Accidentally Falling | Narnia

21 | vigilance

Susan didn't know whether she should feel honored, safe, or worried.

As she and the Dwarves trudged around Lantern Waste, the same forest Susan and her siblings found themselves in when they first stumble (literally) into Narnia, with bows on their hands and arrows on their strings, Susan was very aware of the Horn of Narnia at her side, hidden inside her satchel.

She didn't know why she was worried. She should feel safe, knowing that (if what Peter said was true) she could only just sound the horn to summon help if she would be in danger. Maybe she was just worried that she might lose the horn. Knowing that it was a treasure practically symbolizing Narnia because the Emperor himself gave it to her King, Susan felt the urge to lay her hand on the satchel every few seconds just to check if it was still there. She was pretty careless.

Or maybe because she was anxious. She couldn't ignore the feeling that something bad was going to happen. Which she found ridiculous because surely, the Witch's minions couldn't have known they'd be hunting in Lantern Waste, right? And that they wouldn't have gotten past the sentinels around Narnia's borders, right? She knew that the barrier around the country that is protecting it from the Witch is weakening lately but the Witch's minions wouldn't really think to attack Narnians in broad daylight, right?

Her mind flashedback to the Minotaur.

Susan mentally slapped herself.

Nothing bad is going to happen to you, Susan told herself. The forest is now safe. You are safe.

She tries very hard to believe it.

As she and her thirteen Dwarf companions, including Trumpkin, trudged around the forest, Susan was keeping her senses alert. Not only because she was having a bad feeling but because she was also applying Trumpkin's lessons about always staying vigilant when hunting and trusting her senses.

She also couldn't stop herself from looking around, trying to find the lamppost and avoid it. Because what if she'd find herself groping around the wardrobe again and accidentally stumble back into her world and she couldn't get back to Narnia? Susan remembered when Lucy tried to prove to her and Edmund that she had discovered a land in a wardrobe and when they got inside the said wardrobe all they discovered was its wooden backwall and a few mothballs. She didn't want to go back in her world with no assurance that she could go back to Narnia without her siblings.

And she just didn't want go back to her world, period.

Soon after, they heard a soft rustling to their right. Susan and the Dwarves slowly backed towards a tree, bows ready. Then they looked out to find a brown deer, grazing at the grass a few feet from them. The deer looked small.

Susan saw one of the Dwarves- a black-haired dwarf- raise his bow and arrow, taking aim at the deer.

"How do we know that that creature isn't a Talking Animal?" Susan whispered to Trumpkin beside her.

"Talking Animals are much more bigger than regular animals." Trumpkin explained, whispering back at her.

The Black-haired dwarf release his arrow. The deer fell to the ground, dead.

Three Dwarves went to approach the dead creature and picked it up, placing it inside a satchel-like sack that one of the Dwarves were carrying.

Susan couldn't help but feel sorry for the deer.

They continue to walk around the forest, hoping for more game for them to catch. Unfortunately, after what felt like a lifetime, it dawned on them that the deer they first caught might likely to be their last.

Eventually, they went to the deeper part of the forest. But after a few minutes of wandering around, there was still nothing to shoot.

Susan couldn't help but look around the place, shivering slightly despite the warm temperature. She had this funny feeling that something-- someone-- was watching them.

Watching her.

A rustling sound to her right. She turned her head to see a bush, still lightly shaking.

Okay, she thought. There's definitely something behind that.

"This is strange." someone spoke roughly, and the hairs on the back of Susan's neck stood up.

Susan turned to look at the speaker, the corner of her eye still fixed on the bush. It was the black-haired Dwarf who shot the deer earlier.

"What?" Susan asked him.

"It's strange," the Dwarf repeated, his beady black eyes rove suspiciously around the forest.

"What's strange?"

"The forest, Majesty." the Dwarf replied gruffly.

"Why?" Susan's eyebrows scrunched in confusion, though her heartbeat was slowly speeding up knowing that she wasn't going crazy and that somebody else also noticed the strange feeling in the air, which clearly meant a bad thing. "Is there something wrong with the forest?"

"There's something wrong, alright," another black-haired Dwarf replied, snorting a bit.

"What Nikabrik is trying to say, My Lady," Trumpkin interrupted before Nikabrik could say anything, shooting him a pointed and annoyed look. "Is that we don't usually come to these parts of the Waste in our hunts. The game alone in the first parts of the forest from which we had come can easily provide a feast for the whole Cair. But now--"

"--it looked someone got to the games first." Susan finished Trumpkin's statement.

Silence engulfed Susan and the Dwarves. She took a tighter hold on her bow, and clutched anxiously at the horn on her side. Nikabrik, Trumpkin, and the rest of the Dwarves looked around the forest, their beady eyes roving around the place on alert.

Susan fixed her gaze yet again on the bush on her right.

"Oh, shut your yap, the three of you!" one of the other black Dwarves snapped at Trumpkin, Nikabrik, and the first black-haired Dwarf. "Our borders are heavily guarded. They can't overcome our guards much less get in the barrier. And they are stupid enough to know not to try."

And that was when all hell broke lose.