CHAPTER III
"…Choke on the fucking bath water." He adds, and she rolls her eyes while he smirks amongst himself.
"I'm sure you're not supposed to be speaking to me." She reminds him.
"You're my wife. I'll speak to you if I like." He retorts with a scoff.
"You have a wife." She mumbles, not meeting his eyes when she feels them burning into her.
He's tempted to take a step closer to get a good view of her exposed body, but keeps his lust composured, instead replying to her remark with, "I do. I'm looking upon her."
She meets his eyes flatly, unamused, while he's hiding a smile.
"Belligerent Bastard." He adds to further poke her patience.
"I suppose that feels better rolling off the tongue than 'Bronze Bitch'." She raises her brows, before adding, "Though, I do believe I'm prettier than a sheep."
It's now he chuckles — something she had taken advantage of for the last months they were together as he would try to cheer her up and she'd piss all over it — and it brings a faint grin to her face.
The sight of her lips pulling upward seems nearly foreign to him, as if he's seeing it for the first time, but its familiarity is a comfort that melts any standing-off he had felt he'd need to do toward her.
"I'm sorry to have heard about your husband." He says next. "What a terrible occurrence."
"You were probably rejoicing." She mutters.
"And I'm to believe you weren't?" He asks, and she rubs her lips together. "What was he like?" It's added with a rather flat tone, as if silently ready to compare and declare himself the greater of the two.
"You wouldn't have liked him," is what she can bring herself to speak of it, as if it holds any relevance.
"It wouldn't have mattered had I liked him. Did you like him?"
A part of him hopes she was rewarded a shred of happiness by the gods after being shrouded in grievous tumultury.
"I didn't know him well enough to know if I liked him." She admits.
"Yet you still fed him to Valor." He blatantly accuses her, and she looks at him without a hint of denial in her eyes.
"I tried to request an annulment but your brother wouldn't respond."
"That's surprising, truly." He sarcastically replies, being his brother also refuses to annul his marriage.
"I suppose he wanted me unavailable, and gone from King's Landing." She adds, blinking. "What of your wife?"
"You know what. You've probably heard every detail — or lack thereof." He scoffs. "She was just a means for Viserys to try to send me away once you were gone." His voice turns bitter for the blink of an eye as he speaks it.
It's the first time her abandonment is acknowledged between just the two of them, and it makes her feel constricted to the water she's in.
Her eyes shift to him as she realizes the trap he's set — or hasn't, given his motivations have never truly been a point of absolution in all the years she's known him — and he can see the slight panic in her eyes as he assumes she's drumming up a nightmare in her mind, as if she's preparing herself for him to attack her and drown her in her own bath.
He might have blacked out in a drum of rage had this been three years sooner, the Prince having spent his time in a fit of drunkenness, whores, and violence to get his energy out.
He'd been so angry in the beginning, driving himself nearly mad with the repetition of the fact that he had done everything he could have for her.
Comforted her, fought viscous — and mostly true — rumors off of her, supported whatever odd hobby or random interest she had taken up to try to get her mind off of their passed child only to watch her have meltdowns and damn it all once she realized it wasn't helping anything…he finally snapped, demanding her to accept what's happened and be at peace with their son's rest.
Next thing he knew he was prying her back over the rough stone of the veranda railing while she fought against him.
All the time and dedication he had poured into her, only to have it spat back in his face.
"You can stop looking like a sheep in a Dragonpit." He states sharply. "I'm not angry anymore."
His anger had long been turned to disappointment and boredom, thus sending him to further crave whatever trouble there was to be stirred, which would then create havoc for his brother to patch back together, as always.
He felt like a teenaged boy again, doing whatever it was he pleased with who he pleased and not having to face any monstrous responsibilities after fatherhood and marriage in his early twenties had put an abrupt stop to such as that, halting it until both of those parts of his life had been dissolved, and once the apathetic shock of Aenyka's departure settled in, he picked up where he had left off.
"I don't believe that." She says to him, honestly.
"I assure you, if I were going to kill you it would've been during one of your bouts of stumbling drunk around the Street of Silk shouting incoherently about the King killing our son." He mumbles, recalling a handful of the times she tried his patience the most. "Then there was the time you tore through the Sept…"
"Daemon." She interrupts him, wanting to stop the conversation before it even starts.
"How is it, exactly, that you're even allowed back here?" He questions aloud.
"Your brother enjoys me being around, apparently, more so than he does you."
It hits a nerve in the Prince, but he merely scoffs it off with, "Lord Corlys is our strongest ally. The Gods practically forbid my brother step on his toes or the realm loses the majority of its Navy."
"It's a bit hypocritical of you to point at my brother for keeping me from consequence given you've made mess after mess with Viserys scrubbing it up behind you as you go."
"You've not been here. You know nothing of what I've done aside from whatever it is the gossiping bitches of the Red Keep regurgitate back to you." He bites.
"I had wished you'd actually mature some. As it turns out you're just as puerile now as when we were children."
"I was mature and you were still miserable."
"My misery had nothing to do with you."
They stare at one another.
It is refreshing for him to hear it from her, relaxing a bit with her reassurance — despite the fact he doesn't entirely believe it.
He doesn't press the matter anymore than he has, continuing to look at her even after she breaks from his eyes, readying herself to stand.
"Can you look away?" She asks timidly.
"I've seen all of it. It doesn't matter."
She gives him a glare.
He turns just to humor her, hearing her grab at the bath sheet, and she wraps it around herself and steps from the tub, about to retreat to her chambers until he's grasping at her arm, her back gently knocking into the door.
"What are you doing?" He asks, curiously.
"Going to bed."
"This early?"
"Early?" She furrows her brows, gawking at the audacious nature of his, "this early?" as if it isn't black as a raven outside.
"I plan to buy out a pleasure house on the Street of Silk tonight for the City Watch…" He starts, his fingertips brushing wet strands of her black hair from sticking to her neck and the mere second of contact has her brown eyes flickering to his lips before she finally realizes what he says.
"…No, no, no…" it comes out in nervous laughter, her head shaking as she turns and opens the door, checking the hallway for any witnesses before stepping back across the hall to her chambers, and he follows at her heels.
"…Since we have proven we can stand to be in the same room — though your brother believes otherwise — you are more than welcome to join me." He ignores her rejection, shutting the door behind them.
"Our brothers would kill the both of us if they knew you were here right now, yet you want me to accompany you on the Street of Silk?" She holds a scold in her voice, turning to face him once more, his body closer than she would've expected, and he looks to her lips briefly as he nonchalantly replies, "it's what we used to do."
"We did it once." She hisses, stressing it wasn't a regular thing they did together, and he rolls his eyes. "And it resulted in me having your child."
It sounds bitter falling from her lips.
"Because I couldn't take you anywhere else — everyone in the realm knew you were vowed to the Stranger." He reminds her, about to make the point that it doesn't matter now because she no longer has a vow of chastity and silence. "And you showed great enthusiasm in the moment it was happening for someone so incensed about it, now." He scoffs, recalling his hands tangled in her hair, his tongue rolling up her neck as tears of pure ecstasy rolled down her cheeks while she begged him not to stop.
She feels her face heat up at the mention of it.
"I'm not going with you on your endeavors of getting so drunk you can't see, and rolling around with whores."
"I won't have the need to 'roll around' with whores. I'll have you." He states it casually, and she has to hide the split moment of her contemplating such a thing before deciding, "I'd rather fuck a hot branding iron." A black brow raises.
"I'd pay to see that." He says it with the hopes of seeing her smile again, and it works, ever so slightly.
"Goodnight, my Prince." She says as if to leave no room to further the discussion, and a small closed-lip grin pulls on his face.
He returns to the bath chamber to retrieve Dark Sister and his dagger, and he does so, unbeknownst to him his belongings had already been seen in the Lady's bathing chambers by a member of the staff, and reported to Otto Hightower per request of the Hand.
Several hours later, Aenyka's nails dig into the soft skin of her palms, her brown eyes trained on the stone floor, waiting for Viserys to say something – anything, really – to break up the silence between them.
He had summoned her first thing, handmaidens knocking to politely retrieve her from bed…
She looks around as she continues to wait, unable to help the uncomfortability she feels.
Scanning the replica of Valyria in the middle of his chambers, she glances at him every one and again to see if he shows any interest in speaking to her.
"It's been a while since we've last seen one another." He finally starts, trying to be kind, but he sees the hidden scorn on her face for him. It's in the very air around her.
"Yes, Your Grace, it has." She agrees, folding her hands behind her back.
"Not the fondest of my memories but it is good to see you in good health." He continues.
"Do you know if Rhaenyra has awoken yet? I wish to see her before I return to Driftmark." She ignores his comment in an attempt to already be done with this exchange, to which he replies, "You may be seated, Aenyka."
He doesn't even bother with "Lady," and she hesitates before sitting down across from him at the small table, clearing her throat.
"Were you with my brother last night?" He adds, silently looking her over for any of the tell-tale's of her deceit that he'd grown accustomed to spying toward the end of her time at the Red Keep.
Her throat goes dry, and she swallows in an attempt to remedy it, fumbling with her hands.
"We spoke, Your Grace, but that was all of it." She admits, not bothering with hiding from him, and Viserys takes a deep breath and slowly nods, only to think of what the say next, half expecting her to lie to him.
"You are welcome here. You know this." He finally tells her, raising his brows, nearly to her shock. "But the boundaries set forth four years ago, Aenyka, still stand. Daemon knows it; he just chooses not to obey them."
"We were once married. I don't believe it fair for there to be boundaries forced upon us." She objects cautiously.
"When I annulled your marriage, I placed rules upon the both of you that you would not under any circumstance reunite, did I not?" Ignoring her objection, reminding her of what might as well be written law to her and her former husband.
Her polite smile falls.
"Forgive my saying so, Your Grace, but usually an annulment has at least one person in the marriage that wishes for it to be done with." She points out, meeting his eyes.
No, it was more so an order by the King himself that he had practically had enough of the never ending turmoil between them, and had put a stop to it to maintain what little bit of sanity the two of them even had left regarding one another.
"I did what was the best for Daemon, and for you." He says it so confidently that Aenyka almost believes him, knowing he's genuine when he says it, but also knowing perhaps it wasn't what was best, exactly.
"You always did enjoy making life-altering decisions for us." She faintly chuckles, but it stops abruptly as soon as it starts. "His new Lady Wife is a testament to that."
"And what of the life-altering decision you would have made had he not put a stop to it?" He reminds her, completely shooting down any leverage she has to throw in his face in a passive aggressive attempt to belittle him trying to keep her and his brother safe. "For ten years the men of my court, the people of my realm, have constantly nipped at my brother's heels…the last four years the forefront of each one's complaint being that he ruthlessly hung his grieving wife from a balcony, nearly dropping her to her death." He recalls. "And instead of choosing to put their unsettled perception of it to rest, I follow my brother's wish to allow them to continue to think him a cruel man who did such a thing." He continues. "All so they'll never know his wife jumped, and it was by the gods' mercy that he was able to catch her hand to keep her from plummeting to her demise."
Yet another lash to the back of the Prince taken to cover her for reasons Viserys had never truly understood.
"You drowned my son." She's done with political correctness, discarding it completely as she speaks to Viserys as her former brother-in-law, and not her King.
"Daerek was gone when he hit the water, Aenyka." He states, solemnly, making a point to meet her eyes. "It would have been a wasted effort, and I would have had to face my brother and tell him…" Viserys can't bring himself to finish the thought, not even wanting to imagine the consequences of Daemon's heartbreak.
She moves from her seat, unable to be still from the odd tension perforating the room as they speak, giving him a moment to collect himself, as well, hearing the small crack in his voice.
After a minute, she looks toward him.
"Why did you choose the safety of your child over Aemma, even when there wasn't a guarantee that Baelon would've survived?"
If anyone else had asked it would end in them being hauled away and punished, but she doesn't ask him cruelly, actually wanting to know, and he feels that tightening of his heart in his chest as he answers her, "Aemma was going to pass. It was a fact. I'm not so sure she would have had the heart to have let the boy suffocate had I not made the decision to have him delivered…it would have been the end of her regardless."
The corners of her mouth pull downward.
He didn't give Aemma a choice but to die trying to save their son.
If only he had afforded Aenyka that same opportunity.
There's a quiet between the two of them, before Viserys begins again.
"I remember when Daerek was born." He's actually smiling at the memory that's dear to him, hearing the boy's cries in his ears, followed by his brother's sigh of relief that it was a healthy baby, and Aenyka had done well. "You had been ordered to rest, Daerek had been cleaned up…Daemon presented him to me himself, he was so proud." He continues and she feels her nose burn at the income of emotion.
She can clearly remember seeing Daemon's wide smile through her teary exhaustion of exertion once the midwife confirmed to her quietly it was a boy, Aenyka then announced with shallow breath, "Daerek Targaryen, first of his name, future successor to the Iron Throne, my Prince."
Through the pure joy of seeing Daerek was healthy, knowing she herself had an easy birth, and being freshly married by only minutes beforehand, Aenyka could barely feel the pain her body had endured in that moment.
"I loved my nephew dearly, Aenyka, I do hope you know that." His voice cracks slightly and she looks upon his face, feeling her chest tighten.
He keeps to himself that despite the Prince's pride and love for his son, he had ordered Mellos — if the choice were to come between Aenyka, or losing the babe — "We can have another child," and he repeated the same thing to his brother when he had entrusted Aenyka and Daerek in his care.
At times Viserys wishes he could have the heart to confess it to her. Perhaps it would allow her to see why Daemon hadn't taken the death of their boy as hard as she had, why he more so pushed it aside and carried on as if they hadn't had their lives torn from their hands.
Despite how much he loved his son, he found peace — as selfish as it may have been — in the fact that she hadn't been lost, too, and he kept himself in that peace throughout the grief of his lost son.
The Prince didn't seem to lose his footing until she started dwindling, and by that night on the balcony, Viserys had decided he wasn't going to lose his brother in his war to get Aenyka back to stability.
"It's come to my attention recently that riddles and parables don't help to relieve grief…" His Grace recalls from Lady Alicent, who had visited him to offer her condolences the night before. "…I don't recall that I've ever told you 'I'm sorry,' for what you had lost, Aenyka." He admits it, never having felt the need to, he had just assumed it was clear he was sorry. "Or what you see that I had cost you."
He had lost children before alongside Aemma, taken by the Stranger through stillbirths and miscarriages.
But he had never lost Aemma — someone who had his entire heart and adoration — and he now believes to feel the agony Aenyka had felt.
She keeps her head down, staring at the floor through thick tears that she wipes quickly.
"I wouldn't wish it on my greatest enemy, Your Grace." She clears her throat, her voice cracking, and he nods in complete understanding, able to relate to her for once in the ten years they've known one another, but it's a relation the both of them wish they hadn't in common.
"He toasted Prince Baelon, styling him, 'The Heir for a Day'."
Rhaenyra angrily wipes her eyes from bitter tears, having excused herself after the Small Council meeting to retreat to the peace she finds at the base of the Weirwood Tree for a moment as the words of Ser Otto Hightower – in reference to her Uncle – ring back and forth in her mind.
Apparently the Prince had spent the night celebrating that he, once again, was the heir to the Iron Throne.
It further angers her knowing that anyone who had dared to make light of the death of his own son had been put to death before properly explaining themselves, yet he had no second thought of publicly jesting at the fact Baelon had only lived a few hours.
Her aunt watches her, patiently waiting for her to wipe her eyes a last time before making her presence known, having followed her out here.
"Do you remember when you and your cousin climbed up there?" She asks it as she looks at the red leaves of the tree, the white bark making the color stand out more.
Rhaenyra doesn't turn to look at Aenyka, instead looking up at it as well, recalling her and Daerek getting stuck at the top of it.
"I do." She replies. "Daemon wouldn't let anyone help us down." She adds, begrudgingly.
"I never hit your uncle upside the head, but that was one time I was very, very, tempted to do so." Aenyka says next, remembering Daerek being afraid to climb down the tree with his cousin, and his father calling up to him, "You got up there without any help, you get down without any help."
"Perhaps you should've. I might've knocked some sense into him." The Princess mumbles. "At least some respect for his own family."
"I don't believe he refused to help the two of you out of the hardship you had gotten yourselves into to be cruel, Rhaenyra." She takes up for him, the blonde girl glancing at her from the corner of her eye as her aunt steps to stand beside her. "No more than I believe he said what he did about Prince Baelon as a means of taunt and celebration…he is a lot of things, but purely heartless is not one of them. No matter what Ser Otto Hightower whispers to your father about him."
"He is a good Hand." Rhaenyra says it sternly, speaking to Aenyka as if she is a commoner who has stepped out of her bounds.
"I can respect the love you have for Lady Alicent whilst also wishing her father to burn in the deepest pit of the Seven Hells." She retorts, raising her brows as she looks at her. "I take no issue with her. Only him. Even more, now." She refers to Daemon's intent being twisted by Otto, certainly not the first time he had done such as it to Daemon, or Aenyka, or anyone else he views as inconvenience in an attempt to have them plucked from King's Landing.
"I thought you spurned him, yet here you are still defending him as if the events of the last time the two of you were together hadn't unfolded the way they did." Rhaenyra doesn't hold back.
"Why would I spurn him for that?" Aenyka asks with furrowed brows, confused, and Rhaenyra seems nearly horrified by her answer.
"Typically one does not still desire to protect someone who tried to kill them."
"'Kill them'? When did he try to kill…" She doesn't finish the thought, now realizing what Rhaenyra is referring to, remembering what Viserys had told her about the Court – including Corlys – still thinking Daemon had tried to harm her.
She hadn't thought about their niece also thinking the same of it.
The lump returns to her throat upon the recognition of the fact she now has to tell her niece the truth.
"That wasn't him, Rhaenyra." She informs her, softly but stern, looking at the girl whose brows pinch together.
"I saw the aftermath of it, Aenyk – "
" – It wasn't him." She repeats it, seeing how Rhaenyra thinks about it for several moments, taking a step back as she puts it together.
Daemon hadn't grown tired of Aenyka's grief and wished to rid himself of it…Aenyka did.
"He was so adamant about Daerek being independent. He hated the idea of him relying on us – or anyone – for help. I think that's why he constantly made him get himself out of situations he had gotten himself into, even when he was so young." She refers back to the story of when Rhaenyra and Daerek had climbed up the tree. "He didn't want him to make a bad habit out of constantly relying on us. And for the longest time I just assumed it was how he and your father were raised, but then it occurred to me that he didn't want our son to do what I had. My brother had created somewhat of a monster in terms of my lack of actually taking the full brunt of consequences placed on me for my actions." She explains. "And once Daerek had reached the age of clearly knowing right from wrong, I had started getting him out of trouble and it bothered his father, I feel."
Though Aenyka never quite understood why he was more strict with his son than his wife. Maybe he thought it was too late for her to unlearn how to cower from consequence so he didn't bother.
"Why hasn't he corrected them?" Rhaenyra asks, a little surprised by her uncle's willingness to let everyone believe he would try to kill his wife instead of the truth.
"Because he was a good husband." She states. "And a good father. And I don't believe he meant any harm in his toast to your brother last night because he's a good uncle, as well." She reaches her hand out to brush at the skin of her niece's cheek, and a sad smile meets her. "I've missed you." She adds, enveloping her in an embrace, and Rhaenyra squeezes her tightly.
"I've missed you." She replies back to her aunt, wishing she hadn't been gone these last four years, feeling that so much would've been different had she stayed.
The soft, quiet patter of feet against stone echoes as Aenyka walks to her chambers, finally able to catch her breath and relax after a day of trying to wrestle with her son to get him to remember his histories, and bother to pay attention to his Septa.
Her eyes close and she leans against her door once it's shut, trying to focus on the sound of the ocean outside, it waves a temptation for her to lay in bed and be lulled to sleep by the sound.
It's when she can actually feel the tension leave her body once she's comfortable on her bed, that Daemon and Daerek make their presence known, bursting forth from the thick curtains.
She screams, opening her eyes and scrambling to get out of bed, seeing the boy perched on his father's shoulders, wielding a sheathed Dark Sister, not even able to hold it without two hands, and even then it's pointed down rather than toward his mother whom he's struggling to see whilst wearing Daemon's armour helmet that swallows up in his eyes and causes him to tilt his head back to better see her.
"I, Prince Aemon of Dragonstone, order you, Prince Morion of the Dorne, to surrender, or face the mighty wrath of Caraxes — the fiercest of dragons who thirsts for war to bring forth justice!" The child shouts, bringing Aenyka to look at Daemon.
"I thought I told 'Caraxes' no more letting him run around with a sword." She asks, putting the years her husband had struggled to teach her High Valeriyan to good use, raising a brow to Daemon.
"Caraxes doesn't recall such a thing." He states back, hiding a smirk.
"Do you surrender, or must I cook your head on a spike and feed it to my ferocious Blood Wyrm?" Daerek makes his presence known once again.
"I will not surrender, Prince Aemon." She humors him, plucking the Dark Sister from his hands and laying it on the bed, knowing what's about to happen.
"You've disarmed me!" He exclaims and she hides her laughter as he adds, "Dracarys!" one of the words he knows quite well in his ancestral language.
She's sarcastically screaming out at first before Daemon actually starts running after her whilst holding Daerek's legs to keep him from falling off. It's at this time she actually screams, pulling her door open, she runs down the hall.
Handmaids and guards scatter out of the way as they tear past them, Aenyka laughing while Daerek repeatedly shouts "Dracarys!"
They run until they reach Daerek's bed chambers, a perfect coincidence given the time, and she finally lets them get her.
"I surrender!" She calls. "Though, it wasn't Prince Morion who was defeated directly, but the Dornish army." She points out.
"Don't recall the history of the Fourth Dornish War to me. I was there when it occurred." He doesn't break character.
"Perhaps my Prince remembers how he met his end, then, being he was there when it occurred, as well." She reminds him.
Daemon makes exaggerated eating noises while Aeny pretends to fire an arrow, Daerek dramatically grabbing his throat, choking, and falling backward to land on his bed.
His father reaches down, laughing, plucking his helmet from the boy's head to reveal his silver hair.
"Time for bed." Aenyka speaks those dreadful words, Daerek eyes rolling as he falls back with a groan.
"I do not wish to sleep here. It's boring." He complains. "I much prefer to sleep with you."
"You fight in your sleep. We would be better off sharing a bed with Valor." She tells him and he giggles jumping up to her while Daemon pulls the covers of his bed back.
Once he's tucked in, Aenyka kisses his cheek.
"Tell me a story, Father, it will help me dream." He requests to his father, in which Aenyka looks at Daemon who's patiently waiting by the door for her to finish tucking the boy in.
"The hour is late, Daerek…" He starts.
"…It can be a short story." Aenyka replies.
The Prince looks to his wife, and reluctantly steps back to the bed, Aenyka moving to lay beside Daerek as Daemon sits beside them on the bed.
"What story?" He asks next, inquiring Daerek's opinion, and the young boy replies, "something I've yet to hear."
Is that even possible? Daemon has already indulged the child in every gory detail of every battle and war so many times over that Daerek is a walking account of mighty dragons and their masters — the only history he cares for aside from his uncle Corlys' tales of his adventures, and that of his ancestry.
Daemon thinks for a moment before making his mind up, a little grin at his lips as he suggests, "What about the Stranger's Wife?"
"Yes, Uncle has already told me the story of the Stranger's Wife falling to mass corruption by the mischievous hands of the Prince of the City, and facing the mighty King Viserys, and the High Priest of the Sept for her blasphemous sins."
Aenyka feels the color drain from her face, and Daemon asks him, "And what sins might that be?"
"Breaking her vows of silence and keeping her face concealed, father."
She sighs out her relief.
"But once she was expelled from her duties, the Gods bid the dragon called Valor to bring forth a babe to be declared future heir to the Iron Throne." He continues.
"A dragon brought forth the babe?" She asks.
"Yes, a boy. He placed him in the cradle himself and it was an omen that the Gods had forgiven the woman and the Prince for their sin." He finishes with a yawn.
"Did Vaemond tell you this story?" She questions next.
"Uncle Corlys, mother. He says it's one of his favorites of the adventures he's been on." He adds, and she smiles, smoothing his silver curls.
"You know what my favorite adventure is?" She asks and he shakes his head. "When you go to sleep, so I can go to sleep."
"I'm still not tired, mother." He groans.
"You've had your story, you've had your," Daemon interrupts himself to press a kiss at the boy's hair, "kisses, and now you sleep, Daerek." His father keeps his voice stern, leaving the child no room to argue back.
"We love you." Aenyka adds, pinching at his cheek, and his pout turns to a small smile before she kisses his forehead. "We'll see you on the morrow."
He nods, getting another kiss to his cheek before she's getting out of the bed, blowing at the candle next to his door.
The door to Daerek's bed chambers closes, the Prince and his wife looking at one another momentarily, and she doesn't have to ask him what he's smirking about when he gets a particular glint in his eye.
She's taking off, laughing as he does the same after her, the two of them once again running through the castle, past maidens and guards, before they get back to Aenyka's bed chambers.
Her attempt to shut the door behind her is an easy one to dispute, Daemon shoving it back open before closing it, beginning to undress himself as he stalks to his wife who walks away from him, not paying mind to the display that's reminiscent of a stag strutting about to a field full of hind.
"Daemon, tonight is a night of rest." She tells him, merely poking at his advances as he approaches her, his arms enveloping around her as his lips press to her neck, making her giggle.
"We've not had proper rest for weeks given your son has decided he favors our bed before his own." He reminds her, his hands beginning to pull at the fabric of her dress over her shoulders, freeing the soft skin. "One more night of unrest won't make a difference."
"Oh how I enjoy hearing he is solely my son when he does something that irritates you." She sarcastically retorts, biting her tongue to keep from moaning when he grabs at her throat to turn her to face him, capturing her lips with his own, their tongues meeting as he pushes her dress down her hips, her own hands pulling to rid him of his garments.
Pushing her to the bed, taking a moment to admire her body bared to him.
He wants to shout his thanks to the Gods for allowing them to have a night for just them, not having to wait for their son to fall asleep between them before sneaking around as they did before he was conceived, their throws of passion constantly being interrupted by Aeny asking, "do you think he's awake?" and "what if he wakes?"
At last, tonight, he can hopefully have thousands of moments with her uninterrupted.
He's grabbing at her ankle, making her laugh when his lips press to the inside of it, kissing up to her knee, her small giggles slowly turning to shallow breaths of anticipation, as he nips at the flesh of her thigh, nearly to his target when an abrupt knock on the door pulls Aenyka from her hypnosis, about to sit up but he stops her.
"Daemon," she whispers as he continues, ignoring the next knock.
His mouth finds the space her leg meets her hip bone, his hand running over the skin of her stomach as she squeezes at his wrist, her attention forced from the knock of the door momentarily.
Daemon's half of a second short of his tongue finding what it longs for before, "your Grace, it's urgent!" pipes politely from the other side of the door, and Aenyka offering, "come!" further frustrates him.
"I'm trying to." Daemon mutters under his breath, resting his forehead against Aenyka's stomach and as the door opens he crawls further up her to keep her covered.
"It is Prince Daerek. He insists upon the Song of the Seven."
"And do you not know the fucking Song of the Seven?" Daemon bites.
"He wishes for the voice of his mother." She replies, her voice shaking.
"Tell him I also wish for the voice of his mother." He argues sharply.
"Daemon." Aenyka whispers, taking in a breath and turning her head on the bed to look at their company. "Tell him I'll be there in a moment."
"Yes, your grace." She timidly exits, Daemon rolling off of Aenyka in a fit of frustration, rubbing his hands down his face.
"He's only a child, and I am his just as I am yours. I fear you forget that at times."
"You were mine before you were ever his." He says back, to which she looks at him.
"You are his, too." She reminds him, furrowing her brows. "Whether you love him as I do, or not."
"I do love him. If I didn't I wouldn't have married you to secure his title. I wouldn't ensure he learns the history of his ancestors to know, and take pride in, where he's come from. I wouldn't make the time for him — I'd stay gone and keep him from my sight." He explains, and she sits up, the skin of her back facing him.
"Confessing you only wed me to secure a title for him is not — "
" — That is not what I meant by saying it, Aeny, and you know that. I wanted to have time with you." He clarifies, his hand reaching up to run along the space between her shoulder blades and she closes her eyes, losing less and less motivation to leave the room. "Not arguing. Not fighting to get comfortable in a bed stuffed with a child that strikes me in his sleep and hoards my wife. Not being interrupted when trying to finally have a moment alone with you…" He continues and she looks over her shoulder at him.
"We will have our moment when I return. It doesn't take long for him to fall asleep." She insists, but her husband closes his eyes and puffs out another breath. "We can fly him to Driftmark on the morrow," She suggests, shifting to straddle him, her palms running up his chest to tangle in his hair as his hands grab at her hips, his blood hounding through his veins when she rests on him, feeling the proof of his desire through his pants, "And leave him with my brother, and fly off on Caraxes and go wherever, and do whatever you wish." She offers, her hands holding at his face as he opens his eyes to look at her. "Just you and I. The way it was before he was here."
He thinks about her proposal, his right hand moving to grab her jaw.
"I wish to have you naked all day so I can do what I please to you, whenever and wherever I please." He admits, past the point of desperation being the two of them haven't had more than a handful of minutes dedicated to only one another scattered throughout the past few weeks, and he hungers for the satisfaction of endless time to worship one another instead of a getting it over with as fast as they can due to limited opportunity and little time available to do so.
Aenyka pretends to contemplate it, just to jest.
"Is that truly what you wish for?" She questions, cutting her brown eyes at him.
"What I truly want is to throw you over my shoulder, now, jump from the veranda, retrieve Caraxes and fly as far away as possible only to ensure no one will be a bother to us." He flatly says. "But I can't do that because you have to go sing to our son." He adds.
"I can sing to you when I return." She smartly counters, and he lets out a, "ha!", already able to picture her head tipped back, back arched, eyes closed, as sultry sound is coaxed from her lips, and he's pulling her lips to his, briefly, before he releases her and she puts a nightgown and robe on, grabbing at he sword she had been laying beside and hadn't realized it, handing it to him. "And put that away." She adds before she dismisses herself.
He waits, and waits, only to find himself alone, still.
Stepping to the door, he leaves, and moves through the dim, empty halls, getting to Daerek's door.
It's ajar, the glow of a candle casting light to the hall, as the soft sound of Aenyka singing quietly crawls into Daemon's ears.
"…Her smiles teach the birds to fly, and give dreams to little children.
The Seven Gods who made us all, are listening if we should call. So close your eyes, you shall not fall, they see you, little children. Just close your eyes, you shall not fall, they see you, little children."
She nearly sounds drunk singing the lullaby for the fifth time through the fog of being tired, when she finally hears Daerek's little snores.
Her singing stops, her eyes resting as the bed under her grows as comfortable as a cloud.
Daemon now opens the door fully, seeing the display of his wife and son sleeping peacefully.
The Prince stares at the now empty bed, the single sheet laying over it to keep it covered from dust, swallowing the lump that's gripping to the inside of his throat.
His eyes slowly shift to the scaled egg in his hand, and he's brought back to the clatter of steel cracking together as members of the City Watch step through the castle of Dragonstone.