An Interview with the Halfling Prince
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Prologue
Article published in the New York Times, May 27, 1987.
MILITARY COUP SUCCESFUL IN LORISHAN
Associated Press
YIRBANDI — Democracy has fallen. Early in the morning of May 26 a small faction of military leaders headed by General Rashiv Demis Strail seized control of the south-pacific island nation’s government. The take-over culminated a long period of tension between the military leaders and the duly elected officials of the government. The Lorishi ambassador to America, Olin Dowd, expressed his deep concern for the welfare of his nation. “It is a catastrophe that the military leaders would interfere with the democratic processes of government,” he said in a press conference today. He strongly urged the United Nations Organization to put pressure on the military leaders of Lorishan to withdraw from Yirbandi and return the government to the people.
The Lorishi government just came off turbulent elections in which the incumbent president of the island state, Kain O’Brien, was re-elected for a third term with what can only be called a landslide. Immensely popular in his own country, President O’Brien seems to have made some potent enemies within the despotic military which is now trying to crush the democratic spirit that has bloomed in Lorishan almost as long as it has in the United States.
Article published in the New York Times, May 28, 1987
STRAIL PROCLAIMED KING OF LORISHAN
Associated Press
YIRBANDI — Lorishan has a new ruler. General Rashiv Demis Strail, the architect of the military coup launched on May 26, has declared himself king of Lorishan. In his inaugural address aired on Lorishi television, he spoke out strongly against what he called the corruption of the O’Brien government. He is directly quoted as having said, “The people need a strong leader to bring them out of the bondage of media politics and foolish lies of leaders preoccupied only by the desire to enrich themselves.” Strail then went on to accuse President O’Brien’s democratically elected cabinet of “running Lorishan as a strip-mine.”
Ambassador Olin Dowd, has strongly objected to the statements issued by Strail. “General Strail is living in an age long-passed, benighted, foolish, and unable to see that democracy can heal itself. It does not need the ‘help’ of small-minded control freaks who want to sway the public with their demagoguery to fulfill their need for power.”
It is rumored that General Strail and his cohorts have received substantial support for their coup from the Soviets, something that Dr. Brennan Wallace, Strail’s public spokesman, strongly denies. The issue is long from resolved, as the deposed president of the Republic of Lorishan is expected to address the United Nations assembly in New York city later this week.
King
The cold light of the south pacific fall filtered in through the windows of Rashiv Strail’s bedroom windows. He stood quietly in these wee hours of the morning trying to mentally prepare himself for the ordeal that lay ahead. Yesterday they had celebrated one year of independence from the claws of O’Brien’s despotic rule. Yesterday had been the first anniversary of his coronation as supreme monarch of the island of Lorishan. It had been a hard year, he reflected, having to deal with the die-hard democrats and the ones who wanted to remain in power at all costs. The revolution had been relatively bloodless, but the way the international press had treated it, Rashiv might have led every single member of the House of Representatives and the Senate out into Republic Square and shot them personally. There had been twenty-six killed in the whole operation, all but two on the other side, all of whom were bodyguards of the hated president of the Republic. He was not going to apologize for that.
“It was war, dammit,” he muttered under his breath, and turned back to his dresser where he picked up the golden cuff-links engraved with the Strail crest — an inheritance from his father, dead now some fourteen years. He slipped them through the button-holes of his shirt cuffs, picked up his tie, in the white, violet, and gold of the Lorishi flag, and carefully knotted it around his neck with the precision of one who had done so for a very long time. As a matter of fact, as a soldier he’d done so every morning for as long as he could remember.
He looked at the face in the mirror, the clearly Loresh lines of it, but the dark hair, dark eyes, and slight swarthiness of his skin, hinting at his paternal grandmother and his maternal grandfather’s heritage as Ishi. He was truly the Halfling Prince by blood, from noble lineage on all sides of his family. His father’s father could trace his line all the way back to the ancient Dun-Bendel rulers, as could his mother’s mother. His father’s mother’s family was once one of the princely families of Hindanit province during the Three Kingdoms and his mother’s father could not only draw a direct line back to the kings of Praditha, but even was blood related to the ancient rulers of the Indian subcontinent. Yes, he was royalty by blood and he knew it, but this world did not seem to want to recognize it. His people did, but those ones, out there, could never understand.
“Good morning, darling.” Danya’s face appeared in the mirror beside him, rounded features radiant with the freshness of her shower. Her dark brown hair glowed in the light and her soft green eyes glimmered tenderly as she looked at her husband’s reflection with genuine affection. Rashiv turned and gave her a soft peck on the lips.
“Good morning, sweetheart,” he replied.
“You were worrying again, Rashiv,” she told him evenly. That was Danya, directly to the point. That was one of the things that endeared her to him, that and the fact that he knew she was strong enough to be the wife of a soldier — and now she was queen.
“Hm,” he grunted in reply, fiddling with his tie knot, then picking up the small gold tie-pin with the crest of Lorishan on it.
“It’s the interview, isn’t it?” She always knew what was bothering him, he reflected, putting the pin in place. Twelve years of marriage would do that to a person.
“Yes,” he admitted after a moment. “I am not looking forward to this Amanda Robinette.”
“She’s American,” Danya pointed out. “It’s a very important interview. Now the Americans can finally hear what you have to say.”
“That’s precisely the problem,” Rashiv sighed, reaching up to touch the hand she’d laid on his shoulder. “The Americans could never understand. They don’t know what we’ve gone through and I see the signs that it could happen to them, too. And they don’t have a Halfling Prince.”
“That is not your worry, Rashiv,” his wife told him evenly, stepping away just slightly to make her point. “Your task is to represent yourself and what you believe to that reporter. Let the Americans do what they want with it.”
“But I have always admired them, their country, their freedom,” the king said, lowering his voice, just a note of sadness creeping in. “We modeled ours on theirs and yet now we have had to turn to this again.” He paused for a long moment. “They have forgotten the truth about where the authority comes from.”
“As has western Europe,” Danya pointed out. “Don’t try to reform the world, Rashiv,” she said seriously then. “Just work on Lorishan. That is enough.”
“You’re right as always, dear,” he replied quietly, smiled, and straightened. “By the God, it’s good that I don’t have to deal with this until after the affairs of state this morning. For once I’m looking forward to my desk in the Ministry again.” And with that he kissed her, took his jacket and headed out of his apartment to go to work.
Reporter
Amanda Robinette was what one might call the quintessential reporter. She had been a favorite of her local TV station when it came to hard-hitting news. Nothing was too dangerous, too dirty, too dark to keep her away from it. She could not be turned away from a topic once she’d dug her claws into it and it was this that had brought her to the attention of the 60 Minutes producers.
Now she was here, in Lorishan, a forgotten island nation in the south Pacific, preparing to interview an absolute monarch, a self-proclaimed autocrat who styled himself king. Everything in her liberal American upbringing rebelled against that idea, and that was precisely what had made her want this story. She wanted to expose this man for what he really was: a threat to world democracy. He was an affront to all the ideals she’d been taught about the freedom of the human being to self-determination, to the freedom of speech, to freedom, period.
“No walls,” she used to like to tell her friends, “no boundaries.”
Amanda was known to be a ruthless reporter, someone who thought very little about what she called “other people’s morals,” which was rather surprising to her friends, as she’d been brought up in a conservative Christian home, her father being a Baptist minister in Vermont. Over his protests she went to Harvard where she’d got her journalism degree and had launched herself on this very self-satisfying career. She loved the kick she got from exposing self-seeking little pricks like her father and showing them off to the world. And the best part about being in the press is that you could get away with it.
“And I’m going to do it again,” she told herself, grinning. But the smile faded as she looked over the folder of information she’d put together on Rashiv Demis Strail, Sovereign of Lorishan. There was a glossy black-and-white photo of a young officer in uniform without his hat, half-leaning towards the camera, his dark hair extremely short, his face severe, his eyes portraying a strange mingling of emotions which Amanda was unable to read. The caption made it clear that this had been taken on the day when he’d been promoted to general, at the tender age of 30. She pushed the picture aside to uncover a family candid shot of the Strail family at the beach perhaps ten years ago. A much younger Rashiv Strail smiled out, attired in a pair of loose swim-trunks, his upper body fully defined. Beside him was a striking woman in a one-piece bathing suit with a short-sleeved blouse over it, just about his size, smiling broadly into the camera, Danya Meertissi Strail, now queen of Lorishan. Two children, a girl of about six and a boy of four stood next to them, Shauna and Richard. They were a happy family it seemed, but Amanda still wondered what lurked beneath the façade. Maybe Strail beat his wife? Or had he abused his children? Maybe he’d simply neglected them and this was just a farce, kept up for the public eye?
But, no, this picture was from when he was still merely a captain in the army. Maybe things had changed. She moved that picture to the side to retrieve the newest one: a full-color glossy picture of the royal family. His highness, King Rashiv Strail, sat in a high-backed chair, face straight but eyes bright, his wife seated beside him, a glowing smile on her face. Their three children stood behind them: the lovely Shauna, now seventeen, shapely, golden-brown hair falling to her shoulders, her face and eyes open with delight and joy, her features a perfect mingling of her parents’; the serious young Prince Richard, fourteen, heir to the throne, attired in a blue suit identical to his father’s; and the youngest, Roland, a curly-haired boy of nine, smiling broadly, very much his mother’s son, one hand resting on her shoulder. The picture showed an image of a happy nuclear family, something that Amanda knew to be a lie. It was not possible for such powerful families to stay together in “normal” circumstances. The freedoms dictated by the American Constitution had to transcend the family, she believed, and the family was the last hindrance to total freedom.
She pushed the photo away with disgust and turned to the one she liked the best. It was an enlargement of Rashiv Demis Strail’s passport picture. It was by no means flattering, but he was smiling nicely and she thought that here, in this one image, she could see what he was really like: a dark, self-centered despot who was just ready to come out and destroy the world with his self-glorifying autocracy. That’s what she read in his eyes, his face, and she would show everyone that this was true. But when she put the paper down and looked at her notes from interviews with friends and foes, she found almost nothing damning against Strail. From all accounts he was the perfect soldier, a good husband, though rather distant at times, a fair father, a competent commander, a devout follower of the Loreshi indigenous religion, and now — seemingly — a compassionate ruler.
There was no denying the reforms he’d made in Lorishan had been good. The inflation rate had bottomed out in this last year. Production had increased as the state-owned factories, most appropriated from the O’Brien Industries conglomerate, were now staffed by workers who were gladly trying to “build a better tomorrow.” Crime had virtually disappeared in that year, due to first the military then later the strict police force, and it seemed no one had anything bad to say about King Rashiv. As a matter of fact, she’d had a lot of trouble finding even die-hard democrats that didn’t admire the man. What one of them had said had stuck with her especially.
“King Rashiv himself said it’s just temporary, until the country gets back on its feet,” he’d explained. “Once we have our moral, economic, and social bases back in order Lorishan will become a democracy again.” That had shocked her. If this was true then her image of Rashiv Demis was wrong.
But she wasn’t going to let any facts to the contrary influence her decisions until she met him in person. Today was that day, this very afternoon at three in the king’s personal study. And once there she would tear him limb from limb in her patented, aggressive interviewing style. She would expose him for what he really was.
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