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Storm Untamed
Chapter 4
Argella had entered Storm's End at Orys' side, with Rhaenys tactfully behind them and Argella hating her for that. She had declined the Targaryen woman's offer for one of the gowns she had brought with her, opting instead for the filthy bloodied cloak she had been delivered to Orys in. The Targaryen men had ridden behind her like some misplaced guard of honour and as she had led the horse into a slower step, she had swept a glance over the faces of the crowd awaiting without showing what she was doing, trying to see who was trying to hide not discomfort but fear. At the time, she had been torturing herself out of her mind to know which ones of the people she had trusted had been a party to the betrayal of her. She had been trying to find enemies upon which she could vent her toothless fury, her back as straight as an arrow because should she have allowed herself the smallest hunch of shoulders, she might have slid off the saddle and weep herself to death, not caring just how quickly Rhaenys Targaryen's mount could trample her over.
The girl riding now through the gates now, a quarter of millennium later, was also careful to keep her back straight and also swept her eyes over the crowd without letting anyone see it but it was friendly faces that she was trying to find among all those who stared at her with resentment.
"That poor child," Argella murmured and immediately reproached herself for this. Rhaelle Targaryen might be a small dragon – she was, in fact, quite small in stature – but she was one nonetheless. And she'd be the Lady of the Stormlands one day. Argella refused to pity her. Why should she? The girls' own parents hadn't, offering her instead as the consolation prize to atone for the behavior of their feckless son.
The men riding behind her clearly felt the sentiments of the crowd. The dislike. They had their hands on their blades, their eyes darting around to detect any threat to their princess. The girl stole a look at Ormund Baratheon at her left but if she hoped that he'd smile and say something to distract her from the stony welcome, she was to be disappointed: he was looking straight ahead, not noticing or not caring about her discomfort. Once again, Argella barred her heart against unwanted pity as she had once barred her gates against the advancing army of the dragon queen and her general.
The face of the Laughing Storm made even her draw back and bump straight into Orys. He looked at her with surprise writ plain on his face. "So you can show fear," he said and she leaned against his strong shoulder, for the first time in hundreds of years feeling content that she had disguised her horror successfully, that night in his tent when they had met – he in his plain garb of a men at-arms and she only hidden partially by her hair. Very partially, she thought, shame turning her cheeks scarlet even now. She had heard much songs about maidens whose virtue was spared from sight by their hair but she had had no such reprieve. Her hair had been just as matted, mudded, bloodied, sweaty and ragged as the rest of her. It had hidden naught. In fact, the many hours that she had spent wrapped in that soiled cloak in the damp corridor where the salty waves lapped at her prone form ever so gently while the traitors waited for everyone to settle down for the night, her crown of glorious hair had become so soaked in mud that she had been forced to cut it. She could still hear her sobs as the now scraggly locks fell, almost as bitter as the ones she had wept for her father. How many years passed before it grew again, Argella wondered, surprised that she did not remember. At the time, she had counted the days, as silly as it had been.
The Laughing Storm was not laughing now. His expression was one that made Argella's heart sing in delight even as she fought the impulse to drag the girl away from him, to safety. For the first time, she saw a Targaryen scared before one of her own, as bravely as Rhaelle fought not to let it show, and as unworthy as it was of her to feel this way towards a child, a small dragon was still a dragon.
"He'd better treat her well," Orys said darkly and Argella wondered who he meant, Lord Lyonel or Ormund.
"I'm sure he will," she said. "He is your descendant, my lord." Orys had never treated her ill, even as she provoked him with her courtesy, as cold and beautiful as a perfect snowflake and as constant as the storms shaking her – now their – castle.
Her husband didn't look comforted, although he did wrap an arm about her and Argella once again felt that demeaning echo of deep fluttering joy that crept upon her each time she saw how pleased he was with any display of her appreciation – no, affection. How she had railed against this blasted weakness of hers, this need to make her father's murderer happy, as if she were his obedient hound!
"He's Borros' descendant as well," Orys said and Argella twisted back to look at him without losing the warmth of his embrace, although it was, of course, only spun and kept alive by memory and imagination. She had never told him how much she enjoyed the oneness they shared in moments like this but at the end, he had needed the words not to know the truth of it.
"By the Seven, child, do go inside before you freeze to death!" Lord Baratheon barked and Argella felt a little, wonderful stir of relief, although she had yet to establish if this display of something like concern would last.
The beginning was not a very promising one. Rhaelle was terribly awkward and her fear of the Laughing Storm made her even more so. Filling his cup often ended with wine ending up all over his tunic and the tablecloth and he'd snap at her, wondering what they had taught her at King's Landing to do at all. Then, his lady wife would give him a look that was gently warning or stern, depending on the severity of his own behavior, and he'd fall silent before awkwardly adding that Rhaelle was getting better. She would look between the two of them and the longing in her eyes would become such that Argella felt forced to look away and Lady Margrat would start talking to distract the child from thinking about her so distant home. Still, it all boiled down to sympathy to Rhaelle's situation. Not the child herself, not yet.
The day Argella saw the girl rushing over to help the maidservant who was carrying firewood for her bedchamber was the day she decided that the situation was spinning out of hand. It was painful to watch the child trying to win affection this desperately but as loudly as she shouted, Lady Margrat could not hear her and Argella had to admit that perhaps she would have been deaf and blind in the woman's stead, too: this was the insult of a mother that pained Margrat. All her heart had to give was directed to her own daughter. She just had none to spare for Rhaelle.
That Jocelyn should be the first friend the little Targaryen girl made in what was to be her family in a few years came as a surprise, and more than a little pride. Jocelyn was really maturing, becoming capable of seeing beyond her own suffering. Talking to Rhaelle, taking her along for strolls in the garden or a ride, showing her the lands she'd become a lady to one day was good for her too, squeezing the last drops of the poison searing her heart.
"I won't be happier if you're miserable," she simply said when one day Rhaelle asked her why she was good to her, and Argella was happy, for she had seen too many men and women feeding their bitterness on other people's ill luck. None of them had become any happier.
Three months after Rhaelle's arrival, the news from King's Landing made Orys and Argella stare at each other, robbed of their words.
"Three months?" Lyonel asked and looked at his goblet, as if he wanted to blame his bad reading on the wine he had imbibed. But the goblet was full, as well as the carafe. "That's how much weight he puts on all this? Three months?"
His wife snatched the parchment and read it. Her mouth disappeared into a thin line. She passed the letter to Ormund who read it with growing disbelief before whistling. "I'm starting to believe that Rhaelle will be better off with us! At least she knows where she stands with us."
"This is easy for you to say," Orys snapped, as if Ormund could hear him. He doesn't understand, Argella wanted to say and couldn't because he'd never accept the words, never admit the right of them. Instead, she leaned against his shoulder once again. Just when had she started trying to make up for the lack of understanding of this very matter that he had suffered for so many years? He preferred things clear, or so he said, but sometimes the pain of having his station made so very clear made him long for some ambiguity. A son and not a son. A brother and not a brother. Blood of the dragon without one to ride. She had once so disdained his wish to be defined fully as her husband when the blood of her father would forever mar the distance between them, no matter how short.
"I think you should talk to Jocelyn before telling Rhaelle," Ormund said out of thin air. "She's the only one of us that Rhaelle cares about. She'll know how we should go about this."
His sister's advice was brief. "Be straightforward and honest, Mother," she said. "And gentle. Please be gentle with her." She paused and looked from her mother to her father. "And please never tell me the same thing that you're going to tell her."
"There won't be any need," Ormund said darkly. "I am no Duncan Targaryen."
"You'd better not be," Orys and Argella said at the same time, although Argella suspected that their reasons somewhat differed. She was furious to admit that after all those years – after all those years – Orys still hoped for acceptance from the Targaryens. Argella was just tired of seeing misery in the castle of their House.
Reluctantly, Lady Margrat sent for Rhaelle. Lyonel and Ormund, the men that they were, flew before the girl's arrival, muttering something about ladies' being more suited to deal with matters of heart, and so it was just Margrat and Jocelyn who told Rhaelle that her brother and his lowborn wife were now officially accepted at court and settled in the Red Keep.
Argella saw how pale the girl turned, how her breath caught as if all the air had left her lungs. "Three months!" she only said.
That's how much value they place on her, Argella thought, enraged on her behalf. Losing her to this peace was worth just three months of punishment for their golden son.
Lady Margrat cleared her throat. "Perhaps your lady mother was feeling so lonely after your departing that she needed all her other children around her…" she started but Rhaelle shook her head.
"There is no need, my lady," she said. "Truly. Thank you for trying to comfort me! But I'd rather not be treated as a child. My parents have made their priorities clear."
Aren't you one, Argella wondered and had to admit that here, this far, Rhaelle had only been a coin, and a quite darkened one, at that. Let her become something more, she pleaded with gods whose presence she could no longer feel. Slights and hatred had been in abundance already. Let them stop.
