susan asks. “Where did the Witch’s staff-” she must have noticed the other bodies ”-where did those come from?”

“Nikabrik, probably,” Peter says. “I saw him near Caspian-”

“What?!” Ed's voice is pitched in shock and probably horror. “Did they, is he-”

A traitor? Caspian finishes the thought. 

He is a traitor. 

He doesn't hear the rest of the conversation. He forgets why he's even there. He should just leave, just turn around and run, just run like you always do-

“Caspian?” 

Susan's silhouette turns the corner of the hall. He realizes he's standing alone in the dark, her shadow flickering over him in the torch light she carries. Her eyes are brimming with tears. They fall like shooting stars down her cheeks.

“Stars aren't meant to be touched,” his professor once said, and now Caspian knows why. His touch can only taint them, only ruin them into a flickering flame that's far from their cosmic glory. By blowing that horn, by calling them here, he turned into a gravity that brought the stars crashing down to earth. 

“I'm sorry,” he holds out the skin of water in his hands, remembering why he's even here. “Please, just tell them I'm sorry.”

He's careful not to let their hands touch when she takes the water. He can't bring himself to look her in the eye. 

“Caspian-”

Stars aren't meant to be touched.

Caspian runs away.

Notes:

The 5-4-3-2-1 method Peter uses:
See: Five things you can see around you
Touch: Four things you can touch around you
Hear: Three things you can hear
Smell: Two things you can smell
Taste: One thing you can taste

There's no one fix to panic attacks, but this method has helped me and some of my friends. Try writing it down in your phone or a sticky note for when you need it and remember it's okay to not be okay ❤️
-
Another Pevensie POV and that sweet sweet angst. I hadn't originally planned to write Peter's POV of the scene with the White Witch but I got curious what it was she said to him, how she'd use his insecurities to bait him and ba da bing ba do boom, extra scene for you. I added some spice of recontextualizing some of the prior scenes like Henry Thompson and Ed always grabbing for Pete when he's scared. I hope it reads as more insightful and not repetitive but let me know!

Chapter 6: Pick a Star on the Dark Horizon

Notes:

Edmund dreams of the past that won't stay dead.

TW: Semi graphic depictions of physical and mental torture, blood and injury, anaylst of an abusive relationship and self deprecative thoughts.

Ed wishes the White Witch had just been cruel. Cruel at least was familiar.

The war in England stripped his whole family of their joy. Constant stress eating away at his parents until it consumed his mother whole and took their father to the front lines. Their shoulders bowed under the weight of it, their words turned barbed with it, tensions straining under every air raid and explosive argument. Especially between him and Peter. 

Suddenly he became the man of the family. Everyone, at least subconsciously, looked to him for strength and support, including Edmund. But Peter was only a boy himself, cracking under the pressure and constantly cutting himself on Ed’s broken edges. The same way Edmund cut his hand on the only photograph they had of their father, that night of the final air raid before they left for the countryside. The night the tension between him and Peter finally snapped. 

Every fight widened the riff between them. It drove their sisters to pick sides, but they weren't spared from Edmund’s razor sharp tongue either. He even took pleasure in it, driving them away with sarcasm that cut too deep, using words he knew would go in for the kill. Because at least he could control how they hated him, even if it was through his own cruelty. 

Edmund wishes Jadis had just been cruel. 

It would've been so much easier to hate her if she had never been kind. Because in his heart of hearts, Edmund knew she wasn't completely lying. 

Her eyes were too soft when she found him stumbling through snow drifts, her hands too tender when she helped him stand, dusting off the ice from his robe. All the best liars hid their truths under layers of deception. Ed knew, because he was a liar too. 

On some level, she did understand. He felt a  twin flame of ache and loneliness and isolation when she embraced Edmund in her ivory furs; like they were the only two people in the world, the only two people who could understand each other. 

Edmund wanted to be her, unbothered by the opinions of others, standing tall, strong, sure of herself. In control of herself. She didn't try to hide her jagged edges, didn't shy away from smiling with all of her teeth. He’d stepped into a world frozen in winter, but she gave him warmth. He had iced out his family, but she reached for his hand and offered him a place at her side, somewhere to belong.

The lure of being wanted was sweeter than any delicacies she could conjure. 

Edmund learned when he grew older, when he became a king and navigated foreign courts, that in order to trick a liar, you have to tell them the truth. After you've twisted it into something unrecognizable.

Jadis did understand him, and she used it to manipulate him. She did want him by her side but as a pet. She offered him a place to belong but she neglected to mention that it was at her feet in chains; as an example of her absolute power. 

Yet even after hearing the Beavers describe her tyranny, after seeing the statues of innocents littering her courtyard, he still walked through her gates like a dog, loyal till the end to her transparent promises. 

She didn't believe him at first. It took unforgiving fists and countless cracks of a whip before she pulled him up by the hair, out of his own blood and tears, and finally believed he didn't know where his siblings were. That was the first time she entered his mind. Ripped apart his thoughts until all he could taste was blood and his own screams. Until all he could do was sob for mercy, for her to believe me, please, believe me, I don't know where they are, please–

And she smiled. 

She could see every thought, every emotion. The Witch knew that he was too weak to fight her anymore and if Edmund did know, he would've told her by now. 

Jadis dropped him like a plaything, uncaring as he crumbled to the floor. And then she told her guards to keep going. 

But even after all of that pain, after his ribs ached so terribly it made every breath feel like his last, after his back went numb and the blood froze in rivers of red that cracked with every movement, there were still moments where he thought she might change her mind. 

When she let the ends of her fur cloak cover him in the sleight, just enough to stop his shivering, patting his head like he was a kicked dog. Hope flickered when she tutted over his bruised face, muttering something about damaged barging chips. But he didn't care because her hand was cool and soothing on his throbbing skin. He'd actually felt grateful that night, when at her war camp, she let him eat the scraps from her plate instead of moldy bread. 

And when she stabbed him on the battlefield, after he broke her staff, there wasn't hate in her eyes—only mild disappointment—and Edmund was relieved. Even as the blood soaked through his tunic and into the grass, he felt thankful. Because he knew she was choosing to be kind. 

It was her kindness that had her turning away. A choice to let him bleed out, instead of making death hurt more.

There was a reason why the Wolves of Narnia were the first of the Witch’s followers to swear loyalty to him, and only Edmund, after the battle. 

They understood what it was to be loyal to someone who hurt you, because at one point, they had been kind.

 

-

 

Despite the Lion’s blessing and forgiveness, after he was crowned a King of Narnia, many were distrustful of Ed. 

Peter did his best, all of his siblings did, to curb concerns and comments of treachery in their court. But even Susan couldn't control the rumors.

He heard the whispers, the Traitor King becoming his unofficial title. He noticed when heads stayed still, but skeptical eyes tracked him through the throne room upon his arrival. It didn't matter that he was of the same blood as his siblings, whom they all loved. His quiet demeanor and subtle style of leadership made him easier to single out, to make into the black sheep of the royal family. It didn't matter he was only ten when the Witch dug her claws into him—the Narnians had a hundred years of winter to justify their animosity.

But every drawback has its opportunities. He made use of his ability to overhear what others whispered, to notice what his siblings couldn't. To read a person at glance. 

Peter was their magnificent warrior, Susan their gentle stateswoman, and Lucy their valiant philanthropist. Edmund carved out his own space as their silver-tongued diplomat, their cunning spymaster. 

His peace treaty with Calorman and renegotiations with the Lone Islands earned him a new reputation into adulthood. King Edmund the Just became known not for his affiliation with the Witch of Eternal Winters, but with the Golden Age of Narnia. 

“Your past is your shadow,” Aslan once told him. “It can fade in the daylight, but it always follows you.” 

Edmund would meet people—ambassadors, diplomats, generals, kings—who’d smiled at him like he'd put the stars in the heavens. They'd open their arms to him, offering alliances, friendships, sometimes more than friendship, because of his new reputation that spread like wildfire.

But eventually, the rumors would catch up, the whispers of did you know, did you hear, eroding away at the ears of anyone who stayed the night, who lingered too long at his side. 

Their smiles would stiffen. Their arms would close. A wall of frost would spread between the too long silences and bedsheets grew cold. 

And eventually, everyone always left. 

It stung harder and harder every time, until finally, Edmund just stopped trying. He became intentionally blind to coy lips and lustful looks. Armor encircled the softest parts of himself, only to be seen by his siblings. 

“Your past is a shadow,” Aslan once said, “it can either haunt you, or make you stronger.”

There was a reason the Black Dwarves only accepted peace when Edmund was the one to personally extend it, ten years into his reign.

They had their own network of spies and watched him from the shadows. They knew he understood what it was to work twice as hard as everyone else, because of a dark past the world wouldn't let you forget, or forgive.

He offered them a second chance, and tried to not be disappointed when only half of their people took it. 

 

-

 

Edmund thought he was going insane. That during those last moments as the White Witch locked eyes with him and thrust her staff under his ribs, she'd cast one final spell to unravel his mind.

It started their first natural winter in Narnia. 

The cold that crept in through the halls of Cair Paravel seemed to follow him, seeping into his fingers and toes until his whole body went numb. It didn't matter how many fires were lit. Edmund couldn't drive away the cold, couldn't get rid of the feeling of being watched.

The night the first snow fell, the dreams started. 

In his nightmares, a blinding white world of ice and frost kept him disoriented, slipping and unable to run away. Her silhouette blended right into the walls of his prison cell, only her black eyes and blood red smile visible in the whiteout. He'd try to run, to scream. 

She always caught him.

Her staff piercing his flesh, pinning him in place, her hands forcing his eyes open so she could crawl inside his head, showing him everything she promised to do to his family once she caught them too.

Edmund didn't tell his siblings about the dreams. It felt shameful, after everything they'd been through together, but he found himself falling back into old habits. 

Susan would ask him at breakfast if he was sleeping alright, noting the darkening circles under his eyes. He would respond with sharp words in a cutting tone. After the fifth attempt, she stopped asking. 

Night after night, Jadis showed him visions of broken bones, torn skin and muscles, his siblings faces in agony. Her voice whispered outside his darkened windows, rattling the glass and howling to be let in. 

Lucy followed him around the castle, even when she had no reason to, saying she just wanted to be near him. But Edmund couldn't even bear to be near his sister, lest the ghostly versions of her from his dreams flash behind his eyelids. 

He started locking the doors of every room he went into, pretending he didn't hear her knocking.  

She never stopped knocking. 

Peter tried. He really did. Edmund could see him trying to be patient, to understand. It only made him an easier target. Every argument ended like it did in London, only this time Peter never slammed the door when he stormed off. 

But it didn't matter. Edmund would slam it shut for him. 

Day after day, the snow drifts grew higher. Night after night, Jadis made him watch, just like she promised. And every time he was too weak to stop her. 

It wasn't him she stabbed in the battlefield but Peter, his body turning gray and stiff, face frozen in a scream. She always struck him down before the spell was complete, just so she could see the statue of his brother bleed. 

It wasn't Edmund in her dungeons, but his sisters. Their cries of pain echoing off icy walls between the cracks of her whip. Lu’s bones she broke, Sue’s hair she yanked back before she'd laugh and–

A thunderous roar shook the room. The fire in the hearth flared brighter, and Edmund woke up. 

Outside, a snowstorm raged against the castle walls. But Aslan was unbothered by it, standing great and golden in the firelight that turned his fur into molten amber. 

“Am I still dreaming?” Ed asks.

The Lion replies “No, child,” and Edmund sags in relief. 

He watches Aslan walk around his bed, tail swinging lazily. The lion jumps up, mattress groaning under his weight, before he settles down next to the boy. His paws knead the pillows, great claws flexing but never breaking the silk. 

Why did they even give me so many pillows, Ed wonders. I just have one head.

“It seems you have been doubting your sanity,” Aslan says softly, “if I'm to understand what ‘bloody bonkers’ means correctly?”

Edmund huffs not quite a laugh. He forgot he'd said that, alone in his room and pacing like a madman because he could hear Her voice in the wind. “Yeah, pretty much.”

“Why?”

“I…I can't forget it, any of it. I know she's gone, that I’m safe, but I can't forget what happened.”

Aslan hums, the sound close to a pur. “Neither can I.”

Ed remembers seeing the Stone Table, remembers what Lucy and Susan said happened there, what happened because of him–

“I don't tell you this to make you feel guilty or ashamed,” Aslan says. “I tell you, because I also must carry the memories of the past, both the good days, and the nights I’d rather forget. Do you think this makes me weak?”

Ed looks up, mortified. “What? No!”

Aslan tilts his head. “Then why do you call yourself weak?”

“Because–” He realizes he didn't really know, grasping for any logical reason he can. “Because it's all in my head, it's not real, I'm just–” he's spiraling, “I'm just tired because she won't let me sleep and, and,” he can't tell the difference between being awake or asleep, between what's real and what’s his own mind trying to eat itself alive. 

“Aslan,” Edmund’s voice reduces to a whisper. “Am…am I going insane?”

He's afraid to look, afraid he'll see the answer he dreads in his eyes before any words are said. 

The Lion’s tail flicks back and forth over the quilt, one Susan made him. Edmund's fingers knead and fidget at the blankets edge, tracing the uneven stitches, trying to dry his sweating palms. 

“After the Witch was defeated, I could have only made Peter a King, but I chose to give all four of you the responsibility of the throne.” Aslan’s voice rumbles. “Have I ever told you why?”

"I don't think so,” Ed risks glancing up at him, somewhat relieved when the Lion doesn't meet his eyes, his stare focused ahead and a thousand miles away.

“Narnia is in a delicate state, as I'm sure you know. It will take great strength to push forward, to rebuild and fight for peace. Your brother carries that strength, though he may doubt himself at times.”

Ed thinks last week when he stumbled into Peter outside of the council room, pulling at his own hair and muttering ‘I can't do this, I can't do this,'  only to stand tall and proud the second he saw Edmund, like nothing was wrong. 

“Strength alone cannot chart a course through stormy seas, it takes a watchful eye and objective mind to sense danger before it breaks. Despite her struggle to find common ground between her heart and her mind, your sister Susan brings that balance.”

Edmund realizes Susan stopped asking him if he was alright because she'd already gotten her answer. She could see that he wasn't okay.

“You're slouching, are you feeling alright?” 

“Are you sleeping okay? You've still got bags under your eyes.”

What had once sounded like nagging he now realized was worrying, citing her sources for concern from what she could see. It wasn't some ghost of the White Witch that made him feel like he was being watched, it was Susan. She kept watching over him, even when he pushed her away, even when he locked or slammed the doors shut–

“Lucy never stopped knocking,” Ed whispers. “She keeps doing it, every day, no matter how many times I keep locking the door, she doesn't stop trying.”

Aslan nods. “Your little sister always has faith in others. Narnia will need her, her hopeful spirit, if it is to heal from a hundred years of hardship and hurt.”

“But, what do I have? I'm not… good like they are.” His voice wavers, “I've hurt them, betrayed them. Why me? After what I did,” his tears blur the pattern of Susan's quilt, “why didn't you just send me back?”

“Child, look at me.”

Edmund does, a hiccuping sob catching in his throat at the raw, uninhibited affection he doesn't deserve in the Lion's eyes.

“The reason you are a King of Narnia is because I know you have the wisdom this country needs to be whole again.” 

“Wisdom?” He doesn't understand. “I made the worst choice possible, I trusted and followed her over my own family! How can that–”

“Jadis was allowed to subjugate Narnia because of me.” 

Edmund stills. 

What?

Aslan sighs, that faraway look dulling his eyes again. 

“When this world was young and still being formed, she crossed through an entrance, like you and your siblings did, from another world. I thought,” he sighs again, “I thought perhaps a world that was so full of life and new beginnings would inspire her to also be born anew, to be more than the cruel and lifeless wasteland she came from. But I was wrong.

“Your sister's faith in others could have very easily given her the same fate as you. The fawn she met had intended to lull her to sleep so the White Witch could capture her.” Ed shudders at the thought. “It's nothing less than a miracle that Tumnus had a change of heart. And that's why I need you to be a King.”

Aslan's eyes focused back on Edmund, deep and solemn with understanding. “Like me, you made a mistake, but the way I see it, your past is like a shadow. It can fade in the daylight, but it always follows you. It can either haunt you, or make you stronger.” He smiles at Ed, warm enough to make him forget the winter storm. “Mistakes are what enable us to learn, and to become wiser for it.” 

That winter, Edmund grew closer to his siblings than he had been his entire life.

He stopped locking his doors and let Lucy in. She never forced him to talk, just sat with him quietly and sometimes distracted his racing thoughts with gossip the dryads and nyads told her. Being the youngest, he forgot that sometimes, she felt lonely too. 

Susan did force him to talk but it turned out he needed to. Talking about the nightmares helped, talking about his insecurities and fears helped, because he came to trust Susan to look him dead in the eye and tell him the truth. To his great relief, she didn't hesitate to say, “No Ed, you're not going crazy.”

Peace with Peter came through an unexpected avenue.

They had been talking in the Royal Suite, a Narnia version of a living room, when in frustration with Peter's bullheaded argument about what to get the girls for Christmas, Edmund chucked one of the throw pillows at Peter.

And, by total accident, it ended up hitting him square in the face. 

For a moment Edmund had froze, ready for their argument to escalate into shouting. But Peter had just laughed, grabbed a pillow himself and said “oh, you are so dead.”

After, as they lay panting on the feather covered sofa, their egos too tired to posture and pretend, they agreed neither of their ideas for gifts were good ideas and decided to ask Mrs. Beavers for advice. 

When spring came, it wasn't uncommon for Cair Paravel to still be covered in white, feathers replacing snow in the wake of the battles of the Pevensie’s. It took all winter, but they slowly learned how to be honest with each other, one pillow fight at a time. 

It took eight years, but this is what finally brought the Minotaurs back into the fold. 

When Edmund was 18, he spoke honestly and bluntly about the darkest nights of his life to the chief of the clan. He told them that the greatest test of strength wasn't on the battlefield, but in finding the power to forgive yourself. 

Winter's Warrior was added to his list of titles, and slowly, the Minotaurs rebuilt their reputations under Edmund’s leadership.

Slowly, those dark nights where Jadis visited him in his dreams became fewer and fewer, replaced with memories of golden sunsets and bright smiles. With his siblings by his side, Edmund learned how to ask for and accept their help, and all four of them were stronger for it.

Until one night, a century after her demise, Edmund awoke in a crypt of the Stone Table, leg throbbing, head spinning, and the unmistakable chill of the White Witch crawling up his spine. 

He wonders if he's finally gone insane. Ed can't tell if he's awake or asleep. He's never felt more weak in his entire life as he limps through the winding hallways of the How, images of once long dead nightmares frozen in his mind.

Please, please, he prays, don't let it happen, not again, please don't let it happen again—

And there she was. 

Encased in ice, eyes as black as a sky full of dead stars and pale, white lips curling into a smile. 

He couldn't recall moving. 

Everything was white.

He didn't hear his sword being unsheathed. 

All Edmund could see was white. 

Notes:

I'm baaaccccckkk!

I had to put my childhood dog down and I'm working out the grief through writing again. Thank you SO MUCH for all the kind comments on the fic during its hiatus, y'all have no idea how much it means to me ❤️

I'm so sorry to leave on another cliffhanger, but I ended up loving this chapter the most out of any in the fic so far (which is why it ended up being the longest). The impact of the manipulative and abusive interactions Ed has with the White Witch and its fallout was one of the reasons I wanted to write this fic. Plus I haven't seen many fics show what kind of relationship Ed and Aslan would have, and we never really see that in the books either when I think it's one of the most important and beautiful ones. Let me know if the non linear storytelling was too confusing lol.

We'll be back on our regularly scheduled program of releasing new chapters every Sunday at 6 pm CT, see you next week!

Chapter 7: And Follow the Light

Notes:

They talk (finally).

“There you are,” the Professor says, “I've been looking everywhere.”

Caspian doesn't turn to look at him. He keeps staring out at the meadow and forest beyond like he was still frozen, still under her spell. The Professor sits down next to him with a deep sigh. A gesture that should have brought him comfort. But all Caspian could feel was shame. 

“The stars are beautiful tonight,” Cornelius says, as if they're back in the southern tower to study the heavens. As if nothing had changed. “You can see the Kings and Queens constellation–oh, my boy, what's wrong?” 

Words tumble out faster than his tears can trek down his cheeks. Caspian tells his professor everything. About the raid that failed because of his mistakes, all the Narnians he'd led to their deaths, about Nikabrick and the wand and the Witch. But the terrible, horrible revelation, that Miraz was the reason why Caspian was fatherless, was left unsaid. 

“Did you know?” He asks.

Cornelius’s eyes grow misty behind his glasses. It's all the answer he needs. 

“Why–why didn't you tell me?”

“Because you were barely old enough to spell your own name, my prince. And it was all hearsay. Whispers in the palace between the maids, gossip in the markets, no actual proof,” the man sighs, “at least, not until today.”

A thousand what if’s and what could have been’s are left unspoken between them. Leaving all the more room for Miraz’s voice to coil in Caspian’s mind. 

He didn't tell you because you're too weak, always have been, his uncle's voice hisses. It would've broken you to know. It's breaking you now. 

“I…I can't do this.” He buries his face in his hands, eyes too dry to cry anymore. He's desperate for direction, for orders. “What am I supposed to do, Professor?”

Silence hangs frigid in the air. The wind tosses his hair, cooling the sweat on his brow and sending shivers down his spine. 

It's all your fault. Why are you still even here? Why don't you just run away already? Everything is your fault, you're just a burden–

Cornelius clears his throat. “Did I ever tell you the story of the Seven Lords and the Sea?”

Caspian blinks, then shakes his head. 

“Long ago, Caspian the Ninth had seven close friends. They grew up together you see, and they all had a single dream they shared. They longed to ride the waves of the sea and journey to new lands.”

“Really?” Telemarines hated the sea, almost as much as they hated and feared the forests. 

The Professor’s eyes twinkle as he smiles. “Really. They even had a boat made, named her The Midnight Treader, but before they could set sail, your father found out his wife was pregnant. She was carrying you.”

You've always been a burden. 

“Great,” the Prince laughs bitterly. “So I ruined my father's dreams before I was even born.”

Cornelius grabs his shoulder, pulling Caspian to look at him. “No my boy, you were his dream. He'd prayed for a child for years, and he chose to stay because you were the adventure he'd been waiting for.” He pauses, choosing his next words carefully. “...Miraz convinced him to have the Seven Lords sail without him. And they never came back. Some say they died at sea, or drifted too far and fell off the edge of the world. But regardless of the reason, they never returned. Then your mother died, and your father sat on the throne alone, with only his brother for counsel.” 

The Professor's hand soothes circles on his back, like he used to when Caspian was a boy. “I was afraid that would be your fate too, alone on the throne with Miraz whispering poison in your ear. But by the Lion, were we blessed,” he chuckles, looking up at the night sky, “I never imagined that horn I gave you would bring the same Kings and Queens who watched over us from the stars back to Narnia. And now, you won't be alone.”

The Prince shakes his head. “I almost got one of them killed tonight, I nearly brought back their oldest enemy from the dead. They don't-” 

“They're all looking for you.”

Caspian stops breathing, staring at his Professor in disbelief.

“King Edmund found me, asking if I'd seen you. He told me what happened, that you were tricked and he had to find you and make sure you were alright. I bumped into the other three in the hallways–this place truly is a maze–but anyway, they're looking for you, because they're worried about you.”

Caspian feels fresh tears flooding his vision. Worried about me? After all his mistakes, all the pain he'd brought them…

“The first night we went up to the southern tower, you said ‘stars aren't meant to be touched,’ do you remember that?” The Professor nods. “What can I do but tarnish them? Who am I compared to them?”

Cornelius is quiet for a moment, stroking his beard as he thinks. Until a smile slowly spreads on his face. 

“You know, when I told you that, I never imagined the stars would be able to reach back down to us. Who are we, my dear boy, to refuse their grace?” 

The Professor pulls him closer with an arm wrapped around his side. Caspian barely remembers what it felt like to be hugged by his father, but he wonders if it felt like this. 

“Does his Majesty have time for perhaps one more lesson about the stars?”

Caspian frowns. “Last?”

“You'll be King soon, Aslan willing, and have little time for an old man and his old stories.” 

The thought of being a king makes Caspian feel sick inside, but he nods for the Professor to continue. 

“Do you see those two stars? Look carefully, they dance so close now they appear as one.” He points and Caspian follows with his eyes. “That one is Tarva, the Lord of Victory. That one is Alambil, and what does she govern?”

“She's the Lady of Peace, I remember Glenstorm talking about them. He said they meant the time was right.”

Cornelius nods. “Narnians believe their union is a good sign, one that hasn't been seen in over a thousand years. The last time they came together in the heavens, a curse of a hundred years of winter was finally broken.”

Caspian's eyes widen. “They foretold the return of the High Kings and Queens?”

“Or, perhaps it's a sign that a new ruler has come to join their legacy in the stars.”

“No, surely I–that’s not-”

“You've got an enormous weight on your shoulders, I won't deny that,” the Professor says, “but you're not alone. And no matter the mistakes you've made or might make, I know your father would be so proud of you.”

Caspian's lost count of how many times he's felt tears drop from his lashes this evening. But these ones feel different. The numbness in his chest has been filled with the pressure of something else, something warm, and soft, and solid. 

 

–

 

Edmund scolded Susan a few days ago about eavesdropping, but he finds himself guilty of the same crime. He'd heard Caspian's voice echoing down one of the halls and hobbled his way over, but slowed when he could make out the words. He didn't want to interrupt, but he didn't want to leave either. 

Jadis appearing in that wall of ice felt like a sign. The past never stays dead, no matter how far you run from it. He was exhausted and empty and still trying to get his hands to stop shaking from his nerves attack, but Ed couldn't run from this conversation any longer. So he waits like a man about to be sentenced. 

When the Professor leaves and passes Edmund in the hall, he winks at him, like he's known the whole time he was there. Ed smiles back despite the dread growing in his stomach. He waits a few moments more, pretending it was to give Caspian a second to compose himself (while he worked up the courage to talk to him.)

Guilt was a familiar taste in his mouth, but it rarely makes apologies sound sincere. So Ed swallows it down and prays the right words will come. 

“Hey,” he steps out, “Are you okay?”

Caspian jumps as he turns, eyes flickering down to the bandages on his leg. “Are you okay?” He moves to stand, “should you be walking?"

Edmund waves him off, gingerly sitting down beside him. “Lu stitched me up and gave me a dose of her elixir, I'll be right as rain in the morning.” He strains to give a reassuring smile. “Peter said you made it out okay?”

Caspian nods but looks away. “Yes, yes I'm fine...but, about the raid–”

“It wasn't your fault, I need you to know that. The plan was flawed to begin with and this,” Ed gestures to his thigh, “is because I did the same thing you did. I was so distracted looking for you, Pete and Sue, I lost focus of the bigger picture. Like the archers literally on the same balcony as me.” He manages a much more convincing smile. “Guess I'm still young enough to make rookie mistakes.” 

Caspian gives him a wavering smile back. He looks desperately sad, almost adorably so, gentle brown eyes wide with concern like a kicked puppy–focus, Ed, focus. 

The only one here who should be feeling guilty is him. 

“Caspian, I wanted to apologize to you.” He rushes to continue before the Prince can protest. “There are things about Narnia from the time I was from, things about me from that time, that I should've told you about. I didn't, because, well it doesn't matter. I should've told you for your own safety. If it's okay, I'd like to tell you now.”

Caspian nods, and it feels like a death sentence to their friendship. No one ever stays once they know the truth. 

The story is well rehearsed, even if it's been over a thousand Narnian years since it's been told. A story of a foolish boy as starved of sugar from war rations as he was starved of a sense of belonging. Of a boy who trusted the wrong honeyed words, betrayed his own family, and caused Narnia's most beloved deity to be put to death in his place. 

Talking about Jadis was hard. Ed has to clench his fists in his lap to keep them from shaking again. His voice catches a few times on the syllables of her name, her face is so much clearer in his mind now, voice so much sharper–

No, focus. 

He refuses to give her more stolen time tonight. This isn't about her. 

Focus, Ed. 

The story has a happy ending at least. Aslan returned to life, bringing them victory in the battlefield. His siblings forgave him, and Edmund spent the rest of his time on the throne proving he was worthy of the second chance he'd been given. 

“The Wolves came around first, then the Minotaurs, and finally the Black Dwarves. But even in my day, there were fringe cults who still worshiped the White Witch as Narnia's true ruler. There were rumors that some were trying to bring her back…and if I'd told you all of this sooner, you would've known what Nikabrik was trying to do.”

He learned not to look at his audience until he finishes telling this story. The horror in their faces and shifting eyes always a sure fire way to derail him (or once, cause him to burst into tears). So he’d keep his eyes on the horizon, on the too quiet trees Lucy insists she can hear dreaming. But this was the part where eye contact was needed, no matter how afraid Edmund was to look. 

His mind has tried to picture this very moment dozens of times. Of Caspian's expression closing off, blank of those bright smiles and shining eyes to be forever replaced with disappointment. Or his lips curling down in a snarl, disgust dripping from his accent and tone. Edmund hasn't seen Caspian all out, white hot angry yet, and he's terrified this will be his first time seeing it. The Traitor King was once his unofficial title for a reason; because with the Witch dead and defeated, he was the next best target to blame.  

He turns, bracing himself. 

Oh shit. 

Caspian's eyes are shining with tears, biting his lower lip which is incredibly distracting, but because it's trembling. 

Shit, shit, fuck, he's going to cry, say something you're going to make him cry.

“I'm sorry,” he stumbles, “I, shit, I didn't mean to make you upset. And I'm sorry for not telling you about this sooner–”

“I'm not upset.” 

Ed freezes. Caspian's hand is on his own. His fingers are cold. Ed reflectively entwines his around Caspian's, trying to warm them. 

“I'm so sorry you had to see her again because of me,” the Prince whispers. “She–it was like she was in my mind, telling me exactly what I wanted to hear so she could control me. I was powerless to block her out, to run away…I can't imagine what I would be like to meet her as a child.” 

No one ever reacted this way. No one. A voice that sounds like Susan's reminds him that it has been a thousand years, people forget and forgive with time, but he's been so conditioned to expect the worst, to have all the right words to say in apologies. 

Now, Ed has no idea what to say. 

“I…sorry, I wasn't expecting you to…I thought you'd hate me after I told you.”

“Hate you?” Caspian frowns. “Why would I hate you? I'm the last person who could judge you for a mistake, especially after today.” His eyes lock onto Ed’s bandaged leg. “I almost got you killed, almost brought a force far worse than Miraz back to life, this whole mess is my fault.”

“It's not,” Ed counters. “Nikabrik was driven to desperation because of Miraz. The Narnians are forced to fight for their freedom because of him. This mess is his making, and we're going to help you set it right.”

The Prince is silent, that same look he once had by the river clouding his features; disbelief, insecurity. And that's when Ed realizes. 

“Caspian…do you want to be king?” 

He flinches from the word. “I don't know anymore. I thought I was supposed to, that's what I've been told I'm meant for my whole life.”

“But what do you want?” Ed presses, heart aching as he wonders if Caspian's never been asked before. “What do you want to do?”

He watches Caspian chew at his lip, feels his fingers tightened around their joined hands. His fingers are getting warmer now. 

“I want to give the Narnians back their homes, because I can't stop thinking about the night I had to run from mine. I want the Telemarines to know the truth, to see Miraz as he truly is, and I know being king is the best way to do that, but,” Caspian looks away. “I'm afraid. I'm so afraid of making everything worse like Miraz has or being too naive like my father.” He takes in a shaking breath. “I don't know what I would've done if that horn hadn't called you and your siblings back, but I'm afraid I'm just wasting your time. Even if Miraz is defeated, how can I be a good king when I keep making mistake after mistake?”

The sky is starting to lighten, clouds turning lilac in the approaching dawn. Ed squeezes Caspian's hand, finally as warm as his, making the other look back at him. The fear and uncertainty in Caspian's eyes are like looking in a mirror, back at the ten year old boy who was crowned king over a millennia ago. 

“Aslan once told me something. He said our pasts are like a shadow, and while it can haunt you, it can also make you stronger if you're willing to learn from it. I made hundreds of mistakes during my time on the throne, all of us did. And you're not wasting our time. We want to be here with you, more than you can know, and I'm so thankful that horn called us back home.”

The dawn of a new day breaks over the horizon, bathing the How in a golden pink. Ed's smile coaxes one out of Caspian; he assumes it's a trick of the light that gives the prince's cheeks a flushed hue. 

“I'm not going to pretend to know what the future holds, or how long me and my siblings will be here this time, but I promise you,” Ed curls both hands around Caspian's, “you won't face Miraz alone.”

Aslan once said Edmund would gift Narnia with his wisdom, that his failures would give him the knowledge needed for his greatest successes.

And right now, bringing that smile back to Caspian's face feels like his crowning achievement. A smile with shining, starry eyes he thought he’d never be graced to see again.

Notes:

Finally got it through Ed’s thick head that no one's gonna hate him for being deceived by the White Witch. Was going to have the whole chapter from Caspian's POV but having Edmund’s for the talk just felt right.

Ngl the pressure of getting this conversation to hit right was enormous. Let me know if it needs tweaking or if it feels off.

We're in true AU territory now folks. Cannon is my canvas and I'll be painting some new pictures. 😁 Hope you enjoyed and let me know your thoughts, I'll see you next week! 💕