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FOUR DRAGONS COULD NOT stop the beast from claiming its prey. Even as the creature soared through the sky, blotting out the very sun, there was no stopping her. Vhagar was a monstrosity, a calamity, and the clapping of her wings was as loud as thunder. The only solace was the lack of speed in replacement for all her great mass.
A way to check the balance, the elder dragon keepers had told Rhaenyra. They offered up many long strings of advice that Rhaenyra had eaten up with wayward excitement. Her King and father had forbidden her from riding the calamity dragon and forbade her from so much as going near her.
However, the unease of the orders had soured her nights. Restlessly, she wandered her room, wondering if Vhagar would forget her. She wondered if the old dragon would change her great mind, and that had made a sliver of apprehension cast a long shadow in Rhaenyra's heart.
It took fifteen restless, listless, long nights until she had found the secret entrance out from her rooms. It led through loops she explored in later days, lead around the dark castle, and finally, led her straight to Vhagar.
Eventually, be it her father's exasperation or what, the chains she had to the castle were loosened. Perhaps, this might not have been too good an idea for a girl of only four and one to have such free reign. She, who thought she knew more than the Dragonkeepers, would listen to the advice yet choose what suited her.
She stroked up Vhagar's scales, gripping the saddle for dear life as she opened her great jaws and let out flames so hot that Rhaenyra could feel the sweat on her own brow. "Vhagar, enough, stop," she had shouted over the great flapping of her giant wings. Laenor had far more control over Seasmoke, and certainly no mind for the danger he was in when Vhagar consumed the smoked lamb in so forceful a manner that nearly had Rhaenyra flung from the saddle.
Seasmoke only flew in the other direction, landing upon the shores of the beach as Rhaenyra finally regained control of the great dragon now that Vhagar had food in her colossal belly. She made it down, also not an easy feat since the dragon was so giant that she had to tie a rope to her saddle. The logistics of dragon-riding was hardly something she considered when she spent long nights excited to meet her friend in the sky.
"What exactly were you trying to do?" Rhaenyra asked, meeting Laenor's carefree gaze that had no mind for his actions to steal another dragon's prey. "She could have turned on you."
"She did not," Laenor replied, and Rhaenyra's frown deepened.
"Well, congratulations on testing your mantle. That was the stupidest thing I have ever seen," she replied, whispering words of command in Valyrian to stop her from ripping Seasmoke's head from the tiny body.
"Perhaps you should have waited for Syrax then. We would hardly be having such an issue," Laenor said with a chuckle, but it immediately died in his throat when the beast lifted her great big head, only slightly. Rhaenyra felt her lips twitch, running her hand along the scales of her dragon's tail.
"Calm," she said in Valyrian, her hands stroking up and down the great big scales. Dragonstone hadn't been her destination on the ride, but she would not tell her cousin such. He already thought her a child, so she hardly wanted to place herself in a position of an inexperienced child.
Syrax hatched only five moons ago and Rhaenyra had yet to see the dragon that was supposed to have gone to her. She had awakened to whispers that evening, whispers that told her to calm, whispers that told her to stay. So Rhaenyra did not go to see the beast, did not feel her scales from under her palm.
"Syrax took too long," Rhaenyra said, feeling the breaths of the dragon from beneath her hands. "And I could not wait."
"Why Dragonstone?" Laenor said, staring out into the vast sea, crashing against the shore. The beaches of Dragonstone would usually become littered with bones, with pieces of broken shipsβeven the stern of one such boat had once crashed upon the cliffsides that viciously tore it apart. It was peaceful today, the beaches were cleared the night before by the stewards who watched the castle when a Targaryen was not around to manage it.
It was for her brother and his sons, should her mother's delivery go as planned. "It's peaceful. Dragons grow larger in Dragonstone where they flourish."
"I think Vhagar hardly needs that," Laenor said with a laugh that had Rhaenyra grinning in return.
"It is not mine that I think needs growing," Rhaenyra said, referring to Seasmoke, who had taken to the sky yet again. Seasmoke had decided not to compete for game and take to the cliffs instead. Astute judgment since Rhaenyra hardly wanted Vhagar to turn around and eat her cousin's dragon in one bite. She knew words of apology would not mend that rift between Velaryon and Targaryen.
It was the beginning of spring, and the poets would say that the world smelled of roses and the sunshine that glimmered like powdered golden dust upon the hillside as the sun rose. It did not. It smelled like salt and shit and brimstone that day on Dragonstone.
"That's rather rude considering you just scared my dragon off," Laenor retorted, stretching his arms over his head. His cheeks were smeared with bits of dirt from Vhagar's tail, flinging mud at him an hour prior. He was still handsome, with dark skin and white hair that signified two of the greatest houses in Westeros. Rhaenyra had bonded with him entirely by accident when he had arrived on a diplomatic meeting between Corlys and Viserys.
Laenor had been watching the kingsguard training when Rhaenyra had seen him. She examined his eyes as they trailed each of their movements as if he wanted to be down there with them. Rhaenyra had watched in nearly that same way, but she didn't just want to hold the sword next to them, but enter their skin and become them.
She had done what most cousins would do when meeting for the first time. She had mercilessly mocked him, meaning to draw his ire. Alicent had been positively scandalized, but Laenor had only laughed and called her out on doing the same thing. Two children who didn't quite fit, but worked rather well together. As good-looking as Laenor was, he had the social skills of a soaked cat and the blunt honesty of a man who never had a thought he did not project on his audience.
"You can berate my temperate all you like," Rhaenyra said with a smile as Laenor lifted a seashell from the sand. It was a small thing, but as he turned it around, the clam was still housed in its shell. Rhaenyra watched him carefully place it into the water, allowing the waves to take it back, returning it to the ocean once more. "But the freedom you give to Seasmoke will get you killed and I labeled a kinslayer."
Laenor laughed, meeting her gaze from over his shoulder. "What a way to go," he said, watching the clam disappear from under the waves. Rhaenyra would not have bothered, already thinking that it wouldn't survive anyway so what would be the point of her efforts?
"To bring me down as well?" Rhaenyra shook her head as she walked up next to him, taking off her boots to sink her feet into the water. It splashed against her trousers, so she rolled them up and felt the chill seep into her bones.
"Of course, you'd have just murdered me," Laenor said with a snort. She knocked her shoulder into his own.
"At your beckoning," she told him, staring back toward the horizon where the sun had drooped lower. "How is Laena? I thought she was to spend the spring in King's Landing, but word is yet to reach of her arrival."
Laena was currently batting away marriage proposals, so Rhaenyra had expected Corlys to place her in King's Landing to gain the best match. Yet two summers had gone by and still no word.
"Are you that bored that you plan to steal my sister away from me?" Laenor asked in return, earning Rhaenyra's laugh.
"I'd steal you if only you'd let me. What keeps you in Driftmark anyway?" Rhaenyra's lips pursed, amusement creeping in. "Or, should I say, who?"
"Ah, I think I see Seasmoke on the horizon," Laenor said, and met her arched brows as the horizon remained empty.
"Always watching the horizon or the knights," Rhaenyra said carefully, now moving away from the lapping waters of the shoreline. He let out a choked laugh as she approached the topic that was long since avoided between the two. She decided to offer a bit of mercy as she grabbed her boots from the sand and walked the path back to Vhagar. "I could offer you a little ride back, should Seasmoke find another rider in your stead."
Laenor paled as he stared over at the giant dragon whose entire length nearly made up the whole beach. "I'd rather wait here until the sun goes down."
"You cannot truly be scared," Rhaenyra mocked, grabbing back onto the rope that would hoist her atop Vhagar's back.
"It's not fear. It's sensibility and mistrust," Laenor said in return, whistling as if it might call Seasmoke right back to him.
"Mistrust for who? Vhagar or me?" Rhaenyra asked, walking under the shadow of the towers of Dragonstone. They were patched with uneven black ivy, looking like a mutilated finger from the fists of a knuckle. At night, the owls would make it a home, their loud hoots nearly threatening off onlookers. By day, however, Dragonstone was voiceless in its long shadow over the beach. They loomed today among the mists, which exhaled the cold season that every black stone breathed out. The trees on the cliffs were all but obscured, their leaves snatched by the breeze that led them right down to the beach in wild circles around her hand.
She wanted to visit the grand libraries in Dragonstone, where the books all mouldered away without her touch. Instead, she had to go back to King's Landing alone.
"Oh both, most definitely," Laenor said with a grin.
"Well, then I hope you stay here all night," Rhaenyra said, tightening her grip on the rope with a laugh as she climbed back up. Vhagar only continued to lounge, her tail smacking against the sands in so abrupt a manner that they flew up into the air and scattered into a cloud of dust that had Laenor coughing.
"At least I'd be alive come morning," Laenor said in return. "And if you leave now before your father's council meeting ends, you might just make it to sunrise as well."
"I'm sure he missed me terribly," Rhaenyra said, settling onto the saddle and wiping her sandy feet against the rough scales. Vhagar snorted from above, a warning that made Rhaenyra smile as she finally slipped back on her boots. "Who else would pour the wine?"
"If you don't like pouring wine, you could give them water instead," Laenor suggested, but she only continued to strap herself into the saddle with a shake of her head. "Oi, are you even listening, my pretty little vermin?"
"I have asked you very nicely not to call me that. Next time, I might just ask someone else to spread the word," she said, reaching forward and patting Vhagar.
"Surely you jest," Laenor said, nearly taking a step back as Vhagar rose to full height. Laenor had been the one to teach her how to curse, since nobody curses quite like those at sea, but she decided not to use that language for him now.
"I hope Seasmoke comes back soon. I'd hate to see you here alone when nightfall hits. They say that's when Vermithor comes out from his great hole and pillages the beaches," Rhaenyra shouted from atop Vhagar's growing back as she commanded her dragon to fly.
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She had watched the maesters wrap the child in a red blanket, a signature of their house. Her sister would have been Shaera Targaryen, had she lived past the first cry. As it was, she became a part of the dead, claimed by the gods that Rhaenyra had prayed to the night before. Before Shaera, had been Valarr Targaryen who never made a sound, stillborn and pale. Rhaenyra often wondered what the world would look like had Valarr lived, the brother who had come before even her.
Visera had taken a day's worth of breath before the Stranger claimed her. Rhaenyra even got to hold her, watching her puckered-up face staring up at her. The newly-born child, yet to be as old as the world nor as wise as the very roots beneath the earth, had cried in Rhaenyra's arms. Visera had such goodness, love, and capability for horrors and pity and sympathy and life. Their eyes were coated mirrors of one another, pure glimmering violet. She had been the first child Rhaenyra had ever held, but also the last. Her final breaths were taken in Rhaenyra's arms.
"Mother, something is wrong," Rhaenyra had whispered, watching her mother's face slacken with such sorrow that it broke something in Rhaenyra's chest. A hollow pit had sunk and moved aside her own organs. "Did I hold her wrong?" Rhaenyra had asked, but the screaming of her mother had blotted out the rest of that long day.
A fighter, the maesters had called Rhaenyra when she had survived the first winter in King's Landing when even sickness had touched her and fled. A dragon can't get sick, her father would say as he pressed his lips against her forehead. Now, she was remiss to remember that her mother was pregnant again, her cheeks sallow and her skin so pale that it nearly looked blue.
"You are quiet," Aemma whispered as Rhaenyra ran the brush through her mother's long silver hair, and it softened under her touch. It smelled of jasmine and almond oil, and a mixture of other scents that belonged to a queen. "And you reek of the ocean and that beast."
Rhaenyra felt her lips rise and fall, but she could see her mother's stare against her cheeks through the large vanity mirror. "She's not a beast, mother," Rhaenyra reminded and the words were second nature by now. "She's bored and restless and wanted to see the ocean."
"She is a savage thing. She killed two of our own kingsguard a fortnight ago," Aemma told her, watching her daughter finally drag her gaze away from the brush in order to meet her mother's eyes. Lilac met lilac, but the younger daughter of ten and four did not relent.
"She did," Rhaenyra agreed, even as guilt pierced through her like a shard of glass. "But they shouldn't have been near her prey." She felt the guilt grow heavier, even after the words had arisen between them. However, she wouldn't apologize for a dragon submitting to its nature in a world that was made for them and humans that came after them.
"I am starting to believe that you are both savage things," Aemma said, and despite the reprimand, the smile was as loving as a mother could make it. Rhaenyra pressed her cheek against the side of her mother's head, running her fingers through the hair. When she pulled away, she saw strands had come with her hand. Rhaenyra refused to let the sadness creep in, and she wiped away the thinning hair.
"I could take you for a ride," Rhaenyra suggested, her smile sharp. "After the babe is born and you are well."
Aemma let out a booming laugh, and her palm met her daughter's cheek with a featherlight touch. Rhaenyra leaned into the cool flesh, her own hand covering the other, but with the small size of her, it hadn't come close to encompassing it. "I am no dragon, nor will I ride one. My dear, when I touch the bath water, I always draw away from the heat." Despite the silver hair and Targaryen features, her mother had more similarities to House Arryn.
"It could be a life-changing experience," her daughter tried again, hoping that her mother said yes, would see the city from above, and finally understand why her daughter never wanted to come down.
"Or I could die before my time because you were so stubborn," Aemma said with a soothing smile that made her daughter's lips finally rise. "Perhaps if you had taken to Syrax as you were meant to, we might not be having this discussion."
"She would not hatch," Rhaenyra defended, but looked away the next moment, away from her mother's probing gaze.
"You were seven and too young to be flying, but you were impatient to wait," Aemma said with a swift reprimand, continuing the argument that had been going on in her small circle of family of King's Landing for years.
"You would not ride Syrax or Vhagar. I think they frighten you," Rhaenyra said with careful conviction that made her mother scoff, now lightly slapping her palm against her daughter's cheek before attempting to stand. When Rhaenyra went to aid her pregnant mother, the woman only brushed away the hand and used her own strength to rise.
"They should frighten all, child. They are dragons, not horses or cattle," Aemma said with a sharp smile through the mirror as she held her belly. The handmaidens now approached from the backroom, taking over for the daughter trying to aid her mother to the chamber pot. "Go off and attend to your duties. Your father needs his cupbearer after all. Give the dragon riding a rest for at least a night of peace."
"As you wish," Rhaenyra agreed reluctantly as she pressed her lips to her mother's cheek before the woman could turn away. "Rest and eat please, your skin is sticking to your bones."
Aemma chuckled, "leave, my little nightmare."
Rhaenyra turned on her heels and departed through the large doors, nearly running straight into Alicient who was mid-knock. Alicient was much taller and steadied her friend by the shoulders as Rhaenyra felt a grin creep up on her face. "You're back," Alicient said with a kind smile.
"It wasn't a long ride," Rhaenyra said, but it was one she made every day. Nothing broke her heart more than watching Vhagar waste away in chains in the dragon pit. When Rhaenyra claimed her, they had chained her. If she had her way, she'd break the iron and let Vhagar go free, taste the countryside at her leisure, before her friend flew right back to her.
"Well, certainly you missed the planning of the tourney," Alicient said, her arm linking into her friends as they made their way down the long corridors of the castle. "I am sure that is no coincidence."
"The planning will go on without me. Is that not what the small counsel is for?" Rhaenyra defended, already feeling embarrassment creep up on her.
In truth, she had hoped to catch her uncle above King's Landing, but every time she had ridden, he had already flown elsewhere. Never one to stay in one place of course. Most council meetings were lately in the complaint of Daemon being rash and abrasive and violent and quick to temper. Rhaenyra could go on, but she'd heard enough and did not take too kindly to the offenses that others brought to her King about a fellow dragon.
"He or she is to be your sibling. I think it's sweet to be involved," Alicient said, ever the little diplomat. Her better half, Rhaenyra would tell her.
"I think the moment heβif the stars truly predict a male heirβis born, I will be forgotten completely," Rhaenyra said with a sort of conviction that made her friend squeeze her closer.
"Your father adores you. It would certainly take something far greater than a son to render you to memory," Alicient assured her, and finally, Rhaenyra met her eyes.
"My veracious friend, how I want to believe that," Rhaenyra whispered back, but she knew her father's wayward ambition. She would catch him sometimes, whispering into the fires as if they'd raise in shape to form Aegon the Conqueror himself, gifting him a male heir, swathed in flame. Alicient gripped onto the dark material of Rhaenyra's dress, her hands warm against her shoulders as she motioned for her friend to stand at her front. The immobility of their feet did not match the hectic life of King's Landing, never at rest.
"You are the Realm's Delight, but also your family's pride and joy. Your father could have a thousand sons, but still, light up like a thousand candles when you smile," Alicient said, her voice soft enough to make Rhaenyra's eyes turn crescent as warmth as hot as dragon flames erupted in her chest.
She wanted to go back to the Godswood, rest her head in Alicient's lap, and feel the touch of the wind on her face as she had the days prior. She even wouldn't mind studying the great histories of Westeros, only for the Septa to chide her on details that weren't in the books.
It was only when she got word of her uncle's arrival in the capital that a touch of life dashed away the worry and fear of the birthing. She stood next to the lord commander, Ser Harrold, and watched Daemon lounge against the throne with no heed to the implications of his actions or concern for the blades that might cut him.
"Gods be good," the lord commander said before she dismissed his disquieting silence and made her way down the steps of the colossal throne room. Each movement had been met with the echos that bounced along the dark room, with only the light of windows shining behind him to illuminate the space in front of the many blades. It certainly was not a restful throne, and Aegon the Conquer had once said that no throne should be sat in comfort.
The right king would never be cut, or so some would say. Rhaenyra wasn't sure she believed that, wasn't sure anybody could be worthy enough to avoid a knick entirely. She even saw her father wiping away specs blood from time to time.
And his younger brother lounged against the iron chair as if he were born for the throne. She couldn't completely fault him for it, and perhaps felt jealous of his ability to do as he pleased. She had sometimes dreamed, when the nights were particularly long, what the iron would feel like from under her dress. She never got far enough in her fantasies to imagine a crown.
Daemon watched her come forward while Ser Harrold watched her back drift further and further away. She had no doubt that his hand was resting upon the sword hilt, but she would never fear her uncle's wrath. Even now, even years from now, she couldn't find it in her to be afraid.
"What are you hoping to accomplish, uncle? Besides taunting the goodwill of my father," Rhaenyra said in high Valyrian, slipping into a tongue of privacy since the commander wasn't about to leave her alone with any man, let alone Daemon Targaryen. Very rarely did she get Daemon to herself, outside of watchful eyes, and it had made Valyrian rise as their walls. It locked them inside a place where only they could exist as two dragons who loved the chaos.
"It could very well be my chair one day," Daemon said, brows raised as he leaned against his fist, elbow resting on the steel that might yet cut him. He managed to look as if he belonged or as if he had always been there, and the amusement melded into the danger of his words. Rhaenyra was grateful her lord commander spoke not a word of High Valyrian, even as she sought Daemon with her need for some congenial company. "It's best to introduce an heir to the realm. Even a tourney in my honor."
"The tournament is to the new heir," she amended her words before voicing them, but the amused smile on her face was unavoidable as she took in her uncle's casual treason.
"Could be a girl. You pour their wine so well, little dragon, but I don't trust the prophecy of mere men with their hands in their cups," Daemon said, watching his niece approach the throne closely. "Do you?"
She wasn't so blinded by her unwavering admiration for him to not notice his casual slight, but she only turned the words over in contemplation. Rhaenyra saw his armor, his hair that had been swept left and right by the turbulent winds, and wondered about his adventures. She often amused herself with thoughts of his freedom.
"Do you only come to court in order to cause a spectacle?" Rhaenyra asked, now stopping in front of the dais. He let out a chuckle, leaning forward as his eyes raked down her face.
"Court is dreadfully boring otherwise," he told her with a soft smile. "Is that not why I see your beasty gone every visit?"
"I might just be at court less than you, uncle," she agreed with a conspirator's smile. "If you hate it so much, why visit at all?"
He hummed, now standing to take swaggering steps down the stairs. His pace was relaxed, measured even and his eyes never left her own even as the lord commander sent him a look of repugnance. Rhaenyra heard the shuffle of armor that signified that the knight had now turned away, so as to offer a modicum of privacy. "As I said, the tourney in my honor."
"As I said," Rhaenyra countered with a biting smile. "My brother will yet supplant you."
Daemon had a way of looking at her like she was the most important one in the room, a feat indeed considering most of the court passed over her. Even when she sat alongside the council, she never forgot that she'd only ever hold a cup. However, he also had the outstanding ability to make her feel as though she were the most foolish girl in all 7 realms. Truly it was a gift he had, which he bequeathed her often at his leisure and it was as abundant as his many offerings. "So cruel to your elders. Perhaps I will turn the gifts I bring elsewhere." For all the straightness of his back, he walked with a lazy slouch.
She felt her smile overtake her face as he leaned on one hip, looking down at her. She hadn't seen him since his name day of nine-and-twenty, when he had gotten so drunk he forgot all but Valyrian and disappeared into the lower city for the night. Now, sober, it seemed he decided not to use Valyrian at all to address her.
"Do not deem me ungrateful, uncle, but my gift is merely your presence in this dreadfully boring court," she replied swiftly, sending the throne a conspiratorial smile. "Even if you choose to make your presence known so scandalously."
He smirked, and he drew a blade from his side. It was light in his touch, the smooth leather bound by three golden pins that glinted off the light cascading from the glass planes behind the throne. Her attention was swept from the golden embroidery to the ruby encrusting at the top. She was still staring into the eye of the jewel when he withdrew the blade from the scabbard. He was casual about it, even as Ser Harrold had turned back toward them, as if he thought Daemon were truly about to murder his niece in broad daylight. Rhaenyra always saw him as attempting it in the shadows, between one nightmare and the next.
"So little trust in this shit-filled city," Daemon said, and despite the mirth in his voice, his ire was something that Rhaenyra always found visceral. Sometimes, she could see it in his eyes, spewing out like dragon fire. "If I was to murder you, I'd certainly not do it here."
"You got me a sword. I'd rather not my first visualization of it be so garishly unfavorable to me," Rhaenyra said, and she held out her hands, watching her uncle's brows quirk, but he did not place it into her awaiting palms.
"Have you even been trained to wield so much as a dinner knife?" Daemon asked, watching his niece's excited glimmer, and the way she examined the Valyrian steel. It was likely the same way he often looked at the emblem of the Hand, placed upon Otto's breast.
"I could learn," Rhaenyra shot back, her darkening gaze dragging away from the shimmering steel and back up to him.
"Of course. And who would teach you? Your commander is looking a bit old," Daemon said lowly, as if he even minded that the older man should overhear it.
"If you would stop fighting with everyone you meet, maybe you could stay long enough to educate me," Rhaenyra suggested, and his smirk came back with full force.
"You lack the testicular fortitude for my tutelage," he commented in return, but offered the blade despite his insult.
"So everyone keeps telling me," Rhaenyra said, grabbing the blade and being reminded of the day she held Dark Sister in her hands. The blade glinted, and despite the thickness of the steel, it was feather-light in her hands. It was the ripple pattern in the steel that gave it away.
"Do you know what this is?" Daemon asked, so soft that she nearly did not hear him. The words were hers alone.
"Valyrian steel," she whispered, still stroking down the smooth end of the blade. "You had it made for me?"
"Seems they are quite ready to give every last inheritance to the prophecy of a son," he whispered back, his underhanded, trickster smile disappearing the moment he said, "Lift your arms."
He closed in, her eyes on his chest as he strapped the scabbard to her waist. It hardly fit the dress, contrasting her gorgeous braids in such a way that would have the other lords and ladies whispering. She trailed her eyes up his chest, to his ever-present smirk as the commander at arms scoffed once again. He was looking over her shoulder, taunting the old man with his close distance.
"And here I thought I was to get another necklace," she told him, lips curled in a nearly shy manner that she immediately hated. She envied so many qualities of Daemon's, but none more than his confidence. He already stepped back, lowering to put away the sword that would have her father seeing red.
"After you stole my sword, I thought perhaps you might grow tired of trinkets and dolls," Daemon said in return, watching her carefully as she smiled. "You may not get Dragonstone, but you will get a piece of Old Valyria."
She despised the light feelings bubbling in her stomach, but she quenched them just as quickly when she stroked the end of the blade. It drew a slash of blood that had her drawing away as the red droplets caressed her skin.
"Terrifying you are," he whispered, his eyes shining with restrained mirth.
"I'd rather you did not mock me," Rhaenyra said after some pause.
"I am not," he said carefully, his tone dripping in some manner of solemnity, but it was hard to tell with Daemon. It was always difficult to know if what he spoke was merely how he felt or if he wanted to gather a reaction he could use against someone later. It was the rare moments where he showed restraint, that is, which was nearly as rare as his presence in court.
She paused, head tilting. "Let's get you out of here before you start a civil war."
Daemon only laughed, the sound so sweet that she wished she could bottle it and wear it alongside the trinkets he brought her from Dorne three moons ago. "I hold far too much love for this family to fight it." He said this as if he hadn't dedicated his entirely fighting it, nearly as much as he fought for it.
She felt him move to her side, his arm around her shoulders as she was pressed to his hip. His lips met the side of her head, pressing into her hair. The touch was featherlight, there and gone, before he walked straight past her.
She was still smiling, one hand holding the other from behind her back. She shared a knowing glance with the lord commander as Daemon walked on past him. She paid no heed to the blood, merely swiping her finger into her mouth to taste it.
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Rhaenyra watched the knights, feeling like Laenor as she saw each of their movements strike with fluid ease. Her father had told her the council had not needed a cupbearer today, her own duty as easily giveth as it may be taketh. She was banned from riding, all for leaving too long on the last journey to Dragonstone. Daemon must have done something to incite her father to ire, not surprising Rhaenyra.
"Must he continue to spoil you with useless trinkets," her father would say on the days her would bring back priceless fabrics for her court clothes, golden jewels, and rich gifts. They often had her in disbelief at the fine silks and wondrously woven cloth which arrived in numerous trunks and nearly filled her room with the rainbow colors that seemed out of place against the droll brick of the palace. Her maidservants would hold them carefully with their worn and gnarled fingers as they went to put them away.
When he saw the Valyrian steel, however, he had gone red in the face, practically bristling with a well of wrath that he swallowed with a thin smile. He said nothing, for despite his dislike of it, he never took away the gifts that brought her such joy. However, though he might let her keep it, she had yet to prepare herself for his refusal to let her learn to wield it.
She had never wanted to be a knight. She liked the fine clothes and the pretty ornaments of a princess well enough. The men down below moved with such ease and brutality, striking with force that would break her own arms should she raise even Valyrian steel to defend it. She didn't want to wear the heavy armor or even a gold cloak.
"You are supposed to be in council," Alicent said, and Rhaenyra leaned against the ledge with a glazed expression, wishing Laenor were here to battle off the rising, clawing, listlessness.
"Do you ever wonder what it's like?" Rhaenyra asked, and turned her gaze to her friend. "To be a man instead of being steered by them?" Her mother was on her next child, and often Rhaenyra would ask if she ever thought about finding elsewhere but the birthing bed.
"I think those wondering thoughts make you an unsatisfactory subject," Alicent replied, too quickly at that. Rhaenyra's lips curled up, having her answer despite her friend's reluctance to give her one.
Later on, Daemon Targaryen spent the night with whores, who stripped the armor off his shoulders with haphazard disregard for the splatters of dry blood that decorated them. He had spent much of the night brutalizing the lowest of Flea Bottom, rounding them up for execution. The night was littered with blood, with the glimmering golden cloaks that he had decorated the city watch with the previous moon.
She had heard the rumors of course, the devious ones and the biased ones from the fool, Mushroom, who would often listen with close interest. He told her often of scandalous whisperings of King's Landing, even when she did not ask. The night would be talked about for generations to come, Mushroom had assured her on the days her uncle was made Commander of the City Watch a year and a quarter ago.
Rhaenyra thought him as restless and listless as when he was Master of Coin three years ago, or Master of Laws only two years ago. She had seen the strife he wedged into the small council, and when he left, she saw Otto Hightower implore his removal multiple times in between her comings and goings with more wine.
"Have you tried showing restraint?" Rhaenyra had asked her uncle as they met in between one banquet to the next. "Our Hand clucks and clucks at your removal, and each time my father moves just slightly out of your favour."
Daemon only laughed, but she saw the way his eyes would move over Otto Hightower as a hunter aims a spear at a boar. "A parasite and a leech must be cut off at its source, less the cunt gain more power," Daemon had said, never making his disgust at Otto Hightower a hidden sentiment. His source, Rhaenyra thought with a fond smile, was likely Otto's very neck.
As she watched him, she thought about the chaos he had consigned to Flea Bottom the previous week. She would often see the inhabitants from above, as one watches a play in motion. Her mind sprung to the peach trees behind the baker's house, playmates laughing in tandemβwhat was like, she would never know. She thought on the rice flowers, mothers and father pounding straw, light from cracked windows, and the frogs on the embankment. Midsummer afternoons had never looked so freeing as they had from up above the city. The sorrow and the joy were so intermingled that she felt emotionless.
Now, she imagined it looked as Daemon wished. The children were staying inside, nursing wounds from the severed hands of fathers who would never lift another hammer to a sword. How many were punished? She could ask, and she knew Daemon would tell her, but his answers would be fickle and perhaps not so true.
Mushroom had embellished the tales of the Rogue Prince, Lord of Flea Bottom, making out her uncle to be dastardly and extraordinary.
Her father had told it differently to her face, only to say the opposite to the council. Dragons must protect other dragons, for when they fight, Westeros burns.
"Perhaps, princess, you might look less upon my favour and more on gaining traction in your own House. A dragon in the sky, but a little mouse in the capital," Daemon said with darkening eyes, as if he were unimpressed. Unimpressed with the cups she held or the blade that she still could not use.
"Master of Coin for a year, where you gambled coin away," Rhaenyra said carefully, just as he went to turn from her. "Master of Laws for six months, where you broke them." Rhaenyra loved and admired Daemon to her very soul that sang for him. The whispering grew louder in her head that breathed out violence and anger for his ever absence, returning only to pass over her or offend her. Or, worse crime of them all, ruin the play of peace over the city she watched. He'd leave soon enough, away, away, away to places she could never go. "Commander of the City Watch, I wonder, how long would your sight last?"
Daemon's head tilted sideways, appraising the girl for a moment before they swept right over her shoulder again. "My Little Dragon indeed," he said with a chuckle that swept down her spine as his eyes had done moments before. "Let's both hope the babe is a girl, and perhaps you may just yet get one last consideration."
Rhaenyra smiled right back, though never in her fantasies had her father turned to her and told her she was the only child he needed. By that same regard, even in the deepest of dreams, Daemon never knelt before her and called her Queen.
"Good luck on the tourney, uncle," she said in reply, swallowing pride and strife and mustering up the will to smile. "Perhaps you may win my favour."
"I prefer your favour in private," Daemon told her in return, walking past her once more. "And perhaps, at times, in silence."
