London, 1984. Democracy has given up the ghost. England’s ruler is randomly selected, and this year it’s Auberon Quin, a clerk with an odd sense of humour. Quinn mandates that each borough of London become an independent neo-medievalist state, complete with costume and armoury. The city bears his practical joke with varying levels of patience – except Adam Wayne, an earnest young man from Notting Hill, who takes his sword in hand and the joke deathly seriously.