Chapter Text
When Rhaenyra opened her eyes it was to the sight of her father sitting at her bedside. He looked terrible and all that Rhaenyra could feel was a mix of satisfaction and slow-simmering anger.
“Father.” She greeted him and watched as he jerked out of his slouch and snapped his head around to look at her. She set up, trying not to sink back into the soft pillows. Only one day and they felt almost foreign.
“My daughter.” Her father’s voice carried a heavy note of relief.
“Yes,” she agreed and studied him carefully, “Who else could it be?”
He flinched and the feeling of satisfaction burned bright as dragon flame. But her father said nothing else, only looked at her. That would not do. He needed to say it.
“Who, father?”
King Viserys closed his eyes as if in pain. He was the very image of misery.
“Well, father?”
He still did not give an answer, even though Rhaenyra knew that he had one.
“For weeks you told me that it would happen soon. For weeks I had to listen to the blathering of the courtiers, your council, and your queen.” She spat the last word, for the image of Alicent’s almost scornful look had not faded from her mind.
“And it did.” It had never happened to Alicent. And her former friend’s scorn always carried the taste of jealousy. It had never happened to her father or her mother. Nor to her uncle as far as she knew then.
“The gods granted me and my soulmate.” Her father flinched at the word. He did not even try to hide it and Rhaenyra pressed on. “The gift. For one day they exchanged our souls with one another. So we’d know where our other half is.” Another flinch this one accompanied by a grimace. Rhaenyra’s heart sang. “So we could find each other.”
Still, her father said nothing and yet, given his position at her bedside and his reactions, there was no way he did not know.
“I know who he is father, and so do you.”
The silence between them was heavy. It often was since her mother had died.
Rhaenyra took a deep breath. “You made me a promise.”
--
Marriage – and more specifically having a husband that wanted her for the children with royal blood that he would give him – was something that Rhaenyra had no interest in. She had seen the fate of her mother – a woman who was ostensible the love of her husband’s life – and she had no intention of sharing her fate.
Her father, however, had different plans.
Rhaenyra knew that there was no way around getting married and having children. Even if any of her brothers had lived, she would have been wed to one of them, or a lord of her father’s choosing. Being the heir only added another difficulty and danger to her choice of husband.
Men wanted her for the royal heir she could give them, once that was done, they had no use for her. Princess Rhaenys had warned her that the realm had no interest in seeing a woman on the throne. But even the Princess had not had to face what lay in front of Rhaenyra. Her father would have killed any man who slaughtered his daughter for an heir and Rhaenyra’s own grandfather would have upheld that. It was not a trait he had passed on to his son. King Viserys had already shown how much importance he placed on having an heir.
He had butchered one wife for a son, how could he oppose his daughter’s husband in doing the same? He couldn’t, so long as the child lived. Rhaenyra had no delusions about the fact that many of her suitors were counting on that very fact.
The birthing bed was already a woman’s battlefield. And with each suitor paraded in front of her, and each oh-so-adventurous offer for her hand presented, her father seemed keener and keener to send her to that battlefield without backup and without even an armor and weapons to guard herself with.
Her possible marriage and the birthing bed she would be pushed into were akin to a knife at her throat. Something her father refused to see.
The only ray of hope that Rhaenyra had was her soulmate. Soulmates were sacred no matter which faith you belonged to. According to the faith of the Seven that are One, soulmates were bound together by the crone, who in her infinite wisdom, tied two souls together so that they might lean on each other in the harsh life that awaited them. According to the Old Gods soulmates were those that you met lifetime after lifetime and who would always stand by you. Yet Rhaenyra’s own devotion belonged to the Gods of old Valyria and soulmates were not two souls tied together, but one soul torn in two and meant to be together again.
To marry your soulmate was a dream of many a maiden or young man, but there was no guarantee that your soulmate would reside close enough to you to meet, or even still be alive. And if you were one of the lucky ones, there was no guarantee that a match between you was suitable, be it due to gender or birth. The latter had not mattered to the Old gods or the Gods of Old Valyria, but it was the faith of the seven that reigned supreme in Westeros, and according to the seven-pointed star, if the lives of two people did not fit together, then they soulmate bond was not one intended for marriage.
Rhaenyra prayed that her soulmate was both of the right gender and of suitable birth because she had her father’s word – sworn both of the light of the Fourteen Flames and the Seven - that if her soulmate was suitable, they would wed. It was also the argument that her father had used to publicly put a temporary stop to the flood of people asking for her hand. It was a grace period only. One day the gods gave you the greatest gift and exchanged your soul for that of your soulmate. According to the records the age this happened varied, but it never happened before the younger of the pair was not at least four and ten or at most eight and ten.
As the heir, Rhaenyra could not wait for longer than that. It had been her father’s ultimatum. He would give her the chance to wait until she turned eight and ten, but no longer. If her soulmate was not of the age to marry, they would be unsuitable too.
Rhaenyra had agreed, though she wished she could have waited for them forever-even if they had already left the world. But not even her uncle who had had to need to marry and produce an heir had not been granted that privilege. Still, after the matter of her marriage had been raised and she had pleaded with him, her father’s vow had been thus:
“If you are granted the gift of the gods before you are eight and ten and your soulmate is suitable, you will have my words that you may wed him, regardless of politics.”
Rhaenyra had dared to hope.
--
But the years passed, and the gift of the gods never came, while the proposals that had slowed to a stop started up again.
--
Two moons before Rhaenyra turned seven and ten, Rhea Royce died in a riding accident. Rhaenyra hoped that her uncle would be happy at long last but given the grievous news that kept arriving from the Stepstones, it seemed more and more unlikely that he would live long enough to enjoy his newfound freedom.
Instead of focusing on the war threatening both his brother and his kingdom, he kept reminding her that soon she will have to make her choice. In turn, she kept reminding him of his promise.
“I still have more than a year.” She said one morning after she had been forced to attend him and Alicent at breakfast.
Viserys hummed at her response, but Alicent gave a loud and audible sight. “Rhaenyra, you need to be realistic.” Her tone was falsely sympathetic.
At first, Alicent had tried to make up with her as if she had never crawled into her father’s bed while her mother’s blood wasn’t even cold. But after Rhaenyra had publicly secured her father’s promise, and not even pretended to entertain the idea of marriage – something which Alicent considered her duty – she had grown bitter.
Once Rhaenyra had overheard her commenting to Aegon that he should not be as foolish as his sister.
The words had burned, even though Rhaenyra had known that Alicent had never understood her position. She wasn’t choosing a husband whom she would dutifully serve as Alicent’s faith demanded, Rhaenyra would choose a consort who would serve her.
“I am being realistic.” It was hard to keep her tone civil, but Rhaenyra did not want the queen consort to try and push her father into shortening her time. Otto Hightower already tried that. So far her father ostensibly held true to his vow, just as he held true to his decision to keep her as heir. But both were only due to a lack of actions against them, not in support of them. “A soulmate who would support me is the most suitable consort for a future queen after all. I believe even the faith of the seven knows of the sanctity of the bond.”
“You do not even know if you have a soulmate,” Alicent informed her primly and demonstratively feed Aegon a piece of mush. “A good match can be found outside of a soulmate bond.”
“Everyone has a soulmate.”
Alicent smile turned stiff. “You know what I speak of, Rhaenyra. The world is a cruel place and only few are blessed by the gods and get to meet their soulmates. There is no guarantee that you are one of them. And it’s a princess's duty to marry well.”
Rhaenyra was no mere princess. She was a future queen.
“Yes, even more so since I will be ruling queen,” Rhaenyra smiled in return. “Which is why I agreed to my father’s suggestion to wait only until the end of my eighteen’s year.”
Alicent shook her head and Rhaenyra braced herself for the argument that was to come. Only it was neither her, nor her former friend who spoke next, but her father.
“And there is still more than a year left.” He gave her a placating smile and chanced a short glimpse at his second wife. “Alicent means no ill by her words, my dear. She merely does not want you to hold false hope.”
Rhaenyra forced herself to nod and Alicent smiled at the king, pleased that he had taken her side – again.
“Of course, father.”
But what could she do, when this false hope was all she had?
She hoped and hoped and hoped. The whispers stirred up by the queen got louder and louder and louder. Days passed, and weeks, and moons.
Then, one morning Rhaenyra woke up in a room not her own.
--
Her father awkwardly cleared his throat and refused to look at her, fixing his gaze on the wall of her chamber as if it held all the answers in the known-world.
“Father.”
He made no attempt to hide his grimace when he responded. “I said if he was suitable.”
Rhaenyra scoffed and felt something sour stir in her chest. It was nothing but an excuse. He was backing out. Was this the extent of his word?
“And how is he not?”
At that, her father turned to face her again, probably sensing an opening that did not exist. She did not even give him the chance to build his case.
“Is he married?” She snapped. “We both know he isn’t. Is his birth unsuitable?” She raised her chin. “Don’t make me laugh.” She pushed back the blankets still covering her and realized that she was wearing clothes not her own. They were far more comfortable than even her usual nightshift though. “Is it because he is too old?”
Her father started to nod, giving her the opening to twist the knife. “The age difference between him and me is lesser than the one between you and your second wife, your grace.” Alicent had been at an age where her father had called her too young to wed.
“Rhaenyra-“ he reached out for her, something hurt in his face. Sadly, hurt seemed to be the only way she could ever get him to listen to her. In this matter, she would rather he be hurt than she, for she knew her wounds would only fester.
“Do you judge him unsuitable as a consort?”
The question hung in the air between them and they both knew the answer. But for once it did not matter.
“Unfortunately for you, father, the gods disagree.” She took a deep breath. “As do I. In fact, I can think of no better choice of husband.”
That too was the truth.
--
The bed was uncomfortable. Something smelled horrible. Rhaenyra’s whole body felt like she had taken a tumble from Syrax’s back and miraculously survived.
She knew from the moment she opened her eyes what had happened to her and as her eyes took in her surroundings, she felt despair rise in her throat.
A soulmate. It had been her last chance to escape the marriage parade. Not every person ever met their soulmate. Too many people died of sickness or violence. Too many people, even if they received the gift, found themselves in a place they could not recognize or too far for them to ever reach.
Too many people never got to marry their soulmates—or even meet them. For Rhaenyra the small chance that she had a soulmate that could save her from being married off to the highest bidder-or the person her father most wanted to placate, even though he had promised her a choice-had been a ray of hope. But just as she was aware of the fact that her father allowed her a choice among the men of his choosing, she had also been aware that even if she had a soulmate, if they weren’t suitable, be it on account of gender, birth or marital status, she might not get to marry them. It was the small chance that he would be suitable that had been the source of hope.
That hope was now crushed.
She was in a tent. And not one of the fine ones she had seen at the tourney grounds. It was big enough to house a table and a bed—a small and uncomfortable one—so whoever owned it—her soulmate—was more than a common foot soldier. All the same-
Her soulmate—whoever he was—was not suitable. And Rhaenyra feared that she was not for the current situation. This wasn’t the tourney grounds, but the sounds of steel and horses rang in her ears.
She swallowed and sat up. It was a strange feeling. Her soulmate was taller than her by quite a bit, and his limbs ached. Ached the way her tights sometimes did when she had spent hours riding with her uncle. Only it was his whole body. His. Because, and this was something she took note of with a flush, the body she was in was very clearly male. And very clearly fit.
That much at least was pleasant. Maybe, even if he was not suitable to have as a husband she could have him as a sworn shield? The Kingsguard swore off of marriage and children. Hopefully, that would be enough for whichever choice of husband she could have. That way she could have at least someone who would care for her at her side.
Even as she considered it the thought was laughable. She had learned too much of the entitlement of men to believe that anyone would allow her such freedom - future queen or not. It lit a fury inside her chest that had no target.
“Are you going to grace us with your presence anytime soon?”
Rhaenyra was startled as a man’s voice rang out outside the tent. There was something familiar about it, but she couldn’t place it.
“Well?” It sounded less like a question and more like a demand. Whoever it was didn’t even bother to wait for Rhaenyra’s answer. The entrance to the tent was pushed open.
No one would dare do the same to her in King’s Landing, and she instinctively bristled slightly at the man’s rudeness, but then-
It was a familiar figure that stepped inside the tent. Tall, dark, and handsome. Silver hair, dark skin, and a well-groomed beard.
“Lord Corlys,” She greeted him on instinct, tilting her head in his direction.
The Sea Snake froze.
Rhaenyra couldn’t read the expression on his face—it was gone too quick to study it properly, and she did not know him well enough to know his emotions at a glance—but the way he stopped walking and studied her made it clear that she had surprised him.
No, that she had shocked him. Keen eyes tracked her figure, noting the way, she was holding the blanket to herself and the way she held herself. The furrow that had already been on Corlys’ face got deeper. It was clear that whoever her soulmate was, Corlys knew him fairly well and Rhaenyra was acting nothing like him.
A tense silence reigned for a moment. Rhaenyra wasn’t sure how to continue. None of the stories had ever included awkward meetings with people that you knew and-
“Daemon?” Lord Corlys sounded almost hesitant.
Daemon . It burned through her like dragon fire. Daemon. Rhaenyra looked down at her hands and spotted the familiar sigil ring. Daemon.
Her soulmate. Her uncle. Hers.