Sun to a Spear, Fall of a Tear
The days of their journey to the Water Gardens were some of the longest in Dyanna's life. She spent most of her day on the deck looking for pursuers until her eyes would start stinging. Jena was desperately seasick and often, Dyanna and Astrea had to take over from her exhausted handmaidens. At night, Daeron kept her awake, plagued by dreams that scared both of them – dreams of blood and gore, fire and blood, and grass turning scarlet.
Every day without sails behind them lessened the chance of actual capture. Of course, sometimes there were sails on the horizon and then Dyanna's heart dropped to her feet but they always turned out to be trading ships or small vessels of people minding their own business. Of course, she went to her cabin nonetheless, just in case, until they were safely away again. Her eyes wandered over the sailors' faces and sometimes, she caught herself staring longer at someone and wondering if he wanted to betray them. Break in her cabin at night and drop them into a waiting boat, perhaps? Then, she'd shake herself away from this madness. This imagination will be the death of you, Maekar had used to say… before. And he was right about this. Some of those men had grown white hairs in the Dayne's service! Not imagination. Madness. Only when they saw in the distance the walls of the Water Gardens, she gave a deep sigh and felt safe.
Between those walls, Princess Daenerys raged and paced, paced and raged. Minutes after meeting her, Jena excused herself and retired to the chambers that had been hastily allotted to her. Dyanna couldn't blame her. Looking at Daenerys probably sent her back into the clutches of seasickness. It was incredible how such a tiny slip of a woman could give the impression of a room shaking wherever she went.
"So, she wasn't in love with him?" Astrea whispered and Dyanna prayed Daenerys had not heard.
She had. She spun around and glared at Astrea. Abruptly and against all odds, Dyanna thought that she looked glad to have finally met a woman shorter than her, if Astrea could be considered a woman. All her life, Daenerys had been forced to look up to meet someone's eyes. Compared to her, Dyanna felt giantish – was that even a word? She liked it either way. She's use it the next time she spun a tale for the children. Or Maekar. As soon as she was back home. As soon as this rebellion nuisance – Dyanna refused to think of it as a war – was dealt with.
For a moment, Daenerys couldn't even find the words. It was as if she was seeing not Astrea but Daemon Blackfyre himself. "Certainly not! I was only twelve when he wed that Tyroshi girl. A little young to be in love, I would think."
She resumed her pacing. "That's what he's achieved!" she spat after a while. "Now, people will forever talk and wonder… Why, the next thing I know he'll claim that I came to Maron without my maidenhead. He'd very much like to paint me with his mother's brush…"
New pacing. "I want his lying tongue cut off," she declared, looking for all the world like a miniature goddess of revenge. Dyanna forbade herself to smile. And when the reality of Daenerys' anger started sinking in, she lost any inclination to anyway. If Daenerys was so outraged, so scared, that meant that the rebellion nuisance was indeed quite threatening. Daemon would never feel secure on the throne even if he managed to sit it. Not without Daeron and his line wiped out. Not without Daenerys and her line wiped out.
It was here, at their door. It was real. And it was terrifying.
Dyanna's first task was to let Maekar know that they were safe. That was hard for more than one reason. Until now, their correspondence had gone under the shadow of her father's death. Now, she had to finally give voice to the unpleasant fact that in going behind his back to get her wish, she had stranded herself and Daeron well away from him, away from home for probably the entire duration of the war which might go for many months if not years. That she had implicitly taken Jena along for her merry ride because the thought of leaving knowing that Baelor would disapprove would have never crossed the Princess of Dragonstone's mind without Dyanna's insidious example. And she didn't even know where to send the letter. If she had been a true lady wife, she would have. She would have sat in their chambers at King's Landing and receiving information from the best source – the King himself. Instead, she didn't even know where Maekar had been sent to intercept rebels or gather men…
Usually, letters to him came to her as easily as her stories. She wrote about just everything that came to her mind, secure in the knowledge that she's make him smile and feel amused. But not this time. As Daeron was getting acquainted with his Martell cousins and Daenerys and Jena talked about King's Landing, Daeron and Mariah, she tried to think of what she wanted to say and how she wanted to say it, Astea looking at her amused upon entering.
"Any success?" she asked.
"I have started," Dyanna said and then smiled, entertained by her own evading of the matter. The girl's eyes went wide when Dyanna showed her the letter but then she saw the reason. Dyanna's start consisted of My lord husband.
Jena looked at her and Dyanna get the distinct feeling that her goodsister was measuring her success, or lack thereof, as inspiration. If Dyanna managed to write to Maekar, then Jena could write Baelor, surely…
"How much labour would have been prevented if any of you model lady wives had left a note upon leaving," Daenerys remarked fondly and Dyanna saved the idea for further reference. If there was a future in which such occasions would take place, of course.
Finally, she got tired of trying, so she went out to take some of her own sun in. Its caress upon her face made her close her eyes and breathe in. From the adjacent yard, the children were shouting, lost in some game of theirs. Dyanna tried to hear Daeron's voice among them. He wasn't very good with other children. Dyanna wanted to believe that it was just his father in him but when she watched his restless sleep at night, when something happened just a few days after one of his dreams, she knew that it was his… peculiarity. She would never refer to it as his curse.
No, she couldn't hear him. She forbade herself to feel disappointed. It was just their first day here after all. She'd give him some ideas later. She smiled. After all, they had succeeded. They were in the Water Gardens.
"Why weren't you as black as a blacksmith when you came to us?" Jena asked, startling her. Dyanna hadn't heard her come out and take a seat on the couch opposite her at the open terrace.
"The sun isn't quite this searing at Starfall," Dyanna replied. "The climate is softer there."
"I'd like to see it one day," Jena said and Dyanna gave her a long look, noticing her good colour and the shine in her eye.
"You're better," she said, remembering the night when Jena had appeared clinging to Ultor's arm, as pale as a ghost. The Torrentine mist had been her undoing, in a way. They had left early the very next morning so Jena had never got as much as a glimpse of Starfall.
"I am," Jena said and hesitated. "Usually, I don't throw up my way through the sea. Just when I'm with child."
Dyanna startled and smiled. She didn't know what she should say. Jena had never managed to carry a second child full term. Most likely, she wouldn't manage it this way either. It would be too cruel to say that she was happy for her. At the same time if she didn't, her goodsister was bound to take it the exact wrong way. "I'll be praying for both of you," she said.
Jena's expression eased. "This time, it might happen," she whispered. "I've never started throwing up this early. And before I knew – I rode, I exerted myself a great deal and I still felt great. This time, it will be."
Dyanna's smile became wider. "A child of hope," she whispered. "Just what we need in this desperate moment."
She touched Jena's hand. "It might be better that you're here," she said. "Without everyone fussing over you. If your Marcher heart can take residing in the capital of Dorne, of course."
"Dorne doesn't have a capital," the Marcher woman reminded her but she was smiling as well. "But if he's born liking those spices of yours… I don't think I'm ready for this," she finished and Dyanna laughed.
When they came back to the solar, Dyanna sat down and wrote the letter without pausing once. When she was done, she read it. Brief and informative. Good! She gave a mental nod to herself.
After a brief stay at Starfall, we had to flee the Yronwood men who were sent to attack Starfall, capture us, and send us to the traitor. Jena came with us as well. We're both fine and Daeron loves it in the Water Gardens. If you want to ask why I didn't tell you that I was going to Starfall, just have a look in the nearest mirror, and you'll know the answer. Anyway, we'll wait for the end of this unpleasant affair here. You can come and collect us later. I hope this letter finds you well, wherever you are. I pray the Seven keep you.
P.P. Your Grace, my lord father! How dare you read other people's letters!"
With a smile, she addressed it to Maekar in King's Landing, although she knew he probably wouldn't be there, and pressed the seal, imagining the laughter that would escape her goodfather's lips when he read the last line. The King liked her perkiness perhaps even more than Maekar did. As usual, sending a missive with the three-headed dragon in this time of unrest gave her a thrill, as if she were fighting as well.
Time passed and after a good number of months, even Dyanna had to admit that the rebellion nuisance was something bigger and worse. The fighting went on, the realm bled, even Dorne was torn between the red dragon and the black and Daeron's dreams became worse.
"He has the gift, doesn't he?" Daenerys asked one morning as the two of them were breaking their fast, and Dyanna knew that Daenerys was informed of every mouse that farted in her palace, if she could be so vulgar.
"No," she denied. It wasn't a lie because she did not consider it a gift. It was something that gave her boy pain and thus pained her as well. She'd never stop fighting for him, to help and ease his life as it was – but this far, she couldn't say she'd been too successful. Unbidden, the thought of the Queen came to her. She had long blamed Mariah for not helping Maekar socialize with people when he had been a child. While her reasoning was not in itself a bad one – he had been much ignored as a boy, although there had been some very solid reasons – perhaps sometimes one simply couldn't avoid what the Seven blessed them with. Or unblessed.
Daenerys didn't press the matter but this new pain stayed in Dyanna like a wound that wouldn't keep festering. Like that lesion that had been eating away her breast. Now, Daeron was old enough and people started noticing. He'd never be accepted as a boy, a man like any other. Because he wouldn't be. Despite all the fight that she would put for him.
Jena's child arrived in those days of last turmoil when no one knew which dragon the Seven would favour, the red one or the black one, when loyalties were being changed for one last time – the Lothstons would prove that wrong just weeks later, - when, a mere few hundred miles away, his father was organizing his host of Dornishmen and men of the Stormlands. Jena had known in advance that Baelor couldn't visit her. She didn't entertain any such hope. Dyanna suspected that she did, just a little. But he did not come. He was marching for his battle, the battle of all of them, to an unknown field as behind the walls of the Water Gardens Jena was making the final preparation for hers. Daenerys would be present, of course, as would Dyanna herself. All women of rank they could find would serve witness that it was Jena's child indeed and not a last, desperate attempt to fake renewal of the line that the traitors claimed false.
At the end, it was so easy that Dyanna could have laughed. Everyone - the maesters, Dyanna, Jena herself – had expected a long and hard labour after all those babes Jena had lost. But he was born so swiftly that the last of the invited ladies barely managed to arrive before he did. He took suck immediately. He was so gloriously healthy. For a moment, her fears eased.
The news came a few weeks later. It was over. Daemon Blackfyre was dead and Bittersteel a figutive. This last battle had proven the decisive one indeed. Dyanna laughed and gave the man who brought them the tides the emerald bracelet she took off her wrist as Jena promised him an annual pension.
Now they only needed to wait for Matarys to grow up a little. Two months were age that let most healthy babes tolerate long travels quite well. Dyanna counted the days. As comfortable as she felt in Dorne, it was no longer her home. Her life was at King's Landing.
"Are they going to like me at court?" Astrea asked fearfully and Dyanna smiled, so relieved that their greatest concern now was the court's liking.
"They will," she promised honestly, dreaming of the day she'd be home. She dreamed of it awake. She dreamed of it at night. And when one day, about a week after the news of their victory, she woke up early in the morning to the feeling of someone in bed next to her, she thought it was all part of the dream. Until she realized that it wasn't.
In those months of separation, Maekar had lost weight and the lines of his face looked sharper. But something in his complexion struck Dyanna as odd. Concerning. Very carefully, as not to disturb his sleep, she lifted the cover a little. The huge bandage on his shoulder was so dark with blood that fear surged through her. So much blood after such a long time? Would he lose the arm? Should she summon the maester? She started sliding out of bed but nonetheless he opened his eyes and smiled at her sleepily. Smiling back, her heart in her throat, she laid back down. "I thought it was a dream," she murmured.
"It is," he replied, his voice hoarse.
He couldn't quite lift his hand to stroke her hair but Dyanna snuggled close.
"There are no other wounds," Maekar said, feeling that she was checking him for such under the cover. "And it's healing. I saw the maester before I came to your chamber. He'll change it again in the morning. I'm afraid I tore the stitches as I rode here, that's all. No reason to worry."
That was a bigger lie than each one Dyanna had ever uttered but she let that go. She wrapped an arm about him, feeling that he was already going back to sleep. She tried to do the same but her joy was just too great. It didn't matter. She was ready to spend the whole day like this, just watching her husband sleep.
"Why are you here?" she asked a few hours later when they had enjoyed a lazy breakfast in bed. "I didn't expect…"
He smiled. "You didn't? I thought you wanted me to come and collect you. At least, that's what you wrote in your letter."
At first, Dyanna gave him a blank look before remembering. She now wondered if the King indeed had gotten to read the letter addressed to Maekar before sending it to wherever his son had been. If he had been concerned enough about them, he most likely had. "I didn't mean you should come straight from the battlefield," she said. "And certainly not when wounded! As happy as I am to see you, I'd rather have you accept the maesters' ministration at King's Landing, as well as the accolades for your part in the battle. I could have waited a little."
This time, his smile was a sharp one, with no merriment at all. "Accolades?" he said as if he didn't know what the word meant. Dyanna understood. He had spent his whole life knowing that unless he changed his entire personality, he would never receive more than what could not be reasonably denied to him in terms of recognition and affection. "I don't have it," he had told her, matter-of-factly, early into their marriage when she had made her last attempt to make him something other than what he was. "I will go through the motions if that will make you happy. But that will be all. That's for you. For Baelor. You two can make people love you just by riding through a crowd. Whatever this charm of yours is, it's out of my reach."
But this time, it was different. It had to be. "Why not?" she challenged. "You did keep a wall of men in their place, not letting them engage into senseless…"
"There's no glory in that," he said. "Defense is just something that one does. Attack is the one that stays. I'm sorry, Dyanna, and I appreciate what you want for me. But it won't happen."
No, Dyanna thought. It can't be. People cannot underestimate true worth so easily, can they? Just because it doesn't sound… glorious. But she had to admit that even in the stories she spun, knights and generals were poised to attack, not defend. Tears sprang to her eyes and she brushed them away angrily. He'd only be mortified by what he'd accept as pity on her side. But when she looked up, he was already lying on his good side, his wounded arm curved over him.
"What blade gave you this?" she asked.
He had closed his eyes and didn't open them. "It was an arrow," he said. "In the very beginning of the battle. Before the Raven's Teeth gained the Weeping Ridge."
Dyanna's breath caught. "And you stayed there without seeking help!" she exclaimed, anger overcoming her.
"If I hadn't, would he have gone to gain it without thinking of who'd do my duty in my stead? Would my men have kept their morale if they had seen me wounded and being tended to?"
A faint smile came to his lips. "Sometimes, Dyanna, the most important thing is to stay in place to the very end…"
Outside, a rare rain had started pattering and Dyanna wondered if it would be enough to wash away the blood from that grass that Daeron had seen red.