Chapter Text
. Daemon .
He found him, staggering at the edge of the southwest corridor, in the aftermath, pale and shining greasily against the stone awning.
“You’ve done a good job at making yourself scarce, brother. I’d half expected to find you with a flank of guards clattering up the corridor.”
Viserys let out a sound that might have been a grunt - decidedly cut through with a wet cough, staggering on without so much as a glance over his shoulder. No sign of his lady wife. Daemon half wondered if she had truly gone hysterical by now, bound sobbing to her quarters with Otto Hightower standing sentinel by the door. Or perhaps wailing over her precious, blubbering offspring. It disturbed the mind to think on it too long.
“Not that you’d need them, with that cane. Anyone can hear you, staggering about this place.”
“…”
The air was getting colder the further down the corridor the brothers traversed, rock chilled from the wind, dark textiles spiralling towards Viserys’ adopted quarters in a crested wave stucco. Pretty, if too flouncy for Daemons tastes.
“You're going to have to acknowledge me at some point, you do realise?” Daemon remarked, watching the crown of his brother's unfortunately balding head.
“Hm.”
“…..” alright then.
Viserys had had a tendency for this when they were children - a consequence of Daemon breaking his favourite play sword, or spilling food on an irreplaceable gifted tunic. Their mother would never have stood for Daemon being punished, no matter how much he had admittedly deserved it at times - the slightest raise of his brothers voice, and her beautiful mouth would fix in a pucker, arms crossed, and that would be the end of their brotherly quarrel, thank you very much , unless they wished to be sent to bed without supper. So, Viserys had adopted a unique form of punishment - a silent, wounded reproach, infuriatingly undetectable to outsiders - secure in the knowledge that Daemon and Daemon alone would understand it for what it was, and be cowed by it.
He might almost have believed his nonchalance, were it not for the six or seven glances his brother had darted over his hunched shoulder throughout the damp walk back towards his kings quarters.
.
The door swung with an unattractive scrape of wood against iron fittings, shutting out the guards gaze.
The sound of trickling liquid seeped through the room as his brother decanted wine from the caraf by his table stand, brimming red and shining around the lip of the goblet. It was downed in long, unflattering gulps, one, two, three. Viserys went to refill his cup.
“You're still here, then.”
“Always seem to be.”
Viserys’ face twisted, with some clear difficulty, into a scowl as he cast his eyes over his brother, half shadow and half decay in the torchlight of the guest hall. He had tried to speak to him, earlier. To apologise for the loss of Laena, Daemon supposed. To offer an armistice.
It hadn’t worked. Obviously .
The last time he had seen his brother, truly seen him, and understood him for what he was, he had been thrown to the floor, head spinning, and felt the sharp slam of a boot against his ribs as Viserys lamented the honour of Rhaenyra. His precious girl. The realms delight, with Aemma’s smile upon her lips and Targaryen fire bright in her eyes. She would always be a squalling child, in Viserys’s eyes, still cradled in the crook of her mother’s arms, patchy silver hair peeking up over swaddling cloth. She was a woman grown. Capable of her own decisions. Better him than… better him. Better him than someone else.
“You have ruined her,” his brother had snarled, and even then his face had been wrong, too grey and too dour to be Viserys, his older brother, who had always been so alive in his youth, drawn with pain, held together with a cane and his fragile understanding of dignity. Of honour.
“You’re tracking sand through the good carpets, Daemon.”
Daemon lifted the side of his boot, taking a good long look at the beach sand and silt still clogged against the leather curvatures. With a slow, firm knock of his right heel against the rim of his left, a neat pile of white powder deposited squarely in the centre of his brother's guest room.
Viserys’s eye twitched, minutely, as he turned from him, lugging his cloak from his shoulders to prop against the table with a huff. For a while, they simply stood there, Viserys with his back turned, shuffling possessions around the desk with an air of importance Daemon knew to be feigned, Daemon staring carefully at his back, counting the stiff seconds in his head.
Viserys would crack first. He always did.
He thumbed the heavy weight of his signet ring, once, twice, rotating the crest around his index with his thumb.
A heavy puff of air, dragged out in clear exaggeration. “Seek more important tasks than tailing me, Daemon. You're not a child anymore, though you seem to forget that fact. Comfort your daughters.” A pointed glance, cold in the lamplight. “All of them.”
“I have no problem understanding that I am no longer a child. It is you, dear brother, that seems to find difficulty processing my lack of reliance upon you.”
“And that’s why you ran away, I suppose? Tail between your legs like a chastised hound? To prove you needn’t rely on me, anymore? Need I remind you that you are the one who followed me back to my guest quarters?”
The silence that settled between them was thin as webbing, brittle and sharp. Viserys stared at him. Daemon stared back. The air was drier, here, than it had been in the cold hallway, warmed with burning wood smoke for the kings aching joints, and it took effort not to blink too sharply, not to clear his sight so he could better stare at his brother, thinking, loosely, in the back of his mind, any moment now.
Any moment he will break away, and his gaze will shift, and it will break, all of it break, and Viserys would be normal again, and none of this would matter, ever again, they would be past this mess.
But it wouldn't happen. That chapter of their life was passed thrice by, by now. Did you even miss me? He wanted to ask, wanted to scream in his brother's face, and push him back to punctuate it, or slam his head bodily into the wall, or hug him, burying nails into the soft meat of his shoulder to root him to him, or kill him, and be done with it already. You dismissed me, so easily, then. All I had done was defend this family. Did you think of me, when I wasn't there to help you?
He didn't say any of this.
“Why?”
“Why what, Daemon?” His brother's exasperation was gentle, infuriating long suffering, unerringly like their mothers. His skin looked tighter, more rippable, somehow, against the stretch of his cheeks.
“ Why bring her? After all that has passed between us, these past years, was invitation to my wife’s funeral not enough for you? You had to bring her, to flaunt your charitability in the face of my callousness? Did you think yourself a better man for it? Did you believe it would soften me? Harbouring the girl in the shadows of your castle does nothing to improve your character, brother. ”
“Are you bent on pursuing this line of argument now? She deserves to know her father.” A strangled snort, barely a laugh, blending further towards the edge of frustration came from Daemon’s throat. It lingered there for a moment, fat and ugly in the air between them.
“She has enough opinion of my character to quell her curiosity, I'm sure.” I have never hated anyone in the world as much as I hate you. A puffed up, trembling fledgling, barely flown from the nest, standing pale and vengeful on the beach. A barely there girl that believed she had witnessed him at his worst, believed she understood him, in completion, fully realised, through her hatred.
As if what he had done to her mother was any indication of his full character. It was almost annoying, in a way. She didn’t deserve to say she hated him. It was simply a matter of comparison. Has anyone ever hated him better, hated him so completely other than Viserys? He knew him, fully and forever, since the day of his birth held in his brother's arms, every joy and every mistake, and hated him in completion. Of course he did. Of course Daemon hated him the same. One could only hate someone, fully and with everything they had, if they also loved them despite it all.
Hatred was favourable. Hatred wasn't nothing. He could not be forgotten, if he was so hated, so focused on. So understood.
Viserys’ face was twisted into a rather unflattering mask of offence. “Her sisters, then! They deserve kinship, sisterhood, without blood and beating!” A lean forward, his brothers finger jabbing into his chest to punctuate his words, “The proof of their discourse is cut across her face !”
He hadn’t missed this side of Viserys, at least, Daemon reflected, lifting a careful finger to deliberately flick a drop of his brother's sanctimonious saliva from where it had landed, ever so self righteous and impassioned, on his cheek.
“ You wish to lament the face of a child? I never took you for a hypocrite, brother.” A lie. Viserys had always been duplicitous, whether he knew it himself or not. The look Viserys shot his way was a warning if ever Daemon had seen one. Tough. He was bored. He was curious . He wanted to talk to his brother. “You act as though this is anomalous. As if we never cut each other in our youth.”
“ You cut me with children’s practice blades. Paper cuts! Half my size, Daemon, parading as some jousting knight, ‘protecting’ me. You always did more harm to me than good, but I never - I would never have -!“ Viserys cut himself off, stamping his walking stick into a pivot, turning from him to collect himself. He was shorter now, hunched over in a constant curve, as if he had just been punched in the stomach. Behind him, Daemon found himself shifting his weight, one foot to the other, fighting the urge to cross one childish arm over the other.
When the King spoke again, it was calmer, quieter, staring blankly at the wall. “You see yourself as blameless, in this. You dismiss her, and yet still find pride in your actions. But you forget she is my niece, as sure as she is your daughter.”
“Is that why you took her under your noble wing? I always took you for the sentimental type brother, but I never guessed you would have gone to the lengths of uprooting her from her country cave simply for obligation’s sake.”
The whole business had been built on a foolish whim, then. The court had talked in the way the court had always talked, of course, when he had still been in King's Landing, of the absence of Daemon’s girl. A hidden royal would do no good without sycophants and flatters to stick to them, aiming to curry their favour even in adolescence, prying with jewels and stories, and pretty highborn playmates to play matchmaker with. Tough. They shouldn't have had this one. He hadn’t wanted to see her, and with time, she had faded even from the tongue of the most curious court chatters, replaced with the shiniest new scandal. That was the way it should have remained, could have remained, with the creature slotted neatly between two rock faces, never to be looked at or commented upon or thought about by anyone, ever again.
But Viserys had always been too sentimental for his own good.
His brother turned, slightly, a single pale purple eyes stared through him. Not quite worth turning fully. The blood capillaries had burst, speckled, across his left sclera. “For a man who treats his heir with such abject hatred, you seem blind to the fact she is just as you had been, when we were young.”
“You were always good at seeing what you wanted to see. Did you find my absence so harrowing that you employed my shade in my stead?”
A long pause. Viserys was staring at him with uncanny stillness.
“Sometimes, I found myself asking the same question. She seems so much like you, in certain lights. The way you had been, once.”
Ah.
Stupidly, Daemon realised, it hadn’t been the answer he had been expecting. It threw him, somewhat.
A shuffle, as Viserys turned back fully, leaning the slump of his body hard on his cane. “But perhaps I simply wished to save a guiltless child from your dismissal. To allow her to carry the name of her birthright. Both of her birthrights.”
“You are bold, Viserys, to shame my approach to my children, as if you do not dismiss your own. Aemond , was it?”
“Do not bring Aemond into this.”
Oh, he was so bringing Aemond into this.
“Why not! If we’re planning to call to light my faults as a father, we would do well to see whose child has shed the most blood in the last hour! Or shall you turn a blind eye to that, as well? ”
A sharp intake of breath. “I am sorry, Daemon. For the setting we have found each other in. For the unfairness of your position in it all. For the - the indignance you may feel, that all this has come to pass at the funeral of your wife. If you feel your girls have been wronged. If you feel Vhagar has been displaced from your wife’s side. But we are a family. The beast has not passed across enemy lines, for all your indignance. You would do best not to vex me, by mocking the loss of family blood.”
“Your son, far removed from the line of succession, has shed family blood of those better placed than him! Has questioned the legitimacy of your heirs, chosen by your hand, defended time and time again! You would be blind to see this as a simple children’s quandary!”
His brother had turned, once again, moving a withered hand to shift unread papers across the desk. “Leave me be, Daemon.”
Always the avoidant type, his noble brother.
“Will that be your solution to every problem? To shelter under the shade of your crown until someone comes along to fight your battles for you?”
It could have been me, you know. I would have done it, for you.
“Leave me be. Daemon. ”
“ I invited you here! I made that effort, after years of silence! You haven't apologised to me, even now! Would you truly dismiss me so quickly?”
Viserys’ hand slammed onto the desk as he turned to stare at him. “You had to! People would talk, if I had not been present at your wife’s funeral. At a Velaryon funeral! People would have talked, had she not been here, either! You didn’t want me here, Daemon, so let's not quiver over royal conducts as if the invitation wasn't anything less than a formality. Earlier, in the courtyard, you wanted nothing to do with me, so don't preach to me of owing you anything.”
“You don't know what I want.”
“Do you?”
Well, fuck you then. Daemon grit his teeth into a smile that he hoped very much was dripping with adequate condescension. Who was Viserys to presume what Daemon wanted? Viserys, who had sung praises of his brother, had kept him close by his side, only to cut the wire from his feet again and again, ‘banishment’ after ‘embassy’ after ‘visitation.’ Viserys, who had refused him, as heir, as brother, and as shield and sword altogether, closed the door behind him time and time again, and now asked him of wanting. Of owing.
He had opened his mouth preparing to let these sentiments be known, when a muted shuffle of noise cracked through the corridor, low voices murmuring placatedly against a shrill young voice, breaking his pace. Under the crack of the door, guards feet shuffled and flickered gaps in the light.
Silence.
Tap tap.
A knock on the door, sharp, but quiet. No armour coating the knuckles.
Tap, tap, tap. A cough on the other side of the wood.
……
Tap tap tap tap thud thud thud -.
The two brothers stared at it, carefully, waiting as the seconds dragged by for the announcement of a voice. There was none, save for the flurry of knocks in quick succession, almost as if the visitor had given up on formality and was now thudding both fists with quite a level of force against the panelling, until Daemon let himself cross the room, hand on the handle to wrench open the door.
ThudthudthudTHUDTHUDTHUD -
“ You.”
“…you.” The creature on the King's doorstep stared back at him with mirrored distaste, lip curled into a scowl, without even the shame to lower her offending hands.
“And what do you think you’re doing?”
“I wish to speak to the King.”
“The King doesn’t wish to be bothered. The hour is late, I'm afraid.”
“I'm aware. Perhaps he can tell that to me himself.”
“No need. I am an honest envoy.”
“Oh, I'm sure. For my own peace of mind, then.” Her gaze flitted over his shoulder, scanning the room behind him.
He shifted his body on the entrance, leaning across the opening to block her line of sight, watching the frustration flick over her face as he peered down.
The girl standing in front of him could have been confused for a bastard. There were plenty, by now, roaming the streets of Kings Landing, byproducts of forgetful uncles, drunken grandfathers, shocks of white hair hastily dyed black hiding in brothels and back alleys. As splattered as blood and mud as his daughter was, it would have been no surprise to him had she been such a bleached rat, crawling through the rancour and the muck, up through the slums to wail against the palace gates to him, eyes brining bright and wide with a fury so unmistakably like her mothers.
Her lip curled. “Are you even listening?!” She might have blood in her teeth, he noted, absentmindedly, craning his neck to meet her sight, to look at her fully.
It was unsettling, to look at his daughter for too long.
She had the semblance of a pretty face, he decided. The kind of face he might have liked, in any other person, though every favourable feature seemed disrupted by a warring counterpart. Too tall, for one, in a way that led her towards irregularity instead of elegance. Too wiry - a collection of odd right angles strapped into one thinly muscled frame, juts instead of curves. She had clear skin, though the freckles were undesirable. Sharp Targaryen features, but reminiscent of the men’s features, gave her a princely countenance, unlike the soft smiles of the ladies of the court. An aristocratic nose that cut through her face, too much sharpness in the jaw. Pointed shoulders and elbows. Thick white hair, but untidy curls stuck in tangles.
Long white eyelashes. Brown eyes, like her mothers. Deceptively soft, deceptively warm, with a gaze as hard and unyielding as the coldest steel. Too wide for her face. Out of place, in the careful composition of her features, too wide, too warm against the skin, like a cow's gentle eyes shoved into the visage of a lizard.
Wrong, wrong, wrong.
His firstborn.
Valaeys.
Valaeys. Why Rhea had decided to give her a Targaryen name was far beyond his understanding. Knowing her, somehow, there was underlying spite that would eventually come back to haunt him.
He reflected, looking into her soft brown eyes, of the unabashed satisfaction of driving cold, jagged stone through soft warm pink tissue, burrowing all the way from frontal to parietal bone, until it scraped against the unforgiving soil red and steaming. Muck and mulch, wetting dirt. Stupid woman.
“Do you know, now? I wouldn't be surprised. I seem to be the last one anyone tells anything to in this fucking castle.”
Language. “How did you get past the guards?”
“So you don’t know. Go figure. ”
“There are two guards at the king's door. I find it difficult to believe they would let you pass through in your current state of …dishevelment.” A pointed glare was sent to said guards, who by now were staring pointedly forward towards the wall, as if sheer willpower alone would be able to slide them backwards into the stonework, ignoring the scene. His daughter snapped ( snapped! ) her fingers, drawing his gaze back to her. He had seen less blood crust on soldiers after a day's battle. Had she been rolling in the stuff?
“I batted my eyes and asked very nicely, now let me through the fucking door.”
“Who is it, then?” Viserys’s voice came, tired, somewhere behind his shoulder.
“….”
Brown eyes stared into purple ones, challenging.
“Daemon?”
“No one. Simply -“ “It is Valaeys. Your Highness,” she interrupted, squaring her shoulders back.
“…”
“Your niece. I would have words with you, My King. Important words. ”
“I am sure they can wait until morning, child. You require rest. As do we all.”
Her tongue dipped to lick across her cracked lip. “ Important words,” she ground out, “concerning my marital position.”
“…..”
“It shan’t take long,” she pressed, “assuming you know more about it than I.”
“I believe the king has made his decision clear, my Lady . I believe the lack of sleep has caught up to you. Perhaps tomorrow, when you have collected your senses, you may - .”
“Let her in.”
…what?
“You said - ”
“Let her in, Daemon. And for Sevens sake, close the door .”
He debated, for a moment, on slamming the door right in her accusatory face, simply out of interest in his brother's reaction.
In another world, perhaps it would be satisfactory. Perhaps Viserys would snarl at him, would hit him sharply upside his head, and make him open the door. In this one, though, he would probably sigh, in his unnerving, irregularly elderly way, and heave himself across the room on his walking stick to pry open the thing himself in a way that would have been erring on the side of just slightly too pathetic for Daemon to mentally register at the current moment.
He let her in, watching her white fuzz of hair slip past him, and shoved close the heavy wood with the back of his heel, leaning back against the door arms crossed as he watched her march through the room.
“Dear girl,” his brother's voice was gentle, cautious, in the way it had sometimes been when he soothed a snarling hunting hound, “what possible concern could you have for it to be addressed so late?
“Have you told him?”
“I’m sorry?”
“ Have you told him, Your Highness?” The words were spit out behind ground teeth, “I suppose it would be fitting, for everyone else to know before I did. Even him , who you seem so desperate to hide it from.”
“Watch your tongue,” Daemon said reflexively, though his eyes were darting between the pair slowly now. Viserys’s skin seemed to have paled impossibly, in unflattering red and yellow patches as he stared back at the girl.
“I'm not sure what you mean, child.”
“Would you like me to elaborate? Perhaps draw you a picture? You can cease the performance, your little plan has been recounted to me in vivid detail by now.”
“….little plan?” Daemon echoed, slowly. Viserys ignored him, again .
“I - vivid detail? You must understand -“
“Understand? Oh, I understand perfectly.” Her voice flew up a pitch, bordering into hysterics, “Better than most, perhaps. After all, it is my wedding you were trying to orchestrate, without my knowledge!”
Something gently sour curled under Daemons tongue.
There was a curl stuck unflatteringly out of place on his daughter's skull, ragged and crumpled against the rest. It shifted, slightly, as she turned her gaze back and forth from Daemon to Viserys.
“ Oh , your face right now,” she marvelled, hushed as she took in his expression, “I would almost say that it was worth it, for that. Except, that, you know. It isn’t.”
“My lady, you must understand-“
The realisation crept slowly on the edges of his mind, dim and then bright and blazing in one marvellous moment of recognition. Oh. “That’s why.” A small smile. “Oh, that's why. For all your charity, your hospitality, all your harping about her being our family, you would insult her in a marriage to a second son? Seventh in line?”
Oh, this was wonderful.
“ Don't talk about him like that!” The girl hissed, seemingly reflexively, all but drowned out by Viserys’s protest, squaring up against Daemon with an almost shocking speed.
“My son, shall provide a better future for your daughter, your firstborn daughter, your heir, than you ever did!”
“So you thought you would sell her off to one of your sons without my permission? That you could? ” He might have been impressed with Viserys’ sheer audacity, had he not been so preoccupied with indignation. Passing her hand was his right, not Viserys’, unspoken but obvious and undeniable. A father’s right, and no one else’s. Even in absence, no one else would have had the right. Her line would have tapered out with her, easy and swift. It was as clear a slight as any. “You take liberties, Viserys. Even as king.”
“ I shall fix this! I shall bring order to your mess, once again, where you could not bring yourself to! The match is wise. The match is necessary. It shall strengthen our house, it shall strengthen our family, tie up loose ends, resolve -“
“Loose ends?” Her voice split high and indignant, “I am not some coin you can slip into another man's pocket the moment you see fit!” Brown eyes stared at him reproachfully, jabbing a sharp finger against his chest, “And you are not a part of this conversation!” She snapped, whirling her head towards the king. “Why was my true guardian not consulted? Because you knew he’d object, I assume?”
“Gerold Royce would have - needed persuasion I was unable to provide over letter, given the circumstances -“
“Persuasion? Circumstances?! You wanted to force me into a marriage I didn’t know about! And once Aegon wasn't available, you simply - you simply shuttled me downstream to the next male you could find, to neatly tie up ‘loose ends ’! Were you ever going to tell me? Or were you to wait until I stepped over the threshold of the Godswood, before you bound me screaming to the fucking altar?”
Viserys opened his mouth, but she pressed on. “You knew! You must have known it was unjust, or you would have told my guardian! But you knew he would be opposed! So you hid it! And you tricked me into your court, to…. to what! See if I was good enough, to be auctioned for parts? Under the guise of helping me? You arranged, time and time again for me to be herded in with your children, made me take lessons with - with Helena , you let me be seen by the court, the entire court, unchaperoned with Aegon! Was that another way to trap me?”
“We want you protected. Safe! The vale is no place for a Targaryen child to be raised-“
“AND YET THERE I WAS RAISED! All four and ten fucking years of my life, there I was! Where was your self righteousness then, My King? When my mother was snatched from this world unfairly, what words of comfort were sent? What support given?” She ran a shaky hand through her hair in frustration. “There was none! You were - you were a ghost, on the wind! I heard whisperings of you in nothing more pivotal than land reallocations! You act as if - you act as if you care , for my wellbeing, and yet I have lived a whole childhood not hearing one word!”
“I am an honest man. I admit, readily, that I have made mistakes, in this life. Far too many for me to fully comprehend. The weight of my position has led to many choices that I … that I find myself hesitant to bear the credit of.” Viserys stepped, slowly through the room, towards the girl, hand reached out in gentle supplication.
“Valaeys. Child . Ever since I met you, I have regretted everyday the lateness of our meeting. I treated you not as my niece, but as a subject. It was unfair of me -“ the girl snorted, shying away from his hand, “it was unfair, to you, to be held so far from the arrangements of your union. But you must understand, now, the reason for my hesitance, I must have you understand why we waited - ”
“You waited because you knew I would object. Did you not?”
Viserys pursed his lips, eyes darting. “…yes.”
“You waited because you were afraid I would leave. That I would return home. Did you not?”
“Kings Landing is as much your home-“
“ Did you not?”
A long sigh. “…we did.”
In the firelight, the girl's eyes were shiny, almost bug-like. “You stand there, and preach to me of care. Of protection. As you plot to trap a little girl into a marriage you knew she would object to!”
“I do care - ”
“I am a package, to you. A basket of titles and lands. You yourself know as well as I how fragile the Targaryen hold on Runestone would be, was it not for my birthright.” Cold brown eyes lifted, and caught fast onto Daemon across the room. “Even when my mother was alive, the claim was a thin one, due to the - the actions , of my - of Prince Daemon. I will not be made a bargaining chip, for your wills and wims.”
“You care for the boy,” Viserys insisted, “as you care for your family. For all your obstructions, you hold fondness. You forget your actions tonight, your readiness in protecting him. You would be comfortable - ”
“ It would never work! Do you think I would ever stay silent? That I would sit and simper and play the doting wife? How strong would the Targaryen claim be to Runestone were the news to get out that its lady had been locked away in a Kings Landing castle turret? How long would that indignity be left unremedied?”
“She’s right, you know.” The girl blinked, face shifting almost comically to mirror his brother's incredulity.
“I - I am?”
But Daemon was focused on his brother. “To keep her here, or take the boy there… both are foolish. It wouldn't do to separate Aemond from his siblings, you know it as well as I. Can you think of any possibility of his mother allowing it? The Hand ? After this?”
Viserys had the grace, at least, to hesitate.
“As for keeping the girl at Kings Landing… well. You know my stance on the matter. It was a fool's errand on your part to bring her in the first place.”
With a cold laugh, Viserys slumped himself into a chair, raising both hands to nurse the sides of his temples as he stared, blankly between the pair.
“Is this how it is to be then? Father and daughter, united at last, in their desire to be removed from each other’s presence?”
“I would not fight with you, brother, if you wish otherwise.” (A disbelieving snort from Viserys, but he pushed on,) “I would not fight you over this. Let the girl return to her castle.” This, at least, he and her seemed to agree on. “ Give them an extended betrothal, if you won’t give an annulment. Allow them to push for it, when they're old enough to think for themselves. If not, when they are older, annul the betrothal.”
“Annul it now!”
“You forget yourself, my daughter. You are but yet a child .”
“I am four and ten years old! And he is - he is younger still! ”
“And you have marched into royal chambers without a flicker of trepadice or dignity, demanding an audience with your king and talking back to your father.”
The girl's lip curled back into a perfect smile, almost definitely an excuse just to bear her teeth. “ Barely a father! Does a father advocate to steal his daughters inheritance, mere days after the death of a wife he never visited? Does a father abandon his family, year after year, to go play pretend that he has any relevance at court? Does a father drink and whore in the slums of a city, leaving his wife to raise their daughter by herself?”
“Watch yourself.”
“I have watched myself all the years of my life! I had no father to tell me how to conduct myself! You were supposed to care for me, to protect me from the world! I should have found relief in your company, solace in your presence! Instead, all there was, was silence ! And then my mother died , and you left all together, to taunt me from across the waves with cruel words written in drunken stupors, because the only time, the singular annual moment you deigned to think on me, it was with spite and misdirected blame! Fuck you! Fuck you! It should have been you who died on that mountain!”
Daemon could feel the weight of his brother's gaze hard upon his daughter's face. She didn't seem to notice, frantic as she was pacing up and down the room with one hand fisting her untidy hair, spooling from its reddish white braid in an unflattering scrunch on one side of her face. She spun, suddenly, to point at him, coiled like a whip ready to strike, roughly as intimidating as a newly whelped pup mewling for its mother.
“It was not my fault! It was not my mothers fault! You, you are the sole blame for your “unjust” fate! Your unlucky fate, stuck with - with sheep, and hills, and rocks, and her, and acting like it was - it was charity to grace my home, my castle , to sulk and insult us and drag your stupid , creepy, fucking lizard around the mountainside as if you were waiting for someone to keel over and lick your boots clean of muck for you! We never wanted you! You needn't have come at all! Why, why, didn't you just leave us alone! We were happy!”
The words echoed, just a bit, in the juggering gasp that came after this tirade, as his daughter stared at him, wild with a dead woman’s eyes white all the way around the iris, looking more like a deranged old crone in the darkness than a young girl.
Her eyes shifted, pressing insistently into the kings. “I refuse to live the same fate consigned to my mother. Expected to be a broodmare! To be taken from my home to be some pretty thing at court! To be - to be shamed, to be mocked, to have my agency stolen, to have my life robbed from me by marriage! To be named a whore and a - a bitch, and ugly, and useless, to be neglected until I lie festering on the earth that was mine by law, that was promised to me by law , not some thieving excuse of man who believes himself entitled ! ”
“Enough!” The King roared, loud enough to propel himself into a bout of hacking coughs, bent over the weight on his cane as he composed his breathing.
“You, are a Lady. A Targaryen bred, and sole inheritor to the Vale of Arryn, through Runestone! And you shall do your duty to your family!”
“The family that left me stranded, until it was convenient for them to impose on my birthright?”
“ The very same!” Viserys roared. “The decisions have been made. The small council is in agreement, and my son is promised to you as much as you are bound to him, and for all your kicking, you are fond of each other. You have protected him, cared for him. I have borne witness to it, tonight and all the nights before it. I am not blind , child, and I am no fool, no matter how dearly you crave to cast me as such. It is done. It has been. Done. If not now, then later.”
“But I -!”
“ Later!” Viserys roared. The girl shut her mouth with an audible click of teeth, jaw clenching as she glowered.
Viserys spoke again. “I am tired, Daemon. Of this. Of all of this! Of this family's self imposed hostility. I have seen its results thrice over, this night alone. It won’t do.”
“Viserys - “
“It won't do, Daemon! She is your daughter. She is my niece! If you will not allow me to do my part in ensuring her match, then you at least should deign to keep her by your side! I knew of the tension between my children and my nephews. But this - this has been artfully concealed from me. And I shall not allow it to go on for any longer. I shall not allow it! You are to take responsibility for your daughter! You are to keep her, as your ward, until you are able to reconcile! Do you understand? You have riddled poison over crops of your own making, and complain of the lack of food! You will fix this! By order of the King, you shall fix the bed you lie in!”
A shaking silence, interrupted only by hacking coughs from the king as he spat mucus into his brocade sleeve, wet and viscous. Father and daughter watched on, as the king snorted hasty sputum through his nose, wiping once, twice over the quilted fabric, straightening back into a picture of authority with an awkward clearing of his throat.
“Daemon”
Daemon hummed.
His brother's eyes stayed, long and deliberate on his face, no room for argument or interjection. “I will have words with you in the morning before I leave. Take the Lady Valaeys back to her room. I believe she has had a long night.”
He dipped his head as far as his spine would allow, a perfect picture of respect, and let the poison drip neatly into his mouth. “As you wish, Your Highness.” Stitch by stitch. How nearly they all slid back onto the framework after all these years.
And that was that.
.
“Leave me be.”
“Perhaps I wish to speak more with you.”
The girls mouth puckered as though she had swallowed something sour. “Tough luck. The King’s not here to marvel at your performance, so there’s no need. Leave me be.”
They continued in tandem down the hallway. The further his footsteps traced hers, the higher her hackles raised, puffing her hair up up up towards her ears, until she almost seemed a wound up wooden marionette ready to unspool.
Unfortunately , this was beginning to become a familiar scene. The marching and the following. Daemon was always good at needling those ahead of him.
“Tragically for you, we have been issued by royal decree to do quite literally the exact opposite.”
“From all I care to know of you, it would be wildly out of character for you to begin adhering to the King now. Why don’t you just leave? It’s one of your few talents, after all. Take your creepy dragon and your smug comments and your poison and fuck off. ”
“You’re right. Perhaps I’m simply doing this because I find it amusing.”
Sharp, cold eyes stared pointedly ahead. “I should have found a way to kill you in your bed. Not as if you’re in it too often, though, right? Too busy whoring, or murdering, or sleeping with people you shouldn't be ?”
Good grief, he thought mildly, and vaguely considered bending forward to meet the welps line of sight, chin over the bend of her shoulder, to address her better. She would probably punch him for it. He turned it slowly in his head, before disregarding the thought. It would, after all, be very funny, but he doubted she would share the sentiment.
“Perhaps you should have tried, lamb. It certainly would have made you more interesting. You used to be frightfully boring, you know, not chatty at all-“
“For an absent father, you seem rather unable to leave me the fuck alone when I ask you too, Daemon,” she said tightly.
“You have found yourself in quite the predicament, after all. I wonder, in the clear light of retrospect, which appeals more to you now you have left the King's presence? Your being sold like a pack mule to his mutilated second son, or your indefinite consignment to my beloved care?”
She might have let out a snort of derision, though it was hard to tell through the grit of her teeth. More of a muffled squeak, really. She was wound, now, the thin muscles on the lines of her arms coiled from the strength of the grip of her hands.
“You're trying to vex me.”
“I would say I'm doing rather a good job of it.”
“I can see why he would have wanted to be rid of you.”
“ Careful.”
“See? I know where to prod, too. You're not special, just because you think you know things. ”
“Oh but I do know things.” A sharp laugh.
“Your mistress knows things. Mysaria, knows things. Your only accomplishment is stumbling into her bed.”
……He did wonder how she of all people would have learnt about that.
“And what a splendid accomplishment it was! Marvellous chance of fate on my part, you know.” He leant forward conspiratorially. “No one man can ever track all that occurs in Kings Landing. That’s what friends are for. Allies. Partners. Those you employ to gleen the information unavailable to you. I hold no shame admitting it. What accomplishments have you made in your time at Kings Landing, sweetling?”
“….”
“The king's royal court departs at first light tomorrow,” he threw offhandedly, watching carefully at the back of his daughters head, “in case you wish to say farewell to your darling future espousal. You know. For the time being. ”
A twitch of the hand. A slow breath, in and out, shaking through her body.
“There's nothing to say.”
A smirk crept, light with derision, over his face. Foolish thing. “Oh, I’m sure. It’s only, you seemed so fond of each other, when I saw you last. Where are your tears and embraces now, my dear daughter? You wiped his blood from his cheeks so tenderly.”
They were by her door, now. She had paused, a stiff line framed by wood, seemingly unable to remember how to open the handle. Instead her eyes were fixed, carefully, on the wooden composite panelling, as if she would find her response carved for her neatly in the woodwork, a thin hand tracing a shaky finger over the doorknob she seemed unable to grip onto.
“Not to worry. You shall have all the time to reunite, once you have left my company. Shipped from one court to the next, wherever the King's fancy drives you.”
He walked, smirking, through the bend in the corridor, pretending not to hear the crack of bones against wood as his firstborn, finally hidden from his line of sight, swung her hand, hard and precise, through the brittle framing of her door, and promptly became hysterical.
.
For her most Gracious Lady, Valaeys of Runestone.
Valaeys.
I am charmed to learn that, despite your efforts, you seem to have made some friends, or at least some new interests, though I shall admit, your newfound fascination in Runestone’s wildlife has been an unexpected one to say the least. I have identified the butterfly you drew (very poorly, I may add) in your last letter - let Princess Helaena know that yes, Runestone’s valleys are filled with Callophrys rubi this time of year - the rock-rose and gorse help draw them in great swathes. To answer your question, the reason Kings Landings Entomology books would not have it recorded is due to it not being indigenous to the area - if needed, I can send you a scroll from the library. Nurture this newfound academic interest, and all that.
Concerning your friendship with Prince Aegon, I will simply remind you that company is always best. Keep with the Princess, or the servants. Get Gaius to walk fifteen feet behind you. Never be seen unaccompanied. You and I both know how much of a mess that can lead to.
You left one of your favourite tunics here. I’m sure you must have noticed, the moment you unpacked your bags all those months ago, but I found it, just now. Before you get aggrieved at me entering your room, I shall have you know it was the first time I have done it (I swear it), and it was simply to check that your window was closed against an oncoming storm. Don’t frown at me, smar einn . I simply did not wish for your books to soak, and gain damp.
It’s the reddish one you liked. The one with cowhide lining. You never mentioned it’s absence in your letters, but I found it, just now, balled at the bottom of your wardrobe. Fallen from the peg, no doubt, when I rushed you to pack for the morning's travel.
I don’t particularly know why I mention it. I could send it, if you’d like. I could have Septa Anya clean it for you, get the dust mites off and starch the folds. Unless you have outgrown it, and left it here purposely, in which case you must ignore my offer. Right now, it’s collecting dust against the back of my work chair.
You must write back, to let me know whether or not to send it.
The mountains are beautiful, this time of year. We have saxifrage across the castle banks, for once, I wager purely because you’re not here to pick at them all before they’re ready. It is a wonder what the local ecosystem can achieve once you are prevented from clambering and rolling through the fields, picking half the world’s foliage to shove into every nook of the castle.
I suppose what I’m trying to get at is that I miss you. You’ll have to forgive an old man for his sentimentality. I can picture you sneering over how soft I’ve gotten.
Your cousins visited, you know. Don’t get irate, they were simply in the area. Osfe stayed, for around a week, and being the placid man I am, I have offered to host them the coming equinox. Don’t complain, as is your way - you may not even be back by then to grace the table with your presence.
You can come back, you know.
You don’t have to stay just because you feel you owe an old man your time. And if you do, I would like to remind you that I too am an old man, perhaps even more old in soul even than your uncle, and for all I jest, your companionship never went amiss to me.
Any time you would like. Runestone shall be here, waiting for you. You don't even have to see your cousins, should you not want to. I shall hide you away in your room, and have Septa Anya send up food and books for you, and I won’t allow her to chide you for it.
Do let me know about the tunic.
Lord Gerold Royce, Of Runestone.
It had smeared a bit at the bottom, from where the mud of her heel had unknowingly dragged it along for the ride in her fit. It didn't matter. His signature was clear under the muck, a scratchy, stout lettering that nearly imprinted through the paper. She traced a slow, reverent finger over it, once, twice, and then thoughtlessly, as she reread, again and again.
.
Her room was a mess. By the strains of daylight filtering through the window, she could make out the rough outline of it, shabby and rumpled in the corner of her eye. Sunlight hit the room unevenly, leaving small jots on the wall, a tiny pool of light upon her pillow by which to read the letter she had near forgotten to open, given the rush of the past few days.
Somewhere, distantly, she could feel the throb of her hand, where the splinters she had been unable to pick out with her teeth still dug through her knuckles.
Her head was aching, she realised with a pang, and slid her head further up the pillow, huffing air through her nose to blow stray white tendrils of hair from where they had plastered to her cheek. Faintly, something slipped from the bed and thunked to the floor, displaced by the shift of her body. A book, perhaps.
If she was clever, she would have found some fancy way to describe it. Perhaps a storm had struck her room and ripped it from the inside out. Or maybe a wild boar had slammed itself into the desk, scattering papers and ink, denting woodwork and splaying sheets. But she wasn't feeling very clever, at that moment. She just felt stupid. And this was the byproduct, she supposed. A slightly broken room, slightly dented, slightly shaken, in the heat of unfairness, of childish anger. Just some clothes and paper on the floor, and a bit of wood lodged in her hand to show for it.
The king's royal court departs at first light, her father had murmured to her yesterday, and she held a perfect image of that bone white smirk in her head as she watched the sunlight dart across her wall, picturing how easily the teeth could be knocked out of his clean mouth in neat little shards of red bone on the castle floor.
There was a basin of salt water by her wall, shallow and shivering. She scrubbed her hands through it thoughtlessly, filtered her fresh blood and her and Aemonds not-so-fresh blood through the water. She scrubbed her face some. Got the mud off her neck, finally. Brushed out the caked gore from her hair. Rubbed the splatters of it from where Aemond had leant his face, not quite conscious, against her bicep as they staggered into the hall. Tried to pick the wood splinters from her hand with shaky fingernails, but gave up just as quickly.
Dragged herself back to bed, pushing the torn books from her pillow to rest, newly clothed, over the covers. Carefully, gently, traced the lines of the slip of wax and paper within her new tunic, pressed warm and crinkling against her heart, and let her other hand's fingers curl against the blankets.
Somewhere, a dragons wings were filtering noise through the air.
Vhagar?
A shriek, low and scraping. No. Sunfyre. The hurt dug sharp into her stomach, as Aegon's dragon lifted through the air. Since when has she been able to know her friend's dragon by sound alone? Not her friend. Not anymore .
She shifted over, squashing her cheek against the pillow, as if it would block the noise of dragon wings.
Leaving, then. Without her.
Of course they were leaving without her. Why did that surprise her? Word would have travelled, by now, after all.
What did you expect?
She had made a scene. She was to stay. With her father.
Pathetically, she felt the beginning of tears crowd her vision, hot and stinging and stupid, stupid, stupid . She blinked them back, harsh against the pillow, slid a hand over her collar to fist the fabric as she breathed in and out.
Stupidly, perhaps she had expected a more dramatic parting. Aegon didn't seem the type to leave so readily, without pomp or fuss, or a half- hearted apology rung out of her by pure exasperation at his teasing. She could picture the scene now, the indignation at her locked door, his voice through the wood, an accusing face that told her she was being foolish, and she was to come with him, snuck under the fold of his cloak, onto Sunfyre’s back, and away from this. She could have borne it, she thought, perhaps it wouldn't have hurt at all to know only Aemond and Helaena had left so easily, quiet and dutiful, all unhappy eyes and a sealed shut mouth. She could have understood it. But Aegon?
“M’ sorry. I don't want you to be mad at me, since I’m your only friend,” he had told her, so bright and honest in the streets of Flea Bottom even with regurgitated liquor stuck in his tunic fibres, as if her being upset upset him, as if he had ever cared about her wellbeing.
She remembered the lines of him, cold and pointy, as she bundled him into her arms in the stables that night, amidst aborted confessions and hushed secrets, when he had looked so tired, so defeated by it all, so helpless it was all she could do to hold him to her until he squeezed her back twice as hard, wet and shivering with puddle muck and tears.
Her only friend.
Stupid, blind, angry girl.
She couldn't hear Sunfyre, anymore.
She dragged a hand, too hard over her eyes, allowing herself a moment to sniffle the tears back. Cleared her throat.
Tried not to think of the other two, the uniquely different, uniquely fresh sting that their faces planted in her mind. The cold press of a nose to her collarbone in a warm room. The soft slide of a flower into her hair.
Enough of this. It was clear, abundantly clear by now, that she would find no company here. No true company, anyway.
She would have to leave this bed eventually. No use sulking about it.
There was no one here who would care about it, anyway.