...

Survival on the edge of spite

Can drive a girl to grow her might

Resourcefulness her food and drink

Her brawn to toil, her brain to think

...

So when the time has come quite near

To make her flight, her sights quite clear

The focus on, she is quite ready

Knowing she must keep quite steady

...

Jadis had bided her time. But she was back at last, alone, after nine hundred years ready to silence that blasted Tree of Protection that had trapped her in the far north for so long.

Her survival had meant fleeing as far north from the tinnitic ringing of the Tree of Narnia as she possibly could.

The Tree had spread its sickly sweet tone and scent of faith, duty, love and forgiveness most strongly over Narnia but also of the habitable world and kept lesser evils at bay. None of her students and followers, even innocent ones whom were able to freely enter and go about Narnia had been able to harm it.

In her early forays to destroy the Tree's influence she had repeatedly sent her minions from the rocks and ice and bleak northern forests with axes, or tempted human travellers to return to Narnia and simply chop it down. But it had been to no avail.

The world's defence situated in the site of creation worked to perfection and her plans had gone nowhere. She had heard reports that the rulers of the land, the descendants of that bumbling idiot with the bowl on his head, who had driven the hooded chariot through London kept a close guard on the tree.

But she came to know that they needn't have bothered. That tree looked after itself thank you very much, and much else beside. So she had had to prepare and come herself.

For her, it had taken all the slowly grinding years of her blessed and cursed life to get this close and now, finally it was within her field of vision. If her plans went accordingly, she would soon be able to rove as widely as she would and at any time during the world's solar year. The promise of god-head that had been all but made to her at the dawn of time had not come to fruition yet

Jadis had studied the alien stars and charted the elliptical orbits of this world and its companions for at least a hundred years before she was able to predict when this world's fullest aphelion would be reached. Alambil, Zardeenah and Tarva in the right time would pull the Narnian world even further away from its sun than normal and it was at this time she knew she would have the most power to strike.

It had taken many more cycles whilst she was based in the far north before she learned to partially barricade her mind from the Tree's cursed vibration. And it had taken until the last three hundred years of her sojourn in this exasperating world before she had finally perfected the weapon she needed to silence it forever. She hefted the enchanted narwhal tusk in her hand, its spiralled length finely balanced, its smooth rainbowed surface glistening like mercury.

...

To finally get to the saddle of these twin hills overlooking the great Valley of Narnia she felt that a major milestone had been reached. If the fates existed, they were on her side. And if not, she had got here through sheer force of will, and ingenuity.

Once silenced, that tree would stop jamming her vitality and her magic and she would be able to tap the deep wells of power that underlay this land, and those nearby to the south.

She breathed deeply in anticipation.

The Empire of Calormen, she had heard, had much to recommend it and its neighbouring lands to the South and West. It might not be Charn, but what could she not achieve there under this young yellow sun with the sources of power across the world finally unlocked to her? No longer just power of ice and stone and the deep fire would bend to her will, soon powers of wind, earth and the verdant green forests.

Even in the depths of this, of all mid-winters, and with all her protective spells, teas and copper bracelets, she could still feel the pounding at her temples threatening to spill over into tinittic frequency, hot flushes and nausea. The dull white sun was very low in the south, gradually travelling westwards to sink into the south western mountains. It was time. High time.

She took off her boots. Her feet needed to be in contact with the ground.

Jadis hunkered down in a lunge, braced against the rocks and carefully balanced her tall narwhal wand across her left arm and looked steadily along its length. There was the Tree, about two miles away standing on the edge of a creek that spilled in a series of gentle cascades several yards above the Great River, all now rimed with ice and snow. She could feel it as much as see the tree with dead accuracy. She could spy its guards circling the tree, perhaps feeling uneasy, or maybe just very cold.

Jadis adjusted slightly, took an eyesight again, held position, stilled, closed her eyes and took her awareness to the deep knowledges she had been building since the dawn of time. She let them build, cords of power from the ice clouds of the stratosphere and the Great Cold of the far north. Cords from the grinding tectonic plates of the earth and the deep fires within she let flow into her.

With careful manipulation, she directed them into the substance of the wand where they twined, grew and plaited. It thrummed quietly and then began to vibrate in her hands. She quickly quelled this by deepening and evening her breathing and concentrated on setting limits on the speed of its inflow. Slowly, slowly, the power was steadied into a slim stream, from the deep earth and from the sky. The twining forces were combined. Jadis was now an open conduit. She forced herself to stay grounded, gripping the ground with spread toes. She couldn't hold it much longer. So she opened her eyes and focused again on the tree down the wand's length. One more breath. In. And out!

The forces channelled through her, out of the wand. A beam of bright jagged ice fire streamed across the valley and hit the tree two miles away. Her aim was straight. It was immediately enveloped in a cloud of ice crystals. She could just see it. Jadis maintained the power for as long as she could. 900 years had been far too long to wait.

Jadis drove down into her own will to keep the flow steady and hold the wand on a clear aim. She knew this freezing of the Tree would take time. She settled in. Her new world was about to begin. She drifted into a timeless state.

...

It was into darkness that she woke.

Snow had fallen around her and she was nearly covered. Her feet were deeply frozen and it was spreading.

Grimly, Jadis groped about and found her wand next to her, still intact. Its heat flowed into her thawing her blood and regenerating her nerves; sending her legs and feet into a jangling mess of pins and needles. She pulled her skins close about and struggled on her thick fleece lined boots. After a few minutes, Jadis stood up shakily, brushing snow off and tried to survey the valley below. The darkness was dense. The cold was no worse than she was used, but dark clouds covered the stars. Deep snow no doubt covered Narnia but she could not see it.

She would have to wait until morning.

It was then she finally noticed. The tinittic ringing in her ears was gone. The nausea that had so plagued her again since coming south of the arctic circle was gone. Her sense of dread was gone. The Tree of Protection had been silenced.

Jadis stood trembling. All her long centuries of enduring the cold were over.

The drudgery of eking out an existence on the arctic tundra, on the ice and the frozen seas, living off walrus, mammoth, herring, cod, sea serpents, seals and whales was over. Trying to learn about the world developing around her through indifferent agents who could come further south than she, was over. Keeping the company of eldritch rock and ice spirits, the grotesque Orknies and the wolfish creatures of the snow storm was over.

Jadis almost felt her cheeks blush with pleasure. She laughed gaily to herself for the first time since first eating those apples and reached for her pack. She might be immortal but she would soon need sustenance. So she reached in and took out a roll of freeze dried flesh, broke off a piece and let it moisten and soften in her mouth. It was mammoth, one of the sweetest meats. She reflected, realising that she would almost miss their flesh, but knew that where she was going the world would be her oyster and nothing would limit her appetites.

Jadis hunkered down with her hooded skins about her and dozed till dawn.