For as long as there’s been a fortress, there has been a colonel in charge of it. And a colonel’s daughter to dash down the hillside to the ball. Can you hear the music? It comes from the water, like the call of the sea. Who will notice that the metallic tone of the notes is starting to crack?

For to the North, the shimmering surface of marshland seems to be progressing inexorably. More and more often, cavalry officers on patrol feel their horses’ hooves sinking into the swampy soil.

A storm is coming. And with it, elusive enemies on light steeds. They are all aspects of a more invasive disease that the old colonel is more aware of than anyone. A disease that he carries within himself to the point that he has become one with it…. Old Age.

Some parables are inexhaustible. Jean Lods sings the gesture of a man who is confronted with the invisible enemy that is time. But unlike Dino Buzzati or Julien Gracq, he provides his hero with a family. Which brings this tale of old age – with its legendary tone and descriptions of suffocating nature that grant it a sensual lyricism – closer to our daily lives.