Jenny

Looking at Jenny of Oldstones, Rhaella could almost begin to understand Duncan the Small. The key word being 'almost.' She was objectively very beautiful, with her sun-kissed skin and warm, honey-brown eyes. Her chestnut hair cascaded down her back and framed her heart shaped face, bringing out the softness of her features. But no matter how fine a sight she made, she could never imagine giving the Throne up like that. Best keep her a mistress, the best of both worlds.

She and Aerys sat in the sprawled mass of books lying across the floor. Uncle Duncan raised an amused eyebrow at the sight of the two of them. Beside him, his wife smiled.

"How are my favorite niece and nephew doing?" he asked.

"You don't have any others," Aerys replied, raising an eyebrow in turn.

"You got me there," he said with a laugh. "Look at them," he said, turning towards his wife. "A year back they were still playing with toy dragons and now they're trying to become Maesters at the Citadel." He smiled proudly. "Just look at all the books!"

At that his wife gave a slightly abashed look that didn't seem to fit. Hmm…

"Do you know how to read?" she asked. Jenny's face flushed and Duncan threw Rhaella a disapproving look.

"No, I do not. Never had any books to read from."

Rhaella felt horror surge through her. Illiteracy was the greatest crime both history and Westeros had committed. She figured at the very least, though, people like Jenny got to live through interesting periods. She shuddered at the thought of people leading boring, normal lives without books.

"Wanna read with me?" she asked, patting the place near her.

"What are you reading?" Jenny asked, naive curiosity on her face.

"Oh it's just a book about the great Ironborn raids." She had to admit, the viking aesthetic really appealed to her.

Duncan's brow furrowed. "And Jaehaerys and Shaera are letting you read such things at your tender age?"

Rhaella shrugged and pointed to Aerys. "He nicked it for me from the library."

From the corner of her eye, she saw him glare at her. His expression smoothed over into a smile as Duncan's eyes went to him. He attempted to look stern, but his lips were twitching. Rhaella grinned and he finally gave in, laughter bubbling from his throat.

"You should not read such things," he said, "but I admire your spirit."

"So wanna sit with me?" she asked Jenny again. She really wanted to talk and spend more time with Jenny. She may have been illiterate, but she was interesting. How could she not be, when she had managed to convince the Prince of Dragonflies to set aside his future throne?

"Be my pleasure," she said, a bit unsure. Rhaella offered her a reassuring smile. She heard Aerys scoff beneath his breath.

Carefully she started showing her several simpler words. As it turned out, someone had taught her her letters, however tying them up into words in meaningful time proved to be more of a struggle. As they went through the page, slowly, Aerys and Duncan got into their own discussion about some seemingly boring thing.

"So," she asked once she was reasonably sure no one was eavesdropping. "I heard a lot about you and my uncle while you were away," she said, ignoring Jenny's look of concern. "Why did the two of you marry?"

"Well, Rhaella, why do all people marry? Because they love each other very much," the woman told her as she would a child. The utter gall. Still she was her curiosity remained, so she chose to keep her cool. She maintained her smile through gritted teeth.

"And that was it? Nothing else that led you to do it?" she asked. She was making an effort to try and understand the woman.

"Well no, that was it, we just wanted to spend our lives together to be one in front of Gods and men." Clearly this wasn't working.

"And how did you convince my uncle to also get into the marriage, with what he lost?" she asked.

"Well, he felt the same, and neither of us wanted to live without the other."

The way she said it was so honest and innocent, she realized that Jenny was an incredible actress. What is she hiding? What were her true intentions? Did she just desire power or did she fight for some greater cause, maybe for the smallfolk. Still she clearly wasn't going to get it from her then and there.

"She definitely did an Anne Boleyn." Aerys said when the two of them were alone again. "She seduced and romanced him but didn't allow him to go all the way until they were married."

"Aye, that makes the most sense," she said, glad for at least the common ground between the two of them.

Daeron

"Uncle Daeron is dead," Aerys said, flopping down into a nearby chair. Rhaella looked up from the book she was reading. He recognized the cover and recognized it to be one of the books he had stolen for her from the library.

The one about Maegor, then, he thought. It was the only one she had not yet read. She was a smart one, Rhaella, mad as she was. He had become almost fond of the contrast between her intelligence and her… peculiarities.

"What?" Rhaella said, and he repeated himself, eyebrow twitching. She frowned. "That's a damned shame. He was my favorite uncle."

"Out of two," Aerys said dryly. "In any case, he was a threat."

Rhaella rolled her eyes and waved a hand about lazily. "We have been over this a thousand times," she drawled, "he really wasn't. And if he had been, you know I would have personally impaled him on a stake, favorite uncle or no. Vlad the Impaler had a point; he gets a bad rap."

Aerys bristled in insult. Did she not think him capable of disposing of their enemies? "Not if I had gotten to him first," he said, a tad viciously. Amusement flickered across her face and he forced himself to take a deep breath. To be calm. He was, after all, the level headed one between them. Still, his skin burned with irritation. He shifted the direction of the conversation with the practiced ease that had come with spending years on television.

"It still confuses me how he died," he said, "as a prince and a prince's favorite, he and Jeremy Norridge should have had the best horses, weapons and armor available to them. And if it not as if they were, if word is to be believed, greatly outnumbered."

Rhaella shrugged. "Some people just have shit luck."

He shook his head. "There has to be more to it than that."

In his mind's eye, he pictured how it had happened. Had he taken an arrow to the throat, the metal head ripping through the soft skin there? Had a sword pierced through his chest and carved out his heart? He could picture the blood spurting from the wound, then, the light fading from Daeron's eyes. And what of his beloved Ser Jeremy? Perhaps he had fallen from his horse, crushed by his own mount. The possibilities were endless.

Aerys sat to attention in his chair, curiosity piqued. His fingers twitched. His movement attracted the attention of Rhaella, who looked back up from the book she had resumed reading. "Where are you going?" she asked as he rose from his seat.

"To the library," he said. "I have some reading to do." He really had to get to the bottom of this.

Tywin

"We should kill him," Rhaella said almost instantly. Aerys was more surprised that he didn't expect it. He should have, by now, knowing her nature. Three years into this hellscape together, and she still managed to take him off guard.

"He hasn't done anything against us. He shouldn't if we do this right. And we can use him." He tried to reason with her. Her answering look was an unimpressed scowl.

"You do know this is the person who Gregor Clegane'd our whole family?" she asked with a raised eyebrow.

He grimaced at the reminder. "Only because canon Aerys pushed him too far," he said, "we won't make the same mistake."

If it was possible, her look darkened even more. "Why wait for a man to stab you in the back when you could slit his throat now?" There was a point there. Maybe. And the thought of killing a man as infamous as Tywin Lannister did sound like a prospect that would make them famous.

"Because we will make sure he has no incentive. I don't want to fuck Joanna, and I won't make Jaime a member of the Kingsguard. If you still befriend Joanna and Loreza Martell as per canon, it's only an added benefit."

A strand of silver-gold hair fell over Rhaella's face and covered her eyes. Aerys watched as she blew out a harsh breath, sending the strand fluttering. When she looked at him again, her expression was grudging.

"Just promise me one thing, Aerys."

"What is it?"

Her lips curled back to form some unholy cross between a grin and a snarl. Her teeth bared, she said, "If Tywin Lannister betrays us, I get to handle him myself. And make it painful."

He thought about that.

"That is fair." And I'll help you myself, he didn't add. He knew Rhaella would take that as an insult to her capabilities. So first we try my way and if that doesn't work, we do yours?" he asked.

"Very fair," she said with a nod.

Well, this will be an interesting challenge, he thought. However the thought of having an asset such as Tywin was very appealing, even if he would have to work for it. Maybe later on he could help him exterminate the Reynes? The matter resolved for now, the two of them turned their attention to other matters.

Poe-etry

Rhaella published her first piece of writing when she was eleven. She beamed as she held the pamphlet proudly in her hands and presented it to their parents and grandparents. It was just another one of their attempts to see if there were any others like them. Aerys watched on as Shaera flipped through it, her indulgent smile melding into concern, then ill-concealed disturbance. Beside her, Betha Blackwood's expression, on the other hand, grew brighter with each page.

"Oh this is wonderful, granddaughter," she said as she finished reading 'The Cask of Arbor.'

Aerys barely withheld a scoff. Standing next to Rhaella, he whispered. "And all it took for this masterpiece was plagiarism." He could not resist the urge to make a snipe.

Rhaella's eye twitched. Her smile grew strained around the edges, before it morphed into something else.

"Thank you, grandmother. I did struggle on deciding whether to write this or Poe-etry." Aerys resisted the urge to groan. Something must have shown on his face, then, because Rhaella pinched his hand behind their backs. "Both my writing and comedy are genius," she whispered, "appreciate my talent."

"Only when you steal from other writers," he shot back.

Aegon ruffled Rhaella's hair, his look concerned. "What have you been reading, little one?" he asked. Jaehaerys frowned at Aerys, then.

"Her brother has been stealing her books from the library," he said. Then his expression softened. "They are as close as you and I were at their ages, Shaera."

Bile crawled up Aerys' throat. He saw distaste flash, briefly, over Rhaella's face. Both Betha and Aegon grimaced, not even trying to hide the expressions.

"I haven't been stealing her books for ages," he said, trying to move on and get rid of the nausea. She had long terrorized everyone working in the library into obeying her. As they had long discovered, separating her from her books was a dangerous feat to undertake.

Rhaella grinned at him. "Though I have always appreciated the gesture." She patted his hand.

"What project are you thinking of writing next?" Betha Blackwood said with a smile.

Aerys saw Rhaella pause. Her fingers tapped against her forearm before she said, "I was thinking of 'The Tell-Tale Heart.'"

"A romance?" Shaera smiled, looking relieved, and he almost felt bad for her. Almost. But he was too busy resisting the urge to laugh.

Rhaella's smile was all teeth. "Something like that, Mother."

—-

The Woods Witch

Aerys and Rhaella were thirteen and twelve respectively when Jenny's woods witch arrived at court at long last. They had sequestered in Rhaella's chambers to debate upon her arrival. Rhaella sat slumped in a chair, watching as Aerys wore a hole into the floor.

"So the question is," she said, bringing attention to the elephant in the room, "do we murder her?"

Aerys stopped pacing and turned to face her. "Maybe; it certainly would make things easier for us, if we don't want to get married."

Rhaella's fingertips tapped against the wood of the table."Well? Do we or don't we?"

"If it were up to me, I just wouldn't marry," he said.

"And if it were up to me, I'd currently lean towards Loreza Martell. However, we both know that's not how it works."

Aerys gave a grudging nod at that. He clasped his hands behind his back, the line of his mouth flat. Rhaella sighed.

"So, as of now, we are definitely the only ones coming from our world," she said. They had tried numerous times to locate any other people like then. Her writing had caught on, and yet no one seemed to catch their origins, thus implying no one was from their world. Well either that or they were uncultured swine who she didn't wish to ever meet.

Aerys nodded once more. "We've tried every trick in the book," he said, echoing her thoughts. "It's all but confirmed we're the only ones."

"So where do we go from here?"

Aerys wrinkled his nose. "I have to marry, but I don't want some vapid bride I don't know presented to me, whose only purpose would be to pump out heirs and fulfill the ambitions of some grasping family."

Rhaella hummed in sympathy. "And I don't want some husband who will only treat me as a broodmare and never allow me an ounce of freedom, or let me pick out my favorites once I'm old enough."

"Or even worse, Bonnifer Hasty." he said, his face slightly dark. The man's interest in her had truly and utterly grossed her out, and Aerys too, to the point that she hadn't even had to be the one to arrange his saddle breaking mid-joust. She had only arranged for the maester to botch the bones' healing. She had felt touched by the gesture, then. And enthused too. Perhaps she could get Aerys to have some fun more often from now on.

"So if you don't want to marry a broodmare and I don't want to become a broodmare," Rhaella said, "do we simply… marry each other? Jaehaerys and Shaera are already considering it."

"I guess, if we have to marry anyone, at least we get along?" he asked. "Besides, we trust each other enough to be able to work together as partners. We can't say that for anyone else."

"Partners then," she said with a nod.

"Partners," he agreed.