THE CONVERSATIONS
So this one short is a part of the "Visenya and Aegon : Ten Moments" series so quick recap - Lyanna Stark is never kidnapped and hence Jon is actually Robert and Lyanna's son.
I.
His eldest child, his first born, holds a special place in Rhaegar's heart. Maybe because she is his first child, maybe because she is a daughter or maybe because she looks like Elia. but the thing is she is precious to him. Which is why it breaks his heart to see his ten year old daughter cry alone in her room.
"My dear, what is the matter?", he asks her softly, a tone he has learnt from Elia.
"I don't want to talk to you.", she answers, eyes red due to tears.
"Me? Why do you not wish to talk to me Rhaenys?", he asks her and prays that Elia comes looking for Rhaenys soon. He cannot handle his upset daughter alone.
"Because you do not love me!", she screams at him and Rhaegar's eyes widen at that.
"Rhaenys, my dear, who said that? I love you. I will always love you. You are my little daughter, my little dragon.", he speaks as he hugs her. He hopes his wife will walk in any moment. She was always better at stuff like this.
"Then why are you sending me off? I heard you talking. You are sending me to Storm's End as a ward.", Rhaenys mutters into his shoulder.
Rhaegar takes a deep breath and thinks about how to explain the concept of possible betrothals and marriages to her, of how she will be the Lady of the Storm's End someday.
"Do you want to be like your mother?", he asks her and hopes that somehow he can explain what he is trying to explain to his little daughter.
Rhaenys nods in reply and so Rhaegar continues, "Well then, one day you will have to marry a man the way your mother married me."
"But I don't want to marry.", his daughter protests and Rhaegar laughs at that.
"Every girl must marry a man. And the princess must marry the best man in Westeros."
"But why send me away?", Rhaenys asks again and Rhaegar realises that his daughter is an inquisitive little thing.
"I am not sending you away. You are just going to visit Storm's End. Meet a young boy called Jon. See if you like that place.", he replies softly and prays that Jon and Rhaenys do get along. Elia had wanted her daughters to actually like their future homes and therefore wanted to let them be wards for a year before marriage.
"But I do not want to go.", his daughter answers, her voice still as muffled as before.
"You are not going now. Your mother would kill me if I sent you away right now. It is years from now Rhaenys. When my girl is all grown up.", he tries to console her.
"Then I don't want to grow up." Her words make Rhaegar laugh again and he promises his daughter that she " will always be my little girl and I will never send you away".
His daughter's teary-eyed smile is worth the lie.
II.
Aegon is sitting in the gardens alone, which is surprising because Visenya is her brother's shadow now-a-days, when Rhaegar approaches him. His son looks better than he did three days back, the day of Elia's death.
"You stopped drinking, I assume.", Rhaegar speaks aloud to draw his son's attention.
Aegon doesn't turn back to acknowledge his father, just shrugs and answers, "Guess I grew up."
Rhaegar and his son are alike, too alike, so alike that both of them start to grow distant from their respective father's. Aegon is going through that phase right now. "That's good, I suppose. Westeros will need a good King after me."
This time Aegon actually turns around for his father, "I have better things to do than rule."
Rhaegar is affronted by those words, "Kingship is not only birthright but also your duty as my heir."
"Then I wish I wasn't your heir." Aegon answers him and Rhaegar realises that he is fighting a losing battle. His son has just lost a mother. Perhaps Kingship is truly the last thing on his mind. So Rhaegar uses a different approach, "I am no King without your mother."
Now, Rhaegar notes, he has Aegon's full attention. He is not really surprised by it. Both his elder children had a special bond with their mother and preferred her over Rhaegar.
"I truly am no King without her. I never was. Your mother may not have fought battles but that doesn't mean that she was unimportant. Actually she was the most important." The memory of his wife does sadden Rhaegar a little. After all, the wound is still fresh.
"She deserved better. A better son, a better husband, a better life, a better death.", Aegon replies and in that moment Rhaegar realises just how much his son has inherited from him, his looks, his nature, his sadness, his thoughts of Elia deserving better. Rhaegar does not say it all out loud. Silence, it appears, is better suited for the father-son duo.
"Aegon… I…", Rhaegar pauses because he does not know what to tell his son and so he does what he has always done in situations like these, "You are a Targaryen. The son of a King, the blood of a dragon. Remember that." These are the words Rhaegar has repeated a lot to his brother Viserys (a man stuck in living hell really).
Rhaegar notices Aegon close his eyes, mutter something under his breath and finally look his father dead in the eye, "I am a Martell. The son of Dorne, the blood of Nymeria. I'll always remember that."
Aegon's words honestly anger Rhaegar and in this moment he remembers that his son is the nephew of the Red Viper of all men. That sharp tongue is something he inherits from his uncle and not his father.
III.
Rhaegar is neither blind nor deaf. He has seen Visenya's tears, heard her cries all through the night. Perhaps he could have informed his daughter before announcing her betrothal to her brother. But he hadn't and so he had spent the night listening to his daughter cry herself to sleep.
Rhaenys and Aegon were closer to their mother but Visenya was closer to her father. Was, being the main word. Now his children are as distant from him as they can be without appearing impolite.
The next morning, he sends for Visenya to break fast with her in his solar. She does come but the stiffness in her back signifies how much she doesn't want to be here. "You called for me, Your Grace?"
Her salutation for him is proof enough of how hard this conversation shall be. "Sit. How are you?" Two can play the game and so he decides to be as curt as her.
"As well as a girl can be upon discovering she is to marry her brother.", she replies and it is the same tone Elia used to speak in to dismiss her handmaidens when they irritated her. His daughter is Elia born with Targaryen looks.
"The marriage was a necessity.", he justifies and his daughter is quick to retort, "How exactly was it necessary?"
Rhaegar takes a bite of his food before answering, "When I was the Crown Prince, my parents looked for a Princess for marriage. Your mother happened to be the only Princess in the Seven Kingdoms and so she became my wife."
"Dorne has a Princess. Uncle Doran's daughter or one of uncle Oberyn's daughters.", Visenya states, answering her father's implied reasoning of her being the only Princess in Westeros.
"Doran's daughter is too old for Aegon and Oberyn's daughters are not true born.", Rhaegar reasons.
"So you thought your daughter was the perfect option for your son. Well thought, Your Grace.", his daughter answers, sarcasm dripping from every word.
"Aegon is not the only one. I would never send you as far as the North to marry the Stark boy nor would I have you marry the heir of Highgarden. If you would have married your cousin in Dorne, you would be the wife of a Prince who is second in the line of inheritance. Your marriage to your brother will not only make you Queen but will ensure the Targaryen rule." Rhaegar explains to his daughter because this is exactly what pushed him to have his children married. A lady unmarried was frowned upon, a Princess remaining so would be even worse.
His daughter gets up from her chair, anger flashing in her eyes, "Talk to me the day you stop looking at me like a pawn." With those words, she walks out of the solar and that day, that day Rhaegar Targaryen, the King of Westeros, finally loses his third and last child.