[au] Narnia and the North

[the_seafarer]

There's a chill bite to the air, these days. The horses have been growing out their winter coats, and they look shaggy and plump as Caspian turns them out into the paddocks. Behind the stables, in the makeshift woodshop he'd cobbled together, the sleigh from his drawings is starting to come together. 

He hopes he'll have it finished by Christmas. With a little luck, and maybe some assistance, he thinks it should be possible. The tack, he's largely left up to Susan's devices, though he'd commission Gimli the dwarf for the various buckles and other metal pieces they'll need.

Once the horses are turned out, he gets to his other morning chores with a will, whistling cheerfully as he does. The stable stays strangely quiet around him. It takes him the better part of an hour to realize the strangeness is because he's become accustomed to Susan's cheerful presence working alongside him, talking or humming or simply working in companionable silence. 

Caspian pauses in his task – refilling the grain chest – and looks around. Susan's nowhere to be seen, and when he later wanders through the stables, checking each stall and outside, he can't find her there, either.

Comments

[sai_delgado]

She'd woken in the night, before even false dawn, choking and gasping for air as she clawed her way out from fire-poisoned dreams.

(charyou tree - come, Reap - die ye faithless)

But oh, there's no peace to be found, not for her. Reaptide's too near, now, and the weary exhaustion of days that had dragged her down is now given to the dark blur of nightmare. She can smell the memory of smoke, and can almost feel her hair blazing to ash--

"Not real," Susan whispers, desperate as a child's plea against monsters in the dark. "Not real, nay, not now, not again--"

Nothing answers, and the shadows threaten to swallow her up, but she couldn't strike a candle-light now to save her life, say true. Susan dresses hastily in the dark, only barely remembering to wrap herself in the coat Caspian gave her before she quits the room, then the bar entire.

She'd thought to go down to the lakeside, that surely the icy waters would clear her head, but shies away at the shadow of the bonfire lying ready to be set alight.

Shivering, she turns away from the shore. She thinks perhaps the stables, but no - her fear and upset'll spark the same in her charges, oh aye, and she'll do what she can to spare them and those who care for her.

With a sob, Susan flees into the forest, and is soon lost in the darkness.

[the_seafarer]

None of the stablefolk he speaks to have seen Susan; nor have any of the patrons awake at this early hour. Reepicheep stoutly promises to seek her out and hurries away before Caspian can call him back, and a knock at her door gives no answer.

Fear, sour and sharp, spikes through him. If he'd been with her the night before –

But worrying about choices he didn't make does little enough to help him in the here and now. He returns to the bar, where he meets an exasperated Reepicheep. "Sire, I could glean nothing from the squirrels and chipmunks at the forest edge," the Mouse tells him, fully willing to throw himself onto his own sword for his failure. "None of the animals here speak, or even seem to understand me when I do."

"Peace, Reepicheep," Caspian counsels, though his stomach seizes with worry. "Thank you for trying."

[sai_delgado]

Cuthbert's yawning hugely when he walks out of the staff corridor and makes a beeline for the bar. He and Alain had been up far too late the night before, trying to set their plans for the days and nights ahead. Alanna's agreed to cover his leave if need be, and Susannah for security to call on her for aid should it be needed.

"Mistress Bar, you're a sight for sore eyes," he declares, as he reaches it and pats the glossy surface. "And if you'd be so kind as to--"

That's as far as he gets before a large mug of coffee appears, and 'Bert beams at the Bar. "Thankee-sai, lady."

[the_seafarer]

He'd sent Reepicheep off to scout around the far edges of the paddocks – perhaps Susan is looking at space for an expansion of the stable buildings, or considering shifting the fences. For himself, he'd gotten a hot cup of tea and forgotten to drink it, letting it slowly steam itself cool as he looks out the windows toward the back porch.

At the familiar voice, he jerks around. Cuthbert looks sleepy, but not concerned, which is perhaps a good sign. Caspian makes his way over to the bar and sets down his untouched cup of tea. "Good morning, Cuthbert," he says.

His air is pleasant enough, but there's something tight in his shoulders and at the corners of his eyes. "You haven't happened to see Susan yet, have you?"

[sai_delgado]

"Long days and pleasant nights," he offers in return, but oh, his gaze is keen and sharp on the other man's face. "I haven't, no. I'd have thought she'd be in the stables at this hour."

[the_seafarer]

"I was there early to turn out the horses and do morning chores."

Caspian's voice is still easy, but there's a buzz of forcibly held concern beneath it. "She hasn't been there at all, that I've seen. And she wasn't in her room when I went to check."

[sai_delgado]

Cuthbert's on his feet in an instant, coffee set aside and forgotten. "Not there, or didn't answer?"

[the_seafarer]

"Didn't answer," Caspian admits. "I don't have a key to her room, so I couldn't check inside."

[sai_delgado]

"She doesn't lock it," he informs Caspian. He's already turning on his heel and heading back toward the staff quarters. "Never has. Can't be convinced to. Alain and I keep an eye out, but--"

[the_seafarer]

He nods and keeps pace with the gunslinger as they head into the staff quarters. Perhaps he should have tried the handle, but...

Caspian draws to the side as they reach Susan's door, allowing Cuthbert to knock or open it as he wishes.

[sai_delgado]

Cuthbert raps sharply on the door with his knuckles. "Susan? It's 'Bert and Caspian. We're coming in," he warns, and opens the door without waiting for a response.

The room is empty. Joanie's pen is cleaned and stands unused and silent, as though the little elephant had never been there. Susan's bed, however, is untidy and unmade, and her closet stands ajar.

Beside the door, a pair of gloves has fallen unheeded to the floor beneath the winter scarf that hangs forgotten on its peg. Her coat is missing.

[the_seafarer]

Caspian ignores the jolt that runs through him and instead goes to pick up the fallen gloves, lifting the scarf from the peg. With her winter coat, she should be warm enough, but he tucks the items into his own pockets, anyway, unsmiling and focused.

She isn't in her room, in the Bar, or at the stables. Nor does she seem to be in any of the usual places outside.

"Kiseki was still in his stall, this morning," he says. "I'll take him out into the woods. Reep is searching out by the far paddocks, if you want to join him."

[sai_delgado]

"I'll rouse Alain." Grim and intent, as is the quick, bitter curse he lets out. "We'd thought we'd have the day at least - surely she'd not have --"

[the_seafarer]

Caspian wakes slowly, uncertain at first what had disturbed him. No sound, he thinks, hazily. The lamplight still glows, warm and steady, but there's the first tinge of grayness to the sky outside that speaks of dawn.

Not enough light to wake him, though. He shifts, and as he does, he realizes Susan's warm frame is no longer tucked against him. Turning onto his side, he reaches for her.

The relief he feels at finding her – curled into a tight ball beneath the sheet and the blanket he must have pulled up over them at some point in the night – is swept away shortly on a wave of adrenaline that wakes him faster than the morning sun.

For she's sleeping – he thinks – but her eyes are open and blank, and it's clear that whatever she's seeing, it isn't him. "Susan," he says, his voice rough with sleep, and runs his hand over her shoulder. "Su?"

[sai_delgado]

She floats, barely conscious adrift on a hazy tide of dream and memory mixed. The lamp's barely alight at all, a mere thin thread of light, just as it had been before... before? Before, aye. She watches it through a gaze gone empty, drifting in the flame. But it's different now, she thinks. It's pink. Everything is pink. If she can just hold fast to the color of it, if she can stand and be true, then --

The hand comes down on her shoulder, and she kens well what's to come. Susan stiffens, but doesn't otherwise move. She'll not give him the satisfaction, so she won't.

"Get yer filthy blue-marked hand off me, you bastard."

[the_seafarer]

There's a held breath of a pause, and then his hand lifts away.

Next to her, in a bed that feels as though it's gone suddenly cold, Caspian's expression is almost as blank as her own, Alain's voice running through his head –

(she'll not know them save as those who turned against her)

– along with another, more beloved, better known.

(I know nothing of what you speak! I am the Knight of the Underworld)

"Susan." His voice is steady and calm in the darkness, though he feels anything but. He puts a hint of command into it, preferring to wake her suddenly rather than leave her adrift in her memories any longer. "Susan, wake up, and know me, by Aslan's name."

[sai_delgado]

By Aslan's name. Susan blinks, slow and dreamy.

(the Lion)

Her body relaxes, but her expression curves into a faint, uncertain frown. "It's pink," she murmurs; an explanation of sorts. "Do'ee not see it? The moon. It's pink."

[the_seafarer]

He hesitates only a moment, then runs his hand gently over her hair. "Aye, you told me," he murmurs, in a tone of aching gentleness.

Ruthlessly, he shoves back the part of himself that's screaming in fear and worry. "But the moon is setting, dear one. The morning has come. Wake to it, Susan, won't you?"

[sai_delgado]

"Aye, 'tis. When it sets, she keeps it in a box under her bed. In a magic place she makes with passes," she confides, then blinks again and reaches up to catch his hand against her hair.

"Thee'd not have me cut it too, would'ee?" Even as she asks it, distress fills the fog-gray glance... along with sudden recognition. Susan gasps in a sharp, ragged breath.

"Caspian?"

[the_seafarer]

His breath rushes out of him with sudden, sore relief. "Susan. Thank the Lion."

Caspian does his best to smile, wanting to soothe the distress in her face. "There," he murmurs, his hand gentle on her hair. Cut it; never. Never in life, as Susan herself might say. "You see me now, eh?"

[sai_delgado]

"I see thee," she tells him. "I see thee clear."

And oh, what she sees in his eyes, in the strained way he tries to smile--

Susan pushes herself up to sitting in one swift, sudden surge and stares back at him. "Did I -- what did I--"

[the_seafarer]

He shifts back to give her room, lifting his hand from her head as she moves. "You were dreaming," he tells her, steady. "Or... remembering, mayhap, I'm not sure which. It may have been both."

Caspian shakes his head to her stuttered question. "It matters not," he promises. "I'm only sorry to wake you so early, Su."

[sai_delgado]

"It matters!" she flares. "I hurt thee, I can see it, so aye, it matters!"

Susan holds out both hands to him, pleading. "Cry yer pardon, Caspian, I do - I'd never have wished, I'd not--"

[the_seafarer]

He takes her hands instantly, squeezing her fingers. "Asked and granted," he says. "You have my pardon, always."

His own words come back to him –

(I know more than I could ever care to... when someone you know and love looks at you and cannot recall your face)

– and he lifts her hands to press a gentle kiss to her fingers. "For a moment, you didn't know me. You were caught in your dream."

[sai_delgado]

Her hold tightens as she goes breathless with dismayed shock. She understands well the hurt she's given him by that, oh aye.

"Oh, Caspian," she whispers.