The next day the people of London woke up to an angry purple sky throwing down lashings of stinging rain and a horrible wind that would go through you rather than around you, a lazy wind Sally called it. The leaves were whipped into a frenzied sort of dance in the wind eddies and the rain caused a stinging pain as it touched the skin.

Seemingly regardless of all this however a small figure could be seen running round the corner of St. George's Street towards number thirty-two, the Pevensie residence.

Yes this was Sally Potts on her way to talk with the siblings of Peter Pevensie. The weather matched the wild feelings inside her as she was completely unsure as to how this would go. After all, how often is it that you go around to your friend's house to tell his brother and sisters that he was most likely mad? Not often at all and Sally was not looking forward to it! She dashed up the street cursing the rain as it splashed inside her shoes and soaked her socks.

She pushed the gate open and ran to the door. Once there she pulled hard on the doorbell and stood there shivering.

"Oh come on! Come on! Open the door!" she thought desperately. Finally the door was opened and there stood a tallish woman in her mid-thirties (although if you hadn't know her you would have thought her older) her face was lined with many months worry and terror. Her greying hair was pulled back into a loose bun and stray strands of hair flew about her grey eyes in the wind that reached her from the outside. She was wiping her hands on an apron and she smiled when she saw who it was at the door.

This was s Helen Pevensie, so like her eldest daughter Susan in looks, yet much more like her youngest daughter Lucy on the inside. To Sally she was a sort of role model and one of the best cooks she had ever known!

"Oh Sally dear! Come in out of that horrible weather! Come in here!" She held the door wide for Sally to pass through.

"T-thank you M-Mrs P-Pevensie!" She chattered.

"Oh here, give me your wet coat dear; I'll put it on the range in front of the fire to dry it for you! The four of them are up in the girl's bedroom I think. You can go on up to them, oh and by the way could you tell them that the bread is going into the stove now and should be ready soon enough."

"Yes Mrs. Pevensie! Thank you!" Sally replied and went to run up the narrow staircase. Now that she was indoors out of the wind and rain she wasn't nearly half as cold as she had been and she felt much happier and more optimistic.

When she reached the landing Sally was faced with three doors. The one to the right and the front of the house was the largest room and it was Mr and Mrs. Pevensie's (well at least she assumed it was because she had never been inside it) The one next to it was the smallest and it belonged to the two boys Peter and Edmund. Next to it at the end of the house was the girl's bedroom and it was only slightly larger than the boys. It was on this door that Sally knocked, expecting to see the four of them in there.

"Yes?" Susan opened the door, a wide smile curving on her full lips, grey eyes shining with mirth.

"Oh, hullo Sal, come on in!" Sally followed her into the already overcrowded room. Peter and Lucy were sitting on one bed while Susan and Edmund sat on the other. A chorus of "Hullo Sal!" rang out as Lucy jumped up and ran to give her a hug round the middle. Sally laughed and said, "Hullo guys! Hi Lu! How are things?"

"Sally! Sally, you'll never guess what!" said Lucy excitedly.

"What Lu?"

"Well it was my birthday last week and Peter and Su and Ed got me a new doll! Look, Look!"



Sally saw that Lucy was holding a small rag doll in her hands and was thrusting it towards her. She took it and had a good long look at it. The doll was fairly new, with a mane of red hair, green button eyes and a happy smile. She was wearing a pink skirt and white cardigan. It must have been quite expensive.

"Oh Lucy its lovely! What did you call her?" said Sally delightedly.

"Mrs. Beaver!" said Lucy excitedly.

"Mrs...What?" Sally was very confused.

"Mrs. Beaver, after Mrs. Beaver in Narnia!"

Sally froze. Narnia. The whole room had gone suddenly silent, the wind roaring past the window was the only sound and it was now amplified so much in the tense silence that it seemed to fill the room.

"Oh my. Peter had talked to someone else about all this." She thought, "He had talked to Lucy and the poor child thought it was a great story! She liked it so much that she had named her new doll after one of the characters in it! Ooh Peter!"

"Narnia?" she said calmly, then looked over at Peter. He squirmed uncomfortably under her gaze.

"Yes, Narnia, you wanted to talk to the rest of them so here you are. Tell her!" he addressed first Sally then his siblings.

Sally couldn't believe this was happening! "They couldn't all possibly..." she trailed off when Susan started to speak.

"It's true Sal, Narnia is real! We've all been there!"

"Yea!" piped up Lucy in the back, "It's beautiful!"

"No, it's not! You cannot have a world in the back of a wardrobe! I don't care how big said wardrobe is! It didn't happen!" Sally cried desperately. So far that was three out of four who believed in it, Edmund hadn't said anything. "Surely Ed will help me here! The whole lot of them can't be delusional!" thought Sally wildly.

The whole room went silent again as they turned to Edmund. He stayed silent for a few more minutes looking at Sally. Then he turned to look at Peter.

"What's the point?" He said, "She won't believe us anyway! And you shouldn't have told her in the first place! What were you thinking?!"

The floor seemed to fall from beneath Sally' feet. "All of them. They all believed it." She thought numbly. Then her mind started to search for a plausible, rational explanation.

"They must have been horribly treated." She thought, "You do hear of that sometimes where people are treated horribly they create a place for themselves to go to hide from it all, someplace wondrous and full of magic! Yes that must be what happened!" her mind grasped at the last and only straw left. When she tried to explain her theory though they all but laughed at her.

"Why can't you just believe in magic Sal?" Peter asked her, grinning.

"Because magic doesn't exist! She hissed vehemently. "You're all mad and you need help! I'm leaving!" And with that she turned around, flew out of the room, down the stairs, grabbed her coat and (ignoring Mrs. Pevensie's cries and asking her what was wrong) she flew out the door. However she was only one house down when Peter caught up to her.

"Sal! Sally hold on a minute!"

It was still raining heavily and he was drenched to the bone when he reached her. His hair stuck to his forehead and the rain was running rivers down his face. His blue eyes were desperate with worry.

"Sal, hang on a second!"



"No Peter! First thing Monday morning I'm going to the headmaster and he'll get you all the help you need and –"

"No, Sal he won't." Peter said flatly.

"Yes, he will because-"

"No. He won't Sally because we don't go to that school anymore. Haven't you wondered why we haven't been back yet?" he asked.

"Well, yeah, but I..." to tell the truth she hadn't really thought all that much about it because after all it was only the second day back and she still got to see them after school.

"We're leaving Sally. For boarding school."

"Boarding school, but then we won't..."she trailed off, horrified.

"No, we won't see each other until at least Christmas." Peter said tiredly.

"But...When do you leave?" she asked quietly.

"Monday."

"Monday! Oh Peter!" and she fling her arms around his neck because no matter where he thought he had been. Or what he thought he had done, he was still her Peter, her rock, her best friend. He hugged her back tightly and they stood like that for a while, the rain washing away the tears.