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When Aerys Targaryen's wife tells him she is with child, he does not say a word.
Maella stares at him, defiant. Loose strands of her close-cropped silver hair stick to her forehead with sweat and she grips the hilt of the sword at her belt fiercely, as if she anticipates a fight. Whatever for, Aerys knows not. He is no warrior, Maella knows this well. While Maella trailed after their brother Baelor when they were small, insistent she train at arms beside him and their bastard uncles, he made dusty scrolls and ancient leather bound books his dearest friends.
Aerys can only raise an eyebrow and gaze into her violet eyes that dare him to object.
They both know he is not the father. Their marriage has been chaste since the day they were joined together at the Great Sept, their elder brother never taking his eyes off them from his seat in the crowd. The great stone effigy of King Baelor looked down upon them in judgment, and Maella stared back at the Blessed's namesake while she said her holy vows that day.
Aerys hears all the whispers behind their backs—that Maella is more the husband and he the feeble wife. In at least half of this, they are more right than they know. Perhaps when their child is born, looking more like their mother—like their brother—than either of its parents, they will whisper more. And perhaps if it bears the Valyrian features of their ancestors, they will still scoff and declare Maella more the babe's father than her husband who planted the seed.
Let them whisper, Aerys thinks. Let them scoff. In all this, he is content to allow Maella do as she pleases, just as she allows him to eschew their marriage bed without protest. However the child will look, whoever its fathers, the life she carries within will be blood of the dragon through and through.