Oleander smiled at her, and he made his way back to the two of them, father and daughter. As he was almost at the door he reached out for a goose egg ruby on a plinth, then turned his foot just so, stumbling to his knees. The princess, not only beautiful but kindhearted — remarkable! — reached out to him, and her foot went over the threshold.
They were married the following week, to the fury of the king. The kingdom was happy. A hero should marry a princess. It is right and proper.
Well, now he was a prince, so what else remained for Oleander to do? He decided to grow fat, eating sumptuous delicacies and reclining under the shade of the olives as his wife slid morsel after morsel into his slack mouth. He did not understand her silent moods and resentful stares. He had won, after all. To the victor the spoils. It is right and proper.
The king never spoke to Oleander. Oleander spoke some words to one of the most ambitious of the king’s councillors, and a couple of weeks later it so happened that the king passed in his sleep — a heart problem, so the physicians said — and a councillor became Grand Counsel.
Oleander’s wife spent her time in her chambers, with her books and letters, avoiding him. Oleander, who could not read, left her alone save in the nights, when he awaited her lips and her duties.
On the sixth month of Oleander’s reign, he realised there were a number of men in the council that he hadn’t noticed before; he didn’t tend to bother himself with politics. Yet there were enough unfamiliar faces that a hint of worry began to bite at him.
He went to the Grand Counsel, who nodded, and said they were very good men, very talented, very promising, and did he know there were new delicacies from the Far Far East waiting for him?
Oleander, although he summoned the delicacies (he had begun to use a food taster), still wondered, and he thought about the days when he could have outrun any man in the land. He looked at the sugared candies, and then he pushed the platter away.
He went outside into the sun and made an agonising round of the yard, aware of all the eyes on him. The fat king, running. He used to win races, you know. Oleander struggled on.
By the end of the month he felt something like his old self again, and he could tell the guards no longer laughed at him. Some of them would run with him, and he began to best them. He began to learn about the intricacies of governing a realm, and wondered why the Grand Counsel did things that seemed perhaps not in the best interests of the country, and possibly more towards the best interests of the Grand Counsel.
He ordained a new Grand Counsel, and removed the men who had crept their way in, those responsible for ratifying the most iniquitous of statutes. He was in the process of planning out a set of most benevolent ordinances when war stormed the gates with her bristling panoply of spears and bows and battering rams.
Kingdom marched on kingdom. Oleander knew nothing of war. His own army lay in remnants around him, privatised and appropriated by false statesmen.
The neighbouring kingdom kept coming, sending out more and more men, razing villages left and right. Oleander’s home was the first to go.
War blustered at the gates. Oleander stood on the walls and looked down. The host of the adversary spread over the land for as far as the eye could see. What few guardsmen Oleander had left stood shaking, ready to run the moment the gates broke.
“Surrender, for the sake of your people,” the prince shouted to Oleander, in the tones of one born for nobility. “And for your life.”
Oleander had no choice. The gates came open, the palace traded hands. Oleander and his wife waited in the throne room.
The prince and his retinue stepped through the doors, and in a graceful flutter of skirts, Oleander’s wife rose to her feet and went to her true love‘s side. Oleander’s breath caught in his lungs. Before he could move, the prince’s guards had him by his wrists and ankles, and they stripped off his trousers and pinioned him to the ground so he lay exposed and shivering.
“You, sir,” the prince said, “are a thief.” The axe in his hand swung patiently from side to side. Oleander felt his palms grow slick. His pale and lovely wife, standing by the prince, put her arm through her love’s and said nothing.
“Now,” the prince said, “run.” He raised his heavy iron axe above his head and brought his arms down. Such a ponderous movement, such a sharp and immediate pain.
Oleander screamed a long time.
The prince’s physicians bandaged up the rest of his legs and put him on a beggar’s cart. Oleander writhed and sobbed each time the wheels bounced off the paving stones.
The queen came out through the gates, surrounded by the murmuring of her maids. She looked at him for a long moment, set the goose egg ruby on the cart next to him; the gates shut behind her retreating back.
Oleander grinned at me and pulled up his trouser legs. His legs, from the knee down, were made entirely of wood. He dropped the hems and walked around in a circle to show me how good his stride was, limp or no.
“No scampering up and down the rigging for me, though,” he said, laughing as he tapped out a little jig.
“Is that story true?” I asked doubtfully.
Oleander just smiled. “I’ve learned to read since,” he said.
***a: fix frame story. last third – the author was clearly in process of falling asleep – style: what style? f: proposition: different ending where olivar keeps his legs, since prince smashing his legs in front of his true love isn’t exceedingly romantic. olivar’s essence is running; how could he charm and smile after losing that? unless he is faking it.
