Scarecrow Stories: The Ashen King

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“Apparently I’m taking requests now.” Flea Bag spit into the nearby potted fern before taking another drink out of his flask. Wait, is that even his flask?
“Well, fine, since so many people want to know about the history of the Scarecrow Ministry’s involvement with Cresthaven, I’ll tell you a tale about the first Minister to come here.” Flea Bag adjusted his position on the plush purple couch he was sitting on in the lobby. Many of the younger changelings at the freehold had started to follow Flea Bag around, hoping to catch one of his legendary stories or interact with his other personalities. Now a crowd of them and others was circling Flea Bag, the ones closest sitting on the ground with crossed legs in front of him.
“The first Scarecrow of Cresthaven is far more important than any old storyteller like me. He was one of the freehold’s first leaders, the King of Ashes!” The electric lamps dimmed around Flea Bag as he said the name of Cresthaven’s first Autumn King, nearby lit candles flaring up with his inflection. The crowd gasped in amazement, several little ones even jumping out of their seats.
“Now you should all know the legend that he still lives, unnaturally extending his life by taking the lives of killers, adding their life-spans and bloodlust to his own. That’s not important. What is important is how he does it. It is part of a story passed down through the Ministry since the King of Ashes mysteriously disappeared from historical records in the early twentieth century. Now, pay attention; Ministers are able to take on Roles in Stories that have been entangled by the strings of Fate. We are all taught that to keep these Stories alive they must be re-enacted, and that we gain our power by doing so. However, there are some Stories so brutal, so dark and arcane, that we are told to never Tell them. It goes against the very nature of our order to label a Story as Forbidden, and it has only happened less than a handful of times since the Ministry’s founding. I only know of one such Story, and the King of Ashes wrote it.”
Several of the children were holding each other’s hands for support, and even the adults crowding around the outer circle of listeners began to act visibly uneasy. Flea Bag seemed to be pausing for effect and hadn’t reached for “his” flash since he started his monologue. The lights around Flea Bag dimmed again, this time going completely black.
“The King of Ashes was a monster forged in the depths of Fear itself. A bloodthirsty abomination, he cared far more for crippling the minds of others than he ever did for his subjects. Some say he did so to teach the freehold how to master their fears and channel them, but such fools are attributing benevolence to a madman. It is the darkest of magics to become immortal the way he did it, and while he claimed to be a protector of the freehold he freely executed anyone who made a misstep in his presence. They say that as he walked into a room the floor beneath him would begin to bleed, the people near him becoming paralyzed without even looking at him. As he aged he knew his reign of terror could come to an end, so he tapped into the power of the Ministry’s Contracts to forge a Story where there previously wasn’t one, a Story where he played the Role of an Immortal. Now the modern-day Ministry believes that his Story won’t die because of his dark magics, that he escaped death by becoming the very Story he wrote. Were a Scarecrow to truly tell his Story and take his Role, the King of Ashes would come back to life by using the Storyteller’s body as a vessel, and his reign of terror would begin anew.”
The crowd had grown completely still. Not a movement was made and not a sound was uttered. Flea Bag stood up, stretched his back, grabbed the nearby flask, and silently walked away. When he was out of sight, the lights returned to normal, and the nearby candles blew out on their own. It took around two minutes of sitting in silence before the crowd dispersed, solemnly returning to their daily duties.
Category:Fiction