Windows of Opportunity

by Tonzura123

A drabble-present for floppsyearsthebunny, because even our heroes can have a long week.

After he fell off the cliff, Edmund Pevensie, King of Narnia, Duke of the Lantern Waste, felt like he had wasted his time on climbing lessons.

Monkeys had taught him. Specifically the Monkey Lord, Samson, native to the Western Woods. Samson was an Orangutang with brilliant red hair and a silly grin that could just as easily turn into a fierce growl whenever Edmund erred on a climb. The unpredictability challenged and encouraged Edmund. Within weeks, he could almost keep up with his teacher. Almost. And those had been climbs in trees, with branches that could catch you on your way down.

Cliffs? Cliffs had no such luxury.

It was a straight drop. Fifteen feet. Not much to look up at, but at an awkward angle down, it was a dizzy mile.

Edmund fell on his outstretched arm, which snapped under him, and proceeded to bruise his shoulder, crack a rib, jar his hips and legs. Countless muscles torn. Numerous scratches. Possible concussion.

Dr. Saleni was not pleased with him.

"Climbs is for Animals. Manimals stays on the grounds!"

Edmund giggled. "Manimals."

Definite concussion, the worried Salamander concluded.

Thank Aslan that Peter (Edmund's mother, for all accounts and purposes) was out of the country. While Peter himself couldn't get at Edmund, he sent several Birds who recited half-hour spiels of worry and fussing and bouts of yelling that they obviously enjoyed relating to the bedridden young King.

After a while, he had to go on living with the windows shut. In the middle of the summer.

Edmund was also missing the use of his legs. He had been mummified on his return to Cair Paravel.

Occasionally, Lucy would come to visit him when she and Susan weren't completely preoccupied with ruling a country by themselves. Edmund felt bad for this. He tried to coerce Lucy into bringing him bills and issues so that he could read over them, but the medicines Saleni gave him made him sleepy, and he would doze off before he'd even finished the first line. It was his right arm that had broken; he couldn't write either.

"What a week!" he said sourly to his ceiling. He had kicked off his covers some time ago, spread eagle on the bed to diffuse the heat. Out of sheer boredom, he took to gingerly patting up and down his broken arm, try to localize the exact break by figuring out where the line of pain was.

It looked like most of his arm was broken. The soft bandages didn't do much to protect the wound against his pressing fingers.

He went on pressing and wincing for some mindless time.

But then something crashed through the window.

Something, or rather, someone.

Or rather, someone very much like an assassin who was dressed all in black, wielding two long daggers like- like-

Well. Edmund just didn't like how well the assumed assassin was wielding them.

"I've come to kill you!" bellowed the secretively dressed man. He waved the daggers around.

Edmund, wondering if this wasn't a side effect from the lastest concoction Saleni had shoved down his throat, pinched his broken arm. Hard.

"OUCH."

"I haven't killed you yet!" shouted the killer sullenly.

"Bother," said Edmund. He dizzily found his feet and fumbled for the fireplace poker, juggling it in his less-than-dexturous left hand.

"You see," yelled the man, "I believe that you're a very evil little snot and that you're still working for Jadis. So there. I've come to kill you! I will avenge my poor- OUCH!"

Edmund retreated from where he'd struck a heavy blow to the man's temple. "I haven't killed you yet," he said seriously.

Then it wasn't nearly so silly. The man, whoever he was, had decided that it would be best to give backstory after he had done away with the little snot. But, of course, if some like Peter had been present, they would have let the man know that Edmund was a rather hard snot to kill. Even with a broken arm.

They went at it, hammer and tongs- er- daggers and fireplace poker. All of the advantages were on the side of the man: sharp blades could kill far more easily than a fireplace poker. He had use of all of his limbs. His senses weren't dulled by medicine. And he was considerably taller.

But Edmund was annoyed. There wasn't really any other way the fight could have ended.

OoOoOoOoO

Peter was stepping off of the dock at the exact moment that the black-clothed man went soaring out of the top window. He screamed and flailed as he arced spectacularly over the wharf, and landed in the salty waters with a resounding SPLASH.

Flummoxed, Peter squinted at the window, seeing a pale, scowling figure throw what appeared to be a fireplace poker into the water after him.

"My arm!" gargled the man in the water. "I think my arm is broken!"

"GOOD!" bellowed the figure in the window. "NOW COME BACK UP HERE SO THAT WE CAN REALLY FIGHT!"

It was then that a miracle happened: the nameless man had an immediate change of heart and discovered that he didn't want revenge so badly after all. After he politely (though rather quickly) declined King Edmund's offer, he doggy paddled down the coast until he was in Archenland.

There are less bad weeks in Archenland. And much fewer windows to be thrown from.