
A Yuletide Night’s Tale
(As Told by an Idiot)
Once upon a time in the Kingdom
of Portishead the youngest son of the Royal Household was sent to the heavily
forested but distant Colony of George, where he was granted the title, William
Abraham, Duke of George and Lord of the Royal Hunt.
There he met and promptly
married the Princess Katherine of the neighbouring Kingdom of Nonsuch as her royal parents deemed the match
politically advantageous. As Duchess of George, she immediately took charge of
the ordering of the various ducal palaces and hunting retreats and loyally
served the Duke for many years, bearing two children and coming to be known far
and wide as the Dignified Duchess of the entire Kingdom of Portishead. In the progress of her achievements she
also cemented alliances with the neighbouring kingdom of her origin.
As the ducal pair approached
the venerable age when title succession should be considered, the Dignified
Duchess persuaded the reluctant Duke (who, though the royal succession was
already into the third generation since his appointment was determined to
continue as Lord of the Royal Hunt for further generations) to order
celebration of the annual Yuletide Festival of the Birth of the Lord of Hope in
Hunt Castle’s great festival hall.
Anointed as Chief Lady in
Waiting and Maker of the Feast (more vulgarly known by the commons as Chief
Cook and Bottle Washer) was the Duke’s elder daughter, the voluptuous Countess
Esther. The Honourable Esther, known throughout the great kingdom for her wit,
knowledge, experience in travel and commerce and sense of adventure also bore
the title of Royal Ambassador at Large for the current generation of the Royal
House.
The Countess was ably assisted
in her festival duties on the principal feast day by the beauteous Lady Sarah,
daughter of the Countess and dear to the hearts of the ducal pair. The great
Festival Hall had been gladsomely adorned for the celebration throughout with
garlands of ribbon and streamers and baubles and lights and mistletoe and
greenery and plenteous gifts under the traditional giant of the forest in its
central place.
The other guests invited for
the main feast were members of the Nonsuch Royal Family related to the Duchess
who occupied quite different outposts of that far-reaching kingdom lying
adjacent to the Duchy of George.
First in importance and close
to the heart of the Duchess was her niece, the cultured and intellectual
Princess Linda, who presided over the outpost port City of the Great White Rock
from her Castle Aerie overlooking the sea and its trade and commerce between
the Kingdom of Nonsuch and other lands across the wide ocean.
Undeterred by the fierceness of the wild winter storm, the Princess of letters,
song, painting, and arbiter of manners
and means, with firmness and resolve, joyously mounted her four wheeled
carriage, took the reins of the many harnessed horses and shouted at the wind
with glee through the long journey to heed the summons of her aunt, the
Duchess.
From nearby, only one gatepost
beyond the forested duchy border, last in importance but closest in age to the
Duchess in the Nonsuch royal house, came Prince William, Earl of Nowhere with
his beloved Countess Shirley. Somewhat non-conformist since his youth, with a
strangely mottled visage and the huge proboscis of his ancient forbears causing
him generally to be known among the people of his fiefdom as Prince Longnose,
this youngest son was not his father’s favourite, so he was granted the
appanage of the Fiefdom of Nowhere with all its vassals, peasants, rents and
incomes on the understanding that he remain in that far off outpost, far away
from the kingdom’s capital for the rest of his days. Still, before taking up
his appanage, he insisted on taking one journey abroad to seek a wife and
unlikely though it appeared, he passionately wooed and won the Lady Shirley,
heiress of the Celtic House of Banks in the course of his travels through the
Scottish moors.
Prince William and his Countess
took possession of Nowhere Manor in its protective palisades and continued there
for lo these many years devoted to each other and the needs of their forested
fiefdom. They were only too happy to partake of what they knew would be an
incomparable feast and youthful companionship to celebrate the Birth of the
Lord of Hope at Hunt Castle in deep midwinter. As befit their
octogenarian status they left the gathering early to slither across the
intervening border and just managed to stable the troika and settle in their cozy
well-lit apartments when all again went dark and they were locked quietly
within the palisades of Nowhere Manor to gaze contentedly across the snow
driven palisades by lamplight while at Hunt Castle the wassailing went on for
many hours.
The
End