The King's Challenge #314

PART 10

LINUS MAKAR

TKC 314

I struggle to sit. By the moment I seem to be weaker. Is it being in orbit that leeches from me my energy or has the lengthy journey through space finally caught up?

Feeling less than capable is hard to accept. Always I have been at the forefront of both action and thought. I seized the day, and now I am barely able to sit and that after a rather long ‘nap’.

I begin to suspect something else is at work here.

“Majesty, you need more rest.”

By the stars! Moravin’s voice irritates me. The man may be Brigadier-General of the Ilfin army, with the voice to match, but that tenor truly drives me insane. I feel as if the man speaks in a whisper through a megaphone and ends up sounding like a bloody foghorn. It rattles my psyche. I wish he will go away.

“A man can only sleep so much,” I snap at him. “Get me some coffee, will you?”

I do not see him, but I hear his footsteps recede, and finally I am alone. Moravin takes his duties a bit too seriously, in my opinion; ever he is around. I believe I will ask that a common soldier assume the duty of guardian in this sparse hideaway. A soldier will not dare to address his king unless invited to do so.

After a struggle and some succinct words, I lean back against the pillows, more or less in a seated position. Where is this cure Lorn keeps telling me is on the way? I begin to think my brother is lying. Perhaps there is no cure.

How fares the confrontation on the planet below? No one tells me anything, afraid bad news will set me back. Damn it, I am physically debilitated, not mentally unstable.

It is time to take up the reins again; to here and no further. I am Linus Makar and I do seize the day.