Chapter Text
THE TENTH MONTH OF THE YEAR 298 AFTER THE CONQUEST
THE VALE OF ARRYN
Myra woke to the sound of running feet. Before the door to her cell had even opened, she was kicking off the heavy woolen covers and furs that kept her small cot warm even in the midst of cold mountainous nights. While it was still high summer, the Mountains of the Moon were never truly warm.
Myra had been born and bred in the Stormlands; for the first few years at the motherhouse, her teeth had never stopped chattering. She was a thin-skinned southerner, the other septas joked. There were mountains in the Stormlands, aye, but Myra hailed from a seaside town with blazing hot summers and rainy, mild winters.
She threw on a robe over her shift and shoved her stockinged feet into her slippers, just as the door opened with a squeal. It was Page, the rookmaster’s daughter. Alongside her widowed mother, she tended to the motherhouse’s ravens, pigeons, and falcons. A gawky girl of twelve or thirteen, her pale freckled face shone like the moon in the darkness of the cramped room.
“Septa,” she whispered, “it’s happened. The king is dead.”
This was no great shock to Myra - Robert had been ailing for several days now. Every time the King went on one of his great hunts, there was worry and speculation about his health. Myra had not laid eyes on any Baratheon in over a decade, but she heard enough. The motherhouse was isolated, but not entirely cut off from the world.
They saw travelers and heard news from the nearest noble keep, Ironoaks, often enough. Robert was not the fit, handsome young warrior king she recalled as a little girl, the man who had smashed the Targaryens and their allies. He was an aging fat man with a penchant for strong drink, and that was an ill combination when it came to hunts.
So it was not that they’d not planned for this. Similar motions had begun several times before now, though perhaps most fervently when Robert and his great lords were fighting the Greyjoys. There had been severe pressure on many fronts to leave then, while they were so distracted, but ultimately the Mother Superior had decided against it. She’d thought the Martells overstating their strength, and that so many key players were too young, the Princess most of all.
And of course, Elia Martell had still lived then. But it was out of the question that she flee as well. Her health had steadily declined and she would have been far too weak to make it out of the mountains. It would have meant separating her from her young daughter. Rhaenys had only been nine years old at the time, a shy, timid girl who clung to her mother like moss to a stone.
But that was nearly a decade past. Rhaenys was not that little girl anymore. She was a woman of eight-and-ten.
By all accounts to the royal court, she was modest, humble, and penitent. She had renounced any claim to the Iron Throne thrice over and accepted her life as a septa of the Faith of the Seven. She held no anger nor hatred in her heart for House Baratheon or House Lannister, and indeed, prayed for the forgiveness of those who had killed her father and infant brother.
She was a model prisoner, with no interest in vanities such as pretty dresses or cosmetics. She read only holy scripture and her pastimes revolved around acts of charity and contrition.
By all accounts, Princess Rhaenys Nymeros Martell Targaryen was no more. Only an obedient septa remained. She had even taken a new name when she took her vows; Maegelle, after the famous Targaryen princess who had renounced all luxuries and intrigue for a life tending to the sick and abandoned, the orphaned and abused. After Princess Elia had passed away peacefully in her sleep five years prior, her daughter had never again answered to her birth name.
Until tonight.
“Does Mother Werynfryd know?” Myra asked urgently, following Page to the door.
“My mother went to wake her,” Page whispered. “But the guards- the garrison knows as well, and they’re already up and patrolling the grounds.”
Many motherhouses had garrisons to protect the holy women from bandits or rogue knights who might seek to pilfer their riches- or their maidenheads. But the Motherhouse of Alyssa’s Tears was different in that it held such a high profile prisoner. The garrison was not just there to keep intruders out, but to keep the women in.
While the soldiers were not permitted to enter the motherhouse itself, they patrolled the grounds and outer walls of the keep, and questioned all who entered or left. Myra had not been beyond the walls herself in five years. But she was well aware that the men of the garrison- most of them vassals to House Waynwood- were under orders to kill Rhaenys if she attempted to escape.
Her life had been spared as a child out of consideration for her mother, widely considered an innocent victim of a cruel king and his mad son, and to appease the Martells, who had been horrified by the murder of Prince Aegon. While the men who’d slain the babe were dead, the Martells wanted more. They wanted Tywin Lannister’s head served on a golden platter. They might have tried to take it themselves, if not for the hostage of Elia’s daughter.
“We expected that,” Myra said. “That’s alright, Page. It changes nothing. We’ve prepared for this for sometime.”
Princess Elia was known to be a devout and godly woman. It was expected that any motherhouse she was consigned to would have considerable sympathy for herself and her daughter. Jon Arryn had chosen this one because it was far from Dorne, and the mountains would make a quick escape difficult. But he had never fully trusted the Mother Superior, no matter her professions of utter fealty to the King’s will and hatred for the Targaryens.
Rhaenys was still the last living Targaryen in Westeros. The last living remnant of a dynasty otherwise scattered to the four winds. Prince Viserys and Princess Daenerys were believed to still be alive in Essos, but no one considered them a serious threat, nor were they well known by the common folk.
Neither was Rhaenys, for that matter, but her mother had been, and in many ways she was the picture of Elia.
They hurried down the hall. Other than the sound of their footfall and the wind whistling around the eaves outside, the motherhouse was silent, most of the septas still fast asleep.
“If Robert is dead then they will crown Joffrey immediately,” Myra said in a hushed voice, as they ascended a narrow marble staircase that wound around a statue of a septa with a babe in her arms. “But he must have a regent, he is still a child. My cousin Lord Stark was Robert’s last hand, and my brother…” she trailed off, then shook her head.
“Lord Rogers is at court?” Page prompted her, glancing back as they climbed.
Myra offered a tight smile and no more. Her brother had not taken her decision to join the Faith well. In his view, she had needlessly hurt their parents, refusing to wed and depriving them of yet another daughter.
“Flora ran away across the Narrow Sea to marry a bloody poet, and now you want to marry the Mother,” he’d snapped at her. When she was small, Gareth only ever had smiles and japes for his baby sister, but after the Rebellion, he was a different man, with a much shorter temper and a harsher look on life. “Can you not see what this does to them? For gods’ sake, Myra, do not do this! Refuse marriage if you must, but stay home! This is where you belong!”
Where she belonged? Forever an infant, chained to her mother’s side? It had pained Myra. Her parents had suffered greatly. Flora’s abduction by Prince Rhaegar and his men, what she had gone through with Lyanna- it had been shameful for the entire family, and she had not been the same afterwards.
And they’d lost their second son, Julian, at the Trident. But Myra could not see the logic in spending the rest of her life only as a comfort to them. She loved them. But she had a calling to the Faith. She could do far more good as a septa than as a spinster locked away behind the walls of Amberly.
Of course, Gareth would have told her she’d traded one golden cage for another. It wasn’t as if she’d been out preaching on the street and feeding the homeless. She’d devoted herself to a new mistress instead. And now it had all reached its natural conclusion.
“Stay out here,” she told Page, who nodded obediently.
Myra pushed open the doors at the end of the landing, and walked into the rooms Rhaenys had occupied ever since she’d been brought here as a child of four.
They were the largest, most spacious rooms in the motherhouse, after the Mother Superior’s, with massive windows overlooking the valley far below. When the sun rose in a few hours, it would fill the room with blinding light. Silken and satin hangings were draped over the walls, along with ornate weavings and tapestries depicting the history of the Vale and the teachings of the Faith. From every corner, the Mother smiled down on her children.
And above the marble mantle, a portrait of Princess Elia hung. It had been painted when Rhaenys was a swaddled infant, before the birth of Prince Aegon. Prince Rhaegar stood in the background, but Elia was in the foreground, smiling serenely, the artist’s strokes wiping away the tension and lines from her face, the pain from her eyes.
Myra dragged her gaze away from the painting and turned to the massive four-poster bed. She pulled back the curtains and without much preamble, gave the lump in the middle a shake.
“Wake up!” she hissed. “Princess! It is time, wake up!”
A muffled groan emerged, followed by a face. Rhaenys was darker in complexion than both her mother and father, with light brown skin and black eyes. She’d inherited Rhaegar’s height and lithe build- she towered over Myra and most women, just two inches short of six feet. But she had her mother’s delicate, ovaline face, high cheekbones, and long nose. Her long, glossy black hair fell in waves to her elbows, though it was currently confined to an oiled braid.
“Time for what?” Rhaenys yawned, as she shed her cocoon of silken sheets. She stretched, blinking owlishly at Myra. “I don’t have morning prayer duty until tomorrow, Septa. Let me sleep.”
“The King is dead,” Myra said curtly.
The drowsiness fell away like a cloak. Rhaenys’ black eyes livened and she kicked out her legs, scrambling off the bed.
“The boar?”
“That is what the message says. Quickly, now. Don’t panic. Remember our plans.”
Rhaenys glanced at the windows. “The garrison. They will come here and lock me in the dungeons-,”
“Calm down,” Myra seized her by the shoulders. “Breathe. They are not breaking down our doors at this moment. They do not truly think you will flee. We don’t need to rush.”
“Have we sent out our ravens?” Rhaenys rubbed her face with her hands, wiping away the last vestiges of sleep.
“Elinor has already sent word to the Graftons. They do not fear Jon Arryn’s widow. Don’t worry.”
Rhaenys had begun to tremble- not with terror, Myra realized, but in anticipation. Her teeth were nearly chattering.
“Get dressed,” said Myra. “Come on now. Deep breaths. I will send Page to get you something hot to drink.”
Things proceeded almost sedately from there. The night stretched on, silent and peaceful, and Page returned from the kitchens with a cup of hot cider for Rhaenys. She addressed her as Septa Maegelle when she handed it to her, which made Rhaenys laugh suddenly and loudly, almost like a shriek. Page startled and almost slopped cider all over the dressing table.
Myra shooed her back out, and finished pinning up Rhaenys’ braid. They’d discussed cutting her hair when she was small, to disguise her as a boy, but she was too old to pass for a squire at this point. And her looks were distinct enough in the Vale to warrant curiosity regardless. There were not many Dornishwomen this far north. Still, it could have been worse. If she had the milky Targaryen hair and violet eyes, she would have been even more noticeable.
Myra hid the braid under a velvet coif, and helped Rhaenys into a tunic and surcoat, along with thick hose- two layers of them- and boots. The point was not to disguise her as a man- she’d only pass for one at a distance, on horseback- but to ensure that the ride down from the mountains was as quick and efficient as possible. Fortunately, Rhaenys was a good horsewoman, though she’d never braved the mountain trails before.
The trunk had been packed for years now. Rhaenys stood over it, biting her lip in consternation. It contained basic essentials- warm and cool clothes both, for different climates. Plenty of coin and jewels, to barter with. Hard rations and grain, to trade with. A few books- mostly concerning history and geography.
There was no room for leisure or pleasure in this trunk. Rhaenys’ tomes of poetry and adventure could not come with her. Her high harp and bells would be discarded. Her fine gowns and shoes would molder in the back of the wardrobe.
Myra knew she had to say something. Rhaenys was not spoiled, exactly- she was a prisoner- but she had led a very sheltered life, and in some ways was very young for her age. She’d never had a normal girlhood. She knew nothing of men or the smallfolk. War was a distant horror to her. Her memories of the sack of King’s Landing were fragmented and faded. Leaving the motherhouse would be an icy shock to her, like plunging into a frozen lake. It was necessary, but it would be difficult.
“If you wish to stay,” she said, as neutrally as possible, “it is your decision, Princess.”
Rhaenys turned to her, eyes narrowed. “Stay? So the Lannisters can send their dogs after me, as they did my mother and brother? Stay, so Lysa Arryn can have me thrown out the Moon Door to prevent her kingdom from being invaded? Stay here, surrounded by wolves? Lord Stark begged for my life once. Do you think he will beg again? The Lannister woman? He should rather die.”
Anger was good. It could be sinful, but in this instance, it was good. If she was angry, she would fight. Better blinding fury than languid passivity. Myra could never abide an idle body. It was why she’d put herself in this situation in the first place. Not for any great love of House Targaryen or the late Rhaegar. But because a wrong had been done. An innocent child butchered, a mother and daughter imprisoned for the sins of their husband and father.
And no one breathed a word against it. Robert had given the realm peace and prosperity, aye. But her brother Julian had died fighting for him. And it was Gareth and Ned who’d saved Florence. Not Robert nor any Baratheon. Myra did not wish any ill upon her family. But she’d be damned to the seventh hell if she did not fight until her last breath to give Rhaenys a chance.
“Then you’ve decided,” she said. “I’ll have your trunk brought down. Now we needs wait.”
The sky was a little lighter outside. Dawn would be here in another hour or two. Myra hoped Gerold Grafton could be trusted. If he sold them out to Lady Waynwood… but then, he’d had his chance to do so, again and again over the years. And Robert had killed his brother Marq in the streets of Gulltown. The Graftons did not forget, no more than any other old loyalist family.
The Rogers did not forget either. Myra sat down heavily by the fire, which Page had stoked up hurriedly before running off again. Her family would be horrified with her, if they knew her part in this. Another blow to her mother, her brother. But she thought Flora would have understood. And Luke. They were not like Gareth. They’d never been the firstborn, the heir, the dutiful eldest son. They understood what it meant to feel like a rat in a cage. Myra would always love Amberly.
But it was not her true home anymore. Her home was with her duty, and her duty was to the Princess. She’d made the vow years ago, when Elia yet lived, when Myra was but a girl of five-and-ten, not a woman of five-and-twenty. She hadn’t come here determined to befriend the Martell woman and her child. She’d come as a novice, thinking a motherhouse in the Vale would be easier than one in the Stormlands, so close to home. She’d come here to make a difference. And this was how she could. Rhaenys would be a great queen. She was well-educated, compassionate and stubborn. Rhaegar had forsaken his own claim to the throne with his foolishness, but his daughter did not deserve to be outcast for her father’s mistakes. Mayhaps Robert’s children were also kind and brave. But did they have more of a right to the Iron Throne than Rhaenys? Rhaenys was willing to fight for it, to risk her very life.
The sky was turning pale blue outside when the Mother Superior entered the room. Her white satin robes denoted her high status, and they were trimmed with Myrish lace. A rainbow crystal pendant hung in front of her chest, and her rainbow sash was struck through with a silver pin in the shape of a teardrop.
Werynfryd bowed her head to Rhaenys, who sank to her knees before her. It was her final act as a septa, her last submission. Several other women filed into the room behind the Mother- most were decades older than Myra. Women who had been born during the reign of King Maekar, even, which had ended some sixty years ago.
For these women, Robert’s reign was only a mere interruption to an ancient dynasty. And while few championed Aerys’ actions during the war, most felt that the crimes of House Lannister were nearly as hideous. Some had been serving in King’s Landing during the Sack. They’d seen their fellow sisters raped in the streets. Women and children mangled and left to die in the gutter. Holy relics carried off at spearpoint.
“When you came here as a child, you were forced to renounce any claim to your birthright,” said the Mother to Rhaenys, her hands on her bowed shoulders. “And again when you flowered, Jon Arryn watched as you placed your hand on the Seven-Pointed-Star and swore to never press any right to the Iron Throne. But those vows were made under duress, for fear of violence to your person, Princess. The Seven teach us that a marriage is not valid if a husband or wife is at the altar by swordpoint. The Seven teach us an oath is meaningless if given under torture or deprivation. Tell me true, my child. Do you acknowledge your vows to the Faith? Were they given freely?”
Rhaenys’ voice was a low, fervent murmur. “My only vow to the Faith is to always defend it, Mother. For it to be my shield and my armor against this world. I can do far more good for the people of my realm as their queen than as a holy sister. Forgive me, Mother. Please, forgive me.”
“Peace, child,” said Werynfryd calmly, as if they had not rehearsed this over and over again over the years. “You are forgiven. You were a child, then. You are a woman, now. Go with my blessing. May the Mother’s kindness follow you into the dark. May the Crone’s wisdom light your path. May the Father’s strength bring true men to your cause. May the Smith’s fire fuel your choices. May the Maiden’s peace fill your reign. And may the Stranger’s gaze fall elsewhere, for your time has not yet come.”
“Thank you, Mother.” Rhaenys looked up, blinking hard, and then broke into a girlish grin.
It passed quickly, when she noticed the sober, wrinkled faces gazing upon her, save for Myra.
The Mother helped her to her feet. Rhaenys straightened her fur-lined brown cloak.
Outside, a horn bellowed.
Despite everything, Myra felt a jolt of panic, and turned to the window. Rhaenys shuddered.
“It is only our friend Lord Grafton’s men,” said Werynfryd. “They may be dressed as wildlings, but they are ours. Come. To the stables. Quickly now. The others are already waiting.”
Rhaenys exhaled slowly, and glanced around the room one last time. Myra knew neither of them would ever see it again. She looked upon Princess Elia’s portrait for a long moment, and then followed the Mother Superior out through the door, her cloak whispering after her. Myra followed, trying to ignore the second, louder blare of the horn and the distant shouts of the garrison as the fighting began down below.