[#101] A Matter Of Duty (Original)

[badly_knitted]

Theme Prompt: #101 – Nobility
Title: A Matter Of Duty
Fandom: Original
Rating/Warnings: G / None
Bonus: Yes
Word Count: 1000
Summary: Grand Emperor Boofeldt is dissatisfied with his lot in life, but he’s sort of stuck with it.



Grand Emperor Boofeldt of Carraxia was having a bad day. He didn’t even WANT to be Grand Emperor, but of course no one had bothered to ask him. That was the problem with being born into the Royal Family; the rest of the nobility were always telling you what to do, and you weren’t given any choice in the matter.

They’d more or less said to him one day, “You’re Grand Emperor now, here’s the Royal Coronet, put it on and wear it. Oh, and you’ve got all these important meetings to attend and decisions to make, but we’ll help you with those until you get the hang of it. Really, all you’ll have to do is agree with whatever we say.”

Okay, so there’d be a huge and elaborate ceremony where they’d draped the Royal robes around him and put the heavy gold coronet, encrusted with rubies, sapphires, and pearls, on his head, where it had immediately slipped down over his eyes. That had been sort of interesting, because it had a massive diamond at the front, so you knew which way around it was supposed to go, and he’d found himself peering through the faceted gem like it was a kaleidoscope. It had made the Royal court look a whole lot more interesting, but then they’d taken the coronet off again, added more padding, and stuck it back on his head. Wearing it had given him a headache. That had been three years ago, and the stupid thing still didn’t fit so he only wore it when he absolutely had to, for state occasions and stuff.

He was supposed to wear the chain of office around his neck all the time though. That had a big diamond too, not quite as good for looking through as the one on the coronet, but good enough. Most of the time these days he wore it tucked inside his shirt, out of sight. Not that it made much difference; everyone still knew who he was. His picture was on everything from the money his people used in their day-to-day lives to commemorative cups and plates. There was even a statue to him in the centre of the city. He had to admit it was a good likeness, even though it was huge, but he couldn’t help wishing the sculptor hadn’t bothered. He didn’t much like seeing himself everywhere he went.

This morning there’d been another one of those tedious meetings, and the advisors of the Royal Court hadn’t been happy that he’d disagreed with them. They’d wanted to raise taxes for the working population to help pay for repairs following recent flood damage, but the Royal Court themselves, all members of the so-called nobility, had expected their taxes to be lowered.

Boofeldt had disagreed and said that he wouldn’t be raising taxes for his ordinary citizens but that the Court would now have to pay the same taxes as everyone else, because the floods were their fault. They’d been dithering over implementing proper flood defences for the past two years, saying they were an unnecessary expense since the river Carrax almost never flooded. Now, three villages had been washed away, valuable livestock had drowned, and some of the best agricultural land on the whole planet was under four cubits of water.

“I need better advisors, people who don’t put themselves first.”

The Royal Court were all very well, but wealth, privilege, and power had gone to their heads, and they were so used to having everything they needed that they had no idea what life was like for the ordinary citizens. Boofeldt did, because he spent as much time as he could among them, finding out. Everyone would insist on bowing and cheering whenever they saw him though, and if he could only figure out how, he’d shut down the whole speaker system that automatically announced his presence wherever he went. If it would just shut up then maybe fewer people would recognise him when he was wearing ordinary clothes instead of the silks and satins he had to wear around the palace.

Whichever way Boofeldt looked at it, being Grand Emperor sucked. If he’d done what the Royal Court had wanted they would have loved him and his people would have been upset. Right now his people loved him and the Royal court were annoyed, muttering that he didn’t understand how important they were, and maybe they should have picked someone else to be Grand Emperor. Only they knew as well as he did that there hadn’t been anyone else left of the Royal bloodline, and if they’d tried to crown someone else, or if they caused any harm to come to Boofeldt, the great Dragon under the mountain would destroy them all. They were stuck with him as much as he was stuck with being Grand Emperor.

He mooched his way along the street, head down, hands in his pockets, kicking at a pebble and trying to ignore the cheering, wishing he could join in the game of catch being played in the nearby park. When he was younger, he used to dream of stowing away on a spaceship and seeing the universe, having all kinds of wonderful adventures. Now here he was, eleven-years-old, and stuck being ruler of a whole planet. Already the Royal Court were trying to marry him off.

Well, they’d just have to wait, he wasn’t marrying until he was at least twenty-five, and then he’d marry someone HE chose, not someone the nobles picked from among their ranks. He didn’t even LIKE girls, especially not the pale, simpering things that fluttered around the palace, fainting dead away if they so much as saw a bug. Boofeldt liked bugs, they were way more interesting than girls.

Maybe he should run away to the stars anyway, but then what would happen to his people? They didn’t deserve to be ruled by the members of the Royal Court.

No, he had to stay. It was his duty.


The End












 

Comments

[badly_knitted]

Thank you! I think fantasy and Sci-fi can mix pretty well.

Boofeldt will be an excellent ruler, even though he'd rather not be ruler at all. He just needs to get himself some better advisors, but I'm sure he'll manage. Maybe he'll have a word with the Dragon under the mountain...