Edmund stared his brother in the eye, letting the words sink in.

"'So little fidelity?' Edmund…" Peter's voice trailed off, plain confusion on his face. "I'm afraid I don't understand."

"Of course not." You never will, Edmund thought, shaking his head. Thank Aslan you'll never know what it means to be so… unconscionable.

Peter was clearly beginning to get exasperated. He grabbed his brother by the shoulders and made him sit on the bed. "Ed, as simply and clearly as you can, explain to me just what you mean."

"Two words, Peter: Turkish Delight."

"Oh, rot!" Peter exclaimed. "Edmund, anyone would have-"

"No! Not anyone Pete, just me!" Edmund felt his face drain, a sick sensation in his stomach. "You don't understand. You never can, because it didn't happen to you. You'll never know how I feel day after day… knowing that I betrayed my own brother and sisters."

"Edmund!" Peter gasped. "Ed you kept her from us! Tumnus told me what you said, and the Fox Swiftail, how you tried-"

"Not hard enough!" Edmund snapped. "And it was too late any way, for me to try to act like some reformed character, because she knew I'd betray you! She knew-"

Peter's face had gone white. "Edmund, you protected us!"

The word split his heart like a stone knife. He yelled over the pain.

"I couldn't even protect Aslan!"

Peter stared at him. "Whatever are you talking about?"

The words spilled out. "That day. In the encampments. When the Witch came to claim my blood. Mine!" Edmund's eyes lit with fury. "The traitor's, the one who deserved to die! I stood back like a coward, Pete, and I let him go instead! The only one I protected was myself!"

"Ed!" Peter gasped.

"I could have spared Aslan! I could have gone to the stone table instead, and done as the ancient law demanded! Aslan would have been alive for the start of the battle and maybe fewer Narnians would have died and then it all would have been bet-"

"Don't you dare!" Peter roared.

Up and down the hall, there was a sound of doors suddenly opening.

Edmund stared at his brother from his seat on the bed, white faced. Peter never screamed like that.

Peter sank trembling to his knees in front of Edmund, catching the younger boy's chin in his hand, locking blue eyes with brown. "Don't – you – ever say that again, do you understand me, Edmund? Not ever."

Edmund swallowed and nodded.

"Swear it," Peter insisted. "Swear to me Ed, that you'll never say that, never think that, never even feel that again. By Aslan," the High King commanded.

Edmund stared into Peter's eyes, and nodded. "I swear," he whispered. "By Aslan. And I'm… sorry, Peter."

His brother stared at him for a long moment. Then he grabbed him in a crushing hug that made Edmund gasp. The older boy was quivering.

"No world," Peter murmured into his hair, "Could be better without you, Ed. Not England, not Narnia, not anywhere."

Edmund felt tears begin to sting his eyes. He clutched at the warmth of his brother's arms. "Doesn't always feel like it, Pete."

"Ed," Peter's voice was gentle. "Ed, you must let go. I thought you had accepted this a long time ago, that it was the way things were meant to happen. Don't you see? It was all part of the plan." He turned his face to his brother, and Edmund saw that Peter's eyes were also bright with tears. "If you had… died," he quavered. "The Witch would still have won. Two of the four thrones at Cair Paravel would have been empty."

"One," Edmund mumbled.

Peter shook his head. "Two, Edmund. I'd never have let you die alone."

Edmund gave one sharp cry and then buried himself against his brother.

His rock.

***

The dormitories had long since gone silent as one student after another went to sleep. But Edmund and Peter had been talking for hours.

It had felt more like Narnia, Edmund mused, sitting at Peter's right hand as he always had on the throne. It was a funny thing that no matter where the Pevensie children went, they invariably lined up in order. Susan and Peter in the middle. Lu to Su's left, Ed to Pete's right. The four thrones of Cair Paravel seemed to be forever present, ready for the sovereigns to assume their places.

The comfort of Peter's shoulder against his had been indescribable as Edmund explained how he felt that the title of "Protector" belonged to just about anyone but himself. "We can't deny what I did, Pete," he said simply.

Peter frowned at him. "But I don't understand. You never had a problem with the title Aslan gave you. King Edmund, the Just."

Edmund nodded. "Ah, but that was King Edmund, not just plain Edmund. Don't you see, Peter? When Aslan named me, I was a king. How could anyone expect that I would not be just, after what he did for me? When Mum and Dad named me, I was a brother. To you and Susan, and then later to Lucy.

"The Just referred to all Narnians, whom I love with all my heart. Protector refers to you, and Susan, and Lucy, whom I love far more." His face was very red, but he made himself look Peter in the eye when he said it.

"Oh, Edmund." Peter grabbed him in what was probably the tenth hug of the night. Edmund's neck was starting to hurt from all this yanking around. "Brother. We love you, too. With everything in us. I am sure the girls would say the same."

"I wish they were here," Edmund murmured.

"Me too. I think Lu would be able to convince you a little easier than I."

Edmund laughed. "That's not quite what I meant."

The room was quiet for a moment.

"I just shan't turn in the part about me," Edmund decided. "The papers about you and the girls I shall be glad to share, but-"

"No you won't," Peter interrupted, his face going red again. "I refuse to let you praise me to the high heavens when I know quite well how noble you are. You need to write your part. In fact," he said in a slow, deliberate voice, "I think it will help you to realize just how much of a protector you have been to me and the girls.

"Peter, it still doesn't feel as if that's my definition!"

"It is." Peter grabbed Edmund's arms and pulled him to his feet, then steered him toward the desk. "I know it's late, and you're tired, and this is a class you didn't mean to do well in any way. But hang it all, Edmund!" He pushed his brother down in the chair. "It's time you saw yourself as Lucy, and Susan, and I do." He stared down at Edmund. "As Aslan does."

Edmund stared back up at him. The he turned to face the empty page.

It wasn't easy. For the first fifteen minutes nothing came to mind except all the ways he hadn't protected Peter and the girls. The old memories came to the fore… taunting Lucy for her little "imaginary" country, telling the White Witch about Tumnus, tramping through the snow to her house to betray his brother and sisters…

"Do you think Aslan would want you to be brooding over this?" Peter asked suddenly, looking up from his book. "Because I don't. He told the girls and me that there was no need to speak to you on the subject ever again. Don't you think perhaps he meant for you to not worry over it any more either?"

Edmund stared at him.

"Start with the sword in the ice," Peter said calmly.

Oh.

The sword. Edmund's sword, driving straight through a wall of frozen nightmares. He had run into the How and slain a Werewolf, only to find his brother being… taunted. Told that he, the High King, couldn't defeat Miras. Tempted by a face and voice so deceptively beautiful that it made Edmund sick to see it again, when he had thought it gone forever. And Peter was giving in.

No! Not my brother! Not this time, not ever again!

He plunged his sword into the ice. Edmund's battle cry as she fell rang through the How. It had been such fierce satisfaction to shatter the White Witch this time, not just her wand… Her wand. Edmund smiled a burning smile. That time too, he had been full of just anger as he leapt from a rock to crush the Witch's wand, to stop the horrible wave of stone deaths rolling across the mountain. The relief in his heart had been uncontrollable, knowing that the terror of being made a statue was no longer a threat to his people…

Edmund gave a start as he realized that he had just recalled two instances in which he had, indeed, been a protector. And against the White Witch, of all things.

Peter gave him a knowing smile as he picked up his place in the book. "Don't forget to tell what a blockhead I was, Ed."

Edmund shook his head. Don't think about it being a school assignment, he told himself as his pen scratched across the page tentatively. Don't worry about keeping it all in England. Don't worry about changing names and dates. He wrote faster. Write what really happened…

His pen scattered ink. His hand began to cramp.

Don't worry about it making sense. Don't worry about an audience. Tell about the Witch. Tell about the battles. Write about the duels and the voyages and the diplomatic missions...

Peter fell asleep, his soft steady breathing the only other sound.

Write about the fierce bear charging Lucy on the beach. Write about facing Eustace when he was a dragon. Write about sailing to the World's End…

His eyes began to water and sting.

Tell about Lucy's fear of fire and how you taught her to be safe. Tell about scaring that stray dog away from Mum. Tell about holding Susan's hand when she broke her ankle. Tell about holding Peter's hand when Susan broke her ankle…

Get it out. Write it all. Say it before it slips away. Aslan help me… his pen came to a stop.

Edmund sat back and read his paper. Every memory he could recall of protecting anyone, anything, any hope or ideal. Things he had forgotten. Things that had been frozen over by the guilt were now as fresh on the page as Narnian spring. It read beautifully. Like a folk tale that Tumnus would have delighted in reciting. Like the poetry of The Thousand Dryads. Like the musings of a Narnian King.

Not those of a fifteen-year-old English school boy.

"Rot," he muttered. "I shall have to write it all over again."

***

The first thing Peter saw when he woke was that his brother had fallen asleep with his head on the desk. The next thing he saw was that there was a fresh sheaf of papers under Edmund's hand.

The High King rose from his bed and stepped softly across the room. With fingers accustomed to stealth, he slipped the pages away from Edmund. It was then he knew Ed was really exhausted, when the younger boy didn't react. Any other day he'd have jumped awake and tried to draw the sword that wasn't there any more.

Peter began reading. They were two different papers, he realized. One obviously written with nothing held back, an account of King Edmund the Just in Narnia, his protection flung over the country like a cloak. Things Peter recalled from long marches to war, disputes between territories, small disasters of diplomacy. The other was shorter, a tight little narrative about events that had occurred in England. Peter's lips quirked up in amusement. They were both Edmund the Protector to the core. He slipped the pages back under Edmund's arm, then draped his blanket over the sleeping young king.

"Well Ed," Peter murmured, laying a warm hand on the back of Edmund's neck. "I think you shall have to find a different class to throw."

My first completed FanFic, Yay!!!

Hope you all enjoyed it. It was a blast to write! I never intended for it to get quite so heavy... sorry to those of you who didn't get a hankie warning!

Thanks again ever so much to those of you who have read and reviewed. I can't wait to hear what you think of this final chapter! Double thanks to Sentimental Star and Lirenel (I don't know what time zone you're in Lirenel, but I hope you get this before midnight! God bless you during this season).

Well *deep breath* I guess that's it, except for one last thing. Say it with me now:

Disclaimer: C.S. Lewis owns the Chronicles of Narnia, not I!

Ciao!