the court of king joseph the second

The king sat in his throne, the tall back casting a shadow that engulfed the old warrior and stretched across the audience chamber until it came to rest at my feet.

 

 He wore the finest silver plate into battle, but now years later his finery was an old comfortable sleeping robe, his hair was cut short and his beard trimmed close to his still strong jaw. His father was the king before and he had carved the kingdom from the wild dangerous place to the jewel of the plains that it is today. 

 I loved my king and respected his power and decisions, on my travels I heard tales of mad emperors and jealous queens that split their countries into civil war over the smallest slight or imagined betrayal. 

 King Joseph knew to ignore the people for your own sake would lead to the slow death of a kingdom and he passed those lessons on to his son, King Joseph the second.

 And so between campaigns and wine tasting the king made sure to hold a grievance court once a month where random commoners and merchants could appeal to the king directly, his verdict was final and always fair, I would find myself filled with pride, my face flushed beneath the sliver grating of my helm with my kings wise words and even handed sense of justice.

 A ragged man with gray skin asked for his horses to be returned after a pair of knights had to borrow them to continue the pursuit of an outlaw, the horses were run until death.

The great hall dwarfed the peasent as he explained in a quiet voice how the horses were needed to plow his field, carry his wheat to the market and perform other important functions. 

It always surprised me how the king would lean forward in his throne, and listen to every complaint with the same air of rapt attention.  

 "I'm sorry for what happened to your horses, they were fine mounts and allowed my men to capture and hang the outlaw before he could cause any more suffering to our great land. The fine beats died as a result of the pursuit and were eaten on the return trip."

The chamber was silent as courtiers, knights, and merchants awaited his proclamation, if he replaced the horses it would set a precedent for the treatment of the lower class by the nobility, but if he ignored it he would seem a tyrant.

"I realize that horses are a very important to the farmers of my kingdom and if they have no horses, we have no food so the horses will be replaced at the cost of kings treasury with the knights who procured your horses paying the treasury back in monthly fees.

The horses will be ready by the time you leave my castle."

 Someone to my left took a step backwards, turned and opened the door that lead to the great hall, a courier was sent with a few terse words and the gray skinned man bowed and thanked the king for his mercy.

With a laugh he sat back in his throne his wide and muscular frame stretching the white silk, his crown glinted in the morning light behind him as it radiated through the wide panorama of stained glass showing the defeat of the Troll-King at the hands of Joseph the First.

 "Mercy? My men rode your horses down and then ate them! Go now and good luck to you my good man."

He was quietly ushered out by a robed attendant and given a scroll as he squeezed himself through the crack in the huge doors.

There was only petitioner left in the audience chamber, an old woman in a leather cloak, her face obscured by tangles of gray hair, her feet were bound with rags and her hands shook at he side as the king turned his gaze to her. 

A full and musky smell drifted behind her to where I stood at attention, most petitioners smell like the unwashed peasants they are, body odor, s**t and piss, acrid and sharp on the nose.

The woman smelled of tilled earth and rotted leaves, a pile of earthworms on a wet saddle left out in the sun to dry.

"What is it old mother?" The morning was over and I could see the quiet impatience in my lieges body language, a jousting exhibition was scheduled for the afternoon and the King would need to spend most of the next few hours getting prepared for the event.

Her voice sent shivers through my balls, a dry rasp that seemed to go from whisper to shout once it reached your ears,

"King Joseph the second, the swamps of the east are burning, your people set fire to the marsh and watch the gas burn bright and blue, they want the land for farming just as your father did so many years ago. The agreement between your father and the swamp says that you shall not farm or encroach the sacred land. We gave your father the Troll King and he gave us his word."

Of course I had drawn my sword before she was finished talking, my fellows dad also reacted in a like manner and we stood behind and around her waiting for the word from our sergeant.

King Joseph sat and thought ignoring us and the woman both, his eyes glazed over and I knew he was looking for the best way to resolve the situation. This was a matter of war, unwanted colonization and a breaking of a magical treaty, but he went to the same place where he dispensed justice to the lowest and the highest of our kingdom.

For her part the crone didn't move her hands shaking and her face still covered by hair and as I looked closer brush branches and white moss, probably a witch or a witches construct made of a dead body and plant matter.

"Old Mother, I apologize for the destruction my people have caused your home, my castle is on the outside of the plains very far from your swamp, this is not a planned invasion by me but more likely a village trying to stay alive. 

A force of knights will be sent to the offending villages and we shall deal with the mater accordingly, in the meantime no harm is to come to my people. There can't be so many that your swamp needs their blood for retribution, show mercy for the sake of peace."

Through the grates of my faceplate I saw the crone step forward and hold up her hand, I moved but one of my fellows was faster. I blur of steel and a scream of pain as the crone collapsed on her self into a ball, a river of blood spreading beneath her. The hand lay ten feet from the throne an accusing finger pointing at the king, his face a steady rock in these moments of confusion and blood.

"Fetch a healer dammnit, I can't have her dying in my throne room!"

My sword raised point down I grabbed the crone by her leg and began to drag her away from the throne, a trail of bright red blood following us to the awaiting priest.

Her screams had turned to sobs and I could see her shoulders shaking as she cried, losing a hand is bad I've had it happen in battle, an axe caught my wrist against a tree and it came off like a cork out the bottle.

Pain and then a feeling of light-headiness as a bucket of blood dumps out your stump, your whole arm screams in your head and really I just screamed until the shock put me out.

A week in the healing tents and I was good as new, and we had won the battle too and pushed the goblins out of the river country.

For a random swamp crone there would be no healing tents or magic, we would keep her alive to prevent a curse but she wouldn't use that hand to point at anyone ever again.