Seeing as how I joined the site mostly to share my fanfictions with other Narnia people...
This was my first fanfiction for anything. Ever. So It's not stunningly amazing or anything. It's called "Remember".
It had been one of the greatest shocks of my life when I had received the news of the train wreck. I couldn’t believe it. I was the only member of my family left. The only one. Even one of my cousins, who had been there with them, was gone. Of course, it wasn’t like I was completely alone in the world. I was living in America, married, with one daughter. But it still took me a long time to get used to the idea. My parents, my brothers, my sister…all lost in one single train wreck. Unbelievable.
“Mommy?” I felt a tug on my skirt. I looked down to see Rose, my two-year-old, and realized my mind had been wandering. And here I’d thought I was over it. It had been over a year since the wreck. There had been plenty of time for me to get used to it. And yet, strangely, I hadn’t.
“What is it, Rose?” I asked.
“Can we go to the park, Mommy?”
“No, Sweetie, it’s time for your nap.”
After I had tucked Rose in, I went to my room. I figured I’d read a book or something else that would occupy my mind. A picture on my shelf caught my eye. I took it down and looked at it. It was a picture of my younger sister Lucy, taken a couple of months before the wreck. She had been only 17. As I put the picture back on the shelf, my hand bumped something else up there, and I took it down. It was a notebook: Lucy’s diary. They’d sent it to me afterwards. I’d never read any of it before now. I opened it somewhere in the middle. I would have known the entry I was looking at had been written a number of years ago, even if the date hadn’t been written at the top, because of the round, childish handwriting. It had been written in 1942; Lucy would have been ten. “Dear Diary,” the entry read, “Eustace is really starting to get annoying now. Ed comes up to my room to get away from him, but sometimes Eustace follows him even here. I’m just hoping Ed doesn’t do anything extreme.”
I smiled as I read it. Lucy had always wanted everyone to get along, and sometimes Edmund’s temper wore her down to a frazzle. This entry must have been written when I’d gone to America and the two of them had to stay with our cousin Eustace at his house in Cambridge. I read the next entry.
“Dear Diary, you won’t believe it! I’ve gotten back today! Ed and Eustace came, too. The painting on the wall in my room, the one that looked like it was of a Narnian ship—”
I stopped reading for a minute. Narnia. That was the imaginary world we’d come up with when we were staying at Professor Kirke’s house, when I was twelve. Lucy had stuck true to it to the end. So had Peter and Edmund, in fact. Even Eustace, who had undergone a major character improvement since Lucy had written the diary entry, had started to believe in it. It seemed I was the only person with sense enough to know when to stop pretending. I read on.
“—a Narnian ship, came to life when Eustace was there, and we all got in through it.”
Here I stopped again. Yeah, I’m sure you did, I thought. I put the diary back up on the shelf to read later. Martin would be home in a couple hours. I should probably get supper ready.
I looked in the pantry and realized I needed to go grocery shopping. Once Rose woke up, we walked down the block to the store. Suddenly I heard someone behind me calling my name. I turned around.
One of my friends was walking quickly towards me. I groaned silently. I knew what she would be asking.
“Susan,” she said once she got close enough, “are you coming to church this Sunday?”
I opened my mouth to reply as I had every other time, “No, not this time I guess,” but something in me made me say, “I suppose so.”
You should have seen her face. Her eyes got big and her mouth dropped open. Then she gave a little squeal and hugged me. “Thank you, Susan!” she exclaimed.
As I purchased my groceries, I wondered what I’d gotten myself into. I hadn’t gone to church since I was sixteen. All those Christians had seemed to be a lot of blooming hypocrites, and I had no wish to be a hypocrite. But I had said I’d come! …
Sunday morning I was sitting next to my friend, listening to the preacher talking on and on. I couldn’t believe I was wasting a whole hour and a half, just sitting. Suddenly something the preacher said snapped me to attention. I hadn’t heard all he’d said, but he repeated it.
“He died so we could be kept from the death we’d earned. So we could be saved. He gave Himself, for He was and is the only solution and the only answer to the problem. And then he rose again, having fought the battle we could not win alone—”
I didn’t hear another word for the rest of the service. When I went home Martin noticed something was bothering me.
“What’s wrong, Su? Something the preacher said hit you right between the eyes?” he asked teasingly. I tried to give a little laugh, but everything the preacher had said (or all that I had heard, anyway) had sounded strangely familiar.
The next day a package arrived in the mail. It was addressed to me from somewhere in London. I opened it and on top there lay a little note. I read it.
“Dear Madam,” it said, “we’re sorry it’s taken us so long to get this to you; it was hard to find who it even belonged to, and once we had, the item had been mislaid, but finally we found it again and sent it to you.”
I looked at the shipping date on the package and realized it had been delayed greatly in the mail, too. I lifted the item out of the box.
It was a small sketchbook. I saw at once that it was Peter’s. He’d always loved to draw, and was good at it, although he only did it as a pastime. I opened it to the first page. A winged horse seemed to gallop out of the page at me. I looked closer. The horse had an intelligent look in its eyes and I wondered how Peter had captured the aliveness of it in his drawing. I turned the page. A wolf, with the hair along its back bristling, glared at me from the paper. His teeth were bared in a ferocious snarl. My heart jumped. It had been a bit of a shock, seeing the wolf right after the horse. The next few pages were just small sketches and studies of birds. But after that there was a picture of two beavers. They were standing upright and had such human-like expressions on their faces that at first I laughed. Then I looked again. The picture vaguely reminded me of something, I couldn’t say what.
Most of the rest of the pictures were of animals and mythical creatures: fauns, centaurs, gryphons, and the like. Near the end of the book was a picture of a train station. I guessed that he had drawn it while waiting for the train Eustace and his friend were on. I smiled sadly. This was probably the last picture he had ever drawn. I started to close the book, but then something on the next page caught my notice. It was a picture of a sword. There was a dark, reddish-brown stain near the bottom of the page. I closed my eyes and stroked the book. Then I looked again at the picture. The sword looked very familiar. I tried to remember where I could have seen a sword like that. It could have been at the Professor’s house; he’d had several suits of armor that had fascinated my brothers greatly. That lion’s head on the end of the hilt, though…where had I seen it before?
There were at least a dozen empty pages, all with that same brown stain at the bottom. I closed the book and took it to my room. I put it on the shelf with Lucy’s diary. Then I took the diary down and sat down on the bed. I’d decided to finish reading that one entry, at least.
“It turns out the ship is Narnian. It’s called the Dawn Treader, and it’s Caspian’s.” I choked up. That name…Caspian! I knew it well, but I wasn’t sure why. I read on. “He’s king of Narnia now, of course. It’s only three years later here than it was last time. I’m going to help Eustace fill in the bits of his diary that he missed, because he had it along on the ship. He didn’t want to keep all of it, but I made him. He and Ed and I are going to stay up late tonight writing in everything that happened, so you can read it if you want to have all the details. But one more thing I think I’ll mention here: Aslan says he’s in our world, too.” I looked up from the book and stared absently at the wall. Aslan! He was the lion in Narnia that Lucy had been special friends with. She’d imagined him so vividly that he’d seemed totally real to her. “He says we’ll know him by a different name. I’m guessing it’s Jesus. Lucy Pevensie” I smiled weakly and got up to put the diary back on the shelf, then changed my mind. I opened it to the last page and started flipping backwards until I reached an entry. It was from the night before I’d gotten the news.
“Dear Diary, Peter and Edmund are back. They found the rings, and no one suspected anything. We’re going to meet Eustace and Jill at the train station and give the rings to them. I’m so excited! Not only because Eustace and Jill are going back to Narnia, but for some other reason I couldn’t tell you, and I can’t even tell myself. The Professor and Aunt Polly are coming with us to the train station to give them the rings. I feel so happy! I’m not sure what’s going to happen tomorrow, but whatever it is, I can be sure it’s going to be good! Lucy Pevensie”
I put the diary on top of Peter’s sketchbook. Well, Lucy had been wrong. The thing that had happened the next day had not been in the least bit good. And yet, something about that entry had captured the excitement Lucy had been feeling when she’d written it; something unexplainably thrilling and awe-inspiring.
Suddenly things began to fall together. Caspian. The sword. Aslan. The beavers. Even the wolf and the winged horse fit in. The sermon, though…the sermon fit in somehow. Somehow. I should call Aunt Alberta and Uncle Harold and ask if I could borrow Eustace’s diary. I felt I simply had to read the full adventure. I doubted they would let me, but it was worth a try!
Then I realized what I needed to do first. I slid to my knees and knelt beside the bed.
“Jesus. I—I’m sorry. Please…please…forgive me. I want to be a Christian again. I want to be a Narnian again. I want to believe again. I’m so sorry. I’m so, so sorry. Amen.”
Once a King or Queen of Narnia, always a King or Queen.
Wonderful!
That was very VERY good! I absolutely loved it. Thanks for sharing it. 🙂
It was the first one you ever sent me. 😀 (You should post "Wedding Belles." 
)
Wedding Belles (my most recent fanfic)
The door of Edmund’s room burst open and Edmund jumped. Quickly he shoved the story he was writing under the bed and turned to see who it was.
“Peter, what’s up?”
Peter laughed. “I was wondering if you wanted to go outside and ride horses or do something else fun.”
Edmund raised one eyebrow. This wasn’t how his warrior-like brother normally acted. “Why?” he asked.
“I’m feeling really happy because I finally got rid of that Ariella!”
“Oh, good! Finally. I was wondering if she’d ever leave. Of all the Mary-Sues that you’ve gotten, I think that she lasted the longest.”
“Probably,” Peter agreed. “So, what about that horse-ride?”
Ten minutes later, the boys were on horseback, trotting their favorite horses across the drawbridge. Peter was on a tall white mare and Edmund was on a bay stallion. Not Philip, of course, for no one rides a talking horse except in battle. Apparently you also can if you’re a king or prince training for battle or chasing a white stag. But as the kings of Narnia weren’t doing any of those things today, they weren’t riding talking horses.
“So,” said Edmund, “what did you think of Ariella?” Peter shuddered.
“She was really tough. Her creator was a really good writer, which made it really difficult for me to shake her off. Ariella was a very well-developed character. Her personality was very realistic. She didn’t even use any bad grammar. But the hardest part was that her writer had done her research. That girl knew all about everything. I wonder how many times she’s read the books.”
“So she wasn’t a pure movie-verse Mary-Sue?”
“Not at all! And from some of the stuff she said, it seems as if she’d even studied the timeline a good deal.”
“Well, that’s good and bad,” Edmund said. “Good, as in that she wasn’t constantly squealing over ‘how cute you are and how much you look like you did in the movie and how blu-u-u-u-ue your e-e-e-eyes are!!!!!’” Peter nodded.
“Aslan’s mane, yes! That’s happened so many times…”
Edmund continued, “But it’s bad, as in she was impossible to lose.”
“Impossible! Yes, that about describes it.”
Edmund smirked. “I’m glad I don’t have to deal with Mary-Sues. There are benefits to being a bad guy for part of the story: nobody falls in love with you.”
“Don’t be so sure,” Peter said. “You forget that there were four more books and two movies with you in them.”
“But I’ve still never had a Mary-Sue, so I have come to the conclusion that I never will. For that fact I am very happy.”
When the boys returned to the castle stables Susan met them at the stable door with a hesitant look on her face.
“Peter,” she said, “there’s a girl that just arrived requesting to see you.”
“Good grief,” Peter replied. “Not another one.” Edmund tried hard not to laugh.
“Have fun,” he commented. Peter gave him a withering look.
“Don’t laugh; you’re next,” he warned.
“Yeah, right,” Edmund replied. “Anyway,” he added as Peter dismounted, “I’ll be able to deal perfectly with any Mary-Sue that comes my way, from watching you doing it so many times.”
“Oh, thanks,” Peter rejoined. He sighed. “And here comes my latest one,” for across the courtyard, the three of them could see a teenage girl with long blonde hair running in their direction.
“Ed, where are you going?” called Susan.
“Anywhere but here,” answered Edmund, slowing the stallion from its trot for a moment. “I’d rather not have to stay and listen to some Mary-Sue with an unpronounceable name prattle on and on about how Peter is exactly like she imagined him and how brave and strong he is and whatever else they find to talk about.” He tapped the horse’s sides with his heels and in a matter of minutes was riding on a little-used road that led through the woods. The breeze blew his hair back from his forehead. He stood up in the stirrups and, glancing quickly about him to make sure there was no one in sight, jogged the reins to urge his stallion to a canter. The silver-colored cape he was wearing caught the wind and pulled hard against his neck, making it hard for him to breathe.
“Silly thing,” he mumbled. He pulled in his horse for a moment as he reached up and unfastened the cape. He hesitated, wondering where to put it. Susan would have a fit if he returned without it. He decided he could just bundle it up and drape it over the back of his saddle somehow. He found that this was harder than he had expected, but eventually he managed, and soon was standing up in the stirrups again. Once he had gotten the rhythm of the horse’s pace, he dropped the reins and lifted his hands slightly, then raised them above his head. He laughed, thinking of what Susan would say—and do—if she were to see him.
Suddenly the horse shied. Edmund slipped to one side, but quickly caught the pommel of the saddle and righted himself. He looked quickly around to see what had startled the horse.
“O-o-o-oh-h-h-h-h…!” gasped a voice to his left.
Edmund spun to see who it was. A slender brunette wearing a long blue gown was standing at the side of the road. There was a dainty tiara perched on her head, and her eyes were shining. Edmund realized he probably didn’t look very king-like, and certainly hadn’t been acting very king-like. He sat up straighter in the saddle, pulling his shoulders back, and hurriedly ran his fingers through his wavy hair in a hasty attempt to comb it.
“O-o-oh-h…” repeated the girl. “Are you…are you Edmund?”
“Yes,” he replied slowly. He guessed that the girl was a Mary-Sue looking for Peter. He didn’t want to bother the High King by giving him another Mary-Sue to deal with when he already had one, but there didn’t seem to be anything else he could do. “Peter’s back at the castle,” Edmund told the girl.
“O-o-oh-h-h-h-h-h-h-h-h…” she breathed again, seeming to ignore his last comment. Edmund was starting to feel uncomfortable, and was getting the sensation of being in a one-sided conversation.
“Are you a Mary-Sue?” he finally asked bluntly.
“I don’t know,” she replied absentmindedly. “Is that horse you’re riding Philip?”
Edmund blinked. “N-no,” he stammered. “I only ride Philip during battles.”
“But you are going to ride him when you leave Narnia?” she asked, although she made it more of a statement than a question.
“I don’t know yet,” Edmund replied, dazed. He realized that his answers probably sounded very clumsy.
“Why aren’t you wearing your crown?”
“Um…” Her questions were catching Edmund off-guard, and he again had the feeling of a one-sided conversation; only this time he was on the side that wasn’t saying anything, mainly because although he had two sisters, he wasn't prepared to talk to someone who couldn’t hold to a topic for more than ten seconds. “Would you like to ride back to the castle?” he asked.
“On your horse?” she asked breathlessly.
“Do you see another one nearby?” he asked, but the tone of sarcasm in his voice was lost to her and her brown eyes sparkled. Edmund slid onto the ground and held the stallion’s bridle for the Mary-Sue. She eagerly mounted the horse and looked expectantly at him. Edmund noticed that she wasn’t actually sitting on the saddle, but right behind it.
“Well?” she asked. “Aren’t you going to ride, too?”
“I wasn’t planning on it.”
Her smile dimmed for a moment. “Could you change your plans?” she requested.
Edmund shrugged. “Sure, so long as you don’t fall off on the way back.” The girl beamed as he swung into the saddle. “Hold onto me,” he instructed. She made a funny little noise and eagerly clasped her hands around his waist. He sighed and tugged on the reins to turn the horse.
“You know,” the girl commented, “you look younger than I thought you would.”
“I’m fifteen,” Edmund said.
“Oh.” The girl paused for a moment before continuing. “But your hair is black, like it is in the movie. That’s good. And your eyes are so-o-o-o-o pretty!”
Edmund sighed. It was going to be a long ride back to Cair Paravel.
* * * * *
Susan looked out her window and blinked in surprise. Edmund was back, but who in the world was that sitting behind him on his horse? She laid down the book she was reading and quickly ran down the stairs. As she came into the courtyard, she saw Edmund helping a blue-clad girl off his horse. Susan heard a small sound behind her and turned to see Lucy leaning against the wall, shaking with suppressed mirth.
“What’s up, Lu?” asked Susan.
“I think Ed’s got his first Mary-Sue,” Lucy gasped between laughs.
“Oh, poor Edmund,” Susan said.
“I was thinking more of the poor Mary-Sue,” Lucy replied.
“That, too,” Susan said. “Well, here they come.”
Lucy stood up and tried to look serious, but she couldn’t help the little laugh that escaped when she saw the frustrated look on Edmund’s face. When she glanced at Susan, she saw that her sister’s lips twitched, too, with silent laughter.
“These are my sisters,” Edmund said to the girl at his side. “Queen Susan, and Queen Lucy. Lucy will show you to your room.”
Lucy stepped forward and dropped a tiny curtsey. She took the other girl’s hand and led her toward the door of the palace. The Mary-Sue turned her head and took one more lingering, dreamy look at Edmund before the door closed behind her and Lucy. Edmund sighed in relief.
“So?” asked Susan.
“So-o-o…I somehow managed to pick up a Mary-Sue named Belle. At first I thought she was for Peter, but on the way back I found out pretty quickly that she didn’t give two straws for him: she was after me.”
Susan’s amused smile turned into a laugh.
“Everything happened so fast,” Edmund continued. “She asked me if I was Edmund, if I was riding Philip, why I wasn’t wearing my crown. Before I knew it we were both on the horse. If I had known she was my Mary-Sue I wouldn’t even have told her who I was,” he finished miserably.
Susan laughed again. “Have fun,” she said. Edmund remembered how he had said the same exact thing to his older brother less than half an hour ago and cringed as he imagined what Peter would say.
“I’m just going to have to see if I can lose her before Peter finds out I have her.”
* * * * *
The moment Edmund saw Peter he saw that it was too late. Peter was waiting for him by the door of the palace with his arms crossed, a smile playing about his lips. As Edmund walked past him, Peter nudged him in the ribs.
“So,” he asked, “who’s the lucky girl?”
“Don’t mention it,” growled Edmund. “I notice that you haven’t said anything about your own -Sue.”
Peter glanced around quickly as they walked briskly down the hallway. “I’ve been trying to lose her all day,” he said in a low voice. “She finally tired of following me five minutes ago. I think she’s in the portrait gallery.”
“Let me guess whose pictures she’s looking at,” Edmund said.
“We’re getting off-topic,” Peter said. “We were talking about your Mary-Sue. What’s her name?”
Edmund rolled his eyes. “How did you even find out about her?”
“I have ways of doing these things.” When Edmund cast an exasperated look at him, he laughed and said, “Actually, I met Lucy coming up the stairs with her. At first I thought she’d come for me and I ducked into a doorway—”
“Very magnificent of you, High King,” interrupted Edmund.
“But then,” continued Peter, “I saw that she had that blissful, star-struck look and put two and two together.”
“And now I’m never going to hear the end of it,” groaned Edmund.
“Actually, I won’t be that cruel,” Peter comforted. “But,” he added teasingly as he glanced at his brother out of the corner of his eye, “that was a cute dress she was wearing.” He ducked, laughing, to avoid Edmund’s fist. “So what’s her name?”
“Belle,” mumbled Edmund, gingerly rubbing the knuckles he had bashed against the wall behind Peter.
“Book-verse or movie-verse?”
“Movie,” Edmund replied unhappily. “She won’t shut up about my eyes.” He stopped walking and clasped his hands. Batting his eyelashes, he crooned in a high falsetto, “‘O-o-oh-h, your eyes are so-o-o-o-o-o gorgeous! They’re even more beautiful than they were in the movie!’” He started walking again, scowling. Peter smiled sympathetically.
“It’s hard when your actor looks a lot like you,” he remarked.
“And acts like you!” moaned Edmund. “I wish they’d never found Skandar Keynes.” Peter nodded.
“I’m actually glad that they changed Prince Caspian in the ways they did,” he said. “It makes it much easier to lose movie-verse Mary-Sues.”
“You’re lucky,” Edmund said. “Lucy’s even luckier, though. Once she starts getting Gary-Stus, they’ll all be taken aback by her blonde hair. Her movie-verse -Stus won’t last ten minutes. But our -Sues are more of a challenge.”
Peter agreed, but suddenly a look of annoyance crossed his face.
“And here comes my most recent one,” he sighed. “Too late to escape now. See you later, Ed.” His last sentence was cut short as the golden-haired princess grasped his hand, chattering to him about how much taller and older and handsomer he looked now than he had in his first portraits. Not, of course, that he wasn’t adorable then, too, just…
Edmund thought that now would be a good time to leave, before the ruckus that Peter’s -Sue was raising attracted Belle. So, after giving Peter an encouraging nod, he returned to the courtyard.
The sun was hovering just above the western horizon, but it probably would be at least half an hour before it got too dark to see easily. Edmund decided that a walk in the north garden might be nice, especially considering that the windows in all of the rooms they gave to visiting Mary-Sues faced south. Also considering that there weren’t as many flowers in the north garden as in the others, and therefore would be of less interest to a Mary-Sue.
He started running down the tiled path to the north garden, but as he turned the corner right before the garden gate, he nearly bumped into a blue dress with a brown-haired girl in it.
“O-o-o-o-oh-h-h-h-h-h-h-h…” gasped Belle. “You looked so-o-o-o heroic when you were running like that!”
By Aslan, haven’t you said that about everything I’ve done so far? he thought.
“I knew you’d come down to this garden sooner or later,” Belle babbled on as she seized his hand and pulled him through the gate into the garden. “I asked one of the dryads which of the gardens was the least flowery, because I just knew that you’d prefer someplace like this, with all the trees and the rocks, instead of roses and such, why it’s almost like the woods, isn’t it, especially with that stream over there, with that little waterfall, and oh, look, what a precious little bench, shall we go sit on it?”
Edmund, who couldn’t understand how anyone could talk so fast for so long without taking a breath, found himself being dragged over to the stone bench and before he knew what was happening, was sitting on it with Belle seated beside him.
“I’ve been walking in this garden for several minutes, I was wondering if you’d ever come,” Belle continued. “But here you are, and it was worth the wait, wasn’t it?”
You mean the five-minute wait? Edmund wondered.
“Oh, you’re even better than I expected,” she sighed rapturously, taking his hand in both of hers and holding it against her cheek. She looked up at him adoringly. “I do hope I can stay for a long, long time, don’t you?” Fortunately Edmund was spared having to answer that question as Belle immediately went on, “The room your sister gave me is so lovely, and its windows look out over the prettiest gardens ever, and you can see the sun setting over the ocean, it’s so beautiful. The sun here in Narnia is so big and golden, isn’t it, it’s so pretty, like your eyes, except your eyes are black.”
“They’re brown,” Edmund told her.
“Brown. Right. But that’s even better, isn’t it?”
“Does your author have brown eyes?”
“No, her eyes are green, I think. She probably gave me brown eyes so I would look like you. It’s a shame that you’re the only brown-eyed member of your family. But your sisters are lovely, especially Lucy, she was so thoughtful and so kind, even if her hair is blonde, I wasn’t quite expecting that.”
“Is your author as talkative as you are?” Edmund asked before he could stop himself. Belle smiled sweetly.
“Oh, no, not at all. I wasn’t supposed to be a chatterbox, either, but I really can’t help it.” She smiled at him. “Sometimes it’s nice to surprise your author, isn’t it?”
“I don’t know,” he stammered. “I’ve never really thought about it.”
“Haven’t you ever tried it?” she asked in surprise.
“No. No, I haven’t.”
Belle was speechless for a few moments, then suddenly jumped up, pulling Edmund to his feet.
“Come on,” she exclaimed. “Let’s go watch the sunset!”
Edmund mumbled something about having seen five years of Narnian sunsets, but Belle steadily dragged him by one hand until they were in a different garden on the other side of Cair Paravel, facing the sea.
“Oh,” gasped Belle, “It’s stunning!”
It was indeed a beautiful sight. Most of the sun had already dipped below the edge of the world, but what was left reflected brilliantly off the water, dancing on the ripples where a pair of mermaids had broken the surface half a mile from the shore, and on the waves further out, dazzling the eyes of Edmund and his Mary-Sue and making them squint. A few rosy clouds, edged with gold, hung calmly above the ocean horizon.
“You know,” Belle commented absently, “Cair Paravel is going to be on an island someday.”
“I know,” Edmund replied. “I’ve read the book.”
“So did my writer,” said Belle, “but only once. She liked the movie better.”
“But Cair Paravel wasn’t on an island in the movie.”
The sun was almost gone by now. Only a sliver of liquid gold sat on the sea.
“She thought it was more romantic for it to be on an island when you returned in Prince Caspian.” Belle smiled dreamily as she gazed at the sunset. Edmund’s face remained serious.
“I see.”
“In my story we’re supposed to get married.”
“I know.” Edmund cringed. Why had he said that? It would make things much easier for him if he were familiar with her story.
“Will we get married for real?”
Edmund rolled his eyes. “Probably—”
“Oooooooh!” squealed Belle. “Oh, I knew it, I just knew it, oh, I can’t wait, when do you suppose we will, oh, I have to go tell your sisters!”
Belle danced and skipped her way back to the castle, leaving Edmund alone, moodily staring at the place where the sun had disappeared, to finish his sentence.
“—not.”
* * * * *
“Edmund.” Susan sternly confronted her brother when he appeared at the door to the courtyard. “Promise me you did not tell that girl you would marry her.”
“I didn’t try to,” Edmund moaned disconsolately.
Susan’s frozen attitude thawed a little when she saw how crestfallen her youngest brother looked, but there still were a few icicles hanging from her voice as she demanded, “And how, may I ask, did you tell her you would marry her without trying to?”
“I don’t know!” he whimpered helplessly. Susan sighed.
“It would take you to get into a scrape like this,” she grumbled. “Come on inside. We’ll see if Peter has any advice for you.”
Advice! Edmund was certain he would have advice, punctuated by bursts of laughter. Peter could laugh because Peter had never had to deal with a situation like this. Edmund winced at the thought.
Susan knocked softly on the door of Peter’s room.
“Peter,” she called quietly.
“Yes?” came the reply.
“There’s someone here who would like to talk to you, and,” she added hastily, “it’s not a Mary-Sue.”
“Come on in,” Peter replied. Susan opened the door and pushed Edmund through. Edmund saw Peter shove a stack of papers under the bed. It crossed his mind that it was probably a story Peter was writing, but the thought left as quickly as it came. Peter uncrossed his long legs and stood up.
“Could you close the door?” he asked. Edmund did, then slowly turned to face his brother. Peter searched the younger boy’s face, realizing at a glance that this was no time for laughter, although the mournful look in the big dark eyes made it hard to resist.
“What’s up?” he asked.
Edmund sat down heavily onto a chair, his shoulders sagging. “I think I accidentally told Belle I would marry her,” he said dejectedly.
“You…think?” questioned Peter, raising his eyebrows. He seated himself on the bed across from Edmund. “Suppose you start at the beginning.”
Edmund did, and told the story in such a woebegone voice that Peter nearly laughed one or two dozen times. When he had finished, Peter took a deep breath and leaned back.
“Well, King Edmund, you really have got yourself quite the predicament here, haven’t you?”
“You might call it that,” replied Edmund gloomily, looking at the floor. Unhappily he kicked one of the legs of his chair, making a depressed tapping sound.
“Where is she now?”
“I don’t know and I don’t care.” Tap…tap.
“Cheer up. You’re starting to sound like a Marshwiggle.”
“It doesn’t matter,” replied Edmund dismally. Peter was finding it difficult to keep a straight face.
“Listen, Ed,” he said gravely, “how about you leave this one to me, okay?”
“Sure,” agreed his brother hopelessly. “I guess it can’t get any worse.” He listlessly rose from the chair and with drooping head left the room.
Peter waited a good minute and a half to be sure Edmund was gone before dashing out of his room and out of the castle into one of the quiet gardens, where he collapsed in the middle of the path and laughed until he cried.
* * * * *
There was a timid knock on the door of Edmund’s room early the next morning. He groggily sat up in bed and listened for the sound again. There it was. Knock, knock, knock. As he swung his legs over the side of his bed he noticed that he hadn’t even taken off his boots last night before crawling under the blankets. Knock, knock, knock. Cautiously he opened the door a crack and peeked out.
“Edmund,” said Lucy, “what did you say to Belle last night?”
“Does it matter?” His tone was laced with annoyance. Did everyone need to know?
“I don’t know.” Lucy sounded concerned. “She’s not in her room.”
Edmund sighed. This meant an unnecessary search, for although the kings of Narnia may not have been fond of their Mary-Sues, may have even disliked them greatly, the honor of their positions as knights and kings, and their responsibility for the safety of the girls that had come to Narnia because of them, required that they see that no harm would come to the -Sues. “Just a minute; I’ll be right out.”
Edmund considered not changing into fresh clothes, but the thought of Susan’s reaction changed his mind for him, and he quickly got on a clean tunic and leggings. The neat row of capes hanging in his closet reminded him that the one he had worn yesterday was still rolled up behind a bale of hay in the stables where he had hidden it.
Soon he opened the door and stepped out into the hallway. Lucy fell into step behind him, trotting to keep up with him.
“So,” he said, “you say she’s not in her room.”
“Right.”
“Are you sure?”
“Positive!” Lucy of her own free will had always felt that it was her duty to be sure that Peter’s Mary-Sues didn’t keep him up all night or get him up at unearthly hours of the morning and checked their rooms every morning. Now that Edmund was getting Mary-Sues, too, his obviously were also added to the list of rooms to patrol. “And you needn’t check the rest of the castle, either,” Lucy added. “I’ve already done that.”
Edmund was impressed. “You checked everywhere?”
“Everywhere inside. The door guards wouldn’t let me out by myself,” she admitted.
Edmund nodded. “That was wise of them. Well, I’ll just have to go look for her outside, then. Thanks, Lucy.” Lucy flashed him an encouraging smile before turning and dashing away. Once she was gone, Edmund’s clipped steps slowed and he yawned. Edmund the Just was not a morning person.
“Good morning, Your Majesty,” greeted the faun that stood by one of the doors to the courtyard. “I didn’t expect you to be up this early.”
“Neither did I,” confessed Edmund. “Has anyone gone out through this door today yet?” The faun shook its curly head. “All right. Thank you, Oscuns,” said Edmund. The faun bowed in reply. Edmund turned and with resolute step strode down the hallway towards the front door.
As he turned a corner, a door suddenly swung outward right in front of him. Trying to regain his balance, his boots skidded on the floor and he ended up sprawled very inelegantly across the polished marble. Peter looked down at him in surprise.
“Good morning, Ed,” he said. “I thought I heard someone out here.”
Edmund tried to stand up, but his boots had decided that they didn’t like that floor and promptly slid forward while leaving the rest of him right where he had been. Peter graciously helped his brother get up and watched with curiosity as Edmund brushed himself off.
“I didn’t know you’d decided to become an early riser,” Peter commented. “The early faun chooses the dance, huh?”
Edmund frowned. “I wouldn’t be up this early if I didn’t have to be.”
“Why do you have to be?”
Edmund sighed. “Belle is gone and I have to go find her.” Peter eyed him closely.
“You got up to look for Belle?”
“No!” Edmund exclaimed vehemently. “Not in that way. Lucy woke me up and told me she was gone, so now I have to go find her.” His last sentence ended in a growl. Peter’s blue eyes sparkled.
“Do you want me to help?” he asked.
Edmund shrugged. “It would be nice,” he began, but, noticing the mischievous look on his brother’s face, he added more slowly, “unless you know more about where she went than I do.”
Peter chuckled and beckoned his brother to follow him down the hallway. After going up two flights of stairs, he stopped in front of one of the rooms in the wing that was used exclusively for Mary-Sues, and opened the door.
There was no one in the room. Peter closed the door softly behind them and walked over to the flowered wastebasket. He looked into it and smiled knowingly as he pulled out a handful of paper fragments. He sat down on a chair at the carved table in the corner of the room and began to piece them together.
Edmund walked over and looked on with interest.
“I was hoping she’d find this,” Peter told him.
Edmund saw that he had finished assembling the top half of the paper, and read the first line.
My dearest Edmund,
There it was, plain as day. Peter’s handwriting, though a little bit fancied up. But there was that distinct diagonal crossbar on the t’s, and the less noticeable gap at the top of the a’s and d’s. Edmund sharply glanced at Peter, who had just finished piecing together the rest of the paper. Peter’s face was as serious as a centaur’s but his eyes had a meaningful twinkle. Edmund looked back down at the paper and read the next line.
You can’t imagine, my beloved,
My beloved? Edmund looked again at Peter. Peter was reading the letter as well.
You can’t imagine, my beloved, how much I miss you. Each day I am less and less content as I remember the long distance between us. Oh, how I wish I were with you at the Cair! I cannot wait until that day four years from now when you will take me back with you, this time to stay.
“What?” Edmund whispered in bewilderment. He scowled intently at the sheet of paper as he read on.
I think back with great joy on the day when you asked me that important question which has changed my life, and look forward with even greater anticipation to the day when you will take me back to Narnia to be your bride.
There was more to the letter, but Edmund couldn’t bear to read any more. He turned on Peter in indignation, his face flaming. Peter was grinning at him, his fingers laced behind his head. He had leaned his chair back on two legs, and it was too great a temptation. Edmund put out one hand, and with a tiny shove, Peter was lying on the floor.
As he picked himself up, Peter gasped out between peals of laughter, “Oh, Ed, you should have seen your face! You were as red as a satyr!”
Edmund couldn’t help but laugh now, as he saw the funny side of it all, and he turned back to the letter and read the signature.
Your adoring bride-to-be,
Petra
He rubbed his forehead with his hand and exclaimed, “Whatever got into you, Pete, to write that ridiculously absurd…thing?”
Peter was still in fits of laughter. “I had to come up with something to get rid of Belle, you were so forlorn, so I wrote that note and ‘accidentally’ dropped it where I was sure Belle would notice it.”
“And where was that?”
“Right outside your door.” Back into another uncontrollable round of mirth.
“Peter!” gasped Edmund, feigning shock, but there were tears rolling down his cheeks from laughing so hard.
As soon as they had quieted down and were only occasionally giggling, Edmund whispered, “Who all do you think we woke up just now?”
“I don’t think we woke anybody up,” Peter chuckled quietly. “No one’s in this part of the castle right now except us.”
“What happened to your Mary-Sue?”
“Oh, she left yesterday evening. She was pretty easy.”
Somehow this struck them both as funny and another trail of laughter followed Peter’s remark.
“So,” said Edmund as soon as they had calmed down sufficiently, “seeing how we’re both up, how would you like to go out and ride horses or do something else fun?”
“You bet.”
This, my friends, is my protest against Mary-Sues and YouTube comments on any and every of the Narnian kings’ looks. My apologies if it is offensive to any authors/Narnia fans who have created Mary-Sues or commented on how cute Skandar or Will or Ben are. I would like to thank you, though, for giving me the inspiration for this story and even for supplying parts of the content. And for those who haven’t created a Mary-Sue yet, but are thinking about it, please think twice before subjecting your favorite character to the annoyance and frustration of having to deal with your adoring creation. Thank you!!
P.S. I did NOT create Belle as a Mary-Sue for me, regardless of anything my brothers think or say. She is also a completely imaginary character. I fashioned her after absolutely NO ONE, so any resemblance to ANYone is COMPLETELY unintentional!!!!!
SO FUNNY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 😆 😆 😆 😆
Hobbit, you're not fooling anyone. Both me and your brothers KNOW that Belle is based off of you. 😉
She is not! Aslan is the only character I fangirl over!
*raises eyebrow* You really aren't fooling anyone. At all. 😛
Remember is a lovely story, especially for a first time!
Hi Hobbit. Thanks for sharing your fics. Sorry to get all admin-y but could you try and format your stories with paragraphs when you post them here. Just makes for easier reading. If you need help with the formatting just PM me and I'll help. You should have an option to edit the posts you've already made.
Thanks.
Once a daughter of Eve. Now a daughter of the Second Adam.
Okay. I copied them from a document and thought they'd automatically paragraph themselves...I'll see if I can fix them.
@Lil: Oh yes. 😀 She is a LOVELY writer. (hint, hint, Hobbit. Rise of Valence. Need to post. )
'Remember' is a beautiful story. It made me cry. And I hardly ever cry.
Oh, wow. I hardly ever make anyone cry with my stories. 😯
This one is called "Through the Sunrise". One of my insane fanfics.
“Way, way, for the Tarkaan Kalimir!”
Annoyed, I again moved to the side of the road. I was crammed between a woman holding a screaming child, and a man reeking even more of garlic and fish than most of us other Calormenes. I would be glad when I could get through Tashbaan. I had to pass through it every few weeks because of my job and so I was used to the crowd and the constant making way for Tarkaans and Tarkheenas, but today was the worst. If I felt like trying to count how many times I’d had to stop and move to the side of the road just on this street, I’d have to take off my shoes and count everything twice. On the other hand, if I decided to count how many steps I’d been able to take between each of those stops, I’d only need one hand. I growled as I saw another litter coming in sight around the bend ahead.
Then I heard a loud voice rising above the general ruckus of the crowd. It had a rather whiny tone, and I couldn’t exactly say it sounded very agreeable. When I finally made it around the corner ahead, I could see the speaker.
He would have had light skin like the people who live to the North, if it had not been so darkly tanned. I guessed he’d lived here in Calormen for many years. He was standing on a heap of stones piled against a building, and there was an interested circle of people clustered around him. I joined them.
“The sun got bigger every day, whiter and hotter, and more unbearable,” the man was saying. “The water gleamed and sparkled and sent up a heat of its own. There was no way to escape from the light. It penetrated every part of the ship. The galley, the cabins, the hold, everywhere. Every morning the white birds flew straight out of the sun and went over us, flying towards the west. A few minutes later, back they would come, singing their strange, evil song, and fly back to their home in the sun.”
I leaned over to the man next to me and asked, “Who is that?”
“He’s a sailor,” he whispered back. “He sailed to the end of the world on a voyage with the king of Narnia on the Narnian ship the Dawn Treader years ago.”
I nodded and turned my attention again to the speaker.
“The water grew deeper, and deeper, and deeper, until you couldn’t see the bottom of the sea. And yet it grew clearer, and clearer, and clearer, and the ship raced along like the wind, yet without the wind, as there was no wind but what we made ourselves by our sailing. The magic of the last sea was pushing us relentlessly toward the edge of the world. The water flashed and glittered and the sun bore down ominously until the light and the heat were too much to bear. Before long, it became too bright to see anything. All we could see was white. But one day, the light broke and we could see each other and the ship again. Behind us was what seemed a white wall of light that fell from the peak of the sky, and we realized we’d reached the other side of the sunrise.”
Someone behind me made a stifled choking sound, but I was too spellbound by the sailor who had gone to the last sea to turn and see who it was. The speaker went on.
“But still the magic of the sea pushed us onward, faster and faster. There was no way to stop. Our sail billowed out full behind us from the speed at which we were going, but it slowed us not a bit. On and on we went. We never saw the white birds any more, because the sun never passed overhead now, but rose behind us and made its way west. The light grew dimmer every day as we got further and further from the place where it rose, and still the water grew deeper, and deeper, and deeper, until it was deeper than the world is wide.”
The person behind me snorted. I wondered how he couldn’t believe the sailor, who spoke so fervently.
“Ahead of us, the horizon continued on and on. There was no end of it, no land in sight. On and on, for days and days, caught in the last sea, endlessly sailing on and on, away from the sun, away from our homes (which by this time were thousands and thousands of leagues behind us and which we had not seen for a year), away from everything everyone has ever known. All that was there was water. Only water, and the light, which was daily growing less, and us. Just us, a small ship in an endless ocean, caught in the endless sea at the edge of the world, rushing, rushing, rushing, towards the edge of the world, unstoppable, helpless, hopeless. We were sure every day that this would be our last. But every day the magic pushed us more swiftly, until we were going so fast that the ship was barely skimming along the top of the water. Then one day, we saw ahead of us, stretching from horizon to horizon, a streak of black. It was difficult to see, for by now the light had grown so dim that we needed lights on the ship at all times except for at high noon. We tried to slow ourselves, but it was no use. The black streak thickened and grew by the minute, and we feared lest we might run against it, but there was nothing we could do. As it came nearer, we saw that it reached to the sky, just as the wall of white had, when we passed through the sunrise, yet we still could not see what this black wall was. And yet on it came, faster and faster, until the ship suddenly ceased its eastward rush and we saw (when it was but a league away) that the blackness was nothing. It was the lack of light, darkness itself, in its solid form.”
The man behind me seemed to have gotten some smoke in his face; in any chance, he was coughing rather hoarsely. The speaker went on.
“We rowed slowly forward, until we reached the wall of nothing. They let the boat down, which those in it steered right into the wall and disappeared. They returned soon and we took them back up and rowed into the blackness. For two days and a night we continued through it, and would have seen neither each other’s faces nor anything of the ship but for the lanterns we had on the prow and stern, and we were afraid we were traveling in circles. But finally we broke out of the blackness, and ahead there lay a sea of white water, and we wondered if this was yet another last sea which we had just entered. And above us there stood another sun, which glinted off of the water and blinded us after being in the blackness. And still there was no wind. Far ahead of us we could see a crystal-blue island sitting on the horizon and—”
Suddenly the man behind me called out, “I say, friend, what happened when you turned and came back?”
The speaker, still speaking to his audience in general, said, “When we finally returned to Narnia, the king, who had promised every one of us homes, land, and gold, and an honorable place in his court, turned me away unjustly and denied ever having told me such, although he’d given the others their share. When I reminded him of his promise, he grew angry and threatened to have me imprisoned, and I was forced to flee here. I—”
Suddenly the man behind me burst into peals of laughter. I turned, irritated, to see who it was and saw a light-skinned, muscled man with his arms wrapped around his waist, bending over in fits of laughter.
The speaker looked at him and a peculiar expression crept over his face. “Rynelf!” he gasped, paling.
Rynelf looked up at him and said between laughs, “You know as well as I do, Pittencream, that you deserted at the Lone Islands on the way home and came here, and that you stopped at Ramandu’s Island and waited for us to return from the end of the world!” He laughed again. “You never even saw the last sea, you big old liar!”
“I—” began Pittencream, but Rynelf interrupted him.
“And I must say, you did a very bad depiction of the Silver Sea. And the Dark Island was not in the last sea. And we did not go so fast we lifted out of the water. And the sea did not keep getting deeper and deeper; if anything, it got shallower and shallower. And where on earth did you get the idea for the second sun?”
“I—” began Pittencream again.
“And what about food? Where did the crew on your ‘Dawn Treader’ get food? And you know, I don’t remember being on the other side of the sunrise, with the sun getting further and further away…oh! And that Blue Island! Tell us more about the Blue Island you saw on the horizon, that you were talking about right before you stopped!”
There was no reply. I looked back at the pile of stones. There was no one standing on it. Pittencream had slipped away.
