Business: I own nothing.
A/n: written because the scene where Daenerys locks up her two dragons smashed me in the face with feelings when I watched it while I was catching up ready for the final series.
In Chains
When Daenerys first laid eyes on the charred bones, she'd been confused. When it dawned on her that she was looking at the burnt remains of a person – a child – she'd been downright horrified.
"My girl," the child's father had said. Sobbing. His grief spilling out of him endlessly as Missandei translated him. "My little girl."
His little girl, just three years old. Gone. Burnt to ashes and taken much, much too soon. Scorched to death by dragonfire before she even had a chance to really see the world. But worse was the fact that it was one of her dragons that had done this.
"A winged shadow... it came from the sky and..."
Her baby. Her baby had caused this devastation.
She had to swallow a sob of her own. Queens did not cry before their subjects. She didn't know how, but she managed to keep herself composed long enough to say the right things and sympathise with his grief, and promise this wouldn't happen again. Too little, too late for this poor man. But what could she do?
She dismissed him, watched him go, and then dismissed herself from seeing any more of her people for the day. She asked her attendants and small council to leave her, returned to her room, and then she shed a few quiet tears before she sank into bed to think.
What should I do? She wondered. What can I do? I know I have to protect my people, but... the dragons are my children, too.
What am I supposed to do? I don't know what to do...
She huffed a sigh and lay in bed staring up at the ceiling. Wondering. What should she do?
There was only one thing she could do. And it broke her heart because it really seemed like it was the only option she had left.
She rolled over and buried her face into her soft feather down pillow. Sobbing as tears squeezed their way out of her eyes. But she was alone here. There was no-one to see her un-queenly tears. So she gave herself over to them. Allowing herself to be a little girl for once and grieve for her dragons – her babies – and what she had to do to them to keep her kingdom safe. In the morning she'd wipe them all away and become a queen again.
Until then, she would weep.
. . .
She summoned her two remaining dragons the following night. After she'd steeled herself. Well, steeled herself as much as she possibly could, anyway. Whichever way she sliced it, this was going to hurt like nothing else in the world.
She swallowed hard. Her voice cracking as she called their names. "Viserion! Rhaegal!"
They were good dragons, so they came when they were called, gliding majestically through the air to land beside her. The two of them nuzzling her affectionately. Her lips trembled as she stroked them, enjoying the feel of their beautiful scales. Who knew when she'd be able to touch them again – if ever.
"Come," she said to them, and led them down into the catacombs. Down into the darkness. Her heart growing heavier with every step down. The only light in the gloom being her torch as the three of them descended.
. . .
It was cold, in the catacombs. Cold as a tomb. But Daenerys supposed it was a tomb. Fallen into disuse now, but once it was a tomb. She supposed it was appropriate, given what she was going to use it for. A prison for her children.
They followed her in obediently. Such good children, and she threw some meat for them as a reward. They cooked the meat themselves, burning it with their fiery breath and tearing into it with relish. Daenerys smiled, sadness filling her up inside. They always did love lamb... but she quickly brushed away the nostalgia. She had a job to do. Gods, she didn't want to do this. She really wished there was another way...but there wasn't. There was no other option but this.
This is for the best, she told herself, as her eyes watered and her lips trembled, and sobs threatened to come again. For the best.
She sniffed and dragged her gaze to the floor. To the two huge chains and manacles attached to the wall. Just in case, Ser Jorah had said. Gods, did she wish she didn't have to use them. Not for this.
Her whole body felt like lead as she dragged herself towards them, taking a hold of the heavy manacle, hefting it towards her lovely dragons. Trying to ignore the happy memories of watching them feed, of discovering they could spew fire when they were small. They were so tiny, then.
She even remembered holding the eggs, cradling them against her, wondering what they'd look like when they hatched. She tried to keep a stiff upper lip as the first manacle clamped shut around Rhaegal's throat.
The second manacle felt heavier than the first. But maybe because she was tired; keeping oneself together was hard and took a lot out of a person. And the happy memories of her babies were cumbersome. The first time she watched them fly... the times she had to split them up they were squabbling so much...
Times when she'd sit and read by candlelight in bed, her three dragons curled up asleep beside her, snoring away.
She choked on another sob as she hefted the second manacle, and as soon as it clamped shut and locked the first of her tears started to fall. This was it. She'd unlocked the door and opened it. Now she just had to make the agonising walk through it.
She stood up slowly, her whole body feeling like iron. Cold and heavy. Was she really doing this? She didn't really have much choice. She had to do it to protect her people, as Queens had to do – well, the good queens anyway – and this was the only way to do that.
But that didn't stop it hurting.
It didn't stop the pain tearing through her chest at leaving her children to the darkness.
It couldn't erase the empty, hollow feeling inside her from threatening to either swallow her whole or break her apart.
It didn't stop her heart from breaking just a little more with each step away from them she took, listening to them crying after her. Crying for their mother.
Don't leave us! Mother! Mother!
When she'd climbed halfway up the stairs, hearing them cry almost grew too much to bear. She wanted to run back to them, embrace them, unchain them and beg their forgiveness. Say "I'm sorry, I'm so sorry," over and over again.
But she bore it. She had to. She didn't have any choice. It was either this or risk her people rising up in arms and turning on her dragons – her children – and she couldn't risk that. She couldn't risk them doing something irreversible to her babies. She loved them too much.
So she bore it. She swallowed the lump n her throat, and shut their cries out of her hears and out of her heart, and she walked to the top. Once there, he sobs were harder to contain. When she took one last look down at her babies, in darkness, in chains, it was all she could do not to break down and cry as she nodded to the Unsullied warrior to close the door and seal her dragons away.
. . .
The walk back to her room that night was the hardest walk of all. She'd never felt so empty or desolate in her life. Who was she without her dragons? Her children?
Lost and bereft seemed too inadequate to describe how she felt.
Ser Jorah must have seen the sorrow on her face as she passed him, because he tried to approach her. To console her as he always had as her closest friend. He didn't know right now she was inconsolable.
"Khaleesi..." he began, but she was too afraid she'd just burst into tears if she met his gaze. Besides, she needed to be alone right now.
"Leave me, Ser Jorah," she said, waving him away. "Please," she added, almost as an afterthought.
Thankfully he seemed to understand, and bowed.
"Yes, your grace," he said, and she continued on her way.
Only when she was alone with the door closed, did she allow herself to mourn. To cry. To wail into her pillow, feeling like the worst person in the world. The dragons were her babies. Her children. Part of her life. And she'd just left them in chains. In the darkness. Broken their hearts and betrayed them.
What kind of mother did that?