Coming home to Narnia: "A HORSE AND HIS BOY" by C.S Lewis

I have cats.  I don't own my cats, some might say that they own me.  This story is what is told in the fifth book in the Narnia series. "The Horse and his Boy".   

I think what I enjoy so much about this series is the life given to animals.  I wish I could share the same language with my cats.  But maybe it's better that I don't.  

How can I know? I bet this horse knows, if only he could tell me."

The horse had lifted its head. Shasta stroked its smooth-as-satin nose and said, "I wish you could talk, old fellow."

And then for a second he thought he was dreaming, for quite distinctly, though in a low voice, the Horse said, "But I can."

Shasta stared into its great eyes and his own grew almost as big, with astonishment.

"How ever did you learn to talk?" he asked.

"Hush! Not so loud," replied the Horse. "Where I come from, nearly all the animals talk."

"Where ever is that?" asked Shasta.

"Narnia," answered the Horse. 

* * * 

"Why do you keep on talking to my horse instead of to me?" asked the girl.

"Excuse me, Tarkheena," said Bree (with just the slightest backward tilt of his ears), "but that's Calormene talk. We're free Narnians, Hwin and I, and I suppose, if you're running away to Narnia, you want to be one too. In that case Hwin isn't your horse any longer. One might just as well say you're her human."

* * * 

"Ask on, my dear," said Aslan.

"Will any more harm come to her by what I did?"

"Child," said the Lion, "I am telling you your story, not hers. No-one is told any story but their own." 

* * *

I am not that romanticized anymore by the whole poor boy becoming a prince. With the news of recent events,  the whole royalty thing has left a bad taste in my mind.  In this story... the beautiful ending is for the horses who come home to Narnia.  

The whole king and queen motif of Narnia is not all that attractive to me now.  The dream is not a pretty one.  Reality is that royalty is just another prison.  Maybe a worse prison than poverty.  I don't know, but it seems that way.  So to add it to a child's fantasy seems cruel.  I guess maybe it is time to take a break from the world of Narnia.  

So what book finds me now... It is a story about a different kind of "Prince"... but that will be one of the next blog posts.  It is a big book, and may take a while to get through it.  

I am also reading another book along side... it is about a "Queen", but a different kind of Queen.  

Both books are not fantasy, but really show that the glamour of "royalty" is not all its cracked up to be.