Welcome, newbies, to my dark Narnia 'verse. And to returning old hands, you know how dark it gets. Bring a torch.

This story traces multiple characters through multiple worlds and multiple centuries. I've got it all written, so I'll post regularly. If I get reviews, it'll be every few days. If not, it'll be slower. You've been warned.

Also, anyone know what's happening with this year's Honoring the Heroes awards…?

All the people who I've gotten alerts from but haven't been able to contact via PM, your kudos are at the bottom of this chapter.

Disclaimer: I don't claim.

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Speak

One: Digory

Cair Paravel Year 1

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Digory has already decided the library-that-is-not-yet-a-library is one of his favorite places in this new world. The arching ceilings, the high windows with warm beams of sunlight drifting through, the towering shelves that stand empty, waiting.

But not, Digory knows, for long.

He thinks it is wonderful that in this palace the Lion sang into existence just two days prior, He gave so much space to the library-that-is-not-yet-a-library. Digory can already feel this place will be a haven, a center of learning, a safe space for anyone who needs it—as the public library is for him back in England.

He knows they are going back soon, he and Polly, and the apple weighing heavy in his pocket sends a thrill of gladness through him: he will not be too late. His mother will be saved.

But other knowledge sits on his shoulders, rattles in his mind, and roils the guilt in his heart. He thinks of the usurping queen he has awakened, and the hunger in her eyes when she beheld first London, then Narnia, worlds teeming with life. She will try to take them someday, rule their peoples as slaves. She will have the means to do so. All she must do is speak one simple Deplorable Word.

He has a secret, and it is this secret that will crush him. The knowledge. The fear.

He knows the Deplorable Word.

Not all of it, not exactly. But he knows enough to make a guess at what is written on the scrap of paper in his pocket, nestled next to the life-giving apple, in a bold, scrawled hand.

She had drawn him aside for a just a moment, the Queen of Charn, when Polly wasn't looking (how could she not have known? why didn't she stop them? no, not Polly's fault, mustn't blame Polly—). She had seemed inclined to give him a gift since he had freed her from her frozen enchantment, and had offered him the crumpled paper.

"I have no need of this anymore," she'd said quietly, though her glittering eyes lingered on the paper as it lay folded in Digory's outstretched palm, spotted with brownish-red stains "It's up here—" she'd tapped a bone-white finger against her temple "—and it's already given me everything. But you…" She looks at him then, and he shudders. "I see a hunger in you, a desire to know. And so I am giving you a way to know. But careful with it now—careful!" Her hand had closed over his with the paper inside. He had half-expected his fist to burst into flame. "We can't all get what we want." Her eyes had slid over to Polly, wandering the far corner of Charn's decaying throne room, and then she had looked back to him. And he had nodded.

Now the paper rests in his pocket, because try as he might he could not get it to burn, and he sits at a desk in the library with a sheaf of freshly-bound papers and a quill dark with ink, hesitating. He has already spotted the first page with drips as he delays, and he turns to the second before the ink dries. He can see it through the back of the page, streaking across the sheet and onto the desk. When he finally moves to set the quill to the page, he curses quietly in language Frank the cabby would have been comfortable with on the streets of London, but now would find wholly unfamiliar. The ink has dried.

Dipping the quill once more, he settles over the page and has just drawn his first stroke when the library doors bang open and Polly calls, "Digory!"

He startles, upends the inkwell with a crash that shatters the glass on the floor and splatters his shoes. Through the maze of empty bookshelves, Polly's footsteps wend towards him.

"I say, Digory, is that you?"

His mind a blaze of panic, he scribbles in as messy and rushed a hand as the original owner of Jadis's slip of paper, "USE ONLY IN DIRE EMERGENCY. WORD IS DEPLORABLE. COST WILL BE HIGH. TRUST TO—" but the quill is empty before he can say even half of what he wants, before he can tell where he got it, who gave it to him, what it does. He cannot even finish his advice to do anything else but use the Word. He is useless.

Digory stuffs the scrap of paper into the binding of the new book and whirls to place it on a shelf, but their emptiness confounds him. He cannot let this be the only reference book Narnia currently, publicly possesses. And so he shoves the book into the desk drawer and slides out of the chair and onto his hands and knees amongst the shards of the inkwell just as Polly turns the corner.

"Digory, there you are! I've been looking everywhere for you. The coronation about to begin. What are you doing down there?" Polly crouches, golden gown ballooning out as she settles next to him.

"Just cleaning. I was looking around at the new library and made a mess of things, as usual." He tries to grin, but his hand lands on a sharp piece of glass and his mouth twists into a grimace.

Polly tuts. "You're not even dressed yet. Digory, honestly, we're going to be late! Leave the mess, we'll come back tonight or tomorrow." She hauls him out from under the desk and shunts him through the library—it has one book now, so he can call it that—to get him changed and to bandage his hand the way she learned in Girl Guides.

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Please review!

narutofanatic16: Thank you for favoriting "The Lion and the Fox"!

A Loyal Narnian: Regarding your critique of ch20, Lucy says to Peter earlier, "I'd like for you all to meet Mr. Tumnus!" so Peter can infer that the house she's so upset about must be his. Thank you for your concern, though! Regarding ch27, the Witch has control over ice, so she melts the ice in his cup in order to dump the freezing cold water on Edmund's head. Regarding ch35, the movie score is epic, so I'm glad the chapter feels real enough to fit in! Thanks for reading all the way through, and for the one-shot suggestion! I appreciate all your comments.

Ally1012: Thanks for favoriting "The Lion and the Fox"!