Graham

From King's Quest Omnipedia

Graham son of Sir Hereward was once a knight of Daventry, under King Edward. Being the bravest and noblest knight, King Edward, who was childless, looked at him as a potential heir. The nineteen year old Graham was indeed asked by the venerable King to recover Daventry's treasures when they were stolen. Right when Graham returned to the castle after recovering the treasures, the King's heart failed him, and Graham was named king of Daventry.

During the events of KQII, after a vision he was given from the Magic Mirror, he traveled to the far away realm of Kolyma to rescue a beautiful maiden named Valanice from a quartz tower that an evil witch named Hagatha had trapped her in. After braving many perils, Graham succeeded and he and Valanice were married in the Monastery of the Blessed Wilbury, and she became his queen.

A couple of years later, Valanice bore Graham twin children, a son Alexander and a daughter Rosella. Unfortunately, Alexander was kidnaped in his infancy from Daventry and would not return for almost eighteen years.

Some years after the loss of his son, Graham embarked on a quest to rescue Ahi'aorina, queen of the fairies of the Old Wood from the giant Dunstan, to end the unnatural winter and bring spring to Daventry. He traveled east from Castle Daventry to the Old Woods to meet her husband, Quilli'ehennan. Continuing east he joined up with the minstrel, Shallan, whom he had a few adventures with including running into giant spider, being tossed into a pit that lead to caves of the Laburnum a family of bandits. He escaped the Laburnum, but lost track of the minstrel. Soon he met two gnomes who helped him get new clothes to help cross frigid Glass Mountains into the Kingdom of Sorrow. Soon he found Sorrowing Court and met the giant Dunstan and the Imps that ruled there. He soon found out that Dunstan and the Imps were not mastermind behind the kidnapping and were in fact a pawn in the whole ordeal. The evil Efreeti Kuzgu who was in the guise of an Imp has been the one who had instigated the kidnapping. Kuzgu had made sure Graham's mind was transfered into a slizard. Graham escaped in his lizard for, and had to survive the imps in order to get his body back. Graham soon discovered that a great wizard was being held in the castle in a Glamour Manarvel. Graham recovered his body, and tricked the Imps into thinking he was still transformed, allowing him to defeat them. He helped free the fairy queen, who then helped free the wizard, Karn Megiddo. Together with Dunstan they defeated the efreeti. Because the spell forming the castle together had been broken it began to disintegrate, so Graham, Ahi'Aorina, the Imps, and Wizard all escaped the castle before it completely vanished. But upon exiting the castle Karn turned on the group to try to destroy them. It turned out Karn had been behind everything, and was the efreeti's master. Graham defeated Karn by use of the Slizard. Having triumphed spring had returned, and Graham was able to return back to Daventry.^KQKoS

A couple of years later Graham and Valanice traveled to the Duchy Cumberford to attend the wedding of Duke Faust to the Duchess Aspen of Chouen.^KQSNW

In the following years, Daventry endured terrible hardship in the form of many devastating earthquakes that ripped and tore at the very ground and destroyed many landmarks. Soon after, a vile three-headed dragon laid waste to the kingdom and began to demand the sacrifice of maidens for it's bounty. For some years the dragon ravaged the realm, until the events of King's Quest III, in which Alexander returned after escaping the clutches of an evil wizard named Manannan and killed the dragon, finally bringing peace to Daventry.

In KQIV, Graham suffered a heart attack as he was passing on his his famous adventurer's cap (which he had worn through all of his quests) to his children Alexander and Rosella, and was near death. With the help of a fairy named Genesta, his daughter Rosella traveled to the land of Tamir to obtain a magical fruit that would heal him.

Sometime after, a powerful and evil sorcerer named Telgrin invaded Daventry with his army and claimed the land as his own and stole Graham's soul, leaving Graham in danger of becoming one of Telgrin's soulless servants. Alexander was able to defeat Telgrin and rescue his father and the kingdom.^KQTFC

He spent many months during the time of KQV in the land of Serenia trying to find his family and castle that the evil wizard Mordack had captured and placed in a jar. When he reached Mordack's castle, he defeated the wizard, saved Cassima, and was reunited with his family.

He traveled to the Land of the Green Isles in KQVI to attend Alexander's and Cassima's wedding.

During the events of KQ7, He had waited 15 minutes for Valanice and Rosella return so they could have lunch. After which they told him the story of their adventures in Eldritch and Etheria.^{KQC 319} His daughter eventually began to court Edgar in the land of Eldritch, and he would come to visit her in Daventry (according to the King's Quest Companion). It is implied that she and Edgar became the heirs of Daventry.

Years later, during King's Quest: Mask of Eternity, when he was an white-haired old man, he was with one of his officials discussing kingdom's surplus grain that year, and that they must begin construction on a new silo. When the Daventry Official noticed in the Magic Mirror a bad omen, of the Mask of Eternity being destroyed by Lucreto. The cataclysm caused by the blast of magic from the cracked mask turned Graham to stone like everyone else in Daventry. Connor made it into the castle and viewed a portrait of his King, King Graham of Daventry, in the Dining Room which showed him wearing a green adventure's hat and his hair having gone white. Connor soon found his stone form in Castle Daventry seeing that even King Graham was no match against the evil magic. He vowed to his lord, with all his heart, that he would place himself in mortal jeopardy before giving in to the vile forces which held the king in thrall. Connor eventually defeated Lucreto and reformed the Mask of Eternity restoring Graham to his true self.

Apparently, King Graham was known to have enjoyed Checkers and Backgammon, and he would challenge visitors to the Castle any chance he could.

[edit] King Graham in the Unofficial Games

In King's Quest II: Romancing the Stones, Graham marries Valanice in Caldaur's Castle, rather than in Monastery of the Blessed Wilbury. Graham's vision of the Mask of Eternity era also implies that Graham was quite old during that period, and frail of body.

In King's Quest 2 1/2: Breast Intentions, Graham stays home to feed Rosella with bottles of Valanice's milk.

He plays a major role in The Silver Lining. He goes on a journey to save his son and daughter from a curse put on them by a mysterious man in a black cloak.

TSL mentions that before Graham "chose" to become a knight he used to frequent the "Prattling Pony" in his youth.

However according to TSL's timeline Graham is not very old, he's only in his 50's at the most, as they chose to place MOE not long after KQ7, and TSL takes place just one year after MOE on their timeline. He does not appear as frail as he does in MoE, and his hair is dark grey as opposed white.

[edit] Trivia

• If you ask "What is Graham's first name?" in KQ2 the game will reply with "Cracker".

• If King Graham is killed by Dahlia in King's Quest 1 remake, he becomes a "Graham Cracker".

• Graham has worn several different variations on his adventure's cap, pants and jerkin clothing style, and occasionally worn royal robes, see Graham's Wardrobe for more information on his clothing "variety".

• According to Hoyle's Book of Games, Volume 1 (in which both Graham and Rosella appear), Graham's grandfather was said to have been a great knight that defeated the evil Dragon of Herenna, "using his wits rather than his sword". Its also implied that Graham's father was still alive and proud that Graham was chosen to be the new king (although other sources say his Grandfather was already dead before the events of King's Quest I).

• Graham claims he once played a card game against a firedrake, but it ended when it inceinerated the cards.