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."
him. "By having the king's
"You've been talking
my handmaiden or
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not ask for someone
and more. Is
sharp instincts. Technically,
cousin."
isn't she a lady
choice," he said. "Her mother
banking on her being your
them soon enough, other than
he's hitting on me, then he's insulting me." I glanced over at him, holding back
behaviors run in the family." He
there a way I can keep you out of my
smirked.. "And
others read
might have been able to once upon a time, but not since his scales lost
darkness."
"That have something to do with
of me being chosen as the next heir. I am sure that Maya
- nower:
due to the risk
to keep her from becoming pregnant, but she was bribed by a concubine and later dismissed.
at the thought. "I don't think I want to know what would cause the destruction of a room during birth, but glad to hear I won't
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He went still.
have no desire
www
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
..
never had a desire to marry
at him. "Get out
"I cannot."
shook my head. "It hardly
His eyes were
looked up, startled by the sound. blazing with desire. His hands shook, suspended in
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