Chapter 5 Content Warnings: reference to sexual assault. Addie reflects on the assault and goes through a lot of guilt and justification to try to make sense of it. If this is triggering for you but you still want to read the story, PLEASE skip the last two scenes (marked with two stars before the first word). If you need a summary of what happens, DM me here or on Twitter and I'll fill you in as much or as little as you prefer.
Chapter 5: but i feel warmth on my skin
Addie
Addie settles into a pleasant rhythm with Bruna over the course of a fortnight. They change the bed linens together every few days, perhaps every week. Then Bruna tidies up the bedroom while Addie takes to the study. Bruna always finishes before Addie and leaves with something of a smile tugging at the corners of her mouth, bidding Addie to finish up on her own as she likes.
Surely Bruna never saw her reading anything, but it's a curious pattern. Even so, there's little point in trying to change it. She likes getting to see words on a page again. Perhaps more so because they are in the prince's study and every word tells her something new about him.
The Telmarine tomes and notes are stilted, more like dutiful studies than the passionate learnings of an enthusiastic scholar or student. Unsurprising, given the dryness of many of those books. The Telmarines have legends and myths of their own, but they seem not to have made it onto Caspian's reading list. The only myths and legends seem to be Narnian, tucked away in secret corners or behind other books.
When Addie stumbles across a stray note on the Narnian tales, it seems another man altogether wrote them. The script is looser, the quill strokes lighter, and the words slant across the page like the writer leaned at an odd angle to get the letters in while reading something at their elbow. She thought his notes would be as stilted as he is, all formality and manners and the stiffness the nobility specialise in. But these notes remind Addie of the prince who sat on the kitchen floor and ate with her, who took her hand when she as good as dared him to. The prince who agreed he was wrong when she told him so, who let her decide what should be done about Marcos and didn't seem to mind her fiery mouth.
No, no use in any of that. Addie shakes out her dusting rag and takes to the shelves with a vengeance. The shelves are cleaner than they've ever been with her here every day, but so much the better. Dust can't be good for books, and books with silver lettering as pretty as these shouldn't hide behind something so trivial as dust. Addie dusts and polishes the wood until it gleams and the time for lunch prep must've come and gone. Perla's sure to have a solid scolding ready.
Again, he's getting her in trouble; he's very good at that, never mind that he doesn't mean to. And there's still the desk to clean.
The legs are easy work, if tedious, and the chair is quick enough. Addie glances down at the open scrolls and papers once she's done. There's no harm in furthering her study a bit. She's already late, and she needs practice making out the ornate Telmarine script. It'll be much more useful now that she has a prince's quarters to clean. A glance out the window confirms that Addie's indeed missed the lunch preparations. May as well spend a few minutes practicing her reading before she scurries in for her apologies and her scolding.
Hopefully Perla will spare her the spatula, but the thought of it firms Addie's impulse to linger and read.
She scans the bookshelves for anything less intimidating than the heavy volumes of Telmarine conquesting history. In a lower corner, she finds something she missed in all her dusting of the past fortnight - a collection of Telmarine children's tales. Finally, something interesting.
Addie sits cross-legged in the window seat so the sun can help. The table of contents is easy enough to read. The first story, The Compass Across the Sea, starts with a twisting letter hard to make out, but the rest of the letters are a bit clearer than the usual script. Before long, she's lost to the tale of the eight-point compass that fell from a gryphon's claw into the hand of the first Telmarine king.
"I suspected it was you."
"Tash's hells!" Her head bangs against the wall, her legs tangle, and the floor rises to meet her face as she tumbles and brings half the pillows down with her.
When she rights herself on the floor, the prince is holding out his hand with his lower lip pulled between his teeth.
"Princely as ever," Addie grumbles venomously as she hauls herself up.
Caspian has the grace to restrain himself to a small chuckle. Addie's smile cracks across her face before she remembers herself and scowls.
"I apologise for startling you," Caspian manages. The way he covers his grin with his free hand is utterly unconvincing, but there's something to be said for how his dark eyes light up.
"Well, I suppose that makes us even." Addie only realises then how tightly she's still clasping his hand and drops it quickly. "Sorry. I got a bit… well. Lost."
Bending down, Caspian retrieves the book and places it carefully atop his notes on The Land of Telmar. Another of his school-assigned books, no doubt. "So it would seem. I know few servants who can read."
It's irksome how he seems to look through his eyelashes, his posture still bent from putting the book up and a lock of his hair dangerously close to his eye.
"You're not wrong," says Addie. "I suppose wherever I was before the castle taught me."
Caspian's brow crinkles as he straightens. "You weren't born in the castle?"
Addie crosses her arms over her chest, praying away the heat on her face. "Don't know much else than that. Like I said, the kitchen maids are the only family I have."
It's not quite pity in the heaviness of his gaze on hers, but she dislikes it just as much. "I'm sorry. Borrow it if you wish. I've not used it in years."
"No one to read you bedtime stories?" Addie steps forward to take the book. He doesn't step back when she advances. Not even when her fingers close around the book's spine and their chests are so close she could touch him if she wished.
Caspian's mouth opens, but no sound escapes. Maybe he can't think of an appropriately stiff-mannered reply.
Addie shrugs one shoulder and twists her mouth around a half-smile.
"Yeah, me neither." Addie clutches the book tight and steps around him to the bookshelf door. "Thank you, Caspian."
"You're welcome."
Somehow, those two whispered words are more intimate than anything else he could have said.
Caspian
"My boy, where is your book?"
Caspian snaps halfway out of his haze. "Apologies, Professor. I, ah, it slipped my mind."
Caspian told himself, even after his planted note led to nothing, to keep up his guard. Suspicion is the wise thing. But every moment he spends with Addie tastes warm and sweet like honesty - not like the cool spice of danger. Somehow, Caspian knows Addie - and her uncouth manners - mean no harm.
He knows to expect her snark. Caspian was as prepared as he could ever be to trade awkward conversation caught between daring and propriety when he caught her in the study. He was not prepared for any sort of… is this kinship, this strange prodding glow? This notion of being seen and understood in his loneliness? This notion that she, too, knows its persistent sting?
Doctor Cornelius harrumphs. "Fetch it. And do remember what you're fetching this time! The trade history of Galma waits for no man."
Normally Caspian would have some half-witty comeback, but today his tongue is dry as the Calormen desert; going back to the study will not remedy the situation. The list of his questionable encounters with Addie keeps growing, and he's dangerously close to not minding them. He caught her thanks to nothing but coincidence, and he should mind her poking around his personal study far more than he does. When no spy or anyone at all showed at his note's designated location, he accepted that Addie's disturbance is likely no more than mere curiosity. Perhaps some servants can read after all.
He was only being polite. This odd humming sensation sweeping through his veins must be lingering embarrassment over forgetting the book twice over. It can't have anything to do with the persistent image of Addie perched in the window seat, sunlight streaming over her shoulder. He barely knows her.
Caspian lists the Galman trade agreements in his head until he reaches his study. The moment he steps inside with the window seat's scattered cushions in full view, it's painfully obvious that Addie's presence still leaves quite the mark. The sun seems to stream brighter through the window, burn hotter against his skin when his hand strays into the sunlight. He shouldn't wonder if it would be worth it to forget his book again tomorrow to see her bathed in the morning sun. To see her settled in that seat as if it's always been hers. She's driving him mad and he's only known her a little while. What has it been, a few weeks? A month? Two?
He will not count the days. He will absolutely, unequivocally not count the days, nor the weeks, nor the months. By all rights, no one of their respective stations should ever have crossed paths. He should be thinking of histories and politics and his uncle's schemes. He shouldn't be wondering when he'll see her again.
Caspian swipes the small History of Galman Relations from his desk and rushes out, nearly tripping on his own feet. It's a relief to turn to recitations of last night's reading, tedious even with the Doctor's efforts to liven the material. It's useful to be reminded of what's important.
Addie
After the indignity of Caspian catching her snooping, the rest of the day brings a few too many snaps from Perla and one too many smacks of the spatula. When Addie lets the bread rise for too long and the irregular air bubbles remain no matter how she punches it down, Perla asks if she has, perhaps, forgotten everything there is to know about bread and yeast.
"After all these years," Perla barks, "am I the only woman in this kitchen to respect the yeast?"
Addie mumbles her apology and works the dough until it's as close to even as it can be and Perla threatens to make her redo the whole thing if the bread goes tough.
When Addie's slicing the carrots for dinner, Anna has to remind her to slice the rounds half a knuckle thick. Perla notices some of the thicker slices Addie missed and bangs the spatula on the counter until Addie fishes every last one out of the pan, slices the chunks properly, and adds them back.
Addie's apology isn't as humble that time, and all it gets her is a thorough scolding on why everything must be sliced evenly; has she forgotten Lord Miraz's temper last week? Tash forbid the nobles have to bear a single imperfection.
When Addie's knife slips into her thumb while she's peeling the oranges for the carrot glaze, Perla orders her away from the cutting board altogether.
"Get that cleaned," Perla snaps. "And wrap it! Take to the dishes, since you can't manage a knife tonight."
It's not so bad as the spatula across her knuckles or cracking into her hip, but Addie's eyes sting anyway as she grabs a nearby cloth, marches out to the well, and washes the cut until the blood slows enough she can press her thumb into the cloth. Pressure, she's supposed to keep pressure.
Addie glances around the courtyard before she fully understands what she's doing. By the time she realises the courtyard patrols don't include Marcos, the pain in her finger fades as her chest threatens to cave in. Hot tears spill over her cheeks no matter how quickly she swipes them away. She can't get a good wrap on this thumb if she can't see.
The cloth itself is too bulky, too coarse, too big to wrap properly. Addie brings it between her teeth and yanks it until she gets a good tear started down one edge. Even then, she fumbles with the strip long enough her eyes fill up again. It's not difficult to wrap a cut on her finger. She's done it a hundred times before. It's just this day, and this stupid well.
Usually, she'd have someone to talk to. Or someone who could remind her to smile, who'd sneak by the kitchen window wearing an absurd face or pop his head in and defend her to Perla, or distract the entire kitchen with some ridiculous joke or gossip from the barracks.
He's not here. She didn't want him, so now he's gone. She's lost him, and now she's losing Lola. And she shouldn't think about it. She shouldn't be catching herself scanning the deepening shadows left by the sunset. She should be glad she still has everyone else. She should be inside, apologising to Perla and holding her head up and peeling the pith off the oranges. She shouldn't be crying by the well.
Addie enjoyed laughing with Marcos, and she enjoyed ending the day with him before they ruined their easy friendship with drinking and kissing and -
And she liked his company like she liked Lola's, or Claudia's, or Anna's. Not the way that made people want to throw seeds down a well together, but he made life easier. Made it bearable.
No use in that, not with dinner hour bearing down and Perla already impatient. Addie shakes her hand to check the wrapping is secure and hurries back inside. Perla doesn't scold her for taking longer, but somehow the silence as Addie turns to the dishes is worse.
**Hours later, Addie trails behind the others. Lola peels off to find Alfonso, but Claudia and Anna are used to Addie lingering in the courtyard with Marcos. This time, Addie turns away early to perch on the well steps, sitting with the cool stone at her back as the well's shadow hides most of the moonlight.
Her palm itches being here, as if the ghosts of the seeds still linger. Addie scratches at her hands.
The indistinct murmur of the night patrol echoes from the edge of the courtyard. Addie tucks her knees against her chest, pressing deeper into the shadows until the voices pass. Perhaps they have news on Marcos, but she shouldn't care.
Was it truly so bad? Was he right, that she's overreacting out of regret?
She'd trusted him with her fears, her feelings day to day. She'd sat with him in the moonlight in the courtyard shadows when he worked those rare night shifts. She listened as he told her of his family, how his brother left for Sopespian's army when Marcos was young, how he'd grown up without siblings to play with or tease or wrestle with after that.
She stroked his arm as Marcos said that when he grew up he left for Telmara determined to join with Miraz's men because as little as politics matters to peasants, everyone knew Sopespian and Miraz didn't get along. How he took what he himself called a cruel joy in joining with a military that could face his brother's group in their lifetime, if the lords did as lords do and fought for control on the battlefield. She'd stared at him long enough he squirmed, until he admitted the desire faded the moment the coin purse hit his palm. That he was angry, too angry. She knows, now, what happens when he gets too angry.
Through all the tales of his childhood, she'd listened and sympathised and pretended like it didn't send aches into her heart that he knew what his childhood had been, at least. He knew his family, even if they angered him - his brother for abandoning him, his parents for being too busy with working to keep a roof over their heads to ease the loneliness. She's not even sure if she has one.
Had one.
Still, she listened and she supported because she knew that's what you do for family. You're there for them, even if they hurt you. You're there.
He'd trusted her with his painful memories. Why do that if he only wanted her body? No, that can't be right, can it? He'd said they'd grown close.
Like he wanted more than a kiss.
Like he wanted a kiss and her heart to go with it.
And she stood there and rejected all of it.
What's so different about the closeness he wanted and closeness she wanted? How did he see it so differently, when she traded secrets with him like she traded secrets and nightmares with Lola, and frustrations with Claudia, and listened to Anna's advice? Was it the joking? What was different?
Lola seems happy, and Alfonso too. She thought she'd be happy if she'd done as they had. How wrong, how stupid she was.
Is there something wrong with her for not wanting any of that with him?
Addie pushes her back into the well stones until they grind against her spine, harsh and unforgiving against the muscles across her back. Maybe it was the drink. Maybe he was just drunk, like she said.
Yet his eyes were clear enough when he looked at her. His breath smelled like ale, but he wasn't as far gone as the rest of them. He wasn't so drunk he didn't know what he was doing.
She wasn't either.
Maybe she was toying with him like he'd said, keeping him close because she liked the company. Maybe he was surprised because she really had been getting close and that's the natural progression of things. Does it count if she didn't mean to, if she didn't know she was doing it? Is it her fault if she didn't think she was deceiving him? It felt like he was the one overstepping. He yanked her around like a thief caught at the market.
Or what if she meant to get him close, and she toyed anyway because she'd rather toy with him and have someone she could call a brother, a friend, than be honest with him and lose him? If that's the case, she shouldn't be here while he's sent off to Tash knows what other posting, away from his friends that must be like family to him, like the other maids are to her.
Addie sets her jaw tight, grinding her teeth until they hurt as her fingers knot in her skirts. It's the right thing to do. It was just a misunderstanding. He shouldn't be sent away from his friends because she can't stand the sight of him right now. Not when she still has Anna and Claudia and Lola, at least in some sense.
She'll have to tell the prince. He should understand; he was kind before, when she told him exactly what she thought of his overstep. She has to tell him she was too hasty, she wasn't thinking, it's only a misunderstanding. Marcos just got angry, his temper got away from him a little.
Addie forces her arms to uncurl from around her legs. It takes two tries to get to her feet without her legs shivering, but that's surely just the remnants of the cold well stones.
Better to get it over with.
**Addie stops at her shared quarters to retrieve the borrowed book as an excuse for showing up at the prince's quarters unannounced. It helps to have something solid in her hands as she winds her way through the castle until the wooden back of the bookshelf door lies cool beneath her palm.
Get it over with, just get it over with. It's the right thing to do, isn't it? Addie slips the book into her apron pocket and knocks three times, sharp and quick so she can't second-guess it.
The door swings open and Caspian is right there, features soft and hair swept back like he just raked his fingers through it. She nearly loses her nerve, but then she remembers she still has the friends she calls family and Marcos doesn't.
Addie greets the prince like nothing is wrong.
"Sorry to disturb you," she says as she walks past the welcoming sweep of his arm and into the study. His candle flares high and fresh, wax drips barely marring the candlestick. His desk has some semblance of order at last; the Telmarine history books are closed and stacked on one side with paper scraps tucked in as bookmarks while the scrolls form a triangular tower on the other. His notes, quill, and inkpot dominate the centre. "I see your desk has a surface after all."
Caspian stands awkwardly beside the chair, his right hand tracing back and forth over the carved eagle's missing wooden wing. "Indeed. I thought it time to make sense of my materials."
Addie scrutinises the organised desk as if it's the most fascinating thing in the world. "You kept the dust off the surface. But this is less chaotic."
Get it over with.
Addie squares her shoulders. "I need to ask you to do something."
"Anything," he answers instantly. It takes all of Addie's willpower to keep her eyes on the desk. He understood last time, and he's been kind when he's not accidentally getting her in trouble. As if he can sense her indecision, Caspian steps from behind the chair. "What is it?"
"I need you to bring Marcos back. To his usual post."
The silence sits thick and oppressive between them. She'll have to look him in the eye so he knows she means it. But she can't. Addie's eyes stay cast down, stuck there like she has something to feel guilty about. She shouldn't; she's setting this right, isn't she?
The gently flickering candle is the only sound between them. After a long moment, Caspian speaks - carefully, like she's a deer he encountered in the woods.
"Has something happened?"
Addie swallows hard; if she swallows hard enough, maybe this infernal lump choking her will disappear and she'll be able to look at him like she means it. She tries, but her only reward is a new stinging in her eyes. The papers on the desk start to blur.
"I overreacted. I- it was my mistake. He shouldn't be punished because I…" she tries, she really tries, but the words stick in her throat.
"Matters of that sort are often a soldier's mistake. Not yours."
Addie's pulse thumps wildly.
Is the prince as sincere as he sounds? If Addie looks up, will she find an honest face looking back at her? Or will she find the same doubt that's brought her to his door so late at night mirrored in his gaze? If he had been there, if he'd seen the whole thing, would he say this was her doing? Why should she care even if he did?
"It's fine," Addie says. She curls her fingers until her nails dig sharp crescents in her palms even as her insides tremble. "I shouldn't have- it was my mistake."
Addie digs in her fingers until they break skin and the pricks of pain distract her from her stomach's churning.
Caspian shifts; the slight movement is enough to catch Addie's eye before she looks away again.
"How was it your mistake?"
A spark of heat flares to life in Addie's throat.
"I don't expect you to understand, but I'm here asking anyway. So do as I ask." She swings to look at him head on, half expecting the flashing superiority of a royal even if she knows better.
His eyes are soft and careful, the line of his shoulders low. He's angled away from the door, leaving her a clear path out.
"Did he come to you again?" he asks, as carefully as if every word is a glass shard.
Addie looks back to the candle and its delicate light, because that's easier than admitting she's not really sure what happened and she misses someone who did something she didn't want.
Addie looks into the candle and lies.
"No. It was just a misunderstanding."
It was nicer when he was off-kilter when she stood up to him. This, whatever this is, felt safer when he could only see her anger. Not her pain, not her guilt or sadness. But no matter how hard she digs her nails in, the anger won't come. There's only an awful, hollow hole echoing through her chest and rumbling through her bones like a thunderstorm without rain.
Caspian is more stubborn than she thought.
"It seemed a dangerous situation," he says. "No one should shout at you like that." Caspian's fingers tighten around the back of the chair. "You yourself said you've the right to decide what should be done."
For half a moment, the echo quiets to a whisper and she can breathe again. Then the moment passes and Addie remembers how to force the words.
"Then do as I ask, Caspian."
In the hesitation that follows, she finds enough courage to glance his way through the wispy curls peeking from her cap. Caspian looks away, only to meet her eyes again a heartbeat later. His hand relaxes, stroking gently, absently along the back of the chair between them.
"Is it truly what you want?"
Another lie should be easy with all the practice she's had. The shape of it claws its way up her throat and forms on her tongue. It's one simple word. It skitters around her mouth, tickling the inside of her lips, trying to burst free. One word, and she can put it all to rights.
Her jaw shivers, a broken branch in the fury of a storm. But the prince's eyes in the flickering candlelight are gentler than she thought they'd be, and suddenly the lie turns to ash in her mouth.
"No," Addie whispers. "It's not."
The storm quiets as her breath whistles through the hollows in her chest. Caspian's shoulders drop forward and he breathes a weighty sigh.
"Then what do you want, Addie?"
Addie remembers the weight of the book in her apron. It might sound silly, but he asked.
He doesn't think it was her fault. Maybe she can forget everything in here, tucked away in a prince's study where the rest of her life can disappear.
Addie plucks the book from her pocket and decides she'd rather lose herself in stories than face whatever awkwardness comes after so much honesty.
"Candlelight," Addie half-lies, the book's leather cover smooth in her hands as she holds it up. "I've got some practicing to do."
Caspian glances at his desk with a frown, but Addie's already stepping over to the cushioned window seat. She keeps her eyes turned away from him.
"I won't bother you."
The curve of her lips comes easier now, and just like that Addie's found something close to a smile. Caspian returns it with a wider one than she thought princes were allowed. His manners always seemed to dictate a stiff upper lip, or whatever the fancy noble term is for constantly holding one's face in distant politeness.
When Addie sinks into the window seat, Caspian sits in his chair. He says nothing at first, for long enough Addie wonders if his manners insist on silent study. But then he answers, so softly she almost misses it as she leans over the page and tracks the words with her finger.
"You may bother me whenever you wish."
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"I didn't expect your kindness," she says. "I thought I'd have to fight for what I wanted."
Caspian speaks before his mind can catch up, and Lion help him for it.
"I assure you, Adelina, you will never have to fight for anything you want from me."