Chapter Text
He fell into the water’s cold embrace as he rightfully should if he were indeed trueborn Velaryon. Aemond’s panicked voice still echoing in his ears.
How did it come to this?
The answer was glaringly obvious. It was always so obvious. Yet why did they try hiding so?
Somewhere long, long way back in his mind many lifetimes ago, Lucerys Velaryon heard the distant screams of a boy of ten, along with brief flashes of blood everywhere.
The blood was everywhere.
Even in the sea surrounding High Tide. In every intricate crack on the stone floors. There was a fire cracking in the fireplace somewhere. Fire and blood. Vhagar’s distant growls, feeling her new young rider’s pain through their freshly made bond.
Do not mourn me mother. I may have lost an eye….But I gained a dragon
It was a boulder dropped in the ocean, the ripples spreading far and wide and never ceasing to disappear, the seas still shaking from the weight of a dark fate. The Targaryen dynasty split itself in half as a prince lost his eye by another prince, mother raised blade against mother, ghost of a friendship then lost to the shadows, brother stole his sister’s crown, the one eyed prince finally got his vengeance at his mutilator. Dragons rose and fell, battling for a holy war that did not cleanse but only smear darker. But what did they truly battle for?
Daemon had once told him that to be a Targaryen, greatness can only be achieved if one accepts the madness within.
He didn’t voice out his disagreement.
Verging on insanity they may be, but the house of the dragon cannot stand tall if it is not forged united. As a family.
Too late for regrets now.
As the water filled his lungs, Lucerys Velaryon closed his eyes embracing death like an old friend. The Stranger took him in the shelter of the shadows.
He had thought death would be stillness. Silence. But instead, He saw everything.
Not his life — no, that had been gentle in its way. A boyhood of windswept shores, laughter, and only occasional grief. What he saw now was not memory.
It was prophecy. Or punishment. It was ruin in its primal form.
Daemon entered the war room. The Painted Table glowed with firelight, but he moved past the lords and maps — only toward her. He took Rhaenyra’s hand. Whispered something Lucerys could not hear.
She broke.
Then straightened. Her face — tear-streaked, pale — was transformed. A mother’s agony had turned to a queen’s fury.
Fire and blood. That was the promise in her eyes.
Screams. Helaena’s. He couldn’t shut them out. Two shadows held her down. Little Jaehaerys' head rolled onto the stones. She crumpled with him, sobbing, rocking his body like she could bring him back.
This is for Lucerys, someone had said, voice gruff.
But it wasn’t justice. It was horror.
Vhagar carved fire through the skies. Villages vanished in ash. He saw Aemond above it all, one eye sapphire, the other long lost, face empty but for rage. A boy no more, a weapon of war. Soulless, Godless. Perhaps someone other than Lucerys and Arrax had died above Shipbreaker's bay.
His grandmother. Rhaenys, proud atop Meleys. Facing Aegon on Sunfyre. They danced their last dance in the sky.
Then Vhagar fell upon them like doom itself.
The smoke cleared — Aegon burned, barely breathing. Rhaenys, silent. Meleys, dead.
Aemond sat the Iron Throne. The Conqueror’s crown cast shadows on his pale brow. Tyland Lannister hailed him Prince Regent and Protector of the Realm. His singular gaze was not that of a man. No. There was nothing left within him but shadows.
Jace, Jace. His brave, stubborn brother Jacaerys— falling. Vermax pierced mid-air. His body floated in black waters, arrows in his heart. Lucerys couldn’t reach him.
The God’s Eye.
Caraxes and Vhagar, tangled mid-air. Daemon and Aemond — fire meeting fire, blade meeting flesh.
Daemon leapt.
Dark Sister plunged into Aemond’s remaining eye.
Maybe his eyes were fooling him, but he caught the look on Aemond's gaze. Relief. Welcoming.
Together they fell — two dragons, two princes — swallowed by the lake.
All of them. All gone.
Helaena stepped from the ledge. The garden spikes welcomed her. Dreamfyre’s cries echoed from the Dragonpit, hollow and aching.
Joffrey tried to fly Syrax. The dragon bucked him off — he fell into the crowd of roaring smallfolk, beastlike and hungry with a war of their own.
They tore him apart.
Rhaenyra held Aegon the Younger. Her screams were not human.
The smallfolk stormed the Dragonpit. Tooth met torch, fire met fury. The dragons roared — then died. One by one.
Their blood was not just spilled — it was spent. And with them, so was their's.
Then... the end.
Rhaenyra, his mother, dragged before Sunfyre. King Aegon stood above, smiling like a broken god of death.
"Dracarys," he said.
Flames swallowed her. Aegon the Younger screamed. But there was no saving her. There never was.
Lucerys would have wept, but there were no tears in death. No body to cry with. No voice to scream.
Only this soul, flickering on the edge of memory and ash.
He had thought he died in a storm over Shipbreaker Bay. But now he saw —
That was only the beginning.
"You can fix this."
The voice was… nothing. No warmth. No edge. Neither man nor woman.
It sounded like his own. Like his mother’s. Like Aemond’s. Like no one at all.
He was floating in darkness — thick, endless, suffocating. The kind of dark that curdled and clung like oil. He hated it.
No Jace to whisper that it was just a storm.
No Daemon to ruffle his hair and call him a paranoid fool.
“Who are you? What is this?”
He had no mouth. No form. He was smoke. Flame. But the fire burned cold.
“This is the future of the gods’ chosen bloodline... borne from your death.”
“All this happens because of my death? Am I even dead? Where am I?”
His words echoed, but only shadows listened. They cradled him like arms he couldn’t see.
“You are dead, boy”
The name pierced him. His mother’s voice. A memory carved into starlight.
“It makes no sense. Why? Why must this horror follow?”
“Because it must. Unless you stop it.
“Do you not wish to see your family whole again? No vipers. No betrayal. No fire. No blood?”
He did. Gods, he did. He had always wanted that.
To laugh again with Aemond without fear or pride between them. To be a boy, not a symbol. To take back every childish cruelty he thought was funny. He would never regret protecting Jace — never — but he wished it hadn’t cost his uncle an eye.
He would change it. All of it.
“You can fix this.”
“But why me?”
“Because you were the beginning of this war. And only you can prevent it. You must do whatever it takes to change what is to come. Or House Targaryen will burn as the world watches.”
“And if I fail? What if I make it worse? Is there no peace for me, even after death?”
The voice didn’t answer in words. It hummed in the pit of his soul — low, knowing, eternal.
“You won’t fail, sweet boy. It’s the simplest things: a word at the right moment. A smile. A decision taken, or left alone. Inches, Lucerys. That’s all. Inches for miles.
Sweet boy.
He nearly broke. But there was nothing left of him to break.
His mother called him that when he curled in her arms, small and uncertain. Baela teased him with it, tugging his cheeks until he swatted her hand away, laughing.
He wanted to go to her now. To confess he had failed — that he broke his oath, that he fought when he swore he would not. He wanted her warmth. Jace’s steady presence. Baela’s laughter. Joff’s jokes. Rhaena’s fierce loyalty.
He wanted them alive. Not ashes in the wind.
He never wished to see his mother’s face twisted with rage. Never wanted Daemon to avenge him with such horror. Never wanted sweet Helaena to suffer.
He didn’t want Aemond to become a kinslayer. To carry the guilt like chains. To fall so far that people would whisper Maegor returned
“You can have them.”
“It’s just about the simplest things.”
He believed it.
He would have them.
He would fix everything.
And in the silence of that endless dark, Lucerys Velaryon’s soul grew still.
He gathered his resolve like armor.
“I am ready.”
When that cynical voice spoke of second chances, Lucerys thought he will be back to being a babe fresh out of his mother’s belly. With a clean slate and clean record to start over properly.
But no. They just had to make it difficult up a notch.
He cursed his fate and sunk in his seat as he looked over the table at the farce of a union that was that fateful family dinner.
He was sent back to the time when Rhaenyra Targaryen returned to King’s Landing with her family after eight whole years from Dragonstone to defend her son Lucerys’ claim over Driftmark.
And now Luke was right back at the time after the council, after Vaemond’s death, at the dinner feast arranged by the dying King Viserys in celebration of his family all together after such a long time.
He looked around and could pinpoint the moments with precision. Jace was dancing with Helaena while Otto offered a gentle clap and a small smile at Helaena’s dancing while Baela laughed as her betrothed almost stumbled to keep up to Helaena’s complicated but graceful pacing. Daemon and Rhaenyra were laughing at something Rhaena had said and even Alicent and the Rhaenyra were exchanging smiles, their feud temporarily set aside to let long forgotten bonds re-spin itself into existence.
He remembered his past self, laughing right along with them. Happy and content that his disputed family were for once getting along.
He remembered from the visions shown, how every single one of them in this table would be dead in gruesome ways. Rhaenyra’s now free smile will be reduced to a wroth and grief, Daemon will be become more demon than man, and Aemond-
Lucerys looked over at the opposite side from where he sat and his heart thudded at the sight of his uncle.
Aemond was angled and silently watched Helaena and Jace dance with that same silent, brooding gaze.
The last time Luke had seen him, Aemond was screaming at his out of control dragon to stop going after him and Arrax. She did anyway, the centuries old war hardened dragon who relied upon her instincts that she was.
Afterwards Luke had seen Aemond with Dark Sister run through his skull. That image in itself was so painful that he almost hurled out the contents of his stomach right there and then.
Lucerys wished he never raised that knife that night at Driftmark…….there were other ways he could have protected Jace, hell if the knife was the only option he could have at least mar him somewhere which was not visible and so open.
But now he has the chance to prevent his own death, prevent a war in doing so, and prevent a vengeful Aemond from going after his eye……..but how?
He could start by shouting everything out right now, which could end in either his mother gently coaxing him back to his chambers with the excuse of having in taken too much wine, or the people around the table deciding to send him to the Sept of White Harbor to cleanse his soul.
His head pounded deliriously and he couldn’t fight back the groan as he clutched his temple.
Thankfully no one seemed to notice.
When that darned roasted pig was finally brought to the table, Lucerys felt everything click.
Of course.
He could start by not smirking at Aemond’s face beyond that platter of pork for a start.
Now that he realizes it, it was indeed cruel. He did not intend to laugh so blatantly that time but he was drunk….and the pig looked funny. Only after Aemond had slammed his fist on the table to get up and make that awful toast about ‘’Strongs’’ did he realize the significance of the pig to Aemond, dragging his memory back to that stupid jest in their childhood. But before he even had the chance to regret it, Jacaerys had thrown his fist, Aemond had pushed back, and Luke’s head was slammed on the table on a plate of green beans by a cackling Aegon when he tried to help his brother.
This time though, he didn’t know what reaction he could have at the pig.
He unconsciously settled for a scowl as if the pork had personally offended him.
Well it did ruin a good night in the past so he supposed it was fair enough.
In his peripheral he could see Aemond turn his head to look directly at him. But Luke did not dare look up from the pig even as his uncle’s eye burned into his skull.
But the temptation was too high.
He fluttered his eyes up to meet the lone violet orb and instantly felt his breath stuck in his throat.
He had faced this gaze back at Storm’s End in another life, that violet eye stripping him bare of his layers of emotional barriers. He never truly understood that look and he did not understand it now, but something in him lured him into those pools of unbound fires, until Lucerys was trying to strip Aemond of his barriers too.
They held each other’s gaze steadily, burning in each other’s’ flames.
The pig had been shifted by a servant to Aegon’s side now and was being cut into portions and being loaded into their plates by squires.
He never wanted any of this…he never wanted his uncle to hate him. He remembered a time before Driftmark when he would follow Aemond around like a lost puppy, reading with him, sharing lessons. At first Aemond seemed vaguely annoyed, but soon he resigned and let the Velaryon prince do whatever he wanted. He would quietly read in under the oak tree in the Godswood, sitting against the tree, and lucerys would silently scoot beside him, smushing a cheek on Aemond’s green tunic trying to read the texts too. After a while, Aemond would be reading them out loud and the boys would sit, reading and basking in each other’s company.
Aemond had apparently gotten so used to Luke’s presence, he was driven to a panic when a day came when Luke was not there to follow him. Lucerys lay snuggled up in his blankets, face pale and nose red and runny with cold. Aemond had hesitantly walked into his chambers to meet him, a surprised Rhaenyra greeting him and eying him with suspicion at first but softening when she saw the worry in her brother’s eyes. She let him stay and Aemond had ended up reading to a bubbling with happiness Luke and they had nestled comfortably in the bed together.
The trappings of the Westeros politics may as well have been foreign concepts to them back then. There were no Greens and no Blacks; no Kings to contest Queens. There was only Lucerys, and Aemond.
Remembering those times together sent a pang loud and hollow in his chest, echoing across his entire being.
He did not even realize a tear had slipped out until Aemond’s lips twisted into a frown and eye twinkled with something undecipherable and a wetness in his own chin.
Lucerys blinked and quickly looked away and discreetly wiped away the streak of tear.
He did not look at Aemond for the rest of the night.
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Thank the Seven, the Gods old and new, the Drowned God, the Valyrian gods and whatever deity existed; the dinner feast somehow managed to end smoothly. He breathed out when the plates emptied, musicians moved out their instruments and Aegon was already groggily stumbling out of the hall uncaring, Helaena following soon enough to put her twins to bed.
‘’I think it will be best if I return back to Dragonstone on the morrow. The matter for which we came for is…settled” Rhaenyra sent a look towards Daemon who only continued sipping his Arbor, before continuing, ‘’…and there is no apparent qualms to take care of any longer from my part, I should hope so at least.’’
Lucerys’ mind reeled into panic.
If they return back now, only three days later the King will pass and the Greens will crown Aegon as king…. without Rhaenyra being here, they will take their opportunity and act.
He remembered her cries of pain as she went into early labor and birthed a dead, stillborn and deformed daughter. Little Visenya’s funeral wafting melancholy across the smoky air of Dragonstone.
No.
His would not allow it again.
But before he could scream out any excuse which will hopefully have them delay their departure, it was the Queen who spoke. Her voice carrying its usual gentle firmness with a hint of the misery that seemed to be carved around her for as long as Luke knew her.
"But you’ve only just arrived, Rhaenyra," Alicent said gently, reaching across to take her hands.
The touch surprised her. But after a beat, Rhaenyra smiled and returned the gesture, fingers curling softly around Alicent’s.
"Yes, but—"
"You and your family have been gone a long time," Alicent cut in, her voice low, composed. "Viserys has missed his daughter, his brother, and his grandchildren dearly. And now, with his health in such a fragile state… I think having you here would bring him some comfort." She paused, eyes lingering on Rhaenyra’s face. "It would do him good. And... I would like it too."
The last words were offered almost shyly, quiet and sincere in a way that softened even the guarded tension in Rhaenyra’s posture. She hesitated, glanced at Daemon.
He looked thoughtful, in that uniquely Daemon way—where beneath the reflection, a sharpness always stirred.
"I’ve missed my brother," he said at last, voice calm. "I won’t lie, ñuha prūmia. And I know you have too." His eyes twinkled with a glint that wasn't entirely innocent. "Let’s accept Her Grace’s generous offer, and overstay our welcome—for now."
A faint smile played at the corner of his lips.
"Besides, as heir, it would do you good to reacquaint yourself with the workings of court. The councils, the city, the mood of the realm. I too would like to observe what’s changed in our absence. And perhaps… correct a few of those changes."
To those who knew him, that smile was no act of diplomacy.
It was a dragon flashing its teeth; flames burning in its gullet.
Lucerys sat quietly, but inside he felt the slow uncoiling of relief. Across the table, he saw Otto Hightower’s jaw tighten ever so slightly, his fingers clenching around his goblet. It was just a flicker — but enough. A hairline fracture in the well-laid plans of the Hand.
Daemon saw it too. His smirk deepened behind the rim of his wine cup.
And Lucerys? He felt it then — the first crack in a foundation too carefully built. A weakness he intended to pry open until the whole thing split apart.
He would be the one to do it.
Rhaenyra exhaled, slow and measured, and let her gaze drift to her children. Her hand came to rest gently on the swell of her belly, barely visible beneath her dark silks.
"It seems I’ll be here for a while, then," she said at last, her voice soft with resignation. "Maester Gerardys did warn me not to travel too far — not with a babe in my belly."
Alicent smiled and turned to the servants and asked them to prepare proper chambers for Rhaenyra and her family in the Holdfast. The Queen still looked tense but seemed to have decided that dwelling on their dark past full of betrayals and bloodshed will do them no good than tear apart the Royal Family.
House Targaryen broken and estranged when they should stand tall and united against the wobbly forces of the Realm, will only make it easier to have their reign crumble and therefore plunging Westeros into chaos and catastrophe.
It seemed he was not the only one trying to make things right and peaceful. But where he has the foreknowledge of the dark future, Queen Alicent seemed to be doing things purely out of her own tiredness of being estranged to her once beloved friend and her family. At least he hoped so.
Lucerys dipped his head back and took a long swig of his wine, emptying the goblet.
His steps were heavy, but his mind floated somewhere untethered as he made his way toward his quarters. It was only the Hour of the Witch—early still—but he had died just hours ago, only to wake in the past and begin adjusting the future with trembling hands. The strain was already gnawing at him.
The rest could wait. For now, he needed sleep.
But the gods—or whatever cruel force ruled this world—were never so merciful.
"Tough day, dear nephew?"
Lucerys froze. The voice slithered over his skin, raising the fine hairs at the back of his neck. He went hot and cold all at once.
He knew that voice.
My Lord Strong…
It twisted in his memory, a tone he had heard under dark halls and cold stormy winds. He turned slowly, not wanting to give away how violently his nerves were ringing.
And there he stood.
The shadow from his nightmares.
His greatest regret.
His darkest sin.
"Qybōr…"
Men could be handsome. Fierce. Bold.
But Targaryen men were something else entirely—beautiful in the way fire was beautiful: wild, lethal, divine. Aemond Targaryen was the living embodiment of that fire. And Lucerys, though he'd never dare admit it out loud—especially not in front of Daemon—had always thought so.
Without the gloom of Storm’s End to harden his edges, Aemond looked near-angelic in the warm torchlight. But Lucerys knew better. The flame lit the sharp glint in his lone violet eye. The black eyepatch stood out starkly, the pale scar beneath even more so, like a wound that refused to fade.
He remembered the sapphire that lay beneath—how it caught the lightning like a cursed jewel.
I want you to put out your eye. One will serve. I would not blind you.
Lucerys swallowed. “Is there something you need of me, Aemond?”
I plan to make a gift of it to my mother.
Aemond’s lips curled into that same sardonic smirk. “Can’t I simply pay a visit to my favorite nephew?”
Lucerys met the smile with a sharp one of his own. “Of course you can, dear uncle. So long as there aren't any…. ill intentions fostering your need.’’ Like lunging at me without warning and stabbing out his eye.
“You wound me,” Aemond said smoothly. “I only come bearing gifts.”
He took a step closer—tall, assured, silent in his stride. Lucerys resisted the instinct to back away, holding his ground. Up close, he could make out the fine embroidery of the Targaryen sigil etched into the eyepatch—black on black, invisible unless one looked closely.
“A gift, you say?”
“A gift,” Aemond repeated, almost mockingly.
From within his coat, he drew something—metal catching the light.
Lucerys flinched. Not visibly, but inside, he was screaming.
Give me your eye, or I will take it, bastard!
The storm came rushing back—the roar of Vhagar above, Arrax’s screams, the thunder pounding with the rhythm of his own heart. The sound of wings and rain and Aemond’s voice laughing, chasing, demanding...
Yn elēni enkot jemela, taoba…
He knew it. Gods, he knew it. Aemond would ask for it now. With perfect courtesy, like a knight at court, he'd tell him to cut out his eye as an act of penance. Perhaps that would be enough to stop what was coming. Perhaps not.
Lucerys braced himself for the demand.
But Aemond’s tone was soft. Almost amused.
“Lykirī, Lucerys,” he said. “Despite my deepest instincts, I’m not here to draw blood.”
Lucerys blinked. “What… then…?”
Aemond’s eye glittered with something unplaceable—not cruelty, not exactly. For a moment, Lucerys couldn’t read him at all.
“I’m simply returning something to its rightful owner.”
He flipped the dagger in his hand and held it out by the hilt.
It wasn’t Valyrian steel. Not dragonglass. Nothing ornate. The blade was short, elegantly curved at the tip. The handle was carved from plain oak.
Lucerys stared at it.
The last time he saw that dagger, it was covered in blood.
His blood.
The same dagger he’d used to slash open Aemond’s face all those years ago on Driftmark.
Lucerys knew pain. He’d known it his whole life—the pain of memory, of guilt, of nightmares whispered through time. He remembered the boy sitting by the fire, the maester stitching the ruin of his face. He remembered the letters he wrote afterward, ink smudged with tears. Apologies no one ever answered.
None of that made this moment any easier.
His hand shook as he took the blade, holding it like something vile—a cursed thing he never wanted to see again. It felt heavier than it should. Like it carried every ounce of his shame.
Aemond’s hands clasped behind his back again. His smile was sharp now, too sharp.
“What’s the meaning of this?” Lucerys asked, not bothering to hide the tremble in his voice.
“I told you. Returning it.”
“How do you even have it?”
Aemond shrugged, a subtle roll of his shoulders. “Why? Upset that you couldn’t keep your prize?”
Lucerys had the sudden urge to slap Aemond so hard his remaining eye would fall out of its socket.
Instead, he bit down the words, teeth clenched. Aemond stepped in, closer than necessary, until Lucerys could see the gradient of color in his iris—the faint violet that darkened near the edge.
His voice dropped to a whisper, soft and low, like the first breeze before a storm.
“Keep it, dear nephew. Let it haunt you. Let it whisper, day and night, of the debt still unpaid.” He paused, then softly spoke a phrase in High Valyrian:
''As you have mine.''
Lucerys didn’t move, didn’t breathe, until Aemond turned and walked away, offering a sweetly venomous, “Sleep well,” over his shoulder.
Only once the hall was empty did Lucerys exhale, the air ripping from his lungs.
He looked down at the dagger still clutched in his palm. It burned against his skin. And as he stared at it, memories pooled behind his eyes—blood, rain, flame.
In the silence, he whispered back, words thick with old pain.
''Not like you haven't been doing so for the past eight years.''
And yet, the blade remained. Warm. Real.
A reminder.
A promise.
Lucerys would rather have Aemond curve out his eye, then hold that cursed artifact. It burned his fingers, and if he closed his eyes he could imagine the warm sticky wetness dripping down his hands and the blade.
High Valyrian Translations--
- ñuha prumia- My heart
-Yn eleni enka jemela, taoba!- You owe a debt, boy!
- Qȳbor - Uncle (mother's younger brother)
-lykirī- Calm down