Edmund's sour mood saturated the courtyard until the shadows lengthened into afternoon, but Lucy barely noticed, the thrill of real dragons, real magic still swirling in her head, singing in her blood as Aravis led them out through the courtyard and further up into the impossible monolithic stone of another world.
They climbed a set of steep stairs into a taller, maze-like layer of ruined castle walls, and only then did the topic of conversation shift at last to careers.
Or, more specifically, how to kill them.
"You're the one with all the bright ideas," said Edmund, "What's your plan?"
"I don't have a plan," said Lucy, pulling her mind reluctantly from its tangible daydream, "not yet—"
"Oh, incredible, I just love allying with everyone under the sun for absolutely no reason—"
"I said not yet."
"Okay, and how do I know you'll actually kill them when you couldn't even kill her?"
"They're careers," snapped Lucy, "it's different."
"How?"
She racked her mind for an excuse. "Well for one thing, I don't like singling people out."
Edmund motioned exasperatedly toward Aravis. "She chucked a spear at my face!"
"And missed," said Lucy, pressing on before Edmund could argue again. "They've been training all their lives. If we can kill them, it's almost their own fault. They're the ones who signed up for this. We didn't."
Edmund squinted at her. "Okay, fair point, go on."
She looked ahead at Aravis. "What did you mean when you said this place was dangerous?"
The girl turned a corner and climbed through a broken gap in the wall, speaking without glancing back. "Pits, tunnels deeper than you can see, twisting down into the mountain. I think if you tried to follow them you'd just fall to your death. At least I certainly haven't tried. But something lives down there. You can hear them screaming sometimes, at night."
"Them?" asked Edmund. "What kind of them?"
"Don't know. Don't wanna know. I stay up here. Just watch your step, not all of this is as sturdy as it looks. And don't leave food out, the scavengers 'round here are something special."
"What kind of scavengers?" asked Lucy.
"Oh, I'd call them… dragonish, I guess, in the loosest sense of the word. Fat little vultures, more like, but they've got teeth on 'em, and no wings that I've seen. Mostly I stay off the ground when it's dark."
Lucy glanced around reflexively, but only the sun-bleached stone looked back.
"And of course you get intruders of the curious human variety."
"You mean besides us?" asked Caspian from the back of the group.
Aravis pointed to her right, though a crumbling wall interrupted their view. "The Sevens are camped up north a ways. They came by here, looking for water I think, but moved to the stream a couple miles off."
"The Sevens," echoed Lucy. "You got close enough to see who they were?"
"You can see just about anything from here if you're in the right spot. Saw you coming up all afternoon."
Lucy glanced at Caspian, though uneasiness now swirled vaguely in her gut. "We'd have the element of surprise."
"What, are the careers just going to conveniently stumble up here?"
"Actually, that part's easy," said Edmund, and they all stopped to look at him.
He sighed. "I know, it's shocking, while you lot are thinking about dragons, I'm actually working on keeping us alive."
"Go on, then," said Caspian.
Edmund glanced down at the brittle earth beneath their feet, flipped Aravis' spear in one hand, and drew a large X in the dust.
Aravis propped a hand on her hip as she watched.
"Think of the arena in quadrants, okay? We're in the western quadrant." He jabbed the left-hand side of the X with the spear. "The careers are in the south. They're probably down in that valley hunting their own food for once."
"Or milking their sponsors for everything they're worth," said Aravis.
"Stop ruining this for me. Anyway, it's only a matter of time before they get back to the real hunt, right? So where are they going to go? North?" He jabbed the top of the X. "They don't know the dragon's dead, I doubt they'll try to get past the table."
Lucy nodded as he scribbled out the northern quadrant.
"So, what then, east?" He pointed to the right-hand side of the X. "They've already scoured it, as far as I know, and I was with them for most of it. Shut up," he added before Aravis even said anything.
She sighed, and Edmund scribbled out the eastern quadrant.
"If they're already down south, I don't think anyone else will be settling there in a hurry." He crossed out the south and jabbed at the west again. "This is the only side they can search without re-treading territory. If anything, we're lucky we got here first."
"Okay," said Caspian, "And what are we supposed to do when they get here?"
"We'll be ready for them," said Lucy.
They all looked at her.
She took a breath, the reality of her own plan striking her through their eyes, but she couldn't back down after suggesting it—after uprooting their comfortable status quo once again out of sheer impulse.
"We already have the advantage here. If we lure them into the right spot, we could get the drop on them before they have a chance to do too much damage."
Edmund watched her steadily, then glanced at the others. "We could light a fire. Show them the way. They're always happy to sack an unsuspecting campsite, anyway."
Lucy nodded. Caspian looked thoughtful, and after a long while, Aravis nodded, too.
"Okay. I get Rabadash."
Edmund raised his hands in indifferent surrender. "I don't care who gets who, kill whoever you want."
Aravis gave a short breath and spun on her heel, striding briskly into the late afternoon sun as the rest scrambled to follow, climbing up to the very highest levels of the castle mound.
At last, they struggled up one last narrow, grueling staircase, and came out at the summit of a solitary tower, rubble encasing them on every side, overlooking the desolate world below.
Lucy's heart jumped at the view sprawling before her, castle walls descending away in wide fortified layers, the color of eggshell edged in golden sunset gleaming against the endless valley of pale stone stretching out around them for all eternity.
Aravis stepped to a crumbling crack in the edge and leaned out over the dropoff below.
"Looks like you're the only ones getting here today," she said as Caspian and Edmund climbed up behind Lucy. "They'd be hard pressed to travel in any kind of a hurry, coming all the way around the other side of their valley."
"What?" asked Edmund, turning to face her, though Caspian never tore his eyes from the mesmerizing landscape. "Why would they go around?"
"Because they probably don't fancy broken necks, that's why. The whole thing's a nasty cliff, 'cept for the hills in the south. That's the only way in or out if you don't want to play the odds." She fingered the scabs digging down through her jaw.
Edmund's eyes lingered on them before he looked away.
"What about a fire tonight?" asked Caspian, snapping himself out of his trance. "Just up here, I mean, not the big one."
"Fine by me," said Aravis, "if you get it yourself. I'm tired."
"And you think we're not?" asked Edmund.
"Never said that."
He glared at her, and Caspian shrugged, descending the first few steps again.
Lucy followed.
"Hey!" snapped Edmund. "You're not leaving me up here with her!"
"Come on, then," said Lucy.
He sighed wearily, and perhaps a little over-dramatically, but followed in the end nonetheless, and struck out with Lucy and Caspian to collect dry wood from the brittle, quivering trees that clung like bleached skeletons to the corners of courtyard gardens, roots curling around colossal blocks as if in a final desperate attempt the squeeze water from the stone itself.
Edmund snapped a branch over his knee, and Caspian gathered the splintered remains of another sorry botanical carcass at the opposite end of the shadowy yard.
The slightest breeze nipped through Lucy's tunic, pale fingers picking loose twigs from the gargantuan pavers as something cold settled in her bones, deeper than any breeze could reach.
Caspian glanced up as she approached, straightening and tucking a branch under his arm, looking taller and broader now in the ominous falling light that edged his figure than he had looked under the afternoon sun.
Lucy cast her eyes to the ground, but she didn't bend to pick up any of the matchwood lying shattered at her feet.
"What is it?"
She glanced up again into shining black mirrors. "What?"
"What's wrong?"
Uneasy chills fluttered through her core. "Nothing, I— I mean… nothing really…" She sighed.
Bother it all.
Did he really need to be that perceptive?
Guilt bloomed like ink into her stomach. "It's just… are you okay with all this?"
Bit late to ask now, huh, Pevensie?
A faint smile flickered over Caspian's lips, and he turned away from the tree to close the short distance between them, though her insides still swam as the true weight of her actions washed over her several hours too late, doubt falling in with the creeping grey of dusk.
Another rash plan, another forced alliance against every will but her own. Now a real conflict, with real killers.
Caspian nicked her chin with the crook of his forefinger. "I can hardly argue with Princess Lucy, can I?"
She pursed her lips. "You argued earlier."
"Yes… well… I do question your taste in allies, on occasion."
"Including yourself?"
"Especially myself, but you're the only reason any of us are alive, let alone allied, against every force in the known universe. I truly don't know how you do it, little miracle worker, but we might at least learn to trust your judgement."
Her stomach plummeted.
It hadn't really been judgement at all. Not really. Not consciously. And perhaps it had worked out so far, but would it work this time? Now she could only think of Peter, of the other career boys, the strength in their arms and in their eyes, and she felt tiny and pathetic in Caspian's shadow. Why was she making these decisions? Why were they listening to her?
Caspian brushed the hair from her face and tilted her eyes up to look at him, the touch against her jaw so gentle that it tore her from her thoughts with the sheer jarring leap of her heart. "What are you thinking about?"
"It's… I…" She shook her head, swallowing hard at his soft tone, too understanding, too earnest. "I don't even know where it came from, I don't actually want to fight, I just…"
You just what? You can't keep your big mouth shut?
"I understand."
"You— what? How can you understand when I don't even understand myself?"
"You're right about the careers. At least, you're right that it's better to face them now, on our own terms. I don't want to fight, either, but we're going to have to, sooner or later, the Gamemakers will make sure of that. At least this way we'll have—"
"Control," finished Lucy, her own mind coming clear as he spoke. She didn't want to sit around wondering what new horror would lash out the next time things got boring. She didn't want to wait. "Just an ounce of control. Gosh, I really do sound smart when you put it all that way."
A faint smirk touched Caspian's lips. "They'll have a tough time ambushing us with Lucy Pevensie on the job."
"Oh, Caspian, don't make fun of me!"
He grinned, gazing into her eyes as if he could see straight through to her soul; no fear, no pain reflected in those depths, no hint of the desperate emptiness that had hollowed him last night, now only a peace, a trust. "I wouldn't dare."
She huffed a tiny sigh, and her protest brought out an involuntary smile before she could fight it. She rolled her eyes. "You're awfully chipper today for someone who said I was gonna get us all killed."
"For the record, I did only say you were going to get yourself killed."
She scoffed. "Oh, thanks."
"I didn't say I would let it happen."
Her heart jumped again, and she pursed her lips in frustration. How did he always manage to make her smile when she was supposed to be wallowing in despair?
"Really though. What changed? And don't say Lucy Pevensie."
"What if it is Lucy Pevensie?"
"I think you need better standards for your life-altering decisions."
"I like my standards where they are, thanks." He tapped her forehead. "I like them right here."
"You're being silly."
"Well, if we're all gonna die, I think I'm allowed to be silly."
"Hey!"
He laughed, and turned back to stacking branches into his arms. "Come on, I thought you were my ally, are you gonna let me carry all these by myself?"
Lucy watched him, hair falling loose over sparkling eyes as he handed a bundle of small branches to her and she took them into her arms, an inexplicable ease in his tone and his touch, as if no invisible chasm had ever gaped between them, as if no game had ever held them apart.
"Is this who you usually are?"
"What?"
"This." She motioned vaguely to the entirety of his being. "How you're acting today, is this how you act at home?"
He shrugged with a teasing grin. "Maybe."
"Huh." She grinned back. "Shame I didn't know you then."
"It really is a shame, Drin could've gotten off my back about that whole lack of a social life thing a long time ago."
Lucy scoffed and shook her head, and bundled another dry branch into her arms, bewildered yet again by this boy she could never quite pin down.
Tribute. Competitor. Orphan. Ally. Dreamer. Child. Safety. Danger. Friend. Home.
Caspian Telmar; a creature of wild sunsets and encroaching starlight whose mere glance sent her worries scattering away like soot in the wind.
The sun was setting properly by the time they climbed back up to the tower, shiny orange egg yolk sizzling on the horizon, shining straight into Lucy's eyes as she cast her arm load of branches to the landing and collapsed against the wall.
Edmund dropped down beside her, shooting another glare at Aravis who relaxed against the opposite heap of rubble as Caspian set about lighting the fire.
Before the sun dipped fully out of sight, fresh white sparks burst to life against the darkening sky.
"What if the Sevens see it?" asked Lucy.
"They won't be dumb enough to climb up here in the dark," said Aravis. "If they feel like joining the party tomorrow, they're welcome to it."
Caspian tucked his lighter back into his pocket and settled in on Lucy's other side.
"You'd better not try recruiting them, too," said Edmund. "Don't think I didn't catch you staring at Prettyboy in training."
"His name's Peridan," snapped Lucy. "And I wasn't staring at him, my mentors told me to keep an eye on everybody."
"So did mine," said Edmund.
Lucy rolled her eyes. "I don't think keeping an eye on the competition is supposed to be a full contact sport."
Aravis snorted, and Edmund snapped "Hey!"
Lucy sighed, leaning her head back against Caspian's shoulder and watching the sparks leaping up from tongues of wavering fire. She wouldn't admit it aloud, but the thought of fighting the Sevens did bother her.
She had watched them in training, listened in on their soft words and softer laughter, two beings entirely unbelonging to a place like this.
But then, did anyone really belong here?
The careers, maybe.
She'd just begun to wonder what they would do about sleeping in shifts tonight when a familiar ding sounded overhead.
Edmund's eyes snapped up, and the rest followed his gaze by the second ding, the glimmer of firelight flickering against a metallic parcel as it floated down toward them.
Caspian stood to snatch it out of the air, a bundle wrapped in some strange silvery material. He set it well aside from the fire and unwrapped it to reveal a set of bottles and a bag full of rolls and scones and biscuits.
Lucy's eyes widened, and Edmund snatched one of the bottles filled with a rust colored liquid.
"You're kidding," he breathed, popping the cap off to the immediate acrid scent of alcohol.
"You got a good thing going, huh?" Even the usual sardonic lilt to Aravis' tone vanished for a second, replaced by genuine disbelief.
"Believe me now?" asked Lucy, though she could hardly take it in herself.
"How can they—" Caspian only blinked.
"Real useful, this stuff you're sending today," drawled Edmund as he cocked his head up to the sky. "What are you trying to do, sabotage our plans?" But in spite of his words, he tipped the bottle up to his lips and took the first drink, closing his eyes and breathing out slowly through his nose.
Caspian glanced at him, as if awaiting a review, and Edmund swallowed and leaned back against the wall with a low sigh.
"By all means," he mumbled, "sabotage them."
Lucy smirked, and Caspian took his own drink, downing nearly a quarter of his bottle in one long draught before stopping for a breath of relief and to run a hand through his hair.
Lucy had tasted alcohol a few times in her life, usually when she and Marjorie snuck Mr Preston's cans up to her bedroom to take turns sipping it, making faces and giggling at the bitter taste.
Now she took one of the bottles and looked it over, unmarked with a shiny red bottle cap. She balled the end of her shirt up in one hand and popped the cap off, tentatively sniffing it and taking a tiny drink. She wrinkled her nose, and Caspian laughed. She smirked through the grimace, swallowing quickly to avoid snorting it.
"Don't do that," she whined without any real force behind her tone.
Only one bottle remained beside the fire, light flickering over smooth glass as Aravis eyed both boys, neither showing any signs of stopping for several minutes before at last she caved and took the fourth.
Silence descended on the camp, Edmund savoring his drink as if reuniting with an old friend, Caspian downing half of his and leaning back with his eyes closed. Lucy took sips, but grimaced each time and soon moved on to nibbling a scone instead.
Pinpricks of starlight had just begun to pierce the dull smoky canopy when a shrill cry raked through the night.
Lucy jumped as it stretched on, long and rasping and hollow.
The boys looked at each other.
"Oh, don't mind about that," muttered Aravis. "It's like I told you. They scream, but nothing comes of it. Not up here, anyway."
Lucy shuddered, a chill flushing over her body in spite of the fire's warmth.
Caspian took another long drink.
"I'd like to know what makes a sound like that," said Edmund with a subtle glance into the shadows. "Are they keeping ghosts locked up under this place, or what?"
"Don't let's talk about that," said Lucy.
"I'd really rather maintain my ignorance, thanks," said Caspian.
Edmund scoffed. "I thought you were the one who wanted to know everything?"
"I make exceptions for terrifying noises in the middle of the night."
"So you'll stab a dragon in the face, but I'm not allowed to talk about ghosts? I mean— mutt, I meant mutt—"
"Nope," said Lucy, "You said dragon."
"On accident."
"You still said dragon."
"I realize it's difficult to conceive of me making a mistake, but it actually has been known to happen, on rare occasion."
"How much have you had to drink already?" asked Caspian.
Edmund lifted his bottle to show off the liquid sloshing inside. "Less than you, old man. And I still don't believe in dragons."
"Weird hill to die on," said Aravis into her bottle.
"Nobody asked you."
She swallowed and set the glass down with a heavy clink on the rock. "In Eleven, we know the Old Country as memory, not myth."
Lucy blinked. "You— wait, your whole district believes in fairytales?"
"Sure," said Aravis, "If you wanna put it that way. Everybody's family's got some kind of history."
Lucy stared. Her breath caught in her lungs.
"What—how?" asked Caspian, when Lucy's words continued to escape her. "In Eight nobody even talks about it."
Aravis shrugged. "Hundreds of people fled south of the desert during the rebellion. They brought their stories with them, I guess."
Lucy shook her head. "That's… wow." She took another drink and almost didn't notice its bitterness as her mind spun to catch up. "I mean… so… you believe it all, then?"
"All what? I believe humans weren't the first ones here," said Aravis. "Whether anything magical is still hanging around… well… I probably would've said no, until today. Your theory makes sense, though." She motioned to Caspian.
"Thank you, see? Who's to say it's just dragons, either? Remember those poisonous plants a few years back? Everyone said they had minds of their own."
"And those beehive tombs," put in Aravis, as if he'd just sparked a particularly vivid memory. "In the desert arena? I always thought something was going on there. Noxious fumes don't drive you mad like that, and don't we all know ghoulish stories about dead places?"
"Exactly! I think the Capitol knows more about the outside world than they let on."
"I think you're gonna get us taken off the air," muttered Edmund, "if you keep talking like that. And I'm really not interested in two hundred year old gossip."
"That makes one of us," snapped Lucy, "I want to know everything."
"I want to know how you three ended up together," said Aravis. "That's what I can't believe."
"Unfortunately," said Caspian as he grabbed a biscuit, "It was worth our while."
"What I want to know, Eleven," spat Edmund, "Is why you think you're so much better than me? Say whatever you like, your district still kicked you out just like the rest of us."
"Shut up."
"Honestly, I can see why they wanted to get rid of you."
"I came here on purpose," snapped Aravis.
A shock of silence flooded the tower.
All eyes turned to the girl's fireglow silhouette, eyes flickering orange under the shadow of thick, curly hair.
At last, Lucy asked "What?"
Aravis sighed, and took a long drink, silent for several moments before she swallowed and spoke again. "I asked them to vote for me. I came here on purpose."
Lucy furrowed her brow. "But… why?"
Aravis smiled faintly, almost to herself, a sad smile, an angry smile. "I had a brother."
And suddenly it clicked in Lucy's mind, what she'd been on the edge of remembering all day, but hadn't quite put her finger on. "That's right, you mentioned him in your interview, didn't you?" She'd barely focused on anything after Caspian's interview, too giddy and exhausted to take much in, but now it came back in fragments. "He was in the Games?"
Aravis nodded. "Last year."
Caspian looked down.
"I'm sorry," said Lucy.
"Don't be, it's not your fault." She took another drink, and her words sank in, their implication more than just a dismissal.
"Whose fault is it, then?"
Aravis' eyes flashed to her, but Lucy lifted her own bottle slightly, as if in a silent toast. As if to say make it worth your while.
The girl bit her lip, calculating behind her harsh stare for several moments before relaxing back against the wall. "Our mother died when we were young."
Lucy settled against Caspian, who wrapped an arm around her shoulders, and hung on every word.
"It wasn't until a few years ago that our father remarried to a young woman. She hated us, the arrogant, entitled, spoiled brat. We were below her, she thought she could do whatever she wanted. Father allowed all of it."
Something in her easy tone almost sounded practiced, or, if not practiced, deliberate. This story wasn't just for them.
"Of course it only got worse after the baby came. A boy. From that moment on we didn't matter anymore, and then she suggested my brother should volunteer for the Games. He would be eighteen. He would bring honor to the family." Her tone dripped with mocking hatred and her lip curled cruelly. "I tried to tell him she just wanted him out of the picture, but he loved our father, and he always was so eager to please. I think he hoped if he won then we wouldn't be forgotten anymore. But, he didn't win. The careers hunted him down early, he couldn't take them all at once. I watched the tears streak through the blood on his face as he faded away alone. The world forgot him by the end of the week."
"What about your father?" asked Edmund, voice hard, eyes hard, half disbelieving.
"He moved on. Like he never even had a son. Like he wasn't the reason my best friend walked willingly to his death. He didn't listen to me, he didn't listen to anyone but that picture-perfect wife of his, and as far as I'm concerned, they both killed him. His blood is on their hands, just as much as the careers'."
Caspian gazed into the fire as she spoke, lost somewhere in its glow while Aravis took another drink.
"I wasn't going to let him forget that easily, but the fights only got worse, and a couple months ago he snapped. He said he wished neither of us were ever born. I don't even remember what I said, I just locked myself in my room. As far as I could see, there wasn't a point to staying alive anymore. After you lose someone to the Games, the world acts like you don't exist; they don't want to deal with it, like they're somehow guilty, too. Guilty for watching. Except Rabadash, of course, he said if it'd been him he wouldn't have gone out like such a pathetic crybaby."
Edmund scoffed. "We'll see about that."
Aravis smiled wryly.
"How did you end up here, then?" asked Lucy.
"The night after that fight, I snuck downstairs into my father's office. He's the mayor, so he has special permissions, and he always kept a gun in his desk drawer. I don't even know what my plan was, I don't know if I was going to take them out first… I think I could have done it. I was angry enough to do it. But before I even opened the drawer, I heard the television in the other room, and the announcers talking about the Quarter Quell. The vote. And my plan changed. At least this way it felt like I could achieve something. I could prevent some other girl being chosen, and the whole country would remember my brother, if only for a few weeks. It felt… cathartic, almost. The idea of coming here. Rubbing it in their faces."
Edmund almost smiled through his stony exterior.
"What was his name?" asked Lucy softly.
Aravis picked at the ridges on her bottle, and for the first time the harsh certainty ebbed from her voice. "Alamar. It means… golden one." She glanced at Edmund, but not at his face. "He prayed to one of those. Said it was a symbol of Aslan." She nodded to the pendant at the end of his necklace, and Lucy's eyes snapped to it. "Funny though, you don't strike me as the superstitious type."
"It's not mine," said Edmund stiffly, and stuffed it back under his shirt with a half-hearted glare.
She smirked. "That makes more sense."
Lucy blinked, and looked back at Aravis. "How is it a symbol of Aslan? I've never even seen one before."
Aravis shrugged. "Depends on who you believe. It's all stories now. Some people think it came from the invaders' world, but Alamar sure seemed to think there was something to the whole Aslan thing."
"Yeah, lotta good it did him," said Edmund. "No wonder you only see them on graves, that's the only place you end up with this Lion person."
"Still better than living here," spat Aravis. "And for his sake I hope it's all true, all of it. He deserves a better life than this."
"So do a lot of people," said Edmund, "and I haven't seen any lions saving them."
"Al said we all have a part to play, too. Maybe if you took a second to help anyone besides yourself their lives wouldn't be so miserable."
"It's not my job to save the world."
"Then stop complaining when nobody else does it."
Edmund's eyes flashed in the firelight, but before he could snap back, Caspian interrupted.
"How did you get everyone to vote for you, anyway?"
Aravis smiled, and shifted her attention to him. "I asked nicely. You'd be surprised how many kids will jump at the opportunity not to have to choose between their classmates."
"Actually, I wouldn't be surprised," said Lucy. "That part was awful. Stressed me out for a month. I ended up picking the girl who sent me here, too."
"Really?" asked Aravis. "Who?"
"Why does it matter? Not like you'd know her." Lucy's brain buzzed numb and she set the bottle down, which she'd been absent-mindedly nursing all the while.
"Yeah, but, you know, while we're on the subject of catharsis." Aravis motioned for her to come out with it, and Lucy wondered if it was the alcohol or the encouragement that emboldened her to speak.
"Anne Featherstone."
"Wow, she even sounds like the worst human," muttered Edmund, and Lucy choked on a sharp giggle.
He glanced at her, and then at Caspian. "What about you, Telmar?"
"What about what?"
"Anything to get off your chest?"
Caspian swirled his bottle between his fingers, almost empty now. He gave a short breath, and almost a twisted smile.
For a moment, worry leapt into Lucy's heart, but Caspian's voice came out cool.
"Well, your mentor killed my dad, who volunteered for his brother, who treated my mom like trash until she killed herself, and then he took me in and tried not-so-subtly to kill me too, until I ran away, and right when I thought everything was actually turning out okay he paid off half the district to get me reaped."
Aravis raised her eyebrows.
"That last part's unconfirmed, actually, but here I am, so, draw your own conclusions."
Edmund tipped his bottle with a nod. "Cheers."
"And what about you?" asked Caspian.
"Oh," Edmund swallowed his drink, "I snitched on the wrong people and stabbed a guy. Nobody likes me in Six."
"Shocker," said Aravis. "Who could've possibly guessed."
He chucked a biscuit at her and she yelped in protest.
Lucy opened her mouth to say something, but a speck of light through a crack in the wall caught her attention instead. "Hey, what's that?"
"What?" Edmund followed her gaze, and Aravis stood to get a better look.
"Campfire. Looks like the Sevens moved closer, maybe to the edge of the ruin."
"I thought you said they were miles away!" complained Edmund indignantly.
"Well, they can move around, can't they? It's a free country."
Edmund choked on his own spit, swallowed, and burst out laughing.
Aravis turned on him like he'd gone mad, and the look on her face only sent him into a deeper fit of hysterics at the absurdity of the situation, the bite of his harsh half-coughing laughter almost melodic, a sound utterly unfamiliar to Lucy's ears.
A grin tugged at her own lips before she could help herself, and she glanced at a smiling Caspian.
"Now you've definitely had too much to drink," said Aravis as she dropped back down against the wall and Edmund struggled in vain to control himself, fits of giggles interrupting every desperate attempt to catch his breath.
"Catch up," he gasped, and she smirked, almost a genuine smile as she rolled her eyes and tilted her bottle up to her lips.
Lucy donated the rest of her drink to Caspian and pulled free of his warmth to flop down onto the cool stone, gazing up into a flurry of dancing sparks as they mingled with the stars and the night relaxed, no anthem to break the illusion, no faces in the sky, just the muted hum of familiar voices bouncing off the edges of her senses as they talked and laughed in the cool night air and her fuzzy mind drifted.
"You called them dragonish, or something," Edmund slurred ever so slightly, his voice drifting in as if from another room. "Your scavenger things."
"Yeah," mumbled Aravis, "Seems like you scared them off, tonight, though."
"Well, good, but I was gonna say, why is this arena so snakey? Big dragons, little dragons… I mean— er, whatever."
"I hate dragons," mumbled Caspian.
"There's an original thought, bravo."
"No, I mean, like, before it ate me."
"I don't think you're supposed to like them."
"Shut up, you know what I mean."
Lucy smiled to herself, but her own thoughts shifted in an ever-changing sea as the voices wafted in and out and faded into the darkness.
It might have been hours later when she snapped out of a dream, or perhaps only a very deep thought, the fire dying to embers, Aravis asleep against the opposite wall, Caspian's soft snore to her left.
She shifted onto her shoulder and glanced around, but when she looked up at Edmund, she found him still awake, gazing into the fire, its dull orange glow reflected in glassy dark eyes.
"Hey, Ed?" she murmured.
"Mm."
"I just remembered something really weird."
He glanced down distantly, blinking a few times as he focused on her.
"Back at the crags, when we followed you into the hole, Peter chased us down." It seemed so long ago now, but it had come back so clearly, as if she'd lived it all over again. "Jill went ahead of me, I was right at the edge, and… he caught up. He could've killed me if he'd taken a few more steps. But he stopped. It was… so… I don't know. Why would he stop?"
Edmund sighed. "Sounds like him."
"What do you mean?"
"Oh, you know, he's got that whole… superiority complex, I guess. Thinks he's playing a different game than the rest of us. Like it's some kind of honor. Like it's supposed to be fair. I don't know. He's mad, that's what I know." He sighed again, and shifted against the wall. "Or maybe you were just too pathetic to bother with."
Lucy pursed her lips and shoved his leg. "It didn't sound like he wanted to kill you, either, genius."
"Yeah, well, he was perfectly happy to let Edith do it. And what's this got to do with anything, anyway? Why are you thinking about Peter?"
Lucy shrugged and flopped back down onto the stone. "Dunno."
"You better not double back on what you said about the careers. They asked for this, you aim to kill."
"I will," she huffed. "It's just weird to think, you know? Some people volunteer who don't even want to be here. It's weird to remember that they might be people, too."
"That's exactly what you need to stop remembering."
She craned her neck to look up at him. "Like you do?"
He sighed and nudged her with his leg. "Just go to sleep, will you?"
"No," she said through a yawn, and turned over onto her side.
The dying fire crackled softly, stirred by the faintest breeze.
"Goodnight, Edmund."
A distant cricked chirped, alone in a stone labyrinth.
"Night, Lu."
If she dreamed again, she didn't remember it.
The next time she woke, it was to Caspian's silhouette blotting out the light of a silver-gold sky as he squeezed her shoulder.
She mumbled something incoherent and rolled over.
He laughed. "I think you actually do want to get up, if you want any breakfast before Edmund eats the rest of the biscuits."
She blinked blearily up at him, wincing as she squinted around the campsite to see Aravis and Edmund already awake.
Reluctantly, she struggled into a sitting position as Edmund pelted her with a roll and shot a glare at Caspian.
She picked it up mutely.
Caspian ruffled her hair, rising to stalk to the edge of the tower as the sun shone full in her eyes and she rubbed them in protest.
"What time is it?"
Caspian glanced at his wrist. "Almost nine. If we're building a fire, we should start soon. Any idea where we could set up an ambush?" He glanced from the landscape to Aravis.
She cocked her head, sharp eyes flicking up to him as she toasted a scone over rekindled coals.
"Yeah, I might know a place."