Chapter 2 Chapter 2 The Recklessness of Kings

About three weeks later the last King of Narnia sat under a great oak tree by the door of his little hunting-house.He used to come to the hunting lodge for ten days or so in pleasant spring weather.It was a low, thatched-roofed building not far from the eastern end of Lamppost Wild, a little upstream from the confluence of two rivers.He liked the simplicity and ease of living there, away from the government and pomp of the royal city of Cair Paravel.They called him King Tirian, and he was between twenty and twenty-five years old, his shoulders were broad and strong, his limbs were muscular, but his beard was still sparse.He had blue eyes and a face of fearless honesty.

That spring morning, the King had no retinue, but one of his closest friends: the Unicorn ①Treasure.They loved each other like brothers and saved each other's lives in war.The aristocratic beast stood near the king's throne, bending its neck and polishing its blue horns on its creamy white belly. "I can't ask myself to do any work or do any sports today, Jewel," said the king. "I can think of nothing but this strange news. Do you think we will hear it again today?" Any more news?" ①Unicorn, a legendary monster with a head and body like a horse, hind legs like a stag, a tail like a lion, and a single spiral horn in its forehead.

"Sire, if these reports are true," said Jewel, "then they are the strangest news that our generation, our father's generation, our grandfather's generation, have ever heard." "The news must be true!" said the King. "The first birds that flew over us said, more than a week ago, that Aslan has come, and Aslan has come to Narnia again. After that came the squirrels. They didn't see Aslan, but they said Aslan must be in the wood. Then the deer. He said he saw Aslan with his own eyes, far away, in the moonlight, in Lamppost Wild Then came a dark, bearded man, a merchant from Calormenes. The Calormenes, unlike us, did not care at all for Aslan; It's an unmistakable fact that Lan came. He came last night, and he saw Aslan."

"In fact, Your Majesty," said Jewel, "I believe all kinds of news. If I don't seem to believe it, it's only because the joy in my heart is too great to believe. It's almost too beautiful, beautiful. It's hard to believe it's true." "Yes," said the King, with a long breath of joy, almost trembling, "far more than I could have ever hoped for in my life." "Listen!" said Jewel, turning her head on one side and pricking her ears forward. "What is that noise?" asked the king. "It's hoofbeats, Your Majesty," replied Jewel, "a galloping horse. A heavy horse. Must be a tall horse. Here he comes."

A gigantic, golden-bearded centaur, with beads of human sweat on his forehead and horse sweat on his sorrel flanks, ran straight up to the king, and stopped, bowing his head. "Long live the King," he cried in a voice as deep as a bull's. "Ah, come!" said the king, looking over his shoulder to the door of the hunting lodge, "a bowl of wine for the distinguished guest. Welcome, Longwitt. Wait till you catch your breath. Bring us the message." A squire came out of the hunting lodge, holding in his hand a large, curiously carved wooden bowl, which he handed to the centaur.

"My lord, I drink first to Aslan and the truth, and then to the king." He drank the bowl of wine (enough for six strong men) in one gulp, and returned the wooden bowl to the attendant. "Tell me, Longwitt," said the King, "will you bring more news of Aslan?" Longwitt looked very serious, frowning slightly. "Underland," said he, "you know how old I am, and how long I have studied the stars; for we centaurs outlive you men, and outlive you unicorns. In my old days I have never seen such dreadful omens written in the stars every night here, as I have never since the beginning of the year. The stars say nothing of Aslan's presence, neither of peace nor of joy. I know by my magic that there hasn't been a catastrophic 'planetary conjunction' in five hundred years. I've got this idea in my mind to come and alert the land: there's some kind of catastrophe looming over Nani However, last night I heard rumors that Aslan was coming. Your Majesty, don’t believe such nonsense. It’s impossible. Stars never lie, but men and beasts do. If Aslan Lan has come to the Kingdom of Narnia, and there will be a sign in the sky. If the Lion King really comes, all the polite stars will gather to pay homage to the Lion King. It is a complete lie."

"Lies!" said the King violently. Who in Narnia, or in all the world, would dare lie about such an important matter?He unconsciously put his hand on the hilt of the sword. "I don't know that, O King," said Centaur, "but I know that there are many liars in the world; and there is not a liar among the stars in the sky." "I wonder," said Jewel, "in spite of all the astrological omens, is it possible that Aslan will not come? The Lion King is not the slave of the stars, but their creator. All the old stories Didn't everyone say he's not a tame lion?"

"Well said, well said, Jewel," cried the King, "that is the word. Not the tame lion. There are many stories that say that." Just as Longwit raised his head, and was about to reach forward and speak very seriously to the King, all three of them turned their heads to listen to a wailing voice which was coming closer and closer.The woods to the west of them were dense, so they could not yet see the newcomers.But before long they could hear the words of the wailing. "Calamity, calamity, calamity!" cried the voice, "my sisters and brothers! Calamity is upon the sacred tree! The forest is broken. The ax is upon us. We are being felled. The tree is falling Down, down, down."

With the sound of the last "down", the speaker becomes visible.She was like a woman, but tall, with her head as high as a centaur's head; yet she was very much like a woman.If you have never seen a dryad, it is difficult to explain to you; if you have, you can discern without error certain differences in colour, voice, hair.King Tirian and the two beasts recognized her at once as the Beech Spirit. "Your Majesty, you will do justice—" she cried, "you will come to our aid. You will protect your people. They are cutting us down on Lamppost Wild. Forty giant trees of my brothers and sisters The trunk has fallen to the ground.

"Ah, ma'am! Cutting down the lamppost savages? Murdering the trees that speak the human language." cried the King, sprang to his feet, and drew his sword. "They are so bold? Who is so bold? By Aslan's mane—' "Ah-ah-ah-heh!" panted the Dryad, and she trembled as if in pain--and she trembled again and again, as if struck again and again.Then, in a split second, she slumped into the slant as if her feet had been chopped off.The king and the others saw her dead, lying on the grass for a short moment, and then disappeared without a trace.They know it happened.What's up.A few miles away, her tree was felled.

The king was so sad and angry that he was speechless for a long time.Later, he spoke "Come, my friends. We must go up the river, and find these rogues who have done evil, and we will go as fast as we can. I will not let them go, and none of them will come back alive." "Sire, I wish you success," said Jewel. But Longwitt said, "Your Majesty, be cautious even out of righteous indignation. Strange activities are taking place in the valley. If there are armed traitors in the valley, the three of us will be weak and unable to fight. Will you wait a moment, when……" "I would not wait for a tenth of a second," said the king, "but, while Jewel and I are on our way, you go straight to Cair Paravel as quickly as you can. I give you this ring as a token. Here I sent twenty well-armed warriors, all of whom were good at riding horses, twenty dogs who could speak human words, ten dwarves (everyone was a good archer), one or two leopards, and more. There are stonefoot giants. Bring this group to our aid as quickly as possible." "Your Majesty, I sincerely wish you success." Longwitt said, turning around at once, and ran down the valley towards the east. The king strode forward, sometimes muttering, sometimes clenching his fists.Jewel walked beside the King in silence; so there was no other sound between them but the faint tinkling of the great gold chain that hung about the unicorn's neck, the tramp of a man's feet, and the unicorn's horn. The four hooves of the beast sing. They soon came to the river, and they went up a grassy ridge: now they had the water on their left, and the woods on their right.After a while they came to a place where the ground became more and more uneven, and the thick woods descended to the river's edge.The road was broken, and the direction of the road now jumped to the south bank of the river. They had to wade across the river to get to the road on the other side.The water was deep, up to Tirian's armpits, but Jewel, which had four legs, stood firmer than Tirian, and held on to the King's right against the force of the rapids, and Tirian stretched out his strong arms to embrace him. Holding the unicorn's strong neck, the two of them crossed the river safely.The king was still so angry that he didn't notice that the river was very cold.But of course he was very careful to dry his sword on the shoulder of his coat, the only part of his body which was not wet, when they had first landed on the south bank. They were walking west now, with the river on their right and Lampfield Wild straight ahead of them.They had not walked more than a mile when they both stood still and spoke.King said "What's here?" Jewel said "Look!" "It's a raft," said King Tirian. It is indeed a raft.Six handsome trunks, all freshly felled and pruned, bound together in a raft, were going swiftly down the stream.There is a water passenger at the front end of the raft, holding a bamboo fence to control the raft. "Hey! what are you doing?" cried the King. "Carry the wood downriver, and sell it to the Calormenes, my lord," answered the Waterman, saluting the king with his hand over his ear, or over the brim of his hat if he wore one. "Calormenes!" roared Lian, furiously, "what do you mean? Who felled these trees?" The river ran fast at this time of year, and the raft slid past the King and Jewel.But the Waterman turned his head from his shoulder and shouted: "By order of the Lion King, Your Majesty. Aslan himself gave the order." He added a few words, but the king and the others could not hear them. The king and the unicorn looked at each other, and both of them looked more frightened than they had been in any war before. "Aslan," said the King at last in a very low voice, "Aslan. Can it be true? Can Aslan cut down the sacred tree and murder the dryad?" "Unless the dryads are all horribly wrong—" Jewel murmured. "But to sell the trees to the Calormenes!" said the king. "Is such a thing possible?" "I don't know," said Jewel sadly, "he's not a tame lion." "Well," said the king at last, "we must go on, at the risk we face." "Your Majesty, this is the only thing left for us to do," said the unicorn.At this moment he did not see how foolish they were to go alone; nor did the king see the question.They are so angry that their heads are confused, and yet their recklessness invites many disasters. The King suddenly leaned against his friend's neck, and bowed his head. "Jewel," said he, "what lies before us? Terrible thoughts come to my mind. We shall be happy if we die before this day." "Yeah," said Jewel, "we've lived too long. The worst thing in the world has happened to us." They stood like that for a minute or two, then moved on. After a while they heard the ping-pong of axes chopping wood, though they could see nothing yet because of the heaving of the ground ahead.And when they reached the raised heights, they could see Lamppost Wild in a sweeping view.The king saw it, and his face turned pale with anger. Through the ancient forest, a wide passage has been opened.It was the forest where the gold and silver trees once grew, and a child of our world once planted a "tree of protection" there.It was a repulsive passage, like a fresh gap in the ground, filled with the traces of addiction left by the trees as they dragged them down to the river.There was a great company of men working there, the whips crackling, and the horses tugging and tugging as they dragged the logs with all their might.The first thing that caught the attention of the King and the Unicorn was that most of the crowd were not horses that could speak human, but men.The second thing is; none of these people are blond and white Narnians, they're dark, bearded men from Calormene.Calormene is a great and cruel country behind Archenland, south of the Great Desert.Of course, there was no reason why you shouldn't meet a Calormene or two in Narnia—a merchant or an ambassador—for Narnia and Calormene lived at peace in these days.But Tirian could not understand why there were so many Calormenes, and why they were cutting down a Narnian forest now.He gripped his sword tightly and rolled his cloak around his left arm.They quickly came among these people. Two Calormenes were whipping a horse that was pulling a log.When the king came up to them, the log was stuck in a bad mud hole. "Go, lazy bastard! Pull, you lazy pig!" cried the Calormene, cracking his whip secretly.The horse has been pulling hard, its eyes are red, and it is sweating. "Work, lazy beast!" cried a Calormene, lashing his horse savagely with his whip.It was at this time that something truly terrifying happened. Hitherto King Tirian had taken it for granted that the horses driven by the Calormenes were their own, dumb beasts of wisdom, like horses in our world.While he hated to see even a dumb horse being mistreated too much, he was thinking more of the murder of the sacred tree, of course.It never occurred to him that someone would dare to force a free human-speaking Narnia horse to pull a log, let alone beat a Narnia horse with a whip.But when the savage whip came down, the horse reared up, and half-yelled! "Fool and tyrant! Don't you see I'm going all out?" When King Tirian learned that the horse was a Narnia horse of his own country, a surge of anger rushed over him and the unicorn , so that they don't know what they are doing.The king's sword was raised, and the unicorn's horn was drawn down.They ran forward together.Immediately the two Calormenes fell dead, the one decapitated by Tirian's sword, and the other pierced through the heart by Jewel's horn. '