Etudie Perpetuity

Epilogue Izlandi

“My liege, it is an emergency!”

“It always is.”

“No, you do not understand, the monsters, they are flooding out of the forest towards the capital!” shouted the potbellied prime minister. “We have to evacuate the royal family immediately. Your concubines are already in their carriages and most of your children and grandchildren will be there soon. The army can only hold off the flood for so long. Please, you must evacuate immediately!”

Queen Kol Izlandi stared at the prime minister’s wrinkly, sweaty face. Her mouth hung a little agape. Despite all of the prime minister’s frantic cries and earnest pleas, Kol did not do anything except stare at him speechlessly and with a blank look on her face.

An explosion resounded in the distance. The sound shook Kol out of her stupor but it also let in the floodgates for the headache that she had been holding at bay with her shock. She rubbed her temple. The prime minister walked right up to her knees, and began talking about some prime ministerial authority, constitution this, parliament that. All of it made Kol’s headache worse so she raised a hand towards the prime minister’s face and pressed his lips shut. She then yanked his face towards herself, brought her clear eyes to the prime minister’s frantically rolling eyeballs, and she sighed right on his face.

“This democracy thing is nice and all,” said Kol, “but it does have its shortcomings. When minnows like you get elected, you forget to do the simplest of things. Didn’t your predecessor tell you what you’re supposed to do when the capital is under attack? Maybe we need to introduce some sort of course for new prime ministers. I’ll be the teacher. Failing my class means a smack on the head. Sound fair?”

The prime minister nodded.

“Good,” said Kol. She let go of the prime minister, letting him fall on his back.

The prime minister saw Queen Kol Izlandi get up from her chair and walk right next to him. From his position lying shamefully on the floor, he looked up at the elderly demon queen who didn’t look like her age at all, and he realized that his rapidly beating heart had quietened.

“I’ll take it from here,” said Kol as she walked out the door of her audience room. “You tell those idiots in the carriages they’re all getting a beating when I get back. If the royal family abandons the capital so easily, we’d be the laughing stock of the world! Man, you just can’t find good royals these days.”

She shook her head and walked away.

---

“They’re coming up this way!”

“Why are there so many of them, where did the vanguard go?”

“Commander Rakin got struck by a boulder. He’s been knocked cold for fifteen minutes.”

“What? Then who is next in command?”

“You, sir!”

“Me?” cried the elderly knight in resplendent armor with a golden spear in one hand. The elderly knight began sweating profusely. He lifted up his collar and cleared his throat, but the words that came out were all a stammer.

“Yes, sir. Please, give us your orders!” pleaded the young soldier with scratched up armor and muddy boots.

“I uh, don’t uh,” he said. “Well, you see. There isn’t much. I mean. I don’t know what is happening on the front lines. I couldn’t possibly…”

“The front lines collapsed when the guards saw the flood of monsters in the distance. The commander tried to rally the troops but he was struck by a boulder like I told you,” said the soldier.

The elderly knight gave the soldier a blank stare. “The forest is pretty far away. There isn’t anything but empty fields for miles. I didn’t know monsters could throw boulders that far.”

“They can’t, sir,” said the soldier. “The boulder came from our side. One of the soldier’s accidentally misfired a small catapult.”

The knight raised an eyebrow. “And the commander didn’t die?”

“No, sir. It’s probably a mild concussion. I didn’t even see a mark on the commander’s body when I ran by the infirmary,” said the soldier.

“I see,” said the knight, deadpan. He sighed. “How far are the monsters?”

“About three minutes away, sir!” said the soldier.

“I see,” repeated the knight. “Well then, soldier. It seems it is time for me to make a very difficult decision. Very difficult indeed.”

“Yes, sir!” cried the soldier, his eyes finally filling with hope.

“Go to the front lines and tell the soldiers to get into a defensive formation. Er, they know the one. I’ve forgotten the name…” said the knight.

“The human phalanx?” said the soldier.

“Yes, that’s the one,” said the knight. “Get into that and stay there. When the monsters slam into you, they’ll skewer themselves on your spears, and you won’t have to worry about a thing! The magicians can fire spells at that from behind the lines. I am sure you will be able to handle them all that way.”

“No way, sir! There are too many of them! And a bunch of them can fly! Most of them have skin too thick to pierce with spears without magical strengthening,” said the soldier.

“You don’t know that! And hey, I’m in command so you do as I say! Now go man, go! Off with you! I’ll be right behind you, I just need to uh… get my special family heirloom. It is a spear given to my ancestors by the Great Elf himself!”

The soldier’s eyes widened. “The Great Elf’s spear? The one from the legends? I thought it was lost to history!”

“No, no, it was given to my ancestors long ago. Trust me, when I come back with the Dragon’s Tweezers, these monsters won’t know what hit em!” said the knight.

“Er, I thought it was called—”

“No time for arguments man, go!”

“Right!” cried the soldier as he ran off to the front lines with a determined look on his face.

The elderly knight watched the soldier leave the hallway, staring him down with a serious look, but as soon as the soldier was gone, the knight let out a breath and slumped down against the wall.

“And what is going on here?”

“Ah, no, just thinking about the Dragon’s Tweezers! Don’t worry soldier, with the Dragon’s Tweezers, I’ll turn all of those monster’s into carcasses!” cried the knight quickly.

“Huh?” came the voice from beside the knight. “What are you talking about, man? Isn’t this the command post for the city guards? Where is the commander? Who is in charge?”

“In charge? Nobody, I’m just a servant here. Yes, sir. I will be evacuating in a moment, sir! Er, ma’am. Wait, who are you anyway? I can’t see very well in the dark.”

Snap. The torches blazed. The entire basement was filled with an orange glow and the elderly knight finally saw the owner of the voice.

“Y-your majesty! I didn’t—”

“Yeah, yeah, zip it, you useless Duke. What was the point in keeping the nobility around if you were going to run away from your duty at every opportunity. Ah, well, I suppose that doesn’t concern you anymore. Just a servant, you said?” said Queen Kol Izlandi.

“No, your majesty, I was just—”

“It’s okay. Don’t worry about it. Servants don’t have to put their lives on the line or anything. You’ll lose your rank and privileges but well, at least you won’t become monster food,” said the Queen. Kol shook her head, ignored the duke’s pleas, and snapped her fingers again.

The Queen disappeared. The torches went out. And the duke collapsed onto the ground and fainted.

---

Kol appeared on an empty battlefield. The ground was littered with footprints and fallen spears. Some soldiers seemed to have even thrown away their armor so they could retreat more easily.

Kol sighed and put a hand to her forehead. “I know we’ve been saving their necks for a while now, but did they really get this inexperienced? I have nobody to blame but myself. I know I said this the last time this happened, but the next time, I really will let them fend for themselves.”

A rush of noises filled the air as the monsters got closer. Like the soldier had said, there really were all sorts of monsters here. Flying monsters, tunneling monsters, monsters robed in flames, monsters stepping on ice, and shadows that could persist even under the afternoon sun.

“You know, I have somewhere to be tonight. If you go back to the forest now, I’ll let you all go for another decade or so. Otherwise, I’ll be forced to destroy you all and that would be pretty troubling for me. I’ll barely have enough time to beat up all those idiots in the capital who’ve let the soldiers become so green and who don’t even dare to fight for their own people! So, what do you say, can you help a girl out?” said the Queen, facing the monsters.

The mindless monsters roared and snarled and let out bloodcurdling cries.

“I thought so. Haven’t had an intelligent monster since the red star stopped dropping its tears,” said Kol, barely audible among the sounds of the monsters. “Well, that’s okay.” She leaned down and brought both hands in front of her body. “I should have enough time to slap that duke around afterward.”

A flash of light filled the open plains.

The noises of the monsters vanished, as did a whole chunk of the flood.

The other monsters froze in place. They looked at their incinerated comrades, and then at the tiny demon woman standing in front of them.

“Oh, so you do have something in those tiny heads of yours? Well, that’s great then! Oh, you’re already starting to run? Wonderful! Looks like I’ll have enough time to smack that prime minister too!”

The fields rang out with the cries of the monsters as the Queen of the Demons hounded them with her powerful spells. Most of the monster flood was eliminated, and the few stragglers that made it back to the forest would pass down their fear of the demons to their children and grandchildren instinctively. And when the passage of time eroded that fear, there would still be a few elderly monsters in the forest who would refuse to leave their dens, knowing what would await them if they crossed into the fields of the sentient beings.

Once the monsters were gone, Kol washed her hands in some water magic. She let out a sigh and looked up at the sky. It was getting pretty late in the evening. Smacking around the nobles and politicians would have to wait.

Kol snapped her fingers and disappeared.