Chapter Text
The nursery at Summerhall smelled like lavender and the herbs the wet nurse rubbed into her hands to keep them soft.
Princess Aemma was eleven months old and already furious at attempts to contain her. She had too much hair for such a small head and it was pale as spilled moonlight. The nurse liked to click her tongue at her and say she’d be a beauty and terror both.
Aemma crawled with intention across the room, palms slapping the floorboards, knees red. The nurse followed her. Everyone followed her, even at that age.
The cradle was set by the window where the spring's night light could touch it. Inside, the prince slept in the loose, boneless way newborns do. His little mouth was open. His cheeks were the soft pink of a rose petal. A tuft of pale, almost white hair stuck up.
Aemma hauled herself up the stepstool and against the gilded cradle rail. She steadied, wobbling, and peered down with grave focus. And then her whole face changed. Her mouth opened. A small breath of wonder slipped out. She reached one hand between the bars and laid her palm on the blanket.
The baby stirred as if he felt a sunbeam move across his skin. His little fists flexed. His violet eyes blinked open, unfocused at first and then finding the shape above him. A bright blur, a small face, a fixed stare. Aemma made a sound. She smiled with two tiny teeth and a stretch too big for her cheeks, too certain. She pressed her forehead against the cradle rail.
The baby squinted, then let out a thin, startled cry. Just a complaint for now, not the big hungry cry yet. The nurse moved automatically. “Hush now, sweet…”
Aemma beat her to it. She patted the blanket. Once, twice. A rhythmic thump, like she was trying to remember a lullaby without having the words for it. She leaned in and made a small croon from the back of her throat. It was pure instinct, the way an animal might soothe, not pretty. But the baby’s cry hiccupped. He turned his head toward his sister’s voice. His mouth opened again, still displeased, but the sound that came out was smaller, confused, as if he couldn’t decide if he wanted to be angry.
Aemma laughed quietly. She had discovered she could do magic. The wet nurse paused with her hands hovering over the cradle, watching, startled by the simplicity of it. Aemma’s hand curled, tiny fingers gripping the edge of the blanket. She did not yank, just held on like the world might steal her brother if she didn’t.
Measured footsteps sounded in the hall. Metal and leather. A guard’s presence accompanying one of the blood. The door opened. Prince Maekar stood in the threshold. The young man filled the doorway with the cold air he’d brought in from the corridor. He did not come often, not because he didn’t care, but because caring in front of others was uncomfortable.
He crossed to the cradle with the carefulness of someone approaching a holy object from a foreign religion. Aemma heard him and did not turn. She didn’t need to. She knew her papa’s steps. Knew the weight of him on castle stones.
Maekar looked down at the newborn. Then at Aemma, braced at the rail, a little sentinel. His expression softened in a way that would shame him if anyone outside those walls saw it, and he bent over awkwardly. His hand hovered above Aemma’s head, uncertain, then settled, heavy and gentle, on her hair. Aemma immediately stilled. She leaned into his palm without thinking. She was just a baby too.
“Shouldn’t she be in bed?” Maekar grumbled, trying to sound like a father.
“She doesn’t want to leave the prince,” the nurse said in a low voice.
The little prince made a noise, soft, thin, and Aemma straightened as if on duty. Maekar watched her again and pride passed through his face. She lifted her hand and pressed one finger to the baby’s cheek. He blinked. His little mouth opened. He made a sound that would one day be a laugh. Aemma made her crooning noise again, louder, triumphant.
Maekar let out a short breath that could have been a laugh if he’d allowed himself the indulgence. He bent, carefully, and kissed the crown of her head. “Protect him,” he whispered.
Aemma understood the command in his voice, the feeling, if not the words. She tightened her grip on the blanket. In the cradle, the baby stared up at his sister with wide eyes.
Maekar scooped her off her feet then and spun her around so she giggled. He deposited her in the nurse’s arms. “Put her to sleep. I’ll watch my son.” The nurse bobbed a curtsy and carried off the little princess, who looked forlornly back at her father as she lost sight of him.
Maekar turned his focus to his son. On the white tufted hair. On the infant’s comically serious expression. On his unfocused eyes and tiny fingers. His mouth twitched as those fingers seized his offered thumb aggressively and yanked it greedily. “What’s that, you little tyrant?” he murmured, not pulling away. “What do you want?”
The baby didn’t answer but his angry eyebrows made Maekar’s smile widen just slightly. His second hand joined the first to lift the baby up and hold him face to face. For a moment he just held him there until he remembered he was alone and no one would see this softness. “Do you want a kiss, hm?” He pecked him on his pale forehead. The baby practically startled, eyes opening farther. He wiggled a bit in his father’s hands.
A subconscious instinct to connect himself to this precious child took hold of Maekar, and he nuzzled his nose with his own. The baby swung out wildly, battering Maekar’s cheeks with his fists. He huffed in amusement, pulling back and studying him. Moving closer again resulted in more punches. “You dare strike a Prince of the Blood?” he gasped dramatically. Maekar took the baby’s silence as confirmation. “Are you a traitor, or a madman?” he demanded in a soft tease. “A madbaby?”
Maekar huffed, pleased by himself. He shifted his son to hold him cradled in the crook of one arm. With his free hand he traced a fingertip down his forehead and nose for a moment, contemplation overtaking his visage. With that fingertip he hooked the neckline of the loose linen and pulled it down to inspect his neck and shoulders.
Yes, they were still there. Red scales, thick and rough against the newborn’s skin. Not unheard of in Maekar’s line, which had in days past bonded with dragons and soared them across the skies. Even his own little sisters had such scales. But neither of them had survived past three days.
He tucked the linen back over the scales with reverence and tried not to think of death. “You are strong, my son,” he murmured, brushing his cheek with a knuckle. The baby was quiet. Not fighting, for now. “My little dragon.” He raised him up slightly just to see him closer, to feel the miniscule weight against his chest. So small, yet already enough to change the fate of princes. Maekar scratched softly at the baby’s chin, teasing. “My little Aerion. My Brightflame.”