i do not have a gentle heart

Aside from that rather lovely affair with Garlan, Bartie was only her second real relationship, with feelings and conversations instead of just sex and snogging. She just hadn’t had the time during school for anything big and emotional and dramatic, and Dacey never truly mattered.

"I did once. But not anymore. Somethings just don't work out."

She lets it end at that, and waits patiently for the next animal. She's more leery of the cat, just because it looks far less friendly than poor Davey, but her hand is sure and calm.

As they inch their way through the traffic, she kicked her legs up against the dashboard, sinking into the soft leather of the seats.

"School's going good. I'm thinking about going into public relations." She doesn't mention that she's determined to find out just what Rhaegar is planning--and if it's what she thinks it is, get her first job as a publicist.

If there's one thing Dany's learned from her family, it's how to play her cards close to the vest.

\Back home where Dacey wasn’t constantly second guessing herself when she walked into a room. But soon enough she’d be back there, only a few months until she graduated and then straight up to Lewis and taking over the practice run by old man Jameson and getting ready to settle down. It’d be nice, even if she wanted nothing more than to see a bit of the world first. There would be time for that later though.

Men are a complication she currently can't afford to have. Plus, Dany's track record is awful. The only real relationship she'd ever been was with Drogo and that had ended. Dany shakes her head, letting the thought cut off.

"Yes. Please," she says. "And I'm not sure if your director told you, but later in the afternoon Rhaegar might be sending a news crew? Just for some pictures. I don't know what time. He just sort of mentioned it in passing, that they might be coming so..."

Jon Connington shows up a little over an hour after that, and it's a relief. Not specifically because she's now getting to go home, but because she hadn't been sure her father wasn't sending some nameless, faceless bodyguard who answers all her questions and comments with grunts and shrugs. Mr. Connington is, at the very least, a family friend and familiar.

She looks out into the rain sloshed streets and wonders if he knows that whenever she comes home from break, she counts down the days she gets to go back. She loves her family, her father and her brothers and sister-in-law and her niece and nephew, but there's no point in denying that this return home is nothing more than a duty. Showing the world that the Targaryens are a strong, firm family unit, when they were anything but. Aerys is always go, and Viserys is learning from him. Rhaegar had his own from family, and from what she could tell there's friction there too.

But she lifts a shoulder in a shrug. Appearances. She's been taught since her earliest memory how important they are.

There were some parts of the hospital even he didn’t have access to, and who knew what they were doing there. Petyr probably knew, he was almost sure of it. 

But, then again, she probably smells like him. Her lips twist.

It hurts too much to even look at him, an odd sting of rejection and disappointment, so she focuses on the smaller man ahead of them.

She tracked Dacey's movements, envious of how sure she is with her animals. Dany's good at putting up fronts, but most time she's wracked with an odd sort of self-depreciation, a certainty that she's doing wrong and covering it with confidence and poise.

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” he says with a forced grin and a roll of his eyes. His voice threatens to crack as he laughs. “I promise not to touch your clothes or grandfather’s talons.”

She glances down at the slim black watch around her wrist. "Almost eleven. That'll give you an hour if you want to slip out before the announcement."

But no, they didn’t spend a week out in an unquarantined area only to walk away with nothing but singed fingers from grabbing the dragon’s tail, only to have her slip away because he was careless.

“I can’t.” Edmure fiddles with the strap on his rifle, pretending to adjust it, just for something in his hands to do. “I’m sorry.” The apology seems hollow as soon as he says it, and he knew she wouldn’t accept it. He wouldn’t have either, had he been in her place.

“Where will you go anyway? Back out there, to the walkers?” His hands pull on the strap, making sure it is secure, and he shoulders the rifle. “At least it’s safe in here. You’ll have a roof under your head, a bed to sleep in, warm meals every day. You can’t tell me that’s not preferable to how you’ve been living.”

He doesn’t know what Petyr wants to do with her, though. Even after all this time, his actual knowledge about the outbreak is pretty much nonexistent - all he knows is they’re not alive, their blood can kill you, they’re attracted to noise. Whispers had sometimes said the Targaryens were responsible for this mess, but he didn’t see how bringing in one of Aerys’ children was going to reverse the disease.

But then again, what did he know - he was just a simple gun for hire.

She isn’t going to budge on this - that much is clear - but he has a job to do. The fingers on his left hand unconsciously reach for the ring on his fourth finger, and it isn’t there - he always takes it off when going out, so he won’t get crap under it - but the little hollow bump in the joint makes him feel empty now. The beginnings of guilt are starting to weigh down on him, and he is tired.

Edmure sighs and scrubs a hand through his hair. He doesn’t have to do it often, but this is the part of his job that he hates the most.

She already knows the answer. No. But she wonders if he has courage enough to admit it. She's not sick, she doesn't have the disease, but she'll disappear all the same. She knows it. He knows it. The man ahead of them knows it.

It's the elephant in the room.

She swallows and looks away, hand slipping into her pants pocket. Her phone, with one battery left. She's been darting in and out of ransacked stores, using what electric still hummed to charge it whenever she can. It's the only connection she has to her family anymore.

Hunching over so he can't see it, she sends the text quickly. Don't come to the hospital, and then deletes her whole history.

"I wasn't home much, anyway," she explained. "I've been away at school since I was about twelve." She doesn't mention that it had been a boarding school, that more often than not she was forced to remain there during breaks because her father had jetted he and his mistress off on some exotic trip. "That would have hardly been far to a pet."

“You aren’t that short,” Aegon teases, taking the hand from Dany’s waist to pat her on the head. Teasing Viserys about something he’s sore about isn’t an option if he doesn’t want his ears boxed, so he enjoys when he can joke with his aunt. At her advice, he nods. As smart as he is, Aegon has no mind for politics. Business, perhaps, but posing for photoshoots and giving statements is beyond him. “Thanks,” he says as the song ends.

Briefly, he imagines pulling a rude face just over his father’s shoulder. Immature, stupid, degrading… but wouldn’t it be worth the lecture? He’d like to see Rhaegar Targaryen flush in shame and scream at him.

Like she always does, she twists her head around, taking in the room. Mostly, she tries to locate her family. She's gotten into the habit of recognizing disasters before they happen, and averting them. Viserys, the last she saw, was somewhere in the back--but he's long gone. Rhaegar is in deep conversation with who she thinks is a Stark. One of the older ones, though his back is to her. Aerys is talking to his latest mistress, a woman Dany snubs at every opporunity. Her mother passed almost seven years ago, but Aerys's infidelty is nothing new, nor is the women whose company he keeps. Rhaenys has been drawn to the piano, bopping her head in time with the tune.

"Besides you know my wash is dry cleaner only. And I would never ask anyone to clip Father's fingernails. That is excessive torture."

She brushes passed a waiter, who hunches over to cough violently in his hands. She shakes her head sympathetically.

Hopping out of the van, he grabs his sniper rifle and starts surveying the area, checking for movement, potential ambush spots. “It’s clear.” he calls out, in case Petyr was waiting for a go-ahead.

What had she hoped for? she chides herself. She had just wanted to distract him enough to gain her freedom, but instead she had let herself get swept up in her own ploy. She has no one to blame but herself, but the London Royal Hospital stands before her, dark and menacing, and true terror races up her spine.

She doesn't know how she knows but she can feel it down to her marrow, a steel spike hammered into her spine, that the hospital would become her tomb if she doesn't escape, doesn't flee.

The redheaded man is waiting for her, face streaked with an odd half-lighting from the hospital. It's still vaguely familiar, but one she can't place, and she almost jerks to a halt at that thought. What have you done? something hisses inside her. A man she barely knew, and she had let him touch her, sleep with her. And for what? For nothing.

When the treat's consumed, Dave bumps his nose into her hand, seeking affection. Dany can't resist giving him a loving pat. His face is so dopey, she thinks, and wonders how anyone could want to hurt him.

Aerys is impossible to stomach as a grandfather; he can only imagine what he would be like as a father. All that ambition… Aegon can see the way it’s affected his family. He’s thankful for his mother’s gentle hand at times like these, and for his father’s general disinterest.

Both Rhaenys and Aegon had inherited Elia's shade of hair, and Dany's so thankful for that. She remembers her early school years, being tormented by the other girls, told she couldn't play with the boys because she was going to marry her brother. It had been awful and she's glad Aegon and Rhaenys had been able to escape that, at least.

The song is winding down, she notices. Someone behind her bumps into her elbow, jarring her, and she scoots in closer to Aegon, smiling. "I hate being short," she admits. "Once the song's done I'll help you slip out for a bit. Cover for you. Your father's making his announcement at midnight. You'll need to be back by then. They'll want pictures."

Not of her, of course. Just of Rhaegar and his children, and her father, and perhaps Viserys if he's in a good mood. The girls of the family were largely ignored. Their duty's to marry well, and produce more boys. It's archaic, that thinking, but rooted so deeply in their family there's little point in stopping it.