The Last Dragon King (Kings of Avalier #1)(13)

With that, she clapped her hands as if to hurry us, and I strode across the room to my mother. When I reached her, she turned around and walked out, giving me her back. A pang of sadness and rejection rushed through me, and I trailed behind her.

“Follow them, Nox,” Regina told a fellow Drayken who was standing by the front door.

She didn’t trust me and I didn’t blame her. I’d tried to avoid this whole thing with a fake hunting trip, and my mother was being cagey and strange.

We didn’t speak the entire walk to our hut, and when we reached the door my mother asked Nox to wait outside, which he obliged.

When she finally walked back into my room and faced me, my gut tightened at the tears that ran down her face.

“I failed to protect you,” she said.

“What? No.” I rushed forward to console her. “Mother, I’m fine. There is some more powerful girl in Grim Hollow. He’ll marry her and forget about me and we’ll have five hundred jade coins!”

My mother shook her head. “What if your power grows each day? What if by the time your magic is tested you are more powerful than the Grim Hollow girl?”

“Then I’ll run away,” I murmured.

My mother looked at me disapprovingly. “He’s the dragon king of Embergate. There is nowhere you could go that he could not follow.”

Chills ran the length of my spine at her declaration.

My mother stepped forward, placing her hands on my shoulders. “If it looks like your power is discovered, and it’s clear that you might have a magic that is greater than even he contains—”

“Mother, that’s not possible!” She’d gone mad and was paranoid. Now I was really scared.

She leaned closer to me, her grip on my shoulders tightening. “Listen to me, Arwen. If it appears to go that way, that your magic might be a threat to him somehow, then you make him fall in love with you so he won’t kill you. Understand?”

Kill me? Kill me because my power would be greater than his? Wasn’t that what he wanted? Maybe not. Maybe he wanted a woman with just enough power to give him an heir but not too much? Like Regina said, a man doesn’t want a woman stronger than him. Maybe that’s what had happened to the woman who’d birthed me.

For the first time since this whole thing started, I was genuinely terrified.

“How? How do I make him love me?”

Red colored my mother’s cheeks. “Your body can do certain things that a man craves. Make him think of that every time you are in the room, but don’t give it to him until you’re married.”

Now it was my turn for my cheeks to go red. She meant bed him.

Kendal had told me all about that. She’d learned everything from her aunt who worked in Gypsy Rock, was only two winters older than us and… uninhibited.

“Oh. Okay,” I muttered with embarrassment.

Marry him? Was she serious?

“If it comes down to it, you be the strong queen he wants and give him many heirs, but make sure he adores you so that when you’re done having children for him he doesn’t kill you.”

My mother’s counsel was harsh. He wouldn’t do that, would he? What decent man would?

All I’d heard of King Valdren was of how kind he was to his people, how much he cared for his late wife, Queen Amelia. He saw her through every loss of child—everyone loved him. He was kind… right?

Kind enough to wait outside the gates of Cinder Village? Kind enough to call his guard on me and pull his blade? Kind enough to remarry quickly simply for an heir?

These thoughts scared me, so I shook my head to dislodge them.

Tears welled in my eyes. “Adaline… should I go and say goodbye?”

But my mother shook her head. “She’ll be too distraught and make a scene. Leave her a note and send her a gift with the first food shipment.”

I nodded, walking to our shared nightstand, and pulled out a torn scrap of paper and a pen. I’d taught Adaline and my mother to read and write during my two-year apprenticeship with the scribe.



Dearest Adaline,

I love you more than all of the jade stone in Jade Mountain. Take care of Mother. I’ll send a gift from Jade City.



P.S. Don’t be a brat.



Love, Arwen



I hated leaving her like this, especially after our tiff this morning, but Mother was right. She would throw a huge fit and I didn’t want to leave the village crying.

“Ma’am…” The guard’s voice carried into the house and my mother groaned.

“You come in and take our daughters and give us five minutes to pack them up and see them off!” she yelled back at him. He said nothing in response.

“Mother, be kind,” I told her.

I knew she was flustered, but now I worried if she’d made trouble for me in Jade City. If Regina and now Nox thought my mother unkind, they might make life hard for me.

My mother and I grabbed the trunk at the end of my bed which held the winter furs and started to pull them out and put in more practical items. Jade City was near the ocean; it didn’t snow there. I started to pack my things and my mother slipped out of the room. “Be right back.”

When she returned, she was holding the most magnificent leather armor I’d ever seen.

“Mother!”