A Holiday by Decree
~~Day 11~~
After their tour, Hirat and Adil brought them back to a lounge area filled with throw pillows and blankets.
The covered area looked out over an open field adjacent to the dragon pits, where Tyrion and Sansa now understood that Daenerys and Jon liked to interact with the dragons when they were not training them or 'stabling' them. Within sight of the covered sitting area, Tyrion spotted a single wide-trunked, twisty-branched tree beside a small, red-earth edged watering hole for the dragons. Pointing it out, he asked Sansa if she would like to go to it - there was lunch to walk off after all.
As Sansa and Tyrion walked the few minutes toward the tree, they laughed again at what they had learned: could one really be said to "stable" a dragon? There seemed no better word for it though, as this is what the young King and Queen had managed to train their dragons to accept outside of times Tyrion was aware they let them fly free over the oceans…
"The King and Queen's occasional romantic 'disappearances' make more sense to me. Knowing this place now, it's probably as important to them as it is to Rhaegal and Drogon. The Targaryens surely had such in mind when they developed these compounds," Tyrion observed, reaching the base of the craggy-barked tree. Inspecting a patch of shade on the side of the trunk opposite the building, he plopped down with a satisfied grunt before crossing his legs and putting his hands behind his head.
"What happened to 'walking off lunch'?" Sansa smiled down at him, shielding her eyes against the golden sun barely starting its descent over the ranch.
"I've walked - don't forget that I'm old now," Tyrion piped up at her with an ironic smirk from his seat on the ground.
"Well, if you're 'old' then I'm hardly young anymore - make room," Sansa scoffed at him and stomped over to sit down, thigh-to-thigh, back-to-trunk, beside him.
Glancing out of the corner of her eye, Sansa did not miss the way Tyrion ran a finger under the fabric of his neckerchief again at the contact between them. "Careful, my Queen, you're still younger than me and such close contact may alert our chaperones," he joked, craning around his side of the trunk to look at where Adil and Hirat sat back at the ranch. The young man and woman faced the direction Tyrion and Sansa had walked in but were clearly locked in conversation with each other.
Having glanced the same way, Sansa returned her attention to Tyrion on hearing Hirat's distant laugh. "If this is chaperoning, then our 'chaperones' are more interested in each other than they are in us right now," she said with a smile.
Though Tyrion returned Sansa's smile with one of his own, it was in fact a bit sad.
"Sansa, I know we've said we would mainly 'just see where this goes', but have you thought about what will happen when we return?" he asked.
:::
I just want to say thank you to all of you out there reading along - it really warms my heart that so many are enjoying this story! ❤️