"Where am I?" Lucy thought to herself as she stood up from where she was laying. She had an awful headache. The pain, though bearable, was a nuisance.

She found herself in the hall of what looked to be a castle. Not just any castle. Her castle in Cair Paravel! She smiled as she ran quickly down the hall hoping to she her old friend Mr. Tumnus again.

But suddenly, she felt a sad realisation run over her. Mr. Tumnus was dead, the castle was destroyed and whatever she was seeing wasn't real. She made a hard stop and looked around. "This must be a dream" She told herself.

She slowly paced around looking for somebody, anybody really. "Hello?" She called out but there was no answer. She then heard a creak of a door. "Hello?" She called out again. "Anyone there?" There was no answer once again. That's when she decided that it was getting too creepy and headed to exit out of the castle doors.

Suddenly, someone grabbed her shoulder and flipped her onto the ground. Lucy screamed, hoping that someone would hear her. The person who attacked her had a dark cloak on and the hood was over their head. She couldn't make out who it was but she knew that he wasn't good. She struggled to escape, but he was on top of her holding her down. He was too strong and she couldn't push him off. He pulled out his dagger and was about to stab at her. Lucy gasped as she tried to cover her face. "Help!" She screamed. Lucy's eyes widened as she prayed for somebody, anybody to help. He moved the knife to stab her when they heard a mighty roar. "Aslan?" She called out but she could not see him. In fact, she could see nothing.

Lucy woke up with a jolt. She breathed heavily. "In and out." She thought to herself. "In and out."

She sat up and looked out the cabin window. It was still dark outside and probably would be for sometime. She knew she wouldn't be able to go to sleep but she also knew that she needed the energy for tomorrow. So, she decided to go to Edmund's room. When she was younger, he could always calm her down with a bedtime story. Though she was too old for those, his company always made her feel better, even before they found Narnia.

Edmund heard a creak outside his cabin door but before he could say anything, Lucy walked in, holding a pillow to her chest. "Oh." She said in a whisper. "I thought you were asleep."

"I actually had one of those mist dreams again." He told her. "So there will be no sleeping for a while."

"I did too. That's why I came here." She said as she sat on the hammock with him. "I bet it was worse than yours." She said, challenging him.

"Please. Unless yours has a man in a dark cloak trying to stab you, I doubt it is that bad." He joked.

"Actually, that's exactly what mine had." Lucy said in a concerned voice. "Could you see his face?"

"No, I couldn't actually. Everything was happening so fast. One moment I was walking down the halls of our castle in Cair Paravel, and the next I was pinned down by some crazy person in a cloak." Edmund replied.

"Edmund." She said in a serious voice. "We had the same dream."

"Oh Lucy, are you okay?" He asked with concern in his voice.

"Yes, I'm fine. But what does it mean? Why would we have the same dream?" Lucy paced around the room.

"I don't know." Edmund replied. "But it doesn't matter now. What matters is for you to get some sleep."

"But I…"

"No buts." Edmund said. "Now get on my hammock. I'll take the floor."

"But Edmund…"

"Like I said already Lucy. No buts."

Lucy gave up trying to argue and climbed onto the hammock. She knew Edmund would not change his mind. "Goodnight Edmund, I love you." She said before drifting off to sleep.

"I love you too, Lucy." He said with a small smile before closing his eyes and falling asleep as well.

"Edmund! Lucy!" The siblings heard the voice of their cousin early the next morning and they jumped up immediately.

"Isn't he a dragon?" Edmund looked at Lucy, very confused.

Eustace entered the room, still very enthusiastic about turning back into a boy. "I'm a boy again!" He exclaimed.

"Eustace!" Lucy smiled and hugged her cousin. She wouldn't have done that under a normal scenario back in England, but she was really happy to see him back as who he was.

"What happened?" Edmund asked.

"I think I saw Aslan." Eustace recalled.

"What?" Lucy whispered, wondering if he had actually seen him.

"He turned me back." Eustace said.

Hearing the noises from below his cabin, Caspian walked down the stairs to check on the siblings. "Edmund?" He knocked on the door. Edmund opened it and Caspian widened his eyes seeing Eustace back as a boy. "How-" He started.

"I think you better come in." Edmund suggested.

After they all sat together, Eustace continued telling his tale. "Aslan walked towards me and ripped the dragon out of me. I mean, he didn't pull the dragon out of me but he pulled the scales off and turned me-"

"We get it." Edmund said, knowing that his cousin was hyperventilating.

Though they didn't know each other much, Edmund knew that his cousin had anxiety issues. Even though Eustace won't like to admit it, he knew that Edmund had insomnia.

"What happened next?" Caspian asked.

"The next thing I knew, I was here and I was, well, me." He said, burying his face in his hands.

"It's okay, Eustace." Lucy said and touched his arm, a little unsure whether he would pull away, but he didn't.

"Thank you." He told her and Lucy smiled. They regretted not having been that way before. But it is never too late, right? Or so they thought.

"You should get some rest." Edmund suggested. "You've had a long night."

"Yes, thank you." Eustace nodded.

"You can stay with us." Caspian told Eustace as he clapped him on the back.

"Thank you." Eustace did thank everyone a lot afterwards. "Thank you for everything." He told Caspian and the King simply nodded in answer.

The boys left Lucy to go back to sleep. While climbing back down, Caspian clamped Edmund's shoulder. "Hey, can we talk for a second?"

"Yeah, sure." Edmund said. Caspian walked towards the main cabin and opened a cabinet while he walked in slowly after him. "Is everything all right, Caspian?"

"Here." Caspian pulled a particularly familiar sword out and reached out to hand it to Edmund.

"That's Peter's sword." Edmund stated.

"Yes, I know." Caspian replied.

"Why are you giving it to me?" Edmund wondered, but before Caspian could answer, he continued. "Look. I deeply apologise about what happened today at that cave. I don't know what happened to me. I would never-"

"I know, Edmund." Caspian cut him off. "I wouldn't have spoken those words either." Saying that, he reached the sword out to him once again. "Edmund, I want you to know that I think of you as my brother."

"Me too."

Edmund spent the entire journey thinking about what would have happened if Lucy had never found Narnia in the first place. He had shudders just thinking about the thought itself. He pondered if he would have remained his bratty self and also wondered if being a traitor was in his blood. Maybe it had nothing to do with Jadis. Maybe he was born a betrayer. He knew that no matter what he would do, he could never replace what happened.

"Then listen to an older brother and take this." Caspian handed him the sword with the lion on its hilt. "Peter would want you to have it."

Edmund knew that it was better not to argue anymore and took the sword from Caspian. "Thank you." He said.

"It was my honour." Caspian said and bowed his head. "Now, let's try to get some sleep. We still have a few more hours left before dawn breaks."

Later that morning, Edmund and Caspian had a spar at the main deck while Lucy stood at the hind deck of the ship and admired the sea. She had woken up early and watched the sunrise.

Narnian sunrises were worth living for and she knew that. Right as the sun rose up from the horizon, Lucy heard splashes of water. She looked downwards and encountered a naiad. The naiad was beautiful and waved at Lucy, who waved back but was surprised as to how quickly the naiad's expression had changed from delight to fear. She kept shaking her head no, and was trying to tell Lucy to not go the way that the Dawn Treader was heading in. Lucy frowned and wanted to talk to the naiad but before she could, there was a knock at the door of the main cabin.

"May I come in?" Caspian asked, waiting by the door.

"Of course!" Lucy smiled, walking inside the cabin.

"I just wanted to apologise for my behaviour yesterday."

"It's alright." She said, being her Valiant self.

"No, it wasn't." He asserted. "I challenged Edmund and that wasn't like myself."

"Caspian-"

"I also wanted to thank you for stopping me from fighting your brothers." He added, referring to the fight between Peter and himself after the raid.

"Anytime." Lucy made a joke to lighten the mood.

"Thank you." He nodded and was about to head out when Lucy spoke.

"I think all of us are behaving in ways that aren't really us, you know?" She voiced her concern.

But before Caspian could talk to her about it, the ship shifted to a harsh left. And then again to a harsh right. "Should it be shaking side to side like that?" Lucy asked, her voice filled with worry.

"No. No, it shouldn't."

Both of them ran up to the deck to see what was going on. The boat was shaking side to side. Edmund was on the deck trying to figure out who was attacking their ship. He looked overboard to see something unexpected. "Merpeople?" He asked himself, confused. He looked over and saw Lucy and Caspian, who was commanding people around to try and get the ship steady. "Caspian!" He called as he ran up to them. "Merpeople are attacking us!"

"What!" Lucy and Caspian shouted at the same time. They couldn't believe their eyes either. Why would merpeople be attacking them? The land people had always maintained a good relationship with the sea. They were always helpful to each other.

"Have you crossed their territory without their permission?" Edmund directed the question to Caspian, looking for answers.

"No!" Caspian shouted.

The ship was shaking and it was getting attacked from all directions. Drinian lost control of the wheel, which was followed by a heavy bang that stopped the ship from sailing. The Dawn Treader stood alone in the midst of a never-ending sea. Merpeople started climbing on board the ship and held everyone at the tip of their tridents. "What happened?" Caspian asked them, climbing onto the main deck.

The merpeople took one look at the young man before they started attacking the crew. "Stop it!" Lucy screamed at them.

"I'm Caspian the tenth, the King of Narnia and I order you to stop!" He dodged as he was attacked by a merman. But unfortunately, that didn't work. The merpeople continued to attack the crew members and Caspian had no choice but to join. "Stop it! I am King Caspian the tenth!"

The sound of swords hitting each other was the only sound for a thousand miles. No one could hear the pain of the injured crew members and no one was coming to their rescue. The Dawn Treader was not a battleship but a forced battle could never be avoided, especially when it was done with an ulterior motive.

But things worsened when a cloud of fog headed their way. As they fought, the green mist from earlier started rising up. It made it very hard to see for both sides of the battle, but little did the crew know that the merpeople had used it as an advantage.

As the battle went on, the clanking of the swords became more and more distant. Caspian tried his best to look around but the mist was still too heavy. A few moments later the mist started to clear up. There were no merpeople in sight and the ship stopped rocking.

"They wouldn't just leave, would they?" Caspian thought to himself. He decided to look around and see if there were any crew members who were dead or needed severe help. Most were surprisingly okay with about 5 or 6 needed to be bandaged. "This is strange. Why would they attack our crew, barely injure them and then just leave?" He suddenly had a really bad thought in the back of his head. "They must have successfully done what they came for to leave all of a sudden!"

Eustace came up to him and he was just as confused as Caspian was. They needed more input on what just happened. "Wait." Caspian said. "Where are Edmund and Lucy? I haven't seen them since before the battle."

"I don't know. I did a headcount and everyone was here except for you three." Eustace told him. "I assumed that they were with you."

Caspian started running to the main deck. "No!" He shouted for the whole cabin to hear. "They are here. They are safe. You did not fail to protect them." He thought to himself, doubting every word. "Edmund!" Caspian shouted. "Lucy!" He called for them all around the ship.

His worst fears had come true when there was no answer.

Cliffhanger! I know I'm sorry! But don't worry! More chapters are coming next week! Thank you for reading and traveling this journey with me! I will see you soon!