A/N: Buckle up, folks, this is where the fun Really gets going! This one's our longest chapter of Flashover, so sit back, enjoy the ride, and keep snacks on hand. I promise I tried to cut this one down, but there's just so much to get through.
Chapter 17 Content Warnings: minor reference to prior sexual assault
Chapter 17: rather die alone, together
Addie
Addie takes longer than she should to tell Caspian. Marcos doesn't return with more damning news, but it's been just under a week and they still have months before Lady Prunaprismia's baby is due. If Miraz knew who she was, she'd already be dead.
Caspian has enough to worry about - like his own neck. It seems cruel to worry him over hers, too.
But Addie keeps forgetting how perceptive Caspian can be, and one night he notices the shallow, sore line over her brow. It's silly, but Addie keeps tightening her cap to the point of obsession. The cap marks her as a maid. The coarse fabric itches at her scalp like it never has before, stifling and distracting in the heat of the kitchen.
She'd stick out like a sore thumb if she went without it. Addie knows, but her fingers still fidget and leave flour smudges across her forehead, beside the shallow tracks where her cap's ties dig in.
After a few days, Caspian traces careful fingers over the mark and asks if it hurts.
"No," Addie lies. "Just fidgeting."
She wants to kiss him and sweep away any follow-up questions in the heat of their bodies. Why spoil their usual routine? Why deny them both the comfort of reading together by candlelight? Why upset this fragile balance, when she feels the sundial shadows of inevitability creeping over what time they still have?
But Caspian holds her face and frowns down at her and would it be so bad to share this burden with him? Marcos' warning could be important for him.
Or would it only be a distraction he can't afford?
Caspian kisses sweetly at her hairline. "How are you, really?"
Addie sighs and draws her arms tighter around him, nestles her face in the crook of his neck. "Tired."
"Is he back?"
Addie's breath stalls. How did Caspian guess so easily?
It's selfish, perhaps, to admit the truth. Addie's mouth betrays her before she can clap it shut.
"Got his post back," she mumbles. "It's fine."
In the heavy breath of silence, Caspian rubs careful circles over her back. "Did he hurt you?"
Addie shakes her head. "Just wanted to talk. Remember when your uncle came along?"
Caspian's hands still, but he doesn't quite go rigid. If anything, his hold on her tightens.
"I remember. I've heard nothing from my circles about it."
"I have in mine," Addie murmurs. There's just enough space to work her hands up and fiddle with his collar. Anything to keep her fingers busy, give her something to stare at. He's wearing the flower shirt again, the embroidered petals bumpy under her touch. "Apparently, Miraz ordered his men to look for a servant girl with ties to you."
"How long ago? Marcos told you this?" Caspian's hands pull her out of their embrace, but the way he looks at her soothes the slight sting.
Still, it's harder to look at him and be honest.
Addie gnaws her lip to chew away the temptation of lies. "A few days back. I don't think he'll say anything. I'm being careful; that's why I've been later than usual."
Caspian's hands smooth over her shoulders, like he does whenever she comes in with a burn or minor cut or bruise from the kitchen, his eyes following the sweep. "But at night, when you come -"
Addie curls her fingers into her sleeve and pulls out her cap. Folded tightly, it fits well against her arm. "I know how to avoid the patrols."
Caspian takes longer than he should to answer. But he kisses away her frown with enough tenderness that Addie lets it go.
The next time Addie sleeps in her own room after a particularly late work night, there's an empty bed. Claudia snores away as Lola stares into the low ceiling, but Anna's not here. Anna never goes anywhere without one of them.
"Where's Anna?" Addie pulls off her shoes and sits cross-legged on her bed facing Lola.
"Not sure; I didn't see where she went after work." Lola's gaze stays fixed to the ceiling, almost like Addie's isn't there.
It's not like her. Being here at night isn't like her; Lola only sleeps here when Alfonso has a night shift, and even then she stays out late keeping him company. Addie didn't notice Alfonso in the courtyard when she left the kitchens. Lola rushed off like she always does, Anna and Claudia went toward their quarters, and Addie lingered at the well to scrub a mess of flour from her hands and face.
Addie leans forward, resting her elbows on her knees. "Is Alfonso on duty tonight?"
Lola sighs, short and quick and too heavy to be the usual longing lover's sigh. "No. I just thought I'd sleep here tonight."
"Everything okay?"
Lola worries her teeth over her bottom lip. "It'll work itself out. I… we haven't fought before."
Addie's eyebrows jump. She and Caspian have managed quite a few so far; they fought before they even had each other. "You've been together months now. Or is it just over a year?"
"A year last week," Lola says, her lips curling into a ghost of a smile. "We've disagreed, but we always talk it through." After a long moment, Lola sits up with her knees pulled to her chest. "I suppose this time we were a bit too upset."
What on earth could they be upset about? Addie's never seen them so much as frown at each other, let alone upset. "Wanna talk about it?"
Finally, Lola turns toward Addie and dangles one leg off the bed as she hugs the other with her chin propped on her knee. "It's this castle. You've probably felt it more than the rest of us, but it's been tense. Too tense, like we're all waiting for something to happen. Perla's been snappier. The guards aren't as friendly as they used to be. Sometimes when I pass a patrol, it feels like… I don't know. Like I'm somewhere I'm not supposed to be. Like they're watching or listening for something."
So Marcos was telling the truth. The guards near Caspian's quarters have multiplied, but the patrols here among the servants have always got along with them well enough. Addie used to joke with them, tease Marcos about the few who spent too long with the bottle and too little time sober on duty. Addie's spent so little time in the servants' quarters and so much avoiding any guards at all costs that she couldn't be sure.
"They are," Addie whispers. Even her whisper seems to echo along the walls, tempting fate. "Marcos said they're looking for someone."
Lola meets Addie's eyes like she knows exactly who.
Addie swallows. It's not fair, not to any of them. They didn't ask for any of this. So she clears her throat and stares at her hands as she tells Lola that she's sorry.
"Stop that." Lola straightens and frowns, staring hard enough that Addie's face prickles. "It's not your fault."
Addie looks away. This is one of the few times Lola is wrong. "Kind of is," Addie says. "I could've been quieter. More careful."
Lola's shaking her head before Addie even finishes. "Don't think we haven't noticed you've been distant with us lately. Ever since you tangled up with him, right? So no one will think we know something?"
Addie stutters over air. If Lola's worked that out, have any of Miraz's soldiers?
Lola smiles and lightly kicks Addie's knee, pulling her out of the temptation of spiraling worry. "You can't help who you love. And I know if you could, you would. But you didn't ask for a target on your back, especially not for trying to find some happiness. So don't apologise."
There's too much sincerity in that. Addie bounces her legs like bird's wings and stares at the wall. If it's not her fault, how is she supposed to fix this?
Just be here. Here, with me. That's what you can do.
Those were her words for Caspian, but maybe that's the answer here, too. So Addie turns back to Lola and changes the subject.
"Isn't Alfonso uneasy too? He's in the thick of things more than we are."
Lola frowns at the stones behind Addie's head. "I thought he'd be, but he says it won't come to a head. Something about the Council being royalists and Lord Miraz being outnumbered." Lola only whispers the last few words, as if she momentarily forgot that all such things have to be quiet. "Politics or no," Lola murmurs, "it's not safe."
Addie picks at her skirt until she finds a loose thread to fiddle with.
"No," Addie says. "It's not."
In the morning, Addie wakes to Lola stretching, Claudia throwing on her dress, and the usual two cups of morning after tea sitting on the rickety excuse for a bedside table. But when Addie sits up, she doesn't see Anna.
"Still nothing?"
Claudia glances to the empty bed, her hands busy adjusting her cap. "What do you mean? She came back here with me."
Addie's dress and cap lay abandoned at the foot of her cot as she pads over in stocking feet to Anna's unrumpled pillow. Anna always leaves the blanket smooth like she's making a bed, but the cot looks like she never slept in it at all.
It might be nothing. But it seems stupid to assume, and ungrateful. Anna was there that night when no one else was.
"Anna wasn't here last night," Addie says. "Not when I got back."
Lola turns with her dress clasped in her hands, frowning at Anna's perpetually neat cot. "I came back earlier than Addie, and she wasn't here then either. Are you sure she came back with you?"
Claudia's inhale rattles a moment before she shrugs. "She always does. Maybe she took my advice; I've been telling her to get out more for weeks. Even found her a suitable match in case she wanted it."
Addie's blood runs cool.
Match? Anna never spoke about such things. Perhaps years ago, when she was closer to Addie's age, but she suddenly lost interest.
"Match?" Addie asks. "Who?"
Claudia smooths her skirts before answering. "You and Lola've had good luck with the guards, so I suggested one of them. Luka, I think?"
Addie knows him. She met him months ago, back when she was still suspicious of Alfonso. Luka tried to get her to visit Marcos - to cheer him up. Addie didn't like him then, and she likes him far less now. So perhaps she can be forgiven for speaking too sharply.
"What were you thinking?" Addie clutches at her shift so her hands have something to do. "Anna never liked guards."
Claudia must have meant well. But gods, Anna feared the soldiers. Addie only properly understood why after everything with Marcos.
"She used to," Claudia answers, too quickly for it to be anything but guilt. Guilt for what? "She had a sweetheart years back, remember? I just figured she should move on, try someone new so she could stop moping."
"Moping?"
Lola walks over, but Addie steps around her attempt at a comforting hand.
"Avoiding the guards isn't moping," Addie snaps. "Why do you think Anna never joined in all the drinking?" Addie's teeth ache as she clenches her jaw too hard. "She knew better. You should have, too."
Claudia's mouth opens, then closes in silence. Her shape blurs, but Addie blinks the excess water away and swipes at her cheeks until she can see clearly again.
"I didn't think that -"
"That's exactly the problem," Addie snaps. "You didn't think."
Lola slides between them with the silent grace of a castle mouser.
"What's done is done," she says. "Claudia, I know you meant well, but best not play matchmaker again." Lola's hand finds Addie's arm, too close for her to politely tug away. "Addie, getting angry won't help. Perhaps Anna had a good time, and she's with him still. She may already be in the kitchen, and if she's not, we'll find her before day's end. Alright?"
Addie forces those calming breaths she takes after nightmares. This could just be a case of Anna getting out of her shell, finally moving past prior hurts. She could be fine. She could be visiting family, or out in the city, or trading sweet morning nonsense with someone.
Addie clenches her fingers until the bite of her nails breaks past the what-ifs and the could-be's. Caspian said something about his nurse disappearing one day, no warning, nothing but his own memory to remind him she even existed. This could be nothing. But gods, it couldn't.
"You two go on," Addie says, the words thick as cotton across her tongue. "See if Perla knows where she is. I'll look around, try to find her before lunch."
Claudia turns away too brusquely, as if making the breakfast hour is more important than Anna. No, that's not fair. But shouldn't Claudia seem sorrier, seem worried, seem anything but determined to get on with her day as if nothing at all is wrong?
"Good idea. Really, I'm sure she's fine." Claudia's gone in a flick of her skirts before Addie can mutter that if Claudia believed that, she wouldn't be avoiding it. She wouldn't dismiss the concerns. She'd have better answers than what do you mean and she always does and I'm sure she's fine.
Lola's hand finds hers, a welcome solidity against the unsteady room around them. Or perhaps that's Addie's spinning thoughts destroying her sense of balance.
"I'm worried too," says Lola, something that should be obvious. But it helps to hear her say so. "I'll ask Alfonso, see if he knows anything among the guards. We'll find her."
Whatever answer Addie could have given dies on her tongue.
When Addie is elbows deep in the stock pot, she remembers. The pot clatters into the washing bin, splashing water and suds onto her skirt. Addie stares into nothing, bubbles slowly popping on her fingers.
Stay away from the prince. It'll throw them off your trail.
Marcos knew.
It's stupid, abandoning the pot and the washing brush and running out with suds clinging to her arms. Perla's shout as she runs promises several bruises on her knuckles when she comes back.
Addie doesn't care. She lifts her wet skirt and runs.
By the time she reaches the guard tower, her ragged breathing alerts every guard loitering outside, some sharing a gourd of alcohol, some pointing to the few stars visible through the torchlight, and some rolling dice on the ground. Addie races past them all, shoves down the trembling in her chest. Every one of them looks up as she runs by, but none jump at her.
Small blessings.
Was one of these faces the last thing Anna saw?
Addie darts around a towering hulk of a man reeking of ale and stumbling through the door. He swears, yells to watch where she's going, but by then she's out of reach.
She was watching. He was in the way.
She takes the stairs to Marcos' floor two at a time, dodging soldiers in nightshirts and half-dressed in armour.
There, on the third cot from the door, she finds him.
Lounging, feet crossed at the ankles, one hand behind his head as he throws a wooden ball in the air. Catches it. Toss, catch, toss, catch. As if everything is fine.
Addie's legs quiver, throat scraping dry around the dense air thick with the smell of hay mattresses and drinking and men. Too many men crammed in too small a space. A few who teased her and Marcos before he took her away from the well and -
Did he do such a thing to Anna, too?
Addie's vision blurs.
"What did you do?"
She realises she's screamed it when half the room goes quiet and the weight of a dozen stares pierce her skin like knives.
Marcos jolts upright, eyes wide. The ball thumps to the floor and rolls away.
Addie stalks to his bedside before she can remember how to breathe, how to be pleasant and pleasing and avoid too much attention.
No avoiding the attention now.
Marcos stands to meet her, eyebrows pressing together as she asks him again.
"What did you do?"
Marcos smirks down at her, the momentary surprise swallowed up by something smug. "If you wanted some action, you could've asked nicely."
Her jaw drops.
Anna is missing and he's making jokes about -
In front of these men who -
Her hand jerks back before Addie catches herself, palm itching with the need to hit him.
The stares intensify. One man rises to his feet, while another nudges his fellows.
Addie curls her fingers into a fist. Forces air through her nose. Realizes her cheeks are wet, that she's trembling.
Marcos' smirk begins to slip.
"She's gone," Addie blurts, the whisper still too loud among so many witnesses. "What did you do?"
"Trouble in paradise?"
A soldier behind Marcos jeers, laughs with his gaggle of three. Mouth caught somewhere between the smirk and concern, Marcos grabs her wrist.
It says too much, probably, that Addie yanks away, tries to shake off the feeling of his rough fingers pressed to her skin.
Marcos grabs her again. "Not here," he mutters, barely intelligible. "Outside."
To the soldiers staring, he laughs like she's a… a silly girl. An annoyance barely worth the trouble. He doesn't look at her again as he tells them not to wait up, they know how these maids are.
It's the first time he's been so dismissive of her in front of them.
The nerve he has.
Addie tries to jerk free, but this time Marcos holds her fast and steers her back down the stairs, past more stares and laughs and a friendlier call or two. His fingers dig painfully into her wrist, hard enough to bruise.
"Get off me!"
Marcos pays her no mind. Just hauls her outside, marches past the guards at the door with a nod, and makes for the courtyard, cursing at her when she starts clawing at him like a wildcat.
"Let go!" Addie hisses.
Finally, when the shadows of their old spot wrap around them both like a cloak, he does.
"Care to explain that scene back there?" Marcos flings her wrist away at the same moment Addie wrenches free. "I said lay low -"
She can't help it. Not really.
"Anna's gone!" Addie cries, vision blurry with hot, angry tears. "I know you did something."
Teeth flashing in a grimace, Marcos reaches for her again. Addie jumps back, and his hand meets air.
"Keep quiet! Tash's shits, how stupid are you?" Marcos scratches his jaw when she evades him again. "I didn't do anything, alright? I just heard rumors."
Without thinking, Addie shoves him. Swipes at her wet cheeks, her stuffy nose.
"You said to stay away," she chokes out past the knot in her chest. "You knew."
Marcos' shoulders slacken, barely enough to notice. It's not defeat, this strange thing shadowed across his brow. It's something harder, like a ragged piece of cobblestone broken from the well steps. Like a knife sharpened on the whetstone.
"Nothing for sure. Not until today."
Ice cramps down her spine, lances through her arms.
She asks him a fourth time. "What did you do?"
A muscle ticks in Marcos' jaw.
"Nothing," he answers after a long pause. "A guard drank too much the other night, said he was getting in Miraz's good graces and bragged about coin. That's all."
Addie doesn't even recognise the warbled, rasping voice that comes out of her throat. "Who? When?"
"I told you, the other night. Maybe two nights, I don't know." Again, Marcos scratches at the stubble nearing a short beard. "I didn't know. Not til you told me."
A breath shudders through Addie's chest. It gets caught between her throat and her nose, melts into a sob.
If Marcos didn't have something to do with it, what other leads does she have?
"Can you…" Tash, she hates crying in front of him. Hates to ask for his help, to give him any reason to keep seeking her out.
Anna's gone. This is the least she can do.
Addie forces the words out. "Can you find out what happened?"
Immediately, Marcos scowls. "What part of 'lay low' didn't you get?"
"Please."
For a moment, Marcos' hand strays toward her arm. Addie stiffens, but she anchors her feet and doesn't move away. Marcos' hand falls away before it reaches her.
"Yeah. Yeah, alright. I'll keep an ear out."
When Addie slinks back to the kitchen, Perla scolds her until both their faces are red, though she doesn't use the spatula.
That, more than anything, is proof that nothing is as it should be.
Bruna had no answers. Lola checks with Alfonso the minute he came to fetch her - as he's taken to doing when he's not on duty. He, too, has heard nothing.
Maybe Marcos will turn something up.
The bone-deep tremors of grief in Addie's chest make her too careless as she creeps to Caspian's study. Addie jumps into a shadowed alcove moments before two guards round the corner, marching along the straightaway chattering away about Miraz's slightly less foul temper today.
Addie only finds her breath again when they've gone so far down the hall she can't hear their armour rattling or their footsteps. The hallway is as still and quiet as if no one is alive - awake - within this corridor. It's a rare window between rounds; she should hurry inside, find Caspian and drown in his kisses so she can forget everything else. Disappear into the place where only the two of them exist.
It takes Addie longer than it should to move her feet again. By the time her palms find the hidden door, the guards' boots echo at the edge of hearing. Addie eases the door open, holding her finger to her mouth when Caspian stands to greet her. It's a cruel thing, waiting this long for her hello kiss as she tries to silently shut the door. But Addie makes do, because she has to.
Maybe one day, she won't have to.
The moment the latch slides into place, Addie jumps into Caspian's arms and buries her face in his neck. He smells like candle smoke and faintly earthy soap. He used to smell like smoke and a day spent half among books and half under the sun swinging a sword. But more recently, he smells like royal soap scented with pine.
"Are you well? Did something happen?" Caspian's arms tighten as his lips find her neck, pressing a single long kiss where her neck meets her shoulders. "You're rarely so late."
Something deep in Addie's stomach twists at the thought of telling him that yes, something happened. This is so much worse than idle worrying someone could find out. He's already been worried, and Addie doesn't want to know how he'll handle this.
What words are there, to say Anna is gone and it's her fault?
But Caspian might know something, or he might know who else she can ask. He found out about Alfonso. If Addie tries to lie, she's certain Caspian will somehow see the truth.
He's good at that.
"We're short a maid." Addie tucks herself closer into his chest even as Caspian's breath cools her skin, damp from his kisses.
The silence falls too thick, so Addie shoves the trembles tickling behind her sternum so far down they can't creep back out.
"I'm sure she'll turn up," she lies. "But we're short on hands. That's all." Gods, she can't even keep her voice steady.
Caspian straightens, but at least he still holds her so tightly Addie doesn't have to wonder what he's thinking.
He's worried, yes. But he's holding her like a promise.
"How long has she been gone?" Caspian murmurs. "Who saw her last?"
Addie rests her ear just above his heart before answering. Even with his heartbeat as thunderous as hers, it's a comfort to have the closeness. She needs him close, now more than ever.
His heart, at least, is still beating.
"Since last night," Addie answers. She holds Caspian until her muscles tremble when she tells him that Claudia saw her last, and there might've been a guard involved. The second she says so, Caspian's hands smooth up her back, lingering over her shoulders.
"Was this guard the last one to see her?"
"I think so, but I'm not sure," Addie whispers. "No one seems to know anything."
It's impossible to keep the bitterness from seeping in, but Caspian doesn't comment on it. He's still quiet, his chin resting atop her head.
"My uncle asked after my nightly studies," Caspian finally whispers into her hair. "Are you certain no one sees you come in here?"
Addie's fist tightens in his shirt - plain, no flowers this time. "I don't think I'd still be here if they had."
The silence that falls between them is the kind Addie hates the most. These silences are rare, but she's learned their shape. Silences like this are when Caspian has something on his mind he doesn't want to say, or a question he has to ask to make sure she's telling the truth. This silence is heavy, guilty, the breath before the crack of a whip.
"Perhaps… are you certain we should continue as we are?"
The tremors race back to Addie's muscles, reverberating up her arms, her shoulders, the sides of her neck. Her heart clogs her throat, thundering unevenly in her ears.
That's his answer to this? After everything?
Scattered phrases, curses, traitorous little pleas push at Addie's lips, but there's enough strength in her throat to swallow it all down so she can hold herself steady. And yet, when Addie summons an answer, it come out cracked and thick with every hurt she wants to desperately not to feel.
"You don't think so, do you?"
Caspian hasn't looked her in the eye since she said she's careful. When he lifts his gaze again, his eyes are swimming.
"I don't know," he says, every word stretched tight. "It's never truly been safe, this, but now -"
"I don't care." Addie snaps. She should be gentler, shouldn't be lashing out when Caspian's heart is trembling over the tip of a sword. But her heart is right there too; if he lances his own, he runs through hers in the same stroke.
"Addie -"
"I don't!" Her hands can't decide whether to grip his shirt hard enough to tear or shove him away, find the bookshelf door, and retreat to her shared room. Back to where she's supposed to be untouchable, before she cared anything for a prince she never should have met if accident and their own strange choices hadn't brought her to his doorstep.
Or him to hers. That's how it started.
Caspian takes her face in both his hands, and it's only because of the tiny tremor in his fingertips that Addie doesn't fling him away by the wrists.
"You didn't ask for this, to be hunted because of me. You don't deserve it."
With her palms flat to his chest, Addie shoves him away and shouts.
"Don't tell me what I deserve! I decide that, not you. I'm not some stupid girl; I chose my risks because they were worth it. Aren't I the one always coming to you?"
Caspian reaches for her, gentler than he has any right to be. "Your friend Anna is dead because my uncle thought she was you."
Addie chokes on air. Hearing it said aloud so bluntly lances through her stomach, cramps between her ribs. Caspian is right. This isn't something she can fix, and it's her fault.
Addie shoves him again though she can barely see through her tears.
"You think I don't know that?" she cries. "You think I'd still be here if I -"
Her voice cracks. Addie clenches her teeth so hard her jaw creaks in warning, falls back another step before Caspian can reach her.
"If this is about keeping you safer, then fine," she manages. "But don't you dare toss me aside because you think it's better for me. Don't you dare."
Tash, she can't breathe. She can't bear to look at him, but she can't look away even as the water spills down her cheeks and her lungs fight to hold on to the scraps of air keeping her chest from collapsing in on itself.
A beginning. He said a beginning.
"Addie, I don't want to," Caspian says, every word tight at the edges. "I never want to lose you, remember?"
He reaches for her with open palms and reaches a half step closer. Caspian's hand grazes hers in the half second before she pulls away.
Addie steps back, her arms wound so tight around her middle they could almost stick the pieces crumbling off of her back together. Caspian's hands fall, and the distance between them seems miles further than before.
"I'm trying to protect you."
The tears in Caspian's voice sound like such distant things, as if Addie's hearing them through a wall. It's not enough to keep her whole, to make this bearable.
"I don't need your protection, Caspian," Addie whispers. "I just need you." Her voice breaks as she tries to choke back the confession she shouldn't say, not now. Not with him leaving. But it slips out anyway, tiny broken thing that it is. "I can't face this alone."
Gods, she shouldn't have said it. The words hang in the chasm between them, frozen in time as if mocking her.
Addie doesn't think before she moves. Her feet move without her deciding so, as if they're some other part of her dragging her along toward the bookshelf, toward the door and the passageway and the long run through the dark back to her own bed where she can break in peace. Where the confessions will slip into her pillow and not into the air.
When Addie's fingertips graze the wood, an arm hooks around her waist and scoops her back into the heartbeat she knows better than her own. Back to the pieces of her own heart she can't quite pick up.
Caspian is warm as the afternoon sun behind her. Familiar. Safe. The relief of his touch cracks through her, so loud she only realises Caspian's crooning her name when his tears land on her skin and slide a careful path down her neck.
If Addie pushes her elbows back, it'll break his hold. She rehearses it in her mind, imagines how easily Caspian's arms will fall away and leave nothing but memory around her. At least then it would be her choice.
She know at once she can't do it.
Addie digs frantic fingers into Caspian's forearms, into the tight cords of muscle that quills and sword and arrows strung on crossbows have forged. She digs his arms into her stomach until she coughs and curls forward gasping for air her lungs won't accept.
And yet, this simple, desperate joining of skin sends whispers of strength bleeding back into her limbs as Caspian's heat soothes the raw edges chafing under her skin.
His voice is such a soft, breakable thing in the quiet after her sobs slow to shivers. "I can't lose you, Addie," Caspian whispers. "Not to my uncle, not to death. And not like this."
"Then how could you say that?" Addie can't stop the wobble in her voice, no matter how hard she grips him. "Why make it sound so easy, like you don't -"
Caspian spins her around and seizes her face at the exact angle needed to command her attention. Addie gives up trying to look away.
"Do you think I could live with myself if you disappeared too?" he asks, with his palms scorching her cheeks. "I do want you, Addie. But I need you safe more."
He says that in the worst possible way. Caspian says that like he means it, like wanting her safe more than wanting her makes this any better. Like he expects her to understand.
Like she hasn't heard this kind of double-edged goodbye before.
Bitterness steals words from her throat faster than she can take them back.
"You won't know either way," Addie snaps. "And neither will I."
He's sending her away. Caspian is sending her away and she won't know a thing about how he's doing until one day he's gone and Miraz is king and she'll never have said goodbye. She'll have nothing but the emptiness that comes with the shock and whatever barbed scraps of comfort she can wring from memories. Just like Anna. Just like -
She won't even be able to mourn him. She'll be alone in this wretched castle, again.
Addie realises belatedly that Caspian's gone silent. Something twists across his face, bright and torn and gone too suddenly to pinpoint before his forehead presses to hers and her gaze drifts down to the smooth expanse of tanned skin peeking from the top of his shirt. Caspian's hands slide back, fingers carding through her curls in a cruel echo of the easy comfort they've always found in each other.
It used to be easy. When did it stop being easy?
"If we continue like this, Miraz will know. We're not very quiet."
Watching his face crumble soothes the crack in her chest, and it shouldn't; Addie doesn't want him torn apart like this. But somehow it helps to see him struggling too. To see that Caspian wants her enough to miss her before she's even gone.
"I don't care," Addie whispers.
"You should." Caspian's breath tickles her lips, his fingertips searing brands behind her neck.
"I know."
Perhaps she does. But she doesn't care enough about danger to survive losing him.
That heavy silence stretches for a third time, so thick and cloying Addie tastes the bitterness behind her teeth. Caspian's brow furrows, like it always does when he's thinking. She always loved that lopsided line of his eyebrows, that ticking muscle in his jaw, that subtle flicker behind his eyelids. But this time, looking at him pushes the bile higher in her stomach.
She could end his pondering rather quickly. She could decide to leave. It would be so easy, wouldn't it?
Her choice.
Addie locks her knees and presses her heels into the floor. Her hands tremble and her feet ache, but she tries not to move. If she lets herself move, she'll run.
He's right. She should.
Caspian presses his lips to her forehead, breath overheating her feverish skin. "It's not just sneaking around, Addie. If my aunt bears a son, I must leave. And I'd take you with me."
He should leave this castle. Addie should leave him. It's all so simple, really.
It's all so unbearable.
Addie distantly realizes that she's grasping at nothing, at nonsensical pleas to keep hold of this happy thing they've stumbled into together. She sees everything they should do.
She doesn't care. That's the most damning part.
She can be more careful. She can come later, only sneak during the guard changes. And when Caspian has to run, well, she can go with him. They can draw Miraz's eye out of the castle, away from everyone else they love.
There are worse fates.
"Okay," Addie whispers.
"Most of the lords will rally to Miraz. We'd never be completely safe."
"Okay."
"We'll be hunted through all of Narnia, all our lives." Caspian's hands tighten in her hair, sending pinpricks over her scalp. "I'd spare you that life if I can."
Addie almost laughs. He can't; that time passed long ago. She's made her choice, and she's never regretted it. She tells Caspian so, though her throat tightens around the admission.
"Besides," she continues, "didn't you say once Miraz gets an idea in his head, there's no getting it out?"
They've done the damage already - Miraz knows she exists. He'll find out soon enough that Anna wasn't the new maid assigned to Caspian's chambers.
"Yes," says Caspian, "I did." His fingers gradually soften and return to combing out the tangles he left. The fuzzy pleasure doesn't overtake her like it usually does. Addie doesn't let it.
"Then don't send me away."
Caspian nods once, short and jerky and hesitant. "If you're certain."
After a moment, Addie attempts a smile. It strains at the corners of her mouth, cracks over her dry lips.
"I am. Just help me keep the rest of them safe."
"Alright. Alright." Caspian massages her neck, the base of her skull, eases every tangle from her hair.
Addie lets him. She enjoys his touches, keeps her arms steady around his waist. But that night, when they go quietly to bed and do nothing but hold each other, she stares into the dark until Caspian's breathing evens out and his hands fall slack in hers. Only then does Addie let her fingers stray to his neck, under his jaw where his pulse beats strongest. It's slower in sleep, unless he's dreaming. No dreams tonight, or not yet.
Addie doesn't dream either. She doesn't sleep. She just lies there until dawn, memorising the beat of his heart until her own becomes a stranger.
A/N: Soooo, what did you think of that last scene? First big fight, and so many raw emotions. Who's right - Addie or Caspian?
Chapter 18 Preview:
"Wise indeed." Miraz turns to his breakfast with clanging silverware. Although his uncle hasn't seen fit to stare him down like usual, Caspian's hands still tingle in warning. "I trust you have no more distractions?"