Ariella stood to the side watching them shop together, just like they did everything else. She had an important message, but it was for the High Queen only. Aslan had told her today, so she would be patient. Finally, they decided to divide and conquer the remaining items on their list.

Approaching quickly, she swept into a curtsy. "Your majesty, I have an urgent message for your ears only."

Susan looked shocked, but kept her wits enough to give Ariella permission to speak.

"Your friends will soon be returning home, but Aslan's plan for you here is not yet complete," she announced with authority. "The Lion be with you."

Curtsying again, Ariella turned to leave, but Susan grabbed her arm to stop her.

"When?" was all Susan asked.

"No one but Aslan knows the time, least of all me, my Queen."

With that she walked away, bowing her head deeply and murmuring blessing to the other three as she passed them. They all stared at her until she was out of sight before crowding around Susan.

Edmund voiced everyone's thoughts with an incredulous "What was that?"

While the others broke into speculation, Susan thought back on what she had just been told. Her siblings and fellow consorts would be returning to Narnia without her, and it sounded like they wouldn't be coming back, at least not anytime soon. How would she go on? And what was Aslan's plan for her? How could she complete a job when she didn't know what it was?

Though she wanted to doubt what the strange girl had said, she couldn't. Not when her words had given her the same feeling in her gut that Aslan's had when He had told her that she would never be returning to Narnia. She hated those words with all her heart, but she had never doubted their truth. It had been the same with everything Aslan said, and as much as she despised it, to feel that again made her somehow feel at home, even though she simultaneously felt lonelier than ever.

She had felt lost the first time they had come back through the wardrobe. She had grieved when Aslan had told her and Peter that they wouldn't return. Listening to Edmund and Lucy's stories from aboard the Dawn Treader was like ripping off an old scab and pouring salt in the wound, but she would give anything to still have the chance to hear them again.

Normally, hearing that Peter would be able to go back without her would feel like betrayal, and it still might later, but now all she felt was empty and alone.

"...-an...Susan!" Peter's voice broke through her thoughts.

"Yes?"

"Are you okay?" They all looked worried. Susan wondered how long she had been lost in thought.

"I'm fine," she replied after a moment. "I was just remembering."

They nodded, all seeming to give themselves a moment to reminisce , before Edmund spoke up again.

"Well, if we have everything, perhaps we should call it a day and go home."

They all agreed, but the group of children that left the store was far more subdued than the one that had come in.