Is it just me, Edmund found himself wondering, or does everything here in Svalbard smell like dead fish and seal guts?
Obviously, this wasn't what he should have been thinking, clearly the last thing he should have been worrying his head about, his dire circumstances considered, but he couldn't help it; that smell was rather strong, especially in the cell where they'd put him.
'They', of course, were the guards and agents of the Ruling Powers. 'They' had come and taken him away from the flat, away from Lucy.
Poor, frightened Lucy, hidden under the trap-door in the wardrobe, trembling as likely as not, clutching Reepicheep, ignoring the heavy but well-distributed weight of the two alethiometers in her lap...
Tears sprung up into Edmund's eyes. No, he wouldn't-he couldn't-think about Lucy Pevensie...all alone in the flat after he was gone; taken…that was the one thing that could break him without effort. He was for ever grateful that the Ruling Powers and those who worked for them were unaware of his weakness. He hastily brushed his tears aside, glancing at Ella who blinked to clear her glassy eyes and ruffled the feathers on the back of her neck to hide the horrified, pained emotion she and her human felt.
It had been horrible, it still was. But, if nothing else, he was still alive. For whatever reason, they hadn't killed him. And if there was a way he could escape…then, freedom.
Certainly, though, he did have to face the over-all grimness of his situation. He could do that, so long as he didn't let his mind drag Lucy and Reep into it. Indeed, he'd already, in something of a haze, recapped the events that had brought him to Svalbard.
There had been a struggle in the flat; the guards had to beat him senseless and their dæmons had had to sink their teeth into Ella simply to get him out the door to begin with. This fight had left some blood on the wall-most of it his, but not all of it. They'd taken the book Susan had brought back from Norroway and whatever charts or models of alethiometers they could locate. All of these had likely been destroyed. Or, at least, the charts and models were. As for the book, maybe they had destroyed it, too, but they might just as easy have locked it away again. Still, he-the alethiometrist-wasn't likely to see it again, at any rate.
There was even the chance it had been put back into the restored church in Norroway where Iorek Byrnison's armour had once been kept. After all, before Edmund was taken to Svalbard to begin with, the guards had hauled him off to a small jailhouse in Norroway. They could have very easily just put it back there while they were at it.
Norroway's jailhouse hadn't been so terrible. It had smelled a bit like burnt coal and brimstone, and occasionally the prisoner in the next cell over would miss his chamber pot and the smell of excrement would mix with the brunt odor. But aside from that, it had been tolerable. The food had been all right, too. Nothing fancy, but the bread was only a little dry at worst; twice there had been boiled eggs that had been pretty good. The water they gave him to drink was clean as they apparently boiled their prisoner's water first to make sure it wasn't contaminated. It wasn't piping hot when they gave it to him, though still warmer than he would have preferred a so-called 'refreshment' to be.
Svalbard was worse. The water was probably just as clean, but it was frozen solid, largely just a cup with ice stuck to it-nothing more. The food, while sometimes actually edible, had gotten him quite sick at least twice.
Edmund knew a lot of the prisoners-at least those who had some vague idea as to who he was and why he was in there-must have thought him mad. He could have gotten out, and what had he done? He'd blown that chance. He wouldn't have been deported from Norroway if only he had done one thing that the Ruling Power's guards asked of him. However, Edmund refused. His refusal was flat and unyielding.
Sometimes at night, when he couldn't fall asleep, he still saw the scene played out on the back of his eyelids.
The uniformed man with a collie dæmon standing there, unsmiling, holding out a piece of paper; himself, sore as anything, resting his weary head against Ella's feathers, wondering what this was all about; and a pen with gold-plating on its cap being offered to his right hand.
"All you have to do, Edmund Coulter-" the guard began.
Edmund cut him off. "Edmund Belacqua, Sir." His voice had been hoarse but still understandable.
"What?"
"My surname is Belacqua."
"Whatever." The guard waved that off as if he had no time for such trivial matters. "Anyway, all you have to do is sign this piece of paper and you can go home."
"Home?" Edmund echoed in surprise. "What home?"
"Whatever home you've got."
"Really?"
"Yes, really."
Ella's eyes glowed in the darkness of the cell, peering down like two bright lights at the paper. There was a touch of mild restrained relief crossing over the owl-dæmon's facial expression; also, suspicion as well.
"Explain," said Edmund, slowly.
"It's simple," said the guard. "It's merely a document that states you, former heretic and so-called alethiometrist, were not in your right mind when you made your claims. It states that you do not believe in a Lion named Aslan, and that all of your professions mentioning Dust, other worlds, and the like, were only figments of your imagination. You hereby abandon your rebellious faith and work. In turn, you also herein vow to support the Ruling Powers fully in your reformed life."
Edmund shook his head. "No."
The guard's brow crinkled. "What do you mean 'no'?"
"He means he won't sign," answered Ella for her human.
"Don't you realize what refusing to sign will mean for you, boy?" For a fleeting moment Edmund thought he saw a flickering cloud of pity and genuine concern forming in the guard's eyes, his expression slightly softened. "It will mean persecution. It will mean deportation."
"Deportation?" Edmund felt weaker all of a sudden, lightly pushing against the stone wall of the cell to keep himself upright. "To where?" He hated the quiver in his voice, yet he was unable to stifle it completely.
"Svalbard, kingdom of the ice bears," replied the guard grimly. "That's where they send dangerous criminals. But you're young, you know, very young. You're not a real threat; all you have to do is sign this, say you're only a pretender, not a real heretic, that you don't believe in all that nonsense and hogwash. That's all you need to do. Then you're free to go."
Edmund thought it over. He had faked documents before, plenty of times. This was different, though, and he knew it. This was stating, on a truly official document-not some imitation he bought for whatever reason, to cross this or that border or town barrier-that he didn't believe in the great Lion. This was denying everything he worked himself to the bone for; this was giving up. And who knew what swearing loyalty to the Ruling Powers would entail? They might want him to serve them as blindly and cruelly as his late mother had! No, it mustn't come to that.
Then, worse still, was the thought that if he signed it, even only in hopes of getting free and seeing her again, Lucy would be disappointed in him. What was more, he would be disappointed in himself; he couldn't do this and live with it. Aslan would be disappointed, too. Aslan, to whom he owed so much. If the Lion's roar had not steadied and strengthened him at the last minute, Edmund was certain that he would have perished attempting to cross the ice bridge. No, he daren't become a traitor; the alethiometrist could not deny all that he believed in-not for real, he couldn't.
His words to his mother back at Bolvangar once when she'd called out to him, wanting him with her, rang in his head. He meant them towards the Ruling Powers just as firmly as he meant it towards her and her lifestyle. As clearly as if he was screaming it presently at the top of his longs, he could hear that cry drumming in his ears and bursting out of his racing heart. I'm not yours, I'll never be yours!
"I can't sign it, I just can't."
"Why-ever not?"
"Because, it would be wrong."
"Boy, you would rather be deported?"
"We, my dæmon and I, have no wish to be taken to Svalbard, but we cannot sign this."
The guard tried for force the pen in-between his fingers now. "Just sign it!"
Edmund shook his head and Ella clanked her beak furiously. They wouldn't yield.
"In one hour," said the guard bitterly, no pity or traces of kindness to be found in his face or tone now, "another guard will come for you and take you out of this cell. Take one good look around at the sun in the moment you're outside in the fresh air; I doubt you will see it again after you're locked up in Svalbard."
To this, neither Edmund nor his dæmon, made any reply; they simply watched the man storm off in a huff, slamming the metal-and-bar door behind himself.
Ella tried to comfort her human, nuzzling his neck. "Don't worry, we'll be all right."
Edmund nodded and swallowed hard. He kept trying to remind himself that he had done the right thing, the only thing he could have done with a clean conscience. All the same, the thought of being deported made his heart sink.
To cheer himself, he finally managed, "Well, that's where the other book about alethiometers and Dust is. We may need it, since they've taken mine." He was half-joking, not at all sure he'd be able to get at that book, not even sure he'd ever step out of whatever cell they gave him there. He wasn't even sure if he would see Lucy ever again. But he hoped so. Hope and integrity was all the young, beaten alethiometrist had left.
Now, in Svalbard, where it was always cold, where he was always sick and hungry, not to mention in terrible pain, he kept on reminding himself that this was not the end. It couldn't be.
There was a time when he felt that no one could go against the Ruling Powers, that there was a reason they were in charge. It was Lucy, his brave, wonderful Lucy, who'd taught him to stand up for what was right. Whenever he felt himself giving way, weakening, wanting to end it all or else-worse-give in, promising to do whatever the Ruling Powers asked of him, he thought of her, of how proud she would be of him. Also, as he laid his head back down on an ice-cold floor, longing for the sunlight he was never given access to, he thought of Aslan. In his mind the Lion put a golden paw on his shoulder and said, "Well done."
They won't be in charge for ever, Edmund thought as his eyes closed, sleep over-taking him as it did every once in a while in spite of everything, even if I don't make it, the others will over-throw the Ruling Powers someday. Then things will be better and all this suffering will be worth something. This isn't in vain; there is a purpose, there is truth-and the alethiometers show it.
Meanwhile, what had happened to Lucy?
Still shaking and tears both shed and unshed gleaming steadily in her eyes, half-blinding her from time to time till she blinked and brushed them away, she had prepared to leave the flat. Of course she had to find Edmund; there was no alternative. There was no doubt in her mind that he would have done the same-if not more-for her. She couldn't leave him hanging out to dry. She might not have known where to look, but she figured she'd get directions somehow or other, anything was better than giving up.
So first she rummaged through Edmund's things, looking for anything that would be useful. Of her own things, there was precious little she felt inclined to take with her; the silver alethiometer, certainly, but not much else really.
The Ruling Powers had done a thorough job of taking Edmund's charts and alethiometer models as well as his research papers, but his day-to-day things, such as his clothing, seemed unimportant to them and so they'd left all that alone. Lucy borrowed one of his tunics, a dark blue-almost black-one with faded crimson embroidery on the lower half of it, save for where the pattern was coming loose at the seams. Boys' clothes would be easier to travel in, not to mention make her less noticeable than otherwise, and she didn't think Ed would mind. She also stuffed her hair into a gray woolen cap of his. With the dwarf-sword strapped to her lower waist, Lucy really could have almost passed for a boy. A boy in his elder brother's hand-me-downs (all of Edmund's things were too big on her-his shoes hopelessly so-and she had to make use of several straps, buckles, and belts to keep everything in place), but a boy all the same.
The two alethiometers and her dagger fit into her pouch which she strapped around her middle amidst the leather belts and dwarf-sized scabbard. A pack for carrying food and extra clothes was on her back. Reepicheep consented to ride on her shoulder, trying to look as unassuming and casual as possible. He hoped that other peoples' dæmons wouldn't get too close to him and figure out that he was male; they might assume Lucy was just one of the few persons who had a dæmon of the same sex as herself, but they might just as readily detect the truth and wonder what she was doing, going about in disguise like that. And if they should start to ask questions…no, that wouldn't be good.
"We'll have to keep as far away from crowds as possible, Reep," said Lucy as she crept over to the flat's broken door, out into the hallway.
"What about the bridge on the creek?" Reepicheep wondered aloud. "The toll? Remember those papers Edmund had? They're gone; the Ruling Powers must have snatched them up, too."
"What do you think they'll say when they see my name on there?" Lucy wondered aloud, worried. She knew Edmund wouldn't tell them about her, and that was the scariest part. If they threatened him, he would probably succumb to a fatal beating before he sold out Lucy, or even so much as hinted at who she really was. The paper may have had a false surname for her; but they might see through that.
Reepicheep shuddered, clinging more tightly to his human's arm so as not to fall. Lucy felt as if she had pinched herself very hard there; it was all pins and needles until Reepicheep regained his balance and stopped wavering.
"I guess it's a good thing we're not going out as ourselves, then."
Lucy swallowed hard. "We can't let them see us at the bridge. We might be recognized. You remember what Edmund said, though? About his being able to jump from one side to the other without much difficulty?"
"You think we could make that jump?"
"We'll have to."
"What do we do when we get to the other side? Where do we go from there?"
"I don't know," Lucy admited. "But at least going will mean trying; we'll figure it out somehow."
"Maybe if we went to the Gyptians," Reepicheep suggested. "They should be near Jordan this time of year…Farder Coram would help us. The Costas, too."
Lucy sighed, "I wish we had a map." Edmund had folded his map and used it as a bookmark; so when the Ruling Powers took the book, they got the map, too. "Never mind, we'll get directions somehow, once we're on the other side of the creek."
Everything was quiet and perfectly still as Lucy tied the food pack to the bicycle she and Edmund had used to carry the groceries what felt like so long ago.
Reepicheep jumped off of her arm and into the basket on the handlebars.
"Of course we can't take the bicycle passed the creek," Lucy said, climbing on. "Not if we're going to jump over it. But it will get us there quicker."
She pedaled as speedily as her legs would let her. When she heard a trickle of water in the distance, Lucy made sure to travel upstream and out of sight, among the thickest trees. It got so tight every once in a while that she got a smack across the face from a twig and several dry leaves caught on Ed's tunic, but she managed it in the end.
Finally, she climbed off the bicycle, covered it up with leaves so it wasn't in plain sight, and studied the part of the creek she stood on the banks of. It wasn't deep, nor very wide, but it was a little wider than the downstream parts of it were. Edmund could have still cleared it, probably. Peter, definitely. Lyra, maybe. As for herself, she was a little unsure. There was no other way, however, so she braced herself and made a running jump (Reepicheep was clinging to her shoulder again), hoping the pack wouldn't weigh her down too much.
Within a few seconds she found herself mostly on the other side. At least, her upper body was. Her legs dangled into the stream, getting the bottom of Ed's tights wet. It took a bit of struggling with white knuckles and mud-stained limbs before Lucy was laid-out on her back, squashing her pack under her, slightly breathless, on the other side of the creek. Edmund's cap was askew and a lock of her hair had escaped it. Hastily, she sat up and stuffed the loose strands back into place.
"Come on, Reep." Lucy started fast-walking through the trees.
On the one hand, Lucy hoped to run into someone so she could get directions to Jordan college-it would be near tragic if she got there too late and the Gyptians had moved on by the time she reached her destination. If that happened she would have to come up with another plan, which, at the moment, she was too tired for. On the other hand, however, she dreaded any confrontation with a stranger, frightened that it might be the undoing of everything. What would she say if they asked her why she wanted to get to Jordan? What if her voice gave her gender away even if Reepicheep didn't?
For a few days, her fears were a bit moot. She was wandering through over-grown fields of a sort, dotted with yew trees. If she stood on tip-toe and squinted, she could see a town, only she was still undecided as to whether it would be a good idea to go into it or not.
Suddenly, something-or someone-grabbed her from behind.
Lucy started to scream and Reepicheep thrashed about wildly before a hand clasped over his human's mouth.
There was a continued struggle for a moment until a familiar-looking dæmon, an artic hare, bounded out and stood nose-to-nose with Reepicheep.
Lucy's heavy breathing lessened, as did her panic. There was nothing to be frightened of, she saw now. It was only Lee Scoresby, the aeronaut, and his Hester. Her pupils slid over to him, her neck turning half-way. When he realized she had stopped trying to scream, he let go of her mouth and put his finger to his lips.
He was more or less how she remembered him; a cowboy with white hair and a white mustache. She hadn't seen him in a long while, and it was a relief to see an old friend again. Although she had a million questions to ask him, starting with how he had found her so quickly, he was still hinting for her to be quiet and to follow him silently. She did so.
It took her a ways back from where she had traveled, through a few more trees, to a more open clearing. There, he had left his airship.
"I reckon it'd be safe to speak here, Miss Lucy." Lee Scoresby winked at her; Hester twitched her nose in a friendly manner at Reepicheep.
"Mr. Scoresby," gasped Lucy, almost too happy for words. "How did you find me?"
"The stars tracked you down, and the fairy queen gave me directions," he said, taking her hand and helping her onto the airship. "I assume you didn't think to start on any kind of scout without bringing food?"
"No," said Lucy, hesitantly, "but I am almost out now." She motioned at her dropping pack, which looked like it had seen much better days in the past.
"No matter," he said as she took a seat. "I've got plenty to eat on board, feel free to help yourself to the fixins." He pulled a blanket over her shoulders. "You look cold," he explained.
"You know about Edmund and Ella, then?" Reepicheep asked.
Hester nodded.
"I was thinking of going to tell the Gyptians," Lucy said, washing down some sort of hard, western-flavored cheese with a tin mug of what was either fruit juice or very weak wine.
Lee Scoresby felt he wanted a bit of beer or some whiskey, but he knew better than to drink and drive his airship at the same time, and he was well-aware that they would have to take off soon.
Turning his eyes away from the cask in the corner so as not to even be tempted, he replied to Lucy's question. "Them Gyptian fellers already know. They knew before I did. Queen Serafina's husband was probably amongst the first to know."
"Serafina Pekkala Le Fay is married?" This was the first Lucy had heard of it. "To a Gyptian?"
"To Farder Coram."
"How wonderful!" she exclaimed sincerely. Farder Coram was one of her favourite persons in the world, even if she hadn't seen him in a long time.
Lee Scoresby smiled. Then, "Now, about Edmund, we know where he is."
"Where?" She held her breath.
"In Svalbard."
Lucy nearly choked. "S-s-svalbard?" she stammered out.
"The fairies are trying to come up with a notion on how to spring him."
"What about Iorek?" Reepicheep piped up, his voice shrill with anxiety.
"Iorek?" The old cowboy's gray brow crinkled. "What's he got to do with it?"
"He's an armoured bear, an ice bear," Lucy said. "Can't he go there and…and…I don't know…try to get Edmund out? I know he'd want to help-Iorek, I mean."
"He would want to be of assistance, Miss Lucy," sighed Lee Scoresby, shaking his head. "But if he shows up there, he'll be torn to pieces."
"What?"
"Haven't you guessed? Iorek's an exile, he can never return safely to Svalbard; that's why he was in Norroway in the first place, when Mrs. Coulter went and got him wasted and let them take his armour."
"Poor Iorek!" cried Lucy, shocked, dismayed, and distressed all at once. "I never knew. What happened?"
"If he wants you to know, I reckon he'll tell you himself someday, Miss. If not…well, then, it's hardly my place."
"I see."
"Anyway, I got to keep you in my charge for a little while."
"Why?"
"Because, the fairies hired me on to protect you." He began to start up the airship's engine. "You'll be with me about a day or so, at least."
"What happens after that?"
"Well," he told her, "you remember Lord John Faa?"
"The Gyptian King?"
"That's the feller." The airship's engine made a whirring noise. "Anyway, I'm supposed to take you meet him, in the shipping port at Trollesund. You'll be safe with him and his men."
"But that isn't going to help Edmund," Lucy realized, her eyes narrowing. "Trollesund and Svalbard aren't close at all." She could remember that much, even without a map for guidance. Trollesund, unless she was mistaken, was closer to Norroway than anywhere else. It simply wasn't as far north as she would need to be if she was going to rescue him from the ice bears and the Ruling Powers.
The ship lifted off the ground. "You have to trust us," Hester said, her long ears going down, then pricking back up.
"I have to help him." Her fingers wrapped around the dwarf-sword's hilt.
"You will," the aeronaut promised. "Just not alone."
Lucy yawned; there was something about flying up in an airship after walking for days and days in the outdoors that made one feel very sleepy. She snuggled down in a corner where the wind didn't smack at her when Scoresby made a sudden turn, put her arm around Reepicheep as if she were a small child holding onto a stuffed bear after waking up from a horrible nightmare, and blacked out for a few hours.
AN: Please review!