A/N: (OOH THIS AUTHOR'S NOTE IS HAPPENING BEFORE THE CHAPTER I MUST HAVE SOMETHING INTERESTING TO SAY. ...except I don't—not particularly, anyway—but eh.)

I admit without an ounce of shame that the first two chapters were me getting comfortable with the characters, since we'll be stuck with each other for a while. I solemnly swear to be more interesting from here on out.

...Maybe.

3

Dead Man's Folly

The three—with a grousing and confused Eustace in tow—had walked to what they hoped was the governor's house, encountering no other living beings on the way. Lucy stood at the door, glancing about warily.

"I still don't understand what all the hullabaloo is about," grumbled Eustace. "Why can't we just leave?"

Lucy cast Eustace a long-suffering glance before turning back to face the door. Caspian had explained the matter no less than three times in the course of the walk, but Eustace would not accept these explanations. As such, everyone grew even more exasperated with the boy than they had been before, if such were possible.

"These are my citizens," Caspian said for the fourth time. "I want to know what they're being slaughtered for."

Edmund ignored most of what was said after that, having heard it all already so many times before. He turned his head to see Lucy's expression better. Her mouth was twisted and pressed in distaste, and her brow furrowed slightly. Edmund thought she looked slightly ill.

"You all right?" he asked.

Lucy nodded. "I'm not sure if I want to go in yet," she confessed. "Considering how we found Lord Bern..."

"You can always stay out here if you want," Edmund said. He glanced at Eustace and Caspian, who were still arguing. "...er."

Lucy followed his gaze and snickered quietly. "I'll take my chances with the governor," she said. "The worst he can do is be dead; Eustace'll moan my ears off."

Edmund snorted. He had already reached for the door by the time he realized Lucy was in the process of opening it herself. Lucy flashed a small smile before crossing the threshold. Grinning to himself, Edmund followed.

The only word that came to mind to describe the governor's house was "shiny." Nearly every surface glimmered in one way or another, whether with gold or silver. Even the multitudinous shoes lying beside the doorway sparkled with precious stones.

Edmund scanned the show of opulence with faint distaste. The wealth on display bore a thick aura of wrongness that chilled him to his core. Trying to ignore the feeling, Edmund inhaled deeply through his nostrils. A viscous stench overwhelmed him, sticking to the walls of his throat. He gagged, tears pricking at his eyes.

"I wondered when you'd smell it too," said Lucy.

"Dunno how I didn't notice it until now," Edmund admitted, pressing a hand over his nose.

Lucy didn't reply, instead covering her mouth and nose with the crook of her arm. She turned to Edmund, uncertainty furrowing her brow. He took his hand from his own face and rested it on her shoulder. Straightening, Lucy turned and stepped into a corridor, her tread still hesitant. Edmund followed close behind and tried not to breathe.

The inner chambers were plain in comparison to what Edmund had first seen. Gilded lamps still adorned the tables and walls, but everything else was almost... subdued. The walls were undecorated stone, the floors utterly bare aside from a few jewelled vases. Edmund dared to inhale through his nose, testing the air to find that the strong odour had somehow gotten even stronger. His stomach churned, and he immediately clamped a hand over his face again.

Edmund and Lucy passed into a study covered in a thin coat of dust. A lonely inkpot lay overturned on the writing-desk, spilt contents long dried, and the one bookshelf in the room was completely bare. Tentatively, Edmund tested the air again. His vision swam at the stench, and he found himself wondering how a smell so odious could even exist.

"If the body's not here," he said as he pinched his nostrils shut, "then it's got to be very, very close."

"I hope so. The sooner we find Gumpas, the sooner we can leave."

A familiar shout rang through the air. "Hey, where've you gone off to? ...I say, this house is a labyrinth!"

"In the study," Edmund called out. "Three lefts and a right from the first room without shoes."

"Ah, thank you." There was a grunt and a soft thump, which Edmund assumed was Caspian tripping on one of the carpets. Lucy stifled a giggle. "A dangerous labyrinth, at that," the Telmarine added, voice slightly breathier than it had been.

Edmund unplugged his nose and wiped down the desk with his sleeve, coughing against the cloud of dust that assaulted his lungs. When he could breathe again, he bent slightly and peered at the now clean surface. Thin crescent lines had been scratched into the wood, either by a small knife or a particularly sturdy pen. Some of the marks formed whole words, but these were significantly less defined than those that did not.

"Lucy, come see this," he said. When he saw her lean over the desk at the edge of his vision, he continued: "D'you see these markings?"

She nodded before leaning further to see them better. "Maybe he pushed too hard on the paper when he wrote letters."

"Maybe... but who writes letters made up entirely of scribbles?" Edmund traced one of the marks with his forefinger, taking care not to press on the wood in case it splintered.

"Do you think he was carving something? Or maybe he contracted someone to make the desk a bit more decorative?"

"I don't think there's enough of a pattern for that, though," Edmund murmured. "And if this is meant to be decorative, then the governor's got terrible taste in desk art."

Lucy let out a small laugh at that. "What do you think they are, then?"

"...I don't know," he confessed. "From the looks of it," he added, tracing more of the curved lines, "Gumpas really liked round things." Hearing footsteps, he turned and saw Caspian inspecting the bookshelf.

"No books," Caspian remarked. "How strange." He knelt down and inspected the lower levels, hmming quietly as he did so.

Confused, Edmund stepped over and knelt next to Caspian. "What are you looking for?"

"I'm not sure, but I think..." Caspian frowned and stroked the stones immediately in front of the bookshelf. "This has been moved rather a lot," he said. "Look at the scuffing."

Edmund, now getting rather excited, rearranged himself so as to better see the dusty flooring. Indeed, several rather deep, arcing marks had been made in the floor at that spot, all in the same pattern and at the same angle.

"Maybe there's something behind this." Caspian put a hand on Edmund's shoulder and flashed a roguish half-grin. "D'you mind helping me move it?"

Edmund shook his head, quickly pulling himself to his feet. He gripped the panels tightly while Caspian pressed his palms against the side. Caspian gave a brisk nod, and Edmund tugged on the bookcase as hard as he could. Much to his surprise, it moved incredibly smoothly—more like a closet door than a heavy piece of furniture. To his annoyance, he couldn't see what was behind the shelf when it was moved.

"Ooh," breathed Lucy. "I wish we had had secret rooms like this at home."

Caspian was first to step into this chamber, while Edmund held onto the bookcase to make sure it didn't move back and crush him. When Lucy had passed through, he let go for several seconds and found that it held fast. And so he followed.

The secret room was the plainest of all the chambers in the house. It housed only a stool and a three-legged table. When Edmund's eyes adjusted to the darkness, however...

"Oh."

The walls were layered with hundreds of pieces of parchment, each one nearly black at first glance. When Edmund looked a little closer, it became evident that the charcoal markings on each sheet formed dozens upon dozens of repeated shapes of various size.

"Looks like he was a bit of an artist after all," Lucy said breathlessly. "Dedicated, too."

"Dedicated or mad?" asked Caspian, pulling a sheet off the wall. "What sort of person draws nothing but spheres over and over?"

Edmund peered at a sheet that stood out starkly against the rest. "Not just spheres," he murmured. He plucked it from the stone and scanned the clearly penned words upon it. As he took in the words, he felt a cold dread creep through his blood. "Come look at this."

Lucy reached him first. "'It has become evident that the artefact given to me by my foreign visitor is not a benign gift,'" she read."'Since receiving it, I have been experiencing the most vivid of night terrors, and I now fear sleep as much as—and maybe more than—I fear death.

"'Every time I look at the thrice-damned thing, its surface is altered in some fashion. Of late, I imagine I see faces swirling around within, but I believe this is an effect of the past several nights' sleep deprivation. I have been recording its alterations in the form of charcoal sketches, in case there is some importance or hidden meaning behind the shifts. Perhaps it is trying to communicate.

"'...Perhaps I am going insane.'" Lucy shivered.

There was a long silence, during which Edmund folded the piece of parchment and pushed it up his sleeve.

Caspian cleared his throat. "See if there are any more," he said, setting out to search the room.

"Shouldn't we look for Gumpas first?" asked Lucy. Caspian did not reply.

Edmund inhaled deeply through his nostrils, tears springing to his eyes at the smell. "If he's anywhere in the house," he choked out, "he should be here."

"But he isn't," Lucy said, her tone one of confusion and irritation.

"I know." Edmund wetted his lips. "But the smell is worst here, and—"

"Edmund." Caspian pressed a crumpled sheet of parchment into Edmund's hand. "Read it."

Slightly annoyed by the tone of the command, Edmund unfolded the parchment and squinted at the words it contained. He glanced at Caspian, whose gaze was hard as a dragon's hide. Edmund wetted his lips again and began to speak.

"'I have sent away my servants, every last one. They must never know who was to blame for the ruin that has befallen these isles.

"'I am alone. All is well. Or, at the very least, all is as well as it can be under these circumstances.

"'I sent a message to Lord Bern with the last of my manservants. The command has been made, and no more slaves will die in my place, for I will not survive the night. I can hope as much as I like that the Thing that hunts me will pass over my dwelling, but it is folly to truly believe it. I will die tonight.

"'I will die tonight. I neither know nor care who takes up my position after I have been consumed. It is burden enough to remember that this is the night of my execution.

"'Damn that sphere. I know without an iota of uncertainty that it is the cause of my troubles. No insanity of this sort happened before I was given it. I should have had a bounty put on the head of the foreigner who placed it in my hands.'" There was no more room on the page after this, but when Edmund turned the sheet over he found that there was still more that had been written.

"'…I suppose it is too late for my ire to be of any use. It's too late for much of anything to be of use. The only reason I'm writing at all is to pass the time and to keep myself from going into hysterics.

"'My candle is beginning to go out. I have no intention of going out to fetch a replacement. I will not leave this chamber of my own volition until dawn. I am... I am too afraid to go out now. I have been afraid to leave this chamber for a long time. Perhaps this makes me a coward. Any man who calls me coward is welcome to take my place and see how brave he is.

"'It has begun to rain. If I let the sound lull me to sleep, perhaps my death will be a peaceful one. Did the slaves suffer when they were consumed? Does it even matter?

"'The answer to the latter, I think, is no. Nothing matters at the moment but the coming of my executioner. How much time have I spent here, hunched over my papers, waiting for Death's arrival? Time is meaningless here.

"'…oh. I hear him. I wonder if his entrance will harm my things. He is nearing, snarling and shrieking and hissing as he comes. I am going to die. He is coming. I am going to die he is coming I am going—'" The rest was a series of illegible scribbles and ink splotches, ending in a single line that ran to the end of the page.

"I don't think we'll be finding Governor Gumpas any time soon," said Caspian in a low voice.

"So what do we do now?" Lucy asked.

Caspian swallowed and took a deep breath. "We continue eastward. We keep searching for the remaining lords."

"What of the Islands?" said Edmund, folding the parchment and stuffing it in his sleeve with its fellow. "Shouldn't we make sure these... sacrifices stop?" Hoping that speaking further would scrub away the bitter taste the word sacrifices had left on his tongue, he continued: "And it would—I think it would be a good idea to set up Gumpas's replacement." He glanced at Lucy, who gave a brisk nod of agreement.

"Indeed," Caspian said. He paused for a moment before nodding. "Indeed. We'll remain here until matters of state are sorted out."

-(...)-

They remained for two more days, taking care to keep the circumstances of Gumpas's death a secret. Their business was to repair the damage he had done, not to cause widespread panic. Caspian instated a new governor—a warm, soft-spoken man with a salt-and-pepper beard, a vast array of historical and legal texts, and a reassuring résumé.

The new governor's first act in office was to wish them a safe journey and provided them with provisions to last a full week at sea. He offered to throw a festival in the royals' honour, which they quickly but graciously declined. By noon on the third day, the Dawn Treader's sails were unfurled and the Lone Islands were at her back.

Lucy recounted the first day's events to anyone who cared to listen, which set Eustace a-moaning about how he should have been part of the search group. She was able to silence his complaints rather quickly by describing the terrible smells in Gumpas's house.

Caspian retreated into the captain's quarters and did not return until several hours after supper.

Secondary A/N: ...phooey, I was hoping I'd be able to update in a somewhat timely manner. Sorry 'bout that. -meep- But hey, NaNo's over, and I've been having pretty good bursts of writing-urges for this lately.

...am I allowed to request reviews? -shifty eyes- (And I see you there, person who shall remain nameless in case they don't want their name here. Thank you very, very much for putting this on alert. :3)