Chapter Text
The hour is late when Alicent Hightower, Queen of the Seven Kingdoms, returns from the King's chambers.
She walks with an awkward gait, doing her best to keep his seed from leaking down her thighs, and her cheeks burn as she quietly thanks her sworn shield before stumbling through the open doorway and slamming it shut behind her. In the privacy of her own chambers, she can lean her head against the door, let the tears fall silently, and admit to herself that she has just returned from a particularly... difficult visit. She hardly had time to undress before Viserys ordered her to turn around and covered her head with a pillow. As his hands left bruises on her thighs and he rutted inside her from behind, she could hear him grunting out a name through the fabric covering her ears.
Aemma.
Just the memory of it makes her want to scream. All she endures for him, and he cannot even bring himself to acknowledge her presence when he is inside her.
She scolds herself. It is not her place to think such things. It is she who has failed time and time again to properly prepare herself to accept her husband as a wife should. In truth, she should be grateful; since he took at last to smearing that slimy jelly on himself before joining with her, the discomfort of the act has lessened considerably, and is now but a shadow of what it was that first agonizing night. There is no point in wishing for more. He will do as he wills, and she... will do as she must.
She does not have long to reflect on these truths, though. Mere moments after entering her chambers, she is startled from her reverie by the sound of a throat being cleared, and she turns, blinking, to see the King's daughter waiting atop her bed, legs crossed and a fierce scowl on her young face. Before she can even form the question that leaps to the surface of her mind--how, by all the Seven, had the Princess managed to enter her chambers undetected--the troublesome girl has already begun to speak.
"'Ser Criston protects the Princess from her enemies, but who protects the Princess from Ser Criston?'" Rhaenyra quotes, her eyebrow arched, her thin fingers drumming against the soft sheets beside her. "Isn't that what you said at court today, dear stepmother? It was on everyone's lips, you know. How you put my virtue to question before all the lords and ladies of the realm. Why, one would almost think you want them to believe mine own sworn shield is spending his nights defiling me." She smiles sardonically, pursing her lips. "Of course, that cannot be true."
Alicent heaves out a tired sigh and studies the girl before her. No, that is not quite right. At six-and-ten her stepdaughter is not a girl anymore, not really, but nor is she yet a woman; rather, she is at that peculiar age in which her eyes shine with the insolence of youth that thinks itself something more. She has swapped the modest beige dresses of years past for daring, low-cut gowns of red and black that accentuate her growing curves and also call attention to the fact that, nominally at least, she is the heir to the throne. The Queen thinks darkly upon the attention that these features bring from the countless knights and lords who blatantly lust after Rhaenyra's body and inheritance in varying proportions, and reflects that it does little to curb her stepdaughter's headstrong nature.
On any other night, Alicent would take that responsibility upon herself, and, after calling her stepdaughter an ungrateful brat or worse, would listen to Rhaenyra as she answered in kind, each tearing into the other with sharpened words until they parted, blood pumping with renewed anger and exasperation. On this night, though, she finds that she is in no mood for their usual games. Instead, she closes her eyes, leans back against the door, and murmurs, "What do you want, Rhaenyra?"
If the Princess notices her stepmother's unusual attitude, she does not show it. "I want to know what you were really thinking!" she exclaims. "Ser Criston is a good and honest knight. You and I both know he would never sully his white cloak as you implied he might on his own, so my only conclusion can be that you think I would seduce him into it. Do you think so little of me, stepmother?" There is a note of hurt in Rhaenyra's voice, and for a moment, Alicent is reminded of the first time the Princess called her by that title, of the anguished quiver in her voice before she spat it out like a curse. Then, she focuses back on Rhaenyra's words and has to suppress the urge to scoff.
Her own adolescence happened so long ago that it sometimes feels like prehistory, like it is composed of layers beneath layers that she would have to dig and scrape and burrow through to so much as touch it. Still, there are things she remembers, even from half a lifetime away. She remembers scurrying behind her older brother Gwayne as he took her out into the city under their father's nose, giggling madly all the while. She remembers listening in wide-eyed silence to the ribald tales his fellow squires exchanged as they drank and laughed. She remembers one of them exclaiming I swear, her cunt tasted like strawberries, and Gwayne's face going beet-red when she asked him innocently what that meant. And, of course, she remembers the moment she met the young Princess.
It is natural, she thinks, to remember endings.
The truth Rhaenyra does not want to hear is that it is not a matter of how much or little she thinks of her. Cole is only a man like any other, and white cloak or no, he is not immune to her stepdaughter's considerable charms. The Queen has seen the way his gaze lingers on the Princess, and though rationally she can hardly blame him for following his nature, it makes her blood boil nonetheless. Yet this is nothing compared to the sick, dizzy feeling that overtakes her when she notes how receptive of his attentions Rhaenyra seems, when she sees her laughing at some quiet word from her sworn shield or imagines her pressing soft lips to his in private. She wants to shake her, to scream at her that though she has bled for many moons now she is still not a woman in truth, still younger than the Queen was when she was wed to her father. She does not, cannot understand how her girlish fancies will curdle and wilt in the face of the harsh reality of the marriage bed.
She thinks of saying this. Of describing in gruesome detail the pain she will feel when she at last gives up her maidenhead. Of watching the light dim in her eyes as she realizes that dreams of romance and pleasure at the hands of a gallant knight are just that, and that only grim duty lies before her when she eventually marries. Of taking her by the shoulders and screaming in her face I am only trying to protect you, you ridiculous, shortsighted girl! Perhaps then she would learn to savor what remains of her girlhood, would not be in such a rush to give it away.
Besides, she thinks with a stab of sickening dread in her stomach, Prince Aegon is far too young as of yet, and if she marries before he comes of age...
She does not permit that line of thought to continue. Instead, she sighs again and steps forward, not meeting Rhaenyra's eyes. "I am sure I think as much or as little of you as you think of me, Princess," she says quietly. "Now, if that is all, I ask that you please leave me be. The hour is quite late."
There is a stillness in the air, disturbed only by the sound of their breathing, as the Princess leans forward. Her eyes have narrowed, and the way they study Alicent makes her shift uncomfortably in place. Several seconds pass, and then, at last, her stepdaughter breaks the silence with a single, quiet question.
"What's wrong?"
The Queen makes an impatient gesture. "The hour is late, as I said. I do not know why you presume something must be wrong. I--"
And yet, to her horror, she cannot bring herself to finish the sentence. It is like there is something in her throat, strangling her, and suddenly the Princess has risen from the bed to stand before her. There is a shadow in the girl's eyes, a serious cast to her lovely face as she reaches out to tenderly trace the tear tracks that Alicent realizes, belatedly, she must have seen the moment the distance between them narrowed.
"He hurts you, doesn't he," Rhaenyra whispers, and it is so like this foolish child to make something so simple out of something so complex. She knows nothing of duty, of sacrifice, of the chains of tradition that bind the real world together. She'll paint their lives as some grand romance, cast Alicent as the hapless victim, and smugly act as though she suddenly understands it all, even, the Queen now sees, if it means making her own father into the villain of the piece. It makes Alicent wants to scoff, to snap at Rhaenyra and tear into her until the soft, pitying look in her eyes hardens back into cold indifference.
She finds that she cannot.
It is as if a chasm has opened up under her feet, rooting her in place. She is caught, spellbound, as the shock and dismay on her stepdaughter's face gives way to determination that leads her to pull closer, to wrap her arms around Alicent in a maddeningly tender embrace. Gentle breaths tickle the auburn curls that fall around her neck as Rhaenyra lays one soft kiss upon her cheek, and then another, and then another, until, suddenly...
Her lips are pressed against Alicent's.
The kiss is clumsy and hesitant, inexperienced, yet her lips are soft and warm and unexpected and so unlike the King's that the Queen's mind goes blank for a moment. Her heart seems to stutter to a halt in her chest, and perhaps it is because of this, this brief moment in which she no longer works, that she leans in at first. A little sound comes from Rhaenyra's throat, a sound of surprise or perhaps delight, and she presses still closer, fingers sliding up the back of Alicent's neck to comb through her hair and massage her scalp. The way the Princess touches her is gentle as a dove yet sly as a serpent; it is as if the little minx has calculated the perfect way to drive her to madness. She can feel her stepdaughter's heart pounding in time with her own through layers of cloth and flesh, a drumbeat calling her, tempting her, luring her to the edge of a black pit of sin. At some point--she could not say exactly when--Rhaenyra manages to switch their positions, to swing Alicent around until she stands between the Princess and the bed. Though its sheets are made of the finest silks, never before have they seemed so inviting.
It is only when Alicent feels her stepdaughter's wet tongue probing insistently at her lips that she comes to her senses.
The Queen jerks away, ignoring the broken whine that emerges lewdly from her stepdaughter's throat as she does. Rhaenyra stumbles forward, the sudden movement having disrupted her balance, hands falling to her sides from where they had been slowly creeping down the Queen's back as if to feel as much of her as they could through her thin nightgown. Thus distracted, the girl does nothing to avoid the sharp, stinging slap that follows.
The Princess lifts shaking fingers up to the red mark her stepmother's open palm has left upon her cheek. Though it must smart, her eyes are dark, her pupils wide. Her tongue flicks out and slides slowly, sensually across her lips, as if to taste the Queen on them.
"There you are," Rhaenyra sighs. "I wondered if you were even still in there, underneath all the pomp and piety."
Alicent's heart is like a warhorse in her chest, galloping away. And by the gods, what has she done?
What has the Princess made her do?
"What... what in all the seven hells has come over you?" she chokes out, crossing her arms over her chest to stop herself from shaking. "What have you done?"
Rhaenyra steps closer again, driving the Queen to back up still further, until her the backs of her knees collide with the edge of the bed. "What have I done? Only what you wanted," the Princess says, her voice so soft it is almost a whisper, before she amends, "What we both wanted."
Alicent can smell her stepdaughter all around her, the smell of lavender and a hint of something else, a rich, musky scent that stirs up strange feelings from deep within her. She stammers out weakly, "Since you have apparently forgotten, I am a woman--and, and married, Princess! To your father, no less."
"Believe me, I've noticed," the Princess murmurs, her eyes drifting down. With a flash of horror, Alicent realizes that in crossing her arms she has inadvertently pulled the thin material of her nightgown taut over her breasts, leaving the outline of her nipples--far harder than they ought to be on such a warm evening, though she cannot imagine why--perfectly visible before her stepdaughter's greedy gaze. She lets out a quiet squeak, then raises her arms further to protect her modesty, doing her best to ignore the smirk that overtakes Rhaenyra's face. The Princess continues, "As for your marriage... your marriage is like a castle built on sand. Father does not honor you, nor protect you, nor love you. Not the way a husband should. Not the way I would."
Rhaenyra speaks madness, and Alicent cannot begin to fathom why. Surely she cannot believe the words that pass through her lips! And if she does not, then why could she possibly--
Realization strikes her. Her eyes narrow, and she pushes forward from the bed to seize her stepdaughter by the arm, eliciting a soft gasp in response. She understands now, can see only one explanation for Rhaenyra's behavior, even though the thought sparks both fury and a curious sinking feeling in her stomach. This is nothing but a vile trick, another move in this endless game they find themselves compelled to play. Clearly, the Princess means to tempt her into some temporary lapse of morals, which she intends to then leverage in order to wrest her from her position.
If she thinks Alicent will be so easily lured from the path of virtue, she has underestimated her stepmother dearly.
The Queen's voice is cold and harsh when she hisses out, "Do not presume to besmirch my loyalty to your father, Princess. He is the King! He rules and protects the Seven Kingdoms and our house, and I--"
"But he doesn't make you happy," Rhaenyra interrupts, and her voice is so heavy with pent-up emotion that it strikes Alicent dumb, the rage and certainty fading back into a sea of confusion. "Anyone with eyes can see that you are miserable with him. They'd only need watch you, and believe me when I say that I have. For years I've watched little else."
Brow furrowed and lips parted, Alicent can only watch as her stepdaughter reaches up to cradle her cheek and proclaims with glistening eyes, "I love you, Alicent Hightower. I think I always have, ever since I was a little girl. I knew you'd never look at me the same way, but I held on to hope, even when you were cruel to me. No," she corrects herself with a chuckle before continuing, "especially when you were cruel to me, I think. Because I took it as a sign that a part of you still cared."
Alicent's breath comes quickly in the following moments, the Princess waiting with bright, hopeful eyes for her answer. She reaches for the anger that consumed her before; yet in the face of her stepdaughter's earnest, honest gaze, she cannot find it. Finally, she wets her lips and chokes out, "Enough, Rhaenyra. Enough. You must not say such things. If anyone heard..." Her father's face, twisted into a scowl, flashes before her mind's eye, and she flinches before continuing, "Any hint of impropriety from the Princess could cause a scandal that would endanger your future prospects."
Rhaenyra, however, does not seem to share her concerns. "Do you think I have not heard the whispers, Alicent? All the lords of the realm seem to want to discuss of late is how my majority has come at last, how I should be married soon... and how my behavior puts my prospects in jeopardy." She shrugs carelessly. "Let them talk. Let the lords become reluctant to hitch their sons to my dragon's claws so she might carry them to glory. It is they who would benefit from such a match, not I. You think I am some silly girl, overeager to welcome one of them into my bed, but that could not be further from the truth. I do not wish to be married at all. Unless..."
She straightens up, raising her chin defiantly, before striking the tattered remnants of Alicent's composure with her deepest blow yet.
"I will be queen one day," the Princess says. "Not a consort but a ruling queen, as has not been seen in Westeros since long before the Conqueror forged the Seven Kingdoms into one. And when I am queen, I will change things. I... I could marry you. All the lords and septons could not stop us if we willed it. If any of them tried, I could make his castle into another Harrenhal, melt the marble walls of the Starry Sept, show them all what fate awaits those who defy the will of House Targaryen..."
Dimly, Alicent becomes aware of the way her nails are digging into her knuckles, almost hard enough to draw blood. She feels a crazed laugh bubbling up in her chest as her stepdaughter's impassioned rant continues. When you are queen? You naive, foolish girl, she wants to say. You will never be queen. The lords of Westeros will never suffer a woman to ascend the Iron Throne. No matter your threats, one woman, even a dragonrider, cannot subdue them alone. Not as long as they have an alternative to rally behind.
She does not say this aloud, of course. It would only serve to hurt the poor girl, to dash apart the hope that lies cradled within her, and Alicent finds that she does not wish for that anymore. The anger she felt when she thought her stepdaughter was trying to manipulate her into error is all gone now, and in its place there is only regret.
This is all her fault.
Alicent reaches forward, pulling her stepdaughter into a firm but gentle embrace. "Princess," she murmurs into silver hair as Rhaenyra gasps before slowly relaxing, "I understand why you are doing this. You are confused. You regret the... rift that has grown between us since I was wed to your father, and you mistake that feeling for something else. There is no shame in wanting to bridge that rift, but--"
Rhaenyra has stiffened in her arms, though, and makes as if to pull away. "How dare you," she says tightly. "Who are you to tell me what I feel, what I want?"
"No, listen to me!" the Queen insists, holding her stepdaughter tightly, urgently as she squirms in her grip. "I will not speak a word of what has transpired this night, but I need you to promise me something in return. You must promise not to do this again--not with me, nor with anyone else. It is against the gods." At Rhaenyra's responding scoff, she adds, "And if that is not sufficient, then know that it is also against your own best interests. As princess, as heir to the throne, your virtue must be beyond reproach."
Rhaenyra's lips are pursed. With her customary stubbornness, she objects, "Uncle Daemon says--"
The Queen's grip tightens, cutting her stepdaughter off. "Daemon. I should have known he was the one filling your head with this nonsense. I will speak with him."
Before she can rise and extricate herself, though, Rhaenyra pushes forward. There is an odd desperation in the way she flings herself upon her, carrying them both down onto the bed. Her skirt rises up as she parts her legs in order to straddle Alicent's thigh.
"Tell me you don't want this." She whispers the words into Alicent's neck, planting gentle kisses upon it before she leans in and breathes into her ear, "Tell me you aren't just dripping for me right now."
"Dripping?"
The confusion must show on Alicent's face, because her stepdaughter's eyes widen and then soften. She takes the Queen's hand, and Alicent watches, befuddled, heart pounding, as she pulls it down only to slide it up smooth, warm flesh, up and under her crimson skirt until suddenly it encounters damp cloth.
Alicent understands, then, what she is feeling. She understands what the strange sensation that has begun to gather between her own thighs is, too. What the Princess feels for her, and what she feels for the Princess. What she would feel for her husband, if she weren't so... wrong.
"Feel that," her stepdaughter breathes. "Feel what you do to me. How much I want you. And tell me that you don't feel the same."
She cannot help but wonder how it would feel if Rhaenyra's smallclothes disappeared, if they ceased their wretched interference and left nothing between her fingertips and her stepdaughter's bare, dripping cunt. As if possessed, she flexes her fingers. Rhaenyra's eyelids flutter closed, and her lips part to let out a little gasp.
"Do you do this when you are alone, Princess?" the Queen whispers.
"Yes," the Princess stammers. She looks so pretty like this, her lips red and swollen, her eyes blown out, her chest heaving.
"Do you think of me when you do?"
"Yes..."
Alicent watches, fascinated, as Rhaenyra's hips start to roll, grinding her clothed cunt against her stepmother's fingers.
"Do you think of anyone else?"
For the first time, there is a hint of shame on Rhaenyra's beautiful face.
The thoughts that come over the Queen then are... frightening. She imagines pushing the Princess down over her knee, pulling up her skirt, and smacking her bottom until she sobs, until she wails that she'll never, ever touch herself while thinking of someone else again. She imagines tearing away her smallclothes and plunging two fingers into her dripping cunt while she writhes in her lap, trying desperately to get away. She imagines withdrawing her fingers and raising them to her lips, there to taste the coppery tang of her broken maidenhead.
No, she doesn't just imagine. She... she wants.
She shoves the Princess away.
Behind her, in the corner of the room, stands a tall mirror, angled so that Alicent can see both herself and the Princess. She looks into it, now, unable as yet to meet Rhaenyra's eyes. With unkempt auburn hair and knuckles scratched red and raw, her own reflection looks wild, unhinged, as for the Princess, with her legs still spread wide even as she casts her lustful gaze upon her stepmother...
There is only one word Rhaenyra's reflection evokes: whore.
Alicent keeps her eyes fixed on the mirror. Her own brown eyes stare back at her. "You are no queen," she says shakily. "You are nothing but a deviant and a harlot, and you... you disgust me."
The words are every bit as violent as her imagined actions.
In the mirror, Alicent sees Rhaenyra flinch and draw back. At last, there is more than just a hint of shame in her eyes. Her lower lip trembles in anguish. It does not make Alicent feel as good as it should.
Finally, the Princess swallows, blinks, and tightens her jaw, before saying, "Well. If that is so, I suppose we have nothing more to say to each other, stepmother. Try not to think of me the next time Father shoves his withered old cock into your dusty cunt. You might actually enjoy it, and we certainly cannot have that. The gods might not approve, after all."
The Princess storms away, her departing footsteps echoing in the Queen's mind. Long after she has gone, Alicent continues to stare into the mirror. There is a mad part of her that wants to throw something at it, shattering her reflection into tiny pieces. There is another, equally mad part of her that wants to raise her fingers to her lips, flick out her tongue, and taste what remains of Rhaenyra upon their tips. She wonders if she would taste like strawberries.
She does neither. Instead, she eventually lowers herself to lie atop the covers. She tosses and turns, and at last falls into an uneasy sleep plagued by the look of devastation that her words inflicted upon her stepdaughter's beautiful face.
Alicent first meets the young Princess Rhaenyra the day she arrives in King's Landing.
Walking through the halls of the Red Keep, the Lord Hand's daughter takes in her surroundings with a mix of awe and trepidation. She has been left unattended for the first time since she stepped down from the carriage that brought her from Oldtown to be at her father's side for reasons as yet unknown, and her feet carry her past draconic heraldry and walls bedecked with tapestries depicting scenes of a bizarre and scandalous nature. A fierce blush rises to her cheeks after she pauses to peer at one of them--surely the old Valyrians did not do that with their dragons--and, light-headed, she averts her gaze and quickens her pace, not stopping again until at last she finds herself stepping out of the stone corridors and into the warm spring air of the Red Keep's godswood.
When she pauses to catch her breath, though, a curious sound reaches her ears. It is like the whimper of a distressed child, but it stops and starts abruptly, as though whoever is producing it is trying very hard to keep quiet. Brow furrowed, she casts her gaze about, and it is not long before it falls upon the source of the sound at the end of a dirt path.
There, under the shade of a red-leafed weirwood tree, a girl of seven or eight years sits hunched over, face buried in her tightly-gripped knees. Her dress is a long, modest, but clearly finely-embroidered gown of Arryn blue, and her hair is Targaryen silver. Occasional muffled sniffles filter through the material. At one point, Alicent thinks she hears her blow her nose.
Cautiously, Alicent picks her way toward the girl. Her shoes make hardly a sound as she traverses the dirt path. All the while, the face of the Old Gods of the North stares at her from the tree's carved face, and though she knows better than to put any stock in any god other than the Seven Who Are One, she feels an odd prickling on her neck, as if those pagan gods really are watching and judging her as she walks.
Alicent is a short distance away when the girl gives a start and looks up at her with bleary eyes and tear-stained cheeks. Her eyes are a striking, pale shade of violet, the color of lilacs, and if those are not enough to confirm that this girl is exactly who Alicent expected her to be, the impetuous frown that twists her young face surely is.
"What do you want?" the little Princess Rhaenyra huffs. Her voice is raspy, and her lower lip trembles as she speaks, and Alicent...
Alicent feels her heart melt.
"What is the matter, sweetling?" she asks, kneeling next to her.
The Princess turns her head away, a stubborn scowl on her face. "I don't want to talk about it," she mutters.
"I see. I suppose I shall have to talk about something, then. Let me see..." She makes a show of pondering, making a fist with one hand and resting her chin upon it as she studies the girl's Valyrian features, before a flash of inspiration strikes her. "You know, when my father and I were riding into the city this morning, a great shadow fell over our wheelhouse, and when I peeked out, I caught a glimpse of something flying overhead. It was long and red, like a serpent, and for a moment its wings eclipsed the sun. I don't think I've ever seen such a magnificent beast." She finds she is not lying; though the sight of the dragon certainly struck terror in her heart, it also inspired a sense of awe and wonder and underscored just how far from home she really was.
The Princess has perked up at her words, and Alicent congratulates herself mentally. Of course talk of dragons would be just the thing to distract her.
Rhaenyra begins chattering immediately, her words coming so quickly Alicent finds herself struggling to keep up with them. "That's my uncle's dragon, Caraxes! People sometimes say he's ugly, but I like the way he looks. It makes him stand out more, you know? He was probably out hunting; he likes to coast over the Blackwater and swoop down to pluck fish out of the sea. One time, I saw him with a fish in his claws that was this big!" She sits up and stretches her little arms out as wide as they will go, then widens her eyes in excitement as if something has just occurred to her. "Oh, I have a dragon too, you know! Her name is Syrax. I've had her since I was a baby; she's grown with me, although she grows a lot faster than I do. Would you like to meet her? Oh! And! One thing you should know first. Dragons aren't beasts," she says seriously, narrowing her eyes and tapping a pudgy finger on Alicent's nose. "Don't ever call them that; they need to know you respect them. They may not be able to speak to you the way I can, but they're as smart as any person. No, smarter!"
"Duly noted," Alicent laughs. "And as for meeting her... some other time, perhaps. My journey has been long, and I fear it has left me quite hungry, my lady." Her eyes widen, and she flounders for a moment. Was that the appropriate way to address the King's daughter? Should she have called her, instead, "Your Grace," or else "my Princess"? She cannot remember, though she is sure her father has addressed the subject in the past.
Thankfully, the Princess herself does not seem to have noticed or cared. Instead, she simply lowers her voice, and in a conspiratorial whisper, says, "Sometimes, after my lessons--listening to Septa Marlow drone on and on always makes me hungry, you see--I sneak lemon cakes from the kitchens when the cooks aren't looking." She puffs herself up and adds, "They haven't caught me once."
Alicent smiles. Eyes twinkling, she asks, "Can you keep a secret?" When Rhaenyra nods rapidly in response, she leans in and says, "I used to do the same thing when I was your age, back home in Oldtown."
"No," the Princess gasps.
"Oh yes, though I will admit I was not quite so skilled. In fact, once--gods this was humiliating--I was caught in the act holding a whole tray. I had just slipped out the kitchens when I came face-to-face with none other than the very septa whose lessons I had just left. I was so startled that I tripped over the hem of my skirt, the tray went went flying, and the cakes ended up splattered all over her gown." Her eyes lose focus, and she murmurs wistfully, "Mother gave me quite the scolding after that."
The Princess does not notice the shift in Alicent's mood; she has doubled over in peals of uncontrollable laughter, and only with great effort is she able to get out her next words. "I'll have to get you some of ours sometime. I bet they're better. It's the capital! Everything is better here." When her giggles have at last started to fade away, she adds with a faint blush, "Though I suppose Oldtown has its charms too."
In the silence that follows, Alicent forces a smile. She tries desperately to focus, to think of something else to say to keep the Princess distracted. It takes her a beat too long, though, and she watches as the grin falls from the girl's face while warm gusts of wind stir the red leaves overhead. The silence stretches on, and it is Rhaenyra, not Alicent, who ultimately shuffles closer, steels herself, and with the faintest tremble in her voice, breaks it.
"I heard the maesters talking with my father this morning," she says. "I didn't... understand everything, but they were talking about my mother, and the babe she's carrying, and the ones she's lost before, and..." She takes a shuddering breath before seeming to visibly force out the last words. "I think she's going to die."
Alicent thinks of her own mother and the smell of incense that lingered after the Silent Sisters wrapped her cold corpse. She thinks also of the old King Jaehaerys and how his weathered old faced had seized up and breathed its last as she sat reading at his side. She reaches out and carefully wraps an arm around Rhaenyra's shoulders.
"Queen Aemma is strong, Princess," she says. "I do not know what you heard, but I know that much. I will not lie to you and claim that I know what the morrow will bring, but... I know that she is going to fight with everything she has to stay with you."
The Princess swallows and gives a jerky nod. "That's what my mother said, I think. More or less. The childbed is our battlefield, or something."
"So she is not only strong, but wise as well. I should very much like to meet her."
Rhaenyra only hums, leaning into her touch and closing her eyes briefly. Then, they pop open, and she sits up in a burst of energy. "Wait! What is your name?"
Alicent allows a gentle laugh to fall from her lips. "I'll certainly tell you, but I cannot help but ask why you ask with such urgency, sweetling."
"You were nice to me," the Princess mutters shyly, looking down and hiding her eyes behind the curtain of her hair. "Mother is always saying I should try to remember people's names when they're nice to me."
"Well, we wouldn't want to disappoint her, would we?" Alicent teases before adding with a soft smile, "And my name is Alicent. I am the Lord Hand's daughter."
"Alicent," the girl says slowly, as if to sense out how it feels on her lips. "That's a pretty name," she decides, and burrows deeper into her new friend's arms.
And though Alicent is barely more than a child herself, she sits there in the shade of the heart tree and under the eyes of heathen gods, and she comforts the little princess like a mother would, petting her hair softly as she cries.
It is with great fury and righteous purpose that the Queen storms through the halls of the Red Keep. Prince Daemon's door is unguarded, and so when she arrives at it she does not stop to wait but simply bursts through, heedless of the sounds coming from within... and then freezes.
The Prince is not alone. There are two women in the room with him.
The first sits, fully-nude and with legs spread wide, at the head of his bed. She is objectively beautiful; her hair is long and black, her breasts are small and firm, and her well-defined abdominal muscles make an alluring sight of her bare stomach. Her features strike the Queen as Essosi (from one of the Free Cities, perhaps, or possibly even further), and there is an intense, almost seductive look on her face when she casts her gaze to the door to identify the source of the interruption.
Yet it is not this first woman who truly captures the Queen's attention. No, that honor belongs to the second, the one standing bent over with her head between the first's thighs while Daemon holds her arms behind her back and fucks into her from behind.
Alicent cannot tear her eyes away. This second woman has the distinctive silver hair that marks her as a descendant of Old Valyria, and for one heart-stopping moment, Alicent mistakes the woman for her stepdaughter, thinks it is the Princess who is moaning like a whore while she takes her uncle's cock and burrows her head between another woman's thighs. But no; though she cannot see the silver-haired woman's face, on closer inspection it is clear that her hair is not quite the right shade, her limbs not quite the right length.
A strange mixture of emotions overtakes Alicent at the thought. Relief that her first impression was not correct, certainly. Anger that it was even a possibility she needed to consider, as well. There is more, though, and she finds herself feeling somewhat afraid to discover what remains.
Rather than interrogate her feelings too closely, she focuses on the scene before her.
She can hear the slapping of wet skin against wet skin as Daemon thrusts repeatedly into the second woman. She can see his red, stiff cock, sliding in and out of puffy pink folds. She can smell a familiar musky scent, one that first caught her attention the night before, one that she now recognizes must be arousal. Little muffled sounds come from the second woman's throat as the black-haired woman makes a fist in her silver hair, holding her head in place as Daemon pushes her forward again and again, and is that her tongue Alicent sees against the first woman's--
"Ah, if it isn't my brother's beloved wife," Daemon's voice rings out carelessly, if also a bit breathlessly. "If you'll allow me a moment, I'll be with you shortly." His thrusts pick up speed, and then, with a grunt, he pulls out. His cock erupts, spraying seed across the silver-haired woman's back.
Alicent knows she should look away. Yet still, for some unknowable reason, she finds she cannot. There is something strangely fascinating about the sight of the milky white liquid dripping down smooth skin, settling at first into the grooves created by muscle and bone beneath the woman's bare flesh and then sliding loose once more when those muscles flex and shift. Even defiled as she is, she continues to lap dutifully at the black-haired woman's cunt. Her right hand, now free of Daemon's grip, slips down between her own thighs, and Alicent's mind flashes back to what she did--no, she corrects, what the Princess made her do--the night before. She stifles a gasp.
"But forgive me, my Queen! I should not neglect to introduce you to my companions." Daemon gives a mocking bow, his softening cock jiggling almost comically between his thighs as he does, and flings his arm out, gesturing toward the black-haired woman. "This is Mysaria. And the girl with the talented tongue... remind me, what was her name again?"
Mysaria's voice is breathy, an inscrutable look on her face when she says in a thick Lyseni accent, "Her name is Shiera." Her fingers comb through Shiera's silver hair.
When Alicent says nothing in response, still rooted to the entryway, the wryly amused look on the Prince's face morphs into a sneer. "What? Surely you aren't scandalized. You've taken my brother's cock plenty of times, you must have. Or do you make him fuck you through your clothes, hidden in the dark, never looking upon each other's naked bodies because to do so would be a sin against your precious Faith?"
At that, the Queen gathers herself at last, stepping forward into the Prince's room and closing the door behind her. "I suppose I should not be surprised at your debauchery while your lady wife languishes at home, alone and forgotten," she begins, raising her chin. "If anything your decency in not spilling inside this girl is what ought to surprise me--I'd have thought you would have little compunction about siring a bastard or two on your playthings. Though you need not have bothered. I assure you that if your goal is to offend the Faith, you do so just as much either way. Whether by performing such acts purely for the pleasure of it, with no hope of producing a child, or by filling this girl with your spawn, you are equally sinful in the eyes of the Seven."
"Ah yes, of course," Daemon says, nodding theatrically. "I never can remember all of these rules. Do not misunderstand me, Your Grace. I would be perfectly willing to find release inside her; it's just that she looks so pretty covered in my seed..." He trails off in a way that seems to deliberately imply something. The Queen cannot imagine what it could be.
At that moment, Mysaria lets out an unseemly groan that has Alicent's ears burning. Her thighs press together around Shiera's head, and as she tips her head back, all her muscles seem to tighten at once before suddenly relaxing. Falling back on the bed with a sigh, she releases the silver-haired woman, who wastes no time in scrambling up onto the bed, bracing her knees on either side of Mysaria's stomach, and rubbing herself frantically back and forth across those well-defined abdominal muscles Alicent caught herself admiring when she first entered the room.
As discreetly as she can, Alicent presses her legs together under her skirt.
Daemon, meanwhile, has padded his way over to a small table nearer both to the entryway and to Alicent. A glass of water sits atop it, and he helps himself to a sip before turning to her and asking with narrowed eyes, "Now, would you mind explaining why you have decided to grace us with your presence?"
Composing herself, the Queen tilts her head back to meet his eyes in an accusatory glare and says, "You have been filling the Princess Rhaenyra's head with ridiculous notions."
Daemon's eyes widen, and he seems to be fighting a smirk. "I see. And just what are these ridiculous notions, my Queen?"
"They do not bear repeating. Just heed my warning, Prince Daemon: neither the King nor I will suffer you to continue your attempts to... corrupt her. If you cannot bring yourself to treat her with the dignity and respect her position commands, then stay away from her."
Daemon takes a moment to respond. When he does, his voice is low, dangerous. "So it is on my brother's behalf that you have come, then?"
The Queen steels herself before replying, "I am certain that I speak with his voice on this matter."
The Prince sets the glass down carefully, and then he begins to stalk forward. He still has not bothered to cover up, and her eyes are drawn with trepidation to his cock. It is hard again, and shining, and she realizes with a start that it is still covered with slick left by Shiera's cunt. When he backs her up against the door and wraps one strong hand around her arm, she lets out a quiet gasp.
She is sure that she has never experienced physical attraction to her husband's brother before, not even when she was young and unwed and he seemed the dashing knight, the younger, more handsome alternative to the man her father wanted for her, rather than the scoundrel she has since come to know him to be. She is sure, also, that she is not experiencing it now. Yet there is something about this situation that evokes a strange reaction in her. Against her will, her eyes are drawn to the two women on the bed. Mysaria's inscrutable gaze is fixed upon her, and as for Shiera, her movements have grown increasingly choppy, her sweat-slicked hair tossing back and forth with each rotation of her hips, and every couple of seconds a frustrated wail emerges from her throat. If Daemon were to push her down and force that slick cock of his between her lips, would she taste Shiera on it? If he pushed up her skirt and pried apart her thighs and tried to slide inside her, would Shiera's residual arousal make it easy for him?
She is horrified to realize that he wouldn't even need it. Years of trying and failing to prepare herself properly for her husband, and somehow, now, her body has deigned to do what it was designed to do. It is enough to drive one to madness.
"So," she says, her voice trembling only slightly, "Now we see the true depths of your depravity. Do you hate your brother so much that you would defile his wife just to get back at him? Unhand me."
For one terrifying moment, he just smirks. Then, with a chuckle, he pushes back, spins away. "Peace, my Queen," he says, sauntering back to the table where his glass awaits. "While you are no doubt a remarkably beautiful woman, I fear you are not to my tastes."
At that, something inside Alicent shifts. The fog that settled over her mind when she entered the room and saw the vile activities its current occupants were engaged in lifts, and she feels the fury that consumed her as she made her way through the halls of the Red Keep resurface with a vengeance. How dare he speak in so cavalier a tone of his "tastes," when they both know perfectly well what his words imply? How dare he treat his niece's virtue as fitting subject matter for his careless jests?
She charges forward, sees his eyes widen in surprise when she takes hold of his arm and leans in close. "Do you think I am blind?" she spits, struggling to keep her voice low. "Do you think the marked resemblance between your plaything and my stepdaughter is lost on me? I see the way you look at her. I know you Targaryens have queer customs, but she is not your sister or your cousin! She is your niece!"
He shrugs. "I've no idea what you're talking about." Before she can erupt once more, he continues, "But, suppose I did. Closer unions have been made between my kin. It's how we keep the blood of the dragon strong. Not that you would know anything about that, Lady Hightower."
She stares at him, aghast, before grinding out, "As I said, I know about your customs, the reasons behind them, and the allowances the Seven in their wisdom have made for them. Unions between siblings may be closer by some measure, but that is beside the point." There is a strange ringing in her ears, a howling in her chest as her mind works to resolve the question of what it is that truly vexes her so. Daemon is well over a decade Rhaenyra's senior, she tells herself. His proper role as her uncle is to guide and protect her, and for him to betray that role, to seek to prey upon her instead just like every other man in this gods-damned keep--
Her mind flashes, then, to an image first of the King, and then of her own father. You might wear one of your mother's dresses. Before she can dwell overmuch, though, she hears Daemon's voice cutting her off.
"Ah, you misunderstand me," he says casually. "I was not referring to that well-known practice. No, I was referring to something older, something that dates back to the days of the Old Valyria. You might recall, my Queen, that how we first bonded with the dragons is something of a mystery. Some say we used blood magic to chain their wills to ours. Some say they bestowed their favor upon us freely, making it a gift, a reward for some service rendered."
He takes a step forward, closing in on her once again, and lowers his voice to a whisper, as if to keep his words private between the two of them. Alicent feels a chill run up her spine. "Some even say that the service in question was of a decidedly carnal nature, making the phrase the blood of the dragon far more literal than is commonly assumed. Well, you've seen the tapestries."
A smirk splits his face at that, and Alicent can only stare, dumbstruck, as he steps away again, tossing over his shoulder, "No one knows the truth, of course. Any reliable record was lost with the Doom. But one thing is sure: in those early days, few indeed had the gift. Our ancestors were well aware of how precious it was, and to preserve it, to ensure that it would pass on through the generations, there was no taboo they would not break. They did not stop at joining brothers with sisters. Fathers would fuck their daughters. Mothers would fuck their sons. There are even stories, though I do not know if I believe them, of cases in which one or more of the parties involved exhibited certain draconic features, allowing fathers and sons or mothers and daughters to breed as well. And compared to that, even an uncle and his niece would not be so shocking, would it?"
"Certain... draconic... what?" Alicent sputters. She feels a fit of hysteria coming over her, the ringing in her ears growing louder and louder.
"Forgive me, Your Grace; I should have known someone with your background would not be as familiar with certain details as someone born into this family would be." At another time, the thinly-veiled insult might have driven her into a rage, but now she can only listen as Daemon explains, "Dragons have no fixed gender, you see. Their forms are as changeable as the flame itself; one year, Syrax might mate with Caraxes and bear his offspring, only for Caraxes to be the one to lay eggs the next. We call them by male and female names, but in truth that is something we have imposed upon them, not something inherent in their natures. They are majestic, wild creatures, unbound by the structures and strictures of mankind. I suppose that pretending they are more similar to us than they are helps us to cope with that fact."
He pauses for a moment and casts his gaze back toward the bed, where Shiera still rubs herself back and forth rhythmically, like an animal, atop her mistress. Her whimpers have grown increasingly distressed as the conversation has gone on, and there is a look of boredom on Mysaria's face. Suddenly, Daemon's eyes alight with a cruel, mocking gleam, and he says to Alicent, "Wouldn't it be something if those stories were true, though! Imagine, goodsister, what life would be like if you were like a she-dragon, if you could sprout a cock of your own whenever the mood struck you. What would you do with it, I wonder? Would you remain pious and chaste, and keep it bound up beneath layers of green? Or would it have a will of its own, the way it sometimes seems ours do, and yank you about by the hips until you took it out, strode up to some willing whore like dear Shiera there, and," he smacks his palms together, "rammed it home?"
The Prince seems to find the idea hilarious, and a part of Alicent starts to form a retort: something about how mayhaps in such a world he would be able to fulfill one of his own fondest wishes, and be the Visenya to his brother's Aegon in a way that went beyond mere metaphor. She cannot bring her lips to form the words, though, for the rest of her has been consumed. The ringing in her ears has reached a crescendo as she thinks about the scene Daemon described. As she thinks about the vile, deviant behavior of the Targaryens' distant Valyrian ancestors.
As she thinks about her stepdaughter's tongue pleading for entry between her closed lips.
Daemon, meanwhile, observes her reaction closely, a strange look on his face. In a daze, she reflects that this is probably just want he wanted: to shock her with his talk of depravity, to coax a look of disgust from her (for surely her face could show nothing else) and revel in having shaken the pious queen to her core. And yet, what follows next is... odd.
The Prince squints briefly before his eyes widen as if he has found something unexpected. He opens his mouth as if to speak, then stops, closes it once more.... and lets out a high-pitched giggle.
This shakes the Queen out of her trance. "What? What?" she snaps furiously, but he just shakes his head, still laughing.
"Oh, I could tell you, I suppose," he says, and his knowing smirk serves only to vex her further, "but I think it would be more interesting to let you work it out for yourself."
At the offended, exasperated look on her face, he only laughs harder.
A blur of motion from the bed catches the Queen's attention then, along with a loud exclamation of "Enough!" Mysaria has pushed Shiera off, leaving a shiny strip on her stomach and eliciting a wail as she sends the other woman tumbling to the floor.
Alicent watches, unblinking, as Shiera scrambles to her knees and starts to babble almost incoherently, "No, no, mistress, please, I promise I'm close, just give me a little longer--"
The silver-haired woman squeaks when Mysaria slaps her wet cheek before taking hold of her chin and saying with a disapproving tut, "You have had long enough, girl. If you cannot find your release in the time allowed to you, you do not deserve it."
Something stirs within Alicent then, at the sight of Shiera groveling at the other woman's feet. It's pathetic, she tells herself. It's obscene.
It's intoxicating.
She steps forward, as if caught on a hook.
Mysaria's eyes widen in surprise when the Queen approaches the bed and lays a gentle hand on Shiera's bare shoulder, startling her into twisting her head around to meet the Queen's gaze in the process. Even Daemon has gone quiet.
The girl is younger than Alicent had expected her to be, though still older than the Princess by several years at least. Her eyes are red-rimmed, her hair messy with sweat and her cheeks glistening with other fluids. Alicent can hardly stand to see the results of the cruel treatment to which Mysaria and Daemon have subjected her; her determination to intervene intensified, she draws herself up to her full height and, in a stern but kind voice, asks, "Do you know who I am?"
"Y-yes, Your Grace," the girl stammers. Her lip still quivers, and surely it is only protectiveness that leads Alicent to reach forward and cup her cheek where Mysaria slapped her, to run her thumb lightly over her damp lower lip. She can feel her palm sticking slightly to her skin. The girl's lips part slightly, and she lets out a quiet gasp.
"I will not presume to tell you how to live your life," the Queen says. "I do not know what twist of fate has led you to into this Mysaria's employ, and if you wish to remain with her, I will voice no protest. However, know this, sweetling: if you ever need somewhere to go, there is a place for you among my handmaids. I believe myself to be a fair mistress, and I dare say from what I have seen I will treat you better than your current one does."
And it is with an odd sort of glee that she turns from the girl that looks so much like her stepdaughter, letting her hand fall from her cheek after giving it the lightest of tugs to dislodge it. The amusement in her goodbrother's eyes is gone, replaced by astonishment and a hint of anger.
Good, she thinks as she walks by, meeting his gaze with a thin smile. She was only ever a substitute for the one you truly wanted.
She does not notice the calculating look in Mysaria's eyes when she leaves. She does, however, feel Shiera's eyes fixed on her departing back. Weeks later, when the girl arrives at the door to her chambers clean and fresh-faced and ready to work, she welcomes her in with a smile.