- Drought -

For seven days now, they had come to the Royal Courts on a daily basis in the perhaps misguided hope that The Sagacious One would have spoken, only to leave dragging their feet in bitter disappointment each time. There was talk that there must be something in the constitution which outlawed this manner in which he deprived them so, but no one bothered looking it up. They merely sat and watched, enraptured, half in reverie, half in disbelief at their comparative fortune of being in his presence, an event previously unthinkable. In fact, many among the uninformed were of the firm belief that he was no more than a rural myth, for none among the riff-raff had ever seen him before (actually there was a rather elderly chap who claimed to have once dined with him, but he also believed himself to be Thaw, Lord of Frozen Thunder, and had taken to wearing his underwear on his head in recent months); a mystical creature conjured by those with overly fertile imaginations and too much time on their hands, to scare children to sleep or exploit as a marketing gimmick, as is the innately materialistic nature of Man, who somehow finds some way to make money out of every icon, building, event, and disaster (there were some down in the village who had printed The Sagacious One t-shirts and crafted The Sagacious One claymodels in the likeness of a wise, bearded, bald old man, and yet others who'd created similar merchandise for The Saggy One, depicting something much ruder). Indeed, he was held in high reverence, his legendary status placing him among the ranks normally reserved for gods and dragons and centaurs. And, unfortunately enough, trolls and ogres. But no-one articulated that. No, not if they valued their lives, at least.

He always sat behind a white screen, his silhouette illuminated by the glow of a flickering candle that never seemd to go out. He'd always been cautious to separate himself from the rest, to enshroud himself in the veil of mystery he'd worked so hard to create.

And then the unbelieveable occurred. A collective gasp broke the week of muted anticipation among the masses as the Sagacious One picked up his quill pensively and seemed to mull over his next move, seemingly finding himself in the unfamiliar territory of the writer's seat again. They looked on anxiously as he let out an "ah", in the manner of one surfacing from the depths of fascinated cogitation. He reached over to the inkpot, only to find it desert-gin-dry.