𝓔𝓵𝓪𝓮𝓷𝓪 𝓥𝓮𝓵𝓪𝓻𝔂𝓸𝓷

Vhagar stretches her wings and legs starting off on a light jog before taking off into the night sky.

Picking up some speed the dragon is ascending straight up towards the full moon with no regard for us on her back.

Doing as I'm told for once I hold on, and tight. Vhagar wouldn't kill her new rider, would she?

In a quick moment my fear is torn away with the wind in my hair and Aemond's laugh warming my heart.

He'd mounted the largest dragon in the world and it was only the beginning of what he'd be able to do, I knew it in my soul.

"We've done it, Elaena! I've found my very own dragon!" He calls out, but my mind drifts to Rhaena, Lady Laena's daughter who was also without a dragon.

She was meant to claim Vhagar and once everyone found out, there'd be hell to pay and I just hoped it'd be worth it.

Not landing very gracefully I cringe at the thought of what trouble we'd get in for the damage we might've caused as if stealing a dragon hadn't been enough.

"I'll help you down. Watch me first," Aemond's head might've already grown a size unsure I could handle it myself, so instead I prove him wrong.

Jumping from the ropes I take off running towards the castle, my adrenaline pumping faster than ever.

"Elaena, slow down!" He laughs chasing me through the underground tunnels until we're frozen solid, our laughter drowned out by the angry stares of my brothers along with Baela and Rhaena.

They must've heard us.

"It's you." Rhaena spits accusingly.

"It's us." Aemond replies, stepping in front of me as if to shield me from their accusations but Jace and Luke's hostile stare was enough to tear my heart wide open.

"Vhagar is my mothers dragon!"

"Your mother is dead. Vhagar has a new rider now."

"Vhagar was mine to claim!"

"Than you should've claimed her! Maybe your cousins can find you a pig to ride, it would suit you."

First Rhaena steps forward, reeling back to land a blow to Aemond but he's quicker, pushing her back into the ground.

Everything moves much faster after that, Baela throws a punch and Aemond one back.

Throwing myself in between them it's no use, it's four against one, no one eager to end the fighting except for me.

"Stop! Please!" I beg.

I don't recognize the person Aemond turns into, taking my very own brother by the throat, raising the small boy into the air with a rock in hand.

"You'll die screaming in flames just as your father did! Bastards," he spits at my brothers, forgetting my presence completely but his words still hit me square in the chest.

Ser Harwin Strong may have been Jace and Luke's blood related father but even speaking of such a thing would be an act of treason against the heir, my mother herself.

Is that what Aemond truly thought of me? Just another bastard of the Princess Rhaenyra?

"My father's still alive!" Luke cries out, still innocently ignorant to whom his true father was.

Aemond seems entertained by the fighting, a smirk growing on his lips as he looks to Jace.

"He doesn't know does he? Lord Strong,"

Baela, Rhaena and I cower in the corner, holding onto one another in fear of what will happen next but nothing prepares us for the knife Jace pulls from his side.

"Jace!" Baela calls out to him, pleading with my little brother to stop this madness.

Aemond only sees this as a challenge, raising the rock higher to threaten Luke.

"Aemond! Put my brother down! Now!" My desperate voice reaches him in the gallows of his crazed mind and he hesitates, his purple eyes gazing into mine with instant regret.

Jace and Luke take the free moment to disarm Aemond, throwing dirt in his face blinding him but he fights back, beating Jace into the ground.

I go to to stop him but I'm too late, Luke slices the blade through Aemond's eye, blood pouring through his fingers, around his hand pressed against the wound that would surely blind him.

He cries out in agony and I go to him cradling his face, desperate to help.

"Sister leave him be! What are you doing?!" Jace calls out, betrayal etched on his blood stained face.

"Seize this at once! Get away!" The knights from the kingsguard are fast but they weren't quick enough. 

Doing as I'm told I fall backwards away from Aemond out of fear, my hands and feet trembling from shock of what had just happened. 

They wanted to kill one another, our own flesh and blood... we were family.

The knights usher us to the throne room and I don't have any air in my lungs to mutter a single word. Keeping my fingers locked with Baela and Raena's we keep tightly knit, afraid of all the glances from the nameless faces in the crowd we'd drawn. 

Grandsire Viserys was busied with Ser Criston and Ser Harrold, shouting for answers he couldn't seem to find fast enough. 

Queen Alicent, Halaena and Aegon stood by their brother as the maesters tended to his wound. Aemond made little noise and only flinched when he could not bear the pain.

Bursting through the doors Princess Rhaenys and Lord Corlys have surrounded us protectively, already sensing the unease of the throne room.

Thankfully it isn't long after that my mother and Uncle Daemon appear in the doorway, rushing to us in aid. All three of us cling to our mother as she asses the wounds eager to find the culprit of my brothers bloodied faces. 

"Who did this!?" My mother demands.

"They attacked me!" Aemond sounds off.

"He attacked Baela!" Jace fires back and now everyone has chimed in, shouting into the crowded room eager to be heard.

"That's enough! Aemond, I will have the truth of what happened-" Grandsire Viserys leans onto his cane, making sure to get direct eye contact.

"What is there to hear? Prince Lucerys brought a blade brought to the ambush meant to kill my son!" Alicent shouts, a mother's rage bubbling to the surface for all to see.

"It was my sons who were attacked and were forced to defend themselves! Vile insults... were levied against them." My mother shouts back, defending her children just as fiercely.

Standing behind my brothers I hope to hear no more of this. I should've stayed in my chambers maybe none of this would've happened .

Viserys takes a timid step towards us when he realizes just what insults came from the mouth of the young prince. 

"He called us bastards." Jace admits, his eyes going to the floor but my eyes were locked on Aemond who looked even prouder by the moment.

"Tell me boy, where did you hear this lie-" Aemond's eye darts to his mother Queen Alicent, but at the very last moment he changes his mind.

"It was Aegon." 

"And YOU? Tell me the truth of it!" 

"Everyone knows father. Just look at them. Look at all three of them." Aegon nods towards us and my blood boils. 

Were we just the scum on the bottom of their boots? Did Aemond not care for me at all? 

"This fighting must cease! We are a family! Now make your apologies and show good will towards each other. Your father, your grandsire, your King demands it!" He shouts, his commands echoing through the throne room daring anyone to speak another word and she does.

"Aemond has been damaged permanently. Goodwill cannot make him whole my King, there is a debt to be paid... I shall have one of her son's eyes in return."

Luke shrieks in terror, holding onto to my mother looking for any sign of this madness stopping.

"You will do no such thing!" 

"Alicent this matter is finished. Do you understand?" Viserys takes one last longing look at his deranged wife and begins to walk away.

"And let it be known, if anyone's tongue is to question the legitimacy of Princess Rhaenyra's children, they shall have it removed." Turning to leave for the last time, Alicent moves more swiftly than Viserys possibly could and unseeths a dagger from his person.

In just a few paces she reaches us but my mother is faster, grabbing her arms stopping her where she stood. And just like earlier chaos erupts again, Ser Criston weaving through the crowd but Uncle Daemon slams his body into his intercepting anyone else who might threaten us.

"You've gone too far!" 

"I?  Forever upholding the kingdom, the family the law, while you flout all to do as you please. Where is duty where is sacrifice? It's trampled under your pretty foot again. And now you take my sons eye to even that you feel entitled." The Queen hisses like the green snake she was.

"Exhausting wasn't it? Hiding behind the cloak of your own righteousness? But now they see you as you are."

Alicent narrows her eyes, yanking away from the Princess but in turn slicing into my mother's arm.

Blood trickled down onto the stone below, everyone too stunned to speak that the Queen would violently assault her kin, the Princess and heir for that matter. 

Our family moves in tightly knit, and if Uncle Daemon himself could breathe fire he would.

"Do not mourn me, Mother. It was a fair exchange. I may have lost an eye, but I gained a dragon." Aemond breaks the silence, standing by his mother's side and I stood by mine.

And I hope it had been worth it, my prince.

***