118 Death of a Queen

"It's not me that you should be apologizing too," Laolong said curtly.

Huifu barely managed to stifle a wince as he turned to his brother.

"I am sorry big brother," he said.

Xinglong was shocked his father come down so hard on Huifu, up until now his father had been lenient with his younger siblings. Not wanting to humiliate his brother further, Xinglong gave Huifu a small smile.

"It's fine Huifu."

Lanhuo was pleased that his son had intervened and laid down the rules, it would make it easier for Xinglong in the long run, if his brothers and sisters understood just how serious the situation was, and submitted to his authority.

"Okay, we are all emotional about this subject. It was not easy for any of us either when we all found about this," Yulong said sympathetically.

"Father, please continue," Laolong said.

"Ahem, well then… after the elders came to their agreement, a young dragon was selected from each of the sects and sent to the young queen. To prevent the eleven sects from fighting, lots were drawn to select the order of Queen Xueteng 'mates'."

"Grandfather, surely those sects still had queens, so why were they all demanding new queens?" Xingteng asked, distressed at how the ancient ones had treated their queen.

"Most of their queens were old, the silver queen would only ever create a new queen, once the old queen had died."

"Didn't the dragons at the time find it strange that their sects were going to have two dragon queens?" Yinglong asked.

Laolong could see that his father was becoming irritated with all the interruptions, snickering to himself he wondered just how it would be before the old man lost patience with his grandchildren.

"Yes they did, but the elders were quick to explain that it was Queen Xueteng's idea, as most of the old queens were too old to have wyrmlings, and our numbers were too low, we needed new blood."

"Grandfather?"

"What now?" Lanhuo asked through gritted teeth.

Laolong was silently counting in his head, he had made a private bet with himself his father wouldn't last two minutes before he lost it.

"You said only eleven sects sent a dragon, but excluding silver dragons and us, there are thirteen sects, so shouldn't it have been twelve dragon sects?" Hulong asked.

"Grrrr," Lanhuo growled softly under his breath.

"Xinglong you explain it to them," he barked out, before turning to Yulong.

"Yulong my dear, why do I feel like I am sitting in a desert here?" Lanhuo asked.

Oh damn, Laolong thought, I lost — he didn't even make it to a minute before losing it.

Meanwhile, Yulong was frowning in confusion, trying to decipher her father-in-law words, what the hell does a desert have to do with the current situation.

Touching his snout with his paw, Laolong hid his grin at the cute look on his wife's face. Leaning over he whispered to her: "He is saying he is thirsty."

"Then why the hell did he not just say that?" she whispered back.

Chuckling Laolong just shrugged as Yulong got up to arrange refreshments and snacks for everyone.

While Yulong organized refreshments, Xinglong answered Yulong's question.

"The black sect didn't send a dragon."

"Why?"

"Firstly their queen was still relatively young, and as like the shadow dragons they disagreed the forced mating of the young queen."

"Wait, that doesn't make sense," Yinglong injected, "weren't they the ones that tried to force the queen, and that is the reason she killed herself?"

"Yes!" Lanhuo barked out. "Those filthy bastards, if that hadn't touch—"

"Grandfather, you know that is not the full story, isn't it time for you stop being so biased?" Xinglong hissed fiercely.

When is the old man going to let go of his prejudices, he thought.

"So another lie that we have been fed our whole lives?" Huifu asked snidely.

Xinglong let out a deep sigh.

"Yes," he answered.

"So what is the damn truth then?" Huifu asked.

"Over a hundred year period, Queen Xueteng gave birth to four clutches of eggs."

"Four clutches," Xingteng whispered in horror.

Most dragons would only have a clutch every two to three hundred years. It was unheard of to have some many clutches so close together.

"Her clutches were only one to two eggs at most, and every time she was forced to create a queen," Xinglong said, ignoring his sister whispered interruption.

"Due to her young age, Queen Xueteng didn't have enough heart's blood to create these four new queens and had to burn her own life force to create them. It was at this time that the black dragons started to raise an uproar about the treatment of Queen Xueteng, accusing the elders of the other sects of imprisoning her and forcing her to breed.

Many of the younger dragons started to question the elders about the treatment of the young queen, she hadn't been seen in public in nearly a hundred years. The sects who didn't have a new queen then started a rumor stating that the black dragons had colluded with the five sects who had young queens to suppress them.

There was chaos in the dragon realm. At that time the young heir to the black dragons begged our ancestors to help them rescue the young queen."

Knock, Knock.

Xinglong stopped talking at the interruption, Yulong opened the door. Seeing the servants carry their refreshments, she waved them in. After everybody had been served, the servants left.

"So what did our ancestors do?" Yinglong asked expectantly, she was enthralled with the history that was being revealed.

"The shadow dragons were divided, half wanted to rescue the queen, while the others thought that interfering would start a war. While the shadow dragon elders were debating the issue, a group of brash young shadow dragons joined the black dragons and during a daring raid rescued the young queen."

"Really? So some of our dragons stood up and fought for her?" Yinglong exclaimed excitedly.

Xinglong smiled at his sister's excited expression.

"It was a damn setup!" Lanhuo roared savagely.

"Grandfather," Xinglong said reproachfully.

"Well, it was," Lanhuo insisted stubbornly.

"What was a setup?" Yinglong asked.

"After the so-called rescue, the black dragon heir and our queen disappeared, that bastard kidnapped her."

"What? Xinglong is that true?" Yinglong asked turning to look at her brother.

Glaring at his grandfather, Xinglong said through gritted teeth: "You asked me to take over, would you mind if I finished telling them?"

"Hmph," Lanhuo turned back to eyeing the plate full of snack on the table.

"Yes, Juteng [1] the black dragon, Queen Xueteng and several young black dragons and shadow dragons disappeared after the rescue."

"So it was a setup," Yinglong declared.

"No," Xinlong said shaking his head. "Several shadow dragons had stayed behind to bring back news of the rescue, according to them, when they found Queen Xueteng, she was in a terrible state. Knowing that none of the elders supported them, the young dragons escaped with the queen, taking her somewhere safe.

When the elders of the sects found out, they organized hunting parties to track them down, but for nearly one hundred years no one found them."

"But then if Juteng saved her, how did he end up being the bad guy who tried to force her?" Hulong asked.

"The truth is no one really knows what happened. What we do know is that several elders had tracked down the small group. According to the few survivors, they came across Juteng trying to force himself on the Queen Xueteng, and she in her desperation to save herself, blew her own dantian, killing herself, Juteng and several dragons.

But one black dragon made it back alive, and his story is different. According to him Queen Xueteng and Juteng were in love, but Juteng refused to mate with her until she inherited the ancient queens' powers. They were living in the human realm in human forms waiting until Queen Xuteng was powerful enough to undertake the ancient queens' test when the elders found them. Queen Xueteng refused to return to the dragon realm, stating that if they forced her she would reveal every evil thing they had ever done.

According to the witness, the elders left. A couple of days later Yuteng went missing. Queen Xueteng tried desperately hard to find him.

When she and her guards managed to find him, he had been captured by a powerful human mage and using some unknown technique, been forced into a slave contract. The witness swears that the elders of the several of the dragons sects were with the mage. The elders promised Queen Xueteng that if she returned and gave them their own queens, they would release Yuteng from the slave contract.

Queen Xueteng didn't believe them, instead of returning to the dragon realm and being forced to bear them their queens, she blew her dantian."

"By the gods, what happened to the black dragon witness?" Huifu asked.

"He was tried and found guilty of treason, and killed," Xinglong said bitterly.

"The last silver queen was dead, our common mental path had died with her, as well as our access to all the ancients' knowledge. Somebody had to pay, and the dragons refused to believe that the elders would collude with humans and force a slave contract with a dragon."

Huifu gave a sharp bark of laughter.

"They knew what the elders had done to the queen, but somehow they thought the elders wouldn't stoop as low as to collude with humans to contract a dragon to force the queen to do their bidding," Huifu said derisively.

"Ha, there was only one black dragon witness, how can you believe what a black dragon says," Lanhuo said contemptuously.

Shaking his head Xinglong just ignored his grandfather, no matter what anyone said, the old man would not budge from his views, as far as Lanhuo was concerned, the black dragons had lied to the shadow dragons, and kidnapped the young queen, Xinglong also thought that his grandfather couldn't bear the thought that dragons would have been so despicable as to force a contract with a lowly human.

"Well they couldn't very well come out and tell the general population that they had imprisoned the young queen and forced her to create queens, could they?" Xinglong said rationally.

"But surely some dragons must have doubted their version?" Hulong asked.

"Of course, but the dragon realm was in upheaval about who was going to rule, there was so much infighting that everybody was distracted from the issue. And while everyone was busy with politics here in the dragon realm, the last silver dragon was slaughtered by humans in the human realm, and well you all know what happened after that."

"Why haven't the shadow dragons revealed the truth of what happened back then?" Hulong asked, hiding this history went against everything that the shadow dragons stood for now, and he was disappointed that his grandfather, parents and even his eldest brother were part of the conspiracy to hide this from all the dragons.

"Hulong what you is accomplish coming out with the truth? In the beginning, when the shadow dragons took power is was discussed, but then the Zartonesh invaded, and the last thing we needed was the dragon divided." Yulong said.

She could understand her younger son disillusionment with the shadow dragons, she had been the same when she had found out the truth.

"You can't bring the new queen back without revealing the truth," Xingteng stated her voice filled with determination.

Seeing the stubborn look on her sisters face, Yinglong started to grin. Oh boy, were her family in for a surprise now. Only she knew just how unmovable Xingteng could be.

"If you don't reveal it, then I will."

Xingteng declaration set off a massive wave in the family room.

--

Notes:

[1] Juteng - Hurricane Flying Dragon

Quote of the day

"The best and most beautiful things in the world cannot be seen or even touched - they must be felt with the heart." -Helen Kelle