The King &
The WooDSMAN

The King and The Woodsman

By Z.A. Kosma

The King ruled from a room that never slept.

Light danced on the walls. The room breathed framed charts and letters. Servants moved quietly, rehearsed in their obedience, each knowing exactly where to stand and when to disappear. From the balcony, the city looked orderly—clean lines, controlled motion, power made visible.

Yet the King felt heavy.

Every morning he was dressed in symbols: tailored fabric, polished metal, words chosen carefully by others. He spoke often of growth and destiny, of progress that must be guided lest it decay. People listened. Applauded. Bent slightly forward when he passed.

He had a wife who smiled in public and spoke through secretaries. Children being groomed for the weight he carried. A father's crown that became his own. All his by birth, by blood, by the unquestioned order of things.

Still, when night came, the room did not soften. The light did not dim. The King did not rest.

One afternoon, restless beyond reason, he ordered his guards away and walked past the perimeter roads, past the fences, past the places where the city stopped pretending to be natural.

That is where he found the Woodsman.

The man sat beside a low fire, its coals banked beneath evenly sized sticks. Coffee steamed in a battered kettle hung from a notched crossbar above the coals. His clothes were worn but clean. His hands were scarred in the quiet way of someone who uses them daily. The Woodsman looked up as the King approached and studied him, as one studies the clouds for weather.

“Where did you get that?” the King asked, nodding at the coffee.

The Woodsman smiled. “Same place where I get everything else.”

The King frowned. “There are no markets here.”

“No,” the Woodsman agreed. “There are paths.”

They sat together without ceremony. The Woodsman poured a cup and offered it. The King hesitated, then accepted. It was good—deep, unhurried, perfectly bitter.

“You live far from the city,” the King said.

“I live where I am,” the Woodsman replied. "I've lived in many places. Sixteen years now since I left walls behind."

The King studied him. No guards. No insignia. No visible wealth. And yet—there was an ease about the man that unsettled him. The way he spoke, plain and direct, without the careful layers the King recognized as essential.

"What made you leave?" the King asked.

The Woodsman looked up at the stars, "I wanted to see what was beyond the fence of my father’s farm. Suppose I was curious mostly." He paused for a breath. "War came for them while I was away.”

The King said nothing. There was nothing to say that wouldn't be empty. The fire popped and crackled, the only sound of life in the clearing.

"I found new family. My wife's people, scattered across half the continent. That first winter taught me more about wealth than I'd learned in all the years before."

He poured coffee into two tin mugs, passed one to the King. "They taught me what's worth protecting."

The King took the mug by the handle. "You don't serve anyone?"

The Woodsman considered the question, watching the fire, "I serve what keeps me alive. I serve what keeps my family warm. I serve the ground that feeds me and the people I love." He looked up at the King and gestured at the cup in the King's hand. “Today, apparently, I serve coffee.”

The King smirked briefly, then straightened. “I serve millions.”

The Woodsman nodded. “That’s a heavy load.”

Silence fell again. Somewhere, a bird cut through the air with sudden precision.

“Do you have no ambition?” the King pressed.

The Woodsman laughed, “Well, I wake early. I work. I rest. I build what lasts.” He gestured loosely. "I hunt when the season calls it. Trade tools with families three valleys over. Stand watch when neighbors need it. Tend land, solve problems, make things. I travel when it calls me. Last winter, my family went to the ocean."

“The ocean?” The King blinked. “You mean—”

“Yes,” the Woodsman said. “We stayed a week. Came back before the snow.”

The King felt something twist in his chest. He owned coastlines. He commanded fleets. And yet his last journey had been a procession of meetings and guarded rooms, every moment arranged. His children had seen the ocean once, through the windows of a secured residence, their schedules managed by tutors and guards.

“Why don’t you stay there?” the King asked.

“Why would I?” the Woodsman replied. “I already live well.”

The fire cracked as the Woodsman fed it. The kettle was emptied and set aside. Light shifted through the trees, unannounced.

From the edge of the clearing, barely visible in the lengthening shadows, a woman stood watching, a basket at her side. The Woodsman glanced toward her once, a small acknowledgment. She remained where she was. After a moment, she turned and disappeared into the trees.

The King stood at last. His crown felt absurdly heavy.

“Do you know who I am?” he asked.

The Woodsman met his eyes. “A man passing through.”

For the first time in years, the King laughed—quietly, without witnesses.

When he turned back toward the city, thoughts moved through him that had never had room to form before. The crown he wore—his father's before him. His children, already learning the performance. His wife, who he once knew as something other than a role.

He had never questioned divine right. It had simply been—natural as breathing, fixed as stone.

But the Woodsman had walked away from walls. Had lost family and found another family. Had scattered himself across a continent and somehow held more together than the King, with all his power, had ever managed to hold.

The city lights emerged through the trees. Not farther than before—but different now. The king could see both them and himself walking toward them.

He didn't know what he would do with this. The crown still fit. His son would inherit it. His daughter, the performance that came with it. His hands remembered the weight of the tin mug differently than they remembered scepters.

Some knowledge, once held, cannot be set down.

Behind him, the Woodsman added another log to the fire.

---

Originally published in the Summer 2026 edition of Relief Journal (https://www.reliefjournal.com/summer-2026-relief-print).

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