The Silenced Tale, стр. 49

On screen, Alis seems to have calmed down enough to realize who her da is speaking to. She drops the plushie and reaches out her chubby hands to the monitor, chanting, “Gar, Gar, Gar, Gar, Gar.”

“Hello, sweet girl,” Elgar says back, waving and pulling faces at her while he considers what Forsyth has said. Alis giggles, pain momentarily forgotten.

“I think . . .” Elgar says softly, “I think it’ll take me a bit to get over the . . . I don’t know, the anxiety of it all, I guess. But . . . thank you, Forsyth. For, you know . . . just thanks.”

Forsyth nods gravely, in that way that makes it look like it should have been a courtly bow. For all Elgar knows, maybe it is, of a sort. Forsyth had often given counsel to King Carvel Tarvers. It is possible that this is a gesture left over from that.

“And now, the reason behind the permission you sought from me?”

“Ah, yeah, see, there’s the problem . . .” Elgar says, and then recounts the evening to his creation. “I’m right back where I was. How can I say yes, knowing that I might change things there?”

“Do they wish you to alter the story or the characters?” Forsyth asks, and his expression grows tight with what Elgar realizes, after a few seconds, is probably the closest thing to fear he’s ever seen on Forsyth’s face. “I . . . I wonder if changing the way the story is told in the television series will have any impact on the people I left behind. On me. Will my memories of events alter? Will I even know if they do? Will Pip one day tell me that I am misremembering something, for she will know the difference between the novel and the adaptation?”

“That’s a terrifying thought,” Elgar mumbles, dread creeping up his spine. He wants this series. He wants it so badly, but what if Forsyth’s right? What if . . . ?

“But no,” Forsyth goes on, musing. “If another Writer adapts the script, not my Writer, then surely the story as it is told in the books will remain intact. My memory, my character, my motivations and morals and preferences, my annoyances will remain the same. Adaptation cannot blemish what is originally set down on the page, correct? It cannot change it. Or me. Any more than the existing fan fiction has. I will remain as you Wrote me, and so will my world.”

“You’re sure of that?” Elgar asks.

“As sure as I can ever be, but . . .” Forsyth nods firmly, once. “Yes. I am sure.”

Relieved, Elgar squirms on his uncomfortable seat. “So they . . . they want me to write a short film.”

“Do you want to say yes?” Forsyth asks gently, earnestly. “Because you seem to be forgetting that you have the very real option to say no.”

Elgar chews on his bottom lip for a moment. “I do,” he confesses quietly. “I thought I was done with the series, but this opportunity, the ability to write Kintyre one last time, I want . . . I want to be able to say goodbye to them. Like this.”

“I see.”

“It means I get to set the tone of the series, too,” he adds, twisting the cuffs of his velvet jacket between his fingers; Juan is going to yell at him for rumpling it. “The first thing the fans will see would be by me, a sort of bridge, you know? Between what I did and what the production team will do, and I . . . that means something to me.”

Forsyth nods along, seriously considering his explanation, as Alis squirms and gets fussy again, now that neither adult is paying attention to her.

“I just . . .” Elgar adds, after a thoughtful pause of his own. “I just don’t know what’s safe to write.”

Forsyth presses his finger to his lower lip, thinking. “Please elaborate.”

“They’ll want something that introduces the characters, something that starts in media res, you know? But something cool, something . . . engaging. Something with just Kintyre and Bevel.”

Forsyth nods again, eyes narrowing, and then his whole face blossoms into a relaxed, happy smile, and he leans down to kiss his daughter’s head. She switches her litany from “Gar Gar” to “Da Da.”

“Your solution seems obvious, then,” Forsyth says, letting his fingers substitute for the frozen teddy bear as Alis gets toothy again. He winces when she bites down, but doesn’t pull away.

“And that is?”

“Write a memory. Write something that has already happened, so it changes nothing in the timeline, only expands upon an event that has already occurred.”

“And how will I pick one?” Elgar despairs. “If I make something up, how can I be sure it’s not . . . not something new? I don’t remember everything I was thinking when I wrote it all. It was decades ago.”

“You can ask me.” Forsyth’s smile grows more mischievous. “After all, as both younger sibling to the Great Hero of Hain and former Shadow Hand, I do have quite a number of stories about my brother stored up. Many of them embarrassing, if you prefer.”

And then, with glee, he starts to tell some.