Yesteryear Fiction

The Lord of the Forge (Richard III)
By Kati Tann


Alarums.

Enter Richard.

Richard: A dwarf, a dwarf, my Kingdom for a dwarf!

Cates: Withdraw my Lord! I’ll help you to a dwarf.

Richard: Slave! I have set my life upon a cast, an iron
And I will stand the hazard of the flame:
I think there be six elves in the field,
Five have I slain today, for failure of the forge.
A dwarf, a dwarf, my kingdom for a dwarf!

Alarum, Enter Richard and an elven smith. They fight, Richard is
slain.

Retreat, and flourish. Enter elven smith, a gnome bearing the crown,
with diverse other lords of the fae.

Elven smith: Goddess, and your skill at the forge
Be prais'd victorious Friends;
The day is ours! the bloody master of the forge is dead!

Gnome: Couragious elf,
Well hast thou acquit thee: Loe,
Here these long usurped royalties,
From the gilded temples of this bloody wretch,
Have I pluck'd off, to grace thy brows withall.
Wear it, and make much of it!

Elven smith: Great Goddess of the silver moons, say love to all.
But tell me, is there yet a dwarf in this kingdom to tend my forge?

Gnome: There is my Lord, and safe in Leicester Town,
Whither (if you please) we may withdraw us!

Elven smith: The forge-fires doth wait for no man! We shall at once!

Exeunt.


- - -
Kati Tann's milkshake brings all the boys to the yard.