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“Edmund. Do you suppose...there’ll be any more adventures, now that we’re back?”
This was a difficult question, of course. Aslan had said they would meet him in their world, by another name, that they would have to learn what that name was. He hadn’t said anything about adventures.
Edmund looked uncertain, perhaps because he’d been thinking of this himself. “Ye-es,” he replied slowly, “but they won’t be the sort we’re used to, you know. More the sort Peter and Susan are always going on about.”
Lucy thought about this for a moment. Compared with Narnia, the idea of being sensible and steady and darning socks seemed utterly dull. She didn’t want to be grown-up if that was what being a grown-up in England meant. It wasn’t at all like what she remembered, the memories fading with every year that went by, of growing up in Cair Paravel, a fierce golden Queen who did things. Doing things, things that mattered, would be something. At least Susan was off having adventures in America. It really was a shame, being stuck with the Scrubbs even if Eustace was quite all right now…
Stuck? No, of course they weren’t! Aunt Alberta wasn’t the only aunt they knew. Lucy’s eyes lit up. “Maybe they’ll be the Narnian sort after all. Aunt Polly is sure to have some ideas…”
-
An exchange of letters and telephone rings later, they were on a train to Oxford, suspecting that Harold and Alberta weren’t so very sorry to have gotten ridden of them that easily. Eustace, of course, had wanted them to stay, and Lucy had tried as hard as she could to petition for him to come with them, but in the end it was just the Pevensies speeding along to Miss Polly Plummer’s residence. They counted themselves lucky to have made such an escape at all.
Lucy leaned her head against the cool glass of the window and sighed, her breath making a white puff of steam clouding the green landscape whizzing by. “I’ve been thinking of every name I know,” she said, almost wearily, “but nothing seems to match him. How are we supposed to learn what is is if we don’t know where to look?”
Pulling himself out of a volume of Scott he’d found secondhand, Edmund shook his head. “I think it will come when we aren’t looking. That’s how we always got into Narnia, isn’t it? Don’t fret so much about it, Lu. He’ll find us. He showed himself to you in the gorge, didn’t he? I don’t see why he can’t show us here when he wants to.”
Lucy had never been the patient type. But Edmund was quite right. And Aslan was the most patient type. I call all times soon.
She made another cloud of breath on the window glass.
-
Aunt Polly’s garden was a sunny, cheerful sort of place, where her cat Chant chased lizards with lionish ferocity when he wasn’t busy sunning himself lazily in patches of sunlight. Having thoroughly explored the museum where she curated and toured, Lucy and Edmund spent the latter part of their week watching the darting tabby’s antics and poking at the beds of flowers and vegetables and (in Edmund’s case) reading up a storm. Soon enough, the holidays would be over, along the warm weather and clear air and talks of Narnia and ‘remember when?’s. There was so little time before they had to really grow up, to go back to school and fade back into the grey dull world again.
They didn’t have much time to find his name…
“Was Aslan ever a kitten? Would he have chased lizards, do you think?”
Edmund just snorted from his pile of books afforded by Aunt Polly’s substantial collection, content to enjoy the sunshine without philosophizing over the nature and origin of cats and Cats.
Lucy surveyed the heap of plucked weeds with triumph, imagining them a pile of vanquished foes she’d single-handedly defeated in hand-to-hand combat. A few paces from her, Chant licked his paws assiduously, well-satisfied with his afternoon’s work. She pushed sweaty fringe off of her forehead with one arm and stretched her back, cricks popping after nearly an hour of stooping. But there was one more large foe - er, weed - by the gazing ball in the middle of the garden, and it simply wouldn’t do to leave it standing.
Into the pile it went with an emphatic tug and a wild burst of roots through the ground. Before she could claim a well-earned victory, an inscription caught her eye. She bent over the gazing ball, and the etched letters glittered in the afternoon sun.
“Property of Chrestomanci,” she read slowly. She didn’t recognize it, but “Edmund...have you ever heard of Chrestomanci?”
“Of whatsit?”
She sighed. It was harder to pry Edmund away from his books than a Mouse from his blade. “Chrest-o-man-ci,” she said, enunciating it syllable by syllable.
The world swirled and dipped in a sudden, dizzying array of amorphous colour and light. Lucy drew in a sharp breath, trying to find her feet, and quite unable to, so she reached out for anything she could lay a hand on. There was a yowling squeal and a wriggle of fur under her fingers. In spite of herself, she laughed. “Oh Chant, you goose…”
Were they going to Narnia? No, of course not, they could never go back...but they were surely going somewhere. Lucy hoped she and Chant weren’t the only ones. “Edmund?”
“Lu, what the hell…”
-
The garden was unlike anything she’d ever seen before. A bit like the glimpses through the fences around Kensington, perhaps, but not at all like them at the same time. Wild like Narnia, but without so much Deep Magic. The magic here was quite different, she was sure of it.
She reached out and found Edmund’s hand at last. “So? Chrestomanci? Ever heard of it?” she asked again in a rush, the name filling her with a tingling sensation.
“No, never,” he declared, and she was glad he sounded as breathless and flabbergasted as she felt.
“I have heard of Chrestomanci,” said a voice to their right, a strange, kind, terrible sort of voice, and Lucy jumped and blinked and focused hard on the figure flickering into view. He looked like someone out of one of Edmund’s books. His hat was quite tall, and his coat was very fine and golden and velvet, and his trousers and boots were the kind an Important Gentleman out of a fairy tale might wear, and yet he gave the impression overall of being Dark and Mysterious. “Now, where did you hear of him?”
Lucy was not to be cowed. “I heard of him on Aunt Polly’s gazing ball,” she said stoutly, and very truthfully. “I thought she might have gotten it at her museum...but maybe she got it from here. Where is here, please?”
“Here is here,” replied the Dark Stranger. “And you are in my here. Now who are you?”
Edmund frowned and stepped forward. “Now look here, why should we tell you who we are when we haven’t even heard your name yet?”
Lucy had the feeling this was all the wrong way to go about it. She nudged Edmund with an elbow, then curtseyed slightly. “We are Edmund and Lucy Pevensie. Pleased to make your acquaintance.” Expectantly, she looked at the Dark Stranger, who examined her in return with an inscrutable expression.
“Are you now? I hadn’t been expecting you for a week, at least…” His voice trailed off in an amused chuckle. “But since you’re here now, I suppose something must be done with you.” There was a moment of silence, in which Edmund crossed his arms and Lucy held her breath and the Stranger seemed to look through the two of them. She thought it odd that he didn’t so much as glance at Chant.
“Very well. I am Chrestomanci, and that was indeed my gazing ball you found today. How curious that you saw my name there. I had thought it well hidden. You look like you could use some tea.”
“That’s the most sensible thing you’ve said so far,” said Edmund with a firm nod. “But how are we to know that it hasn’t been magicked?” He’d questioned even Aslan’s Table; this Chrestomanci’s wasn’t going to escape scrutiny.
Chrestomanci didn’t even blink. “It might be. I can’t prove to you that it isn’t. Believe or not, the choice is quite up to you.”
Edmund and Lucy exchanged glances. The last time they’d heard something like that, of course…
Lucy tipped her head back and squinted against the sunlight, trying to look into the tall man’s eyes. She couldn’t tell if the shimmer was just the afternoon brightness or magic or the eyes she was looking for. “It would be our pleasure, Mr. Chrestomanci.”
It was a very fine tea, one that would have delighted the heart of Mr. Tumnus, Lucy was sure. It had been ages and ages since they’d had the sort of goodies that crowded the silver trays on Chrestomanci’s garden table. Cakes and biscuits and tarts and three different kinds of jam and clotted cream, and sandwiches with unfamiliar but delicious cheeses and meat fillings. The tea, happily, was utterly prosaic Earl Grey.
In between bites, Lucy had a good look around the gardens, trying to think what the name of this place might be and coming up quite empty-handed. “Are there many other worlds we haven’t been to yet?” she asked, nibbling at her strawberry tart. “Will we get to see more of them besides Narnia and...well, wherever here is called?”
From the perch on his shoulder, Chant batted at Chrestomanci’s hand, no doubt sniffing out the sardines in his sandwich. Chrestomanci switched to the other hand. “Those are two very different questions, child. Do you hope for the same answer to both?”
She considered this for a moment. “I think both are very likely, sir.”
He smiled. “I think so too.”
“Did we come because we called on you?” Edmund asked, and he was staring at Chrestomanci too, not with suspicion anymore, but like there was a riddle to be solved here.
“Or perhaps because I called you. You just came a little early, that’s all.” Chrestomanci sipped placidly at his tea. “A good host is always prepared for early visitors.”
Was he or wasn’t he? Lucy was just bursting to ask. Edmund looked like he was thinking very hard on what sort of question would get them the answers they were looking for. The gentleman regarded both of them with an amused sort of expression. At last he said,
“Well, out with it.”
“I -” “Are -”
Hissssss!
Lucy squawked and nearly fell out of her chair trying to push away the plate of baby snakes that had suddenly taken the place of all the lovely cakes. Edmund sprang up, reaching for a sword that wasn’t there. Chrestomanci looked weary and terribly annoyed.
“I did think she wouldn’t bother us here. My apologies. Don’t drink the tea, either.”
The Pevensies scrambled away from the dangerous tea things and watched as Chrestomanci stalked off, clearly on a mission to find this mysterious she. They looked at each other for a moment, and there was hardly any way either of them could have not followed him. Something was up, and they wanted to know who, what, and why.
They peeped through the ivy that curled all over the wrought fence, Chant prowling at their feet before hopping up to get a good look for himself, and there across the lawn was a girl about their age looking very satisfied with herself and with the dozens of snakes that hung from the limbs of the old giant oak tree overhead. But before Chrestomanci could reach her, two other figures rounded corner of a shrubbery, in hot pursuit.
It was...them.
Lucy inhaled sharply, scarcely able to believe her eyes. But there in broad daylight were the unmistakeable forms of an Edmund and a Lucy exactly like the two of them, albeit queerly dressed in old-fashioned clothing, and other-Lucy’s hair was arranged in a gather of curls like someone out of a storybook. And they were running full-tilt at the smarmy-faced girl, other-Edmund with an open book in his hand which he was consulting while he shouted strange words, and other Lucy simply tackled the guilty party and found rope from somewhere (was she magicking it?) which began winding itself around the girl’s arms and legs.
She, clearly, was not happy about any of it.
“I’ll turn you both into vipers, and then make you bite the other’s head off!” she shrieked. “And then you’ll fill up with poison and blow up like a balloon and I’ll sell you to the apothecary.”
Other-Edmund, having turned all the snakes back into proper branches once more, said something the two onlookers couldn’t hear (even if the banshee hadn’t been screaming her head off), but Lucy was sure it was something quite clever and retorting. By that point, Chrestomanci had reached the lot of them, his back to the fence, and they could neither see nor hear what he thought of the matter, but it seemed like he approved of their work.
“What sort of magic is this?” Lucy whispered. “Are they really...us?”
“Only if we’ve learned magic in this world,” Edmund whispered back. “But why can we see them if they’re us?”
It was a great mystery to both of them, and there didn’t seem to be any answers to be had until Chrestomanci was back. The wait wasn’t long, however, as he was pointing to the spires of the grand-looking house behind them and waving his hand and sending the tied-up girl (now neatly gagged too thanks to other-Lucy) floating along towards it. The doppelgangers nodded at something he said to them, turned, and followed the uselessly kicking harpy.
“Come on!” Edmund beckoned Lucy back towards the garden table, where the baby snakes had thoughtfully turned back into cakes. Lucy still wouldn’t touch them. She eyed the tea suspiciously - who knew what that witch-girl had done to it and if it was really back to rights.
Two moments later, Chrestomanci reappeared, looking for once as if he was in great haste. “I’m afraid it’s time to leave, children,” he said firmly. “Bad enough that you’ve seen the other Pevensies. Knowing them - and you - they’ll be sneaking back the moment they’ve dropped Gwendolen off at the house. I can’t have them seeing you too.”
“Please,” Lucy interrupted, looking stricken as she gazed up at him, “we’ve only just got here. There’s so many things we don’t know yet.”
“There is always next time, Lucy,” he replied with a kindly smile. “Call my name three times as you did, and I will hear you.”
“Is that the other name then, that we’re supposed to call you?” Edmund blurted out. “Are you in fact Aslan?”
“Aslan?” Chrestomanci blinked. “You think I am Aslan? We are old friends to be sure...long ago I visited Narnia to make sure the magic there was well in hand...but I? Aslan?” He laughed, a great hearty laugh, and shook his head. “I’m afraid you must keep searching for that other name.”
It wasn’t a no, Lucy noticed. But before they had time for any more questions, he was leading them back to the gazing ball in his own garden, long legs striding swiftly so that they had to break into a trot to keep up with him. Chant, on the other hand, seemed to have no problem stalking right along with the magician, though his leg were a tenth of the size.
“And those versions of us?” Edmund asked breathlessly, hurrying to get the question in before they were sent back. “Who were they?”
“Why, you of course. At least, our world’s you. But there isn’t time to explain. You must wait until next time.” Chrestomanci smiled and raised his hand. “Farewell, children. We shall meet again soon.”
As the world swirled around them again, Lucy peered at the tall figure disappearing rapidly. “I suppose you call all times soon,” she sighed, but there was a smile behind her eyes. There was an other name. Whether it was the Another Name, she had plenty more adventures to find out.