Ship to Shore

Epilogue

[Note: A portion of this was taken from the Last Battle by C.S. Lewis himself. I will mark said portion as such: ()]

Peter, Marion and Edmund had gone back to get the rings. Everyone else was already on another train.

Once they'd gotten the rings, they arrived back at the train station and were readying to climb onto the train. Peter glanced at his brother. "They're coming way too fast." Another train rammed into the platform.

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Marion woke up dressed in a long blue Narnian dress in a field.

She noticed Peter, Edmund, Lucy, Polly, Professor Kirke, Helen and Mr. Pevensie, which she found odd.

(How did you get here?" Professor Kirke asked.

"There's not much to tell," said Peter. "Edmund, Marion and I were standing on the platform and we saw your train coming in. I remember thinking, and saying it was taking the bend far too fast."

"And what happened then?" said Jill.

"Well, it's not very easy to describe, is it, Edmund?" said the High King.

"Not very," said Edmund. "It wasn't at all like that other time when we were pulled out of our own world by Magic. There was a frightful roar and something hit me with a bang, but it didn't hurt. And I felt not so much scared as—well, excited. Oh—and this is one queer thing. I'd had a rather sore knee, from a hack at rugger. I noticed it had suddenly gone. And I felt very light. And then—here we were."

"It was much the same for us in the railway carriage," said the Lord Digory, wiping the last traces of the fruit from his golden beard. "Only I think you and I, Polly, chiefly felt that we'd been unstiffened. You youngsters won't understand. But we stopped feeling old."

"After the shock and the noise," said Lucy, "we found ourselves here."

"You do not yet look so happy as I mean you to be."

Lucy said, "We're so afraid of being sent away, Aslan. And you have sent us back into our own world so often."

"No fear of that," said Aslan. "Have you not guessed?"

Their hearts leaped and a wild hope rose within them.

"There was a real railway accident," said Aslan softly. "Your father and mother and all of you are—as you used to call it in the Shadow-Lands—dead. The term is over: the holidays have begun. The dream is ended: this is the morning.")

Marion's gaze turned to Aslan and she smiled before turning to the others with the same smile.

She turned to Edmund and took his hand.

Edmund smiled before saying, "Are you ready?"

"More than anything," she replied.

After a moment, Marion turned to Aslan and asked, "What of Susan?"

Aslan's gaze was sullen. "Susan is no longer a Friend of Narnia. But there is hope for her yet."

Marion nodded slowly. "I do pray she comes back to her faith."

"As do I, dear one."

Marion shifted her grip, lacing her fingers through Edmund's and said, "Friends of Narnia, let us celebrate. The long, dark night has ended and the bright, eternal dawn has just begun."

Edmund kissed Marion's temple and gently squeezed her hand.

The Friends of Narnia journeyed into Aslan's Country, not once looking back at the the world they'd left behind.