The Ivory Merchants
Chapter Seven - Into Telmar
The Telmarines were clear from the beginning that they intended to waste no time in slow travel, nor to make allowances for Edmund's shorter legs on the march. Both Hoom and Reznar greeted him courteously, and Hoom jerked out the names of the two other Men with them - Nim and the shorter one, Wily, whom indeed he knew from the sixth night of the Fair, when he had tried to smoke the Marshwiggle tobacco - but if courteous, they were brief, and the pace they set was swift; he knew that by the end of the day he would be finding it gruelling. Nor did they break long for such small meals of dried meats and fruits as they took on the way. The king had supposed that they might meet again the ten Telmarines who had gone ahead, but no, of those dozen men who had arrived seven days before, carrying the tusks which had so disturbed all his siblings, in their different ways, only Nim and Wily travelled with them.
And those two were empty-handed, so that at least one pair of tusks had been sold, quietly, at the Fair. And the rest? That there had been some movement that last night of the Fair had been reported by the Satyrs, whose eyes narrowed to thin, deceptive slits as they slept, but whose senses were never fully asleep. They had seen and heard movement in the night, stealthy movement from the camp to the quay, and back, and then, after moonrise had seen movement again, quietly, Men departing west, burdened, though they could not see with what. And it could have been Archenlanders, could have been any of the visitors, indeed, even Galmans or Calormenes deciding to travel west to visit with the Telmars, but, Edmund thought, the conclusion was fairly clear.
Well, the guests at the Fair had not been prisoners; they had been free to depart as they would, had been free to trade as they would. Which made it all the more interesting, Edmund thought, as he half-jogged to keep the pace, that they had kept secret that some such trade had been done, between the Telmarines and... presumably the Calormenes, since their ship had been at the quay in the morning. He could only think of one commodity that would make sense of trade between those partners; that they wanted to keep it secret felt distinctly... unsettling.
o-o-o-o-o
"I don't like them both being away," Lucy said, uncertainly. "It's the first time we've been alone together without Aslan."
"Let's go up and watch him as he goes," Susan suggested. The one time they had been alone without Aslan was too terrible to want to remember, now, when they were alone again. "We can be seeing him on his way, and look out for the Ravens as well."
But both sisters felt a further stab of misgiving to see Edmund's smaller, slighter, figure among the fast-moving group of Telmarines.
"They're going so quick! They're just trying to wear him out!" Lucy sounded both angry and unhappy.
Susan set aside the thought that her sister probably was completely accurate in reading the matter, and turned to comforting.
"Edmund will manage. And the Ravens have said they'll report every single day - seven of them, Lu, even old Diamond!"
"Ye..e..es," the word was drawn out, doubtingly, "They can watch him, but what if he needs help?"
"We have to trust him to be able to manage, and trust to Aslan, too."
Lucy said nothing for a little while; the figures heading west were now starting to drop down out of sight, on the other side of a small rise; even this day's two Ravens flying far off, away to one side, had shrunk to near-invisibility. When she could see no more, she answered.
"I do! but still..." with a return to brisk decisiveness, "Susan, Kirrina says she'll help if I ask her to."
"Help how? She's such a fierce little thing, Lu."
Lucy brushed this aside. "I don't know, but she was awfully good before, and I showed her the tusks at the Fair, and she says if I want to, we can..."
"Oh, Lucy! I don't think half-drowning the Telmarines like you did with Neerzat would have helped! And remember what Peter said - he wants you to just be here and be happy."
"Be good, he said! And he said I could do anything I liked if I had a grown-up with me."
"Well, that's true! But, come on! we've got to meet Mr and Mrs Beaver and Mr Tumnus and get things ready to receive all the Narnians who have come from far away. From the Lone Islands, Lucy! Doesn't that sound like somewhere you'd like to go, some day?"
"Mmmm..." said Lucy.
Susan thought it best to ignore the dissatisfied tone in that indeterminate sound.
o-o-o-o-o
Seen close to, from the steep wooded slope below it, the escarpment was awe-inspiring. It rose sheer, many times higher than the walls of Cair Paravel, and apparently unscaleable - hard, fractured rock, sharp-facetted and unforgiving. Edmund glanced up at it, and then across at the little knot of Telmarines standing below, in close consultation. Though the sun was still far from setting, it seemed that the decision was that they would rest the night, and begin the ascent in the morning.
Good. The king was not sorry to have one short day's work, at least. It had been a hard, fast march across Narnia; Hoom had stopped only reluctantly, and late, each night, and had pushed a savage pace during the day, past Beruna, along by the Great River for two days, then swinging south-west and down across the Murmuring Valley. They had forded the river without great difficulty, though the bottom of rounded treacherous stones had sent one of the men spluttering and choking some way downriver. It had been a revelation, that day, to see Hoom, shouting and running along the river bank, outstripping the river and charging out onto an overhanging rockledge, and finally reaching down with unexpected strength to pluck the man, Wily, from the river, pack and all.
"That was well done," Edmund had commented, as the pair had slopped their way back to join the other three.
"Can the King of Narnia do as much for his subjects?" Hoom had asked, goading him.
"To pull them from a river? Perhaps not," the king had replied, stepping aside from the challenge, and had enjoyed seeing the slight surprise in Hoom's eyes give way to a discomfited realisation that Edmund counted among his subjects some very much heavier than Wily - including those very subjects whose safety was the object of his journey.
But there had been no more talk then. Hoom had insisted on resuming the march, though Wily was stumbling and drenched and Hoom himself was wet and strained from the rescue; they pushed up from the banks of the Murmuring, until that night they lay on the far side of the valley. (And the king had noticed, that night, that the ground did indeed seem to murmur beneath him as he lay on it; he had supposed until then that the valley had been named for the river, but now it seemed more likely that underground streams had given rise to the name.)
After that had come another hard day's march, and now this short day climbing up and up on stony ground to the base of the Great Cliff, of the Wall. Tonight's sleep would be hard and on sloping ground, in amongst spindly, thin-growing trees - not Trees, he felt, though he was still the slowest of his siblings to be able to know these things.
Under the not-Trees, though, he could see at a little distance, perched on a boulder, a Bird, quiet and observant. He stood, and walked, casually, away from the fire.
"Smoke's drifting," he heard Nim call quietly across to Wily, and grinned a little to himself. The names they used for him all told their own tales. This one - or Mudsmoke - was Nim's and Wily's private codename; it amused him that they evidently thought it was too deeply cryptic to be understood. Hoom's words, too, were a kind of code, though of state of mind, rather than meaning. "Little king" was when he was in good humour, while "Lord King" flagged bitterness and irony; "Easterner" was more neutral, but evidently called on a long history of hostility, or at the least, difference. But if he thought of codes, it was time to use his own.
Turning, with a show of tired reluctance, he began the stretching and bending he performed each morning and night, exercise in which a keen observer would note the differences, one day to the next, in the number of turns to the left, to the right, the arm-stretches, the kneebends - and those called forth a protest now, from his tired muscles! But he did not doubt that the exercises would do him good, physically, which was a useful subsidiary to the main purpose.
And perhaps would help him sleep also, though no-one would be falling sleep easily tonight; no-one had even bothered yet to find some patch of ground to call a bed. Maybe tonight again could be a chance to use the darkness to build trust, and to learn.
He wandered back to the fire, and looked briefly across to Wily and Nim. But it was Hoom whose trust he needed most to win, and accordingly he sat down next to the Telmarine leader, and began:
"So tomorrow we climb to your land, Master Hoom."
"Aye." There was a pause. "We do so."
"You will be glad to see it again?"
"I will!" It was said with a spurt of dark energy, and Reznar leaned forward from Hoom's other side to add, more kindly, "Your land is not a land for Men, King Edmund."
"Men have lived there before, and will again," Edmund replied, thinking of the returning exiles. Susan would by now have met with them; more skills and knowledge would be returning to Narnia; perhaps even now things were changing there. "Narnian Men and Women both, to join with all our other peoples."
"Your other peoples are no fit company for Men." Hoom said, heavily. "They will drag you down, king. The half-beasts, and the ghosts..."
"Satyrs and Centaurs? They are not half of anything!" Despite himself, Edmund felt his temper beginning to rise. "They are wholly and wonderfully themselves!"
"Wholly and wonderfully bestial!" Hoom replied, with venom, and the other Men looked up with interest.
"Watch the mudsmoke," Edmund heard Wily mutter to Nim.
So they were trying to bait him; Edmund bit back his first response, and replied more calmly, "As to who is bestial, or like a dumb beast, Master Hoom, I would say those who kill a thinking being act more like an unthinking wolf or tiger than like Men."
"Pah!" Hoom kicked at the fire and sent up a flurry of burning ash. "First find your thinking being and we may talk of this, Lord King!"
Edmund nodded sombrely, without words. In two days' time, perhaps, or four days, at the latest, going by the Ravens' news, he should find them.
o-o-o-o-o
The Queen Susan stood on the western battlements, her eyes fixed on one dark speck in the bright sky, and her whole being tensed with barely-contained gladness.
"I can see him!" she called down behind her, and the dark, furry bundle that was Mrs Beaver stumped heavily into view, puffing a little as she came. "Them blamey steps, dear... be the death of me. Which of them is it?"
"Brightbeak! That is, it must be. Diamond said he'd be here by now, and..." Her face glowed with elation. The speck had grown considerably larger as she spoke, and was now perceptibly a bird, a bird whose broad black wings were stroking steadily towards them.
She looked at Mrs Beaver again, and laughed. "We did not ever think we'd need a code for this! He'll be so glad, if we can get the news to him."
Mrs Beaver came a little closer, and took the Queen's hand in one paw, quietingly. The Queen understood at once, and responded.
"Yes, I know. He'd be glad for me as much as anything. It was me who worried the most. But honestly, Mrs Beaver, if it had been that way, if the roof had been made by ..." She took a breath. "...killing, I would have managed." She held the paw tightly for a moment, and then went on, "When I thought it was, and when I thought my Gift... I thought maybe it was meant for me to learn to be humble..."
"Tscha!" said Mrs Beaver. "You come to me when you've turned proud, dearie, and then I'll show you how to be humble. In the meantime, better you learn not to worry so much."
"Well, I won't now!" she answered blithely, and carolled into the air: "Brightbeak!"
Brightbeak was close now, so close she could see the separate long pinions splayed out from the fore-edge of the wing, and the intense drive of the whole short, level body, motionless between those strong-beating vanes, but speeding towards her - and then swivelling in mid-air, and the wings angling, and... Brightbeak dropped his legs down to land perfectly on the battlements, spread his wings wide once more in salute, then settled them again into their proper ink-black sleekness.
"Majesty."
"Welcome, Brightbeak! What news of my brother?"
"He is at the base of the Wall. He has sent greetings to you and the Queen Lucy. He will travel as fast as might be to the northern fringe of the upper forest, where the Free Herd wait."
"If you can ever speak to him, Cousin, tell him..." She stopped for very delight at the news. "Tell him it is well, that everything is well, and that... that the roof of Cair Paravel was made from tree-ivory, from amazingly hard nuts, truly, like ivory, brought in tribute by the Lone Islanders, for years and years... and oh, tell him it was lovely to meet all the Marshwiggles, too, and all the others from the far corners, and... everything is well!"
She stopped again; Brightbeak cocked his head sideways, silent in respect for an emotion he did not quite understand, and the Queen turned again to her older friend.
"To make me humble... that's how I would have felt, But now every time I look at that glorious roof I'll think of the Islanders, and, oh, Mrs Beaver! Lion bless them and their palm-nut-ivory!"
"Lion bless'em for putting your sweet mind at rest, anyway," said Mrs Beaver.
o-o-o-o-o
"Can you climb, little king?" Hoom growled.
"I hope so."
They were at the rockface, at a fissure not seen in the afternoon shadows, but visible now in the morning light, a thin fissure, at the base an arm's-length wide, but broadening as it went up to maybe twice that, till it reached a ledge high above them.
"Then watch me! and learn!" Nim cried, and leapt up the first few feet, catching himself by pressing with both forearms and knees against the walls, inching up a little further, then grinning, twisting seemingly in air, and stopping again, pressed across the gap with his back against one wall and his feet against the other.
"Learning, king?" he asked, rallyingly, and began to hitch his way upward in short, jolting movements. From behind, Edmund heard Wily's response: "Smoke'll go up a chimney, all right, Nim, you just get yourself up!"
Nim laughed, but leapt again, now straddling the gap, balancing with one hand to the rockface, and began to work his way steadily up, pressing hard with his feet and using his hands only to touch, for balance, it seemed. Close to the top of the fissure, unnervingly high, he paused. No-one below spoke now; Edmund felt intense focus in both Hoom and Wily; Reznar's fists were clenched hard, and his eyes were staring.
One breath... two.
It seemed that Nim was gathering his resolution, or waiting until he felt the moment was precisely right, then, terrifyingly, he sprang again, flinging himself across the emptiness, grabbing, clutching with one hand, his feet dangling down into the chasm - and then one more jerk and his body swung, and he was clinging with two hands, and his legs were kicking and his body had somehow disappeared... onto a ledge, Edmund realised. And then the kicking legs slowly withdrew themselves, and Hoom gave a "hoof!" of relief, Reznar laughed aloud, and Nim's face peered down at them, tiny and triumphant.
"And so we go."
He heard the voice, but he hardly knew whose. Wily's, he supposed, but... Edmund felt his insides squirm. Were they mad? Did he even have the length of body to do as Nim had done? This was... No. Possible or not, it was what he had to do.
Aslan, he thought to himself and walked to the base of the chimney. A clap of hard laughter broke behind him, a shout came from above.
"Not you, little king!"
He looked up; Nim was pulling something out of his pack; a rope came tumbling down, and puddled at his feet in a jumble of grey - but already Nim was hauling it up, so that the end wavered just about knee-height, and now he saw that it was a leather rope with one broad slash cut through the hide to make a sling, or a seat.
"You have walked well, Easterner, but to climb - we have a better way for you! Get in."
Easterner put a gulf between them, and Hoom's voice was rough, but there was something of a comradely tone there as well. And the other Men - they were all amused at his plight, and he well understood that. The Narnian King, who had so recently stood on the dais above the Fair, and received the cheers of the crowd, to be hauled up now like a sack of barley! But his chagrin was the least of it... Forgive me, he said, silently - what Beast could have given such strong and long unbroken leather, but an Elephant? Forgive me. I vow no more of you will die this way. And settled himself into the sling.
Even then, his humiliation was not complete, as Hoom flung himself casually alongside, between the grim, golden-grey walls of the fissure and, by the same bracing and edging method as Nim, ascended, while lending one strong arm to keep Edmund's sling away from the rockface. Not even a sack of barley - it seemed he was a baby to be kept from bruising a hip or shoulder.
But after all, the main thing was to get there, to find the Elephants and to get them to safety; he arrived at the ledge in fair humour, and thanked both Men in plain sincerity.
And it seemed he was not quite the only one; the rope was lowered again for Reznar, who came up, indeed, under his own power, but wore the sling for safety's sake, apparently. Wily, though, laughed up at them all, and spat on his hands and clambered up clinging fingers-and-toes to the rockface, like a lizard.
"See what Men of Telmar can do, king!" he announced triumphantly when he got to the ledge; the faces of all four Telmarines were exultant.
Yes, thought Edmund, you climb well, but your triumph makes it plain that this was no common achievement, and Reznar has shown me that not all Telmarines climb as well. It was not possible, he decided, that those twelve tusks, and all the men carrying them, had come or gone by this route.. Therefore... there was another way into Telmar. But that was something he was content for the time to know, and to have the Telmarines unknowing that he knew.
He turned his attention to the Cliff and its challenges. The ledge was large; it dropped away to nothing deeper into the fissure, but widened as it ran back around to the east-facing Cliff. Nim led the group around, and the king was able to look out and for the first time see all of Narnia spread before him, forests and rivers and hills and the still-recovering farmlands. And Table Hill - which he knew only by the four blood-red banners which floated above it, too small to make out at this distance, but that a fluttering caught his eye - and Beruna he could make out, further away, along the Great River, but though he tried, he could not see the Cair for the brightness behind it. He felt oddly cut off by that, that his home was lost to view in the morning sun.
Nim tapped him on the shoulder, and he saw one hand had snaked around his back, as well, presumably to hold him in case he jerked and lost his balance.
"Keep your eyes for climbing, little king. For this next step we climb as Wily did; I go first, and you after. Best you wear the sling again."
He did not argue. It was terrifying enough to be climbing this rockface even with that sling, and knowing that Nim was above and would maybe be able to take the strain if he fell, and with Hoom just below him, shouting instructions - "above you, to your left!"- and guiding his feet sometimes to some tiny crack as a toehold, sometime to some offset for the other foot.
By mid-morning his breath was coming in gasps; to let go of each desperate, scanty handhold to reach high and clutch at the next took all of his resolution, again, and again, and to pry himself away from pressing desperately against the rock to inch up, to straighten the leg which held his weight and inch up just a little farther - each time he thought he would not be able to do it, and each time he forced himself, and did. But at a cost - by the time they reached the second ledge, he was exhausted and trembling.
Nim, however, did not jeer or jest as he gripped his arms and hauled him onto the ledge.
"You have done well, king. Rest now, as the others join us." was all he said.
So perhaps the climb, Edmund considered as he rested, perhaps it really had been as difficult and frightening as it had felt. Long-legged Reznar, at any rate, also came up with the sling around him, and slowly, though his greater stretch managed to move between handholds and footholds more easily.
That second stage had been, it turned out, the hardest part of the whole day's climb, though the rest was slow, hard work, with first Nim, going ahead, then Edmund being carefully tutored up each passage, and then Reznar, with Hoom and Wily coming behind. The sun had moved past overhead, and shadows were across most of Narnia, before they were at the top, and he was standing on shaky legs, able at last to turn his face from the rock, and look out to the east.
And now at last, too, he could see Cair Paravel, all its western windows ablaze in the low rich afternoon light, glowing like a jewel below the narrow silver crescent of the moon, a crown to the shadowed land. Cair Paravel. He took the sight as an omen for good. There he had had been made king; this journey now was his kingship in action. He drew in one long inspiriting look, and then turned, as the others clambered up over the cliff-edge, to take his first full view of the land of Telmar.
He saw a wide, well-grazed shelf of country, a plateau, running right from the edge of the Great Cliff, back to a forest of huge trees and dark shadows, pierced by those same low beams of the afternoon sun. The land rose higher yet behind the forests; he could see far away higher ranges that looked almost black in their own shadow, and behind those what looked like peaks higher yet, where some slopes - snowy slopes? or glaciers? - glowed rosy in the light. The plateau, and then the trees, and range upon range of mountain - it was a sight of heart-shaking majesty and strength.
"Well, little king?" came Hoom's voice, ringing with challenge as well as pride.
Edmund turned, smiling
"It is a very fair land, Hoom. A land blessed, as surely my own. Truly, the Stars do smile on you, as on us."
Hoom's face hardened. "We do not have gold on our river-shores for the picking, nor the iron rocks! We have our own kind of wealth, when we can trade in it."
"Hoom... I will not begin my sojourn here, and before these forests, with quarrelling! Let us not speak of trade tonight."
"Not tonight, no," Hoom conceded. "But tomorrow you will journey with me to see the elephants I spoke of, and to see for yourself that they do not speak, so that the trade road through Narnia can be opened to us henceforward."
Edmund felt the day's weariness catch him suddenly, to be beginning so soon the wrangling that he had known must come. But there was no help for it, so...
"I do indeed want to see those elephants, but not tomorrow. Our bargain was that I could travel through your land where I would. Tomorrow I travel to the north-west through the forest, to find the Herds which roam freely, and to talk with them."
Hoom laughed, and Edmund saw incredulity on all four of the faces looking at him.
"Not possible, little king! You would lead us a wild chase wandering in the forest like a firefly, chasing you know not what you know not where."
He did know where. The Ravens' flights had spelt out for him day by day, in distant swoops and glides and sudden drops, exactly what were the movements of the Herd, in which direction they went, how many half-days' travel they might be, practising on the whole trek through Narnia the wordless code they had devised, as he had practised back to them his own enacted code - but that was not knowledge to share with Telmarines.
Therefore... to force them on this "wild chase", he needed to force acceptance that he was not the little king, the child who had been cossetted on that day's climb, but in all earnest one who ruled, and whose ruling on this journey meant the entire economic future of Telmar.
He crushed down in himself the openness and joy which had come from the sight of the forests and the mountains, making himself utterly inflexible, putting all the iciness he could command into his voice.
"Think of it as you will, Hoom; your thoughts are not my concern. This was the bargain you made with my brother the High King, for one single trade journey through Narnia: I travel where I will through these lands. Come with me or come not; I go tomorrow to the north-west. "
"I will come!" Hoom smashed down his pack to the ground, ill-temper making him clumsy, where he was usually a deft-moving man. "You will not wander alone in our land, Easterner!"
"So be it." If the Elephants were to speak, it was better that they spoke incontrovertibly in front of Telmarine witnesses, better that their intelligence be indisputable. "But for now, I think this is not a good place to bivouac tonight. Shall we not move closer to the trees?"
o-o-o-o-o
The next morning the Ravens' message was plainly written in the sky - the Herd was less than three half-days' journeying away, on the fringe of the higher forest lands. So close! An incredulous excitement fizzed up in Edmund; he could have laughed aloud with it.
He packed with a light heart, trying hard to keep an unmoving countenance, as befitted the king he had been the night before, but wondered as he did so: was this how Lucy felt, all the time? He thought it must be, thought wonderingly and a little enviously that this must be how she perceived the world, every day. And now, he too - he could have almost - would have if these Telmarines were not here! - exploded into action as she did, action for the sheer pleasure of the day; he thought of her as he knew her best, dancing or running or flinging herself at whichever joyous Narnian was there to be hugged, or climbed, or swum with, but - he caught himself smiling and stopped - better not to think of her joy, better to be again the stern Easterner king.
Nevertheless, it was hard not to enjoy the morning's walk. The Telmarines no longer set a punishing pace; perhaps they had pushed so hard before, to be away from a country they were uneasy in, or even afraid of? Whatever the reason, the more easy speed made for a more pleasant day, and though the summer's day was warm, or even hot, walking on level, mossy ground under majestic trees was very welcome after yesterday's rigours. As well, the Telmarines, or the humbler two, at any rate, were calmer, and, simply, happier than they had been. Hoom stalked along, glowering, and gangling, anxious Reznar seemed not to want to displease his senior by enjoying the day too much, but Nim and Wily, though they spoke little enough, were in high spirits, and nudged and teased each other as they walked.
Once, and then again, Nim ran off to one side, out of sight, for minutes at a time. Both times he came back with some forest food - a kind of tree-fungus the first time, which he showed to Wily with a self-congratulatory quirk of his brows, and a ragged bunch of wild fresney, the second time.
"Stop that!" Hoom snarled, the second time. "You forage like a woman!" Then, in a lower tone, jerking his head towards Edmund, "Would you shame Telmar, to be so womanish at such a time?"
Nim pulled a wry face, but seemed content to be called womanish; he flashed a covert grin at Wily.
"We will be glad of his foraging tonight, I do not doubt," Edmund commented, calmly, and then, "This plant grows in Narnia, too, Nim. Why did you not gather it there?"
Nim grinned, and seemed on the verge of speaking, but Hoom cut across him, sourly. "And have you accuse us of stealing Narnian property, as you will try to say about our elephants?"
"Ah, but you go too fast for us there, Master Hoom," Edmund offered, in cheerful bantering, "I think we must wait to see whose the Elephants tell us they are!"
Nim openly snickered at this, and Wily seemed to grin. Hoom opened his mouth to reply, when a wordless shout from Reznar jerked all eyes his way. He was a little ahead of the rest, and stood pointing further ahead still, and to the left.
There was a shape, a large formless something, very distant, through trees; Edmund could not be sure... but Nim and Willy and Hoom had all shouted as well, and now the shape turned, suddenly, and sunlight glinted unmistakeably on tusks, and Edmund could discern the trunk, the uncertainly wavering movement at the edge of the shape that was the trunk. Not the Herd, but one single Elephant, alone, and a male, therefore, judging from the Ravens' reports.
Edmund felt choked with excitement; he began to run, and only then noticed that Hoom, and Reznar and Nim and Wily had all begun running as well, running and shouting, and then saw - so soon! he thought despairingly - that he was being left behind, he was stumbling, the last of them, the sweat was stinging in his eyes, and his confusion and excitement was being swallowed by a pounding fear of what these Men, these hunters, and dealers in ivory, might try to do, to this solitary Narnian, before the very eyes of the King who had sworn to protect him.
Then, from far away, he heard a thin, high bellow, and the shape had turned, again, and was plunging through the dappled green of the forest, and into the shadow between the trees, and was gone.
o-o-o-o-o
o-o-o
A/N: Vegetable ivory! You can read all about it, and how it has been used as a substitute for animal ivory for at least a century and a half, by searching for "vegetable ivory" and checking at waynesword dot palomar dot edu (more or less).
Wild Fresney is a Narnian plant mentioned in The Last Battle, Chapter Seven, where it is described as: "a Narnian weed... which looks rather like our wood-sorrel but tastes a good deal nicer when cooked. (It needs a little butter and pepper to make it perfect...)"
Oh, and I would love to tell the story of how Felimath switched from harvesting the vegetable ivory to grazing sheep, and the story of how the High King and his patrol met and overcame a threat in the north-west, and the story of how the Queen Susan forged a sense of belonging between all the more distant Narnians, and began the work of gathering back the Exiles, but then this story would never get to its end. so... it's just going to be the much smaller story as described in the summary! :)
