The_Complete_Chronicles_of_Narnia_(volumes_1-7,_in_order_of_publication)

"The way to find out is to go right iv among them," said Reepicheep, drawing his sword
and pattering off ahead of everyone else.
"I think it's a ruin," said Lucy when they had got a good deal nearer, and her guess was
the best so far. What they now saw was a wide oblong space flagged with smooth stones
and surrounded by grey pillars but unroofed. And from end to end of it ran a long table
laid with a rich crimson cloth that came down nearly to the pavement. At either side of it
were many chairs of stone richly carved and with silken cushions upon the seats. But on
the table itself there was set out such a banquet as had never been seen, not even when
Peter the High King kept his court at Cair Paravel. There were turkeys and geese and
peacocks, there were boars' heads and sides of venison, there were pies shaped like ships
under full sail or like dragons and elephants, there were ice puddings and bright lobsters
and gleaming salmon, there were nuts and grapes, pineapples and peaches, pomegranates
and melons and tomatoes. There were flagons of gold and silver and curiouslywrought
glass; and the smell of the fruit and the wine blew towards them like a promise of all
happiness.
"I say!" said Lucy.
They came nearer and nearer, all very quietly.
"But where are the guests?" asked Eustace.
"We can provide that, Sir," said Rhince.
"Look!" said Edmund sharply. They were actually within the pillars now and standing on
the pavement. Everyone looked where Edmund had pointed. The chairs were not all
empty. At the head of the table and in the two places beside it there was something- or
possibly three somethings.
"What are those?" asked Lucy in a whisper. "It looks like three beavers sitting on the
table."
"Or a huge bird's nest," said Edmund.
"It looks more like a haystack to me," said Caspian.
Reepicheep ran forward, jumped on a chair and thence on to the table, and ran along it,
threading his way as nimbly as a dancer between jewelled cups and pyramids of fruit and
-ivory salt-cellars. He ran right up to the mysterious grey mass at the end: peered,
touched, and then called out:
"These will not fight, I think."
Everyone now came close and saw that what sat in those three chairs was three men,
though hard to recognize as men till you looked closely. Their hair, which was grey, had