The King

Faceless Ageless was a king. He had a face, and was of some age. He was a very wise king, and to show you how wise he was, I will tell you he wore his hair and beard clipped short. In those days men were always saying to each other:
Look how long my beard is!
And then stepping on it and tripping themselves. And then the man behind would tread on the first man's hair, and a war would begin. It was all very silly, but the men liked to have their beards and their long hair. Faceless Ageless was laughed at and scorned, but he could run through a thicket without getting tangled in a bush, and he never had a sore chin from stumbling on his own beard.

Before Faceless Ageless became king he was a peasant. The queen of the realm fell in love with this strange man who could walk without tripping up, and so he went with her to her castle and became her husband.

Many people did not like to bow to one at whom they had yesterday laughed, so when the king went to meet his subjects he was pelted with rotten fruit and insults. His queen was very angry, and then she was embarrassed, but most of all she was sad. She raised her arms and all fell silent, for no one had ever laughed at the queen. She gazed at the crowds of people and deliberated in her head. And then she began.

When I came to this throne, she said, you were glad to have me. I repaid your service with money and land. I have tried to judge you fairly. You have not complained.
Now I bring you a king. We will rule together. If you find him unfair, or foolish, you may complain. But if a king does the duty of a king, what care you of his appearance? Until he is dead or deposed, he has no face but that of a king, no age but that of his reign. All queens are called the Queen; all kings are called the King. You have made it so, and we need no other identity.

The crowd was very still, and they remained so, until the royal couple went back into their castle. Whether this was because they were awed by the wisdom of their queen, or because no one understood what she said and no one wanted to admit this, we shall perhaps never know.
But so it was that ever after the king was called Faceless Ageless. He was not called 'the King' at all.