It was an odd sized casket, too small for a man, too big for a child. A flag was draped over it, a smallish one. It was carried by four men in uniform, though it was hard to tell for sure from a distance what uniform it was, or even if they were all men. There wasn't room for the usual six pallbearers due to the small size of the casket since it would have made for a comical service to have all six jammed together, shoulder-to-shoulder, crowding around an under-sized coffin. So the extra pallbearers were in the ranks of many others in uniform standing beside a small open grave. The officiant wore a robe instead of a uniform and must have said something because there was a long silence, then a burst of laughter.
Bastards. They couldn’t even pretend to hold a proper funeral for me. If I had to guess, I’d say the officiant, a religious weasel of a man named High Father Ashton, recited the usual burial rites from the Book of Royals; but, when he got to the part of my spirit deserving a place spirits in heaven, everyone, even the men carrying that empty coffin, just lost it. All priests needed to say these words during an event like this. They also needed to act respectfully while doing so, but Ashton turned out to be as horrid a priest as he is a man.
I barely heard what they said before in hushed “reverent” tones, but I could plainly hear them now, riotously howling at my demise. Like a wild pack of sick hyenas you’d find in the far continent, laughing themselves to death. This pack contained seven men total, neatly arranged and standing straight and narrow for the performance. Three stood at the tombstone and four a few paces in front of it. The four Royal Soldiers were the ones carrying the coffin, of course. Strong men, but not bright ones despite the metallic shine of their helmets, swords and belts. Their military decorations all adorned in silver with intricate markings to denote their prestigious ranks. High Father Ashton placed himself behind my tombstone. His pretentious white robes blew in the wind as he raised his thin, rickety arms, trying to regain his composure and continue the ritual. At the left of Ashton was his toady Ascendant Morgan, a spoiled fat cat sweaty from tears of laughter, and at his right was the toady’s toady Gregory. Out of everyone there, it was the meek Gregory who kept his laughter to just a slight chuckle, not out of respect but out of his pathetic inability to offend his masters. Without them around, he’d be laughing the loudest, and they would find him incredibly annoying.
I watch them with an older pair of binoculars, hiding in a tall, heavily foliaged tree. This tree was one of hundreds on the forest’s edge. That puts me about a few yards away from the Royal Graveyard, where all burials are held. The tree line easily rose above the gray stone walls, allowing for a clear line of sight. I couldn’t help but chuckle, seeing them break character, if only for a moment or two. Them cracking under these pretensions was a foreseeable outcome since it involved the men that mediated my assassination. Honoring me in my final moments before my arrival at the great hereafter? Honoring a boy that they despised with their entire beings? Clearly as ridiculous to them as it is to me. Honoring tradition and honoring the dead after a murder and a dishonorable seizure of power. The great two-faced absurdity of a coup d’état.
Unfortunately for them, I survived, but just barely. They tried to poison me, and by “they” I really meant High Father Ashton. He had it out for me since I inherited the throne eight months ago. He spent decades in the kingdom’s service and believed in ideals opposite of my own. Since he decided to poison a young man of royalty, one could easily surmise how dark and cutthroat these ideals were. He considered my father, the previous king, the greatest mind and leader of his time. By comparison, it became destiny for me to become an inadequate replacement, and someone who just had to go. The poison was cooked into my afternoon soup, chicken broth with carrots. The venomous concoction took its toll, so then Ashton tasked one of the lunkhead soldiers with stuffing my fresh corpse and some jagged rocks into a burlap sack. That same lunkhead soldier then threw the sack, with my limp body inside, into the moat, which fed into a great and perilous river. By all rights, the High Father’s assassination plot should have worked, but the priest, or one of his lackeys, made one fatal flaw.
He gave me paralysis poison instead of death poison. It turned out a quick dousing in ice-cold water made an effective cure for that particular malady. Desperate, I began to squirm my ways upwards. The river’s current violently drug me along. After getting swept twenty miles downstream, I managed to loosen the sack’s knot, quite lazily made come to think of it, and launched myself into the freezing stream, properly escaping from death. I crawled my way onto the riverbank, gasping for air. The poison and chill waters sapped whatever strength I could muster. Miles away from my castle home, I laid there in the mud, unable to reach shelter or even cover myself. Desperate prayers for survival escaped in my shuttered ramblings.
A traveling farmer and his mule soon answered them. The oafish farmer had no idea who I was, thankfully, but that didn’t stop him from offering his hand to pull me back up. Having revealed himself as the kind sort of man, that farmer took me, a stranger, into his home and nourished me back to health. Once I halfway restored my wits and vigor, I relished the chance to take back my throne and rub this particular failure into the face of the High Father and his toadies. However, practicing my own common sense, I recognized the foolishness to approach any priest or soldier now. They are the ones who wanted me dead, and they got what they wanted. They expressly announced their mutiny and discordance against anyone who was of royal blood, and I was the last Royal still alive. So, things will fare better for me if they continue to believe I was dead. More time was needed to properly come up with a strategy though. With the farmer’s express permission, I maintained room and board and began my physical and mental training, exercising in the fields and working whatever mills that needed extra hands. I needed to sharpen my entire being for the tasks ahead, and all the while I kept up with the news and gossip coming from the castle. Months after I returned to full strength, I discovered Ashton had gained command of the entire military, putting himself at the top of the command chain. With the might of the Royal army, he pointed it at any subversive or neighboring kingdom that dared raise a complaint. No one on the continent wanted to give him an excuse to use it.
A few more minutes pass. A migratory flock of birds made their flight across the horizon by the time the laughter subsided. Ashton coughed out orders to cease the revelry. He commanded the rest to fall silent or face a prompt execution. The soldiers, their expressions reset in stone, went upright again, raising that empty wooden coffin and ragged kingdom flag back into the air. The priests, once again, clasped their hands in insincere prayer. Ashton brought a large, leather-bound book back up to his beady eyes and turned a few pages. The Book of Royals. Returning to the burial rites, he skipped over the book’s section about my soul, as well as the accompanying gospel. Next he began to recite my name with all its royal signifiers. My name, as I realized when I first learned it during childhood, was much too long to properly memorize or write down, even for a recon report. So, I tuned out the priest’s words. It’s not a name much worth listening to anyway, considering I don’t use it anymore.
Unmoved from my position, I keep my watch from afar. I analyze how the participants moved on with this sham of a private ceremony. By traditional kingdom law, they are required to do upon the death and burial of a royal, but anyone watching with any sense or honor would have recognized the ignoble heartlessness that defined the proceedings. As nice as it was to see the priests and those soldiers in their hysterics, finally appearing more like humans than cruel and stoic fascists, I couldn’t help but feel a twinge of pain in my heart when they began the sham anew. It’s still my death they were laughing about. Hell, they are practically celebrating it, putting the memory of the last Royal to an eternal, undistinguished rest. They tried to kill a young king, and they almost got away with it.
Memories of childhood arose from the forgotten dark corners of my mind. Watching the drills and sparring matches between the Royal Soldiers. Attending the speeches of the High Father and his Ascendants. Foundational experiences during my youth, where I learned the value of strength in the service of others. The bedrock from which I developed the ideals of responsibility and benevolence for my destined time on the throne. I cherished the memories and those noble images from back then, before bitterness came to define my being. It hurt to imagine how such institutions, built over generations, started going so wrong. Quickly, I shake off that small pain and suppress those warm memories. With a slap across the face, I remind myself why I’m here, stuck in a tree and investigating those bastards. This was a recon mission for someone else. A task in service of my new goal and my new job. It’s a favor building toward partnership with my boss, a black-haired and broad-shouldered woman named Phillipa. This was not my personal vacation watching the stupidity of my would-be killers. It was pure luck that I managed to get this mission without scrutiny as Phillipa was another farmhand with no idea who I am or was. If she knew my origin, it was guaranteed that she’d pull her sword and kill me on the spot.
See, royalty was not just unpopular within Ashton’s Church. It was vehemently despised outside the palace gates throughout the farmlands and townships, for pretty clear reasons too. The king before me, my father, and the king before him, my grandfather, prided themselves as men of law and order. That meant increasing military power and spreading their political influence further across the continent. The two men even threatened to invade the territories of neighboring kingdoms if they failed to make certain agreements. My predecessors were popular in their day as everyone from the rich to the poor felt the intoxicating fervor of flag-waving. However, in a more enlightened age, they started to rightfully be viewed as warmongers, endangering the safety of the populace with the consolidation of force and the fragility of monarchical authority. Obviously, Ashton’s new control of it all would prove those views right, but before his coup, I recognized the changing winds of public opinion and sought to divest that familial legacy during my reign. A changing of the guard and the surrender of arms. Peace treaties and the distribution of wealth. Those were my first goals as king once my father had his accident and the throne got hastily passed down to me. It was those goals that drove the church and army to kill me before I gained too much trust and support from the public. Their plot occurred within the first two months of my rule. Most tragically, those traitors deposed me before I could even make a good impression upon the people with a great speech or public appearance.
Lost and alone within a citizenry of around two million irritable but passionate souls made it perilous to venture out without protection. They still viewed me as the same kind of man my father and grandfather were, which would result in a grisly death if they ever discovered my identity. Still, I had to find my back into power somehow. That is where Phillipa and her revolutionaries came in. Once I met their agents at a backwater pub in a game of cards, my plan began to form. Phillipa Finch recognized the changing winds too, but instead sought to stoke fires of anger and rebellion within the people in order to overthrow the royal family and install a democratic government. A very admirable goal, but one that would lead to a preponderance of violence, beginning with dead citizens in the streets and ending with the rich and well-off under a guillotine. From childhood, I had the privilege of learning about war secondhand while practicing the tenants of peace and prosperity. Phillipa, being born a peasant, only learned war from my father and his soldiers. She told me it was the harshest of lessons. Phillipa lost everything due to my father’s actions, from her livelihood to even one of her eyes. The impassioned speeches she would give in protest against that injustice would gather people from all lands and trades. Those speeches turned into calls for action, which then grew into an underground rebellion army called the Rising Tide. I found the name odd, considering we are a landlocked kingdom, but it turned out the semantics didn’t matter once you became a believer and went to the gatherings. In caves and sewer tunnels, Phillipa held meetings of strategy and indulged her soldiers with fantasies of gore when they got their hands around the throats of the royalty and churchmen.
It was an army, but not a particularly organized or well thought-out one. That disorganization is part of my plan and the primary reason I now work for someone who wants to kill me as much as my religious rivals in the court did. While they did not know my secret, we shared a common enemy. High Father Ashton and his Ascendants, along with the military might of the kingdom, will be our primary antagonists in the coming conflict. The people needed to be united and properly prepared if they even hoped to have a chance against him. This recon mission will be the first step towards that. Afterwards, I’ll report that the church just buried the last royal, omitting the unprofessional behavior of the participants and the fact that the whole burial was a sham. Without a commanding royal to worry about, Phillipa will begin the rebellion in earnest, falsely believing the army to be in disarray. She’ll immediately be met with Ashton’s strategic prowess, stopping the Rising Tide in its tracks and weakening its morale. However, she will encounter a savior. A random agent. A fresh, strangely clean face. This man will just so happen to say the right things to keep her spirits high and renew her assault against the enemy. He will also happen to know the strategies and weaknesses of the castle and its inhabitants, eventually becoming the ace that will lead them down the long, hard-bitten road to victory.
Phillipa will remember this agent from a previous recon mission, before the insurrection started. She heard that he had connections to a royal gravedigger, an elderly man tasked with digging all the graves of deceased royals. That responsibility also meant spending his entire life in the graveyard, with only intricately carved tombstones to keep him company, never leaving and never talking to anyone. Like all others in this kingdom, the royal gravedigger had great reason to hate the monarchy. So, on one fateful morning, he encountered this young agent, who recognized his struggle and wanted to free him in exchange for information. Eager to assist in the monarchy’s downfall, he promptly told the agent about a big ceremony held by High Father Ashton. Phillipa would send this same agent out for recon and he would tell her all he needed her to hear. That agent, as could be easily guessed, is me and that ceremony is my own burial, just as I knew it would be.
Besides the strategic reasons, I wanted this recon mission so I could witness the bastards spit on my memory. I slowly notated which one of them should die first. I already decided that the High Father would be the first to go, but that would run against Phillipa’s intentions in the future. Once the Tide finally won, and with my knowledge and strategy they will, she will want to make an example of the highest man on the totem pole. That would be Ashton facing the end of Phillipa’s blade, but I wanted our encounter to be more private. A final confrontation where he is completely at my mercy, dying only to know that he failed, and I won.
The solution to getting that is simple. Through my shrewd espionage, it shall be revealed that High Father Ashton’s second-in-command, Ascendant Morgan, really pulls the strings. The new figurehead of the kingdom is a mere puppet. So, the puppet master will receive the worst punishment. Everyone, except the executed of course, will be satisfied. The risk of pulling such a deceptive maneuver will be great, as I understand, but that bridge will be burned once I get to it. Despite the stress and betrayal inherent to this whole endeavor, I found that violent thoughts and duplicitous schemes came remarkably easy to me. Ever since I joined the Tide, my thoughts fluctuated from a virtuous desire to help the downtrodden towards the burning hunger for vengeance against those that wronged me. An unhealthy state of mind for sure, but one that has not gotten in the way of anything as of yet. For the foreseeable future, I just needed to keep my composure and hold my best cards to my chest, so to speak. With enough favors and patience, Phillipa will reward me with a position in her army and government, where my real work will begin.
With a great force, High Father Ashton slams the Book of Royals shut. Even I felt how hard he closed it, despite my distance. A portentous omen maybe, but more of a sign that Ashton wanted to get this done as much as I did. I appreciate his forwardness. He pointed to the soldiers who slowly put my coffin on the funeral grounds. Strapped to their backs were instruments with ivory grips, finely cut wooden handles and gold rectangular blades. The royal shovels. Everything about my family and my life had to be so damn royal. The golden blades made their first cuts into verdant grass and royal earth. The priests began a song-like prayer of gibberish. It was now time to dig my grave.
From there, the ceremony went at a snail’s crawl. Hours passed as the soldiers halfheartedly threw up dirt, the four separate piles growing taller with each successive heave. Instead of the gravedigging, I keep my line of sight directed at Ashton, Morgan and Gregory. I memorized every crack in their wrinkled faces and every industry they could control. I plotted on the exploitation of their weaknesses and the details of their executions. If there has been one valuable thing to develop while working within Rising Tide, it is the acceptance and hope for bloodlust. I found myself eager to put my new skills to practice in the coming uprising. I imagined myself plunging a blade into the hearts of the wicked. The Rising Tide celebrates me as I do so. Then I remember I’m still royalty, raised to be better than some mindless beast. The immediate shame gnaws at my mind. The lessons and virtues I’ve learned grip my heart. Memories of youth shine brighter; despite the ghostly pain they bring. I need to be better than that if I hope to bring peace.
Hours pass. Evening begins and the sun starts its descent. Now unsatisfied with my placid position, I slide down my recon tree and make my way towards the graveyard walls. I wanted to secure a closer look. Not for the mission but for me. Well-camouflaged and safe within the shade of the coming twilight, I climb over the graveyard walls into the royal burial ground. In the final moments of the ceremony, as much of a sham as it is, I needed to see my empty casket laid to rest. It was my funeral after all. Crouching behind gravestones and darting from shadow to shadow, I keep my distance and stay out of sight from any watchful gazes. The closest I can get is about a half-dozen meters away. An old mausoleum, probably a great uncle’s or a great-great grandfather’s, provides an adequate hiding place. Away from prying eyes, kneeling in one last show of deference to the kingdom I used to believe in, I watch the coffin and start to pray for my future.
The grave wasn’t ready until sunset, so the whole event was rushed and disorganized, except for the very last part. The grave was a massive affair, more of a crater than a grave, and it took until dark to roll the casket down to the bottom. If any prayers were said, they couldn’t be heard over the dull thudding of the clods raining down on the casket far below. It was an odd sized casket, too big for a man, too small for a dream, but just right for a dynasty.
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