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Alicent Hightower dies of Winter Fever, scared and alone, her entire family gone. She prays to the gods to let her see them again, to be welcomed by them, happy and together, an eternal reward after her horrible, horrible life. But the gods had other ideas.
Alicent opens her eyes and she sees not her family, not the Father’s halls and the eternal feast, but rather herself in a mirror. She’s young again and she’s in her old chambers from when she was a girl, not the queen’s apartments.
“Nothing so hateful to the gods as a war amongst kin,” she murmurs. She thinks she understands. She’s here to fix it, here to stop the war, the war she started when she was young, the war she started by marrying Viserys Targaryen.
~~~~
“You will comfort the king,” her father tells her. She closes her eyes and nods. She tries to play the part of a good, obedient daughter, but she knows she can’t. She leaves her father’s chambers and instead goes to Rhaenyra.
“I’m sorry about your mother,” she says, the only thing she’s able to say, doesn’t know how to explain why she’s here in her mother’s dress.
Rhaenyra just shakes her head and buries it in Alicent’s shoulder. Tears are seeping through the dress onto her skin, but Alicent stays quiet, just holds Rhaenyra, thinking that this is how this night was always supposed to go.
~~~~~
Alicent stays as Rhaenyra’s lady in waiting, and Viserys marries someone else, someone from court’s daughter or sister or whoever, it doesn’t really matter. Rhaenyra can’t stand her, complains about her every time Alicent brushes her hair.
“She’s as timid as deer,” Rhaenyra says. “No backbone whatsoever.”
“I know,” Alicent agrees, her hands flitting over Rhaenyra’s neck, ignoring the way the touch makes her shiver.
~~~~~
Rhaenyra still marries Laenor, and she still has three children with Harwin Strong. Alicent bites her tongue, she still has distaste for the bastards, but she allows her displeasure to roll over her like water. Alicent herself is betrothed to some Tyrell heir she never sees, a man more concerned with staying at Highgarden and living out his dull life then spending time with his so-called beloved. She doesn’t mind however, content to stay by Rhaenyra’s side, making sure all the pieces fall in the right way to avoid war.
Viserys still has four children, children who look so similar to her own that it makes her sob alone in her chambers. She wants to reach out and offer them apologies and comfort, to swear to be a better mother this time around, but they’re not her children, they’re practically strangers wearing her children’s images like Faceless Men.
~~~~~~
As hard as she tries, war still breaks out. Rhaenyra still marries Daemon, a marriage Alicent is forced to watch, bile choking her as she watches them exchange vows. They still move to Dragonstone, this time from a fight between Daemon and a King’s Guard that left the knight without a hand. Viserys still dies after years of falling apart, his body finally giving out. Alicent mourns him when she hears the news, but her heart is pounding, desperately hoping Rhaenyra can ascend the throne and they can live in peace, Alicent an ever present shadow in her life.
Viserys’s pushover wife allows herself to be manipulated by Alicent’s father and the rest of the small council. Alicent remembers how raw her throat was that day, screaming at them not to take Rhaenyra’s life, the smell of blood coming from Lord Beesbury. No wonder the new queen allows her son to usurp the throne. Alicent had done the exact same thing when push came to shove, maybe even before push was really even a push.
The boy king is lazy, lazy and an idiot. King’s Landing falls in disarray, the common folk starving as the boy fumbles through warfare. He falls from his dragon, a dragon that had snapped at him on more than one occasion, the bond between beast and rider as tenuous as the relationship between half-brother and sister. The boy king falls, but not before he orders Rhaenyra put to the sword, a traitor to the throne.
Alicent dies alone again, another bout of Winter Fever. The pain of the sickness is familiar, the loss of loved ones equally so. Alicent accepts death with open arms, glad to be free of this life.
~~~~~
She wakes again, right in the place she started, right before Queen Aemma passes. She has to fix this, can’t live through all the pain again and again.
~~~~
She marries Viserys, ignoring the hatred burning in Rhaenyra’s eyes, the way her tone of voice never has that sweetness in it when she talks to Alicent again, any love between them gone.
She raises Aegon to be kind, to be gentle , to respect those around him. She agrees to a marriage between Jace and Helaena, even though the boy still has his father’s dark hair, she hopes their children can mend the broken bond of their mothers.
She keeps Aemond by her side during the funeral of Laena Velaryon, the great dragon Vhagar staying unclaimed, flying back to presumably Essos to live out her final days. He keeps both his eyes and Rhaenyra stays in King’s Landing, Laenor by her side.
Viserys Targaryen still dies as he has before, but unlike the other two times, he managed to put a child in her one last time.
Alicent Hightower goes into labor the same day her father decides to sit sweet Aegon on the throne, a pawn for Otto Hightower’s schemes.
Alicent dies in childbirth, never seeing the resulting war, the bloodiest one yet, King’s Landing the primary battlefield, the once great city almost nothing but ruins when the dust settles.
~~~~~~
Alicent Hightower kisses Rhaenyra Targaryen in her next life. She’s lived enough times to know she wants to, really only had to live one life to know that. Rhaenyra burns brighter than any dragonfire, warming Alicent’s heart with a smile and an arm looped through hers.
“Marry Laenor Velaryon,” Alicent whispers against Rhaenyra’s mouth. “You two share much in common with each other.”
“How do you know?” Rhaenyra asks, running a thumb across Alicent’s hip.
Alicent smiles. “People like us have a way of finding each other, of knowing each other without having to say it.” She runs her hands down Rhaenyra’s shoulders to hold her hands. “I think you two could have a very happy marriage.”
~~~~
Alicent and Rhaenyra live a life of pure bliss. Viserys never remarries, there are no more Targaryen children to vie for the throne. Rhaenyra and Laenor manage to have children, twins mercifully enough, one time of trying was all they had in them. A boy and a girl, Joffrey and Aemma, happy bubbly babies with four parents to dote on them.
~~~~
Viserys Targaryen dies, and Rhaenyra Targaryen ascends the throne. Her reign is one of peace and prosperity, a reign where the smallfolk have food and plenty of it.
It’s a reign that produces few enemies, but enemies nonetheless.
Alicen grabs the cup meant for Rhaenyra, the two of them always sharing during feasts, doing it so seamlessly they don’t think anyone ever notices. And it’s true, the cup was only meant for Rhaenyra, never her lady in waiting.
The poison is odorless and tasteless, and Alicent Hightower dies happy, surrounded by loved ones, and completely unaware of her fate. It takes less time than falling asleep.
~~~~
Alicent wants to curse the gods, to beg them to make this stop , to just let her die. She’s so tired, and just wants this to end, would rather go back to the first time when all her children were dead and she died alone, her mind slowly slipping away from her in grief, rather than have to deal with this again and again until her mind fully snaps in two.
She marries Viserys Targaryen, ignoring the tears in Rhaenyra’s eyes, the betrayal, the hurt. Rhaenyra marries Laenor Velaryon and they have one silver haired boy, a boy quickly betrothed to Helaena Targaryen before they’re both even ten. It’s better to sort that out now, rather than make it yet another point of contention, adding stress until something inside all of them finally snaps.
“Abdicate the throne, my love,” she whispers to Viserys, her voice like honey. “You’ve had a good reign, a peaceful reign all the smallfolk and the singers will remember. Abdicate and let Rhaenyra rule. The masses are more likely to accept a Queen if her king father is still alive to support her.”
Viserys looks at her like the idea had never even crossed his mind. “That’s a wonderful idea,” he says. “Somedays I think you should wear the crown instead.”
Alicent laughs, a hollow sound. She knows the price the crown demands. “I could never be cut out for ruling,” she says honestly. “Not like you and Rhaenyra.”
~~~~
Viserys Targaryen abdicated the throne and his daughter ascends, the first Queen of the Seven Kingdoms. Alicents gets her ready for the coronation, part passing of the torch, and part old times sake, getting ready like they were girls again.
“I’m sorry,” Alicent says, though she’s not sure what exactly she’s apologizing for this time. An apology for marrying Rhaenyra’s father, for betraying her trust, for leaving her, an apology for all the times she wronged her in all those different timelines, all the times Rhaenyra died and Alicent couldn’t or didn’t want to save her. An apology for rushing towards her, knife in hand, for raising Aegon to be an easily molded monster, putty in everyone’s hands, the perfect king in a play for power. An apology for everything, and almost an apology for none of it at the same time. Just an apology for being here, for being Alicent Hightower.
“You make him happy,” Rhaenyra says, meeting Alicent’s eyes in the mirror.
“I try to be a good wife,” Alicent answers. She moves Rhaenyra’s hair off her shoulders, letting it cascade down her back. Her fingers whisper over Rhaenyra’s skin and she still gets the shivers she used to. She wonders if Rhaenyra feels it too, if she remembers wanting to fly across the narrow sea on Syrax, with her saddle for two. She wishes she could’ve done that the first time, wishes she could’ve stopped hiding from herself and her feelings, wishes she could’ve left with Rhaenyra, left King’s Landing and its politics behind, the two of them eating cake until they were sick.
It’s too late for that now.
“Just as I’ll try to be a good queen,” Rhaenyra answers. She turns and tucks a lock of hair behind Alicent’s ear. When her eyes flicker down to Alicent’s lips, Alicent knows Rhaenyra has the shivers too, that if they had just been younger and smarter then they could’ve had each other.
“Alicent, I-”
“Come, my Queen,” Alicent interrupts. “We have a coronation to attend.” She doesn’t want to know what Rhaenyra has to say, knows it will break her, knows she’s not strong enough.
Rhaenyra Targaryen gets crowned to the sound of thunderous applause and fanfare. Her smile is wide and as bright as the sun, and her gaze is focused only on Alicent.
~~~~
Alicent Hightower has a peaceful death at the end of a peaceful life. Her children loved her, and they were good , kind people. Westeros was at peace, Queen Rhaenyra beloved by everyone. When Viserys died, Alicent thought maybe they could try again, that they could have a love that blossomed in secret, a rekindling of what they felt as girls, but she never tried. She doesn’t know why.
Alicent Hightower dies in her sleep of an illness she didn’t know she had. She’s alone in her chambers, but she’s proud of her life. She stopped the war, she stopped the suffering. She kept Rhaenyra, kept some bit of love between them, even if it was never the kind they both truly craved, it was love and it was enough.
~~~~~
Her eyes don’t open again.