Full Crowds of None

I gripped my throne fiercely. Holding the sides gave me a certain little thrill, to ascertain that this was real, this was now, this was happening. The coronation was just over. I was now, truly, lord of this realm. I looked all over. The audience laughed for me, wept for me, they called my name, they offered themselves, others even, they offered what they had, and what they didn’t, all to celebrate this, my coming of birth, the coming of a master in a land without one.

This place was deemed Swallow, thought to be a namesake for the most common bird around these parts, rather it was a mockery of a name, for the number one duty that women did here. This was an honourless place, much less so since the death of my parents. Left without proper rulers and the council of a youngling that scarce knew better (me…) the country, the realm, all that was plunged into its own anarchy and chaos, as the world flew by outside.

During the seven years it took for me to learn what I needed to learn to deal with this problem of my land and of the next lands around me, I had pretty much abandoned my people. Abandoned my absolutely filth and pigsty of a nation. Having naught learned anything of being proper, ruling, and being a scared little puss afraid of the extent of power in my hands, I had scampered to the arms of my dearest Uncle Joen. He ruled the Flight, a land which was next to the sea, so called Flight to see off the wonders that travelled the waters. At least he was in charge of a land that was not mocked.

Fled I did, for three years or so. Scared of the age between the eighth and the decade, I was forced to learn, to deal. I left Swallow naïve and uncaring of the damage I’d done, as I ordered my own council to keep the keep and only the keep, and care not for what happened to the kingdom.

Look at this place. It was horrible. Bodies rotted whence no one cared, trading had devolved back to bartering, as what is gold if no one values it? The worth of metals only goes so far if your rulers did nothing, especially if no one cared.

Ruler of Swallow. What a mockery indeed. I hardly needed to be mocked with a name like that, I mocked myself, my cowardice, my destiny to be a distraught young king, in charge of lands worth less than the name it was crowned. I looked up into the ceiling, and slumbered in front of my nation.

Then I opened my eyes, and stared into the pillow on top of me.

It suffocated me, and I wriggled and twisted and turned, and then I was hit, and I felt as I was drugged.

And I saw my mother rear her other hand back. She had given up on smothering and seemed quite intent now on knifing.

I am thirteen. I will not strike my mother.

Gutted as I am, I was only relieved. I would rather be back with my hollow and empty kingdom, one that I dreamt up, than be with my own flesh and blood. Debauchery and infidelity was nothing but footnotes compared to what my mother was doing.

My eyes dim. I don’t question it.

I opened my eyes again, and I’m back to staring up from the top of my throne. I could feel my life going away before me, though here I be fine. And I stood up, to the thunderous cheers of those around me. Empty, hollow, people that didn’t exist, they ran across my mind and called for me brightly as I fell forward.

And in the afterlife, I hope, that when I meet real kings and queens, real rulers and real tyrants, I would be able to boast, that they may have had the cheers and the jeers of those that lived, but I’d be one of the even fewer who had filled a whole nation with full crowds of none.

Then I would squarely at them in the eye, be they my age or thrice more, and I would ask them, “What do you dream of, dear lords? When I dream, everyone loves me.”

And then, be it heaven, hell, or some other afterlife that awaits me, that is something I can sleep peacefully with.

After all, hardly anyone else had a good sleep.