It was one of those hot dry afternoons so typical of the Pirakteshi Summer. The fetid river Szerkia wound in ruffled slow curves through the scorched desert towards the city. Gradually as the river flowed onwards, the small dusty huts became more common until they could be called a town of sorts. The Szerkia travelled slowly on until at last it flowed under the huge city walls through a rusted, beweeded culvert. Here it was exceedingly broad but contained by man-made embankments. It flowed under numerous bridges and along its banks the houses changed in character; from the shabby huts of the working classes, through the middling houses of the merchant class until it reached the opulent mansions and palaces of the aristocracy. Greatest of all of these was the Imperial Palace - home of the Pirakteshi Autocrats for thousands of years. Here the river moved beside the ornate lawn and gibbets set piece garden. Between the scummy water of the Szerkia and the multiple white and gilt domes of the palace, flies buzzed lazily around the wilibongo trees. Occasionally they alighted on one of the gibbets. which swung slowly and cast a gruesome shadow on the burnt brown grass this afternoon in high summer.

But one man, passing outside the Palace walls, had dared to denounce the obscenity of such a torture garden. And that day, as the waxed ebony carriage of the Count Zamborg Berok passed through the high cobbled streets of Piraktesh, even the Augustr wind seemed to pause and last summer's leaves, yellow and wrinkled, huddled in gutters as if to mutter and gossip at the passing of a man so great. This man, of all men in the Empire, dared to question the decisions of the Autocrat. He alone had dared to damn the harsh slaving laws from the high balconies of the Palace Berok - and he of all the Pirakteshi nobility had declined his ancestral rights and refused to attend the lavish winter banquets thrown by the aristocracy where they feasted and reveled while outside the poor stood in their rags and shivered with hands extended in the hope of wresting a scrap of well chewed gristle from the jaws of some nobleman's hound.

As he passed them today on his homeward journey, those same poor smiled and made signs of blessing - cheering their hero: the protector of the downtrodden, the Count Berok.

Zamborg reached the splendidly decorated Palace Berok and observed the ancestral flag of his family fluttering above it - the Silver Cup of Justice against a sky blue background. He shivered a little as he observed and remembered that it stood for truth, honour and justice. The carriage pulled inside the mighty gates and they were shut behind them. As the valet opened the door he dismounted from the carriage and gave a gold sovereign to the coachman, saying, "Thanks Jack and don't mention this little gift. I know your wife is ill and you have little Bertie, Simon, Trude and Jock to feed."

The coachman tugged his forelock with tears of gratitude in his eyes and he shambled back to the coach, muttering "Thank 'ee, sir."

Count Berok stood a while, the wind caressing his proud aristocratic face. He regarded the burning plains stretching away from the mighty walls of the city of Piraktesh. "One day," he said, half to himself - half to the wind, "one day, I will see justice and freedom brought to this land."

Turning, he strode manfully between the marbled pillars of the doorway, the black leather of his tall riding boots creaking as he did so. He pulled the crushed silk of his yellow and blue cloak from his shoulders and handed it to the doorman. "Thank you William, how's the wife?" He passed on as William muttered something, his words drowned in his gratitude that a man so great could even notice his existence. Inside the hall, a million candles burned - the light shattering into a billion slivers as it struck the heavy chandeliers of crystal coloured by a domed ceiling of Lapis Lazuli and gold. He walked down a long corridor lined with statues in classical poses. As he neared the living room, he heard the voice of his lovely wife, Helena, gently humming a lullaby. She, no doubt hearing the click of his spurs, ran to meet him.

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Helena! He thought - as lovely as the day we first met. There she stood before him, her long blonde hair twisted in plaits and held with golden snakes made by the most skillful jeweler the world had ever known - Eric the Cunning.

"Hello, dearest," he exclaimed happily, "is supper ready?"

"I think Gertie is making it now, dear heart. Did you have a nice day at the Assembly of Piraktesh?"

Berok paused. He scratched his chin as if in a daze. Then he said, "Do you know darling? One day I will see justice and freedom brought to this troubled land of ours. I have terrible trouble trying to convince some of the aristocracy that the lower classes are human. But I am determined to see right prevail in the end."

The maid overheard all of this and, although she didn't understand many of the bigger words, she marveled at her great good fortune at finding employ with such liberal and progressive people. She muttered a blessing.

"Pardon?" asked Count Berok.

"It's all right, dear," assured his wife. "She was just muttering a blessing."

"Thank 'ee, sir," muttered the maid.

Countess Helena turned away, somewhat coyly. "Well," she said, "aren't you going to ask me what sort of day I've had?"

"Oh forgive me dear," said the Count absentmindedly. "I did mean to enquire. What sort of day have you had?"

The Countess smiled and stroked her husband's cheek. "I had a funny sort of day. I went down to the market to comfort the starving beggars and give them soup and rolls as I usually do on a Wednesday. I had already spent some two hours doling out soup to the poor wretches when I noticed an old woman hobbling along towards me. In her crinkled and hideous hands was a grimy and blackened bundle which I naturally took to be a heap of revolting scraps which she or her husband had gleaned from the Palace dustbins."

"Of course," concurred her husband, by now thoroughly enthralled in his wife's tale.

"When she was less than six feet from me she held out her hands, and I, thinking that she was about to make a present of this disgusting mess, quickly moved to refuse. She was however, insistent, and, grunting, extended the bundle again, at the same time pointing with one hand to her open mouth, indicating, through rotting teeth, the lack of a tongue. It was then that the foul sack covering fell away to reveal the dirty, but unmistakably beautiful, head of a baby boy. Seeing my wonderment, she smiled and gave me the child along with a greasy scroll of parchment. I took both, opened the scroll and read:

"To whomsoever it may concern - I Turvius Sullius, dwarf sorcerer, have undertaken to write references for this boy child, which was the product of an unfortunate coupling at the yearly goose fair. Know then that this child is mine and heir to the sorcerous line of Sullius. He shall be recognised by a birth mark in the shape of a dark star on his left buttock. This portends a great future for him - for good or for ill."

"It was signed, Turvius Sullius," said Helena. After recounting this, Helena broke off and stared into her husband's eyes. "I have promised myself to look after this orphan, or bastard, as I suppose we should call him. I will bring him up to love the principles we have cherished and one day maybe he will overthrow the foul Autocratic Regime which is so evil in our land today."

Count Zamborg Berok thought deeply - this was what his wife had always wanted - a child. The child that his impotent loins could not provide for her. He was pleased and enthused by her speech. Count Berok, Count Zamborg Berok, turned to his lovely wife Helena and whispered, his heart racing. "What have you named this child my love?"

"I have named him Zventibold."