February 26, 1941; Wednesday
I sat on a bench waiting for the train. Yesterday, I had received word that Doctor Morris and General Stine had Eamon’s papers all in order, and my brother would be at Goosey Station this afternoon. I arrived early so Eamon wouldn’t need to wait around for me.
I glanced at the cloud-shine. Nearly three o’clock. Train should be here any minute.
Off in the distance, I heard the faint sound of a train whistle. I smiled to myself. “Right on time.”
The steam engine pulled up to the station at three o’clock on the dot. There were a few people that got off the cars – one of the last was Eamon. I spotted him by his red hair and height and by the bandage on his head, of course. I desperately wanted to run up to him and hug him and never let go, but with the slow way Eamon was walking, I settled for a quick walk. When I reached him, I almost burst into tears. Behind his green eye, I could see all the pain the war had caused him and it broke my heart to see it.
“Hey now,” my brother said gently, tucking my brown hair behind my ear with his right hand. “Don’t you get to cryin’. I’m not all that beat up.”
I gave a wet smile. “I don’t know about that,” I replied, motioning towards his eye. “We best get to Polly’s house so I can treat that quickly.”
“Lead the way, little sister.”
We walked as quickly as possible – which was quite slow because Eamon’s injury had thrown his body off-balance. We got to Helen and the buggy, and my brother gave me an odd look. He received an amused smile before I helped him in and put his luggage in the back. I climbed up into the buggy, released the brake, and guided Helen out of town. As the horse trotted down the road, I threw glances at Eamon to make sure he was alright. He looked tired, worn, but content. I must’ve looked back at him one too many times though, for he caught notice of it.
“Not used to seeing a bandage on someone’s head like this, are you?” he asked softly.
I gazed at him sadly. “Actually, Eamon, I’m quite used to it. I’ve seen my fair share of wounded, especially just after a battle,” I answered, leading into my tale of Narnia. “And I’ve lost a great many friends in battle, too.”
My brother narrowed his eye. “What do you mean, Belle? You’ve seen wounded this far out? ‘Battle’? Why did you use an outdated word?”
I added a small smile to my sad demeanor and watched the road as Helen pulled us along. “My adventure, Eamon. The one that Jesus sent me on. He sent me to another world, one that still uses bows and swords and is filled with creatures that are known as myths here.
“In that world, there was a country called Narnia, and that’s where the ‘mythological’ creatures lived, along with Talking Animals. The Narnians are ruled by a king and queen – a son of Adam and a daughter of Eve. I was brought there because the king and queen that were ruling had no children. I grew up with them as their princess, and when they passed on, I became queen. I fell in love, had children, fought in battles, and traveled to other countries for mostly diplomatic reasons.”
I fell silent for a moment to allow my brother to take in the condensed version of my life before moving on.
“Wait a minute,” he said. “You went to another world, ruled it, got married, and had kids?”
“Basically, only I ruled a country – not the whole world,” I answered, hoping that he would believe me.
“What was the name of the country again?”
“Narnia. She was created by Someone we know, Eamon. Can you guess Who it is?”
“Hmmm.” My brother thought a while before giving me a one-eyed smirk. “Jesus?”
A broad grin spread across my face. “Yes. He was there in Narnia, except that He is in the form of a lion. I believe Mary and Saint Michael the Archangel were there too, only they were in the form of stars. I was very comfortable there when I knew they were with me.”
I looked back at my brother. A smile was on his face, and mine only broadened.
“That’s wonderful, Belle. Can you tell me more about your life there?”
I felt like I was positively glowing. Eamon was one of the few people I truly trusted to believe every word I said. “I’ll tell you more, after we get inside,” I replied as we pulled into Polly’s yard.
Pulling Helen to a stop in front of the barn, I put the brake on and hopped out to help Eamon down and over to the fence so I could get Helen free of the buggy. After a few minutes, I led the mare to the pasture to be with Frank and Fledge. Eagerly, I walked back to Eamon and picked up his suitcase. We put an arm around each other as we walked to Polly’s house. From inside, Sam was in the window barking up a storm, with Miss Polly holding his collar firmly. By the time I hung up our coats, Sam toned his guard down to a growl.
I turned towards Miss Polly so I could introduce my brother. “Polly, this is my older brother Eamon. Eamon,” I said, turning towards him. “This is my caretaker, Polly.”
“It’s a pleasure to meet you, Eamon.”
“And you, Miss Polly.”
“Please, call me Polly.”
“It’s against my upbringing, Miss Polly,” my brother answered with a smile.
Miss Plummer smiled in response to his. “That’s alright. I’ve gotten used to it.”
I stepped forward a bit to get into the conversation. “Is everything ready upstairs, Miss Polly?”
She nodded. “Everything you had listed is in your bedroom.”
“Thank you very much.” I turned and reached for Eamon’s hand to lead him up the stairs. “This way, Eamon.”
“Lead on, royal sister,” he teased, and I laughed at him.
The two of us walked slowly up the stairs and entered my room. I helped Eamon sit in the desk chair, and I carefully undid the bandage around his eye. After the cloth was removed, I took a look at my brother’s eye. His green iris had swollen, due to the debris and careless extraction, and covered up his pupil.
“Can you see anything?” I asked Eamon.
“Nope. Notta thing,” he replied.
I went through a few tests on his eye before determining that the iris would need to be treated for certain. Turning to my desk which had a basin, a pitcher of water, the poultice and an application cloth, and a new bandage, I reached for the poultice jar and cloth. I unscrewed the jar and put a little bit of poultice on the cloth.
“Now, I want you to close your good eye, Eamon, but keep the damaged one open. Like when you would make me laugh when I was little,” I instructed.
“Do I stick out my tongue, too?” he asked, doing it along with everything I had asked.
“No, you don’t,” I answered, giggling.
Eamon returned his tongue to his mouth. “Aw, alright.”
Slowly and carefully, I applied the poultice to my brother’s iris. It was a tad difficult because he would flinch as soon as I touched the cloth to the eye, but I soon finished my work. Next, I took the pitcher of water, poured some in the basin, and dipped the second cloth in the water. I wrung the cloth out and started to clean up the poultice that missed Eamon’s eye. Finally, I wrapped the clean bandage around his head and clipped it in place.
“There,” I said when I was finished. “How’s that?”
“Much better, Belle. Where did you learn about that poultice?” my brother questioned.
“Narnia. One day, when I was about thirty, a group of young Fauns had been playing too roughly near windows. On accident, one went through a window – a smaller window, luckily – and he got glass in his eye. That day I learned from the healers how to carefully extract any debris from the delicate eye and how to make a poultice that will heal it,” I answered.
“How’d this Faun make out?”
“He became my sharpest shooter amongst the archers.”
“Huh,” Eamon grunted as he thought for a moment. “Think I’ll have similar results?” he asked in a mocking tone.
I rolled my eyes at him and laughed. “I’m not sure. This is the first time I’ve tried something from Narnia to see if it would work here.”
“Oh, so I’m the guinea pig, huh?” he teased.
I scrunched up my face into a playful glare. “Yes you are! And who knows? Maybe it’ll work.”
Eamon smiled broadly and put an arm around my shoulders. “That’s my sister. Now, how about you tell me more about your second life.”
-x-x-x-x-x-
Eamon went to bed soon after supper was finished. I let him take my bed and said I would sleep on the floor. He tried to argue with me about it – because he didn’t feel right kicking me out of the bed – but I reminded him that he needed it more than I did. I waited outside the door as Eamon changed into his pajamas in case he needed any help. He got along fine and called me in so I could say goodnight. I entered the room, and Eamon was getting under the bedcovers.
“Comfy?” I asked.
“Yes. Thank you for giving up the bed, Belle.”
“You need not thank me,” I said modestly.
“Yes, I do.”
I rolled my eyes good-naturedly. “Alright. I accept your gratitude. And you are welcome.”
My brother smiled triumphantly, which made me laugh, and Eamon joined in the laughter. We were being ridiculous – arguing over something so small. Very typical of us. The arguments always ended in us laughing at ourselves.
“Alright,” I said after we finished laughing. “You should get to sleep, and I need to finish some history reading.”
“Relearning?”
“Yes. Now go to sleep, Eamon.”
“Yes ma’am,” he said in a feigned military tone. I slapped my brother’s arm lightly before leaning down to give him a goodnight kiss.
“Good night, big brother.”
“Good night, lil sis.”
I turned the light off and exited the room. When I returned a couple of hours later to go to bed myself, I took the liberty of watching Eamon sleep. It was something I used to do back in Narnia. No matter what age my children were, I would go into their chambers a few hours after they retired just to watch them sleep. When Bremton and Mezinda were younger, Amesh used to join me, and he would normally end up carrying me back to our own chambers because I would be too sleepy to walk on my own.
-x-x-x-x-x-
I was wandering about a thick forest; my skirts made the overgrown grass and fallen leaves rustle. It was quiet – too quiet. I looked up to the sun, and from what light trickled through the tall trees, I figured it to be about midmorning.
Something was terribly wrong. If it’s midmorning, where were the Narnians? And why had the woods grown so thick? What had happened? I thought to myself.
There was a sudden Snap! I turned left, towards the noise. It was a Wolf. He was stalking something. I walked quickly to catch up to him and figure out what he was watching. From behind the Wolf, I tried to find what he was looking at. The woods thinned in the direction he was staring, and there was a young child just outside the trees. His skin was tan and his hair and eyes were dark.
Telmarine, I thought. What are they doing in Narnia?
I was then afraid for the child’s welfare. While I could gather that my people were being suppressed by the Telmarines, I did not want any Narnian killing an innocent child. I looked back to the Wolf and saw something in his demeanor that I hadn’t before. His hackles were up, but he wasn’t poised to pounce. He was on guard, not hunting. It seemed he was guarding the woods from the Telmarines.
“The Narnians must be in the woods,” I figured.
I continued to watch the child with the Wolf. He must have taken a step too close to the trees, for an older woman came screaming at the child.
“Caspian! Don’t go any closer to those trees! You know nothing nice is in there,” she said.
“But Mamma, I want to go exploring,” the child whined.
I rose from my position behind the Wolf guard and walked to the edge of the woods. I reached the last tree before an endless meadow, and rested my hand on it. There was a frightened whimper from the Wolf that caught the attention of the child – Caspian – and his mother.
Caspian turned in my direction. “MAMMA!!” he screamed as he pointed at me.
Caspian’s mother turned pale, grabbed her son, and they both took off running.
The last thing I heard from Caspian’s mother was her yelling to a guard, “Quick! Flee back to the castle! We must tell my husband, King Caspian the II, that the woods are haunted!”
Understanding that they had seen me, I began laughing to myself. I had been seen by Trem when I “visited” during Jadis’ reign, so it made sense that I would be seen again.
I turned back to the Wolf on guard. He looked spooked, but willing to figure out who I was. I walked up to him and sat down in front of him, letting my skirts settle on the ground. There was a bit of Mesha in him. This puzzled me, but I put my confusion aside, for I could feel my dream coming to an end. I stroked the Wolf’s head once and placed a kiss on his head.
“Carry on, good Wolf. Aslan’s Blessings.”
He gave me a doggy smile. “Yes, Majesty.”
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