Inspired by Daughtry - Ghost of Me
Thought it was dead and buried,
Then it woke you up last night
You sounded so damn worried,
You've been tossing, turning, both ends burning
I want to put your mind at ease again
Make everything all right
Your imagination and emotions running wild
Fuelling my frustration
Like a fire burning, clock keeps turning
And I know it's getting underneath your skin
I try to tell you now
Don't look over your shoulder
'Cause that's just the ghost of me you're seeing in your dreams
Wait, there's no rhyme or reason
Sometimes there's no meaning in the visions when you're sleeping
Don't wake up and believe them
You're looking at the ghost of me
A/N: This is a beautiful song, and I suggest you listen to it whilst reading this. I don't own either the song or Narnia, by the way. They belong to Daughtry and C.S. Lewis respectively. Enjoy! :)
The dream was hazy at first. Blurred shapes whipped to and fro, eliciting sounds that, although muffled, were distinctly vicious. Colours mainly consisted of green, grey and red. Lots and lots of red. The scene was vaguely familiar, but he couldn't pinpoint how or why. Each time he tried, the thought danced out of his reach like a taunting butterfly.
He'd definitely been here before, he knew that much. The haste and frenzy that seemed to grip the figures as they moved was something he'd witnessed, first hand, many a time. If only he could remember where!
"Hello, brother."
That voice… he'd heard it nearly every day for so many years that it was carved into his brain like an epitaph on a gravestone. He turned around, struggling as though immersed in treacle. Proud, strong and just, Edmund gazed at him with something unreadable in his dark eyes.
"Ed? Oh, Ed! Thank goodness you're here!" he cried. He wanted to fling his arms around his younger brother, but something in the boy's expression held him in place.
"Where are we, Ed?" he asked, looking around at the swirling confusion once more.
"We're in Narnia, Pete." A very unnerving - almost cruel - smile tugged at one corner of Edmund's mouth.
Narnia! How could he have forgotten? Wait, that wasn't possible. They'd left Narnia almost two months ago – quite by accident. They had tumbled out of the wardrobe and landed in a heap in the Professor's spare room, as though not one second of their time in Narnia had ever occurred. Life was back to normal. Well, physically. All four of the Pevensie children remained wrapped up in idle daydreams of the magical land they had stumbled across, saved, and ruled for fifteen long years. Lucy still cried, almost every night, with the burden of her longing to be with Mr. Tumnus, the Beavers and various other creatures she had befriended. Not to mention Aslan, the Great Lion himself, who she loved so much.
The background began to focus and sharpen. It gradually became clear that Peter and Edmund were stood in the middle of a battlefield. Something invisible punched Peter in the gut: this wasn't just any battlefield. It was the setting of his first ever battle; Beruna, where Aslan had defeated the White Witch… and Edmund had come so close to dying.
"Why -?"
Before he could ask whatever he'd been about to ask, Edmund lifted a long, thin and tremendously pale finger to his lips. The expression in his eyes gnawed at Peter's heart. He hadn't seen a look so sinister and calculating on Edmund's face since…
Then he saw her; tall, intimidating and so deceptively beautiful that it made Peter nauseous just to look at her. She wore that same dress - the one adorned with Aslan's magnificent mane like some crude trophy. Her fingers were closed tightly around her devastating wand; she wielded her sword like a deadly ballerina.
"Ed, look out!"
But his warning was in vain. Edmund's features twisted into a mocking smile as Jadis approached him from behind. She rested one white, bony hand on his shoulder and leaned forward to whisper in his ear.
"Do it, Son of Adam," she crooned. Peter shuddered; her voice was like ice itself: slippery, smooth and dangerous. "Do it, and you shall be my King."
Peter was about to cry out again, but words failed to reach his mouth. They stuck fast in his dry throat as Edmund raised the sword he previously held at his side.
"You shall no longer rule over me, dear brother," he said softly. His eyes burned with lethal malice whilst that same sickening smile caressed his handsome face. His eyes were no longer a distinct chocolate brown, but liquid black that spilled over and slithered down his cheeks like tears of ink. His voice was resonant, inescapable and overwhelmingly terrifying. It brought Peter involuntarily to his knees, trembling and pleading silently.
Ed, no, please…
"From now on, I shall be the King I deserve to be."
Peter's head reverberated with merciless, sardonic laughter as the sword came slashing down.
"Ed, no!"
The scream ripped painfully up his throat as his eyes flew open. Pure fear had jerked him upright, but he flopped back, useless as a ragdoll, onto the pillows. He was on the brink of hyperventilating and his skin was pyretic, although a chilling sweat coated him all over. The room was dark; the sheets pooled around him were soaked through, as was his nightshirt. The fabric chafed and irritated him as he wrapped his arms around his knees, but he barely noticed. His body convulsed and his heart palpitated so that he thought it might burst right out of his heaving chest. He buried his face in his knees, struggling in vain to muffle the sobs that wracked his strong frame.
He was vaguely aware of rustling and several thumps somewhere to his right. Then he was encased in warmth and surrounded by a solid body. A nightshirt akin to his own rubbed against his cheek; beneath that, a steady heartbeat was detectable through the tumult of his own breathing. There was a voice: the same voice he had just heard inside his mind. He cringed away at first, but the words were quiet and soothing, reaching him as though across a vast distance.
"Hush, Peter. It's all right, I'm here. Everything's all right. Hush, now…"
Edmund was shocked at the state of his older brother. Peter had always been the strong one, the one always in control of his emotions. Edmund had barely ever seen him cry; except that one time, back in London, when Peter had shut himself in their shared bedroom, away from the rest of the family. Edmund had gone up the stairs to comfort him, but had been overcome with helplessness at the sight of the distraught, foetal form on the bed. He had crept away unnoticed, and worried himself into a frenzy over his brother's emotional stability. He had never asked what had gotten Peter so wound up; he didn't want to, either. He'd rather the flawless image he held of his brother remain untainted, so he proceeded to forget it ever happened.
That had been years ago. Peter was a King now: High King Peter the Magnificent. He was radiant, steadfastly, incandescent. He never, ever cried.
Peter lifted his tear-stained face; the weak glow of a single dying candle cast feeble light upon his brother's porcelain skin. Peter searched deep into the depths of his eyes, unsure of what he was hunting for. He needed reassurance that there was nothing bitter, cruel or brutal there. He needed proof that Edmund remained reformed, that he hadn't returned to the dark side. His desperate exploration only illuminated concern and affection in chocolate brown eyes, but the tingling wash of relief was meagre.
"Do you want to tell me about it?" Edmund murmured into damp, rumpled hair.
Peter sniffed. "Not r-really."
Edmund stiffened. The hitch in the blonde's voice answered the question as though his thoughts had been plainly spelled out.
When Edmund spoke, his voice was raw and strained. "You dreamed about her, didn't you?" He still wasn't comfortable with releasing her name into the air: it was poisonous.
Peter shook his head against Edmund's chest. There was a long pause, as if he were having an internal debate, and then Edmund felt him nod.
"I dreamed that you were… that you still…" Words trailed off into a pathetic hiccup.
"Oh, Peter…" Edmund tightened his arms around his brother's trembling shoulders, resting his cheek on top of his head. "I thought we'd gotten past this."
"I-I know," Peter gulped. He bunched Edmund's nightshirt in both fists and tried to stop them from shaking. "I just can't help thinking that… maybe…"
"No!" Edmund cried, too loudly: Peter jumped and shrank back from the fire that blazed inside the scrawny body pressed against his own, as though the flames could jump across and burn him. Edmund closed his eyes against his brother's fearful face. He wanted to grab Peter, shake him, compel him into believing that part of him was dead and buried. But being rough wouldn't solve anything.
"I'm sorry," he said, softly this time. "I just want to make everything all right again. I want to forget about her."
"But, Ed, you have no idea how much the thought of you siding with that… that… demon has haunted me ever since we first went to Narnia. I can't forget how…" his tremulous voice dropped to a breathy whisper, "...how she almost made me lose you."
Emotion swelled inside the brunette, but he fought it back before the dam could break. "It's all in the past now, Peter." He spoke partly to convince himself. "Please, don't be afraid of me. I don't want you to be afraid."
Shakily, Peter reached up and lay his hand on the side of his brother's face; delicately, barely touching the skin. He didn't speak; his blue eyes brimmed with more feelings than he could possibly express through words. Salt water dried on his soft, smooth cheeks. Edmund gently trailed his finger along the tracks, brushing them away. Tears filled his own eyes and, when they finally escaped, the relief that washed through Peter almost made him collapse. They were translucent, fragile droplets of sorrow: nothing like the aberrant, barbaric tears of midnight malice that had marred his pale face in the dream – the nightmare.
"There's no meaning in dreams, my brother. If there were, what would that mean for reality?"
"Oh, Ed…" His voice, so full of untold affection and contrite apology, tugged at Peter's heartstrings. How could he have ever doubted his wonderful brother? "I'm so glad you're here, Ed. I -"
"Sshh," Edmund murmured, brushing the softest of kisses across his brother's clammy forehead. "You don't have to tell me, I understand."
The two brothers held each other for an impossibly long time, although the clock only ticked through seven lulling minutes. Peter found himself willing to accept the sincere words spoken by his brother: the boy was prudent for his age, having spent fifteen years as King Edmund the Just, ruling by Peter's side as his most trusted advisor. England could never alter the trust Peter had in him.
Edmund was relieved to feel Peter's tense body go limp in his arms. They were both weak with fatigue (the clock had barely struck three), and drained from the emotional outpour. Particularly Peter: he leaned heavily against Edmund's chest, inhaling his familiar, calming scent. The nightmare was already fading into a muzzy fog, although the frightening, liquid black tears still remained prominent in his mind. He had to check, just one more time. When he did, Edmund met him with a tired – but soft and reassuring – smile. His eyes twinkled like laughing stars.
There was no room for any more qualms.
"Don't look over your shoulder, Peter. The true me is here, right beside you."
There was a pause while Peter gathered his thoughts. "Ed?"
"Yes?"
"Would you believe me if I said I never doubted you?"
Edmund chuckled and ruffled his hair. "If that's what you want me to believe, dear brother, than I shall believe it."
He gave Peter one last squeeze, then slipped off the bed to return to his own. The moist sheets were only a slight bother to Peter – they could easily be sorted in the morning. He settled contentedly back against the pillows, smiling up at the ceiling.
"Oh, and Ed?"
"Mmm?"
"I never ruled over you; you were never the lesser King."
"Goodnight, Peter." There was a definite grin in Edmund's voice, although it was thick with weariness.
You'll never come between us, Witch, was Peter's last thought before he slipped into a dark and dreamless pool.