Post by The Stranger on Jun 12, 2008 21:01:48 GMT -5
Aldrys sat in an alcove on the rooftops of King’s Landing. The building he sat on was a shop of some sort, an older building. The shops on either side and behind it were a full story taller, and the little shop had many chimneys, so a man able to climb up the rough stone walls between the two rows of shops in a narrow alley, work his way ten feet to the left hanging onto a crack in the building, and swing another five feet onto the slightly over-hanging ledge of the little shop could easily hide away from sight. Aldrys had only broken one wrist and twisted his ankle before he got it right, which he thought fair, considering the only way anyone could see him up here is if they’d climbed three stories onto the tops of the side buildings.
He’d left the Lannister Gala not long ago with a lot on his mind. Emptying his pockets into a small sack, he tried to organize his thoughts. Foremost was the diamond Aranya Royce wore. He didn’t even actually want the diamond. He lived on top of a shop, his only possessions were a wooden box with an assortment of clothes and a few buckets with water he filled daily in case he ever had to stay up longer than a few hours. He was not a man who needed extravagancies. He likely wouldn’t even be able to sell the diamond to a shop, or even in one of his faulty auctions. It was entirely too valuable.
But for some reason, Aldrys felt he had to pursue it. He felt so restless just thinking about that diamond, which worried him. Whenever he felt restless, he ended up doing incredibly silly things. Lying under a fur he’d recently stolen, Aldrys fell asleep.
He woke just before dawn, ate some stale bread, drank the last of his water, and dressed in the clothes he hadn’t worn in four years. Aldrys smiled at the thought of seeing his old friends again. He’d expected that the king would have the mummers troupe known as The Ship of Fools perform at the Mummers Guildhouse, but instead a well-known traveling group had been invited to perform privately for the nobility: Sheyn and the Thousand Faces.
Aldrys wore a grey shirt that buttoned in the front to the top of the high collar, though now he had it closed only up to his chest. The sleeves were long and flowing. His pants were black and loose-fitting, but cinched high on the ankle so the legs puffed out. Very comfortable, very light, and very pleasant to watch a person move in.
The Thousand Faces were staying in an inn a few blocks from the Guildhouse. Aldrys watched as a number of Guardsmen led twenty men dressed as he was out of the inn. When they were a hundred feet away, Aldrys ran to the inn door, quickly opened and slammed it, and ran after the party shouting, “Sheyn! Wait, Sheyn!”
The guards stopped everyone, turned and pointed their spears as Aldrys ran up and stopped, panting. A short, bald old man who looked carved from stone pushed his way through the other mummers, took one look at Aldrys’ face, and without hesitation shouted back, “Aldrys! Idiot boy, what were you doing?”
Aldrys leaned over, panting, then stood up. “P – piss, Sheyn. Had to take a piss.”
“PISS?!” The little man leapt forward before the guards could stop him and punched Aldrys in the stomach with all his might, knocking him to the ground. “We perform for the king and future queen, and you stay behind because you have to take a fucking piss?!” He kicked Aldrys for good measure, then turned to the guards and said, “I suspect you’ll need to search him as you did us?”
The Guardsmen’s eyes were wide, but their leader answered yes.
“Take him in some alley then, and be quick about it.” Two guards dragged Aldrys into the nearest alley and quickly stripped him, turning out all the hidden pockets in his shirt, checking his body thoroughly, allowed him to redress, and returned him. “He had nothing.”
The head Guardsman opened his mouth, but it was Sheyn who spoke. “Good! Now get in with us, idiot. Let’s go!” The mummers started marching again. None had made a sound throughout. Aldrys clutched his stomach and kept up pace, groaning. Old bastard was still strong.
They entered the Mummers Guildhouse through the back door, which was heavily guarded, and each was stripped and searched again. Then they were ushered into the preparation rooms, but Sheyn grabbed Aldrys’ shoulder. “Come with me, idiot,” he said, and led Aldrys into his private room. There was nothing in it but a small chair and a small wooden frame with a rope stretched across two beams for practicing balance on.
Sheyn sat in the chair with his back straight, his face still stern, the lines and angles of his features sharp and filled with a quiet rage. “Close the door, idiot.” His voice held nothing but spite. Aldrys turned around and did so.
When he turned back, a little old man who could only be described as grandfatherly sat in the chair, leaning back, a smile on his plump face. “You really are an idiot, you know?” he said, his voice filled with mirth. Aldrys had no control over his mouth, he was compelled to smile at his jovial old master. Pointing at his stomach he said, “And you are still stronger than any man your size should be. Why?”
Sheyn leaned forward and changed again, his face drooping and haggard, and with a voice so sorrowful it sank Aldrys’ spirits said, “You have not taken care of your uniform. It was dirty. I had to knock you over before they noticed. Don’t worry, I’ll have a new one fetched, we always carry spares. They checked our luggage and kept it locked and guarded here.”
Aldrys chuckled. “I thought it looked fine, if a little worn. I think you just miss beating me.”
Sheyn twisted his neck sharply, producing a loud crack. Now he was himself, a pleasant looking older man who usually had a trace of a grin on his face. “I do. I truly do, Aldrys. We’ve lost all but four of the old troupe since you left us. The new ones,” he groaned, “they’re pathetic. Oh, they can perform, but they can’t act to save their lives. They love the inane traditional performances, the parodies with masks and those idiotic props and outfits.”
Aldrys frowned. Sheyn hated the use of masks. Masks, fake cocks, really any sort of ridiculous prop or outfit were traditional parts of mummery. But Sheyn of the Thousand Faces was not a traditional mummer. He’d spent most of his life known by that title, performing one-man shows. He had a perfect level of control over every aspect of his body, particularly his face, and could make himself into a completely different person in the blink of an eye. Aldrys remembered he used to get sick watching him change from character to character, it seemed so unnatural. He’d never been tremendously famous because of his rejection of traditional mummery and pursuit of more serious performance, but he found a niche and prospered enough to afford to start his own troupe of fifteen like-minded men, sixteen after Aldrys had joined.
“I don’t understand. You turned me into an actor, why can’t you do the same for them?”
Sheyn stood up, giving one of his long annoyed sighs as he did, and started pacing the room. “It’s not something that can be easily taught to people who have grown up in civilized society, that’s why. When you came to me, you’d never seen a mummers show, you had no expectations, no ideas of what a person could do, could become. And yes, the fact that you were willing to believe it was natural for me to beat you every time you messed up helped a great deal, and had its attractions.”
Aldrys smiled, walked over to the suspended rope, and hopped onto it, landing on one foot. It swayed and he was forced to lean and correct himself, but then he stood firm with his other knee raised to his chest. “I need your help, Sheyn.”
“Yes you do, boy. That was a terrible job you did last night, the King’s Justice nearly caught you.”
Aldrys fell off the rope, landing hard on his back. He looked up and said, “You were there?”
“Of course. You think you’re the first person to fall on hard times and do a little theft? Really, I was only there to have fun. It’s refreshing to see the world through the eyes of a nobleman every now and then. I did relieve some Lannister woman of a rather lovely ruby necklace after I saw you fail.” He winked at Aldrys.
Through the wall, Aldrys heard a very forced-sounding cheer. The first performance had begun. Aldrys sat up and asked, “Which acts are they doing?” Sheyn had a pattern for each show, always four acts: something to make them relax, something to make them laugh, something to make them excited, and something to make them cry. Sheyn loved to manipulate the audience, toy with their emotions, bring them to a great high and then throw them to the ground before they left. Some called it twisted. Aldrys called it genius.
But Sheyn sighed and said, “None you would know, my friend. This is too serious an event. It’s a great opportunity for me, for everyone. This is the most important crowd we’ve ever performed for, and I’m afraid I had no choice but to give,” he shuddered so well it sent a tingle down Aldrys’ spine, “traditional performances.”
“What?!” Aldrys leapt up. “Bu – but why?! Do your real acts! You’ve never left a crowd dissatisfied with them, why would you do something different? All your best acts only require three or four people anyways, what’s stopping you?”
Sheyn shook his head and said, “Your heart is in the right place, Aldrys. But I can’t.” Aldrys saw tears in the old man’s eyes. “Sheack and Chennith are out of practice, they can’t give the emotion required anymore, and Darryn has been sick from the cold, we had to leave him at the inn. All I can rely on are myself and Tosh, and we simply aren’t enough. Come, let’s go and see how the children are doing.”
He lead Aldrys out of the room, to the edge of the stage, where they could see all of the mummers currently performing and most of the audience, including the king and queen-to-be surround by several layers of guards. The mummers were doing the things all traditional mummers did: prancing about with limbs flying disgustingly, making rude noises in between dialogue seemingly at random with no account for timing or situation, their masks hiding their faces and their ridiculous outfits blocking their body expressions and, worst of all, their uniforms. They were performing a parody of some ancient battle, as best as Aldrys could tell. Probably one when houses Baratheon and Lannister fought as allies, in tribute to the wedding.
The audience was not pleased. Aldrys was not surprised. After seven days of festivals and events, many looked more than ready to… “Sheyn? Why aren’t they throwing things? Look at them, they’re all ready to kill something!”
Sheyn chuckled softly. “The Kingsguard thought it best that no flying objects be allowed in the same room as the king. From what I was told by our escort as they stripped me, nearly two thousand tomatoes were confiscated.”
Aldrys grinned. “They should serve tomato juice for the king’s wedding toast.”
Sheyn’s lip twitched at that. Breaking Sheyn’s face into a twitch was the equivalent of sending a normal man into possibly deadly fits of laughter, so Aldrys felt proud. Sheyn sighed again. “Come. I can’t watch any more.”
Once they were in the room and out of earshot of the guards patrolling the backrooms, Aldrys turned on Sheyn. “You can’t do this. You are too great a man for this. You’re an actor, and those fools out there are dragging your name through shit.”
Sheyn turned sharply and punched Aldrys in the chest with such force it threw him into the wall. “And what am I to do?! I cannot risk this! I don’t have the ability to put on a proper act! Do you think I enjoy this?! Do you think I’m satisfied with… with THAT?!” He pointed in the direction of the stage, his entire body shaking with rage. The door was flung open and three guards ran in, swords drawn. “Stand down, guards. Just having a word with the boy.”
The guards looked down at Aldrys massaging his chest. “Then be quiet about it, or you’ll interrupt the performance.” They left.
Sheyn sank into the chair looking at the carpet. But there had been something. Something in his voice, that last word before the guards came in. Contempt. Aldrys stood up. “If I were to help, could you put on your real act?”
Sheyn’s eyes stayed locked on the carpet. “My real act? We haven’t performed a real act in two years, Aldrys.”
“Then do one today. Show these people what true acting is. It’s too late to make them relax, but we can still give them laughter, excitement, and tears.”
“We can’t, there’s no time to practice, no time to prepare, to re-learn lines.”
“Then we can do the improvised acts! The acts you loved, the ones that lived on the stage! What props do you still have?”
Sheyn waved his hand feebly. “You saw.”
“The real props, the serious ones, the ones we always used.”
Sheyn listed a number off items off, and a few caught Aldrys’ ear. He smiled. “Sheyn. We can do the Mock Duel.”
Sheyn’s head shot up, his eyes locked on Aldrys’. “Are you mad? No, I know that one already. Are you suicidal? The most powerful people in all the land sit in that audience, and you wish to mock them?”
Aldrys walked over to his master and friend, one of the very few people he could call that. He squatted down so their faces were a foot away from each other, and looked straight into his eyes. “You saw them out there, Sheyn. They weren’t happy. In fact, I’d say they’re damned-near riotous. But we can break them, I know we can. We can make them happy, Sheyn, even if they don’t understand what they’re feeling. People should always be happy. You and Sheack and Chennith and Darryn and Tosh, you all formed the Thousand Faces because you wanted to make people happy. Make them believe that their lives weren’t so bad, even if only for a little while. Remember the first day I was with you, and you told me I had to learn to be a perfect actor, and I asked you what you meant? Remember what you said?”
Slowly, Sheyn smiled, the wild look Aldrys remembered back in his eye. “‘A performer is a man who imitates reality. An actor is a man who creates reality. When you are a perfect actor, you will be a god.’ Go and get Tosh. You two will perform the Mock Duel.”
He’d left the Lannister Gala not long ago with a lot on his mind. Emptying his pockets into a small sack, he tried to organize his thoughts. Foremost was the diamond Aranya Royce wore. He didn’t even actually want the diamond. He lived on top of a shop, his only possessions were a wooden box with an assortment of clothes and a few buckets with water he filled daily in case he ever had to stay up longer than a few hours. He was not a man who needed extravagancies. He likely wouldn’t even be able to sell the diamond to a shop, or even in one of his faulty auctions. It was entirely too valuable.
But for some reason, Aldrys felt he had to pursue it. He felt so restless just thinking about that diamond, which worried him. Whenever he felt restless, he ended up doing incredibly silly things. Lying under a fur he’d recently stolen, Aldrys fell asleep.
He woke just before dawn, ate some stale bread, drank the last of his water, and dressed in the clothes he hadn’t worn in four years. Aldrys smiled at the thought of seeing his old friends again. He’d expected that the king would have the mummers troupe known as The Ship of Fools perform at the Mummers Guildhouse, but instead a well-known traveling group had been invited to perform privately for the nobility: Sheyn and the Thousand Faces.
Aldrys wore a grey shirt that buttoned in the front to the top of the high collar, though now he had it closed only up to his chest. The sleeves were long and flowing. His pants were black and loose-fitting, but cinched high on the ankle so the legs puffed out. Very comfortable, very light, and very pleasant to watch a person move in.
The Thousand Faces were staying in an inn a few blocks from the Guildhouse. Aldrys watched as a number of Guardsmen led twenty men dressed as he was out of the inn. When they were a hundred feet away, Aldrys ran to the inn door, quickly opened and slammed it, and ran after the party shouting, “Sheyn! Wait, Sheyn!”
The guards stopped everyone, turned and pointed their spears as Aldrys ran up and stopped, panting. A short, bald old man who looked carved from stone pushed his way through the other mummers, took one look at Aldrys’ face, and without hesitation shouted back, “Aldrys! Idiot boy, what were you doing?”
Aldrys leaned over, panting, then stood up. “P – piss, Sheyn. Had to take a piss.”
“PISS?!” The little man leapt forward before the guards could stop him and punched Aldrys in the stomach with all his might, knocking him to the ground. “We perform for the king and future queen, and you stay behind because you have to take a fucking piss?!” He kicked Aldrys for good measure, then turned to the guards and said, “I suspect you’ll need to search him as you did us?”
The Guardsmen’s eyes were wide, but their leader answered yes.
“Take him in some alley then, and be quick about it.” Two guards dragged Aldrys into the nearest alley and quickly stripped him, turning out all the hidden pockets in his shirt, checking his body thoroughly, allowed him to redress, and returned him. “He had nothing.”
The head Guardsman opened his mouth, but it was Sheyn who spoke. “Good! Now get in with us, idiot. Let’s go!” The mummers started marching again. None had made a sound throughout. Aldrys clutched his stomach and kept up pace, groaning. Old bastard was still strong.
They entered the Mummers Guildhouse through the back door, which was heavily guarded, and each was stripped and searched again. Then they were ushered into the preparation rooms, but Sheyn grabbed Aldrys’ shoulder. “Come with me, idiot,” he said, and led Aldrys into his private room. There was nothing in it but a small chair and a small wooden frame with a rope stretched across two beams for practicing balance on.
Sheyn sat in the chair with his back straight, his face still stern, the lines and angles of his features sharp and filled with a quiet rage. “Close the door, idiot.” His voice held nothing but spite. Aldrys turned around and did so.
When he turned back, a little old man who could only be described as grandfatherly sat in the chair, leaning back, a smile on his plump face. “You really are an idiot, you know?” he said, his voice filled with mirth. Aldrys had no control over his mouth, he was compelled to smile at his jovial old master. Pointing at his stomach he said, “And you are still stronger than any man your size should be. Why?”
Sheyn leaned forward and changed again, his face drooping and haggard, and with a voice so sorrowful it sank Aldrys’ spirits said, “You have not taken care of your uniform. It was dirty. I had to knock you over before they noticed. Don’t worry, I’ll have a new one fetched, we always carry spares. They checked our luggage and kept it locked and guarded here.”
Aldrys chuckled. “I thought it looked fine, if a little worn. I think you just miss beating me.”
Sheyn twisted his neck sharply, producing a loud crack. Now he was himself, a pleasant looking older man who usually had a trace of a grin on his face. “I do. I truly do, Aldrys. We’ve lost all but four of the old troupe since you left us. The new ones,” he groaned, “they’re pathetic. Oh, they can perform, but they can’t act to save their lives. They love the inane traditional performances, the parodies with masks and those idiotic props and outfits.”
Aldrys frowned. Sheyn hated the use of masks. Masks, fake cocks, really any sort of ridiculous prop or outfit were traditional parts of mummery. But Sheyn of the Thousand Faces was not a traditional mummer. He’d spent most of his life known by that title, performing one-man shows. He had a perfect level of control over every aspect of his body, particularly his face, and could make himself into a completely different person in the blink of an eye. Aldrys remembered he used to get sick watching him change from character to character, it seemed so unnatural. He’d never been tremendously famous because of his rejection of traditional mummery and pursuit of more serious performance, but he found a niche and prospered enough to afford to start his own troupe of fifteen like-minded men, sixteen after Aldrys had joined.
“I don’t understand. You turned me into an actor, why can’t you do the same for them?”
Sheyn stood up, giving one of his long annoyed sighs as he did, and started pacing the room. “It’s not something that can be easily taught to people who have grown up in civilized society, that’s why. When you came to me, you’d never seen a mummers show, you had no expectations, no ideas of what a person could do, could become. And yes, the fact that you were willing to believe it was natural for me to beat you every time you messed up helped a great deal, and had its attractions.”
Aldrys smiled, walked over to the suspended rope, and hopped onto it, landing on one foot. It swayed and he was forced to lean and correct himself, but then he stood firm with his other knee raised to his chest. “I need your help, Sheyn.”
“Yes you do, boy. That was a terrible job you did last night, the King’s Justice nearly caught you.”
Aldrys fell off the rope, landing hard on his back. He looked up and said, “You were there?”
“Of course. You think you’re the first person to fall on hard times and do a little theft? Really, I was only there to have fun. It’s refreshing to see the world through the eyes of a nobleman every now and then. I did relieve some Lannister woman of a rather lovely ruby necklace after I saw you fail.” He winked at Aldrys.
Through the wall, Aldrys heard a very forced-sounding cheer. The first performance had begun. Aldrys sat up and asked, “Which acts are they doing?” Sheyn had a pattern for each show, always four acts: something to make them relax, something to make them laugh, something to make them excited, and something to make them cry. Sheyn loved to manipulate the audience, toy with their emotions, bring them to a great high and then throw them to the ground before they left. Some called it twisted. Aldrys called it genius.
But Sheyn sighed and said, “None you would know, my friend. This is too serious an event. It’s a great opportunity for me, for everyone. This is the most important crowd we’ve ever performed for, and I’m afraid I had no choice but to give,” he shuddered so well it sent a tingle down Aldrys’ spine, “traditional performances.”
“What?!” Aldrys leapt up. “Bu – but why?! Do your real acts! You’ve never left a crowd dissatisfied with them, why would you do something different? All your best acts only require three or four people anyways, what’s stopping you?”
Sheyn shook his head and said, “Your heart is in the right place, Aldrys. But I can’t.” Aldrys saw tears in the old man’s eyes. “Sheack and Chennith are out of practice, they can’t give the emotion required anymore, and Darryn has been sick from the cold, we had to leave him at the inn. All I can rely on are myself and Tosh, and we simply aren’t enough. Come, let’s go and see how the children are doing.”
He lead Aldrys out of the room, to the edge of the stage, where they could see all of the mummers currently performing and most of the audience, including the king and queen-to-be surround by several layers of guards. The mummers were doing the things all traditional mummers did: prancing about with limbs flying disgustingly, making rude noises in between dialogue seemingly at random with no account for timing or situation, their masks hiding their faces and their ridiculous outfits blocking their body expressions and, worst of all, their uniforms. They were performing a parody of some ancient battle, as best as Aldrys could tell. Probably one when houses Baratheon and Lannister fought as allies, in tribute to the wedding.
The audience was not pleased. Aldrys was not surprised. After seven days of festivals and events, many looked more than ready to… “Sheyn? Why aren’t they throwing things? Look at them, they’re all ready to kill something!”
Sheyn chuckled softly. “The Kingsguard thought it best that no flying objects be allowed in the same room as the king. From what I was told by our escort as they stripped me, nearly two thousand tomatoes were confiscated.”
Aldrys grinned. “They should serve tomato juice for the king’s wedding toast.”
Sheyn’s lip twitched at that. Breaking Sheyn’s face into a twitch was the equivalent of sending a normal man into possibly deadly fits of laughter, so Aldrys felt proud. Sheyn sighed again. “Come. I can’t watch any more.”
Once they were in the room and out of earshot of the guards patrolling the backrooms, Aldrys turned on Sheyn. “You can’t do this. You are too great a man for this. You’re an actor, and those fools out there are dragging your name through shit.”
Sheyn turned sharply and punched Aldrys in the chest with such force it threw him into the wall. “And what am I to do?! I cannot risk this! I don’t have the ability to put on a proper act! Do you think I enjoy this?! Do you think I’m satisfied with… with THAT?!” He pointed in the direction of the stage, his entire body shaking with rage. The door was flung open and three guards ran in, swords drawn. “Stand down, guards. Just having a word with the boy.”
The guards looked down at Aldrys massaging his chest. “Then be quiet about it, or you’ll interrupt the performance.” They left.
Sheyn sank into the chair looking at the carpet. But there had been something. Something in his voice, that last word before the guards came in. Contempt. Aldrys stood up. “If I were to help, could you put on your real act?”
Sheyn’s eyes stayed locked on the carpet. “My real act? We haven’t performed a real act in two years, Aldrys.”
“Then do one today. Show these people what true acting is. It’s too late to make them relax, but we can still give them laughter, excitement, and tears.”
“We can’t, there’s no time to practice, no time to prepare, to re-learn lines.”
“Then we can do the improvised acts! The acts you loved, the ones that lived on the stage! What props do you still have?”
Sheyn waved his hand feebly. “You saw.”
“The real props, the serious ones, the ones we always used.”
Sheyn listed a number off items off, and a few caught Aldrys’ ear. He smiled. “Sheyn. We can do the Mock Duel.”
Sheyn’s head shot up, his eyes locked on Aldrys’. “Are you mad? No, I know that one already. Are you suicidal? The most powerful people in all the land sit in that audience, and you wish to mock them?”
Aldrys walked over to his master and friend, one of the very few people he could call that. He squatted down so their faces were a foot away from each other, and looked straight into his eyes. “You saw them out there, Sheyn. They weren’t happy. In fact, I’d say they’re damned-near riotous. But we can break them, I know we can. We can make them happy, Sheyn, even if they don’t understand what they’re feeling. People should always be happy. You and Sheack and Chennith and Darryn and Tosh, you all formed the Thousand Faces because you wanted to make people happy. Make them believe that their lives weren’t so bad, even if only for a little while. Remember the first day I was with you, and you told me I had to learn to be a perfect actor, and I asked you what you meant? Remember what you said?”
Slowly, Sheyn smiled, the wild look Aldrys remembered back in his eye. “‘A performer is a man who imitates reality. An actor is a man who creates reality. When you are a perfect actor, you will be a god.’ Go and get Tosh. You two will perform the Mock Duel.”