Disclaimer: I have no claim on this wonderful world. It is all Lewis' and whoever bought the rights most recently.
You can read this as a companion piece to "Of Cor and Aravis and Miscommunications" but it isn't necessary.
She calls him Cor in all but her deepest, most secret thoughts. In the throne room, in the passages, when speaking to her ladies-in-waiting. Only at night, when her too-active imagination pores over even the minutest of their interactions, does she call him anything else. More often than not in these quiet moments she does not call him anything, but sometimes she is jolted out of a reverie with the realization that she was thinking of him not as Cor but as Shasta.
Sometimes she dreams of him - good dreams where they understand each other perfectly; wonderful dreams when he takes her hand and pulls her to him, wrapping her up in his arms and holding her close; glorious dreams when he tilts her face up to his and -
Her imagination has no way of continuing the dream. She has never been kissed, and certainly not by Shasta. She lies awake, trying to fill in the gaps, frustrated with herself for even thinking this way when clearly he does not feel the same way.
After all, in everything but her deepest, most secret thoughts, all they ever do is argue.
He is Cor in all but his deepest, most secret thoughts. On the jousting field, in the throne room, with his father, even with Aravis. Only in his dreams and his diary is he Shasta.
In his diary he is Shasta - the scared boy who came to Anvard all those years ago. He writes out his hopes for his future reign and his furies over some blunder he made over some obscure rule some person forgot to tell him. The hesitation he cannot show in public is plain here.
In his dreams he is not hesitant. He is Shasta the man, not the boy. He is confident enough to take Aravis' soft hand in his, tug her to him, and tilt her head up just so -
But he has never kissed Aravis, and the dream always fades away without giving him the chance. It's never set in the palace; around them rise the rocks of the narrow desert oasis, and neither one knows that he is a prince - he's just a boy and she's just a girl and Rabadash is not behind them this time - and when he awakens, the pillow under Cor's head is always wet with tears for what could have been.
He loves his father and his brother, but he has known Aravis longer. She knows what the proverbs mean when he accidentally quotes one in front of all the courtiers.
They are his family, but she is familiar - the only one who, like him, knows and loves Calormen despite her own past in it. He'll always be shorter than Corin - living his formative years in poverty with Arsheesh has ensured that - but he's still taller than Aravis. She's a little slip of a thing, so short and slender and full of fierce energy and fire.
And he loves her, loves her with all he is, but clearly she doesn't feel that way, because it seems that all they do now is argue.
He lies awake, staring at a bas-relief carving of a stag on the ceiling above his bed. This morning he and Aravis had what feels like their 658th argument - I'm afraid it was more like a fight - just this year.
It was his fault; he knows that. She had been infuriatingly clever with her argument and he had had nothing to bolster his. In a fit of stupidity he resorted to insulting her Calormene-ness, which she rightfully called out as hypocritical. Aravis, in the heat of the moment, burst out that there were plenty of Archen noblemen who would be pleased to have an exotic wife. In the end they both lost their tempers and stormed away, giving each other the coldest of cold shoulders at supper.
He has a knot of worry in his stomach, now. Are there Archen noblemen who would like an exotic (as Aravis terms it) wife? The thought of Aravis as another man's wife is revolting to him. He thinks of her, coming to Anvard only once a year, a growing brood of children in tow, a rounding belly every year. He thinks of her, shut up in a castle in the Archen highlands, not a bit of Calormen surrounding her. He thinks of her, not allowed to have an opinion, merely a pretty item to grace a nobleman's halls. He thinks of her husband slapping her for the impertinence of the kind of argument she regularly has with him. Such a husband would never get to see the tenderness that Aravis can show when she makes up with Cor after an argument.
His covers fly off and his feet hit the floor. He will not see her so, if by some miracle he can prevent it. Far better to argue with her for the rest of his life, than to see her face bruised, or, worse yet, to see her cowed. He will be hanged before he sees her enter a marriage like that.
His guards are surprised to see him fly out of the room, in bare feet and a robe hastily wrapped around him, but if they look knowingly at each other after he turns the first corner of the corridor, he never finds out.
It was her fault; she knows that. She had been too caught up in winning the fight to see that while her argument was clever, he had facts on his side. When he insulted her for being Calormene, her stomach dropped and she knew he would never take a foreign wife; Archenland had her claws firmly in him already. She had burst out with some nonsensical comment that plenty of Archen lords would be glad to take her off his hands. In a fit of desperation that she had bared her deepest desires so completely she had stormed away, and could not look at him at supper.
Surely he doesn't believe her. Archen noblemen would not want to marry her - she's all prickles and thorns. But she's seen enough of the world to know that some men only see exotic when they look at her; they see a woman sultry and appealing. They do not want her soul.
And what of Cor, if she married some faceless lord? The thought of him as another woman's husband is revolting to her. But she realizes that her own lot would be far worse. She could come to Anvard only once a year, constantly pregnant, with a herd of whining and snotty brats behind her. She would be shut up in a cold stone castle, every bit of Calormen removed from her life and from her. Worse still, she would be expected to agree with her husband on everything - and while Shasta fights her on so much, he still expects her to have her own opinion. She knows a different man would beat her senseless for the impertinence she regularly shows him. And every day she thanks the Lion that it was Shasta: poor, lovely, kind Shasta that she met that night on the run.
If she leaves Anvard, she would miss the gratitude on his handsome face when she humbles herself after an argument, and even miss that feeling of loathing for herself that she gets whenever she sees that particular expression.
Her covers fly off and her feet hit the floor. She wraps herself up in a soft red silk robe - Shasta's present from last Christmas. Her feel slide into the embroidered slippers he gave her for her birthday. Armed with these bits of Calormen he somehow knew she needed, she slips out into the corridor.
Her guards are unsurprised to see her slip out of the room; she regularly leaves in the middle of the night to go to the armory. It is one of the places that smells like her brother, and like Cor. Tonight she is not going to the armory.
He is running down a small, disused corridor when he smacks into her - both in their robes, he in the bare feet he is always more comfortable in, she in her brocade slippers. He laughs in embarrassment and extends his hand to the girl on the floor. She takes it and he tugs her up. Something about it reminds her of her dreams and she shivers. He mistakes it for cold and pulls her to him, wrapping her up in his arms and holding her close.
He tells her he's so sorry, that he's been a fool and a sorry one at that; that he can't bear to see her marry one of those lords and would rather fight with her his whole life than be bored to tears with someone else.
It feels like a dream. So she does what dream Aravis does: she murmurs something like "my Shasta" and assures him, gently, that she does not think him a fool; that she is sorry, too; that she knows he would never hurt her and she loves him for it; that she would rather spend a lifetime making up after arguments than never having -
She is cut off mid-sentence by Shasta kissing her. It is painfully awkward, and neither one knows what to do with their lips - should they move or stay still? - but at last Cor pulls away and rests his forehead on hers.
"I wouldn't mind making up like that," he says, a little shyly.
"No," she breathes, "it's rather nice."
"If we got married it would be much more convenient."
"No sneaking around or running into each other in freezing corridors," she agrees.
He pulls her to him, wrapping her up in his arms and kissing the nape of her neck. She smiles, resting her hand on his, where it encircles her rounding stomach and their growing child.
She says it's a boy. Cor says he knows he's probably wrong, but it's going to be a girl. They'll name it for his grandfather, Ram, if it's a boy, and for his mother if it's a girl. She wants Calormen to have no legal claim on their child, and she's more than happy to give Shasta the family he never had growing up.
She sings to the child, old Calormene songs in the old Calormene tongue, and her husband, who was snatched away too soon to really know Archenland's lullabies, enlists Corin to teach him some.
They argue about almost all of it. Occasionally Cor stops and kisses her. They agree that they are happier arguing together than they would be any other way.
She is queen, a title so far from what she envisioned as a little girl. She has a husband who values her mind and her opinions. She has a child coming soon, with a future so much brighter than either of its parents could have wished.
She could not ask for more.