Chapter 6: Peace and Prophecy

Dhaniz Manor was manned by a housekeeper and her gardener/handyman husband. She greeted me warmly with an unexpected embrace before crying with joy and embarrassment.

“So sorry, Master Tomas, my Lord, but I was so pleased to see thee!” the cheery woman gushed, “welcome home, we’ve waited long years for this moment.”

“I know you, you were the Orphanage keeper, Dame Elrith!” I realised, seeing the woman squirm and biting her lower lip to stop herself from further embarrassment.

“It were no Orphanage,” Jonas the Steward explained with a gentle hand on both our shoulders, “you were the only boarder, My Lord, the other children bedded with their folk while you slept alone in your chamber. Your mother died giving birth to you and Lord Dhaniz went mad, left this place to train as a knight, so Lord Alderlea set up the ‘Orphanage’ to care for you as Sir Dhaniz continually refused to accept you at his manor. Your father did return many years later and, to make amends, trained you to be a knight and tried to get to know you again, to find the best moment to confess.

“When Lord Alderlea served as General at the Palace, Sire, for most of the last twenty years, I would visit him quarterly to update him on Manor records and balances, sign or terminate contracts. I was discrete to ensure you didn’t notice me, but I would report news of you to Dame Elly here, but many Manor folk were interested in what you were doing. We are very proud of those achievements and remember, Sire, Queen’s Consort Morkyn and the Lord were great drinking friends so we all know how bravely our Sir Dhaniz died and of your killing a Dragon while you were still naught but a boy, Sire.”

Later that night, Jarolyn and I retired to our, now private chamber, the children elsewhere in their own chambers watched over by willing maidens from the village that was my birthplace, now our home.

“What about the Prophecy, Tomas?” Jarolyn asked as she rested her head on my chest.

“The Prophecy? Well, you were only four when the Queen declared it and probably remember nothing of it. I remember every word because it changed my life.

“‘When my father was a young king,’ the Queen had said, ‘he was already married to my mother, with me about to be their first born, in fact their only child. My mother was often guided by the advice of a soothsayer at court, while my father took any prophecies made with a pinch of salt. One day an ancient witch asked the King for an audience and my father agreed to see her. She said that our royal soothsayer was a charlatan but she couldn’t say anything before because the Soothsayer Guild forbad criticism among members but she knew that she was about to die and declared she could keep silent no longer. She was granted a private audience with the king and queen and she told them that she had continuously dreamed of a Golden Age. A time, with a Queen at its head, and that the Queen would be a non-royal princess and her Consort not a Prince nor a knight, but he would save her from a Dragon. That they would marry and live happily ever after during which her long reign would be peaceful, prosperous and the Golden Age would last for generations. I never considered this Prophecy would apply to me,’ the Queen continued, ‘but when I was attacked by a Dragon and almost burned to death, losing all my party bar a brave boy who witnessed my rescue. My saviour was not a knight but a brave cobbler and I was no longer a royal princess but already a queen. I have asked my rescuer, the cobbler Morkyn if he would be my Consort and he has consented. Let the wedding be planned and the union blessed.’”