Thron: Part Three

Mog Gammoth

As the top of the hour approached, Thron sat on the high dais of the throne room, ceremonial sword and scepter resting crossed over his chest, composing himself for the coming confrontation, making his face as impassive as possible. In his head he was thrilling with mordant pleasure. The chill of the morning had passed, and long warm bars of light slanted in through the round golden windows of the Sun Tower. They illuminated not only his seat high at the top of the stairs that broadened from his feet to the floor below, but the right-hand row of the statues of kings, heroes, and sages that lined the aisle on either side. He had made Teq and Wesmer do what they could to make the lately unused room as impressive as possible at such short notice, lighting scented braziers to drive the cold and must from the great hall, but his bones still felt frozen and he noticed with displeasure the dust that lay like a mantle on the shoulders of the Morgish champions.

     No matter. He clutched the sword and scepter tighter in his hands as the great gong struck the hour, and tried to hold himself as still and imposing as the stone figures below. As the last stroke faded, unseen guards outside, by order, pulled the great entrance doors grumblingly open. After a brief hesitation the slight figure of Korm came halting in, his ridiculous furry cap in his trembling claws. He jumped as the doors shut behind him with a boom, and turned back nervously, eyes goggling at Thron sitting silently on the throne above.

     "Approach the Dais," boomed Teq from the shadows behind the high seat. Thron had to give it to the young Morg: he could get an impressive sound out of that barrel chest of his. Thron watched as Korm came creeping forward like a beetle across the chamber floor, then pause before dropping uncertainly to his knee at the bottom step. Only then did Thron move, rising without a sound to his full height. The squires stepped forward, and he handed the sword and scepter off to them, and took his black cane from Wesmer. He knew Korm would know the symbolic significance of those regalia: the scepter for official actions, the sword for punishment, and be wondering at their presence. The squires laid them on the throne, and took their place one step behind the king as Thron began slowly, deliberately, descending one ominous step at a time towards the quaking scholar below.

     Half-way down they paused by design, Teq barked "Rise!" and Korm struggled to his feet. Thron was beginning to regret his plan; his ancient body was wracked in every joint with pain, not only from this strained descent and facade of strength, but from the struggle he had had getting to the top in the first place. His right leg was burning white-hot, a vein of fire crawling through a dead log. But he was not going to show weakness before this little taddach. He took another step, inhaling deeply to cover his pain. He gazed off into the middle distance, his eyes under his craggy brows shadowed by the light overhead, refusing to look down at the uneasy Korm below him.

     They finally reached the bottom stair, and Thron let himself feel a fraction of relief. He need go no farther. "You may cover yourself," Wesmer announced in his reedy, adolescent voice, which, try as he might, was never as convincing as Teq's. Thron turned his head slightly towards the boy in calculated disapproval, and in the confusion of mixed signals Korm uncomfortably fumbled his ridiculous hat back onto his head. Thron grinned inside at the scholar's obvious insecurity about the action.

     "Master Korm," he announced, breaking his silence before the other could regain any sense of balance. "Master Korm," he went on more pleasantly. "I understand you play a good game of chess." The other gaped at him in consternation. "Come, let us enjoy a match or two, while I speak to you on a few matters of historic consequence, which have been much on my mind of late." He rapped the cane sharply on the floor. "Gentlemen! Fetch us chairs and the royal table! My councilor and I shall play!"

     "But, sir," Korm started to babble, bowing, clutching his green tunic nervously, taken aback by the unexpectedness of the invitation. "It has been some time since I last had a game! I fear my skills are rusty by now; it's been so long ... "

     "Then we shall sharpen each other's skill. I, too, have not had a good game in quite a while," Thron said firmly. This was true, but a little cunning; all his recent partners had been far below his level, honed as it was by decades of experience. Teq came bustling up behind him with the Lower Throne, an ivory chair used on less formal occasions, and the old Morg sank gratefully into its embrace. Wesmer appeared behind Korm with a fancy stool, and under the squire's persistence could not help but sit. Between the two of them, the squires carried in the ornate chess table and began setting up the delicately carved men.

     "You will forgive me, I hope, if I claim the right to play white," Thron said suavely. "If you will examine the set, I think you will see why."

     Korm blinked his brown eyes and leaned in, looking closer where the squires were busily setting the men up. The delicately carved ivory of the white pieces were made to resemble Morgs, arrayed in their appropriate garb from silver-crowned king to foot soldier, and the rooks were marvelous reproductions of the Sun Tower of Morg City itself, inlaid with pure gold. In contrast, the ebony side of the board was less detailed, more brutal, but with a sinister elegance. Ruby eyes gleamed from the Black King.

     Korm swallowed, and smiled weakly. "You have the better side, my lord. One cannot but hope that you'll win."

     "It's just the fashion of the board," Thron said carelessly. "I hope you won't play any the worse for it. I expect no less than your best effort." The last piece was now in place, and Thron waved the hovering squires away. "Leave us. Wait outside until I call." Teq and Wesmer shared a sidelong glance behind his back, then bowed, chanted "Yes, my Lord," in unison, and retreated in step to the outer waiting room.

     Once they were seated there, and safely out of earshot, Wesmer turned to Teq.

     "What about lunch?" he asked worriedly. "Do you think he wants to be told when it's lunch?"

     Teq sighed. "I don't know. I suppose we'll just have to guess." He massaged the knot on his skull he had received from the steel knob of Thron's cane last week for suggesting before the court that the tired King might wish to go to bed early. "And we'd better hope we guess right."

 

     Inside, Thron coolly moved his first pawn forward.

     "As you know, I cannot be king forever," he began. Korm looked up from the board where he had been concentrating on the move, startled.

     "My Lord ...," he started to protest, but the old king waved him to silence.

     "It is simply a fact, and we must face it. What has been bothering me ... " He watched as Korm made a timid move. "Is who should replace me when I am gone, and how he can be picked. So what I need from you is..." He swooped in and took the scholar's piece deftly, advancing a knight. "An overview of the process in the past, who has been selected and why, and so forth. As you may know, I was chosen as a war king myself, but we have had peace for two decades. If I were to pass away now ..." He hooded his eyes as Korm moved out one of his wizards. "If I were to pass away now, I fear that a peace king may be chosen, who will then almost certainly face an attack by Norda." He warily moved another pawn, then looked up straight into Korm's face. "So I'm thinking that going over some precedents might give me an idea to whom I could lend my voice, as it were, from beyond the tomb. It would be my final act to try to protect the City."

     "A very wise move, Lord," Korm said, returning the look and making a distracted move. Thron reached forward, and with a click Korm's wizard was gone. The scholar gaped at the loss of the powerful piece.

     "I look around," Thron continued evenly, "And I don't see anyone in the Great Houses that I would say had even the makings of a good warrior. What do you think, Korm?" he said, watching the younger Morg's eyes darting around the board. "What would happen if someone like, say, General Taryn was proposed for King?"

     Korm jerked his head up, eyes boggling. His long brown beard set the pieces on his side rocking on their base.

     "I... I... I do not know, Lord!" he stammered as Thron sat back, scrutinizing him over folded hands. "A Man on the throne of Morg City! There is no precedent!" He paused, mind racing. "Although I suppose ... if enough of the Great Houses supported him ... and the need was great enough ... it could not be ruled out ... " He spluttered to a stop. "I am an historian, my Lord, not a prophet, or a lawyer. Such a question is beyond me."

     Thron hooded his eyes and smiled. He had voiced his suspicions in a veiled manner and shaken the fellow up, and now Korm would know that he knew what was in the wind.

     "Ah, well," Thron sighed theatrically. "Let us go over the History then, and the members, such as we have, of the Great Houses. Perhaps we will yet find some hope there." He bent down over the board and awaited Korm's next move.

     The game went even more poorly for the scholar then, as he was kept on the hop between Thron's tactical moves and his distracting questions. Since the old Morg had no real interest in the answers, he was able to keep his attention focused on the board, taking piece after black piece from the field. Thron had lost only a handful of pawns, and Korm was down to three men, and the King was growing bored with the match. It was really all over already; he had accomplished his purpose, and there was only the easy humiliation of his opponent to be played out. His mind started trying to recapture a fugitive memory, something about his father's house and an apple orchard, and he was wondering about lunch, when his startled ears heard the word, "Check."

     He looked down, rheumy eyes wide with disbelief. Somehow the scholar had managed to tie down his superior forces in a tangle so bad that no matter where he moved his men, the king must fall. He felt the veins in his neck stick out like ropy cords, brows knitting in anger, and watched the pleased expression drain out of Korm's foolishly triumphant face. Thron's muzzle pulled back in an animal snarl, showing jagged yellow teeth, and with a bellow he grabbed the table and hurled it to the side, scattering the black and white pieces broadcast like wheat across the floor.

     For a moment, age fell from him and he was a warrior again, facing his foe. Korm backed away in terror from his berserk rage. Thron swung his cane like a club and came lunging at the scholar, the silver crown flying unheeded from his head with a clang, and it was all the poor younger Morg could do to avoid the blows that fell on either side of him, the steel head striking sparks where it hit the stone floor. Thron screamed again in frustration, and Korm turned shrieking and fled, seeking shelter behind one of the nearby statues. The old king brought the cane down blindly on the stone figure, seeking Korm's skull; there was an almighty crack, and the stick fell from Thron's stinging hands.

     Thron stood for a moment, stunned, the red mist clearing from his vision. He found himself looking into the stern stone eyes of Mog Gammoth, First King and Lawgiver of the Morg race. His blow had broken off the top of the gilded words from the Tablet of Code in his right hand. He bent down and picked up the shattered piece with trembling fingers. He read: ... HE IS THE FATHER OF ALL; THEREFORE WE ARE BROTHERS. JUSTICE IS DUE ... After a moment, Thron set the fragment gently between the feet of the statue. He bowed his head, and with slow steps walked back to the bottom of the dais. He struggled, and after a moment was able to set the game table on its feet again.

     "Come, Master Korm," he called tiredly. "I believe I owe you another game." The scholar emerged from where he was still cowering behind Mog Gammoth's pedestal and saw the king stooping, slowly gathering up the chess pieces. He approached cautiously, eyes on Thron's movements, but the fight had gone out of him. When Korm came to help him pick up the chessmen, the old Morg motioned for him to sit while he finished the task himself, setting up each piece as he found it. The last thing he took up was his crown. The silver dome was dented where it had hit the floor. He set it aside with a sigh, then sat in his ivory chair. "The first move is yours," he conceded.

     This game was almost the opposite of the first. Thron played wildly, carelessly, and every time he sensed Korm was going to make a move out of pity, he grunted and shook his head sternly. Now Thron was the distracted one, ashamed of his weakness, his rage. Even so, after a while, and with his men melting away, his fighting instincts kicked in, and he began to play furiously, hoping to at least fall without too embarrassing a loss. He was deep in the game when Teq's voice called him cautiously out of it.

     "My lord," he said quietly. "General Taryn is outside; he wishes to see you on a matter of some urgency to the City. He claims it is quite important. Shall I show him in?" Thron rubbed his aching head with one clawed hand, saying nothing, eyes on the board, but waved with the other hand for the squire to show him in. Teq retreated, and in a moment the great doors rumbled open again.

     Thron looked up. There was Taryn, approaching with youthful ease, almost swaggering up to the throne, his Morgish stooge Roth stumping along in his wake. With him were two more young humans, bumpkins by the looks of them, undistinguished except for the old-fashioned sword one carried by his side, the other by a dull battered medallion bouncing around his neck. He turned back querulously to his losing game, wondering what possible importance this motley lot could be in the face of the greater fate hanging over the white towers of Morg City.

Notes

And the story ends just where Thron's section in Goldfire takes up. I did further stories about Thron, about his younger days and adventure with Belmok in Eye of Darkness, and with a second-hand account of his death in What Grampa Did in the War. He appears as a statue of himself in The Strange Wooing of General Roth.

I based the statue of Mog Gammoth in the throne room on that drawing above, which I did while still in high school. Unusually for me, it was done in ink, and free-handed at that. The drawing is of course done as Mog (rhymes with dog) as a living, semi-divine being. The statue lacked that fiery nimbus and wasn't holding a sword by the naked blade. Mog Gammoth (sometimes written Mog-Gammoth) developed quite a bit as well over the years.

"Mog Gammoth is ‘everybody’s grampa’ (which is more or less the translation of ‘gammoth’) ... While kings (elected executives) among Morgs and the humbler office of Witnesses are obvious stand-ins for Mog himself, they are mere underlings or substitutes and liable to criticism." Mog is the Morgish equivalent of Adam, but 'in world' "there is more evidence that Mog Gammoth trod the world in the First Days than that your great-grandfather ever existed", as Belmok tells Korm at one point. And now it comes to me (as in a vision, but with more certainty) that while we have plenty of Adams, no other Morg has ever been given the name Mog, nor ever will.