"Jason, what do you think of the last winter, as the natives practice it?"
"I don't, usually. You've always said it was barbaric."
"I've changed my mind."
"How so?" Jason perched on the edge of the table, one keg on the floor, the other swinging gently. After two entire days of near silence, this was how Da brought up the subject on both (all) their minds?
"It allows death with dignity."
"To be abandoned by your people and left to starve is dignified?"
"To walk away from your loved ones to save them from the pain of your descent."
"Always figured you'd be going up not down."
"Ah, but that is after leaving the body behind. Tis the body that descends."
"True," Jason agreed, thinking of the grave he had been working on since before the ground got too solid. There would be no delay in that descent when the time came. Better to get it over with when it had to be done. Keeping the dirt from running off as mud had been the biggest problem, before the hard freezes started.
"I see that you have considered this detail," Da said.
Jason shrugged. "Best to do it once and have it done."
"I wish you had told me. I'd not have made arrangements for the winter."
"If you had told me what you were doing, I would have told you that you didn't need to."
Da nodded. "Fair. Tis not an easy thing to address, father to son or son to father."
Jason watched the toe of his boot swing out of and back into his line of sight five times. "So why are we addressing it right now?"
"Because I want you to do something you will not want to, and I'd like to have the argument over with."
"Good god, what do you want me to do?"
"Take the boys back to the mountain and stay there with them until someone sends for you."
"Abandon you? When you need us?" Jason kept his tone calm. It was a miracle.
"Yes."
"Why?"
"Tis hard to put in words. Tis prideful, and pride is a great sin to be embracing as one goes."
"You worry too much about sin."
"Tis a national failing. Or strength, mayhap."
"Perhaps."
Da nodded. "Tis as well you boys were brought up in a kinder country where your sins are your survival."
"I wouldn't go that far. Tell me about your pride and why it troubles you."
"If I were to pass on, on this day, how would you – all three of you, remember me?"
"Probably sitting in your chair wishing us a good day. Looking like you'll be counting the minutes until we come back."
"Not lying in a bed, half aware, possibly drooling because I canna keep my mouth closed, possibly smelling bad because of other things not keeping closed?"
"Uh." Jason stood up and moved around.
"Is that how you would want to remember me? Would you like that to be the last look your brothers could have of you?"
"Uh," he said again, and ran his hands through his hair. "I never thought of it that way."
"I think of it every time I need your help to stand up and walk outside, or have to ask the others to help me dress. And as you know, that happens more and more."
"I never paid attention." That was a lie, but really, Da shouldn't be worrying about this stuff. He should just be – waiting? Dying was the word, Jason thought. Dying.
"Do ye understand now, m'boy?"
"I'm getting there." It was a large thought to wrap a mind and a heart around, let alone three. "Doesn't seem fair to the boys."
"There is nothing fair in any of this." Da's tone was rueful, just a tang of bitterness showing.
Jason couldn't argue with that.
"So. Will ye do it?"
"I'll take the boys away and keep them there, if they agree."
"You'll not just tell them? I will, if I be a bad goodbye."
Jason poked at the fire in the fireplace before answering. "No, I'll not be telling them to do this. But I can talk them into it, given enough time."
"I dinna know that there will be time."
"But you don't know there won't be."
"And what of you?"
"I'm not – I'm not going to avoid this, Da. If you want me to go, I'll go until you're too bad off to argue with me about it. After that I'll check on you every day, maybe more often, as the time draws near. If you don't want me taking care of you, that's fine. But you'll not be left behind. Alone."
"I'd not be alone if there was someone there tending me."
Jason glanced at his father and back into the fire. He didn't know what to say. Hell, he didn't know what to feel, or to think. He shook his head.
Da sat back. "Ye'll need time to think it out, and what you'll say to the boys. I'd rather you just do than say, but that's not your way, and tis you who will have to deal with any problems."
"Yes, I need time to think."
Both men raised their heads as shouts and wild bell clanging filled the air.
"That's the school bell." Jason grabbed his coat and ran out the door.
"Aye."