There has been an idea in my head for a while now. When it started out, it was the story of a boy and his dragon. The dragon has since moved on to become a god. The boy has recently become a girl, and the story that was is now nothing at all like it began.

Save for the Jester. The Jester was always the sage, wise, intelligent, all that sageful Obi-Wan Kenobi/ Optimus Prime stuff. But he was also possessed of a wicked sense of humor, which all good books need.

Several years ago, as I was writing my first attempt at a book (which, while managing to complete, knew that it was unsuitable for a market. Turns out it was little more than an elaborate race of futility, which, oddly enough, is Exactly how the book ended), I learned that the Jester had a brother. The brother, I learned, was a master of disguise, one who could become anyone he wanted. He was a shape changer. The only problem with that is that he's an assassin.

Today, as I started to take some notes on the two characters, I finalized the notion that the Jester is the younger son, whose purpose is to make peace. The Assassin, on the other hand, must do whatever is necessary to protect him brother, and whatever collateral damage lies in between (like, maybe the world). It's strange to think of this relationship, especially distanced from my own life.

You see, I, like the Jester, have an older brother. He was a trouble maker. Now, he has settled down a little, and become quite wise, but in many ways, it's almost like the Assassin. And the Jester, given the role of peacekeeper, almost reminds me of myself. But not really. Anyone who knows my brother and I might make the connection, but in reality, this is a work of fiction, and though, in some ways, these two may resemble my brother and I, in the long run, we're nothing alike. I'm nowhere near as amusing as Jester, and Nick is no assassin, nor am I a peacekeeper and Nick is trouble.

They say that art imitates life, but I can't help but feel that in some way, it's unfair. Good people, no matter what they do, are still good. And characters in a book - no matter how real they seem - are just that. I mean, we can separate the characters from their unwitting source material, can't we?

 

                7.

                Caelyn was reluctant to release the nipple. Fifteen moons since her birth, and gripped with a hunger Bethraia could scarce believe, the little girl was growing by leaps and bounds; far larger and quicker than any of the other thirty or so babies she had ever nursed. By now, “Little” Caelyn weighed nearly twice what the pudgling of Tinessa’s weighed at the same age. No sooner, it seemed, that she would set the babe down for a rest and turn around that Caelyn would awake with a hungry scream.

                “Enough for you, pigling,” the nurse chided the baby. “I’m sore and have another needing of my milk than your greedy lips. We’ve been at this long enough now.”

                Easing the child’s sharp infantile teeth from her breast, Bethraia kissed her forehead and set her down in the wooden manger. The child cooed “Babi,” in relative satisfaction and took up her stuffed rabbit’s paw to play with. Bethraia lingered for a long moment to enjoy her child, surprised still at how much she resembled her father. More and more every day, it seemed. The same brown eyes, the square cheeks. The nurse knew she should not waste time like this, but how could she not? Unlike the other baby in the room, this child was hers. Hers and Borros’. No matter the Princely value of her other charge, this chubby infant’s affections ruled her heart, for she filled the hole in her chest as readily as the infant emptied her breasts.

                A bell tinkled in the next room over. Kissing her thoughts to her fingers, she left them on her daughter’s crown and scurried to her mistress. “M’lady!”

                In the grey shadows of the afternoon rains, Queen Preaneis reclined in a gloomy repose. The scabby dull light gave her pallid complexion a ghastly hue. Not that the bedspread helped any. Bethraia had warned the queen that the burgundy fabric of the spread would sap the color from her cheeks, but the Queen was an obstinate girl – bless her soul. She would have no less, for red was the color of their homeland. And this maroon – so unseemly in the wan light of the rains – was a color that she had fallen for.

                When Preaneis spied the nurse, the sunken face came into new light. “Beth,” she croaked, her voice dribbling off her tongue like saliva from a babe’s. “Bring me my son.”

                I love Fantasy. I love the breadth of the genre: how Dragons can fly, how everyday people can unleash magic from their fingertips. I love the Romantic notion of chivalry, the Feudal systems, the gleaming weaponry and armor of knights upon their chargers; the oddity of creatures born from the imagination. It is a wonderful genre. But I have a problem. I hate reading most Fantasy authors.

                The Fantasy authors that captivate me most are those whose stories are just that: stories. Chaucer’s “Canterbury Tales” – while linguistically challenging – was an eye-opener. It was bawdy, deep, and fully expressive of Human nature. Each person in “Canterbury” had his or her own limitations as individuals. None were perfect, all had his or her own story to tell, and no two were alike. Two plays by William Shakespeare never seem to get old for me: “The Tempest” and “Midsummer Night’s Dream.” While both, technically, are Comedies – where everyone ends up in marriage – both are Fantasy as I know the term: populated with mystical elements of sprites, nymphs, and creatures. Far more than any of his other work, the magic in these two plays is what I hope to find in Fantasy literature.

                More often than not in the Fantasy genre, those elements are missing. I read the likes of Goodkind, Martin, Parks, the late Jordan, Eddings, and find epic tales, but the epic comes mostly from description that would make Herman Melville proud. If I wanted to read about the daily chores of a farm boy, or what every tree in the forest looked like, or what each bead on a princess’ tiara was, I would probably just look it up in an encyclopedia. So much of “High” Fantasy seems bogged down in description, and because so much attention is devoted to that description, the important parts of the story are ignored. Instead, we are given a cliché notion of “good versus evil.” Sorry, that should read “Good versus Evil.” Once, the simplicity of that notion may have been enough for readers, but those days are long gone.

                I want complexity in my characters. I demand multiple-dimensions that I can relate to. I want to see Hamlet fall into madness because of his decision to kill the king. I need to hope that this time Romeo and Juliet might actually make it out alive. I need to relieve myself from Terry Pratchett with a good bark of laughter. When I read a book, I want my emotions tweaked. Boring description does not give me that, but impressive characters, like Darth Vader, whose tragic fall and redemption entertain me again and again; that is what I look for. Recently, two Scotts have given me characters like this: R. Scott Bakker’s “Prince of Nothing” series is magic. The title character, Kellhus, is anguish, adultery, and manipulation so profound that I, a reader, could not put the trilogy down. Whereas the title character of Scott Lynch’s “Lies of Locke Lamora” follows a man who schemes for the sake of scheming. With these fictional people, both Scotts have given a picky reader like me something worth picking up.

                What happens next, you ask? What do I read while waiting for the next good story to come out? The simple answer is I have taken all the best elements of the genre: Shakespeare and Chaucer’s wordplay, the Scotts’ characters, Pratchett’s humor, Shakespeare’s theatricality, and filled a world with my beasts and creatures and Humans and magic. I have taken the everyday people of my life and populated Laonic with them. If you look closely, you just might see someone you know there. But watch out for them because in this world lurks the Assassin of Youlba, and the one you care the most about just might be his first target. But if you are brave; if you are sick of the same old tired stories that have forgotten the real magic of myth and legend, come join me in Youlba.

                See you there,

                Rob Queen

                 6.

                Between the rice balls distributed by the Queen in honor of her husband’s return from Greylock and the day’s dispersal of eggs, the people of Youlba were eating well. Custom played a large role in everyday life, whether it was the need of dairy farmers to empty their cattle’s udders at first light, or a priest of the gods to begin their days with chanted benedictions, or of a Brooker’s mid-day nap, each and every one weighed in with great import to all those who observed the customs. None were above at least some kind of ritual, for artists had the mixing of their oils, the beggars the bowing with upturned hands, the soldiers with their prayers to ward off Kibosh before battle, Kings starting the day with fresh fruit. There were even customs that transcended class or caste or race. Births were the most prolific example of the latter.

                There was a reason Cradall was always depicted with the full belly of a pregnant mother. It explained the goddess’ role with only a glance. If one were to look closer at the girth under her bared breasts, they would recognize the shape of her unborn child as that of an egg. It was for this shape that proud parents of a new child distributed hard boiled eggs to friends and family. Officially, a King was father and friend to all. That being the case, it was his responsibility to celebrate a child’s birth with the distribution of eggs to all.

                For two weeks following the birth of the kingdom’s heir, caravan after caravan would arrive in Youlba through the great gates to the north, east and west. These caravans would be loaded with chicken, pheasants, ducks, geese, and peacocks, mostly hens but with enough cocks to provide enough eggs. As a special gift to the nobility of Youlba, barges would arrive at the Wharves laden with flightless birds standing taller than horses. The still offspring of such exotic birds would prove to be as big around as a man’s head, and would be cooked into immense omelets that the land’s nobility would remark on for weeks to come.

                At the foot of Palas Hill, north of the Valley Square and across the street from the Youlba dar Elembe, stood an immense stone façade that had been split into two sections. The first bore four columns segmented into six rows, at the bottom of each panel bore three things: the name of each fortnight – from the inscrutably-named Hoar Frost descends, through the Great Heat, Rain Water, and Grain Fills; the phase of the moon that each fortnight was begun with (either full or new); and a square indentation. The second section bore only fourteen panels, one for each day within the fortnight. Set before Dating Face was a dais on which the Crier read announcements to the people of Youlba.

                “On this day!” the crier bellowed out with his voice so well-versed in projection that it could rise even above of milling and seething of the heralds and envoys that gathered amid the Valley Square for the daily news. “On this day, His Majesty the King has asked that his children be introduced to their new brother. Two days past, during the New Moon phase of Excited Insects, day 8, the gods have blessed Queen Preaneis of New Gerhein, Cadous, with a child and heir to ours, the Kingdom of Youlba, Heart to the Eight Provinces of Laonic! With great joy, I introduce to all the brother-heir, Pelpis, named in honor of Pelpis II, grandfather of His Majesty The King. Pelpis II was the late ray of Hope that returned the Province of Mesoneis back to the Kingdom following its outrageous attempt at secession.”

                “What’d he say?” Johasua asked the man to his right, a literate who hastily scrawled a stick of charcoal across a strip of parchment.

                5.            

                As the Youlba River was once measured at the Capital as being seven furlongs from the north shore to the south shore, no bridges spanned it here. In order to utilize the prodigious shoreline space surrounding the twin hills of the city, a complex organism of wood, mud-brick, and stone fought for dominance in what the locals called the Wharf District. When Youlba was first settled, a Human architect by the name of Peggotty was called in to lay out the city streets in such an organized fashion as to reduce pedestrian traffic within the city. The Valley Square, leading from the junction of the two hills to the Gate of Dorcester, was the greatest example of this consideration, as the square could easily hold the entirety of the Youlban legions in the expanse of its causeway. But where the Square was the ultimate example of horizontal breadth, the Wharf District was an example of vertical consideration. All throughout the District, residences containing up to ten families lay stacked one upon the other in the honey, flake, walnut layers of tiramisu. One after another to another, with two more wedged between the rest. Beyond these residential structures at the waterside, need and ingenuity had developed immense circular towers that jutted from the tails of the piers like jagged and inconsistent teeth. These towers ranged in height from seven stories on Wharf 5 to the eighteen-storied tower of Wharf 26.

                At the foot of the immense tower of Wharf 26, General Beygon’s men had cordoned off the primary causeway to the pier, much to the irritation of the ox-driver with a cart laden with casks of wine. “Th’freight’s to water! Lemme pass so’s I can earn my keep! Seven kids ain’t gown feed themselves. Business and dragons, man! Without th’one, I ain’t got th’other! Step them men aside! What’s moving that’s staying me so?”

                “Shut him up, or lock him up,” Beygon called out to the blue-cloak whose ineffectiveness in quelling the merchants’ interrogation was beginning to grate on him. The man’s screams were almost as annoying as the soldier spilling his last meal on the cobblestones.

                “Yes sir!” the guard returned, before drawing his sword and finally getting around to giving the driver an offer he could refuse at his own chagrin.

                “How do you make it out?” The Supreme General asked the dark-haired man kneeling before him.

                Huo Ping rocked back into a squat. Before them lay the pulp of whose clothing defined as having once been a living person. “It has no tail; it is Human. Without a doubt, it fell from the tower. Considering its arm is over there, and everything from the shoulder to lower ribs on its left side is demolished, it says much about the fall.”

                Beygon glanced over at the fragmented stalk of arm, untouched at a distance of seven paces from the corpse. The hand looked intact, though the forearm had splintered into half a dozen gooey segments. “Which is?”

                4.

                 Grand Duke Pollast dragged Locum Doln up the marble stairs to the antechamber outside the royal apartments of the Dawn Palace. A gaggle of Councilmen pecked exchanges from one hand to another, too busy in their private world of speculation and conjecture to give the Duke any consideration. The only one to welcome him was the last man Pollast hoped to see outside his cousin’s apartments. Sullus Geurin, a man as broad in shoulder as his head was thick, stomped up to him and produced the brick wall of his open hand, barring Pollast’s passage.

                “If you’re here to see to the Queen’s health,” the man grumbled, “you waste your time. They are hosting none but family and physicians.”

                “Then doubly am I blessed,” Pollast sneered at the brown-bearded second to the Supreme General of the Greater Youlban Legions. Between the two, they shared about as much love as two cocks in a betting ring. That neither had killed each other after nearly a decade of familiarity, Pollast considered a minor miracle owed entirely to the civil sanctions of his own responsibilities as the Queen’s protector. “Not only am I Captain of Her Majesty The Queen’s barristers, but I am also her cousin and heir. And this fellow,” he thrust the Locum forward by a thin arm, “just so happens to be the best Locum in all of Cadous. Now step aside so that I may see my cousin.”

                With the greatest of reluctance but far too much pride to grumble, Geurin nodded to the two guards flanking the doorway, allowing the pair through. No sooner had the two Cadouns set foot upon the cool obsidian stone of the royal suite’s den did the Queen’s nurse come bustling through the door to the hearth, her dark hair bouncing with her every step. In each hand, she carried a massive ceramic jug decorated in rich indigo patterns. Pollast admired the way the jugs’ weight flared the tight muscles of the woman’s arms.

                “Nurse!” Pollast bellowed a greeting. Startled, the woman fair shrieked, glanced at him, and rolled her eyes.

                “Oh, so help me, Cradall!” she groaned over her shoulder, her passage through the room unhindered by the greeting. “No unnecessaries allowed! Get out of here, you!”

                “That is Lord You, to you!” Pollast retorted. “Where is my curtsy?”

                “Aulis take the man,” Bethraia groaned, stopping at last for a quick flare of her knees. “Happy? Now get you gone! Din’t I tell you not to come sniffing around until you was called? How is she aught to deliver when she has to entertain those what have no purpose here?”

                “I will see Preaneis! How am I supposed to protect her if you won’t let me in to see her?”

                Irked by the man’s officious tone, the nurse screamed at the doorway she was crossing to, “Srithawa! Get out here and drive Pollast out! Slave! Get out here, girl! If my Lord remembers correctly, the last time he came here, I told him that he would not be welcome until the child is born, which he is not yet. There are more than enough people in the suite to worry about another, let alone another ignorant man!”

                “What foul language is this?” Pollast asked, snatching one of the jugs from the nurse. “I am no fool to be cursed and insulted.”

                “And you give that back to me!” she cried, stretching around him to get at the container.

                “No,” he mocked, heaving the heavy jug out of reach. “I will be useful if you have need.”

                “For balance at least, Lord Jackass!” she snapped, but her pleas fell on deaf ears. “One is heavy and awkward to carry. My Lord, she needs this water! I ain’t going to have her needs delayed by one who knows naught of healing or child-bearing. Have you felt the kick of an eager little soul inside you? Have you ever dropped a child from your womb? Suckled the little tykes at your teats? I think not. Now give that back and git you gone!”

                “Give me the other, and my purpose here is clearer.”

                “And what of him?” Bethraia snapped, relinquishing the other container for Pollast to carry.

                “Locum Doln has looked after me for the past twenty years. No other surgeon knows their business better than he. See, I do listen to you – when your suggestions suit my purposes as well as yours. I brought him to ensure my beloved cousin’s survival through this ordeal.”

                “It is my pleasure to be here, I pray,” the Locum said by greeting with a stiff bow at the shoulder. The long vest of his profession swung forward at his hips with a jingle of glass and metal: the containers of tonics he wore upon his person. Attached to his shoulder by a heavy leather strap, he wore square black case snapped shut by heavy metallic clamps. As he finished the bow, a wan-faced serving girl appeared at the doorway Bethraia faced.

                “You called, Nurse?” she asked.

                “I did. And all for naught, it seems. I swear to the gods, Lord Pollast,” the Nurse said, “his Majesty will like as not give me a thorough swatting for letting you in, but I can’t deny your man. If you refuse to depart, come in. But I tell you now, stay out of the way. The birthing room is no place for one like you.”

                It was only as the Nurse turned that Pollast noticed the swath of ruddy darkness ringing her hands. A shock of concern rollicked through him. Best we are here, methinks.  

                In less matronly days, the birthing room served as the royal bathing house. In addition to their frequent cleanings, the King and Queen would on occasion hold meetings, either social or political, here in the cool stone of its columns and walls. Two bathing pools dominated the space, one massive for wading, and a smaller one, elevated from the pebble-mosaic floor so that hot rocks could be laid underneath the pool’s waters. About the wading pool, half a dozen people bandied to and fro in service of the Queen.