Epilogue
Prince Caspian’s court was almost impossible to describe.
The high stone walls, decorated with hundreds of rich tapestries, were illuminated by the brilliant glow of crystal torches and wreaths of exotic flowers Isolde did not recognize.
She tightly held her husband’s hand, her eyes searching through the crowded hall for someone she had not seen in more than two years.
“Over here, my love,” Lysande leaned toward her ear, pressing a soft, warm kiss to the sensitive skin beneath it. Her heart leaped at his touch, and Lysande had to steady her weight when her sister suddenly appeared before her in the crowd.
Princess Meera, although she no longer carried the royal title, was still nothing but a princess in the way she held herself.
Isolde immediately released her husband’s hand and ran toward her sister.
The crowd watched from the corners of their eyes, wine glasses pressed against their lips, as the two sisters embraced tightly.
They cried into each other’s hair, looking each other over and searching for any signs of the painful years that had passed since that fateful morning at the docks.
“Oh, my darling, I heard what they did to you,” Meera said softly, and Isolde lowered her head for a moment, her fingers catching on the silk of her dress.
“What matters is that it ended well, but let us not talk about the past. Ah, look at you, you practically glow!” Isolde exclaimed, spreading her sister’s arms apart so she could look at her properly.
And the truth was, she almost did glow. Her eyes shone with pure happiness, her cheeks had grown rounder from a peaceful, undisturbed life, and her dark hair was long, healthy, and glossy.
“Princess,” Isolde heard her husband say as he bowed respectfully to Meera, and Corian himself approached beside them with a wide smile stretched across his scarred face.
“Ah, lord, you do not have to call me by that title anymore. I think I lost it long ago,” Meera said with a warm smile, waving her hand dismissively, and Lysande laughed, the deep rumble vibrating in his chest.
“As you wish, but please do not call me lord either.” He shrugged, still unable to grow truly accustomed to the heavy title.
Lord Lysande. To him, it simply did not sound the same as Ser. Now he was like every other wealthy lord in the realm, while once he had been Princess Isolde’s brave knight.
Meera studied his face carefully—a face that, like Corian’s, now carried the deep, silver scars of Faran’s old rage. She said nothing about it, returning her gaze to Isolde instead, although it was obvious from the tightening of her jaw that she was angry about what they had done to him.
“How does married life suit you, little sister?” Meera asked, gently taking Isolde’s hand.
Isolde only threw her head back, trying to hide the deep blush spreading across her face. Several steps behind them, just as in the old days, Corian and Lysande remained apart from their princesses, silently following their every movement.
“I fall in love every single day, and I wake up with even more love in my heart,” Isolde finally said, squeezing her sister’s fingers. She turned toward Corian and winked at him playfully before pulling her sister into another tight embrace.
“What say you? Would you mind being a godmother to my child?” Meera asked quietly into her ear.
Isolde pulled away in complete shock, her breath catching. “Pardon?” A massive smile was already spreading across her face. “You are...?”
Meera only nodded excitedly, her eyes filling with happy tears. When Corian’s strong arm protectively moved across her stomach and pulled her securely against his chest, a single tear rolled down her cheek. “I’m pregnant,” she whispered.
The sisters embraced once more in pure joy, while the two former knights greeted each other with a firm, respectful handshake.
“I must say, sister, while Prince Caspian has given us even more than we deserve here, I do miss our home, our gardens,” Meera admitted softly.
She closed her eyes for a moment, remembering the green meadows, the rose gardens, and the fresh forests where she had grown up.
“I do wish our child could grow up there.”
Lysande somehow appeared beside them with glasses of wine, offering them to the princesses. Isolde looked around the crowded room, then moved closer to her sister. She knew that most people here did not speak their language, but it was always better to be completely safe.
“You can come home, both of you,” she whispered into Meera's ear. “Father will abdicate the throne soon. That is why Sanaedeo could not join us on this journey.”
Meera’s eyes widened in surprise.
“Speaking of our brother,” Isolde continued, keeping her voice as quiet as possible, “he brought his Forest Witch to court. We made such a perfect, plan, him and I, that soon we should have her as our crowned queen.”
Meera turned toward Corian with a bright smile, and he immediately approached her and kissed her forehead. “Then we sail home with you, princess,” he replied without hesitation.
The sisters danced and laughed and tried different exotic dishes they had never seen in their lives, until the crowd slowly parted and Prince Caspian, who had been sitting on his throne with his gold crown lazily resting over his brow, finally joined them.
“My princesses,” he addressed them in his familiar, arrogant voice. “I have come to say I am sorry about your brother. It is a true shame what happened to him,” he said in their native language, and Isolde nearly began to laugh aloud.
“Yes, the death of our brother was truly tragic,” Isolde said politely, and Caspian smirked, adjusting his cuffs.
“Lies do not flow from your lips as smoothly as they are said to have once done, princess,” he told her. She raised her head and cocked one eyebrow in defiance.
Their husbands approached from their side and greeted the prince, and he gave them a respectful nod back.
“Faran’s cruelty reached even across the sea,” he said, adjusting his crown before briefly stopping to follow the gaze of a beautiful lady who passed beside him.
“The fact that he died by the hand of an innkeeper’s daughter is somehow poetic, don’t you think, princess?”
he asked, not expecting Isolde to agree with his rot aloud.
“Ah, well.” He startled when another lady passed close to him, and he reached out to touch her bare arm as she walked by.
She gave him a shy yet seductive smile, and his eyes hooded.
“May he rot in whatever hole they dropped him into.”
With that, he greeted the princesses and their husbands before sitting back down upon his throne, this time with that same lady pulled onto his lap.
Isolde could not help but notice the single young servant standing against the stone wall near the throne, tears pooling in her eyes as she quickly lowered her gaze from the couple.
But before Isolde could say anything about it, the music began playing again, and Lysande’s strong arm snaked around her waist.
“Would you care for a dance, princess?” he asked, kissing her neck with his warm, soft lips.
Corian was already dancing in the middle of the room with Meera, and Isolde wrapped her arms around the neck of her lord and still her eternal shadow. “Yes, my darling Blood Knight,” she replied.
They danced the whole night away, whispering sweet, forbidden nothings to each other. Just as they had done hundreds of times before, the princess and the knight kissed one another with quiet promises of a sweet future and journeys they would take.
Yet, just as they sometimes used to do back in the castle, they slipped away from the noise of the ballroom and found one of the beautiful meadows of this, to them unknown realm.
Holding hands beneath the fading stars, they watched the sun rise over them.