This chapter references non-con themes (attempted SA). Just a reminder to please be mindful of the trigger warnings in the summary.

PROLOGUE —— PRELUDE TO DANCING WITH STORMS

104 AC, STORM'S END.

There is a garden of flowers at the edge of Storm's End said to have been cultivated by Rogar Baratheon's second wife, Morrigan's great-grandmother Alyssa Velaryon. It is only available to the ruling family of Storm's End and their entourage and, while it's not a secret that there exists a garden in Storm's End, it's not something that has been widely talked about, either. As a young girl, Morrigan had never been permitted to enter alone, always either in company of her mother or handmaidens or guards.

Aside from the shore of Shipbreaker Bay, this is Morrigan's most favorite place in her home.

There are so many beautiful plants here— some, she thinks, must defy the will of the Gods and nature to thrive here, in this climate of storms and harsh edges, and Morrigan watches them whenever she gets the chance. She can name them all in her sleep now, had been able to since the days of her young girlhood.

All over, especially now in the midst of summer, there's Holly and Clover and Wild Marjoram and Ivy and Camomile— and between them Foxglove and Nightshade and Wolfsbane and Oleander and Hemlock…

Only when she got older did Morrigan understand why her parents and grandfather had forbidden her to enter her great-grandmother's gardens so vehemently. Only when she had been fourteen, and had been taught extensively about plants and poisons and the risks of each of the things thriving in the heart of her home, had she been deemed responsible enough to be permitted to enter alone. She'd been tested time and time again before her mother and father had declared she knew the differences enough and allowed it.

Nobody was very willing to risk the health of the only living grandchild, and thus sole heir, of the Lord of Storm's End on the little girl accidentally eating a highly poisonous plant.

Morrigan had often asked herself why they'd even kept it if it was such a dangerous thing to keep closeby. Her grandfather had replied his mother had loved the gardens. It had been a favorite pastime of Lady Alyssa to tend to her plants. Of the few memories he had of her, many of the best had been in this place.

Only rather recently did Morrigan wonder if that's the whole truth, or if there'd been a more practical purpose in mind.

A year ago— she'd still been fourteen then, a few weeks before her fifteenth name day— Morrigan had come to the idea that Lady Alyssa perhaps kept it so devotedly with a girl like her in mind.

It'd been one of her grandfather's stable hands. The boy had been barely two years older than her, just past his seventeenth name day, when she'd encountered him in this very garden. He'd come to escort her to the stables for her riding lessons— not an uncommon thing, since Morrigan had a plethora of them. She loved riding, loved the feeling of the wind in her face, in her hair, the sense of a wild sort of freedom when she was atop her horse, running as fast as she dared without fearing reprimand.

So, fool that she had been, she had not questioned a thing when she had followed him through the gardens and towards the stables.

Until he had grabbed her and pushed her into the alcove, that is.

She doesn't remember everything about what followed, but she remembers the surprise, the confusion. She'd taken too long to catch up with what was happening, she knows.

He'd promised her to ensure she'd still be a maiden afterwards. Enough, anyways. Her Lord husband would have no idea. One taste will not hurt, she remembers him saying. Making promises she did not want to hear of.

And then, as he held her throat with one hand to keep her in place and made work to undress her with the other, she turned her head and bit so hard into his forearm she drew blood. As the boy screamed and screamed and cursed her name, Morrigan pushed him away with all the strength she'd had— which is not to say much against the stable hand who'd towered over her smaller body like the giants of old tales— and ran as fast as her feet could carry, praying to all the Gods that she could think of that the wind was helping her.

She wasn't faster than the boy, she knew; but she made it to the stables, where he'd lured her with in the first place, grabbed her horse and fled her home as fast as she could.

She spent hours on her mare's back and did not return until she had cried herself out and had nothing but cold resolve in her heart.

It was in those hours, riding atop the horse she'd named for the wife of Durran Godsgrief— Elenei, daughter of the sea god and the goddess of wind— that she'd thought of her great-grandmother's gardens again. And of all the flowers, pretty and sweet and luring like a siren's call and filled with poison, that Alyssa Velaryon had kept with such devotion. And she wondered.

Morrigan was sure someone must've noticed her absence— a Septa or a knight or a servant or her family— and when she'd returned and her mother had greeted her in panic, she had not been surprised. She'd acted like nothing had happened. She'd smiled and made excuses about a childish temper, a whim not thought through and had gone on with her day.

She'd resumed her daily activities like before, had ridden and learned and sewn pretty patterns and gone to the shoreline and had visited the gardens of her great-grandmother.

And, whenever she stole herself into the midst of the plants at night or looked out to the wild waves below, she'd thought about whether or not Alyssa Velaryon had liked pretty flowers, or had liked to keep them for girls who had a need for them.

Within two weeks, the stable hand was dead and buried beneath the dirt.

One taste can't hurt, he'd told her and Morrigan had taught him in return that one taste could.

And she had resolved herself to teach anyone else who tried to make pretty promises and sweet lies to her or her little sisters the same lesson. She was the oldest, after all. It was her duty to protect the others— too young to know better, just the way she'd been. Cassandra, the oldest of her sisters, had just celebrated her seventh name day and Floris, the youngest of them, was barely a year old.

She was the oldest— so many years older than they were by design of fate and tragedy that left her parents with her not even a year into their marriage and then with no living children for a decade— and before it all this was her duty. To protect her family, to protect her sisters.

Who would protect them now that she was set to leave within the hour, sent to King's Landing to be a companion to the young Princess Rhaenyra? Who would stand between them and all else?

She'd always known that, one day, she would be forced to leave and marry a Lord somewhere in the kingdoms for the sake of her family but she'd thought she had more time to prepare them. She had tried best she could when her grandfather had told her about the decision to send her to King's Landing for a time— but Cassandra was only seven and she did not understand the way Morrigan did.

Morrigan reaches out and traces over the Nightshade— Belladonna, the Septa had taught her it was also called— with the tips of her fingers.

She'd be leaving today whether she liked to or not, and there wasn't a thing she could do. She didn't know when she'd be back, as her grandfather and parents had only told her that she'd be leaving for a time. No promise of when she would come back.

Not that it mattered. In the end, the result was the same: she would leave her sisters behind, alone and without her protection.

But they had this— Alyssa Velaryon's legacy to protect and avenge them if they needed it.

Morrigan prays to all the Gods she has known— even the ones long gone, who'd once tried to wreck this very foundation to get their daughter back into their embrace— that if they ever hear any of her pleadings, it will be this. Her sisters would never know the need for their great-grandmother's gardens.

She lets out a sigh and rises from her position on the ground, dusting off her skirts.

One taste can hurt— Morrigan had resolved to teach the lesson to any who would not learn it if they dared to taste what was not theirs to taste.

It's just too bad she only learned it herself once it was too late.

AUTHOR'S NOTE,

welcome to stormbringer, aka the result of my new hyperfixation on hotd!!! daemon & mor are gonna be wild skfjsk to me they feel like the polar opposite of vaelara from dead crowns and her (futue) love interest lmao

a heads up: the timeline (that of the births of a handful of characters and events) has been adjusted in this fic but this doesn't affect the overall storyline much, it's just to fit with my plans for this fic better 🙈

this is more of a prologue-esque chapter thingy. the next chapter will start off at the beginning of ep. 1 of hotd (approximately) and then we'll go from there!! please consider leaving a comment if you have enjoyed this as they always mean a lot to me to see <3