Disclaimer: I own nothing in this marvelous universe; it all belongs to C. S. Lewis and Walden Media.

Author's Note: Erm…it's been a rather long time, hasn't it? ::smiles sheepishly:: My apologies. Please be assured that I most certainly have not given this story up, but its updates may be a while coming—being a full-time teacher doesn't really leave much time for little treats like this, but I have been wanting to get this chapter out for a while. ::grins:: I hope you approve!

Reviewers: All 187 of you, thank you so much!

Rating: T

Summary: It is four very different children Helen Pevensie greets at the train station after they have returned from the countryside…(Book and Moviebased) (Familyfic) (NO Slash) (PREQUEL TO NIGHTTIME DEMONS)

"Speech"

'Personal Thoughts (Italics)'

Memories/Quotes (Italics)

.:Helen's Children:.

By Sentimental Star

Trust

Helen is too stunned to move when Edmund lashes out at Peter, still reeling from her eldest child's uttered statement.

"You idiot!"

His older brother easily grabs his fist, and Edmund squeezes his eyes shut: "Are you even listening to yourself? There isn't a power in this world that can undo all of…th-that!"

Helen has no idea what "that" is, but she suspects it might hold the answers to all the questions she can't ask.

Peter reaches out a hand to touch his brother's cheek again, "But, Ed, I'm-"

"You're an imbecile!"

She winces when Edmund's voice cracks, "An extremely important imbecile, but an imbecile nonetheless! You selfless ass, if you just stopped to think a minute-!"

Peter vigorously shakes his head. "Edmund, I have no right-!"

"Bollocks, you don't, Pete! You practically raised us while we were-"

Helen delicately clears her throat.

Edmund's tongue stills and she is fascinated by the mixed rebellious/embarrassed look that colors his cheeks.

Peter takes the opportunity to gently wrap his arm around Edmund's shoulders, pulling his younger brother into his side.

Helen catches the hitch in Edmund's voice when he speaks, watches as her younger son turns to twist his fingers in Peter's pajamas, burying his face in the warm fabric. His voice shakes, "I won't let you go."

Tears well up in Helen's eyes—it has been so long since she has seen them thus. In the years before the war, when Edmund and Peter were very small, her eldest always went everywhere with Edmund perched on his hip. Even when his brother grew too big, even when Peter could no longer carry him, it was not uncommon to find Edmund with his hand tucked into the older boy's.

Then boarding school came, and with it the war. Everything changed: quarrels over the tiniest thing, blown out of proportion, resulted in her two boys going for days without speaking to each other. Hurts and misunderstandings, never soothed over, caused beds to remain full and separate, as they never had before the war. Edmund withdrew, then exploded. Peter exploded, then ignored. Colin leaving to fight had only exacerbated an already unraveling situation.

She and her husband had begun to lose hope that their sons would ever mend the rift between them, and the chasm grew daily, until they had been almost sure it would never be crossed.

Yet, somehow, some way, the children's relocation to the countryside had completely reversed the situation.

She cannot ask why, too afraid of receiving another answer like Peter's. She is not sure she would even believe them if she tried: there is a monumental difference between the children she entrusted into God's keeping and the ones that have returned to her. Logically then, something of equal magnitude—or greater—must have happened to make it so.

That thought is rather frightening, actually. What power existed that could change her children to such a mind-numbing degree? She had sent them to the countryside specifically to prevent anything like that from occurring.

Helen sees now that it may have been a fool's hope that had driven her.

Tbc.