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Shireen goes to Aegon's garden one last time on the day before going to the north. It was rather strange, she had spent her entire life at Dragonstone, but she hardly ever went to the garden until a few months ago. Until Edric arrived. During those months she spent more time in the garden with him than in her entire previous life.
After their lessons they would go out into the garden sometimes with Devan, sometimes not, and often they would play until dark. And there was something different in the garden at that time. She has always had a vivid imagination, but never before has she felt her make-believe so vividly. Between the hedges she saw castles and towers in which they stole the treasure of dragons, in the water fountain she saw a long sea in which they were pirates, a single flower became a large bouquet that he, like a knight of the royal guard, delivered to she as his queen after defending her honor in combat.
Ser Davos came to her the day Edric left and said that the boy's biggest worry before he left was not being able to say goodbye to her. She cried a lot that day, so much so that her mother came to scold her saying that she was being a foolish girl, that it made no sense for a princess to be crying like that over some bastard, these words did nothing to lessen her crying. The next day she started writing letters to him, but as there was nowhere to send them she kept them in a box in her closet. She carried the box with her now.
She goes behind a tree that had previously been one of their favorite places, it was where between games Edric would lay with his head in her lap while she read him stories doing funny voices for the characters that never failed to make him laugh.
She leaves them there in case he returns to that place, in the letters she says how much she cares for him, and how much she misses him. And she tells things that she never told him when he was by her side, that in their few months of living together, just his company, his smile and his friendship made her happier than she thought possible for a human being to be before, especially not one like her, and until the last days she would be grateful to him for that, that for her he was a beautiful spring even knowing that soon winter would be coming.
She leaves the box with the letters on the ground and takes one last look at the place before leaving. The garden was still undeniably beautiful, but the trees were just trees. The water fountain was just a water fountain. The flowers were just flowers. She knows now that the gardens only seemed enchanted before because he was there.