I have been so excited for this challenge (Adventures in Narnia 2021 Encore, if you were wondering) to start!
I may have sidestepped the real point of the prompt, but I think I did cover it; I stayed there for longer because I was concerned I hadn't adequately covered it. Anyhow, I hope you enjoy it, and please review. When I got the idea to do it this way, last night after I saw the prompt (though I wasn't about to start writing then) I was really quite pleased with it.
I have borrowed one word from outside sources. The word tharn, from Watership Down, refers to the so-scared-they're-frozen kind of reaction. I use it in common speech anyway, and it seems just a very excellent word for the meaning.
On with the story! And I promise the first line will make sense later. And the later bits. It's all part of a concept I've not seen adequately explored in fanfiction, and I wanted it so.
Prompt #1: A change of location does not negate character. Show one of the Four being royal in England, whether Magnificent, Gentle, Just, Valiant, or some other trait they needed as rulers.
When will the dreams cease, that I may understand the cruel truth of reality?
As she watched, the crowd separated slightly, revealing a blond-haired boy. He was tall for his age, which looked to be around ten, and straight as a sapling, making the others look mean and petty in comparison. Somebody jostled roughly past him and in the process almost dropped his bag; the boy she had noticed caught it quickly and prevented its fall. Instead of thanks, all he got was a sneer, but appeared unaffected by the other's rudeness.
Three others hurried towards him, calling out, though she could not hear them over the sound of the great black creature's call. They too had something of that straight-backed nobility, although the black-haired girl looked worried, distracted, and discontented with her lot.
The black creature fell silent, and many conversations hit her at once; she picked out the voice of the eldest, a brown-haired boy with a calm, sure expression on his face.
"...don't need to worry, Su."
"After all, we won't be left behind or anything," contributed the blond.
"And if we were, we could always stay with the Professor," suggested the youngest.
Su glanced around her companions and laughed. "What would I do without you three?"
The eldest smiled in response. "Marry some bowing and scraping nobleman, perhaps."
Su's eyes narrowed at him, a smile pulling her lips upward, though sadness remained in her eyes. "Peter," she remonstrated.
The black creature called again, but Su's voice rose above it in a panicked cry. "It's leaving, it's leaving!"
Just then an old man, lean and bent but still remarkably swift on his feet, hurried over to them. The brief conversation was covered by the sound of the creature, but at the end of it the children were steered forwards and put into a compartment in the creature's side. Only a moment later, it snorted smoke and began to walk away, with a curious gait she could not understand until her perspective shifted and she saw it had wheels on which it ran, suggesting it was probably an extremely complicated machine rather than a creature, as she had initially thought.
She stayed just beside the four as they slipped through the countryside, borne by the machine. They were crammed in next to the window, balancing boxes and packages of all kinds on their knees and around their feet, taking up the minimum amount of space possible as they talked in low tones.
"Oy!" The voice was loud, selfish. "You've had the window for ages, I want it now!"
Peter lifted his gaze to the boy who stood next to them, swaying to the motion of the train. He was the same as had deliberately bumped into the younger boy before; she saw that they recognised one another, though the demeanour of Peter's companion did not grow defensive or angry.
"Certainly."
Su began to gather up all the miscellany around the four, preparing to shift over the small space they could, since the boy had vacated the other end of the bench. The children next to them grumbled about having to move sideways, but Su said gently, "It is only fair, you know, that we don't get it the whole time. I'm sorry you have to move, though. It would be far harder to shift all of us up the other end of the seat at once." Most children, apparently, were travelling alone; now she who was observing suspected that these four were siblings.
At that moment a small, wild hope flared into being, but she quashed it in favour of listening to the next words out of the interloper's mouth.
"That's not enough room!"
"We're sorry," said the younger boy evenly, "but it is as much as we can give you without the one on the other end falling off."
"I had more room than that before! It isn't fair!"
"And now you also have the window, and you did choose to move," he countered.
"Ed—" started Su warningly.
The boy glared at them, each of them in turn, even the youngest girl. She, however, did not cower, but looked fearlessly back at him.
"It's not fair," the boy ranted again, forcing himself into the seat and in the process nearly squashing the little girl. "You had way more space than I do."
"We're all crowded," said Su in a soft voice. "But it will be over soon, you know. I dare say we're coming to a station now."
They slowed and stopped, and several children got out; the press only loosened slightly, and the boy began to complain more loudly.
"Why did we have to come out to the country anyway? We would have survived perfectly well in London."
The four glanced at one another, then Ed said, "Would we? What we got of the Blitz was bad enough. I wouldn't like to have stayed."
"Honestly, you still believe that's what really happened? Are you a coward or something?" sneered the boy. "It was an excuse to make sure all the men of London went to war without having to take care of their children, and that their wives could go into munitions. Isn't that obvious?"
Ed's lips tightened, but he quelled his anger and said, "We were taken out of London for our own good and to protect us. We're the next generation, they kind of need us." His attempt at humour was lost on the other boy, who flushed red with anger.
"So they should've left us there! Nobody knew that the war was going to finish so quickly, they might've needed us to fight, idiot! I wish we could fight. It sounds glorious," he added, probably getting sidetracked with wonderful visions of how he would rise to the top.
"Trust me," said Ed, leaning forward and meeting his eyes with compelling sincerity, "it isn't."
The boy pulled back. "Get away from me! What do you know of fighting?"
Ed composed himself again. "I have an older brother who has fought a lot, and I've seen how much of a toll it took on him." His gaze flicked to Peter and away again. Then she, the watcher, understood completely.
And she knew, without being told, the name of the youngest, and looked still more eagerly at that four, as everything shattered, and resolved into a whirling rainbowed mass that eventually faded into darkness.
In the darkness of the burrow, a young Rabbit jerked to wakefulness.
This last dream had told her the most of all of them; before, she had only seen snippets, pieces of one, or another, of an old man, or of other things. At last she knew their names, knew who they were, and besides that knew something else very important.
Aslan is real.
She longed to see him, but it was not to be, not yet, apparently. He had not been sighted in these parts for ages, and she thought she knew why—her parents' burrow being located right in the centre of the Rabbits' domain.
A sleepy snuffling sound came from her mother, whom she lay beside, and the little Rabbit made a decision.
"Mum. Dad," she whispered softly.
They stirred, only lightly asleep so far. They had settled down early for the day, so that it wasn't even morning light yet, or dawn. Another call woke both.
"What is it?" asked her father quietly. "Alya?"
She took a breath, nerves making her tense. Her father's voice came out of the darkness once again, curious; he could probably smell her fear.
"S-something I wanted to tell you." Stammering was not what she'd wanted to do; it made her sound weak, powerless. Childish. Not a good thing for what she was about to say.
"Yes?" asked her mother, gentler.
"I've changed my name?" It sounded a little like a question, even though it wasn't, and once again she wished she could swallow the words and try again. As with everything in life, though, she had one chance.
"Oh?" A hint of warning in her father's voice, but it was too late; she'd made her decision. She wouldn't be fettered by the old name any more.
Aslan help me. "To..." A pause. Why was she pausing? It was only delaying the inevitable, which she'd chosen, which she knew she had to say, or forever hide her real self. "Taira."
Her father let out a loud growl at that, and she felt her littermates flinch awake.
"What?"
"I said it, Dad," she—Taira—replied, her voice firmer now. "I mean it."
"Get out. Either stop this nonsense or get out of the burrow, now!"
"B-but it's almost morning."
"Should've thought of that before you picked a name like that, eh?" he snapped. "Get out, and don't come back unless you're willing to accept your true name."
"Taira is my true name!" she cried in defiance, frightened, hoping her littermates would take something from this, and change as she had.
"Get out now," he said in a cold and deadly voice, "or I will kill you."
Her father was not joking. Taira fled, stumbling through the tunnels, the grass underneath her paws cold and wet as she came above ground. She knew she looked like a ghost, white fur with great dark eyes, but couldn't bring herself to care as she continued to run. As Taira, a Rabbit was not safe anywhere within a good few hundred metres, at the very least. Not even stopping to clean the dirt marring her pale coat, Taira continued to run as the sky lightened. This was what she had expected from her father, but she hadn't realised how much she had hoped he wouldn't react as badly to her information.
She'd made her choice, though, and Aslan would be her guide.
Taira's pace slowed, and presently, in the shade of a tree—no burrows in sight that she could reasonably enter without risking swift death—she began to cautiously clean herself, keeping a sharp eye out. She did not know this country.
A Stag paused beside her for an instant, looking as if he would like to say something, then his gaze hardened into a sneer of disgust and he continued on his journey without a word.
Of course. She was a marked Rabbit. In this area, everyone would probably know what to be a Rabbit meant, and not realise that she was changed. She had to tread carefully.
Unfortunately, she wasn't about to return to the comparative safety of home and burrow, not unless she renounced the new name she had taken on herself, and that she would not do.
Being properly clean felt much better, and Taira continued on her way, trying to remember, from the maps she had seen a couple of times in her very young childhood, which direction it was to Cair Paravel. There, perhaps, if she went, she would be provided with security and kindness. There, the legacy of the four she had dreamed about might stretch to letting her speak, to understanding why she had come, and maybe even letting her stay.
It was a long distance for a rabbit, but even though her feet were quickly feeling sore Taira was determined to keep on going, even though the day was getting painfully bright for her.
Then there was a flash of rusty orange beside her, and she had an instant's horrified warning as the fox lunged at her, snarling, "Alyen! Prepare to die, alyen!"
Almost tharn with terror, she squeaked repeatedly, "Tairen! Tairen!" as the fox's jaws closed around her throat, hoping and praying he would listen.
I'm interested as to whether anyone can guess what these made up words signify. Or what will happen tomorrow.
It's also ridiculously annoying to me that BrokenKestral beat me for second person to post, just because as I wrote the last line I had to stop for breakfast instead of posting.
I hope you enjoyed it, please review, and we'll be back tomorrow!