It was hard not to notice her, she was perfect in his eyes. Every movement she made was regal and spirited, the true procession of the Queen. Her dark hair hung around her shoulders in vibrant waves that made her eyes glow mysteriously like blue candlelight. The sky above him could not rival the beauty of her depthless luminescent face.

She was distant this morning, or more so than he had become used to seeing her. She was usually much more open with her feelings, if not in words in other more intelligently ethereal ways. Susan was the most careful person he'd ever met. She made each step with each foot separately testing the ground beneath them. She was a protector, a peacekeeper. She was bred for it.

He wanted to reach out and touch her face as she sat beside him under the trees watching Lucy and Reepicheep frolic in the courtyard of the Telmarine Palace. But every time he tried, she cast it away casually, her hand barely brushing his.

She was wearing a solid wine gown that day that he'd had tailored for her upon her arrival. It was detailed with tiny golden lions along the bodice that represented their beloved Aslan in his roaring might and loving gaze.

Peter was watching him again from where he was sparring with Edmund. It was hard not to stare back. Caspian kept expecting to see hostility in Peter's eyes. There wasn't any to be found now that the battle against Miraz and Sopespian's forces were destroyed. It seemed that finally Peter had given Caspian his blessing.

Edmund was once again managing to stand his own against his older brother.

Peter had the look of Susan that morning, like he knew there was a painful event in the future that he couldn't escape.

Caspian hadn't seen his aunt in a few days, nor his cousin. He liked it that way. The prickle of the crossbow bolt tearing into his flesh as Pruniprisma defended Miraz would never likely be forgotten. She had betrayed him as well, even if she hadn't at first intended to do so.

Glozelle rarely left her side, and that was just as well. The general had a thing or two to learn about loyalty. It had burned him badly. There wasn't much hope left in him for retribution. All intentions aside, he had truly gone down with his King.

Susan was watching his casual expression with her fierce eyes. She had the look of a lioness that morning, like she was ready to pounce at the slightest movement.

"What is it?" Caspian asked her finally after he noticed that her attention had strayed permanently from Lucy's comedy.

Susan didn't reply, she only looked down at the grass beneath her and sighed. She looked over at Peter and then up at the colonnade where he expected she looked for Aslan.

Caspian touched her chin and brought it up to his gaze. She tried to smile but failed miserably.

"I'm just thinking, that's all," she promised him. It wasn't hard to guess she was lying about something.

"Why are you afraid?" he asked her again.

Susan shook her head, "If not afraid, really. I just want to walk for a while." She made to stand and shook the wrinkles from the fabric of her dress.

"I'll come with you if you'd like," he told her emphatically.

She took his hand somewhat hesitantly, again noticing Peter's wandering gaze.

"You worry too much," she told Caspian. "I'm sure everything will go smoothly tomorrow."

She was reading into his expression now, using her intuitiveness to gauge his mood from the intense shadow in his eyes.

They made their way up the staircase and into the palace, on the way to the private rooms that had once belonged to his parents, and then his uncle. The forceful ringing of sword on sword still reverberated on the stone walls of his city. He still felt the familiar weight of his sword burdening him.

Susan let go of his hand. She seemed to think of turning away and walking the other direction without him, Caspian noticed her eyes dart to the corridor leading to her guest quarters.

"Why can't you trust me?" he asked her. "After all we've been through..."

She silenced him with her steely gaze. "You wouldn't understand." She brushed her hand under the water of a hallway fountain.

"Susan," he took her hand again. "I don't understand because you won't tell me anything. I feel like I'm on the fringe, like I'll never ever be anything more than Caspian the Tenth to you."

She turned quickly causing her hair to tumble in cascades of beautiful dark curls.

"You're more than that to us."

"I asked about you. Not Peter. Not Edmund. Not Lucy. You."

Susan closed her eyes. "I don't know what to say. It's not like it's easy, you know. Last time I tried to have a life in Narnia, I lost that chance. Now I'm sure it will happen again, and in less time. How do I know where to draw the line between the Queen and the schoolgirl who is nothing but Phylis to an odd boy from across the way?"

Caspian silenced her by closing his arms around her in a comforting embrace. "Is that what's bothering you and Peter? You worry about going back to this England?"

"How can I not? One minute I'm in my thirties riding through the forest without a care in Narnia, and the next I'm falling back through the wardrobe and I'm a teenager again, trapped back in my world." She let him hold her. "I would be foolish to avoid the thought."

Caspian noted the fear and hesitance in her voice. "And is there something in Narnia worth trying for? Something you fear of losing?"

Susan looked into his dark brown eyes and took his cheek. "I'm free here. I see my family happy. Peter isn't angry the way he was. He doesn't feel like he's treated like a child. Edmund isn't always trying to make up for shortcomings. Lucy is given a chance to be strong. I have...

"We all have a chance to fix our mistakes together. It's not like that in England. We don't belong there anymore. I kind of feels like a whole different place now."

Caspian shook out her hair and made her look to the wall behind them to the tapestry of them he'd hung on the wall opposite his chamber. "How can you not live on here? You are a piece of this place, Susan. You made this place a peaceful city again."

She shook her head. "I just can't. Like I said, I wouldn't expect you to understand." She turned away. "Let it go, Caspian."

He took her cheek and kissed it gently. "There was a reason the horn brought me you."

"And what if that reason runs out?"

"Kiss me," he told her. "Kiss me, and if your time runs out I'll let you go."

Susan evaded his gaze.

"Give us a chance, Susan."

Caspian looked at her desperately, his thick dark hair matching hers in their closeness.

"It hurts too much."

"If you ignore it, you'll never know."

"If I don't fall in love with you, then I won't have anything to lose."

It was hard to make her stop talking and just feel the world around her with her heart. It was racing.

"Give me a chance."

Susan slid her hand up his arm to his shoulder. "It's better this way, you'll see that in time." She clasped her other hand around his wrist and leaned against him before breaking away.

Caspian noticed Peter in the hall waiting for her with the shadow of Aslan as company.

Susan walked away with her brother and the lion.

He didn't see her again until the next day at high noon as the procession began to lead the Telmarines to their homeland on Earth.

Peter and Susan were walking with the God-Lion again, this time more regally, with finality.

Caspian noted the hint of sadness in their faces had only escalated.

They wore blue a color showing both royalty and mourning. He began to wonder if there would be more than a single farewell that day.

"I wish we had more time together," Caspian told her, letting his heart spill out of his chest. It was too hard to watch her.

"It never would have worked anyway," Susan encouraged.

"Why not?"

Her face lit up for a moment. "I am thirteen-hundred years older than you."

Caspian tried to smile, but there wasn't any happiness left in him. His companions were leaving and two of them he would never see again.

She turned away, back toward her siblings who were finishing their goodbyes. He caught her gaze just as she prepared to follow them.

And in a moment she was running back, grabbing him in her arms and kissing him with all the strength she had left. She let their lips linger for a moment, whispering only to him in words he would never repeat.

He touched the neckline of her dress just as she broke away, slipping a tiny note into her dress lining. "Goodbye, Susan," he told her quietly.

She was already walking away feeling the intense stares of her siblings. Edmund and Lucy were bickering about things they didn't understand.

Peter watched over them almost proudly. It was his last move as High King Peter the Magnificent, for what would be a long while, that he looked over at Caspian and nodded in silent approval.

Caspian pulled Peter's sword from the sheath and lifted it over his head just as the four Pevensies disappeared into the hollow of the tree.

Aslan roared so powerfully that the reverberation could be heard across Narnia and in Archenland to the south.

Trufflehunter, Glenstorm, and Reepicheep bowed their heads to their new king.

And so began the reign of Caspian the Tenth, known to history as the Navigator; the Telmarine who saved Narnia.