Memories of the First King (23 Nov 2001) Tom visits his grandmother again, asking her about the original game that she and her playmates created for "Mirari".

Clarisse Smith's Home
This is a small cottage on the outskirts of town, surrounded by trees. The dirt turnoff from the paved road is identified solely by a set of mailboxes for Clarisse and her neighbors, and the numbers on the cottage mark this one as Tom's grandmother's house. A small orchard and garden fills the area behind the cottage, marked in the summertime by fruit and vegetables growing busily.

The Lord Explorer Thomas's lessons with his friends have gone well and he has gained some mastery over a new skill ... but the day wends on and it has become necessary for everyone to return to their respective lunch, after which Tom has decided to pay a visit to his favorite grandmother.

As luck would have it however, Mrs. Smith is not in her cottage this time but behind it, tending to a small stand of apple trees in bloom, on a stepladder picking flowers off of the branches, leaving only one out of every four or so. The flowers she deposits into a wide, shallow wicker basket nearby, white petals drifting slowly on the breeze before settling into an aromatic pile.

Thomas hmms softly to himself and decides he can use this as a chance to practice sneaking. Mind you, he's not planning on scaring his grandmother; he saves that for people like Agatha. He slows his pace down and starts to creep slowly, watching each step to avoid making noise. Sneak in, sneak out, then call out, he thinks.

Mrs. Smith remains completely oblivious to Tom's cat-like footsteps, as her peripheral vision is blocked by a wide-brimmed sun-hat tied about her chin. She gets down from the stepladder just a few steps away from the young man, moves it over to the other side of the tree, then the basket, and continues to thin the blossoms on the tree. The other trees are in more advanced stages of blooming, with one even beginning to fruit, though the green apples on it are as yet too small to be ripe.

Tom grins. Yes! he thinks, and starts to back off. Now, if I can back off quietly, I'll then call from a distance. Hopefully, that won't surprise her too much. Hestarts to back up, watching his footsteps much like he did when he sneaked in.

Again, Tom is successful, as his grandmother remains innocent of his creeping about. She hums a little tune that sounds oddly familiar.

Tom pauses and listens to the tune for a bit. Could this be the song from the flute?

Yes ... yes, it seems to be. How odd that his grandmother should know it, though nothing seems to be getting unlocked by the process of humming it; perhaps there's simply nothing to be unlocked, or perhaps it has no effect without the flute to hand. More blossoms drift down from the branches, until Mrs. Smith judges that the tree has been sufficiently pruned, and then it seems she is about to step down again.

Thomas thinks for a second, then grins. He decides instead of calling out, he's going to whistle the tune in time with his Grandmother's humming. He waits for a moment, then makes his attempt at whistling along.

Mrs. Smith stops humming almost as soon as Tom has started. She tilts her head to one side, as if wondering if someone might be there.

Tom keeps on whistling the tune, remaining where he's standing.

His grandmother's head tracks around, and then her worried look turns to a smile. "Oh, Tom! I thought for a moment that I was hearing Bram -- Bryant again, and him gone these many years." She gets down off the stepladder and goes to hug her favorite grandson. "What brings you by here so soon after your last visit?"

Tom stops whistling and waves. "Bram, hmm?" he inquires briefly. "Anyway, we deciphered that song from a flute recently, and since I heard you humming it ... I came by to see how you're doing, of course! And to ask a few more probably weird questions about the old game you used to play."

Tom moves up to meet his Grandmother as she approaches and welcomes the hug.

"Oh, it was a popular tune back then, but Anastasia dearly loved the sentiments, and that's why she chose it," Mrs. Smith recalls. "Well, I am doing very fine, though I shan't have any apples to share with you for some weeks yet, I think, dear grandson."

"Chose it as the spell to unlock locks, right?" Tom asks, then says, "That's quite all right. I shouldn't spoil dinner, anyway. How've things been?"

Mrs. Smith eyes Tom, as if suspecting he's not sharing quite everything he's been up to with his parents, nor her. "You have been out and around, haven't you, Tom? Yes, that's what we decided it did, but she gave it as a gift in the first place when they made up again after a little spat. Funniest thing, it didn't use to have that rose carving, but I think after they decided on that tune, she must have had it engraved to remind them of that, should they ever forget." She smiles reminiscently, as if remembering her fellow playmates' protests to the contrary.

"Now, did I ever say it was on a flute?" Tom asks, grinning.

This time it is Mrs. Smith's turn to raise an eyebrow. "And how did you know I spoke of a flute, Tom?" She taps him on the nose. "Don't think you can pull one over on the Lady of February! Even if I am retired." Her wrinkled face crinkles up in a smile.

"Well, because I did happen to mention it first," he replies, grinning. "We found it out in the woods while pretending to be on a quest. Anyway, hey, I was wondering, was there ever a Nymuae character in your old game?"

Mrs. Smith laughs. "And why were you surprised I knew the flute of which you spoke, grandson? Come, let's go in and have some tea." She ushers Tom into the cottage and starts boiling a kettle of water. "Nymuae, you say? Wasn't she the sorceress who imprisoned Merlin in a cave after he taught her the arts of magic? From the Arthurian tales?"

Tom shakes his head, "No, that was Morgan Le'Fay, I think." He goes over to the table and pulls out a chair for each of them and sits down on one. "I think Nymuae is the spirit that lived in the lake that gave Arthur the sword. So, your old game didn't incorporate such a character?"

"No, I don't recall that we ever did, though we might have if we'd thought of a way to work it in," Mrs. Smith says. She looks at Tom thoughtfully, as if wondering why the name popped into his head.

Tom shrugs slightly. "Okay, just curious," Tom says. "Rebecca played such a character when she was still here. She also started the whole game, so I wondered if she found an old diary or something that one of you kept -- maybe an old fake spellbook." He pauses a moment, then asks, "Did the game ever seem a bit 'real' at times when you were playing it? I've got some friends who are really getting into it."

Mrs. Smith smiles and starts steeping the tea in the hot water. "Oh, goodness gracious, it could seem very real at times! I always tried to keep a level head, but sometimes it seemed as if the others, the Harcourts and Ryan, were all in a hullabaloo when there was nothing that couldn't be fixed if one had a little perspective on things."

"Who was Ryan?" Tom asks as he watches his Grandmother curiously.

"Ryan? Oh, you don't want to hear all your old grandmother's stories, do you?" Mrs. Smith says, blushing a bit. She sets out some ginger snaps on a plate for Tom and herself.

Tom grins widely. "Of course I do." He grabs a snap and munches on one, then asks, "Sooooo, who was he? Not Lord November, perhaps?"

"Well, he's probably died long since ... Oh, no. He was the first King we elected, King Riordan. We picked that because it sounded like his real name, Ryan Jordan." Mrs. Smith sets out two teacups and starts pouring tea for the two of them. "But back then, we were both -- Anastasia and I -- rather sweet on him. He'd just moved in town with his grandmother, who was the most outrageously exotic fortune teller, and of course eventually we had to get him into our game. We were terribly disappointed when he eventually had to move away again, the following winter. But you're probably not interested in that, are you?"

Tom hmms. "Actually, I am," he replies, "Is that how the precedent got started that a King only rules for one year? Where did he move to?"

Mrs. Smith shakes her head as she pours out cream and sets out a sugar pot so that Tom may sweeten his tea if he likes, then sits herself down and pours a dollop of cream into her own cup. "Do you know, I don't know where he went. He promised that he'd write, but I don't recall that we ever received any letters from him after that. I've always wondered if Anastasia moved to Hollywood in the hope that she'd see him again. So many girls told him that he should be in the movies! It's a wonder his head wasn't turned! But he was fair and just, when he was available -- his grandmother kept him busy, you see. We crowned him, let's see, at the start of 1912? No, it was 1913. By the end of the year though, they had to move away, so he said that a year was long enough for anyone to rule." She smiles, thinking back to those days.

"What did his Grandmother have him doing?" Tom asks, making a mental note of where the single-year reign came from. Tom then adds a spoonful of sugar to his cup. "And how come you never tried to find him again? Or did you?" he asks.

"Oh, she needed someone able to keep house; she wasn't very strong," Mrs. Smith recalls. "And of course she insisted that Ryan keep up with his studies. But as for finding him again, well, I ask you, Tom, how can you find someone if they leave no forwarding address? That's why we were hoping to hear from him all those years." She grins. "Though I must admit, I think sometimes the mystery of not knowing and imagining that he went off to whatever mysterious fate awaited a King at the end of a Year might be better than discovering that he became a tractor salesman or some such."

"I suppose that could be a better way to look at it," Tom says.

"Well, they didn't exactly die at the end of a Year--" Mrs. Smith starts to say, but Tom launches into a new question already:

"So, where was the realm of the Destroyer back when you played?" Tom asks. "You see, my character in the game now must go there to rescue the 'Lord Protector,' a black Unicorn. He was in your game, right?. I thought it would be kinda nice if we kept it consistent with how all of you played."

"Why, yes! We had a Lord Melchizedek, who was a black unicorn. I wonder if make-believe runs in the family?" She grins impishly. "As for the realm of the Destroyer..."

"Yes, as for the Realm of the Destroyer," Tom prompts.

Mrs. Smith recollects, "At first, that was just John's room. He didn't like our make-believe very much, you see, so we retaliated by casting him as the villain. But when he was sent away to boarding school, it wasn't a challenge to get in his room anymore, so we decided that it would be the old mines. We made up a whole collection of unfriendly country you had to go through to get there: terrible jag-toothed mountains, country guarded by one-eyed pirates, a wide lake watched over by a tower on an island.... Sometimes I felt I'd never done so much walking in my entire life!"

"Past the Ice Jaw pit? Things like that?" Tom asks, expression thoughtful.

"Just so," Mrs. Smith agrees.

"All righty, I'll have to work that in," Tom says. "Leaves plenty of places where my character could've vanished, too. You see, in the game now, I play a character that has been missing for generations -- vanished on a quest to the West."

"Well! That's marvelously creative," Tom's grandmother says with a smile. She nibbles on a ginger snap.

"Wasn't entirely my idea," Tom admits, "and it makes it somewhat strange to play. I wonder what would've taken down even a supposedly experienced Explorer? Hey, did you ever have a villain called the Jack of Hearts?"

"Jack of Hearts? I can't say as I recall any such," Mrs. Smith says with a smile. "But the Destroyer had many manifestations, some silly, others serious. We made it a rule that he always came back sooner or later, of course, because otherwise, we would have had to quarrel with one another sooner or later, for lack of anyone else to fight."

"Of course," Tom says, grinning. "Now, back to something you started to say earlier... What does happen to the King at the end of the year?"

Mrs. Smith thinks back. "Oh, it was a very sad day, dear, because we were saying goodbye to a friend we'd known for what seemed like forever. The Lords and the Ladies of Mirari had all come to the ceremony, and we watched as King Riordan handed down the crown to his son, Caelin, who became the new King. Lord Melchizedek watched solemnly, and then as we acclaimed the new King, Riordan went with the Lord Protector..."

"Really? He went with the Lord Protector? To where?" Tom asks.

"We all snuck away to find just that out once we'd congratulated King Caelin of Riordan, and made our oaths of loyalty," Mrs. Smith continues, "and we were just in time to see the two of them walking down the Royal Way to the Siege! It was there that Riordan turned from where he was standing at the base of the statue, the Angel that guards Mirari, and he waved to us. 'Sorrow not,' he said to us. 'In spirit, I will always be with you.'"

"What can you tell me about the Angel that guarded Mirari? Did you get the idea from the statue in the park?" Tom asks, then takes a sip from his cup.

Mrs. Smith, about to continue, stops at Tom's interruption. "Well! Of course we did," she says.

Tom nods and smiles, "Sorry, Grandma. Please, continue with what happened to Riordan."

Grandmother Smith sips her tea instead, and looks back in her memories. "It was a long time ago, and I don't think I'll ever forget his face. He looked so noble! He looked as if there was nothing he would have liked more than to come back with us, and live forever in Mirari, but that it was duty that compelled him to go with Lord Melchizedek."

Tom nods quietly, listening.

"We were all crying then, and even Lord Bram hid a tear, pretending to be rubbing some dirt out of his eye," Mrs. Smith says, misty-eyed. "But it was no use. Lord Melchizedek bent his neck down and touched his horn to the feet of the Angel, and there was a sound of creaking stonework. It was a stairway, going beneath the statue! We would have gone forward with him, but Lord Melchizedek went between us, saying that what lay beyond was not for us to see. Instead, Riordan descended the stairs, never looking back ... and after a time, the Lord Protector touched his horn to the statue again, and the stairs closed up, so smoothly they might never have existed."

Mrs. Smith finishes. "We commissioned a statue right away, of course, and were sorry that we hadn't asked the sculptor to draw him from life, and had to draw on our memories of his face and body to make it accurate. So we made it a rule that all new Kings would be sculpted at the start of their reigns, and Riordan's statue was first among all those to be placed in the Sculpture Garden."

"Did anyone ever ask the Lord Protector where those stairs led?" Tom asks, looking at his cup.

Mrs. Smith shakes her head. "All he would tell us was that Riordan had passed into the pages of history, so that was what we wrote down for the text to be engraved onto his statue."

Tom nods. "Interesting that people always seem to disappear when they go with the Lord Protector. Why, that's what happened to my character. He went off with Lord Mel into the wilderness. Lord Mel returned, without my character," Tom says. "Interesting coincidence, isn't it? And all that was left of my character, until his recent return, was histories."

This causes a raised eyebrow. "My, my daughter raised a suspicious son," Mrs. Smith comments with a smile. "Didn't you just tell me that you made your character up? But our Lord Melchizedek was always one of the great protectors of the realm. I couldn't imagine that he'd ever do anything underhanded. It couldn't even occur to him! Of course, your unicorn may be a different sort..."

"Not that we're aware of. He's supposed to be a guardian," Tom replies. "And as I said, I didn't make up all of my character. Others added bits in. Of course, we're playing as if he was captured by the Destroyer currently. My character is off to rescue him." He grins. "You know, hearing all this from you makes me wish I could drag you back into the game!"

Mrs. Smith laughs. "Oh, my. If there's even half as much walking as I remember, it's far too spry a pastime for old bones like mine." She pats Tom's hand. "Besides, games like these should be shared between fellow children. It spoils the play to bring in older people, dear."

"Yeah, well," Tom says with a laugh, "I didn't say I was going to! Wishing and doing are different." He ponders, "Not like I'm rapidly getting too old for it, m'self."

Mrs. Smith sips her tea. "Oh, you'll always be my little grandson," she says innocently. "But you are growing up to be a fine young man."

Tom smiles and says, "Well, that's enough of that, I think. I've been pestering you about the old game and haven't even said a word about much else!" The boy sits back in the chair and takes a sip of tea. "Well, there's been lots of new things happening this summer," he begins. "We've got an exchange student from Ruritania staying with the Travisons. Her name is Elinor and she's really nice. Pretty too. Met a guy named Simon just before school let out. Pretty cool, but could sure use some courage at times! Built a tree house with my father. Boy, was that ever an adventure. Let me tell you about that, it's funny..."

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This site serves as a chronicle of sessions in an online roleplaying campaign moderated by Conrad "Lynx" Wong and May "Rowan" Wasserman. The contents of this site are (c) 2001, 2002 by Conrad Wong and May Wasserman except where stated otherwise. Despite the "children's fantasy" theme of this campaign, this site is not intended for young readership, due to mild language and violence.