IP: 82.19.140.112
Posted on November 16, 2014 at 11:03:15 PM by arthur
Arthur caught the look of disbelief on Thoth’s face. A man with half the King’s skill at reading faces would have seen it. Thoth has always been something of an open book. Smiling a little sadly Arthur let the boy rant. He didn’t try to interrupt and he didn’t scowl disapproval at the steadily rising volume of Thoth’s voice. Arthur just listened, waiting for him to run out of steam. When his office returned to silence the king waited for Thoth to regain his composure. “I don’t know,” he replied honestly, “I find it hard to understand why any father would walk away from his child. You have every right to be angry, and you have every right to hate him if you think you need to.” Arthur sighed. “I can’t offer you much comfort in this Thoth other than to tell you that Adonis’ actions say far more about him than they do about you. Whatever he told you, he’s the disappointment, not you and,” the king’s voice took on a firmer tone, “don’t you dare thing otherwise.” A large part of Arthur hated Adonis for what he had said to Thoth; it wasn’t just that he had dared to say it, but that he had the audacity to think it in the first place. He had left out of fear and had failed to return out of cowardice; how dare he try to justify his own failing by shifting the blame onto his son. Arthur had respected Adonis once, but such sentiment was long dead. “Unfortunately, the world isn’t black and white,” the king began as he held Thoth’s gaze, “it would be easy to condemn your father for what he did and didn’t do, but he did help people once. It is one of the enigmas of the world that not all good men make good fathers and some bad men make great ones. If a murderer goes home and plays with his children does that lessen the severity of his crimes? Does it redeem him? Do Adonis’ condemnable acts negate his praise worthy ones?” The king’s tone inferred that the questions were for Thoth to answer for himself. “I’m not trying to justify your father’s actions; I don’t think any man could, but I think it may help you to know that whatever happened later, you did come from goodness.” Smiling a little Arthur paused to study Thoth again, half prepared for another outburst of shouting. He knew that the boy’s ire was not directed at him, but that he needed someone, anyone, to shout at. “I think you’re more like your mother than you realise,” Arthur said, “your intelligence is from her, your reading and your magic.” And, he thought privately, you both sometimes struggle with the world’s grey areas. “As for Adonis, he was a man of nature and well...” Arthur fixed Thoth with a rather pointed look, “we didn’t always see eye to eye.” The king knew what it was like to be fatherless. He had been a father five times over, but he had never had one of his own. “I never knew my father,” he told Thoth, allowing some openness into his grey eyes. “I remember hearing people talking about him. Some people said good things and some people said bad, especially when I wasn’t supposed to be listening. This man was so much a part of who I was, but he was completely unknown to me. I always felt like part of me was missing – how could I understand the kind of person I was if I didn’t know where and who I had come from? Eventually it taught me that our parents do define who we are, but we can have some say in how far.”  |
Replies:
- in learning you will teach - By thoth December 27, 2014 at 07:17:33 PM
Post a reply:
<--
-->