Whisked Away

22. Preparing to Voyage

Caspian's POV
I spent a great deal of time with Shifra during the next few months. The first order of business for the voyage was a ship. I had designed, with Shifra's help, close to five ships, but we both feared none of them would survive the voyage so we began a new one. We decided on the name Dawn Treader, but I suspected that she would not have let me settle on another name. I liked it well enough so I did not mind.

We had finished the design in about a month and began to build the ship. We would have helped more with the construction if we had not been so busy with everything else. We had to pack food and drinks and figure out who was to be on our crew, where we planned to stop, who our captain would be, and who to leave as a regent. A few of those issues were solved easily enough such as the regent. We decided on Trumpkin to be in charge.

The food was also easily sorted, but the hardest part was by far deciding who was the be in the crew. Shifra and I spent many hours with the Lord Drinian, who was our captain, trying to figure out how many men were needed and who. "I would say at least twenty men, your majesty," Drinian replied to Caspian's question. "Maybe more than that in case we run into trouble. At most I would say thirty, but that would be pushing it."

"25 then," Shifra suggested. "We will have twenty-five men, including yourself Lord Drinian, and then Caspian and I makes twenty-seven. Is that manageable?"

"Yes, General," he replied, "I would say that those numbers work well. Your majesty would be in the King's cabin and there is a captain's cabin that you could take, General.  The rest of us under the deck."

"Oh no," she protested, "It is called a 'Captain's Cabin' for a reason. You should take it. Besides, I should like to sleep in a hammock below deck."

"But General," Drinian countered, as respectful as ever, "I'm no captain if I can't sleep in the same place as my men."

"And I am no general if I can't sleep in any condition. I have slept in worse places than in a hammock below the deck of a ship," she retorted.

I was watching their argument with slight amusement, but my entertainment was cut short when Drinian turned to me, "What do you say, your majesty?"

"Oh, going above me like that, I wouldn't have expected that from you Drinian," she said, faking hurt. He only smirked in reply and both looked to me.

"Well," I started, I honestly did not know what to say, "There is another cabin below deck, is there not?"

"Yes, your majesty, but it is only a storage room and has no bed or wardrobe or anything in it," Drinian replied.

"Then Shifra, you take that cabin and you can string up a hammock in there, but still have a room to yourself." Turning to Drinian I added in a lower voice, "There's no point arguing with her, stubborn as a mule, that one. Trust me, I've tried many times."

Although he still didn't like it, it was my arrangement that was agreed on in the end. The rest of the crew would sleep in hammocks in the larger part of below deck. Now, everything was in place. We were to set out in fourteen days time, one month before the anniversary of my coronation. Trumpkin was being left as the regent and while the people of Narnia were sad to see me leave, they understood why I did it.

I had now seen all of Narnia apart from the Lone Islands. Shifra had described them to me, but I longed to see them for myself. She seemed more than happy about the voyage and I had caught her many times with a dreamy look on her face. I had to admit I enjoyed seeing her like this. Before we started to plan the voyage, she was always stressed and rather frantic, but now she was all smiles and joy.

We still had yet to tell the court that we were courting, but rumors were spreading. People did not fail to notice the happy smiles we shared or the blushes when we danced together at parties. Finally Trufflehunter asked me point blank if there was something going on between us. "Maybe," was my only reply. Eventually, we might as well have told them for it was all that was spoken about in the castle as far as gossip.

We were sitting in the library together reading one of the books in there about great voyages of the past when I asked, "Why don't we just tell them?" She looked at me with confusion until I continued, "I mean it's all people are talking about and I'm being pestered about it all the time."

She closed the book and replied, "Sure, why not." It was that night that we told everyone and of course half the lords and ladies muttered to each other, "We were right." I even saw a few lords exchange money as if they had just lost a bet. Many people and creatures came up to both of us and asked when we were getting married. I saw Shifra blush when that happened and she let out a giggle before replying that we hadn't really talked about it.

Now the final planning for the voyage was happening in earnest and before we knew it the day to set sail was upon us. All that we needed was being loaded on the ship while I got up and breakfasted. The crew was all fed and watered and soon we were all on the ship ready to embark. We all said our final goodbyes and set sail. As I watched the water rush past, I felt within me great joy and excitement. This would be fun.
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Now I know I didn't use any scene from the movie for Prince Caspian, but there are some scenes in the movie for The Voyage of the Dawn Treader that I am going to include, so this will be partly movie and partly book, but the plot and what happens will all be from the book. Enjoy!