The Traitor's Heir

Chapter Seven

 In the seventh year of the rule of our Lord, King Hortrobe the Eighteenth, the fifty ninth king of the Halanta Dynasty, long may he rein, a shadow fell across the land, the likes of which, as a people, we were ill prepared. As the chief historian of the land of Hlant, which extends from the Great Sea to the far edge of the Granite Mountains, I have been given the task or recording this new danger which has befallen us, so that someday, when we have triumphed over this menace, we may look back and see the dangers that we braved in the name of our freedom from almost certain slavery.

With the mightiest army in all of the world stationed here, within our fortress made of granite, which has been formed by the earth itself and at a depth that was impenetrable by dragon fire from even the greatest of the Ancients, we felt entirely certain that our empire would stretch on and on. As long as the Great and Noble Queen of each generation was able to produce an heir worthy of the throne upon which our Great King now sits, which most certainly any heir of his noble and pure blood would undoubtedly be able to do, peace would be the rule of the day and our enemies would always run from the swords of our armies, in terror.

Because of the greatness of our kingdom, emissaries came from all across the world to pay tribute to our Wise and Kind Leader. Even from those lands that had not yet come under the shelter of our empire's protective hand came gifts to demonstrate the friendship between our countries, gems and statues and crowns that might bedeck our Great King's handsome head.

It was from one of these poor and inconsequential lands, of whose name I may not even waste the ink to write here, except to say that it is a land that lies between our empire and the borders of the barbarian lands to the north, that the traitor who was to dedicate his life to the destruction of our kingdom, sprang forth.

He came to our land as a very small child, although it is not clear whether or not he was a spy in those days, or if the evil that was surely planted in his heart when he was spawned in those forsaken lands bloomed later, while he was growing up inside of the palace.

It is with a heavy heart that I write that he grew up here, among our walls, that he played with our children and was much beloved by all. We knew not that we had a viperous snake in our midst and that when we welcomed him into our friendship we pressed his venomous fangs to our breast.

It cannot be denied that this viper rose from his lowly stature, the child of a serving girl and some vagabond, to become the cup bearer of the king. It is here that I must pause and address the rumors that have flourished in our time. It is not often that I would stoop to such common gossip, but these rumors have been written of elsewhere and so it is with my hand, as Royal Keeper of the Histories, that I must blot them out.

The Traitor Hobnar is not the half-brother of our Great and Honorable King, whatever the rumors that have been spread by that very same liar say. The Traitor has shown that he is not above using untruths to forward his cause in his quest for the throne. No one with even a drop of true royal blood could commit the atrocities which he has already inflicted upon our beloved kingdom. By his own actions he has exposed his own lies. I will now detail the history of this Traitor who, although elevated to a high and trusted position, used that position to betray the trust of our Sovereign Lord in the most despicable way.

This is the history of the Traitor Hobnar, which I have collected through much research and through investigations and interviews with people who have known him all of his days, along with accounts written in his own hand that have been collected by the King's information gatherers. I have verified the timeline contained within and am confident that it describes the exact timeline of events as they unfolded over the course of the despicable Hobnar's life.