Let it go, let it go.
And I'll rise like the break of dawn.
Let it go, let it go
That perfect girl is gone
Here I stand, in the light of day.
Let the storm rage on!
The cold never bothered me anyway ~ Idina Menzel, Let it Go, Frozen
The hours slowly ticked by and the moon rose slowly into the sky. A few hours before sunset, Edmund's men had erected a camp around the lightning-struck rock. Larkin and Tiristor sat on a log by the fire, Brutus nearby, and watched the bustle around them. They were not entirely sure if they were prisoners or guests. Their bonds had been cut and they had been left pretty much to get on with it. So, they sat round the fire together and waited for something to happen.
"Do you three want any food?" Seb asked as he sat on another of the logs. "I know we were a bit rough with you earlier but we'll treat you well."
Larkin took a side-long glance at Tiristor. The Dwarf's nap in the sun had left him with a rather red nose and brow and the Faun was feeling a bit mischievous.
"Do you have any sun-dried tomatoes?" he asked brightly. Brutus snickered as Tiristor glared at the pair of them.
"I'll have some strawberries. Some nice, big, red ones," Brutus added.
"And for you?" Seb asked, grinning slightly.
Tiristor gave him a filthy look. "I'm fine."
"And what about your friend?" Seb said. The merry mood caused by their joking vanished in an instant as the four of them looked towards Caelia.
She was still sitting on the rocks where she had collapsed when they were captured. The metal ball she had reacted so badly to was cradled safely in her lap and if anyone went near her she would curve her body over it and scream until they retreated. That was the only reaction she had shown in the past hours; the rest of the time she sat on the ground staring listlessly at the canyon wall.
"Best leave her be," Tiristor said gruffly. "She'll speak to us when she is ready."
"She better speak soon," Edmund said, appearing from the camp and sitting with them. "I want to know about her and where she comes from."
"Her name is Caelia. She's apparently the good sister of Jadis, she occasionally spouts nonsense about the world being wrong and she reckons you are a king. That is about as much as we know," Tiristor snarled.
"A king?!" he said and looked towards her.
Tiristor watched him through slitted eyes. Did Caelia really believe he was a king? He looked like an arrogant bully. He was handsome but a pretty face did not a competent monarch make. Where did these frankly insane notions of Caelia's come from?
But the lad's face was now etched with worry and confusion; as if a long forgotten memory had once again been brought to light.
The Hunter reached the mouth of the canyon and heaved a sigh of relief. There were his men's tents all set up in the canyon and he could see the shapes of Brutus and Tiristor by the fire. As he neared, he picked out Larkin's sandy mop of hair and he began to look for Caelia.
"Sir!" Edmund exclaimed as he entered the circle of light cast by the fire. He and the other young man, Seb, scrambled to their feet and he nodded.
"I thought I told you to wait in the Eagle's Run," he said. Edmund didn't meet his gaze.
"We were exposed there. We could not dig in. This canyon is much more defensible," he said, staring into the fire.
The Hunter shook his head and then looked properly at the three he had rescued from the People of the Toadstools. His face darkened as his eyes picked out little things like Larkin's tender nose and the fading restraint marks around Brutus' neck.
"Where is Caelia?" he asked.
"Over there," Tiristor said. He pointed at a hunched white shape just beyond the firelight.
The Hunter took a few steps towards her and she reacted just like she had with everyone else; throwing herself across the Sphere and screaming a piercing scream that echoed off the rocks around them. He stopped dead in his tracks, his eyes scanning over her from her frightened eyes to the ugly bruise rising on her cheek.
"What happened to her?" he said, turning back to the group around the fireplace.
"Nothing! She's been like that ever since I broke her staff-" Edmund began.
"You did what?!" the Hunter roared. Once again, his resemblance to a great bear was frightening to behold as he marched back to Edmund. "You stupid boy! Do you have any idea what you have done!"
Edmund paused and then shook his head. Panic flooded through the Hunter. Could it be... was it possible that they had somehow, in the entirety of a decade, forgotten to explain to Edmund what had happened? What was happening? Why they had had to split up the youngest two Pevensies in the first place?!
Tumnus appeared from the depths of the camp; his mild-mannered face twisted with concern.
"Is there a problem, sir?" he asked.
"She's the Help," he spat. Tumnus' face dropped instantly and he looked in horror at Caelia. "That's right. Look at her," the Hunter hissed. "Ten years we've waited! Ten years we've hoped! And this is what we get. A hopeless, broken mess."
He turned away and walked towards her again, slowly this time so as not to spook her.
"What help?" Edmund demanded of Tumnus. The faun was looking positively ill.
"I think we have made a massive mistake," he said and turned to watch the Hunter with her.
"Your Highness, I realise this is a setback but we cannot let it distract you from your quest. I do realise that you are no longer capable of defending yourself though - perhaps you have some experience with a sword?" the Hunter said formally. He had stopped a few paces away from her and had his hands behind his back. To see him in such a subservient pose was very odd to Edmund and Tumnus. They were used to him dominating every situation with his height and bulk; not pandering to the needs of some broken woman!
Caelia did not say anything for a moment but then she answered him in a voice so tiny they all strained to hear it`.
"A Magician of Charn, greatest city that ever was and ever will be and wonder of the world, needs no sword for they are Blessed of the Birthright of the Will. Their Will shall protect them when they have need and they should not burden themselves with a weapon as clumsy as a sword," she said and she sounded almost like a schoolchild reciting a lesson.
"How about a bow?" he asked.
"A Magician of Charn, greatest city that ever was and ever will be and wonder of the world, needs no bow for they are Blessed of the Birthright of the Will. Their Will shall protect them when they have need and they should not burden themselves with a weapon as clumsy as a bow," she said, tears welling in her eyes and her voice becoming more shrill.
"Your Highness, you need to be able to defend yourself," he tried to say but she rode over him.
"I am a Magician of Charn, greatest city that ever was and ever will be and wonder of the world, and I have no need for sword or bow for I am Blessed of the Birthright of the Will! My Will shall protect me when I have need and I should not burden myself with a weapon as clumsy as a sword or a bow!" she all but shouted, tears pouring down her cheeks.
He struck her.
"Stop it at once!" he hissed. "Adapt and move on! I did not risk my life and that of my wife's for you to give up as soon as you hit a wall!"
He took a step back and resumed his servant-like pose, hands clasped behind his back. "Forgive me my outburst, your Highness. It won't happen again," he said stiffly.
She didn't stir for a moment and then she stood up and shuffled back towards the firelight. She perched on the log by Larkin, the Sphere clasped to her chest. He reached out a hand to try to prise it from her grasp but she squealed and shifted away from him.
"Don't touch it!" she gasped. "In the name of the Lion, never lay a finger upon it! If there is a single drop of magic in your blood, no matter how small, it will obliterate you entirely!"
"How can you touch it?" Seb sneered. Her eyes flicked towards Edmund and then fell back to the flames dancing in the fire.
"I did have magical blood. It's gone now though," she said bitterly. "Burned away."
"Wouldn't that hurt?" Edmund asked. Guilt twisted his heart as she flinched at his voice.
"It did. But I've lived through worse. I've lived through pain so intense it ripped my sanity to shreds," she said in a small, flat voice. "Jadis will be so happy to learn she can beat me again."
"How do you know who I am? Would someone please take the time to explain to me just what is going on? I feel rather like I'm missing a crucial piece of the puzzle," Edmund said.
"There was a Prophecy," the Hunter said with a sigh.
"When Adam's Flesh and Adam's Bone sits at Cair Paravel in throne, the evil times shall be over and done," she said. "My words. Laid down before my sister as a declaration of war a very long time ago."
The Hunter and the Narnians nodded.
"You are one of the Champions of the Prophecy. Chosen by my friends and companions to come to Narnia to stand against Jadis," she continued. "You and your siblings. You are one quarter of a whole; a weapon of Destiny itself."
Edmund snorted and looked away. He met the Hunter's stony gaze. He shifted uncomfortably and returned his attention back to Caelia. She was still rambling aimlessly, the Sphere gently turning in her hands as she spoke.
"It's an old tactic they use. They pick someone they can manipulate to change the world. I was one. I was their instrument. But I didn't work and we lost my world. We thought you, our weapon, had worked. But now it seems like we were wrong again," she said, tears welling in her eyes.
"This is madness," Edmund muttered only to receive another glare from the Hunter.
"Show more respect!" the hulking man snarled. "This woman is a servant of my Master so you will show her the same level of respect you do me; not to mention that in her own right she is a Princess and survivor of a tyranny worse than anything you can imagine. Do not underestimate her."
Edmund looked at her. She looked weak and miserable. She wasn't some great warrior or lore-master. She was just a particularly beautiful and seemingly well-bred young lady, as if some courtier had been snatched from her comfortable life and dropped into the harshness of Telmar.
"Your Highness, please put down the Sphere and have something to eat," the Hunter said to her. She pulled it even closer to her.
"I can't. I have to wait for Metatron to speak to me! If I let it go then it means my Will has truly gone!" she said, the tears spilling down her cheeks. "I can't be the only one left! We are the Emperor's Folk and we do not fall!"
A low moan echoed from deep inside her and she slumped forward. The Sphere rolled off her lap with a dull thump as she dug the heels of her hands into her eyes. "They really are gone. I'm alone and I'm defenceless," she said. She clasped her hands together and muttered something under her breath.
"May I be excused? I need to go and collect my thoughts," she said. Without even waiting for an answer, she stood and wandered away into the camp with her hands still clasped beneath her chin. Those left around the campfire could not bring themselves to even look at the Sphere still sitting where Caelia had dropped it.
"Tomorrow, you are to make amends with the Princess," the Hunter informed his men coldly. "I have not waited and watched for her coming for you to break her spirit with such ease."
The tent was rather bare. There was a low slung bunk with a thin blanket folded at the end and a small chest with a looking-glass sat on top next to it. Caelia sank onto the bunk and picked up the glass. The creature staring back at her was so pathetic-looking that it took a moment to register that it was indeed her own reflection.
"I don't really know who I am anymore. What a peculiar state of mind to find one's self in. I am not the same person I was this morning. Who am I now?" she said, her eyes not moving from the looking glass.
Her name was Caelia. She knew that. That single word had been whispered, screamed, groaned, shouted, wailed, and cried at her literally since her birth. It was the one word that described her perfectly. She was Caelia. But who else was she?
Her head tipped to the side and for the first time in years she found herself studying her face. Not the dirt masking her features or the light smattering of sunburn across her white skin or the ugly bruise that now blossomed freely upon her cheek. She found herself studying her eyes, her lips, the curve of her jaw, and every other little detail that actually physically made up her face. For years, her likeness to Jadis had been pointed out to her; a thing greatly and wondrously praised in the court of Charn and nothing but a hindrance to her as she attempted to carry out her Master's work in Narnia.
Yet there was more to it, she could see that now. Her face was also her mother's. The pale skin and delicate features she had inherited came from her mother's family in the far reaches of Charn, close to the border with Sorlois. But the thick, dark hair and sharp blue eyes were her father's. They were the two parts of her reflection that spoke of the nobility and autocracy of the royal family of Charn. For generations, those two features had passed down through countless royals. She had grown up seeing it in the paintings of her forebears. And, now she looked closely, she could see that her grimace was the same as her father's. It held none of the ferocity or haughtiness that her father or Jadis could hold but there was something slightly unnerving about the icy glare radiating from those blue eyes.
Remember who you are. Remember whose blood runs in your veins, her mother had once said to her.
Perhaps it was time she remembered. She would never throw off the mantle of Servant of the Emperor but maybe she should reach back to before she knew Him. Back when she was a Princess of one of the greatest civilisations in Creation. Perhaps it was time for her to remember just exactly whose daughter she was.
"I am Princess Caelia, daughter of King Merlan and Queen Aglaia of Charn," she reminded her reflection, her new resolve burning in her father's eyes.
"Greatest city that ever was and ever will be and wonder of the world."
Hello everyone! We have passed several milestones with this chapter! Chapter 10, over 30 000 words (thus making it longer than Destiny's Instrument, something I find hilarious as we are still rather at the beginning of DW), 20 reviews and over 1000 views! So, I rewrote the summary and I have a new cover! Like it? I'm worried it is slightly too busy but I like it. :)
If you have been living under a rock, you haven't heard Let It Go from Frozen. Please exit the cavity underneath your rock of choice and Youtube it. It's a gorgeous song. :D Even though Frozen is about two good sisters, Elsa and Anna remind me an awful lot of Caelia and Jadis for some reason.
Hope you enjoyed this chapter and I shall see you soon! Make my day and leave a review! :D