September 27, 2007

• “Whatever I may find, I must seek it here.”

  Eilonwy bowed her head. “You have chosen as you must, Taran of Caer Dallben.”

  “Nor will I gainsay you,” Dallben said to Taran, “but only to warn you.  The tasks you set yourself are cruelly difficult.  There is no certainty you will accomplish even one, and much risk you will fail in all of them.  In either case, your efforts may well go unrewarded, unsung, forgotten.  And at the end, like all mortals, you must face your death; perhaps without even a mound of honor to mark your resting  place.”

  Taran nodded.  “So be it,” he said.  “Long ago I yearned to be a hero without knowing, in truth, what a hero was.  Now, perhaps, I understand it a little better.  A grower of turnips, or a shaper of clay, a Commot farmer or a king – every man is a hero if he strives more for others tyhan for himself a lone.  “Once,” he added, “you told me that the seeking counts more than the finding.  So, too, must the striving count more than the gain.”

  “Once, I hoped for a glorious destiny,” Taran went on, smiling at his own memory.  “That dream has vanished with my childhood; and though a pleasant dream it was fit only for a child.  I am well-content as an Assistant Pig-Keeper.”

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