Chapter Text
Aemond has seen nine name days, he can´t remember the first time he laid eyes on Viserra Velaryon but for as long as he can remember he has been in love with her. Viserra is the daughter of his half-sister Rhaenyra and her husband Laenor. Named for Aemonds father King Viserys Targayen. Viserra, unlike her two younger brothers Jacerys and Lucerys, has never been called a bastard. Viserra has the Velaryon look. She has the deep brown skin and the delicate features. She has two toned eyes just like his grandmother Alyssa Targayen did. Viserra has one deep mauve eye like her mother, my half sister, and as my father pointed out also of the exact shade as the late queen Aemma Targayen. Her other eye is a beautiful true Velaryon azure sea blue, I noticed the same color as the sea snake. Her father's eyes are a pale sky blue almost like the color of lazy clouds on summer days. Viserra´s hair is the same as her mother, my half-sister´s long straight silver sheet, Aemond wondered what it would be like to run his fingers through it.
Aemond and Viserra were the same age; her name day is a shy month before his. He and Viserra always had lessons together with Helaena, Jacerys, Lucerys and sometimes with Aegon when he dained to show up. Every morning Aemond would walk into the room and already see Helaena and Viserra chittering about this or that, but when he got to his seat in unison they would say,
¨Good Morning Aemond.¨
¨Goodmorning¨ he would say shyly back, eyes flicking between Helaena´s cool detached gaze and Viserra´s bright smile. Jacerys and Lucerys sitting on one side of Viserra and Helaena on the other. Aemond would always sit behind Helaena and talk with her and Viserra in High Valyrian. Aemond would do this because Jacerys and Lucerys have no proficiency for the language at all. They must not be dragons because they cannot speak their language.
¨Nyke raqagon skorkydoso ao gōnton aōha ōghar tubī Viserra¨ I like the way you´ve done your hair today Viserra, Aemond said. Viserra looked up and just smiled.
¨Kirimvose qỹbor Aemond, gōnton ao gīda gūrogon koir hen aōhon?¨ Why, thank you uncle Aemond, have you even brushed your´s today? She was laughing as she said it and the humor in her eyes made him know it was a joke. He knew his hair was impeccable.
¨Sỹrī pār manditala, skoro syt ie dore ao gūrogon koir hen ziry syt issa?¨ Well then niece, why don´t you brush it for me? Aemond said not breaking eye contact with Viserra. All three of them started giggling after that. Aemond and Viserra loudly laughing and Helaena giggling, not taking her eyes off her bug drawing. Aemond and Viserra avoided the glares from Jacerys and Lucerys annoyed because they could not understand what was being said.
Unfortunately today was one of those days when Aegon graced them with his presence. They all could hear his mother dragging Aegon down the hall.
They could all hear her say, ¨ Aegon for the grace of the seven you are the son of King Viserys Targayen and his first born son. You must be educated! You cannot spend all your days fawning after serving girls and drunk in your cups.¨
¨But mother it's so boring -¨ Aegon pathetically attempted as rebuttal and then they heard his mother smack him before opening the door and shoving him inside, a red mark still darkening on Aegon´s face.
¨See!¨ his mother said with exasperation. ¨All of the other royal children are here!”
``Fine then Mother, I shall come to clases as is my duty as your first born son.¨ Aegon drawled as he walked past where Helaena and Aemond were sitting and dropped himself into the seat behind Jacerys. Aemond watched his mothers lips flatten at the insult to his siblings for rather than sitting with his own trueborn blood he decided to sit with his bastard nephews. His mother decided to do nothing and just turned on her heel and left.
Viserra never liked her uncle Prince Aegon who spent his days in debauchery and on dragon back. It's unfair she thought that Aegon´s egg hatched and not hers or Aemonds who spend every day studying and bettering themselves. Her brothers are better than Aegon but not by much. They often follow around their uncle and play part in whatever cruel jest Aegon has planned to torment Aemond.
The maester has now started lecturing and asks Aegon what was the name of the dragon of Queen Rhaenys wife of Aegon the Conqueror. Viserra tries to not just blurt out the name because it will only make the maester ask her to wait her turn and make Aegon cross with her.
Aegon responds with ¨I don´t know fertil-axes? I mean wasn´t the only important thing about her is that she gave the conqueror a son?” Both Aemond and Viserra groaned and Helaena pursed her lips. To Viserra´s dismay Jacerys chuckled and Lucerys out-right laughed.
¨Er- no¨ said the maester ¨Queen Rhaenys´s dragon was named Meraxes¨. Viserra fought the urge to start spewing other facts about Queen Rhaenys to disprove Aegon and his impertinent view that the only thing Rhaenys was good for was heirs, but the maester moved on.
Viserra tried to pay attention but her brothers and Aegon were constantly talking and it was getting annoying.
Viserra whispered to Aemond ¨Kostagon pōnta mirre mōris sētegon udir māzigon pōja relgos?¨ Can they ever shut their mouths? .
Aemond just laughed and said back ¨Pōja relgos līs sagon siñagon olive tista kessa¨ Their mouths must be getting quite dry indeed. Both Aemond and Viserra laughed.
Then Jacerys looked over fuming ¨ Why don't you say it to our faces instead of whispering behind our backs in a language we cannot understand?¨
Aemond taking the challenge then said ¨Oh i´m sorry I thought you were a dragon. Dragons can speak the dragon tongue.¨ Aemond would not catch her eye but Viserra was trying very hard to stop this squabble now before it got out of hand. Aemond always had too much pride and too little sense of when he was falling into another trap Viserra thought.
The maester was still talking but no one was listening anymore. When Aegon then said, ¨Well I thought a dragon has wings and you, little brother, have no wings, you are nothing more than a flightless chicken.¨
Aemond stood up at this insult and so did Viserra because as much as she hates to admit it the first born heir of her mother, the heir of the Iron throne has no dragon and therefore no wings.
The maester, realizing no one was listening, told everyone to sit back down and pay attention. Viserra and Aemond did so and the rest of lessons were tense with words spoken and words implied but still between the lines.
Later that day after lunch Helaena and Viserra were in their usual nook in the library. For some reason Aemond did not come. Viserra wanted to ask where he was but worried it was none of her business and he would show up any moment and tell her as much. He has only been detained, she thinks to herself.
Another hour goes by and still no sign of Aemond and Viserra decides she doesn't care anymore if it is her business or not. She sets down her book of Velaryon history and looks over to Helaena who is reading out of her favorite volume of insects.
``Helaena do you know where Aemond has gone?” Viserra acts trying to be nonchalant.
¨Aemond left lunch with Aegon to go to the dragon pit with my nephews Jacaerys and Lucaerys. I don't know why. Aegon said he had a surprise for him.¨ Helaena said, still not looking away from her tome as if it was of no consequence. Viserra gasped she knew whatever ´surprise’ was waiting for Aemond was terrible and would only torment him.
¨Helaena I´ll be right back¨ said Viserra, picking up her skirts and starting to hustle off.
Helaena then said ¨ The wingless will not gain wings, the wingless will have a promise of the sea ¨
Aemond cowers in the tunnel back up to the castle after returning from the dragon pit. He is humiliated by his own brother and his bastard nephews. They had given him a pig and told him they had given him his own dragon. Aemond ran off down one of the tunnels running into a dragon in the dark who nearly burnt him alive.
While he was running away he heard his brother yell out, ¨Yes, run away little chicken run and flap your flightless wings¨ He heard his bastard nephews laugh at his brother's cruel joke. Aemond could barely see where he was going through the tears.
Now he was sitting in this passageway unable to pick himself up and face the shame of it all. How can he be a dragon with no wings? How can the bastard born STRONGS have dragons when they cannot even speak the tongue?
He hears footsteps coming down the hall. He braces himself for a gaurd sent to locate him and his mother´s smack calling him stupid and reckless, but it is not a gaurd that comes walking down the corredor. It is Viserra.
¨Aemond! There you are.¨ She yells and hurries for him crouching beside him. ¨What has happened? What did they do to you?¨ She asks with such concern in her eyes. She sees his scrapes and burns and starts to rip the hem of her dress to make bandages and rags to clean him when he says,
¨They gave me a pig and told me it was to be my dragon, I ran away from them and Aegon called me a flightless chicken. I ran off down one of the tunnels and was nearly burnt alive by my sister´s dragon.¨ Aemond had thought his tears were over but they returned in ernest hiccuping racking sobbs that he could not vanquish. Viserra just embraced him and held him until his childish tears were over and his breathing was calmed.
Viserra looks him right in the eyes, determined and sure ¨ Aemond listen to me, You are a dragon being a dragon is more than riding one. My aunt Lady Laena rides the biggest and oldest dragon in the world, Vhagar, but she only became a dragon rider after 17 name days. I promise you Aemond one day you will have a dragon and you will be the best dragon rider just like you are the best at all things you put your mind to,¨
Aemond is in shock; she doesn't look like she is saying these things out of pity; she says them like they are fact, like they are prophecy.
¨Aemond you will have a dragon and you will be even more fearsome than the Rogue Prince himself, but not if you get yourself burnt to death by dragons with riders, be patient Uncle your time will come. Now come on let's get you cleaned up.¨
Viserra takes him by the hand and they walk together up to the Maester's quarters to get his cuts and burns looked at. All the while she never leaves him. Even when his mother comes storming in. Even when Viserra is told to go and Aemond asked her to stay, and she does.
If Aemond looked back at the moment that made him sure he was in love with Viserra Velaryon it would have been that day, that moment when she told him with all confidence he would be a fearsome dragon rider. More fearsome than even the Rogue Prince.