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The deep, rhythmic sigh of the sea against Dragonstone’s foundations usually lulled Baela Targaryen into the blackest sleep. It was a respite hard-won amidst the drumbeat of war. Yet tonight, a different current pulled her towards consciousness—not sound, but a presence. A weight of regard as palpable as the castle’s stone walls.
Her eyes fluttered open in the velvet gloom of her chamber where the brazier’s dying embers casting long, dancing shadows. And that is where she found him. Stood beside her bed, silhouetted against the faint light from the narrow window.
Her Jacaerys.
Relief, warm and immediate, flooded her. The Gullet. It was done. He was home. A smile touched her lips then, while her eyes still soft with sleep. "Jace?" Baela said, her voice was a husky whisper, thick with the remnants of dreams and sudden, profound solace.
Jacaerys, however, didn't speak at first but sighed. His was a sound pulled from the depths of the earth, heavy with a sorrow she couldn't yet name. He moved then, not with the brisk energy of the Prince of Dragonstone, but with a lover's languid grace.
When he reached her, his hand hovered in a breath above the unruly silver curls splayed across her pillow, before finally settling. His touch was impossibly real, warm fingers tracing the curve of her hair with a tenderness that made her breath catch. "Baela," he breathed, her name a benediction and a lament woven together. "I love you, a lot."
The warmth of his touch, the sight of him whole and here, should have been pure joy. She knew his heart, had always known it, even when words failed them or duty intervened. "I love you too," she answered, the words leaving her lips on instinct, a truth as fundamental as her bond with Moondancer.
Yet beneath the swell of relief, something cold and sharp uncoiled in her chest—a dread she couldn't rationalize. For there is a stillness in him that is as profound as a dragon’s. Or maybe, it was the way his dark eyes, fixed on hers, held not the fierce determination of the heir, nor the familiar warmth of her cousin, but an ocean of regret so deep it threatened to drown her.
Before she could move or spoke, tears had welled in Jacaerys's eyes, catching the faint light like shattered obsidian. "I am sorry, Baela." he whispered, the words raw, scraping against the quiet of the chamber. "For whatever I couldn't do for you." His thumb brushed her temple. "When I knew your heart," his voice thickened, "and refused us to wed... When I knew you'd burn the skies to help our war, and I dismissed the idea..." He swallowed hard, the sound audible in the heavy silence. "I am sorry. For all of that."
The cold dread solidified into icy fear. This wasn't the triumphant return. This was a litany of regret, a farewell spoken too softly. "Jace," Baela murmured, her earlier smile vanishing, replaced by a growing unease that tightened her throat. She pushed herself up slightly on her elbows, searching his face. "What are you doing..?" The question hung, fragile and desperate, in the air between them.
Jacaerys, however, seemed not to hear her question, or perhaps he chose not to. His gaze, brimming with unshed tears that traced silver paths down cheeks too pale in the gloom, held hers with an intensity that felt like a physical anchor. "In our next life, if there is one," he continued, his voice a low thrum vibrating through the charged air, "I will do everything you asked me to." The words were a vow, heavy and solemn, spoken not as a prince to his betrothed, but as a soul making a covenant beyond the veil of this harsh world.
Baela’s breath hitched. The dread solidified, cold and sharp, piercing the fragile veil of relief. "What do you mean..?" she breathed, the words barely audible, a desperate plea against the terrifying implication taking root. The warmth of his hand on her hair felt suddenly distant, overshadowed by the chilling promise of an after.
"I promise I will, Baela." His thumb brushed her cheekbone, a gesture achingly familiar yet imbued with a finality that stole her breath.
"No," Baela whispered, shaking her head slightly, the movement stiff with denial. She locked onto his eyes, searching for the familiar spark of determination, the fire of the heir of the Dragon. But instead, she finding only profound sorrow and an unsettling, otherworldly certainty of Jacaerys Velaryon, her sincere love one. "Why are you talking about next life?" The question was sharper now, edged with rising panic.
He leaned infinitesimally closer, his presence filling the space with the scent of salt air and something else—ozone, perhaps, or the cold, clean scent of high altitudes. "In our next life," he insisted, the repetition itself a form of haunting, "I promise I would be the one recognizing you first." The specificity was a dagger. It spoke of regrets unvoiced, moments missed in this life, the weight of his position perhaps blinding him to her silent offerings.
Baela shook her head more vehemently, dark curls whispering against the pillow. The denial was a shield against the unbearable truth creeping in like the tide.
"In our next life," he pressed on, his voice gaining a fervent, almost desperate edge, "I will find you." His hand, which had been caressing her hair, slid down, his fingers intertwining tightly with hers where they lay clenched on the furs. His grip was startlingly real, warm and strong, anchoring her in the moment even as his words spoke of endings. "I must find you. I will." It was a declaration against fate itself.
He squeezed her hand, the pressure urgent, imbued with all the longing and regret his words could barely contain. "When that happens," he vowed, his eyes blazing with a sorrowful conviction, "I will never let go. When that happens, I will love you better." The final phrase hung in the air, a devastating indictment of the love cut short in this life, and a promise for a future stolen by the Gullet’s cold waves. His tears fell freely now, silent and bright in the dim light, each one a testament to the life they were losing.
Jacaerys slowly withdrew his hand then as the final, devastating promise hung like smoke in the air between them. The warmth vanished entirely, leaving Baela’s fingers icy. He stood, his form seeming less substantial now, backlit by the faint, dying glow of the brazier. He turned towards the chamber door, a silent, irrevocable movement.
"Where are you going?" Baela’s voice was a thread of sound, fraying rapidly. She pushed herself up further, the furs tangling around her legs. "Jace? What is happening?" Panic, cold and sharp, began to lance through the numbness of confusion.
He didn’t answer. Didn’t look back. He simply walked, his steps silent on the stone floor, moving towards the heavy oak door that led out into the dark corridor.
"Jacaerys!" The name tore from her throat, raw and desperate. She threw the furs aside, scrambling to get out of the bed, to run after him, to physically halt this terrifying departure. But her limbs felt leaden, uncooperative. An unseen force, heavy as grief itself, seemed to pin her to the mattress. She strained against it, a trapped dragon beating wings against an invisible cage. "Where are you going?" Her voice rose, sharp with terror.
He reached the door. It didn’t open. But his figure seemed to blend with the deepening shadows gathering there.
"Jace!" It was a scream now, ripped from the core of her being, shattering the stillness of the chamber. "Don't go! Please don't go!" Tears, hot and blinding, erupted, streaming down her face as she lunged forward, her arm outstretched, fingers grasping frantically at the empty air where he had been. "My Love, please! Don't leave me!" Her hand closed on nothing but cold, stagnant darkness. The silhouette dissolved like mist before dawn, leaving only the oppressive blackness of the room and the ragged sound of her own sobs.
Then, she jolted upright. Truly upright. Gasping, drenched in cold sweat, her heart hammering against her ribs like a war drum. Sunlight, harsh and unforgiving, streamed through the narrow window of her chamber in Dragonstone. The brazier was cold ash. The furs were twisted around her waist. She was alone.
The echo of her own screams seemed to linger in the air, mixing with the distant, mournful cry of gulls. The door was firmly shut. The profound, aching emptiness where his presence had been moments before was now a yawning chasm within her chest. Before the crushing weight of realization could fully settle, a hesitant knock sounded.
And her servant entered, face pale, eyes downcast. "My lady..." the woman began, her voice thick with dread. "Word has come... from the Gullet. Prince Jacaerys... Prince Jacaerys and Vermax... they... they did not return. They are lost."
The words struck like a physical blow, driving the air from Baela’s lungs. Not a dream, but his one last visitation. A farewell etched in spectral tears and impossible promises whispered across the veil. He had come to say goodbye. The warmth of his touch, the salt of his tears, the crushing weight of his regret—it hadn't been sleep’s illusion. It had been him, one last time.
Understanding crashed over her, a tidal wave of pure, annihilating grief. The dream’s desperate pleas reverberated uselessly in the hollow silence of her sunlit chamber. He was gone. Truly gone. The heir. The betrothed. Her lover. The boy she’d raced across beaches with. The prince whose hesitant touch had just promised a love deferred to another life. The one she'd had hundred of life promises with. The one she love.
A choked sob escaped, then another, tearing through her. She crumpled forward, burying her face in her hands, the linen sheets rough against her skin. The tears came then, not the silent tracks of the dream, but great, heaving sobs that wracked her entire body, violent and uncontrollable.
She cried for the future stolen, for the words unspoken in this life, for the unbearable finality of his spectral touch. She cried until her throat was raw, until the sunlight blurred into a meaningless haze, until the only sound in the world was the shattered, broken weeping of a girl left utterly alone, guarding ashes in a castle by the sea where the phantom warmth of a farewell kiss burning like ice on her knuckles.
Until the salt on her lips now tasted only of endless, desolate sorrow.