Whose Name is Called Immanuel: Chapter Two
A/N: The before-dinner chapter...! Usual warnings for theology apply :)
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This had not been a good idea. Even for the mystery of Christmas, this had not been a good idea.
Garian stopped, and scrubbed his sleeve across his cold face. Boys did not cry. Certainly not big boys of twelve like himself. And he was Not lost. You couldn't be lost if you knew you were at the Royal Castle at Beaversdam, could you?
Except you could be awfully lost inside the vast extended grounds of the Royal Castle at Beaversdam.
Garian sighed, a long, juddering sort of sigh that sounded horribly lost in the quiet of this strange, snowy orchard he'd come back to, yet again. Unless it was a different orchard. The castle seemed to have so many of orchards, and gardens, and courtyards and gateways. Was he ever going to get out of here?
There had been no answer to his knock at the door of the kitchens when he and Lizzie had arrived. Plenty of amazing smells coming out, but no-one answering the door. He'd waited a bit, knocked a bit more, then tied Lizzie to the hitching ring with the cabbage on her saddle (no-one at the new king's castle would steal a cabbage, surely) and set out to follow the trail of footprints in the slushy snow, that led out of the door and round the corner.
He'd hoped the trail might be that of the cook, or someone who could tell him where the cook was, but round the corner the single line of prints had merged into a wider path with so many, many footprints, they made the tracks across the village green at home look like the single trail of a robin in fresh snow. He'd tried to carry on. Then he'd tried to go back. And then everything had gone wrong. The archway Garian thought he'd gone through one way hadn't been the same one going back. He'd crossed a strange courtyard, turned another corner and come abruptly into the middle of a group of soldiers sword fighting.
Garian supposed now, in the quiet of the orchard, that they'd probably just been practising. But it had been so sudden, and loud, and ferocious looking, he'd jumped and bolted out the first gate he'd seen – which turned out to be the kind which only opened from one side. With the din of the clashing swords, no-one had heard him knocking and calling from beyond the gate.
So. He wasn't lost. Just – lost. Garian scrubbed at his face again, and started forwards. If you walked long enough, you must eventually come to a gateway that let you out, or maybe just even someone who could let you out. But everyone at the castle seemed to be in the castle today, or at least not wandering about in the orchards. He could see the keep, with the red cloaked sentries on the ramparts, but they were too far up to hear him if he shouted. Garian put his head down and trudged on. His boots crunched in the snow. His toes in the boot with the hole in it were cold. Lizzie would be getting cold, too.
Garian gritted his teeth at that thought. He could stay lost; it didn't matter if he couldn't find out what Christmas was; he could even be late home for dinner, so late his great-aunt might whip him; but he couldn't leave Lizzie to go getting cold by the kitchen door! Somehow, somewhere, he was going to get out of here!
This orchard too ended in a wall and a shut gate. He'd avoided shut gates, in case they trapped him yet further. But if Lizzie was cold, and this gate led towards the keep, he had to try it. He pushed down the latch and stepped through.
A garden – or a courtyard – you couldn't tell when all the ground was a rumpled blanket of snow. There was a bare stemmed tree at the centre, snow-dusted stems of spiny roses trained up the walls, an arched open gateway beyond. But these weren't what caught Garian's eye. At the side of the garden, a young man in a red cloak was bent over, scraping up a small pile of snow. He looked up at the noise of the gate – and then straightened up sharply
Garian jumped back, anxious, but the young man dusted off his hands and smiled. "Hello," he said carefully, holding out one hand rather as Garian himself would have held out a hand to reassure Lizzie. "Don't be afraid. What did you want? Did someone send you out here to find me?" he added, as Garian remained silent.
Garian shook his head, and the young man came crunching through the snow towards him. "Don't be afraid," he repeated. "What did you want?" he asked again, setting one hand gently on Garian's shoulder.
There was no doubt: the young man was one of the grand folk. He had a fur cap, not a knitted one, his red cloak had fur trim all around the edge, and the hand on Garian's shoulder had a gold ring on one finger that would, given the price they had bought Lizzie for, have bought at least a hundred horses.
"What did you want?" the young man repeated. "Are you lost? Or were you looking for me?"
What did he want? He wanted to find Lizzie – he wanted to not be lost – he wanted to sell the cabbage – he hadn't been looking for anyone – except maybe the cook – the answers swirled about in Garian's head as he gulped and looked up.
"I – I – please – sir-" Garian gulped again. When the grand folk asked you questions, you were meant to answer them – but his own question simply blurted out: "Please, sir, what's Christmas?"
"What's Christmas?!"
The young man literally blinked, and Garian rushed to try and repair his impoliteness. "I mean, yes sir – no sir – it doesn't matter, sir-"
"Christmas matters a good deal," said the young man, suddenly and firmly. He smiled down at Garian again. "It matters a good deal."
"Because it's the new king's feast?" Garian queried, a slight flicker of hope rising that he, perhaps, at least wasn't going to be scolded or imprisoned for impertinence.
The young man paused – or maybe froze was the better description, for he stood perfectly still for a moment, staring almost blankly at Garian. Then he nodded, slowly, and let go of Garian's shoulder, and squatted down into the snow. "Christmas isn't – the new king's feast," he said, as slowly as his hands were moving, scraping the snow into a mound. "He's simply ordered Narnia to observe it again."
"But what is it?" Garian repeated. "Other than stuff and nonsense for the grand folks and no difference to the poor?"
"Other than what?!" the young man spluttered, looking up from his pile of snow.
"Stuff and nonsense for the grand folks and no difference to the poor." This repetition didn't seem to relieve the young man's shocked expression, and Garian fumbled for an explanation. "That's what my great-aunt says it is. At least, that's what she'd say it is, because that's what she says everything is that's to do with the grand folks. The old king, and the new king, and the War last summer and – and all the new things in Narnia. We – we're only poor," he added, in case that was relevant. "It cost everything to buy Lizzie – our horse – from Lord Sopespian's estate last summer."
"I see." The young man studied Garian's face carefully. "And what is it that you think of this new Narnia?"
"It's splendid!" said Garian earnestly. "But I don't understand what Christmas is."
The young man smiled, and looked down at his snow pile again. "Christmas," he said rather forcefully, scooping up a large handful of the snow and rolling it into a ball. "Christmas isn't the new king's feast, any more than Narnia is the new king's country. They're both Aslan's; it is just that He has set the king to rule over His country, and to see that His feasts are celebrated." He set the snowball down on the ground, and scooped up another handful of snow. "Do you know about the White Witch, and how she made everywhere always winter? The Great Winter?"
Garian nodded. Long ago, Mother had used to tell him those tales, and ever since the new king in the summer, people had been talking about how they were really, after all, true.
"And the Golden Age which followed it? With the Four Monarchs from the Other World?"
"Who – who came back this summer?" Garian ventured. That idea was a bit mind-boggling, really, that you might have Kings and Queens from the ancient stories coming into everyday Narnia. If it had been one of the boys from the village who'd told him it, Garian would have been sure it wasn't true. But all the Dryads said so too, and surely Dryads didn't lie.
"Yes." The young man nodded. "They came this summer, but they came the first time, at the start of the Golden Age, when it was still the Great Winter. "Always winter and never Christmas" – because Christmas is Aslan's feast. That's what they call it on the Seven Isles: the Feast of Aslan."
The young man rolled yet another snowball, and added it to the stack. "They came in the Winter, and then Aslan came, and the Spring came – but He and they both came before the Spring, you see? And the first thing which showed that the Witch's power was weakening was that it was Christmas. Father Christmas came, and brought the Gifts to the Kings and Queens."
At this point, he shuffled back a bit from his squatting position, turned slightly to face a clear patch of snow, and began to lay the snowballs into a ring. "So," he said, "Christmas is to remember that. To celebrate Aslan's coming to us – His first step on the path to the Stone Table and the Deeper Magic from before the dawn of time."
The ring of snowballs had grown three high, each layer overlapping the previous to leave big gaps in the wall. The young man balanced another ball on, then rose and thrust his hands deep into his pockets. "I'm sure I brought it with me," he muttered, switching hands to rummage in another set of pockets. "I really thought I had … ah-ha!"
'It' was a stub of a fat candle, and as Garian watched, the young man drew out a small gold tinder box too, crouched down and lit the candle. Then he reached in, and put the candle in the middle of snowball ring. "Light, hope, new life, in the snow and the dark. Does that make sense to you?"
"Christmas is … Aslan coming," said Garian slowly, trying to think this through.
"He might do," said the young man cheerily. "But it's remembering Aslan coming. Remembering the ice cracking behind Him, and the snow melting at His gaze. It's not that He does again what He has done perfectly once. It's that we have a day to specially remember it. And it's now, because the darkest part of the winter has passed."
Garian frowned, uncertainly, and the young man paused in setting another snowball onto his stack. "Your horse?"
"Ye-yes, sir?" Garian gulped. "She's – she's at the kitchens."
"I hope she's outside the kitchens," said the young man gently. "You have her all the time?"
"Ye-yes sir – sir – yes?"
The young man rolled an extra snowball and set it carefully on the stack. "Do you remember the day you got her?"
"Ye-yes?"
"And do you just remember it, or think of it specially when the same day comes round each year?"
"Y-yes!" Garian cried, suddenly realising where this apparently complete change of subject fitted in. "So – so– "
He didn't finish, because the young man beamed with satisfaction and set the very last snowball on the top of the perfect pyramid through which the light of the small candle flickered – and because a faun in a bright red scarf trotted into the courtyard through the doorway in the far wall and called "Your Majesty! Your Majesty!"
Your Majesty?!
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