Just because everything's changing doesn't mean it's never been this way before…

The Tomb of Aslan, where He lay down His blood to save Edmund, is now a defensible fortress. Inscribed with the Legends of the Kings and Queens of Cair Paravel upon the walls. Drawings of Mr. Tumnus and the lamppost, the Scripture stories and fairy tales of Narnia. But the torchlight chases the shadows from a more sacred place still. The great Stone Table, still split, now an empty tomb. Where only Kings and Queens of Narnia go, Caspian included. Here the walls, telling their story like history, like a legend, are more elaborate. The Song of Old plays so beautifully as they look at the broken pillars surrounding the Table – it looks like Stonehenge. I wonder if Susan or Edmund sees England in the Standing Stones.

Lucy touches the Table, as only a prophet would dare, because a prophet would think nothing of it. "He must know what He's doing," she tells the other Kings and Queen of Narnia. How could you feel abandoned in such a place? And yet, it all seems so very long ago. The Legends have come back, but they look so very small beside the marble carvings of themselves. And the greatest figure, the Lion, is not there in life. Where would you feel more abandoned than an empty church?

Susan looks at the world as it is, her face twisted in skepticism at her sister's faith – seeing the world for what it could be and believing. Peter sees the world as he can make it, "I think it's up to us now." It always was, otherwise Jadis would have fallen centuries earlier. He never does for us those things we could do for ourselves.

Peter brings a Council of War into the most sacred of temples.

Everyone else that happened that night was just another version of that sin.

A Centaur spotted a Telmarine in the Woods – but more importantly a Telmarine soldier became the first (second) Telmarine to see a Centaur in nine generations. And their first thought is to kill it. Because humans are terrified of other sentient races. They don't seem to think they can measure up. We must be the only people – so there's no basis for comparison. Or they just know how royally pissed off the Narnians have every right to be and want to stop them from going all terrorist on their shitty little kingdom.

In the most sacred Temple of Old Narnia, High King Peter suggests going all terrorist on their shitty little castle. His argument is basically: they forgot that we but not they have an air force that can both attack from above AND transport our army across the country under cover of night. Also, he knows the power of air raids. It's the entire reason he found Narnia in the first place. It's an England solution to a Narnia problem – it might work, that's why he was brought here he thinks, but it will NOT make his Narnia again. But this is how he can will something – the England way. He's lost his grip on the Golden Age. Which is necessary, because it's gone.

Caspian is not feeling this for about ten reasons. For starters, he knows every face in that castle. It's very different to kill soldiers than the servants who swarmed about you as you grew. Secondly, he wants to claim his throne rightfully not usurp his uncle as he was usurped, because he is a Telmarine king but, all the more since he's seen one, he wants to be a Narnian king. Thirdly, Telmar and Narnia can never live together in peace if this is how the land is won. The Silver Age does not need to slip that far. Plus he knows that castle intimately – it's never been taken. Peter and Trumpkin's practical rebuttals are not his point – must you take all of the Telmarines' pride? Is that what we will build the new country on? The Kings and Queens of Old (or rather, Peter and Susan, since Edmund and Lucy are having a different discussion entirely) are focused on ousting the supplanters of their people. Caspian wants to reconcile them. He knows it can be done, or he desperately wants to believe so – believe he can lead the Telmarines and the Narnians to peace, be a king of both. It's a good thing to believe in.

If the Battle is fought here, for the sacred ground of Narnia rather than the fortress of Telmar, then they have the advantage in all kinds of ways both symbolic, spiritual and practical. Edmund, perched more comfortably on the ruins because he knows this will be a long night, points out that Narnia could continue dying slowly out under a long siege, because he sees both sides. Then the silly squirrel gets cute and Reepicheep gets adorably sarcastic on him, and now I have images of Reepicheep kicking the shit out of a Telmarine soldier by throwing nuts at him because you know he could. I'm surprised he doesn't want to do so just for the story, so in love with his own legend. He and the Head Centaur stand beside their High King, who seems intent on beating down Caspian.

We pan out and, for the first time, see Lucy. She is sitting on the broken Stone Table. As a Prophet that is her right, her place of strength. She saw the world and her brother saved in just this place, and she saw divinity die to save mortality. So did Susan, but she is no longer The Gentle of tales. She stands beside the war kings, because she sees the world as it is. No better, no worse.

Peter turns with respect to the Head Centaur, because he is a good king. He just doesn't count Caspian as his subject yet, much less a King under him. The Head Centaur looks back at Caspian before answering The Magnificent's question. His answer is telling of his opinion both of the battleplan and this method of defeating the Telmarines but speaks of his honor and love of country, "Or die trying." Such fantastic actors, to get all of that into three words.

It finally provokes Lucy to speak. "You're all acting like there are only two options. Dying here or dying there."

Just because everything's changing doesn't mean it's never been that way before…

"Or have you forgotten who really defeated the White Witch, Peter?"

But Peter is not ready to listen to the Prophet, not ready to look beyond the way he would have the world be to the way that it truly is and could be at once – the world in which Aslan and his prophets walk. He looks at her, as sad as she is but resigned to an altered vision of the world he will impress on reality, "I think we've waited for Aslan long enough." This is the Silver Age. The Table is empty.

Not entirely true; it bears his prophet. But she looks so small.

All you can do is try to know who your friends are as you head off to the War…

If you cannot have faith, you make do with the sweat of your brow.

A griffin carries The Just through the night to a castle that looks more like a fortress. A sentinel has clearly been told to watch the night skies for a potential attack but cannot quite bring himself to believe in it. A moment later, he is gone and instantly replaced with Edmund, King of Narnia. This is what would happen in a victory here. Narnians would move into the Telmarine's old rooms, yet another New World would take the place of Miraz's latest one, rather than a return of the Old.

An English torch shines out into the night, and four more griffins launch themselves into the night. Not far away, a Centaur stands with a dwarf awaiting battle, the children of Aslan and Jadis standing together to take back their own. Minotaur and giant cat. They move together. Nikabrik is loving this. Reepicheep and his band scuttle into the shadows of the palace, waiting for the signal.

Susan, Peter and Caspian drop from the sky, and Caspian is the first to shed the blood of his own subjects. Were you watching? It was a warning, Peter. One who sees the world as it is, one who would will the world to be as he would have it, and one who sees the world that could be born out of this terrible war's labor pains, land upon the battlements of the fortress of Telmar. Susan's arrows make short work of the guard who aimed upon Edmund, in a good position at the top of the tower to do what he does best and see the world from both sides of the divide. A child of Jadis, Trumpkin, is also there. Four representatives: of Telmar and England, of the White World and the Golden Age. Choosing sides because they think they have to, because they think they cannot all exist together. Choosing the Silver over any of the others.

If I sang songs about him to even his heart's content, I could not give Reepicheep a better compliment than this – I love him despite my irrationally strong and panicky fear and hatred of rats and mice (can't watch Ratatouille without getting a week of nightmares – Winston and I could have a nice long chat about it in Room 101). But dang, do they have to keep showing all the silent scuttly bits? With the squeaks?

Tying up the cat was adorable, however. And I loved his smile as he set out to do it. I wonder if this cat is related to the one who lost his ability to speak at the End of the World.

The Shadow over the Moon has gone, and Caspian insists on searching the Castle. "You wouldn't even be here without [Dr. Cornelius]. And neither would I." Without his belief that a man of Telmar could save Narnia and that the Old Tales were true. That Aslan and the Kings and Queens of Old loved their people enough to return. This is not how he would have had it end.

Susan sees the boys about to start getting into it and tells Peter that Caspian isn't needed to deal with Miraz and Caspian promises not to miss his cue, so he heads off with the DLF, to find the man of both their lines.

The DLF heads to the Gatehouse, where Reepicheep's band has made short work of the guards. Then they have an adorable exchange that makes me want a spinoff featuring them. "I was expecting someone, you know, taller." "You're one to talk." "What's that supposed to be, irony?" What it was supposed to be, of course, was a display of the subtle tensions that still exist between the Children of Aslan and the Children of Jadis. They've learned to coexist in their shared exile, but Reepicheep would have rather had a Son of Adam.

Caspian finds Dr. Cornelius in the dungeons, and he demands why he's here. "I didn't help you escape just to have you break back in." He did not want Narnia to take back its land in the way of the Telmarine kings. When Caspian tells him the coup is going down, he warns Caspian that he is only going down the path of all honorable Telmarine kings – assassination. Caspian gives him a WTF look, but you can tell behind it that he's always known this, just as he always knew one day he would be awoken with the words, "Miraz has a son," and that those words would mean he had to run. But now he knows it with all of him, now it is at the top of his mind, and he cannot dislodge it. Blood and revenge are hammering in my head. So he must act upon it. Dr. Cornelius apologizes for all of it.

Miraz wakes at swordpoint and does not flinch, because he too always knew that this moment would come. "Thank goodness, you're safe." Ha. Too bad there's not an audience; they wouldn't have been so quick to challenge his valor in the tent. Caspian orders him out of the bed and Prunaprismia murmurs tiredly and surprisedly. Miraz reminds her that they always knew this day would come. That's why she could grab a crossbow from over their bed.

"But you're not like me," he tells Caspian, "The first time you've shown any backbone and it's all a waste." The first time he has looked like the kind of Telmarine king who survives to rule, if one who miscalculated. But he has never looked less like a king of Narnia.

Prunaprismia levels the crossbow at her nephew, "I don't want to do this." She did not want to be a Telmarine queen either. Susan and Peter arrive in a series of quips, "We don't want you to either." "This used to be a private room." Caspian says screw the gate, he wants the truth for once. "Did you kill my father?"

Backed up against a stained glass window, Miraz is torn between, "Finally," and "Really? People don't know this? It was pretty obvious." Prunaprismia who never wanted to be a Telmarine kind of queen, snaps, "You said your brother died in his sleep." And Miraz is like, "Yes, that's still true."

Susan tries to talk some sense into Caspian, none of this matters in the world as it is right at this very moment. Because at this very moment that damn gate needs to be opened. Miraz decides to play with Caspian properly and begins with a little lesson in what it means to be Telmarine, "We would have nothing if we had not taken it. Your father knew that as well as anyone." Caspian IX would not have saved Narnia.

Prunaprismia is horrified, dropping the crossbow from its ready stance. But Miraz reminds her, just as cruelly, that she always knew this day would come. It's why the crossbow is over the bed. She may not have wanted to think of herself as a Telmarine queen, waiting for fate to just drop everything she wanted into her lap, but she is. And she has taken it. "For our son." Miraz gets his neck closer to Caspian's sword to provoke her fighting stance. Even to the point of getting blood on his neck.

"You have to make a choice dear," he tells her, like the choice she made to never ask how her brother-in-law died. Because she didn't need to ask. She married a Telmarine king, and she is a Telmarine queen. "Do you want our son to be a king or to be like Caspian here? Fatherless!" She shoots him in the arm, screaming, and both of them get away to raise the alert.

The scream makes The Just drop the torch. A guard finds it. Alarms sound. Edmund jumps down on the guard and fights with him as Peter yells to signal the troops. Element of surprise gone, advantages gone. Torch dead, England's plan in shambles. Peter opens the Gate even so. Susan tries to get him to abort mission, but he is determined. Like the dwarves and mice troops working together in the wheel above him. Susan demands, "Exactly who are you doing this for?" Because she sees the world as it is, and that world spells retreat. Her brother sees the world he could will into being, and he refuses to yield again. They cannot talk to each other through such a divide.

In utter joy, not knowing his attack has been compromised, the Head Centaur rears up higher than anyone has ever seen him or anyone before. Glorious, free, full of relief that the time has come after centuries of watching, he shouts, "CHARGE!" So do the guards of the Telmarines.

Narnia charges as one, the gate opens just in time. Peter shouts, "For Narnia!" the way he did in battle against the White Witch. Willing it to end as that battle did, complete with Aslan's reinforcements if the Great Lion so likes.

There weren't archers there then, not surrounding the whole of the battle. Edmund disables one and has to be reminded by his brother to flee from the remaining hundred. Miraz looks down at the boys who would be king, marveling at how they turn his terrible plans into exactly what he needed. A minotaur leaps from rampart to rampart until he stands upon the balcony of Miraz. As he is about to strike, Captain Glozelle kills him, coming up from behind to protect the Telmarine King in all but name. He falls, crashing through rampart after rampart, right past The Magnificent. It finally gets through.

It is always such a terrible moment when great men and megolomaniacs (it's so hard at times to tell the difference) realize that they cannot make the world as they would have it be. The difference is how they respond to that moment.

The Just, looking down at nothing below him, stretching down, sees the divide between the two worlds clearly. Trumpkin readies himself to die fighting as guards burst at last into the top of the Gatehouse. He does well at first, as they always do (never be the first guard into the room), but falls as they always do. Miraz ordered the gate closed.

A minotaur, a Child of Jadis who became a Child of Narnia in the long night of the occupation, leaps at the falling gate and catches it with his body, holding it aloft with all of his strength and his soul for his fellow Narnians. It is enough, at last, for Peter to shout, "Fall back!" Caspian, a captain and not a general who has become lost in the midst of the battle, is surprised that from above it's going that poorly. Susan looks at the world as it is and mourns Narnia. Even in Narnia, it turns on her so viciously. That is when Phyllis started gaining more ground, even in this place.

The Head Centaur takes The Gentle from the battle, the High King goes to collect the boy who would be, The Just takes a griffin out of his current predicament, the Minotaur holds the Gate, and as the Hope of the Silver Age arrives with horses, the Last King of Telmar fires into his own soldiers and takes down the Child of Jadis who gave his life for the Old Legends of Narnia. Many escape, many are trapped. They yell at the others to go, they yell in fear, but mostly it is the noble sacrifice, because they know the bargain they made. Those on the bridge stare, survivor's guilt crushing even those who did not send them to their deaths, squeezing The Gentle out of Susan Pevensie's heart, and some turn, in honor, to fight a fruitless battle. Peter's heart breaks. So does his personal will. Peter Pevensie's bitterness and personal pain become obvious, scars he can stare at and blame. How far he has fallen from The Magnificent.

The Just flies over the massacre of the battle, looking down, seeing how the White World and the Golden Age lie dead together in the fortress of Telmar. None of it is fair. Not this way. The Valiant sits upon the legs of the Stone Table, fingering the cordial that will repair the wounded. She does not know that no wounded will return, none wounded could escape the castle. This was wrong from the start, but she does not yet know how badly it has gone.

She can feel her people returning and runs out to them, thinking she will be needed. So few return.

When The Valiant asks The Magnificent what happened, Peter Pevensie blames Prince Caspian who showed himself a Prince of Telmar. He was walking even with Peter this time – though not because he earned his spurs and his place there – and he whirls on him, furious. He made his mistakes, but so did the Legend, the Great High King. This leads to a very public confrontation about taking power. The Old Tales have failed, and in rage they strike out at the only handy representative of the people who conquered and stole Narnia, and they make it difficult for either of them to lead their people with this display. Because Peter could not will his world into reality, and Caspian was deprived the honor of doing it himself. He needed the Golden Age's blessing to make it real, to make it Narnia of Olde, not a lean and hard hybrid. But the Old Legends are just people, four children, and two of them could not believe anymore. They were being asked to grow up and do things for themselves, and they forgot how to make it work here.

And if you'll spare me a moment – Peter and Susan turn to the world more as adults do, the real world, but Peter can see the other side, the better and glorious other side of miracles and faith and being our best selves; Edmund and Lucy turn to the other side, the spiritual realm of golden light and Lions, but Edmund can see the other side of schoolboy scuffles and the starvation of a long siege. And that's the difference between them. They work best as a whole. Peter and Lucy work best in general, are everyone's favorites, but I think I love Edmund most. And Susan, oh how I understand, lovely girl.

After all, it's Edmund who tells Peter and Caspian to put down their damn swords so that The Valiant can heal the fallen Trumpkin. Peter begins to see a bit more of the blessed world as she brings back the DLF, but Caspian turns away. Nikabrik follows him, pouncing on the failure of the Golden Age. There is an older solution still.

The DLF of the Kings and Queens of Old wakes up with a gruff, "What are you all standing around for? The Telmarines will be here soon." He is so wonderful. "Thank you," he continues, "my dear little friend." The Daughter of Eve, the Prophet of Aslan, grins at him. Of course. The Children of Jadis needed only to believe to be Children of Aslan.

The Telmarines finish the bridge and crown Miraz their king. The ceremony focuses on pledging of troops, which is not just for ominous effect because the cuts of them marching was enough for that. It's an insight into the world of Telmar – all about strength of arm and enforcing loyalty. And there are so many of them come to welcome their new king. So many more Telmarines than Narnians. Not just soldiers, but people. Most of them are simple people, who only want to live their lives in peace. Should they be exiled or oppressed in turn? But they were complicit with their nobles and generals and kings who stepped on the necks of the people of Narnia too long.

Caspian stares at the carvings of the Two Sons of Adam and Two Daughters of Eve who once saved Narnia. He never thought he needed them, but he believed in them. He hoped in them. If they had not come, he would have made do and at the moment he thinks he would have been better off. But they were so beautiful in the stories he heard and kept locked safe in his heart, soft and bright and glowing. Like gold. They could have made him so beautiful. But the world was not that kind. It is cold and hard and shiny. Like silver.

Once the world was colder still and harsh and blinding. Once the world was white with snow and ice.

Just because everything's changing doesn't mean it's never been this way before…

Nikabrik breaks it down for Caspian, the disaster of the war. Caspian asks if saying "I told you so" really consoles him. Nikabrik offers him his uncle's blood, they want it too, the Children of Jadis. Blood for blood, an ancient world under a red sun. Caspian follows the soft, glowing red light that once triumphed in this Stone Table now turned Temple. He calls it a power greater still, that held even Aslan at bay for near a hundred years.

Caspian draws his sword. A werewolf calls himself Hunger and Thirst, the kind that need not be quenched, "I can fast a hundred days and not die. I can lie a hundred nights on the ice and not freeze." He can live in the White World, he does not need the blessed sun or its fruits. "I can drink a river of blood and not thirst." Caspian turns at that, staring at Nikabrik in dismay. Jadis's favorite child looks up at him from the Ancient World – full of wild magic, the ancient magic from the dawn of time that would have given Edmund into the hands of the Witch. Caspian does not know the tale of the Even More Ancient Magic from Before the Dawn of Time.

All you can do's try to know who your friends are…

"Show me your enemies!" Unleash the unstoppable forces of black magic upon them. A harpy dances from the other side of the Werewolf. "What you hate, so will we. No one hates better than us," she almost coos. Her voice is almost gentle, nearly sweet. Caspian has his sword drawn, but he looks at them.

There is a picture called "We Three Fools" which contains only two. That is the picture of a witches coven here – "We Three Black Magicians." There are only two, but Caspian speaks in his heaviest accent yet, "And you can guarantee Miraz's death?"

"And more," is his answer. Much more death. Death is easy. He used to want rebirth. The forces of Black Magic are unstoppable – they cannot be resisted and they go on forever. Far beyond when you've had your fill of blood. Caspian nods the tiniest fraction, barely enough to count as assent, barely, as if he did not will it at all, barely aware that it was happening. But then he is the third in the ritual, inside the circle that summons the Dark and the White.

There is a spell, then the harpy stabs Jadis's wand down upon the stones that witnessed Aslan's victory over her. In this same place, her favorite children grin wildly in awe. They could not bring back their mistress until a Son of Adam fell into their hands. Between two pillars now rises a huge sheet of ice that reflects back another world entirely. The White Witch looks out from it.

That's the thing about the Silver Age: it is a mirror. It can reflect any age that has been or that will come to be. It won't get any of them quite right, but it can be any of them. It gets to choose. It can be the Golden Age or the White World or the Song of Beginning or the End of Days. The choice happens here. Now.

"Wait, this isn't what I wanted," Caspian cries, lying, too late. The werewolf grabs his arm before he steps out of the circle, holding his arm out for the harpy to take his blood.

Much better at cooing, Jadis looks at the child of Telmar, "One drop of Adam's blood and you free me. Then I am yours, my king." She gives herself away, ever so slightly, in her eyes. They always do. They cannot quite hide her lust for life, her own fierce and deadly will as it pretends to bow before another's. Caspian shouts as the knife flies across his skin. Jadis extends her hands, the ice cracking to let his touch draw her forth. He keeps his hand extended as the others rush to stop the Kings and Queens of Old from ending this madness.

She is so beautiful, as Edmund thought once. They said she was terrible, but she comes gently. The snow that is falling all around him is clean and bright and good. The ice under it is treacherous, but he does not see that yet. Snow covers so many sins. This could end Telmar and Miraz, take back the country for the Narnians.

The Silver Age could be White again. It could dazzle with the light of the cold sun off the freshly fallen snow. It could be blinding to Telmar and his enemies. The world could be so new and clean and tidy.

White.