Alright here is the next chapter, I will let you know if I won't be able to update at any points prior to it. I hope you enjoy this chapter and on with it we go.
Destrier galloped through the woods as fast as the horse could possibly go. Lucy could feel the air pushing her hair back as they passed still tree after still tree. Destrier's hoof beats fixed as the only sound that filled the wood and reached her ears.
Then another set of hoof beats joined Destrier's and accompanied by the shouts of a person or more like the shouts of a soldier - a Telmarine soldier.
Lucy spared a look over her shoulder to see that she was right and the soldier followed her with both a cross bow and a sword. The Valiant Queen turned her attention to look forward again and kicked Destrier on a little bit more, even though she was already going as fast as she pretty much could.
The soldier's horse whinnied and for some reason Lucy felt inclined to look to her left. So she did and she was sure that she could see a golden lion running through the wood almost parallel to her. Her eyes followed it as it moved ahead of her until it was just in front of her which was when it stopped moving and growled slightly as the soldier caught up to Lucy.
Before roaring.
Destrier reared up in front of the lion and Lucy screamed as the horse did so before she fell off of the back as Destrier placed her front feet back down. Lucy landed on her side and then rolled over onto her back to look up at the face of the lion.
The lion bared its teeth and growled under its breath before seizing onto its target and leaping onto the soldier, unseating him and pulling him from the back of his horse: grabbing him within his large, padded paws and mauling over him.
After a moment the soldier's cries died down and eventually died out completely as Aslan rose back up to stand on all fours and look over in the direction where Lucy had fallen.
Carefully the young Queen of Old picked herself up off of the floor and looked over at where the lion was stood. She blinked once when she had stood herself back up straight and looked over at him silently while he looked in the other direction.
Eventually the great lion turned his head to face her and the growling, strong, battle face from before was replaced by a face that was full of kindness and love.
Lucy smiled before simply saying, "Aslan!" Her young voice breaking through the silence before she ran over to him, giggling slightly. The moment that she reached him she embraced the lion in a hug (as best of one can with such a creature anyway) and he joined in her giggling with laughter as he let his feet slide from underneath him, so that he was instead laying on one side.
He placed a huge paw over Lucy's arm as she buried her head into his thick mane.
"I knew it was you," Lucy told him as she pulled back and sat down crossed legged on the leaf covered floor, "The whole time, I knew it. But the others didn't believe me."
"And why would that stop you from coming to me?" Aslan asked her as the Southern Sun illuminated the woodland ground and emerald green leaves that were around them.
The youngest Pevensie was silent for a while and she blinked a few times before she even said anything back to him in reply, "I'm sorry." She told him before adding; "I was too scared to come alone." This made her think of Edmund who - not by choice – was alone.
"Why wouldn't you show yourself?" She asked him curiously in wonder as to why he hadn't come to help them find Edmund before hand or to help them fight the Telmarines, "Why couldn't you come roaring in and save us like last time?" All the while during her questions the Great lion had allowed his tail to swing up and down as he listened.
"Things never happen the same way twice, dear one." Lucy knew where she had heard Aslan say that before only a little while ago although at the time it seemed like it had all just been one big dream, because that was what she wanted to see here in the land of Narnia, however now that she was sat in front of the great lion it seemed like it might not have all been just a dream and now the young Queen found herself wondering as to whether it was actually real or not.
Lucy looked at him before adverting her gaze to the floor that was too her left, for a moment she seemed to suddenly be finding the collection of leaves very interesting. And then almost as suddenly as she had looked down, she looked back up at the face of her beloved lion.
"If I'd have come earlier, would everyone who died…" Lucy trailed off for a second before picking her trail of speech back up, "Could I have stopped that?"
"We can never know what could have happened, Lucy," Aslan told her, "But what will happen is another matter entirely."
"You mean you'll help?" Lucy asked.
"Of course," He replied, "As will you."
"Oh," Lucy started, "I wish I was braver."
"If you were any braver, you'd be a lioness." Aslan told her and managed to succeed in putting a smile onto the young girls face, "Now, I think your friends have slept long enough, don't you?"
Lucy watched as the great lion stood up and roared loudly the sun illuminating his golden coat even further and as she raised her gaze to the leafs of the trees, she saw the first signs of life and movement as the green leaves twitched in awakening.
The battlefield in front of the How was flooded with Telmarines with each Narnian having to fight around ten to twenty soldiers each at a single time. The grass - even though it still shone in the sunlight – had lost its real shine when you looked at the array of bodies that covered it both Narnian and Telmarine.
Trumpkin was fighting off soldier by soldier with Caspian not that far away from him. He took a blow that knocked him down while Caspian was fighting off another soldier. When the Prince rose again a second later he saw this and threw his knife in his hand to get his grip before throwing the small weapon into the back of the soldier that was raising a sword to strike the Dwarf.
Said Dwarf rolled over to move away from where the soldier's body was going to fall and then looked up at Caspian who had already moved onto continue fighting.
Peter was battling with one sword alone and was struggling slightly to manage his own group of soldiers just as it seemed some of the others were. The High King had always fought with sword and shield, unlike that of his brother who (during the time when they had been Kings and Queens of Narnia during the Golden Age) had perfected the art of fighting without a shield and using two swords instead of one.
It was at times like now that Peter too wished that he had perfected such an art himself.
Susan fired arrow after arrow, while also being slightly creative and using her bow as a separate weapon entirely at some points finding it extra helpful since she had soldiers coming at her from each direction. However each soldier that she hit was another arrow used and the High Queen was finding some problem that she would eventually run out of arrows which would then put her in a very dangerous position on this battlefield.
Being in the middle of her brother and other Narnians to her right she wasn't getting swamped by too many of the soldiers, however she still had some of them running at her from directly in front of her.
On the other hand her bow and arrows gave her the advantage of being able to shoot down soldiers from a further distance away than you could with a sword and her aim was still as brilliant as it had been when she had been a Queen of Narnia in the Golden Age (something that she was very glad of) as it meant that she wasn't taking her own side out.
Although she did eventually have the Bulgy Bear come over to help her by watching her back.
General Glozelle was also busy fighting against the army that he had originally trained. He had an advantage on this field though, over the other Narnians as the Telmarine soldiers ignored him and went for the Narnians, so as they moved toward Edmund (and a little way away from them his two siblings) he would just stab them in the back.
In both ways.
Edmund was fighting with two swords to knock out soldier after soldier while more marched towards him. He slipped down onto one knee and cut one of them on the leg before catching them in the chest with the second sword. Another soldier ran at him and Edmund swung himself up, hitting one sword against the Telmarine shield before bringing up the other sword, however it only managed to catch the soldiers sword.
Edmund kicked the next soldier that came towards him, his foot connecting with the shield. As he looked on at the approaching soldiers he found himself losing his focus slightly on the soldiers that were actually directly in front of him.
"Come on!" Reepicheap shouted as the Telmarines advanced before he run in under their feet, hoping to take a few of them out from underneath.
Edmund breathed heavily for a second as he came to a short halt.
He turned back around to see Lord Gregoire stab a Minotaur before he, with a shout turned around and ran towards Caspian.
The Lord, however stopped short a few steps away, the point of the spear held out towards the Prince's neck and chest as Caspian swallowed and looked up as he waited for the Lord to kill him.
Said Telmarine Lord breathed in deeply and looked at Caspian before raising the spear and bringing it back down onto the Prince who shut his eyes and prepared to meet his end.
Travel by horse, Griffin or even by Centaur did nothing to compare to travel with that of a lion. At least that was Lucy's view on it (even though she had never travelled on the back of a Centaur she knew that Susan had and she had never flown with a Griffin either, but her other siblings that all done that as well, but only she and Susan had ever travelled with Aslan or on his back at least.)
Aslan ran through the woods and Lucy could now feel the wind and the air pushing her hair back as he did so. She smiled as the Dryads started to emerge from the trees and the roar that Aslan had used to awaken them seemed to pass through every tree as they all finally woke up after years of slumber since the Telmarines invaded.
"Where are we going?" Lucy asked as the lion as they seemed to pass out of the part of the woods that she knew she had just come from.
"A place that you know most well, dear one."
"I don't remember this way though." The Dryads were moving beside them now and Lucy watched as the wood slowly faded away and they ended up coming out by the newly built and recently finished Telmarine bridge. It was here that Aslan and the Dryads all came to a stop.
The trees seemed to whisper words to the great lion who in returned gave them thanks.
"What's going on?" Lucy asked, "I should help Peter and Susan. Oh, Aslan we have to find Edmund."
"And we will dear one," Aslan told her, "But I believe that he has already found you."
"How can you know that?"
"I watch over all of Narnia, dear one and over you and your siblings and I will continue to do so for a long time forward."
"So what do we do now?" The Valiant Queen of Old asked Aslan curiously.
"We wait dear one. They will come and when they do we will be ready for them." Lucy blinked before letting a smile grace her face and then together both she and Aslan waited for the time to come when they headed in this direction and while they waited Aslan talked Lucy through just how she could help.
The body of Lord Gregoire fell down onto Caspian, the spear landing (luckily) just to the side of Caspian. When the Prince looked up he could see only a flash of red which soon moved back to be covered by that of Telmarine armour, but Caspian could recognise easily enough that it was not Peter.
That meant that it could only be Edmund which also meant that when Caspian had seen that same armour earlier that it was Edmund then as well.
The Telmarine Prince looked over to where Peter was still battling Telmarines rapidly from all directions. Caspian looked between the Telmarine soldiers that were approaching him and Peter and eventually had to settle for covering his own back.
Edmund was fenced back in by Telmarine soldiers. He hadn't had the time to properly introduce himself to who he assumed to be Prince Caspian, but he had managed to save his life which was one thing even if it wasn't another. And after all it was the better of the two things.
Lord Glozelle was just a little way away from him, closer to where Susan was and Edmund could only hope that she didn't shoot him thinking that he was the Telmarine soldier that he looked like.
The Just King of Old noticed Lord Sopespian glaring at him and he looked at the look of victory that graced his face even though he had yet to win anything at all in this battle so far as no conclusion had been decided.
Suddenly Edmund felt as something hit him across the back of his ribs and shoulders. As he turned around to source it, but only to find himself lose his footing at the same time that a blade knocked into the sword that Aslan had given him and Edmund let go of it to move his wrist out of the way when a sword cut diagonally along from the top of his thigh up to the bottom of his stomach and he screamed.
Forced to his knees he managed to reach out and grab his sword while using the Telmarine one to block a blow from a soldier. He stabbed the second with his other sword as he brought it up, however he couldn't manage to get the other one, but the soldier yelled and pitched forward before leaning back and falling backwards, dead.
When Edmund looked up he saw the Telmarine Lord stood there, extending out a hand to him which Edmund took and used to pull himself back up onto his feet although his breathing was now heavier than it had been before.
"You should leave," The Lord told him," You can't fight in that condition." Edmund swung his blade forward and managed to catch the blade of the soldier who had come up behind Lord Glozelle before using the other one to strike him straight through the stomach.
"I've fought in worse conditions like this." He replied while stepping forward, so that his back was to the Lord as the soldiers ran at them both now fully realising that their own General was their enemy as well as King Edmund, who they had kept prisoner.
"Yeah like what?" The Telmarine General asked as the pair of them started fighting the soldiers. The only reason that he was talking to the King was to try and help him focus on not losing his consciousness.
"Four years after I became King, I had to rescue Peter from the Calormene, there were a few wars and fourteen years after I became King, Susan and I were almost held prisoner."
"And those injuries were worse than that one?"
"I thought they were," Edmund replied, but I'm not really too sure."
Caspian was trying to fight two soldiers at once and if he was honest he wasn't actually having too much luck at doing so. It only took a few strikes and he almost lost the grip on his sword and was knocked to his knees.
However before he could even reach his knees, he was tripped up by a soldier that was lying on the floor. A moment later he found himself falling over the edge of the massive dip that they had created.
Susan (with only a few arrows left at this point) saw Caspian fall over the edge watched in shock as he disappeared from her sight.
Glenstorm charged through the soldiers and finally reached his destination of some of the approaching ones. They seemed to have, however seen a little sense and had placed their shields above them to try and save them for a little longer.
The Centaur along with a few fauns jumped in on them and knocked a lot of them over, their shields doing nothing so to protect them from any damage.
Peter watched this before spinning around and knocking down another soldier and then moving to strike another, his eyes frantically searching the field for his brother, the few cuts on his face clear to see as they bleed red.
Caspian had let go of his sword when he had hit the ground and now he looked behind him to see some other Narnians down here with the soldiers that they had trapped earlier. He looked around at the Telmarine soldiers and watched as one of the soldiers that were stood in front of him suddenly had something wrap around his waist before he was hoisted off of the ground and whacked into the edge of the land above.
The minute that his head connected he fell unconscious and he was eventually dropped back onto the floor. Caspian watched in shock as this happened, his curiosity spiked as to how that could have even be possible to have happened.
General Glozelle had stopped fighting alone little while ago, well the moment that he had seen Edmund start struggling that was. One moment there was a mass of soldiers in front of them and the next some of them were being thrown backwards and out of the way, with some of them landing on the completely opposite side of the battlefield from where they were originally fighting.
Immediately Edmund's face brighten up and all he said was a single word.
"Aslan."
Alright sorry that this was updated later than I planned and that it's shorted than I had originally wanted it to be, but I will try and make the next one longer and I'm also going to try and write a few of the chapters in advance. Please vote on my poll, thanks for favouriting, alerting, reviewing and reading.