The Next Four Months

Chap eleven

(Susan)

"Mum?" I couldn't believe she was actually standing in front of me. My mother. Here. In Narnia. It barely made sense, how could she be here? She wasn't a child and she certainly wasn't a believer. I almost felt like I'd been found bed-hopping, I felt she shouldn't be seeing me like this, that she wouldn't understand my other life, my alter ego as High Queen. Her world was London England. 6 Dorset Avenue to be precise not Narnia!

I almost didn't want her in that room, she would argue and be critical and have no understanding of anything I or the others tried to tell her. She was used to being in charge of us all, after Father went to war mum did everything, she worked, mended and smacked us- all the things that had once been Dad's jobs. She had been mum and Dad for the past three years and not had anyone to tell her otherwise. She was kind but strong-minded.

"Susan, the," she paused to laugh like a madman, "the mouse showed me in."

She spotted the babies in my arms and flew to them as if they were a box of free silk stockings and a whole 6oz of chocolate.

"Oh Susan they are beautiful,"

For a brief second I really thought she understood I thought she saw them and me and it had clicked in her head but I should've known.

"Who's are they?"It came as soon as she'd seen them. She hasn't even noticed how big my stomach still was. She would never have suspected a thing- just like Mrs Hope had never expected her daughter Sarah to love another girl. Things happened different in this day.

I offered Inara to her and she took the tiny babe happily, cooing over my daughter. Her granddaughter. Inara and my Mum shared glances back and forth, the baby's bright blue eyes staring deep into her lined face. My mother's eyes widened, her smile vanished and slowly, very slowly she turned to look at me. Her eyes asked a thousand questions, disbelief with no choice but to believe. She couldn't speak just looked at me and then,

"Susan what's going on here? Where am I?"

Nothing. She hadn't got it. And I didn't have the heart to tell her, not now. I didn't want to start an argument, didn't want to upset things I felt too groggy to deal with anything else, my brain was already waiting to explode from the worries for the tot in my arms. My poor baby, she blinked at me, her fuzzy, silky dark hair sticking up on her slightly egg shaped head. Her eyes were darker than her sisters, perhaps she'd gain the bewitching black eyes of her Father.

"Susan," my Mother asked again, drawing my attention from my firstborn.

"I, Mum this is not the best time to ask questions. There's so much to explain-,"

"Of course there is! I was in London a few hours ago. I walked through my kitchen door and I was in a forest!"

Her yelling made Inara feel uncomfortable and she began to wail in the crackly voice that belonged to all newborns, she wriggled in my Mum's arms and she crossed the floor to hand the baby back to me.

"She's probably hungry, maybe she needs to go back to her mother," I propped Diara further into the crook of one arm and went to take Inara. Mum shook her head,

"No, no I'll carry her, where will I find her Mum?" I froze, I really didn't want to tell her, really didn't want to. For the first time since I'd met Caspian I felt I'd done something wrong, knew she wouldn't see it that way.

"You don't need to look. Mum, your holding your granddaughter."

(Caspian)

"What! What is this, how could you do this?"

I could not believe my eyes, could not believe I was seeing and hearing this. She had led the rebellion. I glared at the dark-haired and sun kissed figure of my Aunt as she stood before me in the hands of two guards.