[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]

Light gleams from the star-queen's hair and glimmers soft from her skin. Susan glances from her, to the sky above, to the grass between them, trying to think.

"What would you have of me, lady-sai?" she asks, finally. "For ye've said ye'd speak with me, and I'd listen, say true."

[the_seafarer]

"I'd have you know me, and I you," the girl replies.

"You bear a great burden, Susan, Daughter of Eve. I would relieve of you of what I can, if you'll let me, and when we part, I'd have us part in friendship."

[sai_delgado]

Tears shimmer in her eyes for a moment before she blinks them determinedly back.

"I'd not wish to part in other than friendship from ye, lady," she says, softly. "Never in life. It's kind of ye to offer."

[the_seafarer]

The star-girl smiles, and offers her hand once more, as girls do, in a casual intimacy.

"Then friends we will be," she promises.

[sai_delgado]

Susan smiles back, if a little tremulously, and takes her hand. "How is it that a star came to the lands below?" she asks. "It doesn't seem the sort of thing that's usual, ye ken."

[the_seafarer]

"I came to be with my father," she tells Susan, and points with her free hand up at the stars above. Some faded ones hover near the eastern horizon. "When we grow old and weak, we fall to the seas in the east of the world, there to live in human form and slowly regain our power by every morning eating a fire-berry from the valley of the sun."

She smiles, sweet. "My father, Ramandu, was one such star. I stayed with him on the island at the edge of the world, and there I met Caspian and his friends. And so I twice chose to stay for love, and walked the world a while as a mortal woman."

[sai_delgado]

Susan blinks at that, trying to imagine it - berries of fire from the sun itself, that is, not the compassion that'd bring this woman to such acts, for that's already as clear as anything to her.

"And I kennit," she says, after a moment, "that ye were lost--"

(and by the wind grieved)

"--but ye're well now, I'd hope?"

[the_seafarer]

"Yes."

Her fingers trail lightly to her own ankle, and old sorrow passes in a shadow over her face, like a cloud crossing over the moon. "Things that were lost may be found, here. And sometimes death itself is only a door."

[sai_delgado]

"A door, aye." Susan hesitates, but only for a moment. I'd have you know me, and I you, she'd said. "Mine led to a waystation on the side of the Tower."

She may well already kennit, given what she'd said before about what the stars had seen, but Susan feels she has to begin somewhere.

[the_seafarer]

The star's daughter listens, quiet and with sympathy. "The place where all worlds meet," she murmurs, and nods for Susan to go on, if she will.

[sai_delgado]

She nods back. “The place between places, ye called it.”

Susan takes a soft breath. “It were there I were reunited with Roland, and later ‘Bert and Alain, and met Eddie and Susannah and Jake and Oy and even sai Ted. The old tet and the new. Do’ee ken a ka-tet?”

[the_seafarer]

Liliandil, the star's daughter, shakes her head. The motion sends her hair swaying against the simple white back of her gown. "The words are not those we use" she says. "But the feeling of them is. One from many."

[sai_delgado]

"One from many, aye, and together more than any alone," she confirms, whisper-soft. "And we were well-met there, lady-sai, we were, and are still, those of us who remain, I wot. But Roland--"

(my grief - you are the source of it)

Tears are standing in her eyes now, although she refuses to let them fall.

"I brought him sorrow and pain, where I'd never wanted aught but joy for him--"

(bird and bear and hare and fish - go yer course in peace, and go with my love)

"-- and I'd not do so again." Here, now, a desperate surety spins itself out beneath each word. "I'd not hurt any of them again, I'd not be used to hurt them so, nor Caspian, never."

[the_seafarer]

The star-girl shifts on her hip to face Susan, and lifts her hand to cup the other girl's cheek. Cool, soothing light spills from her palm and fingers, offering strength, offering peace.

"To be grieved is no bad thing," she murmurs. "Grief and love walk hand in hand. We all of us leave pain behind, when we go. Let me counsel you thus, Susan, Daughter of Eve: do not let yourself be beholden to the possible pain of another. Do not hold yourself apart, at the price of your own sorrow. Let them love you as they will, and love them in return."

[sai_delgado]

She closes her eyes at that gentle touch, and a few tears spill over, tracking silently down her cheek.

"I do, ye ken. Love them."

[the_seafarer]

The girl lets go Susan's hand and dabs at the tears that run over her cheeks with the soft, filmy material of her sleeve.

"Weep not," she murmurs. "For you are loved in return."

[sai_delgado]

She opens her eyes, tear-blurred but still clear, and meets the shining starlit gaze of the star's daughter.

"Ye are kind, and more than kind," Susan murmurs. "And ye've no reason to be so to me, saving only that ye are -- the kind of person ye are."

[the_seafarer]

She laughs, very softly, and smiles as she wipes away a smudge of dampness beneath Susan's eye.

"Kindness can sometimes be a difficult choice," she says. "But not now. Even if it were true that I had no reason to be."

[sai_delgado]

Susan smiles back, and reaches to catch the star-queen's hand between her own. "Will'ee not come out to the dance? And see him, and the others there?"

[the_seafarer]

The girl shakes her head, but squeezes Susan's fingers. "This time is for you," she says.

"Tell me, Daughter of Eve, have I set at ease the heart that my friend carelessly hurt before?"

[sai_delgado]

Fog-gray eyes grow wide. "How did'ee--"

But oh, that's not nearly the most important thing in this moment, say true, and Susan swiftly says, "He didn't mean it. He didn't kennit, why -- ye mustn't think poorly of him, lady-sai, please."

[the_seafarer]

"Fear not," the girl says, with gentle amusement. "I could never think ill of so loyal a friend. I knew him for a very long time, you see."

[sai_delgado]

"He loves ye dear, say true." Each word is clear and certain. "And he loves Caspian, too. He'd only ever wish joy for ye."

[the_seafarer]

"And I him."

Some old sorrow touches the girl's eyes. "He blamed himself for the loss of our son. But he has always been a true friend and loyal companion. I hope he finds peace of his own here."

[sai_delgado]

"Rilian," she murmurs. "He were lost for long, but restored in the end, lady-sai, if ye'd not known. We were able to tell Drinian that, too."