Narnia fic: "Dust in the Air" (25)
Aug. 24th, 2011 01:10 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
bedlamsbardTitle: Dust in the Air (25)
Author:bedlamsbard
Fandom: Chronicles of Narnia movieverse/bookverse
Rating: PG
Content Notes: mention of ritual sacrifice, brief violence
Summary: And the end of all our exploring / will be to arrive where we started. An AU of The Last Battle, some five years after that book begins.
Disclaimer: The Chronicles of Narnia and its characters, situations, settings, etc., belong to C.S. Lewis. Certain characters, situations, settings, etc., belong to Walden Media. Title and quote from T.S. Eliot's Four Quartets: Little Gidding.
Author's Notes: Dust in the Air uses Warsverse backstory as a general rule of thumb. All chapters of Dust are posted on both LJ and DW. Dust in the Air does not use material from The Voyage of the Dawn Treader (2010).
The biggest coup that Queen Lucy brings back from the north isn’t the diamonds, it’s the journalist.
Tirian has never met a journalist he likes. Back before the occupation there had been a constant push-pull between the crown and the newspapers, who’d denounced Tirian’s grandfather for being too cowardly in his old age, Tirian’s father for being too belligerent in his middle age, and Tirian himself for being too passive in his youth. In retrospect he’s willing to admit that the scribblers may have had a point, at least in regards to the latter, but his memories of the press are made up of vicious accusations of negligence in ink-smeared Number Eleven Aquila typeface presented with his morning coffee. When in his cups, he used to spend hours debating who he hated more: the court, the Assembly, the House, or the press. Which of the four won out depended on what the scandal of the week was. The only thing that Tirian had regretted about the newspapers being shut down in the wake of the occupation was that the Calormenes weren’t going to be plagued by them the way he had been.
The High King’s enthusiasm upon finding out the faun’s profession is a clear sign that the Golden Age had obviously been a more enlightened time, presumably one without newspapers. Well, that’s likely: Tirian’s fairly certain that if there were any newspapers remaining from the High King’s reign they would be in an archive somewhere and he would have read them. He also has a distinct memory of the mention of a town crier in one of the sagas. Also, the printing press hadn’t been invented yet, the lucky bastard, which is probably an uncharitable and somewhat blasphemous thought, but does raise the question of how the High King knows what a journalist is in the first place. Tirian writes that off as either his experience in Cair Paravel or his being the High King and thus bloody omniscient. Or something.
The journalist’s name is Cordylion, and before the Calormenes had dragged him out to the mines for writing scathing opinion pieces about the government he’d written for the Cair Paravel Chronicle, one of the rags that Tirian nurses a particularly bitter hatred towards, since as far as he’s aware the editor had completely lacked any kind of filter for anything but bad grammar and spelling. Queen Lucy’s original plan upon learning his profession had been to smuggle him back into Cair Paravel, but the faun had refused to either leave his adopted daughter or take the child with him, which no one can really blame him for. Eustace had been the one who’d hit on the idea to have him write from the Wild, because no one in Cair Paravel really has any idea what’s happening outside the city walls or, at furthest reach, the Home Farms. Presumably his editor had been too thrilled by the scoop to be alarmed at being contacted by a member of the Long Table, or maybe that’s just a regular day for her. Either way, both Queen Lucy and the High King had seemed far too pleased by the prospect of civil disorder. Tirian isn’t, but since the idea is to cause the Calormenes as much trouble as possible without actually putting an army in the field, he knows from personal experience that the newspapers are the best way to do it. Especially since they don’t have an army to put in the field.
Cordylion had sent his missive downriver in the care of a rather scruffy-looking river otter and since then there’s been no response, though Tirian doesn’t doubt that Rannva Longhallow ran the story. As much as he despises the women even he can’t wish that any harm falls on her for printing it, which seems rather alarmingly inevitable if Tirian knows Prince Bahadur, and he likes to think he understands the man. He hates him, but he does understand him most of the time. The same had been true of Rahim Tarkaan, who had preceded the prince as governor of Narnia and had been summarily dismissed from his post in the wake of the failed Terebinthian invasion. Say what you like about the Tisroc, but the man can certainly pick efficient administrators. For varying definitions of the word. Rahim Tarkaan had probably been smarter than Prince Bahadur, but he hadn’t been good enough to keep the job for more than two years. Bahadur – well, Tirian hopes that the article about the diamond mines doesn’t force the prince’s hand. By now it’s almost certainly bounced around to every remaining paper in Cair Paravel. There will be more to follow – coverage of today, for one; Tirian can’t see any journalist worth his or her salt ignoring the heartwarming story of how even in the depths of exile in the Western Waste Narnians had celebrated Winter’s End, complete with sacrifices, dancing, feasting, and whatever else could be drummed up. Doubtless the presence of the King of Summer and the Queen of Morning would make an even better story, if they hadn’t disappeared early this morning. Tirian would be more worried about their absence if he hadn’t seen them go; presumably they have somewhere better to be.
It’s been a good Winter’s End. Winter’s End in Cair Paravel had been an elaborate affair – it’s unusual for the augurs in Cair Paravel to declare the festival anything but either late or early, so that they either begin a good month of celebration in Narnia or end it. Many years Tirian had made the rounds of every major Winter’s End in Narnia, starting in Cair Paravel and moving onto Glasswater or Bracken or Beaversdam, wherever the augurs have called it next. He’s spent Winter’s Ends in the northern marshes and the southern marches, in the universities and in palaces, in rustic Neo-Narnian country estates and posh Late Telmarine palaces, in army camps and small villages and, on two rare occasions, out of the country – once in Archenland and once in Galma. He’s heard they still celebrate Winter’s End in the Lone Islands, but the Lone Islands had gained their independence from Narnia a hundred and seventy-three years ago, and no Narnian king has visited since Absalian the Blind had signed the dissolution treaty. Especially now, with the Lone Islands taken over by the Black Fleet, but even the Black Fleet was Narnian once. He doubts that the pirates can manage anything on the scale of a Cair Paravel Winter’s End, though – a month’s worth of feasting, parades, pantomimes, sacrifices, and general merriment. It’s depressing to think that the Calormenes have probably managed to destroy that too, but at least they’ve managed to conjure up a passable imitation here, mostly because the members of the Long Table have apparently been competing with each other to send more and better foodstuffs upriver. Tirian really can’t imagine where they found a dozen cows going to spare in Cair Paravel, or how they got them upriver without being noticed, but he’s grateful for it nonetheless. Once upon a time he would have been at the sacrifices – he’s even had the knife once or twice, though it’s hardly a pleasant memory – but not here, not among these Narnians. He’d been politely warned off when he’d tried to go down to the river with the rest of the sacrificial party and he can’t exactly blame them; he seems to be bad luck.
Presumably the sacrifices had gone off without a hitch, because the meat had promptly been hauled back and divided between most of the fires in Arn Abedin. Most people wouldn’t get steaks, but nearly everyone had had a taste. Of course the one thing that’s missing from a festival slaughter is black pudding, because the sacrifices are always drained into the nearest waterway for the gods of river and stream, but that’s no great loss. Even in the wild the proprieties must be observed. It’s more important now than ever before, with the god of the Great River awake for the first time in years.
Somewhat to his surprise Tirian had gotten a rack of ribs, which he’d shared with Leo and Eustace; on some level he’d been expecting not to get anything at all. He suspects that if they’d made an appearance the High King and Queen Lucy would have gotten the best cuts of all, but those who had been hoping for a blessing from the little gods had gone away disappointed. Not for long, though; everyone has been throwing themselves into preparations for the festival for the better part of a week now with the idea that the kings and queens of summer would be there, and even with Peter and Lucy gone there have been plays, pantomimes, and dancers all day long. There’s even been music, and, Aslan bless, the traditional sweets he hasn’t tasted in years fresh from Beka Confesor’s surprisingly experienced hands. Tirian hadn’t expected that to come from a refugee’s campfire in one of the dourest parts of Narnia.
Most of the festivities have petered off now, leaving Tirian warm and contented by the glowing coals of a firepit littered with discarded beef bones broken open for the marrow. Jewel’s bulk makes an excellent backrest; the unicorn smells faintly of excellent thirty-year-old Glasswater brandy, the acquisition of which is a miracle on par with the arrival of the High King as far as Tirian is concerned. He has Elodio Montejo, the capo del’sud, to thank for that, apparently. Tirian is ready to do so gladly.
He wouldn’t be inclined to move even if Leocadia wasn’t asleep with her head on his shoulder, her soft hair fluttering against his neck with every steady breath. Tirian doesn’t mind; he’s missed his cousin, and it’s not like he has anywhere better to be. Festival nights usually end in liaisons of one kind or another – it’s probably where Eustace and Vespasian are now, though presumably not together – but there’s no one that Tirian has his eye on, even if anyone would have him. He’s happy enough to sit here and watch the few dancers that still remain, the serious ones intent on dancing the last lingering touch of the Queen of Winter out of Narnia, until Aslan breathes sun and spring back into the land. Tirian’s danced that dance before too, when he was younger and capable of staying up all night without adverse effects come dawn. It’s been a long time since that was true.
These dancers are good, even in the Western Waste. They’ve taken over the miniature henge, the standing stones that predate even the High King and his siblings, and kindled a fire in the slight dip at the center of the altar stone. The fire has been burning since dawn, stoked whenever it threatens to go down to bare coals. Someone has tossed a sprig of rosemary into it, and even from here Tirian can smell the clean scent of the burning herbs. There are five dancers now, three women with their skirts kilted up and their long legs flashing – or hooves, in the case of one satyr; her legs are dark and hairy in the shadows – and two men, one a centaur and the other human, at least from a distance. Their fellows watch from the sidelines, leaning against the tall standing stones and passing around a bottle of wine and a wooden horn of something stronger. Three are drumming, one great drum and two smaller ones, with a sound like a heartbeat in the pulse of Tirian’s wrist. It feels eternal, this continuation of something that has happened every year for centuries now. Since the High King sat in Cair Paravel.
Leocadia snuffles against his side and Tirian strokes her hair, absent, then touches the glass bottle braced between his knees. It sloshes a little, and he lifts it to see how much brandy is left. He starts to work the cork out.
“Might be you want something stronger, Woodsman.”
It’s one of the dancers from the henge, a stout minoboar with a broken tusk. He thrusts the horn they’d been passing around at Tirian like a challenge; it’s brimming with liquid, and it doesn’t smell like wine or mead. Tirian would be surprised if it did; he knows what this is and he’s impressed that they found someone capable of making it in the Waste. The other dancers at the henge, save those whose legs are still flashing in the firelight, are watching; the dwarf Arnau’s stumpy form is outlined against the fire, as he stands with his arms crossed over his chest. Tirian can’t see his expression, but he doubts it’s approving. He takes the horn without a word, dipping it a little towards the minoboar in thanks, and tips it back to drink.
He’s not expected to drink the whole thing, so he doesn’t bother, just gulps a few mouthfuls and closes his eyes, waiting. It tastes like barley water with a splash of apple brandy and a hefty dose of herbs, which is exactly what it is. What herbs they are is a closely guarded secret. It struck Tirian later that Arnau might have slipped poison into it and Tirian would never have known, but that would have been the worst kind of blasphemy.
The vision comes between one breath and the next.
In the past it’s been nothing more than glimpses of the past or the future, Tirian usually can’t tell which unless it’s something blindingly obvious. This time it’s different. One heartbeat he’s sitting in the ruins of a Golden Age fort, and the next he’s standing in Caspian’s castle, his castle. Only it’s not quite his castle, not yet; he bites back a wave of homesickness as he looks around. He’s standing in the nave of the palace chapel, not yet completed; the vaulted ceiling is bare and rather stark looking without its familiar coat of paint, its river and forest gods looking down at the congregation, while the tiled floor hasn’t been laid down yet. There are stacks of cut marble against the opposite wall. Of the panel paintings on the wall only two have been completed, while the third has been only just begun. There’s no one else in the chapel, and Tirian walks over, his feet quiet on the bare floor, and touches his fingers lightly to the penciled lines of the face of the boy who will become High King of Narnia.
“Tirian.”
He turns. He knows the speaker, of course; his face is all over the palace. Caspian the Seafarer is a tall man; his dark curls have just a hint of silver in them and there are laugh lines on his face. He looks the very picture of Telmarine nobility; Tirian’s family hasn’t managed that for years, due to a stubborn blond streak that probably comes from Caspian’s wife and son.
“Your majesty,” Tirian says, bowing.
Caspian tips his chin up with sword-callused hands. “You’re not doing poorly, you know,” he says, his voice gentle. “I was lucky, and things were very different then. But mostly I was lucky.”
“You had a little more than luck on your side, your majesty,” Tirian ventures. “You had the kings and queens of old – and you had Aslan.”
Caspian takes his hand away. “Aslan,” he sighs. “The great lion. Yes, I had him on my side – eventually.” His gaze goes to the great gold shield hanging above the altar, with its lion’s face worked in metal as bright as the sun and rubies for the eyes. In Tirian’s own time there is a chryselephantine statue in the back of the chapel – or there had been, at least. For all he knows the Calormenes have since smashed it up or sent it on to Tashbaan as a trophy.
“Luck,” Caspian says again and clasps his hands behind his back. He paces with long strides, like a caged tiger. “I had luck once, when I was young – when I was free enough to make my own luck, and young enough not to know it.”
“You had luck all your life, your majesty,” Tirian says, feeling suddenly cautious.
“You forget your history, Tirian,” says Caspian, sounding tired. “Is it luck to lose both wife and child?”
Tirian has no answer to that save that Rilian the Disenchanted returned eventually, so he watches Caspian instead, watches the king pace across the unfinished floor. “Is there a thing you would say to me?” he asks at last, when Caspian doesn’t speak again. “Or are you here – why are you here?”
Strange visions are expected with the festival horn, but Tirian’s never had one like this. He’s never heard of anyone who has, not even Absalian the Blind or Florian the Faithless.
“Eustace said that he saw you in Aslan’s Country,” Tirian goes on, feeling rather uncertain about it.
Caspian nods slightly. “Winter’s End,” he says, and shrugs. “Why not walk between worlds to see a kinsman? I’m not the only one afoot of late. There are gods in Narnia again.”
There’s a sudden sound, like thunder, and both of them look up. In Tirian’s own time stained glass has been laid in, but now the windows are covered with oilpaper stretched tight and nailed to the frames; rain spatters wetly against it. He and Caspian both look up at it, something like worry flaring across the king’s face.
“There is a thing I would say to you,” Caspian says suddenly, stepping towards Tirian. He grasps Tirian tightly by the forearms and kisses him on both cheeks, then on the mouth. “Remember who you are. Once a king or queen of Narnia, always a king or queen of Narnia.”
Between one breath and the next he’s gone.
Tirian opens his eyes to the ruin of Arn Abedin, digging his fingers into the knee of his trousers as he gasps. The minoboar crouches down in front of him, steadying the horn in his other hand. “What did you see?” he demands.
“Caspian,” Tirian says, grimacing at the beginnings of a headache. “The Seafarer,” he adds, since there’s more than one and it’s always good to be precise.
Against his side, Leocadia stirs a little, her weight going off his shoulder as she sits up. “Tirian? What –”
She sees the horn and goes quiet, understanding. Instead she digs her elbow into Jewel’s ribs until the unicorn starts into wakefulness, blinking around at them.
“I’m fine,” Tirian says into the inside of his wrist, clutching at his forehead. He can see Arnau through his spread fingers, glowering at him like the very fact of his existence is a personal insult.
Jewel turns his head and nuzzles his cheek, blowing the scent of hot mash and brandy into Tirian’s face. Tirian pats his neck rather blindly.
“What did you see?” the minoboar insists.
“Caspian. The chapel at the palace.”
“What did the Seafarer say?” Arnau demands.
Leocadia rests her fingers on the back of Tirian’s neck, glaring at the dwarf. “What the king saw is none of your concern –”
Tirian catches her wrist, cutting her off. “He said,” he tells Arnau, holding his gaze, “once a king or queen in Narnia, always a king or queen in Narnia.”
Arnau’s scowl is a beautiful thing to see.
Even though the headache Tirian spares a moment to grin at his back as he stomps back to the henge. After a moment the minoboar follows him, though he looks back over his shoulder at Tirian as he passes through the standing stones.
“I don’t like him,” Leocadia decides, scowling.
“Well, he probably doesn’t much care for you, either,” Tirian points out. The headache is starting to go away, little by little, but there’s still a throbbing pain just behind his eyes. “It’s me he really hates, though.”
“But you’re the king!”
“That would be why.” Jewel makes a move to nuzzle protectively at Tirian again, his nostrils flaring. “I don’t like that stuff,” he adds, grimacing.
Tirian bats him away and uses his shoulder as leverage to stand up, his head spinning for a moment. He stands still, breathing in the night air, and keeps his eyes closed until the world decides to stay still around him. When he opens them again Leocadia has recaptured the fallen brandy bottle and is holding it in her lap, looking up at him from a puddle of skirts, the fabric turned to shadow in the evening against the white splash of Jewel’s side. “Are you all right?” she asks again.
Tirian nods. “Just a headache. You know how it is.”
She makes a small gesture of assent accompanied by a moue of distaste, because she dislikes the stuff only slightly less than Jewel does – not that that’s hard, since Jewel’s family is die-hard Old Narnian, more so even than the Royal Family, which prefers to describe itself as politic in its religious tastes.
“I’m going for a walk to clear my head,” Tirian tells them, and waves back Jewel’s obvious intent to come with him. “You’re too good a pillow for Leo.”
He leaves them beside the dying fire, putting his hands in his pockets. There are people everywhere, some of them in various states of disrobe, and Tirian steers past them, heading for somewhere quieter. The best place to find that is outside the bounds of the old fort, but that’s safe enough now; there are too many people here for the feral hippogriffs in the Waste to venture close, although sometimes he sees their shadows passing far overhead.
He walks until he can’t hear the sound of drumming anymore, into the deep quiet dark of the wood, where the trees rise tall above him and the dryads have slept since Caspian the Conqueror brought the Telmarines into Narnia. A stream trickles over rocks somewhere nearby, probably too small to have a native naiad; Tirian follows the sound to its banks and crouches down to splash water onto his face, the back of his neck. Moonlight falls on the water from a break in the tree cover above, giving Tirian a little light. He stays crouching, picking up pebbles in the riverbed for no reason except to feel them. The quiet is pleasant; there are too many people in the camp and someone somewhere is always shouting. He loves his cousin, but Leo and Jewel have stuck to Tirian’s side like burrs since he came back from Cair Paravel and he finds himself missing breathing space rather desperately.
In the shadows of the trees in front of him, there’s a glimmer of motion. Tirian doesn’t start up, because sudden movements draw attention, but he lets one hand drift casually towards his sword hilt. He checks himself when the figure steps out from behind the trees.
“As –”
It’s the reflection of moonlight off metal in the water that catches his attention. Even so, Tirian moves too slowly to avoid the blade entirely; it kisses his neck and then, impossible, seems to turn in the bearer’s hand, leaping away from Tirian and back towards its bearer. Tirian stumbles up to grapple with the stranger – a satyr, he sees in the dim moonlight, with his face set in a fierce snarl as he tries to drive the blade towards Tirian. In the same instant, Tirian sees also that the blade isn’t a blade at all, but an arrow with a sharp, cruel head shining in the moonlight and scarlet fletchings. He catches the satyr’s wrist, forcing it slowly backwards and around as their feet splash in the shallow stream, making them both slip on the wet stones and nearly fall, clinging to each other like lovers. The satyr snarls at him like a wild animal, with a goat’s square yellow teeth, and Tirian finds himself snarling back. At last his fingertips touch the shaft of the arrow and it leaps again, driving into the satyr’s throat as if flung from a bow. A hot backsplash of blood washes across his face; Tirian resists the automatic urge to jerk back in disgust. A little madly, he remembers that the touch of blood from a sacrifice on a festival day had been lucky, back in the old days when Caspian the Conqueror had first led his people out of the west and the native Narnians had risen against him in disgust. Some other part of him whispers, but this isn’t a sacrifice, and Tirian steps backwards, letting the assassin fall into the stream with Queen Susan’s arrow in his throat.
He looks at the woods again, but there’s no shadow of golden fur this time, and Tirian stumbles away from the stream, barely cognizant of the blood on his face. He meets Eustace crossing the old boundary into the fort.
“I’ve been looking for you –” Eustace starts to say, then sees his face and grabs Tirian’s arm, staring at him with wide eyes. “You’re hurt!”
“Not my blood,” Tirian says, batting his worried hands away. “What’s happened? Is Queen Susan –”
“She’s still in Archenland with Jill. Edmund’s back, with Peter and Lucy –” He digs through his pockets until he finds a handkerchief, thrusting it at Tirian. “The Calormenes –”
Around Tirian the camp is silent and sleeping, still in the few hours left until dawn comes and Winter’s End is over. It takes everything he has not to run to meet the High King and his kin, reminding himself that if the Calormenes were truly at the doorstep then the High King would hardly allow Arn Abedin to sleep. Instead he takes the handkerchief from Eustace, forcing his hands not to shake, and starts to wipe the blood from his face as they fall into step together.
“What about the Calormenes?” he says, trying to think about the most likely scenario. “Rannva Longhallow – is it about the newspaper?”
Eustace’s face tells him that the Calormenes shutting down the Chronicle is a bit better of a scenario than he should really hope for. Besides, King Edmund hadn’t even known about the journalist when he’d left to meet Elizar Confesor’s contact in the woods; they’d only found out about Cordylion’s profession after he’d gone.
“No,” Eustace says, and then adds three of the worst words Tirian’s ever heard. “There’s an army.”
The High King, Queen Lucy, and King Edmund are sitting around the fire that Tirian had left Jewel and Leocadia beside not an hour before, King Edmund making short work of a loaf of bread and the queen feeding sticks into the fire so that the flame leaps and dances like the dancers in the henge behind them. The drumming is still going on, joined now by the plaintive sound of panpipes – almost a lament, Tirian thinks, his hands clenching as he reaches for a sword he’s not wearing.
The High King is the first to see him. “You’re bleeding,” he remarks mildly.
Tirian’s hands fly to his face. “It’s not my blood,” he says, sitting down next to the High King at Peter’s slight gesture of invitation. He scrubs the last flecks of the satyr’s blood away with Eustace’s handkerchief and hesitates over handing it back before Eustace snatches it from him, dropping down cross-legged at his side.
“Are you sure?” Peter says, reaching over. Tirian sits very still, his heart pounding in his chest, and feels the High King put two fingers to the side of his neck. They come away bright with fresh blood; Peter holds them up so that Tirian can see. “I’m guessing you didn’t get that shaving. Been having fun, have we?”
“Pete, no one but you thinks assassination attempts are fun.” King Edmund sounds more cheerful than anything else. “And let’s be honest, even you don’t think that most of the time.”
“I didn’t even say anything,” Tirian says, distracted from the Calormenes for a moment. Eustace makes a sound like a mother hen, looking around like he expects another assassin to come out of the shadows. “How did you –”
“I honestly can’t think of anything else that would end in you covered in blood,” says King Edmund. He gives his brother a significant look.
“Because you’ve seen the aftermath so many times?” Queen Lucy suggests, her mouth twitching. “Are you hurt, Tirian?” she adds, her hand going to the cordial on her belt.
“Just this.” He touches the spot that the High King had touched, where the arrowhead had kissed his neck before turning aside. “He’s dead, though. Your majesty, your sister Queen Susan hasn’t returned, has she?”
Eustace gives him a strange look.
“No, she wrote this morning and she’s still in Anvard with King Eian,” the High King says, while Queen Lucy glowers. “Our situation is hopeful though nowhere near guaranteed. Why? Do you think she tried to kill you?”
“She would,” Queen Lucy says, very softly. King Edmund jostles her with his elbow, frowning at her.
“No, of course not,” Tirian says hastily. “I doubt Her Majesty would need to use such an incompetent assassin. I was just – I was just wondering.” He can’t rid himself of the memory of the arrow leaping into the satyr’s throat, the wood like something living under his fingers. “He’s dead now,” he says again. “Eustace spoke of the Calormenes?”
Edmund swallows his mouthful of bread and balances the heel of the loaf on his knee, wiping the crumbs off his hands. “Right,” he says. “They’re on the move, about six thousand of them – four thousand infantry, one thousand cavalry, and another thousand archers, as far as I could tell. As of last night they were camped a few miles upriver from Beruna, in the Vale of the White Bear – is it still called that, by the way?” He looks interrogatively at Tirian.
“The Vale of Bracken, now,” Tirian says. “It’s still the White Bear on some of the old maps.”
Kind Edmund shrugs. “Well, they’re there, ill luck for us. I got as close as I could, and from what I could find out they’re not entirely certain where we are, but they’re willing to pay gold to find out. They’re mixed Calormene and Narnian forces, with a Calormene commander, some tarkaan named Yasruddin; I don’t suppose you know him?”
“I don’t think so,” Tirian says after a moment’s thought. The name is halfway familiar, but that doesn’t mean anything; a lot of Calormene names sound alike.
Edmund shrugs again. “Worth a try. Anyway, he and his officers are holed up in some poor bastard’s manor house; whoever it is is probably playing fetch-and-carry for them, so we might be able to sneak someone in there if you think they’d be amenable, and probably even if they’re not.” He looks at Tirian again, waiting.
“It’s White Bear Hall,” Tirian says slowly. “But I think Lord and Lady Bracken must be in Cair Paravel – no, Lord Bracken’s been dead for almost five years now. It’s Lady Bracken you’d want, but she’ll be in Cair Paravel for Assembly this time of year.”
“But would she be amenable?” Queen Lucy prods.
“I’ve no idea,” Tirian admits. “I haven’t seen her in years, and we weren’t exactly in the same circles when I was still in Cair Paravel. Leo might know.”
“I’ll ask her,” the queen says.
“And I’ll see what I can do,” Edmund says, his back cracking as he stretches. “It wouldn’t be a bad idea to have ears in a noble’s house; it’d be better to have ears in Assembly, if your cousin has contacts there.”
Tirian nods a little, frowning. “Someone will talk,” he says. “If you’re counting on the Calormenes spending weeks or months trying to find us, someone will talk – one of ours, or some shepherd, some charcoal-burner – Ban or not, there are still those who live out here, where Cair Paravel can’t touch them.”
This time it’s the High King who answers. “I know,” he says. “I’m counting on it.
It took a few more minutes and several interrogative questions about Winter’s End from Queen Lucy before the High King and his siblings left, but as soon as they’re out of earshot Arnau comes over to the fire, his face creased in a deep frown. It’s a change from his usual scowl; there’s something worried about it this time. Tirian had seen him listening from the edge of the henge, his arms crossed over his chest as the dancers leapt and turned behind him, the drums pounding like a line of knights in full charge. He stays seated and looks up at the dwarf, feeling Eustace tense at his side
“The man who tried to kill you, Woodsman,” the dwarf says abruptly. “Show him to me.”
“He’s the king,” Eustace says, starting to rise. “You don’t give him orders –”
Tirian catches his sleeve to stop him. “Why?” he asks.
“Because I asked nicely.”
“You really didn’t –” Eustace says, stopping mid-sentence when Tirian stands up.
“All right.”
Eustace scrambles after him. Tirian sets the pace, knowing that Arnau is going to have to struggle to keep up, but doesn’t look back. If the dwarf really wants to come, he’ll have to come at Tirian’s pace, not his own. Even for a dwarf that doesn’t mean much, but some part of Tirian is feeling just slightly petty.
He slows when he reaches the edge of the old fort, trying to remember exactly which way he’d gone. Eventually he picks his way through the trees more by half-remembered sense than real memory, listening for the sound of running water and the gleam of moonlight off a stream, and finds the dead satyr where he’d left him.
Arnau kneels down beside him, balanced precariously on a mossy outcrop of rock, and frowns at his face. “Not one of mine,” he says at last, sounding relieved, and then his gaze goes to the arrow. He puts his hand out to touch it, then stops, fingers a bare breath from the shaft. “He brought this?”
Tirian nods, once.
“That’s one of Susan’s arrows,” Eustace says needlessly. “Where did it come from?”
“I’m sure she’s left any number of them as souvenirs for the Calormenes,” Tirian makes himself say. It’s true; that doesn’t mean he believes it of this one.
Arnau stands back up. “Her day, her hand,” he says, and Tirian feels a little frisson of nervous energy run down his spine. He knows as well as any other Narnian that in the country they claim Winter’s End is sacred to all four of the kings and queens of summer, but most especially to the Queen of Spring.
The dwarf looks down at the dead satyr, with his life’s blood spilled into the stream like the cattle that had gone to their deaths at the river this morning. “I suppose she got her sacrifice,” he says.
Even Eustace doesn’t say anything this time.
----------
Rahim Tarkaan first appears in Border Wars. The chapel in Caspian's castle appears in Our Impudent Crimes.
Part One 0 | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17
Part Two 00 | 000 | 18 | 19 | 20 | 21 | 22 | 23 | 24 | Interlude | 25 | 26 | 27 | 28 | 29 | 30 | 31
Author:
bedlamsbardFandom: Chronicles of Narnia movieverse/bookverse
Rating: PG
Content Notes: mention of ritual sacrifice, brief violence
Summary: And the end of all our exploring / will be to arrive where we started. An AU of The Last Battle, some five years after that book begins.
Disclaimer: The Chronicles of Narnia and its characters, situations, settings, etc., belong to C.S. Lewis. Certain characters, situations, settings, etc., belong to Walden Media. Title and quote from T.S. Eliot's Four Quartets: Little Gidding.
Author's Notes: Dust in the Air uses Warsverse backstory as a general rule of thumb. All chapters of Dust are posted on both LJ and DW. Dust in the Air does not use material from The Voyage of the Dawn Treader (2010).
The biggest coup that Queen Lucy brings back from the north isn’t the diamonds, it’s the journalist.
Tirian has never met a journalist he likes. Back before the occupation there had been a constant push-pull between the crown and the newspapers, who’d denounced Tirian’s grandfather for being too cowardly in his old age, Tirian’s father for being too belligerent in his middle age, and Tirian himself for being too passive in his youth. In retrospect he’s willing to admit that the scribblers may have had a point, at least in regards to the latter, but his memories of the press are made up of vicious accusations of negligence in ink-smeared Number Eleven Aquila typeface presented with his morning coffee. When in his cups, he used to spend hours debating who he hated more: the court, the Assembly, the House, or the press. Which of the four won out depended on what the scandal of the week was. The only thing that Tirian had regretted about the newspapers being shut down in the wake of the occupation was that the Calormenes weren’t going to be plagued by them the way he had been.
The High King’s enthusiasm upon finding out the faun’s profession is a clear sign that the Golden Age had obviously been a more enlightened time, presumably one without newspapers. Well, that’s likely: Tirian’s fairly certain that if there were any newspapers remaining from the High King’s reign they would be in an archive somewhere and he would have read them. He also has a distinct memory of the mention of a town crier in one of the sagas. Also, the printing press hadn’t been invented yet, the lucky bastard, which is probably an uncharitable and somewhat blasphemous thought, but does raise the question of how the High King knows what a journalist is in the first place. Tirian writes that off as either his experience in Cair Paravel or his being the High King and thus bloody omniscient. Or something.
The journalist’s name is Cordylion, and before the Calormenes had dragged him out to the mines for writing scathing opinion pieces about the government he’d written for the Cair Paravel Chronicle, one of the rags that Tirian nurses a particularly bitter hatred towards, since as far as he’s aware the editor had completely lacked any kind of filter for anything but bad grammar and spelling. Queen Lucy’s original plan upon learning his profession had been to smuggle him back into Cair Paravel, but the faun had refused to either leave his adopted daughter or take the child with him, which no one can really blame him for. Eustace had been the one who’d hit on the idea to have him write from the Wild, because no one in Cair Paravel really has any idea what’s happening outside the city walls or, at furthest reach, the Home Farms. Presumably his editor had been too thrilled by the scoop to be alarmed at being contacted by a member of the Long Table, or maybe that’s just a regular day for her. Either way, both Queen Lucy and the High King had seemed far too pleased by the prospect of civil disorder. Tirian isn’t, but since the idea is to cause the Calormenes as much trouble as possible without actually putting an army in the field, he knows from personal experience that the newspapers are the best way to do it. Especially since they don’t have an army to put in the field.
Cordylion had sent his missive downriver in the care of a rather scruffy-looking river otter and since then there’s been no response, though Tirian doesn’t doubt that Rannva Longhallow ran the story. As much as he despises the women even he can’t wish that any harm falls on her for printing it, which seems rather alarmingly inevitable if Tirian knows Prince Bahadur, and he likes to think he understands the man. He hates him, but he does understand him most of the time. The same had been true of Rahim Tarkaan, who had preceded the prince as governor of Narnia and had been summarily dismissed from his post in the wake of the failed Terebinthian invasion. Say what you like about the Tisroc, but the man can certainly pick efficient administrators. For varying definitions of the word. Rahim Tarkaan had probably been smarter than Prince Bahadur, but he hadn’t been good enough to keep the job for more than two years. Bahadur – well, Tirian hopes that the article about the diamond mines doesn’t force the prince’s hand. By now it’s almost certainly bounced around to every remaining paper in Cair Paravel. There will be more to follow – coverage of today, for one; Tirian can’t see any journalist worth his or her salt ignoring the heartwarming story of how even in the depths of exile in the Western Waste Narnians had celebrated Winter’s End, complete with sacrifices, dancing, feasting, and whatever else could be drummed up. Doubtless the presence of the King of Summer and the Queen of Morning would make an even better story, if they hadn’t disappeared early this morning. Tirian would be more worried about their absence if he hadn’t seen them go; presumably they have somewhere better to be.
It’s been a good Winter’s End. Winter’s End in Cair Paravel had been an elaborate affair – it’s unusual for the augurs in Cair Paravel to declare the festival anything but either late or early, so that they either begin a good month of celebration in Narnia or end it. Many years Tirian had made the rounds of every major Winter’s End in Narnia, starting in Cair Paravel and moving onto Glasswater or Bracken or Beaversdam, wherever the augurs have called it next. He’s spent Winter’s Ends in the northern marshes and the southern marches, in the universities and in palaces, in rustic Neo-Narnian country estates and posh Late Telmarine palaces, in army camps and small villages and, on two rare occasions, out of the country – once in Archenland and once in Galma. He’s heard they still celebrate Winter’s End in the Lone Islands, but the Lone Islands had gained their independence from Narnia a hundred and seventy-three years ago, and no Narnian king has visited since Absalian the Blind had signed the dissolution treaty. Especially now, with the Lone Islands taken over by the Black Fleet, but even the Black Fleet was Narnian once. He doubts that the pirates can manage anything on the scale of a Cair Paravel Winter’s End, though – a month’s worth of feasting, parades, pantomimes, sacrifices, and general merriment. It’s depressing to think that the Calormenes have probably managed to destroy that too, but at least they’ve managed to conjure up a passable imitation here, mostly because the members of the Long Table have apparently been competing with each other to send more and better foodstuffs upriver. Tirian really can’t imagine where they found a dozen cows going to spare in Cair Paravel, or how they got them upriver without being noticed, but he’s grateful for it nonetheless. Once upon a time he would have been at the sacrifices – he’s even had the knife once or twice, though it’s hardly a pleasant memory – but not here, not among these Narnians. He’d been politely warned off when he’d tried to go down to the river with the rest of the sacrificial party and he can’t exactly blame them; he seems to be bad luck.
Presumably the sacrifices had gone off without a hitch, because the meat had promptly been hauled back and divided between most of the fires in Arn Abedin. Most people wouldn’t get steaks, but nearly everyone had had a taste. Of course the one thing that’s missing from a festival slaughter is black pudding, because the sacrifices are always drained into the nearest waterway for the gods of river and stream, but that’s no great loss. Even in the wild the proprieties must be observed. It’s more important now than ever before, with the god of the Great River awake for the first time in years.
Somewhat to his surprise Tirian had gotten a rack of ribs, which he’d shared with Leo and Eustace; on some level he’d been expecting not to get anything at all. He suspects that if they’d made an appearance the High King and Queen Lucy would have gotten the best cuts of all, but those who had been hoping for a blessing from the little gods had gone away disappointed. Not for long, though; everyone has been throwing themselves into preparations for the festival for the better part of a week now with the idea that the kings and queens of summer would be there, and even with Peter and Lucy gone there have been plays, pantomimes, and dancers all day long. There’s even been music, and, Aslan bless, the traditional sweets he hasn’t tasted in years fresh from Beka Confesor’s surprisingly experienced hands. Tirian hadn’t expected that to come from a refugee’s campfire in one of the dourest parts of Narnia.
Most of the festivities have petered off now, leaving Tirian warm and contented by the glowing coals of a firepit littered with discarded beef bones broken open for the marrow. Jewel’s bulk makes an excellent backrest; the unicorn smells faintly of excellent thirty-year-old Glasswater brandy, the acquisition of which is a miracle on par with the arrival of the High King as far as Tirian is concerned. He has Elodio Montejo, the capo del’sud, to thank for that, apparently. Tirian is ready to do so gladly.
He wouldn’t be inclined to move even if Leocadia wasn’t asleep with her head on his shoulder, her soft hair fluttering against his neck with every steady breath. Tirian doesn’t mind; he’s missed his cousin, and it’s not like he has anywhere better to be. Festival nights usually end in liaisons of one kind or another – it’s probably where Eustace and Vespasian are now, though presumably not together – but there’s no one that Tirian has his eye on, even if anyone would have him. He’s happy enough to sit here and watch the few dancers that still remain, the serious ones intent on dancing the last lingering touch of the Queen of Winter out of Narnia, until Aslan breathes sun and spring back into the land. Tirian’s danced that dance before too, when he was younger and capable of staying up all night without adverse effects come dawn. It’s been a long time since that was true.
These dancers are good, even in the Western Waste. They’ve taken over the miniature henge, the standing stones that predate even the High King and his siblings, and kindled a fire in the slight dip at the center of the altar stone. The fire has been burning since dawn, stoked whenever it threatens to go down to bare coals. Someone has tossed a sprig of rosemary into it, and even from here Tirian can smell the clean scent of the burning herbs. There are five dancers now, three women with their skirts kilted up and their long legs flashing – or hooves, in the case of one satyr; her legs are dark and hairy in the shadows – and two men, one a centaur and the other human, at least from a distance. Their fellows watch from the sidelines, leaning against the tall standing stones and passing around a bottle of wine and a wooden horn of something stronger. Three are drumming, one great drum and two smaller ones, with a sound like a heartbeat in the pulse of Tirian’s wrist. It feels eternal, this continuation of something that has happened every year for centuries now. Since the High King sat in Cair Paravel.
Leocadia snuffles against his side and Tirian strokes her hair, absent, then touches the glass bottle braced between his knees. It sloshes a little, and he lifts it to see how much brandy is left. He starts to work the cork out.
“Might be you want something stronger, Woodsman.”
It’s one of the dancers from the henge, a stout minoboar with a broken tusk. He thrusts the horn they’d been passing around at Tirian like a challenge; it’s brimming with liquid, and it doesn’t smell like wine or mead. Tirian would be surprised if it did; he knows what this is and he’s impressed that they found someone capable of making it in the Waste. The other dancers at the henge, save those whose legs are still flashing in the firelight, are watching; the dwarf Arnau’s stumpy form is outlined against the fire, as he stands with his arms crossed over his chest. Tirian can’t see his expression, but he doubts it’s approving. He takes the horn without a word, dipping it a little towards the minoboar in thanks, and tips it back to drink.
He’s not expected to drink the whole thing, so he doesn’t bother, just gulps a few mouthfuls and closes his eyes, waiting. It tastes like barley water with a splash of apple brandy and a hefty dose of herbs, which is exactly what it is. What herbs they are is a closely guarded secret. It struck Tirian later that Arnau might have slipped poison into it and Tirian would never have known, but that would have been the worst kind of blasphemy.
The vision comes between one breath and the next.
In the past it’s been nothing more than glimpses of the past or the future, Tirian usually can’t tell which unless it’s something blindingly obvious. This time it’s different. One heartbeat he’s sitting in the ruins of a Golden Age fort, and the next he’s standing in Caspian’s castle, his castle. Only it’s not quite his castle, not yet; he bites back a wave of homesickness as he looks around. He’s standing in the nave of the palace chapel, not yet completed; the vaulted ceiling is bare and rather stark looking without its familiar coat of paint, its river and forest gods looking down at the congregation, while the tiled floor hasn’t been laid down yet. There are stacks of cut marble against the opposite wall. Of the panel paintings on the wall only two have been completed, while the third has been only just begun. There’s no one else in the chapel, and Tirian walks over, his feet quiet on the bare floor, and touches his fingers lightly to the penciled lines of the face of the boy who will become High King of Narnia.
“Tirian.”
He turns. He knows the speaker, of course; his face is all over the palace. Caspian the Seafarer is a tall man; his dark curls have just a hint of silver in them and there are laugh lines on his face. He looks the very picture of Telmarine nobility; Tirian’s family hasn’t managed that for years, due to a stubborn blond streak that probably comes from Caspian’s wife and son.
“Your majesty,” Tirian says, bowing.
Caspian tips his chin up with sword-callused hands. “You’re not doing poorly, you know,” he says, his voice gentle. “I was lucky, and things were very different then. But mostly I was lucky.”
“You had a little more than luck on your side, your majesty,” Tirian ventures. “You had the kings and queens of old – and you had Aslan.”
Caspian takes his hand away. “Aslan,” he sighs. “The great lion. Yes, I had him on my side – eventually.” His gaze goes to the great gold shield hanging above the altar, with its lion’s face worked in metal as bright as the sun and rubies for the eyes. In Tirian’s own time there is a chryselephantine statue in the back of the chapel – or there had been, at least. For all he knows the Calormenes have since smashed it up or sent it on to Tashbaan as a trophy.
“Luck,” Caspian says again and clasps his hands behind his back. He paces with long strides, like a caged tiger. “I had luck once, when I was young – when I was free enough to make my own luck, and young enough not to know it.”
“You had luck all your life, your majesty,” Tirian says, feeling suddenly cautious.
“You forget your history, Tirian,” says Caspian, sounding tired. “Is it luck to lose both wife and child?”
Tirian has no answer to that save that Rilian the Disenchanted returned eventually, so he watches Caspian instead, watches the king pace across the unfinished floor. “Is there a thing you would say to me?” he asks at last, when Caspian doesn’t speak again. “Or are you here – why are you here?”
Strange visions are expected with the festival horn, but Tirian’s never had one like this. He’s never heard of anyone who has, not even Absalian the Blind or Florian the Faithless.
“Eustace said that he saw you in Aslan’s Country,” Tirian goes on, feeling rather uncertain about it.
Caspian nods slightly. “Winter’s End,” he says, and shrugs. “Why not walk between worlds to see a kinsman? I’m not the only one afoot of late. There are gods in Narnia again.”
There’s a sudden sound, like thunder, and both of them look up. In Tirian’s own time stained glass has been laid in, but now the windows are covered with oilpaper stretched tight and nailed to the frames; rain spatters wetly against it. He and Caspian both look up at it, something like worry flaring across the king’s face.
“There is a thing I would say to you,” Caspian says suddenly, stepping towards Tirian. He grasps Tirian tightly by the forearms and kisses him on both cheeks, then on the mouth. “Remember who you are. Once a king or queen of Narnia, always a king or queen of Narnia.”
Between one breath and the next he’s gone.
Tirian opens his eyes to the ruin of Arn Abedin, digging his fingers into the knee of his trousers as he gasps. The minoboar crouches down in front of him, steadying the horn in his other hand. “What did you see?” he demands.
“Caspian,” Tirian says, grimacing at the beginnings of a headache. “The Seafarer,” he adds, since there’s more than one and it’s always good to be precise.
Against his side, Leocadia stirs a little, her weight going off his shoulder as she sits up. “Tirian? What –”
She sees the horn and goes quiet, understanding. Instead she digs her elbow into Jewel’s ribs until the unicorn starts into wakefulness, blinking around at them.
“I’m fine,” Tirian says into the inside of his wrist, clutching at his forehead. He can see Arnau through his spread fingers, glowering at him like the very fact of his existence is a personal insult.
Jewel turns his head and nuzzles his cheek, blowing the scent of hot mash and brandy into Tirian’s face. Tirian pats his neck rather blindly.
“What did you see?” the minoboar insists.
“Caspian. The chapel at the palace.”
“What did the Seafarer say?” Arnau demands.
Leocadia rests her fingers on the back of Tirian’s neck, glaring at the dwarf. “What the king saw is none of your concern –”
Tirian catches her wrist, cutting her off. “He said,” he tells Arnau, holding his gaze, “once a king or queen in Narnia, always a king or queen in Narnia.”
Arnau’s scowl is a beautiful thing to see.
Even though the headache Tirian spares a moment to grin at his back as he stomps back to the henge. After a moment the minoboar follows him, though he looks back over his shoulder at Tirian as he passes through the standing stones.
“I don’t like him,” Leocadia decides, scowling.
“Well, he probably doesn’t much care for you, either,” Tirian points out. The headache is starting to go away, little by little, but there’s still a throbbing pain just behind his eyes. “It’s me he really hates, though.”
“But you’re the king!”
“That would be why.” Jewel makes a move to nuzzle protectively at Tirian again, his nostrils flaring. “I don’t like that stuff,” he adds, grimacing.
Tirian bats him away and uses his shoulder as leverage to stand up, his head spinning for a moment. He stands still, breathing in the night air, and keeps his eyes closed until the world decides to stay still around him. When he opens them again Leocadia has recaptured the fallen brandy bottle and is holding it in her lap, looking up at him from a puddle of skirts, the fabric turned to shadow in the evening against the white splash of Jewel’s side. “Are you all right?” she asks again.
Tirian nods. “Just a headache. You know how it is.”
She makes a small gesture of assent accompanied by a moue of distaste, because she dislikes the stuff only slightly less than Jewel does – not that that’s hard, since Jewel’s family is die-hard Old Narnian, more so even than the Royal Family, which prefers to describe itself as politic in its religious tastes.
“I’m going for a walk to clear my head,” Tirian tells them, and waves back Jewel’s obvious intent to come with him. “You’re too good a pillow for Leo.”
He leaves them beside the dying fire, putting his hands in his pockets. There are people everywhere, some of them in various states of disrobe, and Tirian steers past them, heading for somewhere quieter. The best place to find that is outside the bounds of the old fort, but that’s safe enough now; there are too many people here for the feral hippogriffs in the Waste to venture close, although sometimes he sees their shadows passing far overhead.
He walks until he can’t hear the sound of drumming anymore, into the deep quiet dark of the wood, where the trees rise tall above him and the dryads have slept since Caspian the Conqueror brought the Telmarines into Narnia. A stream trickles over rocks somewhere nearby, probably too small to have a native naiad; Tirian follows the sound to its banks and crouches down to splash water onto his face, the back of his neck. Moonlight falls on the water from a break in the tree cover above, giving Tirian a little light. He stays crouching, picking up pebbles in the riverbed for no reason except to feel them. The quiet is pleasant; there are too many people in the camp and someone somewhere is always shouting. He loves his cousin, but Leo and Jewel have stuck to Tirian’s side like burrs since he came back from Cair Paravel and he finds himself missing breathing space rather desperately.
In the shadows of the trees in front of him, there’s a glimmer of motion. Tirian doesn’t start up, because sudden movements draw attention, but he lets one hand drift casually towards his sword hilt. He checks himself when the figure steps out from behind the trees.
“As –”
It’s the reflection of moonlight off metal in the water that catches his attention. Even so, Tirian moves too slowly to avoid the blade entirely; it kisses his neck and then, impossible, seems to turn in the bearer’s hand, leaping away from Tirian and back towards its bearer. Tirian stumbles up to grapple with the stranger – a satyr, he sees in the dim moonlight, with his face set in a fierce snarl as he tries to drive the blade towards Tirian. In the same instant, Tirian sees also that the blade isn’t a blade at all, but an arrow with a sharp, cruel head shining in the moonlight and scarlet fletchings. He catches the satyr’s wrist, forcing it slowly backwards and around as their feet splash in the shallow stream, making them both slip on the wet stones and nearly fall, clinging to each other like lovers. The satyr snarls at him like a wild animal, with a goat’s square yellow teeth, and Tirian finds himself snarling back. At last his fingertips touch the shaft of the arrow and it leaps again, driving into the satyr’s throat as if flung from a bow. A hot backsplash of blood washes across his face; Tirian resists the automatic urge to jerk back in disgust. A little madly, he remembers that the touch of blood from a sacrifice on a festival day had been lucky, back in the old days when Caspian the Conqueror had first led his people out of the west and the native Narnians had risen against him in disgust. Some other part of him whispers, but this isn’t a sacrifice, and Tirian steps backwards, letting the assassin fall into the stream with Queen Susan’s arrow in his throat.
He looks at the woods again, but there’s no shadow of golden fur this time, and Tirian stumbles away from the stream, barely cognizant of the blood on his face. He meets Eustace crossing the old boundary into the fort.
“I’ve been looking for you –” Eustace starts to say, then sees his face and grabs Tirian’s arm, staring at him with wide eyes. “You’re hurt!”
“Not my blood,” Tirian says, batting his worried hands away. “What’s happened? Is Queen Susan –”
“She’s still in Archenland with Jill. Edmund’s back, with Peter and Lucy –” He digs through his pockets until he finds a handkerchief, thrusting it at Tirian. “The Calormenes –”
Around Tirian the camp is silent and sleeping, still in the few hours left until dawn comes and Winter’s End is over. It takes everything he has not to run to meet the High King and his kin, reminding himself that if the Calormenes were truly at the doorstep then the High King would hardly allow Arn Abedin to sleep. Instead he takes the handkerchief from Eustace, forcing his hands not to shake, and starts to wipe the blood from his face as they fall into step together.
“What about the Calormenes?” he says, trying to think about the most likely scenario. “Rannva Longhallow – is it about the newspaper?”
Eustace’s face tells him that the Calormenes shutting down the Chronicle is a bit better of a scenario than he should really hope for. Besides, King Edmund hadn’t even known about the journalist when he’d left to meet Elizar Confesor’s contact in the woods; they’d only found out about Cordylion’s profession after he’d gone.
“No,” Eustace says, and then adds three of the worst words Tirian’s ever heard. “There’s an army.”
The High King, Queen Lucy, and King Edmund are sitting around the fire that Tirian had left Jewel and Leocadia beside not an hour before, King Edmund making short work of a loaf of bread and the queen feeding sticks into the fire so that the flame leaps and dances like the dancers in the henge behind them. The drumming is still going on, joined now by the plaintive sound of panpipes – almost a lament, Tirian thinks, his hands clenching as he reaches for a sword he’s not wearing.
The High King is the first to see him. “You’re bleeding,” he remarks mildly.
Tirian’s hands fly to his face. “It’s not my blood,” he says, sitting down next to the High King at Peter’s slight gesture of invitation. He scrubs the last flecks of the satyr’s blood away with Eustace’s handkerchief and hesitates over handing it back before Eustace snatches it from him, dropping down cross-legged at his side.
“Are you sure?” Peter says, reaching over. Tirian sits very still, his heart pounding in his chest, and feels the High King put two fingers to the side of his neck. They come away bright with fresh blood; Peter holds them up so that Tirian can see. “I’m guessing you didn’t get that shaving. Been having fun, have we?”
“Pete, no one but you thinks assassination attempts are fun.” King Edmund sounds more cheerful than anything else. “And let’s be honest, even you don’t think that most of the time.”
“I didn’t even say anything,” Tirian says, distracted from the Calormenes for a moment. Eustace makes a sound like a mother hen, looking around like he expects another assassin to come out of the shadows. “How did you –”
“I honestly can’t think of anything else that would end in you covered in blood,” says King Edmund. He gives his brother a significant look.
“Because you’ve seen the aftermath so many times?” Queen Lucy suggests, her mouth twitching. “Are you hurt, Tirian?” she adds, her hand going to the cordial on her belt.
“Just this.” He touches the spot that the High King had touched, where the arrowhead had kissed his neck before turning aside. “He’s dead, though. Your majesty, your sister Queen Susan hasn’t returned, has she?”
Eustace gives him a strange look.
“No, she wrote this morning and she’s still in Anvard with King Eian,” the High King says, while Queen Lucy glowers. “Our situation is hopeful though nowhere near guaranteed. Why? Do you think she tried to kill you?”
“She would,” Queen Lucy says, very softly. King Edmund jostles her with his elbow, frowning at her.
“No, of course not,” Tirian says hastily. “I doubt Her Majesty would need to use such an incompetent assassin. I was just – I was just wondering.” He can’t rid himself of the memory of the arrow leaping into the satyr’s throat, the wood like something living under his fingers. “He’s dead now,” he says again. “Eustace spoke of the Calormenes?”
Edmund swallows his mouthful of bread and balances the heel of the loaf on his knee, wiping the crumbs off his hands. “Right,” he says. “They’re on the move, about six thousand of them – four thousand infantry, one thousand cavalry, and another thousand archers, as far as I could tell. As of last night they were camped a few miles upriver from Beruna, in the Vale of the White Bear – is it still called that, by the way?” He looks interrogatively at Tirian.
“The Vale of Bracken, now,” Tirian says. “It’s still the White Bear on some of the old maps.”
Kind Edmund shrugs. “Well, they’re there, ill luck for us. I got as close as I could, and from what I could find out they’re not entirely certain where we are, but they’re willing to pay gold to find out. They’re mixed Calormene and Narnian forces, with a Calormene commander, some tarkaan named Yasruddin; I don’t suppose you know him?”
“I don’t think so,” Tirian says after a moment’s thought. The name is halfway familiar, but that doesn’t mean anything; a lot of Calormene names sound alike.
Edmund shrugs again. “Worth a try. Anyway, he and his officers are holed up in some poor bastard’s manor house; whoever it is is probably playing fetch-and-carry for them, so we might be able to sneak someone in there if you think they’d be amenable, and probably even if they’re not.” He looks at Tirian again, waiting.
“It’s White Bear Hall,” Tirian says slowly. “But I think Lord and Lady Bracken must be in Cair Paravel – no, Lord Bracken’s been dead for almost five years now. It’s Lady Bracken you’d want, but she’ll be in Cair Paravel for Assembly this time of year.”
“But would she be amenable?” Queen Lucy prods.
“I’ve no idea,” Tirian admits. “I haven’t seen her in years, and we weren’t exactly in the same circles when I was still in Cair Paravel. Leo might know.”
“I’ll ask her,” the queen says.
“And I’ll see what I can do,” Edmund says, his back cracking as he stretches. “It wouldn’t be a bad idea to have ears in a noble’s house; it’d be better to have ears in Assembly, if your cousin has contacts there.”
Tirian nods a little, frowning. “Someone will talk,” he says. “If you’re counting on the Calormenes spending weeks or months trying to find us, someone will talk – one of ours, or some shepherd, some charcoal-burner – Ban or not, there are still those who live out here, where Cair Paravel can’t touch them.”
This time it’s the High King who answers. “I know,” he says. “I’m counting on it.
It took a few more minutes and several interrogative questions about Winter’s End from Queen Lucy before the High King and his siblings left, but as soon as they’re out of earshot Arnau comes over to the fire, his face creased in a deep frown. It’s a change from his usual scowl; there’s something worried about it this time. Tirian had seen him listening from the edge of the henge, his arms crossed over his chest as the dancers leapt and turned behind him, the drums pounding like a line of knights in full charge. He stays seated and looks up at the dwarf, feeling Eustace tense at his side
“The man who tried to kill you, Woodsman,” the dwarf says abruptly. “Show him to me.”
“He’s the king,” Eustace says, starting to rise. “You don’t give him orders –”
Tirian catches his sleeve to stop him. “Why?” he asks.
“Because I asked nicely.”
“You really didn’t –” Eustace says, stopping mid-sentence when Tirian stands up.
“All right.”
Eustace scrambles after him. Tirian sets the pace, knowing that Arnau is going to have to struggle to keep up, but doesn’t look back. If the dwarf really wants to come, he’ll have to come at Tirian’s pace, not his own. Even for a dwarf that doesn’t mean much, but some part of Tirian is feeling just slightly petty.
He slows when he reaches the edge of the old fort, trying to remember exactly which way he’d gone. Eventually he picks his way through the trees more by half-remembered sense than real memory, listening for the sound of running water and the gleam of moonlight off a stream, and finds the dead satyr where he’d left him.
Arnau kneels down beside him, balanced precariously on a mossy outcrop of rock, and frowns at his face. “Not one of mine,” he says at last, sounding relieved, and then his gaze goes to the arrow. He puts his hand out to touch it, then stops, fingers a bare breath from the shaft. “He brought this?”
Tirian nods, once.
“That’s one of Susan’s arrows,” Eustace says needlessly. “Where did it come from?”
“I’m sure she’s left any number of them as souvenirs for the Calormenes,” Tirian makes himself say. It’s true; that doesn’t mean he believes it of this one.
Arnau stands back up. “Her day, her hand,” he says, and Tirian feels a little frisson of nervous energy run down his spine. He knows as well as any other Narnian that in the country they claim Winter’s End is sacred to all four of the kings and queens of summer, but most especially to the Queen of Spring.
The dwarf looks down at the dead satyr, with his life’s blood spilled into the stream like the cattle that had gone to their deaths at the river this morning. “I suppose she got her sacrifice,” he says.
Even Eustace doesn’t say anything this time.
----------
Rahim Tarkaan first appears in Border Wars. The chapel in Caspian's castle appears in Our Impudent Crimes.
Part One 0 | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17
Part Two 00 | 000 | 18 | 19 | 20 | 21 | 22 | 23 | 24 | Interlude | 25 | 26 | 27 | 28 | 29 | 30 | 31
(no subject)
Date: 2011-08-24 11:30 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2011-08-26 03:50 am (UTC)