Chapter 1: Another Door in the Air

Caspian was leaning over the railings of the Dawn Treader near the forecastle. He felt a little like Reepicheep at the moment; he wanted the adventure to get going as quickly as possible. The trip had been pleasant up until then with lovely banquets on the Seven Isles, and the tournament on Galma which had been good fun, but Caspian was not in the mood for state visits and pomp and circumstance just then. The spirit of a real adventure was running through his blood, and he did not want that hindered by court niceties.

He found everything was most hindered at Galma, their first stop. He hadn't fared too badly in the tournament, though he did have a couple of nasty falls, and his side was still tender from a well placed jab with a lance. That part he was fine with, but at the banquets every night the King kept sitting his daughter next to him, and that was when Caspian shrewdly discovered the plan the Narnian nobles had for him. He was planning to come home with the seven lords, his father's friends, but Narnia was also hoping he would come home with a wife.

He personally felt that he was far too young for that, especially since he was just getting to having a good time now that all things were set straight and peace reigned in Narnia. Besides, he often reasoned, none of the four monarchs had been married in the Golden Age of Narnia, not the High King or the beautiful Queen Susan whose hand was courted far and wide. They had never been married, and their reign was the most notable of all. Caspian had seen a good deal of "court romance" when his Aunt was Queen Prunaprisimia because she loved the intrigue, but he found it deadly dull. It seemed to be all bowing and hand-kissing and false compliments and dropped handkerchiefs. Nothing real or fun or stirring about it.

The Galmian Princess wasn't a bad sort of girl, really. True, she wasn't very pretty always squinting down her nose, but she was nice. She spoke to him pleasantly over dinner and seemed interested in his voyage, though she did say she would never like to spend so long on a boat. However, when she showed him the castle or walked with him, it was obvious she knew nothing about the stables or the dogs, and when he challenged her to a friendly shooting match, she was forced to admit she couldn't even string a bow. Caspian did not think much of this, but he was too polite to tell her that the fairest Queen in all of Narnian history was also the nation's best marksman. When she came to visit him after his wounds from the joust had been tended and he was nicely bandaged, she fainted away, and Caspian decided then and there that courtship was definitely not for him. Not if this were the sort of girls he was expected to love, girls who couldn't even stand to see the sight of bandages. Why, Queen Lucy had been the first to tend Reepicheep's battle wounds, and he had been very bloody indeed.

When they left port, Caspian waved once to the Galmian court from the gangplank, and walked immediately to the forecastle with Reepicheep to discuss the adventures that lay ahead. Drinian had then approached them ostensibly to ask Caspian to help with the oars, but as they walked towards the hatch, he whispered to him, "The King of Galma had hopes you might marry his daughter."

Caspian stared at Drinian and laughed. "Oh no, my friend! She is not the queen for me." And he said no more but went down the hatch to row.

Several days later, when they came upon Terebinthia, the message came that there was sickness in the land. As they pulled around to an uninhabited place to water, Drinian added "It's too bad. They say the women in Terebinthia are uncommon beautiful." He smiled at Caspian and played his trump card. "The legend is that even the High King Peter succumbed to a Terebinthian Lady's beauty."

Caspian looked at him, but said nothing. Only the fact that he liked Drinian more by the day kept him from getting frustrated with the innuendo.

Now they were approaching the last of the known world, the Lone Islands, and Caspian hoped that he could avoid talk there by saying he didn't wish to marry one of his own subjects. He would be glad indeed to get on with the voyage and not worry about romance, which always seemed unnecessarily complicated anyway.

The day was bright and everything was blue, the dark streak of sea rushing up to meet the sky at the horizon. The ship was running forward fast, propelled by a steady strong wind. Caspian resolved to put all the tiresome thoughts of romance behind him and licked his lips and tasted the salt on them. He pushed his hair out of his eyes and felt it thick with brine and seaspray. Drinian said they were making excellent progress.

Caspian was staring intently at the horizon, wondering how far they had to go before the sky really would meet the water. He was thinking about worlds he had heard of as a boy, worlds that were round where you could live on them upside down and never run into the horizon when all at once the strangest thing happened.

It was all so quick that later on, Caspian was fairly sure he was the only one on board who had seen the whole thing. Right in the middle of the sky a doorway opened, and there were three figures standing on its edge. He could just glimpse a Spartan bedchamber beyond them, and he knew it must be a doorway to another world. Caspian thought three things almost at the same time: "I wonder if we shall reach them; Aslan made a door in the air like that once; I only know of four people who have come from another world to this." He was getting to wonder why there were only three and not four when they fell off the edge and into the water quite close to the boat.

Caspian snapped out of his reverie at once. "Hi! Drinian! Rhince! Man overboard!" he bellowed. Instantly his cry was echoed by the man on the fighting top. He pulled off his sandals, keeping his eye on the swimmers the whole time. He had just gotten the left one off when one of the boys grabbed the girl and they went under the waves.

"Allow me, sire!" Reepicheep called, running forward.

"Don't be ridiculous! How is a mouse going to keep two humans twice its size above water?" Caspian snapped. "I'll go help them," he informed Rhince, who was steps behind Reepicheep. "Stand by to pull us up, and make sure he doesn't try to jump in after me!" He gave a stern glare to Reepicheep and dove off the side of the ship.

He surfaced with a cough; the water was much colder than he thought. He barely gave it a second's thought before he began looking around for the people. He heard cries and swam in that direction; fortunately they were still quite close and just over the crest of a wave. One boy was treading water, holding the arms of another who was apparently a very poor swimmer, and the girl was struggling with the current. He recognized them as Edmund and Lucy, but the fact didn't register. His only thought was to get them safely aboard.

Caspian caught the girl with his arm and waved up at the ship. He saw Drinian and Rhince organizing the men, and a second later they cast out ropes. Caspian caught one with his free hand and called to Edmund. "Here! Help me! Can he swim on his own?"

"For a second," Edmund guessed, and he let go of the boy he was holding, who flailed in the water but managed to keep his head above the waves. They turned their attentions to Lucy, fastening the rope around her as a team, but not thinking a word of greeting. Then they waited while the ship righted so they could hoist her up. Once she was safe on board, they threw the next rope down. Caspian fastened this around Edmund who had caught the stranger again.

There was a tense moment for Caspian after Edmund was pulled up because he was now holding this wailing boy who was trying desperately to swim but was only making it more difficult for Caspian. The rope was thrown a bit too far away, and it was hard to swim to it and hold on to the stranger, but he managed it in the end. Then he tied the rope around himself. As he was being pulled up, it struck him who he had just helped, and he was quite impatient for them to pull him safely aboard so he could greet the King and Queen.

Lucy recognized him first, and gasped "Ca—Ca—Caspian!" with such delight underneath her apparent shock that Caspian grinned.

"So it is!" Edmund cried, and he grinned too. Caspian was almost too happy for words, and he wrung their hands and clapped them on the back heartily. The only thing that kept him from embracing them both was their soaking state.

Their companion was somewhat less pleasant. He complained, he did not understand about Talking Animals, and he was sick twice within the space of five minutes. By the time they all went below to change, Caspian was thinking of giving him to the Galmian princess.

Of course he gave his cabin to Lucy, who would now be the only lady on board, but he felt he ought to apologize to Edmund, who was her senior—and his. "I am sorry I can't offer you better accommodation," he said as they entered the small cabin on the lower deck, "But this isn't a big ship."

"Never mind that. This is perfect," Edmund said, looking around with shining eyes. "And between you and me," he added in a whisper, "it's a good sight better than his house where we were staying. You never saw anyplace duller in your life."

Caspian couldn't restrain a laugh, even though it made Edmund's kinsman, Eustace, complain about his head.

Eustace continued moaning about a miserable seasickness, so they left him in the bunk and went to find Lucy. She came out of his cabin presently wearing his clothes. He couldn't restrain a grin when he saw her. The tunic that ended well above the knee for him was as long as a dress on her, hanging somewhere around midcalf. There were wet patches on her shoulders where her two braids rested on the fabric, and she had pulled his belt so tight there was a long strap of leather trailing from her waist. She was grinning, and she looked so comfortable that he didn't think she looked ridiculous in the least. But that was Lucy. She always made him want to smile.

As they told of the trip to this point (and Drinian had to mention the Galmian princess, though Caspian played it off to Lucy) Caspian couldn't help thinking that Reepicheep was right: the only thing that had been lacking to that point was Lucy and Edmund.