[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

[the_seafarer]

Caspian frowns at this – she hadn't mentioned anything about fire before. But perhaps she simply hadn't wanted to worry him.

He casts a worried glance at Cuthbert as the gunslinger speaks.

[sai_delgado]

Alain takes a deep breath, and squeezes her hands. "Was it because of Rhea? Did she do something to make the fire pink?"

"Nay." No resistance at all, but her hands are cold in his and he knows he'll have to bring her out soon or risk worse. "She didn't. She wouldn't have. She wanted me to feel it. Charyou tree."

As she speaks, her voice shifts as Alain's heard before, becoming an eerie mimicry of the witch's horrible cackle. "Take this murdering bitch and cook her red-handed! Charyou tree!"

[the_seafarer]

He pales, but stays where he is and holds his tongue, shoulders and back and neck all painfully tight. The hag, he thinks, and sees again a leaping shadow, feels teeth meeting in his shoulder.

[sai_delgado]

Cuthbert looks like he's going to be sick, Caspian's as pale as salt, and Alain doesn't feel all that well himself. He bears down, holding fast to Susan's fingers with his hands and to her dreaming, drifting mind with the touch.

"Rhea's not here," he says. "She can't hurt ye now, Sue. Do ye believe me?"

"Aye, I kennit," she says, in her own voice, and dreamy though it might be it's worlds better than before. "Even if she were she couldn't. Not ever again. Ye wouldn't let her."

"You're right. We wouldn't." Not just the three of them, either, but that's a little too much for this. "Sue, listen carefully, this is important. Do you know why everything was pink in your dream?"

"Because it's broken," Susan tells them.

[the_seafarer]

He bestirs himself at that and looks to the gunslingers, then to Susan's dreamy face.

"What's broken, Su?"

[sai_delgado]

"The Ka-Tet of Nine," Susan replies, and Cuthbert jumps, startled. Alain opens his mouth to ask another question, but she's not done. "Ka-shume. The shadow on the heart. Grief like a stone. O, Discordia. We've lost the anchor. The door whispers. Don't ye hear it?"

"We hear it," Alain affirms. Not as strongly as she does, but he and Cuthbert have talked about it an-tet. "We hear it, too."

[the_seafarer]

(I'll not leave thee)

His hand fists on his knee before he consciously relaxes it.

(I won't)

Earlier, the name of Aslan had seemed to give her a little peace, a little clarity. He's tempted to speak to her with it again now, but holds his tongue. Alain and Cuthbert have questions of their own.

[sai_delgado]

"So did Eddie. Before." Susan says, in response to Alain. She sighs, weary and sad. "I don't want to go."

Alain squeezes her fingers again. "Her hands are too cold," he says, looking at the other two men, urgency in his tone. "This is important, but I don't think it's down to Rhea, and it's not a good idea to have her this deep for this long. If there's anything else, best ask it, so we can bring her back."

[the_seafarer]

"No," Caspian says. He's pale but controlled, and his voice is quiet but firm. "I say bring her back, Alain. Whatever else she tells us, I'd have it be her choice to say or not as she wills."

[sai_delgado]

Alain nods, and so does Cuthbert, who then shifts forward again. "Susan. Can you still hear me?"

"Aye," she says, slow and dreamy. "I hear ye, 'Bert."

"Good." He puts firmness into his words. "I'm going to count backward from ten. When I reach the end, you'll wake up, and you'll remember everything. Okay? Ten, nine, eight..."

As Cuthbert finishes counting, Susan opens her eyes and looks around at them all.

[the_seafarer]

He smiles at her, slight. "Hello again," he murmurs.

[sai_delgado]

Alain squeezes her fingers and lets go, and as he does Susan turns to put her arms around Caspian and hold him tight. "I'm all right," she tries to reassure him. "I'm all right, say true."

[the_seafarer]

He presses his face into her shoulder and curves a hand at the back of her head, an arm tight around her waist, and doesn't give a damn what the gunslingers might think. "Yes," he whispers.

She is, and she isn't. But she's not hurt, and her mind is clear again – as clear as it can be, today. "I'm glad, Su. You've done so bravely, dear."

[sai_delgado]

Cuthbert takes the opportunity to put the bullet back in his gun with careful concentration, more than might actually be needed. Alain studies his boots, giving them all the privacy there is to be had here.

Susan hugs Caspian, and lets him hold on to her for a moment or two before she shifts and settles against his side, into the curve of his arm.

"It weren't Rhea," she says, definitely. "It were just a dream. So at least we ken that."

"We do," Alain says, "but it might have been more than just a dream. Especially here."

[the_seafarer]

"Especially now," Caspian adds, his arm around Susan. There's been some talk around the bar of especially vibrant and real-feeling dreams over the last few days; visits from friends and family who have passed on. Some patrons seem convinced they weren't actually dreams at all.

[sai_delgado]

"There's that," Cuthbert agrees, with a nod to Caspian and Alain both. "I suppose we could always seek out the Lord Morpheus and ask--"

Susan stiffens and shakes her head. "I'd rather not trouble him, say true," she says, firmly.

[the_seafarer]

Caspian looks to the gunslingers. "Whether it was only a dream," he says, "or more than a dream, has it told us anything not already known? To me, it seems to confirm your thoughts, Cuthbert, Alain – that it would likely be wise to be away from the door this night."

[sai_delgado]

"Hear, hear," Cuthbert says, and it's more than a little grim. He turns to Susan. "Alain and I had some thoughts about that, and we've talked them over with your - with Caspian, here. There's a bit of a tradition we've kept over the last ten years or so, and if you'll allow, we'll keep it with you, tonight."

Susan eyes him. "Say on, 'Bert, do." Her glance travels over all of them. "Or one of ye should, anyway."

[the_seafarer]

Caspian looks to the gunslingers, and gives them a small shrug. "Go on," he agrees. "And then we'll see what we see."

[sai_delgado]

Cuthbert glances to Alain, who nods, then turns back to Susan. "We'd go out of Gilead. Away from the celebrations, into the forest or farmland distant," he says, as gently as he can. They all know why none of them would have had any taste for Reap, Fair-Day or not. "And keep watch together until it was over."

"We figured you'd not want to be around here today, or to be around many people, either. Alain and I thought to go with you into the forest here as far as we could, until we found the Dreaming or another place to bide, but it seems there's another place that might work." His glance flicks to Caspian.

[the_seafarer]

He nods, and looks to Susan. "The tree-sisters' garden," he says, knowing she'll balk at the very thought. Hadn't she apologized over and over again the morning before?

"Consider it, please," he continues, before she can start arguing against it. "We'll not go without permission. I thought to – Cuthbert and I can ride out this morning to speak with them. I think – I think they'd want to help, Su."

He keeps his glance, steady and intent, on her. "Human emotions may be a little strange and unknowable to them, but I believe the garden is a place of refuge, for any who need it."

[sai_delgado]

Oh, but this is something she hadn't known, and hearing it causes her heart to ache within her. She can just see it, as clear as if 'Bert were telling it an-tet together here -- Roland as he'd been when she knew him, turning away from aught that might comfort him save the company of his best friends, with their own grief to carry.

Her expression softens, and she starts to respond, only for fog-gray eyes to fly wide in shock as Caspian makes his suggestion. "Thee can't be serious." She turns in the circle of his arm to give him a look of pure disbelief. "Thee knows I'd not bring this trouble on them, not again!"

[the_seafarer]

"Su, the birch-woman wanted to help," he tells her. "And their magic is pure and good... it'll be safe there, as safe as it can be anywhere. And it's too cold, lately, to be out in the woods at night. But the garden is still warm."

He meets her disbelieving gaze with his own steady one and shakes his head. "Let me ask them, at least. Please."

[sai_delgado]

Too cold. His observation stops her protest before it passes her lips, which is mayhap just as well, as sharp as it were like to be. Susan Delgado kens very well indeed that the men here with her now would like as not freeze to death before they'd light a fire in her presence on this night, and never say a word.

"Ask, then," she concedes, unhappy about it but unwilling to argue without time to come up with a better option. Maybe she will seek out the Dream-lord, come to it. "But if they're in the least worried or uncertain, ye're not to press them, not in the slightest!" She looks sternly back and forth between Caspian and 'Bert, who raises his hands in the air.

"Watch and warrant," he says, amusement in his gaze. "Ye needn't be so fierce about it."

[the_seafarer]

"You have my word," Caspian tells her, and smiles a little, too. "Fierce as a mountain cat," he agrees, not without something pleased and a little proud behind it, to see her flash so. "And valiant as a – as a Mouse."

His eyes twinkle a little at Susan as he says so, knowing she knows well just how martial and brave a Mouse can be. "We'll not press, I promise."