The King liked to disappear into the hidden passageways carved through the interior of the royal palace. Sometimes it could take hours to find him, sometimes days. Courtiers started to whisper that his mind was not his own, that it was moldering like the unpicked orchard apple.
But the King was quite sure his mind was clear. He simply did not like the court, filled with serpents as it was. And that fact they could not reconcile, so they thought him mad when he ordered the tunnels be dug below the palace.
Paddy Dobson
23rd February 2023