Chronicles Of Narnia: The Sorceress' Curse

Chapter 6 : Bells and Birds

When we arrive at the ford, we are greeted with the sight of the Telmarines building a bridge, and I've resigned myself into not mentioning Aslan again and coming to a somewhat begrudging agreement with Peter.

We are crouched behind thick brambled bushes of green leaves, safely hidden from the Telmarine's sight, but still apprehensive of attack and on edge.

"Perhaps this wasn't the best way after all." Susan says and we creep away from the forest's edge.

"Well..." I begin tentatively. "We should go back to the gorge then."

No one protests.

*

"Where do you think you saw Aslan?" Peter asks Lucy and I when we arrive back at the gorge. The air seems different, yet I don't know how, and so do the trees.

"I wish you'd all stop acting like grown-ups!" Lucy protests in exasperation. "I didn't think I saw him, I did see him!"

I turn back and I begin to walk closer to the edge of the gorge. "Lucy's right, you've all been acting different lately," I pause and peer back at them. "Yes. Different."

"We're different?" Peter repeats. "If anything, you're different Ellea." He turns back to Lucy. "Where did you see him then?"

"Right around..."

"What's that supposed to me- AH!" The dirt beneath my feet crumbles beneath me, and instead of plummeting to my death on sharp rocks and in icy water, I land on a rock outcrop several feet beneath where I was standing before hand.

Lucy peers over the edge at me. "... Here." She finishes and I smile.

"Well," I say and I turn and gesture to a path to the left and behind me; it's steep and narrow and going slantwise down the gorge between rocks, and it's barely enough to walk comfortably, but it leads to the bottom of the gorge.

I stand up and begin to slowly make my way down, a hand kept solidly on the wall to the side of me so I wouldn't fall.
The trees are so still I can hear myself think, and, to be perfectly honest, I don't think I want to.

*

There are lots of differences between Narnia and England.

The night skies are different. England is seasonal when it comes to stars, and it has to be a good night. But the Narnian sky holds galaxies and milky ways and a thousand constellations unlike the ones that I would see from the roof top of Grandpa's house.

"Ellea, Lucy, are you awake?" Susan whispers and I take one last look at the night sky before closing my eyes and rolling over.

"Yes." I whisper back.

Lucy shifts beside me. "Hm." She agrees.

"Why do you think I couldn't see Aslan?" She asks us and I roll over again to look at her. Her soft brown eyes are full of hurt and confusion, and my heart squeezes.

"... I don't know. Maybe you didn't really want to." Lucy says and I bite my lip a little bit.

I glance over my shoulder at Trumpkin, and I have the sudden, fleeting feeling that he's listing, but I just turn back and ignore it.

"You always knew we'd be coming back here, didn't you?" Lucy asks and I turn back to face the night sky.

"I hoped so." I say and then I close my eyes. "Grandpa used to say I would, he hoped he would too, one day, that's why he built the wardrobe."

"I just got used to the idea of living in England." Susan mumbles and I smile a little, opening my eyes.

"But you're happy to be here, aren't you?" Lucy asks and I think Susan smiles.

"While it lasts." She mumbles and slowly I fall into sleep.

The laughing of a Dryad wakes me up. The cherry blossom petals are floating above me in the form of a woman with flowing hair, she smiles and moves to help me up, roots pushing me up from the floor. She laughs again and explodes into flowers that whirl and catch in my hair.

Where are my friends? I briefly wonder before the sound of bells fill my ears and I am distracted again.

A flash catches my eye and I turn to inspect it, beneath my bare feet is a path of moss and tiny white flowers, but my eyes are focused on a brilliant white dove that is perched on the branch of a birch tree.

I reach out a hand to touch it, but it flies to the next tree, and the birches part. I follow the dove which flies out of reach every time I wish to touch it, until I come to a clearing and it disappears.

"Elleanora," A rumbling voice says. "Oh how you've grown."

I turn and behind me stands Aslan in all of his golden glory, smiling as much as a lion could smile. But I gasp and run towards him, tripping over my dress in my hurry to wrap my arms around his neck and bury my fingers in his soft fur to see if he was actually there.

"I've missed you," I tell him softly before drawing back and smiling brightly. "And you've grown too!" I notice and Aslan chuckles.

"Every year you grow, so shall I." He says and I frown then.

"There are so many things I want to ask you, Aslan, but I don't know where to begin..."

"Do not worry, we have time."

I hesitate, biting my lip. "Did me and Lucy really see you?" I ask. "Back at the gorge? Where you really there?"

"I am always there, Elleanora. But I am also both here and near and far." I furrow my brow at his words. "Of course you saw me, what made you think not so?"

"Well, no one else did so... I guess... I doubted myself..." I lower my head and with a nudge of his nose under my chin he moves my head up to look him in the eyes.

"Do not doubt yourself, after all, you shall always have yourself yet you may not always have others." He looks me up and down. "You are much like a young Prince I know of; Caspian. Stay strong, Elleanora."

I nod slowly. "I see..."

Something in the air shifts.

"Aslan, I-"

The meadow goes dark, and I hear bells and a laugh.

I awake with a start and bolt up straight, gasping, with tears rolling down my cheeks at a nightmare I don't remember.