𝓔𝓵𝓪𝓮𝓷𝓪 𝓣𝓪𝓻𝓰𝓪𝓻𝔂𝓮𝓷
A day without Aemond was a dull one, void of secret hallway kisses and laughter that could keep us up until dawn.

With the evening came a terrible storm, going on for hours it seemed until finally this morning the sun peeked through the clouds as if in apology for the thrashing winds and waves from the night before.

As my dutiful husband had wished I'd spent the entirety of the day with Jaehaeryn soaring the skies. Soon I'd be much too large and fragile to ride Seasmoke, so now I would spend what time I could on dragon back.

"Faster! Faster!" Jaehaeryn calls out to me, already a natural at dragon back much earlier than I'd expect considering his youth in the Streets of Silk.

When I tell Aemond he'll be so proud of our fearless dragon and hopefully return soon enough to hear it.

Seasmoke stretches his wings, and the sunset shimmers off his silver scales turning him the deep warm orange of the falling sun.

Circling us back around the castle we land gracefully on the hill, bare of almost all dragons that usually kept Seasmoke company.

Walking hand and hand with Jaehaeryn we're met by Prince Rhaenys who wore a sovereign expression, her lips turned down in a frown and though my stomach drops I feign a smile.

"Grandmother-"

"Your mother and father wish to see you. There's been... news from Stroms End." Her eyes avoid mine and that's all I need to know the news is bad, terrible even.

My knees buckle and my grip on Jaehaeryn's hand tightens. It's the only thing that keeps me standing and my composure intact.

Unshed tears blur my vision but I blink them away hurriedly.

"Right," Clearing my throat I offer a curt nod to Jaehaeryn's handmaidens and kneel to say goodbye for now.

I do my damndest to fake a happy face but our little dragon is wiser than I've given him credit for.

Cradling his small face I take a page out of Aemond's book, doing my best to reassure him.

"Go get cleaned up little one, and I'll be back to read you to bed. This time I'll let you choose the story hm?" I promise, bringing a small smile to his face.

"Visenya? Visenya and Vhagar?!" With Aemond's small mention of Vhagar, it was all Jaehaeryn spoke about. I'd already read him a story or two of the great conquest of Westeros but he'd clung to the very idea of riding such a large dragon.

"Of course, whatever you'd like. Have it open to the page,"

Giving him a small kiss on the cheek I follow Princess Rhaenys to what seems to be my fate.

When we enter the grim hall the painted table grows dim with the lit candles beneath and at our entrance my mother and father don't acknowledge me at first deepening the dark pit in my stomach.

Without a word Rhaenys turns on her heels, leaving us the room bare of even any knights or maesters.

"Grandmother said there was news from-"

"News," My father rolls his eyes, scoffing at me for putting it so lightly, and yet my mother keeps her back to me, her gaze lost in the dancing flames of the fireplace.

"Well, then?" I press the matter further but the unease in my stomach bubbles up and the stomach acid burns in my throat.

My mother hangs her head and the tears streaming down her face glisten in the flames but still, I refuse to believe what I know until I hear the words from my father's lips.

Every second of ignorance was a mercy from the pain I was prone to endure.

"There was a battle above Shipbreaker Bay. Arrax... it was only his head that washed ashore."

My little brother was just a child, innocent in every sense of the word and we'd sent him to slaughter...

My father's voice is empty but I feel his gaze shift to me and he does little to hide his anger and disappointment. "There's only one claimed dragon who could've torn apart another in such a way-"

Immediately I know who he suggests must be at fault but I refuse to believe it.

"It couldn't have been, they must be mistaken..." My fingernails dig into my chest and I don't stop, hoping if the pain is physical the emotional heartache wouldn't be my reckoning.

"No, no, no." I shake my head desperately and shut my eyes hoping this was just another one of my nightmares. "Aemond would never. He promised... he promised me." I stutter to myself and my knees give way falling to the stone cold floor.

My prince would wake me soon... wouldn't he? 

This had to be another one of my nightmares that was the only explanation, I begged the gods it was.

"Words and promises mean nothing to those usurper cunts, don't you understand?! Your foolishness is what killed Lucerys! That Hightower should've never been trusted!" From across the room, he yells at me, mourning Lucerys in his own way I suppose but it only crushes me further.

Losing all sense of my body I know I'm crying but I can't tell if I'm breathing, unsure if one can be done without the other.

My mother being a saving grace interjects though her voice is heavy with mourning. "Daemon, it's not her fault. We were all fooled,"

Not bothering to shield his wrath from my mother my father's eyes go wide with anger as he shouts at her, "Not all of us!"

With my father's wrath spreading like wildfire, my mother and I both keep our heads bowed, in no such mood to fight back now especially when he'd been partially right in his rage.

But even when I think this couldn't get worse his voice drops an octave, cracking with sizzling fury, "And even worse... it's his demon seed that grows inside of you."

Once the words pass his lips I freeze in horror.

Instinctively my hands go to my stomach, eager to protect the innocent babe that grew within me. He'd done nothing to deserve this, just like I, already being chastised for his father before he'd even been born.

"How-"

Turning from the fireplace my father marches toward me, "We'd gotten word from Kings Landing the moment he so arrogantly announced it at the small council meeting! Did you think you'd been hiding it well this whole time?"

My tongue suddenly swells in my mouth, the rug being pulled out from under me and I can't find the words.

"This- this has nothing to do with Lucerys," I seethed through gritted teeth only capable of focusing on one heartbreak at a time.

My father may have had his previous grievances but now was not the time to pile it all on me.

"This has everything to do with him!" He shouts.

"Enough!" The Queen's command is law, the only one who could possibly bring a stop to my father's tirade and I can breathe for only a moment.

"There's not enough time, we have to annul this sham marriage and marry her to the Stark lord just as I'd intended from the START-"

At his words, I feel each of them like a blow to the stomach and I think I might vomit when my mother intervenes, her voice commanding and unquestioning. "I said, enough."

My father's face contorts as he bites his tongue, a slew of insults bottled up behind his gritted teeth.

Stepping in front of me, my mother acts as a barrier between my father and me. Without turning to look at me her words are definite, "To your quarters, Elaena." 

For one of the only times in my life, I do as I'm told, and when I find my bed I stay there hidden from the world for as long as I can manage.

That night I couldn't face Jaehaeryn let alone read him to bed about the mighty Vhagar who had torn my baby brother to shreds.

Heartbroken wasn't the word, truly there wasn't one word to summarize what I felt. I was feeling it all at once and every emotion canceled the other out leaving me numb and overwhelmed.

Grief was never-ending.

Guilt overflowing. 

Betrayal in every sense of the word.

And most of all the hallowed out emptiness that came with losing all you've ever known in a split second.

I carried his child, our child and they'd known all this time.

Could it be that my mother had put this trust in Aemond because she'd known?

And yet there was no one to blame but myself. I'd trusted wholeheartedly from the very start, loved until it was all-consuming but I'd been wrong... I'd been so very wrong.

All I had left would blame me for all my life for my little brother's death and I couldn't fault them for it, I would blame myself too.

I'd been foolish, and reckless in my desire for Aemond and it cost me everything. He made promises he couldn't keep and I'd believed them, putting my very own flesh and blood on the line.

What if there was some explanation? There had to be, why would he kill Lucerys? He'd just kneeled swearing loyalty to my mother, swearing on the faith of the seven.

"I'm stronger, I'm quicker, I'm smarter."

"I promise you, Elaena" 

His words echoed in my mind again and again.

Could all of it have been some ploy just as my father suggested? No...

No, it was real, I had to keep telling myself that or I would lose the last bit of sanity I'd had left, going through every moment we'd shared just as when I'd learned of Jaehaeryn...

However, Aemond has been more than capable of lying to me in the past how would now be any different?

What if he did have an affair with Tessa? Was that truly why he killed her? To get rid of her?

Wrapping my arms around my knees I cradle myself back and forth, the sobs wracking through my body as it all becomes too much but his scent surrounds me lingering in our sheets.

His musk of leather and burning firewood once brought comfort, but now it was fleeting and I clung to it in search of that familiar feeling but it's gone, tainted.

"You will never lose me,"

"Get out, get out! GET OUT OF MY HEAD!" I cry out jumping off the bed to bring damage to whatever I can get my hands on. The sheets smelled of him, the pillows even my many garments that lay beside his in our dresser drawers.

Throwing vases, books, and furniture nothing was safe in my tirade but nothing brought relief. It only made things worse fueling the fire from within until I placed my hand over my heart, reminding me of the very thing that hung around my neck connecting Aemond and me from the beginning.

My necklace.

I hesitate for a moment but only a moment before yanking it free from my neck snapping the clasp and letting it fall to the floor.

Watching myself in the reflection of the black sapphires that held so much promise I slam my eyes shut in an attempt to stop the tears but they persist, falling freely and I can hardly gather a breath.

Through strangled coughs, I curl my fingers around the tarnished symbol of our love. I use all my strength to throw it at the stone wall, shattering its jewels into smaller pieces across the floor, and I collapse to the floor succumbing to my grief surrounded by the mess I'd made.

I cry myself to sleep for a night, or maybe more after we hear the news, and truth be told the days blur together, any sense of time lost from me.

With the curtains drawn and the doors locked I mourned alone, wrapped in the safety of my bedsheets with no care of the world outside my chambers.

I couldn't face the daylight or the people who stood on the other side.

The Savior of the Stepstones they'd called me, but now? They'd call me the Realms Disappointment, the Realms Fool... and they'd be right.

Sometime after the sun falls behind the shade of my curtains there's a knock at my door. As I've been doing I ignore it, only pulling the comforter tighter around my body.

From outside the door, I can hear someone calling my name but I ignore that too... that is until the voice is suddenly beside my bed and I can't ignore them any longer.

Flinching away from the familiar voice of my mother I sit up straight in an attempt to redeem myself from ignoring her.

"Mother, I'm sorry I didn't realize,"

Shaking her head she sits next to me on the bed.

"It's alright, come," despite my mother's bloodshot eyes and tear-stained cheeks it was still my aid she came to.

I had shut everyone out for days, mourning selfishly because I couldn't bare to look them in the eye but I wasn't the only one who'd sent Lucerys to his death.

Our pain had been so deep even our dragons cried out in heartbreak. Syrax kept to herself in the depths of the caves and Seamoke who much like me, sat amongst the hills still watching the skies for Aemond and Vhagar hoping he'd have some kind of miraculous explanation... but it never came.

As she tightens her hold around me I realize I'll never feel Aemond's consoling embrace again, instead, I expect I'll keep to myself forever more.

"You must eat child, it's been days, Elaena." She whispers into my ratty hair.

As odd as it was, my mother echoed Aemond's past commands and now I wondered if his protectiveness had only stemmed from control. Control over me, control over our child, and every scenario that surrounded us.

I was a wild card, the heir to the Iron Throne and he'd claimed me for himself.

Pulling back to look at my mother, the Queen, if no one knew of our struggles they'd hardly know the difference despite her bloodshot eyes. "How is it that you press on? Grandsire, Visenya, and now..." My mouth goes dry and I can't even say his name, glancing away but I continue, "You could disown me, disinherit me and it would all be warranted,"

"Hush, I'd do no such thing." My mother furrows her eyebrows in concern, looking me over again, and what she see's only saddens her.

"I will not lose another child. The gods have warned me in more ways than one and I'd be a fool to ignore it." Her lips tip up into a sad smile and she doesn't have to be specific for me to understand.

"Just as the gods take away, they give us small blessings in return and the child in your belly is destined for great things, just like their mother." Brushing the stray hairs from my eyes a lone tear streaks down her face.

"There won't be a moment we don't mourn the ones we've lost, but time doesn't stop Elaena, not for anyone or anything and there are still ones we care about to protect from the very demons that nip at our heels."

My mother didn't have the choice to lock herself away in her chambers, she didn't have any time to grieve. There were plans to make, and people we had to avenge, and falling apart wasn't how we would accomplish it.

Jaehaeryn wouldn't understand why I'd disappeared for almost a week at a time and he like Aelyx deserved a strong mother. I would not abandon them or anyone for Aemond's actions.

"My husband, the father of my child is the kinslayer... even if there was some explanation how could we ever move on? I'd look at him and all I'd see is-"  stopping mid-sentence I stare off into the never-ending darkness losing myself in it.

I may have made a mistake... many, many mistakes but it was quite clear now we were in the midst of a war and each step forward would be done with Lucerys memory in mind.

"The marriage can be annulled at your request. Though if your father had it his way he'd kill my brother before we'd even have a chance." My mother scoffs at my impulsive father, and our violet eyes lock as I muster a chuckle.

"If anyone kills my husband it'll be me," I reply, rolling my eyes.

The words burn on my tongue, the venom that I spit unfamiliar to me but the anger is a pain more bearable than the heartbreak and through it all I still claimed him as mine instinctively. 

If I were to keep myself afloat, the rage stemming from this betrayal is what I would cling to. I would protect what I had left with the fiercest fire inside of me and though Aemond had ripped away my heart, he'd taught me unknowingly how to use that pain accordingly, pointing it at those who deserved it most.

"Before the sun rises I'll have packed and be en route to Winterfell. Word will have reached Jace by now. He shouldn't mourn alone." 

My mother blinks at me, and at first, she frowns confused by my need to leave so hastily but understanding washes over her face.

When my mother lost Ser Harwin, Dragonstone had been her sanctuary, her escape from Kings Landing when all that place had to offer was stale and heartbroken memories just as home did for me now.

Bringing me in for a hug my mother holds me for a few lingering moments, "It's a long journey. Are you certain, zaldrītsos?"
*little dragon

Offering her a small reassuring smile, I nod. At least in Winterfell, I would be of use, assuring the North's support when it came time to avenge Lucerys whether that be by peace or by blood.

Keeping my word to my mother I'm prepped for my journey by dawn. I thrived at night moving in silence and secret to keep the word of my movements as limited as possible, not sparing any possible threat from inside or outside the walls.

As if my guilt regarding my little brother hadn't been enough, telling Jaehaeryn goodbye for a short time was harder than I'd anticipated. We'd be very much attached to the hip from the very moment I'd learned of his existence despite his beginnings. 

Unlike my husband, I would keep my promise and return soon with the support to stop this bloodshed once and for all. I'd wasted enough time but I would make up for it, just as I'd make up for everything else.

Approaching Seasoke in the cold morning air he turns his head in question. 

"Just you and I, my friend," I assure him, running my palm down his cold scaled body. Seasmoke knew much like me that when Aemond and I traveled separately only trouble would come of it and it had. 

I frown to myself but Seasmoke turns his head to me nudging me with his snout. 

Managing a smile he makes a sound almost like a whine, pressing his head into my stomach to surround me with his wings.

"nyke mirre isse aōha gēlȳn, ñuha raqiros." 
*I'm ever in your debt, my friend.

I smile and the happiness feels foreign, but the burn in the back of my throat was all too familiar.

Wiping away my tears I climb atop Seasmoke with my gear in tow I don't look back, I only look north for hope, for revenge, and if the gods allowed... a new beginning.

***