He didn’t have much, just a dream for fame and a nervous laugh. Every tavern’s amateur hour night, every performing arts guild hall, every half-lit corner stage. He tried. Oh gods, he tried.
But the laughs never came easy, if they came at all.
So when he stumbled into the Night Market that fateful night, fairly tipsy and heart heavy with rejection, he didn’t think twice about the entering the tent stitched from faded playbills and headlining tavern adverts for legendary bards. Inside, a vendor whose mask shifted from comedy to tragedy with a charismatic slight of hand offered him a jester’s cap of the finest velvet, with little bleached bells carved from bone and polished to a fine sheen.
“No one shall be spared,” the vendor chuckled, placing it into the man’s trembling hands. “Your observations will be all encompassing, your wit will be sharpened to a fine point, and laughter will be sure to follow with each and every riff. Try it, try it! If you love it, I'll name the price.. later.”
He didn’t ask what that meant.
He started small. Tavern sets, inns, speakeasy halls. The jester’s cap whispered jokes to him in a voice slick yet callous - with barbed, cutting lines that lanced egos and drew roars of laughter. An insult bard loved by the masses.
" 'ey oh, I see Dale's out of the stocks. You know what that means, ladies. Cover your drinks."
Crowds laughed. So if a few patrons wept or stormed out? Well, that was the cost of being bold. Being real and telling it like it was.
"Well lookie there, we have royalty in the house! I'd kiss your ring of course, but I'd like you to remove it from ya backpocket first."
Until a minister from the royal court caught one of his acts and laughed the hardest as our new bard roasted him with focused intensity. The minister laughed, the audience roared, and the bard went in for another run.
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"Whew, give him a hand, folks - he’s gonna need it when her highness pretends to be asleep again tonight."
Afterward, the bard was summoned by decree - invited to perform at the royal court.
A dream come true, at long last. Whatever the price for this fame was, he would gladly pay it a thousand times over. His face would be known throughout the land, his legacy as a performer cemented.
The throne room was colder than he expected. Torches dimly lit the hall as he approached, bowing before King Skarn. The king, stiff and frowning, watched in total silence. Nobles surrounded him like vultures around the crown, each jockeying to be in the royal's favor.
The bard began. The hat whispered. He repeated. Insults cloaked as punchlines.
"I heard Sir Timus was the jousting tourney champ last year. Impressive, though I also heard he's been practicing banging poles in the off season with his squire."
"I'm not saying Maester Gray's mother was a gnome, but you tell me how else anyone can be 4 foot tall with a 3 foot beard."
"King Skarn is so fat, that when he sits around the palace - he sits around the palace!"
No laughter, not a chuckle. Deafening silence.
He stammered. He sweat and pulled at his collar, laughing to himself nervously. He tried again, digging deeper, the hat pushing him harder. Meaner. Crueler.
"I mean, what's the deal with this royal family line? It's like you're purposely breeding ugly dogs. I dunno, maybe step outside your immediate family for once."
Still silence. Except from the minister, sitting smug near the dais, wearing a sly grin with wicked eyes.
"So King Skarn, Queen Helleh and Prince Jorgun all jump off the castle roof in a race to the bottom. Who wins? *Society.*"
The king stood.
“That is enough.”
The sentence was swift. The gallows were prepared for later that week.
The bard said nothing as the hood was placed over his head. The cap lay on the platform, casted aside at the last moment.
The executioner dropped the platform lever. It was over for the bard, but at least sudden.
And the minister, surrounded by courtiers, clapped once. Then twice. And smiled wide.
“Now,” he said, voice smug with malice, “that was funny.” He roared with laughter, his courtiers nervously laughing with him.
Later, a quiet masked vendor mended his tent at the Night Market. A slight tear in the fabric, but this notice of execution flier fit oh so neatly over the tear. With a couple quick stitches, it was good as new. And inside, on display was a jester’s hat, whose polished bone bells would occasionally jingle. It was labeled with a small discount, slightly used but near mint condition.
