Work Text:
Maps stretched out
The day after Peter ships out, the maps start appearing on the wall of the Fifth form common room at St. Maurice’s. Europe as a whole at first, then Italy, the Mediterranean, Greece, Germany, France...
He takes them home with him at the end of the term, Edmund Pevensie does, scatters them over his (and Peter's) room, mixed up with newspapers and letters in Peter's dashing handwriting.
Too many miles to count
He tries to find closer maps, more detail, tracing his finger across mountain ranges and down coastlines. He spans the entire Allied line with his thumb. He'd never felt the world to be so big before, never felt so small. Narnia had been such a small country. How long would it take to sail around the Cape of Gibraltar? How long would it take to fly to Sicily?
Sometimes he does the math. Sometimes he doesn't.
Let's just say we're inches apart
Remember watching the stars with Oreius? How you'd sketch them with your finger so carefully? How we'd lie out in the grass with Era and Philip, in silence sometimes, for hours? There were so many stars out there in the country. Some nights I'm lucky to see stars here. But when I do I imagine you seeing the same ones, mapping your way the way to well, your way to me. Sometimes I swear I can feel you beside me in the dark, little brother.
He lies in Peter's bed, letter in his hand, falls asleep with paper between his fingers.
And even closer at heart
For we are saved by hope: but hope that is seen is not hope: for what a man seeth, why doth he yet hope for? But if we hope for that we see not, then do we with patience wait for it. Likewise the Spirit also helpeth our infirmities: for we know not what we should pray for as we ought: but the Spirit itself maketh intercession for us with groanings which cannot be uttered.
Even as his pen moves over the paper, he finds his lips moving too, a begging murmur, mixing with the summer rain heavy on the roof.
And we'll be just fine
He laughs as Lucy places the crown of daisies on his head, and kisses her cheek. He rubs Susan's aching feet as she sits on the couch and reads aloud to them. He fingers his little silver lion against his collarbone, and smiles through the steam rising off his coffee.
Another pin pushed in
The maps on the wall grow a forest of colored heads and tiny flags, and anyone who wants war news or any better understanding of the progression of the European theatre goes to the Fifth's common room.
To remind us where we've been
He takes a map down to the stables sometimes, unrolls it on the table in the harness room, sits patiently as Master Gringham pores over it, searching for the boy who rode his horses like no one else, all of them trying to coordinate themselves.
The horses miss you, he writes to Peter. Have you had a chance to ride recently?
And every mile adds up
He lies alone in their room, catching the faint murmurs of his parents downstairs, and he can't remember the last time he cried on Christmas, but he's doing it now, hot salt water on Peter's pillow, as Bing Crosby croons on the wireless in the girls' room down the hall.
Please, God, please let him come home safe, please let him be happy, please.
Leaving its mark on us
I was grieved to hear of your wounding, brother, but truly grateful it was not more serious. I wish I could be there, to make sure you were getting proper care and treatment. Be careful, please. But don't be a coward. I'd rather a dead brother, than a coward. But don't die. You're not allowed to die without me.
He means it, every word, that's why he doesn't cross any of it out.
And sometimes our compass breaks
Twelve of them dead, and I alive, and I don't know why, Ed, but I don't know if I can do this, I can't. Not alone. I'd forgotten how much this hurts. I only knew half their names, and I know Badger had four little kids back home, and I don't understand.
I don't understand.
And our steady true north fades
Snow lies thick on the moor, and Ed struggles to open his eyes in the morning. His feet are heavy, his mind moves slow, and he can't get warm. He sits as close to the fire in the common room as he can without setting his clothes aflame. Some mornings he sits with his hand on the black leather cover, but he doesn’t open the book.
We'll be just fine
There's a black and white photograph folded in with the thin paper, and there he is smiling up at them all, officer's cap set at a jaunty angle, shirtless with a bandage on one forearm. Peter hugs a scruffy looking mongrel dog close, hand rubbing the pointed ears, and Ed smiles back at the living shadow of his brother.
We'll be just fine
Warm spring sunshine splashes over Ed's face, and he leans on his spade, brushes mud off his hands, and surveys the dark turned earth of the school's Victory Garden, listens to the first formers laughing as they fling dirt clods at each other.
We'll be just fine
Come, behold the works of the Lord, what desolations he hath made in the earth.
He maketh wars to cease unto the end of the earth; he breaketh the bow, and cutteth the spear in sunder; he burneth the chariot in the fire... Peter writes.
We'll be just fine
Be still, and know that I am God: I will be exalted among the heathen, I will be exalted in the earth.
The Lord of hosts is with us; the God of Jacob is our refuge, Edmund answers.
I know that we will
"I miss him so much," Lucy says, and Edmund wraps his arm around her shoulders as they walk, remembering how he closed his last letter with those three words.
I just know that we will
He kneels by Peter's bed, his bed now, and the maps hang all round on the walls, he is surrounded by everywhere his brother is and was and could be, as he bows his head and the evening prayer comes weary and steady from his lips.
They used to say it together.
Time moves slow
It's been a year, it's been forever, it's been a day, he feels as if he could walk down to the station right this moment and Peter would be there waiting on the platform to say goodbye. He closes his eyes, and sees Peter smiling at him, feels the hands on his shoulders and the warm kiss on his forehead. And then it blurs, he can't remember the last thing Peter said to him, he can't remember if they hugged or shook hands last, he'd told Peter he loved him, hadn't he?
When half of your heart has yet to come home
He hears the whistle of a train through the open classroom window, and it comes back like a flash, Peter leaning out of the carriage to wave, and something snapping, Ed's heart tearing out of his chest, words spilling out in a wild cry, carrying over the sound of wheels turning and steam hissing and steel track shifting. "I love you! I love you, Pete! Please! Don't forget! Don't die! I love you!"
He had run after the train, run to the edge of the platform, where he was forced to stop, but his heart hadn't, and he'd listened for a long time till he was sure he could hear nothing more.
Every minute's adding up
I miss you, Ed. It's like losing a limb, I've found. I can do without you, but nothing is the same and everything's harder. Remember Acamus—how he complained for years afterward, always grumbling about needing another hand?
And leaving a mark on us
There are scars on the back of Ed’s hand, where one of the falcons had grabbed him, and they weren't there a year ago, Peter hasn't seen those, and how many scars does Peter have now? How many places where the skin had mended imperfectly? How many marks Edmund does not know the origin of?
He wonders sometimes.
I can't get you out of my mind
They aren't on the list Mother gave him, but he buys carrots at the green grocers, the short fat ones Peter likes, and doesn't remember till he's halfway home.
I can't get you out of my mind
"Hullo, Ed," calls Benjy from down the street. "How's tricks?"
"Oh, Peter's alright," Ed says, swinging around with a smile, squinting in the sun. "Getting sent to Palestine for a bit; says that should be interesting."
I can't get you out of my mind
He has a whole book of maps of Palestine and the Middle East from Professor Kirke— maps from the time of Abraham, to the conquest of Joshua, to the time of Jesus—and he writes: Tell us all about Jerusalem, if you get there.
I solemnly swear
I'm not going to tell you to remember anything this time, brother. Just know that I feel your pain, and grieve Hans's death as deeply as you. He was a faithful friend to you, and I was always grateful to know he had your back. I'm here, at home, sitting at our desk, and there's a summer thunderstorm banging around outside, though the rain on the roof sounds nice. I'm safe, I promise.
I swear that I'll never try
"Is Peter still over there?" Colin asks when they meet on the platform in a crowd of school boys, and there's a weight, a weariness in Edmund's clipped reply: "Yes. Why?"
The younger boy hesitates, before: "Well, I rather wish he'd come back so you'd be happy again."
We'll be just fine
He aces his School Cert, he's sure, though he won't know until the end of term what his marks actually were. But Master Walsh looks very pleased the day after, and tells him, "Keeping up the family name, I dare say."
Ed glows inside as he goes down to supper.
We'll be just fine
Rags and Tarek are fast friends now, and I can see she'll be in a good hands whenever I leave. She sleeps with him, on his mat under my cot. I've tried to make him sleep with the cook, since he is on kitchen duty, but he refuses, and I won't let him be chained or locked up. He's such a good kid otherwise, nobody really minds. When he's not on KP, he follows me everywhere, like a shadow. Tarek, though. It means 'morning star'.
We'll be just fine
Took Rose out for a gallop all the way up to the tor. Sun was out and made it warm, and with a few late heather blooming, the moor was quite beautiful. Took a lunch and a hymn book; went over my tenor parts and the solo for choir. Sounds boring when I write it out like that, but I know you like to hear that sort of thing.
I know that we will
He does not cry on the second Christmas without Peter. He stands in church with his arm around Lucy, and they sing loud and clear and triumphant: Then tolled the bells, more loud and deep / God is not dead, nor doth He sleep. He laughs at Susan's stories from the hospital over Christmas dinner, and listens to Eustace breathing across the room as they fall asleep.
Somewhere out there on a dusty military base, Peter is falling asleep in his cot, and thinking of home.
We'll be just fine
The lines march across the maps, week in, week out. Pushing further and further toward and into Germany. He marks with a pencil and a steady hand. Places the one pin with the little lion’s head flag squarely in Belgium.
A sense of excitement builds in the boys who cluster round that wall of the Sixth Form common room, an air of hope, a taste of victory.
We'll be just fine
He kneels by his bed, letter cupped in his hands, and his lips move but no sound comes, as his heart reaches for the aching one that bleeds through in ink. Peter marches head on into the maw of the dragon, and Edmund can only beg the Lion of Judah to go ahead of him.
It's a matter of time
The chapel bells ring wild and clamorous, and the courtyard is flooded with boys doing their best to imitate them. In the middle of the unrestrained celebration, Edmund Pevensie pauses, stands still, looks up to search the May sky. He smiles, tired and worn and battle-scarred, recalling victory cheers of years past, the rattle of swords on shields and the cheerful yowls of the big cats. He remembers the longing to ride home again. He remembers standing above Cair Paravel's gate, and seeing the white unicorn spring forward into a gallop.
He gets tackled into the dirt by Colin and Fred and Pat, and then he's laughing with the rest of them.
Till our compass stands still
He stands on the platform, hands in his pockets, quite still, hat pulled low in the summer drizzle. But his eyes keep moving, scanning, searching, face after face, skipping from one to another, and finding no satisfaction. Until... just dismounting the first carriage, tall, clean shaven, officer's uniform, hat in his hand, rain in his golden-brown hair, blue eyes all weary and laughing that lock onto Edmund's, go wide with startled light.
They are magnets, drawn together through the crowd, and he knows Peter is shouting, but Ed has no breath as he is wrapped in his brother's embrace, crushed against the broad chest of his king, his captain, his best friend in all the wide worlds. He clings to Peter, and weeps for a long time.
Till our compass stands still
The maps are forgotten in the dark, and he traces no lines, measures no distance, for the great heart beats against his spine, and the warm breath brushes the back of his neck, and they will sleep safe together tonight. He is here, and Peter is here.
They are home.