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“What is this ball for, again?” Matarys asked them, skipping by Valarr’s side and humming along to the music they could hear at the end of the hallway.
Their father looked over at Valarr with a funny smile dancing at the very corner of his lips. Valarr, looking as glum as ever, straightened his back and replied for him, only looking ahead at the white cloaks that accompanied their family.
“It’s a feast celebrating some of the new merchant agreements the crown had struck, Westerossi and Essosi.”
“Are there going to be eastern sweets?” Matarys asked, hopping not unlike a bunny next to them. Their father put his hand on top of the red hair and tussled it as he replied:
“Indeed, as well as eastern peoples. Try to make a good impression for your brother and I, Matarys. Can you do that?”
“Of course, father,” the boy proudly announced, switching to a more march-like step that nonetheless was full of energy.
Valarr sighed, putting his hands on the hilt of his sword. This was the first social event he attended as a man grown allowed to carry a sword, his sixteenth name day only having passed a fortnight ago. Matarys, five years his younger, had not a thought of what that meant as he grinned and fluffed the fur at the edges of his sleeves with every step.
It meant Valarr was ripe fruit for many a lordling to marry off their daughter to in hopes of her sitting by the throne as Queen one day. Valarr was confident that no such luck would be bestowed on any attendee tonight, but he was also certain that many of them would try nonetheless. He couldn’t imagine being married someday. He couldn’t imagine losing his wife one day, like his father did – he would rather avoid the entire thing altogether.
The huge doors were open and they were each announced with all their titles – their father bearing many. Valarr tried to broaden his shoulders not to look as modestly framed next to his father as he truly was, the silver dragons at each of his shoulders glinting with the myriad of candle flames scattered around the ballroom. There were many a colorful person here, from Ironborn to Braavosi, all sporting bright dyes and exquisite fabrics to show off their far travels and to advertise their merchandise. The music was interesting as well, some of the players and performers brought here by some of the merchants.
Perhaps, tonight wasn’t going to be as tedious as Valarr thought.
Father was immediately assaulted by a whole line of lords and ladies who wished to speak with him, and Valarr dutifully stood by his side since he knew what most of those lords wanted – a match for their daughter with the Young Prince. After the tenth lord or so Valarr started getting rather irritated at the way their eyes darted down from his father’s face to his, and their faces showed uncouthly apparent disappointed upon witnessing his person. Valarr continued to stubbornly make eye-contact with them, his hands nonchalantly resting atop the hilt of his sword, and only the rapidly tapping tip of his boot betraying just how agitated he truly felt.
He heard the distinct sound of Matarys’ voice somewhere out there giggling along with some of the younger children present, and wished that he could be as carefree as his little brother. Alas, his shoulders had to carry many burdens, and nobody really minded just how narrow they were in comparison to his brave and famous father.
Valarr spotted Matarys in the crowd just as father started speaking with a foreign merchant whose accent was so thick Valarr could barely tell a word he was saying. Matarys’ red hair disappeared among skirts and poofy pants again, and Valarr had no other choice but to look up and greet this other lord who surely only came to—
To…
Came to…
What was he thinking just before?
Valarr’s eyes widened despite himself as he saw the young woman standing by the Tyroshi man’s side. She was perhaps a finger’s width taller than Valarr, her complex and stunning hair dyed a pink hue falling down her bare shoulders. Her bronze skin was specked with freckles both her own and made of gold, and her lashes bore the tiniest of pearls just on the line of her lids. Her eyes, like dark pools of thick tar, widened slightly just like Valarr’s when their gazes met, as if she, too, was taken aback by what she saw.
Valarr swallowed and blinked, darting his eyes away only not to stare and out of the very corner noticing the woman do the same. He also saw her gaze return, curiously climbing up the silver dragons stitched across Valarr’s best doublet, until it was caught in the white streak of his hair. He almost timidly turned back around, his father’s conversation with the merchant drowned in the music and the hum in Valarr’s ears that showed itself now that their eyes met again.
His father’s heavy hand landed on his shoulder, and Valarr was almost startled by the gesture. He helplessly looked up at his father, and then at the merchant, but stumbled on her again and lost his chain of thought. The men laughed and he heard his own name in the air, but cared not for the context. His father placed his hand in the middle of his back to call his attention again, only to lean by his ear and whisper:
“It’s time to mingle, son. Try to watch out for Matarys, I’ve lost sight of him again.”
Valarr couldn’t help but let a bothered sigh leave his nose as he looked up at his father and said:
“Very well. But I will not be stuck dancing with him all night this time.”
His father only laughed at that, quiet and polite to those around him, but Valarr saw true amusement in those eyes that were so alike to his own. It was hard not to smile at least with one corner of his lips to that, and so Valarr did, looking at the floor as the crowd shifted around him. When he lifted his gaze, expecting to be alone, he was struck with that beautiful pink vision again. She stood right where she did, even though their fathers were gone to other places and peoples now. Her hands were timidly rubbing her own fingers right in front of the shimmering sash of her dress, and Valarr noticed just how long and sharp and pink those nails were, too, and how they bore specs of gold and tiny pearls as well.
She approached him before he did, and Valarr tried to straighten up as much as his back would let him, his hands still resting on the hilt of his sword. The woman walked over to his side to stand shoulder-to-shoulder with him, and looked at the side of his face with a playful spark in her dark eyes before she averted them over to Valarr’s father again.
“My lord’s father is a very tall man,” she said without looking at Valarr but clearly addressing him. Valarr felt hot under his collar at the thought of how close their shoulders were – close enough that the silver dragon on his could easily touch its snout against the bare shoulder of the woman. The words her soft lips spoke finally reached Valarr’s mind, and he grimly replied as he looked over at his father:
“He is.” Then, feeling already daft for doing so, he decided to correct her: “The proper address of my person would have been my prince, my lady.”
“I do beg your pardon, my prince, there are so many words to call so many kinds of people here,” she easily conceded, her voice soft and melodic. Valarr very much liked the way she said those words, too. My prince. They never sounded quite so sweet from any other set of lips. She continued, turning towards him a little more: “As I do beg your pardon for implying being tall is some sort of virtue.”
Valarr’s very ears felt hot, and he silently prayed to the Seven that they weren’t a color anywhere near as pink as the lady’s beautiful wavy hair that streamed down her shoulders. He continued to try and appear stoic and confident, his back straight, his chin lifted slightly as he looked over the crowd. But… Then she put a hand on his shoulder, then the other hand atop it, and then her chin atop her hands. She looked up at him with a kitten-like stare and all but purred:
“I always found it the greatest gift when one needn’t search far to look her companion in his eyes.”
The slight, rough accent to her voice, and the smooth timber of it, it was enough for Valarr to lose the edge from his posture and his face. He looked down near his boots, stark black next to the beautiful lilac and peach colored dress of the lady, and found it impossible to keep a smile from curving his lips asymmetrically. His hands slipped off the hilt of his sword as he looked up, addressing – he hoped – a charming smile to his companion as he told her:
“I would very much like to invite you for a dance, but know not your name.”
She smiled, lifting her chin off his shoulder and stepped away only to face him properly. She curtsied in a proper Westerossi style, and revealed him her name. Kiera. What a beautiful name. Was there a name more beautiful than that in all of Tyrosh? Or King’s Landing, for that matter?
Her hand fell into his, and all colors around grew brighter. They danced, and then they danced some more. Then Valarr remembered to look out for Matarys after meeting his father’s inquisitive gaze across the room. He found his brother so full of sweets he was half-asleep already, and sent him off to his rooms with one of the Kingsguard to accompany the Even Younger Prince.
When he revealed the nickname to Kiera, she laughed the most beautiful laugh. Then she made a joke about Matarys’ pet canary being called an Even Younger Younger Prince, and made Valarr laugh out loud which he was very rare to do. Now that he thought of it, the joke was not very clever, but, at the time… It seemed like the funniest thing.
He was introduced to a young lady Baratheon, and Tully, and Hightower. He bowed in greeting to a merchant family from Braavos, and he clinked his cup of wine with another from Lys. In the end, he returned to Kiera, and brought her to a quieter spot behind a large column which guests usually avoided because there was water dripping down from the ceiling there, especially when it rained like tonight.
He told her a story about this drip, of when Matarys and him tried to fill a boot with it for something they thought would be terribly funny, but trailed off as he noticed that Kiera was looking at him with eyes almost glazed over, like she wasn’t listening.
“My lady?” he asked cautiously, only to have her giggle coquettishly behind a hand. Her eyes opened again and narrowed in a smile, sending warm shivers down his back.
“Forgive me, my prince. I was staring, was I not?”
He didn’t reply, words stuck in his throat now at the sight of her smile and the earnestness of her gaze that sought his own.
“I was simply admiring your eyes,” she said, and Valarr almost bashfully looked away, a skeptical brow risen.
“They are odd,” he declared, and heard her hair sway as she shook her head in protest before he saw it.
She stepped up to him, their chests almost touching, and parted her lips to speak. Then she looked away, as timid as he felt, and then began to sing. It was quiet, just enough for him to hear, but it was all the more striking for it.
“Like the freedom of sky and the warmth of the earth,
Like the coolness of ponds and the glow of a hearth,
Fresh breeze by the sea and loud, lively full streets,
You’re both frozen and hot when your own gaze they meet…”
She giggled again as it was Valarr’s turn to stare now, his lips lightly parted in awe. Not once had anyone ever written a song about him before, and about such a queer feature of his, too. If his eyes made lady Kiera feel this way, if they truly did… Then Valarr was finally not so unhappy to hold them in his head.
“Your language is a difficult one to master, my hope is that my prince did not find my wording crude,” she said timidly, as if she wasn’t the most glorious creature Valarr had ever had the privilege to look upon.
“You strung those words together? Just… just before? For me?” he floundered like a simpleton, his back pressed against the wet pillar since his knees almost buckled under him. His heart thundered in his chest so loudly, he barely heard the sound of his own voice.
“In truth, my prince and I met before, three years prior,” she said, and her voice was the only clear thing in Valarr’s ears. He frowned, trying to recall a vision such as Kiera, but came up with nothing. She, meanwhile, reached up with her hands still baring those intimidatingly long pink nails, and deftly gestured by the sides of his face as she added in a funny tone: “My prince had hair in a square shape right by his face, like this. I much prefer the short locks that you wear now,” she confessed, her nails now carefully running over Valarr’s scalp and waking shivers all over him. “Makes my prince look like a warrior.”
The word brought some bravery back into Valarr, and he straightened up with a subtle clearing of his throat. He raised his shoulders apologetically and said in a soft voice:
“Alas, I do not remember you then.”
Her hands didn’t leave his face far, settling on his shoulders. He rejoiced at their closeness, and listened to her melodic voice as she reminded him:
“My hair was purple, then. And it’s my belief that my prince was busy almost getting into a fist fight with a white-haired cousin of his. Until your fathers dragged you away from each other,” she snickered.
Valarr wanted to sigh indignantly but… It was funny, wasn’t it? He chuckled along with her, internally forgiving Aerion for keeping Valarr from meeting lady Kiera then. If he didn’t, who knows if it would be so exciting now. And exciting, it was. Definitely that.
“I’m honored that you carried memory of me all this time when I so rudely forgot you,” he told her, his voice low and intimate, the polite mask gone from his face to be replaced with honest enthrallment. “Is there anything my lady desires I could grant her to earn her forgiveness?” he playfully asked, a corner of his lips tugging into a tiny yet confident smirk.
“I can think of one thing only,” she replied, her voice just as low.
Her long black lashes lowered, revealing specs of gold and little pearls all the better. Her face leant closer to Valarr’s, and he met hers half-way with a slight tilt of his head. Their lips softly fell against each other, and it was as if all air was gone from the world sending Valarr’s head spinning. He raised a hand and covered one of Kiera’s on his chest, with his other touching her chin with his thumb and forefinger. He indulged in one long, sweet stroke of his lips over hers before he decided he didn’t wish to steal her honor any more than he’d already done.
He leant back, already missing her terribly. She looked at him with understanding, her eyes lit up just like his must’ve been.
“My prince is very much forgiven,” she said with a brilliant smile, sending Valarr’s heart to race all the faster in his chest. Kiera adjusted her hair near her face, and added coquettishly: “But only if we will meet again, and soon.”
“This, I promise you,” Valarr easily agreed with an honest smile.
There wasn’t much power he had as a mere son to the heir apparent, but he was sure arranging a tourney or a ball like this was not beyond his abilities. Anything, really. Even if he would be paraded around like tonight – as long as it meant he could spend time with her.
From now on, that was all he ever wanted to do.