36. The End

Legendia celebrated Marco’s success. He captured two large empires now. The whole west and the central province were under his rule. Battling the bad marks that Legendia bore due to its connection with the Dark Lord, it was tough for Marco to prosper. But with time, he learned to manipulate the politics and won the hearts of people. He changed the old customs that the world followed; bringing in a revolution sort. He always had new methods up his sleeve to tackle problems and always stretched his alliance with majority of the countries around the world. Kings of various countries including Olgreg would ask for his expertise with their internal situations. He emerged as the most powerful king, currently with an army of forty five thousand under his command. This was a record strength of an army controlled by any king in the past. Peter was asked to take care of the north east as the highest rank of a general. Nothing seemed to stop Legendia from prospering all over the world.

Marco married Emma and settled down in the Great Castle, with his mother for the rest of his life. Peter married a young girl called Suzan, from Rovania, with whom he fell foolishly in love with. He transformed into a romantic knight that Marco would always mock about. He would vision Peter and Suzan riding a horse in the corn field with a rose gritted in his mouth and love blossoming with every gallop. Marco would end up having laughter fits watching Peter in a straight face.

Fred’s mother and siblings were gifted a huge mansion and a royal service for lifetime as a compensation for Fred’s loyalty and bravery for his land. With every passing day, the fear of sorcery and dark magic faded away as the world progressed into peacefulness.

XXX XXX XXX XXX XXX XXX XXX XXX XXX

Marco stared at the graves upon which rested the royal clothes. Peter stood aside Marco. “Life teaches so many aspects of leading a way...”, Peter said, “This man taught just one aspect that lead to all the ways.” He said as he stared at Zimon’s grave.

Marco nodded silently.

“That aspect was love.”, Peter continued, “True love for...”

“...for his men,”, Marco completed, “love for his land, love for the world... and love for a friend... an unconditional love.”

“Indeed.”

“I am what all because of him today. He guided me to the treasures the best way he could. He taught me how to observe things and learn from it. He thought me how to be prudent when necessary. He taught me patience... he taught me to perceive the truth with a smile.”

They remained silent for a while before Peter said, “Hey, Marco... Where is Zulfain? I didn’t see him in a while.”

“Oh... he’s long gone on a vacation to the Grol Gardens. He’ll come back occasionally.”

Peter nodded, “Ok. I’ll see you around, Marco. Take care.” And he left.

Marco wanted to stay for some more time. He sat between the two graves of Zimon and Crevol. It didn’t matter whom he was calling Zimon and whom Crevol. All that he saw was that these were the strongest and the best example of friendship, so powerful that they had their graves resting by each other’s side. Marco wondered what name he could give to such a loyal friendship. His eyes looked upon the etched words, ‘William Zimon’.

“I don’t understand you, old man... not fully perhaps.”, Marco said in a low voice to the tombstone of Zimon, “How did you ever manage to be so pure at heart... not a single flaw... you failed miserably to present any wrong deed to me. This is just the thing that differentiates you from all the people who died, who are alive and are yet to come in this world. I hope I stood by your expectations. I have worked all this long with you as an inspiration and will always do. I feel your blessings around me, my lord.”

His tear dropped from his chin and on the stone of the grave.

“Yet maybe it’s beyond my intelligence to understand the goodness you encompass within yourself. All I could say is that you were the only one who understood the emotions of every man on this land, the essence of every beauty, the power of every magic, the depths of every sorrow and the heights of every happiness. I wish I could write a book about you. Maybe, I shall entitle it as... The life of a humble wizard? Or... the Emperor who lived forever!... or the story of a stoic wizard?... or how about... the story of a friendship!”

Marco smiled and put a flower each on both the graves and stood up slowly. Marco heard Emma calling out for lunch. He smiled again, “Goodbye... for now.”

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15th June, 2008

Siirt Province, Turkey

somewhere near the borders of Iraq and Turkey

An RV truck pulled up in a front of a dull fuel station. The station was in the middle of a narrow driveway in between a heavy cluster of mountains. An excavation work was being done by the foot of the mountains; their huge tractors lined up along the driveway. The RV was filled with tourists journeying from China to Germany on a six month road trip. A tall fair red cheeked man and orange hair, wearing black shades jumped down the RV.

“Aah...! My back hurts... alright folks!”, the guy shouted.

An old French lady limped over to the man, “Masseur... how long we wait?”

The guide gazed down his wrist watch, “Just another half an hour. Alright... here everybody!”, he clapped his hands together and continued in his Irish accent, “We are just an hour’s drive away from Iraq’s border. Next halt will be straight at Ankara. So let’s fill our stomachs and relieve ourselves right now. Oh and yes... a bit know-about of this place. This is called the Siirt Province with a tiny population and it comprises of mostly mountains. I forgot to mention one interesting fact when we were passing through Armenia. People during ancient times used to believe that the world started from Armenia in the south east and Georgia in the north east; Syria in the south and Black Sea in the north; Turkey, Bulgaria and Romania in the west!”, the guide chuckled, “So you know it was a happier small world back then. I wish I lived in that sort of world. I’m tired of travelling so far around the world.”

The crowd giggled at his speech. “So, you mean they didn’t know anything of the countries beyond that?”, one of them asked.

The guide removed his glasses to show his large round eyes, “Maybe! Maybe not! Who knows? And I don’t care!”

The crowd erupted in laughter again. A young kid of nine was bored and sulking around these tourists. He could hardly catch the Irish accent, he being an Indian. He quietly slipped away from the crowd and wandered into the site area of excavation. The site workers were digging a deep hole in the ground and would dump all the junk they found in a crate; highly accessible to anyone. The boy spotted just heaps of stones in the crate, on top of which was kept what looked like a very old worn out cover of a book. The boy was tempted by its distinct look in the crate and snatched it and came back to his father. The father took it from him and read out aloud, “Disclosing Dark Arts �"“

The words faded away. He followed the blank space beneath it to some more words:

W itten by

Ia win R of ldo

“Some cover of a fairy tale, Hemant... Just throw it away.”, He handed it back to the kid. Hemant shrugged and flung it into an orange bin near the footpath...