Chapter Text
The night had been still—eerily so, for King’s Landing.
No shouts from the streets below, no laughter spilling from the wine sinks along the river. Only the distant clink of a guard’s armor and the restless hum of torches burning low.
Daemon sat alone at the great council table, his boots stretched out, one leg lazily crossed over the other. The fire in the torches had burned down to embers, throwing the chamber into a wash of red and gold shadow. He turned a ring around his finger, bored more than anything else, his patience thinning with every passing moment.
They had summoned him without explanation, at an hour when even the schemers were abed. That alone made him uneasy.
He was halfway to deciding to leave when the door creaked open.
Viserys entered first.
Daemon straightened a little—not in deference, but in instinct. His brother looked… tired, older than he had the right to be. There was a slump to his shoulders that even the golden crown on his head couldn’t hide.
Behind him came Otto Hightower, his expression the same as ever—mild, unreadable, and somehow always condescending.
Daemon’s jaw tightened. He offered Viserys a nod, slow and respectful enough to count as manners. For Otto, he spared only a thin, sharp glance—half warning, half insult. Mostly insult.
“Brother,” Daemon said, his tone deceptively casual. “I was beginning to think you’d forgotten me.”
Viserys exhaled through his nose, not quite a sigh. “I’m sorry for the hour. This… matter is not one for daylight.”
“That much I gathered.” Daemon leaned back, eyes flicking between them. “What’s so urgent that you drag me from my bed, hm? Have I unknowingly offended your precious Hand again?”
Otto didn’t bite. He folded his hands neatly behind his back. “This is no matter of quarrels or unreasonable insults, my prince.”
“Then what?” Daemon asked, his tone cooling. “Spit it out, Otto. I don’t have the patience for your riddles.”
Viserys raised a hand, silencing them both before Otto could answer. He looked at his brother—really looked—and Daemon felt the change in the air. There was hesitation in that gaze, and something that almost resembled shame.
“I am not well,” Viserys said quietly.
Daemon frowned. “You’ve said that before. You drink too much, you sleep too little—”
“It’s more than that,” Viserys interrupted, his voice rough. “The maesters think… it may be some affliction of the blood. It eats at me slowly.”
Daemon studied him for a long moment, searching for mockery and finding none.
“And what does this have to do with me?”
Otto stepped forward then, his words measured, as if he were walking Daemon through the edge of a blade.
“His Grace has taken a new wife. Lady Alicent. You are aware, of course.”
Daemon’s mouth curved in something between a smirk and a sneer. “Hard not to be. Half the city won’t shut up about it.”
Viserys flinched slightly at his tone, but pressed on. “We have been… trying,” he said, the word awkward in his mouth. “To conceive. The realm expects it of us. But—”
He broke off, glancing toward Otto, who picked up the thread smoothly.
“His Grace fears the illness may have rendered him… unable,” Otto said softly. “Yet heirs must be born. The crown cannot afford uncertainty.”
Daemon blinked. “Unable?”
Viserys met his gaze then, steady and pained. “I cannot sire children, Daemon.”
For a moment, Daemon said nothing. The fire in the torches crackled softly, the only sound in the heavy room. Then he laughed—a single, humorless bark that echoed off the stone.
“Seven hells,” he said. “You drag me here in the dead of night to tell me you can’t get your cock to work?”
“Daemon,” Viserys warned, but his voice lacked force.
Otto’s expression tightened. “Show some respect.”
Daemon turned that grin on him, sharp as a knife. Oh, how gorgeous Dark Sister would look in his smug face, he thought.
“Listen,” Viserys said quickly, before Daemon could say something.“I need your help, brother.”
Those words stopped him cold. Viserys rarely asked for help. Not from him.
“What kind of help?” Daemon asked slowly.
Viserys hesitated, then looked away—as if ashamed of what he was about to say. Otto stepped closer again, his tone low and careful.
“The realm must believe the king’s line endures. That his marriage is fruitful. We… need an heir of his blood. The queen must bear sons. Trueborn, by law and by claim.”
Daemon’s eyes narrowed. “And how do you plan to manage that, if the king can’t—”
Then he saw it. The glance that passed between Viserys and Otto. The unspoken implication.
His blood ran cold.
“No,” he said.
Viserys said nothing.
“No,” Daemon repeated, harder. “You can’t mean—”
Otto’s voice was quiet. “You are of the same blood, my prince. The same house. None would question the children’s legitimacy. The queen is young, and she will… comply. For the good of the realm.”
For a long moment, Daemon just stared at them both, unable to decide whether to laugh or draw steel.
“You want me,” he said finally, his voice soft and deadly, “to bed your wife.”
Viserys flinched again, shame flickering in his eyes. “I want our family to endure, Daemon. I want peace in the line. Please.”
Daemon rose slowly from his chair. The firelight threw his shadow long across the wall. “You ask me to betray my own blood, my honor—what little of it I’ve left—and you call it peace.”
“It is duty,” Otto said. “And you know it.”
Daemon’s gaze flicked to him. “Don’t speak to me of duty, Hightower. You twist that word to whatever shape suits your ambition. And now you’re even willing to turn your own daughter into a whore, just so your blood may one day sit the throne.”
Otto’s mouth hardened, but Viserys stepped forward, voice low, pleading. “Please, Daemon. I would not ask if there were another way.”
For a long moment, Daemon just looked at him—his brother, pale and desperate and worn thin by the crown.
And then, finally, he sighed.
“Seven hells, Viserys,” he muttered. “You’ve always known how to ruin a quiet night.”
He turned his eyes toward the fire, the gold light cutting across his face. “If I do this… it’s for you. Not him,” he said, nodding toward Otto. “And not the bloody realm.”
Viserys nodded once, grateful and broken all at once.
Daemon didn’t look back as he left the chamber.
Somewhere in the distance, a dragon roared—low and lonely—and Daemon thought, bitterly, that the gods must be laughing, which was funny, because he actually never cared about what they may think of him.
—————————————————————————————————————————
Kings Landing - 115 AC
It was a bright morning in King’s Landing, and the sun did little to quiet the throb at the base of Daemon Targaryen’s skull. He lay not on his bed but beside it, — one boot off and nowhere near him — the sheets twisted and smelling faintly of wine and other people's perfume. The night had been loud and easy; the morning was its hangover — a dry mouth, a taste of copper, and the memory of a bell that would not stop ringing behind his eyes.
He forced himself upright, an ungainly animal trying to stand. His head complained. He stumbled to the small table by the window and seized a goblet of water that a servant had left; the water was colder than he expected, sharp against his throat. He drank until the dizziness subsided enough for him to think in straight lines. For a moment he considered returning to the bed and letting a peaceful dose of sleep do the rest of the healing, but that thought was short-lived.
There was a knock on the door that impressed itself into his head like a soldier's cuff. The door opened and Otto Hightower entered with the slow, measured step of a man who had never wasted a thing.
At the side of him, Daemon rolled his eyes so thoroughly it felt as if they might get stuck in his skull. He set the empty goblet down and spoke, voice rough. “What is it?”
Otto's face was the pale, impartial mask he wore for counsel. He bowed his head in the smallest of formalities.
“The queen is well,” he said. “She birthed a son this morning.”
A son.
Daemon blinked. The sound of Otto's voice seemed to come from far away as if the room were suddenly very deep. He refilled the goblet and drank again because not drinking felt like failing some small ritual. “Good,” he said finally, raw with an emotion he did not bother to name. “I’ll see her later.”
Otto's lips did not move in a smile. “The boys name shall be Aemond,” he added. “Alicent's choice. The king approved.”
The name landed like a stone. Daemon held it between his teeth for a moment before swallowing. The blood in his ears roared. Naming was a thing of claims and history; names were hooks for honors and snares for suspicion.
History does not remember blood, it remembers names.
He thought of Viserys's gentle, trusting face, of Otto's calculating gaze, of Alicent's young and pale composure. He thought, too, of promises made in rooms where the curtains were kept drawn.
“Named after you,” Otto added, as if that weren’t obvious.
Daemon felt something like a laugh, small and sour, try to escape him. He did not offer Otto the satisfaction. He merely inclined his head and tightened the leather across his chest as if fastening a cloak could fasten the uneasy thing in his guts. “How flattering,” he murmured. He looked up. “You may leave now.”
To Daemon’s surprise, Otto turned without a word. The door shut with a soft finality. He drained the last of his water, set the goblet down with far less care than its worth deserved, and looked around the room, searching for his second boot.
The corridors of the Red Keep were colder and the way to the Queen’s Chambers longer than memory allowed. Sunlight pooled on flagstones and the tapestries made the walls look alive and politely hostile. Servants moved like cautious fish, their faces downcast. Guards bowed their heads when he walked past. Every footstep he took was a small confession; every face he passed might be a ledger where his mistakes would be catalogued. He hated it.
He could not be seen here, not today. Not while the court sang its new child's praises and while Viserys smiled in that easy way that invited the world to believe in kings and heirs and bloodlines.
He kept to the shadows—let a servant's sweeping broom wipe his hem while he pretended not to look, let a pair of ladies pass with the latest rumor buzzing like wasps between them. The Red Keep watched, but a man who had learned how to be a prince for the moment and a troublemaker the next could be invisible if he chose to be.
Alicent’s door was guarded by no other than Ser Criston Cole — the only good thing about that man was that he didn’t ask questions, nor did he loosen his tongue with wine to express those questions at last. He regarded Daemon with polite wariness, the way one regards a storm from a distance. The Rogue Prince’s face was a mask of small politeness; the hangover smudged his features into something more honest than Otto Hightower would allow, not that he ever cared about following that cunt’s orders.
“My Prince,” Cole said, and the words were not quite welcome, not quite rebuke.
“Quiet,” Daemon hissed, voice low — an order that had been given to him as much as he now gave it. He stepped past Cole into the warm hush of Alicent’s rooms.
The air inside was thick with the smell of herbs and heat, of linen washed and folded into comfort. Pipes of sunlight fell across the bed where a woman lay propped on cushions, pale and wary and somehow more formidable for having been vulnerable. She looked up as he entered, and the expression on her face held everything — fatigue, triumph, calculation, relief. The newborn in her arms was wrapped in swaddling and slept like a small, furious thing.
Alicent’s eyes, when they met his, were not accusing. They were small and intent, as if searching for some tiny truth. For a moment he saw only that: the mother, exhausted and sharp, and the baby named in his honor.
“You came,” she said simply.
Daemon said nothing. He closed the door behind him and let the sound die there. He crossed the floor on a loose lurch and, because he was a fool and because the world bent in strange ways toward certain loyalties, he sat carefully on the edge of the bed, the wood creaking beneath his weight.
Alicent said nothing, only watched him with those dark, unreadable eyes of hers. He reached out, hesitant for once, and gathered the newborn into his arms. The child was lighter than he remembered his others being—small, swaddled tightly, a little bundle of heat and breath and silence.
Aemond stirred, his tiny hand twitching against Daemon’s sleeve. The prince looked down at him—at his son, who would grow to call him “uncle.”
The thought stung more than the wine had.
Daemon exhaled slowly, the air thick with the scent of milk and herbs. “He’s smaller than Aegon was,” he said quietly, more to himself than to her.
Alicent’s voice came soft, almost brittle. “The midwife says he’s strong.”
Daemon nodded, though his gaze didn’t lift from the infant’s face. He traced his thumb along the boy’s cheek, marveling at how soft the skin was. There was no sign yet of who he might become—no shadow of Alicent, no echo of Daemon either, only the calm, unformed face of something new.
He remembered the night four years ago—how Otto had come to him first, polite and serpentine, spinning his poisonous logic about duty, legacy, and blood. How Viserys had followed, earnest and pale, speaking of the realm and the gods and the need for heirs. He had agreed because his brother had asked it of him, because for all their quarrels, Viserys’s voice had still meant something. He’d thought it would be simple. A duty. A favor. A secret. He would visit the queen’s bed under the cover of night, spill his seed, and leave the rest to the gods and the maesters. No feelings. No attachments. The children would bear Viserys’s name, not his. The lie would stand as long as he kept his distance.
But it had not been simple.
When Aegon was born, Daemon had held him just once—only once—and it had been enough. The child’s tiny hand had gripped his finger with such blind strength that something inside him had shifted, broken, reformed. The same had happened again when Helaena came into the world—his silver-haired little girl with her strange little smile and her way of staring at things as though she saw more than others did. They were his. They would never be called his, but they carried his blood. That was enough—and yet not nearly enough.
He looked down at Aemond, and warmth spread through his chest like a slow-burning fire. It was dangerous, that warmth. It made him soft in a way he despised.
“You’ve got your mother’s nose,” he murmured, and a faint, reluctant smile ghosted across his lips.
Alicent tilted her head. “He’ll have your temper, most likely.”
Daemon huffed, a sound between a laugh and a sigh. “Seven save the realm, then.”
For a moment, silence settled between them—not uncomfortable, but heavy. They had long since stopped pretending this was anything other than what it was. There was no love between them, not the sort bards wrote of, but there was understanding—an unspoken recognition that they were bound together by something crueler and more permanent than affection.
“He looks… content,” Alicent said after a moment.
Daemon glanced at her, then back at the child. “He doesn’t know the world yet. Let him keep that peace for a while.”
Aemond’s tiny fingers brushed against the clasp of Daemon’s tunic, and the prince’s breath caught. He shifted the infant slightly, holding him closer, and for a heartbeat the room fell away—the walls, the crown, the lies, all of it. There was only the weight in his arms, the sound of his son’s faint breathing, the slow rhythm of life that had come from him.
In the histories, Aemond would be called the son of King Viserys Targaryen and Queen Alicent Hightower. The books would write it cleanly, neatly, like truth written in ink that never smudged. But Daemon knew better.
He pressed his lips to the child’s forehead, a fleeting, secret gesture, and when he looked up again, Alicent was watching him. Her expression was unreadable, but there was something softer there—something that might have been pity, or understanding, or both.
“He’ll never know,” she said quietly.
Daemon’s eyes lingered on the sleeping child. “No,” he said. “But I will.”
He rose then, slowly, carefully setting Aemond back in his mother’s arms. The prince stood for a moment longer, as if unsure what to do with his hands.
“I’ll come by again,” he muttered.
“You always say that.”
This time, he almost smiled. “And sometimes I even mean it.”
He turned toward the door, pausing just long enough to glance back once more. The boy was stirring again, a small fist waving in the air.
Daemon felt that same dangerous warmth spread through him, the one that made him want to stay—and burn the world down if anyone ever threatened them.
Then he was gone, leaving behind the faint scent of smoke and steel. Somewhere in the Dragon Pit, Caraxes let out a loud roar — a mix of grief and pride.
__________________________________________________________
Royal Gardens - Same Day
The gardens of the Red Keep were heavy with the scent of roses and the distant hiss of the fountains. Daemon sat slouched on a marble bench, one arm draped along the backrest, the other shielding his eyes from the light. The sun was merciless but honest—it burned away the wine’s residue, the sleepless hours, the thoughts he should not think.
There was only the hum of bees and the lazy murmur of leaves. Somewhere nearby, birds were making an intolerable racket. He thought about silencing them. But then came a small voice, bright and unsteady:
“Uncle Daemon!”
Daemon opened one eye. A blur of gold and white stumbled toward him across the grass. Aegon.
The boy’s gait was uneven, half-run, half-dance, his arms spread wide as if the world were always open to him. His laughter bounced between the hedges like light on water.
Behind him came Viserys, slower, smiling that weary, sunlit smile that Daemon had once envied for its ease. The king’s hair, thinner now, caught the morning light like a crown forged of spider silk.
Daemon straightened a little as Aegon reached him and threw himself into his lap. The impact forced a grunt from his chest, but Daemon’s hand went instinctively to steady the boy.
“Easy there, little dragon,” he said, voice rougher than he intended. “You’ll break my ribs before your first tourney.”
Aegon laughed, showing too many small teeth. “You can’t break, you’re a dragon too!”
Daemon smirked. “That so?”
Viserys reached them, breathing heavier than he liked to admit. He lowered himself onto the bench beside his brother. “He’s been restless all morning,” he said. “Won’t stay still for a septa or a story.”
Aegon wriggled on Daemon’s knee, already distracted by a butterfly. “I am almost big enough to ride Sunfyre,” he said proudly.
Daemon raised an eyebrow, glancing sidelong at Viserys. “Really? Very ambitious for a boy who still trips over his own feet.”
Viserys chuckled softly. “He’s your blood. Ambition was part of the bargain, wasn’t it?”
The words lingered in the air like smoke. Daemon’s hand stilled on the boy’s shoulder. He looked at his brother then—not as king and subject, but as two men bound by a secret that had grown heavier with every heartbeat of the children it produced.
Viserys’s eyes were warm, but beneath that warmth was something Daemon didn’t often see in him anymore—guilt, maybe, or gratitude too heavy to be carried.
“I’ve seen the babe,” he said. “A fine Prince, he will make a fearsome knight, especially with that name of his.”
Daemon didn’t look up from the wriggling toddler in his lap. “He surely will.”
“They favor you,” Viserys said quietly. “All of them.”
Daemon’s jaw tightened. “You shouldn’t say that.”
“It’s true all the same.” Viserys smiled faintly, his gaze turning back to the child. “Aegon has your spirit, and, if the gods so wish, Aemond will have it too one day.”
Daemon tried to smile as well. He failed.
He looked at the boy—at his boy—and tried to see him as the realm did. The crown prince. The male heir everyone had waited, hoped and prayed for. A living lie with silver hair and a claim strong enough to one day challenge that of the girl everyone thought his older sister.
Aegon twisted in his lap and looked up. “Will you teach me to fight?”
Daemon blinked, startled by the sudden plea. “You’re not big enough to hold a sword.”
“Then a dagger!”
Viserys laughed, light and tired. “Seven save me, not a dagger either.”
Daemon let the corner of his mouth twitch. “Soon,” he said. “When you can lift a blade without falling on it.”
Aegon pouted and faceplanted into Daemons chest, causing the Rogue Prince’s heart to quicken. Viserys reached out and ruffled Aegon’s hair, gentle as a man could be. “You’ve given the realm its future, brother,” he said softly. “I’ll not forget that.”
Daemon swallowed the words that rose in his throat. He wanted to say you asked it of me, and now here I am, fighting feelings I am not allowed have. He wanted to ask of what use is a future that is built on a lie?.
But what good would truth do now?
Instead, he only shrugged. “Let’s hope your future doesn’t drink as much as I do.”
Viserys laughed — a frail, genuine laugh — and Aegon joined in though he hadn’t understood the jest. The boy’s laughter rang out bright and unguarded, filling the garden with a sound that almost felt like peace.
Daemon watched him, his own lips twitching. He’d promised himself, long ago, that he would not grow attached. That he would give the crown its heirs and walk away unburdened. But sitting there, the sunlight tangled in Aegon’s hair, his brother beside him — the lie of detachment felt heavier than the one of the boy’s parentage.
Viserys’s hand trembled slightly as he adjusted the ring on his finger. “I am really grateful to you,” he said. “And ashamed. Both at once. A king should not ask such a thing of his kin, and yet I did. I did because I trust you more than any man alive.”
Daemon tilted his head, trying to hide how much this confession pleased him. “You shouldn’t.”
“Perhaps,” Viserys said with a faint smile. “But I do.”
Aegon tugged at Daemon’s sleeve again, sweetly destroying the tender moment between the brothers. “Will you take me to the Dragonpit soon? I want to see Caraxes!”
Daemon looked down, eyes softening despite himself. “Soon,” he said quietly. “Very soon.”
And for once, even Viserys didn’t argue. He just sat in the sun, smiling faintly, while his brother and his son — their son — spoke of dragons as if the world was simple.
“You should marry again, Daemon,” he said after a while. “Properly, this time. Lord Corlys told me that his daughter Laena speaks very fondly of you. Perhaps she would be a good match.”
Daemon’s jaw tightened. “Perhaps,” he murmured. Then, slowly, gently, he transferred Aegon into his brothers lap.
Viserys took the boy, brow furrowing, but before he could speak, Daemon stood. The sudden movement startled a pair of doves from the hedge nearby and made Aegon look up—wide-eyed.
“Uncle?”
You should call me something else, Daemon thought bitterly. Gods, how he hated himself for wishing that the boy would call him what he called Viserys.
“Rest, brother,” Daemon said, looking at his brother, brushing the desire away. His tone was softer now, almost affectionate. “Enjoy your peace while it lasts. The gods don’t give much of it to men like us.”
Viserys looked up at him, but Daemon was already walking away—cloak catching the sun, hair gleaming silver-white in the morning light.
He heard Aegon call his name.
He didn’t look back.
As he left the gardens, the king’s voice drifted after him, gentle and trusting.
“Come to supper tonight, brother. We’ll drink to my sons.”
My sons.
Daemon didn’t answer. Maybe he will come, maybe he won’t. Maybe he will write to Lord Corlys and ask him if he could wed his daughter, maybe he won’t. But he will definitely go to the Dragonpit now, mount his dragon and fly higher and higher until he won’t be able to think anymore, because not even wine could mute the feeling of longing for his children to actually be his.