Here is the first chapter of my new story. Since I have now finished writing I'm Not Holding Your Hand, I decided that I needed another multi-chapter story to write. This idea has been floating around in my head for a while, so I thought I would write it and also it knocks of one Caspian&Edmund (Friendship for this one!) story off of my poll which leaves me with 8 to write instead of nine.
Here it is anyway. I hope you like it :)
A full year had passed since Caspian had become King of Narnia and succeeded in taking the throne from Miraz with the help of the Pevensie's. In that past year, Narnia had returned to what it had been before the Telmarines invasion of Narnia and there was – in almost all of Narnia at least – complete peace.
The people of Narnia were all happy, the army were happy, Caspian's council (that mainly consisted of Reepicheep, Trufflehunter and Trumpkin,) were happy. But Caspian himself was lonely.
He was missing the friendship he had formed with the Pevensie's and constantly wished to see them again. Not being able to focus on any work, Caspian explained to Doctor Cornelius where he was off to and left the castle grounds with his sword and Queen Susan's horn as he set out to his destination.
It took him a while to reach it, however when he finally did, he looked on at it in remembrance of the year past.
Aslan's How had been slightly destroyed in the battle with the Telmarines, but Caspian had done his best to rebuild the parts that he could and it now did look a little more like it had when he had first set his eyes on it. Dismounting, he walked inside of the How and lit a torch to light his way through it. The pictures carved out on the walls meant a lot more to him now and he could see something else in them than just the Kings and Queens of Old. It just made him glad to have met them in their true form from the land in which they had come from.
Looking up at the large carving of Aslan, Caspian raised Susan's horn to his lips. He was well aware of the risk he was taking, attempting to summon the Kings and Queens of Old when there was no problem in Narnia that required their presence. He knew this.
But it didn't have to stop him from trying at least.
Gently blowing on the horn, the King awaited for any form of action to show that his attempt at summoning back the Pevensie's had succeeded. Suddenly, Caspian didn't know quite what was happening when the structure around him began to crumble. He didn't even have chance to move when suddenly he was no longer in Narnia.
Blinking, the King looked at his new surroundings. The tunnel was long and dark. Only a few people stood around, but Caspian recognised none of them as he studied his new surroundings. Eventually he spotted that some people were walking away from the concrete platform that he currently stood on and so decided to follow them out.
The sunlight was blinding as Caspian exited the underground station (that that he knew its proper name) and looked around at the world. He could only assume that he had somehow left Narnia and ended up here.
Confused as to his location, Caspian began to walk around slowly, taking in everything. People were staring at him, that he managed to pick up on, but then who could blame them when you are looking at someone dressed like an idiot - well for the times anyway.
Edmund and Peter had simply gone out shopping for a birthday present for Lucy that Saturday morning and had returned to their boarding school with laughter and smiles until they noticed something rather strange.
A boy in strange clothing stood by the gate, looking inwards at the school, with a bunch of boys surrounding him from the inside of the gate. Sending a glance to each other, they started to walk forward, slightly quizzical looks reflecting off of their faces as they came to a slow halt at the gateway.
"Don't you have anything better to do?" Peter enquired as he recognised the group of bullies from the year below him and above Edmund. Most people in their school (in the years below at least,) knew not to challenge Peter and only a few boys in the blonde's year had the nerve to dare do so. But if you challenged one Pevensie, you would more than likely end up fighting against two.
The boys just started talking and walked off past the pair and out of the school grounds. Edmund's eyes reflected that quizzical look as he looked at the other boy, that was until he saw the face of the boy and recognised who it was. He nudged Peter in the arm and his older brother looked over in the direction that he had been looking in. The black haired Pevensie brother could only hope that the elder had made the same realisation.
"Caspian."
As the three of them walked through the school grounds, every so often they would meet at least one person who would laugh at Caspian's appearance like the people in town had done earlier.
"Why are they laughing?" The King asked as he stopped walking and looked over his shoulder at the group of boys they had just passed.
"Well you aren't really dressed suitably for our time, Caspian." Peter replied before he continued walking.
"But this is fine in Narnia." Caspian commented and Edmund chuckled slightly.
"But that's just it Caspian," He answered as he began to walk again, leading Caspian on with him, "This isn't Narnia."
"He's our cousin, Sir." Peter had told their principal when he tried to explain Caspian's sudden presence. The man hadn't been overly happy with the sudden arrival of course, but with a bit of promising that Caspian would work as hard as he could to get grades like Peter and Edmund as well as catching up from what would have been missed from the start of the term.
Now, as they sat in their room, Edmund tried to help Caspian get the hang of the part of History that they were studying.
"But they've completely missed out your Golden Age!" Caspian commented as Edmund tried to explain about the Tudors to the best of his ability. It was a becoming more of a struggle than explaining History to Lucy when he tried to help her.
"No, we didn't have a Golden Age here, that's solely in Narnian History."
Peter was just struggling not to laugh as he tried to adjust some of his and Edmund's clothes to fit Caspian until they had a chance to return to town and go shopping next weekend. That was if Caspian was going to stay permanently: neither of them had actually asked before enrolling him in their school and moving him into their room – they had simply assumed such.
"So how long are you staying for?" Peter asked finally, causing both his younger brother and the Narnian King to look over at him.
"As long as I can," Caspian replied, "Why do you want me to go?"
"No," Both Peter and Edmund said at the same time before Peter continued solely, "No, I was just thinking that we've signed you up for life here without even asking if you were staying."
"Well it's not like I know how to get back." Caspian mumbled.
"Why?" Edmund asked, "How did you get here?"
"I was trying to use Susan's horn to summon all of you back to Narnia." Caspian replied after a moment, unsure whether he had actually wanted to admit that.
"What! Why were you trying to do that?" Peter asked the king, slightly annoyed. On top of that, Aslan had told him that he couldn't return to Narnia, so it would have meant Edmund going and not him.
"I was lonely and I just wanted to see you all again."
"Yeah, well if you've forgotten Su and I aren't allowed back and I am trying to focus on my school work, Caspian. We aren't available at your beck and call, even if you are the current King of Narnia," Peter replied before standing up and heading out of their room, calling back to Edmund, "I'm going to join the others and play cricket."
"Will he-" Caspian started, but Edmund cut him off.
"He'll be fine. He'll vent his anger playing cricket and in the morning he'll be offering you a tour of the school."
"If you're sure. I don't want to come between the two of you," Caspian added, "I guess I should have thought about all of this before trying to call you back to Narnia."
"It's alright really," Edmund explained, "Now, list of Kings again – without the Narnian ones!"
When Caspian was woken by Edmund early the next morning, he was almost shocked to see the Just King until he remembered that he wasn't in Narnia and was meant to be living life like Edmund and Peter.
"You better get up," Peter's voice rang out, "You still have to come on my tour of the school and breakfast and a bit less than an hour to do so."
"Really?"
"Yes now come on," Peter replied as he threw Caspian a set of the school's uniform, "You can't sleep all day like you can back home."
"If by home he means Narnia," Edmund just nodded to Caspian's words, "Then I don't get any sleep there either." The black haired Pevensie just couldn't help, but chuckle slightly as Caspian climbed out of bed and got ready for the day ahead while Edmund just continued reading at his desk for the time being. When Caspian was ready, the three headed down to breakfast.
Peter used the time while they were sat together to tell Caspian about their school, choosing not to sit with his friends like usual this morning. Edmund nibbled away at his toast while he listened to what Peter was telling Caspian, who was obviously only taking some of it in going by the slightly confused look on his face.
"Pete, he'll be with me all day, I'll make sure he's alright," Peter turned to look at his younger brother and gave him a serious glare, "I won't let him out of my sight."
"Keep him out of trouble as well, okay Ed?" Peter replied as he stood up to head to class with his friends.
"You can count on me, Sir." Edmund answered with a smile as his brother smiled back before walking off with his friends. Caspian watched the High King leave before turning back to face Edmund.
"Where are we going now then?" The Narnian King asked as Edmund stood up from the table.
"History," The youngest Pevensie brother answered as they started walking, "And try to remember that Narnia doesn't exist in our worlds history."
History had been passing relatively well, that was until Caspian had been asked a question by the teacher and Edmund knew that he hadn't been able to tell Caspian anything about this topic yet and had begun to regret it when the King hadn't been able to answer the question.
At least, not the question that he was asked.
"But if you were going to try and take that castle, you could use the Centaurs and the Minotaurs to force your way in. Griffins would be helpful too and I'm sure Reep-" Edmund could see the face of their teacher turning in confusion and he could hear members of their class attempting to avoid laughing at his supposed 'cousin.'
"Ignore him," Edmund cut in quickly, cutting off Caspian's next sentence which he was sure would have involved Reepicheap, "He reads a lot of books."
"Am I right in believing that this is your cousin?" The teacher asked as he looked between Edmund and Caspian.
"Yes, Sir." Edmund replied before some members of the class started to make comments that Edmund was ignoring to the best of his ability, although they were mainly questioning his so called cousin.
"All right, everyone settle down!" The teacher instructed before turning to Caspian, "I would revise your History instead of reading those books if I was you."
"I don't get it," Caspian told Edmund as they left History, "I know all of the History that there is to know and that was a really good attack plan for that castle."
"I know that Caspian," Edmund answered, "I was thinking the same, but you have to try and put Narnia out of your mind. You're here in England now and it's hard, but you have to try and live like Narnia doesn't exist or you make yourself an easy target."
"Easy target for what?" Caspian asked curiously, but Edmund didn't get a chance to answer as a group of boys that he easily recognised, called, walked around the corner of the building towards them.
"How's the battle plan coming on, Pevensie?" Their leader asked, his question directed at Caspian and Edmund took in a breath as he feared Caspian's answer.
"Better than yours." Caspian replied and Edmund could only look on in shock at how virtually perfect Caspian's reply had been. Maybe he had been wrong after all. But after a short moment, Edmund knew that he had thought wrong and allowed his mind to fall into delusion for a moment.
One second it was just a normal conversation and the next a clash site.
My internet is terrible at the moment. Apparently the weather had knocked something so our connection is on and off. I'm going to update The Just tomorrow and hopefully this one beginning/mid of next week – internet permitting! We've been assured it will be properly fixed my next Wednesday or Thursday. Anyway I hope you all enjoyed this, thanks for reading :)