[au] an early snow

[the_seafarer]

It's only mid-autumn, as the Bar-year reckons, but one morning Caspian wakes early to find that the light coming through his window has that particular muted quality to it that only comes from sifting through clouds and a veil of snow.

And snow it is indeed, when he comes outside: it crunches pleasantly beneath his boots as his breath freezes in the air and his cheeks turn pink with the cold. Snow; and still it falls, silent and light.

He heads to the stables with the intention of finishing his chores quickly so he can let the horses out to frolic in it, whistling as he goes.

Comments

[sai_delgado]

She uses the opportunity to do the same, as well to unwrap her scarf, then gives him a puzzled look.

“It were - there were a secret door? Or passage, somehow?”

[the_seafarer]

He shakes his head. "I don't know," he admits. "I've never known how the ways opened between their world and Narnia. And according to the Pevensies, this one disappeared when Lucy came back and tried to show them what she'd found."

[sai_delgado]

Susan frowns, considering. “That’s not how the doors Roland and Eddie and Susannah ken work, or the Manni’s stories, but there’s stranger in the worlds, I wot.”

She shrugs it off and smiles at him again. “And thee said before, it were always winter in Narnia when first they came.”

[the_seafarer]

"They're fickle, true enough," he says, sounding wry.

"And aye; poor thing, she hadn't a warm coat or boots or a hat when she first walked into the Hundred Year Winter."

[sai_delgado]

Susan shivers at the thought, remembering how cold she’d been just that morning.

“What did she do?”

[the_seafarer]

"She met a faun," Caspian tells her. "Tumnus. He brought her to his home for tea to warm her up, then helped her find her way back again."

And he spied for the White Witch as he did so, but what choice did the poor fellow have?

[sai_delgado]

“That were kind of him,” Susan declares, as they step from winter into a cool spring meadow.

[the_seafarer]

"Things were hard then," Caspian murmurs, "even for a creature so innocent as a Faun."

He lets go her hand once more at the edge of the flowers and grass so he can take off his heavy winter coat and leave it and his scarf and gloves in the sweet-smelling greenery.

[sai_delgado]

“Oh, that’s a good idea,” she observes, and does the same.

Or mostly. As she pulls her scarf from her neck, Susan flips it over his head and tugs both ends, coaxing him to her.

[the_seafarer]

He laughs and goes willingly, his hands finding her waist as he leans down to kiss her.

[sai_delgado]

She kisses him back, then smiles innocently up at him as it breaks.

[the_seafarer]

Caspian kisses that smile once more, then reaches up to tuck a wayward wisp of golden hair back behind her ear.

"Thee mischief," he says, smiling back.

[sai_delgado]

She widens fog-gray eyes in mock affront. “Say not so,” she teases.

[the_seafarer]

"Say true," he teases right back, and kisses her again, a little more deeply.

[sai_delgado]

She shivers a little and leans up into his kiss, kissing him back as she puts her arms around his waist.

[the_seafarer]

Caspian lifts one hand to gently cradle the back of her head as he kisses her, utterly entranced by the softness of her lips, her warmth, her scent, her taste.

When it breaks, he rests his forehead against her and smiles. "We seem to keep getting distracted during our visits here," he says, amused.

[sai_delgado]

“Mayhap a little,” she laughs. “Should we go back to the winter, as a distraction?”

[the_seafarer]

He shivers exaggeratedly at the thought of going back into the snow and puts his arms around her.

"Not yet," he laughs. "We've only just got back to spring."

[sai_delgado]

She smiles up at him, bright and warm and laughing.

“So we have,” she teases. “We could wander the whole year through.”

[the_seafarer]

"A very fine idea," he says, though he has yet to let go of her.

"Let's do."

[sai_delgado]

She stretches up to kiss him again, smiling against his mouth, then pulls back and reaches to take his hand.

“Come on then, an’ye will.”

[the_seafarer]

"Gladly, Su."

He laces his fingers with hers and lets her lead him through the springtime flowers, but not before bending to pluck one of the blue silkflowers that grows and reaching to tuck it behind her ear.

[sai_delgado]

She touches it lightly with her fingertips and lets it stay.

“What’s yer favorite time of year?” she asks, as they walk paths that wind through green grass and just-budding trees and flowers.

[the_seafarer]

"I was just going to ask you the same question," he chuckles.

"I like most times, I suppose. There was always something good about each season. But summer was the best for sailing, so that's always had a special place in my heart."

[sai_delgado]

Susan laughs. “For riding on the Drop, too,” she tells him. “Which is why it were always my favorite.”