Ngl, but I really, really, really want Art!Egg to get hugged by like Ser Harwin or Leanor. Just a mentor, maybe pseudo not quite parental figure because let's face it. Aegon is kinda a cesspool of trauma. and I both want him to suffer a bit and get the comfort he deserves
so i tried to write a hug because you're right, egg is a cesspool of trauma and he deserves comfort to go with his suffering. he deserves a hug. he really do
...however.
i tried?
"Well done, Prince Aegon!" His goodbrother cheers, clapping him on the back with enough strength to tip him forwards.
Aegon turns a scowl at the knight. "I lasted five minutes," he mutters, and he knows that it's a feat. He knows that a boy of four and ten lasting five minutes against a blooded knight is a feat to be praised but he isn't just a boy of four and ten. Egg knows he can be better, knows he should be better than he is, but he keeps stumbling over growing limbs and arms that begin to shake too quickly and-
Ser Laenor laughs, bright and loud, and swings an arm over his shoulders as he leans in close. "You almost had me at points," the knight admits easily.
Distantly.
His ears are ringing, the sound of waves and steel nigh drowning all else out. The arm around his shoulders is warm, almost scalding, brands of flame flickering along his skin and he-
"I see why my boys speak so highly of your training," Ser Laenor is saying.
He wants to flinch away.
He can't move.
"...Prince Aegon?"
The arm shifts away, taking the burning-scalding-warmth with it, and a part of him keens for the loss. He wants to run. He wants that arm around his shoulders again and he-
Aegon swallows, marshalling every part of himself that is Arthur Pendragon, King of Camelot, and pretends this is normal. Pretends that his chest isn't aching for Wet Stick and Blue and his girls and the easy touches each of them gives.
He smiles and pretends he isn't going to burst out of his skin.
That he isn't hungry.
(Helaena doesn't like touch and that's fine, he understands. Egg has seen it before and he's proud that when his sister does want touch she'll curl into his side because she trusts him. Aemond doesn't care either way, not now he's growing.
he's not sure Viserys remembers they exist. any of them. Egg is fine with that, given that Rhaenyra has their father's favour and the King treats her like that. but the man has never hugged him in his memory
his mother had stopped once he could walk)
(Aegon hasn't had a touch that wasn't designed to hurt in so long-)
"I'll beat you next time, Ser Laenor," he says, his smile wide. He needs to leave-
His goodbrother stares at him and something dark flickers across his face. He opens his mouth, lifts his arm as if to reach out and-
Aegon doesn't run away.
He just has lessons that he needs to be in, right this moment.
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