Work Text:
“I intend to marry…the lady Alicent Hightower before spring’s end.”
Rhaenyra follows her father’s eyes to her friend. Her friend. It’s not true. It can’t be true. Look at me, Alicent, the princess wills, tell me it’s not true, but the Hightower seems barely able to breathe, let alone meet her gaze.
An argument breaks out across the table. It reaches Rhaenyra muffled, muted by the ringing in her own ears. It doesn’t matter. The fragile ego of a scorned lord means nothing when the world is coming to an end.
Corlys Velaryon storms out of the hall. Rhaenyra follows suit.
#
Rhaenyra makes it as far as the godswood before she hears it.
“Rhaenyra. Rhaenyra! Wait, please,” Alicent calls, surely hurrying after her at a lady’s restrained pace. The princess assumes as much, anyway. She won’t dare give the other girl the satisfaction of her turning around. “Will you just give me a moment to explain?”
“That won’t be necessary. I believe I already understand the finer points of marriage. First, there’s the proposal. It would seem that’s already happened behind closed doors. Then, the wedding. Then, the…” Rhaenyra stops short. She had meant to say the bedding, but the phrase sticks in her throat like candle wax to a cotton wick. It burns about as much, too. A gentle hand grabs her arm.
“Please look at me.”
She doesn’t want to. To face Alicent, to truly discuss any of this, would mean acknowledging that it’s real. If it’s real, it cannot be undone. If it’s real, her father’s announcement of the arrangement has already cemented it into the history books. Alicent is to be his wife. Alicent is to be her mother. Alicent will never ride with her on dragonback, never cross the Narrow Sea, forever trapped in the walls of her childhood-home-turned-prison.
The hand squeezes her wrist again, tender and imploring. She turns around. As always, she is struck by the girl before her, all delicate slopes and copper curls. Her eyes travel from the crease in the Hightower’s brow to the frown in her full lips, which compete for attention only with the shadows resting in her collarbone. She is beyond beauty, and Rhaenyra feels the familiar urge to somehow bottle her up so that she may be hers and hers alone.
“I know this must be a shock to you.”
“Don’t do it.”
“Rhaenyra…”
“Don’t do it. Just don’t. We can run away. We can fly away, just—
“I have to.”
“You don’t—
“I do.”
Tears prick at Rhaenyra’s eyes. How can Alicent not understand? “Ali, this isn’t some small whim that your father’s foisted upon you,” she says, “It’s not the same as entertaining a lord over dinner or accepting the favor of a tourney knight. This is forever. This is your life.”
At this, Alicent’s face shifts. Her jaw sets, and she assumes a manner near-unrecognizable. For the first time since knowing each other, she seems truly upset with Rhaenyra. Not just upset — angry.
“You think I don’t know that? That I don’t know what is about to happen to me?”
“Then why are you letting it happen?”
“Your father believes uniting our houses is what’s best for the realm.”
“And you believe him?”
“He is the king.”
Rhaenyra scoffs, “In measuring wisdom, I fail to see how station is of any consequence.”
“But that’s exactly it, Rhaenyra!” Alicent barks, “We cannot all be The Realm’s Delight. Some of us have to pay mind to consequence!” The princess recoils at the force of the statement. Seeing this, Alicent softens. She takes Rhaenyra’s hand in hers, traces the lines of her palm — a future already in motion.“Your father and mine find it an advantageous match,” she murmurs, “That is the end of it.”
Rhaenyra’s fingers make a fist around those caressing her. How her friend can simply accept such a vile thing disquiets her to her very core. The Targaryen is a creature wrought from fire and blood, from rage and domination. To accept anything but her deepest desires is not in her nature. Perhaps, if she can sink her teeth a little deeper, no one will dare to tear Alicent away.
“So this is what you want, then?” she asks. The Hightower’s face pinches. Rhaenyra pushes more, “Tell me it’s what you want, and I’ll let you go.”
“Our fathers—
“Fuck our fathers. Tell me what you want, Ali.” The princess is so close to her now, having unconsciously obeyed the ever-present draw of her childhood companion. The minuscule gap left between them carries a weight as heavy as her heart. Without pausing to confirm the privacy of the godswood, she brushes her thumb across the Hightower’s cheek, “I know what I want.”
“Rhaenyra, what are you—
She never gets to recover her words. Rhaenyra makes sure of it. She wraps Alicent in a kiss so fervent, and deep, and imbued with the passion that has been building since they learned what kissing was, that she’s certain Alicent will never speak her father’s pretty lies again. But then Alicent’s hands are on her shoulders, and she’s being shoved back and held at arms-length.
“You can’t do that,” Alicent says, looking around wildly, as though she expects an axeman to materialize from thin-air. It’s a little bit endearing.
“I’m sorry,” Rhaenyra half-chuckles, until Alicent glares at her, and she realizes that it’s not funny at all, “I’m sorry. I just thought that if I showed you what I want, it might help you realize—
“This is what I want.”
Rhaenyra blinks, “What?”
“I’m marrying the king. It’s what I want.”
Alicent’s voice is steady, her eyes unblinking, but her fingers betray her. They scramble across one another, picking flesh away in strips like scavenging birds. “You’re lying,” Rhaenyra says, “That’s a lie.”
Alicent folds her hands behind her back, “I’ve said my piece, princess.”
This is all wrong. None of this is how it was supposed to be. It’s only getting worse. Rhaenyra’s breath hitches, “So we’re reverting to titles, now?” She can feel her face contorting, knows Alicent can see it, too. But Alicent mirrors no such pain back at her. She simply straightens her spine.
“I do hope we find better ways of expressing our…familial affection in the future,” the Hightower says, louder than necessary. The words aren’t for Rhaenyra, but they deliver a message all the same. Her Alicent is lost.
A million futures she’d always imagined collapse in at once. The rubble settles in the pit of her stomach, filling her with the overwhelming urge to dry heave. She doesn’t. She just stares at the hard-packed soil of the wood, motionless and silent. If Alicent says anything further, she doesn’t hear it. It doesn’t matter. Whoever inhabits that body now is a stranger.
Heavy footsteps approach, and Ser Harrold arrives with a sympathetic air. “It’s growing late, Your Highness. The king has requested I escort you and Lady Alicent back to your chambers.” They return to the keep, Rhaenyra in lock-step with the silver knight and Alicent trailing behind. Rhaenyra can feel her amber gaze boring holes into her back the whole way. She imagines them drilling straight through into her heart, and wills that they might bleed her dry. They don’t. She keeps on living. The knight stops in front of Rhaenyra’s bedroom door and pulls it open.
“Goodnight, princess,” Ser Harrold says. Rhaenyra nods and makes to walk past him. Then, a small voice says:
“Goodnight, Rhaenyra.”
Rhaenyra allows herself to look at Alicent as she knew her for one final time. Her jaw is still set hard, and not a strand of auburn hair is out of place. But her eyes are rimmed with red, and so is the skin around her thumbnail. She’s forgotten to hide it again.
She’s lying, Rhaenyra thinks. But it doesn’t matter. She chose the lie instead of me.
“Goodnight, Lady Alicent,” she says.
The door swings shut.