"I like it no more than you do," Arianne had overheard her father say, "but there is a blood debt, and Quentyn is the only coin Lord Ormond will accept."
"Coin?" her mother had screamed. "He is your son. What sort of father uses his own flesh and blood to pay his debts?"
"The princely sort," Doran Martell had answered.
(A Feast for Crows)
She is his favorite. Every little girl wishes to believe this of her father at one point or another, but even Shaera says Rhaelle is Father's favorite. "You're impertinent, and Father likes that, for some reason," Shaera says, turning up her nose.
Rhaelle is not sure she knows what impertinent means, but she knows she likes the sound of it.
She likes to sit on his lap and watches the letters form on the parchment. Father's hand moves so swiftly, the scratch scratch scratch of quill on parchment goes on and on for a long time. "Your father is writing his way to a more perfect kingdom," Mother says.
"Are you writing to Uncle Maester?"
Father looks up and smiles. "Not this time. It's not a letter."
Father is writing new laws. Or the reform. Rhaelle is not sure what those words mean either, but she knows Father loves them, whatever they are.
She likes to hear stories about when Father was a squire, and he and Ser Dunk went on great adventures together.
"Did you have to shave your head every day?"
"No, not every day. Hair doesn't grow that fast."
"Tell me about Ser Dunk and the Red Widow."
"You've heard that story many, many times."
"Tell me again. Please, Father, please?"
"Well, there is something else, but it must be our secret."
Rhaelle likes secrets. "It will be our secret. I promise!"
Ser Dunk doesn't know that Father knows, but Father knows about the kiss. And now Rhaelle does too.
Duncan is a dreamer. He looks through people, sometimes, like he's not really seeing them, but imagining something else, some secret of his own.
Rhaelle thinks Duncan is lonely. Jaehaerys has Shaera and Daeron has Rhaelle, but there is no sister close to Duncan's age. "Brothers are good, but everyone needs a sweet sister too," Jaehaerys often says, when he is teased for preferring Shaera's company more than his brothers'.
But when Rhaelle tells Mother this, Mother looks disturbed and says, "Duncan doesn't need a sister close to his age. He's marrying the Baratheon girl as soon as she flowers." And then Mother mutters under her breath, "If only the Tully girl is not so very young still."
"Or else we could have a double wedding," Rhaelle says, catching on, "and save on the cost for the wedding feast. Father would like that." Father is always saying they need more gold dragons to help the smallfolks.
"Clever girl," Mother says, but she is distracted and she does not look at Rhaelle when she says this.
Rhaelle already knows about the weddings, from Shaera. Jaehaerys is to marry Celia Tully, who has long red hair and a beautiful singing voice, Shaera says, with that look on her face when she is upset and trying to pretend that she is not. (Shaera likes to pretend. She smiles when she's angry, and she laughs when Rhaelle could tell she really wants to scream.) Shaera is to marry Luthor Tyrell, who is 'everything a lord husband should be,' Shaera says, but she says that in her pretend voice, so Rhaelle knows it must be a lie.
Daeron is to marry Olenna Redwyne, who is another impertinent little girl, according to Shaera. Rhaelle could not wait to meet this other impertinent girl. Olenna had been at the betrothal feast, but Rhaelle had not been allowed to come. Mother said she was too young.
Duncan is gone for a long time, and when he returns, he has a girl with her. Only she is not really a girl, she is a young woman and she is his wife, Duncan announces, and suddenly everything is chaos. There is shouting, there are voices, many different voices, there are slammed doors and angry words, and then there are tears. Mother is not the one who cries. Duncan and Father both weep when Duncan returns the bronze circlet Father had given to him on his sixteenth nameday.
Jaehaerys has that bronze circlet now. He looks at the coiled metal like it's a poisonous snake about to bite him. "I am to be king," he says, over and over again.
"Does this mean Celia Tully will be queen? Will the wedding be soon? Will it be a double wedding, with yours?" Rhaelle asks Shaera, and for once, Shaera does not pretend. She turns to Rhaelle with a look of fury on her face and she screams, "Leave me! Leave me alone, you impertinent child!" But then she weeps and weeps, and Rhaelle holds her hands while Shaera sobs and chokes out the same words over and over again, "If Duncan can do it, why can't we?"
Father says Jaehaerys must go and live in Dragonstone now that he is the Prince of Dragonstone, though he will need to come to court from time to time for the realm's business. Mother says Shaera is to go to Summerhall, but she does not say for what reason. Shaera cries and begs and pleads, but Mother does not change her mind. Shaera goes to Father, who hugs her and kisses her forehead. Shaera wipes her tears and looks hopeful, but then Father says, "Your mother is right." Shaera turns on him, angrily says, "If this is Rhaelle, if this is for your precious little girl, you would have done something."
"What does she want you to do?" Rhaelle asks Father, after Shaera leaves.
"Something I am powerless to do," Father says, and he sounds so sad and heartbroken Rhaelle decides to tell him about the little kittens growing in Egg's belly, even though she had wanted to keep it a secret until after the kittens are born, to surprise him.
("Egg is not a cat's name, let alone a female cat," Daeron had complained, because they shared the cat, he and Rhaelle, and he wanted to pick a different name. But Father said Egg was a great name for a cat, so Daeron stopped arguing.)
"How many kittens do you think she has in there?"
Rhaelle holds up five fingers.
Father smiles. "You're not going to name them Duncan, Jaehaerys, Shaera, Daeron and Rhaelle, are you?"
"Not Rhaelle. Betha."
Father kisses her forehead. "My sweet girl."
"Shaera says I'm impertinent," Rhaelle whispers.
Father laughs. "Well, you're that too, sometimes."
"You should not have allowed his son to leave," Mother says. "He has been planning this. He was only waiting for his son to be safely returned to Storm's End before announcing his rebellion."
"How was I to know that was his intention? The letter was from Lady Baratheon, not from Lyonel. She wrote that her daughter is very distraught, that her son being home with the family would help ease their sadness. How could I refuse her, when it was our son's doing that caused so much turmoil for them?"
"That whole treacherous family," Mother spits out the words angrily. "Even him, even that boy you've been so kind to and treated like one of your own."
"He's a young man now, not a boy. And I cannot believe that he knew what his father had in mind, before he left King's Landing."
"He must have known," Mother disagrees.
They are talking about Ormund, Father's squire. He did not come to say goodbye to Rhaelle before he left. Usually he would, but this time he didn't.
Duncan wants to go to the stormlands to meet Lord Lyonel's host, but Father says that would be the worst thing possible. Ser Dunk is to lead the army instead.
Rhaelle sneaks into his quarters before he leaves. He is not surprised to see her. "How can I be of service, little princess?" Ser Dunk says, with a wide grin and a small bow, like he always does.
"Will you kill them all? Ormund too?"
The grin vanishes. "No, Princess. Not if they agree to your father's terms."
"What if they don't agree? He's only a squire. He can't defeat you."
"He is a knight now. Ser Ormund. Carrying his father's banner. Lord Lyonel knighted him himself."
"He said he's afraid of dying slowly, waiting for a long time knowing that he's going to die and there is nothing he could do about it."
Ser Dunk looks surprised. "He told you this, a child?"
"No, he told Father, but I overheard them."
Ser Dunk nods, but says nothing.
"So if you really, really, absolutely have to kill him, do it quickly. Decap … decapa –"
"Decapitation, Princess?"
"Yes, that's it. That's quick, I am told. Daeron says it is, anyway. And Daeron knows about these things. Only, if you could, don't kill him at all. I'm sure he doesn't meant to be treach –" Rhaelle pauses, looking for the word her mother had used.
"Treacherous."
"Yes, that. I'm sure he doesn't mean to be that."
Rhaelle is betrothed to Ormund Baratheon. Rhaelle is to be sent to Storm's End to be Lord Lyonel's cupbearer. Both of those things have been decided.
For the good of the realm. To prevent more bloodshed. The king has a duty to the realm, which is more sacred that his love for his daughter. Rhaelle hears those words often in the castle.
Shaera is home from Summerhall for a visit and to say goodbye to her sister, though Mother has carefully arranged it so that Jaehaerys has already returned to Dragonstone by the time Shaera arrives in King's Landing.
"I thought Rhaelle is his favorite. I thought – 'Father would never allow this, not when it is Rhaelle who is at stake.'"
"Shaera," Mother warns, her voice sharp.
"What sort of father uses his own flesh and blood to pay his debts?" Shaera asks.
Mother explodes. "That is unfair! Your father has no choice in the matter." Though, Rhaelle had overheard Mother railing at Father too, about how they have paid enough to the Baratheons, surely? They have paid their debt to the Baratheons tenfold, with the new betrothal, and with Father not putting their heads on spikes, Mother said.
But now Mother is putting a brave face on it. "Rhaelle understands. Don't you?"
"Lady Baratheon was ever so kind to me when she came to court last time, and Lord Baratheon told stories that made me laugh and laugh," Rhaelle says.
Shaera has tears in her eyes. "You fool. They won't be so kind or funny now, after what Duncan did to their daughter."
"Forgive me, Rhaelle," Father says. He has tears in his eyes too.
"It will be a great adventure," she tells him. "Like when you were Ser Dunk's squire. Lord Lyonel might not like me at first, like Ser Dunk didn't like you in the beginning, Father. But then he will grow to love me, like I am his own daughter. You'll see."
"Do you really believe all that?" Mother asks later, after Father leaves. "What you told your father, do you really believe that? I thought I have tried to prepare you, to make you ready, but now I am not certain if -"
"I know it will not be like that, Mother. Not like Father with Ser Dunk."
"So why did you say it?"
Rhaelle shrugs.
"For your father's sake?"
Rhaelle nods.
"He was a sweet, earnest child, and I was a willful, stubborn one. You have his sweetness in you, and I am glad for it. But now you must be more like I was, if you are going to survive in Storm's End."
"Will you tell Father that I don't really believe what I told him?"
"No. It will be our secret," Mother says.
Rhaelle likes secrets.
Mother cries, finally. Rhaelle holds her and says what Mother usually says when Rhaelle wakes from a bad dream, "There, there. Now, now. It will be better in the morning."