A/N: Somehow we have reached the last chapter and I can't thank you all enough for reading!

As always I need to shout out my amazing beta reader Abby (abbisarts on insta) for her incredible dedication to this and all my projects, her constant support, and her beta reviews which sometimes rival my own chapter length. I wouldn't be motivated to write like I do without her, and as one of many influences for the character of Hosha, I can confirm she is in fact a stellar human being.

Also to answer HeynaBlackstar's comment on the previous chapter, the BloodRed series will follow Tirian's story all the way up to the Last Battle, and in fact the final book will be an alternate version of LB! (Not incredibly different in spirit, but some newer plot threads have begged to be answered in their own ways, so I like to think it will be very interesting.)

I've explained my future plans a bit more on my profile for anyone interested in my writing schedule, but for now, thank you so much, and enjoy the chapter!

xXx

CHAPTER FOURTEEN: TILL THE STARS RAIN DOWN FROM THE HEAVENS

Tirian closed his eyes against the rush of nausea that swept through him in spite of the fact that he'd eaten nothing yet this morning, and still had not even left the antechamber where he waited with Jewel.

He buried a hand in the Unicorn's mane, ribs protesting at the motion but not so badly as they had a few days ago, and pressed his forehead to the Unicorn's cheek.

"It's only a simple ceremony," rumbled Jewel softly, "And you know Gareth said you needn't say anything."

"I know," murmured Tirian, the foreign weight of the ceremonial cape fluttering around him, the Red Lion twisting up the front of his rich white tunic, cuffs flecked with gold. "It just… seems so soon."

Jewel didn't say anything, but they both knew what he meant.

It had only been three days since the battle, the cleanup and aftermath of which had thoroughly taken over his mind. They'd heard reports only yesterday that the giants were out of Narnia for good, leaving a path of destruction in their wake that Tirian had yet to deal with, and in fact did not know how to deal with; homes to rebuild, creatures to mourn. The coronation had been the last thing on his mind, the mere concept of it still not quite real.

But Narnia needed a king, and Bran said they'd waited long enough. The best thing he could do for his subjects now was to give them stability, a figure to look to.

Tirian didn't know what to do with subjects. He didn't know what to do with this formality. He didn't know what to do for all the people looking to him.

Hosha's words from the previous evening washed back to him, and he wished he could have stayed there, basking in the summer sunset forever. You don't have to do anything different.

Somehow he didn't think that was quite true.

The door clicked and Tirian glanced up just as the dryad woman gave a deep bow. "They are ready for you, your Majesty."

The churning in his stomach returned full force.

If Jewel hadn't been walking right at his side, he thought he might have fallen over, even after they entered the hall and met rows of ceremonial courtiers who walked on either side, and Tirian lowered his hand from the Unicorn's neck.

The whole palace was thick with ceremony.

Not a single soul walked the halls aside from their procession, and the reason became abundantly clear when at last they passed through the archway into the packed throne room.

Every creature in the city seemed to have gathered there, filling the massive chamber to bursting, save for the perfectly straight path down the center to the throne, on either side of which stood rows of fully armed centaurs, more than Tirian had seen in one place in his life, all with naked swords held level with their noble faces.

His heart hammered faster, but he fixed his eyes on the throne, focusing only on walking at the same pace as Jewel. It felt too slow, too measured.

Each step brought him closer to the dais, to the carved images of kings and queens beyond it, all noble and royal and wise, and then Jewel turned off to stand beside Gareth and his family in the very front row, leaving Tirian to ascend the steps alone, up to the very edge of the throne.

He turned to face the room.

It looked bigger now than it had ever looked before, fluttering with banners in gold and crimson, glinting with swords and standards and the sea of brilliant gemstones that were nobility in their finest clothing.

Every eye was fixed on him.

His lungs constricted and he wished very much for Jewel's mane to hold again.

His eyes flicked to Hosha.

The boy shot him a small smile, and Cinder flicked his tail where he sat very primly at Mal's feet.

And then Lord Bran stepped from the opposite side and knelt to take the crown from the mole who carried it with utter reverence on a rich red pillow.

Gold glinted in the light of towering stained glass windows, and Bran ascended the steps up to Tirian, regal as ever.

If the hall had been quiet before, it held its breath now.

Tirian lowered his head and knelt to one knee just as he'd practiced the night before, but now he felt his insides trembling, suddenly breathless as the gold lowered onto his head, the weight of it pressing into his skull.

"Free Narnians," said Bran, clear voice carrying through the silent hall as he stepped aside and Tirian rose, eyes tracking up from the marble to the crowd. "I give you, King Tirian."

The words hung in the air, strange, terrifying, exhilarating.

"Long live the King."

The room erupted with cheers in every kind of voice imaginable, all echoing the same cry, "Long live the King!" so jubilant and wild that it took Tirian's breath away.

He glanced from face to face, almost unable to believe their joy, but Hosha beamed, and Mal's expression was one of unmistakable quiet pride.

Under the swell of cheers, Bran murmured at his side. "No one could have filled your father's place so well."

It was all he could do not to glance back at the man, a thousand emotions crashing inside him at once.

And then he caught sight of the smaller animals amongst the feet of the courtiers, the rabbits and moles and hedgehogs and mice, cheering just as joyfully as any other, and in that moment Tirian's heart overflowed and a smile broke across his face in spite of the nerves, in spite of the crown.

Ceremony collapsed into celebration, spreading in no time to the great hall and arching passageways and courtyards. Not only for their new King, but for victory, for honoring lives lost, not least of all the King that the country had yet to mourn.

There was feasting, dancing, story-telling, and every other manner of celebration Narnians knew, wild in its reverence, yet free, unbound by rituals some would call mourning. It was a memorial of great times, not of dark endings, for that is not how any Narnian ought to be remembered.

But through it all, Tirian still felt the foreign weight of the crown on his head, the emptiness at his side at the head table, and too many times he glanced as if expecting to see his father, wishing to ask him something, wishing to see his reaction to a joke, as if the last week had been only a dream and he would soon find himself running off to beg to fight at his side.

That moment never came.

Now with no war to fight, he had nothing to set his mind to, no way to bury his thoughts with more pressing matters.

He slipped away onto sunlit terraces the moment he caught the opportunity, smiling at those he passed, but his feet already knew where they were going, wind ruffling his hair, cape tugging at his shoulders as he stepped out onto the eastern balcony.

There was no pyre now, not even the faintest hint of ash on the golden stone, serf crashing over the beach far below, but sparks still danced in his mind's eye as he gripped the railing, longing for something he could not find even here.

He breathed out, leaned against the carved stone, and took the crown gingerly into his hands, its delicate patterns shining golden white in the sunlight.

Its weight no longer taunted him, but still he ached for its rightful bearer.

It wasn't supposed to be his yet.

This crown must have known a great deal more about ruling than he did, how many noble heads had it adorned? How many had it outlived?

"Mind some company?"

He almost jumped at the quiet voice, spinning to find Elise standing just a few paces behind him, fiery hair glinting in complicated braids around her head.

Out of the people he'd expected to come looking for him, she hadn't even made the list.

"I'm sorry if I'm intruding," she said quickly, "I just thought— I wanted someone to talk to, when everything… back when… I thought maybe you might—"

"Don't apologize," he said as his wits came back to him, "You're not intruding." He made room for her at the railing.

She came up quietly beside him and leaned tentatively against it.

For several moments neither of them said anything, watching the waves break over the shore, listening to the cries of the gulls, and he thought back to the day he'd found her, to the story she'd told, weeks alone in the wilderness, not a soul to talk to.

She still hadn't really talked about what happened, not since that first night with his father in Hosha's sitting room.

His eyes wandered up to the edge of the sky, to the glittering cloudless horizon. And at last he spoke.

"They're not really gone, you know."

She glanced up at him. "What do you mean?"

He nodded out to sea. "My ancestor, King Caspian the Navigator… he sailed once within a league of the world's edge. They say you can see the mountains of Aslan's Country from there, just beyond the horizon."

"Aslan's Country?"

He sighed softly in thought. "The afterlife, I suppose. The country of the great Lion. I've always learned I will go there when I die, but to think of it like those mountains… to see it… I don't know if that makes it better or worse. To be right there… just out of reach."

Elise gazed out over the sea for a long time. "Better," she said quietly. Another length of silence hung between them before she added, "We have stories of a Lion, too. Appearing to help people of the village. It's all through our history."

Her eyes shone for a moment before Tirian caught a slight shift in her face, that same slap of reality that had already struck him so many times just this morning.

She was the only one who knew those stories now.

His heart fell with her.

"Tell them to me," he said suddenly. "Tell them all to me and I'll write them down, I'll make sure Narnia remembers them just as well as our own legends."

She looked up at him, grey eyes shining blue under an azure sky. "Really?"

"Of course, what else am I good for if I can't do that?"

She suppressed a wide, teary smile, and he rubbed her shoulder, smiling back.

A few minutes later, another thought struck him. "What were their names? Your parents?"

A pensive expression crossed her face, but not one of hesitation.

He understood.

It was as if the answer were some deep secret, as if speaking them would be some kind of spell, letting them free into the world that had forgotten them, as if something terrible or wonderful might happen if she did.

"Noora," she said at last with a heavy breath. "And Brynn."

Tirian nodded, taking them in, repeating them in his head, determined to keep them safe, determined not to let her treasure them alone.

"What about yours?" she asked, and somehow he hadn't expected that.

"Erlian," he said, and a shiver ran through his core at the release of the word, "and Caitrin."

His heart fluttered at the sound of his mother's name, spoken so rarely, and suddenly another thought came into his head as he gazed at the horizon. Did you find her again? Are you together now?

"They're okay," he said quietly.

Elise looked at him.

"They're okay now. All of them."

And the silence fell between them again, but this time it was a warm, sunlit silence, and Tirian's mind wandered beyond the edge of the world, the elegant pattern of the crown digging into his fingers, glittering like a gem at the edge of the balcony.

It was a long time before another voice broke through his daydreams.

"There you two are!"

This time the impact in Tirian's back left no question as to the owner of the voice, nor did the pair of arms that flung about him or the chin that settled itself on his shoulder.

"I told you they came this way," said Cinder, leaping up to perch on the balcony railing and sitting at once to groom his pelt pointlessly in the ocean breeze.

"Do you just spend your whole life following me around, or what?"

The Cat looked up but didn't answer, and Tirian rolled his eyes.

A moment later the soft clop of hooves pricked his ears and he glanced back to see Jewel and Mal following at a more reasonable pace.

"All of you?"

"I told you," said Hosha, "You're not allowed to run off without me. Especially not with a girl."

Tirian laughed.

"In fairness," Elise spoke up, "I was the one who followed him."

"Oh," said Hosha, and Tirian thought he felt him deflate against his back.

Jewel came up beside Tirian, and Mal put her hands on Elise's shoulders, all six of them looking out over the sea before Hosha spoke again, lifting his chin from Tirian's shoulder.

"Nothing's different now, right?"

"What?" Tirian turned to look at him, the collar of the boy's fine green tunic already loose, stray frizzy hairs falling to frame his olive face. "Why would anything be different?"

Hosha glanced at the crown in his hands, and Tirian's eyes tracked down to it.

"I mean, besides… I guess I might be busier." That felt like the understatement of the century. The word king fell back to him, the weight of what that meant. He didn't even know where to start, it seemed so big, almost incomprehensible. But he shot Hosha a smile. "It's not like you'll never see me again."

"But what about every day? What am I supposed to do all by myself?"

"Don't you have other friends?"

"No," said Hosha sharply, "and I don't want any others."

Tirian couldn't stifle his grin in time, a surge of fondness rushing through him.

"Oh, I know!" cried Hosha, "I'll help you with your— er— kingly duties, whatever those are. You're not getting rid of me that easily."

"I think I could use all the help I can get," laughed Tirian.

"Great, that's settled. And I'm a knight now, so that's got to count for something." He grinned as if it were the first time he'd said it, rather than the thousandth since Gareth had bestowed their titles upon them after the battle. "Knights of the great and noble order of the Lion, the both of us. Think of that."

"I don't think you've yet stopped thinking of it," said Tirian, throwing an arm over Hosha's shoulders. "And I should make you a great deal more, had you not already every title of nobility by your own blood. And you, too," he added, glancing at Mal.

"Yeah," said Hosha, leaning around Tirian, "You're a regular Queen Susan after all. Only, better, cause you actually went to battle."

Her delicate eyebrows rose, hair slipping over the violet silk clinging to her shoulder. "Did you just compliment me?"

"I— what? Uh… well, you're not always the worst."

Mal smirked and reached in front of Tirian to ruffle her brother's hair, and he ducked sharply to squirm away.

"Okay, okay, you don't have to go that far."

She settled back with an elbow on the railing, her other arm still holding Elise.

"And let's not forget our Queen Lucy," said Tirian. "If anyone so deserved a title."

"You are staying at the Cair, right?" asked Hosha as Elise blushed. "I mean, there are lots of other places to live in Narnia, or even Archenland, if you wanted, but if you stayed here you could see us."

"Don't scare her off," said Jewel, and Hosha squinted at him as Tirian bit his lip to stifle a grin.

"If she knows what's good for her," said Cinder, "She'll run as far away from you lot as she can."

"Hey!"

Tirian had to tighten his grip on Hosha's shoulders to keep him from lunging in the Cat's direction.

"Why are you still here, anyway? You don't even live here."

"Oh, I don't know," purred Cinder, "I've been meaning to go back to the forest, but think I like it better here after all."

Hosha huffed. "Great." He shot a look at Tirian. "This is your fault." And then, under his breath, "Domesticated hairball."

"I heard that."

"Good."

Tirian looked back to Elise, still awaiting her answer to the question. "You don't have to stay here if you don't want to. Hosha's right, there are lots of places to go."

She smiled. "No, I think I like it here, too."

Hosha bounced on the balls of his feet. "Perfect! I mean— uh, that's good. I would be offended if you wanted to leave us."

"You would be offended if she moved out of the house," said Mal.

"I would not! But," he glanced at her, "You're not, are you?"

Elise giggled. "Not so long as you'll have me."

That seemed to satisfy him and he leaned against Tirian again, looking out at the sea as strains of faint music wafted up from the palace.

"I don't suppose we're being missed, in there?" asked Tirian.

"Probably," said Hosha, "But they'll live. You can do whatever you want, after all, you're the King."

Tirian smirked. "I don't think that's how that works."

"Well, something like that." He glanced down at the crown in Tirian's hands, silent for a few moments. "Put it on again."

"What?"

"Just do it."

Tirian pursed his lips and looked at the heavy golden circlet, heart beating just a little faster as he raised it and settled it carefully atop his head, the motion still awkward, unpracticed.

He took his hands away hesitantly and looked at Hosha, the boy's eyes already drinking him in, leaning back to get a better look.

His face split into a grin.

"What?" asked Tirian.

"You look awesome."

Tirian scoffed, cheeks tingling at the sudden praise. "That's not exactly the point."

"Actually, I think that is exactly the point. You'll be a great King, I know it."

His insides squirmed. "Just because I look awesome?"

"No, but I'm glad you admit it."

"What? I didn't—" He sighed, and shoved Hosha.

"You'll be a great King because you already are," said Mal.

He snapped to look at her so quickly that the crown almost slipped off again. He almost couldn't process those words coming from her.

"I don't mean you're perfect," she said, and Hosha scoffed.

"Way to ruin a compliment."

But she ignored him. "I've seen battle now. What it looks like, against creatures like that… That's what you ran into twice, without an army at your back, even before you led us. It may have been rash, but it was still brave."

Tirian could only stare, unable to comprehend.

"If that's what you're willing to face for the smallest of your subjects, you have everything you need to be a great King."

For a second his vision blurred and he blinked to clear it, pushing back the heat in his eyes, lips parting wordlessly in thanks that he couldn't seem to utter.

"It's true," said Jewel from his other side. "And we're all with you."

Tirian took a shuddering breath and smiled, glancing back at the Unicorn, biting the inside of his lip to hold back stinging tears.

"Come on," said Hosha, "Don't make him cry, we're supposed to be happy today."

Tirian's grin widened and he breathed a short laugh, meeting Hosha's eyes through a sparkling veil of glass. "I am."

And it was true.

Hosha smiled fondly back and squeezed Tirian's shoulders, locking his arms around his chest and resting his chin on his shoulder again.

The breeze ruffled their hair and clothes, music drifting out over the sea, the horizon gleaming golden.

It wasn't the world he had envisioned for himself only a month ago, but it was hard to despair when the sun shone so brilliantly on the beads in Mal's hair, when Jewel's soft voice rumbled beside him, when Hosha's laugh broke just a little too loud in his ear.

He didn't know how to be King. But he had everything he needed right here.

And some things would never change.

THE END

…for now.