The World Dragon's Heir

Chapter 700: Must Be Paid

With the meeting between the most affected Nobles concluded, the King ushered them all out of the office and down to the party, walking at the front with King Gustav of Dagos at his side.

It was a silent statement of solidarity with the King, a statement that he would go with whatever the King of Dagos wanted, no matter what the other visiting Nobles had been promoting.

So, every Noble in the event was waiting with tense anticipation as the news was quietly spread by the Advisors.

A birthday party was not the spot for a formal announcement, so the advisors would spread the official news through the crowd, informing everyone of the King’s will in minimal detail, and then they would get more details later if they needed them, or through the official announcement of Royal Decree that would come later.

If they were going to claim more territory, that would definitely need a decree.

Dominic took Alexis’ hand and guided her out into the crowd, followed by Thorvald and Josephine. The ladies would have a lot of Nobles coming to talk to them, as one had big news, and the other hadn’t been back since she was married.

In those circumstances, it was easier to have the two husbands at their side.

Not because they couldn’t deal with the Nobles, but to avoid having the ladies pull weapons on someone when they got annoyed. It was strictly for everyone else’s safety.

Alexis’ temperament hadn’t seemed to have changed, but Dominic had heard many horror stories about the easily enraged nature of pregnant women in every nation he visited as a youth.

"Your Grace, welcome back to the Capital. I had been hoping to make your acquaintance today." An older Noble greeted Dominic in an overly polite, almost fawning tone.

"Likewise." Dominic agreed, after realizing that the man hadn’t introduced himself.

"Right. I am the Earl of Arburgh, a port two hundred kilometres east of the Capital. I have heard wonderful things about your work in Wistover, and the Guild has been running regular routes through my airship docks on their way to West Keria."

"Ah, it’s a pleasure, Earl Arburgh. My apologies for not recognizing you immediately, the images I had for reference simply don’t do you justice."

In reality, they were likely made thirty years ago, and never updated. The man weighed twice what he did in the stock image, and no longer had the deep black locks that were in the image. Instead, his head was shaved, and his remaining beard was white.

"Princess Alexis, it’s a pleasure to see you again."

Josephine nodded, "George, it’s always an interesting day when I see you."

The Earl seemed to take that as a compliment, but it was very clearly not. Not even a little bit.

"But that is Alexis. Or did you think that I looked pregnant?" She continued, and the man paled.

"My apologies, Your Highness, neither of you appears to have gained any weight at all, and you know how bad I am at telling you apart. Please forgive me."

The Earl began backing away, his request for Dominic long forgotten.

All that he could do now was try to escape from the mistake that he had made before he said something else that would make it worse.

Dominic chuckled as the man vanished back into the crowd, and the sisters celebrated running off another creepy Nobleman. He likely wouldn’t try anything again, now that they were married.

But they hadn’t forgiven him yet, and had no intentions of doing so.

Seeing that the twins were up to their usual hobby of chasing away Nobles that they didn’t like, the others who were about to come up to say hello took a second to consider whether they were on the sisters’ blacklist.

Fortunately, most of them barely knew the pair, and weren’t among the Nobles who had tried to obtain a Royal marriage.

That was the presumed reason that they didn’t like the Earl. It was well known that he had requested an arranged marriage with one of the two, but was turned down by the King. What most didn’t know was that the sisters didn’t even care about that.

Dozens had made the same request, after all.

They just didn’t like him.

The new Marquis Burton was the first to come over and greet them after the Earl, arriving with a large smile on his face, and receiving an equally warm welcome.

"Marquis, how is your father? I heard that he retired here to the Capital." Dominic greeted him.

"He’s well. Recovering, but he’s stepped away from Royal events. I delivered his gift to the King’s receptionist earlier today, as father won’t be coming to the party."

"Well, parties are mostly for the younger folk anyhow.

Once you get to a certain age, standing around all day, drinking and socializing is just hard on the knees and back, or so I’m told." Dominic joked.

"Oh? According to whom?"

"My new Advisor, Jack Merlot."

The Marquis laughed. "He took a role as an advisor to the Duchy? Now that I did not expect. I had thought that he would just request financial compensation from the King and retire somewhere warm and pleasant, perhaps Port Tarleigh."

Dominic shook his head. "The old man is attempting to stay on the straight and narrow these days. He’s even started sipping expensive wine, instead of drinking mead by the tankard."

Marquis Burton laughed, not believing a word of that.

He had known Jack Merlot for many years, the man was a friend of his father and grandfather. Hearing that he had stepped away from the army was startling enough, but hearing that he was working as an Advisor and moderating his drinking was downright unbelievable.

"How is the construction work at Burton going?" Alexis asked, steering the conversation away from old men who weren’t in attendance.

"Quite well. They’ve got it all nearly finished, including the upgrades that we requested, to make the buildings a bit more fireproof. You’ll be happy to know that the whole city has slate tile roofs now, or at least not wooden ones.

And there are no more thatched roofs at all inside the city walls.

That’s upset quite a few workers, but they’re adapting well. It’s all part of the process, I suppose. The thatchers have started doing all sorts of roofing these days, moving away from the specialty to simply specializing in the tops of the building.

All that’s left is to place an order for some of those lovely transports you arrived in. Compared to the cars we’ve been using around town, they’re positively bespoke."