Links to Chapter One and Chapter Two
Edmund slipped and shivered through the snow until he eventually found the Witch’s castle. It looked quite creepy, but bolstered by thoughts of Turkish Delight (oh, his Saracens – and the Scarlets were his favourite Welsh side), he crept through the imposing main gate.
He found himself in a courtyard filled with statues. They had snow settling on them, and they all looked very sad. Near the gate, there were a couple of magnificent Lions, and then he spotted a statue that looked very like Lucy’s description of Mr Iknus. There was a collection of stone rugby balls, and what looked like a few referees. (“Those referees probably deserved it,” thought Edmund.)
Suddenly, Edmund was rooted to the spot by a chilling low growl. He turned his head to find himself staring into the eyes of Maugrim, chief of the Witch’s Very Secret Police.
“Come,” said Maugrim, “Her Majesty is expecting you.”
* * *
“What!” said the Witch, not at all friendly like the last time, “Have you come alone? I told you to bring the Daughters of Maeve and the other Son of George.”
“B – b – but,” stammered Edmund, afraid of her icy stare and stern manner, “I couldn’t get them away from the Beavers. They were all talking about the return of Paulan to Narnia.”
The Queen turned even paler, if that were possible.
“Paulan!” she muttered to herself, “No, it cannot be possible. My spells are strong.”
Before Edmund knew what had happened, she had crossed the room and spear-tackled him with one strong arm. “Tell me all,” she said, preparing to drive his head into the ground.
Edmund, quaking with fear, told her all that he knew.
The Witch released him with a thump on the floor, and clapped her hands to summon her minions.
“Harness the springboks and prepare my sledge immediately! Get my dwarf! Maugrim: take the swiftest of your wolves, go to the Lodge, and kill the children and the Beavers. If they have already gone, then proceed to the Stone Stadium.”
In the twinkling of a drop goal, the sledge pulled up, driven by a dwarf who looked suspiciously like a scrum-half. Edmund was bound, and unceremoniously dumped into the bottom of the sledge. There wasn’t even any Turkish Delight.
* * *
“Susan,” said Peter, “Where’s Edmund?”
“I – I don’t know. Now that you mention it, I haven’t noticed him for a while.”
“Ah, children,” said Mr Beaver, “I’m afraid he’s gone to see the Witch. We must be on our way quickly.”
“What?”, said Lucy, “No, surely Edmund would never betray us.”
“Daughter, I’m afraid he has the look of one who is in the Witch’s favour. How long that favour lasts is another matter.
“Did anyone notice when he left? Did he hear that Paulan is on the move?”
Nobody was quite sure.
“Then we must be off at once. Mrs Beaver, please pack us up as quickly as you can.”
Mrs Beaver – for of course it’s always the females who are prepared for anything – had already got nearly everything ready for travelling. She had a pack ready for everyone, and they were off in less time than it takes to reset a scrum.
* * *
They had a long, cold and weary journey, and stopped after some hours at a safe hiding place, where they cast themselves down on the floor, covered themselves with the blankets kindly provided by Mrs Beaver, and fell asleep immediately.
They were awakened at dawn by some faint voices, which became clearer as they drew closer.
“Ho, ho ho! Go left! It’s on!”
“I’m straighter than that throw-in.”
The children rubbed the sleep from their eyes and looked in confusion at the Beavers.
“It’s Father Jiffy and Father Nige,” beamed Mr Beaver. “The Witch’s magic has kept them from Narnia for so long, but her enchantment is fading. The voices of rugby have returned to the land.” They rushed outside to find a volley of rugby balls flying through the air, and the snow at last melting.
Ovally Balls 
clotted even. not sure what clostted is
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Nope. No. No. Custard ? On rhubarb crumble ? Cream or vanilla ice cream yes. Custard, no.
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Belgian chips and custard.
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Belgian chips and a good quality vanilla ice cream.
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Belgian chips and whipped cream. Not clotted. Unless you’re a pervert.
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Deebs – the French and Belgians dispute the origin but I’m going with Belgium. The Internet seems to agree with me.
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Sometimes I have custard and ice cream on a crumble.
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‘Sometimes I have custard and ice cream on a crumble.’
Add some clotted cream for the full heart attack effect.
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@OT – PFFFFFFFFT!
Do the real deal, with eggs, milk, caster sugar, vanilla pods etc all the way. Had a funny moment a few years back when a mate of ours who happily admits she can’t cook came round and I said I was making custard. She hung around whilst I was busy heating the milk and whipping the eggs and sugar, and asked when I was going to get the custard powder going. She’s getting better – actually did a roast without assistance last weekend.
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Tried to make Pani Puri yesterday. Got everything perfect except the fucking puris. Just wouldn’t rise like the recipe said they would. Abject failure but compensated for by loads of wine. Happily, I managed to sneak a few bottles out of storage today too!
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Custard isn’t custard unless it’s green
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I really want to see Deebee’s wine stores. Sounds like a separate building to the main house.
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Doesn’t everyone have a wine and food store/cellar/cave? No?
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@slade
Don’t need one when you’ve got a Lidl AND an Aldi in walking distance
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Add a Greggs and you never need to go on holiday ever again.
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I have 2 Greggs within a mile.
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Custard & Craigs Kill Culchie Blog
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Soz
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Dave Greenfield of the Strabglers deid.
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That was an offshoot band from the Stranglers, obviously…..
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Andrew Cotter does it again.
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urgh. Listening to these 5G protesters is depressing
‘it’s like nazi germany!’
‘I’m just protecting everyone’s children’
‘coronavirus symptoms are just like radiation, it’ 5G! wake up people!’
‘it’s the lizard people trying to control our minds’
‘coronavirus is just an cover-up to allow 5G to be rolled out in secret’
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OK I made one of those up.
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Craigs, I have some wine in a storage container along with a whole lot of other stuff that we’ve accumulated in the last few years. Both Mrs Deebee’s and my parents passed away within a couple of years of each other and we’ve got loads of stuff from that. I wish I had my own wine store!
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Chimpie, it’s tricky to figure out which one! Lot of nutters out there.
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I really don’t get this 5G conspiracy thing
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Great words Thauma, hope everyone is keeping well and staying safe
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Yellow Peril + Fear of New Technology.
Mobiles were going to fry our brains, cause impotence in men etc
The coming of train travel is amazing for this kind of thing: https://www.atlasobscura.com/articles/railway-madness-victorian-trains
https://www.mentalfloss.com/article/67806/early-trains-were-thought-make-womens-uteruses-fly-out
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Deebs – is it temperature controlled storage? My house has a really crappy extension with no insulation because the previous owner had hundreds of bottles of really expensive wine in it.
He drank himself to death apparently.
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Pretty sure you’ll be fine though deebs!!!
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Chimpie – that’s cos you’re a normie.
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@tomp
Loving some of those details
‘In 1894, one naked individual even launched a full-on assault on the train by disabling the communications and then attacking those onboard, roaming around at will through the train. The whole affair was treated as puzzling, but not frightening—the attacker was battled and jabbed back with the pointy end of an umbrella.’
Finally, a use for an umbrella.
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‘Chimpie – that’s cos you’re a normie.’
Want to make something of it?
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I’ve not swallowed the red pill apparently
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Or is it blue pill?
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Chimpie – Red pill, to use the accepted parlance l. I read ‘Kill all Normies’ recently which is about the rise of the alt-right and tumblr sjw crowd.
I found out mid way that it suffers from plagiarism and found some of the argument a tad lazy. Not really sure about the conclusion either. But it’s a nice history lesson.
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You should see my bookshelf.
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That sits on my bookshelf between Adam Tooze’s Crashed and Joshua Ferris’s The Dinner Party.
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The Naked Lunch and The Fountainhead*.
*Lent to me after the fire. Unread as yet.
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Time to start a fire as Yos would say.
Where is Yos?
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There’s a book I quite like from a few years back called Bloody Foreigners. It’s by a journalist called Robert Winder. I left it on my windowsill for a few weeks without realising and fear it may have given the wrong message.
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yos flounced after bollockcuppinggate if I remember correctly.
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Never read any rand. Feel I should just so I know what it’s all aboot.
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Tomp – seems like a good read, added to my list.
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Chimpie – rational self interest, look after yourself only.
All you need to know.
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I’d like to think that it wasn’t a full on flounce.
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It was the flounce of all flounces
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