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Slowly, as if untangling the knots in a long-lost bobbin of thread, Alicent worked at the brown curls tumbling past Trystane’s shoulders. He was a patient boy, still, and forgiving; so unlike her sons who squirmed and cursed as she tried to brush out their unkempt silver manes. Even Helaena complained, in her own, silent way; fidgeting, muttering, flinching when a tangle was caught in the bristles. An embroidery hoop kept her busy, or a well-worn book from Orwyle’s personal collection, but Trystane…
They were seated above the training yard, privy to the training bluster of Aemond and Jace and Luke, victim to the harsh thwak of wooden swords, but Alicent was not sure he was even watching. He sat as still as a statue, hands folded over the pale marble parapet, chin atop his knuckles. He oft asked Alicent to comb his hair in the library, or her sitting room, where he could seat himself cross-legged on the floor with a thick book in his lap, or work on his penmanship, but today Ser Harwin was taking part in the young boys’ training — and so she had suggested, for more her sake than his, that they watch. Trystane didn’t protest. He never did.
“I don’t understand how you get your hair so tangled, my dear.” Alicent pinched a rat’s nest of brown strands between her fingers. “You don’t brush it every day?”
Trystane shook his head. Even that was subdued, gentle enough not to disturb her work. Sometimes she appreciated that he took more after Larys, only fond of speaking when there was truly something to say. Other times she worried he would fall behind. Most of all, she simply tried to be thankful — he hadn’t inherited his mother, Finn’s, foul mouth and stubborn temper.
“You must. Morning and night,” Alicent said, lowering her voice to listen when the chatter lulled below them. She could hear Harwin’s voice, rough but gentle, and Jace’s eager reply. When she straightened up to get a better look, she saw only Aemond, sulking in his padded green tunic.
She cleared her throat. “When I was a girl of seven, new to the Red Keep… I despised it.”Another quiet moment, the words receding like a wave. Harwin would be careful with Aemond nearby, and her watching over. “My mother sat me down each morning and forced me to sit still as she brushed out every knot. The same before she put me to bed. She’d braid it to keep it from tangling further, but I’d… I’d pull it out in the night, and she’d have to start all over again come sunrise.”
A flutter of wood against wood, Harwin’s booming laughter. Alicent pulled harder at the knot, tonguing at the inside of her cheek. She went on.
“When it became clear there was no teaching me, she let me do as I desired. I thought myself a victor. Clever. I’d outwitted the fox of Florent.” A tuft of brown strands came free between Alicent’s fingers. “Within a week my hair had grown such a mess it had to be cut here.” She touched Trystane at the nape of his neck. He remained still. “Right above the shoulder. Showed me what I knew of cleverness at such an age.”
A woman grown, the memory was still as fresh as morning dew. Her despair at losing her auburn locks, her father’s disapproval, young Rhaenyra’s snickers. Even wind whipped and tousled from her first flight with Syrax, Alicent had been jealous of her sleek, silver hair. The shame for her youthful follies still burned hot in her chest and cheeks when she gave them too much thought. The only thing she had lost to time was her mother’s face. It was a blur, and had been for years; clouded by the candle-lit shadow of the Stranger and choking incense.
Trystane’s hummed, the same way Helaena did when she wasn’t listening but didn’t want to disappoint her mother. Sometimes she thought her daughter had learned it from him.
“Trystane?” Alicent removed her hand. The sight of a little white strand coiled around her thumb gave her pause. A bit of Aemond’s from his earlier tussle with her and a brush, she surmised, and plucked it off. “Are you listening?”
A loud crack split through the training yard as a straw dummy toppled into the dirt. Jacaerys stepped away, triumphant. Harwin’s words were imperceptible, but his voice rumbled with the kind of pride only fathers knew.
“I wish they were dead,” Trystane said softly.
Alicent frowned, unsure of what she’d heard. “Trystane?”
“Jacaerys and Lucerys.” His voice never rose above a whisper, distant and crackly like the ancient oak in the godswood. “I wish they were dead.”
A dreadful taste thickened in Alicent’s throat, dripping low into her belly and settling there in a hard pit. This was not her doing, surely? She spoke ill of Rhaenyra’s sons often, perhaps more than she ought to in front of Larys’ boy, but such a young, tempered spirit couldn’t have conjured up an idea like that himself…
She placed a firm hand on Trystane’s shoulder, steadying herself, and pulled him to face her. He swayed with the force of her touch, but did not fight.
“You cannot say such things, sweet boy.” Her words were a murmur, yet sharper than she liked. It was necessary, Alicent told herself; he couldn’t go around saying these sorts of things without any sense of caution. “Jace and Luke are… your…”
“Harwin is supposed to be my kin,” Trystane hissed. Such a harsh sound from him made Alicent flinch. “He’s supposed to care about me when my mother and father don’t. Right?”
Alicent snapped before she could temper herself. “It’s an unkind thing to say,” She took a deep breath. Mother, guide me.
Luke squealed, teasing; Aemond bit back with the swish of his wooden sword and a maligned insult. The beds of her fingernails itched viciously.
She continued, “Promise me you won’t say it again.”
“Is it?” Trystane tilted his head. His eyes were wide, irises as depthless and blue as the Blackwater itself. “They’re going to die, anyways. They stink of it. Blood and sea salt and cinder. If they got it over with, I could have Uncle Harwin, and mayhaps grandfather would—”
“Trystane.” Her fingers dug hard into the thin, bony flesh of his shoulders, but he didn’t seem to notice. Her stomach roiled. “No more. Do you hear me? You will speak no more of this. You will tell no one.”
A strand of limp auburn hair, loosened from her tiara, danced in the breeze. Trystane reached out to touch it. As soon as his dark eyes left her, she felt she could breathe.
“Okay,” he said. Whether or not he meant it, Alicent did not care to press. “Will you finish brushing my hair?”
The bluster had quieted. She worried one of them had heard; Aemond would ask about it later, or perhaps Rhaenyra herself would come to her and revile her for using a child to wish death upon her sons. Where else would Trystane have learned to say such a thing?
A ride to the Sept was certain, and much needed. Perhaps Finn would accompany her. He didn’t care much for the new gods of his mother, nor the old of his father, but she needed company in the wheelhouse, and… and to tell him to care for his son, lest he speak some treachery to the wrong ear.
After taking a moment to compose herself, Alicent nodded. “Yes, my dear.” Trystane toiled with her hair until she gently pried it from his fingers and tucked it behind her ear. Her guards floated in the space at her back, saying and hearing nothing. She parted her lips to tell Trystane to turn back around, but he obeyed her silence. She ran her fingers through his frizzy curls to ease her swimming head.
“Be kind to them,” Alicent murmured after a silent moment. “Their blood is no fault of their own.”
Trystane hummed. His gaze found home at the sight of his cousins, sharing easy smiles with the father they weren’t allowed to know. Aemond glared, spinning on his heel to eye the balcony. Alicent continued to tug the brush through Trystane’s hair, watching her second son sulk, only to halt at a flash of white peeking through the teeth of her bristles. She drew the comb back and touched the new growth sprouting from his part, paler than morning mist.
“Trystane,” Alicent frowned. “Your hair…”
“I know.” Trystane laid his head against the parapet and sighed. “Morning and night…”