Work Text:
Baelor knew his brother’s strength, and even more his fury. He had been on the receiving end of both all his life, and had a broken nose and several bruises to prove it. His brother would fight with everything he had to save face. Baelor had seen him fight enough times to know with a certainty that his brother was capable of single-handedly turning this trial in Aerion’s favour. Maekar was a knight and a man not easily deterred. He would treat this like a battle. He would show no mercy.
So when Maekar spurred his horse around for a second round of attack at Ser Duncan, Baelor knew he had to stop him. He turned to face Maekar who was riding toward him at full speed, and with the precision that only comes from countless battles and endless hours in the practice yard, he drove the butt of his lance into Maekar’s side. The blow struck hard, throwing Maekar from the saddle as his mace spun away across the dirt.
Maekar was on his feet almost at once and picked his mace from the ground. Rage carried him forward as he marched towards where Aerion and Duncan fought. Baelor charged in front of him again, blocking his path while Lyonel Baratheon moved in beside him. Together they fought Maekar two against one, managing to hold him off and stall his advance.
Then a scream tore through the air.
Aerion.
“Aerion!” Maekar roared. “My boy!”
Something wild entered his eyes. With a furious roar he shoved both Baelor and Lyonel back. They faltered but managed to hold their positions.
“Let me go! Let me go! My boy!”
Even with the strength of both men, it was proving to be hard to hold Maekar back. He swung his mace wildly, caring nothing for who stood before him. He saw nothing except his son in danger. He had to reach him. He had to. Daeron was already down and probably hurt badly if not dead. He couldn't lose Aerion too. Dyanna would never forgive him if he let their son die here.
Baelor grabbed for the mace, trying to wrench it from his brother’s grasp. At the same moment Lyonel kicked forward, hooking Maekar’s leg to throw him off balance. Maekar stumbled. His mace slipped from his hand as he caught himself on the ground. For a heartbeat the weapon lay in the dust.
Maekar tore free of Lyonel’s grip and lunged for it. Baelor saw the danger at once. If Maekar reached Dunk with a weapon now, the knight would be slaughtered.
In a panic, Baelor rushed forward, seizing Maekar from behind and snatching up the fallen mace. Maekar whirled around and grappled for it. The two brothers struggled together, each trying to wrench the weapon away from the other.
Their feet tangled as they fought and Baelor slipped on the mud beneath them. They fell hard to the ground, with Maekar landing on top of Baelor while still clawing for the mace. Baelor acted on instinct and swung the mace to push him away. The angle was wrong, and the blow came down harder than he intended.
The mace struck Maekar’s helm with a dull, sickening crack, and Maekar's body immediately went slack.
Baelor barely paid attention to him as he pushed Maekar off him and scrambled to his feet, looking toward Duncan and Aerion.
Sometime during their struggle, Ser Duncan had seized Aerion by the throat and forced him down into the dirt.
“Yield!” Dunk shouted. “Yield!”
Aerion thrashed once more before finally speaking. His voice came out strangled with anger and conceiled humiliation.
“I yield…”
The crowd erupted into thunder. Baelor let out a long breath of relief as he watched. The fight was over.
He let the mace fall from his hand and turned back to where Maekar now lay in the dirt. No doubt his brother would be furious at being restrained, and even more pissed that Aerion had been forced to yield before half the realm.
Baelor walked toward him, already preparing for the argument.
“All right” he said as he approached. "You can curse me for this all you like once we are back inside. Now get up”
Maekar did not move.
Baelor frowned as he looked down at him.
His brother was still. Too still for his liking.
“Maekar?” he said. Baelor’s instincts screamed at him that something was wrong.
Baelor knelt beside him and gently shook Maekar's shoulder. "Maekar" he called out again.
Around them, the roaring crowd slowly began to quieten as people noticed what was happening. One by one, eyes turned toward the two princes in the mud.
Aerion was still on the ground where he had fallen after yielding. At first he was too dazed to understand why the noise of the crowd had begun to fade. Then he saw Baelor kneeling beside his father.
He pushed himself up, wincing at his wounds, and stared across the field. Something in the way his father's form lay in the dirt made his chest tighten.
“Father?” Aerion called, his voice weak and muffled behind his helm.
Baelor tried again to shake Maekar awake, but his brother’s body remained heavy and unresponsive in his arms. A cold dread began to rise in his chest.
“Maekar” he said again, louder this time, as he tried to lift him.
There was still no answer.
Panic seized him.
“Maester!” Baelor shouted suddenly, his voice breaking across the field. “Fetch a maester! Quickly!”
The silence shattered into murmuring as the crowd began to stir and whisper amongst themselves. Many leaned forward from their stands, trying to see what was happening.
Aerion had already begun running towards his father.
“Father!” he shouted as he stumbled towards them.
Baelor managed to pull Maekar partly upright. Someone knelt beside him and began loosening Maekar’s helm.
The helm was lifted away.
As it came free, blood began to run down the back of Maekar’s head and along his neck. It soaked his silver hair and painted it a vivid red
Baelor stared at it in disbelief. The memory of him hitting Maekar with the mace surfaced in his mind and his hands began to shake.
“Maekar” he called again, trying to rouse him.
Maekar’s eyes flickered open but his eyes kept rolling to the back of his head. His breathing coming slow and uneven.
Aerion reached them and dropped to his knees beside his father.
“Father” he said again, his voice breaking. “Father, can you hear me?”
In the stands, young Aegon had also seen the commotion and was pushing forward desperately. A Kingsguard stepped in front of him and held him back.
“You must stay back, my Prince” the knight said firmly. “Let the Maester attend to him first.”
By then a maester had already come rushing and knelt beside Maekar. He pressed his fingers gently to the wound at the back of the prince’s head, his expression tightening as he saw the blood.
“We must bring him inside, Your Grace” the maester said quickly. “At once.”
Baelor gathered his brother close and tried to rise with him in his arms. But Baelor's hands were shaking and his legs trembled beneath the weight. One of the Kingsguard stepped forward. “Let me carry him, Your Grace.”
“No” Baelor said stubbornly. “I will carry him.”
He tried again, but his strength failed him. The Kingsguard reached gently for Maekar despite Baelor’s protests.
"No! I can carry him."
The maester sighed. "Your Grace, the sooner we get him inside, the sooner I can have a proper look at his wounds. He does not have much time." That last line seemed to have jerked Baelor onto his sense, and he let the knight take Maekar from his arms.
They carried Maekar swiftly toward the castle. Baelor followed close behind, his hands still stained with blood.
Maekar was brought to his chambers and laid upon the bed. The maester set to work at once, cleaning the wound and examining the back of his head.
Baelor stood nearby, watching every movement.
After a while, the Maester stopped his examination.
“What's wrong? Will he be alright?” Baelor asked immediately.
The maester did not answer, and ony looked at Baelor with something akin to pity in his eyes.
"No..." Baelor shook his head and moved to the bedside. Tears gathered in his eyes, and he made no attempt to hide them.
“Maekar… wake up. You have made your point. You were right. This was reckless. I shouldn’t have taken part. Please Maekar… please wake up.”
There was no response.
His voice grew more desperate.
“Listen- you can complain to me every day for the rest of our lives, and I won’t argue. I promise. You can even strike me back, even the score. We’ll go hunting after, and you can boast about your kill, and I-”
His voice broke, the words dissolving into a sob.
“I’ll accept it all quietly, brother. Just… wake up.”
Aerion moved to the other side of the bed and clasped Maekar’s hand in a desperate grip. He leaned in close, and repeated the same quiet pleas as his uncle, begging his father to wake, to hear him, to come back.
Just then, the chamber doors burst open.
Aegon stumbled inside in tears, with Valarr close behind him.
“Father!” he cried, rushing to the bedside.
No one tried to stop him.
He clutched at the blankets, small hands trembling. “Father… will he be alright, Uncle?” Egg's small fearful voice called out.
Baelor forced a smile. “Of course he will. He will be up again soon, scolding you before long. You’ll see, Aegon. There is nothing to fear.”
Behind them, the maester hesitated. For a moment, it seemed he might hold his tongue, unwilling to shatter what little hope remained, especially in front of the child. But he had a duty and he has no choice but to be honest.
“The wound is too grave.” the maester said quietly.
“Such injuries to the head are… difficult. There is little more I can do. All that remains is to wait to see if he wakes. If he does, before the morrow, then there is hope."
He paused, as though weighing whether to say the rest, then continued reluctantly "And if he does not...We can give him a sleeping potion, Your Grace. Ease his passing. It is the greatest mercy we can offer.”
Valarr knew, the instant the words were spoken, how this would unfold.
“No!”
Aerion shouted and lunged for the maester. Valarr reacted at once, and caught him before he could reach his target. Aerion stilled only slightly, chest heaving, his gaze locked on the maester with a burning intensity that spoke more than words ever could. The maester shrank beneath it, faltering back as far from Aerion as he could.
“He will wake.” Baelor said, his voice breaking the commotion. “He is strong. My brother will wake. Do not speak as though he is already lost.”
The maester nodded quietly, saying nothing more, unwilling to provoke another prince’s wrath.
Valarr slowly loosened his hold on Aerion, and he sank back to the ground with a sharp exhale, the fight draining out of him all at once. He dragged his hands through his hair again and again and rubbed his face roughly, as though he could hide those tears threatening to betray him.
And so they waited, praying, and apologising to Maekar as though their stubborn love alone might be enough to call him back.
-----x------
The midday sun climbed, lingered, and at last slipped away. In its place came the slow gathering of dusk, and one by one, candles were lit to push back the dark.
At some point, Aerion was taken away to have his wounds cleaned and his clothes changed. Aegon was coaxed away to eat, though he scarcely touched the food set before him. Valarr himself stepped out briefly to check on the other competitors and Daeron.
Baelor alone refused to leave at all. He would not eat, would not rest, would not move from his brother’s side.
Even Ser Duncan came, quiet and solemn, offering his apologies and asking after Maekar before slipping away once more.
By the time night had fully settled, they had all gathered again, seated or slumped near the bed.
Valarr watched it all unfold in silence.
He saw Aerion’s proud facade crack, the sharp edge of arrogance slipping away, leaving only a frightened boy clinging to his father.
He watched Aegon pray with all the fierce, desperate faith only a child could muster, whispering to the Seven as though they might yet listen and offer him a miracle.
He watched his father, the Hand of the King and heir to the Iron Throne, brought to his knees beside the bed.
Valarr had always believed him unshakable. But here, now, he did not see the calm and composed Prince.
He saw only a brother, forced to watch as the life of the one he loved slipped helplessly through his hands.
Daeron arrived sometime in the night, pale and unsteady, having only just woken to the news. He sank down beside Aerion without a word, and when Aegon’s strength finally gave out, it was Daeron who gathered him close, holding him as sleep claimed him at last, his tear-streaked face slack with exhaustion.
He and Aerion remained there on the floor, their shoulders pressed together, drawing what comfort they could from the closeness.
Baelor had not left his place.
He still sat at Maekar’s side, his hand moving gently through his brother’s hair, over his face, in small, absent gestures. His thoughts wandered far from the room, lost somewhere deep within memory.
His brother.
His baby brother.
The one he had first held as an infant, small and fragile in his arms. Baelor had loved him from the moment he first held him. The boy had followed him everywhere after, a constant shadow at his heels. Many had called Maekar Baelor’s shadow, and Baelor had never minded. Not once.
Their father had scolded him, said Baelor had duties more important than indulging a younger sibling. But Baelor had never cared. There had been something pure in Maekar’s devotion, in the way he sought his approval, in the way his small hand would clutch at Baelor’s when he was afraid. He had loved Baelor with a fierce, unashamed affection, and when they fought, he did so with that same burning intensity.
And Baelor had cherished it, though he had not always said so.
And now...now it was Baelor’s own hands that had struck him down.
The same hands that had once cradled him, fed him, ruffled his hair had brought him here.
Perhaps this was some cruel punishment the gods had chosen for him, for some failing he could not name. He would have accepted it, any punishment they wished to lay upon him, without question.
But not this.
This was too cruel.
To have his brother’s life taken by his own hands… no, that was a punishment beyond bearing. He would have endured anything else, suffered any fate, if only the gods would spare Maekar.
Baelor’s face faltered, grief breaking through what little composure he had left.
Seeing this, Valarr stepped closer and placed his hands on his father's shoulder in an effort to provide some comfort.
“He was always so loud” Baelor murmured, almost to himself. “Always complaining. He never stayed silent for long… especially when someone pissed him off.”
A faint, broken breath left him.
“He did not do very well with silence. His anger- gods, it was always loud. The whole Red Keep would know when Maekar Targaryen was wroth.” A ghost of a smile flickered and faded. “The loudest of us all, they used to say.”
His hand stilled.
“And for all that I chided him for it… I never meant-” His voice faltered, splintering. “Never meant for him to be this quiet.”
Across the room, Aerion and Daeron had gone still, listening.
At last, Baelor looked up.
His eyes met Valarr’s, and the same mismatched eyes stared back at him.
“I… I cannot do this without him, Valarr.” His voice trembled, stripped bare of all pretense. “I cannot lose him. I never meant to hurt him. I love him.” He ended with a sob.
Valarr had never seen his father like this, so scared and vulnearble.
In that moment, a cold, unshakable certainty settled over him.
If his uncle died here, on this bed....
his father would die with him.
-----x-----
By the morning, Maekar's condition had only worsened. His breathing had grown weaker, each breath slower and more uneven than the last. The maester watched him closely, but there was nothing left for him to do.
And sometime between the first light and early morning sunshine, Prince Maekar, surrounded by his family and those who loved him, drew his final breath.
-----x-----
Grief did not fall upon the family all at once. It settled slowly, sinking into each of them in different ways, shaping what they would become.
Daeron bore it first. Still young, he stepped into a role he had never been meant to fill so soon, taking responsibility for his siblings and the household at Summerhall. What should have been his father’s place became his, and he carried its duties with a sense of responsibility that would have made his father proud.
Aerion changed as well, surprising everyone. The fire in him dimmed and he grew quieter, more restrained, lending his strength to Daeron rather than fighting against him.
Aegon could not bear it at all.
Summerhall became a place of ghosts, every corridor echoing with memory and reminding him of the heavy absence. He could not remain there.
So he sought permission from his grandfather to leave.
At first, the king refused. The loss of his youngest son was still fresh, the wound too raw to bear the thought of losing his grandson as well. But when he looked upon the boy, truly looked, he saw the quiet grief in him, the heaviness in his eyes, and something in that solemn expression gave him pause.
He had seen what grief could do. He had watched it consume his eldest son, hollowing him out until he was but a shadow of the man he had once been. And if there was any way to spare Aegon from the same fate, he would take it.
So, in the end, he let him go.
Aegon took to the roads with the hedge knight, wandering for months at a time. Yet he never strayed too far. He returned often, unwilling to abandon his family entirely, lingering for a while before setting out once more.
And Baelor......
In the years that followed, he was often seen turning his head slightly, glancing to his right as if expecting someone to be there. For a fleeting moment, there would be something like hope in his expression, before it faded when he found only empty space, or another man standing where his brother once had. Each time, the realization came anew, and each time, it seemed to wound him all over again.
There were whispers, too, of darker moments.
It was said that in fevered delirium, he would sometimes mistake young Aegon for Maekar as a child, calling out to him by his brother’s name.
Some said the loss broke something in Baelor Targaryen that could never be mended, that he never smiled again after that day.
Valarr knew that much was true.
He remembered the man his father had been, and the shell of the man he became.
He never truly overcame the loss, nor did he forgive himself for it. Others called it an accident, and none truly blamed him, but their words held no weight. In his own mind, the fault had always been his.
He carried the guilt alone, as he carried his crown, and though he lived on and fulfilled his duty as king, something essential had been lost to him. A part of his very being had gone with his brother, and no passing of years could restore it. A part of him remained bound to that day, to that loss.
To the day the Gods had taken The Anvil from The Hammer.