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“I once saw a magical land,” said Lucy, “a land of eternal youth. Such wonders there were! Pictures that moved on the walls, and music from faraway lands piped through the air, and carriages that pulled themselves — without horses!” Lucy’s eyes sparkled. “There were even machines that flew like great metal gryphons through the sky!”
A tiny cloven-footed Faun nudged a lazing Wolf cub. “I love the Dowager’s stories,” he said, gripping his budding horns in excitement.
Dutifully, the serious young princess asked the question all stories require: “What happened next, Grandmother?”
“The real question is...” Lucy leaned forward as far as her aging back would permit. “What happened first?”
When Lucy was twelve years old, her most royal siblings stayed out all night to dance with Bacchus and his Maenads. Lucy was deemed still too young for the midnight romp in the woods, and was left behind.
Lucy deemed this a bunch of silly rot, and sneaked out of her chambers, slid down the balustrade, and followed her most royally unfair siblings into the wood.
They were not hard to find. The singing and trumpeting, the chants and the drumbeats all pointed the way. But somehow, Lucy became lost. The music disintegrated into a cacophony of cicadas, a whisper of wind and something yet softer. A blowy, quietly hissing sort of sound.
Lucy followed it.
The trees grew deeper and closer together, and they murmured among themselves in a language she had not yet learned. A young fir reached out a limb and tickled her neck. Lucy giggled, and the wood brightened.
Then she saw it.
A short, glossy black tree stood in a clearing. It was bare but for a single branch. At its top, a fire guttered, enclosed by glass. Even from a distance, Lucy felt its warmth on her face.
“Magic,” she whispered.
“Yes,” said a voice.
Lucy turned, expecting Aslan, and was startled to see a stag. His coat was a pure, blinding white, like snow under a midday sun. His antlers gleamed like gold. Only his eyes were dark — not the sleepy-dark of a normal deer, but sorcery-dark.
Lucy shivered.
“Do not be afraid, my Queen.” The stag bowed. “I am not here to harm you. Do you not know that she who captures me is entitled to a wish?”
Lucy giggled. “I haven’t captured you,” she pointed out sensibly.
“Yet, here I stand before you.” The stag’s eyes warmed. “Wishes are mine to grant, by Aslan’s decree. You have one wish, Your Majesty — use it well.”
Lucy brightened. “I already know what I want,” she declared. Then it occurred to her how that sounded, and she jutted her chin out. She was not a little girl. She was a Queen.
But the stag did not argue or condescend. He only waited patiently, without flicking an ear.
“I wish for Narnia to be happy and prosperous. Always. No more hundred-year winters, no more famine and fear."
The stag tilted his head. “That is a very long wish, my Queen.” The soft white fur at his throat dappled in the light cast by the iron tree.
Lucy’s heart sank. “Can’t I wish for that, then?” She couldn’t think of anything she wanted more. Every other wish paled by comparison. Except for Aslan, of course, but she knew instinctively that he was not something to be wished for. He was someone to love, from near or far, someone to be called upon in need — but never summoned. “Can’t I wish for all Narnia?”
The wickless lamp flickered. For some reason, it made Lucy think of snow.
“For Narnia, yes,” the stag said at long last. “For always? That I cannot promise.”
“Oh.” Lucy twisted a stray lock of hair around her thumb, thinking. “How long could I wish for?” She had in mind a hundred years, to balance the Witch’s winter. It seemed like a very long time, and yet some of her friends were older still. A century was not so long for a centaur, faun or dryad. Would her friends thank her for a golden age that lasted only half a lifetime? And what if even that were too long for the stag to grant? Lucy bit her lip.
The White Stag regarded her seriously. He bowed his great head, so his golden antlers nearly brushed her golden hair. His breath smelled like sweet spring grass and morning air after rain. “This much I can grant you, no more and no less: health and happiness, peace and prosperity, for all Narnia, as long as Your Majesty lives.”
Lucy swallowed hard at the magnitude of the blessing — and the burden.
The stag nuzzled her cheek. “Rest easy, little Queen. Have I not just said that all will be well?”
Blowing out a shaky breath, Lucy let the new responsibility settle into her heart. She must live for Narnia, now more than ever before. For a moment, the thought threatened to overwhelm her. She was just a girl, too small for all of Narnia to depend on. Yet even as the worry formed, it was eclipsed by a blossoming joy. Peace. Happiness. Narnia’s future, assured. It was a Queen’s greatest wish come true. How could all not be well?
“Thank you,” she whispered, daring to stroke the silken head.
She did not remember saying goodbye, nor returning to the edge of the forest. There, Susan found her. There were no recriminations, only laughter as the young queens joined the revelry and danced with the fauns until the sun rose turned the wood to gold.
When Lucy was sixteen years old, a Galman prince tried to kiss her. She froze, battling fiercely in her heart between opposing desires. Hit him, kiss him, refuse him, flee him... In that moment, she tried to think what her siblings would do. Susan would endure it or deliver a polite rebuff, whichever she felt in the greater service of Narnia. Edmund would skillfully distract an unwanted suitor, and Peter — well, to be honest Lucy wasn't sure what Peter did with the princesses who came courting, but she was sure it was all very distant and proper. If not, she didn't want to know.
Her siblings all agreed: marriages and alliances were necessary to ensure the future of Narnia.
"Queen Lucy?" He was little more than a boy, really.
Lucy, however, was much more than a girl. And she knew something her siblings did not. "You're very nice," she said, taking a firm step backwards, "but I need to visit my subjects now."
The prince was obviously mystified. "Now?"
"Yes."
"In the dark?" He squared his shoulders. "I will escort you, Your Majesty."
Lucy thought he sounded a little fearful. She took pity on him. "There is nothing for me to fear in the woods, nor from the dark. You may return to the palace." Before he could answer, she melted into the darkness between the pines. There, safely out of sight, she breathed a sigh of relief.
This time, when she saw the faint light, she headed unerringly for it.
The White Stag was waiting for her in the glow of the lamplight. “Have you come for another wish, oh my Queen and valiant Daughter of Eve?”
I wish never to marry— Lucy banished the thought before it was fully formed. She didn't really hate the idea of marriage, just the tedium of courtship and the pressure to ensure a line of succession. Besides, whether she married or not would be her decision and hers alone. No magic.
“I came with questions,” she said instead. “Can you answer them?”
“I can,” the stag said solemnly. "Whether I will depends on the question.”
That was fair, and indeed more than she’d hoped. Lucy placed a hand on the iron tree, feeling the contrast of cool metal beneath her fingers and warmth of the lamp. “What is this called?” she asked finally. “It seems like something out of a dream, or a dream within a dream.”
“It is a lamppost.” The stag scraped his antlers against it, leaving shreds of golden velvet behind. “And it is not from a dream, but rather from another world. Your world.”
Lucy shook her head in stout denial. “Narnia is my world.”
Still, the insidious thought took root: was there yet another place waiting for her? Other adventures? Other friends she had somehow forgotten? “Can you show me?” she whispered.
In answer, the stag turned and walked into the trees. Lucy followed. The obliging evergreens gently held their boughs aside so she could pass. Lucy trailed her hand across their soft needles in greeting, and then she gasped upon feeling — fur?
“Look,” commanded the stag.
Lucy pushed aside a fur coat and peered through a cracked doorway into... a room. It did not look like a magical world. It had one window, as far as she could see, and was largely empty. In truth it resembled nothing so much as one of the spare rooms in Cair Paravel.
Spare room?
“Aslan’s mane,” she breathed. “It’s Spare Oom.”
“Look,” repeated the White Stag.
And Lucy watched in astonishment as a bluebottle on the windowsill flicked its wings ever so slowly... up... and down. Time stood almost still. “Is it the land of eternal youth?” The thought burned brightly, painfully in her breast. Peace and prosperity for Narnia, as long as you live...
“Not eternal, my Queen. But a century in Narnia passes in the blink of an eye in that world, and a year there is longer than a Narnian age.”
She wanted to see more. Lucy stretched out her hand to touch the wood door.
“Take care, Valiant Queen,” warned the stag, “for once you pass through you may not return again for generations, if ever."
Lucy jerked her hand back in horror.
In all her contemplation of the blessed thorniness of the stag’s gift to her, she had never imagined that she might need to leave Narnia to save it.
Gently, the stag lowered his head to touch hers. The weight of his antlers felt like a crown. And then she remembered.
When Lucy was twenty-three years old, the White Stag was spotted in the Castle Wood.
“Let us go to the hunt,” suggested Peter. “If one of us catches him, he will grant a boon. I know not whether his power may extend to soothing the tension with Tashbaan, but surely it is worth one morning’s ride to see?”
Lucy’s heart clenched painfully. Her secret burned within her until she feared it would show upon her face like a brand.
Susan’s face had darkened at the mention of Tashbaan, but now it cleared. “Or we could wish for the perfect mate, or for a successor.” This came uncomfortably close to the truth, and Lucy may have given all away but for Edmund’s interjection.
“I have heard of farmers counting their chickens before the hatch, or shepherds numbering the flock before lambing. But this, dear brother and sister, is nothing more than idle fantasizing. Go we to the hunt, or no?”
“No,” blurted Lucy. They all turned to look at her. Words tumbled from her mouth without conscious thought. “I have met the White Stag while walking through the wood, and I would be most distressed to chase him like a common deer.”
This pronouncement, naturally, elicited many questions. Lucy answered them all truthfully, always dreading the next. But curiously, none of her siblings ever asked what she had wished. Perhaps they assumed, as she once had, that the wish would only be granted upon catching the stag, not merely meeting him.
For a moment, she was tempted to tell them everything. About Mother and Father, England and the war, the Professor, the wardrobe, the Macready, the lamppost... and then the moment passed.
What would the knowledge gain them, except the same pain, longing and heavy burden Lucy had carried since she was sixteen? Did Aslan gently fade their memories only for Lucy to prod them painfully into life? They had already chosen to give up their own home for Narnia once. Lucy knew in her heart that they would do so again, but with a shadow cast over their former joy.
Her heart, she thought, could be large enough for both. It had been so far. She would carry this weight for them a little longer, at least. She could always tell them another day, any other day.
They did not go to the hunt.
When Lucy was forty-five years old, the Calormene army once again tested the mettle of Archenland, and Narnia rode to its aid. The skirmish was over quickly, but Peter was grievously wounded. Her cordial cured him swiftly without so much as a scar.
But the wound remained vivid in Lucy's memory. Shaken, she sat alone in her tent that night. What if she had not gone to battle at her brother's side? What if the precious cordial ever ran out? Peter could have died without ever knowing the truth, without ever remembering his first home.
"I have been scared and selfish," Lucy told her siblings their first night back at Cair Paravel. "And I have kept a wonderful, terrible secret from you for many years."
Peter's frown was magnificent. Susan's face was calm, but her worry showed in how she twisted her rings around her slender fingers. Edmund wrapped an arm around Lucy's shoulders. "Do not fear, dear sister. Tell us?"
Lucy bit her lip. "Do you remember when we were going to hunt the White Stag?"
"You told us you had met him," remembered Susan. "But you never did tell us how."
And so Lucy took a deep breath, summoned all her courage, and started at the beginning. She told them of the stag's promise — a peaceful future for Narnia so long as Lucy herself lived — and, more reluctantly, she told them of Spare Oom, their true homeland, creeping slowly on through time in their absence.
Finally, her words ran dry. "Let me show you," said Lucy.
The night was dark and deep, and the whole wood slumbered. When the kings and queens reached the clearing, the undying flame in the lamppost flickered in welcome.
"What would happen if we went through?" wondered Edmund aloud. The outline of a door was faintly visible through the trees, as if a brighter light burned just beyond it.
"The White Stag said that age upon age might pass in Narnia before we could return," Lucy answered solemnly.
"I wonder what would happen if we died here." Peter's voice was distant. "Would we return to that other world, where time moves so slowly?"
"It must not seem slow to the people there," Susan pointed out.
Peter nodded absently. "I would like to see it before I die." The wistfulness in his voice caught Lucy by surprise.
Despairing guilt flared within her breast. I should have told them years ago.
"Let's make a pact," Edmund suggested. "When we are all old and feeble, the first to lose his wits goes through."
"What a thing to say!" scolded Susan.
"Hmm, yes, you have a point. If your wits are gone, you won't be able to fully appreciate the wonders of Spare Oom. Did you say there were horseless carriages, Lu?"
Lucy gaped at him in distress.
"I never said my wits would be gone," Susan retorted loftily. "I think you have already taken leave of yours, brother."
"Peace!" Peter cried, laughing.
"Have you all gone mad?" Lucy stared at her siblings. "Are you not angry with me for withholding the truth? For making the choice for you?"
Peter sobered. "We rejoice in the gift you have secured for Narnia, and we lament the burden you have carried alone all these years, dear sister. How can we be angry? Yet let there be no more secrets between us."
Lucy blinked away tears. "I am sorry."
Peter kissed the top of her head.
"I do think we should come back," said Edmund, breaking the spell. "When we are old, I mean. Wouldn't it be something to see before we die?"
Even Susan had an odd light in her eyes as she stared into the deep darkness and the sliver of light shining between trees. "Let us each return to this place when we are ready to depart this world," she proclaimed. Then, incongruously, she giggled. "Depart this world! How those words carry new meaning!"
It was not strange to talk of death, for together they had fought in many battles and had long ago made their peace with the thought of dying for Narnia. And Lucy had long intended to make one last journey to the lamppost before her own death. But in all her pondering and worrying and imagining, it had never occurred to her that her siblings might wish to do the same. "But… then you could not be buried in Narnia," she said in a small voice.
"Thank Aslan for that!" exclaimed Edmund. "Can you imagine it? The Fauns, Satyrs and Dryads would want our bodies to be burned, the Minotaurs and Merfolk would want to send us out to sea, the small woodland folk would have us buried, the Centaurs would leave us out under the stars – it would be a royal mess."
Lucy burst out laughing even through her tears. She through her arms around her siblings and drew them all close. "When the time comes," she promised, "I will bring you each here. And whatever happens next, I will join you someday."
Peter smiled at her fondly. "What makes you think you won't go first, Lu? You usually do, you know, when adventure is involved."
In the end, it was Peter who went first — just as he had always led the charge in battle. Every wound he'd ever taken in service of Narnia seemed to trouble him, despite the cordial and the tender, soothing hands of his wife while she had yet lived. Peter was old and gnarled like an oak tree when Lucy helped him off his horse for the last time.
A few years later, Susan followed the same path through the door where Lucy dared not follow. Not yet.
Edmund, ever the contrarian, went alone. Lucy barely caught up to him in time for a breathless, scolding, tearful word before he disappeared into the trees.
Every time, Lucy had seen a flash of gold. Every time, she wondered whether it was the stag's antlers, or the light streaming through the widening door, or a glimpse of Aslan himself.
Every time, the ache of loss was tempered only by the thought that time moved slowly in Spare Oom, and she might yet see the faces of her siblings once more on the other side of the door.
Lucy held all these things silently in her heart. The only truth that mattered was known well enough: Aslan was calling his Kings and Queens home to himself.
When Lucy was ninety-three years old, she felt the end coming in her bones, and she longed to see her brothers and sister again. So she gathered the entire royal family and all her friends, and they held a feast for no reason other to enjoy each other’s company, which was the best occasion of all.
Afterwards, Lucy bade her grandchildren open all the windows so the cool evening air could come rushing in and join them. As she told story after story, the trees listened at the window, all manner of birds and small beasts perched in their boughs.
Lucy started at the end, and went backwards. “Your grandfather and I had such adventures sailing in the Eastern Sea! That is where I met an enchanted dragon, who turned out to be a man. By Aslan’s grace, he is a man again, but the cursed treasure lurks still in the caverns of that hidden isle, waiting to ensnare a new dragon for a new age.”
“But even before that,” she said, casting her mind back and taking her spellbound audience with her, “before I ever met your grandfather, I climbed the highest peak in the Western Wild to treat with the giants there. Yes, giants! Not the ones we know of the Ettinsmoor, but giants that seemed made of living stone. How they furrowed their brows at me!” Lucy laughed at the memory. “And let me tell you, dear ones, when an entire mountain frowns at you, it is best to sit up straight and mind your manners!”
“And to hold your tongue?” suggested Tumnus quietly from the corner by the fire. He was now a very old Faun indeed, and even the sunniest days felt like the cold of winter to him, but his mind and eyes and wit were yet sharp.
Lucy smiled at her oldest and dearest friend. “That would have been wiser still,” she admitted to much general laughter, “but that never has been my strongest round in the tourney.”
On and on, the stories rolled back the mists of time and memory until Lucy came to the very beginning, which she knew was also the very end. “The day I met Mr. Tumnus,” said Lucy, “I had only just arrived from a magical land. Such wonders there were! Pictures that moved on the walls, and music from faraway lands piped through the air, and carriages that pulled themselves — without horses!” Lucy’s eyes sparkled. “There were even machines that flew like great metal gryphons through the sky!”
At her feet, a tiny cloven-footed Faun nudged a lazing Wolf cub. “I love the Dowager’s stories,” he said, gripping his budding horns with excitement.
Dutifully, the youngest princess asked the question all stories require: “What happened next, Grandmother?”
“You know that already,” laughed Lucy. “My brothers and sister and I left the land of Spare Oom and the shining city of War Drobe and came to Narnia! The real question is...” Lucy leaned forward as far as her aging back would permit. “What happened first?”
“What happened first?” shouted the young Faun.
Lucy smiled. Now that the time had come, she found that the sadness she had expected almost all her life was absent. There was only quiet joy, peace, contentment — and perhaps something like longing. “Let me show you,” she said.
They all trooped into the forest. Normally the various Narnians would be gamboling and singing, but all took their cue from their somber Queen.
Lucy walked slowly and quietly, farewelling her land with every step. When they reached the lamppost, a chorus of gasps and murmurs broke the stillness.
“Mother,” began Lucy’s eldest daughter, but she fell silent when the stag appeared.
“Old friend,” Lucy greeted him, once more daring to stroke the silken head and caress the golden horns. “Are you here to keep your promise?”
Health and happiness. Peace and prosperity for Narnia. As long as you live.
“The promise is kept,” the White Stag replied solemnly. “I am here to farewell my friend and my Queen.”
Lucy was old and tired and ready for the journey to come to an end. But she was also a Queen, and there was yet one more service she could perform for Narnia.
A minute in that world is an age in Narnia.
No matter how slowly the other world moved, Lucy did not think it would take long to die. Aslan would not let her linger cruelly. But even if it took only a moment, that one precious movement in a slow-moving world could buy Narnia an age of peace. Lucy's heart lightened as she looked around at her loved ones, envisioning lifetimes of happiness for them and their descendants.
What better legacy could she ask for?
“I am ready,” she said. Her voice rang like a bell through the clearing. The lamppost sputtered and then seemed to brighten.
And at last, Aslan appeared.
“Come, dear one.”
As Lucy walked to his side, the stiffness and pain of age eased, and then faded completely. She straightened. Her steps became firm. Her vision cleared, and as she turned to look one last time upon her beloved children and grandchildren, she smiled as widely and brightly as she ever had in her youth.
Lucy placed her hand on Aslan’s mane, and her arthritic old fingers felt no pain as they tightened their grip.
Together, they walked towards the door in the wood. Lucy trailed the fingers of her free hand through the pine needles, and then through the furs, and then she was using both hands to push aside heavy coats, and then she fell through the open doorway, gasping and laughing.
Strong, young hands helped her up.
Lucy looked up, astonished, into her brother’s face.
“Welcome to Spare Oom,” said Peter. His voice broke, and Lucy could not tell whether it was from sheer emotion or adolescence. He was miraculously alive, and impossibly young again. Then Edmund and Susan were hugging her, and they were all laughing and weeping with joy. Lucy could not tell whether time was standing still or catching them up in its whirlwind.
Into this tableau walked the Professor, a cricket ball in his hand and a twinkle in his eye.
“It’s a long story!” cried Lucy before anyone could ask any questions. “We must have tea.”
She stayed behind but a moment longer. She closed the wardrobe door gently, marveling at the smooth skin of her hands as she caressed the wood. "Farewell, dear ones," she whispered to the closed door. She fancied she heard the echoes of hunting horns, or perhaps a Lion's roar, in reply.
Her hair golden once more, her young blood singing in her veins, Lucy skipped out of the spare room. A new lifetime stretched before her — and ages upon ages of peace for Narnia.
When Lucy was ninety-four years old, older than she had ever been before, she felt the winter settling in her bones. But the radiator was warm, and so was the tea, and so was the blanket her daughter-in-law had crocheted for her. Lucy thought she could conquer one more winter. After all, there were still stories to be told.
"What happened next, Great-Grandmother?" The little blonde-haired girl bounced on her knee.
Lucy winced, laughing. "Gently, dear one! You know what happened next. My brothers and sister and I left the land of Narnia, and returned to what we once called Spare Oom."
"That's in England," declared the little girl knowledgeably.
"Yes, we came back to England." Lucy nodded. "We were never called back to Narnia, for there was no need great enough."
Lucy's granddaughter bit her lip. "You didn't have any more adventures?"
"Of course we had adventures!" Lucy's smile was as bright and wide as it ever had been when she was young. "Don't you know what happened next?"