AN: This fanfic takes place after "Susan's Secret" and before "The Susan Code" in it, Susan decides to go looking for Peter's past a year after the railway crash. She will meet the people he used to know before he was a pevensie. (Other than Gwen, cuz she died before Susan was even born). I hope you like it.

Laughter fills the air. It's a Royal Narnian hunting party. The High King Peter rides out in the front on his tall mount. He stops suddenly and stretches out his arm. A golden-eyed brown-feathered falcon flies to him and lands on the outstretched arm.

"There is good hunting ahead, your majesty." The Falcon tells him.

Queen Lucy and King Edmund both, tighten the grip on their bow and arrows and grin. They ride ahead leaving High king Peter and Queen Susan behind.

Peter gets off his horse and walks into a green thicket.

"Peter?" Susan calls after him. "Where are you going?" He doesn't answer so she sighs and gets off her horse to follow him.

"Peter?" She calls as she pushes her way through the thicket. "Peter? where are you?" After pushing for a while, she finds that she's in a clearing where the bushes have parted and the grass is both lighter and shorter.

Peter is standing in the middle of the clearing. Susan goes over to him. She opens her mouth to speak but nothing comes out so she closes it again. He leans forward and kisses her and she kisses him back. Because their heads are titled, their crowns fall off. The soft grass muffles the sound of Peter's crown crashing to the ground but can do nothing about the pinging sound Susan's crown makes as it strikes against his, hitting the ground a few seconds later.

"I love you." Susan whispers as Peter slips his arms around her waist.

"Do you?" He asks.

"Of course I do." She seems almost offended.

"But you barely know me." Peter says.

"How can you say that?" Susan asks. "I've known you since the day I was born."

"You knew Peter Pevensie well enough." Peter agrees. "But you don't know anything about Peter Burke. You don't know anything about my family or where I came from. You don't know anything about me."

Susan looks up into his eyes and sighs, knowing that he's right.

Bump. The bus ran over a pot hole causing everyone in the back seats to be slight jolted from their original position. Susan had been asleep dreaming about Narnian hunting parties, laughter, and kissing. Now she was awake looking out the window of the bus as the drizzle from the gray-clouded sky hit the glass. The scene had completely changed. Now she was no longer a queen in royal hunting garb but a lonely bereaved young woman wearing her simplest traveling clothes.

One year. That's how long it had been since the railway crash took them away. Susan still felt nervous getting on trains and for months has refused to get on the subway or a bus. But she'd slowly gotten over her public transportation phobia with the passing of time. She dreamed about her dead loved ones less than she had before and sometimes wondered if that meant she was starting to forget them. It was the worry of life being as though they'd never existed that led her to endure the pain of looking at the photographs of them she still had.

Susan didn't live in the house she'd grown up in anymore. She moved out, the place was listed as an estate belonging to a deceased owner, and everything in it that Susan didn't take with her to her new three roomed studio-apartment (Which was located on top of a pizza shop) was sent off to god-knows-where to be sold. The profits given to settle any debts the family had had during their lives. (Peter's college tuition, furniture that hadn't been full paid for let, the television set that still had two payments left on it, etc...)

She thought about Peter's last words to her in the dream she'd just woken from. 'You don't know anything about me'. Not the most comforting words but much better than his real last words to her aka, 'I never want to see you again'. But surely he couldn't have really meant that. She'd spend the whole year telling herself that he didn't really mean it. That he was just angry. That if he had lived, he surely would have come back to her. After all, he'd loved her. Hadn't he?

'You don't know anything about me' Rang through Susan's head again. She reached into her bag and pulled out a piece of paper, a list.

"That's what I'm trying to change." Susan whispered softly, looking down at her list.

The very first thing on it was,

1) Meet Peter's birth parents.

Under it, she's scrawled down the address she'd managed to get a hold of. It was pretty much right across from Peter's spot in the park. It had been their place before he'd died. Now it was only her place.

Jacob and Elise had ended up moving back into the house Peter had lived in during his time with them. They had gotten bored of their new home (The one they'd gone to after dropping Peter off at the orphanage) and returned. It was after all a very impressive house.

Susan looked up at the mansion wondering if it was possible for a person's eyes to widen until the eye balls fell out. She'd heard his family was very rich but she'd never imagined they were that rich. This was absurd wealth. The house had gargoyles on the balconies! It was almost half the size of pre-ruins Cair Paravel. She swallowed hard as she walked through the iron gate passed the sliver-studded water fountains and perfectly trimmed lawn to the stairs that led to the front door.

What am I going to say? Susan wondered. Who am I going to tell these people I am? Why am I doing this again? These people never loved Peter I don't need to know them to know him. This is stupid. No, I have to do this. I have to.

But what was she going to say to them? It wasn't as if she could just blurt out, "You don't know me, but if your dead son wasn't dead, I'd probably be your daughter-in-law now." So just what could she say? Why hadn't she thought this through? She'd used to be so practical, why was just jumping head first into this? Now she was in front of a very imposing wooden door. She rang the bell. It sounded like a grandfather clock.

The door opened. A maid stood there holding a feather duster in her left hand. "May I help you?"

"I'm looking for Jacob and Elise Burke." Susan told her. "Are they here?"

The maid nodded. "May I inquire of the reason for the visit." She eyed Susan's clothes and knew at once that she as not one of Mrs. Burke's friends' daughters.

"It's about their son, Peter Burke..." Susan tried not to stammer knowing how nervous it would make her sound.

"Bless me, I haven't thought about him in years." The maid said. "The last time I heard of him was when Mrs. Burke told me to take his clothes to the state orphanage."

"Did you know him?" Susan asked her. She seemed old enough to have been around when little Peter was there, but if these people treated their help the same way they treated their son, then it wasn't likely.

"Not well." The maid said. "I just cleaned the room. I taught the head-maid the words to a lullaby for him once...that's about it. Why do you ask about him?"

"I'm his girlfriend." Susan said, wondering if she should have said 'I'm his sister' instead. "Or at least, I was."

"Was?" Adele asked.

Susan swallowed again feeling her throat closing. "Peter died in that big railway accident last year."

"I didn't see the name 'Burke' in the listing." Adele said.

"He has a different surname now." Susan explained.

Adele let Susan in the house and added, "That's right, he would've taken the last name of his adopted parents whoever they were."

"May I see Jacob and Elise now?" Susan asked.

"Adele, who's at the door?" A woman's voice called.

"A visitor for you and Mr. Burke Ma'am." She answered.

"Tell whoever it is, to meet me in the east wing drawing room." The woman's voice said.

"This way, Miss..." Adele started, she stopped walking as well as speaking. "I didn't get your last name."

"Pevensie." Susan said. "Susan Pevensie."

The drawing room was done in all gold and white colors. Susan took a seat on the white couch to the left of the gold-rimed fireplace.

"Can I get you something to drink?" Adele offered.

"No thank you." Susan told her.

"Um, Hello there?" A tall middle-aged woman entered the room. Elise had aged gracefully and was though older with a frown line or two was still very beautiful. Her golden hair was pulled back in a bun and there wasn't a single strand of gray in it. She wore a long fashionable blue gown with lace trimming.

"Elise Burke?" Susan asked to be sure.

"Yes and who are you?" Elise asked.

Jacob walked in. He had not aged quite as well as his wife. his hair was almost all gray but he had managed to stay in shape and anyone could tell he'd been very handsome when he was younger. "Who is this young lady?"

"I'm Susan Pevensie." She told them.

"And we know you how?" Jacob asked.

Susan looked shook her head at them and then said, "You don't know me, Mr. Burke. But I know of you, I'm your dead son's girlfriend."

"Oh my." Elise took a seat and put her hand to her heart.

"Paulo is dead?" Jacob asked looking a little sad but not terribly shaken.

"Peter." Elise corrected him.

Susan sighed. She'd found the Burkes alright. She only wondered if she would be able to keep from hating them.

AN: Should I go on? Review and tell me.