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."
at him. "By
been
my handmaiden or
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CH15
could not ask for
more.
sharp instincts. Technically, she
cousin."
"And why isn't she a lady instead of a
said. "Her mother
been banking on her being
meet them soon enough, other than
deal? First, he's hitting on me, then he's insulting me." I glanced over at him, holding back the words
the family." He sounded
a way I can keep you out
tell you?" He smirked.. "And it's the
others read my
have been able to once upon a time,
darkness."
"That have something to do with
is younger than me and resentful of me being
- nower:
due to the
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 until the day of my birth,
what would cause the destruction of a room during birth, but glad to hear I won't be
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CH15
He went still.
have no
www
sat back, wondering what answer to give him. I hadn't ever thought about it. I was a woman and Their to the family. It was expected that either I'd have a child to succeed me or choose someone to do so, and if I married, he would essentially be head of the
..
had a desire to marry
at him. "Get
"I cannot."
my head. "It hardly
His eyes were
shook, suspended in the air between us as if he
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