The King, the Prophet and the Servant

I have tried to write blog posts several times in the past few weeks, about Trump and politics and stuff. But I can't seem to hit the publish button.

And then I started reading the Dark Mountain blog, where the idea of myths and stories surfaces again and again. So instead of facts and reasoning I'm going to share a story I've written, it links with a story that posted ages ago called the Ash, the Oak and the Yew. I hope you enjoy it.

The King, the Prophet and the Servant

The Kings first wife arrived in the summer, in the swimming-in-the-cool-river time, the lying-in-the-meadows time. The sky such a perfect transparent blue that you could see through it to the blackness of space. The butterflies that he put in jars for her because she loved them, those impossible creatures that only a mind of wild, divine imagination could invent. Perhaps, at first she had been something akin to good. But time changed her and she became cruel, sadistic, arrogant; the darkness inside her, that he never knew what to do with, shrank and hardened into a stone of bitterness and, like a grain of sand in an oyster, this grew by degrees until it became her most precious possession. A pearl of malevolence that she treasured because it defined her.

   And in this way the long years passed. He carried out his royal duties as best he could but his tender heart was not in it, for who knew where the Queen went during the long weeks she was away? And who could say how she might treat him when she returned? With indifference or cruelty?

   One autumn, when the Jew’s Ears sprung up, as if the elder trees listened to the secrets of the forest, and when the trees themselves appeared to be faraway lands carved from copper and gold and emeralds, a woman found herself in the King’s court. A fiery woman with red hair and hands rough from years of toil; a fiercely loyal woman with a heart of gold.

   She was a doctor of sorts. And she saw the sadness of the king, saw how the other courtiers took advantage of it, and her heart ached on his behalf. She was kind to him, advised him honestly, comforted him in his misery until she found that she loved him dearly and he loved her too.

   The King proposed marriage but first he must, honourable to the last, divorce the Queen. So he told the Queen that he loved another and although she hadn’t loved him for a long time she was wrathful with jealousy. She and her servants rode away faster than rain falling from the sky. In her absence the King married his lover, the Doctor, and they became one, legally, physically and spiritually.

   Their marriage was a happy one. For two months they lay together in the meadows and wooded places, they walked in the gardens and picked fruits and mushrooms, and she supported him in the running of his kingdom.

   Then the Queen returned. And within three days the Kings love lay dead upon their bed, blue with poison, with the King weeping over her body, softly kissing her forehead. The Queen stood gravely by, and it was clear that the poisoning had been no accident; her cruel lips curled.

   The King knew what she had done and, to her outrage, banished her.

   She returned two months later begging his forgiveness, pouring his wine, serving his food. He was lethargic with mourning yet even he could only put up with her deception for so long and he banished her once more.

   He heard many years later that the Queen had been killed in a distant land, by heroes ridding their town of her tyranny, and he felt a little satisfaction, but only a little. By this time he ruled alone, watching over the hills and forests, hearing the squabbles of ordinary people and protecting their lands from threats within and without. And this is how we find the King when he meets the woman who would become his third wife.

One autumn, after a poor harvest, before a hard winter, a strange man arrived in the kingdom. He rode a fine, strong horse which pulled a cart filled with the most beautiful fruits, vegetables and grain: wheat and barley which was so yellow you might fancy it was grown from gold coins dropped in the soil.

   The man himself was cheerful and rosy cheeked, handsome and plump. Such a vision of plenty when the people were just preparing themselves for a meagre winter attracted attention, and the strange man gave out food all the along the road which lead to the Kings palace. So the King knew long in advance of the mans’ coming.

   He introduced himself everywhere he went as the Prophet and claimed that if he was granted an audience with the King he would solve all the kingdoms problems.

   “Good King!” he cried when the two men finally met, “you have such a rich, wealthy kingdom, why do your people live like peasants, starving in squalor?”

   The King was puzzled. He knew it had been a bad harvest – he had been distributing food himself that very day to the very poorest of his people – yet he didn’t think his people lived quite so badly as the Prophet described; there would always be bad years, just as there would always be good years. He begged the Prophet to explain what he meant.

   “Well, so very many of them work the land for a start! And such little fields, your majesty, and so very few of them. And all between I saw forests and wild land. No wonder your people go hungry when the fields they farm are so few and so small.”

   This had never occurred to the King before. He knew little about the land, although he loved it well enough and always wished he knew more. Perhaps the Prophet held the key to his troubles.

   So the Prophet joined the Kings court and began to advise him. The Prophet had come from a very wealthy land indeed, a place of such great abundance that only very few people had to work the land at all.

   “And of course,” said the Prophet, “they are the very best paid men in the kingdom, because they provide for all of us.” And he promised to share all the ways and methods of his people with the King so that the Kingdom would grow rich and the people could live in comfort.

The arrival of the Prophet brought great excitement to the Kingdom, as well as an unidentifiable shift in the fabric of the world. An unrest of sorts, or a change in the winds, or perhaps it was simply the turning of the seasons.

   When spring came around again, the Prophets plans were well under way, although he promised the King that it would be some years before the Kingdom would experience true wealth like his own land.

  With the spring came another stranger. She did not arrive on the road which lead beyond the borders of the kingdom, instead she walked out of the forest. It was the time of the spring gales; one moment the storm clouds gathered and made war, the next the sparkling world was lit by glorious sunlight.

   The woman also requested an audience with the King. When she was turned away (for she looked like nothing more than rough, grubby laywoman) she returned patiently every day, until the Kings courtiers, amused by her persistence, brought her before him.

   The King sat on his throne, in his lovely robe of silk and fur, surrounded by his closest friends and advisers, with the Prophet at his elbow.

   “My Lord,” she bowed, her voice was low and serious, “I am known as the Servant. And I have come to advise you as best I can.”

   The King welcomed her then added, “what a curious name you have. How did you earn it?”

   “I am servant to all, but no man is my master.”

   “And how would you advise me?”

   “I would advise you to turn that man out of your court,” and she pointed a long finger at the Prophet who cried out in surprise, “and to treat all the things he has told you as dangerous lies.”

   At this point there was an uproar, for the Prophet was well liked by everyone, some even cried that the Servant to be placed under arrest, however the Prophet himself called for order and suggested that the woman explain herself.

   “You say that you come from a land far away,” she said to the Prophet who agreed that this was the case. She continued, “do you deny that the very measures that created such abundance in your land for a few short years destroyed the land and caused its people to starve?”

   The Prophet denied this very loudly.

   “Do you also deny that the measures that you are trying to put in place in this kingdom turned your lands earth to dust, worked its children to death and drove its animals to extinction?”

   He denied this also.

   The Servant stood up very tall and said in disgust, “then you are a liar and a Charlatan.” And she spat at his feet.

   After this she was removed by the guards and thrown bodily into the street; the courtiers cheered angrily as she left. The King was glad to see her go too, but her words had made him uneasy and he found it hard to forget them.

   She returned every day hence, begging an audience with the King. She finally gained one - although she was allowed into court reluctantly - and, like before, she condemned the Prophet.

   The king ordered her to be removed once again but she was nowhere to be found. “perhaps she’s a witch,” whispered the courtiers, “she disappears like magic!” In fact the palace servants had hidden her in their quarters, and they continued to do so each time the King ordered her removal; she would wait until the court had forgotten about her then return to beg the King to stop the Prophets plans. But he would not listen.

   This went on for two years. The first harvest was very bad – and this left the people more desperate than ever for the Prophets plans to be put in place – the second year was even worse, but nobody had time to complain; they were all too busy clearing the forest and wild lands.

   “Soon,” thought the King, “nobody will be hungry. Everyone will be well and strong and happy.” And he worked as hard as anyone.

   It was the first warm week in spring; that surprise parcel of sunny days when the mornings are growing lighter and the birds are beginning to try out their summer songs. The Servant rose early, left the castle and walked into the woods. The King saw her from the window and, curious to discover where she went (and perhaps hoping to catch her at some new treachery), followed her through the trees where the new leaves were coming through and the soft herbs deadened his footsteps.

   She walked slowly, enjoying the morning, all the way down to the river. The King knew that he should turn back but somehow he couldn’t; he hid and watched the Servant bathe.

   When she stepped out of the water she wrapped her cloak about herself and walked straight to where the King was hidden. He apologised over and over until she held up a hand to silence him; she had seen the loneliness in his eyes.

That night there was a quiet knock on the door of the Kings bedroom. The Servant entered softly and allowed him to hold her. Then they lay together and for a while the King felt as if all the broken parts of the world had been made whole, as if all the grey, squalid places had been made green and new.

   After that she didn’t go to his chamber again. But he sought her company more and more; at first trying to atone for his previous desire but soon simply because he liked to be with her. Her clarity of thinking was unclouded by her own wants and her generosity was a more measured sort than the Prophets, like a stream which would never run dry.

   The Prophet watched their friendship with growing unease. He reminded the King not to listen to any advice she might give him because she knew nothing of how to run a kingdom.

   “She doesn’t give me advice,” said the King in surprise, “that’s the very reason I spend time with her.”

   The Prophet had nothing to say to that. For it was true that the Servant no longer expressed any views on how the Kingdom was governed or the land used.

One day the King and the Servant took an evening walk down to the river. The year was growing older but the air was still warm and sweet with the perfume of a summer night. They stopped and watched the water run quickly by.

   “My time is coming,” said the Servant, “you know that I cannot stay silent any longer.”

   The King tried to ask what she meant but she ignored him, she just kissed his cheek and wished him goodnight. He was left in the gentle night listening to the river, while the daisies glowed pale at his feet and above him the stars flickered.

The following day dawned bright and hot. The scullery maid went to wake the Servant (who slept beside the embers of the fire in the kitchen) to find her gone. Her bed was empty and there were drops of blood amongst the ashes.

   The palace guards began their morning duties but were horrified to discover bloody footprints leading from the Kings Throne room, through the cool corridors and atrium out into the heat of the courtyard. From there they seemed to be directed into the heart of the city. They were smudged and smeared but still visible as the guards followed them through the market.

   The source of the footprints only became apparent when the guards reached the poorest streets of the city. The Servant was dressed, despite the heat, in the black veil and garments of a woman in mourning, and she walked slowly, carrying a bucket half filled with lamb’s blood. When her footsteps began to fade she would dip each foot in the blood and continue on her way. She wept all the while.

   At first she went almost unnoticed. But word travels faster than a walking woman and soon people were standing outside their houses waiting for her to pass by. Some stared at her or mocked her, but others gave her food and water, or even filled her bucket of blood. She did not sleep but kept walking, on and on, through the kingdom; past great houses and humble villages, through farmland and forest and metropolis. After just a few days under the hot sun the bucket of blood began to stink, of iron and decay.

   Her long route took her to the very outskirts of the kingdom, and when she had walked to its farthest border she began her slow return. On the way back a change came over her. She stopped weeping, she held her head up higher and a small group of travellers joined her. Misfits and vagabonds they were, outcasts and the most poverty-stricken; those who understood what she was mourning for.

   Together they walked the road that the Prophet had taken when he first arrived, passing many great fields of torn earth which had once been the forests and wild places, but which now lay naked and vulnerable. Ready for crops which would not be sewn until the following year.

   With sore feet and aching hearts they continued through the heat and dust, until, at last, the towers of the Kings palace lay on the horizon.

The Servant walked through the gates of the city and no one opposed her. She seemed taller than when she had left, although she was dirtier than ever, and held her head with a queenly bearing. She still dipped her feet in the blood, with her band of friends picked up along the way, close behind her.

   The city and the king’s court had all heard of her journey. When word reached the palace that she had returned, the city’s streets were thronged with the curious and the cruel. And overhead, thick clouds threatened to break the deafening heat at last.

   She requested an audience with the king. And was admitted with no resistance.

   In that bright, clean chamber the Servant and her followers seemed filthy. The bucket stank of blood and death.

   “I am the Servant,” her voice was clear and resonant, “and I came many times to advise you as best I could.”

   “What would you advise I do?” asked the King, “the Prophets plans are in motion, for better or worse. It would be madness to deviate from them.”

   “This is your last chance to steer your kingdom from the jaws of destruction. Many wild places remain, the earth might heal, your people are not yet so far removed from their relationship with the land that it cannot be restored,” and she walked right up to the King. He stood to receive her.

   “My dear,” she said gently, “I am saying this because I love you. Because you are a good king.”

   “Be silent, harpy!” the Prophets voice rang out like a bell, “wise King, I beg you to see reason, not to listen to this woman who is trying to change your mind with false kindness. She does not understand of what she speaks, she has never lead a kingdom, has never had to lead these people as you and I have. What does she know of feeding the hungry?

   “Furthermore, think of the sheer scale and cost of the preparations we have put in place. Would you throw all of that away on the word of a simple laywoman? And the handful of poor farmers that have followed her here? Your people could be rich, could truly make use of the land which now sits useless and overgrown with weeds. Why! In a few years you might be rich enough to export to the lands around your kingdom, think of the food grown here travelling far and wide! Your people could have anything they desired.”

   The King thought for a moment and then said, “and what of poor farmers such as these?” he gestured to the ragged band behind the Servant, “will they share in this wealth?”

   The Prophet began to speak but the King silenced him.

   “No,” he said, “I have ruled this kingdom for many years and I have learned that there is no such thing as limitless wealth: everything has its price. While some grow rich, others will grow poor. While many fruits are reaped one year, the land is tired and must rest the following year. I may know little about the land but these people, these lowliest ones, know much more than you or I. They know its seasons and cycles, how best to care for it so that it will care for them.”

   “You are foolish,” cried the Prophet, his face growing red, “your people will starve!”

   But before he could speak another word the Servant had emptied the bucket of blood over his head so that he was brown-red from head to toe, and the stench was released into the court.

   “This is the blood of your people,” she said, “but it will not be the blood of ours. Be gone!”

   And he fled in disgrace.

The Forest King married his third wife in the winter, in the crows-hawking-in-the-morning time, the skeleton-trees-against-the-sky time. Ice hardened the earth, their breath bloomed like white flowers in the forest and a bitter wind skinned their faces on the hilltops.

   But dreams of plenty are hard to forget. The people grew restive. Some marched in protest at the banishment of the Prophet. But still the King distributed food to the poorest and gave away his lovely robes.

   And even on the darkest night, when the people rioted in the streets and the courtiers pined for the Prophet with his grand plans, the King patiently waited for spring.

Because everything has its price: While some grow rich, others will grow poor.

While many fruits are reaped one year, the land is tired and must rest the next.

After a cruel winter comes a gentle spring.

The Servant took his hand and he was not afraid.