Disclaimer: I do not own Narnia or anything in Narnia except maybe Rachelle. )
Please R&R!!
He could still hear her voice, still feel her pain in that final breath.
"Don't worry about me...it's...alright. Just look after..."
Then she spoke no more and his world ended.
Caspian stood at his window, not seeing the rain falling outside, not feeling the draft that blew in, fluttering the curtains. Not hearing the servant knock at the door and enter when he did not respond.
"My leige?"
It was Rachelle. Rachelle, who had wiped the sweat from his beloved's forehead as she gasped in pain. Rachelle, who had faithfully served his queen for all these years.
Suddenly he turned to face the girl.
"My lord, I -"
"Go," he said harshly. "Go, and don't come back!"
Her pretty face paled and she dropped a trembling curtsy. "Y-yes, Your Majesty."
He had laughed in delight when she told him that she would stay, stay here with him forever and be his queen.
"But what of the others?" He had asked, growing more serious after twirling her around in the air in his joy. "Will they stay as well? Narnia will not be the same without them."
Sadly, she had shook her head and raised her beautiful blue eyes to meet his. "No," she had said softly. "They will not stay."
"Then why will you not go with them? I mean...I want you to stay. But can they live without you?" His eyes had searched hers desperately.
Then she had looked down, stepped away from his embrace. "We've talked it over," she told him absently. "I'm not sure that Lucy and Ed understand, but they will...someday."
Unable to remain contained in stone walls, he strode briskly out onto his balcony - their balcony. Susan's and his.
Not caring about the rain that poured over his face, soaking his clothes and puddling around his feet, he simply stood and gazed up into the cloudy sky.
His hands clenched and unclenched as if they had a mind of their own and he gritted his teeth as the memories overwhelmed him and the tears mixed with the rain in a steady downpour.
"Why?"
He whispered it, shouted it, screamed it.
Why?
It was a question for which there was no answer.
The day she had told him she was pregnant was the happiest day of his life, besides their wedding day.
"You shall have an heir," she had said, her eyes glowing. "Well, if it's a boy."
Gently, he had picked her up in his arms, holding her. "Much more than that," he had whispered to her, as if this news was so precious that letting the world know would cause it to be false, just a horrible joke. "We will have a child." Then he had to shout it. "We will have a child!"
And she had laughed at him, then with him as he began to laugh as well.
He had thought they should throw a feast over such an announcement, but she had dissuaded him, assuring him that they could have many more feasts when the baby was born.
"It shall be as you say," he had agreed, sure that everything in the world was now perfect.
And it was.
His memory served him well.
It had been a day much like this and he had been out on a hunt when a courier - a centaur - had galloped up, panting heavily.
"Sire," the noble beast had said, once he caught his breath. "Sire, the queen. The child is coming now, Sire."
All he could remember thinking as he urged his horse home was that he was a father, that finally after all these months of waiting, he, Caspian the Tenth, was a father. He rushed into Susan's chambers with a smile on his lips and joy in his heart.
Until.
Until he saw the blood soaked sheets, the maids hurrying in and out frantically, wringing their hands as they brought various pitchers of this or packages of that. Until he saw her too-still form, her chest heaving with each breath, the sweat glistening on her forehead.
"Your Majesty, you have a healthy daughter," one of the maids tried to tell him, but he heard nothing.
He fell on his knees beside her bed, one hand instinctively stroking her silky black hair, the other finding her hands and clasping them as if holding her would make her well again.
"Caspian," she said in a weak, breathless voice that made his stomach turn inside out.
He turned to the nearest maid, not letting go of Susan's hand. "Please, help her!" he had pleaded, begged.
The maid's eyes darted about nervously. "There is nothing to be done, Sire," she had said, "The labor was too much."
No.
Caspian turned back to his queen and buried his face in her hair as if that alone would make this awful truth disappear.
"Susan," he breathed, "My dear, sweet Susan..."
Then she had shifted, moving as if to get up. He looked at her, wondered if she could possibly be well. Instead, she simply raised one hand to stroke his face gently, her eyes pouring immortal love.
"Don't worry about me," she whispered then, fading. "It's alright. Just look after..."
Her body shuddered as if with sudden cold. A strange light came to her eyes.
"Love you..." she breathed.
Then she was gone.
There on the balcony in the rain, he collapsed to his knees, grief finally overtaking him. His sobs shook his entire body, each cry feeling like his heart had been wrenched out and torn to pieces.
He couldn't go on now - not without her at his side to chastise him when he needed chastising, comfort him when he needed comforting, encourage him when he needed encouraging. How could he ever learn to love again when she had captured his heart?
No, it was clear now that they had taken it too far. Susan should never have stayed in Narnia - he knew that no matter how much he would have missed her when she went to her home, he would still know that she was alive and well. Anything would have been better than this.
Anything.
He could almost hear the great Lion's voice in his head now as he wished for the impossible.
"What's done is done."
Finally exhausted from sorrow, he sat back and looked again at the sky.
"What have I done?" he asked himself, quietly. "Whatever have I done?"