3. Sorry About the Blood in Your Mouth
"Sorry about the blood in your mouth, I wish it was mine."
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My dearest darling girl,
I hope you are faring well. We all miss your presence here, Lucerys and the boys in particular. They all have things to tell you and sometimes the distance feels like too much, although I realize it has only been a few days.
I hope that your husband is treating you well, but I would expect nothing less from my brother. From what I have seen for myself, he cares for you deeply, so perhaps you shall be content in your marriage. Such is the hope of every mother for their child, is it not? I will admit, however, that your mother is a selfish creature, who wishes you could have remained with her forever.
You were my child first, before you were anyone else's. Was it so wrong to hope that you could have remained mine longer?
Oh, look at me, blathering on so. The babe must be making me sentimental. Only a moon left and yet I already cannot wait to see her. Yes, her. I have not told anyone just yet, but it is a girl this time, I am certain. I will name her Visenya. You shall have a sister, and I will have four darling girls. Perhaps the gods are sending her to me as a consolation for not having you anymore.
Give my greetings to your grandsire. I fear he is not long for this world and I wish to be with him during his final hours. Perhaps you might lend him strength until I arrive. I find myself not up to riding these days, but as soon as this sickness passes, I will make my journey to King's landing at once.
The boys are doing well. Jacaerys is shouldering his responsibilities as heir well enough, and the younger ones are growing up to be fine boys indeed. Aegon and Viserys miss your nightly tales, but Joffrey has already laid claim to your chambers. He says you have a better view of Dragonmont and the bay. Worry not, I am certain we will be able to evict him should you like to visit us.
I worry for Lucerys though. He is a quiet boy, not as sure of himself as the rest. He is afraid to inherit Driftmark, to bear the responsibility I have placed upon him. Perhaps it is indeed too much for his gentle soul, the gods know that such positions are quite a burden. In another life, I think he would have enjoyed learning at the citadel.
Our Lucerys as a maester, can you imagine? I think he would have been suited for it. He was always so taken with Maester Gerardys and his work.
I had an interesting conversation with him this morning. The sweet boy thinks he cannot be as great a ruler as Lord Corlys. What's more, he thinks that I am perfect. How comical, when these days I feel anything but.
Perhaps you might ease his mind about his worries when you write to him. Tell him that he is capable of the responsibilities I have placed upon him. Tell him that his mother will prepare him as best she can and that his family will always be there to support him. I have told him as much, but he has always listened to you better in most things. I think he took your departure the hardest, so write to him as often as you can, my love. I have seen how your letters light up his entire countenance.
He said he had something of great importance to tell you, but he won't say what it is, so I shall leave it for you to discover. He is adamant about visiting you on your name day, so he will probably tell you then, if his raven doesn't find you first.
I do not wish to force your hand but you are so dearly missed here. Perhaps you and Aemond might like to spend a few moons with us here in Dragonstone. It will be an opportunity for your husband to see your childhood home.
I have rambled on long enough now, but do let me know and I shall make the arrangements.
With all my love,
Your mother.
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Aemond crumpled the letter in his hands, frowning as he did so. Irritation picked at his nerves. It was quite hypocritical of his half-sister to refer to him so fondly when she had never made any efforts to endear herself to him over the years. It was obvious that his mother had already gone over the contents of Rhaenyra's letter, the broken seal a testament to it, so he could not imagine why she asked him to deliver it to Daenys. It would only further alienate her from their cause if she was reminded of her loyalties to her mother.
Still, he supposed it made sense. He had always known his mother to be a kind-hearted person, even if she wasn't able to put her compassion into words. For all he knew, this was her attempt at mollifying his grieving wife, by giving her a piece of home. It must have been penned quite a while ago, before the death of King Viserys, before the death of Lucerys.
He felt the resentment begin to climb up his throat along with the bitter bile of regret. Reading that letter had been too much of an intimate look at Daenys's relationships with her family. He knew his half-sister's family functioned differently from his own, but he couldn't help but feel deprived, as if something had been taken from him, something he never even had to begin with.
A father. A family that was not so disjointed.
"I am just going to leave this here then," he placed the crumpled scrap of parchment beside Daenys and turned to leave.
"I will never know what he had to say to me," she hissed, interrupting his departure. "I will never...I never got to write to him. I never got to tell him that he would have made a brave Lord of the Tides. I will never get to tell him how much I- I will never get to tell him anything and it is all your fault."
"You must know how sorry I am, truly."
She sat up straighter then, scrubbing her face with her sleeve, leaving it reddened and blotched. A little of her fire had returned to her eyes, and Aemond wasn't quite whether to rejoice that for a moment his Daenys had returned, or lament that she had only done so out of loathing for him.
"Your apologies mean nothing to me so cease them at once! You cannot bring him back, can you? No, you cannot, so I do not want any more empty words. He died scared and alone and I just know that his last thoughts would have been of mother. Of how he had failed her, of how he'd failed Lord Corlys. And I will never get to tell him that he could never fail us, not ever."
The one-eyed prince turned to leave again, no longer being able to stomach the derision she threw his way. Maybe that made him a coward but he did not care. He could not bear to see the sharp hatred in her eyes anymore, not when she had only ever looked at him with warmth before.
Daenys's hand shot out and grabbed his arm before he could depart, her nails digging into his arm.
"Wait..."
It took her a while to gather her words. She pawed at her face again and swallowed her hiccups as she took deep shuddering breaths to collect herself, equal parts sorrow and rage.
"I need to know. I need to know what you said to him last. What his last words were. Is there...is there anything of him left?" she choked on the last word.
Aemond hung his head, refusing to meet her searching eyes. What was there to say? Whatever last words his nephew may have said meant nothing now, swallowed up by the wind and the waves. Why the bastard boy was flying in the direction of King's Landing instead of returning home to Dragonstone, Aemond did not understand back then, and now he certainly would never know.
Lucerys Velaryon's last actions would remain forever a mystery.
"Tell me what happened," Daenys repeated.
"Aegon told you most of the story. There is not much more to it I'm afraid."
"Tell me anyway. I want to hear it from you. Every single detail."
"It will only hurt you. I do not wish to cause you more pain."
She smiled bitterly, her fingers digging harder into his arm. Her nails would leave marks, perhaps even draw blood, but he could not make himself pull away. He relished in the pain because at least this way she was touching him. She was speaking to him.
"You have hurt me enough already. What's a little more? This time I am asking for it. You owe me this much."
"I cannot speak of it again."
"Do not act as if you are the victim! As if you are the one in pain! Not when this is all your fault!" she was seething now, as if she was mere moments away from flinging something at his head.
"I do not wish to speak of it because of what it'll do to you."
"How much worse could it be? I just...I just want to hear it from you, instead of your idiot brother."
Aemond met her gaze and sighed in defeat as he began to recount the tale again, and every time he'd try to gloss over certain parts, her grip would tighten and she'd ask him to reiterate.
"What. Did. You. Say. To. Him," she asked for the umpteenth time, speaking as if each word pained her, her hold on his arm becoming almost deadly.
He was nearing the end of his tale, and he wanted to stop speaking. He wanted to stop but he had the mouth of a waterfall and his wife's attention was far too compelling.
"I tossed him my knife. Told him I would not blind him but that he would have to give up one of his eyes."
"And what did my brother say to that?"
"He said he would not fight me because he was there as a messenger only..." Aemond paused.
"Continue!"
"No."
"Aemond..."
She said his name. It had been so long, but she had still said his name, except now it sounded different, the syllables harsh and unforgiving.
"Do not make me say it, please."
"You are in no position to plead with me," Daenys sneered.
"I cannot do it."
"You owe it to me."
"I told him I would...that I would take his eye out myself," Aemond took a deep steadying breath, his gaze dropping to the floor, "and I called him a...a..."
"A bastard," his wife finished softly, her breathing almost ragged. "You called him a fucking bastard, didn't you? It is your favourite insult to leverage."
"I am sorry."
"You know that means nothing to me. Do go on. What happened next?"
"I...your brother...he departed on his dragon, and then... well, you know the rest."
He considered telling her the rest of it, about how Maris Baratheon's words needled into his skin and burrowed into the recesses of his mind, filling him with fury and resentment. It felt too much like an excuse though, and he knew exactly what she'd say in response. She'd call him a coward again, trying to blame his misdeeds on someone else. She'd scorn him for dragging the Baratheon girl into a fight that wasn't hers to begin with.
No, he wouldn't mention Maris at all. It would be utterly pointless.
The one-eyed prince watched helplessly as his wife dropped his arm as if she'd been scalded, as if the mere touch of him burned her.
"Why?"
It was only one word, but he found himself unable to answer. What could he say anyway? What could he possibly say that would mollify her, that would ease her pain, and make her more forgiving? He could bring up his eye again, but the truth of it was that it was never truly about his eye.
Aemond Targaryen hated Lucerys for the privilege he held, for getting away with maiming him, for being absolved of his crime while his own wounds were left to fester. His hatred had spread through him like a sickness, like rot, bone-deep in its misery. The gods were cruel, and everything his nephews were freely handed, he had to scavenge for. Everything they received in abundance, he had to make himself content with crumbs of.
For him, King Viserys's trueborn son, to be set aside in favour of a mere bastard was inexcusable and it was this that he could not let go. It was this unpunished crime that led him to take justice into his own hands, and follow his nephew out into the storm.
It was always going to happen. Lucerys Velaryon had been dead from the moment he stepped into Lord Borros's castle, from the moment he set eyes on Aemond. The Stranger had already staked its claim on him, just as his one-eyed uncle had, and no amount of remorse would change the fact.
An eye for an eye made the world go blind.
Aemond Targaryen would soon come to learn the true meaning of that, and it would be his wife, who would make him see it.
Right now though, she was chewing on her lips again, mulling over his words in contemplation, formulating her response. Her fury distracted her from her grief, but it was not a welcome respite.
"You called my brother a bastard...after swearing to me that you would never do so again. Does your word truly mean so little?" she finally spoke, her voice sombre. "And how hypocritical of you. If he is considered a bastard, then so am I, or have you forgotten, lord husband? Have you forgotten that you married a bastard, something you consider to be less than a person? Or have you perhaps always scorned me for my supposed inferior birth?"
Lord husband.
Her words dripped with venom, and he marvelled at how she could make what once were his favourite words sound like poison.
"You are not inferior."
He meant what he said, although perhaps not in the way he intended to. It was easy for him to forget that she was a bastard too, with her fair hair and violet eyes — dragonless child that she had been—he had more in common with her than with anyone else, and so he could pretend that she was just like him. He could pretend she was everything like him and nothing like them.
It made her easier to love.
She was him and he was her.
It made her easier to stomach without the rot of resentment clouding the air they shared.
"You are not inferior," Aemond repeated. "You are not less of a person."
"But I am still a bastad?"
"I didn't say that."
"But you did not deny it," a crazed laugh bubbled out of Daenys's throat — a prelude to a sob. "You killed my brother for the crime of existing. You might as well do the same to me."
"That was not the reason."
"Wasn't it?"
Aemond sighed, stepping away to run his hand through his hair in exasperation, "It was an accident, I swear it. There was a storm and the visibility was low. Then your brother's dragon came at Vhagar breathing fire. If Lucerys had just listened, if he had just...,"
"If he had what? Given you his fucking eye? Do not pin this on him or Arrax, you pathetic fool. They are dead and you are alive to sit here in front of me and present your pitiful excuses. You are the one who thought it was a good idea to chase them with a beast of war. A war-hardened dragon! They didn't stand a chance!" Daenys's voice rose an octave.
"Vhagar lost control," Aemond's voice dropped even lower.
"No, you lost control! And my poor brother paid for it! Tell me, is there even a body? Does my grieving mother get to see her dead son one last time before she burns him? Do I?"
She squeezed her eyes shut before he even answered, stealing herself against his response, almost as if she knew.
Aemond was quiet for a moment.
"There isn't," Daenys answered her own question. "Whatever was left of him is in the sea now? Shipbreaker Bay, Aegon said."
Silence stretched between them, the only sound the distant clatter of the castle servants going about their day. How strange it was that everyone was able to go on as if nothing had happened, and yet here she was, with her entire world come to a standstill. She remained motionless, her fingers reaching to clutch the fabric of her gown. Better to twist the threads around her fingers, than her fingers around her husband's throat.
Aemond's apology hung on the precipice of his lips, waiting to be spoken, but he found himself unable to utter the words.
She shook her head at him, as if anticipating it, the movement almost imperceptible, and a single tear trailed down her cheek. The one-eyed prince resisted the urge to wipe it away, resisted the urge to touch her as she pressed her lips together, a delicate tremor betraying the strength she summoned to hold back her emotions.
Then the room shrank around them as her grief erupted, her anguished wail shattering the stillness, her breath catching in her throat as she confronted him with a gaze ablaze with accusation.
"Oh, why couldn't you have left him alone? Why couldn't you have let your stupid grudges go? I would have given you both my eyes had you asked, I promise. I would have given them to you with a kiss and my blessing if you had just asked. I would have blinded myself for it, if you only...How could you be so cruel!"
The weight of her words pierced through him.
An indictment and a prophecy.
"Why would I take yours? He was the one who took my eye, not you! Left me with this hideous disfigurement for the rest of my life, without even having to answer for it! Everyone in King's Landing looked at me with either pity or disgust. None of the ladies at court would have married me!" Aemond roared.
Oh.
He had said the wrong thing and he regretted it even before his wife's lips curled in disgust.
"No one would have married you?" Daenys scoffed. "I would have married you. I did marry you!"
"I did not want your pity. I feared that even you would be repulsed by me. That one day you would see past whatever sympathetic affection you held for me and be sickened and ashamed of the scarred creature you claimed to love."
He did not know why he said the words, the most shameful thoughts spilling out of him, unabridged. Perhaps Maris Baratheon's observations had hit him harder than he expected, and now it was all he could think about.
Then Daenys opened her mouth and proved all his fears to be true.
"You were right," she nodded, almost to herself. "I do find you hideous... unsightly even. I do see now, past whatever affection I held for you, and I am sickened and ashamed that you are my husband."
"Daenys..." Aemond's voice trembled. His world was shifting, tilting on its axis. He felt like he had been slapped. In fact, he wished she had slapped him, it would have hurt less.
"You. Repulse. Me."
"Stop."
"Leave. I have nothing more to say to you and I wish to be left alone."
And when the door swung shut behind him, but the click of the lock never came, Daenys felt the walls closing in on her, suffocating her once again.
In a sudden surge of frustration, her hands lifted a crystal trinket from Aemond's desk. It was a fragile, ornate thing, one of the many she had gifted him, a momento of happier times. Before she had marvelled at them, basking in the joy that he kept them all neatly arranged where he could see them every day as he worked, but now they only brought her rage.
With a primal scream, she hurled the trinket at the door, where it exploded upon impact. Then, one by one, she hurled them all at the door, each one accompanied by a cacophony of shattering glass.
She fell to her knees amidst the wreckage, her breaths ragged, the echoes of her screams still reverberating through the room. Tears streamed down her face as she clutched at her chest, the intensity of her emotions leaving her gasping for air. She resisted the urge to swallow the jagged shards, stuffing them each into her mouth, one by one until her tongue was heavy with the taste of blood and not her husband's name. She'd force them down too, swallowing until that gaping hole in her stomach was filled too, filled with glass that felt less fragile than the memory of her dead brother.
It was her cursed mouth that brought this on, so it was only fair, that it paid the price.
When she lifted the largest of the pieces, only seeing the stream of scarlet when she knew she ought to have felt the bite, she knew old habits died hard, and she had never been one to cope well.
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A/N: We about to enter unhinged era, in like 2 more chaps lol, yall ain't ready for what she's gonna do lol. Anyways hope yall enjoy the chapter. Sry for the slow updates, I'll try to do better, uni is just being hectic af.
As usual, don't be a ghost reader, comments really motivate me to continue writing so share your thoughts plz and thank u
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