Wolf King and his Fox Consort [BL]

A deathly silence fell over the throne room, interrupted only by the rhythmic tapping of Chu Yun's fingers on the armrest.

"It was you?" Ru Long roared, straining against the guards keeping him in place.

Chu Yun smiled to himself.

He had been entertaining that possibility ever since the conversation with the Third Princess, in which she revealed her suspicions that her mother was involved in the King's 'mysterious illness'.

While Chu Yun and Xiao Zai knew for a fact of Ru Long's involvement, the Third Princess' words prickled the back of his mind.

Ru Long would have needed help from someone within the palace to achieve his goals. He couldn't have done everything on his own -- especially since it concerned the Su treasury, and constant absences from court while he pursued his goals elsewhere.

Someone needed to cover for him.

Su, like Zui, had ministers and advisers that must be kept abreast of national matters. As the Crown Prince, and in his father's absence, Ru Long should have taken a more active role in court matters.

Instead he spent the past years travelling through Xin and Zui.

It made sense that the Queen Consort had enough authority to justify his prolonged absences, and take matters into her own hands, if the ministers raised any trouble.

The only question was why.

Chu Yun couldn't quite understand why she would ally herself with the child of her husband's lover.

In fact, his goal with mentioning the Queen Consort's role in Xiao Yao's fate was finding exactly that out.

Luckily for him, most of the time people would admit to everything -- if only they thought they had already been found out.

The King of Su turned towards his wife slowly. "Guilan, what is the meaning of this?"

All eyes were focused on the Queen Consort of Su, but her attention was focused solely on Ru Long's accusing glare.

"You don't understand. Your father wanted to abdicate." Her tone was pleading but there was no remorse in her face. "I had to do something. Please know this happened before I met you. It was never my intention to hurt you."

"But Xiao Yao didn't die right away, the children stayed with him for some time," Xiao Zai said, his gaze focused on the King of Su.

The King lowered his head. "In my cowardice I wavered, despite not doing so when I promised Xiao Yao we would be together."

Han Guilan let out a chilling laugh. "You promised him so much, you scoured Su for the cultivators who could deliver you pills to make even an alpha wolf carry your child." Her dignified features were a mask of ice as she turned towards the King. "And yet, knowing how much it hurt me that I wasn't able to conceive, you didn't spare a single thought for me."

Chu Yun's eyes widened in understanding.

He had just found his motive.

The Third Princess scrambled up to her feet. She looked bewildered even behind her veil. "Mother?" Her head swivelled between her father and mother. "What is the meaning of this? How come you..."

"You are the child of one of my concubines who died during childbirth. I gave you to your mother to raise," the King of Su said, not meeting his daughter's eyes. "At her request you were never told about your birth mother, and I also found it unnecessary to burden you with it."

From the distant corner of the room came Ru Long's annoyed scoff. "Yes, father loves keeping things from us."

Chu Yun could imagine the rage Ru Long had flown into when he discovered his true parentage. And he could only guess at the tales the Queen Consort had spun for him -- obfuscating her own role in Xiao Yao's death, and laying all the blame at the King's feet.

Not that he wasn't guilty of plenty as well.

The Queen Consort of Su advanced towards Ru Long, but the Zui guards didn't move from their position. Ru Long himself retreated further into their midst, and away from her.

"Please, Long-er, you have to understand. When I discovered that it was a way for me to gestate a child, something that for so long I thought was outside the realm of possibility, I was overjoyed. It didn't matter to me that your father had gifted it to someone else first. But..."

She looked down at her balled fists, her jaw closed tight.

"But then I found out it took 40 years for the pills to be refined, and that the cultivators that produced them had just started on a new batch. Your father had taken the last of their supply."

Her shoulders shook, but no tears came. Chu Yun had a feeling the Queen Consort of Su had cried them all out.

He felt a tightness below his chest. He was well aware of what had become of the last of those pills. Perhaps the Queen of Su didn't know her husband had gotten two to begin with.

At this point, it was best if she never did.

For his part, the King of Su looked despondent. His already wan complexion had grown even paler. "Those pills were meant for the use of human males. There was no telling if they would work on an alpha wolf, but just the same, no guarantee they would work on a female woman, either."

The Queen Consort turned towards him with a snarl and hit the King with both of her closed fists across his chest. The King staggered backwards, but didn't stop her.

"And yet you tried! Why not offer me the choice? Have I not done enough? For you, for our kingdom? Couldn't I have this one thing..."

Slowly, the King of Su lifted his hands and held on to the Queen's shoulders, keeping her in place as he looked down into her eyes. "I loved him, that was why..."

Han Guilan broke away from her husband with a pained exhale. "Your love for him, and your lack of it for me, got the two of us about the same thing."

She held the King's gaze for one last charged moment, and stalked out of the throne room without a single look back.