The awakening of Jadis

The awakening of Jadis begins when Digory strikes the golden bell in the enchanted room, against Polly’s objection, and ends with a queen rising from among the silent, robed figures. The choice turns curiosity into consequence: the bell’s growing note shakes the palace apart, while its last echo gives way to a powerful stranger whose presence makes the children’s quarrel seem suddenly small.

The Inscription and the Choice

The children find writing cut into a stone pillar. Its letters remain strange in shape, yet, as they look, they become intelligible to both of them. The inscription presents two alternatives: strike the bell and accept danger, or leave it untouched and wonder what would have happened. Polly refuses the invitation, saying they do not want danger. Digory sees the warning differently: the possibility of not knowing seems unbearable, and he insists that they will go on wondering if they leave without striking it.

The difference between the children is not simply caution against recklessness. Polly wants to leave the enchanted place; Digory treats the warning itself as a reason to act, imagining that refusing the choice would impose a lasting torment of curiosity. The inscription’s rhyme makes the decision feel like a challenge, but its warning is explicit. When Digory acts, he chooses knowledge at the cost of safety—and makes that choice for both children.

The Bell and the Collapse

The decision comes in the middle of a quarrel. Polly, furious after Digory dismisses her as a child, turns to get her yellow Ring, apparently intending to leave. Before she can reach it, Digory grabs her wrist, holds her other arm back with his elbow, and leans across her to pick up the hammer. He gives the golden bell a light, smart tap, then lets her go. The physical restraint matters: the awakening is not a joint adventure freely chosen, but the result of Digory overriding Polly’s attempt to withdraw.

The bell’s sound begins softly and sweetly. Instead of fading, it continues on one note and grows louder: within a minute it is twice as loud as at first, and soon it would drown out even shouting. Its sweetness acquires something horrible as the whole room throbs with the sound and the stone floor trembles. A second, indistinct noise joins it, suggestive first of a distant train and then of a falling tree. Heavy impacts follow; a sudden rush and thunder bring down roughly a quarter of the roof at one end of the room. Masonry falls around the children and the walls rock before the bell stops and the dust clears.

The inscription’s danger is thus made physical before the children know what they have released. The bell is not merely an object that makes a sound: its note accompanies the destruction of the palace, turning their act of curiosity into a violent change of setting. Yet the damage does not kill them, and the silence after the collapse is not a return to safety. It is the pause in which the sleeping queen appears.

The Queen Awakens

Across the pillar, the children are still trembling when they hear a soft noise from the undamaged end of the room. The furthest robed figure rises from her chair: the woman Digory had thought beautiful. Standing, she proves taller than the children had supposed. Her crown and robes, along with the flash of her eyes and the curve of her lips, establish at once that she is a great queen. She looks over the damaged room and at the children, but her expression gives no clear sign of surprise or of what she thinks.

Her first question identifies the event as the breaking of a spell: she asks who has awakened her and broken it. Digory answers that he thinks it must have been him. Her response is both an assessment and a rebuke. She lays a beautiful white hand on his shoulder, but its grip feels to him as strong as steel pincers, and she declares him a common child without royal or noble blood. The contrast between her regal appearance and physical strength introduces her as a figure whose authority is not merely ceremonial.

The exchange also places the children’s journey in a wider magical context. Jadis recognizes that Digory is no magician and concludes that he has travelled by another person’s Magic, not his own. When he names his Uncle Andrew, he confirms that the means of reaching this place belongs to someone else. The awakening therefore connects the mysterious queen not only to the bell and the ruined palace, but to the experiment that brought the children into contact with other worlds.

Ruin and Immediate Consequences

The palace continues to collapse after Jadis rises. A rumbling, creaking roar comes from nearby, and the floor shakes. Jadis recognizes the peril immediately: the whole palace is breaking up, and the children will be buried if they do not get out within minutes. Her calm announcement contrasts with the urgency of the destruction. She does not pause to investigate the children or mourn the room; she moves directly from awakening to escape.

Jadis holds out a hand to each child. Polly dislikes her and is sulky, and would refuse the offered hand if she could. But Jadis moves too quickly for Polly to prevent it: before Polly understands what is happening, the queen has caught her left hand in a grasp much longer and stronger than her own. Polly realizes that Jadis is strong enough to break her arm with a twist and that, with her left hand occupied, she cannot reach the yellow Ring in her left pocket. She silently hopes Digory will keep the Rings secret and wishes she could speak to him alone.

The awakening therefore changes the immediate balance of power. The children have triggered the event, but Jadis takes control of their escape and physically prevents Polly from using her means of return. The queen’s first actions combine practical command with coercive strength; the danger of the collapsing palace becomes inseparable from the danger of being in her hands. What began as Digory’s attempt to end uncertainty has opened a new and more consequential uncertainty: what this newly awakened ruler will do with the children who have released her.