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It was early morning when Rhaenyra began to wake. For one moment, meek and static, her mind was blank, and she knew nothing but the distant-sounding wash of waves on Dragonstone’s shores.
But something was odd. Not wrong, not exactly, but not … quite right. Her skin was warm, yes, that was reasonable, it was summer, but … what was that? That coldness?
Yes, there was some strange frigidity, just outside of her. Almost as soon as she noticed it, she felt it suddenly start wrapping around her, choking her, try to slither beneath her skin and burrow into her warmth, crush it out of her, leave her bones frozen.
She squeezed her eyes shut until her vision burst red from the pressure. No relief came – instead, she saw herself standing on the cliffs above Dragonstone’s beaches, looking out at the world before her. And as she looked up, above the horizon line, a terrible thunderstorm stared back. It was hanging in the sky, baring down on her, its eye unblinking.
Rhaenyra opened her eyes, and the storm broke.
All her memories returned, and each one sliced into her more deeply than the last. Viserys, her father, twisted and scaly, wheezing and weak, walking toward the end. Visenya, her baby daughter, much the same, but without even an hour of life to hold against his two and fifty years.
And Lucerys ...
Lucerys. Luke. Her son, her sweet boy, her delight amongst darkness. It seemed impossible that he was gone forever. But she knew it, felt the truth of it in her bones. He was lost to the world.
He was lost to her.
Beside her, Daemon slept on, his breathing an even rhythm. He was as far away to her as a ghost was now – the others, the ones who had followed the Stranger one after another, they seemed more real. Their shadows flickered out of the embers in the hearth, dancing along the floor like dragon's wings. She almost smiled to see them again, but there was a rotten hollow inside her where her heart had once been, and no shadow could fill it.
The pain of losing a father was expected – it had crystalised in her the day Viserys had named her heir. Her life was always destined to rise as his set, and so the news of his death, while raw, was not sharp. A dulled blade, listless and already rusting.
But the agony of losing her daughter, of losing Luke ... no knife wound could compare. She felt as if she had been split open, torn asunder, rendered into two.
Yes, there were two of her now. There was the Rhaenyra whose children all lived, looking up at her as if through still water, smiling and peaceful, her own hands grasping tightly to smaller ones. And there was the Rhaenyra who looked back at that reflection, staring down as if from a great height. Staring down alone, brow heavy with gold, hands empty.
She needed to do something. Now. If she didn't rise from this bed and move, she would lie here until she wasted away. And what then, would become of the kingdom? What would happen if its sole living protector, she who bore the burden of ice and fire, simply gave up?
Rhaenyra thought she knew grief – thought that in her three and thirty years, she'd at least tasted every kind of emotion. Now, as she stood from her bed, feet unsteady on the cool stone, she realised the truth. She only knew two things. One was that she wanted to die, and the other was that she had to live.
So Rhaenyra Targaryen, first of her name, Queen of the Andals, the Rhoynar and the First Men, squared her shoulders and once more took up her father's mantle.
She dressed quickly and practically. How odd, to clothe a walking hollow. It seemed strange that her dress stayed on at all; she felt as if it should pass right through her and crumple to the floor.
She moved through the castle like a spirit, ghosting over the floor’s gloomy, pitch-coloured rock. She had no mind to where she wandered. Everything felt painted grey; she was a white wraith, her pale hair and skin standing stark against the sea of black stone that made up her castle. There were no other shades in the world, because Luke had died, and taken all the colour with him.
In her mind’s eye, she saw Syrax. Proud and haughty, like her rider, but wise and steady too. It was then that Rhaenyra knew where she was going; the tug of their bond pulled at her, and she pivoted on her heel, longing to look in Syrax’s steely eye, feel her rough scales, press her aching brow to her dragon’s. She wouldn’t have to explain anything to Syrax. She wouldn’t even have to say a word.
Rhaenyra turned a corner and came face to face with Ser Erryk, standing half-lit under the arch before the northern wing’s staircase. His armour glinted in the feeble light spilling in from the long window.
“Oh!” she breathed, slightly startled. “Good morning, ser.”
Erryk looked even more surprised to see her than she him. He bowed his head quickly, but didn’t break eye contact.
“It is barely gone the hour of the blackbird, my Queen. The sun is not yet fully risen.” He shifted uncomfortably. “If I may be so bold – where is it you are headed?”
“Syrax,” she answered shortly. He looked momentarily alarmed, opening his mouth to protest – but another voice came forth instead, issuing from the dimness beyond the belt of light cast by the window.
“And to what end do you mount your dragon this morning, Your Majesty?” asked Lord Corlys Velaryon. He came clunking into view, leaning heavily on his driftwood cane. “I would caution you to take counsel first, not wing, in our response to the loss of Prince Lucerys.”
Rhaenyra sighed; she was surprised to find no anger rising inside her at his unsolicited advice, just another thick slosh of anguish. In fact, as she looked at Corlys’s weathered, set face, she noticed some of that same anguish looking back.
“I do not fly to war,” she said tersely. Every word cost her more effort than the last, but she knew it would take more than that to satisfy curiosity. She floundered a moment, and then said, “I merely seek your wife, the Princess Rhaenys. I would tell her of her grandson's death myself.”
Rhaenyra hadn’t meant for that to be true, had no intention of seeking out the Princess, but as soon as the words left her mouth, she felt their rightness settle into the air.
Corlys's face softened ever so slightly. “Of course, my Queen. I was going to greet her myself; I just saw Meleys approaching through our window. She is returned from her patrol of the Gullet with no news, I suspect.” Corlys paused, eyeing Rhaenyra up and down. She was too tired to feel self-conscious, or wonder what it was he was looking for.
“It is a terrible pain, the loss of a child,” he suddenly said, very quietly. “I am sorry you have come to know it.” There was an edge to his voice – and she knew what it was, tasted the tang of blame he laid, correctly, at her feet – but his eyes were sorrowful, and she knew he spoke truly.
It struck her that the both of them had lost a daughter and a son, one right after the other. The cloak of grief Corlys had surely shouldered six years ago came sharply into focus. He seemed older all of a sudden, bent by sadness.
No wonder he ran, Rhaenyra thought, even as she marvelled that Rhaenys hadn’t. She’d never even seen the Princess cry, she realised with a start. Rhaenyra felt something stick in her throat. I wish I could run. I wish I could fly away from here, get on Syrax and never return. I wish I had gone with Alicent when we were children, before all of this had happened.
She sensed, rather than saw, Corlys’s thoughts shift to Laenor. That ever-present guilt bit more sharply at the thought of him now. He’d been a sweet boy, and grown to be a kind and good man. Of how many men could that be said?
It could’ve been said of Luke, she thought. It would have been said of him.
“Thank you for your sympathy,” she said to Corlys. The words came out wooden and strange, but the heart of them was honest, and she could tell the Sea Snake knew that.
His stormy gaze met hers again. “Go to my wife,” he said, dismissing her with a wave of his hand. “Tell her we plan for war.”
Rhaenyra should have been affronted at his dismissal, but she was too distracted by her thoughts of Laenor.
Laenor, sailing off into the wide world, never to come home. Laenor, leaving his whole family behind. And he had done it at her behest.
How naïve they both had been. How arrogant, and how cruel.
Luke’s loss had opened a void inside her, and it was pulling at her edges like a tide pulled at sand. As she swept past Ser Erryk and up the staircase, she finally realised what she was going to do. She would tell Rhaenys not just of Luke’s death, but the truth of everything else. She would give back the gift of Laenor’s life, even as she had taken it away.
And she would do it because Rhaenys had never run away.
Daemon would be furious with her. But she found, as she reached the top of the stairs and pushed open the enormous wooden door that led to the winding path towards the Dragonmont, that she didn’t much care.
This would risk their entire allyship with House Velaryon, which meant risking her own throne too, but suddenly all that was nothing in the face of what she’d done. What kind of queen would she be anyway, if she took sons away from their mothers while they both lived? She needed to put down one burden, just one, set it at her feet and walk over it.
And she yearned for Rhaenys’s forgiveness, even as Meleys’s shadow blotted out the sun above her.
Don’t, came Daemon’s voice in her mind. She watched Meleys, red scales glinting in the warm pink of dawn, soar gracefully down to earth. Don’t tell her. You’ll ruin everything before it’s begun.
“No,” Rhaenyra muttered, mostly to herself, ploughing onward and beginning to climb the mountain. “I’m telling her.” It’s what Luke would’ve done, she thought. He had always been the kindest of her boys, the most gentle. His kindness had, she suspected, been something he’d inherited from Laenor, because gods knew neither she nor Harwin had been particularly soft of heart.
As she climbed, she saw the small figure of Rhaenys disembark elegantly from Meleys’s back. Her red armour, the same colour as her dragon, flashed in the rising sun.
At that moment, Rhaenyra felt a tug in her chest, and Syrax emerged from one of the caves dotting the mountain. Syrax, like her rider, had always been vespertine in nature, but Rhaenyra was not surprised to find her awake so early. She always came when she was needed. Her majestic head glittered in the dawn, and she roared in Rhaenyra’s direction. Above her, Rhaenys turned to follow Syrax’s gaze, and Rhaenyra felt the Princess’s eyes settle on her.
Rhaenyra inclined her head, first to her dragon, and then to her cousin. Syrax bowed her head in response, and settled on a jagged piece of rock, waiting for her rider.
Rhaenys, meanwhile, gave Meleys a quick, gentle pat on her nose, and began to descend towards Rhaenyra. Meleys curled up into a sleeping knot. One eye remained lazily open, trained on her rider.
Rhaenys walked calmly towards Rhaenyra, her boots crunching and sloshing over the daggered stone and volcanic mud.
We are a mirror of one another, Rhaenyra thought grimly as the two women drew level. Our dead children and our stolen throne stare back at us through the other.
“Good morning, Rhaenyra,” said Rhaenys neutrally. “The Gullet remains devoid of a soul beyond myself, Meleys, and some sensibly terrified fishermen. To what do I owe the privilege of a Royal greeting?”
“I come with news,” Rhaenyra said uncomfortably. The weight of everything she had to say felt heavier to her in that moment than her father’s crown.
The Princess just looked at her, sizing her up much as the Sea Snake had minutes before. Rhaenyra had always found that warm stare uncomfortable; Rhaenys gave the distinct impression that she saw everything at once, unblinking and unfettered. Rhaenyra had realised at a very young age that the Queen Who Never Was could not easily be swayed to a cause she thought unjust, nor stomach any form of falsehood. It was one of the reasons evidence of Laenor’s death had to be so carefully constructed. This was not a woman who could be lied to in sight of a heart tree. This was not a woman who would tolerate lies at all.
“I come to tell you of the death of my son, the Prince Lucerys,” Rhaenyra said, the words issuing from her mouth almost without thought or feeling. “His uncle, the Prince Aemond Targaryen, and Vhagar attacked him above Storm's End, and he ...”
The Princess Rhaenys, to her credit, did not even flinch. Rhaenyra thought she saw her eyes soften, but that could have been a trick of the dawn light as much as a sign of sorrow.
“He and Arrax were torn apart.” And tore me with them, she thought. I am in pieces now. And how can pieces hope to hold a realm together? It will slip through my fingers like sand through an hourglass.
“Last night, I received word that what remained of their bodies … washed ashore,” Rhaenyra said flatly. She shifted her weight from foot to foot, and tried to hide the worst of her grief. Casting her eyes down, she stared at the black mud beneath her boots.
“Oh, my girl,” said Rhaenys softly, and then she was beside Rhaenyra, pulling her in and holding her close. The scales of her armour pinched Rhaenyra's cheek, but she didn't care, didn't even feel any pain. She couldn't remember the last time she'd been hugged like this, and she thought fleetingly that perhaps the Mother was real, and her arms were around Rhaenyra too.
Of all the reactions she had expected, this was most surprising. That Rhaenys could still find it within her to give Rhaenyra sympathy, even as she blamed her for the death of her own son … suddenly, her touch hurt Rhaenyra more than it healed.
“You and I have both lost children to Vhagar, it would seem,” said Rhaenys quietly in her ear, and then Rhaenyra was burning. Her skin hurt, and she flinched back, reflexively stepping out of Rhaenys’s embrace. Embarrassed, she held her own arms to her stomach instead, as if to keep her body together even as her mind fell to pieces.
Rhaenys looked at her, slightly confused, but pushed the topic no further. “It is to be war, then,” the Princess said instead. Rhaenyra felt sudden tears sting her cheeks in the high, cold air.
“It cannot be less," she confirmed. “Luke is too high a price to have paid.”
Rhaenys’s mouth tightened. “When I lost my children, my wrath was such that I would have torched the world to hold them once more.”
Rhaenyra just nodded, unable to speak. She knew the feeling. And she had been the cause of that feeling in Rhaenys.
“Laenor,” Rhaenyra said suddenly, the words spilling out like bile, like a bird, like the babes from her womb.
Rhaenys looked at her sharply. Something of the same pain Rhaenyra felt flickered in those eyes.
“Yes,” Rhaenys said coolly. “I speak of Laenor.”
“No,” said Rhaenyra, willing the words to leave her mouth. “I mean … Laenor … He lives.”
Rhaenys, again, froze rather than flinched. Rhaenyra watched as decades of restraint, born from living inside the eye of a storm, flared to strangling life inside the older woman.
“... What?” Rhaenys’s voice was as ice, smooth and treacherous.
“He lives.”
“He what?”
Rhaenyra closed her eyes. She couldn’t look at anything, let alone another mother’s anguished face. “We … we faked his death. Fabricated it. So that he could leave with Qarl, and so that I …”
Rhaenys snorted, and the sound was terrible, humourless and cold. “So that you could marry Daemon.”
Rhaenyra had witnessed Rhaenys’s anger several times before, and her irritation more times than she could count. The blood of the dragon ran in the both of them, after all. Previously, Rhaenys’s irritation had been largely good-natured, her anger always justified. Usually, both had come from concern for Laena or Laenor more than anything else.
This was different. She sounded more furious than Rhaenyra had ever heard her, like she had swallowed that terrible storm from Rhaenyra’s dream and was spitting it out again, venomous and proud. Even the sound of her breathing was loud, clapping like thunder.
Rhaenyra opened her eyes, agonised. “Forgive me, Princess,” she begged. I did not know – the pain of losing ...” she bowed down, the weight of the realm, of all this knowledge, of all these dead children, suddenly too much to bear. Once again, she found herself unable to look Rhaenys in the eye.
Her knees hit the soft, wet mud. Rhaenyra could not remember the last time she had kneeled.
“I did not know a pain like this existed,” she finished, gasping, and the twisted snake of her agony rose in her voice. She wanted someone to rid her of this poison, pull it out like a weed from the earth, roots and all. She wanted someone to wash her clean again, to sew her back together. She wanted her mother.
Instead, she had the draconic rage of Rhaenys Targaryen, and the callous light of a Lukeless morning.
She watched as the other woman’s boots came into her field of view. “You mean to tell me,” Rhaenys said icily. “That you stole my son from me. That I mourned him, even as I buried my daughter?”
“Yes,” Rhaenyra said simply. She looked up, and Rhaenys’s frosted mask of fury was as terrible as any she had ever seen.
Disgust flashed across Rhaenys’s face. “Tell me true,” she demanded bluntly. “Does he still live?”
“I do not know. But I swear to you, six years ago, he left Driftmark alive. I have no reason to suspect he does not live still.”
“Why would he leave? Why would he leave Seasmoke? Why would he leave-”
In all her life, this was the first time Rhaenyra had ever witnessed Rhaenys unable to speak. But she heard the missing word anyway. Why would he leave me?
Because I asked him to, thought Rhaenyra. And because he too would have washed ashore on the rocks of unwanted duty before long. Just as Luke has, as my father did, as I surely will. Oh, Luke, my sweet boy, I am so sorry. So sorry.
“He went with Qarl,” said Rhaenyra quietly. “The two of them stole away in a boat that night, made for Pentos, even as Daemon …”
“Even as Daemon murdered some poor serving boy who was unfortunate enough to have Laenor’s build? Threw him in the fire for me and my lord husband to find? To mourn? Am I correct?”
Rhaenyra nodded.
“At least he is with Qarl,” Rhaenys muttered, more to herself than to Rhaenyra. “I had thought … for him to have been struck down by one he … and after Joffrey …”
She seemed to catch herself before the end of her sentence, and something in her expression shut itself off from Rhaenyra. That warmth she had so luxuriated in was almost entirely gone.
“Does my lord husband know?” Rhaenys asked flatly.
Rhaenyra shook her head. Her knees were starting to hurt from kneeling on the ground, but she could barely feel them. Her body felt like it belonged to someone else.
“So,” Rhaenys said after a moment. Her tone was still flat, as if she had locked herself away, and somehow that was even worse than her anger. “You took Laenor from me, and you watched me grieve. Now, knowing that pain for the first time, you come to me to – what, exactly? What do you want, Rhaenyra?”
The woman who had comforted her had vanished. The Queen who may have been – who should have been, said a voice inside Rhaenyra – had taken her place.
“Nothing. I want nothing.” Liar, said that same voice inside her. You want her forgiveness, and you are too cowardly even to ask.
“Then I take my leave of you, and fly to Pentos to see my son.”
Rhaenyra started. “You cannot leave,” she said, finally finding the strength to rise to her feet again.
“You keep my son’s survival a secret from me, and then forbid me to see him? How dare you,” Rhaenys spat.
Rhaenyra squared her shoulders again. She would not back down. Not now. Not after everything.
“I cannot risk being without your support,” she said.
“Do not lie to me,” Rhaenys hissed. “You cannot risk being without Meleys.”
Rhaenyra looked at her. Rhaenys was standing almost taller than she had ever seen her, her blonde hair whipping about her face wildly. She looked regal. She looked apoplectic.
“You’re right,” Rhaenyra said. “I do need Meleys. But I also need you. I need your counsel.”
Rhaenys snorted derisively, but Rhaenyra pressed on. “Truly, cousin, I do. You are the most experienced dragon rider alive, and possess still the most reasonable temperament. I need you around my table.”
Rhaenys looked askance at her, and Rhaenyra had the distinct impression she’d accidentally made a mistake.
“Queen Alicent said the same thing, you know. About my … temperament.” Rhaenys paused, looking as though she were drawing back words in her throat like arrows in a bow. “And then she said it should have been me. That I should have been the one to sit the Iron Throne.”
Rhaenyra took a step back, shocked. The pride that had been kindled in her from birth, that had been sparked by her father naming her heir, and stoked in the two decades since, flickered angrily inside her.
But then Rhaenyra looked at Rhaenys, and saw her as a mother, and as a Queen. Her anger died completely. She smiled, tiny and sad.
“It should have been,” she agreed. “Then none of this would have happened.”
Rhaenys’s shoulders relaxed, and Rhaenyra got the distinct impression she had passed some sort of test without even knowing it. “No,” Rhaenys said. “It would not have. But so say all who come to grief.”
Rhaenyra bowed her head.
“I will not leave now, for the love I bore my late cousin the King, and for the good of the realm,” continued Rhaenys. “That idiot boy of Alicent’s is no ruler. But you will allow me to tell my lord husband of Laenor’s survival and your deception, and I will follow where he leads. If he decides to depart, I am obliged to go with him.”
Rhaenyra met her gaze, steel against steel. “Agreed,” she said without shrinking.
“And when all this is done,” Rhaenys continued, “and you have your throne, you will allow me to fly to Laenor as soon as is possible. There will be no delay, at all, even if you think there a good reason.”
Rhaenyra agreed, and Rhaenys sighed.
“Either that, or we send for him now,” Rhaenys said. “Gods know we need riders. And Seasmoke must long for him almost as much as I do.”
Tears nearly pricked Rhaenyra’s eyes at that. Rhaenys would stay, then, and fight for her. It was more than she deserved. But Rhaenys had always shouldered more than her fair share of grace.
“I will leave that decision to you and your lord husband,” Rhaenyra said, and Rhaenys nodded.
Rhaenyra knew now that she would get no thanks, nor forgiveness, from the Princess. She suspected that only her love of family had stopped Rhaenys from commanding dracarys. That was probably more restraint than Rhaenyra herself would have shown, she thought wryly.
Without waiting for a dismissal, Rhaenys turned away from Rhaenyra and began to walk down the path towards the castle. She had gone no more than a few steps, though, when she pivoted back to face her.
“Rhaenyra,” said Rhaenys softly, looking up at her. “I am … sorry for your pain. I am sorrier too to say the burden will never grow lighter.” The tears Rhaenyra had been fighting rose in her throat again. They were like roses, blooming and scratching all at once. Rhaenys looked at her heavily. “You will never be as you once were,” she finished.
Then she left Rhaenyra alone on the mountaintop, wind swirling even as the sun began to rise properly. Rhaenyra watched her leave, the Princess’s back ramrod straight. It was hard to tell as she got further and further away, but Rhaenyra thought she saw one of Rhaenys’s gloved hands rise to wipe something off her face. As cruel as the world had always been to second sons, Rhaenyra thought, it was crueller still to firstborn daughters.
The Queen of the Seven Kingdoms sighed, and turned away from the Queen Who Never Was. She began to climb up to Syrax, longing for her dragon’s comforting warmth. She would go back down to the castle soon, where she would shoulder the twin burdens of ruling and mourning, but not yet. First, she would sit with her dragon, and cry for her son.