"Are you a witch or aren't you."
"I don't- No." she breathed.
"What?"
"NO." she raised her voice firmly.
Eydis looked up and stared the man in the eye. He seemed impressed in no way, staring back at her with a hard glare. She tried her best to match it, but those pointed ears of hers faltered back just slightly. They were in the main hall and a man of authority that Edyis could only assume to be some kind of police or enforcer was questioning her in front of a crowd of men in their tall seats, including the king himself. Her hands were shackled in front of her.
"If you're not a witch, then what is this?" the man asked, pulling out spear like object that was slightly longer than the average arms length. An icy weapon with a carefully crafted handle, a long icicle like blade on one end and a frosty spearhead like shape on the other. Eydis pressed her lips together, her eyes watering instantly upon looking at the tool.
"It's not mine." she insisted.
"We know that." he drawled "But do you know who this belongs to?"
She paused, and then shook her head. But it lingered for just a moment too long to be convincing in any way. A small smile broke out on the mans face, and Eydis didn't like the feeling it gave her. She wanted to be truthful, she wanted to explain what she had done and why, but the selfishness in her acts compared to what she'd unleashed upon everyone else seemed insignificant in every way.
"That's what I thought..." he practically hummed, and she wanted nothing more than to smack that grin off his face. Why was he enjoying this? Did he not realize that whatever he got her to admit, this world was still going to be plunged straight into a massive war?
"It's not mine, you must understand-Please- I can't-" he struck her and she gasped as the back of his hand made contact with her face, the rings on his fingers cutting her cheek.
"Ackerley." a voice called from behind him, the tone calling him down. Silence, and Eydis did not look up, instead frowning firmly at the ground as she heard the footsteps of Ackerly walking away and someone else walking towards them. She refused to raise her gaze. "That's quite enough."
"What are you?" the voice asked.
"Human." she replied with a spiteful tongue.
"I have never seen a human that looks like you." they confessed, rather than accused. Eydis looked up, and was surprised to see that it was the very King himself who was speaking to her, not one of the other men of authority.
"That's because I am not like you." she replied with a sniff and a scathing glance to Ackerly, still too bitter from being struck to show any cooperation now. She could feel a few small beads of blood tickling down her pale cheek, a reminder to why she had to stay strong against them. These were the men that had once tried to eradicate magical beings from Narnia. Magical beings that included Eydis, whatever she might be.
"Yes... I can see that." he replied without taking his eyes from her. "You're not a witch... Are you Dryad? Nymph? A half-breed?" he asked. None of the suggestions seemed shrewd in any way, but held a genuine curiosity and something else that underlined his tones. Concern? Perhaps for what kind of monster she was?
"No..." she replied hesitantly, though truthfully she could have been so she slowly shook her head, "I already told you don't know."
The king seemed to consider this information for a moment rather than dismiss her words as lies as the previous man had.
"You never met your parents?"
"No," she shook her head, "The man and woman who raised me are not my parents by blood."
"How did they get you?" Ackerley demanded from behind and the king allowed the question by saying nothing. So she answered.
"I was found. Abandoned in the woods that my father often walked. He said I was wrapped in green silk blankets and no one was there to be seen..." she explained, stopping short. Upon the green silk bundle had been a silver pin with the head of a wolf, decorated with blue gems for eyes. Eydis remembered it vividly, it was beautiful. And these had been the only two things she had had from her previous life. But one winter her and her parents had been suffering, their business was slow and they couldn't even say they were scraping by. So she had taken the silks and the pins into town and sold them to make it by that winter. She told herself that it would bring her closure, that it was about time she put her old live behind her, whatever it was, and focused on her new one.
When the king spoke again it wasn't of what she was and where she came from.
"And of this spell?" he asked. Eydis looked up at him and frowned tensely, "Did you know what it would do?"
"No!" she replied quickly, unable to hide her desperation. "I only knew the danger it put my family in if I didn't do it!" she insisted. Ackerley shifted behind the king at that, grunting and looking displeased. The king didn't acknowledge it, his gaze unwavering from Eydis' pleading one.
"Ackerley..." he said after a long moment. The guard perked up instantly upon behind summon to his side. "Unbind her."
Ackerley's face dropped in bafflement and her sputtered angrily in response.
"But my lord- You can't be-"
"Serious?" The king turned and looked at Ackerley with his brow raised, "You think I would joke at a time like then, then you are in poor taste of your kings personality. Unbind her and have her taken to the west wings quarters. This is a victim not a criminal, I will not be a king who executes his subjects based on paranoia. And for gods sake, get someone to look at her face for that cut." he ordered, then with a wave of his hand dismissed the council.
Eydis could breathe again, for king Caspian was a merciful one.