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"Well, Master, with Canines now Guard to both Queen Susan and King Edmund, in fairness a Cat probably should serve the High King, assuming an appropriate one can be found."
Roblang threw up his hands. "By the Lion, you would think that defeating the Witch would mean an end to these rivalries!"
"Surely you know the Tale every mother tells that on the day after Aslan sang Narnia into being, the Lion had to settle a quarrel between Canine and Feline!"
He laughed. "And I've heard both versions, with the Felines saying the Canines started the argument, and Canines saying the Felines started it!"
"Yet, are the Centaurs and Dwarfs, or Satyrs and Fauns, or Goats and Cows any different?"
"It is a very good thing where once we were united in our hate for her, we are now even more united in our Love for the Four, or we'd be a quarrelsome bunch indeed!"
Conversation between Briony Greatheart and Master Roblang, Chapter 3, The Palace Guard
Inspired by this Tumblr post by queenlucythevaliant positing a Hwin and Bree buddy cop movie.
Syrena and Vialethe has been asking for this ever since. I've finally been able to pull it together.
The summons came before Hwin had finished her morning oats or had the straw combed out of her tail. The brisk cadence of Bree’s trot conveyed a great deal even before the Stallion spoke. He was very excited.
“Inspector Hwin!” She hated when he did that but Bree loved his titles and insisted upon their use. “There’s been a crime wave overnight! We’re needed urgently!”
“Crime wave? You mean the Fauns and Satyrs are fighting over wine? Again? Or someone in the Beruna Orchard versus Herds lawsuit is eating where they shouldn't? Squirrels say the Chipmunks have stolen their nuts. Again?”
The Beings of Narnia had been quarreling since the Day Aslan sang them into being. The story went that there was the First Song, then the First Joke, and then the First Row.
Still, she shook herself thoroughly and hoped the worst of the straw and bracken was gone. Hwin wasn’t vain but Bree always took such pride in his dapper appearance, she always looked very unkempt by comparison. Sometimes, though, that did work to their advantage.
“No! Far more serious. Possible murder. And theft from the Royal Treasury.” He sounded positively gleeful. “And a riot between the Claw and the Parliament is turning ugly.”
Well, that at least, was no surprise. The Small Cats of the Claw and the Owls had an enmity going back at least as far as Centaurs versus Dwarfs. The Cats and Owls were always competing with one another at night for perches in the same Trees or trees, for the same hunting grounds, and for the same dumb prey.
“Well, Bree, we’d best get to the Palace.”
Bree snorted. “You always forgot, Hwin. We can’t expect others to respect us if we don’t respect ourselves!”
Hwin sighed and her lips fluttered. “Well, Inspector Bree, we’d best get to the Palace.”
Only the High King was in residence that morning, which explained the summons. His solution to the usual kerfuffle -- which concededly this might not be -- was to frown, stare, harumph, and obtain meek compliance. If there really was a riot between the Owls and the Cats, the High King would be able to handle that in his typical mode. A true investigation, however, was something Queen Susan or King Edmund usually undertook, often with Queen Lucy to assist with the interviews and King Edmund’s consort managing anything with money.
The High King met them on the Palace steps and looked very concerned.
“Hwin and Bree, thank you for coming.”
Hwin bumped her hindquarters into Bree so that he didn’t try to correct the High King about titles.
They followed him through the front doors, passing by the offices, Council Room, conservatory, Great Hall, and down a long passageway that branched off from the kitchens. Hwin twitched an ear at the sounds of very distressed bellowing.
“Is that Cook?” Bree asked.
“Regrettably, yes,” the High King replied. “Something was removed from her pantry during the night in addition to this strange muddle. I hope you can make sense of it all and we shall surely be eating something that smells bad and tastes worse by teatime.”
The hallway ended at a heavy wooden door that was ajar, and a narrow staircase beyond. “This leads to the Royal Treasury?” Hwin asked. “Is it not usually locked?”
Doors were usually unlocked at the Cair so they could be opened with a firm push. This measure was to protect their Majesties because Royal Guards with sharp teeth and claws but no hands might have difficulty with doorknobs in a dire and dangerous situation. One of the few exceptions to this rule were the treasure storerooms.
Bree had dropped his head and was sniffing the stone floor.
The High King pushed the door and Hwin could see a key in the door’s lock. “I think it is well-known that the key is usually in the Tower Library.”
“Someone probably flew in through one of the Library windows,” Hwin replied. “With King Edmund gone, no one would have been there and I do not think it likely that someone could have made it all the way to the Tower Library and back here with a key without it being remarked upon.”
“Unless the perpetrator was a Guard or on the night staff,” the High King replied miserably. “And there’s this.” He gestured to the floor that Bree had been investigating. “The Hounds said it was Cat blood.”
“Yes,” Bree said, his head still snuffling the ground. “But there are a lot of feathers here, too. Owl feathers.” Bree had made a special study of bird feathers.
Hwin looked about the corridor, seeing the usual debris of any Narnia space – fur, and hair, black Crow feathers, leaves, and the usual mud and dirt. The Palace first floor was very busy in part because traffic to the upper floors was far more restricted. “Were the scents too muddled for the Hounds to follow?”
The High King nodded. “Larkin came himself.” Larkin was the pup of Ibiza, and was following in his sire’s paws as a great tracker. No nose was better. “He’s sure there was a Cat, one of the small ones, not a Great Cat. He did not recognize the scent. He couldn’t follow the scent beyond the front steps.”
“Which could mean it was just confused or that the Cat was carried or flown,” Hwin replied. “Perhaps by the Owl if small enough.”
“I’m dealing with that next,” the High King replied. "A Cat and an Owl are missing. The Parliament and the Claw are convinced that one of their own was murdered by the other. He gestured at the crime scene. “They may not be wrong.”
“Do we know what was taken from the Treasury?” Hwin lowered her head to investigate as Bree was. Not that she would disagree with Larkin but the scent of Cat was unmistakable, and it wasn’t the larger, more powerful scents of the Great Cats, like the High King’s Cheetah guards or Jalur, King Edmund’s Tiger guard.
“We have an inventory, so we know a sum of coins was taken. Lions and Trees. And a little embroidered cloth. Nothing else seems missing”
“All the Treasury to loot from and they take money?” Bree mused. “That’s odd.”
“Most Narnians don’t need money or even have any way to carry it,” Hwin said, thinking it over. She and Bree both knew all about money from their time in Calormen. “But if someone wanted to make an escape to a foreign land, they would need coin to do it. And if a Bird or Beast, they would need to fashion a purse to carry it. Perhaps that’s why the cloth is gone.”
Bree flicked an ear. “High King, I suggest sending Crows to find out if any horses are missing from the stables, or a boat gone from the docks. Someone might have attempted to steal away in the night.”
“Thank you, yes, I will do that. I need to get to the Claw to stop this war between Cats and Owls. Again.” There was a lot of frustration in his tone. “ Will you meet me there?”
“Of course, High King,” Hwin said.
“Right after we speak with Cook.”
The High King rushed off.
Hwin inhaled deeply. Her nose wasn’t nearly as good as a Hound’s, and none was the equal to Larkin, but there were a number of things that just didn’t make sense.
Bree began in the same place her own thoughts were running. “So let’s say an Owl flew up to the Library and stole the key. What then? They bring it back here and…”
“An Owl wouldn’t be able to get a key into the lock by themselves. So there is an accomplice with hands to manipulate the key.”
“There are leaves here, including oak and laurel,” Bree blew out lightly.
“So, maybe a Dryad accomplice. And a Cat comes upon them, interrupting the theft.”
“And then they quarrel and blood is spilled and feathers and leaves are shed.”
“And the accomplice assists in the get-away and disposal of the body or bodies.” Grim.
“What do you think of the blood?” Bree asked.
In a division of labor that made sense only to them, it was the sensitive, observant Mare, and not the War Horse, who had studied blood, injury, and how violence affected Narnian bodies. Bree had spent too much time around fighting, swords, battle axes, lances, knives, and arrows; what weapons, claws, and teeth did to flesh all looked the same to him.
Hwin stared again at the splatters and drops. It, to her anyway, was obviously not something that happened in a kill, a fight, or a maiming injury. It was bloody, yes, but it was also discrete, even subtle. And, she realized as she stared at the pattern longer, it was deliberate. “This doesn’t feel like murder to me, Inspector Bree.”
“Nor to me, Inspector Hwin.”
“It’s a misdirection to keep us occupied,” Hwin decided. “Perhaps to give time to implement that getaway from the stables or docks.”
“Though money and cloth are missing.” Bree flicked an ear in the direction of the kitchens. “And something else.”
They followed Cook’s bellowing cries to the kitchens.
Hwin had not known that Minotaurs could weep as Humans, Dwarfs, Satyrs, and Fauns did. Cook was amongst the most formidable appearing beings in Cair Paravel. Yet she was unquestionably crying as she wielded an enormous knife and chopped up smelly, slimy, and bloody things and tossed them into a pot so large surely no one else but Cook could have lifted it.
“I’m glad we’re herbivores,” Bree muttered in her ear.
Cook waved the knife over her head, nearly nicking a wooden beam in the ceiling. “No animals in my kitchen!” She sobbed so violently, her dainty cap perched between her horns slid down over her eyes and onto her snout. She shoved the cap back with her elbow, brandished the knife again, and innards flew across the table and splattered onto the walls.
Unlike what Hwin had observed in the passageway outside the Treasury, this did look like a grisly murder scene.
“We understand that you do not wish Beasts in the kitchens because of the hair,” Hwin began calmly. Hopefully, Bree wouldn’t mention anything about the Minotaur hair that was flying about with the bloody bits. Hair in Cair Paravel food and drink was a regular occurrence and though much of it was undoubtedly from Cook’s own hide, no one who valued their digestion ever mentioned it.
“We’re here about the thefts and injury,” Bree added. “We understand something of extreme value was taken from the kitchens.”
“There was!” Cook shrieked and gestured wildly at a shelf of crockery. “One of my good honey pots is gone. Near full with honey!”
The interview, as the saying went, was all uphill from there.
With earnest promises to find the nefarious honey culprits, she and Bree retreated to the privacy of the Council Room for a brief consultation. Having a confidential conversation in Narnia was always difficult and particularly at the Cair where everyone was in such close quarters. Though, with the fracas at the Claw between the Owls and Cats, the Crows who might otherwise be eavesdropping on their investigation would be outside and laying down wagers.
“It’s a puzzle, Inspector Hwin.” Bree was nosing about his sides to make sure no blood and guts from the kitchen had splattered on his immaculate coat. One reason for the extreme care he took with his appearance was that he always hoped an investigation might require him to go “undercover” so that he could seduce someone – another horse or Horse, Hwin supposed. How this wished-for seduction might arise was always a little ill-formed, in her opinion.
“Anyone might have taken honey, including one of the Queens or King Edmund when they departed the Cair,” Hwin said. She could see why Cook was so upset. Narnia honey was very special. “I don’t see how a crock of honey would be anything but a nuisance to carry or deal with if a Cat, an Owl, or a Dryad is our thief.” Nor was honey alone adequate sustenance for any Beast.
“If they are using that cloth to carry the money, it could hold the honey as well.” Bree shook himself.
“I do wonder if…”
There was a scritching sound at the door and Hwin immediately stopped speaking.
“You there!” Bree called, far too authoritatively. “Announce yourself.”
Hwin sighed. Bree would love to bully someone spying on them but that was obviously not what was happening here.
Raz poked his nose through the doorway. Raz wasn’t the Lady Willa, chief Spy of Narnia, but Raz was her Deputy and a very senior Rat in the Queen Susan’s Mischief hierarchy.
“No need to get so uppity, Inspector.”
Bree immediately arched his neck, so delighted to have been called Inspector. He would be insufferable for the rest of the day.
“Yes, Raz, thank you for finding us.” Hwin said. “What can we do for you?”
“The High King sent me. All the horses are accounted for in the stables but there is a boat missing from the docks. Larkin is there now and Tarny, the dockmaster, is waiting for you.”
“Thank you, Deputy Raz,” Bree replied. Of course he would use titles.
“The High King asks you to go to the docks first and then to come to the Claw after and report to him, as soon as you can.”
“How bad is it there?” Bree asked.
“Worse even than the usual between Cat and Owl, which is saying something.” Raz scratched his ear. “The fur on the High King’s back is standing straight up.”
The High King, of course, didn’t have fur, but Hwin understood exactly what Raz meant. “So the Royal frowns aren’t working?”
“No. I’ve got a three walnut and cheese rind wager laid down in the Crow Murder that a least one Cat and one Owl will be seeing the Physician by teatime. But given all the snapping and growling, there’s no more than an even money chance I’ll get that back.”
Hwin was tempted to ask Raz to lay in a bet for her, but Bree always put up such a fuss about Inspectors gambling on the job, she could only do it when he wasn’t around.
“We’ll come as swiftly as possible, Raz, after we interview Tarny.”
Tarny. Oh Lion, please give me patience.
“Got it. I’ll tell the High King.” Raz whisked about and scampered away.
Bree’s nostrils fluttered with a sigh that mirrored Hwin’s own resignation. He nudged her with his nose. “I would say, it won’t be that bad, Inspector Hwin,’ but…”
“It is,” Hwin replied. “It always is.”
There was surely no Being more dour in all of Narnia than Tarny.
The Cair Paravel Dockmaster was very good, very capable, and very loyal. But Marsh-wiggles were just a different sort, really. A different, grim, depressing, dismal, gloomy, dreary, joyless, sort.
Bree was far more patient with Narnians like Tarny than she was.
“Terrible day, isn’t it, Inspectors? Robbery, murder, Narnia going to the leeches. Why, I was just telling Larkin here…”
The Hound growled and Hwin sympathized deeply with his irritation.
“Yes, indeed, a terrible business,” Bree agreed briskly. His habit of interrupting was very helpful with Tarny. “So, Dockmaster, we understand a ship is missing?”
“Boat,” Tarny corrected. “My favorite too, of course it was, leaky as a sieve. The ones who took it are surely in the bottom of the bay by now, eaten by sharks. I was just telling Larkin…”
Larkin growled again.
“Can you describe the boat for us?”
“I was just getting to that, Inspector Bree. It was small, ugly as anything, and…”
“How small?” Bree injected. Small for a Rat was different from small for a Minotaur.
“It was a little sailboat, dingy sized and…”
“So was it large enough for two Dogs of Larkin’s size, or one Marsh-Wiggle, but not a Horse?” Bree pressed.
Tarny looked them all over and held out her muddy, webbed hands, as if taking their measure. “Maybe a pony or a …”
“Yes, thank you, Dockmaster. Any other identifying features of the boat? Name? Colour?”
“Pea Soup.”
Bree’s ears twitched. “Could you elaborate, Dockmaster Tarny?”
“I named her Pea Soup, because that’s what she reminded me of. Color of nice brownish, yellowish Marsh Green Pea stew with eel heads and she handled like a soup bowl in a stinky bog.” Tarny moaned so deeply, Hwin wondered if Marsh-wiggles could cry too. “I’m sure they ran it aground or sank her or a sea serpent ate them and I’ll never see Pea Soup again.”
“A tragedy,” Larkin murmured, quietly enough that only she and Bree could hear.
Hwin left Bree to console Tarny and eased away to speak to the Hound. Larkin was sniffing at the dock’s edge where several small boats were tied up. The larger galleons of the Narnian fleet were anchored further out.
“Anything?” she asked.
Larkin raised his big, brown head. Though his eyes always seemed dark and mournful, he was, for a scenting hound, a cheerful Dog. “An Oak was involved. Dryads smell just like their Trees and there are a lot of Oaks around Cair Paravel. There aren’t usually any Oaks around here, though, so it’s pretty distinct. I think the Dryad carried the Cat from Cair Paravel and put her in the boat. Yes, I think the Cat is a She, and she’s young. I don’t recognize her.”
Larkin’s grumbling tone was disdainful. Like most Dogs, he had a very poor opinion of Cats, which was very much a mutual distaste.
“There were Owl feathers outside the treasury. Any Owl scent here?”
“Yes, though it’s faint, which is to be expected. I think they perched over there.” Larkin pointed with his nose at a thick, wooden post used to anchor the dock. “But it wasn’t for very long.”
“The Owl might have pulled the boat but…”
Larkin huffed. “If a Cat is stupid enough to trust an Owl, Tarny’s right and she’s probably at the bottom of the bay by now.”
His tone made clear he thought a Cat was stupid enough to do this.
“Even if an Owl could pull the Boat, they would not get far without tiring.” Owls weren’t seabirds and usually tried to avoid getting too wet. Their feathers were for flying noiselessly, not crossing oceans. “But the question then remains, how did the Cat leave? A Cat couldn’t sail the boat by herself.”
“Maybe the Dryad went with her,” Larkin replied. “But they’d have to be really small and young to fit.”
Young like the Cat herself.
Hwin stomped her hoof. None of this made sense. “I don’t think the Dryad went with her. Very few would endure the salty ocean.” Captain Nanshee, who captained The Splendour Hyaline, always brought Narnian soil and water with her on longer voyages.
“There’s something else I can’t figure out, either.”
With his nose, Larkin pointed to a spot on the dock. It might have been a little damp.
Hwin clomped onto the wooden dock for a closer look. Even she could tell the spot smelled salty from the sea and fishy, yet there was no fish blood, bones, or guts. There were slivers of something large, coin-sized, and glinting. “Do you recognize those, Larkin?”
“They smell like fish scales but not,” the Hound replied. “It’s queer, isn’t it?
“Dockmaster Tarny!” Hwin called. “Might we have your expert opinion?”
The Marsh-wiggle squelched over. “Is the dock falling apart? Another boat missing? Sea serpent sighting?”
Behind the carping, miserable Dockmaster, Bree was rolling his eyes.
“No, nothing like that. I was wondering if you might be able to identify what these are? They look like fish scales?”
“Oh, I’m surely not going to be any help at all,” Tarny announced gloomily even as she bent over and peered at the wooden decking. Her wet, reed-like hair flapped and slapped about and she probed the glint with a long, mossy finger.
“Mer,” Tarny announced very suddenly. “Definitely Mer.”
The introduction of the Mer-people as an element in the mystery immediately elevated the importance – and gravity – of the investigation. Robbery, missing and fled Narnians, and possible harm done were all serious enough. But the involvement of the Mer-people was a diplomatic matter of the utmost delicacy. To involve that independent nation meant recalling Queen Susan from Archenland. Relations were always prickly under the best of circumstances, the protocols for engagement were exhausting, and the disasters that occurred when they weren’t followed could be catastrophic. Even Bree knew they could not go wading into the Cair Paravel bay and demand to speak to someone about the role a Mer might have played in crimes against Narnia.
“This does explain how the Cat was able to leave. The Mer probably pushed the Pea Soup,” Hwin said as they climbed the path that snaked back and forth up the cliff that would bring them back to the Palace’s grounds. Their hooves crunched on the gravel and the Sun felt warm on her back and a light breeze kept the flies away. Narnia in the early summer was always a delight.
Bree’s head shot up. “Maybe we have uncovered a Mer plot to loot the Narnian Treasury!”
He sounded so excited at this possibility, Hwin didn’t have the heart to counter him. His own sense would take over when he thought on it a moment longer.
“As with the Mole spies from so many years ago, Narnians were paid for their disloyalty. Though… Hmmm, I suppose they would have taken far more than some coins from the treasure stores. So, likely not involving the Mer Nation as a whole, but a lone actor, an accomplice, like the Oak Dryad.”
“This is sound analysis, Inspector Bree. Still, if we wish to identify the Mer, we’ll probably need Queen Susan to initiate contact with her diplomatic liaison.”
Bree shook himself. “So a Mer for hire, much as you might hire a guide. It would be much easier for a Cat to leave Narnia by sea than overland. Larkin might not think much of Cats, but it’s a very sensible plan.”
They took another switch on the path, briskly making their way back up the cliff. The path was always well tended and easy to maneuver, with no slipping. The Dwarfs were working on some sort of pulley and crane contraption that would hang over the cliff and could lift things directly from the dock to the Palace proper without everyone having to carry cargo up the trail.
“It is odd, though,” Hwin said, thinking about the trade that passed through Narnia. “The Mer are very proud and wealthy. They have a fortune in pearls and treasure they seize from privateers. A Mer wouldn’t work for a few coins they could get from the bottom of any busy harbour where someone dropped their purse overboard; they would obtain far more from the hold of a sunken galleon.”
“Well, the cloth and honey were taken, too…”
Bree trailed off and swished his tail hard.
The honey.
Hwin swished her own tail in tandem with her partner’s. “I don’t mind marsh grass myself occasionally, or a bit of salt added to my oats.”
“Those salt licks in Calormen were good,” Bree replied. “But there’s nothing like sugar, especially after a lot of salt.”
“For a Mer, everything would be salty; there would be no way to get something sweet. The honey was probably the Cat’s payment to the Mer for passage.”
“Again, a very sensible solution,” Bree acknowledged. “At least one of the Narnians involved here is very clever.”
“It’s clever enough that I will mention this to Queen Susan when she returns; honey may be an advantageous trade opening with the Mer Nation.”
“So the how has become clear but not the why, or the who.”
They crested the cliff and a cacophony of shrieks and catcalls were roiling the Palace grounds.
Bree broke into a trot, and Hwin stepped up next to him. “Bree, why don’t you inform the High King of our findings. I want to look for our Dryad.”
The fur and feathers really were flying. The spat had moved from the Claw where the Cats slept to the Palace front lawns. The Small Cats were circling and yowling, hissing and spitting. The Owls were diving, swooping and screeching. More worrisome was that the Great Cats appeared to have taken the side of their smaller, implicated cousins, and the Raptors had done the same and joined with the Owls. Emotion was very high and the High King was in the middle of it, trying mightily to talk everyone down. His Cheetah guards looked very concerned and their hair was standing up as they circled the High King to keep him secure.
Bree was very good in situations like this. He just trotted fearlessly right into the fray, not minding in the least that he was surrounded by sharp teeth, beaks, and claws. Growling Leopards, Tigers, and Spotted Cats, enormous flapping Birds with knife-sharp talons – none of it bothered him in the least.
And he had a voice that could carry over the din. “High King! I have news of my and Inspector Hwin’s investigation and we believe no murder or injury has been done!.”
With those announcements beginning, Hwin began slowly circling the perimeter of the onlookers. Those not involved in the riot were hanging about, listening and watching and exchanging items with Crows as they put down their wagers.
No, Hwin, she told herself firmly, you cannot lay a wager in the Murder with everyone watching.
Narnians did love their spectacles. She wove in and out among the milling Narnians, listening to their arguments and conjecture. Hwin couldn’t make herself small, but she could make herself part of the crowd of Goats, Sheep, Deer, the smaller Woodland Beasts, Dwarfs, and others. She was just a kind, gentle Mare, who listened as avidly as the Rats and Crows did. The Satyrs and Fauns were arguing amongst themselves, as always. The Wolves, Dogs, and Foxes were immensely enjoying that someone else was having a go at the Cats.
She learned that the missing Owl was a juvenile named Gufo, and the missing Cat was Puci. She didn’t know either of them. She and Bree would have to identify and interview any family groups next, and possibly the Parliament Leader and, if Puci had been in a Den or Clan, her Chief.
At the outside of the yammering crowd, she saw others who disliked large groups and so were keeping their distance but still interested enough to see what was happening – there were a few Bears, a Skunk, a Badger and others. In contrast, the Capybaras were munching on grass, happily offered their food and space to others, and showed no interest at all in the yelling, spatting, hooting, and squawking. Capybaras were not part of the Beruna Orchard grazing and Tree growing dispute. No Capybara had ever been part of any investigation she and Bree had conducted. She didn’t think they were capable of a hostile act or even of forming the intent to commit a hostile act.
The Being she thought she was looking for was by himself. That was unusual on its own as Oak straplings were usually with others of their own kind before moving to places with enough space to grow. He was just tall enough for a Small Cat or an Owl to perch in comfortably and was very interested in what Bree and the High King were saying that there was no evidence of any fowl play.
“Hello, I’m Hwin.”
“Darach,” he replied, stretching himself a little taller to hear. Hwin didn’t think Darach was more than a few years old. Young. Like the missing Owl and Cat.
“What do you think of all this, Darach? It’s both exciting and unsettling, isn’t it?”
He scowled and his bark-skin darkened. “Unsettling is right. All this fighting between factions. All this hatred. It’s stupid.”
A few of Darach’s leaves dropped to the grass and onto her back. He kindly flicked them away. “Sorry. I just get so angry sometimes.”
“Thank you. Why are you so angry, though? Narnians have always been a fractious lot.”
“That’s my point. We’ve been arguing the same arguments since the First Song. No one even remembers why Dryads are supposed to trip any Red Dwarf we see except that someone, once, 500 years ago, chopped a tree down without asking first. Why do Owls and Cats fight when there are plenty of Trees and plenty of dumb game and meat that they don’t even have to hunt for if they don’t want to. We’re sick of it.”
“We?”
He shrugged and a few more leaves flitted down. “Some of the younger ones. You know, the straplings, the adolescents and juveniles.”
Like Gufo and Puci.
“We just want to be together without it being another Battle at Beruna every time you want to see your friends.”
He spoke this last hotly.
“I can certainly see why this would be so frustrating,” Hwin replied. She was making some guesses, but they were good ones. “I would be angry too if my elder Crone, Parliament Leader, or Clan Chief banned me from being with those I care about because of old, stupid prejudices.”
“Yeah. Exactly!”
“And maybe you want to do whatever you can to help your friends who can’t bear it any longer and just want to get away?”
There was a long pause and Hwin could sense Darach weighing how much she knew and how much she'd guessed. But he was also young and hadn't yet learned the patience age and long incarceration as a slave had taught her.
"You know what happened?"
"I do," Hwin replied.
Darach finally sagged and more leaves fell. "It seemed like a good idea. Now, though, I'm really worried about them."
Hwin gently nudged Darach with her nose. “Let’s go find somewhere quiet and you can tell me what happened and where your friends went and what we can do to make sure they are safe.”
It was well after dark when the Seabirds returned with the news that they had found the Pea Soup, still within sight of Narnian shores. The Mer guide had taken the honey and left Puci and Gufo to drift. The juveniles deeply regretted their hasty actions and begged for a rescue, which was flying to them. They would be home very soon and brought before the High King for a full accounting of their tale. Any remedies – punishment seemed too harsh – would be meted out upon King Edmund’s return.
She and Bree were sharing corn, carrots, apples, and salads with the High King who had decided to give his portion of Cook’s guts and innards stew to the Hounds who would eat anything.
“So foolish!” Bree exclaimed. “They could have been killed.”
“They were very fortunate,” the High King agreed. “I do feel we’ve failed them. Two of our young should never feel so trapped that they think they must run away to Archenland of all places to escape Narnia prejudice.”
“Darach was very angry, but it did come from a sincere place,” Hwin said. “He truly wished for a kinder life for himself and for his friends who did not believe they would be left in peace to bond with one another.”
The High King nodded and gnawed a little on his carrot. “I will discuss this further with my brother and sisters when they return. We have deliberately let Narnia’s different factions remain independent and autonomous, so long as they do not harm others, but plainly we have not adequately considered the harm to those even within their communities.”
“It is something to consider,” Hwin replied, thinking of her own misery within the Glasswater herds. ““Given these ancient grudges and prejudices, I can't say that just leaving will always be the wrong decision.”
“But you should only go safely, and without stealing from the Palace.” Bree swished his tail at her and she knew he was also thinking of what it had taken for her to leave her ancestral herd; he had been there to support her journey and she had had a place to go.
The High King became a little vacant and stared into some space that only he could see.
“Your Majesty?” Hwin asked as his silence continued.
“I’m just remembering a scrap of poetry your words brought to mind. “‘Two households, both alike in dignity, In fair Verona, where we lay our scene. From ancient grudge break to new mutiny, Where civil blood makes civil hands unclean. From forth the fatal loins of these two foes, A pair of star-cross'd lovers take their life.’”
The High King shook his head and wiped a hand across his face. “I don’t know where I’ve heard it before.”
“I don’t recognize it,” Bree said. “I’ve never been to a place called Verona.”
“Nor I,” Hwin replied. “That flowery language about star-crossed lovers does sound Calormene, I suppose.”
The Owl and the Pussycat went to sea In a beautiful pea-green boat,
They took some honey, and plenty of money,
Wrapped up in a five pound note.
The Owl looked up to the stars above,
And sang to a small guitar,
"O lovely Pussy! O Pussy, my love,
What a beautiful Pussy you are, you are, you are!
What a beautiful Pussy you are."
Pussy said to the Owl "You elegant fowl,
How charmingly sweet you sing.
O let us be married, too long we have tarried;
But what shall we do for a ring?"
They sailed away, for a year and a day,
To the land where the Bong-tree grows,
And there in a wood a Piggy-wig stood
With a ring the end of his nose, his nose, his nose,
With a ring at the end of his nose.
"Dear Pig, are you willing to sell for one shilling your ring?"
Said the Piggy, "I will"
So they took it away, and were married next day
By the Turkey who lives on the hill.
They dined on mince, and slices of quince,
Which they ate with a runcible spoon.
And hand in hand, on the edge of the sand.
They danced by the light of the moon, the moon, the moon,
They danced by the light of the moon.
The Owl and the Pussy-cat, Edward Lear (1871)