Chapter the Seventh -- On Peter
Chapter: 7/?
Pairing: Peter/Edmund
Story Summary: Takes place after LWW and during Prince Caspian. Edmund tries to recapture his relationship with Peter, who refuses to acknowledge what they had as Kings. After all, how can he admit to loving someone who is a man, and his brother, and a child in a place where every one of those is seen as wrong? THEY ARE NOW BACK IN NARNIA.
Chapter Summary: A glimpse into Peter's head. His reactions to being back in England, and then in Narnia.
Disclaimer: I know this may come as a shock, but I am not in actual fact C.S. Lewis, and thus the characters etc. blah blah blah are not mine. Now you know.
The part where I snivel and make excuses for being almost illegally lazy: I am terribly sorry. If you must blame someone, blame me; if you must thank someone, thank sapphiremistww, whose comment, whether she knew it or not, made me feel flattered/guilty enough to post this.
It took a surprisingly long time for Peter to realize he was homesick. There were signs, but ... his head was so confused, so full of familiar scenery. He had a mother again. A frame of reference to grow up against, no need to wildly make it up as he went along. And perhaps that wasn't so bad.
It was the mountains made him realize. He looked out a second-story window of the new Finchley house, saw rows of grey-slated roofs that formed a stepping-stone path to dark, grey mountains hidden by grey fog. And suddenly the sky was a monstrous thing. How could he not have noticed all that space, quiet and still over their heads? The horizon was lumpen, bent over at the weight of it. Clouds became scouts of an army he could never fight off; and when the bombs fell at night, though his mind knew they'd been sent by a country that could be defined and contained in the lines of a map, he could not shake the feeling -- the instinct, reflex -- that they were the weapons of a great cruel sky, gouging the ground with spurts of earth and fire. How could he defend against such an army? Thunder was no different from explosions in his mind. He woke reaching for a sword that wasn't there.
The second revelation came at the train station on the way to school. He stood at the top of a flight of stairs, looking down into the crowd and saw: a sea of hats and hair, perched on indistinguishable pink heads. And aren't we ugly? he thought. Good god, all so alike -- how do we tell each other apart? How do we stand each other? He was filled suddenly with the hideous wrongness of this. He longed, so strongly he could feel the emotion clogging his thoughts and throat -- for the immensely pleasing juxtaposition of a dwarf's height paired with that of a giant; or of movement, not the treacle-like human sludge at his feet, but the kind he remembered from a court in which dances were conducted to incorporate the helpless joyful prancing of fawns and serene canter of a centaur's hooves, the fluid grace of druids and bumbling paws of Beast.
He closed his eyes and thought of home. When he opened them, they were wet.
Narnia, he thought.
Narnia.
Another boy bumped him from behind. "So sorry," Peter heard, just before he turned around and punched him in the face.
____________________________________________________________________________________________________
The impossible happened. And after it did, Peter recognized the signs much sooner. Perhaps by now it was familiar to him. He'd thought maybe at last the hollow bit inside him (and surely if he had an ally vast enough to take on the sky, it was that one) would be sated. It was so perfect at first -- the beautiful sea, his, Narnia's. The castle ... but he would not think of the castle (it's ruins), the implications of it. Not yet. Please, please, allow him to lie a little longer.
But the lie died when his fingers brushed Edmund's. When he handed him the sword to fight Trumpkin. Edmund didn't react -- of course he didn't, Edmund never let anything distract him in a fight. The fond thought released a wave of memories from the past: battles they'd fought (both domestic and afield), conversations they'd had. Love they'd made. God but he missed loving Edmund. Every little thing, from kisses to meetings where they'd poke fun at each other at the expense of their increasingly confused councilors, to mornings where he'd linger in bed to watch Ed sleep. The feel of him moaning into his neck when he came.
Steel clanged against steel, and Peter came back to himself with a start. Edmund was facing the dwarf with his teeth clenched, the skin around his mouth pulled back. Grinning fiercely. He loved dueling. And Peter was struck, abruptly, by how small Edmund was, holding the sword Father Christmas had once given Peter, battling a dwarf that was, really, not all that much smaller than him.
A child, still.
Not the man who was also his husband.
This was Narnia, but ...
Edmund was still his little brother.
Peter's empty chest grew into and around him, and Peter was made prisoner of war to the sky.
Pairing: Peter/Edmund
Story Summary: Takes place after LWW and during Prince Caspian. Edmund tries to recapture his relationship with Peter, who refuses to acknowledge what they had as Kings. After all, how can he admit to loving someone who is a man, and his brother, and a child in a place where every one of those is seen as wrong? THEY ARE NOW BACK IN NARNIA.
Chapter Summary: A glimpse into Peter's head. His reactions to being back in England, and then in Narnia.
Disclaimer: I know this may come as a shock, but I am not in actual fact C.S. Lewis, and thus the characters etc. blah blah blah are not mine. Now you know.
The part where I snivel and make excuses for being almost illegally lazy: I am terribly sorry. If you must blame someone, blame me; if you must thank someone, thank sapphiremistww, whose comment, whether she knew it or not, made me feel flattered/guilty enough to post this.
It took a surprisingly long time for Peter to realize he was homesick. There were signs, but ... his head was so confused, so full of familiar scenery. He had a mother again. A frame of reference to grow up against, no need to wildly make it up as he went along. And perhaps that wasn't so bad.
It was the mountains made him realize. He looked out a second-story window of the new Finchley house, saw rows of grey-slated roofs that formed a stepping-stone path to dark, grey mountains hidden by grey fog. And suddenly the sky was a monstrous thing. How could he not have noticed all that space, quiet and still over their heads? The horizon was lumpen, bent over at the weight of it. Clouds became scouts of an army he could never fight off; and when the bombs fell at night, though his mind knew they'd been sent by a country that could be defined and contained in the lines of a map, he could not shake the feeling -- the instinct, reflex -- that they were the weapons of a great cruel sky, gouging the ground with spurts of earth and fire. How could he defend against such an army? Thunder was no different from explosions in his mind. He woke reaching for a sword that wasn't there.
The second revelation came at the train station on the way to school. He stood at the top of a flight of stairs, looking down into the crowd and saw: a sea of hats and hair, perched on indistinguishable pink heads. And aren't we ugly? he thought. Good god, all so alike -- how do we tell each other apart? How do we stand each other? He was filled suddenly with the hideous wrongness of this. He longed, so strongly he could feel the emotion clogging his thoughts and throat -- for the immensely pleasing juxtaposition of a dwarf's height paired with that of a giant; or of movement, not the treacle-like human sludge at his feet, but the kind he remembered from a court in which dances were conducted to incorporate the helpless joyful prancing of fawns and serene canter of a centaur's hooves, the fluid grace of druids and bumbling paws of Beast.
He closed his eyes and thought of home. When he opened them, they were wet.
Narnia, he thought.
Narnia.
Another boy bumped him from behind. "So sorry," Peter heard, just before he turned around and punched him in the face.
____________________________________________________________________________________________________
The impossible happened. And after it did, Peter recognized the signs much sooner. Perhaps by now it was familiar to him. He'd thought maybe at last the hollow bit inside him (and surely if he had an ally vast enough to take on the sky, it was that one) would be sated. It was so perfect at first -- the beautiful sea, his, Narnia's. The castle ... but he would not think of the castle (it's ruins), the implications of it. Not yet. Please, please, allow him to lie a little longer.
But the lie died when his fingers brushed Edmund's. When he handed him the sword to fight Trumpkin. Edmund didn't react -- of course he didn't, Edmund never let anything distract him in a fight. The fond thought released a wave of memories from the past: battles they'd fought (both domestic and afield), conversations they'd had. Love they'd made. God but he missed loving Edmund. Every little thing, from kisses to meetings where they'd poke fun at each other at the expense of their increasingly confused councilors, to mornings where he'd linger in bed to watch Ed sleep. The feel of him moaning into his neck when he came.
Steel clanged against steel, and Peter came back to himself with a start. Edmund was facing the dwarf with his teeth clenched, the skin around his mouth pulled back. Grinning fiercely. He loved dueling. And Peter was struck, abruptly, by how small Edmund was, holding the sword Father Christmas had once given Peter, battling a dwarf that was, really, not all that much smaller than him.
A child, still.
Not the man who was also his husband.
This was Narnia, but ...
Edmund was still his little brother.
Peter's empty chest grew into and around him, and Peter was made prisoner of war to the sky.