Chapter Four:    What Lucy Saw

//Life is a journey constantly turning
Down an unknown path//

She wasn’t certain how it came to pass, but it had and at the moment she and the others were squeezed into the Telmarine’s abandoned row boat. Of course she hadn’t had much of an alternative and neither had the others, for as much as High King Peter (the Pig-Headed – her new name for him) proclaimed that Cair Paravel was on the mainland – it just was not so anymore. Regrettably it had taken him three trips around the minuscule island – dragging everyone with him – for him to see that and consequently the six of them had been required to spend the night on the beach.

Buffy was simply not a seafaring individual and in fact she was not coping at all well with the moderate rocking of the boat as Peter rowed. Her stomach was rolling and she was trying her level best not to throw up all over unfortunate Edmund, who had the ill-fated luck of sitting beside during the expedition to the mainland.

Something to be tremendously appreciative for however was that the Pevensies were so caught up in staring at the surroundings – trying to see what had changed – that they hadn’t become aware of the fact that she was turning green and was about to toss her cookies. Although she had a suspicion that Trumpkin knew and was surreptitiously laughing at her – that evil dwarf.

They had been rowing for quite a while when Lucy unexpectedly focused on a considerable grouping of trees. “They’re so still,” she whispered.

“They’re trees,” Trumpkin replied brusquely. “What did you expect?”

Edmund shot Trumpkin a dirty look over what he had just said to Lucy. Buffy had no notion as to why that tree thing was so significant, as far as she knew a tree was a tree and nothing more. Even though, one could deduce that things might be different in a magical land... but she really didn’t care.

“They used to dance,” Lucy insisted.

Trumpkin sighed, “It wasn’t long after you lot left that the Telmarines invaded. Those who survived retreated to the woods. The trees retreated so deep into themselves that they haven’t been heard from since.”

Lucy was horrified, “I don’t understand. How could Aslan have let this happen?”

“Aslan? Thought he abandoned us when you lot did.”

Buffy observed – and was for a moment diverted from her own predicament – as the maudlin looks were exchanged amongst the Pevensies and for some nameless motivation she felt the bewildering inclination to offer comfort. But even as thought entered her mind she decided against it, after all Susan and Lucy had each other, Edmund seemed to be self-sufficient and Peter, well she didn’t want to be offering him anything.

Ever since Susan and Lucy’s insignificant observation earlier she had been more conscious of him and she did not like it one bit. Theoretically he was a lot older than her – in both worlds – but then so was Angel... That brainwave was sufficient to end the internal debate, she and Angel were still officially together – at least she thought so - the situation was a little confusing.

“You know we didn’t mean to leave,” Peter told the dwarf, breaking Buffy from her thoughts.

“Makes no difference now, does it?”

Throwing all of her intentions out of the window at the expression on his face, it was just so grief-stricken. Before she had even consciously realised it, she had placed one of her hands on his knee. Peter looked up at her, strength of mind and something in addition that she could not quite recognize blazing in his clear blue eyes. It shocked her so profoundly that she withdrew her hand speedily and looked away from him.

“Get us to the Narnians,” Peter said loud and clear. “And I know it will.”

Buffy had by no means ever been so delighted to see dry land in her young life. The second she had spotted it, she could’ve jumped for joy, only she didn’t for the reason that she didn’t think the others would appreciate having to swim for it because she’d made them capsize.

When they were nearer to the shore Trumpkin bounded out of the boat to anchor it onto the land. The rest of the older members of the group helped him by pulling the boat partially out of the water and onto the solid groundwork of the rocks. Since Lucy had no task to perform, she moved away from them and it was then that she noticed a bear near the shoreline.

“Hello there,” she greeted the bear happily.

Everyone watched in mystification at the dynamic between the youngest of them and a rather outsized bear. Of course Buffy’s confusion stemmed from the fact that she could not gather why anyone would talk to a bear, unlike the others who simply wondered why the bear didn’t talk back.

Trumpkin was the only one who looked nervous, “Don’t move Your Majesty.”

His word of warning however came too late, within seconds the bear had charged Lucy and she had been forced to run away. Unfortunately or fortunately – depending on your thoughts – she ran back towards the remainder of the group.

Susan sprang into action, grabbing her bow and arrows and aiming them at the bear. “Stay away from her.”

“Susan, shoot,” Edmund yelled worried for Lucy’s life.

Lucy was still running away from the bear as fast as she could go, but as she came within reach of them she fell down. With the bear rushing full speed towards her, there was nothing that she could do but scream in unadulterated terror.

As the bear reared up ready to attack he was hit with an arrow, but after the bear had crumpled to the ground dead and they looked around they saw that Susan’s weapon had not been fired. It was in fact Buffy who had been the one to kill the bear with the Telmarine’s bow and arrows she had found in the boat.

“How?” was all Peter asked.

She dropped the weapon, “I – uh – have no idea. Must have been, like the – uh – emergency of the situation. Some primal knowledge must’ve kicked in or something...”

Peter gazed at her with enormous scepticism and also gratefulness for saving Lucy’s life. She turned away from him yet again and walked over to where the young girl was still on the ground, checking to see if she was injured or not.

“Why wouldn’t he stop?” Susan asked feeling confused and guilty over the circumstances.

“I suspect that he was hungry,” was Trumpkin’s answer.

Buffy helped Lucy up and was surprised – to say the least – when she hugged her. “Thanks.”

“You’re welcome.”

The others rushed over to them, all silent but for Edmund. “He was wild.”

“I don’t think he could talk at all,” Peter added.

“Talk?” Buffy asked. “Animals here can talk?”

Lucy still holding on to her saviour replied, “Yes.”

Trumpkin poked the bear, “Get treated like you’re a dumb animal long enough, that’s what you become. You may find that Narnia is a more savage place than you remember.”

“Everything changes,” Peter muttered discontentedly.

Lucy cried out as Trumpkin started to cut up the bear. “Waste not, want not,” he told her. “You’ll be hungry later and thankful for this.”

“I think I’m turning vegetarian,” Buffy commented as she shielded Lucy from the rest of the dissection.

Walking, she detested walking and yet here they were doing it yet again. Buffy’s solitary appeasement was that there was no more sand, only earth and it’s numerous wide-ranging appearances and there was also the enormous tree roots – although she was still deciding which one was worse to walk on.

“I don’t remember this way,” Susan observed a ways into their journey.

“That’s the problem with *girls*,” Peter proclaimed smugly. “Can’t carry a map in your heads.”

The three girls glared at Peter’s back and Lucy remarked, “That’s because our heads have something in them.”

“It’s called a brain,” Buffy added. “But of course Peter wouldn’t know about that, because he doesn’t have one.”

Peter ignored Lucy and Buffy’s taunts and continued on walking as he pretended that he could not hear Edmund’s uninhibited laughter and Trumpkin’s entertainment at his expense.

“I just wish he’d just have listened to the DLF in the first place,” Susan said wistfully.

“DLF?” Edmund questioned from behind them.

Lucy giggled, “Dear little friend.”

The girls smiled as they looked at each other and speedily followed the pathway Peter had taken, while Trumpkin and Edmund merely stood there.

“Well... that’s not at all patronising, is it?” Trumpkin said grumpily as he and Edmund exchanged a look and Edmund walked off trying not laugh.

A few minutes later they all caught up to Peter who was standing in front of a dead end. “I’m not lost.”

“No, you’re just going the wrong way,” their new friend told him.

“You last saw Caspian in the Shuddering Woods. The quickest way to there is to cross at the River Rush.”

“But unless I’m mistaken, there is no crossing in these parts.”

“That explains it then. You are mistaken.”

As Peter and Trumpkin stood there in the shadows glaring at each other, Buffy just knew that this tremendously long day was about to get even longer. And it was all because a Human and a Dwarf were too insufferable to listen to each other.

They were still following Peter and his so-called map that he purportedly carried in his head when they out of the blue reached a gorge. They all stood on the edge looking down and observing the exceptionally long drop from the cliff-top to the river below.

“You see,” Susan took great delight in informing Peter. “Over time water erodes the Earth’s soil causing-“

“Shut up.”

“Is there another way down?” Edmund asked Trumpkin.

“Yes... falling.”

“Well, at least we weren’t lost,” Peter commented earning glares from all the others.

“There’s a ford near Baruna,” Trumpkin told them. “How do you feel about swimming?”

“Rather that than walking,” Susan answered.

Buffy sighed, “Finally, someone who agrees with me.”

They all started to follow Trumpkin off to the ford and the promise of no walking, when Lucy stopped and stared at something on the other side of the gorge.

“Aslan,” she yelled. “It’s Aslan, over there.”

Everyone returned and stood next to Lucy, but could see nothing there. “Can’t you see? He’s right... there.”

“Do you see him now?” Trumpkin asked her quietly.

“I’m not crazy. He was just there,” she explained. “He wanted us to follow him.”

“Lu, I’m sure that there is any number of lions in this wood. Just like that bear.”

Lucy turned to Peter and practically snarled, “I think I know Aslan when I see him.”

“Look, I’m not about to jump off of a cliff after someone who doesn’t exist,” Trumpkin stated his opinion.

“The last time I didn’t believe Lucy, I ended up looking pretty stupid,” Edmund said. “So, I believe you.”

“If you believe it, I believe it,” Buffy told her.

Peter looked at the group and then off into the distance. “Why wouldn’t I have seen him?”

“Maybe you weren’t looking?”

“Sorry, Lu,” Peter said walking off with Susan and Trumpkin.

Lucy looked back across the expanse of the gorge sadly and then slowly she, Buffy and Edmund followed the others to the ford.

End Part

Lyrics:

Rascal Flatts – It’s Not Supposed to Go Like That