Sorry this took longer than expected. My excuses are that I wrote a novel and rewrote a quarter of another novel and edited another like mad…Yeah, we all know my excuses by now ;)

Thank you to Faucon Bleu as always, to PadrePedro for your review and also to Guest – here's the update haha.

The King and the Fisher Boy

"Aravis, I'm in love with you."

No, that would never work. He couldn't just walk up to her and say it. She'd be surprised and confused and then he'd be confused as they both tried to figure out what was going on. He'd have to build up to it somehow.

"Aravis, will you marry me?"

He shook his head. His reflection shook his head too. Potentially even worse.

"Aravis, I'm in love with you. I don't want to spend a day apart for the rest of our lives and I want to marry you if you'll have me."

Build-up, he reminded himself. Maybe he could start with 'how are you?' and then launch into his feelings. Or maybe he should hold her hand first or kiss her.

His chest tingled. In the two days since Aravis had shown him her equal rights bill, he'd tried to trace back how long he'd been in love with her. He couldn't remember when it must have started, only that he didn't want it to stop. It was obvious really that he'd been in love with Aravis once he'd started thinking about it. He'd been having dreams about kissing her for years. He only wanted to dance with one person at the court balls. And he couldn't imagine a future where Aravis wasn't his wife.

He also couldn't imagine how he was going to go from Aravis not his wife to Aravis his wife.

He slumped onto his bed. It should not be this hard to tell a girl he'd known for a third of his life that he was in love with her. Why couldn't she have realised he was being serious in the library?

He'd decided – possibly because he wanted to – that Aravis hadn't been expecting a marriage proposal and he'd said it at the wrong time. Aravis could be weird about her feelings if brought up unexpectedly and surprises were hit and miss. Once he'd gifted her a new dress and she'd started crying.

"Why would you do this?" she'd said.

"I just wanted to get you a present," Cor had said. "You know, for your birthday." He'd been expecting smiles and laughter and maybe some teasing about his terrible fashion sense. He hadn't thought she'd burst into tears over a dress.

"As though giving me a home isn't enough," she'd mumbled. It had taken ten minutes and an awful lot of hugging and hair-stroking to calm her down. And then she'd said if he told anyone she'd cried, she'd tell Corin he kept a diary.

Since then, surprises for Aravis always felt risky. But how could he propose without it being a bit of a surprise? Send a note saying: Dear Aravis, Just to let you know, I'll come to your room at four this afternoon to propose. Be ready (and please don't burst into tears). Lots of love, Cor xxx

That was probably worse than just proposing, but he needed the right time. He needed the right words. He needed to do something else or he was going to shrivel up from anxiety like a fisher boy facing a Tarkheena in the hot Calromene sun.

-O-

The economic adviser was in his quarters, head down over a sprawl of books and scrolls when Cor and his three shadows came to the door.

"Your majesty," said Lord Girrin, with a curt bow. "How can I be of assistance?"

"The land registry," said Cor.

Lord Girrin raised an eyebrow, then shuffled over to his bookcases. They burgeoned with items, much like his desk. The man was a brilliant mind, but a terrible organiser. He pulled out a few tomes, pushed them back into place, then pulled out another bunch. After a minute, he came back to the desk with a heavy brick of a book, with scraps of parchment sticking out around the edges, and plonked it on the table.

"What did you want it for?" said Lord Girrin.

"Do we have any holdings that have recently become available without heirs to claim them?" asked Cor.

"Is your majesty intending to knight someone?"

"Not exactly," said Cor, though Aravis might like the idea of being Sir Tarkeena. "But I was hoping to give a gift to a dear friend of mine."

Lord Girrin raised his eyebrows. "The Lady Aravis?" he asked.

Cor bit his lip. "Maybe."

Was he that obvious? Who else knew? Corin, of course. Corin had teased him for years…

Corin…

Cor shook his head. Corin had abandoned him and Cor couldn't put off asking Aravis to marry him just because Corin was afraid of being left behind. When Corin got back, Cor would show him he'd never been in danger of being left behind in the first place.

If he got back. Please Aslan, let him come home alive. The search party had yet to send any word back.

"It would be highly unusual to gift the land to Lady Aravis," said the economic adviser. "Women don't usually own their own holdings."

"Your point being?"

"Well the Lords might get uppity about it," said Lord Girrin.

"The Lords will be scandalised by whatever they can," said Cor, then gave the economic adviser an apologetic look.

"Oh, no need to look at me like that," said Lord Girrin. "I'm quite in agreement, but you'll want to watch the Lords. They wield a lot more power than you might realise at this stage, your majesty."

"I'll bear it in mind," said Cor.

He didn't care much for most of his father's court. The majority had never seen the inside of a kitchen, let alone washed their own plates and he thought their insistence on tradition was absurd. It wasn't all of them, but a not insignificant proportion.

"You should remember that you will be King soon as well," said Lord Girrin. "And every decision you take must be taken for the good of the realm."

"Of course," said Cor. "How else would I make my decisions?"

The economic adviser gave him a brief smile. Cor tried not to frown. Marrying Aravis would be for the good of the realm. She would be the fiercest Queen in Archenland's history and if Cor didn't marry her, he'd be a miserable King and a miserable King was no good for his Kingdom.

"Indeed," said Lord Girrin. He turned back to his book. "Now, let me see, recently available holdings."

He flipped through the book, running his fingers down the pages and cross-referencing with a map that was tucked into the front cover. Where his father's maps always showed Archenland as one entity, the land registry map was carved into little chunks of land, like hundreds of miniature countries.

Lord Girrin had a point about the Lords. Cor may not like many of them – they couldn't understand what it meant to be poor and barely acknowledged Cor had been a fisher boy before he came to Anvard – but they were part of the administrative network of Archenland and the Kingdom could not be properly managed without them.

"Aha," said Lord Girrin after a few moments. "There's a small manor house in the Southern Marsh recently available."

Cor peered at the map where Lord Girrin staked his bony finger. "That looks perfect," said Cor.

It was a small plot of land surrounded by farmland, a good day's ride from Anvard in a quiet location that saw little traffic. A perfect hideout for Aravis, if his reign were ever threatened.

"Would you like me to write up the deeds?" asked Lord Girrin.

"In Lady Aravis' name," said Cor. "She is to be the sole and full owner of the property."

-O-

Deeds in hand, Cor knocked on Aravis' door. His stomach felt like it was twisting itself inside out and his palms were sweating like he was weaving fishnets in the midday Calormene sun. This was it. He'd give her the deeds, then ask her to marry him.

"Aravis?" he asked after a few moments when the door didn't open. Maybe he wouldn't give her the deeds immediately. He didn't want her to think he was bribing her to marry him.

He knocked again. No reply.

"Maybe she's not in, your majesty," said Pel.

No, she had to be in. If she wasn't in, how was he going to hold himself together in the face of the Calormene sun? Cor knocked again. Still nothing. "Where could she have gone?"

"I do not pretend to understand the mind of a lady," said Pel.

"In my experience, they're not so different from men," said Yed.

Cor sighed. He wished Corin were here – the old Corin who teased him about Aravis and didn't mind Cor staring at her 'all the time'. Corin would have a plan to propose. It would be daft. It would probably involve throwing mud or boxing or pretending to play chess, but at least it would be a plan.

Cor had tried to rehearse the proposal in his mirror again, but he kept drawing a blank every time he tried to imagine Aravis' reply. Crying, laughing, throwing her tan arms around him?

Shasta, I'm joking.

"Just a theoretical question," said Cor. "If you had to propose to a woman, how would you do it?"

"Flowers?" suggested Pel.

"A picnic?" suggested Pelin.

"An evening under the stars," said Yed.

"An evening under the stars?" said Cor. That seemed far too likely to go wrong. Too surprising. "And Aravis doesn't like flowers. She prefers them to stay on the plants. She thinks picking flowers ruins them."

"Is your majesty planning to propose to the Lady Aravis?" asked Pel.

"What? No!" said Cor. "And don't tell anyone. I can't have it getting back to Aravis."

"So you're not going to propose and it mustn't get back to Lady Aravis?"

"Why does this have to be so difficult?" said Cor. He knocked one more time, even though – "I really don't think she's in, your majesty," said Pel.

Cor looked down at the deeds, at Lord Girrin's neat writing and the name of the new owner – Aravis Tarkheena, the owner of his heart. The only woman he could imagine marrying. His Queen, though he didn't feel like a King when he had to propose. He felt like a fisher boy facing down a Tarkheena in the Calormene sun.

Shasta, I'm joking.

Shasta.

Like she still saw him as the fisher boy.

What if she said no? What if she hadn't dismissed his proposal because it had been a surprise? What if she had realised he'd been proposing and she'd been trying to let him down gently?

"I need some air," said Cor.

"You don't want to find Lady Aravis?" said Yed.

His stomach churned. If he proposed to Aravis again, she'd either say yes or she'd have to tell him outright she wasn't in love with him. Then they wouldn't be able to talk like they did now. She wouldn't brush his neck with her fingers or lean close enough over his shoulder that he could feel her warmth against his.

He'd be alone.

Completely.

"Aravis is probably busy," said Cor. "I need to practice my weapons skills."

Some of you may have noticed I've been editing earlier chapters. I will be doing this every now and then to make the story as coherent and streamlined as possible, so if you fancy re-reading, it's worth bearing in mind.