—but before she can come up with a suitable comment for the occasion, there is an abrupt cut-off scream from the far side of the pavilion. Dryads and naiads scatter in every direction, some of them also screaming.
Oh, so that's what Father Christmas meant by the sword and shield guiding her - is what James finds herself thinking as she drops her backpack, draws her sword, and bolts for the source of the trouble all in a single uninterrupted movement.
Bella runs towards the commotion, too, though not so swiftly as she's not really armed - backpack dropped next to James's, staff clutched tight in one hand and the other hand pressed over her pocket of cordial.
Aslan is with them, but when the braver of the other creatures start forward to the great wolf that has treed a naiad (naiads are the ones who are not supposed to be treed), he calls, "Back! Let the Prince win his spurs."
The Prince so named has very little time to analyze the situation before she's right behind the enormous wolf, slashing at its back with her sword. It turns on her in a blink, howling with rage; she lunges forward and stabs it in the heart with all her eleven-year-old strength.
The wolf's neck is still long enough for it to lunge forward, fire in its eyes, and scrape its teeth against her forehead - but that's all. It dies on her sword.
The naiad creeps down, making curtseys and uttering stammered thanks.
The creatures reorganize themselves; it is eventually the consensus that another wolf has got away without attacking anyone and is most likely reporting to the Witch, but the sun is setting, everyone seems to feel quite safe in the presence of Aslan, and various nymphs pack James and Bella into piles of cushions in the pavillion to rest for the night, after James has been reminded to wipe off her sword.
"Hand it to me and kneel, Son of Eve," instructs Aslan, and when James has done that, Aslan strikes her with the flat of the blade, and says, "Rise up, Sir James Wolf's-Bane. And, whatever happens, never forget to wipe your sword."
"...Yeah. I think - somehow, Aslan and Father Christmas knew something about me that wasn't true yet," she says. "But it is now. It's hard to explain properly, though, because... well. If I said 'James Moriarty', would you know who I meant?"
"Mm-hmm. He's this mysterious criminal mastermind math professor. I've always liked him, because of the math thing and because he's supposed to be incredibly smart and, I don't know, good at things? But I didn't want to be him or anything. But - I don't know, when Father Christmas called me 'son of Eve' that made sense, even though I couldn't figure out why or what it meant that it did. And then Aslan called me James... and I think what it means is that I was going to decide that I really do want to be James Moriarty. A better, smarter version with different priorities. I think that in a sense it's just as true to say that I'm a boy and my name is James, as to say that I'm a girl and my name is Elizabeth. Or - I'm not sure if one is really more true than the other between girl and boy, I haven't really figured that part out yet at all, but I think James is more true than Elizabeth. It feels more mine."
Bella digests this. "I don't think I get how this adds up to wanting to be him. I'll call you James if you want but I'm not getting where Moriarty comes in or why."
"I know, I'm not explaining it well. It would be easier if I'd thought of it myself, I think, because then I would've gone through all the things that make it make sense already. This way it's like somebody handed me the answer to a math problem and I can tell it's right but I can't prove it yet because I haven't figured out the steps." She sighs. "And the books are all back on Earth, and I haven't memorized the Moriarty parts because I didn't know this was going to happen, so I might not have enough information to write the proof until we get back. I'll think about it, I guess, whenever we have time."
"That part's even harder to explain, because I don't think I have all the pieces yet. It's just - when they call me 'Son of Eve', or when Aslan said 'prince' and 'his' about me, I think that if I weren't just-as-much-a-boy it would've sounded incorrect. But it doesn't. I think I could just... go around being called 'sir' and 'he' and stuff, and it would be the same amount of right as 'miss' and 'she'. I even think I want to do some of both. But it's harder to figure out because, you know, at least with the James thing I've read the books and thought about the character and have opinions about him and stuff. The boy/girl thing isn't really something I've thought about before at all."
"Yeah. I think maybe most people wouldn't like it, or it would sound weird to them, like it - didn't fit, didn't belong. With me, I'm not used to it yet, but it doesn't sound weird that way."
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deepest_magic) wrote2014-06-21 10:24 am
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Oh, so that's what Father Christmas meant by the sword and shield guiding her - is what James finds herself thinking as she drops her backpack, draws her sword, and bolts for the source of the trouble all in a single uninterrupted movement.
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The naiad creeps down, making curtseys and uttering stammered thanks.
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"Hand it to me and kneel, Son of Eve," instructs Aslan, and when James has done that, Aslan strikes her with the flat of the blade, and says, "Rise up, Sir James Wolf's-Bane. And, whatever happens, never forget to wipe your sword."
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And now... bedtime?
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"So," says Bella, not yet irretrievably sleepy. "James?"
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