Part 1 of the "A Game of Wings" series
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Archive Warning: No Archive Warnings Apply
Category: Gen
Fandoms: Game of Thrones (TV), A Song of Ice and Fire & Related Fandoms, Winx Club
Relationships: Cersei Lannister & Tyrion Lannister, Cersei Lannister & Jaime Lannister & Tyrion Lannister, Cersei Lannister & Jaime Lannister, Tyrion Lannister & Tywin Lannister, Jaime Lannister & Brienne of Tarth
Characters: Cersei Lannister, Tyrion Lannister, Jaime Lannister, Lyanna Stark, Ellaria Sand, Elia Martell, Tywin Lannister, Olenna Tyrell, Brienne of Tarth, Walda Frey, lots of bit parts that i don't want to clog up the tags with when they don't even talk
Additional Tags: Alternate Universe - Winx Club, No Incest, Female Friendships yo, Background Relationships, ellaria/oberyn and elia/rhaegar, screw canon timeline and screw canon geneology, i do what i want because literally no one can stop me, me: i have fixed game of thrones., grrm: sanitized a perfectly forked up story is what you did!, look at it! it's got healthy relationships!, GFY, no betas we die like man, i'm also making up my own rules about magic, some hints of braime, oops i made it a little sad, jaime's chapter didn't make it any better, Genderqueer Character, Crack Treated Seriously
Additional Notes: Inspired by The Third Blessing by LadyRhiyana. i affectionately refer to this as The Worst AU In The World. Eh, i've done weirder aus.
Crown Princess of the Shining Sun, heiress apparent to the Throne of the Utmost West, Keeper of the Royal Scepter, and Jewel of Solaris was never a difficult string of titles to live up to until Cersei Lannister turned sixteen. Tutors were serviceable for the immature magic of children, but sixteen years marked the beginning of magical maturity and the need for specialized training
Father—Prince-Regent Tywin, rather—eventually selected Alfea College, citing its exclusive curriculum in training future Guardian Faeries, and while Cersei was crushed to be separated from Jaime, the rush of finally coming into her own sustained her through their parting. It kept her warm, like the Second Sun of Solaris, moving through the biting cold between dimensions, and even buoyed her through the sinking feelings of loneliness and homesickness upon arrival.
The excitement of learning more magic, gaining her wings, becoming a Guardian Faery like Queen Mother before her, could have sustained her through anything.
Anything except the realization that every faery in Alfea, from Headmistress Olenna down to the meekest of her fellow freshmen, had a better grasp on their Winx form than Cersei did. Telekinesis and transmogrification were a cinch, but she'd never so much as fluttered in a breeze. It took three weeks and a hostile encounter with a Cloud Tower witch named Osha for Cersei to earn her wings.
Unfortunately, it set the tone for her time as a faery-in-training.
.
Slamming open the door felt cathartic, but face-planting directly into her bed was pure relief.
"How did your final go, Cerse?" Lyanna ventured from her side of their shared room, not looking up from her packing. Cersei's drawn-out groan in response seemed to be received in the spirit it was intended. "That well, huh?"
Cersei, with great effort, rolled over. "My entire body aches, my magical core feels depleted, and if I have to move so much as another muscle today, I am going to liquefy like one of Mace's potionology assignments." She let out another miserable groan. "And I still have to pack."
"How the Headmistress herself has such a useless example of a fae for a grandson, I'll never know," Lyanna acknowledged the jab with a snort. "But as for packing…"
Alarmed by the mischievous lilt to her roommate's voice, Cersei cracked an eye just in time to see Lyanna wave her hands and send a gust of icy magic toward her belongings. Every article of clothing, scrap of paper, piece of jewellery, bit, bob, and knickknack in Cersei's possession surged into several luggage cases waiting, empty, at the foot of her bed. Every speck of it all, once unpacked, would no doubt be covered in a fine layer of hoarfrost.
Shivering, she pushed herself up onto her arms to glare at Lyanna's quietly smug face. "I hate it when you do that," she said, mutinous, before letting herself fall back onto the bedcovers. "How did I ever get stuck with a Faery of Winter as a roommate?"
A set of knuckles rapped softly on the still-open door, followed by the blessedly warm winds of a desert. "It seems a bit chilly in here for a sun faery," the owner observed, coyly resting her hip on the door-jam. "Not fighting again, are you, Princesses?"
"Ellaria Sand, have my children," Cersei replied, basking in the newly-restored warmth. "Please," she added, for politeness' sake.
Ellaria hummed, pretending to think it over. "I have a date with Oberyn tomorrow night, so I think not." Then she grinned sharply. "But, then again, what's life without a little adventure?"
"Ugh." Cersei grimaced. "Whatever adventures you have planned with Elia's witch of a brother, kindly leave me out of them."
"Heard my name?" Elia's voice echoed from the other side of the dormitory.
"Ellaria's being weird about your brother!" Cersei shouted while Ellaria yelled back, "Cersei and I are eloping with Oberyn tomorrow night! You're invited to the service—cash gifts only, please!"
Lyanna cackled at Cersei's expression of horror and ducked out of the way of a low-level energy blast.
"… Rhaegar says congratulations to the happy throuple, but we can't make it!" Elia called back after a long silence. "Do you have a registry?"
"Fuck's sake, 'Laria," Cersei muttered, finally heaving herself off the bed and over to the door. "Elia Martell, you better not be live-texting your godsawful betrothed again! I will skin you alive if the next rumor flying 'round Red Fountain is that I've gone and married a couple of Dornish spares!"
"… Rude! See if we buy you wedding presents now!"
"Cash gifts only!" Ellaria reminded her princess as she sprawled across Cersei's still-warm sheets. "And I'm the heir to Hellholt, actually."
"My apologies," Cersei acknowledged with a faux-polite curtsy. "A Dornish spare and a member of the Dornish gentry. Much better. Father would have my crown off my head faster than light. Assuming he doesn't already, after he sees the results of my final exam..."
Ellaria cackled at what she called a royal insult, but Lyanna groaned a tossed a pillow at Cersei's head. "Give it a rest, Cerse—you did fine. Better than! In fact, you probably set some kind of record, like you always do!" The temperature of the room dropped with the Stark Princess' rising ire. "You've witched and moaned all about being behind everyone else in Alfea, but you've pulled the highest marks out of everyone in the year since our first big test. Face it, sunshine, you're just a late bloomer!"
"Mmm, Lya's right, you know," Ellaria said, idly twirling a lick of flame around her fingers. "It was bound to happen. You can't be good at everything, Cerse, it isn't fair. Just take your one, single flaw with your many, many strengths and be glad the school year is done, yes? Aren't you excited to be going home?"
"I—" Cersei hesitated, then shook her head. Best not get into it during their last day of the year. The magical exhaustion, the sleepless nights, the nightmares and shakes that came from drawing too deeply from her magical core. They were right. She consistently outperformed everyone else in their year, not to mention half the sophomores, so what did it matter if she felt like spun glass most of the time? It was nothing. "Of course, I'm ecstatic to be going home, since I couldn't go over spring break, Elia!"
"Oh, fuck off!"
She settled next to Ellaria on the bed and curled up around the desert faery to wax poetic about Solaris, and Jaime squiring on Domino, and how happy she was to see Casterly Rock after being away for so long.
.
Achieving her Charmix form wasn't easy, by any means, but nearly two full years at Alfea had settled Cersei into a rhythm of finessing her way through lessons, brute-forcing her way through examinations, and willing herself and her command of nox magic to grow.
It worked.
Until it didn't.
Three years of blood, sweat, and tears at Alfea College for Faeries, down the drain when it came time to graduate. No matter what she did, no matter how hard she tried, her golden wings stayed small and petite, her scarlet dress remained plain, her Charmix brooch glinted in the light, and the power of Enchantix stayed firmly beyond her reach.
Father was furious.
.
"The answer is quite simple," Headmistress Olenna said, weathering Father's glower with aplomb. "Princess Cersei is not, I'm afraid, meant to be a faery."
Cersei stared down at her hands, gracefully folded in her lap, and refused to look at Father.
"Explain," he commanded through gritted teeth. "Now."
Headmistress Olenna fixed him with a stern look. "The poor girl's magical core isn't compatible," she said frankly. "Faeries are heavily reliant on nox magic to begin with, but the Enchantix form cannot tolerate anything more than trace elements of aether in the subject's core. The combination is too volatile—it collapses the transformation field immediately. Your daughter, no matter the incredible skill and determination it must have taken to push her through the Winx and Charmix forms, will never be a Guardian Faery."
It became very difficult to hear anything beyond the ringing in her ears after that, but Cersei had heard enough.
.
She threw a chalice embossed with the Lannister lion at Tyrion's head when he snuck up on her, staring at the sea around Casterly Rock, and gleefully hissed, "I diagnose you with witch!" into her ear.
"You're an awful little brat!" she shrieked, looking around for something else to chuck at his head as he ducked and weaved, cackling madly. "I can't believe nobody's punted you into the sea, you little imp!"
"Ah, but then who would be the Lannister on the Rock!" he replied with a grin, dancing out of the way of the Sun Flare she shot his way. He snickered when a grape bounced off his forehead and onto the stone floor, then carefully settled down next to her on the edge of the balcony when she'd slumped back down. "I heard Father speaking to the Headmistress of Cloud Tower in his study," Tyrion finally said, looking up at her with his big, mismatched eyes full of sympathy. "Melisandre, I think her name is. Though I hear the upperclassmen are allowed to call her the 'Headwitchstress'."
Cersei snorted. "They are. And she already hates me," she said glumly. "Lya, 'Lia, 'Laria, and I ruined all the inter-school pranks for three years running. I think she put out a hit on us senior year because of it. Or maybe Osha was just pissed. Wildling, and all that."
"Crown Princess Catelyn?"
"Stayed out of it, for the most part."
"Well, look on the bright side," Tyrion offered, then hesitated. "At least there's always… Beta Academy?"
They contemplated that thought together in silence.
"I'd rather throw myself into the Infinite Sea," Cersei declared, her lip curling at the thought. "If I'm going to be a witch, then I'm going to be trained by the best that Magix has to offer. Not some mixed-magic public school."
Tyrion reached up and patted her shoulder. "There you go," he said bracingly. "Now let's go find Jaime and pummel him. That's always good fun, and he's been acting strange ever since he got back."
Laughing, because it was better than sniffling like a child, Cersei hauled both herself and then Tyrion to their feet. "Yes, let's."
.
The summer passed in a haze of Solarian festivals and whirlwind preparations for Cersei's Princess Ball.
Jaime remained tight-lipped about his squireship, but the new stress-lines on his face gradually eased until he was almost the same smiling brother he'd always been. He drilled in the courtyard and fetched refreshments for them in the library and teased and comforted Cersei about becoming a witch in equal measure and never let a word pass his lips about the goings-on of Domino and the Targaryen court. By the time the night of the ball arrived, his reticence was forgotten in favor of celebrating.
Now Guardian Faeries of Dorne, the Northlands, and the Riverlands, each of her former-roommates made fantastical entrances to the ball, appearing in showers of glitter and sparks and clad in beautiful, flowing gowns. Elia, finally married to Crown Prince Rhaegar of Domino, looked a little wan and washed out, draped in layers of satin and samite in her Martell red, orange, and gold, but embraced Cersei as warmly as ever. Ellaria, in artful strips of Uller red and yellow that made no effort to disguise her swelling belly, kissed Cersei full on the mouth and laughed delightedly at her expression. Lyanna stood out in heavy white and grey furs of the Northlands, while Catelyn's bodice and full skirt of Tully blue lent an appropriately regal air to the newly-crowned Queen of the Riverlands.
At the end of the night, when Father announced that Cersei would be attending Cloud Tower Academy for Witches at the start of the next term, there was a ripple of surprise followed by supportive applause. It helped boost her spirits when she departed three days later.
.
In keeping with the theme of her life, Osha ended up being the R.A. for her new dorm.
Cersei gulped and smiled winningly at the Wildling senior—who'd never consented to call her anything but "little pixie" as long as they'd known each other—but other than a few tame threats of dismemberment, the arrangement seemed to suit. The senior witch had mellowed out over the course of their friendly rivalry just enough to accept Cersei's change in primal form with a diplomatic shrug, and even let her look over some old assignments. Gave her a few tips on hexing, too, which they both knew was Osha's specialty.
Her new roommates, though, made her feel old just looking at them: bright-eyed and boisterous sixteen-year-olds to Cersei's far more seasoned and settled twenty. The Crown Prince of the Reach, Willas, was an agreeable enough lad, not raising an eyebrow at her age. Benjen Stark greeted her like long-lost kin.
And then, of course, Elia's brother Oberyn was the teaching assistant for her Intro to Poisons course. He looked like his nameday had come early when she first stepped through the classroom doors.
It wasn't as awful a time as Cersei had feared, however. The final grades for her first semester were fairly abysmal—learning to use aether instead of nox was a bit like a mermaid learning to breathe air instead of water—but magic came easier at Cloud Tower than it ever had at Alfea. The witches around her even came to view her Winx and Charmix forms as fun party-tricks more than anything, after a few thwarted attempts at hazing.
Still, spring break saw Cersei remaining on campus for remedial studies.
After all, easier didn't mean easy, and she'd spent three years of intensive magical training exclusively learning to use nox magic. It took some getting used to. But, no stranger to hard studying and uncooperative magic as Cersei was, the day before the start of second semester came with a breakthrough.
Aether magic didn't feel soft and dark like nox magic, but bright and sharp, like a lightning strike; if she wanted to use it, she had to be the lightning rod, rather than the earth. By the end of the year, the only freshman with higher marks than Cersei was a rather dour-looking Baratheon.
He seemed to take it as a challenge.
.
(The less said about the following summer, the better.)
(Many worried, quietly and to themselves, that Jaime might never recover.)
.
Witches didn't have forms.
It shocked Cersei, a little, when she finally realized.
Yes, when she had her freshman breakthrough and finally managed a transformation field, it was exciting and dramatic in the same way that accessing her Winx form used to be. But for all that she could reach for her aether and twist it, and suddenly be wearing a delightfully plunging neckline, leather pants, swooshing cape, and stylized C on a chain against her diaphragm, it was almost entirely… aesthetic, for lack of a better word.
There were no higher forms to reach, or bright, flashy costume changes to signify levels of power. A witch simply stepped sideways through their magic and came out the other side wearing a visible representation of their allegiance to aether. A witch was a witch was a witch; a freshman couldn't be separated from the headmistress but their ages.
It was, for a crown princess, somewhat of a letdown; it was, for a failed faery, terribly refreshing.
.
Just because they didn't have different forms, however, didn't mean there weren't different levels of power and benchmarks to be met.
Freshmen focused on erebos, connecting with their aether on a deeper level than mere superficial use; sophomores were meant to learn khaos, the social and cultural aspects of witchery; juniors aimed for zephyros, the art of flying and further mastering their magical domains; and a senior could only graduate by demonstrating empyrus, the soul-deep embracing of and commitment to the use of aether.
In the wake of the fall of Domino, Cersei buried herself in khaos. Embracing the icy proudness that Melisandre projected and throwing herself into the mischief of inter-school rivalries was an escape from the political turmoil outside the Tower.
She was only a student, two-thirds of a faery and not even that much of a witch; it was more important that she train and focus on her studies than watch the Magical Dimension threaten to crumble around their ears.
.
"And, oh, to fly again!" Cersei sighed insistently, trying to tell if Tyrion looked taller upside-down. "I've missed flying, Tyr, so much. It's one of the few things I've really missed about being a faery."
"I look forward to experiencing it myself, then," Tyrion replied with a small smile. He seemed very amused by the way she'd draped herself on the chaise lounge by the fire—feet slung over the back, hair gathering dust and dirt on the floor—and not at all serious enough for how ecstatic Cersei was to finally fly again. "I'm sure it will be quite a boon, being able to look people in the eye without a ladder. I may never let my feet touch the ground again."
Cersei frowned.
"You don't have to be a fae," she mumbled through the haze of wine that made her tongue feel clumsy inside her head. It also made it even more difficult to tell if Tyrion's flippant words came from humor or humor to cover bitterness—a feat that was terribly difficult even without the drunkenness and melancholia. "You—you could be a wizard or, or a Specialist!" Twisting around on the chaise, she propped her chin on her hands and fixed her littlest brother with a very stern and grown up look. "You don't have to just—do what Father tells you to."
"Don't be ridiculous," Tyrion tutted, giving her a look of his own, which was much more eloquent than hers and said very clearly that he thought that was the stupidest thing to ever come out of her mouth. His face could be very rude like that. She'd spouted plenty worse nonsense than that when she was a teenager. "There hasn't been an unequal magical balance in the heirs of Solaris for two hundred years, and Jaime is already training to be a Specialist. Besides, Father is the Prince-Regent of the Westerlands until you finish your education—or appoint a new regent, I suppose—and I haven't even reached my majority yet." He spread his hands. "What else do you propose I do?"
Scowling, Cersei wracked her brain for an answer. "You could, hmmm… He could, ahhh… Oh! I've got it!" Clapping her hands together excitedly, she rolled off the chaise and bounced to her feet. "I'll make you the new regent!"
A metallic crash broke the stunned silence and Cersei turned to see Jaime, thunderstruck. The silver platter of fruits and scones lay scattered at his feet.
"You'll do what?"
.
Father was furious.
Again.
Cersei acknowledged his point that someone under the age of majority couldn't possibly function as regent, but refused to back down. Before she returned to Cloud Tower the following week, formal announcements had been made that Tyrion Lannister, the Prince of Silver Stars, was now Hand of the Queen on Solaris.
A position that, politically speaking, eked out just a tad bit more respect than that of regent.
Tyrion almost cried at the ceremony, it was fantastic.
.
"You're a bloody senior witch; shouldn't you be able to do something!" Jaime shouted over the shrill screams of the besieged faeries on the other side of the clearing and ferocious roars of the minotaur doing the besieging. "A spell, an energy blast, something!"
Rolling her eyes, Cersei ducked out from behind their shelter of an uprooted tree and aimed her strongest attack at the creature's hide. It bellowed, in either pain or anger, but the spell itself ricocheted back towards them. Cersei threw herself once again behind the enormous tree's bulk. "My magic isn't strong enough to get through its hide!" she yelled back, peeking over the trunk to see that the freshmen had banded together to distract the minotaur from charging the twins. Huddled atop a large boulder, they kept trying—and failing rather spectacularly—to create a convergence attack strong enough to harm it. "What about you, hero? I thought that 'blade of yours could 'pierce any monster's hide'?"
"Well, you know me, sweet sister," Jaime fired back as he chucked something at the minotaur's hooves, "I'd lose my head if it wasn't attached to the rest of me!"
"Are you joking?" she shrieked over the following explosion. "You lost it?"
"Take a look," he said with a shrug, pointing towards the western edge of the clearing.
Outraged, Cersei poked her head around the tree trunk and spied Brightroar twinkling on the ground like the great, golden, useless hunk of metal and magic that it was. "Un-fucking-believable," she swore and sat back to determine if she had enough aether to teleport. She barely had enough to fly, feeling more and more drained as the battle wore on. "Jaime Lannister, you are a useless twit of a Specialist and I am going to have Tyrion ring your neck when we get back home!"
"He's not tall enough," Jaime replied, taking potshots at the beast with his Red Fountain-issue phantoblaster. It roared at the two-pronged assault but clearly wasn't sure which was the greater annoyance, and remained stationary.
"You've sunk low enough for him to reach," Cersei muttered darkly. "Shit, alright, I have an idea but I don't know if it's going to work."
"Well," he said pragmatically as she prepared to run, "it can hardly be worse than no plan at all."
"Keep that in mind, would you? I'd like to have it carved on my tombstone," Cersei snapped, then tossed herself into the open at just the wrong moment. Finally sensing an easy target, the minotaur immediately dropped its head and charged. An energy blast, even weaker than her last, did nothing but singe her cape when she was almost too slow to dodge the ricochet.
With a mighty bellow, it swung one meaty arm, almost as large as she was, and Cersei used one last burst of aether to push herself off the ground and into the air. Just before she reached the arc of the jump, she sent a quick prayer up to who or whatever was listening, and reached.
The thing about witches and faeries, Cersei had concluded after many years of contemplation, was that while they, themselves, were not dichotomous, the aether and nox magics they relied upon were. It had been devastating to learn that her magical core contained too much aether to ever become a Guardian Faery of her realm; the realization that, on the flip-side, she had far too much nox to ever make a proper witch either was far less of a shock.
After all, what kind of a witch reached for a faery's magical form when at the end of their rope?
The wave of nox hit her mid-jump, washing away her witch's robes with the ill-fitting yet familiar trappings of her faery form. The little golden wings she'd once lamented carried her farther still, and she landed in a crouch next to Brightroar's gilded hilt.
Fingers tingling as they wrapped around the magic-infused metal, Cersei scooped the sword out of the dirt and flew for the faeries' refuge. The creature's fingers brushed the leather soles of her boots and roared its frustration as her wings carried her out of its reach. She landed in the center of the group and took stock. They were even younger than she'd first guessed.
One lad had the Stormlands look; the other an Ironman if Cersei was a Westerwoman. One girl looked so much like Catelyn Tully it was like peering into an image of the past; the second put Cersei in mind of the Reach; and the third fixed her with an expression so reminiscent of Osha, she could only be from the Wildlands. Not a bad batch, all said and done. If only they could be coaxed to work together properly.
"Oh! We thought you were a witch," the Reachwoman said, curious. Something about her voice had Cersei thinking about her roommate, Willas.
"I am a witch," she replied with a flippant grin, watching the pixies—for they couldn't possibly be attending Alfea at this age, even if they were neck-deep in Black Mud Swamp—as they exchanged confused looks. "Now, how about you and I show this beastie what a real convergence looks like?"
The Tully girl moved first, taking Cersei's free hand with Lyanna Stark's ice cold grip. Her companions blinked before following suit, and joined hands as well. Cersei looked into the girl's eyes and saw Winter staring back at her. Grinning, she turned to face the now-more-furious-than-ever minotaur. "All together now," she commanded, squaring her shoulders and pointing the tip of Brightroar directly at the creature's heart. "Reach into your magical core. Let the nox flow through you and into me. I'll tell it where it needs to go from there."
A chorus of yes, ma'ams followed and Cersei felt the power begin to build, first at a trickle, and then a flood as they all got a handle on what they needed to do. She'd never felt so much nox at once, filling her up from sole to crown, and Cersei knew she couldn't contain it long.
Breathing deeply, she carved a path for the magic to follow, nudging it towards the glittering red crystal set into Brightroar's crossguard. The blade glowed ever brighter and brighter until it was nothing so much as a miniature sun. It nearly vibrated with all the magic it contained, until it felt like the sword would explode in her hand if she didn't use it soon.
The magic cut off abruptly as the convergence reached its conclusion.
"Good," she huffed out, feeling a bit like she'd downed several cups of wine, "very good. Now stand back."
They all obeyed just as easily as before, though the Stormlord jostled the Ironman when he didn't move fast enough for the bigger lad's taste, who in turn jabbed him in the ribs. The Tully girl cooled them both off with a blast of snow once the minor slap-fight that ensued encroached on her personal space, and Cersei couldn't help the rush of fond remembrance for her old faery friends.
"Here goes," she murmured, catching Jaime's eye across the clearing, who nodded and raised his blaster. The first shot landed between the minotaur's shoulder blades, the second glanced its shoulder as it turned, and the third hit it square in the chest. They did no damage, but that wasn't the point.
Watching the creature charge at her brother, Cersei backed up a few paces, then ran and pushed off the edge of the boulder to give her that much more power. The beast, sensing danger, pulled up and turned its great body just in time for Brightroar's shining golden blade to sink nearly to the hilt into its chest. It roared again as it fell to the ground, then stilled, and was silent.
"That," a breathless voice said, close behind her, "was amazing."
Cersei pulled the sword from the creature's corpse, letting her faery form dissipate and deactivating the blade with little thought, before turning to see the Tully girl. No longer in Rivers blue and ladybug wings, instead draped in Stark white and grey, her ice-chip eyes shined with awe as she took in the gory scene.
"Will we all learn ta do that?" the Stormlord called from where he helped the Reachwoman back to solid ground. Despite his looks, he had a thick Crownlands accent that she imagined made Jaime flinch. "Cuz I won't mind goin' ta Alfea if tha's the kind of sh—stuff we'll be learnin'."
Jaime laughed as he vaulted over the fallen tree. "My sister is a force of nature all her own," he said with a bright, Lannister smile. "I doubt even the laudable teachers of Alfea had much to do with what we just saw. That was entirely her own doing."
The lad looked a bit disappointed, until Cersei reached over and shoved Jaime in the shoulder, at which point he just looked amused. The golden twins of Lannister scuffling like puppies tended to have that effect. She had Jaime right where she wanted him—that is, she had one leg wrapped around his waist from the side, pinning his arm down, while she desperately tried to manage a physically-impossible headlock—when the tallest woman Cersei had ever seen crashed through the underbrush.
"Your Royal Highnesses," the woman gasped, looking exhausted and not a little worse for wear. She breathed in deep gulps of air and leaned heavily against a boulder. The gold and silver dragonfly wings behind her fluttered anxiously, one bent at an odd angle. The coronet studded with rose-colored jewels sat askew amongst her white-gold curls, the layers of azure sateen that gathered beneath her bust and cascaded down to her knees looked dirty and ragged at the hem, and her jeweled sandals were caked in swamp mud, twigs, and leaves. "Ser Storm, Free-Lady," she continued, nodding respectfully at the Stormlad and Wildling.
Cersei marveled at the juxtaposition of breathtaking physical disarray and courtly manners, but for once, Jaime was quicker than her.
"Your Grace," he called in unabashed delight from his slowly-hunching position beneath Cersei's weight. "How wonderful to—oof, Cerse, get off—to see you again! I'm afraid you just missed all the fun!"
The unknown duchess, swathed in Enchantix power that Cersei could feel clear across the glade, took a visibly deep breath before straightening up to her full, considerable height. "Prince Jaime," she said with a blank face and a regal nod. "My thanks for your assistance. The tour group was attacked nearby, close to Lake Rocalucce, and I'm afraid these young ones were separated from the rest of us."
Jaime puffed up as much as he could in his position and continued subtly trying to toss Cersei into the dirt.
"However," the Guardian Faery continued, "you'd think I wouldn't have to keep reminding you that the daughter of a duke is not, in fact, a duchess."
Ah, Cersei realized in a flash, the surprise of it finally allowing Jaime to free himself. She watched as he smoothed his Red Fountain uniform and tried to neaten his hair, twin spots of pink appearing high on his cheekbones. Oh, dear me.
"Oh, fiddle-faddle, Tarth," Jaime replied with an imperious wave of his hand. "You'll be the Evenstar one day. No use pretending you won't, so there's no use addressing you otherwise. Your Grace."
Cersei met the Tully princess' incredulous eyes and mouthed, "Fiddle-faddle?" to the girl's amusement. She raised her eyebrows in response and tried to hide her giggles in a coughing fit, interrupting Jaime's and Lady Tarth's back and forth.
"Oh, princess!" Lady Tarth nearly yelped, rushing over to examine her. "Are you hurt? I should get you all back to the school to be examined. Can't believe the Tower's security failed like that…"
The Tully girl waved away Lady Tarth's concern with an, "Oh, no, I'm quite fine, Brienne." She then launched into an animated retelling of the Lannister Twins' bravery while the Tarth woman gathered the pixies around her to check their bumps and bruises.
Without looking at her brother, Cersei rolled her eyes and called out, "Jaime and I should provide an escort. Since it is somewhat our fault that your tour was disturbed. Don't you think, brother, dear?"
Jaime opened his mouth.
"Yes, quite so. Please allow us to accompany you."
Jaime closed his mouth.
The Evenstar's daughter looked sternly at the two of them before nodding and striding to the edge of the clearing with a brisk, "Follow me, everyone, and stay on the path."
Finally deigning to look at him, Cersei quirked an eyebrow in Jaime's direction, who dipped into his fanciest court bow. "After you, sweet sister," he said with a grin, and took up a guard position at the back of the group. After a few minutes of walking, he slowed their pace so they fell a bit further behind, and dropped his voice. "So, shall I assume I'm not getting that back then?"
Frowning, Cersei looked down at her belt, where Brightroar's hilt had somehow found its place. Her fingers brushed the red jewel at its center and she abruptly realized that despite the effort of the battle, she felt almost invigorated. It used to be, when she attended Alfea, that transformation fields would leave her feeling drained and hypersensitive after they dissipated; at Cloud Tower, she found herself jittery and slow to calm.
Now, staring at their family's ancestral blade, all she felt was a deep well of satisfaction and the hard-earned exhaustion of a battle well-fought.
A hand reached over to cover her own, and she looked up to see Jaime's soft smile and sad eyes. "I suppose Tyrion will be elated that he gets to tell Father to fill out a new set of enrollment forms, eh?"
Smiling back, Cersei replied, "Well, balance is important in this family. He can fill out three," and twined their fingers together as they caught up to the others. Paladin of the Shining Sun, she thought as Jaime once again struck up conversation with Lady Tarth. I quite like the sound of that…