Outside, the streets were already dark, at just four pm on a wet December day on Edinburgh’s Royal Mile. Inside, the crowds of primary children and their tired looking teachers, curious tourists, and a few shoppers driven inside by the rain, were waiting expectantly at the Scottish Story-telling Centre.

The compere smiled at all the visitors.

‘Welcome to the Scottish Story-telling centre, for the first of our Advent events, stories set in and around the theme of Christmas and the Winter Solstice. Today we have a young man making his first appearance here. I don’t know much about him but he tells me that he is both a story-teller and a musician, and that he is going to tell us a new story. We always try to help up-and-coming talent, offering a supportive and warm environment for people who lack experience. I know that all of you (at this she looked closely at the school-children) will do the same. So please welcome Darren.’

The storyteller sat on an old wooden chair. He had on a rather tired-looking brown woollen coat, double breasted, done tightly up against the Edinburgh cold, while his throat was further protected by a long maroon scarf. A black knitted hat was pulled tightly over his head: a few brown curls escaped over his visible ear-lobes. Despite his apparent youth, his voice (accented? not Scots) carried across the room when he started to speak. And this is the story he told:

Once upon a time, long after the Elves had left mortal lands and the last of the dragons were dead, but still a long time ago, there was a King who wanted to live forever.

At the time of this story, the King had lived and reigned in his small kingdom for over thirty years. His kingdom was surrounded by larger countries, empires even, but by cleverly asking making friends of first one and then another he had managed to keep it independent for all those years. All his friends, his people, and other rulers said that the King was indeed very clever and the King himself agreed with them. ‘Well I am very clever,’ he said ‘no-one could run things as cleverly as I can. What would happen if I wasn’t here? Anyone else would make mistakes, and the Kingdom would be taken over. I have to stay alive as long as possible. I’m too important to die’

How did the King make friends? Well for one thing, his land was beautiful to visit, and the King’s House the most beautiful of all. The land was hot, so people could wear light clothing, but in the King’s Palace and gardens there was plenty of shade. Many stories were told by those who had visited the King’s Palace, about the buildings, the gardens, and the King himself. There were Olive trees and Lemon trees and enormous bushes of Laurel and Rosemary, so the evenings were filled with smells of fruit and spices. Visitors who came to the Palace would bring gifts to the King, often gold, spices, or fabrics. The King liked to keep cool by wearing the finest clothing, Silk carried by traders all the way from far China. The King loved his fine clothes. ‘After all, he said, I am King. I’m too important to sweat’

And the King did indeed look magnificent in his fine clothing. He was tall, broad of chest, yet slender in the waist. He was proud that he could eat whatever he liked, yet still keep his imposing figure. Like many people who kept slim without trying, he privately felt rather superior to plump people. ‘Look at those revolting bulges on that fat merchant’s stomach,’ he said to himself, ‘and those stupid puffy red cheeks’. The King was also proud of his handsome face with pronounced cheekbones, wide green eyes, and neatly trimmed beard. ‘After all,’ he said, ‘I am King, I’m too important to look ugly’.

The King had many talents. He could sing, and tell stories, and delighted in conversation. Wise men and clever men would come to his Palace and he would talk with them until the hours of darkness passed and the clear lights of the stars above faded into the grey dawn. And then he would ride or hunt in the morning, for he had a stable of black and grey horses of such beauty it could almost stop your heart to look at them. The King, slim as he was, was still athletic and strong and could ride for hours at great speeds on these horses. ‘After all,’ he said ‘I am King and I’m too important to ride slowly‘.

Another thing was that this King was very rich. He gathered money from the people of his country, and used it carefully. The King did not spend a lot of money – some on his palace and his clothes. But he liked people to give things to him. Although he received visitors from foreign lands, he himself tried not to travel too much. ‘Travelling is expensive, he said, and why should I leave when everything I have is so perfect here in my Palace? I would have to give gifts to the people I stayed with, and that’s really the wrong way round. ‘After all,’ he said ‘I am King, I’m too important to give gifts to other people’.

Now the King, despite being so handsome and wise, did have a few problems. One of his brothers had tried to depose him and steal his crown (not to mention his fine clothes and beautiful palace), but the King found out what his brother was trying to do and executed him. This made the brother’s sons, his own nephews, unhappy and the King was forced to execute them too. In fact, just to be on the safe side, he executed all his other brothers and all their sons as well. ‘After all,’ he said, ‘I am King, all the King that my people need, and I’m really too important to be bothering about brothers and their plots’.

One day, after he had been King for many years, the King had a visit from three strange travellers.  They had the faces of old men, but walked upright, with an almost springy gait, as if they were well used to walking or riding long distances. One was dressed in an old cloak that could have been brown, and had a kind, thoughtful face.  Remarkably, a small bird, possibly a thrush, seemed to follow him around everywhere he went. Not a pet, but a companion. The other two dressed similarly, in faded robes, now grey with dust and age, but which could just possibly once have been blue. Their eyes looked at the King, noticing his handsome face, fine clothes, exchanging glances as they caught the details of his beautiful palace.  The King saw they were all carrying gifts, and prepared to thank them in his most gracious and handsome manner.

‘Well, really,’ said the brown traveller, ‘the gifts are for the young prince who has just been born, not for you. We saw signs and received messages that he was close. Is he in the Palace or in the town nearby?’ This greatly surprised the King. ‘There are no princes,’ he thought, ‘I executed all my brothers and their sons. Perhaps one of them escaped, and is sending secret messages to these travellers to plot against me?’

‘Stay in my palace and we will see the young prince together’ said the King to the travellers.

‘Put them in the west wing where there is only one door out and the windows are high and small’ were his orders to his chief guard, ‘then bring them out one at a time so we can interrogate them more closely.’

However, when the guards went to the west wing to fetch the first of the travellers for examination, they found the room empty. Looking quickly for the other travellers, the same thing had happened. The three rooms were empty and the travellers had disappeared.

Increasingly convinced there was a plot against him, the King sent his soldiers out to find the travellers. People had seen them heading for one particular town, but after that there was no sign. Strange music and lights had been seen in the sky, and many of the people asked the soldiers ‘Is it true about the birth of the new prince?’ When he heard this the King lost his temper. ‘There is no new prince!’ His shouts could be heard through the Palace. ‘My country needs no prince. I am King. I am the cleverest the most handsome, best-dressed, and richest person and I am going to stay King! Forever, if necessary! 

That night the King had a dream. He was standing on a high rock, in a barren land. He seemed to be looking across a white (very light – was it sand?) landscape at a distant castle gleaming in the sun. The castle seemed to be made of some fair crystal, as it was transparent yet sparkling as the light hit it. The King was seized with desire to see the Castle more clearly, for it seemed even more beautiful than his own Palace.  The King gazed so intently at the far castle that he barely noticed the stony, muddy, earth marked with holes and craters far below his rock. He was conscious of a roaring noise and a sensation of heat from behind him. Before he could turn towards it a voice spoke in his ear.

‘Do not turn round. Look at the Castle. Do you like it?’ The voice was soft, and rose up and down, even in the middle of each sentence, almost as if the speaker was half singing. It was a joy to listen to that voice, and the world seemed dull and grey when it stopped speaking.

‘It is the most beautiful castle I have ever seen. Who does it belong to?’

‘No-one as yet. It is waiting for its rightful owner to claim it. It is not meant for mortals but a mortal King could have it if he were strong enough’

‘I am strong’

‘I wonder. Are you strong enough? The King who takes this Castle will find his name living forever, yet he will never change or look older. He will be able to move in secret ways through space and time. He will be able to do in a day what would take years for normal mortals. That is a heavy responsibility. Are you strong enough?’

‘I am the strongest and best King in the world. Tell me what I must do to gain this Castle.’

‘Do you really want to? The King who takes this Castle will have great steeds that take him round the world in a night. Could you control them? He will be able to traverse secret ways, and everywhere in the world would be open to him. He will receive messages from the flames, but will never be too hot himself. His name will live forever. Are you strong enough for this?

‘I am the strongest and best King in the world, none other than me. It is my destiny to gain this Castle and these powers. Tell me what I must do to gain this.’

‘It is simple. You must kill the usurping child, this young prince (the voice almost sneered or smiled at these words who wants your throne’

‘But I don’t know where the child is’ The king’s voice sounded weak, even to himself

‘So, are you a fool? You know the town those travellers went to. It must be there.’

‘But there must be dozens of children in that town. How will I know which one it is?’

The voice laughed, and his laughter was not loud, but the first laugh made the King’s ears ring, and the second made his stomach shrivel, and the third beat on his head with such force he fell forward to his knees.

‘Is this the ruler that everyone talks of? Is this the man so clever his country cannot do without him? Kill them all, of course. What are a few br-, no, casualties, shall we say, to a King? Do you refuse to send your men to battle because a few may get killed? Is not the job of King to balance the costs of any action against the benefits of success? That is what we mean by the strength of Kings, not mere physical force of hand or limb, but strength to make the hard decisions, the right decisions.’

‘If I do this, will I gain the Castle? Will I keep on being King for ever?’

‘If you do this, people will still be talking about you in two thousand years time’

‘Yes’ said the King, ‘I will do this. I will live forever!’

Was there a faint warning cry in the distance? Or only in the King’s mind? Just for a second a shadow appeared and moved in front of him, shifting, smoking, almost as if it was trying to form a semblance of solidity. The shadow was of man size and shape: he could see what might be arms, legs, and a head, although one of the hands seemed to be missing a finger. The King blinked, and the shadow was gone.

‘Go’ said the voice ‘Go and do this thing’

And the King woke up in his great bed, and went from it to his Chief Guard. The Guard and the King’s soldiers went to the town, in the hours just before dawn. They forced the children from their beds and the babies from their mothers’ arms and killed them all. Yes, there were a few soldiers astonished and ashamed of what they were being asked to do. However, the Chief Guard killed the first one who objected and after that the others all obeyed him.

The King watched his soldiers returning with blood on their swords in the first orange light of dawn and waited for the voice to return, for the keys to the great Crystal Castle to be placed in his hand, and for his wealth, wit, and cleverness to last forever.

But he never heard the voice again: and only a short time later, some people say a year, some say only months, the King was taken ill with a terrible rotting, wasting, shrivelling, disease. He collapsed in his beautiful palace and died without regaining consciousness, as far as his doctors, guards and servants could tell.

When the King regained awareness, he was immersed in shadow, in something vast, dark and incorporeal that loomed over him. He could not see anything of himself, but it was if he was in great halls, with a black floor, and dark walls, so high he could not see any roof above. The walls (were they walls?) were polished but yet absorbed all light, so it was impossible to tell how far apart they were and how far they stretched into the distance.

He became aware of two voices speaking. One was male, but not a man, one female, but not a woman They seemed a long way off but they could now be heard clearly.

‘This is the one,’ came the female voice, ‘another who would live forever. More petty and selfish than the last one, less trouble perhaps, but more cruel’. Her voice was quiet, a monotone, not cruel or scornful, but almost resigned. Her very lack of expression somehow felt like condemnation to the King.

The male voice was not raised, but it sounded to the King like the noise of mountains falling, like echoes in far underground caves, like the very earth groaning. ‘Well, the offer was clear, and he has accepted the outcome by his actions.’

‘So be it,’ said the female voice, ‘his fate was woven when his soldiers did the deed’. With that the King felt her presence leave. It was if a certain softness had been withdrawn, a rug taken away, and he was naked in cool clear air. He sensed something, someone, looking closely at him, even though he had no body, nothing to see.

‘Who is there? Are you death?’ He found he was able to speak, though he couldn’t say he had a voice, or anything to speak with.

‘This is death. You have died’ came the mountainous, calm voice, ‘I am not Death; Fate perhaps, Doom would be better’

‘I cannot be doomed! I was promised in my dream! I am the King who will live forever in the Great Crystal Castle! The King tried to shout, to be angry, but you couldn’t shout in here, the sound just vanished, like when you throw a stone into soft mud and it doesn’t make a splash, just a gentle ‘gloop’ and its gone. ‘What will you do to me?’ he said more softly.

‘Me, do to you? Nothing,’ said the voice, ‘what happens to you, you do to yourself. What happens to you depends on a test. You can choose between the Crystal Castle or these halls, where you will find judgement, rest and healing if you will’

‘Set me the test, let me pass it, I want the Castle!’

‘Do you indeed? That is the more difficult of the two roads that lie before you’

‘Yes!’ And this time the King almost did raise a shout.

And suddenly, the King’s scene changed.

He was a mother, screaming in fear as soldiers smashed through her door, in terror as her baby was snatched from their sleeping pallet, in pain as a soldier’s bronze gauntlet smashed her teeth as she tried to stop them, in anguish as she watched the sword above her baby rise and fall.

He was a father yelling with fear and rage, as he tried to shield his young son from advancing soldiers, striking the first with his fists and then feeling the hot stabbing of pain as the next thrust a sword into his side.

He was a small child, woken from a restless dream, running towards her mother, seeing the look of horror on her mothers face, but barely feeling the blow that caused everything to go black.

He was a grandfather, weeping as he washed blood from the stone hearth of a small house, weeping as he saw the small shape under a hastily pulled over blanket.

The King lived what his soldiers had done, over and over again, through the eyes of every one of the children, mothers, fathers, families, and onlookers in that small town. If he had been in a place where time still flowed, it would have taken a week, non-stop, from start to finish.

And then he came, sobbing and screaming, to a new reality. He was naked – yes, he had a body now – on cold, cold, white ground. He had never seen it, but he realised this was ice (he had once heard a traveller tell of how water could freeze into a clear, hard, solid, but he had never really believed it). The ice burned his feet, and a wind tore at his bare skin. He screamed with the cold, for fear, and for the memory of what he had just lived through. He looked down and saw a reflection of himself in the clear ice. His hair had gone completely white. ‘What has happened? What have I done?’ and he would have cried, but the tears froze in his eyes.

But then he looked up and saw the Great Crystal Palace, next to and above him. Tall it rose, gleaming in the cold sunshine, and he realised it was not crystal but ice. An ice palace! Standing close by, near a great entrance, was the figure of a man, dressed in robes so dark brown they might be black. No, not a man, for he spoke with the same cold, calm, deep voice the King had heard in the Dark Halls.

‘So, do you like your new palace? For this will be your home now and forever.’

‘But its ice, and I’m so cold. Where are my clothes? Is this my punishment? What is happening to me?’

‘This is not your punishment. You were made a promise by one who is the Great Deceiver, and it will come true. He meant to trick you, and you were foolish enough to believe him. But in this very trick lies your chance of redemption. It will not be easy, but I did warn you this was the difficult choice. Let us start by warming you. I do not think silk will help much here, so let us try this.’

And the King was suddenly clothed. Not in silk, but in thick rather coarse red wool.

‘I can’t wear this – this is peasants’ clothing’ he protested, ‘I will look ludicrous’

‘Yes,’ said the dark figure, ‘it does rather hang off you. This will make it a better fit’. And the King felt himself changing, his body shortening, getting wider, a belly appearing, his face being pulled and pressed by invisible hands.

‘Look in the ice now’.

The King stared in horror at his new shape, the round stupid-looking face, the red cheeks like a peasant who’d had too much sun and wine, the short legs and fat stomach. His jaw moved up and down without speaking.

‘Oh yes, one last touch,’

A great white bushy beard sprouted from the king’s chin where once his beautiful neat trimmed goatee had been. ‘Hmm, reminds me of someone’ the figure murmured, but the King did not hear him.

‘You’ll find it doesn’t need trimming. That was the promise of course – to never change or look older, wasn’t it? What’s next? The great steeds to take you round the world? It’s too cold here for horses, but you’ll find these are pretty efficient.’

The King’s horror turned to disbelief. Instead of his stable of beautiful of black and grey stallions were a group of the most bizarre animals he had ever seen. They were bigger than the largest horse, with long bowed backs and slightly ovine faces. Their coats were long, shaggy and untidy, and one of them had clearly scraped his nose on some rough ice. That wasn’t the strangest thing about them, though. Each one seemed to be growing a tree on top of their heads, a furry tree with no leaves but clearly with branches and a multitude of pointed tips. To the King, they were indescribably ugly, but he found his mouth just wouldn’t work to say anything.

‘Ah, I can see you like them, friendly creatures so long as you remember the carrots. Almost infinite stamina and we’ve got a vehicle for them to pull you with all the presents. Come into the Palace and you’ll see how the arrangements work.’ The sombre, sinister figure almost seemed jovial as he regarded the beasts. He marched into the Palace Entrance, a great open arch, waving for the King to follow him. The King’s new body would not move quickly or gracefully like his old one, but he found invisible hands almost propelling him into the ice building.

A little out of breath he puffed up to the dark figure.

‘What do you mean presents? What am I doing here? What can I do in an ice palace? What will happen to it when it warms, when spring comes?’

‘It never gets warm here. We are as far north as it is possible to get. Your palace will not melt. Was not that part of the promise, that you would never be too hot? And yet, here is the flame.’

The King saw he was standing at one side of a great white hall, with high clear walls and a ceiling so high that small clouds formed below it. In the centre of the hall was a hole, the size of a large well, and from this a blue cylinder of flames emerged. The flames were bright but gave off no noticeable heat. Suddenly a piece of paper came shooting up through the flame and fluttered out into the hall. Before it touched the ground, a short, stocky bow-legged person, dressed in green, came running out of the shadows, caught the paper and scurried away to the edge of the hall.

‘Thank you, Maeglin’ said the dark figure ‘You’ll find they’re all very helpful and will keep you well organised. So there are your messages from the flames, just as you were promised. All secret, of course, and you’ll find that children the world over have remarkably similar requirements.’

At last the King found his voice. ‘Tell me what is going on! I was promised life in a Crystal Palace, with my name famous forever, with magic steeds and special powers. My Palace is made of ice, my steeds are the ugliest brutes in history, I look like a fat stupid peasant, and the only servant I’ve seen is a bandy legged scampering dwarf. I demand to know what is happening! I am a King and I want to be treated like one!’ His face got even redder with fury.

The dark figure stopped. It lost the almost benevolent air it had adopted while describing the animals and the ‘arrangements’ in the hall. It grew, filling the hall with shadow. The voice became mountainous again.

‘You were a King, but are one no longer. The Deceiver tricked you. Your name, the one you had as a King, is known and will be known, while human memory lasts, as a tyrant, a slayer of innocent children. You would not want to meet the people in the world who thought you were that King. A King should cherish and protect his people, especially the children. You killed those that had no chance to sin, had no chance to grow and have families, no chance to become doctors or healers, blacksmiths or artists, singers or storytellers. Your new task is to repair what you have done. Once a year, every year, around the world, at deepest mid-winter, children ask for small gifts from a kindly, jolly old man, dressed like a peasant. They write messages and put them in flames, in bonfires, in chimneys above fireplaces, cooking hearths, and by magic they come here. You and your helpers will see what they want, and deliver those presents. And then your new name will also live forever, and it will have a much better reputation than your old one. And you will move in secret ways, and everywhere in the world will be open to you so you can deliver those presents. You will do this in one night to every child in the world. For though some people say that only good children receive a present from this kindly old man, we know that there is good in every child. How can there not be, when they have not had time to fulfil themselves for good or evil? Each child is like a vessel into which you will pour good things. Of course there are millions of children in the world, so we have warped time to help you with your deliveries. To all the children in the world it will seem that your presents arrive in just one night, whereas it should really take you about 25,000 years to deliver all those presents even with your inexhaustible reindeer. It will seem like one night to the children, but 25,000 years to you. You will have plenty of time to consider what it means to be a King, or a peasant, or a kindly old man and consider which you prefer to be. And as I’ve said, you’ll have plenty of help. Oh, but they don’t like to called dwarves by the way. Elves is a better term’.

And the King noticed hundreds, if not thousands of these ‘elves’ coming out of the shadows, most looking at him with resignation or mild contempt. But with horror he saw faces he knew in the front one or two rows. His Chief Guard, and his soldiers, all misshapen, short, bow-legged, but clearly recognisable. And they were looking at him not with resignation or contempt, but clear, plain hatred.

The King stuttered and trembled, ‘No, get them away from me… no, no’ and his voice rose to a shout and a scream piercing at first, then so high that it was barely audible.

‘What’s that? Lost for polite words? Surely not the King famous for his wit, his conversation, his fine speech? Well, we will have cheerful words or none at all, I think, don’t you?’

And the King opened his mouth to say something to protest, but whatever he tried to say and however hard he tried, the same words came out.

‘HO HO HO, … HO HO HO… ho ho ho’

‘Good, that’s better,’ said the dark figure. ‘I’ll let you get on with it. After all, you’ve got a few million presents to find and deliver already. You won’t see me very much but I’ll be watching to check how you’re getting on.’ And he disappeared, leaving the King (‘Ho, Ho, Ho’), with his elves behind in his Great Ice Palace. And they still live there even as I speak

So there we have it. The story of how the infamous King got to play a different part in the Christmas story and how he did get to live forever after all. Do leave him a mince pie and a few carrots for the reindeer, because even though they are magical they do work hard.

Darren paused and the adults and children listening all let out their breath, thinking he had finished. But he looked up at the audience, and then down with a serious expression on his face, to the children sitting close to his feet. These were his final words:

But if you see that real old man who used to be a king, not the ones in shops pretending to be him, but the real one, don’t get too close. I don’t know whether he really is feeling too kindly just yet. You see, I’m told that if you see him this far north, he’s still got another 24,457 years to go before Christmas Day this year. So don’t delay him…

As Darren walked away from the Storytelling Centre that evening, he sang a song quietly to himself: 

'Who's that knocking at the window, Who's that Standing by the door?'
What are all of those presents laying on the kitchen floor?
Who is the Laughing Stranger, with his hair as white as gin?
What is he doing with the children?
Who could have let him?

Why are there rubies on his fingers, cold cold crown on his head?
Why, when he caws his carol, does the salty snow run red?

Why does he bury the fireside like a spider on a thread?
his fingers made of fuses, his tongue of gingerbread,
Why does the World before him melt in a million suns?
Why do his yeallow yearnng eyes burn like saffron buns?

Watch when he comes a walking out of the Christmas flame,
dancing, double talking, and Herod is his name

(Innocents Song, Charles Causley)