the_court_of_the_crimson_king sabbie and i entered through the bright blue wrought iron doors where a rooster herald dressed in green announced me. he gave out a frog.almighty screech and the at the top of his well cultured voice announced "lady synoin the first, duchess of umbrigde and lady of the snake." i gazed around the hall, awed. the purple carpet from under my feet stretched away infront of me, around the little clumps and gatherings, wove in and out of the harrid servants to rest at the steps before the thrones. apon those glorious eddifaces built of shattered glass and birds wings sat the crimson king and the iceberg queen. he in robes of red and gold, she in white and silver. along the walls were great arched windows, open to the night air and the sounds of fountains running and streams sitting on benches of marbled moonlight. inside the courtiers shuffled and switched to music inspired by jaggered and angled archetecture and the way swallows fly and flies swallow. as my announcment slowly coiled to the rafters like the smoke from the little fire pits dotted here and there amongst the carpet like a rocks in a swirling stream, the whole congreation of flounced and flurried and feted frangipanis fell silent and turned my way. i waited, palms sweating. did i choose the right thing to wear? the right night to appear? the correct way of entrance? should i not have instead chosen to asend from a glass goblet of wine at dinner like a gently drunken genie? or maybe i should have glided in on the evening breeze? but it was too late now. i stood in the doorway in my skirt woven made from butterfly kisses, daisies and song and my singlet woven from spiderwebs and memories, my tiara of farie lights blinking erratically, twisting inside myself as i waited for the king and queen to recognise me. 011227 ... unhinged sabbie dear did you take your pills this morning? your irratic behavior is slightly disturbing. ;) 011227 ... oren It wasn't long after his casual approach to the throne, and his greeting of "Hey, Red, my main man!" that his head was lopped off. 011227 ... sabbie its nice to be able to disturb people that have (sorta) known me for years. makes me feel all warm and fuzzy. actually, i was feeling a little weird today. did it show ever so much? 011228 ... farmfishious the squishious (first a few notes.) 1. oren's version of the story is the radically abbreviated version and a slightly, should we say orwellian adaptation? well appreciated, but details, we want to know what the fuck happened in between. 2. unhinged: sabbie didn't forget to take her pills, she opened another box of lemonheads this morning. (and now to proceed...) lady synoin's forte was not the art of disguise. the butterfly kiss skirt and the faerie lights were a dead give away and she knew it, that's basically why she was twisting inside herself and the erratic glow of the tiara lights was actually symbolic of the embarrassment she was feeling as she waited for king crimson's booming voice. "lady synoin," he said, setting his goblet of malbec down on the armrest of his shattered glass and birdwing throne. "you may have dallied about the courts of phytrolia like a silver laced pygmillion, but here my fly caught expertly in the wolf spider's web, you are snared to give forth adequate explanation of your incognitious presence." "in other words," queen iceberg said, kissing a rayon cloth to sully her lipstick. "what the fuck are you doing here?" synoin was cursing inside herself making the lights of her tiara turn bright red. her cheeks turned the color of king crimson's wine and if she wasn't wearing bare feet she would have kicked the alligator in chain mail who was guarding the throne room. she just had to kick something. but, plan two was in effect, it had to be, for trying to sneak in obviously wasn't working. "your majesty," synoin said, and her tiara lights turned a tranquil blue. "i'm here to give you something." she dug her toes into the purple carpet and hoped she had something, anything worthy to present the king and queen, for to be caught in a lie was certain beheading. (thanx oren.) "well, well," king crimson said, returning the malbec to his lips. "a presentation is a far different consideration. and may i ask, what is it fair child that you parlay to the privy?" "in other words," queen iceberg said, "what the fuck do you have for us so we don't have to chop your head off?" synoin dug into the recesses of her spiderwebbed singlet and out she pulled one, single, silver, fine whistle. "what is that doing there?" she asked herself, and her tiara lights flashed one of those colors you never know what to call it, like mauve or sienna. maybe even a grey that you think looks white. all she knew was she was confused. she didn't know what to do, especially when she saw the perplexed looks on the faces of the king and queen. panicking, she simply raised it to her trembling lips and blew it with all her might. 011228 ... sabbie the sound that came out of the whistle was quiet, at first, and it's sound was pregnant with memories of ones first kiss, tender as trodden violets scenting the summer air. the courtiers shifted nervously and eyed each other askance. this kind of thing was unharmonious with the wolf spider web of court intreuige and ropes of decite they normally were tangled in. synoin blew with all her lung power until her vision started sparking. the sound grew in volume, intensity and curosity. it nosed around in corners and under lacy frills, here peering behind curtains, here peeking behind the thrones to see the lolly papers discarded there. the sound grew and grew from the whistle seed until synoin felt she might climb it to the heavens. the sound drowned all other competing for the title. the king blustered and skrangered (silently) but the queen only pursed her silver lips. the roof, unable to take the strain any longer started crumbling in places and the sound hungrily sought these out, water down a drain. unlucky courtiers, smaller than the rest, fell upward, taken by the vine of sound out of the hall entirly. and still the sound grew. it mussed hair, tore pants of the swank and utalitarian kinds and dyed the carpet colours unseeable. just as synoin felt she would collapse to the floor with breathlessness and chaos the air itself curdled from the whistles (now) shreik and formed into transparent jelly. all around her the courtiers, once so secure in their place at court were now secured by jellified sound. synoin's hands dropped to her sides and the whistle, now tarnished red from it's monumental effort, hovered, unheeded, in the sound beside her. synoin stood, projecting an isle of calm in the jellified rivers of chaos. all but her tiara, which gave her away by blinking and flashing rapidly the colours of panic- brightred,fireorange,brightred,fireorange,brightred,fireorange,brightred,fireorange... the king, in his efforts to seize synoin and secure himself the whistle was now suspended several meters above the throne in cubified jelly, which was doing nothing for his self esteme. the queen sat quite still, watching synoin through narrowed white eyes 011228 ... farmfish the happy "i'm very sorry, your highness," synoin said, finding it hard to look queen iceberg in the eye. the sound of her voice vibrated against the suspended jellified state of all around her, shimmering like the surface of a pond when the last leaf of the stubborn pin oak releases and strikes. "i didn't mean for any of this to happen." the tiara lights faded from their brightred/fireorange emergency mode to a lovely, apologetic lavender. queen iceberg continued to gaze through narrow white eyes, unmoving, silent, listening. synoin's tone entered her auditory canal like an angel with a broom, dustpan, and metal scrub brush, cleaning predatory thought, chiseling plaque from clogged arteries, even if it was the sediment of the wicked, pernicious soul. the queen resisted, for innocence was a ghost from her past that shook her awake from nightmares. she clutched the armrest of her throne, flakes of glass and birdwing falling imperceptibally to the jellified, colorless carpet. this was the enemy she never wanted to encounter and she was petrified with a fear she had previously only read about in the delapidated journals of la rouche de mort. the queen breathed in short gaps of borrowed air, as if oxygen was leaking from cracks in the jelly. yet, repose made her a statue of respect, and to all manners of appearance, she remained the formidable one, even as her inner peace crumbled like the roof above her. in her periphreal vision, she watched the whistle hovering. alarmed, she was prepared to bolt like a rabbit. composed, she could snatch it from its weakened, tarnished state. she closed her eyes only momentarily, remembering. this was the immortal whistle of bockenbea. how did it get into synoin's possession? was this an internal act of deceit? or an attack from external foes? was synoin's disguise an outer shell revealing an inner plan of treachery? or was she merely a pawn placed two steps forward on the chessboard to tempt the royals to move incorrectly? with an effort that rivaled her greatest acts of strength, reminiscent of the war of jorthasdia, she fought the phantoms of trepidation and spoke forth her statement to synoin. her voice, trembling in the caverns of her diaphragm, met battle with the highly resistant vocal chords. and what came forth shook synoin to her very core. this was queen iceberg in her finest hour. "how dare you come to the court of the crimson king, you insignificant waif!" queen iceberg shrieked. "cursed be the lips of your unjusified mouth! what you do is done with ignorance and you will pay with every drop of your unsolicitous blood!" and with a move so quick, synoin did not even notice, the queen removed a turquoise studded wand from her breast and with stiffened arm fully extended it towards her. 011229 ... oren synoin remained frozen, unable to move, as she watched the wand begin to glow. 011229 ... sabbie the wand trailed hissing and hating little green sparks as the queen waved it around her head, all the while glaring at this upstart, this little sprite of chaos that had shown the abyssian cracks in her porcelain armour. synoin watched, hands covering her mouth in horror as if she might, any second, try to take back the whistles song and undo the cransitiy around her. this wasnt the way it was supposed to turn out. the wand desended and synoin felt time bleeding from the jellified air, from the ruffled and ranious courtiers and from the king, still suspended in mid air, his mouth open as he tried to shout, his words fell unheeded and tinkling to the floor like ice. in the hall all movement slowed down, and then stopped; clockwork toys left unattended in the dark. colour bled and significance paled until all that was left was the iceberg queen and synoin. the queen, still gloroius in white and silver, stood on the dais, angry wand pointed at synoin. synoin felt the power cracking toward her, a wave of maligant hatred rolling through the air. she crouched down, feeling for the whistle without taking her eyes off the queen. suddenly, synoin screamed. her dreads writhed like snakes under the cage of her tiara which flashed white with fear. agony was now a part of her back. it felt like the skin was tearing apart. blood sheeted down her body as synoin twisted and turned in horror and pain. the queen, on the dais, kept the wand trained on synoin and smiled. synoin felt as if all the blades in the world were forcing themselves through her back. she could feel her singlet soaking up her blood, and with that the memories her blood contained. synoin shreiked once more as the pain cresended and then she fell silent. the world crashed back with all the strength of the angry ocean. the courtiers moved once more, the king fell to the floor and rolled down the steps, knocking over his favorite retainers and inventing ten king bowling at the same time. synoin's pain still tore at her back, but was suddenly lessened. synoin stood and turned her head to see wings where once she had kept her shoulder blades. the wings, far from being solid, flickered in and out as a badly tuned television. sometimes feathers, sometimes static, sometimes nothing at all. synoin looked in awe. wings. she tried to flap but, as a babe new.come to her legs has not yet learnt to walk, synoin did not even know which muscles to use. she heard a small and frightened noise from the thrones and turned. the queen, far from the assured royality regaly thrusting out the ravenous wand, was now skrunched into the furthest corner of her chair, eyes wide with shock. she was breathing rapidly, her chest rising and falling and fluttering with fear, and her head shook from side to side. far from presenting her with her finest hour, synoin had become her greatest fear. 'the prophecy' she breathed without sound. "GUARDS! GUARDS!" the queen screamed, her voice shrill and cracking with panic. the clanking of plate armour filled the hall as two of the queens personal crocodile guards jingled into the room. "SEIZE HER! THROW HER IN THE DUNGON!" the guards jingled and clanked across to synoin and as one grasped her by her arms the other took hold of her newly born wings. synoin screamed in pain and the world went away for a while. when synoin came too, she found herself curled on an uncaring stone floor in total darkness. her tiara, which had been showing nothing while she was unconcious now blinked black with fear and therefore did not serve to enlighten either her situation or her enviroment. synoin herself was illumintaed in fuzzy feeble blinking light, unfamilier to her after all this time of her tiara. she turned to see her static wings fuzzing softly in the darkness. synoin was slightly conforted and she gathered her strength to stand. 011229 ... reitoei i enter and am promptly beheaded. that bastard. 011229 ... Grievance She stood tall in herself eying forward through the darkness, of herself and that of her tiara. Her spirit connected to the tiara and her aureole grew and glowed. her head felt lifted, and her whole body, wings and all felt lifted. Her tiara had modified, and was now only the aureol, glowing whitely she could see the chaos about her, and then fainted and dreamed. synoin slept a dream of tragic_moon. "future?" she muttered. only to see that the light had only brightened as she awakened, and height seemed infinite and self containing all at once. she cried, her aureole tinged sorrow colors of grace, a deep blue grey that shined. the moon above glimmered her tears that wept in smiles. the doors of her imprisonment felt enlightened, and even the uncaring stone began to care. Her wings now shifted in graces. "should I use them?" she thought. "They were brought about by the queens rage, and my memories. What trust can I have in a gift born of conflict?" She smiled. That is the gift ultimate it whispered. And as she smiled the reflection off the cold bars of her opened imprisonment glowed in sympathy, a light blue piercing. She and all glory stepped forward. 011229 ... farmfish flapping his sticky wings synoin stood a moment longer in the pale blue light of her confusing freedom, a butterfly fresh from the chrysalis, unsure in her pausing meditation. questions swirled in her mind like moths about the porchlight of some distant farmhouse in america. the wings, born of chaotic impetus, were less painful and she was gradually learning their functional ordinance, as if instinct was a gift from their origial creator, and the dream she lavished in, on the stone floor of her captivity was a hundred years or an eternity, or she simply woke to another world altogether. yet, she had memories of ugly anger, malicious intent that had been directed at her. vague remembrances of guided visitation. where were her former clothes? she looked back past the bars... nothing. upon her hands, she was layered in words, statements of hope and possibility, sleeves of victory, a breastplate of honour, leggings of happiness, shoes of confidence. and when her wings flapped in a flurry of excitement, lifting her a few meters off the ground, she noticed that one single, feather-like object fell to the ground, but it was not as it appeared to be. contrary to her expectation, it was a thought, like fear, and she realized she was the sum total of all her emotion, the negative as well as the positive and if she was to take flight, she would have to embrace her entire being. her aureole was awash in watercolor that dripped through her dreads, down slowly across her entire body, painting her with feeling and understanding. she was spectrum. she was a pallete. the future was now the artist that would form the images she would step into, run after, jump over, dance freely with, and fly...flyflyflyflyflfy! however, the black and grey bothered her, for they were the remaining questions. they were the puzzlement and the confusion, the anxiety she could not shake. the voice of queen iceberg was still a needle in her flesh. "the prophecy?" synoin said, aloud. "who am i?" 011230 ... sabbie synoin's steps faltered. prophecy? what prophecy? how could she possibly be part of something so vast, so important as a prophecy? they didnt make prophecies ('prophei?' synoin wondered, a little dazedly) about little things. wether the milk would curdle. wether the cat was off. prophecies were big about worlds at stake, that kind of thing. synoin felt all wobbily inside, and suddenly she landed with a clunk on the floor. she looked around, confused. no, it wasnt her wings, they were still fuzzing gently behind her, surrounding her quietly with white noise. no, that wasnt it. synoin looked down and saw her feet, bare once again. her shoes of confedence had dissapeared. synoin sat down to think. well, it was true she was feeling far from confedent... ahh. she felt she understood. although she might have a breastplate of honour it had been created somehow out of her own honour, while that was sturdy her armour was strong. but if she was without honour within she would find herself lacking it without. synoin smacked the ground crossly and her wings agitatidly stirred up a little breeze. her aureole shrank in on itself. synoin was cross. what a stupid system it was! if she lost hope she would loose her clothes! she stared crossly at her legs which, she couldnt help notice, were bare also. synoin breathed deeply. she was going to have to get hold of herself. she twirled one of her dreads around her fingers, chewing thoughtfully on the end. her dreads were now a watercolour palate of hues. a memory visited her and as it made her smile she wondered at it. what the fuck was rainbow brite? what did it mean to her? she searched her mind but the though had blown away like a brightly papatterend lolly wrapper and she found she could not remember what she had been trying to recall. synoin looked at her legs. she was felling a little better and she needed some clothes back. she grinned, thinking that she would probably attract enough attention as it was, multi.hued and wing.ed without wandering around nakie as well. she thought about footwear. if it was confedence she needed, confedence she would make. she screwed up her eyes and thought hard. about bullies she had stood up to in the schoolyard. about places she had bluffed her way into. about things she had done for herself. about the fact she now had wings, and if all else failed at least she could fly her the hell out of here. synoin grinned and opened her eyes. there on her feet were great big silver boots, buckels confedently marching up the side, laces coragously criss.crossing all the way up the front, soles big and thick and clumpy. synoin stood cautiously. she stomped her feet a couple of times and grinned widely. big boots were a big boost. now to her legs. she closed her eyes and thought of her new boots. she thought of her ability to create them herself. she thought of herself, how glad she was to be her. the word 'pollyanna' floated gently in on the breeze but synoin was too busy concentraiting to hear it. she thought about her tiara and how grand it was that she still had it. synoin opened her eyes. her legs were now covered in stripey pants, blue and black, bright red and green. synoin stared ahead. so now she had her own rules, she was never more going to play by any others. she stalked down the darkened corridor never noticing the word 'lenore' written on the broken door to her empty cell. 011230 ... sabbie methinks this blathe doth get too long. turn the page to the_next_chapters_of_synoin 011230 ... freakizh and nobody's gonna talk about belew? three of a perfect pair? (great song, court of the crimson king) 011230 ... Teenage Jesus Belew hell; What about freaking ROBERT_FRIPP?!? 011231 ... freakizh yeahyeah! robert fripp too!! sorry about belew. it was the first name that popped out from my fingers. 020619 ... Machiavelli70 Definately take a hear at King_Crimson 's albums Beat Discipline Three_of_a_Perfect_Pair 040308 ... doar . 051110 what's it to you? who go blather from