Being a glena collector was the most sought-after job in the village. The glenas were the pomegranate-like fruits that gave the villagers the ability to turn themselves invisible. They grew on the roots of very tall trees, below ground level like potatoes. So the hardest part of the job for a glena collector was to identified the glena trees. You could only really tell by their purple tip. The problem was that those trees often reached fifty to sixty feet high. You either had to have a good eye for it, like Delys’ had, or binoculars, like Respetus had.

Delys and Respetus were the only two glena collectors. It was a two-person job because glenas could be quite heavy. Each fruit easily weighted a pound. Each tree would bare twenty to thirty fruits at a time. Since the trees were isolated, day treks for the glena collectors usually exceeded ten leagues. They had a small circuit where they had marked down the glena trees that gave fruits in the past. However the fruit bearing and gestating of the glena trees was an unknown science for the villagers. Some trees gave glenas all season round. Some gave once and not for many seasons. This made Delys and Respetus’ job a little more complicated than simply going to a rice field where the grain collectors were certain to find rice. But the job itself was easier. After finding the right glena tree that carried fruits, the only hard part was to lug the harvest home.

Delys and Respetus were not in the habit of killing themselves at the task. They took more breaks on the road that anybody else in the village. They had a good reason and Respetus was never coy about it. “You can’t fix a broken back,” he always said. Although she rarely experienced back pains, Delys could not argue with her elder because Respetus, in his ripe age of fifty, carried the bulk of glenas. Usually, Delys was on tools duty. She only ever filled up a small bag containing a maximum of six glenas. It was manageable.

The other strong advantage about the job, one that made it very valuable, was the lack of urgency. Glenas were essential to the village survival, but the villagers usually kept such large reserves that the glenas collectors were never in dire need to bring back a large harvest. They never came back empty-handed though. Delys and Respetus did not abuse the system. They knew the luck they had to have been appointed glena collectors, and they did their best to uphold their end of the bargain. In other words, they did their job well. The village had never run out of glenas.

Like for the grain collectors, the day’s topic during their long walks and numerous breaks was Mallory, especially more so since Delys was the one who found him. She had more questions for Respetus than he had answers. It was during these moments that their age difference truly showed. Respetus had two sons: Linckus and Parrus, a hunter and a grain collector. They were about Delys’ age. He was long past caring about matters of the heart, not that he didn’t hope to love again, but since the passing of his late wife, they hadn’t any potential new suitors. Everyone in the village was so much younger. He had taken an interest in Pheren when she first joined the village, and she hadn’t been immune to his charms, but the age difference was too much, it disturbed him. Plus, from the few conversations he had with Pheren that scratched deeper than the surface, he had had the impression that she was a troubled soul, wrestling with a lot of demons. After due consideration, late nights by the fire, long walks keeping quiet next to Delys, Respetus had decided that he did not want to get involved with Pheren.

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Since then, he let the matters of the heart to his young boys. And he never hid the fact that he liked Delys and that she would make a delightful daughter-in-law, if she was to take a liking into one of his boys. He never rushed the youngsters or abuse his position as partner in glena collection. If two people like each other, it will come naturally. Things were fine as they were for Respetus. Eventually, he thought one of his boys would come to his senses and see Delys for who she was: a quirky, joyful little woman. Delys had this rare quality: she never saw wrong in anybody. Whenever somebody did something unbecoming, bad, criminal, she didn’t cast blame. Instead, she got her mind racing to find external factors that could have led this person to act the way they did. Delys genuinely cared and loved people. It was no wonder she was the one who rescued the prince from his people.

Therefore, when Delys fired up a thousand questions about Mallory and Castle Bartack, Respetus just smiled meekly and dispensed a few wise words when he had the answer.

“Why do you think Mallory doesn’t want to be king? Is being king a good thing? Is this a good job?”

“You see what Gladys does: being sort of the village chief? Being king is like that except you don’t have to look after just sixteen people but thousands. It’s much harder proportionally.”

“So you’re saying… Mallory doesn’t have the shoulders for being king?”

“Probably not. Not many people have. But I feel, from what I know of the outside world, which was a long time ago now, most people would take the job nonetheless.”

“Why so?”

Respetus was thoughtful for a brief instant. He measured the potential negative impact of continuing this conversation. In the end, it deemed it safe for Delys. “Because of the advantages. Yes, the advantages. The perks.”

“Oh, you mean taking all the breaks you can, wherever you want them?”

“Yeah. Sort of. That too, I’d say. But, more to the point, it’s…” Respetus hesitated. “It’s about the perversion of power that comes free with the job.”

“What’s that?” Delys reacted to the information as if she had been told she was banned from dinner today. She didn’t know what it was, or what it was called, but she felt hurt, hurt and upset. What she felt deep in her stomach was what is commonly called: injustice.

“How can I say this? When you’re a king, there is nobody higher than you that can tell you what to do and what not to do. There is nobody to stop you when you do something wrong. This is why kings and queens are usually disliked by their own people. They sometimes do things out of measure. Things that only benefit themselves, at the detriment of their people.”

“Huh… And you think Mallory… didn’t want to do these bad things?”

“Maybe. I’ve never talked to the lad. He does seem like a good apple though.”

“Maybe he was scared of not being able to control that power?”

Respetus nodded gravely. “Maybe.”

Delys took a deep breathe and stared at her boots for a moment, kicking some dead leaves off the ground. She was taciturn, for a time, then the light came back to her rosy cheeks. Her green eyes sparkled. She raised both arms to the sky. “I must find out! I will!”