daeron had never known his true mother. alicent had sent him to ward in oldtown when he was too young to hold memories. he had not looked to replace her role, but it had happened nonetheless. she was the one he would always returned to, ormund's wife. she had sons of her own, children she shared blood with, and yet she treated daeron no different from them.
he remembered little of being an infant, only the warmth of her embrace and the comfort of her gentle lilt. daeron had been taken under her wing and into her arms, raised like her very own child. she sat by his sickbed even when the maesters of the hightower advised against it, she sewed him small trinkets and handkerchiefs with tessarion embroidered in blue thread, she praised his high valyrian when everything he had been taught of himself warred against it, she drew him into hugs and kissed his temple and cheeks despite ormund's disgusted scoldings about how unbecoming it was for a woman of her station to coddle a boy that was not hers. but daeron was hers, in the ways that mattered the most. blood was a thin thing, he had learned, and if there was one person in the whole seven kingdoms that the prince could rely upon, it was her.
so when daeron came to her, that agonizing night in tumbleton, she quickly rose from her spot by the hearth in her chambers, her jaw set heavily. daeron knew he looked an utter mess; with his cheeks wet and eyes still red. he had not noticed he had wept until his eyes began to burn anew at the sight of her. his feet had become planted to the cobble floor, his fists clenched by his sides. "mother," he had said, his voice scarcely above a trembling whisper. not my lady, not lady hightower, not even her name - but the most precious title of all.
before daeron could fix his mistake, she took him into her arms without a second thought. she accepted the name naturally, no comment made to scold or berate as ormund may have done. her hold was firm but not unkind, her touch gentle and grounding, and he melt into her embrace like a chick seeking warmth. "what has he done?" she questioned in a sharp whisper. daeron would tell her then, the words sticking in his throat, of what lord ormund had made him do. he spoke of how the man's hands cradled his face, proclaiming him a claimant to the iron throne. he had held vigilance in his own two hands, and drove sword into flesh with the outcome of death.
daeron heard her breath catch, even above the sounds of his shaky crying. his own hands clutched at her back, feeling the rigid lining of her corset beneath green silks. her grip tightened, body growing tense like a lioness prepared to strike for the sake of her cub. "daeron," she pulled back just enough to look into his watery eyes. "my sweet boy, what has he done to you?" it sounded less like a question and more of a threat to the man she called husband. her hands, smaller and gentler than ormund's, cradled his face with a somehow violent tenderness that only a mother could conjure. "do not fret," she said, wiping his tears and he had no choice but to lean into her touch like a kitten, "i know... the burdens of a king are too heavy for a boy. you are still a child, still meant to be protected. whatever ormund may do, whatever ormund may say, you must believe in me when i say we shall bear the weight together. you would make a good king, for you are noble and honorable and kind, but you are not meant to travel this path with him. you are deserving of guidance, not commands. ormund is a volatile man and he hides much from me, but you are mine. no harm shall come so as long as you return to me."
