In ancient Thrace
stood Suramokas
he bore a mace
of great Zbeltiurdos
The stone fortress Revre Sbodiza stood for years weathering many regimes.
But its spirit was embodied in a big man, wise, humble, and loved by the citizenry. His name was Ramusezvas, known affectionately as Little Xander. Yet his tongue was silent as the garrison’s ranks slowly depleted over time, a rueful result of Brawn Drain.
Young Suramokas simmered over the seasons as his soldiery gave up hope and, one by one, moved on. Perhaps they were the pragmatic ones and he, the idealistic fool. For their replacements were imbeciles and cowards all, effectively rendering the fortress a useless, stony shuck.
The hubris of the new dominion left themselves unwilling to admit complicity in the downfall; instead, they pointed fingers at that last relic of the old order -- old Ramusezvas, who still roamed the ramparts wheezing without complaint.
Buzas Putras, a new order mercenary whose ruthlessness was matched only by his witlessness, took it upon himself to excise this vestige with venom most sedate.“You are no longer needed,” he told the wise one.
“You are no longer wanted,” he told the humble one.
And Little Xander found himself before the gates of Revre Sbodiza, where he gazed upward at his beloved stronghold, and crumpled to the ground on the spot. Abiit ad plures.
The villagers mourned as the body was cleansed in the Sindu Hebros and left in state for three days. As the burial feast commenced upon Skumbras Mount, Suramokas watched as some well-wishers trickled forth to offer praise and a robust transition to Zalmoxis beyond. The good man had had many acquaintances but few intimates.
A familiar face appeared upon the dais with much fanfare. He spouted purple prose and regaled the crowd with vacuous tales of camaraderie he and his ilk supposedly shared with the deceased. Suramokas felt bile and rage rise in his throat. The man speaking was Buzas Putras.
[NARRATOR VOICEOVER]: Indignities graze all men each day, and we bite our tongues and move on, lest they accrue into burdens of bitterness. But who defends the dead from the dishonour of the abject flattery by this man Putras?
Putras raised a full rhyton in an empty toast as Suramokas strode forward, his own goblet aloft, blurting out, “Epikaloúmai Zbeltiurdos kai Némesis! Dákru’ adákrua! È pîthi è ápithi!”
With a single thrust of his arm he cast the drink upon the face of Putras. The hall froze, silence hanging as liquid dribbled down his brow and chin. His countenance reddened with the Furies and pretence dissolved; everyone’s suspicions were attested that the fulsome proclamations of Putras were too good to be true.
Suramokas raised his mace above his head and let gravity guide the weapon’s heft downward until it imbedded solidly in the skull of Buzas Putras. Eyes rolling back, his jaw dropped and spine bowed. Suramokas raised his leg and planted his foot in the cur’s sternum, forcing him off the dais, toppling over and down Skumbras Mount.
ο ψεύτικος έπαινος είναι καταδικασμένος
As the sun set between the nearby peaks, a sliver of rainbow could be seen hanging in the empty tourmaline sky -- the Ouranios Arc -- a divine missive from golden-winged Iris, heralding the arrival of Little Xander into the beyond.
