Taran stays awake the rest of the night in silent thought, and whenever Taran spends a night in silent thought, I know he’s going to make a decision I’m not happy with. In the morning, everyone is preparing for the journey to the Summer Country, except Doli and Kaw, who are there to say goodbye to the others before departing for the realm of the Fair Folk. Taran looks at everyone assembled and announces that he’s made a decision: instead of marrying Eilonwy and living forever, he will stay in Prydain. He has work to do, he says; in addition to tending Coll’s garden and finishing Rhun’s seawall, he owes a debt to Annlaw, Llonio and the other Commot folk to try to restore the Red Fallows and rebuild Caer Dathyl. You see, he’s learned what it means to be a true hero: “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 than for himself alone.” He’s finally given up his dreams of nobility and is content to be an Assistant Pig-Keeper. Our boy’s all growsed up, y’all.

But Dallben says Taran is no longer Assistant Pig-Keeper. I guess with Coll dead, he’s Head Pig-Keeper now, right? Except if Hen Wen’s going to the Summer Country, who will he tend? Is she leaving her piglets behind? We don’t find out, because Dallben has a bigger promotion in mind for Taran: High King of Prydain. That’s right, you guys—he proved his worth by drawing Dyrnwyn and his decision to stay in Prydain confirmed that the prophecy in The Book of Three was meant for him. Dallben says that he never knew who Taran’s parents were: he was a foundling, wrapped and hidden in the trees by his parents, who were slain in battle. Dallben, who had been looking for the future king for many years, had hoped but not known for sure if Taran was the one: “Until now, my boy… you were always a great ‘perhaps.’”

Everyone says goodbye, and Taran gets some lovely parting gifts: a crystal from Glew, Doli’s axe, Fflewddur’s unbroken harp string. Gurgi says miserably that he has no gift to give—his wallet of lembas and jerky stopped working when magic left the realm—but then remembers that he picked up a little something in Annuvin. It’s a metal box containing parchments on which are written “the secrets of forging and tempering metals, of shaping and firing pottery, of planting and cultivating.” These secrets are even more valuable, Gwydion says preachily, than the magic tools “that labored of themselves and would have given carefree idleness.” It’s a good thing those were destroyed, then! Douche. Aww, this is the last time I get to call Gwydion a douche, guys! He wasn’t that bad, all in all. Though, in lieu of a gift, he does offer Taran a little lecture about how his hard work is just beginning: “so long as men still hate and slay each other, when greed and anger goad them,” there will still be evil in the world.

Dallben’s parting gift for Taran is The Book of Three. No longer magic, it now serves as a history of Prydain. Dallben fills in the last page right then and there: “And thus did an Assistant Pig-Keeper become High King of Prydain.” Heartbroken Eilonwy offers Taran her bauble to remember her by, but then loses her chill entirely and stamps her foot, saying she doesn’t see why she has to leave just because she has stupid magical powers. She’d much rather give them up and stay with Taran. Oh, honey.

Dallben says if she really means it, all she has to do is wish on the ring that Gwydion gave her. So that ring is even more lame of a gift than I initially thought! Does she want to take a night and sleep on it before making such a huge decision? No? All righty then. Right away, she turns the ring, and wishes for her powers to vanish. She gives “a sharp cry of pain,” and then says she doesn’t feel a bit different—are her powers truly gone? They are, says Dallben, “yet you shall always keep the magic and mystery all women share” (ugh) and “Taran, like all men, shall be often baffled by it.” And with that, he commands them to clasp hands and pledge their troth—and boom, they’re married!

Bidding Taran a final farewell, Dallben says he’s sure Hen Wen will decide to stay with Taran (and with her piglets, I presume). Outside the cottage, the surviving tertiary characters—Hevydd, Llassar, King Smoit, Aeddan, Goryon and Gast—are waiting to hail their new King and Queen. “And so they lived many happy years, and the promised tasks were accomplished.” And that’s the end of the book… and the series! We did it!