[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]

I am here, the Lion rumbles, and drowsy as she is, Susan smiles. She's glad, say true, and not only for the kindness he's shown her and 'Bert and Alain - she's glad for Caspian's sake, that he has time to spend together with the Lion he loves so well and has for so long.

She stretches a little, then curls closer against Aslan's side once more. As she does, she rests her head lightly against Caspian's shoulder, and closes her eyes.

[the_seafarer]

He feels her, a warm weight on his shoulder, and keeps his voice low as he talks with Aslan. The gunslingers are quiet, their chests lifting and falling with slow, even breaths, and Susan is slowly slipping off to sleep.

He himself stays awake late into the night, speaking with the Lion about all manner of things: magic and Narnia and Rilian and Reepicheep and more. Around them, the garden is still and silent and growing, the tree-sisters conversing in the whisper of breezes and the rustle of leaves. Overhead, the harvest moon slopes down to set past the treetops, and what's left of the magic it carries drifts harmlessly away.

And it is good.