cribellate | narnia au;

"Not likely," Magnus says with a playful grin. His hands are still on her hips, a polite position, left over from their dancing. He's still close, like they're conspiring.

"I still need to be introduced to your siblings, don't I? You have me for the rest of the evening, as you wish. Your Majesty."

[She laughs just a little, but she's so close to crying that it's clear that she's trying to keep herself together. She kisses him on the mouth, and presses their foreheads together.]

I think we are both tired, and too terribly stressed for this. Can we-

-finish here, and come to bed. All right?

"You wish to meet them?" she asks, giggling, and she nudges him up to Peter, first, and then Edmund comes by, and she's introducing them, and it's all small talk. None of it is very deep, but Lucy is keeping her eyes on Magnus, bright and cheery.

Peter seems to be more amused by this than anything, and he grabs Lucy. No trouble, he tells her, and she laughs, and he kisses her on the forehead. Watching them, it's so clear that this family is very close, and untroubled. She hops back to Magnus' arm.

"So now you know my terrible secret."

[He closes his eyes a moment as she presses against him.]

Aye. Do you want to go on, and I'll be in when I've finished?

[He doesn't want her to go, but he only needs to rinse his hair.]

[She gets up, and she nods. She undresses and curls in her bed, and knows he won't be long.

When he gets there, her hands reach out for him, first.]

George.

[She smiles just a little.]

[He slides into bed with her, wrapping his arms around her. When she's so close to him, the rest of it doesn't matter so much.]

Lucy. I'm sorry, love. I hope you know I don't blame you. I don't...none of this was your fault.

I do know that.

[She tangles close to him, her head against his chest, so that she can hear his heartbeat.]

It has been a very tiring day. It is a miracle that we did not say a word that we could use to harm each other.

Aye. I think you're right about that.

[He holds her close against him, one hand curled around the back of her head.]

I love you, and I'm so happy to have married you. Whatever else comes with it.

Magnus does wish to meet them, if only to learn what might get under their skin later. Lucy seems the trickster, but well loved despite it, or for it. So coming up with ideas to plague her brothers seems a good idea, and fun at that.

"Ah, yes, terrible," he says with a smirk. "Golden child, youngest daughter, beloved by family and subjects alike. You are made up of awful things, aren't you?"

"I am," she says, laughing, "an impossible child. Sunny beyond belief. And an endless source of exasperation," she adds. "Ask anyone. Ask my brothers," she says, but she's tugging at Magnus' hands.

He is safe here. She is safe with him. Visitors do not come to Narnia if they would harm the queen. "And so now I must learn something about you."

I love you.

[She says it, and she smiles just against his chest.]

I love you, and I do not regret that I love you. You are meant for me.

He's not used to this kind of attention. Alec wasn't one for public displays of affection, except when the moment called for it. (There were a lot of close calls, after all, and one can be expected to hug/hold/kiss one's boyfriend/husband in those moments.) But here he is being tugged along by a bright and shining girl and he feels old and rusty for it, in the moment.

"What would you have of me?" he asks. "Ask any question, and I might just answer."

She considers him. "I would ask a great deal of you," she says, her nose wrinkling up a little. "But I think I will start small," she tells him, and spins him. "You can come here, however, to make mischief with me. What could I do for you?"

[He smiles as well, into her hair, and relaxes a little.]

And you are meant for me.

[He's quiet a moment.]

Do you know what I think? I think Aslan brought me here for you.

[Or the Angel sent him, but he's been in Narnia too long not to have realized who it was who found him in that cave.]

[She smiles.]

You do not oft speak of the Lion, my love.

[She keeps her body pressed up against his.]

I think so too. I think you were lost, and only I could find you.

He spins and tries not to feel it in any part of his body, other than an ever so slight dizziness.

Magnus pauses with his bottom lip between his teeth, his hands settling politely above her hips.

"Another dance," he says. "You haven't any foreign dignitaries around that expect something of you, do you? We could refuse them and dance together all night."

It feels...strange to talk about him.

[People don't talk about Raziel at home. Not like he's real. Not like they talk about Aslan here.]

I'm so glad you found me.

She comes in close to him, so they're almost scandalously close - another inch and the rumors would reach Calormen tonight - and she smiles, her hands on his shoulders. "Of course," she says. "I always have ambassadors and princes and diplomats from across the world after me."

She lets him tip them into the dance floor. "Tonight my eyes are only for you. Let them wonder who is this mysterious man."

Will you sleep?

[She asks, and she presses her head against his heart.]

I will be here when you wake. And you do not have to leave.

"I can see why," he says in a low voice, just for her. It's the truth, even if it is a touch flirtatious. She's captivating, easy to get lost in, and any one would be happy to be in her presence, scandal or no.

He's grateful for it now. Because it's every distraction he's needed over these past several months that he's ever needed.

They dance through the night. Every time they pause, for drink or a breath, which is infrequent, someone tries to approach. But Magnus is quick to pull her away, act a touch possessively, and when he's not quick enough, she politely but laughingly declines.

The night draws on. People start to leave. The musicians play their final notes and Lucy and Magnus are still left on the dance floor.

He doesn't stop dancing, but hums a soft rendition of Beyonce's "Halo" as he leads her.

She could ask them to keep playing, but she won't. There is something comforting about this, about being the last; Edmund, even, has found his way back to his room. It is deeply late, and they keep dancing.

She doesn't recognize the song, but she is just tired enough that she presses her head against his chest, then, a scandalous embrace for the beginning of the night but at the end of it easily excused with tiredness and lack of witnesses.

"You are an excellent person to have beside me on a night like this one," she tells him, pleased beyond measure.

Aye.

[He trails his fingers over her back, up the back of her neck.]

Will you? I'll still be here when you wake this time.

Perhaps I will not.

Perhaps the High King will summon me early to tell me a new rule he has concocted to make me regret marrying you.

[Joke's on him - she will not regret it.]

"Mm, is that because I enchanted your shoes to be more comfortable after song eight?" Not that Magnus was counting. But at a certain point, he had wanted to make sure that Lucy had no excuse to stop dancing, period.

Not that he's sure it was necessary. There's such deep magic here, in everything. He wouldn't be surprised if the very stones in the hall wouldn't have softened themselves beneath her feet if she asked them to.

She looks up at him, her eyebrows going straight up, and the surprise on her face is crystalline; she didn't expect that. "Did you really?" she asks, her smile wide and her laugh coming from the very pit of her belly, taking up every part of her.

"Why, I thought it was magic, but I thought it was the kind of magic that came from dancing with a handsome man, where you forget your discomforts!" she announces, and she pitches forward to kiss him. This time it is right at the corner of his mouth, a sweet sort of invitation for more.

narnia au;

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