[023] OOM - The truth about his birth

[tristranthorn]

Tristran can vaguely remember the Seventh Magpie being so crowded -- it's happened only once before in his lifetime, and he had been very young then. When he makes his way back through the bar, he has to move carefully, weaving his way past people -- Wall-folk and other strangers alike -- eating (lambchops, bacon, mushrooms, fried eggs, black pudding) and drinking (ale, mead, lager) to reach the exit.

The conversation had gone strangely. Or - well. It went a lot more differently than he ever would have expected it to have gone. His original vision of this fateful day was as follows:
He would get himself back into Wall with a celestial rock in his pocket and find Victoria at her house. Or maybe in front of it (it didn't really matter so much, so long as she was there). He would bend down on one knee before her and reveal the star to her in a gallant fashion like some grand hero. And she would beam and giggle and smile at him. She would wrap her arms around him and he would kiss her and ask her to marry him and they would live happily ever after from then on.

Now, everything is different. Now not only is that dream far away, but it is nonexistent. And the very thought makes him unimaginably happier than he would have believed many months ago. Imagine being stuck here -- in some place where he really doesn't belong -- with Victoria, knowing she would never truly be happy with him. And he with her. He realizes now, quite clearly, that he really could never be happy with all of the things he once wanted. It was all a dream, an ideal his foolish mind had woven because he was young and infatuated and silly.

He is now a man, and he is a man in love. It just so happened to go all -- well, wrong (unplanned), and unexpected (a complete surprise) and ... strangely, he doesn't mind at all. His heart feels lighter.

He wants to tell her. He wants to shout it to the world --

"Tristran."

As he whirls around, his eyes land on a man far older than him rising as they meet eyes. He comes over to younger man and clasps him on the shoulder without speaking.

It is Tristran who breaks the silence. "Father," he says. "You -- you look good."

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[tristranthorn]

He remembers playing in this very meadow as a boy. He'd had a kite once, a kite he and his father spent an entire afternoon crafting, only to bring it out a little too late in the day. And a storm had been brewing as well.

Could all of it be a lie? Was all he believed as a boy a great fabrication?

"Father," Tristran says, "I was wondering if you could answer a question for me."

[nosequels.livejournal.com]

There is a difference, one would say, between a lie and a story that just hasn't been told quite yet. The line may be a fine one, but it is still there.

"I suppose," the man allows evenly. "That would depend on what the question was exactly, Tristran."

[tristranthorn]

Well, here goes.

"I've ... recently heard something that I cannot help but question," he starts, watching his steps carefully. He didn't think it would be this difficult.

"Victoria says I'm ... not from here. That it was my nature to return to Faerie. Is that true?" he asks. "Is mother ... really not my mother?"

[nosequels.livejournal.com]

The man sighs once, heavily, and looks ahead - and the motion is nearly enough of an answer in and of itself.

He pauses for a while, as if remembering, and when he answers he answers as honestly as he can manage - speaking slowly of the strange magic of the Market, and the even stranger magic of a girl with dark eyes and a bewitching smile.

The words come easily, faraway like some some fantastical tale meant for bedtimes and storybooks. But simple. A love story.

[tristranthorn]

And Tristran listens, soaking up every word from his father, understanding and yet not understanding, and feeling more like himself, and less like himself -- all at the same time.

"Do you know what happened to her?" he asks, when his father finishes with his story. He can see their farm-house up ahead and he suddenly wishes they hadn't reached it yet.

[nosequels.livejournal.com]

"No," he replies, and then. "Though I would like to think that she is still - still somewhere."

Still alive, really. It has been eighteen years, after all.

The silence is heavy for a moment and then the front door is opened and the form of Louisa is grinning at them from the front steps, bonnet abandoned and curls falling around her face as she waits.

[tristranthorn]

Tristran doesn't say anything else about his birth, about his real mother, and the story between them.

He isn't all that surprised, though - well, once he got over the initial disbelief, anyway. Things are starting to make sense, and he realizes that between him and his father, they really aren't so different.

He feels closer to the older man, now. He has half a mind to tell him about Yvaine and how he met her too, but there will always be another time for that.

Now is the time for family. And as his sister ushers them into the kitchen, Tristran notices the steaming breakfast waiting for them on the table. Everything is so warm, so familiar. Even the woman whom he had always believed to be his mother.