song for Luna

[suncolors]

☾ And we aren't all that we seem, but we are more than we know.
(Caspian)
☾ Is that who you are? To think we never needed to say hello.
(Caspian)
☾ Man-made never made our dreams collide.
(Edmund)
☾ Reconcile.
(Edmund)
☾ You don't need eyes to see.
(Kay)
☾ Where was my head when I needed it most?
(Caspian)
☾ Don't keep appointments with disappointment.
(Aslan)
☾

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Where was my head when I needed it most?

[treadingdawn]

It doesn't take long for Caspian to reach the stables after his less than fulfilling exchange with Peter. He neither walks nor runs, but his pace is brisk, controlled. Can someone stride with a purpose while feeling purposeless all at once? The Telmarine doesn't have the patience or mood to entertain the possibility. When he reaches his destination he is glad to see the one face who has stood by him for many years, almost as long as his professor's. It would be inaccurate to say that he prefers the company of an animal to that of his friends, but there is something about the destrier named Destrier that remains painfully true

Where was my head when I needed it most?

[suncolors]

Some people spend their lives waiting for something to happen. Others wait to happen. Luna Lovegood waits because she knows that waiting is just as necessary as stepping forward into a moment. Her life is a series of footfalls that land just this side of unexpected, just this side of strange inside of normal, just this side of understanding even when it is sometimes a bit impossible to understand Luna herself.

I wonder if he will ever remember. This is her thought as she watches, ever silent, the young king and his faithful horse. It makes her sad in a way that she has not often felt and her bare toes curl against the bits of dirt and stray feed, threadbare hay on the ground. Wand tucked behind her ear, she averts her eyes when he speaks, closes her ears without covering them, because a moment may be private without a person leaving the room

Where was my head when I needed it most?

[treadingdawn]

"You are just as good as a Talking Horse," he whispers into the stallion's ear as if there might be someone around to hear him even though he doesn't think that is the case. He is proven wrong when he leans away from Destrier's mane and pale gold comes into view.

"Oh. Luna. I didn't know you were here," Caspian says in mild surprise. How much did you hear?

Already he turns away and moves as if to leave the stall and stable all together. She has seen him when he was down, he hasn't forgotten this at all. It is best not to cause her trouble, she who has always found reason to smile though sometimes he detects a phantom melancholy in her. Still, it's best not to alienate two blonds so early on this day. How long has it been since midnight passed? He is unsure and he hopes there is no other curse to make the City miserable again. To make him miserable and not even directly. He walks out of Destrier's stall and hooks the latch

Where was my head when I needed it most?

[suncolors]

His words cause her to change her expression, but not much. To Caspian it is likely nothing more than a shift in the way her irises reflect whatever light falls in the mostly dark stable. It is a comfortable darkness, one that speaks of privacy and quiet, of a safe place when perhaps no others seem like they can be. Those words though, they catch as a snag of fabric on a thorn or wire.

A lie, no less.

What could push you to this, she wonders, when I have given you no reason to run.

Curious.

"I knew we would speak again," she says in that soft-spoken way that is so natural to her. It also means you don't have to be sorry for that, as well as sorry, perhaps, for lying, but not the lack of exchange. One is within their collective power to change, but the other not so much. She trusts him to attend to it when he can and no one is perfect. Peering at him, she tilts her head, pale hair falling over her shoulder with the movement, bare feet hardly touching the floor as she steps toward him in imperceptible measures

Where was my head when I needed it most?

[treadingdawn]

"Did you," Caspian asks curiously.

It is a sickening thing that he finds it much easier to lie to those who know him less than say the Pevensies or Reepicheep. He wonders if he should feel worse for it but does not think twice about actually doing it. No, no one is perfect, but these last two days Caspian feels as if he doesn't even care to try. Maybe it is better this way, for himself and everyone else. He doesn't know for sure, he isn't the great lion after all. Looking at Luna and hearing her natural words that would sound carefully chosen by anyone else, he wonders where has Aslan been? Why hasn't he come to tell him things will be all right, to tell him that he need only try and things can be good again. Caspian remembers what he said of Eustace. Eustace Scrubb is important to his future. Now he knows why and that almost makes it worse because it cements the truth. It isn't easy to swallow at all

Where was my head when I needed it most?

[suncolors]

"He will go back to sleep," she says with a glance and a bow of her head to the horse they speak of. There is something about Caspian X that reminds Luna of a an animal when spooked, and there are many things that can cause this in any given person, but for one who listens and looks as closely as she does, it is a short path to supposing it has something to do with faith

Where was my head when I needed it most?

[treadingdawn]

Again he stares at her, from when she approaches to when she walks past, and he turns around to continue watching when he knows he can just as easily keep his back to her and walk away. It would be so easy to do that and just run away. For whatever reason old words come to him. Perhaps if they had come earlier he would not have shouted at Peter or told him to leave him alone. Those three words still sting with absolute regret, as much as the memory that cuts into his conscience now. Something about backbone. He bristles at the thought and steels himself, all while thinking it is equally just as sickening that he is the thing that inspires him to turn and join Luna now.

"I will sit with you," he nods and does not address her promise to not take up much of his time.

What has happened to me, Caspian wonders with a swallow of his dry throat

Where was my head when I needed it most?

[suncolors]

She expects no less of him. Despite the uncertainty that is clear in each of his steps, there are certain self same things that stay with a person in the face of what makes itself an imbalance of fear and confusion, anger and sadness. Some people think it takes years to know each other, but Luna has never been that kind of person, never will be.

"Harry has returned," she smiles again, a bit wider. "And Professor Lupin too, though he was only gone for a short while," her smile fades at that and she peers down at the hands neatly placed in her lap. What awaits him, she has been able to surmise is unpleasant and she feels it unfair that such a good man return to nothing. She doesn't know he will return only to leave nothing behind, and that among their numbers lost, he will be counted. For this, she is fortunate and odd that for Caspian's misfortune with knowing future events, she sits here now. Not to say that she would not otherwise ask him to sit, because she would have. She will. His company is the likes of which she enjoys and as

Where was my head when I needed it most?

[treadingdawn]

"I noticed. I do not think he remembers," Caspian shakes his head.

He hasn't actually spoken to Mr. Potter since his return, but now that Luna has mentioned him he thinks he ought to. What he remembers most is Harry's reaction to his friendship with Lily. An overreaction is more accurate to say. At first the memory makes Caspian smile, faintly so, because all in all it was a little funny to see the wizard near livid for his trading horse riding lessons for broom riding lessons with her. Now, after learning things he should not know, never know, it isn't so funny. She was to be his mother. The future is no laughing matter, not even the future of those from a different world. It is good to hear that Professor Lupin has returned though, Susan seemed quite fond of him. He was always kind, Caspian remembers, and then he recalls Lupin even offering advice to Merlin about Will. The Iguana one

Where was my head when I needed it most?

[suncolors]

"I am not apologizing for myself," she says, leaning forward slightly as if sharing a secret, even though there is no one else around to hear it, save the horses, and she trusts them too. Truthfully, she wants to know more of what makes Caspian this way, what moves him to such grief, because if there is one thing Luna appreciates, it is the ability to better understand those who have come to matter to her. Earlier words make her tilt her head at him, staring for a while. No, they have not spoken for some time, but that matters little to her. What matters is what they speak of, what they share, whenever it is that they do

Where was my head when I needed it most?

[treadingdawn]

For a second he hopes Edmund did not speak to her but he knows that's a foolish thing to think of the Just. Does she have to be so selfless in the face of someone who has been nothing but selfish? Caspian feels tired, tired of feeling sorry for himself and tired for these conflicts. He is better than this. At the same time he cannot think of one person who has had to confront such a terrible future and been able to put it aside for better things. Caspian is unaware of how closely his thoughts truly thread together. With Peter and Merlin's silence, he never will. So he wonders, who can truly turn his cheek to losing his friends, likely losing his son, likely losing his wife, and then dying. Eustace knew not what he said when he told him oh, and don't worry, everything with your son works out! But Caspian connects the dots together; he will die before whatever works out works out. Who can turn his cheek to this save for the great lion himself

Where was my head when I needed it most?

[suncolors]

"Just a light," she whispers, and something else that he probably can't quite hear, a word here, a word there, and neither of them the sort that the Telmarine would understand even if he did hear her completely. Her lips barely move as it is, and who knows when she took her wand in hand but she lowers it first, as if to touch so lightly the glow in darker hands. In the same motion its direction turns upward, and the point of it barely rests against the brunette's forehead, contact that he could easily not notice at all, if he did not look, but she knows he will

Where was my head when I needed it most?

[treadingdawn]

It is a beautiful light to Caspian, reminding him of the flower he still keeps in his room, reminding him of fireflies in a garden and a friend brushing them out of his hair. To Caspian X, all of them remind him of the stars, of nights spent gazing at them while his mentor tells him stories of Narnia. The old Narnia, that is. He has always listened to every word but it would be a lie to say that at the same time a young prince had dismissed the stars entirely. He has always found them intriguing, points of the brightest light in such a dark sky. He has always found them beautiful and will continue to do so after meeting one. Science says that they burn out in time, something the Telmarine is yet unaware of due to his own world's grasp on science, so for now he thinks they are everlasting. Maybe that is why he finds them so special

Where was my head when I needed it most?

[suncolors]

Smiling at him still, she thinks he is very strong and then she hopes that it will be enough to see him through what lies ahead. Then, as if remembering something herself, she digs around in the small side bag that may have gone unnoticed before, drawing forth a tiny cluster of several periwinkles. They are the white sort with golden centers, and she wordlessly offers them to the Telmarine.

They are for memory.

Because one day, far from here, even at the end, you might remember this time and place and all that you knew too soonSo thinking, her smile softens and her hands fold in front of her again. It is rare for the blond to feel disconcerted, to linger in sadness, and even now these things are colored by a gladness to hear and see this person before her speaking with such ease. A small grace, perhaps

Where was my head when I needed it most?

[treadingdawn]

He looks down at the white and gold cluster then accepts them but not without a minor confession.

"You are always giving me flowers, Luna. Often I wonder if this is your way of bribing me for Destrier's time," he says in a joking manner. He does not mean it at all, although it is also Caspian's way of saying thank you, I wish I had something better to give you. He hardly feels obligated to reciprocate in kind but he wants to. Either way he does smile for her explanation while turning the cluster in his hands. "That does not surprise me. He is far more fond of carnations and gardenias," the Telmarine reveals which only gets a snort from the horse. The horse who is sleeping and subconsciously felt a need to interject. Strange timing, that. Caspian just arches a brow at the big black beast then turns his attention back to the young witch.

"Thank you anyway," he nods then tucks the cluster into his breast pocket.

Where was my head when I needed it most?

[suncolors]

"You never know," is her succinct but ironically knowing reply, her tone the same as it ever is, as well as her expression at this point. Though her feet are bare, her shoes will not be following her here tonight, and she thinks she might prefer to sleep here than return to the others. There is something she rather finds irreplaceable in being alone. It isn't that she needs time to think either, no.

She needs time to not think.

"You should go home soon, perhaps. I did promise not to keep you too long," your Highness, she thinks with a mild sweetness, a suggestion she gives not to get rid of him, but because she knows those who live with him truly will worry. They are family, after all.