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Charonosaurus: meaning "Charon's lizard," one of the largest hadrosaurs currently known

Charon: the ferryman of the underworld in Greek mythology. He ferries souls across the river that separates the worlds of the living and the dead.

Here they passed dozens of strange animals lying on the turf, either dead or asleep, Jill could not tell which. They were mostly of a dragonish or bat-like sort; Puddleglum did not know what any of them were.

"Do they grow here?" Scrubb asked the Warden. He seemed very surprised at being spoken to, but replied, "No. They are all beasts that have found their way down by chasms and caves, out of Overland into the Deep Realm. Many come down, and few return to the sunlit lands. It is said that they will all wake at the end of the world."

- C.S. Lewis, The Silver Chair

U N D E R

M E

After the heart-stopping fall and that first, shattering moment in the darkness when he thought he had lost Pole and Puddleglum both, Eustace began to breathe again. It didn't hurt as much as it ought. He had been pummeled and bashed about by rocks of all shapes and sizes — sharp ones, blunt ones, pebbles to sting his face and great big stones to bruise the rest of him — and Eustace suspected the only thing keeping him from feeling his injuries more keenly was the fact that he could not see them.

(If so, it was an interesting variation on the placebo effect... but all in all, not one he cared to study.)

Even so, he would rather have light and endure a little more pain.

No sooner had he thought this, than a ghostly gray light bloomed in the pit. Eustace looked to Pole, first — dirty and disheveled, her cheek streaked with blood, but she looked intact, thank the Lion. Wherever it came from, the light cast her features in an eerie hue of blue.

Puddleglum looked about the same as always, albeit dustier.

Reassured, Eustace finally turned to look for the source of the light.

His stomach promptly bottomed out, as if he had not finished falling after all.

An enormous woolly creature loomed over them. A giant horn sprouted from the middle of its face, like a rhinoceros, only much larger and hairier. Iron straps wrapped around the horn, supporting a short pole and strange pale lantern that swung before the beast's eyes with every ponderous step. The light was not so bright that it could blind, but it did not look very comfortable.

Behind the creature (woolly rhinoceros, a distant corner of Eustace's mind supplied), a silent rank of other shapes and shadows lurked. There were more horns, sharply curving antlers, darkly gleaming tusks... an endless file of beasts sprung from the pages of one of Eustace's treasured books.

Prehistoric.

Alive.

"Why have you come, creatures of the Overworld?"

Eustace swallowed his tongue.

Into the silence spoke Puddleglum.

"We fell down by accident."

The great shaggy head nodded somberly. "Many fall down, and few return to the sunlit lands." It turned, and the swinging lantern cast devilish shadows across Puddleglum's homely, familiar face. "Come."

"Where are you taking us?" asked Pole.

"To the Queen of the Deep Realm."

Then came a long forced march ever downward. Eustace kept stumbling, not so much from the uneven footing, but because his attention was split between cataloguing the features of every beast he could see and a growing concern for Pole.

She looked even paler than the light could account for.

Eustace pretended to fall, halting the procession long enough to pull her close. "What's wrong?"

She bit her lip and looked away. "I can't stand close spaces," she confessed in a whisper.

After everything they'd been through together, did she truly think he was going to make fun?

"Like me on the cliffs," he said, trying to sound encouraging. "Steady on. It can't get too close, can it? I mean, look at the size of that Elasmotherium! Not to mention the antlers on that Megaloceros, he could hardly get through a tunnel less than three meters wide."

Pole hiccupped, halfway between a sob and a laugh. "I don't even know what that is, Scrubb."

"Megaloceros is that giant deer over there. Elasmotherium is the woolly rhinoceros, the fellow with the lantern."

Pole's hand sought his. "They look awfully glum, don't they?"

Eustace had been trying not to anthropomorphize, but she was right. And after all, they did talk, just like proper Narnian beasts, so perhaps it wasn't anthropomorphization after all.

Puddleglum seemed to be trying to arrange his face in an even deeper frown than it was built for.

"Whatever are you doing?" Pole asked.

"Learning from my betters," mumbled Puddleglum. "These chaps know how to be properly solemn, just like every good Wiggle ought to be."

"Silence!" boomed Elasmotherium.

Pole cast a nervous glance at the rock above them. Eustace opened his mouth to tell her it was as solid as — well, as a rock — but decided that didn't sound as reassuring as he meant it to be and settled for squeezing her hand instead.

After trudging for what seemed like days but must have been only hours, the rocks underfoot changed.

The beaten path turned to smooth, rounded stones that shifted and clacked against one another. Then they became smaller, and smaller still, until they were mere pebbles. And then a wave broke over Eustace's feet.

"An underground lake," whispered Pole.

Elasmotherium raised her head. Across the dark water, another pale light sparked in the distance.

"There will be sea monsters, I shouldn't wonder," said Puddleglum sagely.

Eustace had battled sea monsters before, of course, and had no great wish to do so again. Still... "Plesiosaurus," he murmured wistfully.

Puddleglum shook his head. "Knowing their names won't help much when they eat us."

"You're not helping much now," Eustace muttered.

Pole squeezed Eustace's hand. "I'm all right," she said. "Look, you can't even see the ceiling. It's almost like being out under the night sky when it's cloudy." She glanced upward doubtfully. "Almost."

Their silent host of guides — or guards — stopped when Eustace and Pole were knee-deep in the water.

A wave surged.

Beneath it, eyes gleamed.

Then a pair of sleek humped backs slowly rose to the surface. Eustace swallowed hard when he saw they were labored with chains. Dolphin-shaped heads poked above the water and grinned through sharp teeth. 

"We can't possibly ride them!" protested Pole.

Eustace's heart raced at the thought.

"Into the boat," ordered Elasmotherium.

The boat was little more than a plank of driftwood and rough iron bolts to anchor the harness chain. Eustace wondered who built it and tried to remember when opposable thumbs first evolved.

They were splashed quite a lot on the journey to the opposite shore but the water was fresh, not salt, and it washed away a good bit of the grime that had covered them since their fall.

Eustace spent the whole trip studying what he could see if their steeds. They couldn't really be Ichthyosaurs, could they? Prehistoric mammals were easier to accept, somehow. Before he could make up his mind whether to believe in them or not, the possibly-Ichthyosaurs banked hard, spilling Eustace, Pole and Puddleglum into the surf.

Eustace yelled and got a mouthful of sweet water for his trouble. Pole wrung water from her braids. Puddleglum stood and dripped.

"Who will be our guide now?" Pole wondered. There had been no boat big enough for Elasmotherium, after all. "I can't imagine this Queen would allow us to roam her Underworld without a guide."

Eustace turned to look... and froze.

Through the roaring in his ears, he heard Pole talking about the classical Underworld, something about sticks and ferrymen and not looking back.

Eustace had no interest in looking back. The only temptation was the one right before his eyes.

Fossils.

Living fossils.

Teeth grinned at him. Skulls stared. An empty socket winked.

Pole's litany faltered. She stammered something about pillars of salt and pomegranates.

Eustace stretched out a trembling hand.

The skeleton — Protoceratops andrewsi — crouched to nudge Eustace's hand with its bill.

Lion's mane. It was warm.

Pole's hand trembled in his. The dinosaur trembled too, its bones clacking. Eustace's vision sparked. Had he forgotten to breathe?

"It is said that they will all be reborn at the end of the world," proclaimed a voice.

The Protoceratops fled.

Jill despaired at the longing in Scrubb's eyes. Reborn dinosaurs sounded like a very bad thing indeed. Not to mention the end of the world. But at the moment, she supposed, they had bigger problems.

"The end of the world, as in the very bowels of it?" asked Puddleglum. "For I do believe we are there, good sir. Or the end of the world, as in, the end of all things? For we might be there as well, like as not."

A sad-faced furry creature scratched its long nose with a giant curved claw.

"At the end of the world," it repeated.

"Megatherium," whispered Scrubb. "Giant ground sloth."

Jill hoped that meant it didn't eat people.

"How do you know my name?" asked the sloth, which looked nothing like the sloths Jill had seen in the zoo. It stood on two feet and reminded Jill more of a bear, only its face was too long — and not just in the metaphorical sense.

"From a book," answered Scrubb.

Megatherium blinked slowly. "What is a book?"

Scrubb boggled. Puddleglum shook his head mournfully.

"A magic tome of knowledge," said Jill. "Your Queen must know, perhaps she can explain it to you."

Megatherium raised its paws as if to ward off her words. "You must be brought before the Queen of the Deep Realm. Come."

And the march began again.

There were fossils underfoot, whorled shells and jointed vertebrae and bug-like creatures ("Trilobites!" exclaimed Scrubb as if greeting an old friend), but they were the least of it. It was like walking through an elephant's graveyard. Massive ribs curved up out of the ground, reaching for where the sky should have been. Enormous frilled skulls, ridged with horns... rows of diamond-shaped plates emerging from a hillside... the unmistakeable skull of a predator, with its giant eyes and sickle-teeth. Most of them were still, although Jill hesitated to call them dead, for all they were nothing but bone. Sleeping, perhaps. A few stirred as they passed, but none so lively as the one that Scrubb had reverently touched before Megatherium's arrival.

Scrubb tried to stop at every new skeleton. Jill and Puddleglum had to keep pulling him along in their wake. For a sloth, Megatherium moved quickly. Jill wanted to make a face at his broad furry back, but didn't quite dare.

“Come on,” she hissed. “This is no time to take field notes!” She didn’t think Scrubb had a notebook with him in Narnia, let alone a pencil, but he might not have outgrown all his sneakiness. 

He didn’t answer. All his attention was now focused behind them, where something large and hulking paced in the shadows. Jill felt its footsteps in her own bones.

"Another one of your friends come to eat us, I shouldn't wonder," said Puddleglum.

Jill didn't think Scrubb even heard him. She gripped his hand tighter. This time, less for comfort than for safety's sake, to keep him from wandering away and falling yet deeper into the bowels of the world, as Puddleglum had called it.

So intent was she on monitoring Scrubb, she didn't even see the slumbering giant until they were almost right on top of him.

"Who is that?" Scrub blurted, shaken out of his reverie.

"Father Time," replied Megatherium. "It is said he will wake at the end of the world."

"Then we had better pass quietly," said Puddleglum. "With our luck, the old fellow could be a light sleeper."

Father Time snored gently. Wind whistled through the cavern.

Jill shivered at Puddleglum's words. Despite the cavern's unexpected warmth, she had never felt so cold.

Puddleglum did not voice even half the gloomy thoughts that crossed his mind. No use scaring the children, after all. Well, no further than necessary to keep them on their toes.

It was decisions like this, he knew, that made his mother despair and made his sisters call him names when they were little Wiggles. Bubbleglum, Puddlesun and — worst of all — Happy-Go-Lucky... the names didn't sting anymore, which he supposed proved their point, but he had bigger problems now.

Such as the end of the world.

This is what comes from being such a flibbertigibbet, he told himself.

Puddleglum straightened his shoulders and his pack.

"Well," he said, gaze trained firmly ahead and not on the sleeping giant looming next to them, "onward and downward."

It was, perhaps, not his most inspiring speech, but the children followed obligingly enough. Was it overly optimistic, he wondered, to save his best oratory for some future crisis?

No doubt he would find out soon enough.

"It is not the strongest of the species that survives, nor the most intelligent that survives. It is the one that is the most adaptable to change, that lives within the means available and works cooperatively against common threats."

- Charles Darwin

"Your Highness," Eustace said. "If my old friend Reepicheep the Mouse were here, he would say we could not now refuse the adventures of Bism without a great impeachment to our honour."

"Down there," said Golg. "I could show you real gold, real silver, real diamonds."

"Bosh!" said Jill rudely. "As if we didn't know that we're below the deepest mines even here."

"Yes," said Golg. "I have heard of those little scratches in the crust that you Top-dwellers call mines. But that's where you get dead gold, dead silver, dead gems. Down in Bism we have them alive and growing. There I'll pick you bunches of rubies that you can eat and squeeze you a cup full of diamond-juice. You won't care much about fingering the cold, dead treasures of your shallow mines after you have tasted the live ones of Bism."

"My father went to the world's end," said Rilian thoughtfully. "It would be a marvellous thing if his son went to the bottom of the world."

- C.S. Lewis, The Silver Chair

Megatherium conducted them to a great castle, with shadowed spires and stairs that led — for the first time since their long journey underground — upward. The light was still pale and ghostly, their every step was still echoed by the hollow clack of bone on rock. Eustace wondered if the Protoceratops was following them.

He hoped so.

"Is your Queen a skeleton as well?" asked Puddleglum.

Megatherium's heavy-lidded eyes opened wide.

"No offense," Eustace added hastily. "We were just wondering what sort of queen she is, you see." He couldn't imagine the queen of such a ghastly realm would be anywhere as jolly as Lucy or as kind as Susan. He wondered if those qualities came from being Narnian or from being... could one be queened, like in checkers? Like being knighted?

"Pay attention, Scrubb," muttered Pole. "There's someone watching us."

Megatherium bowed low.

"Overworlders!" cried a delighted voice. It was a more joyful sound than any they had heard yet since fleeing Harfang. Of course, Eustace reminded himself, the friendly giants there had not been all they seemed. He clenched his fists and wished for a sword.

But the creature that stepped forward to greet them was no skeleton, but a man. A human man, here! His features were fair, his expression pleasant, but something about his eyes gave Eustace a chill.

"Overworlders and friends, welcome to the kingdom of my Queen! Come and dine with me, while we await my Lady's pleasure. But — stay, have we not met before, in the Sunlit Lands?"

"Oh!" Pole exclaimed. "Are you the Black Knight we met on the road?"

Eustace couldn't help himself. "I told you he wasn't a skeleton," he murmured to Puddleglum. Although, to be fair to the Marsh-wiggle, they had seen living skeletons down here, and those had not spoken any more than the Black Knight had aboveground.

"I am!" cried the Knight. "I thought I recognized your solemn tutor. Tell me, is he always so... green?"

Eustace was tempted to say that Puddleglum was mostly blue, but he didn't think anyone but Pole would understand the pun, and she probably wouldn't appreciate it. So it was just as well that Megatherium interrupted before he could put his foot in it.

"Your Highness," intoned the giant sloth. "We should confine them to the prison until the Queen returns. The hour grows late."

"Nonsense," said the Black Knight. "They shall dine with me."

Eustace was no expert at reading the facial features of sloths, but he thought Megatherium looked even more glum than usual at that pronouncement.

"If it please Your Highness—"

"It does," said the Black Knight. Again, his voice was pleasant enough, but this time Eustace heard the ring of steel beneath it. This fellow was not one to be crossed.

Puddleglum, of course, had no such reservations. "Begging your pardon, but the last time we accepted your invitation to dine, we were nearly the main course."

The Black Knight's eyebrows rose in astonishment. "My dear frog, how can you say such a thing?"

Eustace scowled, although Puddleglum ignored the insult. (Or maybe Marsh-wiggles didn't see it like an insult, at least not like a Frenchman would back home. Still, Eustace knew Reep would have drawn his sword by now, and he keenly felt the lack of his own.)

"Your Queen sent us to the giants of Harfang for their Autumn Feast," Pole accused. "She failed to mention that we would be the feast."

The Knight's eyes flashed dangerously. "If you were not such a gentle young maid, I would take grievous offense," he warned. "The Queen is the fairest lady who ever walked these realms. She took me to the Sunlit Lands out of her great generosity, and it was in the same spirit that she sent you to Castle Harfang — so that you could take rest and nourishment with her friends there! If they had foul designs upon you, it was without her knowledge or consent, I assure you."

His speech was fair and flowery, and Eustace didn't believe a word of it.

"Then we must let her know," he said as earnestly as he could manage. "It is cruel for the giants to deceive her so."

Pole caught on immediately, of course. "Oh yes, we must warn her of their treachery!" She wrung her hands, which Eustace thought was a bit much, but the Black Knight rushed to take her arm.

"My dear girl, you have a good heart. Come, all of you — come and eat with me, before my hour of sorrow is upon me."

Eustace could hardly wait to hear all about that.

The Black Knight led them deeper into the castle to a sumptuously appointed room. Green tapestries adorned the wall — not with scenes of battles like one would find in an English castle, nor with Narnian celebrations of wine and dance. Instead, endless rows of intricate woven knots marched around the room. The more Eustace tried to trace a single strand, the dizzier he became. They seemed to writhe like snakes before his very eyes...

Pole nudged him with her elbow. "Alright, Scrubb?" she asked worriedly.

Eustace looked away, grateful for the distraction.

The Black Knight clapped his hands. "Bring food and drink!" he commanded.

Silver platters of food were swiftly deposited on the long table, but Eustace had eyes only for the servants, for here (at last!) were more of the living fossils.

A lumbering Ankylosaur bore the serving tray on his armored back; nimble Dromaeosaurs set the places while long-neck Ornithomimids carried pitchers of wine. Eustace's eyes darted between them as he tried to memorize their every movement. He wished he knew what magic made their bones move without muscle. Or maybe their muscles were just invisible, like Puddleglum had once speculated about the Black Knight himself, aboveground.

"Do you like my little pets?" asked the Black Knight, amused.

"They are marvelous!" Eustace didn't have to feign enthusiasm. "But how do they...?"

"My Queen brought them to life." He shrugged carelessly. "A similar creature adorns my sword. Not alive, of course. Would you like to see it?"

Eustace risked a glance at Pole. She rolled her eyes and muttered something about boys and their toys (which was all rot, of course; fossils were hardly toys).

"Yes please, er, Your Highness."

The Black Knight drew a longsword. Eustace was sure it had beautiful bladework that would meet even Reepicheep's standards, but he could hardly look away from the hilt. It had the look of silver, but sculpted in the shape of a small dinosaur clutching the pommel. Eustace peered closer. Indulgently, the knight handed over his sword. Eustace traced the vertebrae curled around the hilt (23 tailbones), skipped to the elongated leg bones and — was that an opposable toe, like a bird would use for perching? He traced the legs backwards... yes, it was bird-hipped. He turned the sword over. A long, S-shaped neck contorted backwards, curling around the hilt. Long arms ending in three fingers, the middle one unusually long, stretched up to cradle the blade itself. Etched around them...

"Feathers!" Eustace exclaimed.

"Yes, isn't it curious," said the Black Knight, his tone languid. "Obviously the bladesmith took liberties."

Eustace held his tongue, but he was certain: this was no sculpture. Nor had the bladesmith taken liberties. This was a fossil, coated in silver and wrapped around the sword in an unnatural position. The tail should be straight, he thought, with feathers of its own.

"Archaeopteryx," he murmured. He gently traced the poor creature's neck, the length of its wings, the imprint of feathers.

"Hm?" The Black Knight bit into something that looked like a fig, only it had hard edges like a faceted jewel. "Try some garnets, they're delicious."

Eustace blinked, coming out of his trance. The Knight must have said garnish, he decided.

"These too were alive once," offered their host. "We pluck them like fruit from the ground. Much like this silver comes from the dead roots of some deeper tree." He took the sword back from Eustace and resheathed it. The Archaeopteryx's head was still visible, and its large eye socket seemed to stare at Eustace.

I'm sorry, he thought, although the little dinosaur was surely long past caring.

Puddleglum's frown deepened. "Is that your Queen's business? Reviving the dead? Perhaps hastening the end of the world?"

Eustace nearly spit out his wine. Pole kicked him under the table, and he summoned a sickly smile.

"Oh-ho! My dear frog," laughed the Black Knight, "you are a treat. The end of the world, my word." 

Eustace cast about for a safer topic of conversation, preferably something other than the hour of sorrow that the Black Knight had mentioned earlier.

"What type of fruit is this?" He held up a handful of raspberries that sparkled unlike any berry he had ever seen.

"Rubies," said the Black Knight, and he popped one into his mouth. "They taste like... something I cannot recall..."

"Sunlight," sighed Pole, savoring a ruby-berry of her own.

Living fossils, edible gems... what kind of world was this?

The Black Knight eyed Eustace knowingly. "My Queen's marvels are many. Come, let me show you one more."

He jumped up from the table and strode to the next room. Pole followed immediately. Eustace stopped to grab a few berries, hoping they somehow were rubies and wouldn't get crushed in his pocket. After all, who knew when their captors would feed them again. Puddleglum nodded in approval, even as he slipped a loaf of bread into his own pocket.

Eustace nearly groaned aloud. Was he thinking like a Marsh-wiggle now?

"Hurry up!" called Pole. 

When Eustace caught up to her, she was standing at arm's length from the Black Knight, which didn't feel far enough. But the man wasn't looking at Pole at all, nor did he seem to notice when Puddleglum inserted himself between them.

"Behold," said the Black Knight. "The instrument of my salvation: the Silver Chair."

He gestured to an elaborate chair that shone with the soft gleam of polished silver, but that was not what Eustace noticed first.

It was made of bones.

Fossils, to be precise. At first Eustace thought it was a jumble from different dinosaurs, all coated in silver like the poor little Archaeopteryx. But the longer his eyes traced the curve of vertebrae or the spindles of ribs, the more it took shape. With dawning horror, Eustace saw the chair for what it was — a single dinosaur, curled around the emptiness where a person would sit.

It had been a Hadrosaur, once. Its neck was twisted, the proud curve of its crested skull tilted oddly to the side. In a cruel touch, someone had placed emeralds in the eye sockets.

"That's horrible," murmured Eustace.

The Knight laughed lightly. "It is but furniture, and you shall be glad of it before the night is over. For I am under an evil enchantment which strikes me every night, and only the strength of my Queen's magic prevents me from committing fell deeds under this wicked spell. It was she who crafted the Silver Chair and I shall be forever indebted to her for this great generosity."

Eustace, Pole and Puddleglum drew back as one.

The Black Knight did not seem to notice.

"Come, friends!" He beckoned. "The hour for my shackles draws near, and you must hide. For if you are discovered, you shall receive shackles of your own and I should dearly miss your company. But remember and beware: let none of my ravings convince you to loose me from my bonds, for this Silver Chair is all that stands between you and certain death."

The Knight spoke with a distasteful mix of relish and reverence. His fingers trailed over the chair, caressing the silver-plated bones.

"We won't touch it," avowed Eustace.

"Not for anything," Pole added hurriedly.

Puddleglum shook his head but remained silent.

The Knight took this as asset and motioned them to hide in the next room. Moments later, the guard marched in: Megatherium himself, flanked by a pair of saber-toothed tigers. The Knight sat without protest. Megatherium solemnly extended a claw and flicked the hadrosaur skull. It swung as if on an invisible hinge until it extended across the Knight's chest. The long, curved crest pinned the Knight back by the throat.

The Knight rested his hands lightly on the hadrosaur's own forelimbs. Next to Eustace, Pole stifled a gasp.

The bones moved.

The hadrosaur's wrists swiveled and its fingers opened to grip the Knight's arms. Its tail scraped across the floor and wrapped securely around the Knight's legs, holding him in place.

The dinosaur itself held him captive.

Megatherium lumbered away, followed by the saber-toothed tigers. None of them even glanced at the door to the next room, still open by a crack, through which Pole and Eustace peered. That was curious. Surely, thought Eustace, they should have smelled two humans and a Marsh-Wiggle just beyond the door?

He wondered what it meant — might they have allies here, however reluctant? — but was promptly distracted when the Knight screamed.

Pole's fingers dug into his arm.

"Please!" cried the Knight. "You must release me now, while I am sane."

"But you aren't," stammered Pole. "You aren't in your right mind, you don't know what you're saying."

"Am I not? Only now, when I can see the sun's light when I close my eyes — only now, when I hear the strains of music in my ears — music! Oh, I can remember the music now! Quick, quick, you must help me. This is the only hour when I am free of her curse."

Pole bit her lip. Eustace dug his fingernails into his palm. Puddleglum was strangely silent.

"In the name of all that is good, loose my bonds!" The Knight's voice grew shrill. "I will break out if I must. I've done it before!" He strained against the silvered bones. "If I break loose, you cannot stand against me, not without her."

Eustace stared at the shining, lifeless dinosaur that served as the Knight's prison.

The Knight wept openly. "My friends, please, I beg you. By the skies of the Overworld. By all you love. In the name of Aslan, set me free!"

Pole gasped.

Eustace's hand found hers. His was trembling and a little clammy; hers felt hot and shaky.

"Well, that puts the fish in the fryer," said Puddleglum.

"That's the Sign," Eustace said slowly. "Isn't it, Pole?"

"You will know the lost prince, if you find him, by this," she recited. Her voice trembled only a little. "He will be the first person you have met in your travels who will ask you to do something in my name, in the name of Aslan."

Their eyes met.

"Will Aslan come?" Pole asked him. "You've seen him, Scrubb. Will he come and help?"

Eustace opened his mouth but no words came out.

"Aslan never made us any promises," said Puddleglum. "He only told Pole what to do when we found the Signs."

"We've got to do it then," said Eustace. "Don't we." It wasn't a question.

"He'll likely hack us to death with that nasty-looking sword of his," said Puddleglum. "But Aslan never said anything about that, either."

Pole swallowed hard. "We have to follow the Sign," she agreed. "No matter what happens after."

They stepped forward together. The Knight closed his eyes as if he could not bear to watch.

Two small hands and one larger, webbed one took firm hold of the Hadrosaur's crest and pried it back. The Knight gasped like a drowning man when it swung clear of his throat. Galvanized, Eustace took hold of one foreleg and slowly, gently extricated the Knight's fingers. Puddleglum took the other arm while Pole stooped to unwind the tail from around his feet. She worked with care not to bend the tailbones too far backward and snap the invisible connection between them. Eustace blinked rapidly. Pole met his eyes and his cheeks warmed.

Before either of them could say anything, the Black Knight sprang free and whirled, sword in hand.

"No!" cried Eustace, darting in front of the silver Hadrosaur.

"That chair was my prison!" rasped the Knight.

Eustace placed a protective hand on the dinosaur's skull. "That's not its fault any more than it was yours."

"It's not really alive, is it?" Pole whispered in horror. "All this time?"

The Knight wavered.

"There are many kinds of prisons," Puddleglum spoke up unexpectedly. "That Witch Queen of yours seems very fond of them."

The Knight lowered his sword. "Take it," he told Eustace. "Before I am tempted again."

Eustace took the hilt gingerly. He couldn't help but stroke the feathers etched into the blade. When they flared with light, he nearly dropped the sword altogether.

When the silver Hadrosaur nudged his shoulder from behind, he did drop the sword with a clang — but the little Archaeopteryx never hit the ground.

It flew.

"Oh!" Pole cried with delight as it circled overhead.

If Eustace squinted, he could almost see a blurry halo of feathers bursting from its skeletal wings and tail. He realized he was grinning like a fool.

"Aslan's mane," breathed the Knight. "You broke the enchantment."

"How?" asked Pole.

Eustace held out his arm. The Archaeopteryx landed and preened its invisible feathers. The Hadrosaur stretched to its full height, which was considerable. Parasaurolophus, Eustace thought, although now that it had unfolded from its chair-shaped crouch, it was larger than he had expected. Some unknown genus, perhaps? He frowned. Had such a creature ever existed in England? Did Archaeopteryx really fly, or was this more magic? 

"Whatever is wrong, Scrubb?" asked Pole. "Everything is all right now!"

"I wish I knew if everything I'm learning about them was true in our world." The frustration of not knowing felt like being landbound again after his Undragoning, restless and captive in a body that felt too small for all he had become.

"Does it matter?" asked Pole. "Whether they match with the dinosaurs at home or not, they are alive here." She glanced at the Archaeopteryx, who waved a featherless claw at her. "Er. More or less."

Eustace stared at Pole, so wrapped up in her words that he almost didn't hear Puddleglum's.  

"Since we are speaking of witches," said the Marsh-wiggle dolefully, "I suppose, since you didn't kill us after all, she'll be along to finish the job?"

That finally jarred Eustace back out of his thoughts. 

The Knight clapped his hands. "You are quite right, friend Wiggle — oh, how good it is to see a real Narnian Marsh-Wiggle again! — but yes, we should flee this place at once, before she returns."

"My dear Prince!" exclaimed a woman's honeyed voice from the doorway. "What hast thou done?"

"Too late," whispered Eustace.