The Accented Crown

Chapter One

The Legend of Our Founding

When the king emerged, singing,

The rest of the party came, singing,

Out of the cavern carved by singing,

Their voices mingling, hoping, singing

Isaac, laughter came, singing,

Blythe, happiness came, singing

Out of the cavern carved by singing,

Their voices mingling, hoping, singing,

Accent ringing, filling the dark, singing

Opening gate to Medley by singing

Out of the cavern carved by singing

Their voices mingling, hoping, singing.

Our founding was with song

When I was born, fireworks exploded into the air. Gold and purple filled the sky, the royal colors. People celebrated in the streets, but colors weren't what was most associated with their king and queen.

It was their voice.

Long ago, a group of people had gone over the mountains, singing. Their voices opened a pass through the mountains. The man that led them was to be their king in the new, green country they discovered. King Isaac the First. Isaac means 'laughter', so he was known as King Isaac the Laughter. His laugh was deep and fruity, even when the Great Famine came and nearly destroyed his new kingdom.

His voice was a deep bass, without a hint of gravel.

More people came to the country called the Kingdom of Medley and that was when the original group noticed something different about these newcomers. The Jubilation Range had separated them from the rest of the world, so they had never noticed their accent before.

The original group of people became the nobility, with King Isaac and his wife, Queen Blythe, as their rulers. It soon became known that the nobility had an accent and the subjects noticed something: they couldn't speak in the accent. It was too crisp, too pure, too like the songs they were prone to singing. They gave up trying, partially because they couldn't do it and partially because it was treason to try.

Over the years, the nobility forgot their native accent, conforming to the commoner's rustic way of speaking. Only the monarchs fought to keep theirs, marking them as the rulers.

So by the time I was born, no one but my family was allowed to speak to me.

When my mother married my father, she went to his brother, Adagio, and he taught her the accent, a highly guarded secret. His brother had been taught by an accent coach how to teach others.

It was the tradition for the second child of the king and queen, boy or girl, to learn how to teach the royal family's wives and husbands how to speak the accent. The first child, boy or girl, was the Crown Prince or Princess.

My mother's voice was as clear as mountain air, her alto voice filling wherever she was singing. My father noticed her when she sang for him and soon they fell in love. My father's voice was as beautiful as King Isaac's, bass without gravel. They sung annually a duet on their anniversary. The king was not permitted to sing a duet with any other woman.

As a toddler, I lisped in the accent, giving all the ministers a relief.

But by the time I was thirteen years old, when people could speak to me, I didn't expect them to.