Chapter Text
Gertrude, the healer of Carvahall, came out of the room where mother Marian was resting. Through the opened door the two boys saw their father sitting by her side, holding her hand, caressing her hair. Over the last few days, mother's poor health had gone worse. She looked so unwell, and she could not leave her bed even for a while. Despite Gertrude's medicine her fever was running higher and higher.
"Your mother wishes to talk to you one to one separately" the woman whispered giving a tender smile at the boys. Someone would say that the healer was quite satisfied with her patience's course of healing. However, Gertrude has always been calm and collected; a very optimistic person, who liked to give courage to everyone. She would be the last one to lose control. "Come, Eragon, she likes to see you first."
The boy was sitting near the cold hearth next to his brother. He stood, gave Roran an anxious glance and he aimed reluctantly for his mother's room. As he passed Gertrude, the woman touched him gently stroking his tousled, brown hair in an unexpected caress. The father had already stood and as he exited the room he met the little boy. Garrow's lean face was pale. Inside his intense eyes two pools of tears were hidden with elaborately care, tears that always would be there, but they would never break out.
"Eragon…" Mother-Marian's voice was cut short by a violent burst of coughing. For many days she had suffered from the nagging cough, and now she pressed her handkerchief on her lips trying to stop it. Then, she dabbed her mouth with the linen and looked at the boy. "Come closer, my child."
The little boy sat by her side taking the seat his father had previously occupied. His mother's long, brunette hair – was it really that long? He had never noticed – spread out on the pillow, her cheeks bright red from the high fever, her eyes blurring. On her nightstand Gertrude had arranged the bundles of herbs she had carried from her hut to use them as medicines. However, despite the healer's efforts the continuous fever had insisted.
"Eragon…" mother smiled at him with a sad look in her eyes stretching her hand towards him, asking him closer. "My little boy…"
The parents in Carvahall, although deeply caring for their children, they were never pampering and cuddling them in fear they might spoil them. Sweet words were unfamiliar to the little boy, so he felt surprised by his mother's attitude.
"Soon you will be much better, my mother" he told her gaining courage with his own words. "As for our household, you should not be bothered about it. Roran and I can very well manage. We're taking good care of our father and…"
"There is something, child," the woman interjected "I wish to tell you since the secret is so weighty, and I do not see it proper to take it with me in my grave."
The mother's words upset the boy, but in his attempt to say something, he was cut short by the woman's intense gaze.
"Please, Eragon, listen to me without interrupting. There is no much vital energy left to me and my time is short. You know, my son, that I've loved you since the first moment I've accepted you in my arms. I've never seen you differently than Roran, but I've always considered you as my own child… You see, Eragon… as much as I love, I am not, son, your mother."
Once more a constant coughing interrupted the woman's talking, and in her attempt to reach for the water on her nightstand, the boy carried the glass helping her drink. What his mother had just said puzzled him greatly. She could not possibly mean that she was not his mother. Definitely not! It would be the fever talking through her mouth.
"Mother…"
"Do not call me that, my boy, although I believe I deserve this title. I've raised you like my own child. I took care of your childhood illnesses, ever during the whole night long. I've shared my time equally between you and Roran, as well as the poor supplies of my kitchen during the difficult winters of the farm. I've cared for you from the depths of my heart, and I've loved you the same way I love him. Yet, I have not given you birth." Marian gasped for breath and she fell on her pillows trying to gather her strength to go on. "I am not your mother, Eragon, but I am your aunt. Your real mother, the sister of you uncle Garrow, is called Selena. She came to our farm during one stormy night. She was pregnant and seeking shelter to deliver her child. After five months living with us, she gave birth to you. Then, she pleaded with us to keep you here, to raise you as our own. Before she left forever, she gave you your name. None has ever heard word from her; neither have we known anything about your father."
As the woman ceased speaking, the room was wrapped in deep silence. Marian peered at the boy's wet eyes. She could very well understand that it was hard for him to accept her words. However, she would never start her journey to the afterworld taking such a secret with her. If Eragon knew all about his true origin, one day he would be able to search for his mother or, maybe, his father too. When she had first come to the farm, Selena was dressed in expensive clothes embroidered lavishly with lace and pearls. Golden jewels with precious stones adorned her neck, ears, wrists and fingers. The parent of this child should be a rich man for sure. Maybe he was a very important noble of the empire. How could Marian die and abandon this world leaving such a secret untold? She told the child all she could recall emphasizing that, it was Selena who had chosen this kind of life for her son. She had insisted that, if the boy stayed with them that would be the best for his future.
Marian kissed the boy's brow giving him her blessing. She wished Eragon a good and decent life full of joyousness and healthiness. She admonished him to spread his kindness around him, inspire the others with his deeds, and gain respect and recognition form all the members of their society. She encouraged him to make his family proud by doing his duty according to the needs of time. She told him to be strong and face the difficulties that always come, supporting those in need around him. She urged him, always aim for the better and she warned him that, when a difficult situation of life has ended, great strength is needed for a new start. Eragon should never forget his origin and the love she had showered upon him during the first, the tenderest years of his life.
When Eragon exited the room tears shone in his eyes, his heart was sinking. Roran glanced at him perplexed, then he entered their mother's room saying nothing. Their father… for him 'uncle Garrow' from now on, sat by the table along with Gertrude. They whispered to each other with soft voices and Eragon could not perceive their talking.
Agitated by the revelation he went out of the house, his thoughts and emotions being like a tangled box of yarn. The boys' usual seat on the doorstep would not invite him, to wait for his brother… cousin there. All the life he had lived so far had just changed in a twist of fate. Puzzled with hundreds of questions and anxieties, he sought refuge in the loneliness of the forest. He ran crying behind the house, he passed the barn, the fields, and the fence of the farm and scurried for the desolation among the trees. His father, his mother and brother, all the family members he cherished so much, now seemed to him like distant strangers. Somewhere dwelt a mother he had never met. A father unknown… he was really the son of None… and, maybe, another brother who lived separated from him. Why had his mother left him with his uncle and aunt? Why had his parents brought him to life just to forsake him? Wasn't he good enough for them, so they had decided to renounce him? The boy sat by a root of a tree letting his tears run freely from his cheeks. He was alone… abandoned… deserted.
After long hours he had searched for him, Roran finally found Eragon in the forest. He detected him lying among the roots of the tree, his little body cold from the wetness of the soil and the chilly breeze that had followed the dusk. His tears had ceased and his cheeks had dried, but he stared with wide open eyes into a world he could not recognize. Roran engulfed Eragon with both arms in a tight embrace. He promised the younger one that he would always be his little brother. He reminded him the love they shared for their father, who, in such a difficult moment of his life, was in need of both of his children. He encouraged him saying that, nothing in their lives was about to change. The blood bond they shared was meant to last forever, and it would be the glue uniting them as long as they lived.
Eragon responded to Roran's words with a barrage of questions about his mother. Answering him Roran said he could not remember the night of the little one's birth. He was too young to remember Selena visiting their farm, or her life with them. He could not recall father Garrow ever mentioning something about a sister. After that the boys returned home holding hands, and they were snuggled together in Roran's bed for the night.
Before the break of dawn and the beginning of a new day, mother-aunt Marian died in the hands of father-uncle Garrow.