England. Home. Another life. The life of a child. Susan finds it very strange to in the blink of eye be a child of twelve when her mind and body has been that of a grown woman for years. She has to adapt, to go back to life in England, so she does, but it does not feel quite right. She wonders how her siblings to it, but when she asks, they just blink in confusion.
It takes Susan a year to start feel that she truly fits into London life. One year with progress that is ripped apart with the sound of her horn that tears between worlds when they are going back to school, and Susan almost loathes the magic call even as she clings to the hands of her siblings as they get pulled far, far away. Back to Narnia, that isn't anything at all like the Narnia they left.
Too old. She is thirteen and too old. Peter accept this as the absolute truth and asks nothing. Susan does not. She feels that there is more to Aslan's cryptic words about them being needed in their own world, being too old for Narnia, and not being needed. She asks, even as Peter glare as her. Aslan's eyes are molten gold that burns deep inside her soul and leaves a spark.
"In time, you will know all that is yours to know, Susan."
Susan can accept that, because the words confirm that neither she nor her siblings are fully done with Narnia.
Returning to England this time is easier, supposedly because she has not lived part of a lifetime as an adult. Susan slips into the life of boarding school, of studies and teatimes with other girls. She has never really had that bond to others her age before, and her soul sings in radiant joy that feels like basking in the sunlight of the southern sun she was once queen of.
She is sixteen and feels too grown up for her age. Part of the mannerisms and the way she walks reminds Susan all too much of the queen she used to be in Narnia. She is too old for sixteen and her classmates ad friends think her slightly stuck up but still alright. She is too old for sixteen and her siblings think she is spurning Narnia and pretending to be an adult. She is too old for sixteen and Susan wants to scream inn frustration. She does not. She lets the sunlight hidden away in her soul guide each second, minute, hour, day, month as more time slips by, and people she meet remarks that she is astonishingly gentle and radiant, that she brings on sunlight in needed times. And Susan knows, finally, what Aslan meant. She is to spread the radiant light of the southern sun amongst her here in this world to make it a better place.
Susan is eighteen and has so much to do. Time flies as she slips between various charities on nimble feet always smiling, always gentle, and always, always with the light of the southern sun in her wake.
Susan is twenty one and the sunlight has diminished, she is alone, and the world seems dark, oh so dark. She no longer hears the faint roar of a lion in the back of her mind. The sunlight in her very core seems shaded, broken. Her family is gone, and Susan is alone and how can anything ever be right again?
Susan is thirty and has moved to the countryside the House. Susan walks through the corridors, up and down the many stairs, in and out of rooms. She avoids one room with all her might. The time is not right. Not yet.
Susan restores the house, makes it a home for children in need and keeps only a small part of it for her own use. During the years that pass, she watches many souls come and go, and the restored sunlight within her shines softly over each and every one that needs it, and the faint roar of a golden lion lifts Susan's spirit and let it soar high.
She is, suddenly, sixty and has lived longer in this world then in Narnia. Her dreams are more often of a darkness that creeps in, and a faint light far, far away. Susan writes her will. She leaves the house to a dearly loved friend. She says her goodbyes in silence, knowing that she cannot voice them aloud.
The walk up the stair to the spare room feels like a dream, it's blurry and unclear. The door opens before her on its own accord. The wardrobe shimmers with magic. The time is right. Finally.
A green, luscious field meets Susan as she leaves the world behind. She walk on bare feet, young feet, and breathes Narnian air again. Her hair is long, loose and black once more. She braids it as she walks. Flowers, bright yellow and purple, blue and green, red, pink, all colours imaginable, seem to show her the way through the endless field. An oak bows, and its spirit takes the form of an old man. Susan curtsies back, takes his offered hand and is pulled forward, up, high and further in. She passes a waterfall, and daughters of the mighty sea deity greets her with waves and smiles as she keep going up, up, up. Golden gates fill her eyes. They shimmer like Aslan's eyes, and Susan curtsies low to the ground, head bent, body at ease in the long forgotten position.
"Queen of the radiant Southern sun, arise."
If a voice has a colour, Aslan's voice is gold. Susan stands on feet that tremble, meet the eyes of the great lion. Power radiates from him, he is bigger and more glorious than Susan has ever seen him before. Joy, pure and uplifting, sizzles through her body.
"Come, daughter, dear one. Walk with me to all that is."
And Susan the Gentle, Queen of the radiant Southern sun, High Queen of Narnia, enter through the Gates, and all is as it should be.