The Return of the Pevensies (sequel to The Fifth Pevensie)

Chapter 12: Secrets are revealed

When I woke up, I didn't open my eyes. I kept them closed and  tried to figure out where I was. I wasn't in my room. My bed isn't this soft.

I was lying in a bed and I wasn't wearing my clothes. I think I was wearing a nightgown, which was long time since I did. I usually sleep in my normal clothes. It was pretty quiet in the room, except for whispering voices. I opened my eyes and sat up.

I didn't feel any pain anymore. Lucy's healing drops has saved my life so many times. I don't know what I would do without them.

I saw Edmund, Susan and Peter stand and quietly discuss something right inside the door. Lucy was asleep in a chair beside the bed I was in. Inside the room was another bed and I figured that this was the room where Susan and Lucy slept in.

I coughed to bring their attention to me. Lucy woke up and saw that I was awake.

"Emily!" she said and hugged me. "Finally!"

I hugged her back and saw how the others came and sat down beside the bed.

"It hasn't been that long time, actually," Susan said. Lucy let go off me. "It's just nightfall."

"Just a couple of hours, then," I said. I stretched out my arms and yawned. It felt good to have slept for a while.

"How can you be so casual about it?" Edmund suddenly asked. I looked at him.

"What?" I asked.

"How can you be so casual about it? You were tortured and nearly died just a couple of hours ago!" he said. I looked closer at him and saw that he had dried tears on his cheeks and his eyes was slightly red.

"I've learnt to not think too much of what happens to me," I said.

"But why?" Peter asked. I looked at him. He was constantly blinking and couldn't focus his gaze upon anything. I looked at Susan and saw that she yawned. I realized that all of them had been up, waiting for me to wake up instead of sleeping themselves.

"What has been going on since we left, Emily?" Susan asked. I didn't want to tell them, but I couldn't lie to them. Not now, not when they had been waiting so long for me to wake up. And they deserved to know. They have to understand.

"Long version or short version?" I sighed.

"The whole story," Edmund said.

"Okay. We have to go back to our 16th birthday," I said and pointed at Lucy and me. "Around five minutes before I was going to go up to the roof and meet you, I discovered a mouse in my room. She told me that Aslan was in Narnia once again and that he wanted to meet me at the Stone Table."

I looked at Lucy.

"I didn't have time to tell any of you. I had to leave immediately. I'm sorry," I said.

"It's alright, Em. You're telling me now. I forgave you long ago," Lucy said and took my hand.

"Well, when I came there, Aslan and I talked and I agreed to become the Keeper, which means I don't age anymore," I said. Peter stopped me from continuing.

"Hold on. What's the Keeper?" he asked. "What does it mean?"

I was tempted to say the same thing that Reepicheep told Caspian when he asked, but I didn't.

"Well, now we're getting in on a side track," I said, avoiding the question.

"Emily," Susan said.

"Okay. You know the White Witch? She didn't die in that battle," I said.

"What?" said both Peter and Edmund at the same time.

"Do you mean she's been alive all this time?" Edmund said, looking horrified.