"Delivery from the tailor's, m'am," she replied, knowing she could be heard through the other door, which had shut behind her. The current room was lit with some sort of overly bright overhead light, probably magical.
"Another one?" muttered her sister's voice from the other side, and though the door was a little too heavy for Lucy to hear her moving, she could just sense Susan moving closer, moving to the door, soon to see her. She suddenly hoped Susan would have the sense not to exclaim over her, as they would be overheard.
The door swung open.
There stood Susan, hale and healthy, her dark hair swept up behind her ears and tumbling down her shoulders, dressed in a fine velvet gown. At the sight of her visitor, her eyes opened wide, but Lucy quickly put her hand to her lips to silence her.
"I'll need to check measurements," she said loudly, to excuse what she intended was to be a fairly lengthy encounter. Then she shut the door behind her and drew Susan into the chamber. She noticed that in no way did her sister appear to be ill-accommodated; the room was spacious and impressively furnished with a canopied bed, a full fireplace and a great assortment of rugs, tables and chairs. A door off to the side presumably led into some kind of bath chambers, and in the corner was a stone wardrobe with a series of mirrors around it. Lucy led Susan there, as it was furthest from the outside door.
The instant they'd reached the corner, Susan burst out in surprise.
"Lucy!" she exclaimed. "How…how in the world did you come to be here? What are you doing?"
"It's a very long story," said Lucy, careful to keep her voice at least a little low, just in case. "I'm hoping we'll have time to tell you la…"
"We?" Susan interrupted, overcome with surprise. Her hand was over her heart, and it was clear she was breathing quite quickly. "Peter and Edmund? Are they here too?"
Lucy nodded and couldn't help but reflect her sister's relieved smile with a proud one of her own.
"Peter's posed as a guard just outside your door," she told Susan in a low voice, glancing at it. "Ed's pretending to be a lord. And I'm here. We're here to rescue you, Su!"
"But how did you even know I needed rescuing?" Susan asked in bewilderment, pulling a chair over for Lucy and sitting herself down on the stool. Lucy noticed that when she'd mentioned Peter, Susan's eyes had flown to the door in hope.
"Well, when…when Peter came back to the Cair, and he was so…so wrong, you know, after that, Aslan came to us," Lucy explained. "He gave us these magic rings that let you travel between the worlds. And so we looked around until we found you, basically. It's much more complicated than that of course but we're here now and we should get back home before we go into any detail, right? We need to get you out of here."
"I won't disagree with that," Susan said with a sour look at the things around her. Lucy had a feeling she'd been there a very long time. "How did you all get in here?"
"This and that," said Lucy. "Tricks. What's important is we're in. Oh Su, it's so good just to see your face again." Her face broke out into another relieved smile.
"I never thought I'd see you again," Susan said, and Lucy thought there might have been tears in her eyes. "I've been holding out as best as I could, but time was getting so short, I'd lost hope of ever seeing Narnia again, of ever seeing you all again."
"So had we, at first," said Lucy softly, putting her hand over her sister's. "But Aslan told us there was a way to bring you back."
"I didn't doubt that he would call me back in time, but I was worried I'd be here quite a while before you came," said Susan. "But I know you're in character, Lu, and I don't want to keep you too long or they'll get suspicious. What can I do to help?"
Lucy straightened her skirt and considered this. Seeing her sister after so long and after such a rough time seemed to have blitzed all other thoughts from her head. But she collected herself and decided to go with the request Edmund would have had.
"Tell me everything you know about this castle, the king, and the wedding," she said.
Susan blinked.
"Well," she said, tapping her chin thoughtfully. "I've spoken to the king a number of times, but you learn more about him from the people around him than from speaking to him yourself. He's a very ambitious man. He wants people to see him as a good king, but he isn't, so he tries to compensate for it by being a showy king. You've probably guessed that from what you've seen of the castle so far. I've managed to keep his bloody magicians away from my chambers so far, but I've heard other rumors about them, too. Nastier ones."
"Oh?" said Lucy, prompting her sister. "Go on."
"I've heard – no, I know. I'm part of this, I ought to know," said Susan. "I don't know how much of the city you've seen, but I watch from my window and I hear from the servants. The people are suffering. The cities can't hold the growth of the people and their resources are strained. It all could be fixed, of course, with some reorganization and good critical thought, but Valin has this idea that critical thought doesn't make people think you're a good king. And so he's going for another approach."
Lucy listened carefully, her dislike of the man growing.
"He's called all the wizards and magicians to the castle to gather under his direction," said Susan, her voice low. "He's set them on finding a way to enter other worlds, to find new resources and more land and a more hospitable environment than this walled-in city. Most of the magicians are simpler than pudding; they're cleaners and tinkers and they fix things or some of them are just students. But a few of them have some real talent, and he's commanding them to make him a conqueror. The rest he puts up to his cheap magic tricks. And now you can probably guess where I come in."
"No, I don't," said Lucy, puzzled. "You're no magician, Su. Why does he want you?"
"It's not me he wants," said Susan gravely. "They've already found a way into another world, Lucy. They've found a way into Narnia."