In the kingdom of Aethelgard, where the spires of the Royal Palace were plated in real gold and the laws of social caste were etched in ancient stone, lived Prince Ridoy.
Ridoy was not your typical stoic heir. While his father, King Alaric, spent his days obsessing over border expansion and tax yields, Ridoy spent his nights staring out of his arched marble window, watching the flickering hearth-fires of the Common District below. To the court, he was a silent, dutiful prince. To himself, he was a prisoner in a gilded cage.
On the other side of the high stone walls lived Nila. She was the daughter of a widowed seamstress, living in a cramped attic that smelled of lavender and damp wood. Nila didn't have a title, but she had a laugh that sounded like wind chimes and a spirit that couldn't be dampened by poverty. She spent her days delivering repaired garments to the wealthy and her evenings singing folk songs to the neighborhood children.
The fate of Aethelgard changed on the day of the Harvest Festival. It was the one day a year when the royals descended from their hill to mingle with the "common folk" under heavy guard.
Ridoy, dressed in suffocating silk and a heavy ceremonial sword, was shaking hands with local merchants when a commotion broke out. A group of rowdy horses had been spooked by a firecracker, sending a fruit stall crashing down. In the chaos, Ridoy was separated from his guards.
As he stumbled through the dust, he saw a girl kneeling in the dirt, helping an elderly man pick up scattered oranges. Her dress was faded blue, patched at the elbows, but her eyes—deep and resilient—stopped him in his tracks.
"Are you alright?" Ridoy asked, reaching out a gloved hand.
Nila looked up, wiping a streak of soot from her forehead. She didn't recognize him immediately without his crown. "I'm fine, but these oranges are bruised. That's a week's profit for Mr. Gable."
Ridoy didn't hesitate. He reached into his hidden pocket and pulled out a gold sovereign—enough to buy the entire stall ten times over. "Give him this."
Nila's eyes widened. She looked at the coin, then at the fine embroidery on Ridoy's tunic. She realized then that she was looking at the Crown Prince. Most girls would have curtsied or trembled. Nila simply frowned.
"A gold coin for a basket of oranges?" she whispered. "You royals really don't know the value of anything, do you? You can't just throw gold at a problem and expect it to fix the heart of it."
Ridoy was stunned. No one had ever spoken to him with such blunt honesty. "I was only trying to help," he said, feeling a flush of heat in his cheeks.
"Help would be staying to help us clear the road," Nila said, tossing him an orange. "Catch, Prince."