iv. the Realm's Delight
Rhaegar still reads. Father likes it even less as he grows older, says they should be sending him off to squire about now, before they mould him into a weakling. Rhaegar isn't a weakling, he's a healthy boy of his age, but he just doesn't like fighting. Trying always makes him afraid someone will hurt him, or that they'll hurt him. Battles he reads about in history are different, they're grand and heroic, but the reality makes him feel a little sick. He wonders what it is Father's so enthusiastic about.
It's old, the book he reads today, written by a Maester not quite three hundred years ago, near the end of Aegon's reign. A history of the Targaryens, although a somewhat dubious one, between their arrival in Westeros and their conquest of it. Some say many of the passages were copied whole from Signs and Portents, although Rhaegar doubts that.
Mother is ill, and Rhaegar tries to distract himself from the fact. She has not really recovered from Shaena – from the girl born dead; it is probably best not to get too attached – and Father's constant suspicious glare does not help. Father was kind about it once, Rhaegar remembers, but he has lost patience and thinks Mother must be doing something to ruin his seed.
His eyes glaze over the words a bit, as he's not been sleeping well, and so he finds himself repeating the same passages over and over: Born among salt and smoke, beneath a bleeding star. He yawns and rubs his eyes. His is the song of ice and fire. Born among salt and smoke...
A prickle runs down the back of his neck as the words start to actually sink in.
Don't be stupid. Imagine what Father would say if you thought you were– but the smoke; everyone always goes on about Summerhall, none of them will let him forget he was born the day so many died. The realm that wanted to weep for joy wept in grief instead. Fire, it always comes back to the fire.
And grandfather. Rhaegar barely remembers his grandfather anymore, but he remembers that last conversation, if only for how Father reacted. You were worth it. Everything. My father, my daughter, my son... you were worth it. The perfect prince, grandfather called him. He wasn't just talking about Rhaegar. He's not that important. But the prince who was promised...
It's him. It must be.
Of course the damn spider knows where I am, Rhaegar thinks bitterly as he takes the letter. He's always hated his father's bloody eunuch, never trusted him, always felt like the man wasn't just reading his letters, but reading his mind somehow. He did all he could to be sure no-one would find them, but Rhaegar is just a storybook prince, and not the Master of Whispers. There's no way he could have ever outwitted the man, he was a fool to think he could. But Lord Varys did not sell him out to Father, and that bewilders him. He is Father's man, isn't he?
All that is of no consequence when he actually reads what Varys has written. Brandon Stark... rode south to find you... Rhaegar wants to vomit all over the words. And his father... burnt with wildfire, and strangled... No, no, no. Rhaegar is a fool, he has always been a fool. Why didn't he see this coming? He made them all think he had kidnapped Lyanna and locked her up as his personal rape slave; did he think her father and brothers would simply accept that just because he's the prince? Mayhaps Crownlands men would, out of sheer ambition, but he knows the Northerners are a proud, honourable, protective lot – Ly taught him that. He must have known they'd come rescue her. Why didn't he think?
But why would Father kill them? Father hates him. You'd think he'd be glad for the chance to be rid of him.
Father doesn't care why he kills, he just likes to do it. Rhaegar shudders; he can only imagine what the mad king would have done to his wife after taking the lives of the Warden of the North and his heir. His father by law, mayhaps, and his brother. How will he tell Lyanna?
He didn't even plan it, not really. He had meant to ride north like he used to ride to Summerhall: to be alone with his feelings, to see if he could find the beautiful, wild woman he'd met in the snows and frosts of her home. But once he'd got there, he'd known he could not leave without her. He felt too much. He felt too much and thought too little, and now her father and brother are dead.
"Rhaegar?" she enters the hall to find him staring over the letter, his kingsguard in an awkward circle around him. "What's wrong?" He looks up at her and his mouth falls open, struggling for an explanation, but there's nothing he can say and so he shuts it again. Lyanna looks at the letter, and frowns. "Has your father found us?"
He shakes his head. Would that he had. We might deserve it. "No. Ly... I don't know how to tell you this..."
Her eyes grow wider, colder. She is afraid. Of course she is too proud to show it. "Well, I always found talking a good way to tell people things."
Rhaegar sighs. "Lyanna... your brother... he rode to King's Landing, when he found out you'd – I think he thought I'd..." done everything I wanted them to think I'd done, gods help me. "He rode into the capital demanding I come out and die. And so my father took him prisoner."
Lyanna stares on in horror for a moment, then scrunches her eyes shut. "Oh Brandon," she says, and Rhaegar knows what she's thinking – she should have seen this coming too. Then her eyes pop back open. "Wait, prisoner? So he's alright?"
The desperation in her voice makes him want to sob. "No. Ly – my father – he ordered your father to the capital as well."
"No–"
"I'm sorry. But he – he killed them both." He will not tell her the details, the flame and the sword, and Brandon strangling himself to save his father. He will spare her that at least. However there is more he cannot spare her. "Now... your other brother is at war, Lyanna, him and Lord Arryn and Lord Tully and Lord Baratheon as well. They mean to be rid of the mad kings once and for all."
For a long moment she just stares, taking this all in. But then Rhaegar sees her jaw clench, and the grey in her eyes turn to steel. "I need to go home."
"Lyanna–"
"I can stop this; I'll tell Ned the truth and it'll be fine, we can go home and–"
"Lyanna, you can't."
She stops in the middle of her rant and turns to look at him, squinting suspiciously. He forces himself to meet her eye. Why didn't he see this coming either? "I won't let you," he says.
"What?!"
He swallows hard; he can see the rage in her, rage ready to bloom into hatred. "It will do nothing," he says, and he knows he's rationalising pitifully, but it might well be true. "If we had learned of this before father – before – and you explained what had happened, perhaps, but now... the war has already began, Ly. Your brother and betrothed will not rest until they have driven my father from his throne and into the grave. You are carrying my child, Lyanna, I will not let you venture out into a warzone in a foolish hope and get yourself killed."
"Then send your guards to protect me," she says, and he shakes his head. It is not the war he is protecting her from, it is Robert Baratheon. Rhaegar can see him slaughtering the woman who's dishonoured him, and any man, kingsguard or no, who stood in his way. "He's my brother, do you expect me to just abandon him?"
"I do not expect you to have a choice," he says.
Her eyes narrow. "What do you mean, I'm carrying your child?" she asks. "You can't know that."
"I do." Because you must be, I cannot force myself upon you; I am not Maegor the Cruel, I am not Aegon the Unworthy–
"So, what, do you intend to keep me prisoner now? Your little northern bitch to be fucked whenever you like?"
He closes his eyes. "No. I promise you, Lyanna, I will not share you bed unless you wish it."
She scoffs. "You think I'd want to fuck the man who's father killed mine, who's now holding me hostage?" A pause. "So that's it, then. You'll let your family slaughter mine, you won't let me save my brother from a war nobody wants, you'll lock me up in the middle of nowhere, but because you can't bring yourself to actually rape me everything's fine?"
Rhaegar says nothing. "...You're as mad as he is," says Lyanna.
Once, he would have been angry at that. He would have screamed at her for it. He would have hated her for it. He might have hurt her for it. But now, he thinks she's right. "Probably," he mutters.
He does not act to stop her as she storms off. He knows she's not going to try and escape – Ly might be reckless sometimes, but she's not stupid; as good a fighter as she is she won't think she could actually win against three knights of the kingsguard. Rhaegar does not open his eyes once she's gone, for his guards are all still there, and he can't bear to see them judging him either. They will do what he says, but they always did what Father said.
"Do you hate me too?" he asks.
"I could never hate you, Rhaegar," comes Arthur's voice. "But I think you've done a terrible thing."
Of course I have. What king hasn't? thinks Rhaegar. What choice do I have? The dragon must have three heads. He tries to remember his grandfather, although it's been over twenty years and he was a tiny child; the man's face has long since fled his memory. His voice, however, remains. You were worth it. Everything. Rhaegar wonders how he figured that out. Maybe it was just what he needed to believe.
It is not until they're all gone, until he's alone in his grief and shame, that he opens his eyes and actually finishes the letter. The news he receives last is as horrifying as the first. The Grand Maester suspects, although he has not spoken as such officially, that your beloved mother is with child once more. Rhaegar's blood runs cold. No, no, it can't be, she's too old. But Queen Rhaella was young when she bore him, and is not yet past forty.
The dragon must have three heads. Himself, Viserys, and this new babe. It is him after all? Has he done all this for nothing?
He supposes he will find out.
Rhaegar wakes to the sound of pained moaning, smothered against the sheets. He frowns. He's heard that before, although he always wishes to never hear it again. Still, he forces himself out of bed. Better he gets there before Father does.
When he knocks the moaning cuts short, perhaps in fear. He coughs. "Mother?"
"...Rhaegar. Come in." He can hear the relief in her voice, and he does not hesitate, nor is he surprised when he sees the blood on the sheets, and running down her legs.
She stands by the side of the bed, staring down at the pool of blood – and then she turns and looks at him. "Help me hide this," she says.
Rhaegar does as bid, and the two of them strip the blood soaked sheets quickly. I knew she was with child, everyone knew she was with child. But no-one wanted to speak of it aloud, for fear of jinxing the babe. Not that it did it any good. Perhaps they could tell Father this was just her moonblood coming late, but Father's gotten so cruel to them now, Rhaegar doubts he'd believe it.
He's tossed one sheet into the hearth and is about to do the same to the other before his mother stops him. "No. We have to wait. Otherwise you'll just smother the flames."
So wait they do, in silence, and they're both terrified. Father could come at any time, they both know. Rhaegar is struck by how old his mother looks, face illuminated by flickering shadows, although she is not even thirty yet.
"Mother," he says, looking down to the blood caking on her legs, "shouldn't you – clean yourself?"
She looks down with him, and then smiles sadly to herself. "I didn't even think of that."
Mother excuses herself to her basin to wet a washcloth and scrape the blood away, and Rhaegar, once the first sheet is half-burned, is brave enough to pass the second one into the flames. A second after he does it, he hears footsteps. Mother looks up, frozen. "Rhaegar, hide."
"What? No!" He turns around, horrified. "I'm not going to just leave you with him–"
"Rhaegar, there's no time for this, do as I say."
He wants to argue, but his mouth gawps open and the words do not come. Mother paces across the room and opens her wardrobe, and Rhaegar climbs inside, and he should be able to protect her; he's been training for years, he's eleven and almost a man grown, and yet he is still a child, he is still her child.
Once the door shuts on him another one opens. "Rhaella," Rhaegar hears, and Father sounds like he's just been woken from sleep, "what are you wailing about? I could hear your mewling from across the Keep."
Mother hesitates, and Rhaegar's heart thumps in his chest, before she answers. "Forgive me, Your Grace. A bad dream, nothing more."
For a moment, Rhaegar is stupid or desperate enough to think Father might believe it. Then he hears him sniffing the air. "Blood," he says. A pause. "You're burning your sheets."
"I am."
There's no need to explain why. They've been through this before. Father waits a moment, and then lets out a hideous, terrifying roar, and Mother's breath is suddenly choked out of her like she's being squeezed by the throat. Rhaegar digs his nails into his thigh so he won't leap out of his position. She's my mother, I have to protect her, but he knows she'd never forgive him if he tried. Besides, he'd only make it worse.
"You've murdered my son!" Father shouts, and Mother just gurgles. "Whose bastard was it this time, whore?! One of the stablehands, or one of the stallions? Did all my kingsguard have you, one after another, so you couldn't tell whose it was if you tried? Or did Lord Tywin make his way into your bed, have his son steal the throne out from me that way?!"
Mother gasps for breath like he's let her neck go, but Rhaegar knows the respite will be short-lived, and sure enough then the first blow comes. "Worthless slut! Bitch! Traitor! Joanna wouldn't – if Father could see you–"
Despite the rage in him, after the sixth blow Father stops. He considers it beneath the dignity of the king to break the Law of Six, one of Jaehaerys' reforms, but though he might not beat Mother hard he beats her often, so Rhaegar wonders what difference it truly makes. After a moment, Mother speaks. "If Father could see us," she murmurs.
"...This will not happen again," says Father, and they all know he's not talking about the beating. "I will not lose my heirs to your perversions. I will tame you, woman."
He storms out, and as soon as he's gone Rhaegar bursts out of his hiding place. "Mother!" he cries, running to her side, the skin around her eye blooming as purple as its pupil, and even though Rhaegar is still smaller than her he tries to fold her into her arms. "I'm sorry, I shouldn't have hid, I should have protected you, I'm sorry–"
"Rhaegar–"
"I'll kill him, I swear I will, you know how good with a sword I am, I'll never let him do this to you again–"
"Rhaegar!" she pushes him away, looking horrified. "Do you know the treason you speak of?"
"I don't care, he hurt you, I won't let him–"
"Damn you, boy!" And Rhaegar jumps. Father is always losing his temper with him, but Mother, never. For a second she looks as mad as he does. "Do you think I want you to be a kinslayer on my account?!"
Rhaegar gapes for a moment, then averts his eyes. "But – I can't let him–"
"It is not a matter of letting. We have no choice."
Rhaegar flinches as if struck, and when he meets her eye again, she sighs sadly. "I'm sorry, sweetling, I didn't mean to be so – come here," she says, folding him into her arms, and Rhaegar has never felt such a child. "My poor boy. My wonderful, brave, strong, kind boy. But you must be careful. You have a soft heart, and unless you learn to harden it, it will be the death of you."
He wants to sob against her bosom, but he hardly thinks that it what she means. "But what if I do," he says, "and I end up like him?"
His mother hesitates. "You could never be like him."
"How can you know?" he asks. "After all, he wasn't always like this. I remember."
"...No, I suppose he wasn't," she murmurs, perhaps remembering a childhood when he was her brother and nothing more. He expects her to continue, to reassure him, to give him some way to believe he really could never be Father – but she doesn't, and then Rhaegar looks down to the floor.
"Why don't we just run away?" he whispers, barely daring to say it. "Sneak down to the docks and find ourselves passage on a ship. Make our way to Pentos or Lys or somewhere. We'd fit in in the Free Cities, and Father, he doesn't even like us, he'd be glad to be rid of us–"
"But his honour would never suffer the slight. He'd have us both killed out of spite," Mother says, and Rhaegar frowns. What, he can kill his kin, but I can't? "Besides, even if I could, I wouldn't. I am the Queen of the Seven Kingdoms, my duty is here."
"But you never wanted to be queen," Rhaegar says. "You didn't want to marry him. You wanted to marry Bonnifer Hasty." He understands that now, what the crown of the Queen of Love and Beauty meant, and it makes him think how stupid he was to think the man would ever want him as a squire, the son of the woman he loved by the man she was sold to.
"I did," she smiles sadly. "But duty wouldn't mean very much if only the ones we chose counted. I am queen, and you will be king. Our lives are not our own," she says. "I will be the best queen I can be until my dying day. That's more than I can say for him."
Rhaegar looks away again. He knows she's right. I am the dragon. I am the prince who was promised. But he'd really rather not be. "Why does he hate me?" he asks, which is maybe the wrong thing to say when she's the one who's just had her face beaten in, but he cannot help himself. "He wants another son so much. Why does he hate the one he has?"
Mother sighs again. "He does not hate you, dear Rhaegar," she says. "It's just... you were our first born, the seed he planted in my belly when Father forced us to the altar. He did not want to marry me any more than I wanted to marry him. I'm afraid, to him you will always be the child his blood saddled him with, not a child he ever chose to have, and he cannot forgive you for it."
Rhaegar nods, a sense of terror coming over him. "Do you hate me?"
"Sweetling, I could never."
He should leave it at that, be glad he has one parent who loves him, and yet he cannot help himself: "Do you hate him?"
Mother purses her lips together in a stern line. "No."
So maybe nothing she says means anything.
He has to sneak past the guards. He's sure they hear the noise coming from beneath his cloak, and he's afraid they won't want to let him in, afraid of what his father would say – it's not worth their lives – but they just seem amused. That, or they think it's not worth their lives to go defying the crown prince either.
Nyssie looks confused when he wakes her. "What is it?" she asks.
Rhaegar presses a finger over his lips. "Shh. Your mother will kill me if she finds out I woke you at this hour," he says. "I brought you something."
She still looks confused, but that expression turns to one of delight as he reveals what he's been hiding under cloth all this time. "Kitty!"
Rhaegar laughs as she scoops the tiny scrap of black fluff into her arms, and the kitten lets out a meow of alarm before settling in remarkably quickly, starting to purr as Nyssie cradles him to her chest. They match, black hair and black fur. The poor thing started following Rhaegar as he walked back from the tavern, mayhaps a little drunk, but as he watched the half-starved one-eared creature he thought that Nyssie had always wanted a pet, and he thought if he found a stray near home he'd take it in for her, but you don't really get strays on Dragonstone, it's too bare, too barren. He could have sent for one, a finely bred creature meant for ladies and princesses, but it would have to come from King's Landing and he could only imagine Father's sneer if he learnt Rhaegar was wasting the realm's coin on a cat.
"Now Nyssie, you have to keep him secret for a little, alright?" she frowns up at him, confused, and Rhaegar gives his best reassuring smile. "Just for a little awhile, until we head back to Dragonstone. You don't want your grandfather finding out; he won't be pleased."
She nods, looking very serious for a three year old. She's been so frightened since that incident with the poacher, and Rhaegar wanted to cheer her up. For awhile, he thinks he's failed. But then her childish delight wins out again, and she grins. "I love you, Father."
"I love you too," he says. "Now, what are you going to call him?"
He thinks the kitten might make her think of Dorne also, that she might choose something to honour her mother's family, mayhaps for her uncle Oberyn who writes all the time and sends her little gold necklaces picked up in his travels, but instead she chooses–
"Balerion. The black dread."
Rhaenys makes a scratching motion with her nails, and Rhaegar makes sure his smile does not fall.
In truth, he overestimates daughter's ability to keep a secret, and so it's only a few days before he sees her running along the halls with Balerion running behind bookshelves and ducking into alcoves alongside her, Nyssie jokingly shushing him every once in awhile. Rhaegar is about to go fetch them before somebody sees when she turns a corridor, and Rhaegar sees his father, hair matted and talons scratching and looking as monstrous as ever, heading straight for her.
Rhaegar wants to cry out a warning, but his voice seems to be stolen from him. Nyssie, so absorbed in her game, barely notices before she walks right into him. "Y-your Grace," she says, joy replaced with absolute terror on her face, and she performs a feeble curtsey. "Grandfather."
"Princess Rhaenys." Granddaughter, he does not call her. Please, don't hurt her, she's just a little girl, she's my little girl, please. From behind a bookshelf, Balerion lets out a confused mewl, probably wondering why the game has stopped. Father frowns. "What's that?" he asks, and Rhaenys gapes a bit for an answer before Balerion's little black head pops out. "Is he yours?"
"Y-yes. Your Grace," Nyssie stutters out, and Balerion just stands there, watching. Run, you stupid cat! Isn't that what you're good at? Father bears his teeth in a savage grin.
"Can I hold him?"
Rhaegar feels like the air's been punched out of him. No, don't hurt him, he's just a silly kitten; you'll break Nyssie's heart. "Of course, Your Grace," she answers automatically. Balerion himself is considerably more skeptical, but ultimately he leaps into his mistress' arms, and she passes him over to the king.
Father holds the little scrap of fur close to him, and he hissing softly. Rhaegar hopes he might scratch Father's eyes out, and then he and Nyssie could get away in the confusion. That's what a real dragon would do. Father just chuckles. "Oh, he's a warrior cat alright. I bet he lost that ear in a fight. What's his name?"
"Balerion."
"The black dread." Father grins again, and then rubs the kitten behind his one ear, careful not to scratch with his long nails. Balerion leans into the petting. And then–
He passes him back to Nyssie.
She looks as stunned as Rhaegar feels, and quickly holds him close. "Don't let your father catch him," the king chuckles. "His daughter, having fun? Gods only know what he would think."
Rhaegar finally feels like he can talk, breathe, move. "Rhaenys!" he calls out, and she spins around. "You're late for your lessons. Come along."
The relief on her face is palpable, and she runs to his side, throwing herself around his leg. When Rhaegar catches his father's eye for a moment, he sees an expression he's not sure he's ever seen before. I've hurt his feelings, he realises. And he hates that there is still a part of him that feels guilty.
He always comes here alone, not even with guards. Is it safe? Probably not, but he can't bring himself to care. He almost died here the day he was born, and if he does die here after all, that seems rather fitting. It would make an excellent song.
He lies on the ground, surrounded by char and rubble, silver harp hanging loosely in one hand. He will come back with a song, he always does, but he cannot think of anything right now and knows better than to try and force it. Still, there is always a song in the end. Arthur teases him for it, the melancholy prince lying in fields of death to write pretty poetry, and Rhaegar and laughs and teases himself also, and pretends it does not bother him, pretends he does not feel like Arthur must think there's something wrong with him.
Perhaps there is something wrong with him. He knows Mother thinks there is; when he told her where he was going she got that look upon her face. Why would you want to go there? she'd asked, reaching for her wine, and Rhaegar hadn't really known. I have to, Mother, he'd said, which wasn't an answer at all. She almost lost her life here, was barely saved by Ser Duncan, a man of war who had to help her give birth out on the grass surrounded by flame and death. He wonders if it still haunts her. He wonders if she doesn't ever think she'd have been better off had she simply burnt to death with all the rest.
It was King Aegon who'd wanted, who'd needed to hatch dragons, because what are the Targaryens without their dragons? And all he'd done was set half his family ablaze. Everyone always speaks so well of Aegon the Unlikely, the last truly good king of Westeros, noble and humble and kind to the smallfolk. And in the end, he'd slaughtered dozens chasing an impossible dream. He was as mad as the rest of them.
There'd been a woodswitch, Jenny of Oldstones' friend, and she told his grandfather a prophecy. The prince who was promised. And so Prince Aerys and Princess Rhaella had wed, and what a great match that was. Jaehaerys should never have been able to do it anyways, should never have been the heir, should never have had so much power, but Prince Duncan gave it all up. For love.
Rhaegar knows he should not be like them. He should not be too loving, like Aegon and Duncan and Grandfather. But he should not be too unloving, like Father, like the other Aerys. He should not be too sad, like Aegon the Third. He should not be too merry, like Viserys the First. He should not be too godly, like Baelor the Blessed. He should not be too godless, like Aegon the Unworthy. He should not be at war with his own family, like Aegon and Rhaenyra.
I should not be. That would settle the matter, wouldn't it? The Faith is right, he is an abomination. A pretty abomination with a pretty silver harp and pretty silver lance to match his pretty silver hair, but still an abomination. He is not even one born of illicit passion, like his father was, born on the night his grandparents stole away to wed in secret before their father could stop them – Rhaegar knows his family can't be the only one to commit such sins, but they are the only one to have them forced upon them. His mother and father might have been able to love each other, if they'd been allowed to do so as the gods intended, as brother and sister. How can he hate his father for all he's done, when it was not truly his fault, when it was bred into him to go so mad? But Rhaegar does hate him, oh how he hates him. If Rhaegar goes just as mad, and does things just as awful, will he be just as hated?
It was grandfather who did it, King Jaehaerys, three years and barely a paragraph in the histories, but he ruined them all. The hypocrite, who wed his sister because he loved her, the pervert, and then raped his son and daughter with each other's bodies for prophecy. The man who looked at a three-year-old boy and told him he had been worth it, as if he could possibly know.
I am the dragon, I am the prince who was promised. But who would promise the world one of them, a family mad and wrong and doomed, always doomed?
Fuck you, Jaehaerys, and your prophecy. Fuck you, Duncan, and your commoner slut. Fuck you Duncan, and your mad king. Fuck you Jenny, and your woodswitch. Fuck you Mother, and your duty. Fuck you Father, fuck you. Fuck you Aegon, and your dragons. I'm only sad you didn't manage to kill more of them. I wish they all burned.
He's wanted to go among the seaside merchants and see if he can't find himself a shirt or a doll littered with the grey plague, be sent to live out his days in the ruins of Valyria, going even madder than Father. He can do no damage there. They are Valyrians, they belong in Valyria; they should never have left. Westeros, with its seven kingdoms and seven gods, was not meant for them. They tried to reforge it in dragonfire, but in truth they left only a misshapen mess of melted steel, fit for no-one, man or dragon. The dragons are all gone. They were wise enough to realise they did not belong.
Rhaegar reaches for his harp and plucks one note, only to break the string. Of course. He sighs and lies back down. I wish we all burned, he thinks. Fuck you, Daenys, and fuck your dreams.
Lyanna is already awake when he knocks on her door. From the armour he wears, he knows she knows why he's here. "You're riding to battle," she says, and it is not a question.
"I am," he answers anyway. "Are you relieved?"
She shrugs. "Well I might hate you, but I don't even know the rest of them," she says. "What are you doing here?"
Rhaegar sighs. "I wanted to – apologise. About what I said the other day." He's avoided her since that fight, too ashamed to meet her eye. "I hope you know, I didn't mean it. I did not choose you because I thought you were stupid. I chose you because you were strong. Because you were brave. Because I thought, maybe, I might be able to make you happy."
A long pause, and then Lyanna sighs in return. "I know," she says. "There are a thousand stupid girls who would have spread their legs for you at the first opportunity. But you had to choose the least politically convenient one of the lot."
He smiles weakly at that. "To be fair, I was also pretty stupid, and spread my legs pretty easily," he says. Lyanna laughs at that. Then she pauses.
"You're going to fight Robert, aren't you?" she asks and he nods. "Look, if – if he surrenders, you will show mercy won't you?"
"Of course." Robert would never do that and everyone knows it, but Rhaegar would if he asked. He feels no joy at the thought of killing a man who believes Rhaegar kidnapped and raped his betrothed. Lyanna chews her lip.
"He's not a bad man," she says. "He wouldn't have been a very good husband but he's not a bad man."
Rhaegar sighs and, feeling like she won't lash out at him for it, comes to sit on the end of her bed. "You said he already had a bastard in the Vale."
Lyanna averts her eyes and shrugs uncomfortably. "Well I ran away with a married man and am carrying his bastard right now. Who am I to judge?"
"Not a bastard," Rhaegar insists. "Remember the godswood? We were wed in the eyes of the Old Gods."
Lyanna looks confused for a second, and then she laughs. "Oh, right," she says. "I'm not sure how many people still follow that tradition. I'm not sure how many people even know about it."
"Well I know," says Rhaegar. "And to me at least, you are my wife."
She raises an eyebrow. "You already have a wife."
"Aegon the Conqueror had two wives, why can't I?"
"Because you are not Aegon the Conqueror."
He averts his eyes. She has a point there. He is not Aegon the Conqueror, or anyone so admirable – no, he is his grandfather again, he simply fucked the woman he wanted behind everyone's backs, made her his before they could stop him. And it proved just as costly. "You can go back to Winterfell," he says. "If you want, I'll have the kingsguard escort you."
He meets her eye again, and she sighs. "Left it a bit late, didn't you?" she asks. "I can barely waddle to the window in my state, let alone make it all the way to Winterfell."
She's right, of course she's right. The babe is almost here, and they have to keep her safe until then. He cannot fix it now; the only solution is to have never done it in the first place. "I'm sorry," he says, looking away again, and he feels like he's about to cry but he realises he has no right to do so.
"...Why did you do it all, Rhaegar?" Lyanna asks. "I might be pretty, but I know there was more to it than that. What did you tear the realm apart for?"
He lets out a broken chuckle. "The dragon must have three heads."
"Yes, but what does that mean?"
Rhaegar lets out a heavy sigh. He's not sure he's ever spoken of it aloud. "There's a prophecy," he explains. "The prince who was promised. It goes back centuries, before Aegon, before us. He's meant to save the world from – something. No-one really knows what." Lyanna frowns, but she's listening. "When Prince Duncan married Jenny of Oldstones, she brought a woodswitch to court. And the witch told King Jaehaerys – my grandfather – that the prince would be born from Aerys and Rhaella's line, my mother and father, that's why he made them wed. That's why I was born. Grandfather was convinced it was me, although I don't know why, I was only three when he did. For years I thought – Summerhall, the salt and the smoke, it had to be me, but then – the comet, so I thought it was Aegon instead. But the dragon must have three heads, that was in the book I first read, but Elia couldn't – so..."
It turns out, spoken aloud it all sounds a bit mad. Still, Lyanna nods like she almost understands. "But why go to so much trouble to fulfil a prophecy, if it's meant to happen anyway?" she asks. "You're a mythical hero, great. Your son is so you don't have to do all the work, even better. But why ruin your life for it? Why is it so damn important?"
"Daenys," he says, and she looks even more bewildered. "There – there has to be a reason. We must have escaped the doom for something. The Gods wouldn't have shaped us into this, they wouldn't have made us into murderers and sisterfuckers and monsters unless... unless..."
He looks away again, not sure how to end that sentence. After a long pause, Lyanna speaks.
"Rhaegar, do you want to talk about your father?"
Grandfather is with the maesters now, and Rhaegar is still worried, but there's nothing he can do. He's been summoned to meet Father, which he doesn't understand, and in the throne room, which he understands less.
He enters to see Father upon the Iron Throne, which makes him frown. "Are you meant to be sitting there?"
Father doesn't answer, but Rhaegar thinks he sees his eye twitch. "Come here, boy."
Rhaegar's confused, but not scared. He knows Father can have a temper, but only really to people who don't show the crown prince enough respect. He's always been kind to his son. When Rhaegar gets close, however, scrambling up the steps, Father turns a violet eye on him. Rhaegar shudders. He doesn't look like Father at all.
"Is something wrong, Father?"
"Your grandfather wanted to see you," he says, and Rhaegar nods. "Why?"
Rhaegar frowns. "Um..." Father taps his fingers on a blade impatiently. "I'm not sure. I didn't really understand what he was talking about. But he is sick, right?"
"What did he say?!" A little spittle flies from Father's mouth.
"I – I don't really remember?" Father's eyes narrow, and Rhaegar, starting to be nervous, tries. "He said – he said I was brave, and handsome, and smart. He said I was the perfect prince. He said I was 'worth it'?"
Rhaegar still doesn't understand any of that, but from the way he grits his teeth, he thinks Father might. "He thinks it's you."
"He thinks what's me?"
Father grabs his collar and pulls him close, and Rhaegar lets out a wail of pain as his feet slip out from under him. "It's you, of course it's you," he spits, twisting Rhaegar's shirt in a ball until it chokes him, and tears come to his eyes. "Three fucking years old and you're already the perfect prince. It's not me, it could never be me; too proud, too vain, too reckless. I'm just keeping the seat warm between you two, am I?"
Rhaegar isn't listening, he's trying desperately, futilely, to pull out of Father's grip, but that only makes him pull tighter. "Father, please–"
"You're so smart, everyone says, not like your stupid Father. Do you think you're better than me boy? Do you?!"
"No, no–" of course not, he's always loved his father, why would he even think that?
"Look at you, crying like a little girl, like your mother," Father sneers, and Rhaegar tries desperately to stop the tears coming, but they won't. He's scared. Why is Father acting like this? "You're nothing, you hear me?! Nothing! All you are is my son! You're only the prince because you're my son, you'd be nothing without me, you'll never be any better than me, do you understand?!"
"Nothing, I'm nothing, please let me go Father, please–" he sobs and then Father tosses him back down the stairs, and as he goes tumbling Rhaegar feels a sharp snap in his wrist. He almost screams in pain, but he bites his tongue. That might make Father angrier.
When he dares look up, clutching his wounded hand in agony, Father has not moved. He is still sitting in the Iron Throne, and he does not look at his son. "Get out of my sight," he says.
Rhaegar, three years and terrified, runs.
The dragon has many heads now, he thinks as his vision starts to blur, the crest on his armour sprawling head after head, although he's not sure what is the pattern of the dragon and what is blood from where Robert smashed him with his warhammer.
What will happen to my dragons now? Aegon and Nyssie are in the capital, and poor sweet Elia, with his father, and that was frightening enough but now Robert is coming for them – and Lyanna and her babe, who even knows what will happen to them?
The prophecy, the dragon must have three heads; they have to survive, it has to protect them, but in truth he never understood that prophecy, he just wanted to believe it could understand him, and maybe it never had anything to do with him at all. His parents have other children.
I tried, gods I tried so hard, he wanted so much to make his family right somehow, to make them good. Robert thinks the only good Targaryen is a dead one. What about your grandmother then? but Robert doesn't seem the type to be too concerned with his ancestry. He would never understand.
As the life slips from him, he finds his mouth twisting into the shape of a woman's name. But he dies before he realises whose it is.
