Disclaimer: I do not own the Narnia books, most unfortunatley I do not even have copies of them, nor do I own any fanfics this might resemble. I haven't even read any other Narnia fics, so I don't know what I should avoid.

A/N The poem at the beginning was written by me, and it's just describing (kinda) the story.

Sanctuary

When darkness comes

And cloaks us all

I'll draw my sword

So we will not fall

If safety's gone

And war won't parry

I'll find us

A Sanctuary

Come my people

We don't have to run

We'll all be safe

When this battle's done

Deep inside

This country's hold

This Sanctuary

Is MidEvil's gold

England

Chapter One: Dreams

Sunlight filtered feebly through the wide, dark curtains in a silent room, falling in a wavering, milky-grey chink across the foot of a navy-blue bedspread. The early-morning sunlight was shifted violently across the blanket as the sleeper kicked again.

The silence of Peter Pevensie's room was broken by the groaning of bedsprings as he thrashed in his bed, muttering wildly and inaudibly, wrenching his blanket from where it was tucked against the wall and unconsciously tossing it around to his other side. The muttering grew louder and small beads of sweat gathered on his forehead, dripping down his temples and into his extremely messy blonde hair. The blankets around him were wrapped so tightly, it seemed unlikely that he would be able to move again for several years.

Then, as suddenly as if someone had prodded him in the side, his muttering stopped and his eyelids flew open. He seemed surprised to find himself in a full body-bind made of blankets, and even more startled to realize he was sweating. Peter, after several moments of wrestling himself from his blankets, stood up and crossed to the east side of the room, where he opened the curtains covering his small window. A dark, ash-black raven, who had apparently been sitting outside the window studying the curtains, glared at Peter reproachfully at being denied this entertainment.

"It was Narnia," Peter told it, ignoring this glare. "I was dreaming of the White Witch, and she had Lucy in a large iceberg and then this strange girl came and– "

"Peter?" There was a sharp rap on the door and his mother's voice. "Peter, aren't you awake? Time for breakfast!"

"Yeah, okay," Peter called back, already beginning to change. He turned to the raven, but he was gone.

"You look awful," Said Peter's younger brother, Edmund, by way of morning greeting. He, Lucy and Susan were already gathered at the table, eating.

"Bad dreams," Peter replied, piling bacon onto his plate and attempting to pass Edmund a meaningful look over his mother's shoulder.

"About what?" Lucy asked innocently, having missed the exchange between her brothers. Her dark, shoulder-blade length hair was pulled into two French braids that swung every time she turned her head; the tips of them were watched hungrily by her new kitten, Thorn.

"Hurry up, Peter, or you'll miss the bus!" His mother instructed distractedly, rushing into the next room to grab something.

"It was a dream about Narnia," He said, very quietly, as he sat next to Susan. He opened his mouth to explain but heard his mother rush back into the kitchen. "I'll talk to you later."

They finished their breakfast in a hurried silence, then departed for school, the girls to one and the boys to another.

"The Water Cycle is fairly basic, not to mention you've been learning about it since your first year of school . . ." Droned the tall and slightly overweight Professor Wilkes, his voice so monotone he sometimes seemed bored while listening to himself.

Peter and his fellow students taking this science course had never found enjoyment in his lessons. Most of them found better uses of their time, such as sleeping on their textbooks or playing tick-tac-toe with their neighbor. Peter had pulled his pile of books toward him, his science one open to the Water Cycle, and was laying on them, his right cheek covering the 'Evaporation' paragraph; he was also hoping that, if he did fall asleep, he would not drool on the left-side diagram.

"Psst," Whispered the short, blonde boy sitting next to him. "Want to have a go?" He pushed a pre-made sheet of tic-tac-toe boxes toward Peter. "I'll be 'O'."

"Sure," Peter muttered back, placing an 'X' in the middle square.

Peter won half of the games they played and they tied a quarter. They were just about to tie another one when the door at the back of the room opened. Visitors to Professor Wilkes' class were so infrequent that everybody, including the students who were asleep moments ago, looked around.

"Uhh . . ." Came a nervous voice from beyond the doorframe. A tall boy with casually messy, chocolate-brown hair, fair skin and near-black eyes walked into the room. "Professor Wilkes? I'm James Brown."

James seemed to have realized that he had caught the attention of the entire class, and paused awkwardly every few steps to look around and occasionally brave a tentative smile. His navy blue sweater and dark, cream-white pants looked uncomfortably stiff and new, as if he hadn't had time to break them in.

"Ah, yes, Mr. Brown. Welcome to our science class. Take a seat over by Mr. Pevensie, if you would please, and open your book to Chapter Three, page 47. Talking will be unnecessary." Professor Wilkes turned back to the blackboard and continued his lesson in the same dry, bored voice and James sank gratefully into the empty seat beside Peter. He opened his book nervously as Peter and his blonde neighbor turned curiously toward the newcomer.

"So, you're new," Peter pointed out unnecessarily. "I mean, uh, where're you from?"

James, looking surprised to find that someone was talking to him, replied, "Uh, outside of London, into the country. We came here for my dad's job."

"So, do you like Finchley?"

"Yeah, I guess it's fine," James shrugged. "My sister is going to that school across the street–"

"Two of my sisters go there!" Peter exclaimed. "What year is she in?"

"Same as me," James replied, looked startled. "We're twins." He looked back down at his book.

Peter nodded vaguely. "Cool." He pulled his books toward him and attempted to resume his nap, but something beyond the window had caught his attention. The lion statues that stood on either side of the wrought-iron gate leading into the school grounds looked, to Peter, anyway, somewhat odd.

Peter sat up, suddenly more awake then he had been all morning. The lion on the left had turned its head so that it was facing him. Peter blinked rapidly as if accusing his eyes of deceiving him, but stopped when he noticed something oddly familiar about the statue.

"Aslan," He said softly.

"Sorry?" James asked, under the impression that Peter was talking to him.

"Oh, uh, nothing. That statue just looked a little . . ." Peter paused, searching desperately for a good lie. "Uh, odd." He finished, somewhat lamely.

"It looked like that when I came in half an hour ago," James said with interest. Peter assumed that both the statues looked the same to him, as they did with everybody who did not know about Narnia. The only other people who could see signs sent to them were Jill and Eustace, who were not in Finchley.

"Oh, maybe I was imagining it," Peter muttered, looking around at James.

"Oh, no," He said eagerly. "I think it looks strange, too. It's head is turned and it's a bit bigger than the other one and his mane looks much smoother, not all rough like the one on the right."

Peter stared at him. "What?" He gasped, his mouth falling into a very unbecoming gape.

James looked a bit unnerved. "Well, uh, has it always been like that?"

Peter, thinking quickly, nodded. "Always," He repeated, and set his head down onto his books, his heart pounding as quickly as if he had been running for miles. He stole a sideways glance out the window and saw – if it was at all possible– the statue tip its head very slightly, as if nodding toward Peter.

"Not impossible," He thought he heard it– in the voice of Aslan– say, very faintly. It was so quiet that he thought it could have been the breeze on the glass.

Yes, impossible, he thought in response. He avoided looked anywhere except the pages of his science book beneath his face until the bell rang. As he, along with everybody else, rushed towards lunch, he stole another look out the window and, to his immense relief, saw that both the statues were facing the street, their backs to the school as usual.

Peter raced across the street, only pausing to dump his books into his bag on his way, bursting out of the large double doors before nearly everybody else. It had, as the grey clouds had promised in the morning, begun to rain in a steady, misting drizzle that was so fine it soaked easily into the fibers of his sweater before he had even crossed the street. He leaned against the outside wall of his sister's school, attempting to calm himself and look casual while tapping his foot impatiently.

Finally, Lucy and Susan came out the front door, their jackets tight around them, their red hats pulled low across their dark hair.

"Peter!" Lucy exclaimed, running up to her brother and hugging him around his middle. "Guess what! Susan and I were walking into school this morning and we saw him! We saw Aslan!"

"Shhh!" Susan hissed at her sister. "Don't go shouting it around! We don't want people thinking we're crazy." She glared at a group of teenagers who were passing, staring openly at the trio. "Were's Ed?"

"Dunno," Peter replied. He lowered his voice. "I saw him too! He was one of the statues outside of my school–"

"And he looked at me and said 'Not impossible'." Edmund finished for him, coming to stand next to them, holding his lunch in a brown paper sack.

"Yeah," Peter said, not bothering to hide his surprise. "But this new boy, James Brown, saw him too."

"Him?" Susan asked, pointing over Peter's shoulder. James had just crossed the street and was standing awkwardly outside of the school, rain dripping from his brown hair. "We saw him come in with his sister Wilma. She's in my music class."

As if waiting for these words to be spoken, although there was no way she could have heard him, the door next to them opened and a tall girl with short, bright red hair called, "James! Hey, James!"

James came to stand by her. Although their hair was nothing alike, they had the same casually messy look, fair skin and near-black eyes. Wilma, in Peter's opinion, was very pretty.

"Uh, hi, Peter," James said, looking fixedly at the puddle at his feet as if he was embarrassed for interrupting their conversation.

"Oh, Susan, is this your brother?" Wilma demanded, looking at Peter with her large dark eyes that were brimming with laughter. "I'm Will. Not Wilma, that name is awful, just Will." She spoke quickly and was grinning broadly at all of them.

"Hi," Was all Peter could manage. Edmund copied him. Silence fell over the six standing in the rain. Peter felt that it would be unwise to carry on their conversation in front of James and Will, because talking about lions appearing in front of them would, as Susan had mention earlier, make them sound crazy.

"Peter!" Lucy shrieked suddenly, grabbing his hand impossibly tightly for a girl her age. "Look!"

He was wrenched from his stupor of looking at the ground, and followed Lucy's finger as she pointed to what appeared to be the middle of the street. There, floating a few inches above the ground, life-size and relatively human, was a tall woman made of what appeared to be rain.

"A water fay!" Susan gasped.

The fay, disregarding the car that had just passed through her, opened her mouth and said, in a light, sing-song sort of voice that did not fit the serious tone she was speaking in, "The time has come, Kings and Queens. You must return to Narnia."

She vanished, but they hardly noticed. There was a mighty roar, like the one of a lion, and they grabbed hands. But, before they could make another move, there was a shriek and someone's hand clasped onto Peter's. He tried desperately to shake it off, but it was clamped so tightly it seemed like it was glued.

Darkness fell, and through the noise that suddenly surrounded them he heard cries of pain and desperate yells coming from the person next to him.

With a sudden, horrible jolt in his stomach, Peter realized who must have grabbed his hand. Will.

A/N Ugh, first chapters are sooo boring! I'm sorry! But it's getting more interesting as I'm planning it in my mind. Stay tuned! (And please review)