Picturesque Landscapes
I contemplated a little and then returned to the telescope and looked for D four.
A happy town, I could see a chroma ringed blob pulling a cart full of produce. Strawberries? Cherries? Peppers? Apples?
In the early summer?
Smoke curled off of sturdy stone buildings. I could see stalls of meat, spotty figures in the streets.
Only ten miles away? How big was this kingdom?
I had a brief vision of that eyeball on the pyramid that keeps getting printed on dollar bills. That awful and pervasive triangle that accompanied every invocation of data analysis and knowledge. Today that was me. Disgusting.
I was the flock camera and my flock were happy at D four.
What was the path out? My mind thought not of victory nor of winning.
How could authority be restored to them? How could I, and especially anybody worse be prevented from this slice of damnation rendered upon sheep most willing.
I looked at the chess board.
I looked at the pawns I had sent forward.
D Four, E Five, F Four.
D four, a happy village with growing fields of corn and beans and rice and squash atop a rocky cliff overlooking a river. The little marshes of the lowland filled with a terrace or two made me wonder if they ate of the bug of the swamp, the noble crawldaddy.
E five a militant camp that seemed too small a contingent. But they made themselves bold on an evergreen speckled mountain side. Perhaps the side I could not see was more forested.
F four a grim little stone ringed dour cloister and church flew that flag of white.
The enemy pawns were much the same. D Five, a smoky Grey town among a wide stretch of leafy fields. E six, I could watch a few caterpillars of heavy infantry marching in drill. The rolling empty hill was not overgrown with summer yet. A gentle and shallow stream flowed between the two squares. I briefly watched what was likely a carriage float through a ford in the river. Horses on a ferry watched as a donkey on the far side pulled.
And I could see this and the pure black flag of my opponent at this distance through this telescope, even if not clearly. The flag of the lion was a sheet of the purest white. Or failing that a literal weave of polished silver held aloft aboard a stick.
Surrender in another world. The plain white standard, in any shape, square, circle, triangle, or hybrid of them all displayed my own anger and sovereignty in this one. Lesser entities were required to fly corruptions of the pure white flag.
Cream, yellow, offwhite, Perhaps checkered. So when a white flag gets dirty… well. It quit being mine as my dear queen had informed me more than once. A rather callous philosophy in my opinion.
So without a white flag, how did one surrender?
The laying down of arms I suppose.
Silver took too much work, and the banners of silver would corrode, which is why the White flag was preferred. But there were other options.
Platinum and its derivatives were less reactive and would look very similar while being even more impressive. If I dared to corrupt this world with my grim sciences.
I wondered if I should wake the Dove from her slumber.
My curiosity satisfied about the war at large, I returned to her, and almost kneeling beside her, I placed my hand on her shoulder.
I resisted the urge to crawl on top of her and run my hands. That wouldn’t go anywhere, I wanted to move, we had spent enough time relaxing over the last twelve hours.
Her eyes slipped open a fraction and her gentle smile made me smile.
“Did you have anything else planned for today my Dove?”
“Nothing O Lion of mine…”
Crud, I guess I’m stuck here if I don’t want to run down the mountain a maniac.
And so quick was my opponent that I watched the second move I had ever seen as the chessboard moved again.
The enemy king had castled on the king side. He had seen my knight’s aggression.
Well now I didn’t know what to do.
I turned to the chessboard.
“No!” My queen’s voice stole my focus. “Why not wait? Our opponent is defensive! Let them stew in fear.” But I heard a sliver of the same fear in her voice.
I remembered that she didn’t want to move.
And I was treating this game, my kingdom, and therefore my wife as a little toy on an airline flight.
It was right she resisted and complained.
What was happening to me?
Or better yet why was it happening?
________________________________________________________________________________
It was sunset by the time we had descended back down the trail-head. I had finished the survey too quick. Which had disappointed the Dove, she had hoped we could have an excuse to stay up the mountain longer.
But when I offered we simply keep climbing she frowned and shook her head refusing to elaborate.
It was times like this I remembered how peaceful was life celibate.
Yet still for some reason I refrained from continuing our chess game. This was bothering me, I had yielded power over myself somehow. As if trapped in some esoteric snare. My move was simple, it was going to be Bishop to the center somewhere.
But this devil queen who behaved more like a political operator than a wife….
Well I guess I had no frame of reference, perhaps all wives were political operators, this was my first and only experience with marriage.
Anyway I had to get her out of my mind before she stole my soul or something. If she hadn’t already.
But I wanted to get this process over-with.
Why had I agreed to leave that chessboard up on the mountain and thereby give her the power to summon it and dictate when our kingdom next moved?
She had been eager to see moves before…
I guess being moved her frightened her. Perhaps it’s that simple.
Very selfish of a wizard. Though I guess that’s what wizards are.
“Should we worry about bandits at night?” I asked loudly, to both the queen and the old driver who had returned for us.
“I think not!” The driver responded, “I have driven these routes for decades and those two of yesterday were the first I have seen since I was young.”
“My Lion would have frightened any locals from the trade with his mighty swings yesterday!” The dove whispered dulcet tones in my ear.
But the old man kept speaking. “These are very safe roads and mountains, the few people who live here are peaceful and do not know of crime, I think that these men are agents of some evil, perhaps your rival.”
I looked at my queen as if she might be evil.
She held my gaze. “Perhaps we could end the war quickly if we hire our own to assault our rival king!” I loved her sweet deep whisper.
How would that work? Was that a bishop threat? No black piece had threatened me yet this game, no, only the white queen threatened me on the board, My Dove.
Not that attacking me was a legal move for a white piece.
So either they were really lost, or they were agents put to rob us by my own queen. From what I knew of her, that seemed like a type of sport she would enjoy.
In all likelihood she already knew where they were from. My actions didn’t matter.
“Let me hope they were simply lost, and then I will be content.” I announced, loud enough the horses could have heard me over the clatter of the carriage and their hooves.
“hmmhmm.” mused the queen.
We entered the gatehouse of my castle, our castle, the castle I woke up in only a few days ago.
I would go interrogate that bishop, just to see what he was like I think before I moved him. If I could move him.
I needed to learn some of my queen’s magic, at least enough to summon the chessboard.