Chapter 19: Pursuit
It was dark and misty when Susan arrived, like looking through a fog mirror. Having carefully stripped one of the palace horses of its fine, leathery and firm halter and saddle to replace it with a much simpler one to better obscure her identity, she gasped as she halted her horse to a sudden stop.
Before her lay a wretched old hovel, if you could even call it that. But what had she expected? She had ridden at lightspeed to several miles outside of Narnia, to an obscure area located in a dark, murky wood just at the brink of Archeland.
The house, decorated with rather odd pieces that Susan assumed was for ritual, belonged to a hag.
A hag was a last straw; a last resort. But Oreius wouldn't help, Peter wouldn't help, not even Lucy, and Tyr would think her mad; though wretched in appearance, hags were of great use, even if aqcuaintance with them was the lowest a person could stoop. They were very knowledgable and observant of the past and the present, and most especially the future. But they were also deluted; Susan daren't forget that they had tried to forcibly ressurect their beloved queen through Caspian's blood.
Mounting off her horse, she didn't even bother to knock and instead pushed the unsteady door open with one hand. An disgusting smell filled her lungs, and an even more disgusting sight nearly blinded her eyes. Perhaps everything in the house was the same dulle, unintelligble color, there were particles on the floor she didn't even know were alive or not and odd insects on a platter; food, she assumed, was scarce in this part of the forest. A large, shining kitchen blade lay amongst the mess.
"Your so-called just brother is not the only traitor in the family, so it seems," came a voice. Susan whipped around, hand resting firmly on her dagger. "Traitorous, lying blood courses through you and your wretched family's veins. I can smell it."
Susan stiffened. "That. Is. None. Of. Your. Concern." She spat each word.
This hag was blind; there was nothing where eyes were supposed to be, only two caved in sockets, withered and useless. She relied on her other senses, her beak for a nose and her holes for ears.
In a swift movement, she grabbed Susan's left arm, the one that was free, and ran a dirty, nimble finger on it before sniffing it for a prolonged period of team; she released it, digusted. Then she laughed. "The oldest girl. The Gentle. My, what a shame."
Susan resisted the urge to stab the old hag right then and there, remembering the dagger was only in case of emergency. "You speak to a Queen. Do not forget."
She shrieked with laughter. "Indeed. A Queen ready to look past her family." At Susan's hesitance to respond, she continued. "But why should I help you? You, and all others who have to do with you, you who killed my beloved mistress, killed her people, killed even my own -"
"A handsome reward, perhaps," Susan replied tightly. "You hags are greedy. Valuables of any kind would replace any ounce of loyalty you have."
"Perhaps not me," the hag replied, rather aggresively. "Perhaps only the living, breathing image of my mistress would be enough to make me talk. Perhaps even that than my own eyesight."
From her belt, Susan withdrew a small, leathery pouch. "Three gold coins, and seven crystalized salts from the seas of Terenbithia. Many of our people must work years for the worth of what I offer you."
She laughed again. "I am blind, Queen, not stupid."
"Perhaps it is the triumph you want," Susan said. "The triumph that a Queen of Narnia, the enemy, has resorted to you, you and your wretched kind. That the defeater consults the defeated. That I had to come to you before my own family for answers."
For once in their encounter, the hag looked taken aback, if you could express such an expression with no eyes. She snatched the leather pouch from Susan, making her jump a little bit, pryed it open and smelled one of the rare salts before turning back to where Susan supposedly was. "What is you want?" she finally snarled.
The long-awaited feeling of triumph overtook her. Hags were not only digusting in appearance. "Your reward is not just for your cooperation in giving in, but also in keeping this conversation within this disgusting hovel. What do you know about the Lady Thea Seethwell?"
"Why do you suppose I would even recognize that name?"
"You're a hag," Susan said matter-of-factly. "Whatever evil passes through Narnia is always linked to you and your kind."
The hag turned her head to one side, defeated. "Daughter of the Lord Aldred and his wife Aurelia Seethwell?"
"Yes. Her," Susan replied venomously.
"A family torn apart by death and destruction." she hesitated. "Caused by your supposedly magnificent brother."
"Peter had nothing to do with Aldred's death," Susan replied coldly.
"You may say so, but you do not know, Queen. You do not know. World does not travel around this part of the woods, but I am a hag, a creature of magic, a creature of the White Witch. And I know."
Susan said nothing.
The hag continued on: "I know he was sent by the King, sent to his death, his bloody and unjust death, no matter how much he welcomed or accepeted it. And I know it left his daughter, that Lady, an orphan. Or so I thought she was the child of a man like Aldred. But her recent behaviour has lead me to believe otherwise. It has lead me to...formulate rumours."
"What types of rumours?"
"Well, one such is the one you believe. That the Lady Thea is humble and well-trusted. Intimate, perhaps too much so, with the king your brother."
"I do not," Susan reassured aggresively, "believe that 'rumour,' if you could even call it that."
The hag cackled. "Then perhaps you will believe the other."
"Which is?"
"Tell me something before I speak further, Queen," spat the hag. "Tell me why you are so keen to discover the truth. Or at least, what you percieve to be the truth."
Susan was, for the first time in their conversation, taken aback. "Because I have proof," she answered, without thinking.
"Your heartbeat is faster," she observed intently. "I know why that is."
"Enough of this, hag."
"You harbour a hidden belief. You believe the Lady Thea is not trustworthy. That she is a reincarnation of younger brother, the just king."
"You will leave my family out of this conversation."
"Traitorous, two-headed, snakes, the whole lot of you," she continued. "Bringing shame to your beloved lion...bringing shame to the whole of Narnia...shame to it's name...to its people and to yourselves-"
Susan withdrew her dagger in a fraction of a second and the hag recoiled suddenly, taking several steps back and shelding her face, ultimatley astonishing Susan. She regained herself. "You can smell it can't you? The blade? Fine silver, this is. It's handle is crafted from pure gold. The blade is blinding – Terebinthian, I think? Or perhaps molded by the giants of Ettinsmoor? It's sharp enough to cut through a fly. I should hate to bloody it."
The hag let her gaurd down, running a withered hand through her balding as Susan sheathed the dagger. "As would I, Queen."
Susan gathered herself. "Tell me what you know of the Lady Thea."
"What I know? Or what I have experienced of her?"
Susan took a step foward. "She was here?"
"Indeed," replied the hag. "She, like you, recognized my existance, my reputation – she, like you, came looking for answers."
"Answers to what?"
"Ah ah," the hag scolded. "I will give you the information you need – not the information you want. That is, of course, unless you are in possession of more than just sea salts."
Wanting no more feud, Susan sighed. "What was she doing here?"
"In search of a concoction she thought I would possess."
"What concoction?"
"Driadidna," the hag said, with much emphasis on the vowels.
"Driadidna..." Susan repeated, astonished. "No, that can't be right...you know more, hag. I know you do."
"I stand by my vow to reveal nothing more," the hag said in a sing-song voice. "Now return. Return with this knowledge, with the satisfaction you have craved so long to be right above all your other siblings."
Never thinking she would be so glad for a hag's dishonesty, Susan said nothing more, and turned in place, pulling the hood of her cape up, intending to ride as fast she could back to Cair Paravel.
But the hag wouldn't let that happen. Swiftly, she grabbed the kitchen knife in one hand, and a bundle of Susan's hair in another, pulling it back with the intended effect of slitting her neck. Susan was quicker; she had sensed something wrong already before she turned, and unsheathed her dagger, plunging it into the hag's stomach and giving it a prolonged twist.
The hag let out a howl, falling to her knees, Susan's hand still on the blade. There was no remorse in her eyes; Susan returned the guiltless stare.
The hag crumpled to the ground. Dagger bloody in hand, Susan turned and walked away.
o-O-o-O-o-O-o-O-o
By the time Cair Paravel had come into view, there were still, to Susan's surpise lights glowing from a distance. More than anything, it excited her; she had eagerly awaited, the whole ride home, to inform her siblings of her discovery.
But what about Thea purchasing Driadidna could she use against her? If anything it would only encourage Peter to trust her more. No, Susan told herself. I must look past. Immaturely and uncharacteristically, she contemplated possible solutions; maybe there was more to Driadina that she didn't know of, perhaps even more that the noble Tyr looked past.
But what if Lucy was right? She was, Susan admitted grudgingly. Lucy would never lie, especially under the current circumstances. Driadidna did casue hallucinations, but the effects were probably different to each individual.
Making a mental note to research the alternate effects of Driadidna upon returning home, Susan quietly mounted off her horse when the bridge across Cair's seas to the castle itself came into view. At the observant satyr stationed at the front, she slid her hood off. "Evening, Svein."
"Good evening yourself my Queen," the satyr replied. He hesitated, then asked, "Forgive me, my Queen, but may I ask what you are doing outside the castle walls at this hour?"
Susan racked her brains for an answer. "Fresh air," she spluttered. "Given everything that's happened, I...fresh air is needed."
"Understood, milady," the satyr said, keeping his gaze foward.
"The High King knows not of my leave? Meaning to say, he is not worried?"
"No patrols have been sent milady. I best believe your honorable siblings asleep."
Susan glanced at the lights glowing from Cair. "I hope so."
She bid him a safe watch and took the horse into the stables. It took her less than five minutes to arrive to her own chambers, where she watched the dirtied hair the hag manged to grasp onto, and cleaned the blood off her own blade. Then, quickly, she dressed herself in a night gown and hurried to the nearest corridor where the light was coming from– Peter's corridor. Two firm knocks did nothing, and eventually she resorted to forcing her way in, to be greeted with the puzzling site of Peter awake and well, but also visibly disturbed. Lucy was with him too, and though Susan was convinced that Peter's awakening would be the key to her own happiness, her face was paper-white, her expression weary. Oreius stood as well, his head hanging low once he saw it was only Susan. She noticed that Edmund, oddly enough, wasn't present.
"What's wrong?" she choked out, upset that now wasn't the time to share her news.
"Cedany's dead," Peter replied, rather flatly.
Actually proud of myself: a pretty fast update. But what do you guys think? Next chapter will deal with Edmund's reaction to the news! Also, really liked your theories as to who killed Cedany!
xx Izzy
