Said Queen Lucy, "for it will not go out of my mind that if we pass this post and lantern either we shall find strange adventures or else some great change in our fortunes."
"Madam," Said King Edmund, "the like foreboding stirreth in my heart also."
"And in mine, fair brother," Said King Peter.
"And in mine too," said Queen Susan. "Wherefore by my counsel we shall lightly return to our horses and follow this White Stag no further."
The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe, pg. 186.
What if they had taken Susan's advice and not gone further?
"Madam, I agree with you. While we have never before backed down from an adventure, the way this lantern works on my mind disturbs me. I believe, my fair consorts, that we should head back to our horses and our courtiers, and return to our home without this stag. The sooner away from this lantern the better, I feel." King Edmund said.
Edmund was known for thinking carefully before heading into action. Even his most spontaneous actions had been thought through very carefully. The fact that he was now refusing an adventure (when he was usually one of the first to find evidence to support an adventure) surprised the others. They pondered his words and found them wise.
"Then let it be as my royal brother has said. We shall hunt the White Stag no more today." King Peter declared.
They returned to their horses and returned to their court in a more somber mood than when they had left them. The members of the court who had gone hunting with them tried to figure out what had worked upon their majesties so, but the royal siblings revealed nothing.
The first days back from the hunt were the hardest for the Pevensie kings and queens. The lamppost had worked upon their mind and they were sorely tempted to return to it and see what adventure lay beyond it. Edmund began trying to find out why a lantern had been planted in Narnia. He researched the earliest histories until he reached the story of the creation of Narnia. There he read that a witch, Jadis (oh how he shivered at that name), had been present at the birth of Narnia. Several strangers from another world had been there and Jadis had tried to kill one of them with a bar of iron.
It missed the humans and planted itself in the ground and there grew into a tree of iron. Edmund considered his searching done, though he marveled that such a thing could exist, such as another world. He had never heard of it in his time in Narnia. He knew that he had not been born in Narnia and that when he first arrived, adventures had befallen him and his siblings, but he could not remember where they had come from. It was all a blank. He decided not to think upon to much, lest it drive him mad.
Historians now consider the years the siblings ruled Narnia as a Golden Era in the age of Narnia. Even when they were separated by marriage, Narnia never forgot it had four rulers and each family member was consulted for the larger decisions concerning Narnia.
Peter the Magnificent never married. He claimed Narnia as his first and only love. All the princesses in the world were disappointed that he would not marry. He claimed that when one of his siblings had a child, be it a Son of Adam or a Daughter of Eve, then that would be the heir to the Narnian thrones.
Susan the Gentle married a prince of Terebinthia and he came to Narnia to help govern Narnia, since Susan claimed she could never leave her homeland. They had two sons and three daughters. All the children made the land smile and laugh and love the children dearly. The eldest, David, would eventually inherit Peter's throne.
Edmund the Just married a duchess of Galma. He moved to Galma, though he visited his royal siblings often and they would visit him and his wife often. He gave birth to a daughter and a son. The daughter soon grew up to marry the son of King Cor and Queen Aravis and became Queen of Archenland. The son grew up to be the Duke of Galma under the protection of his royal cousin, King David of Narnia.
Lucy the Valiant never married. Her constant companion in life was the Faun Tumnus. None of her suitors could compete with their friendship and soon stopped trying to court the youngest queen of Narnia. She like Peter claimed that no man could have her heart since she was so in love with Narnia and her hand was always being held by Tumnus. It soon became a joke in Narnia which would turn into a saying.
When the royal siblings died, they were each buried in Narnia, together, in a garden at Cair Paravel. They reappeared in England at the Professor's house by the grace of Aslan and never told anyone of their adventures, though there was something in their manner and in their eyes that caused everyone to look at them twice.
When Caspian the First led his people from Telmar and into Narnia, he found it harder to conquer, but he killed the aging King David and his heir, and drove the people loyal to the King into hiding and exile. The talking animals soon vanished and Narnia became a land of people haunted by stories of animals that talked and walked like men and of phantoms in the woods. They refused to live in Cair Paravel, saying that a lion guarded the thrones and treasures there. The royal siblings returned to Narnia to help Prince Caspian the tenth ascend his rightful throne.