Ed's Queen of Narnia : YAyyyy! You've finally got one I'm so excited for you and I aboslutely adore your name!

Reader : Aha yes.. if you come to think of it, I've been dragging this over literally 6 years, oops!

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chapter 20 part 3; come morning-light

"I have no clue," he replied finally though she did not buy it. Somehow the fact that he still lied to her, despite what he'd promised her back then a few weeks ago when they made their peace and what had happened right made her sigh as a look of disbelief crossed her features.

"You're unbelievable," she started, shaking her head but before she could continue any further he cut her off, "I know what you're thinking, but in this case, your guess is just as good as mine. All we know of is your necklace somehow connected to Queen Swanwhite, nothing more nor less."

"You could've told me," she said. "When you kept badgering me about it. You made a promise that you would!"

It was his turn to sigh now, "I would've, if I'd known anything for sure. There are lots of things you don't understand Aline. And trust me when I say, all I'm trying to do, is protect you."

"Is that what you tell yourself?" she questioned, "You know what? I thought you could change. That you could be a decent human, a friend even perhaps, despite everything I've heard and moreover come to know of you. But I was wrong." she turned on her heels but felt his hand close around her wrist.

"Least let me explain," she felt a firm grasp on her hand just as she turned around but Aline was done with it all this time.

"Don't you get it? It's my life Ed, not some weird video game. I am clueless, I don't know anything that's going on! I have no idea what am doing here or even if its real. And it's driving me crazy, sometimes I feel like am barely hanging onto sanity by a thread. And all of your lies and secrecy helps nothing. I'm trying, so hard to keep it all together for the sake of your family more than for myself, and how can you expect me to do so when even you keep lying to me about everything? I am not your enemy and I am tired of trying to prove myself to you." She yanked her hand away from his firm grip at that, making her way out the same way she'd come in.

At the feet of the stairs she turned to see him still staring at her retreated form. Even from the distance he looked a vision of regal masculinity yet she didn't dare let her eyes wander or she would never have it in her to say the words she had to next- "And don't bother bringing up tonight ever again. It was nothing but a mistake."

She didn't bother to see if he followed her, briskly making her way up the stairs in a daze. She climbed her way out the trap door to the bed in the corner. She got beneath the sheets, pulling them over her chin to ward off the cold from the still heavy rainstorm outside. She wondered about Edmund and how he would fare on that extremely uncomfortable looking couch but immedietly put that thought out of her head, that was what was best for the both of them besides it serves him right.

Not long after Aline heard the wooden door creak as someone closed the hole bolting it shut and the drag of the couch to conceal it further.

Not long after that she could almost feel a presence make its way to where she was curled up and felt her breathing quicken just as she forced herself to remain still under her covers. She felt that someone yank at the cover just as she felt a weight to her left. No way! How dare he..

Aline turned glaring at him as she yanked the sheets he'd stolen from her side back to hers.

"We're not sleeping on the same bed together," she exclaimed.

"What?" he questioned, was that a vicious grin on his face? She couldn't be sure for the lack of lighting. "You didn't think I'm letting you kick me off my own bed, did you?"

"No, but I assumed you'd have the decency to do it yourself." she rolled her eyes. "but as usual, am wrong again."

"If it bothers you so much, you're welcome to take the couch."

He did not just say that, did he?

She sighed again, "You win this time."

Aline rose up gathering the pillow in her arm just before she felt a grip close on it.

"This isn't a game for either of us to win or lose. And even if it is, I most definitely am not winning."

She tried to yank it away this time but unlike the last, his hold on her was too strong to let go. Whatever he meant by that.. she wasn't going to let it get to her head, she'd witnessed first hand who he truly was and no matter what he did or said ought to cloud her judgement of him, unlike earlier today. That definitely was a mistake and she wasn't about to make another. She determinedly yanked her hand away from him, this time succeeding at it.

"Aline stay. There's enough room here for the both of us."

She paid no heed.

"Its way too cold out there unless you want to freeze to death!"

"Goddamn it Aline, I'll take the fucking couch if that's what you want."

"That's not what I want." she yelled at him finally losing it. "I just-" she sighed trying her best to hold the tears that threatened to flow at bay. "Today's been a truly long day and I- I don't want to make it any worse that what I've already done."

She knew he understood exactly what she meant, but instead of pulling away the Just King surprisingly took her hand in his, "It wasn't your fault." he said. For a moment it seemed like he had more to say, and he did but as he he opened his mouth, words failed him, instead he did something he knew he shouldn't; pulled her closer. for that was all he could do.

"I will not kiss you again," he was close enough that all she had to do was lean in an inch and they'd be wildly making out like they just did down there again, but instead it came out as the murmured whisper of a promise... "not unless you ask it of me. Now please come back to bed, you need to rest up, we have to rise at the crack of dawn if we're going to make it in the Cair unseen."

"But only if...", and so, compromising, they set one long pillow in between the both of them to divide each others territories, when just about then an uncharacteristically loud blast of thunder sounded accompanied by blinding lightning that glared through the windows and both the King and the Lady couldn't help but jump at it.

"You're afraid of it!" she managed to laugh despite the turmoil she felt deep within.

"I hate thunderstorms." he conceded and then added with an eyeroll, "As if you weren't."

"I-" Aline stammered, as she took in his form temporarily illuminated by the flashes of lightening, "I think you need to put something on," Aline hoped the darkness hid the blush on her cheeks.

Edmund looked confused for a moment before going, "Oh,"

And so he did, and by the time he'd made it back to her, she was settled in comfortably, letting the pitter-patter of raindrops on the roof lul her to sleep.

One thing was clear, come morning light, everything was going to change. And Aline had not the slightest inkling as to which way it would go.

Edmund felt like he was wandering the corridors of the castle alone for ages, for how long he knew not, nor what for. But he was searching for something.. but how could he be looking for something when he knew not what it was.

The entirely of Cair Paravel seemed to be abandoned. Something was fishy, he thought to himself.

"Peter?" Edmund called, to no response, "Su?" "Lucy?"

"Lora?" he tried, if not for anyone his Royal Shadow ought to be tagging alone a shadow to his own steps, but Lora never showed up.

Edmund walked on, for how long he wasn't sure. But the King was convinced he'd traversed the length of his Castle a few times over only to discover not a trace of any of it's residents.

"General Orieus?" Edmund tried again, as he made his way towards the training grounds..

It felt like everyone had abandoned him, all alone on his own in this huge stone castle..

Yet another name had popped into his head to call, but for some reason, if he uttered her name out loud and there came no response, he had a feeling it would break him. But what if she did come? his mind reasoned back at him, what if she did and save him from this curse of loneliness that seemed to plague him..

Aline?

But before he could do anything of the sort, within the blink of an eye, Edmund Pevensie found himself not to be in the warm confines of an abandoned Cair Paravel anymore, but rather a place he'd been in more than a decade ago, but yet did manage to make a comeback in his nightmares much more frequently than he'd have liked to admit.

He felt the cold fingers of the chill caress his skin, creep up his spine, seeping into his bones, as his head burst into flames. Quite the irony.

Gulping down the initial streak of panic of having being swept from the familial grounds of the palace he called home to the forbidden ice-palace of his nightmares, the Just King forced himself to concentrate on what was happening. Taking in a deep breath, and blatantly ignoring his frozen muscles and the throbbing pain flaring increasingly in his head, Edmund forced himself to look around. The stalactites and stalagmites, which had protruded a few feet or two from the icy floor and hung from the ceiling, now stood up tall and mighty like giant glittering ice pillars each meeting their counter-parts mid way. But this was impossible, the rational part off his mind argued, for there was no way in Narnia the weather was cold enough to encourage the growth of such large structures. There was the occasional hard winter, but never had the cold managed to foster up to that extent.. unless he was up far far North, past Ettinsmoor and the Anglus Mountain Range..

And then, Edmund saw it. The throne. The ice throne of the self proclaimed Queen, or rather known now as the White Witch, Jadis. The very throne he'd been tempted for, the one for which he'd been willing to sell his own family. Yes, as much as Turkish Delight was indeed delicious, Edmund knew deep down for exactly what he had actually betrayed them. And as much as it had been for the irresistible 'a room filled with Turkish Delight', that wasn't the only cause. And he was now staring at the other.

Then, he heard something. The crunch of ice, under foot.

Edmund turned.

There was nothing.

"If there's anyone out there, show yourself!" the King commanded, but all that replied him was the deafening silence after the echo of his own voice.

Edmund unsheathed his sword, the noise cutting through sharply through the deafening silence, making the hairs on the back of his neck stand up.

Then, he heard it again. The sound of ice crystals crack beneath the weight of something. A boot, perhaps. And then before he could turn, the unmistakable, strident sound of laughter echoed around the ice chambers, accompanied with the whispers seeming to come from inside his head, 'my little traitor.'

He felt for his sword at his waist and there she sat. Edmund drew her out. "By the order of the Four Thrones and Aslan's Will, I command you show yourself, or face my wrath!"

But all that replied him back was dead silence, before.. was that the noise of someone coughing?

Edmund followed it, rushing through corridors after corridors and rooms the size of banquet halls seeming endless he was almost about to give up, but no, he needed to find out what was going on, before he came to the source. It was a room. Small in comparison to any he'd become to accustomed to. In fact it looked like a vault. And there in the middle of it, lay a girl. She wore white though it had been now tainted in a brilliant hue of red that coated her body and flowing on the clear ice floor.

He needed no more confirmation to recognise who it was.

"Ed.." she called out her voice coming out small and far off.

"Edmund!"

"EDMUND WAKE UP!"

And he wanted to. It was a dream he had to tell himself. It was a dream. This wasn't the first, he'd been having similar ones and he had to wake up. NOW.

"Please wake up.." the voice called again and so he did. He woke up to a pair of emerald eyes, very much alive and full of life as she had a hand in his hair and another caressing his cheek reaching to him from across the divide of their pillow territories.

"It's alright, you're safe with me now." she said, eyes wide with concern and her voice filled with care, "It was just a nightmare."

"What was I saying?" he questioned groggily, praying to Aslan she hadn't heard anything she wasn't supposed to.

"Nothing," she said, "You were tossing and turning around and calling out for your siblings. Oh, Edmund you frightened me."

"It's fine, go back to sleep," and when she didn't move he assured her further, "Al, I'm fine. I'm sorry for putting you through this but go back to sleep."

But instead of replying, the girl just promptly removed the barrier pillow in between them without a word, before her gaze reached his eyes almost as if she was challenging him. Before he could say anything, then settled herself in the recently vacated space an arm snaking it's way around his torso just as her head hit his shoulders.

"What- what are you doing?" he questioned as he felt the warmth of her petite body through his clothes..

"Making sure you don't have another nightmare if only so that I can have a peaceful night of sleep," she stated, and then at his lack of response added, "Bodily contact while sleeping is proven to help reduce nightmares."

"So, does this mean you trust me now?"

"Oh no, we have a long way to go before that, but don't worry I trust myself."

He chuckled at that, "Me too, Al."

"Edmund?" she called after some time of comfortable silence between the two.

"Yeah?"

"Goodnight."

This was going to be one long night for sure. But then, if everything were to change on the morrow, he better hold on to her as tight as he could for the little time he had left.

A/N : It was never my intention to drag this chapter into a part 3 but I felt there was just too much going on to be lumped in with the rest. These two are really hot and cold aren't they?

Chapter 15 (yes! theres no part 4 don't worry lol) will be up in 2-3 days so click that follow & favourite to be alerted to it in your emails! And before that I'd love to know what you guys think they're going to be for each other next, hot or cold ? XD