Chapter 10
Lost in the Pages
"Five more minutes and I'll go,"
Sunlight started pouring in from the long windows, bathing the room in golden light. The sun travelled slowly through and made its way to them, touching their cold skin with warmth.
"Five more minutes and I'll go,"
The sun reached his face; Edmund lazily turned on his side to avoid it and found Ariadne's body. He gingerly wrapped his arm around her.
"Five more and I swear by Aslan I'll leave,"
Ariadne shifted slightly, bringing her body closer to his.
"Five minutes..."
She nuzzled her head in his chest, her breathing steadied, etching calmness on her face.
"Damn it,"
He wanted to stay. He didn't want to leave the night behind, not as a memory lurking in the shadows. His body was hooked on to that bed and his heart hooked on to her.
He had done it a million times before—sleeping on a stranger's bed and leaving before dawn—but he couldn't do it this time. Something was different. She was different.
Edmund let the battle be won by love, knowing that he no longer need to define what they meant to one another. It was during his dilemma, he realized that Ariadne didn't have to wonder. He tightened his embrace around her and a faint smile appeared upon his lips. And so his melody became a lullaby, his brain drifting back to peace.
An hour later since Edmund had disputed his feelings Ariadne started losing sleep. The sun had filtered even more through the window, giving her warmth. Her skin was pressed against his with nothing in between.
It had become ridiculous how much she had desired to be next to him in such manners; and now that she had finally got him she knew she would not let him go anytime soon.
She slid her fingers across his chest, found his hand and entwined fingers with him. It stirred Edmund in his sleep, his eyelids trying to open with her touch. With that minimal contact, warmth irradiated within her, making it feel as something deeper than merely nightly affections.
Edmund turned a bit, not letting her hand go, still lost in the land of dreams.
Ariadne looked at him with tenderness and smiled subtly. Her muscles adjusted to the movement after the long rest. In the moment of quietness she found it was like any other Narnian morning, but never had it felt so immeasurably perpetual in that single moment of happiness.
Taking his hand and pressing it to her lips, she stood from the bed and fronted the chill air traveling through the castle. She walked about the room as silently and stealthily as she could.
She took her disheveled dress from the floor and smoothed it out. It was impregnated with the smell of wine and the smell of him.
As she tailored it back to her skin she realized it felt strange, as if it had been made for another person entirely.
Perhaps it meant that nothing from the past mattered, in this new present that included him. Or perhaps it was the other way around, she did not know.
She collected the rest of her garments and only left his behind in the mess they had made. She overlooked the room quickly before leaving and saw her necklace glistening with light. She spread the necklace right next to him, in the empty bed space she left behind.
She knew that her early departure would cause havoc in his mind, as his would have caused in hers. Her abandoned jewelry was a piece to a puzzle for him to solve.
[***]
The fire crackled down and filled the echoes of the room. Ariadne's sweet scent filled the chamber and graced his nose. He opened his eyes again, not knowing how long it had been since he had told himself to stay by her side, but this time his lover had gone.
Bewildered, he looked around in his moment of confusion. If it weren't for her fragrance lingering, he could have said it had all been a dream. A dream filled with the perfect silhouette of her body, filled with kisses, caresses and love he hadn't felt in such intensity for a long time.
In that haste of visions, he could only fathom a single thought coherently: he didn't want it to be a dream.
His hand felt immediately a cold object close. She left her necklace where she had slept, lonely and forgotten in the mattress right next to him. Taking it into his hand, he smiled slightly. The way it had been placed, with so much care, shouted that she wanted to see him again. It was an invitation to look for her still.
He dressed and rushed out, as if he was committed to a schedule.
Servants dashed past him in the corridor outside the chamber door and no one seemed to notice or know him. He followed the long corridor that was becoming emptier by the minute until reaching a ragged and old door. It was oddly placed, since it only lead to another isolated aisle. The castle felt more like a maze than an abode.
It seemed it was to be his mission to find Ariadne yet again. There was no other challenge he would have rather have taken.
[***]
It didn't surprise him how easily he got lost in the castle's midst. He could have sworn he crossed the same hallways for a hundred times. He became surprised that throughout his endless voyage he never crossed paths with his siblings. There could not have been many variations to the castle, not when he had already crossed the same threshold for the hundredth time. Or so it seemed.
He felt positively lost, his mind suddenly confused about how that had come to be.
The castle corridors were drowning, with twists and turns into the same corners, all identical, making his feet go in circles. It seemed the coronation had taken place in a different location entirely; all of his midnight rendezvous seemed to disappear from his memory. He could not locate himself, he felt like the walls were trapping him.
He had wandered for a good while, watching every living soul knowing where they were marching, except for him. He knew Ariadne wanted them to meet again, if only he knew when to encounter her. It looked like Ariadne had purposefully tried to confuse him, a sweet jest.
He considered retracing his steps back to the room they had shared the previous night but he wasn't sure he could manage to find the way.
Stubbornly he continued walking nowhere with the thought of her in his mind. With sheer luck Edmund finally found a way out of the endless spiral of corridors and staircases. He descended the stairway with a trotting pace, tired of looking like a misguided soul.
He looked further onto the courtyard in front of where he stood. Behind the archways he saw a glimpse of her back. He fastened his pace to reach her, glad to be found again.
He kept his eyes fixed on her as she walked with a man by her side in the garden. If Edmund went one direction, she went the other, making Edmund almost jog to catch up to her. She finally became still but her silhouette blended with the architecture of the castle.
Edmund emerged in the opposite side from where she was but approached her with a grin upon his lips nonetheless.
Turned as she was, Edmund could see her profile show her smile, her hair waving slightly with the breeze. It wasn't until he was only a few feet away that he realized she was talking to his brother, both in a delighted mood. Caspian was the first to see him.
"Ah! Edmund! I see you have found your way around the castle," Edmund smiled, although his eyes betrayed his confusion.
"Trumpkin saw you wander about the castle," Caspian clarified with a chuckle.
"Oh," Edmund laughed, "And he didn't offer his help, how rude," he joked.
Ariadne smiled, "Everyone seems to be getting lost, I only just found Lucy in one of the towers, asking to know where the stables are,"
"I probably have walked all along the castle without knowing it this morning," Edmund said
"Perhaps I should show you around," she said. They shared a glance, and Caspian knew it was time for him to leave.
"In that case I shall leave you to it," Caspian said awkwardly, looking at them both. Caspian looked at Edmund in the eye, and Ariadne was not sure what to make of it. She figured he did not seem to care—they were two little lovebirds, everyone knew. Caspian nodded ever so slightly at him and then dashed off in a second, leaving Ariadne and Edmund alone before they could blink.
She felt a burden lift off her shoulders now that she knew her brother had no quarrel with her lover.
Once Caspian had disappeared she turned to face him, her hand quickly taking his.
A mere touch was enough to make him feel adrenaline rushing down his veins, exhilaration in its purest form. She turned her head around to make sure no one was lurking around.
She leaned into his ear.
"I was rather hoping we could escape today," her words pronounced as if her tongue were silk, her fingers brushing though his hair, sliding down his neck. She looked into his eyes, hoping to get lost in them for as long as she could.
Edmund could not resist the temptation, and leaned roughly to have his lips on hers.
"I wouldn't dream of anything else," he said, their lips still close, his brushing hers as he spoke.
He felt her smile, their foreheads pressed.
"Let's go then, before anyone notices we're gone,"
Taking his hand, Ariadne started speeding up her pace, both running and giggling like children.
They came to a halt when she heard footsteps in the gravel. They hid behind the pillars of an archway. Edmund wrapped his arms around her waist. Narnians and Telmarines passed by, immersed into their conversations. They waited, with their hearts pounding with the rush of the exercise until their footsteps seemed far away. She rested her hands on his chest but dared look at him only until they had gone completely.
She stood on the tips of her feet, and kissed him slowly. She kissed him until she felt Edmund's breathing stabilize, until the rhythm adjusted with the one of the kiss. She bit his lower lip, and felt him tremble, and then she stopped. Edmund kept his eyes closed, a view which pleased her, knowing she had caused it.
"We can't waste time," she said shortly, making Edmund open his eyes.
"But that is the only thing I want," he pressed his lips against her cheek and then pressed his forehead in her temple, making Ariadne laugh.
Plenty of time to waste later, she thought. "A race to the stables?" Without any second to spare she dashed off a second time, this time by her own. Edmund could not resist and sprinted behind her, trying not to lose sight of her flowing hair and gown before he got lost in the maze of the castle once more.
She turned corner after corner, and every time Edmund began to catch up to her, she made an unpredictable turn. In the middle of a hall she stopped hearing his heavy footsteps and she halted, looking back for him. She kept still, trying to get a sight of him. In the echoes of the hall she heard his panting, and had to retrace her steps to find him behind the last corner they had turned.
"What? Has the Just King, the best swords man in all Narnia, been beaten in a race, by a weak princess?" she said mockingly, "As I am called sometimes, none of which is true, of course" she talked as she walked closer to him, as he continued breathing heavily. When she was but a few steps away from him he hung his head and rested his hands on his knees.
"I am certainly not weak since I can run faster than his grace," Ariadne continued bragging, leaning on the wall behind him as he continued to regain his breath.
Edmund took a long breath before speaking:
"You keep talking, and you will realize it was only a ruse to slow down the competitor only too late," he said, with complete normal breath and standing up straight and raising his eyebrow cockily.
"Excuse me?" she smiled
"Battle strategy," he laughed and then he sped off down the hall, much quicker than her. He could hear her laughing behind as he went down the stables. He reached the horses, but he could not hear her behind him, but as soon as he entered he saw her, already standing there.
"Surprised?" She turned and walked to the stall of her horse,
"Are you?" he snickered,
"I am!" she chortled, "You didn't know where you were going!"
"Oh, but I was," he passed behind her to look for a horse and a saddle of his own, "I am full of surprises,"
"His majesty is not only Just, but humble too."
"Of course I am," he whispered right next to her ear and pressed a kiss on her neck, "all the grace of a king,"
"We'll see about that," she looked at him with joyful eyes, as she prepared her horse to ride. Edmund half smiled as he started saddling his own stallion.
Outside, mounted, with the air striking their faces they felt a bounded freedom, a moment of bliss awaiting them.
"Now that you have shown me from where you rule," Edmund began, "Let me show you my own castle,"
Ariadne smiled and nodded, a smile that Edmund returned.
Well, hello again. It's been such a long time...almost a year. I have no excuse for my absence, absolutely none. My muse has come and gone, bringing long writer's block with her; however, I have written ahead this time, so there won't be much waiting for the next chapter now!
I do apologize sincerely if this chapter is a bit rusty (I hope not!) but the plot will keep building up from here on. It's a small happy chapter for the couple ^^ Thank you to everyone sticking around still :)