fandomhigh | Mad Kings and Queens: Raving Royals and How to Survive Them [Wednesday, May 28th, 2nd Period]

"Étudiants, bonjour." Ghanima said as the last of the class trickled into the room. "Today we look at a local monarch, King Charles VI."

"Charles was a man of many names to his subjects, frequently called le Bienaimé, or beloved, and also le Fol or le Fou; the Mad. He was the King of France from 1380 to his death, and a member of the House of Valois," Ghanima recited, hopping off her desk to start writing on the board.

"He was born in Paris, the son of King Charles V and Jeanne de Bourbon, and at the age of eleven, he was crowned King of France in 1380 in the cathedral at Reims. He married Isabeau of Bavaria in 1385. Until he took complete charge as king in 1388, France was ruled by his uncle, Philip the Bold," she said, drawing out a timeline. "Now, Charles VI was known both as Charles the Well Beloved and later as Charles the Mad, since, beginning in his mid-twenties, he experienced bouts of psychosis. These fits of madness would recur for the rest of his life. Based on his symptoms, doctors believe the king may have suffered from schizophrenia, porphyria or Bipolar disorder."

"His first known fit occurred in 1392 when his friend and adviser, Olivier de Clisson, was the victim of an attempted murder. Although Clisson survived, Charles was determined to punish the would-be assassin Pierre de Craon who had taken refuge in Brittany. Contemporaries said Charles appeared to be in a "fever" to begin the campaign and appeared disconnected in his speech. Charles set off with an army on July 1, 1392. The progress of the army was slow, nearly driving Charles into a frenzy of impatience. While traveling through a forest, a barefoot man dressed in rags rushed up to the King's horse and grabbed his bridle. "Ride no further, noble King!" he yelled. "Turn back! You are betrayed!" The king's escorts beat the man back but did not arrest him, and he followed the procession for a half-hour, repeating his cries."

"The company emerged from the forest at noon. A page who was drowsy from the sun dropped the king's lance, which clanged loudly against a steel helmet carried by another page. Charles shuddered, drew his sword and yelled "Forward against the traitors! They wish to deliver me to the enemy!" The king spurred his horse and began swinging his sword at his companions, fighting until his chamberlain and a group of soldiers were able to grab him from his mount and lay him on the ground. He lay still and did not react, falling into a coma. The king killed 6 knights, and possibly more," she said. "Accounts from the time vary as to the exact number. Charles' uncle Philip the Bold, Duke of Burgundy, assumed the regency on the spot, dismissing Charles' advisers in the process. This was to be the start of a major feud which would divide the Kings of France and the Dukes of Burgundy for the next 85 years."

Ghanima grabbed a red marker, circling the date. "The king would suffer from periods of mental illness throughout his life. During one attack in 1393, Charles could not remember his name, did not know he was king and fled in terror from his wife. He did not recognize his children, though he knew his brother and advisers, and remembered the names of people who had died. In later attacks, he roamed his palaces howling like a wolf, refused to bathe for months on end and suffered from delusions that he was made of glass."

"Charles VI's reign was marked by the continuing war with the English known as the Hundred Years' War. An early attempt at peace occurred in 1396 when Charles' daughter, the not quite seven-year-old Isabella of Valois, married the 29-year-old Richard II of England."

"The peace in France did not last." Ghanima capped her marker, setting it down to address the class more fully. "It never does. The feud between the Royal family and the house of Burgundy led to chaos and anarchy. Taking advantage, Henry V of England led an invasion which culminated in 1415 when the French army was defeated at the Battle of Agincourt. In 1420, Charles -- now utterly incapacitated by his disease -- signed the Treaty of Troyes which recognized Henry as his successor, declared his son Charles VII of France a bastard and betrothed his daughter, Catherine of Valois, to Henry." Ghanima smiled thinly. "In fact there really were many doubts as to the Dauphin Charles' legitimacy, his mother being notorious for her affairs. He was also of a weak and feeble nature which caused conflict with both her and his own son, the future Louis XI."

"Many people, including Joan of Arc, believed that the King only agreed to such disastrous and unprecedented terms under the mental stress of his illness and that, as a result, France could not be held to them. I am inclined to agree with them."

"Charles VI died in 1422 at Paris and is interred with his wife Isabeau de Bavière in Saint Denis Basilica. Both their grandson, the one-year-old Henry VI of England, and their son, Charles VII, were proclaimed King of France, but it was the latter who finally became the actual ruler with the support of Joan of Arc."

"Unfortunately, Charles VI appeared to have passed on his madness to his grandson Henry, whose inability to govern England helped spark the Wars of the Roses."

[OOC: You know the drill, ~~wait for~~ the OCD is up! Go forth and be kingslayers!]

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"Particularly not if he has a ring of loyal attack dogs," Alice said coolly, not looking up from her notes. "Minions who deal harshly with those who stand against him. That makes it much easier, one would imagine."

Reno went silent as death, looking evenly at Alice, his lips pulled into a tight frown.

It took him a long, long moment to manage words again. Words were... difficult.

"Yeah. Somethin' like that, zoto."

He was going to need to get very, very drunk tonight.

"Such a shame," she said, doodling idly in the margins of her notes. "Had those minions sided with the populace, the threat might have been dealt with much more swiftly. Instead there was presumably needless bloodshed on both sides."

Reno was no longer looking evenly at Alice. Reno was now glowering at his notebook.

It was better than walking out. He'd throw the damn book at the wall later and maybe he'd feel better. Or something.

"Presumably," he agreed. His guts were tying themselves into knots. His mouth was dry. He wanted to punch something.

"The populace had to fight through the minions," she said, still not looking up. "One wonders why those minions stood by a tyrant. They would have been useful allies, and instead, they're as dead as she is, now."

The card guards, lying slaughtered in a hedge maze. Had they really believed Her Majesty would win this time?

Reno grit his teeth. He grit them hard. Any harder, and he'd have busted a freaking molar, and wouldn't that have been the best way to top off this wonderful freakin' class?

"A guy does what he's gotta do to get by. Sometimes even standin' by the freakin' tyrants is better than the alternative."

Edited 2008-05-29 06:17 (UTC)

"Better than the alternative?" she snapped, finally looking over at him with flashing eyes. "All hail the king, appointed by God Himself, and woe to any who threaten his authority? Divine right? All who oppose him must fall? Spare me the mindless rhetoric. I've no interest in it."

Reno was going to make a point of punching a tree until he busted his fist or he busted the tree. Whichever came first.

"You ain't got no interest in it, which is why you're sittin' here pickin' fights with the peons, right?" His lips curled back in something of a soundless snarl. Restraining himself was getting difficult, but dammit, he wasn't going to get himself expelled for the sake of some girl who figured she knew it all, just because he wanted to bust in teeth right now.

Wasn't going to.

He was going to stay in the damn chair.

"No interest in your flimsy excuses," she clarified, eyes narrowing. "Whatever reason you give yourself to defend the status quo, however mangy and damaged it's become. The tentacles are draining life from every corner, the populace are dying, but the peons refuse to let one through. It has to be a fight, with each and every one of them. Fealty to a mad woman bent on destroying all she has in her clutches. There is no excuse for that."

"Draining life." The sound that came from Reno's throat wasn't intended to sound as rough and guttural as it did. Something of a choke and a laugh and the sound someone makes when they're trying their damnedest not to vomit.

"You wanna point at me and tell me that I chose the wrong freakin' team, Alice, you go right on ahead, and I won't even deny it when it boils right down to the basics, yo. But you start confusin' me with whatever the hell it was you went up against, then you're pushin' it. I never met this mad woman you're goin' on about. Your fight ain't with me."

"Very well. You chose the wrong team," she said coolly, looking back at her notebook. Her doodles had become angry scribbles, dark storm clouds that were nearly ripping through the paper.

"There we go. I chose the wrong team. Three cheers for the freakin' bad guy. Boom-rah-freakin'-rah." He was tearing pages out of his book. His book didn't need pages, did it? Nope. The pages were being crumpled into little paper balls and he was perfectly fine. "You done throwin' your snit yet, or you got somethin' else to try to shove down my throat?"

There was the long silence of one who was keeping herself from saying any number of unpleasant things.

"I've finished," she said coldly.

A snit. Clearly.

"We talk later," he hissed, closing his pageless notebook and frowning deeply.

This wasn't anywhere near finished. It was just on hiatus until they didn't have a freaking audience. Reno had to know what brought this about in the first place, damn it.

Oh, they had an audience alright. Ghanima showed every sign of being absorbed in her conversation with Jania, but she was well aware of the tempest brewing between Miss Liddell and The Lupi.

They were both going to get a talking to, once class was dismissed.

Mad Kings and Queens: Raving Royals and How to Survive Them [Wednesday, May 28th, 2nd Period]

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