Again, sorry about the long delay. This is a long chapter (well, by my standards, anyway) to make up for it!

This isn't the last chapter, everyone. The ending seems pretty final, but I promise there's just one more to come after this.

TRIGGER WARNING: Mentions of suicide and death.

C.S Lewis owns Narnia, not me. (Pity.)

Peter, Edmund and Lucy sat together in the back of the taxi as it clattered into the Port of Southampton. None of them had spoken the whole long journey from London. They could hardly discuss finding Susan with the driver there, at any rate.

Taking a taxi had been risky, they knew. There was always the possibility that they would be recognised. But the taxi driver, to the Pevensies' immense relief, did not seem to have read the paper that told of the train crash. And a taxi meant they didn't have to catch a train. None of the Pevensies were sure whether they would ever be able to get on a train again.

"Here you are, then." said the driver, breaking the silence. "Southampton Port. Lovely this time of year." He looked curiously at the Pevensies. "What brings you here, anyway?"

"We're meeting a family member." Peter said shortly. It was the truth – or, at least, he hoped it would be.

The Pevensies got out of the taxi, Peter paid the driver, and they watched as it drove away. They turned and looked out over Southampton.

Dozens upon dozens of hotels. Dozens upon dozens of hotels, and Susan could be in any one of had no idea where to start looking, and time was ticking away fast.

Peter, Edmund and Lucy looked at each other. None of them spoke, but they were all thinking the same thing.

How will we ever find Susan here?

OOO

As night fell and the occupants of Southampton fell asleep, the three Pevensies searched on. They'd been into hotel after hotel, asking at the front desks for Susan Pevensie. Time and again, they were greeted with the same response: "There's no one of that name here."

It was like their sister had vanished off the face of the Earth. And as the night wore on, Peter, Edmund and Lucy became more and more desperate. With every hotel that they tried, their spirits sank a little more. But still they would not give up. On and on they went, although they grew more tired by the minute, although they would have gladly lain down and slept, although poor Lucy was very nearly falling asleep on her feet as she staggered from one hotel to another. Because nothing mattered to the Pevensies now except finding their sister.

Where are you, Susan? Lucy found herself thinking as the night began to give way to pale dawn. Susan,where are you? Susan? Susan? Susan…

OOO

Hours later, you would have seen three tired, despairing children wandering through the docks of Southampton. In a last, desperate attempt to bring Susan back to Narnia, the Pevensies had gone right down to the harbour to see if they could spot her as she was boarding her ship. None of them, however, had any real hope of this plan succeeding. They were all just about convinced that they would never see Susan again.

After asking around a little, they had figured out that the ship Susan was sailing on was the RMS Orion, leaving at eleven that morning. It was now ten-thirty and people were flocking to the docks to see it off.

The Pevensies rounded a corner and were greeted with the sight of the great ship, tethered to the dock, ready to sail. Peter, Edmund and Lucy might have stopped to marvel at the amazing sight, might have even taken pride in the thought that their country could build such a ship, if they had not been so worried. A steady stream of people were making their way up the gangplank. Friends and relatives were crowded along the wharf, waving farewell to their loved ones. Peter, Edmund and Lucy wriggled into the crowd and slowly, slowly made their way to the front.

They stared up at Orion, at the hundreds of people already on the ship, more still boarding. It would be impossible to spot Susan from the ground.

On an impulse, Peter stepped forward, thinking perhaps he could board the ship and look for Susan there. Edmund and Lucy followed him, realising what he was thinking. But at the gangplank, they were stopped by the young official checking people's tickets.

"Beg your pardon, sirs and miss." he told them. "Can't let anyone without a ticket board."

Defeated, the three children fell back and scanned the people aboard Orion. It was ten to eleven by Edmund's watch, which meant they had ten minutes to find Susan or return to Narnia without her.

The passengers of Orion were clustered at the ship's railing, waving goodbye to their families on the ground. But there was one who stood apart from the rest, a young woman who had – or so she believed – no family to farewell.

Broken and desperate, Susan Pevensie had taken the only course that seemed open to her. Unable to stay in England, with the ghosts of her childhood to haunt her, she had booked a ticket on a ship to America. She had made friends there while visiting with Mother and Father. In the bright lights and noises of New York, Susan knew that she would eventually forget Narnia for good, and truly believe that it had all been a game. The thought made Susan feel sick, but she knew that if she continued to think about Narnia forever, the knowledge of the life she could have had would continue to torment her until she went mad. She had to forget.

And so she stood by the ship's mast, a pitiful figure in her black dress, her eyes red from crying and lack of sleep. No one who saw her would mistake her for a queen. She had lost everything, and now she was leaving the place she had grown up to seek a new life.

And that is what would have happened to Susan, except for one thing.
The extraordinarily sharp eyesight of her little sister.

Lucy gasped as she recognised the girl dressed in black "There!" she cried, pointing her out to Peter and Edmund. They too saw Susan, and three hearts leapt with joy. They had found Susan! They could bring her with them back to Narnia!
"Susan!" shouted Peter. Edmund and Lucy joined him, calling to their sister. But Susan's back was turned, and the excited chatter of the crowd drowned out their voices. And now the last people had boarded the ship and the sailors were getting ready to draw up the gangplank. The Pevensies were screaming Susan's name, but she just couldn't hear them.

Lucy looked around frantically. If only she could silence the crowd! Susan would surely hear them then. She looked back to the RMS Orion. The gangplank was rising and the sailors on board were preparing to move her out of the harbour. In another minute she would be out of earshot, and Susan lost to them forever.

Lucy closed her eyes. Aslan, please. she thought. Help me.

Lucy opened her eyes again. The ship was beginning to move. The figure by the mast remained motionless.

If there was ever a moment Lucy had needed to be valiant, it was now.

"SUSAN!" screamed Lucy.

What was it about Lucy's voice, that it cut through the noise of crowd and ship where Peter's and Edmund's could not? Later, when they discussed it, they said that it must have been because Lucy's voice was of a higher pitch than the boys'. But privately, all the Pevensies felt that it was because Lucy's voice was the one Susan was most longing to hear. After all, it was Lucy that Susan had fought with on that last day together, Lucy that Susan had wanted to make up with.
And now it was Lucy's voice that Susan heard.

The girl standing by the mast turned. Slowly she looked down at the mass of people, looking for one person in particular. She moved to the railing, her hands gripping the cool metal, and saw three people that she had never thought to see again. She swayed slightly, as if she were going to faint.

And then she ran.

The passengers of the ship murmured in surprise as the young woman in black pushed past them and leapt onto the gangplank. It was already half up, but she scrambled down it, sliding, half falling in her haste, but always getting up again. She jumped from the end of it, landing heavily on the wharf. Scrambling to her feet, she raced towards her siblings.

"Miss!" shouted the young official that had been checking tickets, now aboard the ship. "Hey, miss!"

Susan waved over her shoulder as she ran. "Sorry!" she yelled. "Not coming!"

The officer shook his head. It wasn't for him to meddle in the lives of the passengers, he thought. His job was to just check tickets and boarding passes. Besides, the girl seemed perfectly happy as she was.

He was absolutely right. As she threw herself into her siblings' arms, heard Peter whisper, "We wouldn't forget you," in her ear, saw Edmund laughing as he hugged her and felt a small pair of arms – Lucy – around her waist, Susan was perfectly, unbearably happy. Happy because her family had come to find her. Happy because she was not alone, after all.

Afterwards, none of the Pevensies were quite sure how long they stood together on the wharf, laughing and crying and hugging each other. What all four of them remembered quite clearly, however, was the moment that Peter took one of Susan's hands, and Lucy took the other, and Edmund took Lucy's other hand, and together the four of them waited for Aslan to take them back to Narnia.

OOO

When it was found that Susan Pevensie was missing and an inquiry was held, the many people that had witnessed her leap off the Orion claimed to have seen Susan throw herself off the ship and into the water. The young official, when questioned, said much the same. He had not been able to stop her, he said.

After an investigation, Susan's death was ruled as suicide and a quiet funeral was held. Connie Anderson and Marlene Brooks were among the few attending. They were saddened, of course, but they did not think too deeply about why Susan would have jumped off the ship. They assumed, naturally, that Susan had simply found life too much without her family.

What they did not know, and what no one could have known, was that Susan was safe with her family and going home, to her true home. Not England, where she had been born, not America, where she had hoped to create a new life for herself, but Narnia, that one true Country, which is a home to us all.