Author's Note: This is the first of two fics I've started after seeing The Voyage of the Dawn Treader. This one focuses on Eustace's thoughts during the movie. I am following the plot line established in the movie, but I'm expanding on all of the scenes that were short-shrifted during the movie, along with all of the ones that weren't. Hope you all enjoy the ride.

This Rough Magic

Chapter One: In the Dungeons

Narnia was no magical land, Eustace decided. It was Hell.

It really wasn't fair. He was a good boy. He always (okay, sometimes) listened to his parents, he did well in school, he kept his room neat as a pin, and he'd won Experiment House's personal hygiene award two years running.

And where did it get him?

Trapped in this dank, dark pit with a bunch of people who smelled like they hadn't bathed in days. He barely had enough space to sit comfortably; every time he moved he was bumping into one person or another. And, though he could hardly believe it, he was going to be sold as a slave in the morning.

If he even survived to the morning.

"We're going to die, down here," he announced, and someone on the far side of the pit burst into tears. He couldn't see the person through the crowd, but it sounded like a child.

"We are not going to die," came Lucy's quiet, calm voice, her tone soothing and gentle. "We are going to be rescued, and everyone is going to be fine."

Eustace snorted, derisively, but before he could say anything, Lucy very pointedly brought her booted foot down onto his own. He yelped in pain as his toes were momentarily but still painfully crushed beneath her foot, his soft house shoe offering no protection when compared to the sturdy boots she was wearing.

His eyes watering with pain, he looked up and saw Lucy glaring at him, her eyes boring into him, fiercely. She seemed to be almost daring him to say what was on his mind, but he kept his mouth shut. If only to save his other foot from a similar fate.

But, it seemed that others in the pit with them were having the same thought as he was.

"There's no rescue coming for us, little girl," a man's voice rasped out. "We're all going up on the auction block in the morning; Gov'ner Gumpas isn't likely to let us go free, now."

"Edmund and Caspian are still out there," Lucy said, her voice confident. "They will free themselves and come for us."

"If they're not already dead," Eustace snapped, nastily.

Then, he almost, almost regretted the thoughtless words at the shocked look that momentarily flashed across his cousin's face. But, Lucy regained her composure, quickly, her face smoothing over into an emotionless mask.

"If those monsters have hurt my brother or Caspian," she said, softly, "I will give them reason to regret it."

There was something dark and dangerous in her usually laughing eyes, and Eustace was sharply reminded of what he'd seen in the bell tower. He never could have imagined that this seemingly delicate, gentle girl could wield a sword with such accuracy. But, he'd seen her fighting just as well as Edmund and Caspian, holding her own well against the slavers that had threatened them.

And now, she looked like she was ready to take them on, again. With her bare hands, if necessary.

"I'm sure they're not dead," Eustace said, gruffly, if only to get the scary look out of her eyes.

But, he didn't believe his own words. He'd seen, although he was sure Lucy hadn't, given her earlier statement, that the men who'd been holding Edmund had hit him over the head to get him to stop fighting them. He'd seen his cousin slump limply in the men's arms, blood flowing from the gash in his temple from where he'd been struck with the butt of a dagger.

Edmund might have called his reading useless, but Eustace knew things. Like just how damaging a blow to the head truly was to a person, how dangerous it was if they were unconscious for longer than a few seconds. And since Edmund hadn't stirred as he and Caspian were being dragged away, Eustace knew that his cousin had been entering that dangerous range of unconsciousness.

And, though he didn't want to admit it to himself, he was worried about the older boy.

The sound of Lucy's voice suddenly jerked him out of his thoughts, and he looked up to see his cousin regarding him with a frank, curious look on her face.

"Are you all right?" she asked, concern in her voice. "You looked like you were a million miles away."

"I'm fine," Eustace snapped at her, wishing with all of his heart that he really was a million miles away.

"Eustace, if you want to talk," Lucy offered, but he brushed her offer off with a cold glare.

"Talk about what?" he snapped. "Talk about how we're going to be sold as slaves in the morning? About how I'm never going to see Mother and Father, again? About how Edmund and Caspian are supposed to somehow escape from a prison and come riding to our rescue?"

"Eustace-" Lucy sighed, and she sounded like she was at the end of her rope.

"You know," Eustace went on, ignoring the tone he could hear in Lucy's voice, "if you think about it, this is all Caspian's fault."

"What?" Lucy demanded, incredulously.

"We should have stayed on the ship," Eustace told her, angrily. "But, no, King Caspian just had to go exploring! I even told him we should have left-"

"We had no way of knowing of the dangers that awaited us," Lucy protested, and Eustace was reminded of the family he'd seen hiding in one of the abandoned buildings.

He wondered, briefly, if things would have turned out differently if he'd warned everyone about the people he'd seen. If maybe they could have defended themselves against the slavers.

But, he just as quickly dismissed the thought. This wasn't his responsibility; it was Caspian's. Their safety – and the danger they were in now – was on the King's head. It wasn't his fault, and he steadfastly ignored the irritating little voice at the back of his mind that kept whispering maybe and what if.

Lucy sighed, again, and it seemed like she was going to say something else. But, she just shook her head, biting back whatever she wanted to say. Instead, she leaned against him, throwing an arm around his shoulders as they sat in the dark.

Eustace considered shrugging her arm off his shoulders and pushing her away. But, it was getting cold down in the pit as the sun went down, and he was warm where he was pressed up against Lucy. So, he just let her be, not even protesting when her head dropped down to rest on his shoulder.

After a while, Lucy's breathing slowed and deepened, evening out in sleep. Around them, the other captives were also falling asleep, filling the pit with a cacophony of snores, grunts, and other night noises.

Eustace, for his part, tried to sleep. But, his overactive imagination kept conjuring up scenarios of what could happen in the morning, each one more horrible than the last. Finally, he just gave up and spent the rest of the night staring into the darkness.