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Governor Haiden

Governor “Lollipop” Haiden was born in a hayloft in Delberry, Portund in the year -2, reputedly at the same time that someone else was being conceived atop an adjacent bale. From an early age Haiden expressed a desire to someday become Battal’s first ever chartered accountant, but this dream was tragically quashed when an accident with a bar of soap rendered him clinically incapable of filing. Not one to be deterred altogether from a life of paper shuffling and bureaucracy, he instead set his sights on someday becoming Governor of Portund.

His upbringing was an unusually sheltered one, due in part to his parents’ considerable wealth, but also because of a rare condition that caused his head to retain fluid, prompting other children to tell him, en masse and via devastatingly cruel rhymes, that he looked like a lollipop (lollipop, smells like a soggy mop, only ever get a job working at a dolly shop). In light of this, and the fact that his higher than normal centre of gravity made it difficult for him to run in anything but a straight line, his parents eventually decided to have him tutored at home.

Haiden proved to be an earnest and dedicated student, his only failing being a lack of imagination. However, he had an excellent memory and seemed to be physically incapable of becoming bored, no matter how dull the subject matter at hand; yet neither could he judge when anyone else wearied of talking with him. Gradually, his parents began to realize that his dream of becoming Governor was not as far-fetched as they had once thought.

Haiden eventually ran for office in the year 29. His campaign was funded entirely by his parents, as he was 31 and still living at home.

Haiden’s chances initially appeared slim. The incumbent, Governor Winott, was well liked and dependable, only welching on his election promises when they became inconvenient. Furthermore, Haiden’s life of isolation had left him with some bizarre political ideals, such as that people wearing spectacles should only ever be allowed to stand facing away from the sun (to avoid blinding others with reflected glare), or his zero tolerance policy on feet.

Seeing that desperate measures were required, Haiden engineered an audacious and dangerous publicity stunt; using the last of his pocket money, he imported a fully-grown Mount Wang Silkworm, and over the course of seventeen hours, ate the entire bloody thing. The feat was so impressive that everyone in Portund thought he deserved a reward regardless of his political leanings, and he won the election in a landslide victory. For years afterwards, however, all of his visits to the outhouse ended up with him producing expensive silk doll's clothing, a symptom that eerily echoed the taunts he had received as a child.

The year 30 marked the formation of The Kings Council, which Haiden was desperate to join, both for his own ego and to advance the position of Portund, which was at the time on the cusp of a mud famine. But Governor Haiden lacked a crucial requirement for entry to the council: He had no Magic Sword. Undeterred, he set his unboreable mind to work trawling through the fine print of the Council charter until he found the loophole he was looking for – due to the flowery and imprecise wording of the definition of a Magic Sword, an ordinary stick covered in ordinary mud would technically qualify.

Selecting a choice branch from a handy Dragonapple tree, Haiden scraped the last scrap of mud in Portund onto the pointy end and set off for The Kings Council. After much shouting and flailing of arms, he and Mudstick were grudgingly granted admission, but Ronard forbade him from participating as a full member. He had no voting nor veto powers. Ronard would live to regret this decision, as it only provoked Haiden to constantly badger the other members of the Council to vote the way he wanted. The full extent of his effect on the decisions of the other Sword Kings is impossible to measure; but Portund weathered its mud famine a lot better than would have been expected had Haiden not been on the council, though it never gained Twelve Realms status.

Governor Haiden remained in office and (sort of) on The Kings Council until his death in the year 108, which resulted from a misunderstanding with a Twelve Fisted Evil. He is remembered fondly in Delberry and the rest of Portund to this day. A statue of him stands in the centre of the Delberry town square, made entirely of wet mud, holding aloft a replica of Mudstick (the real thing residing with the current King of the Mud Men, who traditionally holds it by the wrong end).