Disclaimer: I don't own anything you recognize.
Also, to those who commented that the whole fic was in code, thank you. I hope this has rectified the problem. Please feel free to inform me of anymore.
There were days when Lune was a younger man.
There were days when Lune was a younger man; his hair was lighter, his muscles held more shape. There were days when Lune was a young, inexperienced warrior; days when being King meant listening to your late father's advisors and your late mother's council.
Lune has lost much since his younger days. His father fell when he was the tender age of 21; a man by all standards, but wisdom can only come with age. He ascends the throne and takes a young blushing bride. She is 16 and all golden hair and innumerable freckles. Her eyes are a hazel gold and some days she reminds him of the sun.
His wife and mother get along very well, It is a smooth transition from her home to the arms of this older, loving woman with faded brown curls and influenza paled eyes that crinkle near the edges when she smiles.
Lune doesn't lose his mother to influenza, like his father, but to a bloody coup. The political factions are vying for a different king, one with stronger ties to Calormen. He loses his mother the night he loses his eldest son. She had been holding the child, whispering tales to him, in the language of her Narnian grandmother. The line of Helen and Frank didn't end with the stone table, weak and diluted as it may be.
Motherless and sonless, Lune is nothing but a twisted ball of shattered rage and nerves. His wife's elder brothers accompany him on the sail down towards the Calormen ship that has stolen his son. The tall golden twins fight like mad among Lune's other men. Col finds the captain first and takes a blade to the shoulder for his troubles. Colin dispatches the captain, searches the cabin, bleeding brother in arms and finds it empty. A child's blanket lies in the corner, along with a leather water skin and satchel. Colin recognizes it as a friend's apparel, and curses the day the man was born. Little does Colin know that this Calormen half-breed is yet a man of honor, and would die for country and King. A thousand years or more hence, his descendant will push a man into a stable and step out into Aslan's land.
Lune's wife isn't one to whimper and worry in the dark, but she's a young 18 with a screaming newborn and a political schism on her hands. Frazzled and at whit's end, she preforms a Dowager Queen's funeral and a bloodless purge of her husband's court. Screaming baby at her hip, she makes quick and measured decisions which both secure Lune's throne and make her enemies for the future. Lune returns, prisoners at hand, and the purge continues, securing him the throne and alliances through marriage. Colin is married off quickly and soundlessly to the sister of the Calormen half-breed. Their marriage is tense, but soon gives way to childhood memories and lover's quarrels and a mess of five sons and three daughters clamoring and squalling through a stone cottage on a farm.
After several years and happenings, Lune quietly asks if she would like another child. They begin to try, and struggle to conceive. Carrying the twins was hard, but this is difficult to and at seven, Corin loses his mother to a younger sister, with wispy brown hair and blue skin.
Lune raises his son, alone.
In between these seven years, Narnia fell, the witch was vanquished and that blasted cold stream that came down from the Narnian coast suddenly stopped. Lune is thankful for the warmer weather, even if it does begin to play havoc on the seasonal crops. But it's a blessing in disguise and it brings in a longer growing season and new allies.
When the children come, they are young and their voices sound strange folded around courtly words. The creatures and familiar figures in their retinue all sound different still. There is some slight saber rattling as to Helen and Frank's descendants and minor lords and ladies who feel that they have a blood right to the Narnian throne.
His wife, who was still with him at the time calms the chatter to a dull buzz, and reminds the country subtly, of the political powerhouse that she can be; this lithe, subtle young woman with the silver tongue and golden hair. The children return often, and in some ways, Lune and Helen; for that is her name, mold them. Sometimes they all come and once, after a hard learned lesson, only three can come at a time. Susan makes the trip often; Helen may be six years her senior, but that doesn't change the bond that the young women share.
Lune and Helen watch Susan grow. She becomes a woman, who becomes his friend, who becomes an aunt to his son, and an advisor to his throne and an ally and a best friend to his queen. Lucy haunts the palace sometimes, but she is much more of a wild thing than Susan, and sometimes the age between her and Helen is just to great a thing to manage, and Lucy ends up running through the halls with Corin instead.
Often times gold and black can be seen wandering through the castle halls at night, giggling and whispering. Lune will sometimes hear his name mentioned with a small thrill of horror running down his spine. Breakfast in the morning is an interesting affair. Lune eats, face flushed red as the girls do more giggling than eating. Lune of course must be a gentleman and finish his wife's meal, Corin following his father's example. However the difference between a growing boy and a fully-grown man is a slowly expanding waistline. Lune begins to look more like his with the passing seasons.
The days are long past when Lune is surprised that the Queen Susan roams the halls, but there is a day, when she perhaps sixteen, that Peridan begins to notice that the young Queen Susan is no longer a girl. This leaves Lune feeling defensive and gives him a shock of horror. Peter, Edmund and Lune begin to understand each other a smidgen better after that, and the young Lord Peridan finds himself oddly excluded from events when Susan comes to call.
She was always a lovely child with large grey eyes and midnight black hair and pale skin. But then Susan begins to fill out. The elven thin wrists and awkward frame with the too large mouth and flat chest and gangly arms and legs are gone. She becomes smooth curves and tiny, delicate wrists and her face becomes a dynamic of full lips on high cheekbones and large eyes and lashes. The hooked nose that Lucy shares breaks the illusion in its childlike definition. Innocence lurks too often behind the large grey eyes.
The Narnians begin to travel and Susan comes back less, and her innocence is a bit less every time behind guarded eyes. She becomes like Edmund, for both are skilled diplomats and soon Lune begins to heed her advice for her eagle like intellect.
Then Helen dies in childbirth, and he and Corin are alone.
Susan comes soon after, and she often stays for longer periods of time. She is a fully-fledged woman, and it's been some time since she was free to come and visit her friend. She and Lune grieve together, and she is a subtle presence in the exterior, cleaning and directing and putting Corin to sleep at night. They don't talk often, and soon she must leave again for a few months, but as Lune soon learns, as the others fade, Susan always, always comes back.
She's there when Corin gets angry and beats on everything that he sees. She's there when Lune doesn't know what to do and has trouble balancing parts of the treasury. And she's there when some of the Narnian citizens living in Anvard still demand more freedoms. A few years later Corin is older and Susan begins to wean her visits off again. More and more suitors have come calling for her hand. There can be months in between her visits. But Lune, dare he admit, might miss her. Using Corin as an excuse, he visits them as he rarely does in Narnia. She is a proud and wild Queen, and he sees her as she is, outside of his home in her element, surrounded by her people. She's wilder than he thought.
Susan climbs trees and jumps into rivers, shoots a bow and arrow, and once, just this once, kills a man. They are isolated from Anvard and an assassination attempt is made on Corin's life. Susan kills the man with Corin's toy sword. She has gone to wish him a good night. But the man is there and the small device with its blunted edges does the job. Susan never kills again. But she thinks of Corin as she drives the blade through the man's heart. The would be assassin must not have known that she was there, for her to get the drop on him. But afterwards in her heart of hearts, Susan swears to herself that no one will ever hurt her child. Corin is Helen's child, but sadly, Susan's motives have faded and she fights less for Helen's memory and more now for Lune, and for Corin. Susan has fought for Helen's memory and her family.
This commotion changes things, but she and Lune don't have time to truly discuss it. They argue, again. But Lune leaves in the face of the oncoming Calormen delegation, and Susan has a bitter taste in her mouth from that visit.
Rabidash appears. He is charming, and beguiling. He is handsome to say the least. He is a year her younger. Rabadash is quick with a scimitar and smooth with his speech. He tells her of Calormen culture and brings her jewels and dresses. Lucy hates him from the start. Susan on the other hand thinks of Colin's wife and the Calormen style dresses she wears, in her mother's memory. Susan puts a dress aside for Colin's wife.
A month passes, and she and Edmund visit Anvard. Susan goes on a head as she has a habit of doing. Lune and she make up, and for the first time in some time, Lune feels properly old. He is an aging man, eleven years Susan's senior, but he thinks that even with his father's expanding girth he could give Rabadash and Rabadash's purple tights a proper thrashing is he had the chance. Lune has come to the conclusion that he may be properly in love with Susan Pevensie.
That night late, by the fire, they talk and Susan sit's in Helen's chair and it makes his heart ache a bit. But this time, Lune properly listens to Susan. She talks about all the things that Helen already knew. She talks about England and her parents, and all the things that she keeps close to her chest, and her heart.
Edmund takes Lune aside before he leaves, and looks to him as a man and not a child; Edmund is a sovereign, and a slightly terrifying one at that. This deadly young man with eartheal eyes plainly asks Lune if he is in love with his elder sister. Lune confides that he may be, and Edmund ventures to Calormen with this in mind.
But then Susan is gone, and Corin with her. (Susan won that argument.) And then things rush in, and a battle happens and Lune finds both his sons and he sees Alsan and gives Rabadash a proper thrashing, and adopts a daughter into his midst. There is a feast, and the King Peter comes home from the giants, Lune has Edmund's unspoken blessing, he just needs Peter's and everything is rushing. Lune doesn't find a minute alone with her majesty, and Edmund positions himself in Lune's way every time he tries.
Annoyance, and frustration aside, he almost has time to declare himself, but not properly when he bumps into Susan in the hall. She has gotten Cor settled, and stopped an argument between the two boys. Corin is frustrated, and is no longer the center of attention. As Susan is recounting this, she muses aloud what it will be like to have another son. Lune's heart stops. And she pauses midsentence as she notices his gaping expression at her. She meant what it would be like for Lune to have another son, and Helen hangs unspoken, like a ghost between them.
The Narnian retinue leaves, and Susan promises to return as soon as she can, she has to see to Peter first. Little does she know of Lune's intent to go after her as soon as everything is as settled as it can be. Lune is preparing his horse to leave for Narnia when he gets the message. There gone; all of them. Anvard searches for weeks. The castle is scoured top to bottom for clues, and Peter has a half finished speech written down granting Lune Susan's hand, if she should wish the union. All this, before Lune has even gone to ask.
Lune searches until he is ragged, and he loses weight and gains muscle until he begins to look gaunt. Archenland and Narnia grieve. Corin loses a mother and Cor and Aravis are clawing to adjust to life in Archenlandish court amidst it all.
Aravis becomes a lady, and Corin becomes a great man under his memories of Edmund, and Peter's care. Cor becomes a humble man in a strange land and grows into a wise lord. Lune takes joy in his new family, and grieves the loss of an old. Colin's wife receives a deep purple Calormen style dress, and becomes a bit of a mentor for Aravis, and Cor meets his cousins. Colin learns the story of the strange knight's selfless death to save Cor's life and finally forgives his friend. And the relationship between Lune and Peredin begins to open up again and Peredin finally begins to understand the true heart of the Gentle Queen. The days are passed when Lune was a younger man.