The_Complete_Chronicles_of_Narnia_(volumes_1-7,_in_order_of_publication)

ten by now and almost dark. Those strange new constellations burned in the east. Lucy
would have liked it better if they had been the Leopard and the Ship and other old friends
of the Narnian sky.
They wrapped themselves in their sea cloaks and sat still and waited. At first there was
some attempt at talk but it didn't come to much. And they sat and sat. And all the time
they heard the waves breaking on the beach.
After hours that seemed like ages there came a moment when they all knew they had
been dozing a moment before but were all suddenly wide awake. The stars were all in
quite different positions from those they had last noticed. The sky was very black except
for the faintest possible greyness in the east. They were cold, though thirsty, and stiff.
And none of them spoke because now at last something was happening.
Before them, beyond the pillars, there was the slope of a low hill. And now a door opened
in the hillside, and light appeared in the doorway, and a figure came out, and the door
shut behind it. The figure carried a light, and this light was really all that they could see
distinctly. It came slowly nearer and nearer till at last it stood right at the table opposite to
them. Now they could see that it was a tall girl, dressed in a single long garment of clear
blue which left her arms bare. She was bareheaded and her yellow hair hung down her
back. And when they looked at her they thought they had never before known what
beauty meant.
The light which she had been carrying was a tall candle in a silver candlestick which she
now set upon the table. If there had been any wind off the sea earlier in the night it must
have died down by now, for the flame of the candle burned as straight and still as if it
were in a room with the windows shut and the curtains drawn. Gold and silver on the
table shone in its light.
Lucy now noticed something lying lengthwise on the table which had escaped her
attention before. It was a knife of stone, sharp as steel, a cruel-looking, ancient looking
thing.
No one had yet spoken a word. Then - Reepicheep first, and Caspian next - they all rose
to their feet, because they felt that she was a great lady.
"Travellers who have come from far to Aslan's table," said the girl. "Why do you not eat
and drink?"
"Madam," said Caspian, "we feared the food because we thought it had cast our friends
into an enchanted sleep.
"They have never tasted it," she said.
"Please," said Lucy, "what happened to them?"