i’m stronger than you know

ezra ✩ she/they ✩ 23 ✩ minors/ageless blogs dni

[criminalamnesia]

—✩ hi! my name is ezra and my pronouns are she/they. im a 23 year old who writes for fun.

✩— my works blog/“taglist” is @troiastitans ! I do not do taglists; if you’d like to be notified when I post, follow that account and turn on notifications!

—✩ requests are currently closed! feel free to drop any requests, comments, etc. in the ask box! comments and questions are welcomed at any time!

✩— i typically write for f! or gn!readers. my works are angst or fluff. please read tags! and please, do not steal my works or copy them.

—✩ minors, please do not interact! i may post or reblog nsfw things.

✩— dividers are by @saradika-graphics !

—✩ ephemeral [mini series] ; jack abbot x reader

—✩ the soldier and his shadow [drabble] ; bucky barnes x reader

—✩ call of duty

✩— house of the dragon

—✩ grishaverse

✩— the pitt

—✩ miscellaneous

[captainfern]

Blessed

Baelor Targaryen x wife!reader

✿ baelor is ‘blessed’ by a travelling herb-woman, and after two weeks away from his wife, he is desperate to have her (or, a sex pollen fic with the hand of the king). ✿ 18+ ✿ wc: 5.6k ✿ cw: fem!reader/secondwife!reader, reader is not physically defined but she sexyyy, no y/n, sex pollen, SMUT, unprotected piv, unintentional rough sex initially, clothed sex (kinda), baelor is desperate asf, pet names (sweet girl, little dove, etc), praise, lowkey hyperspermia, strong language, baelor being the people’s princess <3

The red and black banners of the royal Targaryen caravan draws a significant crowd, and when Baelor, heir to the Iron Throne and Hand of the King, dismounts his black stallion, the crowd ripples with voices. It’s a great clamour: common people reaching for him, calling his name, begging for his attention as he’s flanked by his loyal kingsguard.

He has been away for two weeks. Travelling from Kings Landing to Sunspear and back again, stopping in various towns and villages on his way. He spoke kindly with vendors, purchased goods from travelling merchants, discussed the state of the realm with minor lords who frequented trailside inns.

He was a man of the people, but in truth, he only wanted to be the man for one person. He wanted to be your man, and he had been away for two weeks too long.

His pretty wife, no doubt sitting alone within the walls of the Keep. Waiting for the return of your dear husband, biding your time lost between the pages of Valyrian literature or nosing around the quiet observatories.

He smiles to himself as he thinks of you.

One of his guards, Ser Donnel, stoops low to whisper in his ear as he waves to the surging crowd, who respond with shouts of praise.

“We need not stop here, your grace,” Donnel informs. “We are but three hours from the royal residence. We can make landing before midday if—”

Baelor swishes his hand through the air, polite but dismissive. “Do not fret, ser. I will only spend a moment here then we will depart once more.”

Donnel says nothing more as Baelor approaches some of the commonfolk. He extends his arm and shakes the hand of a young man, no older than his eldest son. The boy beams at the prince, his handshake firm and confident.

“Seven blessings, your grace,” the young man says, dipping his head as he shakes Baelor’s hand. Baelor smiles softly at him, and the young man brings a hand to his chest in a display of respect. “I have the means to become a knight.”

Baelor smiles still. “Then I wish you all the best. We are always in need of good men and good knights.”

The young man continues to beam as Baelor moves through the crowd, flanked by the shining white armoured men that comprise his kingsguard.

The village is small and very simple. A scarce few buildings stand amongst crudely made wooden houses, but nevertheless, Baelor winds his way through the wide streets, greeting people who peer out their windows and doors curiously.

Once he has done a lap of the village, shaking hands and offering kind smiles, he returns to where he had started. With one final wave to the people, he mounts his steed and the royal caravan presses on. Cantering beside him, Donnel, his white armour gleaming in the mid-morning sun, casts him a sidelong look.

Baelor meets his gaze. “Yes, Ser Donnel?”

“You assume everyone you meet has good intentions, your grace,” Donnel speaks plainly, and this makes Baelor shake his head, chuckling softly.

“I’d rather assume the good intentions of the people than the bad,” Baelor replies, the Targaryen procession winding through the countryside now, surrounded by endless rolling hills, coloured a patchwork of brilliant greens. “If I assume everyone has bad intentions, Ser Donnel, I would not make a good prince.”

Donnel huffs. “You’d make my job significantly easier.”

Baelor tuts, humoured. “Well, we wouldn’t want that, would we?”

An hour passes beneath the bright sun, and Baelor finds his lower back growing stiff with his continued straight riding posture. But he does not complain, nor does he ask for a break: he has kept his entourage from their homes for long enough, and on the distant horizon, King’s Landing juts from the hills, the ocean glittering beyond.

The well-ridden path ahead of them stretches and coils between the rolling hills like a serpent, and way ahead, the guards alert Baelor to a fully-stocked wagon pulled by a gangly old mule. A shawled figure walks beside the mule, and Baelor smiles to himself as he sees the figure patting the creature gently, heading away from King’s Landing.

“I intend to dismount,” Baelor tells Donnel, who can scarcely react before the prince’s horse sidles up beside the wagon. 

The shawled figure, revealed to be an elderly woman of perhaps seven and ninety, stops at the sound of thundering hooves. She leans into a stiff bow as Baelor leaps from his stallion, stretching his hand to stroke the nose of the old mule.

“Your grace,” the woman greets kindly, her eyes darting nervously to the two imposing kingsguard who dismount their own horses and stand beside the prince. Their hands rest on the pommels of their swords, and they eye both the woman and her wagon skeptically. She gestures to the wagon, which is draped in dark blue material and smells of lavender. “I am a travelling herb-woman.”

Baelor assesses the woman with his mismatched eyes. “Well, it has been many years since I have met someone of your specialty.”

The woman smiles, and the kingsguard bristles as Baelor continues to pet the mule. The prince speaks with a disarming kindness that constantly has them on edge. He was considerably more difficult to guard compared to his younger brother, who spoke to no one unless he really needed to.

“I have been travelling for far too long,” Baelor continues, allowing the mule to butt his hand in search of more strokes. “Might you have something to ease my aches?”

Donnel clears his throat behind him. “Your grace, I don’t recommend—”

The woman splits into a deep smile and turns to her wagon, her dark cloak moving around her like the blackness of night. She smells rich of lavender and road dirt, and Baelor shoots Donnel a pointed look as he waits. The woman peels back the covering of her wagon and rifles through the contents she can reach. After a moment, she spins around with a small vial. She holds it up, the liquid inside a milky-white.

“A tannic tea made from the bark of the white willow,” she says, holding it out to the prince. “Used to relieve muscle and joint aches.”

Baelor goes to reach for it, but Donnel beats him to it, snatching the vial from the woman, who jumps slightly at his roughness. Baelor peers curiously at his guard, who inspects the bottle thoughtfully.

“You cannot take something of which you do not know its origins,” Donnel says in response to Baelor’s stare. “It could be poison.”

The woman gawks. “Oh, no! No, your grace, I do not—I do not carry poisons. I am a simple herb-woman, gods believe me, and—”

Baelor lifts his hand, and the mule snorts in discontent at the lack of contact. “Please, you owe us no explanation. Ser Donnel is simply being thorough,” Baelor says the last part pointedly, and casts Donnel a sidelong glance that makes Roland, on his other side, snort around a poorly hidden laugh.

Donnel frowns. “Your father would not forgive me if I allowed you to drink strange liquids from strangers. Not to mention, your wife—”

Baelor gently takes the small vial from Donnel, interrupting his tirade. The prince carefully uncorks it, smells it—it smells of willow tannins, something he is familiar with from his many travels across the realm—and then drinks the entire small bottle. It’s bitter to the taste, with a subtle honey-sweetness used by many experienced healers to remedy the acridness of many bark-based tannics.

The woman smiles softly, taking the vial back. “It should begin to work within the hour.”

The prince returns the smile, allowing the old woman to clasp one of his hands in two of hers. The kingsguard watches her like a pair of hawks as she retreats, but not before exclaiming aloud, pulling a small pouch from within her thick cloak.

“May I bless you, your grace?” She asks.

Donnel frowns. “No—”

Baelor ignores his guard, stepping forward and presenting himself to the herb-woman, thus putting some space between him and his guards. She smiles, opening the pouch. Between her thumb and forefinger, she produces a pinch of bright pink powder.

“How long have you been from your wife?” the woman questions, tucking the pouch back within her cloak and sprinkling the powder onto her outstretched palm.

Baelor chuckles softly, watching the woman. “Too long. Weeks now.”

“You must desire her embrace then, I assume,” she says, and Baelor ignores another poorly-hidden laugh from Roland at the woman’s open words.

“Desperately,” Baelor speaks plainly, also ignoring the fact he could feel Donnel’s scowl pressing into the back of his head.

“Well,” the woman begins, running her finger through the pink powder on her palm and drawing a circle in it. “I bless you, your grace, with the passion and the desire to make up for such lost time.”

The woman raises her hand and blows the pink powder directly into Baelor’s face. He closes his eyes, the dust settling across him like a mist, tickling his skin as it settles. It takes a second for the smell to calm around his head, but as he inhales, everything he smells is strikingly familiar. He smells his childhood in Dorne: hot, sun-bleached sand, rain-soaked yew trees, spiced wine and pomegranate juice; he smells the ash of Dragonstone, fresh wax seals, blood on Valyrian steel beneath a stormy sky; and then he smells you.

That makes him freeze.

You, as if he had his nose pressed to the crook of your neck.

The musk of your skin, the rose-water of your baths, the cinnamon in your perfume. He smells the lilacs you pick in the gardens, and the ink you so often spill across your fingers as you write. He smells the honey wax soap you wash your hair with, and the rich apple cider you so often treat yourself to during times of celebration.

Baelor opens his eyes and gapes at the woman. “What is—?”

“Blessed be you and your wife, your grace. Travel safely,” she says with a knowing smile, dipping into another stiff curtsy before taking the rope at her mule’s neck and leading him on, pulling the cart away.

Behind the prince, Donnel places a hand on his shoulder. “Your grace, are you—?”

“Let us continue,” Baelor interrupts, slightly too loud. He quickly mounts his horse as Donnel and Roland exchange a strange look. Baelor beckons his knights. “Come, sers. We must not delay our arrival any longer.”

He can’t wait to see you.

Your face flits through his mind and he has to physically press the back of his hand to his mouth to stop himself from groaning as he nudges his horse into motion. When he pulls his hand away, he can see something iridescent dusting across the black leather of his riding glove, but it quickly melts into the hide, leaving behind only a dull shimmer.

He doesn’t feel as though he has been poisoned, but now more than ever, with King’s Landing looming in the distance, his mind is plagued with thoughts of you. Thoughts, which were once wholesome, now diverge—images of you spread out on his bed, a hand between your legs; or the whiny little breath you suck in each time he enters you.

His thoughts are unbecoming of a man of his standing.

But he cannot rid his mind of them.

Images—memories—of you hiking up your skirts as you perch on the edge of his desk, cunt glistening as his mouth lowers, or the way you arch and bend yourself over the edge of your tall bed, gripping the soft furs and sheets, begging him to take you.

“Your grace, are you well?” Donnel asks, catching the light glaze falling across the prince’s eyes.

Baelor nods, clearing his throat. He’s fine. If he ignores the way his cock is currently twitching in his breeches, he’s fine.

“I am,” he replies convincingly. “I must admit, my back feels better already.”

Donnel scoffs, but says nothing more.

If not for the horde of people around him, Baelor would have taken off. No doubt he would have gotten to the Keep in record time, even if he did run his poor stallion into the ground.

—✿—

The sun hangs high in the sky as Baelor hurriedly dismounts his steed and waves Donnel and Roland away. The Red Keep is alive with servants and workers, but amongst the sea of people he does not see you.

The hours that went by were torturous, and on several occasions the prince found himself screwing his eyes shut and willing himself not to burst through the seam of his trousers. Your scent clogged his sinuses, and he could almost feel some phantom of your touch trailing along the back of his neck, rustling the cropped hair of his beard, fiddling with the clasp of his cloak.

He strides purposely through the glowing halls of the Keep, pulling his riding gloves off and tossing them to a servant who hurries after him. He unclasps his cloak too, letting it drop to the ground behind him. The servant squeaks, scooping the cloak up before sprinting forward in an attempt to keep up with the heir.

The servant clears his throat nervously. “Your grace, your presence is requested in counsel at the turn of the hour, and the Lord of Riverrun is awaiting your letter in reply to—”

“I have been absent for weeks,” Baelor snaps, but although his tone is short, he is not cruel. “It will not hurt to miss one more meeting. And as for the Lord of Riverrun, he can wait even longer unless he’d rather a reply from my brother, who he is not fond of.”

The servant nods. “Of course, your grace, but—”

“Where is my wife?” Baelor voices, his doublet too hot and too restrictive around his chest. The halls of the Keep seem particularly warm today.

“Your chambers, as far as I’m aware,” the servant replies. “But—”

“Thank you, you are dismissed,” Baelor says as he rounds a corner, the door to your shared chambers coming into close view. His heart leaps in his chest envisioning you waiting patiently for his arrival.

The servant, arms struggling to hold onto Baelor’s thick, luxurious cloak, frowns deeply. “Your grace—?”

Baelor whirls around, and the servant yelps as he is forced to an abrupt stop. The prince gestures to the closed door of his chambers with a quick flick of his hand.

“Please make it aware to all of the workers that I am not to be disturbed for the rest of the day,” he says, voice low. “Tell the entire Keep for all I care, but under no circumstances is anyone to call for me, understood?”

The servant nods.

Baelor spins and pushes his door open, closing it and bolting it behind him with a resounding clank. He rests his forehead on the rough wood for a moment, catching his breath. His heart hammers wildly in his chest, as if his journey through the Keep had been miles longer than it actually was. It almost pains him, the way it clatters against his ribs as his breaths grow more ragged. His head is swimming too, a dizzy sort of euphoria overwhelmed by everything relating to you.

You.

He groans, eyes screwing shut as his cock presses painfully to the front of his breeches. He has half the mind to simply stick his hand into his trousers and jerk himself into the linen.

“Baelor?”

Your voice is angelic in the quiet of the chambers, and it makes another groan split from between Baelor’s lax jaw.

He turns, eyes opening, blinking blearily as he stares into the sunlight streaming through the windows. You sit up in the large canopy bed, your white chemise sitting loosely on your shoulders, revealing the curve of your neck. The furs and sheets pool around you in a mass of browns and blacks, and you rub at your eyes with the heel of your hand as you take in the sight of your husband across the room.

“You’re home,” you smile lazily at him, pushing yourself from the bed and padding your way over to him.

Your voice is so soft that it makes Baelor fold forward, the weight of his arousal dragging him towards you. You have him on an invisible leash, tugging him across the room until you can wrap your arms around his waist and press your face into his chest.

“No one informed me you were returning today,” you tell him, voice muffled against the thickness of his doublet. He presses two trembling hands to your lower back, pulling you tighter against him. You nuzzle him, the feeling making his stomach swoop. “I’ve missed you.”

“And I you,” he responds quietly, and he stiffens when he feels you go still. His voice is throaty and hoarse, hauled through gravel.

Slowly, you look up, and he realises you can feel the press of his clothed cock against your stomach. He groans, a pathetic little bellow as you gape up at him, eyes sparkling as they take in the state of his fevered face. You raise a hand, placing it against his cheek. He closes his eyes, and like a puppy, leans into your touch with a small sound of pleasure.

“You…” You begin, but falter. Your fingers trail along the neat line where the hair of his beard meets his cheek. He wonders, as he finally opens his eyes, if you can see every one of his pores glistening. He wonders too if the sweat that collects along his forehead is tinted pink. You frown. “You smell of… well, I’m not sure.”

He whines at the timidness in your voice, his hands circling to your hips. He grips you tightly, pulling your pelvis flush to his. It takes all power within him not to grind his cock against you. He doesn’t want to scare you off.

“I’ve missed you so much,” he says before you can open your mouth. Your hands continue to flutter over his face, and it makes his cock jump in his breeches when your thumb slides over the bow of his top lip. “Being away from you has been torture.”

You hum, slightly distracted. Your hands continue to shift across his face, and your brows knit together once more when you slowly pull one of them away. Baelor watches you examine your fingertips before your eyes find his again. He can feel the hot pressure of tears behind his eyes—not because he is sad, but because he needs you so badly he feels his heart will implode against his sternum.

“Gods, I need you,” Baelor declares gently, strong hands lifting to cup your face. He leans forward to press his lips to yours, but you resist, turning your head so his mouth lands against your warm cheek. He whines, frustrated, as he scatters kisses over your cheekbone. “No, no, sweet girl, please don’t—”

“You’re sparkling like a silk-street whore,” you quip, voice light with humour, but Baelor doesn’t hear it that way.

“No, no, never,” he rambles, nose pressing to your cheek. “I’d never, sweet girl, gods no. I’d first open my throat before I ever—”

“Baelor,” you stop him with a small, breathless chuckle, slightly overwhelmed. 

He’s burning hot against you, he knows it, and you’re just as warm against him. It makes his head swim as he inhales, your skin slightly tacky with sweat from your midday nap, but smelling of roses and cinnamon.

“I’ve been blessed,” he says quickly, trying to turn your face, but you resist. He kisses your chin instead. “A herb-woman blessed me.”

“Ah,” you reply, knowing what he’s referring to. Not only have you met a few of these travelling healers in your time, but you’ve also read much about them.

Baelor leans his weight into you, and you stumble back until you collide with one of the thick posts of your canopy bed. He groans, pinning you to it as he kisses along your jaw, strong hands cupping your face. Your fingers find the hem of his doublet and you rub along the dense seam. As you do that, his hips rut forward and you gasp at the thick print of his cock against you, hot and hard in his trousers. Your hands drop, finding the cool metal of the clasp.

You hear him suck in a breath as he kisses the tender skin beside your ear. Then, he whispers, “Yes, take them off. Please take them off, little dove.”

You unbuckle the clasp.

He groans. “Yes, yes.”

Your fingers peel the front of his trousers open, and he finally manages to pull your mouth up to his. His hands are burning hot against the side of your head as his mouth slots against yours. The kiss is tender to start with, but one beat of your heart later and he’s whining against you, tongue sliding across your lips.

“Let me in,” he pleads against your mouth, before delving back in.

You do, opening your kisses for him to press his tongue in, finding yours. Everything about it is warm, your proximity burning hotter than a Dornish summer sun.

The tent of his cock nudges your palm as you finally shuck his trousers down. You feel for the ties of his breeches next, pulling at the knots as his tongue skims across your teeth. When he feels his breeches begin to loosen around his hips, he breaks away to groan, head tilting down slightly, your foreheads bumping together. He watches your fingers draw his breeches undone before they drop alongside his trousers.

You hesitate.

Baelor groans. “Touch me. Touch me, please, I need you to—”

You clasp the base of his cock with a warm, gentle hand. He groans again: this time, louder, and he lifts your head with his guiding hands and slams his mouth back to yours. There’s a subtle bitterness on his tongue, like a medicine of some sort, but it’s overwhelmed by an apple flavour that has you searching for more. Your tongues tangle as you grasp his cock, giving it a few tiny strokes as he pulls you away from the canopy post and pushes you down onto the mattress.

The kiss disconnects and you yelp as you fall flat onto the furs. Your husband’s hands find the hem of your chemise now and push it quickly up your body.

“There’s my pretty girl,” he utters, finding you bare of any smallclothes beneath your sleepwear.

He stares down at your cunt with a misty gloss across his mismatched eyes. His hands drag down your sides, then onto your thighs, massaging the fat there before he’s prying them apart.

One of his hands grips the base of his cock, replacing your own. “You have no… no idea how badly I need this.”

Baelor steps forward and tugs you towards him at the same time. You yelp once more as your arse practically hangs off of the bed as he settles between your spread legs. The thick head of his cock presses right against your clit, and you yowl his name as he taps it there roughly. His eyes snap up to take in your expression, and that’s when you notice a tear slip from his dark-hued eye.

“Oh, Baelor,” you whisper, pussy fluttering around nothing at the unbridled need in his face. There are a million butterflies in your tummy too.

He whimpers deeply, then drags his cock through your silken folds. He collects the slick that gathers there with a small moan before he speaks. The tear disappears into the hair of his beard. “My sweetest girl, please let me have you.”

You’re nodding straight away.

Baelor sucks in a breath, and you see something like regret flicker through his eyes. “Gods, I don’t want to hurt you.”

“You won’t,” you tell him, noting the rapid rise and fall of his chest as his eyes rake down your body. They linger on the peaks of your nipples through the thin material of your chemise. “You could never hurt me.”

“No, no, sweet girl, I can’t—” Baelor slurs, then cuts himself off with a low whine as he notches the head of his cock at your hole.

You’re wet and glistening for him, but his mind is split in two: conflicted, overrun with the effects of whatever he had been ‘blessed’ with, but still anchored to his princely values.

He huffs, desperate as he rubs the tip of his cock in tight circles around your entrance. “Oh, fuck.”

You angle your hips and the leaking tip sinks into you. He chokes on his moan, the apple in his throat bobbing as he swallows around it. He watches, eyes nearly the same colour with the way his pupils dilate, as your pussy splits apart for him and sucks the head in. Then, his entire body trembling with need, he pushes even further, shoving his cock all the way inside you, giving you no room to adjust.

It punches a pained noise from your chest that you tried to keep at bay, and you can’t help but wriggle away from him at the intrusion. It’s instinctive, your body reacting to the sudden pressure that fissures both pain and pleasure deep in your gut. Your body writhes against the furs as you whimper, somehow feeling the tip of his cock all the way in your chest, the sensation of being filled suffocating after over two weeks without him.

Your body flees his, and the moan that leaves his mouth is nothing short of heart-breaking. It’s stretched and whiny and nothing you’ve ever heard before.

“No, no, no, please, don’t run from me,” Baelor stammers, eyes wide, hands tight on your hips. He tugs you back down, spearing you on his cock and you howl as he buries himself to the hilt inside you. You fist the sheets, wriggling. Baelor whines. “Stop, s-stop, no, I’m sorry, sweet girl, please don’t—please don’t cry.”

You hadn’t even noticed a few hot tears slipping from your eyes. He bends then, kissing them from your face. His eyelashes flutter against you and the hair of his beard scratches against the skin of your cheek. He whispers to you as he rolls his hips, stretching your pussy around him.

“M’sorry, need—fuck, tell me to stop and I will.” His lips ghost across your earlobe as he pins you beneath him, the angle slightly awkward, hips trapped beneath his.

You gasp softly as he ruts his hips again. “Don’t stop, jus’ keep going.”

“Thank you,” Baelor says, kissing your cheek once more before he rights himself. He holds your hips tightly, pulling himself out and then back in. The drive is deep, and he’s moaning louder than you as he bottoms out again and again. “Thank you, thank you, thank you—”

His trousers and breeches rustle against his thighs as he fucks you, your arse hanging off the bed, the wood of the canopy creaking with his feverish movements. You take it, the sting of the stretch slowly dissipating with each thrust. Your cunt clenches around him as he thanks you repeatedly, growing more and more desperate as he moves. You can see the sweat on his forehead, and you can only assume he’s drenched beneath his doublet and tunic.

The sounds of your union bounce through the chambers, moans and whimpers and curses ricocheting off the stone. He’s murmuring your name like a prayer, strung beautifully between rambling sentences of High Valyrian as he ruts into you.

Not only is this little blessing working, but the white willow tea surely did. His back no longer pains him, and he feels like he could go on forever as he fills you. His eyes linger on where your pussy takes him, sloppy and wet and so fucking loud that his ears burn red. And you’re loud too, whimpering and gasping as your body is rocked roughly against the silken sheets and plush furs.

With a long-winded groan, Baelor takes one of his hands and presses it down on your lower belly. The added pressure has you keening, eyes almost rolling.

“That’s it,” Baelor speaks in a tone heavy with pleasure. “That’s it, little dove. Feel me filling you. Feel the way you take me.”

His words are so foreign yet so familiar. In bed, he’s no stranger to telling you how well you’re doing, how well you take him, how good of a girl you are. But this? The pink powder is thick between his teeth, clogging up the blood vessels in his brain, and he’s spitting out sentences that have you clenching tight around him. He groans as your pussy flutters, and the knot of pleasure in your tummy grows tenfold. A heavy pressure begins to build in the base of your cervix too, hips twitching as he slams into you.

He must see it in your face, because he’s panting now, eyes taking in every little expression that flits before him.

“I know, I know,” he affirms gently, noting what you could not articulate into words. “I know you’re feeling good. I know you’re feeling real good, little dove, but you just need to h-hang on—don’t want you coming u-until I do.”

You whimper, pouting a little.

“Can you do that for me?” Baelor pants, forcing your hips down. By the way he’s moving, the speed in which he fills you and the whines that begin to replace his groans, you know he’s close. But the pressure in your tummy is so heavy that you can’t answer him. He coos at you. “You can do it, sweet girl. I’m almost there. Just hold on for me.”

You moan his name, arching off the bed as the knot in your stomach pulls taut. He responds with a moan of his own, leaning forward as if he’s beginning to lose his balance. He ruts into you like a starving man, the bed shaking, his body silhouetted by the window behind him. His mouth is agape, his breathing erratic and strained.

“Baelor,” you call for him. You’re teetering on a very high cliff, your entire body alight with your impending orgasm. There’s a scream trapped in your throat and your legs pull painfully tight either side of him.

“Okay, okay, okay,” he rambles, his knuckles white where he holds you. “Okay, fuck, s’okay, little dove. You can come for me. M’right here, m’right here.”

You whine, almost pained.

“S’alright, sweet girl,” Baelor continues to coo down at you. “Let me feel you. Want to feel you come around me while I fill you.”

His cock jerks heavily inside you, and his thrusts falter just as you release around him. Gripping the sheets, you sob his name as the knot of pleasure splinters apart. Your release is intense: you shake beneath the warm hold of his big hands, legs seizing tightly as you wrap them around him. His name and his title tumble from your lips, and they only increase when you feel his cock nudge up against your cervix as he spills inside you.

Baelor groans your name. His hips stutter to a stop as he spills, and he’s panting and shuddering as his pleasure peaks. It’s the strongest release he’s ever experienced, his eyes snapping closed as his entire body shakes and his heart leaps into his throat.

And he’s still spilling. Thick ropes of seed that seem never-ending as he hunches over you, cock jolting over and over until the point of pain.

He whines deeply, then pulls out, just for a few hot spurts of cum to splatter across your mound and your lower tummy.

“Fuck, fuck, fuck,” Baelor whimpers, and you gasp out as he rests his cock against you. You feel it give one last jerk, dribbling at your navel, before you watch it slowly begin to soften, blood steadily seeping away from the head. Baelor notices the mess he’s made when his vision finally clears, still slightly dizzy with pleasure though. “M’so sorry, little dove, I didn’t—gods, I didn’t mean—”

You lift a tired arm and seize him by the doublet, tugging him down beside you. You capture his mouth in a heated kiss, and he melts into it straight away. His hands smooth down your sides as your fingers comb through his beard.

When you pull apart, you kiss the tip of his nose. “You have nothing to be sorry for.”

Baelor frowns slightly, and you can’t help but raise your head to kiss the divots in his brow. He huffs. “I… I was too rough, I shouldn’t have…”

There’s a slight ache deep in your womb, but nothing significant. All you’re focusing on, anyway, is the way his seed leaks from you like honey from its dipper.

“Please, Baelor,” you interrupt him softly, stroking his face. “Like I said, you could never hurt me.”

He goes to speak again, but you kiss him to shut him up.

“I missed you so much,” you say against him, and he grunts, agreeing. You laugh, pulling back a little, examining the bright pink in his cheeks. “And although I… enjoyed this, I must implore you not to take strange blessings from strange people—”

Baelor rolls his eyes, and now it’s his turn to kiss you to shut you up.

———

this might be a little ooc but oh well he’s hot

———

tag list 🌿

@ghostlybfgf @breakspearz @sem-ra @bitterrfruit @dododix @fandom4always @hannisreading @through-the-looking--glass @all-men-are-knights @kittiowolf210 @ildico-the-golden @cheesecakepersonvet @julez-5

[danger-z0ne]

Natural Predators

❤︎ ❤︎ ❤︎ ❤︎ ❤︎

Brendon Park x f!reader

warnings/tags: female reader. smut, biting, cursing, oral (m+f receiving), hair pulling, piv, no mention of condom (don't do that gang be safe), minor dom/sub vibes, pain kink?, so much talk of teeth (I am who I am), nickname pup (get it. shark pup. idk dont judge me you know what you’re here for), maybe size kink? idk he's big man what can i say, possibly cnc (she say’s she doesn’t want it but they have a safe word established that she never uses so she does actually want it), animal analogies. ogilvie being annoying. canon typical medical discussion, mentions of chronic illness (reader and patient).

words: girl idk a lot I was not putting this in a word doc.

Brendon Park, otherwise knows as Park the Shark to his PTMC coworkers, has a reputation. If the nickname doesn't give it away, the way he eyes everyone as if they’re prey, the snap of his jaws when someone questions his judgment, or the sheer brawn of him, does. So when people call him Shark, it’s not entirely inaccurate.

You’re heavily inclined to agree with the nickname knowing what you do about him. You've gotten to know him better than anyone else in the hospital, both professionally and personally. All by being the nice, energetic and witty ED Doctor who Park, for some reason, doesn’t bite at. Verbally, that is.

Although, when needed, that kind demeanor of yours quickly shifts into something sharp and deadly. It’s what got you the nickname of Wolf down in the ED. Cute and sweet until you see the massive paws with claws to match, the bloodied maw growling in your face.

You always meet Park where he’s at. Both of you flashing your shiny rows of teeth in violent displays but never clamping down on the other’s jugular. It became a sort of dance between the two of you. Circling to see where any weak spots are. Whenever you disagree on a case, if you don’t like how he handles himself in front of a patient or vice versa.

The second the carcass is devoured though, you two go right back to easy conversation. Something PTMC staff didn't think Brendon Park was capable of. The pictures of civility. Which is also something people didn’t know Park the Shark was capable of.

Brendon outwardly intimidates those around him. Never smiling. Never giving you a flash of those pointed canines except for when he snarls. He moves through the world proud to show off his threatening demeanor. You think it secretly gets him off.

You, on the other hand, show all your teeth in every smile. Proudly display your most lethal weapon, canines sharp and shining. It's not scary upon first glance. The way you grin as you compliment another’s work, encouraging look on your face as you guide the student doctors through a new procedure. That makes it worse. When you do snarl and dig your claws in, it makes it all the more horrifying seeing the shift. How quickly you go from that sweet, docile, belly up puppy to a violent, raging, snapping dog.

Everyone sees Park as an ominous figure, it’s all he offers them a glimpse of. It's all they've come to expect. So they act accordingly. Everyone has been in the jaws of the Shark before and don't plan to find themselves back in it. Most people only hear stories of your lethal side. It’s enough for them to never want to see it, to never want to feel your teeth in their neck.

Ogilvie though, must not give a shit as he tries to take over presenting your patient to the infamous Park the Shark, his voice cutting off yours. You're in the middle of discussing next steps with Robby, preparing to give Park the rundown.

“Dr. Park!” Ogilvie is chomping at the bit to impress the man. “Patient is a 49 year old female, dislocated clavicle with a severe fracture to the ulnar and radius. Claims to have complex connective tissue disord-”

“Is this your patient?” Park cuts him off, tone short and annoyed like he’s already done with the conversation. He is.

“I’m on the case, yes, but-” Ogilvie pauses. Hesitant. Realizing his slip-up. Park raises his eyebrows as if to say “but?”

“But I’m the lead.” You cut in smoothly. Sharper than you usually are. Ogilvie senses it immediately. Stiffening in his place as if it will make you forget he’s here.

“Then why don’t you let her present me the case? I didn’t realize incompetence got you through med school nowadays.” He doesn’t bother to give Ogilvie as much as a side glance, eyes focused entirely on the scans in front of him.

You don’t hesitate to take over presenting. “49 year old female patient with a dislocated clavicle and multiple fractures to both radius and ulnar. Presenting with severe pain. She's unable to move her fingers, has lack of feeling below the elbow.”

Park begins to softly touch at the patients arm, assessing the damage while you continue.

“Mrs. Henderson has a complex connective tissue disorder, hypermobile Ehlers Danlos specifically." A glare directed at Ogilvie by you. "This presents more of an issue as she has a history of clavicle dislocation and asked us to not address it with surgery.”

You gave Mrs. Henderson nitrous oxide about 20 minutes ago. Wanting to help ease her pain but knowing Park likes patients conscious to assess their injury when possible. The gas leaves her loopy and slightly out of it, conscious but not fully aware.

Park asks, “Why no fixing the collarbone?”

“She’s had it dislocate multiple times previously and doesn’t want a plate put in because she’s been advised that it won't guarantee no more dislocations. She can handle the pain of one collarbone dislocated. Not two.” You recount. Before letting her fall into the soft lull of pain medicine, you took the time to understand her wishes and reasoning.

Park looks back up at you then. Eyes moving away from his hands that were feeling over the patient’s swollen flesh. To anyone else it would’ve seemed like he was thinking, but you know better. So does he.

He knows why you’re so interested in leading this case. Knows that you of all people understand the gaslighting that comes with connective tissue disorder. Months ago you’d explained to him your own condition, exposing your vulnerability to a predator. It's one of the things that made you so ferocious about a patient's wishes and lived experience. God help anyone who came between you and patient advocacy.

So right now, God should help Ogilvie as he opens his mouth to say the dumbest thing you think he's said yet.

“But it makes more sense to do the collarbone plate while we’re in there. Dr. Park I’d love to scrub in, I’ve never seen one done before.”

The room goes silent as the atmosphere shifts. Robby takes a step closer to the wall, leaning against it. Nurses and other doctors find anything to do other than look at the scene in front of them. They're all aware of the beast Ogilvie just woke up.

The only people who don’t look away are Ogilvie and Park. The former because he doesn’t realize the mistake he’s made and the latter because he knows he’s about to see something that’ll fuel his wet dreams for months.

“Dr. Ogilvie, do you have a hearing impairment or is your brain just so full of self centered thoughts that you can't hear anyone other than yourself?” You ask, brows furrowed in curiosity.

Ogilvie stares, unsure of what to say. You push on. "I'm genuinely curious as it affects my teaching you. Answer." You know the answer. Everyone in this room knows the answer. The ED has protocols and systems to help hearing impaired staff. Ogilvie isn't one of those staff members.

He's meek, glancing around trying to catch someone's eye. Decipher the situation. Get help. Something. "No."

“Then I don’t know who the hell you think you are, but this is my patient. You have no right trying to present the case to an attending without my explicit approval. Quite frankly, you don’t have the right to even touch the patient unless I say so.” Ogilvie gulps as he watches you. You’re seething. Anger barely keeping itself contained, pressing against the seams of your composure.

“The patient explained her wishes to us and we do everything in our power to respect those wishes. We don’t just do whatever’s easier. If you want easy I suggest you go twiddle your thumbs across the street in the park where that overinflated ego you’re dragging around like a limp parachute won’t be a trip hazard for the rest of us.”

Robby sighs from the wall, hand on his forehead. He knows this has been a long time coming for almost everyone who’s interacted with the new med student. The only reason he isn’t stopping you is because he knows Ogilvie needs a reality check before he kills someone. Who better to teach him submission than the Wolf?

“You are not special for putting in hard work. Everyone in this room has worked their ass off to be here. Do not discredit their efforts, my efforts by assuming superiority over us and trying to slack off and do the easy thing. This is someone's life. Their autonomy. Their body and choices."

You’re not yelling, your voice barely raising in volume as you reprimand him. That makes it all the more threatening. "The next time you want to try and play alpha and disregard my patient’s clearly stated wishes and consent, I suggest you remember who the fuck you’re talking to.”

Park has to remind himself he’s in public, with a patient, as he starts to feel blood rushing to places it shouldn’t be. The way your words cut deep and the rise and fall of your chest consuming his attention.

Ogilvie stands there gaping, mouth opening and closing like a fish. “You can’t-”

“Can’t what? Reprimand my student for trying to perform a procedure on a patient that they didn’t consent to and that isn’t medically necessary?" Your eyebrows shoot up, smug look on your face as you ask, "Who do you think the board will favor? You and your failed attempt at dominance or me and not getting sued for inexcusable patient care?”

Park’s voice cuts in, steadier than he feels watching your successful attempt at dominance. “I know who I’m vouching for.” There's a faint smirk on his face when he looks at you.

Ogilvie puts his head down, nodding and looking like he’s about to vomit. “You’re right, Doctor. I apologize.”

He sounds sincere enough, so you accept it and move on. You're certain he could make a good doctor, he just needs to get over that god complex of his and listen. As fun as it might be, berating him more will only lead him to shutdown. He isn't your first student like this and he won't be the last.

Ogilvie almost gets whiplash from how quickly you’ve gone back to being a gentle mentor. Explaining how you adjust based on vitals and scans in this scenario. Showing him how to prep the patient with a compliment and a “good job”. He wonders if he accidentally inhaled some of that nitrous oxide and hallucinated the last five minutes.

Before he leaves the room to assist McKay with another patient, Park stops Ogilvie with a hand on his arm. “If you ever disrespect your superior like that again, you’ll have a lot more to worry about than her just chewing your ass out.” This time, Park does flash his teeth. Not with one of those blinding smiles he gives you when no one is looking. With a look of distaste as he delivers the vague threat to Ogilvie. The ambiguousness makes it scarier.

Risking a glance at Park through the clear Trauma doors, you find him already looking at you. His eyes burning your skin before he walks away.

Hands ripping off the bloodied gloves and scrub gown, you check the board. Every patient is being seen and chairs is somewhat under control for once. Which means you get to take five minutes for yourself to pee without rushing for the first time today. Or all week. As you walk to the staff bathrooms, you think back on your first month at the PTMC.

Your coworkers came to the assumption that Park doesn't bite at you because the first time he did, you bit back. Harder. Deeper.

He tried to question your call on a pediatrics case and began to make passive aggressive comments about your skills. A warning bite. A challenge. So you went for blood.

You said nothing in front of the patient, not wanting to add more stress onto the young boy's already bad day. The second you cleared those curtains though, you asked Park to take a minute and speak with you. He barely acknowledged your request and began to brush you off. So you grabbed him by his massive bicep and dragged him behind you to a less crowded hallway. You can still recall the way your fingers unconsciously dug into the muscle.

You figured the hallway would be away from prying eyes and ears. But if there was anything the PTMC emergency department staff liked more than their jobs, it's gossip. Princess saw you dragging the large, brutish man behind you and immediately started smacking Perlah's arm to get her attention. When they subtly moved to the end corner of the hallway to listen in, their jaws nearly dropped at what they were hearing.

"You made a bad call-" Park's usual short tone, this time more heated.

"Fuck you." Their jaws did drop at that. "My call was perfectly within reason and it was what's best for the patient. You just don’t like the fact that it wasn't your call. That you didn't think of it first." The anger was evident in your voice. Peeking around the corner they see you standing no more than 5 inches from Park, forefinger stabbing into his chest.

"But that's not the point right now. The point is that you belittled me in front of a patient. You didn't question my medical choices, you questioned my person. There's a very big difference there. One that I’d imagine a man who is so full of himself because of his big brains and biceps would be able to notice."

Park scoffs at that, mouth ready to retort. "Who do yo-"

"I'm not done. Don't interrupt me."

Perlah is confident she has never seen Park shut his mouth the way he just did. So quickly and forcefully Princess thinks she heard it.

"I am more than happy to hear professional criticism but what you're doing is being a dick. If that's what you need to do to get by with the fact that you're so clearly lacking in other departments, then be my fuckin' guest. But don't you dare ever pull that bullshit with me again." You give him a once over, taking him in as he's almost pressed against the wall by your smaller frame.

"I know how good of a doctor I am and I don't need to make people feel like shit to prove it. Maybe if you got over whatever macho, hero complex you have, you'd be a fun guy to be around. Be sure to let me know if that ever happens." Your chest is heaving, out of breath from you verbal lashing. Face set in determination while he scowls at you. Not backing down.

"Now can we make nice or are we going to stay at each other's throats for the rest of our employment?"

Perlah and Princess are in shock at the scene in front of them. There's no way the entire hospital won't have had this recounted to them word for word by the end of the day.

Park's crossed his arms over his chest, looking down at you like he's ready to rip your head off. The bystanders have half a mind to try and save you from what they know is about to come. He opens his mouth and they prepare for what they know is going to be a bloodbath.

"May I speak now?"

What. The. Fuck.

You nod. "Yes, I'm done."

He starts. “If I don't agree with your medical opinion I'm not going to hold my tongue."

"Never asked you to." You quip.

"Good. I won’t."

"Good."

There's a long stretch of silence where neither of you say anything. Simply standing there looking at each other, both still coming down from the fuming anger that's trying to dissipate from your bodies.

Taking a step backwards, you make space so Park can leave. He takes a step forward, closer than you had gotten seconds ago and leans down to whisper in your ear, voice low and gravely. "Trust me, sweetheart, I'm not compensating for anything."

You don't say anything, only gasp lightly at the comment. The brush of his breath against your cheek making your heart race. Perlah and Princess couldn't hear what he said. His voice quiet enough for only your ears to pick up.

They do hear him bellow out as he walks away, not even turning back to look at you. "You're welcome to figure that out for yourself."

Rushing back to the nurses station, they conversed about the interaction in hushed whispers. And by end of day, everyone knew of the way you chewed out Park the Shark in a hallway. It's when the nickname Wolf started being thrown around.

Based off of that interaction, it gave some people the idea that Park respected you for your confidence. That you standing up for yourself so brazenly earned you some of his esteem. Which is partially true.

When someone else tried their luck with that method, it unfortunately didn't turn out the same way. Whitaker was the unfortunate sacrifice that allowed everyone to figure that out.

Maybe the way your lips quirk up at the memory of Dennis looking like the shell-shocked solider meme after learning that is a bit evil. You have to pee too much to care. Course headed for the staff bathrooms by the on-call rooms, you're quickly dragged into an empty on-call room and away from your bladder's salvation.

"What the fuck man!" You don't even turn to look and see who it is. Eyes still wistfully looking towards the bathroom that's being hidden from sight by the closing of the door.

It only takes a second for you to know who it is. The scent of his cologne, the familiar feeling of his hand on your arm, the warmth you dream about. Brendon.

"Is that any way to greet your superior?" You can hear the smirk in his voice.

"You're not my superior. You just work superiorly." He's technically got no rank over you. But he does have a fancy office upstairs above your department.

"I do a lot of my best work there, don't I?" He teases, hands moving to grab your hips as his face goes into your neck from behind. Laughing, you lean back into his warm body and the feeling of him kissing your shoulder.

"Perv."

"Good work with that hypermobile patient." His lips brush your neck, not trying to start anything but unable to hold himself back from getting a taste of your skin. The moment is incredibly sweet. Or it would be if not for your bladder.

"I'm going to piss on you."

Brendon pulls away quickly at that, turning your body to face him.

"Excuse me?"

"I haven't had a chance to pee since this morning and I feel like I'm about to burst." You whine.

Smiling he rolls his eyes as he opens the door, pushing you out towards the bathroom. Looking up and down the hallway to make sure no one is out there, he follows. "I'll see you at home."

Because that's the thing, Doctor Park the Shark does bite at you. When no one else is around. Physically.

Walking into Brendon’s house you find him in the kitchen.

“Honey, I’m home.” You call dramatically.

Something else that would send your coworkers brains reeling, Park the Shark is funny.

“How was your day at the potato factory?” He muses, not looking up from the vegetable he’s chopping. You’re not even sure what started this bit of yours, but it’s entertaining nonetheless.

“Long and horrible. The factory is falling into disarray.” He hums as if you’re recounting a serious topic and not some bullshit.

Wrapping your arms around his waist from behind, you appreciate the feeling of his strong core beneath your hands. “I got accosted in an on-call room by a coworker too. I might need you to beat them up for me. He tried to make me pee my pants.”

“Oh, is that so? Not what I heard happened.”

You busy yourself with placing kisses on his neck and jaw, leaning up to reach the exposed skin. After you make a noise of acknowledgement, he continues.

“I heard that you yelled at some innocent kid and jumped your boyfriend’s bones in the on-call room.”

Pulling away, you smack at his back knowing it wouldn’t hurt him (it’s a lot more gentle than you normally are) and gasp in offense.

“Ogilvie is nowhere near being an innocent kid. He’s been an arrogant asshole since he got there and someone needed to say something.” You defend.

Brendon places down the knife and turns to you, amused look on his face as you ramble on. “As for jumping my boyfriend’s bones? Yuck. Ew. I’m disgusted at the implication.”

“Oh?” He raises his brows.

Crossing your arms over your chest and rest your weight in one hip. Brendon’s eyes drop down at the movement. “I had to pee, I was sweaty and stinky from having to do CPR not even 20 minutes beforehand and we were at work.” You challenge.

Eyes slowly dragging back up to your face, Brendon challenges, “So?” He looks too damn hot for his own good.

That shouldn’t make heat start building in your stomach the way it does when you’re trying to act mad. Rolling your eyes, you stomp away. “I’m showering!”

“I don’t get a kiss from my stinky girlfriend?” He calls out after you.

Flipping him off, you hear his laugh follow you into the bathroom. It wraps around you while you shower. Plays on a loop in your head as you dress in a pair of shorts from the drawer he cleared out for you months ago and one of his t-shirts.

Walking back into the kitchen, he’s facing the stove. Hands slowly mixing ingredients and making sure nothing burns in his scrubs. They look good on him, his large muscles and bulk filling out every crevice in the fabric.

“I’ll watch this so you can go shower.”

It’s the routine at this point. He starts dinner and lets you shower, then you finish and plate while he takes his own.

“Thanks.” Placing a quick kiss on your cheek he rushes off, knowing better than to try and push his luck when he’s still in scrubs and you’re freshly clean. It doesn’t stop the hungry way his eyes roam over you before he turns. Mouth upturned in a way that tells you he’s going to be trouble.

As you’re putting the last of the dishes in the cabinet, freshly washed and dried, Brendon comes up behind you. His position similar to the one he had you in earlier in the on-call room. This time his hands slide under your shirt and begin to feel the bare skin beneath it. You can smell his soap and the faint lingering of damp heat on him. The scent pressing into your skin with his fingers.

“Dinner will get cold.” You reason as his hands begin to work their way up. Claiming more and more expanse until they cup your breasts.

“I’m not hungry.” He argues, mouth focusing on the soft spot behind your ear, teeth grazing the sensitive skin.

You let your head fall back against his shoulder, hand coming up to grip at his hair as you sigh. “I am, though.”

You’re torn. The on-call room stunt he pulled has had you fantasizing about this all day, recounting the heated look in his eyes from outside the Trauma room. But you also haven’t eaten since lunch and the food he made smells amazing.

“I’ll heat it up after and feed it to you by hand while you’re naked in bed.”

Decision made.

“What about you? Don’t you need to eat?” You ask. Unable to get rid of the urge to take care of him. Not sure of when he’d last had a chance to feed himself.

“Trust me, I’ll be eating.” The comment makes you laugh, your hand tightening its grip on his hair as you feel his teeth push into your skin.

Mouth open in a gasp, your knees start to weaken when you feel Brendon’s canines sink into the flesh of your shoulder. Not too hard, certainly not compared to some bites he’s left before, but enough to make your brain go fuzzy.

Kissing up your neck, he turns you with hands on your waist to find purchase on your mouth. There’s no hesitance to grant him access, letting his tongue brush into your mouth and bring the heat of him with it.

Your hands dig in to anything and everything they can. The hair at the base of his neck. His biceps and forearms as they wrap around you. The firm line of muscle on his stomach that leads down to his gorgeous thighs.

As the kiss deepens, one of those gorgeous thighs pushes its way between your legs. He’s so broad and massive compared to you you’re practically sitting on him like this.

The pressure of his thigh against your core has you breaking from the kiss to catch your breath. His large hands rock your hips as he taunts.

“Someone should really teach you not to speak to your superior like you did today.” Brendon’s voice is low in your ear, mouth brushing the shell of it before gently nipping at the cartilage.

Taking a moment to clear the fog in your brain that he’s creating, you decide play coy. “I have no idea what you mean. I’m the picture of innocence.” Batting your eyelashes, you look up at him sweetly.

You feel him twitch where he’s pressed against your hips as he cups your face with one of those giant hands of his.

“Not sure that’s the word I’d use.” Brendon’s voice is deeper, almost breathless as he leans in to reconnect your mouths.

Not wanting to pull away from each other, you stumblingly make your way to the bedroom. Not without a few pitstops against a wall or two, though.

With the backs of your knees against the mattress, Brendon wastes no time in sliding his hand underneath your shirt to pull it off. Leaning down, he kisses at your chest until he reaches your nipple, the other being covered by his hand.

Running your fingers through his hair, you reach your hands down the neck of his shirt to scratch up his back. His resulting groan vibrates through your chest from where he’s switched to offer the same attention with his mouth to your other nipple.

“Off.” You plead, hands dragging him up to paw at his shirt.

Complying, you’re graced with the sight of his bare chest, hands immediately running over the newly exposed skin. Thumbs digging into the muscle over his chest and shoulders. You’ve seen him naked plenty, but you never tire of the sight.

Trailing down the front of his chest, your hands take special appreciation of his v-line. It’s always made your brain melt in the best way possible. The sharp cut of muscle and faint trail of hair that gets exposed to you when he shifts the right way. The sight of it like this that only you get to see. It makes your mouth water.

Fingers sliding beneath the waistband of his shorts and boxers, you begin to slowly peel them down. Looking up Brendon gives you a faint nod, so you speed up your movements. Finally having him completely bare before you, you drop to your knees.

He’s already hard as you wrap your hand around the base of him while you bring your tongue out to gently lick at his tip. Lips pursing around him, Brendon curses from above you, his hands gently scooping your hair away from your face.

The taste of him drives you crazy, mind forgetting anything but the feeling of him against your tongue. Taking him as deep as you can, you hear him groaning as his hold on your hair tightens. When you swallow around him, he lets out a sharp hiss.

Using his grip, he pulls you off, a thick string of spit connecting your lips to his tip. "C'mere."

Big hands immediately pull you up, pushing you onto the bed as he places himself above you. He's so big. His body caging you beneath him. His arm bracing his weight beside your head shows off his bicep, the veins bulging down his forearm. It makes drool pool in your mouth with your desire to lick. So you do.

Turning your head, you drag your tongue across the skin, letting your teeth scrape gently with little kisses. The question in it is evident when your eyes flutter open to look at his, gaze searching. Free hand coming down to grab your throat, he pulls you up to meet his mouth in another sloppy kiss.

"Do your worst, pup."

That stupid fucking nickname shouldn't have you clenching around nothing like it does.

It's something people whispered about you when they noticed how lax Brendon was with you. Saying you were his shark pup. Like he was taking you under his wing. Whenever you heard someone refer to you as such it made you roll your eyes. But when Park first heard it, he just looked at you smugly and started using the name himself.

In public. At work.

Using it to call you across the room. After praising your work. When he was casually talking to you. You hate the name, think it's stupid and lame and inaccurate. Inappropriate.

But the way he says it, voice low and teasing. The other times he says it when you’re not at work…maybe it's grown on you a bit. It still pisses you off though.

In retaliation you let your teeth sink into his forearm. The muscle firm and delicious in your mouth. Feeling the smooth skin and slight prickle of his hair in your tongue. Brendon’s jaw clenches at the feeling. You have a habit of always clamping down a bit harder than him. He can take it.

"Sure you can handle my worst?" You challenge.

For the most part, Brendon takes control in the bedroom. It’s not without a fight. You don’t just willingly submit and give into whatever he wants. Even if you want the same things. You make him work for it, fight tooth and nail before giving in. Even then, you still like to make it difficult.

Your favorite moments are when he gets so fed up with it he pushes you down into the mattress with his entire body weight and uses his fingers in your mouth to silence you while he makes you cry out over and over and over.

There are also some magical times when you outlast him and have him pliant under your touch. He doesn’t admit how much he likes those times.

Leaning back on his haunches, he grabs at your shorts to pull them down. The action leaves you bare except for your underwear. "I can take anything you give me."

"Funny. I was gonna say the same thing."

Smirking, you reach your hand out to stroke him, thumb pressing down on his slit. His hips stutter forward into the feeling and his the muscle in his jaw ticks.

Running his hands up your thighs, he stops just short of your underwear. He looks up at you, challenge in his eyes. Your hand doesn’t stop its pace, languidly stroking him.

His warm fingertips brush just underneath the seam of your underwear, right over your hipbones. The touch makes your breathing pick up, antsy to feel him where you want him. It’s never that easy though.

Not when you have two apex predators fighting for dominance.

Smoothing over your skin, he watches you pull your hand back before relaxing into the mattress. Arms behind your head as if you were sunning at the beach. As if his hands weren’t less than two inches away from your soaked core.

Brendon moves the lazy drag of his finger closer and closer until he’s barely ghosting over where you want him. Cotton dampening even more when his fingers press just barely into your clit. Fingers hooking in the waistband of your underwear, he drags them down your legs before spreading you out.

You keep yourself relaxed on the mattress. Trying your best to seem uninterested despite the wetness seeping from your hole giving you away. Even going so far as to sigh out and close your eyes like you’re bored. That’s the final straw.

Bending down, you feel Brendon’s breath fanning over your exposed core as he says, “Hey, baby?”

Disarming. Luring. Setting the trap.

Humming, you casually lean onto your elbows to look down at him. The movements slow and drawn out as if it pains you to even bother moving.

The snare pulls taunt.

You answer boredly. “Wha-”

The second you meet his eyes, open your mouth to reply, he’s digging his teeth into the sensitive flesh of your inner thigh and pushing a thick finger inside you.

Your words are cut off at the feeling, head thrown back with a curse at the pleasure.

“Fuck.”

Brendon often makes comments about how his hands are his livelihood. Times like this, you think they’re your livelihood, unsure how you existed so long without feeling his hands on your body.

Curling his finger how he knows you like, he releases the skin of your thigh from his teeth, moving instead to sloppily mouth at your clit. Adding another one of his fingers, you keen into him, hands coming down to hold at the back of his head.

Moaning his name out, you can feel his smirk against you. Any other time you’d pinch him for being so cocky, right now you’re lost in the feeling of him working you closer to that beautiful edge. The most you can do is dig your nails into his scalp as you tug at his hair.

He feels you clenching tighter around his fingers and doubles down, sucking in place of the long stripes he’d been licking into you. The gush of wetness that meets his tongue tells him it’s working exactly how he’d hoped.

Your breathing starts to falter, muscles beginning to shake. He knows your body almost better than you do. You’re on the edge, barely holding on. When you feel yourself tipping over, your back arches with a cry of his name body tensing in anticipation.

He pulls back abruptly, taking with him your release. Asshole.

“Fuck you.” You whine, not even bothering to look at him, hands coming to cover your face in frustration.

Crawling up your body, he pulls your hands away from your face. Cradling them, placing a soft kiss to each wrist before holding them down against the bed in one of his own. Gently kissing your lips, he muses. “I plan to.”

Lining himself up he pushes in slow. Giving you time to adjust and feel every delicious inch of him slide in. His grip on your wrists tightens for a moment, muscles flexing as he breathes through the feeling of your tightness around him.

No matter how many times he sheaths himself inside your warmth, he can never get used to the feeling. He doesn’t know what it is, you drive him crazy every time.

When he’s flush against your pelvis, you pant at the feeling of fullness. You can never get enough of it. The weight of him on top of you. The ache in your hips as they spread wide to accommodate his large frame. Light pricklings of his happy trail and hair on your sensitive skin. The feeling of him so deep inside you that you can hardly breathe.

Bucking up into him, you try and get him to move, gently urging him with your hips. He’s steady above you. Staying still and looking down at you with that intense gaze that makes you bear down around him.

Brendon stays like that, unmoving atop you while you try and rock yourself into him, silently begging him to move. Minutes pass and you’re starting to feel deranged. Rabid.

You try and pull your hands free, but he’s not letting up, pressing more weight into your wrists to keep them pinned. You try and kick your legs, but the wide stretch they’re in makes it difficult. When you do manage to get a knee into his side, he just grabs it with his free hand and holds it still.

All his weight is being supported by the press of his knees in the bed and the grip on your wrists. The position makes him push deeper into you and the whine that comes out of your mouth is pathetic.

You’ve sounded desperate before. This is just sad. He looks at you with a sadistic grin on his face, waiting for you to say it. Waiting for you to submit. Show your belly. Expose your neck.

Your gums ache, the desire to sink your teeth into him so strong it hurts. There’s nowhere for you to go, he’s got you trapped completely beneath him. If you said the word, he’d be off you instantly, retreating and soothing you with gentle hands. Buttermuffin.

You don’t want that though. You want him to stay right here. Pushing you, forcing you into submission.

He coos at you, “C’mon sweetheart. Don’t you want it?”

He’s trying to ease you into it, make it less humiliating for you. Out of anyone he knows how hard it can be to be vulnerable, to give yourself up to someone else’s hold. No matter how much he loves watching you fight against it, see the way you thrash and snap at him with all your might, he still has some kindness in him to make it less humbling. Sometimes.

“No.” You snarl at him. Not wanting to give in. Trying to push him off you with your hips. It’s futile. You’re not even making a true effort.

“No?” He questions, tilting his head. Not in the cute way puppies do when they’re confused. In a deeply predatory manner, like he’s sizing up the kill. “So you don’t want this?” He mocks confusion before slowly dragging himself out and pushing back in just as slow.

“No.” You groan. But the way your body sucks him back in admits the truth. The heaving breaths you started taking the second he began to move speak volumes. The way you’re not saying it, Buttermuffin, tells him everything he needs to know.

“So, you don’t want me to do this then?” He pushes the knee he claimed up towards your head, the stretch in your thigh making you hiss as he grinds into you. Making you feel him so much deeper.

Your head smacks against the pillow beneath it and you let out a quiet curse, desperate to feel the drag of him. It’s been at least ten minutes like this, maybe three hours since he slid into you, you’re not sure. Time stopped mattering when you felt him where he belongs.

“Just-”, you stop. Throat tightening around the words even though you know they’re going to be your release. “Just fuck me.”

Brendon’s mouth quirks up at that, just slightly. His hand moves from the crook of your knee up to your jaw, thumb brushing your bottom lip. He’s staring at you with brows raised. Waiting. You know what he wants.

It’s a struggle to get it out of your throat, so he helps you. Big hand sliding down to rest over the delicate skin, gently pressing into the muscles on either side of your neck. It’s not enough to cut off oxygen or blood flow but it’s enough that he feels the wetness around him increase while your walls clench down involuntarily.

“Say it.” He taunts, fingers squeezing to prove a point.

You’re delirious now, eyes blurring and mouth falling slack. You want him. No matter how much you hate saying it. No matter how demeaning it feels. There’s nothing you’ve ever wanted more than him. You know he loves you. That he feels the same way. That he’d sooner walk through hell than not worship you. So you give in.

“Please.” It’s quiet, meek. More of a whimper than a word. On a different night, he’d be meaner. Make you say it louder. Over and over again. But not tonight.

Tonight, he smiles wickedly, giving you no time to prepare as he starts a brutal pace. Each time he slides home it’s deep. So deep, you feel like your choking on it, throat constricting on an exhale with each thrust.

You can’t speak, you don’t even know what you’d say. You’re not sure your mouth even works right now for anything other than moans and whines. Your brain certainly isn’t working.

Brendon drops his face to yours. Placing sweet kisses over your cheeks, down your jaw and neck as he destroys you. Breaks you apart and turns you into something better.

Fingers clenching, you want to grab at him. To feel his warm skin that you’re sure is damp with effort beneath your hands. He doesn’t give you the ability to, hand still keeping yours planted to the mattress. Keeping you restrained and open for him to do whatever he wants.

He does give you something better through, placing his neck in front of your mouth. You don’t know if he did it on purpose or not, but you’re taking the opportunity.

He’s groaning above you. From the occasional stutter in his movements, the feeling of his dick twitching inside you, you know he’s close. Not an issue, considering you’re right there with him.

Leaning up to close the small gap between him and your mouth, you bite down on the juncture where his neck meets shoulder. Teeth sinking into the firm muscle, feeling it jump beneath your tongue. Brendon moans out at the sting, the sound causing you to let out your own needy moan.

When your teeth dig in deeper, he tightens his grip on your knee and angles his head to nip at your bicep. When you feel his teeth on you, it brings you that much closer to the edge. Delirium sets in as you begin to beg. “Please, please, please, please.” Over and over with a whine, tears forming in your eyes from how badly you want it.

Anyone else would think you’re begging for release, but Brendon knows better. Leaning down to push his face into your neck, he saves you the embarrassment of making a comment about your pleading. Letting go of your knee he positions his arm in a way that your teeth can make their way back into his flesh.

The second his teeth begin to sink into your neck, you do the same to his forearm. The sensation has you tightening around him so much it’s hard for him to keep his thrusting steady. Hard for him to push back inside the slick heat of your core.

Sensing your incoming release, from the increased pressure of your teeth on his arm and the tightening of your walls, he fully bites down on your neck. That does it for you. The pain of his sharp canines. The overwhelming presence of him everywhere. His skin between your teeth. The feeling of consuming each other.

Groaning into his muscular forearm clamped between your teeth, your walls spasm around him. The pleasure making everything fuzzy, warmth flooding your body as your eyes unfocus.

You have to release him from your jaws to pant, trying to catch your breath and not pass out at the intense feeling taking over your body. Brendon loses himself in the feeling of your body sucking him in and follows after you. The added heat of his release only prolonging your high.

There’s nothing but the sound of breathing for a while. Minds catching up and body’s relaxing. Releasing your hands, Brendon gently massages the muscles of your shoulders and arms as he helps guide them back down.

His hands go to your hips next, digging into the flesh to soothe your muscles as he slowly pulls himself from you. Helping ease the ache as you readjust to a less spread out position. He’s mindful of the way your joints crack and pop back into place.

Brendon’s face twists in pain at a particularly loud pop, muttering a small apology. It doesn’t matter how many times you assure him it’s fine, that it’s worth it to be with him, he still feels guilty.

After another quick shower, this time together, he keeps true to his promise. Hand feeding you while you both lounge naked in bed.

Well, he’s naked. You’ve taken one of his massive button ups to keep you warm. Brendon complained, saying he was all you needed to keep warm but compromise was made. The buttons were left open.

“You think anyone knows we’re together?” You wonder aloud, mouth still finishing a bite of the delicious dinner he’d made.

“No way.” Comes his easy reply. “They all know you’re too good for me.” He places a kiss on your bare hip, looking up at you with a softness in his eyes that warms your chest.

“Or that you are way too hot to go for someone like me.” You reason. The soft kiss on your hip turns into a playful nip before he shakes his head.

“No way.” It’s the same reply. Different intensity now. You stare at each other for a long moment, seeing who goes belly up first. This time, he’s the one to submit. “I love you.”

Running your fingers through his hair, you brush your thumb over his cheek and he leans into the touch. “I love you too, my big, scary shark.”

Placing a kiss to your palm, you both laugh and finish eating. Then you lie tangled in each other, skin pressed together tightly. Two natural predators sharing space.

[thelightofday]

I NEED THAT BIG MEAN MAN TO SINK HIS TEETH INTO ME RIGHT NOWWWWW !!!!!!

[thelightofday]

𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐤𝐢𝐧𝐝 𝐨𝐟 𝐟𝐚𝐭𝐞 𝐭𝐡𝐚𝐭 𝐡𝐮𝐫𝐭𝐬 — b. park ᥫ᭡

summary: an accident with a familiar, brooding ortho surgeon has you exploring an unlikely connection.

contents: 18+ minors DNI fm reader, no use of y/n, power imbalance (nurse reader/attending ortho surgeon), unspecified age gap, mentions of head trauma/concussions/medical procedures, jack abbot using pet names, swearing, drinking, oral (f/m receiving), unprotected p in v, creampie, dirty talk, reader has a praise kink, use of the pet name ‘bunny’, slight choking, reader is fairly nondescript besides mentions of having long-ish hair. nasty and self indulgent bc i need that big mean man!!

wc: 7.6k

dividers by @saradika-graphics 🫶🏼

a/n— this is not yet proofread, please excuse any typos pls!

You were almost certain this wasn’t the right hallway.

Realization crept in somewhere between the identical looking beige walls and the third “Authorized Personnel Only” sign you’d passed in the last two minutes. Everything looked the same. Same floors, same lights. Directional signs all ran together, and suddenly your head was spinning.

You’d been working at PTMC for right at a year, but venturing out of the ED was rare. Each time you had to do it ended up the same— an extra ten minutes added onto whatever trip you were taking because you got lost. You were far more familiar with small, rural hospitals.

Your ID badge bounced lightly against your chest with every hurried step, teeth gnawing at the inside of your cheek. A familiar nervous habit. It didn’t help that it was nearing four in the morning and the familar buzz of caffeine in your system from the energy drink you’d chugged thirty minutes prior had you moving a little faster than normal. You were jittery and starting to panic a little and oh! Familar double doors came into view and you immediately thanked your lucky stars you hadn’t had to ask anyone for help to get back to the ED, shoulders dropping as you visibly relaxed.

Picking up your pace, you nervously tugged at your badge reel. Surely Abbot was about to send out a search party for you if you didn’t return in the next five minutes.

Hurrying through the wooden double doors, you turned down yet another corridor, finally familiar with where you were. Your eyes fell to your feet for just a moment. Only one more door until—

WHAM!

You’d been walking too fast to hear the click of the handle, or register the large stairwell door swinging open.

You only feel the sudden, stinging impact of metal meeting your head, followed by a delightfully ungraceful stumble backward that somehow manages to be both dramatic and deeply humiliating. You’re on your ass in less than a second, your right hand flying to your face as a string of profanities spew from your chapped lips.

“Jesus Christ.” A familar voice mumbles, and then he’s on his knees next to you, tugging to pull your hand away from your face to check for bleeding. “You alright?” He asks, voice tense. Park.

Certainly there were other people you’d have rather hit you with a large metal door than him. But it wasn’t everyday that something brought the six-foot-something ortho surgeon to his knees.

You blink hard, trying to orient yourself through the pain, your ears suddenly ringing. “Do I look alright?” You hiss, snatching your wrist from him, hot tears suddenly threatening to fall. You manage to meet his eyes, his expression emotionless as usual. Lacking any visible concern or regret.

“You look like you’re about to pass out, actually.” He replies sarcastically, gripping a shoulder to steady you as you sway a little. And admittedly, you are a little more dizzy than you’d like to be because this could definitely be a concussion or intracranial hemorrhage or—

“Hey.” Park’s voice cuts through your racing internal monologue and fuck you’re annoyed. He’s painfully aware of the panic in your squinted eyes and the way you’re growing paler, cheeks burning red from embarrassment. “Can you stand up? You need to get checked out.”

“Yes, I can stand up.” The words come out harsher than you mean them to, and as big and bad as you sound, your actions unfortunately don’t hold their end of the bargain. You’re slow to fully stand, clumsily swaying as you smack a hand against the wall for leverage. And there’s the nausea.

“Alright, up you go.” Park huffs, sweeping you into his arms in a quick motion, surprisingly not earning any protest from you— only a pained sound. “Don’t even think about vomiting on me.” He says quickly, carrying you with ease through the short corridor until a door opens and you’re met with the familiar sounds of the ED.

You slump against his broad chest, the beaming fluorescent lights only making you feel sicker. That and the strong smell of antiseptic.

Park is desensitized to the looks of fear he usually gets when he marches into the ED for a consult. But these— the ones he receives when he enters with a nurse in his arms.. were very different.

“What the fuck?” Abbot calls, slinging his stethoscope around his neck as he rushes over to Park. “What happened?”

“She walked into the door I was opening— smacked her head pretty hard.” Park grumbles, clearly unamused. He’s still cradling you, his expression almost cracking when you sniffle, clearly in a lot of pain.

“What the hell, hun?” Abbot taps your leg but you avoid his eyes, stuck somewhere between pure embarrassment and searing pain. “Let’s get her to a room.”

So, Park follows, avoiding the many eyes on him as he carries you with ease through the bustling ED.

As soon as you’re sat on the stretcher, you whine. “I feel sick.”

“Okay, okay.” Jack’s voice is soothing as he reaches for a emesis bag, handing it to you quickly before he snaps a pair of gloves on. Your heavy eyes meet his own as he leans over you, fingers prodding at the growing bump on your forehead. “She lose consciousness?” He asks Park who’s leaned against a nearby wall looking annoyingly nonchalant as he mumbles a quick ‘nope’.

Jack reaches for his penlight, retrieving it from his shirt pocket in a quick motion. “Let’s see those eyes, sweets.” The nickname settles deep in your stomach, nearly making you smile a little. You wince at the bright light, following his instruction as he raises a finger and urges you to follow it with your eyes. He shakes his head after, dropping the light back into his pocket as he looks at you. “Pupils are a little sluggish. I don’t like that.” He clicks his tongue. “Let’s get you a head CT, yeah? Make sure nothing is happening that we can’t see.”

You groan, letting your head fall back onto the stretcher, and regretting it immediately when pain shoots through your skull.

“I’m gonna handle this consult real quick.” Park speaks up, starting for the door. “Let me know how she does.”

Jack nods, sitting on the edge of the stretcher as the monotone surgeon exits the room. He glances over his shoulder to make sure Park is gone, then back at you with a goofy look on his face.

“Didn’t think I’d ever see him walk into my ED with one of my nurses in his arms.” Jack chuckles, and you muster a weak laugh that turns into more of a whimper.

“I hate him.”

Jack smiles. “He means well. And I don’t think you hate him.. You don’t look at him like you hate him...”

“Jack, don’t.” You huff. “He seemed more inconvenienced than worried.”

“Yeah, well, that’s just Park.” Jack pats your shoulder, sympathetic.

The next few hours blur together. Between the steady pounding in your head and the way you keep replaying the painfully embarrassing accident in your head, it’s hard to focus on anything. It’s nearing shift change when your head CT results finally return, and thankfully Abbot says you’re all clear. No fractures, no bleeding, no swelling. Just a gnarly bruise forming on the right side of your forehead— and on your ego too, probably.

All is well for a while. You’re accepting the day off tomorrow that Jack mentions you’ll have out of precaution. The embarrassment eventually starts to ease, along with the pain. You’re waiting to be discharged, curled up on the stretcher when you hear footsteps. Heavy footsteps. You almost flinch because you know it’s Park. It’s almost as if he sensed your moment of peace and had set out determined to ruin it.

You meet his eyes, and when he doesn’t talk you give him a look that says ‘I’m waiting’..

He steps closer, letting the door close. “CT clear?”

“Yeah.” You mutter, turning towards him a little. “Thankfully you didn’t give me a brain bleed.”

You notice the way his jaw clenches. “I could’ve left you on the floor you know. Walked away.” He seethes. “I’m not responsible for you not watching where you’re going.”

Rolling your eyes, you fake a smile. “Thank you for saving me in my time of need Dr. Park.”

“Everytime I’ve seen you down here you’ve always been so cheerful. Interesting to see your true colors now.” He nods, returning the sarcastic smile. And you think it’s the first time you’ve seen any sort of expression besides a blank stare from him.

You let out a frustrated sigh. “I’m just having a bad night.”

“And you’re taking it out on me?” He asks, leaning up against the wall.

“Coming from the person who is constantly a dick during consults.” You retort.

Thankfully, Abbot entering the room ends your playful pissing match. He’s holding a few papers, and raises a brow at the sight of the two of you clearly having some sort of moment. “Right— you ready to go?”

You start to slowly sit up. “Dying to.”

“Well, you two be safe and I’ll be texting you to check in.” Jack says, pointing a finger at you.

You blink. “You two?”

“Park is taking you home right? He offered.” Jack smiles a little. “Surely you didn’t think I’d let you drive with a possible concussion, sweets.”

Something bubbles up in your chest. It’s not anger, but rather something you can’t exactly put your finger on. You close your eyes for a second, looking up at Park next with furrowed brows. He shrugs. “You were too busy fussing at me— I didn’t get the chance to mention it.”

“I can take an uber.” You protest, shaking your head.

“Let me take you home.” He sounds annoyed, but then again— that seems to be his normal. “It’s the least I can do since apparently I intentionally hit you with the door, right?”

And you unfortunately laugh a little at that. The sound eats Park alive, and he’s suddenly mentally cursing himself at the feeling. He’d always seen you. Noticed you more than the other nurses or residents. Not only were you clearly quite a bit younger than him, but you were bubbly— a stark contrast to himself. You seemed fearless, and maybe that alone intrigued him a little. Though, having only spoken to you a handful of times, he didn’t truly know you. And he didn’t expect that to change.

So, at the sight of you climbing into his SUV, he’s interested. Observant. You take in your surroundings, straight faced as your eyes rake over the spotless interior of his Porsche Cayenne. He hands you his phone without a word, clearly wanting you to put in your address.

You glance at him after, smiling a little when you hand it back to him. “This is somehow exactly what I pictured you driving.”

“Yeah?” He looks both ways as he turns a corner in the parking garage.

“Mhm.” You hum, eyeing his side profile before you turn your gaze forward.

“How are you feeling now?” He eyes you for a second next, and you’re genuinely surprised the typically cold surgeon is making small talk. You’d pictured a silent drive, uncomfortable even. But then again, he was probably just asking questions out of pity.

“Better.” You confirm, voice soft. “Head still hurts a little but that’s to be expected I guess.”

“For what it’s worth, I’m sorry you weren’t paying attention and I opened the door fast.” Park says, and is he smirking a little?

You chuckle, shaking your head. “You’re such an ass.”

“So they say.” He half-smiles, long fingers moving to flip the turn signal. Your eyes shamelessly rake along his hands. His livelihood. Large and thick. Prominent veins on top. You blink, averting your eyes back to the road yet again and leaning your head on the headrest.

“Thank you for driving me.” You speak up, following a few moments of silence, your apartment building coming into view.

“Where should I park?” He asks, slowing the car. Your hands are busy gathering your belongings, and you don’t even look his way when you mutter “You can just stop at the front, I’ll get out there.”

“Where should I park for a few hours, genius.” He corrects, meeting your eyes.

You shoot him a confused look. “Hours?”

“I’m not leaving you alone with a concussion.”

“Possible concussion.” You correct, just wanting to be in your bed already. “I probably don’t even have one and I’m fine. You don’t have to stay. Plus I have very nosey roommates.”

“Abbot told me not to leave you alone.” Park stares at you blankly, convinced he’s going to win this. He’s pulled the car to the curb now, one hand still on the steering wheel.

Fucking Jack Abbot— he absolutely did this shit on purpose.

You sigh, exasperated. “I’ll be fine.”

“Either you let me stay, or you go pack a bag and you come stay with me.” He commands, and you’re about to bust a fucking blood vessel.

“Okay, okay.” You huff. “You can’t stay here. We don’t have an extra bed and someone’s crashing on our couch for the weekend.”

“So go pack a bag.” He says simply, shooing you. “Do I need to walk you up?”

“I’ve got it.” You grumble, carefully climbing out of the car and hoisting your bag over your shoulder, trying not to slam the door even though you’d love to right now.

It isn’t until you’re in the elevator that you fish your phone from your pocket, cursing into the empty space as you type a message to none other than Abbot.

You: Why did you tell this man not to let me stay alone!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I HATE YOUUUU

He replies almost immediately.

Jack: Well that’s easy. Because you don’t need to stay alone 🙂

You: I think I’m gonna block you 🤭

Jack: Have fun sweets!

It was well past seven in the morning now, and closing in on seventeen hours that you’d been awake. Not to mention the head trauma. You had minimal energy left and you weren’t gonna spend it arguing with Park. You’d get a few hours of sleep and then he’d take you to pick up your car. It seemed manageable.

And so, you watched with sleepy eyes a half hour later as his black SUV pulled into the driveway of a large brick house, nestled in a quaint neighborhood outside of the city. You could tell he was just as tired, both of you silent as he parked in the garage.

You followed him in without a word, watching him toss his keys in a nearby basket. His home was modern, but cozy. Exquisitely neat. Nothing looked out of place. It even smelled clean. You glanced around, impressed.

“I’ll show you the guest bedroom.” Park said lowly, words laced with exhaustion.

You nodded simply, following him up a flight of stairs.

“Bathroom is here.” He pointed, still walking. “There’s clean towels on the rack and some of my sister’s products in the cabinet you can use if you want or need to. Spare toothbrush in the drawer— Oh, and Tylenol too. If you need anything else just let me know. And if you don’t feel good, call me.” As he finishes, he swings open the door to a large spare room.

“Thank you.” You smile politely, offering him a small nod.

He acknowledges you with a hum, heading down the hallway, itching to get out of his scrubs.

You decide on a quick shower, hoping the steaming water will relax your aching muscles. And then, you’re crawling into cool linen sheets, sighing at the feeling of the soft mattress. It’s not your bed, but boy is it doing the job. Such a good job in fact, that you don’t even recall drifting off.

When you come to hours later, the sound of distant thunder greets you, gloomy skies allowing a slight darkness to fall over the room, rain tapping softly against a nearby window. Then, you smell coffee. You stretch a little, wincing when your forehead brushes against the pillow, a reminder of what you’re sure has turned into a nasty bruise. Your bare feet meet the cool hardwood as you stand up, tugging on some leggings before heading to the bathroom.

Crossing the hallway, you immediately head for a mirror, and audibly groan when you flick the light on and catch a glimpse of your head. Bruised indeed. A nasty purple and yellow bruise at that, one that thankfully wasn’t too large but was absolutely noticeable. You run a hand through your hair, sighing as you begin to pad down the stairs. And there was Park, looking much more presentable than yourself, on the couch with some sort of medical journal because ofcourse he reads those. A pair of dark glasses perched on his perfect nose. He looked edible. So painfully domestic.

You can’t help the nervousness that blooms in you when he looks up, eyes following you as you walk towards the opposite end of the sectional he’s seated on.

“Sleep good?” He asks, eyes locking onto your bruise.

“Feel like I just woke up from a coma.” You chuckle. “So yeah.”

“Any dizziness? Nausea? Blurred vision?” He inquires next, sitting his book down.

“No, Dr. Park.” You hum, tone dripping with sarcasm. “I feel fine. Just sore.”

“Fair enough.” He nods, moving to stand up from the couch. “I’m gonna cook dinner. You okay with pasta?”

You just look at him for a moment. “And when are you going to take my back to my car?”

“It’s about to storm pretty heavy. Staying another hour or two won’t kill you, you know?” He looks back before he disappears into the kitchen. You huff, moving to follow him.

“I feel like I’m overstaying my welcome.” You say as you breach the doorway, voice wary. His kitchen is beautiful, one you could only dream of cooking in. Gorgeous marble countertops and dark cabinets. Sparkling appliances.

He plants his large hands on the kitchen counter, looking at you with that look he frequently sports at the hospital. One that typically strikes fear in people. “You are not overstaying your welcome, nor are you bothering me in any way. So can you let me be nice to you?”

You nearly physically recoil. “Not used to you being nice, but I guess I’ll take it.”

He nearly smiles a little at your reply, eyes softening. You can’t help the way your eyes float along his sharp features, then along the broad expanse of his clothed back when he turns toward the refrigerator.

“Glass of wine?” He offers.

“Will that help my alleged concussion?”

You hear him chuckle as he retrieves two crystal stemless wine glasses from a nearby cabinet. “You claim you don’t have one, so why do you ask?”

Darn him for being just as much of a smartass as you are and darn you for enjoying it.

You bite at your lip a little, fighting a smile as you watch him place a glass of red wine before you. Settling onto a barstool, you pull the glass closer, humming a quick ‘thank you’.

“You cook often?” And now you’re the one fueling the small talk.

“I try to.” He says, shuffling around to gather ingredients from the fridge, then a pan and some utensils. “It’s one of the few things that keep me sane.”

You laugh a little, taking a swig of the wine, playfully swirling the glass afterward. “And what are the others?”

“Mmm, the gym.” He starts. “Running. Reading. Hitting people with doors…”

And you’re giggling, the sound making something twist deep inside him. He switches on the stove, turning to lean on the counter and watch you afterward. He drinks you in. Your slightly messy hair that dances along your shoulders. Oversized teeshirt, clearly worn for sleep only. Gnarly bruise on your forehead that somehow you make look good. It’s different here. Out of scrubs. Out of a bustling hospital. He’s never gotten the chance to truly look at you, and he’s starting to hate the way you fit in so effortlessly in his kitchen. In his house.

“I like seeing you like this.” You admit sheepishly, a playful smile tugging at your lips. Almost as if you’d read his mind.

He blinks, crossing his arms. “Like what?”

“Not so mean.” You chuckle. “Relaxed. Making jokes. Trying not to smile even though you want to.”

“Maybe I like everyone thinking I’m mean.” He teases in return.

You lick your lips after taking another swig, and he can’t help but notice. “Seems like you’re just misunderstood.”

Park shrugs, smiling a little as he turns back to the stove, trying to silently convince himself that you aren’t having any effect on him. Because fuck, you’re cute. You’re clever and funny and so easy to talk to.

You keep talking, feeding your want to know more about the mysterious surgeon. And it doesn’t stop there. The conversation flows through dinner and beyond. When you’re watching him wash dishes (ones he wouldn’t let you help with because you’re a guest..) and when you take to the couch afterward. When he learns you’re afraid of storms because you jump at a crack of thunder, despite how loose you feel from the wine.

Before you know it, it’s totally dark outside and you’re still talking. The bottle of wine is long gone, and you’re purely giddy. It had been too long since you’d opened up to someone the way you did with him. Your roommates weren’t much for talking, usually retreating to their rooms as soon as they arrrived. To be fair, you’d met them in a ‘searching for Pittsburgh roommates’ group on Facebook and nobody bothered to really get to know each other. You’d spent so much time alone recently that you were shocked how euphoric it felt to simply hang out with someone. Park the Shark of all people, at that. The two of you were an unlikely combo, yet surprisingly had a lot in common.

Once you’d covered work, college, family, siblings, hobbies, etcetera— you retreat to the bathroom, slightly buzzed and accepting the fact that Park hadn’t mentioned anything else about taking you home. Likely due to the storm and he obviously wasn’t going to drink and drive now.

So, when you return to the living room to all the lights dimmed and the sounds of hockey flowing from the tv, you sit closer to him without a second thought. After all, your view was better there— or atleast you told yourself that. He doesn’t mention it, but he notices the way you’ve inched closer, sprawled out next to him now, reaching for a nearby throw blanket.

And for the first time in a while, he’s truly content.

Content enough to fall asleep apparently. The long hours of shift work that frequently rotate are a pain, and Park has mastered the art of falling asleep just about anywhere. But he can’t remember the last time he fell asleep infront of the tv. When he opens his eyes he starts to stretch, mind in a sleepy haze. The TV is still playing Pens highlights, even though the game is long over. Rain is still falling outside. And you— you’re curled up next to him, head resting on his leg. Chest rising and falling every few seconds, mouth partially open. He blinks, just watching you for a moment, reaching a hand out without thinking to push some hair from your face. That alone makes you stir. You’ve always been a light sleeper.

You twitch, breathing in as your eyes blink open. It registers quickly, the way your head is resting on the soft material of his sweatpants. Sucking in a breath, you move to start sitting up, hand flying to where your head is aching. Likely from where you’d been laying on your bruise.

“You okay?” Park asks, sitting up and adjusting his shirt.

“Yeah.” You breathe. “Sorry, I don’t remember falling asleep.”

“Stop apologizing.” He chastises. “I don’t either.”

Tapping at his phone, his eyes are met with the time. 1:47.

“Want to get in bed?” He doesn’t mean the way it sounds like an invitation.

You rub your legs together, still cozy beneath the blanket. “I’m comfy.” You groan. It’s a weak protest, but not a lie. You can’t help the way you shamelessly itch to lean back into him, and for once you don’t fight yourself. Without a word he lifts his arm, accepting your presence as you curl into his side. He kicks his feet up and leans his head back, something happening in his chest at the feel of you pressed against him. Fuck.

Letting out a long relaxed breath, you look up at him, eyes meeting his jawline and neck, then locking with his own when he moves to look down at you. Your stomach flips, heat ripping through you at the proximity of his face to yours. Then his eyes flicker down to your lips, and that’s when you know. You know he wants to kiss you. Everything feels heavier, especially the way his hand rests on your back, fingers starting to trace over the soft fabric of your teeshirt.

Neither of you dare speak a word, eyes saying everything that needs to be said. Park watches your tongue peek out to wet your lips, and he immediately starts to move in, giving you ample time to pull away even though he’s sure you won’t. And when you grab at his shirt, moving in a little yourself, he seals the deal.

Your lips meet, pressing firmly together, neither of you in any rush. Just taking in the feeling. Inching closer, you don’t dare pull away. His hand moves to slide against your jaw, holding firm as your lips leisurely move with his. When his tongue slides against yours you can’t help the way your thighs press together. You let out a small whine into his mouth, one that does not go unnoticed. Infact, the oh so pretty sound starts playing on a loop in Park’s head and he’s a goner.

He hadn’t dreamt of stopping until you moved to climb into his lap. Raising a hand, he pulls back to look at you.

“We shouldn’t.” He says softly, his rational side taking over.

But then, you’re pressing a kiss to his jaw. Then another. One leg sliding along his lap as you climb onto him.

“But do you want to?” You breathe.

He swallows. “You know I want to.”

“So yeah, we probably shouldn’t— but what if we want to?” You say softly, pressing yet another feather soft kiss to the spot right blow his ear. He groans a little, moving a hand to gently grab at the back of your neck and pull your lips back to his.

The way you move together is effortless, but growing increasingly messy. Teeth starting to clash. Tongues fighting. And when you roll your hips against his, the noise he lets out against your lips is sinful. Breaking apart, he runs his hands through the hair on the side of your head.

“You’re trouble.” His voice is deep, taunting. “Grinding against me all needy, huh?” Lips dancing along your ear as he speaks. Chills roll over you, heart fluttering. You move your hips against his lap again, relishing in the way his hands fly to your sides, your lips meeting yet again. The feeling of him hard beneath you only spurs you on, whimpering into his mouth when your clothed core slides directly over the length of him through his sweats.

“Shit.” He spits, deep voice floating around you. “You’re determined, huh?”

“Maybe I wanna torture you a little.” You purr, forehead pressing to his, careful to avoid your bruise. “As payback.”

“This isn’t the same kind of pain, baby.” He chuckles. “You should be focused on your head injury, not me.”

“Can you stop being responsible Park for twenty minutes?” You look at him, that sweet little smile doing a number on him.

“Which Park do you want right now then?” He teases, shifting beneath you, painfully hard.

“The one that fucks me.”

He’s nearly choking at your words, tangling his hand in your hair and yanking your head back in response. “Used to getting what you want, aren’t you? Stubborn little fucking brat.”

You mewl at his harsh words, eyes fluttering when he drags his teeth along your throat, hot lips leaving wet kisses along the sensitive skin. He’s so much stronger and bigger, hands ghosting wherever they touch, keeping you right where he wants you. Watching you as you helplessly grind over him again. He grips your hair tighter. “Use your words or we’re done here.”

“Want you, please.”

“Want me how?”

You sigh at the feeling of his lips on your pulse point. “Want you to touch me.”

“M’ already touching you, baby.” He reminds you, so fucking annoying.

You grunt, frustrated, and he releases his tight grip on your hair. Returning to his waiting gaze, your eyes are soft, lips plush and swollen from his kiss. “Want you to make me cum.” You say next, voice timid. “Please.”

He pushes some hair behind your ear. “Yeah?” His tone is laced with faux pity, almost mocking. Hips steady as you continue to rock against him, your breaths unsteady.

“I think you can cum like this.” He counters, grip tight on your waist. Neither of you had yet to shed any clothing, and you didn’t mind. He was right, the friction was delicious. “Think you can, baby? Think you can cum from rubbing that pussy against me?”

You clench around nothing, heat bubbling in your chest as you whine. “Just want you.” And you’re begging so pretty, calm little voice filling his ears, thick with want. Before you can form a coherent thought, you’re being lifted. Park’s hands cradle the underside of your thighs, letting you wrap your legs around him as he starts to venture toward the stairs. Your arms snake around his neck, giggling a little as he stumbles around a table.

Moments later when you’re being gently sat on the edge of his bed, you can’t help but glance around at his room. Neat and spacious. Black out curtains. Dark comforter beneath you. It’s so him. His familiar scent dances around you, your eyes floating up to watch him yank at his shirt.

“Lay back.” He instructs with ease, so used to being in charge. Spitting commands and watching everyone obey. You want to playfully object just to see where it gets you, but you listen instead, and his long fingers are gripping at the waistband of your leggings. He makes quick work of dragging them off, sighing in defeat at the sight of your simple grey panties, the obvious dark patch of wetness on the crotch mocking him.

“You wet from just a little teasing, bunny?” Between the tone of his voice and the pet name that came out of nowhere, you think you might actually pass out. He taps at your knee, urging you to spread your legs. Warm hands slide along your thighs and you watch him settle onto his knees on the floor, yanking you with ease until your ass is right at the edge of his bed. The look in his eyes is sharp enough to kill, eyes cloudy with pure lust. Jaw tight in concentration as he runs a finger along the damp crotch of your panties. You hiss and whine at the contact, hips raising to chase his touch.

“Please.” You whimper, begging. “Want your mouth.”

“There she is.” He praises, satisfied with your communication. It takes no further persuasion, and he’s working to drag your panties down your legs, revealing you to him fully.

“Fucking perfect pussy.” He growls, pressing a kiss to your pubic bone. “Pretty little thing. You’re so pretty.”

“Park.” You plea, barely able to stay up on your elbows to watch his motions. Body weak with need.

“Brendon.” He corrects immediately, hot tongue flattening to lick a thick stripe up your pussy, and your head falls back. The sound that leaves you goes straight to his cock. So do the ones after it. He’s skilled in more ways than one, clearly. Experienced. You’re blissed out from his mouth alone, fingers gripping at the comforter beneath you. He watches your every movement, working with delicate precision, and it’s been so long that you’re embarrassingly close already. He can sense it by your breathing and movements, deciding to push his middle finger into you with ease. One finger shortly turns into two and your mouth is hanging open, eyes closed. When you start to squirm, he holds you down by your waist, mouth still working and two fingers plunging deep, curling up to hit the spot that nearly has you in tears.

“Ohmygodddd.” You mewl, reaching to claw at his forearm that’s pinning your hips to the bed, but he moves it to intertwine your fingers. It’s thoughtful, the way he tends to you. “S’ so good Bren.” The words leave you in a choked sob and his response is a long, deep hum against your pussy— and you’re done. Breath hitching, you wiggle a little, legs starting to shake as you helplessly dangle over the edge and he knows. Somehow he can read you. Sense exactly what you need. His fingers curl once more, oh so deep, and you’re crashing beneath him, a high pitched squeal leaving you and he’s totally entranced. Working like a starved man and not daring to stop as he drinks in the way you look when you fall apart. All by his doing. He swears it’s the hottest thing he’s ever witnessed, actually.

And when you’re trying to push him away because it’s all too much, he presses a sweet kiss to the inside of your thigh before he moves to stand up. You watch him in awe, and if you weren’t completely at his mercy before you definitely are now.

He laughs at little at your blissed out face as you eye him. “What?” He asks.

“I hate you.” You murmur. And it’s a lie, you both know it. A playful lie you’re just throwing around because how fucking dare he be so good at everything. Good looking and polite and considerate and talented. It’s not fair. Nothing about it is fair.

“You don’t hate me.” He smiles— a true smile as he starts to work at his sweatpants. You don’t try to tease any further, and he watches as you move to kneel infront of him, your hands moving to stop his. Then you continue his work, yanking at the stretchy material and leaving him in his dark briefs. You nearly salivate at the outline of his hard length through the material. That’s gonna hurt. The thought is there and gone, because you’re tugging them down next, eyes meeting his thick cock. He watches intently, teeth gnawing at the inside of his bottom lip as your much smaller hand wraps around the base of him. You press a kiss to the underside of the tip, eyes locked on his as you lick a stripe up the side teasingly.

He shakes his head a little because you’ve got him right where you want him and he knows it. When you take him into your mouth he groans, the sound rumbling from his chest and only spurring you on. You wanted to make him do it over and over again. A large hand brushes over the side of your face as you take him to your limit, starting to gag against him. “You’re so fucking good.” He breathes, moving to tangle his fingers into your hair again. Holding your hair up, he lets you work at your own pace, one that has him weak in the knees and muttering curses.

You’re relentless, taking him slow and deep until tears are brimming in your eyes and spit is starting to trickle down your chin. It’s a fucking sight. And he’s committed it to his memory forever, though a mental picture would never do the real thing justice. He pulls you off, admiring the string of spit that draws from your mouth that still connects you to his cock.

Up until now, you’d been pleasantly surprised at how soft he was being. The Park you’d shamelessly thought about more than a few times was far from a gentle lover. Though, your thoughts are interrupted by a rough manhandle that nearly has you squealing. He tosses you back onto the center of his bed, watching you bounce a little— and when he crawls over you next, he’s making quick work of your teeshirt that he wasn’t exactly sure why he hadn’t taken off of you yet.

The sight of your tits has his head spinning. Every part of you he’s gotten to see is perfect to him. He works his palm against one before pinching at the pebbled nipple. You writhe beneath him, so whiny. “Want you to fuck me, Bren.”

“You’re fucking bad.” He moves to growl in your ear, kissing at the lobe. “Dirty little fucking mouth on you. Took my cock so well, didn’t you?”

You nod a little, suddenly bashful at his praise. Pulling his face to yours, you kiss him. It’s rushed and messy, but you don’t mind a bit. Your manicured nails move to claw at Park’s biceps, and he hums against your mouth at the contact. When he pulls away, he just looks at you for a second, totally bare beneath him. Before you realize, he’s leaning down to your forehead to press a soft kiss to the dark purple bruise there.

Then, he’s adjusting himself between your legs, smacking the length of himself teasingly against your wetness. You just watch, gnawing at your lip when he lines up at your entrance. “Please be gentle.” You mumble out quickly, already wincing in preparation. His brain short circuits for half a second, and he silently curses himself for being too drunk on you to reach for a condom, but he trusts you and god— he wants to feel it all without any barrier.

“M’ not gonna hurt you, baby.” He promises. “You can take it.”

He starts to push in, aided by how soaked you were for him. You’re gripping at his arms, tense and eyes clamped shut at the stretch. He lowers himself, pressing his lips to your cheek. “That’s it, let me in.” You pulse around him at his words, leaning into his touch. He peppers your cheek and jaw with kisses as he continues to push in, slowly coming to a stop when he’s fully inside. It’s so fucking much you think you might just fall apart right then and there. Deep. Full.

“Mmm— there we go.” He coos, moving up again to admire the way you wrap around him when he slowly pulls out almost fully and then sheathes himself back inside.

You squirm, moans and whimpers flowing freely. “Fuckfuckfuck, s’ so big.”

“Yeah?” He presses his palms to the backside of your thighs, urging them higher until your knees are nearly up against your chest. “Taking it so well. I knew you would.” When he starts truly fucking into you, you’re a whining mess, fingers tangling into his comforter for leverage. He watches your hair scatter around you, painting the prettiest picture of you beneath him.

“Talk to me, baby.” He mumbles, urging you yet again to use your words but you’re so fucked out already you can hardly think.

“Feels so fucking good.” You cry, voice sounding pathetic.

“Yeah it does, bunny. You feel so good. Such a good fucking girl for me. Taking me like this.”

You never want him to stop talking. He speaks so eloquently. Fucking filthy and you’re obsessed.

His hips rock into yours at a devastating pace, a large hand reaching up to hold your throat. He presses gently, experimental almost, not enough to fully constrict your airway. Your eyes are lidded, blinking slow and he notices the tears in your eyes. He moves his hand to soothe against your cheek, worried for only a second until you offer him a weak smile to ease the concern on his face. And something about you feeling so good that you’re about to cry nearly makes him explode.

He lets go of your legs, feeling the warmth of your skin when you wrap them around his waist. Moving to kiss you, his hips continue to smack against you, the sounds of your wetness putting on a show. Your nails dig pretty little crescent moons into his large biceps, and you clench around him as you start to shatter. “Gonna cum on my cock, sweet baby? Huh?”

Your eyes nearly roll back in your head, his pace quickening when you nod, clinging to him. “Bren—”

“I know, bunny. I know.” He coos, smoothing your hair back. “Cum for me. Cum on my cock.”

You arch against him, body feeling like it’s suddenly shattered into a million tiny pieces. Hot tears rolling down the side of your face as you let out a long, broken whine. Vision blurring and hands clawing.

“There it is.” He drawls his words out, tone full of praise and admiration as he continues to slam into you, chasing his own high that’s burning through the pit of his stomach. “Yeah, Good fucking girl.”

You’re wrecked, absolutely spent as you cling to him, pulling him in for a long kiss, tongues thrashing.

“Where—” He starts to mumble, the rhythm of his thrusts growing messy.

You cut him off immediately, whimpering against his lips. “Inside.” You breathe. “Inside please, I’m on the pill.”

He groans, letting you hold him as he offers one more particularly hard thrust before he stills, fully burying himself deep inside, the warmth of him filling you. The sound he makes is otherworldly, a broken sounding growl. “Fuck, baby.” He whispers, staying buried in you as you both fight for air.

He lays there for a moment, skin sticking to your own. Breathing ragged. Then he presses one more sweet kiss to your lips before he slowly removes himself, exhaustion filling him as he heads for the bathroom, returning a few moments later with a damp rag. And he cleans you softly, the sight of it tugging at your heart. It’s so simple but it means so much.

“Go pee.” He nudges you next, the command swimming around your head.

With weak knees, you ease up and follow him into the bathroom.

You freshen up alongside him, neither of you speaking but rather finding comfort in each others presence alone.

And when you’re wrapped up in him again moments later, legs brushing along his as you settle beneath the cool sheets, you’re smiling. Smiling up at him, as sweet as honey.

“You alright?” He checks, hoping your head wasn’t bothering you again.

“I’m fine.” You assure him. “In fact, I think you healed me.”

“Oh, whatever.” He chuckles, pulling you closer.

It’s four days later when you see Park again. This time though, he’s marching into the ED for a consult. You were standing at the nurses station, and manage to spare him a quick glance before he disappears into Trauma 2. You’d spoken everyday, mostly by text. He’d promised to cook you dinner tonight, as it was the last day of a 3 day stretch. A proper date, he called it. He’d brought up a fancy steakhouse downtown, but you’d much rather watch him cook and share a glass of wine in his kitchen. Just be alone with him. He gladly agreed, assuring you that the day would go by quickly. That however, had not been the case.

The ED had been slammed, and though that usually makes for a quick day, maybe the anticipation eating at you had turned it into the opposite.

You speak briefly to Dana about the patient in South 16 that you’d just finished up suturing, and when you turn to round the counter again to check on another patient, you’re face to face with Park.

He’s sporting his typical intimidating demeanor, but you see right through it. For the sake of the rumor mill you know the ED can be, you offer him only a quick casual smile. “How’s your head?” He asks, voice low. And ofcourse, his extended presence has already conjured a few questioning glances.

“It’s fine.” You squeak. “Bruise looks more nasty than ever, though.” His eyes meet the mark, and it’s definitely gnarly. Yellowing and splotchy. But that’s normal for healing.

“It’ll get better.” He hums, his lips threatening to turn up into a smile but he fights it. One hand reaches up to tug playfully at the end of your messy braid, and then he’s turning to head back toward the elevators, leaving you biting your lip— cheeks rosy.

You blink, snapping back to reality and noticing far too many eyes on you as you start to walk towards your next patient in Central 14. Heart pounding in your chest as you scurry out of sight.

Dana stands still, having seen the entire exchange, and she’s nearly shook to her core. Surely not… She hadn’t worked with you much, as you were usually on nights, but she would’ve heard about this right? The infamous, brooding Park— and a sweet little ED nurse?

Robby slaps a hand against her shoulder, making her jump a little.

“I might be mistaken.” He starts, eyeing Dana. “But I think someone tamed the Shark.”

[captainfern]

Please please please Aerion smut where its a jousting tourney and he sees you (a Lords daughter) give your favor to a knight going up against him, he beats the shit out of said knight, steals your favor from the ground and steals your favor from the bested knights lance like an insane person. Finding you after and confronting you about why you gave favor to someone else

he is insane for you like actually

Knights Earn, Dragons Take

Aerion Targaryen x noblewoman!reader

✿ aerion is obsessed with you, so when you give your favour to another knight, he has to take matters into his own hands and show you who you belong to (or, aerion steals your favour from another knight and fucks you) ✿ 18+ ✿ wc: 6.6k ✿ cw: fem!reader, no y/n and reader is an undefined baddie, SMUT, a smidge of plot, unprotected piv, light breeding, fingering, oral (f!receiving), one (1) pussy slap, pussy pronouns, praise, light degradation but not a lot bc he’s obsessed with you, aerion being himself but also maybe slightly ooc, possessive!aerion, threats of violence so maybe not that ooc, tourney violence, strong language, reader is from an unnamed but influential House with non-specific colours, mention of reader having older brothers but her father is a girl dad and reader can do no wrong lol

You have always drawn eyes.

Beautiful, intelligent, the perfect lady. You were admired by commonfolk and nobles alike for your amicability and wit. Your lord father was a loyal ally to the great House Targaryen and a valiant support during the Blackfyre Rebellion, not to mention a loud and magnetic personality. His parties and tourneys drew thousands from across Westeros—even luring nobles and merchants alike from across the Narrow Sea.

Similar has happened today as you watch with bated breath, your ringed fingers interlinked upon your lap, as a pair of lordlings clash in a flurry of splintered wood from your position in your noble pavilion. Your father roars his approval, cheering loudly as one poor knight topples from his horse, a jagged shard of lance protruding from a joint near his shoulder in his plated armour. You can’t help but cup your hand to your mouth, watching as the poor felled knight is dragged from the tiltyard.

Your lord father takes a deep sip from his goblet, resplendent in the midday sun. He is draped in the colours of your House, as are you, with jewels strung around your neck and wrists, decorated like a shrine. He turns to you, wine still glossy on his lips as he eyes your uneasy expression which does little to match the glittering of your jewellery. You’re now fidgeting with a wreath of flowers, an intricately woven ring of heartseases, carnations and lilies, finished with ribbons of your House’s colours.

“What is troubling you, my dear?” Your father asks, reaching across to place a gentle hand atop your own, the metal of his rings cool against your knuckles.

You exhale and then give him a meek smile. “Nothing, father. I apologise—”

“You are my daughter. Do you believe I do not know when you are lying?” Your father interrupts, giving you a pointed look.

Embarrassment claws within your chest as you drown out the cheers from the large crowd beyond the pavilion, realising that there are likely to be dozens of eyes glued to you. You calm yourself, ensuring your face remains as passive as possible, but you can feel the slightest tremble in your lower lip.

“I—what if I do not wish to give my favour away?” You say, fingers brushing the beautiful wreath in your lap. “I see no point in—”

Your father interrupts you again with a smooth and rather diplomatic confidence you’re sure he uses with everyone he speaks to. It usually gets him what he wants, and paired with the irreverent glimmer in his eyes, you realise why he and Lyonel Baratheon get along so well.

“Do not view this as giving your favour away,” he says carefully, drumming his fingers against your hand as he speaks. “View it as lending your favour to a poor, desperate lad who wishes to impress you. You are helping the needy, which all ladies care to do, do they not?”

You can’t help but scoff, your father battering his eyelashes in an attempt to make you smile with his humoured tone.

“These men are not needy. They are knights,” you reply.

“Ah, but they are still men,” your father utters, withdrawing his hand to pick up his goblet and take another drink. He tips his goblet in your direction before he drinks. “And all men, no matter their strength or their status, are needy when chasing the favour of a lady.”

You mull over your father’s words for a while as he gets to his feet and shuffles towards the entrance to the pavilion. You hear him speaking to someone, you hear the thunderous cacophony of the crowd, the stamping of hooves, the blaring of bugles. And you’re not sure how much time passes before you hear a beckoning call of your name. You look to your side, placing your flowered wreath upon an adjacent pedestal, and see that your father is welcoming a pair of men into your pavilion dressed in black and red.

Your heart stammers in your chest as you hurry to your feet, Baelor and Maekar Targaryen appraising you as you drop into a perfected curtsy.

“Seven blessings,” you utter, tone light and airy, your flower-sweet perfume lingering around you as you dip.

Your father introduces you, a beaming smile split across his face, both by name and a proud declaration, “my little dove, my pride and joy.”

Humour sparkles in Baelor’s eyes as he turns back to your father, settling onto a chair on his other side. “You have sons, do you not?”

Your father lets out an annoyed puff at the mention of his sons, then shakes his head as he sinks back into his own seat, Maekar settling with a grunt on the other side of his brother. “My sons are… spirited. My daughter, however, is perfect.”

Something like relatability crosses across Maekar’s face, the subtle hint of a smile as warmth grows in your chest. He’s put you on a pedestal with his praise, and now you can feel even more eyes on you as you settle back into your seat.

—✿—

Across the tiltyard, Aerion Targaryen watches you from the flap of his tent as servants and smiths attend to his intricately plated armour. His violet eyes trace the lines of your face from afar, the curves of your body beneath your dress and skirts as you sit, mostly obscured by the low walls of the raised pavilion. He watches the way you join politely into conversation with your father, his uncle and his father, and he can imagine that you’re saying all the right things. That pretty little mouth of yours would say all the right things, wouldn’t it? Would it plead and beg sweetly too?

“My prince,” some kind of servant says hesitantly as he approaches, cloaked in the colours of your noble House. “Your mount is ready.”

Aerion acknowledges him for the briefest of moments with a bored look, before his eyes find you once more. Your father and Baelor are laughing at something you’ve said, and you dip your head like the polite lady you are to hide most of your smile. He sees, too, the cute little wreath you are now toying with, and he realises, with something sick and sharp building in his gut, that it would look perfect around his lance.

With purpose, the prince strides away from his tent, finding his steed at the edge of the tiltyard. Servants help him into the saddle, before he’s securing his feet into the stirrups and urging his warhorse forward through the sawdust-thickened mud of the tourney grounds. Another knight, already arranged against him at the ruling of your father—“It is my tourney, in honour of my nameday, so I can do as I please,” the lord had announced—canters towards the pavilion.

Aerion pulls his horse to a stop as he watches with narrowed eyes as the knight—a knight from somewhere in the Reach, he thinks he remembers—requests your favour. Or at least, Aerion assumes he does, for he cannot hear anything over the angry rush of blood in his ears as jealousy rips raw through his chest.

You bow your head and rise to the edge of the pavilion, and gods, you look a dream—the material of your skirts flowing around you as you dip, the curve of your breasts and neck on full display as you slip your wreath onto the knight’s lance. Aerion faintly hears the roar of the crowd as the Reach knight says something to you that makes you beam, your smile splitting widely across your face as your father claps.

Then, the knight takes your hand in his and fucking kisses it. Plants a gentle kiss to the back of it before he’s turning his horse away with a triumphant smirk.

Aerion is seething. Anger boils hot inside him, and with an angry, too-hard thrust of his hips, he urges his horse towards the knight, and the pair meet in the middle of the field for a brief moment. Aerion’s eyes drop to the wreath around the knight’s lance, his jaw flexing, violet eyes flashing with an unbridled fury that has him wishing he could drive his lance through the other man’s throat.

Maybe he will.

“It seems the lady has given me her favour,” the Reach knight says with a sickening smile that makes Aerion want to punch him in the face. “Best of luck, for I intend to honour her virtue greatly and de-horse a dragon today.”

Aerion scoffs. “You impudent little rat. If I do not kill you today, I will slit your throat on the morrow for use of such words.”

The Reach nobleman does not look put-off in the slightest, which, admittedly, takes Aerion by surprise. The knight simply smiles and then pulls down his visor, cantering back to the edge of the tiltyard, leaving Aerion alone in the middle, swamped suddenly by the sounds of a jeering crowd of commonfolk. Anger burns in his veins as he turns with a curse, trotting back to where his squire awaits him, his lance primed and ready.

He’s going to kill that fucking knight. And then he’s going to have you.

—✿—

You watch the knights ready themselves as the trumpeting of bugles pierce the clamour of the crowd. Your fingers are crossed against your lap as you watch the young knight you had bestowed your favour on roll his shoulders and clutch his lance and shield, ready. Your father offers you a side-long glance.

“Are you happy now, my dear?”

You don’t turn your head to speak with him, eyes on the tiltyard. You can’t help the way they fall from your favoured knight to the opposing side, where the imposing Prince Aerion is being handed his shield and lance. “Happy may be too strong of a word.”

Your father chuckles. “Well, these men are certainly needy for your favour.”

You huff. “Yes, as you have said.”

“Yes, but I failed to mention,” your father begins, clearing his throat. “That when a needy man does not earn a lady’s favour, well…”

Your stomach squeezes tightly as you watch the dangerously beautiful face of Prince Aerion vanish behind his helm as he shuts his visor with a rough hand.

Your father shakes his head, chuckling again. “They become quite dangerous.”

With a blare of a horn and a surge of noise from the crowd, both knights take off galloping towards one another. You grip the arms of your chair, watching with your heart in your throat as they get closer and closer, lances poised, before they clash—wood chips flying, metal grinding on metal.

You gasp when Aerion forces his lance through the Reach knight’s shield, shattering it completely. The end of the other knight’s lance makes impact with Aerion’s shield, but the now-jagged tip of Aerion’s lance drives through a gap in his plated armour. You hear the Reach knight let out a sharp shout of pain as the lance drives into the flesh beneath his armpit, and he tips sideways off of his horse.

“What a charge!” Your father remarks to Baelor and Maekar, the three men watching, transfixed, as the Reach knight’s horse gallops away and Aerion whirls his around, hounding for a second run.

The black steed takes off again, and Aerion dips his lance low, much to the detest of the crowd, who jeer and curse and throw stones, as Aerion’s lance lands a decisive blow to the staggering nobleman’s armoured back. He is thrown forward into the mud, winded, piece of wood protruding from his side.

You raise a hand to your mouth as you watch Aerion dismount his horse, dragging the tip of his lance through the mud. He’s not stopping, you realise, as he stomps through the muck to kick the fallen knight onto his back. Then, tossing his lance aside, he brings two hands to his shield and slams the heavy base of it down atop the knight’s helm, the visor denting with the impact. Aerion brings the shield down again, and you find yourself shooting a hand out to grip onto your father’s.

Sensing your concern, your father nods to a man near the edge of the pavilion. The man quickly blows into his bugle, and relief washes over you as Aerion, body heaving, pulls away from the unmoving knight. However, terror quickly seizes you when the prince stalks a few feet away to pick the fallen knight’s shattered lance from the ground. He snatches the favour—your favour—from the broken lance and then lifts his visor.

His eyes find yours as he clutches your favour, bringing it to his chest as he stares up at you. The crowd shouts at him, but he ignores them. You can see the way he ignores them, eyes transfixed on you, the dainty garland engulfed by his hand, crushed in a vice-like grip.

You continue to hold onto your father, who angles his head to whisper to you, “See, my dear? Dangerous.”

—✿—

That evening, you successfully manage to avoid Aerion by locking yourself away in your chambers, informing your father that you feel unwell and intend to retire early. Of course, he knew you were lying, but noticing the dullness in your eyes and the unease that seemed to seep from your pores, he let you go with a kiss to your forehead. Now, as the sun sinks beyond the horizon, and your father and the visitors dine across the castle, you light the candles around your chambers until the room is bathed in a soft, golden light, shadows flickering against the wall. You calmed yourself with a bath, and now sit before the fireplace in your soft linen chemise, a book in your lap.

The flames light the pages well and warm the bare skin of your arms and legs.

The quiet is punctuated, however, by a sharp knock on your door. It is much too forceful to be one of your servants, and for the briefest of moments, you wonder if one of your guards has something to ask of you. You pad towards the door, standing just behind it as you unbolt it and open it a crack.

“Open up, little dove,” Aerion utters, and you yelp in fright as his strong fingers curl around the edge of the door and shove inwards.

You jump back, heart in your throat, as he enters your chambers, violet eyes alight and reflecting the flickering flames of the fire and surrounding candles.

He looks you up and down, the point of his tongue running along his bottom lip. “You’ve been avoiding me.”

You shake your head, hugging your arms around your body. The heat of his gaze burns through the thin material of your chemise, and despite the trepidation rooting deep in your gut, something warm gathers at the base of your womb, your nipples hardening.

“No,” you whisper. “No, my prince, I’ve just—”

“I won your favour,” he interrupts you quickly, stalking forward after slamming—and bolting—the door shut. “And you’ve been hiding from me.”

Some semblance of courage seizes you in that moment as you remember what your father had told you. You lift your chin a little as he crosses the room, predatory like a lion. Or perhaps a dragon.

“You did not win my favour,” you hiss at him, but you find yourself backing up in response to his movements. “You stole it. No proper knight would steal another’s favour.”

A dark smile splits across his serpentine features as he creeps closer to you. He wears his House colours, blacks and blood-reds, his tunic and doublet dark and fitting against his strong chest and lean torso. The pale skin of his hands and throat are a stark contrast.

“It was always supposed to be mine, little dove, whether you knew it then or not,” Aerion says, stopping only when your back hits one of the wooden posts of your canopy bed. “I simply saw an opportunity to take it back.”

You scoffed, but it came out more as a breathless sigh. “Knights do not—”

“No, they do not,” Aerion whispers, stepping forward once more to pin you to the post, his chest flush to yours. One of his hands seizes your chin, forcing you to look at him, and your hands fly out to rest against his forearm. You don’t push him away. He continues, “Knights earn, my sweet girl, but dragons take, don’t they?”

“I…” You can’t speak, your tongue heavy in your mouth as he maintains eye contact. Your body heats beneath your chemise, blood honey-thick in your veins as you attempt to form a sentence, but your words fail you.

“I am a prince of the realm, blood of the dragon,” he mutters, trailing a finger across your jaw, up along your cheek before cupping your face. The press of his rings are cold to your heated skin. Your lips part, a feather-light sigh escaping you. “And I will take whatever I want. Do you understand me?”

You find yourself nodding, the warmth of his body against yours pulling something tight in the base of your tummy. Your hands squeeze at his forearm, feeling the soft skin and the sparse blond hair there. No scales, no fire.

“So, from this moment forward, you will not grant your favour to anyone but me,” he tells you, hand back on your jaw. He grips you tightly, and a meek yelp leaves you, his hold bruising, the back of your head knocking lightly on the wooden post. “And if you do, I will sever the head of whomever is brash enough to seek your favour, and mount it to the post of your bed for you to look at whilst I fuck you. Do you understand, or shall I repeat myself?”

“I understand,” you say quickly, voice squeaky with both fear and the restriction of your jawbone. “I understand, my prince.”

Aerion approves, for his eyes flash brightly and a purr escapes his chest as he dips forward and presses his lips to the corner of your mouth. It is soft, tender, and he trails his mouth over the curve of your jaw and down onto the slope of your neck. His other hand rubs over your hip, and your breath hitches in your chest as his hand smooths down your front. It trails over the material covering your mound, before slinking beneath the short hem and brushing against the airy linen of your smallclothes.

The heat of his fingers and the gentleness of his touch has your hips bucking involuntarily, eyelids fluttering as he sucks at your pulse which thrums heavily in your jugular.

“I’ve heard whispers about the sweet little dove that nests within this castle’s walls,” Aerion breathes against you. The coarse pads of his fingers press against your clothed core and a quiet sigh is coaxed from your chest. “I never imagined she’d be such a good girl—such a good listener.”

He rubs two fingers back and forth over your clothed slit, the gusset of your smallclothes growing damp with your slick. The heat of your core against his fingers makes him groan into your neck, his sharp teeth skimming your sensitive skin as he sucks at the junction of your neck and shoulder. 

You hold on to his forearm as it rocks with the movements of his hand, but you should be wrenching him away, cursing and screaming and begging for your guards to seize him, to haul him away for attempting to corrupt your virtue. But you don’t. Your brain is fuzzy, your heartbeat heavy in your core, nipples catching on the linen of your chemise and brushing against his doublet. You can’t believe how your fear has turned into lust as the Targaryen prince works two of his fingers against you, his lips suckling at your neck while he grips your jaw tightly still.

The hands you have on his forearm trail up, caressing the bare skin, then dancing across the sleeve of his tunic. He groans against you at your touch as you wind your fingers over his shoulder, then flatten across his chest, caressing his pectorals beneath the padded doublet. His mouth withdraws as he pants against the curve of your shoulder, one of your hands threading along the back of his neck, nails scraping through the short hair that grows at his nape. You grab a fistful, stroking his scalp, before tightening your fingers and tugging gently.

Aerion pulls back and growls, then slams his mouth to yours. The kiss is harsh, more teeth and tongue than anything you’ve ever experienced, his lips burning hot against yours. The fingers he pushes against your clothed slit dip against the fabric, pressing against the puffy bud of your clit, pinching before rubbing a heavy circle. It makes you stutter out a moan against his mouth, which he uses to curl his tongue against you deeper, sliding across your teeth. He tastes of wine and ash, and something metallic, the richness of blood on his snake-like tongue. A sound of deep pleasure, a loutish grunt from the back of his throat, knocks against your teeth as he kisses you, the hand he has on your jaw forcing you to be completely pliant beneath him.

Aerion pulls back after a long moment, pressing a wet, saliva-slick kiss to the corner of your mouth once more before speaking lowly into your ear, “Are you going to be good for me, little dove? Are you going to give me what I want?”

“Yes,” you whisper, pleasure a firm knot in the base of your belly already as he continues to slide his fingers back and forth against you, the fabric of your smallclothes soaked through, tacky against your folds.

The prince tuts at you, his fingers vanishing from your core. You whimper at the rush of cool air that hits you, but he quickly closes the space when he taps four fingers roughly against you—a measured smack against your covered cunt, which rips an embarrassingly loud moan from your chest, head falling back against the post.

“You are a lady,” Aerion chastises you whilst he acts more unlike a prince than any nobleman you’ve ever met. His palm cups your core now, soothing the dull ache caused by the smack. “Answer nicely.”

You pant, eyes watering as you meet his, lips swollen from the force of his kiss. “I–I’ll be good, my prince. I’ll be good for you.”

He smiles. “Of course you will.”

Then, his palm shifts, two fingers looping through the band of your smallclothes and tugging. The material all but tears as he pulls it down your legs with such aggression it makes your hips buck. Your slick cunt is bared to the tepid air of your room, the fireplace dwindling now, and you squeeze your thighs together as you kick your undergarments away. His other hand leaves your face to join his other in pulling your chemise over your head, tearing it away from you and tossing it across the room. It disappears into the shadows and you’re left bare before him.

He groans at the sight, eyes dropping to where he kicks your legs apart with his foot, trailing his hand over your mound and dipping into the silken wet heat of your folds. Fingers slide over your puffy clit, and he groans again at the way your body jolts against him. His other hand squeezes one of your breasts tightly beneath strong fingers, nipple crushed beneath his palm, making you moan.

“Oh, my poor girl, you’re soaked,” Aerion whispers, almost in disbelief, as he runs two fingers through your slit, gathering slick between your folds. “Pretty little pussy’s drooling for her prince, isn’t she?”

His middle and ring finger find your hole, slick and warm and too empty. You huff out something that sounds like his name, but the syllables are lost as the pads of his fingers trace circles around you. You lean your head back, baring your throat to him, allowing him to swoop down and attach his mouth to a soft patch along the column of your trachea. As he does this, he—with surprising restraint—works the blunt tips of his fingers past the entrance of your cunt. He pushes, and pushes still, until your silken walls open around the intrusion, the bump of his knuckles rubbing against your posterior wall, sending electric shocks into your womb.

“She’s taking me so well,” Aerion lifts his head to utter against your cheek, and he nearly smiles when he feels how hot you are there.

He curls his fingers and presses further until the top of his palm rests against you. Quickly, he retracts his fingers before plunging them back into you, and the wet squelch that fills the space between you makes you suck in a breath, ears ringing. 

The prince hums darkly, kissing your cheek. “Oh, she’s mouthy too, is she? Pussy’s got something to say?”

He repeats the movements, the wet plap-plap-plap of his fingers rutting into you, and his palm hitting your wet folds, makes his cock twitch painfully in his breeches. You whine out, embarrassed, pleasure as heavy as an anvil in the base of your stomach, Valyrian steel threatening to sever the cord of tension that withheld your release.

“Please,” you find yourself begging as your hands grip his shoulders. The contrast of Aerion being completely clothed while you stand before him, naked with slick dribbling down your inner thighs, has a sort of drunkenness washing over you.

His other hand, kneading your breasts still, shoots up to slap a palm across your mouth as he works his fingers in and out, pace quick and unrelenting. He angles his head down to watch where his forearm flexes as he shoves his fingers into you—he pulls out, lines up to add a third, and then forces them in, and the stretch makes you yowl against his palm.

“Easy, little dove,” he utters, pulling his fingers away only to hike one of your legs around his hip, giving him a deeper angle to drive his fingers back into you. Three fingers stretch you open and curl deep inside you, pressing against the gummy spot inside that forces a tremor through you. You moan against his hand, breath coming in quick pants, eyelids fluttering as he fucks his fingers into your cunt. 

The pace is animalistic, rushed. Aerion grunts as his arm works, the other gripping the lower portion of your face so he can listen to the way your pussy takes him. He can feel dribbles of slick running down his wrist, smearing across your inner thighs. Your walls clench him tightly as he nails the best spot inside you, and he marvels in the way your leg trembles against his hip, your nails digging into the thick material at his shoulders as he urges you towards release.

You say something against his palm, but it is muffled. He wrenches his hand away and finally looks at your face as you manage to puff out, “M’gonna… come…”

Aerion pulls his fingers from you, your pussy clenching around nothing. You curse loudly, and then moan his name, eyes springing open when he drops your leg. He hides his smile as he sinks to his knees before you, hands grasping the doughy flesh of your inner thighs to spread your legs. His head slots between them, and he exhales a forceful blow onto your soaked cunt. The air makes you keen, hand shooting out to grasp his hair.

“Gods, just look at her,” he voices from below you, hands moving across your thighs. His thumbs find your folds and he spreads you open for him, slick webbing between them. The feeling makes you whine—and then the feeling of his tongue, pointed and firm, curling into your hole has you whining even louder.

The narrow slope of his nose rubs perfectly against your puffy clit as he works his tongue inside you, curling between your walls, slick and warm. His hand is wet against you as he holds you open for him, a series of soft, dragon-like huffs suffocated in the heat of your pussy as his tongue coils inside you.

The stretched cord of your release is pulling taut in your abdomen once more, and you find yourself rocking your hips against his face in chase of it. Pursuing a hare through the long grass, adrenaline mounting, hound’s teeth closing in.

“My prince,” you whine, hips twitching. “Gods, I’m going to—ah—”

He hums against you and the cord in your lower belly snaps and splinters inside you. Your orgasm racks through you, pleasure white-hot in your chest and womb, spreading through your veins as your pussy clenches around his tongue. You moan his title loudly, pelvis stuttering against the rigid lines of his face as he works you through your release. Your hole spasms around his tongue, clit thrumming with your heartbeat.

He hums again when some of your release dribbles down from the corners of his mouth, running down his chin, and when he pulls away, a string connects his lips to you. It snaps when he runs his tongue over his lips, sitting back on his haunches to admire the glossiness of your pussy and the way your hole clenches around nothing.

“Pretty girl…” Aerion muses, leaning forward to press one last kiss to your clit before getting to his feet.

His cock is painfully hard, pressing against his breeches and the seam of his trousers. Grinding his hips against your pelvis, Aerion drags his hands up your sides, caressing you softly, before placing them either side of your face. He kisses you, lips slick atop yours. A sinful thrill runs up your spine as you taste the faint musk of yourself on his tongue, an earthy-sweet ichor that Aerion will fist himself to the memory of for months to come.

“Your favour is mine,” the prince says against you, before the warmth of his mouth disappears and he’s spinning you around. Still fully-clothed, he pushes his body against your back, keeping you warm. “You are mine.”

You suck in a breath as one of his hands brands you between the shoulder-blades, rings biting against the skin as he forces you to bend. You curl over the end of your bed until your chest presses flat to the sheets, your arse bare against the tent in his trousers. You breathe out an “o-oh fuuuck” as he grinds his clothed cock—the imprint thick against the cleft of your arse—in firm, teasing thrusts.

After quickly ripping his doublet from his body, suddenly too hot, Aerion keeps one hand to your upper back, pinning you to the bed while his other works in unfastening the ties and clasps of his trousers. He nudges your legs wider apart with his feet as his trousers loosen finally, and he can dip his hand into his breeches, shucking them down enough to fish his cock out. He hisses quietly behind you as he fists himself, tip red and ruddy, beads of precum wetting the slit. He chokes on a groan when one slips down his frenulum and along a prominent vein on the underside.

“Gods, little dove, what are you doing to me?” Aerion groans, angling his hips forward to drag the head of his cock down the split of your arse before tapping it against your pussy. He spreads your folds with the blood-flushed tip as you mewl out, incapable of giving him a properly-worded answer.

He chuckles at that, and you are surprised when he bends to press a line of kisses down your sweat-dampened spine. You arch for him as he tongues the dip at the base of your spine, teeth nipping at the skin.

“So good for me,” he breathes against you, and groans as he pulls back to stand a bit straighter.

Still grasping the base of his cock, he runs the head up and down your folds once more, pressing firmly to your clit—“there we go, this sweet girl gets a little kiss,” he says under his breath—before he lines up at your entrance. He says louder, “I deserve this, little dove. This is my prize.”

And then he’s thrusting into you in one deft movement. Your eyes roll, fingers gripping the sheets as you cry out, an echoing moan causing the flames of nearby candles to flicker. An animalistic growl tears from Aerion’s chest as he buries himself to the hilt inside you, the silken walls of your cunt moulding like clay around him. The ridges of his cock slide against you just right, and the prince grips your hip and glues you to him.

“Fuck, fuck, you’re so tight,” Aerion grits out, canines gnashing as he bites down the pleasure crawling up his diaphragm.

“Please,” you call out to him, cheek to the sheets, a tear slipping from the corner of your eye. “Please, my prince, please move.”

Aerion grunts, but doesn’t chastise your begging. Instead, he does what you ask of him, withdrawing until the head of his cock is just nestled inside you, before rutting back in. You whimper out a pathetically meek string of gasps—“ah–ah–ah,”—as he sets a pace, his hips smacking against your arse, the fat rippling. He grunts and groans, the sounds have your pussy tightening along with his movements.

He keeps you anchored to the bed. The hand between your shoulder blades is strong and unmoving, and the hand on your hip clenches around the softness there with a vice-like grip, forcing your arse back onto him as he moves. The pace is quick and rough, packed full of desperation as he stuffs your wet cunt over and over. His cock stretches you open, splits you apart, curls up towards the plug of your womb. Desperation is translated through the way his deep grunts end with the lightest lilt, a slight whimper at the end.

All men are needy when chasing the favour of a lady.

“Hgnh—fuck, come on, sweet girl, that’s it. Y-yeah, that’s it, stay just like that,” Aerion mutters, rambling as his eyelids droop low, sweat beading high on his forehead and at the hair on his temples.

You can’t do much but bend and take it, cock filling you perfectly, the angle driving him deep against a spongey spot inside you that punches whimper after whimper from your throat. He groans when your back arches further for him. “That’s my good girl, that’s my girl—pretty little dove taking my cock like a dirty fucking whore.”

You moan in response, clit pulsing and body starting to shake. You tremble against the sheets of your bed, pleasure building like the rush of water beneath your skin. Rising and rising, suffocating you as the head of his cock drives you closer and closer to release.

Aerion knows you’re close.

“I know, sweet girl, oh, I know,” he coos down at you, caressing your back as he plows into you from behind. The bed creaks with the force, the sheets bunching beneath you. “Let me feel you. Give me your favour, little dove.”

The ball of tension in your belly grows tighter and tighter as your body grows hotter and hotter. Small moans of his name fall from your lips. Not his title, but his name. He doesn’t reprimand you for it, too obsessed with your soaked cunt wrapped tight around his cock, but he’ll be sure to scold you later. For now, he maintains his pace, watching the way your hips bounce against his pelvis, sweat still building in a light sheen along your spine.

“Aerion.” Then, with a realm-shattering moan, you come around him, legs locking up tightly, fists clenching the sheets.

Your eyes snap shut as stars burst behind them, your second orgasm crashing over you. Your lower belly pulls taut, pussy clenching around his cock as the pleasure crests, and Aerion takes it with a groan of your name, pace faltering slightly as he pushes deeper into you.

You’re boneless against the bed now as the prince uses you, his cock twitching, thrusts becoming shallower. He’s rutting into you, humping the curve of your arse, cock barely leaving the drooling sheath of your cunt as his high rears like a hissing serpent inside him.

Knights earn, dragons take.

Aerion groans your name, collapsing half-way on top of you, the hand on your back moving to the side of your head to hold himself up as he grinds his cock into you.

“I’m going to spill inside of you,” he mumbles, tongue flicking out to wet his lips. “Yeah, m’going to fill you, little dove. Fill this pretty pussy with my seed. Every—uh, fuck—everyone’ll know who you belong to i-if you’re round with my babe.”

You whine, screwing your eyes shut, overstimulation leaking into your gut like molasses, but you know he’s not going to last. You can feel his cock jerking inside you with each sloppy thrust.

“Uh-uh, none of that, m’lady,” Aerion murmurs, words drawing together now: pussy-drunk. “You’re mine—your favour is mine. You belong to the dragon.”

Then, with one last growl of your name between clenched teeth, Aerion comes inside of you, release filling you in hot ropes as his cock twitches. He’s buried to the hilt, a wanton groan leaving his lips as the warm walls of your pussy milk him, take him. The heat that fills you, the sensation of growing full, makes you hum out a pleased moan.

Slowly, the prince pulls his softening cock out of you and wipes his shaft along your arse cheek. The stickiness makes you huff out at him, and he laughs as he tucks himself back into his breeches, drawing his trousers back up.

His seed leaks out of you as you attempt to pull yourself onto your bed, turning to lay on your back and watch as he retrieves his doublet from the floor and begins pulling it over his head. You didn’t expect aftercare, but the absence of his warm body against you makes your heart contract beneath your ribcage.

Aerion notices the brief expression of discontent that passes over your face. He rolls his eyes, smoothing his hands through his hair, clearing the strands that stick to his skin with sweat.

“I left your father’s feast for this,” he says, bending down and placing his arms either side of you. He cages you against the bed, nose brushing yours. “I will finish my meal and make your father happy, and then I will return and fuck you to sleep.”

The prince presses one last lingering kiss to your mouth, a surprisingly sweet gesture, before he retreats and heads for the door. He unbolts it and looks back over his shoulder, watching as you reach blindly for your chemise, limbs pleasure-lax, eyes tired. He sighs loudly, stalking back across the room and scooping your chemise from the floor. Pale fingers snap around your wrist and he pulls you into a sitting position.

“Arms up,” he orders, and you do as you’re told. He shoves the chemise roughly down your arms and then over your head. His fingers brush your softening nipples as he lays the fabric back over you. He shakes his head as you blink up at him like a doe. He grumbles, “Pathetic.”

But you’re sure he doesn’t really mean it, especially when he cups your cheek and caresses your cheekbone for a fleeting moment, before he’s heading back towards the door. He opens it and vanishes without a look back, closing it with a firm slam. But even with his abrupt exit, you can’t help but smile as you sink beneath your sheets, his seed and your slick leaking out between your thighs.

All men, no matter their strength or their status, are needy when chasing the favour of a lady.

———

is he obsessed with you? yes. is he going to give you aftercare after you gave his your favour to someone else? no. he’s moody like that smh

[andrewmiinyard]

— heat.

jack abbot x fem!reader

summary: a little harmless flirting never hurt anyone, right? you've been on jack abbot's mind a little too often lately and he's starting to suspect the feeling is mutual. after a late night out at the bar, you're determined to show him just how mutual that feeling is.

content/warnings: age gap, inappropriate work crushes, i don't even bother pretending like i know how a hospital works, jealous!jack, masturbation mentions, garsantos crumbs, alcohol consumption, smoking cigarettes, reader wears a dress/heels/make up, soft dom!jack, dirty talk (jack's got a filthy mouth), kinda degradation if u squint, praise, oral (f + m receiving), jack abbot is a munch duh, fingering, unprotected piv, some breath play, cream pie? NSFW + MDNI! 18+ ONLY!

wc: 7.5k (got away from me lol)

notes: this is like the first proper thing i've written in several years and probably my first real smut ever, but i couldn't stop thinking about jack abbot's tits. purely self indulgent because i know for a fact that he talks you through it lol he's just so yummy. enjoy my old man brain rot

credit: gif taken from this set by ho-ii :)

—

Jack hasn’t been able to focus since you joined the night shift.

You seem to be everywhere. Ever since that first day, he hasn’t been able to shake you. Any corner he turns, every trauma room he enters, there you are. Even when he can’t see you, you still haunt him. He picks up the faint smell of your shampoo, sometimes. Hears your laughter ringing somewhere in the halls and can't help but turn his head towards it.

It’s worse when you’re next to him. You’re great at what you do, there's no denying that. But it's been difficult to work alongside you, elbows and arms brushing while you crowd over whatever patient is bleeding out on the table in front of him. His brain just can't keep up, sometimes. Not with the warmth of your body next to his. Commands come out a little slower than usual. He hesitates for a second longer than he usually does.

However, it's the worst when you’re batting your eyelashes at him when you finally have a moment of downtime. Handing him some coffee from the break room, letting your fingers linger on his for just a beat too long. Casually laying a hand on his bicep when you talk to him, leaving him tingling for an embarrassing amount of time after you leave. He knows exactly what you’re doing. That you know exactly what it does to him. He’s got scars older than you, but that doesn't stop his gaze from following you as you flit around the ER. And he knows you feel it. You’re real young, you’re real fucking pretty and you’re real fucking capable.

Which is why it feels like a cruel joke that you’re always flirting with him. Especially since he’s pretty sure you’d never actually see him in the way that he sees you. Honestly, it makes this inconvenient attraction he has towards you all the more complicated. Jack can't help but notice the way you chew your lip when you’re deep into charting. The curve of your neck when you adjust your hair. When you look up at him with those big eyes, just eagerly waiting for him to tell you what to do next.

Fuck, he’s hard just thinking about it.

His thoughts always wander in that direction when it comes to you. He finds himself at home, thinking of the way that you looked at him earlier in the day or when you swept a slow thumb over your bottom lip absentmindedly, lost in thought. Jack feels filthy when he thinks of you like this, but he still can't help but palm himself through his pants when the thoughts come. Which is more often than he'd like to admit.

When he thinks of you outside of that, however, he’s not entirely sure how he feels. It’s more than just something carnal. He wants to take care of you. And he does, sometimes. Leaves a protein bar by your hand when he hears you complain about how hungry you are, and steps in when patients start being rowdy or handsy with you. 

It’s an entirely different feeling while he watches a doctor get handsy with you instead.

It's the early hours of the morning, and the day shift has started to trickle in. It was always interesting, crossing paths with them. The night shift attracted a certain kind of person. Someone who prefers working under the cover of darkness. Jack noticed that the people on the night shift always played their cards closer to their chests, had a little more hidden depth. Maybe that's why they all worked well together, moving like a unit, fluid and unspoken. 

The day shift on the other hand was, well, bright, in a sense. They were all dazzling smiles and caffeinated energy, bouncing from one patient to the next. They clashed like nobody’s business, bold and brash. There were exceptions of course, like Mohan, who Jack had grown fond of and even attempted to convince to join the night shift on more than a few occasions. (She always said no.)

Then there were the textbook examples. And no one embodies the day shift more than Robby’s prodigal son, Frank Langdon. 

Frank Langdon, who was standing just a little too close to you, elbow propped on the nurse’s station as he gave you one of his signature smiles. Jack was too far away to hear exactly what he was saying, but he didn't miss the way his fingers played with your badge, the light glinting off it as he fiddled with it and examined your photo. Jealousy twists in Jack’s gut, but he can't make himself turn away. He just grips his tablet harder, listening to you giggle at whatever Langdon had to say. It’s the same giggle that you give him when he's just a little too sarcastic in an attempt to make you laugh. That was his giggle.

A hand on his shoulder snaps him out of his daze.

“What'd the tablet do to you?” It’s Robby, looking at Jack expectantly to begin their hand off for the day. Jack can't curb his jealousy fast enough and the other man follows his gaze right over to you and Langdon. He can see the gears turning in Robby’s mind, piecing everything together until he barks out a laugh and shakes his head. “You’re so screwed, brother.”

“I don't know what you’re talking about.” Jack grumbles, and Robby raises a disbelieving eyebrow at him. He’s still gripping onto the tablet, probably moments away from cracking the damn thing in half.

“Right…” Robby has to basically wrestle it out of his grip and Jack finally drags his eyes over to his friend, who looks thoroughly unimpressed. “So you’re just here, burning holes into Langdon for no reason.”

“I’m not,” Jack says, a little too indignantly for his liking. “He’s married. He shouldn't be flirting like that.” Robby laughs at him again, which is really starting to get on his nerves. He knows that it’s a terrible lie, but his mind is too foggy from his overnight shift to think of a better one. He wishes his friend would cut him a little slack here.

“Sure. And it’s got nothing to do with her, I’m guessing,” Robby nods over in your direction, and Langdon is still there. He’s leaning on the nurses station, still talking away while you nod, full attention on him. Doesn’t this guy have a job to do? A beat of silence passes, and Jack doesn't answer. “Okay, well, good luck with that then.”

With that, Robby takes his leave, but not before he grabs Langdon by the scrubs, wordlessly hauling him away. You seem shocked at the sudden intrusion, waving goodbye to the dark haired doctor just a moment too late.

It seems like his best friend can cut him some slack, after all.

—

You’re already two drinks deep when Jack Abbot walks through the door.

You’re in the day shift’s favourite bar, squished into the booth seat next to Trinity. She’s yapping away and gesturing wildly to Robby and Garcia who are sitting across from you, looking equally as squished. Truthfully, you’d tuned her out a few minutes ago; it was a story about Dennis and the farm girl she’s told you a million times before.

Your eyes are wandering across the bar, drifting over your friends who are scattered around as if they own the place. Samira and Cassie are perched on stools at the bar, Parker is trying and failing to teach Dennis how to play pool. Movement catches your eye and your gaze drifts towards the door, where John strides in, with Jack in tow.

You can't even pretend to notice Shen, not when Jack catches your eye right away. He’s got his typical black shirt on, tight in all the right places. His hands are shoved into his pockets as he saunters in, looking confident as always. You swear that you’ve never seen him look out of place before. Everywhere he enters, it feels like all heads turn in his direction.

Well, yours does at least.

And it’s really irritating how fucking good he looks all the time. Scrubbed up, in his civvies and in that unbelievably hot uniform that he rolled up in on the fourth of July. He really has you feeling a lot of things you definitely shouldn’t be, considering that he’s your attending. But that still doesn’t stop your eyes from wandering across his broad frame, up his freckled arms to the grey stubble on his jaw. You practically have to physically stop yourself from biting your lip.

“Oh my God, drool much?” Trinity says in a low voice. She’s clearly stopped telling her story, as Robby and Garcia are now engaged in a conversation of their own. Trinity has caught you checking out Abbot on multiple occasions and she never gives up an opportunity to bemoan you about it. “He’s like, geriatric.”

“Not geriatric. Kind of like, silver foxy?” You laugh, shaking your head. “Plus, I thought we kind of had a thing for older people?” You gesture not-so-subtly at Garcia, who’s taking a sip of her drink and nodding along to whatever Robby is saying. Trinity rolls her eyes at your comment and slips past you, out of the booth.

“Okay, well, I’m gonna get another drink,” She tells you, waving her empty glass. Before she leaves, she sneaks a peek over her shoulder and then leans in closer to you, her breath tickling your ear. “He’s heading your way. So try not to cream your pants, huh?”

That makes you sit up straight as Trinity saunters off and Jack comes into view. He’s looking down at you in a way that makes you squeeze your thighs together. He stares, but only for a moment before sliding into the booth across from you, next to Robby. Garcia seems to have slipped off to get another drink as well. What a coincidence.

‘Well, look who finally made it!” Robby gives Jack a slap on the shoulder as he settles in, whiskey glass in hand. He gives his friend a nod, glass extended in an invitation. Robby accepts, clinks his bottle against his cup and both the men take a sip. You can’t help but be drawn to Jack’s hands, much like you always were during surgery. There was just something about them — the way his fingers were nice and thick maybe, and you couldn’t help but wonder what exactly they would feel like skimming your body. 

You almost let your gaze trail down to his mouth, but you shake your head in a daze as Jack sets down his drink. He still catches you though, the ends of his lips quirked up in an almost smirk. Your heart pounds in your chest as you look down at your hands to avoid any further eye contact, but you can still feel the heat of his gaze on you. It’s dangerously enticing and fuck, are you enticed.

He opens his mouth to say something to you but Dennis plops himself in the spot next to you, interrupting. He’s looking around, beer hugged close to his chest. “I think if I missed one more time, Ellis would have actually killed me.” He says, and you glance over at the pool table where Shen has gracefully slipped into Whitaker's role instead, much to Ellis’ delight.

The conversation takes off again and you can't help but wonder what exactly Jack was going to say to you. He’s wrapped up with Robby and Samira, who has floated her way down to your booth and is looking as angelic as ever. She’s perched on the corner of the table, all long legs and sweet smiles. You watch the way Jack talks to her; smooth, easy and familiar. You’re sure your smile twitches and you give Dennis a tap on the shoulder.

“I think I’m going to get another drink too.” You say, both to Dennis and to no one in particular. You stand and Samira gives you just a bit of a liquored up grin as she helps you adjust your short dress. You thank her with a smile of your own, turning around. There’s hope blooming in your chest at what feels like Jack’s eyes on your back as you walk away, but you're too cowardly to look back and see for yourself.

Trinity is standing at the bar, looking about as dishevelled as you expected. She quirks an eyebrow but doesn’t say anything as you approach.

“Your drink is taking a long time, huh?” You nudge her with your shoulder and she just rolls her eyes. Ignoring her attitude, you rest your elbows on the bar, trying to get a look at where the bartender fucked off to. 

“Don’t worry about it,” Trinity is reapplying her lipgloss and attempting to tame her hair, using her phone to assess her reflection. You try to help and she gives you a grateful smile in return. She nods towards the bartender, who is still kind of ignoring you. “I already got one for you.”

“You’re the best,” You’re still smoothing down her hair, giving her a big smile back. “Should we, like, kiss?” You fake going in for a kiss, and she pushes you away with a laugh.

“Please. You wish,” The bartender finally slides two drinks towards Trinity, who hands you one of the glasses. The chill from the glass is definitely welcome against your warm flesh, flushed from the drinks previous. Trinity shoots you a smirk as she grabs your hand to lead you back to the booth. “Besides, don’t you have a silver fox to catch?”

The two of you arrive at the booth and in the short time you’ve been gone, the people seem to have rearranged themselves. Robby and Whitaker have disappeared and Samira has taken your place, McKay beside her. On the other side is still Abbot, nursing his whiskey. Heads turn at your presence and the pair of you are greeting with excited chatter and big smiles from the girls.

It takes you a minute to realize that the only open spot is next to Jack.

Trinity gives you a small push and you claim the seat next to him. Trinity slides in after you and it’s a bit of a tight squeeze, leaving you thigh to thigh with the attending you definitely don’t have an inappropriate workplace crush on. You can feel the heat radiating off him — his arms, his thighs. You swear you feel him stiffen for a second, but the moment is over as quickly as it happened. He smells woody and warm, and it’s got you basically swooning. Is that just the way he smells, or is it cologne, body wash? You resist the weird, perverted urge to take a sniff of his neck and take a sip of your drink instead.

Conversation comes easy for you guys, especially as the drinks continue to flow. People come and go: Ellis, Shen, Dennis — everyone shuffles through, exchanging seats and manoeuvring around each other as easy as they do on the floor of the hospital.

You and Jack though, you don’t move.

Your two stay pressed together, even when Trinity is long gone. Eventually, everyone thins out and spreads across the bar instead, leaving you and Jack alone together. It’s getting hard to ignore the mirth swimming in his eyes, your faces just a little too close together for the conversation you two are having.

You trace what’s left of the condensation from your empty glass with your finger, savouring the feel of the cool water. Is it hot in here? Or is it just you?

“How about I get you another drink?” Jack offers, the timbre of his voice lower than usual. “On me?”

 It feels like he’s getting closer, close enough that you can smell the whiskey on his breath. It’s probably inappropriate to want to kiss your boss, right? Especially one almost twice your age? The prospect of the situation makes you almost dizzy with want, especially when he’s looking at you like that. Or maybe that’s just the alcohol rushing to your head.

Yeah, it’s definitely just you.

“Actually, I think I need a smoke.” You manage to utter, like the responsible adult you are. You need to remove yourself from the situation, fast. He retreats from your space slowly, and you immediately feel the absence. It takes everything in you to suppress the urge to lean back into him again, instead giving him a shy smile as you exit the booth. Jack lets you leave wordlessly, and this time you’re certain his eyes are on you as you walk away. 

The cool breeze outside is a welcome reprieve from the overwhelming heat inside and you take a moment to let it wash over you. You press your back against the brick of the bar and pull out your pack from your purse and stick a cigarette between your lips, fishing around for your lighter. After some digging, you finally find what you were looking for and you cup your hand around the cigarette, flicking the lighter on until you see the familiar cherry red at the end. Things seem a bit less hazy when you take a deep inhale and exhale slowly, grey smoke curling around the dark sky.

You close your eyes and rest your head against the wall, feeling the tension leave your shoulders. Taking another long drag, you review the night in your head. You’ve always enjoyed flirting with Jack, sure, but Jack also flirts with anything that has a pulse. You never really expected anything to come of it, except maybe something to think about later in the night while you were alone. Lately though, it’s been feeling different. He’s always brushing against you, placing his hand on the small of your back as he squeezes past you. The way he looks at you recently is glimmering with something you can’t exactly place. The way he looked at you when Langdon was trying to charm you.

You lift your hand to take another drag when the cigarette is suddenly plucked from between your fingers. Your eyes flutter open and there stands the subject of your thoughts, Jack Abbot, who has your cigarette between his lips now. 

“Whiskey makes Jack a bold boy, eh?” You tease, watching as he takes a drag. It’s unfair how good he makes it look. He gives a small chuckle at your comment but doesn’t reply, letting silence settle between the two of you. Instead, he extends the cigarette towards you and you take it back. Something is painted on his face, like he’s mulling something over, but you don’t ask. You two continue this for a while, just enjoying each other’s company for a moment, taking turns until you finally hit the filter. It’s easy to admire him in the quiet you share. The flex of his biceps, the way he shifts his weight between his prosthetic and his good leg. He’s so broad and handsome, especially when he’s in his tight shirt and cargos. It’s got you wanting to drop to your knees right then and there.

You don’t miss the way he’s looking at you either, though. It’s common knowledge that Jack’s got a staring problem. It makes you flustered at the best of times and wet at the worst, but this stare was different. You can see the want in his eyes as his hazel eyes basically bore into your soul. If you didn’t know any better, you’d say that he was giving you bedroom eyes. Every so often his eyes flicker down to your lips instinctively, especially when they’re wrapped around the cigarette the two of you are sharing. You’re sure that you’re probably doing the same.

“So, can I buy you that drink now?” He asks huskily as you put out the smoke, tossing it into the garbage can behind you. Your eyes flick between the door of the bar and your phone; the numbers flashing at you indicate that you’ve been out longer than you’ve anticipated and it was late.

“I was actually kind of thinking of pulling an Irish goodbye. I live pretty close,” You say sheepishly, tucking your phone back into your purse. He almost looks disappointed, and you revel in the feeling. You’re not sure if it’s the drinks you’ve had or the way that he was staring at Langdon like he wanted to strangle him with his bare hands for flirting with you the other day, but the words slip out of your mouth before you can really think it through. “Want to walk me home?”

Your tone is shy but warm, an airy lilt at the end of the invitation. Or at least that’s what you aimed for. Realization spreads across his face, until it’s replaced with a smirk. You know it’s an offer he can’t really deny. Even if he didn’t want to fuck you, Jack Abbot was nothing short of a gentleman. He’d never let you walk home alone so late at night. “Of course.”

“Why thank you, Doctor Abbot.” You give him a smirk of your own as you push off the wall, enjoying the way that he watches you move languidly. He scoffs at your joking use of the professional title you call him at work, tongue darting out to wet his lips. You adjust your dress and you two look at each other for a moment; him staring down at you with that obnoxiously smug look on his face, and you staring up at him half lidded like you don’t know what you’re doing.

“Lead the way, sweetheart.” He gestures with a sweep of his arm, breaking your staring contest. You start off in the direction of your apartment, shooting him a cheeky look over your shoulder as he takes a minute to follow behind you.

“Think you can keep up, old man?”

—

He hangs back, just for a second, to admire the view as you flounce away, your heels clicking against the pavement. He can’t help but appreciate just how good you look, dress hugging your figure in all the right places. It doesn’t help that he caught a glimpse of your panties earlier when you left the booth, and he’s been thinking about taking another peek ever since. He’s so distracted that he barely catches the words you throw at him.

“Watch it, kid.” He warns, starting off after you. The night is just cool enough that he can feel the alcohol flowing hot through his veins as he reaches you, matching your stride. The nickname was just a slip of the tongue, something he calls you when you’ve made the right call when treating a patient or when you’re offering to refill his coffee in the break room. You give him that look that you’ve been giving him all night, the one that’s got him in this mess in the first place. Blinking through your eyelashes, like you want to climb him like a tree. It does make him feel like a bit of an old man in a way, chasing after a girl basically half his age. 

But you’re the one that invited him, right?

“I’m not sure what you mean.” You say innocently, another flutter of your eyelashes. He gives a chuckle at that, rolling his eyes. The night is quiet at this hour and the tension is thick between you two as you walk alongside each other. Jack’s got his hands tucked into his pockets, watching as you walk a bit unsteadily and he’s not sure if it’s the drinks you’ve had or the shoes that you were wearing. Before he could ponder on it any longer, your heel skids and you stumble over a small lift in the sidewalk.

He grabs your waist instinctively, catching you before you go down. You’re closer to him now and the scent that he’s become so familiar with fills the air, masked a bit by the perfume you wear, all floral and ambery. The proximity between you two almost makes him stumble as well. 

“Careful, sweetheart,” He says, voice low, still affected by just how close you are. “Don’t think you’d like to make a detour back to work before your next shift.” He hauls you upright and you give him another sweet smile. Jack can’t help but give you one back.

“Why would I need to?” You recover much faster from the stumble than he does, smoothing your dress down with the palms of your hands. “You wouldn’t patch me up? I’d be in very capable hands, no?” You tease, smirking. He knows you’re joking but the idea of getting his hands on you, being able to touch you beyond the feather light touches you have shared, makes his heart beat in want.

“Yeah, you think so?” He smirks and you slow to a stop in front of a building that he assumes must be your place. You answer his question with a small nod, suddenly shy. He can see you scanning his face, looking for some kind of answer in it. You press your lips in a thin line and finally speak in a small voice.

“Walk me up?”

He should say no. Any sort of gentleman would leave it here, say good night. Especially one as old as he is.You’re staring at him, not breaking eye contact as you await his response. He should definitely say no.

“Sure.”

Goddamn it.

You give him a smile as you turn, pulling the door to your building and he grabs it, holding it open for you. The climb to your place is quiet, the click of your heels against the stairs punctuating the terrible choice he’s making. But the choice doesn’t feel as terrible as it should when he gets to watch you climb the flights of stairs, getting the flash of your panties that he was desperately wishing for earlier.

You approach your door, fumbling with your keys for a second before he hears the soft click of the lock. He’s got his forearm resting against your doorframe, watching as you slowly pull the door open. Jack catches a glimpse into your apartment for a second before you face him; it’s a small studio, lived in and inviting. It smells like you.

You’re just staring at him for a moment and he’s staring right back. The thought that this is a terrible idea is swirling in his mind somewhere, but the heat pooling in his gut as you look at him seems to be all he can focus on right now. You cock your head and enter your apartment, door still wide open. Jack’s body moves before he can even think about it, one foot after the other, crossing the threshold. Something he can’t take back.

He closes the door behind him with a gentle hand, like any loud noise might snap one of you out of a trance. You’ve got your windows open and you’re bathed in the moonlight, the same way you were outside the bar. That exact vision of you has hijacked his better judgement tonight and landed him in the apartment of a pretty young girl. He tries to push the thought aside.

Jack opens his mouth to speak, maybe even tell you how bad of an idea this is, but you’ve already hooked your fingers in his belt loops, pressing your lips against his before he can get a word out. He can taste your lip gloss and it makes his knees buckle a bit, the words suddenly dying on his tongue. You don’t hold back, all dirty and desperate, slipping your tongue into his mouth. He can feel you sigh and pull him closer, hands resting at his stomach now. Your nails scratch against the skin above his waistband and it makes all his blood rush downwards.

You let out a shaky moan into his mouth and his resolve just breaks. His hands finally move and take what he’s been wanting, cupping your jaw for a minute before moving down, rough, skimming down and pulling you flush against him, hands coming to a rest on the curve of your ass.

It’s intoxicating the way you kiss him, like you just can’t fucking get enough. Your hands are wound in his hair, carting through the grey curls. You pull away all too soon, chest rising and falling quickly in an attempt to catch your breath. It sends a shiver down his spine when he sees the sultry look on your face and you grab his hand and pull him deeper into your apartment.

He lets you lead him and come to a stop at your couch. Jack must be drunker than he thought, because you barely push his chest and he lands on the couch behind him. It’s a sight to see when you drop down to your knees without a word, dress rucking up at your waist. He can’t help the moan that slips out from between his lips as you look up at him, the same way you do at work. Waiting for him to tell you what to do. His legs part involuntarily and you slip yourself between them.

“Fuck, baby,” He can’t help but take in the moment, cupping your cheek as you lean into his touch. “ You want to suck my cock that fucking bad, huh?” 

You nod —eagerly, he can’t help but note— and he grabs a fistful of your hair loosely. He gives you a small nod, giving you permission to go ahead. Biting your lip, you trace a soft finger over the bulge in his pants and he can’t help but shiver. You take your time unzipping his pants and pulling him out, hand wrapped around the hard length of him. It’s fucking delicious watching you like this, pumping his cock slow, a wicked grin on your face.

You press a kiss to his tip and his hips stutter at the sensation and then you’re pressing the flat of your tongue against him, licking him from root to head. He lets out a loud groan, grip on your hair tightening ever so slightly. He takes in the scene in front of him, you on your knees just for him. It feels perverted in a way, like he’s way too old to be this undone, especially for a woman so many years his junior. But then you place him between your soft lips, lip gloss all smeared from the sloppy kisses you two had shared earlier and he can’t really bring himself to care. Your hands skim down the sides of his bare legs, not even pausing when you feel the heat of skin turn into cool metal on one side.

Your mouth is so warm and wet and it’s got him wondering what your pussy will feel like if your mouth already feels this good. Honestly, he can’t remember the last time someone has had him like this. Your hand is soft where it grips him at his base, spit dripping onto your knuckles and you take him deeper and deeper, until he almost hits the back of your throat.

“Such a good girl for me.” He drawls, voice shaking as you swallow around him. You’ve settled into a rhythm now and Jack is happy to hold you by the hair and let you take control. It feels so fucking good that he can’t help but thrust into your mouth, a crooked grin forming when you gag and drool for him. He can't help but praise you. “You look so pretty on your knees, drooling all over your tits like that.”

That earns him a moan from you and he can feel the vibration of it around his cock. He thinks it can’t get any better than this, and then you look up into his eyes, lips still wrapped around him and a guttural moan rips its way from his chest. This seems to invigorate you as you begin to suck harder, cheeks hollowed as your other hand sneaks its way up to his balls, rolling them in your palm. It’s sloppy and wet and loud —the only sounds in your apartment are the loud, filthy way you’re taking him deep into your throat, and Jack's soft pants and utters of your name. His brows are burrowed in pleasure and it takes all of his focus to not cum in your mouth. He’s basically dripping from your spit, wet all the way down to his balls.

He pulls you up by your hair, rough. You let out a small whimper, like you’re real sad that he’s not letting you suck his dick like you were trying to suck his soul out of it. His lips are parted and his pupils are blown with lust, the hazel of his eyes barely visible around the black. His voice is husky when he speaks next.

“Get on the bed, sweetheart.” The apartment is small, and the bed is just behind him. You’re still wearing your heels and the sound of them reverberates in the cramped space. You don’t bother to pull your dress down this time and he soaks it all in as he pulls off his shirt, trying his best to kick off his boots and pants that have pooled around his ankles at the same time.

He catches up to you in no time and he knows you’re teasing him, walking all slow and sexy like that. Then he decides you’re teasing just a bit too much and he grabs you by the waist and tosses you onto the bed. You land with a soft bounce on the mattress and he crawls on right after you, pulling you towards him.

He’s nosing at your pussy through your panties, the dampness forming for him to see. You smell so fucking good that it makes him throb and he can’t help but wrap a fist around himself and pump loosely a few times.

“You’re soaked for me,” He says gruffly and you mewl, desperate for him to touch you more. “Should I have a taste?”

Now he’s running his fingertips over your covered slit, and your hips buck. Jack can feel the heat of you just under the thin cloth, radiating through the lace and he briefly wonders if you’ll let him keep them after.

“Yes…” You breathe, and he takes a peek at you from between your legs. You look absolutely wrecked, propped up on your forearms, staring down at him through half lidded eyes.

“Why don’t you ask me nicely?” He coos and you groan, head tipping back. He loves having you like this, nice and pliant under his hands. You’re better than he imagined when he was alone, touching himself to the thought of you. “Tell me how bad you want it.”

“Please, Jack,” Your voice cracks as you plead, hips rolling, craving some kind, any kind of friction. “I want it so fucking bad, please…” 

“You always listen so well to me, sweetheart. So obedient.” Jack can’t deny you when you whine for him all breathy like that, so he pulls your panties to the side and does exactly what he said he would do, taking a taste. He laps at your pussy like a man starved, your wetness smearing all over his chin, gathering in his stubble.

He feels your hands grip his hair as you pull him in deeper, wordlessly asking for more. Obliging, he dips his tongue into your cunt and you tighten around the muscle, making Jack’s eyes roll back into his head. He’s sure he’s moaning just as much as you are, one hand on your hip, the other one stroking his cock roughly.

Once he’s had his fill of fucking you with his tongue he lets his fingers take over, sliding two of them into your sopping entrance. Your hips buck again at the intrusion and he lets out a deep growl. “You taste so good, baby —could eat you all fucking night. You like having my fingers buried deep in your cunt?”

The whiskey has worn off by now but he’s drunk with lust, his head spinning as he ducks his head back down, sucking your clit softly. He can feel you fluttering around his fingers, getting tighter as he fucks you rough. He’s caught you staring at them more than once and your little comment about his hands earlier hadn’t gone unnoticed by him.

He can tell you’re close by the way you’re moaning and the way you’re gripping his fingers; he can barely pull them out. The pace he sets is brutal and then you’re coming on his hand and face before he even realizes. The taste of your cum is heady and he’s licking it all up like it’s his last meal.

You’re catching your breath and he flips you over without a word, ass up for him. His hands are rough and calloused on your soft skin, pulling down the top of your dress to expose your breasts. You both moan as he tweaks a nipple between his fingers, before palming your ass and yanking your soaking panties down your thighs.

“Fuck…” Jack curses. He’s rutting against you, coating his cock with your cum, moving infuriatingly slow. You’re pushing against him, pleas falling from your lips as he places a hand on your bare back, pushing you deeper into the mattress. Jack has half a mind to hope that your apartment walls aren’t as thin as he thinks they are. He’s busy trying to sear this moment into his memories to care all that much about it though; you’re under him, moaning his name, begging for him. “Still think I’m an old man? That I can’t keep up?”

He’s throwing your words back at you, the frantic shakes of your head as you rut back into him going straight to his ego and his dick. Jack can't resist the sight any longer as he drags himself up and down your entrance, tapping on your clit a few times and loving the way you jump at the sensation. He’s barely got the tip in when you start moaning for him again, breathy and desperate. Ignoring your begging for him to start moving faster, he pushes in nice and slow instead, mesmerized by the way your pussy just sucks him in.

Gripping fabric of your dress that has bunched up around your waist, he sinks in deeper until he’s fully bottomed out. He stays still for a moment, letting you adjust to his size and schooling his breathing so he doesn’t cum embarrassingly fast. You’re so tight and he can’t help but think you’re one hundred percent better than what he imagined and one thousand percent better than his fist that he fucks into when he thinks of you. Sharp pain interrupts his thoughts, your nails scratching at his thighs as you try to get him to finally move.

“Feels like you’re made for me, sweetheart. So fucking tight for me.” Thoughts are spilling out now, pleasure taking over and loosening his filter. As much as he wants to savour this, savour you, he’s on the fringes of his self control. You’re gripping his cock in a way that makes his head spin and your small pants have him feeling downright sinful. He tries to start slow, he really does, but he just can’t resist. He’s been thinking about having you for so long, the way you would look under him, and now that he has you, he’s not letting you think about anyone else again. Jack wants you to think about him every time you crawl into bed without him.

He fucks you in earnest, the wet slap of skin on skin just spurring him on. He buries a fist in your hair again, yanking your head up so you’re on all fours for him, back curved. The frame of your bed creaks quickly in time with his thrusts, the same way his thrusts are punching small gasps out of you each time. He loves listening to the noises you make and he pulls your hips up higher, balls slapping your clit as he buries himself deeper. Your moans are getting louder, walls squeezing him tight and he pulls out quickly before his vision goes white.

“Jack, please!” He can tell you’re getting tired of the way he’s been teasing you all night, thinking that he just might edge you all night. But really, he just wants to see what your face looks like when you cum around his cock. He flips you over easily, biceps flexing. Before you can even muster out a squeal he’s back inside you, filling you up to the hilt. Your lips part and your eyes roll back into your head, and he can’t help but smirk as he begins to move once more.

This time the pace he sets is punishing, determined to make you cum before even thinking about chasing his own high. Jack can tell by the way that you’re squeezing him like you don’t want to let him go that it won’t be long. He allows his eyes to sweep over your body appreciatively, your thighs, your stomach, the way your breasts bounce, how absolutely blissed out your face looks.

It’s hard to resist the temptation to splay a hand just below your neck, gauge your reaction, so he doesn’t. His hand is so large against the base of your throat and the way your eyes flutter in pleasure makes his dick twitch. He lets it rest there for a moment, then dips two fingers between your lips, tongue swirling around the tips of them like it was around his dick just a little while ago.

Leaving a wet trail down your chest, he makes his way down to your clit, drawing tight circles around with rough fingertips. He lets out a growl at the noise you make, deep and primal. He glances down, noticing the cream gathering around the base of his cock, his happy trail covered in your slick. His legs shake at the sight, his climax suddenly a lot closer than he anticipated. He can guess that yours is too, judging from the way your cunt is fluttering around him and that you’ve seemed to stop caring who can hear just how good he’s making you feel. 

“You gonna cum on my cock, baby?” You’re nodding loosely, like you barely even registered the question. He loves seeing such a capable girl come apart in his hands like this. “Yeah? Cum for me then.”

And you do, as he should have expected, since you always do what he tells you to.

Your cunt is milking his orgasm out of him, and he can feel his hips stutter. He barely squeezes out the words, asking you where he should finish, half aware that he’s not wearing a condom. You look up with shiny wet eyes, fingers tangling in the curls at the base of his neck  and he nearly cums at the sight.

“I want you to fill me up.” You say, and yeah, that makes him want to cum even more. A few more messy thrusts and he gives a low groan, spilling deep inside you. He’s hutched over your form, body shaking in pleasure, loving the heat that’s radiating from your body. After a few moments the haze of sex dissipates and you two are left chest to chest, your nipples brushing his chest with every breath.

“Let’s get you cleaned up, sweetheart.”

—

Jack cleans you up, all nice and sweet, with a warm rag from your bathroom. The action is tender, especially compared to the way he just wrecked you. It makes you feel taken care of, which is not something you would admit aloud to him for now. You’re a little confused about the position that this puts you in with your attending. The only thing you can really make sense of is that the entire situation has gotten about a million times more complicated than it was eight hours ago.

But when Jack looks at you, eyes soft in a way you’ve never seen before when you offer to help him remove his prosthetic, you decide that you don’t really care. You’d give anything to have him look at you that way again.

And now he’s here in your bed, freckled back to you and breathing even. He’d fallen asleep soon after you asked him to stay the night, which you thought was sweet. Old man was up way past his bedtime.

Your phone vibrates on your nightstand and you flip it over, squinting at the bright light. You’d pretty much ignored it when you left the bar with Jack, pretty one track minded. You’d miss a flurry of text messages from everyone else: Garcia asking if she could bum a smoke, Samira asking if you left and then following up asking you to let her know you got home safe, Robby wondering if you had seen Abbot anywhere, Dennis just sending you a blurry picture of the bar floor, which you assumed was a drunken accident.

Trinity has sent you the most recent text, sitting atop of your stack of notifications.

trinity: thank u for winning me the betting pool. will buy u a drink ;)

[unearthlydust]

SEBASTIAN STAN ENDINGS, BEGINNINGS

[fateforgotten]

To Break a Dragon’s Fall pt.2 ͙͘͡★

pairing: baelor targaryen / fem!reader / maekar

part one here!

summary: the trial of seven has ended, and now you had to face the consequences and the scrutiny of the targaryen princes

content: slow burn, love triangle, knight reader, found family, age gap, panic attack warning

note: i’m so sorry i’m finishing this so late…i found this part quite difficult to write but i hope you enjoy it anyways, tho beware it is quiye slow and more of a filler. ALSO ty for all the love on the last part, i really didn’t expect it and it means so much that you guys would enjoy my writing

· · ─ ·✶· ─ · ·

It was hard to tell the real voices from the ones in your dreams. Though your father’s voice was the clearest of them all, calm and steady, exactly as you remembered. 

At least, you thought they were dreams.

The dead didn’t tend to speak to the living, or so you believed.

You reached desperately for the voices that brushed your ears rather than the ones that echoed in your head, but every time you did, the pain dragged you mercilessly back under.

In between the bouts of darkness, everything came in fragments: bursts of harsh white light, a bitter chalky taste coating your tongue, hands prodding and poking at you incessantly.

“…The puncture… avoided any organs but she’s lost so much… only the gods…” A voice floated somewhere above you.

The pain, though, was constant. It shuddered through you like a cold sweat, leaving you clawing for any semblance of warmth before the dark swallowed you again.

Then one voice swam softly through the haze, more tangible than the others before.

“Thank you maester, please ensure she has whatever she needs and that I might be summoned when…or if she wakes.”

Anger now tangled with the confusion. You wanted to shout, to tell them you were still here, still breathing but your tongue felt leaden, your eyelids heavier than stone. The words died before they could ever leave your lips. 

Mercifully when you woke again there was no longer any burning bright light or painful poking, but there were no longer any voices either. 

The room was dim, lit only by the waning fire beyond the bed where you lay. The scent of crushed herbs and fresh linen reached your nose, threaded faintly with sweat.

Lifting your head, even just a little, felt like it drained every ounce of strength, and just brought your attention sharply back to the dull, heavy throb in your side. Though you were almost grateful for the pain, as it served as a reminder that you were alive.

For a long time you remained still, the only measure of time passing being marked by your uneven breaths.

Though the world was clearer to you now, your memories were not. They came to you like ripples in water, fading before you could even quite figure out what they were. 

The ringing of steel.

A chilling warmth.

The taste of salted iron.

Two pairs of Targaryen eyes.

Then it all rushed over you at once and suddenly you had to get up, had to move, had to find answers. Had to get out of wherever the hell you were. 

Your arms felt weak, your fingers clumsy and heavy but you managed to sit up. A brush of cool air hit your legs as you weakly dragged the bedsheets off. 

Your gaze drifted downward.

Linen was wrapped tightly around your middle, thick and firm beneath an unfamiliar cotton nightdress. You frowned faintly at the sight of it. The bandages looked heavy, deliberate.

Strangely, you could not remember the moment the blade had cut you, his blade.

Only the battle before it. The chaos. The noise. And the prince that stood over you.

The pain must have come later.

Perhaps that was a mercy.

Getting to your feet proved even harder. You swung your legs slowly over the side of the bed, your muscles trembling with the effort. For a moment you simply sat there, waiting for the room to stop spinning.

Then, gathering what strength you could, you pushed yourself upright.

The moment your weight settled on your legs, they nearly buckled beneath you.

You caught the bedpost just in time, gripping the wood tightly as your vision blurred. Your knees trembled violently, threatening to give way as your body protested against the sudden movement.

For a moment you could only cling there, breathing hard, willing the weakness to pass.

It did give you enough time to search the room for something familiar but there was nothing to be found. Your pack, armour and sword…all gone.

It spurred you onwards towards the door, panic more than sense taking over now.

The corridor beyond was gloomy and silent. You pressed close to the wall, using it to steady yourself as you forced your legs to keep moving. A chill seeped through your bare feet and along your arms where they brushed the stone, sending a slow shiver crawling over your skin.

It stretched dauntingly ahead of you, as did the realisation that this was Ashford castle, and you had been put here, and kept here? 

Fear crept in with the chill now. 

You had played the Targaryens, and most men on that tourney field for fools. Were they keeping you alive and close now just to see you punished?

Perhaps you could’ve waited in that room, waiting on their whim for when you’d learn of what they decided to do with you, but patience has never been one of your virtues.

Around two corners and down a set of stairs, and at the end of it the deep murmur of voices finally found you. 

You shuffled along steadily, fighting the way the world tilted and swam around you. Everything still felt distant, unreal, as though you were watching it all unfold from somewhere just outside yourself. 

What had first been a low murmur slowly separated into distinct words and steady voices. They spoke quietly, but there was a weight to their tones that was measured, deliberate, the sort of authority that carried even when kept low.

These were not servants speaking in the hall.

You slowed to a stop, catching yourself against the wall as a wave of dizziness passed through you. The cold stone steadied you somewhat, rough beneath your palm.

For a moment you simply stood there, listening.

A bitter thought crept in despite yourself. The last time you had lingered in these corridors, listening where you ought not to, it had been with far lighter consequences in mind. Then it had felt almost like a dare, another small risk taken in the shadow of the tourney at Ashford Castle.

Now it felt very different.

For one thing, Duncan’s voice was now achingly absent among these ones.

“...you have been a most gracious host my Lord,” a soft voice said. “I regret however, that our presence has given the singers a story of Ashford they will not let die soon.”

“It has been my honour your grace, you are welcome to its halls for as long as you wish.” Another replied eagerly.

“I thank you, but we will be on our return to King’s Landing as soon as my nephew is stable enough for the journey.” 

There was a small shift among the men, the faint rustle of movement.

“And the girl?” A different man spoke.

“Your Grace, if I may, she entered the trial in disguise. A woman is no knight. By law alone the trial could be considered invalid. It would be well within your rights to see her punished.”

The words hung in the air for a moment, and you with it.

Then another voice spoke, thoughtful, but cautious. “...perhaps she was sent by the gods as an instrument of divine will.”

“Divine fucking will.” Another scoffed. 

You pictured the silver hair and beard that belonged to the speaker, as well as the scowl that matched it.

It was hard not to share the sentiment though, these men might do anything to reconcile with the idea of a woman holding a sword.

“Her courage is more important than custom. She fought with honour just as any man on that field” The first voice returned. “I believe we should set this matter to rest.”

Silence settled thickly in the room, the kind that comes when men must accept a prince’s judgment whether they wished to or not.

“Very well, Your Grace,” another man said at last.

For a moment you stayed where you were, leaning against the cold stone wall, letting the tension slowly drain from your body. Relief came cautiously, like something you hardly trusted, as the words settled heavily in your mind.

‘Set the matter to rest.’

Then fatally, the corridor started to sway again. 

You pushed yourself away from the wall before the dizziness could swallow you again, forcing your feet to move. 

One corner. Then another. Each step felt heavier than the last. The dull ache in your side stirred with every movement, the pain gradually sharpening as though it had been waiting patiently for you to forget it.

The voices soon faded into the walls you left behind.

The castle seemed strangely distant now, the corridors stretching longer than they had before, the torchlight flickering in soft distracting halos along the walls. Your hand drifted back to the stone for balance more than once as the world threatened to tilt beneath you.

By the time you reached the half familiar hallway leading back to your chamber, you knew you were close to fainting. The door however stood just achingly ahead, slightly ajar, the dim glow of the fire inside spilling welcomingly into the corridor.

Only minutes ago the bed had felt like a prison you were desperate to escape, now it was the only refuge your body wanted.

Almost there.

You took one step toward the bed. Then another.

Your hand reached for the bedpost, but the distance was treacherously farther than it had seemed. The strength left your legs all at once, as though someone had cut the strings holding you upright.

Then the floorboards rushed up to meet you, the impact sending a sharp burst of pain through your side that stole the breath from your lungs.

Your fingers twitched weakly against the floor, but your arms refused to lift you. And then the weight of exhaustion settled over you like a heavy cloak, dragging you downward no matter how hard you tried to fight it.

The fire continued to crackle faintly in the hearth somewhere beyond your blurred vision.

You let out a slow, unsteady breath, and the room returned quietly back into blackness.

· · ─ ·✶· ─ · ·

Something was shaking you. Relentlessly.

You tried to ignore it, tried to sink back into the soft, painless dark where nothing hurt and nothing demanded anything of you. But the shaking came again, more insistent this time, tugging at you to return to the world.

Your eyelids fluttered open weakly. The world beyond them was thick and slow when it finally crept into view, shapes swimming and blurring like reflections in disturbed water.

“Please… wake up.”

The voice was small, tight with worry. It was one you had heard before.

You blinked, forcing your eyes to focus.

A round familiar face hovered above you, framed by the dim light of the chamber. The owner’s violet eyes wide with anxious relief.

“Egg?” The name left your cracked lips as little more than a rasp.

For a heartbeat he simply stared at you, as though he scarcely believed you were awake at all.

Then he moved all at once.

His small arms wrapped suddenly around your neck, nearly knocking the breath from you. The sudden pressure made you wince, as pain flared sharply through your ribs, but you lifted your arms anyway, gladly returning the embrace as best you could.

Funny, you thought, how someone you had known only a handful of days could already feel so familiar.

And for the first time since waking, the room felt a little less strange.

Egg pulled back just enough to look at you again, his expression a strange mixture of relief and lingering panic.

“I thought for a second you might—” He stopped himself, swallowing the rest of the words. His brows furrowed as he glanced down at you. “But why are you on the floor?”

You managed a weak breath that might have been a laugh. “I fell… I suppose I overestimated my strength.”

Egg immediately scrambled to his feet, letting you use his body to hoist yourself up. “Here let me help you.” For someone so small, he held you with surprising determination.

Your fingers tightened slightly on his sleeve, your first question begging to be answered. “Is Duncan alright?”

Egg nodded quickly. “Yes well, I think he’s faring a little better than you are, but…Lord Harding was taken in the first charge.”

The brief relief that had begun to settle in your chest faltered. Your gaze dropped for a moment as the words sank in. You had known someone must have fallen, trials of seven rarely ended cleanly, but knowing it and hearing the name were two very different things.

“Lord Harding…” you repeated quietly.

Your mind drifted back to the field, the dust rising beneath trampling feet, the shouting, the brutal ring of steel on steel. Faces had blurred in the chaos, men moving and falling faster than thought could keep pace. And yet you had fought beside him, shoulder to shoulder, without ever having spoken a single word to the man.

Egg’s expression dimmed as well, the moment of brightness fading just as quickly as it had come. He glanced toward the door before lowering his voice.

“I heard the lords speaking. My father too. They said you could be tried for it—for the disguise. For pretending to be a knight.” He swallowed. “They said you could be imprisoned.”

He climbed onto the edge of the bed beside you, sitting stiffly, his hands twisting together in his lap.

“I begged him to spare you,” he continued in a hurried rush. “I told him I commanded you to fight, that you couldn’t refuse a prince. I thought… maybe that would help.” His words stumbled over each other. “I’m sorry.”

 He looked up at you again, urgency returning all at once. “There’s still time,” he said quickly. “You could leave. I know where your sword is—it’s in my uncle’s—”.

“It’s okay, Egg,” you murmured, your voice still thin with exhaustion. Slowly, haltingly, you told him what you had heard in the corridor, or what little of it you could piece together through the haze of pain and dizziness.

Egg listened closely, the tension in his shoulders easing little by little as you spoke.

“Well he does owe you.” A boyish grin tugged at his mouth. “Your fight with my father, it was incredible. I wish you could’ve seen the look on his face afterwards, I’ve never seen him that way.”

Before you could respond, Egg hopped off the bed, excitement overtaking him completely. “The way you evaded his attacks…

He delved into an enthusiastic performance, eyes bright as he darted about the chamber swinging his imaginary sword through the air. He ducked suddenly to one side, then the other, twisting his body as if avoiding a rain of blows from an unseen opponent.

“And then Father came at you again, like this!” he said, lunging forward with surprising ferocity.

“But you blocked it!” he continued, “Everyone thought he had you, but you just—” he slashed the air again, nearly knocking over a stool, “—turned it on him.”

You watched him in tender silence, leaning weakly against the bed, the pain in your side briefly forgotten as the young prince hopped and spun about the chamber with earnest determination.

And then you noticed the figure in the doorway.

He stood just beyond the threshold, tall and still. There was the faintest hint of amusement at the corner of his mouth, as though he had arrived in time to witness the end of Egg’s enthusiastic performance.

His gaze moved past Egg and settled on you.

For a brief moment the two of you simply looked at one another across the room, the air settling into a quiet stillness. There was something searching in his expression, as though he were measuring you again, now that the dust of the trial had settled.

Baelor Targaryen stepped further into the room, the firelight catching the silver strands in his dark hair. His gaze lingered briefly on the bulge of bandages at your side before returning to your face. Suddenly you wondered whether the sore gash across your cheek really looked as bad as it felt.

“I am glad to see you have survived your victory, Ser.”

Egg turned toward his uncle, the bravado of his swordplay vanishing at once. For a moment he looked very small again, far younger than he had a heartbeat ago. “I’m sorry, your grace I-.”

“It’s quite all right,” Baelor said gently. “Though I suspect your father might remember the scene rather differently.”

He offered a faint smile, but it lingered unanswered in the quiet of the room. “If you would leave us now please Aegon.”

“Of course, your grace.” Egg answered. He turned back to you before going, offering one last anxious smile, as if to reassure himself you were truly awake. Then he slipped out into the corridor, the door closing softly behind him.

Suddenly you were acutely aware of yourself, of the rough linen sheets, of the ache beneath your ribs, of the cool air against skin that was far too bare. You tugged the covers higher, clutching them instinctively to your chest as though they might serve as armor.

Across the room, he regarded you quietly, his long fingers idly turning the ring on his hand.

“Egg kept vigil beyond your door,” Baelor said. “He would not depart his post all the while you were asleep, insisting upon standing guard until word came of your condition, that he might be certain you were safe.”

“…He’s a good boy.” 

Baelor nodded once to you, before turning towards the fireplace. “I owe you my thanks, you perhaps saved me a nasty blow,” He smiled faintly as if remembering something. “My brother is a formidable man,” he added, turning back to face you. “As I expect you discovered for yourself.”

You shifted slightly against the pillows, wincing as the movement tugged at your wound, avoiding his gaze. The memory of the clash, the noise, the shouts, still rang in your ears.

“You don’t owe me anything, I wasn’t fighting for you,” Your eyes lingered somewhere near his shoulder rather than his face, “…your grace.” The words felt awkward on your tongue. 

For a moment you thought you might have offended him.

But his expression didn’t change.

“All the same, you fought with a particular courage and it shouldn’t go unnoticed. And it hasn’t.” He replied. “I believe there are whispers among the small folk of the ‘lady in mail’.” 

Your brow lifted faintly despite yourself. “I suppose there are worse names.”

“Indeed, but I can’t pretend your tale has pleased everyone… there’s disgruntlement among the lords and knights. A woman stepping between them and a question of honour is not a story that sits comfortably with their pride.”

You finally glanced back at him then, your fingers tightened slightly in the sheets. “I know but I’d do it again. For Duncan.”

“As would I.”

The weigh of both of your quiet confessions filled the room.

For a moment, Baelor simply held your gaze, a look you had quickly come to find as unsettling as it was strangely compelling. Up closer, you could make out the details of him more clearly, the weathered bronze of his skin, marked by sun and years, and the dark beard along his jaw, already threaded with streaks of grey. His hair, the same deep shade, was beginning to silver at the temples, and his nose bore the slight bend of a break that had healed long ago. 

Silence enveloped the room.

“Your horse is safe in the stables,” he added almost as an afterthought as if bringing himself back to reality. “Though I’m told it took three stable hands and a great deal of patience to calm the poor creature after the trial. It seems it was as determined to fight as its rider.”

You smiled gently, though the thought lingered uneasily in your mind. You had dragged the animal into that storm as surely as you had yourself, only you at least had a choice in the matter.

“Well Lord Ashford has kindly offered his hall to you for however long you need it, and I shall alert the maester that you are awake.”

You suspected Lord Ashford’s generosity might have been somewhat less forthcoming, had a request undoubtedly not come from a prince.

He turned to the door as words seemed to escape your throat.

“Thank you, your grace.” The admission felt strangely difficult. “I know you didn’t have to argue for me.”

Then he gave a small nod, neither grand nor dismissive, but something quieter. Almost private.

“Rest,” he said.

For a long moment after he left, you simply stared at the door.

The quiet he left behind seemed louder than the conversation itself. The faint scrape of boots in the corridor faded, then vanished entirely, and the chamber fell back into the slow rhythm of a sickroom: the distant murmur of the castle, the soft crackle of the hearth, and your thoughts.

His words lingered in your mind, the ‘lady in mail’. You could almost hear the smallfolk saying it in the markets, passing the story between them like gossip over bread and ale.

You were not sure whether the thought filled you with pride or dread. The voices of the smallfolk could so easily be ones of admiration or mocking scorn.

Not longer after the Maester came to check your wounds, assuring you that there were no signs or fever or infection. And then the maid servants followed suit.

They worked gently, washing away the stale sweat and dust of the past days with warm cloths and soap that smelled faintly of lavender. Their hands were careful around the bandages, patient in a way that felt almost strange.

The quiet attentiveness of it all felt oddly unsettling, as if you had wandered into someone else’s life and were wearing it poorly.

Your thoughts drifted as they worked.

You couldn’t help but turn over everything. The fact that you had participated in a trial of seven and lived to tell the tale, the mercy of a Targaryen prince and how two days ago you hadn’t dreamt of being any more than a part of the watching crowd.

· · ─ ·✶· ─ · ·

The next morning had settled fully over the castle by the time you awoke, and finally forced yourself out of bed.

The first attempt nearly ended with you back on the floor. Your legs trembled the moment you put weight on them, and the dull ache in your side sharpened immediately into something far less forgiving.

You reached for the simpler things laid out nearby, a simple everyday gown someone had left folded on the chair. Even dressing proved an ordeal. Every motion pulled at the bandage around your middle, forcing you to pause more than once to wait out the sharp protest in your ribs.

By the time you had finished lacing the back of your dress, you were already winded. You took a moment to rest, chewing on a piece of toast that the servants had left behind while you slept. 

The thick castle walls had become enough for you and you needed air, and you needed to see Duncan.

You left your chamber quietly and made your way into the corridors. The stone passageways felt less confusing than they had the day before; either you were stronger now, or your mind had finally begun to settle after the haze of fever and pain. Your steps were still careful, the dull pull in your side reminding you not to move too quickly, but at least the world no longer tilted beneath your feet.

The sudden lurch in your stomach, however, was very real when you turned a corner and nearly walked straight into someone, and soon realised who it was.

You stopped short.

So did he.

For a moment neither of you moved, the narrow corridor suddenly feeling far smaller than it had a moment before. His presence filled the space with quiet, immovable certainty, and you felt the strange awareness of standing directly in his path.

Your eyes lifted slowly to meet his.

Maekar Targaryen stood a few paces away, broad and unmoving as the stone walls themselves. Even without armour he was impossibly imposing. 

Harsh light from a nearby window caught the pale silver of his hair, the colour stark against the darker shadow of the passage.

The marks of old pox scars mottled his pale face, faint but impossible to miss once seen, lending his features a roughened edge that made his gaze feel all the more unforgiving.

You noticed a deep purple bruise high on his cheekbone and wondered briefly if you had been the one to put it there.

Yesterday you had stood across a field from this man with steel in your hand, half certain his face would be the last thing you ever saw. It felt strangely unreal to meet him now in a quiet corridor with nothing between you but a few paces of stone.

“You’re walking.” He noted. It seemed more of a statement than a question. 

“Yes.” You replied, shifting slightly on your feet. 

“Have you seen my son? I had expected to find him haunting your door again.” 

“No.” 

The brevity of your answer hit the air with a bluntness that mirrored his own. A flicker of mild irritation crossed his face, marked by the slight flex in his hard jaw. 

For a moment you thought that was the end of it, that he would simply continue on his way and leave the encounter buried in the quiet of the corridor.

But to your dismay, after only a few paces he stopped again.

“Who taught you to wield a blade?,” he asked, his voice echoing with a reluctant curiosity.

You let the silence stretch, before offering the only truth you had. “My father.”

“If I were your father I’d-.” He started.

“Yes, I know,” you said, the words escaping before caution could catch them. You squared your shoulders, meeting his gaze with a defiance that you knew was unwise yet unbreakable. “You’d probably have me marry my brother and submit to churning out silver-haired heirs, who will grow up to burn villages and call it justice.”

For a moment he just stared at you incredulous, the air around you icy despite the warm sun pouring in through a window.

Your quickness to anger would undoubtedly be the death of you.

“You speak boldly, especially for someone who owes her life to my brother’s mercy.” He fumed. “Your father may have taught you well but a wiser man would have taught you how to live in the world as it is.”

“I didn’t ask for mercy.” You said quietly. 

“No, you asked for attention. You turned a trial by combat into a spectacle for half the realm.” He returned, looming over you, though you showed no signs of backing down.

A bark of humourless laughter escaped you. “With respect, your son turned the question of Targaryen honour into a spectacle, by snapping the fingers of an unarmed girl.”

“You presume to lecture me on honour? You disguised yourself as a knight, and forced my brother to defend your actions before every lord in attendance. You had courage but courage does not grant you the right to forget your place.”

Your jaw tightened faintly. “With respect, if everyone had remembered their place yesterday, Ser Duncan would be dead, your grace.”

The corridor seemed to hold its breath around you, and you could swear you almost heard his heart thumping in time with your own.

“If you see Aegon, tell him his father is looking for him.” 

You didn’t stay to watch him limp away down the corridor, half relieved that it seemed to be the second encounter with him you had made it out alive from. You prayed there wouldn't be a third one.

· · ─ ·✶· ─ · ·

The walk from the castle down toward the tourney grounds had been longer than you remembered. Your wound protested with every step, but the sharp edge of it was drowned beneath the rush of adrenaline still coursing through you.

Your heart was still beating harder than the walk alone could explain. 

Maekar’s words followed you down the stone path like an unwelcome shadow.

They battled endlessly in your mind, each one striking against the next, mixing with the responses you had given, and the many more you had not. 

The words you might have striked back at him if you had thought of them sooner. The ones that would have cut deeper. The ones that would have made you sound wiser instead of simply angry.

It was strange, you thought, how two brothers could carry the same name and yet cut from entirely different cloth.

Did they not share the same father? The same tutors, the same endless lessons in history and swordplay? Had they not once trained side by side in the same practice yards as boys, their boots kicking up the same dust?

Yet somewhere along the way the paths between them had split. One seemed so human while the other seemed to have been forged with all the hardness and fire of a dragon.

Before making your way down toward the tourney grounds, your steps carried you towards the castle stables, seeking an old friend amongst the new ones.

The air inside was warm and thick with the familiar smells of hay and leather, which were welcome to you after the stuffiness of the castle.

It was quieter than the courtyards outside, the morning bustle already drifting toward the pavilions and tents beyond the walls. A few stable boys moved about their work, but none paid you much attention as you walked slowly down the narrow aisle between the stalls.

Your horse lifted its head the moment you approached, ears flicking forward in recognition. The soft thud of its hoof against the straw sounded almost like a greeting.

You stepped inside the stall.

“Hello,” you murmured softly.

The horse nudged forward at once, pushing its nose against your shoulder with the impatient familiarity of an old companion. You lifted a hand in return, resting it against the warm line of its neck.

“I’m sorry,” you said quietly. “I dragged you into that mess,” you continued under your breath. “All that noise and shouting… the lances, the crowd.”

Your hand stilled briefly against its neck. “You didn’t ask for any of that.”

The horse shifted its weight slightly, blowing a warm breath against your sleeve. You huffed a faint, tired laugh.

“I suppose you did better than I did,” you said. “You at least had the sense not to get stabbed.”

It nudged your shoulder again as if impatient with your self-pity, and you scratched behind its ear, feeling some of the tightness in your chest ease.

“Still,” you murmured, leaning your forehead lightly against the side of its neck, “thank you.”

For a little while you stayed there in the quiet of the stable, listening to the soft sounds of shifting hooves and rustling straw, grateful for the quiet company.

Eventually you straightened again. There was somewhere else you needed to be, and someone else you needed to see.

You gave the horse one last pat along its neck before stepping back out into the aisle.

“Behave yourself,” you told it softly. “I’ll be back.”

You had decided to make for the Fossoway tent, hoping that Duncan would be there, or at least a friendly face who could tell you where he was. The familiar banners would too have been easy enough to spot among the sea of pavilions.

But you never made it that far.

A solemn but sweet music passed faintly out of a large nearby tent, underscored by the steady thrum of talk. 

“To Harding!” 

The cheer that followed was loud, but not joyful. It carried the strange mixture of respect and sadness that belonged more to remembrance than celebration.

Understanding settled over you. Without a second thought, you stepped inside.

The interior was crowded with knights, squires, and men-at-arms. Tankards lifted and lowered as men spoke in clusters around the long tables set beneath the striped canopy. 

A few musicians sat near the back, coaxing that same gentle melody from their instruments while the gathered company drank in quiet honour of the fallen.

Your gaze swept the crowded space, searching for a familiar silhouette among the sea of boiled leather and surcoats.

It didn't take long to find him.

Duncan stood near the far side of the tent, hunched slightly over in conversation with a man at a table whose face you could not see. 

You made your way towards them through the throng of tables, ignoring the eyes that fluttered to you as you passed. 

Raymun’d voice cut through the din as you passed, flushed with the heat of the tent and the cider in his cup. He hailed you with a boisterous grin, calling for a flagon to be filled on his coin, but you lingered long enough only to return his sentiments. 

“Nevertheless I congratulate you Ser, you’ve certainly done well for yourself.”

You reached out, your fingers pressing firmly against the rough wool of Duncan’s elbow. 

He spun with a start, his massive frame nearly knocking a flagon from a nearby table, but the moment his eyes found yours, his breath hitched. He enveloped you instantly, a rib-crushing embrace that smelled of horsehair and old leather. 

Yet, in that fleeting second before he pulled you close, you didn't miss the grim, hard set of his jaw.

Beside him, Prince Daeron sat slouched over a scarred trestle, watching the pair of you with an absent look. He looked more like a hungover squire than a prince of the blood, his silver-gold hair tangled and his doublet stained with wine.

“Well,” the Prince murmured, as he drained the last of his cup. “I suppose I should take my leave. I came for the ale, and now I’ve had my fill of it.”

He pushed himself up from the bench with an exaggerated sigh. He lingered a moment, his gaze drifting to you with a strange amusement. “I am glad to see you have survived your injuries, my lady… and my father’s pride. Both are equally dangerous to cross, I fear.”

Daeron offered a thin ghost of a smile, though it stopped well short of his bloodshot eyes. With a vague wave of a hand, he turned toward the tent flap,

“The gall he has to show up here—.” Duncan’s voice was low, the words half-swallowed in irritation as he the departing prince.

“I know,” you said quietly. “But come on, let’s sit before one of us collapses.”

The two of you found an empty table tucked into the corner of the tent, half-shadowed beneath the canvas. 

You slid onto the bench first, gripping the edge of the table as you lowered yourself carefully.

Duncan moved a little slower himself, easing onto the opposite bench with the stiffness of a man whose body had also seen better days. His shoulders hunched slightly as he settled, one hand briefly pressing against his ribs.

He really did look awful, with one of his eyes fully close from a brutal purple bruise and barely a spot left unbloodied on his face.

For a moment neither of you spoke.

The quiet between you felt strangely heavy, filled with everything that had happened since the last time you had stood together on that field. 

The murmur of the wake continued around you; low voices, the scrape of tankards across wood, the soft thread of music drifting from the musicians, but it all seemed distant, as though you and Duncan were sitting in some smaller, quieter pocket of the tent.

The two of you were so clearly a marked more deeply by the last day than anyone else in that tent.

“I tried to come see you yesterday,” Duncan said at last, rubbing a hand across the back of his neck. “But they told me you were still resting.”

“Yeah whatever they gave me for the pain knocked me out cold for a while.” You replied.

“I can’t decide which of us looks the worse.” He let out a self deprecating huff. “I should’ve let you pass on that dirt track, maybe you’d have had more luck.”

You hoped he didn’t mean it.

“Between the two of us I think we make our own bad luck enough to turn it into good.” You smiled, though Duncan seemed to find it hard to return. 

He leaned back slightly, studying you more carefully now, as though reassuring himself you were truly sitting there.

“I thought…” Duncan began, then stopped.

His gaze drifted past you, toward the open side of the pavilion where the empty tournament field lay beyond.

“I thought you might’ve died out there,” he admitted quietly.

The words hung awkwardly between you.

You tried to lighten them with a small breath of a laugh. “Well,” you said, “Prince Maekar certainly tried to make that possible.”

But Duncan didn’t smile, he simply shook his head once, slow and firm.

“I shouldn’t have let you do it,” he said. There was no anger in his voice, only a quiet certainty.

“You couldn’t have stopped me Duncan.” Your voice was steady now. “I made my decision and I would make it a million times over, because it was the right thing to do, consequences be damned. Just as you thought when you stepped between Aerion and Tanselle.”

Duncan accepted your words quietly, though the weight on his shoulders didn’t fade.

For a time the two of you remained there, the conversation drifting into quieter things, half-finished thoughts, the strange disbelief of having survived the chaos of the previous day. 

Around you the wake carried on in its slow rhythm: cups raised, names spoken, the soft lament of the fiddlers weaving through the tent.

Eventually Duncan pushed himself carefully to his feet. “Perhaps we should make on our way.” he murmured, offering a large, calloused hand to steady you as you rose from the bench.

The two of you made your way toward the tent flap, weaving through clusters of knights and squires who paused in their conversations as you passed. Some nodded respectfully to Duncan. Others glanced toward you with open curiosity.

You had only just stepped beyond the canvas when a voice called after you.

“Well,” the knight drawled, his voice thick with the rasp of a man who had spent the afternoon shouting at the lists and the evening drowning his senses in the casks. “If it isn't the Lady in Mail herself."

The title carried a jagged edge, sharp enough to hook the attention of a nearby knot of men-at-arms. Beside you, you felt the massive frame of Duncan shift, his weight settling into a stance that promised a storm.

He held a half-empty cup, his cheeks flushed with the heat of the wine, though his eyes remained uncomfortably sharp.

He came to a halt, letting his gaze travel slowly from your skirts to your brow before it settled into a crooked, knowing half-smile.

The knight raised his tankard in a lazy, mocking salute. He took a heavy step closer, ale sloshing dangerously near the rim as he gestured toward you with a gloating tilt of his head. “Quite the show you gave yesterday,” he said, his smirk widening. “Though I was under the impression the Trial of Seven was reserved for knights and men of true honour.”

His mouth twisted, dripping with a sudden, ugly venom. “Instead, we find a woman creeping into the fray behind a false face.”

A ripple of low, jagged chuckles drifted from the shadows of the pavilion. The knight didn't flinch; he took a long pull of his ale, wiping his mouth with a greasy sleeve before continuing. “What honour is there in such a deception? I wonder… did Harding pay for your spectacle?”

Your gaze drifted across the tent rather than meeting the man’s eyes. The fiddlers had stopped playing entirely now, their bows hovering uncertainly over the strings. Tankards hung half-raised in the hands of watching men, the air thick with the anticipation of a fight.

“How dare you,” Duncan rumbled. The giant’s voice was low, vibrating in his chest like distant thunder, but it was edged with a cold, white-hot fury.

You felt suddenly, bone-deep, tired.

“Please,” you said, your voice barely a whisper as you reached out to steady yourself against Duncan’s arm. “Let’s go.”

For a moment it seemed he might not listen. He looked as if he were ready to bring the whole tent down upon the man. But after a breath he turned sharply and followed you out into the open air.

Duncan was still fuming as you left the tent behind, muttering dark curses under his breath. You listened in silence.

Strangely, you found you didn’t have the strength left for anger. The day had wrung something out of you, leaving only a dull heaviness in its wake.

“You know,” came a voice from behind you, warm with amusement, “I had not imagined you to be so pretty beneath your helm, Ser Gillem.”

You turned.

Lyonel Baratheon stood a few paces away, clearly well battered by the trial but relaxed, watching the two of you with a faint, knowing smile.

His dark eyes, sharp and full of life, flicked between you and the towering, sullen Duncan. “I know the prince wasn’t imagining your pretty face, when you were sending him stumbling around in the dirt either,” he continued, closing the distance. 

He took your hand in his, his grip surprisingly gentle and raised it to his lips. “By the Seven, you can swing a sword, my lady.”

“Thank you, my lord,” you said. “Though I fear the credit may be somewhat exaggerated.”

Lyonel straightened, studying you with clear amusement. “Exaggerated?” he repeated. “Half the camp spent the afternoon arguing whether they had just witnessed the finest swordplay of the tourney or the greatest embarrassment ever dealt to a prince.”

Duncan let out a faint huff beside you, still clearly irritated from the encounter in the tent.

“I’m just glad to have gotten away with my life,” you added quietly.

At that, Lyonel’s smile softened slightly, the humor fading just a little from his expression.

“Well then,” he drawled, clapping him once on the shoulder, “I suppose I offer you my congratulations, Ser Duncan. It seems Baelor Targaryen has decided he cannot face the world without you looming behind him. I’d make peace with the departure of your honour, you’ll soon realise dragons don’t make good company.”

You looked between the two of them, confusion settling slowly across your face. “What do you mean?” you asked. “Duncan?”

Duncan still would not meet your gaze. He shifted his weight, as though the words themselves were difficult to carry.

“I pledged myself to Prince Baelor,” he muttered at last. “I’m to join his personal guard… and ride with him back to King's Landing.”

You watched him carefully as he spoke, as if the truth might change before the sentence finished. But it didn’t.

Something hollow opened quietly in your stomach and your smile came a moment too late. “That’s… that’s great,” you said.

Before either of them could see too much of your face, you stepped forward and wrapped your arms around him in a quick, shy embrace, and for a moment you were grateful for the excuse to hide your expression against his shoulder.

“It’s what you wanted,” you added softly.

Duncan hesitated before returning the hug, his arms settling awkwardly around you as if he wasn’t certain whether he deserved the congratulations.

When you pulled away, you turned instead toward Lyonel Baratheon, smoothing your expression into something polite. “I should head back to the castle,” you said. “I’m sorry if I don’t get to see you again before you leave, my lord.”

Lyonel waved a dismissive hand, though the easy smile never left his face.

“Nonsense. You’re welcome in the Storm’s End any time.” He placed a hand over his chest in mock ceremony. “Come to Storm's End and I’ll host a grand tourney in your honour.” His grin widened. “I should very much enjoy watching you knock a few green boys into the dirt.”

You tried to laugh, but the sound never quite came.

Duncan was watching you now, a faint crease forming between his brows. “I’ll walk you back up to the castle,” he said.

You shook your head immediately.

“No, that’s alright,” you replied, forcing lightness into your voice. “You’re hardly steady on your feet as it is. I’ll manage.”

Neither man looked entirely convinced.

“Goodbye,” you added quickly, already turning away.

The path up to the castle climbed steeply from the camp, the sounds of laughter and fiddles fading with every step you took. Torches burned low along the road, their light wavering in the wind as shadows stretched long across the ground.

You walked quickly at first, eager to put distance between yourself and the tents.

Duncan riding south with Baelor ‘Breakspear’ to King's Landing was considered an honor, even you could recognise that. It was the sort of thing songs were written about.

You should be glad for him. You were glad for him. 

The thought repeated in your mind, but it felt strangely thin, like a piece of cloth worn nearly through.

Halfway up the hill your breathing began to change.

At first it was subtle, a little faster, a little shallower but then suddenly the air felt far too thin.

You tried to draw in a deeper breath, but it caught halfway, leaving your lungs tight and aching, which only made your heart begin to hammer even more.

Another step forward, and the sound of your boots on the ground echoed far too loudly in your ears. 

Then the memory surged up without warning.

You could see it again as clearly as if it were happening now: the scream of a horse, the smell of churned mud and blood, the sharp jolt running up your arm every time your blade struck another’s.

Your breath came faster.

You remembered the moment you’d stumbled, the weight of armor dragging at your limbs, the terrifying second when a blade had flashed toward you through the chaos—

Then the path blurred before your eyes as your heart pounded harder, faster, until you were sure it was going to burst through your ribs. Your fingers trembled as you reached out blindly, finding the rough stone of the outer wall beside the road.

You leaned against it heavily.

Breathe.

But the air refused to come properly. You were convinced you were dying.

Your lungs worked in short, desperate bursts while the images still clung stubbornly to the edges of your vision, the dirt beneath your knees, the taste of copper in your mouth, the knowledge that one wrong movement would mean the end. It was all replaying over and over again in your head, no matter how much you tried to wish it away.

You squeezed your eyes shut.

You weren’t there. The trial was over. You were safe.

Still your body refused to believe it.

Your hands shook as you pressed your forehead against the cold stone, the chill grounding you in a way nothing else could. For a moment you stayed like that, breathing against the rough surface, letting the solid weight of it remind you where you were. Slowly, painfully slowly, the roaring in your ears began to quiet.

In. Out.

Your breaths grew deeper, though they still trembled.

Then finally the tourney field faded, leaving only the looming castle ahead and the distant murmur of the camp far below.

· · ─ ·✶· ─ · ·

When you returned to your chamber, the door was already ajar.

Inside, Aegon was exactly where you should have expected him to be.

He stood in the middle of the room, your sword clutched in both hands, the blade wavering uncertainly as he attempted what looked like a very careful practice swing. The weapon was clearly too large for him; the point dipped toward the floor every time he tried to raise it again, forcing him to heave it back up with visible effort.

The sight might have been amusing under other circumstances.

“Please don’t play with my sword,” you said tiredly as you stepped inside. “Your father will have my head if you so much as give yourself a scratch.”

The adrenaline that had spiked during your walk, the phantom roar of the battlefield and the crushing weight in your chest, had finally abandoned you, leaving only a hollow, bone-deep exhaustion.

You lowered yourself onto the edge of the mattress, gripping the frame as the dull ache beneath your ribs flared sharply in protest.

Behind you, Egg hurriedly slid the blade back into its sheath, far more carefully than he had drawn it. He set it against the wall where it had been before, then turned back toward you.

The excitement that had lit his face a moment ago faded quickly.

He studied you for a moment, taking in your pale expression and the way your knuckles had turned a milky white in your grip.

“Are you alright?”

You nodded faintly, though your eyes remained anchored to a knot in the floorboards

Egg hesitated.

Then he stepped closer.

You felt his small hand settle over yours where it rested on the bed. 

“Your hand is cold,” he said quietly.

You let your fingers curl around his without thinking, the warmth centering you slightly against the restless churn of thoughts still running through your head.

“I think I may have overexerted myself,” you admitted after a moment.

Egg didn’t seem entirely convinced, but he didn’t press. Instead he shifted awkwardly from one foot to the other before speaking again.

“My uncle asked to see you,” he said. “He’s in the Lord’s solar.”

Your brow lifted faintly.

Egg hurried on. “But I can tell him you’re resting if you want. He wouldn’t mind, I’m sure.”

You drew in a slow breath, pushing yourself a little straighter despite your body’s every instinct telling you to submit to your exhaustion.

“No,” you said after a moment. “It’s alright. I’ll go.”

Egg studied you another second before nodding. “Alright,” he said. “I can show you the way.”

The walk across the castle was even quieter than the one you had made that morning. The long stone halls echoed softly with your footsteps as you followed Egg through turns and stairways you had not yet learned to navigate alone.

Every so often he glanced back at you.

You tried to ignore them. Instead your thoughts drifted ahead to the man waiting in the solar.

Baelor Targaryen had already shown you more kindness than you had expected from a prince. Which somehow made the summons feel more unsettling, not less.

You spent the rest of the walk wondering what exactly he might say. Had he changed his mind, now convinced by the lords and his brother that you were little more than a fraud, hell bent on making the matter of Targaryen honour a joke?

The heavy oak doors of Lord Ashford’s solar loomed at the end of the gallery.

Before Egg could knock, raised voices drifted through the door, or rather, one raised voice did.

“So you not only spare her, but reward her.”

You and Egg both froze, shooting each other a wide eyed look but not daring to move an inch.

Inside the solar, Baelor answered with the same measured calm you had come to recognise.

“She fought with honour,” he said evenly. “And with skill that few knights possess. She deserves a chance to hone her skills, to train.”

“Train?” the other voice repeated incredulously. Maekar sounded as though the word itself offended him.

“As what, exactly? A curiosity? A court spectacle for idle lords?”

“I have made my decision, brother.”

Maekar’s reply came low and sharp. “Very well. On your head so be it.”

Egg barely had time to step back before the door was wrenched open.

Maekar strode out into the corridor with the force of a storm breaking loose. His cloak swung sharply behind him, and the anger that had been contained within the solar now seemed to fill the passage itself.

He stopped short when he saw the two of you standing there. For the briefest moment his pale eyes flicked between your face and his sons’.

“Eavesdropping now?” he said curtly.

Egg straightened at once. “No, Father, we were just—”

Maekar cut him off with a sharp motion of his hand. “Come,” he said.

Egg hesitated.

Maekar’s gaze hardened. “Now, Aegon.”

Reluctantly, he glanced back at you once before stepping toward his father who was already striding down the corridor, before you offered him a sympathetic smile in return.

Within moments their footsteps had faded around the corner and the corridor fell quiet again.

Behind you, the solar door remained open.

“You may come in, you know.” Baelor’s voice carried from inside, 

You stepped cautiously into the room.

Baelor stood beside the window with his hands resting neatly behind his back.

“I suspect,” he said gently, “that you have already heard the substance of our conversation.”

You shifted slightly. “Some of it, your grace.”

Baelor inclined his head. “Then I will spare us both the theatrics of pretending otherwise. I meant what I said.”

Baelor watched you for another moment before continuing.

“You fought yesterday with courage and discipline that many men train their whole lives to achieve,” he said. “It would be a waste to send you back into the world without the opportunity to refine that skill.”

He paused briefly.

“In King’s Landing there are training yards, masters-at-arms, and opportunities that simply do not exist elsewhere.”

His gaze met yours steadily. “I would offer you a place there.”

For a moment the words hung between you, heavy with possibility.

King’s Landing.

You never had layed eyes upon the place or even wished to, having forever associated it with the family you hated. And now the family you had been given the opportunity to serve. 

It would have felt like an impossible gift to anyone else. And despite your supposed hatred of the family that offered it the first thing that came to your mind was the echo of Maekar’s voice.

A spectacle.

A weakness.

“I can’t.”

The words came out quieter than you intended.

Baelor Targaryen did not react immediately, nor did he seem at all surprised by your answer. 

 “I heard what Prince Maekar said.”

A flicker of something unreadable passed across Baelor’s face at the mention of his brother.

You forced yourself to continue. “He’s not wrong,” you said begrudgingly. “You offering me something like that… it makes it look as though you’re rewarding me for what I did.”

“You believe you should be punished instead?” Baelor asked mildly.

“That isn’t what I meant.” You let out a slow breath, searching for the words.

“Yesterday was already more than enough of a spectacle,” you said. “If you bring me to King’s Landing after that to train me as some sort of… knight, people will say exactly what he said they would.”

Your gaze drifted briefly toward the window behind him. “That you’re weak. So soft are you that you’ll have a woman protect you.”

You couldn’t quite believe you were saying the words as they left your mouth. Nor did you know whether the intention was to spare Baelor’s dignity or your own.

Why should you accept for either of your sakes.

If you did ride to court, it meant standing beneath the eyes of the realm, listening while lords who had watched you fight now laughed behind polite smiles at the woman who had dared wear a knight’s armour. 

It meant serving the very family whose judgement had hung over your head only hours before. The family that you had spent almost your entire life cursing.

And yet the thought of leaving alone was no easier.

It meant leaving Duncan behind, and the boy who had waited outside your door as though your life were worth guarding. It meant turning away from the one place in the Seven Kingdoms where you might truly learn freely, where better knights than you walked the halls and where every day you might sharpen the skill you had bled for.

Then your father came to mind.

You wondered what he would have said if he could see you now, standing in the solar of Ashford Castle, weighing whether to ride south in the company of princes.

He had fought for the dragons once, long before you were old enough to understand what that meant. He had ridden beneath their banners during the Blackfyre Rebellion, when the realm had torn itself apart over which branch of their blood should rule.

Had he really seen something in the Targaryens worth giving his life for, that you hadn’t?

Baelor didn’t move for a moment.

Then he gave a soft, almost thoughtful huff of breath. “My brother has never lacked confidence in his opinions.”

You glanced back at him.

“But you think he’s right,” Baelor said.

“I think…” You paused, choosing your words carefully. “I think you have more important things to worry about than defending your choice of guards.” 

Even as the words left your mouth, part of you wondered why you were arguing with him at all. 

“You believe this offer is about gratitude,” he said.

“Isn’t it?”

“No.”

His answer came simply.

“It is about potential.”

Your brow tightened slightly.

Baelor continued.

“You stepped between princes, knights, and a crowd of watching lords without hesitation,” he said. “You fought with composure under pressure that would have broken many trained men.”

His gaze held yours steadily.

“That is not something I am inclined to ignore because it makes certain people uncomfortable.” The quiet firmness in his voice left little room for argument.

Still, you shook your head faintly.

“With respect, your grace… I don’t belong in King’s Landing.”

“Few people do,” Baelor replied dryly. “I sometimes think I don’t myself.”

Despite yourself, you almost smiled. But the unease remained.

For a moment the room fell quiet again, the faint crackle of the hearth in the corner filling the space between you.

Baelor folded his hands loosely behind his back. “I am not asking you to decide at this moment,” he said at last. “But we ride early tomorrow…if you do wish to come with us.”

“Thank you, your grace.” Your words were not a hollow courtesy.

· · ─ ·✶· ─ · ·

Dawn had only just begun to touch the towers when you reached the yard.

The sky above Ashford Castle was still pale with early light, the first thin streaks of gold creeping slowly over the sky. The castle was already awake. Stablehands moved between the horses with quiet urgency, breath rising in clouds in the chill morning air as saddles were tightened and straps checked for the long road ahead.

It had not taken long to pack what little you possessed.

Your belongings had never amounted to much, your weathered armour, a whetstone, the few small things that had followed you from place to place these past years. 

They now sat tied behind your saddle in a worn bundle that looked almost laughably small beside the baggage of the noble riders gathering in the yard.

You ran a hand along your horse’s neck as you fastened the last strap, feeling the familiar warmth beneath its coat. The poor creature had calmed since the chaos of the trial, though it shifted impatiently beneath your touch, as if sensing another journey ahead.

Beyond the stables, a cluster of riders had already begun to form near the gate. Cloaks stirred in the morning wind.

The road north waited beyond those walls.

Toward King's Landing.

You stood there for a moment longer than necessary, your hand still resting against the saddle leather.

It would have been easy to turn away even now. To remain here at Ashford, to slip back into the quieter life on that dirt track, the one you had known before all this madness had begun.

Instead, you gathered the reins and led your horse across the yard.

Toward the Targaryen banners. 

· · ─ ·✶· ─ · ·

tags: @bubbletea002 @makiishima @otteryougladimback @imnoonejustapiramide @halaeth-oldis @lovelykat001 @arkadiaphilosopher @yaren23 @sgt-lily @littlemisssscar @beany-bo-beany @blacksuiit @hiraya1802 @pjorksie @duckyhowls @lihane @atomicprecipicescheme @notawomanimagod @small-mean-dwarf @blooomsstuff @fushigurosbabygirl @marajade888 @theorginalwife000 @vigilante24ish @jellyforbrains

[baldwinhearts]

Your writing gives me life and I had a brainwave that I would like to share if you feel like turning it into something real for Baelor x reader

Being the hand of the king and the heir, it’s always “your grace” this, “my prince” that, “lord hand” etc. So he goes absolutely FERAL when you softly use his given name in bed.

Ok love you bye

SAY MY NAME (+18) — baelor targaryen

gif credits: @christophernolan

Summary: To the realm, he’s “Your Grace,” “Lord Hand,” “the Prince.” But in your bed, when you, his wife, softly whisper “Baelor,” the unbreakable heir of the Iron Throne goes feral — possessive, reverent, desperate. He talks you through every slow, deep thrust, begging you to say his name again while he fills you.

Additional tags: fem!read; no use of Y/N; +18; MDNI

A/N: and here it is, anon! i hope you love it! 💜

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

The royal apartments are dim, lit only by the dying fire and a single candelabrum on the bedside table. The sheets are already twisted, damp with sweat and need. Baelor — Hand of the King, heir to the Iron Throne, the man the realm calls “Your Grace,” “my prince,” “Lord Hand” — is between your thighs, naked and trembling with restraint.

He’s been worshipping you for what feels like hours.

His mouth on your cunt, slow, deliberate licks, sucking your clit until your hips buck, then pulling back just when you’re about to shatter. His fingers inside you — three now — curling, stretching, stroking that spot that makes your vision white. His free hand pinning your hip to the bed so you can’t chase the pleasure.

He’s hard against your thigh, leaking, but he hasn’t asked for anything. He never does until you’re sobbing.

You’re close again, thighs shaking, breath hitching, and he stops. Again. You whine, high, desperate, fingers twisting in his dark hair. “Please—”

He lifts his head, lips glistening, eyes blown black.

“Please what, sweetling?” he murmurs, voice wrecked. “Tell me.”

You arch, trying to grind against his hand, but he holds you still.

“I need—I need more—” you gasp. “I need you inside me. Please, Baelor.”

The name slips out, soft, intimate, unguarded. His whole body locks. He surges up, mouth crashing into yours, and kisses you like he’s trying to devour your soul. His tongue is everywhere, claiming and tasting, while his hands yank your thighs wider.

“Say it again,” he growls against your lips. “Say my name.”

“Baelor—”

He groans, raw, animal, and thrusts into you in one brutal stroke. You scream, your back bowing and your nails raking down his shoulders. He doesn’t pause — he fucks you hard, hips snapping, cock slamming deep, hitting every spot that makes you see stars.

“Again,” he snarls. “Say it again.”

“Baelor—”

He bites your neck hard enough to mark, then soothes it with his tongue. “Fuck—yes—my name—only my name—”

You’re sobbing now, overwhelmed and overstimulated, cunt clenching around him like a fist. He pins your wrists above your head with one hand, the other grips your throat — not choking, just holding, making you feel owned.

“Look at me,” he demands. “Look at your husband while he fucks you like you deserve.”

You do, eyes locked on his, and he slows just enough to torture, rolling his hips, grinding against your clit with every thrust.

“You feel that?” he rasps. “Feel how deep I am? Feel how I stretch this perfect little cunt? This is mine. You’re mine. Say it.”

“I’m yours,” you whimper. “Baelor—please—”

He groans, hips stuttering, then picks up the pace again, pounding into you so hard the headboard slams against the wall.

“Come for me,” he growls. “Come on your husband’s cock. Come while you say my name.”

“Baelor—Baelor—Baelor—”

You shatter, screaming his name, walls fluttering, clamping, milking him. He follows, burying himself deep, roaring your name, cock pulsing, spilling hot and thick inside you, filling you until it leaks out around him.

He stays inside, still hard, and lowers himself over you, forehead pressed to yours. “Again,” he whispers, voice wrecked. “Say it again.”

“Baelor,” you breathe, soft, reverent.

He shudders, kisses you slow, deep, and starts moving again.

The night is long. He takes you in every position — gentle, then rough, then gentle again — always talking you through it.

“Look at me.”

“Feel that?”

“You’re so beautiful.”

“Come for me, love.”

“Say my name.”

And every time you do — soft, broken, and needy — he loses control a little more. By dawn you’re both trembling, tangled in the sheets, his hand resting protectively over your lower belly. He kisses your temple, voice hoarse.

“I love when you say my name,” he murmurs. “No titles. Just me. Just yours.”

You smile, sleepy, sated, and whisper against his lips: “Baelor.”

He groans, soft, wrecked, and pulls you closer.

The realm can keep their “Your Grace.” In this bed, he’s only yours.

[captainfern]

captainfern the things i would do for a daeron fic where he's accidentally stalking the reader because he's dreamt about her and then ends up having sweet, almost possessive sex with reader... simply unholy things! i am unwell! that baelor fic was splendid btw you have OUTDONE YOURSELF!

oh he needs that cookie bad

His Oasis

Daeron ‘The Drunken’ Targaryen x noblewoman!reader

✿ he dreams of you for days, and he knows he has to have you (or, you are pursued by a yearning targaryen prince). ✿ 18+ ✿ wc: 6.7k ✿ cw: fem!reader, no y/n and reader is an undefined noble baddie (reader wears ribbons in her hair but no mention of hair type, texture, etc), reader is from an unnamed house, SMUT, allusion to either virgin or inexperienced!reader, there’s actually a tiny bit of plot in this one guys, unprotected piv, slight breeding kink, m!masturbation, oral (f!receiving), fingering, praise, possessive daeron, a bit of whiny and desperate daeron too, this man is yearning for you biiig time, tw: aerion mention (lol), strong language, takes place in dorne because dorne is cool :)

Pulling himself from a drunken stupor, his head pounding, brain pressing painfully against the inner-workings of his skull, Prince Daeron sits up in bed, sheets of soft linen and silk pooling over his lap. Bright, golden sun streams between the geometric tracery of the large windows. He winces at the light, puffing out a breath to blow a strand of hair out of his face. Waking up in an unfamiliar room in the Old Palace of Sunspear made his eyes sting even more, let alone waking from another vivid dream.

Although this dream was different.

There was less blood and fire. Fewer haunting screams.

He had awoken—albeit with a nauseating headache he had since become accustomed to—with a soft glow in his chest, an insistent warmth that made him reach to the table beside the bed and grab one of the four bottles of Dornish red. He examined it carefully: was there something different in this that made him dream of sunshine and smiles?

His dream was so different. Stranded somewhere amongst the rolling sand hills of the central Dornish desert, he had wandered aimlessly, but desperately, dragging his body through visible waves of heat. At least, it felt like it was him, but he was unsure. Wings weighed him down: large, black and scaly, but he couldn’t fly. He remembers the pain and the weight as he began sinking further and further into the scorching sand, gold and glitter racing for miles in either direction, swirling around his head like a flurry of birds. And that’s when he saw it, burning red eyes alighting on a blur of blue and green. An oasis, lush amongst the desert, bursting from the sand in a shower of gold.

His dreamstate crawled on all fours, pale skin red-raw by the time he reached the banks of the oasis. The water was the brightest blue he had ever seen, but he could not see his reflection in it. Instead, he saw a different face, a kind face, a beautiful face staring back at him. A woman smiling up at him through the rippling of the cool water.

She spoke to him, but no words came out.

Instead, the sound of bubbles and waves lapping gently against sand.

A clawed hand reached into the oasis pool, searching for the woman beneath the surface. The chill of the water soothed his burns, red disappearing from his skin. His claws vanished too, and he could see the clear crescents of his fingernails, the lines of his knuckles, the veins on the back of his hands. So human beneath the surface.

The woman watched him curiously, eyes shiny like pearls. Then, his hurt lurched and filled with warmth as she shifted upwards, towards the tension of the water’s surface. Up, up, up, and Daeron bent down to meet her. Her lips brushed the surface of the water—

And that’s when he woke up.

Daeron tosses the empty bottle of Dornish red aside. Stupid dreams. There wasn’t even anything useful in that one.

He wanders the warm, breezy halls of the glamorous old palace slightly more sober than he wishes to be. Maids and servants peer awkwardly at him, and he notices. He notices the looks of pity on their faces at the sand-blond hair falling messily on either side of his face, and the dark rings beneath his eyes. His mouth is painfully dry, so he heads into the main hall where his father sits with his Dornish relatives.

Maekar looks up. “You look like shit.”

Daeron slumps onto the nearest chaise and grabs a handful of pomegranate arils, tossing them into his mouth. He speaks with his mouth full, “I feel it.”

A few Dornish noblemen snicker around the vast wooden table, and Maekar just looks at his eldest son with a heavy dent in his brow. Daeron shrugs at him and accepts a goblet full of lemon water from a serving boy. Pity it wasn’t alcoholic.

“We have been here for one night already,” Maekar says blandly. “I expect you to spend some time doing something other than drinking.”

Daeron opens his mouth to speak.

“Or whoring, for that matter.”

Daeron closes his mouth and rolls his eyes.

Nearby, a Dornish noblewoman—a second cousin or something, Daeron cannot remember—offers the two Targaryens a polite smile, attempting to dissipate the slowly building tension across the table. “Our gardens are lovely this time of year. You were but a child when you explored them last.”

Daeron looks to her with mild disinterest, the burn in his eyes seeming to worsen at the way the sun caught the gold of her jewellery. Going outside in his state was not something he wanted to do. At all. But he spares a glance towards his father at the opposite end of the table and feels, for the first time in a long time, a pang of guilt. Small, but there. Maekar ran his fingers through his white-blond beard thoughtfully, but his eyes were sad.

Daeron sighs. He quickly shoves a couple of stuffed grape leaves into his mouth, downs the rest of his lemon water, and then pushes himself to his feet. He bows his head politely at the small number of people gathered around the table.

“If you’ll excuse me, then, I shall go and… explore the gardens.”

He takes his leave.

Bitterly, he realises the noblewoman was right. The gardens are brilliant, growing neatly amongst tiny streams of trickling water, plants blossoming in oranges, yellows and pinks. There’s a honey-sweet smell lingering in the air too, and bees flitter from one plant to another. There is green everywhere, trees swaying gently beneath a small breeze, the colours stark against the sandy beige of the castle’s high walls.

The sun isn’t too bad on his eyes, but he finds himself squinting still. The sun causes sweat to bead on his hairline too. Heated, he bats more strands of hair away from his face. Then, to add to the tickling frustration of his hair in his eyes, a fucking bug flies directly into his face. Daeron splutters, batting at the insect as it hovers around him. That’s when he hears a quiet giggle behind him, and he turns to see—

“Oh, I’m sorry, my prince,” you say quickly, realising you have been seen. Sitting beneath a fruiting tree, you clamber to your feet and bow. “I was… I did not mean—”

Daeron cannot speak. It is you, clear as day, free from the rippling surface of an oasis pool. His mouth opens dumbly as he watches you fumble over your words. He manages to smack the flying insect away from his face as he stares.

“I meant no disrespect,” you finally manage, still deep in a bow.

He still does not speak. His heart roars in his chest, thumping painfully against his sternum as he watches you smooth the soft, slightly crinkled fabric of your dress. He feels breathless and, suddenly, the most drunk he’s ever been despite the Dornish red long gone from his system.

You look up when the prince says nothing. You peer at him politely but curiously, not quite grasping the silence that has fallen between you.

You approach carefully, aware of several armed guards milling around the wall’s edges. “My prince?”

“I—” Daeron begins, then clears his throat. “Who are you?”

You introduce yourself by name, voice velvet in Daeron’s undoubtedly red ears. A noblewoman from a house he vaguely recognises the name of from his father and uncle’s many travels across the kingdoms. And, gods, you are the prettiest thing he has ever seen. Shimmering eyes, fluttering lashes, a charming smile that stretches across your beautiful face. And you’re wearing a blue dress, as blue as fresh oasis water, that makes you look dream-like in his sun-glared vision.

“Well, my lady,” Daeron manages to greet despite the squeezing in his chest. “I am glad you find my struggles humorous.”

You smile when you hear the hilarity in his voice. “It must be your hair, my prince.”

He steps closer to you and cocks his head to the side, the pair of you now standing beneath the shade of the tall lemon tree. “My hair?”

You nod. “It is the colour of honey, is it not? The bees clearly love it.”

Then, you reach forward and take a free strand of his hair between your fingers and tuck it tenderly behind his ear. He nearly closes his eyes at the heat that emits from you and the full body shudder that threatens to rack through him at your touch (he also chooses to ignore the twitch of his cock in his breeches, blaming it on the heat and post-drunkenness). Just as suddenly as the action had occurred, it ceased—you snap your hand back to your side, a vivid expression of shock passing over your lovely features.

“Oh, gods, my prince, please forgive me,” you mutter and take a step back. “I don’t—”

Daeron chuckles. “Do not fret. I suppose my hair is rather unruly today. Perhaps I should tie it back?”

He has no ribbon to tie it with.

But you do.

He watches, unashamed, as you smile and pull a small, thin blue ribbon from inside the bodice of your dress. His eyes catch the curve of your breasts, the supple dip into the stretched neckline as you pull the ribbon out with your fingers. His cock twitches again. The prince manages to snap his eyes back to you when you extend your arm and offer him the ribbon. You seem to lack the shyness of the other visiting noblewomen who walk the long corridors in Sunspear, but there is still a visible nervousness beneath your smile.

“I have a spare,” you tell him.

He peers at the silken material thoughtfully. He almost feels sober now.

“Would you tie it for me?” He decides to test the waters of his oasis. “I find this heat makes me… less than precise.”

Not technically a lie, he tells himself. He is more than capable of bringing his hair out of his face, but seeing the way your face flickers with uncertainty, overwhelmed with curiosity, is too good to resist. He inclines his head in your direction, silently begging for a response.

Your eyes drop. “My prince—”

“It is but a simple request to help your prince.” Gods, he sounds too much like his younger brother. It makes his stomach churn. The feeling is soon quelled, however, when you raise your pretty eyes and take a step closer to him.

He turns and bends his knees to accommodate you.

Gently, as if handling a vessel of glass, or perhaps a wild animal, you gather the tousled locks of his honey-blond hair and slip the ribbon around it. Your fingers brush the nape of his neck as he screws his eyes shut, a pained breath passing out of his nose. He burns up at your touch and his cock is definitely half-hard now. He wonders if you can feel the heat of his skin, hot like a branding iron. You expertly tie the ribbon and secure his hair away from his face, and he almost whimpers when your hands withdraw.

“Perfect,” you say cheerfully. “Although, blue is not really your colour, is it, my prince?”

Daeron turns. “Huh?”

“The Targaryens,” you begin. “Red and black. Blood and ash, I suppose. The blue is slightly out of place, I’m afraid.”

He doesn’t care.

“Is it your colour?” He asks instead.

“Well, I always match my ribbons to my dresses.”

Of course you do.

You run your hands down the blue fabric of your airy dress, and Daeron admires the way the light breeze picks at the hemline and makes it flutter. Then, you sigh wistfully, and look back up at the prince before you, who continues to watch you carefully, eyes thinking, as if he knows you from somewhere. There’s recognition in his light irises.

A voice from somewhere beyond the gardens calls for you. Daeron frowns.

You sigh again, but this time it is heavy. “Apologies, my prince, but I must depart.” Then, you bow, and turn and leave before Daeron can so much as open his mouth in reply. You leave behind a scent of citrus and honey and something fresh. Clean water, lush gardens. His heart aches in his chest, blood pumping hot inside him.

And his cock is still half hard.

“Fucking ridiculous…” he mutters to himself, pressing his palm to the front of his trousers with a low hiss.

He needs a drink.

—✿—

He doesn’t see you again that day, and it makes him…

Sad?

He does not know how he feels, but he knows something is wrong when he politely declines the advances of a stunning Dornish girl later that night. Instead, he leans against the wall of his chambers, burning forehead pressed against cool stone, two now-empty bottles of Dornish red rolling on the floor nearby.

He has your ribbon in his hand, wrapped around his fist as he strokes his cock, tip angry and red and drooling as your face swims around his brain. Your eyes, your mouth, your fingers, your smell. Daeron groans desperately around a drunken hiccup, hips thrusting to meet the movements of his hand. He utters your name into the emptiness of his chambers and spills himself over his knuckles and the intricately woven rug beneath his feet. He soils your ribbon too, and his heart pangs. Unsteady on his feet, he stumbles over to his wash basin and quickly rinses his seed from the shining blue.

He falls asleep with it drying in his hand.

And he dreams of you again.

He’s in the desert, but this time, he knows where to go. He’s never had a dream like this, where he can control so much of what he—is it him?—does. It feels less prophetic this way, and that scares him. The half-man, half-dragon crawls to the oasis but he cannot fling himself into the water. He roars desperately, scrambling against the sand, an invisible wall preventing him from moving any further than sticking one clawed hand beneath the tiny waves. But you still smile at him, and when you approach the surface, your face appears clearer and your eyes sparkle brighter and—

Daeron wakes with a start.

“Fuck!” He can’t help but shout into the stillness of his chambers. He regrets it when it shoots a fierce pain into the back of his eyes.

He tucks your ribbon into the waistband of his trousers, letting his hair fall messily to his shoulders as he hurries through the halls of the palace again. He bypasses the great hall and enters the gardens, but you are not there. Entering the great hall, he ignores the curious glances of his cousins and siblings as his gaze spins around the room. Maekar is not there, but neither are you.

“You have risen early,” Valarr comments.

Daeron calms himself. He cannot just ask for you. “Where is my father?”

Valarr gestures to the way Daeron just came. “Somewhere.”

“How helpful,” he mumbles sarcastically, then leaves the great hall, ignoring the warm aching in his chest that he will, once again, blame on the Dornish wine.

—✿—

Nothing of you the next day, either. He searches the entire palace, it feels like.

Aerion asks him if he’s mentally unwell when he disregards another offer of sex from a pretty girl. Daeron ignores him, and returns to his chambers. There are three bottles of Dornish red already waiting for him, but he doesn’t touch them. Instead, he all but throws himself into his bed and wills himself to sleep, the sun still setting and bathing him in gold and crimson.

He dreams of you differently.

He’s under the water and you kneel on the sandy banks, blue dress blurring at the edges as if you were made from the desert that surrounded you. You reach for him, your hand finding his face, cool and comforting against the blazing heat of his cheek. But the dragon fights to bite her, and when his teeth sink into the flesh of her hand, a sharp pain rips through him. Yet she is not the one screaming, he is.

And then he wakes and uncorks the nearest bottle of wine.

Later, he feels lucky that his drunken prayers have been answered when he finally spots you. You chat happily to a few lesser noblewomen, lounging in a gathering of plush pillows. Daeron feels something prideful swell in his chest. He watches you bring a segment of blood orange to your mouth, the juices glistening over your lips as you talk and eat.

But glued to his father’s side, he cannot speak with you.

And this becomes a recurring nightmare of his.

Over the course of several days, he watches you from afar. While discussing realm politics with Valarr and several royal Dornishmen, he becomes unfocussed as you laugh and gossip with his younger sisters, speaking of brilliant puppet shows with fire and smoke. While being insulted in conversation by his younger brother, his eyes find you as you stand outside a window, the light catching in your hair, your ribbons matching the light green of your dress. While he attempts pathetically to keep up with his father’s instructions, he watches you dismount a large mare, your skirts floating around you, a smile etched deep onto your face, eyes sparkling as you say something quietly to the stable boy.

Prince Daeron is following you, a mere lady, around Sunspear like a puppy. He finds himself lingering in doorways, listening to your conversations, or leaning against the thick trunk of a tree, hiding as you and your ladies hurry past him to head into the gardens. He enjoys the way he can smell your sweet scent hanging in the airy hallways a few seconds after you pass by, and he especially likes the way the ribbon he has still smells like you too, even despite the several washes it has endured.

And which he is not proud of.

—✿—

He dreams of you again the night before he is set to depart back to King’s Landing with his family. He fell asleep only half-drunk on red, and now you are back beneath the surface of his dream oasis. His hand finds your face, and he wills himself to pull you from the depths. Bring you up, rescue you, kiss the water from your lungs. And so you rise, and your lips break the surface of the water for the very first time and he kisses you.

Dragon tongue searching, splitting, invading. It burns the inside of your mouth and he hisses, serpent-like. You emerge from the water, nose and eyes following until your entire face is presented to him. He kisses you and you kiss him back.

And so he wakes with an achingly hard cock, sticky against his bare thighs. His fingers trace the length and he hisses, blood pumping like raw fire beneath the velvet skin. His entire body is slick with sweat too, and so he throws off the covers, slides tunic on, and stumbles out of his room in search of fresh air. He’s stifling.

Instead, he stumbles directly into you.

You yelp in shock as his warm body collides with yours, large hands reaching out to grab your hips, preventing you from falling backwards. He groans when your hands, cool from prolonged exposure to the night air, find his chest and the thin linen of his night tunic. His eyes find your face, and he wishes he could kiss you.

“My prince!” You exclaim, head whipping side-to-side to check the shadowed expanse of the hallway. You continue to touch his chest. “Are you alright? Are you ill?”

Instinctively, you press the back of your hand to his forehead. Daeron groans again, eyes screwing shut and mouth dropping open. You peel your hand away as if his skin had scolded you.

“You’re burning,” you remark.

“I dreamt of you,” he says in return, voice whinier than he intended.

You pause. The silence is deafening save for Daeron’s ragged breathing and the distant voices of the kingsguard nightshift.

“What?” You finally whisper.

“Every night, I have dreamt of you. I dreamt of you before I met you,” he whispers, opening his eyes now. “You are… you’re an oasis. My oasis.”

You frown, but not in displeasure. Moreso confusion. “I… don’t understand, my prince.”

“You plague my mind like something fierce. I cannot… gods, I cannot rid myself of you,” he utters and his hands tighten on your hips, thumbs smoothing over the mound of the bone beneath skin and flesh and fabric. “My mind is consumed only by you. You—you are mine, my lady. You are supposed to be mine.”

You gape at him, hyper-aware of his closeness. You can smell the rich spices of wine on his breath, but there is a clarity in his eyes that frightens you. It sends a thrill down your spine, and the slight buzz of your own nightly endeavours—sipping spiced wine with your ladies in the darkness of the gardens—adds to the feeling blooming in your lower belly. A heat pooling there, sparking like a blade on steel.

“My prince—” you say quietly.

“Daeron.”

“Daeron,” you whisper, and he groans.

“Let me have you,” he leans forward to whisper against your cheek, nuzzling his nose across your face until he can brush his lips against the lobe of your ear. “Let me show you how much I need you.” 

Because I need you like water, he almost says.

You feel yourself heating up. “You are surely drunk…”

“There is no drink left in my blood,” he tells you quickly. “I need you.”

He says your name, then kisses your cheek. He kisses where your pulse hammers in your neck. He kisses the sensitive spot on the edge of your throat.

You take one hand and slowly, gently, reach to grasp the back of his head, threading your fingers in his hair. He whines out as you angle his head back to you and slot your mouth against his, whispering just before your lips touch: “You have me.”

Daeron groans as your tongues meet, and he pulls you back through the doorway of his chambers. You taste the wine on his tongue, and you’re sure he can taste it on yours too. You close the door carefully behind you, fumbling slightly as his hands caress your sides, fondling the dips of your hips, the curve of your arse, the bend in your spine. He’s an incessant press to your front, too, with his hardening cock rucking against your clothed pelvis. He whines something quiet against your lips as he strains against his breeches, a small wet patch growing in the white, nearly transparently thin fabric.

You release his hair to tug at the material of his tunic. He breaks the kiss with a growl, tossing the shirt over his head before glueing his mouth back to yours. Your hands find the warm flesh of his pecs, giving them a squeeze, your thumbs running over his nipples.

“Ah—” he breathes out against your lips.

His strong hands pin you to the closed door, one reaching to ruck your skirts out of the way so he can seize your thigh, pulling it up for you to wrap around his waist. With this new angle, he grinds himself against you, clothed cock rubbing over the delicate fabric of your own undergarments, sliding over the heat of your covered core. There, you are hot and slick, and Daeron groans into your mouth, pulling away to look down at you.

“You’re the most beautiful woman I have ever laid eyes on,” he tells you, other hand reaching beneath your skirts to press a palm flat to your covered core. You draw in a breath and he kisses the tip of your nose. “And you’re mine.”

The prince’s hand slips beneath the fabric.

“Daeron,” you whisper, mouthing at his jaw as the coarse pads of his fingers find your wet cunt. A whimper follows as he parts you with two fingers, running them up and down your folds as you bite down on the junction of his neck.

“I’ve got you.” He flinches at the bite, but his fingers do not cease, and one soon finds the swollen pearl of your clit. He draws a tight circle, clumsy the first few ministrations, but he rapidly finds and settles into a rhythm as you nibble along his neck and shoulder.

After a few circles, he draws his fingers back down your slit, gathering moisture before his pointer and middle find your hole. You draw in a tight breath at the small pressure he exerts, and you flop your head back to find him already looking down at you. Silently, you nod and, eyes locked, he pushes two slick fingers into the tight clutch of your cunt. With a flutter of your eyelashes, your eyes close, and Daeron leans in to kiss the moan from your lips. He licks over your teeth and tongue as he gently pushes himself into the first joints, then the second, your pussy opening for him like he always knew it would. Soon, his knuckles press to the soft flesh of your inner thighs and you’re moaning his name into his mouth like an incantation.

“Shh, there we go, we’re all done,” Daeron shushes you softly, kissing the corner of your mouth. 

Your hands find his back and you grip at the strong muscle there. His skin is burning beneath your touch, and you wonder if he is actually becoming ill. The thought is wiped from your mind, however, when the prince pulls his fingers out of your cunt and then forces them back inside, curling them just the right amount to have you crying out. 

He responds to your cat-like yowl with another intimate coo, “S’alright, s’alright. Be good for me, my lady. Taking it so well, aren’t you?”

He fucks his fingers into you repeatedly. Your nails scratch lurid red lines down his back as he splits you apart over his knuckles. Slick runs down the back of his hand, and his cock twitches as he feels a rivulet run along the inside of his wrist.

You’ve never felt like this before. A sticky warmth spreads through your chest like honey, and something bludgeoning rears itself in the pit of your belly. A fuzzy tingle appears at the base of your spine too, and it makes you whine, your hips jerking forward to meet his movements. 

Daeron groans, pinning you to the door with his front and managing to use his free hand to yank down the neckline of your dress. You hear a resounding tear as he pulls your breasts free of your dress and chemise. The cool air of his dark chambers pebbles your nipples, but he’s quick to suck one of them into his mouth without warning. You yelp as he sucks harshly, your fingers finding his blond locks again and pulling.

He withdraws with a whimper and a wet pop, a glistening string of saliva connecting from his bottom lip to the bud of your nipple. It snaps when you push his head to the other breast, and he obeys, drawing the other into his mouth as he continues to scissor his fingers into the wet heat of your cunt. The sounds are obscene and wet, ringing in your ears like bells.

The heavy feeling in your belly grows tenfold at the dual sensation.

“Daeron,” you mewl, and the piteous sound has Daeron—rather reluctantly—tearing himself away from your breasts. He gives your nipple one last chaste kiss for good measure though. You huff. “Feel… I feel something.”

The prince straightens and kisses you softly. “Yeah? Feeling something in here?”

His hand drops and presses to your lower belly, your womb, and you nod at the pleasant warmth the pressure spreads through your core. Just as you nod, he withdraws his fingers, and the emptiness is like a slap to the face, the cool air bracing and sending goosebumps in trails over your legs. Before you can complain, he drops to his knees, kissing your breasts on the way down, dropping your leg gently. 

You feel him guide your legs apart at the knee as he gathers your skirts.

“If you would be so kind…” He offers them to you, and you clutch the luxurious fabric between trembling fingers. You watch him curiously as he smiles, lopsided and lax. He then ducks his head between your legs, kissing and licking up the ticklish skin of your thighs.

“What—? Oh—” You choke on your gasp as his hot mouth presses to your drooling cunt, his tongue flat and solid through the softness of your folds.

Daeron whines into you, a real trill that is embarrassingly unbecoming in his mind, but makes you clench around nothing. 

You taste of the heavens. You taste of you. Of a citrusy tang, a subtle honey sweetness, of the cleanest spring water. His oasis.

And you grip his golden hair, that heavy pleasure in your belly fills you once more as his tongue circles the rim of your hole and then—“Oh, fucking gods, Daeron”—presses inside you. The feeling is foreign, but welcome, and you gasp and moan as ecstasy seizes you in a white-knuckled grip. Your legs shake, tremble, the haze of the night’s spiced wine dissipating as the feeling of his mouth on you overtakes every functioning part of your brain. You no doubt sound like a wounded animal: whimpering and whining in high-pitched chirrups, grinding yourself onto his mouth.

Daeron has a hand on his painfully hard cock. He blindly pulls his breeches down, cock slapping up against his slightly hunched abdomen. He groans into your warmth as he fists himself, several beads of pre-cum dribbling out and smearing beneath his enclosed palm. You sound breathtaking above him, the heat beneath your skirts burning his cheeks a blazing red. In his pleasured stupor, he manages to bring his free hand up to your pussy and spread his fingers lightly over your clit as he continues to curl his tongue inside of you.

You jerk against him. There’s a knot in your tummy. “My prince.”

Daeron hums into you, unrelenting. His fingers press harder to your clit.

You sob out a moan, tears pricking at the corners of your eyes as your legs quiver and your stomach contracts. Then, something snaps inside you, and the sun seems to bloom from your chest like a yellow rose.

You release into Daeron’s mouth, and he closes his eyes in pure bliss as he laps it up with unwavering curls of his tongue, beckoning more from you with small presses of his fingers to your clit. He mutters your name against your folds before he pulls back, the lower portion of his face shining with your release.

The back of your head leans against the door as the prince gathers himself, kicking his breeches away. Your dress is gathered unflatteringly at your waist, and you continue to hold your skirts in a steadily loosening grip as pleasure lazes through your muscles. But Daeron is back on you in an instant, slotting his mouth to yours as he takes your leg again and hikes it back onto his hip. You are ripped from the rapture of your release by the warm length of his cock pressing against your slick, aching core. Fingers release his golden hair to grab at his shoulders for stability, your tongues intertwining.

You taste yourself on him.

“My lady,” he utters, kissing your cheek, wetness smearing over the warm skin. “My love, will you have me? Will you—” he gently ruts his hips back and forth, sliding his cock through the wet split of your cunt. “—let me have you?”

“Yes,” you gasp quickly, but fear bleeds into your subconscious.

He mellows you with the softest kiss of the night. His lips are an affectionate comfort before he whispers your name and says, “You were made for me, made for this. You are mine.”

The prince, your prince, slides his tongue back into your mouth to muffle your light whimpers as his hand guides his cock to your pussy, running up and down, gathering the heady mix of your release and his saliva: the mix you could still taste on his tongue.

He notches the reddened head of his cock at your hole. A hiss escapes him. Dragon-like in sound, but he withholds a full groan as he presses in with a shift of his hips. He lets go of his cock to help in holding up your skirts as he eases into you, splitting you apart against the door of his chambers. You are damp with sweat beneath your dress and chemise, the back of your neck hot as you fail to keep up with his kiss. Moans roll from your tongue and get caught between his teeth, and he drags himself away to lick over your jaw as he enters you.

Slow, gentle.

“Fuck, fuck, fuck,” Daeron whispers into your neck. His balls tense as he bottoms out inside you, and the base of his abdomen clenches with the effort of holding himself still. This was perhaps the first time he was thankful he was not completely drunk, or he would have spilled the moment your sweet pussy clutched around his thick cock.

You whimper at the pain lingering behind the euphoria, hands scrambling for purchase down his back. “Daeron.”

Daeron sucks and licks the sweat from your exposed shoulder before he starts to move, listening to your heavy breathing. He holds you as he pulls back, then pushes in. Slowly, patiently.

Clearly, his chivalry was not appreciated.

“Daeron,” you say louder. “Please, I need you to go faster.”

Your prince pulls out and then pushes back in as his teeth sink into your shoulder. You cry out, the sound echoing around his chambers, as he drives into you, over and over. The thickness of his cock spreads you like nothing you’ve ever experienced, and you feel as though you can feel him nudging up towards your womb. It’s intoxicating, and his tongue circling now at your pulsepoint has you keening into his warm touch, nails once again digging into his bare back.

You call for him, and he’s on you in an instant, sliding his tongue back into your mouth to tangle with yours. You nip at his bottom lip. He smiles.

“You have haunted my dreams for days,” he tells you honestly, fucking you all the while. “They say my dreams will drive me mad, but how am I to be driven to madness when I dream so often of you?”

You kiss the corner of his mouth and whimper.

He continues. “My oasis in the desert. I need you, sweet girl. You must let me have you.”

His cock slams into that perfect spot inside you that has your back arching off of the solid wood of the door. You hold him tightly and moan like a whore, loud and unabashed, as he aids your movements, tugging you down to meet the thrusts of his hips. He loves the way you sound, but he needs you to speak to him. He loves your voice more.

“Say it,” he begs. “Say you’re mine. Say you will not let me drown.”

You don’t understand that last part, but you find yourself nodding deliriously anyway. Once again, your fingers find his hair and you tug tightly at the loose strands. He whimpers, eyes closing for a moment, tongue pressing to his bottom lip as his thrusts falter.

“I’m yours, my prince,” you say breathlessly. “Gods, I’m yours.”

His eyes snap open.

“Yes,” he whines out. “Say it again.”

“I’m yours,” you moan as his thrusts increase in pace, and his ruts become desperate as he fills you. Your legs start to shake again, and the pressure in your belly returns, and now you know exactly what that means.

“You’re mine, all mine,” Daeron mutters, more to himself than to you. He follows with an even quieter, “And this pretty cunt, all fuckin’ mine.”

You pull him from whatever trance-like state your pussy has entrapped him in, his eyes glassy. Over a moan, you plead, “Daeron, please, I’m so close…”

He redoubles his efforts like a man possessed. “Yeah?” 

Then his hand snakes downward and finds your clit once more. He pinches it, the bastard, and you yowl as he rubs tender circles in the wake of the pain, your exclamation tapering off into a simpering whine. He chuckles, and you realise you had forgotten he was a Targaryen.

“I want to feel you,” he says. “I want to feel you come undone on my cock.”

“Daeron.”

“Come on, my love, give it to me. Give me what I dreamed of.”

With one last desperate whine, the knot inside you snaps and you come around his cock. Your pussy clenches around him and it feels even better than releasing around his fingers. Your nails drag down his back, probably drawing blood, as you moan out his name. Your pussy spasms around the thick of his cock, clit racing with your heartbeat, pleasure bursting from every pore as your high rockets through you. Daeron fucks you through it, panting while watching the way your face flickers and changes as you crest your high and begin to fall. He holds you still as you whimper, your slick dripping down your inner thighs as he maintains his pace.

“Good girl, good girl,” he praises, drunk on pleasure. “That’s a good girl.”

You whine for your prince. You whisper when his pace begins to stutter, “Spill inside me, please—I need you to fill me.”

You don’t know where that came from, but it does something. A moan so raw rips from Daeron’s throat that you think he’s in pain. But instead, he comes inside you, the tip of his cock shoved right up towards the plug of your womb. His head falls forward and he continues his moans against your shoulder, now muffled, as his hips continue to rut.

He says something you don’t hear. “It’ll take. I need it to take.”

Instead, you press a kiss to his cheek when his movements finally stop. Slowly, gingerly, the two of you part: the prince pulls his cock from you and you gasp as seed and slick drool out of you like honey from a dipper. Daeron, almost panicked in his light-eyed gaze, dips down to collect it with two fingers, pushing it back inside you. One handed, he also helps pull the rest of your dress up and over your head. You help him wordlessly with tired arms.

He clears his throat as he places a tender kiss on your stomach. “Will you spend the night here, my lady?”

You stroke his hair as he continues to bend, fingers crooked into your cunt. “Do you wish for me to?”

He replies before your lips stop moving. “Yes. Please. If you, uh, if you wish.”

You urge him up with another tug to his hair. He whines, and obeys, fingers leaving the warmth of your pussy as you place a caring kiss to his slightly bruised lips.

“I would like nothing more,” you tell him, then suck your shared release off of his fingers.

That night, you curl in comfortably at his side, head resting against his chest. Daeron falls asleep with a smile on his face and three untouched bottles of Dornish red at his bedside. 

And he dreams of you. Well, he thinks he does.

A black dragon drinks from a desert oasis as plants begin to bloom around him. Dense, brilliantly green shrubs and trees sprout from the arid sand as the sky-blue water of the pool sparkles beneath the sun. The dragon laps at the cool water as rivers begin to form, and more and more jungle surges out from beneath the golden dunes until the sand becomes grass and trees brush the cloudless sky.

You wake before him, the sun rising in pinks and blues outside. You press a kiss to his chest, where it rises and falls slowly, and nuzzle into him.

Under the sheets, your hand finds something, and you pull your blue ribbon out from beneath you. You smile softly, gripping it in your hand as sleep finds you once more.

———

i need him to look at me like that

[captainfern]

fern i need you to write the most nastiest smut for daddy baelor like toe curling, sweat inducing, cum loading smut i need to ride him like a dragon

toe curling… sweat inducing… cum loading…

Ride Your Dragon

Baelor Targaryen x wife!reader

✿ after your husband dismisses your words of comfort, he works hard to win back your favour the best way he knows how (or, you ride your dragon to feel better). ✿ 18+ ✿ wc: 3.6k ✿ cw: fem!reader, no y/n and reader is undefined but hot (you), baelor is obsessed with you, SMUT, not a lot of plot i'm gonna keep it real guys, unprotected piv, riding, praise, strong language, the softness and desperation we all need from a man like him (so not super duper nasty i'm sorry 😔)

The golden light of the sinking sun illuminates your path through the Red Keep as you hurry through the vast network of halls, your heavy skirts whipping against your ankles as you move. Servants stop when they see you, bowing their heads or casting their eyes downwards in respect, and ever the dutiful princess, you respond with the same kind smile that has earned you quite the positive reputation across the kingdoms.

A kind, amiable consort to match the justness and integrity of the great Baelor Targaryen. A gentle hand beside him to lessen the load, to calm him of his day’s struggles and guide him tenderly through the reddened corridors of the royal residence. Whispers whirl of how your smile can subdue any man, really––lesser lords notice the relief that seems to wash off of Maekar when you enter any room, and the ladies-in-waiting spot how tension leaves the faces of Valarr and Matarys when you place your hands upon their shoulders in comfort.

Some say it is magic. Some say you are an enchantress, primed with the ancient knowledge of some kind of dark ritual that enables you to calm even the most tempestuous of storms (these rumours began when you calmed the raging Aerion one night, several moons ago, and he, to everyone’s utter shock, listened and obeyed).

But it is not magic.

Nor are you always successful.

You continue briskly down the warmly lit hallway, head level and eyes fixated onto the opening space in front of you. You can hear equally hurried footsteps behind you, and you huff to yourself, making it to your favourite wing of the castle and throwing open the door to your chambers. You slam it shut behind you and it seems the bones of the castle rattle with the force, the heavy wood appearing to rock on its hinges. With an exasperated sigh, and in a considerably unladylike manner, you fling yourself down onto the furs of your bed.

There is a gentle knock on your door.

“No,” you respond simply.

“I have yet to speak a word,” the voice of your husband travels quietly through the thick wood. Despite these being his chambers too, he did not open the door. Instead, when greeted with your silence, he continues with a gentle, “My love?”

“Leave me be,” you say loudly, lifting your faces out of the plush furs.

“I do not wish to,” Baelor replies quickly. “May I enter?”

He asks for permission to enter his own chambers. The chivalry of it all makes you sigh as you roll onto your back, picking yourself up to sit on the very edge. You let him wait for a few long moments, watching sunlight dance through the large, reticulated windows adjacent to your bed.

“My love,” he says again, somehow even more gentle than before. His tone has something twisting bitterly inside your stomach, something tasting of guilt when it rises like bile into your mouth. You shake away the feeling, pressing the tip of your tongue to the backs of your teeth as you withhold a pout. Baelor continues, “I will leave if you––”

“You may enter,” you say quickly before you regret it. Not that you ever would.

The door creaks open slowly and your husband enters your shared chambers. He closes the door softly behind him before he remains adjacent to it, mismatched eyes finding yours across the room, a deep crease in his brow. There’s something heavy there, in the way he holds your gaze, his own guilt manifesting itself in the space between you like some kind of spectre. You yearn to bat it away and make him feel right again.

He takes one step closer. “I did not mean to speak to you in such a way.”

His curt words from earlier echo around your skull as if he were shouting them at you right at that moment. Frustrated and tired, Baelor had dismissed you tersely from his solar when you attempted to peel the stress from his body with your kind words. Paired with a flick of his hand through the air in obvious dismission, his words cut through you like a knife––and he knew it. You were offering him such sweet words, such (usually) welcomed comfort and support, and he had all but cleaved your heart in half for it. A short moment after the words had been said, he looked up in surprise––surprise and shock at himself––as you withdrew from him, hands leaving his shoulders and warmth vanishing, extinguished like a candle. You had backed away and then fled the room, leaving Baelor to fumble over the papers before him, inkwell toppling over and splashing ink across the parchment as he moved quickly to get up from his desk.

You notice the ink stains on a couple of his fingers, black smudged into the crevices of his skin. His face appears calm, but he fidgets with a large silver ring on his ring finger.

“Yet you did,” you mutter in reply, crossing your arms over your body. “You spoke to me as if I was little more than… than a servant.”

You pause, then scoff out: “Actually, you are always so courteous to our servants, so I believe you spoke to me with even less courtesy. Perhaps you would speak to a hound like that, or perhaps a Blackfyre––”

Baelor huffs loudly, but he wasn’t angry. “Do not pain me, my love.”

You raise a brow in his direction.

“I apologise for the way I spoke to you. It was unbecoming and unjust of me, and I stand here before you, as your husband, to ask for your forgiveness,” Baelor says carefully, taking another couple of steps towards you. He stops, just out of arms reach. “From sunrise to evenfall I have been continuously called upon, but I know that does not excuse the insolence of my actions.”

“No,” you whisper. “It does not.”

“Please, my love.” Baelor steps forward once more and brings a large hand to the side of your face, cupping your cheek and touching his thumb to your cheekbone. “I am deeply sorry. May you forgive me?”

You notice the glassiness of his mismatched eyes and immediately melt beneath his gaze, a surge of remorse flowing through you as his other hand finds the other side of your face, cradling you. His eyes scan over you and you let your frown slip away.

“You are forgiven,” you begin.

Baelor smiles, the lines around his tired eyes deepening. “Thank––”

“On one condition.”

Baelor cuts himself short, slowly closing his mouth. You smile innocently at him as he continues to cup your face in his warm hands. He leans forward and presses a gentle kiss to your forehead and you feel butterflies in your stomach as if you were some simple maiden.

“Anything,” he whispers against you.

You take a step back (which requires considerable strength considering the warmth and gentleness and familiarity of his hands on your face). His arms drop to his sides and he peers at you curiously. You point at the bed behind you.

“No more work for the rest of the evening,” you say. “And you’re going to get on that bed and not move unless I tell you to.”

Baelor opens his mouth to say something, but decides against it. Not wanting to spurn anymore wrath from his wife, he keeps eye contact while he discards himself of his royal wear, his tunic falling away to reveal the strong expanse of his chest. Silently, you turn and he understands immediately––your clever, observant prince––and makes slow, careful work of the intricate knots on the rear of your dress.

You feel him against you. So warm and solid, his hands skim the heavy fabric as he unravels the backing with deft fingers. His breath fans over your shoulder too, which you can feel when it bares to him, the sleeve of your dress slipping down as he works. Warm lips press to warm skin. Over and over, Baelor takes the time to trail tender kisses along the shoulder, over the junction of your neck and up the side of your throat. He peels your dress down past your waist as he kisses the pulsepoint right below your ear, and you are aware that it is practically jumping out of your skin to meet him.

You lean your head back against his shoulder, your skirts hitting the solid ground with a resounding thump as his hands find the soft linen of your shift, clutching your waist. 

His nose bumps the shell of your ear as he whispers, “I’m sorry.”

Then, his hands move, and you sigh out wistfully as his hands cover your breasts, palms burning-hot even above the thin material. He kneads you there as he sucks the skin at the curve of your neck, humming quietly to himself. You reach a hand behind you to loop into the band of his trousers, pulling him closer, feeling the imprint of him against your backside. You arch into the feeling and his quiet hum turns into a low groan.

You step forward and bring him with you with your finger hooked into his trousers still. He followers willingly, hands reaching for you as you spin out of his grasp, laughing. You stop at the edge of the bed.

Baelor quickly makes work of his trousers, and you can’t help but giggle at the desperation he shows in rucking them down his legs and then ridding himself of his breeches like a lovesick lord. You bite your lip as his already hard cock bobs out, and you have a moment where you wish to reach forward and grasp it (but you realise that would likely end up with you on all fours on the ground––good in any other situation but this).

You nod to the bed.

“So demanding,” he chuckles warmly, clambering onto the bed before turning to rest against the multitude of pillows at the top. He puts one arm beneath his head, smiling over at you as you slowly begin to remove your shift.

He watches you as if he’s being rewarded, free hand wrapped around the base of his cock. The head is ruddy with blood already, precum pearling at the slit as his eyes darken.

Your shift finally, finally––taking too fucking long, Baelor thought––hits the floor, leaving you exposed to the cool air of the room. Golden sunshine illuminates your body in such a way that Baelor’s mouth drops open: you were a vision from the gods themselves.

“Seven above…” He mutters, fisting his cock. The pearl of precum drops and rolls alongside a dark vein prominent on the underside.

You crawl towards him, breasts on full display as you settle up between his legs, and you hear his breath quicken, see the paced rise and fall of his chest. You make a point of swooping in low as you slink over his abdomen, the flushed head of his cock brushing between the swell of your breasts. Baelor groans loudly, the look of victory on his face mere moments ago completely gone. His pupils are blown wide with lust and his cock twitches as he rucks his hand shallowly over the base.

“My love,” he breathes out. “Gods, please, I need you.”

You straddle his hips, cock a hair’s breadth away from the heat of your core. You lift yourself and ignore the slight tremble in your thighs.

“Do you know how wet you make me?” You ask him in a whisper, and the groan that elicits from his chest was as strong an aphrodisiatic as anything you could find in Lys. You continue, “How soaked I am, simply from your touch?”

Baelor swallows thickly. “Show me––”

“How much I ache for you?” You lift yourself higher until the head of his cock, flushed a painful, bruising red, presses softly to your slick core.

“Oh fuck––” Your husband draws in a sharp breath.

But you don’t sink down. You simply begin to rock yourself back and forth, nudging the head of his cock through the wet folds of your cunt while you whine and whisper questions at him that he most definitely cannot answer. He could reach forward and take your hip in one large hand, slamming you down onto him. He has the power to do it, the nerve to do it, but he holds firm. Doesn’t move. Obeying his princess while she takes what she needs.

“Do you know how often you work late into nightfall, leaving me here, alone? How I have to touch myself to the thought of you because you are not here to satisfy me.”

The prince curses again and screws his eyes shut, relishing in the wet heat coursing down the length of his cock. He imagines you lying in your shared bed, your fingers crooked deep into the silken warmth of your cunt, moans drawing from your lips including a loud lilt of his name into the emptiness of the chambers. He envisions the pads of your fingers working desperately over the swollen bud of your clit, your back arching, nipples straining against the thin white fabric of your shift, pussy bared to the room and clenching around nothing.

His cock twitches and he groans.

“Let me taste you, my love,” is all he can think to say as he opens his eyes. He lets go of his cock to reach for your hip, squeezing gently and caressing the skin, as if that would help strengthen his case. 

If you were a weaker woman, it would have.

Instead, you angled yourself to pry his hand away from his cock. He held you still, but let you move his fist away, watching with hooded eyes. All thoughts of work left his mind as you dragged his cock back and forth along the dripping seam of your cunt, nudging your clit and pressing against your hole. Again, and again, and––

“Gods, sweetheart, please,” Baelor whispers, tone strained, his free hand gripping the furs of the bed tightly, knuckles white. “I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m––”

It takes the power of all Seven above for you not to smile in victory at his incessant pleas before you’re slowly sinking down onto his cock. His head falls back against the pillows and he moans your name, loud and clear into the golden glow of your chambers as his free hand snaps to your hip to mirror the other.

Your cunt opens perfectly for him and you whimper at the stretch. He splits you open, sinking deep inside you in one fluid motion like a sword into its scabbard. The perfect fit. And he lets you know it, too––

“That’s it, that’s it, so good,” Baelor mutters his praises when he finally opens his eyes to look at you again. “So good for me, my love. So good––yeah, there we go.”

You start to move, your thighs tightening as you lift yourself and shift back down, cock rutting deep towards the plug of your cervix. The angle is torturous, and you can feel the vein on his cock inside you. It makes you moan, and then whine when his hands brace against the flesh of your hips. He’s pulling you down onto him before he can stop himself, panting as he watches your pussy take him like something out of a dream.

A spark ignites deep in your belly, your body heating. That fierce, intense heat that seemed to roll off most Targaryen men was the same heat that settles now inside you––inside your womb as you ride a dragon. Your dragon.

And he was never one to play on that too much. Never one to flaunt the fire that ran wild in his veins. Until, of course, he had you over top of him like this. Riding his cock so well, taking him so deep, drawing growls from a hidden part within him.

“That’s a good girl,” he says darkly, his cold rings a biting presence against your waist. “Keep going––ride your dragon, sweetheart.”

You moan, and you couldn’t find it in yourself to care that the sound probably penetrated the castle walls around you. You focus on the blooming pleasure in the bottom of your belly, the tingle building in the base of your spine, and the heat of his gaze on your face and breasts as you ride him.

Sweat builds up on the back of your neck and down the curve of your spine. You’re panting like a hound, toes curling against the soft furs, hands gripping at the softness of his stomach and chest, feeling the hair there. Baelor’s hands are strong on your hips, rolling you against him, his own hips shifting upwards with each of your movements, meeting you in the middle and thrusting himself deeper inside you. Your cunt is drooling out from around him, and he can’t help but stare at the thin, white ring that is slowly building at the base of his length. Maybe you are magic.

“Baelor,” you whine.

The wooden bedframe is creaking, the candles on a nearby table are flickering, and the setting sun has morphed from a resplendent gold to a blood red. Your chambers were bathed in the colour, your skin drenched in it, matching the ruby that sparkled on one of Baelor’s rings.

He huffs deeply. “My love?”

“I’m…” You taper off on a whine, head flopping forward as your legs begin to cramp and the tension in your belly grows tighter, pulling taut like a bowstring. You manage to whisper out a desperate, “Oh gods, please…”

“I know, I know,” Baelor shushes you gently. “Feels so good, doesn’t it?”

“Yes,” you whine. You lasted in your conquest for a good amount of time, but ultimately, you can never stay strong when your husband is involved.

He feels you clench around him and he almost loses his sanity, his next words dying on his tongue. They were honey-sweet, though, and so he quickly conjures up, “Need to feel you come around me,” before a low moan rips from his chest.

The hair at his temples has darkened with sweat, his chest flushed. He can feel the desperate tension in his cock, his balls tightening with every wet thrust into the tight clutch of your cunt. He’s fucking you roughly now, chasing the highs that crest upon an imagined horizon like the blazing sun beyond the Keep’s walls. It feels like there is smoking billowing from him, his grunts deep and bordering animalistic, eyes swimming in a red haze as night creeps into the room. The red streaming in is dying out, slowly, slowly––

He moans your name. “Come on, sweetheart, let me feel you.”

You gasp out. “Fu-uck!” And then come around his cock with a drawn-out moan.

Your pussy draws tight around the thick of him, squeezing and pulsing with your rapid heartbeat. It leaves you breathless, heart hammering against your ribcage as you slump forward, arms liquifying as your pleasure rocks through you. But Baelor catches you, presses you firmly to his chest with one hand while the other retains its grip on your hip, fucking you down onto his cock. He kisses you like this. When you’re pliant in his arms, the qualms of the day banished from your pleasure-hazed mind, he places wet kisses across your face, your throat. He sucks at your neck and tastes the salt of your sweat, and then he licks into your mouth and tastes the saccharine remnants of blood oranges imported from Dorne.

Laying here with you, moving together, his mouth on yours, his cock inside you, Baelor forgets about everything he needs to complete today. He forgets about what had stressed him, and forgets the inkwell likely still dripping onto the stone floor of his solar.

His thrusts become sloppier, less coordinated. He pants into your mouth, kissing the corner with a surprising tenderness in contrast with his manic thrusting.

“Baelor––” You sob out through a tired whimper.

“S’alright, my love, just be good for me,” he replies quickly, and you can hear the tension strung between each word. “Be good for me––fuck, yeah, that’s––oh gods, take it for me, sweetheart, take it––”

With one last rut of his hips, Baelor pulls your arse tightly onto him, practically melding you to his hips as his cock twitches once, twice, and then spills inside you. The sensation draws a strained groan from the prince, and the feeling of his cum filling you shoves an involuntary gasp out of your parted lips.

The two of you lay together, heaving chests pressed against one another, your raging hearts falling into sync, sweat slick between your burning bodies. Like glowing embers, the heir to the iron throne and his beloved wife settle and fizzle out just as the sun finally vanishes behind the distant horizon.

Now only a few candles cast light on where the two of you remain intertwined, Baelor’s softening cock still nestled inside you, your combined slick and cum slowly dribbling out and onto the furs.

Baelor presses another characteristically tender kiss to your forehead as he strokes your back with his large, worn hands. “I am truly sorry for the way I spoke to you earlier, my love. I will never cause you such distress again, gods believe me.”

He nuzzles against your cheek as you reply, “I forgive you, my prince. I know how much of a dragon you become when you are overwhelmed.”

He grunts against you, but says nothing more, knowing that, once again, you’re right. And being with you has extinguished the day’s burdens and he feels utterly content.

Maybe you are magic.

———

brooo i know dada i need him so bad

[mrskarma]

put me in there and call it 'The Whore of The Seven Kingdoms' the way I'd be dick hopping

[thefaetellsnotales]

They are so...

Art by: CrazyTom

[fateforgotten]

Haven’t really full gathered the idea but here’s what I’m thinking. The reader in this case travels with dunk and egg during their lil journey. She is attempting to become a knight under the guise of being a man. She joins the battle during the trial of the seven as a “man” to try and prove her capabilities. During the battle she manages to block the hit that would’ve fatally ended Baelors life, essentially saving him in the process.

Maybe at the end she could reveal herself as a woman? Not really sure where I’d go from there 💔

Also I love your writing style immensely, I’ve never sent a request to anyone before so this is my first time!

To Break a Dragon’s Fall ͙͘͡★

pairing: baelor targaryen / reader…./ meakar?

summary: after duncan quite possibly saves your life as a stranger on the road, you are determined to fight for him in the trial of seven, with your participation ultering the course of history

content: violence, slight threat of sexual violence, you egg and duncan being a cute trio, slow burn, multichapter, enemies to lovers but make it one sided.

note: tysm for sending this in! also i’m honoured cause this is my first request too. i really couldn’t stop thinking about this, i loved the idea. idk really where the story may go from here but i’m welcome to suggestions!

· · ─ ·✶· ─ · ·

A falling star streaked across the sky and vanished beyond the dark, and you found yourself praying that whatever fortune it carried might drag the jeering men behind you away with it.

“Come on love, we don’t bite!…Well unless you’re keen on it.”

Two men had been trailing you for the better part of twenty minutes along the rutted dirt track, their voices carrying easily in the open air as they called for you incessantly to turn about and give them a “proper look.”

You did not oblige. Instead you kept your eyes forward and your stride even, praying with every footfall that the Ashford tourney encampment would appear beyond the next stand of trees. You had been travelling for a week or so, eager to witness the thrilling jousts with knights from across the seven kingdoms, even if you resented not being able to participate yourself.

If you could just reach the press of tents and banners, you could lose yourself in the crowd, and trust that even men such as these would think better of making a spectacle in plain view.

Even so you kept your eye on your sword in your saddle sheath from where your horse rode next to you, and your dagger warm against your palm. A handful of backward glances however told you what you needed to know: they were armed as well, and from their surcoats and sigils they were likely knights.

Little good they were for it, you thought bitterly.

You would not draw steel. Not yet. Though you had spent half your life with a sword in hand and a bowstring biting your fingers raw, you would not risk blood here, not when there were two of them, broad-shouldered and braced for it, and only one of you.

Not unless you had no other choice.

But then you felt their footsteps closer and fingers close around your arm, with hot wine–stained breath brushing the shell of your ear. “Don’t be shy now sweetheart.”

You drew your dagger out from your hip, and sliced it cleanly against the drunk’s forearm. He staggered back in surprise, and you felt your own heart leap with the realisation of what you’ve done. You were really in for it now.

You reached for your horses’ reins, heart hammering in your chest, and watched as the man’s once so-called friendliness twisted into something dark, his flushed face hardening with hatred. His companion’s hand hovered near the hilt of his sword, and the cold weight of your solitude pressed down like iron.

“You little whore. Oh I’m going to fuck-”

A sudden rustle cut him off. From between the trees, a shadow moved, then filled the path. A man, nay a giant emerged. His gaze locked on you, taking in the dagger still raised in your hand, then slid toward the two men before you, their own weapons being reached for. A silence fell, thick as the forest shadows, broken only by his low, even voice.

“Are you alright, m’lady?”

The two would-be attackers faltered backwards, uncertainty creeping into their eyes. It seemed their bravado faltered under the weight of his presence alone, and for a moment, you realized just how alone you had been and now how entirely the odds had just shifted.

You swallowed a shudder and forced your voice to a casual familiar pitch. “Cousin!” you called, stepping slightly forward, letting your hand rest lightly on his massive forearm. “There you are! I was beginning to think I’d lost you in the trees.”

The stranger’s brow furrowed in surprise, but he said nothing, letting your false story settle in the space between you. The two men blinked, confusion replacing aggression.

“Oh, these fellows were just teasing me,” you continued, waving a hand toward them. “I told them my cousin would have them running home crying if they tried anything foolish.”

The man’s massive frame shifted, his gauntleted hand brushing against the hilt of his sword, not threatening, but heavy with potential.

The men staggered backward in defeat, drunkenly tripping over roots and each other, muttering curses that carried none of their earlier bravado. You let the dagger fall slowly to your side, though your fingers still itched with the pulse of adrenaline.

You studied the stranger for a moment, taking in the contrast between size and gentleness. For all his towering frame, shoulders broad enough to block the moonlight and hands large enough to lift you without effort, there was no hardness in his face. His jaw was firm but not cruel, and the faint lines at the corners of his eyes softened the seriousness of his gaze. There was a youthfulness there, too, something you hadn’t expected when you first noticed him; perhaps he was not much older than yourself.

“Did they hurt you?” He asked, concern knitting his eyebrows.

“No,” you said, letting your voice soften. “They didn’t get the chance. I should thank you for that.” You offered a small smile, careful but genuine, and you thought you saw a flicker of something in him. Perhaps surprise, perhaps amusement as if the world had just reminded him that not all battles were won with strength alone.

He shook his head lightly, a faint smile tugging at the corner of his mouth. “No. You had it quite managed on your own. I… all I did was stand here.”

You tilted your head, considering him as you let your smile broaden just a little. “And you did that very well.”

“Well… um,” he began, scratching the back of his neck, “You’re welcome to join us. I don’t have a pavilion, but there’s a fire, and… well, perhaps we’d both be a bit safer together.” He gestured behind him, and your eyes followed to a small boy standing half-hidden among the trees, watching quietly, while the warm glow of a flickering fire marked their camp just beyond. “My… name is Ser Duncan.”

You weighed his words carefully. The tourney grounds were close, yes, but you too had no pavilion of your own. The thought of falling asleep on the cold ground to the jeers of strangers surrounded by tents was hardly appealing. You were not accustomed to relying on the kindness of others, and yet there was something different about him.

With a small nod, you accepted. “Thank you,” you said, fully meaning your words. “I appreciate it.”

A faint, almost shy smile tugged at his lips, and for a moment the forest seemed a little warmer, the danger of the road behind you fading as you followed him toward the fire.

The three of you settled quickly into a quiet, easy familiarity. The boy, whose name you learned was Egg, peppered you with endless questions, his curiosity relentless. How did you come to be in Ashford? Where were you from? Was that your own sword you had sheathed on your horse? Each inquiry was rapid-fire, but earnest, and you found yourself smiling despite your exhaustion as the hour grew late.

Duncan scolded him gently more than once, his deep voice rumbling through the quiet night. “Egg, give her a moment to rest,” he would say, leaning back against the trunk of a tree, the firelight catching the planes of his kind face. And yet, despite his scolding, Duncan listened to every answer you gave. His eyes followed yours, attentive and patient, as if committing each word to memory.

You told them of your father. How he had left your mother and you to fight in the Blackfyre Rebellion years past, how the promise of Targaryen favor and hollow honors had pulled him from your home. You could still feel it in your chest, the hollow ache of abandonment, as if the very crown he had served had reached into your life and plucked him away. When he returned, broken and bleeding, it was too late; his injuries soon claimed him, leaving only his sword and the weight of what he had left behind.

You also spoke of your mother, worn to nothing by endless toil, the lines of care and worry etched deep into her face, the work she had done to keep you alive while your father chased a war that was not his. You could almost see her again, bending over the hearth, hands raw, hair streaked with gray, and you felt the sting of both pride and fury.

It was impossible to hide the edge in your voice when you spoke of the Targaryens. How their promises of glory had cost your family everything. You clenched your fists unconsciously, the anger simmering just beneath the surface, a quiet heat you carried with you. You did not curse them aloud; you didn’t have to. The sharpness in your eyes, the tight line of your jaw, the sudden flare of your temper when you recalled your father’s departure all spoke louder than words.

And now, here you were, on your own, no mother to shield you, no father to guide you. You had learned long ago that honor and courage in men were often fleeting, unreliable shields in a dangerous world. You would rather trust in the steel in your own hands than the promises of a husband, or the protection of a knight who might vanish at the first call to glory. You had inherited your sword, and with it, the certainty that you would rather die protecting yourself than die hoping for the aid of an honourable man.

Despite the recollection of your memories, the fire before you and the presence of two unlikely companions, offered a strange but welcome comfort you hadn't known in a long while. The sword at your hip now felt heavier in a way that steadied you, a tangible proof of your key to a life that you could make your own with no one to follow but yourself.

· · ─ ·✶· ─ · ·

The next morning dawned bright and restless, the tourney encampment’s air already alive with anticipation before the first trumpets ever sounded. Duncan, Egg and you moved with the throng of the crowd, animatedly discussing the events of the day.

Then came the banners, red and black, snapping sharply in the wind and above the mounted procession beneath them. The crowd of smallfolk surged forward, craning for a glimpse of the blood of the dragon as the riders passed, their armor gleaming and their horses stepping proud beneath their embroidered sigils.

You felt your jaw tighten. You hated that your eyes followed them as everyone else’s did. Hated that, for all your anger, you looked just the same, another face turned toward House Targaryen. Another figure caught in the spectacle of their arrival.

The resentment coiled low and familiar in your chest, hot as a brand. All this pageantry and worship, for the dynasty that had only brought war and suffering to the realm.

So consumed were you by the sight of them that you barely turned to give Egg your farewell as he returned back to camp. Nor did you question why you followed Duncan, when he began moving toward the castle courtyard, your boots carrying you forward almost of their own accord.

It seemed as if you had almost a morbid fascination with wanting to catch a glimpse of the princes who your father had given his life so readily for.

And then you had it. You weren’t sure what you had expected. Monsters, perhaps. Men with dragonfire in their eyes and cruelty etched plainly across their faces. Something visible, something you could point to and say there, those are the tyrants who took everything from you.

Instead, you just saw men. The elder rode first. Baelor Targaryen. The man you recognised as being heir to the iron throne.

He looked…commanding but not unkind That was your first, unwelcome thought.

He was tall in the saddle and, and his hair, darker than you had imagined, was cut short and streaked with grey at the temples where you had expected bright Targaryen silver. It lent him more of a softness that did not match the songs. His face was striking, almost unfairly so, all strong lines and steady eyes, the sort of handsomeness that seemed effortless rather than cultivated.

Then your gaze shifted to the other man, the one who left no room for doubt. He was every inch the Targaryen of your father’s dying stories.

Prince Maekar sat his horse like a blade drawn halfway from its sheath, controlled, but dangerous. His silver hair caught the morning light like polished steel, bright and unmistakable. There was nothing gentle in him. His posture was rigid, his jaw set, his expression carved from something hard and unbending.

If Baelor unsettled you with an unexpected look of warmth, Maekar looked exactly as you had imagined: a prince forged for war, stern and impenetrable, the living embodiment of the dragons your father had once followed into battle.

“Boy, stop gaping. See to my horse.”

The command rang out sharp and careless.

A rider had pulled up directly before Duncan, this man also unmistakably of the dragon’s blood. His hair was cropped short and silver, bright against the dark of his riding leathers. The confidence with which he had issued his order carried the easy arrogance of someone who had never expected to be disobeyed.

You watched Duncan falter. “I—I’m not a stable boy, m’lord,” he said, the words careful, almost apologetic.

“Well if you can’t manage horses, then fetch me some wine and a pretty wench.” The prince replied, dismounting from his horse.

That was when his gaze slid past Duncan and landed on you. His eyes swept indulgently over you from where you stood a pace behind, in a way that made your stomach tighten.

“Or have you already found me one?” he added, the smirk on his lips enough to make your skin crawl.

You simply pretended not to hear him. Turning your back as if the words had never been spoken, you forced your hands to remain at your sides, though your fingers had already begun to curl into tight fists. Better to walk away, you told yourself, because if you stayed a moment longer, you weren’t entirely certain what you might say.

That small exchange had been enough. The feeling returned at once, sharp and familiar, reminding you exactly why the sight of dragon banners made your stomach turn.

Hatred crept back into your thoughts as you watched the prince stride off across the yard. Duncan lingered behind, soon drawn into conversation with a pair of the king’s white-cloaked guards. You might have joined him but you had already had your fill of the king’s men for one morning.

But soon they were gone as well, and the courtyard settled back into its restless rhythm.

You drifted back to Duncan’s side.“Shall we head back to Egg then?” you asked.

He didn’t answer. His gaze had gone distant, fixed on something you couldn’t see, and for a moment you wondered if he had heard you at all.

“Uh… just wait here for me, will you?” he said suddenly.

Before you could ask what he meant, he was already moving, long strides carrying him across the yard toward a narrow servant’s entrance. In another moment he had slipped inside, disappearing into the shadows beyond the door.

You blinked after him, dumbstruck. “Where are you going? Duncan!”

But he was already gone.

How long you waited there, scuffing the dirt with your shoe you weren’t quite sure, arms folded tight as you muttered a few choice curses under your breath. You knew how desperate Duncan was to find someone to vouch for him so he could enter the lists. But barging into a lord’s castle uninvited? What in the seven hells did he think he could possibly accomplish?

If it was folly for him to sneak inside, but it was probably even greater folly for you to follow. You had known the man less than a day. And yet you had already seen enough to know he was good and honest in a way that was almost painfully rare. The thought of him stumbling into trouble alone sat wrong in your gut.

With a sigh of resignation, you pushed yourself away from the wall. Fine. You would find him, drag him back out before he made a complete disaster of things… and, if luck favored you, slip out again before anyone noticed the intrusion at all.

Once inside however you quickly realized you had no idea where Duncan might have gone.

The passage beyond the servant’s door was dim and narrow, lit only by thin slivers of daylight from high windows. You hesitated for a moment, listening, then pushed forward anyway, boots quiet against the worn floor.

You followed down the dark corridor, turning once, then climbing a short flight of stairs that opened onto another hall. That was when you heard the voices. Several of them, low and measured, and among them one you recognized immediately.

“As you say, Your Grace. I–It was four. I do apologize. The old man, Ser Arlan, he used to say I was thick as a castle wall and slow as an aurochs.”

Duncan.

You crept closer, heart quickening, until you reached the entrance to the hall. Pressing yourself flat against the wall beside the doorway, you leaned just enough to hear but careful enough not to let your shadow betray you. Fuck, you thought grimly. He’s really done it now.

From the sound of it, he was grovelling, stumbling over his words before someone important. You braced yourself for the inevitable: sharp reprimands, offended nobles, perhaps even guards being summoned.

But the harsh words never came.

“No harm was done, ser. Rise.”

The voice that answered was calm. Gentle, even. It surprised you.

There was no bite in it, no arrogance or impatience, nothing like the young prince in the courtyard earlier. For a moment you simply stared at the window in front of you, trying to reconcile the sound with the men you had seen ride in beneath the dragon banners.

You didn’t quite believe it but you knew it had to be one of the princes speaking. You forced your attention back to the voices within the hall.

“You wish to enter the lists, is that it?”

“Yes.” Dunk’s answer came quick and eager.

“The decision rests with the master of the games,” the prince replied evenly, “but I see no reason to deny you.”

That lucky bastard, you thought, a grin tugging at your mouth. Only Duncan could blunder his way into the presence of princes and walk away with exactly what he wanted. Though, if you were begrudgingly honest, it seemed far more the result of the Targaryen’s kindness than Duncan’s nerve.

“Your Grace…” Dunk began, sounding overwhelmed.

“Very well, ser. You are grateful. Now piss off.”

The sharp interruption carried enough irritation that you didn’t need to see the speaker to guess who it was. If you had to wager, it was the silver-haired brother, the one who had sported a scowl from the moment he’d ridden into the courtyard.

There was a brief pause before the calmer voice spoke again.

“You must forgive my brother, ser. His sons went astray on the road here, and he fears for them.”

“Of course,” Dunk said quickly. Then, after a beat of thought, he added, “I trust they will not be found dead.”

Your eyes widened. A strangled gasp escaped before you could stop it as you slapped a hand over your mouth, pressing your back harder against the stone as laughter threatened to spill out despite yourself.

Seven hells, Duncan truly had no sense of when to stop talking.

Slowly, you let your hand fall from your mouth. Your thoughts, however, refused to settle. You had braced yourself for mockery, for cruelty, for the sort of cold dismissal men like Duncan usually received from those born to castles and crowns. Instead you had heard patience. Kindness, even.

The older prince Baelor, had spoken to him like a man, not like some nuisance who had wandered too close to the wrong door. Yet even as the thought crept in, you pushed back against it almost immediately.

A few gentle words meant nothing. A courteous tone did not erase the wars fought beneath dragon banners, nor the countless men who had marched to their deaths in service to a crown they would never wear. Your father among them.

No, princes could afford kindness since it cost them very little. You straightened from the wall, jaw tightening. Whatever pleasant impressions the moment might have tried to plant in your mind, you would not let them take root. Royalty was royalty, whether they spoke softly or barked orders. And you despised them all the same.

· · ─ ·✶· ─ · ·

The next day unfolded with a kind of easy joy you had not felt in longer than you cared to admit.

Ashford had come fully alive with the tourney now in full swing. The fields beyond the castle walls buzzed with noise and color, tents and banners fluttering in every direction while merchants and performers filled every spare patch of ground.

You drank more than was strictly wise, though you blamed the warmth of the afternoon and the cheerful press of the crowds.

The lists drew you back again and again throughout the day. Whenever the horns sounded you joined the surge of spectators, shouting and cheering with everyone else as armored riders thundered down the field. You found yourself yelling encouragement and insults in equal measure with depending your voice hoarse long before the afternoon faded.

You too helped Egg practice the small but important tasks of a squire, buckling straps properly, handing off weapons quickly, learning where to stand and when to stay out of the way. He approached it all with serious determination, brow furrowed as if the fate of the realm depended on whether he could fasten a strap correctly.

You even challenged Duncan once or twice to a friendly duel to each of your victories, though he was clearly holding himself back much to your annoyance.

For a little while, the bitterness that usually shadowed your thoughts loosened its grip. The dragon banners still flew, the princes still walked the grounds somewhere beyond the crowds, but for that single day, you managed to forget them.

But then, the destruction that so often followed the Targaryens materialised, shattering your short lived contentment. Duncan and you had been enjoying the hospitality and cider of a friendly Raymun Fossoway, spitting out words to describe the Targaryens that would have been considered treason, when Egg dashed in with calls of peril.

“Ser! Ser Duncan! You have to come! Aerion’s hurting her.”

All three of you had followed the boy without hesitation to the puppeteer’s tent where chaos awaited you.

People crowded the edges of the tent, some shouting, some only watching, their faces caught between fascination and fear. In the center of it all stood Aerion Targaryen, and before him the puppeteer girl you had come to know that past day as Tanselle.

He was hurting her and the memory of it would sit sour in your stomach long after.

Then Duncan moved. Before anyone else could react, he surged forward, wrenching Aerion away from the girl and throwing the prince hard to the ground with a punch in the process. The sound of it, a prince striking packed earth, seemed to shock the entire tent into silence.

The guards however soon roughly seized Duncan, and for a few monstrous moments you were convinced he would not make it out of that tent alive, as Aérions forced his mouth against the stage. But then Egg had stepped forward, and much to yours and the rest of the tent’s astonishment revealed himself as one of the missing princes, Aegon Targaryen.

You knew the whole thing would have ended far worse if he hadn’t done so.

Shame however rolled over you in waves, heavier than any armor could be. You had done nothing, nothing to stop Aerion from his rampage. Neither did you make to move when Duncan lunged, relying entirely on his strength and courage to intervene where you had stood frozen.

You wanted to tell yourself there was no way you could have helped, that Aerion’s power and the presence of the guards made interference impossible. And yet the thought did little to quiet the sting in your chest. You had trained for years with sword and dagger, honed every skill to survive the world as it was and here, but with everything you knew and all the strength you could muster, you had been useless.

Anger joined the shame, sharp and bitter at the Targaryens themselves. At the entitlement that allowed Aerion to administer punishment on a feeling. By the way the men born to crowns could bend law, loyalty, and fear to their whim, while others, like your father, died or suffered in service to the same dynasty.

· · ─ ·✶· ─ · ·

Hours had passed since the chaos in the tent, and now you stood in the pouring rain with Raymun, doing the only useful thing to do: watching the horses.

Water streamed down your cloak and plastered your hair to your face, yet you barely noticed, half consumed by the cold and half by the gnawing dread that churned in your stomach at the thought of Duncan’s fate.

The silence between you and Raymun was heavy as you had since given up on offering hollow words of comfort to each other. Each minute stretched like an eternity as your fingers ached from the cold, not knowing if your friend would return.

Then by some god’s great mercy Duncan appeared, soaked but unmistakably alive. Relief flooded over you. You and Raymun didn’t hesitate: both of you pulled him into a tight shivering hug, hearts racing at the realization that he was even alive still.

The rain was suddenly inconsequential, as laughter and exclamations of exhilaration broke through the tension that had bound your shoulders for hours.

Practicality however returned quickly. Together, the three of you made for the Fossoway tent.

Once inside, wrapped in the relative warmth of the tent, the three of you, joined by Raymun’s cousin, poured over the situation, turning it over from every angle. You discussed every possible way Duncan might somehow escape what awaited him. The trial of seven.

The odds were cruel, stacked against him before he even drew a sword. And you knew it. There seemed to be little hope in him even securing six other champions to fight alongside him, let alone winning.

An idea however ignited in your mind the instant the words “trial of seven” were even uttered, sharper than any arrow you had ever drawn. A fire flared along your spine, sudden and undeniable: you would fight alongside Duncan, no matter what it took.

It wasn’t just for loyalty, though that alone was enough to drive you forward. You owed him that much. He had stepped into danger without hesitation the first night you met, risked his own safety to keep you from harm on that dirt track. He had offered you kindness and his protection in a world that had too often denied both, and for that alone you would stand beside him now.

But it wasn’t only for him.

You owed it to yourself. To prove that you could stand your ground, that you could fight with the same courage and skill as any man who claimed the title of knight. The thought coiled around you like a living thing, thrilling and terrifying all at once. I can do this. I will do this.

You had watched a Targaryen prince torment a girl on a whim, watched a tent full of knights and spectators stand frozen because dragon’s blood made him untouchable. But now you wouldn’t let the only man brave enough to stand against him die.

Besides, steel did not know the difference between a man’s hand and a woman’s. A blade cut the same either way, you thought wryly.

All your life you had been relying on the flighty honour of men. On the idea that men who carried swords and titles would stand between the weak and the cruel, that their vows meant something solid, something you could trust your life to.

But you had learned, slowly and painfully, how feeble that promise truly was.

Your father had ridden off chasing honor beneath a king’s banners and returned only long enough to die. And your mother had worked herself into the grave while the men who spoke so proudly of duty never once looked back to see what had been left behind.

The honour of men to you seemed just to be a thing spoken loudly in songs and tourney fields, yet strangely absent when the moment demanded real courage.

You were tired of it.

The rain had begun to ease by the time you stepped back outside the Fossoway tent, though the ground was still churned to thick mud beneath every passing boot. You stood for a while beneath the grey sky, arms folded against the damp chill, your thoughts beginning to scheme on how you might have hope of assuming to be one of the champions tomorrow.

Then movement down the path pulled your attention away. Two figures were making their way through the muddy lanes between the tents, one small and familiar, the other taller and moving with a kind of languid reluctance.

“Ah—there you are.” Egg’s voice carried a note of relief as he hurried toward you across the camp. “Is Ser Duncan inside?”

It was the first time you had seen him since he had revealed the truth, that he was no hedge knight’s squire but a Targaryen prince. Now he looked as though he had stepped straight out of the songs: dressed in black and red, the colors of his house, a small dragon worked in thread across his chest.

Well, almost like the songs. He was still missing the signature silver hair but it was hard to have silver hair when you had no hair at all.

“In the tent,” you answered, nodding toward the canvas behind you. “Trying to decide how he’s meant to find six men foolish enough to fight princes.”

Hurt and guilt flashed across his face all at once.

You immediately wished you could’ve taken back the edge that laced your words. In truth, you weren’t angry at him for lying, not really. He was just a boy, who was probably just outrunning the very thing you’d also hated the Targaryens for.

What unsettled you more was remembering that first night on the road, before you knew who he was. How freely you had spoken then, your anger spilling out in careless words as you cursed his family and all the ruin they’d left behind.

He had listened quietly the whole time. You still didn’t know what to make of that. Or what he made of it now. You watched him disappear under the tent flaps.

But the prince who had walked beside him did not follow. He seemed a far cry from the polished image of a prince. His long, sandy hair hung loose and tangled around his face, sweat-darkened in places, and his skin had the pale, slightly blotchy look of someone who had spent too much time with wine rather than sleep.

Prince Daeron’s pale eyes rested on you with a strange sort of focus, like he was trying to put your face to a name.

You shifted uncomfortably under the attention. “Do you need something, your grace?” you asked, not intending for the sarcastic tone but it coming out all the same.

The prince blinked slowly like a man surfacing from deep water. “I dreamed of you,” he said.

The words were so unexpected you almost laughed, assuming some strange jest. But his expression held none of Aerion’s cruelty or mockery, only that same distant seriousness.

“In the dream,” he continued quietly, “there was a dragon.”

Your stomach tightened instinctively at the word.

“It was large,” he went on, his voice thoughtful, almost puzzled. He studied your face a moment longer before finishing. “and it bowed to you”

You stared at him, unsure whether to scoff or be unsettled by the certainty and seriousness with which he had said it. “You must have very strange dreams, Your Grace.”

Daeron continued to watch you for a moment longer, as though weighing something unspoken. But whatever thought had been forming seemed to slip away.

“...Excuse me,” he said at last, almost absently.

Then he turned and ducked beneath the tent flaps after Egg, leaving you alone with the quiet camp and the strange weight of his words.

A dragon bowing to you.

The thought should have sounded ridiculous. And yet something about the way he said it left a faint, uneasy echo in your chest. Maybe all Targaryens truly are just mad.

· · ─ ·✶· ─ · ·

The sky was still dark when you woke, and you had slept little, if at all. Each time your eyes had closed the same vision had come for you again and again, relentless as a drumbeat. Seven riders thundering together, steel flashing, Duncan bleeding on the ground, a pale haired fighter standing over him with you powerless to help.

So you rose before the sun.

You dressed quickly in the dim grey light, pulling on the plain tunic and dark trousers you had slept in before reaching for the bundle you had hidden beneath your saddle blanket.

Your armor was simple, nothing like the shining plates worn by knights and princes. No gilding, no heraldry. Just pieces you had gathered over the years.

Your padded gambeson was thick and worn from secondary use. You shrugged it over your shoulders and tugged the laces tight across your chest, binding it down firmly. The weight and pressure flattened your shape enough that, beneath the armor, few could tell what you had underneath it.

The mail shirt hung a little loose over the padding, the extra slack helping to hide the shape of your body rather than reveal it. Next you fastened your simple leather vambraces, tightening the worn straps around your forearms before buckling on a plain belt to carry your sword.

Last came your hair. You gathered it quickly and tied it back tight at the nape of your neck, pulling it close so it would sit neatly beneath your helm, leaving nothing loose that might betray you.

By the time you were finished, the figure staring back at you from the dull reflection of your blade looked far less like a woman and far more like some thin young hedge knight who had not yet filled out his armor.

It would have to be enough.

Your horse greeted you with a soft nicker as you approached them, breath puffing white in the cold air. You ran a hand comfortingly along its neck, murmuring under your breath while fastening the last straps of your saddle and securing the shield and helm beside it.

The sky had only just begun to pale.

Mist clung low across the tourney grounds as you stepped quietly through the waking camp. Tents loomed like silent shapes in the gloom, their banners hanging limp in the still morning air. A few early risers moved about, stable boys, guards, a cook stirring embers back to life, but none paid you more than a passing glance.

You kept your head down, guiding your horse toward the far edge of the field, away from the heart of the camp. From there you could see the tourney grounds stretching wide and silent before you. You waited knowing Duncan would have to pass this way to meet the other champions.

At last a familiar tall shape appeared through the mist. Relief and dread twisted together in your stomach. You stepped out to meet him.

“Duncan.”

He stopped immediately.

For a moment he only stared at you, confusion creasing his brow.

“What are you—”

“Let me fight with you.” The words came out faster than you intended, tumbling over each other before you could lose the nerve. “There’s still no word from Ser Steffon,” you rushed on, “and even if he comes you’re still one man short. Knight me and I’ll ride beside you.”

Duncan blinked at you as though you had spoken in another language.

For several long seconds he said nothing at all.

Then he found his voice.

“No.”

The answer was immediate.

“I won’t.”

You clenched your jaw.

“I won’t make a lady fight for me.”

You breathed slowly through your nose, fighting the urge to groan. Of all the moments for Duncan’s stubborn chivalry to surface, this was perhaps the worst.

“I am no lady,” you said sharply. “And you know perfectly well I’m as skilled with a sword as you are. Perhaps more so.” You added, a smile twitching at the corner of your mouth despite yourself.

Still he shook his head determinedly. “Men will die out there.”

“Yes,” you said, stepping closer. “They will. Which is why I won’t stand aside while you ride to face seven of them without every blade you can muster.”

His expression hardened. “Even if I agreed, you truly think the lords would allow it?”

“They won’t know.” You held his gaze steadily. “They never need to know what’s between my legs or what’s beneath my helm.”

Duncan stared at you.

“Introduce me as Gillhem,” you continued calmly. “I’ll be the son my father never had. No one will question it once the fighting begins and I’ll be gone after it ends…if I’m still alive.”

Before he could answer, you dropped to one knee in the damp earth. “Now knight me,” you said.

The words hung between you in the grey morning light. For a moment he simply stood there, tall and silent, the mist curling faintly around his boots. Then his hand moved slowly to the hilt of his sword.

Hope flared in your chest but just as slowly, his hand stopped. You watched his face carefully. The uncertainty there was plain enough, his brow furrowed, his jaw working as though wrestling with something larger than either of you. But if anything you thought he looked more lost than apprehensive.

A bitter laugh escaped you before you could stop it, as you pushed yourself back to your feet. “Oh, what does it matter if I’m actually knighted or not,” you muttered. “We only have the gods to witness us out here anyway.”

You met his eyes again, letting a small, crooked smile pull at your mouth despite the tight knot in your stomach. “Just remember, Duncan,” you said. “I’m Ser Gillem now.”

Before he could object further you swiftly mounted your horse and pulled on your helm and visor, riding out to meet where the other champions would be.

· · ─ ·✶· ─ · ·

The waiting was excruciating.

No steel yet. No thunder of hooves. Only the slow gathering of men and the restless shifting of horses beneath their riders.

You kept your head lowered beneath your helm, careful not to meet anyone’s gaze for too long. The slit of your visor narrowed the world to fragments, glints of armour, the dark backs of horses, and glimpses of the watching crowd. Your palms were slick inside the gauntlets.

A horse moved closer beside you, heavy hooves pressing into the churned earth. You heard the creak of thick armour and the slow snort of a powerful destrier. Then a voice rumbled from somewhere beside you.

“You.”

Your stomach dropped as you lifted your head slightly to find the speaker. It was Lyonel Baratheon. Over the past two days you had spent a small time with the man, you weren’t even sure if he could remember your name since he had had a drink in his hand almost the entire time. You felt your heart in your throat.

“I don’t know that sigil,” he said.

Slowly, carefully, you straightened in the saddle as you fought against your racing mind. Think.

“Not surprising, my lord,” you said at least, forcing your voice lower than usual, rougher, and speaking through your teeth so the helm muffled it further. “I’ve little fame to my name.”

Lyonel’s brow lifted slightly. “A hedge knight, then?”

“Yes, my lord.” You dipped your head just enough to appear respectful without inviting further inspection. “Ser… Gillem.”

For a moment Lyonel said nothing. His eyes moved again over your armour, your horse, your shield. You forced yourself not to shift beneath the scrutiny.

Then suddenly the great lord gave a short bark of laughter. “Well, Ser Gilllem,” he said, sounding almost pleased, “you’ve chosen a bold morning to earn your reputation.”

Your shoulders loosened a fraction.

Lyonel gave you one last measuring look. “Just make certain you can swing that sword of yours,” he said. “those princes won’t be gentle.”

Your grip tightened on the reins. “I wouldn’t expect them to be.”

The Laughing Storm grinned at that and turned his horse away, his attention already shifting toward the field where the opposing champions now rode into place.

You exhaled slowly the moment his attention left you. Your heart was still racing. But at least one thing was clear now. For the moment, your lie lived.

However, even with Ser Gillem stepping forward, Ser Duncan’s side lacked a seventh champion. Steffon Fossoway had arrived only to reveal he had chosen to stand with the accusers, selling his sword in exchange for the promise of a lordship.

Perhaps you should have been angrier than you were. Betrayal like that should have stirred outrage, yet what you felt was something quieter, duller. You were not surprised. Not truly. Ambition has always held more sway over most men in your life than honour ever could.

What proved far harder to witness, was what came next.

Duncan stepped forward, turning toward the gathered crowd. There was no pride left in his posture now, only a desperate honesty as he spoke, appealing not to rank or power, but to the simple truth of what had happened in that puppeteer tent. His voice carried across the field as he laid his heart bare, asking for one man, just one, to stand beside him. He was only met with silence then mockery.

The last embers of hope had begun to fade, sinking beneath the weight of inevitability. Around you the field felt heavier, thick with the quiet tension that comes when men know blood will soon be spilled, with a trial or not.

Without a seventh champion, Duncan’s innocence was lost.

Then the sound of the tourney gates groaned open.

Heads turned. From the far edge of the field a rider burst into view, his horse driving forward in a spray of mud and turf. He wore armour black as midnight, polished so darkly it swallowed the weak daylight. Upon his chest, unmistakable even from afar, gleamed the three-headed dragon.

A ripple of confusion spread through the onlookers. Men leaned forward, craning for a better view as the rider thundered across the field, slowing only when he neared the assembled champions. The horse reared slightly before settling, breath steaming in the cold air.

You watched, scarcely daring to breathe. Prince Maekar stepped forward to meet the rider. For a moment nothing made sense. Why would another Targaryen arrive now?

As the rider removed his helm, the crowd stirred again. Dark hair, cut short and a neatly kept beard framed his handsome face. There was a quiet strength in his features. Your gaze fixed on the dark-armoured figure as realization crept slowly into place.

Baelor Targaryen. His voice carried clearly across the field. “I will fight for Ser Duncan’s side.”

The words struck the crowd like a hammer on an anvil.

For a heartbeat the world seemed to stop, before a chorus of cheers and applause erupted from the stands. A prince of House Targaryen, standing with Ser Duncan?

It was unthinkable.

Of all men, it was Baelor who had come riding onto the field to throw his weight behind the hedge knight. A prince of the blood, heir to honour, prestige, and the expectations of an entire dynasty and yet here he stood, openly choosing a side that placed him against his own.

You felt a chill of disbelief run through you.

Every man present knew the weight of what he had just done. Which made it all the more confusing. Why risk the dignity of his house? Why step into a trial that could stain the honour of the dragons themselves? What could he possibly hope to gain from this?

However, those thoughts were soon swallowed by a wave of paralyzing fear, wifh a firm realisation that the trial would go ahead. The noise of the gathering riders blurred into something distant and indistinct, voices rising and falling around you without meaning.

You stood among them as they gathered near Baelor, dimly aware that he was speaking, offering counsel, perhaps strategy, the sort of steady words meant to bind men together before a charge.

You heard none of it. Your mind had narrowed to a single, suffocating awareness: the field before you, the coming clash, and the terrible certainty of how these could be your last moments alive.

It took almost everything in you not to turn your horse and ride away from it. Everything else you had left went into forcing your hands to steady, guiding your horse into place, and lowering your visor as you took your position for the first charge.

A horn bellowed across the field.

The low note rolled through the crowd like distant thunder, and at once every horse beneath the seven champions grew restless.

Your heart began to hammer again. This was it.

Across the churned earth the opposing riders lowered their lances and began to spread slightly, positioning themselves for the charge.

Seven against seven.

Beside you the great warhorse of Lyonel Baratheon stamped impatiently. Somewhere along the line Duncan shifted in his saddle.

Then the horn sounded again.

“CHARGE!”

The world exploded into motion.

You dug your heels into your horse’s sides as the line surged forward, the ground thundering beneath fourteen pounding hooves. Wind tore past your helm, rushing over your armor as the two sides closed in on each other in a heartbeat.

The impact came like a crashing wall.

Wood exploded as lances shattered on shields and armour. Horses collided shoulder to shoulder, screaming as riders crashed into one another in a storm of steel and splintering shafts.

Your own lance struck a shield and snapped cleanly in half, the jolt rattling up your arms. Before you could recover, another rider came thundering toward you from the side.

His white cloak streamed behind him like a banner.

A knight of the Kingsguard.

You barely had time to raise your shield before his lance struck. The force of it ripped you straight out of the saddle and the world flipped violently. You hit the ground hard enough that the breath exploded from your lungs. For a moment you could see nothing but sky as hooves thundered past your head.

Mud splashed across your visor as you rolled desperately aside to avoid being trampled. Your gaze swept desperately across the field only to discover your horse was already gone, bolting riderless across the field.

Wood shattered around you as riders collided again, the crack of breaking lances echoing across the field. Horses screamed and reared, men tumbled from saddles and shields splintered beneath the force of the charge.

Your own lance had glanced off a shield hard enough to send the weapon spinning from your grip.

You didn’t even give yourself time to register it as you were already drawing your sword.

The battle dissolved instantly into chaos. Somewhere nearby you faintly heard Lyonel roar with savage delight as he battered an opponent from his saddle.

But then your attention was drawn instead to the center of the melee. There Duncan was fighting intensely, surrounded on nearly every side.

And near him was Baelor Targaryen. Even in the chaos he stood out.

He fought with a calm precision that seemed almost unreal amid the frenzy of the field. His sword moved with controlled efficiency, each strike deliberate, each movement measured.

You watched him drive one knight back with a brutal series of blows before wheeling his horse sharply to intercept another rider who had been charging straight for Duncan.

It took you only moments to realise what he was doing. He was guarding him. Again and again Baelor positioned himself between Duncan and danger, forcing attackers away from the hedge knight all the while maintaining relentless skill.

You had heard stories of the prince’s prowess from your own father but seeing him fight was something else entirely.

For a moment you almost forgot the battle around you as you watched him work, the fluid movement of his sword, the quiet authority with which he responded to the chaos around him.

Then everything happened at once.

Baelor had just forced one opponent back when another rider broke from a neighbouring melee and came charging toward him from the side.

His armour also bore the three-headed dragon.

Prince Maekar.

You realised catastrophically that Baelor did not see him. He was still turning from his previous opponent, his flank fatally open.

His brother’s sword rose high for a brutal downward blow aimed straight at his unguarded side. A strange, almost bitter thought flashed through your mind.

A Targaryen killing a Targaryen. A small part of you thought you should let it happen. After all, you had spent most of your life hating that name.

Hating the dragons.

And yet—

Your eyes drifted back to Baelor.

Suddenly you were moving without a thought, sprinting towards the two of them. You raised your shield just in time.

Maekar’s blade slammed into your shield hard enough that the impact nearly tore your arm from its socket.

Baelor’s head snapped toward you in surprise.

“Go!” you barked through your helm. “Help Duncan!”

For a heartbeat Baelor hesitated. Then he nodded once and charged back away toward the center of the melee, where the hedge knight seemed to be fighting a losing battle.

And suddenly you were alone with the anvil.

There was no hesitation in him. His sword came down again immediately. You barely caught the blow on your blade, steel ringing loudly as the force of it drove you backwards.

Gods.

You were not fighting some tourney knight now, you were fighting a prince raised in war. He pressed forward again, relentless. Another strike came, sweeping toward your shoulder before you’d even got the chance to register the last.

You twisted out of his aim and let the blade scrape harmlessly across your shield instead of meeting it head-on.

You didn’t try to answer with a counterblow. You already knew better. Maekar was stronger, heavier, with more combat experience than you could ever imagine. Trying to overpower him would be suicide.

So you did the only thing you could. You made him miss.

The next strike came low and fast. You hauled yourself sideways, dodging as his blade cut empty air where your leg had been a heartbeat before.

Maekar adjusted instantly, straightening himself for another blow. His sword flashed again. You leaned away just enough for the edge to glance across your armour instead of biting into it.

Steel screeched. The force of it still jolted your entire side.

You circled him warily, with your heartbeat in your ears. One wrong or delayed move and it would be the end of you.

Your sword stayed ready, but you struck rarely, only quick probing slashes meant to keep him cautious rather than do real damage.

Maekar noticed your strategy. You could see it in the way his shoulders stiffened. You weren’t fighting him like a knight. You were avoiding him. But so what if you weren’t fighting with honour, the odds had been stacked against your side from the start.

His next attack came faster, anger and frustration beginning to sharpen the motion. You ducked the worst of it, the blade slicing past your helm close enough that you felt the rush of displaced air.

Another blow. You turned it aside with your shield.

Another.

You turned sharply as it whistled past your head.

Under the armour, your lungs had started to burn.

But Maekar’s breathing was growing heavier too. For a brief moment hope flickered. If you could keep him swinging long enough—

His next strike came suddenly faster than the rest.

You raised your shield to block it—

Too slow.

The blade slipped beneath the edge of your shield and drove forward. Cold steel punched through your side. It took you a few seconds to even comprehend what had happened, and then your world erupted into pain as your breath tore from your lungs in a broken gasp.

Your sword fell from numb fingers as you slid into the mud. For a moment you couldn’t even breathe. Above you the sky spun wildly.

Through the haze you saw Maekar stepping toward you with his sword still firmly in hand.

You tried to move but your body refused.

So this is it, you thought faintly.

He drew to a halt beside you, the thundering of combat around you fading into a distant clang. The pain was growing steadily now, from where it had at first you had felt vaguely numb but all you could focus on was him.

Through the narrow slit of his visor, you caught a glimpse of his violet eye, intense, and unyielding, burning with a fire that seemed to pierce right through the steel that separated you.

Then a simple thought struck in your mind. Would this really be the last thing you saw?

His blade lifted slightly, as you shut your eyes, waiting for the end. But it never came.

Your eyes fluttered open to find Maekar turned, looking across the battlefield. Something had changed.

Across the field a cry rose from the crowd. “Aerion yields!”

Your head turned weakly toward the sound.

It was over.

Maekar turned away from you without another glance, already moving to reach his son.

Relief washed through you in a strange, distant wave, with the realisation you had actually survived.

But the warmth spreading beneath your armour was growing colder. The chaos of the battlefield, which had roared in your ears only moments ago, receded further. The world now suddenly felt dreamlike, distant and muffled, as though you were underwater.

You tried to push yourself up but your arm refused. Perhaps just a moment of rest, just a few seconds with your eyes closed would help you gather enough strength to rise.

The sky above you was painfully bright. Then suddenly a shadow fell across your vision.

It was Prince Baelor.

Strong hands pulled you carefully from the mud. Pain flared sharply in your side, tearing a gasp from your throat as he gathered you against his side.

“You’re losing a lot of blood.” He said calmly, but urgently.

Another figure appeared beside him, mud-spattered and breathless. You felt them both carry your weight across the field, away from the crowd and the fallen riders. Every step sent another wave of sickening pain through your body, blood soaking through the gap in your armour.

You tried to keep your eyes open but the world kept slipping from your vision.

They laid you gently upon somewhere near the edge of the lists.

His hands moved quickly to the clasps of your helm.

“No—” you managed weakly, lifting a trembling hand at the realisation of what he was doing. “Don’t…”

“You need air,” Baelor said firmly.

The metal clasps came loose and you faintly felt your helm being lifted away. Cool morning air skimmed over your face.

You perhaps would never forget the look that crossed his face then.

His brow furrowed sharply, eyes widening as he took you in properly for the first time, no longer hidden by helm or visor. Baelor took everything in drifted from your clear feminine, now bruised, features to your hair that had been tugged loose to frame your face. The calm certainty he had just carried throughout the battle now vanished, replaced by something far more human.

Beside him Raymun froze. “Seven hells…”

Baelor’s gaze remained fixed on you, studying your face with stunned disbelief, as though trying to reconcile the bloodied knight he had fought beside with the woman lying before him now.

You found yourself staring back.

The world was fading fast at the edges now, but your eyes locked onto his face with a strange clarity.

You noticed things in fragments: the dark hair streaked with silver, the streak of blood across his brow, the tight line of concern tugging at his mouth. His eyes, you noticed were different colours. One a sharp, piercing blue like cold winter ice, the other a warm brown that somehow felt like the earth you lay on itself. They didn’t match, yet together they held you, twisting your thoughts into a dizzying tangle.

Suddenly you became aware of a metallic tang in your mouth.

Baelor leaned closer, one hand pressing firmly and painfully against the wound in your side to slow the bleeding. “Get the maesters now,” he said, his voice dropping lower, urgent but tempered by the weight of command.

But you barely heard him.

You were still staring at him, strangely fixated, as though his face were the only solid thing left in a world that had begun to drift apart.

But then all at once your eyes slipped shut before you could stop them and your body sagged in surrender against him.

And the last thing you saw, the final image to cling to, was him.

[nastyakotsk]

#171

[lovebugism]

✶ — THE WRONG THING !

summary: on the eve of your arranged marriage to baelor targaryen, your childhood best friend, daeron, indulges you in one final night of defiance before he loses you for good - and baelor does not take kindly to learning that his nephew has taken his future bride to a brothel. (6k)

characters: daeron targaryen / fem!reader, baelor targaryen / fem!reader, maekar targaryen

contents: friends to lovers, arranged marriage, angst, implied age gap, so much yearning, depressed!daeron (fork found in kitchen), also baelor would absolutely talk you through it cw for vague mentions of ocd and smut 18+ (MDNI): public sex kinda, fingering, dry humping

( NAVIGATION ) | ( MASTERLIST ) | ( AO3 )

You were to be wed on the morrow, and Daeron sank into his cups.

He had long lived in the folly that he would marry you someday — his first ever friend, and the only girl he ever dreamed of. But then the crown fell into great debts to your father, who managed all the gold mines from Oldtown to Summerhall; and the only way the king saw to foot the bill was to wed the man’s daughter to his own heir.

By all accounts, you were taking your betrothal far easier than your best friend. You had no other choice but to keep your wits about you, to plaster an artificial smile on your face and mindlessly agree to everything everyone ever told you to do, or to think. Even now, you let Baelor Targaryen — the husband you did not ask for — give you a tour of the newly decorated throne room where you would have your reception — which you had no say in.

The orante sea of Targaryen red and Highgarden gold blur together, along with Baelor’s words, as you avert your gaze to your hands, where you scratch fresh marks to your already raging nail beds.

“What do you think about it, princess?”

You only vaguely hear Baelor’s words through the metaphorical cotton in your ears. You blink hard and whip your head to face him, smiling before you’ve even registered his question. “I think it’s beautiful, Your Grace— Your mother did a wonderful job decorating.”

“While I appreciate the compliment, my lady, I was referring to our… arrangement,” Baelor corrects with a polite smile, half-hidden behind his greying beard. He slows to a stop in front of you, and you catch a whiff of the musky oils he’d bathed in — a stark contrast to your much lighter, floral aromatics.

“Oh. Right. I think— I think that it’s…” You stumble over yourself to find the words; not the ones you want to say, perhaps, but the ones you’ve been groomed to. Baelor ducks his head to flash you a patient look, and your cheeks flare with embarrassment. “I think that it is wise, Your Grace. If our marriage can ease the crown’s debts, I’m glad to be of service.”

“Is that you speaking, my lady?” he presses with a soft squint in his blue-brown irises. “Or your father?”

Your breath stutters. “I— I’m not sure what you mean, Your Grace.”

“What is it you want, princess?”

Your mouth parts to answer him. But, before you can stutter out a response you only halfway mean, the sound of chair legs scraping the cobbles rings through the expansive room. Your heads whip in tandem in the direction of the raucous noise, where you find Daeron trying and failing to catch himself on a table by the door.

He’s well drunk despite the early afternoon, wearing the ale in his wild golden hair, glassy blue eyes, and flushed red cheeks. He struggles to readjust the ornately decorated bench he’d run into with sloppy hands. It takes him several seconds too long to notice the looks he’s getting in response.

“My apologies…” he slurs, pink lips curling into a sloppy grin that doesn’t match the solemn look in his light eyes. “I seemed to have— Lost my way…”

“Aye. That much is quite clear,” Baelor sighs, much too used to his nephew’s antics by now.

The boy had always favored his ale, but never quite this much. He’s been haunting the halls of the Red Keep for some weeks now — the Kingsguard once found him in a ditch off of Flea Bottom the day it was announced Baelor would be wed to you, all bruised and bloody from the fighting pits. He hasn’t been fully sober ever since.

“Apologies, princess,” Baelor murmurs to you. “Do forgive my nephew.”

“No forgiveness needed, Your Grace—”

There’s another grating scrape, followed by a dull thud of a heavy body hitting the ground as Daeron trips over his graceless feet. He groans when he hits the unforgiving ground, writhing with only his long legs visible from your view of him.

Your features crumple with a mixture of annoyance and sympathy as you look on at the drunken boy. “I should take him to his chambers before he hurts himself—”

“The knights can escort him, my lady,” Baelor tells you.

“He’s much too fragile for that,” you quip with a tender smile. “And as I said— I don’t mind helping, Your Grace.”

Daeron doesn’t make it easy for you.

He never has, in truth, but least of all now.

He smells of musk and sweet ale as he falls heavily to your side, forcing you to carry the brunt of his weight as you help him back into bed. He falls heavily onto the feathered mattress, limp and unmoving. You exhale an exasperated breath and reach for his legs to situate him properly on the unmade sheets.

“Why must you make everything so difficult?” you huff.

Daeron’s head lolls against the pillows, golden hair sitting wildly around him.

“Why must you wound me so?” he argues in indistinct slurs. His glassy, red-rimmed eyes blink slowly up at your towering figure. He musters a trembling grin at the confused look you give him in return. “We both know it is not my uncle you want, petal…”

His eyes flutter shut as he lifts a sloppy hand to his face, trying and failing to find the rogue strand of hair clinging to his lashes.

“What I want doesn’t matter, Daeron,” you sigh and help him brush the golden tress back behind his ear.

Your breath catches in your throat when the boy’s warm hand wraps suddenly around your wrist, fingers warm and gentle as they linger on your wild pulse. He peers up at you with a pair of wet, ocean-colored eyes and murmurs quietly, “I don’t matter?”

“You know that isn’t what I meant,” you whisper and jerk your hand from his grip. “The decision is already made. The hall is already decorated. I’m getting married whether I like it or not—”

“You could always change your mind,” Daeron lilts, as if it were so simple. “And it would all be done with…”

“Not all of us are allowed to be so selfish, my prince,” you mutter bitterly and turn on your heel, heading the short distance for the pitcher of water and bowl of dates left on the table by the balcony. “Some of us actually have to think about other people from time to time.”

Daeron scoffs sloppily, folding his lanky hands across his lean stomach. “I think about other people,” he argues like a child.

“Do you?” you hum with a palpable lack of enthusiasm, beneath the sloshing of water you pour for him in a chalice.

“Aye, my lady… You,” he answers, smiling lazily when you glare at him over your shoulder. “I dream only of you— My Flower of Highgarden.”

“The Flower of Highgarden,” you correct him of the silly nickname that’s haunted you since birth, and walk the water and dates back over the drunken boy. You leave both at his bedside, with an air of distance about you that makes his chest ache. “I am getting married on the morrow, Daeron. It’s happening. So please, get a hold of yourself— if not for your sake, then for mine.

The evening air outside the Red Keep swells with the scent of sage and fresh flowers. A silken breeze rushes through the skirt of your dress as you lean over the balcony, bathing in the sweet scent down below, where the smallfolk leave bouquets and handmade trinkets by the castle’s entrance.

“I don’t understand,” you murmur to the man beside you, with your gaze still lingering on the shuffling crowd. “We don’t do this in Highgarden.”

“It’s custom for people to leave their blessings the night before a royal wedding,” Baelor explains. “Though, to be true, I have never quite seen it like this… They have taken quite a liking to you, it would seem.”

The kind smile he gives you makes your cheeks flare red-hot. You despise his attention as much as you crave it, desperately so. You fake a smile and swallow hard, picking again at the scarred skin of your nail beds from where your hands rest on the balcony. “Well, I am— pleased that the realm is, Your Grace—”

Your breath catches in your throat when Baelor’s wide hand splays suddenly over both of yours, effectively ceasing your assault on your delicate fingers. You peer timidly at him from beneath your lashes and cower at the warmth in his mismatched eyes.

“You are the most comely girl at court,” he tells you, gutwrenchingly gentle, as his fingers smooth over the red marks on your skin. “Why must you destroy yourself this way?”

“Apologies, Your Grace,” you murmur shyly, clearing your throat as you slide your hands from his grip, clasping them behind your back. “It’s a habit I haven’t quite been able to break, it would seem…”

Baelor softens and takes a step closer, pervading the scent of the late evening with his mixture of leather and musk. “I understand that… that I am not the husband you wished for,” the man starts slowly, calculating each word from his mouth. “But I will do right by you, princess. I can assure you of that.”

“I know you will, Your Grace. You’re a good man,” you say with an honest smile. “Even if it was not what I desired, I am no less pleased that it turned out to be you, Your Grace—”

“Baelor,” he corrects with a soft grin, taking a step closer and swiping an eyelash for your cheek. Your skin flares when his hand lingers there. You wonder if he notices.

“Baelor…” you repeat, far more timidly in comparison.

His mouth parts to speak, but he stops himself short. A flicker of confusion dances over his scruffy face before he wonders aloud. “Pardon my forwardness, my lady, but… Have you ever been kissed?”

Thoughts of Daeron flash instantly across your mind at his question. He’s always there in some way or another, stashed somewhere within each of your fondest memories — how he held you when you were younger; how he kissed you, how he touched you.

But that was all make-believe, you figure, a game of house you knew was always bound to end.

So you shake your head against the man’s softly calloused palm and answer, half-truthfully, “Never in a way that mattered, Your Grace…”

The answer seems to please him as his kind smile slowly returns.

“May I?” he offers vaguely.

You know you can’t say no. You’re not sure if you want to. So you nod and whisper back, “Of course…”

You tilt your chin to meet him halfway when he ducks down to kiss you. His beard tickles your delicate skin, a rather foreign sensation compared to Daeron’s shaven face. His lips are thinner than his nephew’s, too, tasting of sweet mint leaves and bitter whiskey. It’s different — good different — and you finally forget to be nervous as you reach suddenly for his bearded jaw.

Baelor freezes against you when you lick into his mouth, with far more expertise than someone who had never been kissed before. It surprises him as much as it excites him; the notion that there is still so much he doesn’t know about you. You catch him smiling softly to himself about it when your kissed lips part with a quiet click.

Your glassy eyes widen into a not-so-subtle look of shock at yourself. You bring your trembling hands back down to your sides again. “Forgive me, Your Grace. I— I forget myself—”

“No. Don’t apologize,” the man murmurs in an achingly gentle voice that does not match the fire in his blue-brown irises. “If you apologize every time I kiss you from now on, you’ll be spending a lifetime doing so, won’t you?”

His words, the solemn promise in them, make your stomach do a backflip.

“Aye,” you nod on bated breath. “I guess so…”

You’re still reeling from the adrenaline rush of kissing a somewhat stranger — both your soon-to-be husband and future king — when you return finally to your chambers. Your heart lurches to a fluttering stop at the shadowy figure you find lying in your bed, bathed in a golden sea of flickering candlelight. You exhale a relieved sigh when you find it’s only Daeron making himself at home in your bed, but you are still no less aggrieved to see him this way.

“What are you doing here?” you snap and quickly close the door behind you.

“Waiting for you, of course,” the now mostly-sobered boy responds through a groan, stretching out his tired limbs as if he’d just been sleeping. His thin chemise rises up his torso when he folds his arms behind his wild head, revealing his pale skin and the tuft of golden hair trailing down into his trousers.

“You’re not supposed to be in here,” you argue. “What would people think if they saw the two of us in here like this?”

“Who cares?” he scoffs with all the carelessness of a young prince, smiling wider when you scowl at him. “We know the truth of it— What anyone else has to say on the matter doesn’t concern the two of us.”

“That’s because no one ever taught you that it’s not about the truth of it,” you spit and storm his way, yanking your silken sheets from beneath his dirty boots. “It’s about perception. And you know your father would be cross if he found you in here—”

“My father is always cross,” Daeron scoffs.

“Only because you make him so.”

“Tell me, petal…” the boy begins, swinging his long legs off the mattress and peering up at you with a pair of glittering blue eyes. “Have you ever done the wrong thing?”

Your eyes narrow. “I’m looking at him,” you deadpan.

“Ouch,” he grimaces, grabbing at his heart over his baggy tunic. “But I presume I deserve that…”

“Aye. You do.”

He reaches for your hand when you try to turn away, wrapping his warm fingers around your smaller ones to keep you in place. “Come with me. To Flea Bottom.”

“Flea Bottom?” you repeat with an incredulous twist to your features, scoffing out a faint laugh. “Why would I go to—”

“To do the wrong thing,” Daeron finishes for you, tender with a lingering hope. “With me.”

You shake your head and try to pull your hand out of his, but he only holds you tighter. “I can’t, Daeron…”

“Live for yourself for a change,” he tells you, begs you. “Just once. And I will never speak to you of my heartache again, I swear it.”

By all accounts, you probably should’ve known by the subtle glimmer in his soft blue eyes that he only met trouble. Maybe that’s why you went with him in the first place, you think, for a bit of trouble — god knows, that’s all he’s good for. But, even still, you let him dress you in his trousers and baggy shirt, removing any remnants of your status, before stealing you away to the labyrinth that is Flea Bottom.

He keeps your hand clutched in his larger one as he leads you through the unpaved streets of twisted alleyways, reeking of stables, mud, and baked bread. You laugh like a pair of children as you chase gracelessly behind him, forgetting for a fleeting moment that you are to be wed on the morrow — that you will soon be expected to become a wife and a mother before the season is through.

Eventually, the loud chatter and swirling smoke from flickering fires gives way to something quieter, dimmer; smelling of sweat, sex, and soft perfume. Daeron tucks you into his warm side as you duck into a narrow hall, where moans and cries of pleasure bounce off the cobblestone walls. Your footsteps stutter in shock.

“You didn’t tell me you were taking me to a pleasure house—”

“Aye. I didn’t,” Daeron hums with a lazy grin. “Because you wouldn’t have agreed to come otherwise…”

The brothel is dark, lit only by rogue torches growing slowly dim on the walls. The naked bodies surrounding you on either side are bathed in shadow. The hand not clutching the back of Daeron’s cloak rises instinctively to cover your eyes, shielding them from the lurid sight of sex that sits everywhere you look.

“No. Don’t,” Daeron says and reaches for you with his free hand, curling his lanky fingers around your wrist to gently urge your hand from your face. “I want you to watch— To see what it looks like when you take what you want…”

Your eyes are slow to part from his lighter ones. You glance tentatively all around you — at the woman riding the face of a man on a nearby couch, of another man sandwiched between two masculine bodies by the wall, of two women caressing their naked bodies with gentle touches. It’s completely and utterly scandalous. And you can’t bring yourself to look away.

“No princes, no thrones…” Daeron whispers with his mouth pressed to your ear, and his chest against your back. “No debts, no weddings… Just—”

“Fucking?” you tell him.

“Pleasure,” he corrects. “So, ask yourself, petal, and be truthful… What do you want?”

It’s a simple question. One you couldn’t answer if you wanted to.

You want to be queen, like your father always groomed you to be — you want to marry Baelor, to be rich and powerful and idolized. But another, not-so-distant part of you yearns to be without responsibility and consequence — you want to be with Daeron in some far-off place by the sea, you want to fuck and drink and travel the world and never stick around long enough to learn anybody’s names.

You want all of it. And even though you know you cannot possibly have it, you try hard to take it anyway.

You reach out for Daeron and cradle his shaven jaw like you’re holding the sun in both hands. You drag him to you and press a searing kiss to his mouth, wasting little time in tasting him as your tongue licks suddenly between his parted lips, entwining with his own like velvet twisting with velvet.

Daeron grumbles a moan against you. He slides his warm hands beneath your borrowed shirt, up your stomach, and over your ribcage. He leaves faint trail marks along the skin of your back when he scratches his dull nails down your spine. You shiver against him, and he smiles into your kiss — inhaling your gasped breath when he pushes you suddenly into a cobbled wall, breaking the impact with a hand behind your head.

His mouth pulls away from yours with a low smack, lips swollen and rosy and shining with your spit. His eyes are heavy-lidded as he traces the bridge of your nose with the tip of his.

“What do you say, My Flower of Highgarden?” he slurs, panting hard against your mouth. “Are you going to take it?”

“Depends,” you challenge on bated breath. “Are you going to give it to me?”

The blonde boy nods, with a pink smile blooming lazily on his mouth. “Aye… I am.”

He ducks down before you can blink, kissing you hard enough to bruise. He swallows each of your quiet moans as his fingers creep toward your borrowed trousers, loosening the knot there with eager hands. Your fingers wrench the thin fabric of his tunic into fists to keep him impossibly close while his sneak beneath the hem — past your stomach, over a tuft of coarse hair, and down towards where you need him most.

You coat his middle finger in a thin layer of honey when it slots between your velvety folds, whimpering when he nudges softly at your sensitive clit.

“I can feel you throbbing,” he slurs against you. “’S like a heartbeat…”

“Please…” you sigh, though you’re not sure exactly what you’re begging for — please don’t tease me, please make me feel good, please fuck me.

“I’ve got you…” Daeron murmurs, panting against your mouth and swallowing your moans when his long finger slips finally inside you. His lip quirks into a crooked smile at the pretty noise you make for him.

You only vaguely feel him rutting against your thigh, pressing his stiffening cock against you to ease his own ache while he continues to pleasure yours.

“I’ve got you… Let me have it…”

Your moans fill the shadowed hall, and entwine with all the others.

You scrub the remnants of the sinful night from your body and prepare to become a dutiful bride by early morning. You’re still buzzing from the adrenaline rush as you writhe restlessly beneath your silk sheets. You can almost still feel Daeron’s fingers inside of you, if you think about it hard enough, as well as the outline of his hard cock pressed against your outer thigh, from where he’d gotten off humping your leg like a hound.

You revel in the night as much as you mourn it — pleased to have experienced it at all while simultaneously grieving that you’ll never be that girl again; and still a little surprised that you got away with it at all.

Almost.

A quiet knock from a delicate hand echoes through your expansive, pitch-black bedroom. Your heart lurches into your throat — a fleeting horror that turns into ice-cold panic in your veins a second later. You rise slowly, propping your weight on your elbows, and gazing wearily at the shadow looming beneath your door.

You swallow hard and pray your voice doesn’t shake as you call out, “Come in.”

The heavy door creaks open. A sliver of golden light from the torches in the hallway fills the room as one of your handmaidens shuffles in, gaze averted and hands clasped together. She curtsies and clears her throat, “Pardon me, my lady— but the Lord Hand has requested your presence in his study.”

You hope it’s still too dark for her to see the look of fear that flashes across your features. “The hour is quite late…” is the only thing you think to say, with an audible waver in your voice.

“Aye, my lady,” the young girl nods with an apprehensive gaze. “But he said he was urgent.”

“…Alright, then,” you nod once and hold your breath until the maid scurries off back the way she came. She closes the door behind her with a dull click, and the room returns to a velvet black darkness, with only your trembling breath to fill it.

You’re still in your thin white slip when you make the long trek to Baelor’s study, weaving through the candlelit maze of the Red Keep with two knights flanking you on either side. They work for your father, sworn to protect you and you alone, yet you can’t help but feel a bit like they’re leading you to a slaughter now.

They open the double doors of the expansive study for you and remain just outside of it while you saunter slowly in — slippers scuffing the cobbles like your feet are made of bricks, sweaty hands picking at your worry-worn nailbeds. You wear the guilt all over, like a bad dog with blood on its muzzle.

The fear in your stomach blossoms something fierce in your chest when Baelor’s eyes meet yours from across the way, sitting at his desk with Maekar and Daeron standing just before him. The older men are still in their day garb, made of Targaryen red and black, while the blonde boy remains in the baggy tatters he’d taken you to Flea Bottom in.

Daeron wears the sin all over still, hardly bothering to wash it off his skin, lest some of you go with it.

You cower on instinct when their gazes snap suddenly in your direction. You know you’ve long been caught, even when Baelor gives you a kind smile as you approach him.

“Thank you for coming, my lady,” he says in a gentle voice and sets his quill into the inkpot at his side. “I know the hour is late. I hope I did not disturb you.”

“Of course not, Your Grace,” you assure him and clear your throat when the words get stuck there.

“I thought it prudent to make you aware of some rather… troubling accusations,” the man continues with a knowing glint in his brown-blue eyes, flickers of candlelight dancing in his gaze. “You and my nephew were spied, some hours ago, beyond the walls of the Red Keep, engaging in behaviors that were… unbecoming of a woman of the court…”

“So we snuck out and drank a bit of wine,” Daeron laughs at your side, not yet showered and still reeking of sex and ale. He glances at you with glassy eyes and a lopsided grin before turning back to Baelor. “It’s hardly enough to warrant such arbitration, wouldn’t you say, uncle?”

“You were seen defiling the princess the day before her fucking wedding,” Maekar spits from the boy’s other side, jaw clenched tight behind his silver beard. “You’re lucky I’m not shipping you off to the Free Cities to make a man out of you.”

“Right,” Daeron scoffs. “Punish me for going to a brothel by sending me to the sex capital of the Seven Kingdoms— Ow!”

Maekar’s ringed hand slams hard into the back of the boy’s wild head. He grimaces, rubbing at the crown of his golden tresses with a pale hand.

“Do you not deny it?” Baelor asks you, with a suspicious squint in his gaze, as if he were distantly hoping you would.

“No, Your Grace,” you mutter with an averted gaze, etching new marks onto your delicate fingertips. “I did sneak out—”

“She lies,” Daeron blurts before the words have properly left your mouth. “She did not leave of her own volition, uncle. I forced her out… Wouldn’t take no for an answer…” Daeron’s drunk slurs trail off as he turns to flash you a lazy grin and a pair of squinted eyes. “Better a liar than a whore, right, petal?”

“Watch your tongue,” Maekar scolds from his other side.

“But there was no defiling, father, of that I’m sure,” Daeron continues anyway, head swiveling as he turns to face the other man. His smile widens beneath the strands of blonde hair hanging over his eyes. “I only used my fingers—”

“You idiot,” the father hisses, scooping his son up by the collar of his shirt and dragging him back towards the entrance.

Daeron’s stumbled footsteps echo in the otherwise silent study as he staggers behind him on graceless feet. He’s all but thrown out the door when Maekar swings it open again, only to slam it shut behind him with a booming thud a second later.

The sound rings through the suffocating quiet that you and Baelor are soon left alone in — the kind of quiet that snatches all the air out of a room; the kind of quiet that makes it suddenly very hard to breathe.

“Does he speak the truth of it?” the man wonders after a few long moments, with one arm propped along the arm of his chair and the other folded along the table’s edge.

You inhale a wavering breath.

“He does, Your Grace,” you murmur, lacking the courage to meet his eyes. “I had not planned it— Nor did Daeron, I think— It was simply the circumstances of the moment in which we found ourselves in that—”

“Did you like it?” Baelor interjects your rambling, which he knows is only full of the words you’ve been conditioned to say, and not the ones you truly mean.

You falter at the simple question. “I-I’m not entirely sure what you mean, Your Grace—”

“I’m entirely sure that you’re entirely sure what I mean,” the man hums with a kind smile, chair creaking under his weight when he slouches further into it. “Did you like being undone in a pleasure house like a common whore?”

His words, foreignly brash, and his eyes, foreignly hardened, make your stomach do a backflip.

“I… I don’t know—”

“You never do, do you?” Baelor mutters with a sympathetic squint to his mismatched eyes. “You’re always so concerned about what everyone else wants— What everyone else thinks of you— That you never learned how to form your own opinions…”

You shift uncomfortably before him, feeling utterly dissected under his prying stare and grimacing when you dig a fresh mark onto the skin of your pointerfinger.

“So I’ll ask you again, princess,” the man continues, leaning forward in his seat and never once taking his eyes off you. He peers at you over the flickering candles and repeats, more slowly this time. “Did you… like it?”

You swallow hard and nod once.

“Yes,” you hear yourself say on bated breath. “I think I did…”

“What about it did you like?”

You struggle to catch your breath, more so to find an adequate answer.

“I think that I— I just spent so much time worrying about my duties as the… the wretched Flower of Highgarden,” you laugh bitterly at the stupid nickname. “That I forgot what it meant to feel good. That I was allowed to feel good, and suddenly I was surrounded by people just taking what they wanted, and I felt so…”

“Free?” Baelor finishes for you, brows raised to his hairline.

“Powerful,” you correct, squinting like the word is half-foreign on your tongue.

Something flickers in his brown-blue eyes, something more than just the candlelight, as if he were finally seeing you for the first time.

His chair legs scrape the cobbles as he rises slowly to full height, rounding the table in measured strides, ambling towards you like a predator stalking its prey.

“Is Daeron who you want?” he asks with lowered brows. “Is that where your loyalties lie?”

“My loyalty is to the crown, Your Grace—”

You clear your throat and tilt your chin to meet the man’s gaze when he towers over you, smelling of leather and the old books he spends most of his days studying. Your breath stutters when he suddenly reaches for your face.

“Don’t answer from here,” he murmurs lowly, tapping gently at your skull. His pale pointer finger trails down — past your cheek, over your jaw, and down your thrumming pulse — until it rests along your sternum, just over your racing heart. “Answer from here.”

You inhale a wavering breath, glassy eyes darting back and forth between his unblinking ones.

“In a… In a perfect world…” you start in a trembling voice, struggling to keep the man’s gaze as you turn instead to your reddened nail beds. “Daeron and I would take off for Sunspear or Casterly Rock— Somewhere by the sea, where the sun is always shining— And the world would just be the two of us, fucking and drinking and loving all we want…”

Baelor’s brows perk at your sudden brashness. “Then why don’t you?”

“Because this is not a perfect world,” you answer plainly, half-morose. “And I’m not so selfish as to pretend that I don’t have my own duties here…”

Baelor’s lip quirks in a gentle smile beneath his greying beard as he exhales a laugh through his nose.

“A trait rather befitting for a future queen, perhaps…” he hums and points his mismatched gaze to the silk bow sitting at the chest of your slip, tracing it with the tip of his pointerfinger.

“Despite my… regrettable actions…” you trail off, just barely able to meet the man’s gaze as you peer up at him from beneath your lashes. “My racing mind did inevitably run into thoughts of you, Your Grace…”

“Really?” he hums. “Pray tell.”

“Daeron asked me what I wanted, and I thought first of you,” you confess. “And I realized I had grown quite attached to the thought of becoming your wife. Of ruling beside you— some many years on, of course, but— The sheer thought of it made me… It made me feel like I could conquer worlds.”

“Aye,” Baelor nods, with a fire in his brown-blue gaze that matches your own. “We will.”

He’s kissing you before you can blink, pressing his mouth to yours and cradling the back of your neck in a calloused hand, urging your jaw upward with his thumb. He steals the breath from your lungs under the weight of his searing kiss, as fierce and merciless as taking a bite out of an apple. It’s all tongue and teeth and spit — a passion you weren’t sure a man as wooden as Baelor was able to give, or otherwise cared to.

A string of saliva connects your mouths when he pulls away from you. Baelor smiles softly to himself when you try hopelessly to chase his kiss, swiping the thread of spit away with the pad of his thumb when it clings to your chin.

“Did you cum?” he asks you, then follows quickly at the look you give him. “When my nephew fucked you with his fingers at a whorehouse— Did you cum?”

His prying gaze darts rapidly between your glassy one as you struggle to answer — unsure of whether to be honest or to tell a feeble lie in hopes of placating his ego. You decide, finally, to tell the truth.

“Yes,” you answer and nod once into his hand.

“And I trust it will be the last time?”

“As you command, Your Grace—”

“Baelor,” he corrects.

“As you command, Baelor.”

There’s a twinkle of subtle mischief in your gaze that makes his lips curl into a quiet smile. He leans down again, and you think he’s going to kiss you, but he only traces the bridge of your nose with the tip of his.

“You are not as soft as the tales would tell it, are you? Flower of Highgarden,” he hums in a melodic voice, breath fanning over your mouth. “Gentle, yes. But not soft.”

“What’s the difference?” you whisper, and he feels the breath of it over his bearded chin.

“A soft person wouldn’t dare touch a knife, would they? But you… You’d kiss my forehead before pressing a blade to my neck— That’s gentle,” he explains, walking you backward with meandering footsteps that rhyme with your own.

Your breath catches in your chest when the backs of your thighs collide suddenly with the edge of the table. It scrapes once on the cobbles, and then again when Baelor urges you suddenly around with a firm hand on your elbow. He spins you away from him and presses you further into the wooden edge with his chest flush against your back.

“And I am— The idiot who would thank you for slitting my throat…” he mutters in your ear, scruff scratching at your neck as his calloused hands crawl up your thighs, pushing up the hem of it as they go. “As long as it meant you touched my skin…”

His wide palms trail over your hip bones, up your stomach, and past your ribcage. They settle finally under your breasts, just lingering there, and you wonder if he can feel the way your breathing stutters beneath them — if he can feel the way you fight the urge to grind your ass against his cock.

“Is this wise, my lord?” you whisper, nose brushing his bearded jaw when you peer hesitantly over your shoulder. “Our wedding is at dawn— They’ll be expecting a bedding ceremony—”

“Aye. They will. And you can pretend to be the sweet, virgin wife for the people on the morrow all you want,” Baelor hums, reaching for his belt with one hand to undo the buckle there. “But there’s no use in pretending when we’re alone, is there?””

Excitement stirs in your flaring chest and down into the pit of your swirling stomach, throbbing somewhere in the depths of your loins the same way you had for Daeron. You keep his stare when he pulls his half-hard cock from the confines of his trousers, mouth watering for a taste of him.

“No… I suppose not,” you say on bated breath and let Baelor fuck you stupid in the middle of the candlelight study — moaning his name within the cobbled walls, mere hours before you recite your sacred vows before the gods.

[lovebugism]

✶ — DIRTY MIND, DIRTY MOUTH !

summary: when maekar tells you he's leaving for a week on small council business, you do what you always do and wreck his plans (2k)

characters: maekar tagaryen / fem!reader, baelor targaryen

contents: a part of the lark of my heart universe, established relationship, grumpy!maekar (well, yes!), bratty!reader, cw for smut 18+ (MDNI), blowjobs, voyeurism kinda, caught in the act, very brief mentions of pregnancy, canon divergence (maekar is the master of coin in this universe for some reason lol)

( NAVIGATION ) | ( MASTERLIST ) | ( AO3 )

“No.”

“No?” Maekar blinks owlishly back at you, silver brows lowered in distant shock of your stubbornness, which he should very well be used to by now. “You can’t say no—”

“Didn’t I just?” you hum with a lazy smile and drape yourself across his desk, just barely leaving room for his work as you mindlessly shove his inkpot out of the way. You stretch like a cat on top of his scrolls and parchment, only just awake despite the early afternoon, still donned your thin white slip and sleep-wild hair.

You wear marriage quite well, too well for your own good. ‘Cause even when you’re trying hard to annoy him, you’re still the prettiest damn thing he’s ever seen.

“I have to go,” he argues in a sharp monotone. “It is not up for debate—”

“Well, then, why are we debating?” you lilt, propping your cheek on one hand and snatching the quill from his grip with the other.

Maekar huffs a chest-deflating sigh and slouches back in his creaking wooden chair. His eyes flutter slowly shut as he murmurs to himself, “I have raised children who were less stubborn than you are…”

“Well, thank the gods, I’m not your child. How awkward a thing that would be,” you ramble to yourself, holding the quill like a cigar between your fingers as you coax it back into the inkpot. “Even for you Targaryens and your… awkward customs—”

“Why must you be so difficult?” Maekar spits, silver eyes narrowed.

You meet his frown with an innocent grin that borders on devilish.

“Because you like it…” you singsong and reach across the brief distance between you to press the pad of your pointer finger to the tip of Maekar’s broad nose.

His frown deepens, but he doesn’t try to argue the point.

“It’s Small Council business, not a fucking pleasure retreat,” the older man says, grimacing slightly when you keep tracing the edges of his weathered face with your fingertip — from the bridge of his nose, around his brows, across his temple, and over the line of silver hair on his pockmarked cheek. “I’d be too busy to spend time with you, and you’d get bored, and we both know how you get when you’re bored.”

“How do I get when I’m bored, my love?” you ask in a knowing lilt, running your forefinger across his chapped bottom lip.

“Like this,” you answer in tandem with the grumpy man before you, trying and failing to match his deep scowl and deeper voice. Your grin widens when Maekar rolls his eyes and jerks away from your touch.

“Alright. Enough. This isn’t up for discussion.”

You inhale sharply through your nose and sit up straight again, bare legs swinging off the side of the desk. The thin strap of your slip falls off your shoulder as you shrug. “We’ll talk about it later.”

“No, I—” Maekar breathes through the flare of anger in his chest. “I just said it isn’t up for bloody discussion. I am going alone, and that is final.”

“I am your wife, Maekar,” you retort, leaning back on your hands as your sleepy eyes narrow into thin slits. You shove him gently with the bare pad of your foot against the lapel of his black-red coat. “I think I should have a say.”

“And as my wife, you’re a non-factor in the matter,” the man grumbles, swatting your leg away and reaching again for his quill. “The Lord of Casterly Rock wishes to discuss debts with the Small Council— If he wanted conference with a man’s stubborn wife, I trust he would’ve stated as much.”

He presses the edge of his quill to the thick parchment before him. The scratching sound of his writing fills the quiet study, which swells suddenly with the weight of your pouting face. Maekar catches only a sliver of it in the corner of his eye, but it consumes his entire being anyway. He feels your hurt as if it were his own — in an ice-cold, white-hot pang in the center of his chest.

He huffs a deep sigh and returns his feathered quill to its pot.

“Alright. I am sorry,” the man huffs, mostly sincere, though the apology comes out a little meaner than he intends it to. His silver eyes cut back to you, and his hardened features soften slightly. “I’m not trying to be cross with you, my love— I’m only trying to get you to understand.”

His palm is warm and slightly calloused when it cradles your cheek, still soft with leftover slumber.

“I’ll see you in a week’s time,” Maekar tells you, softer now. “You won’t even have time to miss me.”

Your pout never wavers, but you lean instinctively into his warmth despite yourself when his thumb swipes along the apple of your cheek. He catches a flicker of mischief pass through your eyes, and a faint twitch lift the corner of your lip, just before you turn your head and lick your tongue across the length of his palm.

“I don’t need a week,” you tell him with a newfound smile. “I’m going with you.”

Maekar sighs in defeat. “You’re a child—”

“Don’t pretend like you won’t miss me,” you lilt and slide off the edge of his desk, bare feet hitting the creaking hardwood with a gentle thud.

“Of course, I’ll miss you,” he huffs, wiping his spit-slick hand on his trousers. “I just won’t miss— this.”

“You won’t be saying that when you’re off on Casterly Rock,” you murmur, bracing your hands on his broad shoulders while you plant your knees on either side of his thighs. “All alone… Stressed after a long day of meetings… Looking for a little… release.”

Maekar only vaguely catches your smile before you duck down to press a kiss to his neck, just below the line of silver scruff there. He exhales hard through his nose at the feeling of your mouth against him and your taut nipples brushing his chest through the layers separating the two of you.

“Still, the issue remains…” he grumbles on an exhaled breath, which you can feel under your mouth when you press a kiss to his throat. “That you believe we’ll have time for this, when I am telling you that we won’t—”

“I believe the Master of Coin can make time,” you mumble into his milky white skin, trailing your hands down the front of his long coat.

“Not with Lord Gerold,” he tells you. “I get the money from the old fuck, if you’ve forgotten.”

“He’s younger than you,” you giggle, still hidden in his neck.

“Not the bloody point…”

You’re wearing a smile when you pull away from him again, eyes heavy with sleep and desire as they dance over Maekar’s unwavering scowl, made of a clenched jaw and steely blue eyes. Your grin only grows at the sight of him, as if you find him something worth leering so fondly at within him. The notion alone deepens the older man’s frown as his silver eyes flit between your smile and your deft fingers unknotting the tie in his coat.

“I don’t have time for this,” he says.

“And look at you,” you croon. “Making time.”

A groan of annoyance sounds deep in his throat, but he makes no move to stop you when you sink to your knees before him. His thighs spread to accommodate your body between them as you part the edges of his thick coat and reach for the tie in his black trousers. They unknot in a single pull.

“I’ll be fast,” you smile, then tease with an arched brow. “Unless you want me to stop.”

Maekar squints down at you. “I don’t have all fucking day—”

The remaining words get lost in his throat when you take his cock from his trousers, heavy and half-hard, softer than velvet in your palm. His knuckles go white around the wooden armrest as he breathes heavily through his nose, head tipping back against the seat while you work him stiff in your fist. A moan grumbles in the base of his throat when your lips wrap around the peach-colored tip, taking half of him into your warm, wet mouth.

You’re mere moments away from getting the tense man to finally relax when a sharp knock sounds suddenly at the door, creaking heavily when it swings open a second later.

Maekar lurches in panic and, in doing so, shoves himself the rest of the way into your mouth. You gag when your nose brushes the coarse hair above his cock, but the sound gets lost in the harsh scraping of his chair against the cobbles. The man falters at the sight of his brother, burning red as he waits for you to pull off of him.

You never do.

Baelor stills in the doorway, brown-blue eyes widening at Maekar’s foreignly startled disposition. “Is this a bad time, brother?”

“A bit,” the younger man answers, half-strangled, before he clears his throat behind his fist. “I’m a little— preoccupied at the minute.”

“I’ll be quick,” Baelor assures and slips inside, shutting the door behind him with a gentle hand. “Have you received the ravens from Casterly Rock?”

“Aye,” Maekar nods once. “I have.”

He swallows down a moan when your silken tongue runs over the vein beneath his cock and up toward the sensitive tip, where it licks away the pearls of precum like a kitten to milk.

He flares with pleasure and a fleeting panic as his brother walks further into the study — where, if he gets too close, he’ll certainly see your head bobbing in his lap beneath the desk. Baelor stops short by the window, backlit by the grey skies outside, and Maekar sighs hard in relief.

“So then you know he means for us to attend a tourney in his son’s name?”

“We’ll be courted like brides for the taking, no doubt,” Maekar quips in a strangled breath.

Baelor exhales a quiet laugh. “How is the wife taking it?”

The silver-haired man freezes and forgets very suddenly how to breathe. He almost thinks he can feel you smiling around the tip of his cock while he stammers out a measly, “W-What?”

“The news? Of your leaving?” the older man explains. “I’m sure she’s pleased to hear it.”

Maekar means to laugh, but it comes out more as a scoffed breath and a faint twitch of his lip beneath his mustache. “Aye. That’s one word for it.”

“Perhaps she should tag along,” Baelor suggests, then shrugs at the look his brother gives him in response. “You know the kind of man Lord Gerold is— He’d take quite a liking to her, I’m sure.”

“Well, she’s not his to take a bloody liking to.”

You pull off of him slowly, smiling as you take him by the heavy base of his cock, collecting the beads of salty precum on the tip of your tongue. Maekar’s silver eyes peer down at you from the bridge of his nose, meeting your glimmering gaze with something much harder.

He splays a wide hand over the crown of your head to coax you into taking more of him in your mouth. You oblige without a word, sighing hard through your nose in place of a moan as you readjust between his thighs until you’re straddling his shoe. Maekar fights back a groan when he feels you humping his leg like a bitch in heat, achingly warm beneath the layers separating you from him.

He feels a coil knotting in the pit of his stomach at the sight of you alone. Your expert mouth on him might just kill him entirely.

“Where is she, anyway?” Baelor wonders aloud, with a squinted gaze thrown over his shoulder. “It’s rare to find her without you nearby these days.”

“Still sleeping, I presume,” Maekar lies in an annoyed huff, long fingers tightening in your hair in time with his encroaching orgasm.

“Past noon?” the older man wonders with a pensive sort of twist to his scruffy face. A hint of a smile lifts the corner of his mouth as he says, “My wife was like that when she was pregnant with Valarr— Slept like a cat all day. And was still tired when she woke.”

You still suddenly with Maekar’s cock in your mouth, made slightly weary by Baelor’s confession. Maekar, similarly, forgets to mourn his lost orgasm as his bearded face twists in confusion — a confusion that he should not possess, perhaps, because the two of you have surely been fucking like all newlyweds are entitled to.

The rumors spreading across the Red Keep say that you’re trying to produce another heir, though that wasn’t entirely the intention — you just didn’t know it was such a scandalous thing to be attracted to your husband.

“What the bloody hell are you saying?” the man spits.

“I’m not saying anything,” Baelor shrugs. “Just making an observation.”

Maekar’s dumbfounded look never wavers as he follows his brother’s form back towards the door with a pair of squinted eyes.

“You should probably send her to the maester. Just in case,” the older man advises as he swings open the heavy office door. He glances over his shoulder, and Maekar cowers in his seat, praying he isn’t wearing the throes of his pleasure all over. “I’ll see you at break of day on the morrow, brother— if your wife will allow it, that is.”

“Allow?” Maekar scoffs in amusement. “She doesn’t allow me to do anything.”

“That’s what she wants you to think,” Baelor quips knowingly and shuts the door behind him.

You pull away with a dull pop, peering up at the silver-haired man with lidded eyes and a swollen mouth coated with spit. “Should your wife allow you to cum, husband? Or would you rather get off with your hand?”

“Don’t tease,” he hisses.

Your brows raise in a faux-innocent look. “Ask nicely.”

“Please don’t tease,” Maekar spits through gritted teeth.

Your lips curl into a devilish grin. “Good boy.”

The words of an argument die in his throat when your mouth returns to his cock, sucking mercilessly at the bulbous head while you jerk the rest of him in your fist. Your free hand cradles his balls, heavy and wet from your spit. You massage him gently there in time with your thrusts against his leg, squeezing him every time your hips rock forward and releasing when they roll backwards again.

He can feel each of your quiet moans with his cock stuffed in your mouth, adding to his already growing sensitivity. His fingers tighten in your hair and on the edge of the armrest. A groan rumbles deep in his throat when the knot in his stomach unties without warning, and his twitching cock spits warm ropes of cum onto your waiting tongue.

His exhale hitches when you moan at the salty tang of him, and at the warmth of your own release that blooms in the pit of your stomach. Your thrusts against his leg begin to slow as a wet spot forms in your undergarment. Your quiet whimpers and his heavy, trembling breaths fill the quiet study as your adjoining highs come and go.

You pull off of him with a quiet smack, wearing a mixture of saliva and cum on your smiling lips as you swallow down the mouthful he’d just given you. The sight of you kneeling below him makes his chest flare with a red-hot desire, even as he starts to soften in your hand.

“You… will pay for this…” he pants. “Just so you’re aware…”

“At Casterly Rock?” you wonder with wide, innocent eyes.

“Aye,” Maekar nods despite himself, rolling his silver eyes. “At Casterly Rock.”