^ [open post]

[quote_gentle_unquote]

Susan doesn't believe in the mansion spirits, but she is being followed by something in a way that makes little sense.

It begins when she wakes up. Opening the drawer to the sideboard in her room to retrieve tea, she finds another gold chess piece wrapped neatly in ribbon. Lancelot didn't put it there - it hadn't been there when she made her pre-sleep cuppa the night before, and she woke up when he did and sleepily saw him off to his training; he hadn't gone near the drawer. She shuts the chess piece firmly away, makes her tea, and dresses blearily for her own archery practice.

There's a new bow in the closet, too. To her pleasure, it's a heavier one that requires a stronger pull - she's quite got used to the draw of the ones the closet first supplied to her.

After her shooting routine, she finds a lipstick in the precise shade Ingrid used to wear on the bathroom vanity. When she's showered and dressed for the rest of her day, she finds her favorite pastry - a sort of breakfast roll she used to get from the shop by the tube station she'd walk past on her way to work, back in London - on a platter in the kitchen.

It's when she opens one of the closets in the hall off the library to return a pile of laundered wash-cloths that she receives both some clarity and a deepening of the mystery: a jumble of assembled balloons tumbles out, made of some queer material and filled with a gas that keeps them afloat. The writing on them reads: HAPPY BIRTHDAY SUSAN PEVENSIE.

She stares at them, perplexed.


Susan's birthday post! Three days (by our reckoning) and eight months (by her reckoning) early! Feel free to have your puppets run into her in any reasonable location at any point during the day; she's just going to be accumulating more Stuff she can't get rid of as the day goes on.

Comments

[onthewillowsthere]

Exactly. Galahad nods.

[quote_gentle_unquote]

Susan falls into companionable silence then as they make their way to the laboratory where, as promised, she ties off her balloons around a stool. In case Constance should stop by before Susan has a chance to speak with her, she starts jotting off a note explaining them.

[onthewillowsthere]

Meanwhile, Galahad sets up a tent enclosure for the ootheca, and checks on the other habitats while they're there, misting where necessary and occasionally adding leaves or fruit.

"I'm ready," before too very long.

[quote_gentle_unquote]

"As am I." There's another gift by the door to the laboratory - an pristine pair of sturdy gardening snips tucked next to work gloves in precisely her size - and she tucks these away in her pocket and straightens. "Shall we?"

[onthewillowsthere]

"Yes." He doesn't offer her his hand, the way he would Magnus, but he feels the pleasure of walking with a friend nonetheless.

[quote_gentle_unquote]

And Susan, who is in this moment viscerally remembering Galahad as a quiet, wide-eyed little boy who could not be touched by a woman, does not snag his arm. As they make their way out of the Mansion, she asks, "How is married life treating you?"

[onthewillowsthere]

"I'm happy," he says, and then, "Claudius is happy. He calls me husband more than he uses my name." Galahad prefers this. His name, of course, is an ugly trick and a marker of his intended purpose. Husband is a title he has chosen and earned.

[quote_gentle_unquote]

"And you like it that way," says Susan, reassuring herself that this is true even as she says it - she should hate to be called 'wife' over 'Susan.' "Good. I'm ever so pleased to hear it."

[onthewillowsthere]

"I like it," he agrees. "Are you well?"

[quote_gentle_unquote]

"I am." She is, however, still turning over whether she ought to bring up her current quandary to Galahad. He's her closest friend with whom she hasn't a single whiff of romantic entanglement, but then again, he is technically Lancelot's son.

[onthewillowsthere]

Galahad has not observed Susan enough to know when she's not saying something, and he nods and continues in companionable silence. If she wants to speak, she will.

[quote_gentle_unquote]

Perhaps if Galahad were to speak more of marriage, or to ask Susan any specific questions, she might easily open up. As it is, she holds the front door for him, squinting against the brightness of the sunlight.

[onthewillowsthere]

His conversation with Magnus is still on his mind, and after walking a little further he asks, "Do you think I'm different now?"

[quote_gentle_unquote]

Susan regards him for a long moment. She's not noticed any sort of tremendous change - Galahad is still as thoughtful and careful as ever, and she's not certain how best to answer the question. "Would you like to be different now?"

[onthewillowsthere]

"Magnus believes that my marriage will change the nature of our friendship."

[quote_gentle_unquote]

Magnus has queer ideas about the world. "Why on earth would it change your friendship?" Susan wonders. "Is he in love with you?"

[onthewillowsthere]

"No." Galahad is quite confident about this. He remembers what Lan Wangji said about Magnus not always knowing his own feelings. "I think he's jealous," he says.

[quote_gentle_unquote]

"Jealous! Is he in love with Claudius?"

[onthewillowsthere]

"When Lan Wangji and I began training, he was jealous."

[quote_gentle_unquote]

Everything slots into place. "Ah," says Susan. "He's possessive of your time. Is that why he solicited Lancelot into keeping pointless secrets?"

It must be said that she can't keep all of the rancor from her voice; it's clear she's still displeased by Magnus's conditions for training.

[onthewillowsthere]

This particular tone, unfortunately, escapes Galahad. "I believe so. But I don't believe that marriage would change me in that way."

[quote_gentle_unquote]

"No, I can't imagine that it would," says Susan firmly. "You married Claudius for love, yes?"

[onthewillowsthere]

"Yes."

[quote_gentle_unquote]

"And you haven't got to worry about any sort of loss of freedom with your marriage, so it isn't as if there's any sort of tremendous change that should affect you."

[onthewillowsthere]

He tilts his head. Loss of freedom isn't something he'd consider at all. Claudius says that people never bring things up for no reason, and that if something ever seems unusual to him he should pursue it.

"Have you?"