"What?" Susan giggled. "Do you really think we'd just… barge in here without permission? Don't be ridiculous."
"Oh," Filch said, uncertainly. "You do?"
"But of course," Peter bluffed importantly. "Whatever gave you the idea that we'd break in?"
"I…I…" he said, unsure how to respond to the two very confident children. "Those three are always causing trouble." He pointed to Ron, Hermione, and Harry.
"But they're with us now," Susan said. "We thank you for doing your job so wonderfully thoroughly though. It truly is quite commendable."
She even shook his hand while giving him a charming smile. He smiled a gap-toothed smile back.
"Quite commendable indeed, sir. I've never someone so qualified for a job like yours as you are," Peter said with as much fake sincerity as he could mange.
"Nowhere even close," Susan added.
Filch seemed to be possibly blushing from the unusual praise. "Why, you seem like two bright students. Well, get on with it then," he said, hobbling off and even waving at them and humming a bit as he left.
As everyone stared at the two of them, Susan shrugged and said, "If you act confident enough and pretend to know what you're doing, people will believe it."
"How did you think we survived the first few months, years even, of being thrown into king and queen ship?" Peter added.
"And compliments never hurt," Susan said. "Anyways, the plant?"
"Oh! Right," Neville said. "We need a hole first. To plant it like a normal seed."
Hermione said some spell and created a hole. Neville then set to work, gathering the herbs and such he needed from the room and casting spells. Harry, Ron, and Hermione were rather anxious about whether or not he could actually be successful, since this was Neville after all. Although he had gotten significantly better at spells and such while in the DA last year.
"Um… Is that her?" Ron said, pointing in the distance. Having only seen her three times, he had trouble recognizing her in new outfit.
"It is!" Susan shrieked without any hesitation. "Hurry, Neville!"
The Narnians all either pulled out their swords or notched an arrow. Hermione, Ron, and Harry all had their wands out.
Hermione ran up and closed the door. "Won't stop her much, but might as well." She put a sticky charm on the door to seal it. Neville wasn't sure what was going on, but worked as fast as he could without messing up.
The doors became icy, and soon the ice began spreading along the walls. They tried to magic it away with fire, but it hardly slowed it down.
"She's probably going to use the ice to make the room explode out so she could get in her," Hermione deduced.
Caspian ran up to the ice and hit part of it with the hilt of his sword, cracking it.
"If we crack it before she finishes, it might make it weaker and not strong enough to break the walls," he said. The others ran up and either used sword hilts or any hard objects they could find to break the ice as best as they could. Hermione made a few last attempts at spells to break objects, but it seemed the ice was immune to any spells. But when she grabbed a pot to use to try to break the ice, she put spells on it to make it harder and make it fly to the wall faster. She casted spells on a few more pots to do as much as she could.
"I got it!" Neville finally said. The others spared glances to see that a tree was rapidly growing. Suddenly, the entire room began shaking. They began ducking under tables to avoid the objects falling.
"What's going on?"
"I can't see anything!"
"Watch out!"
"Hermione? Hermione? Susan?" Peter called.
Suddenly, a shrill shriek pierced the air, filling the air and making the temperature drop. The very ground itself shook with the fury of giants. The hottest cold any of them had ever felt penetrated through their body, straight down to their core.
Hermione was the only one who could see the White Witch from where she was hiding. It was a gruesome sight. Her head was thrown back grotesquely, her mouth still open in a scream. Tiny shards of ice came out of her every orifice. Soon, small icy cuts appeared all over her body and more shards of ice came out of her as well. The shards swirled and twisted around in a stormy dance. As more shards escaped, the shrieking Witch was obscured.
As the storm subsided, Hermione looked again and the Witch was gone, her wand the only trace of her left. All the ice melted and evaporated in a matter of simply seconds.
"W-What happened?"
"That's it," Hermione gasped. "She's gone."
"Truly?" Peter said, getting out from behind a blue plant.
"Yeah. She just… disappeared," Hermione said. Soon they all gathered around the wand, checking it out.
"I can't believe it. She's actually gone," Susan said.
Peter grinned and grabbed Hermione swinging her around into a long kiss.
"Wha – " Ron began but Harry cut him off.
"It's not like the two of you were going out, so why do you care?" he whispered. As much as he would like his two best friends to go out, Hermione did seem genuinely happy with Peter.
Susan jumped into Caspian, kissing him in celebration. She took him unawares. He was well aware by now that Susan didn't abide by Telmarine standards of decorum, but she did still surprise him now and then. But in the best way possible.
"Huh. So was the retrieving the apple thingie really just a cover for a double date?" Veta teased.
"Wait, Hermione has a boyfriend?" Neville whispered to Ron.
"You've missed quite a lot, mate," he said.
Aslan appeared to them after they explained what happened to Dumbledore in his office.
"Um, why is everyone bowing to a lion?" Neville asked. Having only gotten the story starting from the last time the children had spoken with Dumbledore completely left out Aslan.
"Just go with it. I'll explain later," Hermione whispered. Neville shrugged and knelt alongside them. He was rather used to being the last to know anything.
"Well done, my children," Aslan said. "Rise."
"Merlin's beard! He talks!" Neville cried out.
"Yes, Son of Adam, I do indeed," Aslan said, amused.
"Umm… my dad's name is Frank…"
"Aslan, have you come to take us away?" Peter asked anxiously. He didn't even know what he wanted. Narnia was his home, but he liked being in Hogwarts with Hermione as well.
"Not yet. But those born in Narnia must now return," he said. "The mermaid and centaurs have already returned."
"I…I'll miss you, my queen," Caspian said, turning to Susan and taking her hand.
"Well… it would have never worked anyways," she said, trying to shrug it off.
"Why not?"
"I am 1300 years older than you," she teased.
Caspian grinned sadly. Even now, she had a sense of humor about the situation. At least he could hold out hope that maybe, just maybe when Aslan called them back to Narnia he would still be alive.
"You'll be a great king," Peter said, clasping Caspian's shoulder.
"Thank you. From you, that means the world," he said, knowing how hard it must be for Peter to accept that he was no longer the acting ruler of Narnia. "I can only hope I live up to your legacy."
"I'm completely lost," Neville whispered to Harry, trying to make sense of the medieval reenactment in front of him.
"She does look really good for 1300 years old," Harry teased, not actually explaining anything.
Everyone said their proper goodbyes to everyone else, while Neville awkwardly stood to the side. Not that he wasn't used to be left out.
"And you! Narnia forever thanks you for your help," Caspian said, clasping Neville's upperarm and startling him out of his pity party he was having for himself.
"Oh, um, thanks," he said. "What's Narnia?"
"I'll explain later," Hermione said.
"Uh huh."
Susan took one last glance at Caspian. She just couldn't let him leave. But she had to. She threw her arms around him and gave him a farewell kiss.
Caspian froze, shocked by how forward she was. No Telmarine woman he had ever known would do anything like this. His aunt would be absolutely scandalized. But now he wondered why people didn't go around kissing all the time. He kissed her back until she pulled away, a tear or two in her eyes. He hugged her comfortingly, which she willingly accepted.
"Now, my children," Aslan said. "You may want to plug your ears."
He roared. Next thing they knew, all the native Narnians and Aslan had disappeared.
"I miss him already," Susan whispered.
"Ah, young love," Dumbledore said.
"I'm sure we'll see him again," Peter said uncertainly. "I'd ask Professor Trewlaney to tell us the future to see for sure, but I'm not sure how much stock I put in anything she says."
"Is it later yet? Because I'd really like to know what's going on?" Neville asked anxiously.
Susan curled up with one of her textbooks in the Slytherin common room.
Draco approached her. "I tried my best to delay her. Is… everything okay?"
"She's gone," Susan said, faking a smile.
"Mind if I?" he asked, gesturing to the space next to her. She sighed and nodded. She didn't really want to have to deal with Draco so soon after losing Caspian.
"I … So we're on the same side now that she's gone?" he asked.
"What side is that?"
"I… I need you to promise to tell absolutely no one first," he said, glancing around, suddenly paranoid.
"I – I swear," she said eagerly. This was getting rather exciting.
"Not even your brother."
"I… I… I promise," she lied reluctantly. She would decided once she heard the information whether to tell Peter or not. If it was something that would make him act rashly, then she wouldn't. Otherwise though, she wasn't the type to keep secrets from her siblings.
He rolled up the sleeve of his shirt to reveal a gruesome mark. "It's the Dark Mark that Lord Voldemort gives his followers, the Death Eaters."
Susan tried her best not to look revolted. "I…I see."
"You're against the Dark Lord, aren't you?" Malfoy suddenly spat, his hand on his wand.
Susan saw and realized how delicate the situation was. "No… I just… need more information before I mess up my skin with anything as ugly as… that," she said, gesturing to his mark distastefully.
"I knew you were one of us," Malfoy said with a leering grin. "There's just something about you that's so.. superior to all those idiots."
"And you wish to use my talents, don't you?" Susan flirted, pushing her body closer into his lap.
"I… the Dark Lord has been angry with my family for quite some time. He gave me a task to redeem myself, but it's not going well. Snape keeps trying to butt in, but he would just take credit for it," Malfoy sneered.
"Just give me enough credit that I can become one of you," Susan said slyly. "If there's a group for the best, then that's where I belong."
Peter might have a fit that she was putting herself in such a dangerous situation, but even her protective, older brother would have to see the wisdom of having her on the inside. Or else she would have Hermione make him see sense.
Hermione and Peter met up late at night.
"I can't believe you suggested we meet now. What if Filch finds us?"
"We talked our way out of trouble with him before," Peter said with a grin. "I just wanted to celebrate with you. You, me, alone."
"Doing what?" Hermione said suspiciously.
"Whatever you want to do."
"I…I don't really have anything I want to do," she said. "Um… do you want me to help teach you some spells?"
"Can we start with that mistletoe spell you showed me while in Narnia?" he teased.
"You mean this one?" she said slyly, making the mistletoe appear above their heads.
"Well, now you know what we have to do," he said, glancing and pointing up at it.
"It's not Christmas."
"Who cares?"
The end! Or not... Sequel! The sequel, called AcrossTwoWorlds will take place partially in the Half-Blood Prince and then end up in the Dawn Treader.
I'm trying to decide which characters will travel to Narnia. There's a poll on my profile page with the characters from HP world I'm considering having travel to Narnia (Hermione, Peter, and Susan will of course). If you can't do the poll since you're not logged in, please feel free to tell me in a review.
I'll try to start posting the sequel as soon as I can! I hope you all continuing reading it! Thank you all so much for sticking this story out to the end. :)