CHAPTER FOUR:
TOO CLOSE

■ ■ ■ ■ ■

WHEN ROSALIE COULDN’T SUMMON fire again, the… ludicrous idea that she could in the first place was dropped for the time being. Lucy’s hand was quick to heal, though Peter made sure to keep a close eye on her whenever Rosalie strayed too close. The bear was skinned and cooked over a hastily-made flame — this one summoned by Trumpkin, the sun and two wooden sticks. After that, they were on their way again, the trees an endless maze that Rosalie would’ve easily gotten lost in was it not for the Pevensies leading the way. She didn’t say much for a while, even when the siblings eased up, talking and laughing amongst themselves.

“I don’t remember this way,” Susan insisted about half an hour in.

“That’s the problem with girls,” Peter sighed, a smile tugging at his lips to indicate he was joking. “You can’t carry a map in your heads.”

Lucy scoffed. “That’s because our heads have something in them.”

Susan smiled, nodding in adamant agreement with her sister. “I wish he’d just listen to the D.L.F in the first place.”

From just behind Rosalie, Edmund questioned, “D.L.F?”

“Dear Little Friend,” Lucy clarified, shooting Trumpkin a pointed grin over her shoulder before she and Susan took off after Peter, who’d wandered on ahead of them.

Rosalie only managed a small smile as Trumpkin frowned. “Well, that’s not patronising at all, is it?”

With that, he chased after them, fully prepared to give the girls a piece of his mind. As Rosalie watched him go, Edmund drew closer to her side, nudging her elbow gently with his when she didn’t turn to look at him. Rosalie flinched, scanning his arm for burn marks but finding none. Edmund frowned and tried to reach for her hand. After a moment’s hesitation, she let him intertwine their fingers.

Still, no burns.

Had she really imagined it? That feeling of red-hot anger boiling over? The sensation of heat stinging in her palms? It had felt so real, but perhaps it was just something her imagination conjured up to comfort her moments before death.

Or maybe, none of this was real, including Edmund’s hand in hers, and she was simply dreaming…

As her breath hitched, Edmund squeezed her hand. “You alright, Rosie?” he murmured so that the others wouldn’t hear him. When she didn’t answer, he sighed. “Look, about before—”

“What about it?” she mumbled, eyes cast down to her feet. “Peter was right. It was probably nothing.”

“Probably?” Edmund echoed in disbelief. “Rosie—”

“Why do you call me that?” she asked, before she could lose her courage and change her mind. Edmund seemed confused. “Rosie, I mean.”

“Oh,” he muttered, his face blooming pink from realisation and embarrassment. “Sorry. Do you not like it?”

“No!” she exclaimed, then winced when his eyes drooped with disappointment. “Wait, yes — no, I mean … I do like it, I just…” Now it was her turn to blush. Edmund’s amused smile certainly didn’t help. God, she was being such a fool. “You know what? Never mind.”

If Michael was there, he'd never let her live this down.

“No, go on,” Edmund countered. Rosalie sighed. “I promise I won’t tease you. You just what?”

“Well,” she began shyly. She wasn’t oblivious to her hand still in his, to the way he took the lead and carefully guided her down each rocky slope, Rosalie’s feet unused to the uneven terrain. “No one’s ever given me a nickname before.”

“Really?” Edmund’s eyes flashed with surprise. “Not even Rose?”

“It’s always been just Rosalie.”

Understanding settled in Edmund’s face then. With furrowed brows, he muttered, “Well, we can’t have that, can we? I’m going to call you Rosie from now on. That is, if you don’t mind…”

Smiling softly, Rosalie shrugged, “I don’t mind.”

And that was that. Nothing else was said about it as Edmund, as he promised, called her Rosie several times throughout their trek, his hand not once departing from hers. If his siblings noticed, they didn’t comment on it. Peter barely acknowledged Rosalie as it was, but he was even more stubborn now that something had happened to Lucy, regardless of whether or not Rosalie had intended to harm her.

Deep down, everyone knew they hadn’t imagined what Rosalie did.

They just had no idea how to explain it.

After another twenty minutes of walking, they reached a cave of some kind where the sky opened up to the Heavens. The rocky mountains around them narrowed into a pit, the group coming face-to-face with a tall, solid mound of stone. A small fissure of light indicated an overgrown path that would barely fit Peter through. Sighing, the boy in question turned to watch them catch up with him, the tips of his ears burning pink beneath the slowly setting sun.

“I’m not lost,” he insisted.

Trumpkin sneered, stepping up onto a boulder so he could be eye level with them. “No, you’re not. You’re just going the wrong way.”

A muscle in Peter’s jaw ticked. “You last saw Caspian at the Shuddering Woods, and the quickest way there is to cross at the River Rush.”

“But unless I’m mistaken, there’s no crossing in these paths.”

“That explains it then. You’re mistaken.”

Biting back a retort, Trumpkin merely sighed when Peter turned to face the path again. He used his sword to cut through the shrubbery, continuing on with the stubbornness of a righteous king. Rosalie wanted to point out the obvious — over a thousand years had passed in Narnia. Like its inhabitants, the lay of the land was bound to change. Somehow, though, she had a feeling Peter wouldn’t appreciate it, so she kept quiet and focused on Edmund’s hand instead. He was tracing patterns on her knuckles, urging her to guess each drawing and grinning when she got it right.

( Rosie was such a lovesick fool, it was getting kind of sad. )

( Edmund was too, however, so they evened each other out. )

Yet another twenty minutes lead them to a ledge where earth dropped away to rushing water hundreds upon hundreds of miles below. His face going pale, Peter peered over the edge and sighed.

As Rosalie expected, Trumpkin was right.

“You see, over time, water erodes the earth’s soil, carving deeper—”

“Oh, shut up,” Peter snapped at Susan.

When she merely pursed her lips and turned back to staring at the rushing river, Edmund asked Trumpkin, “Is there a way down?”

A hopeful but fruitless question.

“Yeah,” Trumpkin deadpanned, shooting Peter a pointed stare. “Falling.”

The High King pouted in a rare, childish act. “Well, we weren’t lost.”

More like they were just wasting time, though again, Rosalie doubted that Peter would want to hear it.

“There’s a fort near Beruna,” Trumpkin declared after a moment. For once, even Peter paused to listen. Perhaps he, like the rest of them, realised that Trumpkin was their best — and only — chance at finding Caspian and the Narnians. After all, he was a Narnian, and he knew his land like it was a part of him. “How do you feel about swimming?”

“I’d rather that than walking,” Susan shrugged as Rosalie heaved a sigh. The Pevensie girl smiled faintly at her. “Not excited, Rosie?”

“Hey,” Edmund frowned before she could answer. “That’s my nickname.”

“Oh, sorry, I didn’t realise,” Susan scoffed, raising an eyebrow at Rosalie in a look that the redhead outright ignored. “Let me rephrase – aren’t you excited, Rose?”

Rosalie didn’t answer Susan at first, turning to Trumpkin as he began to lead them back the way they’d just come. “Do we have to swim?” she asked.

“Unless you want to get caught…”

Rosalie shuddered at the thought. She looked back at Susan with a defeated smile. “Oh, I’m so excited, Susan.”

Susan laughed. Behind them, Lucy let out a shocked cry that had everyone stopping in their tracks. For a heart-stopping second, Rosalie was worried that Lucy had fallen over the edge, and was relieved to find the younger girl still standing with both feet firmly on the ground. Despite the sound of her cry, Lucy’s face was bright with glee.

“It’s Aslan! Look, it’s Aslan over there!” she exclaimed and eagerly pointed across the river to where more trees stretched on. From what Rosalie could see, there was no magical lion in sight. Her siblings frowned at her, doubtful. “Don’t you see? He’s right… there…”

Her smile almost immediately dropped. Rosalie sighed, catching Edmund’s eyes. He seemed disappointed, but also a little uncertain. For the first time since they left the bear behind, he released Rosalie’s hand to approach his younger sister’s side. Rosalie lingered beside Trumpkin uncomfortably, but he didn’t look at her as he scoffed at Lucy.

“Do you see him now?” he asked.

The words were mocking, making Lucy frown and cross her arms defensively. “I’m not crazy,” she insisted. “He was there. He wanted us to follow him.”

She turned to Peter like he would listen, but Peter only shrugged. Lucy’s disappointment was like kicking a puppy and feeling no remorse. “I’m sure there are a number of lions in this wood. Just like that bear.”

Lucy scowled. “I think I know Aslan when I see him.”

But Trumpkin was having none of it. “Look, I’m not about to jump off a cliff after someone who doesn’t exist.”

No one said anything for a moment. Rosalie had never met Aslan, so she wasn’t sure what to say that would actually help Lucy. Peter and Susan were just looking at each other, conversing in that one stare, while Trumpkin shuffled around with evident impatience.

At last, it was Edmund who broke the silence.

“The last time I didn’t believe Lucy,” he said, and all eyes darted to him curiously. “I ended up looking pretty stupid.”

A dark look shrouded his sibling’s faces for a second, there in one blink and gone the next. None of them acknowledged it, not even Trumpkin, but Rosalie found herself hesitating when Edmund refused to meet her eyes.

What did that mean? she thought to herself. What was he hiding?

She wanted to know, but struggled to find the words, especially when Peter turned back to survey the woods for something, anything. “Why wouldn’t I have seen him?” he murmured to Lucy, a small crack in his voice being the only indication of doubt in himself.

Softly, like she didn’t want to offend her brother, Lucy murmured, “Maybe you weren’t looking.”

But that wasn’t enough, not for Peter or Susan, and especially not for Trumpkin. “I’m sorry, Lu,” Peter sighed, and turned his back to the river. The three of them left Lucy, Edmund and Rosalie standing there, the latter waiting as Lucy gave one last sorrowful glance at the place she’d seen Aslan.

“Come on, Lucy,” Rosalie said as the others trekked further away by the second. She laid a gentle hand on the young girl’s shoulder, half expecting Lucy to push her away. When she didn’t, she guided her slowly away from the cliff-edge. “We don’t want to get lost now, do we? Your brother’s arrogance would never let us live it down.”

Lucy smiled, but the expression was thin and the both of them knew it. Slowly, they followed after the others, Edmund approaching Lucy’s other side to nudge her arm, murmuring an apology for only her and Rosalie to hear. Lucy smiled again, this one more sad than the last, and nothing else was said.

■ ■ ■ ■ ■

THE TELMARINES SEEMED LIKE ordinary men to Rosalie. That was what scared her the most. As she, the Pevensies and Trumpkin kneeled behind a giant timber pile, hundreds of ordinary men were cutting down trees, slowly but surely making a bridge that would let them cross over the gushing waters of the river. They worked in the shadow of a giant catapult, one that made the Pevensies freeze, their minds going back to their home left in ruins. On the other side of the catapult, two dozen soldiers marched in unison, their weapons glinting in the afternoon light.

“What do we—”

Trumpkin’s elbow sharply nudging Rosalie’s ribs interrupted whatever she was about to whisper. His eyes peered over her shoulder to where several men on horseback came down a path through the forest, armed guards protecting a king. Instinctively, the group sunk into the shadows of the forest, careful to keep quiet as the king and his men continued past them.

Once she was sure they were out of earshot, Rosalie turned back to the others and asked her question. “What do we do now?”

There was only one thing they could do, even if the likes of Peter and Trumpkin didn’t agree. Smiling with a sense of triumph, Lucy retreated back the way they’d come, forcing the others to follow her.

Later, when they were back at the River Rush, Peter asked, “So, where exactly did you say you saw Aslan?”

Lucy turned to glare at him. “I wish you’d stop trying to sound like grown-ups. I don’t think I saw him, I did see him.”

Smiling proudly, Rosalie failed to smother a giggle when Trumpkin blinked and said, “I am a grown-up.”

Lucy paid him no attention as she wandered closer to the edge. Once she was beside Rosalie, she turned back to address them, only for the earth to disappear beneath their feet.

Rosalie’s heart lurched to her throat as she dropped through the air for a second. The sudden impact of the ground was jarring, and she winced as Lucy landed on her back before rolling beside her. Neither girl moved as, terrified, the others shouted their names and rushed to search for them over the edge. Rosalie picked out Edmund’s voice above the rest, loud and shouting her name. He smiled when he spotted her and Lucy just a few metres below them, but fear stayed in his eyes even when the others joined them and they started their descent.

“Are you hurt?” he asked, hands ghosting over her arms to search for injuries. There was a small cut on her forearm and a bruise forming on her elbow, nothing that bothered her of course, but Edmund’s eyes still darkened at the sight. He forced himself to smile when she frowned. “I swear Lucy’s trying to get you killed. That’s twice now.”

“I was thinking the same thing,” Rosalie laughed as Lucy glared and smacked her brother’s shoulder. “But I’m fine, Edmund. You don’t have to worry about me.”

Behind them, two handprints were imprinted on a ledge, smouldering and smudged beneath unsuspecting feet. Rosalie’s hands burned for the rest of the afternoon, but she smothered the feeling down in a state of panic, conscious of Peter’s eyes always watching her and Lucy, just waiting.