Chapter 15
The Dragon King's Substitute Bride
CH15
Morgan
Worry clawed at me. "Isn't it pretty usual for people to leave instructions for their successors?"
He nodded. "In the case of the queen, your instructions are in two parts. One is the journals, but the part you are looking for is held in the Trial itself."
I scowled at him. "I'm just supposed to know because I didn't die?"
His lips twitched. "Because you were chosen by the heavens and blessed by the Phoenix."
I cocked an eyebrow. "Mystic words that mean nothing to me other than seeming important."
He tapped a journal. "Perhaps reading will educate you, then."
I met his gaze. "How can you be so sure?"
He sat on the edge of the desk and looked out the window with a wistfulness in his eyes.
"Because I knew my mother, and she told me many stories about how she came to settle in her power as queen."
I looked down at the journals. "Will you tell me about her?".
"What do you want to know?"
I considered it, trailing my fingers over the cover of the journal in front of me.
"Was she happy with your father?"
"She said she was."
"You didn't believe her?"
her
"I believe that happiness in tion was complicated," he said. "She stirred a lot of
controversy."
looked up at him. "By having the
"You've been
my handmaiden or
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ask for
thinking about it... more and more. Is Maya... related to
"You have sharp instincts. Technically, she
cousin."
I blinked. "And why isn't she a
said. "Her mother and mine
"I'd been banking on her being
"You'll meet them soon enough, other
he's insulting me." I glanced over at him, holding back the words that I wanted
think such behaviors run in the family." He
can keep you
tell you?" He smirked.. "And it's the least of your
others read
once upon a time, but not since his scales lost
darkness."
my head. "That have
nodded. "You asked about Keiji. He is the son of my father's first consort. He is younger than me and resentful of me being chosen as the next heir.
- nower:
to the
she was taking the potions necessary to keep her from becoming pregnant, but she was bribed by a concubine and later dismissed. My father says that my mother didn't show a moment of fear
know what would cause the destruction of a
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He went still.
have no desire for
www
me or choose someone to do so, and if I married, he would essentially be head of the family. I remember telling my father that I'd pass the
..
never had a desire
at him. "Get out of my
"I cannot."
"It hardly
His eyes were
grunt escaped him. I looked up, startled by the sound. blazing with desire. His hands shook, suspended in the air between us as if he wanted to touch me. Did he? He licked his lips and
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