Paper Tigers (1973)

[Myroria]

November 5, 1973

Many bars in the rural areas of Myroria have a picture of the monarch of the nation on one of their walls. It's not clear where the tradition started; perhaps spontaneously across the nation due to nationalist fervor, or perhaps to create the impression that "the law is always watching you, scum." Adon's Bar, an establishment in Caissontown with a particularly creative name, kept this tradition up through its many years of existence - that is, until the death of Fendryn Quarrovth.

Prejudice runs deep in County Ivorheart, you see, and Adondasi just couldn't bring himself to hang a picture of an outlander in the bar that had been in his family for generations - to disgrace the memory of his father, and his father's father, and his father's father's father was out of the question. So the wall sat empty for years until today.

Today was the coronation of Her Imperial Majesty Fredrika I, and the factories that fed the town were all shut down for the week. Since Caissontown was situated right in the middle of nowhere, the townspeople spent their free time doing one of three things: The teenagers were all off having sex, the thirtysomethings were killing themselves on barbituates, and all the old people were getting drunk in Adon's Bar.

Adon scooted his way through the dining room. Seeing the owner actually doing any work was quite a sight, so all the old veterans turned to watch him file past tables. He came to a stop at the wood-panelled wall opposite the bar. By now the bitter old men had stopped complaining entirely to focus all their attention on him.

Adon squinted. He could just make out some scratches on the wall, covered mostly by dust. This is where Fendryn once sat. The motion took only perhaps ten seconds, but it felt like a lifetime for everyone present. The picture hung on the nail snugly. Slightly crooked, but all the tables and all the people in this pub were slightly crooked. Adon walked back behind the bar.

The picture was the only thing on the wall. Unlike Fendryn's photograph, this frame held a portrait. Adon had spent months working on it, on and off. The piece was no Hemmings, but it was Adon's life work. It was a tall woman, wearing full regalia, standing amongst a colonnade in a garden. In her hand was a flagpole, and at the end a flag. Teal and purple, with a black stylized tree in the middle. Below the woman's white high-heeled shoes was another flag, this one far more familiar to the old veterans in the bar. Brown, dark red, and cream. The flag they killed godless natives under.

The bar remained silent as the old men, huddled around tables, took in the sight before them. Then the bar erupted in applause.

[Myroria]

October 2, 1967

The smell of incense was persistent throughout the cathedral. The archbishop of Ivorheart - along with twelve priests - stood in a circle. The bell, book, and candle routine had ended centuries before, but at every official, ritualized excommunication, the circle tradition remained. As did the recitation:

"We the assembled, before the eyes of the Lord Iesus, separate Rarayn Novroth from the body and blood of the Lord and from all Christians; we separate him from Our Holy Mother, from the church built on mundane soil as well as heavenly, and proclaim him excommunicated and anathema - we judge him damned as the Great and Lesser Devils, their demons, and all sinners were and are, and throw him into eternal hellfire until he seeks penitence and forgiveness in the eyes of the Lord. This we declare."

The priests responded much more succinctly to the bishop's recitation.

"This we declare."


It was a week after Fredrika's coronation when Adon sat in on Rarayn's service. Adon had never been a particularly religious man, though he did attend mass now and again. The excitement coming from Rarayn's little chapel on the edge of Caissontown seemed silly, but not enough to warrant excommunication. Adon's continued association with the man expelled from the church built on mundane as well as heavenly soil was often gossipped about among the area's sewing circles. But even though Adon associated with the excommunicate, this was the first time he ever attended one of Rarayn's weekly shouting sessions. It certainly was a change from the somber incense rituals of the Myrorian Catholic Church.

"God spoke to me my friends!" screamed Rarayn. He continued to wear the priest's frock, though no ordained Catholic minister would ever consider saying something like that, much less saying it loudly. "And what did God say to me!? He spoke to me of the s'wits, the outlanders which continue to sit on our throne! Many are aware of my feelings towards the mongrel outlander dogs. People often asked me in the weeks leading up to our queen's coronation, what did I think of finally having a native-born Myrorian on the throne? My answer was always the same. We have no native-born Myrorian on the throne. Through our queen's... associations with the outlanders, through her marriage to an outlander, she has forever tainted House Quarrovth's name!" A oversized roar came from the small audience, quieting only at Rarayn's insistence.

"Because, my friends, any Myrorian who associates, or goes so far as to consummate their holy union with an outlander is no better than one themselves. This is no longer my opinion. This is the opinion of our Lord, who spoke to me while I was on bended knee the night before Fredrika the Eluvataran would sit upon the fabric of the Burgundy Throne!" Another roar.

"It is my duty, as shepherd of this flock, to instruct you. Just as no sheep would mate with a wolf, so too must you avoid contact with any s'wit! For soon, the mongrel dogs which are polluting the Myrorian gene pool will be cast up and thrown into perdition, from whence they came and to where they will return. Only a man or woman with not only a death-wish, but a damn-wish would disobey the word of the Lord."

The sermon continued like this for 45 minutes, though Adon slept - or tried to sleep - through most of it. Afterwards, as the shepherd was showing his flock to pasture, the Catholic bartender approached him.

"That was one goddamn hell of a show," began Adon. Rarayn nodded.

"I would appreciate you do not use that language, sera."

"My apologies. But I did come here to discuss business with you, Rarayn. You will have to forgive me for trying to make small talk."

"I'm aware of how people feel about my services. But I open the minds of my congregation to the glory of the Lord as he was meant to be viewed - not through the thick haze of incense smoke and the archaic Pelagian services and the - " Adon looked away.

"I apologize. Did I offend you, my friend?"

"No, no, of course not. I attend about one mass a year, Rarayn. That's all I can handle." Adon chuckled, but Rarayn, ever the stoic, just nodded.

"Uh, you said you had business with me, Adon?"

"Yes, of course. Er, could we go somewhere more private than this?" Adon pointed at the doorway, and motion to the herd of people mingling just outside the chapel."

"Of course. Is this concerning spiritual matters?" Rarayn inquired, leading him to a pew at the front of the chapel.

"You could say that."

"What can I help you with?"

"Rarayn - " Adon looked at the white wood of the pew as he searched for words.

"As you know my family has been incorporated as a Lesser House for generations. But I am tired of it being just a coat-of-arms above my mantlepiece. This country is going to hell in a handbasket - er, excuse me - because of the outlanders on the throne."

"I've always admired that you share my views on the mongrels, Adon."

"I want House Gavayn to become something more - I want to be Serjo Adondasi Gavayn, not just a bartender from Caissontown. But I need help."

"What are you suggesting, Adon?"

"I am suggesting, sera, that you join ship as my spiritual adviser, speechwriter... consigliere, if you will."

"Consigliere?"

"Yes, consigliere. Adviser, second-in-command... haven't you seen the Godfather?"

"I don't watch many movies."

"Regardless, Rarayn - I need you for this. You're the only person I know well enough to come onboard. And while we're a tiny little Lesser House now, who knows... maybe in ten, twenty years we'll be vying for the throne."

"Vying for the throne. Listen to yourself, Adon. Bartender, artist, and now politician. You're a man of many talents, aren't you?" Rarayn joked.

"I'm being serious."

"Serious. Of course. Well Adon, listen. I can't just decide right now sitting here whether I'm going to risk my image even further jumping ship. But I'm already an excommunicate. Who knows. It's not like my image can get much worse."

Adon laughed. "I suppose you could think of it that way."

[Prydania]

5 November 1973

Fredrika I Empeurer of Myroria and all Her Dominions,
It is with a happy heart that I write to you, on this day of your coronation. It seemed for a while as if the throne, and indeed the stability of Myroria itself, was threatened by that scandal pegged to your husband. In you I am grateful to see a leader who can lead Myroria into a new, prosperous age, a leader who can serve as an example to a nation so desperately in need of one. May God grant you a peaceful, prosperous reign.
Regards,
George VII, By the Grace of God, Emperor of Inglo-Scotia, the Dominions and Realms Beyond the Seas, Defender of the Faith