helen-naus

muses | memes

rules below the cut.

Helaena knew she shouldn’t be doing this.

Mother and Septa had scolded her for this more than once when she was a little girl. The food is meant to be eaten at the table, they would tell her, though Helaena never saw any sense in such rules – and kept sneaking into the kitchen several times to snatch a piece of honey cake before dinner. To her credit, at least, the princess hadn’t done it in years. The habit had found a natural demise with time, fading as the court began to look at her like a future queen, seldom allowing her any space to break the rules in that way again.

This morning, she couldn’t resist.

The yeasty perfume of freshly baked cakes filled the corridors as though the air was fragrant with a scent of her girlhood. Worse, she’d heard about it from her children. The adorable sound of their voices, the pleading look in their eyes and the knowledge that they would not remain this innocent for too long all but coerced their mother back into her childhood’s illicit ways.

Thus, the princess slipped undisguised into the kitchen as the servants hurried about their business. 

There was no point in trying to hide. As a child, she’d once thought it was a brilliant idea to slip into a maid’s gown and pretend to be part of the staff – before realizing that her violet eyes and a full head of silver hair were a dead giveaway. The workers had been kind to her, thankfully. They never complained whenever a little Helaena sneaked in to steal some cake – and often had a piece ready for her when she arrived, though some of the faces around seemed to have changed.

Barely had she reached for the dessert, the figure of an unknown man seemed to emerge behind it.

Something about the unexpected presence startled her. The cook, she observed as her eyes landed on the apron. Was he new? Helaena did not recall seeing his face here before: a woman used to occupy his role back then, she remembered. Her name was Genna, a smiling figure with graying hair and kind eyes who used to call her little princess.

“From the world,”  she repeated under her breath, needle sinking into linen before pulling the thread. A pair of hungry-eyed spiders filled the fabric, their fangs dripping with blood. The web underneath them was sewn in gleaming silver, and at its very heart lay a lifeless moth, wrapped tightly in its deadly silk, the violet wings all chewed and faded. There was despair in the scene, like you could feel the agony that preceded the creature’s demise. The artwork was intricate and far more articulate than its composer had ever been, yet Helaena would seldom know how to respond if anyone asked what her project was.

In truth, her mind seldom registered it. Deep in her intuition, Helaena knew exactly what it meant, but she couldn’t bear to look at it. Her hands moved as though they had a will of their own. There was no conscience guiding her, no plan, no deliberation. A piece with such level of detail would take weeks to conclude, sometimes months. Helaena did this one within days. Her fingers had never worked so fast before, unable to contain their restlessness, like the image they created had emerged from the depths of her nightmares and demanded to be registered on the fabric. The tremor disrupted her work, making her flinch when the needle pricked her thumb. Not once did she look at Aemond, nor anywhere else in particular: her gaze was distant, catatonic, barely alive.

Everything was winter around her.

Grief poured into the embroidered cloth on her lap, endless, though Helaena shed no tears. One must be alive to weep, and there was seldom any life left within her. Whatever form of existence had remained to her since they took Jaehaerys away, it could hardly be called living.

“The world-” she tried to speak, closing her eyes as though the very effort gave her pain. “Was never the threat.” Her voice was low, quiet, coming out through gritted teeth.

All those years, she had followed their lead. Mother told her to wed Aegon because it was safest to stay within the family’s grasp, then the court began to ask after a child and Helaena gave them two, at the cost of hours of pain and months of discomfort, yet it wasn’t enough. They had to crown Aegon, to make her his queen, for that was the only way to survive.

How quickly those lies had crumbled, gone in the stroke of a blade.

At last, her eyes rose to look at her brother.

“This family is”, she added through a clenched jaw, her stare wounded and accusing.

This conflict had started before him, she knew, and it had been brewing for years and years. Still, that eagerness he had, the way the boy’s wounds had become the man’s rage and drove him so swiftly towards violence had all but placed the target upon their backs.

“Where were you, Aemond?” Helaena asked softly, voice faltering mid-sentence, “the night they killed my boy?”

Though her gaze remained affixed to his, she did not look at him as though expecting an answer. She knew her brother well. More likely than not, he would be doing exactly the thing that Helaena feared the most.

The palace had grown quite festive these past few days.

As the Red Keep’s gardens bloomed anew with spring, the city welcomed a different entourage each day - lords and ladies, servants and artists and children of every age and origin came to guest at King’s Landing. In the mornings, up on Dreamfyre, Helaena looked down and saw the endless caravans along the road. The influx had begun about a fortnight after the Crown sent out the ravens to announce the next royal wedding, and every day the princess liked the occasion even less.

Her ladies-in-waiting seemed to thrive in this environment. The girls loved to fantasize about the songs and dances, about the plays, the tourneys, the handsome knights... but Helaena was tired already.

In truth, she’d never liked weddings. The ceremonies were dull, and the guests were always eager to compensate it in the feast that followed, though Helaena only found their roaring celebration loud and chaotic. Most of the times, they went on so late that she would be snoozing on her chair before a guard took her to her chambers. All of that was unpleasant enough, but being the bride came with such exhausting demands that the princess could seldom find the time to ponder on what this meant.

The calling came from her dreams.

They had started on the first night of the full moon: within the depths of the mind which the conscience never reaches, Helaena stood inside a dark and empty room, with no furniture except a small table made of gleaming silver, where a single, motherless caterpillar’s egg lay still. A sweet, childlike singing seemed to echo within it. The sound was distant, muffled, so low that even her breath – quiet though it was – eclipsed it. Oh, how it captivated her! How it made her eyes gleam like sunlight on violet pools, smiling like a little girl at the sight. 

Inevitably, Helaena stepped closer. Within seconds, the egg began to crack, and the song echoed out into the room as it hatched – an ancient, long-forgotten lullaby sang in High Valyrian – but what came out of the broken shell was no caterpillar. Hundreds, perhaps thousands of butterflies emerged from it, too many to have fit the tiny egg. Their wings were baby-blue and silver, tickling her as they surrounded her – and before she realized it, they were taking her higher and higher, past the roofless room where they had been, past the clouds, until she could almost touch the moon.

The next morning, when Helaena woke up, she knew.

Coming to the Dragonpit so early had required some convincing and some exasperating insistence, but Mother had granted her permission after Helaena agreed to finish her breakfast.

And there she was.

Her scales, beautiful and pale-blue like the butterflies in her dreams, made Helaena stare in wonder, admiring her sparkling horns of polished silver. Wide-eyed, the princess approached. No hesitation, no fear.

“Princess–!!” She heard one of the Dragonkeepers call, terrified, but it was a distant sound, like something from another reality.

All that Helaena saw was her. 

Justify the means!

How easy it would be to lean into the immediate temptation to disbelieve his words, for no other reason than not wanting them to be true. For a second, Alicent just waited. For the realization that this was just a bad dream, perhaps, or for her son to reveal that he was toying with her – anything to dissipate the horror gnawing on her stomach like a hungry beast, robbing her lungs of air. No, no, no, she thought to herself, over and over. Not this. Not this! Still, nothing worked. Aemond was no jester, and the pain of her nails pressing deep against her palms was far too real for this to be a dream. 

Nor was Alicent such a fool as to ignore the reality that is shouting at her face.

He did it. Mother above, she had not thought him so – capable? Ruthless? Reckless? Heartless, to strike a child to his death like this? Her corset felt impossibly tight around her ribs, constraining her like claws, like hostile hands around her neck, forcing her to fight for every breath. “Oh, Gods–” Alicent mumbled, exhaling a tense, heavy breath. Eyes widening with terror, she lifted her gaze towards him at last, one of her palms pressed to her heart as if she was trying to soothe its erratic beating.

The thought that Aemond, her Aemond, would do something so hideous, so cruel–

Alicent choked a sob within her throat, refusing to crumble. Another time, she would take a moment to weep. For Lucerys, wicked child that he was, for Rhaenyra, with all her faults, now grieving the loss that no mother should ever have to bear – and for Aemond, the sweet boy he had been once, ever so wounded by the insistent taunting of his nephews and his big brother, who would have lost a precious part of himself in the act, too. 

Alas, there was no time for tears now. Her children ought to see not despair on her face, but guidance. At every moment, Alicent could feel her sons slipping from her grasp, emboldened with authority, deeming themselves too good to listen to her advice – and look where it has brought them! 

The matters of his soul would have to wait, now.

The murder of Lucerys Velaryon, she knew, would be felt throughout the Seven Kingdoms.

So far, the war for the throne was one of letters and ravens. A gathering of forces that ought to prevent bloodshed when the other side realized that their cause was hopeless, but now–

“Do you know what you’ve done?” She asked, hardening her heart, her tone low and grave, gaze dark and ominous, stepping into Queen Alicent’s shoes – not Mother. Her anxious fingers toyed with the seven-pointed star hanging from her necklace, still failing to soothe her. “You drew first blood”, she added, unable to contain the frightened tremor in her voice.

Well, the words weren’t exactly true, to an extent, but the realm would not burn and bleed because Criston Cole had slashed Lord Beesbury’s throat. 

But what Rhaenyra would do for Lucerys…