Moonlight Ball

The jeweler looked nervously at the Queen’s face. The young Queen was the one who stole the love of the country. But the merchants were well aware of her true nature. She was greedy, brutal and it would be impossible for them to work commercially in the capital if they went against her will. It was fine when the King didn’t take her side, but it looked like the King was about to fully support her even if she requested that he kill the jeweler.

Iris had mixed feelings as she stood in the market. The King was strange and scary, yet he was good to her. The fact that he’d organized the market in the magnificent forest on the palace grounds showed his generosity and kindness toward Iris. It was an unexpected misunderstanding, but there was no one to resolve it, and Iris gently pulled the King’s shirt.

Sidrain looked down at Iris as she pulled at the hem of his shirt. He looked at her as if he was trying to tell her that she should say whatever she needed to say.

“I have a secret story,” she whispered. Sidrain bowed his head and put his ears near her mouth. “I’m a little bit c-c-confused because of the Haran’s river accident.” Iris often stuttered when she spoke to Sidrain, but she was unsure why. And when she lied, she stuttered two or three times more. Sidrain held back his laughter and nodded as she continued, “Do you remember what I used to do before? Things like firing the cook or being mean to the maids.”

Iris talked gibberish, but Sidrain understood her stupid words, so he interrupted her, “It’s your job to crack down on merchants or trade with them as you please, my Queen.” After saying this, Sidrain kissed Iris on the cheek to show that he meant what he said.

Iris sighed long afterward. The King had given her permission, so now she could say what she wanted to say, and she looked directly at the jewelry merchant. “The royal family will no longer be buying anything from you.”

“Your majesty, have mercy!” He begged.

Iris raised her voice, “How could you sell such jewels? These jewels all have flaws!”

It was an unexpected slander. The gems weren’t all flawed. Although they weren’t the continent’s number one jewels, they were still of good quality, and the jeweler shook his head in bewilderment. “Oh no, Your Highness, please, please let me explain.”

“I won’t listen to you. These jewels are enough evidence. No matter how generous we are, how dare you sell us jewels like this?” Iris was angry as she put down the loupe, and the jeweler shook his head in dismay.

The merchant’s stomach hit his ankles, and he felt crushed. In hindsight, he should’ve brought the best jewelry for the royal family. It was the truth that they secretly took the best gems to the Magic Tower. And if the royal family had known about it, the jeweler would’ve been in trouble. When all was said and done, he only had himself to blame. And his business would be drastically affected because of losing such a big client like the royal family.

Sidrain smiled and gloated as he listened to Iris putting the merchant in his place, not paying attention to the plight of a jeweler. Being assertive was one of the first things he’d learned in life. As Sidrain watched his first love behave in this manner, it made him feel proud. If she asked him to buy all the things in this market, he would’ve bought them all.

But Iris’s mind was elsewhere, and she wanted to check all the products in the market now to make sure that the royal family wasn’t being taken advantage of by the seemingly dodgy merchants. Her eyes glowed fiercely, and the only person that didn’t feel the harsh gaze was the man in love with her, Sidrain.

The merchants could see that the King would buy her anything, and they cried inside, feeling that they may lose out on his generosity. They thought it was a festival day, so they’d brought a lot of things, but it turned out to be a dreadful day where their goods were going to be inspected by the royals.

In the distance, the jeweler noticed another merchant shaking his head. The Queen had admitted that his items were good, so he at least felt secure in his product offerings.

Following the jeweler, the next merchant in question was the draper. Wizards had always struggled to find quality fabrics because they gave their clothes magical powers. Iris, therefore, had a good eye for cloth as well, as did Rosemary. But Rosemary had an unusual taste, and it was the design side that she was interested in more. But Iris was not familiar with design because she was an expert on the fabric itself.

“Look me in the eye, draper,” she demanded.

The draper was dumbstruck as he continued to look at the ground. He knew that one wasn’t allowed to look directly into the Queen’s eyes, and it was not something that he wanted to take a chance on at all. From experience, he knew that the Queen was not particular about the quality of the cloth. She’d always seemed to care more about the color of the fabric, the visible things. He’d kept that in mind when he’d chosen the cloth to bring to the market. The various materials were all high-end, but they weren’t the best quality per se.

The merchant didn’t know what he was going to say, and he felt physically ill as sweat trickled down his back. The royal family had been paying high prices because he told them that all the fabrics were high-end. And now suddenly, the Queen had tasted the water of the Haran’s river and had become an expert in cloth’s overnight!

Grabbing the draper by the neck like a mouse, she snapped, “Do you think this is the best Lofine of Letaire?”

“Well, that’s debatable,” he replied, without thinking it through.