Narnian Tales

IMO there's not nearly enough Lucy-centered fics out there, so I'm filling some of the gaps. This will all be as in line with canon as I can do (tho if I hit on VODT I don't promise I won't go into Lucian territory ). However I think most of this will be on the Golden Age as well as the post-LWW, pre-PC England years. Probably also England years between PC and VODT, and possibly between VODT and SC.

Some notes/thoughts: According to canon, Lucy is 8-23 during LWW (1940); 9 during PC ('41); 10 during VODT ('42); 17 during LB ('49). However, there are a few issues with this timeline. First, evacuation didn't end until 1944 most places, so how were the Pevensie kids back home in the beginning of PC if PC took place in '41? Then in VODT it is mentioned Father is back from the War and he and Mother and Susan are going to America over the summer (so Father can lecture), it seems far more likely to me that there is, or was supposed to be, a larger gap between either LWW and PC or PC and VODT, and the summer of VODT is the first post-War summer, so takes place in 1946 at earliest. (It couldn't be 1945 because the war didn't end until September, and VODT specifically mentions it is August in Cambridge. And I think if the war were ongoing, the Pevensie parents wouldn't risk both of themselves and Susan on a transatlantic voyage when there was still significant risk to crossing the Atlantic.)

Therefore if I touch on VODT, Lucy will be 14 going on 15, and Edmund would be 15-16. I think Eustace is supposed to be 9 or 10 in VODT, but I might age him up to 12 or so.

I like the looks of the kids in the movies made in the 2000s, so generally will go with those. I don't think they're far off of the books, really, as far as I can tell (except Caspian), as the boy who played Peter had reasonably goldish hair, Susan had long darker hair, Edmund's straight black hair just SUITS the character (I can't remember specifics about his looks), and Lucy's medium auburnish hair could, I think, be considered as on the darker end of "fair" hair, which is the only description of her hair I can remember offhand.

Also, I like General Orieus the Centaur that they made up for the first movie, so he's going to exist too.

I've never particularly liked "Helen" and "Frank" for the Pevensie parents' names (seems too on the nose to me, despite the movie setting the name as Helen). Going on the basis of Mr/Mrs Pevensie's sister's given name being "Alberta," I'd say that "Margaret" is a bit more likely… or possibly Georgiana, but I'm going with Margaret. And I like Joseph to go with Margaret, so Mr Pevensie's name will be Joseph.

Now all that said about how I'm missing some Lucy in the Narnia fiction section… the first chunk is a High King in England bit. And his mother. Lucy's coming soon, though! And the rest.

This is about a week or so after they've arrived back home from the evacuation.

Margaret Pevensie watched her four children sitting at the breakfast table out of the corner of her eye. They'd been brought back from the country about a week ago, and she still wasn't quite certain how to accept the changes she saw in them.

The changes were nothing like what she'd been led to expect.

They'd been warned when evacuation was supposed to come to an end. Their wartime experiences might change your children, they'd been told. Young children might have forgot their toilet training, or sleepwalk. Older children might have a stronger tendency to hang about or cling to their parents—or on the other hand, might not speak to anyone at all. They might have picked up unsavory language or habits like smoking. They might have found boy or girl friends in the country, and not want to come home at all.

No one said anything about the kinds of changes she was seeing in her four, and she was afraid to speak up in the Ladies' Aid Society meetings, in case she was overreacting.

And what would she say? Her children had been changed by the War, but it was all to the better?

Peter, her golden-haired son, had left for the country strained under his promise to his father to look after his mother and sisters and brother, stressed under the burden of trying to be the man of the house when he was barely beginning to step into manhood himself. But over his time away, he'd reined in his sometimes explosive anger, had become someone to whom his younger siblings literally looked to for guidance, and had achieved a sort of mid point between caring for their family, and keeping himself in balance.

Susan, her lovely daughter, had left off the bossiness that had started to become her hallmark, and instead had acquired a deep well of kindness and patience that left her mother mentally gaping. Was the girl in fact only thirteen? She seemed so steady and mature to be that young, but there it was.

Edmund's changes were most obvious. He'd dropped the sullen rage that had informed every movement, abandoned the mean spiritedness of his interactions with his siblings, and seemed to have grown to accept and love his brother as his leader. He was kind to his sisters, and only teased in a happy manner, in a way that would really not hurt. It was heartening to see.

And little Lucy… it was difficult to say what had changed with her, since she'd always been bubbly and bright and optimistic and excitable, and she still was all of these things. But now there was a strange sort of purpose to her movements, a light to her eyes, that utterly, utterly belied her young age, as though the child had seen such things as made her very soul grow and blossom.

It all confused Margaret, and frightened her a little. It seemed sometimes that her children utterly forgot her presence, forgot they even had a Mother. But then one or another of them would look at her, with just a hint of surprise, but the surprise was always mixed with gratefulness, so she couldn't really mind all that much.

She had noticed straight off that things were different with them, of course, but then she hadn't seen her children in so long, she was expecting differences. She rather overlooked most of them—except Edmund's improved temperament; no one could have missed that. And certainly there were physical changes, height and weight and so forth, but the personality changes, she'd overlooked—until four days ago.

She was still working in the factory while Joseph was still away, and Peter had offered to come walk her home. She reluctantly agreed, grateful for the opportunity to spend some time with her eldest (even if it was only a two mile-long walk) but wishing he wouldn't be exposed to some of the…less than salutary people who hung about the factories and docks.

On the other hand, she considered that her son had added at least five inches of height, she was sure, and a stone's worth of muscle to go with it. What had they been feeding him in the country? And when she expressed concern at the distance, he'd only grinned. "You're walking it, aren't you, Mother? And anyway I'm used to long mar—er, runs. Lots of room to run in the country. It'll be good to stretch my legs."

So here she was, having just punched out of the factory, peering through the sunset light to find her boy. She quite missed him at first, standing so tall and strong on the sidewalk, this couldn't possibly be her son, but then he smiled at her, came up and took her lunch pail from her in one hand and tucked her arm through his with a curiously practiced movement, and started to lead her back toward home, asking her about her day.

They'd made it a block and the usual interference hadn't come, and she released the breath she hadn't realized she was holding. Peter gave her a sidelong glance, and she opened her mouth to answer his unspoken question, when she heard him, and bit back a groan.

"Eyyy, Maggie luv, 'oos yer new boyfriend? 'Arvent you bin tellin' me for yonks yer married? An' 'ere you is, swannin' about with some young feller instead of yer ole pal Danny."

Margaret's back stiffened and she lifted her chin, looking straight ahead, same as all the other days. She felt Peter's arm tense where it held her hand tucked through his.

"Ignore him, Peter," she cautioned out of the side of her mouth. But Danny made it impossible to ignore him, as he stepped out of the alley where he'd been lounging, and stopped squarely in their path.

"Wot!" he peered at Peter's young face and laughed. "Been robbin' some cradles, 'ave you, Maggie?"

"Peter, this is Danny Mills." Margaret said evenly. "He works at the factory with me. Danny, this is my son, Peter."

Peter coldly tipped his head slightly in greeting, never taking his eyes off the fellow.

Nervously, Margaret started to step around Danny, even though it meant stepping down into the muck in the street, but she was surprised when Peter held fast to her arm and stood firm, preventing her from moving.

"Mr Mills," he said pleasantly but with a stern coolness Margaret had never heard from… well, from anyone before. "You appear to be in my mother's and my path. Would you mind stepping aside so we may pass?"

" 's'matter of fact, I would mind," Danny said, delight at a potential fight creeping into his eyes. "Wot yer gonna do 'bout it?"

Margaret felt cold steal over her. No, don't let his brute of a man try to fight her boy. Don't, for that matter, let her boy try to fight this brute of a man. "Peter," she said. "We can go around him."

"No, Mother, we can't," Peter almost sighed. "He needs to understand some basic manners, which include not accosting women in the street, nor preventing their safe passage home."

"Oho, I need manners, do I? An' who're you to say so, you pup?" Danny snarled as he caught the insult.

Peter, to her amazement, was unfazed. "Clearly you do. Or you would not presently be standing in Our path."

"Oh, this is ri—" Danny began, reaching out toward them, but before he could touch either of them, Peter's hand flashed out, faster than a snake striking, and caught him by the wrist. The empty lunch pail hit the ground with a clatter… a second after his fingers were wrapped around Danny's thick wrist.

"Do not," he said, in a suddenly dangerous tone, "think to harm my mother or me." And the grip he had on Danny's wrist, for all that it appeared so gentle, was apparently immovable, as Danny immediately went to jerk his hand out of Peter's grasp, only to gasp in pain, and give Peter a wild-eyed, suddenly more respectful look. Peter's fingers tightened slightly, and Danny's eyes bulged.

With very little fanfare, Peter used the grip on this wrist to steer the older man out of the way, and he smiled coldly into Danny's face. "My thanks for clearing our path. I do not wish to hear any reports of my mother being molested in any fashion. By anyone here. Is. This. Clear." His speech was ringing with a clarion tone that almost had Margaret telling him it was quite, quite clear. And she didn't want to know what would happen if Peter did hear otherwise.

Peter's whole focus was on Danny, though, and he held on to his wrist until he got a shaky nod. Peter leaned closer to him, and Danny blanched at what he saw in the young man's face.

"It is well. Good day to you."

Without so much as a backward glance, Peter scooped up the fallen pail, and led his mother past Danny and toward home.

They walked in silence for a couple of blocks.

"How long has that been going on?" He sounded an odd mixture of grim and tired.

Somehow she didn't dare prevaricate with that tone in his voice. "A couple of months."

"If he bothers you again, let me know immediately." His words were crisp.

She could only nod.

A short while later they swung in at the front door, Peter whistling an unfamiliar, jaunty tune. "Peter!" a cry came from upstairs, and small light feet pattered down the stairs. "Hello, Mother," Lucy greeted Margaret. "Susan has tea set out for you in the kitchen. I'll take and wash your pail."

"Oh, darling, you don't need to—" but she stopped at a gentle nudge from Peter as he took her coat for her.

"Mother, you've been working all day, and had a tiresome discussion at the end of it. Go and sit down. The girls have everything in control here."

"Susan even has supper started," piped up Lucy.

That brought a weak smile to Margaret's face as she headed, slightly bewildered, toward the kitchen. Before she turned the corner, she heard a snippet of another odd conversation between Lucy and Peter.

"Brother," and her little girl sounded quite stern. "You're looking particularly Magnificent. Did something happen?"

"No, sister-mine, nothing happened."

"But something almost did," she pressed. "You have that look again."

"I just helped our lady mother to avoid an insult," Peter replied lightly, straightening the hang of a picture on the wall. "Nothing a gentleman oughtn't do, if he can. But I think I shall walk Mother to and from the factory for a while. Peace," he said, apparently at Lucy's expression. "Peace, Valiant Lioness. It will only worry Mother if you go into battle, even on her behalf."

There was a gusty sigh. "I can't do anything here."

"You will," Peter said. "You will. Remember…" and here his voice dropped lower, and Margaret could no longer hear what he was saying.

"Fine," Lucy replied aloud. "I'll remember. Come, let's go help finish getting supper ready."

Quickly Margaret ducked down the hall ahead of them, pondering the strange half-heard conversation.

Her other two children were in the kitchen, having a conversation of their own, which abruptly cut off as she entered. More secrets.

What exactly had gone on in the country during the evacuation? The Professor hadn't indicated anything significant in his letters. Now she was wondering if he'd left things out. She wished Joseph were back, and he could offer his views on their somewhat strange children.

Then she saw the meal the children had lovingly prepared for her—when had they learnt to cook beyond the little she'd taught the girls?—and set aside her worries to ooh and ahh and thank them for their thoughtfulness.

Susan had managed to make the ration-stretched pantry stretch even further than Margaret herself did, and she decided to give them all a treat in return. She'd been saving it for when Joseph came home, whenever that would be, but decided now was as good a time as any. For the moment, though, she'd enjoy a meal she hadn't had to cook.

They sat down to the table, and Peter immediately offered thanks for the food, quite as though this were an essential part of the meal. Before they'd gone away, the children usually forgot grace, or only remembered it on special occasions, or birthdays. Now, they were saying a blessing over even breakfast, for heaven's sake. It was another of those peculiar changes they'd come back with. Not a bad change at all, just… out of the ordinary.

"Oi, Ed, leave the rest of us some bread, will you?" Susan reproved her brother, as he reached for a third slice.

"Not my fault you're a slow eater," Edmund teased, and Margaret relaxed as they acted quite normally for once.

"I," replied Susan with immense dignity, "choose to chew my food, not inhale it, Edmund."

"You are eating with the appetite of a centa—a centurion," Lucy said, uncharacteristically stumbling over her words. "What've you been up to, Ed?"

"Oh," Edmund waved his bread airily. "I went out and fought back the encroaching Giants on the northern border today." He smiled mischieviously. "Gives one a marvelous appetite, you know."

"Fought Giants?" His mother inquired, and they all jumped as though they'd forgotten she was there. Again. "Whatever do you mean, Eddie?"

"He weeded out the back garden," Susan explained. "There really were some monster weeds. He had to get the spade out to dig some of them up at the root."

"Oh! Just like Lilygloves told—" Lucy started, and bit her lip, as though she'd said something wrong.

"Lily Gloves?" Margaret asked. "Is that someone you met in the country?"

"Why, yes, mother," Edmund replied, looking particularly guileless. "An excellent gardener. You could say she—er—knew plants from the ground up. Taught us quite a lot."

"Indeed." Peter said gravely.

"Especially about apples," Susan added.

Lucy laughed at that. "Ed, I'll help you tomorrow," she offered. "I hadn't realized you were tackling the garden today."

"It's all right, sister fair," Edmund replied easily. "Though I'll take your help tomorrow. The side garden still needs tending too. Not," he added hastily, "that you haven't done as good a job as anyone could, Mother. It's just far too much for one person, working, with no help around the house."

"We're here now," Peter said, in a firm voice, and Margaret wondered when he'd got so much older. "She is not alone any more."

Margaret smiled around the table at them at that. "And I am so very happy to have you all home." She said. "It feels like it's been decades."

A little laugh burst out of Peter at that. "It does, doesn't it, mother?"

The others exchanged an unreadable look.

"Well," Margaret rose from the table. "No, sit down, Susan. I have a little surprise for you all. I was saving it for when your father gets home, but as that date is …not fixed… I see no reason not to celebrate your homecoming."

"What is it, Mother?"

"Let me fetch it for you."

"Yes, sit down, Mother."

"Hush!" she laughed, and waved them all back to their chairs. "It's only a little something. Sit."

A moment later, she set the tin she'd hidden in the back of the pantry in the center of the table, and pulled the top off with a little flourish. "There!" she said. "Even in the country, I suppose you haven't seen that," and she beamed at them.

They all looked in the tin, which was nearly full of Turkish Delight.

"Go on, have a piece," Margaret encouraged them, when they sat looking dumbly at it. "It's quite all right."

"A-all right, Mother," Lucy said, a trifle shakily, and with an odd look at Edmund, reached out and plucked a piece, and nibbled on it. "Oh, rosewater," she said, and smiled. "I haven't had this for—for ages."

"Go on, the rest of you," Margaret said, a trifle anxiously. She had rather expected more excitement or eagerness or… something. Susan and Peter took pieces next, but Edmund looked rather green.

"I apologise, Mother, I think I'm quite full," he said. "And I've rather lost my taste for sweets. But I do sincerely appreciate the thought, and—"

"Won't you even have a little piece?" She asked, unable to keep the hurt entirely from her voice. "You used to love Turkish Delight."

"Oh." He looked a bit blank. "We-e-ell, I suppose a little piece." And he picked up the tiniest piece he could find, and took the most minuscule nibble he could. Peter gave him an approving nod, and Susan an encouraging one, and Lucy leaned her shoulder against his for a second. He took a slightly larger bite, and smiled more naturally at Margaret. "Thank you, Mother. This was very thoughtful, and how long did you have to save your sugar coupons to get it for us? You really didn't need to."

"Oh, Eddie, it was nothing. It's worth it to see you children enjoying a sweet." She said, and kissed the top of his head, which seemed to enable him to relax his shoulders. His siblings gave him all particular looks, too.

"You're a brick, Ed," he heard Lucy whisper, when she turned back to the pantry, echoed by Peter's quiet "Well done."

"Mother, let us get the dishes, you go sit down with the paper." Peter said.

Margaret started to protest, only to be stilled by Lucy's bright eyed plead, "Please, Mummy, we'd like to. You've been… alone for so long."

"Well, all right, but this is only for tonight, you hear?" Somehow she couldn't quite muster enough sternness in her voice.

"We'll negotiate that tomorrow," Susan said with a smile, filling the sink with water. "You go sit down."

It occurred to Margaret then that her children were trying to push her out of the room. So they could have more of those peculiar conversations?

She crossed the living room and sat, reaching for a magazine a friend had loaned her to while away the lonely evenings, and heard the low murmur of conversation over the splash of water and the rattle of crockery.

Could she listen in?

Should she listen in?

If it had been one of her children eavesdropping—and no mistake, that is what it was—he'd be scolded. But… She had to know what strange thing had befallen all of her children. No matter that they seemed fine, in fact, un child-like; what if one of them had nearly died while they were away? That would explain the closeness. But if something like that had happened, the Professor would have wired her.

Anyway, that didn't explain the maturity they all bore. The almost fey expressions that crossed each of their faces at times made her shiver, knowing to her bones that something had happened to alter her children, alter them deeply. But they weren't talking to her about it. Though at least they were talking to one another.

Perhaps, when Joseph came home, he could find out… She nodded off mid-thought, before she could creep up to the doorframe and listen in.

The children in the kitchen heard their mother's soft breath slow and deepen into the rhythms of sleep, and they all relaxed.

"You nearly slipped up, there, Lu," said Peter, gently pushing Susan aside so he could scrub the biggest pot. "At least Lilygloves' name can sound like an English name, I guess. Lily Gloves, who we met in the country. Ha!"

"Oh, I am sorry," Lucy said, drying the flatware. "I just miss them so much already."

"Well, at least you didn't say anything too outrageous," Edmund said thoughtfully. "I mean, it would be pretty difficult to explain mentioning someone called General Orieus."

"Almost as difficult as explaining why you no longer care for sweets," Susan said sympathetically, handing Edmund some of the dried plates to put away. "Tough luck, Ed."

"Oh, I don't mind," he ducked his dark head. "But why of all the sweets did it have to be Turkish Delight?" He chuckled and shook his head. "I think it was the shock of seeing it after so long, more than anything else."

"Mm." There was a little silence.

Then Lucy burst out: "Are any of the rest of you afraid?"

"Afraid of what, Lu?"

"Of forgetting. I remember how quickly This Place—England, I mean—faded out of my mind when we hadn't been in Narnia all that long. I pretty nearly forgot—oh, everyone here, even Father and Mother. And I couldn't bear forgetting Aslan, and all our wonderful years at Cair Paravel, and all the rest."

"No fear, Lucy!" Edmund exclaimed. "We'll talk it over often. Keep our memories fresh."

Peter nodded agreement. "And don't forget: Once a King or Queen of Narnia, always a King or Queen of Narnia. And remember He didn't say that applied only in Narnia."

"Is that why you came in with such a kingly look on your face?" Lucy asked him, and his face darkened.

"After a fashion. Though I wish I'd had Rhindon with me today. I'd have beat that man black and blue, and taught him respect for a woman and a mother and a wife."

Lucy hugged him. "It sounds like you handled him, whoever he is, just fine."

He smiled and kissed the side of her head. "Valiant Queen. Next time I shall just send for you."

They sat and talked over Narnian things some more, and discussed ways to get back into the English way of doing things, until Margaret woke, scolded them for letting her fall asleep, and shooed them off to bed.