Black, black, black. I hate black, Lucy thought as she buttoned up a black frock for the fifth (or was it the sixth?) day in a row.
They all had to wear black because they were in mourning. They were in morning for their dead brother. They were in mourning for their dead brother who wasn't even really dead.
Of course as soon as Lucy had found out the truth about the boy in the coffin, she'd raced to Edmund and Susan to tell them.
"Edmund! Susan!" Lucy had cried happily. "Peter isn't dead."
Edmund looked surprised but didn't say anything.
Susan sighed and gently reached out and tucked a stray strand of Lucy's hair behind her ear in a very motherly way. "Lucy, I know it's hard...but we have to except that he's gone, he's dead, there's no use pretending any different."
"But that's just it," Lucy said. "He isn't dead! The boy in the coffin isn't our brother!"
"What do you mean, Lu?" Edmund asked her.
"Just what I said." Lucy told him. "After you all left, I lifted the lid of the coffin,"
"Oh, Lucy, you shouldn't have!" Susan said in a disappointed tone.
"But I had to." Lucy protested. "I had to know."
"And?" Edmund asked, clearly on edge and not able to handle another second of uncertainty.
"He didn't have a scar near his brow." Lucy said, smiling at her siblings, hoping they understood what that implied.
"What does that..." Edmund started before it dawned on him. The coma shaped blood mark (Which is what it was before it became a scar) was one of the first things he'd noticed after Lucy had saved him with her magic cordial. "...his fight with the white witch!"
"Then it really wasn't him!" Susan grabbed her little sister's hand. "Come, let's go tell Mum and dad."
"Whoa, whoa, whoa." Edmund jumped in front of them. "Just what are you going to tell them? That you know the boy in the coffin isn't Peter because in a magical land 15 years ago or a matter of months ago, whichever it really is, he fought a witch and got a scar?"
Susan's face fell. He was right. Their parents didn't know about Narnia. They wouldn't believe them if they told them. After all, they were still uncertain about the fairies and they had seen actual photos!
Lucy had hoped once she told her siblings the truth, they'd finally believe that Peter wasn't dead. But although they believed that the boy in the coffin wasn't Peter, they thought he might be dead all the same. Just not found yet.
"And that alone is worth mourning, Lucy." Susan had reminded her one morning when they were getting dressed, tying a black ribbon into Lucy's hair.
Lucy had never been one to care for clothes (Except in Narnia where clothes are very different from what they are in our world) but she couldn't bear the cheerlessness of the mourning color. Fairies, she was sure, never wore black.
She wondered what the fairies thought of her for wearing it so many days in a row. Did they secretly laugh? Feel sorry for her? Wish harder than ever that she understood whatever it was they meant by 'Rupert'?
"Lucy, don't step there, it's-" Susan started as she saw Lucy taking a step next to a very muddy slope in Mrs. Esmara's garden.
With a slight gasp, Lucy slid, down the small hilly grass getting a long trail of mud on the skirt of her black frock.
"-Slippery." Susan shook her head and sighed. You could always count on Lucy to get into a scrape.
"Did you bring cake?" Lucy asked her sister as she picked herself off of the wet dewy ground and tried to wipe some of the mud off her clothes.
"Yes," Susan told her, She spread out the blanket for them to sit on. Not that it would do any good for Lucy seeing as she'd already soiled her clothing.
Sitting, looking out at the water, the girls quietly threw cake crumbs to the fairies who seemed to sense that they're human friends were sad and stayed more of a distance away from them than usual.
"Su, do you know anyone named Rupert?" Lucy asked, throwing a crumb to a pudgy gnome with a pointing top hat made out of a little tree root.
"The only Rupert I ever knew was grandfather." Susan said, trying in vain to coax Rosie to come closer.
"We have a grandfather named Rupert?" Lucy asked.
"On mother's side." Susan told her. "You wouldn't remember, he died when you were really small. Why do you ask?"
Lucy shrugged. "I was trying to figure out what the fairies are trying to tell us."
"The fairies are trying to tell us something?"
"Well, they made me write 'Rupert' on my slate." Lucy explained. "And I can't figure out why."
"Hmm." Susan looked very thoughtful.
"What are you thinking about?" Lucy noticed her sister's face looked the way it did whenever she had an idea.
"Grandpa Rupert believed Peter about the fairies." She said.
"Did he?" Lucy asked.
"Of course he did, he and Peter were very close." Susan said softly. "They both trusted each other whole heartedly. Shortly before he died, Grandfather gave him his pocket watch as a gift."
"Oh, yes, I remember the watch." Lucy recalled the long gold watch on a chain with little engraved marks she'd never actually read on it. "Peter used to swing it in front of me to play with when I was little."
"And you were like a pet cat about it." Susan teased, not unkindly.
Suddenly Lucy had a light bulb moment. "Su!" She gasped. "Maybe that's it!"
"Maybe what's it?" Susan wrinkled her forehead.
"Maybe the fairies are trying to tell us, something about Peter's watch." She said excitedly.
"Why would they care about the watch?" Susan wondered.
"I don't know." Lucy admitted. "But the watch belonged to Grandpa Rupert. Which would explain why they used that name."
"Lu, if they wanted to tell us something about Peter, why wouldn't they just have written his name on the slate?" Susan said practically.
"Maybe it's about grandfather then." Lucy suggested. "Something they want us to know."
"But what?" Susan was at a loss for ideas as far as that was concerned.
"I don't know." Sighed Lucy.
"Lucy! Susan!" A breathless, panting, Edmund came running up to them causing the fairies to retreat even further into the bushes. "You wont believe what I just heard Mum and Dad talking about!"
"What is it, Ed?" Susan asked.
Edmund paused to catch his breath. "Colin Lee Marcus got the photographs Mr. Preston sent."
"Oh?" Susan asked, still angry that Mr. Preston had sent them in the first place.
"Yes and he's coming here to meet both of you tomorrow." Edmund told them. "He wants to talk with you."
Lucy just barely held back the excited squeal forming in her throat. She couldn't help it. A famous author wanted to talk to them! He thought their photographs were interesting. He thought they were interesting. And because he was a visitor, there was a good chance they wouldn't have to wear black tomorrow. The excitement was marred only by the fear that he would want to see the fairies himself. Or would want to expose them as the first girls in England (or even the world) to have ever played with fairies.
Susan, being older and caring less about famous writers than Lucy did, felt all of the dread and none of the excitement. What did he want to talk to them about.? Would he bring harm to the fairies?
"Alright." Susan gave her siblings a firm look. "The three of us have to make a promise."
"What kind of promise?" Lucy asked curiously.
"The kind that lasts for ever." Susan said darkly. "Let's all sit in a circle."
"Why?" Edmund asked.
"Just do it." Susan ordered.
Edmund sighed and sat down. "This had better be good."
"Now let's all hold hands." She said.
Lucy grabbed on to Edmund's hand and felt Susan grab her free hand. "Okay, Ed, grab on to my hand."
"You're starting to freak me out." Edmund told her.
"Just do it!" Susan hissed.
"Okay, okay." Edmund rolled his eyes and grabbed a hold of her hand.
"Repeat after me." Susan told them. "I, Susan Pevensie,"
"I, Susan Pevensie." Edmund repeated just to be smart.
Lucy broke out in a fit of laughter and had to let go of her brother's hand to try to muffle the noise.
Susan glared at him. "Do be serious, Ed."
"Sorry." Edmund became serious, Lucy stopped laughing, and they all held hands again. "I, Edmund Pevensie,"
"I, Lucy Pevensie," Lucy said dutifully.
"Promise never again to break the code of fairy secrecy." Susan said.
Edmund cringed a little. "You know I've never even met these fairies."
"That doesn't matter." Susan told him sternly. "You're in on this too."
Susan waited a moment.
"Promise never again to break the code of fairy secrecy." Edmund said finally.
Lucy shifted uncomfortably.
"Lu?" Susan looked at her little sister. "Your turn."
Lucy hesitated. "But-"
"Lucy-" Susan didn't understand why she was having such a hard time with this.
"What about Marjorie?" Lucy said partly because she was curious and partly because she was stalling. She was stalling because she didn't like the idea of making a promise they couldn't keep. Or even fully understand. After all what did breaking the code of fairy secrecy really mean? Did it mean never telling anyone about them point blank or was it lenient?
"She's not here." Susan said shortly. "Just say it."
"Swear never again to break the code of fairy secrecy." Lucy gave in.
The next morning Susan and Lucy stayed late in bed. Neither felt like getting up. They were going to meet Colin Lee Marcus today and they were nervous about what it was he wanted from them.
"Susan?" Lucy asked, rolling over to face her sister's bed.
"Hmm?" Susan answered.
"Do you believe Peter's coming back?" Lucy wondered if she was the only one who still thought it was alive.
Susan was quiet for a moment. "Sometimes." She whispered. "Sometimes I think he's just going to walk through the front door and be home again and everything will go back to normal. Then it seems so hopeless." She let out a sigh. "I don't want to believe in anything that could hurt when I realize it's not the truth."
"Do you think he'd know what to do about Mr. Lee Marcus?" Lucy asked.
"More than we do, probably." Susan admitted.
"Maybe I should have taken that book from his room." Lucy said.
"Mum would have been furious." Susan pointed out.
"I know." Lucy said softly.
"We'd best be getting up now." Susan sat up. "It's almost noon and Colin Lee Marcus will be here soon."
Lucy got out of bed and started getting dressed. Thankfully not in black.
Susan slid off her nightdress, replacing it with an undershirt. "I'm going to be sick." She groaned.
"No you're not." Lucy told her.
"I am." Susan insisted, looking for her knee-socks. "My stomach feels like it's doing summersaults."
"Mine's growling." Lucy told her as a slight rumble echoed through the room.
"That's because we skipped breakfast." Susan said practically.
"Oh." Lucy reached over for a sash to tie around the middle of her dress which was slightly too big on her otherwise.
There was a knock at their bedroom door.
"Come in." Lucy called. They were only half dressed but seeing as the only people in the house were Mum, Dad, and Edmund and there was nothing they hadn't seen before, it didn't matter.
The door creaked open and Mr. Pevensie walked in. "Girls, Colin Lee Marcus is here."
"We'll be down in a minute." Lucy told her father.
"You know, if there's anything you want to tell me-about the photographs-it's not too late." He wasn't convinced that the were of real fairies and wanted to give the girls a chance to confess.
They wanted to protect the fairies but they weren't willing to lie. Both girls kept silent.
"Susan?" Mr. Pevensie tried knowing she was less likely to believe in pretend fairies than Lucy was.
"We'll be down in a minute, Dad." Susan told him. The photographs were real. That much they would always have to stand by no matter what.
And with a sigh, Mr. Pevensie left the room, leaving Susan and Lucy in peace to finish getting ready.
AN: Please Review. I stayed up late to update, the least you could do, is leave one teeny tiny review.