Chapter 12

Nightmares

The Earth burning around her, everywhere Susan looked she saw corpses littering the ground. The sky was dark and black; the ground beneath her feet was nothing but ash. Susan turned and that was when she saw it, the hideous creature which was seven feet tall, had the head of a vulture and four long bony arms with claws on the end of them. Susan stood frozen in fear, the creature stood on a mountain of bones and gave a high cold laugh.

"Susan the Gentle" the creature said

"What are you"? Susan screamed

"I am the destroyer of your world" the creature replied laughing

Susan looked around her again and saw the world burning and screaming. She heard someone calling her name and looked up and gave a mighty scream there hanging from some strange black symbol was her sister Lucy.

"Lucy"! "Let her go, you monster" Susan yelled at the creature

The creature did nothing but laugh, there were then more shouts and Susan screamed again as she saw Peter, Edmund and her parents all tied to the same strange symbol as Lucy.

"This is what you fear Gentle Queen, you turned your back on your family and your beliefs" The creature shouted at her

"NO"!

"Let's not forget how you turned your back on the one you loved" The creature said pointing behind her with one of its many arms.

Susan turned and saw William tied to the same symbol as her family, except unlike her family William was dead on the symbol with a long spear sticking out of his torso and eyes which used to be emerald green and full of life were now cold and lifeless.

"NO"! Susan screamed tears pouring down her cheeks

The creature laughed again enjoying watching Susan's pain and misery. Susan couldn't believe what was happening, she kept on screaming and couldn't stop; she cried and screamed as the world around her slowly burned.

"Susan, Susan wake up" a voice yelled

Susan opened her eyes and found herself with screaming in her bed and covered in sweat. She was met by the emerald green eyes of William who was alive and well looking at her concerned.

"Susan, are you alright"? William asked

Susan didn't bother answering she just moved forward and pulled William into a hug and started crying into his chest. She felt his arms wrap around her protectively and pulled her closer, he stroked her hair and told her it was going to be alright. That was the worst nightmare Susan had ever had and she couldn't shake the thoughts of her family on the symbols and William dead with a spear through him.

"Susan, what was it"? William asked pushing her away from him so he could look at her face.

Susan looked at him and thought about telling him everything, but the more she thought about it the more she was afraid of telling it. She mumbled something about a bad dream which William nodded at and to her surprise did not push further; Susan spotted Sophia standing in the doorway and gave her small smile which she returned.

"Do you want me to get you anything"?

"No I'll be fine, thank you William" Susan replied


Father McGuiness was kneeling on the carpet of his office; he was staring at the weird red symbol which had been drawn on the wall. The temperature of the room lowered as a cold wind entered the room causing the candle flickering on the desk to suddenly go out leaving Father McGuiness kneeling in the dark.

"My master" Father McGuiness said to the darkness

"Have you found Susan the Gentle"? A high cold voice asked

"No master, she has escaped again"

There was silence; this caused Father McGuiness to become anxious. Suddenly he felt something sharp scrape his face causing him to gasp in pain and hold his face, he could feel his blood dripping through his fingers and onto the floor.

"How could you have let this happen"? The voice yelled

"I'm sorry master; she had help William the Phoenix is on Earth" Father McGuiness informed

The voice did not speak; it gave a mighty shout of anger. Father McGuiness started to shake on the floor. Although he loyally served his master he did not want to make him angry.

"You need to find those items, then I can truly walk the Earth and none of Aslan's chosen children will be able to stop us" the voiced said

"I will master, I will" Father McGuiness promised

The cold air then disappeared and the candle flickered back into life, Father McGuiness waited for a minute then slowly raised himself off the floor and sat down behind his desk. He looked through the draws of the desk and found a small mirror, which he held up to his face; he groaned when he saw the gash which went across his cheek which told him he could not fail.


Susan slowly walked down the stairs; she could hear the rain from outside and knew that it was another cold February morning which not many people would dare to brave. The house was silent; she ventured into the sitting room and found Sophia once again sitting in an armchair reading a book.

"Morning" Sophia said

"Morning" Susan muttered back

Sophia gave Susan a sad smile and then resumed reading her book. William was nowhere to be seen and at first Susan thought he had gone off on his own again until she heard the door to the study open and then close.

"William's in the study then"? Susan asked Sophia

"Yes, he's doing research on Nemen" Sophia answered

Susan nodded at that and then proceeded to the study, she knocked on the door and was told to enter by William's voice through the other side of the door. She slowly turned the handle and stepped into the room; William was sat behind his desk and was looking over many pieces of paper and many books.

"William" Susan said

"Morning Susan, how are you feeling?" He asked as soon he saw her

"I'm fine, thank you" Susan said not wanting to be questioned about that horrible nightmare.

William just nodded and resumed looking through pages of a book again. Susan closed the door behind her and sat down in the chair opposite, she was silent and just watched William work for a few minuets until finally she couldn't keep quiet anymore.

"Any luck"? She asked

"Not yet, the problem is that Nemen is very hard to track down especially when he doesn't want to be found" William said

"You talk like you've met him"

"That's because I have"

Susan was quiet at that, she wanted to ask where but she knew he would have said Narnia. William looked up from the book and looked at her; Susan met his eyes and once again had the image of the nightmare where his eyes were cold and lifeless.

"Yes it was in Narnia" William said

Susan gasped in surprise; she couldn't believe how intuitive he was. William chuckled at the look on her face and Susan couldn't help but smile, his laugh was like music to her ears.

"So what did you meet him for"? She asked

"He gave me helpful information on an item I wanted to find, he told me the place where I could find it" William replied

"So do you think he will tell us where the items are"?

"I hope so, the problem is finding him though he travels through worlds, so we can't be sure he's on Earth at the moment" William explained

"So how do you know if he's in a world"?

"He leaves signs, however the signs are very discrete and you have to look very close to find them"

Susan nodded at that, she then decided to leave William to his work and left the study. After spending the morning helping Sophia with some chores the afternoon had soon arrived and that meant Sophia had to start preparing dinner, however as they started to prepare dinner William arrived in the kitchen and smiled at the pair of them.

"Found anything"? Sophia asked him

"Maybe, there have been some unexplained events around different countries in the world and I suspect it could be Nemen" William replied

"What kind of events"? Sophia asked

"Well there was a poacher in Africa and he swears that before his eyes his jeep burst into flames and that all the animals that he had captured disappeared without a trace"

"How can you be so sure it was this Nemen person"? Susan asked confused

"Because Nemen might be a traveller, but he cares for all living things there is no way he would allow innocent animals to be harmed" William explained

"But how can he make animals disappear into thin air"?

"Quite easily, he is a sorcerer after all" William answered

"A sorcerer"? "You mean he can do magic"?

"Yes he can"

Before Susan could say anything else the doorbell rang, William looked at the door like he had never seen one before. He looked at Sophia who understood what he was saying with that look; she grabbed Susan by the arm and dragged her out the kitchen and into the study where William heard the door lock.

He then grabbed a knife that was on the kitchen table and slowly moved towards the door. The doorbell kept ringing signalling that whoever was at the door wasn't going away, William grabbed the handle and then took one deep breath wrenched the door open.

William dropped the knife in surprise which clattered to the floor, the familiar face just smiled at him. The man at the door was just a little bit shorter than William and had ginger hair and dark brown eyes.

"Hello brother, surprised to see me"? Said George smiling