The Voyage of the Dawn Treader (Chronicles of Narnia, #5) (Publication Order, #3)

by C.S. Lewis

He had turned into a dragon while he was asleep. Sleeping on a dragon’s hoard with greedy, dragonish thoughts in his heart, he had become a dragon himself.

He realized that he was a monster cut off from the whole human race. An appalling loneliness came over him. He began to see that the others had not really been fiends at all. He began to wonder if he himself had been such a nice person as he had always supposed. He longed for their voices. He would have been grateful for a kind word even from Reepicheep.

He was almost afraid to be alone with himself and yet he was ashamed to be with the others.

“Then the lion said—but I don’t know if it spoke—‘You will have to let me undress you.’ I was afraid of his claws, I can tell you, but I was pretty nearly desperate now. So I just lay flat down on my back to let

him do it.

“The very first tear he made was so deep that I thought it had gone right into my heart. And when he began pulling the skin off, it hurt worse than anything I’ve ever felt. The only thing that made me able to bear it was just the pleasure of feeling the stuff peel off. You know—if you’ve ever picked the scab off a sore place. It hurts like billy-oh but it is such fun to see it coming away.” “I know exactly what you mean,” said Edmund. “Well, he peeled the beastly stuff right off—just as I thought I’d done it myself the other three times, only they hadn’t hurt—and there it was, lying on the grass, ...

than I had been. Then he caught hold of me—I didn’t like that much for I was very tender underneath now that I’d no skin on—and threw me into the water. It smarted like anything but only for a moment. After that it became perfectly delicious and as soon as I started swimming and splashing I found that all the pain had gone from my arm. And then I saw why. I’d turned into a boy again. You’d think me simply phony if I told you how I felt about my own arms. I know they’ve no muscle and are pretty mouldy compared with Caspian’s, but I was so glad to see them. “After a bit the lion took m...

got on now, as a matter of fact. And then suddenly I was back here. Which is what makes me think it must have been a dream.” “No. It wasn’t a dream,” said Edmund. “Why not?” “Well, there are the clothes, for one thing. And you have been—well, undragoned, for another.” “What do you think it was, then?” asked Eustace. “I think you’ve seen Aslan,” said Edmund. “Aslan!” said Eustace. “I’ve heard that name mentioned several times since we joined the Dawn Treader. And...

I’ve been pretty beastly.” “That’s all right...

“Even in your world, my son, that is not what a star is but only what it is made of.

“it is not for you, a son of Adam, to know what faults a star can commit.

“Oh, Aslan,” said Lucy. “Will you tell us how to get into your country from our world?” “I shall be telling you all the time,” said Aslan. “But I will not tell you how long or short the way will be; only that it lies across a river. But do not fear that, for I am the great Bridge Builder.

“I am,” said Aslan. “But there I have another name. You must learn to know me by that name. This was the very reason why you were brought to Narnia, that by knowing me here for a little, you may know me better there.