I Became the Villain Alpha's Omega (BL)

”That makes ten, Your Highness. Ten women in a single week. Please... get your senses together.”

Harlond’s voice was low, heavy with a tired, desperate strain as he stood by the heavy doors of the private drawing room. His posture was stiff, his gloved hands clasped tightly behind his back as he looked at the quiet disaster playing out before him.

On the plush velvet sofa, Crown Prince Alderon took a slow, lazy swallow of dark wine from a heavy golden goblet. He sat sprawling effortlessly between two young noblewomen whose bright, chiming laughter still lingered in the warm, perfumed air of the room. One was leaning against his shoulder, her fingers tracing the fine golden embroidery on his tunic, while the other held a cluster of grapes, offering them to his lips with a coy smile.

At Harlond’s sharp warning, Alderon didn’t flinch. He merely smiled, resting his cheek in his palm as his dark eyes glinted with unbothered warmth. He gestured vaguely toward the exit with his free hand.

”Your company has been appreciated, ladies,” Alderon said smoothly, his voice light and utterly relaxed. ”My aide is about to give me another one of his famous, exhausting lectures, and I’d hate for either of you to die of sheer boredom on my furniture.”

The two women giggled, gathering their silk skirts and bowing low before slipping past Harlond out into the grand corridor. The moment the doors shut with a muffled thud, Harlond let out a sharp, exhaled breath through his nose, stepping further into the room.

”You are playing a dangerously careless game, Sire,” Harlond muttered, reaching up to rub his temples where a dull ache was already forming. ”If the King hears of the state of this wing... if the church elders get wind of how many noble daughters you’ve entertained this month...”

”Oh, Harlond, don’t be so terribly, soul-crushingly stiff,” Alderon cut in with a bright, easy laugh. He leaned back against the deep cushions, carelessly twirling his goblet. ”You look as though you’re carrying the weight of the entire empire on those narrow shoulders of yours. A young man needs to have a little fun. Honestly, if you asked nicely, I could easily get a few lovely companions for you, too. You look like you haven’t smiled since spring.”

”Please, Your Highness,” Harlond begged, his posture remaining rigidly straight, his tone flat.

”No, please, Harlond,” Alderon shot back, his eyes sparkling with a mischievous glint as he set his golden goblet down on the side table. He leaned forward, resting his elbows on his knees. ”I’m the one who should be saying ’please.’ Please let me have a little peace. What, do you expect me to sit in a dark, dusty study all day and stare at military maps until my eyes bleed? Do you think I’m like Lario? Lario Valtrane, who acts as if the mere idea of love, warmth, or human touch are all deeply offensive concepts?”

”His minds his duties and maintains his dignity,” Harlond countered without hesitation. ”I am asking you to think about your reputation.”

Alderon chuckled, folding his hands behind his head as he reclined once more. ”And what is my reputation, exactly? A prince who is exceptionally warm, friendly, and thoroughly generous to those around him? Isn’t that precisely what the people want in a future ruler? Someone who actually enjoys life?”

Harlond let out a long, weary sigh, his shoulders slumping just a fraction as he looked at the handsome, smiling young man before him. ”You know that is not what I meant, Sire. The court gossips behind their fans. They call you reckless.”

Crown Prince Alderon was a man who moved through the capital like a warm summer breeze. He was carefree, effortless, and entirely surrounded by people who adored his charming face, his easy jokes, and his open, booming laughter.

He drank the finest vintages, he flirted with every eligible beauty who crossed his path, and he collected adoration as if it were nothing more than shiny copper coins, things to be spent freely and forgotten by the next morning.

He believed he knew the exact shape of the world and his place within it.

Until the night of his nineteenth birthday celebration.

The grand ballroom of the imperial palace was a blinding, suffocating ocean of light, orchestral music, and rustling silk. Hundreds of high-ranking nobles, foreign dignitaries, and provincial lords had traveled from the farthest corners of the realm to toast the Crown Prince. Alderon was at the absolute center of the chaos, drowned in endless congratulations, receiving formal blessings from high priests in golden robes, and gracefully accepting glass after glass of aged wine from adoring courtiers.

He was entirely in his element. He moved through the crowd with practiced ease, laughing effortlessly at a northern count’s dry joke while charming a foreign ambassador’s wife with a perfectly timed compliment.

It was during one of these endless toasts, while half-listening to a senior minister drone on about grain taxes, that Alderon’s gaze casually drifted over the man’s shoulder.

Across the vast, crowded hall, far past the swirling pairs of dancers and the towering crystal chandeliers, a woman was standing all alone near the high arched balcony doors.

She wasn’t dancing. She wasn’t holding a crystal glass of wine, nor was she making the slightest effort to catch the eyes of the young, ambitious lords bowing and preening nearby. She simply stood in the deep shadows of the heavy velvet curtains, leaning lightly against the stone frame, looking out into the cold, dark night gardens as if the grandest party of the decade didn’t exist at all.

Alderon didn’t care at first. It was a brief, idle glance. He turned his attention back to the minister in front of him, raising his glass to take another polite sip.

But three seconds later, his gaze snapped right back to that dark corner of the room.

A flicker of light shifted across her face, catching the pale, quiet elegance of her profile. Her face was set in a cool, utterly indifferent expression, completely untouched by the noisy, suffocating heat of the ballroom. She looked less like a noble guest and more like a creature carved from moonlight and marble, standing entirely apart from the rest of humanity.

For the first time in his born life, Alderon lost his train of thought mid-sentence. The words of his own charming, practiced speech died right in his throat. The crowd, the clinking glasses, the heavy brass music, the roaring laughter, suddenly felt miles away, muffled and utterly meaningless.

He didn’t hear the minister finish his sentence. Without taking his eyes off her for even a fraction of a second, Alderon reached out blindly, his fingers locking tightly around Harlond’s elbow and yanking his aide closer until the man was practically standing at his shoulder.

”Harlond,” Alderon whispered.

His voice was entirely stripped of its usual playful, careless warmth. It had turned strangely tight, rough, and breathless.

Harlond blinked, surprised by the sudden, iron grip on his arm. ”Your Highness?”

”Harlond,” Alderon repeated, his eyes wide, and entirely fixed on the shadow near the balcony. ”Who is that?”

Harlond slowly followed the Prince’s intense, desperate gaze across the brightly lit hall. When his eyes finally landed on the lone woman standing in the quiet gloom of the velvet curtains, a cold, heavy stillness settled instantly in the pit of Harlond’s stomach.

Harlond He looked at the woman, then glanced back at the Prince’s face, seeing, for the very first time, a hunger taking root in Alderon’s eyes.

”That,” Harlond whispered back, his voice dropping into a low, solemn, and deeply hesitant tone, ”is Lady Nerissa Delvaris.”