Elective School

2000 Mythsteries & Other Pithy Shorts #17

It came to pass that subjects wanted more say in reignment, especially those that didn't like the king who stayed for years and years. So they decided to try another way. They called it democracy. Each person would have a say in ruling otherbodies. And this worked well until there came so many people that the voices ran confused, almost like a towering babble.

Alas, someone started a school in which the votes could be distilled down to a very few so they would be less to count. It would keep errors away and besides the kingdom was growing crowded with otherworldly people and numbers became well more than a box could hold.

The wizards argued it would be easier to count fewer votes even with all the newly arriving fingers and toes. So they spun some numbers off to this school and partied them out. If you said you were one species, your vote counted only for that species and so on. However if you wanted to vote for a third specie it was unavailable.

Two kings, at different times, didn't get a throne because of the voting school but the real people did much want them. Not overly much, but it was more.

And mostly things moved along in that fashion until one day a bird flipped from the bush claimed to whisper in someone's ear that a particular bunch of people who lived on the other farm would toss their eyes into his cocked hat at school. And that would mean a biggish win for him even if the regular joes didn't want it.

But it came to pass that the bull did gore the other guy who although the most people liked him, didn't make the cut because his scholarship was nay'd in some sort of confusion during recess.

Lo! History would note that this all came from a bunch of newcomers to the area who paddled past much water to arrive. It would also note there was a thinning of honor.

And that's how it was in the days when a new king could hug the throne when majorly somebodies didn't set him there.


BigI, Fractal by Sue