Title: Wait
Fandom: The Chronicles of Narnia
Characters: Lucy Pevensie (Lucy/Caspian)
Word Count: 1,704
Rating: PG/K+
Summary: Though almost a week had passed since he'd rescued his friends from the slave traders, Caspian was still worried about Lucy. A random scene in-between adventures during VDT.
Disclaimer: Lewis told us to go out and write our own stories, but I am not C.S. Lewis, nor am I part of Disney, Walden Media, or C.S. Lewis Pte. Ltd. and therefore do not own Narnia. This is just for fun.
Author's Notes: Unbeta-ed. Spoilers for VDT, possible heavier than usual BBC influence. Was playing with different ideas and scene sorta took on a life of its own... (I actually posted this to LJ almost a year ago, but only just realized I never posted it here.)

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It was fairly late when Caspian knocked on the door to Lucy's room in Narrowhaven. Though almost a week had passed since he'd rescued his friends from the slave traders, Caspian was still worried about Lucy. The sight of her wrists bound together and her being dragged away while he went free was not one that would leave him any time soon. He was rather selfishly glad that he'd been too late to see her and not Edmund up on the auction block, for he wasn't sure what he would have done.

Upon hearing the soft 'come in' from within the room, Caspian let himself in.

Lucy was sitting on the bed, apparently having just finished brushing her hair with a comb the Lord Bern's wife had given her. She'd been offered appropriate women's clothes as well, but she'd had none of it, claiming them more inconvenient than necessary on a ship. Why this applied to while they were still in Narrowhaven, Caspian did not know. As it was, she was dressed in some of Caspian's things - even if they were clearly too large for her - and idly rubbing at her wrists, wincing every so often.

Caspian frowned. Even from his spot in the doorway, he could tell that, while somewhat healed, her wrists were still red from where the ropes had rubbed against them and still hurt her.

"Hullo Caspian," Lucy said when she'd noticed who had come in. "Everything all right?"

Caspian had quite a different greeting. "I do wish you'd use your cordial on yourself."

Lucy sighed. "They're just scratches. Even if they were selling us, they weren't cruel."

Caspian marveled for a moment that Lucy could manage to forgive even a slaver that much. "Not in that way, perhaps," he allowed, walking further into the room to take a seat next to her on the bed. "But they still hurt you."

Caspian lightly touched one of her wrists and, as if to prove his point, Lucy winced again and quickly pulled her hand away. "They'll heal quick enough."

"But they needn't have to," Caspian pointed out. "What good's a magic cordial if you won't use it?"

"And what if something worse happens that needs healing and I've wasted it on a silly thing that would heal on its own?"

Caspian had to laugh. "You sound like myself. Did you know before we blew Queen Susan's horn, I'd said much the same? 'Supposing there came an even worse need and we had already used it?' Nikabrik, for all his wrongs, was right in saying that by that logic we'd never use it until it is too late. And you all would never have come."

Lucy said nothing at this, but Caspian could tell that his words had had some effect on her, so he continued gently. "And besides. You know as well as I that were one of the crew were behaving this way, they'd be reprimanded for unnecessarily handicapping themselves. Even if it was 'just a scratch' as you say."

Lucy looked down at her wrists for a long moment more, but finally looked back up at him with a grin and a blush. "I'm being silly, aren't I?"

"Just a bit," Caspian agreed with an answering grin.

Standing, he made his way over to where he saw she'd left her cordial and brought it back over, handing it to her. It likely would have been easier for him to use the cordial himself, but it seemed to him a great offense that he should use her gift.

If Lucy minded it, she didn't say, but simply opened the vial and poured out a single drop on each of her wrists. A few moments later she held them out to him. "Happy now?"

Caspian refrained from rolling his eyes at her. Instead, he took one of her hands in his, looking at her wrist. The red had all but faded now and, as he ran his thumb across one, he noted she didn't wince this time. "Thank you."

"Is this why you came to visit so late? To scold me into taking care of myself?" But she was smiling as she asked it, and made no move to take her hand out of his.

"To escape Eustace's complaining, more like," Caspian grumbled. "I'll give those slavers one thing, they do know how to pick an apt name. 'Sulky', indeed."

"Don't be so hard on Eustace," Lucy reprimanded gently, even if she looked as if she half-agreed with him. "He isn't exactly used to this sort of thing. And it's not everyday one is sold after all."

Caspian wanted to point out that no one had bought Eustace, or had even wanted to, but thought better of it. "You and Edmund don't seem to be taking it so poorly. Though I am sorry you both had to go through that."

"Oh do stop. There was nothing for it. You did what you had to do, and you rescued us. There was nothing else you could have done."

"I could have not brought you there in the first place!" Caspian said, a little louder than he'd intended. Quieter, he added, "I should have had us stay on until Doorn, like Edmund and Drinian had suggested. Then none of it would have happened."

"And it was on my telling you of it that you decided to go," Lucy reminded him. "It's just as much my fault as it is yours. I've seen how much Narnia's changed in a thousand years. I ought to have realized the Lone Islands would've changed as well."

Caspian sighed. He still believed himself at fault, but he knew her to be as stubborn as he and there'd be no point arguing it. "I don't know how you can stand it."

"Stand what?"

"This. This time, the way Narnia has changed since your time, everything."

Such an odd look came over Lucy at that. A queer sort of almost sad look that had Caspian wishing he'd never even asked the question. But before he could tell her to forget about it, Lucy smiled at him and answered. "You get used to it, I suppose. Even a new Narnia is better than no Narnia at all. Even if a thousand years have passed during the two in our world."

Caspian grinned again at the mention of her world. "Tell me a story?" he asked, feeling very much the little boy who'd asked his nurse for another story of the Four Kings and Queens every night. "One from your world?"

"Alright," Lucy agreed with a laugh. "Once upon a time, a beautiful baby girl was born to a King and Queen..."

And so, Lucy told him the story of a princess who had been hidden away in order to escape a curse, but had ended up falling prey to it anyways. And she told him of how the princess had been put into a sleep that could only be broken by her prince waking her with a kiss.

And by the end of the tale, Lucy had nearly fallen asleep, her head resting against Caspian's shoulder and her hand still in his.

"I've never kissed anyone before," Caspian said at the end. He didn't know exactly why he said it, and he blushed as he did so, but it had just come out. And somehow he didn't feel as embarrassed admitting it to Lucy as he thought he might.

Lucy, for her part, merely smiled. "You will."

"Have you?"

"Yes. A long time ago." Anything else Caspian might have said to that was soon forgotten as a yawn escaped Lucy. "Sorry."

"Don't be," Caspian smiled. "You've had a long day. I ought to go and let you get some sleep."

Lucy's hand tightened around Caspian's at that. "Stay? Please?" Looking down at her questioningly, he just caught sight of her blush before she ducked her head. "At-at least until I fall asleep?"

"As you wish," Caspian agreed readily. He watched silently as Lucy got ready for bed, turning when asked so she could change into her nightgown - in actuality a tunic of Drinian's that was long enough on her to serve as such - and then resumed his seat on the bed after she'd climbed in. Perhaps he'd been right to worry about her, Caspian thought. She couldn't be afraid of being kidnapped again, could she? No, not Lucy the Valiant. Still, Caspian made plans in his head to speed up their leaving Narrowhaven as much as possible.

Looking down at her as he helped her pull the blanket around herself, Caspian found himself wondering again at time. Here was this queen whom he'd been told stories of in his pram, who'd saved Narnia a thousand years before he was even born. And yet here was that same queen who managed to now somehow be so many years younger than him - years younger than she'd been the last time she'd come to Narnia. It didn't seem fair somehow, and yet he was more than grateful to have her back again.

"The princess had to wait a hundred years for her prince to kiss her?" Caspian asked, thinking of the story she'd just told him. "Doesn't seem fair she had to wait that long."

"She would've waited forever," came the half-mumbled reply, and Caspian had to smile. Clearly Lucy was moments from falling asleep, but trying to stay awake to answer him. Pushing a strand of hair back from her face, he bent forward and - after a moment of debating with himself - kissed her forehead.

"Say you won't leave m- Narnia so soon this time?" he asked in a whisper. "Promise?"

Caspian waited, but no response came. He waited a few minutes more until he was certain she was asleep, before standing up slowly and walking to the door. Just before he closed the door behind him, a whispered reply from the bed made him stop. It wasn't exactly a promise, but he knew it was the only sort of one his friends from the Other World could make, and it was just enough to give him hope.

"I'll try."

For the moment, it was enough.