Migong - Book 1

Chapter 7: Carp dream (T)

Still brooding from the encounter with the girl who had stolen her son's face, the Queen of Moutan, Cho Ahnjong, rolled fitfully in her bed, clenching her first as she remembered Mu Feiyan's defiant look before she was taken away to the water prison.

Demon! Goblin! That girl must die. She must die or she'll kill the Crown Prince. Die! Die! Die!

Throwing the tangle of blankets off to the side, the Queen sat up with a hand covering her mouth, muffling the jagged sound of her cries. It had been nineteen years now, since she had had the fateful dream that told her that she had conceived.

Passed over in favour of a prettier and higher ranked Princess for the alliance marriage between Keungang and Shobu, Cho Ahnjong had been quietly married into the Moutan Kingdom at the age of seventeen. Painfully aware of her status and prospects as the daughter of a low ranked concubine, she had never imagined that Xiao Jing Feng, an unremarkable third Prince, would not only survive the succession process of Moutan, but become its King, and that she would become his Queen.

Many, including herself, had mistaken his quiet personality as lacking, but unlike his more outwardly confident and outstanding brothers, Xiao Jing Feng's patience was a deep pool that few could see into*. When he ascended the dragon throne of Moutan with the support of Grand Chancellor Mu, he proceeded to solidify a stability that his warmongering Father had failed to secure, bringing peace and prosperity to his people.

And to her great surprise, Cho Ahnjong, not only found herself a powerful woman, but a very much cherished wife. She didn't know when she realized her love for her husband, but it was no secret that there was affection between them. Certainly, their relationship was not marked by any whirlwind romance or grand gestures, but his quiet devotion had moved her heart, and they were quite happy until it became apparent that she would not be able to produce an heir.

After four years of marriage, the Queen had not conceived once, though they often shared a bed. Under mounting pressure from Court, the King reluctantly allowed daughters from high-ranking families and foreign princesses to be sent into the harem in the hopes that one of them would conceive and birth a son.

Although Xiao Jing Feng's attitude towards Cho Ahnjong did not change, the King's visits became less frequent as he made the rounds with the harem. As she saw less and less of her husband, the world around the Queen slowly closed in and lost its colour.

Ashamed and haunted by the whisperings about her barren body, believing that she had lost her husband's favour, Cho Ahnjong gradually withdrew into the Peony palace, until one day she did not leave her chambers at all.

Yet, two months after she had shut the doors of the Peony palace, on a full moon night, she dreamt that she met Grand Chancellor Mu and a tall silver haired man in her private garden.

Barefoot and wearing nothing but her night clothes, she drew her cloak around her and frowned as she walked down the familiar white gravel path. Like her, the garden was barren, covered in two months' worth of winter snow. Despite this, she did not feel the icy cold in her feet, but only in the vise that gripped her heart.

What is this?

"Ah...Your Majesty, forgive our intrusion, but we have been waiting for you," said Lord Mu smoothly, as if it wasn't absurd for him to be casually conversing with his under dressed Queen.

"Indeed, Grand Chancellor? And your companion is...?" she asked. She tried to hide her wariness under a pleasant manner, but in truth Lord Mu had always frightened her.

Curiously, Lord Mu's face was not concealed. She had never seen his unmasked face before, but his expression was unexpectedly serene...perhaps even warm...?