On the occasions when the prince is called away by his numberless responsibilities, and he must leave his father, Edmund makes certain that two soldiers are on hand to take over his task. The king is tractable, he goes where he is led without question. He moves when he is told to move, he stops when he is told to stop. He eats whatever is put into his hand, never seeming to taste it. I think he would eat a rock, if it were given to him. I also think he would stop eating altogether, if no one brought him food.
For long cycles, at the journey’s start, the king said nothing to anyone, not even to his son. Now, he talks almost constantly, but only to himself, never to anyone around him. Anyone that can be counted, that is. He spends a great deal of time talking to his wife— not as she is, among the dead, but as she was, when she was among the living. Our king has forsaken the present, returned to the past.
Matters grew so bad that the council begged the prince to declare himself king. Edmund rebuffed them, in one of the few times I have ever seen him lose his temper. The council members slunk away before his wrath like whipped children. Edmund is right. According to our law, the king is king until his death. But, then, the law never considered the possibility that a king might go insane. Such a thing doesn’t happen among our people.
The council members were actually reduced to coming to me (I must say that I relished the moment) and begging me to intervene with Edmund on behalf of the people. I promised to do what I could.
“Edmund, we must talk,” I said to him during one of our enforced stops, waiting while the soldiers cleared away a huge mound of rubble that blocked the path.
His face darkened, turned rebellious. I had often seen such a look when he was a youth and I had forced upon him the study of mathematics, a subject to which he never took. The look he cast me brought back such fond memories that I had to pause and recover myself before I could continue.
“Edmund,” I said, deliberately keeping my tone practical, brisk, making this a matter of common sense, “your father is ill. You must take over the leadership of the people—if only for the time being,” I said, raising my hand, forestalling his angry refusal, “until His Majesty is once more able to resume his duties.”
“You have a responsibility to the people, My Prince,” I added. “Never in the history of Kairn Telest have we been in greater danger tftan we are now. Will you abandon them, out of a false sense of duty and filiality? Would your father want you to abandon them?”
I did not mention, of course, that it was his father who had, liimself, abandoned the people. Edmund understood my implication, however. If I had spoken such words aloud, he would angrily deny them. But when they were spoken to him by his own conscience …
I saw him glance at his father, who was sitting on a rock, chatting with his past. I saw the trouble and distress on Edmund’s face, saw the guilt I knew then, that my weapon had struck home. Reluctantly, I left him alone, to let the wound rankle.
Why is it always I, who love him, who must repeatedly cause him pain? I wondered sadly, as I walked away.
At the end of that cycle, Edmund called a meeting of the people and informed them that he would be their leader, if they wanted him, but only for the time being. He would retain the title of prince. His father was still king and Edmund confidently expected his father to resume his duties as king when he was well.
The people responded to their prince with enthusiasm, their obvious love and loyalty touched him deeply. Edmund’s speech did not ease the people’s hunger, but it lifted their hearts and made the hunger easier to bear. I watched him with pride and a newfound hope in my own heart.