#bnhotdfic

[bohemian-nights]

An Offer From A Rogue

Word Count: ~9,448

Pairing: Daemon Targaryen x Sister!Reader

Warnings⚠️: 18+; incest, smut, choking, a little bit of soft dom!Daemon; p in v penetration; a tiny dash of degradation; fingering against a wall

Description: Words could never convey quite what she felt. Not in that moment. Not when there was this fire she felt spreading throughout her. Engulfing her. Turning her to flame.

AN: Based on this request by @feelingsandemotionsnotexplored. So sorry it’s late🙏🏽

The sound of dancing and a lively tune could be heard streaming in from just beyond the wrought iron door, but that had long been put out from her mind.                                            

Another tune entirely played reached her. It took her a great deal more effort than it perhaps should have to realize that the sound came from her.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                    

A whine which she felt clawing its way out from the back of her throat and breaking out into the quiet of her chambers. Desperate and greedy thing it was. Not in the least bit ladylike, but she supposed this was most assuredly unladylike and he was encouraging her with his murmurs of let me hear you sweet one and let go for me sweetling I have you.                                                                        

He did have her. Brown legs wrapped around his middle. She clung to him like a vine, splayed against the backdrop of her chamber, though she was mostly being held up by his strength. Hers having long since departed from her already spent form. 

The rest of her senses fared little better. Her ears felt like they had been stuffed with cotton, all she could taste was the salt of his skin mixed with an unearthly of smoke and dragon at his nape, and her voice had gone a while ago, but she had gathered that it hadn’t really mattered. Who needed oxygen when they had this? His breath breathed life into her better than undiluted  air ever could.

Who needed to speak when one could moan out her pleasure no. It did not matter. 

Words could never convey quite what she felt. Not at that moment. Not when there was this fire she felt spreading throughout her. Engulfing her. Turning her to flame. To pure heat and want. She could never describe that. What she felt. What was before. What was after. If there even was an after.

What was apart from this chamber, it truly did not matter. 

That world that she had ventured from so distant. So foreign. So immaterial. It was no more real than the creatures in old fisher wives tales told to scare naughty children who crept from their beds in the dead of night. 

Everything else had faded and turned to gray. There was just him and her in vibrant color and even then she had a hard time distinguishing between the shades that made up him and the ones that made her. 

The guests feasting below let out another round of shouts and cheers. Their stomping faintly registered in the back of her mind overcoming the haze for a brief moment.

They were getting quite loud. Quite merry. Quite drunk.

Twas probably for the best. She was being quite loud herself. With each mewl and breathless moan that broke free of her body increasing in duration and volume. Unrestrained as they serenaded a most captive audience. 

An audience that drew out a whine lodged in the back of her throat to pass through kiss swollen lips. The cause of which was no more than a mere swipe of ardent tongue upon her décolleté and the deft brush of fingers upon her all too sensitive nub sat atop her womanhood. Over and over again as she yielded to her pleasure. 

“That’s it sweet one,” he hummed. Voice thick and with something she could not quite name, but it was something which she felt too. Something that sparked another gasp for the air which he had taken from with another murmur and lap of the wet muscle at her neck. “That’s it.”  

She would have tried to stifle that moan if she had her bearings, if she had any sense or care for her name, but all manner of proprietary and good breeding had flown from her and floated down into the world of gray. Thankfully forgotten for if that gray had collided with her world of color, staining them with the red welts, yelps, and slick of their passion to which she would never forget the shame of it. 

She should have shame. She would have had shame at her own visage if she had any left. If she could gaze down at herself or look into the mirror she kept on the opposite wall of her chamber near her vanity and behind the changing screen which hid her bath, not that she needed to.  

Slacked-jawed, flushed, and incapable of any intelligible speech. She made a lovely sight. By the way in which the brute of a man before stood leering over her, the way his tongue lapped at her, tasting her, marking her as his, she knew she made a lovely sight, but she could not be more indecent.

Body given away to the haze of euphoria that enwrapped her courtesy of a pair of strong arms that kept her firmly pressed against a most willing figure complete with calloused fingers embedded deeply inside her reaching her in places where she had not know existed, but where nonetheless needed him most, and a set of thin, but determined lips upon every bit of exposed brown skin they could reach. 

She could hear the squelching sound that his fingers made as they rocked them in and out of her warmth. Clenching around them whenever he grazed over that place within her that had her seeing the stars of the night sky reflected on the back of her eyelids. Good girl he chanted when she gave into him. Gushing down on his arm with her slick. 

She could feel her curls glued to the wall by his exertions. See the wet trail she had left upon his robes and the deep purple bruises forming over skin on the tops of her ample breasts. Bruises that she’d have to explain away to one of her maids when they came to attend to her in the morn.

I tripped over my skirts and only managed to catch myself upon the railing would do or mayhaps a simple my stays were too tight would suffice. Would they believe her? Mayhaps they would. 

She would have to throw away the horrid garment on the second account. It would be replaced by some other God's awful contraption of death before she could forget the feel of it constricting her, and on the first—well she was a rather clumsy adventurer it had always been easy enough for her to bruise. 

A fall upon her knees would leave her looking as if she were a peasant girl who had been milking cows upon her knees and climbing up trees or traversing through the thistle field where Vermiothor liked to roam would leave her arms raw and red with her own lifeblood.  

But the days of childhood clumsiness had long since passed her and while she might fool a pack of serving girls who were scarcely older than she, she would most certainly not fool her Septa. 

No she wouldn't be so naive. 

She would see what had happened. What he had done to her. What she in truth had let him do to her even if she could not believe it so.

Her septa, a woman not quite old enough to be her grandmother, but a fair deal older than her mother had been, would have been alert that oher whines and whimpers. She was good natured, if not a little strict. She was a sweet woman above all. Wise. Dependable. 

Though unmarried at two and twenty she was getting rather old to need her septa as she did, but truthfully, she did not know what she would do without her. She was all she had known. The only maternal figure which she had and her septa seemed to love he in all the ways that she had seen a mother love their daughter

She could not recall her mothers laugh, the feel of her hands stroking her hair as she brushed and braided her riot of coils, and most importantly,  well important to her, her face which she had been told more times than she had inherited. 

She supposed she must have inherited it. She knew she had not inherited much of her fathers Valyrian countenance, the details of which she could not quite recall either. 

Though in that moment she supposed she could not quite recall anyone’s face apart from the man who had buried his head silver into her neck among other things laying heavy kisses into her flushed skin as she absentmindedly stroked down the planes and contours of his person that she knew better than her own image. better than she should have known. 

She was not the first to do so. The first to touch him as he had her, but she knew a part of him. Knew what he sounded like when he tried to contain his own grunts of pleasure, murmuring into her skin with pet names which she would not go without. 

“My sweet one,” he whispered as she drank up the praise. She knew what those saccharine groans tasted like upon her tongue. The sweetness. 

Knew what it felt like to feel his length pressing against her. rubbing upon her thighs, her womanhood. hard and wanting. She knew him like this and she enjoyed the knowledge more than she should. Letting it wash over her. Engulfing her with every grunt and groan intended or not that slipped from his lips. 

Daemon had been rough with his affections and she had not minded it. She liked it. She had not known she would, not knowing what had lied dormant within her, waiting to be awakened, but no that it had, she was wanton. She was utterly wanton. Every bit debauched. A creature which needed to be fed lest she wilt away to nothing. 

She had heard about girls like this. Her septa had warned her about girls like her. 

Wayward. Fallen. Ruined whatever one wanted to call it, innocence had been corrupted.    

Tainted with sin and damned for it. Their great shame and what a shame it was. 

She would have died from the shame of it if the older woman were to somehow apparate configured from her rapture before her very eyes. 

Or would she? 

She was desperate. Starved. Not caring on but propriety or for the gentle breeding of a lady which had been drilled into her skull since before she could even write her own name.

But now—now the only name which she knew was his. What a name it was. What it stirred within her. Who could have known that a single word could leave her so wanting.

“Daemon,” she moaned when he had nuzzled at a particularly sensitive patch of skin underneath her ear. Trailing open mouthed kisses down her neck. It was not as pleasant as what his fingers could stir from a few fervid rolls of the little pearl he had found at the apex of her mound when he he tweaked her to stiff , or the push of those digits in and out of her heat at the languid pace which he had set, but it was bliss nonetheless. A bliss she was happy to chase. 

Pulling the man as close as their still clothed bodies would allow her to as she wound her fingers through silver strands slicked by lust. Feeding her hunger. 

This, this is why they kept girls away from the truth of what went on between men and women in prowling hours of the wolf in the comfort of their chambers with fears of proprietary and damnation. 

Shrouding it with mystery and hushed chastisements that it was for the marriage bed and if that should be broken it one would risk body and soul as well as social ostracism to silence the more curious sort for if they knew the truth of what pleasure lied, of what lay within them, they should not forgo it. They should grow to want as she had grown to want and wanted and wanted. He had made her want. 

A gale, no, a raging thunderstorm had been awakened within her that she could not put out by her own hands. No matter what she had tried and tried and tried to her great frustration. 

Repeating those same ministrations that he had, the tips of drumming circles into her bundle of nerves, his rhythm steady. Long fingers pistoled in and out of her heat trying to reach that spongy spot he had found within her that had her mewling like one of the feral cats that roamed around the castle, but it was no good. 

Everything was wrong. So very wrong. The pads of her fingers had been too delicate in their movements. Her slender digits had not filled her in the way he had. Had not quite stretched her to find that spot and what they could reach had certainly not elicit that same intensity he had ignited. They had not the callouses which did not catch upon her clit no matter what way she had positioned them. And yet she tried. 

Tried chasing her high that he had taken from her for the better part of the hours between dusk and dawn.

She was in a frenzy of want. Of heat. Of fire, trying to stoke that burning fire until it burst before her into molten magma and still it eluded her. He eluded her and with him that delightful bliss he had set into motion by his strong hand. 

She was made to give up the feverish coxcomb of self pleasure all too soon. Forced herself to for she was gaining nothing from it except anguish.

Laying there in a empty bed, in the dead of night with soaked fingers, a sore cunny overflowing with her slick, a brown face marred with tears, and pride in her throat caught with a scream upon her tongue that she did not dare let it out lest her Septa find her in her ruin or that insufferable man howl with his own pride at having left her in such a state of unabashed avarice. 

Her mother had been in this exact position. Or something similar to it. 

It was how she came about. What bastards grew up with the knowledge of. Still while she may be a bastard she was the bastard sister to a king. Had grown up with his children, under his eye, and that acknowledge meant things were expected of her.

If her Septa happened to walk in this moment, if anyone happened to walk in, and see that she was no better than a common whore, no better than her mother she’d be ruined. Absolutely ruined

the blood of the dragon gone to waste. Common blood won out, unless the man who was doing his best to ruin her for all other men saved her. Unless Daemon asked for her hand and restored her honor. 

Would he do so? Would he save her or at least her virtue? Ask her to be his wife. Be the mother of his children? Would give up his life for her? Would he forsake all others, have her pass through his life at his side, and sully his blood with hers . Would he do that for her? 

She was not quite sure what he would do. After All he had pulled her into his depths and converted her to this nymph. Drawn her away from her, but did she care?

Marriage certainly did not have any bearing in this. Seven help her, thinking in its entirety had lost its place here with him.    

There was only divinity itself. She felt divine. Absolutely divine there with him. As if she had tasted the heavens and had touched the face of the Maiden herself. Gods oh Gods.

Did he find another? Had he been with her or was his hand enough? Was a rough hand scared by battle adequate replacement to her tight warmth or had he taken his pleasure in a whores cunt instead?

Was that why he left her or had he like her gone without satisfaction in its entirety? It seemed now when she had him worshiping her when his mouth was  and nipping at her commanding her to let go to give into him and he’d be there to catch her as she tumbled into her ecstasy so silly to wonder where he had been, but now was not then. 

Then he had left her to want. Left her to cry like a child and beg for him to return to her and make him put out that fire which he had so brought her to life. Make her feel alive for the first time in her short muted life. She’d never live down the shame of it. 

She had hardly gotten more than a few dreary hours of sleep because of him. Plagued by dreams of him and those fingers that held magic in their tips. In his tongue that left In the length of him. 

Him. All him. He consumed her. Burned her. 

It was all the cause of that man who was trailing hot open-mouthed kisses down her neck rough yet surprisingly nimble fingers caressing her in a place in a way that she was left in this sorrowful state, but nonetheless, only he seemed to know that she had been driven mad with passion and lorded it over her. She had found utter bliss and lost it in a few hours and had been left wanting in its absence. In his absence.  

Oh he had known what he was doing. What he had been doing for a good fortnight.

He had rarely let her side since he had arrived back from his latest excursion away to some distant land he would take her to. You ought to see more of the world than this place. He had told her. Arms linked and his head bent to hers as they took a turn about the Red Keeps gardens. Taking great pains to detail the full exoticism that his travels afforded him. Which could be afforded to her.

Her septa had not liked that. Muttering to herself with discontent when they had arrived back to her chambers, but there was not much she could do. For Daemon commanded her company to make up for his absence in that time between and who was she to deny a prince? 

How could she deny him when she insisted  that she be seated besides him at each feast. Asking for her favor at every tourney. Every dance was reserved for him lest she find the lord who dared to take her away from him for a mere round needing to be carried off his mount at said tourneys the next mourn. 

Daemon drew her in with whispers into her lips curl into a smile and a heavy hand upon her covered knee that sent a shiver through her for want of more than mere warmth. 

“Let them stare sweet one,” he had told her with a grin she did not wish to escape from. Wandering fingers inching up the silk which she had painfully stitched together by her own hand. It had taken her the better part of a moon to make the gown, but when she had shown it to her septa she could not have been prouder.

It was a ruin now much the same as her. 

The bodice ripped in two courtesy of the man in her grasps lust ridden possession to free her breasts from their restraints. 

He had been restrained up until that point, but that restraint had severed when she had begun to quake and drool around him. Needing to suckle upon her breast seemingly as much as she needed him within her. Taking the erect bud between his lips and to lavish them with his tongue as he had done so with her neck. Not caring that he had soiled the garment with his salvations and his essence. 

She did not know entirely how the latter had even over, perhaps he had taken himself in hand while she was preoccupied with the feel of him inside her, any part of him inside her, surrounding her, but whatever may be the case it smelled of his musk. Almost overpowering her smell with that smoky scent of warm salt air, dornish red, dragonhide, and open sky. 

She had hid it as best as tucked away under a loose bit of stone under her bed. She hadn't a choice on that matter. 

How was she to explain away that when they saw the state of it? What would they ask her? What would she say? She could feel the words catching in her throat beneath her high. Would anyone say anything?      

No one had said a thing when he had first laid eyes upon it. When he kept his gaze, his hands, his attentions a laugh at their guests  upon her. He kept her person firmly affixed to his side. Eyes darkened under his adore and the dim glow of the candlelight. It was quite hard to tell if his eyes had darkened, but they had lost their violet hue. 

They had gawked at them of course, received a few raised brows, but a brother, even a Targaryen brother, paying compliments to his dearest sister, his only sister, was not so very wrong. And from their eyes such affection did not resemble those of lovers. 

Her brown skin covered her blushes and the table covered his hand inching up her leg hiking  up her skirts or how her foot just so happened to be grazing whenever the wandering limb got particularly close to her cunt underneath such frills. Her own hand wished to touch him in the same way as she did. 

She was not completely naive. She had seen the hounds at it once. Twas a vicious affair consisting of a stubby appendage making rapid pumps in and out of a puckered hole that made her stomach churn and wish to expel her breakfast. It could hardly be comforting for his mate. 

One of the serving girls between fits of raucous laughter when her mistress had finally found the stomach and courage to do so told her it was how pups were made, but people were not dogs.  

Still the question and the answer to that circled back around her this sweltering fortnight.

How would it be with him? Would he be quick?  Would he be gentle? Would he take her from behind like a dog? He already had her pressed up against the wall twice now the ravenous mad dog he was. She knew that humans were different, but he had not even taken her to the bed as befitting her status. 

What would it be like if he had? What would it be like to have him hovering over her?  How would his flesh feel atop hers? How would his length feel like inside her? Would he let her touch him? Love him as he loved her?  Hand drifting to where a growing tent was ensconced under his robes? 

How would it be? 

He certainly had to be bigger than a dog. He felt bigger than what she imagined the hound did deep inside his mate. Would his length bring her pleasure in the way that his hands had? Blind her with it and turn her into some lust ridden beast. She felt like that. Then. Now. 

Oh, she was depraved, but he did not seem to mind her need when he had caught her staring at him with what she was sure was her need. Hands drifting.

“What's mine is yours sweet one,” the warmth of his breath fanned her nape as he spoke the words into her ear. Her cheeks warmed as he had taken her hovering hand in his bestowing a light kiss upon the supple brown flesh before he pulled away. His touch lingering where his lips could not. 

It looked more like lively banter, albeit laced with the affections from the depths of their kinship, than the makings of a passionate tryst. 

Even still she was not so green as to think that the eyes and ears of the Red Keep would not notice something if they kept on as they had. They were Targaryens after all and Targaryens were not so common as mere men in their desires and wants. 

She had not followed him when he had left the Great Hall last night well before dessert was brought in. Their brother huffed and eyed the top of the man’s pale head in the crowd of ravens and browns and gold with some measure of suspicion, but he did not command him to stay. 

Letting him leave without saying a word in protest. 

Daemon did as he pleased and there was no point in keeping him, especially when his behavior raised brows from their more stodgy guests and the ones connected by law than by blood. The ones who would not understand this. What they meant to each other or how natural it was even beneath the sin. 

After a time, which she had deemed appropriate where no one would guess what had been up to under the cover of that table where their hands had wandered and communicated what whispers and gazes could not in an overcrowded hall, she took her leave of the merriment.

Viserys did not seem to mind if she stayed either. Sending her off with a solitary flicks of his hand in the same direction that their brother had left.

She thought he was rather relieved to see her go. She could picture the small as her back turned to him. Feel his stare on the back of neck. He always seemed rather relieved to see her go. As did the rest of the hall save for her cousins. Her very existence raised brows and that was not limited to the ones who were supposed to love her best, the king included among them. 

True enough he cared for her. Their father had seen to that as had Daemon, but he was not brotherly, barely familial and though he was old enough to be her father he had never taken upon that role after Baelon had met his abrupt end. 

Too much like her mother she suspected. He had never been fond of the Naathni whore who had captured their fathers gaze. 

Then again Viserys did not seem very fond of anything apart from his daughter and the little prince she had birthed who looked no more Valyrian than she. His indifference to her was really less to do with her blood and more to do with his general indifference to all things Viserys was not so concerned with the purity of their family and her lack of it, but Daemon, Daemon who loved her, Daemon who had defiled her, Daemon he was  was another matter.   

Daemon had not been particularly brotherly either  with his comings and goings, but his indifference was a foreign concept to her. Her youngest brother had never hid his affections; his care for her even if those affections had turned into something more than it ought to be. Or something as it in truth should be. 

“You’re a Targaryen sweet girl as much as I am.” He would always say when she questioned why he was so affectionate with her without a breath spared. Whispering in her ear and sealing his words with a kiss to her temple or peppering her  face with sloppy kisses. Never mind the frowns and deep furrows they’d received for said affection. They wouldn’t understand.

Half was still a Targaryen. She was still a Targaryen no matter who her mother had been. That was the beginning and end of it or just the beginning. 

It was why they were here and why she was presently in a half state of undress stuffed with her brother's fingers, soaking his hand with her slick and his mouth upon her breasts. They were Targaryens and Targaryens did what they liked. Would have what they liked. Take what they like. Conqueror. 

As he had done with her. Twas in their blood. Her blood that was a siren call and he had answered. Like calling to like. Blood to blood. He had answered with his own call.  

Silly and naive as it was, she had thought he had actually gone to bed. That he had gotten bored of her of the game they played, but he most decidedly had not.

She had only managed to make it a quarter of the way to her chambers before a pale hand shot out from the dark and pulled her back into it. Pulling her into a hard chest while his mouth caught the scream she was sure to have let out if not for his tongue tangling with hers in the most lovely dance swiping across her lips to gain entrance circling the roof of her mouth upon hers she had given into him without much fight.

And now what little fight she had had vanquished along with the rate of rapidly deteriorating care for anything apart from the feel of him upon her. In her. around her. Him. She had not cared for anything else since last night. Just him. 

“Don't turn away from me, little one.” his hand had quickly enough found its way to up her skirts once more when his fingers finally pulled away from her lips. 

The pale Targaryen man wasting no time venturing them up her leg. Grazing the smooth embellished bronze skin of her thighs until he found her warmth waiting for him. Placing a toned thigh between her legs and spreading them apart.  Finding no resistance to stop him. To keep him from her. To keep this pleasure he wished to give her and she would take it all and thank him for it like a dog dying from thirst.

He could've commanded her to streak across that very dark, very quiet hall naked as the day she was and she would've gladly done so. She would've done anything with those digits working her through. A finger gliding across her glistening slit to collect her slick before bringing it up to tease her little button. Drawing crescents into the engorged nub as he grew moans and whimpers from her lips. Getting drunk off the noises. His breath upon her. 

She had been shamefully wet. She still had some shame in that regard when she had heard the sound of her wetness filling in that tiny enclave. The pool of slick he made which stained them both and reached something in her that had her tightening around him and arching back on to him. 

He found the places in herself she had never known and  had never dreamed of knowing. 

She had touched herself on occasion before. Feeble thing it was. Timid and unsure movements made when the castle had gone quiet and the only company she had were the moon's light, her slender hand, and her labored breaths. Each time no different than the last and neither was this attempt at self gratification. Not unpleasant, but it was not particularly eventful, nothing remarkable, nothing euphoric in it. 

She did not have those flutterings spreading from the pit of her core. Had never spasmed around her fingers. Wet them with her arousal. 

Only once had she ever attempted entering them within her channel and she had never tasted herself. She certainly had never lost herself in her fumblings. Not in this way. Never gone and she had been gone. She was gone. 

Every thought left from her body besides that cresting feeling overtaking her like a wave in the harbor and she a ship soaked through with love embrace. 

Gone enough to let him debase her there upon that wall where anyone might see them, see her like a common whore. Chanting his name like a possessed woman. 

Daemon. Daemon. Daemon.

Gone enough to let him kiss away her moans. To whisper sweet things into her dampened flesh. Things that made her cheeks flush with warmth and her stomach clench in pleasure. Bearing down upon his fingers as she clung to him.

She was gone, gone, gone. And then he was gone. 

“Patience is a virtue dear sister,” he had whispered onto her lips. 

Gifting her one last kiss upon the hot skin beneath the shell of her ear just as she felt herself cresting over that little hill of fire which he had built, halting her as he pulled the ground from out under her.    

He did not catch the gasp when he had pulled his fingers from her. A gush of her wetness went with him as he brought those digits to his lips to sample her excitement and left the rest to run down her thighs and stain that ruined silk that of course was then. A wink, and the inaudible groan he let out as he tasted were the last trendles of bliss he had afforded her, before he left her in that scorching void of need and agony, but that memory had been painted over with the vibrancy of desire. 

Now whatever had made him leave her, whatever lesson he had tried to impart upon her, whatever, whatever he had seared into her mind with his,  he had returned to her with great fury. 

Passion reignited as he had thrown open the doors to her chambers after she had tried to slip through them in search of him. His lips were upon hers with not a word spoken between them as he removed all traces of what he was to say to him. The only thing cushioning her head from hitting the wall which he had backed them into was his hands placed behind her that softened the blow. Then it did not matter. What her septa thought, what did not matter. There had only been now. 

Now she was not willing to let it slip through her fingers that were presently holding onto the pale man until she had her fill and more then. 

“Don't leave me,” she rasped with a whimper out into the shell of his ear. The last bit of consciousness before the fall. The words choked out with a gasp for breath over the sound of the squelches growing in their obscenity and his panting into her skin.  

it was pathetic it sounded childish to her own ears, but she was determined to let him know. To not have what had happened repeat to be left as she didn't think she could bear that. She would collapse into herself and never leave from this place he had set her atop above all the rest. 

Passion faded. Flesh rotted. Bones turned to dust. Withering away until whatever had been her, the old her and the new was gone too. 

She could not bear that.  

“I never left you. I will never leave you sweet one.” She believed him. 

Believed him as she could feel him at her fingers. The resolute beating of his pulse. Thump, thump, thump.  The heat of his skin she managed to pull. His blood strumming through him.

Believed him as he lifted his head at last from where he had trailed his kisses down from her neck to her décolletage. The warmth of his breath fanning her exposed skin dampened by his hearty ministrations. 

Daemon had come back, that is what mattered. He had never strayed. Not truly. Not in any way that mattered. He had come for her. He had found her and taken her for his own, giving her this gift of pleasure. This new her. 

“Is this all for me sweet one?” He crooned out the question. Goosebumps erupted across her body as those long digits of his hit the back of her cervix, his pace unrelenting. “Is this why you 

She wouldn’t have been able to contain her moan then even if she wanted to. Nor the shudder that wracked through her body as she folded into him. Nor answer him. Clawing at him. Pulling him tighter to her practically suffocating the man with her bare breasts having pulled down her flimsy gown as if he would flit away as he had before, but he did not. She would not. Not with the way he groaned into her skin. The way he lapped at whatever he could find as he sped up the pumps of his fingers within her heat.

There was something comforting in knowing that she had ruined him the same as he had ruined her. 

Help her mother. If she had found the Gods on the rough pads of his fingers stroking her, loving her, what would she find on the end of his cock? What would that cock make her see, stroking her, loving her, how would she feel? 

A moan interrupted her thoughts once more. 

“That’s it sweet girl.” He teased with a nip at the back of her ear. Taking her lobe between his teeth to suckle upon as his fingers worked her through. In and out over that spongy spot he had. Striking a delicate balance as he kept her on the edge. The balance that she had missed. Come to crave. 

A little heaven right under her nose which she had been kept from. Not that she was complaining, who would complain about heaven when they had reached it, but then she was in fact complaining. Whining again when he pulled his hand from her and with it that heaven. 

The sound of her wetness around his fingers filling the still. Twitching around nothing after being filled for so long. 

She felt empty. Cold somehow and empty. The air leaving out from her lungs. Left starving once more as she clawed at him. Her grip unrelenting. 

She had forgotten what it felt like to feel so empty. It was somehow worse than when he left her crying in the hall. She detested it with every fiber of her being. 

She whined and that whine turned into another moan when he brought those soaked digits to his lips to taste her. His eyes remained locked on her. Watching her as she squirmed around him.

He was a cruel man and he had chosen her to be on the receiving end of this cruelty. 

Cruelty seemed to beget more cruelty. With a pop those fingers were and had voyaged to swipe them  through her sticky folds. Torturing her, but she did not have to wait long. He plunged them back into her depths in the next breath. Reaching her cervix as he curled them. Leaving her shaking in his arms. 

“Do you feel how wet you are for me sweetling,” he growled out eyes scanning her face for acknowledgement and when he received no such thing besides her quaking in his hold silent by the pleasure, he emphasized the point. Pressing his fingers deep into that spongy spot atop her walls, she answered his growl at last with a whimper. 

She could do no more than whimper at the truth of it. The squelches of her heat playing on a loop. In and in and in. Not stopping. Never stopping as he worked her up the little hill he had molded. Her descent into the abyss threatening to undo came thundering down upon her like a clap of thunder. “Come for me sweetling.” And she did. 

Giving into that magma that had been boiling over. Seeping into the hot puddle of her own bliss. Her vision swirling with life and her body trembling with wave after wave until all that was left was her soul. 

Climax overtaking her until she felt nothing but those hands on her. arching into his fingers to draw out that fluttering feeling. Her stomach tightening with it. Body loosening into it until she was but a puddle of molten passion. 

Oh Gods. Nothing more for what else was there, but this bliss. What else was there but this? What else could there be?

Strange and unearthly as it sounded she had left this mortal plane for that brief duration of her orgasm which seemed to stretch endlessly. That puddle of bliss an overflowing fountain which kept replenishing with the sweetest liquid ambrosia. 

She hadn’t realized he had moved them to her bed until she felt the heaviness of his weight and the heat of his skin on top of her. Warming her now cool form contrasting with the feel of the soft linens and the fluff of her pillow at her back cushioning her. 

He wore a smile and greeted her with a tone as if he were frightened that she might float away from him, but how could she after this. 

“Hello.” The corners of his violet eyes which had regained some of their hue crickling with mirth as he petted her cheek with the back of his hand. Softer than she imagined it would be. It was the hand that had been inside with the way it glistened in the moon's light. 

“I think you’ve broken me,” she returned barely above a whisper and more breathy than she would like, but not knowing what else to say. She felt broken. Like a ragdoll. Breathless and listless with what remained of her orgasm. 

He laughed at her ragged state, but it was not the jeering sort. It was as airy as her own voice. Breathless happy if she would be so bold. Not just gloating he was truly happy. Pleased. Pleased with her. Pleased with pleasing her and he was far from being done doing so. 

“I shall endeavor to do that more often than.” He brought his hand up to her cheek. Caressing the flushed skin from brow down to her nape with the back of his knuckles. 

If she hadn't had the good sense to allow her maid to braid up her hair for the night as she had last night too restless with yearning for a relief that had never come till now to allow them to do such, He might’ve encountered loose coils which he could grip. Instead her mop of raven coils were braided neatly into two plaits resting upon her shoulders. 

Though she imagined he might have liked the sight of her mane unbound considering he could not keep his hands from brushing the back of those coils, for he knew better now than to try to attempt to comb through the delicate strands, last night when they had been as such during the feast. Only adorned with a band of rubies atop her head to restrain them. 

Her hair would have been a mess to comb in the morrow, resembling more a brittle bird's nest than hair and taking the better part of that very mourn to undo the damage which had been done, but she’d let him play. 

She’d let him play with her whenever he’d like. 

“Perhaps I can fuck the church mouse from you,” he mused. His thumb swiping across the expanse of freckles resembling a consolation across her nose. If he meant to raise offense to virgins sensibilities which had been bred into her that would have her hiding her embarrassment from his vulgarity he was surely to be disappointed at her reply for she met him in kind. 

“Mayhaps I shall fuck the cruelty from you dearest brother.” 

Wideyed staring up at him she expected a sharp quip for her cheek, perhaps another lewd castigation, but he was to disappoint her as much as she so joyously disappointed him. 

“You’re so beautiful,” his hand had ventured to her lips, eyes darting between them and her brown gaze with not so much as a hint of mischief. “So beautiful.” She should have felt subconscious, full of virgins blush at the intensity in which he watched her, but the flush of lust was still coursing through her waiting to be attended to. Waiting in this hellish limbo that kept her from celestial rapture. 

Bare before her, his robes discarded into a pile with her gown just outside the peripheral of her vision. Covering every inch of her person with his pale flesh and staring down at her. Staring straight through her and right down to her soul. The violet of his irises blown out, replaced with the black of his pupils, he looked the picture of it. Valyrian god come to life to lead her into wickedness. 

Through her haze, she saw he was motioning towards her slightly parted lips swollen from his kisses he commanded her with a solitary word. “Suck.” 

It was less vulgar and more reverent than one would expect from the meaning of the words. Less a command too, more like he had called her beautiful once more with that starry look in his eyes that suited him odd as it was though she did not need to be flattered and she certainly did not need to be told twice.

The taste was not unpleasant. Salty mainly, she did not taste of berries and honey, but there was a sweetness there. A sweetness which she could understand why men seemed to go wild from it, why Daemon seemed so eager to have her taste herself. 

If she were to admit to it, and she hardly thought she could even at his command,it satisfied some dark perverse part of her crawling that crawled out with a tiny moan stiffened by his fingers, but that darkness still hungered. Wondering how Daemon would taste on her tongue. 

To see him reduced to a mere husk of man that would see him beg her with that solitary word and throaty pants. 

Her hand had crawled between their bodies blindly with want. Instinct drove her around this new bend as she took him in hand. 

He was hot to the touch. His skin felt soft like velvet yet rigid with his arousal. Throbbing in her hand and far larger than that hound imprinted in her memory.    

He allowed her to go on like that. encouraging her in her explorations as his hand joined hers between their bodies. Guiding her little tugs upon his length, but halted her movements when she had felt him begin to coat her hands with his spunk. 

The haze of lust she found herself in abated somewhat with a slap placed onto the meat of her thigh which had her yelping at the sting of it. 

Another was placed in that same spot rubbing the brown skin tender for good measure when she had tried to bring her hand to her mouth to taste him as he had tasted her. She could not meet his eye when he sneered down at her. 

“I did not did not give you permission to do that sweet sister.”

Taking her hand in his as Daemon brought her fingers to his lips. Enveloping the digits into to suckle upon before releasing them not a half minute after with a pop that had her wetting her thighs that she tried clamping together for some relief, but was stopped by the hard body atop. Gods, did he have to keep her from this too? 

“Greedy little thing whatever am I to do with you?” His eye sparkled with mirth at her whines and squirms beneath his person, but he took some mercy on her.

“Next time sweet one,” her brother promised. The tips of his pointer finger on the other hand that had not been in her tracing her lips as his bent head smirked down at her. She desperately wanted to meet the small admonition with a protest of her own making. Why could she not love him as he loved him, but he supplanted the words with a moan by way of his lips returning to its rightful place upon hers. 

“Next time I’ll teach you how to use that pretty mouth.” He breathed into her his want. 

Next time his promise swimmed in her head as her tongue wet and wild battled with his. Giving in as was becoming a habit when he swiped it across the nerves atop the roof of her mouth. She did not mind waiting for the next time if it would lead to this. She could wait for next time. Next time. Next time. 

He wanted there to be a next time. He wanted a next time with her. Mayhaps even more than that if he made good on his promise. If he took her away from this half-life of dictums, indifference, and daggers hidden behind tight smiles. Mayhaps there will be a thousand next times. She could almost picture it beneath the clouds. Almost feel it if she just reached for it. If she just—

“Shh sweetling,” he panted out. Pulling away from the kiss, but only just for his lips still ghosted hers.  the warmth of his breath fanning her fevered cheeks as he moved his hands to back up to cup her face as he murmured plaintives. “I’m right here.”

She did not know why, but she had begun to cry. She had not even aware she had, hadn’t even felt the telltale sting upon her cheeks nor tasted the salt of her tears, the thought of next time and its pleasures gripping hold of her til Daemon leaned down to kiss them away. Peppered her face with kisses as he shushed her. 

Trying to calm her overtaxed state with his own branding. Bringing her back down from the skies which he had ascended her into with the gentleness of his touch. And yet he was far from sending her into that bliss. Next time could wait. There was a now to see too

She whimpered as he spread her legs, this time with his bare thigh which felt like a balm to that heat that was regrowing in the pit of her belly. Feeling the stretch and her own stickiness but mostly how sore she had become. Dear god he really was trying to send her to heaven or to whatever land of milk and honey he had come from or perhaps the land of fire and blood was a more apt description for it. 

“Daemon please,” she begged, but he had only answered with a laugh and the tilt of her 

“You’ve been neglected for far too long,” He was toying with her, teasing her. Controlling her movements as he grinded her heat down upon his thigh. 

It was too much. It was not enough.    

“I can’t promise it won’t hurt.” That hand which had been guiding the erratic dilutions of her hips had shifted to the apex of her womanhood cupping her curls before pulling her labia apart to renew their efforts upon her pulsing button; it did not take much to send her spiraling delirious with want as she was. 

“I don’t care,” and she didn’t. Feeling her orgasm crescendo once more with each circle he drew into her engorged clit. That hill so intoxicating a climb. Her sopping cunt pulsing around nothing as her clit thrummed, but so desperately needing to be filled as she once had. “I don't please.”

She wasn’t above begging now. Not when she had a taste. “I need you please I need you—- Daemon,” she choked on her moan as he answered her call. her nails digging into his back as he breached her pulsing walls. She could tell that she was drawing blood, but she had bled for him and the man atop her had choked out a groan of his own as he sheathed himself within her to the hilt. 

He had been right there was pain but it was but a prick swiftly overtaken by that wave of pleasure which he brought the heady concoction that he made for her.

 In out. 

Not stopping. 

Never stopping for she was a finely tuned instrument he knew only how to play. 

Ever the master of his craft his mouth hot on hers as his tongue soaked up every song she gifted him. The long digits of his right hand remained on her clit. The pads of his fingers rubbing circle while his length bullied that spongy spot within her heat which once pulsed around his fingers while the fingers belonging to his left hand wrapped themselves around her throat. Squeezing as her walls squeezed his length. Milking him for all that he would give her. 

She arched her hips up onto him when he tried to leave from her walls just to thrust himself deeper within them, meeting him thrust for thrust. Her need taking over as she let the man use her for their pleasure.

 His thumb had never abandoned her clit as he kept himself seated deep within her quivering walls as she watched black dots blanketing her vision. A little death of the color he had painted over her world of gray, blind as she was, but there was so much more to feel. 

This, this was the thing which she had needed. This was what she was meant for. 

His skin upon hers. Sweat, spit, and spunk gluing their bodies together. The squelches from their lovemaking her spend and his combining with each tilt drowning out whatever remained of the world outside or even within the walls of these sultry chambers. 

The push and pull of him stretching her. His rigid length dragged across her walls, filling her better than his fingers. She felt whole. 

Each thrust somehow deeper and deeper. Carving out a space that had not existed before this, but was always to be. that want and longing that had tormented her so quelled like a babe at his mothers breasts. 

She came around him, soaking him, squeezing him, without so much as a release of breath, but he was there to breathe for her. There to speak for her. There to be her anchor.

That's a good girl. That's my good girl. Gods, you're so tight, so tight. Naughty little thing you squeeze me so perfectly. That's it, he crooned, adores position by his low rasps of breath. Voice strained in the back of his throat as he commanded her, Let go for me. 

It was not his words that undid her. Nor his grunts of pleasure he did not refrain from gifting her. 

It was in his eyes that bore into her. Violet turned midnight eyes that mirrored her own which said You'll be my death you sweet thing, but I will not leave you. In. I belong here. In. In you. In. With you. In. You are mine. In. As I am yours.

 In. In. In. In. 

She shook beneath him and he groaned into the hollow space between her breasts. Eyelids fluttering shut as he bent into her. Squirting around his hot member as he spilled into her. 

He was everywhere. Had taken everything from her body from the depths of her being and she did not care.

This was the beginning, the after, everything. Her body curled into itself. Curling around him. He did not stop and she did not want him to stop going further and further up a cliff which she did not know only that it was more than last time. Stronger too as she tumbled over into the welcoming arms of elation.

Time had lost all its meaning as her orgasm wrecked through body. White and silver the color of moonlight flashing across her. The salt of his skin the only taste on her tongue. The little grunts and moans they let out to the other as effortless as one's heartbeat. Where he ended and she began extended past where their bodies were joined for there was no him, no her, just this. Just them.

It was his hand that she came to the world of color. Petting her cheek as he had before when she had returned back to him from that mountain of bliss. Hand upon her bare hip a comforting weight, but he made no move to exert her further. 

“I will not touch you, but I need to take care of you sweet one.” Another kiss, this one placed on the tip of her freckled nose as she exhaled, loosening that ball of energy that remained from her worn body. 

Cupping her warm face between his palms as he leaned in so that his damped forehead rested upon hers. “Will you let me take care of you?" she nodded, that ragdoll feeling coming about her again, wanting to do but she knew better than to take his words in vain.

She laid there doll like upon a mountain of pillows that as he fetched a cloth and thimble of water from her wash basin. Still as naked as she, backside turned, throwing  her a boyish smile every so often over his shoulder as he dampened the rag, but having no shame in her seeing him as such and she was too tired to be embarrassed by the sight of a naked man or to care what any others might think of it. Let them make what they like.

She would not trade this, seeing that lovely gaze with light in every corner of his face which made him look ten years younger for what had been before ruined as she was. 

There was no talking as he washed slick and spend from her body. Stilted breaths, trembles when he dragged the cloth against her sour cunny, and little gulps of water from the chalice he handed to her when he had deemed his washing the only tune which played. Even the feast below them had gone well and truly quiet. The moon that hung low in the night sky which would soon glow a bloom of red and orange their only company. 

Half bathed in the shadows he stretched out a pale hand towards her as he finally settled himself beside her. Having thrown the soiled rag clear across the room for one of her maids to find in the morning along with her, but that would wait til dawn broke free of the night.

The moon high his fingers glistened in its light with water droplets from the basin as she took that outstretched hand without pause. Daemon pulled her into him with one tug.

A feminine yelp and  a contented sigh the brief interlude that cut the still. Nestling her head beneath his chin as he resumed stroking down her body. 

Gentle. 

It shocked her how he who could be so maddening who could elicit such scorn and want, even from her,  yet he was still so gentle with her when it was all said and done. She couldn’t complain that he was so gentle resting there in his arms, but it was a shock albeit the most pleasant kind. 

They went on like that. Time continuing to be immaterial. The soothing caresses down her bare back pulling her tenderly to the land of dreams. That contented quiet having quenched the hunger prevailing until he broke it.

Pulling her head slightly away from his shoulder where she had rested to lift her chin up enough to face him but not quite enough to pull her in for another sweet kiss or a searing one to begin their lovemaking anew as she had thought. She was not so very tired and the sun was still aslumber, but then she met his eye. 

Brown met Violet as their gazes aligned. 

“Come away with me.” He whispered. His voice sounded just as boyish as he looked then. A slight bit of apprehension beyond the brilliance of his gaze, but so full of hope. A hope she would not leave unanswered. 

Meeting him the rest of the way she leaned into his touch. Her lips grazed his as she breathed her reply into him. 

“Okay.” She’d follow him anywhere. Into bliss and beyond.  

Ao3 Link:

#daemon targaryen x reader #daemon targaryen x sister!reader #daemon targaryen #hotd fic #daemon targaryen x black!reader #house of the dragon #hotd fanfic #bnhotdfic #see what I did with the title 👀 #I might be making this spicer than it is but an attempt was made 🔥

[bohemian-nights]

Arlī(Anew)-Chapter 1

Word Count: ~1,644 words

Rating: 18+

Warnings⚠️: Uncle/niece incest

Description: She was not her uncle’s first choice Naery’s knew that, but she would do her duty.

AN: This story takes place from episode 5 onward. I’ve changed things up a bit but I’ve kept the timeline intact.

Chapter 2, Chapter 3, Chapter 4, Chapter 5, Chapter 6, Chapter 7, Chapter 8, Chapter 9

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115 AC - Dragonstone

Naerys had been told by her septa that a woman’s place in this world is a precarious thing, but she had not known what it meant until now. She was the blood of old Valyria though she did not feel it. She lacked the true spirit of her dragon rider ancestors. It mattered not now. Today was her wedding day and she had been every inch the Valyrian bride. She knew her duty. Naerys was to be her uncle’s long-awaited prize.

Her uncle’s wife, the Lady Rhea Royce, had died. It had been an accident. Lady Rhea had fallen off her horse and broke her back hawking. A tragedy, but that did not stop the murmurs around court and the Vale. The whispers only grew when her uncle had gone to Runestone to claim his late lady wife’s seat.

The king dismissed them of course. Daemon had been away from the Vale in the Stepstones at the time. Short of him being in two places at once, Lady Rhea’s death was an unfortunate incident. And with it, Daemon was freed from his ill-fated union. Free if he chose to take a woman to wife.

Her uncle did not have to remarry. He was a second son who stood to inherit nothing. Daemon had not been his brother’s heir for years. In that time, king Viserys had more heirs. His eldest daughter had sons of her own now. House Targaryen’s future stood secure, but the prince had made it clear that he intended to marry again.

The small council suggested that a match between the Prince of Dorne’s daughter and the rogue prince would be ideal. She was said to be beautiful, she was an avid rider, her High Valyrian was near perfect, and most importantly she was her father’s heir. A second son could not want more in a bride. Daemon had rejected the match with a chuckle that bounced around the throne room.

A Martell bride would bring him his own seat. It would finally bring Dorne into the fold with the rest of the kingdoms Viserys ruled over, but he had not wanted it. He had already been made to take one wife he did not want. He would not take another. This time around Daemon Targaryen had wanted a wife of his own choosing.

Daemon had informed her uncle’s small council that he wanted a Valyrian wife and Dragonstone. He would take his niece Naerys, his half-brother’s only daughter, to wife. The prince had Caraxes, fought in wars, and he would now have her. His final trophy. A young Targaryen wife. A naive impressionable girl and a seat for them to rule over.

The council had all scoffed at his initial request. “Our niece is too young for you brother,” her uncle, the king, had told him.

“She is not Rhaenyra my prince,” Naerys uncle Lord Corlys Velaryon had chimed in as well. “You will find her wanting.” As she was his ward it was his job to worry over her safety and future marriage prospects.

Daemon’s involvement with the king's heir and oldest daughter, Princess Rhaenyra was an open secret. Though she was herself now married to Lord Corlys son Ser Laenor, with them both being at court it was only a matter of time before the two might rekindle their affections for one another.

Naerys was too sweet. A shy little thing who had seen little of the world outside of Driftmark. She would not be an adequate replacement for the worldly Prince’s true desires. It was not until Daemon threatened to go to Lys, find his mistress, and take her to wife, that the king then conceded much to the disappointment of some at court.

No one had dared to voice their objections once the king agreed to the match apart from the queen and unsurprisingly the princess. Her father had once been the king's hand. Ser Otto Hightower and Daemon had never seen eye to eye. It seemed that the father's grudge had passed onto the daughter. Queen Alicent had tried to remind her husband of his brother’s ways, but the king dismissed her concerns.

Rhaenyra had initially laughed upon hearing the news that Daemon had wanted to take her for a wife. “Let my uncle have his little Targaryen bride,” she had exclaimed with glee to anyone who asked her opinion on the matter. “My dear little cousin and his duties at court should keep Daemon occupied. He will do his duty to his king and his heir.” The meaning was not lost to those around the Red Keep.

“If he wants to plot it will not be easy with the whole court watching him,” the princess had added. Naerys would often find her cousin staring across a room in search of their uncle. The man would sometimes meet her hopeful lilac gaze though his eyes would often drift to a pair of deep violet ones.

Rhaenyra’s tune changed upon finding out that they would not reside in the Red Keep and would be given Dragonstone. She then joined in with Alicent. Naerys own opinion on the match had not been asked for her opinion on her future union with her uncle. In the end, Daemon had gotten what he wanted. A young unspoiled niece for a bride and their family’s seat Dragonstone.

The ceremony itself had been nerve-racking. Her uncle had insisted upon a Valyrian ceremony. Naerys did not know half the words. Her Valyrian had always been less than satisfactory. Daemon had not laughed when she stumbled over the words. He never had when it came to her. Even when her face grew hot at his vulgarity he simply grinned at her.

Naerys had not been able to cut herself nor when the priest had called for the binding. Daemon had to do it for her. Seemingly taking pleasure in her anxiousness as he brought the blade to both of their lips and then hands with a self-satisfied smirk. The feast afterward had been a blur.

“Come here sweetling,” Naerys' new husband had called her once her new lady’s maids had left, breaking her out of her daze. They were alone in her bed chambers. Her uncle had been kind enough to allow the dispensation of the bedding ceremony. There was no need to when they all knew that this marriage would be unlike the prince's first.

Naerys felt the urge to pretend she had not heard him. She had been made to change into a sheer gown that did little to hide her figure. Her aunt Princess Rhaenys had tried to warn her of what might occur on her wedding night, but it did little to calm her. When Daemon called for her again she knew that she could not avoid him.

Naerys reluctantly made her way out from behind her changing screen, her eyes briefly landing on her uncle who stood by her fireplace. The fire's glow bathed him in its warm light and cast shadows across the room. From the corner of her eyes, she could see that her husband's gaze followed her across the room. He did not waste time pulling her into his arms when she finally reached him.

Daemon did not say anything as he stroked her silver curls. For a time they stood in silence. His gaze fell back to the fire. The only thing that could be heard was the crackle of it and the faint sounds of the feast down below.

“I suppose I will need to break you in.” He seemed to be thinking out loud, but that did not stop Naerys from pulling back from him. Daemon did not move to stop her as she turned away to face the side of the room. Her arms came up to cradle herself as her dark eyes landed upon what would soon be her marriage bed.

“Give him heirs Naerys.” Her uncle Ser Vaemond had whispered in her ear before her husband took her away to her new chambers. That is what she was there for. A mere plaything for her uncle. To appease him, birth his children, care for them, and console him when needed.

Naerys was wanted for her blood and what she could offer him with it. She was the blood of the dragon even if she did not feel it. She was a dragon rider. She might have even been queen had her father, but she felt even younger than her sixteen name days at that moment.

“Come niece, I will not harm you.” Naerys turned slightly to see that he held out a pale hand towards her. She hesitated to take it, but her fate was sealed whether she took it or not. She gave into her husband's demand, reaching for his outstretched arm with her small brown one. He laid another kiss on her head when she was close enough. She heard her husband sigh as he pulled her back into him.

“Ao issi gevie byka mēre.” Naerys only made out half of his words.

“Do not worry little wife,” Daemon hummed lightly. He drew circles upon her back with his right hand. It was almost soothing until he began to pull her gown up with his other hand. “I will not mind teaching you.” His hands drifted down to her newly exposed rear making the young bride tense up once more. As she closed her eyes she was confronted with the realization of why they were here, to begin with.

With any luck the sooner they consummate their union, the faster he would leave her and go back to his own quarters. Rhaenyra was with them on Dragonstone. The young bride was not naive. She was not her uncle’s first choice, Naerys knew that, but she would do her duty.

Translations:

Ao issi gevie byka mēre: You are beautiful little one

Ao3 link:

#daemon targaryen #daemon targaryen x oc #daemon targaryen x targaryen!reader #house of the dragon #houseofthedragon #hotd #hotd fanfiction #prince daemon targaryen #daemon targaryen x reader #posting this before I chicken out #daemon targaryen x black!oc #daemon fanfic #daemon targaryen x black!reader #bnhotdfic

[bohemian-nights]

Arlī(Anew)-Chapter 4

Word Count: ~5,431 words

Rating: 18+

Warning ⚠️: Uncle/niece incest (mild smut)

Description: “She has yet to give you a child.” Naerys hand flew to her stomach. Peering through the crack in the door that Daemon had left to take a look to see the scene that was playing out in their chamber.

AN: This story takes place from episode 5 onward. I’ve changed things up a bit but I’ve kept the timeline intact.

Chapter 1, Chapter 2, Chapter 3, Chapter 5, Chapter 6, Chapter 7, Chapter 8, Chapter 9

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116 AC-Kings Landing

“That was then Rhaenyra,” Daemon's quiet voice could be heard from their solar, awakening Naerys from her restless nap. She had tried to sleep but had not been able to find an agreeable position in which she could take her mid-day slumber. Instead, she lies in the realm between reality and dreams. Constantly drifting in and out of consciousness.

In the fortnight they had spent at the capital it seemed as if Naerys could not get enough rest. She woke up tired and went to bed in the same state. Her days had become a monotonous string of court proceedings that she struggled to find her footing.

The sun set and the sun rose and a new day of court would begin. An endless parade of pageantry and tittering empty-headed smiles. The young princess longed for the quiet solitude of Dragonstone. Some nights she would lie awake going through every interaction she had that day.

Laena, her husband, and the rest of house Velaryon were stuck on Driftmark. A coming storm had made their journey to Kings Landing impossible. Alicent and Rhaenyra had taken it upon themselves to entertain her in her cousin's absence. If it was not Alicent with her constant teas, sewing circles, and worrying looks it was Rhaenyra and her jibs. Searching her face to see which one would hit its target.

Naerys' husband's general absence had not helped matters. She knew that her uncle had not meant to neglect her. Perhaps neglect wasn’t even the right word for it. The simple fact of the matter was that duty had called. One could hardly say no to the king. Least of all when he is your elder brother.

Daemon was back in the Viserys good graces. All was forgiven since the debacle of their wedding had put further strain on the brother's relationship. Daemon had been invited to attend small council meetings. Lord Strong surprisingly did not object to her husband’s presence on the small council. The lord undoubtedly wanted to keep the peace and was willing to make sacrifices to do so. The rest of the council had followed the hand’s lead.

The rogue prince's seat at the meetings was in an unofficial capacity of course, but some position on the council would no doubt be offered to him once more. He would take it. Daemon was never one for the shadows. Dragonstone was less than stimulating to the mind. At court he was in his element once more.

Naerys herself had been offered to attend a council meeting, but Rhaenyra had put her off from taking up the offer. “Naerys will be bored out of her mind uncle. Wouldn’t you aunt?” It was said with the same condescending tone that she always spoke with. The remark stung, but not as much as her other taunts.

“Children are a joy.” Rhaenyra had found her bullseyes. As Rhaenyra cooed over her black-haired sons, Naerys had to hold back from snapping at the woman. The realm's delight had gotten with child without having to bat so much as an eye. She had given birth to two healthy sons. Two healthy heirs. Not all women were so lucky.

Naerys apparent lack of children had been a source of gossip throughout the Red Keep. Rhaenyra had seen to it. Among the ladies at court, the detail of her empty womb was a favorite topic of conversation. She’s barren. She can not give him children. Poor thing. Perhaps the prince will take a lover again. The young princess would have faltered under the growing weight of the chatter had she not suspected that their efforts to have an heir might yet be fulfilled.

“It wasn’t very long ago.” Rhaenyra’s high-pitched whisperings interrupted the younger girl from her memories. Bringing her back to her present reality, Naerys reached for the robe hanging off her changing room's screen to cover her nakedness. The capital was much warmer than Dragonstone. Even when Daemon did not join her in sleep, she remained comfortable throughout the nights.

“She has yet to give you a child.” Naerys hand flew to her stomach. Peering through the crack in the door that Daemon had left to take a look to see the scene that was playing out in their chamber. Her husband stood by a freshly lit fire with a drink in his hand. Rhaenyra’s back was turned towards her as she faced their uncle.

“So has Laenor.” Naerys could see Rhaenyra visibly wincing from where she stood. Her body jumped slightly at their uncle's words. Daemon looked unbothered, almost bored with the flow of conversation as he swirled the amber liquid in his goblet before taking another slow sip. He had not taken his eyes off the firelight in their chambers.

“She may never give you heirs.” A sneer was evident in her voice. Her spine stilling, holding her head high once more. “What good is my cousin, a Valyrian bride, good for if she has not done her duty to you?” It was a bluff. Naerys could not be put aside so easily. The king would not allow it. Both Ser Vaemond and Lord Corlys would raise hell if an accident were to occur. She was the blood of old Valyria, not a common Andal lady.

“She’s my wife Rhaenyra.” He had lowered his voice. Daemon had finally turned around to glare down at the realm's delight. The dying light of the day coupled with the glow from the fire cast his eyes in a tenebrous haze. “You will do well to remember that.”

“Lady Rhea Royce was your wife as well.” Rhaenyra let out a bitter laugh as she continued on. Unconcerned with the shadows that crossed their uncle's face. “What did you call her? Your bronze bitch. Have you forgotten her already?”

It was easy enough to forget that Daemon had ever been married to another. Her husband never brought up his ill-fated union with the vale woman. Naerys had never even met the woman. She only existed in the outer reaches of her mind as a faceless memory.

“You promised me and yet you married her.” Her cousin's anger and desperation had grown into something else. Rhaenyra grabbed Daemon. Pulling the tall man into her space. “You promised me.” Her husband did not move from her cousin's grasp. Daemon began to stroke her forearm. The touch was intimate. As if they had done it a million times before. Rhaenyra’s words echoed in Naerys' mind.

Naerys did not know what the two got up to during her visits or what happened between the two before their respective marriages. She would not ask now. The past lay in the past. It was best kept that way. Daemon was ever the attentive husband these days. She would not bring up old misdeeds, but it seemed that these wounds appeared whether she wanted them to or not.

“Rhaenyra.” It was said with a sigh. The venom was gone from his gaze. Her husband closed his eyes briefly as if to gather his bearings. His fingers continued their descent across Rhaenyra’s arm. Naerys could feel her blood begin to boil. She was grateful that no objects lay within her reach or else she would have hurled them at her uncle's head.

“Kosti sagon biare kesīr.” Daemon did not reply. His fingers had finally ceased their movement. He cast his violet eyes towards the door where his wife hid behind. Naerys froze hoping he had not seen her.

“Would you abandon Ser Harwin so easily?” Naerys could see her husband leaning down as if to whisper a poorly kept secret in her cousin's ear. Rhaenyra had taken a lover herself. She was not left without companionship. She found her own distractions.

“I had no choice.” Rhaenyra sputtered at her uncle's question. Her desperation returned as she reached out to bring him near her.” I was alone. We both were.” Excuses fell from her lips, but came upon deaf ears. Daemon spurred his niece’s advances this time. Moving further away from her grasp back towards the fire.

“I am not alone Rhaenyra.” Daemon turned his back fully towards the fire to face Rhaenyra, but he did not look at his niece as he had said the words. Naerys felt her husband's gaze lock onto her. A grin spread across his face which seemed to grow when he saw the fury within his wife.

Rhaenyra had yet to see her, but the woman was burning up with her own barely contained-rage. She almost fluttered past her as she made her way to exit their chambers, but her lilac eyes finally landed on her cousin. The princess yanked open the iron-framed oak door, bringing in a draft, to face her cousin. Naerys pulled her robe tighter around her body to ward off the chill.

“He never stays in one bed for long.” Rhaenyra’s eyes cast down at Naerys stomach with a mirthless sneer. The older girl bent down slightly to spit her next words in her cousin's ear. “If he ever puts a babe in you he’ll just move on to the next one.” The older girl cast one last look at their uncle, before storming from the room.

A wave of dizziness came over Naerys. Daemon was by her side with surprising speed. His smirk had fallen as he helped her into his chair, seating her on his lap before handing her a goblet of water fussing over her as if he were a mother hen. “I’ve sent for Maester Orlys.” He urged her to drink the cooling liquid. Her anger at her husband faded with each sip. “We are not going.”

Naerys had nearly forgotten Jacaerys name-day feast. Rhaenyra had pushed it back as far as she could, but now that Ser Harwin and the Velaryon party had finally arrived the feast was to take place that night.

“We must.” They hadn’t much of a choice. Their absence at the festivities would be noted. Daemon may not care what the “sheep” gossiped about, but Naerys would not add fuel to the growing pyre. They still had to do their duty.

Naerys made ready to climb off her husband’s lap though her Daemon would not release her. He merely shushed her as he brought the back of his hand up to stroke his niece's sable cheek. He gave her a dark look before he leaned in, catching her open mouth by surprise. Their pink tongues danced tangling with one another briefly before her uncle pulled away.

“Ao issi issa vys issa byka mēre.” Daemon buried his silver head in her neck. He was breathing her in as he softly petted the silver coils at her nape. Naerys let herself be fawned over. Her husband's words and gentle ministrations soothed the last remnants of the dull ache she had felt moments ago. “You mean more to me than you could possibly know.”

It occurred to her that for all of his bolstering and saccharine remarks Daemon had never spoken those three little words. They had been married for a year now and yet in some ways Naerys still felt like she did not know her husband at all of his true opinion of her.

Was a man like her husband even capable of such feelings? Was he even capable of feeling that way toward her? Love was not a requirement of marriage, but Naerys was certain that she carried half of him inside of her. Surely that meant something. Was she to share a child with a man who ran hot one minute and cold?

“Get dressed sweetling.” Daemon snapped Naerys from her thoughts with a start. Releasing her from his lap with a final kiss on her temple before turning quickly to head to his own antechamber to do the same.

The rogue prince did not stop to check back on her, but his wife did not miss the glance he gave her before he had left to change. Nor did she miss when he hesitated to leave her in the first place. Naerys knew that she was burning under his fire, but perhaps he burned in hers as well. Or perhaps she was too hopeful. Believing in fairytales, words made of wind, and gallant knights where there were none to be found.

If it was something Naerys mother's family were known for it was how to make an entrance. In Velaryon fashion, they arrived late. They were the last ones to arrive at the Red Keep for the little prince's festivities and what an entrance they had made. Particularly Laena’s girls.

The little darlings had stolen the show. Baela and Rhaena were not yet half a year old and yet their presence dazzled the court. They were small little things that had inherited their mother's silver waves and the lilac eyes of house Velaryon. Sans their coloring, which was all Ser Harwin, they looked like the spitting image of their mother.

Naerys held onto the belief that babies could change until she saw Luke and Jace near their sire. Laenor’s “sons” had not a stitch of their “father” in them, nor their mother for that matter. One had only to look at Ser Harwin to see who fathered them.

Naerys had not meant to ambush her cousin, but Laena had arrived too late for a private chat over tea as she had wanted. She and Daemon were officially due to depart for Dragonstone in the coming days. Regardless of whether they made that journey together or not, the feast was likely Naerys' only chance to learn the truth of the situation.

Her cousins had not denied the affair. “My daughter will be queen,” Laena smiled at the passing ladies of the court as they took a turn about the room. “My youngest will likely be the lady of Driftmark.” She was a daughter of house Velaryon and a dragonrider. She held her head high as they passed by her husband. Ser Harwin smiled at his wife, bouncing one of their daughters in his hold. “I am happy with what I have dear cousin.”

Naerys could not understand how her cousin could be so calm in the face of everything. Laena had the patience of a septa. The young princess did not believe she could endure being around her husband’s mistress day in and out, much less embrace the situation with open arms. She would have grown mad by now, but her oldest cousin possessed a quiet acceptance that was lacking in even those twice her age.

Princess Rhaenys bristled whenever Rhaenyra or her sons came near. She seemed to avoid her good son altogether. Leaving for the opposite side of the room when the captain of the city watch ventured too close to her. Her behavior was a stark contrast to how her husband approached the subject of their grandsons and their sire

Lord Corlys for all intents and purposes appeared unconcerned. Baela, Laena’s oldest, was already betrothed to the future king of the seven kingdoms. From Laena’s own mouth Rhaena would be betrothed to the heir of her father's seat. As long as her uncle's blood sat upon the Driftwood throne he would not deny the strong boys the privilege of the Velaryon name.

Naerys' other uncle was a different matter. If there was any question of Ser Vaemond’s views on the future king and the Lord of Driftmark one need only to see the sneers the dark man gave his good niece and her sons to decipher his true opinion.

Laena was called away to deal with a teething Rhaena. Naerys was left alone. Daemon stood on the opposite side of the hall with Lord Boremund and her aunt Rhaenys. Her husband met her eyes, giving her a smirk. She might have gone over to join them, but though he was good-natured she always found the storm lord too brutish for her tastes.

“You glow my princess.” A foreign voice emerged from the shadows. Naerys turned to its source to come face to face with a ghost. Lords and Ladies gilded around the great hall with practiced ease. Not paying any attention to them. Naerys wondered if the woman was a figment of her imagination, but she knew that her eyes did not deceive her when Rhaenyra stared at her from where she sat at the high table with a mocking leer.

Lady Mysaria stood as an unnaturally pale thin creature cloaked in a hooded robe. Naerys had only seen her husband's former mistress from a distance. She had been a child then, but The woman had not changed much from her memory.

“Thank you.” Naerys did not know how else to respond. It was best to take her words at face value than see them as something more. The woman reached out a milky hand to brush her stomach. Her hands were cold. Cold enough to feel through the layers of dark gown she wore. Naerys tried not to flinch at her touch. Something told her not to falter under the pale woman’s stare.

“You have not told him have you?” The white worm continued to caress her stomach. Naerys dared not to breathe. She feared that if she did her body would give into the cold. “Children are fickle creatures. A blessing from the Gods that can be so easily taken away before they are even born.” She smiled and the chill spread. “Fear not princess, your husband shall have his heir.” Mysaria turned her violet gaze on the other side of the room towards where the princess had last seen her husband.

Naerys did not want to follow it, but she could not resist. Lord Boremund and Rhaenys had left from Daemon's side. Their presence had been replaced by a visiting Lysenni lady. Her white hair gleamed and reflected off of the hall’s ember glow. The lady had her hand resting on Daemon’s arm.

The rogue prince leaned into her hold bending his silver head so that she may whisper in his ear. Whatever she had said made the two descend into laughter. Naerys felt her face heat up. She tried to contain her fire, but she felt herself spiraling at the next words the white worm's breathed into her ear. “His heir and more to spare.” Mysaria was not known for her gift of prophecy, but she had known Daemon.

He will get bored of you. Rhaenyra’s unspoken words rang around in her head. She could no longer hear the noise of the festivities around her. Daemon had his fill. Naerys was just a plaything to him. A useful necessity that he was bound to, but the bonds of marriage meant little to her husband. He was back to where he wanted to be. He can not survive in one bed alone. It did not matter what pretty words he muttered to her in the dark of their chambers. Daemon was not built for it.

“Are you well princess?” Ser Gwayne had removed himself from his post and was by her side before she could blink. Holding her forearm up with practiced ease. Concern was written plainly across his face. Lady Mysaria had slinked back to whatever hole she had crawled out from, but the princess could still feel the chill she had left behind. Naerys felt eyes watching her every move. She could barely breathe under their stares.

“Would you escort me to my seat Ser?” Naerys did not have to explain she would not make it there herself. The Hightower knight was not the only one who had noticed her distress. Daemon was thundering across the Red Keeps great hall. The fury of the dragon blazing in his eyes.

Naerys met Ser Gwayne’s dark eyes before nodding her head in the direction of the oncoming storm. I do not want him whisking me off somewhere to simper out more empty words. The knight gave her a small smile in understanding. Taking her arm to escort her into the crowd, but Daemon had made their way towards them before they could.

“Thank you Ser Gwanye, but your assistance is no longer required.” Daemon sneered at the younger man. His empty sword hand twitches at his side. Viserys had not allowed her husband to bring Dark Sister to the feast. Only the guards had a need for weapons. Naerys thanked the Gods for her uncle’s foresight.

“I will go when the princess dismisses me.” The Hightower knight stood his ground this time. His dark eyes stared her husband down. The two were at a crossroad. Naerys wondered if the two would cause a scene.

“She is my wife Ser. You will release her this instant or you will not see to the end of this feast your dear sister has so dutifully planned.” Daemon's grip tightened on her. Only relaxing it when she let out a wince. Naerys would not meet his eyes. Her husband had no right to his foul temper. He had embarrassed her enough for one night. She would no longer placate him.

“Aunt,” a small voice called from the edge of the crowd. Aemond stood beckoning Naerys over to where he and his siblings sat on the far end of the high table. Naerys had never been more grateful for the distraction. Ser Gwayne let her go upon hearing his nephew, but Daemon would not fold.

“Our nephew calls for me my lord.” Naerys felt herself burning up as she finally lifted her head to gaze up at her husband. “May I go to him or are you mistrustful of little boys as well as the knights of your brother’s City Watch?” She expected her husband, but instead, he began to drag her to the king's youngest children.

They passed by the Lysenni lady Daemon had been enchanted with moments before. “Princess.” It was said with a curtesy and a polite smile. One which Naerys did not return. How could she expect her to when she had so blatantly made a pass at her husband with her in the very same room?

“She’d sooner take you into her bed than see me in it, you spoiled thing.” Daemon went to caress her arm, but the princess jerked from his touch. Her husband’s boldness would never cease to astound her. Naerys dug her heels into the floor. A move that she would regret as he threw her over his shoulder. Some of her uncle’s visiting guests looked their way, but the lords and ladies of the court were far used to the rogue prince's antics.

“Are you ill aunt?” Aemond asked with a frown as Naerys' uncle deposited her in an empty seat to Helaena’s left. Daemon moved to sit in the chair to her right, next to his brother's second son.

“Your aunt is fine.” Daemon placed a kiss on the back of her hand before setting their joint hands on the oak table. “She’s just tired.” Naerys sunk her nails into the back of her uncle's hand. It was not enough to draw blood, but it did cause the prince to grunt in discomfort.

She challenged her husband with a raised eyebrow. The man relented with a smirk breathing a threat into his niece’s ear. “Behave or you will not be able to walk tomorrow.” Naerys released her claws with a glare.

The children seemed to pay no mind to the older prince and princesses' heated exchanges. Aemond began to prattle on about some Valyrian text he had come across to his “nuncle.” Aemond and Damon's relationship had improved greatly. It was in no small part to Naerys.

With Naerys' increasing dizzy spells Daemon had forbidden her from flying alone. The royal couple would take turns riding Caraxes and Silverwing together. Carving out some time in the day to visit their dragons. By the second week of their stay in the capital, Aemond would often wait for them at the Dragon Pit entrance. Trying to catch a glimpse of their dragons with wonder in his eyes.

The young prince had no dragon of his own. His egg had long since turned to stone. Aegon had already begun to tease his brother about his dragonless state. His siblings' dragons were too small to ride, but they would soon even little Daeron would become Dragonriders while their brother remained without so much as a dragon to call his own.

The queen was not overly fond of her children’s dragons, but she understood the importance of the bond between a Targaryen and their dragon. She knew how her second son longed for an end to his dragonless state. It took little to convince Alicent to allow him the privilege of a dragon ride. Daemon had not been able to say no either after she had ambushed him while he was still coming down from his high one night.

“I would be grateful kepus if you— if you were to take Aemond with you and Caraxes on your next ride.” The two lay panting in each other’s embrace. Naerys combed her fingers through silver locks as he lay on top of her. The princess winced as her husband replaced his spent cock with his fingers. “Kostilus kepus.”

Daemon's eyes remained glazed over as he watched his digits move in and out of her spasming cunt. Fucking his cum back into his niece while his thumb drew small circles on her clit. “Ao issi sīr gevie byka mēre.” The rogue prince suddenly removed his fingers from within her as the princess was on the crest of another release. Naerys whined at her ruined climax, but her husband only shushed her. “Ao drējī issi vēttan syt issa”

Some of his seed leaked out wetting the silk sheets below, but the lovers paid it no mind as Daemon brought his fingers to his niece's waiting mouth. Naerys eagerly lapped at their combined spends while her husband gave into her demands.

The boy had been ecstatic when Daemon had helped him climb upon Caraxes back. Naerys watched them from the dragon pit entrance with a less than enthused Ser Criston who acted more like the boy's father than his mother's guard as they made their descent into the horizon. Aemond took to the sky’s with a fever she had not seen apart from Daemon and Laena.

Naerys reached for the goblet of water that was placed in front of her. Most of the nausea she had felt in the past had dissipated, but the dizziness remained. Helaena looked up at her with a smile. She was a sweet quiet girl, if not a bit spacey. Alicent’s daughter placed a small hand on her belly with a wistful smile.

“Do not fret aunt. My sister shall be healthy and beautiful.” Dragon dreams. Naerys did not know what to say. Daemon narrowed his eyes at their niece's words, but he made no comment. Only Aegon would grace the table with his thoughts on his sister's riddles.

“Mother isn’t pregnant you nitwit.” Aemond looked as if he wanted to throttle his own brother. Even Helaena had turned her nose up at the unruly boy. Aegon’s ill-mannered behavior remained unchecked by both the king and his mother. His sire seemed to barely acknowledge his existence while Alicent remained at a loss for how to best deal with it.

The king made his way to retire for the evening. He had stayed far longer than he usually did at the feasts of late. Those seated at the high table rose with him as was customary before Viserys would depart. Naerys tried to rise with the rest of the table, but Daemon rested his hand on her shoulder to stop her. As she looked at the pale hand Naerys felt what little was left of her restraint vanish.

She no longer cared if she made a scene. Let the court see how the rogue prince viewed her. The princess managed to shake free of her husband's hold. In her haste, she rose too quickly. Tripping over the leg of her chair she had pushed too far back, Naerys felt herself lose her balance. Her husband caught her before she could hit the Great Hall’s stone floors.

Daemon's voice was the first Naerys heard when she returned to consciousness. She felt sluggish and drowsy. The princess spied from the corner of her eyes one of Maester Orlys’ tinctures on her vanity. Whatever the kindly man had given her had a foul aftertaste.

“How long have you known sweetling?” Daemon did not look angry as he sat in a chair that had been placed by their bed dragging the back of his hand softly across her cheek. He in fact reminded her of a kicked puppy. His gaze was as tender as his touch. The rogue prince looked more like a boy of ten than a man grown. Naerys supposed that was really what he was underneath his bravado.

“When Alicent first invited me to tea.” She felt a weight lift off her shoulder at the revelation. Naerys had her suspicions before, but she had not been sure until Alicent had made it plain to her.

“Ser Gwayne was only trying to help.” Daemon winced. He should have been there for her, not the Hightower knight, but he would apologize for jumping to conclusions. It was not in his nature to express regret for his actions. Naerys understood why. Their fires burned too hot to allow them to. “How far along did Maester Orlys say I was?”

“Three moons.” The baby would arrive in time before the new year. Enough time to get her affairs in order. Enough time to travel to Dragonstone and then Driftmark if she so wished. Naerys wondered if she could fly there now. Daemon answered that question for her.

“We can journey back home.” He gave her a small smile. Petting her silver twists as if she were a child. Her handmaids must have come in at some point to braid up her hair. Something that she would be thankful for in the morning.

“You may stay.” Daemon began to tense up at her words. She reached out in search of the scars on her husband's neck. Stroking the rough skin with a soft hand. It was funny enough, but Naerys felt much calmer now. Looking back on the day the princess had realized that she had let others draw conclusions for her now. Conclusions that only one man could provide.

“I will go to Driftmark.” She tried to sound absent-minded as she said it. Continuing to trace over her husband's scars, threading her fingers into his hair. A storm cloud came over her husband. Naerys could not contain her smile at seeing her uncle's reaction.

Daemon noticed it, but he made no comment as he fell to his knees to kiss the top of her crown before burrowing his silver head into her neck. “I am yours you stubborn girl. I am no one, but yours as you are mine.” The man was exhausted. A day of pointless fighting had worn them both out. “We will go to Dragonstone. I’ve had enough of this city and it’s gossip.”

“I could lose it.” Daemon tensed up once more underneath her fingers. He removed himself from her neck. Violet eyes met a pair of amethyst orbs. It was bad luck to speak of such things. Especially in the early days, but the thought gnawed at her. So many things could go wrong. Naerys never considered herself a very lucky person.

“Ao issi daor nykeā jaes kepus.” Daemon was a man. He behaved as if he were a dragon, but he was still a man and Naerys was a mere woman. They were flesh, blood, and bone. They could not bend fate to suit them. Mortals had their limitations. The king talked of prophecies, but Daemon was little better with his blood obsession.

“Your mother doubts you byka zaldrīzes.” Her husband bent down to place a kiss on her still flat belly. “She worries too much.” Lifting up to face her once more Daemon grabbed her hand and gave it a squeeze. Lending her the strength that had left from her body. “Iksā ñuha ābrazȳrys. Iksā emare ñuha riña. Īlva riña. Iksi jāre lenton.”

Naerys was too tired to argue with her husband. There was still plenty to sort out, but the day had been long. The princess let herself be petted as she drifted off into a dreamless wonder. She would worry about their future in the morning when her head was clear.

Translations:

Kosti sagon biare kesīr: We can be happy here

kepus: uncle

Ao issi issa vys issa byka mēre: You are my world my little one

Kostilus kepus: Please uncle

Ao issi sīr gevie byka mēre: You are so beautiful little one

Ao drējī issi vēttan syt issa: You truly are made for me

Ao issi daor nykeā jaes kepus: You are not a god uncle

byka zaldrīzes: little dragon

Iksā ñuha ābrazȳrys. Iksā emare ñuha riña. Īlva riña. Iksi jāre lenton: You are my wife. You are having my child. Our child. We are going home.

Ao3 Link:

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[bohemian-nights]

Arlī(Anew)- Chapter 3

Word Count: ~3,740 words

Rating: 18+

Warnings⚠️: Uncle/niece incest

Description: As Naerys traced over her husband's battle scars she was reminded of the fact that her uncle had led a full life before their marriage.

AN: This story takes place from episode 5 onward. I’ve changed things up a bit but I’ve kept the timeline intact.

Chapter 1, Chapter 2, Chapter 4, Chapter 5, Chapter 6, Chapter 7, Chapter 8, Chapter 9

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116 AC- Dragonstone

“Do they hurt?” It was early morning, the sun had not come out yet. Naerys hovered over her husband admiring the scars on his pale neck. The pair lay naked as their name days. They were a mess of limbs. A couple of moons back Naerys would not be able to meet Daemon's violet eyes as she did so, but there was no need for shame anymore. The two had done everything together.

As Naerys traced over her husband's battle scars she was reminded of the fact that her uncle had led a full life before their marriage. One steeped in war, distant lands, and exotic people though the latter she tries not to think of too much.

“Not anymore,” he hummed before taking her hand to bring to his mouth landing a kiss upon each digit. Her husband she had found out was a night owl. not an early riser. Daemon could sleep half the day away in their bed.

Her husband had moved her things into his chambers. The Sea Tower, where Naerys' old chambers were located, was too far away from the main tower. They would have more space to expand in the Stone Drum where her husband had taken up residence. The rooms in the tower were much more spacious anyway which afforded them greater privacy.

“īlon emagon nykeā early rhaenagon kepus.” Daemon had resumed her Valyrian lessons at her insistence. Naerys was a perfectionist at heart. She did not want to be just good enough in her language abilities. Her husband had not been easy on her and for that she was grateful.

“The name day of one of Rhaenyra’s bastards can wait.” Naerys frowned at her husband’s choice of words. Her cousins' boys were children. They were not responsible for the alleged sins of their parents. They were victims of it.

“You are being cruel.” She pinched him on his thigh. Apparently not hard enough as her husband only laughed at her attempts to scold him. Daemon had once said that her grip was that of a small child.

“On the contrary byka mēre.” Daemon pulled her down to seat her firmly on his lap. Naerys let out a yelp at the sudden movement feeling a spell of dizziness that was becoming all too common these days. Her husband’s cock brushed against her folds. A wave of arousal overtook her. Giving her a new reason to feel dizzy. Daemon was not totally unaffected as he planted a firm smack upon her backside which only added to the heat of the moment.

Naerys was tempted to sink down and remedy the predicament they often found themselves in, but thought better of it. They could not laze around in pleasure all day. If they wanted to “I rejoice every time our niece gives birth to another strong black-haired son.” No one would accept a bastard to the throne, least of all a bastard born from a woman.

Daemon’s position and her own would advance, but the young princess did not want to be queen. She had grown quite content with their life on Dragonstone. There they only had to live for themselves. The crown was a burden she did not wish for. Viserys had sons, but with a succession crisis, there was no way to be certain that their claims would not be counted.

“My aunt has black hair kepus.” Rhaenys mother had been a Baratheon and had looked every inch a lady of her house. Her aunt had inherited her dark hair from her. Rhaenyra’s own mother had been an Arryn. They had their fair share of dark-haired children born of the Vale house.

“I suppose Rhaenys has a pug nose as well?” Jace and Lucerys were still babies. It was not unheard of for a young child’s features to change as they age. Naerys herself had been born with lilac eyes that had turned deep violet by the time she had reached her tenth name day.

“Ser Harwin is married to Laena.” Naerys could not picture the daughter of Corlys Velaryon and Rhaenys Targaryen being content in a marriage where her husband could care less for her feelings. Nor could she picture her uncle the Sea Snake allowing the affair to go on without any protest.

“Poor sweet little niece. You do not know the ways of men.” Her husband still babied her. A great deal in fact. Daemon could not seem to go a day without infantilizing her. He mostly did it to tease her though. There was no rancor behind his words. His lilac eyes had gone soft despite his expression.

“Are you not a man kepus?” She arched a silver eyebrow at him. She knew what his answer would be of course, but it was now her turn to goad him.

“I am but your humble servant princess.” The pale man tried to look penitent, but a humble man Daemon was not. Naerys had to bite her lip to keep from laughing at her husband. Naerys briefly looked out the window near their bed which earned her another smack. Ever the impatient man. He too was like a child in some ways.

The sun had finally decided to make its appearance. They would never leave their chambers, much less Dragonstone. Turning her attention back to Daemon, Naerys leaned down to kiss him, snaking her right hand into his silver hair. Her husband grew sensitive when she tugged on the hair at the nape of his neck while her other hand traveled down and slipped between them.

She only stopped when she reached his member. Taking it within her small brown hands she began to pump his length which caused a groan to spill from his mouth into hers. The rogue prince became compliant and easily distracted by his wife’s touches. Distracted enough for Naerys to slip out of bed if she was quick.

“Your princess commands you to rise my prince,” she leaned down to whisper in his ear. He had not yet realized her intent until she released her grip upon him. Her husband flopped back on the bed with a groan. He reached out for her but she took advantage of his lazy state and escaped to the opposite side of the room giggling.

Kings Landing had not changed much in the year since Naerys had last seen it. The capital had never been a pleasant place. In the summertime, the sweltering heat made the city unbearable. The people made it even more so. King's Landing was never planned for the number of citizens it housed. On some especially hot days, the smell of human waste could travel to the Red Keep. Dragonstone’s smell of smoke and earth was preferable to the stench of the overcrowded city.

They had been the first of the guests invited to arrive; Rhaenyra and Laenor had been the ones to receive them upon their arrival into the city. The two were waiting at the entrance of the dragon pit when they landed Silverwing and Caraxes. Their “sons” were nowhere in sight.

Rhaenyra had greeted Daemon first with a look Naerys did not want to place (her husband had thankfully not returned said look) before turning to greet her with a tight smile, calling her aunt and kissing her lightly upon the cheek.

Naerys had long since told the king's heir to not refer to her as such. Rhaenyra was two years older than her. Laenor had welcomed them both with a simple cousin and a slight nod of his head.

Her quarrels with her cousin-turned-niece had started long before her marriage to Daemon. Rhaenyra had so affectionately dubbed her “a Targaryen in name only” when she had first mounted her dragon Syrax. As if Naerys did not have a Velaryon mother as well as a Targaryen father. She may not have the spirit of the conqueror, but in blood, she was every inch the proper Valyrian princess as Rhaenyra was if not more so.

The royal couple then showed their aunt and uncle to their chambers. They were given Daemon’s old apartments near the kings in Maegor's holdfast. Rhaenyra and Laenor had moved their chambers near Laena and her husband in the tower of the hand. The last time Naerys had stayed at the Red Keep she had been put in chambers above the serpentine stairs near Alicent and her children.

They did not see the rest of their family until dinner which had been a strained affair. Alicent and Rhaenyra sat on opposite sides of Viserys who seemed to serve as a buffer between his family's two factions. Aegon and Laenor sat next to their mother and wife respectively. Naerys and her husband were seated by Aemond and Helaena. Both of which had both been deemed old enough to dine with the rest of their family.

Aemond, who was seated next to Daemon, seemed in awe of his uncle. Naerys had to contain her laughter at her husband’s annoyance with being fawned over by the boy. Aemond spoke to his uncle in near-perfect Valyrian which irritated both Alicent and Daemon.

He had even tried to converse with Naerys in the language of their ancestors, but quickly gave up the endeavor when he realized she was not proficient as she stumbled over half her words. She could understand Valyrian better than she could speak it, but she was far from mastering their native tongue.

“I’d be willing to teach you aunt if you like.” It was said with the pride of a child who knew his accomplishments. Alicent’s children had taken to calling her aunt. Though the term seemed more sincere coming from the mouths of the youngest of her cousins than their half-sister.

Where Aemond possessed a good sense of childhood wonder and curiosity his brother seemed to lack basic human empathy. Aegon spoke before he thought. When there had been a gap in the conversation at the table Aegon had so dutifully chosen to fill it.

“Should you not be with child by now aunt?” He had been observing her throughout dinner as had most of the other dinner guests though they were polite enough to not comment about her failings as a wife. Half their family thought her barren. Daemon had managed to get his mistress pregnant and would have had a child by now had she not lost it so the problem could not lie with the rogue prince.

Alicent quickly reprimanded the boy, ordering him to apologize to his aunt. Daemon had not held his tongue threatening to “tan his hide,” which he was met with a wide-eyed look of horror from the queen. The king dismissed his youngest children displeased with their behavior, sending them to bed before dessert could be served. Even Rhaenyra looked aghast at her half-brother’s boldness, though once the children had taken their leave her cousin's sympathies had ended.

“My aunt looks tired uncle.” The Realms Delight gave her a smile that didn't quite reach her eyes. “Perhaps you should send her to bed as well.” Naerys cousin acted as if was a naughty child who had stayed up past her bedtime. It was infuriating, but even more so when her husband had taken Rhaenyra’s advice. He had looked sympathetic enough, but he sent her to bed all the same.

Naerys had meant to tell her husband off, but she had fallen asleep before her uncle could make it back to their chambers. She had truly been quite exhausted. The stress of packing and getting ready for their journey had taken up most of her energy and her husband had sensed it. That did not give him the right to order her around in front of others.

Naerys woke up nauseated before. The sun had yet to rise. She barely made it to her chamber pot before she emptied out the contents of her stomach. It was not until she had finished expelling what remained of last night's dinner that she realized Daemon had yet to come back to their chambers.

The young bride debated where she might look for her husband or if she should even look for him in the first place. Daemon had been more attentive in the last six moons of their marriage, but they were back in the capital. There were so many distractions to be found. Old wounds could reappear and fester with a vengeance.

Naerys made up her mind that she would not hide away in her chambers as though she were a frightened chambermaid. Better to know the truth of last night now than wonder about it later. Thankfully the truth had been easy to recover. Boisterous laughter could be heard upon exiting their chambers. The source of which came from the king’s apartments.

Daemon had been the first to notice her after Viserys guards let her into her uncle’s chambers. “Is it not the prettiest little thing in all of the seven kingdoms coming to grace us mere mortals with her unearthly presence,” her husband's eyes lit up as if he had been waiting for her.

He greeted Naerys with a not-so-innocent kiss, lifting her up bridal style as he walked back over to where he was seated by Viserys' dying fire. “Did you sleep well sweetling?” Daemon had become more affectionate in the past six months, but he was usually this open with his tenderness towards his young bride in the company of others.

Her husband was drunk. She would learn from Alicent later that the king had dismissed the rest of the dinner guests last night shortly after Naerys herself had been sent to bed. The two had been up drinking and reminiscing fondly on their youth the whole night.

Naerys noted that the ruby-faced king looked more refreshed than he had in years. It was as if a weight had been lifted off her eldest uncle if only for the night. If one did not take notice of his missing hand they would think that Viserys was the picture of health.

Daemon reached for his glass, but Naerys was faster, lifting the glass from his hand and downing it in one gulp. The liquor burned the back of her throat. She had expected sweet wine instead greeted with the sour taste of ale.

“If you drink kepus then I shall as well.” Both men let out a laugh at their niece’s boldness. Daemon never liked her drinking much. On occasion, she was allowed wine, but never anything stronger than that.

“Was she not made for me brother?” The king let out a hearty laugh. Her husband continued on his conversation with his brother without touching another drop of ale. Naerys knew that it would take him several hours and a long nap before he sobered up, but it was a start and he would no doubt thank her for it once he came to his senses.

It was well past dawn when the king began to grow tired. Naerys had enlisted the help of one of her uncle's guards to get Daemon back into their chambers. Her husband had managed to strip himself and collapsed onto their bed once Ser Erryk (or Ser Arryk Naerys could never tell the two apart) had left.

He had tried to convince his wife to stay with him as he slept, but Alicent had invited her to tea much to her husband's ire. Naerys uncle only let her leave when she promised that she would be back before he woke. With the ale in his system Daemon would no doubt not awaken until the next morning.

“How do you like Dragonstone Naerys,” Alicent questioned as she poured the steaming liquid into her good niece's cup. The queen and Naerys took their tea on the edge of the back gardens overlooking the bay. Helaena had been made to attend, but the girl grew restless which led to her mother dismissing her, letting the young girl venture further into the garden with her septa, no doubt in search of bugs to play with.

“Well enough your grace.” Naerys had never given much thought to her good aunt. Alicent was too close in age to herself to be looked at as a surrogate mother and too far apart to be thought of as a peer. They did have their commonalities of course. Both were motherless young girls who had married men who were out of their depth. Perhaps it was for that reason the queen had to impart some words of wisdom to her the morning after her wedding.

“Take comfort in the mother Naerys. She will give you strength.” Alicent had hugged her for dear life. Whispering the words into her ear almost a year past. Naerys had been a different girl then. One scared and lonely married to a man who saw her as a possession. Alicent knew that pain better than anyone.

A wave of nausea hit Naerys before she could take a sip of her tea. She had tried to push down the feeling, but her body had won out the fight. She left the table in just enough time to retch into a nearby flower bed.

Alicent was over in seconds holding her silver braid back from her face. “Have you seen a Maester yet?” The older woman helped her back into her chair. Ordering a nearby servant to fetch them some ginger tea. Naerys could not meet the queen's eyes as she shook her head.

She had been meaning to see Maester Orlys before they had left Dragonstone, but she did not want to get her hopes up. “Maester Mellos can be discreet,” the pale woman took her hand in her own. Gently rubbing comforting circles on the back of her brown one. Before Naerys could answer, the two were interrupted by a member of the city watch.

“The little prince is asking for you, my Queen.” The knight addressed Alicent, but his eyes had not left Naerys as he had. He was tall, dark-haired, and handsome enough with a familiar air of grace that Naerys could not quite place.

“You remember my brother Ser Gwayne?” The Hightower knight gave her a curt nod finally turning his gaze towards his sister. Naerys felt almost ashamed that she had not recognized the man before.

“Gwayne, please escort Naerys back to her chambers.” Rising from her chair with Naerys hand still in her own, Alicent gave her a knowing smile. “You should rest before the feast tonight. I will send Maester Mellos to check on you.” With a final squeeze, the queen let go of her hand. Her green skirts trailed after her as she exited the garden making her way back into the Red Keep in search of her youngest son.

It had been years since Naerys had last seen the Hightower knight. The last time she had was at a tourney. He had been but a boy of fifteen name days under the thumb of his father. Ser Gwanye was a man grown now.

Ser Gwanye had been the first to break the silence that had enveloped them as they journey back to Naerys quarters. “How do you find your stay, princess?” Ever the soldier, his brown eyes flitted around the corridors of the castle looking for any sign of danger that might come their way.

“Unchanged.” Naerys decided to get a good look at the knight. He was younger than Alicent. He could not have been much older than Naerys herself. He had been handsome from a distance, but up close he was a sight. Naerys had never met Alicents mother but she imagined that her youngest children had inherited her looks rather than their father’s.

They had reached the serpentine stairs when a wave of dizziness overtook Naerys. She had been careful to take the steps one at a time, but she tripped on a loose piece of stone before they could reach the bottom. Ser Gwanye had grabbed her, pulling her into his arms. Saving her from tumbling down the steep steps. The knight had meant to set her back on her feet when a growl could be heard at the bottom of the stairs.

“I’d advise you to unhand my wife Ser,” Daemon barked at the man from where he stood. His violet eyes were overtaken by the black of his pupils. His sword hand rests on Dark Sister. No doubt waiting for the Hightower knight to make one wrong move.

Ser Gwanye hesitates to release her seeing the mood that her uncle was in. He only does so when Naerys gives him a small smile, thanking him for delivering her to her husband. Daemon wastes no time in grabbing her from the Hightower knight once he freed her from his grip.

“He was being kind Daemon.” Her husband was practically dragging her back to their chambers. Keeping pace with him had always been a struggle, but Naerys could hardly compete with the prince's gait when he was angry.

“He’s a Hightower. They always want something,” the rogue prince replied with a curse under his breath. Naerys would have laughed at her husband's silliness, had she not found it difficult to catch her breath.

She debated if she should tell her uncle to take her to the maesters rather than their chambers. The princess put aside the idea when she thought of what he might reveal. Daemon seemed to realize that his young bride was struggling. Not wanting to waste any more time, Naerys husband picks her up and throws her over his shoulder as if she were a rag doll.

“Kepus.” Daemon could never behave for very long if at all. The gardens were on the opposite side of the Red Keep from their chambers. Half the court would see them before they could reach them. Naerys tried to worm free from her uncle’s hold, but it was no use.

“Ao issi tolī paez ābrazȳrys,” Her husband jostled her as she continued to squirm. He planted a smack firmly on her backside. Jason Lannister passed them right as he had, sniggering at the sight. Naerys wanted to die from embarrassment, but the lord had ceased his laughter when Daemon turned to face him.

Whatever look he had given him had shut the proud lord up and sent him on a brisk pace in the opposite direction. To Naerys' relief they had made it back to their chambers without so much as to come across another living soul.

Translations:

īlon emagon nykeā early rhaenagon kepus: We have an early start uncle

Kepus: uncle

Byka mēre: Little one

Ao issi tolī paez ābrazȳrys: You are too slow wife

Ao3 Link:

Tags:

@misssilencewritewell @parizparis @thanyatargaryen @i-love-morally-gray-characters

#house of the dragon #hotd #daemon targaryen #daemon x reader #daemon targaryen x targaryen!oc #daemon targaryen x black!oc #daemon targaryen x oc #daemon targaryen x reader #house of the dragon imagine #hotd fanfiction #hotd spoilers #daemon targaryen fanfic #the rouge prince #prince daemon targaryen #hotd x reader #hotd x oc #hotd x fem!reader #daemon targaryen x black!reader #bnhotdfic

[bohemian-nights]

Arlī(Anew)-Chapter 2

Word Count: ~3,458 words

Rating: 18+

Warnings⚠️: Uncle/niece incest; Mention of oral sex

Description: Dragonstone was the place of Naerys birth, but it did not feel like home.

AN: This story takes place from episode 5 onward. I’ve changed things up a bit but I’ve kept the timeline intact.

Chapter 1, Chapter 3, Chapter 4, Chapter 5, Chapter 6, Chapter 7, Chapter 8, Chapter 9

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115 AC- Dragonstone

Dragonstone was the place of Naerys birth, but it did not feel like home. Nearly everything about the seat of her ancestors' was grim. The island itself was bleak with the smell of smoke lingering in the air. Aegon I was said to have enjoyed the smell. The princess found the smell headache-inducing if she was outside for too long. The actual castle was even more dreary. One could not turn their head without meeting a dragon motif or statue carved within the walls. Talons, wings, tails, and fire encircling every surface.

Her new husband had taken his mistress and set up camp upon her family’s ancestral seat some years back, but he was gone within half a year. The castle had not been occupied since. Naerys uncle the king meant to give the island to her cousin Rhaenyra as his heir, but it had remained unclaimed. It was little wonder Rhaenyra had not taken up residence there.

The island held little apart from dragonglass which was worth next to nothing. The small fishing village and port at the base of the island boasted of little trade. Dragonstone stood more as a testament to the might and reach that Valyria once held in the known world rather than a proper home in which she was expected to raise children.

Naerys new home was so unlike Hightide. Her uncle's seat held life within its white stone walls. Even her Velaryon family’s ancestral seat of Driftmark seemed less gray than Naerys current residence.

Naerys pondered on why her uncle had asked for the old outpost in the first place. She hadn’t wanted to ask why he had, but curiosity got the better of her after their nightly Valyrian lessons one evening. Lessons that Daemon had insisted upon as he had wanted to rectify her education which he saw was less than fit for a Targaryen bride.

“You have been learning Valyrian since you were a babe and yet your cousin Aemond has a better command of our ancestors' tongue” Daemon had sneered at her. A boy of five name days with Hightower for a mother. Her uncle saw her young cousins as little better than bastards. Naerys was of pure Valyrian blood. Her mother had been of house Velaryon and her father was a Targaryen. She should know better.

Daemon had threatened to take her over his knee and spank her when she had mispronounced words. Several times in fact. She had begun to wonder if he would actually make good on his word until he made her strip naked to recite the Valyrian alphabet after she had mixed up some of the letters.

The punishment had been effective. Her Valyrian had improved greatly since that humiliating night. Naerys had managed to please him by reciting a chapter in Valyrian. It was a children's book, but she had done it all the same and Daemon rewarded her with an answer to the mystery, to Naerys at least, behind why he had chosen Dragonstone for them.

“My brother believes that dreams made us kings.” Naerys knew that Daemon greatly cared for his brother, but her husband took little stock in his beliefs. “Dreams saved us from The Doom. Dragons made us kings.”

Her husband motioned to the painted table in front of them. They would often take lessons in its chamber. As if to emphasize his point further, he placed a wooden piece down on the table. The spot that depicted Dragonstone was a mere speck on the map of Westeros in comparison to even Driftmark, but from the island where they stood, Aegon and sister wives were able to conquer kingdoms. Kingdoms that had stood undisturbed for thousands of years

Daemon was not a hard man to understand. She knew that he saw her as little more than a vessel that would bring his own children into this world. It was the reason why he would spend their nights perfecting her Valyrian or why he would praise her for her dragon-riding abilities. Her blood was the reason why she was chosen. It was too soon to panic, but Naerys felt like she was failing to do her duty as a wife.

“These things take time my prince,” Maester Orlys had said after her latest moonblood’s appearance. Five moons into their marriage and she was not yet with child. “The princess is young.” Dragonstone was hardly a place of excitement. Visitors were few and far between.

Naerys had tried to make friends with some of her maids, but Daemon had laughed when she had told him of it. There was no one who was her equal on the island apart from her husband and he barely acknowledged her presence outside of their Valyrian lessons, their weekly dragon rides, or when he tried to put a babe in her.

“Perhaps a change in scenery might do her some good.” Driftmark and Kings Landing were suggested.

Naerys doubted they would journey to court anytime soon. Her uncle grew sicker by the day. His hand, Lord Lyonel Strong, and the small council ruled mostly in his stead. Although Lord Strong was no Otto Hightower, her new husband cared little for her brother's new hand.

“He’s a dull brute sweetling,” was his simple reply when she had asked why he disliked the hand at dinner two moons after their arrival. He had been in one of his better moods. They had gone riding that evening. The rest of their meal, however, was a quiet affair. Daemon sent her to bed once she had finished with an absent-minded kiss.

Naerys would later find out from Rhaenyra during one of her visits, which were far too frequent for the young princess’s taste, that her husband partly blamed Lord Strong for his second banishment from court. He had been the one to suggest that her husband’s head be taken for the alleged defilement of the crown princess. Only the king's love for his rogue brother had saved him.

Daemon conceded to their maesters advice. They were set to leave for Driftmark, when a raven from her aunt Princess Rhaenys arrived. Laena had gone into labor and had chosen to give birth upon Driftmark's shores. Her husband, Lord Strong's eldest son Ser Harwin, had gone with her. Daemon was not overly fond of the lord’s son either. Their journey was canceled. Ser Vaemond, Naerys mother’s brother, was sent for instead.

Her uncle's party was a lively bunch. The spirited knight had brought his lady wife, a pleasantly plump woman with a penchant for gossip, his sons who were just as arrogant as their father, their wives rather plain things, and his grandchildren with him. They had filled up Dragonstone's dreary halls bringing with them much-needed cheer. Not since the early days of King Jaehaerys rule did Naerys believe that its halls had been graced with such life. Even Daemon seemed to enjoy their company.

“If you will recall my prince,” Ser Vaemond had begun as he and Daemon sat by the fire five days into his stay. The two had been laughing and drinking beforehand. Recollecting on their war days mostly, but the merriment had stopped with her uncle’s next words.

“My late sister was always a sickly woman. I believe our dear little Naerys has inherited her constitution.” Ser Vaemond had always been a prideful man. Daring to speak his mind no matter the cost, especially with some liquid courage in his belly.

Daemon drifted his violet gaze toward where his young bride sat on the other side of their hall playing a game of Cyvasse with one of her cousins. His hands gripping the armrest of his chair with enough intensity to turn his knuckles white. Naerys attempted to keep her concentration on the game, but Vaemond was as loud as he was boastful.

“It is a shame that your brother would not allow you to take Rhaenyra as your second wife.” His dark brow was glistening with sweat as he took another sip of Dornish red. From the corner of her eyes, Naerys could see that barely contained storm brewed upon her husband’s face.

Ser Vaemond was either too drunk to care or did not notice her husband's increasing irritation with him. “She would have given you sons by now.” The hall went silent. Her uncle’s words were quite clear. Daemon would have had his heirs. Sons that would have one day inherited the iron throne. Instead, he was stuck with a sickly little bride who had yet to give him so much as a daughter.

“Mind your tongue Ser Vaemond lest you lose it.” Her husband's face had turned to stone as he stood up to tower over the drunken man. “Your sister gave my brother Naerys. My wife, your niece, will be the one to give me my heirs.” Daemon stormed over to where Naerys sat, snatching her from the game, wordlessly taking her to her chambers.

Daemon lovemaking had been vigorous. Her husband has always been passionate; he was more dragon than man some days, but Naerys had never been on the receiving end of his intensity. His fire was usually reserved for the training yard. His affections both frightened and thrilled Naerys more than she liked to admit.

Daemon had only stopped that night when she had made the mistake of grazing the scars at the base of his neck after she had pulled him up from between her legs for a kiss. It had been an accident of course. Her uncle made her taste herself on his tongue a couple of times before, but he had always pinned her arms above her head when he had.

Naerys had been distracted by the taste of her slick on his lips when he had yanked her hand from his neck. Her husband had redressed quickly and was out the door dismissing her apologies without so much as a glance spared her way.

Ser Vaemond made no move to give Daemon his opinions on anything else. He had taken to avoiding the prince altogether for the rest of the duration of his stay, but the damage had been done. In the weeks since her uncle’s visit. Naerys felt more alone than ever.

Daemon had ceased their Valyrian lessons. He had cited that her Valyrian was “adequate enough.” His visits to her chambers were few and far between and never with the same intensity that he displayed that ill-favored night. Even their rides over Blackwater Bay had come to a halt.

Naerys felt herself growing restless. The weather had not helped. It had been raining for the past week. Daemon had forbidden her from flying. Naerys had not ridden in a storm. She was simply not experienced enough to navigate the open waters of the bay in one.

“It will rain today sweetling,” her husband said as he came into her chambers, interrupting her breakfast. It was the first time he had spoken to her in two days. Daemon always knew what she was up to. She suspected that one of her maids was a spy of his. “Best to stay in the library.”

“I am not a doll kepus.” Daemon had requested she call “valzȳrys” him after she saw fit to call an “uēpa vala” once she had learned how to properly pronounce the words. Naerys had begun to call him “kepus” as a compromise. It was only fitting since he treated her as if she was an errant child one moment and a misguided wife the next. “Nor am I your child.”

“Of course not. You're my wife Naerys.” It was said in a teasing tone as he inspected some of her silver curls that had loosened from a braid in her sleep. Naerys did not miss the look he gave. The same look a parent might give to a child when they do not want to be questioned. However, Naerys would not back down this time. Rain or no rain she planned on going for a ride. She needed the fresh air. She had been cooped up inside Dragonstone’s walls for far too long.

“I will accompany you.” Daemon left the room before she could voice her objections.

Rhaenys had taken Naerys to claim Silverwing for her dragon mount on the eve of her fifteenth name day. The dragon had not had a rider since her great-grandmother Queen Alysanne had passed. If her cousin Laena had claimed Vhagar the oldest at twelve name days there was no reason why the young princess could not claim the most docile of the dragons. The she-dragon had accepted Naerys as its rider with little fanfare.

To Naerys, dragon-riding was one of the best if not only freedoms that she had. Her schedule as a child was always dictated by lessons. Not much had changed now that she was a married woman. She was only now beholden to her husband's wishes and scolded like a misbehaving youth, but on the dragon's back, she came into her own.

While her Valyrian was less than ideal her flying was not. Her uncle had encouraged her to keep to the skies. Daemon never seemed to find fault in her flying. He had even made Rhaenyra and Laenor watch her flying during one of their visits. A look of pride was clear upon his face.

“Issa byka ābrazȳrys istan vēttan kipagon.” He had said to them once she had landed back at the spot from where they had watched her fly. Rhaenyra had turned red at his words and looked as if she wanted to storm off back into the castle while Laenor simply chose to focus on the muddy ground below. Naerys was able to piece together his meaning from her cousin's reactions.

Daemon had simply laughed and ushered them back inside. That night Naerys noted that she had not heard the faint opening or closing of any doors nor the sounds of light feet upon the castle's stone floors usually accompanied her cousin's visits. Rhaenyra and Laenor had left before breakfast the next morning. Rhaenyra had not been back since.

By the time they had made the trek to the cave where their dragons lay it had begun to rain in earnest. Silverwing and Caraxes resided in the same cave along with Vermithor, Sliverwing’s mate. The older dragon tolerated Caraxes' presence, but he mostly kept to the back of the cave away from the younger male.

“We can check on the dragons, but we are going back inside.” Her husband stopped them at the cave's entrance, turning her to face him. The prince had to tilt her chin up. Naerys had tried to walk ahead of her husband but his long limbs met her brisk pace without much effort. She was quite agile and his grip was rather loose. She wriggled free from her husband’s hold with ease.

“Where is your sense of adventure kepus?” She began to saddle Silverwing with a grin turning to face her husband. Daemon did not look amused. He had not moved to ready Caraxes. Remaining at the mouth of the cave with a frown.

“Naerys I mean it.” She pretended to not hear him as she seated herself and spurred her dragon on. The last thing she heard was her shouting at Silverwing to stop in Valyrian. She did not obey his commands. They both knew that he could not keep her from riding.

It had been a relief when they had reached the open sky. The rain pelted around Naerys but she had not minded the cold droplets that rained down her face. For the first time in weeks, she felt alive.

Naerys heard the sound of wings in the distance. She turned around to see Caraxes and Daemon not far behind. The rain had blocked her visibility a bit but could make out that her husband was still sporting a frown.

“Stay close.” Daemon's voice boomed out. Naerys dismissed his chiding once more. She urged her dragon to climb higher wondering if they could break through the clouds to look at the storm below them. The thunder came before they could reach their destination.

Silverwing was a nimble pretty thing, but Naerys was a fair-weather rider. Daemon was right when he had said she remained untested on the open sea. She could sense that with each bang of thunder that came, Silverwing began to grow more unsure of herself and her rider's commands. A particularly loud bang that rattled Naerys' bones caused Silverwing to bolt off further into the storm.

“Lykiri Silverwing.” Naerys could not see beyond her dragon's head. The dragon's sudden darts loosened her grip upon the saddle.”Silverwing lykiri.” The princess tried once more, but Silverwing would not listen.

Another crack of thunder set the dragon off again diving for whatever surface lay below. Silverwing had moved too suddenly. Her rider's grip on the saddle had finally slipped. Naerys felt herself falling as she was thrown off her seat.

Instead of hitting the open water as she had expected, the princess felt a pair of hands pulling her up onto another saddle. Her husband wordlessly positioned her on his lap as she struggled to make sense of where she was. The rest of their ride was in silence. Daemon only began to berate her once they had landed back near the dragon's cave.

“When I tell you to stop, you stop,” everything sounded as if she was underwater. Naerys' head was still in the clouds. Thunder was still banging in her ear. Daemon shook her then, breaking her from her trance. “Do you understand girl?”

Dragons were temperamental creatures. As much as their house liked to believe they were Gods among men who had tamed these great beasts of fire they were in truth mere mortal men. Made of flesh and blood as any other. They were beholden to these creatures as much as they were to them if not more so. “You would have been dead if I had not come with you.” It came to her then.

“You could have been rid of me.” Her husband looked at her as if she had grown a second head. Which caused her to let out a laugh. How could he not see it? Daemon could be on his way to the capital once the storm cleared. He had not wanted to marry her truly. He had only wanted a Valyrian wife. A dragon rider with the blood of old Valyria. His heart lay with another.

Rhaenyra was married, true enough, but accidents happen every day. A little sweet sleep or a drunken brawl at some tavern and the crown princess would be a free woman once more. Or perhaps Laenor would allow Daemon to give her cousin children of unquestionable Valyrian blood.

Alicent’s questions would seize. Daemon could have his heirs. Rhaenyra her crown. It could all stop. If her husband had let the storm take her it would have stopped. If Daemon had not saved he would have been free. Well and truly free.

Naerys was brought from her musings when she felt herself being wrapped in her husband’s arms. “I chose you, dōna hāedar. I have no taste for another.” He placed a kiss on her forehead. She looked up to meet Daemon's red-laced violet gaze. He did not laugh at her. There was no mischief in his eyes. Nothing of malice or deceit.

Naerys did not know what possessed her, perhaps she was still in shock, but she reached up with a small brown hair to curl her fingers around the short silver hair at the base of his neck. She pulled him down with a soft tug. Naerys still had to crane her neck to look up at her husband, but they were more on equal footing.

She reached up using her other hand to trace his lips. This time it had been Daemon who had drawn her in. He tasted of smoke, the sea, spiced wine, and something heady and warm that she could not name. Daemon had only stopped to pull away for air after she had begun to sink further into him from a lack of oxygen.

The storm had begun to let up as they stood there breathing each other in, their foreheads lightly touching, before her husband picked her up, throwing her over his shoulder as if she weighed no more than Dark Sister. Naerys could not help but let out a girlish giggle at the sight they must have made which prompted her husband to land a firm swat on her backside. At that too she let out another round of laughter. Daemon had not left her bed that night or the night after.

Translations:

Kepus: Uncle

Uēpa vala: Old man

Valzȳrys: Husband

Issa byka ābrazȳrys istan vēttan kipagon: My little wife was made to ride.

Lykiri: Calm down

Dōna hāedar: Sweet girl

Ao3 link:

#daemon targaryen x targaryen!reader #daemon targaryen x oc #daemon targaryen x targaryen!oc #daemon targaryen x reader #daemon x oc #daemon x reader #daemon targaryen x black!oc #daemon targeryan #prince daemon targaryen #house of the dragon #hotd #hotd spoilers #house of the dragon fanfiction #houseofthedragon #hotd fanfiction #managed to post this before thanksgiving 👏🏽 #daemon fanfic #daemon targaryen x black!reader #bnhotdfic

[bohemian-nights]

Arlī(Anew)-Chapter 5

Word Count: ~7,296 words

Rating: 18+

Warnings⚠️: Uncle/niece incest, brief smut, childbirth, miscarriage, stillbirth

Description: Children are a blessing from the Gods. They fill one’s halls with cherubic laughter. Gracing each chamber that they occupy with sweet little melodies. And yet Dragonstone’s halls remained empty.

AN: This story takes place from episode 5 onward. I’ve changed things up a bit but I’ve kept the timeline intact.

Chapter 1, Chapter 2, Chapter 3, Chapter 4, Chapter 6, Chapter 7, Chapter 8, Chapter 9

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120 AC-Dragonstone

Children are a blessing from the Gods. They fill one’s halls with cherubic laughter. Gracing each chamber that they occupy with sweet little melodies. Their little feet pattering about taking them to some curious mischief that remained thus far undiscovered. A whole new world waiting at their fingertips to be explored. And yet Dragonstone’s halls remained empty apart from the sounds of one small silver-haired girl.

Daenys Targaryen had been born in the middle of a late summer storm. It was an easy enough birth for all intents and purposes. Or at least that's what Maester Orlys had told her mother, but the kindly older man had never given birth himself. He did not know the battle women fought to bring their children into the world.

It had been a restless fortnight leading up to her daughter's birth. Most nights Naerys simply drifted in and out of consciousness rather than fully surrender to the land of dreams. She had been having contractions which had increased with each passing day. False labor the Maester had said. Getting her body ready for the birth of her child even if she herself was not fully prepared for all that lay ahead.

Naerys' water broke before the sun rose. The membranous fluid spread out from between her legs wetting the entire bed. Awakening her from her half-dreams. Naerys in her embarrassment tried not to alert her husband of the change in her condition. Nor the ruined state of their bed.

Daemon had become just as restless as his wife. Taking to staying up half the night or waking before dawn reading ancient texts of various natures in their solar by the hearth. Naerys joined him on occasion when the worst of her insomnia overtook her. Sitting in his lap while he rubbed her belly or stroked her coils. It was by that very same fire that Daemon was found the night before his daughter's birth. Rushing into their bed chambers when Naerys let out a pained scream.

Princess Rhaenys, her daughter Lady Laena, along with the little Lady Strongs, and half of house Velaryon had journeyed from Driftmark for the birth of the youngest Targaryen. Arriving just before the storm came in.

Laena had been more of an older sister than a cousin and the older princess had always been like a mother rather than an aunt. “The seven hells will freeze over before I miss the birth of my grand-niece.” Rhaenys had insisted that Naerys was carrying a daughter instead of the son and heir the young princess hoped to give her husband.

Laena had agreed with her mother. Citing the fact that Naerys belly was high, the same as her own when she carried her girls. “The next one will be a boy no doubt, but this one will be a girl dear cousin.”

The two women clothed still in their robes, for they too had been woken up by Naerys screams, shooed her husband away. Making him wait in the hall and later the library with Lord Corlys, Ser Vaemond, and his eldest son, Daeron. The Velaryon knight had insisted that he and his son accompany his brother’s family for the birth of their youngest great-niece. The only man allowed in the birthing chamber was Maester Orlys.

“To a healthy son and heir my prince.” Ser Vaemond had raised his glass of Golden Vintage with a grin that stretched from ear to ear. The umber man then proceeded to drink the early morning away. His son had to enlist the assistance of a servant, after trying and failing to enlist the service of his uncle, to help him drag his incapacitated father back to his chambers in the Windwyrm tower. The Sea Snakes brother was not seen again until the next evening, blaming a headache caused by “bad wine” for his absence.

Naerys' labor had been long. When she was allowed to push, Naerys felt like she was on the verge of death. Rhaenys and Laena would later say that it was completely natural laughing at her bewildered face. The pain had been unbearable. During a particularly gut-wrenching round of contractions, she had screamed for Daemon who was halfway across the castle. Her husband had heard her nonetheless, but Laena turned the man around at the door of their chambers with the help of her father.

“Best to leave the women to it. They know what they are doing Daemon.” Naerys spied her uncle placing a good-natured pat on the younger man’s arm which Daemon proceeded to shrug off. The man uttered a string of threats at the maester, midwives, and even Rhaenys herself before exiting the room.

Naerys was sure that her husband would have gone off for a ride with Caraxes had the storm ceased, but they did not. Her labors continued through the day without further interruptions. Laena and Rhaenys took turns wiping the sweat from her brow or lending a hand to squeeze. After a series of contractions and subsequent pushes that felt like she was being split into two out came Daenys.

“A girl princess.” Maester Orlys held up the babe for Naerys to see. A small healthy girl rather than the hopeful son and heir of Daemon Targaryen. Rhaenys had been the first one to hold her after one of the midwives had cleaned off the blood and vernix from the babe. A pink little pale thing with a set of lungs on her and a full head of silver curls. Her aunt had said that it was like turning back in time.

Daemon had burst through their chambers after the second round of their daughter’s cries. Naerys could not look at her husband as Rhaenys deposited their babe into his waiting hands. “You have a daughter cousin.” The queen that never was face was set to stone as she inspected her cousin. Looking for any signs that he might voice his disapproval at being handed a girl instead of a proper heir, but the man simply laughed.

“Are you sure you did not clone yourself little one?” He beamed at his wife as he kissed the top of their daughter's downy head. The babe had stopped crying after she had been handed off to her father. “Ao jurnegon raqagon aōha muñnykeā, issa byka zaldrīzes. Kirimvogon se Gods syt bona.” You look like your mother, my little dragon. Thank the Gods for that.

Naerys had never seen her uncle smile as much as he had that night. He would not put the babe down. Only when she began to fuss out of hunger did he hand her back to her mother. Stroking a large hand down her cheek while whispering words in Valyrian as she nursed from her mother's breasts.

The name Visenya had been discussed. Along with both of their mothers' names, but Daemon and Naerys agreed that neither Alyssa nor Shaera suited the little girl before them. Naerys had not planned for a girl. She had been sure that the babe she carried within her those nine moons was a son.

“There is no need to think of names kepus. We shall name our son Aenys.” Daemon had not questioned her insistence though Naerys wished he had when out popped their little dragon and they could not think of a suitable name for her.

The name Daenys was settled on after Laena’s suggestion. “She looks like a Daenys.” Laena declared with a soft smile while looking down at the babe as she bounced her in her arms. Daemon had procured a golden dragon egg from Silverwings newest clutch. Placing the egg in the newly christened girl’s cradle. The Rogue Prince stood watch over his wife and daughter's bedside. Placing kisses upon their heads or taking a rough pale to gently stroke their cheeks. Both mother and child slept fitfully through the night.

Despite her exhausted state, Naerys refused for a wet nurse to be called. Birth was only half of a new mother's battle. The princess was determined to nurse her own daughter. Waking up to feed Daenys whenever she cried for her.

Dreams floated through Naerys' mind whenever she managed to drift off. A tangled web of children and dragons though she could never quite make out the fine details. Naerys had decided on their meaning and had told her husband so the next morning. They were dreams of future babes to come. Their future heir. Their next child would be a son. She was sure of it.

Nothing on this earth comes for free. Not even Targaryen’s were exempt from that fact. They paid for their dragons with the price of blood. Blood that made them mad with the delusions of Gods. Gods with no real claim to this land or the subjects they ruled over. Foreigners In a foreign land. Conquerors of flesh, blood, bone, and ashes. A price too high for many.

There had been four pregnancies after Daenys birth. Three miscarriages and one stillborn. Naerys body rejected each one. Each paid with the price of blood. The first three had ended too soon to tell the sex of their babe. Usually ending no later than the second moon of her pregnancy. They were little imperfect creatures. Some with no eyes. Others missing an arm. There was never enough to burn. Never enough for a proper Targaryen funeral.

It became numbing after a while. An expected pain for Naerys. One which Daemon had tried to shield her from. “You need to rest sweetling.” They had stopped trying for a year. Her husband had forced it. Three pregnancies in less than three years put a strain on one’s body. Maester Orlys brewed her a steady supply of moon tea. Her uncle watched her downing every bitter cup after one of the maids reported seeing her chucking the contents into her chamber pot.

He refused to bed her otherwise. Naerys in her shame had tried to bed her uncle after a night of drinking. Surely he would forget about the encounter if he was drunk enough. He had not. Daemon would not touch her for a fortnight.

When her moon blood came and went he returned, but he refused to bed her properly. Tongue fingers and unmentionable objects were used to bring her to a peak, but her uncle would not put his cock in her. It had been torture for them both. Naerys folded within a week with the reassurance that they could try again for an heir. The man had surprising willpower when it came to denying her what she most wanted in the name of her health. At the start of the new year, the moon tea was disposed of.

The last one had stuck around until the sixth moon. Naerys could feel the babe kicking. Just as strong as Daenys had been. Daemon had taken their daughter’s small little hand in his own much larger one and pressed it to her belly. The girl had beamed up at her and giggled with glee when she felt where her sibling lay. Babbling on in Valyrian to her growing bump.

They had journeyed to the capital for Princess Helaena’s tenth name day. Rhaenyra and Laenor were once again the ones to greet them upon their arrival. However, this time they were joined by their two “sons” along with their newest edition, the little Joffrey Velaryon.

“She’s a pretty little thing aunt.” It was said with the same smile Rhaenyra always greeted Naerys with. A strained smile that now extended to her daughter. “She doesn’t look anything like you uncle.” Rhaenyra had tried to greet Daemon with “kepus” when they had landed outside the Dragon Pit, but the man snapped at her.

“I am your uncle Rhaenyra. You may call me nuncle if you wish, but not kepus.” The crown princess had not uttered the Valyrian word for uncle again. Instead, she had taken to openly glaring at Naerys whenever she referred to Daemon as such. The younger princess paid her no mind. She had staked her claim. There was little Rhaenyra could do about her place in Daemon’s life.

“You are my kepus husband just as I am your wife. I have given birth to your daughter and I carry your son, your heir within me, not some Hightower knight’s.” It was breathed out into her husband’s ear as she sank her soaked folds down onto his waiting cock with practiced ease. Her husband pounded up into wetness leading them both into a blissful haze.

Daemon had forbidden her from riding Silverwing by the fourth moon of her pregnancy at the advice of Maester Orlys. Dragon riding alone was too strenuous for her already delicate constitution and small stature. However, that did not stop other arduous activities.

“Ao kostagon nykeēdrosa kipagon aōha tolie zaldrīzes byka mēre.” You may still ride your other dragon little one. Her uncle never let her take full control during “her rides.” Always seating her atop him, bouncing her in his lap while she clung to him, burying her silver coils into his neck and mouthing at the pale pockmarked skin there. The amorous sounds of the lover's coupling echoing throughout their chambers.

The prince was possessive, but so was his dear little niece-wife in her own way. Naerys could not stand the way Rhaenyra looked at Daemon with want while she spoke the word kepus to him. Daemon was her husband. The father of her children. Not Rhaenyra’s. All it took was one mention of Ser Gwayne whispered into her husband’s ear while his blood ran hot in the mist of their rapture to set things right.

“She’s quite the Valyrian beauty like her mother.” A look of pride was evident in the Rogue Prince's brow as he affectionately petted his daughter's chubby face. It was laughable to question the legitimate status of their daughter, but it was an offense that Daemon would not let pass.

Though she had inherited most of her mother’s looks, there was plenty of Daemon in Daenys. Daenys had her father’s violet eyes rather than her mother’s dark amethyst ones. When she smiled it mirrored Daemon’s infectious grin. The expressions the little princess made with it echoed her father’s.

“As I’m sure this one will favor his sire.” Daemon’s free hand that was not holding onto their daughter reached out to caress his wife’s belly. Rhaenyra could not take her eyes off it. Her face was rapidly paling as if she had seen a ghost. Naerys was reminded of her cousin's reaction to the news of their first pregnancy.

The color completely drained from Rhaenyra’s face at breakfast the morning after Jace’s name day feast. The crown Princess had to be prompted by her father to congratulate her uncle and aunt. After which Rhaenyra went to bed early claiming exhaustion from the festivities of the previous day. She did not see them off when they finally departed for Dragonstone.

Naerys could not help but shift around uncomfortably which did not escape her uncle’s notice. Her husband’s face began to redden with anger and it looked as if he might snap once more at his older niece, but Laenor hastily ushered his own wife into their carriage that would take them back to the Red Keep.

Where Rhaenyra treated her daughter with cold indifference her sons could not help but adore their little cousin. Jace and Luke were of an age with the young Targaryen princess as well as their cousins the Lady Strong’s, Baela and Rhaena. The fivesome could be found getting into mischief around the castle, giving their nursemaids and parents much grief. Naerys was happy for her daughter's enjoyment. Though she was exhausted from chasing after her daughter while six moons pregnant.

Alicent had advised her son’s to be kind to their little cousin, but they were less than enthused with Daenys. A fact that seemed to annoy Daemon, particularly when it came to Aemond’s opinion of their daughter. “That boy my brother calls his son is jealous of our little dragon.” The man had sworn that he had seen Aemond eyeing their daughter's dragon hatchling with envy.

Naerys did not doubt her husband's beliefs, but Alicent’s oldest sons were boys on the verge of manhood and Daeron was at an age where he wished to be like his brothers. It was only natural that they would not coo over a girl babe. Daenys herself did not suffer from a lack of attention from her uncle’s youngest children. Their sister more than made up for it.

Helaena had taken to dressing up Daenys as if she were her little doll. Parading her around the Red Keep while introducing her to the passing lords and ladies of court as “my little sister.” The younger princess had not minded being babied and doted upon by her elder cousin until she placed a spider in her hands while they had gone to watch the boys in the training yard. “Spiders are excellent judges of character sister. This one’s name is Willard. Say hello Willard.”

Daenys violet eyes widened in confusion. Flickering between her cousin's wistful face and that of the spider in her hand before she descended into wails. The training yard plunged into chaos at the sounds of her distress. Helaena’s septa, who was tasked with the care of the two young princesses, was a skittish mousy woman who was half scared of her charge and the pests she kept as company. The woman did little but add to the confusion of the episode with her shrieks all the while Helaena had tried to calm her cousin. “He is a friend sister. He means no harm!”

Ultimately it was Aemond who had “rescued” the little princess from harm. Taking the spider and releasing it back into the “wild.” As a result, Daenys began to follow Aemond around the castle calling him “Ser Knight.” Glued to him as if she was his shadow. Even going as far as making crude favors for the boy which he accepted with a strained smile under the watchful glare of his uncle.

Aegon laughed at the pair when he saw Daenys muddy skirts trailing after his brother hand in hand with her septa(Naerys had sent for the woman after the spider fiasco) in the training yard or when the princess moved her seat so as to be closer to her cousin.

Dubbing Aemond Daenys nursemaid with a chortle during their visit to the Dragon Pitt one morning. An act such caused Alicent’s middle son to turn beat red while the oldest son was pummeled by pebbles from Daenys who did not take kindly to “her knight” being mocked. Sporting a bruised cheek Aegon had apologized to his brother and Aemond became more agreeable to his small cousin toddling after him.

Daenys seemed to enjoy her time in the company of her cousins. That is she enjoyed the company of her cousins apart from the youngest of the bunch. Little Joffrey was a sweet babe, but Daenys was used to being doted upon even though she insisted she was not a baby herself. Daenys could often be found with a small scowl that rivaled her father's jealous gaze whenever Naerys lavished affection over her baby cousin.

“You will have to share me with your siblings one day my love.” Daenys was far used to being the only child around and as a result, was used to being admired above all else. The young princess had become spoiled. All she had to do was bat her silver eyelashes and mother and sire, Daemon especially, were all too keen to meet her requests.

She would not sleep in her room and would often make her way to her parent's door sometime during the night. Slipping herself into their bed under the guise that there were monsters under her own bed or that her chambers were too dark. She was attached to her parents at the hip and was far used to having both at her beck and call.

“Nyke jāhor daor.” I will not. It was said with a little frown and surprising conviction for a girl of only three name days old. Daemon had roared at their daughter's declaration. Calling her his little dragon while saying how she was like her mother. Naerys was less than amused.

“Aōha byka zaldrīzes gets ziry hen ao kepus daor issa.” Your little dragon gets that from you uncle not me. Daenys may have her mother’s looks, but she was truthfully her father’s daughter in temperament. Daemon had not gotten better at sharing his things. Lest of all his prized “possessions.” His daughter had inherited his possessive nature over her mother. Naerys' husband had not been able to deny it.

“Should she not be Lady Targaryen rather than Princess father?” It was the last day Rhaenyra and Helaena sat on each side of their father at the feast. Alicent was regulated to sitting after her daughter a slight to some, but Naerys saw that the Hightower woman almost looked happy to be sat away from her husband or further away from Rhaenyra. Perhaps it was both.

Rhaenyra made the appearance of being cordial to her babe cousin. She had realized that Daemon would not take kindly to his daughter being given the cold shoulder, but one did not have to look hard to see how she truly felt.

It was in the tight-lipped grins that never reached her lilac eyes or how she stared blankly at the small girl when she felt that no one was looking. Naerys tried to keep her daughter away from the crown princess, but the girl adored her cousins, even the bastards among them, and Rhaenyra was never far from her boys

The ailing king replied to his daughter’s inquiry as if she was oblivious. “She will be Lady of Dragonstone after my brother has gone to his grave Rhaenyra. As you will be queen after I have gone to mine. Gods willing it will not be anytime soon.” Rhaenyra fumed, but the matter would have been put to bed had not Ser Otto Hightower spoken.

“Should not one of your own sons inherit Dragonstone after Prince Daemon your grace?” The former hand of the king had been permitted to journey to the capital from Oldtown for his granddaughter's name day. The man had mostly kept to himself, but he was a practical man. Waiting to strike when the opportunity arose.

“If the babe is another girl or Gods forbid another-” Ser Otto had not been able to speak another word before Daemon flew from his seat across the table. Ordering for Dark Sister to be brought from their chambers. The dragon had awoken and the rest of the Great Hall had gone silent.

Everyone knew of the miscarriages. Maesters from the citadel as well as court had been called for. Dragonstone had become a revolving door of maesters, midwives, and healers brought back from as far away as Essos. Rumors flew from Dragonstone to Oldtown. No one said anything to Naerys face, nor Daemon’s lest they risk meeting the wrong end of Dark Sister or Caraxes, but she knew what a look of pity was when she saw it.

It was the king's words that put the ordeal to rest. “Choose your words carefully Ser.” It was said with gritted teeth. Viserys stood up clutching his dinner knife in his good hand while pointing it at his bewildered good father. “You will not speak ill of my niece nor my brother's children.”

The king sounded as exasperated as he looked when he turned towards his brother. “Sit down Daemon, Ser Otto knows his place. Let us enjoy the rest of this feast in peace.” Ser Otto did not breathe another word, nor did his gaze ever venture towards Daemon who appeared ready to strike at any moment, for the remainder of the feast, leaving early so that he was not caught unaware.

Naerys' labors began later that night. This time the princess awoke from her short slumber to blood pooling out from between her legs. Grand Maester Mellos as well Archmaester Orwyle were called for. Daemon flew to Dragonstone for Maester Orlys not fully trusting the maesters at court, but it was too soon. They all knew it. The babe was not supposed to arrive for another three moons. The birth was a blur. Over before Naerys could wrap her head around it. There was no joy to follow.

Their babe had been a girl. Smaller than Daenys had been, but just as beautiful. She would never open her eyes or wail out at being thrust into the world as her elder sister had. They named her Alyssa.

Naerys cradled her in her arms. She would not let the silent sisters take her. Stroking her pale cheeks as she sang lullabies to her babe. It was only after being administered dreamwine as Daemon held her were the sisters able to take Alyssa’s body away. There had been enough to burn this time. Naerys buried her head into Daenys neck when Daemon gave the command to lit the funeral pyre afire.

Daemon placed a cup of moon tea in front of her two moons later. Naerys wanted to try again. She was healed. They needed an heir. Her husband refused to bed her until she agreed to his demands. There could be no more children. He had meant it.

“Gaomagon ao daor jaelagon syt nyke naejot bare ao iā tresy? Iksin nyke daor sȳz enough syt ao valzȳrys?” Do you not wish for me to bear you a son? Am I not good enough for you husband? Naerys spat at him as she threw the cup at him. Daemon had not even flinched as some of the hot liquid splashed on his impassive face.

“Gaomagon ao daor jaelagon naejot glaesagon naejot ūndegon īlva tala riñar ābrazȳrys?” Do you not wish to live to see our daughter's children? Daemon held her in his arms as the weight of Naerys' despair came crashing upon her.

Naerys felt as if she was a helpless child as her husband wiped away her tears, rocking her back and forth as he did with Daenys when their daughter was in a foul mood. There had been so much loss in the past three years and yet she was willing to risk more. She had to.

Daemon called for her aunt and cousin to visit. “You could die, Naerys.” They had gone down to the beach. Resting on top of a piece of driftwood. Watching Laena chasing after her daughters and Daenys. The tide had waned. “Think of your daughter. Would you leave her alone in this world?”

“She would not be alone.” Daemon loved their daughter more than life itself. He would move the heavens and earth for her. Their little dragon would never be alone. The ache would dull and Naerys would become a distant memory, but Daenys would have her father. Daemon could always take another to wife. He had done so once. He could do so again, though Naerys hoped that his eyes would not land upon the one woman he had wanted all those years ago.

“She would not have you.” Naerys yielded once more. For six months at least. Another bargain Daemon accepted. The prince still needed an heir. She had seen the way her husband looked when they journeyed to the capital. Seen the way his eyes lit up with longing as he spared with one of the strong boys or Alicent’s sons. All men wished to have heirs. Her husband was no different though he claimed otherwise.

Daemon had taken to treating Naerys as his heir. He would perch her on his lap on Dragonstone’s throne during petition meetings. Explaining to her why he had made each decision. Depositing her on a nearby bench in their training yard as he spared with his men.

He had tried to give the girl a practice sword, but she threw it away with interest in favor of her dolls. Daenys had become his little shadow. Following his every move. The two were rarely seen without the other. Their daughter relished in the attention she received, but she was not a proper heir. A son was needed.

This would be her last pregnancy. Maester Orlys had warned her. Her body would give out if she were to have another one though it would likely never quicken on its own again. Daemon had taken to treating her as if she were glass. Their daughter had followed his lead. It could be suffocating at times. One or the other would constantly fuss about her. Though it was much more amusing to see the little Daenys order her mother about than her stern father. Naerys accepted it as the price she would pay for her babe.

“Lord Strong and Ser Harwin are dead.” Ser Vaemond wasted no time with formalities. Though he did lend a strained smile. He had arrived on Dragonstone at twilight one evening in the ninth of Naerys final pregnancy. Apart from the servants and Maester Orlys the castle was empty. Daemon and Daenys were out riding upon Caraxes around the island. They were due to arrive back any moment.

The two had been hesitant to leave her, but Naerys had convinced them otherwise. She had been experiencing false labors, but she was not due for a. Her maids rarely left her side in the absence of her husband. Even if her labors were to begin in earnest, the two would be called back to Dragonstone with enough time to spare.

“Rhaenyra has fled to my brother’s keep. Apparently, she and the queen had a disagreement.” They were always at odds. The two could not see eye to eye even if their lives depended upon it. “She’s brought those boys she calls sons with her.”

“They are her sons' uncle.” It did not matter who sired her cousin's sons. Rhaenyra gave life to her boys just as Naerys had given Daenys hers. No man, father or not, could change that. Children were children to a mother.

“You should see it. She’s more bereft than Laena.” Poor Laena. She had brought her daughters to Driftmark for peace and yet there would be none. Her husband, the father of her children, had died while she still stood to give birth to his last child. A child who would never meet their father. Naerys was not sad to learn of Ser Harwin’s demise, and even less sorry to hear of Lord Strongs, but she was sad for her cousin and her children.

“She has her rights.” Naerys sighed, placing a hand on her belly. The babe had made its presence known with a swift kick. Ser Harwin was the father of her sons as well. Her lover and a confidant of sorts. Rhaenyra should be able to grieve the loss of Ser Harwin as well as Laena. Truthfully Rhaenyra might have cared for the strong knight towards the end more than his wife had.

“To think that she is to be our queen after her idiot of a father departs this earth.” Ser Vaemond sneered with every word he spoke. Naerys bristled. She knew where this conversation was going. “You should be queen.” Vaemond had been her father's fiercest supporter. Aenys Targaryen was Baelon's eldest son. From an ill-fated union with her Velaryon grandmother, but a union that put him second in the line of succession after his own uncle's death.

When Naerys father died he had tried to push her mother on the issue, but she was too young and her mother far too fearful. She had fled from court taking Naerys back to Driftmark with her when her father had died. Shaera Velaryon had not trusted the council her good grandsire kept. “I should have never let your mother take you away from court.”

“I am no queen uncle, we both know that.” Naerys was a babe, younger than Daenys, when the great council had been called. Her claim had easily been pushed aside with a laugh in favor of her half-uncle. No one wanted a queen upon the Iron Throne, especially not one that still needed a nursemaid. Naerys had come to realize it was for the best. The Iron Throne was a curse she had been lucky to escape. “Why are you here?” The hour was growing late and Naerys was growing weary of where the conversation was heading.

“I remember when you were your daughter's age.” The umber man went to touch her belly. The babe let out another kick. This one was less active than his sister, but his kicks were just as strong. Naerys wanted to flick her uncle's hand away so that she may soothe the restless babe within but she dropped her own hand to the side. “Daenys is just as beautiful as her mother.”

“She’s four.” A betrothal was out of the question. Her uncle knew that. Even if Naerys agreed to it Ser Vaemond Velaryon could not have possibly come all this way for a union between one of her uncle’s grandsons and their daughter that would not be consummated for at least ten years. It was not up to her to decide her daughter’s fate anyway. The Velaryon knight wanted something else.

“Ser Otto Hightower has been reinstated as hand.” It was said innocently enough. Though one could never tell with the commander of the Velaryon fleet if it was a threat or a warning until his temper made itself known. Her uncle continued to stroke her belly.

“Otto Hightower is not a man to be trusted.” Another kick sharper than the rest. Naerys moved her hand to grip the painted table. Biting down on her lip to ease the discomfort. Her uncle had made a servant show him to Dragonstone’s map chambers when he arrived. The man wanted a stage for his theatrics.

“He is keen on seeing the rightful heirs sit atop both the Driftwood and Iron thrones.” Ser Vaemond finally removed his hand back to his person. Turning his violet gaze to the map in front of them. “Perhaps Dragonstone’s as well.” A warning and an offer. The first of many messengers to come.

Naerys knew the wants of a second son well. She had married one and grown up partly in the care of another. Otto Hightower, Vaemond Velaryon, and Daemon Targaryen were not really much different from one another. They all wanted to set themselves apart from their elder brothers. To carve out their own legacy so that their names may live on in the history maester’s diligently recorded.

The hand’s legacy was to be the Iron Throne. Or at least that is what he hoped for when he married his daughter to the king. In Ser Otto’s eyes, Rhaenyra was only supposed to be a placeholder until Viserys' son could be born from this union. The birth of Aegon should have changed the line of succession, but the king would not push aside his son for his beloved firstborn.

Rhaenyra remaining heir did not stop Ser Otto from wanting to seize the Iron Throne for his grandson. A want his daughter no doubt shared with him. It was Aegon’s birthright. Son’s come before their sisters no matter their birth order. Why would the king remarry if not to secure a son after him? Why break over a century of tradition for one woman? Why pass over scores of Targaryen women, Rhaena the Black Bride, Rhaenys, and Naerys herself only for the throne to land in the hands of an entitled woman? Viserys spat in the face of them all to ease his guilty conscience.

Naerys doubled over in pain, not from a kick, but from an unmistakable contraction. Leaning on the painted table she felt a steady stream of fluid trickle down her legs. The princess lifted up her skirts to reveal a dark puddle on the chamber’s stone floor. Just as the last one ended another wave of contractions arrived. Her labors had begun for the final time.

Birth was never easy. The birthing bed always posed a risk, but it was a woman’s war. A mother's burden. Death hung in the air ready to take both mother and child at the drop of a feather, but the reward, in the end, was worth it. To hear the cries of a squirming healthy babe made the pain bearable. Naerys had only been rewarded with that sound once. She was desperate to hear it once more.

A messenger from Driftmark had come while Naerys struggled to bring her babe into the world. Laena had gone into labor as well, but she and the babe had perished. Vaemond had tried to shush the man away but Naerys had heard. Her cousin had always been harder than her. Vivacious and full of life yet she had succumbed to her labors. What hope was there for her?

“Will she live?” Naerys did not know when Daemon had arrived back, but her husband stood pale and grave-faced at the door to their chambers with Maester Orlys. Speaking in hushed voices so as not to disturb her. The maester and the midwives had given up on telling her to push. It was a fool's errand at this point.

Naerys had neither the strength nor the energy left in her body to do so. She was exhausted. Each round of throbbing spasms that wrecked her body began to meld into one another. She could barely move. She could not tell her head from her hand. Feeling herself slowly drifting towards something unseen.

“No my prince, but the babe might.” Their heir might live. If he were to cut her open they might have a son, but there would be a price that would be paid. Naerys had been too young when her late aunt had died trying, but she remembered seeing the bloodied sheets.

“And if we do not?” Daemon’s violet eyes cast his gaze toward her. Naerys eyes felt another round of contractions radiating throughout her body. She could only whimper out in pain. Curling further into herself. The ache within her was overwhelming.

“She will live my prince.” The maester wavered at his next words. His dark eyes traveled past Daemon’s to land upon her belly. “But the babe will die.” They could not save both her and the babe. A choice was to be made. A sacrifice she was more than willing to make. For Daemon she would pay that price to bring their son into the world.

“Do what needs to be done.” Daemon’s voice was just as solemn as his face. Naerys had not thought of death truly until that moment. She was no stranger to death. Even when she was a girl death followed her around as if she was an old friend. Taking both her parents with him before she had known what life was.

Naerys had not known her father, but she remembered glimpses of her mother's face. Her laugh. Her smile. Soft brown hands that would lovingly braid her hair. “My daughter needs her mother and I need my wife.” She thought she had hallucinated what she heard until Daemon moved towards where she lay a writhing sweaty heap on their bed.

“Byka mēre.” Little one. Daemon placed his hand in hers lightly squeezing it. Naerys tried to return the grip but she failed. “Ao jāhor jorrāelagon naejot indigon skori pōnta ivestragon ao naejot” You will need to push when they tell you to. He kissed her forehead brushing away the sweaty coils that fell from her braid. Her uncle's face has been overtaken by grief.

Naerys in her hazy state spied a midwife handing a large set of clamps to the maester. They reminded her of giant spoons. “Kostilus issa dōna riña. Indigon syt issa.” Please my sweet girl. Push for me. His voice was strained. Daemon brought his forehead to her own as another midwife spread her legs apart.

The princess winced as she felt the cold metal of the clamps being pushed into her before coming to a stop at her babes head. She had to push. Just a little one, but she had to try. Her husband squeezed her hand once more. With the remaining strength left in her body, she made a feeble attempt at a push. After the first round, the pressure became too much to bear. Naerys felt herself fading into the abyss.

When she came to, she heard the babbling of Daenys and her septa in their solar. A reminder that the Stranger had seen fit to spare her. The linens had been freshly changed. The smell of death was gone from the room though an air of dolefulness lingered on.

Naerys placed a hand on her slowly deflating belly and turned her head to gaze upon the near empty crib that was placed near their chambers warming fire. Only a dark dragon egg their daughter had picked out lay in it. Heat for a dragon. A dragon that would remain unclaimed if it ever hatched

“Skorkydoso gaomagon ao feel byka mēre” How do you feel little one? Daemon’s melancholic voice broke her from her thoughts. Her uncle's eyes were bloodshot and his complexion resembled that of a ghost, but he gave her a small smile. Relief. He felt relief with every breath that his young wife still took.

Naerys felt sore and listless beyond belief. She knew that her breasts would begin to leak soon and she would more than likely be forced to drink some milk of the poppy for the dull aches she felt, but the physical reminders of birth did little to compare to the mental torment she felt inside.

“What was it?” She barely recognized the sound of her own voice. The croak it made did not belong to her. It could not have. It belonged to some other woman. Not her. Some broken little lifeless thing. Not a daughter of House Targaryen.

Daemon looked hesitant to answer. Shifting on the balls of his feet as he held his head down. He sighed before grabbing her hand. Bringing her willowy arm up to his thin mouth. Placing a kiss on the back of the smooth skin there. She knew what the answer would be, but she needed to hear it from his lips.

“Nykeā valonqar. Ziry gōntan daor botagon syt bōsa.” A boy. He did not suffer for long. Their child was gone. Their heir was gone before he could live. There would never be more children. No more babes to fill their halls. At least not from Naerys. She was not strong enough to birth a healthy son for her husband. She had never been.

“Nyke emagon qringōntan ao istin tolī.” I have failed you once more. Naerys let out a pained sob turning her head into her pillow. There was not much the Targaryen man could do but comfort his weeping wife. Joining her on their bed. Gathering her in his arms as he let her cry into his chest for their lost children. “Nyke emagon qringōntan ao se nyke kostagon daor tepagon ao tolī.” I have failed you and I can not give you more.

“Ao could dōrī qringaomagon issa dōna riña” You could never fail me sweet girl. Daemon rocked her as if she was a babe. Wiping away her tears and placing half-hazard kisses across her streaked cheeks. “Ao emagon given issa tolī than nyke gūrogon. Ao issi alive, bona iksos skoros matters.” You have given me more than I deserve. You are alive, that is what matters. Naerys was reminded of Daemon’s pleadings a year back. If only she had listened to him then. She could not turn back now.

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#daemon targaryen x targaryen!oc #daemon targaryen x targaryen!reader #daemon targaryen x reader #daemon targaryen x oc #daemon targaryen x black!oc #prince daemon targaryen #daemon targeryan #house of the dragon #hotd #hotd fic #hotd fanfiction #daemon targaryen fanfic #this chapter is a doozy #bnhotdfic

[bohemian-nights]

Arlī(Anew)Chapter 7

Word Count: ~9,934

Rating: 18+

Warnings⚠️: Uncle/niece incest; violence; blood; minor smut

Description: Love is not a precursor to marriage. Nor is it a requirement. Love matches are rare. Even rarer are those who grow to love one another.

AN: This story takes place from episode 5 onward. I’ve changed things up a bit but I’ve kept the timeline intact.

Sorry this took a little longer than expected. The holidays are crazy 🫠

Chapter 1, Chapter 2, Chapter 3, Chapter 4, Chapter 5, Chapter 6, Chapter 8, Chapter 9

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131 AC- Dragonstone

Marriage is an institution. It is the oldest institution in existence. The very foundation of polite and chivalrous society. It can be characterized by duty, affection, and fidelity though the latter two are rare to find in most unions. Love is not a precursor to marriage. Nor is it a requirement. Love matches are rare. Even rarer are those who grow to love one another.

For those fortunate enough to be born high in society we marry those who we are told to. Duty and love are like oil in water in most unions. Perhaps the institution is kinder to those who are less fortunate. Matrimony can be a joyful gift to those lucky enough to have been blessed by the Maiden, but so few are.

Liberation within its sacred vows is few and far between. This is the case for women especially. A woman is first the property of her father and then later her husband. Devoting her life to both. She lives in service of others. To be a devoted daughter to birth her husband's heirs. When she fails that duty she is shamed. Cast aside if not physically she is mentally iced out. She is looked down upon. Reprimanded for her faults, but when she succeeds she is the embodiment of the mother herself.

Marriage of course has its benefits for women as well as men. It offers the chance for a legacy. A way of serving past death. Cheating the very nature of mortality. Life is fleeting, but we can live from beyond the grave. Through our children, we go on. We endure for them so that we may preserve in some fashion or another. It brings legitimacy to children created within its union. The role of marriage at its heart. We all have our parts to play.

Naerys went into her marriage with the same expectations as most highborn women. She did not ask for much. She knew her duty. She was to bear her husband a male heir and at least a spare. She was to educate her children in the customs of old Valyria. If the Gods willed it she would fill the halls of Dragonstone with plenty of children to go around.

There had been a time when she had seemingly failed this duty, that the princess had thought she would have to share her husband with another, but that time had thankfully passed. Though doubts lingered in the back of her mind, the past was the past. She could not change it. Nor would she wish to. Her deck had been set. The cards had been handed out. She would make the best of the hand that she had been dealt. It had not been a bad hand in the end.

Where the first five years of her marriage had been hectic, full of uncertainty and pain, the past eleven years of Naerys' marriage had been as close to felicity as she had ever reached. Daemon was a loyal and attentive husband. Though he could be hot-headed and brash he was a passionate and devoted man. She could not complain. She had more than she could have ever dreamed of.

Nothing could beat her husband's smile when he was thrilled with her or something else that excited him. The way his violet eyes crinkled up at the corners brought light to his pale face. His boisterous laughter filled her up, warming her up on cold nights as he held her in his arms after a heated round of lovemaking.

Her uncle's consideration of her needs was unparalleled. Over the years he had grown to value her opinion above all others. Seeking her council for decisions or problems that arise with their vessels and Dragonstone’s small folk. The day-to-day of their household was left mostly in Naerys' care. An arrangement that worked out the best for both.

Rarely did Daemon miss their evening rides on Silverwing and Caraxes around their island. Nor the chance to recount each other’s days over a cup of warm mulled wine while they sat by the fire. The Targaryen couple relished the time that they spent in each other’s company. Whether it be sharing a simple meal in their chambers solar, reading texts of various natures to each other, or a shared bath to wash off the stress of the day. Daemon always made time for his little wife no matter how busy their days got.

When Naerys had given birth to Daenys and no sons had followed after she had grown weary, her husband had not seemed to mind that his heir came in the form of a girl. Her strength regrew from his conviction. Their daughter was a blessing from the Gods. A miracle that they cherished above all else. Anyone who asked the Rogue Prince’s true opinion on the issue of his lack of sons would receive a firm challenge. “Why would I wish for sons when I have my little dragon?” They would not make the mistake of questioning the prince again or his daughter's position as his heir.

A sweet sentiment, but Naerys had held out a silent hope that her womb would quicken again the first three years after Aenys birth. That the maesters had been wrong. That she would be able to give her husband a son and heir. Praying to the mother every time she lay with her husband and he released inside her that his seed would take, They had not been. By the fourth year after their son's tragic birth, it became clear that Daenys would remain their sole living child.

Daenys was a vivacious girl with a charming disposition. She excelled in needlepoint, dancing, and court etiquette as well as high Valyrian, literature, and ancient histories. She found politics and sums to be tedious, struggling especially with the latter, but she rarely gave her septa or Maester Orly's much trouble for it. Much to her father's disappointment, and her mother's relief, she did not enjoy swordplay, but she had grown to love archery almost as much as her daily rides upon the slender dragon she had named Moonbeam.

Though the young princess had her mother's looks she had inherited her father’s stubbornness. Preferring to do things as she saw fit though she could be persuaded to see the merits in others' opinions if she was given enough reason to. Daenys was a true daughter of House Targaryen. Every inch the Valyrian beauty, standing tall with her silver curls, honey complexion, and violet eyes she had inherited from her father. Her loveliness only grew with each passing name day. The young princess was shaping up to be a fine lady of impeccable breeding.

While Daenys may not have been an ideal heir due to her sex, no one could doubt her legitimacy or her position as Daemon’s successor. She had no brothers. No other siblings legitimate or otherwise. The young princess was the sole living natural-born child of both of her parents. There could be no question of who would inherit Dragonstone after her father would depart from this earth. This was not the case for her older cousin.

The question of legitimacy was presented with Rhaenyra. The presumed heir to the Iron Throne. The firstborn daughter of the king. Born from Viserys first marriage to his late cousin Aemma. Though Rhaenyra was undoubtedly her father's eldest child, the king had since remarried. Her stepmother had given birth to four children, three of whom were sons. Viserys long hoped for heirs. Their births should have pushed her further down the line of succession except they had not and the crown princess remained heir.

Every heir has certain expectations. The continuation of the family line is one of them. Under threat of disinheritance, Rhaenyra had been married to her Velaryon cousin the late Ser Laenor. In their many moons of marriage, she birthed three sons. The eldest two, Jaecerys and Lucerys, had been named the future heir of the Seven Kingdoms and the future Lord of Tides respectively. In the king's mind, his line and Rhaenyra’s position as the heir appeared secure.

Despite Naerys' cousin claiming each dark-haired pug-nosed son Rhaenyra bore, the question of the legitimacy clung to them. Ser Laenor’s proclivities were well known. Whether the two had tried to work past his urges if the Velaryon heir was truly sterile was not known to the realm at large, but regardless of the finer details, everyone knew who really fathered the realm’s delight’s children. They were unquestionably the baseborn sons of the crown princess sired by her late lover and good brother Ser Harwin Strong.

Lord Corlys and his lady wife Princess Rhaenys said nothing publically to contradict Rhaenyra’s son's parentage for the sake of their granddaughters. The little strong sister twins, Baela and Rhaena were set to marry Jace and Luke. The elder was to be the queen of the seven kingdoms while the younger lady of Driftmark was like her grandmother before her. Privately, it was obvious that Rhaenys was less than enthused at her good daughter's lack of discretion. The fact that she had turned to her late daughter's husband as a means to provide herself with heirs had further soured their relationship.

In the wake of Ser Laenor’s death, Rhaenyra and her children fled from Driftmark. I can not bear to be in the place where my husband has died. I am so alone here uncle. All I have are my sons. An excuse and a plea. It was what she wrote to Daemon. Keeping true to his word that there were to be no more secrets between he and his young niece-wife, the Rogue Prince read over the contents of the letter to Naerys as they were preparing for bed.

When he had finished, Naerys expected her uncle to return to his writing desk. Wasting no time to extend an invitation to Rhaenyra, he kissed the worry lines that had appeared on her forehead and tossed the letter into the fire. Pulling her silver coils back from her little brown face before he bent down to capture her sweet mouth in a kiss. He began to pull the loose tie to her gown to reveal the sheer gown underneath. She shivered in the cool night air that had seeped into their solar, but she did not suffer for long. Warming up under her husband’s amorous attention.

“Ao emagon daorun naejot zūgagon issa dōna riña.” You have nothing to fear, my sweet girl. Naerys' husband wrote back to Rhaenyra in the morning. He offered her their condolences once more, but he did not offer her a place by his side in Dragonstone’s halls.

Not receiving the reply she had hoped for, Rhaenyra and her sons made their way to the Vale. Having heard of her plight Jeyne Arryn, her cousin for her the princess's mother had been an Arryn, and Lady of the Eyrie offered her a place at her hearth.

The Warden of the East was a virtuous woman who held little love for those who sought to usurp a woman’s rightful position in favor of their male relatives. She knew all too well what it was like to be looked down upon for her sex. Her own cousin Ser Arnold Arryn had twice risen against her to claim her Inheritance.

Her opinion remained low among those who sought to replace her cousin as heir due to her sex and her children's questionable legitimacy. She dismissed the claims of Rhaenyra’s son's bastard status as harsh untruths. “Your sons have inherited the Arryn look, my dear princess.”

Lady Jeyne Arryn and the crown princess got on well enough with the exception of one subject. Prince Daemon Targaryen. Lady Arryn's distaste for the Rogue Prince had been well known. She had never held a high opinion of the man, but what little regard she had held vanished after the death of Lady Rhea Royce.

“She believes I killed that unfortunate woman who I happened to have been tied to for her inheritance, little one.” Her husband's first wife was a topic that only came up a handful of times in their marriage. It was for all intents and purposes a cold barren union that had embittered them both. The two had only slept together a handful of times and saw each other with little frequency. A stark contrast to the affections he held for his niece-wife.

Naerys sometimes wondered, mostly to herself, if her uncle had done away with Lady Rhea. True enough, Daemon was away from the Runestone at the untimely death of his first wife, but he hated the woman and he hated that he was not allowed to take another for a wife. He had wasted no time in demanding his baby niece's hand in marriage when she finally succumbed to her injuries. Flying to Driftmark to claim his prize for enduring a frigid marriage bed for so long.

Curiosity got the better of Naerys when she asked in a haze of lust and Dornish Red one night if he had. Daemon laughed before breathing into her ear as he thrust his middle and index fingers into her cunt to prolong her peak. Pulling out his digit from her overspent heat when she began to whimper. Bringing their combined spends to her slightly swollen lips. A love-drunk look overtook her husband's pale face when she eagerly suckled on the pads of his fingers. “If my brother had not let me have a taste of you I would have.”

Naerys had been told that Rhaenyra would hear no ill words against her beloved uncle. “It is not his fault dear cousin. My uncle would have never turned me away had it not been for another who has crawled in his bed and takes joy in whispering fables into his ear.” Lady Jeyne spoke no more on the subject.

The Eyrie for a time became a place of diversion for the crown princess. Her cousin was gracious enough to let her have a run of her own household. Giving her the freedom she so desired as long as she did not interfere in her role as Warden of the East.

Still, life in the Vale grew dull for Rhaenyra. The ancestral seat of House Arryn was beautiful, but a small remote castle. Served the purpose of defense well, but for entertainment, it fell short even in comparison to Dragonstone which sat in half isolation. Guests were few and far between besides the young lady Strong‘s who on occasion would fly upon Baela’s mount Moondancer to visit their betrotheds.

I confess that I have grown weary of this place. Though Lady Arryn is kind, the Eyrie is not home. The crown princess had written once again to their uncle. It was Naerys who extended the offer of a visit to Dragonstone’s shore. It was in part born out of her duty as a mother.

Daenys was fast approaching her fifteenth name day. The young princess was a beauty, an accomplished dragon rider, and possessed an overall sweet disposition. She did not lack for admirers, however, her eyes were firmly set upon her cousin Aemond. A fondness that was returned in kind.

“She’s too infatuated with him.” It was said as Daemon glared at Aemond from the high table as Aemond spun Daenys around the great hall during their nephew's last visit. “And you are encouraging it little one.” The Rogue Prince had tried to separate the two after Prince Aemond had asked for his daughter's hand in marriage. An act that had ended poorly.

“Iksan ojūdan mijegon zirȳla nuncle. Wed zȳhon naejot issa isse se tradition hen īlva lentor.” I am lost without her nuncle. Wed her to me in the tradition of our house. The young prince had promised her parents that he would not remove his future bride from all that she loved. Daenys preferred the quiet tranquility of Dragonstone’s smoky shores. The Red Keep with its gossip and foul air held little appeal for the princess. Aemond truth be told found his father’s court to be tiring. It was no place to raise children. He knew that all too well. This had been the final straw for the princess’s father.

“My dear nephew, I’d sooner wed my daughter to a pig than you. At least then we’d get a meal out of it.” Daemon sniggered at his nephew who had dropped down to his knees with his sword clasped firmly between his hands in a show of fealty. The older prince's face turned to stone as he sneered down at the red faced one eyed prince. Daemon ordered him to take leave from Dragonstone. “Your nursemaid will be missing you.” A pair of guards flanked Aemond on his involuntary march to Vhagar. Taking flight without so much as a being allowed a goodbye to his young love.

Daenys had given her parents the fright of their lives when she flew from Dragonstone in the middle of a storm without so much as a trace. They had begun to expect the worst until a raven arrived from the Red Keep informing Naerys and Daemon of their daughter's whereabouts. The young princess had made the trek in perilous weather, a course of action which her cousin had advised her not to undertake, to entreat upon her uncle’s goodwill. Surely he would force his brother's hand and allow their union to take place.

When the appeal was posed by the young lovers to the dying man he was said to have turned away from his son to gaze upon his young niece with a slight look of confusion. Taking her unblemished hand in his frail one with an apologetic smile on his face. “I do not think that is wise Naerys.”

The broken-hearted young princess was retrieved from the capital with haste by her father and barred from leaving so much as her chambers without the presence of at least one of her maids. Daemon threatened to send for her old septa, but Naerys was able to calm her husband. “It was a mistake. She has learned her lesson kepus.”

Daenys complied with her parents' demands without complaint, but she was a restless girl. Her spirit would rally again. She would not be satisfied until she had gained what she wanted and Aemond was unlikely to give in unless he was told to by the young princess herself. The will of youthful pride and passion could not be underestimated.

It came as no great surprise when Daenys came to her mother begging for her help. “Ziry mazverdagon issa sōpagon muña.” He makes me laugh mother. The young princess broke down into sobs as Naerys stroked her silver curls. “Nyke kostagon daor jikagon va mijegon zirȳla” I can not go on without him.

Daemon had not mellowed much with age. Remaining every bit as stubborn as the Rogue Prince of his youth. He disliked Aemond as a match for his daughter and his opinion of him was unlikely to change, but perhaps if Daenys affections were to transfer to another of another they could move past this. Young love was fickle enough. The first passions of youth could fade just as quickly as they began.

“It is good to be among family again uncle.” In the fortnight that Rhaenyra and her sons stayed in Dragonstone’s stone halls she had made herself quite at home. Taking up residence in the Sea Dragon tower, far enough away from Naerys and her family’s residence in the Stone Drum, the princess, and her children were given free roam of the place.

Naerys was reminded of the early days of her marriage when Rhaenyra had been a constant presence in their home, though to her relief her husband did not seem half as interested in his niece this time around. He in fact had left the entertainment of the crown princess to Naerys. “You brought her here little one.” Daemon had told her with a teasing smirk when she had grumbled about her cousin's ways. Having to sit through sewing circles, dinners, and gatherings with a pinched-faced Rhaenyra had been a less than joyous experience, but for Daenys she endured it.

“Joffrey has grown so very fond of Daenys.” The three Targaryens peered down from the courtyard rafters to gaze upon their children in the training yard below. Rhaenyra and Naerys stood on opposite sides of Daemon who had pulled Naerys hand in his. A sight that had drawn the older princess’s attention as revulsion was written clearly across her pale face.

The Rogue Prince echoed the crown princess’s sentiments as he continued to draw circles with his thumb into the back of his wife’s hand. “It is truly a shame that she has no brothers.” It is a shame that your wife has given you no sons. Naerys stifled, but that did not go unnoticed by Daemon.

“As it is a shame that you had no daughters.” The crown princess’s lilac eyes brightened for a moment before her uncle continued on. “Or silver-haired sons.” Rhaenyra gave a tight-lipped smile before making her excuses. Leaving back for the safety of her guest chambers in Sea Dragon tower.

That night Naerys confessed her plan to her husband. Joffrey had not been her first choice for her daughter's potential betrothed, but she had run out of options. Daenys had found fault with every boy she had tried to thrust their daughter's way. He is too dull mother or he is too arrogant or I hate his laugh. While Rhaenyra’s youngest son was a well-mannered boy, she did not know how much longer she could take from her cousin's leering presence.

“Send them away.” Daemon had laughed lightly as he pulled her into his lap. Placing his forehead to hers. “Īlva byka zaldrīzes does daor raqagon joffrey isse bona ñuhoso nor does ziry ūndegon zȳhon hae mirros tolī than nykeā mandia. Ziry jorrāelagon daor dīnagon nykeā bastard.” Our little dragon does not like Joffrey in that way nor does he see her as anything more than a sister. She need not marry a bastard.

Naerys had dreaded telling her cousin to leave from Dragonstone’s shores. She had never been good at confrontation. Preferring to avoid it at all costs. The princess had found silence to be the best course of action when dealing with something or someone unpleasant. In the end, there had been no need for her anguish over the issue.

Two ravens arrived at Dragonstone. The first from Driftmark. The second from King's Landing. Both told the same tale. Lord Corlys Velaryon had fallen ill. A fever. Sudden and unexpected.

The Velaryon lord could not leave his bed. His wife Princess Rhaenys and their eldest granddaughter, Lady Baela, worked tirelessly to nurse him back to health. Rhaena spent most of her days praying for her grandfather's recovery in Hide Tide’s sept. It was when his condition took a turn for the worst that his brother chose to strike. The balance that they had crafted was steadily collapsing.

Ser Vaemond had always held firm to the belief that it was he and not Rhaenyra’s sons who was the rightful heir of the Driftwood Throne. He was Lord Corlys’ only living brother. He was the commander of house Velaryon’s navy. He was a true Velaryon with the undiluted blood of old Valyria running through his.

Though he had some minor disagreements with his nephews all had been in agreement that Lucerys Velaryon and his brothers were really bastards born of Strong seed. They were unfit to rule over them as the Lord of the Tides nor would they suffer through the embarrassment of house Velaryon being headed by a bastard welp of a whore. The Velaryon men had put aside their differences in support of their uncle's claim. It was with one unifying mind that Ser Vaemond, his sons, and his five nephews set sail for the Red Keep.

Naerys had always suspected that Ser Vaemond and Ser Otto Hightower had struck up a bargain with one another. They had a common enemy. The Driftwood Throne and the Iron Throne could be theirs respectively if Rhaenyra’s heirs were officially declared illegitimate. Aemond’s letter to Daenys all, but confirmed their unspoken agreement.

Tell your mother not to worry sweetling. My grandsire will be proceeding over Ser Vaemond’s petition. The king is too ill to leave his bed. Mother believes that we have worn him out from our little ambush. Naerys doubted that her uncle had been informed of the events that were transpiring around him.

Rhaenyra had been unfortunately present when Daenys had been made to read the letter aloud when they broke their fast. “I beg you uncle if you had or still have any love for me please save my boys.” With tears streaming down her face she implored Daemon to see to her children's “safety.” The crown princess’s sons were sweet true enough, but there was not enough sentiment to warrant defensive action. Their lives were not forfeit if they were publicly declared bastards.

Daemon agreed to it. “I would want Viserys to do the same for Daenys' little one.” His simple reply when his wife had asked why. Naerys did not object. If it gave her husband piece of mind that he had done what he could for his great nephews and their mother she would not dare try to sway or guilt him into changing his mind.

It had been suggested by Rhaenyra that she stay within the confines of Dragonstone when they were gearing up to leave for the Red Keep. “We will not be very long dear cousin.” She took all too much pleasure in ordering her around as she moved to smooth down imaginary lines on their uncle's riding leathers.

“My wife could talk some sense into him niece.” Daemon flicked Rhaenyra’s hand away. Naerys knew that her husband could care less for the fate of Ser Vaemond or his kin. However, he was not unaware of his niece-wife’s sentiments. For all his faults the Velaryon knight had been true to Naerys. She could not remember her father, but she could recall every instance that Vaemomd had tried to serve in his absence. She had to try to save him from his own self if she could. Naerys did not spare her aunt another look as she climbed upon Silverwing’s back and took to the skies.

The Dragonstone party arrived in Kings Landing well before Ser Vaemond and Alicent had been the ones to welcome them when they had arrived in the courtyard of the Red Keep. The queen gave a curt greeting to her good daughter before pulling Naerys to the side reiterating what her son had written in his letter. “The king is ill. We do what we can, but it is in the Mother's hands. My father will be the one to make the final verdict.”

Rhaenyra demanded to be taken to see her father almost immediately once the children had left to find some amusement. “I wish to see him.” Naerys could not blame her. If she was in her position she would request the same. The crown princess's visits to her father in the ten years since she had left had been minimal. The Red Keep of her youth was gone. The emblems and regalia of house Targaryen had been replaced mostly by the religious doctrine of the Seven. One was hard-pressed to recognize the castle.

Rhaenyra tried to leave Naerys waiting in the solar outside of the king's bed chambers, but Daemon chastised the crown princess with a frown upon his brow. “She is my wife Rhaenyra.” With a glare thrown in her cousin's direction, she conceded, not even bothering to hide distaste at being reminded of her position in comparison to the Lady of Dragonstone.

True enough the king was confined to his sick bed. The room was kept cool and the shudders were drawn so as to keep the sunlight from streaming in. A gauze covered half his face and the half that was exposed was gaunt and pocket marked with sores.

Viserys had not even recognized his own daughter until she had identified herself. “I am here with Daemon father.” Naerys ignored the omission as Daemon took her small hand in his. As he gazed down at his elder brother she was reminded of the worried look he wore during Aenys birth all those moons ago. The king seemed to come alive upon seeing his daughter and brother's faces together no doubt, but It was not long before a coughing fit overtook him. They left him to the care of maesters then.

Rhaenyra tried to collapse into Daemon when they exited the king's bed chambers. Feigning fatigue and exhaustion as she tried to push aside Naerys hand so that she may be encircled in their uncle’s arms, but the man brushed her off. The crown princess had to grab hold of a nearby chair to keep from falling. Turning to his wife he gave her hand a squeeze and placed a kiss on her soft cheek. “I’ll check on our daughter.” The man still looked like a lost boy as he made his way to search for their daughter. Daenys would set him to rights or at least provide him with enough of a distraction so as to keep his mind off of his brother.

The rest of the day leading up to the petitions passed by slowly. Princess Rhaenys, Lady Baela, and Lady Rhaena arrived not long after the Dragonstone party. While Naerys was glad to see her aunt and little cousin it was not their arrival that she anxiously waited upon. It was not until well in the afternoon that Ser Vaemond and his party finally arrived. At the Lady of Dragonstone’s behest, the queen had brought the Velaryon knight to his niece's guest chambers after she and her father briefly spoke with him. A courtesy that she would not forget.

“You are a Targaryen niece, this does not concern you.” Ser Vaemond tried to dismiss Naerys fears, but she would not let him. She had no dragon dreams, but something told her that this would not end well. The Stranger encircled the Red Keep. The princess could feel that it was not for the ailing king. “I have already received a lecture from one woman of your house. I will not listen to another.” Rhaenys was well-meaning, but she was not a Velaryon. Her interest lay with her blood the Lady Strongs. She would support the bastard's claim as long as her granddaughters sat beside them.

“Was my mother, your sister not a lady of house Velaryon? Was my grandmother, your aunt, not a lady of house Velaryon as well?” Naerys may have the blood of the dragon, but she was just as much if not more so a Velaryon. “Se uēpa, se drēje, se nēdenka.” The old, the true, the brave. House Velaryon’s words. Words she carried in her heart alongside Fire and blood.

“I am your blood. I beseech you uncle. Do not do this.” Naerys would not see the ruin of her mother's house due to her uncle’s ego. This scheme all hinged upon a delicate balance that could topple over at any moment. A set of what-ifs that could turn against him as quickly as they had turned for him. Rhaenyra may be a woman with bastards for heirs, but she was not without her allies. All it took would be a word or two in her favor and Ser Vaemond would be done for.

The Velaryon commanders' friends were few and far between. Ser Otto was loyal to what would put him closer to the crown. The shrewd hand of the king would abandon her uncle without so much as blinking the moment it no longer served him to be his ally. The queen had been kind to her, but her kindness only extended so far. Her interest lay with her children.If she thought that lending her hand would endanger their position or herself she too would turn her back on Ser Vaemond.

Daemon would not speak in support of Ser Vaemond. To do that would mean that he had abandoned Rhaenyra and her cause. He would not defend her Velaryon uncle unless Naerys were to somehow tie her fate to his. Her husband would stop her before it came to that. If Lord Corlys were to recover, there was no telling what he might do to his brother upon finding out that he had “usurped” his chosen heir. It was not too late to turn back, but time was running out.

“It is for house Velaryon that I do this niece.” Ser Vaemond made his way to the door, but his violet eyes softened. A rare moment for the proud man. Naerys was reminded of when she had been a girl. A distant memory of her letting her cry into his arms during her mother’s funeral played back in her head. “Nyke would dōrī deny bona ao issi aōha muñnykeā’s tala. Gaomagon daor ivestragī aōla forget bona.” I would never deny that you are your mother’s daughter. Do not let yourself forget that.

Ser Vaemond was lost to her as he left her chambers with a sad smile, clearing his throat before softly closing the heavy oak door. His fate lay with fickle Gods who had hardly been known to show mercy. Naerys crumbled to her knees as she let herself give in to her emotions.

The petition had been surprisingly short, but the ramifications were not so. Naerys was made to stand near Rhaenyra and her sons. The pale woman ambushed her on the way to the Great Hall. She reached out a hand out to grab hold of her forearm. “I need your strength aunt.”

Wearing a smile as her claws dug into her cousin's skin the crown princess dragged her across the Red Keep as if she were her lap dog. By the time they made it to where Daemon and Daenys stood on the opposite side of the queen and her three eldest children in the throne room Naerys felt her arm go numb from the pain.

Rhaenyra only let go of her grip when Daemon barked at her to release his niece-wife. Taking hold of her forearm to soothe the blotchy brown skin. “Look what you've done.” It looked worse than it felt, but Naerys was likely to be left with a dark bruise by morning. The crown princess apologized, stumbling over her words under her uncle’s dark stare. She was spared the worst of the Rogue Prince’s anger when Ser Otto called for the petitions to begin.

Ser Vaemond was called first to speak. Blood was his argument. Blood is what it all came down to. His blood was pure. The blood of the seas, the blood of old Valyria. He was his brother's rightful heir, not some bastard boy with no blood ties to House Velaryon.

Rhaenyra tried to cut the Velaryon knight off. Reminding the court that Luke was the son of Ser Laenor Velaryon. Lord Corlys' only son. He was a Velaryon just as much as his great uncle. His claim was the true one, but he was a Velaryon in name only. The queen reminded her that she would have her chance to speak. The crown princess quieted with a glower at Ser Vaemond who sported a self-assured smirk across his dark brow, but it was she who the Gods shined upon.

The king was announced not a moment after Rhaenyra began her defense of her son. The throne room went silent. The chamber's occupants and petitioners stood in shock as they gazed upon their ailing king. Even the crown princess looked surprised at her father's sudden appearance.

In the light of the throne room, Viserys looked worse than he had in his shrouded bed chambers. He wore a golden mask strapped to his frail wispy head in replace of the gauze that had covered the decaying side of his face. He stood low with the help of his cane hobbling over to the throne. A startled Ser Otto had no choice, but to hand judgment over to the king.

All attempts at assistance were shooed away until Viserys dropped his crown. Daemon swooped in to aid his brother up the steps leading to the Iron throne. Placing his crown upon his head when he finally sat upon that infernal chair. The brothers exchanged a look before her husband made his way back to where they stood. Naerys knew that all was lost for her uncle.

The king had more of his wit than he appeared. From where he stood Driftmarks succession was settled. Naerys glanced over to see Alicent’s face mirroring her own unease. The princess went to clutch at her daughter who returned her grip with a comforting squeeze.

The king called upon Rhaenys to speak. She was the only one who knew what her husband wanted. She would speak for the dying man. All eyes turned to her. It would be on her word that would deal the final blow.

She might have been swayed to support her good-brother had not Viserys arrived. The queen that never was would not have protested too much had Ser Vaemond offered her one of his eldest grandsons for Lady Baela. As long as her granddaughters, her blood, was not cheated of their inheritance she would not have cared who sat claimed the title of Lord of the Tides. It is what Naerys would do, but the king had arrived.

It came as no great surprise when Rhaenys reiterated her and her husband's support of Lucerys' claim. Calling the boy Ser Laenor’s true-born son. Reminding the court that her granddaughters were to wed Rhaenyra’s sons. Lord Corlys’ blood would appear to sit upon the Driftwood Throne twice over. The matter was once again settled with Viserys reaffirming his grandson’s position as heir of Driftmark upon his grandfather’s death.

Or at least it would have been settled had Naerys uncle been able to put aside his vanity. Ser Vaemond could have walked, but he would not give in so easily. He would not allow anyone, especially a king who championed his daughter at the expense of his own sons, to dictate the fate of House Velaryon. His sons and nephews echoed his protestations.

Naerys tried to go to her uncle, but Daemon grabbed her uninjured arm. Pulling her into her before bending down and whispering into her ear. “Bisa iksos daor ao vīlībagon byka mēre.” This is not your fight little one.

The king warned Ser Vaemond. Reminding him that Lucerys was the grandson of a king. His grandson. The Velaryon knight should have remembered his place as the second son of a second house of Valyria, but he still would not fold. The Velaryons may not have dragons, but they had the blood of old Valyria flowing through their veins as well. They had survived centuries of trials and were stronger for it. They would not be brought low if Vaemond Velaryon had anything to say about it.

“Her children are BASTARDS!” Shock once again rained across the throne room as Ser Vaemond roared the accusation at Rhaenyra and her sons. The color had drained from the crown prince's face as she scowled at the Velaryon knight. Naerys felt her heart quicken as she squirmed in Daemon's hold. “And she is a whore!” Time seemed to speed up and slow down. Everything happened all at once

The king called for Ser Vaemond’s tongue. His daughter for his head. It was Rhaenyra who got her wish. Calling upon Daemon to carry out the sentence. The Rogue Prince glared at her as his wife clutched onto the arms he had wrapped around her. He turned both her and Daenys into his chest so that they would not see the Kingsguard who struck off the Velaryon knight's head. A clean break. The great hall's occupants flinched away from the blood spray. Naerys felt her own blood rush through her ears as she turned back around to face what was left of her uncle and the court.

Ser Vaemond’s sons, Daeron and Daemion stood frozen in shock. Ser Otto and Alicent, who had done the same as Daemon in shielding Helaena, looked horrified at the sight of the severed head which had landed a few feet away from them. Aegon had turned his head to avoid staring at the headless knight's body. The warm pool of blood nearly touched his boots. His brother wore a startled expression on his pale face, but he was not able to turn his silver head away from what was once Vaemond’s head before it and the rest of his remains were gathered to be fed to Syrax.

The hall descended into chaos as protests from Naerys' Velaryon cousins were shouted out at the king and Rhaenyra. Ser Maltine and Ser Rhogar, the oldest of the lot, led the charge. Their uncle was a knight of house Velaryon. He deserved a proper trial not whatever this farce had been.

Ser Vaemond had been guilty of nothing except daring to speak the truth and claiming what was rightfully his. The princess’s sons were bastards. Everyone could see that with their dark hair and pug noses. There was not a drop of Velaryon blood in them. No dark Valyrian gentility or grace that those of house Velaryon possessed. They looked more Strong than their true-born lady sisters. Rhaenys clutched both her granddaughters closer to her then. Staring down her good nephews with a stone face. Daring them to speak another word on Baela or Rhaena.

There were no other words to be spoken. At least not by Naerys' cousins. The five Velaryon brothers were seized by members of the Kingsguard. One by one Viserys ordered their tongues to be cut out. No one uttered a word in their favor. Not even Daeron and Daemion who still stood paralyzed from their father's beheading. Their shock no doubt spared them from joining in their cousin's fates.

For the second time within the span of less the posturing of the overly ambitious could have ended there, but when one feels above even the Gods it is hard to stop them. Viserys was on the verge of dismissing the court when Rhaenyra chose to strike.

“My aunt should be questioned, your grace.” Rhaenyra moved over to position herself at the foot of her father's throne. Bending her head slightly in a mockery of fear as her voice trembled with what Naerys supposed was her best attempt at unshed tears. She should have anticipated that her cousin would not miss the opportunity to kill two birds with one stone.

“For what reason, niece.” Daemon spat the words at Rhaenyra. Viserys echoed his inquiry. Standing up as best as he could to gaze down at his brother and daughter. “What crime has my wife committed?” The crown princess did not flinch as her uncle moved his hand to Dark Sister as he walked toward her with a dark glimmer. One could hear a needle drop as the hall held its breath.

“For conspiring with the late Ser Vaemond to usurp my son's rightful place as heir to the Driftwood Throne.” Penitent was not a look that suited her cousin. It merely came off as posturing. Naerys held her tongue. She would not let pride be her downfall as it had her uncle. She would not let her words be used against her though she did not hide her disdain at the show her cousin was putting on. Not even the king appeared to believe his daughter's tale. Only a fool would believe her accusations. She would let her be her own destruction

“You were there when your daughter received that letter uncle.” Rhaenyra turned her lilac gaze towards her second-born half-brother briefly before turning her attention back to her uncle. Reaching out a hand to calm him. To make him see her reason, but Daemon was not moved.

“You saw how she reacted.” Daenys stirred at the mention of herself and the attacks on her mother's character, but Naerys stayed her daughter. Rhaenyra wanted a reaction from them. The younger princess would not allow her cousin to gain one up on her.

“A frightened niece concerned for her uncle’s safety, that is what you saw. I would expect you to know the sentiment well.” Daemon's grip tightened on his sword. Twisting it slightly within his grasp. “Ser Vaemond raised her since she was a girl. Have you forgotten that? It was not an attack on you and your sons and you know that Rhaenyra.”

“She has forgotten her place uncle!” Naerys did not have to wait long for her cousin to spiral. Her patience had one out in the face of Rhaenyra’s petulance. “Questioning the legitimacy of Luke means to question the legitimacy of his brother, the future king! To question my right to my father's throne. She knows the truth!”

The emotion was thick in Rhaenyra’s voice though Naerys doubted that it came from a place of true sorrow. “She stands to gain everything from this and yet you defend her!” Daemon. It always came back to her husband. Her cousin would never leave her alone as long as her husband remained outside of her hold, but her threats and schemes would only work if the man himself willingly went along with them.

“What do you stand to gain from this Rhaenyra?” Daemon sneered down at his niece. Luring over her as his violet eyes blazed with barely contained fury. Some members of the Kingsguard went to unsheathe their swords in defense of their princess, but Viserys ordered them to hold their ground. “Everything you have ever wanted I imagine. You truly do not see yourself. Be careful what you sow sweet niece.”

“Enough of this!” The king bellowed, standing up from his throne with as much celerity as he could manage in his poor condition. Weariness was evident on his cadaverous face. “You all will cease your bickering at once. The matter is dealt with. There will be no more talk of this. Naerys has committed no crimes except that of acting like a frightened child.”

Viserys turned his attention to his young niece and grandson. “Your daughter is still in need of a husband brother as is Joffrey in need of a wife Rhaenyra.” Daenys paled. Her mother had to tighten her grip on her so that she would not collapse under the weight that was yet to come. From the corner of her eye Naerys spied Aemond stiffening at his father's words. His pale eye landed on Rhaenyra’s son who shifted under his young uncle's glower.

The king seemed to miss the rage upon his second son as he managed a half smile showing off an assortment of rotting and missing teeth in his gummy mouth. “Have them wed after Lucerys and Rhaena.” With that, he dismissed the court. Inviting, or ordering, his family to a private dinner in his apartments so that they may finally put to rest the last of the bad blood that lay between them over good food, drink, and merriment.

Naerys had not realized she had held her breath until they had left the stifling walls of the Red Keep's great hall. The princess tried to catch the eye of her late uncle’s sons, but they remained in a daze as they headed for their fleet that would take them back to Driftmark’s shores with their now silent cousins. Rhaenys and her granddaughters trailed after them, no doubt sending them off before they would ready for tonight’s feast. Daemon ushered her and Daenys back to their chambers before they could be ambushed by either Aemond or Rhaenyra.

The first held his sister's hand as he turned his head towards their daughter's departing figure. His mother and grandsire trying to gain his attention. The latter stood with her sons flanked by two members of her father's Kingsguard. No doubt the king put them there as an act of caution. Her eyes darted with want between her uncle and irritation at her cousin.

“I will not marry him. I will not. I shall not.” Daenys repeated. Her violet eyes watered over as she turned her gaze toward where she had last seen her one-eyed prince. The willowy princess had to be held by both of her parents lest she bolt off. “Gaomagon daor mazverdagon issa dīnagon zirȳla kepa.” Do not make me marry him father. Daemon shushed their daughter. It was not a discussion they would have in front of prying eyes within the king's halls.

Naerys had wanted to leave the Red Keep. “I can not stay here. I wish to go home kepus. Now.” The princess did not care if she sounded like a child. She did not want to be here where she was picked apart or where her daughter was made to play along with petty ruses. Where Rhaenyra watched her as if she was the prey waiting to be slaughtered.

Her husband simply gave her a sad smile pulling her silver coils back from her brown face to place a kiss of placation on her forehead. Daemon promised that they would leave in the morning. It was better to indulge the dying man than to make an enemy of him on his deathbed.

They would sort out the issue of Daenys betrothal once they were within the safety of their own stone walls. After all, it was likely that his brother would die before she would be forced to marry Rhaenyra’s bastard. Naerys would have protested had she not seen the rage still in her uncle's eyes. He was not so easy to forgive her cousin's games at court.

Dinner that evening was a strange affair. The tension and disquietude from the petition proceedings had yet dissipated. The Stranger still clung to the foul air of the Red Keep. It was as if a pot had been left on the fire too long and its contents would boil over at any moment. Burning all those who happened to be within reach.

All were in attendance, except Rhaenys. Her granddaughters apologized for their grandmother’s absence. Claiming that the older princess was fatigued from the stress of the journey as well as the care of her husband.

Viserys called for his family to put aside their grievances for his sake. Pulling off his golden mask so that they may gaze upon his true form. Naerys did her best to hide her revulsion at the sight. She had to grab a hold of her husband who sat to her right to regain her composure. Her uncle had become a walking corpse. The king's right eye was lost. The cavernous tissue of his socket stood in its place. One could see straight clear into his corroded mouth from the flesh and muscle that had long since wasted away. Her uncle would not be among them for much longer.

A mummery of goodwill was exchanged between the factions of Viserys family. First between Alicent and Rhaenyra who toasted to one another and their respective houses. After a minor scuffle over a pass made at Lady Baela by Aegon, Jace toasted his uncle's good health. Recollecting their misspent youths with hope for friendship between them in the future. Alicent’s eldest grumbled in agreement.

Helaena toasted to her little cousin's future marriages.“It isn’t so bad, mostly. He just ignores you. Except sometimes when he’s drunk!” The only sincerity among the farcicality. A round of chortles passed between her grandsire and Daemon. The rest of the guests in attendance wore a mixture of confusion, embarrassment, and horror at the princess’s speech.

The mood lightened for a time. Though Naerys remained disillusioned with all that was around. She would not celebrate after all she had witnessed. Shoving the food pushed in front of her aside. Daemon’s eyes softened, but he did not say anything. Merely taking her hand in his to caress the back of it. She could not eat with a heavy half frightened heart.

The king called for music. Dancing commenced with Jace asking for Helaena’s hand which she eagerly accepted. Her husband was more interested in the wine in his cup than his wife who was led across the king's solar by their nephew. Joffrey looked as if he might follow his elder brother's lead with his newly betrothed, but when his eyes met his one-eyed uncle's glare he thought better of it.

All too soon Visery was taken ill by his exertion after the day’s events. Not a moment after he was carried off to bed a pig was placed in front of Aemond. What possessed him Naerys did not know, but Luke laughed at the sight of his uncle’s irritation. Old wounds had reopened. The merriment and masquerading stopped. The pot finally boiled over.

The one-eyed prince called for a final tribute. Raising his glass, an action that his elder brother readily copied, to toast to his nephew's health, before drawling on. “Come, let us drain our cups to these three Strong boys.” Daenys let out a little giggle though thankfully Naerys did not think that anyone heard apart from herself. The air became thick with apprehension. Jace dared him to repeat his words, but Aemond was not intimidated by the younger prince. “Do you not think yourself Strong?”

A brawl ensued between the Strong boys and their uncles. Jace threw the first punch, though Aemond did not so much as stumble from it. The dark-haired prince slid across the floor from his uncle’s shove in retaliation. Luke made to get up from his chair, but he was pushed down by Aegon into a serving platter.

Joffrey was to join his brothers, but Daenys held his hand to keep him from the fray. The self-willed Baela had to be held back by her own twin sister Rhaena. Guards had to restrain Jace and Luke as Alicent chastised her son for his lack of restraint, but that did not stop his taunts.

The children had to be sent to their rooms. Aemond would not leave for his own quarters until Daemon made his way over to him. Whispering something unintelligible in Valyrian to his nephew with a slight smirk on his pale brow. The younger prince backed down with a huff of annoyance. Leaving from his father's solar with a lurching gait.

Alicent looked, but Daemon wasted no time in grabbing hold of his wife’s hand. “We are leaving little one.” Her husband bent down to give her a small smile. Naerys felt lighter as he led her back to their own chambers. Imagining the smoky shores of her birth. They should have left Rhaenyra to defend herself, but it mattered not now.

“Uncle.” Rhaenyra called out running after them. One could never get rid of her. She was like a rat clinging to a scrap of wood after a shipwreck. “My father is ill. He needs you. He needs us.” With each word, she sounded more out of breath than the last. “ We can not leave now!”

“Do not worry niece.” Daemon had not slowed his stride as he brought them to a brisk pace. His long legs did most of the work for his wife whose short legs could not keep up. Rhaenyra had height on Naerys but she had grown soft in the belly after Joffrey's birth. She easily grew breathless at their speed. “We will be leaving, not you. You may stay here with Viserys if you like. I think it would do him some good. The Gods know what that Hightower woman has done to him.”

“This den of vipers.” They had finally come to a stop at their guest chamber doors. Rhaenyra wasted no time yanking Naerys' bruised arm to pull her away from their uncle. The younger princess let out a hiss of pain, but she did not notice nor care. Her lilac eyes were overtaken by desperation when she tried to turn Daemon to face her. Rhaenyra failed to take note of the dark look growing on his face or the tick of nerve on the unscathed side of his neck as she continued on.

“You would leave me here? You saw what happened today. They will never stop coming for me uncle. Not unless I give them an heir of unquestionable Valyrian blood. Not unless I have your—” Naerys froze when Daemon gave in to his baser nature. His eyes had blackened over as he reached out a large hand to grab hold of her cousin's neck. Pinning her to the oak door of their chamber. Rhaenyra’s hands flew up to protect herself, but it was too late.

“Yes, Rhaenyra I would leave you here in a den of vipers where you accused my wife of treason.” Rhaenyra clawed at their uncle's hand as his grip tightened. The princess's sputtering coughs bounced off the keeps stone walls. Her face was turning a light shade of blue from the lack of oxygen. “I would leave you here when you continue to make a mockery of yourself at my Naerys expense. At the expense of my marriage.”

Naerys thanked the Gods that there were no guards within earshot as Rhaenyra’s choking grew louder. Thanking the Mother that her husband did not have Dark Sister with him either. She shuddered at the thought of what he might have done with it. “Heavy lies the head that wears the crown Rhaenyra. One could so easily topple under all that weight.” The younger princess remained stock still at her uncle's actions until she realized what he still might be capable of even without his sword.

“Stop.” Naerys cried out. The emotions of the day crashed around her as her pleads began in earnest. “Please kepus, stop. Please. Please stop. Daemon stop!” Rhaenyra may have a childish fixation on her husband, but she did not deserve to be harmed for it. Not at the hands of their uncle who had been in part responsible for her delusions, but she was not so instant either.

“Find someone else to give you your heir's niece.” The Rogue Prince finally released her at the sound of his name on his wife’s lips. His eyes returned back to their violet shade. As he took hold of Naerys hand Rhaenyra fell to the stone floor in a coughing heap. Her throat likely burned as she tried to regain control of her breathing. A red Daemon-shaped handprint graced her pale neck. Though it looked painful, the bruise would likely be no worse than the one she had inflicted upon her cousin-aunt before Ser Vaemond’s fateful petition.

“Do you not think I have not tried?” Rhaenyra crooked out. The whites of her eyes were as red as her neck. Tears bumbled at the surface as she let out a snort. The crown princess turned her bloodshot eyes towards the younger princess with venom, but only briefly before she landed her cloudy gaze on her cousin's husband.

“Even with Harwin. I couldn’t see any man but you. Ao lua īlva hen īlva biarves kepus.” You keep us from our happiness uncle. What pity she had for Rhaenyra disappeared. Naerys let her husband tug her inside with him before shutting the door to their chambers. Leaving her cousin to her misery.

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[bohemian-nights]

Arlī(Anew)-Chapter 6

Word Count: ~10,442

Rating: 18+

Warnings⚠️: Uncle/niece incest; minor smut; blood

Description: “I fear I will go mad if I stay here.” Naerys needed to be away from Dragonstone for a little while. Away from all that she herself had lost.

AN: This story takes place from episode 5 onward. I’ve changed things up a bit but I’ve kept the timeline intact.

Chapter 1, Chapter 2, Chapter 3, Chapter 4, Chapter 5, Chapter 7, Chapter 8, Chapter 9

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120 AC- Driftmark

Death is a strange thing. It’s as natural as living even more so, but one never thinks of it that way. Lurking around every corner. It is the final act of one’s life. An inescapable fate. Sometimes a grand finale. Other times a quiet whimper. It often visits in pairs. Prolonging the suffering of the loved ones left behind. Such was the case in 120 AC.

Death first visited the unlucky halls of Harrenhall. A fire swept through the cursed castle taking Ser Harwin Strong and his father Lord Lyonel Strong to their graves. Naerys had never cared much more either. Ser Harwin, though an admirable father to her cousin's children, and his bastards alike, was a poor husband.

There could be no question that Ser Harwin was undeserving of her cousin. He had a lady of house Velaryon for a wife, a young graceful Valyrian bride, and yet that was not enough for him. He instead spent too much of his time in the company of another. Fathering children with said other when his priorities should have lied closer to home.

Naerys did not know the elder Strong well. Lord Strong was a blank sheet of parchment as far as the princess could tell. He did not have the presence and guile of the previous hand, now reinstalled hand, Ser Otto Hightower. The Strong’s were a noble house yet they lacked the distinction of other riverlands houses like the Blackwood’s or the Bracken’s. They had in truth only held their seat for a generation. The Strongs had thus far failed to make their mark upon Harrenhal and Westeros at large.

Then there was Laena. Sweet Laena. A beautiful, vivacious Velaryon woman. A trueborn daughter of Lord Corlys Velaryon and Princess Rhaenys Targaryen. The blood of the dragon ran thick through her veins as much as the blood of the seas. A noble lady who might have been queen one day had it not been for their great grandsires stubbornness.

While Naerys had not cared much for the Strongs she did mourn her cousin's death. Laena was the closest thing to a sister that the princess had. She had been the one that Naerys went to when she could not or did not dare to ask her aunt for womanly advice. She had taught her cousin how to claim Silverwing as she had claimed Vhagar. Now the brown silver-haired woman was gone along with a son who never drew breath, but the Stranger was far from finished with adding to his collection.

Death was to visit twice more, but it was Aenys birth and immediate departure that had been the final blow to Naerys. Aenys funeral was a quiet affair. Ser Vaemond had been made to leave Dragonstone that night. Daemon blamed the Valyrian knight for his son's death. Naerys was not due for another week. If she had not been made to go into early labor, if she had not heard the distressing news perhaps their son might have lived.

The princess had to be carried down to the beach by her husband where their son’s cloth-wrapped body had been placed. She was the one who gave the command to light the pyre. She insisted upon it. Her small cry of “dracarys” was carried by the wind into Silverwings ears. Naerys had gone mute for nearly a week after.

By the fourth day of her silence, she refused to eat. Pushing trays of food away whenever one of her maids arrived. They tried tempting her with her favorite treats, but Naerys simply pulled herself further under her covers. This went on for two more days before a weary Daemon who had seated himself on their bed and curled himself around her. “Daenys iksos asking syt zȳhon muñnykeā byka mēre.” Daenys is asking for her mother little one.

Their daughter had been barred from entering their chamber. Naerys could not face the girl. She had left her husband to deal with her alone. Why should she burden the girl when she had failed as a mother? Failed to deliver a healthy son into the world. Who knew what further damage she might cause?

But her daughter cared not. She wanted her mother. Naerys was Daenys mother before she had been Aenys and she would be there long after the babe had gone. She was a living breathing girl. Did she not matter? All she asked for was her mother's company.

It was not fair of Naerys to deprive her living child of her mother. Daenys was used to the loss of her mother's babes, but she would not grow used to her mother's absence. Naerys had to return to the land of the living. The girl was sent for, along with some broth and bread with honey to break her fast.

Daenys sat with her mother as she ate. Climbing into her parent's bed and fixing herself to Naerys side as she prattled on about a toy Helana had sent as well as the bow and arrow set her father had gifted her. The young princess had found the latter gift to be much more agreeable than her long-since discarded training sword.

It was advised by Maester Orlys that attending Laena’s funeral on Driftmark might put a strain on Naerys' fragile condition. Daemon had agreed with the kindly older man. The stress of the journey alone could disrupt her slow recovery. Naerys was a long way from being whole. Her hunger strike had not helped matters. She was just now regaining her strength. Only being able to stand for short periods of time before exhausting herself and having to sit back down.

It would in truth take months before the princess was back to her old self. Naerys needed proper rest. Rest that could be found within Dragonstone’s walls. There was no need to stress herself, but Naerys remained firm on wanting to leave for Driftmark much to her uncle's dismay.

“Ziry istan issa dubāzma kepus.” She was my cousin uncle. It was late in the evening as Naerys and Daenys had curled up in Daemon's lap, The family was seated by the chamber’s fire. The little girl was dozing off when her mother softly spoke the words to her father.

Laena would do the same for her. Nothing would have stopped her from seeing off Naerys. Why should she not pay her the same? Her son was gone. There was nothing left to do, but mourn his loss. That could be done on Driftmark as well as Dragonstone. She could stand idly by with all that had happened. Naerys owed her cousin her dues.

“Nyke zūgagon nyke jāhor jikagon vēdros lo nyke umbagon rȳbagon.” I fear I will go mad if I stay here. Naerys needed to be away from Dragonstone for a little while. Away from all that she herself had lost. Daemon folded to his wife’s request at her declaration. Maester Orlys was to journey with them and they were to leave if Naerys became overwhelmed, but they would go to Driftmark for Laena’s funeral.

Laena’s funeral was held a fortnight after her death. Enough time for family and friends to journey to Driftmark from Dragonstone and Kings Landing. Driftmark had always been a place of levity and sanctuary for Naerys. Her mother had fled to the stony shores of her childhood when she was just shy of her second name day. Her father had been dead not even a week before her mother fled for her brother’s keep.

“There are spies everywhere brother.” That is what her uncle had told Naerys when she had asked him why she had left with such urgency. Even Ser Vaemond did not entirely believe his little sister. He thought that the late Shaera Velaryon was overly paranoid. She had always been so, but it had worsened with age. Seeing danger when there had been none. “Naerys is not safe here.”

Her mother had gone to Jahaerys with her worries, but the old king dismissed her with a flick of his frail wrist. “She is no longer the heir. There is nothing to fear my lady. Naerys is in no danger from those at my court. There is little that they can accomplish by harming a babe girl.” He was old and cared little for the politics of the realm anymore aside from who would rule over the seven kingdoms after him. Now that line of succession was clear he did not see the threat to his great-granddaughter.

In her desperation, Shaera had gone to her late husband's half-brothers. Though they had never been close to their elder brother, Naerys was their blood. Surely they would care for their little niece's safety? Viserys merely echoed his grandsire's words, but it was Daemon to her surprise who did not make light of her fears. He too believed that his grandfather’s court was full of traitors and simpering sycophants.

The Velaryon lady had thought she had found a champion for her daughter until the Targaryen prince added, “It is a pity that my grandmother saw fit to marry me to my bronze bitch. If she had waited some years more I might have had your daughter to call my little bride. Naerys is such a sweet little thing. I would have enjoyed plucking her flower.”

Daemon claimed it was a joke when he recollected the story to his wife a year after their own daughter's birth, but he professed it while his cock was buried inside his niece's warmth. Hovering over her as he thrust in and out of her sopping heat with a dark look Naerys had grown to adore.

The rogue prince reached a hand down between their love-soaked bodies. Naerys grip tightened as her husband made slow circles around her clit to bring his niece to her peak. “I suppose I have my baby bride now.” She had decided that there had been some merit in her mother’s apprehension.

Naerys' first memories were at her uncle's castle, but the white stone walls of her youth were not the ones she remembered when they had arrived at High Tide. The light and splendor had all but vanished. The castle was as quiet as the grave itself though it was bursting at the seams from the number of guests that had invaded its hall. One of her cousins and his lady wife were the ones to greet them. Making apologies for their lord uncle and his princess wife’s absence.

Ser Laenor had locked himself within his chambers. Not even Rhaenyra nor their sons were allowed in. His parents were trying to coax the man out, but with little success. The heads of house Velaryon and their heir were not seen until the next day at their daughter's funeral.

Ser Vaemond was given the honor of delivering Laena’s eulogy. Naerys did not know why her aunt and uncle chose him for this task. Any one of her cousins or uncles would have done. Anyone who would not make the loss of their daughter about himself. Never one to disappoint, the Velaryon knight did not miss an opportunity to take center stage.

Naerys uncle wasted no time in praising the purity of Laena’s Velaryon blood. The dark man did not take his violet eyes off of Rhaenyra and her black-haired sons as he said so. The Targaryen woman shifted uncomfortably, pulling her boys closer to her. Laenor, her husband, stood apart from his wife and “sons.” Naerys would have pitied her had she not earlier looked at her empty belly with a smirk on the way down to the ragged shoreline.

Daemon let out a laugh at Ser Vaemond’s poorly disguised chastisements of the crown princess. The Rogue Prince paid no mind to the looks of displeasure that his inappropriate reaction received. Instead, he craned his neck down to whisper in his wife’s ear. “Perhaps with her strong knight gone she might give the realm proper heirs.”

Naerys could not join her husband in his satisfaction for it was what worried her the most. Rhaenyra’s lilac gaze locked onto their uncle the moment she had seen him. She had only taken her eyes off their uncle when the Velaryon knight began his derision of her sons. You promised. Her cousin's pleas from all those moons ago rattled around in her head. It had never left her. They were both in need of heirs now. Did Rhaenyra intend on collecting the debt she felt she was owed?

Thankfully Daemon’s smirk dropped when he noticed his niece-wife’s growing distress. Her husband's eyes softened as he placed a kiss on her head. “Hae ao emagon teptan issa ñuhon.” As you have given me mine. Daemon pointed his gaze down to the small girl between them who held her father’s hand. Daenys seemed to be more interested in her cousins who stood by their Hightower mother than her great uncle’s speech.

Ser Vaemond was the first to make his way over to where Naerys and her family stood once Laena’s coffin was lowered into the sea. He brought his son, Daeron, and his eldest grandson with him. Daemon’s son was a plump boy of nine who had inherited his mother’s grace, a doltish woman from a minor riverlands house.

The Velaryon knight took care to introduce Daenys to her Velaryon cousin. The boy let out a clumsy bow. Referring to their daughter as cousin Daenys with a bashful stutter. It was an amusing sight to see to all but his grandfather. Ser Vaemond wasted no time in correcting his grandson's lack of manners. “She is a princess and is to be Lady of Dragonstone as well.”

Naerys bristled at her uncle’s words. Perhaps Ser Vaemond had not thought anything of it. It was the truth of the matter, but he could not possibly think that his niece nor his good nephew were over the death of their child.

Naerys would excuse the blunder. It was a simple enough mistake, but her husband would not take so kindly to Vaemond’s prideful arrogance which led to his forgetfulness. They were all grieving and the first thing that he thought of was what he could gain from it.

“I do wonder if your grandson is as insipid as you Ser Vaemond?” It was spoken with a sneer as Daemon stared down the Velaryon knight. Vaemond’s self-assured smile had finally fallen. His son looked as if someone had struck him across the face before he began to make apologies for his father's gaffe. Daeron regained his composure enough to usher his son and fuming father away from the rogue prince's ire.

Once they were gone from their sight Daenys began to tug on her sleeve fathers. “Will I have to marry him?” A little frown of distaste graced her honey face. The last remnants of tension in the air dissipated as her parents laughed at her little worries. Their daughter was an observant girl. She knew of her duties, but she was still a girl. She had nothing to fear. Daemon would never marry her off to just any boy. Her father affectionately petted the top of her silver curls, reassuring her that she would not have to marry the halfwit.

Naerys bit her tongue. The boy was young, but he came from good stock. His father was dull true enough, but he was a good man. His grandsire Ser Vaemond, though proud, was a good husband and father to his lot. She would have to marry. Why not marry Daenys into her grandmother's house? They were of ancient and pure Valyrian blood after all their daughter could do worse.

“He’d bore her in a week. He’s even more useless than his grandfather.” Naerys' husband did not miss the look his wife had tried to conceal. They both knew that proposals had been made for Daenys hand. Dragonstone and the dragons that it posed were a prized offer. As was the little princess in her own right, for she was every inch a Targaryen beauty in the making. However, decisions on their daughter's future could wait for now.

From the corner of her eye, Naerys spotted the king looking their way. The man looked worse for wear, but he gave them a polite smile. Daemon had noticed too, but the man was avoiding his brother's eye line, but that would not do. “Your brother wants to talk to you.”

Daemon hesitated. He would not leave his niece's side. Not while she tired so easily, but Naerys simply smiled and reached up to place a kiss upon his pale cheek. “Go. I have your little shadow with me to guard me.” Daemon looked down at their daughter who gave her father a salute. Satisfied with her response and his wife’s insistence the man left telling Daenys to “Watch your mother, little dragon.”

It was not long before Daenys turned her violet eyes back toward where Alicent’s sons stood crowding around their sister. Her daughter was ever the dutiful princess, but she was still a child. She deserved a moment of respite. Kissing her daughter on the top of her head she sent her to her cousins. Naerys started to make her way over to comfort Rhaenys and her granddaughters, but she felt a hand reach out grasping her arm. Spinning her around she came to face Rhaenyra’s cool inspection.

“You are brave to come here Naerys.” If one did not know any better one would think that Rhaenyra was almost giddy. She did not look as though she were a woman in mourning. All traces of penitence from Ser Vaemond’s reproach were gone. “I confess, if I was in your position I would not be able to bear it.”

Rhaenyra turned her gaze toward where Daemon stood with her father. “Our poor uncle suffers so, as I am sure your daughter does as well.” Rhaenyra took her hand. “Do not worry aunt, all will be well soon enough.” Naerys never got the chance to reply as Rhaenyra left making her way over to Daemon. To give him comfort in his grief. Daemon looked relieved to see her.

It dawned on Naerys then. Rhaenyra could not be stopped. Not by her cousin at least. She had everything yet she wanted more. She had three healthy sons. A husband who though did not love her in the way that a man ought to love his wife cared for her and her children.

The crown princess had a lover who had been willing to risk everything for her consequences be damned. She would one day inherit the Iron Throne. It all meant nothing. Not when the one thing the one man Rhaenyra wanted remained out of reach. All that stopped her was their uncle's insistence that he had no need for another besides his wife.

What would happen if Daemon were to change his mind? He had always wanted Rhaenyra. It was who he had truly desired, but he settled for another Targaryen niece. He claimed otherwise, but Naerys knew. She knew.

Ser Laenor would hardly put up a fight. He had not minded when his wife had taken Ser Harwin for a lover. Their marriage was not a traditional one. No Rhaenyra and her bastards would be allowed to journey back to Dragonstone with them. Both needed heirs. Proper heirs. Daenys was a girl. She was not a proper heir by virtue of her sex. No amount of lessons her father could give her would change that. She had been born with the wrong parts.

What man would not want to see his son rule after him? What man would not want his own seed on the Iron Throne? Of course, Rhaenyra was still married, but that impediment could be resolved. An annulment perhaps?

It was not uncommon for a Targaryen to take on a second bride. Maegor The Cruel had six; his father before him had two. Who would stop them? The king was old and weak; he would not argue against the arrangement either as long as it did not happen in his presence and once the deed was done he would not go against the union. The faith would not dare go against the king's word. They would not risk another uprising.

Daemon would never cast Naerys aside true enough. Her uncle did care for her. He may not love her as he did Rhaenyra, but some part of him did love her. He would be a husband to her as he would be with Rhaenyra. He would visit both of their beds and Naerys would be made to watch with a smile on her face as the crown princess bared him son after son.

People would whisper and gossip of course. Around court, around Dragonstone, just as they had during the last set of her failures, but Naerys would have to get used to it. The princess would be made to endure Rhaenyra as Laena had. The offer of a son and true happiness would be too tempting to pass.

But Naerys was not Laena. She could not endure. She lacked her sweet patience and grace in the face of adversity. She would not be made a pariah at court, in her own home on Dragonstone. To be mocked and pitied as though she were some poor creature. She would not allow it. She would never be queen, but she was a dragon just the same as the rest. Dragons do not share. She had given her husband an heir. There was no need for the future queen in her uncle’s bed.

Naerys was still reeling from being bombarded by Rhaenyra when Ser Otto approached her. The hand of the king started out by making his apologies for Aenys loss. His pale blue eyes shone with solace. If Naerys did not know any better she would have thought it had been made in earnest. She did not want to think the worst of the man. His sympathy could be sincere. The man had not lost children, but he had lost a wife. By all accounts, he loved her as much as a man like himself could.

“Daenys is very fond of her cousin. As her cousins are fond of her.” The hand had turned his gaze toward where her daughter and his grandchildren were. Daenys held a spider in her little hands as she talked with her cousins. A fact that seemed to please the second eldest prince as he sported a small grin on his face. The little princess had gotten over her fear of Helaena’s “friends.” Or at least the girl was willing to bare them to be in the company of her cousins.

“She has her mother’s beauty. She would have made Aegon a good wife.” Naerys shuddered at the thought. The boy was not unkind to Daenys, but her mother had seen the way the prince treated those who he thought less of. He barely spared his own sister and soon-to-be bride common decency.

Naerys could not help but feel deep sadness for Helaena. The girl was a gentle soul. She did not deserve to be married to such a careless boy who had inherited the Targaryen’s gluttonous and none of their glory. If he ever managed to be crowned king it would be in name only. “She would do well at court.” Naerys snapped her head back to look at the presumptuous man.

She had been too hasty in her judgment of Ser Otto. A leopard did not change its spots so easily. The princess would not make that mistake again. She would take a page out of her husband’s book. She was far too tired to deal with niceties. “If you want something Ser, do speak plainly.” He was wasting both of their time otherwise.

“If you are ever in need of assistance, princess.” The man bent down so that they were more on eye level. “My door is always open as is the queen’s.” With a half smile, he picked up her brown hand to kiss the back of it. It was intended as a version of a fatherly kiss. The same kind Ser Vaemond and Lord Corlys bestowed upon her when she was a little girl when they asked her to dance during feasts. “Both you and the little princess are always welcomed at court.”

Ser Otto turned his focus toward the far end of the balcony. Waiting for Naerys to follow his eye line. Daemon and Rhaenyra had vanished from sight. Not one trace of them could be found and the sun was setting.

Of course, Daemon could have gone back to their chambers, and Rhaenyra could have gone off somewhere on her own, but he looked so happy. He had not looked so in weeks. The better part of a year even. Her husband had not looked so cheerful since before she had told him of her Aenys pregnancy and Rhaenyra glowed under their uncle's adornment.

“How exactly would you help me Ser?” Naerys pulled her hand out from the cold man’s grip. She did not wait for the Hightower knight to respond. She would not hear of treasonous talk. She would not be poisoned by it. Dark commands led to dark deeds and those deeds would come with a price. A price that would soak through and last a lifetime.

Even if her life was to take a turn she would not damn herself to the seven hells to avoid it. “If you will excuse me, it is past Daenys’ nap time.” She had enough of today’s procession of woe. Grabbing her daughter, who was reluctant to leave her cousins, but did not protest when she saw the worry on her mother's face. The two hand in hand made way for the solitude of High Tide’s halls.

Naerys was wide awake when Daemon arrived back to their chambers. He had not come alone. Daenys had been put to be long since as she sat by their chambers lit fire in her nightgown. She had been staring into the flames for hours now losing track of time. She would have gone to be herself but her mind was running in circles playing everything back to her that had occurred in the past weeks.

“We had an agreement uncle.” Rhaenyra’s shrill voice could be heard coming through from the hall. Naerys could just make out their shadows under the door in the low light. Corlys and Rhaenys had been kind enough to offer them chambers that were far enough from the rest of the castle's guests otherwise her cousin would have woken nearby inhabitants

“I never promised you anything Rhaenyra.” Daemon hissed at his niece. He probably expected both his daughter and wife to be asleep, but caution never hurt. He would not be so lucky tonight. Naerys would not let slink in and act as if his absence had not been noted.

“What agreement?” Naerys ripped the door open to face her husband and her cousin’s shocked faces. The princess held her head up high. Her eyes were bloodshot and there were tear tracks on her cheeks, but she would not cower. She would not bother hiding herself away like a frightened child. She was a woman grown now. A mother and a wife. Daemon’s wife. She wanted answers. She deserved them.

“Sweetling you should be in bed.” Daemon came to her abandoning Rhaenyra in the hall leaving the door to their chambers open. He made a move to reach out for her, but Naerys backed away from his touch. A look of hurt flashed in his violet eyes, but his wife was not swayed. He had been gone too long to greet her in such a way. To send her to bed as if she were their daughter who had stayed up past her bedtime.

“What agreement husband?” Naerys held firm as she looked up at her husband. From the corner of her eye, she noticed Rhaenyra rushing into their solar closet, closing the oak doors leading into the hall. Her cousin was a neat woman, but the only word that could best describe the princess at the moment was frazzled.

“Sweet cousin, Naerys, Daemon needs heirs.” Rhaenyra twisted her thin mouth in a false smile. She basked in her pride despite her disheveled appearance. Treating as if she were a skittish doe that might run off at any moment. As if she had any concern for her at all. If she did she would not be here.

“There is no point lying uncle. Not anymore.” Rhaenyra turned to their uncle, placing a hand on his arm. Naerys wanted to claw the smug look off her cousin's face, but she wrapped her arms around herself and planted her feet on the stone floor. “My baby cousin will understand.”

“I have an heir Rhaenyra.” It was said with gritted teeth as he shook off his niece’s hand. Daemon tried once more to come to his wife, but the girl backed away holding a hand up to stay him. He listened to her choosing to run a hand through his shoulder-length white hair in frustration instead. “I have no need for more. Unlike your father, I do not let my dreams cloud my judgment. My flesh and blood will inherit Dragonstone after me and her children after her.”

“What agreement?” He still had not answered her. Breathing was becoming harder with each minute that passed. Naerys felt her heart speed up. Yet everything was in slow motion. She could barely hear anything, but the blood rushed in her ears. Trying to push her dread down. She steadied herself with a breath. She wanted the words said out loud. She wanted a real answer. Not more half-truths.

“A son or two. That is all that I ask for dear sister.” How Rhaenyra maintained her conceit was a mystery to her cousin. She was a woman that had never been told no. That had never been made to bend to others' will. “It is what our kepus has promised. There need not be a marriage.” Rhaenyra’s hand flew to her belly. A victorious smile. As if to challenge her. “It is you who holds him back.” Rhaenyra could give him new blood.

“Did you sleep with her?” Naerys could not look at her husband as she asked about her greatest fear. When they first married she had always suspected that he took Rhaenyra to his bed, but that was then. That was in the past. The present is a different story. They have a life together now. It might be broken and torn into small pieces, but it was a life. “All those times she came to our home—tonight—”

“I haven't been in anyone's bed except yours you hellcat.” It was meant to be a tease. To bring much-needed levity into the room, but he had picked the wrong moment for his japes. His eyes softened when he realized his mistake when he saw his wife’s misty eyes. “Not since I first had you little one.”

Taking her face in his hands he tried to kiss her, but Naerys refused. Turning her cheek so that the kiss landed there rather than its intended target. Rhaenyra was still in the room leering at them and Daemon had not asked her to leave. A wall stood between them and he still would not break it down.

“Did you promise her something?” It was none of her business. Promises were broken every day, but she had to know. She wanted to know. Needed to know. Rhaenyra had been haunting the back of her mind for years. Her uncle's first plaything. Naerys was her replacement. A poor substitute who could not even give him sons. Only a lone little girl to show for. She wanted to be his everything to give him everything, but she had failed and her cousin was all too willing to take up her rightful place beside their uncle.

“You are being childish Naerys.” Her husband scoffed at her. A dark look came over him. Daemon was all too used to getting his way with his niece-wife. Naerys always gave in to him and when she did not he was the one who acted as if she had injured him.

Naerys slapped him then. It had not been hard enough to do any damage. Her husband had barely moved. He stood there and laughed. Lightness returned to his eyes. He actually laughed at her torment. The princess felt her face heating up. She had not expected the reaction. She wanted his fire not to be treated as a joke.

“You married a child!” Naerys felt her fury growing. She would not be humiliated. She had been more humiliated today than many wives were in a lifetime. Everyone knew of her shame. Daemon knew what everyone thought of his relationship with his oldest niece and yet did little to actually reassure his wife. She would not let him talk over her.

“You married me because I was young and naive and you did not think that I knew better. You married me because I would soothe your broken ego. You married me because I was the niece that you were allowed to have.” She had never been wanted and she resented him for toying with her.

“Do you want to know what he did? He begged me to live.” Naerys spun around to face her cousin. Letting her anger guide her as she crowded Rhaenyra. She was enjoying her agitation far too much, but the younger princess did not care if she played the part of the desperate wife. Daemon had his choice, but he had chosen her. She wanted her cousin to know that even if their uncle never told her so. She wanted to haunt Rhaenyra as she had haunted her.

“The maesters told him he had to choose and he begged me to live. He paid for my life with our son‘s.” She hated her husband in part for it, but what was done was done. The past was dead to them. She would not give up her future without a fight. “He can not live without me. I am his wife. I am the mother of his child. Whatever agreement you had is gone, niece.” Rhaenyra’s vanity had faded and been replaced by ire.

“Daemon-” The Rogue Prince held up a hand to Rhaenyra. Silencing the red-faced woman. He did not turn back to face her. Instead, he kept his violet eyes trained on his wife. Bringing her into him pressing his forehead to his wife’s. He brought his hands up to face drawing circles into her temple with the rough pads of his thumb.

“Rhaenyra tell my wife what you said when you prostrated yourself at my door all those moons ago.” He pulled away slightly to hover over her. Naerys wanted to turn her head away, but she could not. Her uncle looked as if he was some avenging old God of Valyria as he gave out a breathless chortle. He had hypnotized her.

“Ao sagon obsessed rūsīr aōha riñnykeā ābrazȳrys kepus. Nyke pendagon skorkydoso bōsa ao kostagon nykeōragon naejot fuck zȳhon gō ao mazverdagon ēdrugī hen zȳhon. Gaomagon ao remember bona Rhaenyra?” You're obsessed with your child bride uncle. I wonder how long you can stand to fuck her before you grow tired of her. Do you remember that Rhaenyra? Daemon did not receive an answer. He had not been truly looking for one. He continued on without a need for one.

“Gaomagon ao remember skoros nyke ivestretan ao? Ziry iksos nykeā pretty byka mirre. Nyke don’t pendagon nyke shall mirre tire hen zȳhon. Nyke’ve found se fountain hen youth rȳ lenton rȳ zȳhon thighs.” Do you remember what I told you? She is a pretty little thing. I don’t think I shall ever tire of her. I’ve found the fountain of youth at home between her thighs. Naerys clamped up briefly when she felt his hand travel between said thighs, but the trance never ceased. Her blood was stoked by its blaze.

Daemon never looked away from his niece-wife as he dipped a finger into her cunt. Gathering enough wetness to bring to her clit. Toying with the little button. His other hand reached up to tug down her gown with one swift motion. Revealing her dark full breasts to the chamber's dim light.

“Sweet little thing. So wet and pliant for me. My baby whore. To do with as I please. I’d share her with you. I offered you that, but you wouldn’t appreciate it wouldn’t you? And I’ve never been fond of sharing my toys.” Naerys was too trapped by her warring emotions clouded by lust to care. She gave into the hazy blanket of salacity her husband offered her.

The man did not pull away. “Issa pretty byka ābrazȳrys. Ziry iksos headstrong isse zȳhon own ñuhoso se jealous gīda though ziry emagon daor drīve naejot sagon. Ivestragī jikagon syt issa dōna riña.” My pretty little wife. She is headstrong in her own way and jealous even though she has no reason to be. Let go for me sweet girl. Daemon sped up his movements. His wife meant to put a stop to his ministrations then.

It was bad enough that he had touched her while in the presence of another. She would not have another see their most intimate moments, but her opposition died on her tongue. Naerys had to clutch onto the man in front of her as she felt herself topple into her peak. “Issa gūrotrir.” My prize.

“Out now.” Rhaenyra looked as if she was in a half-daze. Her pale face was riddled with unabashed disgust. She did not move to exit. “I mean it Rhaenyra.” Daemon’s stern voice tried to break her from her daze, but an urgent knocking sounded at their door. Naerys' husband removed his fingers from her overspent hole placing a light kiss on her temple. Helping to pull the straps up to her nightgown so that she was in a decent enough state of dress.

Rhaenyra had been closest to their chamber's entry, but she remained in a state of crisis. Daemon was the one to open the heavy oak doors. Barking down at the poor soul who was unlucky to be given the task of rousing the Rogue Prince and his wife.

A frightened boy of no more than twelve name days peered up at her husband. Her uncle’s servant stumbled over half his words. “Beg your pardon, your highnesses.” He turned to acknowledge Rhaenyra with a bow.

The boy did not blink at her presence in their chamber. Naerys did not want to think about what went on in her uncle’s halls for him not to do so, “The little princess and princes have been hurt.” Naerys felt her heart stop beating. All the blood left from her body to some indescribable place of dread.

She sensed her arm being grabbed by her husband. He ushered her down toward her uncle's Great Hall. His heavy strides did the work for them both. The princess made note that Daemon had somehow managed to grab his sword as well. Naerys was too in her head to care what he might do with it.

High Tide had descended into chaos. Servants scrambled past them rushing to the source of the mayhem. The shouting grew in volume with each step. Rhaenyra was the last one out of their chambers but she flew past them in search of her sons.

Relief flooded through the princess at the sight of her daughter. Daenys leaned on Helaena who was trying to calm down the wailing child. Upon seeing her parents the young princess ran to her father. The man wasted no time scooping up the girl. Naerys inspected her daughter as she sobbed into her husband’s chest. She sported a bump on her forehead and a small cut on her honey cheek, but she remained otherwise uninjured. She was unlikely to bare any scars from what had unfolded.

Daemon bounced the girl in his arms as he ordered Maester Orlys to be brought down from his chambers. The older man could sleep through a storm. He had more than likely not even heard the commotion going through the castle. The prince placed a kiss atop his daughter’s silver curls as he drew circles into her back. Daenys seemed to calm down once she was in her father's arms. Allowing her parents to comfort her. Daemon’s fury had abated with their daughter's change in mood until he noticed a certain bandaged boy bound to his mother's side who would not meet his uncle’s eyes.

Aemond stood at the heart of bedlam. From the impassioned appeals to the king exchanged between the queen and the crown princess, Naerys gathered that the boy had managed to claim her cousin's dragon. Daenys had snuck out with her cousin when he had taken Vhagar while her mother had been consumed with her dark thoughts.

Baela and Rhaena had seen Aemond riding upon their mother's dragon and altered their bastard half-brothers of it. The Strong girl's mother was not yet cold in her grave and the boy had dared to claim her mount. They had already lost their father and now they had to suffer the loss of their mother and all that she had held dear.

It was a “slight” that they did not let go unpunished judging by the state of their bruised and bloody small faces as well as Aemond’s left eye. Naerys understood their anger, but the fighting had gotten out of hand.

Daemon deposited their daughter into his niece-wife’s arms. Kissing both their heads before turning to face his nephew. His wife was reminded of the Valyrian sword in his possession when the prince unsheathed Dark Sister. Naerys knew it would be impossible to stop him though she did protest. Aemond was a boy. He was hardly vicious enough to attack his little cousin.

“Is this your handiwork boy?” The king made no move to stop his brother. His pallid complexion took over by exasperation at being made to preside over this spat. His younger brother had enough fire for the both of them. He need not make a show of things.

Aemond looked terrified as his uncle closed in on him pointing his sword at him. Alicent pushed her son behind her as her sworn shield unsheathed his own blade in the prince's defense. Naerys wondered if Daemon would take his other eye. She wondered what the king might do as he ordered both Ser Criston and his brother to drop their swords.

“I fell.” Daenys' little voice cried. Her wailing had started once more. She buried herself into her mother's neck at her confession. Naerys did her best to try to console the young princess but she rambled on between sobs. “Cousin Aemond told me to go and I fell. He did not push me.”

“Daemon.” Her husband had not heard their daughter's muffled pleads. It was doubtful the rest of the hall had heard her. Her uncle snapped his pale neck towards them. Her uncle saw red, but his fire could be extinguished when he learned of the truth. He was a man capable of reason despite his hot-blood nature. “She fell. Your nephew did not do this.”

Naerys' husband stormed away from Alicent and her son. He would not believe their daughter's declarations until he saw for him. Looking into a matching set of violet eyes he took their daughter back from his wife’s hand. Shushing her as she babbled out apologies. “I fell kepa. I am sorry.” It was an accident. Daemon saw that. A childish accident.

Maester Orlys had finally arrived. Mindful of his wife's health Daemon directed one of the servants to fetch a chair commanding her to sit. Naerys did not argue. She had been standing for much longer than she should have. The day had exhausted her and drained a great deal of her recovering strength.

Daenys crawled into her lap as the Maester cleaned her wounds. Curling a hand around her mother’s coils the same way she did as a babe. Her poor child. If Naerys had not been so caught up in her own pain, Daenys could have been avoided.

The shouting around them recommenced. Each mother blamed the other and the king remained lackluster in his defense of both. Preferring to take on his version of impartiality. Who was he to choose between his son and his grandsons?

There could be no impartiality when his own son had lost an eye. If someone ever laid a finger on Daenys she would tear them apart limb for limb if Daemon had not gotten to them first. It was the king's blatant refusal to do anything for his son that disturbed Naerys the most.

It did not make it right, but Naerys knew why Aemond had claimed Vhagar. The boy's egg had never hatched. Out of all of Alicents children, he was the one who desperately clung to his Valyrian heritage. Her husband and her young cousin were alike in that regard. He had always scoffed at him for his Andal blood, but Naerys could see the restlessness of a second son in Aemond. He had wanted to prove himself and Vhagar was the way to do it. The largest Dragon in the world, the last living relic from the days of the conquest and she now belonged to a boy of ten name days.

“Daenys was party to this. Perhaps she should be questioned as well.” Rhaenyra turned her sharp gaze to the small girl in her cousin's lap. Daemon's violet eyes narrowed at his niece, but it was Naerys who spoke for their daughter.

She advanced towards Rhaenyra. The woman clutched her sons closer. Her uncle Lord Corlys stood by her side in absence of his son as his wife clung to their granddaughters, the last remnants of her daughter. Naerys would not be intimidated by her cousin's attempts at victimhood. She had gone too far by trying to accuse her daughter, a little girl of four name days, of aiding in alleged treason

“She fell and hit her head, sweet niece.” Naerys turned to face the king. Daenys would not be questioned by her cousin. She would not be brought into a fight that was not theirs. “My daughter can scarcely recall what happened to herself, much less the reason for the disagreement between your son and your grandson’s your grace or why Prince Aemond called them such names.” Naerys did not care if she was impertinent. Her cheek would no doubt be blamed on her recent losses. Better to let them think that she was weak.

The sickly man simply waved her off, going to question his sons. Their mother desperately defended them, but it was a vain endeavor. Viserys would not have the legitimacy of his beloved daughter's heirs questioned even at the expense of his sons or the truth of the matter.

The king demanded for the two factions of his family to kiss one another and apologize for whatever hurt they inflicted upon each other. The fighting must stop as they were a family. Devastation took over the queens. Tears clouded her dark eyes as she stared in disbelief at her husband's verdict. His choice to shield his daughter in favor of his son.

Alicent's inaction did not last longer than a minute. She grabbed her husband's dagger before anyone could stop her. Naerys tried to push herself out of the way from the queen's warpath as she came rushing towards Rhaenyra. The princess found herself caught between the queen and the would-be queen as Alicent demanded justice for her son and her own sacrifices. Her duty. Her stepdaughter laughed at every lawful devotion she held dear. Rhaenyra lorded above them all.

Naerys noticed Daemon scrambling to make his way to her, but he was held back by Ser Criston and two other members of his brother's kings guard. Calls for Alicent to release the dagger and the princess reverberated around the hall, among them was her own father, but the queen would not listen. She wanted blood.

Corlys tried to pull Rhaenyra back to him, but the three women stood locked in each other’s grips as Alicent tried to gain the upper hand, pointing her blade near her rival's eye. The crown princess taunted the queen. “Exhausting, isn’t it? Hiding under the cloak of your own righteousness, but now they see you as you are.” The Hightower woman swung her dagger at the princess forgetting that Naerys stood between them.

She felt the pain before she lowered her eyes to see blood running down her arm bleeding into her cream nightgown. The white bone peaked out from the exposed flesh. Naerys brought her uninjured hand to touch it, letting out a hiss at the sting. She grew dizzy at the sight.

Daemon came rushing to her, finally breaking through from the crowd that had parted in horror. Her husband wasted no time, putting pressure on her wound as he ripped off the left sleeve of her robe in a makeshift bandage. Lifting her before her legs gave out.

Naerys had lost too much blood with her last birth. She was not to exert herself. Not in this way. Her body was healing and who knew how far back this might set her. Alicent attempted to make her apologies. It was an accident. She had not meant to hurt Naerys.

Daemon brushed the woman off, casting a glare that would have killed her on the spot if it possessed the capability to do so. The queen had only escaped the physicality of her good brother's wrath. Her husband had made the wise decision of ordering his Kingsguard to apprehend Dark Sister when Alicent first grabbed

Rhaenyra went to follow them, but Daemon openly glared at his oldest niece. Demanding that she get a hold of herself. “Do you not think you have embarrassed yourself enough for one night?” Rhaenyra sulked back to her boys, avoiding the eyes of judgment that fell upon her. As they made to exit the great hall a teary Daenys began to trail after her parents, reaching up for her mother’s hand. Naerys limply squeezed her daughter’s hand giving her a reassuring smile. She tried not to give into the drowsiness that threatened to overtake her. She would not let it win out.

High Tide’s halls had grown quiet in the early morning. The rest of her uncle's guests had settled back into their chambers. The excitement of the evening had worn them out, but they would be up soon enough. More than likely journeying away from the havoc that had enfolded.

Daenys refused to be put to bed by her nursemaid until she knew that her mother would be out of danger. Curling into her mother's side as Maester Orlys sutured her arm. Naerys was not to strain herself further or lift anything heavier than a cup of tea for a fortnight. There would be a scar. That was unavoidable for the knife had torn through skin fat and tissue to reach the bone underneath, but the wound would heal nicely with proper care.

“Did you promise to give her a son?” The princess was the first to break the silence. Daemon had seated her in his lap on their bed as he stroked her un-injured arm, trying to lull her to sleep. Their maester had ordered her to get some rest. They were to travel home in mere hours. She needed her strength, but the events that occurred over the course of her cousin's funeral were too fresh to forget.

“Yes.” Daemon let out a sigh as he kissed her head, continuing his caresses. They were both too tired to lie or argue with one another. “I did not think that our marriage would be a happy one.” Naerys let out a soft snort, but her husband shushed her. Placing another kiss into her coils. “She had asked me to after she gave birth to Jace. Then again with Luke.”

“Why didn’t you?” He had plenty of opportunities too. In the early days of their marriage, Rhaenyra had been a constant in Dragonstone’s halls. Naerys could barely turn without seeing her cousin in the company of their uncle. Leaving Ser Laenor to entertain her. It would be easy enough to have her slip into his chambers during the night. To give his favorite niece a Valyrian son. His niece-wife would be none the wiser. She could not picture him ever denying the crown princess who he had wanted for so long, but he had.

“You seemed so lonely.” Naerys frowned slightly at her husband’s admission, but the man laughed, pulling her up so that she sat on his lap facing him. He moved his warm hands up to encircle her face. Amethyst eyes met violet.

Loneliness was an expectation of her life. She had grown used to the state with the passage of her own mother. Naerys had her mother’s brothers and her aunt after that, but some days it was hard not to feel like an interloper. They had not put up much resistance when her fathers half brother deigned to take her away to another empty palace. It was her duty. Her cross to bear became not so very unbearable.

“I did not mind it little one.” He beamed at her and it was a sight to see. “You were the first thing I had to myself that never belonged to someone else. I did not lie to my brother when I said that you were made for me.”

“Do you wish for a son?” The one thing that she could not give him. It is you who holds him back. If he ever was to have a son it would not be she who gave birth to him. It was a sacrifice she was willing to make if needs be. If it would make him happy.

“I wish for everything with you.” Daemon continued to stroke down her cheeks. Rubbing soothing circles luring her into a state of contentment. The princess leaned into his touch. “I wish for Daenys to have brothers and sisters, but only with you. Just with you Naerys. I’d rather have you than see Dragonstone’s halls bursting with babes.”

“I love you Naerys. I love you, my sweet girl. No one else. Do you understand sweetling? I don’t want anyone else. I have no need for anyone else. I love you.” Naerys had not realized that she had begun to cry softly until her uncle kissed away the tears that fell upon her cheeks, gently shushing her. “I am sorry that I ever made you feel otherwise, but I am yours as you are mine. You are enough for me. You have always been enough.”

Daemon bent down slightly to capture his wife's lips in a kiss. Their tongues danced. She tasted the salt from her tears and the earth and heat that belonged to her husband. There was no fight for dominance. Naerys let herself be swept away by her husband’s attentions. Enjoying the warmth that spread throughout her worn body.

A knock sounded at their door. Naerys had to push her husband away to stop letting out a breathy giggle at her husband’s annoyance. The man groaned before placing one final kiss, or two, upon her lips.

Grudgingly making his way to the door to find the queen waiting for them. Ser Criston along with a fellow Kingsguard came with her. Though the latter stood watch in the hall, the first joined Alicent in their chambers. The Rogue Prince had not been given back Dark Sister, but any blade in his hand would be lethal. One could not be cautious enough.

Daemon tried to command the queen and her guards to leave. Goading her for her folly. “Have you come to finish the job?” It was Naerys who had to be the voice of reason when scolded her husband's silliness. Asking him to let them in. The man merely grumbled, but he listened to his wife’s bid. It would not do to be angry with Alicent when they knew she had not meant her any harm.

“Words can not express my deep regret princess.” The queen had knelt down on the floor in front of their bed. Taking Naerys brown hand in her pale one as the two men exchanged glares. “Nor my shame.” The Hightower woman’s glassy dark eyes flitted down to the stitches that graced the princess’s forearm.

“There is nothing to forgive sister.” Naerys returned her good sister's grasp. She knew that the blade had not been for her. Alicent had always been kind to her. Her quarrel lay with Rhaenyra and she had been unfortunate enough to be in the way when her anger got the best of her. “How is the prince?”

“The Maester was able to save his eyelid.” Alicent as she started to tear up. Wiping stray tears as they fell upon. She turned her gaze towards the chamber's dying fire. “He will make a full recovery. The king is pleased.” Her voice strained at her last words. Fury flashed in the queen's eyes before fading just as quickly as it came. Clearing her throat she turned back to face her good sister. “Your daughter, how is she?” Worry was evident across the Hightower woman’s face.

“She is fine, no thanks to your son.” Daemon sneered down at the woman. Coming to stand near his wife like a sentry. Ser Criston thankfully made no move to get closer to the queen. Though he did continue to stare down his old rival.” If you want something, spit it out. My wife needs her rest.” Alicent winced, but her focus stayed on Naerys.

“You are welcome at court anytime.” Daemon was about to retort when Alicent peered up at him.“Your brother would like to see more of you as well Prince Daemon.” The prince began to shift upon the balls of his feet. It amazed Naerys how her hot-blooded husband turned into a little boy at the mention of his brother.

“We will try to come to visit more often.” Daemon looked less than pleased with her reply, but Naerys would deal with her husband later. The king would not be around forever. Daemon had always loved Viserys. He would regret it if he was not closer to the king in his final years.

“Your daughter seems fond of my son. As is the prince.” It was said with an innocent enough smile. The woman was partial to Daenys. Inviting her to take tea or join her sewing circles with her and Helaena whenever they visited the Red Keep. The little princess was an easy enough child to get along with and a delight to be around, but Alicent was her father's daughter. Naerys could not forget that.

“That would be the one with the missing eye, correct?” Naerys swatted a hand at her husband in admonishment, but the man only reached for said hand bringing and bestowing a kiss upon the back of it. His violet eyes softened briefly before turning back to Alicent. “Our daughter is four. Your son is far too old for her.” Naerys was thankful for the fact that her uncle left it there. “You should check on him. I’m sure he’s missing his wet nurse.”

Fearing having overstayed her welcome Alicent offered her a small smile, squeezing her hand one last time before departing. Ser Criston trailed after his queen, making his exit with a bow and a ”princess” to Naerys while completely ignoring her stone-faced husband.

The Stranger still clung to Hide Tide. Making one final visit before he too would retreat for a spell. His work was never done. This time it had chosen another Velaryon to call to the Gods. Naerys' cousin Ser Laenor.

Neither Lord Corlys nor Rhaenys had come down to break their fast. A common occurrence during the duration of their short stay. Ser Vaemond saw the king and his party off as they left before noon. Aemond rode off on the back of Vhagar while the rest of the party boarded ships that would take them back to King's Landing. The other visiting funeral guests departed shortly after. High Tide was returning back to some version of normality. Though the absence of Lady Laena’s spirited presence was felt greatly.

It was Rhaenyra who broke the news of her husband’s passing to her uncle and cousin-aunt. The Targaryen couple were standing by the bay ready to return to Dragonstone, by the skies and sea, when the crown princess came rushing down towards them.

“My husband is dead.” With tears streaming down her pale face Rhaenyra launched herself at her uncle. “They murdered him. His friend, Ser Quarl, murdered him.” It had not come as a great surprise. The company that Ser Laenor had kept was less than suitable for a man of his rank. His lovers had never been discreet and had been ill-tempered for the role of the eventual prince consorts paramour.

“Take me with you back to Dragonstone.” Gripping her uncle tight enough for her knuckles to turn white one might think that she was grief-stricken. A part of Rhaenyra might mourn the loss of a husband and a great friend, but Naerys knew her games.

“I can not stay here. Not here with his parents. I can not be alone uncle.” The crown princess switched to their mother tongue for the next of her impassioned pleas. Hoping to hark on some less-than-familial sentiment that the prince once held for his niece. “Konīr iksos daorun bona stands isse īlva ñuhoso sir kepus. Issa kepa would daor deny īlva bisa.” There is nothing that stands in our way now uncle. My father would not deny us this.

Daemon placed an affectionate pat upon the Targaryen woman’s arm.“Comfort your children niece. They will need you.” Giving her a kiss on her cheek he turned to climb upon Caraxes' back. Taking to the skies once Daenys was placed securely in front of him. Maester Orlys ushered Naerys onto their vessel while the crown princess stood a white-faced statue paralyzed by the shock. Watching on until her beloved uncle and his family became distant dots in the sky and sea.

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[bohemian-nights]

Arlī(Anew) Chapter 9

Word Count: ~10,044

Rating: 18+

Warnings⚠️: Uncle/niece incest; violence; blood

Description: Envy is a disease that festers. Rotting the mind like a wound that was never tended to. Becoming gangrenous as it spreads throughout the body. Infecting each limb and tissue along the way until the body is overwhelmed. Succumbing to the sickness at long last.

AN: This story takes place from episode 5 onward. I’ve changed things up a bit but I’ve kept the timeline intact

The finale.

Chapter 1, Chapter 2, Chapter 3, Chapter 4, Chapter 5, Chapter 6, Chapter 7, Chapter 8

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131 AC- Kings Landing

War is inevitable. Peace does not last forever. It can not. The nature of man will not allow it. The very nature that brings about men’s volatility and propensity for violence. Conflicts always arise. Old grudges are hard to forget. The sins of past wrongs bubbling to the surface. Our emotions can not be so easily pushed to the side. They can only be repressed for so long before we must give in. The cost being too high to not do so.

Nothing in life is without its costs. We are in a constant battle of give and take. When we do not get what we want we become hungry. Greedy for what we feel is ours. Seeking glory and redemption no matter the cost or the burden. Seeking to protect what is rightfully ours. Though the matter of what is yours or mine is a subjective one. Entirely fueled by our boundless wants.

Envy is a disease that festers. Rotting the mind like a wound that was never tended to. Becoming gangrenous as it spreads throughout the body. Infecting each limb and tissue along the way until the body is overwhelmed. Succumbing to the sickness at long last.

Such is the case with war. Those who yearn for power claim it through less-than-honorable means. Harvesting the seeds of discontent that were planted eons ago. The starving man can not help but feast upon its ripe flesh. Curing its weary soul and broken body. What is honor compared to desire? For he is hungry and has long since been denied. Envy makes bastards of us all.

Were envy and greed the reason why it had all come to this? Peacetime at long last ending across the Seven Kingdoms in the wake of Viserys death. Petty grievances and blood feuds perhaps killed it. It had been a slow painful death as was the late kings, but he had found relief in his departure from this mortal plane. That would not be the case for the Kingdom he had left behind.

For the first time since the dreaded bloody reign of Maegor the Cruel war was on the horizon. There was no stopping the not-so-distant sound of swords being drawn, shields clashing upon the battle, of dragons roaring above them, firing down upon them. There was no stopping it all. Not unless something drastic were to happen, but the balance was rapidly tipping in favor of the Warrior. One could only accept their fate and pray to the Gods that they would be spared. War was what was coming for them all.

“We hold twelve full-grown dragons to Rhaenyra’s five.” Daemon's voice reigned around the small council chambers that were already beginning to take on the image of that of a war room.

While the lords and ladies of court celebrated Aegon II's crowning, the prodigal son succeeding his father upon the Iron Throne, his chief supporters were called to the small council's chambers. There was too much to be done to leave it for the morrow. Drinking and feasting would be postponed. Their guests could enjoy the merriment for now. There was too much at stake. Too much that could go wrong. Too much that had already done so.

The king himself had chosen to sit in on the council meeting. His presence at his council was a shock though not necessarily an unwelcome sight. Some measure of duty must have snapped into him from his crowning. The adoration of the people was more sobering than any tonic that Grand Maester Orwyle could concoct and give to Aegon. He was king now. For the first time in Naerys nephew's life, he had a true purpose.

All eyes were upon Daemon as he lectured the council. Even Ser Otto who listened to the Targaryen man with a clenched jaw, but otherwise he too let the Rogue Prince lead on. A certain stilted truce had been erected between the two men. A common goal did wonders for their ability to tolerate the other’s presence though both took to glaring at the other in scorn when his head was turned. It was hard to forget the history that stood between them. Naerys strongly suspected that if given the chance they would strangle each other.

Nonetheless, the Hand of the King had offered Daemon a position upon the small council. His pick between his old position of Master of coin or Master of ships. He could be by the king's side, but it was the wrong king.

He declined both. For accepting any post would mean leaving Dragonstone in the care of Daenys and Aemond for the foreseeable future. Their daughter was more than capable of ruling in his stead. She had been groomed as heir since she was four name days old and by all accounts had the makings of a thoughtful and firm steward.

However, baseless as it may be, Daemon did not fully trust their new good-son with the sole care of their daughter nor did he see him as deserving of the position. The boy had been corrupted by his grandsire. He was not to be trusted. Who knows what he might do if he was not there to watch over her. It was a matter that Naerys would put aside to deal with later. They had more pressing concerns to deal with.

Aegon’s crowning, though successful, had almost been overshadowed by Rhaenys and her dragon. Uninvited guests. Crashing through the Dragonpit with no care for the small folk or its other occupants. It was not them who she spared. No, it was the king himself this time. A warning. He would not be so lucky the next.

“My niece will want to claim Dragonstone for her own.” Naerys recalled how Daemon and Otto spoke with hushed voices earlier that day. The older man walked beside them as they made their way out of the now-ruined Dragonpit back to their wheelhouse. Her husband’s grip on her loosened somewhat, but he had not let her go.

Rhaenys' stunt had shocked him enough not to. He kept her arm and hand resting in his, rubbing circles into the back of her hand with the pad of his thumb. She had to confess, it had been a comfort.

The Rogue Prince had tried to grab ahold of Daenys as well, but the girl remained glued at her new husband's side. It was a battle he folded to Aemond with a clenched jaw. There was not much he could do on that front anymore. Their daughter was undoubtedly not just theirs anymore.

Daemon cast his violet gaze down at Naerys. Giving his niece-wife a small smirk as she had shifted where she stood. He knew exactly who would put it into Rhaenyra’s head to make way for Dragonstone. Sixteen years of marriage would tell him if nothing else. Ser Otto no doubt had his suspicions as did the rest of those present. It was more than obvious.

Naerys was the most likely person to aid in her aunt's ill-timed escape. She herself would not correct their assumption. The princess had intended on smuggling Rhaenys out of the Red Keep. Albeit under a different set of circumstances, but she was in part to blame for her flight. They all might have paid the consequences for her sentiments had not the elder princess exercised caution or her husband acted with haste.

Dragonstone had no dragonriders to speak of upon its shores then. They had an urgent need to remedy their seats' present circumstances. It would not do to let such an asset fall into the hands of Rhaenyra and her ilk. The small island presented too much of a temptation, a goldmine for her to turn a blind eye to.

“It is what I would do.” Rhaenyra would grieve for her father that could be sure. Her greatest supporter. The man who put her before all others was lost to his sick bed, but she could not grieve long. With Rhaenys flying for Hide Tide, they could be sure that the older princess would inform her that Dragonstone’s Lord and Lady were presently absent from their keep. “Naturally, she’ll try to install Jaecerys as Prince of Dragonstone.”

Driftmark was only a half-hour flight from Dragonstone. It did not take a military strategist to see that the Black Queen had a chance. A small window of opportunity that she would not be able to miss. Could not miss it. The island after all possessed an edge Rhaenyra desperately needed if she were to turn the odds in her favor.

Four unclaimed dragons called Dragonstone their home. Sheepstealer, Grey Ghost, Cannibal, and Vermithor. The first three were wild, having never been claimed by man, but the last, though not wild, had not been claimed for near on thirty years. For his last rider had been no other than Naerys' great grandsire, the Old King Jaehaerys.

Silverwing would often wander off to coil herself around Vermithor in his cavern beneath Dragonmont where he had taken up residence, but he was a fearsome thing. It would be a difficult endeavor to tame all the dragons wild and old alike though not impossible.

Riders would of course have to be procured. Dragonseeds were not so hard to find. One need only look for their silver heads, or their many shades of violet eyes, or both, upon the shores of Driftmark, Dragonstone, and the alleys of Kings Landing. The Targaryen’s had always been more than generous with their favors and amorous attention upon the small folk of the realm. It was a gift to bear the fruit of a God. Or as close to it as mortally possible.

The capture of Dragonstone could easily turn the tide of the war in Rhaenyra’s favor if she moved quickly. If she had enough sense and foresight to employ its treasures to their fullest extent. The Greens had precious little time before the Realms Delight would gather her strength and strike. They could not lose their advantage to the hands of the would-be queen and her allies.

The castle had been left in the care of Maester Orlys. The kindly old man was as loyal as they came. As were the rest of their household and islands’ occupants, including a small garrison numbering less than five hundred. Daemon had always inspired a certain level of loyalty in his men, from his time as lord commander of the city watch to now. Always rallying their spirits.

Their soldiers would defend the ancient Targaryen seat in their prince and princesses name, but what was their loyalty to the might of a dragon? Or better yet two full-grown dragons? The Blacks would take the island under threat of their queen's house words' reigning true.

Daenys volunteered to journey back to father's seat. She was to be Lady of Dragonstone after him. The island was her home. The young princess would not see it fall into her cousin turned half-good-sister's clutches. She had been born on its smoky shores and she would rule over them when the time came. Why should she not insure its safety?

Her father was needed in the capital and he would not want her mother out of his sight. The two rarely parted from each other. He would not wish for her to defend, but they did not have much choice. Aemond had his mission at Storm's End. As much as she loathed to be parted from her husband so soon after their nuptials, Daenys was well-equipped to handle the issue on her own.

Helaena, who had looked and sounded more than elated at the prospect, extended her own services. “Two dragons are better than one and Dreamfyre is swift as is Moondream.” Neither her good sister's parents nor her brother would allow Daenys to go by herself. The little queen would more than makeup for her brother’s temporary absence.

At any rate, the she-dragons, apart from Daeron's Tesserion, with rider and dragon alike gathering support in Oldtown, were the fastest dragons in their possession. Both were lithe nimble things that would take the new queen and her good-sister to Dragonstone before Rhaenys or Rhaenyra could rally their own dragons and ships to make way for the fortress.

Truth be told, Naerys thought that the young queen was a great deal overwhelmed with her newest occupation. Helaena had always been a girl who preferred the close intimacy and company of those she loved best. Not unlike her good-aunt.

Her ladies, her family, and her non-human companions shined brighter in her violet gaze than all the dazzle of court. She had never taken to the spotlight as her sister or even her now good sister had. The now queen would have made an excellent lord's wife. Somewhere in the Reach or the Westerlands mayhaps.

She would have done well to marry into her mother’s house. In the comfort and safety of Hightowers towering stonewalls. There was much entertainment and less idle tattling to be found outside the barrier erected by her crown. Alas fate had other plans for Helaena.

Although it was done with care, Aemond shot down his sister's assistance. “You are needed here sister. Kings Landing can not be left without its own protection.” In her own words, just as Dragonstone would be better off with two dragons instead of one so would the capital. “I shall journey with my wife.” The pale girl’s eyes lost some of their brilliance, but she conceded with a small nod of her silver head.

The one eyed prince would give Rhaenyra more of a pause than either Daenys or Helaena. She would hesitate to strike Dragonstone with her half brother and his dragon upon its shores. Slow and old Vhagar might be, but she had seen war. She was the largest dragon in the world and though her rider was untested in battle, he was a force to be reckoned upon dragonback with or without a sword in his hand.

Of course his business at Storms’ End could not be delayed. With Daeron away in Oldtown gathering the support of the Reach lords alongside their cousin Lord Ormund it fell down to him to insure an alliance with the Storm Lords. He was to propose a betrothal between one of Lord Borros’ daughters and his younger brother on his behalf.

Time could not be wasted on the onset of war. Aemond could only stay long enough to cement his wife’s position on Dragonstone before taking to the skies for the Baratheon seat. He would only be gone for a few hours, but that would be more than enough time for Rhaenyra to try something if she was alerted of his absence from his Daenys’ side. His wife would have her fathers guards, but Aemond, as men often want to mark their territory, wanted a man of his own with her.

The prince asked his grandsire for leave of Ser Criston. He was a valued friend and mentor. It was clear to all that he trusted the Dornish knight with his own life. He would be up to the task of guarding his little wife while both himself and her parents were away from Dragonstone. Should the need arise he would be able to whisk her away to safety.

A resounding no was the answer to his request. From his goodsire and grandsire and surprisingly Naerys. The first and viewed the knight with the utmost distrust. His wife was prone to agree with him. While she did not think she did not believe him to be a malevolent man as her husband would describe, she did not believe that he would do all in his power to defend her daughter if it came to it.

Thankfully, Ser Otto had need of him. As the new Lord Commander of Aegon’s Kingsguard Ser Criston could not leave the capital. Not while their new king's reign remained tested and the exact whereabouts and plots of their enemies were yet unknown. Aemond was given his uncle Ser Gwayne Hightower instead.

Though he was no Ser Criston he was a worthy and honorable knight. Unlike in the case of the Dornish knight, his regard for his nephew extended to Daenys. He viewed her as her mother’s daughter rather than her fathers. The issue was settled when no objection was given. While it pained him to admit to it, viewing him to be over familiar when it came to her, Naerys knew that her husband trusted him enough to see to their daughters welfare. For a short while at least, Ser Gwayne was safe from Daemon’s suspicion as long as he kept to his person and minded his post.

“Helaena mentioned a beast underneath the floorboards.” Daenys had leaned in to not so subtly whisper to her mother on the walk up the hill where Vhagar and Moondream rested. Apart from Naerys and her husband, who were to see the newlywed’s and the Hightower knight's departure, the rest of their party had gone back to the Red Keep.

The now queen in question had always been a unique child. Insects called to her more than people, even animals. Dragon dreams. A gift to some or rather a curse for others. She was a sweet girl, but it was clear that the Dreams had taken a toll on her.

Giving the appearance of a half-scattered mind. Daenys the Dreamer had been half made they say. Prone to getting lost within the rich fancifulness of her imagination rather than the solid reality that stood in front of her. Her imagination was what ultimately led to House Targaryen’s continued survival. Past the doom and beyond.

“Nyke gaomagon daor pendagon bona ao istan se cause hen skorion massitas? Muñnykeā. Nyke pāsagon ziry istan va moriot meant naejot massigon.” I do not think that you were the cause of what happened mother. I believe it was always meant to happen.

Naerys felt her face heat up as Aemond and Daemon guffawed at Daenys remark. Ser Gwanye could neither speak nor understand Valyrian, but he seemed to infer what had been said when he added his own chortles to the fray. Whatever doubt they had at her part to play in the incident vanquished. If both Daenys and Helaena could see what she had inadvertently caused, there could be no uncertainty.

“Do stop fussing kepa. You look so grim.” Daenys laughed lightly when her father placed a kiss into her curls after she had saddled her dragon. “My husband will see that I am comfortable before he leaves and he won’t be gone very long.” It went without saying that Ser Gwayne would deal with both Daemon and Aemond’s ire should anything happen to the young princess.

Daenys then went to place a kiss upon her mother's cheek as Naerys pulled her in for a hug. Letting out another round of laughter at her mother's tight grip. “Don’t fuse either. I shall see you both soon enough.” The newlyweds and Ser Gwayne, who climbed upon Vhagar’s back with some hesitation after his nephew, were off to Dragonstone.

With both Aemond and Daenys away securing Dragonstone and Storm’s End the present agenda rested on their strengths and allies in relation to Rhaenyra’s. The chief among them being their dragons.

The loss of Meleys was a greater inconvenience than her rider. There was always a danger that came with the opposition gaining an additional dragon, but they held both more dragons and dragonriders than Rhaenyra. They were at the advantage in the skies as Daemon had reminded the council, but he, and Aemond, would hesitate to send either herself or Daenys ride into war. In all likelihood they would not need to.

The Blacks' five dragonriders comprised mainly of the would-be queen's children. They all knew that Rhaenyra, like her uncle and second brother, would be reluctant to send any of her boys into battle unless need demanded it. Jacaerys and Lucerys, who while were more than adequate riders, were learning the commands and capabilities of their beasts as well as themselves. Joffrey's dragon was too small to be ridden into war. Rhaenys would no doubt hesitate to send her granddaughter the Lady Baela into battle as well.

Lady Rhaena had no dragon to speak of. Only three dragon eggs, given to her from one of Syraxes clutches that had all yet to hatch. Though the sweet young lady did pray to the Gods every night that she would be made a dragonrider as her mother the late Lady Laena had been. To join the fold beside her grandmother and elder twin. Naerys had heard that the youngest Lady Strong could seldom be parted with her eggs.

Dragons of course were not the only way to win a war. They were an advantage sure enough, but they were to be the last option on both sides. They brought more danger than they were worth many times over. For when dragons dance, the destruction can be endless.

It could not go without saying that the Rhaenys' escape had left them with little time to execute the Greens' more diplomatic plans. Plans which depended a great deal upon the older princess’s temporary captivity within her guest quarters. It was a setback, but not one that they would not be able to recover from.

Ser Otto had sent a raven to Driftmark for its maester. A man, who in addition to studying as a novice alongside Grand Maester Orwyle many ages past, was a great friend of Naerys' late uncle Ser Vaemond. So much so that he often sought his counsel ahead of that of his own brother. Of course, this tendency to seek guidance in the form of Hide Tide’s maester was helped by him being a blood relation to the Velaryon knight's now widowed lady wife.

When an acolyte takes his vows and forges his chain to become a maester, a degree of impartiality is expected to follow. One’s previous allegiances to their house, their name, and the lands from which they come from must fall to the wayside, but the call of blood is a hard bond to break. He had been shown to hold his lord's brother’s opinions and interests on matters relating to the Driftwood throne. The maester kept council and advised his sons in the wake of their father's untimely end.

Driftmarks maester would have alerted Ser Vaemond’s sons of recent events in the capital upon receiving the hands' letter. A king had been crowned. A king who was sympathetic to their woes. Knowing all too well of the plight of the rightful heir against that of their enemies.

Offering the hand of friendship if needs be. The need only to embrace said friendship and a hand would be lent to place one of Naerys' cousins upon their rightful throne. However, with Rhaenys traveling back to Driftmark they could no longer be so sure that their friends would be able to act on their good faith.

With good weather, the Queen Who Never Was could be back on Driftmarks shores by the day's end. Meleys was older now, but she rose to the task when needed. There could be no doubt that Rhaenys would alert Rhaenyra of the Greens' treachery and treason. Of the danger that would soon be upon her and her sons. Bringing her a worthy ally and a much-needed dragonrider. However, the situation at present was temperamental.

Naerys could not doubt that if she were to transport herself within High Tides' white stone walls she would find a den of discontent. Unease brewing from an unwelcome guest upon its shores. An interloper. Filling up every chamber within the castle. Waiting. Building up dread until the cup would overflow.

What was supposed to be a time of triumph had become a time of mourning for too many reasons to name. They had been made a fool. The sons of House Velaryon. The blood of the seahorse and old Valyria. The rightful heirs of their uncle’s throne. First Ser Vaemond and now they too were being pushed aside. Their pain was being paraded over by a feckless woman and her bastards.

If nothing else, the disquietude should unsettle the Black queen. She was an island surrounded by enemies. It did not occur to her that she had made a mistake coming to Driftmark. She had thought herself safe even with her sole advocate, the formidable Sea Snake lying in his sick bed. She had another that would scare off the monsters for her a thousand leagues away within the Red Keep, but he was dead now. Gone to the seven hells. If Rhaenys did not make it back to her husband's shores in time, Rhaenyra could find herself fighting her own battle within her chosen place of refuge.

A series of what-ifs had overtaken fate. Naerys cousins’ would not speak a word against Rhaenyra and her sons for fear of the king's might and reach, but their silence would only last for so long. They would not forget who made them so low. Never mind if it happened a day ago or ten years.

If Ser Otto’s letter was received before Rhaenys arrival it would only take to gag and bound the would-be queen and her sons. Delivering them to the Red Keep. To Aegon to do with as he pleased. All would be right with the world then. Driftmark returned to its proper heirs. If not, a fight would commence for another day.

“Our support lies heaviest in the south.” Ravens had been sent to houses small and great alike throughout the Seven Kingdoms but had yet to receive replies in mass. It was the early days yet. The lords of Westeros waited to see where the deck would land.

The Riverlands were divided at best. It had always been that way. The support of the Reach and the Westerlands were all but guaranteed. Aemond was dealing with the Stormlands. The North was unlikely to join their cause, but they were unlikely to be of much help to Rhaenyra either.

Winterfell and the lords of the North were a long way away from Driftmark much less Kings Landing and as the Starks' house words do so dutifully remind both friends and foes, winter is coming. With the heavy snows of winter, the journey south would be a long one. The fighting might be down before Lord Cregan Stark ever reached the neck. The Vale was without a doubt lost.

“Perhaps we might send the princess to parlay with Lady Arryn?” The new Master of Coin Ser Tyland suggested, but he backed into himself once Daemon began to glower at him from the opposite side of the small council table. “Or mayhaps a messenger or a raven might be better suited to offer terms of friendship.”

“Jeyne Arryn would sooner see the Prince of Dorne as king than Aegon.” Jeyne Arryn’s blood was Rhaenyra’s. Enmity remained well within the lady’s mind. Her opinion of Daemon remained sour. He was reason enough to side against the Greens. The Rogue Prince had twice done her kin over. Leaving Rhaenyra to fend for herself. Turning his back to her when she needed him most. The business of him marrying his daughter to the son of a traitor would further leave a foul taste in her mouth.

Lady Arryn neither trusted Ser Otto nor Alicent to keep her interests at heart. They had crowned an unworthy man, a usurper, all because he had the luck to be born with the right appendage betwixt his legs. She herself had to contend with countless attempts to unseat her as Lady of the Vale from her own less-than-worthy male relations. If they were to send an envoy it would be a wasted effort.

“We should send an envoy to Hide Tide.” Daemon turned to Ser Otto. “Before we do anything. We might be able to settle things peacefully.” Ser Otto held his tongue though he did narrow his eyes at the Targaryen man's suggestion. “She’s at a disadvantage.” War was a last resort or rather it should be, but for the Hand, Naerys had found that he believed war to be their only option. They were dealing with an unreasonable foe blinded by her emotions and entitlement.

“She has the support of House Velaryon and House Arryn at the least.” More houses were soon to follow. “She is not so weak.” Ser Otto said as his light eyes flitted to the map spread out in front of them. “The princess will not give in so easily.”

Rhaenyra was a proud woman. If she believed herself wrong or denied what was hers she would not give up. From where she stood, damn the laws of men and Gods alike. Her father had seen to such. The Iron Throne was hers. She would not turn her back upon it now. Or ever if she had the means to. She would fight. For as long as she could, but no one fights a war which they could not win.

“We still might reason with my aunt.” Rhaenyra had the support of House Velaryon, but without them, even with her four dragons, she would surely lose. No allies would come to her rescue if the Velaryon’s left her out to dry. Taking away her support would stop the chaos before it began. If they were to take away the Velaryon’s and their fleet, this war could be over by the end of the day.

Rhaenys did not want war herself. Not truly. Not a woman who had sacrificed her own crown near thirty years past to prevent one, but what could they offer her? She sided with Rhaenyra for her granddaughters. For their just due. Naerys did not doubt her aunt's words. Everything she did was for them. They could not offer her eldest granddaughter the crown, but perhaps they might offer Lady Baela Driftmark to rule over in her own right. By all the natural laws in the land, it should be hers.

“Rhaenys has made her decision.” The dowager queen kindly reminded her. Painfully so. The Dragonpit would take weeks to repair from her choice of action. Alicent gave her a soft smile and pulled her brown hand in her pale one before turning to face the rest of the council. “My good daughter has not. We might still reason with Rhaenyra. We offer her fair terms. Jaecerys will be the lord of Driftmark after Lord Corlys if he so wishes.”

It would anger Naerys' cousins, true enough. Though it was a necessary sacrifice for the time being. Surely a future betrothal could smooth things over when the time came to. War was too much of a burden to give into her cousin's demands as honorable as they may be.

“Lucerys a Lordship of his own. Joffrey may become Aegon’s cupbearer or Aemond’s squire at Dragonstone or your own Daemon.” Her husband snorted, throwing his violet gaze at the king's mother. However, he did not say anything against the proposal. Ser Otto looked as if he too wanted to object, but he once again stayed his tongue. The Hand of the King was increasingly becoming outnumbered.

“They all will be welcomed at court.” She gave a pointed look to her father who stiffened in his chair, “and they may keep their titles. On the condition that Rhaenyra journeys to Kings Landing, bends the knee, and swears loyalty to our king.” Alicent turned her eyes toward her son in acknowledgment. Aegon’s violet eyes seemed to liven at the image that his mother painted. “She is Viserys' eldest daughter. Not his son. It is time she recognizes that.” If Naerys' cousin were to give in she would stand as no threat. The once crown princess had bastards for heirs. She was a woman. She was not a threat.

Ser Otto conceded as did the rest of the council. The right course of action dictated it. Diplomacy demanded it. If there was any way to solve this matter civilly then by all means. The dragons may not dance yet. They must first exhaust all of their options before declaring war upon Rhaenyra and her allies. Only then if she rejected their offer of a truce. Their offer of kinship, would they have no choice, but to pursue less than peaceful measures.

It had been ten odd years since Naerys had last stepped foot onto Driftmarks shores. The castle remained unchanged. She wondered if it was even a possibility that it ever could. Some things were stuck within the ages. Remaining a static fixture in our memory. Hide Tide stood as a reminder of youth. An echo of a distant past. Of the joy and naivety she had in it.

The people, however, were a different story. Hide Tides' occupants were more changed than the castle in which they resided. Very much so. Seasons came and went and they were weathered by the passing storms of time. Weary from the days that stained and left their mark upon their skin and in their eyes. The hauntings of past lives and lost chances.

Rhaenys and to Naerys' shock her uncle Lord Corlys were waiting for them. Her mother's eldest brother's umber complexion looked dull in the dusk from his sickness. His neck had been wrapped in gauze. He should be resting, but the man had become especially obstinate in old age. No warm words of welcome were exchanged between the two factions upon the beach where they had landed Caraxes and Silverwing. The only greeting they received were weary looks. Her aunt would not fully meet her eye as she looked on ahead past them.

“Where is Princess Rhaenyra?” Ser Otto was the first to speak. His raspy voice sounded out over the crashing waves. Naerys and her uncle-husband were well suited to offer terms of alliance to Rhaenyra, but the older man had insisted upon journeying with them. His trust in Daemon was fickle at best and Naerys relationship with her cousin was less than idyllic. If they were to choose diplomacy, the occasion called for a steady hand to guide them which is what the Hightower man believed himself to be.

Lord Corlys lips parted in reply, but then there was no need to supply an answer. A roaring could be heard above them. Syrax’s. On top of the golden she-dragon sat Rhaenyra wearing her fathers crown.

Rhaenys was not the only one to have made a half-mad escape from the Red Keep during Aegon’s coronation. Ser Errk had turned his white cloak. At least in service of the new king. The last anyone had seen of him was brother seeing him off Blackwater Bay aboard a ship to Driftmark no doubt. To his queen. He had taken Viserys crown with him that now rested on top of the Black queen's white head. If Rhaenyra could not have the crown of the conqueror, her fathers would have to do.

“I wish to speak to my uncle.” Rhaenyra kept her eyes trained upon Daemon as she climbed off her dragon to face them. Only briefly strained her lilac gaze down at Naerys. She looked the part of queen. Had made her entrance as such, but she was ever herself. Queendom would only make her more so. “Alone.”

Daemon made to answer her. Something crude judging by the smirk upon his pale brow, but Naerys beat him to it. “Go with her kepus.” She met her cousin's narrowed stare with one of her own. A crown upon Rhaenyra’s head would not change her. Her father’s death would not bring her humility, but their was something upon her pallid visage that did show a chink in her queenly armor. She would not deny her closure. Let this be the last of it.

Daemon did not listen to his niece-wife. “My wife can wait in the hall dear niece.” He sneered at the realms delight as he grabbed Naerys small hand. Her husband pulled her along towards the castle without sparing the Black Queen a second glance. Rhaenyra fummed, but she held her head high when she saw her cousins’ dark amethyst eyes turning back to glimpse at her.

The rest of their party attempted to follow them, but guards blocked a positively vexed Ser Otto and his men from doing so. The Lord and Lady of Driftmark scampered off when they were back behind the safety of their stone walls.

They came to a standstill at the heavy oak doors leading to her uncle’s Great Hall. Her husband placed a kiss on her brown forehead smoothing back her silver coils before pushing her towards a bench outside of the hall. Her cousin took care to slam the door shut after Daemon went through.

Naerys did not know how long she remained sitting on that bench. Time seemed to become immaterial.There was nothing to mark it by. She did not worry herself with her thoughts. There wasn’t much Rhaenyra could do or say that would move her husband. There was no harm in leaving the two alone. Good may in fact come from it.

Her cousin cherished their uncle’s opinion above all. She was obsessed with it. If anyone could make her see sense it would be he. She heard no noises coming from behind those shut doors. Not until she heard a loud bang. Dread made her pull open the door. The scene she walked into was a half-surprise.

Daemon and Rhaenyra stood on opposite sides of the long table which occupied the center of the room. Much like a map of the Seven Kingdoms was spread out on top of it. Naerys' husband was leaning over a chair. Seemingly trying to control his breathing. Her cousin stood pacing around her side of the room. Her eyes were red-rimmed. Whatever queenly veneer she had slipped out from her.

“Leave us.” Rhaenyra turned her head to hiss at her. For a brief moment, Naerys was transported back sixteen years. Back to Dragonstones shores. A distant memory of her happening upon them when she went to fetch a book she left in the painted table’s chamber. She had told her the same then.

Naerys was frozen. Trapped in time. Mayhaps people change less than the chambers and halls in which they take up, but she wasn’t a girl anymore. She herself needed reminding of that. Her husband's voice snapped her back to the present.

“Do not listen to her little one.” Daemon breathed harder than he would have had he been sparing with his men around their training yard. He held out a white hand for her to take. His face had lost what little color it had. still leaning over the chair as he motioned her to him “Come here my sweet girl.” He kissed her forehead again before burying his face into the top of her coils when she had reached him. Drinking her in. He seemed to calm somewhat. “That’s a good girl.”

“Kepus.” Naerys tried to begin, but he only buried his head into her neck. The princess sighed as she brought a hand to run through his silver strands. Grazing the scars that ran down his neck. She would let herself bring him comfort once more. Questions on what had upset him could wait for when they were behind the safety of their own walls back at Dragonstone.

“Sweet kind Naerys, you’ve done everything that’s been expected of you.” Her face had turned sour. As if she had bitten into a lemon cake made without sugar. She spoke through clenched teeth. It was a wonder how they did not break from the strain. Her lips screwed up into a frown. “Everything apart from giving our uncle sons. I guess your womb is where it all comes to rot. You were never worthy of that.”

“You are a placeholder.” Rhaenyra continued on. Hurling half-truths in rapid succession. Her mask was put back into place. The appearance of ease. Of self-surety, but her eyes, the eyes always tell. Frustration. Neither darkness nor truth, but her displeasure was unrestrained. “That’s all you really are Naerys. My replacement. He couldn’t have me.” She would never let her forget that. My father wouldn’t allow it, so he took you.”

Why was she still here then? There was no need to have her still. If she had overstayed her welcome there was nothing tying him to her. Apart from what her dear cousin did not want to name. Daemon loved her. He was not an easy man, but she pleased him. She was sorry for it. Naerys pleased him beyond measure and that was what haunted the would-be queen. She made him happy as he did her. It was unexpected, but she would not feel ashamed for it.

“Rhaenyra, dear niece I couldn’t have your father.” Daemon let out a snigger that resounded around the room. No longer leaning upon Naerys to stand. while placing a hand to stroke down her arm. “We could have been each other’s everything had circumstances been different.”

Rhaenyra blanched at their uncle's words. Her thin mouth opened and closed like a gaping fish. “I even pictured Viserys in your place on occasion when we fucked. Naerys was the first time I hadn’t the need to.” Rhaenyra collapsed into a nearby chair. Naerys herself felt as if she too might collapse at her husband's admission had he not held her up rubbing circles into her back to calm her.

“You’ve bewitched him!” Naerys could not help but laugh at the utter ridiculousness of it. She had no tricks up her sleeve. No wiles which to capture him by. She had been a girl ten and five when she had married Daemon. Whatever she had done to make her husband care for her she had done unknowingly. One could not take what was freely given.

The anger came then in Rhaenyra’s pale glower. A frown dropped across her brow as her eyes darkened. A spark. Lit by scorn. By rejection. “Do not take it as a compliment dear cousin.” She spat the next words at her. Leaning over her chair to do so.

“I chose her.” He removed himself from his wife’s side to stride over to where Rhaenyra sat. “She does not know her power over me. She does not know she wields such a thing.” Rhaenyra sank further into her chair at her uncle's approaching form. She recalled the last time she had stoked his temper. Her dress's neckline covered the evidence of it. “Naerys did not climb into my bed in the middle of the night to seduce me away from you.” It had never been about her. “Have you actually ever loved anyone Rhaenyra?”

He came to a stop to bend down to meet her cousin's eye, but the woman avoided him. Taking to staring at Naerys instead, before Daemon yanked her head to face him. His eyes were grim. “I have already told you that if you had her you would understand. She’s given me more than I deserve.”

He reached out to take her wrist in his hold. Her cousin struggled against his strength, but he only tightened his grip. “She would have given me a son, but what good is a son without her?” Rhaenyra wasted no time in snatching away her hand when Daemon released his grasp. “I admit I am a selfish man, but I would do everything for her.”

“Nyke sorry ziry gaomagon ao.” I am sorry he used you. Naerys spoke out. Having to take a breath to steady herself. Both sets of pale violet eyes turned to face her. “Nyke sorry syt bona.” I am sorry for that. Her cousin was a victim in her own way. That could not be denied. Her husband had greatly misused Rhaenyra. He had used and discarded her when he had seen fit. More than either suspected. She knew her uncle. He would never apologize for it.

“Yn nyke emagon dōrī ōdrikagon ao.” But I have never hurt you. She had not made him do the things he had. Daemon was his own person and he had chosen to bend to her. He chose her own on his own violation. He had strung her cousin along, but Naerys was not the cause of it. The Rogue Prince had started his games long before her husband had set his gaze upon her.

“Nyke emagon dōrī jeldan ao ōdrikagon.” I have never wished you harm. Despite everything she had done to her to the ones she loved, Naerys could only feel pity for her rather than true contempt. Tried as she might to rid herself of the sentiment she could not hate her. To do that would mean she resented her. Rhaenyra had nothing of value that she wanted except for her surrender.

“Ziry does daor emagon naejot mōris bisa ñuhoso.” It does not have to end this way. Honey words. The call to kinship. The Lady of Dragonstone could not forget why they were here in the first place. Peace. It was for peace. It was up to the would-be-queen. They could avoid the destruction of their house. If she bent the knee to Aegon and gave up her claim to the Seven Kingdoms. She could live a life here among House Velaryon. Make her court there or wherever she wished. “Ao kostagon sagon dāez Rhaenyra.” You may be free Rhaenyra.

For all her posturing, Rhaenyra was not a warrior queen. She rode a dragon, but she was no Visenya. She was not even Queen Rhaena. She was a princess of leisure. Preferring the comforts of court and its admirer’s than the endless toil of battle. She was not a political woman either. She was no more suited for war than she was to sit upon the Iron Throne after she waged it and paid the price in blood she did not have.

Rhaenyra glared at her. A shadow blotted her face. She sensed her pity and she did not want it. Pride. It would keep her cousin from doing what was right. Her conceit would not fall today. It would be her undoing.

“You are considerate to try little one, but Rhaenyra is just as mad as her father.” Daemon removed himself from looming over the Black Queen, sauntering over back to Naerys. “Believing in dreams.” Letting out a chortle at her cousin's sullen expression. “Even if that prophecy my brother obsessed over is true, we are all the conqueror’s blood. It could mean any one of us. In case you have forgotten, my wife has given me a child. My blood, my grandson shall sit upon the Iron Throne.”

He grabbed her hand before Naerys could process the meaning of her uncle's words. So much had been said she felt as if she was being thrown from one revelation to the next. Barely keeping a hold onto her head. “If all you wish is to talk of is riddles, then there is nothing left to discuss.”

Daemon gestured to the Dark Sister at his side.“I could end it all here. I’d be doing the realm a favor but for the love I bore your father. I spare you this kindness. Let it be my last.” He left the chamber doors wide open as they made their exit. Storming out the castle at double the rate which they had entered into the halls of High Tide.

“You shall do as you please Lord Hand.” Daemon snarled as they passed Ser Otto. He had been proven right. The Hightower man’s eyes gleamed beneath his solemn face as he gave the signal to his men to move out. Naerys' husband helped her onto Silverwing before mounting Caraxes who was just as tempestuous as he rider. They took flight for their smoky shores without another word exchanged.

Dragonstone was quiet when they arrived back. Their welcoming party consisted of Maester Orlys and a couple of servants. The genial old maester informed them that Aemond had not yet returned back from Storms End. Daenys had retired to their new apartments in the Sea Dragon Tower far enough away from her parents in the Stone Drum.

That did not stop Daemon from ordering a servant to fetch Aemond as soon as he arrived so that he may enlighten him of the outcome of his mission. “It can wait kepus.” Naerys uncle’s mood remained foul, but that did not mean that he needed to bother the boy. It would be well past a decent hour whenever he and Vhagar landed. Whatever business he had with their good son could wait until the morrow.

Both he and their daughter deserved the night to themselves. He did not argue with her, but being reminded of their daughter's recent nuptials seemed to set him off further. Leading him to march up to their chambers while whispering curses under his breath.

Naerys could recollect that Daemon had kept her in their bed for a week after they had wed. He had not even loved her then. Of course love had very little to do with attraction. “I believe I have broken you.” He had laughed then when she frowned in confusion as she pulled slightly off his chest after their lovemaking.

She had been mostly frightened of him and the emotions he invoked in her. Emotions he likely shared. “Issa iā sȳz run dōna riña.” It is a good thing, sweet girl. He pulled her back down to lay her on top of him, lining her heat up again with his hardening member. Bringing the back of his rough hand up to caress her face. “Pāsan emā pryjatan nyke tolī.” I believe you have broken me too.

Naerys called for a bath to be brought for their chambers. It had been a long day. The first of many to come. They could worry about what would happen in the coming weeks tomorrow. For now, they needed to rest. They would be no good in the agitated state they were in.

The steaming water calmed their nerves. They sat in quiet contemplation. Daemon had taken to pulling her onto his lap after they had finished bathing the grime of the day off of each other. Resting his chin on top of her head. Stroking a warm hand up and down her bare arm while the other took her hand in his to play with her fingers. Naerys closed her eyes daydreaming of a not-so-distant future.

“It shall be nice to have children running around here again.” Daemon hummed in reply kissing her forehead. Naerys recalled that even in the darkest days when she was laid up in bed the little patter of Daenys feet and her laughter bouncing off their walls had been the most blessed sounds she heard. It had kept her sane in spite of her failures. “Future kings I suppose.” She would not pressure him for an explanation, it would come naturally.

“Aegon is not worthy to sit upon the throne.” Her husband looked at her as if it was obvious as she turned her gaze up to him. He was right about Aegon himself, but their nephew's line did not end with himself.

“Aegon has sons.” Jaehaerys and Maelor. Sweet little cherubs. They held their mothers' temperament rather than the impudence of their father. With the proper training, Jaehaerys could be an honorable heir. “Our nephew is healthy.” Their king was a lustful drunkard, but he otherwise was in perfect health.

“Men die every day as do children, especially in war.” Daemon breathed into the shell of his niece-wife’s ear. “In any case, they would need a regency.” It would never come to that. They both knew it. The lords of Westeros would rather seat a grown man upon the throne than boys even in peacetime. It was why during the Great Council Ser Laenor was passed over in favor of Viserys claim. “We would need a strong king to lead us.”

Aemond. He was next in line and conveniently married to their daughter. An overstep that Ser Otto and Alicent had missed in their haste to secure Dragonstone for themselves. An advantageous position for an ambitious man. For a second son.

“As well as a strong Hand to lead our king.” Her husband let out a chortle at her musings. Aemond no more liked his new good father than Daemon liked his good-son, but he was not too fond of his grandsire either.

Daenys would no doubt convince her husband who was besotted with his little wife that her father would make an excellent hand should it come to it. Naerys did not wish for her daughter to find herself in the precarious position of queendom, but our fate is rarely within our control. The Gods have the final say.

“Viserys was a weak man little one.” He sighed into her hair. “I will not let my affection for him blind me to his faults.” More than brotherly love by his own admittance. Or rather more than brotherly worship. It had been an obsession. “He is the reason why we find ourselves in this mess. My brother was never meant to sit upon that damned throne. He let vipers rule his court for him.” Daemon would not allow the same mistake to happen twice.

“From my blood come the prince that was promised, and his will be the song of ice and fire.” The riddle. The one that had caused her husband to spiral before she arrived. Daemon let out a snort. “The conqueror’s blood. My brother thought it referred to his line as does Rhaenyra.” Presumptuous given that neither he nor Rhaenyra were the only ones with the blood of the man who united the Seven Kingdoms running through his veins. The folly of their house. A lack of hubris. “It could just as easily be ours.” Their blood upon the Iron Throne. A call to right the past wrongs. The idea was too great to ignore.

“Ziry dōrī ivestretan issa.” He never told me. Daemon took to gazing at the flames from their chamber’s fire. Its light cast shadows across his pale face. He squeezed her hand. Bringing it to his lips to place a kiss upon the back of it absentmindedly. Giving her a half smile. “Hae baseless hae ziry istan ziry dōrī ivestretan issa se nyke istan zȳhon dārilaros.” As baseless as it was. He never told me and I was his heir. Dreams were not always so baseless. Naerys wondered if her uncle truly believed his own words. Surely he could not. His face was too troubled for him to believe it was pure conjecture.

A knock sounded at the door. Daemon barked at the poor soul on the other side of their door to bother them in the morrow, but the interruption came with urgency. Aemond had arrived back worse for wear. Rambling. His Hightower uncle Ser Gwayne had been the one to greet him. Whatever condition the young Targaryen Prince returned in had stoked his uncles’ distaste. The two quickly found themselves in a shouting match within the Painted Tables Chamber.

Daenys was called for and she had tried her best to diffuse the situation, but she could not make sense of it and had descended into her own mutterings. They did not need to be told twice when their daughter was in great distress. Daemon Hastily jumped from the bath helping his wife dress before grabbing Dark Sister. The two bound for their map rooms chambers across the Stone Drum that remained eerily muted.

The reason for Ser Gwayne's repulsion and their daughter's distress was apparent to the naked eye when they entered the chamber. “What have you done boy?” Aemond was soaked to the bone. Half drowned was more like it. Drenched by rain from the Stormlands and something darker. Crimson specks scattered across his face and into his long silver strands. He paced the room running his hands down his face while his young wife was comforted by her lady’s maid. Ser Gwayne stood.

“I was owed an eye.” His expression, red with irritation and rage, was as wild as the rest of him. Turning to face his good-fathers assessment. Rancor had clouded his judgment. The fury of a vengeful God. Or rather a young man who thought himself such. “The debt has been paid nuncle.” At the cost of their lives.

“Lucerys was there.” Ser Gwayne supplied with his hand still furiously rubbing his temples. Bringing up the other to pinch the bridge of his nose in frustration. “Delivering a message from his mother. He had left. The boy had left, but he chased him down.”

“I was owed an eye!” Aemond repeated. Daenys tried to go to him, but her mother held her back. Pulling her daughter's head to her side. Petting her silver strands like she did to soothe her as a girl. The young princess had worked herself into a frenzy. “I had every right—”

“Were you owed his life as well?” Naerys' husband met the younger man’s wroth with his own cold fury. The boy backed down some. Glancing at Dark Sister strapped to his good-fathers person. Aemond played the part of a God Daemon was every bit a malevolent Valyrian God of old.

“Aemond did what he thought was necessary kepa.” Only Daenys came to her husband’s aid. Breaking free of her mother's hold. The young girl put her hand in his. Her honey face was pale and her violet eyes were red-rimmed. The first blush of a new bride was gone.

Aemond had the veracious nature of a man of his house. Feed by the fire of youth. He did not know how to control his temper. Rash anger rather than reason Daenys had gotten her first taste of the violent passions that a man such as her husband possessed. A Targaryen man in his prime. Naerys herself had married one. He had mellowed over the years, but sleeping dragons do not lie dormant forever.

“He was her son.” Aemond went rigid at Naerys' chiding. Not expecting his good-mother's reprimand. It was as if his mother was in the room with him and not in her chambers in the Hands Tower oblivious to what he had done. “Rhaenyra would gladly die for any of her children.” Her cousin was many things, but she was a mother above all else. Naerys knew what a mother's love could do.

“As would I! As would your mother!” He was a boy beyond his depth. He was not a mother. He did not understand the depth of that bond. To carry and give birth to a child only to have him snatched away from you. He could not know. His half-sister would repay them in kind ten times over.

“A son for a son. That is what she will want. Do you have any idea of what you have done you half-blind fool?” It was Naerys who had to rest her hand upon her husband to calm him. To stop him from throttling their good-son. “Aōha mandia jāhor emagon aōha bartos valonqar!” Your sister will have your head boy! The Lady of Dragonstone thanked the Gods Daemon had the good sense not to reach for Dark Sister.

Understanding that her new husband provoked her father's ire and that nothing good could come from staying in his company, Daenys dragged Aemond to their apartments. Putting some distance between the two Targaryen men was for the best. Ser Gwayne rushed from the chamber to the rookery to inform his father and sister of the events that had unfolded tonight.

Rhaenyra would not stop until she had her fill. Her feast upon their innards. Until they felt as she did. They would know her pain. A mother's broken heart. The sound of Valyrian steel slicing through bone and flesh alike played in Naerys head. Dragons flames. Burning everything in their path. Colliding with each other in a crimson blaze beneath ash and ruin. Only blood would pay for what was spilled today. The price of vengeance.

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#daemon targaryen x targaryen!oc #daemon targaryen x targaryen!reader #prince daemon targaryen #daemon targaryen x black!oc #daemon targaryen x oc #daemon targaryen x reader #daemon targeryan #daemon #house of the dragon #hotd #houseofthedragon #daemon targeryen x reader #hotd fanfic #daemon targaryen fanfic #hotd fanfiction #lol the finale of part 1 #part 2 will come soon #bnhotdfic

[bohemian-nights]

What We May Mend (Chapter 1)

Word Count: ~6,908

Rating: Mature

Pairing: Daemon Targaryen × Laena Velaryon

Warnings: Difficult Childbirth; Attempted Suicide

Description: In the year 126 AC Lady Laena Velaryon survives her difficult in a foreign land surrounded by strangers. With a second chance to mend their fractured marriage she and her husband Prince Daemon Targaryen return to Westeros with their children in tow as chaos unfolds around them.

AN: Basically, no one is writing for them(which is a crime if you ask me). I’ve gotten multiple asks about them so here is my attempt at giving Laena the happy ending she deserved😊 Keeping that in mind, this is a multi-chaptered work based on show canon(which means physical descriptions including the lack of violet eyes among others will be left out). I'm planning around 5-7 chapters, but that may change 🐉

Chapter 2, Chapter 3, Chapter 4, Chapter 5, Chapter 6

Death was a foreign concept to her. As foreign as the Golden Empire of Yi Ti, whatever lay west of the Iron Isles, or even the wild plains of the barren North. Driftmark was a fortress of life. Neither melancholy nor illness plagued her childhood. Her parents had not been taken away before their time from battle nor sickness. Her brother, cousins, and uncle had been blessed with good health and fortune as well. There was laughter, adventure, and childish mischief to be found in abundance.                                                  

Lady Laena Velaryon had known that many girls could not count themselves half as lucky as herself. Not even her cousin Princess Rhaenyra whose mother had died before she had reached her fifteenth nameday, but the silver-haired cooper-skinned Velaryon girl had not given much thought to death. The stranger had rarely visited the isles' rocky shores and all but once entered the white stone walls of High Tide to call home its inhabitants. On that one occasion, Lady Jocelyn Baratheon had been enveloped in the stranger's embrace.                

Laena was but five when her grandmother passed on to the realm beyond that of the living. ‘Twas on the eve of her sixth nameday. She could recall the tall once black-haired woman whose hair had turned gray in the final year of her life well enough at that moment when she was closer to the Stranger than death itself. 

Age had not withered her regal continence nor rendered her unable to speak fondly of the early days of her elder half-brother's reign, the old king Jaehaerys, Laena’s grandfather though she could not recall, who had passed on a mere year past. True enough the Baratheon lady had never fully forgiven the man for his slight against Laena’s mother, but perhaps it was nostalgia that caused her to look upon those days with longing wistfulness. The world is always brighter when viewed from afar. 

It was those early days that were happiest. That seemed as if the Old King's golden reign would stretch on for an age. That the fate of the blood of the dragon, the last dragonriders of old Valyria was assured at long last, but those days had turned sour. Leaving behind only the bitter taste of ruefulness on the tongue. 

Jocelyn Baratheon was the last of the old lot. Her brother, Lord Baratheon, who was as fierce a defender of her daughter as she herself, had gone shortly after the Old King.  Her beloved husband, the crown prince, the only man she had ever known, her Aemon, was taken before his time at the hands of vipers. She was to be his queen and yet he never wore his crown.

Her half-sister Good Queen Alysanne, her only sister, more a mother than a sister for she was the only mother she had ever known, she had died of woe long ago from all her heartache. 

All were gone. She alone was what remained of them. Of a time that had faded away and lived on only in the memories of the few. 

The once great Baratheon lady had grown weary at a court she no longer recognized. The faces had changed, but she had not. She had come to Driftmark to be among her family. The house of her mother who had given her life to bring her into this world would be her final resting place. Her refuge. 

“You have his eyes.” She had given Laena a half smile as she lay in her bed wheezing. A frail hand the color and shape of bone reached up to touch her cheek. Her lady grandmother had caught a chill that she could not shake. The first time she had struck ill, Laena was told, since she was sick with the shivers as a wee girl an age ago. She had taken to reading to her every night while her mother braided her hair. Easing her mind while she slipped away from her flesh.

It had been peaceful when she finally passed on. Dying in her sleep. A look of contentment upon her pallid face when a serving girl found her the next morning. A natural end to a full life. It was Laenan’s mother's wails reverberating off the walls afterward that made it so sorrowful. She had taken to her own bed for the fortnight that followed. Her sobs drowned out the waves that crashed on the shore. 

Not even her father's sweet temptations with little trinkets, a fool, and singers from all the seven kingdoms and across the Narrow Sea bring back light to her eyes. Not even his boisterous laughter or that of her uncle, the gossip of her aunt, or the gaggles of her cousins filled their halls, and soon enough the sea called with the waxing oh the moon for her father and he went with it. She and Laenor did their best to cheer their dear mother up in their father’s absence, but the stranger was a cruel foe. Their home became as quiet as a tomb for that short time.  

Her mother only dared to venture out from chambers when Laenor had received a gash and sprained his ankle when he had done what all growing boys were prone to do. Sought for action where there was none in a castle that had fallen victim to the Stranger. “Get down from there, Laenor.” She had said running to a tree at the mouth of the cove. She had flown out of the castle like a bat fresh out of the seven hells. Her long silvery-gray hair once had been black trailing after her. Hazel irises widened with panic. A mother's fright, one Laena would know well in time. 

“Come to me.”  She had motioned him to climb down from the ledge where he had fallen to.  “That's it, my love.” When Laenors leg had been set to right and her mother's fears abated that night, laughter returned to Hide Tide once more, and death remained an ever-present shadow looming in the background. Waiting for the moment to strike once more.

No matter how foreign the stranger may seem, Laena supposed her life was shaped by death. If her grandsire had not been killed before her grandsire had died her mother would be the queen. She may be heir to the Iron Throne or rather Laenor would and she would be his queen in the tradition of their Targaryen forbearers. Though the thought of that minor detail made her stomach roll even now. 

Though she supposed whatever would’ve happened, whatever way the dice had landed if she were she would not be here right now. In a foreign distant land. Among strangers. Bleeding out upon white sheets. Her lifeblood steadily slipped away from her. As sure as the sands empty into the bottom of the hourglass. Grain by grain. 

It was a strange experience. Laena could not see the stranger, but she felt him there in these humid chambers. Right there beside her. Over her shoulder. Breathing down the back of her neck. Causing the hairs on her damp neck to stick up and stand on their ends. Death clung like a second skin. Waiting for the pain to run its course and drain what was left of her before he called her back with him. 

She had known pain before. A broken arm from falling off a tree. Climbing to see the last of her father's warships head off to the Stepstones. A cut upon her foot from Laenors first sword grazed the skin when she had dropped it, not realizing how heavy it would be to wield it. The cramps radiated out from her abdomen when she got her moon blood and was bedridden for the first night. A bruised rib when she made her maid lace her stays tight enough to show off her figure during the visit of a visiting Sealord and his son from Bravos who later be engaged to for a time. and the hundred times after that for each suitor that came to Driftmarks rocky shore all ending with one. 

She had known the pains of the birthing bed well enough. Laena had taken to it twice now. The first time had been long and rather taxing. She labored for a day and a half. She had not thought she would make it lying there upon sweat soaked and the Gods know what else sheets, twisting herself into a ball, but then out came Baela. Her fearless girl. A little red squalling babe with a set of lungs upon her that alerted the whole manse of her arrival. 

Rhaena’s labor had been quick. A mere two hours after her pains began did she pop out into the world. A tiny thing she was. Smaller than her sister, quieter too, but just as precious in the eyes of her young mother. Where her birth had been easier than Baela’s, what followed afterward had not.   

Laena had bled for a fortnight straight. Apart from short jaunts to take a turn around the gardens she was regulated to the confines of her chambers for a moon. Much to her displeasure, she was too weak to feed her daughter from her own breast. A wet nurse had to be called for while she spent her days in bed.

The recovery had been a slow one, but she had recovered. She had become herself again, her girls blossomed, and the pain of the birthing bed had become a distant memory. This, however, was different. 

The Stranger had visited with the night this time. Such pain he brought. Laena could feel him in her bones. Exhaustion seeped through every pore. As if every muscle in her body craved to give in. To give up. To meet the stranger who held his hand for him to join her in his cold embrace. 

Never before had she felt so unlike herself. Tired. She was so very tired. She could no longer push. Been instructed not to push even if she could. Her legs were numb. Her silver curls painted to her clammy forehead with her own sweat. 

Her eyes desperately wanted to shut. Calling for rest. A moment of respite. Her arms ached from holding herself up hunched over the bed. From the near-death grip of the midwives hand. Even lifting her fingers to inch up the bedpost for a tighter hold was a strain. 

Laena burned with something she could not name. A foggy bog that she seeped into overpowering her, but some part of her kept her in a hazy state of half-dream half-wake. A candle flickering in the wind. The past and the present intertwined in its dimming glow. 

She could hear the waves crashing back on coming in from the open window that had meant to cool her down. The room frayed. Faces came in and out of view. Switching between her mother's smile and the nurse's worried pallid face as she wiped the beads of sweat off her brow. Voices muffled and low as if they came from the other end of a cavernous tunnel and yet she kept a hold to the last shreds of her wit and strength. A tiny ember. The last snuff before the light went out. 

“My brave girl.” She could make that out with startling clarity. It came from her princely husband. They stood huddled up in a half-shadowed corner of the chamber whispering to themselves, the healer having left her side. He was a swarthy man who sweat like a pig. If he did not open his mouth one would think he was Dornish. Laena was not particularly fond of him. 

There was something in his person,  in his manner of address which, how he always deferred to her husband which made her uneasy. She wished to be back within the safety and care that could be found at her father's house, surrounded by her cousins and aunts who would fuss over her, with her mother by her side who, or at least have a maester who knew her body better and would not act as if mere paranoia was the cause of her woe, but she had little choice in the manner of her present circumstances.

“The magister has healers who will take care of you Laena.” Daemon had replied when she confronted him in the library where he spent his days. Obsessing over their family's history twirling a glass of sweet wine from the magister's cellars in his hand. 

It was a final plea, a desperate plea for she had asked him a dozen times before throughout this pregnancy where she felt her body weakening little by little with every passing day, but he dismissed her with his usual care. Placing a kiss on her belly as their babe greeted his father with a little kick before he went back to his reading. There was no room for argument. He was in one of his moods. He was always in a  mood. 

Her husband had replied to what the healer spoke in that absent-minded way of his. The way that reminded her his mind was a thousand leagues away. Across a narrow sea. To the alleyways, taverns, and well-tread roads that made up King’s Landing to his ailing brother, to the Iron Throne, or perhaps even his beloved niece. Laena could not tell. Not anymore. Mayhaps she never could. 

Or mayhaps she had been the occupier of his attentions and affections at one point. Perhaps it had been she who evoked his passion. Before Baela when they had first wed? When he had whisked her away to this place from her home. Winning her hand away from the Braavosi Sealord's son with the plunge of Dark Sister through his skull. The excitement of it. He had always been one for the dramatics in the most spectacularly brutal fashion. 

Basking in the glow of his victory. Claiming his prize. A bride of his own choosing. A Valyrian bride to wash the stain off his ill-favored union with Rhea Royce. The vale-bride that had been chosen for him. The bride he never wanted nor favored. 

Her father, the great sea snake, was all too keen to give him her hand. To give him his prize for ridding him of an unfavorable match despite his dear wife’s protests. Despite the whispers that swarmed him. He killed my cousin. Blushed her to death. Budgeted her to beyond recognition He’s the devil. 

Laena herself ignored their tales and dismissed her own mother's warnings. “He is charming, but charming men seldom make for good husbands, my sweet girl. Let us find you some lord who will make you laugh.” 

She did not need some simpleton who would make her laugh. She had someone who made her feel more than that. She had someone who caused her belly to erupt with flutters when he threw a smile her way or his pale green eyes met dark ones. 

He was not particularly handsome, his lips were too thin and his brow was hairless and prominent. His face was rather primal, but he was tall, his jaw strong, and there was something magnetic about him. Daemon Targaryen could command a room with a single glance. Why should she not want him? Why should she not have him?

She was Lady Laena Velaryon. She was the blood of old Valyria through and through. She came from not one, but two ancient and proud lines. Even her Baratheon blood was forged in the flames of Valyria. She was the dragonrider of the largest and oldest dragon in the known world. The last living vestige from the time of the conqueror.

The Rogue Prince wanted her. He had wanted her by his side. To be his wife. To bear his children. He saw who she was and he wanted her. They were the blood of old Valyria. Like called to like. They were made for each other. She was his match. She was his wife. 

Wife was just a title she learned. She was so very naive then. Young and in love with the idea of him. An ideal was not enough nor was a title. It did not keep one warm at night. Comfort one when their heart aches. Or while they were bedridden with sickness. 

No, Daemon Targaryen had not married her for such feelings of adoration and cherishment. He had married her for an empty title. For her name. Still, she liked to think that she had been enough for him. That she had been what he had wanted. That he had wanted her for more. That they had a chance the same as any other. 

Mayhaps after Baela they still had hope? When he thought that she might give him the solace he looked for. The peace he craved. what he made no effort to hide.

She had given him a girl to be sure, but there would be more babes to follow. Her own mother had given her father a girl first then her brother came. Why should it not be the same for her? 

She was still young and healthy. Had just celebrated her seventeenth name day. Daemon himself was in the prime of his life at six and thirty. There would be babes a plenty. “The next one shall be a boy husband.” He did not say anything. In fact, he seemed rather in awe of the tiny red-faced babe in his arms. Taking her little hand broken free from her swaddle to wrap around his pointer finger. Bringing the small fist up to his lips to place upon as he stared down at her, utterly entranced,  but she knew. 

When a letter from Kings Landing arrived announcing the birth of Jacaerys Velaryons she knew. She saw the light gone in his eyes. In how he did not let the wine in his cup go empty. She knew what she must do. What she must give him. It was a son he wanted. Just a son. A son and he would be happy. A son and they would be happy. She would give Daemon Targaryen his sons.  

After she had almost given him his long-desired heir, but had only delivered another girl? Did she dare hope then? This one was more of a disappointment than the last for she was not even a dragonrider. Her egg withered in her cradle. Turned to stone. There was no use for the girl. For their sweet Rhaena. 

What was one to do with two girls and no son in sight? No heir. Two girls. Ten years gone by and all she had given him was two girls. Every raven arrived from home a bitter reminder. Son after son. Year after year. A full life lived across the Narrow Sea. A life he was no party to. A son was not all he wanted. 

How he burned those letters and stiffened at the mere mention of her name. At the suggestion that they return. Your brother would surely find you a position at court. Dismissing her words with a smile that did not reach his eyes and a swig of Pentos wine. Pouring over text and drinking himself to bed. Baela only managed to win his attention with her Valyrian or their rides. The better part of him. Rhaena was lucky if she got so much as a good night kiss from her dear kepa. Her failure. 

Yes, wife was only a title. For there were some days he would not even come to her bed. Those days were better despite their loneliness. He was drunk when he climbed on top of her and put this babe in her. Pushing her into the bed. Pushing into her. One thrust. Two Three. In and out. She lost count. Merely trying to distract herself from the dull ache of the stretch.

“Forgive me.” He left her lying there as his seed slipped from her heat. Hastily throwing on his clothes as he scrambled out of the chamber. She did not see him until the next night at dinner. Having to sit through it with a smile that pulled at her mouth from its strain as he and the Magister discussed his son's return from Braavos. A handsome boy with a head of brown curls who was a mere two years Baela’s senior. He was apt to introduce them. Her husband could not seem more delighted by the prospect. 

She did not make him content. She was not the wife he wished for. Her failures in the birthing bed proved that. Her failings to bring him his desires prove that. Laena Velaryon was a disappointment. 

He could not even look at her. She lay in her deathbed, soiled, blood pouring from her at an alarming rate and he could only spare her half a glance before he moved it back to whatever it was that captured his attention on the stone floor underneath him. He did not notice her. Not even now. 

Mayhaps he never had. Not really. Why turn his attention, his affections to her? She had never been what he wanted, only a thing he had settled for. She was always a thing that he was burdened with. What he had settled for. A prize, indeed. A consolation prize.

A Valyrian wife, but the wrong Valyrian wife. Children that were just Targaryen enough, but just as Velaryon in truth as they were Targaryen. A life of comfort and ease, but no action. Close, but not quite. Not what he truly wanted. Second choice. She was his second choice. 

The Stranger mocked her with his silence. She could feel him and yet he said nothing. Just waiting. Waiting for her own body to give now the rest was gone. Now that she could not avoid it. Could he laugh? Mayhaps? Mayhaps not. 

“We could pry open the womb.” He stuttered ever so slightly. Ringing that cloth covered in her blood and tears in his hand. She felt a chill run up her spine. The Stranger reached to hold out his hand. Waiting.” Try to remove the infant by way of the blade.”

“Would the mother survive it?” Her husband had turned his body away from her. He would never notice her. The healer shook his bowed head. A quiet no confirmation fell from his lips. It was he who looked as if he saw a ghost. Her life for her babes. If that. She knew how this tale would end.

No, she had never been what he wanted. She could not give him what he wanted. Second choice. She who had burdened him with her failings. With her inadequacies. She who could perhaps serve him better in death than she ever could in life. The cold reached her shoulder. 

Would he notice if she slipped from the room? Into the night air? Just beyond the castle's walls? Made her way to Vhagar? Grabbed his hand? Ran into the Strangers embrace? 

A dragonriders death. Or at least death at the hands of something which she loved. Something which did care for her. Something that did not which to only take from her.

Yes, that was preferable to this. Preferable to being carved like a stuffed pig. Served up for a grand feast. A feast worthy of a prince. 

He hadn’t noticed. He hadn’t noticed when she pushed the maids away who tried to hold. She pulled herself up on shaky legs to make her way to the door of the chamber. He hadn’t noticed.  A wide-eyed mousy girl shrieked a my lady when she slipped through the doorway. The others gawked with open mouths like a fish gasping for breath on land with horror. Not speaking a word at her retreating feverish figure hunched over, but he hadn’t noticed.  

“Mother,” Laena thought she had heard. Thought she’d seen a little brown worried face peeking out of the nursery that she shared with her sister. Baela for she was too tall to be her sister. Their host had been gracious enough to offer them chambers of their own, but the girls were as thick as thieves. They could not be separated nor should they be. 

She ignored that small voice. The call of a mother. She did not want to know if it was real or a figment of her clouded mind. A trick of her imagination conjured up by the Stranger. Prayed it was only a mirage.  

Baela was asleep, warm in her bed. Dreaming of the trip her father had promised he would take her on the morrow. Riding on the back of Caraxes. Her dragon was too small to mount, but she already had a taste for the skies. “Faster kepa. Faster.” She’d say as she would cry with glee. The wind would whip around their faces as they dove and gilded through open blue causing her eyes to water with happy tears. 

“Eglikta, nyke jaelagon naejot jikagon eglikta.” Higher, I want to go higher. Her Valyrian would be clunky, but she improving. Soon she’d be better than her mother. Would be better than her. 

Laena hoped Daemon would keep to that promise. Perhaps he’d bring Rhaena along with them. The girls would need a distraction. Surely no one would fault him for providing them with one. He’d want to do it. He’d be relieved to be out. He was never one to be idle and she doubted that would change on account of her absence. He’d be free. 

Of course, he’d have to mourn her propriety’s sake. For six moons, a year, a very long year, but any bit of freedom he’d have during this mourning he’d welcome. Relish in it. Yes, he’d take her riding tomorrow and the next day after. 

That little voice did not follow her on her hobble down the corridor. Nor were her ears met with the little patter of bare feet other than her on stone. It seems the mother was kind enough to grant her one. Her babies were asleep safe in their beds. With not a care in the world. 

With a shaky hand upon the banister, Laena turned the corner leaving the guest quarters towards the backstairs that the magister's servants use. It was safer that way. If anyone should come looking for her they’d think she’d use the ones. They’d look for her there. Not creeping around like a beggar woman. 

No one followed her. No one looked for her. Not a single soul. There was some relief in that. If they had happened across her they would surely force her back.  Back to that chamber. Back into that soiled bed. A lamb for slaughter. 

She felt the chill upon leaving the warmth of the manse. It had not been a particularly cool day, but the nights in Pentos were cooled by a western breeze from the bay that bordered its shores. Cool enough to need a cloak of one we’re to venture out for a night stroll, but not Laena felt as if she had stumbled into winter. 

Goosebumps erupting over her sticky bronze skin. Every step felt like she walked in water. Her legs felt like lead. She knew if she were to look down at her feet she’d be met with the sight of her lifeblood. If she were to stop she would collapse into the dirt and never get. Mayhaps she was not as careful as she thought for anyone could find her, but it would soon matter not. 

She was close. So very close. Home. She was almost home. Away from here. Away from the cold. Away from the pain. Nothing could touch her. She would feel nothing. Not the sharp edge of the healer's blade that would pierce her belly. Not Daemon’s disappointment. Not her own longing for what she could never give. A life that would never be hers. With a kiss from her dragon's flame, it would all end. 

It was only by the Stranger's hand that she made it to Vhagar. Stumbling over the pieces of gravel beneath her feet. The pain made her double over. Dropping to her knees. Bowing her head. Pleading. Begging her for release.To be free.

“Vhagar Dracarys. Dracarys. Dracarys. Dracarys. Dracarys.” She had croaked it out half a dozen times to the old dragon, but she would not move. Her voice grew weaker with every plea Threatened to give out. Already sore from screaming, she continued on. She saw no other way. Descending into tears, but tears did little to endear Vhagar to help her. Remaining as unmoved as ever. 

Her mouth opened and closed over and over, but she made no move to bring forth fire. To end her riders' suffering. “Dracarys.” She would not move. Only fanning Laena’s damp face with hot dry air. Not a flame to be seen. No orange glow cast.

“Dracarys.” Another wave of pain came over her. It was hard to breathe through it. To force air through her lungs so that she may speak. 

“Dracarys.” A whisper. A final plea. Yet she did nothing. Unbowing her head so that brown met golden red. She pleaded with her eyes for Laena had no voice left in her. Her gaze went soft. A  lamb begging for the Shepherd to guide her. To save her from the wolves. 

Pity was there. Reluctance too. A resistance to do as she was bid. Like a dog commanded to leave his wounded master on a hunt. but that pity had one out. Understanding. Just for a moment. She understood what she wanted.

Vhagar opened her ancient mouth to reveal an orange glow. A glow that burned her skin, feeling the heat making her sweater soon blister and peel if she were to keep at this distance, but that would be the last pain she would feel. For the glow would burn bright and engulf her in its fiery bite. Laena raised her head. Closing her eyes to meet the fire. Let me be free. 

“Laena.” She heard his voice. In what would be her final moments left on this mortal plane it was his voice she heard. Carried across the dirt in the windless night. How cruel the Stranger was. He brought her here on her knees with pain shooting through her only to prolong her suffering. How he laughed at her expense.  Stinging heat fading bit by bit. As if it had never been. The Stranger laughed indeed. 

“No Vhagar.”  The glow dimmed. It must have dimmed at the sound of her husband's panicked roar for Laena no longer felt its searing burn. She no longer could feel the brightness of light on her eyelids. 

Her dragon had been released from her obligation. Given a choice. Vhagar came to with shame. Did a dragon have shame? Realization that what she was about to do was too rash? Too final? Too desperate. Nothing good ever came from desperation.  Not even now while the Stranger made a joke of a dying woman. 

The flap of wings reached her ears. With a gust of wind bringing back a chill to her bones. Vhagar deserted her. She was left alone with him.

Laena refused to open her eyes. Refused to see what had become of her. What was going to become of her. Mayhaps she could have tried to run, but she would not get very far. She did not think she could even pull herself to her feet much less hobble her way to wherever Vhagar had flown off to. It would be a crawl. A slow crawl. If that. Her lifeblood that left a steady trail from her womanhood painting her thighs crimson told her otherwise. 

“You’re freezing Laena.” He wasted no time enveloping her in his arms. Tucking her carefully into his person. Placing an arm under her legs, the other bore the weight of her back while her head rested underneath his chin. Like a bride. Like how he had so very long ago. Her gown had been a lovely embroidered thing of white Myrish silk rather than the soiled nightgown she wore now.  Not a single curl was out of place. Her silver mane shone in the candlelight. Her head had been crowned with a golden diadem. A single ruby placed at its center. She was a vision. 

Daemon had refused the bedding ceremony that her uncle called for to carry her back to their chambers himself. Halfway along he had begun whispering something rather naughty into her virgin ears which caused her to burst into a fit of giggles as she was thrown over her groom's shoulder. There would be none of that now. 

He must have been closer than she realized she decided. It’s the only way he reached her with such speed. He had no blanket nor cloak with him, but the heat coming off his person warmed her. He felt like a fire. Why was he so warm? Had he always been this warm? This solid? 

She clung to him. Burying herself into his chest. Resting her silver curls into the pocket-marked skin of his neck that told the story of the man she loathed and loved. That he cradled their own babes into when they had been little things. 

 She did not wish to, but he was the only thing keeping her here. The only thing that was here. She longer felt the Stranger's ominous presence. His laughter in her head had left and had been replaced with a pounding in her head. There was only him now. 

“What were you thinking?”I would've been free. I would have freed us both and then you would not have had to pretend as you do now. He was doing a good act of it. 

“If you had left me. I would not be freezing.” Her voice was so very small. A murmur. A croak really. Hardly recognizable to her own ears. Did she really sound like that? Like an old woman? So very weak. If he had not placed her head near his ear would not have heard her. 

“My darling.” He hadn’t called her that in a while. A long while. The last she had was on her twenty-fifth nameday. The night of her twenty-fifth name day. The last time they had truly made love. He had been sober. Gentle. Present. 

He spoke her name with such reverence, whispered things into her ear which made her cheeks flush in heat with such tenderness. In the afterglow of their peaks, he had not pulled from her. They had simply laid their breathing each other in as he petted her. He made love with his words where his body had been spent and she savored every morsel of it, but she wouldn’t give too much thought to it now. Desperation caused one to speak falsities laced with honey. 

Still, there was something, something in his voice, something thick and unsaid that caused her to open her eyes the slightest to meet his. Pulling herself from where she buried her head to find that they were glassy. Filled with unused tears. Threatening to spill from those green depths.

Laena had never seen him cry. Not once. Not even when she presented Baela to him. Her mother had said that her father could not stop crying when she had placed her in his outstretched arms, but not the Rogue Prince. Never Daemon Targaryen. It was shock , she decided. He was just in shock. She had shocked him. 

“You’d be free of me. No healer’s blade required.” He’d be rid of her without another stain on his name. Without it weighing on his conscience. If he was even capable of feeling remorse through that dark haze of his. 

“I won’t let them cut you Laena.” She laughed. Did she really mean so little to him? So little that he would not even give her the truth? Did he truly believe she was so naive? After being with him these ten years as his wife, that she knew nothing of him? Of how little his word meant when he gave it out so freely. When he spoke lies so freely from those pale lips. With his airs. His smirks. Mayhaps he believed his own versions of the truth. He had told so many of them. It must be hard to keep up with them, but she remembered.  

“You will if it will give you the son you want.” It was men like him did. Proud men. Lords,  princes, and kings alike. The need for an heir was too great to pass for men like them.  ‘Twas what his brother had done. His wife’s life for a son, a babe who had only survived a night. His wife who he butchered for an heir that lived but a day. 

Aemma Arryn had been no more with the swipe of a blade at the command of her husband. A command that left him plagued with guilt and regret and no proper heir to show for it. He had loved his wife, claimed to love her, and yet he murdered her all the same. All for a son. Such as men like him do. 

A sharp pain ran through Laena’s abdomen. It had begun to dull before then. Distracted by her abandonment and the cold she felt in it, but that mind-numbing ache was a reminder that the worst was not over yet. That this fight was pointless. That him trying to save her, to make amends after ten years of misery was pointless. Daemon pulled her closer to his warmth, the lines upon his brow made all the more prominent with his worry, but it was no good. 

She would still be dead by the end of it. Laena had found dying to be a rather exhausting business. There was no point in wasting any more breath on the matter. Her fate was inevitable. 

“Take care of our girls or I shall haunt you.” Her last attempt at humor. Daemon did smile at it and Laena herself could find little amusement in it. 

Her one regret. Leaving her girls alone in this world. It was selfish. To take her life so violently when she’d leave them behind. Without saying so much as a goodbye to them. It was heartless. To leave Daemon to pick up the pieces. 

To explain to them what she had done. How does one explain that to a child? Why their mother would no longer be able to tuck them into bed at night. Why when they turned to find her smile they’d only find thin air. Why everything had changed in the blink of an eye. 

Laena herself did not know what it was like to live without a mother. If RhaenysTargaryen had any faults it certainly did not lie with her mothering for she had always been there for her children. No septa, wetnurse, nor nanny could replace the comfort of a mother. 

It was she who fretted over them when they were sick—staying up with them through the night wiping sweat from their brows, singing them lullabies, recounting stories of old to lull them to sleep. She who would kiss their bruises away. She who would listen to their woes without complaint. She who Laena could always depend upon. Only a raven need be sent and she would journey from the ends of the earth to her.   

Her girls would be without that comfort, but they'd have her mother. That much she knew. Her mother would care for them as she had her and Laenor when they were little. That much Laena could take comfort in. They would not truly be alone. Just without her. 

“You will take care of them yourself.” He must have lifted from the ground because the throbbing increased tenfold. With each step he took she could feel it moving through her. Shooting through her wave after wave. Her back, her belly, and her head were all burning. A stab here. A pinch there. She had thought she had known pain, known weakness, but this was all-consuming agony. She went limp in her husband’s hold.

He was with her, she knew he was holding her but he began to sound distant. The blood pounding in her head muffled his speech. It sounded as if they had journeyed into a dark cavern. She on one end of it, he on the other. His voice was a faint echo yet he would not cut that shallow cord of communication. “You will see them grow and have children of their own. You will not leave me. I will not let you leave me.” 

At his last words, his voice broke with a choking sob. A hitch in his breath shook her. Something wet landed on the apple of her cheek. Making its way to her chapped lips. The taste of salt left a kiss upon them. 

Mayhaps she had thought too cruelly of him. It was not every day that one witnessed their wife attempting to light herself on fire to escape them. Mayhaps there was sincerity. Something. Yes, something other than the darkness that resided in him. 

“You’ll die old in your bed Laena. I promise you—” If he had made any other promises Laena did not know. The pain became too much for her to keep awake. Her eyes fluttered shut before they reached the manse. 

Ao3 Link:

#daemon x laena #hotd fic #hotd fanfic #laena x daemon #laena velaryon #daemon targaryen #daemon targaryen x laena velaryon #bnhotdfic #I hope this is to everyone’s satisfaction 🤞🏽

[bohemian-nights]

What We May Mend Chapter 6

Word count: ~14,576

Rating: Mature

Pairing: Daemon Targaryen x Laena Velaryon

Warnings ⚠️: None

Description: In the year 126 AC Lady Laena Velaryon survives her difficult in a foreign land surrounded by strangers. With a second chance to mend their fractured marriage she and her husband Prince Daemon Targaryen return to Westeros with their children in tow as chaos unfolds around them🐉

AN: I was late coming into this world so I might as well be late updating these chapters.

Laena must deal with the aftermath of the conflict. 🌊

Chapter 1, Chapter 2, Chapter 3, Chapter 4, Chapter 5

“Will you try eating something sweetling?” Laena tried asking the small girl sitting at her side with a smile that was most surely strained, but that could not be helped. Honey skin gone pale. She had not spoken a word since she had arrived at their chambers and that had been hours past now. They had broken their fast, rested for an age through the rising day, and noon had come and gone yet she had remained unmoved.                                

Rhaena was not a very talkative girl and she was indeed fairly prone to melancholy for a child of her age, but she had never seen her like this.                                                               

Just looking at her made her heart ache. Felt her with woe that she wanted to snuff out and replace back with the light of her happy girl.                              

“Would you like to hold the Aemon?” Bess had brought him in with their breakfast. They had all had their fill. He had been content after. She nodded her head and that ache twisted in her chest when she grabbed hold of the babe.           

Daemon had locked them away in their bed chambers. Barred to anyone except their little ones and her parents who were due for a visit. 

Laena did not protest against it. She was to be resting. Maesters orders and she did not wish for company or for whatever they might bring. A couple had tried, Daeron muffling some half apology through the door when the maids cleared away breakfast. No doubt prompted by his little wife or his father who had seen sense enough that he had gone too far in his bitterness. 

Then she heard a voice that sounded as if it belonged to Ser Criston arguing with one of the men posted at the door. It was difficult to say if Alicent had come with him, she had, but Daemon looked as if he were a cat that had gotten into the cream when guards turned them away though she could not say she had behaved any better when the guards had turned away the shrill voice of her cousin and her brood of miscreants. She was after all the reason why Maester Croton had ordered this new and hopefully brief bout of bed rest. She could not overextend herself conversing with the lot who had put her here. 

Besides, the children were all the company she wanted or needed. Gazing upon the small girl staring blankly at the tapestry on the other side of their chamber with Aemon in her hold, the only thing that seemed to placate her, they needed her just as much as she had needed them.  

“Would you like a lemon cake?” Twas her favorite. The girl could eat a whole tray if she let her without a care if it caused her stomach to turn well into the next day. 

Laena had sent for them in hopes that they would cheer her up, and had even eaten one, to tempt her. Stomaching the tart-sweet with embellishments of satisfaction as she bit into it. It was a small thing to pay Tampering down the need to screw up her nose at the taste, she had never understood how someone could find the bitterness that stuck to the back of one's throat pleasing, but she had downed the little cake in two bites for her. 

However, Rhaena looked at the treat in her mothers hands the same way one would look at a sheet of parchment. Bouncing her brother upon her knee with no reflection. 

“The weather is decent enough.” Daemon had joined them on their bed to stroke a hand down Rhaena’s cheek. “Caraxes will be growing restless.”  

Laena had tried not to let the sight of that distract her. She could not decide if it was a strange thing or sweet. 

It was sweet when Rhaena did not flinch away. She did not lean into him either, but it looked natural. Like he had done so a thousand times before. Seeing him speak to her with a quiet voice that was usually reserved for Baela when he wished to dote upon her would’ve made her heart soar. 

Mayhaps she would have counted this as progress another time, but his fatherly affections and simple temptations were not the thing that brought her cheer.       

Aemon chose then to let out a gurgle. She looked 

down at him with a whisper of a smile. It was something. Something that Laena clung to and tried to take hold of and stoke back the fire of life into her, but that too was no use. Rhaena was much more interested in making sure the restless babe in her arms was content than in her father's offer that would bring her own contentment.   

“Why do you not go with your kepa Rhaena?” That suggestion did not have its intended effect. Quite the opposite, it only served to push her further away. 

The small smile their girl wore faded as if it had never been there. Laena grew desperate to get it back. Trying once more while trying not to loss 

“Just you and Kepa while Baela keeps me company. Her attention was drawn to the small babe who had grabbed onto Rhaena’s finger and was using it to suckle on. He would be crying for his noon snack in a few minutes, greedy little thing he was, but for now, he was preoccupied with the diversion

“You may bring Aemon if you wish.” That had only served to bring about a lost look in her eyes. Whispering to her with pleadings that went unsaid, but no less known. You know what I wish for. That unspoken request, but where she would not or rather could not utter it her sister voiced it for her.   

“Has Aemond left?” It was said so quietly by Baela that one would have missed it. Odd indeed for their eldest, for she had never been prone to shyness unlike her sister, but there was a reason for the quietness of the query. 

She had told them so twice now. Whispered and then when luncheon had been served. “She would like to see him.” Always finding some way to redirect their attention back to this want much to her father's annoyance who was less than amused. 

“No.” To both or two either one did not need to ask. Pale green eyes darkened at the onset of the first query turning black and as hard as stone by the second. Leaving no room to ponder over his meaning, but that did little to sway Baela against the topic of conversation.   

“He is her betrothed,” she scrunched up her dark brow, silver head high in indignation not used to being dismissed as such. “You and Muna agreed to it, Kepa!” Baela’s irritation increased tenfold at her pleas having been ignored thrice now.

She had never been a patient girl. Requests denied few and far between. He might love all their children equally, but she was his favorite and Daemon was always more than willing to make sure they were met. If she was a more self-involved girl she would've, but she had her moments of unrelenting stubbornness show ever just as she had not been placated by her father's unyielding word so had he not been endeared by her tantrum. Both were as stubborn as the beasts their ancestors had tamed. Laena dared not give voice to that lest they began to spout out fire with objections and as they did too. 

“My brother agreed to it pet,” She could see him trying to restrain his irritation. Emotions churning within the man. Annoyance redirected to his brother.

It would have been comical, his eyes knitting together as the tips of his ears grew a light shade of red. flushed with his anger. The look of a little boy dejected on such a matter as a betrothal at his age was comical indeed, but the comedy soon lost all its charm with his next words. “And your mother was led astray.”

Laena bit her tongue. busying herself with petting the back of their sullen girl's locks. She focused on the brush of her hand upon the braided strands. Letting the feel of the wiry curls against her palm calm her though it still took a considerable deal of restraint to keep her eyes upon Rhaena and not turn them to her husband to glare at.

Led astray. If she was led astray what was he? 

A man led by his pride. The folly of all men. Her mother's words still ringed around in her head. Maphaps more clearly now than when Alicent’s had come to visit her��� yesterday? Only yesterday. Less than a day in truth. 

After the night last it felt like a fortnight between the night and day or at least more than a few hours had passed between when they had spoken in private about the betrothals and now. Now Daemon was threatening to undo that work.

Led astray. How in the seven could he say such a thing? 

Was it not they, Viserys, her father, and Daemon himself rather than the Hightowers who were the reason why they were in this mess?

 They were Targaryens, Velaryons, it was they who made the rules, they who ruled. Had they not been led astray by their egos and ambition for it?  

Perhaps it was a bit cruel of her to add him into the lot, true Daemon had a right to be weary after the chaos that ensued in the wee hours of the morn and before that. 

He and the hand had always been at odds. Her husband was not an easy man and that uneasiness extended to Otto Hightower, but she knew the discord between them was not all his doing. The man excluded him whenever and wherever he could. Council meetings, political dealings, trade arguments, and the running of the kingdom. Taking a special kind of joy in it. 

It was not all malicious. There was a practicality in it. A reason for his methods. For the callousness of it all. Pushing him further and further away from the position he so coveted. There could only be one man at the king's side. Or at least that is how they saw things. A king only had one hand after all. 

Ser Otto had seen to it that the man was him and not the king's brother, even driving out her father in the process of trying to remove her husband from being in Viserys sphere of influence, but he was being utterly ridiculous now.

She had made the deal with Alicent. Not her father. He would’ve never agreed to it. He wanted this no more than Daemon. Mayhaps less, for this arrangement would mean a yielding of sorts, a yielding of the power which he hoarded for himself.  

Alicent only wished for the power to protect her children. Not power for power's sake. There was no harm in letting their girl see the boy, by the Gods, she would be with her and she’d never let their girl be harmed or abused. Alicent would not harm her and most certainly Aemond would not seek to lay a hand or a word against her.  

The boy was not his grandsire. He was not a malicious spiteful creature. He was not some viper waiting in the dead of night at the ready to strike and take what he held dear away from him.  

He may come from one, but he was not a Hightower. He was a Targaryen as his father was before him. The same as Baela, Rhaena, and Aemon. More importantly, he was a child. Nothing more than a child with a child’s wants and regards. 

He could have shown more tact and forth thought in his quest, but painful as it may be, she could not fault him for claiming Seasmoke when he had. It was as if the chance of claiming him would present and Laenor was gone. Buried at the bottom of the sea and never to ride his beloved mount again, but that slender gray beast that he loved so much was very much alive and a dragon would have its rider. 

He was never to not go unclaimed, no one expected that. None could expect that.

Rhaena had wanted him. They all knew that. Twas she who had wished to claim her brother's dragon for her own and therefore it was her opinion and her option alone which Laena cared for on the subject, but their girl was not upset by what was done.

A dragon chooses his master just as much as the master chooses him. Seasmoke had chosen Aemond from forces higher than they were to understand or know as mere mortal men made of flesh and blood. Seasmoke was without a rider The boy had done no wrong in claiming him. He was not spiteful in his doing. He was not petty, certainly not to his uncle or to his cousins, or no matter how some of them may feel about his claim. They had dragons of their own after all and the deed had already been done. 

He was a Targaryen and had done as a Targaryen would. He had only taken what he wanted.

Only took what was his and he had hurt no one doing so. had paid the price with blood chiefly his own. 

He did not even behave like his father whom her husband loathed and loved so much. Though mayhaps he’d like him better if he was. Mayhaps he would like him better if he was like those other boys who were so favored by his brother. If he had his love he might learn to love the boy himself or he might admire him even if he could see himself in him there was more than enough between them to decipher their similarities, but that did not matter. It did not matter if he liked the boy or loved him. 

Rhaena mattered it was her wants, her needs, and her feelings that were most important and if she was this despondent it could only do her good to see him. Could he not see that? See that she was suffering? That she was wanting? It was such a small thing and they could give it to her. An inconsequential thing. There was no harm in it or inconvenience. Absolutely no harm in letting her see the boy. 

“Will I marry cousin Aegon?” Baela asked. Snapping her mother from her thoughts. Her brown face now graced the expression her mother wished to make as her father glared at the word cousin though this line of questioning appeared to not anger him so.

She poked her lip out and crossed her arms as she asked. Waiting for some kind of answer that her father could not ignore. She would have stamped her feet in indignation if she had been standing. Impatient girl she was.

“For now.” The words were clipped. Strained as if containing a growl. Two simple words a pain to the lips they had broken free of.  

It was not a no at least. It was the best that one could hope for given the circumstances. It was indeed something that Laena could work with. For now could easily turn into a yes when the time came. When he had seen the benefit. And really who else was Baela to marry? Some Andal lord from halfway across the continent? A foreign prince? One of her brother's sons?

Hardly likely on all accounts. Each one was more disagreeable than the last and the last was downright unbearable. The thought that she could make her torturer happy by doing so—

She would rather fling herself into the sea below them with a chain of iron around her ankle and join her dearly departed brother than fold to her cousin turned nieces ravenous entreaties.

They had already made enough concessions to one greedy cousin with Aemon and the unborn babe in Hazel Hearte’s belly or the next one after that if this one proved ill-fated for whatever reason. Though Laena almost had half a mind to climb upon Vhagars back, take flight down to Storm's End, and make a proposal to the great oaf whom her mother happened to share blood with. 

By all accounts her Baratheon cousin's plentiful lot, five of them to count and still yet growing, were fine young girls, unlike their bullheaded father. He had a little one who was only a year or two older than Aemon. In due course, she would turn into a perfectly well-bred lady worthy of the title lady of the tides as her great aunt's wife. Borros certainly could do worse than a dragonrider and the lord of the wealthiest house in the seven kingdoms with the largest fleet at his command for a good son. The brother of the future queen. He should be so grateful.

It would be an honor for a second daughter much less for a fifth one and it would certainly help mend the rift between their respective clans, but a promise had already been made. Or as good as one. 

No matter how odious the man was whom they had made that promise to, and what great distress he had lent his hand to a promise was a promise. Laena would not go back upon the unspoken agreement just to satisfy her pettiness and there would be no good in it besides extracting some quest of revenge that was entirely unnecessary. Not that revenge was never justified, and most certainly was not in this case, but Daeron could easily be brought to heel the same as any other man. His wants were as redundant and common as the rest and his anger though temperamental and prone to brashness. 

However, Rhaenyra’s requests were not as common and rudimentary as mere men and their petty demands. She wanted and she wanted and still wanted more.

Twas not enough to accept. That would never be the She would take a whiff and latch, a bit, whatever they would concede to her and latch like the wild dragons when. she’d devour her whole if she could. She wanted to devour her until, but there had been nothing to find. Her shield was impenetrable. 

She and more importantly Daemon had made so much as a hint of such an agreement to her brother's widow and her litter. Laena had seen with her own eyes that ridiculous letter she had sent, turned into ash by his hand a fortnight ago. Last night he had not gone to see her. Even if he had not done as he had, Laena would never make good on those promises or fold to her antics and it seemed neither would Baela.

Their girl hadn't been quieted by her father's word as he had hoped. No, they had only spurred her inquisition on. 

“Who shall Rhaena marry? She can not marry Aemon,” Her mouth curled down in disgust as she looked down at the babe in her sister's hold at the prospect. A look she was sure she mirrored. Pulling the blanket wrapped around her tighter she felt a chill going up her spine as she tried to banish the thought away. “He is too little and she can not marry the other boy that cousin Rhaenyra wishes her to.” 

The other boy. Laena wanted to cackle at that, but she knew Daemon would take it as a sign that she had been tired out and the children would be sent back to the nursery. She couldn’t have that so she hid placing a kiss on the crown of Rhaena’s locks.  

Baela knew good and well who the other boy was, but there was a great deal of comfort in her not naming him. The Gods knew how much the Valyrian lady took comfort in her not naming it. Naming meant something. A name meant personhood. They were more than just some faceless figures. A name meant a connection. 

She did not know any of her cousins well or at all for that matter, but she had managed to name Aegon and Aemond even if she did not, but he, her brother's son, was the other boy. 

“He is not Uncle Laenors son,” Baela continued, turning to her with that dignified expression which did not quite fit her years. “He is a bastard. They are all bastards, are they not muna?” 

She was right of course, more right than Laena would say or than he would admit. Aegon had been right with his assessment of his half-nephew's true parentage. One needed only to gaze upon and then back at the Velaryons and Targaryens scattered about Hide Tide to know they were not as they should be. No true Velaryon would have hair the color of raven feathers, eyes the color of the sky, or noses so common that one could place them anywhere. 

Saints above there were low-born bastards in King's Landing on the streets of Flea Bottom or Hull as common as could be who looked more Valyrian than they. Their mothers were whores or the daughters and wives sailors and shopkeepers and yet they had still managed to inherit the visage of Old Valyria

Like black rams among a flock of sheep. It was more than obvious what Laenor’s sons were not sired by him. 

But saying the words out loud, confirming who they were, she could not bring herself to admit to it. 

Regardless of which loins they had sprung from, they had been Laenors. He claimed them as his own. Watched over them. Cared for them. 

He was not perfect, it was not an easy thing, but he loved them. 

Mayhaps not as much as she loved her children. Laena often wondered if men were even capable of that kind of love, but it was love, and those boys loved him in return.

 It would be almost sacrilegious to not acknowledge it. To disrespect that bond that was not her own or hers to comment upon with Laenor rotting at the bottom of the sea so she froze. 

Her mouth gaping open and closed like a fish. Gasping for air as she stuttered. Her brain scrambled for a reply that was appropriate to the girl who had started to smirk beneath what she supposed passed as a pious brown face, but in reality made her all the more impish.  

It was little wonder why then that seemed to be the extent of her husband's patience.    

A hand rubbed into his brow as he let out a huff of breath. Laena wondered if he'd send the girl for a nap to end her prattling. Thankfully one of the guards, the same boy which he had posted outside their door, knocked upon it and let in one of the serving boys clutching something tightly between sweaty fingers. 

Twas a note from her father. Summoning Daemon for some matter which he was urgently needed by the way he spoke with a flurry and by the lines and deep furrows that grew upon his face when he had stepped away into the sitting room to deal with the matter. His animation increased by the second the boy had not been deterred by his barking focused upon the task of getting her husband to heed her fathers message.

The Stepstones if she had to guess the topic of it from the near silent hisses and from the sliver left by the door halfway shut. 

Daemon had whispered into her ear when they had exhausted themselves last night. A thought which she had to bite her bottom lip to distract herself as she felt her face grow flush with heat. 

It had been a pleasant night. A very pleasant morning, she could almost feel his skin upon hers, his breath ghosting the shell of her ear, and taste the sweetness of his tongue upon her, but the memory of their love making faded with the taste of something more than the bitterness of the lemon cakes upon her tongue when she recalled what would be in that note. 

War. The call of the battlefield. That bloody business of men which her father was about to thrust himself within. A necessary evil some men would say how they would rationalize it, but that was not what this was. 

Twas his way out of all of this. His escape from dealing with what had happened with Laenor. Which had almost happened to her. He wanted away.

She knew he loved her. That he loved and still loved her brother despite his frustrations with what he felt were his deficiencies as a man. There was no doubt that her mother was the very center of his world. It was not a question of love or his paternal or martial devotion, but her father had never been any good at dealing with his emotions and Laenor’s passing pushed him into the depths of them. 

War he knew. A life at sea, with his ships, his crews and his generals traversing the vastness of that sea, journeying to distant lands, ready to take on any foe they might face was what he knew best. What he could deal with.

He was a seaman through and through. Those waters beyond Driftmarks shores were his second home and in many regards his first.  

With a sword in hand everything was as it should be. The fractured pieces mending. The blood and the sweat one poured into battle was what he could wrap his mind round. 

War had a way of simplifying things. Of making the complicated uncomplicated. It was primal. Raw. life stripped down and bare. The fight for survival and nothing more was all second nature. Comfort. Twas a comfort to Daemon too. 

The carnage, the chaos, and the death that would follow it. 

Their playing fields were different of course. The skies were Daemon’s domain just as the seas were her fathers, but the principal was the same and they had the bond of brotherhood in arms flowing through them. That camaraderie which seemed to bind men to each other. It occurred to her then that her father would call upon that bond to bring her husband with him back by his side. 

Did he wish to leave her too? Go to what he knew best. Go back to a place where she didn’t make demands of him. Where the only obligation was to keep himself alive. Otherwise he could do as he pleased without having his wife breathe down on him. The threat of self implosion reflected back in a brown haze that muddied everything it touched. Did he wish that? 

War or not it did not look as if he did not wish to leave. He almost looked pained to have left her side with only the distance of a few feet separating him. Snapping at the poor boy in his company while his sight turned to her. She felt her breath lighten when she met his eyes. 

Laena couldn’t bear the thought if he had turned away from her. If his eyes were alight with the call to war and not with an apology in their emeralds depths. If he had not dismissed the serving boy with another bark that sent him trembling, scurrying back to her father with his reply. He joined them again with heavy steps and a sigh. 

“Eat something for your mother,” Daemon bent down to place a kiss Rhaena’s head in his hands when he reached them. Bending down to place.

He had not looked this exhausted since Laena had awoken. She could not help feeling a pull within her chest when she saw the hard edge of his jaw softening at their girl.

For her part Rhaena did not lean into his affection. Growing stiff when he placed a kiss into her curls. It threw her husband off kilter. His movements grew uncertain. Arms laying stiffly at his side as if he did not know quite what to do with her rejection. 

It was a rare thing for her to receive his attentions. They were almost exclusively reserved for her sister and now Aemon, but today he had given it all to her. If she had been in better spirits she would have lapped it up beaming with a halo around her, but now that affection was like the taste of dirt. Soiled and unwanted. 

He turned, but she could only answer him with a small shrug and a softening of her gaze. Petting the girl to calm her. She could not blame her for the small act of defiance. Not after everything. Now then, before. She was a child. Their child, and she could not blame her for snuggling closer into her embrace while she turned her back to her father. 

The tension in her small body only left when her Daemon had hastily moved on to place a kiss upon the downy head of her brother and then Baela who clung to him where she. Wrapping her little arms around his head to return his affection before he pulled away to repeat his goodbye to Laena. 

“Send for Bess if the little monsters wear you out.” The cod in his voice let some of unease dissipate from the room as his lips ghosted her temple. Eyes drifting over to the silver haired girl sporting a pout and winked at her as she huffed in good natured exasperation.

He was trying at least. Trying for her. for them even if that trying would take a while and never wash away the stain of the bruises embedded within them, he was trying. 

The door had barely been shut, Daemon hardly left from earshot when Baela renewed the conversation. Not quite yet willing to let the situation of betrothals and betrotheds be put to rest. 

“He said I would be queen,” She had her eyes upon her brother in her hold as she reached out a hand to pet him. The corners of her eyes and mouth twitched in amusement when he nuzzled his head into her palm. She was growing better with him. Gentler. In the same way she was when she and Rhaena had been little and she had taken to her role as elder sister like a fish  to water. 

Mayhaps she had taken her fathers words to heart and seen sense not to cause her mother further distress with her sister occupying her plate, or rather she did not wish to destress her with sibling quarrels and  thought the continuation of this subject was a more suitable distraction.

Laena was more than grateful for the ceasefire of hostility. She would have marveled at it. Wanted to coo at it. Even with Rhaena longing, they were safe.

 All her children were safe and sound and she was with them. Her eyes watering as she smiled. She had grown ever so sentimental since she had awoken, every moment all the more precious when one nearly joins the Gods but she kept her endearments close at heart. Part because she did not wish to spoil the moment and part because of the words which Baela spoke.  

“He said it was my birthright.” 

“Do you wish to be queen?” Laena stiffened as she recalled a conversation not dissimilar from this one with her own mother shifting so she could brush loc away from the girl's face, but she had never been asked such a thing then. She had been told who she was and what she was destined for. She was to be queen and that was that. 

She was barely older than Baela was now. Only a girl of two and ten. Still yet to receive her first moonblood. Her mother, but there had never become anything of that. She was not destined to be a queen when it was all said and done. 

The only thing which she had become was the Sealords son. A consolation prize and a poor one at that. She could not say that she was upset. Oh the lord had been rich enough and had collected land aplenty to match his fortune, yet his son left much to be desired and soon that fortune went to dust. 

Mayhaps she should say she felt some grief when he had been slain at Daemon's hand, but she would be lying if she admitted to feeling such. 

It was cruel, but Laena had wanted rid of the boy who bored her to the point where she considered picking out her nails just for some excitement. 

She had wanted to be Daemon’s when he asked for her hand. Wanted it more than anything else. 

Her father had liked him and her mother did not put up much of a fight when she realized her pleas would fall upon deaf ears, but she was a child. A girl who had yet to have her six tenth name day. A sheltered girl who had never left the company of her parents, her brother, her septa, and her cousins. A girl who had not known what the world was, much less her place in it. She did not know she had choices. 

Her girls would have that at least. That she had promised to them and herself. A choice. As much of one she could give them. 

“Yes,” she said simply.

I had wanted that. I had not even questioned when my mother said I would be queen. A queen. The queen. Even to a girl was a hard thing to pass on and an even harder thing for her to understand. For a queen was more than just a title and crown. A queen was beholden to the king. Who that king was made all the difference. 

“Even if it is Aegon’s queen?” Queen she may be but only the wife of a king. She would have power, but only the power which he gave her. She would never hold more power than him. Dependent upon the whims of her husband. 

True enough there would be worse boys to be betrothed to than her cousin. Boys unfit for her. Cruel boys. Men even. Men who had far removed from her boyhood who would want her. The likes of the Lannister twins who had yet to find wives or Lord, Celtigars eldest son. All older than she and the former were rather solipsistic from what she could recall.

Aegon had his merits there. Even though the distance seemed vast now There were not too many years separating them. He was a boy at least the same as her. An gluttonness boy, blinded by greed and vice, he was not a cruel boy. Nor a selfish one. He had been willing to take the blame for his mother. 

Of course there was the issue of his drunkenness, but he was young. Young enough hopefully to curb the worst of it and stop it before it took hold of him and left nothing to salvage the same. Young enough hopefully to mold into a decent enough husband where his and in a large regard his uncle had failed. However, once that crown was placed upon his head it was a gamble of what he would become. The Iron Throne had a way of changing the men who occupied it, even those surrounding it.

Aegon claimed that the crown was her birthright and he was to give it to her, but it would simply not be her crown. Not truly. She would bear the title queen and bore him sons but Baela would be at his whim. She would have to fold to whatever demands he made of her the same as any other subject. That was the cost of her birthright. 

 A queen was not simply the queen. One could never fool themselves into thinking that. 

However, to credit to her Baela the question laid before her some more consideration, beginning anew with some hesitation. Mulling over her speech with careful deliberation. 

“Yes.” Her head was held high again, nose pointed in the air in a rather dignified manner that made it hard to doubt her conviction. “He is not intolerable. Once one gets past the smell of the ale.” She looked older than a girl of nine with that manner of speech.  

Gaining her confidence with each word she spoke. “He is not like his father. He will need help.” As did Viserys though the man did have as they all. “Lots of help and I shall birth the next king,” she looked more than happy at that. Her smile stretched from ear to ear. “It will not be a burden muna. You need not worry.”

Laena burst into laughter at the wide grin on Baela’s face, all too pleased with the level of maturity of that answer and making it all the more comical for her muna in the place of the observer of such behavior. 

She could not keep the genuine mirth she felt from radiating out in that moment nor did she think she should. Oh how she had It even earned a twinkle albeit a small one from Rhaena as she hid it behind the crook of her arm she rested her head upon. 

Her eldest might have her father's stubbornness and temperament, but mayhaps Daemon was right that she had inherited her sensibilities as well. She would need them sooner than she'd like to think. 

Her mother came in not long after for tea as she had so promised. Rhaenys Targaryen almost immediately took up the task of trying to coax Rhaena from her melancholy, regaling her with stories of her own childhood, but her efforts proved to be just the same as the rest. The girl's mood remained steady as the rise and set of the sun. It was clear with each passing attempt that the battle was all but lost. 

“She wishes to see Aemond.” Baela whispered to her grandmother as she helped herself to a lemon cake her sister refused to touch. Chewing with her mouth open, most decidedly unladylike, but Laena could not find the will to scold her for it. It was rather endearing despite the lack of manners. It was nice to see the child that she still very much was underneath the airs which she put on and the pure joy she felt towards the sweet. 

She liked them as much as the younger girl, but being the gracious elder sister duty bound she always let her have most of the lot. Nothing stopped her now though she had not given into greed. “Kepa will not let her.” 

Laena turned to Rhaena who had handed Aemon back to her. Taking a seat at the window as she stared out. Watching the dragons fly around freer than Rhaena restricted by Daemon and his rules.

It came from a good place. She knew it did. Stubborn and prideful as he was he was trying, but her feelings were worth more than his pride. Why should they listen   to that ego when she was this way? No she could not placate him now at the expense of their girl. 

“Kepa is not here.” What he does not know will not hurt him, she convinced herself. Besides, Laena would tell him—in due course. What was done When Rhaena was well again and they had enough sense and proof that taking her to see her cousin was decidedly not a danger to her and was more alluring to taking her for a ride upon Caraxes she would tell him. 

What other choice did she have?

Rhaena would never improve like this. This lifeless creature she had been turned to. Why not give the girl what she wanted? Alicent had not meant her harm and most certainly Aemond would not.   

She called one of the serving boys who had brought in their tea over with a wave of her injured hand while continuing to rock Aemon with the other. “Fetch my cousin Damieon.” He owed her. Of course it was not exactly he who had anything to do with her maiming, but he would be more than willing to make up for where his brother had to trampled over. 

Laena received a raised brow from her mother at more than just her pick of escort, but she ignored it. Focusing her attention on her youngest daughter who looked more lively than she had a minute past. 

“Come Rhaena,” the girl scrambled to her feet with such speed she had nearly knocked the tea service. Big brown eyes full of unshed. Reaching out a hand towards her mother until she put when her 

“Perhaps I should take her to see the boy and his mother.” Laena did not miss the way the last word caught in the back of her mothers throat nor the strain in her expression. Mouth thinned to a line and hazel eyes darting and narrowing at her bandaged hand and then back to meet her gaze that was glazed with flames. 

It was an expression she knew well. A maternal sort. A protective sort. The kind that growled, bared its teeth and dared anyone who so much as breathed in her direction, with a bark of fire. It made her feel as though she were a child again in need of protection from the ghost and phantom creatures under her bed coming to torment her in the dead of the night. Except that shape now took form in one Hightower queen, but she did not need protection from the source of her mothers wrath.   

Oh there could be no doubt that her mother had liked Alicent. Rhaenys Targaryen would never make a deal with someone she did not like, or someone which she thought was a danger to her children and grandchildren at the least. However, if one were to make it past their guards burst through her chambers and ask her who she held in high regard, the Hightower queen would be at the bottom of that list of people she was fond of at the moment. She would come around in time. Stubborn yes, but she was not unreasonable unlike some, but they did not have the time to wait. 

The kings party would be gone back to King's Landing  in a few hours and with it their chance to remedy this

Twas now or the Gods knew when. Whenever that was it would be too late. Daemon would see to it that distance was permanent. She'll forget about him by the end of the moon Laena, he would tell her. Whisper it into her ear as he had before the morning's light greeted them. All too sure of himself that he knew what was best for their girl and in all likelihood he would be right. 

She moped now, but Aemond and Rhaena did not know one another. It truly wouldn’t take much for her to forget about him and think of him no more than wave that came and went. Distractions were easy enough to come by. One trip to Dragonstone an egg placed by her side and her childish fancy would be gone as if it had never been. Daemon would make sure that was the end of it. A dragon's word was final, but he was not the only dragon which she had to contend with, not the most pressing one at that moment. 

Baratheon pride in full swing her mother was already sitting up from where she had settled when Laena reached for her. The corners of her mouth perked up and her eyes softened as she tried her best to stop her from protesting further. 

“Baela has exhausted herself.” She did not look at all convinced, but Baela seemed to catch onto her plans. Making little sighs as she yawned. Bringing her hand up to her face in mock stifling as if that was not  good enough.  

She was not a natural born actress, but she tried leaning on her grandmother to feign the appearance of sleepiness while Laena pleaded her case. “I would take her, but it is quite cruel to take her and she does so enjoy her grandmother’s company.”

Laena practically tied herself into knots as she begged her mother with a smile which she hoped reached her dark orbs. Relax. Light, keep your voice light and free of your emotion, she told herself. She will not give in if she thinks you have reached your limit. “We shall only be in the west tower and Daemion shall be with us.” 

Please listen. Please.         

She did not have it in her to fight this battle. She didn’t want to admit it, but she was still quite tired. Exhausted in fact. The birth of Aemon had taken most of her energy and what little she had gained over the past moon and a fortnight was nearly gone now from the swipe of Viserys blade, but Rhaena needed this. She needed her. 

For Rhaena she would don her robes, leave the comfort of her bed and the warmth of her bed to venture into the den of Greens. The den of vipers as Daemon would call them.

What mother would not do that and more for their children? Never mind her own aches, Laena would not be deterred from it no matter how exhausted she felt. She was not truly hurt anyway. Just exhausted and that was no excuse for her to remain cooped up resting upon her laurels in these chambers.

Her mother must have known that there would be no amount of arguing that would change her mind or she wished not to distress her or Rhaena further. Sheletgo of her hand with a pat when Daemion appeared in the doorway. The one perk to everyone treating her as if she were an invalid.

Her cousin must have sprinted to her chamber for he was more than slightly out of breath as he greeted them with a nod barely manhunt to get out the words my lady cousin and lady aunt and a pensive expression, awaiting instruction. 

“Send the boy my regards.” Her mother fixed herself back upon the settee. She caught Daemon’s, but hazel eyes shifted their focus back onto Laena. That steely gaze sharp as Valyrian steel as it bore into her. “If she starts to look faint, bring her back here. Even if she attempts to persuade you otherwise.”

Her cousin looked rather weary of the possibility of being charged with such a task and having to face the wrath of one mother dragon and likely another angry dragon and a great sealord if he failed at it, but he simply nodded his head. Not daring to open his mouth to question her command. Gifting Rhaena a sheepish smile instead. One for which Laena was exceedingly glad of it. 

A kiss was brushed onto Baela’s cheek and one on her mothers while she ignored the hazel eyes still boring into her own and they were off leaving a trail of skirts in their wake. 

The walk was a silent one. The distance between the guest quarters and their tower was not particularly lengthy, but it was long enough to get her bearings about her and for her mind to wonder.

Absent-mindedly her un-injured hand went to the banaged one. Rubbing it as she stared down at nothing in particular. Too preoccupied to notice anything in front of her. Her mind festered with slivers of voices, shouts, screams. Every step drawing them closer. 

Even with her mind clouded with her own little worries and anxiousness to see her cousin Rhaena noticed for the little hand that was in hers gave a small squeeze. Smiling up at her it reminded her of Daemon.  

Returning it in kind, Stilling herself and finding strength in it. She had no reasons to be nervous. It was she who had been the injured party even if that injury had been intended to her. Alicent owed her a debt  It was she who agreed to Alicents deal and would continue to do so.

Two guards, a kingsguard and one of the household guards were posted outside the doors of the guest quarters where Alicents chamber lay. Ser Criston was absent, but Laena suspected the man could be found behind those doors next to the queen. The guards let her in without much fuss. Without a word in fact.  Simply stepping back to their posts when the iron creeped as they crossed the threshold. That too she surmised was the queens doing.

It was a good thing that she expected their visit, Laena told herself. It was hope. Hope that things were not so bad in the light of day as they had been in the dark of night.

She had held onto hope too. Letting it guide her here. Turning around to face them before one of the servants could fully announce their arrival as had Aemond. The boy Rhaena did and she was off by the boys side. Her mother who she had clung to just moments past forgotten in favor of her cousin. If this was a vipers nest she had seemed to find a home among them.

“I tried to call upon you, but your guard—”Alicent had reached out a pale hand lined with rings, but stopped herself when her brown eyes caught sight of the bandages on her arm. That hand hung motionless in the air, but Laena would not have. Meeting her the rest of the way. Taking her hand in hers and placing a sisterly pat upon. 

“My husbands doing,” and my own, but she did not need to know that. At any rate it was not as if she was purposely trying to exclude the Hightower queen. She only just wished to be left alone. The doors to her chambers were barred to all. Maesters orders. Twas nothing to be ashamed of or apologize for.  

Not wanting to dwell on it a moment longer or let the tension fester, she added the truth to ease Alicent’s  mind, “Rhaena wished to see your boy.” Her darling girl had begged for it. Refused nourishment for it, refused to even let her own mother comfort her, but all seemed well now. 

“How is Aegon?” Alicent had not had time to school her features when she had frowned at the question. Then again the woman appeared to her an open book. Biting her lip or worrying her hands whenever she appeared in distress which was quite often from what little she had observed.  

“With my father—he—he has calmed down.” Her eyes flitted over the light chamber. Dark pools searching for something. Someone in her hesitation. Her breath hitched when she met another brown gaze who had been standing sentinel at the children’s side instead of where he ought to be standing guard near the door.

Queen and knight were drawn together as if he too had been searching her out rather than merely executing his duties. 

Laena cataloged that exchange, which could not have lasted more than a few seconds, somewhere in the back of her mind for safekeeping, not letting the sight of them take up her attention. However, she did note in that moment that the Dornish man showed the anger the anger must have felt with her eldest which was stifled under a mask of grace and sorrow. 

What he had calmed down from went without saying. Hosed down and laid to dry out was the appropriate word for it considering last night. Shame it was for someone so young and in such a state of ruin upon himself. 

A light blush overtook the queen's pale face when she noticed her audience. Clearing her throat as she composed herself or tried to. 

“How is Baela?” Her brows knitted together as she gazed off at the door swallowing the lump in her throat with a smile that did not reach her eyes painted her face. Mayhaps she should’ve brought her, but it would have been unwise. 

The girl did not hold her tongue and would likely say something about last night or her betrothal that she would have to apologize for and there needn’t  be any more apologizes she would like to make. 

There was no need for what ifs. Laena wanted to put the woman at ease before her. 

“As long as her sister is well she is well.” Well indeed by the looks of it.

Laena spied a glance at her girl over Alicent’s shoulder. Rhaena and Aemond had been joined by Helaena. The pale girl had placed a spider into her hands.

She did not think she could be so calm had it been her hand. She would have flung the creature halfway across the room and recoiled against the wall in hopes that would end it, but Rhaena seemed content with her present circumstance. Letting the spindly thing crawl around her palm as if it were a pet and not a pest. It seemed to bring a smile on Aemond’s face as he watched the two girls. 

“They will be happy.” It came out without her meaning to. Thinking out loud she supposed. It was the first bout of respite from worry she had for the better part of the morning. Her tongue had loosened along with her mind from it.  

Mayhaps it was too soon to tell. Mayhaps she should keep it to herself. Bit her tongue, dug her nails into her stitches, or stubbed her foot, to stop herself from saying so. Mayhaps she should even discourage it. 

They were so very young. Younger than Alicent when she had married the king. Younger even than when her own father had tried offering her to that same man. 

They had scarcely two years between them. That was much better than any of them.  

Though it would become immaterial by the time Baela reached Aegon's age, even they had six years between them. It showed now with Aegon on the cusp of manhood at nearly six and ten and Baela just giving up her dolls, but there was little difference between a boy of ten and a girl of eight. 

Aemond had yet to grow hair upon his chest and Rhaena was far from bleeding, but the color had returned to Aemonds face and the light in her eyes. They both looked happy. Content. 

They liked each other and by all accounts it was a good match. A fine match. An excellent match. No matter all Daemons posturing and objections, Aemond was a prince. He was a Targaryen. A second son yes, but Laena did not think that Viserys would be so cruel as to deny him a keep of his own nor would Aegon go back upon this promise when he took the throne. 

Someplace in the Crownlands perhaps? The Reach? It was far, but Rhaena would love the greenery. Or perhaps one of the smaller isles that remained unoccupied between here and dragonstone. Regardless, it would be a place to grow and fill their halls with the patter of little feet and childish totterings, that is when the time came away and childhood had gone. 

There was also the business of them being cousins rather than siblings. That most certainly didn’t hurt. It most certainly helped the Hightower queen. 

Of course she knew what family she had married into. it was custom for one to marry brother to sister in their  family. One must keep the bloodline pure. Had Aemon been born sooner or had Rhaena or Baela the two would have already been betrothed to each other. 

Cousins were a last resort. Not ideal, but better than thinning the blood with those who were not fit to hold the title of husband or wife of a Targaryen. 

House Velaryon, her birth house, would usually get that honor when times were desperate enough. They were Valyrian. Had enough, but even with the edition of House Velaryon. The family had always been rather small, but that had changed of late. There had been plenty of cousins and marriages with them. 

She and Daemon were cousins, yes, but he was old enough to be her father. He treated her like a father sometimes with his chastisements. Shame to say she didn’t always mind it when he got that way. It was safe. Comforting even. Affection. Anyway she could get it. She had wanted him, she was bred for it, but she was not an oblivious child. could not ignore that. 

Lanea was sure that Alicent liked the fact that she would not have to marry her sons to her daughter. Twas a queer custom the other houses never took to. The Hightowers in particular seemed less than enthused to follow their foreign rulers in their strange ways. Even the seven only tolerated it. A mere necessary evil. A necessary compromise. 

Their rulers after all were more Gods than men. 

They had dragons to prove it, to show for it,  that required it, but the practice should not be repeated throughout the seven kingdoms. Not by common men. Not when it led to such unwelcome outcomes and if one were to be truthful, though they may be more Gods than men, the outcomes were not always favorable for them either. 

Mayhaps they should end that practice. There were more than enough cousins to go around now. Cousins would do. Velaryons and Targaryens alike. 

The bloodline need not suffer for it. Their  bond with their mints did not have to suffer for it. The bloodline mayhaps be better off for it. Healthier for it. There was so much sickness. So much madness that went about.

There was something not quite right with so many of them.  

Daemon liked to call Daenys mad. They would not be here without her, would have perished with the rest of the old country, but she had been odd even by the standards of their house. Had balked, face turning white as a ghost and then setting to marble when Laena had suggested the name when she had been heavy with Rhaena. She had not brought it up when Aemon was in her belly and thankfully she hadn’t, but were other names shrouded with the madness that plagued their house.

Maegor was undoubtedly mad. His brother was a weakling he would’ve never been long for the world even if he had succumbed to the weight of the crown. Then there was Viserys with all his ailments. His mother Princess Alyssa had died trying to birth another boy for her great uncle. That boy had not even made it to his first name day before he joined his mother.

Rhaenyra’s grandmother had been a halfwit or as good as one. In all regards she should not have been married off her constitution too delicate for it and the business that would follow. Her daughter fared no better. The late queen consort had lost all her babes save her late cousin. 

Her grandmother, a hardy Baratheon lady, had only been able to have her mother. She had tried to give her, but her womb never quickened once her mother had left from it. Her mother did not suffer as she had, but Laena could recall once when she had been little and her father. There had been no babes save her cousins that graced Hide Tide after that. 

All her babes were tiny things. Even Baela, who had been her most robust babe, was such a little thing. Daemon had even confessed to her when she was still in that he was afraid he might break her if he held her for too long. Then there was the difficulty of birthing those babes. Of Aemon. How that had nearly broken her. 

Mayhaps they would be happier without the pressures and strain of having to marry someone whom you shared a womb with. Or at least less madness, misery, and strife could come about from it.

There would be many moons, before anything could come of that happiness, babes included Gods willing, but it was rather obvious. With the way that they leaned upon the other. How it was not a pretty sight, raw and red for and lined with stitches, but Rhaena not a bit afraid of the damage done. 

With their shy beams and the sweet little kiss Rhaena had placed upon his reddened cheeks flush with a blush that she, Alicent, Ser Criston, Daemion who was helping himself to a bit of cider and cheese, pretended to not see while Helaena prattled on about her six-legged friends and how they were almost as good a friend as her dragon Dreamfyre. 

They would make each other happy. Very happy. 

“They will be.” At last the queen was at ease. Returning her grin. Her first true smile. 

The sound of footsteps coming from the hall pulled them away from pleasant musings. Standing in the chamber's archway Ser Otto Hightower had arrived at last with Aegon and the new Lord of Harrenhal. 

The latter looked more startled to see her than she did him. The my lady and bow he gave her was stiff as a wooden plank, and the smile did not touch his eyes. Downcast doleful, unimpressed by what they gazed at. They  reminded her of some of the hounds her uncle had liked to keep for hunts. They were famed for their dullness, but they lacked conviction in their ability to completely conceal his emotions.

She could imagine that he would have begun to grind his teeth if he thought she would not take notice of it, but she would not let his dour face ruin her mood. He could look sour all he liked, she was not his enemy, and in a handful of years time, they would be family. He would learn to live with it. Laena supposed she should be grateful because his presence was benign in comparison to another pair of eyes she felt upon her. She met that stare and regretted it the instant she had.

One would think he would have shifted his gaze to the wall or when he had been caught as he had strike up a conversation to shift away from his gaffe, but Ser—Lord, she had to remind herself that he was a lord now, Lord Larys Strong did not behave as a man who had been caught doing something he knew social propriety would dictate he beg pardon for. He kept on staring as if nothing was amiss.

Laena would not have paid the man any mind, never mind that it was not his place to be here during this private matter. Would not even have minded if he had feigned ignorance as if he had not been focusing upon her, but that stare. It was unnerving. His person was unnerving. 

It was not his affliction that unnerved. On the contrary, his foot, the limp, and his hunched gait from said affliction was the least odd thing about him, but pity for him was far from her mind when she met his stare. 

He wore neither a smile nor a frown, the expression was nearly innocuous. It should stir no emotions. One should not think, but there was something wrong in it. Something that made her blood turn to ice the more she kept up their contest of stares. That every expression held. Like it knew more than whatever neutrality it tried to claim. 

Laena would have thought she had given into paranoia, she was more prone to that these days or she was far more observant than before. However Daemion had begun to eye the man with much suspicion between sneaking morsels of food and avoiding the pet which Helaena was trying to thrust upon him. 

No, her eyes did not deceive her. 

If there were any vipers, any snakes among them anywhere within this room it was he.

Trying to mask the shudder that crawled up her spine and wanting to escape those pale eyes which followed her, Laena turned to Aegon. 

The boy looked as if his spirits had returned to him from the day last. Eyes no longer reddened by whatever he had consumed. The alcohol was gone from his body. They were a nice color. Not the rich brown of his mothers, but darker than his fathers pallid shade that showed the sickness within. Livelier still than his grandsire's dull shade, the man she had decided was all clouds of gray. 

His were more like his younger brothers. Clear and calm like the sky on a bright morn.

He did look tired. Dark circles and shadows lined his face, but true to Alicent’s word he was fully conscious of his surroundings. Sobriety was a much more appropriate look for a boy his age. 

“Baela sends her regards nephew.” She would look at her as mad as Ser Otto looked at his daughter right now if she were here beside her, but she was  thankfully tucked safely away in her chambers with her mother and Aemon. 

The boy nodded his head aimlessly. Up and down like an empty bottle floating on the sea's surface. His eyes darted from where his mother stood behind her. Discretion was something he seemed to share with her girl if Laena had to guess or bet a crown upon his query. “Is the child—lady Baela,” catching himself, his Adam’s Apple bobbed in his throat when he gazed over at the spot she had last seen Ser Criston residing. “My cousin, is she well?”

“Quite well, rest assured.” He nodded again. That cork-like nod as he walked over to where the rest of the children resided. They were getting on sowell. 

They chattered away for sometime, Laena made it a point to remain as far away from Lord Larys as possible as did Alicent who stuck close to her side while avoiding the eyes of the viper. 

A band of refreshments were sent for while the maids packed, but they began to quiet as the time neared for the king's party to take their leave of them. 

It was then Laena decided that they would walk with them to the docks and the rocky outcrops where the dragons called home. A proper send off was owed and more time beget.

Rhaena had seemed reluctant to part from Aemond and he her. Better to give the girl as much time with him as she could Daemon would not be there and her father was often long winded even if he planned on seeing that his brother and the Hightowers had quit their sojourn at Hide Tide. 

She had been wrong. Her father was nowhere to be found, but the formidable Sea Snake had not held up the man as she had hoped. 

Her husband was waiting for them there by the sea with Baela hand in hand. Rhaenyra was with them, she could not say she was surprised by this, but she did not seem to match each other. Looking the one out of this trio of Targaryens though no less enthused. 

A smile was splayed across his pale face. One that Rhaenyra mirrored, however hers, seemed to be more of the genuine variety than Daemon’s. 

Petting the top of Baela’s silverhead before moving on to stroke her face. One could almost call it motherly if they did not look upon the brown face on the receiving end of this mothering.   

The girl looked to be on the verge of saying something less than pleasant, glaring at her elder cousin, but whatever she planned on saying died in her throat when those dark eyes livened at the sight of her mother and sister. 

That smile did not get warmer on her fathers face. Up close one could see the annoyance in his eyes. He was courteous enough though she was sure that show was for his brother. The spirit of camaraderie and goodwill was in full swing for now as he had reminded them, but Daemon would not be the Daemon the man she loved if he did not behave with some modicum of rebellion. 

He pulled her into him as soon as she was within each. Like a grubby child who could not wait to get his hands upon his favorite toy. It was entirely possessive, but Laena would have preferred if he had left it there and been content by her presence alone. 

“Your mother was kind enough to stay with Bess and Aemon.” He whispered into the shell of her. His breath fanned her flushed skin. Almost as if he was to kiss the sensitive flesh as he had done so a thousand times before.

It was Intimate even now with his restrained ire, but anger was another form of passion. Especially when it came to him. The man was passion itself in all its forms. 

Laena was only thankful his voice didn’t carry over their heads. She would have guessed it had,  but no one's expression had changed by his display. She did not have much time to be annoyed by his chastisement or feign innocence for they were all quickly drawn to the frail man who they called sire, brother, and husband. 

“I expect you in the capital for Jacaerys and Aemond’s name day.” The rumblings of dissent were heard echoing around the dock, but they were stamped out by a flourish of the man’s cursed cane which he wielded like any other scepter. 

For a moment she wished she could chuck it in the sea and watch. Would he command them to fetch it for him with that same voice he commanded them last night? Condemning her for it he would probably command that she go into its freezing depths to retrieve his stick.

No, he would not be so cruel, or rather that would not be his chosen method of punishment for her. No, he would simply order her presence by his side at this farce of a feast that he planned on forcing upon them all and make her promise that, Gods willing, if she birthed another babe of the weaker sex to betroth her to one of his grandsons. 

“I expect all of you there. We will celebrate both together.” All pretenses of speaking to the crowd were extinguished. The king tried to give his brother a stern eye, but it soon turned into an exasperated sigh when he waved Daemon away and motioned to his guard for support where his stick failed. 

“Safe travels mother,” The king, and most of his retinue were out of earshot though Laena doubted the former of the group of men would see the jeer in her tone or care much of it. She would receive no more of a scolding for it than she did last night. 

Her words seemed to have struck a chord with Alicent. Striking the woman through and rendering her speechless. Frozen, trapped in a world where ice was growing around her until Aemond broke the spell.

“I shall write to you cousin.” The boy had called out as he had finally parted from Rhaena’s side inbound for his dragon. 

“And I you.” If those green eyes could kill. Aemond would have been dead before Seasmoke took to the sky. 

“Do not expect to write to you, cousin.” Civility shredded when his mother had taken her leave of them with a renewed vigor was well out of reach to scold him. Boarding the boat with Ser Criston and the snake slithering behind them as much as he could, but his grandfather was not. Grabbing him by the scruff of his neck as he hauled him onto their ship. Hissing at him to mind his manners as his dragon flew without him. 

Rhaenyra was the one who had broken the silence when ships and dragons were well within land and sea. She had somehow resumed her petting. 

“Uncle—”

“Go home back to Dragonstone Rhaenyra,” he smiled. It reached his eyes this time as the corners crinkled with unrestrained amusement. Green gaze shifted from Baela then back to Sunfyre overhead as he grew smaller in the distance. “While it is still yours.” 

Mayhaps Laena should have felt bad that her cousin was practically. However, she felt nothing but pure unadulterated triumph. A sweetness she could get used to.

She did not dare hide it. She might have looked like a mad woman as she grinned and grinned at the crestfallen look which boiled over to absolute loathing when Rhaenyra finally caught onto that grin, but she did not care. Not one bit.

Not until Daemon had turned to glare at her was she brought back to her own predicament and the fire-breathing dragon before her. 

One could hear one of the pins in her hair drop if she reached for it and pulled it while he yanked her from the docks without a single word passing from his lips. It went without saying that one could hear them after the little yelped at being dragged around as such. 

The air stiff with his ire. The journey back up to their chambers was quiet like a growing storm until they reached halfway up the spiral and ordered one of the maids they passed by to take the girls back to their own chambers for a nap. 

Baela had tried to protest it but she was ruled down by the iron fist of Daemon’s glare. That look silenced her as the serving girl did as she was told.

Without the children, his stride hastened. Practically racing down the hall as the flat of his nail beds dug into her wrist, having enough sense even in the midst of his choler to drag her back by her good hand. 

Laena would have kept going with him leading her like a dog, but his grip was boarding on painful and she detested being led around like a rag doll.

“You are hurting me.” He loosened it in that instant, lacking enough to lead, but he did not utter a word in apology nor did he slow his pace. It would have taken an act of the Gods for him to apologize. 

That would not do. He owed her more than silence. He owed her. 

“Daemon—”

“Do you know why the maester ordered you to stay  within the walls of our chambers, Laena?” He did not even look at her as he said so. Pulling her into their chambers with a small tug upon her arm. She knew she was not to escape his wrath, but when the guards shut the doors behind her the illusion that she somehow might escape if had gone with that quiet thud. 

“I am not a child Daemon.” She snapped. Letting her emotions get the best of her. Laena regretted it as soon as she saw that smile across his face.

“You behave as one.” She ignored that. Closing her eyes as she counted to ten. In and out with each breath till she felt that pull to scream at him leave her. 

He did not truly mean what he said. Laena knew he was scared more than anything else. For her. For the children and too proud to say so. 

“They like each other.” She need not say who they If she had said his name it would only send him further into the fit he was on the verge of. He was in if she were to be honest “Our daughter likes him.”

His smile grew. Cold thing it was despite the way it kissed his eyes. She ignored it. She knew he meant to rattle her, but she ignored him when he petted her like he would Baela. She hated it when he did that. Like she was some child in need of correcting some error. She would have liked his bark more than this. “She likes him husband.”

“He could not take his eyes off her at my brother's funeral.” He had seen that. How his eyes had darted between the dragons flying overhead and the girl at her mother's side. He had wanted both.

Daemon's tongue could speak falsehoods all he liked, but his eyes could not lie. The eyes could never lie. Not to her and not to himself. 

“They are children Laena.” Not a lie, but yet still another excuse. 

“They will not remain children forever.” 

“Precisely.”

“He is not a bad boy,” she tried once more, feeling the words catch in her throat in a strain. “He is your brother's son.” As if he needed the reminder. As if it would even 

“He is a mongrel.” It was not shocking, she knew how zealous her husband was about tradition. About their heritage, keeping their blood pure, making sure their girls had appropriate matches, he reminded her incessantly of it over the years. 

She was not immune to it. 

Laena may not have cared if their girls married as she had, but she did not want them to just marry anyone. She knew how he felt though she did wince at the low growl he let out when he spoke about the boy in such a matter. 

“He and his brother, they are all mongrels.” She did not know the pair well, any of them well for that matter, but she knew that they did not deserve that outburst. Not even a boy as wild as Aegon.

“They are your nephews Daemon. Your blood. Targaryen—” 

“Half.” He snarled. The words spit out as if they were poison. The thought of it, of them an offense to him

Laena reached out a hand to stroke down his face. It seemed to soothe him somewhat when the back of her knuckles dragged against the vein that ticked ticked ticked away in his jaw. 

She could take some comfort that he did not brush her off no matter how his eyes blazed and fire spat from his tongue. 

“As am I in case you have forgotten.” She drew circles into the hollows of his cheeks as she felt a sigh breath out onto her fingertips. 

It was a poor argument. Even she knew that as soon as it had left from her throat. 

Born into house Velaryon she may be, but she was Valyrian. Indisputably so. 

Her mother was Targaryen. Her mother's mother was a Baratheon and her mother was a Velaryon. The grandmother they shared. All the ancestors that they shared. Targaryen, Velaryon, Baratheons, it was all the same. It all came back around and looped over and over. She was a Valyrian root and branch. She was the unbroken blood of old Valyria. To Daemon that meant everything and no matter how old and high the Hightowers were, they were not Valyrian.

He would not hear it and so she would have to try again and again until he saw more than blood. 

“Aegon will be king and Rhaena does like Aemond Daemon and he likes her.” He gave out an ungallant snort, muttering to himself. Rolling his head underneath her palms in annoyance. "I am not saying it is love but they care for one another.” A childish fancy yes, but childish fancies can become something. Something more. “You can see that, your own brother can see that Alicent can see that.”   

What did it matter? They were children and she was not a fool, but love was rarely a thing that was. Love could grow. He could not argue with that. 

Daemon had not loved her when they were wed. He could say what he liked to her. That they had liked one another as soon as their worlds collided at her brother's wedding all those years ago, but they barely knew one another. 

The man was led almost solely by lusts and a want for a Valyrian bride then. Still, she liked to think that in those early days, he had been especially fond of her when she had given him Baela even if she was not the son he had longed for or she herself was not exactly what he had wanted then. 

Even at their worst, he had cared for her. Made sure she was safe and comfortable and that she and the children were well looked after.

Even if had been distant, lost within the demons which swarmed his mind he never had abandoned her, but had he loved her? 

She could not say that but she could say he loved her now. However they had begun, he could not live without her without losing himself.

Their love grew. Love was a thing that grew. How could he argue with that, but a man’s hubris was not so easily a yielding thing, love be damned. 

“Alicent does not care-” She would not let him finish that train of thought. Bringing her hands up to cup his face. Allowing her thumb to graze his stumble-coated cheeks, coaxing him to relax as he would her if he had any sense and was not blinded by his pride.

“Alicent cares for her children.” She was a mother. Laena knew mothers. She knew better than Daemon. “She would do anything for them.” It is why she had been desperate enough to seek out her mother. Why she was so willing to betroth her sons to their girls. 

She was not naive. Sure they were lovely girls, but the advantages they brought could not be overlooked. Dragons and battle-tested riders. Driftmark its wealth and the Velaryon fleet. 

Even Daemon had got her dragonstone in the course of a few minutes all without having to raise a single sword. Viserys may be a man prone to prioritizing his eldest, but he would hardly go back upon his word once given it and he would not deny Daemon or something so miserly after all this time. What was the betrothal of his sons he had overlooked to his younger brother's daughters that would inherit no title or lands now with a younger brother to inherit to him?

Oblivious fool as he was, by the time he realized its value, their value, he would be gone from this mortal realm and Aegon would be placed upon his throne.

“She wants them to be safe.” He huffed, it reminded her of a bull stalking his target, but he did not charge.  Glaring at her, but no word in contradiction passed from lips drawn into a thin line. 

Safety. The girls provided that. Safe against Rhaenyra and her need to consume everything in her path while her sire let her go on as she pleased. Safe against Daemon and his bloodlust and puerile grievances from a lifetime spent in said man’s shadow. The man before her could not be a threat if their daughter was married to the crown. 

The man before her scoffed once more, but she could see that flicker of light. A last line upon his softened sometime as he gazed down at her. “She wants to protect her children. She will do anything she can for that.” She should not even have had to say so, but the man was so blinded by hatred for his own blood because of the woman who had borne them. How could he hate them when they had the same? The same blood their children shared. 

“Do you not think she can not see your own desperation?” It was not cruel as only a few seconds, the venom was all but gone, but there was still that doubt. Still, that simmering magnum that fueled him with so much rage deep within his core and separated him from her was there. Just below the surface under the cold, but there nonetheless. 

“I wish for your happiness Daemon. It is the very air that I breathe. The air which I survive off of. I live for you. Your happiness and the children’s.” That stopped him as good as if she slapped him, but she couldn’t have been kinder. Sweeter. Full of honey. He liked when she was sweet and she liked being sweet to him, but she needed him to understand her and not behave as if he was a child having his toy taken away.  

“If that is my desperation and Alicent should see such then so be it, but do not pretend as if everything I do is without thought to you and our children.” She held him fast in her grip. His thumb had begun to draw circles into her wrists, but she had not felt that gentle touch trying to pull her into him to anchor her.

An urgency came about her that made her do so as if he might slip away like grains of sand between her hands. Gone to the storm that always seemed to surround her.

“Your daughter will be queen. Your grandson King. The uncontested heir to the Iron Throne.” Not the son of a bastard. The legitimate son of the rightful king. The blood of old Valyria reflected through and through. Unquestionable. Unimpeachable. “Alicent is a means to an end if she wishes to be blinded by her perception let her. Her desperation is not our own.”

“Lanea–” She would hear no more of it. 

“I do this for your legacy Daemon. Your—”

“Our legacy.” His hands now cupped her face as he met her urgency with his own. The sand stopped. It turned into something solid. Something that could not easily be blown away with the change of the wind. 

He kissed the tremble from her palms. Her cheeks which she had not known were tear-stained. Her temple lined by nerves. 

Anything within reach. anything to bring her back to him. “Ours Laena.” He whispered onto her brow hands now caressing her back as he swayed her to and fro. She did not mind it. It was better than an I am sorry sweet girl. Sweeter. 

She had forgotten he could be sweet too. Kind to her. 

Ours. Not his or hers. There’s. It was better than maybe. She could work with that. She could do with that. 

Their daughter  would be queen, her son, their grandson, would sit on the Iron Throne, and Rhaena would have Aemond and everything she wanted. Laena would see to that. They would see to that.

“Any other requests you should wish to make of me dearest wife.” His eyes had gotten that mischievous glint in them again as he pulled ever slightly to gaze down at her. Playful. Riant and something more yet. 

She had just one request. 

One which he had never acquiesced before, but he was trying. Trying for her. For the children. For them. Laena bit her lip. Parting them as she felt air fill her lungs. Rush through her whole body with its exuberance. 

Surely he would abide by this simple request for she knew not what he would do if he did not, but something in that smile, in the light of those green eyes which she knew better than her own the ones which their son had inherited told her she would not have to know. She would never have to know.

“I do not wish you to leave with my father.” He grinned. Beamed even. Rare and entirely for her that the light grew kissing the corners of his eyes with lines of life of hope.

“I was not planning to.” 

Ao3 Link:

#daemon targaryen x laena velaryon #laena x daemon #daemon x laena #daela #daena #hotd fanfic #hotd fic #laena velaryon #daemon targaryen #bnhotdfic #asoiaf fic

[bohemian-nights]

Arlī Masterlist

Synopsis: She was not her uncle’s first choice Naery’s knew that, but she would do her duty.

Warnings⚠️: Uncle/niece incest

Rating: 18+

Pairing: Daemon Targaryen x Targaryen!OC

Chapter 1, Chapter 2, Chapter 3, Chapter 4, Chapter 5, Chapter 6, Chapter 7, Chapter 8, Chapter 9

#house of the dragon #hotd #hotd spoilers #daemon targaryen #arlī #arlī masterlist #hotd fanfic #daemon targaryen x reader #daemon targaryen x targaryen!reader #daemon targaryen x black!oc #daemon targaryen x targaryen!oc #daemon targaryen x oc #daemon x reader #prince daemon targaryen #daemon fanfic #bnhotdfic #this post was brought to you by queue📺

[bohemian-nights]

What We May Mend (Chapter 5)

Word Count: ~15,898

Rating: Mature

Pairing: Daemon Targaryen x Laena Velaryon

Warnings ⚠️: Violence; minor smut

Description: In the year 126 AC Lady Laena Velaryon survives her difficult in a foreign land surrounded by strangers. With a second chance to mend their fractured marriage she and her husband Prince Daemon Targaryen return to Westeros with their children in tow as chaos unfolds around them🐉

AN: Sorry for the wait 🙏🏽 It’s a huge chapter again though 🌊

Chapter 1, Chapter 2, Chapter 3, Chapter 4, Chapter 6

Laena did not know exactly how she made it out the doors to her chambers and down several rather steep flights of stairs and winding hallways to Hide Tide’s Great Hall. Hide Tide was not an especially large castle, but it was ostentatious. A beacon. Showcasing all that House Velaryon had become. Cementing the might and prestige of their noble and ancient house within the landscape of their new Andal homeland. Her father had overseen the construction of it himself. Next to she and Laenor it was his pride.                                                             

The pale stone castle could be a maze to those unfamiliar. The towers that jutted out made it difficult to get from the top It was easy enough to get lost in the grandeur of its halls if one did not know them well enough and they may very well be the halls of Laena’s childhood but she had been clear across the narrow sea for quite some time and in her present state, well really one had to wonder how she had not given into madness.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                           She supposed her instincts had taken over. Her fears powered her as she rushed through the bustling corridors Aemon in her arms. He was the first thing she grabbed. The only thing she thought to grab in her distress. Having enough sense of mind in the frenzy of fear that had befallen over her to make sure he was not left alone with a serving boy in the hopes that he could find Beth or his wetnurse. Comforted by the fact That one of her children was tucked safely under her bosom.      

The mother guided her as she darted past her father. They themselves were past her father's servants who were running about the castle like someone's life depended upon it.

To and fro from the kitchen, up to Maester Crotons quarters; and back again to the Great Hall. Carrying with them gauze, dark bottles filled with ointments and tinctures from the Maesters stores, pots of boiling water, and porcelain bowls and linens stained with crimson. One had to wonder if stains would ever come out. If they would be the reminder of this nightmarish night. Forever inked in that deep viscus red. The only reminder. 

Laena tried not to look at them. It made her nauseous to even gaze upon that stomach-churning contrast. To imagine whose blood it might be. 

They had been injured. It might be their blood, but she did not want to think of it and give into despair before she had even caught sight of her girls.  

In the clamor, Laena had thankfully come across a frightened Beth. Someone must have sent for her, for she doubted the girl would have been aware of the fact that she had been needed, but the reasons for her need were unclear to her. 

In the time since she returned to her chamber, she had changed into her nightgown. It was not a very cold night, and the girl was from the thin robe for modesty’s sake. Her long dark hair was braided down into a single braid that rested down her back. 

The girl was ready for a much-needed respite. She too was exhausted from their journey and having to look after three restless children while Laena was bedridden and dead to the world and Daemon was too preoccupied with worrying over her mistresses' health. The dark circles under her eyelids were more pronounced in the low light of the hall and there was a grogginess in her tone, but all things considered, she was alert. 

“Take Aemon,” Laena had said as she handed her the babe who had become quite fussy. Not at all pleased from having been woken rather abruptly from his slumber and to be jostled about. “Go back to the nursery.” 

She should have offered her an explanation. The children got into some scuffle. The girls have been hurt, but there was no time in the rancor. She could barely think. She did not know what to think and likely neither did Beth. 

In fact, telling her might have done more harm than good. The girl would undoubtedly wish to find Aemon’s wet nurse so that she may join Laena. They didn't have the time, but her lack of effort did little to quell her curiosity. 

Beth had started to protest. She began running after her. Bouncing a very displeased red-faced Aemon to calm the babe while her short limbs tried yet failed to match the hurried pace she had set. 

Laena could recall that she had shouted out a What has happened my lady, until a gentle voice that sounded rather like Hazel Hearte, ushered her away from her pursuit. Back to the warmth and quietude of the nursery where the maid and child could rest. 

Bless her. She would not have been able to go on with a crying Aemon in her arms. He would have served only as a distraction. Another worry and she could not worry about two little ones much less three having no idea of what she was running into. 

The flock of ninnys reappeared and took to trailing after Laena once Beth had gone out of sight. However, she barely registered their various chidings.  

Be careful my lady, was shouted out by the plumper of the two when she almost tripped over her skirts and would have landed on her face had she lost her balance. 

Slow down my lady, the other had said when she had nearly run into a maid carrying a large bowl of water. 

Wait, my lady, they had chirped out simultaneously when she had turned a corner and left them behind. 

A buzzing had commenced in Laena's ear that made reason impossible, their chidings becoming white noise.

All of Hide Tide was aflutter, a den of life in what should be the quietness that would settle over the castle in the hour of the wolf, but that life was a shapeless blur under the shadow which had fallen over Laena. 

Baela and Rhaena. She had to get to Baela and Rhaena. She could not think of anything else. Their little faces flashed in her mind. Rhaena’s shy smile could light up a room. The way Baela would scrunch up her nose made her want to kiss it so that she too could see her joy. Even the way the two bickered over their dresses and toys or her attention, was music to her ears. They were the very air that she breathed. She would be lost without them. Cease to exist for what was she if not their mother? She had to get to them. 

Aemon had kept her sane, but now that he was out of her arms she felt nothing but cold which always seemed to lurk in the darkness waiting to overtake her seeping back in with every step she took. 

She was nearly delirious, dizzy with dread, by the time she reached the Great Hall. Laena pushed past the crowd of onlookers gawking at the growing spectacle formed on the outer edges of the chamber. One among them included Ser Vaemond who looked worried for mayhaps the first time in his life. He had zeroed in upon her under his hawk-like gaze. Grabbing her arm and speaking in a voice that she could not make out. Her ears were too clogged with the blood that had rushed to her head to make sense of the words he spoke.  

Despite the ringing in her ears, that pit of dread in her belly that ensnared her, and the weight of her fear dragging her down like an anchor tied to her ankle, it was the sight of him, with the clinking of his tongue as he made soundless ramblings, scrambled that had angered her the most. 

Oh, he no doubt meant to calm her, to placate her with whatever parable he thought would soothe a mother's woe, but what good were his words when her girls were hurt? Wanting her comfort as she wanted to comfort them. Useless that is what they were. Useless when all she wanted, all she needed was to see them, to see them safe. Damn him. No words of comfort could do that.  

Baela and Rhaena, she repeated. Heart pounding. She had to get to Baela and Rhaena. 

Laena brushed him off to make her way to her daughters who were standing at the center bloody and bruised with her mother who was trying her best to calm them though her attempts were well-meaning, affectionately coddling the girls, but ultimately inadequate when all they wished for was their mother.  She looked as relieved as Laena wanted to feel at the sight of her sprinting towards them in panic.

The Velaryon lady wasted no time as she scrambled to pull the pair of frightened girls into her arms. Not giving a second glance to the ghastly scene that she had walked into as she drew them close for her inspection. Scanning every inch of their persons for the culprit of their cries.  

The moment she had pulled her girls into her embrace Rhaena took to her with a vice-like grip, throwing her arms around her middle and burying her little brown face into the fabric of her robe, staining the silk with all manner and mordant, and more importantly making it impossible for Laena to inspect her properly. So she focused her gaze on her eldest first. She at least let her turn her about.

A tiny wave of relief flowed through her as she took her in that kept her from the onslaught of the panic that wished to overtake her. 

Baela was fine.      

Well, she sported a rather inky violet bruise on her arm that would worsen and spread marring her brown skin as the day went by, and a small cut right under her left brow. barely visible except if one was looking intently at her as her mother was. It would scab over in a day and be gone by the next. And it went without mentioning that she was covered in a cool layer of dirt, grime, and blood, but she was fine. 

She was shaking, her dark eyes wide and watery with her fright, but she had not been injured. 

To be sure, it was a chilling sight. No mother wanted to see her children with tears streaming down their faces or have them cling on to her like they were babes, but it was not the sight of Baela, however, who added to Laena’s panic. It was Rhaena.   

Where her sister's scraps were minor and the blood on her person was clearly not her own, nothing more than blood splatter for that cut upon her brow couldn’t produce that amount and it was the only one which could be found on her, the same unfortunately, couldn’t be said of the younger girl.  

Rhaena was on the verge of a fit. Shaking in her mother's hold to the point where her teeth clattered. Tears clouded her reddened eyes, only able to make out her mother's face as she babbled. “I did not think they were following us Mama. I did not know. I swear I did not. I swear it. I swear.” I swear. I swear. I swear, she cried over and over. Descending into gibberish. Clutching at her side as she repeated those words that made that pit of dread overflow. 

Sending a pang through her mothers chest that wracked through her entire being. Turning her to and fro in her arms as her mind spun with her and sent her in the throes of worry.

Blood, there was blood everywhere. Caked in her silver locs. Dyeing the ends red. Speckles of that same red across her face, on cheeks, dotted across her forehead, joining the freckles upon her nose, but that little teary brown face was spared from the worst of it. 

Her dress. It was Rhaena’s dress that took the brunt of whatever ill that had befallen over the girl who wore it. The white sleeve of her undershirt torn off, the left no longer white, and there was a tear across her abdomen. She should see a patch of honey skin peaking out beneath it, but all she could see was crimson. Whatever was there, fabric or flesh, was soaked through with blood.   

Laena was frantic in her movements in her search for the source of that blood. A frenzy guiding her as she pulled at the tear on the midriff of Rhaena’s dress.  Begging her to tell her where she was hurt. 

There had to be a gash slashed across her belly, piercing the delicate skin there and seeping her dress with her life blood. There was too much of it not to be from her. Too fresh. Too vivid. Too everywhere. It was everywhere and she needed to stop the bleeding. She needed someone to stop the bleeding. 

Where was Maester Croton? Why had no one attended to her? Why was her mother the only one concerned? Why was she the only one with them? Had no one listened to her? What were they all doing running around out there if they had not even taken the time to attend to her? Why was all of this fuss being made if not for her. Why was Rhaena still left in this grisly state?

She must have taken to  babbling herself for she saw Rhaena’s mouth moving to answer her in the haze of her mind. Making out the words I did not know. Four simple words stuck on an endless loop that made her wonder in anguish. It was in her wanderings that Laena even grew frustrated with herself.   

Why oh Gods, why could she not even find where her daughter was hurt? What would she do if she did not find it in time? There was so much blood. Why was there so much blood?  Why would it not just stop? She was pressing down on where she thought the wound was, but it would not stop. 

Why, why, why. A million questions for a million worry’s for a woman lost in her own grief. Like little stabs to an already broken heart. Making her forget all that was before. Who she had been with. What they had been speaking of. What made that figure with wild auburn curls and a look that mirrored her own dart out with her. She had forgotten even what the messenger had told her before speaking of her girls.  

Laena forgot every last bit of before. Rhaena and that blood that would not vanish was all there was. Her pain blotted out the rest.   

This was cruel. Far too cruel to inflict upon a child who had never harmed anyone. A child who was sweet and kind and inquisitive and all things good. She was brave in her own small way. She was a cherub. The very best of she and Daemon and no one seemed to care that she had been hurt. All they did was scream around her. 

Those voices. They were shouting her name. They had never stopped their cries of Laena, Laena, Laena. Stop Laena. Stop, but she did not hear them. She did not wish to hear them. Why should she when they had done nothing, but squawk at them?

She did not give them any mind as continued her frantic quest to find Rhaena’s wound. Lost in her dread.    

Laena would have gone on like that. Driving herself mad with Rhaena’s cries and senseless babble and her woe as she searched and searched in vain, asking the girl where had she been hurt, but recovering 

She would have gone mad had not her mother had enough sense grabbed her arm and yanked her into her hold. The older woman having to shake her to snap her out from her frenzy.    

“Laena. It is not her blood,” Laena could only imagine the look she must have given her. For she had gone wide eyed. A glint there from tears better contained than she herself had managed. Letting out her next words in one breath before she worked herself into another fit. “They are fine sweetling. Look.” 

She took her shaking hand in hers and wiped it across the abdomen of Rhaena’s dress with a single swipe. Smearing the blood round, adding new stains where there weren’t any to the dark garment ruined beyond repair, but there was no wound when the brown expanse of her stomach was at last revealed. 

No slash across her belly as Laena feared. Nothing  to indicate she had been harmed despite her bloody appearance. Not even a scratch. It was just blood.  

Not her blood. Not their blood. Just blood. Unknown. Unnamed, but nothing to concern her. Nothing to cause her heartache. 

“Maester Croton looked her over as well as Baela,” Her mother continued. Her voice lost some of that breathless urgency when she saw that Laena no longer looked as if she was going to give into her mindless riddles and anguish. A pair of brown eyes captured by a silver head. Baela nodded that head. 

“She is fine.” The jerk of her daughter's locs moving up and down hypnotized her. “They are both fine. It is not their blood.”  

Tis amazing what but a few simple words can do for a weary soul who had all but lost hope. Those last words ringing in her ear as the blood let out she looked between her girls. 

Bruised, scared out of her mind, but she was physically fine. Just like her elder sister. No one had hurt her. She more than likely fell. Tried. She was fine. Laena let that little bit of relief soak into her bones. Her heart no longer wishing to jump from her chest and crawl around on the ground looking for something to soothe it.       

“Where is Aemon?” Her mother asked. Forcing Laena’s eyes back onto her from where she was staring down through Baela lost in her thoughts.

Her arms still wrapped around her in that motherly fashion of hers. Rubbing circles into her back to soothe her as a set of hazel eyes scanned her face. 

She knew she didn’t mean anything by it. That she was not questioning her mothering. Just a need to make sure she hadn’t forgotten anything. Anyone. A very specific little one who Laena hated to be parted from. Today or rather yesterday was the first time since she had awoken in a moon that she had done so. It had taken the better part of the morn to coax Aemon from her arms so that she could say her goodbyes to her brother. The babe was a fixture at her side. Twas odd seeing her without him and in such a state of agitation. 

“With Bess.” Her mother nodded. Her shoulders slumped releasing the tension she had held onto that she more than likely was unaware of. She gave her arm a squeeze and a small smile. There was something in that half-smile that did not reach where it should be that was not quite right. Something discomforting in it. 

Something was missing. No not something, someone was missing and she had not even noticed it in her fog. 

“Where is father?”

She knew Daemon was a lost cause as the hours grew long and her eyelids heavy with sleep. A part of her, beneath the madness, that small part of her that always expected more from him hoped that he’d be there. She would always hope. That he’d be there comforting their girl. Letting them cry into his shoulder. Bouncing them in his arms like when they were babes, just waiting for her, but he was not there. Instead, it was her mother. Only her mother. 

She had grown used to that. Could put aside her own disappointment for the sake of her girls. Had longed learned to stomach it with a smile or at least without her brow breaking out into a sweat, yet things should not have been.   

Her father should be here. He was not her husband. He had no reason not to be there at this late hour when they had all been aroused by the ruckus of the children's misdeeds. No reason not to be beside them in the chaos. Soothing them. Protecting them.  It was his duty as a father, as their grandsire, and he had not been one to neglect that duty. Not for something of this magnitude that had befallen within Hide Tides walls in the wee hours of the morn. It was his duty to be here. Why was he not here?  

Her mother meant to answer her, thin lips drawn and then a mouth opened, eyes darting to the archway as if Laena’s question could summon him, before turning them back to her, but they were interrupted by a drool voice.   

“The children should not have been out of bed Laena,” Daemion drawled from where he had plopped himself in an armchair. Admittedly Laena had not noticed her cousin who was making quite a show of himself gorging on a vine of grapes and Dornish red. How he had the stomach to do so with the scene that had played out in front of him Laena would not question. 

If anyone were able to, it would be Daeron Velaryon. One could not call him a malicious person, he did not inflict cruelties for the sake of it but he did take a great deal of pleasure in others' discomfort. Particularly in those who he had felt slighted him. 

A petty man he was. More so than his father. His slights bordered on irrationality.

Try as she might, Laena had never much cared for the elder of her cousins. Though she could take comfort in the fact that he cared for her as much as she did for him which was more than like the reason for his pleasure. In that moment she loathed the very sight of him.  

Sitting there with that smirk upon his face stuffing his mouth Laena could not help her own irritation and anything but familial sentiment towards him. It was a wonder how the Velaryon sea captain was not as big as an ox or how his rather large head had not been relieved from his body.  

“That is why they are in this state.” He waved a sandy hand around. A hand with a grape held between his thumb and pointer finger, before plopping it into his mouth. Voice muffled his infernal chewing. “You ought to have had that nurse-maid of yours check on them.” 

Loath him she did. Wished that it was his brother who had found them she did and he remained asleep in his chambers. However, as much as she wanted to say something that would quiet the insufferable man, he did have a point. 

“What were you and your sister doing out of bed?”  

She had directed her question at Baela with a voice shakier than she would have liked. Horse and low from her cries. Still lost somewhat in her ache.

The girl was sniffling, blowing her nose, and wiping her tears with the handkerchief her grandmother had given her, but she was much more coherent than her sister who had taken to hiding her silver head into Laena’s skirts crying her sorrow away, but surprisingly it was Rhaena herself who answered between sobs. Stilling herself enough to stop babbling.  

“No one was supposed to know Mama,” she began. Her bottom lip trembled as she lifted her head to meet her inquisition. Bloodshot brown shooting up to meet a matching pair.  

“I didn’t think anyone would know. Not until the morning. We would have told everyone in the morning. I promise. I didn’t know he had a knife. I tried—“ A hiccup had stopped but she soldiered on for a little while longer when Laena began rubbing circles into her back. “I tried to tell him not to. I did try. I promise. I tried mama. I did. No one was supposed to know. No one mama. No one.” She descended into babbles again. 

That brown face nuzzled itself back into the fabric of her robe, but just as one torment disappeared another took its place. Her daughter's disjointed tale sank in as a hand moved down absentmindedly to caress the back of Rhaena’s head as her daughter's rambles gnawed at her. Finally remembering fully what was in the past. 

The blood drained from her face just as quickly as it had returned.   

We. We would have told everyone in the morning. That we had not just been she and her sister. It could not have been just Rhaena and Baela. Blood did not materialize from nowhere nor did the knife which had found its target with such a fury. 

“Who had a knife?” The girl froze in her hold as the memories swarmed her. Dancing with what was around her. Everything flooded in all at once for she had blocked out everything except her girls and the reassurance that they were safe. Now it demanded its dues. Reality inescapable. 

“Rhaena who—” her question was answered before she could utter it twice.

“It will heal.” Spoke a soft voice from behind her. Twas not a voice she was familiar with, but the breathy cadence of a mother's pain was unmistakable. Broken by the sight of her child. Alicent’s voice. 

Aemond. That had been why the messenger boy had come in such a state scared to be on the receiving end of a mother's wrath.  

Rhaena and Baela had been injured, yes, but their injuries had been no more than soiled dresses and some minor scrap. It was Aemond who had truly hurt. Taking the brunt of the damage inflicted from their scuffle.  

It was not hard to who had been the true culprits of the attack judging by the king’s screams at his men and Aegon’s scowls at the sight of Jacaerys and Lucerys standing in the shadows who appeared no longer a shapeless blur in the corner of her sight but corporal beings bloody and clutching at each other it had been they who had been the perpetrators of such violence.  

The pair of pale boys with their red pudgy faces from their blood, and Aemond’s looked worse off than her girls, but their faces were only half the story. 

Laena did not wish to turn her head. She did not wish to know what exactly had happened to Alicent’s second son. 

There was so much blood. Too much blood. Whatever had happened to him was more than a scratch on his brow, the skin of a knee, a bruise, or even a broken bone. Whatever and she would not look. She could not look without fearing that she might break. 

He was not her child but she did not wish ill on him. He was a child. Her cousin albeit distantly. Her nephew by marriage, and he was Rhaena’s betrothed. Or he was about to become her betrothed. His health and well-being were of some importance to her. A fair amount of importance. For that, she would not be able to hold back her horror. 

“Will it not Maester?” She could hear the hope in Alicent’s query as if she had asked it herself. Clinging to the back of the queen's throat with so much longing, but that hope was extinguished by the Maesters declaration and she could not turn her head to that. 

His eye. The boy had lost his left eye. 

Lost to a foolish boy’s blade which should not have even been in his possession to begin with. Christening it with the intoxicating taste of first blood. He had not even acknowledged the gravity of it. Too lost in his own anger to recognize how he had robbed his uncle of half his sight. 

The reminder was permanent. Unlike the rest of the bloody mess, it had not been shuffled off by the score of maids and servants floating about the castle. Instead, the pale thing with its spiny tendril of nerves just sat lying there in a pool of its blood.   

Laena felt her stomach churn gazing at that bowl. She could not look away from it once she had. Brown eyes fixed on the organ. It was a miracle that the boy had not passed out from the pain or succumbed to it. 

“Where were you?” Alicent had rounded on her eldest. Hissing at the boy’s inebriated state with venom that made him stutter. His mumblings did little to calm the tide of his mother's torment. A slap could be heard over the crackling of the fire. Resounding around the somber chamber as the boy brought a pale hand up to his reddened cheek in shock. 

Laena could not imagine the torment Alicent felt, she prayed to the mother never was not even sure if he was deserving of it. Drunk he may be, but he seemed just as grief-stricken as his mother and his brother did not look as if he blamed him. Why should he? It was not he who blinded him. The children should have all been safely tucked into bed. Could he really have done much to prevent it?

 He was a determined boy and the call to a dragon was a hard thing to turn from for any Targaryen, much less a boy who felt. He has to have felt that. Aemond would not have waited until the cover of darkness if he felt otherwise. A desperate determination had taken hold of and his brother would have never been able to stop him. 

“Now I would not be too harsh on the boy. That one was being pummeled into the sand by Baela.” Alicent snapped her neck in her cousin’s direction. If he had wanted the queen's audience he had it, as well as bewildered Ser Otto, and the kings who looked more exasperated by the interruption. As if he had heard this tale quite a few times. Or at least some version of this story one time too many. 

Nevertheless, the man seemed pleased by the attention, Smirk growing ever wise by it before his gaze rolled to Baela. “Though it seems that their little quarrel was put to bed and our dear prince became the lookout. Eh, Baela?” The girl buried herself into her grandmother’s side, but he paid no mind to the glare he received from both the mother and his own father who had moved away from the outer crowd made up of guests, servants, and guards to join them.  

“You ought to be thanking the little one.” He gestured to Rhaena next.  

“She tried to turn her sleeve into a tourniquet for your boy, my queen.” He laughed before popping another piece of the sweet fruit into his mouth. This time right from the vine. She wished he had choked on it as he gabbed on and—he winked at her. Oh, that vile man. Her cousin had given Alicent a grin and then turned to wink at her. “Quite touching really. You would have been quite pleased. You both would have been.” 

Her cousin knew. He knew and he would not keep it to himself. Daeron had felt wronged by her. Gone for ten years and now shown up with an heir. A proper heir. One who he could not refute. Legitimacy unquestionable. 

Daeron would not keep her secrets. Especially not when he felt he could gain some favor from it. Foolish an idea as that may be.  

It was beyond foolish. The fact of the matter was that he would gain nothing from it if he had indeed told the king and he most certainly had him with those looks.

Oh her good-brother would of course thank him for his loyalty, and reassure him that his loyalty would not be in vain, but that would be the extent of it. 

Viserys had no great love for her father. Only a begrudging sense of duty towards him by way of slights and scores old but never felt forgotten. It was that duty that made him consider her for a bride. Why he had chosen Laenor for his daughter, Gods rest his soul, but there was nothing greater there.

He liked Vaemond even less and there was no obligation tying him to him. Barely a genial connection much less a familial one. 

There was a less than amicable association. Twas distant at best. No debt which to be paid that made the Velaryon knight at least tolerable. He was nothing more than a pest to him. 

Dare one say a thorn at his side for he had never been a quiet man nor one to go along with a poorly kept secret. The worst kept secret in the seven kingdoms. 

His opinions on that indiscretion did not go unknown through the years yesterday or even now for his eyes had flitted over to his grandnephews with that sneer of his, but he would not do more than that. Her uncle for the first time in ten years was content. 

He had his differences with her husband. Both were too opinionated of people unwilling to let their ideals and ambitions go unsaid for the sake of keeping the peace, but unlike with her good brother, they did not oppose one another. 

Daemon and Vaemond were singular in mind with their wants, recognition of course. In the way that all second sons wished to be recognized by their elders, but they had one above even the need to be seen or rather because of it.

Her father had always said that history remembers one’s name not blood, but blood carries names. If her father had believed that he would not have tried marrying her off to a man thirty years her senior or Laenor to a woman he could not even bed for a throne.   

When it is all said and done. A name is just a name. It dies with the one that holds it. They wanted more than just names. They had that now.  

Whether it would take Hazel Hearte another babe or two to achieve, her uncle just as Daemon and herself were sure that Aemon would inherit her father's throne that babe would sit beside him and bear. Blood is what carries on. 

Vaemond’s line was secure. He would not utter another word against her cousin. What did he care for the Iron Throne and who inherited it? Twas not the throne of his ancestor. Twas not his blood. 

So at last the king's pest was vanquished, yet his son had not been so easily pacified. 

Laena knew her cousin. Laenor had gone and she was almost sure that a not particularly small part of him had hoped she and Aemon would have gone with him. Discretion evaded him in his quest of some measure of recognition in his own right. 

He had turned to the king for it and while they might find some commonality on this issue. It was on the issue which the king truly cared for that he would be remembered by. Daeron would be lucky to receive so much as a mention of a need for a new commander of the royal fleet. 

Dangled like a carrot in front of him, but by the year's end, the seat would be occupied by some other lord who was much less. A Lannister mayhaps or a Redwyne. Laena remembered from her lessons that her good brother had a fondness for the old lord of the Arbor and his brother. 

“Where is Rhaenyra,” Alicent asked, turning back to her husband. Auburn brows raised as she held her head high. The inquiry was borne part from wanting and part to dare attention to Rhaenyra’s absence, dare Laena say the larger part wanting to distract her husband from what Daeron had just uttered, but there was no use they would find. 

“Where is Daemon?” Daeron drawled. Popping another grape in his mouth. For the second time, she wished that at the least he would choke on what he was stuffing himself with. Or mayhaps she should ring his neck. 

He was enjoying this fair too much. He was not even bothering with hiding. Her cousin viewed this as his entertainment. He took pleasure in her humiliation, but it met its end there. 

Where Laena had not been able to summon her father with a thought Daeron seemed to possess that ability. It seemed that Alicent Hightower did as well. 

Three figures sprinted into the great hall from the main archway. The creaking sound of the heavy door opening drew all eyes towards it. 

It was Baela who had noticed them first. “Kepa,” she shouted. Pulling out from her grandmother's hold who she had glued herself to after Laena’s inspection to run towards the tallest of the three. A silver blur buzzed past them towards him.  

The tall man caught her with ease. Scooping her up into his arms and bouncing her in his hold as she buried her teary face into his neck. 

The girl proceeded to speak in Valyrian. Loud enough for her mother to make out the constants and vowels of their ancestral tongue, but not enough indistinct to make out any words. 

Whatever she had spoken into her father’s ear turned the pale man stormy. Green eyes darkened as they darted between Rhaena still at her side, Aemon, and Aegon before he settled on the latter. The boy turned white under his uncle's stare, but Laena had not even noticed that at first glance. 

That piercing gaze found her for what could not have been more than a second or two across the hall. The corner of his eyes crinkled up with some mirth before he shifted his focus onto their eldest, but that was all she needed. 

Daemon was still in his black doublet from the days past. His silver strands were a bit mused, she could see something akin to dark circles underlining his eyes, but her father had been with him. In the same state. As if the two men had been simply drinking the night away and lost track of time. 

Making a mad dash to the Great Hall and only then happening upon her cousin who had walked in a mere foot ahead of them. Rhaenyra barely gave her half a glance. 

Done nothing but glare at her and then promptly shifted her focus onto her sons whom she rushed to with surprising speed and care for someone who had been seemingly too preoccupied with her efforts what seemed half a lifetime ago to notice the misdeeds of her children. 

Misdeeds paid in a pursuit well wasted for if she had truly won her husband, Laena would have received much more than that unkindness. 

A gloat dressed with a glimmer, pallid irises alight with victory. Something which to say cousin all is done or her hand would have been placed firmly in his, but that hand remained at her side those eyes contained nothing but her the bitter glow of poorly concealed disgust.    

In any case, her father would not have been hot on the Targaryen man’s heels, wearing yesterday’s clothes, with a questioning look thrown over her shoulders at her mother, and her husband would not have been able to meet her eyes, much less dedicate his focus towards their girls if anything had happened between the pair of dragons.

Daemon's indiscretions were never so silent an affair. In Pentos whenever he had taken he would avoid her til the afternoon. Be in his cups for half the day apologize with a drunken kiss to her temple and take Baela out for a ride the day after that. 

And now it was all so utterly ordinary. His concern for Baela and Rhaena. That smile he had gifted her, his eyes with their warmth upon her, they were all such little things but his very presence here with her made the suffocating mix of shame and doubt that she tried to keep tucked not so neatly away, always wishing to claw its way out where she placed it in the shadows, wither before her.  

She was so preoccupied with her elation that Laena had not noticed that Daemon was barreling towards her, or rather where Aegon and Aemond were standing until she could make out what Baela was saying. 

“He did not do it kepa.” It was spoken in the common tongue. Voice raising into something shrill. Pleading. Not in her usual way when she wanted something from him which had more often than not led to him being persuaded to take her out for a ride upon Caraxes. No, there was fear there. Enough panic in her voice to knock her mother out from her reverie to see why the girl was so upset. 

Her husband was making his way to Aegon. Thundering towards him with a face set to stone. Bickering had commenced between the king's wife and daughter, but it stopped at the sounds of Daemon’s heavy gait and Baela's protests.  

The boy to his credit had some merit. She had to give him that.  

He hadn’t cowered behind his mother in the face of his uncle's rage who had tried to pull him behind her, Bickering between herself and her good-daughter set aside at Baela’s cries. Anger long forgotten at her own son's less than admirable behavior as Daemon drew closer. 

Aegon grabbed the arm his mother meant to draw in front of him, but stayed. Holding his ground.

Apart from a slight twitch in his eye and a plaintive glance turned his father's way, who met him with indifference, he had barely even flinched. Of course, it was unlikely that Daemon was to hurt him. He still held Baela in his arms and Ser Criston matched his every move, but her husband was not a man to be tested.

If the boy said the wrong word, in the state Daemon was in, if he so much as stammered when he spoke, he would be upon him in seconds. 

Baela passed to her father who had continued to follow him, whispering something to him, yet he hadn't heard over his own choler or he pretended not to. A hand would wrap around his nephew's throat and pin him against the wall. It would take at least half a dozen knights and lords to pull him off Aegon. 

Twas best to end it now before anything rash were to happen. 

He was halfway to them when she decided to meet him there picking up Rhaena who had been still clinging to her middle. Though her cries had softened, the girl would not let her go. Barely noticing when she lifted her to bounce her upon her hip. Still too lost in her own little failure to pay attention to much around her. 

The maesters had been clear that lifting anything that weighed more than Aemon was out of the question, but she hadn’t the time to worry about it. She would not leave Rhaena alone. Not even with her mother across the hall.who trailed her. 

Hand her to me Laena. She is too heavy, she had said, but she batted her concerns away despite the strain of her weight she felt in her back. 

By the time she had reached Daemon, with some difficulty and a great deal of nagging his eyes were in flames.

“Daemon, they are fine.” She spoke with that same small voice she had used on their daughters when they were upset. Baela especially for she had her father's temperament when riled. 

Reaching out to place a hand upon his bicep. Stroking his sleeve when she saw he didn’t mind it. She did not know how else to reach out to him. Fearing words would simply not be adequate and neither had her touch been. 

He faced her, their eyes met again but it was as if he was looking right through her. His gaze moved down to the silver head buried into her neck with a grimace. She could practically see the steam coming off him as his vision landed upon a bruise on Rhaena’s temple that was not hidden by her curls.  

Laena had seen his anger; even in the midst of his melancholic moods, that fire in him was still there. Simmering just below the veil of it was not an uncommon sight, but it was never a pretty one either. Lesser men would be consumed by it, but he breathed its fires as if it was air rather than smoke wishing to render those caught in it blind and breathless. Stumbling through it until it cleared and one could see the destruction left in its wake.

He would not care. He would revel in it. He was itching for it. 

Her mother echoed what she said, calming her father, but it did nothing for him. Sword hand that had rubbing circles into Baela’s back twitching. She reminded herself that he was without Dark Sister. A small relief, but she knew that he could easily find something else in its place.  

A guard's dagger. Her father's great sword strapped to him. Daeron would surely sprout up from the comfort of his seat and with luxuries twisted between his tacky fingers to offer something to him. If nothing else to see what new mayhem might overtake the hall. 

She tried again. This time bringing a brown hand up to cup his face as she shook. “Our girls are fine. The blood is not theirs.” 

He leaned into her touch. Stubbled cheeks nuzzled into the flat of her palm. It must have been instinctual; it would have been sweet had the situation not been so dire. 

Daemon pulled away before she could say another word. His warmth left her as quickly as it came. The chill of the chamber's air reached her but a second after.

He did not even look at her as he spoke. Green eyes so dark that they might as well be called obsidian shifted to lock upon Aemond. Growing annoyed with Aegon’s refusal to bend under his glare. “And the bruises. I suppose they are not theirs either?”  

“Was it you boy?” He shouted over her head. Finally he set Baela down to stand at his side. Clutching at his arm she had completely given up trying to convince him against his accusations hurled at Alicent’s boys. One would have an easier time trying to coax a screeching cat to swim. 

Aemond turned his un-injured eye away from his father to glare at his uncle. his mother and Ser Criston tried to shield him from view, the boy had been through but her husband was a persistent man. He did not take kindly to being kept from his quarry. “Was this your doing? You half—”

“An accident,” She rushed out. Knowing that whatever he had to say was best left unsaid and would do more harm than good. His blood ran too hot to be rational. 

Her husband might’ve been without his sword, but his brothers' guards including Ser Criston who seemed more than protective of his king's second family, were not. 

The only thing seemingly standing in the way of the Dornish knight from confronting the man was Aemond and Alicent. Cobalt eyes upon Rhaena the injured boy had whispered something to his mother which made her place a hand on the kingsguard armor. Halting  Ser Criston in his tracks. The man was less than amused, but he followed his queen's silent commands 

Easily swayed from acts of vengeance where the Targaryen prince was not.

“It was an accident Daemon. He did not touch them.” Laena swiped her thumb across his brow in what she hoped was a soothing caress. Drawing circles into his skin to coax him to focus on her. It had its intended effect. For a spell.

Daemon had torn his gaze away from his nephews. Neck craned down to face her and she almost wished he hadn’t with the look he had given her.

“Did she tell you to say that?” He brought a pale hand up to stroke down her face. Despite the gentleness in his touch his words and that soft look in his eyes rimmed with ash had stung her. 

Cold, unfeeling they were. Gaze upon Alicent as he had said it. Those green eyes turned slits as he threw daggers at the Hightower woman who stood like a doe caught in between two hunters' crossfire or rather two dragons for Rhaenyra had as much venom for step-mother as her uncle did. 

“I would not lie to you.” Not about this. Never about this, Laena thought to herself. “Not for her.” Certainly not about their children. Not for anyone or anything. He had to believe her, but all he did was continue to stroke the back of her hand and give her that pitying look. 

She felt helpless. The situation was absolutely hopeless.  

He would not listen to her like this. He had gotten it in his head that his Alicent’s boys were guilty of malice upon their girls and that she in her naivety had been tricked by the woman herself into believing otherwise.

Mayhaps he was even right in thinking she was naive for she had almost missed his eyes flickering over to Otto Hightower.  

She had never seen Daemon look so disgusted. Pure hatred it was. Utterly hopeless it was. 

This was his reckoning. It was more than a bruised arm or a bump on their girl's heads from a fall or the vivid imaginations of Aemond or Aegon’s fists upon them. Pushing them into the dirt of the cave floor where the dragons nested. Standing over taunting them. Baseless imaginations fueled by his own hate. 

It did not matter what words she spoke or even the truth. The truth mattered least of all when he could get his reckoning upon Otto Hightower. 

Prideful man. He would not stop until he felt some form of justice was enacted and he’d be the one to do it. 

Laena had not noticed she had backed into her father. Having lost track of the man’s presence from the intensity of Daemon's hatred until she felt a hand on her arm when she had almost lost her balance from Rhaena’s shaking. 

 The girl had taken to rambling again, but her little voice was drowned out by the bards exchanged by Alicent and Rhaenyra who had renewed their accusations against one another to the king. The former had picked up where Daemon had left off with glee.

Aemond did not hurt. She repeated. He let me ride upon Seasmoke. It was not his fault I swear. Those entreaties would’ve warmed her heart if she had remembered. She should have been pleased that she would perhaps not be so miserable with the boy when the time came. That she might find some happiness where even she or her sister had or would not. 

It mattered not. Even if Rhaena had shouted the hall down, her father would have not paid it any mind regardless.

She would have to let him ride it out. Let him charge at their wounded nephew if he so pleased. He would never reach him and It would more than likely be the end of whatever agreement she had almost had. The deal was dead regardless. It was dead long before they stepped foot in this hall.   

Her good-brother had said nothing to Daeron’s goading, but she knew it was only a matter of time. Viserys and he would never allow the betrothals to take place and neither would Daemon or her cousin. 

Her cousin who would want her daughters for her boys. Her cousin who now demanded her half-brother, scarcely older than her own sons, sons who had maimed him over the truth, to be sharply questioned by her father's guards. His fathers too, but he was a father to one only. A brother to one only.  

Ser Otto may have wormed his way into the King's ear and his bed, but not into his heart. Alicent and her sons try as they might, they were not family. Not the family he would listen to. The family he would choose. 

That was the way of Targaryen’s. The way of her husband. Blood mattered, but everyone was blood. Blood demanded retribution for blood, but she was his blood. 

But she was Daemon's family. She was his wife. She was the mother of his children. His only children. They were his family and he would listen to them even if she had to force him away from her or make a spectacle of herself to do so.  

They were not in Pentos. She would not make a repeat of that here.      

“Take Rhaena.” She handed her sniffling girl to her mother who had remained thin-lipped at her side without sparing her a glance. Laena imagined if she were to look she’d see nothing apart from relief on her pale face, but that was inconsequential.

It was easy enough to pry him away from everyone. Prying Baela’s hand from his was a bit of an exercise in restraint. 

Their girl's head had turned up at her with doe eyes. Bottom lip sticking out in a pout. A look she had perfected that tugged at even Daemon’s blackened heart. 

It was the look she used when she wished for an hour more in the sitting perched upon her father's lap when Rhaena had already gone to bed. Adding a please kepa for good measure.

Laena thought she looked rather like her father when she did so, the cunningness of it was all him, but her husband disagreed.

She has your eyes. It’s hard to say no to her when she looks like that, he had said, offering nothing more.

Those eyes, her eyes stared back at her with that look, but once her mother had reached out to take her hand hers she went without complaint.

His eyes remained on the chaos as she drew him between the pillars that he had first entered through with her father, but she did not have to drag him behind them. His footsteps meticulously aligned with her own one after the other as he wordlessly followed her lead. 

It was dark there in that enclave. Quiet enough to where the voices of their family became a low hum in the background. 

Her husband's resistance remained at bay when she reached up to take his face between her hands. Without her boots she had to stand upon the tips of her toes to turn his head to face down. Away from the pale faces occupying the great hall and on her brown one instead.

It was at the first stroke down his cheek that he turned his gaze away from the scene that his brother's family had made. 

He did not look through her as she brought his head down to rest upon hers for half a breath. 

Laena let everything fade except the dark green of his irises and the feel of his skin underneath her fingertips. 

He was warm. So very warm. 

If he had been any warmer she would’ve thought he had come down with fever. but despite the warmness of his skin and that wild look in his eyes, it was nice to know that he was flesh. Living and breathing here with her. 

Soft. Laena had to remind herself to be soft and yet she could not falter. She could not give in and let him as he wished to do.

He could not sense any of her trepidation else he’d go back to stomping across the Great Hall leering at Alicent’s boys with murder in his eyes.   

“Rhaena would not lie to me,” Brown eyes widened as they locked onto each other. Trying not to falter under the heat of his gaze.

She had one goal. She could not get lost in anything else, but she could not look away either. “Neither would Baela lie to you. I would not lie to you,” Laena whispered the last words. There was not a need for more than that. 

“If I thought for a single moment Alicent Hightower or her sons had hurt our girls, I would have commanded my father's guards to fetch you Dark Sister.” It was not the complete truth. She would have never commanded such a thing, but the moment he had burst through those doors she would not have stopped him from ordering someone to do so. 

He knew that truth. He did not question her upon the lie in it once she had said it.

He brought his hands up from his sides to cup her face. If he hadn't been holding her. “They fell.” She nodded her head. She sent a prayer to the Gods when Laena saw the color slowly start to return to his irises. Giving into the hand that had was rubbing circles into the apple of her cheeks. 

She was exhausted as she leaned into his touch. Beyond exhausted. 

The Velaryon lady could not quite recall when she had last slept. Two nights ago. Sometime during the journey back. It was all a blur now. The excitement washing it away and leaving her cup empty. 

She should have gone to bed last night. Left Bess to watch over Aemon as she drifted off into the land of dreams. At least then she would’ve gotten some rest before some maid or serving boy had alerted her of her girls' trespasses in the night.  

She would have surely gone to bed now if it was up to her. Have the northern nurse-maid sent for to take the girls to their beds. Have the maids run a bath for her to calm her nerves. 

She should have had Daemon join her. Hold her. Stroke her silver curls while she let her head rest upon his shoulder. Tucking herself while she breathed in him. His hands caressing her and do more than that after. He would have done it. All it would take was a simple and she would have been whisked away without another thought given. 

Laena should've asked him to take her to bed before they were sucked into any more of it, but luck was no longer on her side in these walls. 

He had stopped his fighting. Stopped trying to get to them. Nodding his head as a hand went to cup her cheek and the other fell at his side. She felt exhausted as she let herself lean into Daemon, but her exhaustion had to wait.  

“He called us bastards.” Jace recounted. His voice was loud enough to flit over to where she had tucked them. 

Laena had never before heard the boy utter a word.  Laenor had not once visited them in self-imposed exile and neither had she in return.

Yesternoon was the first time she had ever laid her eyes upon any of her brother's children and that moon She had taken ill before she had the proper chance to speak to him.

It was an odd thing to listen to him. She tried to find that soothing cadence that had belonged to her brother when he had been the boy's age, but she found none of it. 

“Who did you hear it from?” The king's question boomed across the hall. Straining under an unfamiliar tone. 

He stood leaning upon his cane looming over Aemond. Bathing the boy in the shadows.

Laena had never known Viserys to be what she would call a jovial man, but he was not a cruel man. When one got down to it one would no sooner call him Maegor than they would call him Jaehaerys. Middling in every way. 

Her father was more kingly than he, but this was the closest he got to any of the old kings' might. 

“Aegon.” Aemond proclaimed without a waiver. His good eye unblinking at the towering ailing man.

A lie. Anyone would know that the younger prince had not learned it from his brother. A truth such as that did not come from a child no matter how feral that child was.

Aegon more than likely heard it from their own mother, or mayhaps even their grandsire,  but the boy thought it better to spin some tell some fib than the truth. A brother was a better sacrifice than their mother who clung to her younger son as much as he had clung to her. For even the king had his limits. 

Shades of brown blue and green turned to the prince.

His head was hung low. Lank strands curtaining his face, but Aegon did not miss a beat. Probably had been waiting to say so as his uncle had been with him himself. “Just look at them,” “Everyone knows it.”  

It was hard to decide whether his face or his voice held more repulsion. Defiance radiating from his very being. That defiance did not go unpunished. 

“Does your betrothed know as well?”  If someone had dropped a needle the sound of it hitting the stone floor then and there would fill the hall.

All traces of contemptuous arrogance were gone as Aegon stuttered. “Father?” 

“Come now. You've been truthful so far. Your cousin,” Viserys pointed to Baela standing between her parents. As if any needed an aid to who he meant. Their girls were the only cousins present and no one would think it was Rhaena between the two, but he had not wanted so much as a whiff of doubt. “Your betrothed does she know as well.” 

“She is not my betrothed.” The boy had screwed up his nose. Disgust still lining his sallow face. It was an act, but only partially so. Laena knew that unlike his brother Aegon was displeased by the circumstances. He made no move to restrain that displeasure, but. He had not ratted. 

It would’ve been a good act this part play. If one ignored the sweat upon his brow it would have been a very good act, except his father was not as senile as his appearance would have you believe.

“Do not lie to me, boy.” His voice boomed. Gaining a considerable amount of strength. Shocking Laena as Daemon had brought them closer to it. Diving head first back into the fray at the mention of their daughter.  “I have seen your mother's letters to Rhaenys.”

“Cousin—” Her mother tried to begin, her voice as light as a feather. When she but she silenced with a thump of the cane held in Viserys grasp. A heavy thing it was. Heavier than the man it supported.

That thud startled her where she stood. Her body involuntarily jumped from the sound reverberating around. She had not been the only one. Baela and Rhaena took to clinging onto her a little tighter. Her cousin choking upon those grapes of his, but recovered when his father thumped his back to clear his airway. 

“Not a word from you.” He rounded on her. “Not another word from any of you,” He remained standing. Leaning upon his cane for balance while he prowled. His gaze doing the traveling around the chamber where his legs could not. “You, Alicent, and your daughter have committed treason.” 

Laena closed her eyes when the teal of his met hers. Hiding behind her Daemon like Baela had not ten minutes past.

She knew she should not have. In doing so she had admitted her own guilt, but she could not face him when he wielded a sentence like that. She wished she could disappear into the floor. Melt into it or Vhagar would sense her distress and burst through the white stone walls of her father's keep.

Treason. She had not so much as thought of herself sitting upon the Driftwood throne while Laenor had been alive much less seating her girls on the Iron Throne til the past few days, and now she was accused of treason.  

Was it truly treasonous to seat the king's eldest son on his throne? Treasonous to want to marry Baela to Aegon? For her daughter to sit beside him. Rule beside him? 

She knew they did not want it, the king, Rhaenyra, her husband, but was a want treasonous? Was a want to see to see her girls safe treasonous?

Just because they would rather have a bastard boy seat upon that iron chair, who no one would recognize as a worthy heir apart from them, who would be dead before he could ever sit upon it, did not make it treasonous. 

Just because her mother had let them take what should have been hers. The throne. His crown. The kingdoms. It should have all been hers.

What would they have her to do? What did they expect from her?

She was supposed to let her daughters marry boys who would be dead before ever a crown was placed on their heads. To be mocked. Whispered about. Pitied. She was supposed to go along with it all with a smile and a thank you to the man who stole her mother's crown and the woman who wanted her husband for her own. Not say a thing and let them do as they please while she drowned in her unhappiness?

“Your wife was involved in the plotting?” Those eyes remained on her. “Were you not Laena?” 

Did he really expect her to answer that? She could not answer. Not when her throat felt as if she had swallowed sand. 

“Were you not Laena,” He tried again, patience wearing thin as his eyes narrowed. Words biting. If she had not been saved by her husband Laena was sure that she might have remained stuck there.

“Need I remind you brother my wife did not wake nor leave our bed even for my son's cries,” A hand was placed at her backside. Rubbing circles into the dimples of her lower back through her robe. Calming her as she had calmed him. “Unless she learned how to write in her sleep I can assure you she knew no more than I,” Daemon said with as much conviction as Aemond had and held just as much truth in it. The king did not miss that. 

“Your wife arrived with mine, brother.” He sneered. Pale eyes blazing as he stamped his cane. “She may not have known when you kept, but she most certainly was told by her as soon as she arrived.” 

“Your grace—” Her father had tried, but he too was cut off by Viserys. With a wave of his hand rather than the thump of that cane. 

“Oh, you needn't worry Corlys. I know my dear cousin did not tell you of her plots.” Viserys swiveled slowly in the direction of his hand. Adding to the suspense in an attempt to keep from dizziness.

 “Nor did your daughter tell you, Otto?” He smiled. Or at least she thought it was a smile. A poor attempt at one for his face was hardened into some mask-like figure. Whatever one called that, it did not reach his eyes. “You should congratulate her. She has managed to get your grandson closer to the throne in a fortnight than you have in five and ten years.”

The hand of the king remained mute. What was he to say? Lying would do no good and Laena doubted the man who had been so careful with his plots and schemes would want to admit to the fact that he had no knowledge of these proceedings. The plotters house in disarray. 

“That is why you have done this, correct?” If Viserys had wanted an answer from Alicent, he hadn’t waited for it. “You believe your son to be in danger. By my daughter. By my brother. So much so you thought to seek his own wife out to save them. Allow me to remedy that wife.” His face cracked. Making the sores upon his face bleed. Bursting through their scabs. 

Laena could see the spit flying out from the king’s mouth. As if the words were poison upon his tongue. 

“Father,” Rhaenyra’s dulcet tone rang beside her ear. The targaryen seized the opportunity to unwrap her arm around her. Linking them together in a stiff embrace that made her skin crawl.

Laena was beginning to learn that her cousin moved quickly when she wanted to. “I have made an offer to my uncle,” The wrong kind of offer, doubtless, but she added. “And my cousin as my offer to wed Jacaerys to Helaena stepmother still stands.” It was spoken so sweetly. 

Saccharine poured out from her lips, but that sweetness tasted far too sweet when her claws dug. “After the events of tonight-,” Rhaenyra, was cut off by the same hand raised at her father. 

“You worry about my brother sending assassins in the middle of the night to murder your sons. Is that right Alicent?” The queen opened her mouth to speak, but Viserys continued on. “Then your sons shall become his.” He waited not a second to turn his body to her husband. Scanning his eyes as he leaned on his cane. 

“She is a child,” Aegon cried. “I can not marry her!” His mouth was gaping enough that it could catch flies. Earning his uncle's attention once more. 

“You would be lucky enough to have her,” Fire returned to Daemon’s eyes, but he remained settled when she placed her over his round her back. 

“She will not be a child forever, boy,” Visery supplied. “What was it that your mother told you Laena when your father offered you to me?” Her mother turned as white as a sheet, but. 

All protest. “You will not have to bed her until she is four and ten. She will not  be a child then.” If Laena had thought her husband had wanted to throttle her uncle the day last she had not known the look. Daemon looked as if he wanted to kick his cane out from under him and toss the man into the fire he stood beside himself. 

“She will still be a child brother.” Laena shot her eyes to her husband's side. Finding his sword hand twitching. Daemon’s temper waning and waxing like the moon. 

his eyes on Aegon who found the beauty in silence, hand clasped in front of him, and a bended head. 

His mother would not come to his rescue. She could not look at him more than Laena could look at Baela now though it was not out of guilt that made her do so.  

The boy had dug his own grave while she had tried to save him. Tried to save all of them and he did not make it easy when they faced opposition at every angle.

“Would five and ten suit you better? Laena was that age  when you carted her off to Pentos without my consent or knowledge. Was she not Daemon?” She tensed, but Daemon did not let it rattle him. 

“She was not yours which to give me permission for, as Baela is not yours either to command.” Her husband challenged him with his brow raised. The older man bent his stare. Or at least he did not dissent. 

“They will need a keep of their own,” he gave her hand a squeeze. “Your throne will go to Rhaenyra as will Driftmark go to my son when the time comes.” Laena sucked in her breath. Waiting for someone to object to it.

Her mother was sure that she would be named heir now and, but apart from her father being the picture of mirth  when she had presented Aemon as the future Lord of the Tides, he had yet to say anything on the matter and Daemon could not be very fond of the idea of Aegon and Baela’s betrothal. 

A bluff. It had to be a bluff.

She went along with his throughout the years. A united front. That was their deal. She never questioned. Shut her mouth when he asked. Even on occasion he’d go alone with a minor fib or two, but this was more than that. This was their daughter's future and she had not even consulted him on it. As good as betrothed their girls to the grandson of his adversary  and yet he was going along with the proposition. 

“Dragonstone.” The word was clipped. Spoken as if it pained the man to say so.

If the Stranger himself had appeared before them and pulled back his cloak  to reveal the face of man she would not have been more surprised, but Daemon nodded his head in agreement. Letting out a grunt in agreement for good measure. 

“Then the deed is done,” Viserys turned on his heel. Not wanting to look upon his brother for longer than need be.  “None of you shall lose any sleep over it.”

“I will hear no more of this talk,” The king had begun to move again towards the dias. Eyes roving the crowd as he passed milky to umber hues of faces.  “No more talk of bastardy or of usurpation.”

“Jace shall marry Helaena,” His gaze traveled between the two standing parallel to him. Jace did not look as displeased as his uncle had with his betrothal and neither did Helaena. A pale silent thing she was standing near her brothers, but not displeased. Exchanging shy looks with the boy. 

Quite a contrast to her mother who looked anything but the solemn expression she wore was somewhat alleviated with her husband's next decree. 

 “Aegon shall marry Baela. That shall be your lot.” Not an objection was stated besides a sniffle from Rhaena when he reached Aemond. The boy himself glaring at his father.

The king bent to his eye level. Sneering at him. “You have something to say, Aemond? Think I have forgotten you?” He pointed to Rhaena regarding her as if she were some trinket before continuing on. “Your mother promised her to you and you want her?” Laena was taken back by his candor  when he bobbed his head. Still glaring at him. “You may have her if you so wish. Let no one say I have not been generous with you. With any of you.” He picked up his cane as he stood upon the dias. Thrice stamping the thing into the cobblestones. 

“I am your father. I am your husband and your brother, but most importantly I am your king and you will obey me!”  He looked every inch of it then. Laena imagined it was how the old king had looked. The man who convinced her mother to forfeit her own claim he was here in his grandson's shadow. A shiver went up her spine. The hall had fallen silent all apart from Alicent who still managed to keep a hold of her nerve.

“If you say another word, Alicent I will send for Daeron and have him brought here for my brother to keep. I already have half a mind to already. The Gods only know what poison your cousins have been whispering into his ears.” Viserys' pale eyes held no life in it as he commanded his wife’s silence as she shrank into herself. 

“You are blood and you are bound by it twice over. If you seek to destroy each other you will destroy yourselves and this house.” He thumped his cane. “Make your apologies and show goodwill.” He demanded it. 

Goodwill, blood, apologies. One had to see the sense in it. Twas not ideal, no party present had gotten exactly what they wished, least of all justice. Only half measures. The issue was far from resolved, but they would get no more than that from a stubborn man who was worn past his years. 

Mayhaps that would have been the end of it. At least for tonight. This morning. Whatever time it was now. They could have  all gone to bed. Laena very much would’ve liked to have gone to bed. Whatever had transpired could be dealt with when the sun came out, she told herself. Tugging on Daemon's sleeve and motioning her mother to bring their girls to them when Alicent interrupted her plans. 

Viserys called upon blood, but what did blood mean to this family? Blood meant so little when one was not willing to protect their own. When one did not protect those who needed it the most or played favorites. 

Blood was not enough and Alicent for her part would not be silenced in recognizing that. The matter was not finished for the mother of an injured boy. 

An eye. She wanted an eye. Demanded it from Luke or Jacerys. It did not matter. One eye would do. Cruel it may be, but justice for her boy had not been served.

“He is your son. Viserys.” Tears running down her face she begged her husband for some action. For recognition of Aemonds pain. Of their neglect. If she had gotten on her hands and knees it would not have been more disheartening but the man remained unmoved. 

It was eerie. The way the king looked at his wife. 

His eyes held no life. Not for Alicent. His words held no love for her or her children. 

Hissing at her as he ordered her to quit. Unbending. Unyielding. One would think she were a stranger. Not his children that shared half his blood, that inherited his eyes, his hair, his face were not his. 

“Do you understand?” That broke her, but Rhaenyra dealt the final blow. 

She had not gotten everything she had wished for. Lost the girls and very likely Daemon from a bad play, but she had fathers favor and she was keen on reminding at least one of her rivals that. 

“Thank you father.” The taste of victory had never looked so triumphant from another’s tongue. She did not look at her good-mother Rhaenyra’s conceit. It would drive anyone to madness. Crumble away at any last resolve one would have. 

Her cousin had acted swiftly. She knew later that it had all been calculated long ago. Moving closer to her and Daemon. Locking their arms together in some show of sisterly affection. Those words she spoke directed at Alicent. Taunting her. Baiting her. 

The crowd had done the rest for her. Separating she and Daemon from each other, but it had been her blunt determination that got her there. 

Laena had tried wringing out of her hold. Tried with all  graces and supplications. 

“Rhaenyra.” She did not move. “Rhaenyra,” she tried again, but she remained unmoved. Cousin. Her grip tightened. Any more and she’d feel her arm go numb. “Sister please,” She pleaded. She tried to keep her tears at bay, but she was not made of stone. She tasted the salt of her pain on her lips. “Please.” The last one had been answered with a steel

Rhaenyra’s mockery was redirected with a quirk of the corner of her thin lips. Blink and you would miss it.“I did warn my uncle.” Back straight she did not dare face her. Cause attention to what was out of place. 

Pale eyes firm upon the threat charging at them. Fear in her eyes, but that fear was not in her voice. One would think that she had asked Laena if she would like a chalice of wine.

Warn him. Warn him. Warn him. Alicent was a mere foot from them when Laena realized her meaning.

I need you uncle. Alicent will not see reason. They wish to swallow me whole. I can not see a way out. The letter that bloody letter she had done her hardest to put from her mind these past hours. 

Rhaenyra wanted him to see. She was no more content than her stepmother. This was her way out. Her way for Daemon Laena was the bait, but her realization came a mere foot too late. 

It had taken two heartbeats for Alicent to reach them. Laena could recall that detail when the maester had asked later because she had counted. Trying to calm  herself. 

The queen had not been deterred by her own presence. She was pinned against Rhaenyra as her good sister tried lunging for the Targaryen woman with her husband's blade.  

Duty, honor, sacrifice. Laena had heard her spit out those words. The order she could not say. All became mere noise when a blade was pointed at her eye. 

Rhaenyra did not stop her from backing into her, but she did little to calm the Hightower woman either. Goading her with her bark. 

“Now they see you.” It was the words that sent chills throughout Laena’s on spine. Words alone could not do so. 

It was her coldness. All the light left out from her. A statue made of pale marble. She imagined that it could rival the North and make the hardest of those men breed for snow fall victim to its bite.

Laena could not entirely blame the Hightower woman for her actions then. Just wished she had not been between them, facing the wrong end of catspaw. 

It was over quickly. There was relief in that. A single swipe carved down her arm. Cutting through skin and the silk of her robe. 

She had been too close for her aim to be precise. Too close for the knife to only meet Rhaenyra and not her. Alicent had only one shot and she had taken it.

It was impossible for Daemon to have broken free from the crowd to reach her before she hit the ground.  He would have had to be standing right beside her to do that.  Her knees had already given out when he had. 

Alicent had tried to reach her. Realizing as soon as she and not Rhaenyra had yelped from the bite of the blade digging into her arm. 

“Laena,” she sounded as petrified as she felt. Her brown eyes dangerously close to popping out of her skull with fright. 

“It’s okay,” she had said. She did not know if she had said it for herself or for Alicent. It’s okay. Looking at her own blood, so very vivid, she did not feel okay, quite dizzy. 

She was in her husband's arms before a proper apology could be made. An arm wrapping and another draped across her back as he glared at the Hightower woman into submission. She scampered back to Ser Criston. The knight hastily pulled her behind him. Sword in his other hand.

If he had not found her to be at the very edge of consciousness, the second time in just shy of two two moons, she knew he would have taken the sword strapped to her fathers belt, the closest weapon to him  not in an enemy's hands and given Alicent a scar to match.

Six and ten stitches. That was the exact number of neat sutures she had needed to close the wound Alicent had sliced into her arm. Six and teen stitches. 

Laena winced on the last one.  “Almost done my lady.” She recalled Maester Croton giving her a small smile as he tried to avoid her husband's glare. The main burning a hole into the side of the maesters head with the weight of it.

 She was lucky. Very lucky. If the dagger had moved an inch higher, a single inch, it would have struck something that could not be mended with six and ten stitches. 

He had not left her side. Not since he lifted her into his arms. Not even for her. 

A moth to an open flame Rhaenyra had trailed them. “She will not stop uncle.” Any other time Laena would’ve marveled at the speed her cousin followed them. Then of course if it had been any other time she would have rung her neck for what she had done or maybe it was because of it. Her pain was stroking her annoyance with her.  “Not with me. Or my sons. Or—”

“Or my wife,” her cousin went to nod her head like some halfwit. Seemingly oblivious to the rage in his tone. Her smile fading only with the next of his chastisements. “I wonder if you should help her with that. Or if you shall take it upon yourself to do so.” 

“Uncle I—“

“Listen to your father for once and go to bed, niece.” Someone had slammed the door of their chambers in her face. She wished she could have seen her face, but the sound of her stutter, the feel of her husband, and that door shutting was enough. 

Laena was almost sure it had been Vaemond. Picturing his dark face with a light  with a smile. A simple thing, but one that would have made him positively giddy. A perfect end to a perfect early morning and he had barely spoken more than a few words. 

They had gone back to talking amongst themselves soon enough. Bickering was more like it. 

Her parents, her uncle, even her cousins who had followed them all descended into making jabs at one another for what had transpired. 

Was that necessary? I ought to box your ears for that. You made a spectacle of yourself. Who else have you been sending letters to? It stops here! You ought to have been more careful. You should have come to us first. Not the king. Not Alicent Hightower. You ought to have told us. Told me!

Scoldings after scoldings handed out at the others like they were children, but those bickers gave way to whispers. Then nothing at all and something again. 

Maester Croton had long been gone by then as had Ser Vaemond and his sons. 

Laena tucked into bed. At some point she  had fallen asleep from the mixture of a lack of sleep and the pain in her arm. Awakening to the something. Her mothers voice breaking through her dreamless slumber. 

“Your brother is weak Daemon and a fool!” She snarled. Guttural sound it was. Laena hadn’t thought she had ever heard her father snarl much less her mother.

“If he were in a grandsire's place, our house would long be dead. Your brother is lucky to be Viserys I for he would have been the last” Bleary eyed, Laena could make out her mother pacing before her father grabbed her to settle her. 

“He thinks you are the only one who brings forth chaos, but you both are a disease. I have done what your two could not and I will not apologize for saving our house.”

“You have given our house over to vipers. You have saved no one cousin save your own damn pride.” His eyes were slits as he hissed at her yet he remained seated. By her side. Petting her hair with the gentleness of well with a gentleness that could rival the Mother. The juxtaposition was stark. 

“My pride!” She roared enough to cause Meleys to answer with one of her own in the distance. Much like Vhagar, the smaller red dragon had been making circles around the castle since the funeral.

At one point she had sent out a round of flames into the burgeoning sunrise. She imagined if her mother was able to, she would join her beast with a round of her own.

A dragon's fire could not be extinguished by another’s. Its intensity only growing when it meets the other flames. And her mother had the temperament of a Baratheon to contend with. They would go on like this trying to reduce the  other into a pile of ash but Laena would not withstand their bickering.

“I shall never sleep if you both keep shouting in my ear,” Three pairs of eyes turned to her, setting aside grievances to dote upon her. She endured their pettings for a half hour before her parents left them. Her father assured her once they knew she was in adequate health while her mother glared at Daemon. We shall let you rest, sweetlings.

“Were you with my father the entire time?” It felt the safest option as she sipped upon the glass of water Daemon handed her. Laena was almost sure she knew what his answer would be. They had come in together. There was no awkwardness between the two and they smelt of smoke and wine and not the smell of something which she would rather not think of.  

Her husband grabbed her hand with his free one. Bringing the back of it to his lips placing a kiss upon it before speaking. 

 Eyes gazing into hers as she scanned his face. “Yes.” A simple answer for a simple truth. 

She could have left it at that truth. Let him dote upon her some more. Arm still aching with a pain she would not soon forget and a want for sleep, or at least a want to stay in the bed until tomorrow, but what good was the truth when they did not have all of it? When they had to bleed for it? Almost paid for their life for it twice over? Simple was no longer adequate for her. 

Laena closed her eyes as she thought of more the pain she felt. “What would you have done if you had not reached me in time?” 

Now. A moon ago. It did not matter, it was all the same. Her end could have been met at any turn. Anything could have happened. 

She could hear Daemon placing the glass in his hand onto the end table before the bed dipped under his weight. She was wrapped in his arms in seconds  as he tried turning her mind from it.

“None of that my  sweet girl.” He shushed her as he rocked her. “Please Laena do not say that.” She could have listened to him. Accepted an answer for answer. He had not lied to her. He had given her what she wanted. 

Proved to her his faithfulness in his own way, but once one had a taste of the truth after going for so long without it they would always ask for more. 

“You would have been fine I think.” No point in thinking about it now. She was here. It was unlikely she would go anywhere or any one would get to her, anyone would get to them now, but she would always wonder. 

He would have been fine. Perfectly fine. He would grieve for a time, but Daemon Targaryen was not a man made for grieving. 

He would have lived. No comprises. No half measures. He would have had what he wanted. Done as he pleased. Even their girls would be fine. Finding their own way somehow, but he would hear none of it. No more truths left to tell. 

The past and a million what ifs dying before them. 

“I would be without you.”Tucking her head underneath his chin as he rained down kisses upon his temple. The fight had left her as quickly as it had come. Fights never lasted long when she was in his arms. 

 “You are where you are supposed to be. Here with me. I need you Laena. I do not wish for any one else in your place,”’He cradled her head between his hands. Lips enveloped hers with a whisper of my sweet Laena on them and she did not protest. Leaning into his touch. 

The kiss took her already strained breath away and yet she hungered for more. Whatever he would give to her.

The man before her did not go unaffected either. 

He only pulled away for breath. A pearly string of salvia connected them as he placed small pecks onto her lips before Daemon renewed the maddening extent of his efforts. This time trailing her neck. Taking a brown nipple between teeth to suckle upon. 

Applying just enough pressure to have her thread her fingers through his strands to pull him closer, but not pulling away to trail his kisses down her ribs so as not to draw any milk. 

His mouth never left her skin that had become feverish under his touch. 

She felt like she was on fire. Turning into a pile of something molten before him and he had barely touched her. 

He had reached her stomach when he had paused. Silver head resting on her lower belly. Dropping a kiss upon a freckle before lifting his gaze so their eyes would meet. Shades of fire in them. “I want another one.”   

He sounded so hopeful. He looked so hopeful and she wanted to join him in it. She wanted another too. Wanted half a dozen more. Wanted to ignore the warning  that the Maester had given her. That her own body told her with its aches and pains.

He didn’t give her much time to wallow in her inadequacies. It was the early days still. He reminded her of that fact with his petting. 

Her sopping heat called to him. Ensnaring his senses. Far too wet for what he had down, but he did not mind that tantalizing sight. The taste of her honey on his parched tongue. 

The only drink worth a damn in their exile, he had whispered one night. Breathe ghosting her fluttering heat after she had passed out from the pleasure. Walking up to find his head still buried into her cunt. She had to hide her heated cheeks into her pillow to keep from grinning and moaning like a mad woman.  

Laena had a feeling that he wished to make a repeat of that night before the sun would greet them. His lips making the unhurried descent down to the apex of her thighs. His hands grazed the outer lips of her womanhood. 

“I want you.” It was a silly thing to say when his face was close to her want and she had taken his hand at her thigh and placed it on her bare cunt, but the lack of air to her head made her forget the silliness of it. 

He didn’t chastise her for it. Make fun of the fact that he could smell her and see her arousal as if he had already buried herself into the sopping mess of her. 

“You have me Laena,” he breathed into the skin of her thigh and with that she was gone. 

He was slow. Unhurried. Like they had all the time in the world as he lapped at her folds. Mayhaps they did as he pulled from her peak after peak. 

Pushing his length into her when she trembled underneath him and told him she could not take anymore, but he gave her more still. Rocking into her until they were both a soaking mess of teeth, whines, limbs, and peaks stretched on and left them curling and clinging onto their lover. 

They were breathless lying in the afterglow. Forgetting everything apart from each other. 

“I love you,” he whispered before enveloping her in another kiss. For all that was, he was poured into that kiss. Breathing as much life into it as he did into her. I love you. For the first time, Laena believed him.

Ao3 Link:

#daemon x laena #laena x daemon #laena velaryon #daemon targaryen #daemon targaryen x laena velaryon #hotd fanfic #hotd fic #bnhotdfic

[bohemian-nights]

Between Heaven and Hell

Word count: ~2,003

Rating: 18+

Pairing: Daemon Targaryen x Nettles

Warnings⚠️: NSFW🔥

Description: A lover's tryst under the cover of a storm.

AN: This is the shortest thing I’ve written in a while, but I haven’t written for Daemon and Nettles in a while either. Enjoy 🐑

Thunder crackled in the distance. To the lovers tucked away in a cottage warm in their bed under the cover of the storm within the Mountains of the Moon, it had become mere background noise. No more than the hum of a distant tune playing during a feast from a chamber above them. Too caught up and consumed by the other in a realm of their own making to care about the early spring storm in a world outside of it.                    

He was trying to kill her. That Nettles knew.         

Knew it in the way that Daemon had caged her in. A set of stalwart pale arms placed on either side of her head. Pinning her to the ruined mess of their bedding as she tried not to shiver underneath him.     

Not that he minded. He never minded her trembling when they were like this. 

Knew it in the way his hands would not leave her. Nor his mouth, or any other part of him. Cleaving himself to her.    

One would have to take a butcher's knife to cut them in two and even then they’d. He was everywhere. He was all there was. 

Pressed up against her with not a stitch between them. Flesh melding into flesh. His and hers becoming mere ideas of being rather than reality. This caging made it pointless.

He didn’t suffocate her. Nettles never would call what he did suffocating. She supposed she then should not call what he did caging either. Was it really a cage when she did not mind it? Even now when she had done what she had. 

When she had closed herself to him. Trembling legs snapping shut with a clap that echoed out round the room like the thunder in the night sky. Frantically trying to relieve her shaking the only way she knew how. Crawling up the bed as she tried to catch her breath from his merciless onslaught. 

A reflex, but it was a reflex that would not go unnoticed or without punishment. If one could call what took place in this chamber turned to an altar of worship a punishment.  

“I’m right here Netty,” her lover whispered into her crown. Her coils damp and slicked with sweat, his and hers as he reigned kisses down from her temple to the scar that grace across the bridge of her nose. Lightening streaked through the window, illuminating the chamber which made the back of his silver head glow. 

He had grown ever possessive over her as of late. Daemon had always been possessive of her she supposed when she thought of it, but now what little restraint he had vanished with the dying days of winter. Leaving a starving man in his place. 

That man pulled her from the intensity of her scrambled thoughts, the hands that had surrounded her going to her hips. Head lifting from its resting place along the slope of her brown neck lined with freckles he kissed each with such tenderness it made her ache for an entirely different reason than the throbbing heat aching at her center. The spot she swore was carved out for him the same as the one that matched hers upon his pale frame. The freckles traded for scars reddened by her mouthing.

She was going to hell. That she knew and he was trying to send her there. 

Oh, she knew what he said. In his eyes she was the Maiden, or whatever was the equivalent to his Gods. “You do not have a stain upon you Netty,” he’d tell her as he gazed down at her like she had hung the moon. Not in the way he had stained himself from a lifetime of battles and wars of his own making, but she was not made of sugar. 

She was the daughter of no one and she had survived that. She had seen her home turn ash before her eyes and she lived. She had survived a war. No one comes out of that without a mark upon them. She was not proud of her actions, but she had not taken a life that was undeserving and she had not stolen from those in need. Still, a thief was a thief and a murderer no matter how black the heart that had been taken.

A sinner she was as all the rest. The gates were barred the same as any other with only this brief mortal's respite left to her.

There was pleasure to be found in this realm. A pleasure that she had taken and grabbed hold of between. Never letting go. A consolation in the sin and the eternal damnation that surely awaited her afterward. Eagerly lapping at its saccharine taste. 

Better to enjoy her time here. Better to give what she could. Better to be a saint here if she could. It could never hurt at any rate. She could be the Maiden come to life. 

Though Nettles wondered if the Maiden would find herself in such a position as this. Spread out, a feast for her husband's eyes, naked and wanting. The Warrior taken her for his own. She would not be the Maiden if she did. Corrupted by the sins and lusts of mere mortals, but she could still bring love forth as she would now. 

“Sorry,” It was shakier than she would have liked. Horse, but as the Maiden would have she tried to apologize, but as the warrior would he shushed her, knowing just how pointless it was when she had lost this war nor was she very sorry for it. 

Lips skimmed the tops of her heaving breasts as she tried to keep her heart from beating out of her chest. An endeavor which failed at that when he nuzzled into the plump brown flesh and took a nipple into the warmth of his mouth. Laving her skin with his tongue. Only releasing the engorged flesh when she had begun to pant. 

She tugged on silver strands for more with a whine. Trying to pull his lips back to her breast, but he moved himself to her ear. 

“It’s rude to hide yourself from your husband little wife,” Husband. Little Wife. Nettles would have giggled at his whispering if her head hadn’t felt like she was underwater. 

She still had not gotten used to that. She did not know if she ever would, but she supposed she had a lifetime to get used to it, but right now she was having a hard time keeping her mind from drifting off into the hell they were making. Going blank with each carasses. 

With those fingers of his that had found their home in her sopping cunny once more. He had already Thrumming with her arousal under his stare and lips that seemed to have found its place upon hers breathing her in. Drinking up her moans and whatever little whimpers she would give him like the sweetest ambrosia. 

She would not make it to the end of the night much less another five and twenty years and two others after that like this if they were so lucky. 

Gods, he really was trying to kill her, but she would not go quietly. Or without him. 

Daemon faired little better. 

That she had noticed it. Him rutting into the sheets and her thighs like a dog in heat from the sight of her pleasure at his hands and tongue. “It’s rude to torture your wife husband.” In her haze and between pants she managed to wriggle a hand out from under his grip to bring it between them. 

Letting it trail down the pale skin of his abdomen softened by age and her attempts in their kitchen at domesticity all of which he greedily gobbled down before she took him in hand. She wasted no time swiping her thumb across his swollen cockhead.

Nettles was gifted with a groan for that. His head fell back down upon her breasts as he breathed out. He now the one leaning into her touch. 

Good, if he was going to kill her why should she not return the favor? They could both bask in their sin then. And sin it was. The most delicious kind that swallowed one whole and left them aching, but Daemon would be all too happy to oblige her. He had twice already. Drinking up much more than her moans.

It was a wonder how he had not spilled himself onto her thighs and the sheets though it was quite the relief and she wished to keep it so. Nettles was too selfish to allow him to make like a green boy and empty himself in his hand at the first sight of a woman. Or in her hand in this case. 

She wanted him inside her before he did so. Every last drop till she overflowed with him. 

Bringing her slender hand back up to her parted lips and took the tips of her now glistening fingers into her mouth to suckle upon as she caught his eye. He stared at her. Entranced by her lapping. 

Mouth agape. Only another crack of thunder broke him from the listful spell that had rendered him incapable of speech. Scrambling to give her what she wished. 

“You little minx.” His voice was as horse as hers. Daemon had plunged his fingers back into her heat in one thrust. Not giving a moment to adjust, not that she needed it. Nettles arched her back into his touch as she gave into him. Letting him lead her into oblivion. 

“Tis rude to keep your wife waiting my prince.” She had managed to stutter out between breathless moans. A fresh peak gripping its claws into her spent form.  

He chuckled at the sight of her whimpering and shaking.

Nettles thanked whatever God that might be listening that her husband was in a benevolent mood. Daemon decided to take pity upon her as he leaned down to take that nipple still hard and wet and waiting back into his mouth.

Doubtless, he could not hold back. Newly wedded bliss not yet worn off. She hoped it never would. With the way they went on, attached at the other's hip, it would not for a good while.

“You’re so beautiful Netty.” Mouth upon her neck again. Kissing every freckle under his violet gaze. “So so beautiful.” 

She bit into the plump of her bottom lip to stop from letting out  Nettles had given up on trying to hide her pleasure, but she liked to keep a bit of sense left. “Too beautiful to hide yourself from me.” She laughed breathless as it was, but full of life and that laugh gave way to a moan. Losing her resolve, but for this too she no longer cared for it. 

“My sweet Netty.”

A kiss this time was placed on her temple while his fingers pushed in deeper. It’s gentleness juxtaposed with the roughness of those digits. 

At the contrast, Nettles clamped down on his thick digits as she began to cream around him. The calloused pad of his thumb found the bundle of nerves at the apex of her quivering mound. Drawing circles into her pulsing nub that drew her closer to her climax. It stole the breath from her lungs before pulling from her and stealing it again when he gave her something else to milk dry. 

His cock had entered her the same way as his fingers. Taking her all at once as they clung to each other. “My sweet girl.” 

“You’re all my sweet girl.” He had reached her hilt as he whispered it upon her lips. Swallowing his cries upon his tongue. His length nudged against the spongy spot within her as he pushed deeper still. The lightning in the sky dotted the backs of the midnight of her eyes. The time for teasing long gone. 

All yours. Sin turned to heaven in the land of the damned and what a blissful heaven it was.

Ao3 Link:

#nettles #daemon targaryen #dettles #bnhotdfic #daemon targaryen x nettles #daemon x nettles #bnasoiaffic #nettles x daemon #bnfic #dettles fic #dettles fanfic

[bohemian-nights]

"I think we deserve a soft epilogue, my love. We are good people and we've suffered enough."

-Seventy Years of Sleep, Nikka Ursula

HOTD au where Laena lives and her and Daemon return to Westeros. Finding a way to mend their fractured marriage while chaos unfolds around them.

#daemon isn’t a good person really but laena deserved better #daemon x laena #laena x daemon #hotd au #hotd moodboard #bnmoodboard #laena velaryon #daemon targeryan #bnhotdfic

[bohemian-nights]

What We May We Mend (Chapter 4)

Word Count: ~19,019 (yes I know)

Rating: Mature

Pairing: Daemon Targaryen × Laena Velaryon

Warnings⚠️: Does Daemon Targaryen count as one? This chapter also gets a little steamy 😏

Description: In the year 126 AC Lady Laena Velaryon survives her difficult in a foreign land surrounded by strangers. With a second chance to mend their fractured marriage she and her husband Prince Daemon Targaryen return to Westeros with their children in tow as chaos unfolds around them🐉

AN: Sorry for the delay, but it’s another huge chapter and the gang is all here so yay🌊

Chapter 1, Chapter 2, Chapter 3, Chapter 5, Chapter 6,

Her mother’s warning stuck with her for a spell. It was hard for it not to with everything that transpired around her. An impending doom. A strong current in the eye of a storm and she was caught in the undertow. She could hear voices. She could see land, she was not very far away from it, but she could not move. 

Even if she could she had no way of escaping as the water surrounded her. Wishing to pull her down into its depths to what would surely be her doom She was caught swimming against that current until the sound of her husband's laugh pulled her out of the sea and back to the shore with a jolt. A strange feeling it was. For she had felt lost and even when one is found it is hard to forget the feeling of being lost.                                                                                                                                                              

He laughed. He actually laughed. Laena would not have thought anything of it had they been anywhere else, had it been any other time, about anyone else, but here, now, one this day, in front of everyone who mattered to them; this was wrong; even for him.                       

True enough, it was her uncle's words he laughed at. “Ours runs true. And ours must never thin.” Blood. Their blood. The ancient and noble blood of house Velaryon.The proud blood of old Valyria forged in fires the sea as house Targaryens through the sky. Just as pure. Just as deserving of the respect that a name from old Valyria could command. Fates intertwined. Where they ruled the skies they ruled the seas. Brothers bond in the only way they could be as the last vestiges of a great fallen empire. Save House Celtigar Laena supposed, but they had never been a particularly important house in their ancestral land or Westeros. Never been particularly close to House Targaryen either. Not in the way they were.   

Salt ran through every Velaryon's blood, every Velaryon apart from three who were Velaryon in name only and their very Valyrian mother. Their very Valyrian mother Laena was currently doing her best to not meet the gaze of standing on the same rocky outcrop just to the right of them clutching her eldest sons closer. Yet the same could not be said of the Targaryen woman.

She felt the weight of her stare burning a hole into the side of her skull. Paranoia some would call it. 

Paranoia directed at her good sister. She had to keep reminding herself that she was in fact her good sister and not just any woman, even though she was the same woman who haunted her so for what felt like its own not so little an eternity. She was the same woman who now stood in the flesh before her instead of a ghostly figment in her nightmares kept only at bay by the sea, but that sea was no more.

Lena knew she had not grown paranoid in the time that they had been standing on that rock. Her own mother had confirmed her suspicions when she kept glancing over at the younger Targaryen with a small frown lining her face. Her mother was never one for rudeness just for the sake of it. She was not impolite. One could never call Rhaenys Targaryen impolite without a reason. She most certainly would not take the time to be so here they were grieving. She would not have glanced Rhaenyra's way unless she had glanced at theirs first. 

There was something to this feeling of being watched like prey, but it was a matter to be dealt with another time, even if that other time would be in a mere hour or two. When they were not here. When she did not feel the sea calling to her. The crashing of waves over laughter.

Mayhaps it was not the best idea to have Ser Vaemond give the eulogy for her brother. Daemion had volunteered himself, she and Laenor loved all their cousins just as much as the last, but he was their favorite.  

“I would be happy to do it uncle,” he had told her father. Probably with an infectious smile gracing his long brown face to put them at ease. The matter had been pushed aside in all upheaval that had fallen over Driftmark’s shores and not settled until shortly before the morning they had arrived, but his own father unsurprisingly cut in. Dismissing the idea in its entirety by putting his own name forward.

“You need not trouble yourself Daemion. I shall do it.” As the elder, short of her own father taking up the task, his right was paramount. They could not refuse him. And so her uncle was given the honor of sending her brother off to his final resting place, oh and what a thing he made of it. 

The Velaryon man simply could not help himself when it came to theatrics. It was truly what he was best at. He always had to make a statement, especially on matters which he did not approve of, Matters which he felt were a stain. He would not hold back his tongue. Not but that was no excuse for Daemon’s actions. 

No excuse for that hearty chuckle that caused their guests, the likes of Otto Hightower and his own brother who were standing behind him, to look down on him as if he had gone mad. Laena imagined that the lord hand often looked at her husband as if he had no sense no matter if he was deserving of that look or not, but in this instance, her husband was most certainly not helping his case.    

Daemon made no move to hide the smirk on his face or the glint in his pale green eyes. Not when her mother, whose bloodshot hazel eyes brimming with a mountain of unshed tears were set ablaze. Looking as if she wished to reach past Rhaena and push him towards the edge of the rocky outcrop they stood on top of into the sea below them. Nor when her father, who despite her husband's mercurial ways had always had a soft spot for the Targaryen prince, looked like he might join her mother in pushing him into the depths of the bay. The only one who looked pleased was Ser Vaemond. He continued on with his speech with a glow on his face for the success of his efforts. 

“Kepa,” Baela gasped furrowing her dark brows up at her father. Twas the same tone and look she would use to chastise Aemon when he was placed in her lap by Rhaena after his feeding. She had burped the babe, Beth had taught her how, but the little dear would almost always let out an infinitesimal amount of spittle on her dress. 

Ruining the garment much to her vexation, which did not help to endear him to her, except her brother was a babe. He could not help what he did. He did not know it was impolite; it just happened to come out. Her father, on the other hand, was certainly not a babe. He had full control over his actions. Daemon knew better and yet, he had laughed. 

At that, his grin fell. He looked down at Baela to find disappointment in that little brown face that was so beloved to him and then backed up at her own identical one. He did not meet his eye, her gaze steady on what was her brother. That told him more than if she had met it.

She could see out from the corner of her eyes that those green eyes of his had softened. Try as she had not to cry she could help it. While he had not cared what Otto Hightower, her mother, or any of the other mourners thought of his actions, it seemed as if he cared for her opinion and Baela’s. 

Mayhaps he had not even thought that the reaction would hurt her. After all, he was not laughing at her brother, not really. She had no real reason to be vexed with him, but he could see the pained look in her dark irises that she averted from his gaze.

Daemon bent down, taking her head between his hands and placing a kiss on the top of Baela’s silver locs. That apology seemed to satisfy their daughter. Going back to watching the proceedings with a somber expression. He meant to repeat the apology to the mother as he had the daughter. reached out to grab her unoccupied hand that was not warped onto Baela like a vine on the edge of a cliff. He managed to bring her wrist up to his lips to place what she was sure was an I’m sorry for behaving as an ass kiss upon the back of her bronze skin, but she snatched it out from his grasp, not caring who saw. 

People would notice that she reminded herself, but he had already made a spectacle of them. A mockery and she did not wish to forgive him for it. To coddle him and allow him to go on as if he had done nothing. That it meant nothing that was what he wanted. To soothe his guilty conscience. She knew that is what he wanted when he reached for her. It was not entirely for her benefit. If it had been he would’ve held his tongue in the first place.

True enough, his laugh was not directed at her brother, he had no quarrel with the recently departed, but it indirectly was directed at her brother's shame. His inability to live up to the Velaryon name. His inability to secure their house. His legacy, another man’s. Her uncle had reminded friend and foe alike of that and Daemon had given it recognition with a laugh. He was his good-brother. His cousin. He should have thought about what others would think of it. What she would think of it? He should have known better. Her brother was being lowered into the sea before them. Right before her eyes. In that coffin.  

She had not seen his body. No one would let her. It is for the best Laena. You would not want to see him that way. Better to picture him as he was sweet girl, but when she tried to picture him as Daemon suggested she could not. Nothing could come to mind except a black pit. Filled with the vastness of his absence. 

He was not here, he would never be here. He was not her brother anymore. He was in the seas now. A pile of flesh and bones that would be swallowed by it. Becoming nothing more than food for whatever lived down there to gorge themselves upon. 

A sob caught in her throat. She tried to scream, but she could not. Her hands went to wrap around her neck, clawing at it to force the sound out, but it did nothing. She choked. Her throat felt like it was burning. Struggling even to get breath to her lungs. 

She was caught in the sea again. Everything that was, her parents' ashen faces, Daemon’s morose humor, Baela’s hand in hers, all gone. Faded away. As if she had been pushed off the rocky ledge into the sea. Drowning. She was drowning with Laenor, only she looked around, but he was not there. His coffin was nowhere in sight.  Nothing was as she floated down. She could see nothing. The light from the surface dimmer the further down she went. The current was all there was. Dragging her down into the depths of the sea.  

“Laena,” it was Daemon’s voice. It sounded as if he were an ocean away. Panicked. Trying to keep her here with him as if she really was drowning before him. Throwing out a line before it was too late she was lost to him to the tide.  “Laena breathe.” He cupped her face in between his warm palms. They felt so warm, but she supposed anything that wasn't. The pads of those warm digits drew gentle circles into the apples of her cheeks.

She made note of that somehow beneath the darkness she was. His voice was so far away, but she could feel his touch no different than if she had not been drowning or what felt like she was drowning. Funny how that worked.  “I’m right here. You are right here with me. Just breathe. Breathe for me Laena. I need you to breathe.” Breathe. Just breathe. How does one breathe when they are drowning?  

“I’m drowning.” Where his voice sounded faint her own sounded a water-logged whisper from the depths of her mind. Had she said it aloud? Could anyone hear it?

She tried looking around and all she saw was the sea. She closed her eyelids with a flutter. Squeezing them shut so as not to see the darkness. It was easier this way. If she was still truly on that rocky outcrop with him and not wherever down wherever the current would take her, she had really made a spectacle of them. She supposed it didn't matter. Not when she could not breathe.

“Laena breath please just breathe. Please sweet girl. Please. Just breathe.” His voice broke and something in it broke her. Breaking through the haze. Forcing her to focus on the gentle ministrations of his fingers. Letting it lead her ashore and the water empty from her lungs. 

She opened her eyes. “I’m fine. I’m just—“ Feel like a part of me sank with my brother. “I’m fine Daemon.” She was not with her brother. Not down at the bottom of the sea. She was on dry land. With Daemon holding her “I’m fine.” She said that more to herself than anyone in particular. She was fine. She was fine and she was—- being led out of the sun. Back toward the garden above them. 

Back inside the safety of Hide Tides' white stone walls, but her feet were not moving. She was not vertical. No, she was being carried across the balcony. Carried by Daemon like a bride. The second time this way in a moon. An eerily familiar feeling of disquietude. 

She suspected that this familiarity was the only thing on her husband's mind with the pace he set. How it could be she and not her brother they buried? If she were the one they mourned for. Would he collapse under his own grief as she had?   

Laena shoved those unpleasant thoughts down. Focusing on what was here instead of what had happened or could have happened. She was not in danger. She was alive. Safe and whole. Daemon had to be reminded of that. 

“Put me down.” He did not stop. He did not look at her. He did not even act as if he heard her. “Daemon I am fine. Put me down.” He slowed, but he still would not stop. He kept his eyes on the stone archway of the castle's garden entrance ahead. 

“You need rest.” Laena blanched. Feeling dread digging a pit in her belly. Rest. Of all the words and phrases in the common tongue, those three which were repeated so often that they were branded into the back of her skull had become the most abhorrent to her ears.

Rest is what her father's maester had advised for her last night when he had come to check her over and again that morning while her mother and husband were fretting over her. Echoing the same sentiments as the magistrate's healer. 

“You ought to get some rest, my lady.” He was sympathetic, but they almost had not let her go down to the shore and send Laenor off. Wanting her to watch from a safe distance from the window where her view of the proceedings would be partially obscured. It would be too much to see her brother so close in the state he was in. 

Laena had written of their concern for overbearingness. Her husband’s need for control facilitated by maesters and healers should not be given into. She turned to her only ally. Just having managed to appeal to her mother's sensibilities. 

A suggestion from Maester Croton was never an order that must be followed. If he had meant for her to stay in bed he would’ve ordered her to stay, but now Laena had proven the suggestion was more an order than she wished. 

Mere sympathy from an old man who had grown sentimental and wished to appease the little girl who he had looked after over the years, administering whatever tincture to cure her of malaise, cleaning many scraps, and setting to right a bone or two, against his better judgments as a maester and healer. That lively girl was a hard one to say no to, but the girl was gone and the woman left in her place was a shadow of her. 

She had become a frail bird in everyone’s eyes, one that at the slightest upset such as now would mean confinement. Regulated to sit and watch everyone go about their days while she sat languishing in her bed, waiting. Laena would be lucky now if Beth was so much as to stick up for her against the chorus of abnegation of her personal freedom that would surely follow this blunder. 

Mayhaps she would have accepted the gravity of the maesters' suggestions and orders in reference to her prognosis for what they were, but she had been regulated to waiting long before the tumultuous business of Aemon’s birth. She had enough of that to last her a lifetime.

“Put me down Daemon or I shall scream,” She meant it. She was getting good at that. Meaning what she said. He had already caused a scene as had she. They already thought them mad. What would be the point of trying to preserve proprietary now? 

He kept going though. Not believing her. One step. Two. Three. She screamed. Like a banshee. It was ear spluttering. It hurt her own ears and everyone who happened to be in the immediate vicinity, including Rhaenyra and her eldest son who was still glued to her side. 

The pair got more than they bargained for when they took to following them. An earful more than they had bargained for as they stopped in their tracks. Flinging their arms up to cover their ears before fleeing the scene. 

For the boy, Laena did feel some inkling of remorse for inflicting that small torment upon him, but the former did not feel very sorry for torturing her. 

“By the Gods, put her down Daemon!” Her father barked out between gritted teeth. About ready to strangle him by the looks of it. 

He was not one to take orders, but she had not left him much of a choice. Placing her gently on a nearby bench as he glared down at her. Laena wondered if he would have dropped her from where he stood on that bench if he did not have a very present audience that included a highly agitated Velaryon lord. 

 “Must you behave like a child?” All traces of concern had vanished from her husband's face. The faint worry lines deepened in aggravation. There was something about it that made her grin with laughter. Her laugh was not nearly as grating as her scream, but it was just as childish. It was petty. He did not like that. 

“I thought you liked children.” He liked that less. Her mother's face blanched. Turning as white as a sheet. Baela who had held her not once let go of her hand since she had taken it before they came down that morning sported a frown. 

It was her reaction that concerned Laena the most. Her expression should have mirrored her sister's naivety, but instead, it matched that of her grandfather who looked like he would have rather been anywhere else. The Velaryon lord cleared his throat. Shifting on the balls of his feet. He had only not left her side because was concerned for her health. 

“I—I shall fetch Maester Croton.” Daemion, who had been a part of the crowd trailing them, stuttered out. The usually graceful man almost tripped over his long limbs as made his exit. He could have called over one of the servants and commanded him to find the maester of Driftmark, but she had made things rather awkward. She could not blame him for taking the opportunity to leave them. Even Rhaenyra who had been watching her since she entered the gates of Hide Tide was nowhere to be found. She had seemingly scampered off. Laena could not say she missed her presence.  

Laena meant to lift herself up, she could not stand everyone crowding around her and treating her like an invalid. She rose from the bench. Had gotten to her feet and taken a step away from it when she caught sight of the sea. She would have collapsed on the ground had Daemon not wrapped an arm around her. Bringing her into his hold before turning her to face him as he raised his hairless brow and wore a smirk that said, I told you that you needed rest. He placed her back on the beach without saying a word. She sank into the cold stone with the weight of defeat upon her shoulders. 

She was not fine or at least not fine enough to look at the sea without panicking and hurting herself. No, she could not be fine if something so insignificant sent her spiraling.

There would be no argument this time. She knew her husband would not wait for the maester. The  man would come down from his chambers to find they had left. To bed, she would go with him carrying her off to their chambers. Mayhaps this time he would throw her over his shoulder. She imagined it was more difficult to scream with the same intensity while less blood came to her head. It had the added benefit of robbing her of her ability to break free from his hold. Yes, that would be how it would go. 

No one could stop him from doing so. Not even her father could. He had lost that privilege the moment he had put her hand in her husband’s and the septon pronounced them man and wife. She was Daemon’s, but he was still her father and the two got on well. Mayhaps she could sway him.

Though he did not show it, keeping the face of the mighty formidable Sea Snake as best as he could he was like the rest of them in a particularly doleful mood. The time was now to appeal to his compassion. 

Laena turned to her father, preparing to offer him the most doleful gaze she could muster, but he was not looking at her.

His gaze had drifted to the garden ledge where none other than Lucerys stood by his lonesome. Or at least she guessed the pale dark-haired boy was Luke. 

He was shorter than his brother. He had to be Rhaena’s age though he was shorter than her by several inches, but that was not uncommon for boys his age. 

Laena could recall being taller than Daeron, much to his dismay, until they reached two and ten. He had made up the difference in height twofold. Quite literally lording it over her by sneaking into her chambers and placing her possessions out of her reach. Only stopping when she finally relented and told Laenor about it. She had not known what her brother had said to him, but she had seen the evidence of that talk in the inky bruise that he sported for a week afterward and more importantly in the way that her belongings remained undisturbed. 

Laena planted her stare on the boy her brother claimed as his own. Lucerys did not look a thing like him. She knew Aemon did not look like her, but he looked just as Targaryen as any other. That made sense. It was expected. Her husband was a Targaryen and she was half Targaryen. It was not as if anyone could deny that he was hers. She had the marks lining her thighs and stomach to prove it.

Dark of hair and plain of face and eyes that were a rather unremarkable shade, the boy was common. He would surely grow into a handsome young man, but he was common. He had none of the dark Valyrian grace and regality of house Velaryon or the fairer one of house Targaryen. He did not have the Baratheon look, he was not hardy enough to be one. He did not look like Arryn either. He barely looked as if he belonged to his own mother much less his father and yet the boy was his father's son. 

Laenor was the only father he had been allowed to know. The one who kissed his bruises accepted his childish scribblings with pride, listened to him complain of his maesters lessons, or broke up rows with his brother. He was the one who he called father and now he was gone and Lucerys was left without at the most tender of ages. His tears left a trail of streaks down his pale face as he stared out at the spot that marked his father's watery grave. 

Her father turned his attention back to them. He gave her a sheepish look when he realized he had been watched when he should’ve been watching her. 

Laena wanted to tell him that she would not mind if he were to go to the boy. She was a mother. She had a heart and the sight of him, small pale thing as he was against the waves, pulled at it. He was not responsible for the sins of his mother. He did not deserve to pay for them with solitude. 

If it had been her girls standing there in replace of him she would want someone, anyone who cared for them, blood or not, to comfort them. To dry their tears and let them know that they were not alone. That they were loved and would always be so. 

Luke had lost something, someone, which could never be replaced, but he was not alone and he had more than just his mothers or brothers to depend upon. 

There was really no need for her father to stay at her side. She had her mother and Daemon breathing down her neck. They would not let anything happen to her, but he would not take her word. Thinking that she was just doing so to be accommodating in that way all mothers became when they witnessed a child in need. It was, he believed, maternal nature to put another before themselves.

No, he would believe her if she told him to leave. He would, however, take her mothers. While a mother would put a child before themselves they would never put another child before their own.

Laena had been right in her assessment. Not even needing to catch her mother's eye for she had found the source of her husband's confliction with ease. Pity shone from a white face bathed in her own grief. 

“Go husband.” Rhaenys placed her hand in her father's and gave it a squeeze. He raised a silver brow, obsidian eyes drifting towards Laena but her mother shook her head. Giving him another squeeze. Leave this to me. No other words were spoken. 

He looked relieved. The weight of the guilt that would’ve eaten at him if he stayed gone from his dark face. Rushing to brush a kiss on her mother's cheek then her brown one. He had not once looked back as he made his way to console Luke. Not questioning. Never doubting he had been wrong to leave them.

It was a simple thing, an unimportant thing in the madness of the day, but there was a part of Laena who envied that. Envying your own mother if not sin was surely a tragedy. She knew her parents' marriage was not perfect, but they knew one another in ways no other living soul did. 

Laena wondered if she and Daemon would ever have that. If it was too late for them to have that. To know and understand someone so well that there wasn’t a need for words. They shared one spirit in two bodies. One could just be and exist with the other occupying that very being with them. She turned her head away and as luck would have it landed upon the present subject of her musings. 

He was watching her. Assessing her person. Green orbs afire; boring into hers. Piercing past the dermis of her skin with its blaze. He did not retreat when she caught him. In fact that fire burned brighter when green met brown. Trapping her in its flame, but she did not mind how it enveloped her. 

If she lived in a realm where there only lived them and that feeling Laena would have let Daemon carry her off and do as he pleased. Let the warmth of his fire shield her. Keeping the chill of the sea at bay that wished to engulf her. 

She wanted to be doted upon him. To see him fuss over her. To make sure that she did indeed get rest. She was in fact quite tired. Traveling across the narrow sea was never a particularly comfortable experience. It was even less so under the circumstances she found herself in between recovery and mourning with two restless children and a newborn at her bosom. 

Laena turned her head up at the castle. Landing on a pair of windows she had stared out of earlier that morn. If she were to transport herself inside she would find Aemon with Beth and his nursemaid. He would be on the verge of waking up from his nap and would be in want of his dinner judging by how the shadows climbed up the white stone of the castle's walls. 

She turned back to Daemon. He was still watching her. He held out a calloused hand for her. The spell was not broken. She bit her lip and exhaled. 

Laena was beyond exhausted. Her feet ached. Her breasts were sore. She hated that she was being gawked at by their guests. Expressions ranging from pity to contempt. She dreaded the sight of the sea and was starting to hate the sound of the waves crashing on the rocks and the smell of the salty air. 

A soft feather bed. A warm cup of tea. The sound of Baela and Rhaena chattering amongst themselves as they entertained each other in their sitting room with a game of cyvasse or with their dolls, and Aemons little face looking up at her as he suckled on his super sounded like heaven.

She had done her duty. She had accomplished what she had set out to even with the minor inconvenience of her overactive imagination. What else was there to do? Sit on this bench and try to avoid gazing back at the water while accepting condolences from those who did not care about Laenor but were under obligation to express it, such is the way civilized society dictates until the sun went down.  

Rest, she wanted rest. If he had been here himself Laenor would’ve told her to do as she pleased. She did not owe any of these people. She did not want to be here and she did not have to. 

She reached to take Daemon’s hand, but stopped, her bronze hand suspended in midair as a pale figure caught in the corner of her eye. 

Rhaenyra had not scampered off as she had thought.  Laena doubted she had ever ceased her leering. She was standing there in the archway. Half shrouded in shadows. Watching her. Watching them. Watching him with such intensity it burned a hole in her chest. 

Want. Need. Lust. She had seen it in a hundred faces over the years. A hundred faces who had looked at her husband that way, but those hundred faces had never meant anything. They had come and gone like the wind. Blurring into one another. Each face was more forgettable than the last. The faces of strangers, but this face was etched into her memory from old. This face held more than pure carnality. This face held her fate in its pale glower. 

Unwillingly events that Laena was sure would unfold before her in a matter of minutes played out in her mind. Rhaenyra would follow them to their chambers just as she had here. 

You needn’t worry about anything. She would say once her mother had left for her own chambers after Daemon had commanded her to leave. Get some rest, dear sister. She would put on quite the show of consanguinity and sisterly concern for her health. That glower, however, would stay no matter how she tried to keep it hidden. She would not be able to conceal the sea of loathing within her from bubbling to the surface. She never had. 

Not even at her own wedding Laena recalled. Her eyes plunged a dagger into her back while Daemon twirled her around the dance floor. She had tried to dismiss it then as a young bride who was all too aware of the lonely road ahead of her instead of some tale of marital bliss Septa’s spun to their impressionable charges. She knew better now. 

She had the object of her desires that was denied. There would be no denial now for that object wanted her in return. Who would stop them? Her father was old. Weak. Laenor was dead, as was her lover. Laena’s own father was pacified by an infant grandson who would carry his legacy as well as his blood. Her mother, a princess yes, but still a woman who could do little more than voice objections which would be promptly brushed aside. 

Rhaenyra and Daemon would have what was owed to them. The slight mended and Laena would be made to smile and cheer as they claimed each other. 

We shall be here when you wake. She would place a kiss upon her temple. A caress down her cheek for good measure and then made her way to the door of their bed chambers. Waiting for one final time as Daemon would kiss her in the exact spot where she had. 

They would leave together. Hours would pass, mayhaps she would find herself giving into the temptation of a dreamless bout of sleep within them. There would be nothing else to entertain herself with except madness and cruel imaginings. When she awakened it would be to Rhaenyra sitting by her bed bouncing Aemon on her lap as she would tell her in a honey voice laced with venomous sting of her triumph. It is done Laena. We shall leave for Dragonstone on the morn.  

There would be nothing she could do about it. Nothing she could say to stop it. To stop them. They wanted one another. They would have one another. Their fate was each other and it was her fate to wither. 

She broke the spell. Her sight shifted over to the sea. Felt that pit of uneasiness grow within her. Would it be so bad if she was in Laenor’s place? If it had been she who the stranger took. Mayhaps he and the mother had not spared her. It seems that they had not. Her fate was inescapable. The same extraneous existence whether she lived or died. She would always just be the one he settled for and Rhaenyra would be the one his fires burned for. 

Any moment now he would see her. Any moment now that destiny would be sealed as a silent spectator. Any moment now and—he noticed.

He noticed her. Laena witnessed the exact moment that green met blue. Her eyes blazed. His breath hitched. Laena doubted anyone would notice the way his chest rose an inch, but that inch might as well be a foot.

They held each other in the same orbit. On a plane where only they appeared to exist. Taking in the other after all these years. She had seen that same long years past, but never quite forgotten. On that night Daemon had chosen to make her his. 

Was it really a choice then? A mere convenience she was. He had no choice but to choose her if he wished for a Valyrian bride and his need for one outweighed his want for another, but a want does not leave just because one buries it. 

For her part, Laena had done the job to the best of her ability, given him his heir he so desired, but she was no substitute for the one he had been denied.

A moment. Two. Three passed and then, he averted his gaze. Moving from his nieces back to hers. That plane shut once more.

There was a hard edge to his gaze. His face was a mask of sternness, there was no fiery determination in it, but it was entirely for her and there was a manner of resolve. 

Daemon took her hand in his. Bringing it to his lips before placing a single kiss on the bronze patch of skin. His thumb moved over her knuckles in a caress. “We are going to bed.” We. He had emphasized that. Not you. We. They would. She would not be left to wither tonight. 

Laena let out a breath she had not known that she had been holding. Feeling her shoulders sag with relief.  

“All of us?” Baela asked, wrinkling her brow in displeasure. Seemingly unaware of what passed between her mother and father. Laena sent a silent prayer to the mother for that small mercy.

To her credit their daughter was trying to keep the whine from her voice, she knew her mother needed rest, she had not let go of her hand, but she was doing a rather poor job of containing her disappointment. She was not tired and she would rather not have to be put to bed. “It is not even dark outside kepa—”

“Your mother needs rest pet.” Her use of the endearment had not swayed her father in her favor. He turned his head but kept on caressing her hand as he spoke. 

One look, a look he rarely used for her, for she was undoubtedly his favorite and he was hers, was all it took for Baela’s protests to quieten though she did sulk. Her hand grew limp in her mother's hold as she began to pout at her father. She hoped to sway him to spare her from being made to go to bed, but her hopes remained unfulfilled. 

“I shall join you,” Rhaenys said. Hazel eyes back to scanning the growing crowd, another small mercy from the maiden for Laena knew she would not be able to withstand her mother's anguish for her or her wrath at Daemon and her cousin, til they landed upon the silver head of Ser Vaemond who was currently striding right past her father who was doing his best to console Luke with a self-satisfied sneer. 

He made a beeline for Ser Otto with at his side Daeron and his wife who looked like she could do with a bit of rest as well. “Your uncle has done an excellent job of conveying our sorrow. We shall leave him to continue on as he so dutifully has been.” Something told Laena that her uncle would not mind it one bit. 

The older princess stood from her seat and turned to her grandchildren with renewed vigor. “I have a tapestry of my father and my mother along with your fathers in my sitting room. If you girls are not too tired, I would—”

“I am not too tired.” Baela interrupted. Alert, eager, and radiating with excitement. She looked as if she was about ready to jump up from where she sat and sprint inside, ignoring all decorum with a jig in her steps the entirety of the way to her chambers. 

“Nor I.” Rhaena piped in. The younger girl was much better at containing her jubilation at the prospect though the crest of a smile could be seen cutting into the corners of her brown cheeks. 

“Then we shall leave your—Good lord.” Rhaenys had turned as white as a sheet. Her irises magnifying. As if she had seen a ghost. What she had meant to say was forgotten in favor of horror. A horror that frightened Laena in turn. “What in the seven is he doing?” At that, she had to look. 

If Laena’s skin were several shades lighter mayhaps she would’ve been capable of losing all her color, but she felt a great deal of blood drain out of her face at the sight of him. It was hard not to see why her mother was horrified. 

 “Your brother wants you.” Her mouth was agape, the words tumbling out of it. She was surprised her husband had not seen it, but he only looked at her. 

“My brother can wait.” Daemon did not turn his head so much to glance over at the man despite the grave look on his wife’s paling brown face.  He more than likely dismissed the dullness of her complexion on her illness. His focus remained firmly affixed to her. Reaching out a hand to pet her cheek all traces of annoyance gone once more. She liked this side of him best. When he truly was content with her. When no one else came between them, it was so rare that  it appeared. Most days she wished to hurl the nearest object at him, but on these rare moments, well he could be quite lovely. However, there were other demands present.  

While she understood why he refused, and truly did not want him to leave her side, quite enjoying how he fussed over her in that moment given the present circumstances, Laena almost wished he had gone over to his brother. For the king wished to speak to his brother whether Daemon wanted to or not. He would and was coming over to them and she would rather not be in his company. 

Laena had no fond memories of the man to speak of. She had hardly any memories of him at all. He was a scarce figure in her girlhood. He was the king, the man who stole her mother's crown, then the man who she was expected to marry, then just the king again, then her brother's good father, and finally her own good brother. A distant good brother. A good brother in name only.  

He was never family. Never cousin. Never just Viserys. There was never a need to categorize any memories of him. Never any need to mark them other than to shuffle them off into the distant recesses of her mind, but one among them stood out. A letter in the early days of her marriage. A mere fortnight after her wedding.

She could picture the inky words clearly in her head. Even the smell of the parchment. You could not have my daughter so you have done away with your wife and have taken another child bride, my cast off, against her mother's wishes on the eve of Rhaenyra’s wedding. Must you wound me so? Must you always wound this family so? Why do you take such pleasure in your greed and destruction? 

She had stumbled upon it by pure accident. Looking for a quill which she promptly forgot about when she read the words on the parchment. Daemon had apologized for it when he had found her hiding under his desk. Tears staining the ink. He kissed those tears away as he wrapped her arms. My brother is a jealous old fool. He married an Andal whore when he could have had you my beauty, but I suppose I should thank him for it. 

It was most surely pitiless to take satisfaction in her husband's barbarous tongue. Alicent Hightower had never been cruel to her, quite the opposite for she could distinctly recall how the slightly older girl had found her on a bench in the Red Keeps gardens not unlike this one after that dreadful day of courting the king, and gifted her a handkerchief embroidered with moonblooms as she comforted her in the way she would later see Baela do Rhaena when she was unhappy with herself. You are lucky my lady.

It was said so sweetly that she could not be upset when she learned that Alicent would be their new queen. She had not wanted the man. She had not really wanted to be queen. She was ten and two. A girl who had nothing more on her mind than claiming a dragon. 

She did not want any of it. She had only wanted to make her father happy. She doubted Alicent wanted anything more than that herself. A girl on the cusp of womanhood married to a man old enough to be her father. By the seven, he was the father of her friend. 

It was cruel to laugh at her good sister's misfortune, however, in that fortnight during her honeymoon Laena did. Most heartily because it had paid for her husband's affection. 

It was the first and last time Daemon apologized and offered her any sort of reassurance that at least some part of him wanted her until Aemon’s birth. Laena lapped the praise up like a dying man in need of a drink. She had so desperately wanted him. Wanted to be needed by him. Letting herself take pleasure in his affections in whatever form he would give them to her. 

Daemon must have written back to Viserys for the next letter he received, which he let her read to him, was much warmer. You, Laena, and whatever children come from your union will always have a place in my court brother.

She had clung to that memory for so long, on sleepless nights and every cold morning, it frayed and she had to lock it away before it was lost to her.  

She shook her head trying not to let the memory ensnare her. “I do not think he can.”  Laena doubted he believed that himself. Now he would not take not take his eyes off the man who was slowly, but determinedly hobbling over to them. His youngest daughter was at his side. Leaning on her a great deal. Laena half wondered if he would even make it to reach them.  She wondered how he went on as he was. 

She could not get over the sight of him. It had been ten years since she had last seen him, but on him, it looked as if it had been twenty. 

She had seen the king from a distance. He looked older than she remembered, but the years had aged them. It was natural that he should not look as illustrious as he once did. However, the man standing before her was a fright. He was frail; complexion sallow. His hair was thin, retreating from his head. His face was lined and marked with scars. Some crusted over showing their age, others fresh and a grayish sort of pink. 

The difference in age between her husband and his brother was not very great. It was not the difference between Baela and Rhaena who had but a year separating them. Nor was it the difference between herself and Daemon. From what Laena could recall it was the difference between Rhaena and Aemon. Give or take a year or two. He was Daemon’s elder, but he looked like his father more so than his elder brother.  He looked older than her own mother and she had been the oldest of the old king's grandchildren by several years. 

“When was the last time you saw him?” Her husband asked, turning to her mother, green eyes hardened with hurt and anger once the initiation shock of his brother's appearance had worn off.   

“A while.” Her reply was quiet. Barely above a whisper. “Not since Lucerys first nameday.” She expounded. Her hazel eyes were wide as she could not peel them off the figure of their king. There was shame there in her voice. and she was trying to come up with a worthy excuse. “Your brother's court is not what it once was. Laenor said he was not his best, but,” she hesitated, deliberating in her mind if her next words were wise to say to the irascible dragon before her. They apparently were for she pressed on, “Alicent has been there for him.” 

Her husband grumbled at the mention of the Hightower woman’s name. She had been his good-sister for ten and three years, but she might as well be a stranger. No, he treated her worse than a stranger when she thought about it. Daemon would give the stranger something which he would never give their queen. The benefit of benevolence. 

At the first meeting at least. Then he’d judge the poor soul guilty the same as the rest if he found crime to be offensive to his strange code of sensibilities, but it was more than he would give Alicent. As long as she breathed he would judge her guilty. 

Daemon's eyes narrowed to slits as he looked around for her, but her mother reached out to place a hand on his arm. He glared down at his cousin turned good mother and opened his mouth to speak, but was silenced when she beat him to it. “It is not her fault Daemon. Viserys has not been in good health since he took the throne.” He regarded Rhaenys with suspicion. Green eyes remained narrowed, but he did not say a word against what she had voiced. 

She was right. He could not argue against that fact. Even from her scant visits as a child, Laena would see the cuts on his hands and neck. Red and angry with some oozing out puss. All courtesy of the Iron Throne. The signs of its rejection of him one might say. 

“Is he diseased?” Baela questioned. This time screwing up her nose and mouth. Dark eyes as wide as her grandmother's albeit with revulsion rather than shock. She did not even attempt to hide it. 

“He is your uncle Baela.” His only defense as he tried to glare at her, but he looked more sad than anything else. There was not much even he could say or do. Laena thought, but they could not lie to her. Not when they could all see just how sickly the man who walked toward them looked. This time one look was not enough to quieten her. 

“But is he—ow—Rhaena.” Her disgust turned into a whine directed at her sister who had taken up the seat of her namesake and pinched her arm.

“He’s too close,” Rhaena replied with a gentle whisper to her. Lightly jerking her head in their uncle's direction. Her honey face a picture of pity. She, unlike her parents and grandmother, had gained her senses surprisingly quickly or not very surprising if one knew her. She did like to spend a great deal of time in maesters' chambers bombarding them with as many questions as they could answer. “He will hear you.” 

Daemon reached out a hand to steady the older Targaryen man when he grew near enough, but he waved it away. 

“Do not tell me.” Viserys rasped out at his brother in lew of a proper greeting. Trying to catch his breath. “You must be Baela.” He pointed the tip of his cane in their eldest direction. Leaning heavier on Helaena to make up the difference in his balance. “And you Rhaena. “You look like your mother when she was your age.” His gaze flitted to Baela and then back at Rhaena before proclaiming. “She spit you both out.” He regarded her with another flourish of his cane. “They do not look a thing like you Daemon.” Baela glared at him and some of the sympathy from Rhaena’s face, but Daemon laughed.   

“Thank the Gods for that.” His brother joined in the laughter. Well, it was more of a wheeze. Could one call that strained with pain that made his voice breathless? Like strings out of tune. 

“You will regret saying that in five years' time.” His eyes had drifted in the direction of his sons as he spoke. Only the eldest two were present. Laena had been told that the youngest Daeron resided in Oldtown with his mother's family. 

His brothers more than made up for his absence. They had not come over once to express their condolences remaining at their mother's side or with each other, but that did little to stop their observing. Two sets of eyes on Baela and Rhaena. Whispering to themselves as they stared. 

 By the gods had Alicent informed them of her intentions? Had they told their father in turn? Aemond’s stare at Rhaena was not cruel, more curious than anything, even more curious was the fact that he kept switching between Seasmoke, who unlike the other dragons present had grown restless and kept circling around the castle, and Rhaena. but nothing malicious in it. Aegon’s, however, was nothing short of disdain and Baela had noticed the boy who glared at her from the rim of his bottle. Taking to scowling at him in turn. 

They had been told by their mother. It would be her desperation that had made her do so. Be kind to them sweetlings. She would say, tucking an errant silver curl behind their ears as she implored them to win her girl's favor. They are to be your brides. 

Alicent was a mother. She had a daughter. She knew It would make the matter more appealing if the boys were to endear themselves to her girls and herself, but it appeared as though only one had listened to her desperate pleas and it was not their future king. 

Desperation was never one’s friend and it would certainly be her enemy if the king knew and told his brother of it. His prediction of his enmity at the prospects of their daughter's betrothals would show by night's end rather than five years' time. 

Laena averted her gaze. If he had found out better to play the fool when Daemon would question her.  

“Aemon looks like father.” It was said in that sweet tone of Rhaena’s whenever she spoke of her baby brother. It was enough to make one smile. Said softly, but even someone hard of hearing could hear her. Viserys could hear her perfectly well, nonetheless, he looked at his youngest niece like she had just spoken Dothraki.

“Who?” Laena felt her smile die upon her lips. She knew she looked at him as if had lost his senses, but he appeared to have lost exactly that. Letters had been sent at a constant from Pentos ever since she had informed her parents that she was once. How bad off was he? Mayhaps Baela was right to think the man was diseased. If not contagious what ailed him had spread to his mind and made him slow-witted. Her husband had not missed it. 

“My son Aemon.” The sullen look on his person made its reappearance as Daemon spoke. Patient as he waited for the recognition to sink. He was not usually patient with anyone apart from Baela, but seeing one’s brother in this state would cause anyone’s patience to amplify. 

“Oh yes, yes your boy.” Recognition came at last but left to give way to puzzlement once more.  It was a vicious cycle. The king's face cracked under his bewilderment. “Not Baelon? Surely I would have thought you would have thought you would name your son after our father.”

“Baela is named for our father.” Her husband let go of her hand to grab Baela’s. The girl preening at the homage. 

“Aegon then. You resisted the temptation of that brother?” For the life of Laena she could not understand why the man before her would ask such a question. 

“Is your son not named Aegon your grace?” The son that was within ear and eyeshot of. The son who had turned his flare 

The king let out a humph and dismissed her with a flourish of his cane. Not caring to acknowledge what she had said. Poor boy Laena thought to herself, but that pity faded when she saw that he had begun to glare at Baela again, who had that same scowl on his face.

Its fever had been great enough to bring about the attention of his grandsire who proceeded to knock the boy on the back of his pale head, and snatched the bottle from his hand, before he took him by his collar and dragged him inside. Harsh yes, but he was deserving of it. 

“I would like to meet your Aemon.” At that, Baela snapped her neck in her uncle's direction, mirroring her cousin's repulsion only directing it at his griseled father. 

In a rather uncharacteristic show of sisterly affection, which up until then was solely reserved for Rhaena and not the little beast, Baela put upon a sneer that would rival Ser Vaemonds “Aemon is sleeping. He is not to be disturbed when he is sleeping.” As if to salvage some of the good manners she had lost in her derision, she added, her voice gaining an octave and matching her sisters,  “Mayhaps on the mourn uncle.” 

Her uncle took to wheezing again. Sounding as if he might laugh himself into a fit.  “Gods. She has that look of yours Daemon when you are cross with me. He focused his attention on her. His face cracked under the stretch of his smile to reveal a set of relatively intact teeth much to Laena’s relief. “I am sorry Laena.”

“Younger brothers are lovely creatures.” it was said by a wistful voice belonging to Helaena who had not spoken until now. A pale silvery thing she was and skinny too. It was a wonder how she was even able to support her father leaning upon her. “But I suppose all babes are lovely creatures.” 

“Indeed.” Viserys did not wheeze this time. Gifting his youngest daughter a half smile rather than a laugh he placed an affectionate pat on the young supple hand that held him up with a leathery one. “I believe it is past our bedtime, come child.” His grip upon Helaena tightened as he took one shaky step, then another, but paused and turned half his body to face them again. ” He regarded her mother with a small nod. The expression he had, the apologetic sort, aged him another ten years. “Laenor was a good man. A good father and he would have made my daughter a fine consort.” 

He probably did not believe the last part.  Laenor was never for politics or ruling, he would’ve made quite the abysmal lord if he had ever taken up his father's seat. The Gods only knew what manner of consort he would make, but he had been a father,  he was his cousin's child, and now he was gone. The loss of a child was one her good brother knew well. That was the reason for that look. 

Her mother did not say anything, but when a gnarled hand reached out for her, she took it. Clutching it tightly between her own as she nodded her head. It was a rare moment of familial tenderness, but in the haze of morning, the rare became the expected. A few moments of plaintive silence passed them until they finally pulled their hands away. Visery cleared his throat, regarded her husband with a small smile, and renewed his steps leaning a little more on his cane than his daughter. The two made quite the contrasting figure retreating back to the castle's warmth for much-needed respite.

“I believe I have had enough excitement for one day.” Her mother spoke. Her eyes puffy with unshed tears as she coughed. Trying to clear the emotion from her throat. She turned on her heels.  Her black skirts fluttered in the wind as she stooped down to cup Laena’s face in her hands then placed a kiss on her temple. “Please get some rest sweetling.” Her mother pulled back slightly. Continuing to stoke her cheeks. It made her feel like a child again, but Laena supposed she needed the reminder of motherhood more than anything else. 

The older Targaryen women placed one last kiss on her cheek before pulling back fully to let Baela and Rhaena do the same. Murmuring Goodnight muna, Goodnight mama, and a Goodnight kepa in the former's case who received a kiss on her head for it from her kepa, before joining their grandmother. The trio left the same way Viserys and Helaena had a few minutes passed. 

Daemon took her hand in his when they had disappeared out of sight. Pulling her up from the bench and with a smile bent to whisper into her ear.  “Aemon will be wanting you, sweet girl.” His smile was infectious. It made her feel giddy. She almost laughed. Oh sweet maiden, she almost laughed a few feet away from where her brother had just been buried. Almost until the wispy silver curls on the back of her neck began to stand on their ends. 

Laena felt her before she saw her. That leering presence at her back that had been staring her down since she came through the gates of Hide Tide reached a crescendo as she swooped down from the archway she had perched herself on after her mother and the girls had passed her by. 

Rhaenyra spoke first. A demure penitent look that did not match the glint in her eye when she gazed up at her husband. “It is unfortunate we must meet under these circumstances.” She reached out a hand to take Laena’s in hers. It was cold. Not unnaturally so, but the difference was great enough for her to notice. “I am glad you have recovered Laena. You and your—”

“Aemon.” It was short. Clipped not at all patient like with his brother. Clipped enough to warrant Rhaenyra’s light to dim somewhat, but not to turn any heads to those that might be watching them. 

“Your Aemon.” She smiled, recovering from the cold sting of her uncle's bite with grace. Her voice became overbearingly saccharine as she looked her square in the eye. “I believe he and Joffrey share a nameday.” They did not. Joffrey was older by a week. A small difference, but it was a difference. “And my Jace shares your Baela’s as well.” That most definitely was not the case.  Although all the children were close in age.  

Laena would have thought it planned between the two, but how would they do so, and for what purpose? They did not need to be of exact age for betrothals and there wasn’t any way to control what sex they might be. It would be a wasted effort to synchronize their conceptions and the thought alone made her nauseous. 

“She is lovely as is Rhaena Laena.” She would have returned the compliment, her boys were well-mannered from her observation, but her lips would not move. That tone of hers grated her ears. 

Laena could do no more than nod and take the compliment for what it was. Ignoring how she had made a point to use your when referring to her and not her husband. Separating them from him. She imagined that is what Rhaenyra wished for. For those babes he had sired upon her  just to be her children

“Might I have a word with my uncle?” Her smile was polite and there was some light in her eyes, but there was that undercurrent of disesteem ever-present. “Alone.” She stressed the last word as those blue orbs tried to turn her to ash.   

“In the mourn.” Short once more. His green eyes lacked much of the luster they had moments before his niece had interrupted their plans. Her husband was on the verge of snapping at her, but Rhaenyra who had begun to pout, did not seem to take note of just how agitated her uncle was becoming with her. 

Mayhaps she just thought it was some great mirage he conjured up to keep Laena pacified. He could not very well make eyes at her in front of his wife for a second time this evening then go off with her on the day of Laenor’s funeral, and send Laena to bed. What would people think? The scandal of it all. No, he could not very well talk with her alone here. In an odd cruel twist of fate, Rhaenyra could very well be right “We are—“

Laena placed a hand on Daemon’s chest, stopping him before he could say more. She could feel his eyes upon her. Not having to look up to know what his expression held. Confusion across his white face. Eyes scrunching. Increasing the lines upon his face. 

He thought her mad and for that matter, Rhaenyra would as well. Mayhaps she was mad. The mad woman who could not look at the sea, who wished herself dead rather than her husband leave her. She was mad and there was nothing that could be done. 

 If her cousin so desperately wanted to be alone with him then let her be so. Daemon himself had wanted to go to her what not a half hour ago. She saw that spark of interest when their eyes met. 

What had changed now? What would stop him from changing his mind again? He had wanted Rhaenyra for so long, had made his own wife he had chosen feel like she could never live up to her, and now he could give her up?

Desire or whatever else they may have could not be swept away so easily. Laena could not be so naive as to think that. The Velaryon lady did not wish to retire to bed with her husband only to wake up and find that bed empty before morning light. Better to have whatever may happen, happen now and learn how to tamper her disappointment without wanting to fling herself off a ledge into the sea or have Vhagar send her to whatever the Gods had waiting for her. 

Laena put on her most dazzling smile as she met her cousin's eye. Not willing to give her the full satisfaction of victory. “Of course niece,” Rhaenyra winced, the word sounded awkward to her own ears, but she soldiered on. “I am sure my husband would like to express his condolences for your losses. You are our chief concern.” The Targaryen woman’s smile hardened and that comforted Laena. Losses, she had not missed that slight thrown her way. Good. Let her have this small taste of embarrassment. 

She craned her neck up at her husband, ignoring Rhaenyra’s sour face for a moment. Moving a hand from her side to caress his face. That confused look was there, but he leaned into her touch. She almost didn’t want to leave him. To make an error which they could not come back from, but she saw no other way.

“It is Aemons dinner time anyway, my prince. Our little lord will be wanting me.” Laema whispered the last part, her fear showing in her voice, but pushed it down as she leaned in to breathe it into the pocket-marked skin of his neck. She placed a kiss on his jawline. Feeling his pulse jump beneath her lips. Pushed away with some reluctance curtseyed and to Rhaenyra who returned the farwell with that smile not reaching her pale eyes. 

Laena counted her steps as she left. One after the other. Not looking back or down at her feet. Head held high. Her moves were measured. Precise. Her slippers, having been banned from anything with a heel of even an inch, made a scuffing sound on the garden's stones ground, but she liked to think that in her black mourning dress she looked every inch the future Lady of the Tides who did not mind her husband conversing alone with the woman he loved. 

She had counted to thirty before she lost that regality. She tripped over her skirts when her foot caught on the bottom of her trail as she reached a step. Forgetting that her balance was not quite what it ought to be and her skirts too long. Daemon was too far away to catch her though he could surely see her. Probably cursing her silent command to stay. She would have fallen on her face if an olive hand had not reached out to grab her.  

“Careful my lady.” His voice was surprisingly gentle as he pulled her upright. Dark of hair. Dark eyes to match with a warm complexion. Decidingly Dornish. Handsome. Much more handsome than her husband, she never really noticed until now how handsome he was. Cutting quite dashing in the silver and white of his Kingsguard armor. 

“Thank you Ser Criston.” She was too close. She knew she was too close. She probably should have pulled away from him. She did not still have to hold onto his arm for balance or smile at him so, but had caught a glimpse of her husband's face from the corner of her eyes and Ser Criston for his part did not seem to mind. Some part of him enjoyed this too judging by the hint of a smirk on his tan face. The pride of men. 

Daemon had gone beat red. His lips were a thin line and the green of his eyes was overtaken by the black of his pupils. He looked like he wanted to run the man through with Dark Sister which was thankfully not on his person. Having it left back in the safety of their chambers at her insistence. Why would he need a sword at her brother’s funeral? They had guards and no one would attack them here. She was sure he was regretting listening to her. 

If had it in his hand he would have stood across the garden and plunged his sword into the Dornish knight's chest straight into his heart without a care for who witnessed it and she liked it. 

Laena liked this look on him. She had been so starved of his affections that she actually liked it. She liked imagining what her husband might do for her in a fit of jealous rage. What those pale battle-hardened hands of his might do. 

Would he strangle the man or beat him into a bloody pulp? Who would win? She had seen what the knight could do when he was provoked, but her husband was a force when his emotions were up. How many men would it take to pull him off the Dornish man? What would be the damage that those hands might do? 

She dreamed of how they might look wrapped around his throat, but it was not her husband's hands that came to claim her.  Her elation ended before she could become too excited at the prospect of her husband leaving Rhaenyra’s side to strangle a man in her honor. 

Ser Vaemond appeared in front of Laena seemingly out of thin air. “That will be all Ser Criston.” He did not look at the Dornish knight. That sneer that never quite reached his dark eyes ever present and directed at her. “My son and I shall escort my niece back to her chambers.”

She looked around her uncle to find both Daeron, Daemion, and the maester. A new plan hatched as she molded her lips into that same cheery smile she gave Rhaenyra. “I thank you uncle, but Ser Criston shall escort me to my chambers. Maester Croton may join us.” Her voice all honey. Straining by a margin to ensure it was loud enough for her husband to hear her. 

He should be relieved that she had asked the maester to come with them when she could have ordered the old man to go ahead of them. He had what he wanted beside him. He should have turned around back to Rhaenyra without another thought on the matter, but he hadn’t. Instead, he clenched and unclenched that fist which would normally hold Dark Sister over and over.  That vein on his jaw where she had kissed a minute ago, ticking under his ire. 

She saw Rhaenyra’s lips move. Saw her grab his sleeve, attempting to tug her husband's focus back onto her, but he shoved her off. She looked bereft as he stepped forward. Heels hot on the ground. He would have made it to her in seconds, but that too was over before it could begin. 

“I insist, niece. We must let Ser Criston attend to his duties and Maester Croton must attend to you.” Ser Vaemond’s, who had blocked her view of her husband, mouth stretched into a mirthless grin as he held out his arm for her to take.     

She took it. Laena had no choice, but to take it, bid the knight farewell, and let him lead her inside. If she had not, Daemon would have immediately suspended his thunderous steps. Slithering back to Rhaenyra, the moment he saw her arm in her uncles rather than Ser Cristons, would have come over and ended the dismal day with an encore to its proceedings.

They set off in silence. The shuffle of boots and her slippers echoing off the castle walls was the only sound that marked their presence until her uncle broke that lull midway to her chambers  “You and your mother play a dangerous game.” His dark eyes shone in the dim light in a way that would have made her trip over her own feet for the umpteenth time that day if he had not taken to holding most of her weight. 

He knew. She had not once gone to Alicent during Laenor’s wake. Had not even talked to her, nor had her mother outside of greeting her. Laena barely looked in her direction. 

True enough she had seen Ser Vaemond conversing with Ser Otto earlier, but the hand would not know of his daughter’s plans. The Hightower man would never agree to them which would leave Alicent with no choice but to keep them from him. Her mother would do the same. Not even trusting her father who had a soft spot for Rhaenyra’s boys with their plans.  

So the two their schemes between themselves until all who opposed would be forced to agree to it. Hoping Laena could somehow sway Daemon that the grandsons of Otto Hightower would be the best match for their daughters. Until that time came, no one who would tell her uncle would know, and yet he knew. 

Laena turned her head keeping her eyes in front of her.

“I am afraid I do not know what you are speaking of uncle” She whispered. She should not have whispered, it could only serve to confirm what he suspected, for she reasoned that he could not possibly have more than a hunch, but her cousins as well as Maester Croton were just a few paces behind them. Well within hearing. 

Laena would not mind so much if Daemion knew. He was good at keeping secrets. He would not tell anyone if she asked him not to. As would the old maester, though he would more than likely tell her father, but that was a small price to pay. No, they would not be the issue. That title belonged to her oldest cousin. Ser Daeron Velaryon would gleefully go blabbing to anyone who would listen if he found it to be beneficial to himself. 

Laena tried her best to keep a neutral expression on her face, fighting off the way her lips wished to twist up, but she knew she was failing. She had never been a particularly good liar. She never had much to lie about in the first place, but no she most certainly did. 

“Do you take me for an oblivious old fool the same as your father?” He halted them before they reached the first landing. His grip on her arm tightened. Her head snapped in his direction. Narrowing her eyes at him into slits. 

“My father is not a fool.” She would not hear it. Not from Ser Vaemond. Not from anyone. A fool Corlys Velaryon was not. He knew what was around him. He knew his enemies and he knew those he could depend on and yet he kept those closer than his friends. He had never been oblivious. He would not have made House Velaryon the richest house in the seven kingdoms if he was truly an oblivious fool. 

“Mayhaps not a fool, but he is willfully oblivious. He turns a blind eye to the actions of those around him for the sake of ambition.” That was rich coming from the likes of Ser Vaemond Velaryon. Her father was ambitious, yes, but no more than any other man. No more than any lord ought to be certainly not more than him. 

Laena schooled her features. This time she let her full lips raise just the slightest in a smirk. “Are you still upset that my father refused your offer of Daeron for me?” Ser Vaemond winced and she tried not to look too pleased. Thanking the Gods that it was still a sore spot for him. A grudge he would carry against her father for the rest of their natural lives. 

Marry her to Daeron and have the business be done with. He had advised her father on numerous occasions over the years. It was born from his own self-interest, yes,  but it was not as if it was out of the realm of tradition. 

Velaryons may not have ever been dragonlords, but they were still Valyrian. Their blood was untainted. Pure. The purity of it had to be preserved. 

Of course, they did not marry brother and sister as Targaryens did, there wasn’t a need to, but a cousin, even an aunt and nephew or niece uncle was the expectation. Her father turned down that exception every time her uncle proposed it. On the last occasion, he had allowed her to choose and she chose Daemon. 

Her cousin would not have been a bad husband. Overbearing mayhaps, poor company yes,  a nuisance, undoubtedly, but not a bad husband. In many ways, he might have been a better husband than Daemon. The man made her want to rip her hair out and let the wind drown out her screams, but she loved him. She loved him with every fiber of her being. She could not live without him. She would never have loved Daeron in the way she did her husband. 

 “The Driftwood throne would have been yours, uncle, your grandson would have sat upon it, but now it shall go to a Targaryen and you can not write this one off as a bastard” It was a distraction and a poor one at that judging by the way he too was trying to dampen his temper. Nonetheless, she still held out a hope he would take the bait. “Now your hope rests on the fate of a child still in its mother's womb. What will you do if Hazel Hearte births another son?”

He had not taken her bait. Succeeding in his endeavor she had failed to keep her neutrality and manner of carelessness. Giving more than she got. Instead of snapping at her as she hoped he gave a sort of forlong smile. The kind when one knows that they have said all they could and now they left it to the recipient. 

“Be careful Laena. You know me. My ambition aligns with yours, but you do not know them.” He leaned into her. If someone were to pass them in the winding hallway or if sons were to overtake them they might have thought he had told her a jape by the expressions of mild amusement on their brown faces. 

“Do not be oblivious as your father is. Alicent Hightower is not your friend. She cares for nothing more but to see her son sit upon your good-brother’s throne.” 

They had arrived at the door to her chambers before she could counter his claim. They came to a halt and he placed a fatherly peck upon her cheek. The kind he would give her when she was a child on a rare moment.

The ones where she would sneak into the library hiding from her septa or from the boys. Wanting a rest from their roughhousing. He had not minded it as long as she was quiet. Sometimes he would even let her join him at his desk. Sitting in companionable silence as he wrote his letters and she with her head in some book. He, like the rest of them, still saw her as that little girl, maybe she was underneath this lost hopeless woman she had become. Or maybe the little girl had grown up and through her despair, she had learned. She was still alive after all. The sea had not swallowed her nor had dragon fire consumed her. That was something. 

Her uncle left her to ponder over her memories in the care of the maester. 

Maester Croton’s examination was brief. The man looked her over once. Pronounced her in no immediate danger when she, with great indignation, had recited every house in the Crownlands and described their sigil. He gave her a tonic for her nerves, proceeded to order two maids not to leave her unattended for the night, and then told them to send a serving boy to his chambers if Laena’s condition were to change, before departing for said chambers. 

The girls to their credit or rather their fear of what the lady of the keep might do to them if they were to be discovered having left her side took to watching her like a hawk. Laena did not mind it for the first hour and a half when she had thought that at any moment Daemon would come in and dismiss the pair of clucking mother hens, but he had not. 

The second hour she had attempted to close the door to her bed chambers and leave them in the sitting room for a bit of privacy and to relieve herself from their chattering, but they remained ever vigil. We can not see you, my lady. Her hope of rescue was dashed with their refusal by her own hand or her husband’s so she settled in an armchair by the chamber's fire and tried to distract herself with needlework. 

They made for excellent nanny dogs, guard dogs they were not. Their presence did little to deter other visitors. Namely, Beth who had come in to check on her at least half a dozen times once the maester had left. Always finding some excuse to. The first time she had brought in Aemon who had woken up from his nap crying out for his super which she had more than happy to oblige him with. 

The second time she had not been called for, but it was a sweet surprise. Coming in with a tray of assortment of cakes and a steaming pot of tea that smelled divine. “Tea my lady?” 

The third time she had heard Aemon’s cries. Recognizing them from the nursery as his cries for food. “Would you like me to take the little lord to the wetnurse?"

Laena dismissed that suggestion. Her breast had grown full again and Daemon was not there to scold her for it so she fed the babe once more. Aemon had his fill falling asleep at her bosom without any strain on her person. 

“Do you want any company, my lady?” The last time Beth had said with her mending in hand. Laena had relented with a sigh. Wanting more than anything else to rid herself “You may stay Beth.” Her company was preferable to that of the giggling pair of ninnies charged with the care of her health and safety. 

Laena’s sitting room had become a den of ideal chatter, mainly on the children, Rhaena made this the other day, I do believe Baela is starting to soften up to the little lord Aemon almost smiled at her and she returned it until Beth like Aemon had fallen asleep by the sound of the gentle waves crashing on the shore from the open window and the chamber fires crackle. The sun had set hours ago leaving only the light from it that fire. The shadows on the walls had grown long.

It was peaceful, quiet, and yet lonely. So very lonely. Laena’s thoughts drifted to last night in her solitude when it had not been so lonely. Last night. Gods, what she would give for those hours cloaked in darkness now. 

It was exceedingly late when Daemon arrived at their chambers. Well past the hour of the bat. The sun would be up in a few hours. They had a long day ahead of them, yet there he was as naked as his nameday placing open-mouth kisses up her heated figure. 

“Laena.” He breathed it into her skin. The way he did when he wanted her and he did want her. Nipping at the delicate patch of bronze skin on her inner thigh. His mouth landed on a particularly sensitive spot that made her whole body shiver.

“Laena.” He murmured again. His breath grazed her heat as his head rested on the junction of where her pelvis met her womanhood. 

A hand wandering up and up to cup a breast, he leaned his weight upon her. He had stripped himself of every last stitch of clothing when he had crawled into bed. She could feel his hardened length warmed her bare skin where her nightgown had ridden up from his petting. 

“My sweet pearl.” He was happy. He only called her that when he was exceedingly happy. 

Laena had thought about feigning sleep. She had no reason to do so. He wanted her and she wanted him, but it had been so long since he had touched her in this way. 

She could lie, pretend to be well ensconced in the land of dreams, but he knew she was not asleep. Besides, even if she had truly been asleep, that would not have stopped him. Her being asleep had never stopped him before. She had lost count of how many times she had awakened to find him suckling on her breasts. A finger circling her pearl hidden beneath her curls or plunging his member into her waiting channel. Burning himself to the hilt in one single thrust. His length bullied that spot deep within her that would have her come alive to see stars. Sending shockwaves of pleasure through her. Even in her sleep, she would let him have her. I need you was all he needed to whisper into her ear and she would let him do to her as he pleased. 

He made it good for her too. He wasn’t a selfish lover, at least not with her. For every orgasm she’d give him, he’d wring two more from her spent body, but that night she felt the weight of everything and nothing to give in to the pleasure that awaited her. 

“It is late husband.” Laena managed to pant out between little breaths. Swallowing the moan that wished to be let out from her throat. Daemon had taken to circling her pebbled nipple with the rough pad of his thumb. Drops of milk landed on the pale digit, but he didn’t mind it as he brought the finger down to his mouth. His tongue peeked out to lap at the sweet liquid. At the sight of it Laena felt her belly burst into flutters that traveled straight to her cunt. 

“Very, sweet girl.” He said absentmindedly as he took to staring at her leaking heat. He did not wait for her to reply. Taking her pearl between his teeth and sucking on the bud for half a second before pulling away when she began to pulse on his tongue. “I’ve missed you.” He breathed into her dampening skin. 

“Daemon,” She tried to bite back a moan but failed when he licked a strip down her weeping center. “I’m tired.” He laughed into cunt. The vibrations made her heat spasming around nothing. Not even attempting to hold her whines in. 

Laena thought about saying she was still sore, but the maester had already come to check on her. “You may resume your wifely duties whenever you should like my lady.” He informed her. Not looking her in the eyes as her mother, who had turned red-faced, had been there holding her hands. The older man had surely informed her husband of that fact as well. 

In any case, the fact that she had started to grind her cunt on his arm that he had draped underneath her to hold her up to relieve the growing ache deep between her thighs showed was not very tired nor sore in any sense of the word.  Both could see the trail of wetness decorating his marble skin. 

“Tell me if you wish me to stop.” She barely heard him over the sound of blood rushing to her head. Relief flooded through her as he licked another strip down her slit then repeated the action in reverse. This time his tongue landed on her clit. He circled the bub round before drawing it into his mouth to suckle upon. 

“Muna kepa, Rhaena can not sleep.” It was Baela’s little voice. She faintly recognized the sound seeping in past the euphoric spell she was under.

“Have her sleep in your bed, pet.”  Daemon pulled away from her for half a second to answer their daughter before she slipped her fingers through his silver strands and forced him back down upon her pulsing heat. Smothering him as she had begun to grind on his face. Desperately chasing her climax. Thinking that would be the end of it, but Baela was as persistent as she. 

“She does not want to.” Her voice was more urgent this time. Louder too. “She’s brought Aemon too.” Laena felt her cheeks heat up with embarrassment. The fog of arousal slowly dissipated with each word she spoke.  Baela had heard something. She wouldn’t know what it was, but she had heard. 

Laena let out a heavy sigh as she pushed her husband away from her. Pulling his mouth from her spasming cunt as she let out a whimper and he with a groan. She opened her mouth to speak, but all that came out was something between a squeak and a moan. Only adding to her embarrassment. 

“Wait a moment pet,” Daemon called out. He lifted himself up with a grin to hover over her and enveloped her in a kiss. He tasted of her slick, sweet wine, and something warm that she only associated with her husband. It was over before they could work themselves up again. 

Pulling off away from her and off the bed to rummage around the room as he found himself a dressing gown and undergarments and a nightgown for her that was not soiled with sweat and arousal. 

Baela eyed them both with suspicion when her father finally opened the door to their chambers, but it faded the moment Rhaena set Aemon down in his bassinet and leaped into their bed. Piling in after her sister to cuddle at her side. Monopolizing her as well as most of the bed. 

“You may sleep with Aemon papa.” Rhaena lifted a little finger to point at her brother's crib which earned her chuckle as he moved Baela to climb back into bed. Swaddling his pet in his embrace. 

Laena had thought about leaning over their girls to place a kiss on the shadow of his broad chin, but grabbed the hand that had taken to stroking the back of Baela’s locs, trying to lull their wild girl to sleep, and brought the back of it to her lips. Planting a kiss on each knuckle. I. Love. You. He knew that. He knew she was incapable of anything else.  I’m. Sorry. That he knew was a lie, but he had not held it against her. Squeezing her hand,  he mouthed the words over Baela’s silver curls. I love you too, you minx. 

Love, he loved her. Maybe not the way he loved Rhaenyra. Maybe never in that way, but was a part of him that loved her. That part of him that had chosen her when he had not had to. 

Gods she was so stupid. Was it so terribly silly of her to have Daemon open their chambers last night? Should she have just let him take her and succumb to their passion? Should she have told the girls that they were too old to join them? That they just needed to get used to their new chambers?

No, she hadn’t been wrong to do that, but it was mad to do what she had a few hours ago. He had not even wanted to leave her side. Had turned Rhaenyra down for her. She should’ve taken it for what it was. Not to question it, but she had pushed him right into her arms with her questioning. Now the Gods only knew what he was doing with her that kept him from their bed. 

A knock sounded at the door to their chambers. Breaking Laena free of her memories and waking Beth with a start from her nap as she asked her guards stationed at the door who it was as she made herself and Aemon presentable enough for whatever visitor deigned to disturb them at this hour. “The queen, my lady.” Her guard spoke causing the girl to turn to her with a slight panic, but she commanded that they be let in

The door opened wide enough for Laena to peak around to see Ser Criston standing vigil, she wondered if the Dornish night might join them, she wondered more what her husband might say if he were to find him in here even if the queen was as well, but the man remained on the other side of the door when Alicent’s had been let in, and Beth who she had to dismiss by ordering the girl to get some proper rest, was let out. 

She meant to stand and curtsy to her, not forgetting her manners even at this late hour, but the woman waved a hand for her to stay where she was. “You must be exhausted. There is no need for that when it is just us.” Us. She did not miss the informality in her address, but Laena settled back into the chair not having to be told twice. She was not tired. In fact, she doubted she would have slept a wink that night, but her feet were sore from standing on them for most of the day. 

Alicent remained standing. Wringing her pale hands she gave her a shy smile. “I wanted to give my condolences to you personally, Laena. I did not know your brother well, but I am sorry for your loss.” It was more sincere than Rhaenyra’s attempt, she decided it was best to compare the two to each other for they both wanted something or another from her, but it was not the truth. Not at all why she was truly here. It would be improper to speak on it now so she let it be left unsaid. The unspoken hanging in the air around them. 

The Hightower queen's smile relaxed when her gaze landed upon Aemon who had been awakened by the knock and was currently squirming in his mother's lap. “And I admit I wanted to meet your little one.”

She held out her arms, smile widening. “May I?” Laena bid her closer and handed her the babe. Watching her cradle him with practiced hands. “He looks like my Aemond when he was little.” 

“Does he?” Laena would have thought it was some kind of jape, but it could not have been more plain that it was more an observation than condensation. They were both Targaryens. To be perfectly fair, Targaryens only had so many features to pull from. Their pool was not an especially large one to allow for much difference besides various shades of pale eyes and silvery white hair. 

“Aegon and Helaena were plump,” Laena could see a glint of light in Alicent’s brown eyes and a hint of a smile when she spoke of her children as she bounced Aemon. “Chubby little cherubs. Daeron too. Aemond was my smallest. I used to spend hours just watching when he was a babe. Precious thing.” To that she did not know who she was referring to, but it mattered not. 

Laena almost did not wish to ruin the moment. Alicent did look genuinely content holding him as was Aemon with being held for he had seized his squirming and instead took to observing the person attached to the new pair of arms he was in, but that unspoken thing remained heavy in the air and she wanted to be the one to give a voice to it. Least the Hightower woman remembered why exactly she had come to her chambers and caught her unaware. 

“It is easy is it not?” She wore a smile on her face. Alicent would find it to be friendly enough if she were to pull away from cooing over the babe. Inviting. Innocent. Laena thought. Her tone was equally unassuming. Nothing which suggested she spoke of anything  “To imagine him when in your arms.” 

“Imagine who?” Her gaze had turned back to the babe with a smile humming softly as she rocked him. Not really paying her much attention to anything apart from his coos. Laena almost let her reply die in her throat, but she pushed it out before she lost her nerve. 

“Imagine what our future king will look like.” Alicent stopped her swaying. Standing rod still as Aemon let out a yawn. Oblivious to the chasm that had formed in the chamber sucking out the light. “The king that my daughter will birth your son.” Alicent opened her mouth. She looked like a doe caught unaware by a hunter. “That is truly why you are here, is it, not my queen.” 

“Your daughters are lovely Laena.” The queen recovered quickly though her nerves shone through. The gaping mouth that made her look like a lost puppy was replaced with that same expression she had made when she first came in as she resumed bouncing Aemon in her arms. 

“Twas the same thing my cousin said to me not an hour past.” Flattery was a rather obvious choice, but unlike with Rhaenyra, the sincerity held more truth. Her cousin had said it as a jape. They look like you, not a thing like my uncle. That was what she had meant, the woman who gave birth to bastards who had been humiliated by See Vaemond wanted to make her feel inadequate. This was a compliment. There was no jape in it though it was just as self-serving. “She wants them for her sons too.” She had not said anything. She could feel the queen's anger so she pushed on. 

“Let’s see,” Laena paused to look off towards the window as if truly in thought. “You were five and ten when you married Viserys and I was on the eve of my sixth and tenth name day when Daemon and I said our vows to one another here on these shores.” She turned her gaze back towards the Hightower woman her head held high. She had stopped bouncing Aemon, but the babe had not minded. He entertained himself instead with a bright auburn curl as he nibbled on the edge of her strands. Her spine turned to steel. 

“We were barely more than children,” but that was the way things went. “I suppose Baela is to follow in our footsteps. Or shall she marry your drunken prince bed the moment she has bled? Am I to tell you that so that she can give us our grandson.” She had tried to keep her voice calm. Measured when all she wished to do was scream. 

“They will not marry a day before she is six and ten.” She walked closer towards her, Aemon in hand. “You have my word Laena. She will not just be a broodmare. I swear on the Seven that Baela shall be Aegon’s wife, queen, and equal.” She had said it with so much conviction so much resolve that Laena almost believed her, but she knew better than to be so naive.  

They were pretty words, but pretty words were just as empty as the rest. They did little other than placate one’s vanity, but what was vanity compared to the truth? It may feel good at that moment, but eventually, all it would do would be to leave her with a broken heart.

Lies they were. All lies said to comfort them in their empty bed chambers. Baela may be his wife and queen, but she would never be his equal. She would bend to him.  That was the way the world worked. Even for a Targaryen. 

“You forget yourself Alicent. You may have married a Targaryen and raised four, but you are not one. You forget that I did not marry into this family. My mother is a Targaryen. Though you and your father look down on him, my father is just as Valyrian as she.” Laena felt her temper boiling over past the point of containment as she sneered down at the queen. 

She remembered her mother letting her read some of the letters her father sent home from his time on the small council as master of ships. It was to prepare her for what she may face, to know her enemies, When they thought she might still be Viserys’ queen. His account of Otto Hightower had never been complimentary. She knew that the man envied her father's lordship, his heritage, and his closeness to House Targaryen. 

He was a second son who had only been handed scraps from his brother. He had to claw his way to where he got to and once he had the position he coveted and his daughter seated beside the king, he pushed her father out and replaced him with his lackeys. Much like he did with her own husband. Although he could never truly get rid of Daemon no matter how he tried. His king had a weakness for him. They all did. 

“Daemon is my cousin as well as my husband. I ride the largest dragon in the world.” He would not have had her if she had not. She was good enough. She knew that with every passing minute he remained with Rhaenyra she knew she had been just good enough as would her daughters be.

“I have borne him three children. I have borne him a son and heir who shall inherit my father's throne. I might have been queen in my own right. I am the blood of old Valyria. I am the blood of the dragon and yet I am not his equal.” Mayhaps it was foolish to speak to her with such venom. Powerless and weak as she may appear to be, she was still queen, but Laena did not care anymore. Let the truth reign for once. For what good were lives when the world may very well fall apart after tonight? 

“I am not my husband's equal nor will I ever be. No matter what I am, what I do, what I can give him, my very soul, it matters not. My existence is for the pleasure of Daemon Targaryen. I am his plaything, you are Viserys, and my daughter shall be your Aegon’s.”

 A pair of big watery brown eyes looked as if they wished to pop Alicent’s skull. Laena had shocked the woman to silence with her ranting. The truth was a heavy burden to bear and exhausting one too for she was panting like she had run around Driftmark twice over. She had barely breathed since she had opened her mouth and yet there was one last truth to lay bare before them. 

“My husband has a claim to the throne.” Alicent's eyes contracted back. Regaining some of her senses with the reminder of that threat. “We have an heir now.” She was holding said heir rocking him, trying to calm him as he had begun to fuss finally sensing the growing tension in the room. 

Aemon was a babe. He was just a babe with no care more than milk, sleep, and being held until he fell asleep, but babes soon enough turn into men with wants greater than food or affection from their mother. He was the firstborn son of the Rogue Prince. The untainted blood of old Valyria. His father would wish to give him all he felt owed to him. “What is to stop him from staking his claim for our son?”

“Your husband has never been well-liked Laena. I would think carefully before you put your faith in his claim.”  It wasn’t a threat. There was no venom there. It was a fact. Daemon made his share of enemies. He made more of those than friends.  

He had never much sought to endear himself to the lords of the realm and it was their support and not just of the common people or a half a dozen dragons that he would need to win him his crown. 

“I have a claim.” She was not some motherless child of an overly ambitious second son who had the misfortune of marrying into this treacherous family. She was Lady Laena Velaryon. 

She was the great-granddaughter of the old king. If her grandsire had lived long enough to ascend to his father's throne she would have been her mother’s heir or the heir of her brother.

Her claim was better in fact than that of her husband. Better than Viserys even

Of course, no one would back her while her good-brother lived, but if she were to endear herself to the lords of the realm now she might hold enough sway to get them to call for a Great Council on his deathbed. 

The lords did not know. It could be an advantage, though it would not help much. They may not know her, but they knew she was the daughter of the queen who never was and the Sea Snakes daughter and now the wife of the king's temperamental younger brother.  She had been raised to be a queen, yes, but queen consort. Not a queen in her own right, 

Even if she were to muster up enough support and betroth Baela, Rhaena, and  Aemon to the likes of Houses Tully, Tyrell, or Lannister, it would not be enough. She might not be her husband, but she had his stain upon her. House Baratheon would support her regardless even if begrudgingly, but Houses Arryn, the Stark, and Greyjoy and their vessel would not bend so easily. 

The Arryns were kin to Rhaenyra’s mother, the Starks would honor whatever vows they had made even from a thousand years ago, and the Greyjoys could not be trusted on anything but petty violence. Blood would pay for her claim and that is what Alicent counted on.

“You would not start a war for the throne Laena.” The corners of her mouth quirked up into a  small smile. It was the pitying kind. The kind that said I know you because I know myself. “No more than I.” She was presumptions, but this conversation was presumptions. 

“You do not know me, Alicent.” A gamble, but she had already taken a dozen of those. Why not this one as well? 

Alicent believed her to be weak, the safer option, the only between Rhaenyra’s rule and her son's death, but she was a dragon too. Just as much as her husband or Rhaenyra.“One word from me and it shall be Aemon who sits upon the throne of my ancestors. I promise I will make sure that my husband sees to it.” She swallowed the last bits of whatever fear remained. “My husband will prove your father's fears to be true. Do not test my patience, your grace.” 

“My father does trust your husband and neither do I.” She drew closer still. Placing Aemon in his crib. “But I trust you Laena. I trust that you are a mother. I trust that you will do anything to protect your children as I would mine, but we do not have to plunge this realm into chaos and shed the blood of innocents to do that.” Alicent grabbed both her hands in her pale ones hand and held fast. They were soft, but her grip was surprisingly firm. 

“Aegon has his faults. I will not deny you that.” How could she? The evidence was plain. She would have to think her a half-wit when she had seen with her own eyes how Aegon was.“But he knows his duty. He knows who his duty is. He will protect his queen, the mother of his children, with his life. As will Aemond with Rhaena.”  

“Your children will never be safe with Rhaenyra on the throne. Your Aemon is a threat to Rhaenyra’s son just as much.” She flinched. She wanted to tell the woman bent before her that her husband would never allow anything to harm Aemon or their girl, but her throat felt like it had been filled with sand. “The lords of the realm will never allow a bastard to sit upon the Iron Throne. Your girls will not be protected if you marry them to her boys, not in the way mine can.”

Brown met brown as her gaze bore into the back of her skull. “Please Laena. We have a chance. Let us not make the same mistakes as our husbands and fathers have. I am begging you for the sake of our children let us join our houses and protect them.” 

Laena scanned the pale woman’s face. Assessing her every word and action since she entered the chambers that had culminated with her kneeling to her. It was not a sight witnessed every day that one witnessed a queen kneeling to what should be her subject, but Laena supposed that as far as queens go, Alicent Hightower's power at her husband's court was middling at best if she had to stoop so low as to beg her for an alliance. 

Save for one of Laena’s great-great uncle Maegor the Cruel's many wives, who left as quickly as they came,  she had nothing. No one. She was a complete outsider. Locked out and alone. She had no choice but to beg. To plead so that someone might hear her cries. They were the cries of a desperate woman, but she had not lied. She had not told a single lie to her. Had not denied why she was here, or what she wanted from her. She had not lied. 

Her plans were a bit idealistic, but Laena saw the merit in them. What other way was there? 

Rhaenyra had already seen the threat that her half-brothers possessed. She could not touch Aemon, Daemon would kill her himself if she did, but her girls would never know peace if they married those boys. She herself would not for her cousin would find a way to insert herself into every facet of her life, the lives of her children, and her marriage. Alicent offered them both a way out without bloodshed. Laena had to take it. 

Another knock sounded at the door before she could answer the plea. The voice of her guards and Ser Criston came through from the wood. She bade them to come in while Alicent rose from the floor. Smoothing out her wrinkled dark green skirts. 

First entered the Dornish knight looking rather miffed with the messenger standing next to him. 

A boy really. He was short and dark. Shifting upon the balls of his feet, no doubt doing so to calm the growing ball of nerves that had formed from his given task. Whoever had dealt it to him must not have done so out of spite. 

“You-uur grace. My-my lady,” He stammered out Eyes glued to the ground. As he made hurried little bows half a dozen times. Stopping and starting his speech just as many.  “There has been—there has — there has been—well there ha-aa—”

“Speak or have someone else will do it for you boy,” Ser Criston barked, growing impatient with his ability to finish his sentences. It did drive one made, but Laena hardly thought that the frightened thing would help matters. However, it did serve to instill in the poor boy enough fear to finish his speech lest he be chastised by her father's steward for his inability to complete a simple task. 

“Ppp-rince Aemond has be-een gravely injured m-my queen bbby  Pr-rrince Lucerys.” He spoke. Swallowing as he trembled where he stood. “And the ladies Baela and Rhaena ha—vvve be-een injured as well.”

Her body went stiff. Every last drop of blood drained from her body. All she could hear was a ringing in her ears. How she remained standing she did not know. Laena almost wished she was staring at the sea again. For drowning was preferable to having your heart ripped out from your chest. 

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