Page 90 of The Flame King's Queen

I smile as I gaze at my family. How thankful I am not to be locked beneath the mountain. Have I given thanks in the Flame Temple for my freedom lately? I must remember to give an offering, for I have never been this happy before.

I do not take for granted one moment spent with my infant daughter, day or night. I know this cozy time with just the three of us can’t last forever when the whole country needs us.

A few hours later, I dress in the usual jacket and breeches I wear when performing duties around the castle. Isavelle has Sylvi laid out on our bed, changing her into fresh clouts.

“I’m going to ask Santha and Posette to help us with the baby,” Isavelle tells me, rubbing her nose against Sylvi’s belly and then picking her up and cuddling her against her breasts. “They have already offered, and I think it would be good for both of us. You have duties to return to, and I need to take some fresh air and see my dragon and my crone.”

“It has been wonderful to retreat from the kingdom and into this cozy world with you and our baby,” I tell her, buttoning my black jacket up to my throat.

“It has been everything I could have hoped for,” she tells me with a smile. “How will you be today?”

“I’m fine.”

Holding Sylvi, Isavelle pads over to me. “Zabriel, you’ve barely slept. Don’t force yourself to work all day, all right?”

I groan and scrub my hands over my face. “I’m an Alpha dragonrider. I’m the King of Maledin. I will not be bested by a tiny little baby.”

Isavelle holds the baby up so they’re cheek to cheek. “What, this tiny little baby?”

“This one,” I agree with a smile, and kiss our daughter and then my queen.

Isavelle yawns. “You’re right, she’s bested me too. I’ll ask Santha and Posette if they can take Sylvi between feeds tonight so we can get some rest.”

As stubborn and proud as I am, the prospect of several uninterrupted hours of sleep sounds tempting. I kiss Isavelle goodbye and head out of our room, stopping to speak with the guards standing outside our door.

“Please send for Fiala and Dusan. The queen and the princess will be without me for a few hours.”

“Yes,Ma’len.”

I walk down the corridor grinning to myself. The queen and the princess. How good that feels to say aloud.

When I reach the Great Hall, the head steward informs me that there are several dozen urgent matters for me to attend to.

I feel my eyes widen. Have I sequestered myself away for so long that the whole country has fallen into devastation? “How urgent? Are our borders breached? Has Emmeric been sighted?”

“No,Ma’len. These are…internal political matters,” he says tactfully.

I know what that means. The lords in the big houses are squabbling, and they’re bringing their problems to the castle to lay at my feet instead of being adult men and women and sorting them out themselves. I think I’d almost prefer our borders being breached. At least I can solve those problems with a dragon and a big sword.

“Fine. Clear the Great Hall. I’ll see them from my throne.”

Perhaps the authority of sitting in a big gold chair will disguise how tired I am, and how little I wish to adjudicate aristocratic squabbles.

A few hours later, I’ve heard the details of several land disputes. Some borders were redrawn by the Brethren and the families want the fields and forests returned to them. Archivists have found the old maps, and after consulting them, I order that the land be returned, but the profits from the land be split equally between the two families for a period of five years. The lords and ladies leave the Great Hall with some grumbling, but at least they haven’t come to blows.

I hear that someone’s son “sullied” someone’s daughter. The sixteen- and seventeen-year-old couple are an Alpha and Omega pair, and I have to firmly educate them on Maledinni designations and that the pair were in fact blessed by the gods. They were acting as nature intended, are miserable without each other, and they’ve done nothing wrong.

“And women are notsulliedby partners they choose to couple with,” I shout angrily after the departing lord, who is scarlet with indignation. “That’s Brethren nonsense to be left in the past.”

Mother Linnea has been standing at the side of the cavernous room, and I signal her to approach me.

“Send someHratha’lento that Alpha’s and Omega’s families, would you? Someone who’s had more sleep and possesses more patience than I do should teach them about designations.”

“We are of the same mind,Ma’len.” She inclines her head respectfully.

Finally, when the lowering sun is making the shadows long on the ground, I leave the castle and cross the dragongrounds. Scourge has his head raised and is watching the sunset, and I lean tiredly against his side, soaking in his warmth and steady presence. It’s so soothing being with my dragon that I almost fall asleep standing up.

When I get back to our room, Isavelle shows me the antechamber where there’s now a second crib, and Sylvi is sleeping peacefully, watched over by Santha and Posette.

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