"Lucy, have you seen Wendy?" asked Romeo. "We're about to open presents."
"No, I'll go find her," said Lucy.
"She reminds me of you," Romeo said. "Always wanting to play hide and seek."
Lucy shared a smile with Romeo before searching the entire house - rooms, closets, nooks, and crannies - but Wendy was nowhere to be found. Exasperated, Lucy was about to give up when she thought to check outside. Sure enough, Wendy sat on the porch step, taking in the cold winter air. Lucy followed Wendy's intense gaze, which was set upon what little was visible of the night sky.
"Enjoying the stars?"
Wendy jumped but soon recovered from her scare. "Yes," she said, "But there's so many lights and I can hardly see anything."
Lucy took a seat next to her younger cousin. "Is everything alright?"
"No," said Wendy unconvincingly. Lucy put an arm around Wendy to hold her close and give a questioning glance. "Well, yes, I suppose..." She sighed. "I just wish I could go to one of the stars."
"Go to?" Lucy was puzzled - how could you go to a star? "Do you mean... meet a star?"
" I meant that I'd like to travel to one of them, you know, such as travel to a place like Narnia."
"You can't go to a star," said Lucy. Wendy turned to watch Lucy, who had a curious expression on her face, a look that said she would very much like to be somewhere else.
"If I'm bothering you..."
"No, it's nothing," Lucy quickly said, not wanting to hurt Wendy's feelings. It wasn't that Lucy didn't want to be with Wendy, it was that Lucy wanted to be with King Caspian, on the Dawn Treader, or with Trumpkin at the Dancing Lawn, celebrating as they had after Caspian's coronation, or even back at Cair Paravel itself, with all three of her siblings – Erza included. Lucy began to wade in her thoughts, wondering what had really happened on Laxus's second journey to Narnia – he hadn't said much. All Lucy knew was that King Caspian had married Ramandu's daughter (who Lucy had never learned the name of, and felt quite horrid about it) and – Ramandu! Lucy snapped back to reality, remembering what she wanted to tell Wendy.
"Stars are people, and Narnia is a planet." Wendy's look of utter confusion caused Lucy to say, "I suppose I never told you that story yet. You see, Lucy and Gray once met a star."
"You met a star?" exclaimed Wendy, getting caught up in the gist of the story and forgetting the lie Lucy had been telling – the lie that the four Pevensie children had not in fact been to Narnia, and that it was all some made up story.
"Yes, we... um, they did. Would you like me to tell the story? It has a bit of an Astronomy lesson in it as well."
"Assa-what?"
"Astronomy; the study of stars and planets."
~!~!~!~!~!~ Narnia 2307 ~!~!~!~!~!~
Laxus sat on the deck of the Dawn Treader watching the stars above. He found it hard to wrap his head around the thought of them actually being a living, breathing person. He was so occupied in his thoughts that Laxus failed to notice when Lucy joined him.
"Pretty, aren't they?" she finally said after a few moments of silence.
Laxus nodded. "Lucy, how are they made of gas, yet still a person? I just don't understand. I suppose I never will get used to Narnia's ways – I mean, a flat world? How is it possible?"
Lucy was thoughtful. To be honest, she didn't quite know herself, but Laxus watched her expectantly. "Hmm... You haven't been here long enough so you probably won't, but I'll ask you anyway," mused Lucy. "Do you know any dryads?"
"Back in England, we have dryads. Don't forget - I'm a bug collector," said Laxus, "I know where the bugs live, and dryads are home to-"
"Spare me the details." If Laxus started about bugs, they would be sitting there for days. Lucy pondered what the least shocking way to inform Laxus about dryads, though she could come up with nothing so she said, "Well, dryads have spirits."
"Spirits? As in ghosts?" asked Laxus, whose face had turned an even lighter shade of pale, something significant for someone who was hardly outside and already fair-skinned. "That's frightful."
"Try not to think of ghosts." Laxus tried, but images of spooky beings infiltrated his mind. "Oh, bother, you're thinking of them, aren't you?" demanded Lucy.
"Sorry," he mumbled.
"I think the best way to put it is that there are two ways for dryads to get around – they can sort of swim in the ground, as if it were water-" Laxus smirked at the thought of the trees doing such a thing; the silly image seemed almost impossible. Then again, it was Narnia, after all, and anything seemed possible. Lucy continued, "-and the other way is for them to leave their tree. They've told me that it's quite inconvenient to do it this way, but some do nonetheless."
"And they look like ghosts."
"No, Laxus - unless you think of a ghost as a bunch of petals swirling around and talking."
"Anything that isn't sold is what I think of as a ghost, and that includes water. I hate swimming." Laxus frowned. "You probably think I'm wimpy, now."
"There's nothing wrong with being scared of the unknown," said Lucy. She glanced around the deck to make sure Gray was still asleep before sharing a story with Laxus. "In fact, Romeo told me that the first time Gray met a dryad – that was the night the White Witch killed Lion – he screamed so loud that the army general, Athylt, came bursting in the tent thinking that the Witch had come to torture Gray. Romeo got quite a laugh out of it and didn't let Gray live it down."
Laxus laughed. "So, do you think stars do that too, leave their star in form of a person?"
"Kind of," said Lucy, "Only, I think that they bring the whole star with them, and appear as a ball of gas. Actually, I'm not really sure what stars are. I mean, look at Ramandu and his daughter, they both were normal people. I think. They looked like normal people. Maybe the stars have planetary bodies – similar to the tree of a dryad – and they come as people, like how the dryads have petal spirirts?"
Suddenly, Laxus said, "No, the star has to be made of gas. Ramandu said, 'In your world, my son, that is not what a star is but only what it is made of.' So therefore, they are made of gas."
England 1945
"Lucy?" Gray stuck his head around the door. "Are you coming?"
"In a minute," said Lucy. Thankfully, Gray didn't ask any questions about Lucy's sudden secrecy and he shut the door quietly behind himself.
"So they're people?" asked Wendy when he had left.
"Well, I imagine they are," said Lucy. She gave another wistful glance at the stars. "I haven't been visited by one, so I couldn't tell you," she fibbed.
"I wish I was visited by a star."
Lucy felt really bad for Wendy – here they were, feeding her lies, and now the girl was longing for them to be real – but what could be done about it? If Lucy told the truth, it might only increase her unhappiness, but if she kept lying, who knew what would happen. So Lucy just said the first thing that came to mind.
"Let's make a wish, shall we? What was the rhyme again? Ah, yes, this I lear... um... made up, for Narnia: Star light, star bright, first star I see tonight, if I may, if I might, have the wish I wish tonight." Lucy recited the poem taught to her by Tumnus and stood up, partially because she didn't want to prolong Wendy's stargazing, and partially because she didn't want her cousin to see the tears that had formed in her eyes. "Come on, let's go inside, I'm freezing."
"One moment, please." Wendy settled her eyes on the brightest star - the North Star, although of course she did not know that, being the small child she was. Her eyes closed tight, then re-opened. Lucy kept silent, for she already knew what Wendy had wished. Together, the two went back inside.
What they didn't see, though, was a bright beam of light shoot across the sky. One would have thought it to be a shooting star if they had seen (or, if they had the imagination for it, aliens). Then, light swirled in a single place on the porch. It was nothing at first, just light until the particles shot in random directions to form a beautiful woman.
"Your majesty, I came as fast as I-" The star stopped talking. She was alone, in front of the run-down Cambridge house. "I came as fast as I could," she whispered. The star was as upset as Wendy would have been upon learning her missed opportunity for as rare as it is for a human to meet a star, it is rare for a star to meet a human, only Queen Lucy the Valiant was able to.
Out of curiosity, she peeked into the nearest window, and saw Lucy, Gray, and Romeo laughing heartily, while Erza sat elegantly with her legs crossed and a forced smile on her face, watching the little ones open presents. "That's King Gray and High King Romeo! From the Golden Age! And, is that Queen Erza? I can't tell, her face seems very pale. I do hope she is well – her lips look rather red compared to her face, so maybe she's sick?"
Another star shot from the sky and appeared next to the woman. "Curious, isn't it?" said he. "They dress so strange."
"Yes, but look, Queen Erza seems ill. Perhaps we should get a healer?"
The star shook his head sadly. "Queen Erza dresses the silliest of all, and even worse, Lion has not heard from her in a long time. I'm afraid we're losing her."
"Maybe if we visit her-"
"Lion won't allow it."
"Why not?" They stepped back from the window to sit on the porch together, just as Lucy and Wendy had been doing.
"The Sons of Adam and Daughters of Eve are not accustomed to us – did you ever pay attention to Ramandu?"
"Oh, I do wish Lion would bring them back to Narnia."
"Soon, my dear ones," said Lion who had appeared behind them. "Soon. I'm afraid Erza may not be coming, though." The stars gasped. "There is still hope, but she must make the decision on her own. But now, we must return home."
With a last look at the happy family inside, the particles that were the stars began to swirl again before they disappeared altogether. Lion breathed on the house, and for a moment, Erza seemed happy, genuinely happy. Then, her she smoothed her dress and that look melted into her old composure. Lion cast a sad glance in her direction and slowly turned to walk away.