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“That night I learned there are two kinds of hunger. [...] but there’s a second part of me, biding its time. It can go on like that for months, maybe even years, but sooner or later I’ll give in to it. It's like there’s a great big hole inside me, and once it takes his shape he's the only thing that can fill it.”
― Camille DeAngelis, Bones & All
“What is that scar on your hand?”
It was one of Daemon Targaryen’s earliest memories—he sat with his father in the godswood, under the shade of an alder tree. After his father tossed a stone into a shallow pool, Daemon caught a glimpse of the silvery line that ran along his palm.
Baelon looked at him with a sad smile. “Your mother and I were wed in the Valyrian tradition,” Baelon explained, holding out his hand. “We cut our palms, and our lips.” His fingers ghosted over his lower lip, long-healed of that injury.
Daemon examined the mark closely, comparing it to his own smooth, unmarred palm. “So Mother had a scar too?” He could not remember what his mother’s hands looked like.
Baelon nodded, his eyes growing wet. “She did.”
“Did it hurt?”
“It must have,” he said, flexing his hand. “But it is a funny thing. Time has dulled the sharpness of it. I can no longer recall.”
"How can you not recall something like that?" Daemon asked, furrowing his brow. "Something that made you bleed?"
“The pain is not the point, Daemon,” Baelon said. He laughed softly, his eyes unfocused and faraway, seeing something that only existed now in his memories.
“What is the point, then?”
“The joining. Hen lantoti ānogar, va sȳndroti vāedroma.”
Blood of two, joined as one.
As Daemon grew to manhood, he expected a match with one of his aunts, or a cousin, perhaps. None of them inspired the same fanatical devotion in him that seemed to exist between his parents, but nevertheless there was no shortage of suitable options.
So when Queen Alysanne announced he was betrothed to Rhea Royce, a dour and joyless girl from the Vale, Daemon thought it a cruel jape. It quickly became clear it was no jest—and Daemon wondered what had he done that was so abhorrent he should be denied a Valyrian bride.
Daemon understood marriage was a political arrangement. A duty, to have children and strengthen the family. Yet he could not disavow himself of the idea that it was possible to both fulfill one’s duty and delight in the consummation of it.
He had well exceeded everything expected of him as a Targaryen prince—he claimed a dragon, he earned a knighthood, he wore Dark Sister at his hip—what had it all been for? While he longed to spit at his grandmother’s feet with the bitterness accumulating on the back of tongue, Daemon could not help but stoke a flame of anger toward his father, who did nothing to protest.
“Perhaps it is better this way,” Baelon had said, his voice thick with grief. “You will be spared the pain that comes from living each day missing half of your heart.”
The wedding was a stoic affair.
When Daemon envisioned this day, it was amidst the salt and smoke of Dragonstone, standing across from a woman with silver threads of hair that caught the light of flickering candles. Whose eyes reflected back a shared understanding of the weight of their legacy. It was joining the seams of blood on their palms, linking them forever heart and mind, just as it had been with his mother and father.
Instead, he stood in the cloying air of the royal sept, listening to empty words from a dusty old septon. The girl standing across from him held scarcely-concealed hatred in her eyes, her hair dark and dull against the limpid flames of guttering candles. The cloak he placed around Rhea Royce’s shoulders was heavier than stone, and it took all his strength to raise it.
Daemon’s palm itched as he spoke the words of a toothless contract he had no intention of honoring: “One flesh, one heart, one soul, now and forever.”
The words rebounded in the hollow of his chest—he would join no part of himself with this girl, no matter what they forced him to speak. These gods were not his gods, and when he committed his flesh, his heart, his soul to forever, it would be with someone worthy of the devotion.
He had but to wait.
When Daemon first held his niece, his heart swelled with primordial affection.
He had never thought himself particularly interested in babies, but Rhaenyra Targaryen was a perfect Valyrian princess, with her wispy tufts of silver hair and bright purple eyes. Already she was possessed of a bold, ungovernable spirit, and Daemon’s joy in the moment was matched only by a commensurable spike of envy.
The blood of old Valyria did not surge so insistently in Viserys as it did Daemon—how then did it come to pass that his brother should have the life he coveted?
Viserys, whose tongue was clumsy and ill-suited to the language of their ancestors. Viserys, whose dragon claim withered and died in less than a year. Viserys, whose lip and palm remained smooth and unmarked, content to seal his union with only the empty words of foreign gods.
All that Daemon desired in his own life dangled in front of his grasp, just out of reach. He resolved to have it, though he did not know when or how, but by the gods of Old Valyria he would take what he was owed.
When Daemon claimed his niece’s maidenhead, he expected blood.
Though the princess had been riding horses and dragon both since the age of seven, Daemon was rather generously endowed. It was not a boast, like the ones men are wont to make over their cups; it was simply the truth. Even with preparation it was likely to be difficult for her to take him.
But she did take him, and beautifully at that.
Spread out beneath him, Rhaenyra wanted—nay, demanded—all that he had to give her. She was already a greedy thing, a creature of lust, hot-blooded and at once easy and impossible to please. A heady combination, he had to admit, the way she came apart for him so easily, again and again, in contrast with the way her lust was never slaked.
He loosened her first with his tongue, devouring her sweet cunt until her legs shook around him, her slim thighs pressing against his temples. He eased her open with his fingers, slowly, steadily stretching her until she begged for more.
Even as pliant as Rhaenyra turned out to be, there was, as expected, some bleeding. What Daemon did not expect was the maddening fire it would stoke.
To see his cock shining with her maiden’s blood ignited something deep within him—some great slumbering beast that shook off centuries of sleep. Some part of his heart he had sealed off and let grow cold in the long bondage of his marriage. He thought to taste it, to take succor from her blood and renew his spirit that had gone so long bereft.
Daemon had once made sport of deflowering maidens, and thus had seen his share of blood in their breaking, but none had ever roused such a thing in him.
He wrote off the dark impulse as a result of so many frenzied emotions, he and Rhaenyra both in a delirium after a night carousing about the city with their spirits running high, aroused to tremendous heights by the varied displays of flesh in the brothel. Surely it all played a part in this new, vicious hunger that had awakened in him.
Or perhaps it was a product of their shared blood—Valyrian blood, flowing so strong and hot in them both it stirred an ancestral predilection. Blood had once been central to their religion, after all. Rites and practices steeped in it, wreathed in smoke and fire.
“What is it, Uncle?” Rhaenyra asked, gasping and catching her breath after he filled her with his spend. She glanced down, and saw the evidence of her broken maidenhead. Her eyes went wide. “Oh! I…I bled on you.”
“It is known to happen,” he said softly. He settled beside her, stroking sweat-slicked strands of hair back from her face. “No matter. Are you in pain?”
Rhaenyra shook her head. “Not really—not much. It’s a good ache, I think.” She grinned then. “I should like to try it again.”
Daemon’s cock stirred, apparently requiring no rest, as if he were still a boy of six and ten. “We can try as many times as you like, Princess.”
She turned on her side, slipping easily into the little space that had remained between them. Her eyes were bright when she looked up at him. “Right now?”
Daemon laughed and slipped his arm around Rhaenyra’s waist. “Whenever you desire.”
Daemon knew from the first moment he sheathed himself inside her that he would spend the rest of his life endeavoring to test the limits of her desire. There would be no other for him, unless Rhaenyra desired to invite company into their bed. Their bed. He got ahead of himself, thrilled at the prospect of bedding this fiery girl every night until he no longer could.
“Will I…” She bit her lip. “I won’t bleed again? Will I?”
He shook his head, and bent to kiss her brow. “Likely not.”
Yet his dark thoughts swirled: I wish you would.
Word spread quickly of their deeds in the brothel, racing ahead of them before they could return to the Red Keep in the morning. The Hand’s work, Daemon had no doubt. Otto Hightower had long despised him, seeking out every opportunity to undermine him to the king.
But Daemon did not fear retribution. His purpose was clear.
He and Rhaenyra entered the gates of the keep together, just after dawn. The guards moved to seize Daemon, but it was Rhaenyra who stepped between them, holding out her hands. She stuck out her chin, her eyes blazing with defiance.
“If you touch him you will have to clap me in irons as well.”
The guards balked at the prospect, and conceded the way. They followed closely behind as Daemon and Rhaenyra made their approach to the throne room.
Viserys was waiting, gathering to himself all the rage and anger he could bring to bear. He shook, his face a cloud of fury, and as close to true blood of the dragon as Daemon had ever seen his brother. He lunged for Daemon, but again Rhaenyra placed herself between him and those who would do him harm.
“You have ruined her!” Viserys cried.
“Then give Rhaenyra to me,” Daemon said, and Rhaenyra looked back at him with delight. “I will wed her in the tradition of our house.”
“You are mad!” Viserys said. “Is your ambition so monstrous?”
“I have no designs on your throne, Brother. I want Rhaenyra.”
“I want this,” Rhaenyra interjected fiercely. “You gave me leave to take a husband of my choosing. I choose Daemon.”
Viserys looked as if his knees were about to buckle. “And if I refuse?”
“Then I shall climb the highest tower in the Keep and fling myself onto the cobbles below. You will have to explain to the realm how you drove their princess and heir to end her life.”
Daemon felt a surge of affection for Rhaenyra as Viserys’ mouth gaped open in shock. She stood firm and resolute until Viserys had no choice but to acquiesce, and to grant Daemon the annulment he had long-desired.
A great burden that had hung about his shoulders since he was six and ten finally lifted. With the promise of Rhaenyra to take to wife, he was free. He was capable of anything. He could conquer the world.
They were wed a fortnight later.
It seemed all of King’s Landing assembled in the Dragonpit to witness the joining of Prince Daemon and Princess Rhaenyra. A septon presided over a ceremony of the Faith, reviving bitter memories of his youth. However, this time placing the cloak about Rhaenyra’s shoulders was easy, a task lightened by his keenness for it. Still Daemon did not stock much in the custom. They were wed in the eyes of these Andal gods, and laws of the land, but it meant little to him.
As soon as dawn broke after their wedding feast in King’s Landing, they took to dragonback.
Amidst the salt and smoke of Dragonstone, they cut their palms, sliced their lips, and spoke their vows in the only tongue that could feel like an oath to creatures of Valyrian blood. When they shared a kiss, Daemon sucked drops of blood from Rhaenyra’s lip, and his whole body shivered with pleasure.
He needed more of this, more of her.
Their bedding the night before had been long hours of enjoying each other until they were both sore and utterly spent. Daemon was sure he had given her a babe, the amount of seed he spilt inside her.
But the smear of blood on Rhaenyra’s forehead, the wine-stained lips, renewed his vigor in both spirit and body. In a storm of lust he took Rhaenyra to the chambers he had established for himself in Dragonstone’s keep. They scarcely made it into the room before tearing off each other’s robes, grasping and squeezing and gripping with eager, violent hands.
Their palms ripped open anew from their exertions, fresh blood pouring forth—a holy ichor with which to anoint themselves in blessed union. When they finally parted, it seemed there was no span of flesh on the other they had not painted red. Rhaenyra looked like a blood god of old Valyria—her hair draped around her like a silver veil, her skin covered only by the blood he dressed her in.
“You look so beautiful like this,” Daemon growled, squeezing her hips.
Rhaenyra returned his primal energy, her eyes ablaze with a fierceness that made him desperate for her. “You enjoy the sight of me drenched in blood, Kepus?” she asked, her lip titled in amusement.
“Kessa. Yes,” he breathed. “Ñuha ānogar. Īlva ānogar."
My blood. Our blood.
“I imagine this is how you looked in battle, Uncle,” she said as she grazed his neck with her teeth. “I thought of you often, resplendent in your armor. Your braids. Spattered with the blood of your enemies. Such a fire that burned in me at the thought.”
Daemon snarled, clutching her to him and lifting her by the waist. She wrapped her legs around him as he carried her to the bed. He slammed her down, and hovered over her, drinking in the sight of her wild, blood streaked face. He ran one hand down her stomach, slippery with blood, and slid his fingers into her humid slit. She arched her back, and thrust her hips toward his hand.
“What did you do, then, when you had these thoughts? Hm? Did you touch yourself, my sweet wife? Did you fuck yourself on these delicate little fingers?”
Rhaenyra gasped, tossing her head back and exposing her pale, slender throat. Daemon sucked at the flesh, smearing it with the blood streaming from his lip.
“Yes, Kepus,” she breathed.
“But it wasn’t enough, was it, my greedy girl?” he said, slipping two fingers into her cunt. She cried out, then her face split into a wide grin.
“No, Kepus. Never enough.”
Daemon wondered now what would ever be enough for him. He wanted to take everything from her, and give everything in return. He wanted to take her to the very boundaries of pleasure. He wanted to sink his teeth into her, to claim her in every way he possibly could.
What he felt for her was beyond description—something so raw and powerful it could only be thought, for no words existed in any tongue to describe it. He endeavored to put word to it anyway.
“I have never been a man who prays, but you, ñuha ābrazȳrys, are a goddess. I would worship at your altar.”
Rhaenyra surged up to him, clutching him, thrusting her hot, eager tongue into his mouth. Daemon felt the sting in his lip as blood poured between them, coppery and rich and alive.
“Kneel, then, husband,” she murmured. “And pray.”
Daemon knelt there and then, gripping her thighs and urging them apart so that he could pull her to the edge of the bed and bury his face in her cunt. The salt tang of her arousal mingled with blood made him ravenous. He moved entirely on impulse, letting his tongue rove where it would, wherever it wanted a taste of her.
She came apart, gasping, after only a short time.
After, Daemon watched Rhaenyra sleep, blood dried and crusted all over her lithe body. Bearing his fingerprints in the smudges, the evidence that he was there, that she belonged to him. That he belonged to her in turn.
The low thrum of contentment beat steadily in his chest.
Their ardor did not fade in the weeks that followed. They remained on Dragonstone, and fucked often, loudly, and with little regard for who might hear or even walk in on them. They spent the better part of the next several weeks in bed, only leaving when necessity required it. Servants brought them food and drink, and news from the capital. Daemon was utterly besotted with his bride, his perfect wife.
Viserys expected them to return eventually, for Daemon to resume his duties as commander of the city watch, and Rhaenyra, her duties as heir. But in their newlywed haze little else mattered. They measured the passing of hours only by the space between their pleasures. Daemon could not stop touching her; he never wanted to be more than a finger’s length away. And Rhaenyra was content to let him dote on her. She clung to him just as possessively.
It was only when Rhaenyra’s courses came that she was hesitant to allow him access to her cunt. But that strange thrill flared to life in him again. He found himself desperate to see the blood spill out of her. To feel it slick and warm between his fingers. To taste it.
“It’s dirty, valzȳrys,” she protested, squirming away from him in their bed.
He caged her in his arms, pressing his hips into hers. “It is not,” he insisted. “No dirtier than any other blood of yours. Which, if you recall our wedding night, should not concern you.”
She gave him an incredulous look, and wrinkled her nose. “That’s different.”
Daemon smirked. “Silly girl,” he said, tracing a finger down her thigh. “I’ve been covered in blood on the battlefield and I can assure you, your blood is not filthy, no matter where it comes from.”
She chewed her lip, clearly still uncertain. Daemon would beg, if it came to that. He needed to know this part of her. “The blood is different, Kepus. Thicker.”
“Do you think this is the first time I have bedded a woman while she bleeds?”
Her scowl could darken the room. “There is pain that comes with the blood, too,” she complained. “Terrible cramping. I…I fear I will not make it an enjoyable time for you.”
Daemon cooed softly as he traced the curve of her thigh, and cupped her mound. “I will help ease the pain. Did you not know pleasure was the remedy for the pain from your courses?”
Rhaenyra shook her head, panting slightly as he stroked her slit with a feather-light touch.
“It’s true. The release will soothe you, better than milk of the poppy, or any Maester’s draught.” Daemon dipped his head to kiss her neck. Rhaenyra sighed happily as he nuzzled the delicate skin just beneath her ear. “And my cock filling you will take the cramping away. Your sweet little cunt just needs to be stretched.”
Rhaenyra’s eyes slitted shut, and she exhaled shaky breaths as he continued to touch her. He kept his touches light, gentle, rubbing softly over her tender bud.
“Will you let me help you, ñuha jorrāelagon?”
“Kessa. Yes. Please, Kepus.”
Daemon smiled. He kept kissing—her jaw, her throat, her collarbone—down to her round, swollen breasts. He sucked lightly on her nipples, which he knew must be sore. She gasped, already writhing beneath him. Daemon’s blood heated quickly, pumping straight to his cock.
When his lips approached her stomach, Rhaenyra clenched, stiffening. He murmured against the taut skin. “Open for me, ñuha prūmia. Do not be shy.”
He parted her thighs and made sweet approach to her cunt, tenderly kissing along her milk-white legs until she softened toward him. He parted her folds, running his fingers through her white-blond curls, damp with desire and tinged already with smears of blood. That same feeling pulsed in his gut, in his dark heart. The desire to drink her.
Daemon slipped one finger inside to start. So much wetter than usual, and Rhaenyra’s cunt was deliciously wet at the slightest prompting.
“It feels—it is—,” Rhaenyra struggled, squirming. “—too much.”
He withdrew, and his cock hardened almost painfully at the sight of his long, pale finger glistening with her blood. He held it up for her to see.
“Look how beautifully you adorn me, dārilaras.”
Her cheeks flushed with shame and arousal both. Daemon needed her to see how beautiful she was. How beautiful this was. He sucked his finger into his mouth, letting his tongue clean him of her.
Rhaenyra’s eyes went wide. “How does it taste?” she asked meekly.
It was coppery, metallic, like how he imagined blood cleaned from the blade of a sword must taste. "I would taste more, if you’ll permit me.”
Rhaenyra nodded feebly. “Yes. All right.”
Daemon returned to his place between her thighs, and lifted her legs to drape them over his shoulders. He brushed his lips over her first, and she shuddered. He flitted out his tongue to taste her. Her moon’s blood bloomed on his palate like good wine, revealing new and delightful notes the longer it remained, the more he drank.
Slowly she relaxed, easing into his affections until she was crying out in ecstasy as he brought her over the edge, any shame at tainting him with her moon’s blood long forgotten as her hips thrust wildly against his mouth. And when he fucked her, she screamed louder than she ever had before, brought to tears by the force of her climax.
“Do you feel better now, dārilaras?” he asked her afterwards, as they lay tangled together.
“Yes,” she affirmed. She rolled on her side to face him, admiring the stain of her womb on his cock. “Perhaps the maesters ought to prescribe this remedy to all women suffering in the ache of their courses.”
“What do maesters know of pleasure?” Daemon scoffed. “Best leave your treatment to me.”
"Of course, valzȳrys,” she said with a grin. “I will not think to question your wise judgment on such matters again."
It became a ritual, Daemon quickly learning the pattern of her cycle.
His excitement grew to unbearable heights as the time approached. He found himself unable to focus on much else. Caraxes sensed his restlessness, taken to fits of prowling the island for fresh prey, leaving scattered goat carcasses strewn about the countryside in fits of monstrous appetite.
And Rhaenyra seemed to grow to look forward to it as well. She quickly shed the girlish reluctance that had first plagued her. His bold, brilliant girl rode his face without a shred of shame, letting her blood leak into his mouth, down his cheeks and throat. He drank greedily from her, thrusting his tongue deep into her cunt so that he might taste from her womb itself.
It was still half a turn at least until she would bleed—if she was not with child. Conflict warred inside him—he wanted badly to see her swell with his child, but so too did he fear that her courses would stop, and for many long moons he would be a man starved.
It called to mind tales he had read as a boy, of ghoulish creatures from the unknowable reaches of Essos, far to the east past the shadowlands and Asshai. Creatures who could not be nourished by food and drink, and thus sustained themselves on blood and human flesh. A sickness, a craving, that had to be satisfied, lest they be driven to madness.
Daemon could not say when the cadence of their blood sport was no longer enough to satisfy him, only that he was starved for her in the intervening weeks, to the point he could no longer stand.
He approached her one evening, and it took only his hands on her waist, and a soft kiss on her mouth to endear her to him. She melted into his arms, her clever hands already making quick work of his breeches. He swept a hand into her hair, pulling her mouth to his. They shared a long, languid kiss before he pulled back.
“Do you remember our wedding night, ñuha prūmia?” he asked, stroking her cheek.
“How could I forget?” She grinned and slipped her hand around his cock.
“I have been thinking of it often of late,” Daemon said as he brushed his thumb over her plush lower lip.
Rhaenyra looked up at him inquisitively as she gave his cock a gentle squeeze.
“Would you let me cut you again?”
She smiled beneath his thumb. “We can relive our wedding night as many times as you wish, valzȳrys. It is one of my most treasured memories.”
Daemon caressed her cheek. “I want to do more than that, ñuha jorrāelagon.”
She cocked her head, and to her credit, showed no hint of fear. If anything she seemed eager for what he might say next. He dragged his fingers down the side of her neck, across her collarbone. He pushed aside her robe, and stroked her breast. Her nipples hardened under his attention. “Would you let me cut you elsewhere?” he said,
Her hand on his cock stilled. “Where do you want to cut me?”
“You would look so beautiful with my blade pressed to your skin, here.” He squeezed her breast, and she gave a giddy sigh.
“Yes, Kepus. I want you to. I want to do this.”
He kissed her fiercely, and she withdrew her hand from his trousers to fling her arms around his neck.
"Take off your robe," he growled.
She smirked, and stepped away from him, loosening her robe the rest of the way. Daemon’s eyes drank her greedily as she let it drop to the floor. His beautiful wife.
"Lay down."
She complied, spreading herself out on their bed. The pale skin of her chest flushed prettily. In her eyes danced the fires of anticipation. Her desire to explore new territories with him never ceased to warm his heart, and harden his cock.
Daemon withdrew his dagger from his discarded belt, and joined Rhaenyra on the bed. He knelt between her legs
At first he did not cut; he dragged the flat of his blade across her skin. Delicate, careful never to press too hard. Valyrian steel had a sharp bite, but it obeyed its master, it was responsive to his touch. He could exert as much or as little force as he desired, and the blade submitted to his will.
So he started with just enough to scratch. He etched designs in her flesh, pink marks left behind on alabaster skin. Like an intricate work of Myrish pottery, of marble and rose quartz. His breath was shaky, his cock aching for her. But he did not wish to rush.
Rhaneyra writhed and flexed beneath him. She panted, Daemon slipped his free hand between her thighs, his fingers slid in the slick heat pooling there.
"Enjoying this, are you?"
“Yes, valzȳrys,” she sighed, her eyes closing as she rocked against his fingers.
Only once she was accustomed to the touch of his steel did he dare press deeper, did he dare draw blood. “Can I cut you here, ñuha jorrāelagon?” He dipped the point of his knife into the pliant flesh of her breast.
"Please."
Slowly he exerted more pressure, the blade impressing her skin, the tension like an overfull glass of water, just a drop away from breaking. When it broke the skin, Daemon felt it ripple through his body, the sort of thrill he had only ever felt in battle.
Rhaenyra gasped as a bead of blood rolled down the curve of her breast.
He made more shallow cuts, until her chest shimmered and sparkled with a hundred tiny rubies.
"Please, Kepus. I cannot stand it any longer. I need you inside of me."
He fucked her with his blade held against her throat, and when they lay with their foreheads pressed together, sharing breath and blood, the hunger in him was soothed and sated.
They returned to King's Landing, given their own apartments in Maegor’s Holdfast. Daemon keenly missed their time on Dragonstone, where they had no duties but to one another. Where she could be the singular focus of his attentions.
There quickly grew murmurings about the Keep of their proclivities, due to the loudness with which they proclaimed their passion for each other, but soon too did rumors abound which took a nefarious turn, couched whispers behind cupped hands about the heir to the throne and the Rogue Prince coupling in service of some dark art, blood rites and Valyrian black magic. Their servants kept their heads bowed and spoke in hushed whispers when they cleared the sheets, and people looked at them askance whenever they passed in the hall.
Daemon found it amusing—he was accustomed to being the subject of malicious rumor. What new and depraved thing the court might say about him behind his back was a delightful guessing game. But he did not take lightly aspersions cast on his wife. He was quick to threaten to cut the tongue from any man who dared utter a foul word against her.
So too was he driven to distraction by his need. A constant dark thread tangled with all his thoughts. At small council meetings he could only focus on his wife from across the table, thinking of when he could next bleed her.
Rhaenyra was eager, her zest for the practice nearly matching his own. One evening, as rivulets of blood streamed down her bare arms, she made a request:
“You have bled me so many times, Kepus. I would very much like to try.”
Daemon thought there could be no greater pleasure than bleeding her, but when Rhaenyra first dragged his own knife along his forearm, tracing his branching veins, he had to keep tight grip on his throbbing arousal lest he spill prematurely.
She rode him that night, the dagger blade kissing his throat, and Daemon’s heart sang with the fulfillment of their vows: hen lantoti ānogar, va sȳndroti vāedroma.
Blood of two, joined as one.
For a time, Daemon thought himself perfectly content. Rhaenyra denied him nothing, yet the hunger crept in once more, gnawing and clawing at the interstitial spaces between his bones. When the thought of how next best to feed it entered his mind, it was as good as done.
Rhaenyra was already abed when he came to her. She smiled fondly at the sight of him. “You have a certain dark look about you, husband. I wonder what it is you need?”
"It is not me, but Dark Sister,” Daemon said, drawing the sword from his belt. “She has a thirst. She envies my knife its taste of you. Envies my tongue.”
Rhaenyra leaned back on the bed, pulling her nightshirt over her knees, and up her thighs. She spread her legs. Her cunt pulsed, already shining and wet. “Let her drink, then.”
Daemon dragged Dark Sister's keen blade along Rhaenyra's milk-white thighs, blooming fresh trails more beautiful and bright than those he had so often made with his knife. The blood flowed freely, mingled with her arousal, sweet sacrament pouring forth from the most holy font—and he was drunk on it, the heady rush stronger and more potent than any wine. But the blood did not stop. There was so much—too much.
The color drained from Rhaenyra’s cheeks. Her eyes flashed up to him, fearful. He recoiled—she has never looked frightened of him, never withdrew from him in fear or disgust. "Daemon…I, I don't feel…" Her eyes slid shut, and her breath faded to a fragile rattle.
Daemon did not remember dressing. Did remember running. Did remember gripping Maester Mellos by his robes, wild-eyed and fearful, before dragging the man to their chambers.
Mellos staunched Rhaenyra’s wound, applying pastes and ointments that stemmed the flow of blood. Then he stitched her closed. With every stitch Daemon felt a needle in his own heart. Her pain was his, shared, he did not know where hers ended and his own began.
Later, while Rhaenyra slept in a deep, dreamless sleep aided by milk of the poppy, Daemon found himself transfixed on the wound, the stitches. It was a lengthy gash, running nearly the entire length of her thigh. The fear was palpable, unthinkable that he could have lost her. He would rather die than live one day in this world without Rhaenyra. He thought of his father then, and wondered how he could have endured all those years without his mother. It would have been easier to die.
Daemon sighed, and traced the ridges of Rhaenyra's stitching. Valyrian steel cuts clean, so while it was gruesome now, the injury would heal to just a delicate white thread where once Rhaenyra’s lifeblood nearly poured out.
Guilt gnawed at him, and yet the hunger had stronger jaws.
He imagined running his tongue along the scar, and gods help him if he did not think about running his blade along the ghostly lines as well. To know if scarred flesh felt different, tasted different. If the blood poured out just the same.
But it put a fear in Rhaenyra’s heart, and Daemon did not want to see that look in her eyes again. So he would suppress that awful desire as best he could.
Fortune would turn in their favor that soon after the scare, Rhaenyra became pregnant with their first child.
Before they had split their time between King’s Landing and Dragonstone, but Rhaenyra wanted to enjoy her pregnancy in the peace and quiet of their private home. Daemon passed command of the city watch to Harwin Strong, and brought his wife home to Dragonstone.
Her pregnancy distracted him well enough—nearly enough to forget. He was drunk on desire watching her body swell and grow. Worshipped the blessed font of life that was her cunt, the swollen tender breasts.
Impossibly, her lust charted higher than ever before as she entered the mid-months of the pregnancy. He could hardly keep up with her insatiable appetite for him. Often unable even to wait until they got back to their chambers. She pulled him into darkened corners, lifting her skirts and pulling him to her. He liked to fuck her from behind, rubbing his hands over her swelling belly.
For the moons of her pregnancy, the hunger for more than what her flesh could offer satisfied him well enough. But when she brought the babe into the world, the pulse of life gushing from her sent him into a frenzy. Mad with desire for her, to fuck into that sweet, messy cunt until he was covered in her.
The maester had hardly cut the baby from the cord when Daemon, wracked with frantic impatience, demanded he and Rhaenyra’s ladies clear the room. Rhaenyra looked up at him in dazed confusion, but was otherwise too occupied holding their child to her breast to notice anything awry.
“Get out,” he commanded.
“My lord,” Mellos cautioned. “The Princess still needs—”
“I said leave us!”
They looked to one another fearfully, and to Rhaenyra. But the babe was clean and healthy, cooing softly at Rhaenyra’s breast. Rhaenyra hardly seemed to notice the blood and viscera she still lay in—she only had eyes for the babe.
Daemon carefully laid himself beside Rhaenyra, and reached out to stroke the cheek of their sweet son. He moved to caress his wife’s thigh, his fingers dipping into the blood that smeared her.
“Daemon…” Her voice wavered.
“Please, ābrazȳrys. I need you.”
“Daemon, I cannot—”
“You have no idea what the sight of you like this does to me.” He groaned, pressing his hardening length against her. “I need to be inside of you.”
She clutched their babe, and looked at him wide wide, fearful eyes. A flicker of that fear from the night he cut her too deeply. His stomach clenched wretchedly at the sight, and he relented.
“It brings me no pleasure to deny you, valzȳrys,” she said.
He stroked her sweat-streaked face with trembling hands. “I know, ñuha jorrāelagon. I know. I am sorry. I’ll send the septa back in to get you cleaned up.” He bent to kiss her brow. “You are beautiful, dārilaras. Our son is perfect.”
She smiled up at him dreamily, and returned to kissing and snuggling their child.
Daemon sent the maester back in, and tried to distract himself with walking. But he could not let his thirst go unslaked. His cock throbbed in his breeches, desperate for release. His blood sang for blood—more blood, her blood. But his blood was part his own after all. It would have to do.
In his study, Daemon took off his pants, his cock thick and heavy. It was not the same when he had to do it himself. Nothing provided so good a release as his sweet wife. But he could not harm her, not now, he did not wish to see that frightened look in her eyes ever again
He unsheathed his dagger, and drew the tip across his palm.
He was flooded with memories of their wedding, of their Valyrian vows. So he cut his own lip, and licked at the beads of blood that gathered there.
With a wet, stinging hand he gripped his cock, and began to stroke.
The blood smeared in uneven streaks. And it was true, that their blood was the same, for as it bathed his cock he could not tell the difference between his own and hers.
Daemon spilled quickly, the spend mingling with his blood as it dripped to the floor.
Waiting for Rhaenyra to heal from birth was the longest torture Daemon had ever endured.
She could not bear to take him inside her cunt, so they devised other methods to extract their pleasure. She took him in her mouth, and he lingered for hours between her thighs, pleasuring her with his tongue, gently and slowly even as he longed to savage her.
Being deprived of her set his mind wandering, and he sought any distraction he could to keep his thoughts from dwelling on the empty, gnawing ache in his gut. On one such quest for distraction, Daemon found among the many ponderous tomes in the Keep’s library a rather curious account: a journal, from a maester of the Citadel who intended to forge his Valyrian steel chain, and thus set out to study occult practices in all the far-flung corners of the world.
“...brings us to the N’ghai. After centuries of raiding and plundering, the kingdom of N’ghai has been reduced to a single remaining city. The city, Nefer, is situated at the mouth of a river that empties into the Shivering Sea, and serves as the last known port in the Far East of Essos. Known as the ‘Secret City’ by travelers, the vast majority of Nefer is said to exist underground, encased beneath the high chalk cliffs surrounding the river delta. Few outsiders have been permitted entry, and the tales that do emerge paint a sinister picture.
“When our ship approached the harbor, it seemed a dead city, long-abandoned, with but a few dilapidated out-buildings. There were but few inhabitants, silent, serious men who assisted in mooring our ship to the docks.”
Daemon read on, about the maester’s tour of the secret city, the many queer sights beneath the earth, and his impressions of the people there.
“...a notch at the base of the cliff, cleverly concealed by the natural terrain. Only the N’ghai themselves know how to access the entrance. I was blindfolded, and disoriented such that I would never be able to find the way back through my own recollection. The N’ghai take great care to preserve their secrets, especially given the relentless plundering by their neighbors, the Jogos Nhai.”
“There is a meandering path, cutting back and forth, carved deep into the walls. It spirals down many yards before opening to the true city. It is cool, and damp beneath the earth. There are certain fungi and other such plants that emit an unearthly glow, adapted to the darkness. The N’ghai have adapted as well. Their eyes are better suited to drinking in what little light lingers in such a dim place.”
As Daemon flipped through the pages, his eyes and his mind snagged on a particular entry.
“It so happened there was to be a marriage ceremony during my stay in Nefer, and I was invited to attend as a distinguished guest. I was eager to observe such a custom. Much like the Valyrian rites, there was ritual garb, the man cloaked in rich reds and browns, the woman wearing a beaded shawl set with rubies. I did not understand the words that were spoken, but it seemed to follow the pattern of marriage ceremonies around the world—an exchanging of vows, presided over by some representative of their faith. However, the similarities to any recognizable custom ended there.
“To seal the covenant, the priest brought forth a peculiar knife, small and curved, and set it on an altar. He then produced a chalice, which I was informed later contained an elixir to dull the senses for what came next. The bride and groom each moved aside their garb, to reveal their underclothes which bore a small, rectangular hole, exposing an area of flesh just below their breast. To my enduring shock, the N'ghai then cut a small piece of flesh from the exposed area, first the bride, then the groom. The priest’s elixir must have been quite potent, as neither party showed any indication of pain or fear. Once the flesh was removed, the priest said a few words, apparently blessing the offerings.
“The N’ghai then did the unthinkable—something so gruesome I hesitate to describe it in detail in these notes. The bride and groom each murmured a vow, then placed the flesh of the other on their tongues—and consumed it.
“When I asked my guide what this signified, he responded as if it were the most obvious thing in the world: So that they might become one flesh.”
Daemon could only hear the thunderous blood rushing in his ears, could only feel the swelling hunger distending his gut, could only taste the rich bloom of Rhaenyra’s flesh and blood beneath his tongue. All of his senses converged to deliver the import of this message:
One flesh.
When one night Rhaenyra came to him in a thin gossamer gown, her darkened nipples and thatch of hair visible beneath the immodest fabric, he knew it was time, and he had leave to enjoy his wife fully once again.
She rode him mercilessly that night. He drank the sweet milk from her breast as he plunged into her cunt.
“I have missed you, valzȳrys,” she said, tears of ecstasy spilling down her cheeks. He kissed them from her, wrapping her in his arms so that she might never be parted from him.
She traced his palm, where the raised bed of his scar was inflamed with frequent use. She frowned, and pressed a kiss to it.
“I missed you as well, but I feared to demand too much. I had to make due.”
“I am sorry,” she murmured. “I would never wish to deprive you of anything.” Rhaenyra kissed his palm again, gentle at first. then roughly prying apart the fresh-knit skin with her tongue. Daemon hissed at the sharp sting that accompanied the tearing. Then she sucked, drawing new blood from his wound.
She looked up at him, her lips spreading in a feral smile to reveal blood-stained teeth. “I would reopen mine as well, ñuha jorrāelagon. Let us share this. Show me what you have done in my absence.”
Daemon was drunk on his affection for Rhaenyra as he gently cut open her palm, spilling the familiar warmth of her blood across his hands. He guided her hand to his cock, and shivered in contentment at the slick heat of her. Her touch was softer, silkier, her slender hand so deft and lovely. He thrust into her hand as she stroked him, the split lips of her wound embracing him, caressing him. And when he released into the seam of her palm, it was pure bliss.
They lay together a long while after, the disjointed pattern of their breaths eventually coming into sync.
“Do you need me to fetch the maester?” he asked, lifting her bloody hand.
Rhaenyra shook her head, her eyes blazing and bright. “I am well. Is that what you needed, valzȳrys?”
“You are everything I need, ñuha prūmia.”
A clever smile tugged at her mouth. “I know there is more that you want, Kepus. More that you need. I can see it in your eyes. I can feel it when you touch me. I would give you more, Kepus. I would give you all of myself. Name your desire, and I will endeavor to satisfy it.”
The lurking hunger roared to life in Daemon’s chest, beating its claws and gnashing its teeth against his ribcage. Rhaenyra would see it freed.
“We have shared our blood. Would you share of my flesh?”
“I would cut mine own heart out of my chest and give it to you, Kepus, would it not kill me.”
Daemon spent the better part of the week preparing.
He procured a drug from Maester Gerardys to ease the pain of the cutting, to allow the mind to detach from a self-inflicted act of violence on the body. He commissioned from a smith in the village a dragonglass knife—his best approximation of the form described in the maester’s journal. He prepared a chamber below the castle in hopes to recreate the caverns beneath the secret city of Nefer, so that he might feel the weight of the earth above him, consumed by it as they performed the ultimate consummation.
When evening came, Daemon went to Rhaenyra’s solar. She wore only her night linens, her hair unbound, falling in cascading waves over her shoulders. She was so beautiful.
“Come,” he said simply, and took her hand.
She followed him through the castle, to the staircase leading down to the caverns below the keep. The air grew hot and thick with sulphur for its proximity to the volcanic pools. He brought her into the chamber, alight with hundreds of candles, and her eyes widened like dark pools, taking in the brilliant, dancing light.
In the center of it all, a small altar, bearing the dragonglass knife.
He led Rhaenyra to it, and they settled themselves on either side. From a pouch Daemon produced the vial of calming drug he had requested from the maester.
“Drink, ñuha jorrāelagon,” he said, holding it out to her.
“What is this?”
“It will calm your senses.”
Rhaenyra frowned. “I do not wish to have my senses dulled, Kepus. I would feel the bite of the blade, and have my mind sharp for all that is to come.”
Daemon smiled, and set the vial aside. “Then I shall do the same.”
Instead of ritual garments, they stripped bare of their nightclothes. Rhaenyra’s skin seemed to glow, the many paths carved by his knife glittering like gems in the candlelight. Daemon pressed the point to the skin just below Rhaenyra’s breast.
“Are you ready, ñuha prūmia?”
“Yes,” she breathed.
Rhaenyra’s eyes went wide when the blade cut into her, a tremulous moan coming from her parted lips. She trembled as he cut her, alive with ecstatic fanaticism. He watched his own hand, transfixed as he drew the blade in neat lines, and tore free the block of flesh. Rhaenyra seemed not to even notice the blood that oozed down her side, the pain fully eclipsed by the ecstasy.
Daemon’s hand shook as he set her flesh on the altar.
Silently, he handed her the knife, dripping with rubies of her blood, and moved to bare his ribs to her. He nodded encouragement.
The blade was so sharp that at first he felt nothing; it sunk into his flesh like a warm knife through butter. The pain was slow to catch up, and even then he welcomed it; it was something holy, a bright burning sting that accompanied the drag of the blade like fire set into his flesh, searing white-hot through his mind and burning away every thought that was not of her.
“It is done, Kepus.”
They held each other’s gaze for a long moment as they lifted their pieces of one another. The anticipation raced through him like battlelust, like dragonflight, that he should consume this part of her, and she him. That they should be forever bound by this, truly and utterly one flesh.
"Hen lantoti ñelly," Daemon said. "Va sȳndroti vāedroma."
Flesh of two, joined as one.
Daemon placed Rhaenyra's flesh on his tongue, and she did the same. He held it in his mouth, his eyes locked on Rhaenyra's, as he savored this taste of her. It tasted raw in a way nothing else ever had, like the distilled essence of life, broken down to its simplest elements. Rich and earthy and pungent, sharp with the tang of blood he was so familiar with, but with an even deeper satisfaction. Her eyes reflected back what he felt in his bones—the unfettered joy of the moment, the complete euphoria of this essential craving, finally satisfied. He swallowed her, and felt himself come alive.
The hungry beast inside him calmed, the enduring gnaw in his gut faded.
Daemon Targaryen was whole.