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When the party has died down, Isabella, for one, is well and truly exhausted. She explores the palace until she finds a room with a bed in it, and into this bed she flops, still in her clothes and holding her staff and carrying the cordial in her pocket. She sleeps late, because the party kept her up so late and she hadn't really slept the night before; but around noon, she stirs, and gets up, and goes looking for James and wherever her backpack may have got to. The backpack she finds in the great hall where the principal mass of the party was; some enterprising creature took both bags from the battlefield at Beruna up to the castle for them, and she only wishes she knew who it was. She takes her bag to her room and carries James's with her and continues looking for her friend.
"Very well," he says, smiling slightly despite himself. He scoops up the rat.
The rat sits quite contently in his hands and points out the path to where the rest of the remaining Witch's creatures are gathering.
It's such an incredible relief to be among creatures again, any creatures, that he almost doesn't mind which creatures they are.
The creatures are all very glad to see him and flock around him like he's a flag. They have barely-there and not-even-slightly-consistent plans for an assault on Cair Paravel, which they are more than happy to share with Winter.
He is drawn into the conversation, corrects some blatant foolishness, organizes them a little better, listens to everything they tell him about Narnia's restoration and the King and Queen who rule it. He doesn't really mean to encourage them like this, but... he can imagine what they would be like if he said he'd really rather get back to killing himself.
Certainly they would not be nearly as pleased as they are now.
While he's here... he inquires if there are any smiths among them, and if such a smith might be willing to make him something, just for his personal amusement.
There are dwarves! They don't have access to a proper forge under the circumstances, but could possibly make something rough and simple.
That should be fine. He describes what he wants, leaving out its intended use. Let them think he plans gruesome torture. It's the natural thing to think, when Eternal Winter asks you to build a sort of little open cage with a strong metal spike through the middle, never mentioning that the measurements he requests and the unusual design of the lock are all so that he will be able to lock it in place with the spike through his own heart. Perhaps that will be suitably permanent.
The dwarves agree, none too clear on the current dimensions of either the King or the Queen, and get to work on his request while the other creatures solicit his assistance in their plan of attack.
In hardly a day, the plan takes shape. Over the course of a few more, he gets them moving, sending the most careful and stealthy scouts ahead to check their path.
And he appoints Bristle leader - because, he explains, he has a secret errand to run. He does not expect it to take very long, but he can't put it off another day. If he has not returned by the time they arrive, they must go ahead without him.
He takes the smiths' contraption with him when he goes.
Well then.
They will go on ahead.
And Winter—will abandon them, to find somewhere even more remote to see if this time he can finally die. Probably they'll all be killed or captured. Probably a lot of creatures will die or be hurt. But he can't really think of a way to avoid that. And he would rather go back to failing at suicide than stay with these creatures who expect things from him that he doesn't want to give - who expect him to be someone he's not sure he is anymore. It's been painfully obvious since Bristle first showed him to their camp. He can't keep on like this, not even if these are the only creatures in all the world he can keep company with.
The creatures wait until the appointed time, and then, obedient to Winter's instructions, proceed in his absence.
High above, a mere speck in the sky at this distance, Flit is out for an afternoon flight.
He circles closer, curious about this odd arrangement of creatures.
There are some dwarves, and some dryads, and a variety of animals - rats, wolves, one vulture - a small but definitely unpromising assortment of creatures.
"Pin-I-mean-James-I-mean-your-majesty," he says, "there's some creatures coming toward Cair Paravel and they look sort of unfriendly, they have weapons and things and none of them is a knight."
"Thanks for telling me," she says. "How far away are they? How many of what kinds of creature? Can you see the weapons clearly?"
He provides the requested information, circling lower still to get a good look at the weapons so he can list how many of what kinds of those. A sizeable little band - especially with so few fighting knights of Narnia in the vicinity to meet them - but nowhere near an army.
When he gets close enough the vulture spots him and the creatures become alarmed. A dryad with a slingshot aims a rock straight at his eye.
Isabella is on her balcony playing a board game with a hedgehog who has been visiting the castle.
He yelps and flaps frantically for altitude; the rock hits a flailing hoof.
"A band of about thirty of the Witch's creatures is attacking Cair Paravel from the northwest. They're about three miles from the palace, about two and a half from the knight-hall. Stay out of their way, warn any creatures you can, get the innocent and vulnerable to safety." And then, to only the subset who are fighting knights - "Come to Cair Paravel. We'll meet them here."
"Another time," Isabella says to the hedgehog, and she gets up to sweep into her room and pluck her cloak from its hook and swirl it on around her shoulders. "What's the composition of the band?" she asks James.
The vulture seizes two sword-bearing rat comrades and flies up after Flit, intending to drop them on his back where they can attack and he'll be unable to kick at them.