are you satisfied with an average life?

unfortunately, his moment of irritating her had slipped by, her next words bringing a deep sigh to aemon's lips and causing his eyes to roll upwards to the ceiling. there was little he found more tedious than the topic of marriage at the best of times, never mind rhaena's laments, which firmly crossed into the territory of things he didn't care about at all. "so don't get married then?" he shrugged a shoulder. "if you're so against it. deimos won't force you into it." a marriage conducted under force was, under the law, invalid anyway, though that was a law all too often overlooked, and so aemon didn't bring that up. "why are we even having this conversation, anyway? it's boring." he raised his glass to his lips, drained it in one, and then refilled it.

"and if you start talking about your 'womanly body' again, i'm going to be sick." it was hypocritical, given his previous lewd comments, and what was about to come out of his mouth next. "besides, if it was all about sex and breeding, we'd just take up with the smallfolk and whores. noble ladies are so delicate and fragile. much better birthing hips on a farmer's daughter. it's why there's so many of them." to aemon, matters of marriage were nothing more than a practicality. he wasn't sure he ever really wanted to be a husband, was certain he did not care much for children, but his personal apprehension was outweighed by the benefits. he was a man who had always managed to find a place for himself wherever he went, who survived on influence and favour alone. his choice of bride was not so different, really.

it was rare that someone could make rhaena fold into herself, make her want to be small in a room she tended to overflow with her charms, but if anyone could do it, it was her brothers. not that either ever meant to, at least as far as she knew, but there was a certain way they showed their exasperation with her –the sigh, the tone– that reminded her of their father. she wasn’t corlys’ least favorite or anything, but no daughter wants to disappoint their father, even when they are dead and sunk and all that remains of him are the little pieces in her brothers. “i want to get married….” she muttered into her cup, quiet and more to herself than to him. what she really wanted was a proper choice of whoever she felt matched her best, not someone dictated by king or head of household. she’d grown up with the story of rhaenys choosing their father, and the conciliator kowtowing to the desires of his first grandchild. however nowadays she did not think she’d be so lucky. her smallness disappeared as quickly as it came, and she rolled her eyes at aemon as he poured another drink for himself. “you’re boring.” she shot back, halfhearted in the insult. it was a lie and they both knew it.

it was when he brought up breeding with smallfolk that rhaena’s spine turned to steel, her brow furrowing in a way that darkened her eyes, jaw clenched in anger. she still hadn’t gotten over their father having a bastard, one that if she did the math right on was just a tad bit older than aerion. she didn’t know how aemon felt, but she’d been so angry when deimos told her. angry at their father for doing that to their mother, angry at deimos for knowing and not telling her until later in life. and a bit angry at herself for idolizing the sea snake and thinking he was better than all other fathers. “please don’t bring up fucking the common folk.” if her tone and the look on her face wasn’t enough, perhaps a sign of how it bothered her came from how she went to the bottles and pulled the one that looked closest to what he’d given her, pouring herself at least two fingers’ worth before swallowing at least half the glass as if to burn the aftertaste of her words from her tongue. it helped, it made her face relax after pulling another face from the burn, and she set the remainder of the drink down on the desk as she rummaged through it at his request.

the ruling lord of the crossing stood in an isolated corner of the garden, where hedges and climbing flora formed a quiet veil against watchful eyes. it would have been difficult to notice him unless one meant to seek him out. a missive had been sent, and now he waited. keiran was a patient man, no doubt. many thought the freys greedy, impulsive, even cruel, and perhaps there was some truth in that. still, keiran carried patience where others in his line had not, though even his had its limits.

his hand drifted to his pocket as he paced, his gaze catching on a cluster of flowers nearby. they reminded him of his late wife. they had been her favorite, though he had never known the name and did not know it now. still, he had always made certain they were gathered for her nameday. soft petals of rosy pink, brushed through with pale yellow. he looked at them only a moment before turning his attention away.

at the sound of approaching footsteps, he turned, a faint smile touching his lips. it was more habit than warmth, though his company, at the very least, was easy on the eyes. he hoped she was as clever as he believed her to be, as he had heard. such a plan would require discretion, and if she lacked it, he would see to it that his name did not become tangled in whatever followed.

rhaena had intended to be early, but rhaenys wanted her to watch as she danced to a new made up song of hers and who was she to deny her littlest niece a few minutes of her time. early became just on time as she arrived in the dictated place, vaela her loyal shadow as she turned to see lord keiran frey and a frey lady’s maid a distance away. the intrigue turned into very peaked curiosity, in truth it had once she realised how secluded the meeting spot was, and she wondered how she seemed to end up in situations like this as of late. at least there were maids this time.

what did she know about keiran frey? what most unmarried women knew; he was a widower with seven daughters and did not seem to be rushed to find them a stepmother, and that he was a frey. there were many connotations to that, a reputation that preceded both him and his supposedly strange brother, but she did not trust reputations only. a silent look from rhaena was all her maid needed to stand with her frey counterpart. she noted the distance, how even keen ears would have a hard time hearing them at that distance, as she moved to the lord’s side. “lord frey.” her words were light and congenial in tone despite the questions that rolled through her mind, her face betraying none of her thoughts. for a moment, her eyes moved from his face to the elbow offered, as if he had offered something far more suspicious than his arm. the question of why buzzed still in her mind as her hand rested ever so gently in the crook of his elbow, not nearly as answered as she wanted by his words.

all reference to any small talk and discussion they had with one another of anything seemed to slow wist away, the same way those rumoured spirits that once hid within these very trees soon too evaporated - he had been multitasking for some amount of time now, effortlessly winding himself in and out of conversation whilst being all too painfully aware of the growing feeling of tension that stretched between the two. there was nothing a man wanted more than what he knew he should not want, nor something he did not have; and whilst cedric tyrell was entirely a paradox, there was one matter he was not so mysterious regarding - and that was the wants of the body, the flesh.

there was a slight hum of acknowledgement after she spoke, though words were not something he was clearly rushing to say. rushing to get out there. there was a strange sense of tension wrapped up in the quiet, in the silence between words - as though they were sat on opposite sides of a chessboard, watching for the other to make a move. "then we can get to fixing that, soon enough." he uttered, hearing the sounds of a twig crunch beneath his boot as he pulled a final canopy behind him, closing all view - only momentarily. he remained stood in place as he looked round at her, watching the way she seemed to glide and slither around him; brushing his shoulder, then moving away.

"i mean, you've already been vocal enough, rhaena. there's little use in stopping now." his words were all but a challenge, to put openly - she had already put aside the boundaries and expectations of being a woman of her station. of what was seen as socially acceptable, and adequate. now, he wanted to see how much he could get her talking about what she wanted. he would find pleasure in it, wholly aware of the expectations they were subverting and the lines they were blurring. he also intended to ensure even driftmark could hear their lady. "keep going."

vivid ocean hues trailed not on the brief exposure of skin as she climbed over a rambling root, but rather on the figure of the small of her waist and the way her neckline seemed to dance around what he could see, and what he could not. it took a large amount of self control to resist the urge to reach out and allow a hand to rest along that very exposed part of her neckline, slowly pushing the silk from her shoulders and watching the rest fall away; there was something almost magnetic about the very valyrian lure, and whilst cedric wholly knew it existed, he did not entirely feel the intensity of the pull until this moment.

he did not think about why he did not feel that same intense pull considering there was another with amethyst orbs that often found herself within his bed; only knew all too well that urge was going to end up resulting in behaviours he ought not to demonstrate toward his friend's own sister. he did not want her half clothed, beneath some canopy presented to them by a canopy of trees, holding by her hips as she used the bark behind them to steady herself. no. the image of pushing away the silks of her dress remained burned at the very front of his mind, more than any other - but as their eyes remained transfixed on one another, he knew he wanted to see all of her, in the way a man wanted to see every part of a woman. slowly, with instruction; piece by piece put aside, threw over the shoulder.

there was a dance of mischief on his smile, pearly whites on show for a moment in the moonlight and the darkness the way one expected a wolf to look upon looking at what it would soon consume; she wanted him. and he, wanted to wind her up. "what, did you want me to speak to you all along?" he asked, all tense of formality dropping from his voice and his tone when speaking with her; he knew his question was taunting, wholly irrelevant to this situation, but considering he felt as though he were hanging on by a single thread, he would use it to bind them both if he needed to. "i'd had no idea." he muttered, a slight laugh slipping from him. he did not move until he asked the question, and when he did, he suddenly found himself directly before her; he looked down at her when he asked the question. she would see the amusement in his orbs, if only they were not momentarily clouded by lust.

she’d never had the sweetest of voices, no one could compare a songbird’s tweet to the rich deepness of her words. she shied from publicly singing–of course she could carry a tune, did not all ladies get taught that?–because it was not some high sweet melody tinkling like crystal in a well-lit ballroom that music tutors and apparently future husbands liked. it was low without being manly, warm like melted chocolate or a good smoky fire, and when she wanted it was soft like a sinfully delightful blanket or sharp as a valyrian steel knife. now, she was like smooth sweetness, eyes glittering in amusement as she and cedric shared air as the space between them narrowed. “were you truly my bane, you wouldn’t have gotten so far as to get me to walk off with you.” it was a dangerous game they played, moving themselves with intent like a chess game but the stakes of which should have kept them far apart. but moon tea isn’t illegal in the reach, and it is well documented in driftmark maester’s ledgers that she lost her maidenhood due to riding too much on moondancer.

“be vocal, be quiet, keep going, have caution… which is it, hmm?” her tone teased between knowingly and leadingly, her lips curled with the barest bit of satisfaction, and she dared the first touch of skin against skin. her hand raised and ever so gently rested under his chin, a silent command for his eyes to lift from her skin to her face. he would raise his eyes to see how the light filtering in turned usually deeply dark purple of her eyes into the most exquisite explosion of red-violet, how their closeness revealed freckles at the apex of her cheekbones, and pull him from seeing how her neck may be starting to flush, her breath just a second faster. for all her pomp, she was a maiden. “of the two of us, i think it is you unraveling, cedric.” a further push into the inappropriate, his given name falling from her lips tasting of daring and danger. 

When she rebuked him for speaking as though he were already a surrendering man, or someone heading to war with some intention to die, Deimos’ expression barely shifted. He shook his head before he moved towards Rhaena, and he let his hands rest on her shoulders. “I do not intend to die,” he assured her. “But I know what war does, sister. There is never any certainty of victory or survival”. Some might say it was a pessimist's mindset, or a defeatist's mindset, as Rhaena hinted at. Deimos had seen enough to know it was best to be a realist. His hands on his sister's shoulders were steadying and reassuring because he understood her concerns, and that her anger came from love and from fear. She too had gone through so much and seen more than one should've at a young age, when her world crumbled for the first time.

In truth, it humbled him that his sister would care for him so much. Blood ties didn't mean there was always love and friendship. He was glad that out of every sibling he had, at least he'd managed not to fully alienate Rhaena after the world hardened him and jaded him so much. Her eyes watered somewhat, and Deimos couldn't help but recall their infancy. One time or two, as a little girl, she'd tripped and fallen on the cobblestone path from the docks to Driftmark castle, and he'd wiped away the tears from his baby sister's cheeks. Proud as she was, he'd not seen Rhaena cry in a long time. Just as he did when she was a little girl, Deimos lifted a hand to wipe away those tears that were forming in her eyes.

Susan and Lucy: We're not friends, we're sisters

Louis Leopold Boilly, Two Sisters / The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe (2005) / Krystal Sutherland House of Hollow / Cover of C.S Lewis, The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe by Pauline Baynes / Unknown / Little Women / Chen Chen, 'when i grow up i want to be a list of further possibilities' / Louise Glück, Descending Figure / Prince Caspian (2008) / C.S. Lewis, Prince Caspian / Florence and the Machine, Grace / C.S Lewis, Till we have faces / Hunger Games: Mockingjay / unpublished poem by me (@folktail) /Jessica Goodman / just like falling snow by @zannolin / C.S Lewis, Till we have faces / unknown / unpublished by me (@folktail) / poem by @inkskinned

cedric felt the shift the moment she said it, felt the air tighten in that particular way it only ever did when a conversation tipped from polite exchange into something edged, something chosen. he watched her as she spoke, really watched her now, not merely as a velaryon, not merely as his friend’s sister, but as a woman who had decided not to shrink in his presence. her answer pleased him more than it should have. not because it aligned with his own, but because she refused the simplicity he had baited her with. it depends. gods, of course it did. he gave a low, thoughtful hum, eyes narrowing faintly with interest rather than irritation, his mouth curving with something that was not quite a smile. “that wasn’t the answer i asked for,” he said quietly, amusement threading his tone.

his gaze lingered as she shifted into high valyrian, and though the words themselves slipped past him, the meaning did not. he had learned long ago to read people rather than languages. the slight tilt of her head, the casual dismissal in the motion of her shoulder, it all spoke clearly enough. and yet it stirred something old and faintly bitter in him, the memory of lessons never pressed for, tutors never demanded. “my brother would’ve understood you,” he added after a beat, not accusing, merely reflective. as though he were not speaking of the same brother he had watched be hung from a window beneath a bloodthirsty, roaring crowd, whipped into a frenzy for the souls that had perished within the flames that crept up the statues of the seven in ashford. what a turning point it had been.

“he was given the language. i was given… other things. i never thought to resent it, not truly. didn't think it worthy to chase what wasn’t placed in my hands.” his tone was almost ironic, considering he was there - speaking of it. in a position that, depending on who one asked, he had killed for - or had been given. as she spoke of forces and proof and futures, he listened, though a part of him noted the familiar weight beneath her words. the way she spoke of men dismissing revelation when it came from women was not new, nor was it unearned, but it carried the cadence of a grievance revisited too often. he did not interrupt her, did not correct her, only watched as she circled herself with it, careful and practiced.

“lament long enough and you risk making it prophecy,” he said at last, not unkindly. “there’s a point in naming injustice, but there’s danger too, if you let it define you before the world has the chance to try.” sometimes the world didn't need fixing - only your orbit did.

her offer came then, light as silk and twice as deliberate, and cedric paused, genuinely paused, his attention finally flicking outward to the hall around them. aemon’s sister. gods, the optics alone should have stopped him. the tension was obvious, the kind that hummed just beneath the skin, and he knew exactly what it would look like if he disappeared with her now. he should have declined. the thought barely finished forming before he felt the thrill curl in his gut instead. shouldn’t had never stopped him when it came wrapped in temptation. “i doubt the old men will miss us,” he said, dry, already moving as he looked behind his shoulder, pausing to wait for her. he stepped forward, not offering his arm, not claiming her, merely angling his body in a way that cleared a path through the crowd. he glanced back only once, a silent question in the lift of his brow, before continuing on, slowing just enough for her to fall into step beside him.

they were stopped more than once, greetings exchanged, obligations met with ease and charm, until at last the noise thinned and the stone beneath their feet cooled. a glint of mischief crossed his expression then, brief but unmistakable in the flickering candlelight of the halls, where only a few courtiers passed by and some serving girls intending to make their way to the sisters. now there were less people, he took the moment to speak more openly - perhaps almost recklessly so, as though he wanted to see if he could get her to try to quieten or shush him. “you appear to have words for the grand seven, don't you?” he remarked lightly as he turned them beneath a cloistered archway, the air shifting, quieter now, older, almost feeling as though he were walking back in time.

“so i thought i’d show you something that offends it from both sides.” the ancient sept loomed ahead, worn smooth by centuries, with the infamous godswood growing defiantly within its walls beneath a tranquil pool.

their exit was not quick nor easy, nothing ever was in their positions. but she learned ages ago the charms she carried and how to ease in and out of just the right amount of small talk before making excuses. rhaena found it easy to say they wanted to go see this presentation or hear that person speak and they must go now or miss it, letting those that approached feel seen by whichever of the pair they wanted to draw away. when the throng thinned and the air was filled with softer sounds and the smell of nature, something in rhaena’s body relaxed. she thrived around people, but even the most outwardly charming needed time away, space to breathe. the rigidity of her spine, the gentleness of her steps, every careful thing relaxed like a muscle. she was less the illusion and more the mortal.

he was open with his words, and she’d slouched off what may tempered her own back with the crowds, shrugging at his question. “i have words for anyone willing to listen, really. and not all of them are for absent gods…” the wind shifted and she knew it before needing to see it that there was a godswood beyond that arch somewhere. there was a sort of feeling in being somewhere ancient, a stillness she felt settling in the soul. she felt something like it on dragonstone by the dragonmount, in the caves of driftmark, places that stood strong in the face of time. but nothing was like a godswood. the praying masses were undisturbed by them, rhaena almost floating through on the balls of her feet to keep her heels from making too much noise on the stone. her eyes never fell to the floor in reverence, instead observing how nature was reclaiming each brick and board, inches at a time. the reach was all fertile earth and greenery, it seemed, and refused to allow something to exist without its influence. “more like the trees are set on making themselves known. i can appreciate the stubbornness.”

he always deflected talk of those who had passed like this, with an easy streak of dark humour. it was debateable if, even after time had passed, he had ever truly registered just how much the velaryons had lost (dead brother. dead father. dead sister-in-law. dead dragons), or if distance from driftmark made it easier to compartmentalise it all, and thus, pretend that it didn't exist, and that they were all just busy across waters he would never sail. there was only one loss that he never spoke about in jest, never spoke about at all. dead mother.

"i don't think she'd want you to save her the effort, actually," he was suddenly serious, leaning in a little closer, as though about to confide in her a great secret. "it frightens me, truly, but i think she actually would smother me, given half the chance. only thing is..." he broke off, sighed, putting a hand on his chest. "i can't say it. it's too horrible." he was clearly enjoying dragging it out, violet eyes twinkling. "the only thing is, it's not a pillow she's holding over my face." his laughter came out in a hoot once he had reached the punchline, clearly suggestive in intent, talk more suited to a brothel than conversation with his kin. that was why it was so funny to him, because he knew it would disgust her, and he was nothing if not a brother who delighted in terrorising his little sister.

her legs were replaced atop his lap, and he gave her a half-hearted flick to the ankle. "you're like a cat, rhae. more i shove you off, more you try and claw your way back." he grumbled. he took the pillow she had launched at him, leaning forward to place it behind his back, as though it had been a great kindness that she had done him and not an attempt to attack.

for the first time since she had walked through the door, something she said had aemon lost for words, the look he gave her one of genuine surprise. "a fatter heiress cow? gods, couldn't have phrased that more repellently if you tried, could you? bitch." the latter word was delivered teasingly, rather than with any malice or insult attached, but something about her wording genuinely didn't sit right with him. "but nah, no, nothing like that. vivienne is a fine enough woman. if i have to be married, it's good that it's her."

watching him was like watching a mummer’s play, the way he was practiced in his movements, like it was a dance and he was the center point of it all. she wondered if he rehearsed these faces in the mirror, if he spent time in figuring out how his eyes sparkled and at what degree he had to turn his head in this light to achieve it. it wasn’t like she was not guilty of something similar, the way she roiled things over and over in her head like water over a stone until it was far past smooth and nearly sand. deimos had given her responsibilities and she worried over how well she was handling the children, how the daily business of driftmark fared under her purview instead of yna’s. she did not worry about how she looked draped across a couch or how her eyes shined in certain lights, as she was vain enough -and self-aware enough- to know she looked dazzling in most any situation.

and even as she dazzled now in the privacy of her brother’s rooms, there was something very human in the way she play-gagged at her brother’s insinuations about the lady penrose. “gross, aemon. i don’t want to think of that.” having had her pillow confiscated, her first instinct was to start punching his arm with both fists. she had no true strength behind the three or so hits she landed until she stopped to huff and cross her arms in a dramatic pout. that was mostly due to him getting up, walking away to pour drinks. “i’m not being a bitch… that’s just how it is at it’s most basic interpretation.” rhaena shrugged, her dramatics melting away as she examined a hem on her dress nonchalantly. her words carried the same laissez-faire sort of delivery as she explained her view of it all. “we get brought out, led around so men can see our birthing hips and whatnot you all find appealing about the womanly body, our pedigree examined for how well-bred we are, and then our fathers or brothers sell us off to the highest bidder.” rhaena looked up at her brother, wondering if he saw courting and marriage in some other way, as a man. at her grown age of twenty-seven, she was less likely to find fantasy in the whole debacle, not that she didn’t hope for something akin to what her parents had. love and partnership and being respected were important to her, or at the very least the last two if she could not have all three.

cedric tyrell let her words settle in the space between them like the hush that comes after a well-played chord, one that stretched and lingered amidst that of a thunderous applause that seemed to go and on and on. he did not speak at once—not because he had nothing to say, but because he found it almost too pleasurable to simply look at her, the background sound of chattering and disagreement and yet, the entire time his gaze merely remained sweeping across her own. her voice had been soft but unshaking, threaded with the kind of conviction that came not from sermons but from years of internal reckoning. and when she leaned in, asking her final question with that glint in her eye—half jest, half blade—he didn’t lean in to meet her.

no, he stayed precisely where he was, looming slightly, as if rooted, watching her the way a man might regard a fire he did not fear but would not dare touch.

his gaze lingered—unashamed, steady. he looked her over as a man looks at a painting he’s already decided to steal: with admiration, yes, but also calculation. the shape of her mouth, the scent of citrus and salt that hung about her—he took all of it in like a private indulgence, his lips pressing slowly into a smile that cut sideways and sharp. she was ravishing. that particular kind of beauty that made a man imagine things with his hands. and gods help him, he wanted to make her eyes roll back. in pleasure. in disbelief. in whatever moment silenced her long enough to forget the word if. he chuckled low in his chest—just once.

“if i were hiding,” he murmured, tilting his head, letting his voice drop as he did, “i wasn’t doing it well. i’d argue i was waiting for someone to turn around.” his smile deepened, slow and dry, golden against the lean lines of his face as he watched her for another second too long—long enough to let the humour and the challenge both sit in his gaze. she was close enough now that he could feel the difference in height more keenly—the way he had to angle his head slightly down, the weight of his voice lowering so as not to speak over her but to her. there was something oddly intimate about it, standing amidst the bustle of scholars and noble minds, yet speaking in a register just for two. as though the crowd around them had ceased to exist, or better yet, as though he’d granted it permission to vanish.

and then, when her smile curled and her teasing inquiry came—do you consider yourself a god, cedric tyrell?—he didn’t smirk, didn’t laugh. he simply regarded her, let the full, unbroken weight of his attention fall on her features, one brow raised as though mulling the question in earnest. but his eyes were not solemn. they were dangerous. his gaze travelled over her again, slowly this time, thoughtful and intimate and impossibly impolite. his pause was calculated, designed to remind her that he could hold a silence just as well as he could fill it with words. eventually, he spoke.

“no,” he said, softly. “i’m not a god.” he straightened ever so slightly, that sharp crown of curls gleaming faintly in the afternoon light. “a nonbeliever. and what is a god to a nonbeliever?” he looked down at her like the question wasn’t rhetorical at all; a bed time story. a rumour. a fantasy. and most importantly, irrelevant. there was no venom in it. just certainty. seductive in its confidence, unshaken by offence or doubt.

“i don't believe in gods because i don’t need to,” he continued, shifting his stance slightly, the edge of his boot brushing a fallen blossom beneath their feet. “and because i’ve seen the world turn without them. i’ve made it turn. not with dragons. not with prophecies, but with will, and wit, and weight." of my own name. of broken promises, of kinslaying, of blood on the hands that would never be able to be washed out. his eyes flicked toward the horizon briefly—the ancient reach stretching outward with its green waves of abundance, dotted with septs and shrines and smoke from prayer fires. “some would say the velaryons believe themselves close to gods because they ride beasts that breathe fire,” he said, turning his head back to her slowly. “but even a dragon must bow its neck to a man who understands leverage.” the words weren’t threatening, but there was a velvet sharpness to them.

“some don't need to fly to command the sky. and some, don't need to land a mighty beast to benefit from the earth either.” somewhere in the very back of his mind, a tense conversation with a childhood friend that did not survive to adulthood arose to the very front of his mind; the guardian of the faith, the once voice of oldtown - how he had once told him their gold, their power, came from the ground. it was enough to fill him with a distant feeling of coldness upon his shoulders, like the final chime of a funeral procession - another conversation which felt like a lifetime ago, with one who would never be again.

the conversation around them continued, the speakers still waxing lyrical about divine order and celestial mercy, but he gave none of it his attention now. she was the only presence that held his focus. her ideas, her curves, her voice. it thrilled him more than he liked to admit, this tension of intellect and unspoken promise. a storm gathering behind civil discourse. “you speak of building meaning in a meaningless world,” he said, his tone softening—not in warmth, but in texture, like wine darkening in the cup. “and i respect that, more than blind faith. more than devotion passed down like an old shirt. you speak boldly, and i think all should be able to do that. this is only proving that, look at them. even the old men are joining in.” he indicated his ringed hand toward a group of elderly men, excited, eager to chime in on matters of a world that had long since left them behind.

his eyes dropped for the briefest of moments—just enough to glance at her hands still folded at her waist, at the line of her collarbone where her necklace sat like a signature—and then lifted again. “but it’s the ‘ifs’ that give you away,” he said, the grin returning now, sly and edged with charm. “every stance you’ve offered rests on condition. on possibility. ‘if they exist.’ ‘if they care.’ ‘if they’re cruel, or kind.’” he moved half a step closer, not to intimidate, but simply to close the air that flirted between them.

"tell me your stance," he said, his voice smooth, with just the faintest touch of amusement curling in it, "without using the word if." his eyes danced at that, glinting in the warm reach sunlight, cutting straight through the hesitation that hung around philosophical musings like incense. “not a single ‘perhaps’ or ‘maybe’ to hide behind. no conditions. no cloaks. do they exist—yes, or no?” something about gut instinct was what he wished to see from her; if she needed to pick one word, what would it be? he let the question rest between them like an apple held out in the palm of a snake.

and her desire for knowledge, one could argue and rhaena did –internally, of course–, led her to a similar realization that the king had. “it depends.” the words came assured from her, not a yes or no like what the king of the reach expected or asked for. rhaena was hardly what someone tended to ask for. her eyes, so dark purple they could be almost voids in this light, did not falter as they looked up to the king’s. “i’m not saying that to be contrarian or obstinate, but… for example, the seven? no.” she switched to the tongue of valyria not knowing or caring if he understood, as her tone and the way she ever so gently shook her head was translation enough. in a hall filled with andal descendants and she of valyrian blood, it was just a smart idea to keep from someone getting mad at her and therefore mad at house velaryon. as if they needed further rivals.

“but the valyrian gods? the northern trees and their seer princess? there is merit and proof.” the only two strong examples she could provide –between her own experiences and her family’s friendship with the northern royals– were ancient and half-dead. the great proof of her people’s gods existing were smoldering ruins of an empire and decaying flesh peeling off great bones. and the northern spirits? well she had enough of a mind in her head to know that the powers of the woods and wolves were best left to those who felt it in their blood. let them prove their gods, if they feel the need. “there are forces in this world that allow mortal men to tame fire incarnate, to see the future, and summon the dead back to their bodies. something exists and i won’t deny that. but i do not know which name is true, and i leave myself open to enlightenment in the matter.”

 “if i learn the truth of it one day in some spectacular moment of ecstasy,” rhaena shrugged nonchalantly, freckled shoulders rising just so and curls swishing against her back as she moved, the waterfall of deep brown so unlike the shining silver that framed her face. “well it’ll be another thing men write off coming from a woman.” a hollow amusement was in her voice as she spoke, well aware of how the hypothetical would end. either she’s a new daenys the dreamer or she’s written off as mad. or both, most likely. she had no desire to be either, in truth. “i have more worldly concerns to put my mind to in the meantime. i’ll let men who feel death’s breath on their necks use the last of their own to argue while i look to the future, to better what lay before us.” were she a man it would come off as almost altruistic, for a lord to care about building instead of maintaining the status quo was rare.

Rhaena had never been one to lie to him when asked something, even if the questions opened such old wounds. “It’s a hole we will never fill, I fear,” he said at last, matter-of-factly. “I don't think we are meant to either,” he added, his tone honest, lacking the usual armor the Lord of Driftmark wore. An armor he donned sometimes even with his family. Gods knew time only hardened him more and more, colder in the eyes of others, and it was through conversations like this that he sought to keep from growing so rigid he could no longer reach those he still had. For all the losses that chipped pieces away from their house, from him, it still mattered to him that his sister stood beside him.

He trusted her with Driftmark. That was never in question. But that wasn't all he was entrusting her with, however. “Take care of them,” he said. His words were not a command, but a sincere plea in his own quiet way. There was a subtle undertone of something raw and vulnerable in his tone, the kind he rarely allowed. Acheron and Aelora understood the situation more, suddenly forced to grow up despite their infancy. But Rhaenys still asked him when her mother would return. She had watched the stone coffin that carried what remained of Yna sink into the sea, and still didn't fully understand death as something definitive yet. “It shouldn't fall on you, but it has, sister. They... need guidance, and a loving figure while I'm gone,” he said. His jaw tightened for a moment, and his gaze dropped briefly to the floor before he looked up again, finding Rhaena's eyes. “Tell them only that I will do what I can to come back. Do not make promises that not even I can keep for them”. Don't promise them I will come back, was what he didn't outright say.

she recognized that her brother was being vulnerable with her, admitting without words that he was unsure if he would come back from the conflict. she appreciated that the lord of the tides allowed her to see this, after so long of watching her brother put up wall after wall with loss after loss, but now was not the time for it. not when it was too late to be anything but resolute. “you sound like you are expecting to sail to your death.” rhaena’s voice carried a tone that was almost accusatory but more so, and perhaps worse, hurt. after everything their family had suffered through, it felt like a slap in the face. she only ever got her hackles up like this when her pride was injured, but whatever tender part of her heart still existed throbbed like an unhealed wound at his words. it made her set her jaw tight. “if you have that mindset, you’ve already lost. might as well toss you into a stone coffin now.” 

for all the times she considered herself rhaenys’ daughter more than corlys’, there were times it showed. mostly when she was stubborn, resolute in her decisions and ideals, or with the taste of ambition in the back of her throat. it showed now, as she stood firm and tall in front of her brother, refusing to allow a maybe exist in this moment. “these children are your legacy, deimos;” she motioned to the window, to the innocent children playing, oblivious to how on fire the world truly was. “not mine, not ‘emon’s or nellie’s, yours. you have to be here to mold them into driftmark’s future, to nurture and guide in the way only a parent can... trust me, there is no replacement for a parent when you lose them young.” there was a heaviness to the insinuation, an obvious reference to how young she’d been when their mother died, and not much older when their father passed. deimos was grown, rhaena was not, no matter what society said about a girl.

"Sturdy men fall hard." Owen finished his drink, sitting it down on the arm rest of his throne. When it came to Velaryons, they lot of them were stunning. He recalled seeing Naelys Velaryon and having to remind himself she was the sister of Deimos. And he oft needed to remind himself as he stood here. Yes, his mind wandered to the other woman he invited to stay in his court, still, only a blind man would not see Rhaena's beauty. But Deimos was his friend and therefore Rhaena was just that, his good friends sister.

"Tell me, what brings a seadragon to the North? Surely it's more than my favorite day of the year." The King smiled before he reached over and grabbed the mug off his throne, refilled by some passing servant and he was grateful. The King liked to keep a watchful eye on his staff, they worked harder than any in the realm when it was time to deal with the king and his love of sport and drink. The halls would flow with food, drink, and blood until the coals were finally allowed to dim.

it was not, but it was the largest reason. their houses were friends, but there was also trade between them that deimos charged her with overseeing, and a meeting both she and the lady yuan decided would be best done later and not while winterfell was full of cacophonous celebration and very drunk giant men. "it is my house's gift to you, of course, but i refuse to not at least gloat a little. you'll understand when you see it." somewhere, sitting amongst all the other gifts, lay that solid northern oak box, trimmed with velvet, housing a splendid craft of iron, ivory, and ironwood.

rhaena knew, even this far north, she could not speak the truth of her heart on the matter of jaehaerys targaryen and the way he lost silverwing over the dornish desert. the mount of queen alysanne deserved far better than to end her days as the last dragon, dying with a subpar rider on her back. the deep dark cruel part of her, made of rage and bad influences and the way she feared she would not hesitate if a dagger was in her hand and an enemy was on their knees, wished silverwing would have thrown him on the flight and come back for another rider. and while she could hold those thoughts where no man could ever know and call it treason, to speak them would be folly. "i've rarely ever met a man that wasn't similar to his father in one way or another."

there was more to it than simple pleasure for pleasure's sake. it was in the way people leaned in to tell him secrets after their third glass, because he had spent the time talking like they were old friends. it was threaded into his gift for making half-hearted comments sound sincere. it was his talent for being remembered long after the dullness of dinner had worn off, for all the right reasons. he'd been a fixture of king's landing for over two thirds of his life, and in that time, he'd learned how to walk away from any conversation having bent it in his favour. his hedonism was an art, something that was easy, and led to people trusting him, doors opened and favours owed over the twirl of a goblet in his fingers.

"let the whores be picky," he said with a laugh. "i get invited back far more often than they do."

legs were thrown over his lap, and he made a soft noise of protest. he gave her a withering look, and shoved them with the heel of his palm. "get off me, you lump," he complained, and yet he did not move from his seat. "i'll be doing the same thing i always am, obviously. smiling, drinking, dancing, having a wonderful time." there was more to it than that. he'd be gathering threads and pulling at them, suggesting a lord might have more luck if he brought his trade prospects to a different port, or a daughter might shine in the path of an alternative suitor, and making them think it was all their own idea.

her legs may have been pushed off, but stubborn rhaena flopped them right back, crossing her arms as she listened to her brother, watching him with keen eyes that studied his face. she wondered what joy he got from all of this, of spreading himself so thin in order to manipulate things to go the way he wanted. that was what it all was, in the end, manipulation of minds slower than his in order to get what he wanted. but what did her brother want? was it truly just influence? maybe it made him feel important in some way he might not otherwise. could she even ask him for the answer, or would it be rude? would he even know what the answer would be?

he was saved from the question though when he insulted her intelligence, as she forgot the train of thought as she immediately grabbed a discarded throw pillow and swung it hard at his midsection. “rude!” she practically yelled, moving sit up, her legs swung off his lap as she kneeled on the couch, ready to attack again if he continued. “i should smother you for that. save the penrose girl the effort.”

she wasn’t surprised he asked for her to accompany him versus his fiancee, because she was no fool, she knew her brother was just marrying the girl for -at this point- just the money. once he may have had parchments, called himself ruling lord without putting in work, but the bastard now superseded his trueborn sister. if he had a plan, he’d need money that didn’t come from deimos, or he was unwilling to ask their brother due to probably some sort of patriarchal pride. shame he hated the sea, surely he could press a claim for storm’s end due to their maternal baratheon grandmother otherwise.

cedric tyrell had always believed that the mind, when unburdened by the theatre of power, could move with far greater grace; it was what he liked best about the verdant concord—this singular, strange space he had helped make room for. it was not the grandeur of highgarden's halls, nor even the careful balance of politics that quietly thrummed through every attending house and delegate, but the fact that here, at least for now, ideas were sovereign. he stood amongst them, not above, clad in his blue tunic that bore no crown, his hands tucked behind his back as he watched the debate unfold like a dance of finer steel.

and it was a dance, wasn't it? between certainty and curiosity, between ancient belief and new logic, all waltzing before the silken-draped dais of civility. he had not expected to find her there.

and yet, rhaena velaryon had arrived with all the quiet storm of a ship gliding into a foreign harbour—unannounced but not unnoticed. he had been watching the two central speakers volley between metaphysics and measurable cause, but not without catching the way rhaena velaryon tilted her head, as though weighing each syllable like a goldsmith checking for true weight. it was not the kind of performance many offered in such a setting—not the overwrought passion of orators desperate to be quoted, nor the pretentious aloofness of men too convinced of their own intellect. she simply listened. and in listening, she had drawn his. he had yielded her space without thinking, not because she was a lady nor because she was his friend’s sister, but because she moved with such intent, such purpose, that to hinder her felt like standing before the tide.

he had not spoken then, only inclined his head when she looked back at him, a gesture so small and weightless that it could have been mistaken for nothing—except it was not.

there was something about the way she had turned, the glance over her shoulder not hesitant but deliberate, as though she was not merely checking the path she had carved, but making a mark of it. her voice had joined the debate not with fire, but with a fluid sense of clarity. she did not demand the floor, she earned it, and cedric had found himself watching her more than the speakers themselves. there had been moments—just small ones—where her arguments took turns he had not expected, where her phrasing was laced with a touch of irony that suggested a deeper knowing. he had caught her eye more than once as she spoke, not to interrupt, nor to unsettle, but because it were the rules of such feats. there was an art to debate, matters which he himself did not cross: and yet,each time she returned his gaze with a glint something felt almost conspiratorial.

he did not flatter, for he believed such intelligence was standard, whilst flattery was too easily spent, and rarely worth the coin. but truth, when offered with sincerity, could be the beginning of something far more dangerous. his gaze rested on her not as a king assessing a subject, nor as a man weighing a woman’s beauty—which, admittedly, was easy enough to admire in her—but as a peer recognising a fellow hunter in the woods of thought. “well well well,” he continued, tone softening to something almost pensive, and suddenly they were having their own conversation, his towering figure slipping beside her shoulders. what he uttered was not a challenge, but a branch: to clarify. to make more coherent. “trust a velaryon to make an entrance and ensure one knows they are in the room.” cedric continued, glancing toward the speakers still consulting their scrolls, his tone welcoming - not many would even know it were him, if they did not know him personally or were a courtier of his.

he offered her an amused, entertained grin; one that was wicked to the very core, i in the way it almost appeared to be the rays of the sun itself. “so, according to your own words, we will consider both design and disorder to be two sides of the same coin. but how is that to impact the argument when design is used to support the existence of the gods, and disorder to either refute their intelligence or deny them completely?" his gaze swept over her features, a slight rose tint to her cheeks that no doubt blossomed due to the rush of the moment; it were not necessarily about wanting to be right, not in this circumstance. but rather being involved at all, and that made him have to ensure he resisted the urge to chuckle slightly to himself. his gaze lingered at her neck line, and he indicated toward it with a lazy sort of ease.

"that necklace of yours appears ornate, intricate, functioning; if i had made it, you would assume me an intelligent designer. yet if it were unappealing to the eye, or lacks in function - can't clasp, let's say, what would that say about me as a designer? either i'm not as intelligent as people claim, or i do not care for my creation. now, apply the same to the gods."

“but for every perfect pattern, there is imperfection - and that is fine, if we did not call them perfect. a child born blind while her twin sees the sunrise. diseases that waste the body with no regard for virtue or cruelty, storms that strike temples while sparing brothels. examples of natural disasters, let us take the doom itself as an example. if this world was designed, then the design bears cruelty as well as beauty. and if the gods intended such disorder—if they planted both roses and rot—then either they are not wise, or they are not kind.” his eyes flicked to hers again, but this time there was no smile—only the faint glimmer of something heavier. not sorrow, exactly. not quite cynicism, either. but something older than both, and sharper. “i ask not to unravel your point, lady rhaena, but to understand it more clearly,” he said, softer now - his words had no mocking in it, and yet, there was always that glint of mischief in his ocean eyes.

“if we call the world a work of divine craftsmanship, how do we reconcile the pain stitched into its corners? if the gods are designers, then they are not impartial architects—they are artists who chose to mix horror in with harmony. and if we must believe in them, must we also believe they are good?”

his move to stand with her was an unsaid signal, and she turned towards him just so. mostly out of comfort so her neck was not turned too drastically as she listened, allowing his words to wash over her, a mind honed by ancient and modern texts turning them over and analysing what was said. there was either courage or a blase sort of uncaring in openly speaking of the gods as either uncaring or imperfect. it was something she expected from a valyrian, now openly encouraged to light candles and say prayers to the ancient gods of their ancestors instead of kneeling before the seven-in-one, not a reach-born tyrell who could see the hightower and the starry sept on his south-western horizon. her eyes darted as she listened her; sometimes meeting his, sometimes moving as she thought deeply on his phrasing, on his questions, on the way his voice changed with each point. there was more to him than her brother's bosom friend who he found trouble with, as she assumed as all people are more than what they appear, but this was a glimpse at what lay beneath the reputation of cedric tyrell and his crown of golden thorns. it interested her, like the toy puzzles her father gifted her, but more deeply. were people not the most complex of puzzles? and were they perhaps never solved, not even by themselves?

"tell me, do you not find the beauty of your roses all the more lovely when you accept one day they will wither and wilt? whether cut by your gardeners or left on the bush, eventually the flower fades." the velaryon's words were measured, thoughtful and occasionally she paused as she formed her answer, taking what she had heard him say and not chipping at it but rather adding to it. building something from it. her eyes searched his for an answer she wouldn't wait for. "i find that to appreciate things, we must also accept that they will atrophy, and that is for a reason. whether that is the gods' design or just nature is up to you and the strength of your faith. you have your views of your seven, who frankly i find to be more like lackadaisical minders than makers myself, if they exist." she could divert to complain about the starry sept and gods knew what mysteries they purported and encouraged to keep the smallfolk and lords complacent and acting in fear of their souls, but this was not the place or time for it. she bore little love for the seven, thinking back to her moody and dark teenage years for a moment. a shade of darkness crossed over her eyes as she remembered how her faith disintegrated in the wake of the queen who never was. "and if they exist, they have their plans which are ineffable to mortal minds. whether they guide us or have left us on our own will never be known by us. so we must keep going, find our own meaning in the meaningless."

"after all, you pray to the warrior for strong arms, you ask the mother for healthy children. if they were something like kind, you wouldn't have to ask. no man would fall in war, no child would be born deformed. but these things happen." rhaena turned towards cedric more, as she lost all desire to hear men consulting scrolls and arguing for the masses when she had her own discussion, her own philosophical back and forth to enjoy. it was so rare to find someone that wanted to talk to her like this, to have the discussions that few would dare. the additional bonus of it being someone attractive -because she was not blind nor stupid, cedric tyrell was almost objectively attractive- that she did not mind looking at while speaking. it was not like aemon would mind that she spoke to his friend in this way. her brothers had long ago given her freedoms that she's never given them a reason to regret.