For King and Country ⭒Caspian x Reader⭒

Chapter 14

My hands spread over the ridges of the crotcheted blanket I held in my arms, standing in the drafty room where servants milled about tending to a fire in the hearth, beating the dust out of the velvet curtains over the windows, and arranging linens on cots scattered across the room. 

Murmurs came from the refugees as they sat on their cots watching the mayhem around them as the room Caspian had set aside for them was prepared. The sitting room had sat unused for a long time, Morgan had said, which wasn't too difficult of deduction considering the dust that had flown into the air the moment the door opened.

"We should keep them all together for their safety," Caspian had said to me as we rode back to the castle. His horse clomped over the uneven cobblestone jostling him side to side in a choppy gait.

My hands shook the whole way up to the castle. The reality of seeing a piece of my old home in front of me was settling in. My subjects. My people. Some days it had almost become too easy to forget that I had ever had a life outside of Narnia with its nectar laced afternoons and lazy rivers accompanied by dryads singing over the bubbling streams. But reality can't be held at bay for too long, it's always standing in the shadows waiting for its invitation back into the light.

"They're watching you," Titus said trotting up next to me, gesturing his head to the Vidalians following close behind in the back of a wagon, "Back straight, Princess."

"Thank you," I said, sitting up in my saddle, "I'm not sure how to behave right now."

"Just...be solemn, but don't go too far and look miserable," Titus was as collected as I had seen him, "Just be you. You'll know what to do."

"Let's hope so," I returned, going over the grim details the old woman on the dock had told me. My imagination had more than filled in the gaps of what was going on in Vidalia. Erik was sparing no mercy. A chill went down my spine at the thought of ever having laid with the man.

Caspian rode close to me up to the castle, continually casting glances at me causing me to wonder if I looked as nauseous as I felt. I did not meet his gaze for fear that it would confirm the roiling emotions that were tossing in my stomach.

We trotted into the stables, and Caspian waved away the stablehand that came running and helped me dismount. His hands gripped my waist as I descended from the horse, his grip firm and sure. He leaned in and whispered, his lips just brushing the crown of my head, "You did amazing out there. You brought them peace," I braced my hands on his forearms for just a moment, looking into his eyes. He gave me a nod of encouragement before breaking away.

A servant dropping a glass jar broke me from the memory, and I continued over to a cot where the mother from the docks held her baby close to her chest. She rocked back and forth whether to rock the child to sleep or out of anxiety, I'm not sure anyone would have been able to tell.

I kneeled before the woman, offering her the knit blanket, "How old is your baby?" The child was kicking their feet and waving their fists in the air while their little eyes roamed the room but seemed to fixate on the flickering candles illuminating the space.

"He's four months of age, My Lady," She said, eyes quickly flitting back down to the infant in her arms.

"He's precious," I said, watching the child reach up for a strand of his mother's hair that his fingers would inevitably tangle and pull on.

Like a storm on the sea, the child's mood changed with no warning, and began to fuss in her arms while she hurriedly tried to shush him as if it were some offense to me that her baby was doing exactly what babies do. 

"May I?" I turned to see Peter behind me, extended out to the woman. What a sight it was to see a broad-chested man with a sword at his hip reaching expectantly for a child.