Archive of Our Own

Chapter Text

Fire was never meant to endure alone.

Left to itself, it burned bright and brief—devouring all within reach before collapsing into ash and memory. But beneath the unseen breath of the wind, even the smallest flame might be coaxed into something greater. Something vast enough to swallow fields, cities, kingdoms whole. The wind did not fight it. It shaped it. Fed it. Bent itself around it until the blaze became so vast that men mistook its hunger for destiny.

"Freedom"… a strange word. Sharper than it ought to be.

The day after Queen Emma’s death, she stood upon the eastern ramparts of the castle where the wind came unbroken from the open fields beyond. Below, the world continued as it always had—indifferent, unyielding. Above, the sky split with the distant beat of wings.

A dragon.

Daemon Targaryen’s dragon, carving through storm-cloud and thunder as though the heavens themselves had learned fear.

She did not know how long she watched it.

Her thoughts were elsewhere, adrift in that quiet place where duty and desire no longer spoke to one another. She thought of freedom—not as a word spoken in courtyards and lessons, but as something felt. Like wind through open land. Like breath unrestrained.

Memory came unbidden.

A younger girl slipping through stone corridors. Stealing her brother’s horse when no one looked. Riding too far beyond the reach of Highgarden’s watchful walls. The wind had always been kinder there. It tangled itself in her hair like something alive—almost gentle, almost approving. Back then, she had believed it a promise.

She closed her eyes now and let the breeze find her again. She breathed it in as though she might swallow it whole.

For a moment, there was peace.

Then thunder broke it.

Her eyes opened.

The dragon was gone.

Only the storm remained.

Her gaze drifted back toward the castle. Heavy. Still. Waiting.

Rain threatened on the horizon, but she did not move.

She had never liked movement that was not chosen.

She thought of all she had never been permitted to refuse.

Riding her brother’s horse—until her father’s wrath sealed the stables from her hands. Lessons in needlework and silence. Books taken away, for curiosity was unbecoming in a lady of her station. A mother’s death, and a girl of fourteen placed in her stead before court, required to smile where she should have wept.

Four years had passed since then.

Four years of obedience layered upon obedience, until instinct itself had learned to kneel.

And now this.

A summons, spoken gently enough to sound like honor. Tonight, she was to attend the king and offer him comfort.

The thought sat ill within her.

Freedom still spoke—louder now. Not as a whisper, but as something edged and insistent. Urging refusal. Urging flight. Urging fracture before she herself was made irreparable.

Yet her father’s voice remained beneath all other thought.

The world does not yield, it had taught her. It must be shaped.

Did she wish to be the one who shaped it?

Or the one shaped and forgotten?

Power or freedom. Neither came without cost.

And beneath even that choice, something more dangerous lingered.

A marriage.

A transaction dressed in silk and courtesy. A king old enough to be her father. A future never spoken of as hers to decide.

Sickness rose in her throat.

When the first drop of rain struck her forehead, cold and final, she exhaled once and turned away from the sky.

She walked back into the castle.

And did not see the eyes that had watched her from the shadow—patient, observant, already storing the shape of her hesitation.

He saw her from the sky.

Caraxes cut through storm-laden clouds in slow, restless arcs, wings tearing thunder into broken sound. Far below, upon the pale stone of the Red Keep, a single figure stood upon the eastern walk.

A Hightower girl.
At first, she was nothing more than that.

Another face in a court already swollen with names and ambitions—one that should have been forgotten the moment it was seen. Yet something in her stillness held his gaze longer than it ought to have.

Yesterday, when he had asked for her favor at the tournament, it had begun as nothing more than a calculated slight—an elegant cut aimed straight at Otto Hightower’s pride. A way to needle the Hand through his own daughter’s composure.

And yet it had not stayed that simple.

There had been a shift—subtle, almost imperceptible at first—when he saw the faint color rise in her cheeks. It had amused him more than it should have. Made him linger longer than he intended. Something like satisfaction curled at the edge of his thoughts, sharp and unexpected.

Do not misunderstand him. Daemon Targaryen had seen plenty of women at court look his way with hunger, with open admiration, with far less restraint than a septa’s prayers demanded.

But there was something different about her.

The “good daughter” of Otto Hightower. The one who should have looked through him, or away from him, or anywhere but at him.

And yet she had not refused him.

Not properly.

That alone had been enough.

It was almost laughable. As if he had plucked a hidden string in a harp no one else was meant to hear. As if, for one brief moment, he had unsettled something carefully kept in place.

A maiden girl like that was not meant to blush for men like him.

And yet she had.

The wind worried at her hair, copper-red and unbound, catching what little light broke through the storm. It moved like something alive—untamed, untrained, unwilling to be shaped by anything but its own will.

Fire, he thought absently.

Not the controlled flame of Valyrian blood, measured and preserved behind stone walls and ancient names.

Something else.

Something that did not yet know how to bow.

He had known such women before.

Flea Bottom had been full of them—girls with wine-dark hair and borrowed laughter, warm for a moment and forgotten the next. He had taken them without memory and left them without consequence.

But this was not that.

There was something too intact about her.

Too whole.

Too unbroken.

Below, she did not look up.

That, more than anything, held him in place.

No fear. No instinct to kneel. No reverence for scale and flame.

Only distance.

As though the sky itself were of no concern to her.

Daemon’s mouth curved faintly—something between amusement and irritation.

He could descend. Close the space. Force her to look up and remember what it meant to stand beneath something that could end her in an instant.

But he did not.

Not yet.

Caraxes shifted beneath him, uneasy in the thunder. The beast disliked storms. Daemon, for all his defiance, understood the sentiment well enough.

He had not slept.

The night had been long with thought and absence. The king’s silence had stretched farther than it should have. The court had begun to move in that silence already—careful, cautious, like men testing ice that might break beneath them.

Otto Hightower would be among them. Always.

And Corlys Velaryon, too—tides turning where they would, seeking advantage in any fracture they could find.

They would not wait for Viserys to choose.

They never did.

Daemon narrowed his eyes slightly.

If the king remained within his chambers much longer, the choice would be made without him. That much he understood well enough. Delay, in King’s Landing, was never neutral. It was surrender in disguise.

And he would not be left outside that decision.

Not again.

Not while others whispered themselves into position.

He turned Caraxes slightly, as if weighing the sky itself.

Viserys would speak. He had to. The realm did not permit silence when succession hung so openly in the air. And when he did—

Daemon intended to be the first voice he heard.

Not Otto’s.

Not Corlys’s.

His.

Below, the girl finally moved—turning back toward the Keep, swallowed by stone and obligation once more.

Only then did he look away.

And even then, he did not forget her.

Nor the thought that lingered beneath everything else:

that the court was already deciding the future in his absence… and he would not allow them to finish without him.

Daemon returned to his chambers long enough to wash the smoke and ash from his skin.

The bath had gone cold by the time he stepped from it, though he scarcely noticed. Servants dressed him in black—the color he wore often enough already, though tonight it served another purpose. Mourning, they would call it. Mourning for Queen Aemma… and for Baelon, the king’s newborn son and heir for scarcely a day.

Heir.

A faint smirk ghosted across his mouth at the thought before vanishing just as quickly.

The Red Keep had fallen into a deathly silence. It felt as though ash itself lingered in the air, settling over every corridor and torch flame. Even the funeral had passed with little grandeur. No music. No spectacle. Only dragonfire and grief.

Rhaenyra had commanded Syrax to burn her mother’s body, her face pale and hard beneath the heat of the flames. Daemon had remained beside her throughout it all, silent for once. But afterward she had retreated to her chambers without a word, swallowed whole by mourning. Viserys had endured only part of the rites before disappearing back into his rooms, broken beneath the weight of losing both wife and son within the same day.

And now, at last, the king was alone.

Daemon considered it the perfect moment.

No lord in the realm would dare disturb Viserys tonight. No councilor would risk intruding upon his grief. Which meant Daemon could reach him first—before Otto Hightower’s whispering poison, before Corlys Velaryon began circling the throne like a starving gull scenting blood upon the tide.

He did not intend to stay long.

Only long enough to remind his brother of what remained true.

That Daemon was still here. Still loyal. Still the only living male heir of House Targaryen.

And, perhaps most importantly, that he had no intention of losing his place again because of the snakes forever coiled around the king’s shoulders.

Viserys had denied him before. Again and again. Sometimes gently. Sometimes cruelly. Always with the same frightened look buried somewhere behind his eyes—as though naming Daemon heir would unleash something terrible upon the realm.

But Daemon knew better.

Viserys was weak. Weak enough to let other men think for him. Otto Hightower with his careful smiles and quiet schemes. Corlys Velaryon with his endless ambitions dressed up as loyalty.

The Hand and the Sea Snake.

Both forever pulling the king away from his brother because they knew one simple truth:

As long as Daemon remained close to the throne, neither of them would ever truly control it.

And now they would try again.

Daemon could almost hear it already. Otto whispering caution into the king’s ear before the funeral smoke had even faded. Corlys speaking of stability, of optics, of alliances. All of them pretending concern for the realm while clawing after power for themselves.

No.

He would reach Viserys first this time.

If the king meant to name him heir, Daemon would ensure the decision was made before the vultures gathered.

His boots echoed softly against the stone as he neared the royal chambers.

Then he stopped.

A figure slipped through the king’s doorway just ahead of him.

Small. Slender.

And crowned with unmistakable copper-red hair.

Daemon’s brows lifted slightly.

The little Hightower.

For a moment he simply stared.

Then, without a sound, he stepped back into the shadows lining the corridor, letting darkness swallow the shape of him before the guards could notice his presence.

He was not fool enough to announce himself now only for Viserys to refuse him. That humiliation would linger far longer than tonight.

So he waited.

Curiosity rooted him there more effectively than caution ever could.

Why was Alicent Hightower visiting the king at this hour?

And why did the sight of her disappearing behind those doors feel suddenly connected to the strange unrest he had glimpsed in her earlier that morning?

Time stretched.

At last the chamber doors opened again.

Alicent stepped into the corridor alone, moving quickly, her face unreadable in the dim torchlight.

Daemon pressed himself deeper into the alcove as she passed.

Then he followed.

The corridor beyond curved into darkness where fewer guards lingered, the castle quieter here, stripped of ceremony. When the moment came—when no watching eyes remained—Daemon moved swiftly.

One hand caught her around the waist. The other covered her mouth before she could cry out.

Alicent gasped sharply as her back struck the cold stone wall.

Her eyes widened in terror.

“Shhh,” Daemon murmured.

He lifted one finger to his lips before slowly removing his hand from her mouth.

“Prince Daemon…” she whispered breathlessly.

A crooked smile touched his face.

“You are coming from the king’s chambers.”

It was not a question.

Alicent said nothing at first, though the panic in her expression betrayed her more effectively than words.

Daemon tilted his head slightly.

“That corridor leads nowhere else.”

Caught red-handed, she straightened despite the fear still flickering across her face. And there it was again—that Hightower pride surfacing precisely when cornered.

“Yes,” she admitted carefully. “I went to offer His Grace comfort.”

Daemon’s eyes swept deliberately over her.

Nothing about her appearance suggested seduction. No loosened hair. No flushed mouth. No signs Viserys had touched her.

Still, he drawled lazily,

“How fortunate for him. A man must be desperate for comfort after losing his wife.”

Alicent caught the mockery immediately.

“He lost his son as well.”

“The heir for a day,” Daemon replied.

“And the woman he loved.”

Daemon’s expression darkened.

“You think a man carves open the woman he loves?”

The words struck like a slap.

Alicent’s breath faltered. Her stomach twisted violently at the image his voice conjured.

Daemon saw it happen and smiled wider.

“Oh,” he said softly. “No one told you?”

Before she could answer, he caught her lightly by the shoulders and steered her farther down the corridor, away from listening ears. When he leaned close again, his voice dropped almost to a whisper.

“If you stand near her tower at night, you can still hear the echoes of it. Her screaming. Begging Viserys to stop.” His mouth curved cruelly. “Begging and begging while the maesters cut her open alive to drag the child from her body.”

Alicent made a small, horrified sound and covered her mouth with trembling fingers.

She could not picture gentle Queen Aemma enduring such brutality.

Could not picture Viserys allowing it.

“And do you know the worst part?” Daemon continued softly. “Viserys scarcely looked at her while she died. He only cared for the boy once they placed him in his arms.”

He stepped back then, watching the horror settle into her face.

“A grim fate,” he mused. “Wouldn’t you agree?”

Alicent stared at him.

And suddenly she understood.

He knew.

Not everything perhaps—but enough. Enough to guess why Otto had sent her. Enough to see the shape of the game already forming around the grieving king.

For one wild moment she wanted to deny it. To tell him this had never been her wish. That she had gone because her father commanded it.

But the words died behind her teeth.

She would not hand House Hightower over to his ridicule. Would not give him the satisfaction of seeing weakness in her.

Daemon, meanwhile, seemed almost amused by her silence.

“I pity the poor creature who becomes the king’s next wife,” he said lightly. “She will spend her life chained to his bed, forced to breed heirs until he gets the son he wants.”

His shoulders lifted in a careless shrug.

“And Viserys will not stop trying. No matter how many women he kills along the way.”

Alicent’s face paled further.

Daemon leaned slightly closer one last time.

“He did this to the woman he loved,” he murmured. “Imagine what he would do to one he does not.”

Then, satisfied with the storm he had left raging behind her eyes, he turned and disappeared back into the darkness of the corridor.

Leaving Alicent alone.

She returned to her chambers in silence, every step unsteady beneath her.

By the time the doors shut behind her, she could barely breathe.

She crawled into bed still fully clothed, too shaken even to undress. Her hands trembled beneath the blankets as Daemon’s words echoed endlessly through her head.

Imagine what he would do to one he does not.

Tears finally spilled down her cheeks.

And before sleep claimed her, Alicent Hightower swore to herself that she would never enter the king’s chambers again.

Alicent felt guilty.

Now, kneeling beneath the towering statues of the Seven, hands clasped tightly enough to ache, she prayed in silence.

For the king. For Rhaenyra. For Queen Aemma’s soul.

And selfishly—for herself.

She prayed her father would not ask her to visit the king again tonight. Prayed Daemon Targaryen would keep last night’s encounter to himself instead of twisting it into a weapon against House Hightower.

Though even as she prayed, she knew the gods were unlikely to concern themselves with such matters.

So why was she here?

Because shame demanded ceremony.

Because guilt needed somewhere to kneel.

She had betrayed Rhaenyra. Betrayed the kindness Queen Aemma had always shown her. She had gone willingly to the king’s chambers knowing precisely what Otto intended of her, even if nothing improper had truly passed between them.

And perhaps that made it worse.

No seduction had happened—not truly. No practiced smiles, no loosened gowns, no calculated touches like the women whispered about in court tales.

Yet Alicent knew the intention behind it all.

And Daemon, cruel as he was, had forced her to confront it.

Imagine what he would do to one he does not love.

The words had not left her mind once since last night.

That morning she had gone to see Rhaenyra out of guilt more than affection, desperate for reassurance that nothing had changed between them.

But Rhaenyra had refused to receive her.

At first panic seized her. Alicent had wondered if somehow she already knew. If word of the late-night visit had spread through the castle like wildfire.

Only later did servants quietly reveal that Rhaenyra had refused Daemon as well.

That eased something in her chest.

At least she was not singled out.

Still, she prayed Rhaenyra never learned the truth.

Because Alicent had sworn to herself she would never return to the king’s chambers again.

Once had been enough.

If comfort was truly what Viserys needed, then she had offered it already. There was no reason for her to become a nightly presence beside a grieving widower’s bed.

But her father…

No. Otto Hightower would not relent so easily.

That truth became painfully clear by evening.

Earlier that afternoon she had crossed paths with Daemon in the courtyard. The memory still burned hot beneath her skin. She had lowered her gaze immediately and hurried past him in embarrassed silence.

Daemon, of course, had smiled.

Not kindly.

Mockingly.

As though he alone knew something ugly hidden beneath her ribs.

By sunset, Otto came to her chambers once more.

Alicent had been sitting upon the edge of her bed, halfway through a forbidden history she had stolen from the library—a book concerning the Targaryen kings and their dragons. At the sound of the door opening, she nearly dropped it.

Otto’s gaze landed upon the book instantly.

Disgust tightened his features.

Alicent swallowed hard, sudden fear coiling through her stomach. She thought absurdly of the stables again—of all the little freedoms taken from her one by one whenever she reached too far.

Perhaps books would be next.

But Otto ignored it.

Instead, he spoke as though continuing a conversation already decided.

“Put on your mother’s burgundy gown,” he said. “You will visit the king again tonight.”

Something inside her stiffened.

For the first time in years, Alicent chose resistance.

“No.”

The word surprised even her.

Otto’s expression darkened slightly.

“No?” he repeated.

“I will not do this again, Father.” Her voice trembled despite her effort to steady it. “It is wrong. If Rhaenyra finds out—”

“What does Rhaenyra matter?” Otto snapped sharply. “Foolish girl, you are doing this for your family.”

“I do not wish to betray her. Or dishonor Queen Aemma’s memory.”

“Friendship?” Otto let out a cold laugh. “You are weak enough to believe a princess values friendship above power?”

Alicent flinched.

“Rhaenyra will sacrifice anything for that throne when the time comes,” he continued. “As you should sacrifice whatever is necessary now.”

“I do not want this,” Alicent whispered desperately. “No matter how you justify it, it still feels wrong.”

Otto stepped closer.

“You have duties, Alicent. Or have the Targaryens filled your head with foolishness?” His voice sharpened. “Do you think you may simply pursue whatever your heart desires like they do?”

She said nothing.

“Look at them,” Otto continued bitterly. “Daemon Targaryen could have remained Viserys’s rightful heir had he not spent his nights in brothels instead of beside his wife. Rhaenyra neglects her lessons for dragon rides and childish rebellion because they have all convinced themselves dragons alone sustain kingdoms.”

“If they did not have dragons,” Alicent replied quietly, “they would never have become kings.”

Otto stared at her in disbelief.

“Gods preserve me,” he muttered darkly. “Now you repeat their madness as well. Is this what those books teach you?”

He began pacing slowly across the room.

“Dragons may conquer kingdoms,” he said, calmer now, “but they cannot govern them. Kingdoms endure through alliances. Through marriage. Through lords whose interests are tied to the crown.”

He turned toward her again.

“Fear alone cannot sustain power. In excess, fear becomes weakness itself. That is precisely why Daemon will never sit the Iron Throne.”

His tone hardened with contempt.

“No great house wishes to kneel before a man who disregards law whenever it inconveniences him. A man who abandons duty for appetite. A man who kills servants and guards as casually as other men dismiss them.”

Alicent thought fleetingly of Daemon’s eyes in the corridor last night—bright with cruelty and amusement alike.

Otto continued:

“We saw what sort of commander he was with the City Watch.”

Then, after a pause, his voice softened again into something almost patient.

“The Targaryens remained upon the Iron Throne because the great houses of Westeros allowed them to remain there after the fires dimmed.”

His eyes flicked briefly toward the forbidden book beside her.

“That is what these histories fail to understand.”

He stepped closer once more.

“House Hightower will outlast dragonfire, Alicent. Fire burns bright and dies quickly. We are the ones who shape kingdoms after conquest is done. We guide kings. Without men like us, they are nothing.”

Alicent lowered her eyes.

“And if not us,” Otto said quietly, “then another house will take our place.”

His mouth thinned.

“The Velaryons already circle the throne. Corlys means to place his daughter beside the king.”

Alicent looked up sharply.

“Laena is only nine.”

“At least the Velaryons understand duty,” Otto replied coldly. “Corlys would gladly spend his life to ensure the next king carries Velaryon blood.”

Then his gaze swept over her with cutting disappointment.

“Meanwhile my naïve daughter would throw away a crown because she fears upsetting a friendship that means little to the princess she clings to.”

“And how do you know the king would choose me over House Velaryon?”

Otto’s answer came instantly.

“That depends entirely on how well you charm him.”

His eyes moved slowly over her appearance before he added with deliberate cruelty:

“At present, I do not think your chances impressive.”

The humiliation hit exactly where it always did.

Alicent’s shoulders curled inward instinctively. Every conversation with her father left her feeling smaller somehow—less capable, less worthy, perpetually lacking in ways she could never seem to mend.

And worst of all…

Part of her still believed him.

Otto Hightower had a gift for making his arguments feel inevitable. Unanswerable. Perhaps that was why he sat at the king’s right hand while other men merely shouted from beneath him.

At last he spoke again, leaving no room for refusal.

“Wear your mother’s gown.”

His voice carried the weight of command now.

“And tonight, you will go to the king.”