song for Luna
☾ 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)
☾ ( Read more... )
"Horses seem to like you," she nods, not disapproving or approving either way, but well aware of how he skirts past departures with a smile. How long has he been here, she wonders, and then she wonders how long he wants to be here. So wondering, and barefoot already--not that this is a surprise--she steps toward the stream, and then into it, not so deep, pale ankles causing similarly sized outward circles around them in the water. Her jeans cut off awkwardly at the knee, a sloppy job all frayed and washed too many times, but at that length they don't risk a soaking, and neither of course does her butter yellow shirt that hangs loosely on her slender frame, long enough to be more of a short dress than a shirt really.
"But Ginny is quite good at flying," she adds, not moving from where she stands, back to the brunette and not looking thus at him or his horse. "And it would not hurt, much, perhaps, to try your hand at it once more." There is the tinge of a smile on her words here, and underneath it all a current of while you have time to take advantage of it and other things more literally ambiguous.
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"I like horses and I consider myself very good with horsemanship. I think they appreciate that," he smiles while leading the dark horse to the edge of the water. He doesn't step into it like Luna does but after dipping his head to lap at the water Destrier joins her with two hooves in the cool temperature.
"Honestly I saw that she'd offered to teach Peter," he admits behind a soft laugh. Their rivalry and the potential to see the oldest and the blondest take a fall are also motivators to try his hand at flying again. "So I have considered it again."
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"Whatever your reason, I'm sure that she would not refuse you," is the mild reply this time, a glance over her shoulder to accompany it. This stare she levels at him for a while, looking for the briefest of moments beyond his shoulder before returning focus to where a heart beats and then where brown eyes set themselves so honestly. Never in a hurry to even out any palpable or potential awkwardness of too much quiet or wordless space, she only continues to stare a bit longer before turning away again, walking just a couple of yards or so upstream, ankles dragging through clearness and soles of her feet touching somehow only on the smoothest of river stones and shallows. When she pauses again, she steps back enough to sit at the edge of the stream this time, knees bent up and feet still dipping just below the water's surface.
Sometimes it's more interesting to wait and see what other people will say than to say something yourself, and she has always been interested in the words of her friends, even ones they might be reluctant to share.
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After a silent moment he averts his gaze to pull at Destrier's saddle pocket.
"I have something for you, but if I am to give it to you now we would have to walk back. It is a little delicate to ride with unpacked," he explains while retrieving a small white box. "Would you like it now?"
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"I don't understand," she says at last, not ungrateful, and not believing one must have a specific purpose beyond making someone else happy or thinking of someone to give a gift, but sensing some extra reason here all the same. A day for rarities perhaps, this would be one of the few times she seems less knowing, even as it serves as a way of covering said knowing mannerisms by saying in plain words what vague ones could express. "It is not Christmas, and I have never told anyone my birthday," she smiles quietly at him, something older in the curve of her mouth and the depth of her eyes.
What is it for?
What are you doing?
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But upon hearing her question Caspian keeps the little box away from her.
"Wait. When is your birthday?" His question is casual and even mischievous as if learning this will give him a better, more legitimate, reason to be presenting her with a gift.
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"July," she tilts her head again, not setting the date, a half answer for no answer. Her eyes never deviate from the face of her friend, though she remains ever aware of the small white box. Her mouth quirks to the side just a little, thoughtful, the same as one often does when chewing on the inside of one's cheek, and this is the closes to looking plainly a combination of curious and dubious as Luna Lovegood gets...and it's still more than a little vague, but blame that on her gene pool maybe. Her whole family, reportedly, has that sort of distant air no matter how closely they are in fact paying attention.
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Should she open it she'll find some tissue paper wrapped around a palm-sized lotus with petals made of pearlescent shell and edged in gold. The petals can fold too, open like a lotus in bloom or closed like a lotus bulb. What its purpose is he can't say, but it would hold a small candle well or provide a hidden place for jewelry when shut.
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"Thank you," she says, bowed slightly over, shoulders forward in that manner that people often stand in when curling to peer down at something in their hold. The sunlight through branches above glint off of the gold edges in softening sparks and when just glancing at it, the shimmering floral representation seems almost real, odd, a bit of a contradiction, but the truth. She busies herself folding and unfolding the petals, and upon closing them a third time, she asks, "Do you suppose then that you will not be here when July comes to pass?"
She doesn't have to look up at him. Her tone carries that ever precarious mixture of consideration, concern, and curiosity, as well as that which traces back through to their first meeting: a genuine affection, a sort of non-confrontational form of being utterly truthful. In the end, they are not the kinds of people who have much of any use for lies, even white ones, and Luna prefers, lifting her head just enough to bring blue eyes to the Telmarine's now empty hands, to speak to what is there, even if it isn't always the most comfortable thing to approach.
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He knows she knows that.
"I hope you like it."
He knows she does.
So her question becomes one he can't avoid because it fits within their exchange of words. Caspian realizes this misstep but he doesn't think he has any good reason to avoid it now. Omitting remarks or deflecting questions isn't quite the same thing as outright telling her that which isn't true. He runs his fingers through dark brown hair and averts his gaze.
"I might not be... You can never tell in this world," he shakes his head. That is true, isn't it.
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"No, you never do," she agrees and turns so that even if Caspian does look up again he will not have to make eye contact. She can still see him out of peripheral vision, her profile to him, but it's not the same, has not the weight or immediacy of a pointblank stare, and she knows that too, for all her seeming aloofness. Slipping the flower back into the tissue and closing the box, she settles it more comfortably in her left hand, right hanging at her side again, fingers curling absently, and then uncurling, as if exercising that they still work, a thoughtless motion for the sake of movement alone. Swallowing an almost foreign feeling, one that settles dispassionately behind her heart, she tilts her own gaze to her bare feet, toes curling against the soft earth. In her small bag, still slung across her shoulder and front, she has proof of having suspected something like this before verbally breaching the subject. She doesn't over think it, but she doesn't draw it out yet either.
"Have you told anyone else?"
That you worry...that you worry more often, of late, my friend?
You should.
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Secretly Caspian is thankful for her keeping her profile to him. He knows he ought to have the decency of meeting her blue gaze directly but it is difficult to acknowledge the very subject at hand, much less acknowledge that someone else is aware of his unwillingness to address the situation.
"It may be nothing, you know. I may be worried for nothing," explains the Telmarine. It's not a very good explanation.
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This, she sees, and neither of them need to be looking at each other for that to be the way of it.
Oh she could speak to that, or to similar topics. She knows they are there.
"I very much like my gift," she says instead, and then, quieter but also not a whisper, "Thank you."
I would listen if you decided you had anything more to say remains the undercurrent of everything, but she projects this even when not presented with such a timely concern, and as with someone who this feels natural to, she doesn't consciously do so. Sometimes, as a result, it is enough to communicate itself, and other times, not at all.
It really depends, more or less, on who the other person is.
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He is trying to convince himself, desperately. To worry about something like the mark of one year (or six months however one wishes to look at it) is silly. But he has left once before, after a half year, and he has no desire to even think about the possibility of return, like doing so might crush his chances completely. A King of Narnia has no place wanting to leave his throne for a time, even if that time proves no danger to the land. What kind of leader willingly abandons his post to be part of something that was sent away so suddenly through a door in the air? Everytime this question comes to mind he thinks of a mane thick and full of warmth and a voice both comfortable and frightening, then he chastises himself for having such thoughts at all. Everyone is fortunate he is not really a guilt-ridden member of a church.
His expression softens with another hidden look to Luna. Caspian should tell her something, tell her more, but he doesn't know what to say. He doesn't know what she could do to ease that anxiety just as he didn't know what to say to Peter when he regained his younger face.
"Do you want to head back to the stables yet," he asks, already sheepish for giving in to that same avoidance.
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And, more than that, a good friend, avoidance or no avoidance. No one is perfect.
"Do you?" she asks and the clover stem twirls half way between her fingertips.
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"Thank you...."
Caspian takes the clover from her, equally careful not to damage it before he tucks it into a button hole. He lifts his gaze to her again and smiles. Does he want to head back? No. Not yet. Not if they're talking about some place that isn't a stable block. The softest sigh escapes his lips and he runs his fingers through his hair again.
"We should," he nods. That's always the way of it, what they should do differing from what they want to do.
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