Heaven Thunders the Truth

Heaven Thunders the Truth

K.J. Parker

A lot has changed in that time. The People of Heaven had fought a bitter war against an alliance of their most powerful neighbougs and had lost badly; we’d managed to patch up a sort of a peace, but it wouldn’t be long before they’d be back to finish us off. The king’s army was mostly dead; of the survivors, five regiments had crossed the northern border and kept going, until nobody knew where they were, and the king was only still alive because his three senior generals were still trying to decide which of them was going to kill him and take his place. There weren’t enough soldiers left for a civil war, so they were having to talk it through instead.

Meanwhile, the king’s illness, which he’d suffered from on and off for the last five years, had finally broken his will to resist, and he was about to save his loyal people the job. I, on the other hand, had prospered. I’d cured a plague. More to the point, I’d accurately predicted each crippling defeat, with enough circumstantial detail to convince even the most skeptical observer. I was turning away any job that didn’t interest me, and asking for (and getting) ridiculous fees for the few I condescended to take on. I think it’s fair to say I was the only doctor in the country who hadn’t messed up at some point in the war. I was universally respected, and if I’d wanted to, I could’ve chosen who was going to be the next king, and everybody would’ve accepted my decision. But I chose not to. I was, I gave them to understand, above things like that. who cared only for wisdom. And truth. Heaven no longer thundered it. I did.

Heaven Thunders the Truth. Image by Elena (Sunset in Jamaica).

So he came to see me instead; unannounced, uninvited. But he still had a bodyguard of two hundred picked veterans; I had about seventy men minding my cattle and doing odd jobs for me, but even if I’d had notice and mustered them too fight, they wouldn’t have lasted very long against the guards. So, when two guard captains burst into my cave late one night and said the king was paying me a visit I just yawned and said yes, I’d been expecting him.

He’d changed. It was a particularly unkind sort of illness. He’d swollen up like a body that’s been in the water. His arms and legs were like tree-trunks, and his body was grotesque; his head, though, was more or less the same size, which made him look ridiculous. He couldn't stand or sit, so he had to be carried on a stretcher, with trestles to rest it on. They brought him in, and I didn’t look up, « Go away, » I said. A moment or so later, I heard them filing out of the cave. Only then did I lift my head and look at him.

« Hello, uncle, » I said.

His puffed-up cheeks had almost closed his eyes; they were narrow almonds of white, glaring balefully at me. « It’s true, then, » he said.

« Oh, yes. How did you find out, by the way? Oh,» I added, because my father was standing over him. He was grinning.

« Is he still there? » asked the king.

« Yes. »

He sighed. « I can’t see him all the time, but I know he’s there, I can fell him. »

My father shrugged and pulled a face. He’s a jolly man, with a good sense of humor. I like him. I wish I’d known him.