FIVE: THE DEPLORABLE WORD

After the bell’s note dies, the last robed figure—a tall, beautiful queen—rises. She identifies the children as servants of a magician and learns of Uncle Andrew. As the palace begins to collapse, the Queen seizes their hands and swiftly leads them through corridors, naming dungeons, torture chambers, and bloody histories as they flee.

At the main doors, the Queen speaks a spell that turns the massive gates to dust, warning Digory to remember what happens to those who oppose her. Outside, under a dying red sun and a single star, she unveils the silent, ruined city of Charn.

Calling herself Jadis, last Queen of Charn, she recounts a war with her sister and reveals the Deplorable Word, a secret magic that annihilates all living things except the speaker. She claims she used it only when forced, dismissing the lives lost as her subjects’ purpose and asserting a ruler’s freedom from common rules.

Jadis explains she enchanted the Hall of Images to sleep until the bell awoke her. Learning the children’s sun is younger, she decides to go to their world to rule it. She assumes Uncle Andrew is a great king and demands immediate transport.

When Polly calls her story nonsense, Jadis seizes Polly’s hair and, in that moment, releases both children’s hands. Digory and Polly each touch their yellow rings, and the world of Charn vanishes as they surge back toward the warm, green light of the Wood between the Worlds.