Always Winter

~ A 'Chronicles of Narnia' Fanfiction ~

~ By Heatqueen ~

A/N: I've never written a Narnia fanfic before; however I was watching the movies recently and came up with this. So here you go, my first attempt at Narnia. Hope you enjoy.

'Enough's enough,' said Susan, and the expression on Lucy's face switched from defiance to the most horrific despair. Watching the tears that streaked down Lucy's face was gut wrenching but a necessary reality check. Lucy turned and fled with a choked sob, leaving Susan to share a glance with Peter shake her head with a quiet sigh.

In the days that followed, Lucy remained adamant. At first, she would not be quiet, taking every opportunity to raise the subject of the mysterious land that lay beyond the wardrobe. She was always shot down by her older siblings, often unkindly if it was Edmund, but somewhat more gently if it was Susan. No matter who rebuffed her, though, it drove Lucy near hysterical. Eventually, she quietened down, and Susan hoped this meant she'd dropped the fantasy.

A week later, Susan was playing a game of croquette with Peter, when Lucy showed up.

'Narnia is real,' she said.

Susan concealed a growl of frustration. How she'd hoped to hear the last of that so-called magic land.

'Lucy,' she sighed.

'No, Susan listen. Narnia is real! I went there again, and it was all the same, the lamppost and the faun and the eternal winter…'

'You must have been dreaming again,' said Susan.

'I'm not dreaming, I'm not!'

And Lucy cried again.

Susan didn't sleep that night. She pondered the strange behaviour of her sister. It was the war's fault, she decided, for forcing the four siblings away from their parents. Lucy had taken it the hardest, and now she was suffering the consequences. Susan hadn't failed to notice how tired her younger sister was. The once-bright girl had developed rings around her eyes and rarely smiled. But there was nothing to be done. War was war. Reuniting with their parents was simply impossible.

She listened as Lucy shuffled in the bed beside her. When Lucy rose from the bed and wandered out of the room, Susan decided to follow. They walked down the same corridor leading to the spare room with the wardrobe. Lucy entered the room and closed the door, leaving Susan to stare at it.

Annoyed, Susan grabbed the handle and flung the door open.

'Lucy! Get back to bed!' she hissed.

Lucy stood in front of the grand wardrobe with a strange expression on her face.

'Susan,' she said. 'There's a lion. Called Aslan. He spoke to me.'

'Not this again. Lions don't talk, Lu. You know that.'

'In Narnia, all the animals talk. Even the trees are alive.'

'Let's just go back to bed.' There was no point in trying to argue.

When Susan looked around outside, and saw the trees and birds that inhabited them, she wondered what could possibly be going through Lucy's head when she said that they were alive.

Lucy refused to eat, especially meat.

'How can I eat a lamb when I have spoken to one?' she said. She went hungry rather than accept a dinner containing the body of an animal. She refused, no matter how hard the siblings tried to change her mind, no matter how much the older boys threatened her. Over time she got thinner, and the shadows under her eyes darkened her appearance.

The atmosphere in the house was tense as everyone tiptoed around Lucy. She skulked around alone, refusing to join in with the other children's games. Many times, the others found her in the spare room, staring with wonder at the wardrobe, and had to pry her away, on the edge of near-hysteria. Her eyes remained dark and glassy. She refused to talk, except for her beautiful fantasy land, Narnia, and the eternal winter, and the White Witch, and Aslan.

'Aslan will come for me,' she uttered once, sitting in front of the wardrobe. 'Aslan will bring me back to Narnia. And then it will be real forever.'

The words shocked Susan, who feared for Lucy's life.

She decided to talk to Lucy. Not to try and talk some sense into her. There was nothing that would change the young girl's mind. If she was so determined to be believed, then perhaps it would help for Susan to at least give the impression that she believed her.

'Tell me about Narnia,' she said to Lucy, who sat on the windowsill, staring out of the window. It was snowing.

Lucy looked as though she couldn't believe her eyes.

'It's beautiful. Much more beautiful than England. Everything is alive. And it's always snowing. It's snowed for one hundred years. I think it's pretty, but Mr Tumnus told me that it's only snowing because of the evil White Witch. If only there was someone who could defeat the witch, then maybe the eternal winter would end and spring would finally come.

'Susan, do you think that it will ever be spring?'

Susan shrugged. 'Of course it will. Once Christmas has passed and the weather is warmer, it will be spring.'

Lucy shook her head. 'My winter will never end, like Narnia.'

Lucy spent the rest of winter staring out of the window. When spring finally did come, she changed. Instead of moping, she straightened her shoulders and walked more determinedly. She talked to her siblings more. She went outside and played.

'You seem happier,' said Susan.

'Aslan is coming,' Lucy responded with the tiniest smile. Still, she wasn't quite the same as before. She wandered in and out of the spare room, and looked around as though she was searching for something. Whenever anyone asked she gave the same response. 'Aslan is coming.'

'Su,' she said, late one night.

'Yeah?'

'I'm going back to Narnia.'

'If you say so. Sweet dreams, Lu.'

'Goodnight.'

The next morning, Susan awoke to find that Lucy was not there. She got up and went straight to the spare room, where she found Lucy's body collapsed on the floor.

'Lucy,' she muttered, going over to shake her, but there was nothing to be done. Susan's eyes flicked to the wardrobe, blurred through the tears obscuring her vision. She sobbed for the pain her sister had suffered. She stood and opened the wardrobe. Inside, there were coats and hats. She found the back of the wardrobe and knocked it hard. It was solid and wooden, but Susan could swear she felt a piercing chill rush through her body.

'Look after her, Aslan,' she muttered. 'I hope her springtime arrives.'