AN: Here's the first Rhaenys POV!

CallMeAuthor-san: Thanks, and it's still a while until the dragons come. :o)

Rhaenys I

Days blurred into one another. Finding sleep was difficult, finding an inner balance even more so. Staying in that house was suffocating.

It stung how well Aunt Daenerys got along with him. Sometimes she caught herself wondering if there was already a budding romance between aunt and nephew. It'd be the perfect match as well: the future king and his beloved aunt as his queen.

The king with the name of their greatest ancestor. The king with the name of her baby brother who had been so brutally torn from life before he even got a taste of it.

Angry tears threatened to spill again. She dried her eyes with the back of her hands, swiping angrily and almost cutting herself in the process with her fingernails.

Was her Aegon's body even cold when her father had named him? Or had he named him before her Aegon was gone? Whichever it was, it was terrible and it hurt and she was so, so angry.

She didn't want to hate him. He was a good man who held himself to impossibly high standards; she could see as much. Yet, it was so difficult not to hate him. She hated that he was here and alive, the result of her father's betrayal, while her baby brother's skull and brain were plastered against a wall and her mother was almost cut in half, her body parts barely held together by her flesh.

And nothing of it was his fault. She knew. She understood. But she needed someone to blame. Neither his mother nor their father was alive anymore. He was, however. It was convenient. It was easy.

She exhaled deeply. The security of her and her aunt's bedroom was a small comfort and almost meaningless compared to the whirlwind of conflicting thoughts in her mind.

He had tried talking to her once. She had almost gouged his eyes out, then and there –

– only in her head, but the sizzling, burning inferno of her anger had been there. Aunt Daenerys had pulled him away. It was a good thing she did. Rhaenys couldn't tell for how much longer fantasy would have remained fantasy.

Aunt Daenerys understood her.

Aunt Daenerys may be younger, but out of the three of them, she was leagues above them in maturity and wisdom. Rhaenys was not ashamed to admit it. Even hidden, even with the danger of her discovery looming over her had she had a rather innocent childhood. Aunt Daenerys hadn't had that luxury and even more so with the whole Viserys-tragedy.

She needed to talk to her.

With a sigh, she got up from the bed, walked towards the door and opened it. Willing herself and her body into quietness, she listened.

"Mēre?"

"One."

"Lanta?"

"Two."

"Hāre?"

"Three."

"Izula?"

"Four."

"Tōma?"

"Five."

"Very good, Aegon!"

Rhaenys bristled. Yes, Aunt Daenerys had started to use that name now.

"It is his name, my niece. It is his Valyrian name. A good, strong name."

A name that had belonged to her baby brother before the Monster had painted the wall with his blood, skull and brain. A name that her father apparently enjoyed handing out to just anyone.

She took a deep breath and exhaled slowly. She needed to be calm. A conversation with her aunt was what she needed. Two young women with difficult lives and even more difficult, dead fathers.

Walking towards the sitting room, she hovered at the threshold. It was hot and the fireplace was burning with the dragon eggs in there. He was sweating as well. Her aunt, however, didn't.

They were going through the numbers six to ten now. His High Valyrian still sounded like shit because of his northern Common Tongue.

"Aunt Daenerys? I'd like to talk to you if you have time to spare." She sounded like a small child, even when she was two years older, but Aunt Daenerys had developed this aura about her that made it seem as if she was towering over them.

Her aunt smiled softly at her. "Of course, Rhaenys." She then looked at him. "Let us stop here for today, Aegon. You know the numbers. Learn them until tomorrow."

She clenched her jaws upon hearing her call him by that name again. He collected his paper, words and numbers scribbled down in his chicken scratch, and left the room, giving her a small smile. Rhaenys breathed out heavily through her nose as she glared at him.

Smiling at her, Aunt Daenerys beckoned for her to come in while she walked to the fireplace, adjusting one of the eggs with bare hands as if there was no fire at all. It was both fascinating and terrifying.

"Don't you feel the heat at all?"

Aunt Daenerys thought for a moment before answering. "I do feel something, but I find the temperature comfortable." She then turned away from the fireplace and focused on her. "What did you want to talk about, Rhaenys?"

Sitting down on a pillow, Rhaenys looked around the room. She looked at the fireplace, at the window, at the table. She looked everywhere, but avoided her aunt. "I don't know how you do it," she finally said.

"Do what?" her aunt asked with confusion in her voice.

Rhaenys fidgeted. "How you stand being around him. Watch him without wanting to strangle him." She looked towards the door leading to the hallway and the two bedrooms. "Whenever I see him I see my father with that woman and my dead brother and mother. There is just...burning fury and it drives me mad, Aunt Daenerys. And now he has my brother's name." The moment those last few words left her lips, she winced at how she had set herself up for what was surely to come.

"He is your brother as well, Rhaenys."

Exactly that one. "I know." She looked at her aunt. "I don't wish to hate him, but it's so difficult."

"I understand, Rhaenys. I genuinely do understand you and I have told Aegon to give you time." Her aunt walked towards the table, took one of the pillows and placed it next to her before sitting down. Then she placed an arm over her shoulders and hugged her sideways. Rhaenys allowed this and rested her head on her aunt's shoulder. "You feel like my brother was replacing little Aegon, do you not?"

Rhaenys huffed a humourless laugh. "How can't I? What was he going to do had he had a daughter with that woman instead of a son? Replace me? Name her Rhaenys?"

"I wish I could tell you," Aunt Daenerys said while combing her fingers through her hair, making her relax a bit. "I wish I knew what was going on with my brother. Every one of his last decisions...I do not understand any of them."

"I think only he and that woman do and they are both dead."

"Will you talk to Aegon?" Aunt Daenerys asked.

"I suppose I have to at some point." She sighed and nestled herself even closer to her aunt. The comfort she sought and needed was being provided after all. "I don't want to be the reason for our family to fall apart again."

"You won't be." Much to her displeasure, her aunt retracted herself from her and got up to her feet before helping her up as well. "Now go. Talk to Aegon."

Rhaenys nodded and her aunt returned her attention to the eggs, reaching into the fire and running her hand over the scaly surface of each of them.

"They are just stone, are they not?" Rhaenys asked. "Why do you care for them so?"

Her aunt shook her head. "They are not. I cannot explain it, but I feel life within them. I have dreamt of them."

She furrowed her brows. "Like a dragon dream?"

Without looking away from the fire, Aunt Daenerys cocked her head to the side in thought. "Perhaps," she said eventually. "It surely was no common dream."

"I see...I will go to him –"

"Aegon, niece. His name is Aegon."

"...yes."

Aunt Daenerys turned around. "Say it. He is your brother. His name is Aegon. You have to, at some point."

Aunt Daenerys was right, of course. Rhaenys did have to, eventually, but she didn't want to. Still, she listened to her. "I'll go...and talk...to Aegon now." Her heart clenched painfully. It felt like she was committing a terrible betrayal.

"You do that, my sweet niece," Aunt Daenerys said with a smile. "You know where to find me, should you have need of me."

Nodding once, Rhaenys left and headed to the short hallway. The door to the men's bedroom was open and there he was, reading the numbers he had written in Valyrian, muttering them under his breath. His pronunciation was still shit.

"It's 'hah-re', the 'e' like in 'egg' and not 'hairy' or whatever it is you are saying. And roll your bloody 'r'."

He was startled out of his concentration, then looked guarded immediately when he saw her. It made her feel a bit guilty.

"Rhaenys."

"Aegon." It tasted like poison on her tongue.

He sighed and looked at the ceiling as if he was begging some Pantheon for patience. "You act like I chose that name myself and did so with the sole intention of hurting you."

Rhaenys stepped inside the room and crossed the short distance before sitting on the bed next to him.

"Aegon." She shook her head with a sad, angry smile. Tears were burning in her eyes again. Angry tears, bitter tears. Tears filled with heartache, with pure and utter agony. "Sometimes I can't help but wonder...was father as mad as grandfather? What do you think? I'm genuinely interested in your opinion."

She didn't look at him and there was a little bit of space still between them, even as they sat together on this small bed. The urge to needle him further was there but now was not the time. After all, if she was honest with herself, he was also a victim of their father's whim. She could only imagine how thankless of a position he found himself in and it certainly was not made any easier by her. But she couldn't help it.

"There was no madness in him, I am sure..."

"But?"

"His decisions make little sense."

"So his decisions are mad." Rhaenys nodded and gave a small snort. "Sounds about right."

"Why are you here, Rhaenys?" Aegon asked with a tired sigh.

"I don't know." She turned her head and looked at him. She didn't want to hate him. He was the only sibling she had left. "It feels like father was replacing little Aegon with you." But not hating him was so difficult.

"No!" Aegon got up from the bed and knelt in front of her, surprising her when he took both her hands in his. He'd never touched her before, that one hug on the ship aside, and that had been her from behind. "I refuse to believe that father would do that. No matter his decisions and choices, as confusing and maddening as they have been, I refuse to believe that. I am saying this for your peace of mind and not for mine."

She sniffled and laughed, despite herself. It was a bitter laugh. "Do you want to know what the only thing I remember of little Aegon is?" she asked him and answered without waiting for his reply. "It's what was left of his head sticking on the wall. I saw it when Ser Jaimie snuck me out. Blood, pieces of his skull and brain." She shuddered, suppressing the urge to vomit. That picture was burnt firmly into her mind. "It's that and his name."

Aegon looked at her with wide eyes, then looked down, swallowing audibly. "It was not my choice."

"No, it wasn't." He still had a firm grasp of her hands and was still on his knees in front of her. It was starting to become awkward. She pulled her hands away and motioned for him to sit back on the bed. He did so and neither of them said anything for a while. "I don't know whom to be angry with anymore. Your mother? Our father? You? The M-mountain? Tywin Lannister? Amory Loch? All of them? None of them?"

"Do you want my honest opinion?" he asked her and she wanted to say no! but nodded regardless. "Being angry with my mother, with father or me is pointless. None of us killed...little Aegon. Or Princess Elia."

"But father and your mother were the spark that started everything!"

"That may be so," Aegon said and looked at her pointedly, "but whatever my mother and our father had ignited with their dalliance, there was no reason to butcher a woman and child for it. Once father and grandfather were dead, they could have stopped. The rebellion was over."

"Mayhap. And mayhap if there hadn't been a dalliance at all, there might never have been an opportunity for the murders in the first place."

He shrugged. "With grandfather's madness, who knows what would have happened."

"I suppose so."

Silence followed, broken by Jon...Aegon...a few moments later. "I would...I would like for us to get along. You are my older sister."

"I am," Rhaenys said, hiding the way those words had made her feel.

"You are not making it easy."

"I know." Rhaenys sighed, feeling tired. She looked at him and, for the briefest of moments, saw a boy with silver hair and dark-blue, almost violet eyes. Was that what Aegon had looked like? In her mother's letters to Dorne, she had described Aegon as a little dragon. She had written that he had taken after their father. "Have you ever wondered...never mind." It was a terrible thought to entertain. It could never be, after all.

"You can tell me." His voice was soft and reassuring and it was exactly things like that about him that made her feel even worse.

Rhaenys tried to collect herself, inhaled shakily and exhaled even more shakily. She decided to indulge his desire to be a good listener for his big sister. "Have you ever wondered how things would have been had everyone been alive?" she finally asked him.

"You mean...everyone?"

"Yes. Everyone. Little Aegon. And Balerion. My kitten."

"Aye, I have," Aegon said, looking a bit amused after she mentioned Balerion, "but I never found an answer to satisfy me and I doubt I ever will."

She felt disappointed. "Do you believe we could have been a real family?"

The surprise at her question was evident on his face. "How would that have worked? A man cannot have two wives. That hasn't been done since Maegor The Cruel."

"It happens in Dorne," Rhaenys said. "I've seen it. A marriage for duty and a paramour for love. It is quite common."

"Those are not two wives though, are they?"

"Well, no, but –"

"And that is why I do not wish to entertain fantasies that may never have been possible."

She harumphed. He could have just indulged her. This was frustrating. Everything was frustrating. Lyanna Stark was frustrating. Their father was frustrating. Jon – or Aegon – was frustrating. She wanted to rage and rave and break things. She also just wanted to go to sleep and dream of the days when she would watch her brother in his crib or when she would chase Balerion through the Keep. She wanted to dream of these things and never wake up.

Rhaenys looked at him again. His brows were furrowed in that annoying way of his. "Do you want me to be a big sister to you? Do you want us to be close as siblings?"

He looked at her and his cheeks gained a faint, red tinge. He nodded. "Aye. I would...I would like that."

Her eyes burned and she swallowed thickly. It'd feel like she was replacing her dead baby brother with a new baby brother. "I don't know if I can," she admitted.

"Could you at least try?" He reached over and took her hand in his again. For comfort, maybe. It didn't really help. "You and Aunt Daenerys wanted me to stay. I stayed. You needed time after this whole name debacle and I gave you the time you needed. You have to give something as well. It cannot just be me working on our relationship. Could you at least try, Rhaenys?"

She squirmed a bit under his gaze. Looking in his eyes from such a short distance, she realized the intensity they had in them; something wild behind his quiet, solemn nature. His eyes were as dark a grey as the clouds of a furious thunderstorm. It wasn't so bad.

"Aye," she said, a bit nasally as she sniffled, a bit teasingly and a lot not sure why.

At least it made him chuckle.

"My Prince, my Princesses – I believe that it is time to do something worthwhile in these idle days."

Rhaenys looked up, as did Aegon and Aunt Daenerys.

As a way to mend the heavily damaged bridge of their relationship, she had offered to take over some of Aegon's language lessons. It was uncomfortable at times, but the way he had looked at her when she had made the offer had made her almost cry. It was clear that he was desperate for a good relationship with her. He had many siblings – or cousins, but they basically were like siblings to him – in Winterfell, so she doubted that it had to do with the particular desire of having a sibling. She had a feeling that it had to do with her specifically. They shared the same father, after all, so she believed that it was that bond between them which made him want to be close to her.

She couldn't begrudge him that, but it was still difficult. It would still be difficult for quite some time.

Effort from her was needed, however. They were all that remained of the Targaryen name. Her Dornish cousins aside, Aegon's Stark cousins aside – both Aegon and she owed it to their Aunt Daenerys. She had no one but them.

Grunts and the clinking of a lot of metal were heard, followed by the sound of someone dragging something heavy.

Aunt Daenerys turned away from the dragon eggs and looked at the small hallway with a bemused expression.

Today's fire had died out and only small embers remained. The sitting room was suffocatingly hot, but the three of them needed to spend more time in each other's presence. Being cooked alive was a small price to pay – they were Targaryens after all, the blood of the dragon.

"What is all this?" Aunt Daenerys asked and stepped aside as Ser Jorah heaved a heavy sack past the threshold.

"Weapons, my Princess," Ser Jorah said while trying to catch his breath. "Prince Oberyn and I have had many conversations about how to best prepare you for your destined path."

Uncle Oberyn took over. "And we concluded that we have neglected something important: training." He looked at Aegon. "I know the Prince has at least basic knowledge in swordsmanship. Raised by Lord Stark, I expect nothing less."

Aegon nodded in confirmation. "Aye, Ser."

"And I know," her uncle continued, looking at her, "that my lovely niece has spent too much time with my daughters."

Rhaenys just grinned back at him. She missed her Sand Snake cousins.

"Princess Daenerys, however, needs training from scratch."

Aunt Daenerys pouted a bit with her arms crossed over her chest but relented with a sigh. "You are right, of course. What did you have in mind?"

"Something to complement you, my Princess," Ser Jorah said and Rhaenys nodded in assent.

"You have a small, petite stature, Aunt Daenerys. Daggers, or maybe a bow would suit you."

"I say that bow and arrow would complement not only her but us as well."

Rhaenys raised a brow at Aegon. "Us? When did that happen?"

Aegon gave her a blank look. "Since you stopped being a miserable cunt."

Her mouth was agape in shock and the sudden silence in the room was palpable. His mouth twitched.

Her expression changed into half-annoyed and half-amused. "A nice, little jest."

Aegon shrugged. "Only half a jest."

"You little –!"

"Enough, you two. It was all in good humour," Aunt Daenerys interrupted them before she could retort. "Aegon's suggestion sounds reasonable. I shall try out a bow and arrow."

"Do we have a bow and arrows in there, Ser Bear?" Uncle Oberyn asked.

Ser Jorah nodded. "Aye."

"Very well then," her uncle said and untied the sack. Reaching carefully in, he handed a sword, the blade covered with its worn and torn scabbard, to Aegon. "We will have to make do with these for now. They are old and used but they were cheap. Good enough for training."

"I doubt any one of us will complain, Prince Oberyn," Aegon said.

Rhaenys nodded in agreement. "At least we will have something to do."

"I have something new for you as well, Rhaenys," Oberyn said while Ser Jorah, Aegon and her aunt searched for arrows after finding the bow amidst the chaos of swords and daggers. "We bought a few old spears from a very unsavoury fellow."

Her eyes widened and she felt excited. "You'll teach me spears?!"

"Indeed I will." He grinned at her, but a shadow of sadness washed over his features. "Your mother would have had my head, but given the circumstances…"

"If she is watching us right now, I know mother would love you even more, uncle." She reached up and wrapped her arms around his neck to press a kiss against his cheek. "I know I'm grateful every day for everything you've done for me and keep doing for me."

He didn't answer and opted to hug her back instead with a kiss against her temple.

"Come on," she said with a grin after retracting herself from him. "Show me how to wield a spear like the Red Viper!"

He grinned right back – the mischievous, arrogant one. "Careful what you wish for, my lovely niece, or you just might get it."