The First King of Shannara - Terry Brooks [147]
He left her alone for a time, gathering his own thoughts, not wanting to rush what he intended. It was a delicate matter, and if she felt she was being coerced, she would close herself off from him completely. Yet there must be a resolution, and it must come now.
“On nights like these, I think of my boyhood,” he said finally, looking not at her, but at the summit of the hills and the stars that hung above them. He smiled. “Oh, I suppose it seems as if someone as old as I am could not ever have been young. But I was. I lived in the hill country below Leah with my grandfather, who was a metalworker of great skill. Even when he was old, his hands were steady and his eye keen. I would watch him for hours, amazed at his dexterity and patience. He loved my grandmother, and when she died, he said she took a part of him with her that he could never have back again, but that the loss was worth it for the time they had shared. He said I had been given him in her place. He was a fine man.”
He looked at Mareth now and found her looking back, interested. “But my parents were another matter. They were nothing like my grandfather. They were never able to settle in one spot for long, not ever in their short lives, and nothing of my grandfather’s dedication to his craft ever took root in them. They were always moving about, changing their lives, looking for something new, something different. They left me with my grandfather shortly after I was born. They had no time for me.”
His aged brow wrinkled thoughtfully. “I resented it for many years, but eventually I came to understand. That’s how it is with parents and children. Each disappoints the other in ways that neither recognizes nor intends, and it takes time to overcome that disappointment. It was so with my parents and their decision to leave me.”
“But you have a right to expect your parents to stay with you through your childhood,” Mareth declared.
Bremen smiled. “I used to believe that. But a child doesn’t always understand the complexities of adult choices. A child’s best hope in life is that its parents will try to do what is best for it, but deciding what is best is a difficult process. My parents knew I would not grow well traveling with them, for they were not able to give me the attention I needed. They could barely give it to each other. So they left me with my grandfather, who loved me and watched over me as they could not. It was the right choice.”
She mulled it over for a moment. “But it marked you.”
He nodded. “For a time, but not in any lasting way. Perhaps it even helped toughen me. I don’t pretend to know. We grow as best we can under the circumstances given us. What good does it do to second-guess ourselves years after the fact? Better that we simply try to understand why we are as we are and then better ourselves by learning from that.”
There was a long silence as they faced each other, the expressions on their faces lit well enough by the light of stars and moon to be clearly discernible.
“You are talking about me, aren’t you?” Mareth said finally. “My parents, my family.”
Bremen did not let his expression change. “You do not disappoint me, Mareth,” he said softly. “Your insight serves you well.”
Her small features hardened. “I do resent my parents. They left me to grow up with strangers. It wasn’t my mother’s fault; she died giving birth to me. I don’t know about my father. Perhaps it wasn’t his fault either.” She shook her head. “But that doesn’t change how I feel about them. It doesn’t make me feel any better about being left.”
Bremen eased forward, needing to shift his body to avoid cramping of muscles and joints. The aches and pains were more frequent and less easily dispelled these days. The very opposite of his hunger, he thought with irony. Welcome to old age. Even the Druid Sleep was losing its power to sustain him.
His eyes sought hers. “I would guess that you have reason to be angry with your parents beyond what you have told me. I would guess that your anger is a weight about your heart, a great stone