The Dragon and the Queen (The Raven and the Dove Book 3) by Kaitlyn Davis

Author:Kaitlyn Davis [Davis, Kaitlyn]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2021-06-20T22:00:00+00:00

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Twenty-Second Day of the Fifth Moon

* * *

Another ten days gone in a blink, much the same to report as the last. Wedding by day, rebellion by night. Zavier tells me more about the kingdom I didn't know before. Avians are not allowed to learn to read, though some (such as his mother) have carried on the practice in private, teaching their young. Avians are not supposed to believe in anything but magic and the all-powerful aether, as we mages believe, but they have an entire system of gods they honor behind closed doors. They are not supposed to communicate with the others of their kind, but they've created secret messages through wing shapes and movement across the skies that no mages could hope to understand.

He doesn’t know much about life in the other parts of the kingdom, though he tells me, from what he's heard, the hierarchy of magic isn’t kind to those with little power, or worse yet, none at all. I've known this, of course, in theory. Powerful mages get the biggest households, the most servants, the most prestige, but I always thought my father took care of the rest. But there are sectors of the city that grow hungry and weak, and with fields tended by agro'kine magic yielding unending crops, for that there is no excuse.

I asked him what he once thought of me, and he grew quiet.

"That I was a spoiled princess, no doubt," I teased, laughter in my voice, though it didn’t quite cover the hurt. Not at his thoughts, but that they were true. "Up here in my palace, uncaring of the horrors the outside world faced."

He placed his palm over mine and squeezed gently. "It wasn't true."

"Wasn't it?"

I met his eyes as he rubbed his thumb across my skin, making me shiver. We were close, our faces no more than a few inches apart, close enough I could just feel the brush of his breath on my cheek. He tilted his head to the side, moving our lips closer in the process, but he didn’t drop my gaze. The golden speckles in his eyes brightened, the green depths shifting wider as though opening to let me in. There was no judgment and no anger, only sympathy.

"I admit, I thought that, yes," he said slowly. "But just as you had no knowledge of what happened in my home, I had no knowledge of what happened in yours. The palace has thick walls, not just to keep enemies out but to keep its secrets in. And there are things that happen here, Princess, things I've seen happen to you that would make even your enemies shudder."

I thought of my soon-to-be husband.

There was no telling what he would unleash on me once the ceremony was through, though I tried not to think on that too often, and especially not in moments like these, with Zavier close and the rest of the world so far away.

He seemed to sense my shift.

We pulled apart. I didn’t want to think of Bastiant with Zavier's hand upon me—it felt wrong.

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