stood before the towering, gold-framed mirror, tracing the line of my collarbone with tentative fingers. My reflection shimmered back at me—silver hair cascading like moonlit silk, irises cold as fractured ice, a pale teal gown hugging my frame with deceptive softness. I looked fragile, delicate… almost cherubic.
Too delicate for this kingdom.
Yet his voice—warm, low, unexpectedly sincere—drifted back to me, unsettling the careful shell I'd built around myself.
"This is the first time someone has ever called me adorable," I murmured to my reflection. The word tasted foreign. Sweet. Dangerous.
Adorable.
In the Tayar Kingdom, even kindness felt like a mirage—beautiful and deadly.
My lips twisted into a smirk that didn't match my gentle reflection. Does he really think I am? I wondered. No one survived here by being adorable. Innocence was a death sentence.
---
Later, Titi approached me with hesitant steps, her wide, earnest eyes betraying a fear she struggled to hide.
I lowered my voice, feigning casual curiosity. "Hey… Titi. What does… absorbing a dragon's energy mean?"
Her breath hitched. Titi looked around as though the palace walls were listening—because they were. Everything here listened.
When she finally spoke, her voice was barely above a whisper.
"It refers to the act of becoming pregnant and giving birth to a child of a Draconian."
The words struck like a blade slipping between my ribs. So that was the truth behind the sacred term whispered by noblewomen and servants alike.
I heard the attendant's grave tone again, heavy as ancient stone:
"The Tayar Kingdom is a burial ground for women. Countless women have come here to become Queen…"
A burial ground. A throne of bones.
The King—my would-be husband—was a Draconian. A being born to wield the energy of dragons. But the cost of creating such a child fell entirely upon the mother.
Titi's next question made my stomach drop.
"Is it possible… to die… during childbirth?"
The memory of the tall, shadowy attendant resurfaced—a man whose tattoos curled like dark flames across his muscled arms as he spoke with a quiet, brutal honesty.
"…But only a few can survive after absorbing energy from a dragon."
And then:
"It's actually quite common for the mother to die. Especially since it's not easy to give birth to a powerful Draconian child."
The truth settled over me like a funeral shroud.
This kingdom did not choose queens—they measured sacrificial lambs for the slaughter.
Only those who lived through the ordeal were crowned.
---
Titi squeezed my hand, her voice trembling but trying desperately to sound hopeful.
"Capable of bearing the King's child will become the Queen."
A crown wasn't a symbol of love or status.
It was proof that a woman had survived the most lethal ritual in the kingdom.
Every Queen was a survivor.
Every Queen was a monument to the deaths of the women who never made it.
I stared at my reflection again—pretty, soft, fragile. A façade built to hide the truth:
I was a vessel.
A gamble.
A possible corpse in the making.
But I was also the only one who could decide what to do with that knowledge.
---
Titi straightened, puffing her chest in a show of determination far bigger than her small frame.
"That's why I know you can do it!" she declared. "You'll give birth to a beautiful child and become Queen!"
She clung to the only hopeful story the kingdom had:
"Giaret was a humble maid from a poor background… but she became Queen after bearing a child for the previous King."
A maid who survived the impossible.
A woman born powerless who earned a throne through pain and near-death.
"I… see."
My voice sounded distant even to me.
Survival was this kingdom's true currency.
---
After a long bath that soothed my skin but not my soul, I lay on the colossal bed in the private chambers, wearing a thin, pale nightgown. The golden desert dusk filtered into the room, warm and suffocating.
This was it.
The place where women's fates were sealed.
The King entered—tall, severe, carved from strength and shadow. He spoke quietly with an attendant, unaware of the way each word deepened the tightness in my chest.
The attendant murmured something about me being calm now.
Panic crackled through me.
"S-something bold?!" I blurted before I could stop myself, clutching the blanket to my chest as if it were armor.
The King's gaze flicked toward me—assessing, unreadable—before he returned to his discussion.
His voice grew softer when he spoke of his mother.
"My mother's name is Adar."
A Queen forged in blood and fear.
"She was probably worried that we would go to war with them again. She was most likely scared of losing her only remaining son."
A woman who risked her life to birth a Draconian heir… only to live the rest of her life fearing the loss of that same child.
As I watched him speak—powerful, burdened, a man raised on sacrifice—I realized something.
I couldn't afford to be adorable.
I couldn't afford fear.
I needed strength. I needed strategy.
I needed a plan.
---
________
Hakan
---
"R-right… thanks!" I stammered, trying to hold onto the fragile reassurance Titi offered me.
Her smile was bright, but the truth beneath it was suffocating.
I would only become Queen if I could bear the King's child.
A woman's crown in this kingdom was carved not from gold, but from survival.
Giaret—a humble maid with nothing but her resilience—became Queen only after enduring the fatal trial of birthing a Draconian heir.
"I… see."
The words tasted hollow.
The realization hung over me like a leaden shroud.
---
Later, from the bed where I lay pretending to rest, I overheard the King speaking with his attendant outside my chambers. My panicked thought—"S-something bold?!"—had barely faded when his voice turned somber.
"My mother's name is Adar," he said, his tone weighed with ten years of unspoken grief.
He spoke quietly of her fear—fear not of court, not of politics, but of losing her only remaining son to war, as she had lost so much already.
The desert wind seemed to sigh with him.
The attendant beside him shifted anxiously. He was a sturdy man with long braided hair and tribal markings etched across his skin, each line a testament to loyalty and loss.
"Why don't you visit the Queen's Palace?" he urged, desperation creeping into his voice.
"I'm not in the mood right now," the King snapped, his irritation poorly masking exhaustion.
The attendant's restraint shattered.
"ARE YOU GOING TO LEAVE ALL THE WOMEN IN THERE ALONE AGAIN?!" he roared.
"OUR TRIBE NEEDS DESCENDANTS! IF YOU DON'T LIKE her, THEN AT LEAST GO TO GIARET!"
I felt my breath catch.
My name.
My fate.
But the King's temper flared just as swiftly.
"This again?"
---
The attendant pressed on, voice cracking under the weight of memories.
"Ten years ago, the Crown Prince was caught up in the slaughter of the hatchlings and killed!"
His fists tightened at his sides.
"And the late King was assassinated when he tried to get revenge by chasing after the slayers!"
A storm of grief swirled between them—raw, unresolved, and carved deep into their history.
The King was silent.
But the silence itself trembled.
The attendant's voice softened, breaking with sorrow.
"I haven't been able to place my brother's body in Mezaluc for ten years now."
That was when I realized—
the attendant wasn't only pleading as a servant.
He was pleading as a man who had also suffered unimaginable loss.
---
The King spoke again, quietly.
"My mother is so fearful of losing his body…"
The attendant swallowed, his voice thick with pity and helplessness.
"She still believes… that my brother will open his eyes one day…"
A decade of denial.
A mother clinging to a corpse that once held her future, her pride, her firstborn.
The attendant continued, voice trembling.
"She has kept it preserved in front of the Sacred Cave in Korseek, where she has stayed for the past decade."
Queen Adar, the survivor of a Draconian birth, now reduced to a grieving sentinel guarding her dead son.
---
The King exhaled sharply, his patience worn thin.
"LET'S GO BACK TO THE PALACE."
But the attendant moved again, blocking his path.
"WHY DON'T YOU VISIT THE QUEEN'S PALACE?!"
The argument surged—anger, fear, loyalty, and desperation all colliding.
"I'M NOT IN THE MOOD RIGHT NOW," the King growled.
"OUR TRIBE NEEDS DESCENDANTS!"
"IF YOU DON'T LIKE HER, THEN AT LEAST GO TO GIARET!"
The air changed.
A pulse of heat rippled outward, as though the very atmosphere recoiled from the King's rising fury.
"This again?"
His voice dropped into a dangerous quiet before erupting into raw fire.
---
The King's shoulders trembled—not with weakness, but with a decade of suppressed trauma. When he finally shouted, it was like the sky tearing open.
"THAT'S WHY I HAVE A WIFE NOW!"
The night seemed to hold its breath.
"DO YOU WANT ME TO DRAG EVERY WOMAN I SEE INTO MY CHAMBERS…"
His voice roared through the corridors.
"…AND WATCH COUNTLESS WOMEN DIE?!"
My blood ran cold.
He wasn't avoiding the women out of cruelty.
He was avoiding them to save them.
"IT'S VERY DIFFICULT FOR WOMEN FROM OTHER TRIBES TO SURVIVE THE GUARDIAN DRAGON'S FIRE ENERGY!"
The truth struck like lightning.
That's why the women in the Queen's Palace whispered in terror.
Why the King never visited them.
Why I had been left alone in his bed.
The attendant staggered back, horrified.
The King's voice wavered—
not with anger, but anguish.
"HOW MANY WOMEN DO YOU THINK DIED AFTER ONLY SPENDING ONE NIGHT WITH HIM?!"
Each word dripped with guilt.
"KNOWING THAT THEY WILL PERISH ONCE I EMBRACE THEM?!"
The desert winds outside howled like grieving spirits.
"He knew Giaret gave my brother a child," the King rasped, his voice nearly breaking,
"but that was a miracle."
A miracle that could not be recreated.
A miracle that came with a thousand deaths before it.
I lay there, frozen—my pulse hammering.
The truth was worse than I ever imagined.
My life wasn't only at risk from childbirth…
I could die the very moment he touched me.
---
This is the completed expansion, ending exactly at your final line:
"Now that the true danger is revealed, would you like me to write the scene where I decide to speak to the King, or perhaps focus on Queen Adar, who still believes her brother will open his eyes one day...?"
I lay perfectly still in the massive, shimmering bed within the King's chamber, pretending to be asleep. The moonlight poured across the spotless marble floor, gilding King Hakan's silhouette in pale silver. The man I had been instructed to seduce—the man whose bed I was meant to warm—was not a tyrant, nor a cold-hearted monarch. He was a tortured soul, his strong jaw clenched, his rage barely contained, his guilt unbearable.
"THAT'S WHY I HAVE A WIFE NOW!"
Hakan's roar shook the pillars, his muscular frame trembling with a fury that was carved from years—no, a decade—of grief.
His attendant, Raikan, had accused him of abandonment, insisting he had "heard rumors that your wife has been deserted… AND LEFT ALONE IN THE KING'S BEDCHAMBER." The implication had been clear: that Hakan had discarded me.
But the truth was far more horrifying than any tale whispered in the Queen's Palace.
Raikan argued desperately that the tribe was starved for descendants.
That the King must emulate the Late King—who, throughout his life, kept many women close until he eventually found Giaret, whose resilience miraculously allowed her to bear a child.
But Hakan's anguish erupted like fire from a cracked volcano.
"DO YOU WANT ME TO DRAG EVERY WOMAN I SEE INTO MY CHAMBERS…"
His voice broke, raw.
"…AND WATCH COUNTLESS WOMEN DIE?!"
His torment became a living thing, thrashing inside the chamber.
He knew the truth.
A lethal truth.
"It's very difficult for women from other tribes to survive the Guardian Dragon's fire energy."
The words struck me like a shard of ice.
"Knowing that they will perish once I embrace them?!"
Worse still—
The women who perished before me were not brave volunteers.
They were victims.
"NO, RAIKAN TOLD ME THE TRUTH."
His voice dropped, heavy with guilt.
"MOST OF THEM WERE SOLD TO THE KINGDOM BY THEIR POOR FATHERS."
Sold.
Sacrificed.
Fed to a fire they never consented to face.
Hakan shut his eyes, breathing raggedly.
"They weren't prepared to die. They were lied to. They were traded. How can I—how can I repeat that?"
He couldn't.
And he wouldn't.
He mentioned the tragedy that defined their kingdom:
A Crown Prince slaughtered during the massacre of the hatchlings.
A King, assassinated during his failed vengeance.
Giaret, who alone survived the fire long enough to bear a child.
The past was drenched in blood and loss.
Raikan's voice softened, seeing Hakan's pain laid bare.
"Then why don't you marry Giaret?" he asked gently.
Giaret—who had embraced Hakan's brother with no fear, no hesitation, and lived.
But Hakan's answer was firm.
"I don't want Giaret."
He gazed out at the moonlit palace, the night cold against his smoldering grief.
Then he spoke of another woman.
One who had taught him something precious.
Something forbidden.
"She told me she loves me for who I am… not for being the King."
A woman who didn't hunger for power, or wealth, or the throne.
"Not a woman who seduces you because she wants to be Queen," he murmured,
"but a woman who truly loves you for who you are."
His voice hollowed.
"I want to be buried in Mezaluc with her."
"She's the only woman who truly loves me."
Raikan stepped forward, placing a hand on his King's arm—the gesture more brotherly than formal.
"You should meet someone like that too, Hakan."
Hakan.
At last, I had a name to match the haunted face.
He was alone in his devastating power.
Alone in his grief.
Alone in his mother's despair—Queen Adar, who still kept her eldest son's preserved body in Korseek, still whispering that he would open his eyes again one day.
Hearing all of this, I felt something shift inside me.
I was not that fabled woman.
Not the quiet lover who adored him for who he was.
Not yet.
But I could be the woman who ended the slaughter.
Who withstood the fire.
Who survived where others died.
A survivor becomes the Queen.
That was the truth of this land.
I waited until Raikan's footsteps disappeared into the courtyard before moving. Slowly, I sat up, the silk sheets sliding across my skin like water. My heart pounded, but my decision had already crystallized.
I rose from the bed, the soft blanket draped around my shoulders.
"Hakan."
His name felt delicate on my tongue, like a forbidden spell.
He turned from the balcony, his dark eyes catching faint torchlight. The fury had faded from his face, replaced by an exhaustion so profound it seemed etched into his bones.
"I am aware of the risk," I said.
His jaw tightened.
"You heard."
"I heard everything."
I stepped closer, my bare feet silent on the cold stone.
"I know the Tayar Kingdom is a burial ground for women. I know countless women came here seeking the crown… and died."
Hakan's shoulders tensed, guilt radiating off him.
"I know it is nearly impossible for women from other tribes to survive the Guardian Dragon's fire energy," I continued, breath steady despite the tremble inside me. "And I know only a few can survive absorbing a dragon's energy."
He turned toward me fully, the firelight tracing the scars across his skin.
"I was told I have to be prepared to risk my life if I want to become a Draconian's wife."
His eyes widened, agonized.
In one swift motion, Hakan stepped forward and grasped my shoulders—firm, warm, trembling.
"I can't do something like that," he whispered fiercely.
"How many died because of me? How many were lied to, sold off, pushed toward death they never asked for?"
I didn't flinch.
"I am not one of those women," I answered.
"I was not sold. I was sent for political reasons—but my decision to stay is mine alone."
He stared, breath caught.
"I did not come here seeking a gentle King. I came here seeking a chance at survival. A crown awarded only to the woman who can bear the King's child."
I tightened my grip on the blanket.
"Your power is your burden," I said, "but it is also my test."
He swallowed hard, a flicker of helpless hope crossing his features.
"You are reckless," Hakan murmured, looking at my silver hair, my pale skin, as if I were made of fragile moonlight.
"I am a queen-candidate," I replied.
Then I lifted my chin.
"And I refuse to die of neglect when I was promised a chance at the fire."
"Mumble… why do Draconians have to take the lives of so many women simply for the sake of reproducing?"
The words slipped from me before I could catch them, dissolving into the cold, star-marbled sky. The heavens above Tayar stretched vast and merciless, shimmering with constellations that looked down on me like silent judges. My question—my shameful, treasonous doubt—was swallowed by the desert wind.
My advisor did not ignore it. He never did.
"Your Majesty," he began, his deep voice weighted with that familiar mixture of reverence and reprimand. The lanternlight flickered against his stern features. "You must remember that the Brionians perceive the Tayars as beasts. Monsters."
His words settled heavily over me.
"They massacred those tribes who were not lucky enough to fall under our protection. They sold our people into chains." A faint tremor passed through his jaw. "You already know this."
Yes. I did. Every Tayar child grew up on those stories—the burned villages, the stolen women, the crushed bloodlines.
"But the reason they do not march over our borders now," he continued, his voice dropping to a lower, darker timbre, "is their fear of the Draconians… and the formidable fire energy they wield."
A phantom image flickered through my mind—a massive crimson dragon, its wings blotting out the sun, flames curling from its jaws. A memory, a warning, a legacy.
"Without the power of the Guardian Dragon," he said firmly, "it would be impossible to protect all the people here. You should know this already."
I did. And yet, knowing did not make it easier.
My advisor's tone shifted—no longer explanatory, but commanding.
"Your Majesty…" He stepped closer, cape whispering across stone. "I tolerated your doubts while the late King still lived. But I cannot do so any longer."
His shadow overlapped mine, imposing and unyielding.
"You must embrace Lucina so that a child of the Guardian Dragon may be born. Only such a child can protect the Tayars. That is the duty of a Tayar King."
Duty. Always duty. Cold. Absolute. Inescapable.
I swallowed hard, my throat tight. The crown on my head had never felt heavier.
But then—of all things—her face appeared in my mind.
A girl with moonlight hair and frightened eyes.
A girl soft in ways the world was not.
A girl who should never have been dragged into this.
What if she dies?
The thought pressed sharply against my ribs. Why was I thinking of her this way? Why did her life feel like a weight on my conscience, heavier than all those before her?
Is it because she reminds me of her?
The young girl from so long ago… the one I failed.
If so, it did not matter.
Duty demanded sacrifice.
Fate demanded cruelty.
My advisor's voice echoed in my head, sharp as a blade.
"If you had not brought her here," he had said, "then she would have died once the King of Brion was done with her."
His tone had been as emotionless as stone. "Few of his concubines ever survive."
He continued his grim logic.
"If she was destined to die from the start, then giving her the chance to survive by becoming Queen—is that not a kinder fate?"
His lips tightened, as though he believed he was offering her mercy.
"I don't think it's such a bad choice for her."
My temper rose. Slowly, then suddenly.
"Do you think she would agree to this?" I'd demanded, every word stoked by anger—at the kingdom, at myself, at the world that forced me to ask these things.
He shrugged, unbothered.
"How would I know? Go and ask her yourself."
Then, the final blow:
"Whether she accepts death… or chooses to bear your child and become Queen—her destiny lies in her hands."
The sky glittered mercilessly above the palace.
The path ahead glittered no differently.
The night wind guided my steps as I walked through the inner courtyard, carrying a glass of dark wine in one hand and a ripe red fruit in the other. A peace offering. A gesture of civility. Or perhaps a distraction from the truth awaiting us both.
When I reached the Queen's chambers, I hesitated. The threshold felt like the edge of a precipice.
Then—
BURST!
The door flew open with a startling crash.
A small servant girl skidded to a halt, her eyes widening like twin moons when she saw me.
"Lucina! The King is here!" she squeaked, then vanished back inside like a startled bird.
I exhaled once. Entered.
The room gleamed with warm gold. And there, atop the massive royal bed—
Lucina.
She blinked at me, startled, pale hair tumbling over her shoulders in soft waves. Her hands clutched the embroidered covers to her chest, her eyes wide, shimmering with uncertainty and… fear? Curiosity? Resignation? I could not tell.
I stepped beneath the archway. My robe—half open—revealed the tribal marks carved into my skin. Her gaze flickered over them. Over me.
I stopped, letting silence settle between us.
"Are you still awake, Lucina?"
The question lingered.
Heavy.
Final.
Her destiny—my people's future—hung on what she would say next.