Chapter Text
Alicent rushed out the front doors of the school once the bell rang and towards the parking lot. She veered out to where her car was parked next to Helaena’s. The girl was standing beside it talking to Rhaenyra.
“Laena,” Alicent called, out of breath from running through the school. Helaena and Rhaenyra both turned their attention to the girl who was close to gasping for air. Rhaenyra chuckled a bit and Alicent felt her cheeks turning red from embarrassment.
“Here I thought you were running all that way for me.” Rhaenyra prodded, but her voice held humor behind her words. Alicent let out a huff as she caught her breath and ignored the girl.
“Are we-..” She started to speak, but Helaena had spoke at the same time, cutting her off, “Sorry for interrupting, do you want to go to the field after the game tonight?” Alicent’s brows furrowed at that because Helaena rarely partook in those type of activities while Rhaenyra rarely allowed for it to happen even if she had wanted to.
“Rhaenyra said I should come and invite you,” Helaena continued and Rhaenyra snapped her head to look at her sister, “I did not say it like that!” The older girl protested.
Helaena stared at her sister in confusion, “That’s exactly what you said, Nyra.” Rhaenyra huffed in frustration and Alicent laughed a bit.
“What’s funny?” Rhaenyra spat, the laughter died in Alicent’s throat quickly and the smile faded from her face. Helaena looked ready to scold her sister, surprised by the outburst herself.
“Nothing, sorry…” Alicent trailed off with her words, the other girl sighed, “I’m sorry, that was rude.”
Alicent was pretty sure that’s the only time she’d heard Rhaenyra apologize to somebody other than Helaena. Both siblings were staring at her now, waiting on her response.
“Sure I’ll go, what about Criston?” Alicent questioned and Helaena nodded, looking to Rhaenyra. The older girl scowled at the younger one, “Why would you want him to come?”
“He’s our friend, Rhaenyra,” Helaena protested, she watched her older sister deflate at that.
“He’ll probably be there with Aemond and their weirdo friend Larys, Harwin always invites him to everything for some reason.” Rhaenyra said with a hint of irritation in her voice.
Helaena clapped excitedly, “We’ll all be there to party together!” Her smile was bright and wide, this caused Rhaenyra and Alicent to show their own smile to her.
They heard chatter getting louder behind them as footsteps approached, Alicent turned to look at the source. Aegon and Harwin were quickly approaching them with the siblings’ cousin, Laenor, in tow.
Alicent didn’t miss the way Harwin had smiled and looked Rhaenyra up and down or the way the girl smiled kindly back at him.
“Ready to go, Nyra? I’ll ride with you back to the house, I need to get my car.” Aegon announced and Rhaenyra nodded before walking off with them. No farewells were given from either side.
“You’ll pick me up from my house right?” Helaena questioned, pulling Alicent’s attention away from the fading figures.
“Yeah, I just have to run home and change quickly.” The girl replied.
They both hugged and said their farewells before both departing in their own vehicles. As Alicent passed by where Rhaenyra was parked she could’ve sworn she saw the older girl watching her the whole way.
Night had fallen quickly and Alicent was pulling up to the Targaryen household with a minute to spare. She sent Helaena a quick text to let her know she was outside.
The house was noticeably larger than the others in the neighborhood as was their driveway, but Alicent assumed that was because they had four children who all had their own rooms and cars.
It made Alicent wish she’d had more siblings. She had an older brother, Gwayne, but he was years older than her and had moved out by the time she was old enough to need him. Now, it was just herself and her father, Otto.
The girl was pulled from her thoughts as the front door opened. Viserys, Aemma, and Helaena all spilled out on to the front porch. They stood together as Viserys locked the door and Aemma spoke to Helaena.
Once the door was locked, they all walked down the driveway. Aemma and Viserys offered a warm smile and a wave at Alicent, which she returned kindly.
Helaena opened the car door and slid in cautiously. Alicent loved the way she did everything with caution, as if everything was a matter of life or death to her.
“Hey Laena,” Alicent greeted as the girl clicked her seatbelt in to place. The girl smiled at her, “Hi, i’m so excited for tonight, I’ve never been to one of the after party’s for the football games.”
“Me neither,” Alicent said nervously, “You aren’t a little frightened?”
“Aegon and Rhaenyra won’t let anything happen to us,” Helaena said casually. Alicent knew that was true, Aegon and Rhaenyra had stopped a lot of things from happening to them, but it had always been when they were together. She couldn’t help but wonder if they’d help her the same way if Helaena wasn’t there.
They arrived at the football game in a reasonable amount of time and stopped to get snacks on the way. The two girls stood in the student section together at the bottom, standing right over the cheerleaders who were practicing below.
They began to get packed in beside other students as the stands began to fill. The game started and to no one’s surprise, Westeros had won by a landslide.
They were all cheering and celebrating, but Alicent’s celebration was cut short as a boy behind her and Helaena tried to force his way to the front. Alicent assumed he wanted to be in the front when the football players ran up to the student section to celebrate.
“Knock it off,” Alicent said, pushing him back to the row behind her again. He had began to bump into her and Helaena more than a few times.
“Let me through then you cunt,” The boy yelled angrily, trying to push through again. He successfully ended up knocking Alicent back to the ground and his slushee he had in hand slipped and fell on her, covering her from her shoulders down in red icee.
“Alicent!” Helaena cried and rushed to help her up, the boy who’d done it just laughed as if it was the funniest thing he’d ever seen, others laughed around them. Alicent’s eyes began to fill with tears as Helaena got her off the ground.
Alicent realized the crowd had died down to a silence now, but through her tears she couldn’t see why. Helaena had begun pulling her away, heading to the car already.
Behind the two fleeing girls, Aegon had hoisted Rhaenyra up the high wall before pulling himself up to join her; they now stood on it and stared at the crowd with fire dancing in their eyes. The stare they gave the boy responsible for it had sent shivers down everyone’s spine.
Later in the night, Alicent arrived at the old field with Helaena by her side. Her make up was fixed and her clothes were changed.
They were late to the start of the party, so many people were already well into being drunk. Helaena spotted Aemond, Criston, and Larys standing off to the side.
Helaena gave her brother a quick hug, “Have you seen ‘Nyra and Aegon?” She questioned and he shook his head, “You know I stay away from them, Helaena.” His younger sister nodded her head at that.
Alicent’s eyes traveled over to Larys Strong, who was currently staring at her feet in her sandals. She’d always heard the boy had a thing for feet, but she just thought it was a rumor spread by those who bullied him. Right now she felt like it had a lot of truth behind it.
Suddenly, Alicent was pulled into a hug by Criston. “I’m glad you made it, I heard what happened. Sorry I wasn’t there to protect you,” He said, a frown on his face.
Alicent’s eyebrows pulled together as she wondered what the boy would’ve done anyways. The man who had knocked her down would’ve pummeled the boy and made him into a slushie himself.
“That’s alright,” Alicent settled on saying, patting his arm and pulling away from the hug that lasted a little too long, she could tell Criston was a few drinks in.
There was a lot of commotion going on by the drink stand and Alicent pointed towards it, “What’s going on over there?”
“Rhaenyra and Aegon are happening like always,” Aemond said with a bored tone.
“What are they doing?” Helaena questioned and Larys smirked, “You should go see for yourself, especially you, Alicent.”
Alicent stared at him in confusion at that and Criston scoffed from beside him.
Alicent slowly made her way towards the group, there was a crowd surrounding what was happening. Laughter filled the air around them.
She pushed through to the center and was shocked to see Aegon holding a boy to a chair as Rhaneyra threw icees on him. The boy was covered from head to toe and four empty cups were at her feet, she had three more beside her waiting to get thrown.
It didn’t take Alicent long to realize it was the boy who’d knocked her over that they were throwing slushies at. He was crying and trying to get away from Aegon.
“This isn’t funny!” He cried out and Rhaenyra laughed as she chucked another cup into his face.
“It was never meant to be funny to you.” She sneered, throwing another before Alicent could stop her. Once she dropped that cup, the girl grabbed her arm before she could pick another up.
“Rhaenyra, what are you doing?” Alicent questioned, staring at the girl in dismay.
Rhaenyra smiled at her, obviously well into her own drunkenness like those around her.
“Teaching your friend a lesson.” She replied coolly.
Alicent shook her head and looked to Aegon, “Let him go!” She shouted.
Aegon looked to Rhaenyra who nodded, but instead of letting him go the boy just got him off the chair and began dragging him further into the party. A couple football players followed behind them.
“Why were you doing that?” Alicent asked Rhaenyra, her face was full of disgruntlement.
Rhaenyra’s eyes traced Alicent from head to toe, lingering on her arm that still gripped her own, before meeting her eyes.
“He needed to be taught a lesson.” She repeated herself as she’d said earlier.
“What lesson?” Alicent asked, she was still well beyond herself at what she’d just witnessed.
“That no one should mess with you or they’ll have to deal with us.” Rhaenyra stated dryly. The younger girl could still see the way fire danced around in the older one’s eyes, as if beginning to start more chaos.
Alicent looked around at some of the crowd that still lingered around them who stared at them as if it were the strangest sight to see. Which in many of their cases it would’ve been, it was unusual to see Rhaenyra be so kind to somebody outside of her own clique.
Rhaenyra grabbed Alicent’s hand that was gripping her arm and pulled it off, the other girl swore she felt her finger rub her hand a few times before she dropped it.
With that, Rhaenyra sauntered off the same way Aegon had went. Like a dragon that was stalking after its prey that it had already wounded.