The Passionate Queen (Dark Queens Book 2) by Jovee Winters Read Free Book Online

sentient. I’d always likened the stones to a shy, timid rabbit running away from a loping wolf. That was how difficult they were to find. The stones were likely part of the reason why she’d smelled as she had.
    Smiling, I tucked them into the pocket of my shirt and patted it. “I will treasure them.”
    She laughed. I loved her laugh.
    “Shouldn’t you eat them?”
    “You do not eat a gift, Lena.” I winked. “How very uncultured of you.”
    “Oh, very well then.” She rolled her eyes and fluttered a hand upon her breast. “Please forgive me, devil.”
    I swept out an arm theatrically and bowed. “Forgiven. Forgotten, my princess.”
    Immediately I sensed her mood shift, sensed the smile falter. When I looked at her, she’d grown morose. Leading her by the hand to our patch of grass, I made her sit and then sat myself.
    “What is the matter?”
    Clear-blue eyes looked up at me, shining with tears. She was always so strong. Never even crying when her back was torn open and bleeding. It killed me to see her thus.
    “Lena?” I wrapped her in my arms, wanting to sever the neck of whatever had made her hurt.
    Sniffing, she wiped at the tears with her knuckles. “In three weeks I’m to be mated. And I am not sure I can bear it.”
    I clenched my jaw. She’d rarely opened up to me or told me much about why she was forced into this marriage with the king. Every time I’d broached the subject, she’d gone cold on me and would leave soon after.
    I did not want her to leave, but I couldn’t stand the not knowing. “Lena, why? Why must you marry him? Is it that the hag wishes coin? I’ve coin aplenty; once I am pledged I can—”
    She placed a finger against my lips. “Stop, Ragoth. Please. You do not understand—”
    “Then make me understand!” I could feel the rage coursing through my blood, heating like a furnace through my belly. The fires lingering on the back of my tongue, ready to fly free. But I could never harm her. I could never hurt her. “You are mine.”
    She shook her head as another fat tear fell. “I am the hag’s first. And always have been. I can do only what she allows me to do. The alliance between the king and I is sealed.”
    “But how does this possibly benefit him? You own nothing. You are poor. A lowly, servant girl. I can see how this benefits that witch, but you, my dear one—”
    Her smile was haunted. “You recall that I told you once I was human, but only for a short time longer?”
    As a dragon I forgot nothing. It was the blessing and curse of my kind. I’d thought her words odd but hadn’t dwelled on them. “Yes. Why?”
    Her shoulders drooped and I knew that finally, finally I would learn the truth of my Lena.
    “I am a morphling, Ragoth. And my value is far greater than the worth of any dragon’s nest.”

Chapter 4
    Zelena
    I f he’d been from Kingdom, his eyes would have widened, and the avarice so common among the greedy would have consumed him for want of me.
    But Ragoth, my sweet boy, did not come from my world, and his eyes were full of nothing but curiosity.
    “And that means what exactly?” he asked with a deep burr.
    Gods, I could see the man he’d become. The man he very nearly was. The truth of it was, I called him a boy to keep him at a distance. There was very little about the shifter before me that wasn’t mature.
    He stood two heads taller than me. His eyes were piercing, blazing jewels of knowledge that seemed to always study me like a fascinating riddle.
    And he’d grown far more handsome than I could have ever imagined when first I’d met the boy so many years ago. His features now were sharper, stronger, and far more masculine. His shoulders broad, his chest massive.
    The only youth I still saw in him was his ability to laugh and tease me so easily.
    Truth of it was, somedays it was difficult to remember that my heart was not my own to give away. Though I desperately yearned with every fiber of my being that it were so.
    “Lena?” he