Exceptional Blood

by MongoosePirate

Summary:

An alternate history where King Maegor killed both Prince Aegon and Princess Rhaena with Prince Viserys and Prince Jaehaerys later mysteriously disappearing. Now, Maegor is married to his brother’s widow, Queen Alyssa, and Princess Alysanne must survive in an increasingly dangerous Red Keep as the walls close in around her…

Chapter 1: INTRODUCTION

War continues in the Seven Kingdoms!

The death of Queen Alys and the fiery destruction of House Harroway marked a bloody turning point in the reign of King Maegor Targaryen. After the Red Keep’s construction was completed, Maegor killed its builders to preserve the keep’s secrets, and he marched to war against the Faith Militant once again. For the next two years, the Seven Kingdoms were consumed by fire and blood as Maegor rooted out Poor Fellows and hunted down the remnants of the Warrior’s Sons. The last year after that has been less bloody, though the occasional skirmish and massacre still occurs. This effort to crush dissent was hindered by the increased fanaticism of the Faith Militant following the death of Ser Joffrey Doggett, the Headless Dog.

However, zeal alone could not defeat Maegor’s dragonfire and armies since the Faith Militant still stood alone against Maegor without the support of the Great Lords. One by one, Poor Fellow leaders were hunted down and executed: Dennis the Lame, Rob the Starvling, Ser Horys Hill, and even Septon Moon. Only a few Faith Militant remain, largely in hiding from the king. Rebel lords like Qarl Corbray have also been driven into hiding, named traitor by the crown. Maegor’s wars continue nevertheless, to the king’s unending frustration.

Meanwhile, Tyanna of the Tower solidified her stranglehold on the Red Keep. After the deaths of Alys Harroway and Queen Dowager Visenya, the purge of the Harroways, and Maegor’s marriage to Alyssa Velaryon, Queen Tyanna and Lord Edwell Celtigar, Hand of the King, became the dominant force within Maegor’s court. The fragile alliance between Tyanna and Edwell bore fruit as the Red Keep became a more stable environment, even as the realm burned outside. Within Maegor’s Holdfast, Queen Alyssa, her daughter Alysanne, and her grandchildren Aerea and Rhaella were confined, kept away from public sight.

Alyssa’s sons by King Aenys, Prince Viserys and Prince Jaehaerys, escaped the Red Keep after the deaths of Queen Alys and Queen Visenya, and unlike Princess Alysanne, they remained outside Maegor’s grasp. Fugitives with bounties on their heads, the names of the princes are spoken with a mix of hope and dread. Many of the Great Lords are on the look-out for their reemergence, eager to elevate someone else aside from the madman Maegor to the Iron Throne. However, due to their continued absence, some have begun to whisper that Maegor simply had his trained killer Tyanna dispatch them or killed them himself, just as he did with their siblings Rhaena and Aegon at the Battle over the God’s Eye. The Faith Militant and other pious men and women continue to denounce all Targaryens, Maegor and otherwise, declaring that only those with a bloodline free of the taint of incest and polygamy should rule the Seven Kingdoms.

Since the death of Queen Alys and her child in childbirth, Maegor has continued to be unsuccessful in siring an heir. Queen Tyanna and Queen Ceryse have proved themselves thoroughly barren while the grieving Queen Alyssa Velaryon has conceived once, resulting in a monstrous stillbirth. Growing impatient with his wives, Maegor has spent more time outside the Red Keep, and many lords have grown restless due to continued ambiguity about succession. With no heir of Maegor’s body, many wonder who will sit the Iron Throne if he dies: Alysanne or Aerea, the daughter of the dead Prince Aegon? Will he take more wives? Maegor himself offers no answers to these questions.

In the last year, Poxy Jeyne Poore reemerged in the Kingswood after disappearing for nearly three years. The king immediately mounted Balerion, followed by his army, and set the Kingswood alight. Maegor has no patience for the Faith Militant, and he offers no surrender. The capture of Poxy Jenye came after a particularly bloody ambush, and she now stands ready for execution, the latest in a long line of martyrs in Maegor’s bloody reign.

Notes:

Hello! This fanfic is a continuation of Black Dread, Red Keep, so I recommend you read that fic first. Also, the main character of this fic will be Alysanne Targaryen; Maegor will not be the main POV like the last one.

Chapter 2: JEYNE

Jeyne Poore was kneeling in her cage; naked but for a soaked, torn shift that clung to her like mildew, hair plastered to her skull, and mud pooling under her knees. Rain trickled down her spine like the touch of a rat’s tail. She didn’t flinch. She didn’t ask for a blanket. She didn’t shiver.

She just prayed.

“Father, judge the monster who calls himself King. Let his sins be weighed and found wanting. Let the Warrior grant steel to the hands of his Faith Militant for-”

“Oi, shut it, Poxy Jeyne!” came a voice from beyond the bars. “The gods ain’t listening to you. They’ve got ears, not boils.”

Snickers.

“Ugh, look at her. You’d think with a name like Jeyne Poore she’d be poor, not pox-riddled and half-mad.”

She kept her hands folded, eyes skyward.

“Let Maegor the Abomination be cast down from his throne. Let fire consume the unworthy. Let blood cry for blood.”

Inwardly, she was already imagining how sweet it would be to snap all their necks.

Gods, I’d love to take that smug little shit’s head and twist it until his helmet clanked sideways. They talk like they’ve got balls, but let them face one real Warrior’s Son and they’d shit in their armor.

Someone spat at her cage. It hit the bars and splashed her arm. She didn’t blink. She just kept chanting, voice calm, pious, maddening.

“I shall not fear the darkness, for the Seven are my light. I shall not waver in chains, for justice walks with me…”

Light of the Seven, my ass. I’d like to take a light and shove it so far up Maegor’s dragon-spawn arse it comes out his eyes.

Another soldier swaggered past, snorted, and said, “She’s not even old enough to scare children. This is the great Poxy Jeyne? Looks like a chamberpot scrubber.”

“She’s got the face for it,” came another voice. “Bet the pox peeled half her cunt off.”

Jeyne exhaled deeply.

Is there a special place in the Seven Hells for soldiers who think they’re funny? May they all get roasted halfway by dragonflame, survive, and spend the rest of their lives drooling into their soup. Still she prayed. Louder now.

“The Stranger walks behind him, unseen. The Father watches from above. Let their judgment come swiftly-”

Inside, she wanted to scream.

Not just at the dogs in armor who jeered at her through the rain.

At the spineless bastards who once called her Sister, those who’d left her and her men to die. At the septons who kissed her feet one week and called her witch the next. At the lords who whispered, ‘Oh yes, we believe, we believe,’ until Balerion flew overhead and they pissed themselves.

And Maegor.

Maegor, that stone-faced goat-fucker. That butcher prince who calls himself King. That baby-burning, whore-wedding kinslayer with a cock thicker than his skull and half as clever. Oh, I’d love to sink a blade between his ribs and twist until he pissed fire.

But she didn’t say any of that.

She kept praying. Sweet and slow. Like a godly girl.

“Let the flames take this flesh. Let my bones turn to ash, but let my words remain. Let my death shame the dragon and poison his name for all the ages-”

“You’re lucky he didn’t roast you right there,” one voice muttered. “He’s killed better men with less cause.”

She smiled at that. A small, crooked thing. She hoped Maegor was listening. She wanted him to hear. Wanted him to know she didn’t weep. That she wasn’t afraid. That even in chains, even in rags, even with her knees in mud and her name turned to a joke, she still stood taller than all of them.

Let him see what the Seven make of his “kingdom.”

Let him hear her curse his name with her dying breath.

Let him dream of her, smiling, sneering, praying, as she burned.

Let him wake screaming.

It was still raining. Still cold. Still loud.

She could feel the soldiers staring.

“Maiden, grant me purity of spirit, that I may suffer with grace-”

“Think she’s ever known a man?” someone asked, loud enough to be heard over the hammering rain.

Laughter answered.

“Wouldn’t guess it. Looks like she bites.”

“Too ugly for it, surely. Pox took the charm right off that face.”

“She’s got that wild look in her eye. Maybe she thinks the Warrior’s her husband.”

“She’d probably pray the whole time.”

Another voice: “You know what they say about the crazy ones-”

Louder laughter now. Louder than before. It grated at her like a dull knife over bone. She kept her head bowed. Her hands stayed clasped so tightly the knuckles had gone white. Her lips moved steadily.

“Let not the words of the wicked turn me from the path. Let not flesh tempt the soul from its calling. Let not cruelty shake my purpose-”

But the words scraped in her throat now. The prayers weren’t flowing. Not like they used to. Not with them whispering that. She wanted to ignore them. Pretend they weren’t there. Pretend she was still out in the woods with a sword in one hand and a banner in the other, her Poor Fellows behind her, her voice rising in fury and flame.

But she couldn’t stop hearing them.

Was I ever pretty? she wondered, bitterly.

No. Not really. Not since the pox. Not before it either, if she was honest.

She remembered mirrors, small ones that her mother had bought. Remembered trying to smooth her hair when she was twelve, fingers fumbling with braids, cheeks red with effort. She remembered watching the pretty girls in town, the ones the knights lingered to look at. The ones with dimples and honey-blonde curls and soft hands.

She wasn’t one of them.

She'd never been. Even before the scars. Even before the short-cropped hair, the muddy boots, the blade on her belt. Even then, she'd felt strange. Too sharp in the jaw, too wiry in the frame. Too loud. Too still. Too wrong.

She’d wanted to become a septa once. That felt like a lifetime ago.

When she was still just Jeyne. Before the dreams started. Before the fire in her head.

She would’ve worn white, spoken softly, poured holy water over babes and bones alike.

The Maiden was her favorite then. The Maiden who kept girls clean. Who promised peace. Who held back time.

But the dreams came. Dreams of dragons fighting one another, burning down the world. Dreams of queens screaming in the night as eyeless monstrosities tore their way out. Dreams of fire and blood and steel and pain. The Maiden stopped visiting her. The Warrior came instead.

He came with a bloody sword and said: Stand up. Fight.

So she did.

She never laid with a man. Not before the pox. Not after. Not even when some of the Poor Fellows whispered that she could if she wanted. That a prophetess deserved comfort. That the gods wouldn’t mind.

She stayed a maid. Deliberately.

Partly out of devotion. The Warrior didn't take lovers.

Partly out of necessity. Men followed her easier if they saw she was chaste. It made her seem pure, as pure as a girl with pox scars and short hair could be.

Partly because she just… didn’t want to.

She didn’t know how to touch another person without feeling like she was wearing someone else’s skin. The Seven hadn’t meant that for her.

Even if she hadn’t had the scars.

Even if she hadn’t led men into battle.

Even if Maegor hadn’t turned the world into ash.

The Seven hadn’t made her for bed or cradle or cloister.

They had made her for war.

“Let me suffer, if I must,” she prayed aloud, voice hoarse but steady. “But let the dragon suffer worse.”

A boot scuffed close to the cage.

“You still praying, Poxy Jeyne?” said one of the bolder ones. A young knight with a silver belt buckle and a sneer. “What are you praying for? Maiden won’t save you. The Warrior won’t fuck you. You’ll die today either way.”

Another snort from behind him. “Maybe the Stranger fancies her. I hear he’s not picky.”

“Let Maegor burn,” Jeyne hissed, louder now. “Let his heart rot in his chest. Let his seed wither. Let his name become a curse. Let-”

The knight stepped forward and slammed a gloved fist against the bars.

“SHUT UP!”

Jeyne didn’t flinch.

She looked him dead in the eye, scarred face gleaming with rain, and smiled. A real smile. All teeth and defiance.

“You afraid of words, Ser?” she asked sweetly. “You think the gods won’t hear just because you shouted louder?”

He stared at her. A muscle jumped in his jaw. Then he turned and stalked away, muttering. His compatriots watched on.

She turned her face back to the sky.

Let them talk. Let them wonder. She knew what she was. A sword in a woman’s shape.

The gods hadn’t made her to marry. Hadn’t made her to birth. Hadn’t made her to mourn.

They had made her to kill dragons.

She would pray through the mud, through the cold, through the stink and the laughter.

She would pray until the fire took her.

She’d go to the flames smiling.

Because when Maegor burned her… the gods would finally start listening.

The rain had slowed, but the damp stayed thick in the air; settling in Jeyne Poore’s lungs like wet ash. She was still kneeling in her cage, knees numb, shift soaked, spine straight. Her voice was hoarse now from praying, but she kept at it like a drumbeat: steady, endless, righteous.

“Let His justice fall like rain. Let His wrath crack the sky. Let His fire consume the wicked-”

“So this is her.” came a different voice.

Not one of the jeering knights or loutish squires who liked to take turns calling her ugly or mad or both. This one was quieter, flatter. Too sharp to be drunk, too crisp to be friendly.

She stopped mid-verse, just long enough to look up.

The soldiers around her had straightened. No more jokes. No more idle speculation about whether her maidenhead had grown moss.

They were straightening up.

That caught her attention.

The man stepping toward her cage was tall, broad-shouldered, and armored in black plate trimmed with dull grey steel. His surcoat bore the sigil of five black towers on white, a double tressure red and black. One of Maegor’s dogs. A new one, but rising fast.

Lord Walton Towers.

Harrenhal’s latest lord. Maegor’s lapdog.

Jeyne said nothing as he approached. She resumed praying, calmly now, her voice softer, as if she hadn’t noticed him at all.

“Let their castles fall to dust. Let the dragon choke on ash. Let the rain wash away the blood of the faithful-”

He stopped a few paces from the bars and tilted his head.

“Huh,” he grunted.

Jeyne didn’t look at him. Didn’t need to.

“Is that really her?” he asked the guards. “The witch? The prophet of the Faith Militant? The… what do they call her?”

“Poxy Jeyne,” one muttered.

“Poore,” said another. “Poxy Jeyne Poore.”

“She’s been praying since dawn,” added a third. “Nonstop. Ain’t tried anything. No magic. No tricks. No… temptations.”

Walton scoffed at that, eyeing her with distaste.

“She looks like a drowned cat,” he said. “Not what I expected. Thought she’d be taller. Stronger. Even if she’s a woman.”

One of the squires coughed a laugh.

Jeyne smiled. Just barely. A faint twitch of her mouth, enough to show one tooth.

Even now, even in chains, they were wary.

They didn’t know what she could do. What she might say. Whether she had secrets. Spells. Curses. Prophecies. They called her mad, but they still watched her like she might burst into flame. And that? That was worth a smile.

She turned her head slowly toward Lord Towers. Her eyes found his, pale and unblinking.

And then she spoke: quiet and clear, her voice gravelled with wear and rain, but strong enough to cut through the hush.

“Are you enjoying your new castle, milord?”

He stepped back like he’d been slapped. She watched his eyes widen. So the witch could speak.

Good.

She let the silence stretch a moment longer, savoring the tension.

Then, in a tone as casual as if they were sharing a drink in a tavern, she added:

“Harrenhal has wide halls. Good bones. Ghosts in every corner.”

He said nothing.

She tilted her head.

“I don’t need dreams to know what kind of gift Maegor gave you. King Harren and his kin burned alive in that castle. Lord Qoherys cut to pieces. The Harroways?” She smiled wider, her teeth yellow and crooked. “Turned to ash by your own king.”

Lord Towers’ lips thinned.

“House Towers?” she whispered, voice like a snake curling through a crack in a wall. “New name on an old curse. You should tell your wife to sleep with a dagger. And your sons, if you’ve any, to keep away from the windows.”

A few of the soldiers shifted uneasily.

Walton took another step back, then caught himself and stiffened.

“You’re full of shit,” he growled.

But his eyes kept flicking back toward her. Like maybe she knew something.

She held his gaze.

Of course I’m full of shit, she thought. She never had any visions about Harrenhal, but she didn’t need prophecy to rattle a man like Walton Towers.

Harrenhal spoke for itself.

He spat at the ground near her cage and turned, muttering as he walked away.

“Maegor’s taking too damn long. Burn the bitch already.”

Jeyne turned her face back to the sky.

Rain touched her cheeks like cold fingers, and for a moment she let herself believe they were the Maiden’s tears.

She resumed praying, but inside, her thoughts burned hotter than ever.

She’d put a crack in him. That was enough.

Jeyne prayed through the ache in her throat. Through the cold. Through the mockery.

“Let the Stranger guide the lost. Let the Mother cradle the slain. Let the Father judge Maegor’s crimes, one by one by one-”

The soldiers around her cage had grown bored of their earlier taunts, or maybe unsettled. It was hard to tell. Some still tried to bait her with foul jokes or halfhearted threats. Others kept their distance now, fidgeting with sword belts, glancing at the trees like they were afraid the rain itself would start to answer her prayers.

One muttered, “I think she’s prayed louder than Queen Alyssa screams at night.”

The laugh was short. Someone smacked him hard in the shoulder, and he shut up fast.

Jeyne’s lips twitched. She didn’t look up. Didn’t react. But she heard every word.

Alyssa, she thought.

The somber queen with eyes like wet stone, voice like a broken bell. The widow of Maegor’s brother Aenys, most of her children dead or missing. Maegor had chained her with gold and grief both, wrapped her in widow’s black and called it marriage. What a joke. Alyssa didn’t deserve that. No one did. Not even the Targaryen queens. Not even Maegor’s wretched, withered court.

Everyone deserved peace. If not now, then later. If not in life, then beyond.

She closed her eyes briefly and thought of Ser Joffrey Doggett.

The Headless Dog.

He stood tall even after Maegor severed his head. The man’s name still stood tall. They whispered it in the Riverlands and the Vale, in the cracks between silence where soldiers dared not speak too loudly.

He’d have made a better king than any of the lordly bastards or dragonlords or lickspittle lords.

He’d have fought.

He had fought.

So had she.

And now he was ash, and she was next.

But she didn’t regret a damn thing.

A new sound caught her attention: footsteps, heavy ones, deliberate.

Boots in the mud.

Different than the soldiers. More precise. More… pompous.

Jeyne lifted her head.

Two familiar men were approaching the cage.

Lord Edwell Celtigar, Hand of the King.

Lord Butterwell, the Master of Coin.

Two of Maegor’s most loyal rats. Court-fed and clawless, but dangerous in their own way.

Jeyne straightened a little, spine cracking. She didn’t kneel lower. Didn’t bow. She just looked at them, face blank.

“Seven preserve us,” Butterwell murmured as they neared. “Is that her? The witch? I thought she’s… just a girl.”

“A girl?” Celtigar said flatly. “What did you expect?”

Jeyne didn’t say a word as the two lords approached. Not at first.

She simply stared, head tilted, pox-scarred face slack and firm, as Lord Edwell Celtigar and Lord Butterwell stepped close to the edge of her cage.

Lord Butterwell kept back, lips puckered, face pale and powdered like a fruit gone soft. His rings flashed like nervous birds in the gray light. His shoes squelched in the mud, and he kept glancing sideways like he was hoping someone would tell him he could leave.

Lord Edwell Celtigar was another matter entirely.

The Hand of the King stepped closer. Unlike the others, he wasn’t afraid.

He was older, yes, gray streaking through silver hair, beard trimmed close to a chiseled jaw, skin drawn but smooth, but his bearing was upright, almost regal. He looked like a man carved from old saltstone: weathered, elegant, still sharp at the edges.

The lines of his face might’ve been handsome, once. Some would still call them so. There was something magnetic about him; an ease that didn’t belong in Maegor’s court, where most lords flinched or fawned.

Even now, standing in the muck of a camp surrounded by mud, piss, and wet steel, he carried himself like he was walking through a feast hall.

He regarded her with a mild expression.

“You know,” he said lightly, “everyone around here acts like you’re still dangerous. That you’ll curse them, or hex their cocks into knots.”

A few of the nearby soldiers chuckled, nervously.

Celtigar continued, “But when I look at you? All I see is a scared little girl in a wet shift.”

Jeyne blinked slowly.

Then she said, “Are you sure I’m not dangerous?”

Edwell’s smile faltered for just a moment. He hadn’t expected her to speak. Not so clearly. Not so calmly. But he recovered quickly, letting out a breath through his nose.

“You were captured in battle. Like any soldier. Any rebel. You know how it goes.” He shrugged, almost apologetically. “The king’s wanted you burned for years. Now he’ll finally get his wish. If this bloody rain ever stops.”

That made a few men around the cage laugh. One of the squires actually grinned, nudged his mate in the ribs.

Jeyne didn’t laugh. She didn’t even smirk. She leaned forward instead, eyes sharp, and asked:

“Is it worth it?”

Celtigar’s face remained neutral, but he leaned in slightly.

Jeyne continued, softer but no less cutting:

“The burnings. The trials. The lies. Do you think the gods will forgive you, milord?”

“Will the ones you’ve betrayed?”

Celtigar’s face… changed.

The genial polish faded, like breath vanishing off a mirror. His eyes darkened. He took a step closer to the bars, voice low.

“You have no idea,” he said, “what Maegor would be like without me.”

His voice didn’t tremble. It was steady. Controlled. But it wasn’t glib anymore.

“I keep blades sheathed. I keep the fire low. The Seven will thank me for what I’ve done.”

Jeyne stared back at him, unblinking.

She didn’t respond. Not with words. But her silence said enough. She didn’t believe him. Edwell knew it.

The doubt flickered across his face, brief, like a cloud sliding over the sun, but it was there. For a heartbeat.

He stepped back, straightening his fine cloak with practiced fingers. Adjusting the lie on his shoulders. He turned to go, but paused just long enough to say over his shoulder:

“He is coming.”

Then he was gone.

Jeyne didn’t pray after he left.

Not yet.

She just sat in silence, soaked and bruised, eyes fixed on the camp’s edge.

The rain thinned to a mist, fine as breath, clinging to the skin like cobwebs. The fire pits were embers now, glowing faintly in the wet, and the soldiers had grown quieter: no more crude jokes, no more jabs about her maidenhood or prayers. They just waited. Like her.

Jeyne sat still in the cage, spine curled slightly now, legs aching, head bowed as if in prayer; though her lips no longer moved. Not yet. Not this time.

She was thinking about her dream. The last one. She’d woken from it in the mud before sunrise, the chill of it still clinging to her bones. It had been strange. Even for her. She had dreamed stranger things than most could name. Rivers of blood. Mountains of ash. Dragon-shadows with screaming mouths. Faces melting into the likeness of the Stranger.

But this one had been different.

Quieter.

She’d dreamed of cold.

A wasteland of ice and wind. Not like the stormy rain of the Kingswood. No, this was worse. White death stretched forever, sky as pale as bone, air as dry as old cloth. Jeyne had walked through it barefoot, every step stabbing up her legs with knives of frost.

The world had been silent. Not dead; just waiting to die.

She’d walked for what felt like hours. Days. Maybe longer. Time had no place there.

Everywhere she looked, she saw death. Frozen armies with spears still clenched in frostbitten fists. Shields cracked with age. Banner poles leaning like broken trees. Great beasts, their bones jutting from the snow like jagged teeth.

And then…

A hill.

A single green hill.

Lush. Living. Warm.

It rose from the dead white like a flame in the dark. Atop it, children played. Five of them. Four girls and one boy.

They laughed and spun and shouted, their voices bright against the hush of the cold.

Above them, dragons played, too.

Not the terrible, world-burning dragons of her waking hours. Not Balerion the Black Dread. No. These were smaller, gliding through the air with a kind of joy she’d never seen in a dragon’s wings.

Jeyne had climbed the hill in the dream. Hands numb. Eyes tearing.

Seven stars shone above the hill. Seven. No sun. Just stars.

She never reached the top. She awoke in the cage, heart hammering, mouth dry.

What did it mean?

What could it mean?

She’d never dreamed of children before.

She’d thought it might be a message from the Stranger, come to guide her home.

But… no. That hill had felt holy. But there were dragons?

She didn’t know. She hated not knowing. This one slipped through her fingers like sand.

But she clung to it anyway.

Because it was the last one.

And perhaps, perhaps, it meant something for after her. For what came next.

A better world, where dragons did not rule but played. Where children laughed. Where stars lit the sky instead of flame.

She’d die for that world.

She would burn for it gladly.

A sudden noise pulled her back: the unmistakable sound of armored boots on wet earth.

Heavy.

Slow.

Deliberate.

Someone big was coming.

The air shifted.

The soldiers stiffened, and the murmur around the camp dropped to a hush. Even the squire who’d spent half the morning picking at her with dirty jokes went pale and stepped aside. Jeyne didn’t look up. Not yet. She could feel it. That weight. That presence.

The Abomination on the Iron Throne had come.

Maegor. The Murderer. The King.

She exhaled once, quietly.

But her hands didn’t shake.

She bowed her head again.

And began to pray.

“Stranger, walk beside me. Warrior, carry my flame. Father, weigh his soul. Mother, forgive the world that bore him. Maiden, shield the innocent. Smith, break the chain. Crone… show me what comes after.”

And still, she wondered…

Does Maegor dream?

If he did, they must be blacker than pitch. Full of blood and smoke and nothing that sang.

No green hills.

No Seven.

No stars.

No children.

Only death.

The boots came closer.

Jeyne raised her head and looked the dragon in the eyes. He was taller than she thought he’d be.

Even surrounded by armored men, flanked by his lords like wolves trailing behind a lion, Maegor Targaryen towered above them all.

He wore black steel from neck to toe: thick plates carved in cruel ridges, like the shell of some ancient beast. A crown of Valyrian steel sat on his scowling brow. His breastplate was worked with the sigil of House Targaryen, the three-headed dragon grinning wide in blood-red enamel. A cloak of deep crimson hung from his shoulders, soaked with rain but no less regal for it.

His hair was silver-gold, cut close, damp from the rain but shining all the same. His face was clean-shaven and cold: a broad, brutal thing with a wide mouth, a straight nose, and dark violet eyes that looked at her like a butcher weighs a carcass.

No. Not a butcher, Jeyne thought. A butcher kills for meat. Maegor kills because he likes to.

There was no kindness in that face. No cruelty either. Just cold, black certainty. As if he’d been born to kill. As if he’d emerged from the womb with blood on his hands and flame in his breath.

Behind him stood the lords: Celtigar, his silver fox face taut and mocking. Towers, stiff and still, jaw clenched like a man holding in piss or panic. Butterwell, trying his best to look anywhere but at her.

Maegor looked down at her through the bars.

Jeyne didn’t flinch. She didn’t blink.

She stared right back at him, pox-scarred and sopping wet, hair plastered to her face, arms limp with cold and exhaustion, and she smiled.

His eyebrow cocked slightly.

“So this is the witch?” Maegor said. His voice was low and gravelly, deep as an old well. “This wretched scrap?”

He turned to his soldiers.

“She’s smaller than I expected. Pitiful.” A pause. “Bind her. It’s time.”

The cage creaked open.

Boots stomped in. Rough hands seized her wrists.

Rope coiled around her arms like snakes: too tight, biting into her skin.

Someone pulled her up by the rope with a jerk. She stumbled, knees wobbling, but stayed upright.

“Your Grace,” Lord Towers said, voice low, “how will you burn her in the rain?”

Maegor didn’t even glance at him.

“It won’t be a problem.”

The soldier at her back gave the rope a tug. Jeyne staggered, caught herself.

The king turned without another word and began walking.

They followed.

Her, dragged behind on a tether. The lords at Maegor’s flanks. Dozens of soldiers behind, armor clanking, swords rattling, laughter bubbling in ugly spurts.

Jeyne kept praying.

“Let the fire bear witness. Let the Seven count each breath. Let Maegor choke on ash-”

“Still at it?” someone muttered behind her.

“She’s gonna pray herself hoarse.”

“She already looks like a corpse.”

“Burn her, then we can go home!”

The lords said nothing. Neither did Maegor. Only the sound of boots in mud, rope scraping rope, and the hiss of the last, cold rain.

Jeyne saw the Wendwater through the trees now: gray and wide, curling through the Kingswood like a serpent fat on blood. The mist hung low on its banks. Crows perched in the branches above, watching silently.

Then she saw something else.

Massive. Black. Breathing. Waiting.

Her heart kicked in her ribs.

Balerion. The Black Dread.

He sat in the field like a mountain with wings, hunched and still, his head turned slightly toward the approaching party. Smoke drifted lazily from his nostrils. Even from a distance, Jeyne could see the heat rippling off his back, could hear the low rumble in his throat like stones shifting in the deep.

His eyes, those monstrous, molten eyes, blinked once, slow and bored, as if daring the world to challenge him.

She’d never seen a dragon this close. Not truly. Not like this.

She could feel her teeth ache just looking at him.

And then-

She saw it.

Near the dragon.

Standing tall in the middle of the churned-up field, surrounded by churned mud and ash.

A stake.

No pyre. No pile of wood. Just the single blackened stake, already charred from use.

Her stake.

She felt the rope yank again.

The soldier ahead of her chuckled.

“Well, witch. Looks like your pulpit awaits.”

Jeyne didn’t answer.

“Let the Mother cradle me. Let the Warrior stand beside me. Let the Crone light the way. Let the Stranger take my hand…”

The mud squelched beneath their boots as they crossed the field, dragging her by the rope. Jeyne’s arms ached, the raw hemp biting into her wrists, but she kept walking. Half-stumbling, half-dragged. The stake loomed larger now. Blackened. Scorched. Splinters curling from old fire.

Still, she prayed.

“Let the fire rise. Let the sinners burn. Let the heavens see the dragon’s blasphemy-”

“Gods,” Maegor groaned. “Does she ever shut up?”

He didn’t turn his head, just kept walking ahead of her like she was an afterthought. His red cloak dragged through the mud behind him, soaking up dirt and blood in equal measure.

Lord Celtigar, walking just behind the king, chuckled softly.

“She makes a grand show of it, doesn’t she?” Edwell said, eyes glinting with dry disdain. “Feigning piety to the very end. Doubtless she thinks it’ll save her soul from the Seven Hells.”

That broke something in her.

The weariness, the cold, the mud, the rope, the pain had numbed her, the laughter had worn her down, but that…

That arrogant calm, that sneering certainty from a man with blood on his hands and silver in his beard…

It cut deep.

She stopped praying.

Instead, he spoke.

“You smug bastard.”

Celtigar’s brows lifted.

Jeyne twisted her neck to glare at all of them: Maegor, Celtigar, Towers, Butterwell, all of them dressed in steel and velvet and lies.

“You think this is for show? This isn’t for you. This is for the gods. To show them your faces before you go to hell.”

A few soldiers laughed, already amused.

Jeyne’s voice rose as she twisted her head, looking wildly around at the soldiers and the lords.

“You serve no gods but the Black Dragon! That THING is your altar!” She jabbed her chin toward the hulking shape of Balerion. “You kneel for flame, for claw, for fire! But the Seven see you! They see all of it!”

She turned her gaze on Maegor, who had paused mid-step, his back still turned.

“Kill the Headless Dog. Kill me. Kill all the Poor Fellows you want. You can burn every Faith Militant, but you’ll never burn the Seven! You’ll never burn faith!”

The camp was silent, save for the hiss of rain.

Then the laughter started again. Low. Ugly.

Even some of the lords couldn’t suppress their smirks now.

“Gods,” muttered a soldier, “she really doesn’t stop.”

“Shall I gag her, Your Grace?” one asked.

Maegor turned his head slightly, jaw tightening.

“…Do it.”

The soldier stepped forward, pulling a length of filthy rope from his belt.

Jeyne laughed: sharp and defiant, eyes gleaming like coals in a wet fire.

“Gag me, go ahead!” she snapped. “It won’t stop it. Nightmares, you’ll see it in nightmares first! Fire, blood, hellfire! Every night, Maegor! Every time he closes his eyes, he’ll burn!”

The soldier grabbed her jaw.

That was when Maegor turned fully.

Stormed over.

No words.

No warning.

Just the metal CRACK of his gauntleted hand as it backhanded her across the face.

Her head snapped sideways, cheek splitting on contact, blood and rain mixing as she crumpled into the mud with a grunt.

Gasps from the crowd. A few soldiers stepped back.

Silence.

Maegor’s voice came out low, raw, and furious.

“Tie her to the stake. Now.”

He didn’t shout. He didn’t need to.

Everyone moved.

Jeyne coughed once, spitting red into the dirt, and laughed.

Low, wheezing, wild.

She could feel it in their steps now. In the way the soldiers gripped her arms too tightly. In how Butterwell’s eyes darted anywhere but toward her. In the way Celtigar’s lips pressed to a thin line, and Maegor’s fists clenched even as he kept walking.

They knew she was right. That terrified them more than any flame.

They hauled her toward the stake, and she cackled all the while, like a woman already halfway in the Stranger’s arms with nothing left to lose.

The rain had begun to fall harder again, just as they tied her to the stake.

Thick, slapping drops that streaked down her cheeks, soaked her shift, and darkened the splintered wood at her back. The rope dug into her wrists, rough and wet, cinched so tight her fingers throbbed with every heartbeat.

Still, she laughed.

The soldiers retreated from her, backing into the circle of watchers, all quiet now. Even the jeering ones, even the boys who'd once whispered about whether she was a maid or mad. The fire was close. The dragon closer.

They didn’t laugh anymore.

The lords stood further back: Butterwell pale and bloated, Celtigar silent and stiff, Towers shifting uneasily. But Maegor remained, unmoving.

He stood a dozen paces from her, cloaked in rain and black steel, face unmoving. Balerion loomed behind him like a great idol carved from midnight, smoke drifting from his maw in slow curls.

The king took a step forward.

His voice rang out over the field, heavy with command.

“You think the dragon burns,” Maegor said. “You think your hell will find us.”

His eyes locked with hers.

“But the dragon does not burn. Not in dreams. Not in life. The dragon is invincible.”

He stepped aside now, just enough for the looming bulk of Balerion to be fully visible behind him: massive, hunched, watching.

“You, on the other hand… will burn,” Maegor said. “Not even rain can quench dragonfire.”

Jeyne's head lolled slightly to the side, blood and water trickling from the corner of her mouth.

She smiled.

Her voice was cracked, her throat raw, but the words came clear.

“The Light of the Seven shines brighter than dragonfire.”

She spat into the mud at her feet.

“You’ll see it when you sleep, Maegor. You’ll hear their screams. The Headless Dog. Aenys’s sons. The ones you burned in Harrenhal, all the septs. The ones buried below the Red Keep. They’ll find you. In the dark. In the silence. When you close your eyes, they’ll be there.”

She leaned her head back against the pole and laughed again.

Maegor’s composure cracked.

Just for a heartbeat.

His eyes narrowed. His jaw tensed. Then he roared:

“I FEAR NOTHING! NOT WITCHES, NOT DREAMS, NOT DEATH!”

The camp flinched.

Even some of the soldiers took half-steps back.

Maegor turned toward the beast at his back: massive wings tucked, jaws steaming.

He raised a single, gloved hand and pointed it at her.

“Dracarys.”

Balerion moved.

The rumble in his throat deepened to a growl, then to a roar. His wings shifted slightly, rising like the walls of a temple. His jaws opened.

The heat hit first.

Even before the fire, it swept across the field like a wave, curling the wet grass, drying the air.

Then…

The world turned gold.

The dragonfire came.

A torrent of living flame, belched from the mouth of death itself, engulfed the stake.

In the heart of that fire, before the ropes burned away, before her body turned black, before the laughter ceased…

Poxy Jeyne Poore was still laughing.

Chapter 3: ALYSANNE I

Princess Alysanne Targaryen stood motionless in the Great Yard of the Red Keep, her hands clasped tightly before her, knuckles white with restraint. She wore a pale blue gown trimmed with silver, the fabric chosen for her by attendants who whispered of color and appearances. Blue for the Maiden. Blue for innocence. Blue for calm.

She felt anything but calm.

Before her, the court stood in stiff formation, all eyes turned toward the sky, knowing the king would soon return.

Beside her, Maegor’s three queens stood in icy silence.

Queen Tyanna of the Tower, adorned in black velvet and rubies, stood like a statue of polished obsidian. Her smile was painted, her posture perfect, her hands folded around a serpent-headed cane. Her dark eyes, lined in kohl, surveyed the courtyard with idle amusement; an executioner watching a stage.

Queen Ceryse Hightower, pale and pinched, clutched a book of prayers to her chest. She murmured softly beneath her breath, not looking at anyone. Her faith was brittle, worn thin by years of humiliation, but she held it like armor.

Then there was Queen Alyssa Velaryon. Her mother.

Once a woman of laughter and strength, now she seemed carved from grief. Her gown was deep gray, her silver-blonde hair pulled into a tight coil at the nape of her neck. Her face was calm, but hollow; her beauty faded not from age, but sorrow. She had not smiled in… gods, Alysanne couldn’t remember when. Not truly, despite Alysanne’s best efforts.

Alysanne longed to reach out and take her hand. To give her mother something, anything, to hold on to.

But she didn’t.

They were being watched.

They were always being watched.

In front of Alysanne were the toddlers Aerea and Rhaella, daughters of the late Rhaena and Aegon. Their white-gold curls were tied with ribbons, and they stood obediently, too still for children so young. They had been taught well; not by their mother, but by the maids and Alysanne, “Don’t cry. Don’t move. Don’t be loud.”

Alysanne watched them with quiet heartbreak.

They were orphans. Like her.

He had taken everything from them.

He had taken their parents. He had taken their homes. He had taken hope.

And yet… Alysanne still had some. Somehow.

Not because it came easy, but because she had clung to it, desperately.

She still dreamed of her brothers.

Jaehaerys. Viserys.

Gone now, vanished into the world, their names whispered in fear and secrecy. Some said they’d fled to Dragonstone. Others whispered of lands across the Narrow Sea. Most had no clue.

But Alysanne believed.

She believed she’d see them again.

She believed the war with the Faith Militant would end. That dragonfire and steel would not be the only path to peace. That her family and the Faith could honor the Seven as one.

She believed that Maegor’s reign, his terror, his fury, his endless burnings, would end.

Someday.

Somehow.

When it did, the realm would need healing.

It would need someone who remembered what mercy felt like. What kindness looked like.

That was why she stood tall, even now.

She would not give in.

That was what Maegor wanted; for them to break, to become shadows of their former selves. Silent wives. Scared little things who bent before the throne.

Alysanne would not allow him that satisfaction.

The line of courtiers remained stiff and silent, like painted dolls left in the rain, but little Rhaella had never been one for silence.

"My knees hurt," the girl whispered, swaying on her feet. “I wanna sit down.”

Alysanne leaned over quickly, keeping her voice low but firm.

“Quiet, Rhaella. You can sit once Maegor arrives. Just a little longer.”

The child frowned deeply and crossed her arms, a tiny stormcloud in a pale pink dress.

“But it hurts…”

“A little pain never hurt anyone,” Alysanne said with a wan smile, though her own back ached from standing still for so long. “You’re almost five. Brave girls stand tall.”

Aerea, standing just to Rhaella’s left, said nothing. She stared straight ahead, her expression blank. A still little statue of duty and silence.

She was always good at that. Too good.

Alysanne’s eyes flicked to her mother.

Alyssa Velaryon made no move to intervene. No soothing touch. No encouraging words. Her face was as pale and distant as the moon.

She hadn’t been able to comfort anyone in years.

Not since Jaehaerys and Viserys vanished. Not since Rhaena and Aegon burned at the God’s Eye. Not since Maegor took her and turned her crown into chains.

Now, she stood like a ghost among the living. Alysanne no longer expected her to act. She was simply glad when her mother didn’t cry.

But Rhaella’s whining had caught the attention of the worst person possible.

Queen Tyanna of the Tower turned her head, slowly, snake-like, her eyes sliding toward the child.

She smiled.

It was the kind of smile Alysanne had only ever seen in nature on a cat just before it lunged on a mouse. Her lips curled, just slightly, but her eyes gleamed with something… hungry.

For a moment, Alysanne could almost believe the old whispers.

That Tyanna wasn’t a woman at all, but a thing born of fire and blood, a sorceress fed on secrets and souls. Alysanne half-expected her to lick her lips.

She looks like she wants to eat her, Alysanne thought, bile rising in her throat.

That thought was horrifying but not unbelievable, not in Maegor’s court.

Alysanne straightened and quickly leaned down to whisper into Rhaella’s ear.

“If you stand still, I’ll read to you tonight.”

Rhaella blinked. “Florian and Jonquil?”

Alysanne smiled gently. “Yes. And I’ll hold your hand after Maegor arrives.”

The child pouted for a breath but finally nodded, brushing tears from her cheek with the back of her tiny hand. She resumed her stance beside her twin, visibly trying to be brave.

Alysanne reached down and brushed a lock of damp silver-blonde hair behind Rhaella’s ear.

The child didn’t notice the danger that had passed.

But Alysanne had.

Her gaze lifted back to Tyanna.

The Queen was watching her now.

Not the children.

Her.

Tyanna’s eyes were like polished jet: unblinking, unreadable. They roved over Alysanne slowly, like a merchant inspecting a blade for cracks. Over her honey-colored curls, her blue eyes, her slight frame, her long neck. The princess knew she didn’t look like a typical Targaryen… but that didn’t change who she was.

Alysanne stared back at Tyanna.

She did not look away.

She’d long since learned not to cower in Maegor’s court. Not even in front of Tyanna, the most dangerous woman in the Red Keep, second only to Maegor himself.

Their stare stretched, taut as a bowstring.

Behind Tyanna, Queen Ceryse clutched skirts tighter. Behind her, Alyssa still stared into nothing, unaware of the silent war unfolding beside her.

And then, after what felt like an hour…

Tyanna blinked.

She turned her head, slowly, back to the skies above the Red Keep.

The wind stirred her gown. Her ruby earrings swayed.

She wasn’t looking at Alysanne anymore.

She was looking for the only thing that truly mattered to her.

Maegor.

Alysanne exhaled, quietly. Almost a sigh. Almost a breath of relief. Another moment of survival, another refusal to submit.

Because she had to.

For her mother.

For the girls.

For her brothers.

For what came after.

Alysanne found herself silently wishing for Septa Keira as she turned her eyes to the sky.

If Keira were here, she would have whispered a dry remark beneath her breath about Tyanna's gaudy jewelry, or Queen Ceryse’s vacant muttering, or even the king’s own lateness. Keira would have smiled with her eyes, just enough to let Alysanne know she wasn’t alone. She would have been there with a hand on Alysanne’s shoulder or a soft joke spoken behind a veil of piety.

But of course, Septa Keira wasn’t allowed here.

Not in the presence of Maegor’s return.

Only the highborn. Only the important. Only those loyal, or quiet.

Alysanne’s chest ached with the absence.

She looked down at Aerea and Rhaella and gave them another small smile; something warm and human amid the marble faces of the court. Inside, she yearned for voices that weren’t afraid to speak to her.

Since their complete confinement in the Red Keep, Alysanne had seen no girls her age, no ladies from great houses, no one to whisper dreams with by candlelight, no one to walk arm-in-arm through gardens or tease about dresses and singers and knights.

The noblewomen at court now were all too old or too cautious, or worse, loyal to Tyanna. They kept their distance as if Alysanne were sick with something.

But Septa Keira never had.

Keira had held her hand when her brothers vanished.

She had wept quietly with her when word came that Alyssa’s child, Alysanne’s brother, had died before it was born, misshapen and monstrous.

She had scolded her gently when Alysanne once refused to eat for days after Tyanna told her she was growing fat.

She had been… family.

And her handmaids; Alysanne smiled at the thought of them. Lowborn, sharp-tongued girls, quick with gossip and quicker with affection. None could sew half as well as Ceryse’s attendants or speak properly in High Valyrian like a Targaryen. But she preferred them. They were real.

Maegor's world was made of masks and blood and silence.

Her handmaids had given her laughter.

They told her stories of life outside the Red Keep: tales from the markets of Flea Bottom, songs from the Riverlands, whispered rumors from Oldtown and Duskendale. Stories about street mummers, fire eaters, weddings, births, and dreams.

And in return, she shared her world: scrolls, songs, stories.

She had even taught two of them to read.

Sera had wept when she could finally write her own name. Jenya had blushed furiously when she read her first passage aloud, only to discover she’d pronounced half the words wrong. Septa Keira had beamed with pride while Alysanne had laughed.

They are more my ladies than anyone in this cursed court, Alysanne thought, and I miss them more than any noble lady of the realm I never met.

But the thought twisted in her belly suddenly.

Because she remembered where she was.

Who was coming.

She tensed, like a bird sensing a hawk overhead.

A gust of wind stirred the banners.

The sound.

Wings.

A deep, terrible thrum that pulsed through the stone, a noise that was not of this world.

The court stirred as one. All heads tilted skyward. The silence broke with gasps and murmurs.

He was coming.

Maegor.

And worse… Balerion.

Alysanne stiffened, clutching her hands tighter, forcing the image of Keira from her mind.

They must all stay far away, she thought. Far from this. Far from him.

If the king even sensed that her handmaids had given her solace, he might have them removed. Or worse.

Maegor liked to destroy things that made people happy.

Alysanne inhaled slowly and focused on standing straight.

She wished she could see Silverwing again. Her dragon had been nothing like Balerion; Alysanne could barely remember it now, but even the faint memory comforted her.

Then came the roar.

It wasn’t a sound; not really. It was a force. A thundercrack that tore through bone and soul alike, echoing off the red stone towers, shaking tiles loose and sending crows shrieking into the sky.

Balerion the Black Dread circled overhead once, wings wide enough to shade half the yard, smoke curling from his gaping maw like whispers from hell. His tail almost clipped the top of Maegor’s Holdfast; what a pity.

Rhaella and Aerea both clamped their hands over their ears and ducked, shrinking away from the noise.

They weren’t alone. Grown men flinched. A few ladies gasped aloud. A knight near the back of the yard dropped his helm in fright.

Alysanne fought the urge to cover her ears, too.

“Hands down,” she whispered sharply, voice low and firm. “Stand straight. He’s watching.”

The girls obeyed.

Just in time.

With a deafening crash, Balerion landed in the center of the Great Yard.

The ground shook. Dust lifted. Flags snapped violently in the wake. Several courtiers stumbled backward; one woman screamed.

Aerea, so quiet and still all morning, was knocked off her feet. She hit the stone with a soft oof, her hands scraped and her composure breaking at last.

She began to cry.

Alysanne was already moving.

She dashed forward, dress trailing behind her, and knelt beside her niece. “Quiet, now,” she whispered quickly, lifting Aerea to her feet, “You’re fine. You’re brave. He’s here now. No tears.”

She squeezed the girl’s hand.

Aerea hiccupped once, then bit her lip and nodded.

The noise finally stirred Alyssa Velaryon from her fog.

Her voice was quiet and brittle as she stared down at Aerea and Alysanne.

“Stop crying. The king is here.”

No comfort. No softness. Just survival.

Aerea wiped her cheeks, still shaking, but said no more.

Alysanne stood, brushing dust from Aerea’s skirts, then turned her gaze upward.

There he was.

Maegor. The Dragon. The King.

He sat atop Balerion like he was born there; as if the dragon itself had grown around him. His black armor gleamed like oil, spiked at the shoulders and etched with the sigil of House Targaryen. His cloak flared in the wind, crimson as fresh blood.

There was no joy in his face. There never was. Alysanne had never seen him smile, in fact; at least not that she could remember.

He slid from the dragon’s back with unnatural ease, landing with a metallic clang that rang out across the yard like the toll of a great bell.

His boots cracked the stone beneath them.

Monster of a man on a monster of a dragon, Alysanne thought, her stomach twisting.

He wasn’t just large; he was imposing. Thick-necked, broad-shouldered, with hands like meat hooks and eyes like cold amethysts. He wore no crown today. He didn’t need one.

The court held its breath.

Alysanne turned to look at the queens.

Her mother, Alyssa, wore the same mask she always did. Tired, distant, lifeless. The only time Alysanne ever saw emotion on her face anymore was when she looked at the girls. When she looked at him, it was all stone and shadow. If there was any hatred there, it was buried deep behind layers of grief. Grief for the children Maegor had butchered.

Ceryse Hightower, once the highborn bride of the prince who should have been a better man, looked… wistful. Alysanne had seen that look before. It frightened her. There was still hope in it. Still a memory of a younger Maegor. Still a trace of love. The kind that curdled slowly into madness.

Tyanna… Tyanna stared at Maegor like a starving woman gazes at a feast.

Alysanne didn’t have the words for it. Not yet. She didn’t understand what it was exactly. But she knew it was dangerous. And wrong.

Tyanna’s lips parted slightly as she watched him. Her fingers tightened. Her eyes glittered; not with fear, but something else. She doesn’t worship the gods, Alysanne thought, she worships him.

Alysanne looked away quickly, turning her eyes back to the man at the center of the yard.

Maegor was walking forward now, toward the gathered court, his steps slow and heavy, each one echoing like a death knell.

As Maegor strode across the Great Yard, the court bowed low in near-unison: nobles, knights, courtiers, and queens all offering silent obeisance to the monster in black steel. The nobles bowed. The lords dropped to one knee. The ladies curtsied, heads bowed low.

Alysanne curtsied as well.

But she did not drop her eyes.

She watched him as he came closer.

The only sounds were the hiss of the wind and the soft clatter of Maegor’s boots on wet stone.

It was Tyanna of the Tower who moved first.

Like a shadow gliding across the yard, she stepped forward from her place among the queens and dipped into a deep, dramatic curtsey; lower than any of the others, and slower, too.

“Your Grace,” she said, voice smooth and dark as velvet. “Your absence has been deeply felt. The Red Keep was far too quiet without you.”

There was something in her tone; almost a purr. It set Alysanne’s teeth on edge.

Maegor stopped and gave her a single nod, nothing more. Then he turned to the assembled court and lifted one massive gauntlet.

“I bring you good news,” he said, his voice loud and commanding. “The witch Poxy Jeyne Poore is dead. Her band of rabble, the band of Poor Fellows in the Kingswood, has been burned, broken, and beheaded.”

He gestured to the main gate.

The massive doors creaked open.

Through them came the procession.

A line of knights in black and red, faces grim, leading the gruesome prize of Maegor’s victory. A cart rolled into the yard, wheels splashing through puddles, drawn by two sweating horses and flanked by pikemen.

Atop the cart sat a great pile of skulls, many still charred and cracked, stacked like firewood.

But what drew the eye most was the centerpiece: a tall blackened stake, lashed down in the cartbed, and at its center-

A burned skeleton, barely held together, ribs blackened, mouth twisted into a final scream.

Gasps and stifled shrieks rippled through the court.

One lady clutched at her husband’s arm. A nobleman turned pale. Even some knights looked away.

But not Tyanna.

Her smile widened.

“Magnificent,” she murmured, not bothering to hide her delight.

Alysanne didn’t flinch.

She had long ago grown numb to Maegor’s theater of cruelty. Skull piles. Scalps. Crushed relics and heads on pikes. Every return to the Red Keep came with another grisly trophy. For the last couple years, Maegor had been constantly on campaign, bringing more and more skulls and scalps back the Red Keep. Alysanne preferred his absence.

She finally looked away.

More importantly, she turned Rhaella and Aerea away too, placing a gentle hand on each girl’s shoulder.

“Don’t look,” she whispered. “You don’t need to see it.”

Rhaella obeyed instantly, burying her face into Alysanne’s skirts. Aerea hesitated longer, her eyes wide with the awful curiosity only children can carry, but eventually turned as well.

Alysanne watched Maegor raise his hand again.

“With the death of this so-called prophet,” he declared, “the war with the Faith Militant is nearly concluded. The last of the Poor Fellows scatter like rats. But we will hunt them. We will root them out. And the next time I return to this yard…” He paused for effect. “The war will be over.”

There was a long silence.

Then: a cheer.

But it was thin. Strained. Half-hearted.

The clapping came from the lords at the front, the sycophants and survivors. A few brave voices echoed it, but it was nothing like triumph.

Alysanne felt no triumph.

She had heard this speech before. Half a dozen times, in half a dozen forms.

Each time Maegor returned from one of his blood-drenched “victories,” he spoke of peace being just around the corner. Each time, the court was expected to rejoice, to celebrate his strength.

But the blood never stopped.

The fire never went out.

If killing Ser Joffrey Doggett, the great Red Dog himself, hadn’t broken the Faith Militant, how could Maegor believe that burning a woman, no matter how feared, would bring true peace?

Jeyne Poore had only become a martyr now, Alysanne thought. Her skull may sit in Maegor’s yard, but her memory will walk the realm.

The Faith smoldered, beneath stones and in shadows. It would not die so easily. Neither would Maegor.

But then… neither would Alysanne.

The court surged around Maegor like waves crashing on black rock; noise and silks and whispers, all rustling and bustling in careful choreography. But none came too close.

None dared.

They gave the king a wide berth, a ring of empty stone around him where even the boldest lords feared to tread.

All but one.

Tyanna of the Tower glided to his side as if summoned by thought alone, her gown trailing like smoke, her eyes bright with mischief. She leaned toward him, whispered something soft into his ear, her lips curving into a knowing grin.

Maegor did not smile, but he did listen.

Alysanne kept close to her mother, who remained unmoving and expressionless, and to the twins, who had huddled tightly around her skirts.

Then, surprisingly, Rhaella reached up.

A small hand tugged at Alysanne’s.

“Can I… can I hold your hand now?” she whispered. “You promised.”

Alysanne blinked. Then smiled.

“Yes,” she said gently, and took her niece’s hand in her own.

It was small, warm, a little damp with nervous sweat.

Aerea turned slightly, her voice soft and unsure.

“Can I… too?”

Alysanne reached out her other hand without hesitation.

Two tiny hands gripped hers now.

Let Maegor look at all the skulls he wants, Alysanne thought, this is real strength.

And then she heard the sound she dreaded most.

Boots.

Heavy, echoing, deliberate.

She looked up.

Maegor was approaching; every step a thunderclap in her chest.

Tyanna was at his side, of course, walking like a cat with a prize in her mouth. Her eyes flicked briefly toward Alysanne, gleaming with silent amusement.

The king stopped in front of Alyssa.

He looked her up and down, his face behind the curtain of steel and shadow.

“Are you healthy again?” he asked curtly.

His voice was low, disinterested. Like he was commenting on the weather.

Alyssa, ever the statue, replied, “I feel fine.”

Her tone was flat. Acceptable. Emotionless.

Maegor nodded. Slowly. “I’d been worried,” he said.

Alysanne nearly choked.

Worried? She almost laughed aloud. That towering monster, who had married her mother like a man seizing a sword; Maegor, worried? He’d shown no worry when Alyssa was being tortured in the black cells, nor when her sons disappeared, nor when her womb miscarried a child twisted beyond recognition.

But Alysanne said nothing. Her face remained composed.

Maegor turned his gaze forward.

“I will be staying in King’s Landing for some time,” he said. “Prepare for that.”

He didn’t wait for a reply. His gaze instead dropped to the children.

To Aerea.

The toddler withered beneath his stare, lips trembling, feet shuffling closer to Alysanne’s side. She clung harder to her young aunt’s hand, eyes wide.

Rhaella made a small, high-pitched sound: half whimper, half breath.

Tyanna let out a delighted titter, her lips parting in some perverse enjoyment. She clearly loved it; watching children fear the king.

Alysanne’s stomach twisted.

Witch, she thought. Vile, barren witch.

But she didn’t let her face show it.

She squeezed the girls’ hands tighter, silently, protectively.

Then Maegor’s eyes turned to her.

He studied her with the slow, detached interest of a smith weighing a blade. Not affectionate. Not cruel. Just assessing.

“How old are you now?” he asked.

Alysanne swallowed.

“Thirteen, Your Grace. Almost fourteen.”

He frowned slightly.

“You don’t look it.”

That was when Tyanna laughed.

A sharp, cruel sound.

Alysanne’s cheeks flushed despite herself.

She lowered her eyes slightly. Do I really still look like a child? she wondered. Am I still small?

She thought of herself as a woman already. She cared for the girls. She read. She ruled over her own heart when her mother could not. But perhaps… Maegor and Tyanna only saw her as a girl. Barely even a proper Targaryen. She had always tried to remain beneath their attention; Alysanne would rather not incur their wrath.

Then Maegor gestured vaguely toward Aerea.

“She healthy?”

Alysanne nodded quickly, finding her voice.

“Yes, Your Grace. Aerea is a good girl. She’s learning to read and write now. So is Rhaella.”

She knew she shouldn’t have said that last part. She saw the twitch in Maegor’s jaw the moment she did.

His scowl deepened. Just slightly. But she caught it.

He liked hearing about Aerea.

He didn’t like hearing about Rhaella. Alysanne didn’t know exactly why.

A moment of silence passed.

Then Maegor turned.

Without another word, he began to walk away, boots striking the stone hard, Tyanna trailing behind him like a dark mirror.

Alysanne watched them go.

She didn’t speak.

She just squeezed the girls’ hands one more time.

As Maegor and Tyanna vanished into the stone halls of the Red Keep, his cloak trailing like smoke behind him and her dark silks slithering beside it, the tension that had gripped the yard did not vanish. It only changed shape.

Alysanne did not relax her grip on the twins' hands. She stood still, spine straight, breath steady. Her mother beside her did not move at all.

But Alysanne saw her shoulders tense when Lord Edwell Celtigar approached.

The Hand of the King walked with the practiced ease of a man who'd long grown used to navigating courts filled with knives. He wore his silver-stitched cloak like armor, his chain of office gleaming against his breast. His beard was trimmed, his silver hair swept neatly back from his brow. To anyone else, he looked like a man at peace, a dignified lord basking in his station.

But Alysanne knew better.

She felt her mother stiffen as he neared; not with fear, but something more complicated. Something twisted between old affection and betrayal.

There had once been warmth between Alyssa Velaryon and Edwell Celtigar. Even Alysanne, a child at the time, had noticed it. That warmth had long since turned to cold.

And still, he came.

“Princess. Queen Alyssa.” His voice was warm. Controlled. As always.

Alyssa said nothing.

She did not look at him. She did not blink. She simply stood, tall and silent, as though the man speaking did not exist.

Alysanne gave him a curtsy. A shallow one. Cold.

“Lord Celtigar,” she said politely, but without warmth.

Something flickered across Edwell’s face.

A slight hurt, quickly smothered beneath layers of practiced poise. But she saw it.

He kept talking. Of course he did. It was what he was good at.

“Now that things are calmer,” he said, “and I expect to remain in the capital for some time, I’ve sent word to Claw Isle. My children will be rejoining me at court.”

He looked at Alysanne now. His eyes softened, almost genuinely.

“I remember how fond you were of them. Trevor, and my girls, Prudence and Prunella. I thought perhaps you might like to see them again. Rekindle old friendships.”

Alysanne's heart twisted.

She had liked the Celtigar children. Trevor, a little wild but kind. Prudence and Prunella, both a little silly but also good friends. She remembered how once Prunella had made her laugh so hard she cried during a feast, how Prudence had told her silly stories about Claw Isle and life outside the Red Keep.

But the memory of them belonged to another life. A brighter one.

They reminded her of...

Jaehaerys, telling secrets to Trevor.

Viserys, effortlessly making Prudence and Prunella swoon.

Alyssa, brushing Alysanne’s hair while humming, listening to Prunella and Prudence chatter.

Those children, those days, had vanished in the dragonfire that took Queen Visenya, Queen Alys, and too many others.

Still, Alysanne smiled sweetly. She had learned to hide grief like a sword in silk.

“That would be lovely,” she said. “I look forward to seeing them again.”

And then, perhaps foolishly, perhaps bravely, she asked:

“Has there been any word of my brothers?”

The words left her lips before she could stop them. She saw her mother flinch ever so slightly beside her.

Lord Celtigar’s composure faltered.

His warm courtier’s smile faded in an instant. His back straightened. The moment of kindness fled from his eyes.

“No,” he said, voice lower now. “Unfortunately not.”

He didn’t blink.

“The last credible sighting placed them in Pentos. But nothing since. No sightings. No letters. Nothing.”

A beat of silence.

Alysanne nodded. Quietly. She knew what he didn’t say: If they were dead, we would have heard. Maybe. Maybe not.

Celtigar inclined his head.

“Thank you, Your Grace. Princess.”

And then he turned, briskly, cloak snapping in the wind as he followed the path Maegor had taken into the keep.

Gone again. Like smoke.

Alysanne stood still.

One of the twins, she wasn’t sure which, squeezed her hand tighter.

She didn’t let go.

Chapter 4: BENIFER I

The small council chamber of the Red Keep had grown quiet since the return of the king. Once, these walls had rung with debate, with pageantry, with the petty pomp of noblemen trying to out-talk one another. But no longer.

Maegor did not tolerate excess talk.

The chamber was quiet, save for the scratching of Grand Maester Benifer’s quill, the occasional cough from Lord Butterwell, and the low, smoldering voice of the king.

The council was small; intentionally so. The lord admiral and two of Maegor’s queens were conspicuously absent.

Benifer’s ink flowed smoothly as he recorded the names of those present, his script tidy and unhurried:

King Maegor Targaryen; stern as ever, black-armored and stone-eyed.

Queen Tyanna of the Tower; the true whisperer of court, smiling like she knew every secret under the sun.

Lord Edwell Celtigar, Hand of the King; older yet dignified, silver-haired, handsome still, clever beneath his calm exterior.

Lord Butterwell, Master of Coin; bloated in both body and greed, lips slick with excuses and sweat.

Lord Albin Massey, Master of Laws; a twisted frame, yes, but a young mind sharp enough to cut steel.

Ser Harrold Langward, Lord Commander; old, stiff in the joints, but loyal and dependable as a mailed fist.

And Benifer himself, seated at the lower end of the table, scratching out records in silence.

He did not speak unless spoken to.

Not here.

He knew exactly what had happened to Grand Maester Gawen, to Grand Maester Myros, to Grand Maester Desmond.

Dead, all of them.

While no one spoke of it, everyone at the table knew. So Benifer kept his tongue behind his teeth and his quill moving.

The discussion now was of coin; always coin, always fire, always blood that needed paying for.

“The treasury bleeds,” Lord Butterwell was saying now, dabbing at his brow with a cloth. “Even maintaining the current tax levels is dangerous, Your Grace. The realm groans. Ports are quiet. Traders vanish. The Reach barely yields half what it did five years ago.”

Across the table, Lord Massey nodded, his hunched shoulders rising.

“We cannot squeeze the lords like this, nor the smallfolk. Not without breaking something that won’t mend.”

“Then let it break,” said Queen Tyanna, her voice smooth as silk and sharp as razors. “The Faith Militant is nearly crushed. One last push, and the war ends. Raise the taxes. His Grace needs his armies.”

She smiled at Maegor as she spoke, eyes glinting like embers. “Fire consumes all. But it leaves only gold behind.”

Ser Harrold Langward, white cloak hanging from his shoulders, gave a rare grunt of agreement.

“The men need paying,” he said. “Blades need coin. Sellswords won’t wait long. If war must continue, so must the coin.”

Lord Butterwell spoke again, sputtering this time.

“The treasury is nearly empty, Your Grace! We can’t keep spending like this!”

Benifer’s eyes flicked to the king.

Maegor said nothing yet.

He sat at the head of the table, fingers drumming slowly against the wood, eyes shadowed and distant.

Lord Celtigar watched him as well, carefully. The Hand hadn’t committed either way, which meant he was gauging where the king’s mood would settle.

He often waited before speaking, cleverly so.

Benifer’s quill continued to move, recording the debate in exacting detail, though his own mind was heavy with unease.

He knew the ledgers.

He knew the truth.

The crown could not afford another year of war at current spending. It certainly could not afford more dragonfire and bribes, nor the cost incurred by Maegor’s Red Keep or this new Dragonpit.

Yet, Benifer said nothing. Maegor did not care for numbers; he cared for results. When results failed, he took bodies.

Benifer dipped his quill again and kept quiet.

The silence after Lord Butterwell’s latest sputtering protest had grown thick; thicker than the smoke from the hearth, thicker than the tension lingering always in Maegor’s shadow.

Then Lord Edwell Celtigar, Hand of the King, leaned forward.

His expression was calm. Calculated. The silver in his beard caught the torchlight like a blade’s edge.

“Raise the taxes,” Edwell said at last. “Temporarily. Long enough to crush the last rebels. The Faith is spent,” Edwell went on. “The last Warrior’s Sons are scattered. The Poor Fellows are broken. Qarl Corbray hides in the mountains like a bandit. None of them have a dragon. You do.”

He nodded toward Maegor, though the king had not moved.

“The realm will groan, yes. The people will pay and hate us for it. But when the rebels are ashes, the taxes can fall. That will silence most complaints.”

Benifer noted the subtle phrasing: the rebels are ashes, not defeated. Like they were one and the same.

Lord Massey gave a thoughtful nod. “It’s a fair enough plan. But dangerous. If the people believe the taxes will remain, if the smallfolk lose faith, it could spark fires worse than any septon’s sermon.”

Benifer’s quill paused.

That, he thought, is the truest thing spoken today.

It was a reasonable plan, yes.

But so was every mistake that had ended with heads on spikes and villages in flame.

In his heart, Benifer suspected they were near a breaking point. The Faith Militant was fractured, yes, but not yet finished. And the people? They bent, but they did not forget.

One bad harvest. One too many levies. One more septon burned in the square.

The dragon might not be the only fire the realm saw.

He dipped his quill.

But before he could write another word, the king’s voice boomed across the chamber.

“What does the Grand Maester think?”

The room turned.

Benifer’s mouth dried.

Of course. Maegor had waited. Let the lords weigh in. Let the cowards squabble. And now he called on the weakest, the man furthest from power: me.

Benifer slowly looked up, clutching his quill like a dagger.

The others watched in silence. Tyanna looked amused. Butterwell looked relieved it wasn’t him. Celtigar gave him the faintest, warning glance; measured and genial.

Benifer swallowed.

“Your Grace,” he began, bowing his bald head slightly. “I… agree with the Hand.”

He didn’t dare look Maegor in the eye.

“Raising taxes may strain the realm… but if it ends the wars… then it will have been worth it.”

He chose each word with care, laying them like stepping stones over a boiling lake.

“A final push to bring a final peace.”

He paused, waited.

Maegor’s eyes were like molten amethysts, locked on him, intense.

Benifer did not believe a single word he had just said.

He did not believe the war was close to ending.

He did not believe the people would quietly bear higher taxes.

He did not believe Maegor would ever stop burning his enemies.

He did say it anyway.

He knew it was the right thing to say.

He knew it was what Maegor wanted to hear.

Above all though, Benifer simply did not want to die.

The moment Benifer lowered his head and returned to his notes, Maegor turned his gaze elsewhere. He did not praise. He did not thank. But he did not strike. That, for a Grand Maester under this king, was all the reward he needed.

The king’s voice rumbled again, and Benifer scribbled dutifully as Maegor began listing off the enemies still resisting his rule.

“The Poor Fellows,” Maegor said, “still infest the Riverlands, the Vale, and the Dornish Marches. Ragged bands of zealots hiding in caves and ruined septs.”

“In the Vale,” he went on, “Qarl Corbray and his traitors hold out in the mountains, still calling themselves loyal to the missing princes.”

He slammed a hand on the table, the clang of steel gauntlet on wood making Butterwell jump.

“And the septons,” Maegor growled. “Dozens, maybe hundreds. Still preaching sedition. Still naming me monster. Still calling for anything but a Targaryen to sit the Iron Throne.”

Benifer nodded along with the others. He could feel the weight of the chain around his neck, cold against his collarbone.

Maegor leaned forward slightly, eyes narrowing.

“New laws will be drawn,” he said. “Any septon who dares speak against the Iron Throne will be fined, flogged, or hung. And if they preach rebellion, they will burn.”

Benifer’s stomach turned.

They all nodded; Butterwell, sweat-drenched and jowly. Massey, scribbling in his thin, spidery script. Celtigar, calm and reasonable as always. Even Tyanna, who smiled with her eyes as the king spoke of blood.

Monstrous plans, Benifer thought. Monstrous king.

But he nodded too because he liked his throat intact.

Then the king turned his attention to Tyanna.

The room grew just a little colder.

“Any word,” Maegor asked, “of Viserys and Jaehaerys?”

Benifer froze, just for a moment. He kept his eyes on the parchment. Kept his pen steady.

The question fell like a stone into deep water.

Tyanna’s eyes sparkled. She tilted her head like a woman recalling the taste of an old wine.

“No, Your Grace.”

Her voice was honeyed. Mocking.

“Not for years. Not a word, not a whisper.”

Maegor’s expression tightened.

“Driftmark?” he asked.

“My agents report hatred there,” Tyanna replied. “The Velaryons still name your reign cursed. But no princes.”

“Dragonstone?”

“No sign. The dragons remain. The keep is watched. But no trace of the boys.”

Maegor grunted.

To the untrained eye, he looked furious.

But Benifer had trained eyes.

He could see the truth.

It was a performance.

Maegor wanted to appear displeased. To seem like a king still searching, still furious, still obsessed.

But the rage was hollow.

He doesn’t believe they’re alive, Benifer realized, or worse, he knows exactly what happened to them.

His pen scratched quietly across the parchment.

Viserys. Jaehaerys. Two princes, two sparks of legitimacy, of possible rebellion.

Where were they?

Across the Narrow Sea, biding their time?

Hiding in the Vale or the Stormlands, gathering swords?

Or… already dead, their bones buried deep beneath the Red Keep, like so many others?

Benifer had heard the rumors. Whispered things in the dark. Of screams behind the walls. Of black cells never unbarred. Of Maegor’s hidden dungeons beneath the Red Keep’s foundations… places even Tyanna didn’t speak of.

He didn’t know. Not knowing, that was the worst part.

If they are dead, he thought, then perhaps the realm will never know peace. But if they live...

Benifer’s pen paused again, briefly.

Then he resumed writing.

The small council chamber had fallen into another one of those slow, careful silences; the kind that settled like ash after the fire, when no one wished to be the first to speak, and everyone feared they might be the last.

Maegor, seated like a mountain of black steel at the head of the table, exhaled audibly. The firelight glinted off the three-headed dragon on his breastplate.

“What of the great houses?” he asked at last.

“The Lords Paramount. What do they think of their king?”

Benifer didn’t look up, but his quill slowed, listening.

Across the table, Lord Edwell Celtigar cleared his throat. He did not hesitate. He never did. Edwell was one of the only men in Westeros who could still speak honestly to Maegor and live.

Benifer thought that courage… a little admirable. And reckless.

“None of them are pleased, Your Grace,” Edwell said plainly. “Not one.”

A lesser man would have choked on the words. Celtigar sipped from his goblet and continued.

“But displeasure is not defiance. The Lords Paramount may despise your rule, but they do not yet dare rebel.”

Benifer’s pen scratched softly, noting every word, every name not spoken but implied.

Celtigar continued, leaning forward slightly.

“House Baratheon,” he said, “grows restless. That Rogar is proud. Ambitious. Still unmarried. Still has Targaryen blood. A dangerous combination.”

He paused. Then:

“House Lannister… not much better. Lord Lyman grinds his teeth in silence. His bannermen openly mutter. He supported the rebel prince Aegon from the shadows. But neither house will move; not without a prince to rally behind. Not without a dragon.”

Benifer nodded faintly, his face neutral.

As always, it comes down to dragons.

“And the rest?” Maegor asked.

“The North and the Iron Islands are watching,” Edwell said. “Rumors claim House Stark and House Greyjoy have entered into a mutual pact; to stand together if the realm rises against you… or them.”

That drew a few raised brows around the table. Even Butterwell, who usually only raised a brow when the treasury was threatened, looked alarmed.

“A Stark-Greyjoy alliance?” Lord Massey murmured. “Seven save us.”

Benifer didn’t need to speak to know the implications. Ice and saltwater, forming an unlikely wall.

“House Tully and House Tyrell are too frightened to act,” Edwell said, “though they stew in their cups. House Arryn dislikes your rule, but they hate anarchy more. The rebels have few friends in the Vale; they despise Qarl and the Faith Militant.”

Benifer noted that carefully. A realm full of simmering nobles. Not boiling, yet, but Maegor was fire, and fire made everything boil eventually.

Then Tyanna spoke, her voice like oil poured over still water.

“And several houses,” she said, “watch the skies, not the throne. Particularly House Velaryon… and House Baratheon.”

She smiled faintly. “They look not to rebellion, but to opportunity.”

Maegor’s eyes narrowed.

“The princes,” he muttered.

Tyanna nodded. “They’ve not forgotten Jaehaerys. Or Viserys. If either of them returns with a dragon at their side…”

She trailed off, but the meaning was clear.

Benifer continued to write:

Baratheon & Velaryon; suspected to support lost princes.

Stark & Greyjoy; possible pact.

Tyrell, Tully, Lannister; passive hostility.

Arryn; pragmatic but firm.

He didn’t bother writing the subtext:

Not burning anyone yet, but it hovered in the air, clear as firelight.

No lords were condemned today, not yet.

But Benifer had lived long enough to know that Maegor’s memory was long, and his patience short. He was not a forgiving man.

Another silence had fallen over the small council chamber: long, brittle, and taut as a crossbow string.

Benifer, fingers still smudged with ink, glanced across the table at Lord Celtigar, who leaned back in his chair and let out a dry chuckle. “Well,” the Hand said lightly, “if we’ve exhausted blood, gold, and fire for today, perhaps we are done?”

A polite murmur almost followed, but it died the instant Maegor raised his hand.

The king’s voice cut through the chamber like a black blade:

“Not yet.”

Every man stiffened.

Benifer’s fingers tightened around his quill.

Maegor leaned forward, folding his gauntleted hands on the table. His voice was quieter now, but no less dangerous.

“There is still one matter left.”

Benifer already knew what it would be.

“The matter… of heirs.”

The words dropped like stones into a well.

The temperature of the room seemed to drop with them.

No one moved. Not Butterwell, not Langward, not even Tyanna, who sat straighter now, her dark eyes narrowing just slightly.

Maegor continued.

“My mother, Visenya, wanted sons of my body. To secure our rule. To carry on the legacy.”

A pause.

“But I’ve had none. Not truly.”

Benifer dared not lift his gaze, but the images flickered across his mind all the same.

Alyssa Velaryon’s dead child, malformed and lifeless.

Queen Alys Harroway, gone with her bastard babe stillborn.

No other pregnancies. Only barren wives and empty cradles.

“So I must decide,” Maegor said, almost to himself. “Do I name Aerea my heir? Or Alysanne? Or do I try again, to father a son?”

The room went silent as the table considered the question.

Benifer’s mind strayed to the girls… Alysanne was a bright young girl… but just a girl. Meanwhile, Aerea was little more than a babe.

The tension shattered into a frenzy of agreement.

“You must try again, Your Grace,” Butterwell said immediately, his voice quivering.

“Yes, indeed,” Lord Massey agreed.

“You are still strong. Still capable. The realm must have a male heir.”

Even Ser Harrold Langward, quiet and old as he was, nodded silently in firm assent.

Benifer hesitated only a second, longer than he should have, then dipped his head and echoed the others.

“Yes, Your Grace. The realm would benefit from such a pursuit.”

He said it plainly. Carefully.

He did not say "the realm would prefer a male heir."

He did not say "you are still young enough."

He did not say "this is wise."

He said what Maegor wanted to hear.

All of them did.

All but Tyanna.

She said nothing.

When Benifer looked up, just briefly, he saw the look on her face.

Not rage. Not envy. Not hatred.

Just… quiet humiliation, like a mirror cracked down the center.

The only thing Queen Tyanna couldn’t provide Maegor: children. Now, her king mused about finding another path.

Celtigar seized the silence with practiced skill.

“Your Grace,” he said smoothly, “you know I will serve you in all things. I’ll soon be bringing my children to court: Trevor, Prudence, and Prunella. All good stock. My daughters are maidens, well-tempered and strong. If it please you…”

He let the implication hang.

Maegor did not answer immediately. He stared down at the table. His fingers tapped against the dark wood.

“Alyssa,” he said at last. “She conceived once. She could again. She’s older now, but…”

Benifer fought the urge to look up.

Alyssa Velaryon, the king’s queen and prisoner. Grieving mother. Broken widow. Still fertile.

That fact had become a sentence all its own.

Maegor’s voice dropped lower.

“Of course,” he mused aloud, “if no son comes, I could name a girl my heir. But would the realm accept a queen?” he asked. Not angrily. Just… pondering.

All eyes turned to Benifer.

He knew it was his turn to speak. Benifer cleared his throat. Measured his tone.

“Your Grace,” he said slowly, “no woman has ever sat the Iron Throne. Not in all the years since Aegon’s Conquest.”

A pause.

“It would be… unprecedented.”

Maegor didn’t flinch. He nodded. Absorbing that like cold iron absorbs heat.

Benifer looked at him and wondered…

What new madness is this?

Would Maegor wed again? Try again? Or would he make a girl his heir, only to burn her later?

Benifer did not know.

The king stood.

The scraping of Maegor’s chair echoed like a grinding wheel through the council chamber. All others remained seated until the dragon himself moved; his massive black form rising like a waking giant, armored from throat to heel, dark cloak trailing behind him like stormclouds.

Benifer watched with shallow breath.

He had been half-hoping the king would simply leave. That this meeting, filled with its usual fire and threat, might pass without further strangeness.

But Maegor lingered.

He turned back to the table, eyes sweeping across the men seated before him; his council. His tools.

“I have made no decision yet,” he said, voice low, eyes ever suspicious.

“On heirs.”

The silence that followed was near-sacred. Not reverent, just afraid.

“But I think on it,” he went on, “because what is the point of war, of crowns, of conquest; if it all ends with me?”

He began to pace slowly behind his chair, gauntlet tapping against the carved dragonhead atop the seat.

“I could burn the realm with Balerion. Win every war. Crush every rebel. Salt the bones of the Faith Militant. But if I die without a son…”

He stopped, voice dropping:

“It all crumbles. Just like before Aegon came.”

Benifer nodded along with the others, lips thin, chin lowered.

They all agreed.

Of course they did.

Butterwell babbled something about legacy.

Massey said it was the duty of kings.

Langward solemnly declared that peace required order.

Celtigar, ever calm, simply murmured: “A realm without heirs invites disorder.”

Benifer nodded too.

But inside, he squinted.

Something about Maegor’s tone was wrong.

Too reflective. Too speculative. Almost… regretful.

And then came the next blow.

“Perhaps,” Maegor said, more softly now, “I should take a new squire.”

A beat of stunned silence.

Benifer blinked.

It was such a mundane thought… a new squire? Amid talk of taxes, rebellion, and heirs?

Still, like trained dogs, the table leapt to agree.

“A fine idea, Your Grace.”

“Yes, a good way to raise the next generation.”

“A squire to learn your strength, your wisdom.”

Benifer said nothing for a moment too long. Then he added, dutifully:

“A wise move, Your Grace. It may… offer new perspective.”

But inside, he was deeply unnerved. Maegor did not muse aloud like this. He did not ponder posterity. He did not ask questions.

He issued commands.

This… this was different.

Was it a trap?

A test?

Some perverse game Tyanna had whispered into his ear? Benifer couldn’t tell. But something had changed.

He did not like it.

Maegor cast one last glance around the table.

“Think on what I’ve said,” he muttered.

And with that, he swept from the chamber, cloak billowing behind him, footsteps like war drums. Queen Tyanna followed closely, gliding at his heels like a shadow with a smile.

The door closed behind them with a deep, echoing thud.

And the room exhaled.

Benifer’s hand slowly loosened around his quill. The tension in his shoulders released like old rope. Butterwell was already reaching for the wine. Celtigar remained still, a small smile on his lip as he turned to Butterwell. Massey scribbled a note. Langward rubbed his temples.

But Benifer just sat there, still, the candlelight flickering over his chain.

He thought of Maegor’s words: New heirs. New queens. New squires. Legacy.

What fresh hell is this? Benifer wondered.

His only hope, his quietest prayer, was simple.

Let Maegor leave. Let him take Balerion and vanish into the countryside, chasing ghosts and rebels. Let the Red Keep have a moment’s peace.

Because so long as the king remained… there would be no peace.

Not for the realm.

Certainly not for Benifer.

Chapter 5: MAEGOR I

Notes:

WARNING: This chapter has explicit content

Maegor Targaryen lay on his back beneath the suffocating folds of his oversized bed canopy, staring into red silk shadows like he might punch through them if he tried hard enough. His bedchamber inside Maegor's Holdfast was comfortable... but Maegor did not want comfortable.

The bed was extravagant, absurd; Tyanna's work, no doubt. All gold-threaded curtains, plush pillows, the scent of foreign perfumes clinging to the linens. Maegor hated it.

It was soft. Useless. Fit for a singer, not a king.

He wanted to look at stone. Steel. Something solid he could beat his fists against.

Instead, he lay among silk and shadows, alone with the buzz of his thoughts.

Well, not alone.

A faint shift of weight beside him. A breath. A creak of the mattress.

He turned his head.

Alyssa Velaryon lay curled beside him, her back to him, the covers drawn up to her shoulder, her hair a silver tangle against the dark sheets.

Still. Quiet. Trying to sleep. Or pretending.

The firelight caught on the fresh bruises ringing her pale neck; his bruises. They looked strange on her. Like wine stains on a septa’s robe.

Dignified, they called her. Highborn. Royal widow. Mother of the princes and princesses he’d killed.

He snorted softly.

She didn’t even cry anymore.

Just lay there, quiet and obedient, too spent or too broken to argue.

She doesn’t talk. Doesn’t scream. Doesn’t fight. Fine by me.

Maegor studied the curve of her back, the way her ribs rose and fell slowly under the blanket.

She was still beautiful, in her way: slim, soft, pale, like a piece of old lace someone forgot to pack away. He had taken her because he could. Because her womb still worked. Because it hurt Aenys's memory. Because it proved he could take what was his; wife and throne and all.

He wondered, vaguely, what Aenys would think if he could see them now.

His brother’s seed buried in his widow. Their father’s crown on the head of his brother. His sons turned to ash.

Aenys would’ve wept, Maegor thought. Maybe written a song about it. Maybe prayed for forgiveness like a gutless fool.

Too soft. Too slow. Too kind. All the things that made him weak.

Visenya had always said so.

His mother hadn’t been a woman. She had been a blade in the shape of one. Cold and sharp and necessary. She’d seen the truth about Aenys before anyone else.

She’d seen what Maegor had to become. She had never liked it, never felt like he was good enough, despite being responsible for everything he’d become.

He looked back at Alyssa.

Valyrian blood was strong in her, just like his mother. Same eyes. Same hair. Same bones.

But where Visenya had been iron, Alyssa was hollow.

Maegor grimaced as his thoughts went to his mother, to Visenya. He still missed her, missed her advice, missed that little voice in his head that sounded like her that steered him in the right direction. That voice, Visenya’s voice, had been absent from his head for years now. His eyes strayed back to Alyssa, and he remembered how he'd had her tortured for poisoning Visenya, how he'd just as quickly married her at the advice of Tyanna and Celtigar. Was he a fool?

Alyssa wasn’t dead, not yet. But the life in her had been drained; first by grief, then by him.

He didn’t care. Not really.

She didn’t need to love him. Or talk. Or pray. Or beg. Or scream.

She just needed to open her legs and give him a son.

A real one this time.

Not some twisted thing she bled out onto the bed last year.

Not another bastard girl like Alys’s brat.

He needed a heir. A legacy. Something that would last longer than blood and fire and that damned throne.

Otherwise, what had he done all this for?

What had he become all this for?

Behind him, Alyssa shifted slightly, and in her sleep she whispered a name. It wasn’t his. He didn’t recognize it. Perhaps her daughter. Or one of the ones I killed. He didn’t care.

He turned his head back toward the canopy. Red shadows danced above him like blood in water.

He closed his eyes.

He couldn’t sleep.

First came the echo of Poxy Jeyne Poore’s laughter; that madwoman's cackle as Balerion turned her to blackened bone. Her parting words…

“You’ll dream of fire. Of blood. Of Hell.”

He didn’t know what the bitch meant. He’d never dreamed. Not once. Not even as a boy.

Sleep was like death: black and blank and peaceful.

No ghosts. No gods. No flames.

But he remembered it; because it felt like a curse. And he remembered another:

Princess Rhaena, screaming something as she fell from the sky atop her dragon. A curse on his line, maybe. Or just mad fury.

He liked that memory, actually. Her fear. Her madness. The way her fire had guttered out like a candle.

He almost smiled; just a little.

He wasn’t afraid of curses. Not of gods. Not of women. Certainly not of burnt-up witches and bitter little princesses.

But still…

He found himself wondering; what are dreams like?

A strange thought.

He remembered asking it once, long ago, half-drunk and naked, lying in bed between Alys and Tyanna in the Tower of the Hand. A real question, back when things had felt… different.

He didn’t like thinking about Alys, but gods, he missed her sometimes.

He missed the way she used to squeal and wriggle when he grabbed her, like she didn’t know whether to moan or giggle.

Missed her plump thighs, her soft belly, her big stupid brown eyes that got even bigger when he undressed her.

Missed the way she blushed in embarrassment when she moaned his name.

She’d been a cow, yes. A soft little Harroway cow with more hips than sense.

But she’d been his. She’d at least tried to please him.

Then she’d gone and ruined it.

Pregnant with another man’s brat. Dying with her bastard half-born, screaming like a sow in a firepit.

The rage flared again, hot and ugly in his chest.

He told himself the same thing he always did: She never loved him. Never cared. Just another lying whore with a crown in her eye.

He repeated it like a prayer.

Even if he missed the way she called him “Maegor,” just that. Even if he missed her stupid, honest little smiles.

He turned toward the woman lying beside him.

Alyssa. Queen. Widow. His brother’s wife.

Her pale back was to him, her body curled inward, her breathing shallow. She’d been silent since they’d finished earlier. No crying. No whimpering. Just… nothing.

The bruises on her neck were faint now, but still there. His marks.

He reached out and ran a thick finger along the hollow of her throat.

Her skin was soft. Smooth. Finer than Alys’s. More regal. More fragile.

She shivered under his touch.

Not from desire. That much was clear.

Doesn’t even try to fake it, he thought with a sneer.

Tyanna always moaned like a pleasure-girl in heat, even when she wasn’t feeling a thing.

Alys would blush and stammer and cling to him like she didn’t know whether to cry or laugh.

But Alyssa?

She just lay there, body stiff, eyes far away even when he was on top of her.

Like she’d died and left her flesh behind.

It infuriated him. And yet…

She was beautiful.

Slim. Elegant. Silver-haired. Valyrian. A queen in truth, not just title.

And fertile.

That set her above Tyanna. Above Ceryse. Even above Alys, who had died trying to bring forth another man’s whelp.

Alyssa had carried his child. Misshapen. Monstrous. Dead before it ever drew breath. But his.

He stared at her neck as his hand drifted slowly along her back, petting her like one of the royal hounds.

Would she carry again?

Would she finally give him a son?

The thought settled on him like a stone on his chest.

He needed it. Badly, like nothing else.

It would all be nothing.

Just ashes without it.

He gripped Alyssa’s shoulder, his thumb pressing into her bone.

She flinched. Slightly. But she didn’t speak. He leaned forward, still gripping Alyssa’s shoulder, his hand firm on her skin, fingers curling just slightly where the bruise had begun to darken again. She didn’t move. Didn’t speak.

Alyssa’s breathing was shallow. Feigned sleep, perhaps. Or cowardice.

He hated being ignored.

His voice came low, rough from disuse but full of intent:

“Is now the right time?”

She said nothing.

His grip tightened, not quite bruising, not yet.

“Alyssa.” His tone sharper now, but still quiet. A predator’s whisper.

“I asked you a question. Is now the right time for you?”

Still, no reply.

The silence itched at him like chainmail on bare skin.

So he got meaner.

“Alysanne’s flowering now,” he said casually, his mouth close to her ear. “Your daughter. Pretty little princess. Obedient. Good manners. Clever tongue.”

He let the words hang like smoke in the air, warm against the nape of her neck.

“I’ve been thinking…” he added, as if it were nothing, “…she might make a good bride.” A pause. “Maybe it’s time she married. Perhaps soon.”

He let the implication bloom.

He didn’t need to say to whom.

He wanted Alyssa to imagine it.

Alysanne in his bed, in Alyssa’s place, under his weight, giving him the son Alyssa hadn’t. For a moment, he saw it in his mind: the honey-blonde hair, the nervous blush, the stiff posture slowly broken under him. Then it went away; it wasn’t a serious suggestion. Not yet.

Beneath him, Alyssa sighed; not loud, not emotional. Just weary.

She turned her head, finally, slowly, her eyes shadowed in the faint firelight.

“Yes,” she said.

Her voice was flat. Hollow.

Maegor didn’t care. He’d won. Again.

Another soft-spoken victory. Another small submission.

Another knife in Aenys’s memory.

He reached down and pulled the sheet back, exposing her to the warm air.

His gaze traveled down her pale back, over old bruises and fresh ones, and he felt something tight and ugly stir in his chest: desire, yes, but also conquest. Without any effort, Maegor pulled her over, putting her on her back.

She was his now. Entirely. Body. Soul. Womb. Lineage. Soon, perhaps: his heir.

Another triumph over his dead brother.

Another nail in the coffin of that weak bloodline.

He loomed over her like a storm, thick arms braced on either side of her slender frame, the mattress sagging beneath his massive weight. Alyssa lay beneath him, still and composed, the way she always was: every inch of her delicate body speaking restraint, distance, dignity. Maegor’s body was built for war; thick with scars and calloused muscle, his back wide as a siege shield, his legs like tree trunks. Her body felt fragile beneath him, all narrow shoulders, small breasts, and soft limbs, the skin cool and pale where his fingers touched. She was warm and real and alive, yet she lay, cold as a stone. She didn’t resist, didn’t speak; it was her way of slighting him.

He hated that.

He wanted her to react, to move, to make a sound, to see him the way he wanted to be seen: not just as king, not just as conqueror, but as the man who ruled her.

His cock lazily found its way to her womanhood, already slick from their last encounter earlier in the night.

He pressed into her roughly, without ceremony. The way she always tensed, stiff and cold, almost annoyed him more than if she cried. He started thrusting. His hips pressed against her with the same force he brought to killing: rough, driven by more than lust. It was need. It was rage. It was a demand for something he hadn’t yet earned, hadn’t yet seized. Her small hands gripped the sheets; not his shoulders, not his back. The muscles in her arms were tense, her jaw clenched. His free hand pawed his chest, her left breast; he squeezed it.

“Say my name,” Maegor muttered, low, his voice more breath than command.

Nothing.

Just the same soft, miserable panting.

No pleading. No moaning. No begging his name like Alys used to do when she wanted to please him. No sweet evil words to excite him like Tyanna faked so well. Just this dull, dead silence. Almost like damned Ceryse.

Fine then.

Maegor pressed harder, forcing her body to yield beneath his, but it never did the way he wanted. She fit beneath him like a blade fits its sheath, perfectly shaped and absolutely resistant.

He felt her breathing speed up, her ribs pushing softly into his chest. But no words. No sound. No his name.

He bent his head low and whispered it again, through clenched teeth.

“Say it!”

Still nothing.

Only her eyes, wide and unblinking, stared past him; as if she was somewhere else entirely.

It made him wild.

She was smaller than any of his other wives, more delicate than Alys, more graceful than Tyanna, but colder than both; not by temperament like Ceryse, but by will. And yet it was that very stillness that made him obsess. He wanted to shake something loose in her: anything.

He wasn’t sure what he wanted more: her body, or her submission.

No. What I want is a son.

That’s what she was good for. That tight little body, a little old but still capable of getting pregnant. Unlike Ceryse. Unlike Tyanna.

Alyssa had done it once for him, hadn’t she? Even if it came out wrong. Even if it died squirming in blood.

He finished with a grunt, his body clenching as he emptied himself into her. A final thrust. A shudder. A silence.

Then he collapsed on top of her, chest heaving, the sweat sticking them together. He lay there a moment, his breath hot against her neck, hand still gripping her hip possessively.

She didn’t move. Not even a sigh.

Her silence felt like a mockery. Like defiance wrapped in lace.

He hated her for it, and he wanted her again.

Maegor rolled off her finally, the bed creaking under his weight, and stared at the dragon-stitched canopy above.

The room was silent, save for the fire crackling in the twin hearths.

Would she give him a son this time?

Or just another dead thing?

He didn’t know, but he would keep trying. She would keep taking it.

Cold little queen, he thought. Doesn’t even cry anymore. Doesn’t even flinch.

But when she’d opened her legs, it was warm between there. She let him fuck her. That was enough.

That was all that mattered.

Maegor rolled onto his side, the bed creaking beneath his bulk. His skin was still slick with sweat, his pulse steadying. Beside him, Alyssa lay flat on her back, her hair spilled across the pillow like pale weeds in dark water, her chest rising and falling fast.

He really looked at her this time.

Not just her body, slender limbs, soft curves, long neck, cunt full of seed, but her face. Eyes open, staring at nothing. Lips parted but silent.

She looked dirty to him now, despite her noble coloring and the silk sheets. Not filthy like a whore in a dockside alley. Dirty the way a hunted thing looks after the chase: feathers ruffled, dignity cracked, still breathing but no longer untouchable.

A hunted swan.

That’s what she was.

A swan with a long neck, once regal and untouchable, now pinned beneath his hand, bruised where he’d held her.

He rubbed his own neck absently, thumb pressing the pulse, eyes roaming her like a hunter studying trophies.

They all had shapes, he realized.

It was how his mind worked.

Alys had been a pig: plump, dirty, wanton, eager to please, rolling in whatever slop she’d been given.

Tyanna was a spider: lean, deadly, poisonous, spinning webs around him even as she purred at his side.

Alyssa… a swan. Noble. Beautiful. Long-necked. Her silence a mask for some old grief he couldn’t crush.

And Ceryse? She was a deer. Dull-eyed. Frightened. Good for nothing but bolting when she could, standing still when she couldn’t.

He let out a slow breath.

He’d butchered the pig. He’d fed the spider. He’d broken the swan. He’d mounted the deer.

Still, no son. No heir.

His hand drifted toward Alyssa again, brushing the bruises on her throat, fingers sliding over the rise of her collarbone. She didn’t flinch this time. She just stared upward, eyes glassy.

It almost irritated him more than her earlier silence.

I won’t wait much longer, he thought, his thumb pressing against her pulse as if to measure it.

You will give me my heir. Or I will look elsewhere.

He stared at her pale, delicate neck, that hunted swan’s neck, and for a moment imagined it under his hands, soft and breakable.

Maegor exhaled, rubbed his own neck again, and rolled onto his back.

Another night. Another try. Another warning in his head.

The swan still had a little time.

But not much.

Chapter 6: ALYSSA I

The stones of Maegor’s Holdfast were always cold, no matter the season, and their cold crept into Alyssa’s bones now more than ever. She stood by the door, fingers gripping the frame just to steady herself.

“Your Grace?” a young maidservant asked softly from outside. Her face was fresh, unlined, but her eyes darted nervously. “Are you sure you don’t want me to come in? Are you all right?”

“I’m fine,” Alyssa said. She forced her voice into calmness, into that same flat, regal tone she’d worn like armor these past years. Her stomach lurched even as she spoke.

The girl shifted on her feet. “I just wanted to clean, if it pleases-”

“That won’t be necessary,” Alyssa cut her off gently but firmly. “I just want to be alone.”

She listened as the maid retreated and vanished down the hall. The echo of soft slippers on stone carried for a few moments and then faded, leaving only the heartbeat of silence.

Alyssa stood still.

Listening.

The Red Keep had a way of listening back, of holding sound. She counted the footfalls in her head, waited for them to stop. She’d learned to do that: count the steps until she was certain no one lingered just out of sight.

When she was sure she was alone, she clamped a hand over her mouth and stumbled to the chamber pot.

She vomited, hard. Bitter bile and nothing else. The retching echoed against the cold stones, sounding louder than it was.

When it was over, she knelt there on the floor, fingers gripping the rim of the pot, trembling. Her eyes blurred.

She didn’t need a septa to tell her what it meant. She’d learned the signs the hard way. The missed bleedings. The nausea. The faint ache low in her belly.

She was pregnant.

Again.

A sob rose up but she bit it back. Tears burned her eyes anyway. She pressed her palms to her face and rocked once, silently.

She was carrying the child of the man who had burned her life to ash. The man who had killed her children. The man who had forced her into his bed to erase her husband’s memory and turn her body against her.

But the child wasn’t what terrified her most.

Tyanna was.

Alyssa was certain, not suspected, not feared, but certain, that Tyanna had killed Queen Alys. Poison in her cups, poison in her blood, poison that made the birth go wrong. She hadn’t gotten Alyssa to kill Alys, but she’d found some other way. She was almost sure Tyanna had killed her own child, too, the one that had been born twisted and dead, the one Maegor had looked at once and turned away.

And if Tyanna knew she was pregnant again…

She imagined the queen’s black eyes, her thin smile. She imagined a vial slipped into her wine, a powder mixed into her herbs. She imagined her child gasping before it ever saw daylight.

She didn’t trust anyone.

Not her maidservants: spies for Tyanna, no doubt.

Not Lord Celtigar: clever and charming but always Maegor’s creature.

Not the courtiers: too afraid to risk anything for her.

No one.

No one would believe her if she spoke. They’d smile, nod, murmur comforting words, and leave her to her fate.

It was terrifying.

And it was isolating.

She knelt on the cold stone floor a moment longer, wiping her mouth with a trembling hand. She could feel her heartbeat in her throat, a steady, panicked pulse.

She wanted to run. She wanted to hide. She wanted to scream.

Instead, she straightened her back slowly, breathing through her nose until her face smoothed over again, until the mask of calm returned. She walked towards her bed and sat down.

Alyssa sank down onto the edge of the bed, her knees folding under her like paper. The great canopy above her swayed faintly with a draft, but the chamber felt airless, as if the stones themselves were closing in. She curled in on herself, pressing her arms around her belly, and let the tears come.

They came soundless. She had taught herself not to sob aloud. It made the spies curious. It made Tyanna smile.

She was caged here. Not just locked in Maegor’s Holdfast but sealed away from everything that had once been hers. Her children. Her friends. Her self.

She thought of the nobles and the girls who had been her handmaids when Aenys was still alive, her friends in all but name. Gone, replaced, or turned to watchers for Tyanna. She thought of the lords and ladies who had once whispered to her with smiles in the hallways, now either silent or gone. Betrayed by some like Edwell, abandoned by the rest.

She thought of her own children.

She had even withdrawn from Alysanne, from her own daughter, from her granddaughters Aerea and Rhaella. She had done it deliberately. She had seen the way Maegor’s eyes lingered on her when she cradled the girls. She had seen how he had wanted Alys more after she played at being the doting mother, holding the twins in her arms.

The memory made her stomach churn.

It disgusted Alyssa. It made her feel filthy. It had fractured her own family, her own bond with the children left to her. She had taught herself to stand apart, to be cool and distant, so that the girls would be less visible to him, so she would be less alluring to him.

But it hadn’t worked. He had returned to her bed, over and over, a man obsessed with the idea of an heir. A king who would set fire to a continent but treat her belly like a vessel for his line.

He had turned her body against her.

Made her betray Aenys.

Made her betray herself.

Made her hate herself.

Her tears soaked the sheets as she curled tighter, the weight of the secret in her belly pressing like a stone against her ribs.

Yet, beneath all the guilt and the shame, terror beat strongest.

Tyanna.

Alyssa’s breath hitched just thinking the name.

Tyanna had killed Queen Alys. She had poisoned Alyssa’s own womb, killing the child before it was born. Now, she was pregnant again.

What would Tyanna do if she found out?

What would Maegor do if Alyssa tried to warn him? He might not believe her. He might not care. He might think her mad.

But what choice did she have?

To stay silent was to risk another stillbirth, another monster, another dead thing, maybe her death in childbirth. To speak was to risk Tyanna’s wrath and Maegor’s disbelief, perhaps her own death.

Alyssa wiped at her eyes with shaking fingers. She stared at the canopy above her, her vision blurring.

Which is worse? she wondered.

Dying in childbirth, or dying by Tyanna’s hand? She prayed, to the Seven, to anyone, for an answer.

No answer came. Only the cold stones, the hush of Maegor’s Holdfast, and the faint echo of her own heartbeat under her palm.

A knock at the chamber door struck like a sword to her ribs.

Alyssa froze, still seated on the edge of her bed, arms around her midsection, tear stains not yet dried. For a brief, absurd moment, she imagined it was Tyanna, come with some sweet lie and bitter poison.

But then came the voice.

“Mother?”

It was Alysanne.

A moment later, her daughter’s voice returned, softer. “I’m here with Queen Ceryse… she wants to speak with you. Are you feeling well?”

Alyssa’s stomach turned again, but not from nausea this time.

Ceryse? Why?

Why come to me, now of all times? Why bring Alysanne?

A surge of panic twisted through her chest. She stood too quickly and swayed, catching herself on the bedpost. Her mind reeled through possibilities: was this a trap? Was Tyanna using Ceryse now? Had they found out somehow?

She breathed in, shallow and fast.

“Wait, give me a moment,” she called out, steadying her voice. “I need to make myself decent.”

She turned sharply to the corner where the chamberpot still sat, the stench barely masked by the bitter herb bundle she’d dropped in it the day before.

She grabbed it in both hands, went to the arrow slit window, and tipped it out, the foul contents spilling into the dry moat below with a splash lost to the depths.

She quickly placed the pot back in its corner and wiped her hands on a cloth. Then she moved to the mirror; not out of vanity, but necessity. Her eyes were red. Her face pale. She dipped her fingers in a nearby bowl and patted her skin, smoothing her cheeks, fixing the fall of her silvery hair, adjusting the high collar of her robe.

When she was satisfied that her mask was back in place, the dignified widow queen, not the weeping prisoner, she stepped to the door and opened it.

There they were.

Alysanne, her face gentle but worried. Her hands were folded in front of her like a proper lady, but her eyes searched her mother’s face with that sharpness Alyssa knew well; the girl had always been observant.

And beside her stood Queen Ceryse, Maegor’s first wife; forgotten by many, ignored by most, but always watching. She wore her usual modest gown of grey and green, her face pale and pinched, but her gaze was steady. Ceryse Hightower had once been the proud daughter of Oldtown. Now she looked… diminished. But not gone.

Both women looked concerned.

That alone was enough to keep Alyssa on edge.

“My ladies,” Alyssa said with practiced grace, giving a small nod. “Please, come in.”

They stepped inside quietly, and she gestured to the small table near the hearth; polished oak, with two chairs already pulled slightly askew from the morning’s unrest.

She motioned for them to sit, and took her place opposite them, smoothing her skirts as she got another chair and settled down.

The fire popped softly in the hearth. The air was thick with unsaid things.

What do they want? Alyssa thought.

Why now? Why together?

She folded her hands and rested them lightly on the table.

“Well then,” she said, her voice calm, her posture perfect. “What is it you wished to speak with me about?”

Alyssa sat straight-backed at the table, her fingers laced tightly in her lap, knuckles white. Across from her, Queen Ceryse Hightower sat with her usual quiet formality, hands folded like she was back in the septs of Oldtown. Beside her, Alysanne looked stiff and uncertain, as if torn between affection and fear.

It was Ceryse who spoke first, her voice soft and deliberate.

“I come on behalf of Septon Tobas,” she said. “From the Royal Sept.”

Alyssa blinked slowly, the name cutting through her suspicion like a cold knife.

Ceryse continued, glancing briefly at Alysanne.

“I asked your daughter to accompany me. It seemed… appropriate.”

That alone put Alyssa further on edge. She nodded once, politely, warily.

“The septon and others… they’ve noticed,” Ceryse said, her eyes returning to Alyssa. “That you’ve not attended services in two moons. They are concerned for you. We all are.”

Alyssa exhaled sharply; not quite a sigh, more a surrender.

Of course. The sept.

She looked away, her eyes drifting to the hearth.

“I have been…” she began, then caught her voice before it cracked. She blinked, hardened it, then continued.

“I’ve been too wrapped in my grief. That’s all.”

Her words were practiced. Tidy. But the list she spoke was not.

“Vaella died in the crib.”

“Aegon and Rhaena… burned over the God’s Eye.”

“The child I carried for Maegor was stillborn.”

She swallowed.

“And Viserys and Jaehaerys… are still missing. And every day I wake wondering if they’re dead too.”

Each name felt like stepping off a cliff. Each memory sharpened like glass in her throat.

She said nothing of the new life inside her; the fragile, flickering terror growing by the day. That fear stayed buried, for now. One secret grief atop the mountain of others.

Across the table, Ceryse looked down at her lap, pale and still.

“I’m sorry,” she said softly, “I know nothing of that kind of grief.”

Alyssa almost believed her.

But it was Alysanne who broke the quiet, her voice tight with something closer to pain.

“It’s not just the last two moons.”

Alyssa turned sharply.

“You’ve been distant for longer,” Alysanne said, her voice suddenly cracking.

“You sit in your chambers all day, you barely speak to me, or to the girls. It’s like we’re not even here. You just… stare at the window, or the fire, or-”

She stopped herself, her hands curling into fists.

“You care more about Viserys and Jaehaerys than the family you still have.”

That struck harder than any blow.

Alyssa’s mouth opened, but no words came.

Then, it was too much.

The mask cracked.

The tears came.

“I’m sorry,” Alyssa gasped, the words tumbling from her mouth.

“I’m trying, I’ve always tried, but I’m so tired-”

She pressed her hands over her face, but it didn’t stop anything. The tears spilled over, hot and humiliating. Her shoulders shook. Every breath hitched with guilt, with fear, with memories she couldn’t stop reliving.

“I miss your father. I miss the life we had. I miss who I was. I miss all of you-”

Her voice broke entirely. The room blurred through her tears.

She hadn’t cried in front of anyone in so long.

Alysanne didn’t speak.

She just moved.

Her chair scraped back, and in a blink she was beside her mother, arms slipping around her shoulders, holding her tight. Her head pressed to Alyssa’s.

“I’m sorry, Mother,” Alysanne whispered, “I didn’t mean it. I just… I miss you too.”

Alyssa wrapped her arms around her daughter and clung to her, shaking. The fire crackled, a quiet witness.

Ceryse, across the table, said nothing… but there was something mournful in the way her eyes rested on them. Something old and untouched.

Alyssa hated crying in front of them both; hated feeling like a broken thing. But the grief refused to stay hidden any longer. She sat quietly, her cheeks still damp, Alysanne’s arms wrapped tightly around her shoulders. The weight of grief hadn’t lifted, but it had… shifted. At least for now.

Alyssa inhaled shakily, smoothed her robes, and blinked the last of the tears from her eyes.

“I’ll attend services at the sept again,” she said softly, her voice barely above a whisper. “I promise.”

She felt Alysanne nod against her. When they separated, the girl was smiling: small and cautious, but genuine. It nearly broke Alyssa all over again.

“That’s good,” Alysanne said. “Septon Tobas will be glad. And the others too. And maybe…” She paused, growing more animated, brushing her pale hair back behind her ear. “Maybe we could have dinners again? Just us, and the twins. Even Septa Keira, like before!”

Alyssa gave a small nod, mustering a smile that didn’t feel like a lie. Not entirely.

“Yes,” she said. “I’d like that.”

“Prudence and Prunella are coming back soon, the Celtigar twins. You remember them, don’t you?” Alysanne leaned forward eagerly. “I know you never spoke with them much, but they always liked you. And now that they’re returning, maybe we could invite them too…”

She kept talking about her hope for the future, letting her thoughts hang in the air like lanterns.

Alyssa kept nodding gently, one hand resting over her midsection where a new life was growing: unwanted, untrusted, but hers all the same. She listened to her daughter speak and tried to absorb the warmth of it. For now, Alysanne needed hope. So Alyssa gave her the illusion of calm.

Across the table, Queen Ceryse watched them both, quiet as always. Her face bore that familiar expression; neutral, unreadable, the corners of her lips tugged into the faintest smile. A shadow of serenity.

But Alyssa couldn’t stop the thought from creeping in.

How much of this does she feel?

How much does she understand?

Ceryse had never been cruel to her. Never played the games Tyanna did. Never whispered poison or watched her with those glittering eyes. If anything, she had been a figure of quiet dignity; one who sat in silence during court, always present, always alone.

But Maegor had cast her aside. Left her barren and cold. All while Alyssa, the widow of his brother, was forced into his bed and made the queen in her place.

Did she resent that?

Did she resent her?

Alyssa’s eyes wandered over the Hightower woman’s thin features, her pale hands resting in her lap like folded parchment. The sadness in her eyes wasn’t bitterness. At least, not openly. It was just… sadness, like it always was for Ceryse.

Ceryse had long ago learned how to suffer, just as Alyssa had. Just as Alysanne was beginning to.

Perhaps that was why she looked away now; perhaps not to judge, but to spare Alyssa the shame of being seen so openly undone.

Still, Alyssa didn’t know what lingered behind those calm, hollowed eyes.

Maybe she never would.

All she could do was nod again as Alysanne spoke of dinners and prayer and girls in the garden. She would try. She had to try.

If for no one else, then for Alysanne.

For whatever life was now forming within her womb.

Chapter 7: EDWELL I

The Street of Silk was far from the Iron Thone but not far enough.

The booth smelled of sandalwood oil, sweet wine, and the faint trace of old smoke. Soft music drifted in from the floor beyond, some girl plucking at a harp like her fingers weren’t raw. Laughter and slurred songs echoed through the walls, but in this curtained alcove, the world was quiet.

Edwell Celtigar, Lord of Claw Isle and Hand of the King, sat slouched in red-dyed velvet, his silver-trimmed cloak bunched up behind his neck like a pillow. His cup was near empty. His face was flushed.

A Lyseni girl, young, smooth-skinned, and silver-blonde, was nestled against his shoulder, her long nails gently stroking his cheek as though he were something worth worshiping. She purred into his ear in that low, exotic accent, saying things he wasn’t even bothering to translate anymore. They always said the same things. Pretty lies. Breathless flatteries.

He didn’t answer her.

Didn’t want to ruin the illusion with truth.

His eyes stared past the girl, past the red silk curtain swaying slightly, toward nothing.

Two of his guards, his own men, not the King’s, stood outside the booth. Discreet. Well-paid. No one would speak of this.

He took another slow sip of wine, swishing it in his mouth before swallowing.

And then, finally, he spoke; more to himself than to the girl.

“I should be happy.”

The Lyseni woman gave a small sound of interest, like a kitten who heard the rustle of a ribbon.

“I’ve got a title half the realm would sell their fathers for,” he muttered. “I sit at the right hand of a king. I write laws. I decide life and death. I even have a foreign beauty hanging on my shoulder.”

He glanced at her with a wry, humorless smile.

The girl smiled back automatically, her fingers continuing to stroke. She didn’t understand. She didn’t need to.

“I’m richer than I’ve ever been,” Edwell went on. “My daughters are coming to court, pretty little things. They’ll be married off like proper noble girls. My house rises. Claw Isle’s secure.”

Another sip of wine. It burned more than it should.

“So why,” he asked the bottom of his cup, “does it all taste like ash?”

The girl said something sweet in Lyseni. He ignored it.

He thought of Moya. His wife. Still in Claw Isle. Still angry. Still absent.

She refused to come back to King’s Landing. Said she couldn’t bear to live under Maegor’s roof, much less attend Tyanna’s court after what happened three years ago. She’d always had a spine, gods bless her for it, but it made life… complicated.

Then there was Trevor, his son and heir.

Also not returning. Kept back by Moya’s insistence.

Edwell hadn’t forced the issue. He could’ve. Should’ve. But he hadn’t.

He wasn’t going to tear the boy from his mother just to parade him before the king. Not here. Not now.

But it stung, nonetheless. The idea of his house rising, but with his family drifting like flotsam behind it.

He tilted the cup again. Empty.

The Lyseni girl saw and refilled it without a word.

Obedient. Silent. Beautiful.

Everything in King Maegor’s court was the opposite. Obedience came with knives. Silence came with secrets. Beauty came with poison.

Tyanna, with her cold laughter and sharper eyes. Maegor, with his monstrous strength and molten rage.

Running the realm was exhausting. Funding Maegor’s endless wars, writing edicts he didn’t believe in, attending executions like they were feasts.

All work. No joy.

But it was what he had always wanted, wasn’t it?

“Power.”

The word escaped his mouth like a confession.

He had it. Titles. Riches. Influence. Access.

He had all the things young Edwell had once dreamed of in his cold tower on Claw Isle.

Yet… he felt like a man drowning in honey. Sweet on the outside. Sticky. Suffocating.

He leaned his head back against the velvet.

The Lyseni girl kissed his jaw. He didn’t react.

Edwell swirled the dregs of wine in his cup, staring at the dark red liquid as though it might spell his future in its rings. The Lyseni girl pressed closer, her pale hair brushing against his beard, her long nails scratching lightly at his jaw. She smelled faintly of oranges, though the perfume did nothing to cover the old scent of sweat and silk that clung to the booth.

“I miss her,” Edwell murmured at last. His voice was low, roughened by drink. “I miss my wife. I miss my son.”

The girl cooed something in Lyseni, tilting her head like she understood.

“I miss… Alyssa.”

That one hurt to say. More than he cared to admit.

His mind wandered back to years ago, before the Red Keep had been finished, before death had twisted everything. When his family and hers had sat together at table, when their children had laughed and played in the gardens. Alyssa had been radiant then, alive in a way she no longer was. They’d been good friends; better than friends, some whispered. The sort of bond forged in trust, not ambition. He remembered the kiss; oh, it had been so sweet.

But that was before.

Before Visenya died and left the realm to Maegor’s fury.

Before Alys Harroway died screaming and brought Tyanna into full command.

Before Edwell himself had made the choices that chained Alyssa’s life to Maegor’s.

He took another sip, bitter as bile.

What he didn’t say aloud: before I betrayed her.

He’d been the one to tell Alyssa that marrying Maegor was the safest path forward. He’d said it gently, earnestly, as a friend advising her to secure her family’s future. But the truth was colder: it had secured his own.

And worse, he had told Maegor where her children had fled, their knowledge of the tunnels beneath the Red Keep. Where the princes might be found after they escaped, to claim Vhagar.

He still remembered the day. Maegor’s cold eyes narrowing as he listened, nodding once, then saying nothing more. He had never told Edwell what came of it. He’d burned Harrenhal soon after.

But Edwell could imagine.

He would not be surprised if Maegor had found Viserys and Jaehaerys with Balerion, burned them to ash, and told no one. Let the whispers of their survival linger, to bait his enemies, to keep the lords wary and restless.

Alyssa didn’t even know the full extent of it.

But she already hated him. She had every right. It didn’t make it hurt any less.

For a long while, he said nothing. Just stared at the cup in his hand, his thoughts circling like carrion birds over an old battlefield.

Finally, he turned to the Lyseni girl, a crooked smile tugging at his lips.

“You don’t need to pretend you don’t speak the Common Tongue,” he said playfully, watching her eyes. “Do you? Tell me true: are you on Tyanna’s payroll?”

The girl froze for a heartbeat, then tilted her head, lips curling. “No,” she said at last, her accent faint but clear. “But half the whores in King’s Landing are. Most patrons prefer it if I don’t talk.”

Edwell barked a laugh, loud enough to make his guards shift outside the curtain.

“Most patrons are idiots then.”

The girl smiled, stroking his cheek again, her eyes glittering.

Edwell laughed again, but this time it was softer. More hollow.

Deep down, he wasn’t sure if he was laughing at them or himself.

The Lyseni girl shifted on his shoulder, her fingers trailing along his jaw with feline ease. Her lips parted, and for once she did not whisper some honeyed nonsense in her own tongue. Instead, she asked, carefully:

“Will the wars end soon?”

Edwell blinked at her. He almost laughed, but she wasn’t smiling. Her eyes were clear, cautious, searching.

“On the Street they say the Faith Militant still roam the countryside,” she went on, “but others say they are close to breaking.”

Edwell leaned back against the wall, exhaling through his nose. His cup was empty again, but he didn’t bother raising it.

“I don’t know,” he admitted, his voice heavy with the weariness of truth. “Gods, I hope so. I’ve been telling myself this will be the final year. Maegor is preparing for a push into the Vale; the last great nest of them. Qarl Corbray and his pack of rebels, still clinging to their mountain holes.”

He rubbed his beard, eyes narrowing.

“Break them, and perhaps the rest scatter. Perhaps the realm breathes again.”

The Lyseni tilted her head, watching him closely. Then, bold as brass, she asked her second question:

“And will the king like peace?”

That stung more than he’d expected.

Will he?

Edwell’s tongue froze in his mouth. His lips parted but no words came. Because he didn’t know.

Did Maegor Targaryen even want peace?

The king seemed to thrive on fire and rebellion, as if he needed enemies to justify the blood in his veins. Peace felt like a stranger’s word.

Edwell stared at the girl until she looked away. Then he forced a laugh, too loud, and leaned in to kiss her, turning the moment back into wine-soaked japes and whispered filth.

But the appetite was gone.

The questions had soured him. His body was heavy, his thoughts heavier still.

He broke off with a grunt, patted her hand, and murmured thanks. Then he gestured to one of his guards outside the curtain. The man ducked in, set a pouch of coin on the table, and the girl slipped away with a smile practiced enough to hide her disappointment.

Edwell rose, straightening his cloak, smoothing his silver beard, setting his face back into the genial mask of the Hand of the King.

But inside, the storm churned. Guilt, pleasure, power; all whirling like wine in a cracked cup.

This was not the only stop he would make tonight. But the next would not be to a brothel.

The air outside the brothel was damp and heavy with lantern smoke. The Street of Silk was alive at night; girls leaning from windows, boys calling from corners, painted smiles under painted lanterns. Voices rose in bawdy greeting when they spotted Lord Celtigar, and the boldest of them called out his name, laughter laced with promises.

Edwell grinned, lifting a hand in return, tossing back flirtations like coin he’d never spend. His two guards walked close behind, unsmiling, practiced in ignoring both the whores and their lord’s mood.

It was harmless, he told himself. Just words. Flattery on both sides. But still, a thought gnawed at him as he walked:

What would Moya say, if she saw me here?

She’d threaten to leave him. She’d shout that she wanted no part of this sordid city, no part of this sordid life. She’d retreat deeper into the cold halls of Claw Isle, clutching Trevor to her as though the boy needed protection from his own father.

And Alyssa?

Alyssa would just look at him with those pale eyes, filled with quiet shame. She would question his virtue, remind him of the Faith, remind him of their shared griefs. She’d be as disgusted with him as she was with herself; ashamed that once, long ago, she had even thought kindly of him.

They both hated him, in their own ways.

Perhaps he deserved it.

But neither of them could give him what he needed anymore. Not Moya, locked away in her hurt. Not Alyssa, drowning in hers.

His needs found their way into the night, into the streets, into laughter that never lasted.

They passed the last of the whorehouses, the air shifting as the perfume faded, and came to the quiet, crooked building with its small lantern and faded sigil of the Seven over the door.

The orphanage.

Edwell straightened his cloak as the septa came forward. She was older, her face lined and misshapen, with a nose bent too far left and teeth crooked as a broken comb. But her eyes were kind, and her bow to him was honest.

“My lord,” she greeted, her voice warm. “We weren’t expecting you tonight.”

“I find it best to arrive unannounced,” Edwell said with his genial smile. “Keeps everyone honest.”

She chuckled, leading him inside.

The air within was close and musty, but not foul. The children came at once, small faces peeking from doorways and corners, whispering, giggling. A few braver ones tugged at his cloak, staring up at him with wide eyes.

Edwell’s heart softened, as it always did here. These visits soothed his conscience. A lord who gave coin to whores was one thing; a lord who gave coin to children was another. And he preferred the second story be the one people remembered.

But then his eyes landed on her.

A toddler. Bigger than the rest. Brown-haired, heavy in the shoulders, her face round but strikingly solemn for one so young.

She frowned at him: not shy, not playful. A serious look, straight into his eyes.

Edwell felt his stomach drop. He couldn’t help it whenever he saw her.

Brie.

The name came back to him like a whisper from a grave.

The child of Alys Harroway.

The child Maegor had branded a bastard.

The child for whom House Harroway had burned.

The child Maegor had sworn was dead.

Everyone believed it. Edwell had made certain of that. He had seen the girl hidden away here, smuggled under cover of darkness, while others whispered she had died in her crib after she’d been left in the darkness of the black cells. He had told himself it was mercy. He had told himself it was practicality.

But looking at her now, larger and sturdier than the other children, he could see it.

The set of the jaw.

The glare in the eyes.

The sheer presence.

She was her father’s daughter.

Maegor’s child.

Even without silver hair or purple eyes, Edwell knew it. Knew it with the same certainty that had haunted him for three years.

He forced his face into neutrality, turning back toward the septa as though nothing had changed.

But Brie’s gaze lingered on him, heavy and unblinking.

Edwell did as he always did at the orphanage: he reached into his purse and drew out a handful of silver stags, handing them out with his practiced, genial smile. The children flocked around him eagerly, sticky fingers snatching at his largesse, giggling as they weighed the coins in their little palms.

All but three.

At the edge of the crowd, a wiry boy with a crooked nose, a sullen girl with straw-colored hair… and Brie.

They stood apart, lips pressed tight, eyes hard. They did not reach for his hand, did not bow or thank him. Brie only stared.

The septa, embarrassed, wrung her hands. “Forgive them, my lord. They are… difficult ones. Especially the girl. Too proud for her own good.”

Edwell forced a smile. “Children learn in their own ways,” he said mildly, though his stomach tightened.

Pride, he thought as he glanced again at Brie, watching her turn away from him, squat down, and join the other children in a game with stones. Or stubbornness. Or both.

Her father’s blood, no doubt.

He felt foolish. Foolish for noticing. Foolish for wondering. Foolish for ever letting her live.

Tyanna surely knew. She knew everything. She probably thought it a fine jest: Alys’s child, tucked away among beggars and orphans, growing up without name or crown. It would amuse her twisted humor.

And Maegor?

Either he didn’t care, or he couldn’t bring himself to smother the last trace of Alys.

Edwell swallowed hard, and his gaze softened despite himself.

Because when he looked at Brie, he saw her mother in her brown eyes, in her brunette hair.

Alys Harroway: simple, trusting, too trusting. She had believed in Maegor’s promises, believed Tyanna’s honeyed words. She had believed Edwell, too, once. Gods forgive him.

But she had also been kind.

Kind in a court that devoured kindness.

That was why he had spared her child. Why, when the order came down to cleanse House Harroway root and branch, he had made sure this one was spirited away into the septa’s keeping instead of the grave.

Maybe it was the last scrap of decency in him. One thing he wouldn’t trade for power.

Not this one, he’d told himself. Not an innocent babe.

But then again… hadn’t there been innocent babes in Harrenhal that day, cut down or burned because it pleased the king? Children no different from Brie?

His smile faltered. He turned away.

When he stepped back into the night air, the Street of Silk was quieter. The raucous laughter of the brothels had given way to the murmurs of late-night gamblers and drunks. His two guards fell into step behind him, silent shadows.

Edwell sighed, long and low. His chest felt heavier than his coin purse.

He should not care so much. He had daughters of his own coming to court, Prudence and Prunella. He needed to prepare for them, to guard their futures, to play the part of the clever, smiling Hand.

He could not afford to be weighed down by the ghost of Alys Harroway, or the stubborn stare of her orphaned child.

And yet, as he walked away from the orphanage, the memory of Brie’s gaze clung to him.

Unblinking. Accusing.

A reminder he could not buy off with coin.

Chapter 8: MAEGOR II

The Iron Throne loomed about him like a cage of knives, its shadows stretching long in the flicker of guttering torches. Maegor sat hunched forward in his black armor, the dragon helm resting on the step below, his gauntleted fists gripping the arms of the monstrous chair. The throne was always cold beneath him, and heavy; heavier, it seemed, on nights like this.

The Kingsguard at the foot of the dais said nothing. Two white shadows, unmoving, their presence more symbolic than useful. No assassin would dare creep through these halls with Balerion roosting in the yard. No lord would dare raise a voice against him when half the court had been silenced already.

Yet Maegor could not escape the feeling that something always pressed at him, something unseen.

Today he had spoken with Celtigar and Tyanna, weighed the matter of the Vale, dictated the words of ravens to Arryn and Tully. Another campaign, another round of killing in his wars. Another army to burn. All routine. All simple.

But his thoughts refused to stay fixed on war.

They had gone, as they often did, to the dead.

He thought of Visenya. His mother. His guide. The only soul who had truly known him and yet never without disappointment. She had wanted him to temper himself, to protect Alys and her child, to put Tyanna aside, to never marry Alyssa, to keep Alyssa’s children untouched.

What had he done? He had ignored every word. Alys dead. Alyssa, his wife. Aenys’s children, slain or imprisoned.

But still he sat the Iron Throne.

What did she know?

His teeth ground together at the memory of her sharp eyes, her voice like steel, always pressing, always judging. She had forged him into a beast and then hated what she’d made.

Maegor’s mind shifted, unwilling, to Aegon.

His father, the Conqueror. The dreamer. The one who had spoken of the Song of Ice and Fire, of a darkness that would come one day. The man who had forged the throne beneath him and seen beyond the horizon into centuries unborn.

Maegor had barely known him. Aegon had been a shadow, distant, while Maegor grew under Visenya’s eye. It was Aenys who had played at father with him, Aenys the weakling, Aenys who had inherited all the softness of this cursed continent, none of the fire of Valyria.

Why Aegon?

Why could Aegon dream of prophecy, while Maegor, who carried his strength, his fury, his blood, dreamed of nothing?

No visions. No whispers. No fire-lit truths in the night.

Only darkness.

He wanted to know more; about the dreams, about the prophecy, about the destiny of their line. But all those who might have told him were dead. Aegon, Rhaenys, Visenya.

Now it was only him.

Maegor the Cruel. Maegor the Murderer. Maegor the King. Maegor, who had never once dreamed.

The silence of the Great Hall pressed in on him. He shifted on the throne, the points of twisted swords biting into his shoulders and back. He preferred the clash of steel, the smell of blood, the roar of Balerion’s wings. Out on campaign, there was no silence. Out on campaign, there was no room for thought.

But here?

Here, the silence let the thoughts creep in, the ghosts.

They were worse than any enemy.

He clenched his jaw until the sound echoed in his skull.

The hall was dark. But his mind was darker.

The sound of the great bronze doors groaning open echoed like a scream through the cavernous hall. Maegor stirred on the Iron Throne, his fingers tapping idly against the sharp armrest of a melted blade.

From the darkness stepped Lord Commander Harrold Langward, ever upright in his white cloak. He walked with the stiff precision of age and habit, stopping below the dais with a respectful bow.

“Your Grace,” he said, voice low and steady. “Queen Ceryse Hightower requests an audience with you. Alone, if it pleases.”

Maegor’s brow furrowed. His black-gloved hand stilled on the throne’s hilted edge.

Ceryse?

She hadn’t requested anything in years. She hadn’t requested to speak to him in private since… since before Alys, since before Visenya’s death.

He leaned forward slightly, his armor creaking in the silence.

“What could that barren nag want at this hour?” he muttered aloud; not really to Harrold, not really expecting an answer. He almost waved it off, almost laughed.

But there was something about the timing. Something about the way Harrold stood a fraction more stiffly than usual.

Curious.

Maegor nodded once, curtly.

“Send her in,” he said. “But the Kingsguard stays.”

Harrold inclined his head and withdrew.

Maegor shifted again, adjusting the massive weight of the throne beneath him. The chill of the metal seeped through his armor. He drummed one finger on a twisted pommel at the throne’s edge, gaze fixed on the shadowed doorway.

She appeared a minute later.

Ceryse Hightower, first of his queens. She moved with the same quiet dignity she always had, shoulders squared, back straight, but even from the throne, Maegor could see it: the redness around her eyes, the tightness in her mouth.

She’d been crying.

That was… unexpected.

Her gown was properly laced and rich in embroidery, but her hair wasn’t as tightly arranged as usual. Something was off.

She paused at the base of the Iron Throne, folding her hands before her. She didn’t bow; not deeply. Not fully. But Maegor didn’t correct her.

He narrowed his eyes.

“What business brings you to me at this hour?”

No answer.

She simply stood there, breathing too quickly, lips parted like the words caught in her throat.

Maegor’s voice dropped a shade colder.

“I asked you a question, Ceryse.”

Still nothing. Her knuckles whitened as she clasped her hands tighter.

She was afraid but not of him. She looked… broken, frightened of something else.

That’s what made Maegor sit straighter on the throne, interest blooming behind his dark eyes.

Maegor’s fingers clenched the Iron Throne’s armrests, the chill of forged steel biting into his gauntlets as he leaned forward again, voice edged with iron.

“Speak, Ceryse. What is your business-”

But she cut across him.

“Alyssa is pregnant.”

The words hit him like a hammer.

He froze.

It took him a moment to process them, as if she’d spoken in some foreign tongue.

Pregnant. Again.

He stared at Ceryse, eyes narrowing. “How do you know this?”

Her breath hitched. Her composure was unraveling by the second. Ceryse looked up at him, red-rimmed eyes glassy with unshed tears.

“I visited her,” she said hoarsely. “With Alysanne. We spoke. I saw… I saw the signs. She’s hiding it, but not well. She’s…” her voice broke. “She’s afraid.”

The truth stung.

Alyssa, hiding her pregnancy from him.

Maegor’s lips curled, and a low growl began in his chest. His first instinct was rage; not over the child, not over the fear, but over the secrecy. That she would dare keep it from him.

“Alyssa…” he began, voice rising.

But Ceryse didn’t stop.

“You need to send her away,” she said, the words tumbling out now, desperate. “To Dragonstone, or Driftmark, somewhere far, somewhere safe, before the child is born. If she stays here, it’ll die like the last one. Like… like Alys’s baby.”

That name struck deeper than the first.

Alys and the child.

He did not think of her name. He would not. He crushed it down. Locked it away.

Maegor’s face twisted as he growled, “Why are you speaking of this?”

And then Ceryse broke entirely.

“It’s Tyanna,” she said through sobs. “She’s a danger: to Alyssa, to the child. She poisoned Alys. She poisoned Alyssa too. That stillbirth; don’t you see? She’s killing them, Maegor. She’s been killing them all along!”

Her voice cracked like breaking glass.

“You’ve been blind to her! She’s a demon in a woman’s flesh!”

“Enough!” Maegor roared.

His voice crashed through the throne room like a hammer on steel.

The Kingsguard straightened at the shout, but did not move.

Ceryse fell silent, trembling, but still staring up at him, lips parted as if she might speak again.

Maegor stood slowly, the armor groaning with the motion. His black-clad form cast a long, jagged shadow down the steps of the throne.

And then he began to descend.

Each step was deliberate.

Heavy.

Measured.

She said I was blind.

She said Tyanna is killing my children.

She said I don’t see…

Ceryse stood there, inches from him now. She didn’t flinch. Her fear was real, but her words had been braver than he’d ever known her to be.

She’d spoken like a woman who had nothing left to lose.

Maegor loomed over Ceryse, his black armor glinting dully in the torchlight, eyes burning with suspicion and fury. The Iron Throne loomed behind him, silent and jagged; as if it too were waiting for his judgment.

“Do you have proof?” he growled, his voice thick with contempt. “Anything beyond grief and slander?”

Ceryse, still trembling, raised her chin. Her face was streaked with tears, but her voice didn’t waver.

“You’ve never needed proof to kill before.”

The gall of her, to say that, to him.

But she wasn’t done.

“You only need your eyes,” she continued. “You know she doesn’t want your other wives to bear children. She wants you to herself. She’s always wanted that. She’d kill anyone to keep it that way.”

Her voice cracked, but she pushed on.

“She killed Alys.”

“She killed your child with Alyssa.”

“She might have even killed Visenya!”

That did it.

Maegor’s face twisted in a snarl and turned away from Ceryse, though the rage that swelled in him was more than just anger: it was defensive, reflexive.

Because part of him remembered.

Visenya, on her sickbed, whispering warnings. Cautioning him about Tyanna. Telling him she was poison in silk, that her smiles were daggers, that she would turn him against all his kin.

He hadn’t wanted to hear it then.

He didn’t want to hear it now.

He couldn’t be wrong.

He wouldn’t be made to look like a fool.

He clenched his fists until the metal of his gauntlets bit into his palms.

“Cease your baseless accusations,” he snarled. “You will not speak of this again.”

But Ceryse didn’t stop.

She was crying now, but her words came like a flood, cracked and raw.

“I don’t care anymore!” she shouted. “You don’t see me. You never have. You only ever wanted power, and when you had it, you gave it to her.”

She pointed a trembling hand to the dark air where Tyanna’s name lingered unspoken.

“You’ve ignored me. You cast me aside. You gave your heart to monsters. And now innocent women are dying for it. Children are dying. And you-”

“You don’t care about the gods. Or the seven hells. Or the truth. But I do! The guilt… it’s killing me!”

Those words landed like a hammer against Maegor’s pride. It wasn’t just accusation now; it was condemnation. His eyes flared. And in one brutal, automatic movement, he struck her.

The gauntlet cracked across her face with the weight of a smith’s hammer.

Ceryse crumpled to the floor with a cry, her head snapping sideways, her body folding like broken parchment.

She lay there, weeping, one hand cradling her face where blood now welled beneath the skin.

The Kingsguard didn’t move. They stood still as statues, trained to obey, trained to be silent.

Maegor stood over her, breathing hard, his jaw clenched, his whole body trembling with rage.

Rage at her.

At Tyanna.

At himself.

Because her words echoed in the chambers of his mind:

You gave your heart to monsters.

You ignored me.

You don’t care.

He didn’t want to believe any of it.

He refused to believe it.

He wouldn’t be made a fool of. Not by Tyanna, not by Ceryse, not by the ghosts of his past. He felt the rage rise before he even understood it: a hot, choking pressure behind his ribs, climbing his throat. His fists curled against the arms of the Iron Throne until the steel points dug into his palms.

Every accusation she spat, every reminder of Tyanna, of Alys, of the child, was a blade scraping across the inside of his skull. She was speaking aloud the things he had buried: Visenya’s warnings, his own doubts, the whisper of poison in his court. She was naming the shadows he refused to name.

Maegor couldn’t stand it. When he turned to his Kingsguard, the command came out in a low, lethal snarl:

“Her shrewish lies are unacceptable. You dare stand here and spit your lies at me?” he snarled. “You dare speak of Tyanna in this hall? Of Visenya?”

Ceryse’s voice cracked. “They’re not lies. You know they’re not lies. The gods know-”

“Enough.” Maegor turned to his Kingsguard, his face like iron. “Ser Owen. Remove her tongue. Let’s see if the gods hear her then.”

Ceryse shrieked, falling to her knees. “No! Maegor, your Grace, please!”

Ser Owen hesitated. His hand went to his belt but stopped short. “Your Grace… she is your queen…”

Maegor’s glare snapped to the knight. “Do it. Or I’ll cut it out myself.” He reached for his sword, his voice dropping to a growl. “I won’t tell you again.”

Owen’s throat bobbed as he swallowed. Slowly, he drew a short, curved knife and stepped toward the queen.

Ceryse scrambled back, palms scraping the floor. Her words tumbled out in a frantic rush. “Seven save me! Seven save me! I- I confess! I killed Alys, I poisoned her for the witch, I confess I tolerated her evil, just as you did Maegor! I tolerated your evil! I-”

She didn’t stop, even as Ser Owen descended upon her. Her voice rose higher, tears streaming down her cheeks. “I told myself I was a queen and that was enough, but the gods will judge me! They’ll judge us all! They’ll judge-”

Her cry ended abruptly.

Owen staggered back, knife slick and red. “I-” his voice cracked. “It slipped, Your Grace. It slipped!”

Maegor strode forward, his boots thudding. He looked down at Ceryse where she had fallen, her throat cut open, blood pooling beneath her cheek. Her eyes stared up at nothing. Her mouth was still parted, as if the next word was frozen there forever.

He looked up at Ser Owen. The knight’s face was pale. “Your Grace,” Owen stammered again. “I didn’t, I didn’t mean-”

Maegor’s voice was flat, heavy. “Enough.”

Owen swallowed. “What are your orders?”

Maegor’s jaw clenched. He stared at Ceryse’s body, at her open eyes, and for a heartbeat his mother’s voice flickered in his mind: “You’re a fool for loving her, Maegor, a greater fool for trusting her.” He crushed it down.

The torches on the stone walls flickered in the breathless stillness of the throne room. Blood gleamed on the floor in dark pools, and Ceryse’s broken body lay like discarded silk.

Maegor stared at her for a long moment: no rage now, just cold calculation. Then he turned his head slightly, his voice like hammered iron.

“Ser Owen. Ser Olyver.”

Both Kingsguard straightened. Olyver Bracken had not spoken since the queen fell, only watched, rigid and pale.

“Wait a few hours,” Maegor ordered. “Until the hour of the wolf. Then take her to the battlements of Maegor’s Holdfast. Throw her into the moat. Make sure she lands on the spikes.”

Neither knight moved.

Maegor’s voice sharpened. “It will be suicide. A fall in the night. No one will question it. Not if we say she was distraught. She had no friends left in court.”

Still silence.

“Tell no one of this,” he added. “Not your brothers. Not Tyanna. Are we clear?”

“Yes, Your Grace,” Ser Owen said first, quickly.

“It will be done,” Ser Olyver added, his voice a little heavier.

Maegor flicked his hand toward the trail of blood. “And get some servants to clean this mess. Now.”

As the two white cloaks moved to obey, they each took one of the queen’s arms and began dragging her limp body toward the narrow corridor behind the Iron Throne. The slick drag of blood followed them like a ribbon of guilt.

Maegor sat alone once more.

He stared down at the smear on the floor, then at the place where her head had struck the stone. He sighed, deep and low.

“What a mess.”

He leaned his cheek against one gauntleted hand, thinking.

If the Hightowers caught wind of this… another rebellion.

Ceryse had been a Hightower of Oldtown. Her father had sent her to King’s Landing as a gesture of faith and alliance. If they believed she had been murdered, even by accident… it would fan the flames. Again. Always again.

He’d lost his temper.

But she provoked me, he told himself. She lied. She accused. She wept like the gods had sent her to judge me.

His eyes narrowed. Was Alyssa even pregnant?

He didn’t know. He hadn’t seen the signs. Not lately. He would ask. Later. When he could look at her without thinking of Alys, without thinking of Ceryse’s trembling voice.

He thought of Visenya then.

His mother would have never let it get this far. Never spilled blood without knowing how to bury it. She had taught him to be strong, to be swift, but never sloppy.

The thought left a bitter taste in his mouth.

He needed to speak to Tyanna. About Alyssa. About Ceryse. About what she knew and what she had done.

But… he didn’t want to. Not yet.

He didn’t want to see that smirk of hers. Didn’t want to hear her lie, or worse; tell the truth.

He didn’t want to be wrong.

He never did.

Chapter 9: ALYSANNE II

The Royal Sept was unusually full, but quieter than it had any right to be. The candles still flickered, the colored light still poured through the stained glass images of the Seven, and the septon had spoken long about grief and repentance, but no one had listened to him.

Not really.

Alysanne Targaryen sat on a polished stone bench beside her mother with Septa Keira seated on the other side, dutifully watching over Aerea and Rhaella, who squirmed in their seats. The twins, as ever, were too young to understand the weight of silence that had settled on the congregation like dust. They were more interested in poking at each other and swinging their legs.

No one had spoken about the sermon since it ended. Not really.

Everyone was speaking about Queen Ceryse Hightower.

Or rather… they were whispering.

“Leapt from the battlements.”

“Onto the spikes.”

“A quiet woman, but cold. Always cold.”

“No wonder, married to him.”

It passed from lip to lip, pew to pew. Nobles and servants, septas and knights; all murmuring like the seven statues above them had gone deaf.

Alysanne sat stiffly, trying to look straight ahead, as though the sermon had lingered in her heart. But her ears strained toward every whisper, every half-swallowed theory.

Ceryse? Suicide?

She glanced sideways at her mother.

Alyssa sat with the same dignified mask she wore to every court function. Her hands were folded, her lips moving faintly in quiet prayer. But there was tension in her brow; not grief exactly, but unease.

Beside her, Septa Keira leaned in now and then to whisper something; something soft, perhaps comforting. Alyssa gave small nods.

But neither of them spoke of Ceryse.

No one spoke of what mattered most.

Alysanne stared down at her lap. Her fingers tightened around each other.

It didn’t make sense.

Only a few days ago, Ceryse had come with Alysanne to visit Alyssa: had urged her to return to the sept, had seemed… quiet, yes, but not broken. She had watched the twins, she had listened to Alysanne talk about the returning Celtigar children. She had even smiled, faintly.

Why would she kill herself?

Why now?

It made her stomach twist.

Alysanne wanted to ask.

She wanted to lean over and whisper to Keira, “Do you believe it?”

She wanted to tug at her mother’s sleeve and say, “You saw her: she wasn’t like that, was she?”

But she knew better.

In Maegor’s Red Keep, questions were not asked so loudly. Not even here, beneath the statues of the Seven.

So Alysanne kept the questions tight in her chest, where they would stay.

But something had shifted. She could feel it.

Something darker than mourning hung in the air.

And Alysanne Targaryen, barely fourteen, understood one thing perfectly:

People didn’t fall. Not in Maegor’s castle.

They were pushed.

Alysanne sat stiff in her seat, fingers clutched tightly in her lap. The tension in the air was thick, coiled like a snake waiting to strike. She wanted, needed, to speak with someone, to let the thoughts out before they smothered her.

Her gaze drifted to the altar of the Maiden, bathed in pale blue light from the stained glass above. That was it. A quiet excuse.

She leaned slightly toward Septa Keira, her voice barely more than breath.

“Septa… may I go pray? At the Maiden’s altar?”

Keira turned to her with a soft glance and gave a small nod, already beginning to rise with her when the doors of the Royal Sept creaked open.

They hadn’t been opened since the sermon ended. Everyone turned.

King Maegor Targaryen entered first, hulking in full black armor, his face unreadable beneath his pale brow. Behind him came Queen Tyanna, cloaked in glimmering black silk like a shadow given flesh. Her eyes were sharp and amused, as if this were all some pageant staged for her pleasure.

Lord Edwell Celtigar, still silver-haired and composed, came third, walking with the calm confidence of a man too clever to be caught off guard. Behind them trailed several Kingsguard, white cloaks ghosting through incense.

Alysanne had never seen Maegor step foot into a sept for worship.

No one had.

Not for a wedding, not for a funeral, not for penance.

The congregation froze like a painting. Even the children stilled. Rhaella sucked her fingers, wide-eyed. Aerea held Keira’s hand more tightly.

Maegor moved like a black tide to the front of the sept, where Septon Tobas stood, stunned.

The king said something low, about funeral arrangements, about Ceryse, not quite loud enough to hear all the words, but just loud enough to understand what it was about.

It sent a fresh ripple of whispers through the crowd.

Alysanne’s stomach turned.

She looked at her mother.

Alyssa’s face was blank. Cold. Exhausted.

Eventually, she leaned toward Septa Keira and said with quiet authority,

“It’s time we left.”

Keira nodded, rising, gathering Aerea and Rhaella with quiet efficiency.

But Rhaella, true to form, decided at that moment to start whining.

“My feet hurt-”

“I’m tired-”

“Why can’t we-”

“Shhh,” Alysanne whispered. “We’ll go soon. Just walk.”

Rhaella pouted but allowed herself to be led, slow as molasses.

They reached the main aisle. They were almost to the door-

-and Maegor turned back.

The king, grim and monstrous in black steel, walked straight toward the entrance and blocked it.

The congregation parted for him like waves before a ship.

Suddenly, Alysanne was face to face with him. Her mother froze beside her. The twins instinctively clung to Keira. Maegor didn’t look at them. Not at Alyssa. Not at his grandnieces. Not even at Alysanne. He simply walked by like they weren’t there, like they were furniture in his hall of war.

It was Tyanna who paused. She smiled. Not warmly. There was always something pointed in Tyanna’s smile; like the glint of a blade.

“What a lovely family you’ve gathered, Alyssa,” she said silkily. “All so pious. I’m sure the gods are listening.”

Alysanne felt her hand tighten on her skirt. She didn’t trust herself to speak.

Tyanna didn’t wait for a reply, she turned and glided after the king.

Then Lord Celtigar lingered.

He paused and looked at all of them; his expression neutral, almost kindly. But there was a glint in his eye as he looked at Alysanne. Perhaps it was guilt. Or maybe regret. Or something older, heavier.

“Princess,” he said with a short bow. “I hope you’re keeping well. The Maiden watches over you, I’m sure.”

Alysanne smiled, sweet, polite, and nodded.

“Thank you, my lord. And may the Father guide your steps.”

He gave a faint smile, bowed again, and followed Maegor out of the sept.

The heavy doors thudded shut behind them.

Alysanne exhaled the breath she didn’t know she’d been holding.

Her mind buzzed with questions she couldn’t speak aloud.

Why had Maegor come?

Why had Tyanna come with him?

Why now, and why like this?

What was there to show by parading his power through the sept?

And most of all-

Why did it feel like Ceryse’s death had never been suicide at all?

Chapter 10: BENIFER II

The flickering candlelight in Grand Maester Benifer’s chamber was dim, soft, and steady; the only source of warmth he trusted anymore. His long fingers carefully guided the quill across the parchment, forming tight lines of neat script.

To Archmaester Orwel, of the Stargazers’ Study,

I write again regarding the progress on the lens tube project we discussed, for long-distance celestial observation. Has the curvature of the inner lenses been resolved? And what of the brass fittings? I remain hopeful, as ever, that we shall soon see the stars more clearly than our ancestors ever dreamed. Such a device has never been manufactured in Westeros before…

He paused, dipped the quill again, and gave himself a moment to think; not about Maegor, not about Tyanna, not about Queen Ceryse’s “fall” or the whispers flitting through court like vultures waiting to land.

Just the stars.

Unchanging.

Reliable.

Safe.

Not like this castle, where walls had ears and steps had teeth.

Benifer sighed and reached for the small scroll case that would carry the letter to the Citadel. His hands trembled faintly; the same tremor that hadn’t left him since his arrival at court. The same tremor that reminded him he was alive, but only just.

And then…

A knock.

Three gentle raps against the thick wooden door.

Benifer startled. The ink bloomed across the end of his word, staining the parchment. He cursed softly and carefully set the quill down.

He cleared his throat.

“Who is it?”

A pause. Then a soft voice, a girl’s voice; firm, but not yet hardened by age.

“It’s Princess Alysanne, Grand Maester. I… I have a question. May I speak with you?”

Benifer blinked.

Alysanne?

He hesitated. His heart beat a little faster; not from fear, but from curiosity.

She had always struck him as the quietest of the court’s younger members. Polite, intelligent. Watching everything. Like a raven perched in a storm.

He composed himself and stood, smoothing his robes.

“Yes, my lady. Of course.”

He unlatched the door and opened it slowly.

Princess Alysanne stood in the torchlit hallway, alone. She wore a modest dark gown, her honey-gold hair bound with a blue ribbon. Her expression was solemn, and her eyes sharp. Older than her years. Wiser, maybe, than he liked.

Benifer stepped aside and motioned gently.

“Please, come in.”

She entered without hesitation, her steps soundless on the stone. As she moved past him, Benifer noticed the way she looked over his chamber; not idly, but purposefully, as if committing every scroll and bottle to memory.

He shut the door behind her.

“What troubles you, Princess?” he asked gently. “If I can help, I will.”

Alysanne turned to face him. Her hands were folded in front of her, the posture of a perfect lady. But her voice, when she spoke, betrayed the heat beneath the surface.

“I had a dream,” she said softly, “about stars.”

Benifer tilted his head. “Stars?”

Alysanne nodded. “I asked Septa Keira about it… but she didn’t know much. She said you might. That you study the heavens.”

The old Grand Maester felt something unexpected stir in his chest; something like warmth. His face brightened. “Indeed I do. I’ve long studied celestial arrangements; I even wrote a treatise once on the rotation of the Stranger’s Lantern across the autumn sky.”

Alysanne looked faintly impressed or at least politely interested. “My dream… I was flying. Through the stars. And I saw a pattern. A line of six stars shaped like a wing, and another curve like a tail behind them. They shimmered blue and white. It looked like a dragon.”

Benifer’s brow lifted.

“The Ice Dragon.”

He sat straighter, intrigued. “That’s a real constellation, my lady. A rare sight in the southern skies, but visible above the Wall. Six stars for the wings, and a trail for the tail, just as you described. It’s quite a precise vision for a dream.”

Alysanne’s gaze lingered on the candle between them. “What does it mean?”

Benifer folded his hands over his robes. “The Ice Dragon has many meanings, depending on the culture. To some in the North, it’s a harbinger of deep winter. Among certain maesters, it’s a symbol of wisdom; guidance through darkness. But in the Reach, it’s seen as a good omen. For travelers. For rulers.” He paused, then added gently, “For those in exile.”

Alysanne sighed, her shoulders drooping slightly.

“It made me think of Silverwing.”

Benifer nodded slowly. Her dragon.

“She’s still on Dragonstone, yes?”

“I haven’t seen her in years.” Alysanne’s voice cracked ever so slightly. “Sometimes I dream about her too. I wonder if she dreams about me.”

Benifer hesitated. Then, in an uncharacteristic show of sympathy, he reached across the desk and placed an awkward, papery hand on her shoulder.

It startled her. But she didn’t pull away.

“You’re not wrong to feel lost,” he said quietly. “The stars don’t change, but the world below them does. And too quickly.”

Alysanne looked up at him, eyes glassy but dry.

“It’s hard to be hopeful when nothing feels right. We’re prisoners, even if no one says it. Queen Ceryse is dead. People are whispering. Even the sept feels… cold.”

Benifer looked at the flickering candle again. Then at the girl in front of him; not yet grown, but far too old to be called a child. The candle sputtered slightly, throwing trembling shadows against the stone walls as Alysanne lingered by the door.

Her voice, when it came, was soft.

“Grand Maester… did you see her? Queen Ceryse. After she… jumped?”

Benifer blinked. The question struck harder than he expected.

He straightened slightly in his chair, regarding the girl’s face: open, hopeful, but aching beneath the surface.

“Yes,” he said after a moment. “I was called to examine the body. It is my duty as healer and witness.”

She lowered her gaze. “Was it at least… quick?”

Benifer studied her a beat longer. She wasn’t asking out of morbid curiosity but out of empathy. Real sorrow, not the performative grief that perfumed so much of Maegor’s court.

He allowed a gentler tone to enter his voice.

“Yes, my lady. It was quick. Likely before she even struck the moat. Her throat was… it was quick.”

Alysanne’s shoulders eased, just a fraction.

“Then I hope… I hope she didn’t feel fear in the end. She always looked so sad. But I don’t think she was weak.”

Benifer nodded.

“No. She wasn’t.”

They sat in silence for a few more breaths. Alysanne looked around once more. at the books, the scrolls, the small telescope by the window, then gave him a small, graceful curtsey.

“Thank you, Grand Maester. For your time… and your honesty.”

Benifer rose slightly and gave her a bow in return, old joints creaking.

“Anytime, Princess. The stars are always here to listen, even when others won’t.”

She smiled, faint but real, and turned to leave, her golden hair catching the candlelight as the door clicked shut behind her.

Benifer remained standing for a while, listening to the echo of her footsteps vanish into the corridor.

Then he returned to his desk. He stared at the unfinished letter to Archmaester Orwel, the one about stargazing lenses and dream-patterns. He dipped his quill again, but paused.

What a kind, sad girl.

Not yet a woman, but already older than her years: sharpened by loss, tempered by silence.

She didn’t belong here.

Not in this den of vipers and liars and monsters.

She deserved stars, not steel. Wisdom, not war.

Benifer exhaled and began writing again.

He returned to the stars: because they were the only truths left in a kingdom ruled by fire and blood.

Chapter 11: ALYSSA II

The late afternoon sun filtered through the tall windows of the solar, warming the small tea table that had been set for six. Fine Myrish porcelain clinked gently, and the air was thick with the scent of honey and lemon balm.

Alyssa Velaryon sat with a straight back and calm hands, her teacup poised between her fingers. Her mouth was curved in a small smile, but her eyes, pale and sharp, watched everything.

Across the table, her daughter Alysanne laughed lightly, hands folded in her lap like the proper princess she had been raised to be. But there was more in her than that. She had been raised in a cage, and still, she knew how to fly.

“So,” Alysanne said brightly, turning to the Celtigar twins, “are the other girls on Claw Isle as silly Lord Celtigar always says you are?”

Prudence, the taller and more reserved of the two, flushed pink.

“Father said that?”

Prunella giggled, nudging her sister with an elbow.

“He said you talked to rocks, Prudence. And to cats. And to the moon once, I think.”

“I do not talk to rocks!” Prudence huffed.

“Only cats,” Prunella added sweetly.

“I recall you said you wanted to be a dragon once, Prunella,” Alysanne added.

The laughter that followed wasn’t forced. It was light and real, and it warmed the corners of the room.

On the other side of the table, Septa Keira sipped her tea in polite silence, though her eyes flicked constantly between the girls, taking everything in with quiet approval. Jenya, the plump and clever chambermaid, sat beside her, whispering something to Sera, the taller, quieter one with curling dark hair. Both of them looked amused by the Celtigars, but not overawed.

Alysanne turned to them with ease, asking what the best gossip in the servants’ halls was.

“You must have something,” she pressed with a teasing grin. “Something shocking. Or scandalous.”

“I heard the head cook was caught kissing the apothecary,” Sera offered.

“The apothecary’s husband was the first to find out,” Jenya added, earning a round of gasps and giggles.

Alyssa watched it unfold like a play she hadn’t written but was glad to see performed.

She had not known what to expect when Alysanne asked to host a tea party, nor what to feel when Lord Edwell Celtigar’s daughters arrived at court under their father’s careful watch, especially with lowborn present. But this?

This was something like hope. Something like normal.

Even the lowborn girls, the handmaids she had once been wary of, were folded into the group like it was natural. That was Alysanne’s doing. She had always been kind, curious about commoners… but it was the quiet authority she now showed that surprised Alyssa. That she could hold a room like this, bring people together: highborn and lowborn, sweet and proud, alike.

Alyssa should have felt content.

But she didn’t.

Her hand unconsciously drifted to her stomach beneath the folds of her gown. She was still hiding it: from the septa, from the girls, from Maegor himself.

A new child in her womb. The child of a monster. A child she wanted to love… but could not yet trust to survive.

She sipped her tea slowly.

In her mind, she saw Queen Ceryse’s body again, or at least, what she imagined of it. The spikes of the dry moat, the blood, the rumors. She threw herself. That’s what they said.

She had looked into Ceryse’s eyes the last time they spoke. There had been desperation, yes. Sadness. But also purpose. Something to confess. Something to protect.

Now she is dead.

Would that be her fate, too? Crushed by Maegor, erased by Tyanna, mourned by no one?

Her gaze drifted again to Alysanne, now giggling with Prunella over some joke involving Lord Butterwell’s ill-fitting breeches.

Just like that, the dark thoughts ebbed.

No.

That wasn’t going to be her fate. Not while her daughter still smiled like that. Not while Alysanne still had a future to protect.

This was worth it. Every sacrifice. Every secret. Every breath of fear.

Alyssa closed her eyes for a moment, let herself breathe in the warmth of the room, the laughter, the small, hard-won joy.

She would endure. She had to.

For the girls.

The room remained warm with laughter, honey-sweetened tea, and the sound of girls gossiping like the war outside the Red Keep had never happened. For a moment, Alyssa allowed herself to feel the warmth.

But then Prunella, cheerful and wide-eyed, turned to Alysanne and tilted her head.

“And how are your nieces? The twins? Rhaella and Aerea?”

Alysanne straightened slightly, ever the proud young aunt.

“They’re thriving. Truly.”

She gave a little smile, brushing a strand of silver-gold hair behind her ear.

“Rhaella’s bold and curious. She shouts far too much in quiet halls, and once she kicked Lord Massey’s shin when he said something she didn’t like. He was kind enough not to complain.”

The girls burst into laughter.

“She sounds like a dragon in a child’s skin,” said Prudence, eyes wide.

“She is,” Alysanne admitted. “But she’s clever. And brave. You just have to know how to talk to her.”

Her smile faded slightly.

“Aerea’s quieter. Very quiet. She’s… afraid of a great many things.”

The laughter died down just a little.

“She cries easily. Hates dogs, horses, loud voices. Hates dragons the most. She wets the bed sometimes, though she’s better now. She’s scared of dancing and men with beards.”

Sera spoke up gently, her voice low but kind.

“But she tries. She tries so hard to be brave.”

“And she’s sweet,” Jenya added, nodding. “Sweet as honeycake when she wants to be.”

Alysanne smiled again, more tender this time.

“Septa Keira’s been wonderful with her. And Mother, too.”

Alyssa blinked at the mention. Her teacup paused mid-air, then lowered slowly to the table.

“You’re both too kind,” she said softly, giving Alysanne and Septa Keira warm looks. “You’ve made such a difference in their lives.”

Prudence clasped her hands.

“I’d love to see them again! They were so small when I last saw them. Just little bundles.”

“Oh yes,” Prunella chimed in, “we adored them! Please, Your Grace,” she added, turning to Alyssa, “may we visit them sometime soon?”

Alyssa offered her most practiced smile. “Of course, my dears. I would be delighted to introduce you properly. I’m sure Rhaella will ask a thousand questions, and Aerea might hide behind the curtain, but we’ll coax her out.”

The twins tittered excitedly, already whispering to each other about little dresses and games and songs they might bring.

But inside, Alyssa’s mind had gone elsewhere.

Babes.

The word echoed in her skull, hollow and heavy.

Her eyes flicked to her teacup; the liquid inside suddenly bitter.

How long could she hide it?

She felt the faint swell beneath her dress when she shifted. It wasn’t visible yet, not really, but soon it would be. The dizziness in the mornings, the sudden aches, the tightness in her gowns… they would grow harder to explain away.

How long until someone noticed?

Until Tyanna noticed?

Until Maegor knew?

The warmth in the room seemed to dim slightly, the sunlight dulling just a touch.

Still, she kept her smile. Kept her posture.

The laughter in the solar had shifted; it was lighter now, airier, no longer wrapped in stories of crying twins or courtly manners. The girls were fully in their element, spinning the conversation into realms that only girls their age could truly inhabit.

It was Prudence Celtigar who lit the match.

“There’s a squire back on Claw Isle I like,” she said, cheeks already flushing as she reached for her tea. “A friend of Trevor’s.”

Prunella gasped in mock outrage.

“Trevor’s friend? Oh, Pru. You have awful taste.”

Prudence rolled her eyes. “He’s kind! And he gave me a rose during Trevor’s name day feast. He has nice hands.”

“Nice hands!” Jenya repeated with a laugh.

“Who cares about nice hands?” Prunella countered, tossing her curls over her shoulder. “My tastes are more refined.”

“Oh gods,” Prudence muttered. “Here she goes.”

“Prince Viserys,” Prunella began proudly, counting on her fingers.

“That Lyseni sailor who stayed at Claw Isle’s harbor, he had the bluest eyes, and… Lord Daemon Velaryon.” She smiled wickedly. “I like Valyrian men.”

The table erupted.

“Young lady!” gasped Septa Keira, setting down her cup with a clink.

“Viserys is still missing!” said Prudence, scandalized. “And Daemon Velaryon is Queen Alyssa’s brother! And married!”

Alyssa flinched at the name Viserys, just slightly, her fingers tightening around her cup. Her sweet boy, with his quiet voice and bright eyes. Still gone. Still lost.

But she smiled through it, practiced and soft.

“It’s quite all right,” she said quietly. “We all remember him fondly.”

Even if it twists the knife, she didn’t say.

Alysanne gave her a look, gentle, understanding, then turned to Prunella.

“You’ve always had a strange taste.”

“Strange is better than boring,” Prunella quipped, clearly unrepentant.

Sera, emboldened, raised a hand.

“Can I talk about my taste?”

Alysanne, smiling, nodded. “Permission granted.”

And off they went again. Sera’s crush was a baker’s apprentice she’d glimpsed from the tower window. Jenya’s was a city guard she kept seeing on duty near the Dragon Gate. There were giggles, teases, dramatic reenactments of awkward greetings, even a mention of a love poem gone awry. Jenya had barely known how to write at the time, after all.

Septa Keira shook her head fondly.

“All of you are foolish,” she said, but didn’t move to stop them.

Alyssa didn’t either.

She let them talk. She let them laugh. Let them imagine a world where love and crushes were their greatest concern, where the iron chains of Maegor’s reign and the poison lurking in court corridors didn’t touch them.

She kept smiling and listening.

Her gaze drifted to Alysanne, still the center of the circle, still steering the current of conversation. But something struck her: Alysanne never once mentioned a crush of her own. Not even as a joke.

She smiled, she teased the others, she told Sera her city guard had a crooked nose, but she offered no names. No blushing, no laughter at her own expense.

And Alyssa wondered… Had her daughter even thought of love yet?

She had just flowered; Alyssa had quietly noticed the shift in Alysanne’s body, had prepared her own quiet talk a year ago but hadn’t found the courage. Perhaps Alysanne had too much else to think about. Being Maegor’s ward. Being a prisoner in all but name. Protecting the twins. Worrying for her lost brothers. Watching queens die.

When would she have time to think about boys?

The teacups were mostly empty now, but the solar was still alive with laughter and light. The conversation had drifted like a leaf on the wind; from crushes to court gossip, and now…

“Do you still love dancing?” Alysanne asked, her eyes lighting up as she turned to the Celtigar twins.

“Of course we do!” Prunella replied, nearly bouncing in her chair.

“We’ve been practicing the Maiden’s Waltz and the steps. Prunella’s always a step behind, though.”

“I am not!” Prudence swatted her sister’s arm. “You skip counts.”

Jenya leaned in, grinning.

“You girls learn noble dances, but we have ones too. There’s one we do at the fair at the Blackwater: spinning, clapping, stomping. Gets everyone dizzy.”

“Sounds more like a battle than a dance,” teased Prunella.

“That’s the fun of it!” Sera chimed in. “When we’re back in the kitchens, we teach each other. Sometimes the stableboys try too. They’re hopeless.”

Alysanne let out a wistful sigh, her hands folded neatly on the table.

“There hasn’t been a proper dance in court since… Queen Alys’s feast. That was before she died.”

The tone shifted for a moment; the name hung there like a shadow.

But Prudence, ever eager to chase, teased lightly, “We’re definitely not surprised you still love everything the lowborn do. You always did like them more.”

Alysanne’s face warmed. “What’s not to love? They talk about things we never hear at court, stories we never hear.”

Prudence smiled, looking from Prunella to Alysanne.

“You still love books too, right?

Alysanne’s eyes lit up as she leaned in, the excitement overtaking her.

“Of course I still love books! Especially the old ones. The History of the Rhoynish Wars is still my favorite. I’ve been reading Chronicle of the Companions again, it’s full of tragic knights, dead maidens brought back to life, and cursed swords.”

“Oh Seven,” Prunella groaned with a smile. “Those silly chivalric romances?”

“They’re not silly!” Alysanne insisted, mock offended. “They’re hopeful. Brave men doing impossible feats for the maidens they love! I think the realm could use more stories like that.”

Alyssa watched and thought to herself, wryly, lovingly:

She’s definitely thinking about boys.

“She’s not wrong,” Jenya murmured.

“She even taught us to read,” Sera added proudly. “Well, mostly. I still mix up ‘knight’ and ‘night.’”

“That’s because they sound the same,” Prudence agreed.

“Of course you’d say that, you can barely read,” said Prunella, which sent the girls off into another round of giggles.

Alyssa, quietly watching from her end of the table, let a smile tug at her lips.

She hadn’t smiled like this in some time.

The girls were talking about dances, about books, about noble knights and secret love; all the sweet things a girl’s life should be full of. Not courtly poison. Not whispered deaths. Not dragonfire and thrones built from swords.

The girls were still giggling over Sera’s terrible impersonation of her city guard when a knock came.

A soft, poised tap-tap-tap.

The sound froze the laughter like ice poured into warm tea.

Septa Keira, ever the steady presence, rose and crossed the room to the door. Her hand lingered on the handle a second too long before she opened it.

Queen Tyanna of the Tower stood in the hallway, a small, demure smile playing on her lips, a basket covered in linen tucked beneath one arm.

All conversation died.

“Good afternoon, ladies,” Tyanna said sweetly, her voice like silk over steel.

Her eyes flicked to each girl, resting longest on Prudence and Prunella Celtigar.

“I simply couldn’t let the Hand’s daughters come to court without paying my respects. We are good friends, after all.”

The twins bobbed nervous curtsies, murmuring greetings.

Without waiting for permission, Tyanna stepped fully into the solar and placed the basket on the tea table, directly in the middle of the cheerful mess of crumbs and half-drunk tea.

“I brought a gift,” she said, lifting the linen cloth.

A dozen lemon cakes revealed themselves, golden and delicate, still faintly warm. The smell filled the room instantly. The Celtigar twins gasped: it was their favorite.

“You remembered!” Prudence said weakly, her politeness automatic.

Tyanna beamed and sat herself at the edge of the nearest chair.

“Of course I did.” She looked around the table. “Come now, girls. Don’t let them get cold.”

One by one, the girls reached forward and took lemon cakes; slowly, stiffly. Only Alysanne took one with her usual composure. The others kept their gazes low. Even Alyssa, seated at the head of the table, found herself swallowing against a dry throat.

Tyanna’s presence soured the air, like a drop of poison in wine.

Then Alysanne, bold as ever, spoke up.

“You weren’t invited.”

The silence that followed was sharp and immediate.

“Alysanne!” Alyssa whispered, scandalized.

“Princess!” Septa Keira hissed under her breath.

But Tyanna only smiled wider.

There was a glint in her eyes; amusement, not anger.

“You’re not wrong,” she said lightly. “But a queen is always welcome at her own court. And I did bring treats.”

She stood then, brushing imaginary crumbs from her gown.

“Still, I wouldn’t want to overstay. I see I’m clearly not wanted.”

Her eyes flicked back to Alysanne.

“Still, dear girl… you ought to learn some manners. Maegor prefers ladies who know their place.”

And with that, she turned and glided out of the room, a ghost in black velvet.

The door clicked shut behind her.

A long beat of silence passed.

Then Alysanne turned to the others and said flatly, “I’m sorry for the uninvited guest.”

That broke the tension. The twins laughed, a little too loud. Jenya clapped her hands over her mouth to stifle a snort. Even Sera muttered something approving under her breath.

“You haven’t changed a bit,” Prudence said, still grinning.

“You’re braver than any knight,” Prunella added.

“She’s not scared of anyone!” said Sera.

Alysanne just smiled modestly and took a bite of her lemon cake.

But Alyssa’s smile didn’t quite reach her eyes.

She looked across the table to Septa Keira, and the septa was already looking back at her; an unspoken conversation in that glance.

They both knew what Tyanna was.

The girls thought her odd. Bold. A cruel witch from a story.

But Alyssa and Keira knew better.

They knew about poison, about whispers, about the long, quiet knives of court.

And Alyssa, hand drifting once more to her stomach, whispered thanks to the Maiden that Tyanna hadn’t looked too closely. Hadn’t stared at her waist. Hadn’t commented on her appetite.

Not yet.

The warmth in the solar hadn’t returned, not fully. The girls were laughing again; perhaps louder than before, too loud, as though sound could blot out the chill that Tyanna had brought in and left behind.

They nibbled at their lemon cakes, giggling about which dances were most foolish, what books they’d been sneaking under their pillows, and which lords' sons had the best hair. The moment, once derailed, had returned to its girlish charm; at least for those still able to believe in safety.

Alyssa sat still at the head of the table, hands folded in her lap, her teacup now cold. One of the cakes, golden, sweet-smelling, slightly sticky, lay untouched on the small porcelain plate before her.

She looked at it.

All she could see was Alys Harroway’s face.

She remembered Tyanna’s words, so many moons ago, hissed like a secret over a goblet of sour red wine:

“You’ll brew the tea. Serve it to Queen Alys when she visits the nursery; like she always does. You won’t ask questions. You’ll offer it sweetly.”

Alyssa had refused.

But what if tea wasn’t the only thing that was poisoned?

Her child had been stillborn, monstrous. That couldn’t have been natural.

The taste of lemon now felt like ash on her tongue.

Her fingers trembled as she reached for the cake; then slowly pulled back. She pressed her hand to her stomach instead, as though shielding the child within from memory itself.

Across the table, Septa Keira’s gaze flicked from the untouched cake to Alyssa’s face. Their eyes met.

Keira didn’t eat hers either.

The girls were still talking: Prunella insisting she’d teach everyone how to dance the Reel, which she claimed to have mastered. Jenya teased that none of them had hips for it, which made everyone laugh. Sera tried to quote a scandalous romance novel and failed to keep a straight face.

They were trying so hard to reclaim the afternoon.

Alyssa smiled, nodded where expected, made the right noises. But her mind was elsewhere, her stomach hollow despite the scent of sugar and citrus.

She had to be more careful.

Tyanna had left them a gift: sweet and soft and poisoned with doubt.

Chapter 12: EDWELL II

The wax had pooled into a hardened lake beside Edwell’s inkwell, and his cramped fingers ached from holding the quill too tightly. The last of the raven-scrolls were sealed, bound in ribbon, and placed aside: messages to House Lynderly, House Grafton, and others of the Vale, all pledging Maegor’s “righteous wrath” against the remaining rebels.

It was late.

Too late, really. Even the Red Keep had fallen quiet, save for the distant, rhythmic patrols of guards below the Tower of the Hand. The candlelight wavered in his chamber, shadows dancing across his lined face, the silver in his beard catching gold.

He allowed himself a small luxury now.

Lady Moya’s letter sat at the edge of the desk; the parchment folded neatly, her script flowing and unhurried.

Edwell read it again, slowly this time. He smiled faintly at her questions:

Are the girls behaving? Prudence promised to write, but I suspect she’s already forgotten. Is Prunella still infatuated with Prince Viserys, or has she moved on to someone equally impossible?

Has Alyssa really recovered from her stillbirth? The girls still speak so fondly of her. And what of her daughter, the princess? You never speak much of her in your letters. You should.

News reaches us even here. They say Queen Ceryse fell. Is it true? Did she jump? Or is that simply what the king wishes the world to believe?

That last line made Edwell frown. He ran a hand down his face, weariness washing over him.

He missed Moya.

She had every right to stay away; he had sent her back to Claw Isle originally, after all. But truth be told, it was as much about shielding her from the court’s rot as from its dangers… even if that included himself.

He glanced toward the sealed letter he had written in reply, sitting by the wine carafe. Perhaps he’d revise it before sending. There were truths too heavy to share; even with her.

As he reached for the letter, a sharp knock cut through the silence.

Edwell blinked. At this hour?

He hesitated, then called out,

“Come in.”

The door creaked open.

And in stepped Queen Tyanna of the Tower, clad in black and deep crimson, her hair coiled like a viper’s nest, and her smile, faint, knowing, lighting the doorway.

Edwell rose instinctively. “Your Grace.”

He couldn’t mask his surprise. “I wasn’t expecting visitors.”

“No one ever does when I visit,” Tyanna replied smoothly, stepping inside without waiting for invitation.

“That’s half the charm.”

She closed the door behind her.

Edwell gestured to a chair across the desk. “Can I offer you wine?”

“Not tonight.” She sat without grace, without ceremony, her presence filled the room, as it always did.

She looked at the desk, at the letters, and at the flicker in Edwell’s eyes.

“Writing to your sweet Lady Moya again?” she asked, voice like silk sliding over a dagger, “or just sending more ravens to nervous little lords?”

Edwell managed a half-smile.

“Both. Though I’ll confess, one’s more satisfying than the other.”

Tyanna tilted her head. “And which is that?”

“I’ll leave it to your imagination.”

That earned the smallest, thinnest laugh from her.

But there was something in her gaze tonight; something colder. Focused.

Edwell could sense it before she even spoke again: Tyanna hadn’t come to banter. She rarely did when she came this late.

Tyanna sat like a cat too close to a hearth, all grace and tension. Her fingers traced lazy circles on the carved arm of the chair as she spoke, but her voice was anything but casual.

“I met your daughters today,” she said. “At a tea hosted by Princess Alysanne.”

Edwell blinked. That was news to him.

Neither Prudence nor Prunella had mentioned a visit from Tyanna; though they’d told him about the tea party in broad strokes.

“Ah,” he said carefully. “I’m pleased they’re making themselves welcome.”

Tyanna’s mouth twitched.

“They were pleasant enough. But Queen Alyssa’s daughter, the little princess, was less so. She all but told me I didn’t belong there.”

Lord Celtigar was not overly surprised, but he hid that like he usually did.

“Alysanne is very… direct. Stubborn. Many girls that age get that way.”

Tyanna shifted again.

“Did you know she invited her chambermaids to the table?”

Her voice curled with distaste. “They sat beside your daughters.”

Edwell gave a slow, diplomatic nod, concealing his surprise.

“Alysanne’s always been…” he paused, choosing his words like stones across a river, “…fascinated with the smallfolk. It’s a naïve charm, really. My daughters think it quaint.”

That much was true. He had long suspected Alysanne held strange ideas about the peasantry, about power, ideas that might be dangerous if she ever came near power itself.. But she wouldn’t, not here. Not under Maegor.

Still, Tyanna looked rather displeased. That made Edwell narrow his eyes.

So it had bothered her.

More than it should have.

Tyanna of the Tower, the king’s strangest and most dangerous queen, was rattled.

Edwell watched her carefully now, his expression calm but the gears turning inside his skull.

She had always styled herself above petty slights, a mistress of poisons, not pettiness, unmoved by the gossip of courtiers or the cold shoulders of other ladies.

But now?

Now she sounded… wounded. As if the disdain of Alyssa Velaryon or a teenage princess meant something.

That was a crack in the mask.

A dangerous crack.

Edwell offered a neutral shrug and a practiced smile.

“They’re prisoners, Your Grace. Neither Alysanne nor Alyssa has any real voice at court. If they dislike you, it changes nothing.”

He added gently, “Surely you don’t take such things to heart?”

For a moment, Tyanna said nothing.

Her eyes, those sharp molten things, stayed fixed on Edwell’s face, as if measuring how much of that was honesty and how much was strategy.

Then she leaned back.

“No,” she said finally, though her tone made it feel like a lie.

“Of course not.”

Edwell watched her closely. He didn’t believe it either.

Now, he was suspicious.

Tyanna didn’t waste time with powerless women unless she thought they weren’t powerless.

Or unless she knew something.

Tyanna’s words tumbled from her mouth like daggers wrapped in silk, a measured stream that grew sharper with every breath.

“I didn’t come here to talk about your daughters,” she said at last, tone suddenly tight and focused. “Not really. Not about tea or chambermaids or cake.”

She leaned forward, elbows resting on the desk as if she were making a proposition in a tavern, not in the halls of power.

“I came to ask you a favor.”

That… surprised Edwell. Tyanna didn’t ask for favors. She extracted obedience or offered deals: veiled threats, occasional smiles, almost never simple requests.

“A favor?” he repeated cautiously.

Tyanna nodded, the candlelight catching the crimson threads of her gown.

“I want you to speak to the king. About me.”

Edwell’s brow furrowed.

“What about you?”

She answered without pause; too fast, like she’d rehearsed it.

“I need you to tell him I had nothing to do with Queen Ceryse’s death.”

A moment went by.

“That I was as surprised to hear she died as anyone else.”

Edwell sat back, steepling his fingers, watching her carefully now.

“Maegor thinks you were involved?”

Tyanna gave a small laugh, but it was bitter.

“He hasn’t said anything. He hasn’t had me questioned. But he hasn’t spoken to me either. Not properly. Not since the morning after she was found.”

Her words grew more rapid, brittle at the edges.

“I’ve questioned every servant and guard in the tower. I’ve had three of my little birds beaten black and blue trying to find something. The Kingsguard say Ceryse came to speak to the king alone. Then returned to her chambers. That’s all.”

A sharp breath. Her nails tapped the wood of his desk like a war drum.

“No sign she jumped. No one saw her walk the hallways. Not even my people. I always see everything, Lord Celtigar. But that night… I saw nothing. Not just that, some maids have run away. Something happened... but I had nothing to do with it.”

Edwell said nothing.

“You’ve worked with me for years,” she continued. “You know I don’t make reckless moves. I never wanted her dead. She was nothing! Ceryse was a faded ribbon, practically discarded. Why would I bother?”

For the first time since she entered, Tyanna’s voice cracked; not loud, not dramatic, but with a note of frustration that didn’t sound performed.

She’s afraid.

That realization struck Edwell sharply.

He had never seen her like this. Not when Queen Alys was still alive. Not when she killed the entirety of House Harroway. Not even when they conspired to have Alyssa marry Maegor.

But now?

Ceryse was dead.

Tyanna felt… isolated. Suspected. Avoided.

“You think Maegor blames you,” Edwell said slowly.

“But you haven’t asked him directly?”

Tyanna looked away.

“He doesn’t want to talk to me. He hasn’t wanted to.”

The words hung in the air like smoke.

So it’s true, Edwell thought. There’s a crack in their relationship. A rift Maegor had opened up. And for all Tyanna’s power, her poisons, her eyes, her presence, she was off balance. And she knew it.

She needed him.

He nodded, affecting sympathy, smoothing his voice into something warm.

“Of course I’ll speak with the king. You’ve always supported the Crown, supported me. I’ll do what I can to remind His Grace of that.”

She looked at him, eyes sharp as ever but no longer gleaming with certainty.

“Thank you, Lord Celtigar.”

She stood, smoothing her gown, carefully rebuilding the mask as she moved toward the door.

But Edwell didn’t move. Not right away.

Because deep in his mind, beneath the years of careful calculation, a thought had bloomed.

There is distance between them now.

Real distance.

This was… interesting.

Chapter 13: ALYSANNE III

The library of Maegor’s Holdfast smelled of vellum, paper, wax, and the faint musk of old ink. The high windows let in pale autumn light, turning the dust motes into drifting stars. Princess Alysanne Targaryen sat curled in a carved oak chair, a heavy tome open across her lap, her honey blonde hair falling like a curtain as she read.

Her finger traced a line of text she had already read three times. The words from the Seven-Pointed Star stared back at her:

Self-murder was among the gravest sins. To take one’s own life is to spit upon the Father’s justice and deny the Mother’s mercy.

Alysanne closed the book softly and stared at nothing.

Suicide. Mortal sin.

For a pious woman like Ceryse… improbable.

The thought had been gnawing at her since the day the news spread through the sept. She had seen Ceryse in person, only days before, gently pressing her mother to return to prayer. There had been sadness in her eyes, yes, but also purpose. Piety.

Would a woman so steeped in the Seven send herself to the Seven Hells? Not just risk it, but choose it?

Alysanne’s hand tightened on the edge of the book.

No. It doesn’t fit.

And there was more. Sera had whispered it to her the day before while brushing her hair; how two maids in the Red Keep had vanished the night after Ceryse’s death. Quiet disappearances. No explanation. No bodies. Just… gone.

No one saw Ceryse fall, the whispers said. Allegedly.

Alysanne’s mind conjured Tyanna’s smile, that serpentine curve of lips, the glint in her eyes at the tea party. Tyanna had always been cruel. Clever. Untouchable.

This… this smelled like her work.

Alysanne closed the book completely, resting it on her knees. Her eyes drifted to the rows of shelves around her, the little table where she and Jaehaerys used to sit. The memory struck her like a spear: the two of them poring over maps, whispering jokes about how their ancestors had turned dragons into kings, making grand plans for adventures they’d never take.

He’s gone. Still gone.

But I can’t be like Mother. I can’t just fold into grief. Jaehaerys would hate that.

She sat straighter, wiping at her eyes before the tears could form.

No, she would keep reading, keep thinking, keep fighting; even if all she could do for now was fit pieces together. Even if it was dangerous.

She traced her finger over the embossed leather cover of the book.

“I’ll survive,” she whispered to herself. “I’ll find the truth. For him. For me.”

Her voice was swallowed by the silence of the library, but the words settled in her chest like a promise.

The clink of armored boots echoed through the stone halls just beyond the library doors, each step deliberate and unhurried; the sound of a man who expected the world to move aside.

Alysanne’s spine stiffened.

She knew that gait. Everyone in Maegor’s Holdfast did.

Her first instinct was to run, to slip between shelves, to escape into the halls, but instead, she forced herself still, breath shallow, heart thudding like a war drum.

He might not come in, she told herself. He might walk right past.

But the boots stopped.

The door creaked open.

King Maegor Targaryen stepped into the library.

The light caught on the black of his armor, burnished like obsidian. His face, chiseled and hard, was unreadable; save for the intensity of his eyes, which found Alysanne the moment he entered.

She stood quickly, pushing the heavy book shut with a soft thump.

“Your Grace,” she said with a low curtsy. “Is… there a problem?”

He didn’t answer.

He only stared.

Alysanne could feel his gaze moving across her face, down her shoulders, lingering too long. It wasn’t lust, not overtly, not yet, but it was assessment, the cold calculation of a man measuring a piece of steel before swinging it.

Her stomach turned.

She remembered Visenya’s words:

“Because you’re a girl. A Targaryen girl, one he might want one day.”

Maegor broke the silence with a single word, “Sit.”

She obeyed, settling back into the carved oak chair as Maegor slowly, deliberately paced in front of her, arms folded behind his back.

She tried to calm herself, to keep her breathing even, her hands from trembling.

What does he want?

Why now?

When he finally spoke, his voice was low, blunt.

“Do you speak with your mother often?”

Alysanne blinked.

“Yes, Your Grace. We take meals together every day.”

Maegor nodded slowly, still pacing.

“Has she said anything unusual to you?”

He paused, then added:

“In the past moon or so?”

There it was. The edge beneath the words.

Alysanne felt a shiver crawl up her spine, but she masked it with practiced calm. Her voice was quiet but clear, her spine straight in the carved oak chair.

“My mother has been more distant these past moons,” she said, measured but firm.

“But I think it’s mostly her grief. The family she’s lost. The family you took from her.”

The words fell like stones.

The silence that followed was heavy. Even the dust in the high beams seemed to hesitate.

King Maegor’s black-armored form didn’t turn to her immediately. He just stood there, his broad back still, the only movement the slow rise and fall of his shoulders.

Alysanne waited. Her pulse thundered in her ears.

When Maegor did turn, his face gave nothing away. No rage. No snarl.

He resumed pacing.

Then: “She’s pregnant.”

He said it like a sentence. A pronouncement.

“Your mother. She’s hiding it.”

Alysanne blinked once.

“I don’t know if that’s true,” she replied cautiously, choosing every word like it might explode. “But… I wouldn’t be surprised.”

Maegor stopped.

“Why?”

The word came out sharp. Accusatory.

Alysanne drew a breath, grounding herself.

“Because she’s afraid of you,” she said. “Afraid of Tyanna.”

Maegor’s gaze darkened.

“She’s afraid Tyanna will do to her what she did to Alys,” Alysanne pressed on, “to any child Mother might have with you.”

That made him freeze.

His eyes widened, not in shock, but in offense, like someone had dared spit at the Iron Throne.

Alysanne didn’t falter.

“You know the rumors, Your Grace. Everyone does. Servants whisper it, lords murmur it. Maids talk of poison and missing girls. Of… what happens when someone gets in Queen Tyanna’s way.”

Maegor’s voice was low.

“You accuse my queen of murder?”

“I don’t need to,” Alysanne said, chin high. “Everyone else already has. You just haven’t asked.”

His nostrils flared. He took a step closer, heavy boots echoing on the stone floor.

But Alysanne didn’t look away.

She wanted to. Her legs screamed at her to rise and back away. But she held the gaze of the man who had murdered her siblings, caged her mother, orphaned her nieces, and ruled with blood and fire.

Because she remembered Visenya’s words:

“Either start being more honest or become a much better liar.”

This was bold.

It was honest.

After a long moment, Maegor exhaled through his nose, a short blast like a bull preparing to charge. But he didn’t strike.

“You’ve a sharp tongue,” he said at last, his voice edged with iron.

“You’d make a better fishwife than a princess, girl. Shouldn’t you be quiet, demure? Learning to embroider and nod politely, like your mother?”

Alysanne swallowed. For a moment she hesitated, but then her voice came, soft but unyielding.

“You came to me,” she reminded him. “You asked questions. I only answered them… truthfully.”

She clasped her hands together, keeping them still, her back straight. Then, emboldened, she added:

“I don’t want to be like my mother.”

That made Maegor blink.

“I want to see outside this castle,” she went on, letting her words rise like a tide.

“I dream of other things. Of being someone else. Someone like Queen Rhaenys. Or Princess Nymeria. A woman who commanded fleets, who changed kingdoms. Something beyond this... cage.”

A long, heavy pause fell between them.

Maegor looked at her as if trying to decide whether to laugh or rage and did neither.

Instead, after a slow exhale, he muttered,

“You’re a fool to speak like this in front of me, girl.”

Alysanne didn’t flinch.

Another silence followed; until Maegor said, almost too casually:

“Would you like to see your dragon again?”

The words struck like a lightning bolt. Alysanne straightened, eyes wide with hope she hadn’t dared feel in moons.

“Yes,” she said quickly, almost breathlessly.

“I… I dream of her often. Of Silverwing.”

That caught Maegor’s attention.

He studied her again, this time more closely; not as a man appraising a pawn, but like a scholar observing something he didn’t quite understand.

“You dream?” he asked, quietly.

Alysanne nodded.

“Sometimes. Of flying. Of dragons. Sometimes… I dream I’m someone else. Someone I’ve never met. Somewhere I’ve never been.”

That made Maegor go still.

So still it frightened her more than anything else.

He didn’t speak. Didn’t move. Just… stared at her. A long, uncomfortable silence. It stretched out for what felt like an eternity before he finally asked:

“Do you know of the Song of Ice and Fire?”

The question was so unexpected it almost didn’t register. But when it did, Alysanne’s breath caught in her throat.

Jaehaerys.

Her brother had whispered it to her once, after the brief escape from the Red Keep. The Song of Ice and Fire. The prophecy. The dream of Aegon the Conqueror. She had dismissed it as a self-serving legend then but now?

Maegor. Maegor, was asking about it?

“Yes,” she answered carefully. “ Of course I’ve heard of it. I’m a Targaryen.”

Maegor said nothing. His jaw was tight. His eyes narrowed.

He lingered there, frozen, not with anger, but in deep thought. Something flickered behind his gaze, some tangle of memory, ambition, fear… or perhaps recognition.

Then Alysanne, still bold despite her pounding heart, spoke one more time.

“What are you thinking, Your Grace?”

Maegor did not answer.

He simply said, “We will speak again,” and then turned, striding from the library without another word, his black cloak trailing behind him like smoke. His armored boots could be heard even as he departed.

The doors shut with a dull thud.

Only then did Alysanne let herself breathe again. Only then did she realize…

That had been the longest conversation she’d ever had with the king.

Alysanne remained seated, unmoving, her hands clasped in her lap; cold and damp with sweat.

What have I done?

The thought slammed into her like a wave, sudden and drowning. Her breath caught in her throat, her fingers tightening around one another until her knuckles ached. She felt… dizzy.

She had just told off the king.

The King Maegor Targaryen, the man who had murdered her siblings, imprisoned her family, and burned his enemies alive. The man who rode the Black Dread. The man who sat the Iron Throne alone, bound by no council, no septon, no gods.

And she had stood before him in a library and told him he was feared, hated, that his most trusted queen might be a poisoner and a murderer.

What in the Seven Hells was I thinking?

She thought about her mother, about Aerea and Rhaella, about Septa Keira. About her handmaidens, her friends. Would Maegor punish them for what she had said? Would he strike back at those who couldn’t speak for themselves? Would he kill her?

She had seen it before. Everyone had.

I’ve ruined everything.

The edge of the chair bit into her thighs as she leaned forward, head falling into her hands. Her heartbeat thundered in her ears, her mind spiraling down into a black well of guilt and fear.

Should I have told him more? Should I have told him what I really think happened to Queen Ceryse? That the missing servants might be connected to Tyanna?

She didn’t know.

Everything about Maegor was unpredictable; like standing before a snarling beast, sometimes docile, sometimes deadly.

Yet…

He hadn’t struck her.

He hadn’t shouted, hadn’t even really insulted her beyond that jab about fishwives.

He had listened. Listened.

More than that…

He had spoken of her dragon. He had asked about dreams. About the Song of Ice and Fire.

Alysanne’s brow furrowed, and for a moment the spiral of panic slowed.

Why? Why ask me that? Why speak of prophecy? Of dragons?

Her thoughts skidded to a halt.

Wait.

Her eyes widened.

“Is Mother really pregnant?” she whispered to the empty library.

Chapter 14: ALYSSA III

Alyssa Velaryon sat beneath a flowering trellis, soft white blooms rustling in the wind, and the sun warming the stone path beneath her bare feet. Prince Aenys, still young, still bright-eyed and unbent by crown or court, stood before her with a lute cradled in his arms like a newborn.

His voice, clear and warm, drifted through the garden: not perfect, not polished, but honest. The melody trembled once or twice, but Alyssa adored it all the same.

When he finished the final note, he winced.

“Well,” he said, scratching the back of his neck, “I think I’ve just insulted every bard in the Seven Kingdoms.”

Alyssa laughed, the sound bubbling up like water from a spring.

“Don’t be ridiculous. You sounded lovely.”

Aenys grinned, sheepish.

“Lovely? I warbled like a dying gull.”

“A gull in tune, then,” she teased, standing and brushing flower petals from her skirts.

He smiled wider at that, the awkwardness fading. His eyes found hers: soft, unsure, hopeful.

“Sometimes I wish I wasn’t the heir,” he said suddenly, sitting beside her on the garden bench. “Maybe I’d just travel and sing for my supper. You could come with me. I’d sing, and you’d…” he gestured vaguely, “look stunning and make sure I didn’t starve.”

Alyssa rolled her eyes and leaned in to stroke his face, brushing her thumb over his cheekbone. His skin was warm, smooth; untouched by grief or fear or kingship.

“You’ll be a better king than you think,” she said.

“You have a good heart, Aenys. That’s more than most.”

He kissed her hand in reply, soft caring fingers brushing her knuckles. His smile was small but true.

Alyssa’s chest tightened.

She didn’t want to leave this. Not this moment. Not this peace. She wanted to sink into this memory, to let it take her; to remain in that garden forever, in the golden glow of what had once been.

Before the throne.

Before the death.

Before Maegor.

Before her world turned into a cage.

She clung to it, even as the edges of the dream began to blur; the scent of flowers fading, the sky darkening, voices distant.

“Stay,” she whispered into the dream.

But the garden was already slipping away.

The laughter. The sunlight.

The touch of Aenys’s lips on her fingers.

It all dissolved like breath on a mirror.

Now there was stone.

Cold. Wet. Rotting. Familiar.

Darkness. The kind that crept beneath your skin, behind your eyes. The kind that remembered your name.

Alyssa’s eyes flew open in the dream, but she saw nothing. Just the walls of the black cells, pressing in like a tomb. Her breath came quick and shallow, the stench of damp straw in her throat.

She knew this place. Knew it too well.

She was back in the prison where Maegor had thrown her after Visenya’s death.

Back after Visenya died, after Prince Viserys escaped, her son, her child, her hope, vanished into the night.

The sound of dripping water echoed around her, slow and steady, mocking the rhythm of her own heartbeat.

Inside her, she could feel it.

The thing.

Not the cell. Not the dark.

But the child. Her child. His child. Maegor’s.

Even in the dream, she felt it pressing against her womb like a brand.

Heavy. Unnatural. Invasive. Uninvited.

Her hand crept to her belly, and in the dream, it wasn’t flat anymore. It was beginning to swell, firm and foreign beneath her palm.

Her skin crawled.

She hadn’t asked for this. She hadn’t wanted this.

It was growing inside her like a seed planted in ash: something unwanted, impossible to root out.

The sound of footsteps echoed down the hall.

Louder than the drip now. Louder than her pulse.

Then came his voice.

“You should’ve told me where he went.”

She froze.

“You carry my heir.”

He said it like a victory. Like a collar snapping shut around her neck.

“You can hate me, Alyssa… but that’s my blood.”

She backed away, heart hammering.

But she could feel it: the child, his child, pulsing inside her like an infection.

She hadn’t the power to stop it. Not here. Not in this cage. Not in this nightmare.

He stepped forward and reached for her, iron gauntlet outstretched.

She tried to scream; not in fear, but in fury. In violation. In grief. But her throat had no voice.

Alyssa jolted upright, gasping, her shift damp with sweat, her fingers clawing at the sheets. Her chest rose and fell like a storm-tossed sea. The cell. The child. Maegor’s grip-

The darkness around her wasn’t complete. A candle’s glow burned beside her bed, soft and golden.

But its bearer made her blood run cold.

“Good evening, Your Grace.”

Queen Tyanna of the Tower, ever-smiling, leaned over the bedside, one hand still resting lightly on Alyssa’s shoulder, the other holding the flickering candle.

Behind her stood three Kingsguard, armored and watchful, white cloaks flowing like specters in the gloom.

Alyssa jerked away from Tyanna’s touch as if burned.

“What in the Seven Hells are you doing in my room?” she snapped, clutching the sheets to her chest. “At this hour?”

Tyanna’s smile never faltered. If anything, it deepened.

“I’m here on the king’s orders, of course,” she said sweetly, voice syrup-thick.

“You’re to be moved, Your Grace. The king has decided it’s time for you and your little granddaughters to take up residence on Dragonstone.”

A moment passed. The candle crackled softly.

“Isn’t that wonderful?”

Alyssa blinked. Her heart pounded.

Dragonstone? Now? At night?

Was this exile? A grave? Did Maegor, did Tyanna, not know she was pregnant?

Wait.

Or worse still…

The thought hit like a blade to the gut: Was he planning to marry Alysanne?

A wave of nausea nearly overtook her.

“No.”

Her voice came sharp.

“No. I want to see the king. Now.”

Tyanna’s eyes gleamed, candlelight dancing in them like wildfire.

“I’m afraid that won’t be possible. His Grace’s orders were quite clear. Immediate departure. No discussion.”

“This is madness,” Alyssa hissed, swinging her legs over the bed. “You come in here like a thief in the night and expect me to-”

“Oh come now,” Tyanna interrupted, tone sing-song and infuriatingly calm. “No one is throwing you in chains. You’re being honored with a change of scenery. Dragonstone is a lovely place: peaceful, private. I thought you’d be pleased.”

Alyssa’s mind raced. If this was punishment, why send the girls?

If it was mercy, why send her without Alysanne?

She turned sharply to the Kingsguard.

“I want to bring my daughter. Alysanne. I demand it.”

None of them spoke. They looked only to Tyanna.

Who laughed.

A low, girlish giggle: completely at odds with the venom behind it.

“Oh, Queen Alyssa… you’re not in a position to demand anything.”

Alyssa’s hands trembled as she reached for her robe. The weight in her belly, small, secret, unspoken, felt heavier than ever. The child. Her child. His child.

Did they know?

Did she know?

Tyanna stood and straightened her gown, then turned to the Kingsguard.

“Give her a moment to dress,” she said, and then, to Alyssa:

“Do hurry. The ship is waiting. And Maegor… well, he doesn’t like delays.”

Alyssa stood, back straight, hands trembling as she fastened her gown’s ties. The cold of the midnight air did little to quiet the heat in her chest: fury, shame, and fear battling for breath.

Behind her, Tyanna of the Tower watched with amusement carved into every feature, the candlelight dancing in her dark eyes. Three Kingsguard stood like statues by the door, silent witnesses to humiliation.

Alyssa’s voice was low, but sharp.

“I want to see the king. And my daughter. One last time.”

Tyanna gave a low laugh; not cruel in sound, but in intent, honed like a needlepoint.

“One last time?” she echoed sweetly.

“You speak as if you’re off to die, not being gifted a lovely little exile. Dragonstone’s a fine place: moody, drafty, but rich in history. You should know, shouldn’t you?”

Alyssa’s hand went to her stomach before she could stop herself. She forced it away quickly, but not quickly enough.

Tyanna’s smile widened. “Ah. I see. That explains the long face. You’re not just angry… you’re anxious about her.”

She stepped closer, candle held just high enough to cast long, flickering shadows across Alyssa’s face.

“Did you really think you’d keep Maegor’s favor forever?” Tyanna whispered.

“You were never his queen. Not even close to me. And you’re certainly not Alys; the only one he truly mourned.” She grinned, with a twinge of bitterness in her voice.

“Poor Alys. Soft voice, soft body, softer head. He loved breaking her.”

Alyssa turned her head away, stomach twisting.

But Tyanna pressed on, circling slowly, the candle turning in her hand like a blade.

“You should be grateful, truly. Maegor’s letting you take your sweet little granddaughters. You’re leaving this place alive; that’s more than Ceryse managed.” A pause. “And more than Alys, come to think of it.”

That made Alyssa freeze.

Tyanna leaned close, voice a breath at her ear.

“You’re leaving because Maegor wants better. Someone younger. Sharper. Unspoiled. Your daughter.”

Alyssa’s vision blurred for a second. Her knees weakened, but she remained upright. She wanted to scream. To shout that she was still carrying Maegor’s heir, that she wasn’t done, that he didn’t need to look at Alysanne like that. But her lips remained sealed.

“He’ll ruin her too, of course,” Tyanna went on, almost musing. “But perhaps she’ll scream prettier than you did when he takes her maidenhead.”

That did it.

Alyssa moved, swift and wild, arm raised, fingers curled like claws, but a Kingsguard caught her wrist before the strike could land. Not harshly, not cruelly. Just… firmly. A wall of silence descended.

Tyanna blinked.

Then laughed; genuinely, this time. “Well. The bitch has teeth.”

Alyssa jerked her hand away, breathing hard.

She said nothing. Not about the child. Not about the threats. Not about the hatred pooling in her chest like tar.

Because if she spoke, she’d scream.

Because if she spoke, Tyanna might hear something she wasn’t meant to know.

Instead, she straightened, kept dressing, and endured.

Tyanna watched her the whole time.

Mocking. Smiling. Enjoying every second, watching her like a cat watching a mouse try not to tremble.

Inside, Alyssa’s rage curled in on itself, quiet and deadly, a flame banked behind a mother’s mask.

She would go to Dragonstone.

She would protect her granddaughters.

She would remember.

Alyssa would never forget what they had done to her and her family.

Chapter 15: EDWELL III

Lord Edwell Celtigar sat stiffly at the long table in the dimly lit dining hall, his goblet untouched, the sweet wine within it clinging to the sides like blood in a basin. On either side of him sat his daughters: Prudence and Prunella, both dressed impeccably and trying their best to behave as they had been taught. Prunella fidgeted with her knife. Prudence smiled politely at everything.

Edwell’s eyes flicked to the far end of the table.

King Maegor was eating in silence; his movements methodical, not brutish, but there was something almost animalistic in how he cut into his roasted boar, piece by piece, never looking up.

To Maegor’s left sat Queen Tyanna, her laughter too sharp and too frequent for the mood of the room. She seemed to be doing most of the talking: spinning stories, asking questions, making little jokes at her own expense and at everyone else’s.

To Maegor’s right sat Princess Alysanne, and it was she whom Edwell watched most closely.

She looked… wrong.

Not in her dress; pale blue and modest, perfectly courtly. Not in her posture; upright and dutiful, as always.

But her eyes. They were fixed somewhere far away. Her usual spark was dulled, as if someone had whispered a terrible truth in her ear right before she sat down. She had barely touched her food. When Tyanna teased her, in that oh-so-friendly tone that always carried a dagger, Alysanne nodded and smiled just enough not to seem rude.

It was not the Alysanne he remembered from just days ago, laughing at tea with Prudence and Prunella.

It was the Alysanne left behind.

Edwell lifted his goblet and took a slow drink, letting the wine roll over his tongue as he turned over the facts in his mind. Queen Alyssa was gone, shipped off to Dragonstone without so much as a formal farewell. The twins, Aerea and Rhaella, went with her. Alysanne had stayed behind. Not stayed, actually. Been kept.

No announcement. No court gossip beyond vague murmurings. The silence around the whole matter had been loud; calculated. And now here they were, gathered at the king’s table, feasting under the weight of that absence.

Tyanna, ever theatrical, had claimed it was a “lighter evening,” one meant to “lift spirits” and “make new memories.” She had personally invited the Celtigar girls and even praised their “poise” before launching into tales of a future garden party she was “planning in Alysanne’s honor.”

Alysanne didn’t react.

Edwell wasn’t fooled. This was a performance. A test. For whom, he wasn’t sure.

Tyanna was looking to dominate the tone. Maegor was watching everything: silently, like a man appraising horses. And Alysanne…

Seven help her, Edwell thought. She’s trapped between a queen and a dragon.

Still, this… might be a moment. For him. If Alyssa had truly lost the king’s favor, if Maegor was thinking of new unions, new heirs, then his own house had something to offer.

Prudence. Prunella.

They were well-bred. Young. Smart… smart enough, at least. Pretty enough. And most importantly; not yet ruined by Maegor’s court. Not like Alysanne.

Tyanna of the Tower sipped her wine with the serene smugness of a cat warming itself by a fire it had lit.

She gestured toward the girls with a jeweled hand, voice light and musical.

“Have you seen the new silks coming out of Myr and Pentos?” she asked.

“Deep jewel tones, sheer in just the right places. Foreign cuts, of course; less stiff than Westerosi gowns. I daresay all three of you would look stunning in them, even without the usual… Valyrian coloring.”

Her smile landed gently on Prudence, Prunella, and Alysanne in turn, but only the twins smiled back.

“Oh!” Prunella gasped, delighted. “We’ve never worn anything from Pentos.”

“Are they dyed with Myrish fireweed?” Prudence asked, eyes alight. “I’ve always wanted to try a Myrish red.”

Alysanne sat straighter but didn’t speak. Her expression remained calm, polite, yes, but her knuckles whitened around her goblet.

Edwell didn’t blame her.

The comment had been sweetly delivered, but the insult was there: clear as ink on parchment. You’re not Valyrian enough. But you’ll look pretty, dressed up like a foreign doll.

Before Tyanna could twist another knife behind a compliment, Edwell leaned in.

“Speaking of celebrations,” he said, voice jovial, calculated, “perhaps we should host a ball. It’s been so long since the hall was filled with music.”

He nodded toward the girls.

“They’re of an age to enjoy such things. Laughter, dancing; it would do them good.”

“Oh, yes!” the twins chorused.

Even Alysanne, momentarily, perked up, her eyes lifting toward Tyanna as if weighing the odds of such a night actually happening.

But before Tyanna could respond, Maegor’s voice cut across the table like steel through silk.

“There will be no spending on balls or dances until the war is won.”

Silence dropped like a curtain.

Tyanna didn’t flinch. She nodded smoothly.

“Of course, Your Grace. Joy must wait until the realm is quiet again.”

Edwell inclined his head, careful.

“Then let us hope peace comes swiftly. The children deserve to grow up in a world where they can dance instead of hiding from swords and daggers.”

Tyanna raised her goblet, smiling over the rim.

“To peace, then.”

The others followed. Toasts were raised.

But no one said Alyssa’s name. No one said Dragonstone. No one asked why the king’s queen and her granddaughters had been carted off like forgotten baggage, or why their absence echoed louder than any toast.

The air remained tight, stretched across the table like a drawn bowstring. And Edwell felt it more with every passing second.

They were all performing: queens, princesses, lords, and girls.

The air in the hall was stiff with courtesy and unspoken questions, but Tyanna cut through it again, her voice light, teeth behind the lace of her tone.

“Princess Alysanne, darling,” she said, tilting her head, “how is your Septa these days? Still managing to keep up with you? I imagine it’s no small feat, educating a girl as clever as you.”

“Septa Keira is very patient,” Alysanne replied, keeping her tone neutral, “and I enjoy my studies: embroidery, heraldry, history… etiquette.” She spared a glance at Tyanna, subtle but intentional. “And of course, the Seven.”

Tyanna smiled wider. Edwell noted the little shift in her posture. She didn’t like being toyed with.

Then Alysanne added, a bit more boldly, “But I’d like to see more of the world, not just read about it.”

She turned slightly toward Maegor, her gaze careful but direct.

“May I visit Dragonstone someday?”

The words dropped like a stone into a still pond.

The clink of a fork against a plate. A sharp inhale from Prunella. Prudence blinked rapidly.

Tyanna’s eyes flashed like drawn steel.

“That is not your place to ask,” she said, voice laced with saccharine rebuke. “You ought to-”

But Edwell stepped in smoothly, tone mild and unbothered.

“It’s natural for a daughter to miss her mother, Your Grace. Especially after such a sudden… change of residence.”

He let the word sudden hang delicately in the air, veiled in politeness but pointed enough.

To his quiet satisfaction, Maegor nodded.

“She may write to Alyssa,” the king said flatly. “And if things remain calm… perhaps she can visit Dragonstone. Her dragon too.”

That last part turned every head, and Tyanna’s expression faltered for just a moment.

“Silverwing is a dangerous beast,” she said, trying to recover. “Surely it’s too soon for such indulgences. The girl-”

“The girl is a Targaryen,” Maegor interrupted, voice hard.

“She should know her blood. And her dragon.”

Silence again.

Edwell sipped his wine to hide a flicker of surprise.

So. Maegor wasn’t as reconciled with Tyanna as he’d thought. That rift still festered beneath the surface: like rot beneath armor.

Tyanna quickly shifted gears.

“Of course,” she said lightly. “You’ve always had such a commanding instinct, Your Grace. Speaking of instincts… Lord Celtigar, what of our campaign in the Vale against the Faith Militant and the rebels?”

Edwell turned to her with the practiced smile of a man who had played politics for too many years to misstep.

“Our ravens continue to reach the Lords of the Vale. The plan remains intact. Once the snowline retreats, the roads will be ours again. Lord Qarl and his rabble won’t hold the mountains for long.”

Tyanna nodded along. But Edwell noted the sharpness had not quite faded from her eyes, and Maegor, for all his stillness, seemed to be watching everything.

The dinner resumed, tension baked into every bite.

No one mentioned Alyssa.

But her absence, and what it meant, hung heavier than her presence ever had. The candlelight flickered over silver goblets and quieted appetites.

Lord Celtigar nodded at Queen Tyanna as they discussed logistics, the last of the roast cooling untouched on his plate. His daughters, seated beside Princess Alysanne, had drifted into their own hushed conversation, the sort that buzzed beneath noble dinners when politics became too dense for pleasantries.

He heard Prunella, ever the more timid one, whisper:

“Is there… any word of your brothers? Prince Jaehaerys or Prince Viserys?”

Alysanne shook her head slowly.

“No. Nothing new.”

Her voice was flat, composed, but Edwell had come to know the sound of a child forcing themselves not to hope. It was not new in Maegor’s court.

He turned his attention back to Tyanna, who was still waxing strategic.

“The Vale’s snow is breaking,” she said, voice smooth as honey over gravel. “And once it does, Lord Qarl will find the mountains not so defensible. The king will strike from Gulltown and squeeze them like rats. The Arryns will thank us!”

“And after that?” Edwell said lightly. “Once the rebels are ash?”

Tyanna smiled like someone reading from a play.

“Then the king can rebuild. Set the Faith where it belongs: in submission.”

Edwell raised an eyebrow and thought to himself. “Submission? Perhaps the king should keep the Faith close, then. Move the High Septon’s seat here. To King’s Landing.” Edwell said it plainly now, without pretense. “The High Septon has clung to the Starry Sept and Oldtown for too long. Perhaps it’s time the heart of the Faith sat beside the Iron Throne.”

Tyanna’s eyes sparkled at the idea. She turned to Maegor, clearly pleased.

“Well? What say you, husband? Shall we build our own Starry Sept here in the shadow of Balerion?”

Maegor gave his usual grunt of vague approval.

“Perhaps.”

The table seemed satisfied with that: all except Alysanne, who set down her cup and spoke clearly.

“Forcing the High Septon to leave Oldtown will only ignite a new rebellion,” she said. “Even if he agrees, the smallfolk won’t. Nor the lords who wish to pray to the Seven with clean hands.”

The silence that followed was swift.

Prudence and Prunella looked mortified. Edwell noted their cheeks flush with embarrassment as they gave each other subtle glances.

Tyanna looked amused.

“Oh, Alysanne,” she said with mock affection, “what a charming dreamer you are. Smallfolk?” She chuckled into her goblet.

“What are they going to do: march on the Red Keep? With pitchforks?”

Edwell didn’t laugh. Despite Tyanna’s flippant tone, Alysanne had a point.

Ever the cautious Hand, Edwell considered the realm as it truly was: wounded, bloodied, resentful. The war was not truly won, not yet, and Maegor’s terror had bought silence, not loyalty. Uprooting the Faith’s center might not spark a war, but it might light a thousand hidden fires.

Maegor raised a hand, annoyed.

“Enough. This is a dinner, not a council.”

Everyone quieted at once.

Except Tyanna.

She kept talking, voice soft and syrupy.

“When the last Poor Fellows burn, and Corbray’s head adorns the gates, the kingdoms will remember who rules. Then you can finally build, Maegor. Rebuild your legacy. Expand House Targaryen.”

A strange note in her voice there, her eye on Alysanne. Edwell caught it.

Expand.

His mind ticked.

Alysanne still seated at Maegor’s right.

Alyssa, vanished without announcement.

Tyanna smiling too easily.

No mention of heirs. Not yet. But… in time?

Edwell didn’t know what Maegor planned; whether he even knew himself. But Tyanna’s ambitions were clearer by the day. Alyssa had been a rival. Now gone. Alysanne was next in line; not just by birth, but by convenience. He sipped his wine slowly, his mind moving faster than the court around him.

If Maegor truly intended to marry again… if Alysanne was in danger of becoming his next queen, his next victim, then perhaps it was time Edwell stopped watching from a distance. He placed his goblet down softly.

“Your Grace,” Edwell said, voice smooth, respectful, but loud enough to silence the soft murmurings of the girls at the table.

“Might I ask, now that Queen Alyssa has taken leave of court, whether you intend to take more wives? Someone younger, perhaps?”

The silence that followed was sharp.

Prudence and Prunella froze on either side of him, their faces going pale with the implication. Alysanne turned her head toward him with a slow, steady glare; one that burned far more than any scolding ever could.

Edwell didn’t meet her gaze.

Across the table, Tyanna tittered softly into her cup, clearly delighted. Her voice was velvet wrapped around steel as she leaned in with amusement.

“Such a bold question,” she said sweetly. “Why, Lord Celtigar, you’re usually so subtle.”

Maegor had stopped eating. Knife and fork clinked against his plate as he laid them down. He looked across the table with those cold, dark eyes.

“I’ve considered it,” he said simply.

The room held its breath.

“Since the deaths of Queen Alys and Queen Ceryse,” Maegor continued, “I’ve given the matter more caution. Wives have brought me benefits… and chaos.”

Tyanna, still smiling, picked up the thread.

“But surely, a king cannot rule without heirs,” she mused aloud. “And if Queen Alyssa proves unfruitful, again…”

She leaned back in her seat, voice playful now, taunting.

“There’s Lord Darnold Arryn’s daughters: three maidens, bright-eyed and bland, perfect for marriages and birthing children.”

“Or Lord Tyrell’s younger sister, a little older than most maidens, but I hear she’s quite pretty.”

“A Velaryon niece, perhaps: keeps the bloodline close and clean, and it might keep the Velaryons close.”

Then Tyanna turned, slowly, to glance at Prudence and Prunella, who were sitting like statues.

“And of course, our lovely twins. Polite, well-dressed, and House Celtigar is ever loyal.” She smiled wider. “Surely one of them could warm the king’s hearth and give him a few silver-haired dragons.”

Edwell said nothing; she was doing his job for him. His daughters looked ready to crawl under the table.

Then, after the perfect pause, Tyanna added, almost lazily:

“And then there’s Princess Alysanne. She is of the blood, after all. A fine match… if His Grace favors boldness over meekness.”

“That’s enough,” Maegor said, his voice flat but final.

He looked back at Edwell.

“If I wish to take another wife, I will. But I haven’t decided. As for your daughters…”

He glanced at the girls, who shrank slightly under his gaze.

“…I have no desire to marry children.”

Edwell gave a soft smile to hide his disappointment, nodding.

“Of course, Your Grace. Your wisdom speaks for itself.”

He raised his goblet slightly; a gesture of respect, not defiance.

But internally, Edwell was buzzing.

Tyanna’s behavior… her casual sarcasm, her list of candidates… it wasn’t a performance meant to help Maegor choose. It was a show of control. She was mocking the idea that any of them could matter, because she believed, in the end, that only she would matter. Even if he married Alysanne, which Maegor did not seem to keen on... yet.

But the tension between her and the king remained. Maegor’s silence had grown heavy with uncertainty, and Maegor didn’t like uncertainty. Uncertainty meant chaos. Uncertainty meant… opportunity.

Opportunity for him.

Opportunity for Prudence or Prunella.

Opportunity… if he moved carefully.

The dinner continued.

But Edwell was already thinking about what would come next.

Chapter 16: MAEGOR III

The Great Hall was silent, lit only by a few guttering torches that threw long, jagged shadows across the stone floor. A few Kingsguard stood vigil, as they often did. The Iron Throne loomed like a god of swords, and King Maegor Targaryen sat atop it in full black armor, unmoving except for the restless motion of his hands.

In his gauntlets, he held the Crown of the Conqueror.

The Valyrian steel circlet, dark, strong, unbending, glimmered faintly in the firelight. The rubies set into it were deep red, like the hearts of men crushed underfoot.

Maegor turned the crown slowly in his hands, feeling the grooves and weight of it, imagining his father’s head beneath it.

“Even a crown can feel like chains,” he muttered.

But it wasn’t the crown that weighed on him tonight.

It was voices.

Ghosts.

Ceryse, screaming and accusing him in her last hour.

Alysanne, bold-eyed and blunt, speaking truths no girl should speak.

Visenya, always Visenya, dead but never gone. Her last words were still thorns under his skin.

“She’s a demon in a woman’s flesh!”

“You know the rumors, Your Grace. Everyone does.”

“Tyanna will kill Alys. And the child. And whoever else she must, just to have you.”

Maegor gripped the crown tighter.

But then came other memories; the ones he told himself were truth.

Tyanna’s hand on his shoulder after Alys’s death.

Her voice in his ear in Pentos, after everyone else abandoned him

Her laughter in his bed, mocking all those who feared him.

She had loved him when others had feared him.

Hadn’t she? Didn’t she?

He looked up at the dark chamber. Two Kingsguard stood by the great doors: faceless statues in white cloaks. They knew nothing. Said nothing.

Only Tyanna dared to speak to him as an equal.

But then again… so had Ceryse, in the end. So had Alysanne, this very night. So had Edwell, when Maegor needed his advice despite his own anger. What should he do?

He snarled and stood suddenly. The rubies on the crown caught the light like blood.

What did he know anymore?

Tyanna had given him his enemies’ heads, spies throughout the Seven Kingdoms, secrets from the whispers of lords and ladies alike. She was his dagger in the dark.

But what if the blade turned on him?

He turned the crown over in his hand one more time. He could feel the crown’s weight. It was forged in fire and blood.

Just like him.

Just like her.

Something powerful.

Something demonic.

He sat back down slowly, resting the crown in his lap, staring down at it.

He had not made a decision.

The crown of Aegon the Conqueror sat heavy in Maegor’s lap, but it was not the steel that weighed on him now.

His thoughts drifted from rubies to honey-blonde hair.

To clear blue eyes, like the open sky.

To the girl bold enough to speak the truth: to him, no less.

Alysanne.

She was not like the others.

Not like Alyssa, who had curled into silence and tears.

Not like Ceryse, whose bitterness had festered too long.

Not like Alys, who had smiled and lied until she died screaming.

Alysanne had faced him. Calm. Sharp. Honest.

Maegor’s fingers drummed against the armrest of the Iron Throne.

Tyanna wanted him to wed the girl: to punish Alyssa, to secure an heir, to replace what had been lost. But Tyanna did not understand the truth.

Maegor already knew Alyssa was pregnant.

That child, growing in secrecy now on Dragonstone, was being watched by men loyal only to him. If Tyanna had poisoned Alys or Alyssa… if she had interfered before… she would find no such opportunity again.

Sending Alyssa away had not been exile.

It had been a precaution.

A calculation.

And Alysanne?

That had been another calculation entirely.

With her mother gone, the girl was alone. Edged away from support. Separated from comfort.

She was clever, clever enough to speak of dreams, of prophecy: the Song of Ice and Fire. Few outside his mother had dared breathe those words. And even fewer had the eyes to believe it.

She did not look the part of a Targaryen, her coloring was like a peasant girl, not dragonsteel and fire, but looks meant nothing. What mattered was blood, and will, and whether or not the gods had chosen her.

Could she be heir?

Temporarily, perhaps.

Or an understudy, a guardian to the child growing in Alyssa’s womb, her younger brother or sister.

Or a wife? That could wait.

But what would Tyanna say if she knew his true plans?

Maegor’s jaw tightened.

She thought he had done it for her: to punish her rival, to clear the path for another pawn on the board. She thought her cleverness was unmatched, her counsel irreplaceable.

But her whispers were growing sour.

Too many secrets. Too many deaths.

Now, she laughed too quickly. Asked too often. Grew too jealous.

Tyanna of the Tower had built her web, and now it might be time to burn it.

The crown settled on Maegor’s brow with a cold finality.

Valyrian steel. Rubies. His father’s weight now made his.

He rose from the Iron Throne like a storm slowly gathering height.

The torches hissed in the stillness of the Great Hall as he descended the long steps, his black armor clinking like distant thunder. When he reached the base, he turned toward the shadows where his guards stood.

“Ser Owen. Ser Maladon.”

The white-cloaked Kingsguard stepped forward, faces hard, hands resting on sword pommels.

“Seize Queen Tyanna. Deliver her to the dungeons.”

The command dropped like a sword.

Ser Maladon Moore stiffened, blinking in surprise.

“Your Grace… forgive me, are we to understand-”

“You heard him.”

Ser Owen Bush cut in, voice low and sharp.

There was a faint tension behind his words; not surprise, but recognition. He had seen this coming. He had seen worse.

Maegor’s eyes, black and unblinking, locked on Ser Maladon.

“I have credible reason to believe she has plotted against my house,” he said.

“She has murdered queens. Perhaps mine own children.”

There was no shouting. No fury.

Just the quiet, cold wrath of a man who had finally decided.

Ser Owen bowed his head first, then Ser Maladon followed.

“It will be done, Your Grace.”

They turned and left at a brisk march.

Maegor stood alone beneath the Iron Throne. The silence returned, but it was different now.

He rubbed his chin.

The hall suddenly felt… colder.

She had been his raven, his dagger, his spider, his shadow.

Would he regret this?

Perhaps.

But he was a king. Regret had no use.

He only knew one thing for certain:

If she confessed, her death would last for days.

If she denied, the dungeons would break her for even longer.

Either way, the Red Keep would have one less spider in its web by the end.

Maegor… Maegor might finally have peace.

Chapter 17: BENIFER III

The stone floor was cold beneath Grand Maester Benifer’s slippers as he shuffled after the Kingsguard, the long tail of his grey maester’s robe dragging behind him. His joints ached; the hour was early, the torchlight dim, and his heart beat too quickly.

The Kingsguard knight leading him, Ser Olyver Bracken, marched with the ease of someone long past caring. His white cloak rustled faintly with every stride.

Benifer broke the silence, voice hoarse.

“Might I… inquire why I’ve been summoned so urgently?”

Ser Olyver didn’t turn around.

“The king has need of you. That’s all you need to know.”

Benifer swallowed.

A pause. Then, despite himself:

“Is Maegor going to kill me?”

That made Ser Olyver laugh; not kindly, but like a man who’d seen too much blood to find the question shocking.

“If he wanted you dead, old man, he’d have done it already. Right in your bed. Might’ve even used your own chain to strangle you.”

He smirked over his shoulder.

“You’re still breathing because you’re not stupid like the last three. You don’t talk too much either.”

Benifer offered a thin smile, but his stomach twisted. That wasn’t exactly comforting. He clutched his chain of office, Valyrian steel, gold, silver, bronze, lead, a symbol of wisdom that had become a noose more than once in this cursed keep. Three Grand Maesters, all dead by Maegor’s hand. Too loud, too unskilled, too old.

Benifer had done better. He said little, offered quiet support, and kept his head low.

But today… he had been summoned early.

That meant something had changed.

His mind whirled.

Had Maegor found out something?

Was this about Alyssa? Alysanne? Tyanna?

Or Maegor himself?

Benifer felt each step like a drumbeat of doom.

The torchlight grew dimmer the farther they descended into the dungeons; as if even fire hesitated to touch these halls. The air turned damp and sour, heavy with the scent of rot and wet stone. Down and down they went, past cells with rusted bars, past prisoners who did not speak. Then further still, to where even silence seemed to hold its breath.

Benifer’s pace slowed.

He recognized the walls. These were not the black cells. These were below them. The fourth level. The pit.

Where screams went to die.

Ser Olyver turned his head slightly.

“Is there a problem, Grand Maester?”

Benifer swallowed hard.

“No,” he said, his voice thinner than he liked.

“No problem at all.”

He forced his legs to move.

Down. Down. One step, then the next.

They rounded a corner.

Benifer stopped breathing.

Maegor stood there.

The King of the Seven Kingdoms.

Six foot six and a nightmare made flesh, clad in black armor that looked slick and wet in the low torchlight.

But it wasn’t the armor.

It was the blood.

Splattered across his breastplate.

Smeared across his gauntlets.

Soaked into the crevices of his vambraces and dripping slowly from his fingers.

His arms… his arms were red to the elbow.

Benifer froze.

His knees nearly buckled. The room tilted. His chain felt like a weight pressing into his throat. He felt a cold sweat crawl down his back and an old fear claw at his ribs.

Maegor looked like something torn from a Septon’s worst sermon: the Lord of the Seven Hells in the flesh, the Stranger bloodied from judgment.

Next to Benifer, Ser Olyver Bracken seemed perfectly calm.

“Your Grace,” Ser Olyver said casually. “I’ve brought the Grand Maester.”

Maegor turned.

His eyes met Benifer’s, and the Grand Maester felt the full weight of the Iron Throne in that gaze.

Heavy.

Pitiless.

Absolute.

Benifer managed a tight bow, his voice shaking.

“Your Grace… you sent for me?”

Maegor did not speak right away. He merely looked at the maester as one might look at a piece of parchment before deciding whether to burn it.

Then, slowly, Maegor gestured to the cell behind him; the heavy iron door left ajar.

“I need your expertise, Maester,” Maegor said.

Benifer stood silent in the hallway, the light of the nearest torch flickering across the king’s blood-slicked armor.

The king’s voice was composed; not weary, not winded. Simply cold.

“Tyanna has betrayed me,” Maegor said, as if declaring a fact of nature.

Benifer’s throat tightened.

Maegor folded his arms, streaks of red along the edges of his black vambraces.

“I’ve punished her, but she’s still alive. I want her to stay that way. For now.”

A pause. A long one.

“You’ll see to that.”

Benifer looked to the slightly open cell door. He could smell it now; the sharp tang of copper, the stench of sweat and pain.

“What exactly has been done to her, Your Grace?” he asked quietly.

Maegor listed it like inventory.

“Tongue’s gone. Three fingers. Four toes. A nipple. The back’s open. The soles too. Some burns. Cuts. No gut wounds: I’m not a fool. She’ll last days, if you do your part.”

Benifer thought of his books, his scrolls, the careful lectures of anatomy, his training in healing, preservation, bloodletting, sutures, poultices.

And now this.

“The necessary supplies are in the cell,” Maegor added, gesturing. “If you need more, ask Ser Olyver.”

Benifer gave a tight nod, all while his stomach twisted into knots.

“Understood, Your Grace.”

He didn’t dare ask why she was to be kept alive: not truly. There was no clarity to be gained from that question. Only peril.

Still, something in him, some fraying thread of curiosity, did break through.

“Your Grace… may I ask what… precisely… her betrayal entailed?”

Maegor turned, slowly. His eyes gleamed in the firelight.

He stepped forward, towering.

“She was a jealous, barren bitch of a woman.”

Benifer said nothing. His hands folded in front of him to keep them from trembling.

“She murdered my children, like the witch she is.”

He paused then leaned in, his voice lowering to something between a whisper and a growl.

“And she lied to my face while she did it.”

Benifer nodded again.

“Of course.”

For once, he didn’t disagree, even in his own head.

The Grand Maester took a breath, then stepped into the darkness of the cell to do what was asked of him.

Notes:

The next chapter will be pretty long and be very consequential, so buckle up!

Chapter 18: ALYSANNE IV

The torches along the passageway burned low, and the polished black stone of Maegor’s Holdfast caught their light like a thousand watchful eyes. Princess Alysanne Targaryen walked at an easy pace beside Septa Keira, the hem of her pale blue gown whispering over the ground. The hour before evening prayers was the one of the few times she was allowed to roam freely, and she tried to make it last.

They spoke softly as they went, their voices carrying no farther than the next archway.

“I’m glad the Celtigar twins are at court now,” Alysanne said. “There are so few girls my age here at court.”

“They’re good girls,” Keira replied. “Proper, if a bit talkative.”

They both smiled at that. The warmth faded quickly, though, as their thoughts turned, as they always did, to those who were gone.

“Do you think my mother is well on Dragonstone?” Alysanne asked. “And the twins, Aerea and Rhaella?”

Keira folded her hands together. “We must hope so. Dragonstone might be safer than this place for them.”

Alysanne nodded, then glanced around before lowering her voice.

“They say the king and Queen Tyanna haven’t been seen since yesterday.”

Keira’s brow furrowed behind her white linen eyepatch. “Rumors again. No one ever knows the truth in this castle.”

Alysanne giggled. “I wouldn’t mind if they never came back.”

Keira gasped and gave a scandalized laugh of her own. “Hush, child. The walls have ears.”

But her mirth lingered as they turned another corner.

The corridor narrowed, the light dimming. Alysanne studied the familiar tilt of Keira’s head, the small hitch in her gait, the pale band of cloth that covered one side of her face. The eyepatch had been there for years now, ever since that terrible night; the night her and her brothers had fled, and everything had changed.

Alysanne’s throat tightened. The words left her before she could stop them.

“I’m sorry, Keira. For what Viserys did. For your eye.”

The septa didn’t break stride as they walked into the Great Yard, crossing it to get to the Royal Sept.

“You’ve nothing to be sorry for.”

“But you were only hurt because of me,” Alysanne pressed. “If you hadn’t helped us-”

Keira shook her head. “You were afraid Maegor might kill you, Viserys was too. He was a brave boy… and foolish. You were children, all of you.” Her voice gentled. “Don’t carry that weight, sweetling. You were a good girl then, and you are still. None of this is your fault.”

Alysanne blinked back the sting in her eyes.

“You’re too kind to me.”

“Kindness is what the world’s starved of,” Keira said simply. “And the gods will judge the cruel soon enough.”

“Thank you,” Alysanne whispered.

Keira touched her arm gently. “Come. The Father forgives the sorrowful, not the tardy.”

The doors of the Royal Sept groaned softly as Alysanne and Septa Keira slipped through, bathed in the golden-orange light of the setting sun. It poured through the high stained-glass windows, casting colorful halos over the polished stone floor.

“The sunset’s lovely tonight,” Alysanne whispered, her eyes lifting to the vivid pattern cast by the Maiden’s window.

“Another wonder of the Seven’s grace,” Keira replied gently. “Even in the darkest courts, the gods leave light.”

Alysanne smiled faintly. They were some of the only words that gave her comfort lately.

As they moved further into the Sept, Alysanne was surprised, and gladdened, to see familiar faces. Near the altar of the Maiden, Prudence and Prunella Celtigar were kneeling in prayer, heads bowed, their fair hair braided neatly under their veils. Lord Edwell Celtigar, their father, was seated in a pew behind them, his hands steepled, but his eyes roving, watching the septon.

Further down, near the altar of the Warrior, Lord Walton Towers of Harrenhal stood speaking with Septon Tobas, his craggy profile uninviting as ever. His grandchildren lingered nearby, stiff and silent in formal dress.

But it was the sight of the twins that made Alysanne’s steps quicken.

“I’ll be at the Maiden,” she whispered to Keira, who nodded, taking a seat in one of the side pews.

Alysanne glided forward, quiet as a shadow, then knelt beside Prunella and Prudence, her hands folded before the image of the Maiden.

It was a few moments before Prunella, eyes bright, noticed her and gasped lightly.

“Alysanne!”

“Shhh,” Alysanne smiled. “We’re praying, remember?”

After a few more quiet moments of half-hearted prayer, Alysanne rose. The twins followed, giggling softly behind their hands.

“You gave us a fright,” Prudence whispered. “We weren’t expecting you tonight.”

“I come more often now,” Alysanne said, brushing back a stray strand of hair. “It’s the only place they don’t watch me so closely.”

The girls exchanged a look.

“We’ve been worried about you,” Prunella said, a little guiltily. “Ever since your mother was sent away, everything’s been so strange.”

Alysanne gave a shallow nod.

“I’m fine. As fine as anyone can be in a prison dressed like a palace.”

The twins hesitated.

“We’re still furious with Father,” Prudence muttered. “He should have stood up for you. And for us! Offering us to Maegor like meat in a market; he only thinks about himself!”

“Prunella nearly threw her goblet at him,” Prudence added, trying to lighten the mood.

Alysanne chuckled under her breath. “I would’ve cheered if she had.”

The three of them laughed softly, careful not to draw Septon Tobas’s attention. It was a rare thing, laughter in the Red Keep.

“Thank you,” Alysanne said sincerely. “Just… thank you for still being here.”

Prunella grinned. “Of course we are. And we’ll stay far away from any more dreadful dinners; unless you’re hosting one without… her.”

“Tyanna?” Alysanne rolled her eyes. “If I ever have to sit beside that witch again, I’ll toss myself into the Blackwater.”

The three of them dissolved into another fit of quiet laughter, huddled like girls at a true court again, before kings and queens and dragons turned everything sour.

The colored glass of the Royal Sept painted flickering shadows on the white stone floor as Alysanne and the Celtigar twins returned to the pews. Septa Keira waited there, straight-backed and watchful, her good eye sharp beneath her veil.

“Did you hear anything from the servants, Septa?” Prunella asked in a half-whisper as they sat. “About the king? Or… the queen?”

“Hush,” Septa Keira scolded, though not unkindly. “This is a place of prayer, not gossip.” She folded her hands in her lap. “And no, I’ve heard nothing. That is, nothing worth repeating. I’m far more concerned about Queen Alyssa and the little ones.”

“Aerea and Rhaella,” Prudence nodded. “It’s strange… they were just gone. Like shadows whisked away at dusk to Dragonstone.”

“We all miss them,” Prunella said, her voice even. She meant it.

But as the twins murmured their agreement, Alysanne’s mind whirled.

She knew what the others didn’t.

She knew her mother was pregnant.

And it was eating her alive.

Maegor’s child was still within her mother; perhaps the son and heir he had always wanted. That knowledge had kept Alysanne awake at night since her mother was sent to Dragonstone.

She’d told no one. Not Keira, not the twins. Only the gods. It felt like a secret too heavy to carry, yet too dangerous to share.

She had not even been able to wish her mother goodbye.

Was she being kept behind as… a replacement? Alysanne had wondered that more than once, even though Maegor had denied it repeatedly. Her uncle was a murderer, it would be no less surprising if he was a liar too.

Alysanne’s gaze drifted up to the light cascading from the Maiden’s window. The colors seemed dimmer now. Her hands, clasped tightly in her lap, trembled slightly. She didn’t want to be a piece on someone else’s board. But that was what she had become. Alysanne turned her gaze to the Septa and the Celtigar girls.

They were kind. Loyal. But they weren’t Targaryens. They couldn’t understand what it meant to carry the fire and the burden both.

Lord Celtigar approached their pew with that polished, pleasant mask he always wore. Alysanne had long since stopped trusting it.

“Princess Alysanne,” he greeted with a small bow, “it’s good to see you in such pious company.”

Alysanne returned the bow of her head, cold and shallow. “Lord Celtigar.”

If he noticed the chill in her voice, he didn’t show it.

“I come with some heartening news,” he continued, glancing between her and his daughters. “Your mother and your nieces arrived safely on Dragonstone. The seas were calm. They’re in good health.”

Alysanne blinked, her throat catching. She hadn’t realized how tight her chest had felt until it loosened slightly.

“Thank you,” she said softly.

“And… in other news,” Edwell added more gravely, “His Grace has agreed to permit House Hightower to receive Queen Ceryse’s remains. She will be buried in Oldtown, as she would have wished.”

A silence followed.

Even the Celtigar girls fell quiet at that. Alysanne remembered, solemnly.

Ceryse had never belonged to King’s Landing. She was too proper, too soft-spoken, too lost in sadness to ever find footing among Maegor’s brutal court. Alysanne couldn’t claim to have known her well, but she remembered the queen’s sadness, along with her occasional kindness, how she had comforted Alysanne and her mother soon after their arrival. Alysanne had never forgotten that.

“She’ll be at peace,” Alysanne murmured. “She never wanted to die here.”

“Nor to live here,” Lord Celtigar added, unusually honest for once. He looked down for a moment, and then gestured to his daughters. “Come, Prudence, Prunella. Time we take our leave.”

The girls nodded and turned to Alysanne.

“We’ll see you again soon,” Prunella said brightly.

“Yes,” Prudence added. “Perhaps at a real dinner. A proper one.”

Alysanne smiled. “One with laughter, not lectures.”

That earned a laugh from both twins.

Before he left, Lord Celtigar looked to Septa Keira and Alysanne. “I’d like to arrange more dinners,” he said casually. “Between the girls. Without… royal interruptions.”

Alysanne perked up. “I’d like that very much, my lord.”

It was sincere. She had spent so long in silence, in forced politeness, in fear. But with Prunella and Prudence, and with Keira nearby, she could almost pretend things were… normal.

The Celtigars departed, and Septa Keira rose, brushing off her robes.

“Come now,” she said, adjusting her veil. “Dinner awaits us too, Princess.”

As Septa Keira and Alysanne stepped out of the Royal Sept, their conversation faded the moment they spotted two white-cloaked figures standing ahead.

Ser Harrold Langward, Lord Commander of the Kingsguard, stepped forward and bowed his head.

“Princess Alysanne,” he said. “His Grace requests your presence. Immediately.”

Septa Keira’s brow furrowed. “Then I shall accompany her,” she said firmly.

But Ser Harrold shook his head. “Alone, Septa. Those were the king’s specific orders.”

A chill ran through Alysanne. She didn’t let it show.

Keira hesitated, her one visible eye narrowing with unease. “Is that truly the king’s command?”

Before the knight could answer, Alysanne stepped in. She rested a hand gently on Keira’s arm.

“It’s all right,” she said. “I’ll go.”

Keira’s lips parted, as if to object again, but Alysanne offered a small, brave smile; meant to comfort, even if it didn’t quite reach her eyes.

“I’ll be fine.”

That was a lie.

But it was the only lie Alysanne would allow herself tonight. She sensed Tyanna’s hand behind this.

She turned to the Kingsguard, nodding once, and began to follow them down the corridor. Their armored boots echoed off the stone as the trio moved deeper into the Red Keep.

She didn’t know what awaited her. Alysanne remembered her last conversation with Maegor: how he spoke of dragons, of dreams, of the Song of Ice and Fire. She remembered her last conversation with Visenya: how she told him to always be honest with Maegor, to protect his children, to remember she was a Targaryen woman and what that meant to the king. She remembered her interactions with Tyanna: the mocking, the poison, the casual threats.

Whatever this summons meant, she had to be ready for anything. She had to be strong.

Behind her, she didn’t need to turn around to know that Keira was still standing there, watching her go, her hands wringing quietly at her sides. Alysanne and the Kingsguard reentered the Red Keep; it swallowed them like a great beast.

The stone walls grew colder with every step. Princess Alysanne followed the two Kingsguard, Ser Harrold Langward and Ser Olyver Bracken, through the narrow torchlit corridors of the Red Keep’s lower levels. They had passed the cells, passed the level where political prisoners were kept, and now descended toward the fourth level: the level for torture.

That was when Alysanne’s heart began to pound.

She swallowed her fear and kept her chin high. “Don’t ask. Don’t beg. Don’t cry,” she told herself. “You are a dragon, even if you may not look it.” That was what Visenya had said once, long ago. Dragons did not whimper.

Still, she could not help but wonder:

Was she being imprisoned? Punished for her bold words in the library? For daring to speak truth about Tyanna? Had Maegor changed his mind?

Then, around the final bend, she saw him.

King Maegor Targaryen, standing tall in his black and crimson armor, gloved hands folded behind his back. His mere presence was enough to command silence. The torchlight shimmered off the black steel of his breastplate, casting long shadows on the dungeon walls.

Alysanne’s steps slowed, just for a moment, before she forced herself forward.

He turned his head, meeting her gaze. His violet eyes were hardened.

“Your Grace,” she said calmly, with a practiced courtesy that disguised the tightness in her chest. “You summoned me?”

She noticed the Kingsguard taking a step back to give them space. They didn’t leave, but they did not speak.

Maegor studied her for a long time; long enough that Alysanne felt the silence press into her bones.

Then, at last, he spoke.

“You’re brave to come, girl.”

It was not a compliment. Not entirely. But not a condemnation either.

Alysanne bowed her head slightly. “You asked. I obeyed.”

She kept her voice even. She would not give him the satisfaction of fear.

Inside, however, her thoughts were spinning. What am I doing here? What does he want? She kept her posture firm, every muscle taut with control.

Somewhere, faintly, she heard a distant echo: a whisper or a moan? She couldn’t be sure. But she didn’t look away. The torchlight flickered along the damp stone as Maegor knocked on the iron door.

From within, Alysanne heard… nothing.

No chains, no voice, no movement. Just silence: thick and eerie.

Grand Maester Benifer emerged from the cell, looking paler than ever, his robes damp with blood. He didn’t say a word, only nodded to the king, eyes avoiding Alysanne’s. Whatever he had seen or done in that room had drained what little color remained in the old man’s face.

Maegor gestured curtly to the Kingsguard.

“Escort him back to his chambers. Now.”

Ser Harrold Langward, the Lord Commander, hesitated.

His eyes darted from Maegor to Alysanne. He looked like he wanted to protest. But he didn’t. He bowed instead, turned, and followed Benifer with Ser Olyver Bracken behind him.

Now, it was just Maegor and Alysanne.

And the cell door.

Maegor took two slow steps closer to it, and tapped the metal again with the side of his gauntlet.

“Do you know who’s in there?”

His voice was low, almost casual.

Alysanne kept her posture straight. She would not flinch.

“Is it Viserys?” she asked. “Or Jaehaerys?”

There was a flash of surprise in the king’s eyes. His head tilted, but he answered simply:

“No.”

He looked back at the door, gauntlet still pressed to it.

“It’s Tyanna.”

Alysanne’s heart gave a small jolt.

She blinked. Of all the people she expected to find behind that door… Tyanna was not one of them.

“You imprisoned your queen?” she asked, cautiously. “Why?”

Maegor turned fully toward her now. His expression was flat. Not rage, not grief. Something in between.

He flexed the fingers of his gauntlet, almost like they ached.

“Not just for one thing,” he muttered. “It was… all of it. Little things. Big things.”

“My mother warned me. Visenya. She saw what Tyanna was. Ceryse saw it too. So did you.”

His eyes bored into her now, as if testing her memory. Alysanne met his gaze evenly.

“I was blind,” Maegor continued, voice hardening. “Blinded by pride. By ambition. By… her.”

He looked back at the door. His voice dropped.

“Ceryse… tried to tell me the truth before she died. She wanted to confess. She said Tyanna would be destroyed by what she knew.”

He exhaled slowly.

“Tyanna killed her for it. I know it now. And this time, I didn’t ignore the signs.”

There was silence again. The flames of the torches crackled faintly.

Alysanne stepped slightly closer to the door. Her voice was quieter now.

“What was Queen Ceryse going to confess?”

Maegor turned his head, eyes locking with hers again. There was something deeply unsettling about the look. Not rage. Not guilt. Calculation. It felt wrong in Maegor’s eye.

“Would you like to ask Tyanna yourself?”

Alysanne didn’t answer immediately. Her mouth was dry.

She looked again at the door. The air around it felt heavy. Dread pooled in her stomach. But some part of her, the same fire that always pushed her to speak truth to power, flickered alive again.

“Yes,” she said softly. “I would.”

Maegor nodded.

“Then go in.”

He stepped back.

Alysanne took a single step forward… and placed her hand on the iron door. She opened the door slowly, expecting to find Tyanna as she always was: radiant, sharp-eyed, smug, maybe even defiant. What she found instead made her stop cold.

The figure inside the cell wasn’t entirely recognizable.

It lay still upon a straw-strewn mat, the body wrapped completely in heavy, blood-stained bandages. Not a single limb was visible; no arms, no legs, no fingers. The only part of the figure left uncovered was the nose: a thin sliver of pale flesh just barely poking through the wrappings.

Alysanne stepped into the cell cautiously, her slippered feet whispering against the cold stone floor. The air was thick, hot with the scent of blood, rot, and something… medicinal. She could hear the shallow rasp of breath, slow and ragged, coming from the thing that had once been Queen Tyanna of the Tower.

Maegor entered behind her, his armored boots loud against the stone. He stood tall and impassive, his shadow falling over both of them.

“You’re wondering what I did to her, aren’t you,” he said.

Alysanne didn’t speak. She could only stare.

“I won’t tell you everything,” Maegor said, his voice like gravel. “But she lacks a tongue, so questions might be difficult. The bandages are so she doesn’t bleed out. Grand Maester Benifer has done his part.”

He paused, looking at the broken form on the floor with something that might’ve been contempt… or disappointment.

“What matters is what she said. What she confessed.”

Alysanne turned her head sharply, her throat tightening.

“She confessed?” she echoed, voice thin.

Maegor nodded.

“To all of it, even before I started on her. She poisoned Alys… and your mother while they were both with child. The babes dying weren’t the gods’ will. They were her doing.”

Alysanne’s stomach twisted violently.

“She… she killed my mother’s babe?”

“And your brothers,” Maegor added darkly.

Alysanne felt her knees weaken.

“Viserys?” she whispered. “Jaehaerys?”

The king’s face was hard as stone.

“She did it quietly. I never knew. She disposed of them while they were in hiding. Claimed it was to ‘protect’ me from their claims, said I was too weak to do it myself.”

Alysanne staggered a step back, nearly tripping over her own feet.

“And Queen Ceryse?” she asked, though her voice already knew the answer.

“She killed her too,” Maegor said flatly. “For trying to tell me the truth. Tyanna slit her throat to silence her… just like she silenced your brothers.”

Alysanne stood there, frozen, eyes wide and unblinking.

She had wondered for so long what had happened to her brothers. Whether they had escaped. Whether they were safe. And now… now she had her answer.

It was worse than she could have ever imagined.

She turned slowly back to the bandaged form on the mat. That… thing… had killed them. Had robbed her mother of children. Had whispered poison in the king’s ear for years.

“Why are you telling me this?” she asked, her voice brittle.

Maegor stared down at the cell’s occupant.

“When I spoke to you in the library,” he said, “I saw it in you.”

She turned slightly, enough to see his shadow stretching across the stone floor.

“You might not look it,” Maegor continued, “but you are Targaryen. You dream of dragons. Of conquest. Just like my father did.”

Alysanne’s breath caught. She’d never imagined Maegor would say anything like that. Not to her.

“You’re brave,” he added. “You speak the truth. You’re not afraid of me. That’s rare.”

He stepped closer to the cell wall, staring past the bars at the silent, bandaged form of Tyanna.

“She hurt us both,” Maegor said, quieter now. “She killed my children. Your brothers. My queens. My own mother. She played me for a fool.”

He reached to his belt and drew something: a dagger.

It gleamed strangely in the dim light. Even before he spoke, Alysanne sensed it was no ordinary blade.

“This belonged to Aegon the Conqueror,” Maegor said, holding it up. “Forged of Valyrian steel. Passed down to Aenys. He gave it to me.”

Maegor turned the blade in his gauntleted hand. For a moment, she could almost imagine what it had looked like in Aegon’s grip, glinting in dragonfire.

“Before the Conquest,” Maegor said, “my father had a dream. A prophecy.”

Alysanne said nothing. She already knew. Jaehaerys had whispered it to her in their childhood, and she’d clung to it ever since.

“He foresaw darkness… a Long Night. The return of a great evil from the far north. He believed the realm had to be united under our blood to survive it.”

Maegor handed the dagger to Alysanne, his gauntleted hand around the blade.

“The last of the Valyrian pyromancers etched his dream into this blade,” he said. “But the words only reveal themselves when the steel is heated.”

Alysanne stared down at the dagger. It was deceptively simple; elegant in its age. She didn’t need to see the words to believe him.

“From my blood,” Maegor recited, “will come the Prince That Was Promised, and his will be the Song of Ice and Fire.”

Alysanne’s eyes snapped up to meet his.

“That’s the prophecy you spoke of, isn’t it?” Maegor asked. She nodded slowly.

“You said you dreamed. Perhaps you were meant to.”

He stepped back, towering and still.

“Tyanna took your family from you,” Maegor said. “She took mine too. This is my gift to you, Alysanne. A choice.”

She looked back at him, startled. Maegor’s voice was grave.

“Take the blade. Take your vengeance. Prove to me, and to yourself, that you are a dragon. That you are Targaryen. Otherwise… return the dagger, leave this place now, and go back to your cage.”

Alysanne’s fingers tightened on the hilt.

“Use it to remember who you are.” Maegor growled, “Use it to avenge your brothers. And if you wish to learn… if you want to ride your dragon… you’ll have that chance too. You won’t be a wife... you will be a guardian, a protector of my heir. A lady of House Targaryen, a dragonrider .”

Alysanne’s fingers closed around the hilt, hands trembling slightly. The steel was cold; heavier than she expected, but finely balanced. She stood still, the cold dungeon air brushing against her skin, the Valyrian steel blade heavy in her hand. Tyanna lay before her; unmoving, her figure swaddled in bloodstained bandages, her face nearly obscured except for the pale curve of her nose and a faint, rasping breath that proved she still lived.

Behind Alysanne, Maegor’s presence loomed like a mountain of iron and fire. He had said so many things, accusations, confessions, explanations, but Alysanne’s thoughts refused to settle. Her heart was pounding, not with fear, but with calculation.

She didn’t believe all of it, even if she almost wanted to.

Yes, Tyanna had always been dangerous. She had always held her mother and the twins in contempt. Alysanne could believe she had poisoned others, could even believe she had a hand in the deaths of Viserys and Jaehaerys.

But Maegor?

Maegor was no puppet.

He had murdered her brother Aegon and sister Rhaena in full daylight with dragons and steel. He had locked her mother in the black cells and ripped their family apart. Now, he offered her this: a blade, a confession, and the image of a traitor who had taken everything from them both. He wanted to rewrite the story: to make Tyanna the shadow behind the throne, and himself the victim. Not only that, but she knew Maegor was lying about Tyanna killing Visenya; Viserys had done it by his own hand.

Alysanne wasn’t sure if she hated Tyanna more than she hated Maegor.

She looked down at the dagger. It shimmered faintly in the torchlight. She had to make a choice.

She could speak out, accuse him in turn, reject this theater for what it was, even try to stab him. But then what? Imprisonment without end? A quiet death? She hadn’t survived this long by being foolish. Maegor had power; he had offered to let her see Silverwing again. The blade might be the only way she ever held any of it in her hand.

Seven, forgive me, she thought. I do this for them. For Viserys and Jaehaerys. For Aegon and Rhaena. For Mother. For little Rhaella and Aerea. For the realm you’ve turned your gaze from.

Without words, Alysanne knelt before the still figure of Tyanna, the bandages soaked and stained, her breaths shallow if present at all. Without a word, she raised the Valyrian steel dagger Maegor had handed her. Her heart pounded in her chest. Every fiber of her being trembled: not just from fear, but from the weight of the moment. Then, with a determined breath, she slammed the blade into Tyanna’s chest, careful and deliberate.

It was not graceful. It was not clean. It was final.

Tyanna didn’t scream. She didn’t move. After a few seconds, her stillness deepened, and Alysanne knew it was over.

Alysanne leaned back, breath caught in her throat. Her hand still clutched the hilt of the dagger, but when she tried to pull it free, it didn’t budge. She tugged again, but the steel stayed lodged. Flustered, she fell back on her rear. For a moment, Alysanne almost felt embarrassed. However, Maegor stepped forward quickly enough.

With a single, practiced motion, he pulled the dagger loose, wiping it on a cloth he’d brought with him. Then, without fanfare, he reached down and helped Alysanne to her feet. His gauntleted hand was cold and firm.

“You could have gone for the neck,” Maegor muttered, almost like a teacher correcting a student. “But you passed the test.”

Alysanne didn’t respond immediately. She felt cold, the chamber suddenly too quiet.

Maegor turned to her fully. “You’ve proven yourself, girl. From now on, you walk the Red Keep freely, not just Maegor’s Holdfast. No more guards or septas trailing you like a child.” He paused. “Alyssa and your nieces may return.”

Alysanne’s eyes widened. “Truly?”

Maegor nodded once. “You’ll have your family again. And your dragon too, in time. But remember what it means to be Targaryen. We rule through fire and blood. Actions, not words.”

Alysanne looked at the blade, then back to Maegor. “I understand,” she said.

But deep inside, a whisper of doubt lingered. About Tyanna. About Maegor. About herself.

She wanted to cry. She wanted to scream. She wanted to pray.

Had she just gained the key to her family’s survival, or had she just damned herself in the eyes of gods and men?

Notes:

The story will take a major pivot from here, but this was the part I wanted to get to!

Chapter 19: MAEGOR IV

The dogs tore at the meat with the kind of hunger Maegor understood best. There was no hesitation in them, no treachery, no pleading. Just need. Pure, simple, honest.

He watched them through the slats of the pen: three mastiffs, bred from Harrenhal stock, beasts near as big as wolves. Their jaws snapped, blood slicking the straw beneath them. One whimpered as another stole a scrap from its maw, but Maegor simply frowned.

“Take it back,” he muttered. “Or you don’t deserve it.”

The smaller dog lunged. Teeth met flesh. A yelp. A crunch. The smaller victor dragged the meat into a corner and ate alone.

Maegor tossed another piece of meat over the fence.

It landed with a wet slap.

The smell should have sickened him, the reek of blood, damp fur, the iron tang that clung to the stones, but it didn’t. It reminded him of his youth on Dragonstone, when Visenya let him visit the castle’s hounds. His mother had said the dogs understood loyalty better than men.

He had not believed her then.

He did now.

Mother had been right about so much.

It had been six days since Tyanna died.

He could still hear her voice in the quiet moments. Could still smell her perfume: amber and myrrh and the faintest trace of smoke. The chambers where she had once laughed were empty now, windows shuttered, tapestries stripped, her body cut into a thousand pieces.

He had seen to that himself.

She had lied even to the end.

“I love you,” she’d said, blood spilling from her mouth where he’d begun to cut her tongue out. “Even if you kill me, I’ll always love you, Maegor.”

He’d thought he wanted those words. Thought they might heal something.

They hadn’t.

Now her ghost lingered, not in the corridors, but in his mind; every whisper, every silence, every flicker of candlelight behind a door he didn’t remember closing.

He’d handed the rule of the realm to Celtigar, if only to give his hands something else to destroy.

Celtigar had accepted the duty eagerly, like a septon taking the pulpit.

Let him bear the petitions, the reports, the whining lords. Let him see what it was to sit beneath the weight of the Seven Kingdoms. Let him sit the Iron Throne.

Maegor had other battles.

He’d trained until his arms ached, sparring until his Kingsguard begged for rest to prepare for his next campaign. He’d flown Balerion across the Blackwater and set half the Kingswood ablaze. He’d ridden through the night until the stars blurred together like embers in a forge.

But none of it burned the memory away.

He still saw Tyanna’s eyes as he cut her.

Still saw Alysanne’s hand trembling when he’d given her the knife.

The girl had obeyed him, though. The first true obedience from her he’d seen in years, much more obedient than Viserys had ever been. The stab had been clean, killed Tyanna in an instant. She’d stared at the blood like it was prophecy.

Maybe it was.

Maybe the girl had finally begun to understand what it meant to be a Targaryen, to be like him.

He dropped another chunk of meat into the pen and watched the dogs tear at it.

“The bitch lied,” he said aloud, though there was no one to hear him. “She lied about Alys. About Alyssa. About me. About everything. Mother was right about her.”

One of the dogs lifted its head at his voice, muzzle dripping red. Maegor stared back. Its eyes were a deep brown, almost human. They were innocent… almost like Alys- Maegor caught himself before he finished that, he didn’t want to think about her.

“The bitch said Alyssa’s womb was cursed,” he went on softly. “Said no child of mine would live.”

The dog tilted its head.

“The bitch was wrong.”

The words felt good in his mouth. Solid. Final.

Alyssa was with child again. And Alysanne…

He exhaled through his nose. The girl had surprised him. There was steel in her now, a quiet, simmering thing he could almost respect. She had stood her ground when he’d ordered the blade into her hand. Her fear had been swallowed by something colder.

He saw Visenya in her sometimes. Her intelligence. Her calm. The stubborn refusal to look away.

If she could be molded, she could be useful. If not as a wife, as another rider. Another dragon to protect his line.

He turned from the pen and wiped his hand on a cloth. The blood smeared like paint across the fabric.

The hounds were still fighting over the scraps.

Let them. He didn’t want her anymore.

Maegor started toward the yard, his boots echoing down the narrow corridor. His mind drifted as he walked; through corridors of stone and memory both.

Alyssa’s screams of pain in the black cells. The corpse of Alys lying cold and beautiful. Her bastard looking up at him with quiet eyes. Tyanna’s laughter in the halls of the Red Keep. The shrieks from dying Harroways. The whispers among the people still festering across the Seven Kingdoms.

They all blended together.

At the doorway, Maegor paused and looked back at the kennels one last time. The dogs were circling again, blood on their muzzles, teeth flashing in the torchlight.

He felt the corner of his mouth twitch.

“Good,” he said quietly. “That’s how you survive.”

Then he turned and left the hounds to their feast.

Outside in the Great Yard, Balerion waited.

Balerion’s wings beat like thunder above the Great Yard, stirring the evening haze into whorls of dust and cinders. The last flickers of daylight glinted off the Black Dread’s scales, casting ripples of shadow across the stones below.

Maegor walked up to his dragon in silence, the wind tugging at his cloak. There was no audience tonight. No kingsguard, no courtiers. Just the king, his grief, and the monster that had outlived conquerors, even Valyria itself.

Balerion’s eye, huge, molten, and ancient, turned to regard him.

Maegor met the gaze without flinching.

“You remember,” he said quietly.

The dragon didn’t move. Didn’t need to. Maegor swore there was something behind that stare. Not thought, not speech; just memory. Not just Vhagar but Visenya too.

“You remember Mother better than I do,” Maegor murmured as he placed a gloved hand on Balerion’s scaled flank. “You flew with her before you flew with me. You knew Aegon. You knew what they wanted for this place.”

He climbed and hoisted himself into the saddle with a grunt, armor clinking, the weight of the day dragging behind his every motion. It only took one command. Balerion’s wings unfurled like great ships of night, and the ground dropped away in an instant.

They rose above the Red Keep, circling once over the towers of the castle before arcing out across the city.

Below, King’s Landing sprawled like a dying beast: lights blinking to life in the streets, smoke trailing from hearths, ships anchored like teeth at the mouth of the Blackwater.

To the west, Visenya’s Hill rose dark against the sunset. On the Hill of Rhaenys, the Dragonpit, half-built, a black shell of stone and broken ambition, stared back at him like the eye of some waiting god.

Maegor guided Balerion in a lazy spiral over the city.

“She wanted this,” he muttered to the wind. “Visenya. She wanted me to build something. Not destroy.”

The Black Dread rumbled low in his chest, a sound like stones grinding beneath the earth.

“Did I give her what she wanted?” Maegor asked. “Was I a good son?”

No answer.

He let silence stretch between them. The wind was cold here, sharp against his cheeks, but clean. Above it all, he could almost breathe.

“She’d be ashamed,” he said at last. “Of what I let happen.”

Tyanna’s name hung unsaid between them.

“I gave her my hand. Gave her the keys to the realm. Let her whisper in my ear. Trusted her when Mother warned me not to. And when it ended…”

He clenched his jaw and shook his head, bitter. A moment of silence stretched between them.

Then, in a voice low and sharp, he added, “Sometimes I think I should burn it all.”

Balerion shifted beneath him.

“All of it,” Maegor went on. “King’s Landing. The septs. The towers. The Dragonpit. The Red Keep. Let it all vanish in fire. Let them see what happens when the dragon turns on its nest.”

The thought festered for a moment. A beautiful image.

Ash falling like snow. The screams. The silence after. No more whispers, no more voices in his skull.

But then…

“No,” Maegor muttered. “Mother would hate me for even thinking that.”

The wind whipped past, cold and cutting.

“She’d say it was wasteful. Say I was weak to even think it. That I’ve already wasted too much.”

The words tasted like sand.

“I’ve lost too much.”

He let the thought pass, eyes narrowing as they crested over the city and banked south over the Blackwater. He angled Balerion toward the dark trees of the Kingswood.

A place for fire.

A place to forget.

“Burn something,” he muttered. “Anything.”

But even as Maegor prepared for fire, the wind cleared his mind again. Not peace, never peace, but clarity.

He thought of Alyssa. Her belly, rounding again. The maesters were cautious, but not fearful. Not yet.

An heir. A legacy.

“Just one,” he said aloud. “One child who lives. That’s all I need.”

And once the babe was born? Once the line was secured, once the realm was cowed again?

New beginnings.

He would take new wives. Bring strength into the line.

And Alysanne…

She lingered in his thoughts more than he liked. Too small. Too clever. Too silent. But she hadn’t flinched with the blade. Hadn’t wept.

She believed in the prophecy. That had to mean something.

“She could be useful,” Maegor said. “She could be a wife. Or a weapon.”

He wasn’t sure which yet.

The wind howled past as Balerion crested the ridgeline of the Kingswood, the dark green canopy sprawling beneath them like a sea of unspoken things.

Maegor sat high in the saddle, armor creaking with every shift of muscle, his eyes fixed not on the horizon but on the past.

Tyanna.

Visenya.

Why did he still care? Why did they linger like ghosts in the back of his skull, whispering through smoke and silence?

Because they made you, you fool.

Visenya most of all.

He clenched the reins in one gauntleted hand, the leather groaning.

He had been a fool. A strong fool, perhaps. A king no lord dared cross. But still a fool.

Visenya had built him; her son of sword and steel, not song. She’d carved out a place for him in Aegon’s shadow and told him one truth, over and over again:

Strength holds the throne, but the dragon cannot rely on strength alone.

And he’d listened… until he didn’t.

He’d ignored her warnings about Tyanna, brushing them aside like smoke.

He thought power was enough. That a sharp blade and a black dragon would make the world kneel.

For a time, they had, hadn’t they?

He stared down into the forest, its dark green limbs shuddering in the wind beneath Balerion’s slow, circling wings.

Now, the silence pressed harder than steel.

Tyanna had thought herself his equal. His partner. She’d worn her poison like a crown, whispered her advice with honeyed breath, and smiled as she lied.

He had let her.

He’d left the thinking to her. And to Celtigar.

And now, look what remained.

His line, barely holding.

His realm, restless.

His queens, dead.

His name, feared but unloved.

He exhaled, sharp and bitter.

He could still hear her voice from that last night, brittle but unyielding:

“You must protect Alyssa and her children.”

“Protect the blood. Unite our house again.”

And he had spat on that advice.

He’d hunted down Viserys and Jaehaerys like dogs. Killed them like dogs too. Lied to the realm: They disappeared. They ran. No one knows.

He married Alyssa, but not for love or legacy. No, he made her a brood mare. Locked her in the Red Keep and bred her like a bitch in a cage.

Alysanne?

Confined. Watched. Handed a knife and made to spill blood.

The Seven Kingdoms will break if House Targaryen is not united.

Visenya’s voice, again. Clearer than it had any right to be.

Perhaps…

Perhaps it wasn’t too late.

Perhaps, for once, he could do what was right; not just what felt good, what shed blood.

The thought tasted strange. Like water after too much wine.

He looked down at the Kingswood. The treetops rustled beneath them like whispers, secrets moving in the wind.

“Enough,” he muttered to Balerion. “No more of this.”

But Balerion, ancient and immense, rumbled deep in his chest. He wanted fire.

So did Maegor.

Just a little. Just to purge the ghosts from his head.

He rose in the saddle, straightening, breath cold in his lungs.

“Let it burn,” he growled.

“Dracarys.”

Balerion obeyed.

A column of flame roared from the sky, bright enough to blind, hot enough to boil blood. Trees crackled like bones. Branches withered to ash.

Fire danced across the Kingswood, devouring the green.

And above it all, Maegor Targaryen sat astride his monster, jaw clenched, heart thundering; not with triumph, but with the cold, stinging clarity of a man who finally sees the shape of his mistakes.

He could not undo what he’d done.

But perhaps…

He could finish what Visenya had started, what Aegon had started.

The flames below devoured the Kingswood like starving beasts, clawing skyward in coils of orange and red, blackening tree trunks and turning nests to cinders. Balerion’s shadow passed over the inferno, vast and godless.

Maegor breathed deep. The smoke bit his lungs, and he welcomed the sting.

This was the first time he’d felt right in days. Maybe longer.

No voices. No tears. No gods.

Just fire.

Just power.

He sat tall in the saddle, muscles tight under his armor, hand steady on the reins. Balerion’s wings stretched wide, beating the heat back in waves.

He looked down at the burning forest like a man looking into his own soul and seeing nothing but hellish fire.

Good.

Let it all burn.

Let it scream.

The only thing worse than fire was the quiet that had come after Tyanna.

He should have buried her memory with the dogs.

But no. That black-eyed witch still curled in his head like smoke under a door. She’d lied. Lied for years. Lied with a smile. Lied with her legs wrapped around him, whispering sweet filth while she fed poison into his ear.

He’d let her.

He clenched his jaw until it cracked.

He hadn’t fucked a woman since.

Not since Tyanna. Not since he sent Alyssa to Dragonstone with his heir in her belly.

It was driving him mad.

The ache clawed at him. Low. Hot. Hungry.

Nights alone in his room, fists clenched, cock stiff and mind racing. He couldn’t sleep. Couldn’t think. His blood itched beneath his skin.

He needed something.

Not wine. Not feasts. Not council.

He needed to fuck, or to fight, or to burn.

So here he was.

Burning.

Because at least fire didn’t pretend to love him.

He stared down at the flames as they chewed through the woods. Trees collapsed into ash. Birds turned to sparks mid-air.

His lips curled.

It was better than fucking.

No lies in fire.

No teeth bared in false smiles.

Just obedience.

He leaned forward, stroking Balerion’s neck with a gauntleted hand. The scales were warm, slick with smoke and oil.

“She lied to me,” he said to the beast. “Every breath. Every word.”

He laughed, bitter and low.

“I still wanted her,” he muttered. “Even as I carved her open, I wanted her.”

He thought about flying to Dragonstone. About grabbing Alyssa by the waist and taking what was his again. She was with child, yes, but he was the king. What did that matter?

The image rushed through him like heat: her pale skin, her long neck quivering, her fists pounding against him, her cries: of rage, fear, whatever.

His cock stirred.

But he forced it down.

No.

Burning is better.

Burning didn’t scream. Burning didn’t beg.

He exhaled hard, wiping sweat from his brow.

Fucking makes you weak.

That’s what Visenya would’ve said. That’s what she did say. She always hated how Tyanna led him around by his cock.

Strength is in discipline. In fire. In blood.

And yet…

He thought of Alysanne.

Young but wise. Quiet but not shy. Careful but bold.

She wasn’t soft. No, not soft.

She hadn’t blinked when he told her to kill Tyanna. Hadn’t cried. Hadn’t begged.

She’d obeyed.

There was something beautiful in that.

He’d remake her. Mould her into something worthy. Something that bent to his will, not out of fear, but belief.

A dragonrider. A weapon. Maybe a wife. Maybe all those things.

She understood the prophecy. She saw what others didn’t.

He stared down into the flames again.

Would it work?

Would the realm ever stop bleeding?

Would Alyssa birth to a living heir?

Would the wars end before he died, alone, hated, heirless?

He didn’t know.

He didn’t fucking care.

It had to work.

He’d burn it all. Every fucking city. Every goddamn sept. Every false lord, and whispering queen, and bastard child who thought they deserved his crown.

The Black Dread rumbled beneath him, eager, ready, alive. Maegor bared his teeth.

“Dracarys,” he snarled again.

The world below burned brighter.

Chapter 20: ROGAR I

A storm beat against the walls of Storm’s End like a battering ram, sheets of rain slamming the narrow windows and howling through the stone like some caged beast. Thunder growled above the thick domed roof of the colossal drum tower, rattling the tapestries and setting the fire to flicker in the hearth.

In the solar of the castle, the fire crackled loud, but not louder than Rogar Baratheon, who paced the chamber like a bull in heat, hands clenched, boots stomping with every step.

“It cannot stand!” Rogar snarled, his voice rising with the storm. “These taxes! These wars! Maegor bleeds the realm dry for a throne no man respects and no god sanctifies!”

He turned, glaring at his younger brothers, seated and silent.

Garon, lean and hawkish, rested his chin on his knuckles, lips pressed tight.

Ronnal, broader but quieter, studied the fire, saying nothing.

Orryn, the youngest, drummed his fingers on the armrest nervously, eyes darting from Rogar to the rain-streaked windows.

None of them spoke yet. They’d seen Rogar like this before. Best to let him roar.

Rogar stopped pacing, thrusting a hand toward the map table. “And now what? More dead queens? More campaigns, more pointless death? Does he think he can bleed the entire realm dry because he rides Balerion?”

He scoffed. “I want to put an axe through his face before this is done. Seven damn me, I will.”

Garon finally spoke. “We don’t have the men to storm King’s Landing. Nor the dragons. And the last ones who tried…”

“Rhaena and Aegon,” Ronnal said flatly. “And they had dragons, Rogar.”

Orryn added, “And the princes? Viserys and Jaehaerys? Who knows where they are? We’ve tried to find them. Not a word. We lost good men trying to even contact Princess Alysanne, but at least we know she’s still alive.”

Rogar’s jaw twitched. He slammed a fist on the table. “I know the other Great Lords won’t stand with me without a claimant. But gods help me, I’ll not sit idle while the realm dies one field and child at a time. And with Tyanna dead… I think we have the best chance we’ve had in a long time.”

Garon shook his head. “We need a Targaryen. You’re right, the Great Houses will not rise without one. Maegor rules by fear, but the blood of the dragon commands loyalty across the Seven Kingdoms. Without a rival claimant, all we have are whispers.”

Rogar exhaled. “Aegon’s line is dying. Maegor holds Alysanne in the Red Keep, makes a show of her . The rest? Alyssa and her granddaughters? Hostages on Dragonstone. Viserys and Jaehaerys? If not dead… vanished.”

Orryn muttered, “Then what do we do?”

Garon looked at Rogar. “You said it yourself. The realm’s breaking. The people burn, the lords grumble. If there was ever a time…”

Rogar’s brow furrowed. “For what?”

The solar door banged open like a war drum.

“They’re dead!” roared Borys Baratheon, thunder on his heels and a crumpled letter in his fist. Rain dripped from his cloak, and his cheeks were flushed, not from weather but fury.

All heads turned.

Rogar halted mid-step, eyes narrowing. “What in the Seven Hells are you shouting about?”

Borys shoved the letter out like it was a sword. “From the maester in King’s Landing. Fresh seal. It’s true: they’re dead. Viserys and Jaehaerys. Both.”

Silence.

Only the fire spoke, popping sharply in the hearth.

Rogar snatched the letter and scanned it with wide, furious eyes.

Borys pressed on. “Tyanna of the Tower. She confessed before the end. Claimed she did it herself. Said Maegor never knew.”

Rogar crushed the parchment in his hand, his voice full of righteous anger.

“Lies!”

He turned on Borys like a storm himself. “You believe that? You believe Maegor let her do it without his knowing? Without his blessing?”

Borys shrugged, eyes alight with manic fire. “I don’t give a shit who did it. The princes are dead. That’s what matters!”

Ronnal stood sharply. “Seven save us…”

Orryn rubbed his jaw. “It… does change things.”

Borys nodded hard. “It changes everything! Maegor’s got no sons. No male heirs. Just women: Alysanne, and the babes, Rhaella and Aerea.”

Garon, calm as ever, said, “Then we move on Alysanne. We break her out. Get her away from the Red Keep and raise the banners. She’s the best shot we’ve got.”

Borys scoffed. “Alysanne’s a girl, no queen. No dragon. She cannot sit the Iron Throne.”

He went on at manic speed. “There’s only one house with a strong Targaryen tie. Only one family with the Conqueror’s blood still alive.” His eyes met Rogar’s. “Ours.”

The room exploded with voices.

Garon: “Are you mad?”

Orryn: “That’s stupid, Borys.”

Ronnal: “You think the realm will crown a Baratheon while a Targaryen still draws breath?”

Borys threw his arms wide. “What realm? The one that pisses itself when Balerion flies overhead? The one bled dry by Maegor’s coin counters and butcher priests? People want order. They want strength. And you,” He jabbed a finger toward Rogar. “You’ve got both.”

“Enough.” Rogar’s voice was quiet. Too quiet.

The room stilled.

Rogar stepped toward the window, slow, deliberate. The rain slashed the panes beyond, wind howling like wolves against the stone.

“Our grandfather,” he said, “was Orys Baratheon. The first Hand of the King. A bastard, aye, but Aegon’s brother.” He turned, eyes sweeping the room. “I am Maegor’s closest male kin. That is truth.”

The room was silent.

Rogar’s voice dropped. “But I will not sit the Iron Throne while the dragons still breathe.”

The words fell heavy.

“I am no usurper. Not while Alysanne lives. Not while the babes live.”

His fist tightened.

“With Tyanna dead, the lords stir. The taxes cut deeper than the sword. His dragon burns without purpose, the Kingswood burns even now. And now the princes are gone.”

He turned to Borys.

“We are going to war, brother. A final war. But not to crown me. To end Maegor.”

He strode to the map table and pointed at various locations.

“Send word to the Reach, the Riverlands, the North. Write to House Arryn. House Lannister. Even the Greyjoys. We’ll see where their loyalties truly lie.”

Ronnal stepped forward. “And the Faith Militant?”

Rogar smiled grimly. “If the Faith Militant still prays for justice, they’ll follow our lead.”

Lightning flashed beyond the window.

Garon spoke up, asking a question they’d all been thinking.

“How in the Seven Hells are we going to get Alysanne out of the Red Keep? There’s no war without her to press the claim.”

Rogar didn’t look up from the map table, his knuckles planted firm on the wood. His voice came low, steady.

“I’ll figure that out soon enough.”

Garon frowned. “It’s not like sneaking a milkmaid from a brothel, Rogar. It’s the Red Keep. Every hall’s watched, every shadow has ears. The girl’s surrounded by queens, lords, the Kingsguard, and gods know what else.”

“I said I’ll figure it out,” Rogar snapped, lifting his gaze now. “She’s the key to it all. If we get her out alive, the realm will rise. I don’t need your doubts. I need your swords sharp.”

That ended it.

Garon gave a stiff nod. The others followed, one by one, rising and heading for the door: Ronnal murmuring something about logistics, Orryn already drafting a list of which bannermen they could trust. The solar emptied slowly, their footsteps fading down the long hall, leaving Rogar alone…

Almost alone.

He didn’t have to turn around to know Borys was still standing there.

The sound of rain filled the silence.

Then:

“You’re a coward, brother,” Borys said.

Rogar’s spine stiffened.

“Excuse me?”

“You heard me.” Borys crossed the room, arms folded tight across his chest. His dark hair was still dripping from the storm, eyes wild with the same restlessness that always burned in him. “You’re shirking your duty. Hiding behind a little girl because you don’t have the balls to do what needs doing. This war could start now if you called your banners.”

Rogar turned slowly. “You’d best think very carefully about your next words.”

Borys didn’t flinch. “You know what I’m saying is true. Alysanne’s just a girl. Smart, maybe, but too young, too sheltered, too weak. She doesn’t even have a dragon. You think she can unite the realm? Stand against Maegor? Sit the Iron fucking Throne? You think lords will kneel to her and not to you?”

“It’s not my place,” Rogar growled. “And you know it.”

“Why not?” Borys barked. “ You got the blood! You’re strong, proven, feared! What, suddenly you care about some gods-damned Targaryen birthright? You think Maegor is special?”

Rogar’s hands were balled into fists now. “The other Great Lords will never follow a Baratheon unless there’s no Targaryen left. And if I try to take that throne while Maegor lives, or while Alysanne breathes, the realm tears itself in a hundred pieces.”

“They already respect you,” Borys said. “They’d rally to you if you claimed the throne.”

“They fear dragons,” Rogar shot back. “And I have none. We’re just men in castles without fire to back our claim. You want to see this castle burned to the ground? You want to see Storm’s End ash beneath Balerion’s flame?”

Borys sneered. “You sound like a craven. You don’t want the throne. You don’t want a new wife. What kind of man are you, Rogar?”

The slap of those words hit harder than any blade.

Rogar stepped forward, close, towering.

“I am your lord. And your brother. But speak to me like that again,” he said, voice cold as the rain outside, “and I will throw you down these stairs with my own hands. That or beat you til you bleed. You understand me?”

Borys’s eyes flared. But he didn’t step back.

“I’m just saying what the realm’s thinking. What the lords will think. You’d be a better king than a girl. That’s the gods’ own truth.”

“Get out.”

Borys lingered a heartbeat longer, then turned and stalked from the room, the door slamming shut behind him like a thrown gauntlet.

Rogar was alone again.

The storm outside howled like wolves in mourning. The fire in the hearth popped low and sullen.

He moved back to the window, his gaze falling on the gray seas beyond the battlements. Rogar stared into the dark, endless sea beyond the cliffs, jaw tight, arms crossed over his broad chest. The flickering firelight cast long shadows on the walls behind him: tall, wide, looming shadows. Like the man himself.

He was trying not to think.

He was failing.

Gods help him, Borys wasn’t wrong. Not entirely.

Rogar did want a wife.

He always had. A proper one. A match worthy of a lord like him.

But noblewomen had always feared him: his height, his voice, the roughness in his laugh, the size of his hands. The way he spoke plainly, too plainly, too boldly. They called him “Lord Bull” behind his back, or worse. His first wife had hated him to the day she died, it had been one of the many reasons they’d never conceived.

It was always the same: too crude, too loud, too much.

The highborn girls preferred flatterers, poets, silk-swaddled cowards with soft hands and softer spines, men like King Aenys. Not a warhammer in the shape of a man.

The lowborn women?

They didn’t care. They loved him.

He'd likely bedded half the maids in Storm’s End and a fair number of cooks and washerwomen, too. Probably a few bastards here and there.

They liked him the way he was. A beast of a man with rough fingers, a hungry mouth, and a laugh that rattled rafters.

But you couldn’t marry a kitchen girl. Not and keep the loyalty of Storm’s End. Not if you dreamed of more. Not if you dreamed… of a crown.

Rogar exhaled hard.

He hadn’t thought about it before tonight. Not seriously.

He’d fantasized, maybe. Wondered what it would be like to sit that big old throne, to command the Seven Kingdoms, to hear the nobles speak his name with fear and respect.

But only as a dream.

Not like now.

Not with the realm so ready.

No sons. No peace. No heirs but girls.

Maegor was just asking for it.

And suddenly, every word Borys had spat came echoing back.

Would they follow a girl? Could they?

Alysanne…

He closed his eyes a moment.

Marry her? Be her king?

He shuddered.

“No.”

The word came out harsh and final.

The princess was a Targaryen, she was brave, strong-willed, and even rather pretty if the ravens were to be believed. But still a girl. Barely flowered.

He didn’t want a slip of a girl for a wife. He wanted a proper woman. A match that wouldn’t shame him, or make him look like a lecherous old man sniffing around the nursery.

But he could be her regent.

That thought nestled itself like a seed in his gut.

Alysanne would be queen, but he’d rule in her name. Guide her. Shield her.

Wield her.

He could command armies. Command the crown. And when she came of age; well, they’d see. Maybe she’d marry elsewhere. Maybe not. But by then, the kingdom would be his to shape. And he would doubtless do a better job than Maegor or that lickspittle Celtigar had done.

His grip tightened on the stone sill.

And then another thought came.

Alyssa.

The queen of Maegor.

The widow of Aenys.

Maegor’s estranged bride, locked away on Dragonstone with her girls.

Alyssa Velaryon had once been the brightest flower in King’s Landing. She was older now, worn by grief, but not broken. Not by a long shot.

And she was still of royal breeding.

She was a woman.

She was a mother.

She was older, but she might be worth the risk.

He didn’t need to reach into the Red Keep just yet. Dragonstone might be an easier nut to crack.

Not as many guards. Fewer spies. And fewer eyes.

If he could get Alyssa and her grandchildren out, get Alysanne later… he’d have the queen and the heir.

And with them, the realm.

His knuckles rapped on the cold stone once, slowly.

A plan was taking shape.

He would not be king. Not yet. Maybe not ever. But he would be at the center of whatever came next.

And if Maegor died on his axe… well. That was justice.

Rogar turned from the window, his boots thudding heavy on the stone floor.

There was work to do.

Chapter 21: EDWELL IV

The tap of polished boots on stone echoed through the upper corridor of Maegor’s Holdfast as Lord Edwell Celtigar, Hand of the King, moved with practiced pace and easy posture, flanked by a scurry of maesters, scribes, and stewards.

“After the servant inspection, my lord, the trade delegation from Tyrosh will be awaiting you in the Tower of the Hand-”

“The Tower of the Hand?” Edwell asked, smiling faintly. “ Are they there already? I’d rather not repeat the last embarrassment and have three wine-soaked Tyroshi poking around my quarters.”

One of the younger maesters chuckled nervously. “Ah- no, my lord, they’re waiting outside. Cleared and ready.”

“Good. I’d rather not have Tyroshis stealing my spoons.”

Laughter again, thin but obedient.

“And after the Tyroshi,” another servant piped up, half-breathless as she read from a scroll, “you’re to meet the Small Council; Lord Arryn has sent updates from the Vale. Lord Corbray’s rebel bands have the outlying roads, and there’s word of Poor Fellows taking shelter in the Eyrie’s foothills.”

“Lovely,” Edwell murmured, eyes half-lidded. “I do love when rebellion comes with a view. I’m sure Balerion will make it look even better.”

That earned a more genuine chuckle.

He kept walking. Kept smiling. Kept commanding.

He was still elegant. Still poised. Still every inch the silver-haired nobleman from Claw Isle: beard trimmed, cloak of crimson and pearl draped just so over his shoulders. His ringed fingers gestured gracefully as he spoke.

But inside?

He was drowning.

Tyanna’s death had changed everything.

No. Not death.

Execution.

By Maegor’s own hand, doubtless.

And ever since, the king had retreated: into the throne room, into his chambers, into the belly of Balerion. He no longer held court. He no longer read missives. He barely spoke to anyone, and to his Hand, he gave only curt orders, passed through clenched teeth or flung from behind closing doors.

“You can rule,” he had said, days ago, voice hoarse. “I need to… think.”

Lord Edwell Celtigar, proud son of Claw Isle, had embraced that charge.

He ruled.

He decided.

He wrote the letters, signed the warrants, led the councils, fed the Red Keep’s ever-starving bureaucracy with parchment and blood and silver.

He led the kingdom.

It was killing him.

He hadn’t slept through a full night in weeks.

His knees ached from standing. His fingers from signing. His temples from the unrelenting tension of watching every single word, gesture, nod, smile.

Today, he had to approve thirty new servants. Interview them personally. Why? Because the old ones had fled.

Fled after Tyanna. Fled after the deaths. Scared of Maegor, no doubt.

Most of them had been loyal to Tyanna. Whisperers, spies, apothecaries, little birds.

Now they were gone.

So much of the keep felt empty now. Edwell had never liked Tyanna, but she had kept a tight ship, a firm grip over the Red Keep. Without their alliance, Edwell was still struggling to regain his footing.

Edwell forced a smile and made another quip about preferring Tyroshi brandy to Tyroshi diplomacy, and his attendants chuckled dutifully.

But he could feel it.

The weight.

The crown wasn’t his, but its pressure was.

He carried Maegor’s realm now; on stiff shoulders and an exhausted spine.

Every day that the king sulked in silence, Celtigar felt the blood pumping harder in his temples, like a storm tide waiting to break.

He had given everything for this: loyalty, ambition, cleverness. He had tamed the court. Balanced Maegor’s arbitrary fury with cold order. Managed Tyanna while she lived, reined in the lords when they dared to mutter.

But there was no one else left to manage Maegor.

Only him.

Just Edwell.

He kept walking.

He would greet the new servants. He would meet with the Tyroshi. He would hear the council out and plan another campaign, a council Maegor wouldn’t be attending.

Tomorrow…

He would do it all again.

Because someone had to.

Still smiling.

Still ruling.

Still breaking, slowly.

Lord Celtigar moved through the corridor at a clipped pace, his cloak trailing lightly behind him as candlelight shimmered on the polished stone walls. Maesters flitted in his wake like birds in a storm, reading names off rosters, debating inventory shipments, muttering about grain rot in Duskendale.

And then-

“Your Grace,” one of the stewards whispered urgently.

Edwell looked up.

There, walking calmly down the opposite end of the hall, surrounded by a modest entourage of pale-robed handmaidens and one septa, was Princess Alysanne Targaryen.

She wore a gown of pale lavender today, modestly cut but finely embroidered. Her hair was coiled neatly in braids. Her face, still youthful, but colder than it once had been, was calm and composed, though the dark rings beneath her violet eyes betrayed the truth.

Edwell slowed, surprised. She did not usually walk this part of the holdfast unescorted by a queen or guard, but Maegor had let her roam more freely recently.

The maesters and stewards behind him went still.

As they neared, Alysanne stopped and dipped into a small, perfect curtsey.

“Lord Celtigar,” she said smoothly. “Forgive me. I did not mean to block your path.”

She began to step aside, the septa trailing behind her.

Edwell, ever the courtier, offered a small bow and motioned with one hand. “Nonsense, Princess. Please, after you.”

Alysanne hesitated.

Then, as if the question had been bubbling just beneath her breath, she asked-

“When will my mother return to the Red Keep?”

Edwell’s face remained perfectly composed.

She went on, softer now. “And my nieces, Aerea and Rhaella? His Grace said they’d be brought back soon.”

Edwell’s mind flared for the briefest moment. So Maegor had lied. Not surprising.

He gave the smallest nod. “That decision rests with His Grace. But I, too, look forward to the Queen’s return. As do we all.”

Alysanne’s face didn’t change, but he saw it: the tightening of the jaw, the faintest narrowing of her eyes.

She knew. Or at least suspected. But she said nothing.

“Thank you, Lord Celtigar,” she said coolly, inclining her head. “I will tell my mother you asked after her, when next we speak.”

The words hung in the air like a blade: perfectly courteous, yet unmistakably barbed.

Then she turned and walked off, handmaidens flanking her once again, the septa close behind.

Edwell watched her go, lips pressed thin.

She still resented him. He saw it in every stiff courtesy, every false smile.

Let her.

Let the girl bristle behind silks and smiles. It would amount to nothing.

She may have caught Maegor’s attention lately. Perhaps even his strange, fractured version of favor. Many in court thought the king was grooming Alysanne to be his newest wife, after the deaths of Ceryse and Tyanna.

But Edwell knew what the others did not.

Queen Alyssa was pregnant.

Maegor had told him personally after he’d killed Tyanna and handed the reins of rulership over to the Hand.

Maegor’s true heir was already growing in the womb. Not some willful girl in silk. Not a fragile princess with no dragon and too many troublesome thoughts.

A son.

Maegor was sure of it.

He had been sure of it with Alys too, hadn’t he?

Edwell pushed that to the back of his mind; there was no Tyanna to mess it up this time.

Soon, the question of succession would vanish. The realm would have an heir. A male heir. And Alysanne would be a footnote.

Once the babe was born.

Once the dragons had a prince again.

Edwell drew a breath, smoothed his expression, and turned down the next corridor.

At the end of the hall, the door to the servants’ quarters was open. Inside, thirty nervous men and women stood in formation: cooks, torchbearers, pageboys, laundresses, turnspits, all freshly hired to replace the ones who had vanished after Tyanna’s death.

Most had never seen a lord up close, let alone the Hand of the King.

Edwell swept into the room like a wave, eyes sharp, voice calm.

“Let’s begin,” he said. Just like that, the masks were back on.

The narrow chamber smelled of soap, damp wool, and nerves. The new servants stood in rows, their backs straight, eyes flicking between the hearth and the man who paced before them: Lord Celtigar, Hand of the King, dressed not in armor but in crimson silk and pearl-trimmed robes that whispered with each measured step.

Behind him, two junior maesters scribbled furiously onto thin parchment, while a steward kept track of names.

Edwell’s tone was warm, his questions gentle. Almost fatherly. Almost.

He stopped before a wide-shouldered young man in cook’s livery.

“Name?”

“Jon, m’lord.”

“Where from?”

“Maidenpool.”

“Septon?”

“Septon Yerrick, from the Holy House near the salt market.”

“Good man?”

“Speaks too long, but aye.”

A chuckle from Edwell. “Most septons do. If they didn’t, the gods would get lonely.”

Laughter trickled down the line. The tension eased.

But Edwell watched.

He watched every blink, every twitch, every mouth too tight or voice too smooth.

Two girls from Fair Isle claimed to be sisters: one laughed too quickly, the other didn’t laugh at all. A pot-boy from the Reach spoke of his “uncle” the septon, but couldn’t name a single prayer. One maid was too still, too quiet, her posture drilled into her like a soldier’s.

Edwell’s smile never wavered.

But he noted them.

Five in all. He’d seen enough to know: false tongues, false pasts. Perhaps Faith Militant spies, perhaps worse.

For all her black arts and venomous soul, Tyanna of the Tower had kept the Red Keep clean of infiltrators. Her methods were foul, but her results… effective.

Now that she was nothing but meat, rats had begun to creep back in.

Finally, the last of them: a red-haired laundress, slight of frame, with a face so plain it bordered on forgettable.

Edwell stepped closer.

“Name?”

“Mia, m’lord.”

“From?”

“Stoney Sept. In the Riverlands.”

The accent confirmed it: thick, muddy vowels, a bit of grumble on the R’s.

“What brought you to King’s Landing, Mia of Stoney Sept?”

Her hands folded in front of her, not shaking. “Fled after the Battle at the Great Fork. The fighting took our home, and the roads weren’t safe anymore. Thought I’d find work in the city.”

“Did you?”

“Yes, m’lord. But nowhere like the Red Keep.”

“Your septon’s name?”

“Septon Larn, at the foot of the Hill of Rhaenys. Old, half-blind, and had a fondness for dog stew.”

That earned a soft chuckle from the maesters.

Edwell’s smile thinned just a little.

“What are your thoughts on the Faith Militant?”

Mia blinked. “No love for them, m’lord. They killed my cousin. Madmen, the lot of them.”

A pause.

No stammer. No flicker of the eye.

No lie.

Edwell studied her for a moment longer than was comfortable, then gave a single nod.

“Thank you.”

He turned and glided back toward the steward and maesters.

“I want these five names,” he listed them swiftly, “set aside. Quietly. I’ll decide what to do with them later.”

The steward bowed. “And the others, my lord?”

“Give the rest provisional duties. Rotate their stations. Keep a close watch, but don’t make them feel watched.”

“Yes, my lord.”

Edwell exhaled. His joints ached, and the dull throb behind his temples hadn’t eased in days. But the moment he let down his guard, the entire Red Keep would drown in treachery.

“Come,” he said, gesturing to his entourage. “We’ve a trade delegation to charm and a war in the Vale to plan.”

He swept from the room, robes rustling, every movement poised.

There was still so much to do, and no one else left to do it.

Chapter 22: BENIFER IV

The soft scratch of quills on parchment echoed through the high-domed solar of Maegor’s Holdfast, mingling with the rhythmic patter of rain against the glass-paned windows. Books lay open across the table, scrolls unfurled, inkpots arranged with methodical precision. And seated among it all like a sprig of spring in a tomb of stone sat Princess Alysanne Targaryen, her brow furrowed as she murmured High Valyrian syllables under her breath.

“Ābrar, ābrar…”

“Not ābrar,” corrected Grand Maester Benifer, his voice wheezy but patient, “ābraz. Feminine plural.”

Alysanne wrinkled her nose. “But it ends in an ‘r.’”

Benifer gave a gentle smile. “High Valyrian enjoys its exceptions. Like noblemen; it follows its own rules, and breaks them at whim.”

Alysanne stifled a laugh, her honey-blonde hair shaking as she shook her head and looked down at the parchment. Beside her, seated rigidly upright and radiating constant vigilance, sat Septa Keira, her lone eye tracking Benifer with all the warmth of a drawn sword.

Benifer sipped from a warm cup of watered wine and cleared his throat. “Try the next phrase.”

Alysanne did, stumbling over the consonants, but recovering swiftly.

She was learning. Faster than most boys.

Sloppily, yes. With the occasional lapse into the Common Tongue. But the structure was taking root. She asked questions. Challenged the oddity of irregular rules. Pressed for examples. And she remembered.

Benifer had been skeptical when Maegor gave the order: “Teach her as you would a son.”

The words had come after Tyanna’s… disappearance. Benifer hadn’t seen the queen since the king had left her: bloody, broken, and whimpering in the dungeons like a trapped fox. By dawn, she had vanished entirely, declared dead. And Maegor, grim-faced and stinking of blood, had given Benifer his next task with no explanation.

“High Valyrian. History. Sums and numbers.”

“Your Grace, she’s-”

“She’s my ward. Teach her.”

That had been that.

Benifer had expected it to be a chore. Maesters didn’t typically teach girls. That was for septas.

But Alysanne… was different.

She listened. Not just with ears, but with intent.

She didn’t flatter. Didn’t simper. She wanted to learn.

It had been years since Benifer had taught a student who actually wanted to learn. Most lords’ sons viewed their lessons as a form of polite torture, something to endure before tilting at tourneys or learning to swing swords.

Alysanne asked him about dragons, about the Doom of Valyria, about the nature of the Seven Kingdoms. She memorized family trees, interrogated ancient laws, and even questioned doctrine when Septa Keira wasn’t too quick to hiss about heresy.

Benifer stole a glance at the septa now. Keira sat ramrod-straight, her mouth a thin line, her lone eye tracking every movement he made as if expecting him to enchant the girl into a snake.

He’d long stopped trying to talk to her.

The woman was made of iron and judgment.

Still…

He returned his gaze to Alysanne and allowed himself the quiet luxury of a smile.

It felt good, this work. Real.

Better, at least, than whispering counsel into the ear of a king who heard only what he wanted and killed what he didn’t.

With Alysanne, there was no crown. No madness. No threat.

Just knowledge.

Just learning.

Just… something hopeful.

The scrolls on High Valyrian had been rolled away, the quills cleaned, the ink capped. Now, Grand Maester Benifer stood by the tall window of the solar, the evening sun painting the floor in golden bars as he lectured his pupil, slowly, carefully, on the human body.

Alysanne sat upright at the long table, hands folded, her attention unflinching.

Septa Keira, to her left, had the air of a cat bristling against stormwinds.

Benifer gestured to a woodcut illustration, aged and fraying, mounted on the easel nearby: a diagram of the human frame. Two blank figures, one male, one female, sketched with dignity but unmistakable intent in their shapes.

“In general,” Benifer said, smoothing his beard as he spoke, “the male and female forms differ in stature, bone structure, and internal humors. It is said men are stronger, taller, and larger, full of aggression, pride, and mind, while women, softer, shorter, and smaller, are more rooted in blood, empathy, and heart.”

Alysanne raised an eyebrow. “Is that what the Citadel believes? I’ve met some women who’ve lacked all those.”

Benifer chuckled. “The Citadel records fact, Princess. These are not simply beliefs.”

Septa Keira sniffed loudly, arms crossed.

Benifer pressed on, ignoring her. “There are, of course, more obvious differences as well. Some visible, others internal. Notably-” he coughed gently “notably, women possess the ability to bear children, a function carried out by the womb and its-”

Alysanne leaned forward. “So how are babies made, exactly?”

Benifer froze mid-sentence, his mouth hanging open in a soundless gasp.

Septa Keira’s head snapped toward Alysanne with the swiftness of a striking hawk.

“Princess!” she hissed. “That is not a question for a man… let alone the Grand Maester! Such things are for a woman to explain, when the time is right!”

Alysanne blinked, startled by the vehemence. “But I want to know. I’ve seen women pregnant all my life. Mother had six children, seven counting Maegor’s. I’ve watched peasants and noblewomen carry babes and then return empty-bellied. And none of them explain it!”

“That’s because it’s unseemly for a maiden to ask such things, especially before she’s wed!” Keira snapped. Her one eye narrowed like a dagger. “No respectable girl asks such things.”

“I’m not trying to be disrespectful,” Alysanne shot back. “I’m trying to learn.” She turned her head back to Benifer, tone suddenly sharp with challenge. “Isn’t that what this is about? You’re supposed to teach me. So, how are babies made?”

Benifer stared at her, aghast. Then looked at Keira, who looked ready to brain him with her prayerbook if he so much as cleared his throat.

He opened his mouth.

Then closed it.

Then opened it again.

“Well, you see,” he began, awkwardly smoothing his robes, “that is… ah… a matter traditionally discussed between a young lady and her septa or mother, not her maester. Certainly not at this stage. There are, of course, natural processes involving bodily union and-”

“NO!” Keira barked, slamming her hand on the table. “You will say nothing, Grand Maester. Nothing inappropriate will be said in this room.”

Alysanne crossed her arms, expression stony. “I’m not a child.”

“You are not yet a wife,” Keira growled. “And you-” she turned back to Benifer, voice like iron, “were tasked with educating her, not corrupting her.”

Benifer lifted both hands slowly, palms out in peace.

“I mean no corruption,” he said mildly, though his cheeks were tinged red with embarrassment. “I merely aim to serve the wishes of His Grace and expand the princess’s understanding in accordance with her station.”

“And her station,” Keira interrupted, “demands modesty. Not maesters mumbling about ‘bodily union.’”

The silence that followed was stiff and brittle.

Alysanne stared straight ahead, lips pressed tight, defiant.

Keira’s eye burned into the side of Benifer’s head.

Benifer cleared his throat again and turned back to the easel.

“Perhaps,” he said, voice returned to its usual rhythm, “we’ll should resume with a more… general examination of the differences between men and women.”

Neither woman said a word.

Benifer pointed to the diagram, hands trembling slightly.

Teaching the princess was, indeed, more pleasant than serving a mad king…

But it felt no less dangerous.

“…and so we find, through centuries of anatomical observation,” Grand Maester Benifer droned, “that the balance of humors affects not only physical stature, but disposition: men tending toward choleric temperaments, while women, by contrast, are often dominated by phlegmatic or sanguine balances…”

He gestured vaguely to a vellum chart depicting the four classical humors, while Princess Alysanne Targaryen sat upright, chin resting on her hand, eyes sharp with interest. Her septa, Keira, loomed at her side like a moral gargoyle, back straight, robes stiff, and her one good eye burning into Benifer like a branding iron.

Benifer was speaking, but barely registering the words.

He couldn’t stop thinking about her question.

How are babies made?

It had caught him off guard; deeply off guard. But it made sense. Alysanne was flowering, nearing womanhood. She was intelligent, hungry for knowledge, and surrounded by secrets, by bodies and silence. She wasn’t a fool.

She was curious.

Curiosity, Benifer knew too well, was a dangerous virtue in the Red Keep.

Alysanne lived caged. She had a mind sharp as broken glass, yet was walled in on all sides: by Maegor, who watched her like a dragon circling its gold; by Keira, who guarded her virtue like a starving dog with a single bone; and by the very stones of the castle, which echoed lies louder than truth.

And here he was, a maester, supposedly a conduit of learning, bending under the weight of a single glare from a septa.

He glanced at Keira again. She hadn’t blinked.

Gods forgive him, he found himself liking it.

Not her silence. Not her fury. But her intensity.

That cold, merciless discipline. That cutting judgment that turned the air thick.

The way she watched him like a sinner about to hang.

It horrified him.

It thrilled him.

He’d been a maester for twenty years. He had served lords and kings. He had endured plague, fire, and famine. But this, this little wriggling seed of shameful interest, slithered through him like a leech in the bloodstream.

He liked being scolded, didn’t he?

He almost dropped his pointer.

Clearing his throat, Benifer tried to refocus.

“…and in women, one of the more… distinctive features of their nature is the cyclical shedding of blood during their moon-time, often beginning at the age of-”

Keira’s voice, sharp as a whip crack: “Skip it.”

Benifer blinked. “Ah, of course, yes, perhaps better left to… ah… the septa.”

He glanced at Alysanne. Her face was stony with restrained frustration.

“I want to understand,” she said quietly. “I bleed now. I want to know why.”

Keira’s eye narrowed. “You know enough. Never speak of such things in front… in front of him!”

Benifer wilted under her glare, his shoulders sinking ever so slightly. He turned back to the scroll.

And still, still, that traitorous thought crept back: he actually liked her putting him in his place.

He wanted to claw it out of his own skull.

He forced himself into the next part of the lecture, droning about pain tolerance and height variances between the sexes, while his mind thrashed in circles.

Alysanne watched him intently; clearly noticing something was off. She didn’t speak again, but her stare was needle-sharp, cutting through his every word.

Keira watched him too. Always watching. Not with curiosity. With judgment.

Benifer…

Benifer kept speaking, but inside, he was melting.

He had survived Maegor’s madness. He had survived Tyanna’s poisons. He had survived politics.

But he was not sure he would survive these lessons.

Not with a princess who wanted truth, not with a septa who wanted control.

Not with this septa who sent a strange, shameful thrill creeping under his skin like a slow fever.

“…and thank you again, Your Grace,” Benifer said with a slight bow as he rolled up the last of the diagrams. “You are, without exaggeration, a most diligent pupil.”

Princess Alysanne smiled, cheerful and radiant. “And you are, without exaggeration, the most patient old man I’ve ever met.”

Benifer chuckled, pleased, though he caught Keira frowning at the jest.

“Would you like to come with me and Septa Keira to the godswood?” Alysanne asked, rising from her chair with surprising grace. “I’m meeting the Celtigar girls there. It’s beautiful this time of day.”

Benifer blinked. “To… the godswood? Me?”

It was not the sort of invitation he was used to receiving. Certainly not from princesses.

Keira visibly stiffened beside her.

“Come now,” Alysanne urged, her voice lilting, persuasive. “You need more sunlight. The maesters say it’s good for your bones, don’t they?”

He opened his mouth to object, to make some tired excuse about scrolls to copy or joints to oil, but, gods help him, he folded.

“Very well,” Benifer sighed. “But only for a brief walk. I must return for my books and my sanity.”

Keira said nothing, but her eye practically rolled into the back of her head.

Benifer took one last glance at the diagrams he’d left rolled on the table, murmuring to himself, “Retrieve those later… yes, later…” and followed them from the solar.

They descended the wide hallways of Maegor’s Holdfast, the torches still lit from the morning storm. The redstone corridors echoed with their footsteps, the shadows long in the late afternoon light.

Alysanne walked a half-step ahead, her septa flanking her, while Benifer trailed behind, robes whispering over the floor, hands clasped, chains clanking, breathing more heavily than he would’ve liked.

As they passed servants and guards, Alysanne greeted them all by name.

“Good day, Moryn.”

“Thank you again for the jam, Alayne!”

They all answered her with shy smiles and bows, some astonished, others utterly charmed.

Benifer watched in fascination.

This… this was new. Just a moon ago, Alysanne had been a ghost in the Red Keep. Confined, silent, watched under Tyanna’s eye in Maegor’s Holdfast. Now she walked like a princess, and more than that: like a person who knew she was being watched and had chosen not to care.

There was no bitterness. No spite. Only warmth.

How?

He couldn’t understand it. A girl whose siblings had been viciously killed, whose father had died, who had been locked away under her uncle’s eye, should not walk like this. Should not smile like this.

But she did.

At every turn, Alysanne had proven him wrong.

Now, here she was, glowing like a sunrise in silver and blue silk, her blonde braid swaying gently with every step, unbowed by all that had crushed stronger men.

Benifer found himself staring.

He wasn’t sure how long.

But when he finally blinked and turned, Keira was watching him.

Her eye narrowed like a sword sliding from its sheath.

Benifer looked away instantly, flustered.

His cheeks burned. Not from desire, not that, but from shame, from being caught looking, from the strange, growing weight of his own confusion.

Yet still, part of him thrilled at Keira’s attention. Her gaze scorched him and he welcomed the fire.

By the time they crossed the drawbridge from Maegor’s Holdfast into the open air of the inner bailey, Benifer was sweating slightly.

The wind struck him like a cleansing slap. He welcomed it.

They walked in silence toward the small but carefully kept godswood nestled within the red walls of the Red Keep.

Alysanne led the way, chatting now and then with Keira, who answered in grunts and clipped prayers.

Benifer walked behind them, eyes low, boots clicking against stone, thoughts whirling in directions they had no business going.

The sun was still warm. The leaves did shimmer, just as she’d said. The godswood within the Red Keep was no match for the great forests of the North, but it had its charms: a tall oak and a few spreading elms casting dappled shade over trimmed grass, white flowers pushing through mossy cracks, and the thick heart tree, young but vibrant, that stood quietly near the center, solemn and still.

Prunella and Prudence Celtigar were already there, clutching a worn leather ball between them, their cheeks pink with excitement.

“Alysanne!” Prudence called, waving.

Alysanne laughed and broke into a light jog, her pale skirts fluttering as she joined the twins in the clearing without hesitation. Their voices lifted in cheerful chatter, words tripping over one another in girlhood shorthand: shared jokes, whispered names, giggled secrets.

Benifer paused at the edge of the clearing, watching them from under the heavy shade.

The girls’ septa, an ancient thing with a face like a dried fig, sat slumped upright on a bench beneath the oak tree. Her cane lay across her lap, and though her eyes were closed, her posture was straight as a soldier’s; old habits dying hard even in slumber.

Beside her, Septa Keira had already claimed her place on the far end of the bench. She sat with her back stiff, robes gathered around her like armor, her one eye scanning the children in the grass.

“Don’t stray beyond my sight,” she warned, not even raising her voice.

The girls chirped an affirmation but paid her little mind.

Benifer hesitated.

He could return to the solar now. Retrieve his books. Slip back into the safety of parchment and candlelight.

But something… pulled at him.

Not the girls, not the godswood.

Her.

Keira.

She hadn’t acknowledged him since they entered. Made no gesture of invitation. No glance. Nothing.

And still… he wanted to sit near her.

He couldn’t explain it.

He stood, uncertain, arms behind his back, watching the children play their little game of toss and shout. Alysanne laughed with abandon, braids bouncing, the Celtigar girls circling her like stars around a moon.

Benifer watched her and felt something twist in his chest; not desire, but something heavier: a knotted blend of awe, sadness, and confusion.

How did she still laugh like that?

After all she’d seen. All she must know. He was almost certain Maegor had shown her Tyanna… or what was left of her.

He realized, too late, that he was staring again.

He turned away and cleared his throat.

Then, slowly, he moved to the bench.

The old sleeping septa was in the center, slouched and silent, her cane clattering slightly as Benifer eased himself down on the other side of her.

He was not close to Keira.

But he could feel her.

Even without looking, he could sense the iron-straight posture, the disapproval rolling off her like cold wind.

Still, she said nothing.

Neither did he.

They sat in silence, watching the children play: two guardians from two separate worlds, united by duty, divided by everything else.

Benifer folded his hands in his lap.

He felt the warmth of the sun on his face, the cool of the stone beneath him. He listened to the laughter of children and the distant call of gulls from the harbor.

Somewhere between shame and serenity, confusion and curiosity, he sat still.

Watching.

Listening.

Waiting for something he couldn’t name.

The girls laughed and shrieked in the grass beyond, their voices carrying on the breeze, mingling with the rustle of leaves and the distant, steady rhythm of water lapping against the Blackwater’s shore.

Benifer no longer heard them.

His gaze, casual and sideways, had drifted, not to Alysanne, not to the heart tree, not to the gods, but to her.

Septa Keira.

He didn’t stare, he knew better, but the temptation was constant, like a tickle behind the eyes. He let his gaze shift just enough to study her in profile.

She sat as she always did, like a blade sheathed in linen. Her posture so straight it seemed carved from marble, her veil fixed firmly in place, concealing her hair except for a few dark strands that curled across her brow.

She was younger than him. He could see that now. Not a girl, but not yet haggard by time. Perhaps thirty. Maybe a little older. Perhaps ten years his junior, though she carried herself like a woman much older.

Keira had a slender frame, but her robes gave away little of it. A shapeless cocoon of white and gray that erased the woman beneath.

Benifer told himself not to wonder what that robe hid.

His gaze stayed on her face. Only her face.

She had strong features, unpainted, sun-touched. A rigid jaw. A pointed chin. High cheeks hardened not by age but by habit.

But it was her eye, the one she had left, that drew him.

A deep, dark brown. Earthy. Heavy. Alert. It darted now and then toward the girls, never resting too long, always moving, always watching.

And beside it… the other.

Gone.

Covered by a strip of white leather, or maybe cloth. Tied tight. A small indentation where the flesh had long since healed.

Benifer’s mind, ever-curious, couldn’t help itself.

What took that eye?

An accident in childhood? A blow from a cruel father or jealous sister in a scuffle between novices? Or was it something more dramatic: punishment for defiance? Some cruel joke of Maegor’s? A failed attempt to protect the princess?

He swallowed.

Was it as beautiful as the other?

The thought made him nauseous.

He pulled his eyes away, planting them on the ground as shame crawled up the back of his neck.

He was nearing fifty, a sworn maester of the Citadel. He had taken the vows: chastity, humility, knowledge above all.

He had honored them. For decades, he had turned down pleasure and praise alike, in favor of books and scrolls, treatises and treatises on treatises. He had scorned the carnal indulgences that led other maesters astray.

Now, here he was, side-eyeing a septa.

Feeling drawn to her iron rigidity, her stormy silence, her judgment of him.

What kind of man was he?

What rot had crept into his soul these past moons?

He shifted on the bench and looked firmly at the grass.

He heard Alysanne laugh. He heard the ball slap against a palm. He heard Keira whisper a warning: not to run too far.

Benifer closed his eyes and inhaled the godswood air: grass, bark, and the faint sweetness of moss.

Get ahold of yourself, he thought. You are a maester. Not a boy peeking through a window. Not a courtier sniffing after courtly love.

Yet…

The pull remained.

He didn’t look at Keira again. He kept his gaze locked on the dirt between his boots.

“Why are you still here, Maester?”

The question came without warning, slicing through the birdsong and laughter like a knife.

Septa Keira’s voice, low and flinty, crossed the slumped, dozing bulk of the older septa seated between them.

Benifer blinked and turned his head slightly, not daring to look her full in the face. Her one good eye was on him, he knew it. He felt it.

“Isn’t your chain getting hot in the sunlight?” she added, tone dry as old parchment.

Benifer flushed. He hadn’t even thought about the heat. Hadn’t noticed the weight of the chain around his neck. All his attention had been tangled in knots of shame, discipline, and whatever madness had drawn his gaze toward the septa in the first place.

“I- I’m quite comfortable,” he mumbled, adjusting his robes pointlessly. “We’re in the shade, after all. And… the fresh air is good for me.”

Keira snorted, soft and sharp. “Is that so? Or are you just another eye watching Alysanne?”

Benifer stiffened.

“I beg your pardon?”

Keira leaned ever so slightly forward, her voice still quiet, but laced with fire. “Don’t think I don’t see it. The looks. The timing. Maegor’s orders to ‘educate her.’ Another old man sent to watch her. Shape her.”

Benifer opened his mouth, but she didn’t give him the chance.

“She’s a child. A child who’s bled, yes, but who has seen too much. Lost too much. She is kind because no one else is. She smiles because it keeps her sane.”

Keira’s voice trembled; just for a moment.

“I see what the king is doing. Dressing it all in books and lessons. But we both know what he wants. What he’s waiting for.”

Benifer stared down at his hands, shocked into silence. The wind stirred the leaves above. The girls’ laughter, for once, seemed far away.

Then Keira’s voice hardened again, like a drawbridge slamming shut.

“I would sooner slit my own throat than watch that girl marry Maegor. I would slit yours, too, if I thought you were helping him.”

Benifer’s heart thudded in his chest at the obscenity, the boldness of the statement. He glanced at the sleeping septa between them, still snoring gently, and kept his voice low, hurried, almost pleading.

“Keira,” he said, “I swear by the gods old and new; Maegor said nothing about marriage to me. Not a word. He only told me to teach her. Language, history, mathematics. That’s all.”

Keira watched him. Still. Measured. Weighing him.

“I did not come here to shape her into a wife,” Benifer added, his voice firmer now. “And I’m not here because of Maegor. I came because the girl asked me.”

A long pause.

Keira looked back out toward the clearing.

“Good,” she said. “You’d better keep it that way.”

Benifer exhaled slowly.

They sat in silence again.

The old septa stirred but didn’t wake.

The children played.

And Benifer, though rattled, found himself impressed.

There was steel in Keira: not just suspicion and venom, but love, fierce and raw. She guarded Alysanne like a lioness with one eye and no patience for the world’s games.

Gods, Benifer thought. If she were a man, they’d call her a knight.

He kept his gaze ahead now, properly. The moment had passed. But a strange feeling lingered in his chest: part shame, part admiration.

The septa was terrifying.

For once… he was glad someone was.

Benifer sat motionless on the bench, the old septa between him and Septa Keira still dozing, undisturbed.

For a long time, neither of them spoke.

Then Keira, voice quiet and rough like gravel beneath cloth, broke the silence.

“Nothing about her makes sense.”

Benifer didn’t respond. He didn’t have to.

“She looks like any noble girl,” Keira continued, eyes fixed on the child. “Fair hair, blue eyes. Soft voice. Soft hands. She could be one of the Hightowers, or a Redwyne, or a Fossoway. But… she’s a Targaryen.”

Benifer listened. The sound of the girls’ play continued in the distance; Prunella shrieked and missed the ball, Alysanne caught it instead and curtsied mid-laugh after throwing it to Prudence.

“She’s a Targaryen,” Keira said. “A dragonspawn. That’s what they call them. That’s what the Faith Militant all says. That their blood is unnatural. That they’re not truly of man and woman, but something else. Something tainted.”

Benifer swallowed, but said nothing.

“And yet… she goes to sept regularly. Says her prayers every night. Knows them better than half my sisters in Oldtown. She lights candles for her dead brothers. She fasts when she’s told. And never, not once, has she asked why she should.”

Keira leaned back ever so slightly.

“She’s a princess, but she speaks to everyone. Guards. Maids. Cooks. The smith. She remembers names, and faces, and asks after the children of stablehands like they were her own kin. She thanks the girl who cleans her chamber every night.”

Benifer found himself watching Alysanne again.

“She’s a noble girl,” Keira said, quieter now, “but she cares more about scrolls than silks. She wants to know about wars, about kingdoms, about how the world works. She asks questions other girls are scolded for even thinking.”

The septa’s voice trembled, barely, but it was there.

“And after all of it, everything, she’s still kind. Still soft. She’s lost brothers, sisters. A father. Been locked up. Dragged to the Red Keep like a prisoner. And yet she smiles. She laughs. She loves.”

A pause.

Keira exhaled.

“It makes no sense,” she said, more to herself now. “It defies reason. It defies sense.”

Then, after a moment, the final truth, raw and unguarded:

“That’s why I love her.”

Benifer’s hands tightened slightly.

“The Faith Militant say they’re cursed,” Keira whispered. “That the Targaryens are prideful, perverse, unholy. That they have no place in a realm of gods. But she… she’s not cursed. She’s just… exceptional.”

A moment of silence.

“She’ll be a wonderful queen one day.”

Benifer’s breath caught. He turned, slowly, just enough to see her profile: hard jaw, one eye watching the children, the faintest hint of pain in the lines around her mouth.

She finished, voice flat and final:

“I just pray it isn’t as Maegor’s queen. Anything but that.”

Benifer turned his gaze back to the children.

Alysanne caught the ball again and collapsed into the grass, laughing as the Celtigar girls fell beside her in a heap of limbs and giggles.

She looked… happy.

Whole.

Untouched.

Benifer, a man who had read the histories of Westeros three times over, who had served four lords and one king, who had seen monsters wear crowns and martyrs die in filth, looked at her and quietly, honestly, agreed.

“Anything but that,” he whispered.

Chapter 23: ALYSSA IV

The sea wind always carried the taste of ash on Dragonstone, but here, in Aegon’s Garden, it smelled of pine and roses.

Queen Alyssa Velaryon sat alone on a stone bench, her hands folded in her lap, her eyes on the little ones.

Her granddaughters, Aerea and Rhaella, played near the edge of the cranberry bog, their laughter shrill and sweet against the restless crash of the surf beyond the cliffs of the castle. The septa, a patient, round-shouldered woman in gray, followed a few paces behind, warning them not to stain their dresses, not to wander too close to the bog.

Alyssa smiled faintly, though her smile never reached her eyes.

It was beautiful here.

A strange, stolen beauty amid the black stone and sulfur smoke of the island.

Where the rest of Dragonstone was carved from onyx and fire, Aegon’s Garden bloomed defiantly with color: thorned hedges, wild roses, tall pines whispering secrets to the wind, and the low bog where cranberries clung to green vines.

Aenys had loved this place.

Her Aenys.

He used to walk with her here when they were still young; before the crown, before the court, before the poison of power had seeped into every corner of their lives.

They’d sit beneath that same pine by the wall, her hand in his, talking of children they hadn’t yet made and how they’d visit every one of the Seven Kingdoms. Aenys talked about all his grand plans to improve the lives of everyone.

It seemed another life. Another woman’s dream.

She breathed in the scent of the pines, letting it fill her chest, trying to let the ache pass.

But Maegor came back. He always came back.

Even when she tried not to think of him, his shadow lingered in her mind; the memory of his eyes, his voice, the way his hand had felt when he claimed her.

Her stomach shifted slightly, the faintest reminder.

The child.

She pressed her palm to her belly, feeling both warmth and revulsion.

She hated it. Gods forgive her, she did. She hated that it was his, that its blood carried the same madness that burned behind Maegor’s smile.

But she loved it too.

Because it was hers.

Her body. Her womb. Her chance at something new and pure in this broken life. She wasn’t even sure if it would survive, or if it would come out dead and twisted like the last one. But Alyssa prayed it lived, despite everything.

She whispered softly, “You will not be him.”

A gull shrieked overhead, wheeling out toward the cliffs.

The septa called after the girls again. Rhaella laughed and ignored her, tugging her twin by the hand toward the bog. Aerea tripped and fell into the soft grass, giggling until her sister helped her up again.

Alyssa’s heart clenched at the sight.

They were all she had left here.

Her granddaughters: Aenys’s legacy, Aegon and Rhaena’s children. Her blood. The last proof that something good had once lived in this family.

If not for them… she might have done it already. Ended it.

The thought flickered through her like a cold wind through the pines. She felt its chill but let it pass.

Selfish. That was what it would be.

The gods had given her too many burdens to cast one away of her own choosing.

She drew her cloak tighter around her shoulders and turned her face toward the garden again.

The afternoon light was fading, the sun bleeding gold across the gray sea. The hedges rustled gently in the wind. For a moment, she could almost pretend it was Aenys’s laughter she heard echoing between the trees.

Almost.

She blinked hard, and the sound was gone.

Her hands rested on her belly once more.

Her granddaughters. Her unborn child.

All she had left to love, and all that kept her tied to a world that had forgotten mercy. Alyssa exhaled slowly and whispered, to the air, to the gods, to no one:

“Let this child be mine, not his.”

The sea wind had softened by now, carrying the sweet rot of the bog and the clean salt of the waves. Alyssa sat very still upon the stone bench, her hands folded atop her belly, her eyes fixed on the two little girls tumbling about in the grass.

Aerea and Rhaella.

Her granddaughters.

The septa stood vigilant between them and the cranberry bog, skirts hemmed and voice clipped. Every few moments she murmured, “Not too near, my dears, not too near,” and the twins obeyed; at least in spirit.

Rhaella darted through the grass like a bird just learning its wings, curls of pale gold flying as she squealed with delight. Aerea followed, slower, quieter, smiling but cautious, the more timid of the two. The sight of them together, Rhaella pulling her sister by the hand, Aerea giggling despite herself, hurt.

Because it brought back ghosts.

Rhaena and Alysanne, long ago.

Not together, no, Rhaena had been a woman grown before Alysanne could walk, but she remembered each of them separately, with a mother’s clarity.

Rhaena, fierce and willful, bright as a forge flame, laughing in defiance of every rule she ever broke.

Alysanne, soft-spoken, thoughtful, gentle to every creature that crossed her path.

Two girls so different, and yet both hers.

The ache of missing them was like an old wound reopened.

Rhaena… dead and gone, her daughters orphaned.

Alysanne… still in King’s Landing. Still there, with him.

She closed her eyes and drew a trembling breath. Seven watch over her, she prayed silently. Seven keep her safe. Alyssa feared the silence most of all. There had been nothing. And Maegor…

Alyssa’s throat tightened. Her daughter was alone with the Black Dragon. It made her want to cry, to vomit, to…

The wind rustled the pines. The girls’ laughter echoed faintly, and she opened her eyes again, forcing herself to focus on the present.

Aerea had sat down now, plucking flowers and stacking them into little crowns. Rhaella was running in circles around her, arms spread wide like wings, calling something about being a dragon, her voice bright and proud.

Alyssa’s lips curved, despite the heaviness in her heart.

That was Rhaena all over again: fiery, untamed, loud, full of love and fury in equal measure. Aerea… so gentle, so fearful, clinging to her sister’s shadow for safety… so much like Alysanne. But more scared, more quiet.

Alyssa smiled then, properly.

She whispered, “Oh, Rhaena, if only you could see them.”

The wind seemed to answer with a sigh.

Her gaze drifted upward, toward the black towers of Dragonstone rising beyond the garden walls. How small they seemed from here, yet how heavy their shadow was.

She thought of Aenys, then. Her Aenys.

He would have loved this moment: their granddaughters, the sunlight, the smell of pine and salt. He’d been such a tender father. Gods, he’d been born to be a father.

She remembered him cradling Viserys after a nightmare, whispering stories about dragons and stars until the boy fell asleep on his chest. Remembered him laughing as Rhaena tried to braid his hair with flowers and being patient with Alysanne as she tried to learn her letters.

And Jaehaerys… her little dreamer with his father’s eyes.

The ache swelled again.

She hadn’t heard a word of them in so long… Viserys or Jaehaerys. No raven. No rumor. Nothing but the emptiness that had followed their disappearance.

She prayed for them all every night; her lost sons, her captive daughter, the babes who were all she had left.

She prayed that the gods, if they were not deaf to dragon’s blood, might spare these children at least.

Out in the grass, Rhaella had collapsed beside her sister, laughing breathlessly. Aerea clapped, and the two of them fell into a heap, giggling uncontrollably.

Alyssa’s chest loosened.

She smiled through tears she didn’t bother to hide.

Let them stay this way, she prayed. Let them have peace. Let them grow in sunlight, far from fire and iron and Maegor’s shadow.

She closed her eyes once more, letting the laughter of her granddaughters wash over her like a blessing.

It was enough to keep her alive, at least for now.

The wind shifted.

Not sharply. Just enough to bring the scent of salt stronger to her nose, enough to muffle the girls’ laughter in the grass. Alyssa Velaryon had lived long enough in court to feel the change before she saw it. A presence approaching. A weight in the air.

She turned her head and saw the familiar figure of Ser Gawen Corbray, old and weathered, his silver-white hair tucked behind his ears, his limp more pronounced than it had been last year.

He wore his sword, as always; a relic of the days when he had trained the prince who became king. Maegor’s blade had once sung under Gawen’s hand.

He walked slowly through the garden path, hands folded behind his back. A knight’s gait, even now. Alyssa didn’t stand. She didn’t even shift.

She waited.

Gawen came to a stop a few feet from her bench and inclined his head respectfully.

“My lady,” he said. His voice was low, tired, not unkind.

Alyssa nodded, her tone cool but composed. “Ser Gawen.”

His eyes flicked toward the twins, who were now kneeling in the grass, trying to build a crown of sticks and petals.

“They remind me of their mother,” he said softly. “Your daughter, Rhaena. She had that fire in her eyes when she was a child. Especially the loud one.”

“Rhaella,” Alyssa replied. “Yes. She has her mother’s temperament, I think.”

Gawen chuckled faintly. “And Aerea… she has that watchfulness. Like she’s already learned too much.”

Alyssa didn’t respond.

Gawen looked back at her. “How are you faring, my queen?”

Alyssa inhaled. The words came slowly, as if pulled from deep within her ribs.

“I miss my children,” she said. “I miss my daughter. My sons. I don’t know if they’re alive. I don’t know what they’ve become. I don’t know what’s been done to them.”

She turned her eyes back to the twins.

“But I find peace in watching them. It is… almost like remembering who I used to be.”

Gawen’s smile faded, the lines around his eyes deepening. His mouth tightened slightly.

He looked at her then, not cruelly, not coldly, but with that particular sorrow reserved for those who carry orders they did not write.

He bowed his head for a moment.

“I bring a message,” he said. “From King’s Landing.”

Alyssa did not move.

The wind stirred her hair. Somewhere behind them, the sea hissed against the rocks.

The king.

She had not heard from Maegor since she’d been exiled from King’s Landing. No ravens. No messengers. Just silence, like a blade dangling over her throat but never falling.

And now here was Ser Gawen, castellan, knight, jailer, delivering what passed for a royal decree.

She didn’t speak. She didn’t ask what the message was.

Ser Gawen reached slowly behind his cloak and drew forth a folded letter, sealed with pale red wax bearing the imprint of the Hand of the King: a crowned crab.

The sight of it made Alyssa’s breath catch.

He held it out silently. She took it with a careful hand, eyes narrowed.

Her thumb brushed the seal. The parchment was stiff, formal, the wax still unbroken. She turned it slightly to see the name.

Lord Edwell Celtigar.

Her heart twisted in her chest.

Edwell.

Once, long ago, she had loved him.

Before the chains. Before her marriage to Maegor.

She had trusted him, leaned on him in her darkest hours. He had whispered sweet words into her ear, returned her affections, even… kissed her.

Then he had pledged himself to Maegor.

Fully. Absolutely. Become his Hand.

Her fingers curled around the letter, creasing the edges. Part of her wanted to rip it apart and throw it into the bog.

But…

What if it mentioned Alysanne?

What if there was word?

Her mind spun through possibilities, news, warnings, commands, but she was snapped from the spiral by a sharp sound behind her.

A cry. A child’s wail.

She spun on the bench.

Across the garden, by the edge of the cranberry bog, Aerea was crying, her dress soaked and stained with reddish mud.

The septa was already at her side, hauling the little girl from the muck with awkward firmness. A few steps away stood Rhaella, hands behind her back, watching the scene with a pleased smirk tugging at her lips.

Alyssa didn’t hesitate. She dropped the letter, still sealed, on the bench and rushed forward, her heart hammering.

“Aerea!” she called.

The little girl was bawling now, clinging to the septa’s sleeve, tears streaking down her pink cheeks.

“I’m here, sweetling, I’m here-” Alyssa knelt and scooped Aerea into her arms, the wet dress soaking into her own skirts. “You’re all right. It’s all right. I’ve got you.”

The child hiccupped, buried her face in Alyssa’s shoulder.

Alyssa looked up sharply. “She wasn’t supposed to go near the bog!”

The septa wrung her hands. “They were just on the edge, my queen. I- she- slipped. Or-”

“I didn’t slip!” Aerea sobbed. “Rhaella pushed me!”

Alyssa turned, eyes narrowing.

Rhaella blinked and offered no protest. She simply shrugged, a glimmer of mischief dancing in her eyes.

Alyssa sighed heavily, running a hand through Aerea’s damp curls.

“Rhaella.” Her voice was stern now. “We do not push our sister. Especially not into bogs.”

“She’s not my sister,” Rhaella said, scowling. “She’s my twin.”

Alyssa stared at her. “That means she’s your sister. Exactly that.”

“She cries all the time.”

“And you’re the reason for it today.”

Rhaella pouted, looking away, arms crossed.

Alyssa stood slowly, Aerea still clinging to her like a limpet. She gave a look to the septa, sharp enough to cut stone. “Take Rhaella back to her room… without dinner. From now on, don’t take your eyes off them. Not for a moment.”

“Yes, my queen,” the woman murmured, chastened.

As they walked back toward the bench, Alyssa kissed Aerea’s brow gently and rocked her in her arms.

So much fear in this little one. Always flinching, always hesitating. The world had scared Aerea before she’d even had the chance to know it.

And Rhaella?

A wild thing. Untamed and untethered.

Too much fire. Too little fear.

They were handfuls, both of them; like Rhaena and Aegon, but more volatile. Too much of the dragon in their blood.

She loved them, gods help her, but the task of shaping them felt like holding a blade by the edges. Alyssa sat again on the bench, Aerea still sniffling into her shoulder, her dress wet and clinging to her sides.

The sky was softening to violet, streaked with gold and the faintest bruised gray. The wind had gone quiet for the moment, the way the world sometimes holds its breath.

Aerea was still crying, small and sharp, her face buried in Alyssa’s shoulder. Her little fists clutched at the queen’s gown, hiccuping gasps breaking the rhythm of her sobs.

“Shh,” Alyssa murmured, stroking her back. “Shh, my love, you’re all right. You’re safe.”

But the tears kept coming.

The child’s voice was muffled and desperate when she managed, “M–Mother… sing.”

Alyssa froze.

Not Grandmother.

Mother.

The word slipped out of Aerea’s mouth like instinct, not thought. It caught in Alyssa’s heart, fragile as glass. She told the twins a hundred times not to call her that… but Aerea had persisted.

She sighed softly. “Very well, little one.”

Her voice, when it came, was low and trembling at first, but she knew the song by heart: it had been her mother’s, and her grandmother’s before that.

A song of the sea and the seahorse, of the Velaryons who tamed the waves before dragons ever flew.

“Under the foam rides the silver seahorse,
over the tide where the merlings sing.
Salt for our bread and wind for our chorus,
Velaryon ships and the sea our king…”

Her voice steadied as she sang. The wind seemed to hum with her, the pines whispering in counterpoint.

Aerea’s sobs softened, quieting to sniffs. Her breathing slowed, her little body relaxing against Alyssa’s chest.

Alyssa pressed a kiss into the girl’s damp curls, her hand smoothing over her small, trembling back.

“You see?” she whispered. “No harm done. The sea forgives, and so must you.”

Aerea only sniffled again, whispering, “Sorry.”

“I know, sweetling,” Alyssa murmured. “I know.”

For a few heartbeats, there was only peace; the smell of pine and salt, the warmth of a child pressed close, the hum of her own heartbeat.

Then her thoughts began to drift.

To the ache in her belly.

To the life growing inside her.

Barely a moon or two along, fragile as a whisper, and already it felt like a burden she could not bear and a miracle she could not lose. She had told herself she didn’t want it. Gods, she didn’t. Not another child of Maegor’s: Maegor, who had crushed her will, who had burned her love into ash. But when she felt it stir inside her, faint as a ripple in still water, she felt something else.

Guilt. Love. Pity.

She wanted to hate it. Instead, she hated herself for even thinking about it.

It deserves a better father.

She looked down at Aerea, whose breathing had grown shallow and steady, her lashes wet, her mouth open slightly in sleep. Alyssa brushed a lock of pale hair from her face.

And a better mother too, she thought bitterly. Better than one who hates it before it was even born.

The girl was so light in her arms. So delicate.

Too delicate for this cruel world of dragons and fire and men like Maegor.

She remembered Aerea’s parents, her children Aegon and Rhaena, and the night they died above the God’s Eye. The flash of dragonfire, the scream in the dark. She had not been there, but she’d seen it a thousand times in her dreams.

They would never see their daughters grow. Never see Rhaella’s wild grin or Aerea’s shy smiles.

A tear slid down Alyssa’s cheek. She didn’t brush it away.

“I’ll keep them safe,” she whispered to the wind, her voice barely sound. “Somehow.”

Her hand, still stroking Aerea’s soft curls, stilled as her gaze dropped to the bench beside her.

It waited there, pale against the stone.

The letter.

The seal of the Hand of the King still unbroken.

Alyssa’s throat tightened.

With one arm still wrapped tightly around Aerea, Queen Alyssa Velaryon reached with her free hand and gently lifted the letter from the bench. The wax seal, red and formal, stamped with the sigil of the Hand of the King, cracked beneath her thumb with a soft snap.

She unfolded the parchment slowly.

The ink was dark, the hand unmistakable; Lord Celtigar had always written with precision, every line even, every flourish restrained.

Her stomach turned as she began to read, Aerea shifting slightly in her arms, cheek still damp against her shoulder.

Your Grace,

I write to you with the deepest respect, and with sincere regret that so much time has passed since last you received word from King’s Landing. The silence has not been of your daughter’s choosing, nor, I confess, my own.

At the command of His Grace the King, no letters or messages were to be sent to Dragonstone until he himself permitted it. His reasons were his own, though I suspect you will understand his reasons better after you read this correspondence.

However, I am pleased to inform you that I have received His Grace’s approval to write to you now, and I do so both out of duty and, I hope, some lingering regard between us. There is much to report, and none of it light.

Queen Tyanna of the Tower has been executed. She was arrested by royal command and put to death following her confessed role in the murders of Queen Ceryse Hightower, and more grievously, your sons: Prince Viserys and Prince Jaehaerys.

I know how difficult these words must be to read, and I wish I were not the one to deliver them. I cannot imagine the depth of your sorrow, but I offer what small comfort I can: the King did not know. He was deceived, as we all were. And in his fury, he acted with finality. In light of these events, changes are underway.

Princess Alysanne remains in good health and high spirits. Her wit and clarity of mind have earned her a place of growing influence at court, though nothing untoward, I assure you. His Grace does not intend to marry her, and I state this unequivocally on his behalf.

In fact, with the King’s blessing, Princess Alysanne will soon be permitted to write to you herself, and I have advocated for a visit to Dragonstone in the near future, that she may see her mother and the twins once more.

You, too, shall be recalled to the Red Keep when the time for your confinement draws near. His Grace wishes you well, and desires the safety and strength of both you and the heir you now bear.

I know you have every reason to mistrust me. I have served a king you have suffered under. I cannot undo the past, nor would I insult you by pretending to. But I hope, at least, that this letter proves I have not forgotten you, nor the promises I once made in better days.

May the gods watch over you and yours, and may peace find you soon.

With sincere respect,

Edwell Celtigar

Hand of the King

Alyssa’s hands trembled as the letter fell from her fingers.

It fluttered gently down, settling on the grass beside her foot.

She said nothing.

She only held Aerea tighter.

The little girl was quiet now, hiccuping softly even as she dozed, but not protesting.

Viserys. Jaehaerys. Dead.

Gone.

Tyanna. Dead.

Gone.

It felt impossible.

It had to be impossible.

Notes:

HAPPY HALLOWEEN! Had a bit of a pause, but I will try to be more regular with the updates.

Chapter 24: ALYSANNE V

The wind rustled faintly outside the narrow tower windows of Maegor’s Holdfast, whispering across the stone like an old ghost. It was the hour of the bat, long past most people’s bedtime. But within a certain bedchamber, lit by a cluster of warm tallow candles, all was laughter and whispered secrets.

Princess Alysanne Targaryen sat cross-legged at the center of her vast, canopied bed, a worn leather-bound book cradled in her lap. Around her, nestled among pillows and quilts, were her four handmaidens: Jenya, a born romantic; Taliya, shy and willowy; Sera, with ink-stained fingers and a clever mouth; and Dorthy, always giggling before the punchline.

They were girls. All of them. Barely past their childhoods but still in the service of the Red Keep. But tonight, for just this hour, they could pretend they were nothing more than that; just girls, and not birds within a golden cage.

“‘The brave knight raised his sword, swearing to the Seven that he would not let the foul King Marric lay hands upon fair Lady Rowena, even if it cost him his life…’”

Alysanne’s voice was steady and theatrical, her blonde hair falling in waves over her shoulders, catching the candlelight like spun moonlight.

The girls clutched their blankets tighter, their eyes wide.

“What happened next?” Jenya whispered.

“Did he kill the king?” Taliya breathed.

Alysanne smiled faintly and turned the page. “Let’s see.”

They leaned in as she read about the climactic battle, forming a tight circle atop the goosefeather mattress, a little island of wonder amid the silence of the great stone tower.

It was the first night in years Alysanne had felt anything close to free.

A strange convergence had made this possible.

Maegor, her uncle, her captor, her king, had grown strangely permissive in recent weeks. Ever since the death of Tyanna, ever since Alysanne herself had…

She blinked. She didn’t want to think about that now.

Septa Keira, always watchful, always stern, had taken ill just hours ago, confined to her own chamber, leaving Alysanne unwatched for once.

She hadn’t wasted the opportunity.

Alysanne had wanted this since she was ten; since the day she realized the Red Keep was not a home, but a prison. But even in a prison, one could find friends.

They were lowborn girls, yes, but girls who loved her, who whispered with her at night, who helped her laugh even when there was nothing left to laugh about.

They knew not all of her secrets, but enough.

They knew she cried in the bath sometimes.

They knew she had nightmares about her brothers.

They knew she had long ceased praying for rescue but not for the health of her mother.

But they never pressed her for more.

So tonight, she gave them this story.

A knight and a princess. A cruel king. A promise of escape.

Yet, even as the words left her mouth, something cold lingered beneath her skin.

Because the story was a mirror.

Because she was not Rowena.

Because Maegor was more than a cruel king.

Because there was no knight riding through the night to save her, even if she wished it was true.

The dagger Maegor had given her still lay in a silk-wrapped box at the bottom of her wardrobe.

It was the same blade she had used, at his command, to end Tyanna’s life.

Alysanne didn’t know if she felt guilt or pride or shame. She only knew she hadn’t screamed. She hadn’t wept.

She had done it, and Maegor had looked at her, afterward, with something that almost resembled… pride.

Her stomach twisted.

She turned the page, trying to bury the memory in the rhythm of the tale.

But the thoughts would not leave.

Her mother was still imprisoned on Dragonstone. So were her nieces; Aerea and Rhaella, sweet little things who barely knew their names.

Her brothers were dead, murdered by Tyanna.

Her father had been a ghost long before his body was cold.

And she, Alysanne, was now the closest thing Maegor had to a living heir before her own mother gave birth.

He had made her read, speak, and learn differently than before.

He had given her rooms, books, luxuries.

He was shaping her into something that frightened her when she looked in the mirror too long.

The girls leaned forward in anticipation.

“Well?” Jenya asked, eyes wide. “Does he slay the king or not?”

Alysanne smiled slyly and continued reading.

“…and as the evil King Marric lay slain upon the broken stones, Ser Cedric knelt before fair Rowena, not as a knight, but as a man in love. She took his hand, and the bells rang across the realm. He was crowned king, she his queen, and the people rejoiced from mountain to shore at their wedding, attended by lords and ladies from across the land. Their love ruled long and just, and the cruel days faded into song…”

Alysanne closed the book softly, her pale fingers resting on the worn leather cover. The candlelight danced across her silver hair, now loose around her shoulders, a few strands clinging to her cheek.

Her friends clapped and sighed dreamily.

Jenya, ever the romantic, leaned back into her pillow with a grin.

Sera wiped at her eyes, sniffling.

Dorthy whispered, “I knew the wedding would be magnificent.”

Only Taliya frowned, arms crossed beneath the borrowed fur blanket.

“I don’t know,” she said. “It just seems… too easy. He slays the king, marries the girl, rules the land? That’s not how the world works.”

Sera immediately gasped. “Don’t ruin it!”

Jenya rolled her eyes. “Taliya thinks she can write better than every book in the library.”

Dorthy laughed. “Maybe she wants to marry a knight and make him do the ruling.”

“I didn’t say that,” Taliya muttered, but her eyes seemed thoughtful. “I’m just saying; stories like that make it sound like everything bad just goes away once the right man has a sword.”

Alysanne said nothing at first.

Because, deep down, she agreed. She wished evil kings died with a sword to the heart. She wished love could fix everything. She wished the world worked like the story she had just read.

But she lived in a castle built on fear with a king who could kill with a word and a past soaked in too much blood for happy endings.

“Should I read another?” Alysanne asked quickly, trying to smooth the tension.

But Jenya sat up instead, eyes gleaming. “No! Tell us your story instead.”

Sera nodded eagerly. “Everything’s changed so much since that witch Tyanna died.”

“Yeah,” Dorthy said, leaning in. “You’ve got this new room now, right? One of the big ones with this nice bed?”

“And you go outside the Holdfast,” Jenya added. “You talk to the king. You sit in lessons with the Grand Maester. You’re… important now.”

Sera rolled her eyes at Jenya, “Alysanne was always important, she’s a princess, Jen.”

Alysanne blinked, suddenly unsure.

Before she could speak, Taliya, quiet and sharp-eyed, asked in a soft voice:

“…is it true? What they say? That King Maegor plans to… marry you?”

The room went still.

The other girls looked at Taliya like she’d sworn in a sept.

“Don’t say that,” Jenya hissed.

“Why would you even ask her that?” Dorthy frowned. “She’s just a girl. And he’s so… old.”

“Well… she’s a princess,” Sera whispered. “And he’s… her uncle. They’re Targaryens. It’s awful, but people talk…”

Alysanne lifted her hand gently. “It’s all right.”

The room fell silent.

She exhaled slowly and met Taliya’s gaze. “He told me himself. He doesn’t want to marry me.”

There was a collective sigh of relief, like air let from a stretched skin.

“Oh, thank the Seven,” Jenya whispered.

Sera patted Alysanne’s shoulder with trembling fingers.

Dorthy let out a breathy “Good.”

But Alysanne, lips pressed into a faint smile, leaned in conspiratorially.

“I’ll tell you something else. A real secret.”

All four leaned in.

Alysanne lowered her voice.

“I think… the reason he doesn’t want me is because my mother is carrying his heir.”

Gasps.

Wide eyes.

Mouths falling open.

“Queen Alyssa?” Jenya squeaked. “Again?”

Sera clutched her hands to her chest. “Really?”

“A baby?” Dorthy breathed. “Another one?”

Taliya’s face was unreadable, but her eyes didn’t leave Alysanne’s.

Alysanne gave a single nod. “I haven’t seen her since she left. But the king told me in private. My uncle wants her well-fed and watched over in Dragonstone.”

“And you think that’s why he’s being so… nice to you?” Sera asked.

“I don’t know,” Alysanne said. “But I think it means I’m… safe. For now.”

The handmaidens burst into questions.

“What will she name the baby?”

“Will it be a boy?”

“Will he keep her on Dragonstone forever?”

“Will you get to go see her?”

“Do you want to go back?”

Alysanne smiled and tried to answer, dodging some questions, parrying others with grace.

But inside, her thoughts churned.

Yes, she had new rooms. Yes, Maegor gave attention, let her roam the keep, looked pleased when she spoke boldly.

But she was still in a dragon’s den. She should never forget that.

The candles had burned lower now, casting long flickering shadows across the canopied ceiling. The warmth of the night had drawn them closer together, blankets tangled, elbows bumping, laughter softly echoing off stone walls. The girls sat cross-legged in a loose circle on Alysanne’s bed, and the air was thick with a rare thing: safety.

Alysanne, her cheeks flushed from laughter and the heat of the closed chamber, leaned back on her palms, her honey-blonde hair spilling behind her, eyes alight with that fierce, bright cleverness that sometimes frightened her tutors.

But now, she let herself speak freely.

“I’ve sent twelve letters to Dragonstone,” she muttered, lips twisted into a pout. “Twelve. Maybe thirteen, if the septa forgot to count that little one I slipped to the Grand Maester. Not one has come back.”

“Maegor isn’t letting them through, is he?” asked Taliya, her tone cautious.

Alysanne gave a sarcastic shrug. “Of course he isn’t. He says he wants us reunited ‘when the time is right,’ but the only time Maegor thinks is right is when everyone else’s throat is slit and the world bends over for him.”

The girls giggled nervously. Alysanne’s boldness was often thrilling and sometimes terrifying.

She rolled her eyes dramatically. “He never smiles. Not once. He eats like he’s angry at his food. He scowls at birds. He thinks fine clothing is just a different kind of armor. I swear he thinks color is a sin.”

That broke them.

Jenya let out a squeal.

Sera buried her face in a pillow.

Dorthy giggled so hard she nearly rolled off the bed.

Even Taliya cracked a grin.

“He’s no fun at all,” Alysanne said with mock despair. “The man needs a jest, a book, a mirror, or all three.”

“That’s because he’s scared if he laughs, his face will crack open and a dragon will crawl out,” Jenya added, giggling.

“Or Tyanna will rise from the dead and stab him with her hairpins,” Dorthy whispered.

That brought the laughter to a pause.

A silence settled, short but sharp.

Then, with sudden boldness, Jenya asked, “Who did you hate more? Maegor… or Tyanna?”

Alysanne didn’t hesitate. “Tyanna.”

The word came out like a sword pulled from its sheath.

“Maegor’s like a hammer,” she went on, voice lower now. “You see him coming. You know when he’s about to strike. He’s simple, in that way. Brute, awful, cruel, but you know where you stand.”

The girls nodded.

“But Tyanna…” Alysanne shuddered slightly. “She was all needles. She knew just where to stab you so it lingered. She once made me stand in front of the entire court while she made jokes about how I didn’t look like a Targaryen. She called me a soft little lamb. Called me a ‘nice looking peasant girl’. Said if I were her daughter, I’d make a very pretty septa.”

The laughter was gone now, replaced by wide eyes and quiet anger.

“She told me I was getting fat,” Alysanne added. “That a girl who couldn’t ride a dragon shouldn’t take second helpings.”

Sera gasped. “That’s awful!”

“She was awful,” Alysanne said. “She’s dead now. And good. Everyone is glad.”

The other girls murmured agreement.

But Alysanne said nothing more.

Because deep down, under the pride, under the laughter, under the armor of clever words and cutting jokes, she still felt that twist of guilt.

They didn’t know.

They didn’t know that it had been her who’d sunk the blade to Tyanna’s heart.

They didn’t know what Maegor had made her do; what she had agreed to do.

They didn’t know that Tyanna’s blood had stained her hands, and she hadn’t dropped the dagger.

They only knew the rumors: that Tyanna had poisoned the princes, that Maegor had executed her.

They had avoided asking for details. Carefully. Deliberately.

Alysanne appreciated that.

She swallowed the thoughts, folded them neatly into that dark drawer in the back of her mind. Then she clapped her hands lightly.

“Enough of me,” she said brightly. “I’m tired of talking about dragons and monsters. I want to hear about you.”

The girls blinked.

“Come now,” Alysanne teased. “I know all your names, your favorite colors, how many brothers Jenya has, but I want stories. What did you do before the Red Keep? What did you dream of? What mischief have you been getting up to?”

Taliya looked hesitant. Sera turned pink. Dorthy grinned immediately.

Jenya, as always, was the first to speak. “Well… there’s this city guard…”

The chamber burst back into laughter, and Alysanne let herself sink into the warmth of it.

For a little while longer, she would let them carry her away.

Away from daggers.

Away from dragons.

Away from the truth.

Just girls.

Just stories.

Just the last hours of peace before dawn.

The fire in the hearth had long since burned low, now just embers and shadows. The chamber glowed only by the last stubborn candles and the warmth of the girls’ voices, low and rhythmic like lullabies or confessions.

Princess Alysanne leaned against a velvet bolster, the book long set aside, her silver hair tousled, her blue eyes reflecting candlelight. She let herself fade into the rhythm of the room, no longer leading, just listening.

Jenya was chattering again, as always, her voice animated and full of mock pride at her object of affection.

“He wore that gleaming breastplate every day,” she said, fanning herself dramatically. “Even when it rained! You’d think he was going to a tourney, not walking patrol in Flea Bottom.”

The girls laughed.

“You said he’s almost thirty!” Alysanne grinned. “And had three missing teeth.”

“Three is respectable,” Jenya said, smirking. “He can still whistle.”

Dorthy snorted, and Sera wiped tears from her eyes as she giggled.

Then Sera’s turn came. Her laughter faded and her voice softened.

“My family’s struggling,” she said, picking at a loose thread in the coverlet. “The taxes… they’ve gotten worse. My brothers are nine and ten, and they had to start working. One cleans pots in a tavern. The other… just runs errands for coin. They send what they can back to mother.”

There was no pity in her tone; just quiet shame, like she’d tried to keep this inside too long.

Alysanne reached out without hesitation, gently placing her hand atop Sera’s.

“I can help,” she said. “Coin. Food. Whatever they need.”

Sera’s eyes welled up, but she nodded quickly and smiled. “Thank you, Princess. Truly.”

Dorthy jumped in next, her tone light at first, but with something brittle beneath it.

“My brother got swindled by a Dornishman in the Street of Spices,” she said. “Tricked him out of our family’s last savings. Father called him a fool. He ran off, joined the Begging Brothers. Walks barefoot now. Preaches outside septs. Says all Targaryens are cursed devils. That we’ll all burn in hell.”

The laughter died again.

Alysanne reached out instinctively, brushing Dorthy’s arm. “I’m sorry, Dorthy. I know what it’s like to lose a brother.”

The girls nodded solemnly. The candle flame flickered, and for a heartbeat the only sound was the gentle pop of cooling stone.

Then silence.

All eyes slowly turned toward Taliya, who sat with her knees drawn to her chest, picking idly at her blanket. She hadn’t said a word in a while.

“Taliya?” Alysanne asked softly.

Taliya didn’t look up. “It’s nothing.”

Jenya nudged her lightly. “It’s not nothing if it has you so quiet.”

Sera added, “You always have something to say. Don’t make us worry.”

Taliya glanced up, but she avoided Alysanne’s gaze. Her dark eyes were calm, but Alysanne could see the tension there, just beneath the surface.

“I was just thinking,” she murmured. “This doesn’t feel real.”

The girls shifted, glancing at one another.

“It just doesn’t feel real sometimes,” she said, eyes flicking up toward Alysanne. “That we’re here. In your bed. With you.”

Jenya scoffed. “Alysanne?”

“No,” Taliya said gently. “She’s Princess Alysanne Targaryen. Daughter of King Aenys. Granddaughter of Aegon the Conqueror. The blood of the dragon!”

She looked at her own calloused hands. “We’re lowborn. Dirt under your boots. We don’t even sit at table, most of the time. And yet… here we are. Laughing with you. Being treated like… like friends.”

She didn’t say it with bitterness; only a sort of awe.

“We don’t deserve it.”

Alysanne sat up slightly, brushing a strand of silver hair from her cheek. Her voice was quiet, but firm.

“Don’t say that.”

The other girls turned to look at her.

“I chose you. All of you.” Her eyes swept across the circle. “Not because you were noble. Not because someone told me to. Because you were kind. Because you didn’t pity me. Because you never lied to my face, because you never spied for Tyanna.”

She looked directly at Taliya.

“Because you matter.”

Taliya blinked, caught off-guard.

Alysanne’s voice softened. “Maesters never write about girls like you. All the books are about lords, knights, princesses, or mad kings riding dragons. They don’t care how common girls live. Or what you dream of. Or what hurts you.”

She folded her hands in her lap. “But I do. I want to know. I want to understand. You and your people are most of the Seven Kingdoms, right?”

The bedchamber fell into a still hush.

Then Jenya, ever the light-hearted one, broke it with a snort. “Well, the Celtigar twins won’t like hearing that. They think the world starts at the castle moat and ends at their mirror.”

Alysanne laughed; really laughed, the tension breaking like a snapped cord.

“I do like them,” she said, wiping her eye. “They’re sweet, just… gods, they couldn’t have handled tonight. They’d have fainted when Sera mentioned pot-scrubbing, and Dorthy would’ve had them convinced that the Faith Militant eats children.”

That made the girls erupt into laughter again, even Sera, who clutched her stomach.

“They mean well,” Alysanne added once they’d calmed. “But… yes. They’re not great with serious talk.”

Jenya leaned in. “Didn’t Lord Celtigar bring them here to befriend you?”

Alysanne rolled her eyes. “Of course. I’m sure he thinks a noble girl needs noble friends, and we were good friends… when I was a child. But Maegor keeps the court so small; the great houses don’t want to send their daughters here, for good reason. And the ones who are here…”

Her tone dipped. She didn’t say the names. She didn’t need to. Then, with an attempt at lightness, she added, “The Towers girls tried to make friends.”

Groans echoed from the bed.

“Seven save us,” Dorthy muttered. “Them?”

“They never shut up,” Jenya grinned. “All they do is talk about their hair and which knight smiled at them.”

“And boys,” Alysanne added, grinning. “But not in the fun way like you, Jen.”

That earned another round of laughter, with Jenya pretending to be offended.

But Taliya didn’t laugh. She smiled, faintly. But she was staring down again, fingers twisting at the hem of the blanket in her lap.

Alysanne watched her carefully.

There’s still something she’s not saying.

The night was full of stories. Of secrets. Of truths spoken in soft voices where no lords or spies could hear.

Alysanne had learned to recognize when someone was holding back.

She wouldn’t let Taliya carry that weight alone. So she leaned forward, her tone gentle but direct.

“Taliya,” she asked. “What is it you’re not telling me?”

The laughter stilled again. The room turned. All eyes on Taliya. The question hung in the air, soft but unyielding. This time, Taliya couldn’t look away. The warmth in the room had changed. The laughter from moments before lingered like the last echoes of music; fading, fragile, already beginning to feel like it had happened in another place entirely.

Taliya finally exhaled, shoulders trembling slightly.

“My family…” she began, voice hoarse. “They’re… struggling. Like Sera’s. My mother works as a washerwoman for a noble house in the city. My father… he takes work where he can. Fishmongers, cart-pullers, whatever pays.”

The others leaned in quietly, all smiles gone now.

“But the debts…” Taliya’s fingers twisted tightly in the blanket. “The taxes keep climbing. My wages from here help, gods, they help, but it’s not enough. My younger brothers are six and four. Too small to work. Too small to go hungry.”

She swallowed hard. Then, her voice cracked.

“They’ve started talking. Quietly. But I heard them. My parents. About… about selling me.”

A stunned silence followed.

Taliya closed her eyes. “To a brothel on the Street of Silk. They think I don’t know. That I’m too far away to hear. But I know. I know.”

For a moment, the air in the room felt too heavy to breathe.

Alysanne sat bolt upright, her heart pounding. “No. That’s… that’s monstrous! You’re so young!”

Her voice cut through the quiet like a bell.

Jenya looked sick. “The Street of Silk? That’s not work. That’s-”

“It’s slavery,” Dorthy said flatly, face pale. “That’s what it is.”

Sera was already leaning in to hold Taliya’s hand, but it was Alysanne who moved first; kneeling across the bed and pulling Taliya into her arms.

Taliya didn’t resist. She collapsed against the princess, shaking with quiet, bitter sobs.

“I’m so sorry,” Alysanne whispered, stroking her dark hair. “I didn’t mean to push. I shouldn’t have asked.”

“It’s not your fault,” Taliya muttered through tears. “I just… didn’t want to say it. Not in front of you.”

Alysanne pulled back just enough to meet her eyes. “Taliya. You must stay here. Stay in the Red Keep. I can move you to the servant’s quarters officially, or better, ask Lord Celtigar to reassign you to the kitchens or the library. Anywhere safe. You’re not going back to them. I won’t allow it.”

The other girls nodded fiercely.

“We’ll hide you in our own chambers if we have to,” Jenya added.

Taliya tried to laugh, but it came out as a sob. “Thank you,” she whispered. “Thank you all.”

They all huddled close now, no longer a circle of stories but a knot of limbs and whispers and comfort.

As Alysanne held her crying friend, her thoughts burned beneath her skin. This is the realm Maegor rules. A world where parents sell daughters to pay their taxes.

Where a girl like Taliya, clever and kind and loyal, could be discarded like trash.

Where coins mattered more than kinship.

Where her own handmaidens, her friends, were one step away from ruin.

I am still a princess.

I get books and velvet gowns. My bed is bigger than half their homes. I have coin. I’m Maegor’s prisoner, yes, but I am not cold. I am not powerless.

She looked at Taliya; eyes red, face blotched, but still proud even now.

She deserves more than fear. They all do. She cradled Taliya gently under one arm, the girl’s face pressed into her shoulder, breath hitching now and then, but no longer crying. She was calmer now. Quiet.

Alysanne stroked her hair and murmured softly, “I get scared too.”

The other girls stirred slightly, listening.

“I’m afraid of Maegor. I’m afraid of the Faith Militant. I’m even afraid sometimes of the gods themselves… that the Seven might damn my family, or punish us for our sins.”

The silence around her deepened. None of them spoke.

“But I try not to lose hope,” Alysanne said quietly. “I believe the Seven still hear us, even if we’ve strayed. I believe… we can still be better.”

She looked around at her girls. Her friends. Her sisters in everything but name.

“I believe that if we hold on to each other, if we care for one another, that has to count for something. Even in a world like this.”

Dorthy, blinking sleepily, offered a soft idea: “Maybe… we should pray. For your mother. And the baby.”

Alysanne nodded. “Yes. I’d like that.”

She straightened slightly, pulling the blanket around her shoulders like a cloak, and folded her hands. The other girls mimicked her, heads bowed, voices hushed.

Alysanne cleared her throat softly, then began, her voice low and reverent:

“Seven Who Are One,
Father, guide those who rule with justice and mercy.
Mother, protect my mother, Queen Alyssa, and the child in her womb.
Warrior, shield my handmaidens and their families from cruelty and hunger.
Maiden, keep my nieces Aerea and Rhaella safe and joyful.
Smith, strengthen the hands of the smallfolk, so they may survive these hard times.
Crone, give me wisdom to do what is right, even when I am afraid.
Stranger… stay far away, if you can. We have seen enough of you.”

Her voice cracked slightly, but she went on.

“And to all the Seven, I pray for peace… for Westeros, for us Targaryens, and for everyone who wants more than blood and fire. Forgive us. Let us start again.”

When she opened her eyes, she saw the other girls were still bowed, some murmuring quiet amens, some simply holding silence.

The prayer passed through the chamber like a gentle wind.

They snuffed out the last candle.

One by one, the girls pulled the covers over themselves, shifting into sleep-heavy stillness.

Just before sleep, Alysanne whispered with a grin, “I think Grand Maester Benifer has a crush on my septa.”

Jenya let out a sleepy snort. “No he doesn’t.”

Dorthy rolled onto her side. “I hope not.”

“I bet he dreams of her smacking him with a holy book,” Sera mumbled.

They all giggled softly, even Taliya, before sleep took them.

But Alysanne stayed awake.

She lay still in the dark, eyes open, staring into the black above.

She hadn’t told them. Not about Tyanna, not about the way Alysanne had killed her, not about how Maegor had watched. Not about Viserys and Jaehaerys, whose faces still haunted her when she closed her eyes. There was never a funeral; not even Maegor knew where the bodies were.

She hadn’t told them about Silverwing; how much she missed her, how the absence of her dragon felt like a piece of her soul had been taken and locked away.

She hadn’t told them about why she really feared for her unborn sibling, how Visenya’s words from so long ago made her suspect Maegor might not keep his word if the babe did not live.

They wouldn’t understand.

No, they shouldn’t have to understand.

They’re not princesses. They don’t have to carry this.

I do.

Alysanne tightened her arms around herself.

She was still a Targaryen. She had royal blood, fire in her veins, a duty written in dragon’s breath and prophecy. It was her responsibility.

Their suffering was heavy, but hers had to be silent.

They needed her strength. Not her tears.

She would cry only when alone.

She would carry the pain like armor.

She had to be strong enough for them all.

Maybe, just maybe, that was what being royal truly meant.

Chapter 25: MELONY I

The sweepers’ brooms whispered across the flagstones like soft gossip. Low afternoon sun slipped through the slit-windows and laid crooked bars of light over the floor, catching on dust motes and the dull, black points of the Iron Throne as if to mock it with beauty.

The servant women chattered: women whose hands knew the songs of soap and stew, who argued about whether the Faith Militant would rise in rebellion again, who swore about taxes and lads who drank their wages and the bargains they’d struck in the market. The words were small, human things: jealousies, complaints, comforts. They left a little warmth in the room.

One woman stood a step apart, red hair tied back with a strip of linen, sweeping in slow, careful arcs that left the stones cleaner than they’d been. Her name here was Mia; that’s what the steward called her, that’s what the tip-givers on the stair knew. Her real name, Melony Piper, fit her like an ill-fitting dress. It had traveled with her from the river-salt of the Riverlands and the barbed years since. She didn’t feel like a noblewoman anymore, not even a Piper.

When she lifted her head, the hall seemed to tilt toward the throne. The Iron Throne’s jagged silhouette loomed like a mountain of cold iron, each twisted blade a promise and a threat. Men knelt to that shape. Lords and ladies spun their fortunes around it. Children learned its name. Melony watched it the way other folk watched the hearth: a place where destinies turned.

She did not watch it with reverence.

She watched it with the hunger of someone who had counted what had been taken from her: three brothers she still loved, a prince she believed in, a princess she yearned for even years later, a friend and his family that had been burned alive by the king in their home. The list grew in her head like a ledger, each line a debt written in bone. She should have married and been a lady, a wife. The throne and the king who sat it made that impossible; they killed that future just as they’d killed her princess.

“Mia!” one of the women called, jostling her back into the present with a laugh. “Sweep closer to that corner, you’re missing all the grit.”

She answered with a word and bent again to the stone. Her arms moved, and the broom made the old, weary sound. The other women’s chatter rose and fell like tides, petty and vital and harmless, and for a while it calmed her. It was good to be merely a woman with a broom again.

But whenever the work lulled, the Iron Throne reasserted itself at the edge of her sight, black and impossible. She pictured Maegor on that chair, stone-faced, a thing of fire and discipline, and the picture did not make her ache with hatred alone. It made her ache with the knowledge that one man’s shape could press so hard against a thousand lives.

Melony pushed the broom forward, leaving a path of clean stone like a line of intent. She would not speak of sharpened blades in the great hall; she would not map out schemes where gossip could carry them like embers. She had been trying to enter the Red Keep for years, but Tyanna had kept her out; the queen had rarely ever hired new servants. The Hand of the King had been generous enough to let her in.

She had to keep to the shadows and the slow work of living: watching, learning, keeping account. If a moment came when the shape of things changed, she told herself, she would choose carefully. Maegor was always armored, always guarded… but he would slip up eventually.

For now, she swept. For now, she watched. For now, the broom made the sound of a small, stubborn kind of defiance. The sun had shifted now, slanting deeper into the hall. The great shadows of the Iron Throne stretched across the floor like black claws, jagged and reaching. A breeze whispered faintly through a high arrow-slit, stirring motes of dust in the air.

The servant women kept sweeping, and so did Melony, the quiet red-haired girl they all knew as Mia from the Riverlands who never gossiped too much and always finished her chores.

One of the older women, Gretta, leaned on her broom with a tired huff. Her knuckles were swollen, and she had the tone of someone who’d worked in too many kitchens and too few warm houses.

“So, Mia,” she said, eyeing the younger woman with mild interest, “you came up from the Riverlands, didn’t you? What’s the Red Keep like compared to back home? Or King’s Landing? Must feel like a different world, all this stone and silence.”

Melony didn’t stop sweeping, though she slowed just a touch. She had grown used to these harmless questions; the idle curiosity of lowborn women who didn’t mean to pry but needed something to talk about.

She gave a small shrug, her tone as casual as the role demanded.

“It’s quieter work, that’s true,” she said. “Especially now that King Maegor barely shows his face around court, and Queen Tyanna’s… gone.”

Like clockwork, it came.

Gretta spat on the stone floor.

“Good riddance to that snakey witch,” muttered another woman, Edda, shaking her head. “Poisoned her way through half the court. Would’ve done the same to us if she’d cared enough to look our way.”

“She scared the ravens off the rookery just by looking at them,” someone else joked. Laughter rippled among the women.

“Aye,” Gretta snorted, “work’s better now, even if half the help ran off. Pay’s better, food’s better, and the guards aren’t as twitchy.” She gave Mia a glance. “So long as you keep your head down, this ain’t a bad job. Even with Maegor being… well. Maegor.”

More nervous laughter. Maegor was a word everyone knew how to whisper.

Melony smiled faintly and gave a small nod. “Quiet is good.”

She bent again to her sweeping. Calm. Steady. Eyes lowered like a dutiful servant.

But behind her stillness, her mind screamed.

Tyanna. Let them curse her. Let them spit on her grave. Melony didn’t care about that witch or what she’d done.

Her war was not with Tyanna of the Tower.

It was with the man who had placed that serpent beside a throne of swords: Maegor.

King Maegor. The Murderer. The Cruel. The rider of the Black Dread. The man who had torn Westeros to pieces and called it peace.

He had burned villages across the Riverlands. Had crushed dissent with fire and steel. Had hanged lords and boys alike. Had declared war on the Faith and buried every law that had once made her father lift his head with pride.

In doing so, he had killed three of her brothers.

And worse, worse than that, he had taken Rhaena.

Her Rhaena.

Melony tried not to think about the name; it hurt.

The only person she had ever truly loved. The one whose eyes had always seen her, truly seen her, even when others only saw a daughter of House Piper, a loud girl, a fierce girl, a foolish girl who wore boy’s clothes and played with swords.

Rhaena, who had held her hand on cold nights in Pinkmaiden.

Rhaena, who had promised to take her to King’s Landing after she and Aegon defeated Maegor.

Rhaena, who had flown away on Dreamfyre and died fighting Maegor on his dragon, Balerion.

Melony had come to the King’s landing under a false name, under a humble face, sweeping and scrubbing like a thousand others. It had taken her years to worm her way into the Red Keep. A couple weeks to learn the rhythm of the guards. Nights of sleeping cold on stone floors and praying to the Stranger that when her time came, her hand would be steady.

She would kill him. She didn’t dream of walking away. She didn’t need to.

If she could sink a blade into Maegor’s neck, even for one breath, one second, she would have balance. She would have peace. If she died in the act, then she would die whole. Melony Piper swept on, slow and methodical.

The servant women went on gossiping behind her, talking about flour stores and missing hens, about a fat guard who’d tripped down a stairwell and cracked his helm, about how quiet the throne room had gotten since the king had vanished into himself. They weren’t like her; they had husbands, children, lives beyond these walls.

But Melony never looked away from the Iron Throne.

She swept beneath its shadow.

Waited beneath its knives.

Waited for the man who had made the world bleed.

When he returned to sit upon that throne, Melony promised herself again, quiet and steady, that he would not leave it alive.

Chapter 26: EDWELL V

The afternoon sun burned golden beyond the narrow arrow-slit windows, but little of its warmth reached the cold stone walls of the small council chambers. The long, oaken table cast shadows on the floor like prison bars, and the air smelled of ink, sweat, and wax; like it always did on long, difficult days.

Lord Edwell Celtigar, Hand of the King, sat at the head of the table, tall-backed and alone in his authority. His robes were crisp, dark crimson edged with sea-silver, but his face was drawn, the hollows beneath his eyes darker with every week Maegor refused to rule.

He steepled his fingers and looked across the table at the remaining members of the small council.

Lord Butterwell, soft-cheeked and already dabbing sweat from his brow, sat to his right.

Lord Albin Massey, thin and sharp-eyed, beside him.

Ser Harrold Langward, the towering and silent Lord Commander of the Kingsguard, wore his white cloak like a shroud.

Lord Walton Towers of Harrenhal, new and overly proud of it, folded his arms with the bored arrogance of a man who thought he already understood how power moved.

Lastly, Grand Maester Benifer, his chain glinting faintly in the light, already scribbling something onto a parchment with weary fingers.

Maegor's chair remained empty, as it had for every council session since the death, no, the execution, of Queen Tyanna.

Celtigar began.

“My lords,” he said, voice level but clipped, “thank you for coming. Before dinner, we have two urgent matters: the economic unrest from the Great Houses, and the continued preparations for the campaign in the Vale against the Faith Militant and that rebel Qarl Corbray.”

Butterwell gave a sigh like a bellows. “If I might begin, my lord? We’ve had three ravens in the last few days: from Casterly Rock, Riverrun, and Highgarden. All with the same tone: protest, not quite rebellion. But unmistakably angry.”

“Displeased about the taxes?” Edwell asked, though he already knew the answer.

“Aye,” said Benifer, not looking up. “And the levies. Lannister’s words were veiled, but clear: ‘There is only so much gold in the mines, even for kings.’”

“Tully’s was worse,” Massey added with a sneer. “Something about ‘peace born of trust, not force.’ That they were loyal, and they do not feel rewarded for that loyalty.”

“And House Tyrell?” Edwell pressed.

Butterwell winced. “Their steward wrote the letter, not Lord Tyrell himself. Which is its own message.”

Edwell's face remained still, though internally he made the first mark in a mental ledger.

Three houses. Three of the Great Houses.

He looked to Massey. “And those who’ve said nothing?”

Massey snorted. “Cowards, most likely. Or plotters. Some, like Baratheon and Stark, are definitely planning something. Their silence is louder than words.”

Benifer nodded gravely. “The Faith Militant stir unrest. Whispering. Their continued rebellion in the Vale may be small, but its message is clear. The realm is splintering under the weight of its own fear.”

Edwell’s jaw tensed.

Maegor, what are you doing while the realm crumbles around you?

“Very well,” the Hand said aloud. “We’ll draft responses. Assuage the Great Lords’ concerns; blame the Faith Militant and the rebels for the taxes, not the crown. I’ll speak of reforms. Stability. Peace! Show them that someone is still holding the reins.”

Butterwell wiped his brow again. “But what of the king? They’ll want to hear his voice, not yours.”

“Then they’ll be disappointed,” Edwell said flatly. “His Grace remains in mourning. I speak with his voice.”

He did not say for whom Maegor was mourning. He did not say that Maegor was hardly eating. That the king had not so much as looked at the Iron Throne in weeks. That the death of Tyanna, however deserved, had left him fractured. Edwell wasn’t even sure if Maegor would actually fly out on Balerion for the campaign in the Vale when the time came.

Let them all believe the king was watching, waiting, ready.

That illusion was all they had left.

“We’ll manage appearances,” Edwell continued. “We’ll show strength. We must. And the campaign in the Vale will help.”

He turned to Ser Harrold. “How many knights are prepared to ride?”

“Three hundred in King’s Landing,” the Kingsguard said. “Another two hundred from Crownlands. Lord Towers assures me Harrenhal can provide five hundred more.”

Walton Towers gave a proud, shallow smile. “Harrenhal serves the crown.”

Edwell gave him a nod, but no more. “We need more levies before we move against Corbray. The terrain in the Vale favors defenders, and the Faith Militant are dug in.”

Lord Butterwell leaned forward, his voice carrying the thin whine of a man too used to keeping ledgers, not raising armies.

“There isn’t enough coin, my lords. Not for another levy. The current taxes strain the realm as it is. If we press harder, there’ll be riots from the Dornish Marches to the Wall.”

Massey tapped his fingers on the table. “Could we not seek a loan? From the Velaryons or the Hightowers? They could spare us the gold.”

The room broke into low mutters before Massey had even finished.

Lord Towers of Harrenhal snorted. “The Velaryons? They’d rather throw their silver into the sea than fill the crown’s coffers.”

Butterwell nodded quickly. “Aye. Their queen exiled on Dragonstone, and the King’s marriage to her has brought naught but hatred from Lord Admiral Velaryon. Driftmark curses Maegor’s name in their prayers.”

Lord Celtigar looked down and sighed; he tried to forget his own role in that ill-fated marriage every day.

Massey grimaced but persisted. “Then the Hightowers-”

Benifer raised a weary hand. “House Hightower has no tie to this crown now, Lord Massey. Queen Ceryse is dead, may the Mother have mercy on her soul. No issue. No binding tie.”

Lord Towers grunted. “And they are too tightly bound to the Faith and the Starry Sept. You’ll get no coin from Oldtown.”

The room fell into another uneasy silence.

Grand Maester Benifer broke it, his tone thoughtful but grave. “Lord Arryn has promised to raise his own banners to aid in the campaign in the Vale. His levies may offset a lack of our own.”

Ser Harrold Langward frowned behind his beard. “That may not be enough. His aid will not carry us far in those mountains. We need our own levies, we need coin from someone.”

The room was heavy with defeat.

Edwell sat motionless for a moment, fingers drumming once against the table before stilling. He looked from one face to the next: Butterwell’s nervous eyes, Massey’s cautious frown, Towers’ simmering disdain, Benifer’s quiet exhaustion.

Then he straightened his back and spoke.

“Then we will make do with our own coin.”

The words snapped every head in the room toward him.

“I will fund the levies myself,” Edwell said. His voice was even, but it carried through the chamber like the toll of a bell. “Claw Isle has its vaults. My ships have made their share from trade with King’s Landing and the Narrow Sea. The crown will not falter for want of gold, not while I breathe.”

There was a long pause before Lord Massey let out a low whistle. “That’s… generous, my lord Hand.”

Butterwell nodded, wide-eyed. “A great kindness, aye. The realm will remember it, and so will the king!”

Even Benifer looked up from his parchment, expression softening. “Truly, Lord Celtigar, the realm is fortunate to have a servant such as you.”

Only Towers’s lips twitched slightly: half a sneer, half approval. “A noble offer indeed. Let us hope it’s enough to keep the men fed and the swords sharp.”

Edwell inclined his head to the murmured praise, but his smile was tight.

Inside, he felt only the cold weight of inevitability.

It wasn’t generosity.

It was necessity.

If Maegor’s rule collapsed, Edwell’s name would fall with it. His fortune, his lands, his bloodline; all consumed in the firestorm that would follow the king’s fall. He had hitched his life to Maegor’s, bound himself to the dragon’s shadow.

Dragons did not forgive those who let them starve.

The small council had quieted after the announcement of Celtigar’s funding pledge, but the respite was brief. No sooner had Butterwell begun rolling up his parchment than Lord Albin Massey, lean, watchful, his fingers steepled beneath his chin, cleared his throat.

“There is… another matter,” Massey said, his voice thin, but distinct. “One of rumor. But one that, if true, carries consequences far beyond coin.”

The other lords shifted subtly.

Massey went on. “There have been whispers. Within the Keep. That Queen Alyssa is with child. That she carries the king’s heir.”

The words dropped like stones into still water. Even Benifer paused his scribbling.

Lord Towers lifted his head with a dark glint in his eyes.

Ser Harrold glanced sidelong, but said nothing.

Edwell Celtigar didn’t flinch, but inside, his stomach clenched. He hadn’t expected Massey to be the one to bring it up. The man rarely spoke boldly, rarely spoke at all.

Still, the room was watching him.

So Edwell exhaled, leaned forward, and gave the truth.

“Yes,” he said, his voice calm and clear. “Queen Alyssa is pregnant. His Grace confirmed it to me personally.”

A pause.

“She was not exiled to Dragonstone,” he continued. “She was moved there, before the death of Queen Tyanna, to protect her. Tyanna was a threat to her, to her granddaughters, and potentially to the child. The king acted preemptively.”

Towers grunted. “So it just looked like exile.”

Edwell ignored him.

“As for when Queen Alyssa or the twins might return, I have no knowledge of His Grace’s intent. That decision lies solely with the king.”

There was a murmur of acknowledgment.

But the conversation was not finished.

“And the girl?” asked Towers, his voice sharp. “The princess. Alysanne.”

Edwell raised a brow.

Towers folded his arms. “His Grace has been seen with her more. She’s permitted free movement. Her chamber has been moved. And the Grand Maester,” he glanced toward Benifer, “spends much of his time educating her. That is a great deal of effort for a girl who, by all rights, ought to remain a prisoner.”

Benifer, looking weary but still composed, replied softly. “She is not a prisoner, Lord Towers. She is the king’s niece. A girl of thirteen, with no army, no weapons, no plots. A girl who prays, who learns, who has shown no ambition beyond letters and maps.”

“A girl with dragon blood,” Towers snapped. “A girl with dragon blood, Grand Maester. You think rebels will care how gently she reads your scrolls when she takes wing on her dragon? When some brave fool places a crown on her head and declares her Maegor’s better?”

Edwell held up a hand. “Enough.”

The table went quiet.

He turned to Towers, voice edged with warning.

“I understand your concerns, my lord. But we are not here to speculate over the ambitions of a child. Princess Alysanne is being educated as a royal should be. That is the king’s decision. Just as it was the king’s decision to spare her, to educate her, and to keep her within the Red Keep.”

Benifer nodded. “She is bright, respectful, and good-hearted. That she has become close to His Grace is a blessing, not a threat.”

Towers scoffed. “Until someone declares her queen.”

Edwell fixed him with a hard look. “And if someone does, the crown will deal with it. But we do not dictate how His Grace treats his kin. We serve the king, and the king wishes to treat Alysanne as a princess.”

The small council remained silent. The room, for a moment, seemed to breathe again.

Edwell leaned back in his chair, tone cooling.

“If there is to be a new heir, that changes the shape of the future. But that, too, is the king’s prerogative. Not ours.”

None argued with that.

They knew Maegor’s wrath. And if they didn’t fear Celtigar’s; they feared what would happen if no one reined the king’s fire at all. After Tyanna’s death, Edwell knew he was one of the few people Maegor still listened to. The rest of the room knew that too.

The small council meeting continued on. The fire in the hearth had been reduced to coals, and dusk was bleeding into the corners of the stone chamber. The discussion had finally worn thin, like old fabric fraying at the edges. There were no more useful numbers to toss about, no new strategies, only the familiar grind of disagreement and half-made plans.

Lord Celtigar, Hand of the King, stood slowly from his chair, his spine creaking like an old ship’s mast.

“Gentlemen,” he said, tone cool and composed, “we shall adjourn. There is still dinner, and I suspect none of you wish to face it cold.”

Lord Butterwell, still blotting his forehead, stood with a nod. “Of course, my lord Hand. I’ll have the figures for the updated ledgers prepared by morning. Enjoy your supper.”

He left quickly, almost too quickly, as though eager to escape the air of heavy consequence that hung in the room.

Lord Towers rose without a word, only a thin sneer on his mouth as he passed Edwell without so much as a glance.

Benifer offered a polite bow. “Your patience is appreciated, my lord. As always.”

Edwell nodded and watched as the Grand Maester and Ser Harrold Langward, ever silent, left together.

Only one man remained seated.

Lord Albin Massey, the young Lord of Stonedance, still lounged against the back of his high chair, his twisted spine leaning just slightly to one side. He did not speak immediately, just watched Edwell with an curious look.

Edwell narrowed his eyes. “Is there something more, Lord Massey?”

Albin’s pale lips curved faintly. “Only a few questions, my lord. Ones better asked without an audience.”

Edwell slowly returned to his chair, folding his arms across his chest. “Go on, then.”

Albin drummed his fingers lightly along the polished wood. “Do you truly believe the king’s tale, my lord? That Tyanna of the Tower murdered Queen Alys, Queen Ceryse, and the king’s sons? Viserys. Jaehaerys. All of them without his knowledge?”

Edwell kept his face still. “That is the king’s word.”

Albin’s brow lifted slightly. “Yes. But is it yours?”

The words hung in the air like smoke.

Edwell’s tone sharpened. “You tread close to treason, Lord Massey. If you voiced such doubts in the wrong company, His Grace might hang you by your crooked little spine.”

Albin smiled without fear. “Would you hang me, Lord Celtigar? For asking questions?”

Edwell studied him for a moment; this boy-lord with a broken back and a sharper tongue than most twice his age. Finally, he answered, voice colder now: “No. I wouldn’t. But I would advise you to be very careful where you speak such things.”

Albin’s smile faded into something more thoughtful. He leaned forward slightly, eyes keen. “Then allow me to rephrase, my lord. Do you think others, many others, doubt the king’s story? About all these deaths? And… do you know anything more than what His Grace told us?”

A long silence fell.

Edwell leaned back. He did not answer immediately. He stared at the shadows dancing along the walls, let the crackling embers fill the room for a time. Then, quietly, he said:

“I know this: I worked with Tyanna for years. I watched her manipulate men who thought themselves unshakable. I watched her destroy families with words and ruin lords with a whisper. I never trusted her. And I was under no illusions about her capacity for evil.”

Albin said nothing, his fingers still.

“But,” Edwell continued, “I do not know, not truly, whether she killed Ceryse, Alys, or the princes on her own volition. I have only the king’s word.”

Another moment of silence.

“That said,” Edwell went on, quieter now, “I know that the Red Keep has become a graveyard for Targaryen heirs. Even I must wonder how so many more dragons will perish behind the same walls, in the same castle, under the same…”

He paused before saying the final word.

Albin Massey nodded slowly. “That’s what I thought.”

He paused for a moment before continuing. “You’re a careful man, Lord Celtigar. I appreciate that. I’ll keep my questions to myself.”

Edwell stood with him, his voice low but sharp. “Do. Because beyond these walls, words are daggers. And unlike you, most won’t ask before they stab.”

The chamber had grown dark save for the hearth’s dim glow. A servant would arrive soon to relight the wall sconces, but for now, only the red wash of firelight warmed the stones.

Lord Albin Massey remained seated despite his earlier motion to rise. His crooked back was pressed against the high chair, his twisted silhouette thrown across the stone floor like a bent shadow.

He smirked slightly, lips pursed. “Another question, my lord. A less dangerous one.”

Edwell narrowed his eyes but gestured for him to go on.

Albin tilted his head. “Now that it’s plain enough that Maegor won’t take another wife, at least, not soon, are you still seeking a match for one of your daughters?”

A pause and no rebuttal from Lord Celtigar.

Albin smiled with all the subtlety of a fox at a henhouse gate. “I ask because I’m… interested. In a match. If you’re willing.”

Edwell’s brow lifted slightly. “Interested?”

“Your Prudence or Prunella,” Albin said. “I’m not too proud to say it: I’d be honored to marry into House Celtigar. And perhaps, with some patience, there might be grandchildren of better back than myself.”

Edwell gave a brief chuckle, folding his arms, then nodded slowly. “I’m not opposed. You’ve served the realm with diligence and intellect, and I appreciate both. But I’ll need to write to Lady Moya first. She has views on such matters, and I would not slight them.”

Albin grinned at that. “The most powerful man in Westeros, answering to his lady wife. The singers will weep.”

Edwell’s mouth twitched. “You’ll understand when you’re married. May the gods preserve your hide when your wife dislikes your choice of curtains.”

They shared a brief, genuine laugh; an unexpected crack in the usual tension.

But then Albin’s smile faded. Not fully, just enough to become something thinner, more dangerous.

He cast a furtive glance toward the door. Then, softly:

“I do have one last question.”

Edwell’s stomach dropped a fraction. He could feel the shift in the air.

Albin’s voice was low, curious. “It’s been said, and I say this only because it came from someone I trust, that you, Lord Celtigar, make regular visits to an orphanage in the city. Off the Street of Silk. That you… check in on a particular child.”

Edwell froze.

Albin continued, gently. “This source believes the child is yours. Bastard-born, of course, but still… yours.”

Another pause. The fire crackled behind them, throwing orange onto stone.

Albin leaned forward slightly, watching Edwell now like a hawk might watch a trembling hare.

“But another source, one closer to Maegor’s old court, told me something quite different. That the child in that orphanage is not yours at all… but Queen Alys Harroway’s. The very same bastard babe who brought about the fall of her house.”

He tilted his head. “So I ask, not as a threat, and not with any intent to wag tongues. But only out of… curiosity, my lord. Which tale is true?”

Edwell didn’t speak right away.

He felt a flicker of heat; not from the fire, but from the old wound he kept buried beneath duty and titles and self-denial.

The girl. The girl.

The child was real, flesh and blood, and utterly innocent of all the storm she had caused.

And Albin, clever, crooked, irritating little Albin, had sniffed it out like a hound on a blood trail.

Edwell let out a long breath. His tone, when he spoke, was calm, even. But there was steel behind it.

“It’s a long story.”

Albin’s brow quirked. “I have time.”

Edwell didn’t smile. “You don’t have that much time.”

A moment. Then, softer: “There was a child. Alys’s child, a birth that killed her. Not born of Maegor. Not of royal blood. A mistake, perhaps. A desperate thing. A human thing.”

Albin didn’t interrupt.

Edwell went on, quieter now. “The king sent the babe to the black cells to die. The entire House Harroway burned for it, Harrenhal too.”

He looked into the hearth.

“But fire doesn’t always reach every shadow. And sometimes, the king… hears what he wants to hear.”

He did not say how the child survived. Or who had spirited her away. Or why Edwell still visited.

Albin Massey watched him a moment longer. Then he simply nodded.

“I thought it might be something like that,” he said. “Your reputation is all sharp corners and ledgers. But I’ve long suspected there’s a man under that chain of office.”

He stood, slowly, carefully. “Don’t worry, my lord. I’ve no plans to speak of it. What would be the point? There are so many secrets in this castle already. What’s one more?”

Edwell rose with him. “See that you remember that.”

Albin gave a crooked bow. “Good evening, my lord Hand.”

And then, with his slow, limping gait, Lord Massey exited the small council chamber, leaving Edwell alone once again.

The fire cracked in the silence.

And Edwell, alone now, whispered to the empty air:

“She was never supposed to live.”

He wondered if Lord Massey might use this information against him. Edwell doubted it. After all, he hadn’t told Albin the worst part: how he suspected Brie might not be a bastard, how Maegor had been taken in by a lie he had refused to abandon. Many days Edwell wondered if he should tell the king about Brie, but he thought against it. Maegor saw traitors all around him, and Edwell sparing the child might be seen as another sign of treachery. Then again, he might already know and not care.

Edwell straightened up and dusted off his clothes. He would visit the brothel tonight and write Moya about the marriage proposal before bed. She would appreciate that, that the girls were getting offers of marriage. Would she appreciate him visiting whores? Visiting the forgotten child of Alys Harroway? Assisting in the rule of King Maegor? That was something for Edwell to worry about another day.

Chapter 27: MAEGOR V

The clang of hoofbeats on cobblestone echoed through the narrow streets of King’s Landing, the sound muffled only by the sullen mutter of the smallfolk clearing the path. The Kingsguard flanked King Maegor, iron-clad and immense in white plate, and beside him, small in the saddle, her honey-blonde hair tied back carefully, Princess Alysanne rode a dappled mare, posture proud despite the stiffness in her back.

They rode beneath banners of red and black. At a glance, it could have been a father escorting his daughter. At a second glance, one saw the truth: a conqueror and a captive.

Maegor rode in silence, the weight of his black armor bearing down on the destrier beneath him, every movement creaking like some war-forged automaton. His hand never strayed far from Blackfyre, and his expression never softened.

Alysanne had not spoken for some time. That was well. He preferred silence.

But then, her voice, light and uncertain:

“Your Grace… is that the Dragonpit? On the Hill of Rhaenys?”

She pointed with an eager finger toward the rising skeletal dome of dark stone taking shape atop the Hill of Rhaenys, where old ruins had once crumbled.

Maegor did not turn to look at her. “It is.”

He spoke like a man announcing the gallows.

Still, she brightened. “I’ve never seen it before so close. It’s so- so massive. You could fit a hundred dragons there. Well… maybe not Balerion.”

He allowed himself a faint grunt. “It will house all our beasts. Yours as well, when the time comes.”

That made her go still for a moment. “Silverwing…” she whispered. “Will she be brought here?”

Maegor glanced at her. “If you’re to ride her, she’ll need to roost here. This is the future of House Targaryen. The dragons will sleep beneath one roof. The crown’s roof.”

“So… that’s why the Grand Maester is teaching me High Valyrian?” she asked.

He nodded once. “Dragons only heed old tongues. They speak Valyrian, not any language of Westeros. I was taught it from birth.”

“And the riding?” she said, smiling now. “The archery lessons?”

“Yes.”

She turned in her saddle slightly, watching the poor huddle along the street edges, children barefoot, women bent with burdens, men thin as poles. “It’s strange. I spent years in your Holdfast. Now you let me ride beside you through the city. Thank you, Your Grace.”

Her voice was tentative, sincere.

He didn’t answer.

She went on, unbothered by his silence, her voice turning airy, poetic. “It’s lovely to be outside again. The city’s filthy, yes, but alive. It makes me feel alive too.”

He did not reply. He was staring ahead at the Dragonpit, already imagining the size of the chains, the thickness of the walls.

Her voice flowed behind his shoulder like a brook:

“My mother and my nieces. I miss them. I hope you allow them to return to the capital soon.”

Maegor remained focused on the Dragonpit, unconcerned with her talk of mothers and nieces. Alysanne continued to speak anyway.

“I had a dream last night, actually. A strange one.”

That halted his thoughts like a door slammed shut.

He turned to her now, sharply. His black helm was off, but the force of his stare was as heavy as steel.

“Tell me.”

Alysanne blinked. “What?”

“Your dream,” Maegor said. “What did you see?”

Alysanne’s voice took on that half-whispered rhythm of the dreamt. “I was flying… on Silverwing. High, higher than I’ve ever flown. The air was so thin it felt like glass. Below me were mountains… covered in snow. Peaks sharp as knives. Everything was white.”

Maegor narrowed his eyes. “The North?”

She shook her head. “Maybe. Or the Vale? Or… farther. Beyond the Wall, maybe. I don’t know. But it felt real. Not just a dream. It felt like the future.”

Maegor’s horse snorted, sensing the tension in its rider.

The king exhaled slowly. “Good.”

Alysanne blinked. “Good?”

Maegor turned toward her, the sun catching the black scales etched into his plate. “It confirms what I have already decided.”

He paused before saying it, watching her reaction.

“You will accompany me on the campaign in the Vale.”

Her lips parted, surprised, but not in fear. “Truly?”

“Yes. You are a Targaryen. Born of the Conqueror’s blood. And dragon dreams are not to be taken lightly. Not by our kind.”

Alysanne looked toward the half-formed Dragonpit, a flicker of awe and worry in her eyes. “Then… it wasn’t just a dream?”

Maegor’s jaw clenched. “No dream is just a dream, not for us. Mother said that often. And Father believed it too. The future whispers in our blood.”

He looked down at her, expression granite. “You saw yourself flying ahead of the storm. That matters.”

She nodded once, solemnly. “Then I’ll go. I’ll fight, if I must.”

Maegor did not smile, but he was pleased. “You’ll stand with me. Against the Faith Militant, against Corbray, against anyone who would endanger your mother and my child.”

The wind picked up, and Alysanne’s eyes glistened. “My sibling…”

Maegor gave a slow nod. “A child of fire. Like you. Like me. We will secure this realm for them. Together.”

They reached the gates of the Dragonpit: two massive bronze doors, flanked by scaffolds and guarded by knights in dark mail. Masons stood upon platforms, chiseling scaled patterns into the arches above, carving dragons into stone like gods of the sky.

The princess stared in awe. Maegor… only in satisfaction.

He leaned toward her slightly, voice low and sharp now.

“But understand this, Alysanne: loyalty is not a choice. It is a duty. One betrayal can end all of this.”

She turned to him, frowning faintly.

Maegor’s eyes were dark, cold. “Your brother Aegon defied me, your sister Rhaena too. I gave him the chance to serve. They spat on it, and I killed them for it.”

Alysanne’s hands tightened on her reins.

Maegor stared ahead. “Viserys. Jaehaerys. They were… foolish. Misled. They, too, turned their backs on their king.”

He did not elaborate. He didn’t need to.

Alysanne nodded slowly, her face pale but resolute.

“I will be loyal, Your Grace.”

Maegor turned his head to her again, eyes dark. “You will.”

The gates creaked open ahead of them, revealing the dark, yawning cavern of the Dragonpit interior: smoke rising from forges within, the smell of iron and scale hanging in the air.

He spurred his horse forward. “Come. I’ll show you where Silverwing will roost.”

The massive bronze gates of the Dragonpit groaned open before them, their hinges like the bellow of some ancient beast awakening from stone sleep. The sunlight slipped into the opening in thin golden streaks, briefly illuminating the dust-thick air within.

King Maegor rode ahead on his great destrier, the black plate of his armor soaking up the sun like cold obsidian. The hoofbeats echoed in the stone-walled corridors of the half-completed wonder, bouncing off unfinished vaults and scaffolds like distant thunder.

Beside him, Princess Alysanne rode silently, her mare’s steps more tentative now that the air grew close and warm with forge-smoke, stone dust, and sweat.

Inside, the Dragonpit was chaos under control; hundreds of city prisoners, most shirtless and gaunt, labored beneath chains and whips. Overseers from Myr and Volantis, garbed in rich colored silks and harsh accents, barked commands.

Maegor’s voice echoed through it like a decree.

“This will be the great stone stable of House Targaryen.”

He didn’t look at her as he said it, eyes locked ahead on the vaulted heights of the dome.

“A home for dragons, carved from the belly of this hill. Not just for Balerion… but for the beasts to come. Yours. My son’s. And his sons after him.”

Alysanne said nothing, but he could feel her attention sharpen.

They rode slowly across the inner circle, the very heart of the construction: a wide ring of beaten dirt and volcanic sand where the dragons would one day feed, fight, and rut.

Around this core rose towering buttresses, stone columns being shaped with fire-blackened chisels.

“There are forty undervaults,” Maegor continued. “Caves, man-made, dug deep into the hill’s guts. Five times the size of the ones on Dragonstone. The outer doors open to the hillside, should a beast need to fly out directly. The inner doors open here… to the Pit.”

Alysanne’s mare snorted softly, uneasy. The scent of scorched iron, hay, and blood hung in the air.

“Those dragons will be wilder than your Silverwing,” Maegor muttered. “But they will serve. They must.”

He spurred his horse forward a few paces, then slowed again, his voice lowering slightly.

“The workers here, most are criminals. Taken from the dungeons of the city. Traitors. Murderers. Thieves. The masters of craft come from across the Narrow Sea. Myrish for brick and vault, Volantene for domes and tunnel arches.”

He said nothing of the men who had built the Red Keep, those who had known the secrets of its hidden tunnels, its walls-within-walls.

He had butchered them. All of them. Thrown into pits, burned in bonfires. Their bones ground into the very mortar.

The Dragonpit would have no such secrets whispering through its stone.

“Does it please you, Princess?” he asked, his tone heavy and unreadable.

Alysanne looked around in silence. The light of the setting sun streamed through the unfinished ribs of the dome, casting long shadows over the vaults and scaffolds.

“I’ve never seen anything like it,” she said quietly. “It’s… frightening. But grand.”

She hesitated. “Will they be safe here? The dragons?”

Maegor’s mouth tightened slightly. “No dragon is ever truly safe. But here, they will be controlled. Caged, yes. But fed. Housed. Watched.”

He turned to her fully, and for a brief flicker of a moment, his eyes were almost… warm. Not soft, not kind, but approving.

She listened.

She didn’t prattle like a child or tremble like some court lady. She didn’t gawk at the prisoners or weep at the sound of hammer on bone.

She listened.

“You’ll see this place finished,” he said. “You’ll fly from its gates, as our forebears flew from Dragonstone. The blood of Valyria still beats in you. In time, it will show.”

He turned again toward the central ring.

“And when the Faith Militant and their pet lords burn beneath our dragons, the realm will remember where it all began.”

The air grew heavier the deeper they rode into the Dragonpit, warm with the breath of the mountain’s bones, with sweat and soot, steel and straw. The light of day filtered only faintly through the towering ribcage of the unfinished dome. The clatter of hammers and the shouting of overseers dulled behind them as they entered the central ring, a vast circle of sand and earth scorched in places by test fires and dragon bile. Maegor kept his eyes ahead of him.

Alysanne rode at his side, posture upright, face lit by wonder and nerves in equal measure. The girl was quiet, watching everything, absorbing details like ink to parchment.

Then, her voice, light, almost hesitant:

“Will Mother be returning to the Red Keep soon?”

Maegor didn’t answer at first. The horses stepped carefully through the loose, dark sand. Somewhere, deep in the ring, a distant crash echoed; a scaffold collapsing, or a hammer dropped.

Then, with flat finality:

“She will not be returning. Not soon.”

He didn’t look at her. He watched the sand, watched how the hoofprints dissolved behind them, lost in the churned earth of the ring.

“But,” he continued, “you will be seeing her. Within another moon’s turn, we depart for Dragonstone.”

There it was.

Alysanne’s breath caught, a hitch in her throat. She twisted in the saddle slightly, turning toward him with wide, almost disbelieving eyes.

“Dragonstone?” she whispered. “Truly?”

Maegor gave a curt nod. “There. You’ll see your mother. And your nieces. And-” his voice lowered slightly, “Silverwing.”

The girl beamed. Unrestrained, bright. That rarest of things in the Red Keep: honest joy.

She clutched her reins tighter, the color returning to her cheeks. “Thank you,” she said, blinking fast. “Thank you, Your Grace. I’ve dreamed of them for so long. I thought I might neve-”

“Do not cry,” he said, voice flat.

“I’m not!” she said quickly, wiping her eye with her sleeve. “I’m not. Just the a bit of sand, that’s all.”

He said nothing. But he felt it, the flicker of something unexpected in his chest, a kind of peace. Something that had once existed in his mother’s presence, Visenya, long ago. When things had been simple. Before Aenys, before Alys, before Tyanna, before everything had become an endless storm of betrayal, zealotry, rebellion.

Alysanne was not Visenya. But she was blood.

She dreamed like a Targaryen.

She would ride like a Targaryen.

Perhaps, perhaps, she would fight like one.

Maegor let his silence speak. But inside, something wrestled beneath the plate.

Will she betray me too like the rest of Aenys’s spawn?

He’d watched it happen again and again.

Aegon.

Rhaena.

Viserys.

Jaehaerys.

All gone. Burned away, cast aside, trampled under the boot of duty.

Only Alysanne remained.

She was small. Hopeful. Too clever by half. And yes; annoying, with her questions, her dreams, her praying.

But she hadn’t lied to him. Not yet.

She shared her dreams.

She listened.

She called him Your Grace without trembling.

That was worth something. Perhaps more than she knew.

It was Tyanna who’d taught him to feed the fire. To revel in cruelty, to revel in pain. She had nurtured the storm inside him, stoked it with poison kisses and silvered words.

But Tyanna was dead. Her screams had faded beneath the stones of Maegor’s Holdfast.

And this girl… this last daughter of Aenys… when she smiled, the storm grew quiet. Not vanished… never that. But quieter.

Maegor clenched his gauntlet until the joints groaned.

Please, he thought, not for her sake, but for his own.

Don’t be like the rest. Don’t make me do it again.

His mind strayed back to Alyssa; sad beautiful pregnant Alyssa. He would be seeing her soon again as well.

The central ring had gone momentarily quiet, then, the crack of a whip shattered the stillness like thunder. Maegor did not look toward the sound but instead Alysanne’s reaction to it.

Alysanne’s head snapped toward the sound, her mare dancing nervously beneath her. From her saddle she saw a thin man, his back stripped and bleeding, writhing in the dust just beyond the nearest tunnel arch. Two Myrish overseers, slender and cruel in their silk sashes and lacquered belts, were lashing him with furious, rhythmic precision, shouting orders in their sharp, half-sung tongue.

The man was not rising.

He twitched. Moaned. Tried to crawl.

The whips kept coming. Maegor could hearing them cursing the man in Myrish.

“Make him get up!”

“Lazy dog!”

“You will work until you die, and then your bones will hold the mortar!”

The other laborers didn’t look. They didn’t dare.

Alysanne flinched. She turned in her saddle, her voice cracking like the whip itself.

“Your Grace; tell them to stop. They’re going to kill him!”

Maegor turned his gaze slowly to her.

His face was stone. Unmoved.

“He committed his crime. He was sentenced. This is his payment to the realm. His blood buys stone.”

The girl’s jaw clenched. “He’s not buying anything if he dies.”

Maegor’s nostrils flared. He was used to such talk from maesters, septons, soft men. But from her… it grated. Yet also.. it struck.

He turned his head toward the overseers and barked, sharp and sudden, in High Valyrian:

“Let him breathe. Ten minutes. He’s no use to us dead.”

The Myrish men halted, startled. One bowed, speaking quickly in their own tongue; words close enough to High Valyrian that Maegor understood them:

“Forgive us, King. We serve. We did not mean to shame your sight.”

Maegor waved a hand dismissively. The man on the ground was dragged to the shade and tossed a waterskin.

Alysanne gave Maegor a look, both cautious and grateful, a softness blooming behind her eyes that tugged something ancient in his chest, something that remembered Visenya reminding him that he could not rule through force alone.

He didn’t meet her gaze.

“You think this will be built without death?” he said, voice lower now, rougher. “The Red Keep cost thousands. This will cost hundreds more. Every stone soaked in sweat and blood. You think Dragonstone came from goodwill?”

He gestured around the pit, toward the scaffolds and chains, the dark vaults hollowed into the hill like a wyrm’s nest.

“Castles are tombs before they are homes. You want dragons? Thrones? Power? This is the cost. This is why I brought you here, to show you.”

Alysanne didn’t argue. She only watched the man being dragged to shade. Then, quietly, she said:

“I’m used to death, Your Grace. I’ve lived with it ever since my father died.”

She looked up at him then, eyes harder than before. Not angry. Not weeping. Resolved.

“That doesn’t mean I like it.”

Maegor said nothing for a long moment.

Then he turned his horse away from the spectacle and muttered:

“Good. I’d rather you hate it than fear it.”

They rode deeper into the Dragonpit, where shadows thickened and the forge-fire glowed red behind the iron bones of the dome. In that glow, Maegor, for the first time in many moons, felt something unfamiliar stir beneath his armor.

Not warmth.

Not sentiment.

Not yet.

Chapter 28: ROGAR II

The clang of steel echoed off the weather-worn walls of Storm’s End, each blow a thunderclap in miniature beneath the cloudless blue of a rare clear sky. The Baratheon brothers, brawny, broad-shouldered, blood of Durran and Orys both, moved like bulls across the packed dirt of the training yard.

Lord Rogar Baratheon, armored in storm-dark steel etched with golden stags, was a tower in motion, each of his sword swings carrying the force of a charging warhorse. Sweat gleamed on his dark brow, and his breath came in huffs, but his footing remained iron-solid.

Across from him danced Ser Borys Baratheon, his youngest brother, leaner and faster but just as wild. His jet-black hair was tied back with a strip of leather, his grin sharp and crooked as he circled. The edge of his sword tapped against Rogar’s vambrace with annoying precision: quick, sharp, testing.

“Too slow, brother,” Borys taunted, breathless with laughter. “You’re fighting like a man who’s had too much wine and too little woman; though I suppose you’ve had plenty of both.”

Rogar didn’t answer. He just came at him harder.

A roar, and then steel met steel, again and again, Rogar hammering down with heavy two-handed strikes, forcing Borys to retreat step by step toward the edge of the yard. Each impact jarred through Borys’s arms; he was quick, but even quick men falter when battered like a drum.

“Too stupid to answer?” Borys goaded again between parries. “Or too winded to talk? Been too long since you took up your sword, my lord, or is it just harder with all that weight on your back? Maybe you’ve been too busy with your other sword?”

That earned him a grunt and a shoulder-check that nearly knocked him off his feet.

“Hah!” Borys yelped as he stumbled back. “Didn’t think you remembered how to move that fast!”

Rogar pressed in. Two crushing blows, high then low, made Borys curse and drop to one knee, sword flying from his fingers and skidding across the dirt.

There was a heartbeat of silence.

Then both men burst out laughing.

Rogar reached down, grinning like a wolf, and hauled Borys up by the arm as if he weighed nothing.

Borys got up and looked Rogar in the face, smiling. “I’ll beat you one day, Rogar.”

“You’ll beat me when I’m grey and blind,” Rogar growled, clapping his brother on the back hard enough to stagger a squire. “And not a day before.”

“I’ll take that bet,” Borys shot back, retrieving his sword and shaking dust from his breeches. “You’ll be grey by next week if you keep trying to bed every maid in the castle.”

Rogar barked a laugh, wiping sweat from his brow. “Gods, I hope so.”

Several knights and servants were watching from the sidelines… especially the ladies who Rogar always offered a wink to. The other Baratheon brothers, Garon, Ronnal, and Orryn, watched from the steps nearby, shouting encouragements and insults, tankards of watered ale in hand.

This was the rhythm of House Baratheon: brothers brawling, mocking, bleeding, and laughing, just as they had as boys in this same yard.

But behind Rogar’s laughter, behind the thick cords of muscle and the clang of steel, a darker resolve smoldered. The storm was coming. And next time he raised a sword, it wouldn’t be for sport. It would be for a king’s throat.

The ring of steel and the echo of laughter had barely faded when the click-click of boots on stone heralded new arrivals.

From the arched passage leading out of the keep strode Lady Jena Morrigen, black-haired and sharp-eyed in a green riding dress, trailed by a knight in weathered mail: her brother, Ser Gyles Morrigen, tall, lean, and severe. His armor bore the black crow of House Morrigen, but there was no mistaking the shadow behind his name: nephew to Ser Damon the Devout, once Grand Captain of the Warrior’s Sons and slain by Maegor the Cruel himself in that cursed Trial of Seven.

Jena’s steps were brisk and sure as she walked towards Rogar. She was not a lady prone to hesitation.

“My lords,” she called brightly, nodding to each Baratheon brother in turn: Garon, Orryn, Borys, and her husband Ronnal, who offered her a tired smile. “Forgive the intrusion, but several birds have come squawking for Lord Rogar.”

Her hand extended, clutching four rolled parchments bound with distinct seals: silver, green, red, gold.

Rogar, still catching his breath, reached out and took them from her. He recognized the crests immediately: Hightower, Velaryon, Lannister, Tully. Heavy names. Important names. He had written all of them to inquire on the state of the realm, and they had responded rather quickly.

Jena’s eyes sparkled with mischief. “So many letters from Great Lords? Tell me, are we hosting a tourney, or are you planning a wedding feast without telling the rest of us?”

That earned a round of chuckles from Garon and Orryn, and even Ronnal let out a dry huff of amusement.

But Borys, still red-faced from his defeat and never one to suffer jesting from women, snapped:

“It’s none of your concern, Lady Jena. Perhaps leave the lord’s business to lords.”

The yard quieted, the laughter snuffed like a candle.

Jena blinked, her expression turning stony. Then she sighed; not surprised, only tired.

“Right. I forget sometimes. You lot never had sisters.”

With that, she turned on her heel and strode off toward the keep, her skirt snapping behind her like a banner.

Ser Gyles, stoic until now, turned to Borys, frowning deeply. “You’re a grown man, not a kennel hound. Show some dignity when speaking to my sister.”

“She’s my wife, Borys,” Ronnal added, brushing dust from his sleeve. “Maybe try not snarling at her every time she breathes.”

Borys muttered under his breath and sheathed his sword.

But Rogar wasn’t listening. Not to the squabble. Not to the wind rising from the sea.

He held the letters in one gauntleted hand, his gaze fixed on the seals like they were king’s coin and he a starving beggar.

Progress.

The Hightowers. The Velaryons. The gold lions of the Rock. The trout of Riverrun.

They were writing back to him. That meant they were watching, waiting, weighing their chances with the newest challenger to King Maegor.

Rogar Baratheon.

The stag who might lead the storm that broke the dragon.

Rogar walked away from his brother Borys and took a seat on the steps with his other brothers. He glanced at the training yard: the dust, the blood, the sweat on his brothers’ brows. The sun still shone bright, but the air had grown heavier; thick with sweat and heat and the scent of oil from the sparring swords.

“Come on, then!” Ser Borys called, stalking after Rogar again with his blade resting on his hip. “One more bout, eh? Best of three!”

Rogar didn’t even rise from the steps. He was already unbuckling his gauntlet, his attention drawn elsewhere; far more valuable than another bruised rib.

“No. I’ve fought enough today. These need reading.”

He tapped the sealed parchment tucked beneath his arm. That earned a frustrated grunt from Borys.

“Fine,” Borys muttered, eyes narrowing, “if my lord brother is too busy playing maester, maybe Ser Gyles will give me a proper match?” He cast a sideways glance at the knight of House Morrigen, whose face was carved in quiet stone.

Gyles answered without hesitation, sliding the leather from his sword grip.

“Gladly.”

There was no jest in his tone.

The two men circled, steel drawn, boots scuffing the training yard’s dust. Borys’s grin was wolfish; Gyles; calm, watchful, silent as a waiting storm.

But Rogar Baratheon had tuned them out already.

He sat on the sun-warmed stone of the steps beside Ronnal and Orryn, the distant clash of steel behind him like a drumbeat to thought.

The first scroll he cracked open bore a red lion stamped in wax: House Lannister.

Lord Tyman wrote that he would continue paying the crown’s tax, but noted, curtly, that the gold mines of the Westerlands are not infinite, and his bannermen growing restless. He opined on whether the crown intended to reimburse those who’ve raised men to defend their lands during Maegor’s wars.

A veiled complaint. But it was a beginning. Lannisters rarely wrote unless coin was involved.

Rogar moved on.

The second seal was silver, the beacon and tower of Oldtown. Lord Donnel Hightower. His letter was longer, and angrier.

He made clear his fury over the death of his aunt, Queen Ceryse, even if Maegor had executed Tyanna for it. Donnel questioned why the Red Keep had become a tomb for queens and princes both, and whether Westeros still had a king or merely a butcher with a crown.

Rogar smiled darkly at that. Hightower’s grief was the stuff rebellion was built from, righteous and sharp.

The third was the trout of Riverrun; Lord Prentys Tully.

Measured, but no less displeased. The Riverlords had paid their dues. But Prentys wrote of swelling discontent among the minor lords, of roads still harassed by Poor Fellows, and a sense that the realm had lost its shepherd. His final words were carefully chosen but indicated… dissatisfaction.

Rogar’s fingers tightened around the parchment.

They were waiting. All of them.

Waiting for a match. A banner. A call.

They were looking to him.

The crowd behind him hooted suddenly; Borys and Gyles locked blades, spinning in a flurry of motion, sweat flying. Gyles landed a sharp blow to Borys’s thigh, and Borys cursed aloud, backpedaling.

Rogar didn’t even look.

He reached for the final letter.

The sea-green seal of House Velaryon.

Lord Daemon Velaryon. Lord of the Tides. Admiral of the Royal Fleet. Kinsman by marriage to the king, and man of silent influence, whose coffers could feed armies and whose ships could blockade the Blackwater.

Rogar unrolled the parchment slowly after he open the seal, the edges stiff with salt and wax. The paper bore the fine script of Driftmark’s lord, sharp and seaworthy, clean and precise.

His eyes swept over the opening lines. Polite. Gracious. But pointed.

“To Lord Rogar Baratheon of Storm’s End,

You honor House Velaryon with your candor and trust. As kin to Queen Alyssa, it shames me that we have allowed her to remain a prisoner in all but name. My house is united in the belief that she and her granddaughters must be liberated, for their sake and for the future of Westeros.”

So far, so good. Rogar’s fingers gripped the edge tighter.

Then came the next paragraph, clean and cold:

“However, before any sword is drawn or ship unmoored, you must be aware: my sources on Dragonstone speak of changes.

King Maegor intends to come to Dragonstone himself; soon. Not alone. With Princess Alysanne. Allegedly, to train her with her dragon, Silverwing, and prepare her for the campaign to come in the Vale against the Faith Militant.”

Rogar’s jaw clenched.

Maegor himself?

That was… dangerous. But also, perhaps, an opportunity. If Alysanne came to Dragonstone, perhaps she could be rescued too?

Then came the third paragraph, and Rogar nearly hissed aloud.

“Furthermore, I am told, though I pray it false, that my dear sister Queen Alyssa is again with child. And that this child belongs to the king.”

“Should she carry to term, Maegor may have a son. A new heir. A living Targaryen male to justify all his madness.”

Rogar’s eyes darkened.

A new heir. Of Maegor’s blood. That would change everything.

Not only did it complicate his already fragile alliance-building; it meant the longer Alyssa remained in the dragon’s clutch, the more secure Maegor’s legacy became.

A child by rape or force was still a claim, and one that many lords of Westeros would rally around. One of the many rallying-points against Maegor had always been that he had no heir of his own body.

But Daemon’s letter did not falter. It continued, unwavering.

“Do not mistake me, Lord Rogar: these revelations do not change our course. They merely raise the stakes. Alyssa must be rescued, and Maegor must fall. You are not alone in this cause.

House Velaryon stands ready, as we ever have, when the sea turns black and the storm rises. Please keep us informed of your plans.”

The letter ended with Daemon Velaryon’s unmistakable signature; a looping, tidal swirl of ink. Clean. Determined. Final.

Rogar stared at the parchment a moment longer.

Behind him, the clang of blades rang out again; Borys and Gyles locked in another ferocious exchange, sweat flying from their brows.

But Rogar no longer heard them.

He folded the letter carefully and tucked it into his belt. Then he rose.

“He’s going to Dragonstone,” he murmured to Ronnal, who looked up in surprise.

“Maegor. He’s bringing Alysanne with him.”

Ronnal’s eyes widened. “Gods…”

“And Alyssa is with child.”

Orryn let out a soft curse. “A trueborn heir of Maegor? Seven hells.”

“Likely. But it doesn’t matter.” Rogar turned toward the sea, jaw clenched. “The plan moves forward. But we strike faster. We will discuss this more later.”

The yard erupted as Ser Gyles knocked Borys flat with a precise sweep of his sword, the younger Baratheon’s feet tangled beneath him, his blade clattering loudly to the side.

A few gasps rose from the watchers; gasps quickly followed by low hisses. A Baratheon bested in his own yard was no small thing. Only Ronnal, ever loyal to his wife’s kin, let out a whoop and clapped loudly.

Borys rolled to his side, growling, sweat and dust streaking his face, eyes burning with fury, not just at Gyles, but at himself.

Rogar stood calmly and handed the letters to Orryn beside him, his face firm.

“Hold these. I need to move.”

There was too much in his mind: the letters, the war to come, Maegor, the child Alyssa carried. His blood was up. He needed his blade. To feel rather than think.

Even as Borys was already barking at Gyles again-

“Another round! Come on, crow boy, one more! Wasn’t even trying that time!”

Rogar stepped between them, voice like iron.

“He’s done. You fight me now.”

Borys blinked. For a moment, real anger sparked behind his eyes, his pride battered and bruised. But Ronnal and Orryn, never ones to pass up a moment to needle their hot-tempered brother, began to mock him immediately.

“You’ll lose again, Borys.”

“Maybe let the grown men play now.”

“Careful, you might start a collection of defeats.”

Borys let out a low growl but stormed off to sit beside them, sullen, wiping blood from his mouth.

Ser Gyles stepped back, readjusting the grip on his sword with that same cool demeanor that had won him the bout. “My lord,” he said simply.

Rogar nodded. He drew his blade.

They circled, slow and deliberate, the sun now hanging low above the ramparts, casting long golden spears of light across the packed yard.

And that’s when he saw her.

Lady Jena Morrigen, returned from the tower, now standing beside Ronnal, whispering something softly with a hand brushing her husband’s arm.

She didn’t even look toward the match.

That stung more than he liked to admit.

Smart. Confident. Poised. Beautiful in her own quiet, composed way. She wore her nobility without artifice, without needing a dozen jewels or flattery from court hangers-on. She could ride, could read, had sharp eyes and a sharper tongue. And she was married to Ronnal.

Borys, even, with his snarling temper and crude jokes, had a wife who loved him. Orryn, who barely spoke, had three children now.

And Rogar, Lord of Storm’s End, muscle-bound, respected, desired by maids and widows alike, had nothing.

No wife. No child. No legacy. Only a dead wife he hadn’t loved and memories he didn’t want.

It wasn’t envy exactly. It was something hungrier. Something darker. Something that whispered of how unfair it was for his brothers to have these things while he bore the weight of rebellion and the responsibility of the Seven Kingdoms on his shoulders.

Jena’s quiet laugh drifted across the yard.

Rogar turned back to Gyles.

She’ll watch now, he thought.

They all will.

The two men circled again. Gyles, ever light on his feet, nodded and struck first, low, a testing blow. Rogar blocked it, pushed forward, struck back, steel on steel. The clang rang out loud across the stone.

It was a beautiful spar, measured, precise, two deadly men exchanging blows, each gauging the other. Gyles moved like water, dancing around Rogar’s heavy swings. But Rogar pressed harder, his blade cleaving through the air with unstoppable strength.

He wasn’t just fighting Gyles.

He was fighting Maegor.

Fighting every lord who’d yet to answer his letters.

Fighting the fate that had left him childless.

Fighting for her eyes.

He caught Gyles with a sudden shift, low feint, then twist, the flat of his sword driving into the man’s ribs. Gyles stumbled, not down, but winded. Rogar surged forward, forcing Gyles back with a brutal barrage of two-handed strikes that only a bull could deliver.

Steel clanged. Dust flew.

Finally, with a loud crack of blades locking, Gyles’s sword went flying.

The Morrigen knight fell to a knee. Panting. Beaten.

The yard roared.

Borys cursed under his breath. Orryn let out a low whistle. Ronnal laughed. Even Gyles chuckled and raised his hand.

“I yield,” he said, and bowed his head.

Rogar stood tall. He wasn’t breathing hard. The sweat glistened on his shoulders, his chest heaving, eyes scanning-

Jena, turned now. Watching. Eyes on him.

The sword hung heavy in his hand, the warmth of sweat and exertion steaming off his skin in the cooling air. Rogar stood tall in the fading sunlight, his chest rising slow and deep, gaze locked on Ser Gyles as the knight rose from one knee.

He could feel the ache in his shoulder from that last exchange, a real match, not just play, but he welcomed it. Pain was honest. It reminded him he was alive.

Rogar lowered his sword and offered a short nod.

“You fight like your father,” he said, not unkindly. “Clean. Unrelenting.”

Gyles, still catching his breath, dipped his head.

“You don’t lose like a man who’s used to it,” Rogar said. Then, quieter: “Well fought.”

Without another word, Gyles turned and strode back to the sidelines, where Lady Jena awaited, still beside her husband. She murmured something to Gyles, touched his arm lightly, smiled. Ronnal gave Gyles a hearty slap on the back.

Rogar watched them. He shouldn’t have, but he did. Watched the closeness. The ease. The familiarity.

Then, cheers broke the tension.

The gathered men of Storm’s End, knights, squires, servants, called out to their lord, clapping, stomping, raising tankards.

“Storm-Lord!”

“Well struck, my lord!”

“A warrior true!”

And then, of course, there were the maids.

Three of them came flitting through the yard like flowers chasing sunlight: Lanna, Myrielle, and Jocey, all flushed, giggling, each with a basin or rag in hand they didn’t bother pretending to use.

Lanna, bold as ever, sidled up to him, hand brushing his arm through the thin wool padding.

“You swing your sword better than any man I’ve ever seen, my lord,” she purred.

Myrielle joined in, biting her lip.

“I’ll bet he’s just as strong with his hands…”

Jocey laughed behind her fingers, eyes alight with admiration.

Rogar gave them each a smile, sharp and practiced, his voice rich and rough from the fight.

“And what good would strong hands be without someone soft to hold?”

They tittered like girls, and he let them, let his voice deepen, his smile sharpen, fingers brushing an exposed wrist here, a waist there; every touch genial, every word familiar. Indeed, they were familiar; he’d slept with all three before.

But his mind?

His mind was back on the stone steps, watching Jena’s hand still resting on Gyles’s arm, watching the soft crinkle of her eyes as she smiled at someone else.

He felt like a drunk with a cup of water.

She hadn’t watched the fight.

Or she had… and turned away.

That stung worse than any wound Gyles might have given him.

He let the girls hang off him, let the cheers wash over him, let his knights come forward and offer praise.

But inside, he was gnawing on the bone of himself.

A moment ago he had been the warrior-lord, the man of action and fire, of passion and promise. But all that faded when he looked back at Ronnal and Jena.

He could win the war. Drag Maegor out of the Red Keep. Bring the Seven Kingdoms to heel.

But he had no one like that.

Not yet.

You stupid bastard, he thought, a bitter smile twitching in place of joy. You’re too old for daydreams, too scarred for courtly longing. And she’s your brother’s wife. Gods damn you. Find your own highborn lady.

He let his arm slip around Lanna’s waist, tugging her gently closer. She squeaked, delighted.

But it felt hollow.

Still... he smiled like it wasn’t. Still, he played the part.

You need to fuck. Or fight. Or get married again.

Anything but rot here, a childless lord in his father’s hall while dragons rule the sky.

A storm was coming.

And he would ride it, burn in it, or drown trying.

But first… he’d remind the women of Storm’s End who their lord was, even if just for tonight.

Chapter 29: ALYSANNE VI

The air smelled like oiled leather, trampled dirt, and string-drawn sweat. The twang of bowstrings sang intermittently through the cool air, broken by the occasional bark of a guard or the clatter of wooden shafts against target boards. The barracks of the Red Keep was always a busy place, especially under Maegor.

Princess Alysanne Targaryen, daughter of King Aenys, niece of King Maegor, stood with her braid tucked back, face flushed but focused. The plain brown leathers she wore felt strange compared to silk, but they moved better. She could feel the tension in her back, the strain in her arms.

No stays. No corset. No flowing fabric to get tangled in. Just her, the bow, and the target.

Another arrow notched. She drew. It still hurt a little to pull the bowstring, but Alysanne had mostly gotten used to it.

“Grip, don’t squeeze,” muttered Rory, a barrel-chested Riverlander guard with a scar down one cheek and coarse hands. “It’s not a dagger, Your Grace. Let it lie in the palm, like a lover.”

“Hold your tongue!” Septa Keira yelled out, never too far away.

Alysanne bit back a laugh at the phrasing and adjusted, centering her breath.

She released.

Thwack. The arrow flew, trailed slightly, and struck the left rim of the straw-stuffed dummy.

A miss. Not a failure, but not what she wanted.

She let out a soft grunt of frustration, but behind her, several guards cheered all the same; not loud, not mocking. Just impressed. Supportive.

“Better,” Rory grunted, squinting at the shot. “Still pulling too hard on the string. You’re throwing your aim. But you didn’t drop the bloody bow this time, so gods be praised.”

Alysanne gave him a small, crooked smile. “Progress.”

“Aye. Not a proper archer yet, but progress.”

Nearby, Septa Keira stood beneath a small awning, arms crossed, her ever-present scowl deepening. The single dark eye not hidden by her pale veil flicked between the guards and Alysanne with quiet suspicion.

“Princess,” she called, “you’ve been out long enough. Perhaps it’s time to rest, say your midday prayers. Perhaps a book?”

Alysanne didn’t turn.

“I’d rather keep the bow, Septa. A few more.”

Keira sighed through her nose but said nothing. Alysanne could feel her irritation radiating through the yard.

She knocked another arrow. The guards, half in armor, half lounging with helms off, watched with a strange kind of reverence. Most of them had only ever seen a Targaryen on a throne or a dragon. Now, one stood among them, loosing arrows with blisters on her fingers and hair clinging to her damp temples.

Maegor had suggested this. It had been one of his more unusual commands: “Learn the bow. You’ll see why.”

He had never told her why. He rarely did. But she liked the range. Liked the simplicity. The focus. But a part of her, a dark, disloyal, quiet part, wanted him to train her to fight properly. Not Rory. Not guards who shuffled their feet when she missed. Maegor.

He’s a killer, she reminded herself. But he’s a warrior too. The greatest one alive. He could teach me more than books or bows ever could.

She lifted the bow again, ignoring the ache in her fingers.

“One more,” she said aloud, picking up another arrow.

Rory just grunted approval. The guards went quiet. Keira said nothing.

She drew. Held. Breathed. She loosed.

Thwack.

The arrow struck dead center, pinning straw through board, quivering gently in the bullseye like it knew it belonged there.

A collective cheer broke out from the guards: more genuine now, not the half-hearted humoring of a royal. There was a note of respect in it. Even Rory, typically stingy with praise, let out a sharp whistle.

“Well then,” he said, squinting at the target like it had personally offended him. “Seems the dragon lass has claws after all.”

Even Septa Keira, despite herself, clapped twice: soft, sharp sounds like someone closing a book. The look on her face was hardened, but Alysanne swore there was something almost proud in her single visible eye.

Alysanne exhaled, lowering the bow. The tension in her shoulders eased slightly, but inside… her thoughts were still a whirlwind.

Dragonstone.

The word echoed like a distant bell in her mind. She would see it soon; the black castle of her ancestors, carved from the bones of volcanoes and shaped by Valyria’s shadow. It had been years since she’d walked its halls, since she’d touched Silverwing’s warm silver scales since…

Mother…

Alysanne swallowed, lips pressed into a hard line.

She wanted to be excited. She should be.

To see Alyssa, to see Aerea and Rhaella, her little nieces, who must’ve grown so much in the last few moons.

But Maegor would be there too. Maegor would always be there.

His shadow clung to her future like ivy to stone.

He’d been… different, lately. Not kinder, Maegor had no kindness in him, but more measured. He let her train, let her study, let her breathe. He spoke to her like she was something to be shaped, not broken. But even that was unsettling.

Because deep down, Alysanne knew the truth:

Targaryens were dragons. And Maegor was the biggest, blackest, oldest beast of them all.

He killed Aegon. He killed Rhaena. He might have killed Viserys and Jaehaerys too. He married Mother. He wears armor like skin.

She had smiled at him. Laughed with him, even. Let him think she trusted him. Maybe she almost had. But the fear was always there, crouched in the back of her thoughts. Not just fear of him… but of herself, too.

What if she was growing like him? What if this…

The bow, the thrill of the shot, the desire to ride, to fight-

What if that was the fire Maegor had always embraced?

What if it truly ran in the blood like Maegor said?

Alysanne drew another arrow from the quiver and notched it with practiced ease. Rory stepped back, folding his arms, watching in silence now.

Her arms ached. Her back stung with effort. But she could feel her heartbeat steadying, her breath coming slow and even.

She wasn’t doing this to impress Maegor. Or Rory. Or Keira.

She was doing this for herself.

If war was coming, if treachery lived in the walls of Maegor’s Holdfast or Dragonstone, then she would meet it not as a frightened girl but as a Targaryen.

“One more,” she said.

Her voice was sure now.

She drew.

Held.

Let go.

Thwack.

Another perfect shot.

The guards cheered again. Louder this time.

Alysanne smiled.

It didn’t last long. But it felt real.

That feeling died the instant Alysanne heard the sound of him approaching. Heavy steel boots on stone, only one man sounded like that. She slowly turned her head towards the noise.

The clatter of boots scraped against the stone as Maegor Targaryen, the Black Dread reborn in flesh, neared the range with a clutch of men at his heels: Lord Towers of Harrenhal, armored knights bearing various sigils, squires young and wide-eyed with fear, a few highborn hangers-on who clung to the king like moths to the flame.

Even in daylight, Maegor gleamed like midnight, black steel catching the sun but never surrendering to it. His crimson cloak dragged like a wound. The silent, heavy authority of him crushed every voice into silence.

Guards rose.

Septa Keira bent her head.

Squires bowed low.

Only Alysanne remained upright, bow lowered but gaze steady.

Her fingers twitched around the leather grip.

Don’t flinch. Don’t blink. Don’t look small. Don’t show fear.

Maegor approached, steps deliberate, boots grinding dust beneath him. His scowl, as ever, sat permanent upon his face, stone carved into cruelty, but he said nothing at first. His dark lilac eyes, almost black, shifted from Alysanne to the target dummy, its chest now riddled with arrows like the corpse of a hedgehog.

He stared.

Then, gruffly:

“You’re learning quickly.”

It wasn’t warm, not by any stretch, but it wasn’t dismissal either.

Alysanne took the moment, that flicker of space Maegor left open, and filled it. Her voice was even.

“Thank you, Your Grace. I’ve been practicing, as you suggested.”

He grunted. Turned again to the target.

“Perhaps you are as clever as they say. If you ride a dragon half as well as you loose a bow, we’ll make something of you on Dragonstone.”

The praise, measured, cruel-edged, but still praise, struck like a spark in her chest.

Her mouth opened before her caution could stop it.

“Then… might I train as a squire?”

The silence hit like a thunderclap.

Lord Towers stiffened. The guards froze mid-breath. Septa Keira’s face blanched visibly beneath her veil. Even the squires, still kneeling in dust, looked up in stunned horror.

But Alysanne kept going, her words tumbling now, clumsy but earnest:

“Like my brother Viserys did with you. I want to swing a sword. Ride. Fight… like Queen Visenya. I want to be useful to the crown. To you, Your Grace. Not just-”

Maegor’s scowl deepened, but it was no longer just his usual mask of rage.

His face flickered, once, with shock, real and raw. As if the girl had thrown a spear directly into his gut. Then, it twisted into something darker.

A muscle in his jaw ticked.

He said nothing.

The silence pressed down like a mountain.

Alysanne stood frozen. Her heart pounded beneath the laces of her leather jerkin. Inside her mind, the cracks were forming fast:

I said too much. I invoked Visenya. And Viserys. The ones he-

Her voice had been too eager.

The silence was suffocating, pressed in on all sides by armor and heat and fear. Princess Alysanne stood as still as stone beneath the black gaze of her uncle, heart thudding in her chest, fingers sticky with sweat. The last of her breath had fled when Maegor looked like he was about to speak. But now… now she forced herself to speak first.

“Forgive me, Your Grace,” she said, voice quiet but even, trained from prayers. “I did not mean to overstep.”

She could feel Septa Keira’s eyes boring into her from the sideline, a silent I told you so.

One of the younger guards, emboldened by the pause, spoke up with a laugh under his breath:

“Not that it matters. No girl could ever be a squire.”

A few more snorted behind him.

That was when Maegor’s hand rose. The laughter died. Not silenced by embarrassment, but by fear. His gauntleted hand hung in the air like a blade waiting to fall. Then it clenched slowly, deliberately, into a fist.

“No,” he said. “She can have her chance.”

Gasps fluttered through the yard.

Alysanne’s heart skipped. Her lips parted, breath caught between disbelief and a tiny, treacherous glimmer of hope.

Was he…

Was he actually going to let her try?

Maegor turned to the ring of knights and squires, sweeping his gaze across the lot like a hawk spotting prey.

“You lot have practice swords, don’t you? A large stick perhaps?”

A few chuckles broke out again, then halted, as men realized Maegor wasn’t joking.

A guard moved quickly, eager to stay useful, and returned with two wooden training swords. They weren’t carved elegantly, just stout planks bound in hide, meant to bruise and break teeth, not dazzle a tourney crowd.

Maegor turned, scanning the crowd again. His black steel pauldron creaked as he raised a hand and jabbed a finger outward.

“You. Towers boy. You’ll fight her.”

A lad, barely fourteen, pale and sandy-haired, flinched like he’d been struck. His lips trembled as he rose. Lord Towers, arms crossed beside the king, didn’t so much as blink.

“My son will obey,” he said sharply. “He’ll do his duty.”

The boy said nothing. He stepped into the circle.

Septa Keira, at last, could remain silent no longer.

“This is madness!” she cried. “Alysanne is a princess, Your Grace… this is beneath her. Unnatural. Wrong!”

Maegor didn’t turn.

He just spoke, voice like a sword drawn slow.

“If you speak again, Septa… I’ll take your tongue.”

A hush fell like a axe.

Keira froze. Hands clenched into fists at her side, eye burning, but she said nothing more.

Alysanne couldn’t breathe.

The crowd moved now, guards and knights forming a tight circle around the yard of the barracks. Boots kicked the dust clear. A squire tossed one of the wooden swords toward her, and she caught it awkwardly.

It was heavier than she expected. Her fingers barely wrapped around the hilt.

Across from her, the Towers boy held his practice sword with more confidence, but his face was twisted in conflict: ashamed, angry, unsure.

Alysanne’s stomach churned. Her throat was dry as sand.

This was a mistake. A terrible, dangerous, stupid mistake. She was a girl in leathers, holding a stick, trying to prove herself to a man who’d killed her brothers and married her mother.

She hated him.

She wanted to impress him.

She hated that she wanted to impress him.

But somewhere beneath the fear, the fire was awake.

A Targaryen fire, hot and stubborn and proud.

Let them see I’m not weak.

Let him see I will not yield.

Maegor stepped into the circle, between them. His voice was clear and cold.

“You fight until one of you yields. If either runs… you forfeit.”

Then he turned his back, walked to the edge of the circle, and raised his hand.

The yard held its breath.

Alysanne raised the sword.

Her knees felt soft. Her shoulders tight. But her grip… her grip was solid.

She looked at the boy across from her, he looked back.

Neither wanted this.

But it didn’t matter.

This was her chance.

Maegor’s voice rang out:

“Begin.”

The yard was quiet as the fight began. It was almost over before it began.

The circle of onlookers, knights, squires, guards, and servants, watched like men before a pyre, unable to look away as the fire consumed what had once been something innocent.

Alysanne’s heart pounded in her ears, drowning out the murmurs and Keira’s distant weeping. Her arms trembled. Her knees ached. Her shoulders felt like lead beneath the welts rising rapidly along her flesh.

The wooden sword in her hand was shaking. Or maybe it was just her hand.

She could taste blood in her mouth.

Across from her, the Towers boy stood, panting, sword lowered but not dropped. His face, still boyish, was pale, sickened, confused. His knuckles were white on the grip. He had done as he was told, struck her as commanded, beaten her into the dirt in front of kings and commoners.

He hadn’t wanted to. Not really. But he had.

Because Maegor was watching.

The blows had come fast after her first failed strike. She had never even held a sword before, not even a wooden one; why did she think that would work? He’d parried with the ease of training, then retaliated like a drill: arm, shoulder, wrist, ribs. Each hit felt like thunder cracking against her bones. Her breath fled her lungs when he caught her thigh. She stumbled. He struck again.

She went down, but she hadn’t yielded.

Still, he’d kept coming.

Another strike. Another. The yard had blurred into light and dust and pain. She’d heard Lord Towers’s voice barking from the edge:

“Keep going!”

And then…

The weeping.

Septa Keira.

She wasn’t screaming. Wasn’t pleading anymore. Just that dry, wrenching sob of someone watching a child break and not allowed to stop it.

That sound pierced deeper than any wooden sword.

And yet…

Alysanne still tried to rise.

The bruises throbbed along her limbs. One elbow stung with raw splinters where she’d been hit repeatedly. Her hair had come undone, tangling around her face. Her lip was split. Her right knee gave a warning throb, don’t rise, girl, don’t rise again, but she pressed a palm to the earth and tried.

Until another blow cracked across her shoulder.

That one nearly made her scream.

She fell again.

Finally…

Finally…

Her breath trembled past bloody lips, and she whispered:

“I yield.”

The words floated weakly into the dirt. But the silence that followed was loud.

The Towers boy dropped his sword at once, the wood clattering beside her head. He stepped back, shaking, lips parted, not looking at her. Not at anyone.

Septa Keira rushed forward, heedless of Maegor’s threat, and dropped to her knees beside Alysanne, pulling her up gently, cradling her like a broken doll. Her veil was damp with tears.

“Princess, oh, gods, what did they do, what did he-”

Alysanne tried to smile, but her lip stung too badly. She closed her eyes instead, chest rising with shallow, shaky breaths.

She hadn’t screamed. She hadn’t cried.

She had fought.

Lost.

But she was not broken.

And as the dust settled and the guards stared, some ashamed, some stunned, none cheering, Alysanne was carried to her feet with Keira supporting her. Her legs barely held, but she made herself stand.

Not tall. Not proud. But standing.

The roar of blood still pounded in her ears. Every bruise throbbed with the pulse of her heart. But Alysanne stood, even if she leaned slightly into Septa Keira, who held her like a porcelain doll, arms stiff with rage. The princess’s limbs trembled, pain blazing under the skin, but her face, her face stayed cold.

She would not give them the satisfaction.

Not Maegor. Not Lord Towers. Not the guards.

Certainly not that boy, who stood awkwardly in the dust, sword dropped, shoulders hunched like he’d just clubbed a kitten.

Maegor moved.

She hadn’t even noticed him approaching until the black shadow of him swallowed the space between them. The King of the Andals and the Rhoynar and the First Men, her uncle, her captor, her would-be executioner, stood with arms crossed, Blackfyre on his hip, crimson cloak flicking in the wind like a bloody banner.

His voice was calm, as if they had just finished a discussion about feast arrangements.

“Do you know why I allowed that?”

Alysanne blinked. Her mouth felt full of ash.

“No, Your Grace.”

He didn’t smirk. Didn’t gloat. Just spoke like he was listing truths carved in stone.

“First, because I wanted you to understand how pointless it is for you to learn the sword.”

“You’re small. You’ll never be strong. And worse, you’re a girl. You could swing that stick for ten years and any knight in this yard would still gut you like a fish.”

Alysanne didn’t flinch. Not even when Keira made a choked sound beside her.

“You brought up Visenya. My mother wielded Dark Sister better than I could. But you are not her. You never will be her.”

“That’s why you’ll ride. That’s what your blood was made for. Let the knights kill each other in the mud. You’ll burn them from the sky.”

His eyes narrowed as he looked her over again; spattered with dirt, lip split, bruises blossoming already beneath her torn leathers.

“Second,” Maegor said, “I wanted to remind you that any form of defiance is wind. Noise. It means nothing if you cannot defend yourself.”

“But you yielded. You knew when it was done.”

There was a strange glint in his eye then, cold. Calculating.

“That makes you wiser than Viserys. He never learned that. He never yielded that easily.”

Alysanne’s jaw tensed.

“But you’ve learned your place, haven’t you? Better than Aegon. Better than Rhaena too.”

The compliment slid across her skin like oil: unwelcome, suffocating.

She didn’t want it. She didn’t want his approval.

So why did it still sting?

She nodded once. Cool. Controlled. Not grateful. Just accepting.

Maegor turned away without another word and barked over his shoulder.

“Get her out of my sight. She looks terrible.”

Keira flinched at his tone, but she obeyed, her arm tightening around Alysanne.

The crowd parted. The circle broke. No one looked her in the eye.

As they walked, slowly, step by aching step, Alysanne didn’t speak. She could barely lift her arms, but she walked with dignity, even as Keira whispered prayers under her breath, tears soaking her veil.

Every step was fire in her knees. Every breath was a cracked rib.

But inside?

Inside was ice.

You fool. You stupid girl. You thought you could impress him? That he’d teach you? That he’d treat you like a son instead of a stupid little girl?

Maegor had taught her a lesson. But it wasn’t the one he thought.

Not about yielding.

Not about dragons.

He’ll kill you one day. If you forget what he is, he’ll do to you what he did to your brothers. And your sister. And your mother. So don’t forget, she told herself.

Not when he lets you ride Silverwing.

Not when he lets you sit in small councils.

Not when he lets you live.

The journey back from the yard was a haze of pain and stone. Septa Keira bore most of Alysanne’s weight as they crossed courtyards and climbed winding stairs, her veil darkened with silent fury, lips pressed in a tight line.

Alysanne barely made it to the bed before her knees buckled.

Keira gently eased her down, fingers surprisingly gentle as she helped unlace the filthy, sweat-soaked leathers. She peeled them off inch by inch, muttering soft apologies under her breath as Alysanne winced with each movement.

“Sorry, child… gods, look at your shoulder… he let that boy do this…”

Soon, Alysanne was stripped down to a shift, breath shallow, back propped against a pillow as Keira pulled the covers up over her.

Only moments later, the chamber door flew open with a burst of footsteps and concerned gasps.

Jenya, Sera, Taliya, and Dorthy, her four ever-loyal handmaidens, spilled in like a tide of warm hands and louder voices.

“Alysanne, what happened?”

“We heard, it was the yard!”

“He made you fight?! Are you hurt… how badly?”

Alysanne raised a hand, weakly.

“I’m fine,” she said. “Just… sore.”

It was a lie, of course, but a useful one.

The kind of lie a Targaryen told.

The girls gathered around her bed, their dresses brushing the floor, hands smoothing her blankets and touching her arm and shoulders, each of them murmuring reassurance and outrage.

“It’s not right. He’s a brute,” Taliya snapped.

“You have bruises all over you,” Sera muttered.

“You’re so brave, Princess,” whispered Jenya, pressing a kiss to her hand.

“We’ll stay with you tonight,” said Dorthy. “We won’t leave you alone.”

Alysanne smiled at them, or tried to. Her lip cracked open again with the effort.

“You don’t have to,” she murmured.

“We want to,” Sera said. “Now hush.”

That was when Septa Keira reappeared at the door, with Grand Maester Benifer in tow.

The old man’s expression, at first unreadable behind his chain, cracked as soon as he saw her.

“Seven preserve you, Princess,” he muttered, hurrying forward. “You look like you were trampled by a bloody horse.”

“Not a horse,” Keira said grimly. “A boy. At the command of the king.”

“It was my choice to fight,” Alysanne added weakly.

Benifer didn’t ask more. He just began working.

The room fell quiet as he peeled back her shift to access the worst of the bruises, at her ribs, her thighs, her shoulderblade, applying cool poultices, dabbing honey-salve over the rawest cuts with fingers that had once treated kings and queens.

“You’ll bruise like a peach,” he muttered. “But no breaks. Thank the gods.”

Alysanne winced once when he pressed near her ribs but made no sound. She kept her eyes on the carved beams of her chamber ceiling, teeth clenched.

Not one complaint. Not one tear.

The girls whispered comfort. Sera stroked her hair. Taliya held her hand. Dorthy offered honeyed tea. Jenya wiped her forehead with a damp cloth.

Keira sat by the head of the bed, arms folded tight, watching them all like a hawk.

When Benifer finished, he murmured something about returning in the morning and left with a rustle of robes and chain.

The light in the room dimmed. Torches hissed.

Alysanne lay there, not asleep, not fully awake either.

But still silent. Still strong.

Because she had to be.

Because Maegor would never see her break.

Because the realm would never bow to a weeping little girl.

I’m a Targaryen, she reminded herself. We are fire made flesh. We do not cry. We endure. She had to endure.

The chamber was quiet now; soft torchlight flickering against stone walls, the scent of poultice herbs hanging faintly in the air. Alysanne lay propped against her pillows, arms tender, ribs wrapped, her face beginning to swell just beneath the eye. Her shift clung to her like a second skin, damp with sweat and faint traces of blood that the girls hadn’t managed to scrub away yet.

Her body ached with every breath.

But it wasn’t the pain that gnawed at her, it was the silence. The way they all looked at her. Like she was broken. Like she might shatter.

So when Dorthy broke the hush with a hesitant voice, Alysanne felt almost grateful.

“Septa Keira… why would the king make her fight a boy?”

Her tone was soft, like she was afraid saying it aloud might summon Maegor himself.

Keira, seated beside Alysanne with her hands folded tightly over her lap, gave no answer at first. Her one good eye glimmered with weariness.

Then, quietly:

“Because cruelty is easier than mercy. And he has never learned any other way.”

That seemed to settle the matter for the handmaidens. They murmured darkly, shaking their heads, but Alysanne finally stirred. Her voice came rough, edged with wear.

“No… I asked for it.”

That shut them all up.

Alysanne sat up straighter despite the protest from her ribs.

“I asked to be his squire. I wanted to learn. Fight. Like… like Visenya.”

Jenya gasped softly.

Sera’s brow furrowed.

Taliya blinked in disbelief.

Dorthy looked like she wasn’t sure whether to admire her or scold her.

Keira made a sound like a dying dove.

“Child,” she whispered, “you didn’t ask to be beaten bloody. That wasn’t training. That was punishment. That was wrong.”

Alysanne looked away, jaw tight.

“He gave me what I asked for,” she said simply. “A taste. A lesson. I know now; I’ll never win with a sword. I was made to ride dragons. That’s where my strength lies.”

The girls looked at her like she’d grown two heads.

It was Taliya who finally said what the rest were thinking.

“You’re not meant for that. You’re a girl, Alysanne, a princess. You’re supposed to be learning dances, and needlework, and… and how to hold a fan right at court.”

“I’m not… not that,” Alysanne said. Her voice was sharper now, flint behind the fatigue. “I’m a Targaryen. And in my house, even the women fight.”

The handmaidens exchanged glances, uncertain.

Alysanne didn’t stop.

“My grandmother Rhaenys died in Dorne with her dragon. My sister Rhaena fought at the God’s Eye. Our women have always stood beside their men in war. I will not shame them.”

The passion in her voice startled even herself. She meant it. She could feel the blood of the dragon stirring behind her bruises, behind her swelling ribs. It burned.

That was when Keira leaned forward, her voice low but not scolding.

“You don’t have to prove anything to them. Not to your ancestors. Not to Maegor. Not even to yourself.”

Her hand touched Alysanne’s shoulder; gentle, grounding.

“You are already good in the eyes of the Seven. And you are good in mine.”

There was a moment’s hush.

Then, Jenya nodded.

“And ours, too. You don’t have to be a knight. We already know you’re brave.”

Sera reached for her hand.

“We’ll follow you no matter what, Princess.”

Dorthy gave a watery smile.

“Just don’t fight any more boys. Please.”

Taliya rolled her eyes, but even she muttered:

“Dragons are better anyway.”

They surrounded her then, her little court of the lowborn and the overlooked, brushing her hair from her face, smoothing her blankets, fussing over her with tender hands.

For a moment, Alysanne let herself soften. She smiled.

But deep down, behind the warmth and comfort, a quiet thought lingered.

They couldn’t truly understand. They hadn’t heard Maegor’s voice in the silence. They didn’t feel what it meant to wear her name like prophecy and curse. They’re good girls, she thought. But they will never be Targaryens.

The pain had dulled to a low throb, the kind that whispered behind her ribs and arms rather than screamed. Wrapped in bandages and surrounded by warm blankets, Alysanne sat half-upright in her bed, her skin flushed, hair loosely braided by Sera, cheeks still mottled with bruises and scrapes.

The worst of it was no longer physical.

It was the feeling of humiliation.

The memory of falling, of yielding, of Maegor watching, cold, unmoved, while she bled in the dust.

She needed to escape her own thoughts.

So when Sera tugged lightly at her sleeve and whispered:

“Tell us more about Silverwing again! Your dragon!”

Alysanne took the offered rope and pulled herself up out of her shame.

Her voice was soft at first, tentative, then stronger, steadier.

“Silverwing’s not like the other dragons,” she began, eyes turning toward the window as if her dragon were perched outside. “She’s smaller than Vhagar or Balerion… but she’s beautiful. Her scales are silver, almost like polished plate. She has these two tiny horns that curve just over her eyes, and her wings shimmer when the sun hits them right.”

The girls were spellbound instantly.

Jenya clasped her hands beneath her chin, wide-eyed.

“She sounds like you, Princess! Small, beautiful, and gentle.”

That made Alysanne snort softly, then wince, her lip still sore from the earlier split.

“Gentle?” she muttered. “Didn’t you see me today? I was a warrior!”

That set them off.

Laughter bloomed in the chamber, warm and cathartic.

Even Septa Keira, perched stiffly near the hearth, gave a snort of surprised amusement.

Alysanne smiled, despite herself. She kept talking. She told them how Silverwing liked fish more than mutton, how she once curled her tail around Alysanne’s whole body like a protective mother-cat, how her breath steamed silver in the air.

She told them about the Dragonmont where Silverwing’s lair had been: the sharp scent of ash, the sound of leathery wings in the dark.

“She was kind to me,” Alysanne said quietly. “Even when I was too small to ride. She never roared at me, never snapped. Just watched.”

It was a kind of healing.

Each word about Silverwing was another salve, another breath that made the pain in her ribs feel lighter.

Then, a knock at the door.

Alysanne paused, brows drawing tight.

Jenya moved quickly, whispering,

“I’ll get it!”

She padded barefoot across the rugs and opened the heavy wooden door. A moment later, she stepped aside with a bow:

“The… the Lady Prudence and Lady Prunella of House Celtigar, Your Grace.”

The Celtigar twins swept in like whirlwinds, gowns trailing, cheeks flushed pink from the chill, their matching septa trailing behind them like an old white ghost.

“Alysanne!” Prudence cried, “You poor thing! What did he do to you?”

“You look terrible!” said Prunella, horrified as she stared at the bruises on Alysanne’s neck.

“Who let them beat you?” Prudence added indignantly.

“Did someone see? Do they know?” said Prunella.

Alysanne let them pester her with questions for a few moments before breaking into a tired smile.

“Gods,” she said dryly. “You two haven’t changed at all.”

They gathered around her like a pair of concerned hens, gently touching her arms and fussing with her blanket. Even their septa, looking half-asleep, gave Alysanne a curt nod before taking a seat beside Keira, both of them glaring at the hearth like it had personally offended them.

“We only heard this evening,” Prudence said. “Father’s been talking with Lord Butterwell all day, some nonsense about a campaign in the Vale, but this news sent us running.”

“Why didn’t you send for us?” Prunella asked.

Alysanne shrugged weakly.

“Didn’t want to be seen like this. Besides, I already had four- five fawning hens around me. Didn’t want to drown in sympathy.”

That earned more laughter. More warmth. The chamber soon became a cocoon of laughter and chatter. For a brief while, it almost felt like they were just girls; just girls gathered for gossip, sweets, and stories, not nobles and servants huddled in the shadow of the Black Dread’s iron fist.

Alysanne, her voice hoarse but steady, recounted everything to the Celtigar twins. Every blow, every bruise, every biting word Maegor had offered afterward. She tried to keep it light in tone, with a bit of humor and a lift of her brow, but the twins asked a thousand questions, interrupting constantly.

“Wait, he actually let you fight a boy?”

“Why not one of the squires from House Towers? They’re all awful!”

“And no one stopped it?”

“Seven above, he threatened to cut out her tongue?”

The questions flew like arrows, and Alysanne answered as best she could, until, by the time her story was done, the elderly septa who’d accompanied them had fallen asleep upright in a chair, snoring with a gentle whistle through her nose.

It might’ve been funny. Might’ve sparked another wave of giggles.

But the room turned quieter.

Prunella, always the more skeptical of the two, crossed her arms.

“Trying to become a squire was foolish, Alysanne. Brave, yes,” she added quickly as Prudence opened her mouth to argue, “but foolish still.”

“Romantic and brave,” Prudence corrected her, nose tilted. “You should’ve seen the look in her eyes just now… a maiden knight on a dragon! That’s one for the stories!”

Prunella looked back to Alysanne.

“Well… you’ve always been brave. Even when you were little.”

Then she added, with a knowing grin:

“Like that time you got between Maegor and Viserys in the yard. You stood up to the king!”

The words hit Alysanne like a slap to the soul.

She remembered.

The moment came rushing back; Viserys on the ground, his cheek red and bleeding, Maegor looming above him like a mountain in armor.

Alysanne, only ten, had stepped between them. Her voice had shaken. Her fists had clenched. And Maegor had stared at her with something between fury and… bemusement.

He hadn’t hit her.

But now Viserys was dead.

And so was Jaehaerys.

And Rhaena.

And Aegon.

All of them gone.

Her brothers. Her sister. Her blood.

Alysanne blinked hard, but the tears came anyway. She tried to laugh again, to bury it in some offhand joke… but her throat tightened. She had always tried to hide her tears, always while she was alone, but it was impossible now.

“I’m sorry,” she whispered.

Everyone looked at her, startled.

“I- I shouldn’t. I’m a princess. I’m not supposed to… to…”

Her words choked as the tears spilled over.

They weren’t loud sobs. Just quiet, helpless streams that stained her bruised cheeks and soaked into her shift. She lifted a hand to wipe her eyes, but it shook.

“I miss them,” she whispered, and then the dam broke.

“I miss Viserys and Jaehaerys and Rhaena and Aegon, I miss my mother, I miss Aerea and Rhaella, I want to see Silverwing, I don’t want to be hurt all the time, I don’t want to be here, I don’t want to hurt anymore-”

Her voice cracked. Her whole frame trembled.

No one spoke for a heartbeat.

Then, Prunella stood sharply, halfway toward the door, discomfort clear on her face.

But Prudence grabbed her wrist.

“No. Stay.”

And she turned, knelt beside Alysanne, and embraced her.

Septa Keira moved next, lifting Alysanne’s hand and pressing it to her chest. The girls followed, all of them, the handmaidens, Prudence, even a reluctant Prunella, drawing closer.

Jenya whispered prayers.

Taliya rubbed her arm.

Sera stroked her hair gently.

Dorthy tucked the blankets tighter around her.

“It’s alright to cry,” Keira said, her voice soft and warm. “It doesn’t make you weak. It makes you alive.”

“It means you still have something to fight for,” whispered Prudence.

Alysanne cried until her chest ached again, until her breaths turned ragged and shallow.

But she did not cry alone.

Notes:

In regards to the chapter count, I've changed my mind on that yet again since I wanted to have more POV chapters. This story probably won't be as long as the first, but it'll still be longer than planned 66 chapters (RIP I tried and failed twice now).

Chapter 30: EDWELL VI

Lord Edwell Celtigar sat not at the head of the small council chamber, but off to the right, one seat removed from the Iron Throne’s shadow; a subtle but unmistakable shift. For nearly two moons, that place had been his by necessity: the king absent, cloistered in brooding silence, grieving or raging or simply waiting for the next enemy to kill. Edwell had ruled in his stead, quill and seal in hand, fielding ravens, planning campaigns, and holding the kingdom together with brittle fingers.

But now Maegor had returned.

Black-armored, brooding, storm given flesh, he had taken back his place at the head of the table without ceremony or word. Just presence.

Edwell, the loyal Hand, had yielded the seat without protest. Yet as he sat one chair down, hands folded neatly, eyes low, his gut twisted. Not with wounded pride, but with worry.

The clatter of chairs and murmured farewells signaled the close of the small council’s session. One by one, the lords and their attendants filtered out of the chamber: Lord Butterwell shuffling with a sheaf of tax ledgers tucked under one arm, Ser Harrold Langward quiet as always, and Grand Maester Benifer pausing long enough to offer Edwell a tired glance before departing without a word.

Only Lord Towers lingered a moment longer, exchanging a brief nod with the king before leaving; Maegor’s new favorite, if the pattern held. That was a problem. A dangerous one.

Edwell remained seated.

He watched as Maegor, still cloaked in black and steel, stood slowly. The king hadn’t spoken much during the meeting, only giving a few curt commands about troop movements coming to the capital and logistics for the campaign in the Vale against Lord Corbray and the Faith Militant. He hadn’t even acknowledged Edwell’s careful updates on their communications with Houses Lannister, Tully, and Hightower.

In truth, Maegor’s silence was worse than his fury. It was hard, cold, and sharp at the edges.

Edwell cleared his throat as the chamber emptied.

“Your Grace,” he said quietly, hands folded before him, “may I have a moment?”

Maegor paused, one gauntleted hand resting atop the table, thrumming softly. His black eyes settled on Edwell without warmth, without malice; just heavy.

“Make it quick.”

Edwell stood slowly, back stiff with age, with duty, with tension too long carried.

“You’ll be departing for Dragonstone soon. I thought it wise to speak before you go.”

Maegor didn’t sit. He merely waited.

Edwell swallowed.

“I’ve worked hard in your absence. Letters to the great houses, calming anxieties, holding together fragile loyalties. I’ve tried to keep your peace.”

No response. No flicker of emotion.

“But the incident with the princess… it’s stirred things. More than you know.”

Maegor said nothing, his expression stone.

“I know what she asked. I know she wanted to prove herself,” Edwell continued, more carefully now. “But the image, Your Grace, your kin bloodied before the eyes of lords and knights, it feeds a story. And the story it feeds is that the king is a brute who beats children. That the dragons are still eating its own.”

Maegor’s brow twitched, faintly.

“And what would you have done, Celtigar?” the king finally asked, voice low.

Edwell did not hesitate.

“I would have told her no. That she is a princess of House Targaryen, not a squire. I would have waited to let her ride her dragon, not break her bones to show a point.”

Silence again.

Edwell pressed forward.

“The princess is beloved among your court. Even among the smallfolk. She is your niece, the daughter of your queen. She is your last real tie to the blood of Aenys. If something happens… the realm will not blame her. They will blame you.”

Maegor’s eyes narrowed, but he said nothing.

Edwell’s voice softened; less political now, more… personal.

“You’ve been absent. You’ve left me to speak in your name, to carry the weight since… Tyanna. I have done so gladly, loyally. But I cannot shield you from every consequence. Not if you continue on this path.”

Still, Maegor said nothing, but he drew closer to Edwell, right up to him. Despite his escalating anger, the Hand held his ground. The chamber had gone still, the torchlight flickering across the polished wood of the council table. Lord Celtigar kept his gave on Maegor, eyes level, spine taut beneath his crimson and pearl-trimmed doublet. Across from him, the Black Dread loomed: armored in darkness, dark-eyed, and breathing like something barely leashed.

Maegor had closed the distance.

Edwell did not flinch. His voice was low, even.

“I have never betrayed you, Your Grace. Never doubted you. I stood with you when others fled. I served while others schemed. You know why?”

Maegor said nothing, his mouth tight, his stare unblinking.

“Because we were always honest with one another. You told me the truth, and I gave it in return.”

Edwell allowed a breath: controlled, careful.

“So let me speak the truth now: you need to learn how to be a father.”

Maegor’s brow ticked. His gloved hands curled tight at his sides.

“Love does not come only from blood,” Edwell pressed. “It is grown. You must build it. Invest in it. Cultivate it like a garden: slow, patient work. Painful, sometimes. But it cannot be beaten into bloom.”

He took a step closer; not too close.

“Alysanne is no traitor yet. But if you continue to treat her like a sword, or a spear, or worse, a thing, she will break. Like Viserys. Like Alyssa’s other children.”

That snapped the cord.

“You dare compare her to them?” Maegor roared.

His voice hit the stone walls like a warhammer. The air itself seemed to quake.

“You think she’ll betray me like Alys? Like Tyanna? Like all the spawn my brother spat into the world? Like all the others who’ve sunken their claws into me!”

He stepped forward, and for a heartbeat, Edwell feared Maegor might strike him.

But Edwell did not retreat. He rose from his chair, slow and deliberate, until the two men stood nearly eye-to-eye though Maegor still loomed half a head taller.

Edwell spoke softly.

“If you fear betrayal, then why place a dragon in her hands?”

Maegor’s nostrils flared.

“Because she’s a Targaryen.”

“And so were the ones you fought at the God’s Eye.”

A long silence followed.

Edwell kept his voice even.

“You want her loyalty? Then treat her as kin. As your blood. As a girl, not a pawn or a threat. I’ve raised two daughters, Your Grace. They are malleable, yes, but they need guidance. Not fists or swords.”

Maegor’s breath thundered from his nostrils, the heat of his fury palpable. But he did not move. The fury ebbed, slow as tide. Then, like a blade sheathed too suddenly, Maegor sighed. Heavy. Gravel-thick.

“You are clear-sighted,” he muttered. “As ever.”

It wasn’t praise. But it wasn’t dismissal, either.

Edwell inclined his head, cautiously.

“I only speak as your servant. And as a father.”

Maegor didn’t respond. His gaze had drifted, somewhere beyond the walls, to memory, to ghosts.

As Maegor turned toward the door, the heavy ring of his boots echoing on stone, Edwell raised his voice once more, not pleading, never pleading, but with the calm urgency of a man who had borne too many burdens too long.

“Your Grace… one last thing.”

Maegor stopped, glancing back. Edwell clasped his hands together behind his back, his face carefully composed though his stomach churned like storm-tossed waters.

“How long should we expect your absence from court?”

A pause.

The question hovered, heavy with meaning.

“The campaign in the Vale will not wait. And though I will prepare all in your stead, coin, supply, ravens, you are needed to lead it. As king.”

Maegor didn’t answer immediately. Instead, he rolled his shoulders beneath the thick folds of his black cloak and spoke with idle coolness, as though discussing the weather.

“I’ve not decided yet.”

A tight, cold knot formed in Edwell’s chest.

Maegor’s voice drifted on, as casual as it was maddening.

“Might be a few weeks. Long enough to see Alysanne ride.”

“Might be longer. Perhaps I’ll remain for the birth.”

The word birth hit like a slap.

Edwell’s jaw flexed, but he said nothing. He bit the inside of his cheek, hard, until the bitter taste of blood filled his mouth.

Alyssa. Lady Alyssa, carrying Maegor’s child.

He forced himself still.

The king gave him something resembling a slight grin: a pale imitation of warmth, or perhaps a test of cruelty.

“I’ll give the queen your regards, shall I?”

And then he was gone. The doors shut with a boom that echoed down the marble hall.

Edwell did not move. Not for a long while. He remained at the edge of the council table, his knuckles white, breath shallow. Only when the guards' footsteps faded did he finally sit again; not with dignity, but with collapse.

His shoulders slumped. His breath came hard and uneven. Tears beading in his eyes.

The weight of the day, the moons since Tyanna’s death, piled upon him like stones.

He had kept the realm together. He had held the court together with spit and parchment, with lies and charm, with a trembling hand beneath a steady voice. He had kept the rebels at bay, isolated and alone.

And for what?

For a mad king to brutalize the last daughter of Aenys.

For Alyssa to birth the child of her rapist.

For the Great Lords of Westeros to plot rebellion while he played the diplomat.

He couldn’t do this much longer. He needed… a distraction, yes.

A letter to Moya, maybe.

Or wine.

Or the Street of Silk.

Maybe all three. Edwell dug the heels of his palms into his eyes until the pressure blurred his vision. His heart thundered in his ears. If he let himself think too long, too deeply, it would all come undone. And all his clever words, all his measured restraint, all his power… would be worth nothing.

He breathed in.

He exhaled.

He wiped the tears off his face.

Then he rose, slowly, like a man peeling his soul off the stone.

He needed to forget. Just for a little while. And tomorrow… Tomorrow he’d wear the mask again.

Chapter 31: ALYSSA V

Queen Alyssa Velaryon lay curled in the center of her bed on Dragonstone, staring blankly at the dark canopy above, the sea wind rattling the shutters as if demanding to be let in. She didn’t rise, didn’t move; except to shift slightly when the pain in her back grew too unbearable. But the pain was nothing compared to the weight pressing on her chest, the hollow tightness behind her ribs that never seemed to leave anymore.

Grief was a constant now. A heavy, aching thing. It wasn’t sharp anymore; not the blinding, soul-tearing agony that had gripped her when Rhaena and Aegon were burned, when word came of the deaths of Viserys and Jaehaerys. No. Now it was dull. Rotten. Like something buried deep inside her was slowly decaying.

The child inside her, a child born of violence, of humiliation, of Maegor, twisted her insides with a strange, impossible ache. She could feel its presence always, stretching her belly, draining her strength. It was her child. It was his child. She hated it. She loved it. She feared it more than death itself. Still, it lived.

Her fingers curled over the slight rise of her belly beneath the blankets. It was too early for kicks, for movement. Sometimes, she feared it was already dead. It made her throat close.

Somewhere else, Aerea and Rhaella were playing under supervision. They didn’t understand. They couldn’t. Rhaella still called Dragonstone “the castle by the sea” and asked when they would see Alysanne. Alyssa never had answers. Her children, dead. Her grandchildren, orphaned. Her own body, invaded again. Used. Sacrificed for Maegor’s legacy, a thing she had never agreed to, never wanted.

Was this what she had become? A womb? A relic? A broken thing fit only to weep into her pillow and wait for death or worse, another labor?

She missed Alysanne so terribly it twisted her stomach worse than the nausea. Her bright girl. Her bold girl. Brave, stubborn, kind, and clever, and now left in the care of a monster. Maegor claimed he was training her, teaching her, treating her like a proper Targaryen. But that was all lies.

Alysanne was her last hope. The only living remnant of the family Alyssa had built with Aenys. The last child of her womb not yet destroyed by fire, or Tyanna’s knives, or Maegor’s endless wrath. She shouldn’t have let her go. She should have run when she had the chance. She should have killed Maegor when he slept, should have poisoned Alys and her child, should have poisoned Maegor, should have done something.

But she hadn’t. She had stayed. She hadn’t drank moon tea. Now here she was, bedridden, helpless, praying to gods who hadn’t answered her in years.

Alyssa turned on her side, burying her face into her pillow to muffle the sound as the tears came, slow and quiet. Her shoulders shook. She didn’t want the servants to hear and bring her more food that she wouldn’t eat. She didn’t want the maester to come with another draught to dull her pain and silence her mind.

She wanted her children.

She wanted Aenys.

She wanted herself, the woman she used to be, before she became a prisoner in every sense of the word.

But most of all… she wanted out.

A soft, tentative knock broke the heavy stillness of Alyssa’s chambers. She flinched beneath her bedsheets, face pressed to the pillow, back aching, belly taut with the weight of her unborn child. Her voice rasped out, dull and weary:

“I said I don’t want visitors.”

From beyond the door, a meek servant girl answered, muffled by the thick carved oak.

“Forgive me, Your Grace… but I’ve brought your meal. And… you have a visitor. Lord Admiral Daemon Velaryon.”

Alyssa blinked. She rolled halfway onto her side, heart stuttering. Daemon? Her brother? Here?

She hadn’t seen a soul from Driftmark since being locked away on Dragonstone. Letters had only recently been permitted again, and she’d received none from there. No one had been allowed near her. Was this… real? Or another cruel trick?

She hesitated.

And then, through the door, she heard it; his voice, calm and low, sea-worn and familiar:

“Alyssa. It’s me.”

That anchored her. She closed her eyes.

“Come in,” she called softly, her tone thin as parchment.

The door opened, and in stepped the red-haired serving girl bearing a silver tray, followed close behind by Lord Daemon Velaryon, taller than she remembered, dressed in dark wool and sea-cloak, his brow knit with concern the moment he saw her lying there; barely more than a pale figure swaddled in linens, her long silver-gold hair unbound, her shift clinging to a body grown hollow and weary.

Alyssa did not rise.

“Forgive me,” she said hoarsely, not looking him in the eye. “I’m… not at my best.”

Daemon crossed to her quickly, his eyes raking her face, her frame, her too-sharp cheekbones.

“Are you sick?” he asked, voice low.

She turned her face slightly toward him. Her expression was tired.

“No. I’m pregnant.”

That hung in the air like rot. Daemon said nothing for a moment too long.

“I don’t want visitors,” she added, “just my children.”

The servant girl placed the tray down, the clink of porcelain loud in the silence, and Daemon gently waved her out.

“Leave us.”

She obeyed, casting a glance back at Alyssa before closing the door behind her.

Brother and sister were alone.

Daemon sat down on the edge of Alyssa’s bed, the mattress sinking beneath his weight, and at once he leaned in and folded her gently into his arms. For a moment, he said nothing; just held her, as if to shield her from everything they had both failed to stop. Then the words came: halting, hoarse, each one laced with a guilt that had clearly festered for too long.

“I’m sorry. Gods, Alyssa, I’m so sorry…”

His voice trembled as he pulled back just enough to look at her, hands still resting on her thin shoulders.

“I should’ve acted sooner. I should’ve gotten you out. I should’ve taken the girls, the boys… you. I let you rot in that place while Tyanna did gods-know-what, while Maegor-” He choked on the name. “While he used you. While he murdered our kin.”

He looked down, jaw clenched, the skin around his eyes tight.

“Viserys… Jaehaerys… I thought maybe… maybe we’d reach them in time. And I didn’t even try. I didn’t try hard enough. Because I was scared. Because I didn’t want to risk open defiance. And now look where we are. Our father, Aethan, he’d be ashamed of me.”

Alyssa didn’t speak at first. She let the apology flow, allowed his guilt to breathe. Then, softly, her hand reached for his and she gave it a squeeze.

“Daemon… no. I don’t blame you. You did what you could. Driftmark has no dragons. And Tyanna… is terrifying. She would have known.”

Daemon swallowed hard. His eyes searched her face, and for a moment, she looked more like a ghost than a queen.

“It’s true, then?” he asked, his voice low. “That Maegor’s bringing Alysanne here? That he’s coming to Dragonstone himself?”

Alyssa sighed and shifted her aching body beneath the blankets, her voice distant.

“So I’ve heard.”

Daemon leaned in close, his voice dropping to a whisper like a prayer passed between conspirators in a sept.

“I’ve been in contact with House Baratheon. Rogar, especially. He and the other Great Lords… they’re plotting something. A true rising this time. Not whispers. Not words. They mean to move against Maegor. And they want you safe. They want to get you and the girls out before he arrives. Even with the child.”

Alyssa turned her face slowly toward her brother. Her body ached. Her stomach turned. Her bones were too tired for rage. Her voice came out flat, brittle.

“No.”

Daemon blinked. “Alyssa-”

“No.”

She sat up, barely, wincing as she shifted her weight. Her eyes met his, pale and sunken but burning faintly still.

“You want to save me now? After all this time? After all those letters I wrote in secret, all those prayers I screamed into the dark while I bled and begged and lost everything… now you come with ships and noble allies?”

She let out a bitter laugh, hollow as the wind through Dragonstone’s towers.

“I forgave you. I still do. But it’s too late, Daemon. You get me out… and he’ll turn to her. Alysanne is still in his grip. And if he loses the heir in my belly, if he loses me, he’ll marry her. And gods help us all if that happens.”

Daemon looked stricken.

“You don’t know that-”

“I do know that,” Alyssa snapped. “He won’t risk losing everything again. Not after what he’s lost already. If he loses the babe, he’ll take the next best option, another wife, another womb.”

She leaned back again, her voice cracking now.

“So no. No rescues. Not without her.”

Daemon’s mouth opened. Closed. He ran a hand down his face. “Then what do we do?”

Alyssa stared at the ceiling.

“We wait. We pray. I leave my fate to the gods.”

Daemon let out a long sigh, rubbing his brow with his callused fingers. “I didn’t come here to make things harder for you,” he said softly. “I just… wanted to see you. And to help, if I still can.”

Alyssa didn’t answer. She couldn’t; not with words that wouldn’t be cruel or exhausted or undeserved. So instead, she stayed still as he turned toward the tray on the sidetable.

“Have you eaten today?” he asked.

She almost shook her head, but stopped herself. What would be the point?

Daemon lifted the small bowl of stew from the sidetable, still faintly warm, and sat back beside her. She didn’t reach for it, so he dipped the spoon and offered it to her wordlessly.

Reluctantly, she opened her mouth and took the first spoonful. It tasted of barley, herbs, and broth; bland but hearty. She didn’t want it. She didn’t want anything, but she let him feed her anyway. For him. For the brother who had come too late, but had come all the same.

Between spoonfuls, Daemon tried to fill the silence with light conversation. Updates from Driftmark: his wife’s new gardens, his son’s progress with a blade, the antics of the younger cousins. Alyssa murmured small noises in response, vague nods and quiet mmms, keeping her expression friendly. She didn’t care, not really, but some part of her knew she needed to pretend she did. It was what was expected.

When the bowl was half-empty, he changed the subject, tone shifting subtly. He spoke of the latest rumors from the capital: tax riots in Duskendale, whispers of renewed violence from the Faith Militant, nervous bannermen writing secret letters to lords of old loyalty. He mentioned the Hightowers and the Tullys, the Lannisters growing uneasy, the Baratheons sharpening their axes in secret.

Even without a seat on the small council, Daemon still heard things. He had his ways.

Alyssa chewed slowly. Swallowed. Nodded. Her mind drifted in and out of his words like fog slipping between fingers. She wanted him to stop talking. She wanted him to go. And yet… his presence warmed the room in a way the fire never could. Even when she hated him for being too late.

She was so tired of needing people.

“Thank you,” she said at last, as he offered her the last bite.

Daemon gave her a tired smile and brushed her damp hair back from her face like he had when they were children.

“You’re not alone, Alyssa,” he whispered. “I swear it. Whatever happens next, you won’t be alone.”

She wanted to believe that. She tried. But all she could do was nod again.

Daemon rose from her bedside slowly, as though reluctant to let the moment end. The bowl of stew sat half-finished, forgotten on the tray. His hand lingered at the bedpost a moment longer before he finally spoke.

“Thank you, Alyssa. For forgiving me… after everything.”

She said nothing, her eyes downcast, fingers resting protectively on the slight swell of her belly.

“I want to make it right,” he continued. “For you. For the girls. For Alysanne. For House Velaryon. If there's ever to be peace, real peace, after Maegor… we’ll all be needed to put the realm back together.”

Alyssa raised her head, eyes shadowed but clear. Her voice was cold, almost bitter.

“Do you really think Maegor can be overthrown?”

Daemon faltered. She kept going.

“Can anyone truly defeat Balerion?”

He didn’t answer at once. When he did, it was quiet, steady.

“Someone has to try. A man like him… he shouldn’t be king. Not of Westeros. Not of anything. He rules through fear. He’s hurt you enough.”

Alyssa almost laughed. She didn’t. Instead, she gave him a long look, heavy with exhaustion and grim clarity.

“Easier said than done, brother.”

Her voice was firm now. Tired, but not weak.

“Don’t be a fool. Don’t throw away your life. Or ours. I know what doomed rebellion looks like, I’ve lived in its ashes.”

Daemon held her gaze for a breath, maybe two. Then, without reply, he turned.

He crossed the stone floor of the chamber in silence, pausing only to glance once more over his shoulder. But Alyssa had already looked away.

And then he was gone.

Leaving her, again, alone.

Alyssa waited until she was certain Daemon’s boots were no longer echoing down the hall, until even the distant murmur of servants faded into the dull hush of Dragonstone’s ancient stone. Only then did she push herself upright, breath hitching as her back screamed in protest.

The stew sat on the sidetable, half‑finished, its steam long gone cold. Alyssa stared at it for a long, long moment; long enough that her reflection grew dim in the surface of the broth. Her stomach clenched at the thought of swallowing another bite. Her mind clenched harder.

Slowly, she slid her legs over the side of the bed and lifted the tray with both hands. Her fingers trembled; not from weakness alone, but from a quiet, persistent dread she’d grown used to carrying like a second skin.

She crossed the chamber to the window.

The shutters were cracked open just enough for a cold, wet breeze to creep in from the sea. The scent of brine, smoke, and sulfur curled around her as she leaned forward. Alyssa tilted the bowl carefully over the ledge. The stew dripped down the volcanic stone and vanished into the mist below.

Another meal gone.

Another precaution.

Another quiet rebellion.

She placed the empty tray aside and returned to her bed, her every step slow and deliberate. When she reached the mattress, she sank back into the tangle of sheets and pulled them around herself as though she could disappear in them entirely.

She curled onto her side.

She did not cry.

She had cried far too much already.

But she shook; a faint, barely perceptible trembling that came from deep inside her bones. She forced herself to breathe evenly, to quiet the gnawing panic that always tried to crawl up her throat after she disposed of her food.

I won’t touch it. I won’t.

Tyanna had poisoned her once.

Poisoned her womb.

Poisoned Maegor’s first child with her, her child.

Maegor claimed Tyanna was dead.

Lies.

Alyssa squeezed her eyes shut.

Maegor would never kill her. Not truly. That woman slithered through every crack in the Red Keep, seeped into every shadow. She was everywhere. She is everywhere.

Even here.

Even now.

Alyssa swallowed hard and shoved the thought away before it consumed her whole. Better to lean into memory, into the one place Tyanna could not touch.

She let her mind drift back to a softer time.

Before Maegor. Before blood and fear. Before every child she bore became another casualty in a war she never declared.

She imagined herself back in the warm gardens of Dragonstone. Birds singing. Roses blooming. Aenys laughing softly, his hand warm around hers. She imagined her belly swelling not with Maegor’s monster, but with Rhaena: all over again. Her first child. Her bright, wild, perfect daughter who had been taken far too soon. She imagined Aenys kissing her cheek, whispering that the babe would be beautiful, would be strong, would be theirs in every way that mattered. For just a moment, just long enough to breathe, Alyssa let herself live in that world instead of this one.

The truth was too sharp, too cruel, too heavy for her bruised and hollow heart to bear. She curled deeper into the sheets, closed her eyes, and let the ghosts of the only love she had ever known cradle her in the dark.

Chapter 32: MELONY II

The door slammed behind the guards, the screams of the girl they dragged away still echoing through the cramped stone room long after her heels stopped scraping the floor. They could all hear her cursing the name of the king, a final desperate rebellion.

Mia stood rigid beside her straw pallet, hands clasped as meekly as any lowborn laundress. Her face wore the same mask of wide‑eyed shock the other serving girls clung to… but her heart was a burning pit.

As soon as the footsteps faded, the tension broke, and the whispering began.

“Did you hear? She tried to slip something into the king’s supper, Seven save her.”

“Near killed the poor taster instead!”

“Must’ve been one of them Faith Militant!”

“Or worse… maybe she hated the king enough to try it for free.”

The giggles, the gasps, the exaggerated shudders fluttered through the room like startled birds. Mia murmured something appropriate: shock, sympathy, anything to stay invisible. The girls believed it. They always did.

She had made sure of that.

But inside?

Inside Melony Piper was seething.

Too slow, she cursed herself. Too godsdamned slow.

She’d spent weeks studying guard rotations, the kitchens, Maegor’s Holdfast itself: learning the habits of the king, the weaknesses in his armor, the tastes of his temper. But every plan she crafted frayed at the edges. Every opportunity dissolved before she could seize it. The problem wasn’t even that she might die, Melony had accepted long ago that might happen. The problem was that she wasn’t certain it would work.

And now another girl, some poor, desperate creature clinging to a lost cause, had tried to do what Melony had sworn to do.

And failed.

The other servants whispered blessings for the taster. Melony only felt nausea.

A failure like that didn’t make Maegor cautious. It made him crueler. It made him watch. It made him kill. Worse, it made him paranoid. Now he’ll be expecting something, she thought bitterly. Another plot. Another knife.

He would be right.

Melony moved to her pallet, pretending to smooth the blankets. Her fingers trembled, not with fear, but with frustration. A few moons in the Red Keep had earned her nothing but rumors, sweat, bruised hands, and a growing sense of futility.

She had not expected it to be easy.

But gods… she hadn’t expected it to feel impossible.

Stabbing him?

She’d never get close. His Kingsguard were always near; Ser Harrold and the others, grim as ravens. He was tall and always armored; that made it even harder.

Poison?

Tyanna had made Maegor fear everything in his cup and dish; his tasters were replaced frequently, his food tested daily. And now, after tonight… it would be harder than ever.

Fire?

Laughable. Balerion’s rider feared no flame but his own.

Melony breathed through her nose, steadying herself. No. No giving up. Not now. Not ever.

Because she hadn’t come here for heroics.

She had come here for vengeance.

For her brothers: cut down like dogs for daring to stand up against the king.

For the Harroways: deceived, betrayed, butchered.

And most of all…

For Rhaena.

For the girl she had loved more fiercely than life.

For the princess whose heart had beat against hers as they whispered futures stolen by fire and steel.

Melony’s throat tightened.

She folded her hands, bowed her head, and let the mask of meek little Mia settle over her features once more.

No. She wouldn’t give up.

She wouldn’t falter.

If someone else’s failure made things harder, then she would simply have to be smarter, quieter, deadlier.

Maegor the Cruel still breathed.

And until he didn’t…

Mia would live.

Melony Piper would wait.

The air in the quarters was heavy with tension and candle smoke, whispers still buzzing around the edges of the latest arrest. But it was the girl, the youngest of them all, who spoke next, her voice tight with fear.

“What if they try to poison Princess Alysanne next?”

Melony turned her head. The girl’s name was Taliya, if Melony remembered correctly. Thin, dark-haired, eyes too wide and too honest. She wrung her hands as she spoke, her eyes darting between the others, seeking reassurance.

“I mean… the Faith Militant hates the Targaryens, right? What if- what if they try something? She’s not safe!”

Several of the other girls scoffed or waved the concern away.

“Don’t be foolish.”

“She’s just a girl. A child.”

“No one’s trying to hurt her. Everyone likes the princess.”

“Everyone except her uncle, maybe.”

“Poor thing: lost her siblings, her dragon, her whole family. Her mother married him, and now she’s going to Dragonstone?”

Melony said nothing at first. She watched the girl, Taliya, carefully. Her cheeks were red with frustration, her eyes glassy with emotion.

Too open, Melony thought. Too raw. That kind of devotion gets people killed… or turned into martyrs. It could also be useful.

Melony stepped forward, voice mild, deferential, with just enough curiosity to seem harmless.

“I’m Mia,” she said, offering a small nod. “New to the castle. I don’t know much about the princess… but she must be something, for you to worry so much.”

Taliya looked surprised, then softened, grateful to be taken seriously.

“She is. She’s- she’s the kindest person I’ve ever known. She remembers our names. Asks after our families. When my parents wanted to sell me, she gave me refuge here without me even asking.”

Taliya’s voice lifted slightly, her fear momentarily forgotten.

“She’s clever too, loves books, knows everything about the history of the dragons and the gods. And she’s brave. You should’ve seen her after that brute of a squire beat her… she didn’t break. She’s a survivor.”

The other girls rolled their eyes or muttered that the princess was still a Targaryen, but Melony kept nodding, her expression warm. Inside, though, her thoughts were sharpening.

Kind. Brave. Smart. Loved.

She wondered, not for the first time, how much Alysanne resembled her sister. Rhaena had burned like a wildfire: defiant, furious, passionate. But this one… this one sounded like stone warmed by sun. Patient. Still dangerous. Still a dragon. But slower to wrath.

Melony caught Taliya’s last words:

“Maegor’s taking her to Dragonstone soon. I heard it from the Hand himself. Said it’s to ‘train her with her dragon.’ But what if he hurts her again out there? Away from the court. Away from everyone.”

Melony’s pulse quickened. Another reminder. Dragonstone. Soon. It wasn’t just talk anymore. He was moving. And when Maegor moved, he would be out of Melony’s reach. Time was narrowing like a hallway, and Melony knew one thing beyond doubt: if she didn’t act before the king left the Red Keep, she might lose her only chance.

She looked again at Taliya.

So soft. So lowborn. So stupid. So loyal.

Or perhaps, Melony mused, not stupid at all. Perhaps perfect.

“Do you serve the princess directly?” she asked lightly, as if merely making conversation.

Taliya nodded. “Most days. I help her with her dresses. Her books.”

Melony smiled faintly. Her next words were simple, pleasant.

“Tell me more.”

Taliya did, and Melony listened.

Chapter 33: MAEGOR VI

The heat of the chamber was cloying by the end of the meeting, torches flickering against the stone as the afternoon light dwindled through narrow windows. The heavy scent of parchment, old sweat, and Maegor’s own brooding silence lingered over the table like a stormcloud that refused to break.

Lord Celtigar spoke with his usual practiced efficiency, outlining riot suppression efforts in Duskendale, tax resistance again, and the latest supply concerns for the upcoming campaign in the Vale. His voice was steady, assured, and Maegor barely heard a word of it.

He sat back in his chair, steel-clad fingers tapping idly against the black armrest of his seat. His eye drifted.

To her.

Alysanne.

His brother’s last daughter. His niece.

She sat composed and silent beside him, her pale gold hair pinned back modestly, her face clear and attentive. She was a strange, sharp little thing: clever and cautious but not shy, far too perceptive for her age. She had not spoken once, had not even fidgeted, through the entire session. Not even any faces or grimaces. She was better than Viserys, certainly.

He had beaten any insolent streak out of her in the yard. That squire had left her black and blue. And yet she had risen the next day with fire in her eyes and no complaint on her lips.

She was no Viserys. No Jaehaerys. No Rhaena. No Aegon.

They were ashes.

But this girl…

She listened.

He still didn’t know what it meant to be a father. Lord Celtigar had confided that it was necessary, just as Visenya had long ago.

Maegor had not understood her then. He wasn’t sure he did now. He’d wanted to be a father for so long… but he barely knew what that meant.

Aegon had been distant; a conqueror, a legend, not a father.

Aenys had been soft. Weak. Not a man to look up to.

Maegor had no heirs. Not yet. Not living. Not breathing. But one day… perhaps.

And… this girl, she was here. Still breathing. Still watching. She might make good practice for his trueborn child.

Celtigar finished speaking, his voice tapering off.

“Your Grace,” the Hand said, “would you like to continue further?”

Maegor gave a single shake of his head.

“No.”

Chairs scraped. The lords rose. Bows were given. Robes rustled. Harrold Langward nodded once and exited last. Grand Maester Benifer gave Alysanne a faint smile.

But Alysanne did not move.

She stayed seated, as she’d been instructed before the meeting begun.

Maegor did not speak until the last echo faded from the chamber and the guards had shut the doors behind the others.

Then he turned toward her.

“What did you think of the meeting?”

Princess Alysanne, seated with her hands folded on her lap, met his gaze without flinching.

“Lord Celtigar holds the realm together with grit and ink. He’s tireless. Loyal. And falling apart at the seams.”

“Lord Massey and Lord Butterwell didn’t want to be there. I could see it in their eyes. Massey was watching the candle melt more than he listened to you.”

“Ser Harrold Langward… he wants to fight. He doesn’t care about politics. He barely cares about your crown. He just wants his sword wet.”

“Grand Maester Benifer tries very hard to seem calm. He isn’t. He’s terrified of you, but he’s no craven. He has good reason.”

Maegor let out a dry grunt of amusement. “I asked for your opinion on the meeting, girl. Not your courtly gossip.”

Alysanne’s face didn’t change.

“Then allow me to say what I heard, not just what I saw.”

He gestured for her to continue.

“Lord Celtigar wants to suppress the tax riots with soldiers, executions, intimidation. And now you ride for the Vale; another campaign against the Faith Militant. But brute force can only last so long before more rebellion breaks out. You kill one man and five more take up the sword against you.”

Maegor’s face darkened. “So what? Should I lower taxes? Open the gates to the Faith Militant? Reverse my own decrees? Violate our own traditions?”

Alysanne looked up at him, her voice calm. “No. But perhaps there is a middle. You’re not married to three wives anymore. You’ve shed polygamy, haven’t you? The Seven might smile more kindly on a king with one wife. If you were to promise to stay that way… the war may finally end.”

Her words hung in the air like a drawn blade.

Maegor’s fingers flexed on the table. His jaw tightened. From another mouth, he might have cut out the tongue that dared say it. But there was something in her tone. Something in the quiet defiance. Not a challenge. Not a sermon. An observation.

“You speak like a septa,” he said at last, voice low, “you think this war is about wives, Alysanne?” he asked, voice deep and even. “That the Faith rose against me because I married more than one woman?”

Alysanne didn’t speak.

Maegor stood, paced slowly behind her, steel boots echoing on the stone.

“This began with your father.”

His voice hardened with each step.

“Aenys, the weakling. Your father married Aegon to Rhaena, and the Faith howled. They saw incest. They saw abomination. They saw a threat to their gods. He gave them the excuse they needed.”

He stopped, turned, his eyes burning into her.

“And what did your father do? Did he take up a sword? Did he call his banners? No. He fled. He died like a coward on Dragonstone, sick and trembling, while the Faith Militant overran this very city. And who came to save King’s Landing?”

He didn’t wait for an answer.

“I did. I came back on Balerion. I burned them in the Sept of Remembrance, those rebels who tried to kill you and your family. I tore the sept down stone by stone. I broke the Warrior’s Sons and the Poor Fellows and scattered their bones from the Red Mountains to the Neck. I saved House Targaryen. I saved you.”

Alysanne’s eyes flicked down for a moment, but she didn’t speak.

Maegor stepped closer, looming over her.

“That is why you must ride your dragon. Not just to honor your blood… but to understand. To see the world as it truly is, not as some cloistered septa paints it. You think the Faith Militant will ever yield? They believe their cause is the gods; they will win or they will burn. No compromise.”

He leaned in.

“They will never stop, Alysanne. Not until we are all dead. You, your mother, your nieces, my unborn child, even our dragons. They want us all dead.”

Alysanne stiffened, her face pale, but still she did not look away.

Maegor straightened again, stepping back.

“This war is not of my making. I did not choose it. But I will win it.”

His voice lowered, more somber now.

“And you must help me.”

She hesitated. Then, softly, she nodded.

It was enough.

He folded his arms, watching her with the faintest flicker of satisfaction.

“Good. You understand more than your siblings ever did. That is why I have faith in you, in House Targaryen.”

Her lips parted slightly at that. She didn’t like hearing it. He didn’t care.

He turned away, walking toward the long window cut into the stone behind the council dais. The city sprawled below, sun-drenched and teeming. It looked peaceful. It never was.

“The prophecy, Alysanne,” he said. “The Song of Ice and Fire. You’ve heard it. You know.”

She said nothing, but he could feel her attention sharpen.

“The realm will freeze. The dead will rise. Only our blood can stand against the cold. That is why our house must survive. Why I have done what I have done.”

A heavy silence.

Behind him, he imagined her face. Unsure. Searching. Perhaps even believing.

Good.

Because he was lying. Every word. The prophecy and dreams intrigued him, but they were not what drove him.

He burned because he wanted to burn.

He fucked because he wanted to fuck.

He destroyed because it felt good to crush his enemies, to silence their voices and see the fear in their eyes as he killed them. The prophecy gave it all purpose, meaning.

But she didn’t need to know that. She needed a reason to follow him, after all.

“Who told you about the prophecy?”

Maegor stilled at Alysanne’s voice.

Then, slowly, he turned to face her.

His expression gave nothing, but inside… it caught him off guard. No one had ever asked him that. No one had ever needed to.

“My father, your grandfather,” he answered. “Aegon the Conqueror.”

Maegor stepped toward her, the light at his back throwing him into silhouette. His tone turned bitter as he continued.

“And Aenys… for all his softness, even my brother knew. He spoke of it the day he gave me the dagger. He said it was more than steel; it was memory. Legacy. A reminder of our destiny.”

Alysanne’s eyes widened at the mention of the dagger, the one she now possessed. Examining the princess, Maegor folded his arms.

“And you? How did you learn of it?”

She hesitated, visibly.

That stirred something in him. Her fear. Her reluctance. He could feel it. It was… unusual.

“My brother,” she said finally. “Jaehaerys.”

His name hung in the room like a ghost.

“Before he… disappeared. He told me things. About our blood. About a cold darkness. He made me promise to remember.”

A pause.

“But… even before that, I dreamed things. Strange things.”

Maegor didn’t move, but his body tensed.

He had never dreamed. Not once. Not even as a boy. Deep inside, he had envied that gift; dreams that meant something, dreams that lit the future on fire. Dreams his father had, dreams he only vaguely understood.

Maegor masked it.

“You still dream?”

Alysanne nodded, uncertain.

“Sometimes I see Silverwing. Sometimes other dragons… flying, burning. I see towers of black stone, oceans of ash. Then… light. A voice I don’t recognize. A babe in the dark. New life from ashes. It never makes sense.”

Maegor studied her. Every word sank like iron into his thoughts.

“Never tell anyone else about this,” he said abruptly.

That made her blink. “Why?”

“Because dreams are power. And power should never be shared so freely.”

He stepped closer, lowering his voice.

“We’ll find the meaning of them. Together.”

That seemed to surprise her more than anything.

“Dragonstone,” he added. “There’s more in that place than stone and sulfur. Secrets buried even I haven’t unearthed. I will teach you to ride your dragon… and you will tell me your dreams. We will interpret them… together.”

For once, his voice wasn’t iron. It was something else. Wonder. Something close to need.

“This world doesn’t need another conqueror,” he muttered. “It needs someone who understands why we conquered in the first place. And besides… two dragons are better than one.”

She said nothing, only nodded again.

It was more than enough for him.

“Three days. We fly.”

The princess took that as her cue to leave. The fire in the brazier had begun to die, its light flickering low as Maegor finally sat back in his chair, armor creaking against the carved wood. Alysanne had paused at the threshold, glancing back one last time, as if uncertain whether their conversation was truly over.

Maegor’s voice halted her.

“Three things.”

She turned slowly.

His gaze was fixed, cold as iron.

“First,” he said, “your septa does not come to Dragonstone.”

He watched her reaction closely. There was a flicker of surprise, then resistance; he could see it, even if she hid it.

“I’ve tolerated her presence long enough. I will not have her whispering prayers to gods who fear us. The Seven fear dragons, Alysanne. Their followers fear us. On Dragonstone, you will remember your true heritage: not some sheep-praying Andal dogma. Your blood is Valyrian.”

Alysanne didn’t speak. But her hands tightened at her sides.

Good. Let her feel the weight of it.

“Second,” Maegor continued, rising from his chair, “you will write down every dream. All of them. No matter how strange, how vague, how small. And you will bring them to me… at least once every fortnight. Dreams have meaning. And if you dream as Daenys did, as my father did, then you will not waste them.”

His tone hardened.

“Do not withhold them. Not from me.”

She gave a small nod. The firelight danced off her honey-blonde hair.

“Third,” he said, walking toward her slowly, “you will speak only in High Valyrian on Dragonstone.”

That caught her off guard.

“Why?” she asked.

“Because it is our true tongue,” he replied. “The language of dragons. The language of our home. Your father failed you in this; he raised you with the Common Tongue, a soft tongue. Dragons do not answer to soft words.”

He came to a halt in front of her.

“Balerion does not heed prayers. Silverwing will not bow to the Common Tongue. They know High Valyrian.”

His tone lowered, almost reverent.

“You will speak it as I do. As my mother taught me. As my father dreamed. If you wish to ride your dragon, if you wish to protect our family, you will need that tongue in your mouth like a blade.”

He stared at her for a long moment. Then…

“You may go.”

Alysanne hesitated, just for a breath, then bowed, graceful and cold, and turned to leave.

Maegor sat alone, one gauntleted hand resting on the carved wood of the table while the other clenched and unclenched at his side. The torches crackled faintly, the scent of burning pitch mixing with the ever-present smell of dust and stone in the small council chamber. Everyone else was gone. Good. He needed silence. He mulled over the conversation with Alysanne again, retracing her every word, her every breath.

She had listened. She had been still. She hadn’t flinched when he raised his voice or questioned her. And most of all… she hadn’t mentioned the incident. Not a word about the boy from House Towers, about the yard, about her bruises.

Smart, Maegor thought. Smart and obedient.

She understood fear now. That was good. Fear kept people close. He’d been too rough; he could admit that. He had treated her like a boy, like Viserys, despite himself. Viserys had often needed correction. Alysanne was different. Girls didn’t respond to pain the same way. Boys required action, girls required words.

Still, it all made him think of… the child.

Not Alysanne.

The child.

The one Alyssa carried now.

His heir.

His legacy.

That, that, led his mind down darker paths. His first… so-called heir.

He closed his eyes, grinding his teeth.

Alys.

Her name felt like fire and ice on his tongue. Alys Harroway.

That plump, kind-eyed fool. He hated thinking about her.

Her body had been soft as warm dough, her voice soothing, her touch unlike any other. She’d spoken to him like he was a man, not a monster. She had believed in him… or so he thought. He had changed for her, hadn’t he? He had tried to be less cruel, less rageful. He had wanted children with her. He had wanted a home.

He had loved her.

And she died.

Died giving birth to another man’s bastard.

A child she’d conceived in a lie. A secret. A betrayal.

Maegor’s eyes snapped open, burning.

He hated her for that. Hated the weakness in himself that still missed her, missed the way her fingers would smooth over the scar above his hip, the way she would hum when she braided her hair, the smell of her skin after a bath, her cunt when he pounded into her. He hated how real it still felt.

He hated Tyanna too.

That bitch had whispered poison into his ears, day after day. About Alys. About all of them. And he had listened. He’d let Tyanna twist him into knots, set him aflame with jealousy, until he was hollow and wrathful and broken.

She’d laughed at him for loving Alys. She’d told him that she was the only one who could ever understand him, ever love him.

He had repaid her for that lie. Oh, how he had repaid her.

But even Tyanna’s screams hadn’t removed Alys from his mind. Not truly.

“Fools,” he muttered. “All of them.”

He would not love again. He would not yearn again. The world did not deserve that.

His fists clenched on the carved edge of the small council table until the wood cracked beneath his gauntlets. The fire in the brazier hissed and popped, throwing shadows across the stone walls, but he didn’t see it; his vision was red. All this thinking, all this sorrow, it had riled him up significantly. Rage and want throbbed behind his eyes, inside his cock, up his spine like molten iron.

He shifted in his seat, grinding his thighs together under his armor. No relief. The plates pressed into him like punishment. His whole body ached with it.

Lust.

Not soft, not sweet. Ugly. Insistent.

It had been more than a moon, maybe two, since he’d had her: Alyssa. And that was too godsdamned long. He’d sent her away, out of caution, strategy, weakness, but now, every night since, the image of her swollen belly, her full breasts, that stiff noble mouth of hers… it haunted him. Hounded him.

He wanted her bent over the fucking bed, sobbing into the sheets, nails scratching the stone while he split her in half like he used to.

“Three fucking days.”

His voice was a low snarl. He rubbed at his groin through the thick plates of his cuisses, furious at the discomfort, at the need. His cock throbbed like it was punishing him.

Three days until he arrived at Dragonstone. Three days until he could get the bitch alone again. The queen. His queen. Mother of his heir.

He’d fuck her like an animal in heat. He’d take her on her back, on her knees, over a table, wherever the hell he wanted. He’d remind her of what she was: his cunt, his vessel, the mother of dragons.

“I’ll fuck the fear of me back into her.”

He hated how dry his mouth was. Hated how empty the Red Keep felt without the scent of her, the sound of her whimpering. Not like the whores on the Street of Silk. Not like any lowborn servant girl. He could have them anytime. Too easy. Too low.

He wanted nobility. He wanted a woman with a name, a title. Someone who’d grit her teeth, sob under him, and still wear his ring. That was what he craved.

Not some sweaty gutter-whore.

His wife. His queen.

Alyssa, his brother’s widow, was his now. And she carried his son or daughter, he didn’t give a shit. His blood was in her again, stretching her from the inside.

Maegor stood up, the chair scraping loudly behind him as he shoved it aside. His armored boots stomped toward the fire, and he stared into it like it owed him answers. The king began stalking in front of the fire, his eyes following the dancing flames.

He’d take Alyssa again. He’d put another child in her if this one failed. He’d use her the way she was meant to be used. Alysanne could have new siblings, better siblings.

But even as he paced, as his lust burned like dragonfire, the bitterness crept in again.

Alys.

Alys fucking Harroway.

She had moaned his name like no other. Clutched him like he was her sun and stars. Called him her king, her dragon, her beloved.

And she’d birthed another man’s bastard in his bed.

“Whore,” he hissed, staring into the flames. “Fucking lying whore.”

His balls ached. His jaw clenched so hard it felt like his teeth would snap. He hated that he still remembered her face when she screamed his name, how her tits bounced under him, how she smiled when she thought he couldn’t see.

She was dead now.

Just like Tyanna. Another snake he’d trusted. Another cunt who twisted his guts and left him bleeding.

But Alyssa still lived.

In three days, he’d claim what was his.

He would own her again: body, soul, all.

He breathed hard, chest rising and falling like a beast’s, willing himself to forget the others.

The fire hissed louder.

He would burn everything else if that was what it took.

Chapter 34: BENIFER V

Benifer adjusted his chain slightly and cleared his throat, returning his gaze to the vellum scroll that depicted the great wheel of the heavens. It was hanging on the wall of the solar of Maegor’s Holdfast, natural light illuminating the room. He traced a thin finger along the lines of the zodiac as he spoke.

“And this, children, is the White Lion, sometimes called Leononos in the old Valyrian texts. In high summer, he prowls highest in the sky, reigning from the zenith with his terrible claws and fiery heart.”

Princess Alysanne leaned forward, her young brow drawn in concentration. Her hair shimmered like beaten gold in the sunlight pouring through the windows, and Benifer allowed himself a brief moment of admiration; not of her beauty, but of her intensity. There was something so terribly focused about her when she learned, as though knowledge were a weapon she was desperate to forge for herself.

“And the seven wanderers, Grand Maester?” she asked. “Are they truly gods, as the lowborn say?”

That earned a sharp look from Septa Keira, who sat with her hands folded tightly in her lap, one eye ever on Alysanne, the other lost behind her milk-white patch. Keira said nothing, but Benifer felt her bristle.

He chose his words carefully.

“Many believe they are the Seven, yes. The Maiden wanders the skies alongside the Warrior, just as the Stranger stays ever apart from the rest. Others,” Benifer continued with a faintly wry smile, “argue that the wanderers are merely celestial bodies, not divine. But one cannot deny that the heavens stir the soul, whether for worship or wisdom.”

Alysanne nodded slowly, absorbing the thought, but Benifer’s gaze flicked for just a moment to the four girls seated on cushions behind her. Sera looked enraptured, her hands clutched together. Jenya was squinting with effort, clearly trying to make sense of the diagrams. Taliya seemed distracted, chewing the edge of her sleeve, while Dorthy was fearfully peeking at Septa Keira, almost as if she was worried the older woman would eat them up.

It was a strange menagerie to be teaching, a princess and four half-literate girls, each from the gutter of the city. Usually, a princess would be given highborn handmaidens, but unsurprisingly, Maegor’s court had precious few noble maidens. Benifer had initially balked: education was a rare jewel, meant for the highborn and those sworn to the Citadel. Yet… something in Alysanne’s insistence had silenced his protest. The girl had steel in her spine. She would not be denied. He had only given her two rules: no speaking or whispering while he spoke and Alysanne was the only one allowed to ask questions. The princess agreed to both.

And they had all surprised him. Not just Alysanne. Sera’s questions about lunar tides and the stars. Jenya’s delight in learning about birds and other animals. Even Dorthy, vulgar as she could be, had asked to borrow a book on herbs last week, of all things. Benifer hadn’t expected any of it.

Still, the oddest piece in the room remained Keira.

Benifer could feel the septa’s presence like a brand on the back of his neck, always watching, always judging. She was silent as death today, but he remembered her outburst the week before, when he’d dared explain symbolic castration in the old Valyrian epics. She’d accused him of filling the girls’ heads with filth.

Yet, she hadn’t left. The septa came to every lesson, watching over them, watched every word. Benifer sometimes wondered if she came to learn as well.

He didn’t look at her as he talked, not directly, but when he glanced to a window, he caught her reflection in the glass. Her eye met his there, dark and glinting, like the stars he taught about. He looked away, pulse quickening, heart scolding him like a coward. Keira looked especially cross today; Benifer tried not to think about why.

“Now,” he continued, pressing through his disquiet, “can anyone tell me which house the Red Wanderer moves through during the final moons of winter?”

Alysanne’s hand went up instantly. But, startling him, so did Jenya’s. The princess, seeing her friend raise her hand, lowered hers in response.

Keira twitched.

Benifer sighed, pinched the bridge of his nose, and gestured to the lowborn girl.

“Jenya?”

“The Wolf,” she said, nervously.

Benifer blinked.

“…Correct.”

He looked to Alysanne, who was grinning like a fox. She wasn’t even mad that her handmaiden had taken away the spotlight; she was proud of her friend.

The lesson stretched on for another twenty minutes, though time passed oddly in the solar that afternoon. The sun had shifted behind clouds outside the narrow window, muting the golden light and casting the chamber in a gentle gloom. Benifer’s voice, tired but practiced, moved through the names of the constellations, through the slow dance of the seven wanderers across the sky. Alysanne listened with unwavering attention, her quill occasionally scratching notes on a bit of parchment spread across a closed book in her lap.

To Benifer’s surprise, it wasn’t only the princess who listened. The handmaidens were rapt as well. Sera was the boldest, asking pointed questions about the celestial cycles. Jenya, though slower to understand, offered earnest guesses that drew light chuckles even from Keira. The other two, Taliya and Dorthy, remained quieter, but their eyes were fixed, their bodies still, the way true students learned.

He found himself… at ease.

When he finally closed the heavy book of charts beside him and announced, “That will be all for today,” it was with a faint touch of disappointment. The girls remained on their cushions, stretching, whispering among themselves.

Benifer straightened his robes and inclined his head toward Alysanne.

“You have been a fine pupil, Your Grace. It is a pity I won’t be able to continue these lessons once you depart for Dragonstone.”

He meant it. Perhaps more than he expected to.

Alysanne smiled gently, with the maturity of someone far older than her years.

“I’ll miss them too, Grand Maester. And so will my girls.”

That prompted giggles and nods from the handmaidens, who were gathering up books and rolled parchments. Benifer nodded indulgently at them, then turned toward Keira with a bit of good-natured ribbing on his tongue.

“Well, at least I know the septa will be watching over you-”

The silence that followed was immediate and strange.

Alysanne’s smile faltered. Jenya and Sera exchanged looks. Even the normally cheery Dorthy turned solemn. It was Keira who broke the quiet, her voice flat.

“I won’t be accompanying the princess to Dragonstone.”

Benifer blinked.

“I beg your pardon?”

Alysanne’s tone was quiet.

“The king doesn’t want Septa Keira there. He says he’ll be teaching me personally now.”

Benifer felt a tightness take root in his chest. Keira’s jaw had locked. She said nothing else. The handmaidens didn’t speak, though their eyes all flicked between Benifer and the princess with visible unease.

Benifer’s mind began racing. Alysanne, constantly alone with Maegor on Dragonstone. Something curdled deep in his gut, and his fingers clenched slightly over the spine of the astronomy tome. But he said nothing yet.

He just nodded once, too slowly to hide the dread building behind his eyes. The Grand Master immediately attempted to busy himself by gathering up his remaining supplies in the solar. Benifer cleared his throat as he slipped closed the final clasp on his leather satchel, fingers twitching with residual embarrassment. “If I have caused any offense, Your Grace, I beg your pardon,” he said, voice low and stiff, unwilling to meet the girl’s eye.

Princess Alysanne, still seated on the cushion, tilted her head, her expression unreadable for a moment before softening. “You haven’t,” she replied gently. “I’ll be alright. I’ll have the girls with me… my nieces, and my mother, Queen Alyssa.” Her tone grew more distant with that last name, more wishful than certain.

Benifer paused, glancing briefly at Keira, who stood by the door with arms folded across her modest white robes, lips thinned but resolute. The Grand Maester suspected she didn’t believe Queen Alyssa would be any kind of comfort. Perhaps she was right.

Alysanne rose, smoothing her skirts with one hand and stretching the other behind her back with a wince. She’d been sitting too long, and the bruises from the sparring still hadn’t faded entirely. “Still,” she added, turning toward him with a smile that didn’t quite reach her eyes, “I’ll miss you both. You’ve taught me so much. The best teachers a girl could ask for.”

Benifer blinked at that. Him? “Best teacher”? He’d spent his life buried in parchment and glass jars, debating ancient histories with men twice her age, advising lords and kings. Being compared to a one-eyed septa who looked at him like he was a worm in a wine cup felt oddly… gratifying for some reason, despite himself.

Septa Keira made a noise somewhere between a sigh and a snort, looking skyward as though beseeching the Seven to rescue her from such sentimental nonsense.

The handmaidens, of course, burst into stifled giggles.

Benifer straightened his chain and tried not to look flustered. He gave a nod of thanks, managing only, “You are a very diligent pupil, Your Grace.” A pause. “All of you are.” That drew a smile from Sera and a wide-eyed blink from Taliya, who clearly hadn’t expected to be acknowledged.

After Benifer had finished stowing the last of his scrolls and charts back into their lacquered box, Alysanne turned to him with that bright, hopeful spark that made her seem more girl than princess. “Will you come with us to the godswood again today, Grand Maester?” she asked, smoothing her skirts with excitement. “The Celtigar twins will be there too!”

He hesitated, not out of reluctance, but habit. They often went to the godswood after lessons, and Benifer often followed them… but he always had his reservations.

“I would be honored,” Benifer said, bowing his head with stiff ceremony. “Stars and scrolls are one thing, but the godswood holds older wisdom.”

The girls giggled at that: Jenya the loudest, Sera elbowing her, Dorthy smiling softly, Alysanne nodding softly. Even Taliya managed a quiet grin. Keira, ahead of them by the door, rolled her eye and turned without waiting, white skirts swishing as she stepped into the hall. Benifer and the girls followed her out into Maegor’s Holdfast.

As they turned a corner into the west hall, the sunlight from the narrow arrow slits cast long, golden stripes over the stone floors. Septa Keira walked ahead of them all, leading the way. Alysanne and her handmaidens walked in a gaggle of soft chatter and occasional bursts of giggling; Jenya and Sera always the loudest, Dorthy half-listening, Taliya quiet as ever. Alysanne only talked occasionally, mostly listening and giggling at her friend’s japes and gossip about lowborn nonsense. Their laughter echoed faintly through the otherwise silent castle, a strange and lively contrast to its usual solemnity.

Benifer followed a few paces behind, his hands folded over his chain, head slightly bowed in thought. The godswood was peaceful, yes, but it was not the trees that concerned him. The realm was not peaceful and a storm was coming: one of steel and fire, war and rebellion. Riots in Duskendale. Word from the Vale was dire. The Faith Militant still on the warpath. And now the king was departing, leaving his Hand to soothe a kingdom on the edge of riot while he drilled his young niece who hated him into a dragonrider who could serve him.

That girl, Benifer thought, glancing ahead at Alysanne. She was walking close to Sera, heads tilted together in quiet conversation. She plays the innocent, the kind maiden; perhaps she is. But she’s clever. Too clever. Even if Maegor did fall, she would survive.

Would Benifer survive?

He had served Maegor loyally. Spoken little, endured much. He had survived where so many others had perished. But if rebellion came, when it came, and Benifer could feel it, like a knife pricking at the base of his spine, his name might be inked beside Maegor’s in the ledgers of the doomed.

And what then? Hanging, beheading, or worse. Hot tongs. He knew the tales. He had read the records. People loved recording executions.

His mind spun with visions of gallows and torches when his eye, traitor that it was, lifted forward again and fixed for just a moment too long on the figure walking ahead of the girls.

Septa Keira.

She moved with precision, as always, her white robes clean and formal, veil covering her cropped brown hair. But the way the sunlight caught the fabric; it clung faintly at the curve of her hips as she turned to scold Jenya for laughing too loud. Just a shift of movement, a ghost of shape beneath linen. Her…

Benifer’s throat went dry. His eyes dropped instantly, guilt slamming into his gut like a mailed fist.

Seven preserve me, he thought. Again.

She was a septa. A woman of the cloth. Pious, sharp-tongued, disapproving of almost everything he said or did… and yet, she was there, in his thoughts more and more often, looming like a living contradiction: the scorn of the gods in one eye, and something far less holy in the shape of her haunches.

Benifer closed his eyes for a moment as they walked, whispering a small prayer beneath his breath. He would ask forgiveness in the sept tomorrow. He would pray longer. He would… find a book to occupy his thoughts. He forced his mind down narrow corridors, history, constellations, herbal formulas, anything but her. He could not look. He would not. The sway of her hips, the quiet judgement inherent within her; it haunted the corners of his vision, but he kept his eyes resolutely forward, locked on the pale braid of Princess Alysanne bobbing as she walked among her chattering handmaidens.

They soon emerged from the Holdfast’s shadow into the sunlit yard of the Red Keep, the stones warm beneath their feet, and the breeze carried with it the salt of Blackwater Bay. The godswood lay ahead, green and sun-dappled, and for a heartbeat Benifer wished they could all turn back. It felt too hot, far too hot.

Yet, the moment they entered through the vine-choked arch, Alysanne lit up like a flame in the wind.

The Celtigar sisters were already there, their matching faces brightening at the sight of the princess, but not at her handmaidens. That was something Benifer had observed about the twins since their arrival in the Red Keep. As ever, Prudence and Prunella acknowledged the lowborn girls with tight smiles, the kind that weren’t smiles at all. They only softened for Alysanne, bending toward her with a flourish of skirts and rehearsed affection.

Benifer’s attention shifted, and his chest clenched: Lord Edwell Celtigar stood near the shade of the great oak bench, arms folded, watching everything unfold with a knowing smirk. A father surveying his little scheme. He looked altogether too pleased to see his daughters hovering like tame hawks over the Targaryen girl.

Benifer paused on the garden path, unwilling to go further.

Ahead, Septa Keira had already seated herself beside the snoring old septa who guarded the twins. She sat stiff-backed as always, hands folded, her one eye fixed on Alysanne like a protective blade. She wasn’t looking at the Hand, even though he was practically right next to her. She hadn’t looked back once to see where Benifer was. That burned more than he’d admit.

There was only one spot left on the bench.

Next to her.

Benifer remained standing beneath the boughs, refusing the seat, unwilling to subject himself to Edwell’s knowing glances or Keira’s sharper ones. He would observe from here. He would keep his thoughts locked away, his gaze distant. He watched the girls as they walked around the godswood talking to one another: Alysanne and the Celtigar twins and the handmaidens.

Benifer’s arms were folded tightly behind his back, the chain around his neck hot and heavy with the midday sun. He pretended to watch the girls, a golden princess flanked by giggling handmaidens and sharp-tongued noble twins, but his eyes drifted again and again toward the bench beneath the godswood’s oldest tree.

There sat Lord Edwell Celtigar, smooth as ever, speaking with Septa Keira. Benifer couldn’t hear the words, not clearly, but he could recognize that voice: steady, dry, warm with calculated humor. A charmer’s tone. Edwell leaned toward her slightly, speaking with his hands, as if the septa were just another man to be won over in a hall.

Keira didn’t look impressed.

She answered, he could tell that much, but her posture never changed: rigid, guarded, unmoved. Her lips barely moved. Benifer watched her lashes lower, her head tilt away, the faint purse of her mouth that was almost a scowl. She was humoring the Hand of the King the same way she humored swarms of lords and nobles who buzzed too close to Alysanne.

Benifer found himself smiling. It wasn’t a kind smile.

He shouldn’t be smiling. He shouldn’t be thinking anything at all.

Still… he envied Edwell. The easy way he spoke, the way he could sit beside her like it was nothing. Like it didn’t matter that she was a septa sworn to the Faith and he a married man with daughters and ambitions of grandeur. Benifer never dared such a thing. The thought of sitting next to her, saying anything that might be construed as familiar, turned his stomach to water.

What would he even say?

Talk of the heavens? The Maiden’s constellation shining over the godswood? Would she even care?

Talk of the Seven? She would see through him in a moment, feel his blasphemous thoughts squirming under his robes.

Talk of Alysanne? Yes. That was their shared ground, their duty, their charge. He could speak of the girl, perhaps… but the moment the subject turned, even slightly, even innocently, he’d ruin it. He knew he would.

Benifer rubbed at the back of his neck, furious at himself. What foolishness was this? He was Grand Maester of the Red Keep, a learned man, chosen to serve kings. And yet here he stood like a moon-eyed novice watching a woman who wanted nothing from him: not respect, not friendship, not love. Only that he do his job. Only that he not harm the girl they both taught.

She was a septa. He was a maester. They had taken vows.

Vows that meant something. Still meant something.

And yet…

He glanced back toward the bench. The Hand was smoothing the front of his tunic, saying some parting remark Benifer couldn’t hear, and then walking away towards the girls with his usual self-satisfied air. Keira did not watch him go. She merely adjusted her veil and returned her eye to Alysanne in the distance.

Benifer felt a warmth crawl up his neck; half embarrassment, half something uglier. It was not just relief that Edwell had left. It was something like… satisfaction.

Keira hadn’t smiled for the Hand of the King.

He’d take that petty, wretched victory and carry it like a relic to his grave. He knew it was foolish, impossible, poisonous.

But gods help him.

He could dream.

Benifer stood with his hands folded before him, feeling the weight of the chains at his throat more acutely than usual. The murmuring girls were only background noise now, distant and soft as the rustling of leaves above. His eye was fixed on Keira, perched at the edge of the bench like a wary hawk in the guise of a woman. Her back was impossibly straight, her veil immaculate. The line of her jaw, the pale cheek, the way the breeze caught the hem of her sleeve; he catalogued it all without thought, without permission from reason.

She was from the Riverlands. That much he’d gleaned over the moons they’d taught together. A septa educated in the Starry Sept of Oldtown: his own place of birth, the city of stone and salt, of towers and whispers. He had been there too, not so long ago, not in years. Just… in the arc of a single life. He had been at the Citadel, the only place for the younger son of a household knight. Both of them trained in silence, service, and self-denial, perhaps passing in the same streets without ever knowing. They might have seen each other once, just once; two people walking opposite cloisters, eyes downcast.

He imagined it now: a bright corridor beneath stained glass, her veil white and fresh, her hands folded. Himself, younger, leaner, his hair still thick and brown, carrying scrolls fresh from the Citadel’s libraries. Her, younger, brighter, her eyes brown, beautiful, and unmarred by weariness of the world. Their eyes meet for the briefest moment. A flicker, a breath.

He would have spoken first. A clever remark, something about the beauty of the constellations or some remark on the High Septon’s latest sermon. She would have smiled, surprised to hear a maester speak with such candor. Maybe she would have lingered. Maybe not.

But in the dream that flowered behind his eyes, she lingered.

He imagined their conversations, late ones by candlelight, about the boundaries of faith and reason, the gods and nature, the mysteries of life and death. They would laugh, heads bowed over books and bread crusts, two cloistered hearts pretending not to notice they were beating harder.

Then one night, the tension would break. He would say her name, not Septa or Sister, just Keira. She would touch his wrist lightly, just above the pulse. A kiss would follow. He didn’t imagine the mechanics of it, the breath and the warmth and the impossible hunger of it. That was too dangerous. He imagined only the idea of it, soft and trembling, like the edge of a dream you fear to wake from.

In that vision, they would leave. Flee. A ship from Oldtown to the Arbor, or farther still. A cottage in the woods, perhaps; not in the cold North, but somewhere warm, gentle. He’d be a healer, humble but learned. She would tend the garden, teach their children prayers, scold him when he slipped up, laugh when their goats chewed the washing line.

Children. Gods. He’d never let himself think of that before. A boy with his eyes. A girl with her sharp tongue. His heart twisted at the thought.

Benifer blinked and looked away, breath catching in his throat.

Punishment. The word rose like a bitter tonic.

A maester who breaks his vows faces the Wall. If he’s lucky.

A septa? No court would forgive her. Not for breaking her sacred vows. The Silent Sisters would take her, clothe her in gray, take her tongue forever.

He closed his eyes.

Fool. Fool of a man. His whole life spent in study and discipline, and here he stood, daydreaming like a lovesick novice, building futures on clouds and shadows.

But oh, what a pleasant dream it had been.

When he opened his eyes, Keira hadn’t moved. Still as the statues in the Royal Sept, her good eye watching the girls like a blade.

Benifer swallowed down the ache in his chest. There were vows. There were walls. There was duty.

He could bear the chains. He could bear the silence.

But he’d never stop dreaming.

His mind was still on Keira when a familiar voice, smooth as aged wine, stirred the stillness beside him.

“Greetings, Grand Maester,” said Lord Edwell Celtigar, his tone effortlessly warm, almost teasing. “Do you always haunt the trees like a pale owl, or is it only when septas and maidens run loose?”

Benifer nearly startled, nearly, and turned with measured calm to face the Hand. “Only when I’m invited, my lord.”

Edwell laughed softly, glancing past him toward the path where Alysanne strolled with her handmaidens and the Celtigar girls in tow. “The princess invited you? I thought she had enough kind protectors watching her.”

“I’m observant,” Benifer murmured, adjusting the sleeves of his robe. “Kindness rarely enters into it.”

“Well, I’m glad someone’s observing.” Edwell shifted his stance, the embroidered hem of his cloak brushing the grass. “I find it difficult to keep my eye on any single thing lately. War in the Vale, taxes boiling over, and our king playing teacher to a child he once kept locked behind guards.”

Benifer raised an eyebrow. “And yet you seem optimistic.”

“I’m trying,” Edwell admitted, his voice lower now, more guarded. “She’s become a favorite of the king.”

“For now,” Benifer said softly.

The Hand exhaled and nodded. “For now.”

Benifer folded his hands behind his back and glanced sideways toward Lord Celtigar, voice low but tinged with irony. “The king favors you, Lord Celtigar. I wonder; how does it feel to be a friend of the king?”

Edwell gave a crooked smile, something halfway between pride and weariness. “Friend? I… perhaps. You don’t walk beside Maegor to feel safe. You do it because you’d rather risk being scorched than crushed.”

Benifer raised a brow. “And yet you seem uncrushed, unscorched. A rare feat in this court.”

“I speak because I know when to hold it,” Edwell replied, his voice quiet, firm. “Maegor has killed maesters who did not know when to hold their tongues.”

Grand Maester Benifer offered a thin smile.

“I know the value of silence around Maegor.”

Lord Celtigar gave a low chuckle at that, nodding in agreement. “Aye,” the Hand said, “that’s why you’re still breathing. Your predecessors lacked that talent. Or they trusted their chains to protect them.”

Benifer nodded quietly. That only widened Edwell’s grin and his tone shifted slightly, more purposeful now. “On other matters… I was thinking. The princess is heading to Dragonstone soon, and she’ll be in need of good company. What would she say to taking one of my girls with her? Prudence, perhaps. Or Prunella.”

Benifer blinked slowly, digesting that. “And the king agrees?”

“He does,” Edwell said, almost too quickly. “I asked him days ago. He thought it wise.”

“Then I imagine she’ll agree as well,” Benifer murmured. “So long as she’s the one asked. If she feels it’s being forced, she’ll bristle.”

“Which is why I had the girls ask her. Not me. She said she’d think on it. She seemed… open.” He paused, then smirked. “Though her septa was less than welcoming. Probably frigid or just resentful of being left behind.”

Benifer’s mouth twitched. “Keira is not frigid, Lord Celtigar. She is cautious. Her world is smaller than ours. Tighter.”

Edwell raised a brow. “You speak as if you know her.”

“I do,” Benifer said simply. Then, with a touch of defensiveness, “She and the princess have endured more than most, and yet remained strong. That’s not nothing.”

The Hand gave a sly grin. “Perhaps you’ll also miss Alysanne more than you care to admit, Grand Maester.”

Benifer didn’t answer. He just turned back to the bench where the girls were gathered, laughter rising into the trees. There was Keira, silent as ever, a sentinel in white.

“Why don’t we join them? Edwell barely waited for Benifer to respond before striding over the bench.

Lord Celtigar’s boots crunched lightly on the gravel as he strode toward the bench with his usual confidence, calling out, “Well then, ladies, what is the topic of such spirited chatter?”

Grand Maester Benifer followed, slower, folding his hands behind his back with a measured gait. The girls quieted somewhat as the two older men approached, but Alysanne raised her chin politely and answered with calm formality. “We were talking of Dragonstone, my lord. Of dances… and of Silverwing.”

Edwell’s face lit up with a smile that almost looked fatherly. “And here I was afraid you might all be conspiring rebellion.” The joke earned a few chuckles from the girls. Prudence snorted.

“I suppose you’ve decided then?” Edwell turned toward the princess, his tone shifting with curiosity. “Which of my daughters will be attending you?”

Alysanne looked toward the Celtigar twins, then back to the Hand. “Prudence will accompany me,” she said clearly, not unkindly. “She really wants to see Silverwing.”

That was when Prunella burst out, her arms crossed. “It’s not fair! Why Prudence? I’m the older sister!”

“You’re barely older,” Prudence snapped back.

“It’s the principle!” Prunella sulked, tossing her long braid over her shoulder. “I want to see the dragon too, she only picked you-”

“Enough, both of you,” Edwell interrupted, but his tone was indulgent, not angry. “The king allowed one, and that is generous. You can still write the princess. Often.”

“About what?” Alysanne asked dryly, already preparing her answer. “Maegor’s orders are very clear. While I’m on Dragonstone, I am to speak and write only in High Valyrian. Even my letters.”

A moment of silence followed.

“Only High Valyrian?” Edwell repeated slowly, blinking. “Even for personal matters?”

Alysanne nodded. “That’s what he said.”

Prudence made a face. “I can’t even read High Valyrian. Can you, Prunella?”

“I can read a bit,” Prunella muttered, still annoyed.

Benifer was silent, but his thoughts raced. It wasn’t entirely senseless, dragons were known to respond only to the Valyrian tongue, but to forbid the princess from writing even a single letter home in her mother’s tongue? That was isolation. Not training.

Keira, for once, spoke up. “That is madness,” she said sharply. “She’ll be cut off from everyone here.”

“It’s not a terrible idea, honestly,” Alysanne interrupted her gently, with a forced smile. “I need to learn to speak it properly to command Silverwing. The king wants me to ride with him when he goes off to the Vale.”

The septa went quiet at that. So did the rest of them.

Benifer studied Alysanne’s face as she said it. There was pride in her voice… but not peace. Not joy. She was repeating the line Maegor had planted in her, like a lesson recited but yet fully not understood.

Keira sat stiff-backed on the worn bench beside the old dozing septa, her white robes neat despite the heat. Lord Celtigar stood beside the Grand Maester near the fringe of the garden’s thorny hedges, arms folded, his crimson mantle catching stray petals on the breeze. The girls, highborn and lowborn alike, clustered in a circle nearby, chattering softly beneath the old pine boughs. Alysanne’s voice shook Benifer suddenly.

“You know High Valyrian, don’t you, Grand Maester?”

Benifer blinked, momentarily caught off guard. “I… yes, Your Grace. I am fluent, of course, but-”

She interrupted him before he could finish with a voice as confident as a queen’s. “Then you should help Septa Keira and Prunella understand my letters when I’m on Dragonstone. You could teach them. You’re not teaching me while I’m away.”

The girls fell silent, all turning to Benifer with wide eyes. Keira slowly turned her head toward Alysanne with the exact expression one might wear when asked to dine with a murderer. Lord Celtigar raised his brows in mild amusement. Benifer, caught between embarrassment and something dangerously close to excitement, coughed into his sleeve.

“It’s not a bad idea,” Prunella said at once, eager. “Even if I can’t come to Dragonstone with you, I’d rather not miss out on what you write. I already understand a bit.”

“A bit,” Alysanne teased, then looked back to the bench. “And you, Keira? You’ve already listened to every one of my lessons. You surely know more than you admit.”

Keira frowned, deep and unmoving. “I have duties at the Royal Sept,” she said. “I should not squander time learning dead languages for letters.”

“You wouldn’t be squandering time,” Alysanne replied, undeterred. “I’d like to tell you about Dragonstone. Hear from you.”

The septa’s one visible eye narrowed. There was a long pause. Then, with a tight sigh that might have cracked stone, she inclined her head.

“One lesson a week,” she said. “That is all.”

Benifer nearly forgot how to breathe.

Prunella let out a delighted squeal, clapping her hands like a girl half her age. “I’ll learn High Valyrian! Oh, I’ll be so clever my tongue will catch fire!”

Prudence snorted, crossing her arms. “More likely that Silverwing will set your hair on fire when you try to say hello. ”

That drew laughter from the handmaidens and even a smirk from Lord Celtigar, who gave his daughter a fond but warning glance. Alysanne, half-scolding and half-amused, shook her head. “Peace, both of you. You’ll need to learn some High Valyrian, all of you. At least enough to understand me, my uncle won’t allow me to speak the Common Tongue in public on Dragonstone. Privately, perhaps… but not before the court, not in front of dragons.”

Dorthy paled a little. “Not even with us?”

Alysanne softened her tone. “I’ll try. But we all must do as the king commands, or appear to. And besides, if Silverwing only understands High Valyrian… we may as well learn to whisper to her properly.”

That quieted them. The thought of dragons always did.

Across the godswood, Lord Celtigar stood with arms folded, watching the exchange with a look of detached amusement. Septa Keira sat stiffly at the end of the bench, still and unreadable, her hands clasped so tightly her knuckles were white.

Benifer noticed her silence more than anything else.

While the girls turned to giggles again, Sera mimicking a dragon’s roar in a shrill and totally unconvincing voice, Benifer let his eyes linger on Keira. Her lips were pressed into a thin line. She hadn’t said a word since agreeing, reluctantly, to the tutoring. Not a complaint. Not a protest.

But her silence was louder than shouting.

He thought, for the briefest moment, to ask if she was all right. Perhaps he should ask.

Then the old septa beside her gave a great snore and startled half the group, her eyes blinking open and unfocused. “What’s all this noise? Has the king died?”

“No,” Alysanne said brightly. “We’re just talking of dragons and languages and letters, septa.”

“Hmph.” The old woman smacked her lips. “Just don’t summon any demons.”

Prunella raised her hand. “What’s the High Valyrian word for demon?”

That set everyone laughing again, even Benifer… only Keira remained silent.

Chapter 35: ROGAR III

The hall of Storm’s End was a thunderous sea of meat and mead and roaring voices. Minstrels plucked away in one corner, barely audible over the laughter and song of a hundred lords and knights. Pageantry displayed showed the importance of celebration: the purple thunderbolt of House Dondarrion, the green turtle of House Estermont, the suns and moons of House Tarth, the black nightingales of House Caron. All and more were represented in the hall today. Platters steamed with venison and goose, blood sausage and honeyed yams, the heavy scent of roasting fat lingering over the long tables like perfume. Wine sloshed and spilled, dogs barked beneath benches, and the firelight caught steel and jewels in every noble crest.

Up on the dais, Lord Rogar Baratheon tore into a turkey leg like a soldier after campaign. Grease shone on his beard and fingers, but he did not care. Garon and Orryn flanked him, drinking deep and bickering over whose squires had botched the jousts earlier that day. Every few minutes, Garon thumped the table with his fist, and Orryn threw a flagon at Garon, nearly toppling a carafe of Arbor red.

Further down the dais, Ronnal sat stiffly among the Morrigens, his wife Jena beside him, eyes sharp and lips thin with disapproval as she watched the revelry. Her father Lord Morrigen sat nearby, a wizened old hawk who seemed more interested in his food than conversation. Her brother, Ser Gyles, wore the half-smile of a man who saw everything and said nothing, sipping from a goblet and leaning in now and then to murmur something into Jena’s ear. Rogar caught their glance toward him once or twice and offered a slow nod. Polite. Measured.

Below them, among the long tables of bannermen and lesser houses, Ser Borys Baratheon weaved like a stormwind through reeds. He clapped men on the back, whispered in women’s ears, took a flagon straight from one knight’s hand, gulped it, and passed it back with a belch and a booming laugh. He snatched a turn with a fiddle from a minstrel, played one sour note, and tossed it back with a shrug before being pulled into another story at another table. His energy set the hall alight.

Rogar’s eyes followed him, warm with approval. Borys was an arse sometimes, but he made people love him. That was a kind of power too, wasn’t it?

As a serving girl in a low-cut bodice bent near, Borys whispered something into her ear. She giggled and slapped his shoulder, barely a rebuke, and Rogar watched her retreat with a sway in her step.

He chuckled under his breath, raising his goblet.

But even as his teeth tore into meat and his ears caught the echoes of laughter and song, his mind drifted elsewhere. Beneath the sound of revelry, there it was again: the storm behind his brow.

Maegor.

Even in this hall of laughter and full bellies, that name soured his stomach. The king still sat the Iron Throne with Balerion under him, still ruled with fire and fear, still kept Queen Alyssa and the Targaryen children as hostages… even if now he tried to dress it up with feigned fatherhood.

Rogar growled low in his throat, and the turkey bone cracked in his fist.

Daemon Velaryon had written him again. Queen Alyssa had refused to cooperate, to participate in another failed escape. The lord admiral himself had still seemed adamant on the idea though, and so did Rogar. Securing the queen and Maegor’s unborn heir was their best chance to undermine the tyrant and end his rule once and for all.

But if they failed? If Balerion rose from Dragonstone in fury, black wings blotting out the sun?

Storm’s End might burn next. All his brothers. His people.

He shoved the thoughts down with another swallow of ale. Not now. Not tonight. They were instead replaced by new thoughts, worse thoughts.

He still had no bride. No heir. No legacy beyond his name and sword. Storm’s End was his, but for how long if he died without issue? The lords would tear it apart.

Rogar gritted his teeth, watching Ronnal’s wife Jena laugh at something her brother said. She looked so happy… and so did Ronnal, despite himself. Ronnal had always been the quietest of Rogar’s brothers; perhaps that was why he fit in so nicely with the Morrigens.

He looked down at his half-eaten turkey leg, suddenly uninterested.

But then Orryn elbowed him, smirking, holding up a goblet like a challenge. “Don’t let that brain of yours boil the feast, brother. You’re scowling like you found a worm in your wine.”

“Just thinking,” Rogar said gruffly, wiping his hands on a cloth. “One of us has to.”

“Bah, save your thoughts for councils and hunting. Tonight is for meat and music.”

Rogar gave a humorless grunt, but he clinked goblets with Orryn all the same and took a long drink. The warmth of the wine spread through his chest, dulled the edge of everything.

Just for tonight, he would feast. Tomorrow… tomorrow he’d think again.

Rogar grunted low in his throat, shook his head, and finally spoke, more to distract himself than anything else. “Tell me, brothers… what kind of women do you prefer? Highborn? Low? Quiet? Loud? Or just warm and willing?”

Orryn choked on his drink with a cackle. “By the gods, what sort of question is that for a feast?”

“A fair one,” Garon said with a shrug, licking grease from his fingers. “You’ve clearly got something chewing through your head, might as well let it out.”

Rogar wiped grease from his chin, narrowed his eyes at Garon, and tossed the question again like a gauntlet. “Well then, what sort of woman sets your blood burning, brother?”

Garon didn’t think. Didn’t hesitate. He grinned like a man speaking directly to a hall of soldiers and tavern‑girls, not lords. “The sort I can grab,” he said, thumb hooking toward his own chest, “not the sort I have to bow to. Noblewomen always have these… rules. Give me a ripe woman who knows her way around a man’s cock. No squeaking maid who thinks an arse is scandalous. I want a woman who’s been around the block; who can take a hand on her hair, a bite on her neck, a knee between her legs, and still tell me to go again without blinking.”

Orryn snorted into his wine. “By the Seven, Garon, no wonder you’re not married.”

“Aye,” Garon shot back, eyes bright and utterly shameless, “I’m not the marrying type. Look, I don’t want some stuck‑up spring‑filly noblegirl who wilts if you slap her thigh. I want a seasoned mare. The kind who’ve smelled ale and a dozen men’s sweat and still choose mine. The kind who spread her legs like castle gates and don’t ask questions about lineage. The kind who scream, not whisper. The kind who claw your back, spit in your mouth, and laugh while they do it.”

A few knights at a lower table overheard and laughed outright. Even some of the squires snickered at Garon’s words.

Orryn slapped the table. “You want a whore? Fucking seven hells.”

Garon slapped the table and roared with laughter. "Aye! But at least they don’t nag you to death."

Rogar shook his head, amused despite himself. He gestured with the bone. “I asked what kind of women you prefer, not what you fuck when you’re drunk.”

“I answered,” Garon said, grinning still. “Lowborn, bawdy, the kind who know how to keep your bed warm and your tongue occupied. What about you, Orryn?”

Orryn’s smirk thinned. “My wife,” he said with no hesitation. “A noblewoman. Dignified. Keeps the house in order, sees to the girls, doesn’t shame the name Baratheon. You two should be so lucky.”

“Why isn’t she here then?” Garon asked with a lopsided smile. “Afraid we’d see what you married?”

“That’s none of your gods-damned business,” Orryn said, his voice suddenly clipped.

“Oh, struck a nerve,” Garon teased, waggling his brows. “Maybe she doesn’t like feasts, or maybe it’s just you.”

Rogar chuckled, cutting the tension. “Leave off it, Garon.”

“Nay, come on,” Garon said, swinging back toward Rogar. “You brought it up. What’s your type, ‘Lord Rogar?’ You’ve dipped your wick in every bathmaid and barmaid from here to Shipbreaker Bay, but let’s hear your ideal woman. Thin? Plump? Noble? Silken voice or sharp tongue?”

Rogar tapped the bone once against the rim of his goblet, considering. The great hall roared around them, but his brothers waited.

“I prefer noble,” he said at last, slowly. “Manners. Grace. The kind of woman who turns heads at court, not because her tits are out, but because she knows how to walk, how to speak. A woman with breeding.”

Silence. Then both brothers burst into laughter.

“Liar,” Garon coughed through his chuckles. “You’ve fucked half the washerwomen in the keep!”

“Probably bent a few stablegirls over too,” Orryn added, raising his goblet mockingly. “To noblewomen and their fine manners!”

Garon waggled his eyebrow at that. “Oh, like our lord’s first wife?”

Rogar scowled, but there was no heat in it. “There’s a difference between what a man fucks and what a man marries.”

“Doesn’t stop you from running after any free cunny you can find,” Garon grinned.

“Look,” Rogar said, straightening, “I’ve had plenty of women, aye, but I want a wife who can rule beside me. Not just ride me. Someone who doesn’t spill secrets to the servants, who doesn’t blush at every word spoken, who can smile and charm a lord and put the fear of the gods in his wife if she steps out of line.”

“You want our grandmother, then,” Orryn said dryly.

That actually got a real laugh out of Rogar. “Gods forbid, Granny Argella will haunt all of us if you say that again.”

Rogar chewed thoughtfully on the last of his turkey leg, sucking grease from his fingers as he cast a long glance toward Ronnal and Jena at the lower table. Ronnal was leaning close, whispering something in his wife’s ear, and though Jena didn’t laugh, didn’t smile even, seven, had she ever smiled, she nodded with that slow, considered manner Rogar had come to associate with people who held their tongue instead of wasting it. It made her different. Strange. Frustrating.

“I want what Ronnal has,” Rogar muttered finally, wiping his hand on the hem of his cloak. “A wife who’s loyal. Who keeps his bed warm and gives him sons… and fights for her own with tooth and claw.”

Garon snorted like a horse. “You want a cold fish with a dagger in her boot, then? Ronnal’s wife’s more ghost than woman. Don’t blink too fast or she’ll vanish.”

“Say that louder,” Orryn murmured dryly, “so Ronnal can knock your teeth in before dessert.”

Rogar ignored the bickering, eyes still on Jena. “She’s loyal. That’s what matters. Stands by Ronnal like a true wife, even if she’s not chattering all day like some craven puppy.”

“She’s not loyal, she’s vicious,” Garon said, reaching for another haunch. “Morrigen girls are all sharp‑tongued, sharp‑hipped, and mean as crows. You’d bed her wrong once and she’d poison your next stew. No thanks.”

Orryn leaned back, crossing his arms. “You’re overthinking this, Rogar. You’re the fucking Lord of Storm’s End! You could marry half the Seven Kingdoms if you wanted. Redwynes, Rowans, Hightowers… any girl of age with a pulse and a pedigree. It’s not like you’re still grieving your first wife… though people may think so.”

“I’ve not,” Rogar said simply, voice a low rumble. “She’s dead. Gone.”

That silenced the other two, if only for a moment. Then Garon raised a brow. “So what’s stopping you? Say the word, and you’ll have twenty girls sent in by morning. Take your pick: wide hips, sweet tits, long hair, rich fathers. You name it.”

Rogar chuckled, but his gaze never left the Ronnal and the Morrigens. “Maybe I should.”

He was done feasting on salt and whores, done flirting with maids and pretending their giggles filled anything deeper than his belt. A Lord needed more than comfort; he needed alliances. Legacy. A woman who didn’t flinch when storms came; he’d had enough of softness.

“Maybe I will start looking,” he said, more to himself than to them, voice thick with intent. “I’ve a war coming. I’ll need a lady at my side, not a whore in my lap.”

The hall was roaring with laughter and music when a drunken hedge knight, red-faced and swaying where he stood atop a bench, bellowed out a toast that cut through the clamor like a dagger through flesh.

“To the Headless Dog!” he shouted, sloshing his ale across the table. “To brave Ser Joffrey Doggett, who stood against the black beast on the throne!”

A hush stole over the room like a sudden draft of cold wind. A few gasps rang out, a few chairs scraped quietly away from the bold fool. Rogar’s hand froze mid-bite, the meat slick with grease halfway to his mouth. His eyes snapped to the knight, who was raising his cup high, oblivious or uncaring of the danger his words courted.

Before the silence could settle fully, Borys Baratheon was moving; quick as a shadow and twice as loud. He surged up behind the hedge knight and cuffed him hard across the back of the head. The man went sprawling face-first into a trencher of bread and onions.

The hall erupted in laughter, shouts, and stomps of approval. Borys barked, “Sit down and drink, you daft bastard, before you lose more than your wits!” He clapped the man on the back again, this time with something almost like affection, and shoved him back down onto the bench.

Rogar let out a low chuckle as the tension bled out of the room. He leaned back in his high seat, surveying the ripple the knight’s words had caused, how quick his brother had been to smother it. Out loud, he only said, “That dog lost his head for a reason.”

But behind his smile, his thoughts churned.

Fool or not, the man had spoken aloud what more and more men were whispering behind their cups. The name “Headless Dog” was becoming a symbol in too many corners of the realm who despised the king. Maegor… Maegor was still king.

Not forever. Not if Rogar had his way.

He looked down into his goblet, then raised it with a glint in his eye. “May we all drink freely one day… when no man fears naming the tyrant for what he is.” Orryn and Garon, the only people close enough to hear it, nodded. Rogar tore a strip of meat from the bone, chewing as Garon slouched in his seat beside him, swilling wine with a lopsided grin.

“If you could fight anyone in the Seven Kingdoms,” Garon asked, voice thick with drink and mischief, “man-to-man, steel to steel… who would it be?”

Rogar grunted, licking grease from his fingers. “You already know the answer to that.”

“Maegor,” Garon said with mock solemnity, raising his cup in an ironic toast. “Of course. But not today, right? He still has Balerion, you know.”

Rogar chuckled low in his throat. “I’d rather fight the man than the monster, aye. But there’s others. Ser Qarl Corbray, maybe. Ser Lorence Roxton. I’d like to see what it feels like to clash with a man holding Valyrian steel.”

“Ha! You just want their swords,” Garon jeered. “You think you’d survive long enough to steal one?”

“Blackfyre’s still out there,” Orryn muttered, voice quieter but heavier. “If Maegor draws it again, gods help the realm.”

“And gods help Rogar if he faces it,” Garon cackled. “Maegor swings that blade like it was born in his fist. You better start thinking how to take Balerion out of the sky before you worry about Blackfyre.”

Rogar smirked, but then his attention drifted. A plump, golden-haired serving girl was weaving between tables, hips swaying under her modest skirts. Her cheeks were flushed from wine or exertion, maybe both. She caught Rogar’s gaze for a heartbeat and smiled knowingly before ducking away to the next table.

He was about to rise, just to follow the view, nothing more, when a pale-robed figure stepped directly into his line of sight.

Maester Oran. Young, scholarly, insufferable. His short-cropped beard was too neatly trimmed, and his maester’s chain looked polished as a knight’s armor, as though he believed himself the heir to the Citadel itself.

“My lord,” Oran said, oblivious, or indifferent, to the scowl forming on Rogar’s face. “I bring word. A raven arrived not an hour past. A letter.”

Rogar glared at the maester as if his eyes might burn a hole through him. “You’re blocking the scenery, Oran.”

“I’ll move when I’ve delivered this.” The young maester produced a scroll sealed in pale green wax. “From Grassy Vale. Lord Meadows.”

Rogar blinked. “Lord Meadows?” He leaned forward now, interested despite himself. “What in seven hells does the lord of cows and grass want with me?”

“I didn’t read it,” Oran said dryly, though his tone implied he would have if he thought he could get away with it.

Rogar snatched the letter and cracked the seal, eyes narrowing as he read. Orryn and Garon leaned in, curious. A few sentences in, and Rogar’s frown deepened.

Rogar read the words again, as if the ink might shift and change beneath his eyes. A tourney. At Grassy Vale. In a moon’s time.

“A tourney?” Garon barked a laugh beside him. “You’re jesting. A tourney, in only a moon?”

Orryn leaned closer, peering at the letter over Rogar’s shoulder. “Is that wise?” he asked, voice low. “With the realm burning?”

Rogar held up a hand to silence them both, scanning further. His eyes narrowed.

“They’re all coming,” he murmured. “Velaryon. Hightower. Tully. Even Lannister.”

That silenced even Garon. The words hung in the air like thunder before a storm.

Rogar’s mind raced. He felt the weight of it settle in his gut; not fear, not quite, but the rush of knowing the game was changing. The timing couldn’t be more perfect. Tyanna was dead, and her many eyes across the realm had dimmed. Maegor, for all his black armor and Balerion’s shadow, would soon crawl into Dragonstone like a wounded bear. He left his realm in the hands of Lord Celtigar, a man with gold and blood but not enough iron in his spine, a man whose attention was entirely on the Faith Militant and the Vale right now.

And now the great lords of Westeros were gathering, under pretense, of course, but gathering all the same. There, they could plan their rebellion: to remove Maegor, to rescue Alyssa and the other Targaryens, to decide what came next. All it would take was one whisper in the wrong ear for Maegor to burn Grassy Vale to ash. But if they were careful, if they moved like hounds in tall grass…

This could be the beginning.

“Should we go?” Orryn asked, reading the flicker in his brother’s eyes.

Rogar folded the letter, slowly, deliberately. “We’re already invited,” he said. “And the Baratheons do not hide. Not in armor, and not in silk.”

Garon smirked. “If there’s a melee, I want first swing at whoever shows up with the king’s banner.”

“Shut up, Garon,” Rogar muttered. “This isn’t about banners.”

He glanced toward the high table, toward the noble guests and minor lords seated below, drinking and feasting without a care. Some of them might come to Grassy Vale. Some of them might not survive the moons to come.

Rogar took another bite of turkey, chewed, and swallowed. The meat tasted better now: salted with the promise of war.

“Write back to Lord Meadows,” he said to Maester Oran, who still lingered nervously nearby. “Tell him Storm’s End will ride. And tell him…”

Rogar’s eyes glittered in the firelight.

“…the storm comes with us.”

Chapter 36: ALYSANNE VII

The Great Yard was alive with the hum of departure: iron-shod wheels clattered over stone, retainers shouted instructions, and the sea breeze carried the scent of salt and smoke up from the docks far below. But for all that movement, Alysanne stood still as a statue beside the carriage, her hands clasped before her, blue skirts whispering faintly in the wind. She had selected it herself; blue had always been her favorite color. The light of morning kissed the pale honey of her braid, and the soft sheen of her gown gave her the look of a painted maiden in a sept stained glass.

She smiled, but it was a smile worn like armor.

Her handmaidens were a bustle of fluttering ribbons and girlish chatter. Jenya spun in a circle to make her skirts twirl, Dorthy fussed over Sera’s too-tight lacing, and Taliya clutched the small satchel of books Alysanne had picked out to take with them to Dragonstone. Their delight was contagious, or it might have been, if not for the churning pit in Alysanne’s stomach.

Her eyes drifted past them to Prudence Celtigar, demure in pale blue, deep in conversation with her father, Lord Edwell, who seemed to be half-scolding and half-coaching both his daughters. Prunella rolled her eyes dramatically at something he said and mimed a silent retch when he turned his head. Alysanne stifled a laugh.

Grand Maester Benifer stood with his hands folded neatly in front of him, giving Alysanne a warm nod when their eyes met. Septa Keira, by contrast, stood rigid near the stone stairs, her face a mask of calm that failed to hide the dread beneath. Alysanne’s heart clenched seeing her. She wanted to run to Keira and hug her, to beg her to come with them, to Dragonstone, to the ends of the world, but that wasn’t allowed. Maegor had been firm. No septas. No softness. No more distractions from her training.

She looked away, blinking hard. That was when she noticed it.

The only one not present… was Maegor.

The king had said he would ride with her, lead her ship, teach her to fly. And yet now, when it mattered most, he was late.

Late or watching from some high window, she thought with a chill. Watching her, judging her, waiting to see if she would falter. Or perhaps he had forgotten altogether. Alysanne could not tell which would sting more.

Alysanne turned her gaze to the empty space where his great black destrier should have been waiting, the absence looming larger than anything else in the yard. Lords muttered behind gloved hands. The courtiers tried to pretend it wasn’t odd. But it was. King Maegor was never late. Not unless he meant to be.

Jenya leaned in and whispered, “D’you think he changed his mind?”

“He’s probably still in the armory, polishing his armor again,” Sera joked, though her voice trembled just a little, “it’s the only thing he wears.”

“Maybe he’s letting us go alone,” Taliya whispered with a hint of hope. “That wouldn’t be so bad.”

Alysanne said nothing. Her eyes were fixed on the gate. He would come. Or he would send for her. She knew that much. Maegor always got what he wanted. And now, he wanted her.

And dragons. And dreams. And whatever hope still smoldered in her heart.

She swallowed her fear and straightened her spine. If he came now, he wouldn’t find her weak. Let the lords watch, let her enemies whisper; Alysanne Targaryen would walk into the dragon’s mouth with her chin high and her eyes forward.

But still… the king was nowhere to be seen.

Prudence approached Alysanne in a dainty trot, her blue silk skirts swishing behind her like a trained hound’s tail, and her smile was bright as noonday sun. “Alysanne!” she beamed, reaching to embrace her lightly. Her sister, Prunella, followed a step behind with her arms crossed and a scowl drawn sharp enough to cut wool. Behind both girls came their father, Lord Edwell Celtigar, clad in wine-red velvets and polished blackmail, still managing to look like a stiff wind might snap him in half. The stress was getting to him, even if he acted like it didn’t.

Prudence hugged Alysanne briefly and offered a few whispered words of reassurance that made the princess smile despite herself.

Prunella rolled her eyes. “Try not to learn too many commoner habits from your… delightful companions,” she said, casting a glance at Jenya and the others, who were giggling over Taliya’s traveling hat slipping sideways in the wind.

“I shall try not to teach them too many, either,” Alysanne replied sweetly, folding her hands and feigning innocence.

Prudence elbowed her sister gently, but Prunella smirked. “And don’t forget to breathe fire now and then, or Maegor will think you’re not a real dragon at all. All that High Valyrian is bound to turn your tongue forked eventually.”

“Prunella,” Lord Celtigar muttered through his beard, stern but not particularly surprised. He turned to Alysanne with a tight-lipped smile, one that barely touched his pale eyes.

“You honor House Celtigar by allowing Prudence to accompany you, Princess,” he said, bowing his head a fraction. “Dragonstone is… different from the Red Keep. Harsher winds. Older walls. Be wary of both.”

Alysanne nodded politely. “Thank you, my lord. We’ll take care; I was more worried about he dragons.”

“And do give Queen Alyssa my regards,” he added quickly, as if the thought had just occurred to him. “I’ve written to her thrice in the past moon, but… she has not written back.”

Alysanne’s lips didn’t curl, but they wanted to. She could feel the heat of disdain bubbling under her skin. This man, this preening spider cloaked in duty, dared to act as though he were a friend to her mother? After he’d served Maegor with such obedience, after he’d stood by while her mother was imprisoned, humiliated, taken as wife like a lamb to slaughter?

She forced a sigh, playing the polite princess. “I’ve sent letters as well, my lord, but… she hasn’t replied.”

The Hand looked more confused than insulted, and that only deepened Alysanne’s disgust.

“I’ll mention you to her,” Alysanne said, her voice sugar-drenched. She would do no such thing.

The man bowed again, satisfied, and turned to speak privately with Prudence. Prunella gave Alysanne a knowing look that bordered on affectionate mischief. “If the king becomes too much, write me,” she said, and added under her breath, “And if he tries to teach you courtly dancing, push him off a cliff.”

Alysanne laughed, a real one this time, and she hoped no one else heard that. The Celtigar twins were such foolish girls, but they were good friends.

As the Celtigars, save Prudence, retreated into the swirl of banners and bustle, Alysanne turned her attention to the thin, sun-weathered man approaching with a cautious gait and clasped hands: Grand Maester Benifer. His chain of office clinked lightly as he bowed his head, greying hair wisping in the breeze.

“I regret, deeply, that I won’t be continuing your instruction, Your Grace,” he said, voice low and full of unspoken sentiment. “It’s been a privilege… to teach you. I hope your reunion with your lady mother brings joy, and that you take well to your dragon. The bond between dragon and rider is…” He paused, his eyes distant. “It is unlike anything else in this world. A love all its own.”

Alysanne smiled and stepped a little closer. “Thank you, Grand Maester. You’ve taught me more than books and stars. You taught me to look up.”

Benifer blinked, visibly touched, and Alysanne pressed on with gentle firmness. “I do hope you’ll be kind to Keira and Prunella while you’re teaching them High Valyrian,” she added sweetly.

The handmaidens tittered, Sera outright laughing while Dorthy covered her mouth in mock shock. Jenya whispered something to Taliya that made her choke on a laugh.

Benifer flushed a deep shade of red beneath his greying beard and waved his hand dismissively. “I- of course! I shall treat them as I would any pupil,” he insisted with a stammer, and quickly turned on his heel to depart, clutching the edge of his chain like a drowning man might a rope.

As he scurried off, Alysanne watched him go, a sly glimmer in her eye. She thought to herself how obvious it was; how foolish and sad and sweet it was, the way he looked at Keira when he thought no one was watching. The slight catch in his voice when he said her name. The way he stood too straight around her, like he still had something to prove.

No one else seemed to see it. Not the handmaids, not even Keira herself, though she always looked especially annoyed whenever Benifer entered a room.

But Alysanne had seen it, and it had made her think. Keira would remain here, in the Red Keep, while Alysanne rode for Dragonstone. Maegor would not allow her septa near her anymore: too womanly, too pious, too soft, he’d said.

Keira would be lonely.

Maybe this was a way to help, just a little. To give her someone to speak to, to argue with, to share silence with, even if nothing ever came of it. Maester and septa… they both had vows. But friendship was not forbidden.

Alysanne knew, in the hollow of her chest, how cold the world became without it. That was when she saw her septa approaching.

Keira stood just before her, eye red-rimmed and full of things unsaid, the white eyepatch obscuring the other. Alysanne’s throat tightened at the sight of her septa’s trembling fingers, her thin lips pressed firm, as if damming up the grief swelling inside her.

Still, Keira smiled, a soft, worn smile, and her voice was steady. “May the Seven watch over you, my sweet girl,” she said gently. “I hope your stay on Dragonstone is brief… and that I see you again very soon.”

Alysanne straightened her shoulders, trying to seem taller than she was. “You will,” she said with a strength that surprised even herself. “I’ll be safe..” It was another lie, but it felt right.

Keira reached out, taking her hand. It was a small gesture, but Alysanne gripped it like she was holding a rope in a storm. “Thank you,” the septa said, squeezing gently. “You’ve been the finest girl I’ve ever had the pleasure to teach. You listened. You tried. You had heart.” A glimmer passed over her face, somewhere between amusement and sadness. “Even when you were disobedient.”

That made Alysanne smile faintly. “Especially then,” she whispered.

Then Keira pulled something from beneath her robes: a silver necklace bearing the seven-pointed star, delicate but worn with time. She held it out like it was a relic. “For you. To remember the Seven… on Dragonstone.”

Alysanne reached for it slowly, reverently, as if she were being knighted. She took the pendant and ran her thumb over its smooth, cool surface. She understood the real meaning; more than faith. It was Keira’s heart being placed in her hands. A prayer made solid.

“I’ll wear it,” Alysanne said, her voice tight, and she slipped the chain over her head. It settled against her chest, just above her heart. “And I’ll think of you, always.”

The septa’s composure wavered for a moment. Her eye shone, and her mouth trembled, but she swallowed it down, as she always did. “I’ll pray for you every night. That you come home to us. Whole. Unscathed.”

Alysanne’s hand hovered, aching to reach forward, to throw her arms around the woman who had raised her more than her own mother had in the last few years. But she held herself still, teeth clenched, chin high.

She could feel the eyes around her. Courtiers, knights, her handmaidens; all watching. Somewhere, Maegor might be watching too. And she would not give him the satisfaction of seeing her weep or beg or cling.

She would carry the Seven with her. She would carry Keira with her. She would walk into Dragonstone like a Targaryen. Even if her knees trembled.

“Go with the gods, Keira,” Alysanne said softly. “And don’t let Grand Maester Benifer bore you too badly with his Valyrian.”

That made the septa huff a laugh, blinking fast. “He’ll try,” she said, managing another small smile. “But I’ve endured worse.”

They stood a moment longer, hand in hand, two women clinging to a line of love neither of them could name aloud. Then Alysanne let go, slowly, and turned back to her handmaidens and the waiting carriage. The princess showed her necklace to Prudence, the other handmaidens admiring all around her.

She could feel Keira’s gaze on her back, like a blessing burned into skin.

The chatter of departure swelled around her like the rising hum of bees, but Alysanne stood still as a statue beneath it all, her blue skirts fluttering lightly in the breeze and her handmaidens forming a loose cluster around her.

Courtiers drifted past like ghosts with titles. Lord Butterwell, corpulent and pink-faced, offered an oily farewell and some toothless joke about the sea air at Dragonstone being good for the skin. Septon Tobas followed close behind, offering blessings in a dry voice burdened by too many problems. He made the sign of the star before drifting off to speak with a knight. Then came Lord Albin Massey, hobbling on his twisted foot, offering a polite bow and a murmured wish for a peaceful voyage, though his pale eyes, always watchful, lingered too long on Prudence for Alysanne’s liking.

Then… Lord Walton Towers.

The old (or perhaps new) lord of Harrenhal moved like stone made flesh, heavy and rigid, his hard mouth unsmiling beneath sharp black eyes. He offered no apology, only a stiff inclination of the head, before turning away. His presence turned the handmaidens to ice, and Alysanne could feel their hostility radiating like a furnace at her back: Jenya’s narrowed eyes, Taliya’s clenched jaw, even Sera biting her tongue. Prudence didn’t say anything, but she stood straighter, face tight.

But it was the squire, the Towers boy who had struck her, that truly turned the heads of her little retinue.

He arrived shortly after his father departed, walking with uncertain steps and eyes full of apology. His dark hair was still rumpled, and he looked almost ill with nerves as he approached her.

“My lady,” he muttered, voice nearly cracking, “I… I never wanted to hurt you. I was ordered. It was the king’s orders. I swear it.”

The words were clumsy, and he didn’t kneel, but he did bow his head low. Behind Alysanne, Dorthy made a disbelieving snort. Taliya whispered something about punching him herself. Even gentle Sera stared like she’d bite him. Prudence stood between him and Alysanne, almost protectively.

Alysanne raised her hand gently, stilling them.

“You swear it? You’re sorry?” she asked softly, voice level. “Even if it took you far too long?”

The boy nodded. “I- yes. I am sorry.”

She studied him for a moment. He was barely older than her. A servant to his father, a pawn like so many others. And unlike Maegor, he could still feel shame. That made him something.

“You’re forgiven,” Alysanne said. “Go. Don’t make the same mistake again.”

He nodded gratefully, but before he could leave, a peal of laughter echoed across the courtyard. A cluster of richly-dressed Towers girls, his sisters and cousins, stood by the gates. The eldest had her arms crossed, watching with haughty amusement.

“You fool,” one of them called out, “groveling like a dog! Perhaps you should be her next handmaid!”

“Or perhaps she’ll knight you for weeping!” another jeered.

The boy flushed scarlet and practically ran off, shoulders hunched with embarrassment. Prudence gave a tiny sigh beside Alysanne.

“They mock him, but he did what they never would,” the Celtigar girl muttered.

“Too much pride in that lot,” Jenya said, glaring.

“That’s Harrenhal for you,” muttered Dorthy, “they always think they’re the next Great Lord.”

Then, as if to change the mood, Sera suddenly smirked and elbowed Prudence. “Maybe you should marry him.”

Prudence recoiled so dramatically it nearly pulled her braid loose. “Absolutely not!” she cried. “I’m going to marry a Velaryon!”

That set off a round of giggles, Prunella would have had a field day with that, and Alysanne found herself laughing too, quietly. She needed this. Laughter. Joy. It was a small rebellion against the weight pressing down on her chest.

But then the laughter faded, and her thoughts darkened once more.

Who would she marry?

Once, there had been certainty. Viserys, perhaps. Jaehaerys, if she was lucky. Targaryens married Targaryens, always had. That was the path laid before her. But now, they were all gone. The Iron Throne, the bloodline, the traditions; none of it made sense anymore.

She’d seen boys at court she found handsome. Ser Jon Tollett in a melancholy sort of way, a squire from Massey’s Hook with bright blue eyes. But those were passing fancies, not real affection, not love.

Love. That word still felt distant, foreign. She was only thirteen.

Seven save me, she thought. I could be married already, with a babe in my arms.

She shuddered.

It could have been Maegor. He could have married her like her mother. Could still be lying about it. A shackle in a wedding cloak.

No. No, she would die first.

But where was he?

Her eyes drifted past the great gate, past the guards, past the horses milling in preparation. The wind stirred her hair, teased her cheeks. The sun was high now, and the shadows had begun to shrink.

Still no sign of the king.

“Late,” she murmured aloud.

“Maybe he overslept,” Dorthy offered with a grin.

“Maybe he fell on his sword,” Jenya whispered.

Alysanne glanced to Prudence, who shook her head. “He’s never late without a reason.”

Alysanne looked eastward. The docks waited. Dragonstone waited. Her mother. Her dragon.

The king.

Where was he?

Their answer came not in words but in thunder.

A monstrous roar split the sky, a sound like the world itself being torn open, and all heads snapped upward. The sun vanished for a heartbeat as the shadow of wings blotted it out, Balerion the Black Dread, the largest and oldest dragon in the known world, swept over the Red Keep with a sound like tearing canvas and hurricane wind. Courtiers screamed. Lords ducked. Maids clutched each other in fear. One knight nearly fell to a knee out of sheer awe.

Alysanne didn’t scream. She flinched, yes, her shoulders tightened, but she stood rooted, staring up at the black shape sailing above them. Around her, her handmaidens cowered and scrambled: Jenya shrieked and nearly fell, Sera dropped the satchel she was carrying, Dorthy clung to the carriage wheel, and even proud Taliya threw an arm over her head and crouched. Prudence grabbed Alysanne’s sleeve instinctively, trembling, and Alysanne reached out with her other hand to steady Jenya without looking.

The Black Dread circled once more before descending.

The gust of wind and ash kicked up by the dragon’s landing slammed into the yard like a siege engine. Dust flew, courtiers stumbled back, and the very ground trembled. Balerion touched down in the open court near the training yard, his claws sinking deep into the stone, wings folding slowly like the collapse of a mountain. His eyes glowed molten gold beneath the heavy ridges of his skull.

Upon his back, clad in black steel from throat to heel, was her uncle, the king.

Maegor.

He did not leap down. He climbed, slowly, deliberately, as though daring anyone to look away. As he stepped from the dragon’s side, his boots hit stone with a sharp, final sound. His sword, Blackfyre, bounced slightly against his armored hip as he walked forward.

The crowd parted before him like grain before the scythe.

Alysanne watched him approach: imposing, vast, implacable. Every inch of him was command. She kept her chin up, her spine straight, even as her blood chilled.

He was late. He had made them wait, knowing what his arrival would look like. Knowing the effect Balerion would have. This was a performance. A warning.

The show was only beginning.

Maegor came to a halt in front of Alysanne, black plates rasping as he faced her, the yard’s silence folding under his presence like cloth under a fist.

He spoke in High Valyrian, voice gruff, words clipped like stone shards tumbling down a mountainside. “Are you prepared, or do you still cling to nurses?”

“No, I-”

Alysanne’s mouth opened to shape the Common Tongue, reflex and rebellion intertwined, but his hand snapped up, gauntlet creaking.

“Not the Andal tongue. Try again, girl.”

Heat crawled up her neck like a hand, prickling, alive, unwelcome.

“I-,” she managed, dragging the ancient words from memory like a sword too heavy for her arms, “I am ready to see Mother… ready to ride my dragon, Your Grace.” The sentence was rough, a road of broken stones, but she said it.

Someone barked a laugh somewhere behind them, the kind that cracked like flagstones.

Maegor only snorted, satisfied.

“You will not travel in wood and canvas like cargo,” Maegor said in High Valyrian, voice low, rough, ancient power still ribboning through the syllables like wildfire through dry grass. “Your maids and trunks may crawl by road and sea. You fly. With me. On Balerion. Now.”

The girls’ voices behind stuttered and tangled, confused as birds in storm before a lightning strike:

“What did he say?!”

“Something about… trunks?”

“Is she in trouble?”

“Gods, that sounded angry.”

None of them understood the language of dragonlords.

But Alysanne did. She had never felt smaller. Or larger. Or more afraid.

Her destiny lifted from the ground behind his boots, a black-winged thing, waiting above them in the dusk like a hungry shadow.

She only whispered one more word to herself in the stillness left behind by his command:

“Fly.”

Gasps rippled through the Great Yard like wind over water as Alysanne’s single word left her lips, clear and bright as a bell toll. The murmurs began at once, overlapping, cresting into a cacophony.

“She said fly… did she say fly?”

“The king means for her to ride with him?”

“She’s a child!”

“She’s a Targaryen, same as him!”

“-with him, on Balerion?”

“Seven save her.”

Her handmaidens all surged toward her at once, blue skirts flaring, panicked words piling up at her ears.

“Alysanne, you can’t-”

“You said we’d sail!”

“Please, say something!”

Septa Keira remained rooted nearby, face like a carved tombstone, silent as death but with eye full of thunderclouds. One trembling hand clutched the side of her robes; the other curled over her stomach as if bracing for a blow.

Grand Maester Benifer looked as though the world had fallen out from beneath his feet. Unlike everyone else here, Alysanne knew he understood Maegor completely. Chalk-white, lips parted, fingers clutching the folds of his robe like they might keep him from collapsing.

Only Lord Edwell Celtigar did not move, though even he shifted his weight and furrowed his brow, unease evident. His eyes flicked toward Maegor, then toward the murmuring crowd, calculating.

Others didn’t hide their enthusiasm. The Towers girls clapped their hands in delight. Lord Butterwell elbowed Lord Towers with a wide grin. A few courtiers cheered. Look at her, they said. Brave thing. A girl riding the Black Dread! What a story to tell.

But Maegor did not acknowledge any of them. His black gaze locked on one thing: the silver pendant glinting at Alysanne’s neck, the seven-pointed star swaying gently with her breath.

He reached for it.

“No.” His voice was low, the word in High Valyrian, but absolute. “Not that. Not on Dragonstone. You look like one of the Faith Militant, not a princess of House Targaryen.”

Alysanne’s hand shot up, her fingers closing over the pendant in an instant, cradling it like the sacred thing it was.

“Truly?” she asked, her voice sharp, also in High Valyrian, ringing with steel. “You would tear a symbol of the gods from my throat? Here? In front of all your entire court?”

It wasn’t a plea. It was a challenge. Her chin tilted up, eyes locked on his. The buzz of the crowd faded like a held breath.

Maegor froze.

Not from fear, not from shame… but calculation. His eyes flicked to the watching lords, the blinking maester, the septa gripping her skirts, the wide-eyed handmaidens. Every one of them watching. Every one of them waiting.

He growled something low in his throat and pulled his hand back like it burned him.

“Follow.”

He turned without another word and stalked toward the great black shadow of Balerion, where the dragon crouched, vast and patient as a mountain, wings drawn in like the folds of a cloak. The yard split before Maegor like a crack in ice.

Alysanne stood still for one heartbeat more. Then she smiled.

It was small, but it curled like smoke in the wind.

She turned to her handmaidens, eyes dancing.

“I’ll see you on Dragonstone,” she said simply.

Then she walked after Maegor, pendant shining against her throat like a defiant star in an ocean of darkness.

Chapter 37: MELONY III

Melony hunched over clay wine cups, the rough table sticky with onions and spilled ale, air thick with the sour‑sweet reek of smoke from the pyres on the Hill of Rhaenys. The Brown Lantern groaned and cheered as if the walls themselves were drunk, celebrating a brief future not ruled by a beast’s shadow, a foolish belief Melony could almost taste on her tongue like iron. She lifted the cup, gulped, wiped her mouth with the back of her hand, imagining how the Dread’s wings had once blotted out the sun at the Battle Beneath the God’s Eye, warmth she now missed like a parched field misses rain. If only she had burned that day.

A cheer of laughter burst from a nearby table where two dockworkers arm‑wrestled, betting salted fish against brown bread. She didn’t look at them, eyes instead fixed on the thought of poultices dabbed on childish flesh she would never see healed if this cycle continued, remembering her brothers’ blood soaking soil when Maegor and his men killed them, coin and cruelty dressed in the same colors. The thought of horses and scrolls, whips and woodcuts swirled at the back of her mind like the storm winds outside Storm’s End.

“ Here’s to the Headless Dog!” roared a hedge knight in dented breastplate, raising his tankard. Others echoed him, slamming cups, spitting to underscore their fervor. Ser Joffrey Doggett, the folk hero maimed into myth, toasted by small hands and calloused fists. Melony’s jaw tightened as she rose, stepped near, didn’t bow, merely lifted her own cup high enough for them to see.

“Seven keep him,” she murmured in the low purr of bitterness, accent smooth‑masked as shears scraping linen. “Beats being alive.” The table laughed, but there was an edge, like a sword fetched from the forge, recognition that humor and hate were close kin here.

She drank again, the burn rolling down her throat like a poor cousin to dragonfire, the kindling of frustration flaring under her ribs, restless as embers in a bellows. She imagined Dragonstone not as a haven but as a stage, a place where fate might crack like a walnut under an axe swing. The cup thudded to the table as she set it down, breath rough, pulse hammering under skin too thin to hide it. She was a noble without a sword in leathers of another life, dreaming of a blow struck first, dreaming of a future born from ashes that she, unlike Maegor, might actually earn.

Melony drained her cup and slammed it down, the crack of ceramic on wood lost in the clamor of voices and clinking tankards. She blinked hard, her eyes burning, not from the wine, not entirely, and stared into the puddle of spilt red on the table like it might show her Rhaena’s face. It didn’t. Just her own distorted in the slick stain, a servant woman’s shadow, not the Lady of House Piper she had once been.

Rhaena. Gods, Rhaena.

She’d almost kissed her once. Rhaena had laughed, soft, like the bells on a kitten, and said Melony was silly, but she hadn’t pushed her away. She’d held her hand. She had meant it. Melony would’ve burned the world for her, if only she’d known how. If only she hadn’t been such a coward.

Now the girl she loved was gone, vanished with her dragon, her fate sealed, dead like the rest. Maegor had crushed everything. Now, that scaled monster squatted on Dragonstone, whispering lies into Alysanne’s ears, looming over Alyssa’s pregnancy like a curse, breathing smoke over the heads of Rhaena’s little daughters, Rhaena’s blood, pretending they were his.

Melony curled her fingers into a fist until her nails bit her palm. She should have killed him moons ago.

They deserved better. Alysanne, for all her softness, for all her polished manners and careful smiles, was brave enough to walk with that brute, living in the shadow of Balerion. Alyssa had been Queen for two kings now, though her crown had become a shackle. And those little girls… Seven preserve them. Melony couldn’t imagine their dreams, only their nightmares.

And yet here she was, sulking in a winesink, surrounded by men who toasted dead martyrs with fat tongues and empty bellies, women who gossiped and flirted and poured wine with fingers like worn rope. They laughed with mouths stained red and teeth gone to rot. They had no idea what it meant to love someone more than yourself. To feel guilt gnaw like wolves at your insides because you could have, should have, done something. Anything.

She hated them.

She hated their simplicity, their stench, their unthinking happiness in the wake of tragedy. She hated that she had to smile and nod and fetch and scrub just to keep her cover, to remain Mia of Stoney Sept. Most of all, she hated that even now, after everything, she still hadn’t found a way to kill Maegor.

She pulled her cloak tighter around her, the threadbare wool rough against her arms. Her dagger rested against her thigh under her skirts, cold and small and useless against the mountain that was the king. She’d fantasized often: of slipping into his chambers, of poisoning his goblet, of throwing herself at him in a feigned passion and driving a blade between his ribs while he grunted above her. But none of it was real. Whenever he wasn’t under the guard of the Kingsguard, he was heavily armored or riding Baleiron. It was impossible. Even if she’d gotten closer to him after Tyanna died… it was still impossible.

She finished the last of her wine. It tasted like vinegar.

“I should’ve died with them,” she muttered under her breath. “At the God’s Eye. Wherever she is now. I should’ve gone with her.”

But she hadn’t. She’d stayed. Because Rhaena wouldn’t have wanted her to die.

And that was the worst part. That was what broke her. Rhaena hadn’t looked back when she rode against Maegor.

The scrape of wood against stone drew Melony’s gaze up from her cup. A woman was easing herself into the chair across from her: middle-aged, rough hands, damp sleeves from soap and steam, the stench of boiled linens clinging to her skin like a second shift. A washerwoman. Lowborn. Probably a mother, or looked it, with the kind of lined face that came from too many children and too few quiet moments.

Melony clocked all that in a breath. She didn’t respond, just watched the woman settle down like a sack of wet laundry, her cup sloshing red at the rim.

“Hope you don’t mind,” the washerwoman said, her voice worn thin. “Ain’t many empty seats this hour. Name’s Emma.”

Melony gave a nod that could’ve meant anything and murmured, “Mia,” without meaning it.

Emma sighed, leaned back, and gave her joints a weary stretch. “Gods, what a day. My hands feel like boiled cabbage. Dragonpit bastards don’t care if your bones fall off, long as the linens get done.” She gave a bitter little laugh and took a gulp from her cup. “But I s’pose that’s work. Least the pay’s decent.”

Melony didn’t answer. She swirled her own wine and let Emma talk. This was what lowborn folk did, she’d learned: talked to fill the silence, aired their aches and miseries like they were proud of them. Like survival was something to boast about.

Melony had survived, too. But she didn’t speak of it. She just drank.

Still, when Emma grumbled something about how men from the Red Keep had been visiting more often now, Melony’s ears perked. Not because she cared about the Dragonpit. Because these people, these talkers, sometimes said things they didn’t realize were important.

And then Emma said it, offhand, like it meant nothing at all.

“…though I heard Lord Celtigar’s been visiting the Lacehall more’n usual. Not that I blame him. That one’s got no softness left in him. Probably goes there just to remember what a woman feels like since his wife left him behind.”

Melony’s fingers twitched. Her cup stilled.

She blinked, just once, slow and thoughtful.

Then, she smiled. Just a little.

Melony’s eyes remained half-lidded, her body slumped as if the wine had numbed her, just another tired servant girl swaying in her seat, but her mind sharpened like a whetstone scraping steel.

Celtigar.

So that upjumped crab fucked whores on the Silk Street, did he?

She let Emma ramble, the washerwoman’s voice turning into a gentle hum beneath the roar of her thoughts. She spoke of soap rations and stubborn bloodstains and the endless drag of laundry from the barracks, but Melony’s mind had already slipped beyond the confines of that grimy winesink, out into the winding alleys that led toward the Red Keep. Lord Edwell Celtigar. The Hand of the King. The man who kept the realm running while Maegor sulked on Dragonstone and licked his wounds from the blood of half his family.

He’s the key, she thought, her fingers curling slowly around her empty cup. Cut off the Hand, and the sword falters. Burn the bridge, and the tyrant stands alone.

Celtigar wasn’t just some pompous lord grown fat on flattery and favors. He was shrewd; dangerous in a way that Tyanna had been, without the needless cruelty. She’d seen him in the halls, always working, always calculating, always in the king’s ear. If Maegor was the dragon, Celtigar was the reins. And every beast, no matter how monstrous, lost its balance when the reins snapped.

She turned her eyes lazily toward Emma. The woman was nursing her cup and blinking blearily, perhaps a little drunker than she’d first seemed. That was good. Melony offered a faint smile.

“You said the Hand goes to brothels? You see him yourself?”

Emma gave a sly little nod and a shrug. “Not him myself, no. But I’ve heard it from the girls. Some say he’s fond of redheads and blondes, real pale ones. Doesn’t matter much, I suppose. Gold is gold.”

Melony smirked and looked into the dark red dregs at the bottom of her cup. Redheads and tears. What a surprise. She fit the description.

She stood slowly, pretending to stretch her back like a sore, aching washerwoman. She gave Emma a kind pat on the shoulder.

“Thanks for the talk,” Melony said simply. “Hope your soap lasts you the week.”

Emma offered a sleepy smile, already half-drunk and likely to forget the conversation by morning. Melony didn’t care. She had work to do.

By the time she stepped out into the night, the air was thick with salt and woodsmoke. Far above the rooftops, the towers of the Red Keep loomed like fangs against the stars. Somewhere behind those walls, Edwell Celtigar rested his weary head: safe, secure, protected by his position, his power, his proximity to the most feared man alive.

But men like him grew careless when they felt untouchable.

Especially with their cocks out.

She needed a plan. She needed information. She’d have to find out which brothel. Where. When. Who he favored. How many guards. She could play a whore; she had done worse for less. Or perhaps she could speak to one of the girls who’d serviced him before and convince her to help. Or poison him, slowly, through repeat visits. Or stab him when his breeches were down.

She clenched her jaw. No. No more half-measures. No more waiting.

It needed to be public. Brutal. Unmistakable.

The realm needed to see the dragon’s hand get chopped off.

She might not have wings or fire.

But a dagger in the right hand, at the right time, in the right place, could bring a kingdom to its knees.

Chapter 38: ALYSSA VI

Queen Alyssa stood rigid beside the black‑iron gates of Dragonstone, the wind clawing at her cloak and plaited silver‑gold hair like some hungry sea spirit desperate to pull her back toward the surf. Rhaella tugged and twisted at her hand, full of restless little kicks and impatient hums, while Aerea clung tight to Alyssa’s skirts, trembling whenever the wind whistled too sharply through the jagged volcanic stones around them.

Alyssa bent her head to shield Aerea, wrapping an arm around her narrow shoulders. Seven save me, she thought, these girls deserve a woman who has something left to give. What they had instead was a grandmother who felt hollowed by years of fear and shame and grief; cored, as if something had carved her out from the inside and left only a skin stretched thin over unsteady bones.

The castellan, Ser Gawen Corbray, stood dutifully at her side, a stiff white-haired sentinel in weathered mail, his eyes fixed on the dark sky. Guards lined the walls above, cloaks snapping violently in the gale. Every soul present waited with the same strained stillness, bracing for the inevitable roar.

He comes, Alyssa thought. On that beast… with my daughter clinging to him.

She closed her eyes briefly. She had only just learned Alysanne would ride with Maegor. She had been told in that dreadful letter from Edwell Celtigar, in that mix of false warmth and veiled warning he always managed. But knowing was different from seeing; from imagining her gentle daughter perched on the black scales of the greatest terror in the world, bound to the man who had destroyed her family, her life, her body, her future.

She wasn’t ready for this. She wasn’t ready for anything anymore: not carrying Maegor’s heir, not the uncertainty of what Tyanna’s poisons might still be doing to her, not the dread of her so-called husband who had forced himself on her so many times she lost count.

Another child.

Another life she hadn’t chosen.

Another chain.

A small hand tugged at her sleeve. “Mother… will Alysanne come too?” Aerea asked in a whisper, her voice pitched with fragile hope.

Alyssa forced a thin smile and brushed a strand of hair from the girl’s face. “She will love, very soon.”

“She’s not our real Mother,” Rhaella huffed, bored of waiting already, and nearly bolted toward the cliff’s edge before Alyssa jerked her close again. “Stay near me,” she scolded softly, though her voice wavered. “Please, Rhaella. Just stay near.”

But her mind wasn’t truly on them. Not on the sea, or the wind, or the guards. Her mind was trapped inside her own trembling ribs, where she felt the slow, unwanted swell of her abdomen; the tiny weight of Maegor’s heir, pressing against organs that already ached from fear and memories she could never escape.

People may claim that Tyanna was dead, but her poisons had lived on inside Alyssa, stealing children from her, twisting her womb into a battlefield where hope went to die. Alyssa didn’t know if this babe would survive. A piece of her prayed it wouldn’t. Another piece hated herself for that prayer. She didn’t want to think about it.

Alyssa’s eyes remained fixed on the horizon, but her mind had long since slipped away. The roar of wind against the stone, the grip of her granddaughters’ hands in her own: none of it seemed real. She held them still, out of instinct, like she had held so many others now lost. Her body rocked gently with the rhythm of memory, the only place left to go where Maegor could not yet follow.

Back then… it had smelled of wood and parchment. Their manse in King’s Landing had been warm, not from fires but from the sun-drenched tiles and the open windows that let in the sea breeze. Aenys had always hated the stuffy, enclosed spaces of court. He’d hated formality altogether, really. Alyssa had adored that about him, that stubborn softness; his refusal to become hard in a world that revered steel.

But not that day.

It had been the year they lost Vaella. That day, Aenys had been pacing across the study floor like a caged cat, his purple eyes wide and wild behind tear-glazed lashes. She remembered the way he’d gripped his robes, twisted them in his long-fingered hands like he might strangle the High Septon with silk instead of swords.

“He’s my brother,” he had said again and again, as if repetition might change the dilemma. “How can they ask me to cast him aside like… like he’s nothing? He has been loyal. Always.”

Alyssa, seated near the window, had only thought of her lost child. The milk had dried in her breasts. Her grief was still so raw it hadn’t yet found a voice. She hadn’t spoken unless asked. Her heart had no room for politics. And yet…

“He married her without asking you,” she had said at last, voice dry and quiet. “Without even telling you.”

Aenys had stopped pacing. His lips parted, then closed. A tremor passed over his jaw. “Our father married two women as well. Alyssa, he’s still my brother-”

“He’s your Hand,” she had corrected gently. “And a prince of the realm. And he made a marriage that threatens the peace of the realm. That puts you in danger.”

“I know,” Aenys had whispered, and then louder, “I know!”

But he hadn’t acted quickly. He had delayed for days: debating, praying, cursing Maegor for putting him in that position, cursing the High Septon for the same. He had thrown goblets. He had sobbed in her lap. She had held him.

When he finally passed judgment, Maegor must either set aside Alys Harroway or leave Westeros, it had shattered him more than anyone.

“He’s gone!” he had whispered, hours after Maegor left for Pentos. “He’s refused. He said… he said that he would rather leave than serve, that I didn’t deserve Father’s crown.”

That had hurt him. Not just the words, but what they meant.

Even after all of it, Aenys still hoped. Hoped that one day they’d reconcile, that Maegor would return and kneel and ask forgiveness. That they’d be brothers again, as they were when they were boys, wrestling in the sand on Dragonstone or flying together: Aenys clumsily atop Quicksilver and Maegor dark and perfect on Balerion.

He never stopped hoping, Alyssa thought, bitterly. Even when he lay dying. Even when Maegor became what he is.

That had been the cruelest part of Aenys. His hope. His bottomless belief in the goodness of people who didn’t deserve it. That’s what broke him, in the end. Not the Faith, not the lords, not the strain of rule. It was betrayal. His hope in the realm, his people, his Faith, had broken.

Then came Maegor: Maegor’s betrayal, Maegor’s rejection of everything soft and hopeful and kind in the world. How could her kind husband have ever loved a beast like that?

Alyssa blinked, snapped back into her body by a sharp gust of wind that nearly knocked Rhaella from her grasp.

She held her tighter.

Aenys would never have let their daughter ride with Maegor. Aenys would never have allowed what she had allowed, he could have kept control of his brother. But Aenys was gone, and she remained.

Hollow. Sick. Full of Maegor’s child. Again.

She looked up toward the clouds, the ashen sky above the Dragonmont.

Any moment now.

Everyone heard him before they saw him; an eerie, thunderous rhythm in the sky that silenced speech and stilled breath. The wind carried the deep, monstrous beat of wings, a sound like the heavens groaning. Even the sea seemed to pause, waves slackening beneath the weight of the noise. A low, bestial growl rolled across the stone battlements of Dragonstone, and the guards shifted nervously.

Alyssa felt Aerea go rigid at her side, clutching the fabric of her cloak so tightly it began to tear. Rhaella, by contrast, hopped in place on her little boots, practically vibrating with excitement. “It’s him! It’s Balerion! I hear him! He’s coming, he’s really-”

“Stay still,” Alyssa said quietly, firm but not harsh. Her eyes fixed on the gray, windswept sky above.

The first glimpse came as a flicker of shadow, then a wing, vast, black, and leathery, slicing through the clouds. Then the dragon broke through fully, a mountain with wings, his belly ridged like old armor, his maw a gaping furnace. Balerion descended in slow, majestic spirals, utterly unhurried, the wind howling around him as if in protest.

He was so massive he blocked out the sun. Even Alyssa, who had seen dragons before, who had lived among them and borne children to dragonlords, felt her blood run cold. The sheer scale of him. The knowledge that no army, no prayer, no wall could stop that beast once he was in the air.

On his back, yes, there they were.

Maegor, a black shadow in armor. And behind him, smaller, cloaked in blue, hair trailing silver like a comet’s tail: Alysanne. Her daughter.

Alyssa tightened her grip on both granddaughters. Rhaella tried to wriggle free to get a better look. “I want to see!”

“No,” Alyssa hissed. “Stay beside me.”

Balerion roared once, a sound so deep it rattled teeth and sent ravens screaming from their roosts. The castle walls themselves seemed to tremble.

Then the Black Dread landed. The impact cracked stone, dust billowed up in clouds, and all around the yard, guards and stewards flinched or fell back. Even Ser Gawen Corbray, hard-faced and unyielding, took an involuntary step away from the beast.

Still Alyssa did not move.

She could not look away from her daughter.

Alyssa exhaled, slow and bitter, as her eyes settled on the slim figure dismounting Balerion, following Maegor down. Alysanne looked so much like Rhaena it made her stomach twist. That golden hair catching the wind, that proud tilt of her chin trying to mask the fear in her eyes; gods, it was like seeing her firstborn rise from the grave. Alysanne was a little taller now than Rhaena had been at her age, more serious too, but the resemblance was cruel. It wasn’t fair to look at her and remember every shattered dream.

“Grandmother, she’s here!” Rhaella shrieked, yanking at her arm.

Alyssa flinched, dragging herself out of the memory. She tightened her grip on Rhaella’s hand with a sharp, whispered, “Quiet.”

Rhaella pouted but stayed close, still bouncing on her heels. Always so loud, so eager… so unlike Aerea, who clung to Alyssa’s skirts with wide, wary eyes and didn’t speak a word.

Rhaella frustrated her. Alyssa knew she shouldn’t think it; she tried to love them both equally, as she had loved all her children, but Rhaella’s energy scraped at her nerves. She didn’t listen, didn’t sit still, didn’t act the way a girl was meant to. There was fire in her, and not the kind a septa would praise. Alyssa hadn’t the strength to tame it.

Maybe Alysanne will help, she thought. Maybe she can reach her. Gods knew Alyssa could barely keep herself together, let alone parent two motherless girls while growing heavy with another child: Maegor’s child.

The wind bit through her cloak. She looked toward the towering shadow of Balerion, and her stomach turned again. She’d feared Maegor returning, but seeing Alysanne descend from the beast’s back twisted the knife deeper. That girl, her girl, riding with the monster. It felt like a betrayal, even if she knew Alysanne hadn’t had a choice.

Not anymore. None of them did. Not with Maegor here.

Alyssa stood rigid, her hand pressed flat against Aerea’s back and her other gripping Rhaella’s wrist like a tether. The cold sea wind snapped her cloak around her ankles, but she didn’t move, didn’t breathe. She watched as Maegor dismounted, slow, heavy, deliberate, and Balerion shifted behind him with a deep, resonant growl, smoke curling from its nostrils like the breath of some forgotten god.

Then came Alysanne behind him.

Alyssa’s heart clenched as her daughter swung one leg over the dragon’s back, her skirts tangling briefly before she gathered them and climbed down with surprising grace. The final landing jostled her, but Alysanne straightened quickly, lifting her chin, her golden braid catching the light like a banner of defiance. She stood beside Maegor without flinching, even as he loomed beside her like a steel-clad shadow.

He said something to Alysanne, inaudible over the wind and the hiss of the dragon’s breath, but Alyssa saw how Alysanne nodded, calm, obedient. Her face was calm, composed. That frightened Alyssa most of all.

They approached, boots crunching on stone, two figures cast in stark contrast: the monster in black steel, and the girl in blue silk. Alyssa’s joy rose like a tide at the sight of her daughter, alive, whole, not broken, and yet it curdled as soon as she looked at Maegor.

His dark eyes locked on her, and Alyssa froze.

That look. Gods.

He drank her in like a man starved: his mouth hard, his nostrils flared, his gaze dragging over her frame with a vile familiarity. Hunger and violence tangled in his stare like a rope around her throat. His steps didn’t quicken, but the weight behind them pressed against her chest, invisible and suffocating. He had not touched her in moons, but now she saw it in his face: he meant to take her again.

He looked at her like a possession: one he’d left behind and now returned to reclaim.

For one awful moment, Alyssa truly believed she might collapse. Her knees faltered, her spine screamed at her to kneel, to turn away, to run, but she didn’t. Instead, she lifted her chin.

She would not cower in front of her daughter. She would not let Maegor see her tremble.

But she couldn’t stop the ice from blooming in her veins. Not when death, or something worse than death, was walking toward her with her daughter at his side.

Maegor and Alysanne came to a halt before the gathering, the great black beast behind them settling with a thunderous exhale that rattled the stones. The assembled courtiers, guards, and retainers stiffened under the king’s presence. Ser Gawen Corbray stepped forward and bowed, voice steady despite the shadow looming over them all.

“Your Grace, Princess; Dragonstone is honored by your return.”

Maegor didn’t so much as nod. His cold, burning gaze remained fixed on Alyssa, cutting straight past the castellan like he were no more than the wind. Ser Gawen, unused to being ignored, stepped back with clenched jaw.

Alysanne opened her mouth, as if to speak in greeting, but Maegor’s armored hand made a curt motion. She adjusted herself at once and turned to her mother, speaking in deliberate, elegant High Valyrian; a tongue Alyssa had not heard her daughter use so fluently before.

Alyssa blinked, the words sounding like a greeting, a formal one, but she could barely catch the meaning. Aerea shrank behind her skirts, clutching tight, while Rhaella leaned in, trying to hear. The language sounded like flame and silk on Alysanne’s lips, so alien and yet… formal.

Maegor finally turned his gaze away from Alyssa addressed everyone, his voice harsh and absolute in the Common Tongue.

“As part of her training, the princess will speak only High Valyrian while on Dragonstone. It is the language of dragons.”

The words struck Alyssa like a slap. Her lips parted, a protest caught in her throat. She knew only scraps of the tongue of Old Valyria. She could feel the distance between her and Alysanne growing already, sharp as a blade. It wasn’t just a lesson; it was isolation, division. A punishment. A warning.

But she smiled.

Because she had to.

Maegor’s eyes still bored into her, burning through flesh and bone. Alyssa felt her throat tighten as he stepped forward, boots grinding on stone, his bulk eclipsing the gray sky above the Dragonmont. Alysanne, behind him, hung back slightly; only a pace, but Alyssa noticed. The blue of her dress made her look younger somehow, and the silver pendant gleamed against her collarbone like a fragile shield.

“Wife,” Maegor said flatly.

It wasn’t a greeting. It wasn’t warmth. It was possession. A reminder.

Alyssa curtsied with forced grace. “Your Grace.”

The words tasted like ash. She hated calling him that, hated herself for giving him even the illusion of obedience. But she had learned, in the long, grueling moons since Dragonstone had become her cage, that Maegor responded to open defiance with cruelty. Subtlety, subversion; that was her armor.

Maegor’s eyes trailed down her form, heavy and scrutinizing. She had put effort into her appearance today, out of fear more than vanity. Her silver hair was plaited back from her face, and her gown, dark green trimmed in silver, was cut to flatter her despite the slight swell of her midsection. But she felt like a thing on display, a mare being judged at auction.

His stare lingered on her belly.

“You look healthy,” he said.

Alyssa forced a tight smile as she lied. “I feel well.”

Maegor nodded, once. “That pleases me.”

It did not sound like a husband’s pleasure. It sounded like a farmer’s satisfaction at a field ready for harvest.

Behind them, Ser Gawen was still standing awkwardly. Aerea peeked around Alyssa’s skirts, clutching tightly to them, her small mouth drawn in worry. Rhaella, now silenced by her scolding, sulked beside her twin, arms crossed.

Then Maegor looked at the girls.

Alyssa tensed.

A moment passed. His gaze lingered longer on Aerea, then dismissed Rhaella altogether as he always did. The girl didn’t flinch this time, but her lip curled in a defiant pout. Maegor scowled in return and looked ready to say something.

Before he could, Alysanne stepped forward. In perfect High Valyrian, she said something: fluid and gentle.

Alyssa couldn’t catch more than a few words: child, dragon, blood. The tone was soft, coaxing. A balm against the flint-hard silence that had grown in Maegor’s presence.

Maegor turned his head and gave a grunt of acknowledgment. For a heartbeat, Alyssa thought he might soften… until his eyes settled back on her and hardened again.

“You will move chambers,” Maegor said.

The words hit like a slap. Alyssa blinked. “Your Grace?”

“You will be leaving Sea Dragon’s Tower. I want you in the Stone Drum. The princess will be taking your chambers,” his voice dropped, too low for the girls to hear, “and we will be sharing chambers.”

Her stomach turned. They had never even shared chambers in the Red Keep. Her throat clenched with the instinct to scream. But she didn’t.

“I understand,” she said coldly.

Maegor’s gaze shifted once more to Aerea, and he stared: silent, unmoving. His eyes settled on the child like a shadow stretching at dusk. The look was not one of fury, not like the scorn he so often reserved for Rhaella. No, this was different. A flicker of something strange, almost sorrowful, twitched behind his eyes as he watched Aerea press her face into Alyssa’s hip, trying to disappear into her grandmother’s skirts.

Alyssa’s heart froze, her spine tightening like drawn bowstring. She could feel Rhaella tense beneath her arm, feel her breath catching as if sensing the danger too. Without thinking, Alyssa clapped a hand over the girl’s mouth, holding her still, silencing her before she could say something, anything, that might ignite the king’s temper.

Maegor tilted his head slightly, as though weighing something in his mind, and then turned his face toward Alysanne. He asked her a quiet question in High Valyrian. Alysanne, visibly uncertain, answered back in the same tongue. Whatever passed between them, it made Maegor look back at Aerea one final time with an expression Alyssa couldn’t name: regret, perhaps, or recognition… or something else, something darker.

Then, at last, he turned to Ser Gawen and spoke curtly.

“Princess Alysanne’s handmaidens and effects will arrive within a day or so. Prepare accordingly.” His tone brooked no reply, and with that, Maegor strode toward the gate without sparing Alyssa another glance.

The entourage began to follow, boots crunching on the stones, voices low and deferent. Alyssa did not move. She stood frozen in place, arms tightening around her granddaughters as the wind bit across Dragonstone’s courtyard. Alysanne did not move either, her gaze following Maegor then turning back to Alyssa.

As the wind whipped around them outside the looming gates of Dragonstone, Alysanne took a small step closer to her mother and lowered her voice. “Mother,” she said gently in the Common Tongue, her eyes glimmering with restrained emotion, concern. “I hope this… our arrival didn’t frighten you. Did… did you get my letters?”

Alyssa’s hands, still resting protectively on the shoulders of her granddaughters, trembled slightly. She looked over her daughter, dressed in her blue finery, hair braided like a proper royal, a silver Seven-Pointed Star at her neck, and something hardened in her throat. She managed a faint smile, brittle and exhausted. “I received them,” she said. “I just wasn’t… allowed to write back.”

Alysanne’s face fell for a flicker of a moment, but Alyssa pressed forward before her daughter could speak again. “The child is healthy,” she lied smoothly, “the girls are well. We’re managing.” She added more quietly, “We missed you terribly, all of us.”

Alysanne’s mouth curled into a grateful smile, but Alyssa could already feel the clock ticking. They had only heartbeats together, and she had to ask it. Her voice dropped to barely a whisper. “Is it true?” she said. “About Tyanna. Is she truly gone?”

The change in Alysanne’s face was instant; stillness, like a mask being slid into place. Her breath hitched, her eyes flicked to the gates, and too many seconds passed. “Yes,” she said finally. “She’s dead.”

Alyssa didn’t believe her. Not entirely. There was too much silence around that yes. Too much weight in the pause.

From the gates, Maegor’s guttural voice barked something in High Valyrian: commanding, unmistakable. Alysanne turned, her body already moving toward him.

“I’m sorry,” she said quickly, looking back at her mother. “I have to-”

“I know,” Alyssa murmured.

She watched as Alysanne scurried after the black-armored king, like a blue wisp chasing a shadow. Behind them, Balerion stirred, then took to the sky with an earthshaking roar, ash and smoke and hot air slamming into the ground around them.

As Alyssa turned and slowly walked after them, holding Aerea and Rhaella close to her sides, she murmured under her breath to no one in particular:

“Mother’s here now. Whatever comes… mother’s still here.”

The wind screamed as it whipped down from the Dragonmont, sharp with salt and ash, and Alyssa pulled her cloak tighter around herself and the children. Aerea pressed against her left side like a shadow, silent as ever, small fingers curled into Alyssa’s skirts. On her right, Rhaella squirmed and whined.

“You’re not my mother,” she said again, louder this time. “And I’m cold!”

Alyssa didn’t scold her. She didn’t have the strength. She only tightened her hold and kept walking toward the gates of Dragonstone, the black maw that would swallow them all whole again.

One of the Kingsguard stood just inside, armored and still, a statue made of white steel and sharp judgment. His eyes never left her, and Alyssa could feel it. Watching. Measuring. Ensuring she didn’t try anything foolish… like fleeing with the children. But what would be the point? There was nowhere to run. Not from here. Not with Maegor on the island.

Her mind spun with dread. She hadn’t heard Tyanna’s voice in moons, hadn’t glimpsed her shadow slinking through the corridors… but she didn’t believe it. Maegor said she was dead. But he had lied before. He could have lied to Alysanne. He always had lies at the ready when it suited him. If Tyanna was alive, she would be watching. She would be waiting. She had poisoned Alyssa once before, twisted her womb, killed her children.

She could do it again.

But worse than Tyanna… was Maegor himself.

Alyssa’s stomach turned with every step. He had returned to Dragonstone like a shadow stretching across the island, dragging Alysanne with him like a lamb meant for some grim altar. He wanted her daughter under his thumb: tamed, trained, reshaped in his image. A rider of dragons, a weapon, a tool, his… wife. She feared that more than anything. She had seen it in the way he spoke to her now. In High Valyrian, not the Common Tongue. In the way Alysanne hesitated before speaking, carefully picking each word as if afraid she might step wrong and be burned for it.

Maegor was isolating her. Molding her. Claiming her.

Yet… even that was not what made Alyssa’s heart beat like a drum of doom in her chest.

It was the way Maegor looked at her.

There had been hunger in his gaze. Not simple lust, not mere appetite: obsession. Like a man who believed something belonged to him and would never let it go. She had seen it before, back when Aenys was still alive, when Maegor used to stare at her with that same silent hunger in court, at feasts, at her wedding when he took part in the bedding.

She had thought he’d gotten what he wanted when he forced her into marriage: heirs. She’d thought his interest had waned, dulled by her pregnancy, by his grief, by the many directions of his own madness.

But it hadn’t. If anything, it had deepened.

He had not laid a hand on her during her last pregnancy. But that was before she’d started to show. She was round with child now. Clearly carrying his heir. Maegor, monstrous as he was, desired that. He didn’t want her despite the child: he wanted her because of it, because it made her his. That was why she was being forced to share chambers with that… demon.

Alyssa shuddered, and not from the cold.

He had loved Alys, hadn’t he? Alyssa had seen it in how he looked at her. The way he touched her. There had been gentleness, in his own fractured way. Even during her pregnancy, there had been something bordering on worship. Before he cut her into seven pieces and mounted her on pikes, that is.

She remembered how gently Aenys had touched her so gently when she was heavy with their children. The reverence in his hands. The awe in his eyes. How he whispered to the unborn babes, sang lullabies in the morning, wept with her when they came too early.

But Maegor? Maegor stared at her belly like a thing he’d conquered.

She hated him. She feared him. Worse, he wanted her again, and he would not be gentle.

She glanced down at the girls. Aerea was silent, expressionless. Rhaella huffed, pulling away as much as she dared, always defiant. Alyssa pulled them both in tighter. Not just to warm them… but to keep herself upright.

Her daughter was slipping away. Her body was no longer her own. Her mind was fraying. Her womb had become a weapon used against her again. Now Maegor was here, inside Dragonstone, inside her life again, and the walls were closing in.

She missed Aenys so much it stole the breath from her chest. She missed his laugh, his clumsy attempts at strength, his soft hands, the way he loved their children, truly loved them, not as extensions of himself but as people.

He was gone. They were all gone.

She looked down at the girls, Aerea silent and watchful, Rhaella scowling and stubborn, and something knotted in her throat. She did not have the strength for them, not truly. She didn’t even have the strength for herself anymore. But she had no choice.

Alyssa passed through the gates like a sleepwalker. A prisoner returning to her cell.

Chapter 39: MAEGOR VII

Notes:

WARNING: This chapter has explicit content

Maegor’s boots struck the ancient black stone with each step like war drums echoing down the narrow, torch-lit corridor. The flickering flames cast twisted shadows on the dragon-carved walls, his shadow among them, longer and darker than all the rest. His breath steamed; not from the cold of the night, but from the furnace of frustration burning just beneath his skin.

His first day back on Dragonstone had been long, and he had endured it with uncharacteristic restraint. He had played the part he told himself he must: the teacher, the father-figure, the burdened king preserving his bloodline through the child of his useless brother. He had walked Alysanne through the halls of Dragonstone and filled her ears with stories of the Doom, of Balerion’s birth in the smoking caverns beneath Valyria, of his own mother Visenya’s lessons to him on dragonriding. He had spoken in High Valyrian until his throat was dry, schooling her tongue to match his, correcting her pronunciation with a patience he barely possessed. She had listened. She had nodded. She had learned. Good. Obedience pleased him.

But the whole time, some traitorous part of his mind had not been on the girl. Not on her dragon, not even on prophecy. Every time she turned her head, every time she asked a question, every time she looked at him with those wary blue eyes…

…another image slammed into his skull:

Alyssa.

That bitch.

His wife. His queen. His prisoner. His prize. His tormentor.

Maegor stalked through the Stone Drum like a man half‑starved, half‑rabid, fully aflame.

Every clang of his armored boots on the obsidian floor throbbed up through his bones and stoked the heat already gnawing at him. Torches spat and guttered in their sconces as he passed, their trembling light carving wild shadows across the walls: dragons twisting, devouring, birthing fire. His breath came harsher with every step, fogging the air inside his helm, but he didn’t slow. He couldn’t.

Alyssa pale and stiff in her thick furs. Alyssa clutching those brats to her skirts. Alyssa with her belly just barely rounding again: with his child.

Alyssa looking at him like he was a storm wind that might pass if she stayed very, very still.

The calm disgust of it. The quiet defiance of it.

Gods, it made him shake.

He wanted to rip that look off her face with his hands.

Not because he hated her… it would’ve been easier if he did. But because he wanted her. Wanted her body, her fear, her breath, her heat. Wanted the sight of her swollen with his seed, wanted the proof of her submission writ across her skin. Wanted her to arch into him instead of away. Wanted her to look at him with something other than that distant, brittle nothingness.

She wouldn’t. Not willingly.

That… aggravated him. Like a talon dragging under his ribs. His last wife looking at him with fear and hate.

His thoughts spun hot and foul as he stormed up another flight of steps. His gauntlets flexed, the metal creaking. He imagined her in that dark chamber: lying alone, wrapped in her innocence and her misery, praying to gods who had never once saved her from him. He imagined slipping into her room, into her bed. He imagined the feel of her thighs, the give of her waist, the way she used to gasp under Aenys but only ever stiffened for Maegor.

He wanted to break that. Wanted to teach her. Wanted her pliant and panting and marked by him until there wasn’t a shadow of Aenys left in her bones.

The more he tried not to think of it, the more feverishly his mind roared:

Her mouth.

Her hips.

Her breasts heavy with milk for his heir.

Her body refusing him, and how he’d make it stop refusing.

By the time he reached the corridor to her chambers, Maegor’s heartbeat was a hammer inside his armor. The two Kingsguards stationed there stiffened as he approached, trying not to look directly at the king’s eyes; which was wise, because Maegor’s gaze burned like a forge.

They stepped aside instantly. No words. No questions. None of them dared.

The torchlight behind him flickered, casting his shadow long across Alyssa’s door.

He stared at the wood: thick, reinforced, useless if he pressed.

A pulse of want, hot, vicious, shot through him.

Alyssa was his. His wife. His queen. His stock. His prize. His curse.

Tonight, she would know it.

He raised his armored fist.

Maegor shoved the door wide with the flat of his palm, the hinges whining as if they, too, feared him. The chamber swallowed him in its dim red-gold glow; torchlight trembling over carved dragons, black stone, and the massive bed that had once belonged to Aegon the Conqueror himself, his famed father. It smelled of old stone, salt air… and her.

Alyssa.

She was seated at the small table by the hearth, a book open in her hands. At the sound of him, her head snapped up: a startled little jerk, like a doe lifting its head at the crack of a twig. Her eyes met his, wide and already guarded. She looked softer in the firelight, her hair loose around her shoulders, her face pale, her body wrapped in furs that could not hide the new swell of her stomach.

His.

That slight roundness dragged a fresh growl low in Maegor’s throat, though he forced it down.

He gave her a curt greeting, nothing warm, nothing gentle, and stalked deeper into the chamber. His boots thudded on the stone, heavy as a drumbeat. He did not wait for her reply, because he didn’t need it. She would speak only when forced to.

He stopped in front of the armor stand and began tearing himself out of steel. Plate by plate, strap by strap, he shed the weight of the day. The breastplate came first, hitting the stand with a resonant clang. Then the vambraces, the pauldrons, the greaves. Every discarded piece made Alyssa flinch a little more, though she tried to hide it by returning her eyes to the book.

She failed.

Maegor’s voice cut through the room, low and matter-of-fact but edged with something hot.

“Alysanne showed progress today.”

His gauntlets hit the table with a metallic growl as he began stripping them off.

“She listens. She obeys. She speaks High Valyrian better every day.”

He ripped off the last buckle, the plates sliding away. Now only his quilted under-armor remained, clinging to his body with heat and sweat.

“She will make a fine rider. Better than any of her brothers or sisters.”

His tone sharpened. “She learns because she values her house… our house.”

Blackfyre, unbelted from his hip, went onto the rack with reverence; the only soft thing in all his movements.

When he finally turned back toward her, he saw her trying to pretend she’d been reading this whole time. But the book trembled in her hands, and her eyes were fixed not on the page, but on him. On the bare-armed bulk of him. On the tension in his jaw. On the quiet that came after his voice stopped filling the room.

She knew. Of course she knew.

She always knew what came next.

Her breath had gone shallow. Her fingers pressed the edges of the book as if she might vanish into it. And her other hand, the one nearest the swell of her stomach, hovered protectively, instinctively.

That small, terrified gesture pricked something ugly and hungry in him.

Maegor stepped toward her.

The room felt tighter, heavier, almost too small to contain the heat rolling off him.

“Alyssa,” he said, and her name in his mouth came out rougher than intended.

She looked up, lips parting: no words, only dread.

Maegor saw it all: her waiting, her resignation, her fear. He saw it and did not soften, did not retreat. He had come for precisely this. He stripped the last of the quilted padding from his body, tossing it aside with far less care than he’d shown Blackfyre. Now only his smallclothes clung to him, the heat of his skin rising in waves. He stood there a moment, silent, expectant: waiting for Alyssa to do what she always did.

She moved.

Slow, resigned, she slipped the fur from her shoulders. It slid down her arms and pooled at her feet, leaving her in nothing but a thin white shift. The firelight made it nearly translucent where it brushed her hips. Her pregnancy, three, perhaps four moons, was unmistakable now, a small, rounded swell pressing gently at the fabric.

But the rest of her…

Gods, she looked nothing like Alys had. Alys had glowed, lush and flushed, full as a ripened fruit. Alyssa looked… worn thin. Too pale. Too bony at the collar. Her ribs hinted beneath her skin. Her cheeks hollowed. She looked less like a queen and more like a corpse wrapped in linen, her belly bloated like the victim of a famine.

She padded across the carpeted stone floor and perched on the edge of the bed: delicate, almost birdlike, her hands folded in her lap. Her eyes were on him. He could feel the weight of that look, the dread in it, the obedience in it, the steel she tried and failed to hide.

He stepped closer.

“What is this,” Maegor demanded, motioning sharply at her frame. “Why do you look like that? So… thin.”

Alyssa’s fingers curled into the fabric of her shift. But she met his gaze: tired, frightened, but not entirely broken.

“Women with child do not all swell the same way,” she murmured. “Grief wears the body down. So does fear. So does…” Her throat moved as she swallowed. “Exile. Being cut off from my daughter.”

Maegor’s stare hardened.

Alyssa continued anyway, though her voice trembled.

“And now… now you forbid Alysanne from speaking to me in the tongue we share. You know I can barely speak High Valyrian. You know what that does. You know what it means.”

Her hands shifted to her belly, protective without meaning to be.

“You ask why I look as I do,” Alyssa whispered. “It is because you have taken nearly everything from me, Maegor. Even the comfort of words.”

The room was silent.

The fire crackled.

Maegor felt something twist in him, not pity, not remorse, nothing so gentle, but a sharp, territorial agitation, a heat behind his ribs that made him want to snarl. Alyssa was obviously not taking care of herself; it was almost as if she’d finally lost the will to live.

She looked fragile.

She was his.

Something in him hated and hungered for that in equal measure.

Maegor closed the distance between them, the floorboards whispering under his weight. Alyssa stiffened, but she didn’t move; she never moved anymore unless he made her.

He reached out and took her chin between his bare fingers. Her skin was cool. Too cool. The fragility of her bones pressed lightly against his touch, and something inside him coiled tighter, hotter.

He tilted her face up, forcing her eyes to meet his. She trembled, but she held his gaze.

“Alyssa,” he said quietly, dangerously calm, “do you want to speak with your daughter freely?”

The answer came so fast it was almost a gasp.

“Yes.” Her breath hitched. “More than anything.”

He felt the truth of it in her voice: the raw longing, the small cracked thing inside her that still dared hope. He savored it for a heartbeat.

Then he gave his terms.

“I will allow Alysanne to speak the Common Tongue,” Maegor said, his thumb brushing her jawline, a mockery of tenderness. “With you. With the twins. With her little flock of handmaids.”

A flicker of life sparked in Alyssa’s eyes; faint but unmistakable.

He extinguished it with his next words.

“In exchange,” he murmured, “you will take care of yourself. You will eat. You will sleep. You will keep your strength for the child you carry. My heir.”

He leaned closer, his breath stirring the loose strands of hair near her temple.

“And when you come to my bed,” he continued, voice dropping into a low growl, “you will come willing. Eager. Not this frightened, hollow thing you’ve been giving me.”

Alyssa’s breath stuttered.

“You will say my name,” he finished, “when I am inside you.”

Then he released her chin, letting her face fall a fraction before she steadied herself, her eyes lowered… but not fully defeated.

She sat still, hands clenched in her lap, the firelight flickering along the curve of her stomach; the life she carried because of him.

Maegor watched the battle behind her lashes: shame, anger, maternal desperation, grief, the last tatters of pride folding in on themselves like burned parchment.

“It is the best offer you will have from me,” he said. “The alternative is that you learn High Valyrian well enough to understand your daughter on your own.”

Silence pressed between them.

A long moment passed. Alyssa’s throat worked. Her fingers tightened around the fabric at her knees. Her eyes glistened, but she didn’t cry. She sat on the edge of the bed in her thin white shift, hands gathered in her lap, knuckles bloodless with tension. Her long pale hair clung to her temples from the sea wind that still clung to her. The swell of her pregnancy, his child, rose beneath the linen, delicate and obscene all at once. When she finally spoke, her voice was barely above a whisper.

“…I agree.”

Maegor exhaled, satisfaction, triumph, elation, as the last of her resistance bent toward him. In no time at all, he had shrugged off the last of his clothes. Maegor fell upon his queen like a storm cloud descending, vast and dark and inescapable. Knocked backward, Alyssa lay pinned beneath his shadow, her breath trembling, her shift tangled around her thighs. Underneath, her soft pale inner flesh and the alluring bottom curve of her belly were revealed. The firelight traced every hollow in her face, every sharp edge grief had carved into her.

Her body felt small beneath his, too small, too thin, too breakable, and that somehow fed the blaze coiling through his blood. He braced an arm beside her head, the muscles in his forearm taut, the heat of him pouring down over her like a furnace. His other hand positioned his cock at her entrance, smearing it with fluid and heat. Her skin caught it; he could feel the warmth blooming wherever his weight settled.

Her breath shivered against his collarbone when he leaned close.

“Alyssa,” he rasped, voice scraped raw from wanting and anger and moons of starvation he refused to name. “Say it.”

She swallowed hard. He felt the movement through the points where their bodies touched; her throat beside his fingers, the soft pink lips of her cunt clenching just underneath his cock.

“…Maegor,” she whispered.

Her voice was thin, fragile as a reed, yet it rippled through him like a hammer blow. His mind flashed back to Alys, to the best years of his life.

His control fractured totally.

He speared her and began hammering between her thighs at a ragged, desperate pace. Maegor did not see any need for gentleness, thrusting forward into her with a fast, savage burst of fury. He touched her, not gently, never gently, but compulsively, hands roaming her sides, her back, her shoulders, her meager breasts, her pregnant belly most of all. Each touch made her jolt, or stiffen, or gasp; each reaction tightened her accursed twat, a coil wound far too tight. His movements were frantic, impatient, almost clumsy in their urgency. Alyssa’s hands hovered awkwardly, unsure where to go, unsure what he would allow, finally settling weakly against his shoulders as though merely trying to steady herself. Her touch, that accidental intimacy, inflamed him even further. Alyssa tensed up again as Maegor forcefully ripped her shift as he pounded even deeper inside her.

Her breath hitched when his weight pressed her deeper into the mattress; an involuntary sound, thin and frightened. His arm locked around her waist, possessive, immovable, pinning her in place. His cock stabbed at her lower lips: probing, angry, burning. He moved, she endured. He demanded, she complied. Every flinch, every trembling breath, every unconscious arch of her spine under his hold deepened his feverish intensity. He needed a wife for heirs… but he also needed this.

Somewhere in the frantic haze, Alyssa whispered, “Maegor… please…”

He didn’t know what she was begging for, mercy, speed, or simply for it to be over, but the sound of his name sent a violent shudder down his spine. His movements grew rougher, more desperate, until the tension inside him finally snapped. His breath seized, body stiffening; a low, guttural sound tore from his throat. A huge blast erupted from him, and immediately filled her; she was already pregnant, but his cock did not care.

When it was done, he slumped forward, chest heaving, sweat dampening her hair. Alyssa lay beneath him unmoving save for her ragged breaths, arms wrapped around their bodies. Chest heaving, Maegor stayed over her for a long moment. Longer than he meant to. Her hair stuck to her temples. Her shift was half torn and only covered her upper half, barely clinging damp to her breasts. Her breaths were small and uneven like a small bird trying not to be crushed.

Maegor touched her face; not softly, just deliberately, inspecting, memorizing. She flinched, barely, but didn’t pull away.

“Good,” he muttered, satisfaction rough in his voice. “You did well.”

Alyssa didn’t answer. Her eyes slipped half shut.

Slowly, awkwardly, Maegor shifted his weight off her, though one hand stayed on her hip, anchored there possessively as if fearful she might vanish if he let go.

Alyssa didn’t speak. Didn’t move. Only blinked up at the ceiling, eyes glassy, lashes trembling with exhaustion. Not a word more than he’d asked from her.

Maegor lay beside her, dragging her against him with one massive arm. She stiffened for a moment, then sagged, too drained to resist or pretend. Her cheek pressed against his shoulder, her belly warm against his ribs.

Mine, he thought.

His heir, beneath her ribs.

His queen, in his arms.

His claim to a future only he could create.

Alyssa’s breathing slowed. Exhaustion overtook her like a tide. She fell asleep with her hand curled weakly against his chest, not by choice, but from sheer depletion. Maegor lay on his back, the great bed of the Stone Drum creaking softly beneath his weight, the heat of the fire ebbing to a low, sullen glow. Alyssa was curled against him, one arm tucked between their bodies, her cheek resting just under his collarbone. She felt small there. Smaller than he remembered. But warm now, at least. The shivering had stopped.

Her breath brushed slow and damp against his skin, each exhale followed by a faint catch, as if even in sleep she didn’t quite trust the peace of it.

It reminded him of Alys.

The thought slid in unwelcome, quick and sharp. Alys, flushed and soft, heavy with child and laughter, her weight sprawled over his chest without fear, her fingers tracing idle patterns along his scars as if they pleased her. Alys, who had looked at him and seen not just a king, not a monster, but a husband.

He clenched his jaw and ground the memory down like gristle between his teeth.

No. He would not think of Alys. Not now. Not here.

His free hand drifted down, fingers splaying over Alyssa’s belly beneath the crumpled shift. The swell there was still small, subtle under the fabric, but it was there. Firm. Real. A new weight where there had only been emptiness before.

He pressed his palm in gently, as though sheer will might force a response from whatever curled within. For a moment, he held his breath, listening, not with his ears, but with some primitive, hungry part of himself, for the flutter of life.

Nothing. No kick. No twitch. Not yet. Just the quiet warmth of her body and the dull, steady rise and fall of her breathing.

Even so, the simple fact of it, of her changed shape, of the proof of his seed resting under his hand, soothed something ragged and raw inside him. A knot loosening in his chest, just a fraction.

“The next king,” he murmured into the quiet, though Alyssa couldn’t hear him. “Or queen, mayhaps.”

He would make do with whatever the gods, or fate, or his own stubborn blood, gave him.

His hand drifted in slow circles over the curve of Alyssa’s stomach, not gentle in the way a lover might be, but careful in the way a man might touch a weapon mid-forging: aware of its worth, its danger, its necessity. It was strange, how the contact calmed him. How the thunder that had been in his skull since they landed on Dragonstone eased beneath his palm.

He knew with a cold, hard clarity exactly what he intended.

He would be spending many, many nights like this. With Alyssa in his bed. Her belly growing. Her body bearing the weight of his future. He would take what he needed from her, the warmth, the distraction, the oblivion that came in the moments when even his rage went white and soundless, and he would leave her with the only thing that mattered: heirs.

He would teach Alysanne in the yard and in the sky, shape her to the dragon saddle and to High Valyrian, burn the softness out of her until she understood what their house truly was. And when he was done with teaching, he would come back here. To this bed. To Alyssa.

He curled his fingers, feeling the resistant push of the small swell.

Forty, he thought. She was around forty now. Lines at the corners of her eyes. A little more silver in her hair. Past the age where most women thought of more children.

He did not care.

She was still beautiful, still fertile, still carrying his heir. So long as she did, so long as her body could still quicken with his seed, he would use it. Use her. Sully Aenys’s memory. He would wring from her whatever strength and softness and blood the gods still allowed her, until there was nothing left to take.

Then… perhaps he would look elsewhere. Another wife. Another girl. Alysanne maybe or some other maiden who would spread her legs for him and push out heirs.

But that was later. The future.

For now, Alyssa was warm against his chest, her breathing steady, her body slack in exhausted sleep. The old bed that had held his father and mother now held him and the woman his brother had once loved. Aenys, he thought, would have wept to see it. That notion gave Maegor a dim, cruel flicker of satisfaction. “He was such a fool, a pitiful fool.” That weak worm should have never exiled him; Aenys’s sons would never sit the Iron Throne now.

Alyssa stirred at the vibration of his voice, a tiny, involuntary movement. Her hand, splayed weakly near his ribs, twitched and then settled again. The faint brush of her fingers against his skin made him aware, suddenly, of how closely they were pressed together. Of how small her frame felt in the circle of his arm. Of how easily he could have crushed her, and how carefully, whether he admitted it or not, he had held back.

He didn’t like that thought. It made the inside of his chest feel tight in a way that had nothing to do with anger.

He pushed it aside.

He shifted her slightly, tugging the torn shift back over her shoulder, pulling the blanket up to cover them both. Not from kindness, but because he did not want her sick or weakened. Useless. Her body was an investment now. An asset. It would be wasteful to let it fail.

The fire snapped softly. The wind howled faintly beyond the thick stone walls. Somewhere deep below, in the volcanic caverns of the island, he could almost imagine he heard the distant rumble of something ancient and slumbering.

Maegor closed his eyes.

He did not dream. He never had. Not like his father’s dreams of conquest and the Long Night. Not like Daenys’s prophecies of doom. Not like the girl, Alysanne, with her talk of flying over snow and mountains.

But as he drifted closer to sleep, his hand still resting on Alyssa’s belly, he found himself thinking: not in pictures, not in prophecy, but in hard, simple shapes: of a babe with silver hair and his eyes. Of a boisterous child with him on dragonback. Of an Iron Throne with no one to dispute it but him and his blood.

He fell asleep clinging to that image like a drowning man to wreckage, Alyssa’s slight weight a living reminder pressed against his side.

If she dreamed beside him, he did not know. He only knew that, for the first time in many nights, the storm in his skull quieted enough for the king to sleep soundly.

Chapter 40: BENIFER VI

Afternoon light slanted in thin, dusty bars through the narrow window of the Red Keep, turning the little chamber into a dim, floating box of gold. Grand Maester Benifer moved about it with more fuss than the room truly required. The place was modest but orderly: a narrow bed pushed against one wall, a stout wooden table with three mismatched chairs, a lean bookcase sagging under vellum and ink, and a second shelf crowded with jars of dried herbs and stranger things steeping in glass.

He had scrubbed and straightened everything that could be scrubbed and straightened. Now he stood at the table, staring down at it as if it were an altar. Three chairs, carefully placed. Two scrolls unrolled and weighted at the corners, each bearing twin columns of script; the familiar loops of the Common Tongue mirrored in the clean curling strokes of High Valyrian. The standard first lesson, he told himself. Nothing remarkable.

Yet his palms were damp.

Benifer shifted his weight from one foot to the other, then forced himself to be still. His chain clinked faintly with the movement, a small, constant reminder that he belonged to knowledge, to duty, to the crown.

It did nothing to calm him.

He was nervous for reasons that had nothing to do with grammar.

It was one thing to teach a king’s daughter, a bright, eager child like Alysanne, under the eyes of septa and court. It was another thing entirely to shut himself into a small room with Septa Keira.

Keira, who watched him like a hawk judged a snake.

Keira, whose withering stare had, gods help him, lodged somewhere uncomfortably between his ribs.

Keira, who would be sitting at his table, repeating after him, relying on him.

He did not like the way that thought made his stomach twist.

You are a maester, he told himself angrily. Chains, not cheeks. Scrolls, not sighs. You have seen men bleed out, held the hands of dying lords; do not come undone over one sharp-tongued woman in white.

But his palms were still sweating.

Under that more personal anxiety, deeper currents churned.

Alysanne on Dragonstone with Maegor. Alone with him. The image haunted him: the girl in her blue dress, bright and soft-spoken, now riding on the back of the Black Dread, learning from Maegor about dragons and warfare. Maegor teaching her “as a father,” he’d said.

Benifer had seen too much of Maegor in the court to trust that word.

Beyond Alysanne, there was the realm. The Faith Militant still lurked like a wound that refused to close. Lords wrote letters in careful, measured tones that barely concealed their fury: at taxes, at dead princes, at vanished heirs and burned septs. It felt less like peace and more like the silence that came right before a storm broke upon a city’s walls.

But at least, he thought grimly, Maegor is elsewhere.

The memory of three Grand Maesters dead in quick succession flickered through his mind: chains broken, bodies carried out, a letter delivered back to the Citadel. Benifer had outlasted them. He had done so by never speaking too boldly.

A king who was on Dragonstone would not likely decide, in some dark mood, that his current maester displeased him. It was a thin comfort. But it was some small comfort.

He glanced again at the door.

“Students,” he muttered under his breath, tasting the word. “Seven save me.”

It did feel strange, applying the title to Keira. Prunella could be a pupil; she was young, malleable, spirited. But Keira was his contemporary, nearer his age, already trained in her own hard school of doctrine and discipline. To correct her tongue, to guide her hand over unfamiliar letters… it felt, in some small, secret way, like crossing a line.

Before he could chew that thought any further, a brisk knock sounded at the door.

Benifer straightened so fast his back popped. After the knock, he tried to steel his voice into something steady and scholarly before calling, “Enter.”

The door creaked open, and his breath caught.

To his trepidation…and a shameful flicker of pleasure, Septa Keira stepped in first.

Her white robe swept the floor in a clean, disciplined line, veil framing her face like a blade’s edge. Her one visible eye was already fixed on him: not soft, not neutral, but sharp with the same suspicion and weary wariness she reserved for kings, snakes, and sinners.

Benifer straightened reflexively, as if caught at some impropriety. “Septa Keira,” he managed, dipping his head. “You’re early.”

She did not answer. Did not even slow.

Instead she moved past him without a word, her robe whispering over the rushes, and began surveying the room as though she expected to find rot beneath every book and treason behind every jar.

Benifer stood rooted to the floor, watching her glide from shelf to shelf. The set of her shoulders was stiff; her hands were clasped lightly behind her back, knuckles hidden but tense. There was nothing gentle in her manner. She examined the room like a fortress under siege.

Of course she did. She never trusted anything in Maegor’s court: not kings, not lords, not maesters.

But Seven help him, she was striking when she moved with purpose like that.

She bent slightly to read a spine on one of his oldest volumes, veil shifting just enough to reveal the angle of her neck, and Benifer’s eyes betrayed him, flicking down, catching the outline of her backside through the robe before he violently forced them up again.

A maester of forty-one years reduced to a blushing novice. Appalling.

He swallowed and stepped forward. “If you would prefer to sit-”

Keira cut him off without turning. “I would prefer to see where I am.”

Her voice was clipped. Straightforward. Unapologetic.

Then she straightened and pivoted, eye sweeping the chamber once more before landing back on him.

“It’s bare,” she said flatly. “Barren. Lifeless. Even a sickroom has more warmth than this.”

Benifer blinked. “It is a maester’s chamber.”

“It looks like a oubliette.”

He bristled, gaining some rare steel to his spine. “Maesters swear to lands and lords no more than septas swear to vanity. I do not live like a lord. I did not think comfort part of your vows.”

She arched an eyebrow beneath her veil, just barely, but enough to make him feel like a child being scolded by an irritable aunt.

“My vows,” she replied coolly, “are celibacy, modesty, and service. I did not swear to ugliness.”

He coughed, unsure whether to laugh or apologize.

Before he could decide, she moved past him again, finally approaching the table. Her steps were small, measured. She pulled out the chair with her fingertips and sat with her back straight as an oaken beam.

She folded her hands in her lap and announced, without looking at him, “I am only here to learn enough High Valyrian to read and reply to Alysanne’s letters. Not a word more.”

Benifer nodded, throat tight. “Of course.”

Silence settled between them, long and stiff, while they waited for Prunella’s arrival. Keira continued surveying the room with calm, cutting judgment. Benifer stared anywhere except at her, though he could feel her presence like a pressure on the air. It was going to be a very long lesson.

The two of them would wait for another fifteen minutes in silence.

Lord Celtigar’s arrival filled the little chamber in an instant: his presence always seemed too large for small spaces, too polished, too deliberate. Prunella bounded in before him, her skirts swinging and her energy scattering the stale awkwardness like startled birds.

“Grand Maester! Septa Keira!” she sang out, already halfway to her chair. “I’m so sorry I’m late, Triss and Lysa Towers taught me a new clapping song and then-”

Keira cut her a look sharp enough to slice parchment. Prunella shrank only slightly before plopping cheerfully into her seat.

Lord Edwell Celtigar stepped forward, offering Benifer a courteous incline of the head. “My apologies, Grand Maester. My daughter’s sense of time remains… aspirational. I will have to tell her septa to teach her about schedules.”

Benifer mustered a small, professional smile. “Quite all right, my lord. The lesson hasn’t begun.”

Keira made a faint sound, something between a sigh and a chastisement, that Prunella pretended not to notice.

The Hand clasped his hands behind his back, surveying the table set with scrolls. “I appreciate your efforts for my daughters and for Her Grace. These hours you give them… will not go unrewarded.”

Benifer blinked. “My lord, I assure you-”

“No,” Celtigar interrupted kindly but firmly. “I insist. The Crown’s maester serves tirelessly; it is time your labor be recognized. A few extra coins each lesson. Nothing extravagant, two stags mayhaps? Merely appropriate.”

Benifer felt his pulse hitch. Payment from the Hand himself? In front of Keira? The Seven had a wicked sense of humor.

“My lord,” he tried again, “truly, I do not require-”

Celtigar smiled. “Which is precisely why you deserve it.”

Keira stiffened across from them. Her hands, folded on her lap, tightened fractionally. Benifer wasn’t sure if she was uncomfortable with the Hand’s presence or the notion of paying for the lessons. Perhaps both. She had always disliked the Hand’s smoothness, his political ease.

He could see it now: her eye subtly lowered, jaw set, shoulders rigid under the white veil. She looked like a woman enduring a sermon from a septon she did not respect.

“My daughter will rely on you,” Celtigar continued warmly. “And Alysanne thinks highly of you. That alone merits gratitude. And compensation.”

Benifer flushed. Keira’s expression only cooled further.

“Very well,” Benifer murmured. “If it pleases the Hand…”

“It does.” Celtigar nodded to all three. “Enjoy your studies. I look forward to hearing of your progress.”

He withdrew smoothly, closing the door behind him.

The second the latch clicked, Keira exhaled sharply, as though she had been holding her breath since he entered.

“I will pay you as well,” she said abruptly.

Benifer blinked. “Septa, that is not-”

“I will,” she repeated, leaning forward slightly. “I will not owe you. I have saved coin. I will use it.”

“That isn’t necessary,” he protested. “I agreed to this out of concern for Her Grace, not for-”

“That is irrelevant,” Keira snapped softly. “Service deserves fair exchange. I will not have it said I took advantage of your time or charity.”

Prunella bit back a laugh, eyes sparkling. “Septa Keira paying for lessons: imagine! Grand Maester, I hope you charge her double.”

Keira silenced her with a glare sharp enough to send even a Celtigar girl ducking her head.

Benifer raised both palms in surrender. “Fine. Fine. The same rate as the Hand, if it eases your conscience.”

“It does,” Keira said curtly, settling back in her chair with renewed primness.

Prunella broke into giggles again, unable to contain herself. “Seven help us,” she whispered theatrically. “A septa and a maester arguing over silver. Is this what learning High Valyrian does to people?”

Keira ignored her. Benifer rubbed at the bridge of his nose.

But beneath the embarrassment, a strange warmth flickered in him; Keira insisting on fairness, on dignity, on responsibility. It was exactly the sort of stubborn principle that made her both maddening and…

“All right,” Benifer said, voice steadier than he felt. “Payment settled. No more argument.”

Keira nodded once.

Prunella smirked.

Benifer cleared his throat and tried to assume the manner of a composed scholar: never mind the fact that his heart still hadn’t settled properly since Keira and Prunella had sat down.

He reached for the two pieces of parchment with the short Valyrian poem and set it before them.

“Today,” he said, “we begin with script. Sounds come later, once the shapes feel familiar beneath your eyes. High Valyrian grammar is different from our own, more… fluid.”

Prunella nodded vigorously, already leaning over the parchment as though proximity might grant her instant fluency. Keira sat upright, hands folded neatly, eye scanning the columns with practiced focus.

“Read the Common Tongue version first,” Benifer instructed.

Keira spoke first, calm and measured:

“Before mountains were raised and seas carved their paths, the fire sang the world awake…”

Her voice was steady, reverent even, not for Valyria, but for learning itself.

Prunella followed, enthusiastic but stumbling on the second line, turning forged into fogged, and breath into bread, which made her flush.

“It’s the same letters and words you always use, my lady,” Benifer reassured lightly.

“Yes, but they keep rearranging themselves,” Prunella muttered, glaring at the parchment as though it had personally betrayed her.

“Now,” Benifer said gently, “the Valyrian version.”

He did not expect either to manage it on the first attempt.

Keira inhaled, eyes tracing the letters, then read slowly… but well.

It was halting, yes, but recognizable. The consonants landed firmly, the vowels shaped with care. Her voice wrapped around the foreign tongue with the same stubborn discipline she applied to prayer.

Prunella, emboldened, barreled in:

“A… ab- ab- rar… eh- za- uh- dra-”

Her tongue tangled almost instantly. She resorted to laughing through the rest of the line.

Keira hid a sigh behind her hand. Benifer pretended not to notice.

“High Valyrian must be approached slowly,” he explained. “Precision first, speed later.”

He spent the next part of the hour introducing the building blocks: the four main noun types, possession in relation to words, the difference between singular and plural. Prunella stared as though he’d recited a spell; Keira nodded along, face tightening in the places where her understanding strained but did not break.

Finally, he set fresh parchment before them.

“Write these phrases,” he instructed.

“I am well.

You are my friend.

Alysanne is well.”

Keira’s quill moved cautiously but confidently, forming the Valyrian words with a steady, unadorned hand. Her script was sharp, narrow, severe; much like her face when she concentrated. She paused only when confronted with an unfamiliar diphthong, muttering under her breath before correcting it.

Prunella, meanwhile, gripped her quill like a child clutching a stick and produced a line that slanted uphill so dramatically it nearly climbed off the page. Her Common Tongue writing was already shaky; her Valyrian words looked like tipsy ants trying to march in formation.

Benifer leaned over her shoulder, carefully, so as not to touch her, and pointed to her inverted vowel.

“Not vala, my lady,” he said softly, “but vala. The stroke rises, not dips.”

“It’s backwards,” she insisted.

“That is because you wrote it backwards.”

Prunella groaned into her hands. “Why are dragon words so complicated? They look like spider legs.”

Benifer almost choked on a laugh.

By the end of the hour, the difference between them was stark:

Prunella’s writing resembled battlefield casualties.

Keira’s was imperfect but promising; her efforts wrapped in disciplined control.

Benifer gathered their parchments, laying them side by side. The comparison was almost comical.

Keira noticed immediately. “She will learn quickly,” she muttered, cheeks faintly coloring; not with pride, but with embarrassment.

Prunella peeked at Keira’s sheet and gasped. “Yours looks so good! Septa, you’re already better than me!”

“I have heard these lessons many times,” Keira said stiffly. “I simply… listened.”

Benifer hid a smile.

“It is clear,” he said, rolling up the scrolls, “that Septa Keira will take to the written language with relative ease… and that Lady Prunella will take more time.” He softened the words as much as possible. “But that is no fault. Talent differs. Persistence matters more.”

Prunella brightened instantly. “Oh, I can persist! I persisted in climbing the Tower of the Hand even after I fell twice!”

Keira stared at her. “That is not the reassurance you think it is.”

Benifer rubbed his temples.

Yet even as the lesson concluded, he felt a warmth beneath the exhaustion: Keira’s determination, Prunella’s earnestness, the strange fragile bridge being built across languages and distance.

For Alysanne.

For the letters that would soon cross land and sea to reach her.

For the women here who refused to let her slip away.

“We will make this work.”

Benifer had barely set aside their practice parchments when Prunella, chin in her palms and quill dangling uselessly between her fingers, let out a theatrical groan.

“I hate being apart from Prudence,” she declared. “I’ve never gone more than a day without seeing her, and now it’s been, what? Three? Four? I feel like half my face is missing. Or one arm. Or- oh! Maybe I should write to her. And then, listen, this is brilliant, she can give my letters to Alysanne, and Alysanne can send hers back through Prudence in secret!”

She looked entirely pleased with herself, eyes bright with triumph.

Benifer couldn’t help the small laugh that slipped out. Keira pressed her lips together, but even she smiled faintly, an expression so rare on her face it startled him more than Prunella’s enthusiasm.

“Lady Prunella,” Benifer said gently, “the maester on Dragonstone will open and read every letter by raven he receives. If he finds you addressing the princess with a letter meant for someone else, he will catch it.”

“And if he doesn’t,” Keira added dryly, “King Maegor certainly would.”

Prunella’s triumphant posture wilted instantly.

“Oh.” She slumped. “So… I really do have to learn all of this spider-leg writing if I want to talk to Alysanne?”

“I’m afraid so,” Benifer replied, though he softened the blow. “But you can learn. And imagine the advantage; you’ll know more High Valyrian than your brother Trevor or even your sister Prudence. Probably more than half the Red Keep.”

Her eyes brightened again. “So I can hold it over them?”

Benifer allowed himself a small smile. “Yes, Lady Prunella. Precisely.”

Prunella beamed.

But Keira, who had been quietly tracing the spine of her quill across the parchment, exhaled a long, low sigh.

“These days have been difficult for me as well.”

Both Benifer and Prunella looked up sharply. Keira rarely volunteered anything about her private thoughts; Benifer had assumed she locked those away in some inner sanctum guarded as tightly as the Starry Sept itself.

“Why?” Prunella asked immediately, full of misplaced cheer. “It must be nice being posted in the Royal Sept now, isn’t it?”

Keira let out a humorless huff.

“Nice? They despise me.”

Prunella blinked. Benifer straightened.

Keira’s voice sharpened, gaining momentum like a cart rolling downhill.

“The septas there refuse to listen. Half of them have grown complacent doing nothing but stitching embroidery with noblewomen, and the other half spend their days gossiping. I try to suggest they tidy up the sept and impose basic discipline, and you’d think I’d asked them to scrub the cobblestones with their tongues. And Septon Tobas, Seven save me, he acts as though my presence is an insult to his piety. I thought he liked me when Alysanne was here!”

Her eyes flashed with righteous irritation.

“They isolate me. Whisper when I approach. They undermine me at every turn. It is like being dropped back into girlhood in the Riverlands, but now I must pretend not to hear every word.”

Prunella’s mouth fell open, wide as a hatchling fish.

Benifer, though, felt something twist in his chest. Sympathy; not the dutiful kind he offered the sick, but something warmer. Sharper. Keira’s voice carried not just irritation but… loneliness. The very thing he’d feared she might suffer in Alysanne’s absence.

He found himself leaning slightly forward.

“I did not know,” he said softly. “You hide frustration well.”

Keira scoffed. “Frustration is unseemly in a septa. Or so they remind me.”

“That is nonsense,” Benifer said before he could stop himself, surprising even himself with the firmness in his tone. “You are capable. Disciplined. And you care deeply for Alysanne, far more than any septa I have known would dare. What you face… it is unfair.”

Keira looked at him with some mix of surprise, calculation, and… gratitude she refused to voice.

Prunella finally piped up, earnest as ever:

“You can sit with my father and I when we come to the sept, Septa Keira. We don’t whisper behind your back. We whisper behind everyone else’s backs.”

Keira actually let out a breath that might have been a laugh.

Benifer felt the tension in the room shift. Not dissolve, Keira was not a woman whose walls crumbled easily, but soften. Just enough that the lesson no longer felt like an exercise in survival.

Just enough that he could imagine, fleetingly, that maybe, just maybe, this strange trio could make something resembling… companionship.

They sat together for another ten minutes, just talking.

Benifer had barely begun stacking the inkpots when a firm knock interrupted the warm drift of conversation. The door eased open, and in stepped Lord Edwell Celtigar: robes crisp, expression brightening at once upon seeing his daughter seated at the table.

Prunella jumped from her chair as if launched.

“Father! High Valyrian is so hard, but also, I think- I like it?” Her voice trilled with the same breathless delight she used when discovering a new pastry.

Edwell offered his daughter a proud little smile. “Our blood comes from Old Valyria, Prunella. It’s only fitting you learn the tongue of your ancestors. Your brother Trevor can barely manage his letters for High Valyrian; imagine his face if you surpass him.”

Prunella lit up exactly as the Hand intended.

He then turned to Benifer and inclined his head. “My thanks for your instruction, Grand Maester. You have my gratitude, and my coin.”

Benifer bowed modestly. Keira’s jaw tightened faintly at the mention of payment again, but she said nothing.

Edwell collected Prunella with a sweep of his arm, and the pair left in a flurry of cheerful chatter, Prunella already attempting to pronounce “dracarys” correctly, Edwell correcting her with amused patience.

The door clicked shut.

Silence unfurled between Benifer and Keira.

Benifer folded his hands, preparing to offer some polite dismissal, then Keira’s voice cut through.

“May I stay a little longer?”

He blinked. “Of course. If you wish.”

Keira exhaled, lowering herself back into the chair with a kind of brittle exhaustion.

“I would normally take confession,” she muttered, “but the thought of speaking to Septon Tobas about any of this, Seven protect me, I cannot abide it.”

Benifer straightened, surprised. He had expected, hoped, perhaps, that she would speak of Alysanne. Instead-

Keira’s restraint snapped like a bowstring.

“They are impossible, Grand Maester. Every last one of those so-called holy women in the Royal Sept. Lazy. Ill-disciplined. Some haven’t washed their robes in a fortnight. Half of them whisper endless nonsense about prophecies and predictions, yet jump like frightened mice whenever a noble enters. And Tobas- Tobas acts as though he alone carries the Seven on his shoulders, when he can scarcely carry his own weight.”

Benifer blinked at the sudden force of her new tirade.

Keira did not speak like this normally. She was disciplined, sharp, often silent, but now her words tumbled in a torrent, sharpened by weeks of isolation and bitterness.

She continued, hands gesturing in uncharacteristic agitation:

“I try to impose a proper schedule, but they scatter like hens. I ask them to keep their vows with dignity, to not wear jewelry or other finery, and they glare as if I’ve insulted their mothers. The Royal Sept was supposed to be an honor. Instead, it feels like I’ve been buried alive beneath incompetence and resentment.”

Benifer listened; first startled, then quietly enthralled.

Her passion blazed through every word. Her spine stiff even as her voice dipped low. Her frustrations so tightly bottled that now, in private, they poured out like a breaking dam.

He had never seen her like this.

Gods help him, he admired it.

“That sounds…” Benifer began gently, “irritating.”

Keira’s tirade faltered. Her brown eye locked on him, just a moment, then she looked away.

“It is,” she admitted in a voice far softer than before. “They speak ill of me simply because I try to do my duty. And with Alysanne gone…” She swallowed. “There is no one there I trust.”

Benifer’s chest tightened.

He wanted to say I understand.

He wanted to say you are not as alone as you believe.

He wanted, dangerously, to reach out.

Instead, he folded his hands tighter.

“You may speak here freely whenever you need,” he said softly.

Keira’s single brown eye flickered toward him; guarded, but no longer hostile.

For the next half hour she spilled everything she had held back for days. A steady stream of biting observations, wounded pride, indignation, and exhaustion. Benifer nodded when needed, murmured a word when appropriate, and simply listened.

She spoke a hundred words for every one he offered.

When she finally slowed, exhaling deeply, Benifer realized something new: she trusted him.

Not fully. Not openly.

But enough to unburden herself in a way she would to no one else in the Red Keep.

Enough to let him see the woman beneath the veil, beneath the discipline.

For a man who had spent these last few moons longing for a woman he could never touch, never claim, never confess to…

…it felt like the start of something dangerous. And precious.

Keira rose at last, the chair legs scraping softly over stone. She smoothed her robes with brisk, practiced motions, as if wiping away any trace of vulnerability she’d let slip.

“Thank you for your time, Grand Maester,” she said, back to her usual clipped formality. “I will bring the coin I owe you at our next… lesson.”

The brief pause around the word told him she still disliked it. A septa, a pupil? It scraped against her pride.

Benifer dipped his head. “That isn’t…”

“And,” she added, cutting him off neatly, “you should come to prayers.”

He blinked. “Prayers?”

“At the Royal Sept,” she clarified, adjusting her veil. “You look as though you haven’t set foot in a sept in years. Perhaps the Seven might yet salvage your soul. Even groveling maesters such as yourself deserve the chance at salvation.”

His mouth fell open in affronted outrage before his mind could form words.

“Groveling..? I do not grovel.”

“You practically bowed yourself in half for the Hand,” she replied, eye narrowing. “I’m surprised your chain didn’t drag on the floor.”

Heat flared in his cheeks: part indignation, part that strange, unwelcome thrill he always felt when she skewered him with that sharp tongue.

He straightened, fingers tightening on the edge of the table. “Perhaps,” he said, more sharply than he intended, “your fellow septas and Septon Tobas would treat you with more warmth if your words were not always sharpened like knives.”

The silence that followed dropped like a stone.

Keira’s face went very still.

Her jaw clenched. Her hands clenched. That single brown eye flashed with a hurt anger that made Benifer’s stomach lurch.

Idiot. Idiot.

“I see,” she said, voice low and brittle. “So that is what you think.”

Benifer put his hands up, only now realizing what he had done.

“Septa, I only meant-”

“A cad,” she hissed. “That’s what you are. A clever, smug cad in a chain, thinking himself better than those who actually try to hold others to a standard.”

He lifted his hands, horrified. “Keira, I-”

But she was already moving, veil snapping with the sharp twist of her body as she strode to the door. She yanked it open with more force than necessary.

“At least the Seven do not scold me for speaking plainly,” she threw over her shoulder. “Unlike certain maesters.”

And then she was gone, the door slamming shut with a hollow thunk that echoed in the small chamber.

Benifer stood there, half-risen from his chair, hand outstretched toward a woman no longer present.

Slowly, he sat back down.

The room felt emptier than it had before anyone arrived: quieter, the silence not soft but stabbed through with things unsaid. His chain suddenly seemed heavier, pressing against his collarbones.

“Fool,” he muttered to himself. “Utter fool.”

He scrubbed a hand over his face.

Would she come back next week? She’d said she would, coin in hand, but Keira was a woman of fierce conviction; if she decided he’d offended her beyond repair, she might decide her soul was better served by learning High Valyrian from no one at all.

He exhaled, long and slow.

And yet… under the worry, under the chastened sting of her anger, there was that other feeling again. That restless, guilty quickening.

She had stayed. She had chosen to speak with him, to complain, to share her struggles. She had trusted him with more of herself than she ever showed in public.

Even furious, calling him a cad, she felt… alive. Real, in a court choked with unsaid words and masks.

He leaned back in his chair, staring up at the rafters.

“Will she return?” he murmured. “Will any of them?”

Alysanne was doing gods-knew-what on Dragonstone: isolated with a king whose temper burned like the hottest fire and a dragon that could turn cities to ash. No raven had come yet with her careful, hopeful words.

Benifer found himself anticipating two things with equal, absurd intensity:

The elegant, ink-blotted scrawl of Alysanne’s first High Valyrian greeting from Dragonstone.

The sharp knock of a septa’s hand on his door, veiled and scowling, coin in her palm, fire in her eye.

Seven help him.

He was looking forward to both.

Notes:

I honestly enjoyed writing this chapter much more than I expected. More to come!

Chapter 41: ALYSANNE VIII

It was early morning in Dragonstone, and the princess was getting ready for the day.

Jenya tugged the last of the laces tight, and Alysanne winced as her bodice firmed against her ribs.

“Not so hard,” she hissed in the Common Tongue, then immediately glanced at the door.

It was shut, the iron ring hanging still. No armored footsteps in the corridor. No rumble of a dragon overhead.

The handmaidens relaxed at the same time she did, like they were all sharing one set of lungs.

“Sorry, my lady,” Jenya whispered, easing the pull a little. “It’s the damp. The cloth clings.”

“The whole castle clings,” Sera muttered from where she sat braided Alysanne’s hair. “Walls, sheets, my hair, my bones. I miss the dry air in King’s Landing.”

“That’s because it stinks less here,” Dorthy said, fussing with the hem of Alysanne’s dark blue gown. “The sea air is clean. Up on the battlements yesterday I could smell salt instead of the shi- stench like in the capital.”

“The sea air nearly pushed me off the battlements,” Taliya grumbled from the wardrobe, arms full of folded cloaks. “The wind here has teeth.”

Prudence Celtigar, perched delicately on the window seat and pointedly not helping the other girls, looked out into the grey morning and sighed in theatrical delight. “Dragonstone has character,” she said. “It looks exactly the way my septa described Valyria. All black stone and smoke and dragons. I can almost imagine it was carved by dragonfire.”

“You almost walked into a gargoyle yesterday,” Jenya reminded her.

“That gargoyle was in the way,” Prudence sniffed. “Besides, once we see Silverwing, it’ll all be worth it.”

Alysanne smiled at that despite herself.

Silverwing.

She could almost feel the dragon before seeing her; the memory of smooth silver scales beneath her hand when she was younger, of warm breath, of that strange sensation of… being seen.

“I’m eager to see her too,” Alysanne murmured. “But Uncle says we begin proper dragonrider lessons tomorrow, once you’ve all settled in. Today is for ‘household matters’.”

She mimicked Maegor’s growl unconsciously; the girls snickered.

Then the laughter faded, and the room filled with a softer hush.

“Did you see the queen yesterday?” Sera asked quietly. “Your mother, I mean.”

Alysanne’s smile faded.

“No. Not yet. I… I thought we might all go after I have breakfast with the king.”

The words tasted odd in her mouth. Breakfast with the king. As if he were just an uncle, just a lord. Not King Maegor, not the man who had killed her brother and sister, not the man who forced her mother to marry him.

Taliya set the cloaks aside, coming nearer. “She looked… different,” she said. “When we arrived last night and curtsied in the hall. The queen.”

“Smaller,” Dorthy added softly.

“Smaller,” Prudence agreed, frowning. “And thinner. My father said pregnancy usually makes women-” She stopped herself, cheeks pinking. “Well. She didn’t look like I expected.”

Alysanne swallowed.

She saw again her mother standing in front of the gates of Dragonstone, sunlight showing hollows beneath her eyes, hands resting on the slight swell of her stomach, her face and collarbones unusually bony. The pregnancy showed more in the way she carried herself than in her body: carefully, as though every step might shatter something inside her.

“She’s just tired,” Sera said loyally. “Grief sits heavier on the bones than any baby.”

“She looks like she has more grief than bones now,” Taliya muttered.

Alysanne’s fingers twitched against the Seven-Pointed Star pendant at her throat. She still wore it beneath her gown, the cool silver resting against her skin. Maegor hadn’t tried to take it again, not here, not yet. Perhaps he understood that tearing holy symbols from women in front of half the court was a bad look?

“Mother is strong,” Alysanne said, more firmly than she felt. “She’s lived through more than most men at court ever will.”

The girls nodded, but their faces told different stories. Sera’s eyes shone with sympathy. Dorthy looked away guiltily, as if thinking anything less than admiration for a queen was sacrilege. Taliya’s mouth tightened; Prudence studied her own folded hands.

Alysanne exhaled, letting them brain her hair.

Strong.

Her mother had always been strong. The woman who had carried seven babes, who had smiled for her husband even when the court whispered he was weak. The woman who had fled King’s Landing, who had returned, who had survived Tyanna, who had survived Maegor.

But yesterday… when Alysanne had sat beside her after the feast, just the two of them and the crackling fire and the twins already abed…

Her mother’s eyes looked like cooled ash. Not melted. Not broken. Just… emptied.

“Do you think she’s glad you’re here?” Sera’s question was tentative.

“Yes,” Alysanne answered at once, clinging to that certainty like a rope over a chasm. “Of course.”

She remembered the way Alyssa’s hands had clutched her sleeves when they embraced, the faint tremor in her voice.

A contradiction only a mother could live in.

Jenya stepped back from the bed, surveying Alysanne critically. “There. You look like a proper princess. Even on this cursed rock.”

Prudence snorted. “Proper princesses don’t shoot bows and ask to be squires.”

“Proper princesses would have already married Maegor if they were stupid,” Taliya shot back.

Prudence grimaced. “Do not even jape about that.”

Alysanne laughed, the sound coming easier here, away from Maegor’s looming shadow and the constant High Valyrian. Here, in this drafty room with her chatterbox lowborn girls and Prudence’s highborn flightiness, it almost felt like those rare nights in Maegor’s Holdfast when Septa Keira had fallen ill and they had all gathered in her bed to whisper stories until dawn.

“I miss Keira,” she said abruptly.

The room quieted again.

“Really?” Sera murmured. “She always glared at me when I spoke out of turn. But she knew my name, I suppose.”

“She glared at everyone,” Dorthy said, smiling at Alysanne. “But she always glared at you like she expected better.”

“That’s her way of being kind,” Alysanne said, smiling faintly. “I hope she… I hope she likes the Royal Sept. Benifer will look after her. And Prunella.”

Prudence perked up at the mention of her twin. “Prunella will be such a menace when she learns High Valyrian,” she said. “She’s already insufferable in the Common Tongue.”

“That’s assuming she can learn High Valyrian,” Taliya muttered.

“Benifer will teach her,” Alysanne said. “He’s patient. Mostly.”

“He’ll faint the first time Keira starts speaking too loud,” Jenya whispered.

They giggled again, quiet and conspiratorial. For a moment, the fortress of Dragonstone felt less like a prison and more like the Red Keep’s godswood on a sunny day.

Then a knock came, firm and measured, at the chamber door.

All conversation died.

Jenya’s eyes went wide. Sera’s hands flew from Alysanne’s hair. Prudence straightened like a soldier at inspection.

Alysanne’s hand went instinctively to the pendant at her throat.

For half a heartbeat Alysanne thought it was a maid or a guard, and then Maegor’s voice rolled through the oak, deep and unmistakable, speaking High Valyrian.

“Girl, your dragon day has begun. You have but a minute to be ready.”

Jenya went pale. Sera’s hands flew from Alysanne’s hair. Prudence’s eyes went round as saucers.

“He says he’s waiting,” Alysanne translated quickly and quietly in the Common Tongue. “I have a minute.”

That snapped them all into motion. Fingers tugged and smoothed, laces were yanked and retied. Sera thrust Alysanne’s cloak at her; Dorthy fussed with the fall of her skirts; Taliya tried to tame a stray lock at her temple.

By the time Alysanne lifted the latch and pulled the door open, her heart was thudding almost as loudly as the sea outside.

Maegor stood in the corridor, a black wall of mail and boiled leather, with two Kingsguard in white cloaks flanking him like statues. At the sight of the king, every one of Alysanne’s handmaidens dropped their gazes or looked away, shoulders hunching small.

Alysanne did not. She made herself meet his eyes.

He let his gaze travel over her and then past her, counting the girls behind with a single sweep.

“From this day onward,” he said abruptly, loud enough for the servants to hear as well, “you have new liberties. You may speak the Common Tongue with your maidservants, with your mother, and with your brother’s get. You can thank your mother.”

He didn’t bother to add specifics, but Alysanne’s stomach tightened. Because Alyssa begged him.

Behind her, there was a chorus of tiny, irrepressible noises; Sera’s gasp, Jenya’s whispered “thank the Seven”, Taliya’s choked laugh. Prudence, bolder or perhaps more foolish than the rest, bobbed a quick curtsy.

“Thank you, Your Grace,” she blurted.

Maegor did not so much as glance at her. “Enough,” he snapped, and the hall fell silent again. He jerked his chin at Alysanne. “Come. We break our fast with your mother and your nieces.”

Alysanne stepped out, pulling the door shut behind her, and fell in beside him as the Kingsguard turned and moved ahead.

They had barely gone ten paces down the cold stone corridor before he switched back to High Valyrian, his tone almost conversational.

“Remember, girl, these privileges exist because I allow it. They can be just as easily revoked if you do not do as I say.”

“I know,” Alysanne answered, keeping her voice smooth.

He went on, “Remember that this only applies to the girls and your family. In all other respects, you will speak High Valyrian. If you speak the Andal tongue with me, I will take back your privileges. If you displease me, I take them back.”

She nodded once, obediently. That tiny sign of submission seemed to satisfy him; his mouth flattened into something that might have been his version of approval, and he said no more as they walked on toward the great hall of Dragonstone.

Dragonstone’s hall was smaller than the Red Keep’s but no less imposing; carved black pillars shaped like coiling wyrms rose to support a ceiling lost in shadow. At the high table, beneath a wall of weathered banners, sat Queen Alyssa with the twins on either side of her.

Aerea clung to Alyssa’s arm, small pale fingers tight in the queen’s sleeve. Rhaella, by contrast, swung her feet impatiently, a crust of bread in her hand, eyes bouncing around the room as though measuring how far she could run before someone caught her.

Alyssa herself wore a simple dark gown, the swell of her belly faint beneath the fabric. Her hair, which once gleamed silver-gold, lay in a loose plait over one shoulder, duller now, as if grief had drained the color rather than age. Even from the far end of the hall, Alysanne could see the hollows beneath her mother’s eyes.

At the sight of Maegor, Alyssa rose: too quickly. Aerea nearly toppled from her bench and clutched at her skirts.

“Your Grace,” Alyssa said, voice steady but soft.

Alysanne noticed the way her mother’s hand slipped instinctively to her stomach as she dipped her head.

Maegor didn’t bother to acknowledge the gesture. He strode forward, Alysanne matching his pace, and took the central chair at the high table.

Alysanne took the seat to his right. Alyssa sat to his left, with Aerea clinging to her and Rhaella now staring unabashedly at Maegor, crumbs all over her chin.

“Mother,” Alysanne said, quietly, in the Common Tongue.

Alyssa’s eyes flickered to her, and for one heartbeat they lit, really lit. The change was small but powerful, the way a dying fire catches a fresh bit of kindling.

“Alysanne,” she breathed. Just her name, nothing more.

Rhaella leaned across the table without permission. “AlySANNE, you won’t believe how windy it is here. I almost fell into the sea when you arrived!”

“You nearly fell because you were trying to run away,” Alyssa corrected gently, pulling the girl back toward her side.

Maegor picked up a cup of watered wine, watching this exchange over the rim with a flat expression.

“Let go of the child,” he said. “Better that she eat than scream.”

Rhaella opened her mouth.

“Eat,” Maegor added.

Rhaella shut it again, pouting, and bit into her bread so aggressively that crumbs exploded everywhere.

Trenchers of eggs, sausages, and steaming porridge were set before them by quiet servants. Alysanne’s stomach, which had felt knotted since the knock on her door, growled in betrayal.

“Eat,” Maegor said to Alysanne in High Valyrian. “You have work to do after.”

“Thank you, Your Grace,” Alysanne replied automatically, then caught her mother’s confused look and reined herself back into the Common Tongue. “He says… we have things to do after breakfast.”

“Of course you do,” Alyssa murmured. Her hand trembled slightly as she reached for a small piece of bread.

Aerea leaned closer to Alysanne, voice barely above a whisper. “Did it… did it hurt? On Balerion?”

Her eyes were huge, pupils wide like a frightened foal’s.

Alysanne softened.

“No,” she said. “It was,” She searched for a word that would soothe Aerea without angering Maegor. “loud. And very high. But… it was also beautiful. I’ll take you to see Silverwing, when Uncle allows it.”

Maegor glanced sideways at that, but said nothing.

“Can I ride too?” Rhaella demanded, voice bright.

“No,” three voices said at once: Alyssa’s, Aerea’s, and Alysanne’s. Maegor watched the unfolding scene with a look that might have passed for mild bemusement.

Rhaella scowled.

“Well, I want to,” she insisted under her breath.

“Wanting and doing are different things,” Alyssa murmured. “Eat.”

All five of them did, and the talking largely ceased there. It seemed like Maegor was too focused on eating while everyone but Alysanne was too scared to talk now. Alysanne wanted to talk… but it felt too uncomfortable. So uncomfortable.

Alysanne watched her mother’s fingers as she broke bread, as she lifted a small slice to her lips. It was like watching someone try to move through deep water. Every action measured, delayed, slightly off. It was like she was reluctant to eat at all.

She remembered what the handmaids had said: gaunt, distant. She wondered if her mother was eating more now than she had been before they arrived or less.

“Your mother begged a concession of me,” Maegor said suddenly, in the Common Tongue.

Alysanne’s fork paused over her eggs.

Alyssa’s shoulders stiffened. Alysanne realized the king was saying this solely so she could her it.

“She asked that you be allowed to talk to her and your maidservants,” he continued. “I agreed. You should thank her… but you should remember my expectations of you.”

He turned his head, eyes hard on Alysanne.

“You are not some Andal lady to gossip idly. You are my blood. When you ride with me, when you stand before lords, when you talk to me, you will speak as a dragon does. Do you understand?”

Every eye at the table turned to Alysanne.

She saw Aerea’s small hand slip against Alyssa’s sleeve, seeking reassurance. Rhaella, for once, kept quiet. Alyssa watched her with a strange, stricken intensity.

“I understand,” Alysanne responded calmly in High Valyrian. “I will speak as you have commanded, Your Grace.” She turned to Alyssa. “Thank you, Mother.”

Maegor’s gaze held hers a moment longer. Then he grunted and tore into a sausage.

Alyssa let out a breath so soft Alysanne would have missed it if she hadn’t been listening for it.

“Thank you,” Alyssa said to Maegor, voice barely above a murmur.

He didn’t glance at her. “You all keep your end,” he said, “and I keep mine.”

Alysanne’s fingers tightened around her cup. Something greasy and unpleasant slid under her skin at that exchange, but she pressed it down.

She turned to Aerea instead.

“What have you been doing since you came to Dragonstone?” she asked, gently.

Aerea blinked, then brightened in a small, hesitant way.

“I like the garden,” she whispered. “The one with the bog. There are cranberries. And sometimes… sometimes I can hear dragons in the distance. Not Balerion. Different ones.”

“Vhagar, most likely,” Alyssa murmured, more to herself than to anyone else. “Or Vermithor. They still roost here, I’m told.”

“Have you seen them?” Rhaella asked eagerly. “The other dragons?”

“Not yet,” Alysanne replied. “Uncle said I must prove myself with Silverwing before I see the others. ‘One beast at a time,’ he said.”

Maegor snorted around a mouthful of bread. “Better than your father. He tried to pet two at once.”

The jab landed between them like a thrown knife. Alysanne flinched inwardly at the memory; those two dragons had been Quicksilver and Dreamfyre, the ones Maegor had killed on Balerion along with Aegon and Rhaena. Alyssa’s hand closed so hard around her cup that her knuckles went white.

She swallowed.

“Father was gentle,” Alysanne said, quietly but firmly. “He loved the dragons.”

“He loved being loved,” Maegor replied. “And it killed him.”

A tense silence fell.

Alysanne kept her gaze steady on her plate. She refused to give him the satisfaction of seeing her flinch again. Across the table, Aerea had curled in on herself; Rhaella glowered at Maegor, small jaw jutting.

“Finish eating,” Maegor said at last. “I want you to see your dragon.”

Alysanne’s heart skipped.

“Silverwing?” she asked, before remembering to speak in High Valyrian “I’ll see Silverwing today?”

“Yes,” he replied in Valyrian. “We go below after. She’ll know you, if she has any sense.”

Alyssa’s eyes flew to hers, wide, suddenly alive, a mix of fear and excitement.

“Today?” she breathed. “You’ll see Silverwing today?”

Alysanne smiled for real. “Yes, Mother. Today.”

“SILVERWING?” Rhaella’s voice interrupted both of them.

For the first time that morning, Alyssa looked something like the woman Alysanne remembered: the one who had laughed once, who had danced with Aenys in the Red Keep, who had held each of her children as though they were the whole world.

The moment was small and fragile, and Maegor’s shadow still lay over all of them, but it was something.

Alysanne clung to it like she would cling to Silverwing’s back.

Breakfast passed in uneasy fits and starts: Rhaella’s pointed questions, Aerea’s quiet answers, Maegor’s occasional blunt comment that smashed through conversation like a mailed fist. Alyssa barely spoke at all. More than once Alysanne saw her mother’s hand drift from her stomach just as her own hand drifted to the pendant hidden beneath her gown, fingers brushing the spot as though reassuring herself that it was still there…

Child and faith.

When the trenchers were finally cleared, Maegor rose.

“Come,” he said to Alysanne in High Valyrian. “Let us see if Silverwing remembers you.”

Alysanne stood.

“Will we come too?” Rhaella blurted.

Maegor frowned. Alyssa tensed.

“No.” One curt word, flat as a slapped hand. “The princess and I will attend the Dragonmont alone.”

Alysanne felt her mother stiffen beside her. Alyssa didn’t argue, only lowered her gaze in that hollow, resigned way that made Alysanne’s chest hurt.

Rhaella, of course, pouted at once, lip jutting. “But that’s not fair-”

“Rhaella.” It was Alysanne who cut across her, not Alyssa or Maegor. She leaned toward the girl, forcing a gentleness into her voice she did not feel. “Hush. You’ll have other chances to see the dragons. Let me go first.”

Her niece’s lilac eyes flashed with anger, but she bit down on whatever she’d meant to say. She folded her arms and glowered at her trencher instead.

The meal wound down in uneasy quiet after that. When at last they rose from the table, Alyssa gathered Rhaella and Aerea close, the twins clinging to either side of her skirts, while Alysanne fell in a step behind Maegor. Three Kingsguard peeled away from the walls to shadow Alyssa’s heels like pale ghosts. Alysanne noticed as they walked that her mother walked slightly bowlegged; perhaps it had something to do with the babe?

As they crossed the yard toward the outer steps, Alysanne’s thoughts churned. Maegor had been as he always was, cold, controlled, occasionally cutting, but her mother had seemed even more distant than in King’s Landing, as if some last fragile thread inside her had frayed thinner still. Alysanne tried to think of ways to coax a smile from her later: a walk in Aegon’s Garden, letting the twins ride on her back like ponies, reading aloud from one of the old romances she loved so much.

At the gate, Maegor gave Alyssa a brusque farewell and even bothered to incline his head to Aerea, his favored twin for reasons Alysanne still didn’t fully grasp. Then he switched to High Valyrian, the shift in language as sharp as a door slamming.

“Girl, with me.”

Alysanne murmured her own goodbyes in the Common Tongue to her mother and nieces, squeezing Aerea’s small hand once, resting her palm briefly on Rhaella’s wild curls. Then she turned and followed Maegor, away from the pale daylight and watchful eyes, toward the black mouths of the Dragonmont tunnels.

The Kingsguard did not come with them.

They walked in silence until the sound of the yard had faded behind, stone swallowing the noise. Only then did Maegor speak, his voice low and matter-of-fact in High Valyrian.

“Did you tell your mother what you did to Tyanna?”

Alysanne kept her eyes on the damp floor ahead, jaw tightening.

“No,” she said shortly. “I only told her the witch is dead.”

He made a thoughtful sound in his throat.

“Wise. That truth would chew what’s left of her mind. She’s brittle enough at the moment.”

They turned deeper into the mountain, where the air grew hotter and the torchlight showed the glimmer of old obsidian veins in the walls.

“Have you dreamt here yet? On Dragonstone.” he asked abruptly.

“No,” Alysanne answered. “Not since we came.”

He did not bother to hide his displeasure; his mouth tightened, and for a few steps his silence felt heavier than any rebuke. But he said nothing more, and they walked on together into the glow and gloom, toward Silverwing.

The air grew hotter the deeper they went, until Alysanne’s breath felt thick in her chest and sweat prickled under her dress.

The sudden sound of Maegor’s voice made Alysanne flinch.

In High Valyrian, he lectured as if they were in some strange classroom carved into the mountain’s guts. He spoke of the basic commands, sōvēs for fly, drējī for down, demās for sit, daor for no, lykirī for stay, dracarys for flame, rolling each word off his tongue with the ease of a man who had been thinking in that language since the cradle.

“Dragons will know the words.” he said, the torch in his fist throwing hard shadows over the scar at his jaw. “You will do the rest. That is what a rider, a queen, is for: control.”

He’d never called her that, queen, when others could hear.

Alysanne nodded when his voice lifted while he judged her words, murmured the words when he barked them at her, repeated the commands until her tongue felt thick and clumsy. He corrected her pronunciation sharply when she slipped, but she could tell; behind the hard tone, there was something almost like satisfaction.

He liked the sound of his own voice, certainly. But he liked something else too: being listened to. Having someone nod and look up at him and not argue, not flinch, not flee.

Maybe that’s all it takes, she thought sourly. Survive him, listen, don’t run, don’t show displeasure. Her brother Viserys had been his squire for nearly a year, but they’d always hated each other; Viserys had been too visible in his distaste for Maegor. Before he disappeared. Before…

She was still chewing on that when his words shifted, and she realized he was pressing her for something.

“How did you bind yourself and Silverwing?”

Alysanne blinked, dragged back from her thoughts.

“My sister Rhaena put the egg in my cradle from the start,” she answered in High Valyrian, slow but sure. “She left it there. It hatched. And she was my dragon from birth.”

She remembered aloud, seeing Aenys and Jaehaerys in her mind’s eye.

“Father used to bring me and Jaehaerys down to the caves to see them,” she said softly. “Silverwing and Vermithor. When they were little. I remember… their bellies were smooth, and they squeaked more than they roared. Jaehaerys was braver with Vermithor, but Silverwing always came to me first.”

Maegor made a low sound in his throat. It might have been approval. It might have been annoyance that Aenys figured so much in the memory.

“Eggs in cradles,” he muttered in High Valyrian, almost to himself. “I’d never heard of that before your brother’s brood. Visenya didn’t do it. Father didn’t either.”

He went quiet for a few steps, boots scraping the damp stone. The air stank of sulfur now, and something like hot iron.

“I took Balerion after my father died,” he said at last, voice rougher. “Mother said to be a dragonlord, you need a dragon,” Maegor told her, though she had understood most of it. “Blood is only one part. Only dragons obey dragonlords, only dragonlords can sit the Iron Throne. If I wanted to be king, I had to prove I was not afraid. So I went to him, the largest dragon in the world. Alone.”

He didn’t look at her while he spoke. The torchlight lit half his face; the other half was all shadow and memory. Alysanne swallowed.

“What did you do?” she heard herself ask.

He huffed.

“I walked to his head,” he said. “He opened his mouth. I walked closer. He breathed. I didn’t run, and commanded him. That was all.”

He snorted once.

“Sometimes that’s all it is. Dragons know their own.”

They don’t have a problem killing their own, Alysanne thought, but she didn’t say it. Balerion had no problem killing Quicksilver and Dreamfyre, had he?

They walked on a while without speaking. The tunnel sloped more steeply now, the floor slick with condensation, the rock sweating heat. Her shift clung damp to her back under her dress. Her heart had begun to beat in a slow, nervous thud that matched the echo of their steps.

“There is only you and the beast,” Maegor said suddenly. “I do, he does. You do, she does. A dragon will never betray you, never abandon you. Remember that. They will outlive all of us… they are our power.”

There was something naked in it; some confession he might not have realized he was making.

The dragon is the only one who never left, Alysanne realized. Not Visenya. Not Tyanna. Not Alys. Not Father. Not anyone else.

She was saved from having to respond by the way the passage ahead flared with reddish light.

The narrow tunnel they’d been following spilled into a broad cavern, ceiling lost in darkness. The walls glistened with bands of obsidian-veined rock, and fat chains hung like dead vines from iron rings. Hot wind blew from somewhere unseen, tasting of ash, salt, and old bones.

There, in the center of the hollow, curled upon her hoard of scorched stone and scattered skeletons of goats and cattle, lay Silverwing.

Alysanne’s breath caught.

She had last seen the she-dragon years ago. She had glimpsed her as a girl, small enough then to fit in her father’s arms, stretching stubby wings. But nothing had prepared her for the sheer size of her now up close. In the moment to Alysanne, the she-dragon looked like it was at least the size of a house. In reality though, she was probably closer in size to a very large horse.

Silverwing’s body was long and sinuous, coiled like a silver whip. Her hide gleamed in the firelit gloom, each scale a tiny sliver of polished metal. Horns curved back from her head like swept-back blades, and the ridge along her spine rose in cruel, elegant points. One vast wing lay half-unfurled, its membrane so thin Alysanne could see the torch-glow bleed through it.

“She’s…” Alysanne started, and then stopped, because every word she knew felt too small.

Silverwing’s eyes opened.

They were huge, pale, rimmed in molten gold, pupils tightening into knife-slit lines as they fixed on the two small figures by the tunnel mouth.

Alysanne felt the look like heat on her skin.

Beside her, Maegor spoke low in Valyrian.

“Go on, girl. See if she remembers your blood.”

Alysanne’s mouth had gone dry.

“What if she doesn’t?” she whispered, the High Valyrian clipped and nervous.

“Then she kills you,” Maegor said, utterly without emotion. “Or maims you so badly you wish she had. But she will remember. You are the blood of House Targaryen, even if you look like that.”

He took the torch a few paces to the side, giving Silverwing a broad berth, putting himself where he could see both dragon and girl.

“You told me how you met her,” he went on in High Valyrian. “Now show me if she thinks it matters. No more questions. Walk.”

Alysanne looked from him to the dragon and back again.

Her legs felt like something carved from the same black rock as the walls, heavy and stiff. Her heart hammered so hard she thought Silverwing must hear it.

Keira’s pendant felt cold against her throat.

Seven, watch over me, she prayed silently, and then, because that felt wrong under this mountain, she added under her breath in Valyrian, “Father, guide my feet.”

Then she stepped forward.

Heat rolled off Silverwing in tangible waves, prickling Alysanne’s skin. The stone underfoot was warm now, even through the soles of her shoes. She could hear the dragon’s slow breathing, a deep, rhythmic rumble that vibrated in her ribs.

“Silverwing,” she called softly as she came closer.

Silverwing’s head tilted, just a fraction, as if tasting the word.

“I’m here,” Alysanne whispered, slipping unconsciously back into the Common Tongue before correcting herself, returning back to High Valyrian. “It’s me. Alysanne.”

She could feel Maegor watching her, the weight of his expectation like another heat at her back.

Silverwing’s nostrils flared. She inhaled, a great, shuddering breath that drew the air itself toward her. Smoke curled from her jaws, a faint thread, lazy and unthreatening.

Alysanne stopped an arm’s length from the dragon’s muzzle.

Her hand shook as she lifted it.

Tyanna bled, she remembered suddenly, stomach lurching. Her mouth soft and wet around the dagger hilt, her eyes-

She pushed the memory away like a curtain and pressed her palm forward.

Her fingers met hot, smooth scale.

For a moment nothing happened.

Then Silverwing pushed, gently, into her touch.

Alysanne’s knees almost buckled with relief. A laugh broke out of her, thin and choked but real. She laid her other hand on the dragon’s muzzle too, splaying her fingers, feeling the texture of each plate, the living muscle shifting beneath, the thud of that colossal heart somewhere inside.

“Demās,” she whispered, Valyrian this time. Sit.

Silverwing’s eyes shut halfway, but she did not otherwise react.

Behind her, from the edge of the cavern, she heard Maegor’s low voice.

“Good,” he said. “But now we see if you can sit her without pissing yourself.”

Alysanne let her forehead rest for just an instant against the warm silver hide, a single secret heartbeat of peace.

Then she lifted her head, swallowed her fear, and turned to where Maegor was already moving closer, torchlight dancing on black mail and burned scars.

“Come on then,” she muttered in Valyrian under her breath, for herself and for the dragon both. “Let’s show him we are not sheep.”

“Demās, Silverwing,” Alysanne said, patting the dragon’s warm neck. “Demās. Sit.”

Silverwing huffed a billow of hot air and, instead of lowering herself, nudged her rider’s calf with the blunt of her muzzle, almost knocking Alysanne off her feet. A rumbling sound rolled from the dragon’s chest; too soft to be a growl, too rough to be a purr. Something playful.

“Demās,” Alysanne repeated, a little more firmly. “Sit.”

Silverwing nosed into her side like an overgrown hound, nearly bumping Alysanne into the rock wall.

“Is she witless,” Maegor drawled in High Valyrian from his rock, “or are you?”

Alysanne shot him a look over her shoulder, cheeks hot. “She isn’t witless,” she said in the same tongue. “She remembers me.”

“She remembers you smell like the cradle,” he said. “That’s not the same as obeying.”

Alysanne turned back, pressed both hands to Silverwing’s muzzle, trying to fix her voice into something firm.

“Silverwing,” she said. “Demās. Demā-S.”

The dragon’s only answer was to push forward again, rubbing her huge head against Alysanne’s shoulder hard enough to make the girl stagger. The scales were hot through her dress; her hair stuck to her damp neck.

“Try down,” Maegor suggested, dryly. “If she won’t sit, she may at least remember which way the ground is.”

Alysanne bit back a tart retort, you try giving orders to something with teeth that large, and said instead, carefully:

“Embrot. Down. Embrot.”

Silverwing flicked her eyes at the sound of her name and then, utterly ignoring the command, twisted her head to nip lightly at the trailing end of Alysanne’s braid, tugging once before letting go.

A breathless, startled laugh escaped Alysanne’s lips despite herself.

“That’s not down,” Maegor said, unimpressed. “In case you were wondering.”

“I can see that,” Alysanne muttered under her breath in the Common Tongue, then switched back. “Inkot. Back. Inkot. Back to the wall.”

Silverwing did at least begin to move this time, three loping steps that made the cavern shudder, but not in the direction Alysanne indicated. Instead she circled around, tail sweeping wide, and curled herself around the girl in a loose half-ring, resting her head once more near Alysanne’s shoulder. It felt, absurdly, like being penned in by a very affectionate rockslide.

“She’s soft,” Maegor said, tone edged. “Too soft. Your father’s brood and their toys. Dragons are weapons, not pets.”

Alysanne laid a hand on Silverwing’s eyelid, feeling the warm, delicate membrane twitch beneath her fingers. The dragon’s breath gusted over her again, smelling of smoke and blood and the sea.

“She isn’t soft,” Alysanne said quietly. “She killed to live, same as any dragon. She just… likes me.”

Maegor made a dismissive sound. “Liking you won’t help when you need her to burn a host to ash.”

He shoved himself to his feet and strode closer, circling to where he could see both girl and dragon’s head. His gaze swept over Alysanne, sweat-damp hair against her temples, flushed cheeks, the stubborn set of her mouth, then returned to Silverwing.

“At least she hasn’t torn your arms off,” he conceded. “That’s more than many would have ever managed.” The corner of his mouth twitched. “We’ll make a dragon of her yet.”

He jerked his chin toward Silverwing’s head.

“Again,” he ordered. “Keep at it. If she won’t heed your voice, maybe she’ll learn your temper. They feel what we feel. That’s why they’re ours and not the Andals.”

He went back to his rock and sat, one boot braced against a fallen chunk of basalt, elbows on his knees. From there he watched them: girl in blue, dragon in silver, heat shimmering around them like a veil.

Alysanne took a breath and set her jaw.

“Vēzot,” she tried again, firmer, “Up.”

Silverwing’s eye rolled toward her, gold ring around a black slit. The dragon let out a soft clack of teeth, but then, very slowly, her forelegs folded. She lowered her chest to the stone with a heavy thump, tail still curled, head still angled toward Alysanne.

“Demās,” Alysanne added, daring to feel hopeful. “Sit.”

Silverwing shuffled her hindquarters, settling a little more. One wing stretched, half-unfolded, then drooped in a lazy arc.

“Better,” Maegor allowed. “She’s halfway between sitting and lounging like an old woman at her fire, but I’ll accept it. For now.”

Alysanne exhaled, a little shaky, and stroked the smooth scales along Silverwing’s jaw.

“Good girl,” she whispered.

For the next half-hour, the cavern echoed with her voice.

She cycled through the commands Maegor had drilled into her on the way down. Sometimes Silverwing responded, sometimes she did not. The dragon seemed perfectly willing to follow Alysanne… if following meant ambling where she pleased so long as Alysanne stayed within the circle of her tail or under the shelter of a lowered wing.

When Alysanne called for here, Silverwing would come: eventually, after finishing whatever she was doing, like a cat deciding whether a summons was worth her time. When Alysanne said walk, Silverwing might take two ponderous steps or six delighted bounds. Stay worked only so long as Alysanne herself didn’t move more than an arm’s length away.

If she did, Silverwing followed, like a massive, molten-shadowed shadow.

“Your dragon is as stubborn as you are,” Maegor observed at one point, when Alysanne had tried and failed three times to get Silverwing to pivot on the spot instead of turning her entire body to face Alysanne each time she shifted. “She doesn’t respect you yet. She’s humoring you.”

Alysanne wiped sweat from her brow with the back of her hand, chest rising and falling. “How do I make her respect me?”

“You stop begging,” he said. “You stop cooing. Dragons don’t listen to whimpering. They listen to certainty. Want her to move? Want it. Not hope. Not ask.”

She flushed, aware he’d been hearing every waver in her voice.

“I am certain,” she protested.

“No,” Maegor said simply. “You’re pleased she remembers you. You’re relieved she hasn’t killed you. You’re afraid if you press too hard she’ll stop nuzzling you and start biting. She feels that. So she treats you like a clutchmate, not a rider.”

The words stung because they were true.

Silverwing chose that moment to butt her head gently into Alysanne’s back again, nearly shoving her off-balance. Alysanne caught herself on the dragon’s horn, breath coming out in a huff.

“Stop it,” she snapped in the Common Tongue. “You great… lout.”

Silverwing blinked and nudged her again, as if delighted by the game.

“She won’t understand that, girl,” Maegor’s flat voice reminded her in High Valyrian.

Alysanne’s temper, frayed by heat and strain and the feeling of Maegor’s eyes on her every misstep, finally snapped.

She stepped back, slapped her hand flat against the dragon’s muzzle, more a smack than a stroke, and spat, in High Valyrian, voice hard as she could make it:

“Daor!” No.

Silverwing’s head jerked back in surprise, nostrils flaring. The pupils thinned.

Alysanne’s heart hammered, but she pressed on, seizing that flicker of attention.

“Rȳbās!” she commanded, stabbing a finger at the stone. Listen. “Demās! Sit.”

For a heartbeat, everything in the cavern held its breath.

Then, with a low grumble that might have been a complaint, Silverwing folded herself down again, this time properly: forelegs tucked, hindquarters lowering, tail wrapping in close instead of curling around Alysanne.

She sat.

Alysanne didn’t dare move. Her pulse roared in her ears.

“Better,” Maegor said again after a moment, and this time there was something like approval in it. “You found a spine.”

Alysanne swallowed, still breathing hard.

Silverwing blinked once, then laid her head on her forepaws, watching Alysanne from under heavy lids.

“You’ll keep coming down here,” Maegor went on, his voice dropping back into lecture. He leaned back on his hands, staring up into the darkness of the cavern roof. “Every third day at least. Every day ideally, when Celtigar’s ready to march for the Vale. She needs to know your weight, your voice, your moods. You need to know what makes her shy and what makes her obedient.”

He shifted his gaze back to Alysanne.

“You aren’t a child with a pet,” he said bluntly. “You have Targaryen blood, and I’ll have use of you. Qarl Corbray and his Faith Militant rebels aren’t afraid of banners. They aren’t afraid of swords. They’ve been crushed and defeated, but they keep crawling back out of their holes.”

He spat on the rock.

“Fanatics. They’ll choke the Vale until we clear them. I won’t ride alone into the Eyrie’s shadow. I need another dragon beside me. When my heir is born, I want a sky already ruled by our wings. No one dares rise when fire sits on every mountain. Until House Targaryen is feared and respected again from the Wall to Dorne.”

Alysanne watched him, chest still tight, hand resting lightly now on Silverwing’s neck.

Her sibling.

She imagined a tiny creature, a seed of life rolling in her mother’s womb, not yet with a name or a face. She thought of her mother’s belly at breakfast, the proprietary way Maegor eyed it.

“My mother is tired,” she said quietly in High Valyrian. “The rest of us are tired too.”

Maegor’s jaw tightened.

“Being tired doesn’t change what’s coming,” he said. “Prophecy doesn’t care for sleep. Ice and fire moves whether we sit or stand. War is already upon us… and we must hold the Iron Throne, at any cost.”

His hand made a vague gesture, encompassing the cavern, the mountain, perhaps the whole world.

“Our task is to make sure there’s still a throne for that child to sit,” he said, voice low. “That there’s still a world for your dreams and theirs. Everything else, Faith, smallfolk, lords, bends or breaks.”

Alysanne stroked Silverwing’s neck, feeling the slow, steady breath.

“And if I don’t want that?” she asked quietly in High Valyrian. It slipped out before she could stop it.

For a moment she thought he hadn’t heard.

Maegor’s eyes fixed on her, very dark in the wavering light.

“Then you remember what happens to those who wanted something else,” he said. “Aegon and Rhaena wanted the crown. Your little brothers wanted freedom. The Faith Militant wanted our heads. Tyanna wanted… gods know what. They’re all gone. I’m still here. You’re still here.”

He let that hang in the air.

“But you’re not them,” he added, almost grudgingly. “You’re smarter than that. You’ve got dragon’s blood and a dragon of your own. Learn to use both, and you’ll live long enough to see this realm be great, even better than under the Conqueror.”

Alysanne said nothing.

She turned back to Silverwing, who had inched her head forward again, just enough that the tip of her muzzle rested against Alysanne’s thigh. It was the lightest of touches, careful, almost questioning.

Alysanne laid her palm there, fingers spread.

“Demās,” she murmured, softer now. “Stay.”

Silverwing stayed.

From his rock, Maegor watched girl and dragon with a narrowed gaze, some knot of calculation and hunger and something like hope in his eyes. Alysanne could see it.

“Enough for today, girl.” he said at last, pushing to his feet. “Let her sleep. We’ll come again. Often.”

Alysanne hesitated, then gave Silverwing one last stroke along the jaw.

“Goodnight, my dragon,” she whispered.

Silverwing’s lids slid shut, breath deepening.

As they left the cavern, climbing back up into the cooler, narrower tunnels, Alysanne’s hands still smelled of smoke and warm metal. Her dress clung damp to her back, her legs ached, and her throat was sore from repeating Valyrian commands.

But under the exhaustion and the nerves and the coil of dread that always lived in her belly now, there was a small, fierce ember of something else.

Silverwing had remembered her.

Silverwing had listened.

Not perfectly, not yet. But enough.

As Maegor strode ahead, talking of burning the Faith Militant and a future conquest of Dorne and the child in her mother’s womb, Alysanne walked behind him thinking not only of what he wanted her dragon to destroy, but of what she herself might one day be able to protect. Not Maegor’s throne… but herself, her family.

Her mind thought of many things. She needed to send letters back to King’s Landing, back to Keira and Prudence. She needed to visit the twins, see how their education was coming along and if they could read yet. She needed to find something to cheer up her mother, anything to make her smile again. She needed to ask her lowborn handmaidens about the local smallfolk; she wanted to know more about them if she could. She needed to start writing down dreams, anything to further curry favor with Maegor, to win his trust.

Most of all though, Alysanne wanted to learn how to truly speak to her dragon, how to ride Silverwing like her sister Rhaena had ridden Dreamfyre or how Maegor rode Balerion. That was the only way she could protect her family… and perhaps her only chance to kill Maegor one day.

Chapter 42: MELONY IV

Visenya’s Hill had a bad temper that day. The air felt tight, the way it did before a storm, and every mouth Melony passed seemed full of curses: at the new levies, at a war that refused to die, at the king brooding on his black beast instead of giving them peace. In the midst of it all, Mia of Stoney Sept lingered at a gaudy little market stall, pretending to study bottles of cheap scent and colored powders as she had every day this past week. On the Street of Silk, a serving girl eyeing perfume made perfect sense; for Melony, it was simply the best excuse to loiter where she needed to be, loiter and watch for Lord Edwell Celtigar’s habitual walk from the brothel door down toward the hill.

She forced herself to pick up one of the glass vials, turning it between her fingers as if the cloudy pink liquid held all her interest.

The merchant, a heavyset woman with her bodice laced so tight her breasts nearly spilled onto the counter, tilted her head. “That one’s from Lys,” she lied cheerfully. “Makes men stupid as calves.”

“They don’t need perfume for that,” Melony muttered, but Mia would never say such a thing. So she bit her tongue and managed a weak smile instead.

“Are you buying, girl?” the woman pressed. “Or just smelling what you can’t afford?”

Melony reached for her coin pouch, more to quiet suspicion than out of any real wish for the stuff, when the brothel door at the corner creaked open. The sound slid along her spine like a knife.

She stole a glance without turning her head.

There he was.

Edwell Celtigar stepped out into the street, squinting briefly at the daylight. He looked as he always did: beard neatly trimmed, hair going to salt at the temples, cloak good but not ostentatious, red and white of his house dulled by city dust. He said something over his shoulder to the madam, who laughed too loudly, then adjusted his cloak and started down toward the lower streets.

Three guards moved with him, the same ones as always. Old Man Limp-Knee, Tall Boy with the wandering hand, Short Barrel with the bad temper. She knew them now the way she’d once known her brothers’ sparring partners: how they shifted their weight, where their eyes went, where their blind spots lay.

Not enough. Not yet.

“Here,” she said abruptly to the merchant, slapping down two coppers for the perfume, barely hearing the woman’s delighted thanks. She shoved the bottle into her satchel and melted into the crowd as if she were being carried along by it.

She followed.

Far enough back that the guards would see only a girl in drab wool, close enough that she could always pick out Celtigar’s cloak between heads and baskets and whores’ painted faces.

Her initial plan to pose as a whore had not even lasted a day before Melony went back on it. As much as she wanted to kill Maegor, to harm him and his cronies, she could not give up her last shreds of dignity to some lowborn wretch. So, instead, she stalked the Hand and conspired in the shadows.

The Hand did not linger on the Street of Silk, this time. No lingering glances at the doorways, no pause at the dice-game corner; he moved through the press like a man who had somewhere else to be.

The orphanage, she thought, teeth worrying the inside of her cheek. You sneak down here to play father and savior, and all the while you make Maegor’s work easier. How much better would it be for the world if you choked on your own kindness?

He turned off the silk road sooner than before, cutting down toward that crooked-lane slum where the little sept-house crouched with its flaking star over the door.

The children were waiting again. They always seemed to know when he would come. They swarmed him with squeals and questions, tiny hands tugging at his cloak.

Melony watched from her usual corner by the broken crates, feeling her jaw tighten as he laughed, as he bent down, as he scooped up one of the littlest. The boy clung to his neck like ivy. A mean-looking little guy eyed him with suspicion.

The septa came, apron smeared, eyes bright with gratitude and worry both. Celtigar handed over his little purse, made some gentle jape that had the woman smiling through what looked very much like shame.

Then they went inside, and the door shut, and Melony was left with the guards and the waiting.

She could walk away now. She could chalk this up as information gained: the Hand walks alone into a house full of children at this hour, with only three guards outside; perhaps there is a way to kill him while he was in there: set fire, poison the suppers, blades in the dark… She turned those options over and found each one wanting.

Fire might take the children first.

Poison would empty that little house of every small body along with the Hand’s.

Knives slipped past the guards into Celtigar’s throat might lead to a massacre.

She was not soft. She had seen men die, women die, children too, on Harroway lands and in Rhaena’s wake. But she could not make herself imagine walking through those doors with death in her hands and not feeling Rhaena’s eyes on her. Is this what you will burn for? the princess would have asked, brows drawing together, mouth twisting in that way she had when something offended her sense of rightness.

Rhaena had loved children. She’d gone off to fight Maegor to protect her infants, to protect her siblings. Maegor had taken all that from her.

Melony wanted his blood more than she wanted breath, but she could not quite make herself offer up this little knot of foundlings as kindling.

“Seven damn you for making this hard,” she whispered at the closed door, meaning Celtigar, meaning Maegor, meaning the gods themselves.

She waited anyway. Ten minutes. Twenty. Long enough for her feet to begin to ache and for Old Man Limp-Knee to shift his weight and swear under his breath.

At last the door opened, and the Hand emerged. No child in his arms this time, though one girl followed him to the threshold, lifting a hand as if she might reach for him again before thinking better of it.

Edwell ruffled her hair and said something too low for Melony to catch. Then he turned up the lane, and his guards fell in beside him, and the little sept-house swallowed the girl once more.

Melony let them go ahead, counting heartbeats. When she judged it safe, she stepped out and turned the other direction, away from the hill, away from the Red Keep.

Her steps carried her down, toward the smell of the river.

She did not have a plan yet. That realization scraped at her nerves like sand under the skin. Melony Piper of Pinkmaiden had never been a schemer, never been a planner. Now she was deep in enemy territory, with no clear path to the king and no clean strike at his Hand that didn’t cut through innocents.

There were other pieces on the board, though.

The Faith. The smallfolk. The lords.

She had no patience for septons, her moons fighting the Faith Militant in the Riverlands with Ser Edwyn had only deepened her contempt, but she could not deny that the Seven’s servants still had power in this city, even after Maegor’s butchery. She thought of the Begging Brothers in their rags, of Septon Tobas droning at court, of whispers that some in the Royal Sept still half-sympathized with the Faith Militant.

She doubted any would help her kill anyone. The Faith Militant had been cleared out of this city years ago.

She walked until the lanes widened, until the river stink became a physical thing pressing at her nose. Barges bumping at the quays of the Blackwater, men shouting, gulls screaming overhead. She sat on a stone bollard, pulled the little perfume bottle from her bag, and uncorked it.

The scent was too sweet, cloying, like crushed flowers left too long in the sun. She dabbed it at her wrists anyway.

Mia ought to smell like the Street of Silk. Mia flirted with guards. Mia giggled.

Melony Piper planned murders. Melony Piper yearned for a dead woman. Melony Piper preferred being alone, being quiet.

She recorked the bottle and stared out at the grey water.

Her self-hatred bubbled up again; she was a broken failure of a woman. She had never told Rhaena her feelings, she had been chasing Maegor for years without luck… and now her plan was to kill another man? Why couldn’t she find some other obsession, some other way to be happy? Why didn’t she just go back to Pinkmaiden and marry a lord like her mother had wanted her to? It was all so pathetic.

Melony laughed under her breath, a small, sharp sound that startled a passing boy.

“Sorry,” she muttered, tucking the perfume away and sliding off the bollard. “Didn’t mean to scare you.”

The boy ran off anyway.

Melony turned towards Aegon’s High Hill then back to Visenya’s Hill. She should return to the Red Keep before the hour of the eel; that was when servants were supposed to go back.

Visenya’s Hill drew her eyes, its slope crowded with crooked roofs and winding lanes, the kind of place where secrets pooled like stagnant water. The orphanage. Lord Celtigar’s orphanage. The thought settled with a click, neat and inevitable. If she was not yet ready to strike him, then she would map his destination: his habits, his soft spots, the only place where his guard dropped because he believed himself virtuous.

Melony slid off the bollard and melted back into the flow of the streets. Dusk bled into evening; fishmongers shouted their last prices, tanners packed away hides, the bells tolled the hour that warned servants back toward their posts. She kept to the margins, hood low, pace unremarkable. “Mia of Stoney Sept” belonged here. Melony Piper did not.

By the time she reached the orphanage, the light had thinned to a gray smear. The door answered her knock with a long pause and the scrape of a bolt. The woman who greeted her wore a septa’s habit rubbed soft by years of washing. Her face was a map of old hurts: nose bent left, teeth crooked, eyes sharp and kind all at once.

Melony lowered her gaze, folded herself smaller. She offered the practiced lies smoothly.

“I’m Mia, from Stoney Sept originally. Work in the Red Keep. I’d like to look at the children. None of my own, no husband since no one wants a body that can’t quicken. I’d like to adopt a child one day… maybe.”

Each word was measured, calibrated to invite pity without suspicion.

The septa’s expression gentled. “Come in,” she said, and the door opened.

Inside, Melony counted steps, doorways, sightlines. She noted the stair that climbed to the upper rooms, the narrow passage that led toward the kitchen, the back door with its simple latch. Children moved like birds, quick, curious, wary, half-seen, half-ignored as Melony let the septa talk. The woman spoke of bread shortages, of fevers that came and went, of alms that never quite stretched far enough. Melony listened with half an ear, her other attention skimming the walls, the windows, the places a man like Celtigar might pause to smile, to kneel, to be seen doing good.

It was the septa’s voice that finally snagged her. Too precise. Too educated. Not the lilting Common of Flea Bottom.

Melony looked to the septa, a curious look in her eye.

“What should I call you?”

“Celia,” the woman said, then hesitated, color touching her cheeks. “Celia Lychester. Once.”

The admission landed heavier than it should have. A noblewoman, stripped of silk and certainty, tending foundlings in the city’s belly. Melony felt a prickle of something she did not like: recognition, perhaps. They were both noblewomen hiding among the lowborn.

Melony kept her tone light, the careful lilting humility that came easy after years of wearing Mia’s skin. “We’re both from the Trident then, septa. A long way from home for both of us.” She watched Celia’s reaction closely, testing whether the woman’s smile would falter at the reminder of roots.

“It’s true,” the septa said. Her voice had that even calm of someone who had practiced serenity until it stuck. “I was born to Castle Lychester. It feels like another life now.”

Melony tilted her head, feigning wonder. “A lady turned to the Mother’s work? You must’ve had suitors lined up from here to Harrenhal. Why the sept, if I may ask?”

“I had no calling for silk or sons,” Celia replied, moving past a group of small children playing with sticks on the floor. “I liked quiet. I liked study. I liked the thought that the gods might love us all the same, noble or low. When I took vows, my kin called me mad.”

“Were wrong?” Melony asked, too sharp.

Celia only smiled faintly, the kind of smile that forgives sharpness without bothering to notice it. “Madness depends on what one values. I’ve never regretted it. The children… they need hands that care, not bloodlines.”

She spoke like a woman who’d sanded the edges off her pain until it fit neatly inside her piety. Melony found herself gripping the hem of her skirt, knuckles whitening beneath the guise of meekness.

Celia continued softly, “I do miss my family sometimes. My brothers. My father. But they’re with the Father Above now. Queen Visenya saw to that when she burned our castle. My nephew writes, when he remembers. I pray he rules more wisely than his forebears.”

That name, Visenya, made Melony’s blood hum in her ears. “And you don’t fear living here? In the city ruled by her son?” she pressed, lowering her voice. “By Maegor?”

Celia looked at her with that same impossible calm, eyes soft but steady. “What would fear change? The dead don’t return if I curse their killers. The living need me more. Forgiveness is harder, but it keeps the heart from rotting.”

Melony nearly laughed, nearly shouted. Forgiveness. The word scraped her insides raw. Forgiveness was surrender. Forgiveness was forgetting Rhaena’s scream, her brothers’ bodies, the stench of burnt flesh from Pinkmaiden’s fields.

“Truly pious,” she managed through a smile that hurt her cheeks. “The Mother must love you dearly, septa.”

Celia inclined her head, accepting the false praise as genuine.

Children had gathered around them while they spoke; dozen little faces streaked with dirt, curious eyes peering up. One small boy held something behind his back, whispering to the girl beside him. Melony didn’t notice until thwack: something wet and stinking hit her cheek. A second followed, splattering her shoulder.

The children burst into shrieks of laughter as two culprits bolted behind a pillar: a ragged boy and a young robust girl with brown hair.

“Oh, Seven save me,” Celia sighed, pressing a hand to her temple. “Jack! Brie! You mind your manners or you’ll be scrubbing pots for a week!”

The children vanished around the corner, their giggles echoing down the hall. Melony wiped the pulp from her face, jaw tight, forcing her breathing calm. She’d survived battlefields and fire. She would survive rotten fruit.

“I’m so sorry,” Celia murmured, dabbing her sleeve against Melony’s chin like a mother fussing over a child. “Those two are hopeless. The worst of them, though their hearts are good.”

“I’m sure they are,” Melony said, her voice brittle. She smiled again, because Mia would smile, and because it would be too strange not to.

Her gaze flicked toward the doorway where the stocky girl had disappeared, a streak of dirty black cloth fluttering after her. “Brie,” Melony repeated quietly. “She’s a little big, isn’t she?”

Celia didn’t answer that, only turned the conversation back to the gods and gratitude and how the city’s light was dimming.

Melony followed her out into the street soon after, the stench of the harbor replacing the stale air of the orphanage. Her face still smelled faintly of rot and sweetness.

Forgiveness.

She almost spat on the cobblestones.

Celia could keep her piety. Melony’s gods were vengeance and memory, and neither of them ever forgave.

Chapter 43: MAEGOR VIII

In the belly of the Dragonmont, where the air was warm as breath and tasted faintly of ash and old stone, King Maegor Targaryen sat with his back against a jagged spur of rock and watched his niece make a spectacle of herself.

Alysanne stood in the torch-glow like a child trying to scold a storm into behaving. She barked commands in High Valyrian, careful syllables, too neat, too courtly, and Silverwing answered with insolence so gentle it bordered on affection. The she-dragon listened when she pleased, ignored when it amused her, and when Alysanne grew stern, Silverwing simply lowered her silvered head and nudged her like a spoiled hound begging for another scratch. No snapping jaws. No hiss of threat. Only that maddening playfulness, as if the dragon thought all of this, Maegor’s rules, Maegor’s war, Alysanne’s seriousness, was a game meant to fill the hours.

His mouth still twitched now and then, betraying him, whenever Silverwing made Alysanne stumble with a too-soft shove or pinned her with those bright, knowing eyes as if daring her to try again.

Maegor almost felt like it was a waste of time.

Yet he stayed seated, gauntlets resting on his thighs, eyes fixed on the girl and the dragon as if watching a house being built: slowly, clumsily, but with promise once it finally stood.

Alysanne tried again.

“Dohaeras,” she commanded, jaw set.

Silverwing blinked, one slow, languid blink, then swung her head down and pressed her snout into Alysanne’s chest hard enough to make the girl grunt and stumble back two steps. The dragon followed, crowding her with affectionate weight. Alysanne’s braid whipped across her shoulder; her hand shot out on instinct to steady herself against warm scale.

“Stop leaning on me,” Alysanne hissed, half laugh, half outrage.

Silverwing exhaled through her nostrils in a gust that ruffled Alysanne’s hair, and the sound, gods help him, was close enough to a pleased rumble that it made Maegor’s mouth twitch again.

He hated that twitch. Hated what it suggested. Riders were masters, not playmates.

He rose.

The scrape of his boot on stone carried in the cavern, and both dragon and girl stilled. Not in fear, Silverwing did not fear him, but in attention, the way a hall quieted when a king stood.

Alysanne straightened as if she’d been struck with a rod. Her eyes flicked to him, searching his face for judgment, then snapped back to Silverwing with a forced seriousness.

Maegor paced closer, slow and deliberate, until he stood just outside the reach of Silverwing’s snout. He kept his hands still at his sides. He did not touch the dragon. He did not need to; his presence was a kind of contact all its own.

“She is testing you,” he said in High Valyrian, voice flat.

Alysanne’s cheeks flushed. “She’s being difficult.”

“She’s being a dragon.” Maegor’s gaze slid over Silverwing, over the sleek, bright curve of her neck, the powerful hinge of wing folded like a blade. “She is asking a question you refuse to answer.”

Alysanne frowned. “What question?”

Maegor leaned forward slightly, just enough that the torchlight caught the hard planes of his face. “Do you mean it?”

Alysanne’s lips parted, then pressed together. For a moment she looked very young; young enough that it stung him, unexpectedly, like cold water on scar tissue. Then stubbornness returned, iron in a small frame.

“I do,” she said.

“Then speak like you do.”

Alysanne drew in a breath. Her hand slid from Silverwing’s chest to the thick line of her throat, not petting now, but anchoring herself. She planted her feet wider, as if bracing for a wave.

“Dohaeras,” she said again, and this time there was less pretty pronunciation and more will behind it.

Silverwing’s eyes narrowed. The dragon’s head tilted, considering. Alysanne did not look away.

Maegor watched the moment hang, watched his niece hold her ground, watched the dragon decide whether this was still a game.

Silverwing lowered herself halfway, forelegs bending… then stopped, as if to say almost, and bumped Alysanne again with a gentler nudge, testing whether the girl would laugh and let it all dissolve into giggles.

Alysanne’s mouth twitched. She nearly gave in.

Maegor felt the urge to bark at her, to strike the softness out of her the way he struck softness out of men. The impulse rose quick and familiar. He strangled it.

Celtigar’s voice, unwanted, irritatingly sensible, echoed in his mind: Words, not blows. She is not a boy.

Maegor stepped closer to Alysanne’s side, looming in her peripheral vision like a tower, and spoke low enough that only she could hear.

“Do not smile,” he said. “She wants your smile. It tells her you’ve surrendered.”

Alysanne’s jaw tightened. The twitch vanished.

She pressed her palm more firmly against Silverwing’s throat and spoke again: shorter, sharper.

“Demās.” Sit.

For a heartbeat, Silverwing held still.

Then, with a long, dramatic sigh that would have sounded ridiculous coming from any creature smaller than a ship, the dragon folded down fully, settling her weight to the stone. Dust puffed out around her claws. The cavern seemed to breathe with it.

Alysanne froze, as if she didn’t trust success not to evaporate. Then her eyes widened with a fierce, bright triumph that she tried to hide and failed.

Maegor let her have one second of it.

“One,” he said, and Alysanne blinked at him.

“What?”

“One second to feel pleased,” Maegor answered. “Then you do it again.”

Alysanne swallowed her grin like medicine and nodded. “Yes, Uncle.”

The word Uncle still struck oddly, not because it was wrong, but because it was… real. Not Your Grace, not King. Something smaller. Something that implied a family still existed between her.

Maegor turned his eyes back to Silverwing. “You hear her,” he said, voice carrying. “Good. Now prove you will hear her again.” The she-dragon didn’t look at him, her eyes still on Alysanne.

Alysanne lifted her chin and gave the next command, rise, turn, still, simple things, but each one a stone laid in a road that led to the sky.

Silverwing obeyed three out of five times.

When she disobeyed, she did it with maddening sweetness: a nuzzle, a rumbling croon, a playful shove of her head that would have flattened a horse. Each time, Alysanne’s knees bent, her body absorbing the force, and each time she recovered faster. Less indignation. Less laughter. More control.

Maegor watched, and in the watching he found himself thinking of Visenya.

Visenya had never begged a creature to obey. She had expected it, and they all had: him, Father, Vhagar.

Alysanne did not move like that.

Not yet.

But he saw the seed of it in her stubborn refusal to yield, to simply give up. In the way she corrected her own posture the moment he frowned. In the way she fought her own softness with the same intensity she fought Silverwing’s.

Alysanne glanced back once, quick as a thief, checking whether he was watching.

He was.

Their eyes met.

Maegor did not smile. He gave her the smallest nod: acknowledgment, not affection, a coin tossed to a beggar that still changed the beggar’s day.

Alysanne turned back to Silverwing with renewed focus.

Good.

He could work with that.

He moved to sit again, but not as far away as before. Closer now, part of the circle of this training, a silent weight in the cavern that reminded both girl and dragon that play had limits. He listened to Alysanne’s High Valyrian, and when she slipped into an Andal rhythm, rounded vowels, softened consonants, he corrected her with a single word. Alysanne repeated it until it was sharp again. Unlike himself and Aenys, Alysanne and her siblings had been raised with the Common Tongue, and that frustrated Maegor to no end. He made a note to himself that his heir’s first words would be High Valyrian.

Minutes passed. The torchlight shifted. Somewhere deeper in the mountain, another dragon stirred, claws scraping faintly in sleep.

At last Alysanne’s shoulders sagged, just a fraction. Not defeat; fatigue. Silverwing’s playfulness dulled into a calmer attention, the dragon’s head lowering near Alysanne’s shoulder as if to rest.

Maegor stood.

“We end here,” he said.

Alysanne looked startled. “But-”

“We end while you are both still willing,” Maegor cut in, and his tone left no room for argument. “If you push until you are frustrated, you teach her frustration. If you push until she is bored, you teach her boredom. You will come back tomorrow, and she will remember today as… tolerable.”

Alysanne’s mouth tightened. She wanted to argue anyway. He could see it.

Instead she bowed her head slightly. “Yes.”

He watched her turn back to Silverwing and, carefully, deliberately, press her forehead to the dragon’s warm cheek.

Not a hug. Not clinging. A simple, intimate touch.

Silverwing’s eyes closed, and the dragon made a soft sound in her throat that would have made a fool of Maegor if Balerion ever made it.

Alysanne whispered something too quiet for Maegor to fully catch: High Valyrian, but gentle.

Then she stepped back.

Maegor gestured toward the tunnel mouth. “Come.”

As they began the walk out, the heat of the Dragonmont fell behind them like a door closing. The air grew cooler, damper. Alysanne’s steps echoed softly beside his heavier tread.

For a while he said nothing, letting her sit in the residue of the lesson.

Then, without looking at her, Maegor spoke. “You did not give up.”

Alysanne’s eyes lifted to him. “I wanted to.”

“But you didn’t.” Maegor’s voice was blunt, almost grudging. “Remember that feeling. You will need it when men try to move you with swords or smiles.”

Alysanne stiffened, understanding flickering behind her eyes. “Is that what you’re doing?” she asked, brave enough to risk it.

Maegor’s gaze slid to her: heavy, dispassionate. “I am not a man who smiles.”

Alysanne’s lips pressed together. “I know, Uncle.”

They walked on.

Somewhere behind them, deep in the Dragonmont, Silverwing’s low, pleased rumble followed like a promise: soft as affection, sharp as a weapon waiting to be lifted.

As they trudged through the Dragonmont’s throat, stone sweating salt, torchlight stuttering on wet basalt, Maegor found his mind circling the same irritation like a vulture that refused to land. Silverwing did not act like a proper dragon.

Half the commands slid off her as if Alysanne’s words were rain on slate. Not defiance, not refusal, something worse in Maegor’s eyes: indulgence. The young she-dragon listened only when it pleased her, and when it didn’t, she simply… pressed her skull into the girl’s chest, nudged her with that ridiculous gentleness, rumbled like a complacent cat. No snapping. No warning hiss. No hard lesson. Only warmth and play.

It made Maegor’s teeth itch.

Because Balerion was nothing like that. Balerion did not play. Balerion did not nuzzle. Balerion did not offer softness. Balerion answered because Maegor spoke, because Maegor was the command. One mind, one will: clean, brutal, simple. There was no affection in it, no need for it, no room for it. A tool did not require love. A weapon did not wag its tail. The Black Dread had never once tried to charm him into patience. He should just give Alysanne a dragon whip and force her to make her dragon obey.

And yet… watching Alysanne with Silverwing had scraped at something in Maegor’s head. It felt wrong. Weak. Dangerous. He had been patient with her, far more patient than he would normally be.

The thought lingered longer than Maegor expected, trailing him through the tunnel like the echo of a struck bell. He watched Alysanne from the corner of his eye as they walked, the torchlight catching in her blonde hair, her shoulders squared in that quiet, deliberate way she had when she was thinking. She did not chatter now. She did not fidget. She absorbed: words, lessons, silences. That, at least, pleased him.

He told himself it wasn’t affection. Alysanne alive was useful. Alysanne loyal was necessary. Alysanne on Silverwing was another blade in his hand, another wall between his blood and the knives of the realm. That was all it was.

And yet.

He remembered Aegon on Quicksilver: the biggest threat to his rule before he’d been blasted out of the sky. Remembered his squire Viserys: flinching, sulking, defiant in the wrong ways. Remembered Jaehaerys’s teary accusing eyes, too sharp for a boy so young. Remembered Rhaena’s open challenge, her refusal to bend, her dragonfire pride that had dared him to break her. All of them had forced his hand. All of them had tested him.

Alysanne did not test him that way.

She yielded when it mattered. She questioned without sneering. She listened even when she disagreed, and when she pushed back, it was clumsy and honest rather than calculating. There was no hunger for a crown in her, no coiled ambition pretending to be innocence. Only duty, fear, and something stubbornly hopeful that irritated him more than outright rebellion ever had.

As they walked, a thought intruded on Maegor unbidden, unwelcome, and stubborn: Alysanne truly was not like the others. Not like the boys, Aegon, Viserys, Jaehaerys, nor like Rhaena with her womanly defiance. Somewhere along the way, against his own expectations and instincts, he had grown… attached. A guarded fondness, the sort a man might feel for a child taken in after too much blood had already been spilled.

It unsettled him, that fondness. He rolled it around in his skull like a loose tooth, testing it, half-wanting to tear it out. And yet… Alysanne walked at his side now without shrinking, without posturing. She listened. She absorbed. She endured. That, more than obedience, earned something like respect.

Visenya would have approved of that part at least. The girl had her sharpness: quiet, contained, pointed inward instead of flung at the world. Not the blazing arrogance of his father Aegon, not the soft-handed hope of his brother Aenys. Something else. Steel wrapped in softness. It irritated him, her piety, the way she still clung to the Seven as if gods had ever saved anyone worth remembering. Visenya would have scoffed. Tyanna would have mocked it. Alys and Ceryse, curse them, would have approved. Maegor himself wanted to burn it out of her some days, make her cease her prayers and throw away that silly pendant around her neck.

Yet he hadn’t.

A dragonrider needed conviction; break her too completely and she’d shatter, refuse Silverwing, refuse him. Better to bend than to break. Better to shape than to crush. He had learned that lesson late, learned it with corpses piled too high to ignore. The boys had never bent; they’d been broken. They’d only resisted, sulked, defied. Rhaena had looked at him like he was the enemy from the start. Alysanne was… different.

He found his thoughts circling back to the way she spoke to Silverwing: firm, coaxing, familiar. No fear there. No command either, not truly. It wasn’t domination. It was… conversation. The dragon answered not because it must, but because it chose to. A dragon shouldn’t care for that sort of thing.

Yet Silverwing hadn’t killed Alysanne. Hadn’t burned her. Hadn’t snapped her spine between its jaws. Even if she didn’t always obey, the she-dragon clearly listened. That counted for something, whether he liked it or not.

His thoughts drifted, unbidden, to Alyssa. To the swell of her belly, to the steady rhythm of her breath at night, her warm presence underneath him in bed. That, too, grounded him in a way he refused to name. A child coming. An heir. Proof that his line would not end in ash and accusation. With the thought of Alyssa warm beside him and Alysanne walking ahead into the dark of the Dragonmont, something almost like order emerged from the noise in his skull.

Family. The word scraped against him, ill-fitting, half-forgotten. Family had always felt like a battlefield to him, even before he’d become king. Brother against brother, son against mother, uncle against nephew, him against gods. But this, this strange configuration of dragon, girl, unborn child, felt different. Smaller. Contained.

Dangerous, perhaps, because of that.

He watched Alysanne’s back as they walked, the steady set of her shoulders, the way she did not look back in fear or for reassurance. Maybe this could work. Maybe he could make it work. Not for love, never that, but for their house, for survival, for the song his mother had whispered to him in dark nights.

Maybe, he told himself, this time he would not ruin all that he touched.

Chapter 44: ALYSANNE IX

The village did not welcome her the way she might have hoped.

Here the air was brine and old blood and smoke that never quite turned sweet: fish laid out on rough boards, nets drying like limp skin, tar bubbling in black cauldrons beside boats with ribs showing through cracked paint. Gull cries knifed the wind. Every doorway seemed to hold a face that vanished the moment the princess looked directly at it. Many of the smallfolk here were blonde, like her, some of their hair even the same pale color of Alyssa and her... siblings. Perhaps that should have meant something; it did not appear they held any kinship with her though.

Alysanne Targaryen kept her chin up anyway. She could barely hide her excitement; she would finally be able to talk to the smallfolk of Dragonstone! Alysanne loved her handmaidens, but she wanted to talk to more commoners, to see more commoners, to go more places. The last time she’d done something like this was when she and her brothers tried to escape through King’s Landing- Alysanne suppressed that thought. She was in the here and now, not back then. This was something new, something exciting!

The three Kingsguard in white cloaks made a moving wall behind them, their armor too clean for these muddy lanes, their hands never far from swordhilts. The smallfolk watched the knights more than they watched her; it wasn’t curiosity in their eyes so much as the wary calculation of animals deciding which direction to run. Her handmaidens clustered around her, as if going too far away might be dangerous. Perhaps it would be.

Alysanne tried not to look too enthusiastic; she knew it must seem strange to them, especially Prudence. The Celtigar looked like she was about to vomit.

“I came here a few days ago, Alysanne. They don’t like strangers,” Dorthy murmured, almost apologetic as she stepped around a puddle that was more scales than water. “They especially don’t like… you all.”

Prudence pulled her cloak closer, nose wrinkled hard. “They smell like they live in a bucket.”

Jenya snorted at the highborn lady’s comment, but kept her gaze lowered. Taliya hovered close to Alysanne’s elbow as if the village itself might reach out and grab her. Sera looked pale and quiet; even though she was also a commoner, this place was still unfamiliar.

Alysanne slowed, letting the group bunch up beside a fish stall where a man in a stained apron hacked at a silver-skinned catch with a knife too dull for clean work. He didn’t bow. He didn’t even pretend to.

Alysanne forced a smile anyway. “Good day,” she said, and the Common Tongue almost tasting strange in her mouth after so much High Valyrian training. “How fares the catch?”

The lowborn man’s eyes flicked to the Kingsguard, then back to her face. “Fares,” he said. One hard word. Nothing else.

Alysanne nodded as if it were a real conversation. “Do you sell to the castle?”

A wet laugh came from somewhere behind the stall, a fishwife with arms like rope and hair pinned up under a scarf. “Castle takes what it wants,” she called. “Always has.”

The nearest Kingsguard shifted, just a half-step, just enough to remind everyone what a wrong tone could cost. The fishwife shut her mouth, but she didn’t look cowed; she looked like someone who had already lost things fear couldn’t bring back.

Alysanne lifted a hand slightly, palm down, the way Maegor did. The Kingsguard stayed still.

She looked at the fishwife instead of the knights. “I’m not here to take,” she said. “I’m here to learn.”

That earned her a different kind of stare, confused, almost offended.

“Learn what?” the fisherman muttered. “How we stink?”

Prudence made a small sound of outrage; Dorthy shot her a warning look.

Alysanne ignored them. “How you live,” she said. “What you need. What you fear. How we can help.”

The fisherman barked a laugh this time, sharp as a snapped line. “We?” He jerked his chin upward, toward the mountain and the castle that sat like a black fist on its back. “You all live up there and ride your dragons. We live down here and pay our taxes. The only help we need is you lot staying far away.”

Alysanne bit her lip; this wasn’t working. She turned back to the fishwife.

“What do you call this place?” Alysanne asked, gentle, as if she were asking the name of a garden and not stepping onto someone else’s life.

The fishwife hesitated, then dipped her head in the smallest bow that was still a bow. “Dragonstone,” she said. Just that: flat and practical.

Alysanne blinked. “The village,” she pressed. “Does it have another name?”

The woman’s mouth tightened, and her gaze flicked past Alysanne to the white cloaks and steel. “We’re the village under the castle,” she answered at last, voice careful. “The Dragonstone village, if you need words for it. Same as the island. Same as the rock. We’re… part of it.” An afterthought, bitter as brine.

Alysanne nodded at the fishwife’s bluntness as if it were a courtesy, then let her gaze travel over the faces gathering in cautious little knots along the lane: hard eyes, wet hands, old scars, children half-hidden behind skirts.

“If you have troubles,” she said, keeping her voice steady, “tell me. I can bring them to the king.”

The words were simple. The effect was not.

A ripple moved through them; fear first, like a cold draft under a door. A few people turned away instantly, muttering, as if speaking ill-luck aloud might summon dragonfire. Others lingered, measuring her, deciding whether she was a trap wrapped in blue cloth. Alysanne held still and let the silence stretch. She’d learned that from Maegor, of all people: sometimes the world confessed when you simply refused to fill the air.

At last an old fisherman stepped forward, cap in hand. His beard was the color of seafoam, his fingers split and swollen from years of rope.

“Taxes,” he said, low. “We pay. We pay, and we pay, and still the castle takes fish besides.”

Alysanne’s jaw tightened. “How much?”

He shrugged like someone who had given up on numbers meaning anything. “Enough that my boy went to Massey’s Point to cut wood; hasn’t come back yet. Said he’d rather cut wood there than have his catch taken.”

Her handmaiden Sera, hovering close, fumbled the little notebook out of her sleeve. She held it open, charcoal poised. Alysanne glanced at her and nodded once.

Sera began to write, the charcoal rasping in quick strokes: Taxes. Fish levies. Men leaving.

A woman pushed forward next, younger, with a baby tied to her chest in a sling. “The sept,” she blurted, voice tight with embarrassment at daring to speak. “The roof is half gone after the fire. Septon says we need a new one. We can’t afford it.”

Prudence looked as if she might object, this was a princess, not a steward of shingles, but Alysanne didn’t let her. She only asked, “Is the septon here?”

The woman pointed with her chin toward the little stone sept with its weather-worn carving. “Inside. Praying. Or drinking.”

Sera wrote: Sept disrepair. Roof half gone. Needs a new one. Needs a new septon, probably

Another man, broad as a barrel, spoke without stepping close. “Firewood,” he said flatly. “The woods on the island are thin now. Most of it has to be shipped in. The winds bite.”

Firewood shortage, Sera added.

Then a thin girl, maybe no older than Alysanne herself, slipped forward and whispered as if the air might carry her words up to the Dragonmont. “The dragons,” she said. “Not the Black Dread. The wild ones. Sometimes they come down. A goat goes missing. A pig. Once…” Her eyes flicked to the Kingsguard, then away. “Once it was a man.”

Alysanne felt a sudden prickle under her skin, as if she’d stepped too close to the mouth of a cave. She’d been down in the Dragonmont often enough now to understand the presence of dragons; how they were not just beasts but forces, like storms given hunger and wings.

“How often?” she asked quietly.

The girl swallowed. “Not often… but it happens. When they’re hungry. The man was taken last year. He was... he was my cousin.”

Sera wrote slower now: Wild dragons preying. Livestock. One death.

The list grew in short, sharp strokes. Complaints about salt prices. Broken nets no one could replace. A cough going through the children’s beds. A boat seized by the castle’s men in the name of 'need.' Alysanne listened until her ears rang with it, until the village stopped being a stink and a smear and became horrifyingly real.

All the while, the Kingsguard knights loomed behind her like a reminder carved in white steel: you can listen, princess, but you cannot promise anything, you cannot stay here forever.

Still, Alysanne found herself saying, again and again, “I will bring this to the king.”

Not he will fix it. Not you will be safe. Just that: I will carry your words.

Even that felt like a risk.

A gaunt old man finally tottered up close enough that she smelled fish and sour ale on his breath. He peered at her silver necklace where it glinted faintly under her cloak. Her handmaidens tightened around her, Prudence gripping Alysanne’s arm.

“You wear the Star,” he rasped.

“I do,” Alysanne said, heart thumping once hard against her ribs.

A few faces changed at that: less guarded, less hostile. Not suddenly loving her. But willing, perhaps, to see her as something other than dragonspawn.

She received a few more complaints before the Kingsguard made it clear; it was time to leave. The princess separated herself from the small crowd of lowborn fishermen, finally setting back up the street towards the castle. Her handmaidens remained close by while the Kingsguard knights tailed them close behind.

Alysanne kept her smile in place until the last of the villagers fell behind them and the wind swallowed the murmurs. Only then did she let her shoulders sag a fraction, as if the whole little village had been a weight she’d carried up the lane and could finally set down.

“I will bring your words to the king,” she called once more over her shoulder, loud enough for the nearest fishwives to hear. It felt ceremonial, a promise. She hated how easy promises were to say, and how hard they were to keep.

Then she turned uphill.

The path back to the castle cut through scrub and black rock that looked like it had once been molten and angry and simply… stopped. Dragonstone always did that; reminded you that the world could burn and cool and pretend it had never been fire at all. Her skirts snapped in the wind. Salt stung her lips. The Kingsguard stayed close, white cloaks tugged and flapping like pale wings, their boots crunching on gravel with that steady, indifferent rhythm that made her feel both protected and watched.

Behind her, the village shrank into a smear of nets and roofs.

Prudence walked at her shoulder, chin high like a lady forced to step through a pigpen without acknowledging the smell. “They stared as if they were looking at a two-head calf,” she muttered.

“They stare because the last Targaryen they’d probably seen was a king in armor,” Dorthy answered under her breath, far less concerned with niceties.

Taliya crossed herself anyway, fingers quick at her throat. “It felt… wrong,” she whispered. “Like the air was waiting for something to go bad.”

“On Dragonstone the air is always waiting for something to go bad,” Jenya said brightly, as if that was a good thing. Then, with a softer tone, she added, “But you did well. You looked like a queen.”

Alysanne snorted, more laugh than breath. “I looked like a girl trying not to sneeze from all the fish.”

Sera didn’t join the teasing. She was rereading her charcoal notes as she walked, lips moving silently. Every so often she smudged a word with her thumb and rewrote it sharper, as if making the ink look braver could make the message safer.

Prudence’s voice dropped. “Do you think-” She glanced at the Kingsguard, then leaned closer to Alysanne. “Do you think he’ll be angry that you spoke to them in the Common Tongue?”

Alysanne didn’t look at Prudence. She kept her eyes on the uphill road and the castle’s jagged silhouette, the Stone Drum rising like a clenched fist against the sky.

“He won’t care,” she said, and she made her tone sound certain. “Not about that.”

“But he-”

“He said I should speak High Valyrian at court,” Alysanne cut in, still quiet. “But a fishing village is not court.” She touched the Seven-Pointed Star pendant at her throat: half comfort, half reminder. “Those people are beneath his concern.”

Taliya flinched at that, because it was honest in a way that wasn’t kind.

Sera looked up from her notes. “How will you tell him?”

Alysanne’s stomach tightened. That was the real question. Not whether Maegor cared, but how to make him care in the way that mattered; care enough to act, without turning his attention into a blade.

“In High Valyrian,” she said first, because that was always the answer now. The girls giggled at that; it wasn’t a real answer, but it made them laugh.

Dorthy made a face. “Can you even say ‘rotten fish smell’ in High Valyrian?”

“I can say ‘shortages’ and ‘repairs’ and ‘firewood’ in High Valyrian,” Alysanne replied, then let out a breath. “And I can say ‘dragons’ in High Valyrian. That part will catch his ear, especially if they’re out preying on livestock… or people.”

Prudence perked up at that, all her fear briefly replaced by curiosity. “Silverwing?”

“Not Silverwing,” Alysanne said, and the words tasted wrong. “Others.” The handmaidens seemed almost disappointed to hear that; none of them had seen Silverwing yet.

They climbed in silence for a while after that, the kind of silence where everyone is privately deciding which thoughts are safe enough to keep.

It was Jenya who broke it again, as if she couldn’t stand for the world to be heavy for too long. “Do you think they have stories?” she asked, eyes bright as candles. “Good ones. Like the ones my nan told me back in King’s Landing. Something about this place. Knights drowned at sea, princesses stolen by dragons, princes marrying merlings-”

“Merlings aren’t real,” Prudence sniffed automatically.

Jenya responded with expert ease. “All the best stories have something that isn’t real in them.”

Alysanne found herself smiling despite the wind. “They might,” she admitted. “And if they do… I want to hear them.”

Dorthy gave a wary look back toward the village. “You want to go back?”

“Not today,” Alysanne said. “But soon.” She glanced toward Sera’s notebook. “Next time we bring something.”

Prudence frowned. “Like what?”

“Firewood,” Alysanne said, surprising herself with how quickly it came. “Or coin. Or cloth. Something that proves I didn’t just come down there to listen and leave.”

Sera’s eyes softened, and she nodded as if she’d been waiting for Alysanne to say exactly that.

Jenya whispered, “Do you think they have a singer or a storyteller down there?”

Alysanne huffed a laugh. “Gods Jen, you’d sell your soul for a good story.” That made even Jenya laugh in reply.

They crested the final rise, and the gates of Dragonstone rose before them: black stone, sharp angles, carved gargoyles with mouths frozen open like they were still screaming smoke. Guards in Targaryen livery watched them approach. For a heartbeat Alysanne felt the familiar clamp of the castle around her, as if the island itself had hands. She lifted her chin.

The Kingsguard announced them, and the gates swallowed them into shadow.

Inside the courtyard of Dragonstone the air smelled different; less fish, more ash and hot stone. Alysanne’s heart did that odd quick beat it always did on Dragonstone, like the castle was a living thing and she was walking into its ribs.

Alysanne slowed just a fraction and turned her head to Sera. “Go back tomorrow and make a bigger list,” she murmured. “Not just the complaints; how many families, how urgent, what can be fixed quickly. If I sound prepared, he might actually listen.”

Sera’s face went fierce again. “Yes, princess.”

Prudence looked impressed despite herself. “You sound like my father.”

Alysanne’s mouth twitched. “Gods forbid.”

They reached the inner steps, and Alysanne paused there, the wind tugging at her braid, her pendant cold against her skin.

Somewhere above, in the heights of the Stone Drum, Maegor would be, wherever Maegor always was: a presence you could feel even when you couldn’t see him.

Alysanne inhaled, tasting salt and iron and courage she wasn’t sure she owned. The corridor narrowed as they climbed, Dragonstone’s walls closing in the way they always did; black stone sweating cold, torchlight smeared into wavering amber along carved gargoyles that leered from arches like they were listening.

Jenya wouldn’t let the silence live.

“So... is Silverwing really silver?” she whispered for the third time since coming to Dragonstone. “Like a spoon? Like moonlight?”

“She’s not a spoon,” Prudence hissed, scandalized on the dragon’s behalf.

Dorthy snorted. “Jen, you are something else.”

Alysanne let them chatter around her like sparrows. It was easier than listening to her own thoughts, which had begun to circle the same sharp truth again and again: she was starting to believe she could move things.

A moon ago she would have swallowed every question like a stone and waited for it to pass through her. Now she found herself measuring Maegor the way one measured a locked door: testing the hinges, watching when the guard turned his head, memorizing what made it creak.

Lately, he had been… favorable. Not kind, but less purely vicious, less unpredictable in that wild, lightning way that made every breath feel borrowed. With, Silverwing he watched more than he barked. He patiently watched her trying to command and lead the she-dragon, not forcing her too much. He corrected her pronunciation like a man correcting a pupil, not a butcher measuring a calf. He listened when she spoke of her dreams. It was almost like they were related. It was almost like she didn’t want to kill him, didn’t plan on doing it as soon as she could.

In the shadow of that small, terrible change, her mother had drifted further away.

Alysanne could picture Alyssa’s face at breakfast, eyes dull as spent coals, hands always busy with something, folding cloth, smoothing Aerea’s hair, cutting bread, anything but being present for Alysanne. Pregnancy made women tired, everyone said. Grief made them hollow. She always seemed too tired to talk with Alysanne, and Alysanne understood it was better to leave her mother alone if she wanted it.

Alysanne’s stomach tightened as she turned down the last passage toward the twins chambers.

The door was familiar: a plain oak door reinforced with iron bands, as if anyone expected a four-year-old to storm a castle. A Kingsguard stood outside, white cloak hanging like a banner at rest. He inclined his head when he saw her.

“Princess.”

Alysanne nodded back, already reaching for the latch. Her hand hesitated. She could feel her handmaidens bunching behind her, excitement prickling off them like heat.

“Quiet,” she murmured without turning. “My mother might be in here.”

They tried. For about a heartbeat.

Alysanne opened the door.

The room smelled of beeswax and clean linen, of warmed milk and the faint tang of whatever herbs the servant woman burned to keep the damp out. Alyssa was absent… for now. Aerea was on the rug near the hearth with a little carved horse in her hands, head bent so low her pale hair veiled her face. Across the room, Rhaella had climbed onto a bench meant for grown women and was attempting to leap from it onto a pile of cushions like she was conquering something.

“Rhaella,” the servant woman warned, too late.

The child launched anyway with a delighted squeal, hit the cushions, and sprang up again as if she’d been thrown by a catapult rather than landing in feathers. Her eyes found Alysanne, and the whole of her face lit like a torch.

“Aly!” Rhaella shouted, half her own invention, half stubborn refusal to bother with full names, and she charged, skirts flying.

Alysanne braced herself and caught her niece around the ribs before Rhaella could headbutt her stomach. The impact still drove a little “oof” out of her, and Rhaella laughed as if that was the goal. “You have got to stop calling me that.” Alysanne said that more because the name reminded her of Alys Harroway than any perceived childishness.

“You smell like outside,” Rhaella announced proudly, as if she’d discovered a grave crime.

Alysanne squeezed her once and set her down. “I was outside.”

“I want outside,” Rhaella declared instantly. “I want dragons. I want to see yours!”

The servant woman near the hearth went pale at that and darted a glance toward the door, as if Maegor himself might materialize from the stone at the word dragons. Aerea looked up too, eyes wide and anxious. She didn’t move toward Alysanne, only clutched her carved horse tighter.

Alysanne’s chest pinched. Aerea had been like that even before everything, but now fear lived in her like a second heartbeat.

“Hello, sweetling,” Alysanne said softly, forcing her voice to gentleness. She crossed the room slowly, like approaching a skittish animal, and crouched down so she was smaller. “May I sit with you?”

Aerea’s lips parted. Her gaze flicked to Rhaella, then to the servants, then back to Alysanne. She gave the smallest nod.

Alysanne lowered herself onto the rug, blue skirts pooling around her knees. She didn’t reach for Aerea right away. She simply sat, sharing the space, letting the warmth of the hearth fill the silence.

Behind her, Prudence and the handmaidens hovered like a colorful flock at the doorway, trying to look respectful, failing because their eyes kept darting everywhere with barely contained awe. Jenya mouthed ‘they’re so small’ at Dorthy, who elbowed her.

Rhaella stomped up to them and planted her hands on her hips. “Who are you?”

Jenya blinked, startled, then did a quick curtsy that looked like something she’d practiced in secret. “Jenya, princess.”

Rhaella squinted at her, then looked at Taliya. “You’re pretty.”

The girl nearly choked at that. “Thank you.”

Rhaella nodded as if that settled something profound. “You can stay.”

“Wonderful,” Prudence managed, voice tight as if she had wished to be acknowledged by the toddler as well.

Alysanne hid a smile by turning her attention back to Aerea. “What is his name?” she asked, nodding at the carved horse.

Aerea hesitated. “He… he doesn’t have one.”

“Then we should give him one,” Alysanne said, as if this were a task as important as a treaty. “A horse should not go nameless.”

Aerea’s mouth twitched, the beginning of something like amusement. “What name?”

Alysanne considered, deliberately dramatic. “Something brave. Something that doesn’t get frightened by loud sisters.”

Aerea glanced toward Rhaella with a tiny look of guilty affection. “He’s… he’s scared anyway.”

“Then he can be brave and scared,” Alysanne said quietly. “Those are not enemies, you know.”

Aerea stared at her for a long moment as if trying to decide whether this was true. Then she murmured, almost inaudible, “Star.”

Alysanne’s fingers brushed her pendant lightly. “Star,” she repeated, feeling the word settle warmly in her chest. “A good name.”

Aerea’s shoulders relaxed a fraction, like a knot loosening.

Rhaella, meanwhile, had discovered Sera’s charcoal notebook.

“What’s that?” she demanded, reaching.

Sera yanked it back like it was a crown jewel. “Notes.”

“Want it.”

“No.”

Rhaella’s eyes narrowed in outrage that someone had spoken to her like an equal, especially a servant. The servant woman took a step forward, ready to intervene. Alysanne spoke before the room could tip.

“Rhaella,” she said, not loud, but with a sharpness that made even Prudence go still. “Come here.”

Rhaella’s head snapped toward her. She didn’t like that tone. She liked it even less because it worked. She stalked across the rug and plopped down hard beside Alysanne, making Aerea flinch. The handmaidens drew closer, eyes examining the twins closely.

Alysanne put a hand on Rhaella’s knew; not affectionate, not quite, but anchoring. “You can’t have Sera’s book because it’s important,” she said. “It holds problems.”

Rhaella’s eyes narrowed suspiciously. “Problems?”

“Problems that when people speak, someone listens,” Alysanne said. “I went to the fishing village today. They told me what their problems, what hurts them.”

Rhaella wrinkled her nose. “Fish hurt them?”

Dorthy let out a strangled laugh and slapped a hand over her mouth. The other girls were less restrained in their giggling, especially Prudence.

Alysanne’s lips twitched. “Not the fish. The taxes. The ruined sept. The cold. The dragons that hunt too close.”

At the word dragons, Rhaella leaned forward, hungry for it. Even Aerea’s gaze flicked up.

“Dragons don’t hunt people,” Rhaella insisted, as if she could forbid it by declaring it false.

Alysanne looked at her niece, really looked. “They are dragons,” she said softly. “They do what dragons do. That is why we must be careful, and why-” She stopped herself before she said why Maegor wants me to ride Silverwing. She didn’t want that shadow in this room. She wanted to keep her uncle very far away from her nieces.

Instead she reached out and took Sera’s notebook from where the handmaiden held it, and she opened it to the charcoal list.

“These are the village’s words,” Alysanne said. “I will tell the king. But I need to tell him properly, or he will hear only what he wants to hear.”

Rhaella pointed at a smudged line. “What’s that one?”

Sera’s eyes widened. “She can’t read?”

“I can read some,” Rhaella lied immediately, chin lifting.

Alysanne didn’t call her on it. “That one,” she said, tapping the line, “says they need firewood. And that their sept has a bad roof.”

Aerea’s small fingers crept toward the page like she was touching something sacred.

Alysanne glanced at her. “Do you want to help me?”

Aerea froze, startled by the invitation.

Rhaella brightened instantly. “I want to help!”

Alysanne didn’t even look at her. “Aerea.”

That was all. Just the name, chosen.

Aerea swallowed. “How?”

“By telling me what it says here on the page,” Alysanne said, pointing at a line. “Nothing more.”

Aerea’s eyes flicked to the servants, then back to Alysanne. “The… the village, the village, it needs- firewood?” Aerea whispered, as if confessing a sin.

Rhaella scowled at that, as if jealous her sister could read more than she could.

Alysanne’s heart tightened. “Why do you think they need firewood?”

Aerea thought hard. Her brows drew together. “Fire,” she said finally.

She reached over and tucked a strand of hair behind Aerea’s ear. Aerea didn’t flinch this time.

“Exactly,” Alysanne murmured, and her voice held a promise she wasn’t sure she could keep, “and they need it to stay warm. You wouldn’t want to be cold, would you?”

Behind them, the maidservants exchanged glances. Prudence’s face softened. Even she looked like she might be thinking about the village instead of the smell for once.

Rhaella, offended by being ignored, grabbed at Alysanne’s sleeve. “When do I get dragons?”

Alysanne looked at her niece and, for a moment, saw the future of her in miniature: a girl who would push at every boundary until it either broke or broke her.

“Soon,” Alysanne said, steady. “Not today. You need to learn how to read first.”

Rhaella opened her mouth to protest.

Alysanne leaned in, voice dropping so low it was almost secret. “And if you scream about it, the king will decide ‘not today’ becomes ‘never.’ Do you understand?”

Rhaella’s eyes widened. She understood the threat of Maegor even at her young age. She swallowed, then nodded once, sharp and resentful.

Alysanne smoothed Rhaella’s hair anyway, one slow stroke. A truce, not tenderness.

She closed Sera’s notebook and handed it back. “Keep it safe,” she told her handmaiden. “I’ll need it when I speak to him.”

Sera nodded, face serious.

Alysanne rose, then offered a hand down to Aerea. Aerea stared at the hand like it might vanish if she blinked, then placed her small fingers in Alysanne’s palm. Alysanne helped her up gently, feeling how light she was, how easily she could be broken by a careless world.

Aerea whispered, “Will he be angry?”

Alysanne didn’t pretend not to understand who he meant. She looked toward the door, where the Kingsguard waited beyond the wood and iron.

“He’s always angry,” she said honestly. “We just have to pray that it’s not at us.”

Aerea looked like that wasn’t much comfort at all. Alysanne wasn’t sure she did either.

Rhaella tugged her sleeve again, impatient. “Are you done? I want pudding!”

Alysanne exhaled, a small laugh escaping despite everything. “Yes,” she said. “We’re done.”

She started toward the door, her handmaidens falling into place behind her like a bright tail.

At the threshold she glanced back once.

Aerea had returned to the rug, Star the horse clutched in her lap. She was watching Alysanne with that quiet, aching focus she always had, as if trying to memorize her before she vanished again. Rhaella had already climbed onto the bench, plotting her next leap.

Alysanne’s throat tightened as she exited the room, off to dinner.

Before she could get far, a servant arrived with a piece of paper in hand, nearly knocking into Prudence and Taliya. The two girls stumbled back, and the servant bowed his head immediately.

“Apologies, my ladies. I come bearing a letter for the princess. It came by raven just now.” The servant handed the letter to Alysanne then quickly scampered away. Alysanne stood there for a moment; she had sent a couple letters in High Valyrian to Keira and Prunella, but she had never received a reply.

The princess’s handmaidens immediately erupted in noise as they crowded around her, their voices chattering at the possibilities: Septon Keira’s first letter? Another from the Hand? Grand Maester Benifer? A surprise attempt by Prunella Celtigar?

Alysanne waved her hand to quiet them down. “Calm down, all of you.” She opened the letter and pulled it out slowly. A wide smile emerged on her face as she recognized the deliberate writing of her loving septa, even though it was now in flowing High Valyrian.

Series this work belongs to:

• Part 2 of The Reign of King Maegor the Murderer