He sits upon a seat on the balcony over-looking moonlit gardens. From behind a curtain, a young man comes, blade drawn, to take his life. Oddly enough, while there were some guards, he actually waved them away and asked the lad to come closer so he could have a talk with the young assassin.
"I currently rule as king amongst my people. We have the Cardinal Law, ensuring that no one, no matter how poor they are, is left without at least good, wholesome, food, clean water, and shelter, even if it must come out of the royal treasuries to pay for it. And no matter how wealthy or powerful a person is, they are forbidden to mistreat the ones that serve under them. They are not allowed to refuse to pay their fair share of taxes just like I, and everyone else, does. Yes, I do pay my taxes, that's only fair after all. We do everything we can to make life in these lands as pleasant as possible for our people. And yet even as you stand there with your blade in your hand threatening to end my life so another can take the crown, do you realize how little freedom this crown brings? The sacrifices a ruler must make lest their land fall to ruin? Where you must think of your people's health, safety, and well-being above all else, even your own happiness? Tell me... do you truly understand the cost of a crown?" -- DaniAndShali
"Lord Baisingr said you would lie," said the would-be assassin. They spoke with a lower-class accent, suspiciously from the under-valued areas of Lord Baisingr's own realm. The King suspected Lord Baisingr himself of using agents to agitate the people his sublaws victimised. Lord Baisingr was already under investigation by his peers, peers who understood the necessity of the King's Laws.
"Did he tell you in person?" said the King. "Or have they passed along the message through other speakers?"
The would-be assassin scoffed. "Lord Baisingr is too important to talk to me... I heard everything by the Lord's Bards. They tell the news. They tell people what's important."
"Nothing from the King's Bards?" asked the King.
"The King's Bards lie."
"I'm sure they do. Things don't always conveniently fit into meter and rhyme. All Bards lie, but the truth can be found in the way they lie. That and reading. Everyone has the right to an education, according to King's Law."
"Those schools are a farce. They won't let anyone pass unless they can read and write. They even try to give people enchanted eye masks to hide the real truth."
The King pinched the bridge of his nose. Truly, the investigation of Lord Baisingr had been overdue before it began. "The real truth, of course, being that which Lord Baisingr endorses via his Bards?"
"Exactly! You and your council of sycophants are moving to destroy him and everything he's made. You're going to ruin our way of life and upset the economy."
Technically true, but the King could not admit that while the mislead lad had a knife ready to strike. "What does that mean for you, that you come to me in the night with a knife? What does my death fix for you?"
"Nothing. I'm willing to lay down my life for the greater good."
"I would object," said the King. "You are useful to the realm as more than an expendable knife in the night."
"HOW? I'm not learned, I'm not wealthy. I barely had a home and my family perished in the last winter. I'm sick! I'm not strong. I have one year at the most before the same thing that took my family takes me in the next winter. My life is worthless! I can only give it so that others don't suffer your tyranny."
Well. It looked like the lad and his deceased family had come down with a bad case of economy-driven class oppression. The people under his reign all had the right to medical care, but the Lords had the decision about what that meant. Sometimes, that was a network of the wise and herbalists. In others, it was a series of superstitions wrapped in hot soup and a good lie down. The King was still working on that, his Lords fighting to maintain 'the economy'.
The economy. Ha. Those with wealth adored nothing more than having more wealth, and showing it off in various ways. The economy. One might as well say, Wealthy Lords' Folly[1] Money, or, Wealthy Lords' Gilded Carriage Money. The King could talk about the flow of money, or how this lad with a knife had been betrayed. That would only accelerate the knife in its useless path.
"I'm sorry that's happened to you," said the King. "Would you allow me to help, if it's possible?"
"You can help? You think you can help. I won't be victim to your royal necromancers, turning me into a puppet to repeat your false propaganda."
"Of course not. That would be against your consent," said the King. "I can give you access to any cleric or medicine-maker you would accept. You can eat the food I eat, sleep in the same bed I usually sleep in. You can have everything you want. For one year."
"And then?"
"I haven't finished," said the King. "You also have my responsibilities. The decisions I have to make and what the long-term consequences are. You will see not only Lord Baisingr's realm, but the realms of other Lords and see how things are run. You will see and hear with your own senses. You will have all that I have. The rights and the responsibilities. And at the end of that year, if you have not changed your mind, I will help you push that knife into my heart."
It was a deal.
The lad bathed when the King bathed. They bathed in a hurry in tepid water, with people there to accelerate the process. They dressed in the same clothes, but not ornate ones. They were functional. Fine, but functional. Then the paperwork began. The endless reams of balancing the books of the kingdom.
Paying for all the help that all the helpless needed. Making sure the money went where it was meant to go, instead of some garden ornament on a vast lot of fallow lawn. Ironing out the kinks in the laws to be sure that no avaricious Lord could wring more coin for themself than they deserved.
Arguing with the Lords or their representatives to make sure those laws went through. Fighting for fairness and equal rights. The right to proper meals. The definition of what 'proper meal' was. Whether or not those who contributed so little to Society had any right being a Drain on the Economy.
"You'd rather be without them?" challenged the lad. "Who would raise the crops that make your bread. Who would weave those fine linen shirts. Who would spin? Who would knit? Who would pay the taxes that buy those pretty jewels? Live off your own lawn, my lord. Make your own clothes. You can have all the gold you can eat."
"Who the hell is this?" said an objecting Lord.
"This," said the King, "is my new Knife. Cutting through the horseshit and seeking the truth."
Some Lords, loyal to the crown, knew what this meant. This was another would-be night assassin who had been mislead into trying to kill the best King that had ever been in charge of the realm in years.
In a month, the new Knife would have an intricate insight into the kingdom's economy. In two, they would understand the infighting amongst the highborns, the backstabbing, the wrangling, the personal vendettas... In three, he would be proposing his own reforms.
By the end of the year, he would not use that knife he had come with, and would not want to. Of course, by the end of the year, the lingering effects of proper diet and hygiene would have worked their magic. After the end of the year, this Knife would not die. After the end of the year, he would have some solid plans to run the late Lord Baisingr's lands.
After the end of the year, the mislead lad with the knife would become the new Lord of Baisingr. After the end of the year, the world would be made a little better.
There would be other Knifes. Other chances to reform what had gone rotten out of the King's sight. Other chances to save the desperate from their desperate circumstances.
[1] Folly(n): A garden ornament that costs a lot of money to have and serves no useful function. Some stately gardens still contain a one hundred percent fake roman ruin that was once home to a one hundred percent fake hermit, who was paid to live there and, if Nobles came to visit, dispense one hundred percent fake wisdom.
[Image (c) Can Stock Photo / Lagui]
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