Author's note: Sorry about the delay, my internet connection was acting up. Here's the next chapter. As it turns out, the scenes directly following a battle are by far harder to write than the battle itself. I am glad you all liked the battle of Anvard.

This chapter: Cor finds out about his identity, and there is finally another conversation between Lune and Rayna, as well as just a little bit of Edmund's cheekiness. I have two more chapters and an epilogue planned for this part, and then the Pevensies will unfortunately be gone for 1300 years. I will miss them.

As always, please check out my profile if you want to know about my plans for this story or any others. I already have most of the rest of the story mapped out.

Responses to your reviews are at the bottom of the page, but as usual thanks to all those that reviewed: HeartFyre, MCH, PJO-Blue-cookies, LovableAmethyst129, songwriter16, allycat23 and Guest.

I will publish the next chapter once I reach 6 reviews.

Chapter 16: Reunion

April 16th, 1014 - Anvard

Once the fighting had ended, we all found our way to the gates of the Anvard, where Edmund and King Lune were greeting each other, shaking hands across the abandoned battering ram. The few living Calormenes were being led into the castle as prisoners, and there was much cheerful conversation as the Narnians and Archenlanders rejoiced over the victory.

I studied the battlefield carefully. The battlefield was littered with dead Calormenes, only 40 or so having survived the onslaught. Our losses, however, were minor. We had lost less than 50 between us, including one of the giants. While the surviving Calormenes were in large parts battered and badly injured, a great deal of our army had endured no more than cuts and bruises. Those who had been wounded were being rushed into the castle, and a few healers, among which was Lucy, were already scattered around the field tending to those who could not be moved and searching for survivors.

Several others were getting up from where they had fallen during the battle, gravitating towards the crowd. Among them I spotted a familiar blonde haired boy. I smiled to myself, glad to see that Cor had succeeded in staying out of trouble.

"Storm," I called softly, dismounting and facing my friend. "Keep an eye on that one for me, will you?"

"Naturally," Storm agreed, turning to join the boy.

Satisfied by this, I made my way to Edmund. There would be serious matters to talk of soon, once the thrill of the fight was over, and I would need to be there. Unfortunately, that also meant an encounter with Lune, which I would have to endure sooner or later. I could only hope that the events of the last few days would warm him up to me at least a little. I disliked the tension between us.

"There you are, Rayna," Edmund greeted me as I approached. "I was wondering where you'd got to."

"I was taking stock of our casualties," I explained.

"Nothing too serious, I hope."

I shook my head, "We've done remarkably well. Our dead our relatively few in number, and very few are gravely wounded. I cannot say the same about the Calormenes, though I did not see any sign of Rabadash. Does anyone know what's happened to him?"

"Not as of yet," Edmund responded. "We're searching for him now, but I doubt he ran off. The fool is far too proud for that."

"A proud fool indeed," Lune grumbled, putting in a word for the first time since he had arrived. "He has forfeited any honor he had in coming here in time of peace, seeking to kill and conquer."

I turned to him and curtsied lightly, "King Lune, it is a pleasure, as always."

Lune eyed me cautiously, his gaze lingering on the bloody sword slung across my back, but seemed to be grudgingly happy to see me.

"We have much to speak of."

I nodded, "I assume this is about the boy. I trust that by now you have guessed his identity."

Lune was prevented from answering him by a great roar of laughter, which rose up suddenly from the crowd a little way away. Edmund, who was just as puzzled at the cause of this as I was, called to a passing soldier.

"What's going on over there?"

"They've found Prince Rabadash, your highness!" he called back jovially.

Edmund glanced back at Lune and I, "We should take care of this buisness with Rabadash as soon as possible. Your conversation will have to wait until later."

Edmund was right. While I sensed Lune's frustration over the matter, I also knew that Rabadash would have to be dealt with, and fast. The princes would have to be discussed later. And so, without complaints, I followed Edmund's lead and cut through the crowd of soldiers surrounding the spot where Rabadash had been found.

Even with all my talents of prediction, I could never have expected this. The scene we found upon reaching the prince was without a doubt one of the most comic things I had seen in a long time. Rabadash was suspended from the castle walls, about two feet off the ground, flailing wildly. His chainmail shirt was hiked up, halfway covering his face, and tight under his arms. The shirt itself seemed to be caught on some sort of hook in the wall, trapping the Calormene prince in an absurd position.

It took a while to figure out what had happened, as everyone was laughing and shouting, and attempting to tell some detail of the story all at once. Finally, however, we managed to piece together what had happened.

Early in the battle, one of the giants had made a stamp at Rabadash. The blow had missed, but one of the spikes on the giant's boot had torn the chain mail at his back. Rabadash did not let that stop him, and so the fight had gone on. Eventually, Edmund and Rabadash had met, swords clashing at the gates of Anvard itself. Edmund, by far the better swordsman, had begun to press him back, closer and closer to the wall, and Rabadash had jumped up on a mounting block and started raining blows upon the Edmund. The battle between the two was never resolved, the press of battle pulling the two apart, and Rabadash had realized that while his position gave him an advantage over the swordsmen attacking him from below, it also made him a mark for every one of Lune's archers. He had therefore jumped down with a cry of "The bolt of Tash falls from above!" Likely this would have been very impressive, had the hole in the back of his hauberk not caught on a hook in the wall, leaving him trapped.

This was how we found him.

"Let me down, Edmund," Rabadash howled in challenge as we approached. "Let me down and fight me like a king and a man; or if you are too great a coward for that, kill me at once."

"Gladly," began Edmund, his hand falling to his sword hilt, but I placed a cautioning hang on his wrist.

"This is not the time for a duel," I hissed into his ear.

"I think not," King Lune objected. He then turned to Rabadash and addressed him formally, "Your royal Highness, if you had given that challenge a week ago, I would say that there was none in Narnia, from the High King down to the smallest talking mouse, who would have refused it. But by attacking this castle unprovoked in time of peace, you have proven yourself no knight but a traitor and a coward. You are not worthy of crossing swords with any person of honor."

The crowd fell into silent reproach at his words, the general hatred towards Rabadash taking precedence over the ridiculousness of his situation.

"Take him down, bind him and carry him inside until we find a time to decide what we shall do with him." I ordered, taking action before any of the many soldiers watching decided to do something rash, which now seemed a likely possibility.

Strong hands wrenched Rabadash's sword from him and he was carried away into the castle, shouting, threatening, cursing and even crying. I suspected that though he could have withstood torture, he could not bear to be made ridiculous. After all, in Calormen everyone had always taken him seriously.

"King Lune, you mentioned we have much to talk about. I believe it is time to address the matter of your sons," I pulled the king's attention away from the scene.

He turned to me just as Corin decided to show himself, dragging Cor behind him as he plowed through the crowd with a shout of "Father!"

"There you are, at last," Lune said Lune in a very gruff voice. "And you have been in a battle, contrary to my wishes and King Edmund's orders. At your age, you should be playing with stick swords not swinging steel at other men." But everyone, including Corin, could see that he was very proud of his son.

"Your Highness," intervened Darrin, one of the Archenlandish lords, "I would not chide him overmuch, he is after all your son. I believe that it would grieve you more if he had not inherited your zeal for battle."

"Well, we'll pass it over for the time. And now –" his gaze landed on Cor, and I saw a myriad of emotions flash across his face. He embraced Cor in a bear like-hug. Then Lune released him and positioned him to stand next to Corin, facing his lords. "Now, gentlemen, look at them both. Has any man any doubts."

All the assembled lords stared at the two twins, all of them slowly realizing what was happening, and that their lost prince had returned. Then there was a great shout of joy and everyone was cheering and clapping Cor on the back. Cor himself looked utterly confused.

"I see now why you ran off with the boy," Edmund chuckled beside me.

"I did say that you would know the truth in time."

"I never doubted you for a second," he smiled lightly, his gaze never moving from the group surrounding Cor, "Somebody really ought to rescue him from there."

"That's just what I was thinking," I agreed, striding forward to Lune, "Perhaps you should take Cor aside and explain things to him. He does not understand yet who he is."

After that, Lune quickly dispersed the crowd, taking aside Cor and Corin, as well as Lucy, Edmund and I and brought us to a small room in a secluded room of the castle, where we could avoid the disturbance of the armies still scattered around Anvard. There, Lune told Cor everything. He spoke of the boy's birth, the prophecy, and of the prince's disappearance when he was just a boy.

"And so you have returned to us," he concluded as he finished his tale, "just as the centaur's prophecy fore told, to save us from a great danger. I am only sorry that your mother could not live to see this day."

"But," sputtered Cor seemingly overwhelmed but what he had learned, "I didn't do anything really."

"Of course you did something!" the boy's father objected fiercely. "You warned us of the attack on Anvard, which would otherwise have been taken."

"But that wasn't just me. I had Hwin and Aravis and Bree, even Lady Rayna."

I shook my head, "But you went on when they could not, and in that you have proved yourself a hero of Archenland. As for me, I was only there to watch over you, as Aslan instructed of me."

Cor seemed to study me carefully, "How long have you known?"

"Since you were first taken into the Narnian party at Tashbaan."

"How?" he pressed. "And why didn't you tell me?"

"Corin would have talked more," I pointed out. "And I did tell you all that I could. The rest was not for you to know, not until now. The timing was not right."

"What does that even mean?"

Edmund chose this moment to give his signature grin, "I wouldn't push too far. Rayna's always like that."

"Oh, hush," scolded Lucy.

"All the same, I owe you my thanks for your part in this, my Lady," Lune addressed me formally. "It seems I have misjudged you."

I nodded solemnly, "It was understandable, all things considered," I said, referring to the long past war I had once waged on Archenland.

Once that tense conversation was over, Lune immediately turned back to his son, "Tomorrow, Cor, I shall take you around the castle and see each of its rooms and mark its strengths and weaknesses, for it will be yours to guard when I am gone."

"But Corin will be king then," said Cor.

"Nay, you are my heir. The crown will come to you."

"But I don't want it," Cor objected, "I'd rather –"

"This is not a question of what you want, nor even what I want. It is the law. You and Corin may be twins, but one must come first and you are Corin's elder by a good twenty minutes."

At this Cor looked at his brother with regret etched on his features, "I never wanted this at all, and I am sorry Corin. I never dreamed my turning up would chisel you out of your kingdom."

Corin on the other hand looked absolutely ecstatic, "Hurrah! I shan't have to be king! I'll always be a prince. It's princes that have all the fun."

"But—" Cor began, only to be cut off by his newfound sibling.

"If you say another word about it I'll knock you down."

And that was that. I suspected that many arguments between the two in years to come would end with Corin threatening the other boy. Still, I could also guess at the great friendship that would also spring up between them. Things were now as they should be.

Author's note:

HeartFyre: Rayna definitely has her own things going on, and she will have even more problems when the Pevensies are no longer around to rule Narnia. I really miss writing her and Peter together, but for story purposes I just can't have him around all the time without making Rayna completely and ridiculously dependent. I can't wait to write him again, unfortunately just before he leaves. I am going to get a lot into what Rayna will have to deal with when the Pevensies are gone and the Telmarine threat rises. And yes, she will almost definitely be at Cair Paravel during the attack.

MCH: The battle scene was hard to write, so I'm glad you appreciate it. I would have liked to get a little bit more violence in, but I felt that what happened was true to what Edmund and Rayna would do during a battle when they have to work together. As for what happens next, that is for me to know and you to find out, so you'll just have to keep reading, though I do give some details about my plans for Rayna on my profile, if you want to check it out. As always, thank you for being such a loyal reader.

LovableAmethyst129: Yes, that does count as a review.

Songwriter16: I'm glad you liked the way I portrayed the battle. I'm also really happy that you managed to pick up on Rayna not being involved unless needed, as the battle sequence illustrates how she does that in pretty much every aspect of her life. I do feel that Rayna's personality isn't completely gentle, and she will kill her enemies if she feels it is necessary, but it would be just a little out of character for her to get so involved. She did participate a lot more in the battle in LWW, but even then I only wrote her coming in once the battle had already started, and that conflict was also much more personal to her because of her mother.

Allycat23: I hope I can keep you satisfied with the rate at which I update. Glad that you like the story, keep reading and feel free to give me as much feedback as possible.