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Chapter Text

The common girl is barely old enough to be out of her parent’s house, Viserys thinks darkly, but she charges into the room like she was born to the highest of nobility. The steward is hot on her heels, hand outstretched like the girl has just wiggled out of his grasp, face red from what has evidently been quite a chase.

“A thousand apologies, your Grace, I promise the slut will be beaten within an inch of her life,” the man wheezes, but the girl takes no notice of him, plain dress and apron marking her as a maid of some degree, although her gaze is sharp as a thorn. She is staring at Aemma (screaming and terrified), at the array of instruments laid out, the many hands holding his wife down, and at Grandmaester Mellos who holds a scalpel outstretched above Aemma’s bare belly.

“You’re going to kill her doing that!” she shrieks, and faster than Viserys can track, goes for the maester’s tool, a small leather bag swinging wildly from her shoulder. The steward catches her mid-swing, gripping her arms far too tight, even as the girl is still bellowing.

“Your Grace, please! I’m a midwife, I can help her!” she entreats, and Viserys, who is so completely exhausted and heartsick that he can barely stand to breathe, receives one of his brief, infrequent flashes of the future. Usually he is asleep when the visions come, but this one slams into him like the lances are down below on the tourney field. Aemma, dead, and the child, dead, and his realm rotting around him like the carapace of the mutilated body he is trapped in –

He comes back to himself with a jolt. “Let her in,” he hears his own voice say, and as the girl shakes off the steward with a foul look in the man’s direction, all he can do is watch as the girl approaches the bed, eyes assessing the scene before her, and evidently not liking it much.

“Let her arms and legs go,” she directs, and when the servants look at Viserys, he nods.

“Do as she says,” he rasps, and Aemma is allowed to sink back onto the sheets, still whimpering and terrified, even as the milk of the poppy dulls her wits. The sight of her takes every iota of Viserys’ attention, until raised voices bring him back. Of all things, the girl is scolding the maester.

“Why is she on her back?” she snaps at him. “Have you kept her like that the whole time? Everyone knows it’s the worst position for a woman to try to give birth in –” The maester draws himself up haughtily.

“It may be fit for a harlot among the smallfolk to push out yet another bastard on her hands and knees like a beast in the field,” he informs the girl, who crosses her arms over her chest, clearly unimpressed. “But this is a queen, giving birth to a prince. The appropriate decorum must be observed.” The girl turns to Viserys, and the look she gives him could strip the paint off a shield. He’s not being looked at like he’s a king. The girl is glaring at him like he’s just a man, and an idiotic one at that.

“Do you want etiquette, or do you want your wife to live?” she demands. Viserys is too astounded to reply; the girl clicks her tongue like she’s urging on a reluctant goat. “Well? Which is it?”

“Live! Of course, live!” Viserys manages to stammer out, which seems to earn him the tiny woman’s approval; she stops scowling at him, at least.

“Good! Now you, in the red. Fetch smelling salts and cold water to wake her the hells up. You two there. Hot water, clean linen, and for the Mother’s sake, open that damn window!”

The birthing chamber is transformed, rapidly. Viserys is shunted off to the side while the girl unpacks her little bag, laying out various objects and phials Viserys can’t even begin to guess the use of, grumbling to herself. “Woman can’t push if she’s drugged half out of her mind,” she mutters, and turns back to the bed, flinging the requested jug of cold water directly onto Aemma.

Viserys’ wife wakes up howling.

“None of that, love,” the midwife says firmly, and hands her the smelling salts. “Put this under your nose. Time to get this baby out your belly.”

Aemma looks wrecked, even as she waves the salts under her nose and grimaces at the odour. “I can’t,” she murmurs, so pale she nearly blends into the linens. “I’ve been trying. For days.” The midwife kneels beside her, tilts her chin so that their eyes can meet.

“I know,” she replies. “You’re not open enough yet. I need you to drink this.” She holds up a vial, which shines dully in the light, the liquid within viscous and sloshing. “It will widen the place inside of you where your womb opens to let the baby descend.”

Viserys bites his tongue, hard. It could be anything jostling around in that tiny glass bottle; poison springs to mind at once. But his wife is silent; Aemma is staring at the vial, transfixed, something like hope dawning in her dull and weary eyes. “I don’t even know who you are,” she says finally. The midwife sighs and quickly grabs Aemma’s limp hand, grasping it and shaking it briskly in the manner that the smallfolk sometimes do.

“Elaena Rivers,” she replies. “I work in your kitchens. But my ma was a midwife, and her mother too. She taught me enough about birthing. When they said you were dying up here, my queen –” The girl bites her lip. “No woman deserves it. I had to come, even if they flogged me ‘til I breathed my last.”

Aemma blinks, then seizes the vial and drains it in a gulp. A moment later, she coughs violently, eyes streaming. “Gods, that’s foul,” she rasps. Elaena grins, sharp and savage.

“Never said it would be pleasant. Now, I’m going to need to feel inside of you. That maester of yours says the babe’s coming breech, but there’s different ways for that, so I need to check. Open your legs please, your Grace.”

“Aemma,” says Viserys’ wife, her eyes huge in her pale face. “That’s – my name.” the girl looks briefly dumbfounded, before recovering.

“All right then, Aemma. Let’s get on with this.”

The sight of a hand disappearing into his wife’s womanhood is one Viserys never expected to see from this angle, Aemma’s legs spread open as the midwife feels around inside of her. “How bad is it?” Viserys enquires anxiously. The girl looks up at him.

“Go to your wife’s side,” she says, and Viserys does as instructed, clasping Aemma’s hand as his wife utters a weak groan of pain at another pang. She continues her work for another few moments. “Not as bad as expected,” she reports, and Aemma groans when the midwife removes her hand, going over to the basin of hot water to scour her hands with strong soap. “Footling breech. Your little one is coming out feet first.”

Aemma sobs aloud. “I can’t do this anymore,” she wails, her hand in Viserys’ slackening. “I’ve changed my mind. I don’t want it.” The midwife’s mouth twists, as though she’s heard this a thousand times before. She returns to the bed and kneels down beside it.

“I know you’re tired,” she soothes, holding Aemma’s other hand in her own. “But it’s not much longer now. I know it’s not very dignified, but you need to get on your hands and knees. You, husband –” The girl appears to have forgotten that the husband in question is also the King of the Seven Kingdoms. “Help her.”

It’s a bloody business, birth. Viserys knew that in the abstract, but it is nothing to being there in the room with it, his wife howling as the birth pangs come closer together and last for longer. But Elaena is unflappable, coaching both Aemma and Viserys himself through the horror of it, with aid from the handful of servants she had evidently decided were not as thoroughly useless as Grandmaester Mellos. Viserys, supporting Aemma’s front, her exhausted head on his shoulder and her screams threatening to permanently deafen his right ear, can’t see what is going on below – doesn’t want to see it, really, but his nerves are in pieces, and it is taking everything he has to keep his voice soothing and encouraging, to be strong for Aemma.

It's hard. “I bloody hate you, Viserys!” she howls at one point, trying to bat at him weakly with one hand. “You are never, ever, ever fucking me again, do you hear me?”

“I hear you, my love,” Viserys replies, only barely managing to keep his voice level even as his face flares hot in the cheeks and ears. He is certain he hears a snicker from the wretched midwife currently trying to deliver his son and keep his wife alive in the process, but Aemma begins screaming again and time collapses, dilates down to just his wife and the bed and the fear – but then, despite those same fears, despite Aemma’s exhaustion and the dire warnings of the Grandmaester –

There is the sound of a baby’s wailing.

Viserys expected the midwife to take the babe away at once, but as Aemma collapses in fatigue on her back on the bloody linen, Elaena merely scoops up the child and puts it straight down on Aemma’s bare breasts (her nightgown discarded hours ago when Elaena deemed it was ‘only getting in the way’, and Aemma too out of her head to protest). Viserys, back on his knees at the bedside, gazes in wonderment at the little scrunched face, the closed eyes, the exquisitely minute fingernails on the baby’s tiny hands.

Elaena is back peering between Aemma’s legs, where the cord attached to the baby’s belly disappears inside of her, although not for long. Aemma groans as the afterbirth leaves her, and as a servant puts the bloody mess into a pot, the midwife shows Viserys how to cut the cord. Only then, as he is alone with his family and the midwife, does he manage to find the words.

“Is it –” His voice cracks, in a most unkinglike fashion, and he bows his head to try to hide the tears pricking at his eyes. The midwife places a pad of linen between Aemma’s legs and draws a sheet up to her waist for her modesty before she replies.

“A boy,” Elaena says absently, like it’s nothing at all, like she’s too busy thinking about what else needs to be done. Viserys nods, eyes never leaving his wife and child.

“And my wife?” he manages. “She will live?”

Elaena raises her head, satisfaction shining in her eyes, and no more words need to be said. Viserys loses it with sheer relief; Aemma stares at him as he bows his head, sobbing without restraint, tears falling onto the linen. He has never broken down before her so.

“They said there was no other way,” he manages, between great, wrenching shudders. “That I could have either the child alive or the both of you dead. I nearly let them…”

There’s a tap on his shoulder. Elaena is there, handing him a scrap of linen to dry his eyes. Viserys laughs wetly. “I suppose you see fathers break down often in the birthing chamber,” he says, dabbing his eyes, even as his gaze falls back to his son, who is now rooting around for Aemma’s nipple like the little beggar had not ten minutes ago still been inside her womb. “Less often a king, perhaps.” Elaena smiles at him, a thin little thing, before gently clapping him on the shoulder.

“At least you didn’t faint,” she says wryly, before hesitating a moment. “Congratulations on the birth of your son.” Viserys nods, but her next words take him completely off guard. “Would you like to summon the guards now, or should I present myself to them to be punished?” Viserys blinks at her, bewildered; Aemma is trying to sit up.

“Punished?” Viserys says, even as Aemma is clutching at his arm, murmuring, “Don’t have her punished, please, husband.” He glances down at his wife. “You saved my wife and my son. Why in the name of the Seven would I have you punished?” Elaena looks away. A veil has fallen. She is no longer at ease.

“I barged into the queen’s chambers without leave,” she says, her voice subdued, eyes downcast. “I spoke to the king of the realm with disrespect, along with his grandmaester and steward. I called her Grace by her name. I am only a lowly scullery maid. The steward has had servants like me whipped for far less.”

Viserys looks down at Aemma, whose eyes are beseeching. He nods, and warmth returns to her expression; she turns her attention to the child – to Baelon, their son. Viserys stands, and Elaena takes a step back like she expects to be struck, but Viserys only picks up her limp hand, brushes a kiss over her knuckles, before stepping back and bowing.

“I think something rather worse than punishment is in order, Lady Rivers,” he says, keeping his expression grim. Elaena flinches, but then the title registers, changing her face from determined and frightened to confused.

“… Lady Rivers?” she echoes. “I don’t understand.” Viserys lets his smile show, his cheeks aching with the stretch of it. He has a son, and his wife is alive, and the dreadful future he’d glimpsed for a moment will now never come to pass.

“Far worse,” he confirms, and glances back at Aemma, who is radiant with happiness, and Baelon, already suckling at her breast. “My lady. I think we just might insist for you to stay.”

Chapter Text

It is perhaps stupid, impulsive and thoughtless to immediately ennoble a scullery maid after the birth of his son, but Viserys is flying too high on happiness to care. Otto says as much when he hears the news, in carefully calculated sentences; Lyonel, in contrast, had shook the woman’s hand heartily and called her ‘a greater hero than any ever seen on a battlefield’. Daemon, now formally ousted as Viserys’ heir, had only regarded her with cool, contemptuous curiosity.

Rhaenyra adores her on sight.

“Mother!” Viserys’ daughter damn near flies to Aemma’s side, as much a creature of flight as the dragon she rides, and sinks to her knees beside the bed. Aemma laughs, her face tired and careworn, but all the fear melted away, as though it had never been. Only a day since Baelon’s birth, and it is like the world is new and bright again – at least for Viserys, who feels he has aged ten years in the last week alone.

“Come up here, silly girl, and meet your little brother,” Aemma tells Rhaenyra, who tucks herself carefully against Aemma as her mother carefully puts the baby into her arms.

“He’s tiny,” Rhaenyra whispers in awe. “Mother –” Her eyes search Aemma’s face. “Are you all right?” Aemma leans her head onto Rhaenyra’s shoulder; the girl is almost as tall as her mother already.

“I am now,” she sighs, and Viserys gives into the impulse inside of him; he crosses the room, sits himself on Aemma’s other side on the bed, and puts an arm around the frail woman who has given him so much, and who holds his heart so fearlessly. Aemma smiles up at him.

“You have a son, my king,” she says softly. Viserys, conscious of Rhaenyra’s tiny flinch on his wife’s other side, reaches out with the arm cradling Aemma to rest his hand softly on his daughter’s shoulder.

“And a daughter,” he reminds her – reminds them both. “And you, my love, who have given me them both.”

There’s a knock at the door.

“Come,” Aemma calls, like Viserys is not even here, like he is not someone she ought to defer to in the slightest. He vastly prefers it this way. Elaena Waters enters, bearing a tray laden with steaming cups. She has not yet bothered to divest herself of the rough woollen servant’s clothes, but has changed yesterday’s bloodied dress and apron. Her eyes warm at the domestic tableau before her, although her face remains impassive as she curtsies deeply – too deeply, still as a servant would to her liege, rather than a lady.

Which reminds him. Viserys must speak to Otto. “I must take my leave, my queen,” he says, and kisses Aemma lightly on the forehead, even though he wants nothing more to stay. “Before your midwife presses me into some service.” Elaena shakes her head, although her eyes are still amused.

“I wouldn’t dare, your Grace,” she replies, but Viserys remembers the calm orders she’d given him in the birthing chamber, as though he is any other man in the realm. He leaves Aemma’s chambers, but the voices float down the corridor, echoing in the hall.

“More bone broth, Elaena?” Aemma’s voice is amused. “I fear I will float away on a sea of it.” A disapproving tut.

“You lost a good deal of blood bringing that little scamp into the world, your Grace. It will help to restore it. Is this your daughter? You have the same look. Well met, Princess.”

He turns a corner, and loses whatever reply his daughter might have made. It hardly matters. By suppertime, Rhaenyra, with her usual all or nothing manner, has decided that the midwife had saved her precious mother from certain death, and metes out her affection accordingly.

For now, though, Viserys climbs the stairs to the Tower of the Hand. Perhaps a king should rightly summon his advisers to him rather than go to them himself, but Viserys has never been that kind of king. It chafes at him, sometimes, the restrictions of his existence, the frustration of being deferred to constantly, the weight of Aegon’s dream resting squarely on his shoulders.

Viserys shakes it off, and threads his way through the apartments of the Hand, pausing before Otto’s closed door. He thumps it with his fist three or four times.

“Come in.” Otto sounds vexed at being interrupted, but then, he always does. Viserys smiles to himself and pushes open the door.

Otto is just a hairsbreadth too slow looking up from his ledger, so Viserys fills the doorway and has time to arch an eyebrow at the older man before his Hand registers that it is his king disturbing his work, rather than the page or servant he had supposed. “Your Grace!” Otto flails up to his feet, but he must have been seated for several hours, legs going numb beneath him; his knees almost buckle under him and he grips the edge of his desk as he bows.

“Otto,” Viserys says in lieu of a greeting. “Don’t get up on my account.” The expression that Otto casts him is withering, like Otto would like very much to tell Viserys a thing or two about his levity, but as always, his Hand’s cool façade holds sway.

He does allow himself to say: “You could have summoned me, your Grace,” in reproachful tones. Viserys suppresses his smile. It is always this way; Otto is always surprised and mildly exasperated that a king would bother to seek him out rather than have Otto called for, but Viserys enjoys (perhaps too much) subverting the expectations made of him, among the few people that he can. Otto seems to remember the events of the past twenty-four hours. “Is the queen well? The little prince?” This Viserys can allow himself to smile at. He has a son, and a living wife, and a daughter who will not have to live without a mother. All else is immaterial.

“The queen is much recovered from her labour,” he informs Otto, who sinks into his own chair at Viserys’ gesturing, although not before Viserys has claimed the one in front of Otto’s desk for himself. “And the midwife reports that Baelon has been weakened by the birth, but is getting stronger. The gods have granted me a great gift.” Otto inclines his head.

“Indeed, your Grace,” he replies, and pauses, wetting his lips as he thinks. After all these years together, Viserys can sometimes watch the thoughts collate inside Otto’s incisive mind, and so he waits, and is not disappointed. “This midwife…” Viserys nods for Otto to continue. “Forgive me, your Grace; I do not mean to cast a pall on the happy news of the prince’s safe delivery and her Grace’s recovery. But does it not seem strange to you, the appearance of this woman –” Otto pronounces woman in the same way he might pronounce serpent, or traitor – “At such a crucial moment, when needed the most? It may well be some machination of an enemy to the Crown, to insert one of their own into the Red Keep, to inveigle herself into the doings of the royal family, the better to betray them in the end?”

Viserys leans back in his chair with a sigh. Indeed, Otto has not disappointed, as usual managing to think of the worst possible outcome from the timely intervention of the scullery maid. It is the same with everything, particularly any happenstance that seems a boon on the surface; Otto sees treason and betrayal at every corner, in the shadow of every nook and cranny of the Red Keep, and of the kingdoms beyond. It is precisely what makes him such a good Hand. But it makes him hell to work with, and Viserys, perhaps more liberal minded than most of his Targaryen ancestors, does consider it a mutual service. He is the king, the figurehead, the flashy peacock to Otto’s sober hawk. They play their roles, and they try to keep the Seven Kingdoms from breaking apart.

“As always, a damning assessment of the situation, my Hand,” he replies, having thought on Otto’s words for some time while his Hand waited patiently for a reply. “Which will make my next words a bitter draught for you to swallow, I fear. Aemma has taken to the woman greatly, and wants her to become part of her closest circle of ladies-in-waiting.” Otto’s lined face furrows further into a frown.

“So soon?” he tsks, clearly disapproving. “Your Grace, the queen has endured a terrible disturbance. Perhaps the matter could be readdressed, when her mind is less clouded from the ordeal –” Viserys raises a hand, and Otto falls obediently quiet, although his expression does not change.

“And I agree,” he continues blithely, as if never interrupted. Sometimes with Otto one must simply keep talking, until he comes round to the idea. “I wish to raise Elaena Rivers to the formal rank of Lady, and give her a position within Aemma’s direct household staff, as well as a small living as befitting her rank.” Otto looks like he has been slapped across the face with a wet fish. “A new position, perhaps. I thought the Queen’s Physician might be the most appropriate.”

Oh, but Viserys is a bad man, to relish disturbing Otto so. The man is floundering, in the face of what he clearly deems his monarch’s insanity.

“Your Grace –” Otto splutters in protest, and Viserys makes a low encouraging noise in response. It is a rare thing, to see Otto grasp so for the right words, when he usually always has a prepared response to any question ready, rolling smooth off his tongue. “A midwife is not a maester! She cannot speak to any question of medical care beyond the birthing of children, and even that –” Otto’s tone carries the disapproval many lords have for the healers and cunning men or women of the smallfolk. Hells, Viserys had shared some of it himself, right up until one of them had given him both wife and son alive and hale, when Grand Maester Mellos himself had given up on them.

“Again, Otto, you make a pertinent point,” Viserys allows, and Otto quiets, as though he thinks Viserys will now see sense. “Lady Rivers has raised this concern herself, when I presented the notion to her. Which is why I will be tasking you, my faithful Hand, with the sourcing of the finest healers, cunning folk, and medicine men from Essos and bringing them to our shores for both Lady Rivers and whoever else is interested to study from. Too long has the realm had only one centre for the healing arts, and while no man can stoop to criticise Old Town or the devoted maesters it produces, it seems impractical for the knowledge of the healing arts to be concentrated in so small a number of men.” Viserys ends his long spiel there, knowing that Otto will be ready to contradict it all in a heartbeat.

“And what will you do with this collection of shamans and witch doctors, your Grace?” Otto enquires, right on cue. “Create a school for the study of the flimsy and drivel produced by savages from the far side of the world? Offend our own maesters of the Citadel, who have devoted themselves to the Seven Kingdoms long before anyone of Valyrian blood stepped onto our shores?” Otto’s words are dripping with sarcasm and the very picture of cynicism, but it’s just, that. Well. Viserys hadn’t considered that. A school! What a clever Hand he has.

“Otto, you’re brilliant,” he tells his Hand, who goes a touch greyer when he realises what he has done. “I can think of no greater way to contribute to the future of my realm by establishing such a school for the continued education of my people. Why stop simply with healing? They could teach the histories of Westeros, or the pattern of the stars – the art of warfare, or navigating the tides –” Otto has his ‘sucked on a lemon’ look again. Viserys cuts himself off there. Start small, man, he tells himself. But Viserys is a dreamer. He always has been. “But there will be time enough for that later,” he adds hastily. “For now, we must find the teachers first. I will ensure there is sufficient gold from the coffers to fund this enterprise, and you may recruit whichever support you need, after all –” He regards Otto across the desk. “I don’t expect you yourself to travel all the way to Asshai, my friend. I would be bereft without my Hand.”

What makes Otto such a trusted servant is his iron will, his relentless in his duty, but it also makes Otto as rigid as a great oak, and just as unbending. Viserys knows the other man is faltering when he sighs, draws a hand across his eyes, and murmurs, “Your Grace…” in a tone that is almost pleading. Viserys does feel for him; Otto sounds completely lost. But this is no flight of fancy, no whim of a fickle king, and so Viserys straightens his shoulders, adopts what he privately thinks of as ‘the king posture’, and meets Otto’s eyes with his own.

“Otto Hightower,” he says softly, and Otto tenses a little at the sound of his full name, like he thinks Viserys’ next pronouncement will fall upon him like a blow. “I am your king. And as your king, I want you to join with me to ensure no woman or girl in the Seven Kingdoms – highborn, smallfolk, or anything in between – ever have to fear being cut open like a pig for slaughter, for the sake of simply bearing a child.”

Otto’s expression is resigned. He knows Viserys well enough now that when he goes all regal and stuffy – which he hates doing, and Otto knows it – that Viserys’ mind is made up. “It would be prudent to allow the Citadel to send an archmaester or two to be included in amongst the educators,” he says reluctantly, like bending even this tiniest degree is almost more than he can bear. “I know you disdain the politicking of it all, my king, but perception here will be key. Say not that we are challenging the Citadel’s knowledge, or who they choose to allow that knowledge to be learned by…” This is why Viserys knows Otto is the right man for his Hand. The wheels are turning slowly, but gathering speed. Once Otto is convinced, he throws himself body and soul into his work. Duty should be his second name, Viserys thinks to himself, and smiles. “But that we wish to bring together a great meeting of minds, to honour the young prince’s birth, to ensure the traditions and culture of Westeros proves triumphant over any offering the Essosi can muster…”

Viserys is no longer needed here. Otto is talking to himself now more than he is to Viserys, and while Viserys hates to put a greater burden on his already overburdened Hand, the importance of this endeavour is paramount.

He had meant it, after all. Not one more woman, butchered and bleeding, not if Viserys I Targaryen has anything to say about it. His duty chafes at him at times, but this, at least, is a duty he can embrace with his whole heart.

He must tell Aemma at once.

Chapter Text

“You lost a good deal of blood bringing that little scamp into the world, your Grace,” Elaena says tartly as Aemma accepts the cup with her free hand. “It will help to restore it.” Aemma nods, and sips the steaming broth, which is pleasant enough, albeit in small doses. “Is this your daughter?” Elaena asks, and Aemma nods. “You have the same look. Well met, Princess.”

“Hello,” says Rhaenyra, a touch more shyly than she usually would. Aemma nudges her daughter gently in the elbow.

“Would you take your little brother for me, my love?” she asks. Rhaenyra’s eyes widen, but she accepts Baelon into her arms carefully. Aemma adjusts her daughter’s hold to better support the baby’s head before taking Elaena’s outstretched hand and lifting herself carefully out of bed.

“Mother, should you be getting up?” Rhaenyra asks. Aemma shrugs into the thin over-robe held out to her by the midwife.

“Lady Rivers says it would be best for me to take a turn about the room a few times a day,” she explains wryly to her daughter. “Apparently common women do not lie in as we noble ladies are instructed to. Nor do most bother with a wetnurse.” Elaena tuts, and lends Aemma her arm as they start a slow promenade around Aemma’s chambers.

“Most can’t afford to lie in for four weeks, Princess,” Elaena adds. She is shorter still than Aemma, who herself is not an overly tall woman. Rhaenyra is shaping up to be taller than Aemma, although perhaps not by much. “Husbands to be fed, children to be taken care of. As for the wet-nursing –” Aemma hides a smile. Grand Maester Mellos had attempted to enter Aemma’s chambers, had caught a glimpse of Baelon at her breast, and had proceeded to castigate Elaena for supporting it. Snippets of the midwife’s retort still linger in her ears:

“Don’t you think her body wouldn’t produce it if it wasn’t good for the babe and the mother? It doesn’t matter whether the woman is from the Keep or Flea Bottom, you bloated, close-minded ass. By the Seven! That a man should think himself learned enough to lecture a woman on what’s best for her body –” Mellos had departed hastily, a harried expression on his face, and Viserys, tucked out of sight behind a pillar and out of the grand maester’s view, had struggled to stifle his amusement.

“Grand Maester is very learned, Lady Rivers,” he had commented mildly. Elaena, still unaccustomed to the title, had flinched just a little.

“There is such thing as too many books and not enough practical application, your Grace,” she’d replied, then had checked the pad between Aemma’s legs for bleeding.

Elaena might be small, but she is far sturdier than Aemma feels. She knows she has lost both fat and muscle from this pregnancy, the long months of nausea and vomiting, the terrible discomfort of Baelon growing inside of her. Rhaenyra had not been so difficult to bear, but Aemma was younger then, without the scars of her dead babes and miscarriages on her soul.

“You’re doing well, your Grace,” Elaena murmurs, but at Aemma’s glare, relents, “Fine. You’re doing well, Aemma.” Rhaenyra’s head flies up from where she was gazing into her brother’s tiny face. Aemma is not surprised. She has always been reserved, polite and dutiful as befits a queen, but cool, keeping her own counsel and preferring the company of her blood kin to the chatter and bustle of the court. She has never allowed anyone outside the family, let alone a servant, refer to her by her name.

Speaking of blood kin –

“Is this a private gathering or can anyone join in?” Daemon leans against the open door to Aemma’s bedchamber. Rhaenyra, deeply fond of her uncle and blind to the worst of his faults, beams at the sight of him. Aemma only arches an eyebrow.

“Do you make a habit of wandering into the bedchambers of highborn ladies, cousin?” she enquires. Daemon, with customary arrogance, ignores her comment and simply sweeps over to her, as usual sucking all the air out of the room with his presence. Elaena releases Aemma’s arm when Daemon steps towards them, but Aemma is steady on her own two feet, and anyway Daemon is there, leaning down to kiss her on each cheek, before pressing her fast to his chest.

“Congratulations, my lady,” he murmurs, before releasing her fast and bounding over to the bed. “Princess! A fine little prince your mother has delivered.” Daemon’s eyes are bright, his demeanour warm, and to look at him, no one would suspect he had just been ousted as the official heir of the Seven Kingdoms. But Aemma knows him well, and the darkness in Daemon is never far from the surface; he is too animated, too jovial as he teases Rhaenyra gently and offers a finger to Baelon to grab.

Elaena he treats as if she is not even there. Of course he would, Aemma finds herself thinking with a degree of disgust, although it is less at her cousin and more at the whole bloody system of it, the ranking of importance of some over most simply by dint of who their parents happened to be. “Lady Rivers, Daemon, is the midwife who brought me safely through my labour,” she says pointedly. Elaena, who has taken her place at Aemma’s side again as she guides her back towards the bed, looks as if she wishes the ground would crack open and swallow her whole.

Daemon’s white-blonde eyebrow raises. “Lady Rivers,” he replies, the stress on the second word heavy. “I cannot say I have met many ladies of that house in my time.” His tone implies clearly that he knows that Rivers is the default surname for bastards of the Riverlands. Aemma opens her mouth, but Elaena beats her neatly to it.

“I am no lady, my prince,” she murmurs, eyes to the ground as Aemma settles back onto her pillows. She accepts Baelon back from Rhaenyra, who is watching the exchange with wide, curious eyes. “I serve in the kitchens.” Aemma frowns.

“You served in the kitchens,” she corrects. Elaena seems to shrink further in on herself.

“As you say, your Grace,” she replies, so meek that Aemma barely recognises her as the fiery invader who barged into her birthing chamber and ordered the Grand Maester himself to lay down his blade.

“Lady Rivers was employed in the kitchens, as a scullery maid,” Aemma repeats, for Daemon’s benefit. “Her timely intervention saved both my life and that of my son. Viserys has already stated he intends to raise Elaena to a titled rank, and give her a position amongst my staff.” Aemma expects it, but still, Daemon’s condescending little smirk makes her want to slap him.

“Is he mad?” he asks, incredulous and very much the titled, jaded nobleman as he barks out a cynical little laugh. “Ennoble a scullery maid? I’ve never heard of such an absurd idea. Surely you told him what folly it would be to see it through.” Aemma scowls.

“I support my husband the king in all endeavours,” she replies serenely, queen face firmly on. It is Daemon’s turn to scowl. He hates it when she does that. “Especially in this. Are you saying my life, or the prince’s life, is not worth honouring the one who saved it?” Daemon frowns, more thoughtful now than denigrating.

“Of course not, sister,” he concedes. It is proof that all of this has rattled him. Aemma had heard only this morning from one of her closest ladies that throughout her labour Daemon had fought everyone in the lists who would fight him back, including a sword bout that left him on his back in the dirt, and had then gone down into the city and had drunk himself under a table, staggering back around dawn Daemon can only cope with his feelings with oblivion or with violence – or with fucking, Aemma adds wryly. She is not truly his sister, but she is Viserys’ wife, and to Daemon, apparently, that is practically the same thing.

“We agree, then,” Aemma tells him, before anymore can be said. Elaena has retreated to near the wall, eyes down, hands folded before; the flawless posture of a servant waiting for orders. Aemma will have to train her out of that, when she isn’t so exhausted, not to mention take her to the seamstresses to dress her decently, in accordance with her new station.

Hopefully Viserys has talked Otto around.

“Daemon visited you?” Viserys is taking off his outer garments, hanging them carefully over a nearby chair before sitting down upon it and pulling off his boots. Aemma stares at him. It is well after sunset now, Rhaenyra long sent off to bed and Elaena to whatever apartments the steward has found for her.

“He did,” Aemma agrees slowly. Viserys nods absently.

“And he behaved?” Even in her confusion Aemma can manage a smile at the recollection of her good-brother holding his new little nephew in his muscled arms, much as he had Rhaenyra, more than ten years ago now.

“As much as Daemon can be expected to,” Aemma replies.

“Good.” Viserys stands. He is down to his linen shirt and braies, and he goes over to the basin of fresh water by the window, rinsing the dust of the day from his hands and face. He catches her glance as he dries them off. “What is it?”

Surely Aemma is not wrong in being perplexed. Viserys does not habitually share rooms with her; he has the king’s chambers for all of this, and to sleep. Why is he here?

“Why are you here?” she asks, tactlessly, but too tired to care. Viserys shrugs.

“I intend to sleep here, with you.” Aemma’s stomach turns over in her belly. They have only shared a bed in the past when trying for a child. Surely he doesn’t mean to bed her, only a day after the delivery of their son –

Viserys must read it in her face. “Do you truly think so little of me?” Viserys asks. The lines of his handsome face seem deeper than a week ago, and his expression is desolate. Aemma looks away.

“You would have them carve me up like a side of lamb for supper.” Only now does she allow herself to think on it. Milk of the poppy can dull recollections, but Aemma remembers it perfectly; the hands locking down her wrists and ankles, the shine of the blade as it curved through the air. “You vowed to protect me when you placed your cloak around me. Is that how a man protects his wife, by putting her to the blade?” Even now, anger simmering hot in her veins, Aemma hates to do this to him. Viserys is a soft man, a gentler soul than any other who has sat the Iron Throne before him. If fate was kinder, he would have never been forced to become a king.

“The maester said there was no other way,” Viserys says, but Aemma can tell it rings hollow, even to him. “I’m sorry, my love.”

“I’m sure you are,” Aemma retorts tartly. To her surprise, Viserys drops to one knee, reaching for her hand and brushing his lips over her knuckles – not like a king would do his lady, Aemma realises, her heart thudding hard in her chest. Like a supplicant come before the Mother.

“I’ll sleep on the floor,” Viserys says, his eyes imploring. “In the next room. Anywhere you like, so long as it is close enough to hear you breathing. To hear Baelon breathing –” He casts an anguished glance at the cradle where their son sleeps, although Aemma doubts he will sleep for long. Rhaenyra had slept terribly, and Aemma had often had the wetnurse take her for the night so she could sleep without the cries of a newborn, but that was then. Aemma understands her place in the world better, now. Baelon stays with her.

“Fine,” she clips out. “Sleep on the floor, then.” She tugs her hand free and tosses the closest pillow and blanket she can find, dropping them on the floor unceremoniously. “But don’t blame me when we’re both woken up in an hour and a half by your son wanting to suckle again.” It is more than a woman should be able to bear, Aemma thinks, those adoring eyes. Their match may have been arranged, but Aemma has never had cause to doubt Viserys’ affection. At least, until now.

She gets into bed, and watches the King and Protector of the Seven Kingdoms lie down on the rug beside her bed, fluff up his pillow, and pull the blanket up over him. “You’re serious,” Aemma says blankly as she blows out her last candle. Viserys rolls over so that he is on his back, gazing up at her. How unlike a king he looks from this angle, silver hair mussed and loose, eyes half closed.

“Is a king’s word not his bond?” Aemma sighs, and lays back, eyes on the ceiling, half already into sleep.

“Good night, Viserys,” and if he replies, Aemma is not awake to hear it.

Wailing splits the silence. Aemma blinks awake, bewildered for half a heartbeat before she remembers the baby has come. The issue about not having a wetnurse, she reflects sourly, is that one has to get up directly to pick up one’s screaming infant out of the cradle. Still, needs must, and she prepares to get up to the cradle, but –

“There, there, lad.”

Viserys’ familiar rumble comes out of the shadows. Aemma wishes she could say that it startles her, but she has been his wife too long now, and even half asleep her body recognises the sound of his voice. “What’s the matter, little man?” Viserys asks Baelon. The baby’s cries change as he is picked up and soothed; Aemma can just make out the shape of Viserys in the dark, the practiced way he jiggles Baelon in his arms.

“He wants feeding,” Aemma says. A few moments later, her son is being placed into her arms, and even before Aemma opens the front of her nightgown, Baelon is trying to latch onto her breast. “Greedy,” Aemma admonishes lightly, but there’s no heat in it. Baelon fits his tiny mouth to her nipple and starts to suckle voraciously. It is a strange sensation, and a new one; the grand maester advised Aemma against suckling Rhaenyra, so she never put her girl to her breast. Strange, to miss suckling one child, with the other attached now.

“You look so lovely with a babe in your arms.” Viserys comes back from the next room, having lit a candle and brought it with him. The shadows play tricks with his light hair and eyes, silver-bright, then cast in darkness.

“He feels lovely to hold in my arms,” Aemma asks honestly as he sets the candle down safely on the table beside the bed. Aemma’s eyes narrow at him. “Where did you learn to soothe an infant?” she demands. To her knowledge, he never held Rhaenyra as a baby for longer than a handful of minutes at a time, or their little doomed son either, who died in the cradle.

Viserys shifts on his feet, clearly uncomfortable about something. “Sometimes I would send the wet-nurse away and sleep in the nursery of a night when ‘Nyra was a babe,” he confesses. Aemma’s mouth actually drops open. Of all the absurd, foolish, unkinglike things to do –

The dear man.

“You’re wasted being a king, Viserys.” The words leap from her mouth, and Aemma bites her lip hard, but there is no taking them back. The silence is broken only by Baelon’s soft little satisfied sounds, and their breathing.

“That –” Aemma braces herself. “Do you know, I think that’s the kindest thing anyone has ever said of me.”

All these years of marriage, and he’s still able to surprise her.

“Viserys,” Aemma sighs, and his gaze jolts up to hers from where he’d been watching Baelon feed with an expression of extreme contentment on his face. “Get into bed, husband.”

In the morning, Aemma wakes with her husband’s arm draped over her, warm and contented – and her baby screaming his little silver-haired head off, demanding to be attended to.

It’s such a wonderful thing, to be alive.

Chapter Text

Aemma spends two blissful weeks in her chambers, sequestered away from the bustle of the court, no longer sick and frail but becoming haler every day. Part of her thinks it would be sweet to spend a lifetime in only her quarters, in this place where she has only her name, the titles fallen away and discarded like the fine gowns she is forced to don outside these rooms. But the rest of her clamours to be up and about; her body is stronger now than it has been since before Baelon’s conception, since Elaena’s notions about what a new mother should eat differ vastly from the grand maester’s.

Small portions, Mellos had counselled after Aemma’s last stillbirth. No meat, no poultry. A little bit of bread at supper and nothing more, your Grace. Too much heavy food will burden you.

Elaena had called it madness. “Small portions!” she’d repeated in astonishment. “By the Green Fork, I’ve never heard of such foolishness. Your body has just grown a whole new human being, and now you are nourishing it. You need good, hearty food! I will take care of it.”

Elaena’s time in the kitchens has left her with connections. Aemma’s meals come to her chambers rich, piping hot, and varied – “The servants like you a great deal, your Grace,” Elaena had commented absently once, sewing a sling-like garment for Aemma to carry strapped to her chest, so her arms remain free. “Of course they like his Grace as well, but –” Elaena had shook out her creation triumphantly. “We’re mostly women down in the kitchens, and women ken other women’s plights.”

The creation works successfully. Aemma reappears in court dressed in one of her finest day gowns and with Baelon strapped firmly to her chest.

Viserys sits the Throne, but he has never shied away from Aemma’s occasional desire to hear petitions with him, or sit at his side as he makes judgments. The smaller chair is not made of iron, only humble wood, but there is a thick cushion on it that Aemma is sure Viserys would not mind for his own backside, to protect him from the bitterly sharp edges of the Conqueror’s chair.

She slips into court from one of the side doors at the rear of the Great Hall, waving off the customary obeisance from the courtiers as she settles into her chair. Otto, on Viserys’ other side, offers only a raised eyebrow at the infant attached to her chest.

“I was not expecting you today, my queen,” Viserys comments. His eyes dart to Baelon, softening his face from the ‘king of Westeros’ mask he always wears when sitting the Throne.

“A woman can only spend so long in her quarters before she must see something other than the same four walls, your Grace,” she replies lightly. There is a cough from the assembled courtiers.

“Forgive my impertinence, your Grace –” What would happen if she decided not to forgive said impertinence one of these days, Aemma wonders? “But it is plain to all that you have with you a babe. Is this our new little prince you have there with you?” Jason Lannister should learn to hold his tongue, she reflects; poor Tyland must be ever mortified at his brother’s brazen nature.

“This is Baelon, yes,” Aemma replies, and a hush falls over the court briefly, to be replaced by fervent whispering. Lord Lannister takes a step forward, his eyes gleaming with the prospect of an opportunity to curry favour.

“Then may I be the first to congratulate your Graces on their –”

“You may, Lord Lannister,” Aemma cuts in, splendidly amused by how Lannister’s mouth gapes open like a fish at the interruption, although she doesn’t show it. “When Baelon is presented formally to the court in several weeks’ time. For now, I am here only to support my husband the King.”

Lannister gets the message, and the rest of the court takes his lead. When the day’s business is completed, Viserys rises from his chair, offers Aemma his arm, and they ambulate companionably past the bowing courtiers and throughout the Keep, to Viserys’ chambers.

Otto has beaten them there. He waits outside Viserys’ rooms patiently, bows his head when his monarchs pass, and waits for them to settle into comfortable positions before launching into his spiel.

“That could have been done more gracefully, your Graces.” Despite addressing them both, Otto is only looking at Viserys. Her husband is not so blind.

“Aemma brought the boy into this world, my dear Otto,” Viserys says blithely. “She may decide when she feels it is appropriate to introduce him to court.” Aemma beckons to Otto, and slowly the man comes over, wariness in every inch of his tired face. Aemma plucks Baelon’s tiny hand out of the wrappings and presents it to Otto, who – as though he is handling a cache of wildfire – gently offers the baby a finger to hold.

“Baelon,” she says seriously, “This is Otto, your father’s Hand.” Baelon of course is far too young to note the importance of the man whose finger he is holding, but Otto shows something, for once, other than his customary cool façade; he almost looks charmed.

“It is my honour to make your acquaintance, my prince,” Otto replies gravely, and just for a moment, almost too quickly to see, a tiny smile quirks up the corner of his lips. He smothers it fast, like to merely smile in the presence of a newborn is too much of a weakness for him to be comfortable showing. But Aemma has seen it, and she will not forget.

“To the business of the school you have proposed, your Grace,” Otto says. Viserys waves him into a chair at his side, which Otto accepts, perching in it like a large bird of prey. “We needs must discuss who to send to Essos as our envoy.” Viserys frowns.

“I gave you leave to choose whoever you thought best,” he tells his Hand. “Did I not?” Otto bows his head.

“You did indeed, your Grace.” Aemma, now ignored by both men, scoops up her embroidery hoop and begins to stitch, the very image of ladylike behaviour. Aside from a brief glance at the movement, neither man comments. “But a task of this magnitude can be given to no mere courtier.” Viserys, now intrigued, gestures for Otto to continue. “It must be someone of considerably high rank,” Otto continues. “Someone loyal, and dutiful, who is able to display the necessary humility as well as put on a show of the Iron Throne’s might and superiority.”  Viserys frowns.

“What did you have in mind?” But Aemma sees it.

“You should send a dragon rider.” Both men turn to look at her, as though they have forgotten she was present at all. It had taken all of a minute, or less. Aemma raises an eyebrow at her husband, who has the decency to look slightly abashed. “A woman embroidering still has ears, your Grace, my lord Hand,” she reminds them. “But to return to the conversation at hand; a dragon rider. That was what you had in mind, was it not, Otto?”

Otto does so dislike being pre-empted. “Her Grace is correct,” he supplies reluctantly. “Preferably one of our largest and most impressive dragons.” Viserys frowns.

“Vhagar is currently riderless, and located in parts unknown,” he points out. “The princess Rhaenys has Meleys, who is not inconsiderable in size –” Otto is already shaking his head.

“There is no clear solution to this case, your Grace. The princess Rhaenys may be of Targaryen blood, but the Essosi will not see her as a viable emissary for your Grace.” Otto would be squirming, if he wasn’t so practiced in his duty.

“Because she’s a woman,” Aemma finishes for him. The glance he throws in her direction could almost be called grateful. “Otto is right, Viserys. There is only one viable choice.”

Otto is frowning. “I have studied our options carefully, your Grace, and none have presented them to me as a solution –” Aemma interrupts him. Interrupting men while they’re speaking is one of the few enjoyable perks of her station; the gods know there are few others to be counted.

“You should send Daemon, your Grace.” Otto is no longer grateful. Otto, under his placid court mask, is seething.

“Daemon,” he hisses, disdain dripping from the syllables like poison. “Forgive me, your Grace, but the prince cannot be counted on to accomplish a mission which requires such diplomacy, perseverance, and tact. He would offend even a merchant in Pentos with his uncouth ways, let alone a godswife of Asshai or a Dothraki warlord in the Great Grass Sea.” Aemma folds her hands over her belly, under the warm mass of Baelon resting peacefully against her breast. She is still thick around the middle from bearing her son; memory tells her she will remain so for some time. She may even miss it, when it is gone, now that the infant inside her belly has made his appearance.

“Daemon is capable of more than you suppose, Otto,” she replies calmly. “But you are correct. He would not manage alone.” Aemma pauses. “But Caraxes is capable of bearing two, and Daemon is experienced enough dragon-rider to keep his mount from eating his companion.” Viserys is nodding. He sees the shape of her plan, even if Otto is still in the dark.

“And Lady Rivers is certainly enough of a stabilising influence to keep Daemon from accomplishing too much trouble,” he reasons. “But will she go?” Otto is for the moment speechless. Aemma really shouldn’t enjoy it as much as she does.

“She will if I ask it of her,” Aemma replies. “The missives will no doubt not be ready for at least another moon. That is sufficient time to allow Caraxes to become accustomed to her, as well as to instruct her on the basics of Essosi culture. Daemon speaks both High Valyrian and much of the trade language of Essosi’s merchant classes, from his travels. Interpreters may do the rest.”

Otto is still struggling with these revelations. Aemma would feel guilty about distressing him so, except she knows full well that if it had been Otto’s decision to cut her open to free Baelon from her belly, he would have not hesitated to give the order in the slightest. It tempers her sympathy for the man. “Maesters study the histories their whole lives, and still learn only a fraction of what there is to know about the languages and cultures of Essos. You cannot think –” Otto’s voice cracks; he clears his throat hastily, ignoring the goblet Viserys pushes in his direction. “That Daemon and a common woman can manage a task of this magnitude –”

“Send messengers by the usual methods, then,” Aemma says sharply. She does not like Elaena being disparaged. Aemma owes Elaena at least two lives, her own and Baelon’s, and perhaps Viserys’ also, since she is certain he would have not fared well with her loss. “Elaena and Daemon need only broach the way, to inform the recipients that formal envoys are coming. They may introduce only the most preliminary of offers. Their power will be limited.”

Otto has calmed slightly. The muscle in his jaw is no longer throbbing quite as intensely. “You are forgetting one thing, your Grace,” he says, with only the barest thread of courtesy to his words; Viserys frowns at his tone, but Aemma shakes her head at him slightly. “Daemon will never consent to undertaking such a task. His selfishness and indolence will not allow him to perform such a service to the Crown. He would scorn the very notion of doing so.” Aemma smiles, and it only furthers Otto’s disquiet.

“Well, perhaps you shouldn’t be the one to ask him,” she replies placidly.

“Fly to Essos? Hand out a few scraps of parchment? This sounds more like a holiday than an inconvenience, cousin.” Daemon never stands on courtesy around her. Aemma is sitting in the easy chair Elaena has found her, a shawl draped over her chest modestly as Baelon suckles voraciously at her nipple. Daemon wouldn’t give a damn if he could see her breasts (both he and Viserys are still extremely Valyrian in their principles, for all their line has sat the Iron Throne for a century) but it wouldn’t do to scandalise any of the servants who might enter at any time. Although since Daemon has chosen to sprawl on Aemma’s bed while they talk, the scandal ship may have already set sail.

“It is important, vitally so,” Aemma tells him. From this angle, in just woollen trousers and a light linen shirt, armed only with the knife she knows he always keeps in his boot, Daemon looks remarkably young and innocent – particularly in contrast to his brother. Viserys is only four years older than Daemon, but his reign has added lines and creases to his face long before his time. “Viserys would be grateful beyond words.”

Daemon scowls. The unspoken truth between Aemma and her cousin/good brother is that Daemon desires desperately to please and impress Viserys, almost as much as he rails against the confines that nobility places on their lives. This is the closest Aemma has ever come to addressing it. “I wouldn’t do it for him,” he sniffs, with both of them equally aware that Daemon would do almost anything if Viserys required it of him, as long as it was not Viserys himself asking. Aemma smiles to herself, hiding her fondness for Daemon’s contrary nature behind a glance down at her son, as though merely amused by the child now attempting to drain her right breast dry.

“If you deem it so necessary, cousin, I will deliver your messages,” Daemon says after some time, when Baelon is almost finished feeding. Aemma smiles.

“I am delighted,” she tells him earnestly, which only serves to make Daemon look away, since any praise or positive reinforcement of his good behaviours aways makes him queerly uncomfortable. “I will inform his Grace, the Hand and Lady Rivers at once.” Daemon sits up, his gaze suddenly sharp.

“What has the midwife to do with it?” he asks, and must see the answer writ across Aemma’s face, because he stands at once and begins to pace. “No. Oh, no. I’m not taking her with me. Caraxes loathes having a second rider on him –”

“I thought you rode Caraxes, not the other way around,” Aemma puts in mildly. For that, she gets a very nasty look thrown in her general direction.

“You may call the woman the second coming of the Mother herself if it so pleases you, but it doesn’t change the facts. Aemma, the woman is as common as mud. All this talk of ennobling her is absurd in the extreme –”

“I did agree with them on that,” Elaena says from the open doorway. Daemon clamps his mouth shut, expression indicating that he’s currently feeling a sensation rather akin to being hit hard on the head with a large rock. “But your kin are a stubborn lot, my prince. They have insisted, and his Grace himself elevated me in rank but only yesterday. So I am afraid that ship has departed.”

Daemon finds his voice. “They want me, to take you –” He points at Elaena like she needs the gesture to understand the gravity of what he is announcing – “To Essos with me, to deliver invitations for this hells-sent school they’re planning –” Elaena nods, and does not seem remotely perturbed, which only serves to increase Daemon’s ire.

“Her Grace has ordered me to do so, and I will carry out her will to the fullest of my ability,” she replies serenely. She had been afraid of Daemon before, Aemma recalls suddenly, and realises that Elaena is still very wary of him. Why? His reputation, perhaps. He is known as the Rogue Prince, after all.

Daemon advances towards Elaena threateningly, and Aemma almost intervenes. But Elaena must learn to stand up to Daemon if they are to travel together, as well as to learn that Daemon’s bark is nearly always worse than his bite. All bluster and air is her cousin, but easily managed once one is aware of his true nature.

From Elaena’s narrowed eyes, she is starting to gain an inkling. “You will have to meet Caraxes at once,” Daemon pronounces, his handsome face drawn tight into a sneer. “Tell me, midwife. Have you ever flown on a dragon before?” Aemma senses more than sees Elaena’s stubborn nature kick in. Good, Aemma thinks. Don’t allow the little princeling to cowl you, my friend.

“Oh, many times indeed,” Elaena retorts blithely. Daemon, looming over her, rears back an inch, startled by the reply. “I’m sure your Caraxes is up to the challenge, my prince.” Elaena leans forward, rising up on the tips of her toes, until her nose is only a few scant inches away from Daemon’s. “My question is, are you?”

Aemma smirks as she drapes the shawl over her shoulder and sets to patting Baelon’s back to bring up his wind. Daemon, glaring into the eyes of the much smaller woman glaring back as equally as fiercely, does not even notice.

Oh, yes, Aemma thinks. They will do well enough indeed.

Chapter Text

Rhaenyra enters her mother’s chambers to find a flurry of activity. She stands near the door at first, eyeing the scene. Aemma, for all that Baelon has only been born for a scant seven days, is in fine form; Rhaenyra’s mother is ordering the servants about like she wasn’t a scant inch from the Stranger’s embrace only hours ago. One hundred and seventy-one hours, but it’s not like Rhaenyra is counting.

(She is.)

In amidst of it all is Elaena, her mother’s midwife, who looks mortified at all the fuss and furore going on around her. She is attempting to argue with Mother, with little success: “Your Grace, it really isn’t necessary,” she is proffering meekly, a stark contrast to the fiery individual who only yesterday Rhaenyra witnessed telling the Grand Maester that blood letting was a disastrous, foolhardy practice that only weakened the patient, and that if he could find actual, unbiased medical evidence that supported the treatment, only then might she consider it, but anecdotal evidence is no basis to support draining the lifeblood out of a woman already on the mend anyway.

It had been fun. But that Elaena is vanished, down to only a rough, home-spun shift while Aemma’s favourite seamstresses whirl around her in a dance that only they know the steps to.

“It is necessary,” Aemma says firmly. “No one respects a woman in this court unless she looks the part.” Elaena sighs.

“Your Grace. You could dress me in Myrish lace and satin from Pentos but you would only be clothing a sow in silk clothing,” she says plainly. No less than three of the seamstresses giggle, before falling abruptly quiet at Aemma’s withering expression. “Don’t blame them for laughing, your Grace. It is the truth.”

‘Sow’ might be overstating things. Rhaenyra squints at Elaena, trying to look at her through objective eyes. She has noted at times there are certain physical differences between highborn and the smallfolk, although she’s never pondered this deeply on them. Elaena is not stout, but where Rhaenyra herself, for instance, has a dainty waistline from corsetry and fine breeding, Elaena’s middle is thicker, muscled enough for some definition but generously padded with fat; her body in general can be described thus. She would not look right in the court styles of small, nipped-in waists and tight corsets, Rhaenyra decides.

“Mother,” she says, and Aemma turns, raises an eyebrow.

“Yes, my love?” Gathering her confidence, Rhaenyra steps into her mother’s rooms, goes over and kisses Aemma’s cheek before proceeding over to Elaena. The midwife smiles at her, and Rhaenyra offers the same gesture back.

“Princess,” Elaena says in greeting respectfully enough, except her tone says, can you believe what’s going on here? Rhaenyra is not sure how old the midwife is, but she is certainly closer to Rhaenyra’s own four and ten than either Aemma or Rhaenyra’s father.

“Lady Rivers,” she replies, and Elaena’s expression crinkles up in involuntary distaste. “May I?” One of the seamstresses has just draped the beginnings of a gown over Elaena. Rhaenyra grips the cotton by the waistline and raises it up a few inches, until the waistline now sits just below her breasts. “What do you think, Mother?”

Aemma and the head seamstress crowd around her. Elaena is holding very still, as though if she remains as immobile as possible, she may pretend none of the fitting is happening. The seamstress purses her lips.

“It is not the court style,” she begins, but favours Rhaenyra with a glowing smile. “But the Princess has a good eye for these things. A higher seam will indeed suit the Lady Rivers well.” Elaena twitches.

“Call me Elaena, Stelsa,” she mutters. “I served you supper last for week, by the gods.” The seamstress – Stelsa, apparently – tweaks her nose, gently which is hardly a dignified way to treat a lady but does serve to make Elaena smile.

“Now, Lady Rivers,” Stelsa says airily. “You know how us common folk must speak gently to our betters.

There is a sharp bark of laughter. It is Aemma. Stelsa goes red in the face and dips a low curtsey at once. “Forgive me, your Grace, I quite forgot myself –” Aemma is still laughing to herself.

“So you did!” she agrees, and Stelsa blushes darker. “It was most refreshing.” Aemma goes to sit in the chair set out for her nearby. She is still recovering, Rhaenyra knows, and gives her mother a sharp look to remind her to take care of herself. Aemma just smiles softly, fondly back.

“Are all women amongst the common folk built along your lines, Lady Rivers?” Rhaenyra wonders aloud. Elaena shrugs as Stelsa starts to pin the cotton together into a rough outline of a gown.

“You mean designed for sturdiness, not loveliness? Aye, there are differences enough, but for the most part, the gods have made us strong enough to survive the brutality of the seasons.” She must notice Rhaenyra’s curious expression, because she smiles and gestures to Rhaenyra’s own slim frame.  “I mean no offense, your Grace, Princess, but you’d starve in a week if you were a commoner and famine broke out.” Elaena pats her own belly. “Our fat is what keep the smallfolk working even if the crops blight or the animals die from frost.” Rhaenyra tilts her head. Fascinating. She’s never considered that – but then, she’s never been hungry before, either.

“She is not incorrect, your Grace,” Stelsa confirms. “When I was nine, at winter’s end we didn’t eat more than once every two days, and little enough besides. All the thin folk died.” She smiles wryly. “I was grateful to inherit my ma’s hips then, although not so much later, when my time of life came upon me.” She is indeed quite bountiful around the middle, Rhaenyra notes, although it seems rude to comment upon.

“Don’t be too unkind to those hips,” Elaena consoles, wincing as one of the junior seamstresses jabs her with a pin. “Noble ladies die in childbirth far more than we do because of those bird-boned little pelvises, poor things. Yours were sufficient to bring your little ones safely into the world, I trust?” Stelsa beams.

“Five and all hale, thank the gods. My oldest girl is about to give me a grandchild next moon.” Stelsa winks. “She inherited my hips, gods be praised.”

Rhaenyra, who has never heard women from the smallfolk talk so openly before, is fascinated.

“Is that true?” she asks. Elaena arches an eyebrow in silent query. “That the size of a lady’s hips can influence the path of her labour? I thought it was only an old wives’ tale.” Stelsa has a warm, low chuckle, like honey being poured over a flat cake. Rhaenyra likes it – likes the seamstress, who has been supervising both Rhaenyra and Aemma’s wardrobe since Rhaenyra was old enough to toddle.

“I am an old wife, Princess.” Rhaenyra flushes, and has the absurd desire to apologise – to a commoner, no less! But the women have already moved on.

“Wide hips can indicate a larger pelvis – the bony structure within, that the child must descend through to be born,” Elaena is explaining. Rhaenyra looks down at herself.

“How are mine?” Elaena and Stelsa both give her an appraising look.

“You’re too young to tell,” Elaena says. Stelsa tuts.

“If the Princess were a common lass, she might already have one at the teat and another on the way,” she points out. Elaena sighs.

“But she is not,” she demurs. “She is a Princess. But –” Another long, appraising look. “You’re not as willowy as most highborn girls, your Grace.”

“It’s the dragon-riding,” Aemma puts in. Baelon is resting against her chest, his little eyes closed tight. Elaena nods.

“That’s good. You will do well enough, I think, Princess. As long as you make sure to eat enough while you’re still growing.” Rhaenyra grins.

“That’s not hard around here,” she points out. The Red Keep has an obscene amount of food. Another thought occurs to her. “How are Mother’s hips?” Both Aemma, Elaena, and Stelsa wince. “Oh. That bad?” Elaena’s expression is grim. Aemma’s is just sorrowful.

“When did your septa start cutting down your portions, your Grace?” Elaena asks. Aemma startles in surprise, although Baelon sleeps on, unbothered. “Had you flowered, or were you still a child?”

“One and ten, and no, not flowered yet,” Aemma replies. “How did you know?” Elaena’s face is even grimmer now.

“Grew a little round in the tummy in between growth spurts?” she inquires. Aemma nods again, comprehension dawning, but Rhaenyra doesn’t see it. “Noble houses want their daughters to be two things: beautiful and fertile,” Elaena explains to Rhaenyra. “A pretty wife is worth more than an ugly one. likewise, a fat wife is worth less than a slim one.” Rhaenyra’s mouth falls open and she turns to her mother in horror.

“Did they starve you –” she begins, but falls silent at the look on Aemma’s face. This is an old wound, clearly, and not one to be poked at lightly.

“If a body does not receive enough of what it needs, it does not develop correctly,” Elaena finishes up. “The young need good food, sunlight, plenty of sleep and to be know that they are loved.”

Aemma looks up from where she is studying Baelon’s little face. “How do you know so much, Elaena?” she asks. “You are what, nine and ten, or younger?” Elaena turns pink.

“I was two and twenty on my last name day, your Grace,” she murmurs. Stelsa winds a length of cord around her waist, and obligingly Elaena raises her arms, although her face still implies she would rather be anywhere else. “My mother had me in the birthing room with her from when I was eight. I delivered my first babe at twelve.” Twelve. Only two years younger than Rhaenyra herself. She cannot imagine what it would be like, to bring a whole other living thing into the world.

“So young,” Aemma says lightly. Elaena shrugs, then stops, because Stelsa gives her a warning look for rumpling the fabric.

“Sorry, Stelsa. Midwives don’t ‘prentice, you have to have a guild for that. But we start just as young. I only came to the Red Keep five moons ago, so I’ve been at my trade independently seven years.” Aemma purses her lips.

“You left your trade, your home, to be a scullery maid in the kitchen of a castle more than a hundred leagues away?” Aemma asks, one fine light brow raised. “Why?”

Something in Elaena’s face closes over. “That is a longer story by far, your Grace,” she replies stiffly, and Aemma, with the deftness Rhaenyra one day hopes to possess, inclines her head gracefully.

“Then we will not speak of it today,” she says gravely. But Rhaenyra is only half paying attention, still fixed on the words Elaena had said only minutes ago. Good food, sunlight, plenty of sleep, and to know that they are loved.

Baelon is so very small.

There is a hard lump in her throat. Wordlessly, Rhaenyra goes to the window, pulling the drape aside just enough so a beam of light spills onto both her mother and brother. She goes over to the chair, sits, puts her head against Aemma’s knee. A moment later, the arm not supporting Baelon pats her on the shoulder, before fingers start carding gently through her silver hair.

“There,” Rhaenyra tells her unsteadily. “Now Baelon has sunlight. And he is sleeping well. And eating enough?” She glances up at her mother, who nods silently, old grief haunting her eyes. “Then he will be all right,” she declares. Aemma smiles down at her.

“My thoughtful girl,” she says softly, and then in High Valyrian, just for the two of them to know: “Ñuha byka dārilaros, ñuha rāpa prūmia jorrāelagon.” My little princess, my kind-hearted love. Rhaneyra ducks her head.

“Avy jorrāelan tolī, Muña,” she replies. I love you too, Mother. “I love you, little Baelon,” she adds in Common, since surely High Valyrian is too complex for a small baby to understand. It doesn’t matter. Rhaenyra will teach him.

The dress fitting continues, but Rhaenyra is bathed in the sunshine and replete inside bubble of warmth and love, and is content to stay there as long as she can.

Chapter Text

Caraxes is a stubborn bastard, and will not suffer the Dragonpit unless heavily coaxed with enough goats to feed a whole hoard of dragons. Thus, Viserys meets his brother on the outskirts of the city, where the walls of King’s Landing give way to the Kingswood and beyond.

Viserys leaves his horse with the guards that have accompanied him and goes towards Caraxes alone. Daemon is a tiny figure against the mammoth bulk of red scales and sharp claws, but he looks up as Viserys’ footsteps approach.

“Give me a minute,” he calls over the distance. Viserys is warmed by it, because it means Daemon does not want Caraxes to chew him up into little pieces and must acclimatise the solitary beast to another human nearby.

He studies the pair. Daemon has his face pressed against Caraxes’ huge snout, just the barest hint of a smile evident on the tiny part of his face visible, and jealousy thuds hard within Viserys’ breast. His brief time with Balerion was a lifetime ago now, but Viserys misses the enormous dragon like a knifepoint in the heart. He has never regretted his choice. Balerion died loved, and the anguish Viserys felt at his passing had been almost like an honour to bear, rather than a burden; the very least that the ancient kingmaker deserved, to have a rider mourn him.

But it has meant that he has not been on dragonback since he was six and ten. The last vast, craggy body he had pressed his face to had been Balerion’s cooling one, when Viserys was too young to even be able to grow a full beard yet. Daemon’s bond with Caraxes, Rhaenyra’s fledgling one with Syrax, they all cut him deep. Rhaenys has offered to take him up on Meleys, an offer Viserys has dearly cherished from his reserved cousin, but it wouldn’t be the same. He and Balerion had been connected, in some eldritch manner that Viserys can’t even begin to describe, and to ride another dragon without that link, that press of mortal mind to flaming intent –

It is unpalatable, like being a voyeur in someone’s bedchamber. Small wonder that a dragon-rider can only bond once, Viserys thinks, as Daemon wraps his arms around as much of Caraxes as he can reach with something like tenderness. The sorcery of old Valyria is strong, but not so strong that a man can master an avatar of flames and flight itself more than once.

Daemon beckons, and Viserys squares his shoulders, starts a leisurely walk towards them. He trusts Daemon to know Caraxes, so if Daemon deems it safe, then hopefully Caraxes won’t decide to have himself a kingly little morsel for lunch today. He reaches the huge scaled form and Caraxes snarls, but Daemon only continues murmuring soft nonsense in High Valyrian to his red wyrm.

“Sȳrī rhēdan, Caraxes,” Viserys greets in the same tongue. Well met. “Ēza aōha kipagīros issare jurnegēre tolī ao sȳrī, rōvēgrie mele wyrm?”

Has your rider been looking after you well, great red wyrm? Or thereabouts. High Valyrian is an odd language to navigate, and Viserys suspects that after two hundred years of speaking it away from Valyria, the Targaryen form of it has become hopelessly dialectal.

“Shut up, of course I have,” Daemon grouses with a complete lack of kingly respect. Caraxes huffs, as if to say, I keep him in line well enough. Daemon pulls back enough to look into one vast gleaming eye. “Traitor,” he grumbles, and gropes blindly behind him for Viserys’ hand, planting it firmly on Caraxes’ warm scales when he finds it.

Viserys sighs with the sheer pleasure of it. Daemon grins. “Sȳz valītsos, dōna mēre,” he praises, and Viserys suppresses his smile. Only his brother would say good boy, sweet one to his monolith of a dragon. Caraxes is no Balerion, but he is formidable enough.

“Kostagon nyke –” Viserys starts, and needs get no further. May I?

“You may,” Daemon replies in Common. “He’s in a good enough mood today.” Viserys shifts on his feet and steps closer, pushing his face shamelessly into Caraxes’ scales, stretching out his arms to rest as much of his skin on the rough heat as possible. Caraxes makes a low grinding sound, a dragon’s equivalent of a purr; Daemon starts, before his eyes narrow.

“You old sap,” he accuses Caraxes. “Issi ao jāre rāpa isse aōha uēpa age, rōva vala?” Are you going soft in your old age, big man? “Or picking favourites, kostilus?” Viserys sighs, warm as toast and extremely happy.

“You need more emphasis on the second syllable for kostilus,” he says dreamily, his eyes closed, breathing in the familiar and beloved scent of brimstone and strong animal, twined through with heat - indeed, heat can have a scent, as Viserys had learned the first time he pressed his forehead to Balerion. “Ko-STI-lus. Otherwise it sounds less like perhaps and more like –” Viserys presses his lips sharply together at the disgruntled sound from his brother.

“Do not think to lecture me in our ancestral language, brother,” Daemon growls. “You mangle every vowel sound you pronounce in it. Rhaenyra could manage it better, in fact, aōha tala iksis tolmiot sȳrkta rȳ Valyrio Eglie than zirȳla kepa ēza mirre issare.” Viserys presses a surreptitious kiss to Caraxes’ snout, hoping Daemon won’t notice in his ire. Caraxes doesn’t mind, the wily old lizard.

Daemon had said, your daughter is far better at High Valyrian than her father has ever been. If he was expecting this to score a blow, Viserys must disappoint him. “Nyke hope sīr,” he says, borrowing the second word from Common since he can’t remember how to say hope in High Valyrian. “She’s been practicing since she was three. I was much older by the time the septas sat me down to learn it.” Daemon sniffs.

“I was four, if you recall,” he says airily to anyone who happens to be listening. Only because he refused to be parted from Viserys and followed him everywhere as a child, even to lessons. Viserys wisely chooses not to mention this, reluctantly opening his eyes. He can sense Caraxes getting restless, unaccustomed to this much human contact with someone not his rider. But it is far longer than the dragon used to allow.

“The old boy’s mellowed a touch,” Viserys observes dryly. On cue, a low rumbling growl sounds deep in Caraxes’ massive throat. Viserys chuckles at the warning. Any man who calls a dragon a dumb beast is a fool. Caraxes, Rhaenyra’s Syrax, and old Balerion himself are cleverer than half the courtiers of Viserys’ acquaintance – and demand far less of him. “But he is a faithful and noble mount indeed.” Daemon shrugs.

“He knows his king,” his brother says, before giving Viserys his patented Rogue Prince lingering side-eye. “As do I.” Viserys sighs. He should have known it would come to this.

“Aemma has her heart set on the midwife going,” he says quietly. “She will be more a boon to you than a burden, Daemon, of that I can be certain.” Daemon scowls.

“Birthing one babe does not make a woman an expert on everything else,” he says waspishly. Viserys shrugs.

“Indeed,” he agrees blithely. “That is why you are going also, brother. Since your wisdom encompasses everything that has lived, died, or existed under the sun.” Daemon’s scowl deepens into a full-blown glower.

“You mock me,” Daemon mumbles, turning back to Caraxes. The dragon’s huge liquid eye seems to wink at Viserys, and regretfully he pats the patch of red scales nearest to him before clapping his brother on the shoulder.

“Aemma wants to have a family dinner tonight, for Elaena to get to know you better,” he advises. “Try to bathe first. Not everyone appreciates the unfettered scent of dragon as much as we do.”

“There’s nothing wrong with the way I smell,” Daemon rasps. Viserys looks him over ruefully. It’s true enough, after a fashion. Daemon could reek to the highest of the seven heavens and still women would throw themselves at him. Even Rhea Royce had been charmed at first meet, before Daemon’s spiteful tongue had put an end to that, so shortly after their acquaintance began. But Daemon has never been one to desire the fruit that hangs within reach; always, he must stretch up towards what is too far for him to grasp.

“You must also come to see your nephew,” Viserys reminds him. Daemon’s sullenness vanishes; or, rather, Daemon tucks it away out of sight.

“That I will suffer gladly,” he replies, dramatic as ever. Viserys passes a fond hand over Daemon’s silver hair. His brother allows it, even leaning into Viserys’ hand just a touch. So prickly and so sweet inside, Viserys reflects. Daemon is a study in contradictions.

“At sunset, brother,” Viserys says, and leaves both dragon and rider to their musings.

Chapter Text

Aemma loves her good-brother and cousin, but he does tend to push the boundaries of what is appropriate.

In one of the smaller dining halls, the one Viserys often favours for private family affairs, a collection of dragons sit waiting, silver hair catching the light, for their brother and uncle, who is twenty minutes late to supper. The dining table only seats six; Viserys at its head, Aemma to his right with Baelon’s bassinet only an arm’s reach away. Rhaenyra flanks her father on his other side, and next to Aemma Elaena sits quietly staring at her folded hands, dressed in the plainest supper gown Aemma has ever seen in her life. It is quality work – Stelsa would allow no less to leave her workshops – but the sleeves are plain and close-fitting, the cut conservative. There are no embroidery or beadwork or lace to mark it as a lady’s gown, and Elaena has tied her hair into a ruthlessly practical bun.

There are splotches of ink on her hands. “I know my letters well enough!” Elaena had snapped defensively two days when the grand maester had implied otherwise, but had confessed after Mellos was gone that it had been several years since she’d had the opportunity to write. watching the midwife slowly relearn the craft had reminded Aemma how she really must speak to Viserys about more schools for the realm’s smallfolk to become literate, but it had become just another facet of the enigma of Elaena; how she had learned to read and write in the first place, when so many others of her class could not.

Aemma smiles over at her daughter. Rhaenyra is resplendent, as the daughter of a king should be; silken gown trimmed in Myrish lace, gold flashing in her ears and at her wrists. Aemma frowns. The necklace she is wearing is dull grey metal in hue; Valyrian steel studded with rubies. It is very grown up for an adolescent girl.

“Wherever did you get that necklace, daughter mine?” she asks. Rhaenyra flushes a light pink, always a sign that she feels guilty about something. “I have not seen you wear it before.” Rhaenyra tugs self-consciously on one of the metal loops.

“Uncle Daemon gave it to me,” she replies, clearly not wanting to do so. Aemma raises an eyebrow at her daughter, and Rhaenyra flushes darker.

“Such thoughtful gifts your uncle gives,” Aemma replies, and leaves it there for now. It would not do to make a scene, after all, and Viserys, usually so amiable and deeply supportive of his brother despite all the trouble Daemon makes for him, might actually lose his temper if he thought Daemon was actively pursuing their daughter.

It’s just… it puts Aemma on edge, the sharp metal lines of it against Rhaenyra’s soft throat. It looks very much like… like a claim. Like a brand, wrapped snake-like around her daughter’s still-childlike neck.

Aemma needs must have a very serious talk with her cousin, and soon.

As if summoned by her thoughts, Daemon saunters in – now a full half hour late. Aemma straightens, gives Daemon a serene smile that betrays none of what she is thinking about, and gestures to the free chairs. “We thought perhaps you had been waylaid, cousin,” she says archly. Daemon stalks towards the dining table, assesses the available seating options – next to Rhaenyra or next to Elaena – then drops very pointedly into the chair next to his niece.

Next to Aemma, Elaena’s spine stiffens just a tad more, and her plain face becomes inscrutable; the mask of the indifferent servant. Aemma has seen it a thousand times before, while bathing or dressing or any other number of menial tasks that apparently as a queen she cannot possibly manage alone. It says, you may have my service, but not my spirit.

Viserys claps his hands, and the servants begin to enter with the laden trays. Elaena is eyeing the trays (and the array of cutlery set at each place at the table) apprehensively. Squaring her shoulders, she accepts a slice of mutton when offered, and a crusty roll; the wine pourer waters down her ale significantly at her request. Then, as Aemma’s entire family stare at Elaena like she’s gone mad, she begins to eat her sparse serving in small bites, like it is all she intends to consume.

“Lady Rivers,” Viserys says. Elaena looks up to the head of the table, laying down her fork and knife and dabbing gently at her mouth with her linen napkin.

“Yes, your Grace?” she asks. Viserys looks pained.

“How do I – my dear, there is plenty of food,” he says, indicating the trays now set in the centre of the table, still piled high. “Surely you need a little more than that.” Elaena tilts her head.

“In the kitchens, the maids are beaten if we eat too much,” she says, excruciatingly matter of fact. Aemma closes her eyes. Viserys’ expression changes, sorrow entering his eyes. “In complete honesty, your Grace, this is more than enough. Most nights we don’t even get meat.” She gestures at her paltry serving of mutton as if to make her point. “What returns from the high tables are distributed to the highest-ranking staff first. By the time it filters down to the pageboys and the girls in the scullery –” She shrugs.

Poor Viserys. His compassionate nature is taking this hard. “How can so much go on within my own Keep that I am not aware of?” he wonders aloud, taking a drink from his wineglass. Aemma sneaks her free hand into his own closest to her, and Viserys squeezes it back gratefully.

“Because it doesn’t matter,” Daemon says. He is leaning back in his chair, his cool eyes darting between Elaena and Viserys, appraising. If Viserys is visibly upset, then Elaena appears to have turned to stone. “They’re servants, Viserys, by the Stranger. They are of no concern to us.”

“That’s not true, Uncle.” If Aemma is surprised at Rhaenyra speaking up, Daemon is more so. He eyes his niece like she has sprouted a second head. “Everyone matters. Everyone’s important in their own way, to their own families.” Daemon shakes his head, adopting a condescending expression.

“You are tender-hearted, byka dāria,” he says to Rhaenyra, who narrows her eyes at him, clearly unimpressed even as the endearment gives her a little sparkle in her gaze. “But the people of the Seven Kingdoms do not love us, their alien conquerors; therefore, why should we care for them? They fear the might of our dragons. That is all that stands between your father’s reign and all of our heads on pikes outside the city walls.”

Rhaenyra’s sparkle has faded with Daemon’s grim pronouncement. Aemma sighs, trying to find the right words to cheer her, when a quiet but firm voice to her left says, “That’s not true.” Aemma turns to the midwife next to her, startled. Elaena is setting down her fork and is looking directly at Daemon, holding his gaze with her own.

“You dare to speak to me,” Daemon hisses. Elaena blanches a little but holds her ground.

“Yes. I do. If your brother the king names me lady, then I am no longer your inferior, and I may speak in your presence as I see fit. You are incorrect in your previous statement. It is not fear of dragons that contribute to the stability of the realm, but the faith of the common people in their King.” Aemma peeps at Viserys out of the corner of her eye, who is starting to blush a dull red in the cheeks and ears. “From the Neck to the Crownlands, Viserys the first of his name is regarded as a good, fair, just King who is worthy of his rank.” She fixes Daemon with a hard stare. “They would not be able to think the same of many others.” The implication is bold, and impossible not to see.

“They know him not,” Daemon spits. “It could be all the doing of his Hand and Council for all they can tell.” Elaena shrugs.

“They know he does not tax them anymore than he needs to keep the realm from falling into disrepair,” she replies tartly. “They know if the Ironborn come raiding from the east, he will not allow their deaths to rest unavenged. They know that if their lord beats their sons or rapes their daughters, there is a higher power they may apply to for their justice.” Elaena cuts off her tirade there, breathing a little harder than usual. Rhaenyra is staring at Elaena like she has just found a new hero to worship. Daemon has gone silent and sullen; beside Aemma, Viserys is almost at the end of his rope.

“Please stop,” he mutters, his entire face now beet red behind his curtain of silver hair. “It’s not as grand as all that.” Elaena inclines her head.

“As you wish, your Grace,” she says, and applies herself to her slowly diminishing mutton slice. “Maryene has done a splendid job with the mutton tonight,” she comments. Aemma seizes on this conversational peace offering like a drowning man might do to a cork vest.

“It is delicious,” she agrees, and so passes the evening, until the last of the plates are cleared away. Daemon gets to his feet without a word and makes to stalk off angrily, still steaming about being routed so neatly, but Elaena, who has stood automatically when he did (still a commoner at heart), trips against the table, and a small patch of something pale and woven falls out of her pocket and into Daemon’s path.

He looks at it like it is a piece of manure that a horse has freshly excreted in front of him, stooping down to pick up the rag and holding it derisively up to the light. “What’s this?” Daemon’s sneer could cut even the hardiest of souls to the bone. “What passes for lace amongst the gutter folk you come from?” Carelessly, he flicks the scrap back down to the ground. Elaena turns white, then ferociously red in the cheeks. Aemma hopes dearly she will give Daemon the tongue-lashing of his life, but she doubts it. Aemma is starting to feel out the shape of her new companion’s wariness; Viserys she shows the appropriate deference to (now there is no active labouring going on, at least) but there is no edge of hidden fear when she is in his presence. Aemma understands it better now. To Elaena Viserys is safe, because he is a married man who openly adores his wife; Elaena has no need to fear advances from him. But Daemon. Daemon looks at pretty women like he’s imagining what they look like unclothed, and plain women like they’re not even there.

To Elaena, Aemma grasps, Daemon is clearly a predator.

The former scullery maid is kneeling and scooping up the tattered piece of fancywork like it is the most precious of jewels. “It is lace, actually,” she says quietly enough, but if looks could kill, Daemon would be no more than a smoking stain on the rug that he stands on. “The very first piece my little sister made after she was ‘prenticed. She always spun and stitched as a wee thing, and I brought her what bits of thread I could afford, to practice with. She loved it so. When she was old enough I went to the lacemaker in our village and asked if she might be taken on.” A smile breaks through her glower as she straightens up, tucking the little piece carefully back into a pocket. “Mila was so happy, she wanted me to have the very first piece she made as a ‘prentice, because she said she wouldn’t have had the chance without me.” Daemon has gone still and quiet, his face frozen into a rictus of some unnameable emotion Aemma can’t begin to guess at. “I carry it everywhere.”

“Why?” The question is so simple and so softly spoken that Aemma can hardly believe it came from Daemon. Next to her, Viserys stills, his fingers clenching tight on the stem of his cup.

Elaena seems to be trying to gauge if Daemon means the question cruelly or innocently as she peers up at him from her much lower height. She must decide, because she takes the little keepsake out of her pocket again, smoothing a fond thumb over the tattered edge. “Why do I keep it?” Daemon nods. “Because it is hers. Because I love her. And I am proud of the fine woman she is becoming.” Elaena searches Daemon’s face for something, and seems to find it, because very gingerly she reaches out and pats his arm. “It is a great kindness from the gods to have a younger sibling, my prince. I’m sure your brother would say the same.”

Daemon’s head flies up, catching both Aemma and Viserys in the act of blatantly staring at him. A sneer twists his handsome face, and he turns sharply on his heel, his short cape flapping behind him in his haste. Elaena’s hand is still outstretched, but she lowers it wearily. She clearly does not understand what she said to offend Daemon so.

But Aemma. Aemma knows.

“Lady Rivers…” Viserys clearly does not know what to say. Elaena turns, and pastes on a bright smile.

“Your Grace,” she replies. “My lady Aemma. Perhaps I might take the little prince back to your chambers, so you may finish your meal?” She is one of the few people Aemma trusts Baelon with, and she nods. Gently, Elaena lifts the babe into her arms, tucking him securely against her as does. “Come on, wee man,” she tells him softly, in the lilting voice that is so easy to talk to little children in, like an instinct bred in the bone. “Let your royal parents have a bite to eat, yes? Yes, we will.”

When they are alone, Aemma turns to Viserys, but he is already starting to speak. “I want you with me when the chamberlain is summoned tomorrow,” he says without preamble. “Beaten for eating when they’re hungry, indeed. I won’t have it under my roof.” And this is why Aemma loves Viserys, it is, because he is as wedded to his duty as he is to Aemma herself. So she shuffles aside her concerns about their family affairs, for now, and together they start to plan.

Chapter Text

The bitch dares to mock him to his face.

Daemon grits out a harsh oath and takes another harsh gulp of wine from the bottle he is clutching in a white-knuckled grip. He knows the capital like the grooves of his palm, or the song that is Dark Sister in his hand and his blood blazing alive in his veins. Even in a city of half a million people, he can still find places to be alone; this broad windowsill in one of the Keep’s disused towers is a familiar haunt, the upper levels abandoned now because of structural instability. Not that Daemon cares about such things. Perhaps Viserys would finally deign to pay attention if he fell from this great height and cracked his head clean open on the stone –

Probably not.

Daemon slams his head back against the wall and drains his flask before tossing it aside in disgust. He should have brought more. He should have picked somewhere closer to the wine cellar to brood. He should have – told that little common wench that for some families, a younger brother is only a burden, a last resort, not anything to be celebrated or cherished, and certainly not something to hold a keepsake of.

Seven hells. Daemon loathes this melancholy, the rising tide of emotion that will not be stemmed. He wants to be obliterated, and whether that comes from a bottle, a blade, or from between a woman’s thighs, he cares not – although in his current location, all three are starting to look unlikely.

Because it is hers. Because I love her. And I am proud of the fine woman she is becoming.

It is a great kindness from the gods to have a younger sibling, my prince. I’m sure your brother would say the same.

Viserys would not. And that’s the rub of it, isn’t it, the little kernel of spite lodged under Daemon’s skin, festering and oozing. How dare some little common born slut be given so freely what he, Daemon Targaryen, has been denied for so long – the approval of his brother, his only brother, the only one who really counts –

And how dare her older sister say it so plainly. Like the notion of not loving her sister is as alien to her as if the trees grew from the clouds and the rain ran upwards. Like it’s normal. Like it’s expected. Like maybe every commoner from the Wall to Dorne has this simple familial acceptance, and Daemon, the blood of old Valyria, is the only one without it –

He growls, and swipes a hand over his face. The fumes from the shit wine are making his eyes sting.

If he’s not going to spend the night here, he’d better climb down now. Wavering, Daemon gets to his feet, and painstakingly makes his way down through the ruined tower. The stairwell is intact enough, but his head is spinning when he finally lays his feet on solid ground. The notion of finding a half-decent and willing woman to fuck evaporates. He’ll be lucky to stagger safely to his own bed.

It’s difficult, but he manages. Mostly by squinting to clear his hazy vision and scowling at anyone who looks his way. At this hour, the Red Keep is deserted compared to the hustle and bustle of the daytime, but still, the castle ticks on; night guards going to and from shifts, servants attending the needs of their masters, which never seem to end.

Daemon is more self-sufficient than most. His quarters are opulent, but not overlarge; he is only one man, after all, and he prefers to go down to the city when seeking company rather than bring them into his rooms. Which is why he spots it at once, the change, small though it may seem; a piece of folded parchment, left neatly on his bed.

Daemon narrows his eyes at it. it looks innocuous enough, but so did his wine bottle earlier, and now his temples are beginning to throb with the fury of a hundred dragons. He unfolds the parchment warily, and it takes him embarrassingly long to realise what he is looking at; uneven childish letters scrawling their way across a torn-out page of a writing book, splotched heavily with ink.

i dare you to flick ink at maester arbrage

The line below it is in a much more experienced hand, and alternates as such throughout the parchment. Daemon squints at the words, and he –

He remembers. The sweltering summer afternoon, bored out of his mind as their tutor Maester Arbrage had droned on about the history of their people, ‘the greatest civilisation to grace this world – pay attention, young princes!’ On and on it had went. Viserys had been as bored as Daemon, but his four extra years meant he was better at hiding it. Daemon had picked up his quill and carefully penned the letters, before tossing it onto his brother’s desk surreptitiously while the maester’s back was turned.

i dare you to flick ink at maester arbrage

Viserys had looked up warily, before picking up his quill and starting to write.

What’s in it for me? Daemon had frowned thoughtfully, before brilliance dawned.

i’ll give you my sweets at suppertime

Viserys had considered this for a moment, before nodding, treating the bargain with the gravity of someone who enjoyed sweets immensely. He’d dipped his quill carefully, aimed, and flicked it with devastating precision. The ink flew through the air and landed neatly on the back of the maester’s rough grey robes. Daemon had stifled laughter while the maester continued scratching away with his chalk, totally oblivious. Daemon had snatched back the parchment.

you’re the best rōva lēkia ever

Viserys had been getting so serious of late, but when he’d read the words, the scrunch in his forehead had smoothed out, and a grin had tipped up the corners of his mouth. He’d scrawled a couple of words on the parchment and passed it back one last time, just before Maester Arbrage had turned around from his board to peer at them with his ancient, coal-black eyes. Still, Daemon had had time to read it before he had to shove it under his slate to hide it from the maester’s prying gaze. It had warmed him all the way through, the two words in his brother’s neat, orderly script.

Avy jorrāelan.

I love you.

He’d never thought to wonder what had happened to it. Viserys must have scooped it up at the end of the lesson and tucked it away – for all these years! Soft fool. Daemon moves to flick the parchment into the fire burning in the hearth, but stills his fingers at the very last moment. The scrap has been folded and refolded what looks like a thousand times, as though Viserys had taken it out often and looked at it; a reminder, perhaps, of when they were young. Of when Daemon still saw his brother as the best in the world, and when Viserys loved him.

He’s just drunk enough to do it.

His brother’s quarters are not far, and despite the late hour, when Daemon knocks, the even voice comes at once: “Enter.” Viserys is sitting by his miniature Valyria, a book on his lap, but he sets it aside when Daemon comes in. He moves over to his brother, long strides eating up the distance between them, until Daemon could reach out and set a hand on his brother’s shoulder, should he so choose. “Get up,” he demands. Viserys raises an eyebrow, but complies; he stands braced as though for a blow. They are of a height; Daemon may possess half an inch over Viserys, perhaps, but no more.

“Well?” Viserys inquires. Daemon looks at his tired face, the fall of his silver hair, but finds what he is seeking; somewhere deep within, there is his brother as he was as a boy, hair tied back and eyes gleaming, ever ready to lift Daemon up into his arms.

Daemon puts his own arms around him. Viserys stiffens, but it is only the space between heartbeats; he hugs Daemon back as fiercely as Daemon is hugging him. Daemon’s head fits neatly in the crook of his older brother’s neck just as it had when he was four, for all they are both so much bigger now. “There now, lad,” Viserys murmurs, the smell of him the same, the low rumble of his voice a comfort. “You’re all right.”

Oddly enough, Daemon is. He sniffs, and draws back. Viserys’ eyes are shining, the mask of the king fallen away; he is just himself again, as Daemon has wished it to be for so long. The words, in the end, come easily.

“Avy jorrāelan,” Daemon mutters. It takes Viserys a moment, but when he realises, he grins broadly, and the years drop from his face like minutes.

“Ñuha jorrāelagon valonqar,” he replies warmly, and Daemon savours the words like they are the sweetest of wines, or the most precious of oases, after so long in the desert; my dear little brother. “I love you too.”