Caspian/Edmund: Not Enough

[clovenbuttercup]

Title: Not Enough
Rating: T
Setting: Voyage of the Dawn Treader
Character(s): Caspian X, Edmund Pevensie, Ramandu's Daughter (mentioned).
Pairing(s): Caspian X/Edmund Pevensie, Caspian X/Ramandu's Daughter (implied)
Notes: Bookverse, with filmverse casting (and the filmverse's name for Ramandu's daughter).  This returns to themes explored in That’s The Deal, about Edmund’s imminent departure from Caspian’s life and how he recognises and deals (or fails to deal) with the part Ramandu’s daughter will play in Caspian’s future.  The title and the lyrics quoted at the beginning of this piece are both from the song Chasing Cars by Snow Patrol.
Disclaimer: Characters you recognise belong to C. S. Lewis.
Summary: For Ed, this is seeing the future; he doesn’t like what it’s showing him.

Those three words?
They’re said too much;
They’re not enough.

It doesn’t matter whether you and Ed love each other.  You both know you have no future; the Lion could descend upon you and separate you for ever at any point.  And Ed’s almost at the age Peter was when Aslan forbade him Narnia.

Yet acknowledging what you can’t have doesn’t keep you from wanting it.  In fact, it almost makes things worse.  It hasn't, can’t, change how you feel about each other.  You still drown in Ed and he in you, your connection already deep enough that to break it off now won’t make the inevitable parting any less painful.

Sometimes you’re full of heat and passion.  Sometimes it’s slow and drawn out, with an aching tenderness.  Every night between you is different.  You lie in each other’s arms afterwards, unwilling to be any distance apart, and listen to each other’s breathing.  Now and then, you talk in low voices about what it would be like to spend a lifetime ruling side by side.

This lasts until you arrive on Ramandu’s Island and meet the Star and his daughter.  You can’t hide anything from Ed, and wouldn’t if you could.  You can tell when he notices your reaction to Lilliandil; his face shuts down, and he won’t meet your eyes.  For Ed, this is seeing the future; he doesn’t like what it’s showing him.  You can read him well enough by now to know he’s jealous; in fact, it’s obvious enough you need not read him at all.

He pushes you away later when, under the guise of ship’s business, you try to broach the subject with him, and he doesn’t come back to you until after everybody else has gone to bed.  He’s silent, and his eyes are so full of pain it hurts to look at him.  You open your arms to him and don’t say a word; words won’t help what ails him.  You make slow and passionate love to him, trying to put across with hands, mouth, and body what you cannot say in words, and you think (you hope) it’s enough.

It isn’t until you wake up halfway through the night, to find him with his face buried in your shoulder crying in his sleep, that you realise there’s only one thing that could ever be enough.  It hurts beyond measure to know you cannot give it to him.

He wants to stay here, with you, and be the one you wed.