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When Otto Hightower handed you to him like a piece of signed parchment, the alliance felt less like a marriage and more like a tactical capture. Your bloodline stood fiercely with Princess Rhaenyra, bound by oaths to the late King's chosen heir.

To you, Gwayne was the very body of the usurpation—the brother to the Queen who coveted the throne, the face of the creeping green shadow slowly overtaking the Red Keep. You were deeply put off by the factional taint of his name, constantly on your guard, waiting for the claws to show beneath his courtly exterior.

Yet weirdly enough, he treated you with a devastatingly polite distance, an immaculate chivalry that left you feeling like a guest in your own life.

He would offer his arm, he would hold doors, he would speak kindly. And yet your heart remained shielded deep inside your chest.

But despite the effort you had put into keeping your walls high, the change from formal to something soft and living occurred without a sudden declaration, almost escaping your notice. It was an accretion of unwritten truths.

It was discovered first in the gradual unraveling of his voice.

That clear instrument he used to command guards and placate lords slowly dropped its courtly register when the armours were cast aside. In the glow of the burning candles, away from the prying eyes, his speech became a gentler, more fragmented thing, meant for your ears alone.

He did not demand your submission, rather, he surrendered his own vigilance. You watched the rigid set of his shoulders slowly relax the moment he crossed the threshold into your chambers. The room ceased to be just a place where he slept, it became a place where he was permitted to bleed off the poison of the court.

There was a profound, unhurried tethering. He would often sit near your window while droplets of rain lashed the stone, his fingers idly tracing the embroidery of your clothes, calmed simply by the sound of your breath across from him.

One evening, he returned from an exhausting meeting with his father, his eyes dark with the weight of Otto’s demands. He sank to the floor beside your chair, burying his face in the fabric of your skirt.

“Gwayne?” you whispered, your fingers threading through his hair. “What did he say?”

“Do not ask me of the world out there,” he grunted, his voice a muffled rasp against your velvet gown. “Let me stay here for an hour. Just an hour where I do not have to be my father’s son. Tell me something ordinary. Tell me about the animals in the garden, or the book you read today. Anything.”

“I saw two lovebirds building a nest on the tree by the wall,” you murmured, your voice instantly soothing the nerves in him. “It reminded me of us.”

He leaned his head back against your knee, looking up at you with burning fondness that made everything else fade into background noise. “Mm, did it now?” he teased, reaching up to press a kiss to the center of your palm. “The gods help me, I am utterly helpless against you.” He let out a sigh.

Then lived those moonlit hours when the pressure of the world dissolved into the linen of your bed.

In the quiet aftermath of your intimacy, when the frantic heat had slowed to a languid warmth, he would hold you in the dark. His hands moved with gentleness across your bare skin, tracing the curve of your collarbone and sweep of your hip as if memorising the boundaries of a world he couldn’t bear to let slip away.

You would be flush against his chest, your head tucked beneath his jaw while his fingers idly brushed strands of your hair. His breathing would slow, heavy with the exhaustion of the days he carried, but his embrace never faltered. He would press his lips softly into the crown of your head, his chest lifting with a content sigh.

In those stolen hours, he belonged entirely to you. There was a night when the two of you refused sleep, consumed in conversation. He laid with his hand resting flat against yours, his eyes fixed on the canopy above as if tracing the map of a life he actually wanted to live.

“When the spring comes, I want to take you away from this place,” he had murmured, “perhaps to your father’s halls. I want to see the cliffs you spoke of, where ‘the wind smells of salt instead of rot,’ if I recall your words correctly?”

A breathless giggle escaped your lips, a spark of incandescent joy warming your chest. You turned in his embrace, your fingers brushing the hair from his eyes, your face alight with excitement.

“Only my father's halls?” you questioned, leaning up on one elbow to look down at him.

“Gwayne, if we manage to escape the jaws of this castle, I am not letting you slip away so easily. We must go to the cliffs, yes, but then you must take me to the Reach. You promised me once that we would walk through the bed of roses in the summer. We can pack nothing but wine and bread, and forget that the city ever existed.”

Gwayne watched you, his gaze tracking the curve of your smile, a look of helpless adoration softening every hard line of his face. A laugh rumbled in his chest as he reached up, wrapping his hand around the nape of your neck to pull you down into a sweet, lingering kiss.

“The Reach, the ruins, the edge of the world,” he whispered against your lips, his arms tightening around you as if you were going to disappear if he let go. “Wherever you wish, my love. A hundred different places, if only to keep that look in your eyes.”

You rested your cheek against his chest, listening to the reassuring thud of his heart. You fell asleep weaving those foolish, beautiful dreams into the dark, utterly convinced that the man holding you would sooner slaughter the world before he ever let a single drop of rain fall on your happiness.

Yet the air of King’s Landing grew relentlessly venomous, thickening with the acrid scent of treason.

In those breathless months following Aegon’s coronation, the peace you had inhabited with Gwayne was instantly exposed for what it was. A fragile ornament crushed beneath the heel of his father’s ambitions.

While the capital continued adjusting to the rule of the Greens, your house remained a stubborn holdout. Your father refused to acknowledge the new king, holding fast to his oaths to Rhaenyra. To Otto, your bloodline was no longer an honorable ally, but a defiance blocking the road to the iron throne that could not be suffered to endure.

Then came the ravens from east.

You learned of the coming storm not from a herald, but from the terrifying silence that occupied Gwayne when he returned to your quarters after a council meeting. He stood before the window, his hands clasped tightly behind his back.

“The ultimatums were returned unopened,” he said. His voice lacked its usual warmth. It was a hollow sound that seemed to sap heat from the room. “Your father remains loyal to the princess.”

The blood in your veins went solid. You knew the volatile nature of the men who sat at Aegon's right hand.

You knew that if Criston were unleashed upon your childhood home, there would be no mercy, and if Prince Aemond took to the sky, your heritage would be reduced to ash before the week's end.

“What will they do?” you whispered, crossing the room with frantic steps, your fingers catching his sleeve. “Gwayne, please. Speak to your father, or perhaps your sister. Let me send a rider– let me plead with–”

“It is past the point of letters,” Gwayne interrupted softly, finally turning his gaze to meet yours. He reached out, his palms framing your face with a tenderness that felt terribly final. “Cole demanded the vanguard. He wanted to make an example of your house...”

A muscle leaped in his jaw as he swallowed down whatever pride remained in his throat. “I kneeled before the King in front of the council. I begged for the vanguard myself. I told them a Hightower sword must lead the assault to ensure the territory is secured cleanly. I… I gave them my word.”

You stumbled backward, pulling out of his touch as horror bloomed beneath your ribs.

The man who had spent his nights finding solace in your arms had just bartered for the right to destroy your life. “You asked for the command?” you breathed. “You are marching against my blood?”

“It is better this way,” Gwayne insisted fiercely, closing the distance between you and grasping your shoulders desperately. “Do you not see? If Cole goes, he will put every soul bearing your name to the sword. If Aemond flies, your home becomes a sepulcher. But if I go, I can dictate the terms.”

A harsh, broken laugh escaped your throat, tears of raw fury finally spilling over your lashes. “And I am supposed to thank you for that? I am supposed to welcome you back into this bed with the scent of my home’s burning fields on your skin?”

“I have sacrificed my own honour for this!” his righteousness flared, his grip tightening on your shoulders. “I am doing this to shield you! I am doing this because I love you!”

“How dare you call this love?” you yelled, the words tearing from your lungs. “You do not love me, Gwayne. You loved a political knot that grew compliant in your hands. You loved having a place to crawl into when your father’s weight grew too heavy for your perfect shoulders. But the very moment the world demanded you choose between the Hand’s ambition and my survival…” you shook your head, your lower lip quivering. You couldn’t bring yourself to continue.

Gwayne’s face went pale, his hands dropping to his sides as if you had just stabbed him.

“If I do not hold the torch, the fire consumes us all!” he barked back, his voice laced with desperate pain. His eyes flashed with a devastating wildness you had never seen in him before. “Would you prefer Criston and Aemond? Tell me! Would you rather I let them lead?”

“I would rather a husband who did not look at my family’s ruin and call it an immaculate gift,” you spat, backing away from him until the wood of your vanity pressed against your spine.

You looked into his eyes, searching for your husband. Your Gwayne. But you found only a knight. One trapped in the machinery of his father’s war. He truly believed his compromise was a holy mercy. He believed that by becoming the executioner of your past, he was preserving your future.

Three days later, Gwayne rode out through the King’s Gate at the head of a thousand spears, your favour still braided into the hilt of his blade.

He left you alone with your thoughts, left only to count the heartbeats until the sky turned to smoke.

The weeks did not pass. They accumulated, settling over your shared rooms like the fine grey dust that drifted from the lower yards.

Every midnight, you would collapse onto your knees before the small carved altars in the corner of the castle’s shrine, your skin shivering against the cold stone as you pressed your palms together. But the moment you opened your mouth to plead with the heavens, your throat would lock. You discovered, with a sickening horror, that you no longer knew how to pray.

Did you beg the Smith to strengthen your father's walls, knowing it meant Gwayne would be butchered at the gates? Did you beg the Mother to shield your husband, knowing his survival required the destruction of your childhood home? Your words became choked and useless in the dark—a terrible realization that the gods could not bless one half of your heart without utterly destroying the other.

Then came the day when the bells of the sept did not toll for prayer, but clanged with the triumphant roar of victory.

The heralds in the courtyard shouted of a rebellion quelled, of a defiant house brought to its knees by the righteous hand of the King’s vanguard.

They were cheering for the execution of your blood.

When the doors to your bedchamber finally opened, it revealed a man who looked as though he had been dragged out from the deepest pit of seven hells.

Gwayne stood in the entryway. The knight of Oldtown, the man who had meticulously memorised the curves of your skin in the dark, was long gone.

The silver lines of his armour was caked with layers of soot, the plates dented and covered with dried mud. He carried the suffocating stench of charred timber, along with the sickly sweet metallic tang of blood.

His breathing was frantic, chest heaving beneath the metal as his eyes searched for you. He found you sitting by the cold hearth, a ragged sound escaping his throat. He took a reluctant step toward you, hands reaching out blindly.

“It is finished,” he choked out, “Your sisters are in custody, but they are breathing. They are alive. I secured it.”

You didn’t rise to meet him.

“And the cliffs, Gwayne?” you whispered, your voice dangerously level. A hollow timbre of a woman speaking from inside a grave. “How do they look now? Does the wind still smell of salt? or did you choke it with the debris of my father’s halls?”

Gwayne stilled, his outstretched hands hovering in the empty space between you. “Your father would not bend!” he pleaded, dropping heavily to his knees before you, the metal of his armour striking the floor with a mocking clang.

He reached out, filthy fingers desperately clutching at the fabric of your gown, mimicking the exact posture of surrender he had used weeks ago when begging to take the vanguard.

“He wouldn’t look at the terms. If I hadn't swung the blade clean myself, Cole would have left him tortured! I gave him a clean, honourable death!”

“Do not lie to yourself to make your sleep easier,” you muttered, and for the first time, your eyes shifted down to look at him, cold and unblinking. “You didn’t break your soul to save my family, Gwayne. You found it. It looks exactly like your father’s.”

An agonizing sob tore from his throat. He buried his face in your skirts, his shoulders shaking as he wept, pleading for your love, the fingers combing through his hair, the soothing voice.

But you remained frozen. You did not touch him. You could not.

As the sun set, you were not permitted time for mourning. The maids were sent, their trembling hands forcing you into a gown of emerald silk. They pinned your hair back with golden needles, and paraded you down the stone corridors like a prized trophy of war.

The hall was deafening. Lords and ladies drank from their golden chalices, their laughter bouncing off the walls, while musicians played a spirited tune to celebrate the crushing of the rebellion.

At the high table, you sat motionless. You didn’t touch your wine, didn’t look at the feast before you. You sat perfectly straight, your wide eyes staring vacant into the middle distance.

To your right sat Gwayne, washed clean of the soot and blood. His hand rested flat against the small of your back—a frantic touch that had been there for hours, silently begging for even a flinch, a glance, a single tear to prove you were still alive.

From your left, a shadow fell over your plate.

Otto Hightower stepped slowly toward you. He looked to be unbothered, his face a mask of serene statecraft. He leaned down slightly, placing a cold hand on your shoulder.

“A tragic business, my lady,” Otto murmured, his eyes scanning your blank profile with the curiosity of a master checking on a piece of chess. “Your father was a man of honour, but regretfully, honour without wisdom is a short lived thing in this world. It is a mercy that Gwayne arrived in time to spare your sisters from a traitor’s end.”

Otto’s fingers tightened slightly—a subtle warning disguised as a gesture of comfort.

“The King notices your silence.” His voice dropped into a pragmatic register. “You are a Hightower by law and by blood now. Smile for your King. Speak to your husband. Let the court see that the rebellion is truly dead.”

Otto then paused, waiting for your compliance, waiting for the polite response you had been taught since birth to give.

You gave him nothing. You remained horrifyingly still, an exquisitely dressed corpse sitting in the center of their victory.

Beside you, Gwayne let out a sharp breath, his fingers digging into your waist as he looked up at his father. He wanted Otto to stop. But he merely sighed, a flick of disappointment crossing his features before he pulled his hand away and dissolved back into the crowd of cheers.

Across the hall, a lord raised a goblet, his voice booming over the chatter as he toasted the victory of the Greens, explicitly naming your ancestral home as the nest of traitors that had finally been cleansed by the righteous steel of Ser Gwayne.

The noise that came after shook the very foundation of the castle. Gwayne closed his eyes, his forehead pressing forward as he shattered beside you.

But your eyes were no longer vacant.

Your body had not moved an inch, but your flat gaze had slowly drifted down to the linen table cloth.

Resting just inches from your motionless hand was a small, silver knife, laid out for the final course of the banquet. The torchlight caught the polished steel of the blade, reflecting a tiny glint of fire.

You didn’t care about the roar of the crowd cheering for your father’s execution. The hall faded into a distant, muffled hum as your unblinking eyes locked onto the silver with clarity.

It was a promise of an exit, a way to finally wash yourself clean of their green banners and go home to the salt-swept cliffs where your father was waiting.