A/N: I hear they're making a new Narnia movie for the Silver Chair! Thanks for all the reviews, follows, and faves!

Disclaimer: Narnia is mine! No...it actually isn't...Surprised?

Chapter 4

Lucy put her arm under Edmund's shoulders and proceeded to drag him up to his room. He wasn't very heavy for his age, but he felt like a deadweight in her arms. She turned to the cougar, who quickly attempted to help by leaning against the young king. They eventually made it to Edmund's room and she deposited him quickly onto his bed. He fell into the feather bed, unconscious and she sat down beside him.

Edmund's room was smaller than the rooms of his siblings, but he preferred it this way. He had picked out this room the week of their coronation, and hadn't moved from it since, although Lucy and Susan chose different rooms every year for a change of scenery. The room was a dark blue, and the floor was made of cold white marble with a small rug at the foot of the bed.

Lucy glanced around. There was a desk in the far corner with papers scattered over it, an ink well and quill lying on the edge of it, looking as though they would fall at any second. A wooden wardrobe stood next to the bed, and something about that wardrobe always made Lucy feel warm inside, though she couldn't put her finger on why that was. A silver shield with a red lion on it hung on the wall, along with Edmund's sword and a few maps of the world and other such trinkets. He had a horrible definition of decoration, Susan always told him.

"Decoration does not mean hanging your toys on the wall," she could hear Susan's voice now, although the Gentle Queen had not come with her, preferring instead to stay with Peter and figure out what was going on. Lucy's lower lip jutted out into a pout, but then Edmund began thrashing and she forgot her jealousy quickly, turning worried eyes back on her brother.

"Go and get a healer!" she ordered the cougar. "Please." The cougar disappeared.

Lucy turned back to her brother. She didn't understand why the healing cordial didn't work. It did, sort of, but Edmund was still very weak and seemed almost feverish, and the healing cordial had gotten rid of fevers before. She wrapped a blanket around his thin shoulders and he shuddered with the cold air that suddenly blasted the room. She knew she should get some water for him, but she was hesitant to leave his side.

She brushed hair out of his face and sighed. "Aslan, please help us," she whispered hoarsely. If the White Witch had truly returned as she feared, they were going to need it. It had been almost a year since Aslan had crossed the Eastern Sea out of Narnia, and though Lucy did not doubt for an instant that he would return, she knew that Peter and Susan did and were discouraged by it. And now, with this happening...

She turned back to Edmund. She knew he still had nightmares about the White Witch, that he would wake up in the dead of night shaking and sweating and would run to Susan's room to be comforted. Sometimes he even went to Peter, but never to Lucy, so she could only imagine how bad the nightmares were. She had no idea what the knowledge of the White Witch's return might do to him. Unlike the others, he seemed to harbor no doubts about the stone statue. If it was there, the Witch had returned. In his mind, there was no other explanation.

Edmund let out a moan. Lucy brushed his forehead, worried. The healer seemed to be taking a long time to get there. Her brother groaned and his eyes shot open. He struggled to sit up and Lucy put up a hand to steady him.

"Wha-?" Edmund felt a pain in the back of his head. He lifted a hand to it and rubbed it. Glancing around, he realized that he was in his room and that he had no knowledge of how he had gotten there.

"It's all right, Edmund," Lucy whispered. "You're all right." Her soft hands had a calming affect on his swimming head. Gently, she pushed him back down onto the bed. "You're going to be all right."

Edmund blinked at that. "Lu, what...happened?"

"You fainted, Ed," she teased, smiling. "I brought you up here and the healer's coming to have a look at you."

Edmund groaned in annoyance and embarrassment at all the attention. "I didn't faint, Lu, I just got a bit tired, is all. I don't faint."

Lucy grinned. "Of course not, Ed."

"Why did you send for a healer? I'm perfectly fine," Edmund mumbled, feeling that swimming sensation again. Maybe not so fine as he was letting on, he thought with a wince.

Lucy just smiled and ran her hand over his forehead, not responding. The door opened then and a dryad entered, the cougar following behind nervously. It stopped in the doorway of Edmund's chambers to guard them, as was his usual duty, as the dryad came forward and knelt on the bed in front of Edmund. She turned questioning eyes on Lucy as she examined her young charge.

"He fainted during court today," Lucy explained, ignoring Edmund as he rolled his eyes, not sure if she could bare to mention all the rest of it. The stone statue, the minotaur, the fact that the healing cordial hadn't worked. The dryad was likely one of the only Narnian creatures who didn't know about it all yet, she supposed.

The dryad raised a flowery eyebrow. "Have you used the cordial yet, Your Highness?" she asked. She was a kindly pink creature and one of Lucy's closest friends amongst the healers. Lucy went down to see the healers often to study their work, so she knew most of them by name. This one was name Naya, and her tree was tall and old.

Lucy nodded.

"There. You see? She's already used the cordial and it heals any injury. I'm fine," Edmund insisted, struggling to sit up again only to be not-so-gently shoved back down again by Lucy and the dryad. "And I didn't faint, I just fell unconscious for a few seconds. There's really nothing to be worried about." He at least tried to untangle himself from the blankets Lucy had cocooned around him.

"Try to be still, Your Highness," the dryad ordered with her sweet voice, and Edmund slowly quieted and allowed the healer to examine him. "Go and fetch some water and a towel, my lady," the dryad said without looking up. Lucy scurried away.

The moment she was gone, the dryad turned irritated eyes on the Just King. "You are not as well as you are letting on, my lord. Tell me how you feel, and truthfully, this time."

Edmund sighed. "My head hurts," he finally admitted after much consideration. He really didn't feel that bad, and he was annoyed at how weak he was, to have been moved to sickness at the news of Her return, and annoyed that he hadn't been able to go to the council meeting to help decide what they were going to do about it.

"And?" the dryad demanded, lifting his head and checking it for injuries. She frowned when she found none and put his head back down on the bed. He noticed her expression but said nothing about it.

"I feel a bit dizzy and like I'm having summer fever. I might be a bit nauseous. Nothing more," Edmund said adamantly, knowing his words were useless on Naya's ears. "It's really not that bad; I've been through much worse."

Lucy returned then with the water and the towels, before the dryad could say anything. She took them without thanking the Valiant Queen, who sat down on the bed once more and laid Edmund's head in her lap, running her hands through his dark hair.

"Try to drink this," Lucy whispered to him, lifting the tall glass of crystalline water to his lips. He complied and she made him drink the entire glass before she took it away again. Then she mopped up his sweat with one of the towels.

The dryad finally spoke up again. "Valiant Queen, I would see you in the hallway. King Edmund, if you so much as move from the bed I will bring back rope and tie you down." Naya had treated his injuries many times before, and though most of them were more serious than this, she knew that they should tread carefully.

Lucy glanced up quizzically, not wanting to leave Edmund's side. The dryad motioned her come again, and Lucy stood, kissing Edmund's forehead and turning to follow Naya out into the hallway. Edmund's voice stopped her.

"Lucy?" she turned back to him. "Could you open the window, please?" The fact that he was asking her and not doing it himself showed that either he was afraid of Naya's threat, as she had tied him down once before when he was injured, or he really was weak from this fast fever.

Lucy took a deep breath and let it out slowly, going over to the window above the head of Edmund's bed and opening it, smiling at the cool summer air that drifted into the room. Then she left the room, finding Naya in the hall with the cougar standing guard already. Naya quickly shut the door, her face drawn.

"What is it?" Lucy asked, apprehension on her pretty face. "Is something terribly wrong?"

The dryad shook her head. "My lady, he thinks that this is some bout of summer fever."

"Perhaps it is. He didn't eat much this morning," Lucy reflected, remembering the way he had picked at his food. Of course, that was nothing to go on. Edmund always was a light eater.

"I don't think so," Naya said.

Lucy's eyes widened. "You think it something more than that?"

Naya sighed. "The healing cordial should have worked on a simple fever, my lady. And though it does match the symptoms, the fever never comes on this fast. No, something else is at work here. What happened before he fainted?"

Lucy bit her lip, remembering the days events and becoming horribly worried.

ǁ

The White Witch had returned. The news spread throughout Narnia so quickly that almost all the talking creatures knew about it by nightfall. It would have been impossible to contain. She was back, she had turned a Calormen to stone, and that meant the wand was back, too. A hag had even seen her. Narnia was in turmoil. Aslan had abandoned them.

But where was she? No one else had seen her. No one seemed to know where she was hiding. It was rumored that she had taken up residence in the Shuddering Woods, that she was living underground somewhere, that she had crossed the Eastern Sea to fight to the death with the Emperor-over-the-Sea, that she had gone North to the land of the giants, that she had gone to Calormene and made allies with the Tisroc.

The wolf who had brought the Calormen boy to the cave in the North, the one responsible for bringing back the Witch, knew differently. The Witch hadn't done any of these things. She was just...sitting.

She was still in the very same cave she had been revived in, but now she sat in a throne she had carved for herself made of stone. The werewolf stood behind her, hood over his ugly, mangy head. The Witch hadn't moved since the hag had left.

"Wolf," she said suddenly, and wolf jumped up from his place at the back of the cave, hackles raised in apprehension but willing to be of service. She was still holding her wand, and it put him on edge. Her hands slowly caressed the wand as he slunk forward.

"Your Majesty," he bowed.

"Why hasn't the hag returned?" she demanded, her voice as icy as her reputation. Piercing eyes studied him. She still seemed to tower over everyone and everything, even sitting down. Her wicked beauty seemed ten times more potent now than it had five years ago.

"Your Majesty, I...I..." the wolf had only left the cave once, to rally up some of the Queen's loyal supporters and tell them to meet in three days, per the Witch's instructions. This had been before the hag had laughed, so he didn't understand why the Queen could possibly think he knew where she was.

The Queen's eyes grew dark, and she slowly lifted the wand. "Well?" she demanded, her voice soft but deadly. The wolf cowed. "Go and find her, Wolf!"

The wolf bowed low. "Yes, Your Majesty," he said quickly, eager to get out of the cave. He scampered away, past the two ogres who stood as guard at the entrance of the cave, past the observing eyes of the hawks perched in trees that had always remained loyal to Her Majesty, and into the forest, cursing that hag for not yet having returned.

The Witch watched in silence until he left, and then turned to the werewolf. "It seems the Captain of my Police chose fools for his soldiers," she observed coldly. "I thought he was smarter than that."

The werewolf swallowed hard. "There are few wolves who have stayed loyal to the cause over the years, Your Majesty, falling to the offer of amnesty from the High King."

It was the wrong thing to say. "High King?" her voice was shrill. "High King? That boy who sits upon Cair Paravel in throne is naught more than a child picked to be the lion's puppet."

Despite her tone, the werewolf noticed that she would not even say the lion's name. He had heard that she still cringed at the mention of that name, that it was like death to her ears. "Yes, Your Majesty."

"Now," the witch's tone became sickly sweet once more, and her hands turned back to her wand, running along it as if it were her long-lost lover. "Tell me more of this Just King." She laughed and the werewolf, despite his courage before the Calormen boy, couldn't help but shudder. "Is that supposed to be a joke? Edmund, Just King?"

"It is the title that As-the lion gave him, Your Majesty."

The Queen shook her head. "Fools, all of them. I should have made sure he was dead. It is a mistake I will not repeat."

The werewolf nodded. "Very wise, Your Majesty."

"But his siblings? They harbor no ill-will towards the young traitor?" she sounded surprised.

"None, Your Majesty, so far as anyone can tell. He is well-liked by the people, also, his treachery forgotten, for his wisdom in their private disputes, which they bring before him once a month."

The Queen shook her head at this. "I will make them loathe his very being before the end," she said coldly. "And when they do, they shall come running back to me, their Queen, and beg for my mercy."

The werewolf did not have time to respond to this before they were interrupted by a crow which came flying into the cave. It landed on the ground before the Witch's throne.

"Your Majesty, there is word from the wolf you sent you to search for the hag," the crow said.

The Queen glanced at the crow with suspicious eyes. "So soon?"

"The hag has been taken captive by the usurpers in Cair Paravel, to be executed for her role in following you, My Queen. She was captured soon after the stone statue was 'discovered.'"

The White Witch nodded, as though she had been expecting this. "She will be silent as to what she knows. Hags are very...loyal. And the others? My faithful are meeting there?"

The crow chirped in response. "The giants are coming down from the North in droves, and the tree spirits that follow you are gathering everyone they can. Ogres, wild dogs, wolves that were not turned, black dwarves, ravens, minotaurs, and anyone else that can be trusted."

"Good," she praised the crow, though she did not at all sound pleased. "The hag has been taken. We must assume that, despite her loyalty, they will be able to extract some bit of information from her." She stood finally, her legs now strong after having to wait so long for her body to function properly once more after being dead, and turned to the werewolf. "Ready the warriors. We leave at dawn."

The werewolf nodded. He did not ask what was his plaguing him at the crow's news: would they make no attempt to rescue the hag? Was she to die and the Queen would do nothing to stop it? Was this how she rewarded her faithful?

ǁ

Once the meeting was over and the hag properly locked away, Peter decided it was time to go and check on Edmund and Lucy. Susan wanted to come, but had been stopped by Oreius, who said he needed to speak with her about important matters of state that could not be left alone, even in such a time.

Peter left before Oreius could saddle him with something important to do, needing to check on Edmund, needing to know that his little brother was all right even with the Witch's return. He learned from a sparrow that the two youngest monarchs were in Edmund's room, and that a healer was looking after him. Fearing the worst, Peter ran to Edmund's room and found the cougar waiting outside.

"What's going on?" he asked the cougar, panting, afraid to go in there and see now that he was here and could hear nothing on the other side of the door.

The cougar merely shifted uncomfortably.

Taking this as a sign of the worst, Peter tensed his shoulders and stepped inside, shutting the door silently behind him and only looking up when he came to the foot of the bed.

Lucy was sitting with her legs draped over the side of the ornate bed, her arms wrapped around her brother's shoulders. A tree spirit was cocooning Edmund in so many blankets that Peter could just barely make out his brother's head of raven hair.

It wasn't until Peter saw the blankets and the blue tint to Edmund's pale skin that he felt the burst of cold air upon entering Edmund's room, and shivered, wrapping his arms around himself. A roaring fire sat in the hearth, and Lucy was dabbing the only part of Edmund's skin that was exposed-his face and neck-with warm water. The window had been shut.

The other tree spirit, moving about more tiredly, glanced up when Peter entered. She was the only one to see him. "High King Peter," she monotoned, and he held up a hand to stop her, walking wordlessly to his brother's side and sitting on the bed next to him.

"He's freezing and nothing we do seems to be able to warm him," the dryad whispered in his ear as he passed her. He nodded to signify he'd heard.

"Ed?" he took his brother's hand.

Edmund's eyes opened slowly, and he glanced around the room before finally resting on Peter. "Pete. Tell these girls I'm fine. They won't stop fussing over me."

Peter laughed but quickly turned it into a frown at the dryads' fierce looks. "How are you feeling?"

"Fine," came his younger brother's tired reply, and he sounded so young. Then, "Cold." He shivered again as if to prove a point. His eyes slowly slid shut and he lay there, asleep. Peter brushed the hair out of his eyes and looked up.

"What's wrong with him?" he asked the older dryad as she sighed.

She shook. "We're not entirely sure. We thought it was just a summer fever, but then Her Highness-," she glanced at Lucy- "and I went out into the hallway and she told me about the stone statue today and when we came back in, he was screaming and complaining of how freezing it is in here. He hasn't let up since, despite the fire and the blankets. I worry-," she stopped abruptly, her gaze turning on Lucy. The younger girl pretended not to notice.

"Yes?" Peter demanded, desperate for answers. "You worry?"

The dryad hesitated a moment, and then voiced her fears. "I worry that this has something to do with the White Witch's return."

"You think she's cast a spell on him?" Lucy asked, tightening her grip on her brother as if that alone could shield him from the witch. Peter bit his lip.

"Perhaps. But not necessarily. It may have to do with...with the wand. She stabbed him during the Battle of Beruna."

"I healed him with the cordial, and he hasn't complained of it since," Lucy argued, worry creasing her forehead.

"Yes," the dryad said carefully, "but he was holding his stomach in the throne room and he told me he felt sick earlier. I don't know. Perhaps it is ill-founded, but I find it suspicious that he falls ill the day we hear of the Witch's return."

Peter nodded, wrapping his arms around Edmund's shoulders. It made sense, but the thought of that Witch harming his little brother any more than she already had made him ball his hands into fists and wish he could kill her, without Aslan's help this time. Hadn't she already hurt Edmund enough? Hadn't she already hurt Narnia enough? Where was Aslan?

That last thought popped up before he could stop it and he instantly felt ashamed. Lucy would never doubt Aslan, not for a single moment, yet more and more he found himself wondering when Aslan would come back, why he was taking so long to return to them.

"I'm afraid there is nothing more I can do," the dryad said softly, watching the tender display of affection between the siblings. "Just try to keep him warm, and when he awakens, make him drink this. It will help with the pain." She handed Lucy a small brown mug filled to the brim with dark liquid. With one last sympathetic glance in the Just King's direction, she disappeared out the door, the younger dryad following without a word.

Once the tree spirits were gone, Lucy and Peter got into the bed and laid down on both sides of Edmund to try and keep him warm, Lucy setting the mug down on the small table beside the bed. They sat in silence there for a while, the three siblings, Edmund occasionally shivering and the two others trying desperately to warm him up.

"Peter?" Lucy whispered, her voice hoarse. He glanced up and saw the tear tracks down her cherub-like cheeks and inwardly cursed the White Witch once more. "Ed's going to be all right, isn't he?"

Peter glanced down at his little brother, buried beneath the blankets but seemingly unaffected by them. "Of course he is, Lu." He wanted desperately to believe his own words.

Lucy nodded. "Where is Susan?" she asked after a moment of silence.

Before Peter could answer, the door opened and the young lady in question barged in, her bow slung over her shoulder, ignoring the small gasp from the Valiant Queen. "I'm here," she announced herself, coming forward and standing in front of the bed, concern etched across her features. "How is he? I came as soon as I could get away."

Peter's forehead crinkled at this and he cast her a questioning look. "Later," she mouthed, and then sat down on the now nearly full bed and took Edmund's hand, encased in warm blankets. "Oh, Ed."

Their brother moaned at these words, and then nestled further into Peter's shoulder. Peter reached up and ran a hand through his little brother's hair and glanced up to find the two queens watching with eyes full of tears.

"I don't understand," Susan whispered, not wanting to wake her brother. A little of the Finchley accent that had, over time, been replaced with pure Narnian, slipped back into her voice, and for a moment, Peter no longer saw a Queen before him, but a scared little girl begging him to "just listen."

"It'll be all right," Lucy reassured, repeating Peter's earlier promise. "She can't win. She's already been defeated. Aslan will come back like he always does when Narnia is in trouble."

The two older siblings exchanged glances. Unfortunately, Lucy caught the look. "He will," she insisted. "We just have to trust him."

R+R please!