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She would never hear his voice or laugh again like it had been echoing in her head, his comforting soft tone, one of her first memories as she had fallen down some stairs, he was immediately there telling his girl that everything would.be alright. Or was it merely a play of imagination designed to betray her when the line between righteousness and madness faded?
Her father's death was inevitable, she knew it since she stepped into his room filled with the sweet scent of sickness and death. However the pure assumption that she wasn't beside him as he joined her lady mother shook the very base of her world. Her father always loved his family, unconditionally, and purely. The thought that he was sentenced to die in a dark room, sharing these last moments with no one but the Stanger had awoken her fury.
Those Vipers were letting Death to feast on his body alone made her blood freeze, by what right does the Tower pass judgment on the Dragon, using his fading fire to shelter herself but letting him down the second his fire goes out? They locked her sweet Kepa's body in that cold chamber for a week. They claimed to worship the gods but she would ask, where were they when the time had come for her father to meet his own gods? Did they think the Valyrian gods are merciful enough to overlook something like that? Had the Tower hoped the wrath of the dragon lords won't come for them?
She had lived barely nine years when her father named her his heir, her cloak was too big and her heart to broken still mourning the loss of her mother as the lords of the realm descended on their knees, pleading themselves for her and swearing on their gods, be it new or old. Perhaps oaths were nothing but words in the wind, she wondered whether the lords barely whispered her half-brother's name as they proclaimed him Aegon II King of the Seven Kingdoms and Protector of the realm. If the gods were real they have heard their whispers as well, forming their fate for betraying sacred oaths like the one they swore for her.
Her wasteless piece of a brother whom she hasn't seen sober since the last winter got her father's ruby crown, the same one Jaehaerys wore. The irony hasn't gotten lost, even on her. Mayhaps the gods decided to laugh at her and the serpents living in her home. She is truly the one who wronged them so much and now they draw out the punishment. Her uncle used to say that Targaryens were gods trapped in human form waiting for the great absolution when they could finally leave this weak mortal body and become a dragon, joining their ancestors.
But Rhaenyra didn’t feel like a god as the blood stained her thighs, her heavy black dress soaking with it. She couldn't breathe no matter how in the back of her mind she knew what was happening, yet her body refused to obey. The ground seemed to be coming closer and closer until someone saved her from hitting it.
She heard the screams even from the prison of her head, only failing to realize that they were coming from her own mouth. She heard multiple voices screaming for a maester, oblivion waited for her as she fell into its warming embrace.
“There is nothing we can do for her, my Prince, at least until the princess wakes up.” The voice of Maester Gerardys was the first thing she could register.
“She is your Queen now and you better do something unless you want to feel like how one becomes the supper of Caraxes, after all, every single of yours thinks they can play god behind the closed doors of the Citadel” Daemon was basically growling but somewhere under the edge of his voice, she could hear the desperation.
“My Prince needs to understand that it’s too early, her Grace’s body isn’t ready to give birth at all…. however, if we keep waiting the detachment of the womb will kill the mother and the child alike”
The sound of something shattering on the wall made her flinch. She could try to wake up for once, but the pain in her lower abdomen sent her back to being powerless.
“Daemon-”
Rhaenyra knew her voice was barely more than a whisper and yet he was holding her hand in no time murmuring valyrian into her ears.
“It hurts too much, I don't want to die uncle please don't let me go”
Her blood slowly made their white bedding look like it had been embroidered with crimson flowers. Her vision was blurry, whether, from the blood loss or her tears, she couldn’t decide.
“I could open her womb and try to save the child but at this stage, it’s no guarantee that it will live. And it would be fatal for the mother”
The air left the room, the moment Rhaenyra realized her uncle left her side a suffocating sound left the Maester’s mouth. She could see he was frozen as a statue fearing the dagger pressed to his neck, would cut flesh.
“You will do no such thing you are going to save your Queen no matter what. If she dies, you die with her. Have I been clear enough? “
The old man had no opportunity to nod but his voice sounded serious enough.
“Y-yes my Prince.”
Soon the room was filled with maids, who had been trying to keep up with every order of Gerardys. The light in the room was fading and then completely vanishing as Rhaenyra was made to sit then walk and sit again. She was only partly in control of her body trying to focus on Daemon as he held her through her suffering.
“Make her push My Prince, we can’t do anything if she is not willing”
Daemon seemed to have had enough of the servants because his face turned dark as he caressed his wife’s head. She already looked like she was half a foot in the grave and it was horrible enough to see it.
“Little dragon you need to do this for me, just a little more, then you can meet with our daughter.”
They both knew he was lying, no one could tell whether the child still lived or would be able to live at all. But sometimes lies were sweet elixir, fabricated not to poison but to heal. The constant screams turned her voice into a weak thing.
“I can’t-“
“I don’t care what you can or can’t do, you won’t leave me alone, you won’t leave us alone, you damn stubborn creature. I am not going to break the news to our children that their mother gave up! Can you hear me?”
He was gently shaking her, trying to burst the ember left in her into flames.
Her memories travel back to a different time, perhaps another life when she was nothing but a girl and her mother ended up butchered because apparently women only serve this sacred purpose. But Rhaenyra would never go out like that, she had a name to write in history books, the youngest dragonrider ever known, claimed Syrax at the age of seven would not greet the Stranger in a bed bleeding out.
So she squeezed her teeth and fought. For her children, her love, her future and most importantly for herself.
“Your grace I can see a head, just a little more”
If Rhaenyra had the energy she would have grumbled at the old man whose tone suggested her pain was just another experience for him to write down.
“ You can have the rat’s head later if you want but first get on with it”
She hissed.
“This is all your fault uncle, who wants to have children at eight and forty, I hate you!”
“No you don’t, now push” His words seemed to tease and anger her at the same time. So she grabbed his hands with even more force while throwing curses at him.
After everything, those moments seemed to go by all too quickly, and between grunts and desperate cries, Rhaenyra collapses on the bed as the child finally leaves her body.
“A girl Your Grace”
And there was silence, heavier than the winter snow in the north, someone cutting the umbilical cord as the babe left out a weak hiccup sound.
Maids share knowing looks, pointing out her size, and her weak voice.
“She is very early, You Grace, and will need special care but healthy babe otherwise
But as they put her daughter into her hands Rhaenyra knew she was going to prove everyone wrong.
“Visenya?” Daemon asked as their daughter wrapped her tiny fist around his finger.
“Visenya”
Like she could sense they were talking about her, Visenya opened her amethyst eyes so unlike their deep purple and lilac, so beautiful and innocent Rhaenyra smiled, despite her father's death and the war that was looming in their future Rhaenyra Targaryen was smiling.