Chapter One
Peter was just finishing packing when he heard wild footsteps coming up the stairs to his room. Then without warning his little sister, Lucy, burst through his door with a smile so big it could have lit up his room by itself.
"This summer is going to be fabulous, Peter, just fabulous!" She sighed at the end rather dreamily.
"We will get back this year, I know it, and I just know it! What will you do once we get back Peter?" She looked at him curiously.
"I'm not going to get my hopes up for something that is probably never going to happen again. No matter what the Professor says." Said Peter, though he wished that what he was saying was not the truth.
"Don't say that!" Lucy said back stubbornly. She was three years older than she was when she first set foot in Narnia. She was tall, slender, and, as Peter understood, had her first ten year old "boyfriend". They went to the Professor's house every year for the summer, she always had high hopes that they would all get back to Narnia. He had not the heart to tell her he sometimes thought Narnia was all a dream, that it was impossible. But he couldn't do that to her, she loved it and missed it so much.
"Are you ready up there?" Peter heard his mother's voice from some where beneath him.
"Yes mother!" Peter hollered back. "Come on Luc, it's time to go." They got there at about 7 o'clock the next morning. The train was just pulling in when Edmund woke Peter.
"Hey it looks like Ms. MaCreedy is not here yet, so we are going to have to wait in the rain. Best get your coat on or you'll be soaked to the bone the minute you step off this train." When they were off the train Peter realized how hungry he was, just while he was peeling off the wrapper on his sandwich there was a ice cold bitter wind that blew through the trees and all of the sudden nothing was there any more not his sandwich, not even the bench he had been sitting on, nothing.
"Ouch! Peter are you there? Edmund! Where are you?!" came Lucy's voice from somewhere on his right. Where ever he was now it was night time and he could not see anything.
"I'm right here Lucy!" He reached out his hand and found her arm. She grabbed him and hugged him tight. She was scared.
"Ed is you there? Where are you?" Peter twisted his head around as if he could see where he was in this darkness.
"I'm right here, don't worry! I'm here, I'm right here." He came up behind Peter and grabbed his shoulder.
"Are you okay? I hit my head on a really big root sticking out of the ground! You know where we are don't you? We are in Narnia." The siblings all fell silent, almost as if no one dared to breathe.
"Alright we know this land better than our own. The one thing that I learned during my rein as king is that you do not travel these woods by night. We can find a village in the morning. Now we either wait or we sleep." Peter said in the voice of the king he had once been, a voice he thought he no longer possessed. At that moment Edmund kneeled close to the ground and felt around on the ground.
"It's okay Lucy you can sit down, nothing's in your way. Peter perhaps I should look for a town now rather than later. Mostly because we don't know which woods these are." He looked around rather uneasily at this. Edmund had grown up quite a bit since the trip here.
"You are right. No, I will go look for a village. It may take a few days; can you take care of Lucy while I'm gone? I'll go faster by my self. And Lucy is scared to death." Peter said this last sentence quietly so he did not offend his sister.
"Yes I can take care of Lucy. But you better hurry or I'm coming after you." Peter nodded. He knew what his brother said was true and he did not want that to happen.
"I shall set out immediately. See you soon Lucy." Peter started heading north, as he looked back he saw Ed looking for fire wood and Lucy laying down her head to rest.
It was nearly midday when Peter reached a town. He was feeling very uneasy at first, for it was a dwarf village. But he soon saw other creatures and nobody seemed to notice him. The hustle and bustle of the small city was nice. But he had to get some help fast. He saw a dwarf merchant selling jewels and went to ask him some questions.
"Excuse me, sir, could you tell me where I am." Peter asked politely. Peter waited and he waited for an answer, but he did not get one, the dwarf had not even turned around at his voice. Peter asked again to make sure that the dwarf heard him. At this the dwarf turned on him, red in the face and told him to bug off immediately or he would have to attack Peter. Peter turned at this remark and found himself looking upon a very pretty girl. But what amazed Peter the most was not her beautiful chocolate colored hair that was pulled back almost perfectly to where her bangs fell gracefully on her face. Or the elegant blue diamonds that sparkled and shone in her eyes. It was not even the small but lovely smile that was directed at him. What amazed Peter the most was that she was a girl, just like Lucy, a human, from his world.
"Hi, sorry about that they aren't really pleasant creatures, dwarfs." She said with the smoothness of a queen. When Peter did not reply she went on. "You are in the southern wild lands that border Narnia. Nothing here is safe, not even the goods they sell." When she said this she turned and smirked at the tiny dwarf, who was looking at her in awe and horror. Peter thought this very strange. Why was he scared of her?
"Sorry, my name is Peter. I was wondering if you could tell me how to get to Narnia, to see Aslan." She looked up when he said the beast's name.
"You know Aslan, funny he never mentioned you. Peter, you said your name was?" He nodded. Did she know Aslan?
"Do you know him, Aslan I mean?" He asked inquiringly.
"Oh, um, well you could say that. Here, I'm headed to Cair Paravel, I'll take you there." At this she bent down to the dwarf, who was still in a trance, and whispered something in his ear. He immediately broke out of his trance and bowed very deeply.
"Are you ready to go now?" She said turning back to him.
"Um no, my brother and sister are waiting for me in the woods, we will need to go get them first." He looked at her uncertainly for a moment, hoping she would not change her mind.
"Okay, which woods? North or south?"
"This way, I came into town from over here. I left markers along the way as a trail." He turned and led her out of town. When he reached the edge of town there was a steep drop in the ground that he nearly tripped and fell down. He turned around to help her but she didn't touch his hand, she simply jumped off and landed on her feet. She had obviously been in these parts before. Their journey was long and rough for Peter, but she seemed to just glide through the forest easily and without challenge. All of the sudden he felt her hand on his shoulder, he stopped and turned. Something was wrong, he could tell by the look on her face. Her hand twitched underneath her cloak. Then he heard a twig snap on his right, they both spun around to face the noisemaker.
"Peter, Peter is that you?" A little head popped out of the bushes, it was Lucy.
"Oh Peter," she ran up to him and hugged him hard, "four little dwarves attacked us about 3 hours after you left, Edmund fended them off, but he said we should follow you so we would be safer." She had a little cut on her cheek and was extremely dirty.
"Luc, where is Ed now?" she was looking curiously behind him.
"He's sleeping under a tree over there." She pointed in the direction that she had come from still not taking her eyes off something behind him. He started to walk that way when Lucy tugged his sleeve and motioned for him to lean down towards her.
"Who's that?" she whispered pointing behind him. He felt very stupid, he had completely forgotten about his guide.
"Lucy this is…I'm sorry I never got your name." He said turning to face her. "Aiden, my name is Aiden." She said to him.
"Lu this is Aiden," he liked that name, it was pretty, "She is going to take us to Aslan at Cair Paravel." Lucy's face illuminated at that name.
"LUCY! LUCY! Lucy where are you!?" they heard someone yell behind them.
"Ed she's over here with me!" Peter called back. Edmund nudged his head around the bushes to see his brother and sister. But the other person was quite unexpected and the sight of her put Edmund in a daydream of his own. "Ed this is Aiden, she is our aide back to Cair Paravel." Edmund blushed deeply upon hearing this. He turned quickly so Aiden would not see. She smiled at him.
"If you are going to go traveling around Narnia you are going to need different clothes, we will have to stop at a village and get you some. It might get a little cold when we reach Narnia. Fall has just ended so it's a little chilly." They had been hiking for about two days when they came to a huge open valley. Aiden peered down into the valley first and what she saw made her livid. None of the others knew what it was until they looked for them selves. There were hundreds of creatures, armies of them and in the middle of them was a tent colored in black and crimson. At that moment a young looking woman stepped out, she matched the tent exactly. The only thing that was different was the gold crown on her head and the paleness of her skin.
"How dare she come here!" fumed Aiden, "We are in Narnia now and she is not welcome here. Wait here so I can steal us some horses." Then she took off without another word.
"I think Narnia has made some new enemies since we were gone. But how do we know Aiden isn't one of them." Edmund said to Peter.
"Because she hasn't killed us yet." Peter replied shortly, he had grown rather fond of Aiden, and did not want to hear that sort of rubbish. She soon returned with three horses and they set out with Lucy and Edmund riding together. They stopped at a well not very far from the valley to let the horses drink after such a steep ride. Lucy was playing in the stream with Aiden and the boys were watching the delightful scene. While they were packing up after a long and well-deserved rest, Aiden stopped. She signaled at them to get down, Edmund grabbed Lucy and hid behind a tree, Peter got low to the ground behind a bush. But Aiden stood firm in front of her horse, Peter noticed that she was slowly reaching into the back of her cloak. What was she doing? There was no time to ask though because two dreadfully disturbing creatures, that were so hideous I can not describe, came out of the brush to the left of him. They saw Aiden and put on disgusted faces and brandished their swords for appeal. Aiden smirked at them and in a flash had grabbed two knifes and flung them at the creatures hitting both of them in the heart. He heard Lucy scream and cling to Edmund. Aiden went and retrieved her knives, he got up slowly.
"We are almost to the palace," was all she said as she mounted her horse, the others followed her lead and they took off wordlessly.