oh, i'll stay here till morning.

she is speaking of herself.

daemon was part of her. more herself than she ever was; ferocious, brutal, and free. they were pieces of the same beast, a continuation of one another, and with him gone, she's less herself than she ever was, for before him, she didn't know the heights she could achieve, stuck to the ground, another bastard with nothing, not even a name.

if she lost sheepstealer, there would be nothing left. she'll be flung back to where she started, and the world she once knew would be a stranger to her. now that she's tasted freedom, she cannot return to the life of before, cannot be anything less of herself than the bleeding version which exists today.

❛⠀ yes! don't mention him. don't talk of him. i don't care about your claims. i don't care about your fucking blood.⠀ ❜ she does not care that he sired created this child or any other. the son of his first wife, the daughters of his second, the brood of his third, who are they to her claims? do they gasp awake each morning with an ache carved into their chest? do they spend their days haunted by his ghost? can they still feel his hand at the back of their neck, his fingers tracing their face as he said his last goodbye?

those were hers. hers and hers alone, same as he had been. same as sheepstealer was, same as she is -- hers, and no one else's. and she didn't need refuge, and she sure as hell didn't need a bath.

❛⠀ i see,⠀ ❜ she snarls. she's heard that speech before. never from one so well-dressed, but men are the same everywhere she's been. ❛⠀ you'll clean, clothe and feed me today, i'll go to sleep on a bed of feathers, and tomorrow i'll wake up in your debt.⠀ ❜ half the girls she grew up with fell into this trap eventually, following the same footsteps as their mothers, even as they said they'd never do it. they all did it. it was better to be raped on a whorehouse than out on the street. ❛⠀ or do you expect i'm going to wake up in your bed?⠀ ❜

or would it be more accurate that it felt as though rheowyck was staring at the after-image of his own father in his youth ? after all, rumours of father's impudence and recklessness is well-renowned. for such a wrought marriage, mother certainly had never echoed the same opinion. aye, she did not often speak about him at all, and the few he did, she had kept it respectful. even father's vices, she'd limited it only to his absences. nothing beyond. but rheowyck grew smart, he grew clever. he collected his own tales and stories of father. he gathered himself what father was like.

and then he measured it with the evidence father had left. he watched, in the aching way a child could watch its parent bears a brave face, how often mother's dismissal on the topic of her barren marriage was out of courtly reservation as it was to avoid a gaping wound. he watched mother sidestepped arrogant lords who thought the husband she could not control somehow equated to the way she ruled her lands. he watched the late-nights with which mother poured nearly every inch of her dedication into, in ensuring runestone would be well-kept and well-fortified. all, without even a glimpse of support he knew later house targaryen had so-called promised.

and granted — the girl, woman, child of the wilderness, who is in front of him now may have the ground to react the way she does for the lack of education. for the lack of poise that noble-born were taught to possess. still, rheowyck's shackles rise from her brazenness. soon, a scoff bursts from his throat.

he smiles, and it is all teeth.

❛⠀hah ! do you think i am so lustful, filled with so little restraint, as my forefather that i would bed a young woman who probably hasn't yet completed her fifth year bleeding ?  ❜ he stalks towards her, and here, sheepstealer makes a near-clicking sound of warning, but for once, rheowyck heeds it no attention. the dragon begins to shake his body like it is trying to pull his attention away, clawmarks digging into the dirt, but rheowyck ensures that his eyes meet hers directly. ❛⠀without consent and for food, no less ? food, the very thing your body needs to survive, as it does air and sleep ? was that what my father offered ? was that what he promised ?  ❜

and here, rheowyck has purposely dug into her injury. he presses into the wound. his smile is menacing and challenging, as though daring her to correct him : that his father indeed was respectable. that he had held his hands completely to himself. that he never bathed her in sweet words, and tempted her in an intimacy she was never supposed to be privy to given the supposed sanctity he's meant to keep towards his queen wife.

when the simple matter of fact was this : even if it had taken the cloak of love, she was still no more than another woman he kept among his list of others.

here, sheepstealer does hinges his jaw and lets out a roar. the sound resonates. had rheowyck had less of a composure, he would jump by it. he would cover his ears. he does nothing but hides his face slightly from the force of it, the hot breath it threatens him with.

The Hollow Crown, Henry IV Part I

Dir. Richard Eyre

“Now do you see, the monsters that we deal with!”

He shifted his gaze from her hands to her face, and the sheer absurdity of the moment hit him hard. For years, he had been cast as the villain in everyone’s narrative, the wastrel prince, the drunken letdown, the cruel sibling. He had trained the world to see him as a tempest to endure or a nuisance to control, never as a man worthy of mourning. TO BE MET WITH SUCH GENUINE, UNFILTERED EMPATHY FELT LIKE A BREACH OF THE ESTABLISHED ORDER OF HIS EXISTENCE. He had anticipated judgment, or perhaps a detached kind of pity that reeked of obligation, but this, this raw, urgent desire to comfort him, was a dialect he had never learned to understand. A sudden, intense impulse to pull away surged within him, to snap at her and remind her of his rank, yet his body refused to comply.

“They are truly fiends, monsters of the highest order.”

HE DID NOT LET GO. Instead, his fingers entwined with hers, clutching her hands with an urgent, almost pleading strength. This was not the grip of a ruler asserting his power, but rather the instinctive grasp of a man on the verge of drowning, clutching at a piece of driftwood amidst a tempest. For what felt like an eternity, they remained there in the dimly lit corridor, the oppressive silence of the Red Keep enveloping them, heavy and stifling. Aegon's hold was firm, nearly painful, as if he were striving to tether himself to reality, to affirm that he was still present and not just another specter wandering these halls.

“It is not your fault.”

The abruptness of his actions was not a decision, but a breakdown. He let go of her hands only to raise his palms, cradling her face with a frantic, awkward urgency. His skin felt icy, yet his grip was intense, drawing her nearer until the distance between them disappeared. He did not gaze at her with the eyes of a monarch or even the man who had once pursued kitchen maids through the gardens; HE LOOKED AT HER AS IF SHE WERE THE SOLE SOLID ENTITY IN A REALM OF SMOKE. When he kissed her, it was not a gesture of passion or longing, but a desperate effort to seize a moment of tranquility from the cacophony of grief raging in his mind. It was a kiss born from a hunger, not for a woman, but for a kindness that asked for nothing in return.

the strength of it, despite one might think, does not scare her. although, neith ponders quietly, in this small moment that she could, whether she is a very frightful person at all. sure, she had been called reserved and shy. she is coy with attention, and wilt almost instantly under the full gaze of someone on her if it were not a gradual transition into accepting it. neith thrives in the shadows of someone else than she does in the heart of the sun, which might be a damning comparison had any of her siblings knew, for the blood that runs in her veins are the very same who had defied the targaryen ruling for a century and some decades. how can she be shy of the sun ? she was meant to blossom under it. and yet.

still, it does not answer whether she is easily frightened : here, neith recalls nearly acutely the lack of anxiety she's exuded when she'd followed sailors and merchants into ships and shop and slowly learn for herself the art of their tongues. she was not shy when she saw the fast-paced footsteps of an ancient rhoynar dancing and was determined to master it, perform it, for nothing else than the thought that she wanted to. and there certainly was no reservation nor hesitation when she had came to her eldest brother, the unbending qoren, and asked him to place her name instead to be sent to king's landing than that of her brother.

some of her siblings had called the act a needless sacrifice. others had proclaim it nothing more than attention-seeking. but deep down, neith wonders if she had always wanted for the world, but could never find the words to explain it.

no, so very few frighten her, just as the hightowers did not, not completely, neither does the house of the dragon, even if arguably she had been intimidated only by the prospect that she may once be rejected and sent back. but beyond, it was so very clear to her that they were no more than people themselves. some ambitious and others more resigned with the roles the keep has assigned them, but people nevertheless. there is naught to be fear here. none at all of the ghastly description she often hears. what was it that she once told aegon : swapping gossips of how members of his house were scale-like creatures with retractable claws. he had laughed then, as she perhaps intended for him to, and for a moment, all was indeed well.

aegon touched her, kissed her, and that—

was when the first touch of fear rings inside of her.

people think she's foolish, or naive. or, like her queen helaena, that maybe the tales of his infidelity is well-known, but it was easy to forgive him for the very crime of him bedding women had always been one of his vices. that much, she supposes, could be true. but neith has also heard— rumours. stories. of his pinching and leering. of his insatiable lust, and the women that fell into it. she would never have thought— though perhaps that is what indeed makes her all the more foolish. thrown in a lion's dens, and do one expect to never be bitten ?

still, in spite of that first traces of horror, neith feels herself steeling her resolve. she adjusts. she softens her mouth before she gently parts their lips away, and says, ever so softly, ❛⠀no, aegon. we cannot.  ❜ the rejection here lands gently, and her hands that come to wrap itself around his wrists aren't out of protest. but to hold. to ensure that she, too, grips him right back. as though to say, don't be lost to me. i am still here, even if i may not want this – for it is not mine to have. ❛⠀was that why you're here ? were you meant to secure an heir with the queen ?  ❜

she says then, searching his eyes, her own prickling with tears at the anguish she could see rimming red around his own violet set.

Ser Otto kept writing. Letters of support. Letters to garner loyalties.

And one from Dorne had laughed at him.

I would sooner sleep with scorpions, Qoren had written back, prideful and courageous, even at the risk of angering those who rode on dragonback. And Neith… Neith had had to listen to that as Ser Otto repeated the content of his missive back to her in Queen Alicent’s company. It seemed your brother wanted your return, Ser Otto had tutted. What will you do?

So she had chosen stay — but not without favours, the few she had earned, fell right through her grasps.

Soon, she followed Queen Helaena closely in the shadows. Neith does not stand out. Leverages on her light foot to attend to her Queen, who, while it takes time, is slowly responding. One night, she is walking from the bath when she notices a figure near her Queen’s chamber. Aegon. Sullen and ominously quiet. Staring at the door. Neith, at first, does not want to speak. She wants to slink in the shadows. To hide from Aegon’s stare, from the shame of all her talks of hope before that now felt traitorous on her tongue, but he turns, and his violet eyes land on her.

And she finally speaks — “She’s asleep.”

She says, assuming that this is why he is here. For his sister-wife, whom he cannot comfort.

And then.

“Do you condemn me?”

“...”

HE DID NOT RESPOND TO HER RIGHT AWAY. 

Instead, he exhaled a breath that resembled a slow leak from a deflated bellows rather than a simple sigh. In that moment, HE APPEARED LESS LIKE A KING AND MORE LIKE A SPECTER wandering through his own corridors, his shoulders sagging under the unseen burden of a crown that had always seemed too weighty for him. 

He pressed his forehead against the frigid stone of the doorframe, closing his eyes as he revealed not to Neith, but to the stillness of the hallway, how his life had spiraled beyond his control. It had started with a series of escapes, wine to numb the tedium, WOMEN TO SILENCE THE SOLITUDE, and the reckless chase of pleasure to evade the stifling expectations of a mother who regarded his life as a project in need of fixing. 

NOW, THAT SPIRAL HAD CONSTRICTED, DRAWING HIM INTO A WHIRLWIND OF CONFLICT AND GRIEF, LEAVING HIM MAROONED IN A PALACE WHERE HE WAS THE RULER OF EVERYTHING YET THE CAPTAIN OF NOTHING.

“It was a game of subtraction.” He whispered, his voice hoarse, barely rising at all. “First, I removed the lessons. Then the duty. Then the dignity. I believed that if I stripped away enough of the ‘Prince,’ something genuine would remain, something that was truly me.” 

HE REMAINED ANCHORED TO THE DOORFRAME, AS IF THE STONE WERE THE SOLE SUPPORT KEEPING HIM FROM COLLAPSING. 

"The boy was innocent of my crimes." He murmured, his voice trembling. He finally moved away from the door, but instead of approaching Neith, he began to walk in a small, frantic circle, the sound of his boots echoing hollowly against the stone. 

“He was the only good thing I have ever done in my life.”

NO AMOUNT OF GOLD IN THE TREASURY, NO BLAZE OF SUNFYRE, AND NO ROYAL EDICTS COULD STAND AGAINST THE SIMPLE, UNYIELDING QUIET OF A LIFELESS CHILD. HE HAD WORN THE CROWN FOR MONTHS, YET CONFRONTED WITH THAT TINY BODY, HE FELT LIKE NOTHING MORE THAN A POWERLESS BOY HIMSELF.

“They killed my baby boy; do you see now what it is we are fighting against?”

nothing could've touched them then. nothing could've hurt them the way the present has, in the absent of young prince jaehaerys, and his tiny foot falls, and even the petulant way he would be adamant to never share his toy but would be immediately put-off if jaehaera simply allowed him to have his way. he was a bright boy, the little prince. a s curious as her queen mother and as playful as aegon had been.

and now he was gone. taken.

and his kingly father is reduced to nothing but a shadow. a crippling thing shuffling by the hallways, pacing now, murmuring of his son's innocence, and the lengths his half-sibling and their faction truly had gone through in a rhetoric neith has once denied him with. what was it her foolish words again ? if he cannot have faith, then she shall. but where is her faith now, as her own lips tremble at the sight of her childhood companion like this, and her brows come together like they are behaving their best to restraint her expression from crumpling over, but it fails. oh, it fails so miserably and he comes ahead, and apologises, grasping at aegon's hands—

❛ i see, i see, you're right, i see it, ❜ she nods, and her answer comes out too quick. clumped together in its desperation. she had cried the same, often, with queen helaena when she begs her to eat, and the helplessness is heavy, like an iron cloak. neith feels suffocated. ❛ i'm sorry, i didn't— i wouldn't think— not jaehaerys, not the children— ❜

but it was what aegon had said once, hadn't he ? that his half-sister would aim not only for his siblings, but his kins, his family.

❛ i was foolish. and i was hopeful, ❜ and maybe apart of her is still hopeful now. that maybe the blacks would realise their wrong, would surrender their arms, or both sides would come to a negotiation. after all, prince lucerys was a casualty too by prince aemond's swift wrath. but another part of her, the ones who had seen how devastating it'd taken her queen helaena and her brother-husband, as she saw how icicly distant the queen dowager had become in turn, felt the hope waste slowly in the back of her head. drip-drip-dripping. soon, even a full bowl could be emptied.

she rubs at his hands incessantly, like she could warm them up to something more than the hands of a shrivelling man.

#for your dreamling consideration