Disclaimer: I do not own the characters or anything else that's recognizable. It belongs to C.S. Lewis.
Note About the Story: I got this idea from reading 'The Things They Carried' by Tim O'Brien, particularly the story entitled, 'How to Tell a True War Story'
Author's Note: I'm sorry I haven't been able to update anything recently, but I've been away to London and Paris. Hopefully there will be more time to update now that the summer's really begun. Thanks for being patient, and I hope you enjoy this!
They were in a war with the fell beasts.
Edmund did not like war. He kept on thinking this as he lay on the cold, damp ground. The first snows of winter were going to fall soon. There was a cold in the air that penetrated to the very bone and did not go away, and he knew it wouldn't go away until he was either back at Cair Paravel or dead.
He did not like not knowing where he would end up, but he had no choice and he just had to deal with it and pretend that the not knowing didn't bother him.
Really, if he took the time to think about it, it would drive him mad.
Which is why he and Peter did not spend much time to themselves, barring when they were sleeping. They distracted each other, they made attack plans, they attended to those in the Narnian army who needed them. They found every possible way to keep busy so that they would not have time to sit and actually think about what was happening to them.
That sort of thinking was left for when the war was won and they were back in the comfort of Cair Paravel, and by the time they got to thinking of everything the war seemed so far away that it didn't drive them mad with fear or grief. Rather, it simply left them uneasy, and eventually this was pushed to the back of their minds, although it never completely left, and it always resurfaced and grew when the next battle came along.
Peter was right next to him now, and Edmund could barely look at him. There were times when it was hard to look at those around, because they could be dead soon. Edmund hated losing anyone. He felt guilty about it, never mind whether it was his fault or not. They all felt like that.
But Peter was breathing steadily, and this did much to ease Edmund's mind, although he still did not look at his brother. It was hard, sometimes, but he knew Peter understood. Peter was the worst person to be with during war, because Edmund knew that Peter would do anything for his country and family, even die, and he had come close many times and would continue to until one day it all stopped.
But, then again, Peter could say the same about Edmund.
Edmund finally put some of his less pleasant thoughts to rest and turned to Peter, who was staring up at the black sky. "Peter, why do we have to have war?" he asked.
Peter turned to look at him and frowned. It was almost a disturbed frown, the frown of an older brother who did not like to think that the younger had lost innocence but knew that he had all the same.
"Because," he answered, "there are always those who choose to call us their enemies, who would hurt us and kill us if we never did anything to stop them."
This was not what Edmund had meant. "No; why do we have to have enemies at all?"
Now Peter understood, but he couldn't even begin to fathom it. "I suppose that is one of those great mysteries."
Edmund turned away. "Also one of the worst."
The battlefield was covered in bodies, the grass and snow stained red with blood, and there was a heaviness in the air that one could only associate with death.
The Narnians had won.
Peter was talking to someone, but Edmund wasn't paying much attention. He was exhausted, but his eyes swept across the battlefield and he knew he couldn't rest. If he closed his eyes he would see this field, covered in bodies, only worse because his imagination would take the image and add to it. And Edmund was no fan of what his mind could conjure up.
He had already experienced enough of that, from his time with the Witch. His mind seemed to like conjuring up images and memories, perhaps as they happened, but many times worse. Or, if they weren't worse, than it was that Edmund was forgetting and it was more painful to be reminded again.
He stepped out, into the field.
It was so easy to miss all of this when one was fighting. In the midst of all the chaos Edmund never really looked at his surroundings, aware of them though he might be. But now he saw every detail, every single body. Each body told a story, the story of how it had died. Edmund recognized some of them as ones he had killed, but soon they began to blend into each other and they all seemed the same.
They were all dead.
Edmund knew why Peter worried so much about him, and it wasn't just injury that made Peter so protective. No, it was the war itself and what it could do to someone. The dead, the injured, everything about the war haunted Peter, and it haunted Edmund as well, but Peter didn't want his younger brother to be haunted by such things.
These sort of things, being a soldier, would either make one bloodthirsty or be one's undoing. There was a fine line between being able to handle everything that came with the fighting and stepping over the edge, either way.
Luckily for Edmund, Peter had been strong. He could deal with all of this. As a result, so could Edmund.
It scared him, really, because he knew the moment Peter couldn't deal with any of this would be his undoing as well. Part of him had made a sort of promise that if Peter broke, he would be there for him, and be strong. But such things were not guaranteed, and as with all things in war, he never knew how he would react until confronted with the situation.
Really, he could never prepare for anything. Not even death, no matter how many times he'd killed or how many times he'd seen someone die, or how many times he'd been at death's door himself. Death had a way of taking him by surprise, even at its most unsurprising.
Edmund lifted his eyes from the dead and found himself staring at his brother. Peter stared back, looking incredibly despairing. It was always this way after a battle, and neither felt really like they'd won at all, not faced with a field full of the dead, who wouldn't have needed to be dead if they had been able to prevent the fighting in the first place.
Peter walked over. Edmund sometimes wished that he could die first, even though it would kill Peter. It was selfish, and he would bury the thought, but it still reared its head at times. Really, what he wanted most was for neither of them to die, or for he and his siblings to all die together. Terrible, really, but one thinks those things when death is a possibility.
"Is everything all right?" Edmund asked Peter.
Peter glanced at the bodies, including the ones at his feet. He looked slightly sick. "No. Right now, nothing is really right."
Edmund gave him a grim smile. "When is it ever right?" He did not say what he was thinking, because he knew Peter was thinking the same. They had always known it; neither needed to say it. It was a cold hard fact. It was the truth.
Such are the sacrifices of war.