Page 10 of The Ruby Dragon Prince (Omega Fairy Tales #1)

Chapter

Nine

Rufus

T he only way I was going to keep Tovey by my side and happy was if I gave in to the demands he made about things that were important to him. I realized that as he was sleeping off the birth of our eggs. I wanted nothing more than to surround him with safety and comfort for the rest of our lives, but as my darker urges to claim and mate subsided, I understood that Tovey would never be happy, no matter what I gave him, as long as he thought his beloved brothers and the people of his father’s kingdom were in danger.

Which was why I found myself walking a few yards behind my mate and his brothers as they traversed the streets of the city outside the castle, enjoying the harvest festival. I was dressed as an ordinary townsperson and had a slight, magical cloak of disguise around me so that I could be seen and people could interact with me, but I appeared ordinary and mostly unnoticeable to them. Even the half dozen guards that surrounded the omega princes didn’t notice I’d been following them since the castle.

It was a shock to me that King Freslik had let the omegas out of their room at all. They’d been kept in their room and the garden through the week that had followed in the cruel world after I’d pretended to kidnap Tovey to finish breeding him. Argus hinted that he might have had something to do with the king’s change of mind, but I was too busy keeping an eye on my mate to delve into details.

Tovey had spent two weeks with me, off and on in combination with time in the cruel world, building his nest in my home. The difference in the way time passed between the two kingdoms made it possible for him to split his time between his brothers and me and the eggs, though there were limits to how far the passage of time between the two places could be stretched. His nesting meant he’d stripped my bed and remade it with the finest silks, piles of featherbeds, and, for some reason, a dozen musical instruments of all kinds.

“I can’t explain why,” he’d told me with a shrug when I questioned him. “I just feel like they need to have music around them.”

That did not, however, mean that he wanted any sort of actual musicians in the room to play for him or the eggs. Just the instruments themselves.

I’d brought Tovey several choices for nursemaids, and after agonizing over the decision to leave the eggs, he’d chosen a beautiful dryad named Phygalia, who had forest green skin and hair like autumn leaves, to mind the babies in our absence. She’d promised to sing to them, which was what won Tovey over.

“I hope we’re able to expose Father’s plot and bring things to a peaceful resolution as quickly as possible,” Tovey said as we all wandered the many stalls of the market that had been set up all along the streets of the city. “I don’t like being away from home.”

Anyone could have heard that comment and they likely would have assumed Tovey was speaking to his brothers. He looked straight past them to me, though, worry creasing his brow.

“Father intends to announce the new tax before the dance this evening,” Prince Rumi said, also glancing back toward me, though his gaze kept slipping past me as his brain told him I wasn’t important enough for his notice. “He plans to announce the bounty for reporting anyone trying to evade the tax or any females or omegas farming more land than they’ll be allowed in order to turn farmers against each other tonight as well.”

“That bounty is just evil,” Prince Leo said, stomping along, arms crossed. “It’s cruel to impoverish farmers and then promise them exactly what they need to feed their families on the condition that they make accusations against other farmers.”

“Father doesn’t even care if those accusations are true or not,” Prince Selle added, adjusting his glasses. “He just wants to turn the farmers against each other.”

“It won’t work,” Prince Misha said, though he didn’t sound entirely certain. “I hope it won’t work,” he added in a whisper.

“It won’t,” Prince Rumi said confidently.

I wasn’t convinced. Humans had a sad way of turning against each other over the slightest differences when they thought their lives and livelihoods were in danger. Even when the danger was more of a discomfort than an actual crisis. Above all, humans wanted to be comfortable, and while there was nothing wrong with that and comfort was one of the greatest joys of all creatures, if hurting someone else, or turning a blind eye while someone else was hurt, preserved their own comfort, they would turn on their neighbors and turn fast.

My thoughts rumbled around my already sullen and suspicious head, but they were brought to a quick stop when the princes turned the corner to find King Freslik’s retinue marching forward from the cross street.

“Turn back,” Prince Leo whispered, trying to push his brothers back around the corner, but it was too late, they’d been seen.

“What is the meaning of this?” King Freslik demanded, scowling at his sons and stepping in front of the crowd of sycophantic nobles that trailed him. “I allowed you to attend this festival, but I did not allow you to wander the market stalls like peasants.”

“What else are we to do, Father?” Prince Rumi asked, just enough innocence in his face and his question to sound like he was asking a genuine question.

King Freslik balled his hands into fists and ground his jaw. “You shouldn’t be parading yourselves like the strumpets you are,” he said, clearly not having an answer to Prince Rumi’s question. “You’ll have half the alphas in the kingdom panting after you, and I will not accept a low-bred bastard anywhere within my castle walls.”

“None of us are close to being in heat, Father,” Prince Selle said in a quiet voice.

King Freslik didn’t have an answer for that comment either.

“Go conceal yourselves,” he said. “You can watch the festival from the platform in the town square, where I will make my speech tonight.”

“Yes, Father,” some of the omega princes said, including Tovey, which surprised me.

King Freslik started to move on and the omegas changed directions slightly, like they intended to do what their father had asked. As they passed the group of nobles following the king, an alpha with a large nose and a sour expression stepped into Tovey’s path.

“Prince Tovey. How lovely to see you again,” the odious nobleman said, his voice oily and too forward. His smile was full of crooked teeth.

“Lord Groswick,” Tovey said with a nod, stepping back. He turned to me with a look as if to say “this is the man who has been bothering me”.

I was instantly furious and nearly threw off my concealing cloak so that I could throttle the life out of the man.

“You should know that I’ve been speaking with your father,” Lord Groswick went on, seemingly unaware that I was inching my way closer to him between the princes. “Everything will be in place for the two of us to be together soon. The new tax isn’t the only thing he will announce before the dancing tonight.”

“I have no intention of marrying you, Lord Groswick,” Tovey said, his head held high, even though Groswick was inches taller than him. I was deeply proud of my omega.

Lord Groswick chuckled. “I think you’ll find, my pretty, that it doesn’t matter what you want. It’s already been decided that you are mine.”

The bastard had the nerve to reach out as if he would touch Tovey’s face.

I would have swooped in and broken the man’s arm, but Tovey dodged out of his way too fast. “You will not touch me,” he hissed at Groswick.

Groswick looked affronted. He sneered and jerked like he would lunge forward and scoop Tovey into his arms to carry him off then and there. He would have to get through me first.

“Groswick!” King Freslik shouted before the brewing confrontation could happen.

We all turned toward the king. The rest of the royal retinue had moved on, and they all stared back at us.

“Stop wasting time on a pathetic omega!” the king scolded Groswick.

“Yes, Your Majesty. Of course.”

Like the coward he was, Groswick ignored Tovey, rushing after the king, likely to lick his boots. I was glad the man was such a sheep, however. It meant my omega remained unharmed and I didn’t have to kill anyone and ruin the festival for him.

“That was close,” Prince Obi gasped as the omegas moved on.

Prince Leo snorted. “Father doesn’t have the balls to harm us in public.”

I could feel from my beloved Tovey that he didn’t believe that to be true. “Why don’t we all go our separate ways for a while and see if we can speak to some of the townspeople?” he suggested. “We need to warn them about what’s coming.”

“Indeed, we do,” Prince Rumi said.

The princes broke into two groups, three of them heading in one direction and two of them in another. I noted that neither group looked as though they would do as the king had ordered them and take up places in the town square.

Tovey stayed with me. He grabbed my hand with a sudden, mischievous smile and said, “Come on. Let’s explore the festival.”

I went from seething with anger to ready to laugh so quickly that my head spun. The human harvest festival was nothing to some of the markets and celebrations we had in the magical kingdom, but I loved seeing the excitement in my mate’s eyes as he dragged me around, pointing out the wares of various craftsmen.

“Aren’t these boots lovely?” he asked with a fond sigh, poring over a table with children’s boots. “Someday, our babies will wear things like these. Perhaps I should purchase some now.”

“Whatever you wish,” I said. I didn’t need to tell him that I could have half a dozen elven shoemakers custom sew boots and shoes in every size and of every description that would put even the finest wares Tovey was looking at to shame.

He moved on without buying boots, crossing the street to look at a tray of sweet buns and tarts instead.

“Don’t they look delicious?” he asked, licking his lips.

They were fine. The confections and treats that the servants in my mother’s castle made for the nightly balls at the pavilion were of a much higher quality, but taste was different for all.

“I’m going to get one,” Tovey said, reaching into the pocket of his jacket and pulling out a few coins. “Do you want one, too?”

The young woman standing behind the baker’s cart blinked in surprise when she perceived me standing with Tovey. My partial concealment was working.

“Yes,” I said, smiling at the woman. “But I’ll pay.”

Tovey looked surprised. The baker woman was even more surprised when she handed Tovey two swirled cinnamon tarts and I paid her with a handful of rubies that I conjured out of nowhere.

“Thank you!” she gasped, staring at the gems in her hand. “This is…this is…this is enough to buy the entire bakery and the store across the way!”

“Then perhaps you should do just that,” I told her with a wink as Tovey and I moved on.

“I’m not certain you should have done that,” Tovey told me once we’d walked away, turned down a side street, and found a place to sit and eat our pastries.

I frowned at him. “Why not? She looked like a good woman. Her life will be forever improved now.”

“Unless people say she stole those rubies,” Tovey said thoughtfully. “What will she answer when she tries to use them to buy the bakery and she’s asked where she came by such wealth? Will people believe her when she tells them a man paid her in rubies for two cinnamon swirls?”

He had a point. Humans were forever suspicious of where each other came across their wealth. It was ridiculous, really, since so many of the wealthiest among them were thieves, that common people were questioned and penalized when they earned their living by the sweat of their brow. Or, in the case of the baker woman, when she stumbled across a stroke of good fortune.

I nodded, sending a stream of magic back to the woman. “There,” I told Tovey. “When she reaches into her pocket to see her rubies again, she will find coins of your realm, old and new. People will think she has scrimped and saved, but the value will be the same.”

Tovey smiled at me, then, since we were seated side by side, he leaned into me, resting his head on my shoulder.

“I do love you,” he said. “I know that love came about magically?—”

“Not magically,” I corrected him. “It was fated.”

“Whatever the case,” he said, sitting straighter, eating the last of his pastry, then finishing with his mouth half full, “I love you more with each passing day.”

I laughed at how funny he sounded confessing his love with a mouth full of pastry. Once he swallowed, I leaned in and kissed him soundly, wiping the sugar and cinnamon from his lips with my tongue. We both laughed, and my heart felt so light. The only thing that would have made the moment better would have been if our children had been there with us.

I was about to tell Tovey as much when a commotion from the courtyard behind the building we were sitting in front of snagged our attention. I’d vaguely noticed several men walking down the short alley near our bench and into the courtyard, but as I turned to check, it was clear to me the men were gathering for a meeting.

“It’s the farmers,” Tovey said, grabbing my hand, standing, and pulling me along. “I recognize some of them. This must be their meeting to discuss Father’s new tax.”

Tovey was correct. The meeting was already in session as we made our way back to the narrow courtyard that filled the space between two rows of buildings.

“This new tax proposed by the king will break too many of us,” a middle-aged alpha with a greying beard and a kind face addressed a growing crowd of others. “It penalizes us for doing well. It is a blatant attempt to push us back into those dark ages when a handful of feudal lords controlled the lion’s share of the land’s wealth.”

“We won’t go back again!” another farmer shouted, a female alpha, by the look of her. “We’ve earned our homes and our land the hard way. We’ve made more of ourselves than we were given and the land has been fruitful because of it.”

“If King Freslik has his way,” another, slightly younger female alpha said, “Women like me and Leandra there won’t be allowed to own much land at all.”

“The tax is heavier on anyone who isn’t a male alpha,” a man who looked like a beta shouted from the other end of the courtyard. “It’s clear what sort of land he wants this to be.”

“He’s after money,” the farmer leading the meeting said. “He wants to fill his coffers and those of men like Lord Groswick and the others who follow him like puppies.”

“Aye!” several people called out in agreement.

“He wants to dangle meager coins in front of us so that we’ll turn on each other for the scraps from his table,” the man leading the meeting went on.

“Outrage!” someone shouted.

“You cannot allow this to happen!” Tovey shouted, surprising me and everyone else.

All eyes turned toward him. Several of the farmers must have known who he was. A murmur went through the crowd, and one by one, the farmers dropped to one knee in deference.

Tovey seemed energized by the show of respect. He sent me a quick smile, then faced the crowd again.

“You must band together to resist whatever my wicked father and his followers have planned,” he said. “The only way to save one is if each one of you works together to save all.”

“What do you mean, Your Highness?” the man running the meeting asked.

Tovey was smaller than anyone else in the square, and even with most of them on one knee, I knew he needed to be more visible. So without pausing to ask him about it, I knelt and swept my shoulder under his bum, then stood as he sat on my shoulder. Tovey gasped in surprise, then instinctively steadied himself using my magic.

“The only way to fight back against a tyrant like my father is to pledge to help one another,” Tovey went on, much more visible to everyone in the courtyard. “His methods depend on each of you turning against the other. His taxation scheme is intended to make you all weak enough to grasp at whatever he offers so that he looks like the savior. But you cannot allow him to have that sort of power over you.”

“How can we avoid it?” one of the farmers asked. “Your father might be evil, if you’ll pardon me for saying so, Your Highness, but he is also powerful. If he wishes us to starve, then we will starve.”

“If you starve, he starves,” Tovey said. “If your farms do not produce, then he will not have bread. If you do not have money for the market, those who sell the wares will have no buyers. But I know you are all stronger than the arbitrary rules that bind and restrict you. I know that you can find secret ways to help one another. I have recently come to learn that the world works in a thousand unexpected ways, and what we see on the surface is only a tiny fraction of the reality that we live in.”

“You’re talking about magic,” the man running the meeting said. I noticed that his eyes kept shifting to me, then slightly away, like he knew I was cloaked in some sort of magic.

“If that is what it takes,” Tovey said with a nod. “But kindness is the greatest magic that I have ever known. Steadfastness and loyalty to those near and dear to you is the most powerful magic there is. When we all stand together, not even the strongest force?—”

“Look out!” a young boy shouted from an upper window in one of the houses lining the courtyard. “The king’s guards are coming!”