THE CHRONICLES OF NARNIA
THE LION THE WITCH AND THE WARDROBE BBC
PART 13
THE STONED PARTY
PREVIOUSLY: The children, Chirp and Beavers and their new friends are woken up the next morning by the ominous bells outside the cave and they assumed it was the Witch herself. Mr. Beaver and Chirp go out together to investigate, but soon return to the others surprisingly cheerful and happy, before they take the others to the maker of the bell sounds, who is revealed to be Father Christmas, who has finally returned to Narnia after one hundred years as a sign that the Witch's power beginning to crumble and that the winter will soon be over. Father Christmas gives everyone presents and a set festive table. Father Christmas gives Peter a sword named Rhindon and the shield with the lion in it. He gives Susan a bow and quiver of arrows and the ivory horn to call help whenever she needs it. And to Lucy he gives A magical healing cordial and a small dagger for self-defense. Father Christmas leaves the children and the animals to celebrate the Christmas together for the first time in one hundred years, before the children, Chirp and Beavers are forced to continue their journey to the Stone Table and Aslan.
Meanwhile, back with Edmund and the White Witch, Ginarrbrik was still driving the Witch's sleigh - relentlessly whipping seemingly already worn horses backs with his whip to make them to move faster - while his mistress searched the passing woods with her sharp eyes, since they hadn't seen any sight of the children or their allies the whole last night, she hoped they would be easier to spot in the snowy terrain now that it was a daylight.
However, at some point last night, Edmund had neglected the task the Witch had given him to look into the woods for his siblings out of exhaustion he couldn't hold back and had fallen into the deep sleep next to the Witch, who gave him no regard.
Edmund slept well into the morning - though he frowned sleepily at the brightness of the daylight as it hit disturbingly to his closed eyes - and he heard no other sound but the everlasting swish of the snow under the sleigh and the creaking of the horses harness.
"AH!" the Witch suddenly yelped.
Her yelp was so sudden, sharp and high-pitched that Edmund was forcibly jolted out of his sleep. Groggily and frantically, Edmund looked around him to try to get the picture of where he was, what had happened, what time it was and how long he was asleep.
It didn't take long for him to realize that he was still sitting in the Witch's sleigh right next to her, and it seemed to be morning already.
Edmund glanced cautiously at the Witch, who appeared like she was staring at something that was right in front of them.
"What have we here?" the Witch questioned to herself, her pale face stiffened into ice-cold frown.
Edmund leaned forward to see what the Witch was looking at and noticed a little further ahead of them a merry party of animals: Mr. Fox, two little squirrels, two dwarfs, Satyr and Mama Bear, and two bear cubs sitting on tools round a table with red cloth and Holly decorations.
As they drove nearer, Edmund could see that a great big teapot of steaming tea, a bowl of few fruit and grapes, a glass bottle of good smelling wine, the bread with butter and jam, the plates of few cookies, frosted cakes, delights (which reminded him about the Turkish Delight), partially eaten roasted salmon and ham, a bowl of halfway eaten steaming porridge with cream and berries and in in middle of it a delicious-looking plum pudding with cream. He also saw in the squirrels hands the bag of nuts, in the bear family's paws a large jar of honey and in the Dwarfs hands a barrel of beer.
Seeing all those treats on the table, Edmund, who has had nothing to eat but dry bread and water since leaving the beavers's, began to long for breakfast so much that he hoped that the Witch would stop by those animals for the same reason... and he hoped that they would happily welcome them to join them to eat with them.
However, his hopes for the warm welcome and the breakfast were pushed aside immediately when the party - with Mr. Fox having just risen to his feet and holding a glass of vine in its right paw as if he was going to say something - noticed their arrival.
As the sleigh drew closer to the party, all the merriment, gaiety and eating had stopped like in a wall and the animals' faces were wrapped with surprise and horror as they saw the White Witch in person in front of them.
Mr. Fox stood still, frozen in terror. The little squirrels squealed and hid behind the table, peering fearfully over the edge of the table. The little bear cubs whimpered in terror and jumped off their stools and rushed to the safety of their mother's arms. Mama Bear wrapped her paws around her cubs and shielded them while casting a dread-filled but determined glare at the Witch, as she was not going to let her to harm her little ones only over her dead body. The Dwarfs glared at the Witch with the narrowed frowns of fear and hate, while the Satyr trembled on his stool.
"STOP!" the Witch cried and Ginarrbrik pulled the horses up and the sleigh stopped next to the party.
###
In the meantime, the rest of the children, the beavers and Chirp had already at this point recovered the rest of their things from the beavers' cave and resumed their journey to the south and towards the Stone Table and Aslan.
In less than ten minutes, they had already made it a short distance from their new friends and the party spot - which was still visible from their current position - until they stopped dead in their tracks when they heard a sharp and shrill scream echo in the air, which sent a chills down their spines.
"Wha-wha-wha-what was that?!" Susan asked, already trembling from the sudden cold and dread.
Beavers and Chirp gasped in horror as they recognized that shrill and ice-cold voice, which they and any friend of Narnia would recognize in every corner of Narnia in these days, before turning to look behind them.
"Oh, my goodness! It's her!" Mrs. Beaver screamed, putting her paws over her cheecks in terror.
"Sh-she's-she's here! The Witch!" Mr. Beaver cried frantically, pointing his trembling claw at the party.
"Chirp, chrip! And your brother is with her! Chirp, chirp!" Chirp chirped, jumping around them and flapping his wings in panic.
Peter, Susan and Lucy turned around to look back at the party, and they gasped with dread and horror when they saw the white sleigh with the Witch in it - with their brother sitting next to her - standing right in front of the party!
"Oh, no!" Susan gasped, putting her hands over her mouth.
"She's got them cornered!" Peter exclaimed.
"Oh! Those poor animals!" Lucy cried, utterly devastated by their new friends' misfortune, as they were soon and most certainly about to meet the same gruesome fate as Mr. Tumnus.
Peter suddenly remembered his gift sword that was resting on his left side in its scabbard. Feeling the urge to do something within him, he took a step forward towards the party and reached for his sword's hilt with his hand as if he was about to draw his sword and go back for the party.
Lucy, apparently thinking the same as Peter, took a step towards the party too while reaching her hand for the hilt of her own dagger.
However, the others noticed this and were quick to interfere: Mrs. Beaver and Susan both immediately grabbed Lucy by her shoulder to stop her, making Lucy to turn around and look at them in confusion.
"No, no, dearie! Don't!" Mrs. Beaver said, shaking her head while putting her paw over Lucy's dagger-wielding hand and gently lowered it down.
Mr. Beaver, however, rushed in front of Peter to block his way back to the party, making Peter - who had at this point drew his sword halfway out of its scabbard - to halt and look at Mr. Beaver with perplexed look
"Where you think you're going?!" he asked rather frantically.
"Back to the party!" Peter said hurriedly, looking over Mr. Beaver's shoulder at the party and nodding his head to their direction. "We need to do something for them!"
Peter tried to move towards the party, but Mr. Beaver put his clawed paws over his shoulders and held him back, almost forcibly.
"Let go of me!" Peter demanded.
"NO!" Mr. Beaver snapped, refusing to let him go. "Didn't you notice that the Witch is there too?!"
"I did!" Peter snapped back. "And Edmund is there too unless YOU haven't noticed! This might be our chance to save Edmund! And we must help those poor animals!"
"Peter is right! We must do something for them!" Lucy said. "They came to our aid just in the moment of need when we needed it most!"
"Chirp, chirp, chirp! Bad idea! BAD IDEA! Chirp, chirp, chirp!" Chirp chirped frantically.
"But we can't just abandon them!" Lucy tried to reason with both Mr. Beaver and Chirp.
"You run back there for them and Edmund, you'd only run into the Witch's hands!" Mr. Beaver reasoned back. "Remember, she's out to kill you all, which is why she's keeping Edmund alive until she has all four of you in her clutches! You'd only make her job easier if you went back there! Then four new statues will stand there alongside with them!"
"He's right!" Mrs. Beaver said. "We need to get as far away from here as possible as long as she is distracted. There's no time to lose! Hurry! Hurry!"
"Peter! Come on! Let's go!" Susan called as she and Mr. Beaver began gently but still urgently moved Lucy away from the party and back to the direction they were heading to.
"But what about them?!" Lucy called, referring the animals they were leaving behind to the certain doom.
"Are we just going to leave them to perish?!" Peter questioned, sounding outraged and refusing to budge. "And leave Edmund in the hands of that monster?!"
"All we can do for them is get out of here and get to Aslan before she catches us first!" Mr. Beaver said and began to near-forcibly push Peter after the others.
Susan left Lucy with Mrs. Beaver's care and hurried back to assist Mr. Beaver to get Peter to move.
"Come on, Peter! Listen to him!" Susan pleaded, grabbing from Peter's right arm and starting to pull him away. "As much as I hate to leave those animals and Edmund there, I think that Mr. Beaver is right! We need to get out of there or else we'll end up just like them!"
"But... But..." Peter stammered, still refusing to turn away from his brother and the animals now that they were the ones who needed the help most. "But now that we have the presents we got from Father Christmas, maybe we can stand a chance against her now!"
"Chirp, chirp! STILL BAD IDEA! Chirp, chirp!" Chirp chirped.
"You can't take her on your own! Not now!" Mr. Beaver tried to reason with him. "Now, come on!"
"But..." Peter still tried to protest, never taking his eyes away from the Witch, from the party or least from his brother.
"Hey! Peter, listen!" Susan said, getting into her brother's face to speak some sense into him. "Just because some man in a red coat gives you a sword doesn't mean you have to play a hero! Let's go!" she practically screamed.
"Listen to your sister, Peter!" Mr. Beaver pleaded. "Now let's get out of here before the Witch realizes we have been here!"
Susan half-gently removed Peter's hand from his sword's hilt, before she and Mr. Beaver turned him around and pushed him back on their way to the Stone Table and Aslan.
It actually took the combined efforts of both Susan and Mr. Beaver to make Peter to move away from the party - and the obvious suicide mission - since he still refused to budge on his own, as his eyes were still fixed on the Witch, the party and especially his brother.
Peter couldn't believe he was walking away from his brother and the chance to finally save him, even if it was surely a suicide, and he wasn't sure when, if ever, another chance to save him would come. He was also worried by the fact if they reached Aslan in time, there was always the chance that the Witch might suddenly change her mind about sparing Edmund's life once she realizes there was no point in trying to catch them anymore.
"C'mon, Peter! We must hurry!" Mr. Beaver urged hurriedly.
Albeit with great reluctance, Peter finally turned away from the party behind them and left with Susan, Mr. Beaver and Chirp to catch up with Mrs. Beaver and Lucy... and hoped that Aslan would truly help them to save Edmund once they meet him at the Stone Table.
###
Back in the party, Mr. Fox, Satyr, Dwarfs, Squirrels and Bears whimpered and trembled with fear as the Witch stood up to address them all.
"What is the meaning of this?" the Witch demanded, pointing her wand at the table and all the foods and decorations.
No one of the animals answered, since they were all too scared before the Witch to speak.
"Speak, vermin!" the Witch shouted. "Or do you want my little man to find you a tongue with his whip?" she added, gesturing her wand towards Ginarrbrik
Ginarrbrik chuckled cruelly, before he demonstrated his mistress' threat by cracking his whip towards the animals and the table, hitting right to the glass pitcher and shattering it, spilling all the remaining good wine all over the table, and making the animals flinch from startlement.
Edmund felt uncomfortable again as he watched from the Witch's sleigh all this happening before her eyes.
"I ask again. What is the meaning of this... this gluttony?!" the Witch snarled, glaring at the Satyr, who was sitting uneasily in his bench.
"This waste?!" the Witch snapped, glaring at one of the squirrels, who leaned against Mr. Fox in fright.
"This self indulgence?" the Witch snapped again, turning her glare at the Dwarf with the red cap, who frowned back at her.
"This repugnant merriment?!" the Witch snapped one morte time, glaring at the Mama Bear, who growled softly and glared back at the Witch while shielding her little bears.
"Where did you get all these things?" the Witch demanded again.
Though terrified himself down to the core, Mr. Fox put in enough of courage to stand up to speak to the Witch in the behalf of his friends.
"P-P-Please... your Majesty. We were g-g-given them." Mr. Fox explained with shaking voice.
The Witch turned her ice-cold glare into Mr. Fox, but didn't say anything, indicating that she was wordlessly demanding Mr. Fox to continue.
"A-A-And i-i-i-if I might be so bold a-a-as to drink t-t-to your Majesty's very g-g-good he-health..." Mr. Fox stammered, raising his glass of vine up to toast to the Witch to appease her somehow.
"SILENCE!" the Witch screamed with the terrible and chills-giving high-pitched voice, making Mr. Fox to flinch.
"WHO GAVE THEM TO YOU!" the Witch demanded.
Though knowing that the Witch will not take the answer well, which terrified him greatly, Mr. Fox saw no other choice but to tell her the truth.
"F-F-F-F-" Mr. Fox stammered, struggling to find his voice to speak.
"SPEAK!" the Witch shouted, very angry and impatiently.
"P-P-Please, your Majesty. W-W-We were g-g-given them by... F-F-F-Father Chri-Christmas." Mr. Fox stammered.
The Witch's eyes wend wide upon hearing that name.
"What did you just said?" she questioned, unsure if she had heard the fox right with all of that stammering. "Say it again!"
"Father Christmas." Mr. Fox repeated.
The Witch did not take this well, as Mr. Fox had predicted, as her face contorted into a horribly ferocious that no one couldn't even look at her.
"WHAT?! FATHER CHRISTMAS?!" the Witch roared, before she sprung out from her sleight and took a few strides nearer to the terrified animals. "So this is what you're celebrating? Christmas? Is that what this is?!"
"Yes." Mama Bear confirmed, being a little too bold for Mr. Fox's and the other animals' comfort.
"NO! NO! NO!" the Witch shrieked with fury. "HE HAS NOT BEEN HERE! HE CANNOT HAVE BEEN HERE! HOW DARE YOU?!
The animals now nearly huddled together to the other side of the table, terrified of the Witch's terrible wrath, though only Mama Bear was brave enough to hold her ground.
However, suddenly, and surprisingly, the Witch quickly calmed down and offered to the animals a sweet smile. "Say you have been lying and you shall all even now be forgiven."
Mr. Fox and the other animals turned to each other and started muttering to each other. Mr. Fox didn't know what to say against his previous claim about Father Christmas being here because that was the truth, no matter how much it would displease the Witch. The Satyr urged him to come up with some excuse that would prevent her from turning them into stone, but both the Dwarfs and Mama Bear claimed that the Witch's promises were false and misleading. All the while the Witch stood there arms crossed, waiting impatiently for the animals' response, and Edmund sat in the sleigh, anxious about where this might lead.
However, since it was starting to take too long for them to decide what to tell, the Witch, having reached the limit of her patience with getting her answer, opened her mouth.
"WELL!" she said, making Mr. Fox and other animals to turn back to her. "So how its going to be?! I'm getting busy here!"
The Witch then raised her wand, possibly intending to turn one of the animals into stone before the others' eyes in order to motivate Mr. Fox to make a haste in admitting his 'lie' before she could finish her business here and go back into more important matters.
"No! Don't! Please! Don't do this, your Majesty!" Edmund shouted before she could do anything.
Edmund quickly sprung out of the sleigh and rushed between both the Witch and the animals, much to the both the animals' and the Witch's surprise/shock that he would dare to stand up for them to the Witch.
"And why shouldn't I?" the Witch questioned, annoyed with Edmund's interference.
Edmund briefly looked back at the animals, whose eyes were all fixed to him, waiting for him to say something to convince the Witch to spare their lives... that is, if he could.
"Because they..." Edmund started as he turned back to the Witch. "Because they haven't done anything wrong. They're just celebrating Christmas: having fun with each other, eating, drinking, partying, laughing, getting presents and just being happy. What's wrong with that if someone wants to celebrate Christmas?"
"What's wrong with that? WHAT'S WRONG WITH THAT?! I'll tell you why this is wrong!" the Witch snapped, her face turning to pinkish-white from fury. "Father Christmas has been exiled from Narnia forever with the penalty of death. And therefore the Christmas, with which I mean all of this... this gluttony, this waste, this self indulgence and repugnant merriment, is highly forbidden in my kingdom! And yet these wretched creatures dare to celebrate it under my nose with the false justification that the Father Christmas has been here!"
However, at this moment, one of the squirrels lost his head completely.
"But he has! He has, he has, he has! Father Christmas has been here!" the squirrel squealed aloud. "And we had fun for the first time in years! Us, the beavers, and..."
The animals, including the other squirrel, gasped with shock and dread after the squirrel mentioned "the beavers" right in front of the Witch!
"HUSH, SQUIRREL!" Mr. Fox snapped sternly, hopping to silence them before they could spill out any more vital information.
However, it was too late, since the damage was already done.
"WHAT?!" the Witch gasped, turning back to the animals in wide-eyed shock when she realized what the little rodent had just said.
The squirrel's mention of the beavers immediately caught Edmund's attention too, which made him hold his breath with dread as the realization hit him.
His siblings, the beavers and the robin... they have been here?!
"WHAT DID YOU JUST SAID?! THE BEAVERS?!" the Witch shrieked and waved her arms in the air in fury, making everyone around her flinch.
The Witch took the look down to the snowy ground around the table and saw how extensively the snow had been milled with the animals' footprints... but much to her frustration, there wasn't any tracks leading away from here.
"WERE THE BEAVERS HERE?!" the Witch interrogated the animals while holding them, the squirrel particularly, at wand-point. "WITH THE HUMANS?!"
"The h-h-h-humans?" Mr. Fox stammered, pretending he didn't know anything about the 'humans' while trying to defuse the situation... hopefully. "Please, yo-yo-your Majesty. We d-d-d-do not know a-a-anything about a-a-any hu-hu-humans."
Satyr, Dwarfs, another squirrel and the bears all shook their heads to 'confirm' this.
Of course, just after the children, Chirp, and the beavers had left and before the Witch could show up, Mr. Fox had instructed his friends to wipe their tracks or cover them with their own - while the beavers and kids took care of wiping those that led back to the beavers' cave - to clean up any evidence of their recent presence here as a precaution, in case the Witch's minions or the Witch herself might show up, and to buy them enough time to get far away from here before the Witch figured out where they had gone.
However, thanks to one of the squirrels' slipping tongue, the Witch might have already seen through of their ruse and didn't look convinced by their denial of the beavers or the humans' presence.
Literally fuming with rage at not getting the information she needed, the Witch clenched her trembling fists tightly and growled through her gritted teeth like a beast, while glaring at the animals terribly.
"AAAAGGGGHHHH!" the Witch screamed furiously and raised her wand up again, causing the animals to panic and cover themselves with their hands/paws, for they knew what was coming for them.
Mama Bear, however, showed no fear before the Witch's wrath and the certain doom, as her drive to protect her little ones pushed away all the fear from her system. Mama Bear got up from her bench and, baring her teeth, growled defiantly at the Witch.
However...
"NO! Don't do this, your Majesty! Please!" Edmund shouted, stepping in front of her again with the pleading look on his face, making the Witch look down on him with the scowl.
"These animals don't know anything. They do not know anything. They... haven't been here. Please!" Edmund pleaded desperately.
The Witch gave Edmund a deep scowling look for him stalling her hand from giving these animals their 'deserved' judgement.
However, she quirked her brow curiously when she detected a small gap between Edmund's words, as if he had just momentarily hesitated to say something before saying it.
Studying Edmund's face a little more closely for a moment, the Witch managed to catch amidst all the desperation and pleading a glimpse of deep concern in the boy's eyes, which she realized could only mean one thing.
Edmund was absolutely sure that his family had been here... but by standing up for these animals, who surely knew it too, he tried to withhold this knowledge from her, stall her long enough to allow his family to get away, while pleading her to spare these animals' lives.
The Witch then calmed down, lowering her wand and giving Edmund a sweet and somewhat assuring smile, before she gently caressed his right cheek.
"Maybe you're right, Edmund dear." the Witch said with the softer, calm and sweet voice. "Perhaps I acted too hastily to assume them to know anything about the fugitives. You made me to see my error of my ways. Thank you, Edmund."
Edmund frowned her brows at this, a little confused of this change in her attitude.
"Does that mean…" Edmund began, very hesitantly but desperately hopeful. "...that you're going to spare them?"
the Witch hummed softly. "Yes, my dear. Perhaps I will." she promised.
Edmund, who hadn't even noticed that he has been holding his breath for some time now, let out a deep sigh of relief and returned the Witch with a small but grateful smile of his own.
But when Edmund turned back to the animals, expecting them to express their gratitude to him for saving their lives, instead, much to his confusion, Edmund was met with the stares of dismay from all of them.
Mr. Fox, the Satyr, the Dwarfs, the squirrels and the bears could not believe that Edmund would so naively believe the Witch's false promises... let alone of them having seen him being in the Witch's company in the first place. They knew, as well as any Narnian would undoubtedly know, that the Witch cannot be trusted, since she possessed a powerful enchanted methods to lure any unwary and gullible into her clutches and her control via false promises - unless they proved to be useful to her. Which was why they were all dismayed to see Edmund, one of the two Sons of Adam destined to save them and Narnia from the Witch's rule, gullibly believing he could talk the Witch out of something he deemed unnecessary to do... which made them to realize that the Witch had at some point enchanted Edmund into her clutches.
The Witch then turned back to the animals.
"And as for you." the Witch's started, spreading her arms and smiling at the animals forgivingly. "All of this shall be forgiven."
However, the animals were not convinced of this, but still uneasy about what was obviously coming for them.
"And I am grateful that you all had the honor to witness Edmund's, the son of Adam's compassion for you and his royal nobility of convincing me of your… so-called innocence." the Witch announced.
The Witch paid a sideways glance at Edmund, who was staring at her with confusion for her words.
The Witch's then turned back to the animals, and then, her sweet smile turned into a psychopathic grin!
"Before YOU DIEEEE!" the Witch shrieked and whipped her wand towards the animals.
"NO!" Edmund screamed in dismay and horror.
But it was too late!
There was a crack of thunder before the blinding white light erupted from the tip of the wand and shot out of the wand the beam of light that hit the table and the animals. They were all completely sillhouetted by the bright light. And when the light faded away, the animals were all turned into lifeless statues sitting around the table, which was also turned into stone, along with the cups, saucers, glass goblets, bowls, cutlery, bowl of sugar, jug of cream, great big teapot, bowl of fruit and grapes, glass pitcher of wine, the bread, butter, jar of jam, plates of cookies, cakes, delights, salmon, ham, bowl of potatoes, bowl of porridge, the Dwarf's barrel of beer, the bears' jar of honey and the squirrels' bag of nuts and their nutcracker toy and the plum pudding.
Everything, all of it, was just hard gray stone in an instant.
Mr. Fox stood frozen in the pose, where he was just about to drop his glass of vine from his paw to cover his face with his paws.
Satyr stood frozen still next to his bench as if he'd tried to stand up and run away for his dear life.
The Dwarfs' faces were frozen into wide-eyed, worried expressions, while leaning back in their benches.
One of the squirrels had leaned against Mr. Fox's side and petrified there, and the other squirrel had let out the gasp before his fave had frozen forever into a terrified expression.
The bear cubs had hugged each other before being petrified behind the Mama Bear, who had tried to charge towards the Witch, mouth roaring wide open, teeth bared and claws raised high up, before she was frozen in place.
Edmund stared at the statues of the animals in disbelief and a wide-eyed and slack-jawed horror, while the Witch's eyes gleamed with sadistic pleasure.
"WHY!" Edmund screamed in anguish and fury as he and the Witch faced each other (with the Witch giving Edmund a cruel and remorseless grin). "WHY DID YOU DO THAT? YOU SAID YOU WOULD SPARE THEM, YOU... YOU... YOU MONSTER!"
The cruel smirk faded away from the Witch's lips and turned into an angered scowl.
"As for you...!" the Witch said dangerously. And then...
SLAP!
Suddenly and unexpectedly, the Witch had backhanded Edmund clear across the face.
Peter's earlier blow to the back of his head earlier for him almost closing the wardrobe's door behind their backs when they entered Narnia together for the first time was nothing compared to the blow the Witch had just given him. If Peter had intentionally wanted to hurt him, he would have hit him a lot of harder than that back then.
The Witch's own blow, on the other hand, was completely and remorselessly intentional, but also savagely fierce - that it left a nasty bruise in his right cheek - and forceful enough to knock Edmund's head to the left and throw him off his feet and with the loud thud and pained groan into the snow.
Edmund was left stunned by such a violent blow across his face. As he slowly rose up from the snow to his knees, he gritted his teeth tightly as his right cheek hurted so much it felt like the right side of his face was on fire after the stone-hard blow, making him raise his hand to his cheek to ease the pain. The shock and pain together made Edmund's eyes water, and no matter how hard he tried, he couldn't hold himself back any longer and he began to sob.
The Witch, unsympathetic towards sobbing Edmund and remorseless for striking him across the face, walked up to Edmund, before she leaned down and seized the boy by his right shoulder with the and stone-hard grasp, making Edmund gasp in pain.
"Get up!" The witch commanded sternly and lifted Edmund from the snow forcibly, not caring that she was hurting Edmund in the process.
"OWOWOWOWOWOW!" Edmund whined, as the Witch pulled him up to his feet, before the Witch made him to turn to her.
"Look at me!" the Witch demanded.
Her betrayal of all the broken promises she had made to him - her promise of him getting more Turkish Delights, her promise to make him King of Narnia, and her promise to spare those animals' lives - and all the physical and verbal abuse inflicted on him by her hand was starting to take their toll on him so much that even her ice-cold stare and simple looking at her was already too much for him to bear. Which is why Edmund kept his head low, and slowly turned away from the Witch.
"LOOK AT ME!" the Witch's shrieked fiercely, making Edmund flinch.
The Witch then took a savage grip on Edmund's jaw, squeezing so tightly that it hurted him even more, and forcibly made Edmund to look up at her, tightening her grip around his jaw - making Edmund fearfully believe that her grip could dislocate his jaw - as a warning if he tried to resist.
Their eyes then met: the Witch's fierce and piercing ice-cold eyes, and Edmund's fearful and tearful eyes.
"Let that teach you to ask any favours for spies and traitors... and to withhold any further information from me in the future!" the Witch snarled through her gritted teeth. "The time has come for you to think carefully about which side you're on. Mine... or theirs." she added, turning Edmund's face to look directly at the stone animals.
The Witch then removed her hand from around of Edmund's jaw and left the boy to stand there by himself, while she stepped away from him to think about their next move.
Edmund gently clutched to his from the pain stinging jaw with his hand to ease the pain, while watching with deep sadness, with pity and with shame at the poor animals' stoned forms, as the tears began to stream down his cheeks.
It seemed so pitiful to think of them sitting there all the silent days and all the dark nights, year after year, till the moss grew on them and at last even their faces crumbled away.
And the longer Edmund stared at them, the more he began to re-think of all the statues of those poor souls in the Witch's castle yard, and of Mr. Tumnus in the Witch's dungeons, and the horrifying thought that this might be the gruesome fate of his family if the Witch caught them... and all this just because of how much of a fool he's been since deciding to side with the Witch against his own family, the beavers, Chirp, Mr. Tumnus, all those Narnians who were right to fear the Witch, and even Aslan himself.
All his previous self-centered actions made Edmund feel himself no better than the Witch herself with her broken promises, and gave him a downhearted thought that maybe his siblings wouldn't be happy to see him again, or would they even bother to come for him.
Why would they even bother to save such a 'filthy little beast' such as himself?
Meanwhile, the Witch was rethinking all the clues he had gathered here so far: the squirrel's mention of "the beavers", the milled snow around the table that was possibly the animals' attempt to wipe out their tracks, and the worry in Edmund's eyes upon him realizing that the rest of the children have been here.
"They were here." she deduced, before she gritted her teeth angrily again. "Snowstorm and the wolves have failed me! Those fools let them to get away!"
The Witch then looked to the direction of the east, that led to the Great River, on the other side of which were both the Stone Table and... him!
"They went southeast from here, to the Great River! They can't be too far ahead." the Witch's deduced again.
Witch then walked up to Edmund and grabbed him by the arm.
"Come!" she ordered, forcibly dragging Edmund away from the stone table and the stone animals. And as they re-mounted the sleigh, the Witch literally threw Edmund to his seat next to hers with such of force that it almost threw him over the rail of the sleigh.
"Sit there... and be quiet!" she demanded.
"Y-Y-Yes." Edmund stammered, shaking with fear as he quickly adjusted himself in his seat, before the Witch's sat down next to him.
"Drive on!" the Witch ordered her Dwarf.
Ginarrbrik then cracked his whip in the horses' backs and they began to pull the sleigh after them.
And as they departed, Edmund leaned over the railing and looked back at the stony forms of Mr. Fox, Satyr, Dwarfs, squirrels and the bears as long as they were still visible, feeling still remorseful for failing to prevent this from happening to them.
"Drive faster!" the Witch's demanded. "They cannot be far! We might still be able to catch them before they cross the river, if we make haste! Faster!"
"Yes, your Majesty!" Ginarrbrik said and whipped the horses to make them go faster.
And as they raced again through the woods, the Witch spread her arms, her wand in her right hand, and looked up at the trees they passed by.
"Trees... trees... all the trees that are on my side! Deliver this message to Snowstorm and my Secret Police, wherever those fools are! Tell them to head to the east as swiftly as they can! Tell them that the children and their allies are trying to cross the river in the east! Tell them to capture them before they manage to cross the river!" the Witch chanted, her voice echoing magically through the trees like in the wind.
At that moment the trees, or at least some of them among the thousands in each direction, began to let out a deep creaking, moaning, or groaning sound that sounded like the menacing growling, which went from tree to tree to the direction of south.
These trees were the very Trees that were on the Witch's side and delivered their mistress' message while looking for Snowstorm and the Secret Police.
However, little did the Trees on the Witch's side knew that the one single Tree a little further away from the bad Trees' locations happened to overhear - by eavesdropping the bad Trees - the message they were delivering from the White Witch to the Secret Police.
That Tree learned from the message about the children, the human children, who were heading southeast in attempt to cross the Great River before the Witch captures them, as well as the Witch's orders to the Secret Police to head straight there to cut their escape.
This Tree, who was not like the ones serving the Witch, decided to act quickly and started to let out a softly moaning and lightly/quietly creaking and groaning noise, which the other Trees, who were on the same side as this Tree, began to carry on from Tree to Tree towards the southeast and after the children, hoping to reach them in time.
###
Elsewhere, on the river at the southern end of the forest, Maugrim and his wolves had secured all the crossings and were guarding them tirelessly, while Snowstorm hovered high in the sky in his normal animal form, keeping an sharp eye on the edge of the forest and every crossing point in case the children and beavers - and especially that wretched robin - appeared from somewhere.
However, Snowstorm was starting to get impatient here.
He and the wolves have been on guard in their positions for all night and morning, since they believed that they had managed to get here before the humans, but he has not seen any sight of the fugitives, and none of the wolf guards hasn't let out a howling as a sign of their detection.
Eventually, both confused and frustrated, Snowstorm landed onto the tree branch of the highest tree, from which opened up a wide view of the river and its both directions, where he then transformed into his anthropomorphic form.
"Hoo-hoo! Come on! Where are you, you brats, oversized rodents and that small pile of feathers! Hoo-hoo!" Snowstorm hooted impatiently as he looked down at the river.
"Hoo-hoo! I know you are out there somewhere, trying to find a way to cross the river without being noticed. Hoo-hoo! Well, that's not going to happen, not as long as me and the Secret Police are on the watch. This I swear. Hoo-hoo!" Snowstorm promised.
Suddenly, Snowstorm caught a deep creaking, moaning, or groaning sound, which came from the woods and approached his position fast.
"Hmm?" Snowstorm hummed, tilting his head curiously as he turned to the direction of that sound.
The snowy owl then took off from the branch, transforming to his normal owl form, and flew towards the sound to investigate.
Snowstorm glided for past the trees for a mile or two towards the sound, until he came across of the dead-looking one, where the sound also arrived shortly after him and ended there.
Snowstorm then landed onto the dead tree's branch and reassumed his anthropomorphic form, before he turned to face the tree's trunk next to him.
"Hoo-hoo! You have a message from the Queen? Hoo-hoo!" the snowy owl inquired. "What's the message? Hoo-hoo!"
A transparent human-like face with the tree-like skin - which were aged, wrinkled and pale, and which had a thinning and hoary gray hair with withered and torn leaves hanging from them, and branch-like stumb as a nose. - then suddenly appeared on the tree trunk.
"Snowstorm..." the face, which was the Spirit of this Dead Tree, started with the echoing voice. "Her Majesty the Queen of Narnia has ordered you and the Secret Police to head immediately to the east, to the Great River, as swiftly as you can."
Snowstorm tilted his head at this, confused. "But why? Hoo-hoo! We're positioned here to wait for those human creatures and traitors with them trying to cross the river here. Hoo-hoo!" the snowy owl protested.
"The human creatures have managed to elude you. They are heading southeast, trying to cross the river from there, not here."the Spirit said.
"WHAT?!" Snowstorm gasped in wide-eyed shock.
"The queen's orders you to head to the Great River and cut their escape before they reach the other side." the Spirit said, before it vanished from the tree trunk.
Snowstorm's face hardened from the seething rage when the realization finally dawned to him! They have been fooled! And now the humans had a huge head start to the Great River, while they were pointlessly guarding the river in the southern end of the woods.
"Hoo-hoo! That stinking fox LIED TO ME! Hoo-hoo!" Snowstorm hooted furiously, before he quickly turned back into his regular owl form and took off the branch, heading straight back to the river to alert Maugrim about this.
With doubled efforts, Snowstorm arrived back at the river much faster than it took him to reach the dead tree to hear his mistress's message, and he immediately went to the crossing point where Maugrim - in his anthropomorphic form - was standing in watch along with his lieutenant and few other wolf.
"MAUGRIM! HOO-HOO! MAUGRIM!" Snowstorm alerted as he landed near the crossing point and turned back into his anthropomorphic form.
"Any sight of them yet?" Maugrim growled, turning to the snowy owl along with his wolves.
"Hoo-hoo! Those human creatures and the traitors! They have eluded us, thanks to that lying fox! Hoo-hoo! They were never coming this way! They're heading to the southeast, the Great River, and cross the river from there! Hoo-hoo!"
Maugrim's eyes widened upon this revelation, before the wolf began growling fiercely, first softer and slowly louder from the rage building within him.
And then, he let out the blood-curdling roar that echoed in the air.
"RRRRAAAAAAAAGGGGHHHH!"
"That stinking fox lied to us!" Maugrim growled. "I'm gonna tear that treacherous little thing into pieces!"
"No time! Hoo-hoo!" Snowstorm protested. "We must get to the Great River as swiftly as we can before those humans manage to make their way across it Hoo-hoo! Alert your pack and let's go! NOW!"
Snowstorm then turned back into regular form and took off into the sky, heading towards the east. Soon after he did, Maugrim raised his muzzle in the air and howled to call the rest of his pack to re-group to him.
"OOOOWWWWWWWW-WOOOOWWWWWWWW!"
Wolves from all over the river's crossings points answered his howl in kind, letting him know they had heard him, before they all left their positions and re-grouped around Maugrim: they first arrived in their normal wolf forms and upon arriving, they changed back into their anthropomorphic forms.
With all twelve wolves having re-grouped, Maugrim addressed them all, still growling with fury.
"Snowstorm has just received the message from her Majesty!" he started. "Those human creatures have eluded us, and now they're heading to the southeast, towards the Great River"
The rest of the pack growled angrily at these news, as they realized that they have been fooled by that fox from the last night.
"The queen has ordered us to head to the east as swiftly as we can and cut those humans' escape across the river! NOW LET'S GO!" Maugrim barked.
The Captain of the Secret Police then changed back into his normal wolf form and ran towards the east and the Great River.
His lieutenant and the rest of the pack then transformed into their normal wolf forms too, and went to follow their captain, resuming their hunt for the humans.
TO BE CONTINUE...