yeah

[bedlamsbard]

Seriously, after a year, Golden Age Narnia suddenly returns and says HI HI HI I DO IN FACT HAVE MORE STORIES TO TELL. I mean, it's lovely, don't get me wrong, I now want to write Peter/Osumare after this and Jaisen Ettore's origin story and fortunately that is all I know of right now, but this is on top of other parts of my brain going, "TWO MORE RILIAN STORIES" and also, "Aha, the third Jill story!" and also, "Now would be a great time to write that DVD commentary on The Land of Silent Seas!"

Look, brain, I appreciate the effort, but now is not actually a good time. I'm willing to reschedule for next week, though, and also, please let me know what's happening in the next chapter of Dust, as that appears to be the one thing you aren't plotbunnying wildly. Unless you count that JP thing, but I have no idea where that's going.

Comments

[aella_irene]

Unless you count that JP thing, but I have no idea where that's going.

To hell in a handbasket, given Helen's general state of mind. And the part where Jack has just put off killing himself until he runs out of patients. (I think he runs into someone who knows him before this can happen.) I think Victoria's the best off of them all, but I also think she's the other end of Archenland.

[bedlamsbard]

Possibly Jack stumbles over the charcoal-burner and his apprentice, and also Edmund.

Archenland's due for some major problems very very soon. Also a tournament. (Also, there was that plague, but that was several years earlier.)

[aella_irene]

Yes, that seems likely. And Edmund is...concerned. Very concerned.

...oh Victoria.

The village is empty. There aren't even any birds, and Jill is so tense she can barely breathe.

A shout goes up when they find the first body, then more, and more as they count them up.

"They're all dead," says a woman's voice, and the speaker steps out of the doorway of a hut. She's wearing a fine gown, worn to rags, with her hair pulled up in a coronet, and the bones of her face are sharp enough to break the skin.

"I should know," she continues. "I killed them."

(This is killed-them-because-they-sheltered-me-and-someone-came-looking, by the way. Which Susan realises about two seconds in.)

[bedlamsbard]

And now I am curious! (And this could get very awkward if they'd stumbled into a non-JP'verse Narnia, but that might be weirder.)

[aella_irene]

"What do you mean?" demands Susan, walking through, making a path by the force of her personality. "They died by the sword. You are not bloody, as you would be--"

"I am death," the woman says simply, "Death follows me, wherever I go, and everyone I love dies."

Susan looks at her, and Jill's hand is on her sword, and then Susan says, voice oddly mild. "Victoria Elizabeth Pevensie, don't you think you're a little old for amateur dramatics? Especially over mortality."

[bedlamsbard]

*makes hand motions that mean KEEP GOING*

[aella_irene]

"Pevensie?" Jill says, because she's never heard of a cousin Victoria, and even if she had, how could she be here, of all places, in a village filled with dead men in Archenland.

"Thousandeyes" breathes Graynor.

"Mama," says the woman, softly, and Susan is only just in time to catch her as she slides, weeping, into the dusty road.

[bedlamsbard]

Poor Jill. Poor very confused Jill.

[aella_irene]

"There are tales," Graynor says, soft and a little awkward, when she corners him. "Of the children of the Four. Helen of Winter, she who is vengeful, Jack of the Day, he who heals, Richard of Autumn, who brings the autumn storms-- And Thousandeyes. Victoria Thousandeyes, the Queen of the Night, who sees and knows all."

"But they're legends," Jill says, "How can she be--"

"And so are the Four," Graynor says softly. "Is it so unlikely, with the Deep Magic waking, that their children would rise as well?"

[bedlamsbard]

"But they don't have children!" Jill protests. "And there's only one of them, so --"

[aella_irene]

"We do," Susan says, and her voice cracks a little, as she adds: "Victoria's my younger daughter. Yes, she has three older siblings, no, we don't know where they are. I didn't even know the spell had brought them back as well, until now."

[bedlamsbard]

Jill is so confused she rather wants to cry. "But -- who's the father?" she says eventually; it's the only thing she can think of and she regrets it as soon as the words are out of her mouth. She already knows too much about Susan Pevensie's sex life.

[aella_irene]

"Peter," Susan says, and the bottom of Jill's stomach disappears. She feels suddenly sick.

[bedlamsbard]

"Papa?" Victoria says raggedly, raising her head. "Is he here? And the others, are they --" She sniffs, then sneezes.

"Peter's in Narnia with your aunt and uncle, the others are --" Susan takes a breath. "I've no idea where your siblings are, but I'm sure they are more than capable of taking care of themselves. Now, my dear, do you feel well enough to tell me what happened?"

[aella_irene]

"That's easy," Victoria says, soft and bleak. "Everyone died. You died, and Val died, and then Iulius, and then Helen, and Jack, and Richard, and Ala-- she was such a beautiful baby, don't you remember? You never knew Iulius, but Ala was such a beautiful baby. She had curls, and she laughed, and you played hide and seek with her in the gardens, and you could always find her, because she thought that if she couldn't see you, you couldn't see her."

[bedlamsbard]

"I remember Ala," Susan says, stroking her hair. She and Jill are the same age, now; Jill has never seen her look older.

[aella_irene]

"She killed herself, everyone said, but she can't have, because she wouldn't have done that to her horse. But she was dead anyway."

[bedlamsbard]

"Darling," Susan says gently, "that was more than a thousand years ago. And I'm here now." She pauses. "And you're not in Aslan's Country," she points out.

[aella_irene]

"How do I know? How do I know this isn't all a dream? I used to dream that the others were alive. I used to dream that I would wake, and Helen and Jack would be having breakfast, and Dicky would be down in the harbour, and Ala and Iulius would be arguing, and they'd all be alive, but that didn't make it real."

[bedlamsbard]

"Well, if it's any help," Susan says, "you weren't born yet when I was twenty-two. None of you were."

[aella_irene]

"No," Victoria says dreamily. "It's not. Who's she?"

"Jill. Jill Pole."

[bedlamsbard]

"What a funny name," Victoria says, and Jill bristles.

"It's a perfectly normal name! Unlike --" Well, actually, Victoria Pevensie is one of the most normal names she's heard since she arrived in Narnia, at least to her English ears. Although the Archenlander names aren't too far off.

[aella_irene]

"Oh," Victoria says. "Mine's strange as well. And the others'. The cousins got normal names, though, and Helen made sure the children did. Alambil and Eddard and Cottia and Piotr--" Her mouth twists. "And they're all dead. A thousand years, and they're all dead. Cottia was a Queen, in Archenland."

[bedlamsbard]

Susan sighs wearily. "Children complaining about their names," she sighs. "The same in every world. Jill is from England like I am, Victoria."

[aella_irene]

"Oh," Victoria says softly, as if she's about to fall asleep. "Oh, I want Papa."

Susan leans down to kiss her forehead, maternal.

*

I suspect that the Helen-Peter reunion involves Helen going down on one knee and reaffirming rather a lot of complex oaths. And Peter going "...oh, FFS, just get up so I can hug you."