FicWad

Warnings: Spoilers for the Last Battle. Also, extreme soppiness.

Disclaimer: I do not own Narnia, nor any of its inhabitants. No disrespect is intended by this fanfiction, nor is any profit sought from it.

"She's interested in nothing now-a-days except nylons and lipstick and invitations," Jill had said. She spoke with the easy scorn of a child, untroubled by adult longings and unsympathetic to those tugged across the threshold by adult concerns. Peter, closer to that edge, was uncomfortable with that quick, cruel condemnation, and turned the talk away from Susan.

Susan, all alone in the world, lapsed for a while into the same error of judgement. She alone had been left behind; she alone must have been deemed unworthy. She must be at fault. She spent day after futile day on her knees, struggling with prayers that went unanswered. She had been rebuked once, long ago, for wanting to break the rules and undo the Emperor's magic. She wasted no time now on wishing the others had not died. But deep down, although she could not voice this thought to anyone, she hoped her family weren't, as everyone said, in heaven. She hoped they were in Narnia.

By daylight, she was too numb to cry. At night she remembered, and the memories were an odd aching mix of joy and sadness, because she had to remember alone. There was no one left, now, to whom she could confess that she'd never forgotten. It was too late, now, to try to explain the embarrassment and excitement and anxiety that had made it impossible, during her first awkward efforts to grow up, to admit that she'd known all along that it had all been real. Now there was no one left to believe for her, and no one to believe with her, either.

And then one blessed evening the setting sun turned the light in the deserted church golden, and she looked up and He was there.

"Susan," Aslan said, and the deep voice was filled with love, and she wept in the last light of day.

"I thought you hated me," she said finally, letting all the piled-up misery flood out. "Why did you leave me behind?"

The huge eyes shared her sorrow. "I cannot work against the Deep Magic," he reminded her. "Know that I love you, Susan, as I love you all, but only one of you could be saved."

"Why did it have to be me?" she asked.

"It wasn't meant to be a punishment," He said softly. "However tarnished it has gotten, Susan, I love this world you live in. It cannot just be abandoned: it must be fought for, with courage. And you, alone, were old enough that you would have understood what you were missing. The others could step through more easily, because they did not yet fathom how much they had lost."

"The verger's wife said that it was a blessing they were taken while they were still innocent," Susan said, her voice flat with the pain of it.

"I hope, for her sake, that she was trying to be kind," Aslan said gravely, "but it was a silly thing to say, and she was wrong. It was a small mercy that they died without a full understanding of what was lost to them, but innocence is not more valuable than wisdom."

"I wouldn't have missed anything, if I had been taken to Narnia with the others," Susan said, but there was a note of doubt in her voice.

"Would you have had Mr. And Mrs. Beaver deprived of the joy of loving one another?" He asked her, his voice rich with understanding. "All creatures hurry to adulthood, Susan, as beautifully and as naturally as all plants thrust towards the sun. Growing up is a duty and a blessing, not a fault."

"Now," He told her sternly, "rise, Daughter of Eve. You, who were once a Queen in Narnia, owe it to yourself and to your world to spend your life in useful work, and to love wisely and well. That means standing on your feet, not staying on your knees. I promise you that, though you will suffer sorrow and loneliness, your life will have many opportunities for kindness and love. Yours will be a long battle, but you will not always have to fight it alone. And afterwards, we will be waiting."

It was the last time, in this world, that she ever saw His face.