Saga Of The European King

People started coming hours before the party even started. They had all heard the news. And it didn’t even matter that Michael had thrown a big party just a few days before. In fact, it helped quite a bit. Everyone knew that Michael’s parties were awesome, and they had heard that this one would be better. People brought presents just to show how much they appreciated that this party was happening. Michael and the King personally greeted every last person who arrived and got them a seat and a drink and showed them how to get a pina colada or a hot dog. Michael’s best Jews had worked very hard for two days to get the old barns stocked full of piping hot hot dogs and ice cold pina coladas, and Michael made sure everyone who came to the party gave thanks to the guys who made it happen.

Lots of people turned up, and many had traveled a really long way to be there. There were some people from previous Sagas there. Some of them were old friends, like Axe Axewound’s family – the Royal Family of Scotland – or old enemies, like Axe Axewound’s family – the Royal Family of Scotland. Some of them were current enemies. Some gypsies showed up. The President Of The United States sent his CIA guy, Agent Cajun, to keep tabs on things. Paddy McSeparatist and Siobhan ‘O Republicanbot, from the dark and twisted shores of Ireland, came right on time. Darkness Darkhaven, the Rogue Jew, came out of his hiding place in the wilderness outside of Jerusalem and brought a cutlery set as a gift. You might think that there would be a fight, or that these guys who hated the King wouldn’t be welcome at the King’s party. That would be a wrong thing to think, because the King made these guys particularly welcome. At a party, you shouldn’t be dredging up the past and making a big deal out of stuff that came before. Part of the whole reason for this party was to get everyone to be cool to each other and not to be sad or angry or dwell too much on the past. The important thing was that there was a future and it was going to be awesome. So the King welcomed the villains just as strongly as he did the heroes, and he laughed when they acted confused. Of course, because the King’s laugh was so throaty and rich, the villains laughed too, and then they sat down by the pool and struck up really interesting conversation with great people who were wearing swimsuits and wet from the pool.

That’s not to say that the King’s real actual friends didn’t get a chance to come, or didn’t get a big welcome and a hug. Far from it. Pretty much everyone was there. Commander Flightfeather was there with his captain of the guard, wearing a funny hat. The King’s girlfriend came along, too, and she was smoking hot. Old Adventure Friends who were still alive, like Jungle Spiderweb, Feasle Girlpants and Lady Dragontail dropped by. Almost all of the monks from Mandatory Towers had flown there specially, although they weren’t allowed to drink any alcohol or look at women, so they left quite early. The Mega-Knights from the Land Of Green rode in late and the Big Rocks from the Rock Kingdom rolled over, but they didn’t really understand what was happening and one of them broke the pool at midnight.

Once everyone had arrived and had been introduced to each other (this happened naturally, in a fluid sort of way), Axe Axewound lit the big meal-fires with his flaming axe and everyone sat down for dinner. Dinner started with the most sumptuous and beautiful hot dogs available in Europe in any century, with a side order of chips or rice. After that was roasted dragon-spawn in a manticore dressing. Dessert was grated Irishwoman on a pillow of magical ice-cream. You will never have a chance to eat any of these, because of how different the world is today from when it was in Medieval times, but if anyone were to bring these foods back they would so rich many times over. That’s how good they were. Maybe today, with technology and the internet, they could clone some manticore or some purebred Irishwoman and we could get their meat in the shops. Maybe they’ll find a frozen manticore in Russia or something and they get its sperm. Maybe I’ll write a story about that. Anyway, Sally Minefield had used her rouge’s knowledge of people and socialality to calculate a seating plan for dinner that would be the best possible fit for everyone. No one was seated right near all of their friends, and there was at least one mutual acquaintance within three seats on all sides. Because of this, everyone was better friends with everyone else by the time dinner ended and it was time to rock out to the concert. Everyone took off their coats, which were collected by servants and hung up specially, and got ready to get down. They all made their way to the Jerusalem Auditorium, which was one big stage carved out of the living rock of a volcano, lit only by sparse torchlight. While people took their places, the torches went out one by one. By the time everyone had settled and quietened down a bit, they were in total blackness. Then the King came on the stage, lit by a single candle.

“My friends, you are all my friends. I love you, each and every last one of you tonight. I hope you never die. I hope you can all just be happy and warm and well-fed and awesome for the rest of all time. If I could, I would make it so this party never stops. Until I gain the power to do that, I have to rely on you all to depend on each other. Don't just be a dick to people. Do you know how much stuff there is that you don't understand? Don't not laugh at someone's funny joke because you want them to leave the room. Life's too short to waste on that. And you know what you do when someone makes a bad joke because they're trying to interact with you and they're nervous. Laugh at that too. When people make jokes, you laugh. They just want you to say that it's okay. And do you know what? Why not just say it is? I want you all to be okay to each other. And here, tonight, to make songs about this message, it’s Leonard Cohen and Burzum!”
The crowd went totally nuts. They’d only ever heard of Leonard Cohen in legend or in their dad’s CD collections. No one ever thought that he’d actually show up. Also, they were amazed that Burzum was out of jail. They asked each other if it is was true – was the master of songs about the brutal reality of life really here? But then they could see that he was, and that he was on the stage with Leonard Cohen and this giant, two-headed demon that was wreathed in black smoke. The almost panicked, but Leonard Cohen spoke to him, and his Wisdom was 20+.
“Ladies and Gentlemen of the Medieval world, you’re all such great people and it’s a pleasure to come out of retirement to give you this one last performance before I disappear forever. Over here is my good friend Burzum, who was doing hard time in a Viking prison camp for a crime he didn’t commit.”
The crowd started to rile up. Despite the fact that Erik Rage-Eater! had said quite plainly years before that the Vikings weren’t fighting Europe any longer, there were still a lot of bad feelings about the Vikings in many parts of Europe. Burzum intervened.
“Settle down guys, it’s okay. It’s not their fault. They just do things differently over there. We need to understand them. We need to share our feelings.”
At this point, Michael, the Mayor of Jerusalem, appeared on the stage with his band. They took their places carefully on the stage, and all of the musicians looked at each other. Then Michael took the centre stage.
“Just like the King said that we need to share ourselves and our good fortune with each other to build a stronger Europe.” said Michael. The crowd went nuts again, and Burzum had to lift his hand before he could speak.
“And just like Ba’al here need to learn about sharing and being a more compassionate person.” He said.
There was an ‘awww’ from the crowd, because Ba’al looked genuinely ashamed of himself. He had been acting selfishly for the past thousand years.
“You’re right. I’m going to change. Things are going to different from now on. I’m not just going to find little things that I can dominate over and correct people on whenever they bring up that one thing that I know well. I’m going to let everyone in, and it’s going to rock.”
“One, two, three, four…” said Leonard Cohen, and then they rocked. They sang the greatest song about sharing and compassion and always letting people have their say without interrupting that has ever been sung. Everyone learned something from that song and liked it, because of the poetry. Nobody found that they couldn’t get into the music and just stood around waiting for the show to end. It wasn’t like that. It was beautiful. And just then, as the song made its final chords, the sky was full of fluttering, flying shapes.
“What is that?” said one European person.
“Are those birds?!” cried another.
“Help us, Your Majesty!”
“They’ve come to finish us all!”
“This was all a big lie!”
But the birds were being led in their flight by Gadfly and Formation, and they wanted to show that they were cool with sharing and being good people, and that it wasn’t fair to hate all the birds just because Terrorthaw had summoned them from another dimension to do his evil. Leonard Cohen explained this to everyone, and they calmed down and were happy again.
“People should be nice to birds from now on,” said Burzum. And then the King appeared with his Adventure Friends and the whole lot of them sang a song about how great birds were, if you thought about it. At the end, something special happened. The spotlight went on to Colonel Glowfist, who was having trouble with his drums. The King went to go and check on his friend, but then Colonel Glowfist knocked over his drums and burped real loud. Then all of the birds that his body was still digesting after he had cast that spell a while back flew out of his mouth at top speed and went up in the sky to join Gadfly and Formation’s birds. These birds were glowing, and they were beautiful. They weren’t all chewed up and zombies like you’d expect them to be. They flew around the auditorium three times and then spoke as one, “We are free. We have merged with the magical energies inside of Colonel Glowfist. He have become aware. We know human suffering, and love. We will never serve lame people like Terrorthaw again. Colonel Glowfist, our creator, we will do anything you ask of us. Please.”
Colonel Glowfist, now on his knees, looked weakly up at the birds. He was stunned from what had happened. He slowly got up to his feet, sat back behind the drum set, threw his hands up in the air and said, “LOVE!” And then the band played an encore on their song about how great birds were, and the birds all flew off with that one thought in mind.

Some people thought that the night couldn’t get any better, but then it just did. The next song rocked so much and so hard and so long that the stage began to shake. The song was about missing your girl and love in general. Not Leonard Cohen, not Burzum, not Ba’al, not the King or his Adventure Friends, not Michael or his band even realised that the stage was shaking and weird stuff was happening. The audience was aware of it happening, but they just thought it was another awesome thing that was happening. The only person who knew for sure what was happening was Carolyn, who ran onstage clutching David, whose eyes were glowing blue again. Carolyn ran up to the King and grabbed him. He kept on playing, but looked over at her.
“What’s up?” he said.
“We’re going to find my husband!” said Carolyn, tears streaming down her face.
“Cool.” Said the King.

And then the stage was rocking so much that it took off and launched into space. Everyone in the audience did not panic or freak out or do anything weird. They had good feelings about it all. They just finished up their partying and, over the course of the next five hours, made their way home.

End Of Chapter 30