Thirteen
𝓃𝒾𝑔𝒽𝓉𝒸𝒶𝓅𝓈 &𝓉𝒸𝒽𝒶𝒾𝓀𝑜𝓋𝓈𝓀𝓎
"Drugs Rhaenyra," Daemon Targaryen said, dropping his keys on the table and rubbing his temples. He leaned against the table with his fingers pressed into his temples, lips drawing into a scowl that was one part endearing and two parts scary. She knew the silence he had given her the ride home was too good to last. At 19 years old, Rhaenyra felt the cusps of rock bottom when she was caught up in a miniature drug bust. This was less due to the actual crime, but more so the idea that her uncle was actually high roading her. "And heroin at that."
Rhaenyra squirmed in her seat, clearing her throat as she went to speak, maybe defend herself. It had been five months since the funeral, so she'd been milking her grief for all it was worth. Or perhaps this was her grief. Hard to tell when you are high, which she was, usually.
"Why didn't dad come?" Rhaenyra asked, sitting on Daemon's couch and playing with the hem of her dress.
"I thought it best if we kept this one from him," Daemon said, now turning to her with narrowed eyes. She had been quiet since the moment he walked in with two lawyers and a briefcase of cash. He wasn't exactly the picture of a white knight, since those men wouldn't subtly threaten a man for doing right by a community that she was trying to poison. "Unless you want him to know."
"I don't care," she said, flippantly tucking a strand of hair behind her ear. "I wasn't using. It's not my fault they were looking to buy." It wasn't even proven that the girl had overdosed on the product Rhaenyra brought. In fact, Rhaenyra barely remembered the girl.
"Do you have any idea how many favors I had to pull just to keep you out of jail?" Daemon asked, and she couldn't tell what was to happen next with his voice that level.
"I didn't ask for favors," she said without looking at him.
"And I didn't ask to abandon all my duties, drive two hours across New York, spend five chatting with lawyers and your dean, all for you to be this hostile," he said calmly, leaning himself against the table to her right.
"I have not been hostile," she told him instead.
Daemon was undoubtedly angry, of that she knew, but Rhaenyra suspected it was hardly due to the drug trade. Even so, he had a beguiling sort of tone, contrasting with the words in his attempt to be an adult. "Haven't you?"
Was he really trying to rescue her? Rhaenyra rolled her eyes, glancing off toward the wall. Men.
"Did you at least get a good enough cut?" Daemon finally asked, his own exasperation clear in his voice. She continued to play with the hem of her dress, twisting it and fidgeting with the material with her eyes trailing the viscose.
"It wasn't about the money," she said, all but holding her breath when he let out an exasperated groan. He was in front of her then, and she could see his long legs, his black slim slacks, and his expensive shoes. She swallowed, following a path up his legs, slow and nervously as she made it to his crossed arms and stern face.
"Do you mean to tell me that I bailed your arse out, and it was all for a drug operation where you gained nothing?" Daemon's hair was a long silver, clipped back in a way that beach boys in California would be jealous over. However, he didn't look like a douche from Berkley, sitting under a tree and singing songs about nature on his guitar. He looked every bit like the man who helped her destroy her ex-boyfriend's entire life, one day at a time.
He looked dangerous.
"It wasn't about the gain," she told him carefully, trying to appear calm, even as the nervous flutter came alive in her stomach. Her father and Daemon were so different that it was a wonder to her how they were ever incubated in the same womb. Besides the hair and the eyes, they could be strangers.
But moments like these truly set them apart, where her father would say that crime could never be a means to an end or be rationalized away. Daemon, however, found crime to be the end and never bothered to rationalize it. She wondered if there was an act she could take to earn his ire, or if she could ever go too far. Then, she wondered why she wanted to know.
"It's always about gain, Rhaenyra," he said, gripping her chin and forcing her to look up at him. His hand on her skin felt visceral, and she smiled in a way that might have looked angelic if it wasn't for the split lip and bits of blood on the corner of her chin. "And you let that girl jump you for nothing."
"You saw her," Rhaenyra said lowly, feeling his thumb against her chin, wiping away the blood. "You'd never know who jumped who."
His lips twitched up, that gaiety that danced with the shaded and entrancing eyes. She thought it was weird how beautiful he could be, but that thought felt rather bordering on taboo, so she shrugged it off like an itchy cloak. "Let's get you cleaned up, kid. After, maybe I will yell at you some more."
His thumb stroked the underside of her jaw once more in that affectionate way he'd done most of her life. She stood quickly, almost obediently. The action was sudden enough that he had yet to move back, causing her body to slide along his until he was already walking towards the bathroom, behind the staircase. She followed, slapping the back of her hand against her cheek as if to knock the sense back into her.
"You can yell at me during," she told him as she entered the bathroom, hearing him snort as she hopped on the counter, her feet dangling, heels slapping against the wood cabinets as she stared at him from over the lights that surrounded the mirror of the giant bathroom. Her tired eyes traced along the path of faint, yet emerging, lines etched around his own. They'd become a reminder, and eventually a permanent one, of his ever-smiling face. She sometimes wished, especially these long months, that she could absorb some of his contentment, bottling it for each long night. "Get it out of the way."
He had pulled out cotton balls and alcohol, which made her already have to prepare herself for the sting. "I should," Daemon said, pouring some of the alcohol on the cotton. He had yet to glance at her, but she could look nowhere else. That was hardly new, as Daemon had a way of drawing eyes no matter what room he walked into, as if he was born to gain attention. Or, more likely, he did everything purposefully so he got it. As was the plight of the second son.
Or an abandoned daughter.
"It would be very adult of you," she agreed, and watched his smile peek out as he finally met her probing gaze. His head shook, and his free hand was against her jaw, his fingers somehow encompassing her neck and her chin as he closed in.
"Very. Especially considering you are a poor businesswoman in these deals," he whispered, and her heart, for unknown reasons, seemed to freeze in motion in her chest. She watched his perusing gaze, his nearly apologetic smile that made her jittery, and not only out of worry for a bit of rubbing alcohol. He delays, as if to enjoy her suffering, but all it did was prolong her own ignorance.
She didn't get a chance to examine whatever the hell that was when she tried to flinch away from the stinging press of cotton against her lip. "Fuck," she muttered, the sting so precise that it shot directly into her nerves.
"Perhaps it might teach you to dodge next time," Daemon said with a roll of his eyes, his hand the only thing keeping her in place for the next light dab.
"She came out of nowhere. Like a ninja," Rhaenyra said, little tears gathered in her eyes. Daemon's lips twitched up, but as the little pained droplets descended down the skin under her right eye, his thumb lightly brushed it away. The gulp she took was a long one, that freeze in her heart coming back with a vengeful shutter that had her questioning her health.
"Your unprofitable drug operation did almost kill her sister," Daemon said, his breath warming her lips and creating a weird fog in her hazy brain. She could attest it to the pain of the next dabbing of the alcohol before he switched to water to wipe away the little trace of red on her chin.
A flush of guilt managed to pierce the selfish bubble she had erected over her heart. It was nearly as painful as the alcohol on her bottom lip. His touch snapped her out of it, thumbs wiping away another trail of tears. "Addicts will get their fix, no matter the hand they buy from. Your only mistake was getting caught."
She let out a sound, halfway between a breath and a laugh, as her fingers squeezed against the marble counter. She couldn't look away from him as his gentle touch contrasted the dark eyes and terrible reputation that made her father often yell. "And not dodging," she said, and he laughed, both his hands cupping her face as he kissed her forehead.
"Now you're getting it," he said, already pulling away before she could linger on the touch.
"Can I stay for a while?" Rhaenyra asked with a careful pause, as he applied a tiny amount of liquid bandage atop the cut. His eyes met her own, his touch gentle and fleeting. She didn't bother to say that she didn't want to go home, didn't want to see her father, didn't want to deal with the house that once held her mother's presence, and now it felt as dead as a graveyard.
"I won't be home until late," he told her, and she didn't bother asking where he was off to, not wanting to pry like a little kid who wanted to spend every waking moment with her uncle. He never took any of shit, but he also never strayed away from it. She needed that.
"I don't care," she said with a shrug.
"Alright then. You should call your father anyway," Daemon told her, sounding as if he couldn't care either way. He slapped his palms against her thighs, and his warm touch spread up and down her skin. "Now, show me your fist," he said, and she grinned at him, the motion so unfamiliar these days. Something warm captured his expression, and she watched it spread over him, erupting back inside her.
She raised her hand and showed him, feeling irrationally happy just to make him smile at her. He took her fist in both his hands and pressed a kiss atop her knuckles. "Is it satisfactory?" Rhaenyra asked this after a slight hesitation, her gaze locked on the heat searing into her skin.
"Perfectly adequate, if not a bit bare," he said, now putting away the alcohol and medications, leaving her skin cold without his touch. "Perhaps a ring or two would do you good. That's how you take out flesh along with eyes."
She let out a surprised laugh, "You truly are the worst." She looked down at her hand, deciding she would buy a few rings to decorate her middle and ring finger. Perhaps something gold. Perhaps something steel.
"Gold or silver?" Daemon asked, as if he had read her mind, and she vaguely felt his hip against her knee as he put away the last of the supplies.
"Huh?" Rhaenyra asked, lowering her hand. He was already looking at her, unapologetically, while she usually felt like a thief, her hands overflowing with stolen glances.
His answering smirk was a lazy one when he said, "Do you prefer gold or silver?"
"Gold," she said slowly, and he ran a palm over his hair, as if he already knew. He probably did as Rhaenyra hardly remembered half the garbage she spewed his way, only that he was the first one she usually wanted to tell.
"Can't say you're not consistent," he said, fingers trailing over the golden pendant around her neck that she found at a boutique weeks ago. Despite the obvious wealth, she had tucked it in her sleeve like a dirty thief. He lifted it in his fingers, staring at the emerald in the middle. When he dropped it, it fluttered against her collarbone, somehow warmer as she finally hopped off the bathroom counter.
"I can say the same of you," she said, reaching over to grip onto the Valyrian steel pocket watch that was attached to his vest. All that was visible was the chain, but the ripple patterns in the steel were unique. Her fingers trailed along it, a light touch, there and gone. He ruffled her hair, and somehow, it made her feel ridiculous and like a kid.
"Can't say that doesn't kill my reputation just a little," he told her, as he walked past her to leave the bathroom. She ran her palm down her face, as if she could wipe away whatever was happening, leaving it behind in the bathroom. She followed him out, watching as he grabbed his coat, the black woolen one that she got him last year. "Dinner's in the fridge. Don't wreck my place."
"Thanks dad," she said, leaning against the wall to watch him check his phone. He snorted, his thumbs sliding along his phone. She spotted the family ring, fitted against his middle, his soft smile as he stared down at his screen. She saw everything, from his sharp jaw, to his feathered lashes, to his plush lips.
Plush? Rhaenyra was going insane. It was a long day, she was tired, she was going to pick the lock on his liqueur cabinet.
"Dinner's really in the fridge?" Rhaenyra asked, only a bit hungry, an odd thing since she hadn't had much of an appetite for months.
"This isn't the Brady Bunch. Make your own," he said with a breathy laugh.
"Fuck you're old," she said, and he grabbed a pillow off the couch and tossed it straight at her face. She laughed as she caught it, the sort that so few could lately pry from her chest. He glanced up at her with an expression that lit her up. "What?"
"If you do that again, I might just want to stay," he said with that smooth expression, unreadable, and her breath was taken from her. One needs air to laugh, and that was sucked right out of the room.
"Do what?" Rhaenyra asked, but the moment wasn't something stagnant, always morphing and it was gone before she could understand.
"Your criminal activity was very distracting," he said glancing at the time on his phone. He was already leaving and she watched with a tug in her gut that was too close to disappointment.
"I'll work on being more on the low," she told him, and looked around his place. It didn't have much warmth when he wasn't occupying the space, but it was far more comfortable than Southampton. "Maybe I'll give baking a try."
He paused at the door, turning to look at her with narrowed eyes. "I heard you lit a girl's hair on fire in your Home Ec class." How he knew about that was beyond her.
"That wasn't due to lack of skill," Rhaenyra said, leaning on one hip as she watched his suspicion rise. "That was due to lack of impulse control."
Daemon hummed, trailing his hand over the doorknob that lead out to the entrance. "Maybe put your hair up."
She smiled, "Get out of here."
She never meant anything less than when she saw him leave. However, she swiftly got over it as it gave her the chance to snoop on every corner of his place. She snaked about his many rooms, most empty and desolate, and certainly no juicy skeletons in his closet. She did search in the guestrooms, but it was the roof that she always found the most interesting.
After realizing her uncle had no measuring utensils, she did give up on baking. But the roof was the one place she loved the most in all the visits, which she got to see for the first time last year, then never again. "Where have you been hiding," she whispered, already stripping off her dress, leaving her in her undergarments as she circled the jacuzzi. He must have just installed it. It was just at the edge, surrounded by a platform of dark wood, and it took her ten minutes to figure out how to turn it on.
Her father probably would have had one installed, had she only asked. Lately, she hadn't asked anything from him. She already had five unanswered texts from him, asking where she was, asking her to call him, asking, asking, asking.
She liked how the waters overlooked the darkening sky, as the New York skyline couldn't get more beautiful from high up, where you could see where the ocean met the sky. She swam to the edge of the body of water, near the jets, letting her back rest against the swooping waters as she grabbed her glass. While she probably couldn't bake, she could make a fine negroni.
She was enjoying life when Alicent called.
"Tell me why I just covered for you?" Were her friend's first words, deep into Rhaenyra's second negroni where she dripped puddles of water as she strolled, half-naked through her uncle's penthouse. She hadn't bothered cleaning that up, figuring evaporation would take care of it.
"Dad called you?" Rhaenyra asked, resting her chin in her arms that rested on the soft wood. If she looked over the edge, she could see all the way down to the city below. It was five parts gorgeous, one part terrifying.
"Like nine times. He's worried, Rhaenyra," Alicent told her, as if Rhaenyra was 12, instead of 19. "And after the entire Sebastian incident, he's actually being quite lenient."
"I thought I told you never to speak that name to me again," Rhaenyra said, turning on her back and putting the phone on speaker.
"I thought you said you were over it," Alicent shot back before her voice grew soft. "I told him you were staying with me, so please, at least tell me where you are so I can feel better about lying."
"Rooftop jacuzzi, safe and sound," Rhaenyra said, not saying anything about almost getting arrested this morning or about being caught with enough cocaine that the search dogs went insane. Or about the girl who nearly overdosed. Or about the sister who jumped her with her two friends. Alicent, while the closest thing she would ever come to a sibling, was not the most understanding.
Also, Rhaenyra wasn't ready to hear how awful of a person she was, as if Rhaenyra didn't already know. From everyone, she could take that, but from Alicent? Rhaenyra might not recover from losing her.
"You are impossible. Whose jacuzzi?" Alicent asked, and the worry in her voice touched a tiny part of the light left in Rhaenyra's shriveling heart.
"Uncle Daemon. I helped myself while he was out," Rhaenyra reached her hand out into the skyline, admiring her manicure before she noticed that her nail had chipped on that stupid bitch's nose ring.
"Thank god," Alicent said with a loud and dramatic sigh. "Why are you there?" Alicent's voice lowered now that she knew where her friend was.
Rhaenyra didn't look as she lifted her phone with a lazy motion, snapping a photo of the view and hitting send.
"Oh," Alicent said, pausing on the other end. "Okay, that's fair. I forgive and understand. How was your first session?"
Ah, mandatory therapy. Rhaenyra hadn't gone in favor of nearly getting arrested, which might show a necessity for a shrink. Alicent had been adamant about it, saying that it could be the outlet she needed. As if what Rhaenyra wanted was to tell her problems to a stranger, watching him low-key judge her for an entire hour. Nothing sounded worse, and that included jail time.
"Borderline Personality disorder. Instability. A chronic liar. Perhaps prone to interpersonal relationships," Rhaenyra listed, and was immediately interrupted.
"He said all that?" Alicent asked, her voice high.
"I didn't go," Rhaenyra had already lied enough, so she wouldn't lie about this and leave a sour taste in their friendship. She was still gazing at the clouds painting the sky in soft patchwork, noting the dark clouds on the horizon that threatened to move over every piece of beautiful baby blue and orange. One minute, it would be sweltering heat, and the next, it would be cold and grey.
"Oh," Alicent couldn't hide the disappointment in her voice, and while that was hard to hear, Rhaenyra was grateful that she didn't have to listen to a lecture. Despite what everyone thought, she wasn't a child and she didn't want to be pitied or helped. She just wanted space so she could learn to breathe in this world without her mother.
"I'll think about going," Rhaenyra forced out the words, reaching for her Negroni.
"I went to one before," Alicent's voice was small, a tiny bit of pain layered somewhere in there. Sometimes, be it selfishness or what, Rhaenyra forgot that she had lost a mother too. "It's not an immediate fix and it's hard, especially with everyone always asking if you are okay as if they want you to say yes so it's easier for them."
Rhaenyra was silent, trying to find the words to say that she didn't want to talk. She wanted to drink and wait for the rain to drown her. "I'll try again. Tomorrow or the day after. Eventually."
"When you're ready," Alicent said carefully, her voice lightening. "But next time, remember that my phone is always on and I'm available. Rude to be looking at the beautiful view without me," her light voice, an attempt at easing her, made Rhaenyra's smile return as she watched those clouds come closer.
"I thought you didn't like Daemon," Rhaenyra said, nothing more true than that. 'He'd rather burn all his bridges rather than apologize for being an asshole' Alicent had said the nights following Daemon's 'heir for a day' comment. Rhaenyra had so few bridges left in her life, so she didn't want to burn any with Daemon just because his comment broke her heart. If she never brought it up, then maybe she could ignore that it happened.
"I like his roof," Alicent said with a laugh. Rhaenyra tried to speak for a bit longer, talk as they used to, but the words grew heavy and the weight of them made her sink further and further in the water. Eventually, she ran out of them and the conversation became one-sided. Eventually, not even that.
And then it was over before the first raindrop fell against her nose. Rhaenyra let it, the mixture of the warm water underneath and chill above made her feel as if she were being tugged in different directions. She closed her eyes as the call ended.
If you stand right at the edge of the night sky, someplace between the meeting of 12 am and 1, it becomes easier to believe that the breeze could carry your words up to the stars. Maybe they could swallow your secrets and keep them locked securely in the asteroid belt, you can hand those truths to the sky.
She watched her Negroni begin to overflow, but she grabbed it, dumping the water and alcohol over the side. Down below, she spotted umbrellas, an army of them. New York, is ever in motion, never slowing, even in snow storms or hurricanes. What was that like? Rhaenyra felt as if her life had paused. She dreamed of something past autumn, passed the chilly autumn winds and soft fall rains that were hitting her naked back. She could feel the cool moisture as the rain droplets ran down her face, down her cheeks, and making her blind.
She dropped the glass over the roof and watched it fall down below, into the city that never stops.
"That was crystal," Daemon said, and an umbrella appeared above her head. She glanced up at him, wiping away some of her drenched bangs. "And a gift."
"From who?" Rhaenyra asked, gazing up at him as his eyes touched nearly every part of her, perhaps even the parts that may have never been touched before. Parts that Sebastian never had the chance to brush, even when she thought he had. They flashed with lightning, dusting over her nerves with electric currents of heat that she didn't understand. The sultry, answering thunder was conjoined with the sky itself, with a flash of lightning in the distance, calling forth a storm so unexpectedly that she felt betrayed by her own body.
What the hell is happening to me? Rhaenyra didn't have an answer, didn't want the answer, and wouldn't search for it either.
"Can't remember. But if you want to toss the rest of them, try a better aim," Daemon said, gazing over the roof. "Looks like you missed."
Rhaenyra's lips twitched up and she slowly stood, before realizing that she was in her bra. She immediately lowered back to the bubbling water. "I didn't think to bring a bathing suit."
Daemon was already outstretching her dress that she had left abandoned at the door. As well as a towel that he held out to her next. She took it with raised brows. "You left piles of water on my Persian rug. Looks like the Titanic down there."
"Ah," Rhaenyra said, evaporation be damned.
"And you raided my liqueur cabinet, can't say I was surprised that you preferred this to baking. Next time, however." Daemon still held the umbrella, pointedly looking out to the sky as she stood from the jacuzzi and wrapped the towel around herself. "Perhaps look at a weather report."
"I liked it," she said, ringing out her hair over the water as he turned off the jets. "Relaxing, up until the thunder."
"I am sure you did, heathen," he said, placing his palm on her back, just over the towel. "Come on before someone looks up in search of who almost murdered them with a crystal glass."
"Couldn't you just buy their silence?" Rhaenyra riposted, letting him lead her back out toward the stairs that led back down to the lower levels of the penthouse. He shoots her a quick sideways smile, which was cool because who even needs lungs? Breathing was overrated.
"Some people, Rhaenyra, can't be bought," he told her as they walked down the stairs in tandem, her body sloshing water with every step as her feet made wet prints on the wood.
"Is that how Ms. Yumiko rolled with your shoplifting spree story," Rhaenyra asked with a smile towards her uncle as they made their way into the lounge where she clutched the towel to her. He was pointedly not looking at her, moving past her to walk over to his liqueur cabinet, through the entryway that connected the lounge and the kitchen. She watched, leaning against the entryway, as he approached it. "At least you managed to bury the insider trading."
"2007 was a dark year, and Ms. Yumiko was a real bitch," Daemon said, now pausing in front of the busted lock to turn and look at Rhaenyra.
"That lock was a bitch. Also, you're out of lime," she said with a shrug, leaving out how she shattered the shackle with the hammer she found under his sink.
Daemon pried the busted padlock from the cabinet, tossing it on the counter. "I thought I taught you how to pick these kinds."
"Patience wasn't my priority," Rhaenyra said, pausing, holding up her dress. "Do you have anything I could wear? This is soaked."
He had already poured himself a glass of straight whiskey, staring at her from across the room as she tried to hide the fluttering pulse that made her feel like she had heart disease. His eyes didn't linger, already walking, moving past her. "You dedicated your entire day and night to inconveniencing me, haven't you?"
She sat against the wooden lounge chair as he left to get something for her to wear. It gave her time to literally slap her stupid face. "We're not doing that," she whispered to herself, lowering her face into her hands, as if she could bury those feelings in a bed of asphodel.
She was still covering them up, burying them under slender leaves, when he came back and dropped the clothes on her head. She reached out and grabbed them, looking at the sweatshirt that was obviously not his, considering they were obviously belonging to a woman. There was also a pair of black leggings, once more, definitely not his.
Her lips pressed together to hide a smile, "Are these your girlfriends?"
"Sometimes they leave them around the house so they can feign the need to come back and pick them up," Daemon said with a slight snigger that was covered in the glass of whiskey he had lifted from the counter.
She stared down at the outfit with a mirror of his expression. "That's genius. I should take notes."
"Get dressed, Rhaenyra. You've gotten enough water on my floor," he said, shaking his head. She quickly did so, locking herself in the bathroom and stripping off her clothes. It felt weird to not be wearing anything under leggings, but not any weirder than wet underwear. She practically drowned in the leggings, and she turned around to inspect her flat ass. Obviously, this girl never missed a day at the gym.
She frowned, clicking her tongue and knawing on her bottom lip. "Alright. That does it," Rhaenyra said, walking out of the bathroom in the leggings that fit just enough to stay up. "I'm going to commit. I'm signing up for Perfomix. I'm gonna get a Bowflex."
Daemon snorted into his whiskey, and she decided there was something inhuman about drinking it on the rocks. She didn't care how much he defended the quality of the alcohol. "I hope they reject your application," he said, referring to the exclusivity to the gym that denied most who applied.
"I am a Targaryen with an amazing social media presence," she said, leaning over the counter to grab the whiskey that he had placed next to him. He continued to scroll through his phone while she brought his glass up to her nose and sniffed. She took a sip, wincing as she felt the taste burn her tongue. "I am convinced you drink this to look cool."
Daemon smiled, glancing over at her from his phone. "Is it working?"
"Not in the slightest," she said, peeking over at his phone. "Who are we texting?"
"We?" Daemon said with a quirk of a brow, his eyes falling into a half-mast that shouldn't have looked so gorgeous. "What about you?"
"Me?"
"I seem to recall you mentioning getting a place in the city," Daemon said, the subject nearly causing her heart to still. She ran a tongue over her lips, and over the tender flesh of her cut. His eyes were intrusive, nearly puncturing her like a needle into a balloon. "What happened to that?"
"I don't know," Rhaenyra said carefully, as it had been something her mother supported. Independence, closer to school, and arguments of the like had been made. They had been in the process of the purchase when one of the signatures on the dotted line disappeared. Now, the future was something she resolutely ignored. If she didn't put her entire attention on the day at hand, she was afraid the impenetrable dark on the horizon would engulf her.
Daemon reached over, capturing one of her hands. It was a simple touch, something so soft and fleeting. "And what about hiking? Reading? Art? Piano? I seem to recall you liked all that."
Rhaenyra's teeth dug into the flesh of her lip. She hadn't touched a piano in months. She hadn't read any more than a text message in months. Art? She barely used emojis anymore.
"I'm going to see a therapist," she said, exhausted already. "I'm going to see one. I'm fine." The smile that had been on her face disappeared. He let go of her hand, standing and her eyes followed his motions.
"Come on, up," he said, and she barely realized how malleable she was until she was standing at his order. "I got you something."
She followed him, barely realizing she was doing it. They walked past the lounge, onto the next room, her favorite, with the window planes overlooking the city below. The fireplace that had been switched on, likely sometime while she had still been trying to drown in the rain. The crackling heat melded with the rose candle that was lit on the center coffee table, the scent of vanilla and flowers wafting into the air.
Near the windows where New York was lit in the city lights, was a grand piano.
When Daemon struck the first few keys, terribly at that, she nearly laughed. She was certain if he continued to do so, Steinway would come down personally to rub his name off the piano. The black bench was made of quality leather, which she minded because animals were adorable, but it felt amazing when her shaking hand touched it.
"That's awful," she said, hand on her face as if to cover the sound of her laugh. "You really have Van Gogh's ear for music."
She stared at him from in between her fingers as he leaned against the new piano. Her mother had driven her to all her piano lessons, but she hadn't known she wanted to learn until she saw Daemon play when she was seven. Now, the memories were dredged up from the dark and she glided her hand over the keys.
"Do you want to play something?" Daemon asked, and she glanced up at him, wondering if he had ever looked more beautiful than in the city lights on his left, mixing with the firelight on the right. Her lips parted, and she sat.
"It will sound bad," she whispered, staring down at her hands, but felt more comfortable looking at his. Fingers always revealed far more than faces. People could change their faces, guard them, hide them. Everyone forgot their fingers. Hers were small, made strong and supple from all the hours she spent playing. They were thin, long, and they could play beautiful music. They once did.
What good were they now? For the first time she could see the real danger of her hands, what they did to the human mind when it wasn't restricted by drugs. Flat white fear coiled in her stomach when she felt his hands cover her own. He sat down on the bench next to her, facing the opposite direction, his own hands tense around hers, even as his face was indifferent.
"I don't deserve it," she said, her voice softer than the keys. "I don't deserve it."
She wanted to bash apart the gift, she didn't want to reveal it. This secret was supposed to be between her and the breeze.
She felt his hands slide away when she played the first note, and those beautiful keys strung together in soft succession. It was the pauses, however, between the notes where the art resides. Or so her mother said. The sad, slow music filtered into the small hours of the early morning. It's a narration of everything she couldn't hide. And through the myriad of the morning dew, the twinkling stars that would soon enough fade with the rising sun, she stopped.
"I was angry when I found out," Rhaenyra whispered, staring up at him through hooded lashes. He wasn't looking at her, instead, his back had rested against the piano keys, facing the window planes as his steady blink showed her that he was listening. Rhaenyra played a last note, a sweet melody. Did he realize it was the one she first heard him play? Tchaikovsky would be proud. "When I found out she was pregnant."
Her hands curled into her lap, but she felt him shoulder to shoulder with her.
"I didn't want a brother. I," her voice cracked, and a tear drop splashed against her clenched fingers. They followed in quiet succession. "I told her I hope he didn't make it. I told her," her voice broke off, nose burning, and vision blurring. "I told her. I told her."
Daemon dragged her into his arms, and accepting each of her clumsy words, the secrets she had buried. In between the breeze, the melody, and his tight embrace, she finally sobbed out the truth.
