"When you die, does Mother die too. Or does she keep living."
Cael said it at the small family table.
He said it at the small family table at the third bell of the evening, at the end of the small wooden bowl of the second dish, which had been the small dish of stewed onions and small carrots Arethil's apprentice had set at the family quarters at the half-hour past the second bell. He had been eating the small dish, in the small steady careful pattern he ate the small dishes of the evening meal at, with the small wooden spoon Halbarad the Elder had asked the carpenter to cut for him at his fifth year-mark. He had been eating in the small careful steady set of a six-year-old who had been at the small family table for the small dish at every evening of the past year. He had not, by the small careful steady reading at the small family table of the better part of an hour, set up to ask the question.
He had set down the small wooden spoon.
He had set the spoon on the small folded napkin at the edge of his bowl, in the small careful steady set he had been taught by his mother at the first year of the small family table.
He had looked across the small family table at his father.
He had asked.
Aldric was at the head of the small family table at his own bowl. He had been at the bowl for the better part of half an hour. He had been at the small slow careful pace of a man who had been at the inner chamber for the long afternoon and had come up to the family quarters at the third bell, in the small careful steady inner pattern of a man who had not, that week, eaten with the children at any of the five evenings preceding because the council had been at long sessions and the small folded notes on his desk had been at the small careful steady accumulating pile and the small careful steady inner work of the cancellations had been at the small inward cost they always took. He had come up tonight. He had set himself at the head of the small family table. He had been eating in the small careful steady pattern of a man who had not eaten with the children for five evenings and was, by the small inward registering of the small family table around him, glad of it.
He stopped at the question.
He did not, at first, move.
He registered — in the small careful steady inner way of a man who had been reading his son at long fences for two summers — that the question had been at the small inward weight of preparation for some weeks. He had read the small inward weight in the small careful steady set of his son's shoulder at the small family table over the past three or four evenings without naming, even to himself, what the small inward weight was at the work of. He had not been at the small family table for the past five evenings to read it more closely.
He read it now.
He looked at Tauriel.
She was at her own seat at the small family table at his left hand. She had been at the small bowl of the second dish in the small careful steady inner pattern she ate the small dishes of the evening meal at, with the small carved Sindar spoon she had been using at the small family table for the better part of fifteen years. She had not, on the question, immediately set her spoon down. She had been, by Aldric's small careful steady reading at the side, registering the question in the small careful steady inner way of a woman who had known the question was at her son's preparation for some weeks and who was — at the moment the question landed at the small family table — at the small careful steady inner work of meeting the question.
She set the spoon down at the small careful steady pace of the small family table.
She set it on the small folded napkin at the edge of her bowl.
She looked across the small family table at her son.
She said, in the small steady careful inner voice she used at the small family table for the small careful steady inner questions: "Cael."
"Mama."
"I will answer the question. The answer is — Cael — a long answer. The answer is not, by the small careful steady inner shape of the question, a yes or a no answer. The answer is the shape of two answers. I will give you both. You will hear them both. You will — by the small careful steady inner work of a boy who has been at the fence for two summers — set them in your own head in the shape you will set them in. I will not, by any of the small careful steady inner shapes of the asking, ask you to set them in any of the shapes I would set them in."
He nodded once.
He did not, in the nodding, reach back for the small wooden spoon.
He waited.
She drew a small careful steady breath.
She said: "Your father is — by the small careful steady inner reading of the body he was born with — going to die before me by the small standing form of a man and a woman of his people and of mine. He will not — Cael — die for many years. He will be at the small family table for many of your years. He will be at the fence with you for many of your years. He will be at the council table for many of your years. He will be at the long bench under the window for many of your years. But — at the end of those years — by the small careful steady inner shape of being a man of his people, he will, at the end of those years, die."
She paused.
She set the small carved spoon a finger's width to the side, in the small careful steady inner gesture she made when she was committing.
"I am — Cael — not a woman of his people. I am a woman of my own people. The people I come from do not — by the small careful steady inner shape of being them — die in the same way. We do not, at any of the small careful steady inner counts of our years, die at the small careful steady standing form of a Mannish life. The people I come from — by the small careful steady inner shape of being them — keep living. Some of us keep living for thousands of years. Some of us — by a small careful steady inner choice we set ourselves at some point in our years — set down the keeping-living, and we then die, at the small careful steady standing form of the people we have set ourselves on the side of. The choosing is — Cael — a choice that is in the small careful steady inner hand of every person of my people who lives, by the small careful steady inner choice of love, with a person of another people. I am, in this country, a person of my people who lives with a person of another people. I have, in my own hand, the small careful steady inner choice. I have not — at the small family table this evening — yet set the choice. I will set the choice — Cael — at some point in the years before you are a grown man, by my own small careful steady inner work. I will tell you, at the end of the work, what I have chosen. I will — by my own small careful steady inner promise — not set the choice without telling you. I will not — by the same promise — tell you the small careful steady inner work of the setting until the setting is at its end."
A long pause.
The small family table was quiet.
Lúthien — Aldric registered with the small careful steady reading at the side of his bowl — had set her own small wooden bowl two finger-widths sideways on the small family table and was at the small careful steady inner work of carving the second small piece of carrot in her small fingers. She had not, by Aldric's small careful steady reading at the small family table, registered the question. She had not, by the same small careful steady reading, registered the answer. She was at the small careful steady inner pattern of a small careful steady two-year-old at the small family table. She was — by the small flat private inward acknowledgment — at her own work.
Her not-registering was — by the small flat private inward acknowledgment — the small careful steady inner gift of the small family table to the small careful steady inner conversation between her parents and her brother.
Cael set his small fingers against the side of his small wooden bowl.
He set them at the small careful steady inner pace of a boy who had been at the fence for two summers.
He said: "And which will it be."
Tauriel inclined her head.
"That is the question I have not, at this small family table, set out for you, Cael. I have not set it out because — by my own small careful steady inner promise — the work of the choosing is mine and not yet at the small family table. I will, at the small family table at some evening in the years to come, set out for you which it has been. I will not, at this evening, set it out."
He looked at her.
He looked at her in the small careful steady inner way he looked at the third man on the brother-discipline at the practice yard.
He did not, in the looking, register what he found.
He said: "And Lúthien."
Aldric, at the head of the small family table, drew a slow breath.
The follow-up was, by his own small careful steady reading at the head of the small family table, the small careful steady inner question of a tactical mind. The follow-up was the question of a boy who had registered, at the small family table this evening, that the small careful steady inner asymmetry of his parents' kinds was — by the small careful steady inner reading of his own family at the small family table — an asymmetry that did not stop at his parents.
Tauriel inclined her head.
"Lúthien is — Cael — of both lines too. She has the small careful steady inner reading of her own line on the side of mine more strongly than you do. She has the small lift at the ear. She has the small slender hand. She will — by the small careful steady inner reading of Arethil at the long count of years — be at the small careful steady inner choice when she comes to her own years of choosing. I do not, at this small family table this evening, know what she will choose. You will not, at this small family table this evening, know what she will choose. You will — Cael — by the small careful steady inner work of the long years, watch her at her work, in the small careful steady inner way you have been watching her at the long rug. She will, at her own years of choosing, set her own choice. The choice will not be yours. The choice will not be mine. The choice will not be your father's. The choice will be — Cael — hers."
He absorbed this.
He absorbed it in the small careful steady inner way he had absorbed the small careful steady inner answer about the wall on the parapet on the long September evening some years ago.
He picked up the small wooden spoon.
He set it back in the small bowl of the second dish.
He took up a small piece of carrot.
He ate it.
He chewed at the small careful steady inner pace of the small family table.
He said, in the same small careful steady inner voice, with the small piece of carrot still at the corner of his mouth: "All right."
That was the whole of the follow-up.
That was the whole of the small careful steady inner conversation.
He returned to the small bowl of the second dish.
He finished the small dish at the small careful steady inner pace of the small family table.
Aldric set his hand briefly on Tauriel's at the side of the small family table, in the small careful steady inner gesture he had been making at the small family table for years. She inclined her head a fraction. She did not, on the inclining, take her hand off the small carved spoon.
Lúthien set her small carved second piece of carrot in her mouth.
She made the small confident sound she made when a small piece of carrot was the right small piece of carrot.
The small family table went on.
⚜ ━━━━ ROYAL PROCLAMATION ━━━━ ⚜
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