The shipbuilding project gets off the ground - the White Witch had a ship, but it is widely believed to be haunted or cursed and the Narnians won't touch it. They build their own boats, and establish regular routes between Narnia proper and overseas territories of the Narnian Empire.
The schools are very popular. Isabella takes an old lady dwarf's calligraphy class and a centaur's forestry class and learns history from an ex-statue unicorn; she tries archery and singing and leatherworking. James sits in on miscellaneous lessons and teaches a bit of math. (The puzzle present turns out, after considerable fiddling, to unfold into a simple computer, although in an abstract and extremely mathematical way that renders it near-useless to anyone but James herself.)
Isabella heals any injured or sick Narnian who makes it to Cair Paravel, and will travel considerable distances for those who can't make the journey, with her cordial; when she notices the level of the juice visibly dropping she adds a berry from her potted plant as instructed by Father Christmas, and it fizzes and dissolves and the crystal is full again.
When the weather is fine - or dramatic - or she sees a new place - or when the leaves are startling red on the morning of Queensday when she turns thirteen - she takes a picture, and pastes it into her infinity notebook. Sometimes she takes portraits of her subjects and copies them onto loose paper for them to keep, and every now and again she will loan the postcard-camera to someone who is publishing a book, so that they can paste pictures into each copy as it comes off the press and have them all illustrated in a jiffy. She reliably gets it back afterwards.
There are pictures of herself and James in the infinity notebook, too. James with an eagle messenger on her fist, hearing news from Archenland. Isabella, staff in hand, dancing with a Faun on Kingsday. James on her throne gravely hearing the dispute between a rhinoceros and a rabbit. Isabella christening a new ship for their fleet with a bottle of champagne and a grin on her face. James practicing with her magic sword, solo, guided by its enchantment into learning how to do it herself. Isabella in the wardrobe mistress's most extravagant choice of finery officiating a wedding between Acorn and an equally shy lady rabbit. The king and queen together both of them on horseback beside Isabella's sometime-bodyguard unicorn, Dewdrop, and a small contingent of centaurs and bears riding out to respond to a report of a werewolf attacking the people of a distant town. Isabella can't reasonably wish to have had the camera before the notebook to put the pictures in and the accompanying pen (the pen, it turns out, will do calligraphy tips at her whim), nor before her ability to walk and run or the cordial that saved so many lives - but she very much likes having it early, to get down all the splendor of Narnia to keep forever between the white covers of her infinity notebook.
Queensday goes by, the pumpkins are harvested, the kitchens of Cair Paravel produce stew and drinks and sweets of them, and the frost descends.
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timeasmymeasure
no subject
Date: 2014-06-28 01:17 am (UTC)The shipbuilding project gets off the ground - the White Witch had a ship, but it is widely believed to be haunted or cursed and the Narnians won't touch it. They build their own boats, and establish regular routes between Narnia proper and overseas territories of the Narnian Empire.
The schools are very popular. Isabella takes an old lady dwarf's calligraphy class and a centaur's forestry class and learns history from an ex-statue unicorn; she tries archery and singing and leatherworking. James sits in on miscellaneous lessons and teaches a bit of math. (The puzzle present turns out, after considerable fiddling, to unfold into a simple computer, although in an abstract and extremely mathematical way that renders it near-useless to anyone but James herself.)
Isabella heals any injured or sick Narnian who makes it to Cair Paravel, and will travel considerable distances for those who can't make the journey, with her cordial; when she notices the level of the juice visibly dropping she adds a berry from her potted plant as instructed by Father Christmas, and it fizzes and dissolves and the crystal is full again.
When the weather is fine - or dramatic - or she sees a new place - or when the leaves are startling red on the morning of Queensday when she turns thirteen - she takes a picture, and pastes it into her infinity notebook. Sometimes she takes portraits of her subjects and copies them onto loose paper for them to keep, and every now and again she will loan the postcard-camera to someone who is publishing a book, so that they can paste pictures into each copy as it comes off the press and have them all illustrated in a jiffy. She reliably gets it back afterwards.
There are pictures of herself and James in the infinity notebook, too. James with an eagle messenger on her fist, hearing news from Archenland. Isabella, staff in hand, dancing with a Faun on Kingsday. James on her throne gravely hearing the dispute between a rhinoceros and a rabbit. Isabella christening a new ship for their fleet with a bottle of champagne and a grin on her face. James practicing with her magic sword, solo, guided by its enchantment into learning how to do it herself. Isabella in the wardrobe mistress's most extravagant choice of finery officiating a wedding between Acorn and an equally shy lady rabbit. The king and queen together both of them on horseback beside Isabella's sometime-bodyguard unicorn, Dewdrop, and a small contingent of centaurs and bears riding out to respond to a report of a werewolf attacking the people of a distant town. Isabella can't reasonably wish to have had the camera before the notebook to put the pictures in and the accompanying pen (the pen, it turns out, will do calligraphy tips at her whim), nor before her ability to walk and run or the cordial that saved so many lives - but she very much likes having it early, to get down all the splendor of Narnia to keep forever between the white covers of her infinity notebook.
Queensday goes by, the pumpkins are harvested, the kitchens of Cair Paravel produce stew and drinks and sweets of them, and the frost descends.