"Hey, spitfire."
Lilith halted her flee as she reached the hospital doors at the sound of the old nickname.
"It wouldn't be proper for a High Queen to be rushing so." The Lord spoke, catching up with the redhead as she turned to glare.
"I don't give a toss."
"I didn't think you would." Caspian replied with a short laugh, "But come on, you're not the one to run away like that. Come talk, somewhere-" he glanced around. "Away from prying eyes."
"There's prying eyes everywhere."
Yet Lilith allowed herself to be lead to the cafeteria.
"You haven't called me that in forever." She spoke minutes later, accepting the coffee she was handed as the Lord sat across from her.
"I haven't had chance." But then the brunet's smile faded, "What happened, Ame- Lilith? You ran."
"I ran so I didn't almost get Gryff killed again." She replied matter of factly, taking a sip of her drink before making a face, "Yikes that's hot."
Caspian rolled his eyes, "It's steaming- of course it's hot. What do you mean nearly get Gr- Sanya killed again?"
"The attacks- the torturing-"
"Wasn't your fault."
"Now you're sounding like Peter."
"Well then he's right!"
Lilith scowled, getting to her feet, "If this is all we're going to discuss-"
Caspian grabbed her wrist quickly, "It's not. I was going to ask how yesterday went, too. After everything. Did you get them all?"
The Queen dropped into her seat, feeling far more in her comfort zone once more.
"Well. We rounded them all up- all we could remember, anyway. Well, one or two escaped but- no one's perfect." She replied with an over dramatic shrug.
Caspian gave an amused nod of agreement.
"Lou's okay?"
"'Course he is. We kicked ass."
"I'd expected nothing less. I'm sorry- I didn't- I left with the Pevensies."
Lilith shook her head, "Don't be. I should've gone, too, really. You went with Susan- it was sweet. Because you looove her."
Caspian gave a short, embarrassed laugh, suddenly finding his mug fascinating. "Perhaps... anyway! No! I'm not taking this bullying!"
Lilith laughed, sipping her now-cooler coffee, "I can bully you all I like! I'm High Queen!"
"Talk about abusing your position." Caspian scoffed, sitting back.
"Is she now?"
"I'm doing nothing of the sort!" Lilith lied terribly but quickly as her husband appeared.
"Such a liar."
"Low blow, Cas." The redhead scowled to her friend again, yet he shrugged and got to his feet.
"I'll leave you two to it."
"Sus- they're still up there. In the family waiting room, now." Peter told the Lord who smiled with a nod.
"See you, Spit."
"Fuck off, Cas."
"Not very 'proper language', Your Majesty."
Lilith glared, snatching her coffee from the hands of her husband once he'd sat in Caspian's recently and attempted to steal her drink.
"Mine. Get your own. And no one's listening."
The High King shrugged, "Yet. Anyway, where'd you disappear off to?"
"The cafeteria." She replied bluntly. "Where does it look like?"
"No more lies, Lil."
"I went for some fresh air."
"Why?"
"I like breathing, believe it or not."
It took Peter everything he was to not quote his brother.
"Managed to breathe, then?" He decided not to pry, she'd tell him when she was ready.
"In a satisfactory manner... Does Ed hate me?"
Peter looked slightly surprised at the abrupt conversation change, but shook his head.
"He's not the happiest but- who can blame him? It's not your fault, though."
"You think I was right to tell her?"
The blond took his wife's hands across the table, "After all we've given you about telling us the truth, how could you be chastised for doing so? Besides, she DID have the right to know. Honestly, I just don't think any of us had the courage to go against his word."
She laughed a little but smiled, "I knew I married you for a reason- Oh! Heard anything of the press?"
The blond's brows furrowed, "I hadn't- I hadn't even thought to check."
"Well-" Lilith spoke, taking back her hands and sliding a paper across the table to her husband, "What do you think to that?"
---------------------
"As always, the press don't know the whole story." Caspian said as Peter and Lilith entered hand-in-hand, looking away from the TV in the Family Lounge, cleared out of everyone except the Royals- even Sanya's family had left to get her some necessities from home.
"Well, they didn't have an inside source this time." Susan, evidently having been curled up against him but now sitting normally, added. "What's the paper?"
"The same as is being shown on there." Lilith answered, handing the paper over. "Fortis, the fact they attacked 'King Edmund's' engagement party, kidnapped us, and surprisingly enough they also know where the base is and that Sanya was in critical condition."
Lucy's eyes snapped to her. "They don't know about her-"
"No, no." Peter shook his head. "They have no idea about WHAT her injuries are, just that they're severe. They don't know about Lilith, either." He added, seeing his other sister open her mouth. "It's all confidential, and people love us."
"We should give an official statement of our own on Sanya and everything, nevertheless. E-" Susan faltered, having forgotten her grieving brother wasn't present. "I-I'll contact someone."
"Shouldn't we change and look at least somewhat royal?" Lilith asked, acutely aware that they had dressed themselves extremely hurriedly that morning, and looked like random stragglers on the road, and not like Monarchs who had been enjoying a dinner party at the Dorchester only a day and a half ago.
"Looking like this would increase public sympathy." Lucy looked uncharacteristically shrewd for a second before adding, "We should tidy ourselves a little, though."
"And- what about Ed?" Peter asked hesitantly. "Should we let him speak?"
"I don't know Edmund half as well as you do, but he's a master at disguising and hiding his emotions." Andrews would have proud of him, was on Lilith's tongue but she curbed it. "It's not a question of letting him speak, but a question of him wanting to."
"I don't think he's going to leave Sanya's side till she gets out of hospital- he's still in the clothes he wore at the Dorchester, after all! I don't even know if he's had a shower." Susan added the last bit quietly.
"No, no, he did, while his future in-laws were in." Lucy informed her, looking giggly. "The face he made as he stepped out of the bathroom..."
"It's funny, if things'll turn out how I think they will, he'll be the only one of us with in-laws." Peter said thoughtfully, putting his arm around Lilith. "Unless we count Caspian's aunt, and Lil's grandmother."
"Caspian and I aren't married!"
"Eh, my gran and I aren't that close anyway now."
"Excuse me, I exist!" Lucy cried indignantly. "I could have in-laws!"
"Lu-Lu, do you even ever WANT to be married?"
The littlest Queen wilted at her brother's question. "Well, not really, no..."
He looked extraordinarily pleased with the answer.
Presently, Edmund entered the room, face pale and sullen and he half-scowled at the happy faces.
"They threw me out, they want to run some more tests." He told them, going and sitting in the farthest sofa. "Might increase the dosage of Benzodiazepines..."
"Calming medication." Peter elaborated to the others, who looked half lost and half horrified at the long word. "Is she still asleep?"
Thankfully, he thought, and did not voice it.
"Yes, she is. Listen, I contacted the media, I read the news online and I thought we should speak to them too-"
"That's exactly what they were planning to do." Caspian told him and then was surprised as the young King looked at him, graveness and- gratitude?- in his eyes.
"I don't know if anyone at all has told you yet, but thank you. You saved Lucy, Sanya- you saved all of us. Thank you. We owe you a debt of gratitude that will never be repaid."
Peter went red at the unconscious dig at him- he SHOULD have thanked Caspian but he just hadn't thought of him.
"It was partly my fault, along with it being my duty and my pleasure, Your Majesty." Caspian bowed his head, happy and even happier as he felt Susan slightly lean her leg against his.
Edmund looked at Lilith for a split-second but was unable to wrangle up any genuine thankfulness towards her, after everything that had happened with Sanya.
Instead, he rose out of the comfortable chair and said, "The media should be arriving in twenty minutes", before leaving and settling into his old position on the floor outside his fiancée's room.
-------------------
"Your Majesties!"
"Here, Your Majesty!"
"Is it true, Your Majesty?"
"Is what true?" Peter decided that ONE of them had to pick one of the shouting journalists to answer, instead of them all simply stood on the hospital steps looking as exhausted as they felt.
"That Her Highness Reza is to die?"
"It most certainly is not."
"Then what IS the truth, Your Majesty?"
"Sanya is stable and shall be discharged within the coming weeks." Edmund spoke firmly before his brother could get out a word.
"Is it true of her miscarriage?"
The brunet King froze. How did they- when did they-
Yet his elder sister came to the rescue, "That's nothing but a horrendous rumour."
"Is it true that High Queen Lilith was part of the rebel group responsible for the kidnapping?"
"Once again, an horrendous rumour!" The brunette Queen gave a surprisingly convincing disbelieving laugh. "I can assure you she couldn't be further from!"
"Are there any more questions that DON'T contrive such ridiculous accusations?" The High King demanded, wishing nothing but to get straight back into the hospital and find out WHERE such information had 'leaked' from.
"Is the wedding still set to go forward?"
"It is!" The youngest Queen spoke quickly, grasping frantically at the change of topic. "Most certainly!"
"Are your sister's claims true, Your Majesty?"
Edmund blinked, rather affronted, his head spinning, "I- yes! Yes, of course they are- it is!"
-
"I don't want any news channels or anything open in Sanya's room, no newspapers, if she sees rumours of our b- of her- of the miscarriage plastered everywhere, it'll be terrible for her recovery." Edmund barked to Lucy, who looked taken aback.
"What's the point in telling ME? What am I to do?"
"You're going to sit outside her room and then inside once the doctors leave, she won't be left alone." He told her, stopping his stride and letting his family catch up to him. "I'm going to find out who the fuck leaked everything to the press."
"I'll help." Lilith found the courage to speak out, looking so grim and determined the younger King couldn't say no.
"We need a list of everyone who's got access to her medical records, then, and anyone who would've been stationed near the Family lounge and could listen in." Peter said, looking to Susan, who nodded.
"I'll go speak with the Chief Executive of the Hospital." She nodded, and left, wondering where Caspian had disappeared off to.
"There are only 2 possible Nurses and a Doctor who had access to the records." Susan recited as they regrouped- none with any luck- half an hour later. "Doctor Drune, Nurse Stride and Nurse Medilock."
"Medilock." Lilith spoke decidedly.
"What?" The High Queen asked a moment later, 4 frowning, confused faces turning to look to her. "I didn't like her."
"Me neither." Lucy agreed. "She was a bit of a bitc- potential outlay of confidential information." The young Queen corrected herself, slightly over dramatized - yet pointedly- to her elder sister, who simply rolled her eyes.
"Well then, we'll have her taken in for questioning." Peter decided, accepting his sister's and wife's judgement with ease.
"And the other two. Drune and Stride. I want them all questioned." Edmund added firmly. "Within the next 3 hours."
"Needy, Ed?" Susan attempted with a light-heart, yet accepted her brother's glare before he disappeared back into his fiancée's hospital room.
"10 out of 10 for effort, Su."
"Oh, shut up, Peter." The brunette snapped, turning on her heel.
"Where're you going?" Lucy queried with a frown.
"To go find Cas- pian. The hospital's making me claustrophobic."
"You say that like anyone likes hospitals, Su!" The High King called to his sister's retreating back, yet was simply left amused as his sister held up her hand over her shoulder, displaying a highly un-Queenly finger gesture.
Lucy let out a laugh, "Oh, but I can't even say 'crap'."
"'Course you can't, Lu. It's improper for a Queen to use such language." Peter spoke mechanically, watching the eldest sister leave as he put an arm around his wife.
The blond received both a light slap and sharp nudge in the ribs simultaneously.
-
"Where are you going?" Sanya asked Edmund two hours later, as Peter entered to room to beckon her fiancé out. "I thought you said you wouldn't leave m- wouldn't leave."
"It's just some matters with the press." He reassured her, hiding a grin as she glared at Peter as well, most of her inhibitions dropped down.
"You're lying to me again. Aren't you? Isn't he?" She added to Peter, who looked panicked and exited the room hastily.
"Please STOP flying into hysterics, darling, you know what happened to you." The brunet told her warningly but gently.
"I just got a fever." She attempted a shrug but winced- damn the metal whip. "That's a normal occurrence for human beings."
"Of a 105! That's not normal at all!" He frowned at her nonchalance. "Listen, someone here's leaked information about your- condition and about Lilith's affiliation and we're trying to find out who."
"Oh." She said shortly, realising what about her 'condition' must've been leaked. She wanted to ignore that part. "Alright, uh, just keep me posted." She requested before adding, "If my parents aren't back yet from home, could you tell them to get a book for me? Anything, really, I would read something on my phone but...I don't know where it is."
"It's with them, but I'll tell them." He promised, leaning down and kissing her forehead- still hot. "Be safe."
"I'm stuck in a hospital room, there isn't anything dangerous here to do." She rolled her eyes. "I've had enough of pain, anyway."