Date: Tue, 01 Apr 2003 02:14:15 -0500
From: Bookwyrm6@yahoo.com
Subject: SongSpell: 0 Prelude

This story is a work of fiction. It contains references to violent behavior
between adults, and expressions of physical affection between consenting
adult males. If you find this type of story offensive, or if you are
underage and it is illegal for you to read it, please exit now. All
characters are fictional and in no way related to any persons living or
deceased. Any such similarity is purely coincidental.

This work is copyrighted by the author and may not be reproduced in any
form without the specific written consent of the author. It is assigned to
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the author.

Copyright 2003 Kristopher R. Gibbons  All rights reserved by the author.


0    Prelude: Playing the Game

Horatio: This bodes some strange eruption
to our state.
      Hamlet, Act 1, Scene 1, Line 69

Polgern son of Morruth, Lord Protector of the Thronelands kept a bland
smile on his face as his eye slid from a babbling fete-companion and onto
his co-ruler and enemy. Today, as always, the Lord Abduram wore black - a
habit better suited to a reckless assassin than to the co ruler of the
oldest kingdom in Kelotta. Lord Abduram embodied both. 'He might as well
scream it on the street corners.' Polgern murmured, again annoyed at the
gaucherie.

Four years had passed since young Abduram son of Lukaad first approached
then King's Counselor Polgern, and "Lord" Abduram had fleshed out in the
luxury of those fatling years. Still his black garb served him well as his
herald, a warning to the curious that four years had not gentled him. 'All
that these four years has done for me,' the son of Morruth reflected
sourly, 'is make an old man older.'

Taking the Lord Protector's distracted silence for attentiveness, Polgern's
human barnacle prattled on, and Polgern glared beyond the noisemaker, at
his personal albatross. Though Polgern stood tall by most standards,
Abduram stood yet a handspan taller. Where Abduram looked well fed, solid,
Polgern remained wraith-thin. A balding head and light gray eyes
contributed to an appearance of elegant sagacity that Polgern willfully
cultivated. Just so, Abduram emphasized his deathly pale complexion, fierce
black eyes, and aquiline nose, to evoke the sinister and
perilous. Polgern's tepid smile vanished when he followed his adversary's
statue-like, unwavering gaze to its object.

Near the main entrance of a feast-hall littered with yapping, greed-driven
courtiers playing games of status and rank, one fellow stood talking and
gesticulating with all the intensity and unselfconscious abandon of
youth. He had a dancer's lithe body, but the broad shoulders and arms of a
smith; a face as open as the skies, broad also, with a wide, scarred nose
that bespoke a brawling injury in the past. The fellow drew attention by
not clamouring for it; an ingenue among a nest of embittered spinsters. The
Lord Abduram watched this young man with tensed jaw and glittering eye, a
predator's facade Polgern knew intimately. He himself had been the only
prey ever to frustrate Abduram's ambitions. Whether the hunt involved
politics or an evening's pillowpounding, for Abduram it all devolved into
power, dominion and, inevitably, someone's death or ruin. The brute had no
levity, no restraint, nothing to balance his self-serving gravitas.

"Your pardon, Jek-kandere." Polgern interrupted his companion's spate. "I
must leave for a moment. Hold your thought until I return." After cruelly
asking the impossible, Polgern signaled one of the omnipresent Guard to
follow him, then slipped out of the fete-hall through an obscuring cluster
of courtiers and a side exit. When they had gotten to where even the mumble
of the revelers had faded, Polgern finally halted and turned to his escort.

"Your name is..."

"Kinmeln, my lord."

With a semblance of informality, Polgern rested his back against the
nearest wall and closed his eyes, the image of wearied, overburdened
authority. "Kinmeln. I desire the death of a courtier at the feast. He
stands near the front entrance, dressed in blue flannel, with tawny
hair. Remove him quietly from the...festivities and serve me in this. I
shall, of course, be grateful."

Neither man moved.

The Lord Protector turned his head and opened his eyes. "Well?"

"Lord, I will not." Kinmeln's face betrayed him, with its sudden rigidity,
its struggle to suppress any hint of fear.

"You refuse me?" Surprise belled out in the tone of his voice.

Kinmeln managed a nod.

"Am I not your lord?" Polgern's voice rose, his gray orbs glistening
ominously.

Kinmeln looked away, his face flushed. "Lord, I wear Guardian blue. Not
assassin black. Yes, I am my lord's man, upholding the regulae of the
Thronelands. I am not privileged to execute a courtier unless his fellows
have deemed him a violator of the freedoms of the Court and the liberties
of the people. And even so. I would not take away anyone's last hope on the
whim of another."

"Should Abduram and I both wish it...?"

"I must still refuse, pending a Court writ."

Kinmeln took a deep breath. "What is my lord's pleasure concerning me?"

Polgern's next words came out, deliberately, too rushed to convince. "I but
tested you. And while you are not a man such as I might like, you are such
as I need. The courtier I described...it is my intention to exile with all
haste. You will see that this is done. Involve no one else. Secure his
effects and possessions, two mounts, and ride escort with him to Alta. It
is the eastern-most province of our race and distant enough for my
comfort. Tell no one of your direction or destination. No one! You are to
ensure his safe arrival. When you return you will assume duty at the
eastern portcullis into the city. Without comment, opinion, or ado. Can you
perform this for your lord? In all conscience?" Polgern chilled his
delivery with the frost of scorn.

"Yes, lord. And if the exile should question me? How shall I speak?"

As he had one further instruction, Polgern purposefully
misunderstood. "With every courtesy, as to a member of royalty. Under no
circumstance are you to make him feel a prisoner or t'bo1; he is neither of
those things. Under no circumstance are you to treat him as anything less
than an honoured and honourable emissary to the City of Peace. Oh. You
mean, how shall you explain his flight? He shall not ask. Commence now."

The self-styled Lord Protector strode back into the fete-hall. In an errant
musing he wondered how his old liege, the late and unlamented Lord Menam,
would have broached Abduram's bloodthirsty predations. He remembered too
vividly the murdered king's unreasoning temper and insensitivity, and
decided that the justifiably dead king would have made a mess of it. He
could picture Lord Menam confronting Abduram, trying to threaten him away
from the courtier, or else warning the youth of the co-ruler's p`derastic
and mortal intentions. All in vain. After four years of power, the Lord
Abduram heeded no man. A cunning raptor, he cared little whether he caught
his prey by charm, the paralysis of fear, or a cudgel in the
dark. No. Menam had been a lost cause as a thinker, and while his greatly
mourned heir had shown promise, Polgern doubted Prince Evendal's potential
would have survived such a father. By treachery or no, both king and heir
rotted, now four years dead, on a battlefield turned swamp. Rid of and good
riddance.

"And what are you called?" Abduram enquired graciously, with a cordial
smile.

The lithe young man opened his mouth to answer, but faltered at the
talon-fierce grip on his arm. He turned to find himself the object of the
Lord Protector's benevolent regard. Suddenly awkward and gawky, he stepped
back, but remained under Polgern's grasp. The Lord Protector continued to
smile with all apparent warmth, while Lord Abduram's grin shattered.

"He is called Lemwyrdd, Master Abduram." Lemwert'h, part of the maritime
lingua franca, meant such things as 'orphan' or 'urchin'. Lemwert'h also
served as another name for a pipel - a child of simple mind and therefore
easy virtue. The young man lifted his head when Polgern spoke, but his eyes
seemed to focus nowhere. "Is this not so?"

The young man opened his mouth again, but could neither breathe nor speak
at that moment. The Lord Protector kept his gaze fixed on the youth,
ruthlessly attentive. 'Lemwyrdd' swallowed, then nodded.

"Tell me, Master Abduram. What do you think of our Lemwert'h?" The damning
breath at the end, the elision, came out as clearly deliberate. The victim
of Polgern's wit flushed.

Abduram glanced from prey to fellow-predator before he replied, as if
uncertain of the game being played. "He seems a gentle lad." he tendered,
cautious.

"Indeed, he is gentle." Polgern's imbued his tone and smile with a wealth
of knowledge and intimate certainty. Abduram nodded, and stepped back. His
face stayed placid, but his manner spoke all too clearly: A tawdry toy, if
Polgern could boast of him.

The Lord Protector watched Abduram shift his attention to a woman dressed
expensively in the gray and black of mourning, and fought to conceal his
relief and mirth. Their ever-grieving Dowager was a sacrifice looking for
an altar; incredibly dense and insufferably needy. Polgern could trust
Abduram to merely bat and jostle that woman and do nothing more, certainly
nothing mortal. Being King Menam's widow protected the wench from her own
stupidity. Also, unlike the courtier, the Dowager offered no real
challenge, no mystery, merely diversion - and the questionable status of
being seen with her.

Should he be mistaken, and Abduram choose to immolate the Dowager, Polgern
knew he could emerge unscathed by any blame and see that Abduram did not
emerge at all. This would free him from two encumbrances, one too stupid
and one too cunning. 'Even a regicide wouldn't be that accommodating.'
Polgern thought, amused with the fancy.

Abduram nodded to the flush-faced youth and the old man. "I see the Dowager
unescorted. Your pardon, gentlesirs. My duty to you, Master Polgern." He
accented his use of the word, 'Master', to acknowledge the slight that Lord
Polgern had quietly delivered him throughout their brief exchange.

As Abduram moved to go, the flustered youth touched his sleeve to detain
him. With the speed of experience, Abduram had the offending hand in an
iron grip and a once hidden dagger now gleaming at the boy's neck.

Polgern sighed. "Master Abduram." His tone and demeanor displayed all the
indulgent and unwavering patience of a parent sorely tested.

"Next time, young cub, do not be so pert!" "No, good my lord." the young
man whispered. And Abduram moved away.

Polgern let 'Lemwyrdd' stand free and breathe for a moment, a simple task
that the youth performed with fervor. "Let us get out of here." Polgern
murmured.

Light metallic eyes flashed into muddy gray ones. "I am not going anywhere
with you." The young man did not whisper his defiance.

"Hush, Limmal..."

"My name is now Lemwert'h," he snapped. "You told me as much. My duty to
you, Lord Polgern." He bowed and moved to leave, until Polgern's unyielding
grasp halted him.

"Wait for me outside." He hissed.

The tawny-haired courtier shrugged the gentled claw away and stomped out.

Wary of witnesses, the Lord Protector lingered, and noted with satisfaction
how the Lord Abduram's attentions had fixed, obsessive, on the Dowager
Onkira. 'Hungry for prestige but with none of the patience or subtlety it
demands,' Polgern confirmed to himself for the hundredth time. 'A vulgar
mind.' He hastened out of the feast-hall when he saw Jek-kandere waddling
toward him.

Polgern found the young man at the main courtyard in front of the
palace. In the courtyard's center sat an unpolished granite pedestal with
statues of Lord Abduram and Lord Polgern flanking a throne, one hand of
each figure resting possessively on the back of the royal chair. The young
man had been tossing pebbles into the seat, his targeting flawless. Before
Limmal could vent his outrage, Polgern took the offensive.

"What are you doing at a Court function?"

"I wanted to attend at least one. Yes, I know. You told me never to be seen
here. That it was too dangerous. But surely a large party is a harmless
enough occasion."

Polgern sighed, affecting simple weariness this time. "Can you not trust
me? I know my restrictions are rough on you. But nothing I deny you is done
out of whim or perversity. It all has a reason. I bar you from the palace
for good reason."

Limmal wrapped his arms tightly around his chest. "And what you said in
there. How you named me. Shaming me has a good reason?"

"Yes."

"I am not a whore's get. I am not a whore. Nor a...a..." Limmal's voice
shook with old pain, well-worn insecurity from a boy-man who never spoke of
his parents. Old pain, which, Polgern knew, no art of his could assuage. In
the war's aftermath, he had rescued Limmal from life on a dead king's
dole. He had seen to Limmal's upbringing through a chain of matronly
housekeepers and disciplined tutors whose loyalty he could guarantee. And
still Limmal suffered with a crippling delusion from his parental loss and
swift isolation. A suspicion that he had somehow caused his own
abandonment, and a fear of being abandoned again.

'Ironic,' Polgern mused. 'On the eve of exile.'

The Lord Protector stood a hand's-breath from the impassioned youth. "No,
Limmal." he whispered gently. "You are no fool. Not an oaf. Far from
it. You are Limmal son of Kaider son of Yai-lokhad. Limmal son of Gwentton
daughter of Morruth. You are anchored in wisdom and rooted in uncommon good
sense."

In the evanescent solitude of the courtyard, the son of Morruth held a
young would-be courtier in the circle of his arms and softly kissed his
temple. "I remember when I first saw you, so clearly. Kaider shared my
dismay on seeing the damage to your nose. But Gwentton... Gwentton just
smiled and said how that proved you were unique, special even from
birth. In her selflessly harsh wisdom, she left you to my care. She may
have died with our king in the cataclysm, but I know as surely as I breathe
she would feel nothing but pride to see you now. She loved you. Maybe not
as I do, but she loved you. If she could have, she would have taken you
with her to the battle of Mausna. Or have become a living citybound midwife
rather than a dead King's healer."

"I have arranged for you to leave the city for Alta with a single escort,
an honest man. Leave tonight or before dawn tomorrow."

"Must I?"

No hint of rebellion coloured the question, only a childish hope of
reconsideration; a moment's indulgence. So Polgern's avuncular grin looked
utterly sincere, if sad. "Yes. When you smiled at Lord Abduram you were
flirting with Death. We would be a danger to each other if he ever knew
what you are to me."

Limmal moved slightly away from Polgern. "Then I shall indeed go. And
quickly. Only... I will think of you, and miss you. I will worry about
you." He turned and glared at the mock throne.

"Is this worth all your effort, all the pain? Is it worth your life?"

Startled by Limmal's ferocity, and intrigued at an obvious query he had
never thought to ask, Polgern honestly considered the question.

This throne; a symbol of so much: Challenges, and constant weariness. His
sometimes private, rare, yet still delicious triumphs over boors like
Abduram. The double meanings, and double-faced courtiers and
attendants. The unexpected demands, the restricted liberties, and the
adulation. The honours and awe, along with the awesome spate of vicious
gossiping - which merely marked the justified envy from the powerless. The
strange sweetness of enforced praise. Every so often he yearned for those
simpler responsibilities he'd held before he had loosed Abduram to
assassinate Menam in battle. But such an impulse only signaled his need for
a brief respite. If he were not willing to pay the price he would not have
begun the game.

"Yes, sister's son." he replied, satisfaction mellowing his tone. "This is
worth all."

_______________________________
1 T'bo - A disenfranchised non-citizen, without the right to charity,
shelter, food, health; without the right to work, to beg, to earn any
monies or food.