Date: Fri, 17 Feb 2006 07:04:49 +0000 (GMT)
From: Mike Arram <mikearram@yahoo.co.uk>
Subject: Henry in High Politics - 12

The Michael Arram stories are now beginning to appear together at:
http://www.iomfats.org/storyshelf/hosted/arram

This story contains graphic depictions of sex between young males.  If the
reading or possessing of such material as this is illegal in your place of
residence please leave this site immediately and do not proceed further.
If you are under the legal age to read this, please do not do so.


XII

The first bell began ringing from the cathedral of Ss Andrew and Vitalis at
ten, and, taking their cue from the mother church, the other bells of
Strelzen awoke and sang.  The king was coming home.  This was not the
change ringing Henry knew from England, but the raucous and joyous carillon
of continental Europe.  The noise swept and surged across the city, it set
Henry's nerve ends tingling.
  Terry had used his contacts to get them into the Hilton, and he had used
his not inconsiderable personal wealth to book them all luxury suites.  So
Henry and Ed woke in great comfort in an ample bed which they had used to
the full the previous night; the smell of their multiple couplings was
still hanging in the air.  Ed went naked to the windows.  He swept back the
curtains, looking down on the city from their ninth floor balcony.  It all
looked quiet from this height, although the air was clanging and
reverberating with the sound of the city's bell towers even through the
double glazing.  Their balcony looked southwards and they could see over
the palace grounds to the New City beyond.  The Rodolferplaz in the
distance was already filling with people.
  Ed bounded back to bed, pulled the covers off Henry and slapped his small
rump.  `Come on little babe, we can't miss any of this.'  They showered
quickly and dressed.  Henry rang David's room and made sure he was
downstairs waiting for them.  Nathan and Justin were going to do their own
thing, while Terry was busy with some jobs Will and Oskar had given him.
Henry's wallet was bursting with a huge wad of cash that Terry had pushed
into his hands with a kiss.
  While he was waiting for Ed to finish up in the bathroom, Henry checked
Sky News.  Trachtenberg, as expected, had taken the post of interim
president, with Maritz retiring.  Rudi was expected in Strelzen at noon,
and was coming down from Modenehem in a special train.  Henry switched to
Eastnet.  He tuned in just as the broadcast switched to the cathedral
square, and to the balcony above the gateway to the abbey of St Waclaw, a
former open air pulpit that had been used for the proclamation of
Ruritanian kings since the papal bull creating Rudolf I king had been read
there in 1644.
  With the bells clanging and booming in the background, the mayor of
Strelzen, the archbishop and the new minister of the interior stood by as
the general commanding the city garrison proclaimed the high and mighty
prince, Rudolf sixth of that name, by the grace of God, most faithful king
of Ruritania.  And as he finished, the boom of the first of the twenty- one
gun royal salutes echoed across the city from a battery in the great park
at Bila Palaz.
  Henry led his friends round the perimeter wall of the palace through
streets swarming with happy and excited people.  They bought Elphberg flags
from the street traders, while David scoffed at the tacky plastic ones
showing Rudi's smiling face.  Ed bought a few anyway, so he could embarrass
Rudi with them when he returned to school.
  Big though it was, the Rodolferplaz was packed, and there would have been
no getting a view if the boys had not been tipped off to go to Rodolferplaz
33.  Will's old friend, a producer and cameraman called Bolslaw Meric, had
a fourth floor office and studio on the northwest side of the great square,
where he had already set up his cameras in the window.
  `Hello, English boy queers,' he said, `my room is at your disposal.'  He
was a bald man in his sixties, rather fat and very roguish.  Will had told
them he was harmless, and not to worry about his mannerisms.  They went to
shake hands, but he gave them Rothenian double kisses, his moustache
brushing their cheeks and giving off the smell of tobacco and what Henry
thought might be absinthe.  He showed them to his window, tall and wide
with plenty of room for them and for his cameras.
  They hung out and looked over the packed square: every other window was
full of people too, and flags were hanging from most of them.  Red and
yellow bunting and drapes were everywhere.  For the first time in almost a
century, workmen had taken out the posts, and the royal drive up the centre
of the square had been opened as a processional way, it was lined all the
way up to the palace by soldiers in blue full dress uniforms.
  Once they had got used to Bolslaw he was very pleasant, if risque,
company.  He had them open-mouthed with his stories of working in the gay
porn empire of Falkefilm.  He made no secret of the fact that he thought
Will Vincent was the hottest porn actor he had ever seen, though his career
had been a brief one.  `You knew he was in porn then, naughty boys?'
  David and Henry confessed to having seen clips from `An American in
Strelzen' and David had subsequently tracked down all Oskar's DVDs.
  `That Oskar,' said Bolslaw, `so beautiful and so uninhibited.  One of the
greats of course, but he did not have the vulnerable sexiness of sweet
Willemu.  I wish they'd made more than just that one film, but it still
sells hugely for Falkefilm.  It's reckoned to be a porn classic.  Look
across the square and just north of us is Rodolferplaz 12, where Falkefilm
has its offices.  You can see the pretty boys hanging out the windows of
the top floor studios waving flags.  The gay community here in Strelzen is
very enthusiastic about the new king.  Not just that he is quite a hot
looking guy, of course.  They seem to think that once kings are in fashion,
queens may have an easier time.  Then there is all the dressing up for the
new royal court.'
  The boys were laughing by now.  He had cokes for them in his office
fridge.  `You're like a gay grandad, Bolslaw!' Henry said.
  `And you're a nice looking boy, Hendrik.  If you ever fancy a shoot,
you'd take a sexy little set.'
  `What, not me?' said David.
  Bolslaw gave him a once over, `Not enough character for me, young man.
But the more undiscriminating might like you.'  David guffawed, not in the
least offended.
  The boom of an artillery piece rattled the windows and sent the pigeons
into the air all over the city.  The king had reached the Central Station,
and the second royal salute was being given as the municipal authorities
greeted their sovereign.  Henry asked Bolslaw if he had a TV but was told
that he didn't want one either in his office or apartment; he blamed TV for
the downturn in the film industry that had been his living.  Apparently, he
had once worked with Passolini in Italy in the sixties.  Henry was
impressed.
  After about twenty minutes a stir in the crowd and the distant sound of
military bands alerted them to the approach of the king.  There were orders
shouted over the murmur of the crowd, followed by a ripple along the line
of soldiers leading up to the palace, as they presented arms.  Cheers and
applause began to be heard from the Mikhelstrasse where it led into the
square.  Henry craned around the corner of the window jamb trying to see,
Ed was pressing up behind him looking over his shoulder.
  Suddenly the sound of military music was loud as a large band entered the
square at the head of the procession.  The flags began waving and cheers
and applause began below them.  A squadron of cavalry trotted on to the
sanded cobbles of the royal drive, and behind them was Rudi, not in an open
carriage as they had expected, but riding a large and beautiful white
stallion.  He was in what they took to be a Rothenian general's uniform,
rich in gold braid and hung with aiguilettes - so that had been the
emergency tailoring he had referred to.  The red sash and star of the order
of the Rose was across his chest.  A laced shako in the Austrian style,
with tall white plumes, was on his head.
  As he entered the square and the roar of the vast crowd reached him,
Rudi's horse skittered, but he mastered and checked it.  His mounted staff
and the marching soldiers behind him stopped.  He took off his shako and
raised it to the crowd, a huge and boyish grin all over his handsome face,
his red hair glowing as if it was lit by something more than Strelzen's
sunshine.  He was a sight to see, still boyishly vulnerable but full of
life and hope.  `Long live King Rudolf!  Long live the Red Elphberg!'
rolled up the square again and again.  With a flourish of his cap, the king
replaced it and rode on towards his palace, and Henry found his cheeks were
wet with tears, as few were not in the Rodolferplaz.
  Bolslaw blew his nose.  `That I have lived to see such a day,' he
muttered in Rothenian.
  Ed asked, `Did you get a good one of Rudi on his horse?'
  `Rudi, you call our young king Rudi?'  Bolslaw's eyebrows were raised.
  `Of course,' said Ed, `didn't Will tell you that we are at school with
him?'
  Bolslaw's jaw hung loose.  `This was not mentioned.  Heavens.  So you
know him well?'
  `Well enough to have punched him twice,' grinned David.
  `Good God!' said the old man, and they spent the next quarter of an hour
satisfying his curiosity as to his new king, as they watched soldiers and
bands marching in the square below them.  `Look to the flagstaff over the
palace, boys,' he eventually said.
  As they watched, the king must have ridden under the palace arch.  The
large tricolour waving over what had been the presidential palace sank down
the flagpole, and in its place was raised for the first time since 1880 the
royal banner; not the quartered arms of the despised Thuringians, but the
plain red lion on yellow of the Elphbergs.  Henry later learned that the
banner raised over the palace that day was the same that had been laid over
the coffin of Queen Flavia during her state funeral.
  The crowd began surging up the square towards the palace gates.  The king
was going to appear on the balcony.  But the boys stayed in his studio with
Bolslaw.  He pulled a bottle of Rothenian fruit wine out of the fridge and
they toasted the health of King Rudolf VI while they viewed Bolslaw's
shots.  They selected a few and he printed them out, giving them one that
he said he wanted them to get the king to sign for him if they had a
chance.  Then he insisted on taking a few shots of the boys, singly and
together, as souvenirs, he said.  They signed one of all three of them for
the old man.  They kissed him back this time when he kissed them.  `Goodbye
pretty boys ... come back and see me some time soon!'  They promised they
would.

It was with difficulty and long queuing that they got a late lunch on
Mikhelstrasse.  Visitors were staying on and partying all over the city,
and a huge fireworks display had been promised over the royal palace after
sunset.  Will, the Tarlenheims and Terry were at a state banquet that
evening.  All the boys had to do was to buy decent suits, for tomorrow.
  `Why?' they asked.
  `You're going to church tomorrow, sweet babes,' Terry had said.  So they
got three suits off the peg at the Mikhelstrasse Top Man with the wad he
had given Henry, along with dress shirts and ties.  Then they went off to
meet Nikki Baltasar, Henry's friend, at his home in Sudmesten.  Other kids
from the Anglican church youth group in Strelzen turned up, and Nikki's
parents had a barbeque out their back garden.  Since there was a pool too,
it turned into a brilliant afternoon and evening for the lads, and they
reckoned when they got back to the hotel just before the fireworks display
that they probably had a far better day of it than the others.  A phone
call brought Nathan and Justin to their balcony and they watched the awe-
inspiring display as it erupted from the palace grounds just below them.
  `What did you two do today then?'  Henry asked Nathan.
  `You mean when we weren't arguing and sulking?'  Justin scowled at
him. `We watched the parade, and then hit the Wejg.  It was half price
Guinness in the Irish bar.'
  `What's got into you two?' asked Ed.
  `Not saying,' said Justin.  `Don't seem that Lord fuckin Underwood here
will let anyone do anyone a favour.'
  `Cut it out, Justy.'
  `No, you.'
  `I give in.'
  `Good.'

Terry was tapping his foot waiting for the boys the next morning, few
things annoyed him, but the exception was bad timekeeping, and Justin and
Nathan were late.
  `Whassup with you two?' he snarled at them both.  Nathan was in awe of
Terry and was not happy that he was angry with him. He mumbled something
apologetic.  `Well bloody sort it out quick,' Terry snapped.  `And if I
think it's what it is, then you're being totally moronic, Nathan.  You
should have learned by now that Justin may be wild, but he can be trusted.
Now pull yourselves together, the car's here.'
  A limousine had slid up under the hotel's front canopy.  The doorman
smiled and saluted as he opened the door for them to get in.  There was
room for six with the fold down seats behind the driver.  `Henry,' said
Terry, `tell the guy to get us to the cathedral and step on it.  We should
have been there ten minutes ago.'  Nathan wilted as Terry glared at him.
  They were not the only people late that morning.  A tailback of
limousines was queueing along the south side of the cathedral, and all
sorts of elegantly dressed people were getting out, some wearing
decorations and orders.  When their turn came, Terry led them through the
south transept door past a line of cavalrymen with drawn swords.  The
former mounted section of the Presidential Guard had been reconstituted as
the revived Royal Lifeguard, and new uniforms were on order.
  They had good seats, just behind the ambassadors and EU commissioners.
It was to be a pontifical mass and Te Deum for the restoration of the
monarchy.  Rudi had vetoed the idea of a coronation in the old style on the
grounds of cost and obsolescence, but he would receive anointing and take
the coronation oath after the ministry of the Word.  The music too was
drawn from the tradition of European coronation rituals.  They slid into
seats next to Will Vincent, who was eagerly scanning the programme for the
musical content.
  For Henry, it was just fascinating to sit there and soak in the
atmosphere of a great state occasion in a venerable and historic church.
Across from them in the north transept he could see the faces of prime
ministers, presidents and other European royals who had been able to fly
in, and there facing them was him, little Henry Atwood from Trewern.  He
beamed with delight at the incongruity of it all.  TV cameras were up in
the triforium, he resisted the temptation to wave and shout `Hi Mum!'.
He'd rung her that morning and told her to watch the televised broadcast
from Rothenia.
  A fanfare ripped through the murmuring in the church.  Following a great
procession of ecclesiastical dignitaries, and flanked by guards officers in
the elaborate uniforms of the nineteenth century with swords, came the
king, his arm resting on that of the cardinal archbishop and his train
carried by ten pages.  A great anthem welled up from the choir, and the
service was under way.
  `Would have been better if we could have had a big tub of popcorn -- the
sweet stuff, not the salty -- like in UGC in Ipswich,' was the only
complaint that Justin had to make.  `Was impressive, and Rudi did a good
job.  Looked cool in that white uniform and that long robe type thing.  Did
well not to trip over it.  Liked his chair too.'  Henry told him he loved
him.
  Following the mass, in which Terry and Justin, both Catholics,
communicated, they picked up their car again and this time headed down to
the royal palace, up the Rodolferplaz and through the gates.  Justin and
Henry waved enthusiastically at the crowds waving at them.  Justin began
blowing kisses, until Terry gave him a stern look.
  `Wass happening now, Uncle Terry?' Justin asked.
  `Buffet in the palace, I'm told, and the first royal levee in nearly a
century.'
  `Wass a levy when iss at home?'
  `You stand around and make inane conversation with inane people and get
your picky taken with His Majesty.'
  `Aw right.  Iss not fun then?'
  `No.'
  But in fact it was great fun.  Henry found himself talking to a boy of
his own age, foreign but with perfect English.  They soon found they had
common ground: an interest in strategy games, and they swopped tactical
hints on several of Henry's favourite games.  The foreign lad, Henry and Ed
copped three glasses of fruit wine from a footman and had a good laugh in
the corner.  Henry wasn't sure, but he thought he got an open invitation to
Stockholm at some point.
  Will gave Henry a smile as the group separated, `Get on OK with Gustav
did you?'
  `You know him?'
  `He's the Crown Prince of Sweden: you should read more celebrity mags.'
  Rudi had changed into a morning suit, and was circulating very regally,
accompanied by Mr Pokolosky, the royal chamberlain, and Oskar, who had been
invested as count of Modenehem that morning and appointed chief of staff
and private secretary to the king.  After about three quarters of an hour,
a trumpeter gave a brief fanfare, and palace servants brought in an
unsheathed sword and a kneeler.  They placed the kneeler on the lowest step
of the dais of the throne.  The king took the sword and went up to his
throne.  `Royal brothers and cousins, my lords and ladies, gentlemen,' he
began, `One of the pleasanter duties of monarchy is the reward of those who
have done great service to the nation.  I hope this assembly will bear with
me as I do just that, and there are several people in this room worthy of
high honour.  When your names are called out please go to the chamberlain,
and he will instruct you as to what to do.'
  The former president, Mr Maritz, was called out and smiled as he was
cited for his great services to Rothenia in the post-communist period, he
knelt to receive the grand cordon of the order of the Rose and was awarded
also the title of baron.  There was great applause.  Several of his former
cabinet received lesser honours.  Then a loud voice called out `Mr Willem
Vincent'.  Will looked very grave as he went up to receive the grand cordon
of the order of the Rose, and came back beaming, resplendent in red sash,
star and gold chain.  But then `Mr Terence O'Brien' was called, and he
looked stunned as he was pushed forward by a shove from Will.  He knelt to
receive the order of the Rose, and the accolade of knighthood, and he came
back with ribbon and star looking as if he was in a dream.  Several
generals and officers received decorations, including Major Antonin, but as
Henry thought it was all over, the voice called out `Mr Henry Atwood'.  His
knees went wobbly as he saw a lane open in front of him and he knelt in
front of a grinning Rudi to have the ribbon and medal of the sovereign's
personal order of Henry the Lion, second class, placed round his neck.
`Gotcha, you little queer,' the king whispered to him as he shook his hand.
`Bastard,' Henry whispered back.  Ed, David, Justin and Nathan got the same
award each in turn.
  `My,' said Edward as they stared at each other, `don't we all look
distinguished.'