A Heavy Crown

“Listen to the man with the golden voice…
For it is he who brought you into this world, golden skinned and yelling you were, I had never seen a more beautiful child. Wunderkind some called you, some said your mother had lain with a god. I tutored you, taught you the ways to fight, and the ways to lead. I remember when you first started to ride, wind flying through your hair as though you were an old hand, but, you were only a child. I remember the first time I gave you a sword… it was like watching the strokes of a master artist as he began his next great work.
Even in your studies you excelled beyond any ones wildest imagining. I taught you to charm and court your way through society, to be an ambassador of the kingdom, to love and respect life and all people. I taught you history and literature, philosophy and science, and you swallowed it all with room for more. I guided you through your adolescents, though you were quick to find yourself. I remember the time I found out you had bribed the guard of the northern tower to have a naked picnic with two princesses, one in each arm when I saw you. Did I say anything to your mother?
I was with you on your first campaign. In front of men you come into your element; leading from the front, a shining flash through the lines. The men loved you and thought of you as a Titan among them. Follow the golden spear and you will find only bodies they would say in awe. City after city fell before you, the peninsula, the northern plains, your lands grew.
Was I not with you every step of the way? Did I not teach you and raise you as my very own. In the beginning it was just covering for you from your parents whenever you went off on some adventure as a child. Later it was covering for you when you went off to pleasure yourself on your next royal conquest. Then your father died. I was with you then, I grieved like all the rest, more even than I grieved for my own wife. You changed then; you turned into a king then, turned into a conqueror.
I went with you on your first conquest its true, but it soon became clear you needed no advice, no oversight; you were as gifted with a map as you were with a sword. After our conquest in the hinterland I went back to care for home, for the capital of your new empire. That was when I gained my reputation for my voice. I rebuilt the messes you made, forged your burgeoning empire in the space you made forging your path.
I remember when you went our across the sea. We waited a year then sent an expedition after you. They came back several weeks later bearing news of an inland conquest. Another year past and we sent another expedition; they found a trail of destruction but could only go so far. Every year for six years we sent expedition’s desperate for word. We heard nothing. It was just me and your mother. I was already running the empire; I just needed your legitimacy, so when you didn’t come home I married your mother. She didn’t want to do it, but it was the only way, it would have been civil war otherwise, thousands would die. It isn’t my fault your mother died, it was an accident, and she fell off the battlements in despair one lonely night waiting for you.”

The hero stood over his broken mentor, the arbiter of his fate, even eleven years later a vision of superiority. He picked the crown off the head of the old king and placed it back where it belonged on his own golden brow. The old man at his feet cowered as the rightful King lifted his sword in judgment and silenced the man with the golden voice.

Word Count: 673