Author's Notes: Ahahah. site work...
Astral - Honestly, if I were the reader, I'd feel the same about Rain as you do. But what you said ties in to the storyline I wrote and is a key point for the plot and such. It'll all come into place soon. (insert a finger pointing to this chapter and next) If you're not a fan of Rain, I think you'll like what I've got planned.
All - Thank you so much for the reviews and your theories! Here's the follow-up!
Disclaimer: I don't own anything from C.S. Lewis or underOATH. ("It's Dangerous Business..." is a song by underOATH)
Chapter Seven - Indigo Eyes
Susan yawned and sat up in bed. Her guess was that it was far past midnight. She had stormed off during dinner with only a few sips and bites of it, and she could feel her throat grow dry from thirst. Still half-asleep, she stumbled out of the tent to get a drink of water.
She felt herself start to doze off, and she walked slowly, her eyes almost fully closed. Then, in a very sudden manner, she smacked into something rather stiff - a shoulder.
"What in the world?" Susan said, shaking herself awake. She looked and saw... a shoulder. She raised her gaze higher and was sleepily greeted by Peter.
"Susan..." he murmured.
Susan shook her head. This boy looked very much like her brother, yes -- but something about him was different. He looked sort of transfixed on something... possessed, almost. He surely wasn't himself.
"Are you alright?" Susan asked nervously.
"Of course I'm alright!" he said, and she noticed he had his sword and shield with him.
"Why've you got those?" Susan said, surprised, pointing at the tools. "What're you doing?"
"I'm doing everything I'm supposed to."
"That doesn't make sense!"
Peter looked up at the sky. "I'm going to go get this started by myself. I'm going to go take my revenge... on Macht." His eyes gleamed under the starlight. He really does look different, Susan thought. Then she noticed something that was oddest of all - his eyes. They were a different color... He looked like someone from a dream did. A nightmare.
"Peter! Your eyes - they're... purple!" cried Susan, pushing him away. "What's wrong? What's happened?"
Peter pushed her away even farther. "Nothing's happened! You're the one that something's happened to! Something must be wrong with you! My eyes are fine!" He shielded his eyes from the starlight and moonlight. "They're fine."
Susan blinked. His eyes were no longer a purple-indigo. Her mouth hung open. What's going on?
"Whatever. I've got to go," Peter said quickly, and he dashed away in the direction of the woods.
"Peter, wait!" Susan yelled. Her brother was acting foolish.
"What's all this noise?" came Tumnus' voice. He sauntered out of a small blue tent and approached Susan.
"Peter's run off!" Susan ran over next to the tent, which was by trees that cast a shadow over it, and there was no light shining on them.
"Run off where?" Tumnus asked.
"The woods! He thinks he's going to go start the battle by himself, or something along that line! We've got to stop him!" Susan grabbed Tumnus' wrist and dragged him in the direction of the woods.
Tumnus shook her hand off. "What's gotten into you, Susan? He's just doing what he feels he has to, for the Great Nymph..." He stepped into the starlight.
Susan squinted and stared at his eyes. Purple.
"It's gotten to you too!" Susan dashed back into the tent that Lucy, Juliet, and herself stayed in.
She shook Lucy and Juliet awake quickly.
"What's the matter?" Juliet asked, yawning.
"Did little Susan get a nightmare?" said Lucy with a grin.
"No, be quiet, Lucy! Tumnus and Peter... their eyes... they're purple!"
Juliet raised an eyebrow. "Purple? I don't think that's possible, Susan... Especially since you know, their eyes weren't purple to begin with."
"That's why it's odd!" Susan said, trying to calm herself down. "I think, it's this place. The lake, maybe. I don't know. Just... follow me."
Susan stepped outside the tent into the starlight, followed by two confused-looking girls. She stared at their eyes, which were not purple.
"Listen, Susan, maybe you were dreaming. Go back to bed, I'm sure it'll be fine in the morning." Juliet said, looking up and squinting. "If it's not getting to be morning now. It's getting a bit light, don't you think? An hour or so of starlight and then the sun may just start rising."
Susan looked up, and agreed. "Something about this place is ... different. I think we'd best just go somewhere else, before something happens to us, too."
Juliet just closed her eyes and shrugged. "Alright. Whatever you say. Fine."
Susan woke up Edmund, Alden, and Skye, who looked grumpily at her and doubted her story of the purple eyes. However, Edmund and Skye agreed to go stay somewhere else.
"Come on, Alden, you goon..." said Juliet, pulling her brother's arm and trying to get him out of bed. "Let's go!"
Alden shook her hand off. "Go without me! I'm... tired." He glanced at them and then closed his eyes and began snoring again.
Edmund looked at Susan. "We're all tired, Susan. Why do we have to leave now? I mean, I will, if you really want me to... But we don't even have a place to go."
Susan shook her head and thought for a moment. Where could they go? At last, it came to her. "The Beavers!" She darted out of the tent and began going back the way they'd gotten to the lake from Tumnus' home.
"Do you even remember how to get there?" said Lucy. Susan stared blankly. "Oh, then I'd better lead the way then!"
The children walked and walked, following Lucy. Edmund and Susan were relieved that unlike the last time they'd traveled, they wouldn't have to walk in the snow.
Finally, they spotted a dam in the distance. It wasn't a small little hut of sticks -- it was like a little village.
Lucy grinned and ran as fast as she could towards the home. "Mr. Beaver! Mrs. Beaver!" she called.
It was light outside now, and Mr. Beaver popped out of the dam-house and sniffed the air, looking up at her. "My goodness... Lucy?"
She nodded and hugged him.
Beaver stared. "Look at you, dear. You look like you did a year or little more after your coronation!"
Lucy sighed. "Yes, I know. Everyone knows now, silly beaver... Why weren't you with everyone... at the camp at the water nymphs' lake?"
Beaver shook his head and beckoned Lucy and the others inside.
"Beaver, who're you talking to? Oh, if you wake up the baby...!"
As soon as they were inside, he shut the door, and the person to make the voice, Mrs. Beaver, came to greet them. "My dear, oh my goodness! Look at you all! Lucy! Edmund! Susan! And you've brought along some friends! Oh, forgive my appearance, your Highnesses! I beg your pardon!" She shook Skye and Juliet's hand. "G'morning. Early morning, if I may say so."
She looked at Edmund, Lucy and Susan. "And the High King's missing? Where's your brother? Is Peter alright?"
Susan closed her eyes and frowned. She opened them, and her eyes looked filled with sadness. "I'm not sure, to all of those questions, Mrs. Beaver."
"They -- they were at the water nymph's lake!" cried Mr. Beaver.
Mrs. Beaver gasped. "What were you thinking, my dears?"
Edmund spoke up. "What do you mean?"
She walked closer to them, and said in a softer tone, "A few years ago, Archenland banished all the water nymphs in that land. Nearly all of them came here, of course. And after that, some of our water nymphs, well -- haven't really been 'right in the head,' if you know what I mean."
"And what about... Oceania?" asked Susan suspiciously.
"Oh, Oceania, bless her! She was always from Narnia. She still seems the same. Gentle. Loving towards all creatures. Of course... there's the fact that she's always been ignorant towards things."
"Ignorant?" Susan said.
Mrs. Beaver continued. "Yes, ignorant. Last time, she didn't believe that the Sons of Adam and Daughters of Eve came -- you, of course. And Peter. Now -- tell me, Susan, even if you're not sure."
Susan told her and Mr. Beaver about what had happened back at the lake.
"Purple eyes..." murmured Mr. Beaver. "That's a sign. It always happens when a sea nymph uses her power to make a male fall in love with her. Things like that. But love wouldn't explain battling. They use love merely for enjoyment...well, normally..."
"Oh, don't ignore the other facts, Beaver!" said Mrs. Beaver. "Sea nymphs, especially those from Archenland, can't easily be trusted. They each have a mean temper when provoked, and use their power, and the men under their power, for their own purposes. To destroy, to build."
"We've got to get back to camp!" Mr. Beaver said urgently. "Who knows what's happening?" He opened the door and ran out in the direction of the sea nymphs' lake.
The sight at the camp was not a pretty one. The tents were all torn, the fire logs tossed around, the rocks tossed around, and nymphs nearly in tears, fuming around, trying to clean up.
"What's happened here?" demanded Edmund, approaching Oceania, who sat on a rock in the middle of the mess looking furious.
"Macht!" she yelled. "Macht - that lying beast, that... wolf! He thinks he's the next Maugrim, I suppose? I'm fuming mad. He and his pack all came an hour or so ago and tore everything up! And now, I can't find my daughter!" She noticed the beavers and ran over to Mrs. Beaver. "Mrs. Beaver!" she cried. "My best friend... I can't take any of this in. I can't believe it."
Mrs. Beaver sighed. "You must, your Highness..."
"Where's Peter?" Lucy said, horrified.
"And Alden!" added Juliet, recoiling and nearly crying.
Susan nearly burst into tears.
As if almost on cue, Peter and Alden walked out from the woods.
"PETER!" cried Susan and Lucy, running over to hug him, forgetting that he had the purple eyes of a sea nymphs' servant.
"You!" yelled Oceania, getting up off the rock and walking towards him, pointing an angry index finger. "Where is my daughter? I know there's something going on between you two! Macht came, and destroyed everything. He said you'd tried to kill him!"
Alden had gone closer to the woods, and the Susan thought he'd gone to hide from Oceania, but then she realized he was waiting for Tumnus, who was walking slowly out of the woods.
"I've done nothing wrong!" cried Peter angrily.
"Your Highness!" yelled Oceania, trying to remind him that she was royalty.
"There's no need to remind me that I'm High King," Peter spat. This was unlike him.
Before anyone could stop her, Oceania raised her hands high in the air, and then slapped Peter's cheek.
"And do you expect me to turn the other cheek, nymph?" Peter growled. His purple eyes glowed with anger.
"Why, you -- " Oceania stopped abruptly, then glanced at Peter's eyes. "Purple..." She cringed. "Who's kissed you, boy? Which of my water nymphs has given you the Kiss of Power?" she demanded. She looked the Tumnus and Alden and saw their eyes as well. Juliet looked stricken when she saw her twin's eyes. "TELL ME!"
Peter looked over at Juliet, Susan, Lucy, Edmund, and Skye. His eyes flickered and lost purple for a second. "Your daughter. Rain..." They returned to purple.
"My daughter... would never do that."
"She did! She loves me!"
Oceania shook her head sadly. "And now I do know... that that is not my daughter."
Juliet stared at her. "What do you mean? You said yourself that she was your daughter. Second most royal of the nymphs."
Oceania remained looking down in grief. "After... After the nymphs from Archenland came, there was a great rush and many of my nymphs disappeared. Then we figured out that some of the nymphs from Archenland were banished for rising to too much power which resulted in the deaths of many. The nymphs that disappeared... were killed by those from Archenland. This included my beautiful daughter. I had a large funeral for her, even if the body was never found. Then, one day, ages later, she showed up, out of nowhere."
"But I thought you said she'd died?" said Lucy.
"She did. I believe, and always sort of did, I admit now... that this one is a traitor posing as my daughter. A banished nymph from Archenland."
"You're lying!" shouted Alden from behind Peter.
"She is your royal daughter, and she loves me," Tumnus sneered at Oceania, a gentle faun turned to an angry creature from this "Kiss of Power."
Alden pushed him. "She loves me."
Peter growled at them both. "Foolish ones. She loves me. She has told me so."
"She's told me so as well!" they shouted in his direction.
Oceania began crying again. "I'm afraid to say that Rain -- or, imposter Rain -- has given the the Kiss of Power. It makes the kissed more powerful, but makes the kisser, the nymph, even more powerful. The kissed do her bidding at any cost. She just needs to say it."
Edmund nudged at his sword (which he'd been carrying since they left for the Beavers' dam) and walked off into the woods.
"What're you doing?" Susan said.
"I'm going to go find this imposter Rain."
Oceania interrupted him. "Kill her. She's no daughter of mine. She's a liar, a fake."
Edmund nodded. He didn't think he could kill someone, but this beast had taken control of his brother. His brother was his hero, and he couldn't let this happen.
Edmund walked off into the woods, but not without Lucy, Juliet, Susan, and Skye with him.
Author's Note: Just so you don't get too confused, the purple eyes are sort of a side-effect from the Kiss of Power, and can only be seen in light. That's why when Peter shielded his eyes from starlight the color couldn't be seen, and Susan couldn't see Tumnus purple eyes when he was near the tent. That's also why Peter and the others' eyes were purple during the day.