Work Text:
222 a.c.
The next two days, when his name day comes around and Valarr turns nine and twenty, he will have lived more of his lifetime chasing after Daeron than being the Prince of Dragonstone.
The thought itself engraves through his mind, not much different than his scars after a tournament, marring and tender at the touch. To love Daeron is such an uneasy thing. To live up to his father’s standards is none different. Both a sip of dornish red after the sweetest treat.
Marriage didn’t come easy enough for both Valarr nor Daeron, more often than not they were at odds. It took them time before reaching an understanding, and even then, Valarr ever patiently sought him out, and Daeron at best ran wherever he desired.
This day is not different.
And he knows so when he stumbles into Gael, ending his hiding spree.
“Careful,” he takes Maelor from Gael’s arms before the boy throws him out accidentally while being alarmed.
Valarr’s stern voice erases the evergreen boy’s remaining mischief, who resembled his wayward mother’s in many forms. Not to be confused, as Valarr thanked the gods for Gael’s willful temperament and whimsical grace, for he was carefree, but it was proven difficult to look upon his pug nose or purple eyes and not see a small Daeron etched into their first child.
He knows the utter perfection he sired every time he gazes at Gael. His seeder boy in what the court could only say is the perfect heir with his perfect Targaryen white hair. The seed of a successful bringing, he hopes so.
“Father.” His mouth frowns downward, clenching his jaw just the way Valarr used to perform at the same age and for a moment all he can see is his reflection staring back at him.
Some servants pass both with hurried steps provoking an echo inside the cold hallway, which reminds him the sickening wet sound is what Daeron hates the most of Dragonstone, for it is too gloomy for him, too uncertain.
The shadows nested on his face gives him an edge as he sees Gael petrifying himself as a carved statue, eerie still.
“Gael,” he starts, voice low and careful, slackening his limbs, knowing Gael was a mirror of his demeanor at best.
Valarr shall be anything in the eyes of their realm, but never a lackluster father.
He sighs, eyes closing briefly to maintain himself from scolding his boy who only wants to spend time with his siblings, the same as Valarr did when Matarys graced Dragonstone’s hallways, both alive. The reminder of his blue absence works like an ointment to quell his irritation.
“Should you not be at your morning lessons?” He says in a velvety tone, satisfied when Gael easily embraces the warmth, no longer a stone-being carved in the hallway.
“Muña-.” He pauses, getting closer towards his father's imposing stance before adding: “Mother told me to sneak, he is at the shoreline waiting for us”.
The man cradles Maelor’s wispy blond hair while closing his eyes one more time, breathing his baby scent. His perfume subsides Valarr’s anger successfully, which only grants his younger son a few kisses from his sire, making Maelor happily babble.
When he stops, Gael is looking at him with a glimmer in his large eyes.
His father Baelor, or even his stepfather Maekar, would have Gael turning around directly to his lessons. Instead, he walks ahead of Gael. It disturbs him deeply the dire need of understanding what kind of shenanigans Daeron is up to, beyond reason. Makes him lack common sense and duty.
“Let us go, your mother must be waiting for you.”
Gael lingers by his side, constantly tugging his garments. For the day, setting him straight is out of the question.
It does not take them longer than a few minutes to reach the dark sand belonging only to Dragostone’s coast, boots stepping onto small specks of dirt and things Valarr can not comprehend, emitting a soft crunching noise. Their sandy steps are engulfed by the seagulls who chant their cries amongst its hunting.
A full smile carves out Valarr’s face seeing both Daelor and Vaela running behind their mother's long strides.The three of them waltz under the numb light of the day unaware of Valarr’s presence near them. And when the misty crashing of the waves lifts a dim breeze onto their front, he can already hear the servants complain about their children's tangled knots for their fine strands are already reduced to crisp threads nor Daeron or Valarr can untie.
“Mama, wait!” Daelor screeches in a futile attempt at keeping up his mother’s rhythm.
Luckily for him, his mother stops as soon as he crosses Valarr in his line of sight. His body goes rigid, caressing his bump absentmindedly while his face contorts in an atypical bashfulness.
“Ñuha jorraelagon.” Valarr kisses his temple when he enters in proximity. “Tis is your third time in this moon.”
The light scolding is palpable and it does not go over his wife’s head, who sighs and takes Maelor apart from Valarr's hold. His face adorns the doomed appearance Valarr never truly knew to chase away, for Daeron’s dreams haunted both.
“At least I have brought the children with me this time.” He quickly steals a long kiss from his husband and promptly stops when he hears Gael’s gagging noises.
He ruffles Gael’s hair before prompting him to leave both his sire and muña for a moment.
In turn, Valarr cradles his beloved face, bestowing in his lips a lengthy kiss, both sighing for the sultry touch. Between them, Maelor protests, patting his sire's chest in confusion while Valarr gently strokes Daeron’s small belly, quicked with his seed once more.
“Kepa!” Vaela shrieks, embracing both of his legs. “Look what Daelor discovered!”
“It is mine.” Daelor grumbles, sulking over the tiny blue seashell his sister tightly holds, close ever so slightly so he can snatch the shell back as soon as Vaela allows it.
“She is just showing me, boy.” He softly explains, palms holding Daeron’s waist. “She will return it”.
He crouches low, eye to eye for his only darling daughter. Her white hair is braided carefully in the manner Daeron only knows to, silky looking despite the salty breeze looming from the waves; the warmth in his chest only comes from knowing the braid resulted in Daeron’s precaution.
For all the fear Daeron had of birthing a daughter, he raised her utterly perfect, even if the people's whispers differed.
“What a beauty.” he proclaims whilst rotating the piece, sowing a rush of bashfulness from the child. “I am certain you and Daelor can seek more shells.”
Before Daelor could even gripe, Gael steps in, embracing Maelor back not before ordering his siblings around:
“Vaela! Daelor! Kepa commanded that we leave them be!” His heir yells, very much displeased, looking down at them.
Daeron’s amusement ends the moment their heir looks at them, sterned faced.
“So they can do lovers stuff…”
“Gael.” Daeron sighs for he knows he mothered a replica of himself.
He wonders within himself if this golden cage is so bad, if his past-self would take a look upon the family he made and keep thinking about these gilded chains who only keep his feet on the ground… if they truly feel scorching through his veins.
If he would remain dreaming about becoming an unbound bird soaring Dragonstone’s skies.
“Lord father,” Daelor steps into his solar, hands tightly clasped at his front, brown curls bouncing whilst he swayed, timid.
Valarr noticed, absent minded, that the white curl in his forehead appears yellow beneath the candle lit walls.
Swiftly he drops the quill, closing his book and patiently waits to hear his carbon copy son.
“Mama says your nameday comes at morrow.”
“On the morrow.” He chides softly in his quiet voice, beckoning him forth with his hand.
He trespasses the room in haste, his beige robe flowing at the movement and asks to sit in his father's lap.
Valarr makes room for him, gaze unwavering in his button nose and freckled cheeks.
“What is it?” He gives him one of his rare small toothy smiles.
“I brought you this gift, father.”
Daelor uncovers his hands where it lays a seashell necklace, and Valarr recognizes the shell as the same Vaela showed him at the shore, because he shall never forget any little speck of his children's life just as one remembers to draw a breath, for it is life itself. He remembers Daelor’s first breath, his first kick upon Daeron’s womb. Everything.
His son awaits expectantly, hands at his side gripping hard his tunic and Valarr nothing but embraces him firmly, cheekbone against the crown of his head.
“It pleases me greatly, Daelor, I thank you.”
At a later hour, a shell clasped around his throat and his lap full of Daelor scribbling in his own parchment paper, he carries on with his duties until he remembers it is pass his bed hour and prompts him to go.
Instead, he looks at him with full of doubt, faintly uttering a sentence, leaving Valarr wondering if he truly heard him right, for the words rendered him mute.
“Will I marry Gael when I turn four and ten?”
“Why, pray tell, would that happen?”
“I am a bearer, just like mama. Gael spoke of his age, that he is to be married soon for he is nearly the same age as you were”.
“Eight and twenty?” He weakly jest, voice croaked.
“Is it a jest?” His younger asked, puzzled.
“Daelor, ñuha tresy, both of you will do only as your heart bids”, he promises.
When the child silently leaves and the night casts shadows upon his face, he can only succumb to his cups, cheeks flooded in that pinching feel he has time and again he touches a cup of wine.
The tingling remains at the very sips he takes, and drinks and drinks until he can only remember the sun’s kiss upon his skin and the gentle caress the breeze gave both him and Matarys whilst they rested under the tree’s canopy.
“It is stupid,” Matarys said then, most angry at their father.
“What is it?” Valarr sighed, turning a page over, his gaze softly diverted to the younger who laid recumbent between two big roots, red hair displayed upon the ground.
He rolled his eyes. “Father said I shall find a worthy match at your wedding… I shall only find nuances around, who only want our name.”
“I cannot imagine anyone willing themselves to marry you.” He jested then, back aching against the hard barked tree.
Then, he spoke again with his gentle tongue, trying to soothe him.
“I think marriage can become rather romantic.” He suggested, turning one more page over. “Just as the books you revel in back at Dragonstone.”
“What must be romantic about tying up so young to sire children while imprisoned in duty.” He absentmindedly stated, throwing his apple in the air and catching it the same swift manner. “Worse, running around behind your spouse?”
Matarys meant no harm, but to hear his destiny so aloud pained his heart. That hollow empty buzzing he felt when he knew father was to marry his uncle Maekar. The same one he felt when they decided he was old enough to marry, to leave his life in Dragonstone behind.
The book closed abruptly by his hand’s doing, his gaze grazing the movement of the bird whose wings fluttered so full of liberty, until his eyes ached and could no longer trace their travel higher in the sky. His mouth plastered in a downward position and he could hear his grandmother's exasperated sigh at the return of such an unprince-like gesture. Valarr supposed she righteously said it, for his gallant countenance was changed completely by it.
He did not need to look over Matarys to know his face betrayed the mature demeanor he had trained so hard to maintain since both reached the Red Keep.
“Sorry…” Matary's soft apology did not grasp his ears, lost between the cicadas singing and the buzzing pains inside Valarr’s body.
For all he could think of was the tailored gilded cage made for both him and Daeron.
Nothing feels different the moment he turns nine and twenty. He wakes up the same, he bathes the same, he closes his doublet the same. But there was a time where he woke up to forever change, bathed himself in the warmest water to lay beneath the stained bedsheets at the end of night and, with whatever courage and peace he mustered while four and ten, tied up his doublet, fingers shaking as a feeble leaf.
He mused then if Daeron felt the same.
Apparently incorrect when he beheld Daeron drunkenly stumbling down Maegor’s holdfast corridors, ushered to be prepared for the wedding, for his wife's life remained the same rotten tree.
Maekar could only hide his wayward son from Valarr’s eye in the corridor, grunting at him: “This is yours to bear now, my prince. The gods know I tried.”
And Valarr pondered if anyone ever truly tried for Daeron.
With the same thought he tries to freshen up peacefully in the morning, so he can go directly to Daeron’s private chambers where both of them break their fast with the children.
He soon crosses the entryway, observing Gael eating as hounds do when starved. Besides him, Daelor watches him in ill-concealed revulsion, eating small bites at the time. Vaela is the first to notice him, screeching “Kepa!” and rising directly to embrace him with her short arms. Daelor does it mildly calmly whilst Gael only gives him half a courtesy so he can return to his food.
When he notices the void, it is embarrassing how quick he is to look around the chamber for his wife, for he was the only one absent, Maelor still suckling from his wet nurse.
He wanders inside his chambers, hoping to find him at least bathing in or worse, still embracing his sleep, for Valarr knows the pregnancy was proving to be the most difficult after Gael’s. Dread consumes his body, finding only an empty space where Daeron should be.
At last he takes a seat beside Daelor, and unable to disrupt his children’s peace again, he starts eating. The food tastes exceptionally delectable and so does the wine, a small dance of notes caressing his tongue makes him forget his dreadful night, pondering himself if their food was made specially for his nameday, the thought only reminding him again of his lady wife’s absence.
After a few bites, he inquires softly: “where is the lady of Dragonstone?” at the nearest servant.
Just then, the door opens once more and Daeron lowly chides in: “upon this spot. I made certain no one shall disturb us on this day.”
His garments are finely placed upon his body, hair gathered at his nape, looking lively, in a better state than Valarr last saw at the shoreline, for his cheeks glowered in a prettily pink, in the way Valarr often succumbed to Daeron’s whims.
“Is it in your intention to fill my heart with fear?” He jest, smiling from the rim of his cup, “or is it a gift of sorts?”
“You will see no further kindness from me.” Daeron protests, taking Valarr’s cup.
The threat goes naught the moment he bestows a delicate kiss over his brow, muttering a small regard for his nameday, right hand cupping his checkbone before he takes a seat by his side. Valarr retains the hand, placing a kiss upon his palm and his knuckles next.
Both resume their eating, talking with their children at times until one by one leaves for their lessons.
“I assumed we would spend time alongside them.” Valarr points, earning a mocking frown mingled with scorn.
“I see no future where you would welcome their presence in our bedchamber,” he sips from Valarr’s cup, silver tongue sanded in sarcasm. “Can you phantom it? Vaela watching our coupling.”
“Ah.”
Daeron kisses him earnestly, breathless and full of love.
Valarr spent the last five and ten years of his life chasing Daeron, like a moth flies towards the prettiest light at nightfall. He chased for him, and now without regrets, he may dare to proclaim he does not concern himself with the gilded chains fleshed upon his skin.
“I love you.” Daeron sighs between kisses.
And Valarr thinks he does too.