Page 12 of Earth Dragon
“At all times,” he confirmed.
She nodded thoughtfully. As much as it stung, it did make sense. Even though she should turn away from him and refuse to listen to another word, the truth was that the arrangement sounded interesting. It would at least take her out of her official imprisonment. He could not very well have a captive for a mate. She would be queen.
The thought felt foreign, even though only a year ago she had thought perhaps that title was destined to be offered to her. She would never have worn it, of course, seeing as her father was so set on his mission to break every crown and wipe out every border separating the kingdoms.
She did wonder about one pressing thing, however, since the arrangement seemed mightily convenient for him, and so asked, “What of heirs? You expect me to share your bed when it suits you?”
He blanched. He clearly hadn’t gotten that far in his thinking process. Then he grew self-conscious, looking away from her as she leaned one hand against the mantelpiece.
He cleared his throat. “We might have to…” He trailed off.
“Procreate?” she filled in. “And if I don’t want to? I might not want to have children.”
“Don’t you?” He looked up, gaze meeting hers again.
There was something searching there that she couldn’t tolerate, so she walked slowly up to the window, reached out and pulled it closed. She tried to collect her thoughts, but they were in disarray.
It was obvious to her that if she accepted, it would mean that he could have eyes and ears on his queen every hour of every day. Clearly that made him feel better about having to form a mating bond with someone, but he also seemed to be in earnest when he said that he didn’t think he would ever fall in love.
She thought back to the prince she had met in Fawha and wondered if this person with this amount of suspicion had been buried just beneath the surface all along, or if he had been shaped into it by the events in Fawha.
“Have you no one else?” she asked slowly. “No one to ask?”
“No,” he replied. “I keep little male company. Much less female. I’ve never been one for large gatherings. And the court is… I know how lecherous they can be,” he admitted. “It has put me up forming any form of friendship. It’s better to keep a distance. I am to rule them, after all.”
So, most likely he had always had this within him, she concluded.
“And Malcolm?” she asked.
“We’ve known each other our whole lives,” he said. “He’s like a brother. But that came from understanding one another in ways no other dragon can. We both connected with the elemental magic from when we were young. We both had it in our blood. And we wore our proverbial future crowns together.”
“You trusted him to have your back,” she clarified.
“Yes,” he said.
It was dawning on her that she was never going to earn that sort of trust from him.
This was where she had ended up. In a castle in a forest, very far from home, with a prince asking her to be his, if only in title. Of course, there was still one glaring hole in this arrangement.
“Why should the king accept that we’re in love when we’re so clearly not?” she asked.
Ewan drew a soft breath, sighing it out as he replied, “We shall have to make him believe that we are.”
So that was his grand plan?
She stared at him, trying to hold down the laughter, but failed spectacularly. He looked perturbed enough for her to calm herself fairly quickly, but she couldn’t kill the smile no matter what she tried.
“We were almost friends,” he reminded. “All we have to do is behave like that. Like people who…”
“Like each other?” she filled in, one eyebrow quirking. “You’ve been vehemently against my coming here,” she remarked. “How are we meant to make your father believe that you’ve had such a profound change of hearts?”
“Because we were almost friends,” he said. “And he knows it.”
“Oh, so now that I’m here, that friendship is meant to grow strong enough to strike a match and light itself into passion?” she inquired.
He quirked an eyebrow to mirror her. “Poetic,” he commented. “And yes, precisely.”
“You actually think this will work?”
