A/N: A relatively short chapter, but I'll have the next one posted very soon.
Chapter Three
Everyone was strange at breakfast the next morning. Aravis was still pale and pensive. The Duke was preening and King Peter was watching him with careful, thoughtful eyes. The Duke's daughter would not take any food, and both Corin and Queen Lucy were red-eyed and subdued. Cor couldn't help but wonder if they shared a similar experience during the night.
Despite all this, no one said anything. The Narnians left and the Galmians stayed. The marriage contract was sealed and signed, and Corin said nothing. Cor wanted to speak up, but if Corin wasn't objecting to the marriage, how could he? He especially remembered the High King's words, and wondered if you could give someone an epiphany. Perhaps a good knock to Corin's hard head would do the trick.
He didn't try the experiment, though, and the betrothal became official. Anvard started preparing for the royal wedding, the first since Lune's own. Lune called Aravis in to help, and Aravis pitched herself into the planning with the rigor and routine of a soldier. Watching her, Cor couldn't help but marvel at her zeal when she had been so against the marriage. He asked her about it one day when she had enlisted him to choose roses. As they sat before an array of the fragrant flowers, he asked, "Why are you working so hard, Aravis? I thought you didn't even want this wedding to take place."
Aravis shot him a cold look. "I have been charged with a duty."
"What does that matter? A few weeks ago you were plotting with me to stop everything! You had a duty to your father, and to Ahoshta, but you didn't let that stop you," Cor returned.
"And what about you, and your duty? You were plotting as well, and you say nothing now! Perhaps I realize that there is no freedom, not even in these Northern countries." Her cheeks became bright red and she began to arrange the roses with trembling fingers.
"That's not true, and you know it! Queen Susan—"
"Oh, Queen Susan. Then let me amend my statement. There is no freedom in Archenland. Perhaps I should move to Narnia, where the men are not cowards and believe in true love!" She started to stalk away, but Cor grabbed her wrist. Before he could even voice his protest, she grabbed a handful of roses and hit him with them so that petals flew everywhere. He was so surprised that he loosened his grip and she slipped away quickly. At the door she turned back, breathing hard. "You would say you are not a coward, that you believe in love and the freedom of choice. I say, prove it." She slammed the door behind her.
The entire castle was upended for the wedding. A given morning would have the castle staff running around attending to a hundred errands. The only person who seemed entirely unconcerned was the bridegroom. Corin took rides in the woods, practiced his archery and swordplay, ignored his tutor with "That's stuff for kings to know, and I'll be a prince forever." In short, he acted as though nothing was changing at all. Occasionally someone tried to pin him down with a direct question about the wedding, and on those occasions, Corin pretended to be deaf and dumb.
It didn't matter who the questioner was. One night at dinner Lune turned to his younger son. "I have been thinking about your wedding present, Corin. 'Tis tradition for the younger prince to have the castle at Grena. Now that you'll have a wife and, please Aslan, a family, perhaps it's time you take your seat there."
Cor nearly dropped his fork. A castle was quite a gift, but it was hard to imagine Anvard with Corin living someplace else. He looked to his twin to see how he would react to leaving his childhood home, but Corin had a dreamy look on his face. "Grena," he said with a grin, "We went there that summer with Mama." He turned to Cor and Aravis and explained "It's on the sea, like Cair Paravel."
Cor blinked at his brother in astonishment. He acted as though he hadn't even heard what their father said. Indeed, the next moment Corin rose from the table and wandered off.
"He'll be ready when the time comes," Lune said, but he sounded like he was trying to convince himself.
Cor twisted his mouth doubtfully. A question occurred to him. "Father, were you matched with Mother, or did you choose her for yourself?"
"We were matched," Lune replied. "But well matched. I loved her dearly." Cor bowed his head to honor the mother he never knew. "Corin will learn to be happy as well. He is young, but marriage will steady him. Love will."
Cor wanted to speak and say that Corin was already in love, but what was the point if Corin would say nothing for himself? Aravis looked at him intently. When Cor only shrugged in return, she rose and swept from the room.
Aravis remained strangely mercurial as the wedding approached. In the morning she would claim he didn't believe in love, only politics. Yet that evening she would kiss him goodnight with passion and tenderness. There was so much in that kiss that Cor was sure the only thing that kept her from his bed was propriety.
Lune kept repeating aloud that Corin would grow into marriage, as if he was trying to convince himself. Cor could see why he needed convincing—Corin's blithe oblivion persisted like a streak of bad weather.
Cor longed to climb a tree to think it all out, but there was never time. Father had appointed him chief statesman, and as such Cor had the responsibility of seeing to all the royal guests flocking in from all parts of the world. Even the newly crowned Tisroc Rabadash sent a delegation and a fine gift of a cup encrusted with jewels.
Aravis was supervising Cor supervise the recording of gifts when the goblet was unpacked. "Send it back," she said at once.
"It's a gift," Cor protested. "A goodwill gesture."
"I care not," Aravis returned coldly. "There can be no goodwill from him. We should have nothing from Calormen within these castle walls."
Cor blinked, surprised by the vehemence of her words. He did not dare point out the irony of her forbidding anything Calormene in Anvard.