The Two Confessions John Whitbourn (best books for students to read txt) 📖

actually dwarfish but well intothe lower range of Anglo-Saxon physique. Samuel wasn't aware the army tooksoldiers that petite: not even the militia or the Watch would've had him. Itwas curious.

Hedidn't seem to mind Trevan looming high over his head - merely pleased to meethim.

‘Areyou hungry - or thirsty? Have you been looked after? Let me get yourefreshments. Colour Sergeant, see to it. Will chicken do? Do you likechicken? And cider? That's what the people here seem to have lived on.’

‘Um,fine,’ said Samuel, ‘but I'm not all that-....’

Itwas too late; already a bluecoat had rushed off. The small soldier frowned.

‘Youappear troubled: don't be. You are amongst potential friends. I have thepotential to be a very good friend.’

TheSicarii glided over. He seemed permanently teetering on the edge of amusement,though well content to just balance there.

‘Theproblem is,’ he confided quietly, ‘that our miner doesn't know who you are.’

‘Fewpeople do,’ agreed the soldier, unfazed. ‘Yet. Though I warrant when he doeshe'll have heard of me.’

‘Doubtless,’agreed the Negro, starting up a slick but unappealing double-act: twocrocodiles agreeing to share their prey. ‘And then he'll realise just how gooda friend....’

‘Orbad a foe,’ said the soldier.

‘...you....’

‘...or we....’

‘...can be.’

‘Allowme to cut the knot and introduce myself,’ said the small man, still holding onto Samuel's reluctant hand. ‘I am General Mott.’

Trevan'sjaw did, alas, sag a fraction before he regained control.

‘That'sright,’ the soldier added brightly, noting the involuntary reaction, ‘‘TheBeast of Llanarth’!’

Frombehind an impassive front he was later proud of, Samuel gingerly greeted thethird most powerful man in the England.

U[U[U[U[U[U[U

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ARCHBISHOP OF LONDON'S LIBRARY - WHITEHALL CITADEL.

‘ENCYCLOPAEDIABRITANNICA’ 2020 EDITION.

'SICARII:from the Latin. Literally 'knife-man'. Originally a terrorist assassin groupmurderously active in 1st century Judea. See Josephus' 'The Jewish War'passim. In modern parlance applied (initially jocularly) jointly and severally- in defiance of correct Latin usage - to the elite legion maintained by hisHoliness. Established 1828. Volunteered by pious parents in tender youth orliberated from heathen slavery; selected against the most stringent of criteriaand raised in long years of seclusion at the famous Ravenna Monastery of StPeter-of-the-Sword, there emerges a soldier free of family ties or nationalfeeling, zealous only in the service of the true faith. The Legion's proudboast is that they have never experienced defeat in the field. Notable battle honoursinclude Sparta, 1858; the recapture of Constantinople, 1900; and theIroquois-League 'Prairie War', 1980-85. Their giant battle banner is notablefor being emblazoned with objectives to be removed when achieved. Athens andConstantinople are now duly unpicked; Cairo and Mecca yet remain. However, inmore recent times the Sicarii have also acquired a less overtly militaristicrole, in keeping with Christendom's largely peaceful condition. [See, forexample, in connection with the events in England 1995-96: ENCLOSURE CRUSADE,THE]. They are now most often employed as individual emissaries and agents ofpolitical policy....'

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Extractfrom: 'Advice and admonitions to my successor, G*d preserve him'

Foundamongst the effects of Ariel ben Yisrael, Pope Simon-Dismas, 1979 - 2002. Firstgenerally published in 'Wisdom of the Holy Fathers'. 12 volumes, Ed.Cardinal Frank Holdsworth, Archbishop of Ankara, Fiat Lux World-wide PressCorporation, Rome, the year of our Salvation 2402 AD.

‘A word regarding sicarii. The world is as it is and how Almighty G*dmade it, but we can still deplore the wicked necessity to so pervert aG*d-given life by breeding these human attack-dogs. Alas, there is need of suchmen to thwart the malevolence of other men. But I feel in my bones that eachsuccessor to St Peter will be hard put in the tribunal of the afterlife toexcuse it. However, we know that G*d is love and mercy, and that His son andthe Blessed Virgin will be there to intercede for us. There are always groundsfor hope.

But that hope must be earned. I earnestly implore you to visit ‘St Peterof the Sword’ at Ravenna, where sicarii are made out of mere boys. Witnesstheir birth and acknowledge fatherhood. I have done so as reparation andpenance every year since taking up the cross and yoke of the papacy. Whereof Isay to you most solemnly, that I found precious little love and mercy there….

 

...But they exist. That melancholy fact being so, be advised that the sicarii,our well-named 'daggermen', represent a sharp tool ready to hand: so very sharphowever that it is quite possible to cut oneself by mistake. There is thetemptation to reach for them at every opportunity, knowing that they are equalto all tasks. Yet this is a mistake. Do farmers cull rabbits with cannons? Dobarbers trim bunions with broadswords? No indeed. Both, I grant, will do thetrick but they are too much. What is the gain in success that leavesbehind a blasted landscape? No, use your sicarii to pluck just one choice fruithigh in the tree, not gather in the whole harvest.

I will give you an example of the required restraint. When England wasruled by the boy king Guy, and every faction in that restless nation writhedand strived, ambitious for the regency, I sent them a sicarii. He, a Nubian,attached himself to a notorious man of blood, an English soldier namedMott....'

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ARCHBISHOPOF LONDON'S LIBRARY - WHITEHALL CITADEL.

'THEDICTIONARY OF NATIONAL BIOGRAPHY'

PublishedStalybridge. Auto-da-fé Press. 2098.

MOTT,Alexander Scipio. 1967 - 2050. English general and statesman.

‘…origin is obscure in every sense. Such indications as survive suggest that hewas born of what was then administratively termed ‘Saxon’ and ‘churl’stock in a Surrey-Hills hamlet called Binscombe, (near Guildford, the countytown). However, even these bare facts exist in only one contemporary reference:namely a (mischievously inspired?) pencilled note by the artist Miss Mary(‘Pat’) Freeman on the reverse of Mott’s official portrait for the National Gallery.This presumably escaped the General’s attention and life-long policy ofmystification. The single-source attribution acquires some credibility viaMott’s death-bed decision to take the title ‘Lord Binscombe’ upon hiscontroversial and much belated ennoblement.’

…

'...the Welsh so-called 'free-state' had long troubled the Kings of United Englanduntil Mott's brilliant lightning campaign in the summer and autumn of 1995. Itssuccess, culminating in the unconditional surrender of Caernarfon on ChristmasDay, owed as much to Mott's painstaking preparations in the preceding two yearsas to his martial skills in the field and repeatedly proven personal bravery. Ablight was however cast on his achievement by the treatment meted