A/N: Took me longer than expected, but here's the chapter at LAST, brought to you by the last shred of sanity I possess. Special thanks to my beta reader, he jumped in and helped a LOT in drafting the last scene.
Chapter 86 Content Warnings: some gore, death, more evil enchantments
Chapter 86: the great hope
Caspian
The manor is half rubble, and eighty are dead.
Caspian holds his side and continues picking his way over the battlefield, breathing shallowly. Every inhale brings pain, but so many are not breathing at all.
"Sire?"
"Keep searching, Darius."
In silence, the minotaur shoulders a pack of medical supplies - a few poultices, bandages, splints - and follows.
Aegos fell in battle. He lies crushed in a collapsed stairwell.
Only ten Giants attacked, and they killed eighty - fifty-two of his own men. The cries of the wounded and dying haunt the manor ruins.
If he had Queen Lucy's cordial, he could save some of them.
Caspian swallows a curse. In his rush, he brought only two healers, and one is dead. The other is busy far across the field. Survivors who can stand and help the injured are sweeping the field and patching what wounds they can.
Or, as he has done too many times, easing a soldier's passage to Aslan's Country with a gentle hand and kind words.
He should have brought more healers. Should have listened to Doctor Cornelius, that without the cordial…
On bloodied fields such as this, it is difficult to believe that Aslan's Country even exists. But for his people's sake, he must try.
He must hope they are in a kinder place than the world they left behind. That the pain and fear were not their final ending.
There must be more survivors. There must.
Without Queen Lucy's cordial, every battle will be like this. No rescue but death will await the worst-wounded.
Why in the Lion's name did Addie take it?
A choked cough floats on the wind.
Caspian whirls and skirts around a hulking Harfang giant's corpse.
He curses on Tash.
The enchanted northman, Varn, lies crushed beneath the massive body. He still breathes, but only just. Blood trickles from his mouth.
Caspian sprints to his side and throws his weight against the dead giant's shoulder.
"Darius, help me!"
The minotaur heaves and grunts, and slowly, the giant's corpse moves. Varn cries out as the weight lifts, his stomach a bloody, smashed tangle. A few jagged ribs protrude from his chest.
"The healer, fetch the healer!"
Caspian kneels and mutters a prayer as Darius sprints away, but Varn seizes him and pushes a piece of torn, crumpled parchment into his hand.
"Many… paths… follow heat… deepwood… sea…"
"Where?" Caspian flattens the parchment, but it's little more than scribbles.
"River… mou-" Varn coughs, his death rattle beginning. "Mountains." The northman chokes on his own blood, face contorting in pain. "Too late, don't… better, this way, better…" A crimson-painted grimace. "Free now. Better to… better to die than live… no freedom, her voice…"
"Save your strength," Caspian says, more kingly order than compassion.
Varn shakes his head. He tries to inhale, only to choke, blood spraying from his mouth. "Forgive… forgive me."
"Darius!" Caspian throws a glance over his shoulder, but neither the minotaur nor the healer are in sight.
They'll be too late. There's nothing to be done.
Caspian clasps the northman's hand in a soldier's shake.
"The Lion will absolve you," he murmurs. "May He grant you peace."
A flicker of quiet, broken by Varn's dying breaths.
"Yes…" he gasps. "Peace…"
The northman does not breathe again.
Fifty-three.
Caspian clenches his jaw, closes his fist on the scattered skeleton of a map, and walks on.
Of the few surviving servants (formerly enchanted, skittish as wild colts), none know the way to Underland. Lady Opheodra's kept her underground lair a secret from all but a few soldiers.
The manor's guards are dead.
As is Varn.
In the library, one of the few mostly intact rooms, Caspian clenches the incomplete map, rough edges pinching his palms. Varn's crude sketch shows only the manor, the Great Northern River, and the mountains.
"My Liege, we cannot." Glenstorm's usual sternness is gravelled with battle fatigue and the discomfort of a broken arm - not his sword arm, by the Lion's small grace. "We must retreat to the castle and regroup."
That will cost them a week or more, when the witch has half a day's lead already.
Too often has he been cautious when he should be bold - brave.
"Retreat? No, General, we cannot. We continue north at first light," Caspian says. "If we let them escape, we cede the keys to Narnia to a witch."
Glenstorm trades an uneasy glance with Darius.
"My Liege, without the cordial -"
"Yes, the cordial!" Caspian pauses for breath to calm his temper, but it lashes past his teeth like a wicked serpent. "Every moment we waste is another moment that witch has the cordial!"
How many died today that could've been saved? How many doomed souls did he lead here, chasing a villain he should have known long before now? The moors have suffered woe after woe for much of his reign - Giants, werewolves, pirates. Lord Belevoz's untimely death was the first sign. How did he fail to recognise the stink of treachery?
He allowed grief to dull his mind. For months- years - he has done nothing but wait!
He could've had Addie arrested, kept her locked away and questioned her day and night until he pried the truth from her lips.
Addie's not herself. I think something happened to her in Ettinsmoor.
Enchanted, enchanted… Did the witch's hold ever falter? Were those scarce moments Addie seemed like herself again a trick, or a flicker of truth?
Was she screaming for aid? Was that why she provoked him so?
"You are already injured, Sire," Darius rumbles. "We have no way to heal a mortal wound."
Caspian gestures to the field of frozen dead outside, ignoring his ribs' painful protests. "I am well aware of what we risk without the cordial."
"And the risk to your royal person?"
Caspian scowls. He heard his fill of this argument years ago, when he was a fugitive prince and every ally thought it their duty to die for him.
"The risk to my kingdom," Caspian says coldly, "is far greater."
He slaps Varn's sparse map onto the low table before his general or his honour guard protests further.
"We make for the river. The grottoes along its cliff-banks must lead somewhere; why else did he mark them?" Caspian taps the map. "The river is closer and less treacherous than the mountains, and it keeps us from venturing too near Harfang."
"We know not how deep these grottoes reach, nor where they lead," says Glenstorm. "We do not have the supplies to wander endlessly."
The centaur is firm rather than fearful, but his gravity almost makes Caspian reconsider.
You could spend weeks lost in those caverns without a guide.
What choice does he have? He cannot do nothing, cannot wait for divine inspiration.
His penchant for waiting caused this entire crisis! Waiting for letters, for absolution, waiting for Addie to come around. Waiting for Aslan…
"I understand the risks, General. But we cannot do nothing, and we cannot retreat."
The witch has too much lead time as it is; she could be worlds away by now, with Addie and the cordial.
No, he cannot think of that. He will despair if he dwells on such dark possibilities for more than a moment.
Caspian considers the open window, the snow gusting in. If he prayed, would the winter whip it away before Aslan heard?
Would Aslan even listen, after he has been such a Tash-cursed fool?
Surely the Lion would not abandon the whole of Narnia to its fate.
"Aslan will guide us," Caspian murmurs. "He would not have us hesitate now."
Glenstorm and Darius straighten instantly, resolve overcoming uncertainty.
"If this is your command, My Liege, we will follow," says Glenstorm.
"Ready the men. We leave at dawn."
By the light of a sputtering lantern as he haunts the manor's mangled library, Caspian clasps his hands and prays yet again. His knees are numb, his throat hoarse, every breath laced with the pain of cracked ribs, but if ever there was a time to pray on a fool's hope, it's now.
"I beg you, Aslan, show us the way. Give me a sign, a whisper, anything." Don't let me lead them into another trap.
Silence.
"I know I could have stopped her. I know I should have. But I swear, I will do anything to end this now."
Again, silence.
"I don't ask for guidance for my sake -" Liar, liar. "I ask your help for Narnia's sake, Aslan, please." Caspian swallows the sour burn of guilt, fouler than wine's morning sickness. Where are you, where are you? Always, you are gone when I need you! "I will keep pressing on, as I know I must. I…"
A king's duty is to keep his people safe.
I am not yours to protect anymore.
Caspian grips his hands until his thumbs crack, straining battle-torn knuckles. "I know I cannot fail them again."
He cannot let the rest of Narnia share Addie's fate. Surely the witch Opheodra will not be satisfied with the keys to a hundred worlds when she already has a foothold in this one. Does she intend Narnia to be her staging ground for a larger conquest?
A distant boom of thunder is his only answer.
How sick he is of unanswered prayers! Has he not done enough for this kingdom? Has he not -
No.
No, he hasn't.
He allowed a witch to thrive within his own court, drove away the last woman who might have been his queen, and let his once-love toy with him like a puppet.
It was not all her fault.
Lion, let it not all have been Addie's fault.
Let it be all the witch's doing, let the foxes he sent ahead find the path to Underland.
Let this all be a nightmare. Let the dawn wake him in the castle of his ancestors with Addie safely there, the rings in the vault, and nothing but the sting of unrequited care to trouble him.
Caspian squeezes his burning eyes shut and pretends the salt on his lips is sweat.
In the storm's sudden lull, a confession spills free.
"A good king would have no other request - no prayer but for the safety of his people. But I am…" He swallows. "I am not that king. I ask your guidance for my sake, too. And for…"
Is it right to pray for Addie's deliverance when he cannot be sure of her innocence?
Even traitors may mend. King Edmund did.
But he is king, and Narnia… Narnia must be his first concern. His people ought not suffer from his blindness, nor from Addie's…
Was she foolish? Was she tricked? Or did she walk into the witch's snare willingly, glad for any respite from him?
Better to focus on Narnia - he knows his kingdom can be saved.
Narnia is not yet lost.
Caspian prays and prays with a fool's desperation until his mouth is too dry to speak. The answer is always the same.
Silence.
Caspian waits - one moment, two, five.
Hang prayer! He ought to be scavenging for clues, not begging for help that will not come. Addie came to Ettinsmoor for the books, spent months in this room researching Giants and the old northern kingdom. Was the witch preparing her for a life in the Wild Lands?
Addie must not have yet told her of the rings.
When was the moment she betrayed him? Was it when he jested with her over titles? While he could not sleep for worry after the werewolf attack? Or when he again became His Royal Majesty King Caspian X to her?
Does it matter? No matter the timing, she is gone, and she is a witch's servant.
Caspian thumbs through books he recognises - titles Addie catalogued, in case her research into the Wild Lands was more than she claimed. He struggles to keep his eyes open, to make sense of the words, but his head droops toward the page.
Perhaps the witch's study? It's been searched, but his battle-weary soldiers might've missed something.
Caspian ascends the only surviving staircase and tears the place apart, ignoring the floor's creaky warnings and the wind whipping through the ruins. The secret room that housed Varn's ambush resembles an apothecary shop, full of vials, powders, and drying plants. Barrels of supplies line what remains of the far wall. Tiny bones crunch under his boots as he inches around a crumbling hole in the floor.
They're sharp, sticking into his leather soles. Caspian plucks one out and holds it under the moonlight.
It's a fang, a familiar shape…
Exactly like the snake bones he caught pirates smuggling last year.
Other barrels contain grey mushrooms, poppy seeds, dried mint-like leaves, and flattened daisy-like flowers.
Opheodra must have been dealing with the pirates. But importing these many supplies requires gold he didn't think she had.
Were the human sacrifices sent to Harfang for more than keeping peace?
Stomach churning, Caspian returns to the library. He continues skimming the stack of books he recognised, but all too soon, the words blur and he feels himself losing the battle to sleep.
Exhaustion drags him under.
Addie
Her second journey to Underland starts in a grotto by the Great Northern River and passes quicker than the first. The path is darker, steeper. There are no glowing worms, no cavernous caves or flowing rock formations. On Snowflake, Opheodra leads them down a steep, winding tunnel barely tall enough for them to ride through, so narrow the walls seem to press in on them, constricting and suffocating. Addie scrapes her knees raw and tears her dress. It's a shame - Opheodra gave it to her, a pretty midnight velvet.
Addie sets her chin high and wills the sense of peaceful triumph the Lady bestowed on her to return. The underground is dank and the path is unfamiliar, but this is no trap. Underland is a refuge. Any unease is thanks to King Caspian's dogged pursuit, which will soon end in the king's well-deserved frustration and failure.
When they reach the city, Addie makes herself a quiet, unobtrusive shadow, out of the way but ready when Opheodra calls. The Lady's been… uneasy on the journey, her tongue lashing like an angry viper at the slightest provocation.
After a silent breakfast, Addie follows the Lady into her personal drawing room, where she prefers to work her enchantments. A slow-blazing fire warms the hearth, sweet smoke blanketing the stone floor and whispering reassurances in welcome.
Opheodra takes her pouch of powder from a recess beside the mantle and ties it onto her girdle. Then she opens the golden velvet pouch.
Addie blinks.
"I should grab my mother's diaries. I can't leave -"
"First I must go alone," Opheodra says. "If all goes well, I will return shortly to guide you home."
A flicker of unease pricks Addie's chest. They're supposed to go together, aren't they? Opheodra has the cordial, but she's never been to the Wood; how will she know which pool leads to her world?
"You want me to... I'm not going with you?"
Opheodra's distraction condenses into a glare, so harsh and sudden Addie shrinks back.
"The Wood- I mean, the pools are…" Addie stammers. "I just... are you sure, my lady?"
Opheodra's skirt lashes the floor. "Do you doubt me, Adelaine?"
"No, I..."
Opheodra's eyes narrow, a scalding recrimination.
"I'm sorry," Addie whispers. "I'm sorry, it's just… the Wood's dangerous. Or it can be."
"Did you find it so?"
"No, but -"
"Then who taught you to fear it?"
Shame heats Addie's face.
Scales scrape over stone, though Opheodra retains the upper half of her human form. Addie meets her narrow irises with a shiver.
"I see the king's hold on you is stronger than I feared."
"It's not!" Addie cringes as her petulant denial echoes around the room, the hearth smoke curdling at her half lie. "The Lord Chancellor had concerns too, and I didn't care when it was just me, but now… now it's not me taking the risk."
"Hmm." Opheodra leans in and tilts Addie's chin up with her sharp nails. "Then this moment of doubt is born of care?"
Yes, yes, of course it is! Addie bobs her head.
"You've done so much for me. I just hoped…" That I'd go home when you did. That we'd do this together. "I don't want you to face the Wood's magic alone," Addie amends. "I know I wouldn't want to."
Opheodra tilts her head, tail hidden by the thick smoke saturating the room. She turns Addie's face side to side, searching for something - truth? Care? Betrayal?
Finally, she relents with a sigh.
"Your concern is touching," says the Lady, soft as velvet. "But to fear for me is to doubt me. Tell me, did I doubt you when I sent you into the dangers of King Caspian's castle?"
Addie hesitates. She hopes she didn't, staked all her courage on Opheodra's confidence, but in her friend's heart of hearts, perhaps she -
"I did not," says Opheodra, nail pricking the delicate skin behind Addie's chin. "Nor did I fear. I had every faith in you, and you did not disappoint me. You can extend the same courtesy to me, yes?"
What kind of friend is she to doubt so readily?
The fire's herb-rich scent floods her nose, and Addie nods.
How stupid she's being; if anyone can navigate that strange Wood and its mysterious rules, it's Opheodra. She knows magic, and she's kept her every promise.
Addie trades her worry for a smile and confidence she should've shown from the moment Opheodra shared her plan.
"I must be sure of the path," the Lady says. "Once I have bent this Wood to my will, both our passages shall be secure."
"Then I'll wait eagerly for your return," Addie says.
To her relief, Opheodra returns her smile. "You shall not wait long, my dear."
Addie helps her tie both pouches around her neck and wishes her well.
Opheodra reaches into the golden pouch, and quick as a blink, she vanishes.
Gone.
She'll be alright.
Addie waits, the room's silence and green smoke her only companions.
She waits.
And waits.
Her heart fills the silence, thumping against her ribs. Slowly at first, then faster, faster, like a courier's frantic fist.
Addie coughs, throat stinging.
Is something burning? Opheodra's fires don't smell like burnt eggs and sulphur; they're sweet, like a…
Like…
Sweetness sharpened to a knife-point, caustic on her tongue, a film over her teeth.
Addie sways, a hand to her pounding head, and tucks her face into her elbow.
A whisper, more sensation than sound.
"Opheodra?"
No answer.
The whisper grows.
Stop.
With another cough, Addie waves away the fire-smoke, begging for clean air she doesn't find.
Wake up.
Addie rubs her watering eyes and retreats to the corner further from the fire. God, her head!
Something's wrong.
She has to get out.
No, she has to wait. Opheodra said to wait, said she'd be back soon.
Inside her, something rattles.
The whispers crack into a single, ear-splitting scream.
"Ah!" Addie crumples to her knees and covers her ears, groaning, but the sound worsens - a wordless wail, a bloodied howl. Something desperate, buried deep, clawing to freedom with a cacophony of piercing cries.
"Quiet, quiet!"
Her plea falls on deaf ears, and the scream inside her worsens. She smells blood and wipes her nose, streaking her hand with red.
"Stop, I'm sorry, I'm sorry!" Addie slams her hands back over her ears and curls into herself, rocking, waiting for her friend to come back and make it better and make it stop, make it stop!
Suddenly, silence.
There is no sound but the wet, ragged gasp of her own breath.
Her stomach lifts and sick surges up, burning her throat and tongue as it splashes on the floor. Addie hacks and vomits again, groaning. It's the smoke, it's the fire, it's everything, everything.
Addie heaves until there's nothing left, and even then just breathing makes her start again.
Run. You have to run.
Her mind clears a little, latches on.
Run.
Run.
Run!
Addie gets to her feet, legs shaking, arm over her nose and mouth.
Run where?
This is Underland, where Opheodra-
Opheodra, her friend, not her friend, who uses dark magic to tear seams in the earth and make people into puppets to build underground cities and steal and kill and -
She's done all those things. She set fires, stole the rings, drugged guards, tormented Caspian, killed -
Quiet.
Addie hauls herself to her feet and paces, breathing in sips, nose buried in her elbow. Think, think, have to figure a way out of this. She ruined everything, betrayed everyone, so she has to fix it!
Caspian.
Oh God, Caspian doesn't know - about this place, these people, the gnomes, the slaves, the alliance with Harfang, Opheodra's magic, he… he needs to know his kingdom's in danger! That she put it in danger.
He will find a fitting welcome for his trouble.
Fresh horror surges up her throat. What nightmare did Opheodra leave for Caspian? An ambush? An enchantment?
If it's an ambush, he'll need the cordial - for himself, for his soldiers. Oh God, if Opheodra's trap sprung already, then…
He's alive. Caspian has to be alive.
He has a kingdom at his disposal - an army, soldiers and spies, generals and advisors. He's fine. But if he isn't, or his men aren't…
Fuck, he needs the cordial she stole!
Addie's stomach lurches, but this time, she forces the sour bile back down. No time, there's no time; Opheodra could be back at any moment with her magic and music.
Opheodra has the rings and the cordial, and she's God only knows where by now.
I will return shortly to guide you home.
What if she doesn't?
She could've lied.
Addie trembles and paces faster. If Opheodra doesn't come back, then she'll bluff her way onto a ship, wander every tunnel and crevice until she finds the surface, and from there…
The only thing to do is turn herself in. Tell Caspian everything, so he'll be prepared if Opheodra returns.
If Opheodra doesn't, the cordial is lost forever.
God, why did she take it? The rings are defensible, but not the cordial.
Suppose Opheodra does come back.
Addie chokes on bile.
Then she'll be a puppet again. God only knows what unforgivable things she'll gleefully trot off to do next.
No, no, she won't!
She's always accepted the enchantment willingly, or mostly, hasn't she? Maybe it doesn't work if she doesn't let it.
Maybe.
She's pinning her hope on a maybe!
Addie exhales, trembling, and braces against the wall, breathing into her sleeve. How did she ever find this disgusting, oily smell pleasant?
Focus.
If - when - Opheodra returns, she'll have the rings and the cordial; she can't travel without them.
Addie balls her hands into fists. She has to steal them back.
What's one more betrayal? She's done little else these past months.
The cloying stench turns to bitterness in her mouth.
Months, months! What a stupid girl she is, how easily she let -
Addie breathes as shallowly as she dares, head swimming. Cursing herself now fixes nothing. She has to get the rings, escape Underland, and find Caspian. There's nothing else to be done.
But how?
Suddenly, a figure appears through the smoke and Addie's heart slams into her ribs in belated warning.
Opheodra's back.
Play along. You're a puppet, you're devoted, you're nothing.
With a faint sigh, Opheodra slumps over.
The terrifying thing isn't seeing Opheodra weakened. It's how readily, how automatically Addie rushes to her aid, before she's even thought about it. Her own body is a traitor, weaker than even her will.
That's good; concerned is what she needs to be, the part she has to play.
"Are you alright?" Addie asks, the question tumbling from her mouth as automatically as breathing, as sweetly as the enchanted smoke coating her tongue.
Opheodra accepts her help in silence, eyes squeezed shut, her grip strengthening every moment. By the time Addie asks what happened, Opheodra is standing tall and proud, her face milk-white in fury.
"That accursed Wood is strong indeed," she says, more sibilant hiss than human voice.
"What happened?"
"Quiet! I must think."
Addie swallows the stinging scold and helps Opheodra to her armchair, close enough a popping log's spark might singe her skirt. The flames flicker a sickly green, its promise of warmth corrupted by dark magic.
Darkness creeps in, edging her vision.
That goddamn smoke!
Addie sinks to her knees beside the chair, dizzy with magic and the tiniest breaths that can sustain her.
"Tell me again of your journey through the Wood," Opheodra says suddenly. "You felt weakened, yes?"
The Wood weakened Opheodra, too?
Addie sits back on her heels. "Yes. I could hardly keep my eyes open."
"And your mind was addled, was it not?"
"Very."
"I see." Opheodra leans into her chair's plush cradle, dark circles under her eyes.
Addie wets her lips, stifling a grimace at the oily film on her skin. The more she teases out of Opheodra, the more information she'll have for Caspian.
"I don't want to pry -"
"Then do not."
It would be so easy to fall silent and cower. So much easier than fighting the inescapable creep of the enchantment, that sour-sweet poison filtering into her lungs with every breath, greasing her throat for more simpering pledges of devotion to Opheodra and barbed betrayals for everyone else.
God, how was she so stupid?
Feeling sorry for herself won't do any good.
Addie ducks her head in deference and tries again.
"When I was in the Wood, I almost forgot everything - my life, my friends, even my own name. It felt like heavy magic." Addie forces her mouth to smile, her eyes to stay cast downward. "Not peaceful magic, like yours. A heavy weight I couldn't shake off, even if I tried. And I'm just human. Maybe the Wood's magic reacted with yours?"
Opheodra hums. "You are right that the Wood sensed my power. I have never met its like."
Never?
"But you can overcome it, can't you?"
Opheodra says nothing, only stares into her cursed fire with her delicate jaw set in displeasure.
In the breath of silence, hope drums a new heartbeat into Addie's chest.
It stutters at Opheodra's answer.
"I must," the witch says, voice echoing with a dark command. "So I shall."
But how?
If she knows Opheodra's plan, she can thwart it.
Addie scoots closer, crouched beside the Lady's chair like a dog.
"Did you get home?"
Opheodra grips the chair arms, porcelain-pale fingers curled like claws. "No, but I shall. The path is known to me, and none shall keep me from it."
A shiver crawls down her neck at the sinister promise in the Opheodra's words. She doesn't sound like a magnanimous lady; she sounds like a tyrant. Like a witch.
"Is there anything I can do?"
Opheodra's nail scratches luscious green velvet. "Yes, I will need you by my side. Perhaps another ritual… yes, I think that will be well."
Oh God no, not another one, she can't -
Addie grips her own hands, her skin bumpy and tight. The last ritual… Opheodra tore open the earth.
Didn't she?
Wake up!
Addie bites her inner cheek until she tastes blood and her head clears again.
"Of course," she says. "Anything, whatever you need - of course I'll help you."
"Yes, you will, won't you?"
Addie chews her bloodied cheek and looks down. If she doesn't keep her few remaining wits about her, she will.
And then the rings… Narnia… Caspian -
A cool, dry fingertip lifts her chin, and twin emerald eyes with a snake's irises quiet her racing thoughts.
"You have been my most loyal friend, sweet Adelaine," Opheodra croons, a curse spoken like a gracious blessing. "I shall miss you dearly when you return home."
Panic bolts from her chest to her gut. Go home, to England, and leave this mess behind?
Unless…
They are so industrious, eager to earn their place.
Those we delivered are not here to work, but to rest.
My servants have earned their respite. Their work for me is finished.
Opheodra wouldn't kill her. She wouldn't, she…
Would she?
Oh God, if she does, what then? Who will take back the rings and the cordial? Who will tell Caspian? Who will stop this?
Dying means leaving Narnia vulnerable - Caspian vulnerable - and at Opheodra's mercy, on the chance she really will go home and stay there.
What of the people there? Will Opheodra enslave them too? Cover the land and people that raised her in her dark magic, hollow them out until there's nothing left, like she's done to everyone in Underland?
If Opheodra goes home, then maybe Narnia will be safe. Caspian might be too, if Opheodra gets what she wants. If one world is enough for her.
When she leaves, will it free everyone in Underland from her spell?
If so, then Narnia'd be safe - safe enough. Free of Opheodra's clutches, at least.
But the people of Opheodra's world… what happens to them?
They don't deserve this fate. No one does!
Even if she sacrifices one world for this one, people she doesn't know for people she does, Opheodra will have the cordial.
And then Caspian…
Caspian, the king without the cordial. What happens when the next war comes, when he gets hurt protecting his kingdom and there's nothing to save him? What happens when assassins come in the night and succeed?
And if Opheodra ever comes back, if she decides one world at her feet isn't enough?
Addie wets her lips. "I don't have to go just yet, do I? Especially if there's more I can do to repay you for… for everything you've done for me."
Her simpering turns her stomach, and any joy she would've gotten from Opheodra's pleased smile curdles like spoiled milk.
Addie clenches her teeth and smiles like she's ashamed of the magnitude of her own debt.
After all, didn't Opheodra twist her guilt into devotion?
Or her own idiocy did.
"What if I come with you?" Addie continues, barely a whisper. "To the Wood, and beyond. If you asked it of me, I'd be glad to."
She can strand Opheodra in her own world. Play her part, be a good little servant, steal the rings when the moment is right.
Get the rings, get the cordial, get back to Caspian, tell him everything.
She will not think further than that. She cannot think further than that, or she'll lose her nerve.
"Hmm."
Opheodra's melodious voice snaps Addie back to reality, where she is still on her knees beside a witch she thought was her friend.
"I am loath to part you from your heart's deepest desire," says Opheodra, thumb stroking the cleft of Addie's chin. "But I see you have anticipated my need."
Addie looks down to hide the suspicion in her eyes. Did Opheodra ever intend to let her return to England?
"As you wish," Opheodra says. "When next I go to the land of my kin, you shall be at my side."
Kin? Are there others like her - witches who change into serpents?
The Lady releases her and falls quiet, pensively staring into her green-tinged fire, and Addie digs her nails into her palms until the sting summons a thread of courage.
"Will you tell me about your homeland?"
Opheodra goes still, her skin paling - anger or surprise, or something else unpleasant.
"You presume much."
She wasn't presuming, she was asking.
Addie worries her tongue with her teeth and her palms with her nails. "I didn't mean to, I just… you know so much about me. I'd like to know more about you. About where you come from."
"Where I am from matters not, Adelaine. What matters is where I - where we - are to go. I expected you to know that bittersweet truth better than anyone."
"But your birthplace is both, isn't it?" Addie rests a trembling hand on the velvet armrest. "If you'd rather not talk about it, I won't press. I just wanted to know more about where we're going. So I can… be useful. Helpful, I mean. To you."
Opheodra tips her face up again, her fingers so dry they sap the moisture from Addie's cheek.
"Your heart is truly tender, my dear. At times, perhaps too tender."
If her heart was so tender, she wouldn't have betrayed Caspian, after everything she'd already put him through.
Addie tucks her lip between her teeth and bites, an iron-tinged sting of clarity.
Truth.
A convincing lie requires truth.
"Sometimes," she whispers, "I think it's not nearly tender enough."
Opheodra smiles, her snake eyes unreadable, and pats her cheek before letting her hand drop.
Addie trades her lip for the tender skin behind it - something to sink her teeth into.
At length, Opheodra relents.
"I once told you I was exiled. You remember?"
Addie nods.
Every word Opheodra's ever said to her is seared into her mind.
"It was my own family who cast me out," says the Lady. "I was banished for the magic I was born to, because they feared what I could do. Long have I hungered to take back the throne they stole from me." Her smile turns venomous. "Perhaps they were not wrong to fear. In part, I must credit their hatred for my strength now."
Exiled, a stolen throne, a hunger for justice…
She's heard this before. She's seen it, seen the good that can be forged from pain.
But Caspian never manipulated his way to power. Never stole from innocents, never committed murder.
Did he?
Stop that, stop it!
Addie bites the bloody inside of her cheek and swallows a wince.
Opheodra and Caspian are not the same. She… she'll remember why in a moment. Not the same, one terrifying where the other is tender…
It isn't Caspian's thumb on her cheek.
Wake up! Not true, you know it's not!
Truth…
Addie feels herself nodding, her tongue sticky as toffee.
"Just… just tell me what you need. Anything, I'll… do anything…"
Opheodra tilts her head, her unblinking stare rooting Addie in place.
"If I'd only had a friend as true as you in my hatchling days."
"You have me now."
"Yes, I do, don't I?"
Of course she does.
No! No, you don't!
Would it be so bad to go along with the Lady's wishes? Is it so terrible to pledge her loyalty to… to…
To her friend, her confidante, her last… her only…
A witch! She's a witch, you stupid idiot! Fight back!
Magic, enchantments… music and smoke and rings and…
And the cordial. And Caspian.
Addie coughs.
Opheodra's emerald eyes narrow.
"Sweet Addie, how pale you look. Quiet now, and I shall ease your troubles."
The Lady lifts her mandolin from beside the armchair and onto her lap.
Addie's breath lodges in her throat, knots behind her tongue. A few strums, and she'll be as she was - a puppet, a witless servant, a faithless thief and a killer and a traitor worthy of nothing, nothing!
"You don't need to," she blurts.
Opheodra stills, ivory-smooth fingers hovering at the strings.
"No?"
Addie shakes her head, her friend - the witch, the witch - wavering in her vision. If Opheodra plays, she's not strong enough to fight it.
The magic's already working. The smoke's sweetened to vanilla-lavender-sandalwood, sticky as gold-spun sugar.
Addie hollows out her breathing, but keeps her chest expanding, mimicking deep inhales. As if the magic senses her hesitation, it tints bitter - a faint aftertaste, like a tea brewed too hot.
"I…" Think, think! "Sometimes I wonder if…"
"Yes?"
Devotion means gratitude. Devotion is so much gratitude it becomes guilt.
That's what Opheodra needs to hear.
Addie's sheepish smile shakes and her shallow breaths stutter in her chest.
"Sometimes, I wonder if I ask too much of you. You've done so much for me, and I… I feel I haven't done enough for you."
"How sweet you are." Opheodra strums once, a cascade of low, slow-rolling notes. "It is I who have offered much, and gladly."
Addie sags onto her heels. Yes, the Lady has offered her everything she could ever want, so selflessly, so generously -
No!
Opheodra strums again. "Will it ease your conscience if I say you have done more than you know?"
Has she?
Oh God, has she? What other crimes has she committed?
Addie digs her nails into her palms until the skin breaks and the fog clears a little.
"Can I ask what I've done? Or how? Or -"
Opheodra's skirt flicks into a scaly rope.
"You have done enough, sweet. Be content."
Addie suppresses a shiver as Opheodra's tail curls around her ankle. "I'm just… worried, that's all. About you."
Opheodra arches an auburn brow. "Stay your concern, I am well. But I fear you are not."
The tail tightens, scales sliding over her skin.
Addie holds perfectly still.
"If you're alright, then I am too," she murmurs, forcing herself to meet the Lady's hypnotic gaze. "I'm just glad you're back."
"Hmm. And yet you have no need of my music?"
Strum, strum.
Addie blinks sluggishly, almost forgetting not to breathe too deep.
"Well, yes, I always do…" Focus! Stay awake! Addie smiles blearily. "But I can wait a few hours. I think I'm tired from the journey."
"I see." Opheodra's hands still, her last note so low it's more vibration than sound. "Perhaps you are right. My journey was far more taxing, and I would be glad of a brief rest."
A wisp of hope flickers in her stomach.
"Sleep might do us both some good," Addie says.
"A fine idea."
Opheodra sets aside her mandolin, her tail sliding away and calming to fabric as she stands. Heart thudding, Addie rises too. The floor seems to undulate under her feet.
"Until the morrow," says Opheodra as she glides to the fireplace. There, she takes out the cordial and both ring pouches and secures them inside a stained glass box atop the mantle.
No lock.
Addie wobbles into a curtsy. "Until tomorrow."
While Opheodra retires, she'll gather food and winter clothes and wait to be sure Opheodra's asleep. Then she'll sneak back here, grab the rings and the cordial, go to the docks, stow away on a ship. When the pale beach is close, she'll steal a lantern and swim the rest of the way.
Pack, grab the rings and cordial, get on a ship. That's all she needs to worry about, just three things.
She can do this.
She can.
Caspian
He dreams of steel and pain and cold, such cold as he has never known. A rope of oily darkness drags him through tunnels and caverns and caves, the taste of limestone and stale water drying his tongue, and into an ink-black sea.
Waves thrash him, smacking his face, dragging him under as he struggles to breathe. The freezing waters numb his limbs, dulls his fight but for the burning, yearning ache in his chest for…
A flash of hazel.
For air.
With a powerful stroke, Caspian breaks the surface. The sea roars around him, sweeping him up in a wave and dashing him against jagged rocks, sharp edges digging into his body and scraping cracked ribs.
With a ragged cry, he hauls himself up, his hands leaving bloody streaks on the stone, and collapses with the sea grasping at his legs, frothing its frigid anger over his shivering form.
He knows not how long he lays there, gasping like a gutted fish. Caspian's eyes drift shut, time ebbing away.
They open to silence. The water is gone, and a small castle atop an underground mountain looms over him, wreathed in sickly green smoke. Its windows are dim, and the air holds the stillness of death.
Caspian drags himself to his feet and limps closer. As he climbs the craggy steps, the main doors swing open with a groan, releasing a cloud of overpowering incense-smelling smoke, so thick it coats his throat in charred-herb bittersweetness. From the castle, a feminine silhouette emerges.
Her name - Addie - sighs from his lips, the plea of a fool. Because although this woman wears Addie's face, it is not - it cannot - be her. This woman has skin of ice and a hollow-eyed stare, her every movement jerky and halting like a marionette.
The fury on her features roots him in place, silencing his wayward tongue.
"You." Addie's voice echoes like a war drum in a mountain pass. As she speaks, her hazel eyes burn gold, bright as twin suns. "You failed me."
"No…"
His every muscle burns to take a stand, to turn his back, to draw his sword, but his heart thunders a different entreaty. Caspian stays still, caught in the golden fire of her gaze.
"You failed me!" Her accusation deepens to a rumble, and in a blink, it is no longer Addie, but Aslan before him.
Caspian falls to his knees.
But his belated penance is too late.
The Lion lets loose a terrible roar, sharp teeth gleaming moon-white in the gloom, and in the same moment, the earth splits in two.
Liquid fire spews from the open seam, and a boiling, sulphuric cloud engulfs him. Caspian's lungs seize, burning from the inside out, the ground cracks away, and he falls into the fire, into pain, down down down…
Caspian jolts awake, choking on panic with Aslan's roar still ringing in his ears.
His breath turns to cold fog, and the manor's ruined library takes shape - toppled shelves, a splintered sliding ladder, books strewn across the snow-speckled floor. Snow drifts in curls through the broken windows, silver in the predawn light.
Only a dream. The sea, the castle, the still-echoing roar, it was only -
The book that was his pillow is splayed open, its pages flipping as though caught in a violent wind. Blinding sunlight breaks over the horizon, streaming into the library. Caspian squints against the light, shielding his eyes as the white pages catch the sun's rising rays.
The roar that shook his very bones fades.
Eventually, the book's pages slow, finally resting on an illustration of an ancient city.
Chapter Six - Cloch Moin, City of Stone
Once the capital of an ancient and powerful Giant kingdom, the Cloch Moin is now most commonly known as the City Ruinous, or the Ruined City of the Giants. At its height, this capital was the seat of power of such notable leaders as King Am Na'Callen, King Kairas, King…
Caspian rises, cradling the book as he pores over the page by the light of the golden dawn.
The kingdom's last ruler, known in Giant legends as Father Time, carved the following inscription into the heart of the city:
Though under Earth and throneless now I be,
Yet, while I lived, all Earth was under me.
"The City Ruinous," he murmurs. It makes sense; his spy spotted Lady Opheodra, Addie, and a northman heading from the Ruined City to Harfang. He hoped to avoid the Wild Lands, but if this is Aslan's will, if this is the answer to his prayers…
He will follow.
A/N: I'm just as shocked as you that I didn't immediately ruin the hope here. But structurally, we're entering the climax, soooo everyone who's tired of Heartworm, the end has never been closer!
Not sure when Ch 87 will be up but I don't think it'll be before October. Please direct any and all complaints about the slow updates to my day job, as it seems determined to grind me into a fine paste and burn my ashes. (I'm not tired and cranky, why do you ask? 😅) I'll post a preview for 87 when I have it. Thank you all for your continued patience and understanding!