I

The Golden Age

Lucy woke up and, for a moment, she seemed to be blind. She sat up and threw the heavy satin comforter off her, and stared around groggily in the dark. Her hands stretched out and she felt silk draperies, and she sighed. For a moment, she had forgotten herself. She pushed them aside and early light flooded the room, gray and new. She shivered, for even summer mornings were cold here. She slipped her feet into embroidered slippers and pulled on her dressing robe, and padded out to the small balcony off her room. She leaned on the polished white railing, overlooking the sea. She looked east, the faint rim of Sun just rising, and thought of Aslan. Surely, Lucy thought, he must be the one who makes it rise every day. In the rough blue surf, mermaids shrieked and splashed. She sighed, closing green eyes. "It is a beautiful world," she said aloud.

She turned at a cough. Susan had entered, a smile on her face. "Morning, Lu. Don't you even know what today is?"

"Why, no," she said, surprised. It didn't ever seem to matter in Narnia. Spring went to summer and that turned to autumn and winter. Days didn't mean anything more than the Sun crossing the sky. Lucy pulled her tangled braid over her shoulder, bright red in the morning light. "Thursday?"

"It's your birthday," Susan said softly. "You couldn't have forgotten your own birthday, Lu."

"I must have," Lucy was embarrassed. For a few long moments, Lucy said nothing, her eyes unfocusing. She wondered if Mr. Tumnus would remember, and if he would call on her. He came most days. Her heart tripped a little in her chest and she gasped, catching herself. She felt most like she was falling, when she thought of him without restraint. Susan laughed at her gently, her blue eyes reading her younger sister better than Lucy realized.

"Well, come on to breakfast, then. Let's get you dressed. Your brothers have a surprise for you."

Lucy dressed and brushed out her long hair, leaving it hanging down her back. She did not usually enjoy fussing with it. She made her way to the Grand Hall, where they were most partial to taking breakfast. Peter and Edmund were indeed already there, along with Susan. Peter looked up when she entered, sunlight catching his golden beard. Lucy smiled at him. She loved her eldest brother so, and she thought that every day he grew more handsome. No girl should ask for a better set of brothers, really, she said to herself as she sat down.

"Morning, Lu," Peter greeted her. Edmund had his mouth full of toast and jam, but he grunted in way of hello. Peter looked as though he would burst from smugness. "Susan tells us that you forgot your own birthday."

"I must admit that's true," Lucy laughed, sitting down across from Peter. She looked at him. "Peter, you look awfully queer. Do you feel alright?"

"I feel fine, Lu. I just feel that someone who forgot her own birthday probably wouldn't be interested in any presents."

"How old are you, anyway, Lu?" Edmund had swallowed his toast. He grinned. "Do you remember that?"

"I'm eighteen," she said defiantly. He shrugged.

"Well, at least you remember that."

"What's my present?" Lucy looked expectantly at her brother.

"How'd you like to go on a hunt with me?" Peter watched her expectantly.

"Oh, Peter! D'you really mean it?" Lucy's eyes shone as brilliantly as the sun when Peter said that. She had so longed to ride through the forests of Narnia with her older siblings, but Susan and Peter had always insisted she was too young. But now, here they were offering. "Susan, you mean it too?" Susan smiled softly.

"It's not any fun without you, really, Lu." Lucy shrieked in joy and nearly knocked her chair over hurrying to fling her arms around Peter's strong neck and Susan's thin shoulders. She hugged Edmund for good measure, and although he grunted he was smiling. "After breakfast, we'll get ready."

Mr. Tumnus did not find it strange that none of the Pevensies were on their thrones when he arrived just after breakfast. In his hands, he clutched a packaged neatly wrapped in brown paper, tied with a knotted white string. In the crisp summer wind, his curls were wild as he nodded to the guards and made his way to Lucy's room.

It must be said, Tumnus never felt completely comfortable being in Lucy's room just with the both of them. He always suspected that Peter and Susan knew of his feelings for the youngest Queen—although neither were anything but kind towards him. He knocked at the door, his hands clammy, shifting the bundle in his arms. The brown paper crackled and, he hoped, hid the pounding of his heart.

There was never anything quite like seeing Lucy for the first time in a day, Tumnus thought, as she opened the door. The sun lit her from behind, her hair the color of flame in this light, her green eyes just a shade lighter than her gown. On her feet, deep chocolate boots. He stared at her waist, slender underneath the close-fit bodice.

"Mr. Tumnus!" her voice was delighted and he forced himself to look at her face. Her round cheeks glowed with excitement and her small mouth stretched to smile at him. He loved most, he decided, the gap between her front teeth. And then she hugged him gently, arms brushing his hair, and he changed his mind. Her arms, certainly. Her arms were certainly what he loved most. "What are you doing here?"

"Bringing you your gift, of course, my Queen," he mumbled softly, holding out the brown paper to her. "I am only sorry it is not finer."

"You must call me Lucy," she told him earnestly. "And I am sure it will be the most wonderful gift." She laughed as her nimble fingers picked at the knot. "I really am the only one who forgot it was my birthday!"

"You forgot your birthday?" He didn't believe her. "How did you manage that?"

"Mind on other things, I suppose," she said, suddenly distant. He always wondered where her mind went on such occasions. This always happened, when he asked her what she thought about. Her fingers stopped working the knot.

"Let me," he said, pulling the strings apart. "I should not have made it so tight." She started and then flushed.

"I'm sorry, Mr. Tumnus. I forgot myself. I seem to do that often these days."

"My Queen—Lucy—forgive me for forgetting. How old are you?" Tumnus changed the subject. He didn't like for her to wander too much. He feared she wandered to the man she loved. Man, he thought bitterly, and a frown must have creased his brown because she looked with concern at him. She did not say anything, simply took the package back after the knot was removed.

"I am eighteen—oh! Mr. Tumnus! You shouldn't have," she said with glee, pulling the paper away from a soft green scarf. It was the misty green of moss, knitted by hand all that bright early summer. She looked at it adoringly, and then clutched it to her chest, eyes large. "It's a pity my birthday is in August, isn't it?"

"I suppose anticipation to wear it will be another part of the gift," Tumnus laughed, and Lucy mock-pouted her round lips at him before smiling. She turned and failed to notice the longing in her dear friend's face.

"I fear I cannot visit long today, dear Mr. Tumnus," she told him, after gently placing the scarf in her wardrobe. "The others are finally taking me on my first hunt."

Mr. Tumnus hid his disappointment with ease. He had become used to, watching Lucy grow more beautiful with each day and each day more queenly.

"I forgive you on one condition," he said grandly.

"And what is that, loyal subject?"

"That you call upon me as soon as you return." Lucy smiled.

"That is a promise, Faun." She closed the door to her room.

"Your eyes are the color of the sea during storm," he said breathlessly, before he could stop himself. The deep green studied him. Tumnus looked at his hooves. There was no hope for him and Lucy. He was only a Faun, and she—well, the Queen of Narnia.

"Thank you," she said. "For the fine compliment and gift. I am not sure which I like more." He shifted his weight. "Why do you not look at me?"

"Because I am afraid what other foolishness might escape my lips," he muttered to her boots.

Without thinking, she blurted, "I like your lips!" He looked up with a queer expression and they both laughed, albeit nervously. "I like your foolishness. You're a silly Faun." He smiled painfully.

You have no idea the things I think of you at night, he thought, looking her in the face.

"I should go," he said, turning. "I hope you have a marvelous hunt. I am sure you will catch the White Stag."

"Oh, what do you reckon he'd tell me?"

"He would give you what you most want," said Tumnus, his voice growing strong with the air of a storyteller. "He would look at your face and see your heart's desire, and then he would grant you the ability to snatch it up and keep it safe forever."

"Well, I will call on you when I return. I promise you that." And, without knowing why she did, Lucy hurried to put a hand on his arm. He turned back to her, confused, and Lucy pressed her mouth to his without thinking about it.

Tumnus felt the strength leave his muscles. Her hands held his cheeks firmly, the soft skin of the palms against his short beard. He could not bring himself to pull away, although here in this bring parlour anyone with a mind to could see them. Her lips were parted and so tempted was Tumnus that it was fortunate Lucy released him before he pressed her against a wall and—

Then Lucy's smooth lips were gone and Tumnus, thankfully, could kill that train of thought. Lucy was red in the cheeks. Tumnus could not speak. He moved his mouth and no words came out. Finally, he managed her name.

"Lucy," it was a squeak. And she laughed, and the awkwardness smoothed out.

"I must go. Thank you for a lovely birthday gift. I will call on you when I return. Take care 'til then, dear Mr. Tumnus." He held her against him for the briefest moment and watched her precede him down the passage to the bright Grand Hall.

"Damn you, Tumnus," he muttered to his own heart. "You must never, ever let her know. She would laugh in your face and, what's worse! You would lose your only, dearest friend. Stop it. She is a queen and you are only a faun who knits and lives alone in a damp old cave. Satisfy yourself that she looks on you with such affection." Yet she had kissed him. He left Cair Paravel with a wave to the siblings, mounting their horses, and traveled the well-worn path back to his home.

Tumnus never knew that Lucy and her siblings found the White Stag and chased it. He did not know that the Lamp-Post awoke in them memories of a life long past, and still as curious as the day he had met her, Lucy had led them straight back to the wardrobe. All Tumnus knew was that a week passed, and then another, with no sign or word of the Pevensies. Tumnus knew only the anxious, heart-wrenching wait as search parties scoured the land; Tumnus only knew the snap inside of him when they declared the four children dead.

It was not simply Tumnus' heart that broke when he heard news that Lucy Pevensie, Queen of Narnia, was lost. His entire being cracked. He could barely rise from bed. He certainly did not leave his home. All those shortening nights, as August vanished as Lucy had and turned slowly to winter, he sat in a daze. What happened? He asked himself. Could I have saved her? Stupid, careless Faun. He screamed it out loud. All those passing continued by. Mrs. Beaver very nearly brought him over dinner, but Beaver discouraged it. They all knew of Tumnus' affection for Lucy—most as friendship, but a few (like the Beavers) suspecting something more. Outside Tumnus' grimy windows, rain poured. All that autumn Narnia wept for its lost Kings and Queens. It was just as broken as Tumnus, although we did not realize it yet. The Golden Age had ended, but to Tumnus all he could think about was Lucy.

Part of you dies when you lose the one and only person that has ever mattered. There is nothing, Tumnus thought, for me now in this place. There was no joy in anything. Day passed day, weeks turned to months, and he festered in his grief, staring down at his rough fur.

No news came of the four children, although hope remained in Narnia. Hope was the most any had in those unstable days of early winter. And soon, a new King was appointed. Tumnus heard the news from the Beavers, when he finally left his house. He sat at their table, blue eyes as blank as the cold gray sky. It was almost Christmas. Beaver and his wife looked at each other with concern.

"It is my fault," Tumnus said, and then wouldn't explain.

Each day he longed to wake a Son of Adam. Each night he went to bed a Faun. One morning, it was too much. Fretfully he pushed all of his books and tea cups off a table. The picture of his father crashed to the floor, the glass covering the photo breaking. "If only I had been born a Son of Adam!" he cried. And with a sob, Tumnus dropped into a chair and yanked out fistfuls of his own fur, teeth gritted. Two wispy bare patches appeared on his thighs. "Horrible Faun," he hissed. "Worthless, loveless, Lucy-less Faun." The Beavers stopped calling on him.

"It's too much," Mrs. Beaver told her husband, tears gathering in her small eyes for she was, after all, a sentimental woman. "That poor young man."

"He misses her hard," Beaver grunted in agreement. "But he's gone funny, dear. I think it's best to give Mr. Tumnus some space."

And snow began to fall. It was one week till Christmas.

It is not to be supposed that Lucy forgot all about her dear friend, Mr. Tumnus. Every night, Edmund or Peter or Susan dragged her away from the wardrobe, wrapping her in blankets and setting her before the fire with hot chocolate. She whimpered and wept, but she would not talk to anyone about what had happened to her. Her eyes were dark and she barely spoke. Even the Professor did not know what to make of it.

"Give her time," was the only suggestion.

It was Susan who first realized what it must be. She wrapped her arm around the bundle that was her young sister.

"You miss Tumnus, don't you, Lu?" Peter and Edmund looked at the girls, their eyes dark in the dim room.

"He—he was my very best friend!" she sobbed, burying her face in Susan's chest. Susan stroked her short hair.

"Don't worry, Lu," Peter said encouragingly. "He'll be waiting for the next time we go to Narnia. You'll see him again. We'll all see Aslan and Tumnus and the Beavers and everyone again."

Lucy cheered after that day, but on the darkest nights she still returned to the wardrobe, tapping at the back of it, trying to find a way in. The professor caught her one and explained she would only get in now when she was not expecting it. Still, she tried. But time past and slowly Mr. Tumnus faded from her recent memory, tucked away in her heart where a woman hides her deepest treasures. And when she did return to Narnia, she did not meet Mr. Tumnus. There was no sign of him. And so she sailed away with Prince Caspian and Edmund, leaving Peter with the Professor in a new, small cabin near the woods and Susan off to America with her parents. Her love for Narnia returned, but the love for Mr. Tumnus was being sheltered, waiting for the day to break out into all of Lucy once again.

It was on that day of the Beaver's discussion that Tumnus appeared at the lamp-post. He simply sat down in the snow with a book, huddled under his parasol, red scarf wrapped about his neck, and waited.

"He's waiting for something that will never come," the Animals said to one another. And so the story passed through the woods that Tumnus, the Faun so dear to the late Queen Lucy, had lost his mind. All avoided him. He did not seem to notice. He simply sat at the lamp-post, waiting for Lucy. After all, he reasoned to himself, if she does return to Narnia, she will come here. For this is where she appeared in the first place. He knew he was right. This was a good plan. And so, he waited. And perhaps he would have kept waiting.

Some say that the story spread all the way to Aslan. And well did Aslan remember the youngest Queen, brave of heart, and her determination to save Mr. Tumnus from the White Witch's spell. And one bitingly cold day, as Tumnus sat reading, he heard the familiar crunch of feet in the snow. Heart in his throat, he leapt up.

Before him stood the White Stag.