“Well said, well said, Jewel,”cried the King.“Tho are the very words：not a tame lion.It es in many tales.”
Roonwit had just raid his hand and was leaning forward to say something very early to the King when all three of them turheir heads to listen to a wailing sound that was quickly drawing he wood was so thick to the West of them that they could he newer yet.But they could soohe words.
“Woe, woe, woe！”called the voice.“Woe for my brothers and sisters！Woe for the holy trees！The woods are laid waste.The axe is lood against us.We are being felled.Great trees are falling, falling, falling.”
With the last“falling”the speaker came in sight.She was like a woman but so tall that her head was on a level with the taur’s yet she was like a tree too.It is hard to explain if you have never en a Dryad but quite unmistakable once you have-something different in the color, the voice, and the hair.King Tirian and the two Beasts k ohat she was the nymph of a beech tree.
“Justice, Lord King！”she cried.“e to our aid.Protect your people.They are felling us in Lantern Waste.Freat trunks of my brothers and sisters are already on the ground.”
“What, Lady！Felling Lantern Waste?Murdering the talking trees?”cried the King, leaping to his feet and drawing his sword.“How dare they?And who dares it?Now by the Mane of Aslan—”
“A-a-a-h,”gasped the Dryad shuddering as if in pain—shuddering time after time as if under repeated blows.Then all at once she fell sideways as suddenly as if both her feet had been cut from under her.For a d they saw her lying dead on the grass and then she vahey knew what had happened.Her tree, miles away, had been cut down.
For a moment the King’s grief and anger were so great that he could not speak.Then he said：
“e, friends.We must go up river and find the villains who have dohis, with all the speed we may.I will leave not one of them alive.”
“Sire, with a good will,”said Jewel.
But Roonwit said,“Sire, be wary in your just wrath.There are strange doings on foot.If there should be rebels in arms further up the valley, we three are too few to meet them.If it would plea you to wait while—”