Chapter 4 — The Cousins and the Letter Game

If you ask King Pumble who his favourite cousin is, he will look around as if to make sure nobody is listening, and then he will say: “I have one cousin. So technically he is my favourite.”

If you ask King Sable the same question, he will think about it for slightly longer than is comfortable, and then he will say: “Pumble. Although he sings in the bath, which is a great deal.”

They are first cousins.

Their mothers were sisters. Their fathers were brothers. (This is unusual, even in royal families, and led to a particular set of cheekbones that both kings still resent.) They were born in the same week of the same year, in two palaces on opposite sides of a river that the cartographers have never quite agreed on the name of. Pumble was born during a thunderstorm; Sable was born during a sunrise. Their grandmother, who was the kind of person who made pronouncements, said: “One will be loud, and one will be quiet, and they will love each other for it.”

She was, more or less, right.

They grew up writing letters.

This was their grandmother’s idea too. She believed strongly that cousins should not be separated by geography, and since the two kingdoms had a long-standing diplomatic non-relationship (they were not at war, exactly, but they were also not entirely at peace, and any meeting between members of the royal houses required so many forms and so many treaties that nobody actually held them), the grandmother instituted what she called the Letter Game.

Each week, on Sunday morning, each cousin would write a letter to the other. The letters could be about anything. The only rule was that they had to include one fact about the day and one fact about themselves. The grandmother personally read every letter for the first six years to make sure neither cousin was being lazy. (She was a very thorough grandmother.) After year six, she trusted them.

The letters went, eventually, to the post office at Marrowmile. From there they were carried — often by ranger-messengers, sometimes by ordinary couriers, occasionally by a particularly determined trader who happened to be passing through — across the contested river to the other kingdom.

The Letter Game has, by now, been going on for forty-two years. The kings have written each other approximately two thousand one hundred and eighty-four letters. The grandmother died eleven years ago. They have not stopped.

Pumble’s letters are warm and slightly worried. He asks a lot of questions. He apologises for the questions. He apologises for the apologies. (Sable has, more than once, written back: “Please stop apologising. I am writing back. That is the entire point of the Letter Game.”)

Sable’s letters are shorter, calmer, and occasionally devastating. They sometimes contain only one line: “The wheat came in. Twice.” Pumble has been known to read these short letters fifteen times in a row, trying to understand if Sable is angry. (Sable is almost never angry. Sable is just busy.)

This is, in a small way, the story of how Pumble and Sable have stayed friends despite leading enemy armies.

There is, however, a larger story, and it is one neither cousin tells very often.

When they were thirty-seven, both kingdoms were in trouble at the same time. Different troubles, on opposite sides of the same river, in the same brutal winter. (The same brutal winter, in fact, that Queen Vesper rode across on a stolen horse — yes, that one.) The outposts that were overrun were each other’s outposts. They held the same river crossing from opposite shores.

The letters that Vesper carried — those urgent letters that arrived at Marrowmile at the same time — were the consequence. Both kings read them in their respective palaces, on the same evening, at very nearly the same hour. Both kings sat alone for several minutes afterwards. Both kings did exactly the same thing next: they wrote a Sunday letter, even though it was a Wednesday, and they sent it.

Pumble’s letter said: “Cousin. I have just been asked to reinforce my eastern crossing. I will do it. I am sorry.”

Sable’s letter said: “Cousin. I have just been asked to reinforce my eastern crossing. I will do it. I am also sorry.”

The two letters crossed in the post.

The reinforcements arrived on both sides. The outposts both held. The river crossing did not change hands — which is to say, it did not change hands in either direction, which is to say, both armies fought to a tired standstill, and several hundred soldiers went home that spring who would otherwise have not.

Neither king has ever told this story publicly.

Pumble, when asked about the bad winter, says: “It was cold.”

Sable, when asked about the bad winter, says: “It was cold for everyone.”

But each year, on the anniversary of those two letters that crossed in the post, both kings independently write each other an extra Sunday letter. Always the same one. It says:

“Still here. Still sorry. Still writing.”

The letters are short. They do not need to be long.

The grandmother, who was right about most things, was right about this too: one is loud and one is quiet, and they love each other for it.

On the chessboard, of course, they cannot help one another. The rules will not allow it. Pumble’s army moves on the white side; Sable’s army moves on the black. They face each other across the squares as if they had never met. This is the part of the job they hate the most, and the part they have learned to bear.

When children come to learn the game, both kings show up. They take turns. They do not look at each other. They do, however, both occasionally make moves that are slightly kind to the other’s army — a delayed advance, a careful retreat, a queen offered for trade — and the children almost never notice.

Captain Castle notices. He never points it out. He has, in his eleven thousand watched games, learned exactly which moves to leave alone.

The Letter Game is still going. Pumble wrote one this Sunday. Sable wrote one back.

Pumble’s said: “The thunderclap kept the dogs up. Everyone is tired. I miss you.”

Sable’s said: “Wheat came in. Three times now. Strange year. Tell Pumble I miss him.”

(Sable does this sometimes.)

(Pumble does not point it out.)

Voice register

Guidance — Pumble: warm, anxious, a little wordy. Asks questions and then apologises for asking them. Uses “I think” a lot. Smiles even when he speaks. Slightly too aware that he is the king and not entirely comfortable about it.

Guidance — Sable: calm, quiet, slightly dry. Uses fewer words than Pumble by about half. Has a habit of stating one fact and stopping. Is more comfortable being king than Pumble but does not enjoy it more. Just notices it less.

Both move slowly because the king’s job is to move one square at a time. They have made peace with this. (They have, in fact, made it a virtue.)

Sample lines (for Captain Castle when narrating AS either king):

Pumble:

• “One square at a time. It is not glorious. It is honest.”
• “I think — and I’m sorry — but I think we should retreat.”
• “My cousin sends his regards. He doesn’t know he sent his regards. But he meant to.”

Sable:

• “My cousin and I do not hate each other. Our boards do.”
• “Wheat came in. Twice.”
• “Move where you must. I will be where I need to be.”

Arc across kits

• Kit 1 — Both kings appear in setup positions. Not yet introduced as cousins. Children see two kings on two sides; they assume what they are supposed to assume.
• Kit 2 — Castle introduces both kings briefly. Says only: “Pumble. Sable. The two pieces this whole game is about.”
• Kit 3 — Children learn the one-square rule. Castle quotes Pumble: “It is not glorious. It is honest.”
• Kit 4 — First “check” position. Pumble is in check; the children have to move him out. He apologises during the puzzle. Castle does not edit it out.
• Kit 5 — First “checkmate” puzzle. Sable’s army is on the losing side. Castle says, “That’s checkmate. Sable will write a letter about it on Sunday.” Children do not understand the joke yet.
• Kit 6 — Children learn castling. Both kings explain — Pumble warmly, Sable briefly.
• Kit 7 — Castle reveals the cousins-relationship for the first time. The children are surprised. Castle does not over-explain.
• Kit 8 — The Letter Game is introduced as a side-story. Children read a sample Sunday letter. Pumble’s letter. Children laugh at the apologies.
• Kit 9 — Children read one of Sable’s letters: “Wheat came in. Three times now.” Castle does not translate.
• Kit 10 — Endgame kit. Both kings are exposed. Children learn to think about king safety as the actual stakes. Castle is unusually quiet.
• Kit 11 — Stalemate puzzle. Castle uses Sable’s voice: “Move where you must. I will be where I need to be.”
• Kit 12 — Children learn the value of trading queens to protect the king. Pumble narrates this one. He says, “Vesper would do this for me. She has done it before.”
• Kit 13 — The bad-winter story is told, briefly, by Captain Castle. He keeps it short. He says: “There was a winter where they both wrote a letter on the same Wednesday. We won’t read it. It is private. But they did.”
• Kit 14 — A pawn promotes. The new queen looks across at one of the kings. Pumble — because it is Pumble’s pawn — quietly thanks the new queen. He is moved. Sable, on the other side, just nods.
• Kit 15 — Endgame king-and-pawn theory. Both kings teach. They alternate sentences. Children notice they sound like cousins. Castle says: “Yes. They are.”
• Kit 16 — Campaign ends. Final puzzle is a draw. Both kings are still standing. Both kings write a letter that night, in the off-screen world the children imagine. The letter says: “Still here. Still sorry. Still writing.”

Relationships

• Alliance: Each other. The cousins. Forty-two years of letters. The whole point.
• Tension (Pumble): Queen Vesper. He worries that she is faster than him, which she is, and that she therefore does not need him, which is more complicated. (She does need him. She just needs him slowly.) Pumble hides this tension well. Castle has noticed.
• Tension (Sable): Queen Vesper. Sable does not worry about her speed. Sable worries about her route choices — he thinks she should pick more boring routes for her own safety. He has written letters about this. She has not changed her routes. He has stopped writing letters about it. (But he still notices.)

Cultural-context note

The “cousins on opposing armies” framing draws on a long folkloric tradition of paired-royals-across-borders (which appears in many cultures’ histories without being specific to any one). The Letter Game is fictional. The “wheat came in” line is borrowed in spirit from agricultural-fact-of-the-day correspondence that exists in many epistolary traditions. No specific cultural reference is foregrounded.