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[GreyPawn]

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The path is worn between the tower and the gates of the city. He no longer takes the teleporters established for mass transport on the island he knows better than his own aged and frail frame. Too fast, not enough time to hear what the island has to say today. Whispers in the brisk arctic wind blowing in from Dagger Isle brush his weather-worn face, hints and spirits of yesteryear that persist to gently haunt the old man in staid ambivalence.

The grass is worn were horse and cattle have strayed from the manor houses of Verity, each truncated blade an expression of the personality of the island and city. The nose perks at the pungent fragrance of an outcropping of o'hii in bloom and a blue bird chirps out at a brief alarm. Verity is here, Truth is right, Honesty lives and sings. The old mage passes into the city proper in a state of near ecstacy, in short communion with the city that is of him and is with him.

Dressed in unremarkable attire, nobility by no means, the old man takes his task of sweeping the cobblestone streets with a dignity well-learned in the courts of Britannia. A flaxen broom in hand, in his mind he briefly returns to the sorcerous balconies of the Mage Tower in the north, a beginning. Training in the use of a wizard's staff. The deep belly-laughter of Tiffric, punctuated by the tones of Nick, Jenny and Aldroud echoing up from the keep below. So much has happened since then, he muses, sweeping a bit of paper and refuse from behind the sandstone walls of the bank.

"Oh, my dear Moonglow. How far we have come, no? I have given you my life, my energies and my blood. I have been your consort and your custodian. I've raised you armies and great commanders, made you responsible for so much... light."

"Oh, I know that. You didn't give me much of a choice, did you?" GreyPawn pauses sweeping momentarily to lean against the broom, his chin propped up against the handle in a grin with thought.

"I remember that. I had such trouble finding my way from the moongate to the iron gates. You had your fair share of murderers back then, if memory serves."

"Yes, I know that it is unlikely to happen now. It was one of the few times I had hoped you would be destroyed. Don't be coy. You can't tell me you never had second thoughts about me. Stonegate? Ahh, see!"

"Yeah, no, I miss Richard too. Yolen reminds me so much of him, it's uncanny. They could be related."

"Fong? He's had some issues he has to take care of. I didn't realize you and him were talking... No, I'm not jealous. Just surprised. I know I showed him how to hear you, but I don't think I've ever heard of anyone other than Yoldran who could hold a conversation."

The former Mayor returns to sweeping the cobblestones, moving in an efficient circle of cleaning nearer the teleporter maze.

"Don't ask me to do that. You know I don't have it in me. The Empire will have to live in history, in books in the Lyceaum. You ask too much."

"You'll be fine, trust me. I'll always be here to make sure you are, that much I can promise you. Let's just idle quietly in this golden time of renewal and leave the epic sagas to the new authors of today."

"I'm working on a new creedo for my smaller incantations. Want to hear it? It's a little different from the last one, but I think you'll like it."


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I am the raised right hand of Honesty.
Five fingers, pointed up and out in defiance of all the corners of darkness and falsehood.
I am the destruction of deceit and the immaculate creation of presence in what is and remains.
I am the opened eye, the light in all the dark secret places.
Truth for truth's sake, intoned in pure, dulcit tenor unbroken and unfettered by flatterer's tongue or spinster's weave.

Consort of Moonglow and the Bearer of the Blue, I am Archmage and progenitor of her great works and witness to her grandeur.
I have read the Book of Truth and I know what it says.
I have kept.
I have persevered.
I have endured.
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Dusk brings the faint glimmer of stars and the outline of the two moons of Felucca and Trammel over Moonglow City. Cobblestone streets dully reflect the lamplight spilling out from the various buildings, streets cleaned by a man who once nearly ruled the world. The Could-Have-Been King in Blue stows his well-used broom in the Counselor's Guild Hall, propped up in its own corner. Tired, he makes his way home on foot and falls asleep with a musty tome in a chair beneath a wall-mounted pair of too-familiar antlers.