Ceru arrived early to the compound at Valla, a place his father had spoke of but he had never been. The main house, as large as it was, looked fragile against the backdrop of the churning sea and roiling gridelin clouds. Leaning hard into the wind, his hand tight on his hat, Ceru struggle up the slippery wet stone steps, worn smooth, it seemed, as bar soap and onto the grey wooden porch. Blu was waiting and together they made their way into the house and to the study where Zeke was standing, his white tunic-ed back to the pair, head bowed and a painting in his hands.
"Come in Ceru" said Zeke without turning, his eyes still locked on the canvas in hand. "Thanks for being on time. You know, your father, he was always on time too."
Von's son stood in the doorway, not quite knowing what to say.
"Come, come, have a seat. The planet's not going to blow away today. Tomorrow maybe, but not today," Zeke smiled, the painting still in his weathered hands. "Can I get you anything to drink?"
"Thank you, but I'm fine," said Ceru as he sat opposite Zeke's desk in an old leather chair and wondered how many famous arses had graced the seat he sat. He placed his hands in his lap like a nervous schoolboy and looked around the study as if in a museum. After what seemed an awkward silence, he asked, "Is that one of yours?" Then quickly added, "the painting."
"This one?" asked Zeke, holding the painting in the air with one hand. "I wish it was. Then, perhaps, I could leave it be." Zeke realized from the look on Ceru's face the young Hynerian had no idea what he was taking about. "My granddaughter painted it, Kyra. Actually, we did it together. The lesson of the mountains I called it. It was her first time with oils. Still my favorite. We did it with our fingers, her choice. Grand was none too happy." Zeke smiled with the remembrance of the heat he took for that one. Oil paint, fingers and a child don't mix she had said, over and over again. And he had listened over and over again. "But I didn't call you here to wax sentimental. I need your help. Important mission. You open-mined?"
"I suppose no would be the wrong answer?"
Zeke smiled without answering.
"Okay, I'm open-minded."
"Good. But before we discuss details I need to tell you something. About your father."
Ceru moved to the edge of his chair and if there had been birds chirping he wouldn't have heard them, for the gale whipping the shutters and windows presently stood outside the attention Zeke's statement commanded. One never knew one's father as well as one thought. The mere mention of new information, inside information, for it certainly seemed Zeke was about to share something a son would not know about a father, was as treasure more precious than gold.
The ninth order Tao spoke slowly, his voice slightly deeper than before. "He loved you. He loved you as I loved Kyra."
Ceru's eyes welled. He loved his father. Zeke had been the one to authorize the imprimatur on his book of letters, so he knew the Hynerian sitting across from him knew his heart, at least as it related to his father.
"And he left for one reason only. I asked him to." Zeke paused to take the measure of the moment. "I ripped his heart from his chest. I tore him away from what he loved most, his son, you, because he owed me a debt. And I knew, I knew your father, in spite of the pain, the personal cost, would honor the debt. I would like to tell you the asking was noble or honorable or right. I'd like to present my case as to why I had the right to demand such a sacrifice. But I had no right and I have no case. Your father was the honorable one. I was wrong.
Ceru looked down at the floor, the muck of his mind stirred by the words cast his way. Zeke walked around from his desk. "Stand up and look at me." Ceru obeyed as if the asking was an order. Zeke placed his hands on the young hynerian's shoulders as his pale blue eyes sparkled without blinking. "Before we discuss our mission, I need to ask you something and I need you to look me in the eye and answer from your heart, not your mind. I won't accept anything but the truth. You understand?"
"Yes sir," said Ceru, his head spinning, confused, throbbing with a million thoughts.
"Can you forgive me?"
12 comments:
This chapter again takes us back two years in time to Hyneria in the days after Bravo and Kyra have left and the planet continues to deteriorate.
Somehow I was expecting the final apology before I could reach it...
Papa was wrong. Question: why would anybody obey orders just for the sake of debt knowing it was wrong...
Are personal values less important than repaying a debt by sacrificing them?
Personal love, personal loss in terms of family & wealth etc. maybe...but values?
To tell you the truth.. I personally don't like your Kyra...
Mona, I suppose all I can say at this point without revealing up coming chapters and spoiling the fun of debate and speculation is, stay tuned. I think your questions will get answered as the story unfolds. As always, thanks for taking the time to visit and read and leave engaging feedback. Peace to you my friend. :-)
It has been said, by myself too a few dozen times at least :-), but you are the most marvellous story-teller. To begin reading is to be transported to this other place within seconds, so effortlessly it rises up within the heart and mind building upon the memories already secured, attached to the characters. One could write a list of the traits that your writing comprises, find evidence of each in turn within the vast majority of chapters, know it as fact and yet discover it anew at least in so much as being dazzled by their brilliance. I was struck here by your long since acknowledged flow, the smoothness of the line extending from the first word to the last. We've been in offices/studies before, John's aboard, John's at home, Em's father, each of those described in more detail, the content within, but to return to the first part of this comment, one entered with Ceru and though one would be hard-pressed to present details of the surroundings, I would still insist if anyone asked that I had been there.
What we will do for others in the name of love, assistance, because it is asked of us is often so far above anything that we would do for ourselves, not that this is the reason. A debt of gratitude, all that we do not know and one most memorable event of an embrace and this too is not reason enough. Respect too, honour, duty and still it doesn't reach, instead, with this chapter added, the impression I am left with is one of love and understanding, that in the depth of Von's love for Ceru, he understood Papa's request and though I shouldn't like to classify too clearly what gives the impression, need has much to do with it too. We know not the life or age of Ceru, but the impression based on what we do know is of a Hynerian in his own right and perhaps too it has something to do with the differences we have already seen between Ceru and Kyra. Kyra two years ago was not the Kyra we see now, not that any of us are what we were two years since. Perhaps too, though I really don't like to say, the impression gained has part in separation, we have not seen young Kyra, Kyra prior to leaving Hyneria, in any other way than with Papa nudging her, nurturing her if you will, of her still in the throws of the fast-paced development that accompanies youth, whereas what we know of Ceru tells us, in particular via the Book of Letters and in all the varying respects that it should be so, that his needs are not less but other. Level even as Von to he. Perhaps too, in some way, Von saw an opportunity to make amends, to recreate, to do for Kyra what he was unable to do for Ceru and remain by her side to watch over her, be there if and when he was needed. Perhaps. :-)
A tapping foretells of firm links between the Book of Letters and the scene we see here, significantly more so between the shared knowledge of it that excluded Von until such a time that he had left Hyneria with it in his possession. Why exactly that should be so, since it pertains less to Von's decision than it does to why Papa would ask it of him and is therefore still a head-scratcher. At the same time, I wonder if I am sporting rosy shades through this comment and as such Papa does have every reason to ask for forgiveness so that he can reconcile the action that he took. I guess it all depends not on whether it was right or wrong to ask such a sacrifice of Von but on whether he considers it a mistake that Von left aboard Bravo. This chapter ends with a smile for the knowledge is certain (at least so it appears to me) there is more to come, more clarity that is, for Ceru. One wonders if this time, Ceru will be the last to know as Von was in regard to the Book of Letters, whether Zeke is about to impart some detail known already to Von, but my guess, and it is a guess, is that once again Ceru alone will have heard what Zeke has to say about the past, as opposed to anything concerning the future (Important mission)which may come into discussion also. Wonders also whether in the asking, Zeke of Von, there was an exchange, a two-way promise, a mutual assurance, that just as Von would look out for Kyra come what may, Zeke too promised that he would know what was to become of Ceru, come what may. Somewhere in the above should have been something about Kyra's uniqueness, but her gifts speak for themselves.
This is such a beautifully flowing chapter. It was so nice to see Papa and Ceru again, to see them after Bravo has left the island, soothing in the moment which in turn eases the impact of what will become of them, though we may never know and though it if we do may be something quite different than being swept away, so to speak, by the winds ravaging Hyneria. In it's own right a credit to your writing talent, unlike any that came before just as each is different from the other, and as lovable. Ceru's sense of unease for lack of a better word at where he is, the reasons he was asked to come there (museum, arses, waiting to be asked in, not knowing what to say, adding to what is said unsure of being clear) demonstrated so very well. The inclusion of the painting for which the chapter is named such a nice touch, easing, warm, sharing, opening. Time to end this one.
Loved this chapter. :-)
Something too, around the part that spoke of making amends, that though Von was shown anew aboard Bravo that his son loved him and though Zeke assures Ceru of the same in regard to Von here, neither was in any doubt, also in regards to the aforementioned amends that Von should think and feel this way is not so much justified as natural, in short though Von may have physically been apart from his son at times, though he is it now too, his role as father is evidenced in Ceru's love, his respect, understanding and admiration.
Gosh, but though Von and Ceru especially have been with me for about 3 hours now, they remain, never having left in the first place. Their dock scene and the Book of Letters, Von's conversations on his time of capture, with these they have become as embedded in my heart as any of the other poignant revelations have done for the other characters, the scale of aching on their separation is so great. I think of Von on Bravo, in capture, of Ceru now, writing the BoL, of the love between them, the bonds that bind them shown clearest when they are apart, of each of them alone with a knowledge of the other never verbalized each other's company, with a love that they are now unable to physically wrap around the other, each destined as far as we know never to learn what became of the other after the dock scene, the having to say goodbye, the never knowing, the as you put it so heart-wrenchingly effects of the decision Von had to make, times that were, times that will never be, so much a part of each other I want to quote Nerdy and the phrase that she uses which I can only nod along to in complete understanding when she speaks of her heart living outside of her, I think of Von and Ceru and tears well, my chest hurts in measures of joy and sadness. Almost too much it has been, as you can probably read here, so very clever to combine the two, Zeke befeft of Kyra, Ceru of Von and therein vice versa, the result is to be doubly over-whelmed.
I can see myself coming back here many times today, or being unwilling still and continued to leave the page. :-)
;-D Although once those words have been written they seem to work as a jinx against such an occurrence which matters not so much for it saves your eyes and does not deter the chapter from being taken with. And perhaps now the jinx has been acknowledged, it will be combated. LOL
Re-reading I have to once again applaud the opening paragraph and your wonderfully descriptive language!
Good morning when you get that far. :-) (coffee)
Sweetest, again, you amaze me with your comments. Bless your hide.
Without giving anything away that is to come, let me say this. Papa is projecting in this chapter. His description of what he thinks he did to Von and Ceru is actually what he feels he has done to himself and Kyra. Although he feels the need to ask Ceru for forgiveness, he is actually stuck with forgiving himself and accepting that putting her on the vessel and staying behind was the right thing. It pained him more than we know to let (allow/ask) Von to go in his place. And, after the fact, as I think was implied in the chapter where Zeke and Blu head home from the dock, he immediately feels an uncomfortable and seemingly unshakable sense of regret. Call it buyers remorse. :-D
Zeke is also uncharacteristically ungrounded (un-mountained, which is --intentionally--ironic in light of the lesson of which he speaks, the lesson he taught to Kyra and seems to have lost, at least in this moment) not to mention slightly self-deluding. He tells Ceru he is not sentimental, yet everything we see here is that he is all but. I wanted to show Zeke as fallible, as capable of being wrong and as one that could humble himself also. I feared that I went too far in this chapter, but I like the idea that we see three Zekes. There is the Zeke before Kyra. There is Papa. And now we are seeing the Zeke without Kyra. Each one, rather different, each one helping fill out the picture of the great Tao.
As always, thank you for the love you show the story. :-)
In other words, to use his own words against him, he is seeing the world not as it is, but as he is. ;-)
Tree, Forgive my impertinence...sometimes your moods effect your comments...
What I mean is Kyra is not getting well developed. We see her mainly as shadow of Papa...
Maybe you are finding it hard to develop that character fully because she is a woman... something a little hard for you t describe...
Mona, no worries. The story is fiction and written to be enjoyed. I love the raw honesty in your comments, good or bad. As for Kyra, we haven't seen much of her of late, but in the story as a whole, she has almost one third more chapters devoted to her than any other character. I will take to heart what you are saying and see if I am missing the boat on her, but we have seen interviews and journal entries by Kyra that have been quite revealing on what she thinks and where she has struggled. Still much to understand about her, but then again, since I plan on writing the story for years and years to come, we have time. :-D
As for the woman thing, I'm almost embarrassed to say I feel more comfortable writing about the women in this story than I do the men. How close I get to how a "female hynerian" would see the world, well, I suppose that is for others to judge. ;-)
As always, thanks for stopping by. Peace. :-)
Oh I say! Curiouser and curiouser!
My favourite line?
"Ceru moved to the edge of his chair and if there had been birds chirping he wouldn't have heard them, for the gale whipping the shutters and windows presently stood outside the attention Zeke's statement commanded "
Something in that one line caught me.
Miladysa, I kinda liked it too. The ear doesn't hear, the mind does. And in this scene, Ceru's mind is all on what Zeke is about to say. No room for even a freight train coming through. :-D
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