#7: FIC: In Greece, PG
Title: In Greece
Pairing: Edmund/Bacchus
Rating: PG
Warnings: None.
Summary: He thinks he sees a young man move through a doorway with a wildness that makes the heart ache, but when he catches his eye he finds no recognition.
Disclaimer: All not mine.
Notes: A companion to forochel's very lovely fic. If you haven't already, you may want to read it for context. Quadrudrabble for forochel.
Edmund Pevensie arrives in Athens at the height of the civil war, and finds a city crumbling. Dead men are found sprawled on street corners even as the buildings overhead gape gutless, debris from their ravaged walls strewn across sidewalks, and when a British soldier with a halfway familiar face sits him down with a drink and asks, "So what brings you to this charming hell?", he feels like a fool.
Still, Edmund looks for that dark head amongst the scores of strangers, for familiar features and mischievous eyes in pale faces he meets. He thinks he sees a young man move through a doorway with a wildness that makes the heart ache, but when he catches his eye he finds no recognition.
On the fifth day Edmund glimpses a lad on the street; his flashing gaze and the way he curls in the dust makes Edmund think, maybe, just maybe. A mine goes off, in another alleyway, then gunshots. "It's not safe," says Edmund urgently, trying to pull him up. His skin is burning against Edmund's fingers, but not from wine or revelry. A glance down at the lad's leg reveals that it is broken and bloodied.
"Here, come on." He crouches down and picks the boy up with some effort, stumbling down the street. The boy breathes rapid and rasping, squirming fitfully against Edmund's chest as he mutters in Greek. His hand snakes out to clutch at the front of Edmund's shirt. Edmund has seen this enough times on Narnian battlefields to know that the boy is going to die, except that this time, there is no drop of magic cordial to save him; no miracles on these desolate streets.
At night, he dreams he is still holding the boy, scrambling along narrow alleyways while guns go off in the darkness.
"Little King," the boy is saying, but he is no longer the boy but a god.
He tastes wine but it becomes bile in his mouth - the boy is gone - it's not safe; writhing, dancing, dying-
"Little King," says Bacchus. He has the same beauty as a cliff's edge, a heady savagery fey and fearsome.
He falls.
Lucy is waiting for him when he finally returns home. "Did you-"
A glimpse, through mud: in his mind the boy goes still, an aggregate of deity's limbs in Edmund's arms.
"I don't know," says Edmund truthfully.
(400 words)
Note: This was originally supposed to be yule-y and was to feature tawdry wenches and much banging (or some banging, anyway), but background research got in the way. Find out more about the Greek Civil War.
Pairing: Edmund/Bacchus
Rating: PG
Warnings: None.
Summary: He thinks he sees a young man move through a doorway with a wildness that makes the heart ache, but when he catches his eye he finds no recognition.
Disclaimer: All not mine.
Notes: A companion to forochel's very lovely fic. If you haven't already, you may want to read it for context. Quadrudrabble for forochel.
Edmund Pevensie arrives in Athens at the height of the civil war, and finds a city crumbling. Dead men are found sprawled on street corners even as the buildings overhead gape gutless, debris from their ravaged walls strewn across sidewalks, and when a British soldier with a halfway familiar face sits him down with a drink and asks, "So what brings you to this charming hell?", he feels like a fool.
Still, Edmund looks for that dark head amongst the scores of strangers, for familiar features and mischievous eyes in pale faces he meets. He thinks he sees a young man move through a doorway with a wildness that makes the heart ache, but when he catches his eye he finds no recognition.
On the fifth day Edmund glimpses a lad on the street; his flashing gaze and the way he curls in the dust makes Edmund think, maybe, just maybe. A mine goes off, in another alleyway, then gunshots. "It's not safe," says Edmund urgently, trying to pull him up. His skin is burning against Edmund's fingers, but not from wine or revelry. A glance down at the lad's leg reveals that it is broken and bloodied.
"Here, come on." He crouches down and picks the boy up with some effort, stumbling down the street. The boy breathes rapid and rasping, squirming fitfully against Edmund's chest as he mutters in Greek. His hand snakes out to clutch at the front of Edmund's shirt. Edmund has seen this enough times on Narnian battlefields to know that the boy is going to die, except that this time, there is no drop of magic cordial to save him; no miracles on these desolate streets.
At night, he dreams he is still holding the boy, scrambling along narrow alleyways while guns go off in the darkness.
"Little King," the boy is saying, but he is no longer the boy but a god.
He tastes wine but it becomes bile in his mouth - the boy is gone - it's not safe; writhing, dancing, dying-
"Little King," says Bacchus. He has the same beauty as a cliff's edge, a heady savagery fey and fearsome.
He falls.
Lucy is waiting for him when he finally returns home. "Did you-"
A glimpse, through mud: in his mind the boy goes still, an aggregate of deity's limbs in Edmund's arms.
"I don't know," says Edmund truthfully.
(400 words)
Note: This was originally supposed to be yule-y and was to feature tawdry wenches and much banging (or some banging, anyway), but background research got in the way. Find out more about the Greek Civil War.