The Twelfth Sun

i ♦The Third Sun♦

            She saw a man sitting on a three legged milking stool in front of a sunflower, a cup of sun in his hand, tilting it this way and that so the reflected light poked his eyes, illuminating patches of his face a bright white. Birds chirped and cawed somewhere inside the forest-like garden which had been veiled in a thin sparkling mist, like a cool exhale against something wet, it pulsed with magical light. "Where is your king?" The girl caught herself asking, her voice carried deeply through the enclosure. All alone in this man-made paradise, the resting servant on the stool had to know, reasonably so, where she could find him. The servant did not turn to her as she'd expected. Instead, he kept moving his cup as a perhaps shy smile tugged at his lips. "My king," the servant began, keenly. "Is wondering how delicate his wife would look with petals raining down her face. If she would laugh as the flowers drowned her. And if that laugh would be enough to put him at ease, that she had forgiven him." The girl went completely still. The servant had spoken of the king's wife with such overwhelming intimacy that she had realized her mistake, too late; the servant was not a servant at all. This was the king. "Do not look surprised. I am a simple man. It is my people who have painted me with fine garments and gold." He laughed as she kneeled.

*

It had been Keyon. Dismissive toned, rein disgarding Keyon who had left her at the stables, all alone. The scurry of a small boy scratching his sandals against the cement floor, the unresponsveness as she called out to him behind the palm tree he'd just vanished behind. "Hello?" It was instead, a stable boy from the other side of the barn who answered her. 

Holding the reins of Keyon's black stallion he said, "Who are you?" And she rolled her eyes, "Couldn't you have started with a simpler question?" 

"Whats your name then?" 

And the girl sighed. It was the small boy, from behind the tree who called out so the stable boy could hear, "She's with me!" 

The stable boy bowed his head immeadiatley. "My king." And he left.

The girl craned her neck to catch a glimpse of the young boy and came closer. It was forenoon and the sun was a cool breeze fawning her pale face. King? But this boy was not Keyon. 

"Excuse me," she said, lifting her finger, hovering it in the air unsuredly as the boy inched around the tree trunk whenever she rounded it so it felt like a game of tag. "Who are you? Boy, would you mind telling me where I can find the king. Why did he call you-" 

Her words stuck in her throat as the small boy peeked his small head out behind the trunk, finally, encasing the world of her eye in small emerald green eyes specked with yellow and blue, hair falling down his ears dusty brown against a dark bronze complexion. But that wasn't what surprised her, it was the gaze which held hers, sucking her in, paralyzing her to his will, to this moment where they were meeting which made her doubt her certainty. A Boy King. But perhaps more kingly than Keyon. Ancient orbs of green floated like storm clouds inside him, he asked, no, demanded to have her seized in his vision, once he decided he wanted to be looked at, he did not take no for an answer. The boy couldnt be more than ten years old, his age spoke in the suckle round cheeks still plump with baby fat yet to be shed, but his eyes, those eyes, the girl thought, held ancient sadness, brimming with unshed tears, soft and vulnerable both like a child and an old man. He is what one would call, an old soul. If only, she knew. 

She licked her lips, she found her voice like bravery. "W-who are you?" She asked again, this time. She wanted to know.

"Yarrow." He replied. But not smoothly. Ya-Row. Ya-rr-ou. "King Yarrow." He added which made her place her hand on her hips, tilting her head so a flash of confusion cut through the young boys guarded expression. "So you are king. What about the other one?" She refused to say his name. 

"You mean Keyon?" 

She nodded, and he said, "He's king too."

She chuckled, "I've never heard of a kingdom with two kings."

Yarrow shook his head then, having spent less time with him than Keyon, she preffered this one better. "We're not two. We're twelve." 

She held her blink, looking around, craning her eyes up to the palace minarets. "Twelve? I've never heard of such a thing-"

"But you've never heard of anything before."

"What?"

"You've lost all your memories, I know. You're like a newborn baby. You're as new to life as we are... old to it."

"Old? But youre just a boy." 

He did not answer, "Keyon's my brother. We all are. Brothers I mean. We have different mothers but our father is the same."

She scoffed then, "What?" He said, drawing into himself as if she'd scared him. What a jittery boy. 

She said, hurriedly, "You dont strike me as related to that gimp. That's all." Then thought, "Why is your father not the sole king, I apologize I'm trying to see how twelve kings, not princes then?"

He shook his head, "I'll take you to the king, the real king."

"Your father?"

He hesitated again, about to subvert the question before thinking better of it, curiosity is a fickle thing. Left unchecked it can lead one through dangerous doors. Was she fickle? Where did she come from? How did she break the curse? These were all questions swirling inside Yarrow as he took a step forward about to lead her inside. From in front of her, he said, so she couldnt see his sunken face, "My father is incapable to meet you."

"Oh, I see. I apologize. I didn't know he had died."

He shook his head then, turning his face towards her, the sun in his eyes.

"He's still alive." He said and did not elaborate, thinking as he crossed the threshold.

There are things wore than death.