HIDDEN CURSE

Edmund: 16

Peter: 19

Susan: 18

Lucy: 14

A special thanks to tacobella18 because she honestly gives me the loveliest reviews that make me feel like my story is amazing. So thank you from the bottom of my heart.

TRIGGER WARNING: SUICIDE ATTEMPT AND CUTTING MENTIONED

Sorry if this cuts the flow of the story, but this idea came to me when I was thinking about where to take the story, and decided to write it. I'm kind of iffy on putting it in. Hopefully you guys like it.

Chapter 4: Reversing the Roles

Peter got up to chase after Edmund but was stopped by a shouting Lucy.

"No Peter! Let him go!"

Peter whipped around.

In a gentler voice, "I don't think he wants you hovering over him right now. Just let him have his space. If he wants you, he'll seek you out. For now, just let him deal with himself."

Peter looked ready to protest, but then nodded. Lucy was usually right on what to do when it came to Edmund, or even Susan, when things took a turn for the worse. He sat back down, and poked at the rest of his dinner.

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Lucy found Peter with a book in front of his face in his quarters, but she knew he wasn't really reading it. His brow was always furrowed when he read, and it was more tilted in frustration.

"Good book?" She plopped herself onto the bed next to him.

"I've read better," he said, throwing the book aside.

She smiled, and climbed into his lap. Even though she was 14, she still couldn't resist climbing in her big brother's lap, and right now it looked like he could use some cuddling.

She wrapped her arms around his middle, and rested his her head on his chest. She grinned as she felt Peter's head drop onto her shoulders.

"Lucy, I can't do this," he murmured into her shoulder.

"Can't do what?" She said comfortingly, even though she knew bloody well what.

"Can't just sit here, and watch him waste away. That's what is going to happen. I can't. I just can't. And he's just given up, and is acting like it's no big deal."

"I don't think he's given up. I think he's more resigned himself to the fact, and accepted it. While this is disturbing, I suppose it's better than him going suicidal or bitter."

She felt Peter stiffen when she said the word "suicidal". She gasped when she realized her mistake. "Peter, I'm sorry…I didn't mean…it was an accident…"

But he had reached his breaking point. He untangled himself from Lucy, and ran out of the room, into the cold, night air. Leaving Lucy with tears streaming down her face, muttering about how the whole world had turned upside down in one day.

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Peter burst into the cold night air, a scream threatening to rip from his throat. He fell to his knees in the snow, and pounded his fist into it instead of screaming. A memory threatened to over take him, and he resigned himself to it, falling onto his side. The snow seeped into his tunic as the memory took shape in front of his eyes.

He'd heard a tinkling of glass coming from Edmund's quarters, and a loud thud. He ran into the room, to find Edmund wrists slashed, blood pooling around his 11 year old baby brother. His dark eyes were open, but clouded, waiting for death to take him.

"EDMUND!" He screamed, but his voice felt disjointed, like it was coming from a loud speaker somewhere else.

He hears Susan and Lucy running. Susan reaches the doorway first. She gasps, and pushes Lucy away, telling her not to leave her room until she is told to do so. Susan then rushes in, and drops next to Peter.

"I can't believe…" She says in a strangled voice.

"Go get a healer. Wake up the whole damned castle if you have to," Peter finds himself saying.

He looks back down at Edmund. His eyes are closing now, slipping out of consciousness. "No, stay with me," he whispers, tears streaming down his face.

Three healers rush into the room, and Susan pulls Peter away from Edmund. They quickly work around Ed, staunching the bleeding, and force potion, after potion down his throat.

They put him in his bed. Peter waits anxiously for him to wake up. Hours later, Edmund's eyes flutter open. "Ed…" Peter cries.

"I'm sorry, Peter," Edmund whispers.

"Don't be." He strokes Edmund hair, happy to see his little brother breathing.

The memory ended, leaving Peter staring, sideways, at a tree in front of him. He'd almost lost his baby brother that day. When he'd asked Edmund why he did what he did, his heart broke into a million pieces. Edmund recounted feelings of guilt from betraying them, nightmares, worthlessness, hurt, feeling like he didn't deserve to be loved. Peter had made him talk to him every day for the next year, and slowly Peter had helped him cope. Looking back, the curse may have been another reason for doing what he'd had done. Peter nearly screamed again, how had Edmund managed to carry that with him for the last five years, and arrive at a state of acceptance all on his own? It must have been pure agony.

The curse. Peter began to hyperventilate, he was losing his brother again. He wasn't sure if he could stop it. There was scarcely any hope, and Edmund had resigned himself to it. There was very little chance he could be saved. He'd never see his brother again by the time the last snow melted. He'd die a slow, horrible death. He'd never give Peter a sarcastic smirk again. He'd never give Peter a death glare. He'd never tell Peter he was being a mother hen. He'd never watch Edmund swiftly resolve an issue. Never eloquently formulate a treaty with another land. He was just sixteen, barely enough time to live.

Peter's panic attack was in full swing now. His lungs were closing up, he couldn't breathe. The world was slipping in, and out of focus.

He felt arms pulling him up into a sitting position. He leaned back onto the person, wincing as his head knocked onto sharp ribs.

"Breathe in and out, Pete," Edmund's voice came from behind him. "Come on now, you can do it. In and out. In and out."

Peter's breathing slowed, and the world stopped going topsy turvy. Edmund's bony, but surprisingly strong arms, pulled Peter up, and turned him around to face him. "Are you okay now?"

Peter nodded, dazed. He was shivering, and he let out a cough. "Come on, let's get you back inside."

Edmund kept one hand on Peter's back, and the other on his shoulder, and pushed him into the warm light of the castle.

When they reached Peter's quarters, Edmund pushed him down in an arm chair. He went to Peter's wardrobe, and pulled out a nightshirt, in the same manner Lucy had done the night before for him. "Go take a warm bath, and change into this. When you're done I want you to get into that bed, and don't move until I come back."

Peter nodded again, and opened his mouth to say something but Edmund cut him off forcefully. "Don't argue with me. I'm not in the mood."

Peter snapped his mouth shut, and drew the curtains around his bathing area. Edmund sighed, and walked out into the hallway to find Lucy watching from down the hall. Her eyes were puffy. It didn't take Edmund long to put two, and two together.

He marched up to Lucy. "What happened?"

She looked down, ashamed. "I said the s word by mistake, Ed. I'm sorry, it was an accident. I didn't mean to."

She started to cry again. Edmund paled a shade, if that was even possible at this rate. "It's okay, I know you didn't mean it," he told her disjointedly.

Before she could say anything, he was rushing towards the kitchens. Peter was surely going to get a cold now, he was always prone to things like that. That cough Peter had made on his way back inside, hadn't escaped Edmund's notice.

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A half an hour later Edmund walked into Peter's room with a steaming mug of hot chocolate in his hands. Peter was sitting in bed with all the blankets on top of him. His eyes were broken, staring at the patterns on his comforter.

"Drink it," Edmund commanded. Peter took the mug into his hands.

"I'll be back in a minute. Drink all of it." He walked away hearing Peter sneeze.

A few minutes later Edmund came back in his night shirt, and climbed into bed with Peter.

"What are you doing?" Peter asked thickly.

"Reversing the roles," Edmund replied simply.

Peter finished his hot chocolate, and silently handed Edmund the empty mug to put on the bed side table.

The silence was interrupted by a coughing fit. Edmund patted him on the back. "Of all the places to go, you had to go straight into the snow."

Peter's shoulders began to shake, collapsed forward, and buried his face into Edmund's lap. "She, she..said…"

"I know, I know. I'm sorry you had to relive that…I'm sorry I put you through that…" Edmund said softly, rubbing circles into Peter's back.

"I swore to protect you, and I had failed in that moment. And I'm failing again…" Peter moaned.

"You've never failed me…not now, and not then. You helped me Peter, you helped me out of that dark corner. I am eternally grateful for that. And now, it is not your fault."

"I feel so helpless…"

"I know you do, and that's the worst feeling in the world for you. But it's going to be okay, it's going to be okay." Edmund knew full well it was going to be okay, at least for a very long time, a time he'd never live to see. But he didn't know what else to say.

Peter cried himself dry for over an hour. When he was finished his eyes were sore, and his head was pounding. He was drained. Pulling himself out of Edmund's arms, he slumped onto his pillows.

"Thanks, Ed."

Edmund gave him a weak smile. "Get some sleep Peter, you're going to need it to get rid of this cold."

He gave Peter a small pat on the shoulders, and began to untangle himself from the blankets. "No…can…can you stay?" Peter's voice was small.

"Sure." Edmund allowed himself to get tangled into the blankets again. Peter fell asleep almost instantly, exhausted from his emotional breakdown. However, Edmund stared at the ceiling for hours, before getting pulled away into a fitful sleep.