The funeral for Regina and Joslyn was beautiful. Regina was laid to rest, without an actual body to bury, in the Royal Guard cemetery in the north side of town, and Joslyn was buried next to the king’s private family mausoleum. It was a great honor and the entirety of Jade City shut down in mourning. Drae had set Joslyn’s parents up with monthly payments for the rest of their lives as they were from the poorest part of Grim Hollow and he knew they would be counting on it. Word had gotten around town that I was the Lost Royal from the stories and that I’d tried to save Joslyn’s life that night. The people seemed to love me, smiling and waving happily as I passed. They knew nothing of my magic being able to suck the life from their king, and nothing of the fact that the king needed to make an heir or they would all die.
Narine told me that she had taken the liberty of spreading a rumor that the king had chosen me initially but his advisors forced him to pick Joslyn and that’s why he was marrying me so quickly, that he’d loved me all along. The city loved a good bit of gossip, and they wanted their king to be happy, for which I was grateful. I would hate for there to be a rumor he’d cheated on Joslyn with me or something awful like that.
The Nightfall queen had sent back Regina’s head as a message, but no other retaliation. Drae increased border patrols and sent an entire Royal Guard escort for my mother and Adaline. Now the wedding was tonight and my mother was arriving any moment.
I had no idea what she was going to think of all this. I was marrying the man she was originally scared would hurt me. But there was one thing she’d drilled into me since I was born…
Duty.
She’d say, “You have a duty to this family, your sister, this village, me.”
Now I would have a duty to the entire dragon-folk people, and I hoped she would understand, because I planned to tell her the truth about everything. I could live with keeping secrets from a lot of people but my mother wasn’t one of them.
“She’s here!” Narine said excitedly as she poked her head into my room.
I stood and allowed her to fix my wedding gown. This event, our wedding, was not one I wanted to wear trousers for, though I did ask the palace seamstress to put pockets in the gown for me.
Where is a girl to keep her daggers and things if she has no pockets?
“You look… like a dream,” Narine said as she creased the lace hem of my white dress.
I smiled. “Did Annabeth give you that one hundred jade coins prize money?”
Narine grinned. “I get it tonight after the ceremony. Then I’ll pay you back for the—”
“Nonsense, you keep it! I’m going to be queen. I’ll have more than enough money at my disposal.”
Narine shook her head. “No way—”
“Keep it for your own wedding.” I winked and she blushed. I’d seen her flirting with Cal lately. “And is your sister’s wedding planning going okay?” I asked.
Narine waved me off. “Yes, thanks to you. Now go see your mother and sister!”
I was stalling. To be honest, I was nervous as Hades to tell my mother I had fallen in love with the king—that I was going to marry him but could never have children with him, that instead I would be allowing him to have children with his mistresses…
What if she refused to stand by my side at the wedding? What if she left town and never spoke to me again?
With a shuddering breath, I nodded to Narine. “Please fetch her and my sister and bring them to the living room.”
Narine slipped out of my bedroom and I followed her, pacing the living room and waiting. This was the last time I would be in this apartment. Tonight, I would sleep beside Drae and share a bed with him for the rest of my life.
Holy Hades, I’m going to be sick.
Was it normal to feel like you were going to vomit every few seconds on your own wedding day?
The front door opened and my mother and sister walked in with Narine in tow. They each held a small travel pack and looked at me with wide eyes as they entered. They were expected last night but there had been a sandstorm, and delays from others coming from all over the realm.
“Holy Hades, you look like a queen!” Adaline rushed over to me. “Does this make me a princess?”
She opened her arms to hug me and my mom yelled at her. “Don’t touch her dress, you’ll stain it.”
I pulled my sister in for a bone-crushing hug, not caring about the dress. “I don’t think you can be a princess but you will be a highborn lady.”
Adaline pulled back to peer at me with wide eyes. “Lady Adaline?”
I nodded and she grinned.
“This is so cool.”
My mother hadn’t moved. There were tears in her eyes, which I didn’t know how to interpret.
“Lady Adaline, would you like some chocolate cake?” Narine offered upon seeing the awkward moment between my mother and I. “I can show you the main palace kitchens and the library.”
Adaline glanced to my mother, who nodded, and then she left with Narine.
I looked up at my mom then, and a single tear spilled over her cheek.
“I… I’m not sure what they told you,” I fumbled. “And I’m sorry you have to find out I’m getting married like this. It’s just that—”
“You look beautiful.” She stepped closer to me, reaching out to grasp my hands. “King Valdren greeted me a few hours ago as our transport party arrived outside the city, and told me his intentions with you.”
He did?
“His intentions with me?” Now I wanted to know what he’d said.
“He told me that he knew about your lineage and that he would never hurt a hair on your head. That he loved you and wanted to take care of you. To have a family with you.” She was smiling and I realized then that her tears were happy tears.
A family… of course he wouldn’t tell my mother about our arrangement. He couldn’t have a healthy family with me, that was the problem.
“Mom, sit down,” I said, and her lips pulled into a frown.
She joined me on the couch and I sat next to her, careful not to mess up my dress. I loved Drae, but I was still saddened with our arrangement, and needed to unload my problems on someone else. I needed my mother’s wisdom.
“Drae needs an heir or all of the dragon-folk will die.”
My mother gasped, her hand going to her mouth. “Adaline.”
I nodded. “His people are linked to him through a special magic that gets stronger when you reproduce but dies out if you do not by a certain age. The line must continue to carry on, no matter what.”
My mom dipped her head. “I understand. Now the quick engagement and wedding makes sense. You do what you have to in order to save the people, Arwen.”
My heart pinched. “That’s the thing, Mom… Drae is a dragon from the Dark Night Dragon clan, I am a full-blooded dragon from the Eclipse clan.”
She stilled, as if sensing this was going somewhere she wouldn’t like.
“And we recently found out that my magic and his magic don’t—” My throat tightened and I suddenly couldn’t speak; tears filled my vision.
“Oh, honey, what is it?”
My mother was a midwife; she’d seen the worst of the worst when it came to child-bearing.
“A midwife journal was found of a royal couple like us, one Dark Night clan royal, one Eclipse clan royal. They had a child together, but… it was born severely deformed, with organs outside of its body, and only lived hours.”
My mother folded in on herself then. The hopes she might have had to have a grandchild to help raise were crushed in that moment. I could see the light die in her eyes.
“Why is he marrying you, then?” My mother looked up at me, surprised.
That simple question brought tears to my eyes, and was a true testament of Drae’s love for me. “Because he loves me.”
My mom nodded.
“Mom, remember when you told me that dad let you lie with another man to get Adaline?” I asked her.
Understanding dawned on my mother’s face and she inclined her head, reaching out to grasp my hand. “You do what you have to do, Arwen. You’re going to be a queen. You have a duty to the people of Embergate.”
Duty, there it was. I knew she would say it. I wanted to do right by my sister and everyone else, but it didn’t make it any easier.
I nodded. “But this is three women, to give him the best possible chance.”
My mother winced at that but then rubbed my hand. “It will be a winter, maybe two, of wondering when he goes to them, and then he will have his heirs and you will have him forever.”
“But… lying with them and then lying with me…” A tear slipped down my cheek.
My mom wiped under my eyes. “If your father had denied me, Adaline would not exist.”
It was as if she’d taken my heart and squeezed it. As much as my little sister annoyed me at times, I couldn’t imagine a world where Adaline didn’t exist. She was right—I knew she was right—but I still felt unsettled by the whole thing. “Thanks, Mom.”
A winter or two until a healthy heir was born. I could do that. I was young and it wasn’t that long.
AFTER MY MOTHER LEFT, I couldn’t shake the feeling that I was walking into a marriage that might devastate me. I needed to see Drae and lay down some ground rules for our new arrangement. After asking Narine to settle my mother and Adaline into their guest apartment next door, I had her notify Drae that I wanted to see him. Then I paced the floor in my apartment and wrung my hands together as anxiety built up inside of me.
The door suddenly flew open and I jumped. Drae was there, wearing his black dragon scale leather printed royal armor and looking as handsome as ever. I didn’t care that he was seeing me in my dress. I needed to say this to him.
“Tell me you aren’t canceling the wedding.” He grabbed his chest as if a physical ache had taken up residence there.
I smiled and shook my head. “I am not.”
He sagged in relief and then shut the door behind him, his eyes raking over my body and the white lacy dress I wore that was a symbol of my purity.
“Are you unwell?” he asked, reaching to take my hands in his, feeling them for warmth.
I sighed. “I do not relish the idea of sharing you with other women, so I have some rules that I would like to discuss before our union.”
He visibly flinched at my abruptness but nodded.
“I do not want to know when you have bedded them. Do not tell me.”
“Of course,” he agreed.
“Have a bath before you see me. I do not want to smell them on you either.”
“Yes, my love.” His face fell and I could see that he hadn’t really thought this through. My heart hurt to even have to say any of this.
“No Kendal,” I whimpered. “She is my friend from home. Try with the other two first, and if no healthy child comes from it, then Kendal is a last resort.”
He pulled me into his arms and wrapped them around me. “I don’t want to do this at all. I’m not sure I even can. I only want you.”
A sob died in my throat. “You have to,” I managed to get out. “This is bigger than just us. You have to. We will get through it together.”
The realization that I would never become a mother hit me like a ton of bricks.
“I’ll never be a mom,” I said suddenly and he pulled away, looking at my face in horror. So he hadn’t thought of it either.
“I… I’m so sorry, Arwen.” He stared down at his feet and then went stock still as if realizing something. “You could be a mother if you bedded someone else. We could raise the child together…”
These were not conversations I wanted to have hours before my wedding. Bed another man? Have another man’s child? Both of us sneaking into other people’s beds? It was not the life I wanted to sign up for.
“Calston is loyal. He would… agree to an arrangement. He’d let me raise the child,” Drae said, but his voice was thick with hurt.
Raise Cal’s child with Drae? Bed Cal? No.
My voice was small. “I could never do that. I’m not capable of such a thing.”
He looked relieved but also saddened. Without knowing what to do, he took me into his arms again, just holding me tightly, as if he were afraid I might run off.
We held each other for what seemed like an eternity. Finally he pulled back with narrowed eyes. “Tell me I can make you happy. That this life will make you happy. If not, I don’t want to marry you and have you live in sorrow on my account.”
I considered his question seriously. Would it be sad that I could never have children of my own? Yes. Would it kill me to know he’d bedded other women to have heirs? Yes.
But the alternative, living without him, him marrying Kendal or one of the others just to have an heir… it devastated me to think it.
I leaned forward and kissed his lips, pulling back to look him in the eyes. “There may be times of sorrow, I will not lie. But I do not see happiness in my life without you in it as my husband.”
A devastatingly handsome grin pulled up the corners of his mouth. “I feel like I’ve waited my whole life to find you.” He ran the pad of his thumb along my jaw.
I tilted my chin up to gaze at him. His eyes held an adoration I wasn’t sure I deserved, but I knew within my very soul that I was ready to marry this man.
“Let’s wed.” I leaned forward, brushing my lips across his earlobe.
A small growl emanated from his throat and I smiled, pleased with myself for eliciting such a reaction over him.
