This would have been fucking amazing.
/
Otto Hightower looked at his granddaughter, a wave of concern creeping in over him.
"We're going to name her Helaena," Viserys said with a doting smile as he held his child close. "Isn't she beautiful?"
"Quite," the hand of the king said with a tight smile.
He confronted his daughter as soon as they were alone. "You had another daughter."
Alicent raised an eyebrow at him. "You say that like it's an accusation."
"You had Rhaeyns, and now Helaena," he said, "But you must provide the king with a son. One that Viserys can name the rightful heir to the throne."
"Not if he puts his other daughters ahead in the line of succession," Alicent said, amused at the idea.
"Then you must make him see reason and bare him sons, it is your duty…"
Alicent grimaced at him. She had only recently been on the birthing bed and she had little patience for this conversation. "And how do I do that father?" She asked. "Is there a position I should assume to choose the baby's gender? Have the Maesters discovered some secret to ensuring my children are boys?"
"Do not speak to me like that," Otto said. "We all must do what is necessary. The realm will not no peace with a girl on the Iron Throne."
That pissed her off even more. "I've done my duty." She said, her voice sharp. "To you. To my husband. To the realm. I have done anything and everything you've asked of me. If you want the king to have a son, you go lie in his bed and let him put one in you." With that she stormed out.
/
Otto waited with bated breath for the raven that would tell him of the birth of the third child of the union between his daughter and his king. He hoped that this would be what he was waiting for. The realm's Aegon. He'd long since decided that that would be a good name. To remind everyone of the form the king should come in.
The maester walked out looking somber. "I'm sorry sirs," she said. "The boy was stillborn."
/
Alicent was inconsolable. She stayed in her rooms, crying for the child she never held, whose silence had felt like death.
She'd thrown her pillows at Rhaenyra when she'd come to comfort her until nothing was left to throw and then collapsed weeping in the arms of her old friend.
She would later feel terrible for the relief she was filled with when Viserys, horrified at the sight of her covered in blood and haunted by the death of his first wife, told her that they would stop trying for children and that Aemma would be Rhaenyra's heir until she had a child.
/
"You must prepare Aemma for rule," Otto told his daughter, visiting Kingslanding on the pretense of seeing his grandchildren.
To his surprise, she burst out laughing. "What?" She asked.
"Rhaenyra's baby is obviously a bastard," he said. "She cannot be allowed to rule. Viserys must pass her over for his second child."
"I thought the realm wouldn't accept a girl," Alicent said.
Otto had prepared for this. "It will have no choice if there are no other options. And a properly trained one…"
"Shouldn't he pass her over for Daemon?" Alicent asked, the amusement having drained from her eyes at the mention of training.
"Daemon is too wild. He will not be a good heir, nor a good king. The realm will come to see that a girl with proper guidance would be the better option."
"He also isn't your grandchild," Alicent said.
Otto's eyes hardened. "Do not accuse me of such a thing."
"Do not accuse Rhaenyra's children of being bastards."
"It's not an accusation. It's the truth."
Alicent gave him a flat look.
"Do you want her on the Iron Throne?" he asked, switching gears. "Do you want your marriage to the king to be for nothing?"
"In all honesty, I don't know. But I feel it would be a better option than letting you try and fail with them as you have me." She stood to full height. "And I know it may be hard for you to grasp, but my daughters aren't nothing."
She turned and walked out.
/
"Am I the only Targaryen producing sons in this age?" Rhaenyra asked as she looked down at Joffrey.
"Must be in the blood," Alicent commented with a small smirk as she raised her goblet to her lips.
Rhaenyra gave her friend a flat look. "Hmm, well, at least they'll have their choices of Targaryen brides."
The Queen choked on her wine.
/
Otto watched, stone-faced, as Rhaenyra was crowned Queen of the Seven Kingdoms, her bastard sons and sodomite husband behind her and her trueborn sisters even farther behind. He would have raged, had he not already spent the last several years raging. Without a boy, there was no point in trying to undermine Rhaenyra's claim. And it remained to be seen if being a bastard would undermine Jacaerys' claim enough for the lords to accept a woman. He would probably not live long enough to see it, but he was sure his daughter would have a laugh at the irony of having to fight for another girl to sit on the throne when the time came. If she bothered to fight.
/
Otto really put the entire crux of his plan on his daughter's womb, and it's funny as fuck. What if she was barren? What if she only had daughters? The switch up to Otto the advocate of women's rights would be astounding.
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