Metamorphosis || Edmund Pevensie

Chapter 5: New Beginnings

Six years passed by and Narnia had never seen such a prosperous reign since King Farhan and Queen Helena's reign, although nobody alive at that time remembered them apart from the stars. The Pevensies were not children or teenagers anymore. They grew taller with grace in the time that passed by and lost their baby faces. They couldn't remember their time in England as much as their time in Narnia seemed more like home. They ruled faithfully and abided by the Prophecy.

There was peace among the nations, except for the occasional battle with countries who tried to defy the Four Rulers. The initiators of such battles were pardoned most of the time, in hope that they would lead a better path.

The castle would hold the occasional balls every year, in order to let the High King choose a potential wife for himself, but that was the Council's intentions. The siblings only wanted to have a time of relaxation during those nights, not to mention the rich food that would be prepared for everyone.

Although the Pevensies thought that they were the only human beings in Narnia at that time, Robin was no longer a bird. She was back to her original form as a human and kept her distance from the Royalty. She lived with the Narnians in the Shuddering Wood. Well, she lived in a nearby town but she considered the woods her home and Narnians her family. They taught her all the scripts and languages that she needed to know and she was grateful to Oreius, the General of the Centaurs for everything that she was.

Oreius was the first person to have found her by the river bed after the Battle of Beruna. She struggled to speak with him at first but he finally understood the real reason for the joining of the stars to represent peace that he had observed the previous week. He wanted to take her to the young Kings and Queens immediately but the wordless human begged him to let her be as she was. Robin did so because she couldn't live in a castle because it would only remind her of her loss.

He taught her how to speak, read and write along with the craftsmanship of sparring, using a bow and arrow and tactics for survival. When he caught her awake very early in the morning one day, humming a very old Narnian melody lost to time, he taught her astronomy. Her fascination with the moon and the stars was very obvious to him. When he asked her about it, she confided in him about her imagination of her parents on the moon. She told them that it made it easier for her to remember certain memories that she never wanted to forget. He did keep a strict timing for her to sleep, which she had to follow from that day.

He gave her a name - Dhruvika. But she was so used to hearing a bird's name that she preferred being called by that. It was a way to be connected to her roots. Her parents were one of the closest families to High King Farhan and Queen Helen. All that Dhruvika was came from the culture that would have been lost to her if it wasn't for the scriptures that taught her the true history - her true self.

Dhruvika asked Oreius about the alignment of the stars that he had mentioned when they first met and he revealed that it was going to be a time for love and future. "What does that mean?"

"The stars are guides of our life, Princess."

"You can call me by my name, Oreius. I am no princess."

"It's a force of habit." He smiled. "If you had agreed to live at the castle, it wouldn't have been a problem."

"I can't..." She shook her head. "And you know why that is so."

There was one problem though. The bird was still a part of her. She turned into a bird for twelve hours, which usually was from ten in the morning. Even though Oreius set up a personal lockdown for her human self, she would stay awake till the sun rose up over the mountains overlooking the great Cair Paravel and she would sleep once she turned into a bird, away from the responsibilities of life and the noise of the world.

When twilight came upon the land, Dhruvika would fly to the forests on the edge of Castle Cair to sit on a sturdy branch and look at the flickering lights. She went there almost every day because of the view that she got from there.

The castle may have been facing the gorgeous beach but the backdoors faced the forests. She would stare at the gradient sky, the blue dissolving into the purple and occasionally, she would hear the voice of Edmund Pevensie. She had never dared to cross the line of the trees to see him from up close, but wondered what it would be like if they could meet each other.

In spending her time there, she would turn back into a human and would find her way back home through the dense forests. Her friends would inquire of her occasional trips and were conspiring with each other on the potential of a secret admirer.

"Oh please!" She rolled their eyes at them one night.

"Come on, tell us who he is." Starshine, daughter of Oreius, insisted.

"There is no one!"

"There is someone." The dryads tried to get the truth out but nothing worked, one of whom was close to the Valiant Queen herself.

Dhruvika was very stubborn, but that was a good quality unlike what most people thought and in this story, stubbornness is the key to life. "Now, if you may excuse me, I'm going to go to sleep."

"Or to dream about the secret boy." Her friends giggled behind her back but she shook her head, too tired to argue.

Following the same routine one evening, Robin shook her head when she imagined what she would tell him if they ever met. She craned her neck to look at the moon to distract her thoughts but the outline of the trees were blocking her view all of a sudden.

"How dare you?" She wanted to scold the trees.

She tried to perch from branch to branch but nothing seemed to work. She took a deep breath and walked into the clearing, but the moon was still hiding from her, like a newly engaged bride. Robin groaned at that analogy. 

She flew up until she could catch a glimpse of the moon but the castle towers came in the way eventually. Her head turned left, her eyes widening at the only possibility for that night's dosage of the heavens.

She had to take the help of the castle balcony. The vantage point was absolutely perfect. She stood there and watched the sun disappear behind the mountains and into the horizon. But having been lost in her thoughts, she did not hear the footsteps of someone climbing down the stairs or the fact that she had turned back into a human until that someone spoke.

"Who are you?"