Prologue
The lion cub strode back to take a better look at the statue. The marble eyes of the Great Lion returned the gaze. Some illusion of the falling snow on the cold marble caused the statue’s eyes to crinkle in kind amusement and the mouth to smile in benevolence. Just by gazing at this stone representation of their great leader could the citizens of Arthika fill their hearts with peace and contentment, and the cub felt no less joyful. He tried to copy the statue’s expression, crinkling his own eyes and stretching his mouth in an exaggerated smile. His fur stood on end from the strain.
He turned to his playmates sporting on the snow; they had built a snow fort and were involved in pelting one another with hastily rolled snowballs from both sides of its low walls. Still smiling, the cub turned its attention to the old fox on the granite steps of the pedestal. That wrinkled citizen had been reading a book, propping his thin back on the cold stone. Behind and above him were praises carved in honor of the greatest lion of all time. Splattered on his foot were the remnants of a stray snowball.
“Sir? Sorry.”
“I have forgiven you, my son, if there’s anything to forgive.” It was the old fox’s turn to present a smile, and he did that, a toothless copy of the cub’s.
“I, too, have thrown snowballs at the old when I was a cub like you, and not by mistake, unlike you,” the fox cackled merrily.
“How old are you, Sir?”
“Old? I am ancient, hee, hee, hee! I remember the time when the great Bherek was a cub like you. Good crops can be known by their sprouts, as the proverb rightly says.”
“Bherek?” The cub glanced at the statue, “Tell me what you know of him, Sir, please.”
By this time, the cub’s companions had begun to arrive at the foot of the statue, drawn by the promise of a story.
“It was in the second millennium AM, according to the calendar we had in those days,” began the fox, throwing his book aside.
“AM? What AM?” whispered a bear cub to his friend.
“Something like our RBW, ‘in the Reign of Bherek White,’ I guess.”
“AM is After Man,” said one big bear, who had just come up, “There was a race called humans thousands of years ago. At least, that’s what they say. And nobody knows what they looked like.”
Many adults had joined the gathering by now, and the storyteller, delighted with his large audience, stood up, the better to tell his dramatic story.
“Arthika didn’t know Bherek White then. He was just an orphan boy come to stay with his uncle at the city. The city was not as it is now; it was a time of hatred and unrest, a time of jealousy and greed, a time of all bad things. When Accerbus the Luce, with his evil designs, wanted to make the whole of Arthika his kingdom.
Accerbus was born Mritor Accerbus, a son of an overlord of the land of gray lions. Gray lion like you my son. At first, he was a nice cub, like you, but he chose his companions badly. He grew up into a young lion with a desire to control everybody and a passion to possess everything he saw. He killed his brothers and hastened the death of his father so he could become the overlord. He fought and killed his way through the ranks of his country, and eventually became its ruler. He kept his cold sword warm with the blood of those who opposed him. He then acquired neighbouring lands and became more powerful. His motto was, “Today I own as far as I can see from this hill; tomorrow I will stand on a mountain and look farther.”
The whole of Arthika was in danger of being ruled by this evil beast.
But the gods decided to send one of their own to us, the Great Lion. As an old saying goes, “When beasts descend to the level of men, the gods descend to the level of beasts.”
The old fox continued, completely capturing the minds of his audience.
A figure slipped away from the gathering, an old lion wrapped up in a dark red cloak, and walked off the gardens into the woods beyond. Being with his happy people always made the old lion as happy as them, but today the old fox had brought back memories. Memories of those innocent years when he had not known his destiny, or done anything to change the destiny of the world. When he had been just a simple village boy…
