Midday, I walk into the place of my father’s resting. I’m sure he’s dying and I’ve come to say my final good-bye and become what I was born to be. King. I slowly push the door open to find my father laying the exact way I left him the previous evening.

“Ah, Mathius you’ve come to see your father,” I hear from Albechli my father’s caretaker.

“Yes,” I reply without thinking upon the question.

“He’s weaker still, I believe this will be the day he dies,” She says to me solemnly.

And then, as if on cue, my father gives a great heave and the rise and fall of his chest stops, and I know he is dead. The king is dead. I run, as I have in a thousand dreams before, to the church and grab the bell rope. Pulling as hard as I can, the bell rings three times to proclaim my father’s death.



Evening, I sit upon my father’s throne. The fealty ceremony is fully underway. And one-by-one all the knights come to stand in front of me. When they get there they bow, kneel, draw their swords, and present them to me hilt first. Thus swearing to serve me in fealty until death.



Finally there is no one else, or so I thought at the time.

“Is there no one else here to swear fealty to the new king,” I pronounce. I wait several long moments and finally say, “Very well then, the ceremony is…”BANG!

The great oak doors fly open. And there stands three cloaked figures. They slowly walk, almost glide, up to my throne. When they stop I try to pierce the darkness hidden beneath their hoods.

“Who are you three? And why have you interrupted this ceremony?” I inquire.

Slowly the first figure, in a silver cloak, draws a sword, bows and presents it to me. Then the other two, in blue and bronze, just as slowly follow suit.

“Who are you?” I ask again impatiently.

“We are the warriors three, come to pledge our loyalty,” announces the one cloaked in blue.

“We have come form the farthest reaches of this world to serve you. The noblest king of Dragok,” implies the one in bronze.

I wait for the one in silver to speak. But he only extends his sword further. But at length says, “We served your father in secret, and now we serve you in openness. We are the protectors. We serve in war and peace and have come to aide in whatever way you need us.”

“Well, if my father trusted you than so can I,” I pronounce. And at the final word I take all three of their swords in one swoop.