False Kings

The False Kings were a group of human refugees from the Earth-666 iteration of reality. In 114, after convincing the native population that they were a fulfillment of the prophecy of “The Promised Return,” the False Kings assumed control of the Edenian territory of Wonderland and divided it amongst themselves.

Over the course of the next thirty years, these men and their representatives proved time and again that they were not the second coming of the heroic Bekiskapan—no matter their claims to the contrary. Only The Great Abdication Movement and the work of the Seven Queens could undo the damage the False Kings had done. And even then, places like Watersmeet were so far gone that it would take the eventual rise of Frieda Jacobs as the first Queen of Hearts to set them straight.

The Founders

The seven men met on the shores of the Sea of Tears, near Saltgate (later called The City of Hearts). Several of them had survived the sinking of the Titanic just before their universe came to an end. They were:

• Östen Eadgilsson, a third-class passenger who would have drowned below decks if the world hadn’t ended
• Oskar Wolff, a crew member on the ship and the bastard son of a certain Professor James Moriarty
• Luther Dawkins, the grandson of a pickpocket who’d spent time in the penal colony of Australia
• George Switzer, a struggling salesman who had finally found a product—the Honeybear—he could sell, just in time for the unsinkable ocean liner he was on to, well, sink
• Vladimir Mikhailovich Ivanov, a veteran of the disastrous Russo-Japanese War who fled his homeland in the wake of the 1905 Revolution
• Jacob Winters, a factory worker and aspiring inventor whose designs would later be realized as the Model E
• Hamish, a man of many stories who claimed to be the time traveler who had inadvertently caused the end of the world

Seeking to establish a homeland for their fellow human beings in the strange world of Eden, the seven men divided the land they were given into seven kingdoms roughly divided along their ethnic identities—all of which were European, it must be noted, which left refugees who had been marginalized on Earth now marginalized in Eden as well.

It was an arrangement which broke down almost immediately, as these egomaniacs each sought to dominate and expand their spheres of influence. The conflict between the neighboring kingdoms of Neverland and The Realm was the most fierce, eventually leading to the murder of one king by another. But even with this in-fighting, the seven still met on neutral ground north of the Oadü once per year in order to maintain their control.

That control would come to an end from 137–142 with the Great Abdication Movement, which found the citizens of the seven kingdoms rising up against their rulers. Following the headlines made in 136 by Gretel der Jäger and Daisy Rampion, the people demand that all remaining false kings abdicate by 142 and that their heirs apparent marry heroines like Gretel and Daisy—lists of whom shall be presented by the public to the kings on a regular basis.

The Second Lineup

Two years after the end of the Great Abdication Movement, the surviving kings—emboldened by Oscar Diggs’ successful Invasion of Oz—reunited with the widows of their two dead members, all in an effort to take back control. The widows in question were:

• Mercy Graves, the so-called “Evil Queen,” she had been married to Jacob Winters and had been implicated in crimes against her step-daughter Sadie Winters—the rightful heir to the throne of The Realm and now the Queen Consort of Fatherland
• Johanna Vinternsdotter, the so-called “Snow Queen,” a powerful sorceress who had recently been demoted from Queen Regent to Queen Mother and was not taking that demotion well at all

Their attempted coup was unsuccessful, but the damage they did to the city of Watersmeet during their ultimate downfall would take decades to repair.