Final Confessions of a Goblin Emperor 7

Chapter 6
It took three weeks for the Kiemandra College to be brought back into control. It was a shock to be brought back on our knees as the noblemen shuffled home. One by one the students who had braved the fear of war and death were given back as servants to the nobility. I was back to Enath Brashfall, slave-gladiator of the noble orgies, servant-whore of the aerial duchess, lower-than-dirt farmer’s son, the grand, hybrid, hyphenated no one. But we had sampled our own worth, we knew who and what we were and that was worth everything. It didn’t take long for conflict to emerge between the scholarship students, especially my pack of five, and the nobility. It was scarcely a month before conflict came to a head. At the center of our disagreements was the virtue of instructing common born mages in combat arts. The schools governors were adamant in their refusal to allow us professional training in the matter. We begged for duels to showcase our talent, to which they responded that the idea was out of the question, someone could get hurt. They refused to watch demonstrations because they were too busy governing. A simple oral examination on magical concepts wasn’t even entertained. We were out of options. Save one that I dreamed up while sitting in the lavatory. It was as simple as writing a letter, though the letter was sent to an entity not quite as simple, the crown.
I had almost instant results; frightful, wonderful, instant results. An imperial police force arrived about two weeks after my letter went through; they were wearing a new set of uniforms, tricolored crimson, purple, and ocean blue. They promptly ordered a full opening of all classes to all students, pretty straightforward.
A handful of new teachers joined the staff, but what of it? So what if a few of the more outspoken ones were dismissed?
It was a magical time, those last two years of school; we had everything that we wanted. I continued to fight in those gladiatorial fights, but I reaped the rewards. I had enough to dine out every week’s end and to clothe myself elegantly. I also rekindled my romance with Baron Valleysraid. What to say about my first intimate romance? We ate fine meals, all paid for out of his pocket of course. We danced slow and close to violins at expensive noble balls. He sent me roses every other week to remember him by, since we usually couldn’t meet during the week days. He was a very passionate and talented kisser, in the sack I’d rate him a seven, not terribly talented but pleasant and warm. Yes I did the deed at sixteen; I won’t have condemnation slung at me for it. It isn’t like I was going to impregnate him anyway, I wasn’t diseased or anything of that ilk, and we were very close at the time. I didn’t rush into anything, and when the sun came up I was still in his bed. I was in love. We were in love. I’ve lived through a life time of condemnation for being in love, I’ll make my final argument a good one since I have to give it. I lost so much for being what some people would call ‘queer’ or ‘broken’, when the Celestial Lord, who molds all thing made me incapable of loving a woman like I would a man. I sat through every tyrannical sermon condemning my passion as sin because I believed that god is love. God is love, his servants are not. I’ve been jeered by every red-necked farmer and day laborer who has no qualms with sleeping with everyone besides their wives, who steal copiously. But I was the guy who was screwed up in all of this, who was evil and disgusting. The priests of the Celestine say that forgiveness is only an apology away, but is it really? I want the verse pointed to that condemns me definitively, that damns innocent men to hell. Then I want to see the verse that grants instant, irrevocable pardon. The secret is that there are neither. Misinterpretations and dogma are the only things that religious pundits have to hide behind.
I will not apologize. Let the sky fall and the water rise. May the wheat shrivel in the field. Let the flesh of the children be stricken with lesions and let the mother’s milk run dry, I will not apologize!
In my lifetime I have been brutally beaten, I have been verbally assaulted, I have watched lovers die, I have been kidnapped, and I have been tortured. It has been hell. But I’ve had maybe a dozen nights with candle light, soft music, a good meal and a handsome lover who told me how beautiful and special I was. Those nights are worth everything, they’re stunning and ethereal and fleeting and the moment I apologize for them is the moment they become wrong. I have loved, there is no evil in that. So many men have led lives ruled by their worthless marriages, miserable until the day they die. There is nothing commendable in misery, there is no glory in humiliation and suffering. Why should these men who go to the tavern every night and bitch about their wives be held any higher than me who just tried to be happy. We live in a fucked up world where there is so little good, never, ever sacrifice what little happiness that can be eked out of our existences, the moment you do your life is over.

I failed to sense the darkening horizon ever looming. After the defeat of the Orcish Army at the Kiemandra College things started turning up for the humans and their allies. The Elven throne regained the ground it had lost in a matter of weeks, and an attack force was landed on the northern coast of Jillibar, the Dwarven home continent.
Orcs, goblins, Trolls, dwarves, gorgons, satyrs, minotaurs, imps, nymphs and fairies were all summarily deported from the Tri-Power homelands. I thought nothing of it at the time. Life was too good to think evil thoughts.
My friendships were good. Feiy was married on a fine spring day to, serendipity, Ichtamandor Shattersword. She had thanked Thespasian a little too soon. I attended the reception and the ceremony, which was presided over by the newly appointed Priest of Kiemandra County, Sardas Kolkas. It was, for all the shock, a beautiful ceremony. I got to be seated in the front row with Letharius, Grayllin, Lita, Iruna and Yathrina. It was a traditional wedding, bride’s family on the left, groom’s on the right. Three hymns were sung, five candles were lighted for the Sons of the Celestine, water poured on the ground to assuage the enemy of God, the Queen of the Night, and finally a calf was offered for the blessing of the new couple. It bled and died for the sake of love and the two kissed.
The reception was fun, a lot of my friends from school were there, though it was a little awkward between the two parties. On one side of the room the military entourage that was in attendance for Ichtamandor sat austerely, drinking quietly, not talking. We on the other hand carried on like it was the end of the world. I guess that’s the difference, those men had tracked through blood and gore and came out realizing how little life matters. We on the other hand were still pure and young, not covered with blood stains. The party ended and we went home. Feiy got to go to her new home, and then to her honeymoon, to receive her first married kisses, and then her first married bruises.
Other events came and went, I placed first in my class for nearly every area of instruction, save divination, transmutation, weather and necromancy, I was second in all of those to Yathrina, Iruna, Feiy and Lita respectively. But conjuration, apparition, evocation, combat, kinetics, telepathy and defensive principles were all mine. The nobility grumbled jealously, I was just proud and paid them no heed. To no surprise I soon had a dozen acceptance notes from every major sorcery college across the Tri-Power alliance. I debated on going to Vreshnak School of Sorcery in Rehyobar, the gnomish continent. But turned them down when the Imperial College of Ruda Aztar sent me a letter. I accepted and was told that my term would start in the autumn.
Letharius and I got to spend a lot of time together, Grayllin usually tagged along, though he never really gave any serious input. He was a classic example of form before function, his face could part the clouds, his mind could barely cut a sandwich. But he was better company than many. I would be lying if I said I didn’t fool about a little with him when he got particularly drunk, but I never did anything we would regret. He was a being formed of nature in its purest form. He existed merely to exist. He had a kind heart, that of a healer, which he did aspire to become. Other than doing good, he had no other aspiration, maybe that’s what we should all want to be, just good.
To my dismay I discovered that I was nursing a very powerful infatuation for Letharius during those days. It sparked and then flamed, and for the first time in my life, I knew what it meant for something to be impossible. I made sideways attempts to entice him but they all fell flat and came out as being humorous. In the end what I felt was insignificant and worthless, and if I would have said what I really felt about him our friendship would have deflated like a gauged bladder.
What can I say about unrequited love? It’s awful to picture a shoulder to lean on and then never have it. It’s agony, but that’s life.

Graduation started bearing down us as the year danced swiftly by. The campus was decorated lavishly like it was every year for the auspices of conclusion. I find it odd that we always celebrate the end of education, the end of expansion and abundance, the nourishing of the mind. We never celebrate the beginning of those kind of things. Is learning such a chore, like plowing or cleaning?
Valian Artanya graduated as valedictorian of the Engineering School. I was top Sorcerer. To much surprise Letharius graduated as first soldier in the War School. In the field of politics and the sciences thereof, a young upstart named Braxus Mespasius, an island elf of outstanding breeding, and one eye, I often wanted to ask how he lost it, but it always seemed so insensitive. I learned through the grapevine that his people had long sought independence from the Elven Empire and that he had, at the age of sixteen participated in a six thousand man coup across fourteen islands to resist the King Cinla. That only left physical sciences which were again taken by Valian.
I sent money so that my parents could come and watch. Mother had fallen ill and couldn’t make the trip, so father stayed behind to watch her and sent my siblings. My brother had become a handsome every-boy, energetic, wearing, slim from youthful frolicking. There was absolutely nothing outstanding or unique about him. The two of us were fighting the moment he got off the boat. My sister however seemed to have made up for his dryness in every possible way. She had followed in my footsteps and began instruction as a sorceress, and was only half steps behind where I was at her age. Apparently talent for sorcery ran in the family. She wore a horrible green sequin ensemble when she disembarked, and as I discovered, everything else in her wardrobe was green, with small reliefs of black and white here and there. I didn’t notice it at first, but she also had a green snake coiled around her neck.
She also talked to herself, a lot.
She was the perfect partner to go gallivanting around with. We laughed, we drank, we shot fireballs at the other children, it was just the gayest time in the world. She and Feiy hit it off right away, she hated Lita and Iruna (good for her). She and Letharius flirted a bit but who am I to grudge human nature. She had matured very early and apparently very well. She became particularly entranced with Valian, who still hung around with us every now and again. We had so much mirth and fellowship in those days.
I also had a letter sent to Thespasian, to have her installed at Kiemandra College, and a letter for Evith to be accepted into Karkinias Imperial War College. Confirmations returned almost instantaneously, it’s good to be able to throw your weight around. Thespasian’s letters were always so warm and friendly, he really liked me for some reason, perhaps I was source of fascination, how am I to know?

With two weeks left until the magnificent occasion I was invited to attend an open campus tour of Ruda Aztar College of Expanded Magical Education, and I was to meet headmistress Achvella Kiemandra herself. A reminder to my human readers that the ch makes a k in the Elven language.
I took Letharius, Feiy and Yathrina. I left Erita and Evith for a weekend with Grayllin, who I would have trusted with my life. We stayed at the Traverse Doors. It was still woody and woodsy and reeking of liquor. We had plenty of time to talk which is a treasure people don’t appreciate.
“So Feiy, where are you headed?” asked Letharius across a cup of purple liquor so big it would be better described as a trough, “What’s your plans? What’re you gonna do with your life.”
“I’m going to Nacco Alaxia in Rehyobar, haven’t I said that already?”She chirped back kindly enough, “I’m going to learn from the best weather makers in the world!”
“Well have fun with the clouds Feiy,’ said Yathrina sarcastically, “I’m headed back to the plains to assume governorship, father’s take ill lately and they’ll need a leader. Though I’ll of course have the finest tutors my budget can provide.”
“I am going to throw my lot to the good graces of the army,” giggled Letharius, face as pink as a rose, “and if I die, then I won’t need to worry about what I’ll do when I’m done!”
“Living for the moment leads to terrible regret Letharius, a single moment in time changes the stream just a little forever, for better or worse. My father used to say things like that,” Feiy was speaking again, in a very somber manner that seemed almost uncharacteristic, “It would have been his birthday today.”
“Oh Feiy, I’m sorry,” said Yathrina grabbing her hand, “You know, some believe that time doesn’t exist, many in the school of divining think so. It is a relative stream, occurring all at once. I like to think it’s true, it means that we never die, that we always exist.”
“Yuck!” said Letharius wobbling a bit, “Who wants to be endless? Life hasn’t exactly been a cake walk for all of us. Why go on?”
It was me who responded, strangely enough.
“Because of coffee at six in the morning, rose gardens by the river, because of love.”
Utter silence.
“Ha!” screeched Letharius upstarting, “Love? You of all people Enath? Love? What have you ever loved? Getting your tiddly squeezed by lonely soldiers and oversexed barons? Looking at my ass when you think I’m not looking in the shower house? I don’t think you know a thing about love… queer!” and he passed out.
The accusation hung in the air sharply, poignantly, tangible.
“Enath, don’t listen to him, he’s drunk,” covered Yathrina expertly trying to preserve peace.
I simply walked out of the room and into the night.

I just walked for the longest time. It must have been hours. Finally I had the sense to find someone I knew. I had fortunately strayed into the wealthier tier of town. I decided to visit Nestro, my boyfriend, he was in town that weekend I recalled.
It wasn’t much more than a nice townhouse once I found it. Fortunately he was home. I just realized how often I use the word fortunately. It seems my life is dictated by fortune, but whose isn’t?
He took me in happily. We did what we usually did when we met, and then we just sat up and talked for hours, him holding me.
“You know Enath,” he said, “I sometimes wonder if the whole world hates people like us.”
“Not the whole world,” I returned planting a kiss near his mouth, “just most of it.”
“I take it you heard about what happened a few days ago then?”
“I haven’t a clue.”
“Assassins, dozens of them, they attacked the palace. They were apparently under orders from Archimandrite Yeza. They were all elves.”
“I take it they were stopped.”
“Of course, they never even got near Thespasian. Karkinias killed a dozen of them at the gate, the guards got the rest. It is still unsettling. But not for much longer.”
“You sound like you know about something.”
“I shouldn’t tell you this, but hell, I love you kid. Thespasian has, eh hem, coerced, dozens of Bishops in the Celestine Church to return to the worship of the Celestine’s makers, The Lords of Fire.”
“What? The Lords of Fire? Elven paganism has been dead for centuries. What could he gain from resurrecting the old practices, the Archimandrite will crush the movement the second it starts up!”
“The old Elven Gods demand sacrifice.”
“You mean…”
“Yes, the first festival will be the grandest, and the bloodiest.”
“No more about this. I refuse to believe it.”
“Very well then no more. We all make our own worlds.”
“So… you love me?”
“You know it.”
“Then that’s all the more I need.”

The next day I met with Achvella Kiemandra face to face. It was a meeting I would never forget. I remember the cold looks all the Elves gave me as I was ushered in to the Princess’s Parlor, which she used for receptions. This practice was immediately noted, for Elves never received a person in a sitting room, they were too intimate for that. It was an almost Orcish move on her behalf, at least bizarre enough to seem like it.
The first time I saw her was interesting. She was a lovely sight. I thought Thespasian was attractive, but his sister was five times the beauty he was. She had lovely dark hair and very refined, icy features. Her clothes were promiscuous looking, lacking a midriff, and revealing a great deal of cleavage beside. A massive wheel tattoo (The Symbol for Elven Celestialism)was centered around her belly-button.
“Master Enath Brashfall!” said the Princess as she rose from her seat.
“My Lady, I am unworthy,” I returned as I did my best to be submissive.
“Rise, rise and speak beloved of the Lord. I am pleased to finally meet you, my brother spoke very highly of you.”
The way she said brother was painful, forced, chilly, and dead. It was a play word, a false act. I knew something was wrong with that woman from that moment on.
“I’m certain he flatters me, his majesty is very generous.”
“Tezpori’ian is not the flattering kind. At least from my experience.”
The archaic break between the third and fourth syllables, along with the archaic fifth syllable in Tezporian.
“I am first in my class mistress, if that counts for anything.”
“We shall see. You know, magic is a gift from the Celestine. There are men who are completely incapable of the high art. What must their lives be like without a little nonsense? A world where everything is cold and dead, where wonders surround them but they cannot partake. I can’t begin to imagine it, can you?
“I suppose not my lady. How would you like to test me?”
“I already did. While you were listening to that rant your mind was as clear as an arctic night. You have tremendous talent Lord Brashfall, enough to become an Arch-mage someday.”
“Truly? Why thank you my lady.”
“That is if you change the way you run shop a little bit.”
“I don’t grasp what you’re saying my lady.”
“Your mind is a mess. You’re ambitious but you aren’t. You think you love but you don’t. You’re a pot of focusless misdirection, spinning everywhere. What do you think being a wizard is about?”
“Magic my lady.”
“No! It is not! It is about so much more.”
“Such as?”
“Dreaming Enath. Love. Don’t be silly. Magic is a tool, not a way of life.”
“I don’t understand where you’re going with this my lady.”
“In time you will. For now, let it be known that you won’t pay a penny to my college, you are accepted fully. You will be given quarters and five chamber servants. I look forward to seeing more of you come fall.”
“Likewise my lady. I am overjoyed.”
“One last thing, what will your Major be?”
“Excuse me?”
“What sort of Sorcerer do you want to be? Do you want to be an Alchemist and make potions? Do you want to be an Evoker and make energy change its course? Do you want to be a combat mage and protect kings and destroy evil? What?”
“I guess I’ve never really thought about it.”
“Where do you see yourself? At the head of armies or locked in a tower? In a laboratory or at a desk? It’s your decision. We need to know now so I can buy your training materials.”
“I don’t really have a mind for research, but I find it difficult to decide between Evocation and Combat principles.”
“Well that’s good, because you grasp neither of them. You think slinging a fire ball makes you a Combat Mage, or heating a pot makes you an evoker. I suggest you study both.” And she laughed.
“Fair enough. I will do so my lady.”
“One area of expertise is enough.”
“My lady, I think I can handle it. After all, I have no grasp, I must improve somehow.”
“Your arrogance is worthy of reprimand, but I admire your determination. Combat Principles and Evocation, God help you Lord Brashfall, please show yourself out.”
And she waved me away. I for my part left, changed. She was right. I had no focus, no direction. I had been drifting, floating on a sea of angst and youthful idiocy. I would change that, and one day I would be an Arch-mage. I would be a man who bent space and time at my own will.
And then they would pay for what I’ve suffered through.
What had I suffered through was the question? Why did I feel wronged in some way?
They hated me, that’s why!
Who hated me?
The world, that was the answer, the whole world. They had stolen from me, they had deprived me.
Had they deprived me?
Yes, yes of course they had. Why was I raised as a servant and a hireling? I deserved jewels, after all, look at my talent.
That and I’m a homosexual.
Yes! Yes! That’s obviously the answer!
It was as I walked from the parlor that these dark thoughts over took me. I wonder at their well-spring. I have paid numerous therapists throughout my life to decode the source of my unnatural anger and all they could ever do was advise me to take time off from my work and studies and to reduce stress in my personal life. None of them knew why I felt this way, they simply told me a cure and sent me on my way. Therapists are such damn idiots.

Later that day I toured the campus. It was uneventful; mercifully, I would have had an ulcer if I had another confrontation like that one with Prinzeza Kiemandra. The campus was stark and cold, rather devoid of décor. Apparently Lady Kiemandra was a follower of the growing minimalist movement in the academic community. Art had no place in the learned world, according to them that is.
I went back to our hotel after the lifeless tour. All three of them were there and Letharius was looking very apologetic. I waved away any apologies that were to be made, after all, what are we if we can’t forgive?
It was a quick packing up and a quick leaving, yet again uneventful. I had met Achvella Kiemandra. I wish I had known the role she would play in my later life, but at the time I just thought of her as the attractive and distant headmistress.
She was a thousand times more.