***
Mérdmerén was tapping his knee with his fingers, his other hand supporting his face and his elbow resting on the arm of the throne. He watched the long line of people coming to submit their petitions.
He would never forget Nordost or the Metallic Knight. He thought of them day and night. Every minute of the day, even in his dreams, he wondered at the power there had been in his hands when he had wielded the Sword of Stern and created his link with Nordost. Riding Mégalath when he had fought Mórgomiel the first time, going in search of Nordost along the River of Time… He could not get these things out of his mind. The River of Time! What a phenomenon, by all the holiest Gods! Those memories were so strange that they sounded like the most unlikely fairy tale. But it was all true. Truth, as they say, is stranger than fiction.
What most troubled the King of Mandrake was not able to remember exactly was how he had returned to the Imperial Palace almost a month ago. Almost a month since they had defeated evil! How time flew!
It was as if someone, or something, had laid him down on his bed and he had suddenly awakened from a dream that had seemed everlasting. He would have liked to stop to analyze, savor, and create a memorial of the moment when he had wielded enormous power so that one day, he could remember again and be a hundred percent sure of what had happened. But unfortunately, everything had happened too fast and there had been no chance for him to stop and reminisce.
When he woke, the palace and Háztatlon were in a state of celebration. The few soldiers who had stayed there, including the king’s court, were cheering for what the people were claiming as the most important victory of all time. They were right. If this war on a cosmic scale had been lost, they would all be dead.
It was Macadamio, the king’s butler, who had explained to him that on the morning of his arrival, a messenger bird had brought a note explaining that the shadow had been defeated and the war had ended. If a bird had come that same morning, Mérdmerén had decided, then he must have come back to the palace the day they had won. The problem was that he couldn’t remember anything.
Mérdmerén asked Macadamio how he had got to his room. The butler had not known how to answer, and for a moment, he wondered whether the king had lost his sanity. As far as he could remember, the king had arrived on foot and after giving the order not to be disturbed until he woke up, he had withdrawn to his bedroom for several hours until he was fully awake. When he asked how he had been dressed when he came back, Macadamio said that nobody remembered, but he had appeared to be in his black armor of tanned leather. This meant that he had lost the Metallic Knight’s armor.
Before waking in the palace after the catastrophic war, he had dreamed about a sky-blue presence that had occupied his soul. Had it been a dream or reality? He could not make out whether or not it had been a dream. When he remembered details, it seemed like a dream because of its strangeness, as if he had experienced it in the third person. But it had felt so real…
Whenever he remembered that blue presence, he felt as if he had died and been reborn in the same instant as if that light had been a purifying one.
Before he woke up in the palace, the last thing he remembered was having torn Mórgomiel to pieces. It gave him enormous pleasure to relive that memory over and over again. When he closed his eyes, he saw himself astride Nordost’s back, flying above the clouds and fighting the war. At the same time, he also remembered being brought down and defeated by the shadow. Those tentacles had been horrible and how strong they had been! They had tugged at the Dragon of Metal Scales until he had been consumed! It was when the shadow had devoured him whole that the blue presence had appeared and taken control of his existence.
When that light appeared, he had heard a voice. It told him that he had fought with courage, that he had accomplished his task, and for that reason, he was going to return alive to continue leading the Empire that he had helped to build so shrewdly.
One thing was true: he had lost the Dagger of Stern forever. He did not even look for it. He knew that something or someone had taken it from him after he had used it during the War of the Gods. He did not need it anymore, but how much he missed it! The dagger linked him to a part of his life he missed, the time when he had visited Nabas and felt free and comfortable. Maybe he should go back to Nabas, now that Armageddon was over. Would he ever see Nordost again? Seeing two dragons, talking with them, and riding them had changed his perspective on life. People’s mundane problems sounded ridiculous in comparison with the great battle that had been fought to defeat evil.
“My neighbor poisoned my dogs,” the peasant in front of him repeated. “And without them, I’m nothing, my lord. The dogs help me keep order in my herd.”
The peasant wore a simple cotton tunic. Not even four weeks had passed since the defeat of the shadow, the most important defeat of terror of all times, and the people were already trying to petition him over stupid things.
Did they not know that the Empire, the world, had just avoided utter destruction? He sometimes felt jealous of simple people. There were moments when he would have given everything to be a peasant concerned about cattle and crops, knowing nothing about war and politics. But then he realized that if he were a peasant, he would give everything he had to be the king of the most powerful empire in the world. So he brushed aside his thoughts and decided to answer his subject’s petition.
“Two dogs and a hen for your woes,” the king said in utter boredom. “Anything else I can do for you?”
The peasant’s eyes shone with emotion. “That would be all, my King. Thank you, oh thank you!” He fell to his knees and touched the floor with his forehead.
Mérdmerén turned to glance at Gáramond. “Let it be written in the books that the peasant Noreldo Valgus of Aldebarán has had his petition addressed. The fact may be documented.” The historian, Valdur Hervix, was busy documenting the monumental war which had taken place on the Fields of Flora.
The philosopher was now his right hand and until they could find a trustworthy scribe, he would be in charge of all the tasks of documentation, planning, and consulting. Gáramond was sour-faced all the time now since nothing annoyed him more than being treated as a common subject. He was a translator of sciences and the languages of the Empire! He had no time to waste on trifles.
I should have stayed in Maggrath with Jochopepa, the philosopher mused. But the king had desired his presence, and he could not ignore his command unless he wished to be flogged in public.
“The requests are over for today!” shouted the soldier in attendance at this morning’s session. “Lines will form again when the doors open for the public!” A hundred or so peasants, villagers, citizens, and other subjects of the king who had arrived to present their petitions sighed in despair. Most of them had been there for hours without the line making much progress. The soldiers began to lead them outside, most of them expressing their discontent in the form of disapproving noises.
“My King,” the butler said. “It is time to prepare for the event. The leaders of other nations are in their rooms and the foreign armies are already camped outside the city.”
A month had gone by since they had defeated evil. It had been enough for all the cultures to gather in Háztatlon for the funeral ceremonies. The preparations for the event had been weeks in the making. For a change, it had been the Baron’s idea to mount a huge and magnificent event to grant closure to the foreigners. The Baron himself had offered all his resources to carry out all the preparations that a celebration on this scale would involve. With his help, and that of his contacts, Mérdmerén was sure that the celebration would be a success, and the funeral would give closure to those who needed it most.
“We need to unite the people from other worlds with the Mandrake Empire and make them feel welcome in the Meridian,” the Baron had said. “There’s no mage capable of opening portals as Balthazar did and I’m afraid that so far there’s no way of procuring safe-conducts so that the foreigners can return to their worlds of origi
n.”
“And Kanumorsus? And Elgahar?” Mérdmerén had asked. “There must be more than one of those portals that open into one of those worlds, surely?”
“I’m afraid that the only ones who might be able to guess how to navigate Kanumorsus and its endless complexity are the Naevas Aedán. After speaking with them, it seems that only Teitú knows how to do it now. Elgahar, as you know, is a prolific mage, but he lacks Balthazar’s ability to travel between worlds. I’m afraid that even though he may have learned how to open portals, he would only be able to do so when a destination had previously been selected.”
“How did Teitú know that? And how did you manage to speak with the seraphs?”
“I have my contacts. And yes, Teitú assured us that since he separated from the God of Light, he’s lost the ability to navigate those routes. Apparently, his union with Alac had increased his ability to navigate, but without him, it’s not possible. What’s more, to reach the portals, you need to be able to enter the Interim, the dimension of ghosts. Although Teitú, Nidra, and Tenchi could manage it, none of them seem ready to take anybody to the place of spirits.”
“It seems fair to me,” Mérdmerén had replied before the meeting with the Baron had ended. He had been meeting with him almost daily since he had woken. Neither of them could believe that the war had been won, and there was so much to plan, so much to carry out. Mérdmerén’s job had been difficult enough when he had had to destabilize the Mandrake Empire to take it over. Now it was ten times worse because he needed to create peace, union, and hope between the cultures, governments, and nations.
“And the boy?” the Baron had asked.
“Manchego the Shepherd,” Mérdmerén had replied, savoring the name. “He hasn’t been found. They say he’s gone back to the South. I’m surprised that even you don’t know about him.”
“That’s not true,” the Baron had said from the shadows. “We know where he is physically. His whereabouts are no problem. I just wondered why he had no desire to appear at the funeral and be given his award for bravery. That lad, more than anybody else, deserves all the medals there are and ever will be.”
“Something tells me he’s not interested in all that,” Mérdmerén had said. “I believe he’s found what he needs.”
“I believe you’re right,” the Baron had said.
That meeting, like so many others, ended suddenly with Mérdmerén blinded by a hood and taken back to his room to go on with the business of government. There would be plenty more meetings to carry on with the work of orchestrating and organizing the most important event since the defeat of Mórgomiel.
Mérdmerén came back to reality after recalling the details of one of his meetings with the Baron. “Have all their needs and requests been attended to? And have they been fed?”
Petitions, he thought as he came down from the throne. Everybody has their petitions. And when you’re the king of the most important nation in the world, you have to learn to listen to everybody’s petitions. What torture! But that’s how it must be. When you ignore some people’s requests, the unhappy ones tend to accumulate pretty quickly, then they create a storm of demands.
It’s not even a month since the defeat of Mórgomiel and you’re already starting to want to go off on some adventure, he thought to himself. But it was true. His feet itched to go and get into another fine mess, visit some foreign land, or ride a dragon to travel the River of Time and visit Tempus Frontus to say hello to Nordost, if he was alive. That’s the trouble with having had such a rich set of adventures. Now, any more of them would be a pale shadow compared to what you saw during the Times of Chaos. Where’s Ságamas? That bearded rascal is always involved in some adventure I can join in.
“Yes, my liege,” Gáramond replied. “Every culture has been served according to its wishes.” The philosopher seemed to be aging as the seconds passed. The reality was that after the Battle of Háztatlon, he had not fully recovered. He had been limping ever since, and now his exhaustion was more obvious than ever. Despite this, his eyes shone brightly.
“We need to make them feel comfortable. These people came from other worlds to give us the support that helped us win. Without them, we’d be nothing.” Mérdmerén glared at Macadamio. In general, the butler was opposed to major spending. Looking after the needs of the people of another world meant an enormous amount of money and human effort.
“I’m aware of that, my liege,” the butler said.
“The truth of the matter is that you don’t understand,” Mérdmerén said. His hands were clenched like claws as if he wanted to get inside the butler’s head to make him understand. “You don’t know how they died for the cause, you’ve no idea what sacrifices they made. Without them, you wouldn’t be here, Macadamio. Do you understand that?”
“That… I hadn’t considered, my liege. Thank you for making me see the importance of the presence of all those people from other worlds.”
“They scare you, don’t they?” the king added. “That’s why you’re not convinced that we have to treat them with all the respect we can manage.”
Macadamio turned red, and he looked down. “It’s true, my liege. I can’t get used to the horse-men, goat-horses, or those horrible insects. Least of all the enormous crystals that seem to shine when they speak. And what do you say about the winged horse that seems to be more intelligent than all the others? And the bastard flies!”
Mérdmerén cleared his throat at the sound of the butler letting his tongue run away with him. “When you’re drunk at the bar in your own time, you can say and do whatever you please. When you’re working at the palace, I require you to speak with respect.”
“Yes, my liege. I apologize for giving way to my emotions.”
“I noticed that you didn’t mention the elves.”
“My liege?”
“I said you didn’t say anything against the elves. The cultures of other worlds scare you, except the elves. Have you been flirting with the elf-women? You like the look of them, I know. You’re a rascal, Macadamio.”
“My liege! I’m a married man!” the butler cried in horror.
“There’s no denying that those elf-women are gorgeous. Come on, Macadamio, don’t deny it.”
“It’s true,” the butler said heavily. “They are very attractive women.”
“Thanks for putting up with my malicious sense of humor, Macadamio. And my daughter? Is she already on her way?”
“Yes, my liege. She’s already here. Ajedrea is making herself comfortable in her chamber.”
“Perfect. Send the best midwives to examine her body. My grandson is inside it, Macadamio. The least I expect of you is that you treat the little prince with all due respect.” Mérdmerén stood up and went back to his room.
“As you say, my liege,” Macadamio said. He was relieved that the sovereign was leaving and no longer playing with him. The king was unpredictable; sometimes his jokes were serious comments and sometimes his serious comments were jokes. He did not like this habit of the king’s at all, but all he could do was learn to let his sovereign’s comments slide off him.
“May I withdraw?” Gáramond asked when he saw the king leaving.
“When you’ve finished documenting all the petitions, of course,” Mérdmerén said with a smile. The philosopher simmered with rage and got down to work. “Besides, Gáramond, today is the funeral, another event which will need to be registered. The scribes are going to have their hands more than full with documenting all today’s business. Don’t you worry, philosopher. I know you’re longing to go back to Maggrath and continue your work in linguistics and the translation of Elgahar’s essays. But before you do, you’ll need to leave a well-trained substitute here at the palace to be my right hand.”
Gáramond half-closed his eyes. “Thank you, my liege. Poor wretch, he doesn’t know what’s coming to him,” he added to himself.
“Did you say something?”
“I said that the next philosopher and counselor who becomes y
our right hand will be very happy and will carry out his work with passion. Thank you, my liege.”
What Gáramond wanted most was to speak to those horse-men and the giant he-goats. It was said that the centaurs did not speak the common tongue, which presented him with an opportunity to learn a new language and then in turn to teach them Mandrakian. There was so much to talk about!
Gáramond savored the moment when he could sit down to smoke his pipe and talk for days on end with these people from other worlds. Soon!
Chapter LXVI — Funeral Rites
After the Battle of Háztatlon more than a year earlier, the area around the imperial city had been destroyed by the trampling of thousands of evil soldiers. Earth, grass, trees, and bushes had been reduced to a muddy confusion. After months, nature had recovered.
The earth of the Fields of Flora had been nourished by so many corpses, and something similar was happening around Háztatlon after the shedding of so much blood and viscera. It was hard to accept that the bodies of the fallen, whether evil or not, were the best fertilizer, and after the war, a beautiful expanse of grass had grown on the flattened area. It could have been said that around Háztatlon, the second version of the Fields of Flora was now radiant, although nobody did so because there was only one place with that name, and it held great historical significance.
The preparations for the funeral rites had begun a day after the celebrations that followed victory. The Baron, surprised and grateful at still being alive, set to work and had put in motion what he knew would be a huge event to appease the souls who were suffering after the loss of so many. He was grateful to have been the Baron during these times of enormous changes and made no delay in setting in motion the mechanisms which would grant peace to a world in ruins.
Necromancer’s Sorrow: (Series Finale) Page 66
