"The blood of Lucerys will be repaid tenfold. A brother for a brother."
In which Daenys Velaryon, the oldest child of Rhaenyra Targaryen and Laenor Velaryon, must come to terms with the fact that the man she loves has committed an unforgivable crime...
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"Home is the first grave, and you will always be buried here, in my heart."
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Aemond Targaryen sat alone in his makeshift chambers, the weight of regret heavy on his shoulders. The room felt emptier without the presence of his lady wife, and the silence echoed the absence of her laughter and warmth that he realized he had begun to take for granted. It had been four days since he had seen her last.
His thoughts churned with self-reproach, and the memory of their last argument played out in his mind like a haunting refrain. He recognized the cruelty in his words, the callousness with which he had wounded the woman who had chosen to be his companion. She, who had always stood by him, was now misguided by his suggestion that she was a mere consolation prize, someone he settled for because he could not fathom anyone else having him, wanting him.
He had not seen her since. She refused to let anyone into her chambers, not even Helaena, and she did not take a single meal, each tray outside the door remaining untouched until one of the servants came to replace it with yet another. In fact, the only indicators that she was still alive, were the occasional sounds of things being thrown about, and the scuffle of her feet as she paced endlessly.
It did not help that the walls were paper thin and Aemond's temporary residence had been set up in the room adjacent to hers. All day, he heard both her screams and her pleas to some unknown deity, and if she got no rest, neither did he.
Even now in the dead of night, as he tried to occupy himself with the latest book he had picked up from the castle library, he could hear the unsettling cadence of hollow thuds echoing through the walls. At first, he dismissed them as the sounds of a heart heavy with sorrow and frustration, perhaps a physical manifestation of emotional turmoil.
However, as the rhythm of the banging persisted and grew more pronounced, he found it increasingly difficult to disregard the disconcerting noise. The hollow echoes seemed to reverberate through the corridors like a mournful lament, and his attempts to focus on his reading became futile as the sounds clawed at his conscience.
Then, a sudden escalation in intensity seized his attention, culminating in a terrible crash that shattered the uneasy stillness of the Red Keep. Without a second thought, he leaped from his seat, the urgency of the moment propelling him toward the source of the noise.
As he approached Daenys's door, he found one of her guarding knights struggling with the handle in vain. The guard's brow was furrowed in frustration as he hammered against the door.
"What is going on here, it is late, people are trying to rest!" Aemond snapped, impatiently.
"My prince!" the guard greeted his arrival with a nod. "Something has happened to the princess, I fear, but I can't get the door open. Something's blocking it from the inside."
