a/n: My first asoiaf fanfic! This is a story of a girl living in the Freehold of Valyria before the Doom.
disclaimer: I don't own A Song of Ice and Fire.
dedication: To my friend, for her nineteenth birthday.
summary: On her fifteenth birthday, she watched her world turn to blood and fire. – OC-centric, Valyrian Freehold.
dragon child
i.
Namrhenys Voltair is born to a well-respected family – noble enough to reap the benefits of the vast empire, and yet common enough to avoid the Lords Freeholder and their poisonous court.
She has the characteristic purple eyes and the wisps of blonde hair on her head have already begun to curl.
The first word she says is dragon.
ii.
Namrhenys – or Nammi, as she's been christened by several exasperated members of the household – is fairly capable of getting into trouble. She's an inquisitive child, never stooping to walk when she could run. At the age of two, she's already explored most of the house, waddling around on her short legs.
Her father catches her before she enters the vault. "No," he says sternly, carrying her back to her room, "You can't go in there."
Nammi watches him implacably, and crawls out the window.
iii.
Nammi finally finds a way past the servants and overbearing aunts and her father's ever-watchful eye. She shuts the door of the vault behind her, and walks inside. Her legs are nowhere near as long as an adult's, though, and Nammi's craning up at all the treasure mounted on the walls.
But then she forgets about the treasure, because she sees the most perfect stone in the world. It's oval and blue and the surface is rippled with indents and textures but Nammi doesn't care because it's warm.
It's warm and it's making a funny thumping noise under her fingertips and Nammi holds it close, hugging it to her chest even though her arms can barely reach around it.
Her frantic mother finds her curled around the dragon egg two days later.
iv.
There's a lot of shouting in the courtyard. Nammi tucks the blue stone – dragon egg, sweetheart, it's going to hatch soon – and wanders out of her room. She's found a way past the servants so many times that they hardly bother to stop her now, and she walks out into the foyer, hiding behind a pillar so she can see what the noise is about.
She can see her father arguing with someone in a large black coat, a man who draws his eyebrows together at her father's words.
Her mother is silent, with a dark look and crossed arms, but the man does not appear to care. He shakes his head once, and turns and walks out, his retinue following behind him.
Nammi realizes only later that he's one of the Lords Freeholder, and he's come because of her.
v.
By the time Nammi reaches her fifth birthday, she's mostly aware of the political machinations around her. She's a dragon rider, even if her dragon hasn't hatched yet, and that vastly increases her political standing. She doesn't have a brother, or even a cousin to be promised to, which means that the wealthiest and most powerful of the Lords Freeholder are competing to see whose son she'll marry.
Nammi finds all the strange posturing ridiculous, but she's a child, what does she know? She stations her dolls around her, the blue stone tucked up against her side, and pretends she's a princess.
A dragonlord's wife.
vi.
Nammi does not go anywhere without the blue stone now. She takes it with her in the bath, into bed, in her lessons, everywhere. The constant pulse of heat under her fingers is more precious than the sound of her mother's voice and she does not let the dragon egg out of her sight.
It's almost stolen.
She's in the market, ducking and twirling around legs and skirts and occasionally encountering other children, pressed to their parents' sides. Her father will not notice she's gone until much later, and even then, he'll probably just sigh. Her mother is the one that scolds.
She bumps into an adult, hard, and nearly falls backward. She's rubbing the tears out of her eyes, prepared to give this man a piece of her mind – she's going to be a dragonlord's wife – when she sees the collar.
The man is eyeing her blue stone with a creepy amount of attentiveness. He reaches forward and Nammi screams.
Instantly, the market erupts into chaos, but when it is over, she's clutching her stone, feeling its heartbeat match hers.
vii.
Nammi is seven years old when her egg hatches. It's in the middle of her lesson – she's reciting the dates of the Ghiscari Wars when she hears the first crack.
Soon, she curled around her egg, watching in amazement as a claw pokes out. It's followed by a thin, fragile wing, and soon, a small head peeks out, watching her warily.
"Rhenya," she calls it, and the blue dragon stretches its wings, breaking the rest of its egg into pieces.
viii.
Nammi likes the feeling of power that a dragon brings her. Rhenya is still small enough to perch on her shoulder, and her mother has started plaiting her hair to give the little dragon a handhold. The servants are more respectful now, and the streets clear when she walks outside.
Rhenya clutches her tightly-bound plait and blows a wisp of smoke towards the sky.
ix.
The first suitors have started arriving. Rhenya is no longer able to perch on her shoulder, and she takes to flitting to and from the perches that have been installed all around the house. The wisps of smoke have gotten larger and Rhenya snarls at the line of men that have come to ask her hand.
Her father spends all his time in his office, negotiating with the Lords Freeholder. Gifts began appearing around the house – long swords, glittering necklaces, feasts. Nammi throws her foot down at the two young slaves who arrive in nothing but bejeweled collars.
"I don't care what presents you bring!" she spits at the young dragonlord who's staring at her like she'd bite his head off, "Get out of my house before I make you!"
Her father is aghast, but her mother smiles, sharp and dark.
x.
It doesn't stop the suitors, however, and Nammi's tenth nameday celebrations are interrupted by a grand procession from one especially arrogant lord.
It's the final straw. Nammi whistles for Rhenya and says the one word she's been waiting to say for a long time.
"Dracarys," she whispers, and laughs as the procession goes up in flames.
It seems that the lord was no true blood of the dragon after all.
xi.
The suitors have stopped. It's the one good thing that came out of the debacle. Her father appears from a tense meeting with the Lords Freeholder looking tired and frazzled and doesn't say a word to her. Her mother attempts to comfort, but her words are meaningless.
There are no more dragons perched on the main roof, sunning themselves. There are no more processions, no more slaves, no more arrogant posturing.
Her mother is pregnant again, and Nammi tries not to think about what that means.
xii.
It wasn't her fault. She wants to scream it from the skies until everyone understands. It's not her fault she lost her temper. It's not.
But no one wants to think about that. No dragonlords come visiting now and her baby sister is growing up fast. If a line can produce one dragon rider, surely it can produce another.
Nammi notices that her father doesn't stop her little sister from entering the vaults.
xiii.
She leaves for longer and longer. Rhenya is large enough to take a thirteen-year-old's weight and Nammi flies to the fields outside Valyria. The Fourteen Fires smoke in the distance, and Nammi alights from Rhenya, leaving the blue dragon to hunt for lunch as Nammi wanders the fields.
She twists some flower stems, but can't make it into a crown. Leaving that, she tears blades of grass, imaging each as one of the myriad suitors that came to ask for her hand.
She is so absorbed in the fantasy that she shrieks when a human face swims into clarity in front of her. Rhenya is in the air at her shout and wastes no time in breathing fire at the threat, which Nammi realizes too late is just a boy her age.
The fire clears to leave him standing there, shocked but otherwise unharmed.
xiv.
His name is Daerys and he's the son of one of the Lords Freeholder. But for the first time, Nammi doesn't care who he is. Whose family he belongs to, or whose name he holds.
Nammi is perfectly content to sit in the fields with him and talk – talk until the sun disappears and the night is lit by the distant light of volcano fires. Talk on the flight back to Valyria, talk when they meet up once again. Talk while days stretch to weeks and months until suddenly, Nammi finds herself eagerly anticipating their rendezvous in the grass.
When he proposes, she accepts immediately.
xv.
Namrhenys sits on top of Rhenya and watches the fires. It's too late to do anything – the Council building is a ruin, the Lords Freeholder burnt in their seats. Her own house is a mess of ash and fire, as is everything else in Valyria.
Daerys is a warm presence at her back and he presses his fingers against her shoulder. She heeds the unspoken message and urges Rhenya to turn. The Fourteen Fires still expel ash and fire creeps across the land as it shakes and roils.
But they are in the air.
Namrhenys turns east and leaves, Rhenya's powerful wings carrying them far ahead of the ash clouds. Soon, they are nothing but a speck of dark blue in the gray sky. Daerys grips her tight as they leave their families, their home, their country.
The Doom has come to Valyria.
fin
a/n: Hope you liked it!