The_Complete_Chronicles_of_Narnia_(volumes_1-7,_in_order_of_publication)

CHAPTER ELEVEN
THE LION ROARS
WHEN the whole party was finally awake Lucy had to tell her story for the fourth time.
The blank silence which followed it was as discouraging as anything could be.
"I can't see anything," said Peter after he had stared his eyes sore. "Can you, Susan?"
"No, of course I can't," snapped Susan. "Because there isn't anything to see. She's been
dreaming. Do lie down and go to sleep, Lucy."
"And I do hope," said Lucy in a tremulous voice, "that you will all come with me.
Because - because I'll have to go with him whether anyone else does or not."
"Don't talk nonsense, Lucy," said Susan. "Of course you can't go off on your own. Don't
let her, Peter. She's being downright naughty."
"I'll go with her, if she must go," said Edmund. "She's been right before."
"I know she has," said Peter. "And she may have been right this morning. We certainly
had no luck going down the gorge. Still - at this hour of the night. And why should Aslan
be invisible to us? He never used to be. It's not like him. What does the D.L.F. say?"
"Oh, I say nothing at all," answered the Dwarf. "If you all go, of course, I'll go with you;
and if your party splits up, I'll go with the High King. That's my duty to him and King
Caspian. But, if you ask my private opinion, I'm a plain dwarf who doesn't think there's
much chance of finding a road by night where you couldn't find one by day. And I have
no use for magic lions which are talking lions and don't talk, and friendly lions though
they don't do us any good, and whopping big lions though nobody can see them. It's all
bilge and beanstalks as far as I can see."
"He's beating his paw on the ground for us to hurry," said Lucy. "We must go now. At
least I must."
"You've no right to try to force the rest of us like that. It's four to one and you're the
youngest," said Susan.
"Oh, come on," growled Edmund. "We've got to go. There'll be no peace till we do." He
fully intended to back Lucy up, but he was annoyed at losing his night's sleep and was
making up for it by doing everything as sulkily as possible.
"On the march, then," said Peter, wearily fitting his arm into his shield-strap and putting
his helmet on. At any other time he would have said something nice to Lucy, who was his
favourite sister, for he knew how wretched she must be feeling, and he knew that,