Arvid only returned to his palace way past midnight, long after I had given up waiting and gone to bed myself. When I heard him arrive, I got up to greet him. He looked absolutely exhausted, even more so than usual after a long day. I had heard through the servants that the interrogation of the captured elf had lasted almost six grueling hours without break. And afterwards, there had been mountains of paperwork to review and sign, plus an extended emergency meeting with all the military commanders to discuss security improvements. There was just so much he had managed to accomplish in one impossibly long day.
Meanwhile, I had spent a much more leisurely day. I'd had that pleasant lunch with Arvid's young cousins that had stretched agreeably until early evening, filled with good food and enlightening conversation. After that social obligation concluded, I had gone to explore and visit the castle library, which I'd only recently learned existed.
After all those fascinating talks about the legendary scholar Tarhan Gunasera and the critical importance of education in Southern society, I found myself practically salivating for something I hadn't properly gotten my hands on in far too long: books. Real, substantial books to read and study.
So when I had asked around among the servants about whether there might be a library somewhere inside this massive castle complex, I was delighted to learn there was indeed a substantial library housed within the Arpa castle grounds. I was led by a helpful maid to a location inside the castle I hadn't visited or even been aware of before, an entirely new section.
We had walked past an elaborate and beautiful sunflower garden in full bloom, and adjacent to it stood a lovely palace that was clearly well-maintained and cared for, though it appeared to be completely empty and unoccupied. The palace was called Sunflower Palace, according to the signage.
"This is the palace where the emperor's offspring would traditionally occupy and live before they reached twelve years of age," the elderly maid who had been gifted to me by Prince Yarun—Ruka Ma—explained when I asked with obvious curiosity why such a beautiful palace stood empty. "After reaching that age, most of the time the young princes were formally moved to reside in the Gold Palace, while the princesses were transferred to the Silver Palace. Currently all those imperial children's residences remain empty, since our current emperor has yet to produce an offspring."
An offspring. The word echoed in my mind uncomfortably.
Aiona had been absolutely furious with me ever since early this morning when I had deliberately and defiantly gulped down the contraceptive pill I had originally obtained from Jiao back in the North. Somehow I had managed to keep that small vial with me through all the chaos and changes, all the way to Arpa, even though I had gone through so many transformations.
"We need a hatchling! A cute little hatchling!" Aiona had screamed directly into my mind with frustration. "Why would you do this? Don't you want a hatchling at all?"
"There's a specific part of the curse that's been documented in Draga bloodline history," I had responded to her calmly, trying to be rational. "It says that every child born to someone with dragon blood who doesn't have a partner with black hair and black eyes is destined to become a monster. Isn't that correct? What do you think about that prophecy?"
"That's not the actual truth," Aiona had said after finally calming down somewhat from her initial anger. "Your ancestors deliberately twisted the truth over generations, changing the meaning. The one who becomes the monster isn't the hatchling, the child—it's the one who has the dragon blood between the two parents. The parent transforms, not the baby."
"You cannot give birth to a dragon without being one yourself," she had stated firmly. "It's a universal truth of our species."
I had repeated that sentence over and over in my head, trying to process the implications.
*You cannot give birth to a dragon without being one.*
*You cannot give birth to a dragon without being one.*
"You need to understand something important," Aiona had continued, her mental voice taking on a lecturing tone. "Every dragon ever born throughout all of history has been a half-blood. They were born from the union of one dragon parent and one human parent, or any other species other than dragon. The only exception to this rule was Rulha himself, who was born to two full dragon parents. So essentially, when we dragons are born, we are no different than human children initially. We are born the same way, through the same biological process. We look exactly like human babies. Despite what I showed you back in that vision in Ferne, we weren't actually born from eggs—that was symbolic."
She paused. "Instead, we grow up appearing completely human until we reach the age of seventeen or eighteen years old. When we reach that critical age threshold, we go through an extremely painful process called dragonification. That is when we violently shed our human self and crawl out transformed as a dragon. It's not easy or magical or beautiful. It's actually quite horrifying and gruesome to witness and experience. We essentially kill our human self to become the dragon. After that traumatic transformation is complete, we finally have full access to our magical powers and gain the ability to shapeshift to look like humans again. But that human form is something magically created and maintained, not real or natural. The actual human part of us dies permanently during the dragonification process."
She had taken a mental breath. "So I repeat: you absolutely have to be a dragon yourself to give birth to a dragon. There's no way around it."
"You understand what this means for you specifically, right?" she had asked pointedly.
---
I deliberately shook off the disturbing memory of this morning's conversation from my mind. I wasn't ready to confront or deal with whatever implications were waiting for me in that direction just yet. And besides, Arvid and I were both still quite young. We could seriously think about children much, much later. There was no rush.
"...since the young princesses and princes traditionally start their formal education very early in their childhood years, the Imperial Academy and Imperial Library were both built together in close proximity near the Sunflower Palace for convenience. That's why the Imperial Library is situated here in this section rather than the main castle," Ruka Ma concluded her explanation.
Since I had been so completely caught up dwelling in my own troubled thoughts, I had unfortunately missed the entire middle portion of her historical explanation. But I felt reasonably confident that nothing absolutely critical had been missed during my mental absence.
We passed another impressive architectural structure that featured open-air design with numerous low tables and chairs arranged in rows. The only solid wall in that particular space was covered entirely by an enormous blackboard that stretched across the whole surface. This was clearly a classroom designed for lectures and lessons.
Beyond that educational space lay what appeared to be a well-equipped training ground featuring archery targets for arrow practice, racks of wooden training swords and practice spears, and many more weapons designed for instruction rather than actual combat. Beyond that training area stood another classroom structure almost identical to the first one I had observed.
As we walked even further into this children's complex, I could see some living quarters that had clearly been designed and built for the imperial teachers and tutors. But as per Ruka Ma's matter-of-fact explanation, those residential buildings were also completely empty and unoccupied currently.
Just how many children had the previous emperors produced to justify building such extensive and elaborate facilities for educating his offspring? That seemed like it would require way too many imperial-blooded children to fill properly. And what exactly were we supposed to do with such massive infrastructure now? It certainly wasn't as if I was going to personally fill all these buildings with my own numerous children anytime soon.
Besides, that many children who carried both Selon imperial blood and Draga dragon blood in their veins would be... oh gods, I really didn't want to think about the implications of that particular scenario.
Then we finally reached our actual destination: the Imperial Library itself. It was a genuinely huge and impressive structure, rising four full floors above ground with an additional basement level below.
The basement floor, I was informed, was a heavily restricted zone. Only specifically authorized personnel with explicit written imperial permission could access that level. What valuable or dangerous materials that secretive floor held, I had absolutely no idea. Perhaps ancient texts, forbidden magic, state secrets.
The first floor served primarily as the main study area. There were rows and rows of sturdy tables and comfortable chairs arranged throughout the large open space, providing ample seating for scholars and students. Against one side of the wall stood secure lockers where visitors could store their personal belongings. One entire wall was constructed almost completely of floor-to-ceiling windows designed to let natural air and light flood in, creating a pleasant reading environment.
The wall nearest the main entrance held an organized receptionist desk, currently unmanned, and several large cupboards positioned behind it probably held various administrative documents, lending records, and catalogs.
And beyond that reception area rose an impressive staircase that clearly led up to the second, third, and fourth floors where the actual book collections must be housed.
I looked around with growing excitement and satisfaction.
I was absolutely going to love this place. Finally, a library worthy of serious study.