Disclaimer: I do not own any the stories or character's of C.S. Lewis's Chronicles of Narnia.
Author's Note: I'm not sure how long this will be, but it is meant to span some of the time between the two movies. Thank you for reading. I hope you enjoy.
Lucy trips as they descend the steps, legs too short, and Susan reaches for her, but finds her arms not long enough; Lucy bumps into Edmund who feels the blow with more force than he ought to, steadies himself against Peter who starts at his brother's touch being at his elbow and not his shoulder.
They stop on the steps, looking around at each other askance. There's a flood of vivid memories still flickering in all their gazes; dreams realer than their lives had been... or is it the reverse?
"Well?" Mrs. Macready stops at the landing, looks up at them with a scowl, "Come along then. I said dinner was ready."
They follow her in a daze, pressing in on each other as they walk; the contact between them an assurance that whatever magic this was, at least they were in it together.
"Straight back to your room when you've finished," Macready commands, stands at the door as they file in.
She shuts the door behind them with a resound click and they release a collective breath of relief at being out from under her critical eye. The professor had listened to their story, delivered in half-sentences and hazily unfinished thoughts right from the floor in front of the wardrobe. He'd smiled and nodded and hmph'd with genial understanding; told them they'd adjust soon enough, to treasure the memories they could keep, live with the wisdom they had accumulated, enjoy the lives they were re-given, and perhaps one day they would visit this land of magic again– then he'd left them.
He'd left them on the hardwood floor, fifteen years younger than they'd been an hour ago and a world away from the lives they'd built.
Peter had stood first, of course; held a hand out for Edmund, who had helped Susan, who had pulled Lucy up. They'd not been give a moment to speak when Mrs. McCready had summoned them.
And here they were now; a small, wooden table set with four plates of meager, cold food.
"There's a war afoot," Peter remembers suddenly, his voice low.
"We're in the country," Edmund adds moments later. He approaches a window slowly, "Mother-"
He stops there, the word bringing a flood of memories. He gasps, can see her suddenly, their mother; her dark hair and sad smile, can hear her voice, "You will listen to your brother, feel her touch against his cheek–
He whirls around to face his siblings, eyes wide; Peter's pale, leaning back against the table, Susan holds hands with Lucy, both of them looking ashen.
"I thought it was..." Susan's voice cracks, she draws in a deep breath, "It was a story... just a- a story..."
"A land where animals do not speak," Lucy whispers and her voice, so small and high-pitched, it makes them all start. She looks down at herself, pulls her hand from Susan's to stare at it; her tiny hands. She curls them into fists.
They had tried to remember their mother, on occasions, their father too; and where they haled from prior to Cair Paravel and Narnia. The shining city of Wardrobe in the wondrous land of spare 'oom, Mr. Tumnus would tell them and at first, there had been more to it. At first it had made them giggle, exchange glances, a silent joke all their own. They had known more solidity to their memories, if not the memories themselves; they knew there had been more, games and uniforms and heavy books full of incomprehensible words.
But slowly, year by year, it had faded; spare 'oom had become a mystical wondrous land and they had filled in the gaps visions of their dreams – trees that never danced and stars that never spoke.
"This must be a nightmare," Susan murmurs, falls back into a chair, brings a hand to her temple. She had a gala to prepare for – her gown to select, seating arrangements to finalize, Kedar's outfit to-
There's a gasp that catches in her throat and her vision goes dark for an instant before she stands from her seat in a lightening quick motion, moving towards the door with panic building in her chest.
"Susan!" Peter calls out, alarmed.
She doesn't stop; rushes out of a the room without a backwards glance and with barely a beat of hesitation, they follow her.
They tumble up the staircase and through the halls with clumsy steps, gasps and winces as they bump into each other and objects, but they all know where Susan is headed, what she has remembered, what her plan is – and despite the professor's words, there's unwilling hope in their hearts.
Maybe for them, maybe for its Kings and Queens, Narnia would keep its door open.
Susan is already reaching the wardrobe when her siblings cross the threshold into the nearly empty room. She pulls the wardrobe door open and knows, already, from scent alone – it is just wardrobe and nothing more.
Still she steps inside it, pushes past coats and comes face to face with a hardwood wall. There's a burning behind her eyes as she lays a palm against the wood – this can't be happening.
"Come out of there, Su." Edmund says quietly. He holds the door open, head bowed.
Lucy takes a step towards the wardrobe, mouth puckering in a grimace and tears filling her eyes, but Peter puts a restraining hand on her shoulder, exchanges a look with Edmund.
"Su..." Edmund calls again.
Susan pushes against the wood, nails curling painfully against it; she needs there to be pine trees, she needs the Western Wood... she needs- she needs to get home. A sob tears out of her chest and she hits the wood, pounds on it, tears blurring the panels in front of her. She needs to get to her son.
Edmund touches her shoulder, had followed her inside. "Come on-"
"No..." she gasps, shakes her head, "No, no, no..." her forehead thunks against the wood painfully and Edmund folds an arm around her waist, tugs her backwards.
Susan shakes her head again, can't catch her breath, "Ed, no..." she whimpers, "No..."
"Shh," he murmurs, opens his mouth to add more, but doesn't have the words suddenly; not when he almost bends down to lift her, before realizing he can't. He's a boy, too slight for that, and has to settle for pulling at her.
They stumble out of the wardrobe, would have fallen if Peter hadn't been waiting by the opening, arms ready to steady them.
Lucy rushes to her sister, arms going around her middle tightly; Susan can't see beyond a veil of tears, presses her face into Peter's shoulder, grips Edmund's hand tightly.
They stand like that for a long time, huddled tightly together, and then Susan makes a sound, a strangled sob and whispers the one word echoing in all their minds, the one question their hearts already know the answer to.
"Why?" She breathes in a voice heavy with tears.
Lucy presses her lips together to keep from sobbing too. Edmund shuts his eyes, feels tears on his lashes. It's Peter who exhales slowly, gives voice to answer, "It is Aslan's will."
It is cruel, Susan thinks; bites back another sob.
"He'll call us back," Lucy whispers, sounding so impossibly young. "He will."
Peter nods his cheek against Susan's hair, Edmund gives her hand a reassuring squeeze, and Susan clenches her eyes shut more tightly, feels another tear drip down her cheek. He will, she thinks more fiercely, He will. Aslan is not cruel.
It's Edmund who pulls back first, "Calm yourself, Su," he pats her shoulder, "Lucy's right..."
They need Lucy to be right. "I am," the young girl chirps, lifts a hand to wipe at her face, "I am Susan, you'll see. We'll be back in no time... no time at all."
Her voice echoes in the room and Edmund cracks a smile, "You sound ridiculous, Lucy."
She whirls on him, something vaguely like relief in her chest. Edmund taunting her, that she could handle – that was the same at every age, in every world. "Don't make fun."
"You don't sound much better, Ed," Peter teases quietly. They look away from Susan, giving her a moment to herself, to wipe away tears and steady her breathing.
"I can't very well help it can I?" Edmund sighs, looks down at himself again. He thinks there didn't used to be, recalls faintly how these words would have been said before, the last time he had been this age in this land – and he cringes a little.
Lucy props a hand on her hip. "Oh and I can?"
"I didn't say you could, did I?" He retorts, the smile still hovering at the edges of his lips.
There's a familiar rhythm to the taunting, familiar not from this land, but from growing. Turns of phrases meant to tow the line of serious and playful; and when Peter murmurs, "Settle," rubs at his hair, they all breathe out a bit – whatever else may change, but they remain.
"I'm sorry..." Susan whispers a beat later, sighs softly, "I just..."
"Oh Su it's alright," Lucy says on a rush, finds her sister's hand, "We're all allowed to feel distraught. How could we not?"
The words, the diction, sound odd coming from Lucy's mouth; her voice too childish for it, but Peter supposes it's something they'll get used to. He wraps an arm around Susan's shoulders, a little startled at how close in height they are, "We'll be alright..." he comforts. "We'll be back soon."
Susan breathes out shakily and goes to drop her her cheek against Peter's shoulder; except what she does is bump their heads together, rather painfully.
Peter jumps, hand moving to his face, "Ow!"
Susan flinches, her cheek stinging.
Edmund snickers a little, "Peter hasn't had his growth spurt yet."
"I would cease in pointing fingers if I were you," Peter offers bemusedly, motions at his younger brother, "How old are you?Nine?"
"Ten." The response rises to Edmund's lips before he's really thought it out – he blinks. "I'm ten." He remembers.
Susan clears her throat, "Yes... and I'm... thirteen," she adds quietly, turns to look at her older brother. "You're fifteen, Peter. Lucy is eight."
They fall silent again; memories slipping through their thoughts like quicksand, some vivid and some faded, this world and that world, dreams spiraling into Narnia, Narnia melding into this world.
"This will make a great adventure for the annals," Edmund offers, touches the door of the wardrobe. "Just think, a time as children in a far away and strange land..." his fingers fold around the knob, tips brushing lightly against the engravings.
"Songs of childhood recaptured will be written and sung," Lucy agrees, smile up at Peter and Susan.
Peter nods, "Of faith and endurance during times of uncertainty."
Susan glances at each of them, Peter's certain eyes and Lucy's faithful smile, the determined tilt to Edmund's chin; and she pulls up a shaky smile, let's their certainty and faith and determination fill her up inside, silence the cries of grief, of unfairness, of fear. "Tapestries woven of us in these dreadful clothes..."
Lucy giggles, "It's really no wonder we'd forgotten."
Susan smiles faintly, "The amount of brown is a little startling..." she reaches out and touches Lucy's sweater, "The trouble it must be to get the color green looking quite so muted."
Lucy nods, grinning. "Peter's wearing suspenders!"
"Hey now!" He cries, tugs on one, "I'm certain these are quite... useful."
"In the event of your pants falling off?" Edmund lifts an eyebrow.
"I am not the one in shortpants." Peter points out, "You look quite darling, Ed."
Lucy laughs and Susan's smile stretches a little. "They'll be the darling, muted adventures in the land of Wardrobe," Susan declares, forces down the knot of anxiety in her chest; her siblings have the right idea, the right outlook. Faith and patience would deliver them to Narnia again and in no time at all, Aslan's will would makes itself known to them.
She gives them a wider smile, "In the meantime, perhaps we should eat...?"
"I suppose wine won't be on the menu," Edmund jokes.
Lucy wrinkles her face at him, "Not for a good lot of years."
"Water will do for now," Peter proposes, moves towards the doorway.
The girls nod, precede him out of the room slowly.
"Ed...?" Peter calls, looking behind him. Edmund is still standing by the wardrobe, hand still on its door; dark-head bowed again, in thought or prayer, Peter wasn't sure. He held his tongue though, waited.
Susan and Lucy paused at the steps as well, quiet.
Edmund lifts his head a moment later and carefully tips the door of the wardrobe shut; splays his fingers over the center, against the carved tree.
"For now," he echoes Peter seriously, looks over at his brother, their gazes meeting. "We'll have wine again soon enough."
"And silk please!" Lucy adds with an impish look, "These clothes are itchy." She tugs at the collar of her blouse.
Susan laughs a little, but feels compelled to warn, "Shhh, Lu!"
"The Macready doesn't like noise," Peter reminds her, remembers that himself suddenly. He motions for Edmund to come forward and when his brother passes in front of him, he lays a hand on his shoulder.
Soon enough.
.tbc.