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The trial was a disaster beyond his darkest dreams.
Daeron had been as sober as he’d been in years, head aching and stomach roiling as flames danced before his closed eyes. The sensation of imminent doom had threatened to drop him where he sat, to make him heave and weep in a way that only a pitcher of wine would dull down, but he’d pulled on his helm all the same, had spurred his horse into action to face down Mad Robyn Rhysling, and the nightmare had begun.
He'd intended to fall, of course, as early as possible, to roll to the side of the stands and wait out the rest of the trial, dishonoured but alive and unharmed. It would disappoint his father, but the hedge knight was right - he had lied, and without taking back his word and coming clean, this failure was the best he could do.
He wasn’t a very good knight, anyway. He’d only get himself killed, against the likes of Baratheon and his uncle, even against the freshly minted Fossoway.
Against the hedge knight.
But whilst he'd missed the strike with his own lance, arm opening last second to let the blow go wide, the Mad Knight had not missed his own.
He'd taken the blow to the chest, lance shattering off his plate and hitting with enough force to throw him back out of the saddle. Instead of falling his instinct had kicked in, desperate not to fall and clinging well enough to remain ahorse to the end of the tiltyard. His horse had spun to charge again, better at its job than Daeron by far, and it was that which had thrown him down, foot staying long enough in the stirrup to drag him a pace before coming free. He’d rolled under the great beast's legs, catching a flying hoof to the ankle, but the horse had leapt over him with nimble feet instead of trampling him down into the mud. He'd landed close enough to the edge of the tiltyard to drag himself from harm's way, where he would stay until the horn was blown to signal the end of all things.
"I'm out," he'd gasped to Rhysling, as the knight had approached, still ahorse but wielding his sword rather than his lance. As though Daeron had any intention of rising, of fighting any further. It was a miracle he was not vomiting, both from pain and terror alike. "My foot is crushed, Ser. I yield."
The knight had looked at him for a long moment before turning tail to crash into one of the Kingsguard, and Daeron had collapsed back, closed his eyes against the hysteria threatening to bubble forth, and waited for it to be over.
And then, of course, upon Aerion's surrender, after being dragged upright by Maekar and a maester, pulled through the stands to the rest of his family, Dareon had heard of his uncle's death.
Heard the screaming, the ripple through the yard as the news spread -
And then he'd fainted, the pain and horror overwhelming as he realised that the dragon in his vision, the greatest of them all, had not been slain by the hedge knight.
It had died to protect him.
By the time he wakes, his wounds have been tended and his father is sat in vigil at his bedside, relief burning in his eyes when Daeron manages to sit upright. He reaches for him in a way that has Daeron flinching back, but the blow he expects doesn’t come. Instead, Maekar presses his hands to Daeron's face, dragging a thumb over the still oozing wound with a gentleness that makes him want to cry.
"Baelor is dead," his father says in greeting, face twisting in a way Daeron hasn't seen since his mother's passing. The grief that gleams in his eyes is sharp and raw, an albatross around his neck, a weight he can never escape. Kinslayer. "Aerion withdrew his accusation. We lost, and it was all for nothing. We will be better. We must be better. That includes you. You will stop drinking, and you will resume your studies as heir to Summerhall if I must pick up the sword and beat it into you myself."
Daeron swallows raggedly, fixing his eyes upon a point over his father’s shoulder so as not to see his disappointment. He hesitates, and the way his father’s eyes stare him down has him speaking the truth before he can bite it back or come up with something witty to deflect.
“I do not know that I can stop, anymore,” he admits, barely more than a whisper, and his father’s face crumples. “This is my fault - this is all my fault.” Tears spring to his eyes and he hates the weakness of it all, but he’s nigh sober and in pain and his uncle, the crown prince, is dead. “I cannot bear it sober.”
The hands cradling his face move to the base of his head, the space between his shoulder blades, and for the first time in years, perhaps, Daeron sinks into his father’s arms, buries his face in the breadth of his chest and weeps, tears spilling over silently with only the shake of his shoulders betraying him.
“It is not your fault, child,” Maekar breathes harshly against the crown of Daeron’s head, and he shakes under the weight of it, the wall around himself that he’d so carefully tended to for years crumbling away at the affection, the first bit of tenderness allowed him. He’s always been weak. A coward. It is a mercy, he thinks, that his mother is not alive to see him so. “You did not land the blow.”
“The hedge knight did not steal Egg,” Daeron gasps out, voice little more than a croak and hands trembling uncontrollably. “I lost track of him, and when I realised he was gone, I could not sit up, let alone stand - I lied to you, to protect myself.”
Maekar sighs heavily, something Daeron feels rather than hears. “I know,” he says lowly, the words rumbling against Daeron’s ear. “Your brother told me. I had not believed him at first.”
Daeron hiccups and braces himself, fully expecting his father to withdraw, to stare him down with those same hard eyes that followed him every time Daeron staggered across the halls in Summerhall, when he would skip his lessons and training to surrender to the oblivion of drink.
“Then you see that this is my fault,” he weeps, and finds that once he has started to speak, he can no longer stop the words from coming. “That if I had kept a closer eye on him, if we had come straight here - none of this would have happened.” He gasps a laugh as flames dance before his eyes, a funeral pyre, a pair of mismatched eyes staring at him through a swathe of smoke. “I was a fool - of course the dragon was not me, it was big enough to fill the sky. I should have known, and instead I put the wheels into motion.”
“Gods above,” Maekar says, but it lacks his usual scorn. His hands only draw him closer, holding him steady against his chest, an anchor in a storm. “What are you talking about, the dragon?”
Daeron laughs again, wet and hysterical.
“The dreams, father,” he chokes out, surprised, for surely his father has not forgotten his curse. Not when it haunts him, so, a punishment from the gods for a crime he does not remember committing. The world burns behind his closed eyes, so he forces them open, feels the thud of Maekar’s heart under his ear and tries to count along. It is faster than it should be. “They will swallow me whole, will have me watch our family burn and the dynasty fall - I cannot escape it, I cannot interpret it, all I can do is watch and try to dull it but it does not stop --”
Maekar’s hand pauses where it had been rubbing circles into his back. “Breathe, boy, else you will faint,” he orders firmly, and Daeron manages to drag in a hitching breath. “The dragon dreams. You still suffer them.”
It’s a statement rather than a question, and Daeron flinches - apparently his father had indeed forgotten - then nods to confirm, hating the weakness of it all, knowing that Maekar will tell him to stop talking about them, to ignore them, the way he had done when Daeron had tearfully confided in him how he saw a star falling and burning out almost nightly in the months preceding Dyanna Dayne’s death.
“Endlessly.” He gasps. Maekar’s grip tightens, to the point of pain, but it is stabilising. He continues, “No matter what I do, I cannot escape them. The drinking - it helps. I can’t stop - I can’t.”
“I thought they had stopped. After your mother - you stopped speaking of them,” Maekar says, stumbling over his words in a way Daeron has never heard before, a crack in a castle of glass. “Seven fucking hells, Daeron. I thought you - that you outgrew it.”
Something in Daeron’s chest gives way at that, his vision clouding over - a child under a tree, fat and happy; a tall wall standing strong against a gale; a trio of dragons in flight over an island. He blinks and the vision is gone, but the next breath he draws is easier.
“It upset you,” Daeron says, voice catching, and it hurts in the way of a lanced abscess, rather than that of a fracture. “You did not want to know. It made you furious.”
“Not at you, my boy. I loved - love, still - your mother.” Maekar clutches at him, and Daeron distantly registers that his hands are trembling as much as Daeron’s own. “I couldn't - I did not want to believe it was true. Did not want you to upset her or your brothers; I did not want it to become a self-fulfilling prophecy. And all I did was drive you away.” He swallows, hard enough that Daeron hears it. “You started drinking not long after that.”
“It makes it easier. I don’t - I didn’t want it. It got out of control. And then --” Daeron drags in a breath, screwing up his eyes and his courage. “The tourney. A dragon, its wings large enough to cover a field, to blot out the sun. It was dead, and the hedge knight was beneath it, holding a sword. I thought he had killed it. I thought - I thought it might have been me.”
“That is why you hid,” Maekar says heavily, and Daeron nods. His tears have finally slowed, now that the words have been spoken aloud, leaving him heavy, wrung out. Everything aches, likely from the emotional wounds as much as the physical, and he yearns for the flagon of wine sat on his bedside with an intensity he has not felt since Valarr’s wedding.
Gods, he thinks, bile rising in his throat and heart quickening in his chest. Valarr. The pain he must be feeling, tucked away under all his stoic determination, not bearing to let anyone see any weakness - Daeron must find him later. Must be the rock that Valarr has always been for him.
For a moment there is silence, and then Maekar pulls back, slowly, hands returning to cradle Daeron’s face, to brush away the tears lingering under his eyes. His own glisten, rimmed in red, and he looks far older than his six and thirty years.
“I have failed you,” Maekar breathes, sorrow twisting his mouth and pinching his brow. It is a rare admission of weakness, uncharacteristic from the Anvil of the Red Grass Field. “You and your brother both. Let me help you, now. I will not let you walk the path alone. But you must try.”
Daeron wants to be sick, to bury himself alive, to pitch himself from the window unto the tourney ground below, but - he’s more than half sober already, and that step is always the worst. For a moment he feels small, so small, like he has been caught sneaking through the halls when he should have been abed as a child, but his father is holding him in a way he has not in a long time, and for the first time in over a year, he feels safe.
Daeron shivers and swallows hard. He has nothing to lose by trying, if only for a while. The three dragons dance behind his eyes when he blinks, and one of them breathes a plume of purple fire before they are gone.
“I will try,” he rasps, finally, and Maekar bows his head to press a kiss to Daeron’s brow, lingering for a moment before pulling away. Fresh tears threaten to spill down Daeron’s face, but he blinks them back, ashamed, balls his hands into fists until the fingernails bite through his palms. It does not stop them trembling.
“The burning is in an hour,” Maekar murmurs, the weight of the world saddled upon his shoulders. “Egg will ride with you, for both of your sakes. Aerion is unconscious, still, which is a blessing for us all.”
“I will be ready,” Daeron forces out, and something throbs in his chest when his father nods, relief visible in the lines of his face. “But I can’t - my hands -”
He will not be able to sit ahorse when he cannot stop them from shaking.
“I will send a maester,” Maekar says, stepping back. “But, Daeron - I know you can bear it. You are a dragon, no matter what you believe. You are my son.”
And then he turns on his heel and is gone.
The flagon contains boiled water rather than wine, and it is all Daeron can do to not throw it across the room. He drinks a cup only to clear the bitter taste in his mouth, and then sinks back unto the cushions, head throbbing and body trembling and mind horribly, awfully raw, unable to make heads nor tails of his father, of himself.
You are my son. It is the first time in a long time that he has heard that.
He closes his eyes and drifts from then. Visions dance behind his eyes, clouded and blurred, none as clear as Baelor's prophesied death. All that comes through is uncertainty, smoke and mirrors and a rising tide of despair, though that could easily be born from his own mind rather than the gods.
A maester visits, one he vaguely recognises from the last time he was at the Red Keep, and brings with him the smallest cup of wine Daeron had drunk since the age of five.
He takes it with unsteady hands and swallows it down too fast. The relief it brings is none.
"We must wean you off slowly," the maester says gently, pity in his eyes. “Else more harm will be done. Something weak would be better, to trick the mind with quantity where there is no quality. Cider, perhaps. It will take great strength to overcome this, my prince. It will be worse before it is better.”
“I can't do it,” Daeron says weakly. The goblet is empty and his blood thirsts for more, hands still shaking and heart rabbiting through his chest. The taste has already brought him low, already making him regret his words to his father. He is weak. Daeron the drunken, Daeron the disappointment.
You are my son.
“You must,” replies the maester, kindly. He passes Daeron a bowl of porridge, topped with berries and honey and warm against his hands. “And you must eat, my prince. Else you will collapse upon rising. The shaking will ease, once the wine reaches your blood stream.”
The shaking has eased by the time Daeron has half finished the porridge, each mouthful a chore to swallow but steadying the roiling in his stomach. The maester trades him a cup of cider for the bowl when he can manage no more, the drink thin and weak but better than nothing. He grimaces as he swallows it down, lets the maester fuss over him for a minute more, and then he is left alone again.
Until Egg appears in the doorway, bald head bright against the dark stone walls.
“Brother?” he asks in his high pitched voice, but there is an anxiety there that makes Daeron’s chest hurt. Egg should not know stress; he is still just a boy.
“You may come in, little Egg,” he says, and carefully pushes himself upright against the pillows, tired and aching.
Egg slinks into the room, laden with clothing that he carefully deposits on the foot of Daeron’s bed. “Father sent me to squire for you, one last time. I told him I wanted to go with Ser Duncan, when we leave, and he said he would consider it.” Egg looks guilty at this, little hands folded behind his back. Daeron forces himself to smile at him encouragingly, despite the pang of loss that hits his gut. “Not that I don’t like squiring for you! But -”
“It’s alright, little brother,” Daeron says gently, slowly rising to his feet, testing his weight. His left foot twinges dully, but it is bearable. “I am no knight; you need not spare my feelings. It would serve you well, to go with Ser Duncan. I hope it brings you peace.”
Egg smiles, a small thing that grows as he realises Daeron’s sincerity, and Daeron finds his own smile becomes more real as well.
“Help me dress?” he asks, and Egg jumps to the task with nimble hands, far quicker at managing all of Daeron’s laces and buttons than he has managed himself in years.
He is stripped from his smallclothes, still sullied from the trial, and Egg turns his back as he wipes the sweat from his skin with a wet rag, uses the chamberpot, prods tentative fingers at the gash in his face.
“Are you alright?” Egg asks tentatively, turning back around once Daeron has fresh small clothes on, sitting cross legged on the chaise lounge by the hearth. “Father says you were not too injured, but that you will need help all the same.”
Daeron grimaces and fumbles the laces to his chemise. Egg is on his feet before he can ask, fingers dancing as they lace him up. His eyes seem far too large for his face, without his hair, though there is a smattering of silver-blond coming back in over his crown.
“I was mostly uninjured,” he says, mouth twisting in some semblance of his usual humour. “But father demands that I do not drink, and I thought I might give it a try. We reached an understanding, of sorts.”
You are my son.
Egg hands him his doublet, fine black velvet with red stitching, almost a match for the one Egg is wearing himself.
“I’m glad,” Egg says, doing up the buttons, tongue peeking from between his teeth in concentration. “You scared me, in the inn. I thought you might die.”
“I will not die by drinking,” Daeron says wearily, and it rings true in his mind in a way that makes him nauseous. “But I am sorry. You did not need to see that. I have been a bad brother to you, and to Aerion.”
Egg’s nose wrinkles. “Aerion is a monster,” he says harshly, and it is true. Aerion has been nothing but monstrous to Daeron’s littlest brother, and he struggles, sometimes, to reconcile it with the sweet boy he had once known.
“He is,” he agrees, stepping into the moleskin breeches that Egg lays out. “But I still should have done more to look after you all. Mayhaps he would not be so bad, if I had.”
“Stop it.” Egg’s words are fierce, and his glare is fiercer. “It’s not your fault he is the way he is. And besides - you did your best. I know you did.”
Daeron swallows hard. “You think too much of me,” he tells his brother, and reaches out to tuck him into a hug. Egg sinks against him immediately, wrapping his little arms tight around Daeron’s middle.
“Your hair is growing,” he notices, a fine silver fuzz over Egg’s skull. Egg tenses under his hand. “Would you want me to shave it again for you? My hands are steadier; I will do a better job this time.”
He loosens his hold as Egg pulls away, head tilted to the side where he looks up at Daeron and then beaming with all the intensity of a lighthouse. For a heartbeat Daeron sees him sat upon the Iron Throne, a man grown, a crown adorning his silver hair. Then he blinks, and the vision is gone, leaving him with a tang of something bitter in his mouth.
“I would like that,” Egg is saying, hands gently pulling at Daeron to steer him towards the basin. “Father will be upset, but I do not want it back. I will wear a hat.”
“We will both wear hats,” Daeron agrees, and sets to covering Egg’s head with shaving cream, the way he would treat his own face as opposed to the botched job he did at the inn. “It is only appropriate, after all. For a funeral.”
Egg doesn’t move as he works, but Daeron can feel the way he sags all the same. “I don’t know what to say to father,” Egg says quietly, a secret, and Daeron’s hands falter before resuming sweeping the blade across his brother’s head, washing it, returning to sweep again. “I have never seen him so - so sad.”
“I think all we can do is be there for each other, Aegon,” Daeron says, stilted. He has never been one for advice, but he is trying. He is trying. “He loved Baelor, even if he resented him at times. Just - be there. Before you leave with your hedge knight. He will appreciate it. Look, you’re done.”
“You’re a lot more eloquent when you’re drunk.” Egg turns his freshly bald head this way and that to preen in the mirror before looking up at Daeron with those big, big eyes. “I prefer you like this.”
“I shall have to try to remain this way, then,” Daeron sighs, a knife in his ribs, and watches as Egg scurries to the bed. He picks up Daeron’s black leather boots and scurries back to kneel by his feet to lace them on with less careful hands than Daeron’s bruised foot appreciates.
“You’re still my favourite brother, though,” Egg continues, and kindly ignores the choking noise that escapes Daeron’s throat at the words.
“What about Aemon?” Daeron asks, a poor jest, but Egg just shrugs.
“He would probably be my favourite if he was around.” He has the decency to look apologetic. “But he isn’t. So it’s you, Daeron. I hope you can manage without the drink; I’m sorry I won’t be around to help.”
“That’s hardly a competition then, if it is just between Aerion and I,” Daeron says thickly, and reaches to scrub a hand over Egg’s head. It earns him a dirty look that makes him smile. “But you’re my favourite, too. Even if you do try to strangle my feet when you’re putting on my boots.”
Egg looks affronted, but does stop yanking so hard at the laces, pulling them out enough that Daeron can feel his feet again. The left one throbs dully, but it’s nothing. “You can do it yourself next time, and arrive late to everything you attend to,” he huffs, all the brattiness of a nine year old. “We’re going to be late already. We can’t be late. We can’t let Uncle down.”
Gods, Daeron will miss him.
The funeral passes.
Daeron stands near the back, behind his father and Egg, guilt gnawing at his chest despite the way his father had reiterated his innocence in the matter, all steely eyes and heavy brow. It’s a kindly lie, but a lie all the same. Daeron will not hide from the responsibility; just from the smoke that dances across the sky, the unease that fire brings him. From Valarr’s eyeline, where he stands off to their right, Kiera of Tyrosh behind him.
The septon says - something. Daeron does not hear him over the pump of blood in his ears, the throb in his head that grows the longer he watches the flames. They dance and roar and engulf the body of his uncle, the greatest dragon of them all, and though he feels like weeping, no tears will fall. He had shed them all earlier, he thinks, and has none left to give.
When the fire has reduced to smouldering and his more distant family has begun to disperse, Maekar turns to him, hands on Egg’s shoulders.
“We must return to the castle,” he says lowly. There’s a sword above his head, hanging from a fraying rope. Daeron blinks hard and it is gone. “I would like to have departed before nightfall. Will you return with us now?”
Daeron turns slightly, enough to see Valarr sat upon a rock, face carefully blank and eyes fixed on the way the silent sisters are preparing to work on his father’s smouldering bones. Kiera has already gone, he knows, for she had smiled weakly at him as she passed him by.
Valarr will want the time alone. It is likely that he has had ceaseless apologies and pitying words given to him all day; he will have accepted them graciously, with all the bearing of crown prince, but he will need the space to grieve for true.
“Daeron?” his father says, and Daeron flinches back unto himself.
He swallows. “I will return with you,” he hears himself say. He will find Valarr later.
Maekar brings a hand to his shoulder, steers him and Egg alike towards the horses. Daeron leans into his father’s hand, watches Egg do the same on his other side, and hopes it brings him some comfort.
He finds himself at the Beesbury tent after they return, watching the odd merging of grief and celebration, the even odder tradition of a swarm surrounding the coffin. He offers his apologies and recompense for the man’s death, which Lady Beesbury accepts with a bowed head and watery eyes, and finds he cannot refuse the tankard of mead pressed into his hands when she offers it.
He has drunk half the mead when the hedge knight finds him, all indignation and bruises, stepping from a fire that burns all else around him.
“Will you take Egg to squire?” Daeron asks, and finds himself disappointed when the hedge knight refuses. He doesn’t finish the tankard, and it feels like a victory.
-
He stops by the Hardyng pavilion next to offer his respects, and finds a much more somber affair. The young Lady Hardyng has lost her brother as well as her husband, and she shouts at Daeron before realising who she is speaking to and hastily apologises, face bloodless and hands trembling.
“You are forgiven, my Lady,” he says, as gently as he can, for the poor woman looks as though she might faint, and her entourage is frozen as though expecting him to scream. He is not Aerion, and the fear on their faces tugs at his breastbone. “There is no harm done; you have suffered a great loss. I did not mean to upset you so.”
“Thank you for your sympathy,” she says shakily, accepting when he makes her the same offer as the Beesbury’s, and curtsies deeply.
He slips from the tent on tired limbs and tries to find Valarr’s pavilion, only to see that it is in the midst of being packed away, little more than canvas and furniture remaining. The attendant he stops says that Valarr has not returned since he gave his father his armour before the trial, and Daeron can only nod in understanding before departing.
He curses at himself. He had not noticed what Baelor was wearing when he died, too preoccupied with his own misery, and resolves to make his way to Valarr before his cousin can do something foolish, like step into the pyre himself.
He limps more than walks his way back to the castle, as fast as he can manage. His foot aches with the strain, likely bruising black and blue under his boot, but it is fine. He is alive, and his hands are steady again thanks to the mead.
He hopes his father appreciates his refrain; the mead had been rich and strong, and he could have drunk a barrel of it, had the hedge knight not come and soured the taste.
His father is overseeing the clearing of Baelor’s rooms when Daeron returns.
“You are well?” Maekar asks, face pinched as he fiddles with the hilt of Baelor’s dagger, now strapped to his own belt.
“As well as can be,” Daeron confirms. His father is drinking wine; he can smell it. “I offered the Beesbury’s and Hardyng’s our respects, and recompense for their losses. It can come from my own coffers, if needed - I made the offer on a whim.” He swallows. “They are dead in part because of me. It seemed the right thing to do.”
His father tilts his head, face unreadable before he claps a hand to Daeron’s shoulder and turns back to watch the maids strip the bed.
“Have you seen Valarr?” Daeron asks, when it becomes clear that his father has nothing to say. “He was not at his pavilion.”
Maekar's mouth narrows. “I have not seen him since the pyre,” he says slowly, pained. There is a heaviness to his shoulders that speaks of his guilt, and Daeron’s own ache to look at him.
“He isn’t back yet?”
“I do not believe so. His wife is overseeing the clearing of her rooms; he is not there with her. She said he would come when he is ready.”
Daeron sighs and resists the urge to drag a hand through his hair. “I will bring him back,” he says, and odd eyes flash at him when he blinks. “When do we depart?”
Some of the tension falls from Maekar’s shoulders. “At dusk. We will stop shortly after, but none of us wish to spend another night in this place.”
“We’ll be ready before then,” Daeron promises, and quietly revels in the way Maekar nods approvingly.
“Take my palfrey,” Maekar tells him, eyes distant. “Valarr rode in the wheelhouse; he will not have a horse up there to ride back. She is stronger than your own; she will be able to carry the both of you.”
Daeron hesitates; the offer is no small thing, but it is not rescinded. “Alright. Thank you, father. I’ll take my leave.”
Maekar pats him once more before Daeron pulls away, but before he can make it from the room his father has turned and called his name.
Daeron halts in the doorway, eyebrows raised, dreading that Maekar has smelt the mead on him, that he is overdue a lecture, a strike to the cheek. But all that happens is that his father nods at him, the corner of his mouth pulled into a weak but present smile.
“I will pay the reparations myself,” he says firmly. Daeron blinks at him, surprised. “And you have done well, today. I am proud of you.”
And he turns back to watch the maids, as though he hasn’t just cracked Daeron’s chest clean in two.
Daeron slips from the room without a word, and counts himself lucky that he does not run into anyone on his way to the stables, for he can’t quite blink the tears from his eyes.
“Are you alright?” Egg asks, jumping down from his perch from atop a bale of hay and scaring Daeron half to death.
The stables are bustling with life, horses being readied for departure, grooms brushing their coats until they gleam, but the corridor clears as Daeron approaches. He ducks past the first few stalls, towards where his father’s and uncle’s riding horses had been put.
“Why is that all anyone asks me, today?” Daeron asks, not really expecting an answer, carefully wrapping his cloak tightly around himself. It feels odd to not have a wineskin at his waist, as though he is missing a limb.
“You look more forlorn than usual,” Egg says mildly, dogging his heels. “Like one of Daella’s kittens that got left out in the rain.”
“Wonderful,” Daeron sighs, reaching the stables and finding himself at a loss. The four palfreys are black, and all look much the same to him. His own is a bay with a star between her eyes and a snip shaped like a boot between her nostrils, and it is the only way he is able to distinguish her from the rest. “Our uncle died in the first trial by seven in over a century not even a day ago, I am not allowed more than cider, and my foot may well fall off from how much it is hurting. I believe I am allowed to look forlorn.”
Egg hums. “I suppose that is true,” he says, the little shit. “What are you doing here? Your horse is back there, you know; you walked straight past her.”
“Valarr,” Daeron says, and Egg makes a noise of understanding. “He hasn’t come back yet. Which of these is father’s palfrey, do you know? He said to borrow her.”
“Father said to borrow his palfrey?” Egg repeats, and sounds more surprised by this than anything else thus far. Daeron can understand it; he has not been allowed to sit upon his father’s horses since he was learning to ride himself, cradled between Maekar’s arms, too small to sit a saddle alone. “He hates people riding his horses lest they make them too soft. It’s that one, with the whorl between her eyes.”
Daeron glares at him - Egg knows he is useless with horses, the brat - and Egg neatly points at the furthest horse from them. It is indeed the biggest of the four, and there is a swirl in the hair on her forehead.
“Make use of yourself and get her ready, would you?” he asks, and lets himself collapse against one of the stall doors, body aching. The horse inside reaches through the gap to nudge its nose at his face, warm breath ruffling against his hair. This one has a streak of white in its dark forelock, and he distantly remembers teasing Valarr in years past about his father favouring a horse that resembles his son. “Unless you’ve retired from being my squire already?”
Egg rolls his eyes hard enough that he likely sees inside his own skull, but complies. He even holds the mare at the mounting block, and is kind enough not to laugh at the way Daeron struggles to mount.
“Daeron,” Egg starts hesitantly, as Daeron adjusts his seat and cloak; the wind is picking up again and he does not want to catch a chill. He dreads to think how cold Valarr must be, alone on a hill with only his father’s ashes for company.
He hums in question and looks up to find Egg looking sheepish. “What is it?”
“If I’m gone before you return -” he twists his mouth. “I will miss you. I’ll see if I can get Ser Duncan to bring me to Summerhall, some time. To visit you all.”
“The hedge knight will have you?” Daeron asks, surprised - the man had seemed quite vehement in his refusal earlier.
“He says he changed his mind.” Egg shrugs. “I’ll depart with him today. I think we might go to Dorne.”
“And you didn’t say anything until I was mounted?” Daeron teases, ignoring the ache that rises in his chest at the thought of Egg, gone. “If you want a hug farewell, you’ll have to get on that block. I’m not getting off now, not after all of that.”
Egg scrambles up the block and throws himself at Daeron before he has even finished his sentence, short arms flinging around his neck and knocking the breath from him. Daeron jerks to catch him, dropping the reins in the process, but the horse doesn’t shy under the weight and so he wraps his arms around his favourite brother, rests his cheek upon his smooth, bald head.
“I’ll miss you too, little Egg,” Daeron says quietly. He closes his eyes to see Egg sat upon a mule, wearing a floppy straw hat, and quickly opens them again. “Make sure Ser Duncan looks after you, else he will have my sword to answer to.”
Egg pulls a face. “That is not the threat you think it is, brother,” he says imperiously, and Daeron laughs.
“Begon with you, then,” he says, loosening his hold so Egg can wiggle free, back to the block and then jumping to the floor. “Have fun on your adventures, and try to write from time to time. Else father may hunt you down himself.”
“Will we see each other again?” Egg asks, quieter this time, fingers twisting together uncertainly.
Daeron leans down to press a hand to his brother’s cheek. “We will,” he says, and means it. “I know it.”
“Good.” Egg nods once, and then his face cracks in a grin. Daeron pulls himself back upright and waves a hand as Egg steps back. “I’m glad. Farewell, brother; I hope you succeed in your mission. For Valarr and for yourself.”
“You should get a hat,” Daeron calls, watching as Egg turns to head back inside the stables. “Else your head will burn, and your poor Ser Duncan will never hear the end of it.”
Egg makes a rude gesture over his shoulder in lieu of reply, and Daeron clicks the horse forwards without looking back.
His father's palfrey is bigger than his own by over a hand, and whilst it had made it harder to mount, it gives him a much gentler stride as he canters across the brow of the hill, towards the scrag of rock where his uncle was burned. The scent of smoke still hangs in the air, growing stronger as he draws nearer, and the wind bites hard at his face, blurring his vision and making his eyes sting.
What will Valarr say, he wonders bleakly, when he finds him? Will he turn him away, the gap that's grown between them over the past year too wide to overcome? Will he wear his princely mask, pretend all is well, that he's fine?
The fact that he remains here, alone, whilst his father's rooms are cleared and his bones packed away to be returned to King’s Landing, says that he might. Might turn Daeron away, perhaps with anger, perhaps with a coldness that Daeron has likely earned. He had spent the two weeks they had traveled together as a host from Summerhall avoiding him, hiding away despite knowing that Valarr had been looking for him, unwilling to get between he and his wife. Unwilling to see them together, for he knows they will be close now from how they had looked at each other at their wedding. There was no place for him any more, he had thought, and it hurt enough to know it without having to see it as well.
If Valarr is angry, Daeron can deal with it. But he cannot deal with knowing Valarr is alone in his grief, and so he pushes on.
He dismounts the horse with less care than he should have and staggers heavily on landing, knees threatening to give way under him. It sends a jolt of pain shooting through his foot and his back, making him hiss and curse until it subsides.
He tethers the horse with shaking hands, and limps over the crest of rock. The wind is colder still, whipping his hair and cloak around him, and he spots Valarr sitting exactly where he was when Daeron last saw him hours ago. For a moment he desperately wishes he'd brought a skin of wine with him, something to dull the ache that rises in his chest at the sight.
He makes his way down to him on unsteady feet, the pain overridden by the urge to touch, to fall to his knees and beg forgiveness -
"Leave me be," Valarr says quietly, once Daeron has drawn closer. He doesn't move, doesn't take his eyes off the spot where the pyre had burnt. "I shall make my own way back."
Daeron ignores him, forces himself to keep moving until he's stood a few feet from where Valarr is sat vigil. His skin is pale, paler than it should be, and there's a purple tinge to his lips that makes Daeron shiver just to look at. He doesn't move, despite the urge to reach out, to comfort the way Valarr has always comforted him, warm and strong and unbending in the way Daeron has never managed to imitate.
He'll have to give it his best try, now. He'll have to be the strong one, lest they both fall apart. He blinks against the sting in his eyes, and for a heartbeat sees a flash of fire, a falling tower. He blinks again, and it's gone.
"Please," Valarr says, voice hoarse. "Just go."
Daeron doesn’t move, feet rooted to the spot but unable to find the words to say, to break the silence. Gods, he wants a drink. He has always cared less about things when drunk, though he supposes that Valarr has never been one of them.
Valarr draws a breath as though steeling himself and then finally looks up.
"Oh," he says, barely more than a breath, mismatched eyes meeting Daeron’s own. "Daeron."
Daeron forces himself to smile. It feels more like a grimace, pulling against the gash in his cheek.
Valarr stares at him, his facade of dull calm slipping away to leave him wide eyed and heavy with a pain that Daeron recognises from the mirror. It hurts to see reflected back upon him, and with a twist of guilt, he realises that this must be how Valarr feels whenever he finds Daeron lost to the melancholy of wine and dreams, entirely useless and usually needing to be carried to bed, to be held as he shakes and sweats in the aftermath.
No more. You are my son.
Daeron's body moves without his permission, stepping in close enough that his knees brush the inside of Valarr's own, and despite how shaky he feels, a ship in a gale, when he reaches out, his hand is steady.
He cradles his palm around Valarr's jaw, vaguely registering the iciness of his skin, and drags his thumb under Valarr's dark brown eye. He pushes his fingertips behind his ear, into his hair, and feels a swell of relief when Valarr sinks into the contact, eyes slipping closed and shoulders drooping.
"Do you want me to leave?" Daeron asks around the lump in his throat, thumb stroking the cold skin under Valarr's eye, across the angle of his cheek.
Valarr shakes his head immediately, and something in Daeron's chest gives way, the relief threatening to bring him to his knees. "No. Stay, please."
Daeron exhales shakily and reaches forwards to thread his other hand through Valarr's hair, gentle. It's shorter than it was last time Daeron saw him, tangled from the wind but as soft as ever. It suits him, Daeron thinks, winding the silver strands around his thumb. Shows off the delicateness of his face, in sharp contrast with the breadth of his shoulders, the finely honed strength fitting for a prince.
"Of course," he murmurs. "Whatever you need."
Valarr shivers, eyes still closed but face crumpling in a way that Daeron has only seen once before, when Jena Dondarrion had passed. It had left him helpless then, and he feels helpless now, at a loss for words that will mean anything. Egg was right; he has always been more eloquent drunk, stumbling and awkward when sober in a way that drives his father to madness.
"Valarr-" he starts, and then stops, unsure.
"It's my fault," Valarr says, stilted, and a tear slips down his cheek, brushed away by the press of Daeron's thumb. "I lent him my armour, and it killed him."
Daeron's hands still for a moment before he tightens his grip, chest cracking open under the weight of it all. "No-"
"I should have refused him. We knew it was too small, but I let him take it anyway. I should have said no." Another tear falls, and Valarr's face shatters, chin dropping to hide the way he's screwed his eyes up, the way his mouth is twisting in pain, in grief. He shudders, and his next words are half a sob. "I should have gone myself."
Daeron tugs on him, gently, until Valarr's head is resting against his solar plexus. He folds himself down, curls his body to shield Valarr from the wind, from the rest of the world, wrapping an arm around those shaking shoulders and gripping on tight. It's not enough; Daeron wants him closer, wants to crawl inside his skin, to tear himself apart to fix the cracks in Valarr's soul, but the urge settles as Valarr moves. He slips his arms up under Daeron's cloak to the small of his back, under his doublet, and winds his hands tightly in the cloth of Daeron's undershirt.
His hands are cold. Everything about him is cold, bar the heat of his breath against Daeron's middle.
"It wasn't your fault," Daeron rasps, after a silence broken by the cries of the gulls above and the cries of Valarr below, muffled against him. "It was mine; it was Aerion's. My Father's, for it was his blow. Aegon's, for dragging the hedge knight into it in the first place." He swallows thickly, closes his eyes against the tears on his face. Saying the words out loud eases something within himself, a knot loosening. "He knew the risks himself. It wasn't your fault."
Valarr makes a noise that could be a word or could be a sob, and tugs at Daeron’s shirt, pulling him closer. Daeron's ankle buckles at the pressure and he drops to his knees, lets Valarr rearrange them until his face is buried into the slope of Daeron's neck, hidden under his cloak. Daeron can get his arms around him fully, now, and he holds on, tries to be the rock in a storm that Valarr has always been for him, ever since they were boys and he'd woken the Keep with his screams.
It's always been the two of them. Valarr and Daeron, Daeron and Valarr - until the recent months, at least, with Valarr married off and Daeron confined to Summerhall for most of the year. It had been easier when they had been younger and he aches with the memory of it, simpler times before the precursory weight of the crown began to dig into Valarr's shoulders and trapped him in a gilded cage, ever observed, unable to be anything but perfect. Before Daeron submerged himself in the barrel to try and escape the future, to stop seeing the glimpses of fire and blood consuming the world every time he closes his eyes.
He misses it, misses the ease at which they had come together, two sides of the same coin; no matter how heavy the weight had become, they had each other to lighten it. He doesn't think anyone else in the world has known him quite so well. Certainly nobody else has tried.
"I have you," he murmurs into the crest of Valarr's head, mouth catching on his hair. Valarr shudders in response, fingers biting into Daeron’s back. "It's alright. I have you."
They stay there until the shakes racking Valarr’s shoulders subside, until his fingers loosen from their deathgrip to start pressing circles against Daeron’s skin. Daeron strokes through his dark hair, along the knobs of his spine, the hinge of his jaw, and feels when the tension slowly seeps from his bones.
"I don't know if I can do this," Valarr says eventually, barely more than a whisper. It’s a vulnerability that Daeron knows is a privilege, a thought that Valarr would likely not let anyone else hear. He pulls back just enough to meet Daeron’s eyes, face blotchy and cheeks streaked with tears. His breath is warm against Daeron’s lips when he speaks, nose grazing the stubble on his jaw. "I was supposed to have years. He was supposed to guide me. I can't do it alone."
His eyes are dull and as Daeron looks at him, they fog over with the cloud of death, skin greying and veined with purple, rot permeating the air - he flinches hard and it’s gone, leaving Valarr alive and pale with cold, the only thing in his mismatched eyes the raw pain of grief.
"You can do it," Daeron croaks, and knows it to be true. "You're strong enough. And you won't be alone with the weight. I'll help as best I can, you have my word. We all will."
Valarr's pupils dilate slightly, darting between Daeron's own. He swallows hard enough that Daeron imagines he hears it, tongue darting out to wet his lower lip. "Would you stay?"
Daeron hesitates for half a heartbeat before nodding, and the relief that breaks over Valarr's face is worth it, the sun coming out from behind a cloud. His father will want him to return to Summerhall, but not immediately. Perhaps he can persuade him to mentor Valarr, to help carry the burden. Maekar would do it, if only from guilt.
"I'll stay," he breathes, and Valarr's eyes fill with tears again, quickly blinked away. "As long as I can. Whatever you need."
Valarr lets out a shuddering breath. "I've missed you," he murmurs, sending heat flaring through Daeron's ribs, a pang of longing that's quietly plagued him since he was 14. It’s been a year since he's allowed himself to truly acknowledge it, a year since they've had any time alone, and the feeling is as fresh as it was when they parted.
Valarr moves slowly, enough that Daeron could pull away if he so wanted, and brushes his mouth across Daeron's own, a barely there touch. He moves away before Daeron can react, eyes wide, but Daeron is already moving, chasing, bringing their lips together with too much force that is immediately quelled into something soft.
Valarr sighs into it and sinks into Daeron’s hold, a puppet with cut strings, hand coming up to tangle though Daeron’s hair, to drag his fingers across Daeron’s scalp. It makes him moan, mouth parting enough for Valarr to lick into it, a familiar rhythm that feels as easy as breathing.
He drags his hands along the curve of Valarr’s back, feels him shiver in response. He’s always been broader, stronger than Daeron, if a bit shorter; he fits against him like he’s meant to be there. It makes heat pool beneath his breastbone, liquid gold, and he desperately wishes they were anywhere but here, on the open hillside where anyone could see, stood where his uncle’s pyre had burned only hours earlier.
The thought makes him hesitate slightly and he leans back, revelling in the way Valarr chases him. “We need to get back," he murmurs against Valarr’s mouth, sighing when Valarr drags them together again. The kiss is gentler, tamer this time, and Valarr’s lips are slightly puffy when he finally pulls back to sigh, dropping his forehead to rest against Daeron’s unmarred cheek. "We're leaving before nightfall."
Valarr says nothing for a long moment, hands stroking across Daeron’s shoulders and breath warm where it puffs against his neck.
“Alright,” he whispers, and eases his way back enough that Daeron can heave himself to his feet. He staggers upright, legs stiff from how long he’d been kneeling, body aching from the fall he took in the trial. Valarr reaches to steady him, letting him brace on his forearms until the spots fade from Daeron’s vision and his balance returns.
“Father lent me his palfrey,” Daeron says, helping Valarr stand in turn; he’s even stiffer still, grimacing when he carefully, slowly straightens his legs, rolls his ankles to return life to them. “So you can ride with me. If you want.”
Valarr takes a tottering step before steadying, wrapping an arm around Daeron’s own and pressing tight to his side. “I would like that,” he says quietly, as though he’s as unwilling to break the veil of intimacy that has settled around them as Daeron is.
Daeron wants to kiss him. He wants to hold on and never let go, to run in the opposite direction before he can get his hopes up too high and risk plummeting back to the ground when Valarr has to withdraw, to return to his pretty wife and his castle in the sky.
He settles for resting his free hand over Valarr’s where it is tucked into the crook of his elbow, mind quieting when Valarr reaches up to cradle it between both of his own. His fingers are warmer, now. Daeron gently tugs him forwards, slowly, carefully, up over the brow of the hill to where the palfrey is tethered.
“Are you alright?” Valarr asks, as Daeron stumbles on his pained foot and pained thoughts, dragging him back to the present. “You’re sober.”
“I’m alright,” Daeron reassures, wincing. “Just a bit bruised. And I’m trying to ease off the drinking, for now. My father and I - I need to try. For all of our sakes.”
Valarr hesitates, pulling away for long enough to let Daeron free the palfrey and watching him with tired eyes. “I’m glad,” he says. “You know I don’t think any less of you for needing to, but - it would be nice, for you to be well.”
“I know,” Daeron sighs, a spilled cup flashing behind his eyes, red puddling around it. He blinks and turns to assess the height of the stirrup so that he doesn’t have to see the understanding in Valarr’s face, the hope. “I’ll try as best I can. You don’t have to help, unless you want to - it will likely be messy. Messier than usual, even.”
“You could not do anything that would make me leave,” Valarr says, an echo of every other time Daeron has tried to force him away, to let him escape the turmoil that dogs his step. “Of course I’ll help, don’t be a fool. Would you like a boost up?”
Daeron hums so that he doesn’t have to formulate an answer around that lump that’s formed in his throat, the fear that he doesn’t deserve the kind of devotion that Valarr offers. He bends his leg and strong hands wrap around it, lifting him so that he can swing into the saddle. He strokes a hand across the palfrey’s warm neck in greeting.
Valarr heaves himself up with far more grace than Daeron could ever manage. He tucks in close to Daeron’s back the moment he’s settled, wraps his hands around his middle and presses his face to the hood of Daeron’s cloak.
“Are you warm enough?” Daeron asks, as the wind whips around them, biting once more at his exposed skin and making him shiver.
Valarr tucks his chin atop Daeron’s shoulder, lets his temple rest against his cheek.
“I am now,” he replies.
Daeron keeps the mare to a walk as they make their way back to the castle, both to save the horse’s legs and to indulge himself in the sensation of Valarr plastered to his back, alternating between leaning his head on Daeron’s shoulder and the nape of his neck.
They’ve walked in silence for a few minutes when Valarr sighs again, breath warm against Daeron’s ear. “I know you can’t stay in King’s Landing forever,” he says quietly. “It was unfair of me to ask it of you.”
Daeron turns his head to look at him. “I’d stay if I could. I’ll persuade father; there’s no need for me to return to Summerhall when he’s there himself.”
Lips press gently to Daeron’s cheek, the angle of his jaw, hot like a brand. Valarr retreats before Daeron can turn his head to respond in kind. “You don’t have to. I’ll be alright.”
Daeron tries to glare at him, but Valarr has hidden away in the hood of his cloak. “I’m staying,” he says, as firmly as he can when his heart is dancing through his chest with uncertainty. “What was it you said? You can’t do anything to make me want to leave.” He hesitates. “I won’t be much use in the castle, but I can share the weight if you would let me.”
Valarr sags against him, squeezes around his middle, and doesn’t answer immediately. It makes Daeron want to fidget, but Valarr has always chosen his words carefully, far more so than Daeron himself. Especially so when he has had his own words reflected upon him, as though he can’t quite parse their relationship doesn’t only go one way, as though his affection is not returned in kind.
“Unless you want me to go, of course,” Daeron adds, insecurity getting the better of him. He’s rewarded with a pinch to the wrist for his trouble.
“I want you to stay,” Valarr says, muffled into the fabric. Daeron sighs, relieved. “Thank you. I don’t know if I could do it without you, Dae.”
Daeron’s chest hurts at the quiet admission, at the old nickname, and brings a hand to press over Valarr’s own. “You could,” he says, and hopes he manages to convey the certainty at which he knows it. “But you shouldn’t have to.”
“We’ll figure it out, then,” Valarr allows. “Together. Like before.”
For a moment, Daeron lets himself soak in it, the affection that sits between them, as though it had never left. As though Daeron hasn’t run from him, as though their last farewell hadn’t been stilted and awkward.
Until -
“What about Kiera?” Daeron asks suddenly, because - because Valarr is married. He is married and he has to produce an heir; he does not have the freedom to do what they did when they were younger, slipping into each other's rooms to sleep and to fuck and to whisper truths and promises to each other in the night. They do not even have the freedom to do what they have done now, and Daeron’s stomach drops into freefall at the thought that this might be it, a flash in the pan in the throes of grief before they return to their lives, the heir to the throne and the family disappointment.
He does not know if he could stand it. Certainly he would turn back to wine to dull the pain, to try and dampen down the fire that had roared back to life the moment Valarr had breathed his name, had brought their lips together. He’s never been able to put it out, not entirely, the feeling smoldering no matter how much Daeron drinks, how much he tries to smother it.
“You’re thinking too loud,” Valarr says gently against his ear, reaching to rest a hand over Daeron’s where he is gripping the reins, white knuckled. He’s never struggled with it as much as Daeron; a gift, perhaps, that comes with getting everything he’s ever wanted as Baelor’s heir. “Do you remember those months we shared on Dragonstone, just before I was betrothed?”
Daeron huffs as he drags himself out of his head. It is easier now than when he is drunk, oddly. “I remember the first half well enough. The second I spent more time abed with my ears bleeding than with you.”
“I spent more time by your side than anywhere else. You scared us all. We thought you were going to die.” For a moment Valarr sounds younger than his years, a boy again, nervous in the face of the court.
Daeron bites at the inside of his cheek. “I thought I had,” he admits quietly. Valarr’s grip on him tightens, to the cusp of pain. “I thought I saw the beginning and the end of all things, the ruin of our house, every outcome to every decision we would make for the next millennia - and then I woke up, and I could remember none of it beyond that, beyond the pain.”
“You started drinking more after,” Valarr says, chin tucked over his shoulder, breath warm on his neck. “Not much, but when you were alone -”
“It all became worse after then.” He sighs. He had not experienced the flashes whilst waking before that point, had not woken with blood in his mouth and smoke in his lungs. That time on Dragonstone had been the last time he had felt normal, to any degree, a man rather than a specter. The drink had stopped the flashes and blurred the dreams; he has seen more in the last day than in several moons before. “The weight is easier to bear with company. You’ve always made it easier. Egg, too. Most everyone else has given up on me, I fear.”
Until this morning, at least, when his father had sworn him a vow, had offered more than a sharp word in the face of his pain. Daeron still does not quite know what to make of it. You are my son.
Valarr strokes up his flank, holds him as though he’s something precious. “I would not give up on you. If our lives allowed it, I would not have let them separate us. I would have stayed. I want you to stay.”
Daeron wants to stay. Gods, does he want to stay, but it’s not a promise he can make quite so easily. “I'll stay as long as I can,” he swears again, fingers pressing to the pulse point below Valarr’s thumb, feeling the blood pump warm beneath his skin. “I - anyway. Your wife?”
Valarr sighs, but accepts the return to topic. “They were considering betrothing her to you, initially,” he says, and that - that is news to Daeron. “They wanted a marriage to the Riverlands for me. Or the North, since in the last generations, all the marriages have been southron.”
Daeron casts his mind back, ears ringing slightly. “I didn't realise,” he says distantly. “I knew that father was no longer mentioning making me a political match, when I woke, but I didn't realise they had found someone before then.”
The first time he had seen Kiera was in a dream. Stood tall on the bow of a Tyroshi ship, pink hair billowing around her delicate face and wearing a dress fit for a queen. It had scared him enough that he’d spent the night in the stables, drunk out of his mind to try and escape the weight of duty, the echo of a laugh he’d never heard aloud, a marriage he did not want.
And then he had seen her in person, three days before she and Valarr were to wed, and the fear had slipped away, replaced with the sting of jealousy.
“She was on the island for a few days, whilst terms were being discussed. You were unconscious for all of them, but she sat with me. With you.”
Daeron huffs a humourless laugh. “Counting her lucky stars, I imagine. She got a much better deal out of my fit than I did.”
Valarr pinches him again. “She thought you were pretty. You are pretty.”
“Not as much as you. And you're a far better match than I could be, a far better husband. At least she wouldn’t have had to search the cellars for you, come morning. Only your - the Hand’s solar.”
“Must you be so self degrading?” Valarr asks, without any of his usual teasing. “The point I'm making is that she saw it. How I care for you. I think she thought it was funny, more than anything. We spoke a lot of you, whilst you slept, and she wanted to meet you properly. But you only woke the day after she left, and our betrothal was announced a moon later.”
Daeron did not know any of that; when he’d awoken and recovered, he’d spent most of his time stumbling alone across the island, or tucked under Valarr’s chin. He mulls it over, biting on the inside of his cheek. “That does not mean that she - that she will accept this,” he says finally, a lead weight in his gut. “Me. She is the crown princess. She is to be queen, and I am - me. It would be a scandal were she to tell anyone.”
“You are you. I wouldn’t change that, other than to perhaps ease your sleep.” Valarr drums his fingers along Daeron’s ribs, almost in time to the rabbit of his heart. “And she would not tell anyone; she has a female lover, amongst her handmaidens. We love each other, but as friends. I am glad for her to find her happiness elsewhere, and I believe she would want the same for me.”
Daeron twists his mouth, despite the way the knot of anxiety loosens in his chest. “It will not be easy,” he warns and Valarr laughs, barely more than an exhale.
“Nothing is ever easy,” he says. He sounds more himself, finally, and he sits strong when Daeron leans back into him, reaches up to place a hand over Daeron’s heart. “You in particular. I would try anyway.”
Daeron swallows. “Valarr --”
“Don’t argue with me. I will not repeat myself.” He smiles against Daeron’s back, small but there. It provides more warmth than the midsummer sun. “I will make it an order if I must.”
Daeron can’t help but smile back. “Of course, my prince,” he says, aiming for teasing and yelping when Valarr pinches him for it. “Whatever you command.”
They approach the castle at a canter, the sky having darkened quicker than Daeron had expected. His father may be being oddly kind to him, but he does not want to test his ire so soon by delaying their departure. Especially not when he can feel the way Valarr’s grip tightens with every stride.
He pulls the palfrey to a stop at the treeline, barely a hundred meters from the stableyard.
“Are you sure you're ready?” he asks, bringing a hand to cup Valarr's own, still pressed warm around his middle. He’s starting to shake again, to sweat and wobble in a way he knows will end up in a flagon of wine and his father’s disappointment, if he does not fight the temptation.
“You’re shaking,” Valarr says, in lieu of a reply.
“Not because of this.” Daeron turns his head to look at him, still pale and wan but more present in his eyes than he was on the hillside. “I’m sure we can delay, if needed. I can pretend to fall off; if I don’t get a drink soon, I may do so anyway.”
Valarr huffs in faint amusement, then sobers. “I'm ready,” he says, and then Daeron gets the horror of watching him piece himself back together in real time, face flattening and emotions tightly reigned in until all that is left is the prince, and none of the man that kissed him. “I should make sure that - my fathers things. I should make sure they have packed them properly. And make sure Kiera is alright.”
“My father oversaw the packing,” Daeron offers, pressing the palfrey on. “So that is one less thing for you to do. You should eat, though, lest you faint on the road and bring his clucking down upon your head. You do not want that, I assure you. I’d have to do something dramatic to distract him.”
Valarr exhales shakily. “I do not know if I can face him,” he admits. “I understand that it was - it was an accident, and yet -”
“I understand,” Daeron says, guiding the palfrey into the courtyard and pulling her to a halt. The grooms and stable boys are carefully pretending they do not exist, which he appreciates. “I imagine he will feel much the same, but bear it with none of your grace. He is - struggling, to put it lightly.”
Valarr sighs again and untangles himself from Daeron’s waist. “I will go to him in time. For now --”
“I’ll deal with him.” Daeron says, watching as Valarr slips from the saddle and waiting for him to move aside before doing the same. A groom appears at their side nigh immediately to take the reins, and Daeron gives the horse a pat farewell before turning to walk besides Valarr into the hall. “I can find someone to send food to Kiera’s rooms, if you wish?”
Valarr arches an eyebrow at him and reaches for his arm. “I thought you said you’d stay?” he says, and, well. Daeron can’t not follow him, after that.
Kiera greets Valarr with a tight hug and a kiss to his cheek when they reach her rooms. Valarr sinks into her hold for a moment before straightening and turning to usher Daeron inside, lips quirking in an attempt at a smile when he sees how Daeron is fiddling with his fingers.
“I had you food prepared,” Kiera says, skirts swishing around her as she moves towards the empty hearth to pick up a plate. She has none of her ladies-in-waiting to help her, which is odd. “Are you coming in, Ser Daeron, or are you just going to hover in the doorway like a beaten dog?”
Her accent has softened in the year that has passed, and it is a shame. He greets her awkwardly, mind ringing with what Valarr had told him earlier, and lets Valarr nudge him further inside, steer him to the couch draped with clothes. It’s vaguely uncomfortable, certainly, watching the ease at which they move around in each other’s space, but Kiera smiles warmly at him despite the grief in her eyes, seemingly unfazed by the state of him and the way he’s followed Valarr into her private chambers.
She has almost finished packing, he finds upon looking around; the only things that remain are a set of Valarr’s clothes and the supplies next to the basin. Kiera places a platter of cakes on the table beside him when she passes him by, and that’s when he notices the flagon of wine within arm’s reach.
The wine calls to him, a siren song, and he becomes more aware of the shake to his hands and the rabbit of his heart as he stares at it. Valarr has noticed, head tilted as he watches over a shoulder, eyes entirely non judgemental in a way that makes Daeron want to scream. It beckons with the gift of oblivion and he closes his eyes, fists his hands to avoid reaching out, to avoid falling at this first hurdle.
“How have you been, good-cousin?" Kiera asks mildly, and he hears the rustle of clothing, feels the way the seat dips as she sits down on the other end. “Have you dreamt of me again?”
His eyes shoot open at that, shocked at her brazenness, and finds that the flagon of wine has gone.
“You’ve dreamt of her?” Valarr asks, hands busy with the buttons to his doublet but mouth quirked in faint amusement. It’s all that holds Daeron in place, stops him from turning tail and fleeing.
“I didn’t realise I had told you,” he says, plastering a smile on his face that clearly fools neither of them.
Kiera’s smile softens from teasing to something kinder. “At the wedding, when we danced. I’m not surprised you don’t recall; you were drunk by that point, and even more so after.”
There is no judgement in her eyes, either; only sympathetic understanding. Daeron wants to hate her for it, but finds that he can’t. He sinks back into the couch and lets his head flop back against the cushions. “Of course I was,” he sighs, and scrubs a hand over his face, wincing when he catches the gash bisecting his cheek.
“But then you got all shy and wouldn’t tell me what the dream was,” she continues, and leans over him to pick up a lemon cake, entirely too familiar considering they have only ever had two conversations, one of which he apparently doesn’t even remember. She smells warm, like cinnamon.
Valarr is watching them with soft eyes, still fiddling with the buttons on his doublet. He looks alive again, if worn out; a man rather than the ghost Daeron found by the pyre.
“Shy?” he says, humour warming his face. Daeron rolls his eyes at him and picks up a lemon cake with unsteady hands. “Are you sure it was Daeron who said it, wife mine?”
“Fuck off,” Daeron tells him. Kiera barks a surprised laugh, and coughs around her lemon cake. “Embarrassed, more likely. It’s never a good first impression, a drunken dance and manic rambling. I apologise, my lady.”
“I thought it was memorable, if a bit odd,” Kiera commiserates, and pats him gently on the knee. “Valarr’s told me a lot about you. I hope we can become friends, with time; he seems to think we would get along.”
Valarr has his back to them now, but Daeron can see the way the tips of his ears flush pink. “You both live to torment me, it only seems right to let you scheme together.”
“I would like that,” he finds himself telling her, and her smile grows more genuine, lighting up her face. “Maybe between the two of us we can stop him working himself to death.”
Valarr stills for a moment, and Daeron squeezes his eyes closed, immediately regretting the choice in words. A hand pats him on the knee again, and when he looks at her, Kiera’s eyebrows are steepled with concern.
“Thank you for bringing him back,” she murmurs, low enough that perhaps Valarr cannot overhear from where he has resumed pulling his doublet over his head. “He said you would come, and I’m relieved to know it was the truth.”
The words feel like a test. Daeron nods slowly. “Of course,” he replies. “I couldn’t - I care. Of course.”
Some of the tension seeps from Kiera’s posture, and she folds her legs underneath herself to lean in towards him. “It’s alright,” she hums conspiratorially. Valarr is watching them over his shoulder again, and it takes a fair bit of effort for Daeron to drag his eyes from the broad planes of his back to - to Valarr’s wife, seven hells. “I know.”
Heat creeps up Daeron’s cheeks. “So I’ve been told,” he tells her, and lets himself relax into the cushions when she nods, satisfied.
“Then we are all on the same page,” she smiles wanly. “Wonderful.”
“Wonderful,” Daeron repeats dumbly, and then forces himself to eat the pastry to save him need saying anything more.
Valarr is stripping down further now, a sight he’s seen plenty of times before, but it makes his face burn all the same. He can feel the way Kiera looks at him, amusement and pity alike, and once again finds himself longing for a drink.
“I can go, if you wish,” he says, as Valarr begins to unlace his small clothes. “I do not want to impose.”
Kiera shrugs beside him, slippered foot tapping to a rhythm only she can hear. “I do not believe you are imposing. You were invited, after all.”
“Stay,” Valarr says, without turning around. There’s a vulnerability in his voice that makes Daeron want to reach out to him, to hold. “Please. I would have you close.”
“Unless you have somewhere to be, of course,” Kiera continues. She reaches over Daeron once more to retrieve another sweet, and presses a pork pie into his hand. “We are due to depart soon; have you prepared?”
Daeron turns the pork pie around in his hands, a habit born of swirling wine in a goblet. His hands are shaking, still. “I had little unpacked to begin with,” he tells her. “What with my late arrival. The rest was done whilst I was unconscious. I have nowhere to be.”
“Good,” Kiera smiles, and settles back down to observe Valarr, now pulling on fresh breeches. She drops her voice and leans in towards him again. “Were you much injured? I saw you limping, coming in. I can send for the maester, if you need.”
She cannot have been quiet enough, for Valarr freezes in his motions and turns as though made of stone. His face is pale again and eyes hollow; he steps forwards with an arm outreached before catching himself, and Daeron has to force his eyes up to his face, away from the bruises mottling green and purple over Valarr’s breastbone.
“You were unconscious,” Valarr states, brow pinched. He’s looking at Daeron as though he’s only just seeing him, eyes roving as he takes in the state of his cheek, the way he’s slumped on the chair. “I saw you fall - the horse. Did it kick you? Are you alright?”
Daeron sighs. “I am fine,” he tells him, and watches some of the worry drain from his face. “I fainted, afterwards, but more from shock than injury.”
“I did not watch you,” Valarr says hesitantly, a guilt in his eyes that rubs Daeron wrong. He resumes dressing, but does not turn away. “I saw you in the mud, but there was - a lot going on.”
“Rightly so. There was not much to see from me.” He twists his mouth, and feels the way the motion stings at his cheek. “I had meant to fall, you know. Before the blow was struck. But Rhysling’s horse was faster than I expected, and he got me before I could jump.”
Kiera snorts a laugh, and immediately slaps a hand over her mouth to silence it. “I’m so sorry,” she says, eyes wide. “I don’t mean to laugh - gods, I’m so sorry.”
“It is fine, my lady,” Daeron tells her, and his smile becomes more genuine. “I have never been much of a fighter; I much prefer being on my back in the mud, well out of the way. Though, had I fought --”
“You would likely be in worse condition than you are now,” Valarr interrupts fiercely, before he can finish the thought, before the guilt starts to gnaw at his chest. “Better to know your limits than to - than to -”
He trails off, mouth pinched and eyes distant, hollow. Kiera exchanges a look with Daeron, sorrow heavy on her brow, seemingly at a loss for words. Daeron understands; he has never been good at comfort, especially not for a wound so big and so raw.
He is saved the trouble of formulating a reply when Valarr shakes his head and takes a tentative step forwards, then another.
“Your injuries?” he asks, as though asking for a report on the grain stores, all calm and collected in the way that’s been trained since birth. He can’t hide the concern in his eyes, though, nor the way his fingers twitch as though wanting to touch.
Daeron shrugs. The pork pie has crumbled where he’s been turning it over in his hands; Kiera takes it from him gently and deposits the remains on the table.
“Nothing major; the horse was well trained enough to jump over me. Just the bruising from the lance and the fall, and the sprain where my foot got caught in the iron.”
“And this?” Valarr asks, stepping into his space, reaching up to press at the gash splitting Daeron’s cheek with gentle fingers. It takes all of Daeron’s power not to lean into the touch, to press his lips to the cool skin of Valarr’s wrist. "What happened?"
“I'm not quite sure.” He has not even seen it yet, but the skin is raw and tender under Valarr’s thumb, crusted with blood and jagged in a way that suggests it will scar. “The splinters from the lance, perhaps, or the inside of my helmet when I fell. It isn’t terribly painful, but I imagine it doesn’t look pretty.”
"It looks fine,” Valarr breathes, eyes darting up to meet Daeron's own. They're brighter than they were, but the storm in them makes Daeron want to drown. “You held your seat well. Better than Ser Donnel, certainly. He took a lesser blow and was out of the saddle immediately. If your horse had spun the other way, you likes would have stayed on.”
“Thank the gods that it did not.” Daeron reaches up to take Valarr’s hand in his own, gently pulling it from his face. He can feel Kiera's eyes upon them, but Valarr doesn't seem to care. “For then I would have had a much harder time rolling all the way to the stocks. It would have been embarrassing.”
“I liked your feather,” Kiera says mildly, as though commenting on the weather, and they both flinch as though burned, the spell broken. “It made it much easier to distinguish you from the rest.”
Valarr steps back, pulling his wrist from Daeron’s hold and turning away. The back of his neck is flushed red, and he resumes dressing as though he had never been close at all.
It takes a moment for Daeron to regain his thoughts, heart in his throat, but when he turns to look, Kiera is smiling. She pats him on the knee comfortingly, and doesn’t seem to mind the way he gawks at her, cheeks flushed.
“My father insists on it,” he hears himself say, voice surprisingly steady. “To keep better track of me. Lest I turn tail and run again.”
Kiera nods, and though her next words are soft her eyes are steely. “You do seem to be good at running. Best not make a habit of it; it caused quite a lot of distress on the road here. Especially when you vanished.”
“Kiera,” Valarr says, a warning. She rolls her eyes, and takes a bite of her cake.
Later, she mouths at Daeron. He swallows at the threat, and tries not to feel guilty; he’d had his reasons, and though in the aftermath they feel weak, at the time it had been the end of the world.
How naive he had been.
They sit in silence as Valarr finishes dressing, carefully packing his worn garments in the trunk at the foot of the bed and coming to sit between them with a sigh. He drops his head back against the cushions, eyes closed, and doesn't fight when Kiera takes one of his hands in her own, eyebrow arching at Daeron until he does the same.
Valarr’s hand is warm, and he intertwines his fingers with Daeron’s own immediately. His hands are broader if shorter, calloused from practice with swords and bows and spears in a way that Daeron’s have not been for years.
They tremor in a way that matches Daeron’s own, though, and he finds himself squeezing to try and quell it, ashamed of the sweat on his palm that Valarr can surely feel.
Gods, he needs a drink.
“You’re shaking again,” Valarr says quietly, as though reading his mind, shifting his weight until Daeron is pressed against his side, solid and warm. “Are you sure you don’t need the maester?”
“I’m sure.” Daeron lets go of Valarr’s hand when he reaches over to pick up the platter of pastries and balance it on his knee. “Just the withdrawal. I have not had anything to drink in several hours, and my body is in rebellion over the fact.”
Valarr hums in acknowledgement. “Then you should drink,” he says, as though it is so simple, and picks up a sausage roll. “It’s not something you can just stop, from what I understand. You’ll need weaning off, if you are serious.”
Daeron blinks at him. “You've looked into it?”
There’s a pause as Valarr swallows, hesitates. “A few times,” he admits. “Just in case.”
“It’s a common thing on the boats,” Kiera chips in, leaning forward to peer around her husband, dark eyes sympathetic. “So it is a well understood malady on Tyrosh. We have discussed it, before.”
“Then you know it is not going to be pretty, these next few weeks.” Daeron drops his head to rest on Valarr’s shoulder, giving up on all propriety. “I do not blame you if you demand me go and wallow in my misery elsewhere."
“It will be fine,” Valarr says around a mouthful of roll. “Stop being ridiculous. Besides.” He swallows, and leans his head atop Daeron’s own for a moment. “It will give me something to do. Helping you, I mean. I know it’s not nice, but - a distraction will be welcome.”
“Always happy to help,” Daeron gripes, and then yelps as Valarr pinches him on the knee. “You’re too good for me.”
“And Kiera is too good for me in turn, so we’re all balanced out.” Valarr smiles against his head, a hollow thing. "You've vomited on me enough before; I'll manage it again."
“I’m sure we will cope,” Kiera says, and then there’s a goblet being passed along to him, barely a quarter full with wine. He stares at it for a moment, watches the liquid ripple as he tremors, and then swallows it down in three mouthfuls.
It’s a temporary respite, but a respite none the less. He closes his eyes around the taste and feels himself relax further into the couch, into Valarr. Kiera takes the goblet back from him immediately and refills it from - somewhere, he is not sure, and does not want to know. She takes a drink herself, then passes the goblet to Valarr.
“It cannot be worse than childbirth,” she continues, as Valarr drinks. “And if you get too terrible, I will not hesitate to tell you, of that you can be sure.”
“She will slap you,” Valarr says mildly, passing her back the goblet and picking up a lemon cake. “She has remarkably strong arms.”
Daeron snorts a laugh that borders on hysteria. “I can live with that,” he says, and lets the silence drape back over them, comfortable like a worn blanket, tucked up into Valarr’s left whilst Kiera does the same on his right.
Daeron closes his eyes and lets himself drift, lets his mind whirl over the disaster of a day, the rawness having quietened in the face of Valarr's care and grief, Kiera's non judgemental warmth. His limbs ache and his face throbs, but Valarr is eating and listening intently as Kiera begins to outline the logistics of their return to him, the hollowness haunting his eyes slowly fading. Kiera pats him on the knee at some point, asks him to travel with them, and he hums in agreement without second thought.
Behind his eyelids, the dragons dance, black and green and gold against the blue of the sky. For now it is peaceful, almost hypnotic, a comfort rather than a horror.
Baelor is dead and it cannot be changed, but resting here now, warm and safe, he tentatively allows himself to think that things might turn out okay.
--