Need Friends

need to expore more things.

[vaokses]

I have gone nowhere

Series Masterlist / Navigation

Pairing: Daeron Targaryen x Betrothed!Reader

Summary: 

Mors Martell has been in Summerhall two days when he looks at Maekar’s children and names what Maekar has spent years refusing to see. Daella is not only curious. Egg is not only restless. Aemon is not only dutiful. Aerion is not only cruel. Daeron is not only lost. In the days before Daeron’s wedding, Maekar watches his children orbit the Martell bride and her family, each of them reaching in the only way they know how. What he finds is not comfort, not absolution, but the shape of a house where every child has learned a different way to stand alone.

Word Count: 12.2k

Warnings: Grief, parental emotional neglect, dysfunctional family dynamics, alcoholism references, references to brothels/sex work, implied past sexual self-destruction, class/gender/political tension, Aerion being Aerion. Mors Martell said i can fix nothing but i can make you aware of it, and now Maekar is on a failsons and faildaughters speedrun. This is my first attempt at writing the smaller Maekarlings.

A/N: I wanted to explore how the Maekarlings might have initially reacted to the Reader, and what Maekar might learn of his children with the Martells as contrast. This is my first time delving into family dynamics and Maekar's relationship to all his children, I would love to hear your thoughts! I hope you like this!

This is another installment of the Where I am good and loved collection/series, but like all pieces it can be read as a standalone.

Title is from the quote by Theodore Roethke: "Father, I'm far from home, and I have gone nowhere."

By the second night they spend there, the Martells have begun to make Summerhall untidy. 

Not in any way Maekar can object to, nothing is disordered enough to require correction. No servant has been insulted, no courtesy forgotten, no hall invaded beyond the allowances of kinship and hospitality. Prince Mors’ party bows where it must bow, stands when rank requires it, eats what is set before them.  

Still, Summerhall has altered around them. 

It is in the sound first. The gallery is not louder than it has been on other evenings, but the noise sits differently in the room now. Dornish voices run close to one another, interrupting, answering before a question has fully finished, folding laughter into speech. A woman near the far hearth touches another’s wrist to hold her in the conversation, you being your head towards your sister, arms linked as you both listen to something Daella is telling you with too much earnestness and not enough breath between sentences. 

Your sister laughs, sudden and bright, and the sound carries farther than it should. 

Maekar looks toward it before he can stop himself. 

The girl does not seem offended by Daella’s eagerness, and that is the first irritation. She seems amused, and that is the second. Daella, who has spent the last day looking too often at the Martell women’s sleeves, hair, earrings, shoes, and easy closeness, brightens at being received instead of corrected. 

Mors sees Maekar looking. Of course he does. The man has always had the disagreeable habit of noticing what he ought to leave alone. 

“They find one another quickly.” Mors comments, stepping closer.  

The Dornishman leans one side of his hip against the wall behind them, where Maekar stands at attention. 

Maekar keeps his gaze on the room. 

“Your daughters?” 

“Women,” Mors corrects, after a beat. “Girls. Sisters. Whichever word makes a prince least uncomfortable.” 

Maekar gives him a dry look, but Mors only smiles into his cup. 

It is almost easy, for a moment. Old taunts, old rhythm, the familiar shape of a friendship neither of them would name softly. Mors has always spoken like a man bold enough to be impertinent, and Maekar has always preferred that to cautious respect. Respect makes liars of men who know better. 

Mors stands near the window with one shoulder turned from the room, a cup in hand, sun-dark fingers loose around the stem. The day’s travel dust is gone from him, and whatever stiffness the road put into his back has either eased or been hidden. His wife sits with Baelor and Manfred and Lenna Dondarrion near the hearth, speaking with calm authority. Every so often, Mors’ gaze goes to her. Not anxiously, merely by habit. 

Maekar has seen it three times in as many minutes. 

“You still count her breaths?” He asks. 

Mors does not bother pretending not to know whom he means, “Only when she wants me to.” 

“That seems unlikely.” 

“You have not been married to her for over twenty years.” 

“No,” Maekar concedes, “A mercy to us both.” 

Mors’ mouth curves, “To her, certainly.” 

Across the room, Daeron stands near one of the tapestries with a cup in his hand. 

He is not drinking from it. 

Maekar notes this, as he noted it the previous night. He notes the gloved hand curled around the stem, the easy posture arranged over some private strain, the smile Daeron gives one of the Dornish knights when spoken to, light and useless and almost convincing. Daeron has always known how to look least wounded when most watched. It is one of his more infuriating talents.  

The previous evening returns to Maekar without permission: Daeron’s bare hand, the glove pulled off too quickly, the tremor hidden by grace only because everyone had agreed to call grace by that name. The way you had offered your hand and Daeron had come the rest of the way. The way he had left the glove off after, as though the uncovered hand had betrayed him into some honesty he could not immediately cover again. 

Then later, the laugh. 

You had laughed at something Daeron said beside one of the old hunting tapestries, and Daeron had looked at you as if the sound had reached some foolish, undefended place in him. His face had changed before he could govern it. Only for a breath. A smile, almost boyish in its surprise, gone once Maekar’s attention found him. 

Maekar had not meant to look so sharply, but Daeron had noticed anyway. 

Now, on the second night since the Martell’s arrival, his son keeps himself at a better distance. Near enough to answer if spoken to. Far enough to pretend he has not chosen where to stand by the line of sight it gives him to his betrothed. 

Mors follows his gaze. 

“Your son does not approach easily.” He says. 

Maekar’s jaw tightens, and rushes to let the conversation reach its objective, admitting to what the other man alludes to, “Daeron has faults.” 

A short laugh that would have earned any other man a fist to the jaw, and mors replies, “I know.” 

“They have been made louder than they deserve.” 

Mors looks at him then, but not with surprise. With something worse: patience. 

Maekar dislikes that look in any man. From Mors, he dislikes it doubly, because Mors has known him too long to be impressed by silence. 

“Is that so?” 

No. if anything, rumor is kinder to Daeron than he deserves. 

But Maekar won’t say that. Before anything else, that boy is his own. 

“He has sense,” Maekar says instead. “When he chooses to use it.” 

The defense sits between them, hard and insufficient. 

It is not tenderness. Maekar knows that. It is not even quite mercy. It is only a…a correction of record, a father’s answer to the shape of gossip before the gossip has been spoken aloud. He has cursed Daeron’s habits in private, cursed his weakness, his disappearances, his wasted mornings, his wine-sour returns, his useless mouth and all the cleverness he spends making himself smaller. He has said worse to Baelor than he would ever permit from any man outside his blood. 

That is different. 

A father may name the rot in his own house, but he need not offer it to guests. 

Mors turns his cup once, watching the wine catch the light. “I am not speaking of the wine, by the way.” 

Maekar looks at him. 

For the first time that evening, the room seems to step back from them.  

Not in sound. The music continues, thin and courtly beneath the talk. The Martell sister laughs again at something Daella says. Egg has drifted too close to Aemon and is being moved back by one quiet hand at his shoulder. Aerion speaks to one of Mors’s men with the expression he wears when he has found a blade and is deciding where to set the point. 

Everything remains as it was. 

Mors’s voice lowers. “Leave it to you to fill a house with six children and leave each one of them alone.” 

The first answer in Maekar is immediate and ugly. 

It rises so quickly that only discipline keeps it from his mouth. A thing about presumption. About Dornish men arriving with dust still in their bones and thinking themselves fit to judge royal households. About Mors’s own daughters, loud enough to mistake noise for happiness. About daughters being easy to gather because they are permitted softness sons must outgrow. About war, duty, rank, grief, governance, all the things Mors speaks around because Dorne lets men pretend tenderness is the same as freedom. 

He says none of it. 

Mors watches him not say it. 

Maekar drinks. The wine is good and wasted on the moment. 

“My children are not neglected.” He says instead. He hears the sulk, the petulant offense, in his own voice, and detests it at once. 

“No,” The agreement is so quick Maekar distrusts it. Mors looks into the room. “That is not what I said either.” 

Maekar follows his gaze despite himself. 

His children are easy enough to find because he has always known where each disturbance in a room is likely to settle. Aemon near Baelor, quiet, pale head inclined toward whatever is being said to him, attentive enough to seem at peace to anyone who does not know the weight attention can become. Aerion at the far side, smiling too softly. Egg half-contained, his dignity in constant war with his feet. Daella bright beside the Martell girls. Rhae drowsy near her governess, one hand wrapped in the woman’s skirts. Daeron apart, cup in hand, looking nowhere too long. 

Six children. 

Rooms. Tutors. Guards. Horses. Septons. Maesters. Names properly entered and spoken. Clothes fitted, futures arranged, places held at table. Aemon has the Citadel before him, if the Gods and his own mind continue in agreement. Aerion has skill, despite whatever poison he pours through it. Egg has more indulgence than Maekar should allow him. The girls are watched, taught, protected. Daeron has a wife coming from a house Maekar trusts because Maekar has swallowed enough pride to ask for what his son would never ask for himself. 

Alone. 

The word has no place among such provisions. 

Mors sets his cup down on the narrow ledge beneath the window. 

“You look as though you are counting bedsheets and guardsmen.” 

“Those are not nothing.” 

“No. They are not.” 

Maekar’s mouth curls for a moment, before he half-remembers the same man standing before him now taunting him about growling like a dog nearly twenty years ago. 

“You speak very freely for a guest.” He comments past gritted teeth. 

“I speak freely because I am not only a guest.” 

That is true enough to be inconvenient. Mors had stood with him in mud and smoke before either of them had learned how much of themselves war would keep. He had cursed beside him, bled beside him, once laughed into a bloodied sleeve because Maekar, half-stunned and too young to be commanding anyone, had given an order so terrible in phrasing and so correct in substance that half their line had obeyed from disbelief alone. Mors had known him before Summerhall, before six children, before grief. 

Knowing a man young is a dangerous thing, it gives one’s insults too many doors. 

Maekar looks again toward Daeron. “You have seen them for two days.” 

“I have seen children before.” 

“Daughters,” Maekar says, and hears the bite before he can recall it. Mors turns his head. “Daughters are easier to keep near.”  

For a moment, Mors only stares at him. 

Then he laughs once, without pleasure. “Spoken like a man who has never had eight of them trying to take a household apart from the inside.” 

Maekar says nothing. 

“No,” Mors continues, quieter. “Daughters are not easier. Mine simply never learned to let me be deaf in peace.” 

The words settle badly. 

Across the room, Daella leans toward the Martell girls, hands folded tightly before her in the way her septa praises because it keeps them still. She is listening too intently to whatever Mors’s younger daughter is telling her. Too bright with it, too grateful for an answer. 

Maekar feels irritation move in him again, sudden and sharp. 

Daella is curious. That is all. A girl’s curiosity in the face of novelty. The Martells are new, bright, sun-warmed, full of stories that will fade once the wedding is done and the household returned to its proper order. Daella has always been full of questions; she asked them of maesters, septas, nurses, visiting ladies, Baelor when she could corner him, Aemon when he was too kind to escape, Egg when she needed a less reliable answer and did not mind knowing it. 

Lonely children do not ask so many questions. 

Or perhaps they do. 

No. 

Maekar rejects the thought with a force that surprises him. 

Mors says nothing. 

That is worse than argument. 

“You are angry.” Mors says at last. 

“You came into my house and insulted my children.” 

“I insulted you,” Maekar looks at him. Mors’s face is steady. There is no satisfaction in it, no victory. “That is different.” 

Maekar almost answers. He has several replies fit for the purpose, most of them older than either of their eldest children. None reach his mouth. 

The music changes. A servant passes near enough that both men fall silent until he is gone. At the far end of the gallery, Baelor’s voice warms over some graceful remark, and Lady Martell answers with a smile that makes Mors’s attention shift by habit before returning. 

Maekar sees the movement. 

Again. Always again. 

“Your wife will think you neglect her if you stare at my failures all evening.” He says. 

Mors snorts, “My wife would inform me if I neglected her.” 

“How fortunate for you.” 

“Yes,” Mors says. “It is.” 

The simplicity of the answer is indecent. 

Maekar turns back to the room, to the children Mors has presumed to pity and accuse him through. His gaze finds Daella because he means it to. Because she is the easiest proof, because Mors does not know her, because a man who has been in his house two days does not get to make a wound of every bright question a girl asks a stranger. 

Daella is not lonely, he thinks. 

She cannot be. 

The thought holds for less than a breath before the Martell girl laughs again and Daella leans closer, shining with the borrowed warmth of being answered.  

Maekar chooses Daella first because she is easiest. 

He is aware that is not a kind thought, but it is not an unkind one either. It is simply where his mind goes when it looks for proof. Daella is not Daeron, whose failures have learned to leave rooms before he does. She is not Aerion, who sharpens every conversation until someone must either bleed or smile. She is not Aemon, quiet enough for duty to mistake him for peace, nor Egg, who must be caught by the collar of his name before he climbs, asks, interrupts, or vanishes into some unsuitable passage. 

Daella is bright, Daella is dutiful when reminded, Daella is full of questions and fond of pretty things and sufficiently indulged by her elder brothers to believe most rooms will answer her if she persists long enough. 

Daella is not lonely. She is…nosy. That is different. 

The thought holds well enough until the third afternoon. 

There is no feast that day. No formal welcome, no music, no line of guests arranged beneath the eyes of the house. The Martells have begun unpacking themselves into Summerhall by degrees: trunks opened, servants redirected, horses walked in the yard, letters sent toward Dorne, bright fabrics aired over chairs and screens in a way that makes the attending women murmur and rearrange what has already been arranged. 

Maekar has no reason to linger near the small solar beside the western gallery. 

He does so anyway. 

The door is open, and that is excuse enough. The room lies on the way to the outer stair if one takes the longer passage, and he has taken it because a servant told him Baelor had gone that way. Baelor is not there. Instead, the room is full of women’s voices, afternoon light, and the smell of some Dornish oil or soap that has escaped an opened traveling chest and settled into the old wood. 

Daella is inside. Of course she is. 

She sits on a low stool beside Mors’s younger daughter, knees angled toward her with such intentness that her septa would have corrected the posture if the septa had not already been defeated by the room. Rhae stands half behind Daella’s shoulder, one hand fisted in the fall of her sister’s sleeve and the other worrying at the edge of a ribbon she has no right to touch. Maekar noticed the way your eyes travel to Rhae’s plump little hand and the way you pretend not to see the ribbon being worried. You sit nearer the window with a length of yellow silk folded across your lap, while your mother speaks quietly to Lady Clarisse over a tray of pins, thread, and small gold pieces Maekar does not know the use of and does not intend to ask about. 

Wedding work, he supposes. Women have always had an astonishing capacity to turn cloth into governance.  

He thinks, for a moment, of a boy that knew little and appreciated even less, and the soft-spoken young girl dressed in purple and silver. He thinks, for a moment, of draping a Targaryen cloak over unfamiliar shoulders and a loose strand of mahogany hair caught under red and black. 

He imagines, for a moment, a red dragon covering a Martell yellow sun. He hopes, for a weak moment, that his son finds the same love he did. 

“Is it true there are pools for children at the Water Gardens?” Daella asks, dragging Maekar away from his thoughts. 

“There are pools for everyone.” Your sister says. 

“But children are allowed in them?” 

Your sister spares a glance towards your mother and states, “If they are quick enough to avoid being pulled out by their mothers.” 

Daella absorbs this with a seriousness better spent on her lessons. “Even noble children?” 

“Especially noble children. They are usually the ones most in need of being made ridiculous.” 

Rhae’s fingers go still on the ribbon. 

Daella frowns. “Princes too?” 

“Princes most of all.” 

You glance up from the silk. Your mouth moves, not quite a smile.  

The look passes between the sisters with the ease of a thrown ball. Daella sees it and leans forward as though proximity might teach her the rules. 

Maekar tells himself he should move on. 

He remains where he is, just outside the door, shielded by the angle of the passage and the half-fall of an old hanging worked with red thread gone dull from age. 

“Have you pushed a prince into a pool?” Daella asks. 

The younger sister lifts one shoulder. “I have pushed cousins. That is almost the same thing.” 

“You pushed Doras, and held him under the water.” You say without looking up. 

“He pulled my braid.” 

“You bit him.” 

“He had hands enough to let go.” 

Daella’s eyes widen with immediate admiration. 

Rhae makes a small sound, nearly a laugh, and hides her face against Daella’s shoulder. Daella reaches back without looking and pats her sister’s hand, impatient but not unkind. 

There is nothing wrong with the scene. 

That, perhaps, is what makes it difficult to leave. 

His daughters are attended, received, entertained. Daella has found the novelty he expected her to find. Rhae is no more forward than any child made curious by color and unfamiliar voices. The Martell girls are polite enough, warm enough, not too familiar for their station and not cold enough to offend hospitality. Nothing here accuses him. 

It is all very ordinary. 

He distrusts how little relief the thought gives him. 

“Do all your sisters write to you?” Daella asks. 

The room moves around the question without changing. One of the Martell women lifts a length of fabric to the light. Lady Clarisse says something too low to hear. You thread a pin through the silk and answer only after you have secured it. 

“Most of them. When they remember.” 

“How many letters do you get?” 

“That depends how many quarrels have happened since the last raven.” 

The younger sister laughs. “Or how many quarrels she caused before leaving.” 

“I caused none.” 

“You caused three.” 

“Two,” You says. “The third was a misunderstanding.” 

Daella looks between the two of you, delighted. “What was it about?” 

“You are too young to hear it.” You retort, with the same ease he has seen Daeron hold Egg away from a bucking horse. 

“I am not.” 

“You are.” 

“I am a princess.” 

She wasn’t so inclined to make arguments like that before Aerion started participating in her lessons with her septa. 

“That does not make you older, little one.” 

Daella looks down at her gown, considers the argument, and seems offended only because it has worked. Rhae touches the ribbon again, more carefully this time, as though some freedom has been extended to the whole corner of the room and she means to make a modest use of it. 

Maekar should move. He should certainly move before someone sees him standing like a thief outside a room full of girls. 

Then Daella shifts in her seat, turning fully to your sister and asking, “Will she still write to you after she marries Daeron?” 

Your hands pause over the silk, only for a breath. It is not long enough for Daella to notice, but it is long enough for Maekar. 

“Of course.” Your sister says. 

Daella doesn’t look convinced. “Every week?” 

“If she has anything worth saying.” 

“And if she does not?” 

Your sister gives you a look of grave consideration. “Then I will write first and accuse her of becoming boring.” 

You look up fully now. “I would never give you the satisfaction.” 

“You say that because you are not married yet.” 

“I say that because I have never been boring.” 

Daella smiles, pleased by the answer and not done with it. “But she will stay here, right? With us?” 

The room quiets by some small degree. 

A pin is lifted, fabric shifts, someone near the hearth sets down a cup with care. No one stops working simply because a child has asked a question, but the air alters all the same, and Maekar feels the change before he understands why it has struck him so sharply. 

Your gaze moves to Daella. Then, for the smallest instant, her gaze moves to the open door. 

To him. 

Maekar does not step away. 

He sees the thought pass across your face, or imagines he does. To you, he is only the father of the man you are to marry, standing where a father might stand if he wished to judge whether his future daughter entered his house with proper grace. Perhaps you think he has come to measure your manners. Perhaps she thinks he watches his daughters around her and wonders what sort of influence she will become. 

That is fair enough. He is wondering it now. 

“I expect so.” You say. 

The answer is correct, careful. Too careful for Daella, who has never had much taste for answers that close a door without telling her what lies behind it. 

Her nose wrinkles. “That is not an answer.” 

The younger Martell girl chokes on a laugh and lowers her face at once. Lady Clarisse murmurs Daella’s name, not sharply, only in warning. Rhae presses closer, either from embarrassment or enjoyment. 

Maekar does not expect a daughter of Dorne, least of all a daughter of Mors Martell, to be offended by insolence. And you clearly aren’t. Your mouth softens, though not enough to make the question harmless. 

“Then I will give you another answer,” You say. “Yes. I will stay.” 

Daella studies you. 

It is an insolent look, too direct, unfiltered in the way children and spoiled princesses are both permitted to be until the habit becomes dangerous. Maekar has seen her use it on septas, maesters, servants, Egg, once on Baelor when she wanted the truth of whether a visiting lady’s jewels had been real. He had corrected her then. Or meant to. He cannot now remember whether the correction was spoken aloud or merely intended so firmly that memory has given it the dignity of action. 

“How long?” Daella asks. 

Your sister’s smile fades, little by little. You do not look toward Maekar this time. 

“As long as I am Daeron’s wife.” 

It is another correct answer. Less evasive than the first and somehow worse for it. 

Daella accepts it only in part. Her gaze moves to the window, to the grey afternoon beyond it, to the hills around Summerhall that are not Dorne and will not become Dorne no matter how much yellow silk is folded in its rooms. 

“And if he dies?” 

Lady Clarisse chastises, “Daella.” 

“What?” She retorts, turning to her aunt seemingly offended by the interruption, “People die.” 

No one answers quickly enough. 

Daella looks back at you. “My mother died.” 

There it is, Maekar thinks, and hates Mors for having made him hear it. 

Maekar’s hand closes once at his side. 

You hold Daella’s gaze, your head tilting to the side. There is no pity in your face. Thank the Gods for that. Pity would have made Maekar enter the room, or leave it, or do some other foolish thing he could name later as propriety. 

“I know.” You say. It seems there is not much more you can offer her, and yet it seems it is enough for Daella. 

“She wore purple jewels,” Daella says, unprompted and unashamed. “Like amethysts, but darker. Father gave them to her. Aerion says he chose badly because they made her look too pale, but he only says that because he thinks everything should be red or black or on fire.” 

The younger Martell girl laughs then, properly, helplessly. Even your mouth breaks into amusement before you lower her eyes to the silk. Rhae smiles because the others do, because laughter has become permission. 

Daella beams, and there is nothing wounded in her face. That should make it easier. 

Maekar turns from the doorway before any of them can decide he has been standing there too long. The passage beyond the solar is cool and narrow, the stones holding the damp in the old way despite the fires lit in the occupied rooms. He walks without haste because haste would give the moment more consequence than it deserves. 

Daella misses her mother. 

That is all. 

A girl without her mother will ask foolish questions of women who arrive with sisters and trunks of silk and stories of warmer courts. She will be eager. She will be overbold. She will mistake a bride’s arrival for the arrival of answers no one has promised her. That is grief, it is not loneliness. Or if it is loneliness, it is the ordinary loneliness death leaves behind, and no father, however diligent, can govern death back into obedience. 

Dyanna has died. That is the beginning and end of it. 

Maekar reaches the end of the corridor and stops before the stair. From behind him, Daella’s voice carries out of the solar, bright again and already asking something else before the last answer has finished. 

Maekar puts one hand on the stair rail. 

Dyanna had died, he thinks again. 

The thought steadies him, but not enough. 

Egg’s voice carries. 

It has always carried. Down corridors, through shut doors, across courtyards where horses are being saddled and men are attempting to hear one another. Maekar has often thought that if his youngest son were ever truly lost, one would need only stand still and wait for some distant argument to betray him. 

On the fourth afternoon since the Martells’ arrival, the argument comes from the map room. 

“No, no, that cannot be right,” Egg is saying. “If this is the pass, then Sunspear must be there.” 

“That is not Sunspear,” Your sister says. 

“It says Sunspear.” 

“It says Salt Shore.” 

There is a pause. 

“The letters are very small,” Egg says, after a moment. 

Maekar stops before the half-open door. 

He has come looking for Aemon. Or that is what he tells himself in the instant before he looks inside and finds both boys already there. 

The map room is cooler than the rest of the house, its windows narrow, its walls lined with rolled vellum, old surveys, sea charts, and fading claims of men who had thought the world would remain where ink placed it. A large table stands in the center, and over it Egg has spread one of the maps with the careless authority of a child who did not ask permission because he never imagined permission might be denied. 

It is a map of Dorne. 

An old one. Too old, perhaps. The ink has browned at the edges, and the coastline is not as cleanly drawn as Maekar remembers from newer charts. Mountains crouch across the page in careful little humps, roads thin into uncertain lines, names sit in unfamiliar relation to one another. 

Egg is bent over it with both hands planted on the table, one knee already braced against the chair he has dragged too close. Your sister stands opposite him, amused and openly unconvinced. You are beside her, quieter, one hand resting lightly on the table’s edge. Aemon stands a little apart, near the corner where the map has begun to curl back on itself. 

Of course Aemon is there. Where Egg is found committing some impropriety, Aemon is often found nearby, either having warned against it or preparing to apologize for it. 

“The Water Gardens are near Sunspear,” Egg says, recovering. “Everyone knows that.” 

“Yes,” Your sister concedes. “But that still is not Sunspear.” 

Egg frowns at the map as though it has personally failed him. 

Aemon looks down at the parchment. “Sunspear is farther east.” 

Egg turns his head. “I knew that.” 

“You were pointing west.” 

“I was finding it,” Egg looks back at the map. His ears have gone red, but his chin stays lifted. “This is a bad map.” 

Your sister laughs once, not unkindly. “It may be.” 

That is all she says. It is worse than if she had agreed fully. 

Egg looks from her to Aemon with the betrayed expression of a boy who has discovered that blood may be precise at inconvenient times. Then he bends again over the map, unwilling to surrender the table simply because the country has not placed itself where he expected. 

The table is too high for him to lean over with dignity, but he makes the attempt anyway. Both his hands settle on either side of Dorne as if he means to hold the whole country still long enough to understand it. 

“It looks possible like this.” He says after a short while. 

Your sister’s smile changes before she can make mockery of it. “What does?” 

Egg’s fingers move from the mountains to the coast. 

“Going.” 

No one answers at once. 

Maekar feels the silence before he knows what to do with it. 

It is not wisdom. Egg is not wise, not yet, not in any way that can be trusted to preserve his bones. The words are too young, too blunt, made of wanting before thought has properly shaped it. And still, they sit strangely in the room.  

Dorne lies flat beneath his small hands, reduced to ink and road and coastline, near enough for a boy to cover half of it with his palm. 

Going. 

As if a life might be escaped by learning where to put one’s finger first. 

You look down at the map. 

Until then, Maekar has thought you only politely entertained by the scene, drawn in by Egg’s insistence and your sister’s amusement. Now something in your attention changes. Not softens. Sharpens. 

Your fingers move to the river mouth. 

“That is wrong.” You say. 

Aemon looks at you. “Yes.” 

“And this,” Your hand shifts along the coast. “That is not where the shore turns.” 

“No.” 

Your sister leans closer, smile fading into interest. Egg straightens a little, pleased that the map has become guilty enough to absolve him. 

“So it is a bad map.” He states, almost a boast. 

“It is old.” Aemon says. 

Egg looks at him. “That can be both things.” 

Aemon considers the map, then nods once. “Yes.” 

Egg looks briefly satisfied. 

You do not. Your gaze remains on the false coast, the misplaced river, the little failures of ink by which some dead hand has made your home strange in a Targaryen room. 

“Show me.” You request. 

Aemon’s hand stills where it rests near the rolled edge of the map. It is a small hesitation, so small that Maekar would not have noticed it three days ago. 

Now -may the Gods curse Mors Martell- he notices. 

Aemon steps forward because he has been asked, and because Aemon rarely refuses any duty once it is properly handed to him. He does not push Egg aside. He waits until Egg shifts, grudgingly, and then places two fingers on the map with care. 

“Sunspear is here,” He lists. “The Water Gardens are close, but they are not marked. This road is badly copied. It should turn before it reaches the coast.” 

Your sister bends over the map. “That road does turn. On newer maps.” 

Egg’s hand creeps back toward the mountains. Your sister catches his wrist before he can crease the parchment. “Careful.” 

“I am being careful.” 

“You are leaning on it.” 

Egg lifts his hand at once, offended but obedient. “It keeps moving.” 

Aemon reaches for a map weight and sets it near the curling edge before Egg can turn the correction into another argument. 

You watch the gesture. Then you look back at the coast. 

“How do you know?” You ask. 

Aemon looks up. 

The question has been asked plainly. Not indulgently, not as one asks a child to repeat a lesson for the pleasure of seeing whether he has retained it. But not tenderly either. You want to know because the map is wrong, because Dorne has been made wrong in front of you, and Aemon appears to know the shape of the error. 

Aemon glances once at Egg. 

Egg is already touching another part of the map. “Is this the Boneway?” 

“Not even close.” Your sister answers. 

Egg squints. “It could be.” 

“It is not.” 

“You cannot tell from there.” 

“I am from there.” 

Aemon lowers his eyes again. 

For a moment, Maekar thinks that will be the end of it. Aemon will let the question pass. He will stand there, useful and silent, while Egg fills the room by the simple method of putting his hands on everything in it. 

But your gaze remains on him. 

“You were saying, my Prince?” 

Aemon’s fingers move once against the parchment. 

“The coast is wrong,” He says after a moment. “Here. And here. Some older Stormlander copies place the Planky Town too far north, because the river mouth was copied from another chart. Maester Ormond says that happens often. A mistake is copied, and then the copy is copied, and after a while men trust it because it looks old enough to be trusted.” 

Your sister looks down at the chart with fresh suspicion. “Someone was lazy, then.” 

“Perhaps,” Aemon says. “Or far away.” 

That quiets her more effectively than correction. 

Egg leans in again. “Then I was not entirely wrong.” 

“You were pointing at Salt Shore.” Aemon reminds him. 

“But on a map you just said was wrong.” 

“I said the coast was wrong. Salt Shore is still Salt Shore.” 

Egg considers this, mouth pressed tight with the effort of deciding whether the distinction is fair. 

Maekar remains outside the door. 

The corridor is dimmer than the room, and the map table lies in a clean square of afternoon light. Dust turns slowly above it whenever someone moves. Egg is all movement, all claim, a boy trying to press his body into a country made of ink. He wants to be at the table, that much is plain. He wants his wrong guesses answered, not dismissed. He wants Dorne to remain possible even after it has been corrected out from under his hand. 

“Have you been there?” Egg asks. 

“To the Water Gardens?” Your sister asks. 

“To all of it.” 

“All of Dorne?” 

“Yes.” 

“No, I haven’t.” 

Egg looks disappointed by this, though he tries to hide it by studying the map more sternly. “But more than here.” 

Your sister looks at him. The amusement has not left her entirely, but it no longer sits so easily in her mouth. 

“Yes,” She says. “More than here.” 

Egg looks around the map room as if seeing it briefly through her eyes: the narrow windows, the old wood, the careful shelves, the air held cool and still around dead men’s borders. His mouth tightens, then loosens too quickly. 

“I could go.” He says suddenly. 

“To Dorne?” 

Egg looks down at the map. His fingers curl against the edge of the table, not touching the parchment now because he has been told not to. 

“Why not? I am a prince.” 

The words are too large for him and not large enough for what he means. 

Maekar should enter then. 

He should correct the familiarity, or Egg’s posture, or the knee hooked over the chair, or the careless certainty with which his youngest son speaks of escaping his home in front of guests. He should remind him that princehood is not license. 

Instead, he watches Aemon. 

Aemon has not moved away. 

He is still near the table, one finger holding the edge of the map flat. His eyes are on the place he corrected, though the conversation has moved on without needing him. You notice the same thing, or perhaps you never stopped noticing. Your attention returns to him not with softness, but with the same directness you gave the map. 

“Would you like to see it?” You ask. 

Egg answers first, of course.  

“Yes,” Your eyes remain on Aemon. Egg catches the direction of your attention and stops. “Oh.” 

Aemon lifts his head. “I have not been asked to go.” 

“That was not what I asked.” 

It is mild. It is not a rebuke. Somehow that makes Aemon take longer with the answer. 

Maekar thinks of Daeron before he can stop himself. Daeron would have given two answers by now, and neither would have touched the question. He wonders idly what will be of his son’s diversions when faced with one that does not care for them. 

Maekar waits for Aemon to say what he ought to say. That the Citadel is his intended road. That Oldtown will have enough for any mind made properly grateful. That boys do not choose journeys because a country looks warm on a map. That wanting is not the measure by which a prince’s life is arranged. 

Aemon looks at the map. 

“I would like to see a better copy.” He says. 

Your sister makes a small disappointed sound. Egg shifts against the table, impatient with the answer but not surprised by it. 

But you smile. 

Not brightly, not the sudden laugh you had given Daeron by the tapestry. This is smaller, almost private, a recognition of the shape of an answer that has come slantwise because it did not know whether it was allowed to arrive directly. 

“I will ask my father if he brought one.” You promise. 

Aemon blinks in response. 

Again, small. Too small. 

Maekar sees it anyway. 

“You need not trouble him.” Aemon attempts, but there is a glint in his eye. 

“It is no trouble. He brought more than one map.” 

“To correct people?” Egg asks. 

“To know where he is.” You correct. 

That lands differently. 

Your sister’s hand stills on the map weight. Egg looks back at the map as if this, too, is something a country might allow a boy to learn. Aemon’s gaze remains lowered, but the corner of his mouth shifts once and is gone. 

Not quite a smile. 

Near enough. 

The room receives it without ceremony. No one stops to praise him for wit. No one seems startled that he has spoken. No one makes use of the almost-smile by naming it. You only bend back over the map, your finger finding another uncertain line. 

“And here?” 

Aemon begins to step back. 

Then he stops. 

He looks at the place you mean. Then at you. Then back at the map. 

“There.” he says, softer, and leans forward again. 

That is all. 

It should not be enough to trouble Maekar. 

He has seen Aemon at lessons, at the  table, beside Baelor, near his brothers. He has seen the boy answer correctly, gently, and at proper length when called upon, then fall silent with the grace of someone closing a door before anyone thinks to ask it shut. He has called it discipline, he has called it temperament, he has called it wisdom beyond his years, when he was in a mood to be generous, and good sense when he was not. 

Now Aemon stands in the map room with one finger on Dorne and stays because he has been asked another question. 

Egg’s voice rises again, lower than before but no less insistent, as your sister tries to roll the map away from his hand. He protests, not loudly enough to be insolent and not softly enough to be ignored. 

“I was looking at it.” 

“You were bending the corner.” 

“I was remembering where it was.” 

Your sister pauses, the map half-rolled beneath her hands. 

“It will be there tomorrow.” She reminds him. 

Egg does not answer at once. 

Maekar cannot see his face clearly from the passage. Only the set of his shoulders, the hand hovering over the map and then drawing back, fingers closing on themselves instead. 

You say something Maekar does not catch. Aemon answers, low and careful. 

Maekar steps back from the door. 

No one in the room looks up. 

That should reassure him. It means he has not been caught lingering, it means nothing improper has occurred, it means his sons are where they should be, attended by guests of a good House and watched by one another. It means Egg has found novelty and Aemon has found use for his learning. 

He walks down the corridor with the sound of Egg’s voice following him. 

Egg, he can explain too quickly. That is the trouble. He has explanations ready for Egg before the boy has finished moving: insolence, idleness, indulgence, restlessness, youth. 

But the boy had looked at Dorne on parchment and said it looked possible. 

Aemon had said no such thing. Aemon had only stayed when space was made for him. 

Maekar is not sure which of them Mors would count first. 

By the sixth evening, Mors Martell’s accusation has become a burr under Maekar’s skin. 

It follows him through his own halls and catches where it should not. Daella with her questions, Egg with both hands on a map of Dorne, Aemon staying when another question is asked. Maekar has begun to look for Mors’s eldest daughter before he admits he is looking, as if one more room might give him the proof to lay the whole ugly thing to rest. 

Instead, he finds you on the terrace with Aerion. 

The supper has ended, though not the evening. Voices remain in the gallery behind him, softened by wine and heat and the relief of ceremony loosening its grip. The doors to the terrace stand open because the night is clear enough for it, and because the Martells, impossible people, seem to think any room improved by allowing the outside to enter it. Beyond the balustrade, Summerhall falls away into dark slopes and a sky pricked with early stars. Torches burn near the steps, their light moving over stone, over the low wall, over the small gathering of guests taking air beneath the watch of servants and guards. 

Daeron is inside, Maekar has already marked him: near the hearth, caught between two of Lady Martell’s ladies in waiting and an aunt by marriage whose name Maekar has not troubled to remember. He holds a cup he has not emptied and wears the expression of a man listening carefully to his own execution. Every so often one of the women asks him something, and Daeron answers with courtesy that still looks like surrender. 

You stand near the far end of the terrace, one hand resting on the stone rail. The other gathers your sleeve against the evening chill. You are looking outward, not at the view exactly, but at the darkness beyond the reach of the torches, as if measuring how far a place can go before a house stops pretending to contain it. 

Aerion stands a few paces away, angled toward the balustrade as though the conversation has merely found him there by accident. He has a cup in hand and a smile on his face. The cup has not been touched, and the smile is worse for having no heat in it. 

Maekar stops just inside the open doors.He should turn back. 

He does not. 

Aerion says something Maekar cannot hear. You answer, quieter still. Your face is composed, but your shoulder has set in a way Maekar recognizes from court women asked to endure a man they cannot yet escape without making the escape visible. 

Aerion’s smile deepens. 

He has found something. 

Maekar knows that smile. He has seen it across practice yards, at tables, in doorways where servants stood too still and younger boys went silent. Aerion smiles that way when a thing has answered to the point of the knife. 

“You mistake me,” Aerion says, clear enough now for the words to carry. “I mean no insult.” 

Your head turns slightly toward him. “That must be inconvenient for you.” 

The answer is sharper than Maekar expects from you. 

Aerion laughs under his breath, pleased despite himself. Or because of himself. “There. I knew it was not only Dornish heat.” 

You look at him fully then. 

That is the mistake, if it is a mistake. You give him your full attention for one breath too long, and Aerion sees it, of course he does. His body changes around it, not much: a shift of weight, a little easing at the mouth, the settling attention of an animal that has heard movement in the brush. 

“One can see it, in certain lights,” He says, a drawl to his voice, entirely too self-satisfied. “The blood of the dragon does not vanish so easily.” 

The air between you seems to cool. 

Behind Maekar, someone in the gallery laughs at something unrelated. A servant passes with a tray and does not look toward the terrace. The little movement of the evening continues around the place where Aerion has set his hook. 

“My father would say Dorne has managed well enough with its own blood.” You say, almost casually. 

“Fathers say comforting things.” 

“Some do.” 

The words land where you aimed them, perhaps, but not only there. 

Maekar feels them strike and cannot be certain whether you know what you have touched. You are looking at Aerion, not at him. Your voice holds no special meaning for the father standing in the doorway. It is only an answer to a prince who has made a trophy out of ancestry. 

Aerion’s eyes narrow with amusement. He understands enough to enjoy the wound even if he did not choose its depth. 

“Then yours is charitable,” He says. “But mine tends toward accuracy.” 

“Does he?” 

Maekar’s hand tightens once against the doorframe. 

Aerion turns the cup in his fingers. The torchlight catches on the rim and on the pale fall of his hair. He is a handsome boy, and that has always been part of the danger. Cruelty sits more easily on a beautiful face. People forgive it longer, or call it brilliance until it draws blood from someone important. 

“My father,” Aerion says, something like steel under the words, “knows what strength looks like.” 

You glance, very briefly, toward the gallery. Not far enough to find Maekar. Far enough to remind Aerion there are listeners, whether he cares for them or not. 

“And does he see it in you often?” 

That should have ended it. 

A wiser boy would have taken offense. A duller one would have missed the insult. A gentler one would have been hurt by it and stepped back. 

Aerion only smiles. 

He moves then, not closer at first. Sideways, along the balustrade, his free hand brushing the stone as if he is idly testing the cold of it. The movement has no purpose except not to be still. He looks out at the dark beyond the terrace, then back at you, then down into his cup.  

If he were bored, he could leave. If he were offended, he could leave. If he had come only to insult you, he has done enough. 

He remains. 

“You know,” He continues, “Princess Daenerys must have had admirable patience.” 

Your face does not change. “For marrying into Dorne?” 

“For listening to Dorne call it an alliance.” 

The insult is clearer this time. Less elegant for being so. 

Your hand stays on the balustrade. “What would you call it?” 

“A dragon entering a lesser House?” Aerion asks. “A gift, if the lesser House has sense enough to be grateful.” 

“A marriage.” You correct. 

Aerion’s mouth curves. “You say that as if the word changes what was given.” 

“No. I say it as if a woman is not a cup passed from one table to another.” 

For the first time, the line cuts cleanly enough that Aerion goes still. 

Only for a heartbeat. 

Maekar sees it because he is watching for it now. He sees the moment Aerion’s pleasure nearly becomes something else. Not hurt, Aerion does not allow hurt where anyone can see it. But the answer reaches him, it meets him somewhere.  

Then he laughs. 

Small. Almost approving. 

“You will do well here.” He states, as if he has any wisdom with which to say it. 

“I doubt you mean that kindly.” 

“I rarely mean things kindly.” 

“Is that something you take pride in, my Prince?” 

Aerion’s gaze fixes on you. 

The torch nearest him snaps softly in the wind. Light moves over his face and leaves half of it in shadow. He looks older in that uneven light. Older, and less finished than he pretends.  

For a moment Maekar sees the restlessness underneath the practiced cruelty: a thing pacing the bars of itself, biting whatever comes close enough and then furious when the hand withdraws. 

The thought is intolerable, and Maekar rejects it at once. 

Aerion has been corrected. Taught, watched, punished when punishment was required, praised when praise could be given without feeding the worst of him. He has skill, rank, a future, every advantage a prince of the blood can reasonably be granted without handing him a city to burn for amusement. 

If Aerion is alone, he has made much of the distance himself. 

That should be enough. 

It is not, because Mors has made sure nothing is enough anymore. 

You turn slightly away from Aerion, toward the steps back into the gallery. The conversation has lasted long enough, more than long enough. Your civility remains intact, but only just. Maekar sees the effort in the line of your neck, the controlled way your hand leaves the balustrade, the small adjustment of your sleeve before you move. You do not flee, you do not excuse yourself with too much sweetness, instead you simply begin to end it. 

Aerion lets you take two steps. 

Then he says, “Does it trouble you?” 

You stop. 

Maekar almost curses aloud. 

Aerion has not raised his voice, he has not made a scene. That is the skill of it. He leaves the question there, low enough that you may pretend not to have heard it, shaped enough that pretending will cost you. 

You look back. 

Aerion’s eyes are bright now, fixed entirely on you. 

“The dragon in you,” He taunts. “Does it trouble you, or only being reminded?” 

The silence after that is very thin. 

Your fingers close once in the loose fall of your sleeve. Anger. He has found it and he knows he has found it, not because he understands you, but because he understands where pride flinches when struck. 

“My blood does not trouble me,” You say, chin held a bit higher. “Men who think blood is the only true thing about me trouble me. Briefly.” 

Aerion smiles again. 

There should be satisfaction in it, triumph. There is some. Maekar knows triumph in that boy; he has seen it often enough to wish it rarer. But this is not only that. Aerion looks pleased, yes, but not complete. Answered, and already hungry for the next answer. Met, and immediately restless with the silence that follows. 

You turn back toward the gallery. 

This time Aerion lets you go. 

That may be the most unsettling part. 

He does not follow, he does not call another insult after you, he does not press until the room is forced to notice and correct him. He only watches you cross the terrace, your face composed again before you pass the first servant, your steps measured, your anger tucked beneath courtesy because you have been raised well enough to carry a blade without showing its edge. 

You enter through the open doors. Maekar steps aside before you reach him. 

For an instant, your gaze meets his. 

You know he has seen something. Not all of it, perhaps. Not the shape of Mors’s accusation inside him, not the way Daella, Egg, and Aemon have already made a ruin of his denials. You only see a father standing where he should not quite be standing, having watched one son do what that son does. 

Your face closes further. 

“My Prince.” You greet. The courtesy is flawless. 

Maekar inclines his head in response. 

Across the gallery, Daeron has looked up. He is still where Maekar last saw him, caught among Martell women who have decided to interrogate him. One of them is speaking to him but Daeron does not seem to hear the end of it. 

His eyes find you first, then move past you to the terrace doors, to Aerion. 

When he looks back, your mouth has gone flat in a way too small for anyone else to read. Daeron’s expression changes by less than a smile, less than amusement; only a brief, tired acknowledgement, as if you have handed him a complaint he has been carrying for years. 

Then one of the women beside him touches his sleeve to reclaim his attention, and he lowers his eyes at once.  

Maekar sees it. He wishes, immediately and cravenly, that he had not. 

You pass into the gallery, where voices receive you without knowing what they have been spared. After a moment, your sister’s voice rises from somewhere near the hearth, calling you toward some matter of fabric or laughter or both. You answer her, and if there is anger left in your voice, it is gone before anyone else can claim it. 

Maekar remains by the doors. 

On the terrace, Aerion has not moved. 

He stands with his cup still in hand, turned halfway toward the darkness now. His profile is sharp against the torchlight. He looks, for a moment, as though he has forgotten there are other people in the world. 

Then he smiles to himself. 

Not softly, never that. But...privately. 

Maekar feels a cold irritation move through him. 

Aerion had wanted to wound you. That was true. He had wanted to test you, to catch at your pride, to drag your blood through his own understanding of it until Dorne became something he could correct. 

But his son had not left after the first cut. He had not even left after the second. He had circled and returned, not bored, not satisfied, not finished. He had made the conversation hostile because hostility was the only shape in which he knew how to ask another person to stay with him. 

No. Maekar’s jaw tightens. Not ask. 

Aerion does not ask. He takes, provokes, corners, tests the line of another person’s patience until either they retreat and prove themselves lesser, or they answer and become, for a moment, real to him. It is an ugly thing. 

It is also a lonely one. 

Mors, Maekar thinks, with a sudden and exhausted violence, should have kept his mouth shut. 

Aerion lifts his cup at last and drinks. 

Then he looks back toward the gallery, toward the place where you disappeared, as if silence has already disappointed him. 

By the eve of the wedding, Maekar knows better than to call it accident. 

He has watched his eldest son for days now, though he would not have named it watching at first. A father observes, a prince evaluates, a host takes note of where a delicate match may fracture before the vows have been spoken. There are enough names for the habit that Maekar has no need to choose the ugliest one. 

Still, he has watched. 

He watched Daeron in the courtyard on the day of the Martells’ arrival, his hand bared too quickly, the glove crushed wrong in his other fist. He watched him in the gallery afterward, a cup of wine lifted and lowered and never touched while Mors’s daughter asked him whether the wine was so bad. He watched Daeron lead you toward a tapestry with no plan except the poor, visible hope of keeping your attention a moment longer. He watched your laugh catch him unguarded. He watched the smile answer on Daeron’s face before the boy remembered he had a father in the room. 

Since then, Maekar has watched smaller things. 

Daeron standing near one door because you were beside another. Daeron leaving a room only after you had already gone. Daeron looking toward your voice and away again, as if the first movement were involuntary and the second a punishment for it. Daeron’s cup untouched one evening and emptied too quickly the next. Daeron arriving clean-mouthed to supper with too much care in the line of his shoulders, then disappearing before the final course because some effort had spent itself past use. 

None of it is proof of anything. 

Maekar knows better than most men how little appetite needs in order to dress itself as feeling. Daeron has wanted before. Wanted wine, wanted escape, wanted women he did not have to see again, wanted doors, dark corners, morning to come without demanding an account of the night. Wanting has never made him less careless, it has only given his carelessness finer names. 

And yet. 

Mors Martell’s words remain. 

Six children, and each one alone. 

Maekar finds Daeron in the gallery after supper, surrounded by women. 

For one terrible breath, the shape of it throws another room over this one. 

A low ceiling, heat trapped beneath poor shutters. Perfume gone sour with sweat and spilled wine. A woman laughing before she understood who had entered. Red cloth underfoot, or perhaps only a rug made red by candlelight. Daeron half-reclined against cushions, his hair loose, his shirt unlaced badly enough that someone else’s hand must have done part of the work. Not asleep, but not awake in any way that mattered. His mouth red from wine, his eyes slow to find his father, a woman’s fingers still resting on his sleeve as if she had forgotten him the moment he stopped being amusing. 

Maekar had stood in the doorway and felt anger come first. 

And thank the Gods for anger. Anger had been clean, anger had given him a shape to put around the thing: disgrace, indiscipline, filth, weakness, shame carried in Targaryen skin. Anger had let him order Daeron upright, it had let him pay what needed paying, silence what needed silencing, drag his son back into the world where names had consequences. 

He had not thought of loneliness then. Why would he have?  

The room had been full of people. 

The gallery returns by degrees. 

High ceiling, tapestries, beeswax. Wine poured into good cups. Martell women in silk and warm colors, clustered near Daeron with the bright, dangerous courtesy of relatives examining the man to whom one of their own will be given by morning. They are not unkind, they are curious, amused, skeptical in the way women can afford to be when they have decided a man must answer before he is trusted. 

Daeron stands among them like a man enduring a trial. 

He is dressed correctly. Beautifully, even, though Maekar dislikes the word for him. The dark doublet sits well across his shoulders. His hair has been tied back with enough care to suggest either vanity or terror. One glove is on. The other is absent. Not forgotten, surely. Daeron forgets many things, but rarely the small instruments by which he manages to face a room. 

His bare hand holds a cup. 

That is the first thing Maekar notices. 

Not wine in itself. Wine has been in Daeron’s hand so often that it might as well be another inherited jewel. But the way he holds it now. His fingers curl around the stem with careful pressure, not tight enough to tremble, not loose enough to seem careless. The cup gives the hand a duty, something to hold, something to explain why it is visible. 

One of Mors’s cousins asks him whether he has spent much time in King’s Landing. Another, older, asks whether Summerhall is always so cold in the evenings. 

“In the evenings, yes, my Lady.” Daeron says. 

“You say that as if the days are better.” 

“They are warmer.” 

“A loyal answer, my Prince.” 

Daeron’s mouth moves, almost a smile. “I am told loyalty is a virtue.” 

The older woman studies him over the rim of her cup. She is not displeased, exactly, but she is also not satisfied. The Martell women have not come to this corner of the gallery for compliments about the weather. 

“And do you ride?” She asks, dark eyes trailing over a nearby hunting scene in the tapestry. 

Maekar feels the question land before Daeron answers. 

Daeron’s fingers turn the cup once. “Not well.” 

“Were you not taught?” 

“Often,” There is a small pause. Daeron lowers his eyes toward the wine. “I was given every opportunity to do it better.” 

That changes the air around him. Only slightly. The older woman looks at him more carefully now. Perhaps she hears the admission, perhaps she hears only the self-mockery he has left polished for her convenience. 

“And still you did not?” She asks. She is not asking about riding, and he is certain his son is sober enough to understand that. 

Daeron’s mouth moves again. This time the smile does not arrive. “No, my Lady.” 

He gives her nothing more. 

Maekar’s jaw tightens. 

There. That is Daeron too. A door opened half an inch and then held shut from the inside. An answer that asks not to be pressed and resents the mercy if it is granted. His son’s failures have always made demands even in their confession. Look, but not closely. Hear me, but do not answer. Know what I am, and then leave before I make the knowing your fault. 

One of the younger women asks something about the galleries. Whether he knows them well, whether he will show them to you properly after the wedding, since he has apparently already shown you one corner and abandoned the rest of his duty. 

Daeron looks toward you. 

This time, you have heard. 

Maekar sees it happen: the slight lift of your head, your gaze cutting across the room toward Daeron, your sister still speaking beside you and then stopping when she realizes she has lost you. Daeron meets your eyes before he can arrange his face into anything safer. 

For one brief instant, the gallery narrows between you. 

Nothing improper passes, nothing anyone could name. You do not smile, not really, and Daeron does not either. But your mouth flattens in a way that makes something exhausted and almost amused move through his face. It is a beginning of a language, too small to be caught by anyone not already cursed into watching. 

Maekar catches it. 

He wishes, again, that he had not. 

A few nights earlier, after the matter with Aerion on the terrace, Maekar had seen a look much like it. You crossing back into the gallery with anger tucked so cleanly beneath courtesy that only the line of your neck betrayed it. Daeron, caught among your women even then, glancing from your face to the terrace doors and back again. The slight change in your expression, no more than a complaint carried without words; and Daeron’s answer, less than a smile, more tired than amused. 

Yes, his face had said then. I know. 

Or perhaps Maekar had imagined it. He finds he does not think so. 

Now you look at Daeron across the room while the question about the gallery remains unanswered. 

You touch your sister’s wrist, murmur something to her, and cross the room without haste. No one could call it rescue, that is precisely why it works. You come to the circle as if you have meant to join it all along, as if there is nothing unusual about a bride returning to the place where her betrothed is being measured by her kin. 

Daeron watches you come. 

He does not brighten. That would be easier to despise. He does not relax. He holds himself still, and the stillness is so complete that Maekar can see the work inside it. The cup remains in his hand. His bare fingers do not shift now. The whole body waits as if waiting were a discipline that might save him from wanting the arrival too much. 

You stop beside the older woman first. 

“Aunt Dorea,” You say, “My mother was asking for you.” 

The woman’s gaze flicks toward the hearth. “Was she?” 

“She said your name twice. The second time sounded less patient.” 

That earns a few smiles from the women around you, familiar rather than bright. The older woman gives you a look that contains both affection and suspicion. 

“You have come to steal him from us.” 

“No,” You retort with ease. “Only to make certain you leave something of him for tomorrow.” 

Daeron lowers his eyes for a moment. 

Gratitude, perhaps. Embarrassment. Perhaps both. 

You do not look at him while it happens. You are still speaking with your aunt, still part of the women’s circle, still making the shift seem like family business rather than intervention. The older woman lets herself be drawn away after another remark from one of the cousins, and the pressure around Daeron changes. 

Before, he stood at the center of their attention, and now he stands beside you. 

It is a small difference, but it is everything. 

The questions loosen. Someone asks you about the cloth your sister had been holding, someone says your mother will only become more impatient if she is made to wait. Your sister calls from across the room, too low for Maekar to make out the words, and you answer her with a small lift of your hand. Daeron’s mouth moves at that, small and involuntary, and you glance at him once as if to check whether he is still intact. 

He does not touch you. 

Maekar notices that too. 

Daeron has known how to take liberties when wine and shame have made a lesser room of the world. Maekar knows this because he has had men whisper it to him, and because he has dragged proof of it home before dawn with fury holding his dignity together. His son is not innocent of bodies, he is not some trembling boy who has never learned the uses of charm and skin and a lowered voice. 

Yet here, beside the woman he will marry in the morning, he stands as if even the space between your sleeves must be respected. 

His hand remains on the cup. Bare. Occupied. Exposed. 

You say something Maekar cannot hear. Daeron bends his head slightly toward you. Not much. Enough regardless. 

He answers quietly. 

You look at him while he speaks, and Daeron’s gaze holds for half a breath before it drops to the cup again. The wine inside it has gone still, he has not drunk. Maekar does not know when he stopped wanting to, or whether wanting has anything to do with it. 

Perhaps that is a lie. Wanting has everything to do with it. 

Daeron wants to be there. 

The realization comes so plainly that Maekar nearly refuses it on instinct. 

His son wants the place you have made beside you. He wants it with the same body that has wanted wine, escape, sleep without dreams, hands without memory, laughter that costs nothing because it is bought and gone by morning. He wants it badly enough to make stillness out of himself. Badly enough to fear every sign of it showing. Even while standing there, he looks prepared for the place to be taken away. 

That is what Maekar had not understood. 

Daeron does not look less alone beside you. He looks alone differently, As if the room has given him something and he has already begun teaching himself how to survive its loss. 

The thought is unbearable in its own way. 

Maekar had meant to give his son a marriage. A house, a wife, a future with hands enough in it to pull him back from the worst of himself. He had meant to place a shape around Daeron’s life that Daeron might not be able to slip through easily. Duty could hold where desire failed, habit could keep what affection could not be trusted to begin. 

He had not meant for Daeron to look at one young woman as if the whole room might go dark when she turned away. 

Across the gallery, Mors Martell has gone quiet. 

Maekar sees him only because he has learned, these past days, to resent every place the man’s attention lands. Mors stands near Baelor, a cup loose in his hand, no smile on his face now. He is not watching his daughter only, he is watching Daeron stand beside her. 

There is no triumph in him. 

That is almost worse. If Mors looked satisfied, Maekar could hate him properly. If he looked smug, Maekar could sharpen himself on the insult and be done with it. But Mors looks only grave, and for one breath the old friend from the war is there beneath the Dornish prince: the man who had once known how to see blood on another man’s sleeve and say nothing until saying something would keep him upright. 

Mors does not speak. Maekar looks away first. 

His gaze moves through the room because he needs somewhere else to put it. 

Daella is with your sister near the hearth, explaining something with both hands despite the septa’s distant disapproval. Rhae has fallen half-asleep against Lady Clarisse’s side. Egg is near one of the windows, being prevented by Aemon from opening it wider than the servants will tolerate. Aemon says something low, and Egg protests, but only half-heartedly. Aerion stands apart with his cup, sharp and bored and listening too closely to pretend he is not. 

Six children. 

Maekar has provided for them. 

The thought rises old and armed. 

He has. He knows he has. Rooms, guards, tutors, horses, maesters, marriages, futures. He has kept the roof over them and the name before them. He has buried their mother and not followed her into the earth, though there were mornings after Dyanna when remaining seemed less like strength than a sentence passed by children too young to understand they had spoken it. He has done what fathers do when there is no softness left in them and too many lives still requiring shape. 

Across the room, Daeron shifts. Only slightly. 

One of the Martell women has drawn you into another question. You turn your head to answer. The movement takes your attention from him, nothing more. It is ordinary, necessary. Daeron’s place beside you remains exactly as it was. 

Still, his hand tightens around the cup. 

Maekar sees it. 

Then you move your elbow a fraction, not touching him, only leaving the space beside you intact, making it clear by remaining there that the place has not closed merely because you have turned your face elsewhere. 

Daeron’s fingers loosen. 

He does not look at you. But he remains. 

There is no grace in it that a singer would notice, no vow, no clasped hands, no sudden mending of what has been broken longer than you have known his name. Only Daeron standing where you have made room for him, careful as a man allowed near a flame he expects to be burned by and cannot make himself leave. 

Maekar watches from the doorway. 

He waits for the old word to come. Weakness. 

It has always come easily. Easier than fear. Easier than grief. Easier than the thing in him that wants to seize Daeron by the shoulder and shake sense into him, or hold him there, or drag him away before hope makes another ruin no father can repair. 

The word does not come. 

Across the room, Daeron does not touch his betrothed. He only stands where you have made room for him, one hand curled around a cup he has forgotten to drink from. 

Maekar watches his son remain there. 

For once, he does not call it weakness.

As you can see, you shouldn't be fooled by Daeron's perspective. The man hasn't been chill about his betrothed/wife for one second. Thank you for reading!

[whyamihere666]

a knack for pretend

daeron x wife!reader NSFW 18+

synopsis: for your husband’s nameday, you surprise him dressed as a royal whore eager to please him, and even more eager for him to indulge your fantasies

warnings: whore x client roleplay fic, mentions of cheating (jokingly), degradation/praise, daeron commits to the bit, body worship (f receiving), oral (f receiving), licking, roleplay fantasy, reader and daeron are very in love and down bad for each other :)) fluffy moments also

WC: 1715

You had draped yourself languidly across the silken bed, one arm cast above your brow as you fought the persistent urge to rub away the dark kohl that traced your eyes. The soot-black pigment, so carefully lined upon your lashes, teased at your skin with an infuriating itch, yet you bore it with quiet resolve. It would not do to spoil the care that had gone into your appearance. Not on this night.

The hour had slipped well beyond dusk. Night had claimed the keep entirely, cloaking its halls in velvet shadow, while the world beyond your chamber lay hushed beneath a moon veiled by drifting clouds. Only the faint chorus of crickets beyond the open casement and the distant murmur of the sea upon the cliffs disturbed the stillness.

Within your chamber, dozens of candles burned low in polished brass and silver holders, their golden flames trembling with every passing draft. They painted the stone walls in warm amber light, filling every corner with soft, wavering shadows that danced like silent spirits. Their glow spilled across embroidered tapestries, carved oak furnishings, and the rich velvet curtains gathered around the great bed, lending the room an intimate warmth against the chill of the night.

The air itself had grown heavy with sweet fragrance. Jasmine blossoms, scattered with careful hands, perfumed the room with their delicate bloom, while the rich scent of wild honey lingered from beeswax candles melting into gilded pools. Upon a nearby table rested a flagon of deep crimson wine beside two waiting goblets, untouched, their surfaces gleaming beneath the candlelight. Rose petals had been strewn across the bed linens, their crimson hue vivid against sheets of ivory linen and furs softer than fresh snow.

Every detail had been prepared for one soul alone.

It was your husband's nameday, and all had been arranged in quiet devotion, from the fragrant chamber to the flickering candlelight that bathed the room in gentle gold. With each passing moment your anticipation deepened, your gaze wandering often toward the chamber door. Every distant footfall set your heart fluttering, every whisper beyond the corridor stirring hope that it might finally be him returning to you. And so you waited, wrapped in warmth, candlelight, and longing, eager to greet the man for whom this night had been fashioned. 

The light that shone from the small gap between the floor and door went dark. Just before your heart could escape your chest, it opened slowly, squeaking with every inch. Your posture straightened. Your sheer garment shifted. Your bracelets clicked against one another. You clear your throat. 

“My Prince.” You greet, your voice a sultry husk meant to contrast your usual softness. Daeron drank in the sight of you and your chambers in one big swallow, the amusement clear on his face. Surely the goblets of wine he’d sipped at the feast didn’t make the surprise any easier to digest. 

“To what do I owe all this, my dear wife?” His eyes roamed your nearly bare form leisurely, savoring every inch of skin you bore to him. 

“I know not of this wife you speak of my Prince, I was sent to your chambers as a gift. To please you, your grace. For your name day.” There was a playfulness in your tone that allowed Daeron’s head to catch up with what you implied. He wasn’t aware of your sudden knack for pretending, but Gods, it shamed every gift he’s received that day. 

“Swear to me my wife will never hear of this.”

”My tongue is yours, my Lord. It shall remain still.” You purred, crawling toward the edge of the bed, your jewelry gently clinking with your movement. Daeron began to strip his doublet as you crossed the room, his bottom lip snagged between his teeth. You drew his hands to his sides, insisting you undress him. With each brush of your fingers you felt the warmth beneath his skin, the need for you searing deep within his veins. He fights the relentless urge to caress every inch of you, letting you have your fun. As you pulled his tunic over his head, you feasted upon the sight of his bare chest, the flickering candlelight gilding every curve. Daeron’s skin hungerily drank the hearth’s glow as his chest rose and fell. 

“You bear the sort of beauty that makes silence feel like praise, my Prince.”

”I imagine that’s well rehearsed. Do you offer every man with a heavy purse that promise?”

”Pity you think so low of me. Do you speak to every whore this way?”

”Only the ones that make wedding vows seem negotiable.”

You stifled a laugh as your lips drove into his, greedily claiming your touch as his own. The taste of wine plagued his tongue, drawing a soft moan from you. Daeron’s hands lost their temperance as your kiss deepened into something primal. A lustful conquest of closeness, man and wife, playing the role of client and whore. You doubted many noble wives did the same with their lord husbands, but you were happy to accept being the first.

”What does his Grace request of me?” You gasped against his lips, eager to regain your breath. Daeron smiled against your mouth, his hands traveling from your waist to your tits, offering them a gentle squeeze. 

“He requests you to undress, filthy whore.” His commitment made your brows raise, the pool between your legs growing slicker with every demanding glare. You reach for the single pin keeping your garment intact, allowing the fabric to glide from the expanse of your body. It laid in a pool at your feet, completely bare aside from the jewels adorning your figure. 

Daeron drops to his knees, his wanton eyes refusing to leave yours. Instinctively, your hand begins to card through his hair as he kneels before you. He reaches for your waist, drawing you closer to him, peering deeply into your eyes. Then, he licks from your navel to the apex of your ribs. The feeling of his tongue makes you shudder. Daeron nuzzles and presses lazy kisses to your stomach and upper thighs, humming against your skin. It was a worship so reverent, as though he was surrendering to divinity, a devout servant at your altar. 

 “A face like yours could empty a lord's treasury. Such a pretty thing you are.” The flush in your cheeks betrayed the character you played as you blushed at his words. 

“A prince of the realm deserves the best, does he not?”

”The very best.” Daeron grinned as he reached for your thigh, gently placing over his shoulder as he kneeled. Your balance came and went, confused as to what he intended.

”My Lord, it is my duty to please you.”

”Nothing would please me greater,” He dipped his head, placing a reverent peck to your clit, “Than tasting this pretty pussy. It’s mine, is it not? This sweet cunt,” he places another, “Belongs to your Prince.” 

The words leave your mouth agape as you watch him through half lidded eyes. Your grip tightens in his hair, welcoming the feeling of his face buried deep between your legs. With a flutter of your eyelids, his tongue dives between your folds, flicking where you feel best. A moan escapes your lips, a wanton sigh straight from filthy tavern songs. 

He hums against your folds feeling you grow slicker with every jerk of his tongue. Daerons hold on your thighs and ass tighten, beckoning you closer. There was no other kingdom in Westeros that could compare to being smothered by your heat, in Daeron’s eyes. When he’s left with no choice but to devour you, worship you, feel your sweetness flood his tongue. 

“Mhmm- your ladywife is a very lucky woman, your Grace.” 

Daeron hummed against you in reply, his tongue quickening in its pace.  As your moans grew in neediness, he began to suckle on your pearl drawing a pleasured gasp from you. The sensation made your heart flutter like a frantic crow. The blood in your veins burned with the sort of pleasure that made you tremble. Your fist tightened around his sandy hair as you bucked against his face. 

Your husband gave a sharp slap to the plush of your ass as he sucked on your clit, his finger plunging deep into your pussy. You felt so warm, so pleasured, so full. 

“F-fuck!! Daeron- too much, feels so good- Gods…”

You felt Daeron hum a muffled, “mhm”, face buried deep in your sopping pussy. It began to flutter and clench with every kitten lick of his tongue and curl of his finger. It was enough to make your thighs shake around his head as you surrendered to release. He pulls away for just a moment, his fingers maintaining their pace. 

“Gonna cum on your Prince’s tongue? Hm, pretty thing? I want my wife to hear you when I make this pussy cum…mhmm…that’s it…”

Daeron buried his face between your thighs once more, not bothering with any form of precision. His ravenously tongued your pussy as he fucked you on his fingers, sending you over the brink of pleasure. With a gasp, you trembled in his hold, feeling the warmth of a thousand hearths burn through your core. Your pussy fluttered, gushing cum as you grinding against your husband’s soaked face. Labored breathing and moans of ecstasy filled your chamber walls as you welcomed every ounce of the sensation, reverently stroking your Daeron’s hair. 

As the pleasure begins to weaken your breaths come in long, blissful sighs. Daeron rises from his knees. His lips find yours again and claim you with your own arousal fresh on his tongue. You rest your forehead against his, languidly draping your arms around his neck. 

“No nameday gift will ever compare to yours, dear wife.”

”You flatter me, dear husband.” 

You laugh against his lips as you claim them in a playful kiss, still high off the pleasure he gave you. The two of you rest there for a moment, relishing the feeling of each other’s skin. Candle warmth, oils, your husband’s touch all flooded your senses. You were the most beloved wife in Westeros. Your husband left no room for doubt in the matter.   

“Do you think my wife will hear of this?”

”Oh shut up.”

[sl-ut]

the dragon tattoo | aperitivo

description: jacaerys was ecstatic when his mother proposed that he invite his girlfriend along on their annual summer holiday in dorne. two weeks in paradise, endless luxury, the love of his life, and…his entire extended family–what could go wrong?

warnings: UNEDITED dear god dont hold me accountable for typos or bad grammar i had a bad week guys, SMUT mdni (p in v, oral, mention of masturbation), substance use (alcohol and marijuana), swearing, reader is described as feminine presenting (mentioned to be wearing bikinis and skirts/dresses), a disgustingly large wealth gap (middle class!reader), very toxic family dynamics, no targcest featured in this one (jace, luke, and joffrey are still velaryons but lets not dwell on that), aegon and aemond are the weird uncles but at least they share their weed

words: 7.7K

date posted: 26/07/26

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Jacaerys had laughed aloud at the look on his girlfriend’s face as their driver pulled onto the tarmac. She’d expressed her nerves about flying, having only been on two different planes in her life, which had consisted of her being squished between two strangers and shaking from the turbulence. It had, of course, been on a standard economy flight, which she had not been expecting from the billionaire family, but she also had not been expecting a glittering red and black and gold private jet waiting for them at the airport. 

This flight had been nothing like she’d ever experienced before, just another jarring reminder of the unimaginable wealth sitting beneath the Targaryen family. Jace had packed her softest pyjamas in his own carry-on for the flight, reminding her that she would be more comfortable once she changed out of her linen shorts and shirt set. She took them begrudgingly, making a stern remark about how she wholeheartedly resented such an unethical use of fossil fuels while slipping into the generously sized bathroom. She even rolled her eyes when she returned from changing to find that breakfast had been spread across one of the tables for them, but had no reservations about having seconds as she sipped on a perfectly ratioed iced latte. 

The stewardess on board seemed to preen under her praise, keeping just enough distance to offer privacy, but always watching for signs that they may need her assistance. Jace seemed quite amused at the woman’s eagerness to please his girlfriend, and even more so at his girlfriend’s many failed attempts to keep pretending that she didn’t like it. 

She dragged her heels as she stepped down onto the tarmac, thanking the staff politely before allowing Jace to guide her to the deep scarlet convertible that awaited them. With the luggage packed into the boot, they set off down the road onto the coastal highway. She was glad that Jace seemed to know where he was going, because as marvelled as she was by the natural landscape, she would have somehow wandered into the desert without him. 

It was late in the afternoon when they finally arrived at the villa–or rather, villas. The property was guarded by a large iron gate, followed by a long, palm covered driveway before finally leading into a cul-de-sac surrounded by three monumental houses, all built with traditional Dornish architecture, but each retaining their own Targaryen features to them; dragon statues, an excessive use of black and red, royal symbolism all over. 

Jace opened the door for her, offering her a hand to guide her out into the driveway. 

“I know it doesn’t look like much, but–” he teased with a wicked grin on his pink lips. 

“Don’t even finish that sentence,” she hissed, pinching his arm playfully, “I used to spend my summers in a camper van.”

“Alright,” he admitted, hands finding her waist as he stepped nearer to her, “it’s nice, I know,”

Two young men appeared from one of the villas, rushing toward the parked car and hurriedly unpacking the trunk of their luggage. She glanced over her shoulder at them, offering a grateful smile as Jace guided her up towards the second largest of the three villas, his hands never leaving her waist as they stepped inside. 

A breath escaped her lungs as she took in the grand entryway; marble and precious metals and glass all over, physical evidence of the Targaryen legacy before her eyes. She glanced over her shoulder at him, her cheeks growing hot as she found him already looking, watching her take it all in, watching her in yet another one of his spaces. 

He wanted her there, he wanted her everywhere. If there was anything that he could call his own, he wanted her to take it, to make it her own. He wanted her in every part of his life; he’d let her live inside his own skin if he could. It all made sense when she explained how his wealth could make her feel when he just threw it around, and as much as he wanted to bury her with gifts and material affection, he respected that she wanted to maintain some of her own financial independence–but if she ever let him, she would wear only the finest silks and jewels, eating and drinking however she pleased, and on as many vacations she would allow him to organize. They’d only been together for nine months, but he wanted only her to be part of that future, and now that he was getting a glimpse of what it would look like, he couldn’t get it out of his head. 

“What?” She asked defensively, turning toward him curiously, “what’s that look for?”

He stepped closer, hands pulling her closer by the hips and lowering his lips to hover just over her own.

“I was just imagining bringing you here on our honeymoon.”

She pushed at his chest with a laugh, “oh shut up!”

“I’m not joking,” he laughed, stepping back from the force of her shove, “and then we’ll go to YiTi for our first anniversary, skiing in Winterfell for New Year’s.”

“You’re skipping over a few steps, I think,” she giggled, “first, we’ll graduate, move in together, you’ll propose…”

“Don’t give me any ideas,” he said, “you’d have a ring tomorrow if I thought you would say yes.”

“I would say yes,” she reminded him, “just not right now.”

Jace leaned closer with a cheesy grin, his eyes dropping to focus on her lips. He shifted to press closer, lips about to brush against hers when his brothers appeared in the doorway. 

“Ugh!” Joffrey huffed in disgust, “Mo-ther! Jace is mauling his girlfriend again!”

The hurried click of Rhaenyra’s shoes against the marble flooring echoed through the bottom floor of the villa, her sunkissed figure appearing behind the younger two of her sons. Her hair was loose around her shoulders, silky silver locks glistening in the sunlight like polished glass as she pushed through the two younger boys, her arms extending with glee as she rushed towards the young couple. 

“You’re here!” she cheered, “I’m so glad you could make it!”

Jacaerys stepped forward to meet his mother, only to let out a sharp grunt of surprise as she pushed past him, her arms curling snugly around the figure of his girlfriend, who seemed equally surprised by Rhaenyra’s affection while also not-so-subtly cosying into the embrace.

She pulled away, keeping her hands steady on the younger woman’s shoulders as she took in her appearance, “oh, you look so beautiful, but I just see how much you need this vacation.”

Jace cleared his throat impatiently. He was her firstborn son, her, her favourite–though she would never admit it. Never before had Jacaerys felt dismissed by his own mother, let alone for someone who wasn’t even her own blood. 

“Should we give you two a moment to catch up?” He scoffed, “perhaps you may give me a ride back to the airport when you’re finished?”

Rhaenyra smirked at her son’s pout. He was not truly angry with them, but there was little he could do to stop the slight whine to his tone at the implication of his mother’s rejection. 

“And you, my boy,” she hardly stifled her laugh as she moved to cup his cheeks, “how glad I am to see you, too. How was the flight?”

Jace, practically purring under his mother’s touch, turned his content gaze to his girlfriend teasingly.

“I practically had to force this one off the jet. I think I’m beginning to spoil her.”

His girlfriend scoffed at him, “the beginning was a long time ago.”

Rhaenyra barked a laugh as she shifted back to glance between her son and his girlfriend. 

“Clearly, even more spoiling is in order if you think this too much already.”

“Funny,” Jace grinned at her, “I’ve been saying the same thing.”

She shook her head in embarrassment, “I don’t–I’m not–”

“We’re only teasing, my girl,” Rhaenyra laughed, “now come in, you must be exhausted. We’ll be having dinner in a few hours, so try not to pick too much and ruin your appetites.” 

After exchanging pleasantries with Luke and Joffrey and offering them their own–much shorter–hugs, Jace led her up the stairs and through the long corridors to their bedroom. It was the same one he’d kept since he was a child, decorated finely as any other room with a few touches of his personality throughout the years. Photos and trinkets decorated the space; family portraits, football posters, collages of he and his brothers during their vacations. It was a strange sort of intimacy to see evidence of the boy Jacaerys had once been.

Their luggage awaited them in the room. Or rather, simply their belongings that were already tucked away in the large armoire in the corner, their toiletries arranged neatly on the ensuite counter, and two stiffly pressed bathrobes folded on the foot of the bed. 

She let out a soft breath as he closed the door behind them, her shoulders slouching as she felt the exhaustion seep into her bones. Suddenly, the weight of it all slipped away, and it was just the two of them again. She felt her lips curl into a lazy smile as she felt his chest press up against her back, his arms curling around her waist possessively. 

He hummed against her neck as he pressed lazy kisses against the soft flesh, his teeth catching on the dainty gold chain that helped balance a small J pendant between her collar bones. She hummed at the graze of his teeth against the sensitive flesh.

“Jace,” she whispered weakly, “I know what you’re doing–stop that! I’ve gotta get ready! Don’t start anything you cannot finish.”

“It’s a casual dinner, love, no need to get all dressed up,” his lips curled into a smile against her neck, “and who said anything about not finishing?”

She laughed then, fighting against his hold but only becoming more restrained as he tightened his grip around her waist.

“Gods forbid I show my girlfriend some love and affection,” he whined, burying his nose deeper into her flesh. 

“Love and affection? Is that what you call what’s poking into my back right now?”

One of his hands slid down, gently pinching at the fat of her bum, “it certainly could be.”

She finally broke free of his grasp, putting a few paces between them before turning to face him.

“I am tired, I am anxious, and worst of all, I am sweating from this gods’ forsaken heat. I am not having sex with you right before a dinner with your entire extended family–who, mind you, could have me quietly disposed of if they do not like me and see no consequences for it. It truly irks me how easily you forget what privilege you come from.”

Jace, whose attention had fallen to her lips as she scolded him, glanced back up to meet her gaze.

“So…after, then?”

His girlfriend huffed, turning on her heel, snatching her monogrammed robe from the bed and heading for the shower, where all of her products already awaited her in a neat little row. 

“Take care of it while I shower,” she ordered, “I’m also not going to dinner with that sitting next to me all night.”

He let out a dramatic sigh before throwing himself onto the bed dramatically.

“Can’t I join you? It would be quick.”

“It never is,” she barked, “take care of it.”

“Can you at least leave the door open?” He asked weakly. 

The door shut firmly behind her.

***

When Jacaerys said that it was a casual dinner, she should have known better than to believe him. 

To be fair, it likely was actually casual by billionaire royal standards, but even her nicest dress was far too understated, she suddenly realized, for the grandeur of the king’s own villa. It was decorated with glittering rubies, rich linens and satins, sleek leather, and glistening marble columns. Rhaenyra led the charge, accepting a glass of Dornish red from a hired server as she led the path through the sprawling house like it was her own. Her own tailored suit likely cost more than a month’s rent, her shoes double that. 

Jace and his brothers were all dressed in varying colours and materials, but all seemed to compliment one another perfectly; Rhaenyra never gave up the opportunity to flaunt her picture perfect family before her stepmother Alicent, the crown princess’s former best friend turned enemy after discovering that Alicent had been sleeping with the king. Somehow, she had even found a way to match Jace’s outfit to his girlfriend’s, ensuring that each of them were so subtly correlated that Rhaenyra knew only Alicent would pick up on it.

Jace guided her along from a step behind, his warm palm pressing into her lower back comfortingly. She reached back, fingers ghosting across his forearm until she caught his hand with her own and fell into step with him. He squeezed her hand, offering her a supportive smile as they stepped into the parlour. 

“Stop that,” he whispered after catching her shifting at her dress, “you are breathtaking.”

“You call that casual?” She hissed as she glanced towards the queen, who stood next to her husband’s chair in a floor length emerald gown made of the softest silk in the realm. 

“Trust me,” he murmured back, “for her, it is. You should see her during Yuletide.”

Beside Alicent, the king sat in a soft leather chair, a glass of vintage scotch trembling slightly in his hand. He was well dressed, though in attire far more comfortable than formal, and despite the toll of age and illness, he carried himself with an easy warmth, his cheerful demeanor refusing to yield to his frailty. Jace had often told her that his grandfather was deeply devoted to keeping the family together, even as the fractures between them had become impossible to ignore. 

“My boy,” Viserys beamed as Jacaerys stepped before him, “it’s good of you to finally show up, only two days late.”

“You know my Jacaerys,” Rhaenyra hummed,  “always fashionably late.”

Jace rolled his eyes at the pair, “I’m beginning to think you only wanted me here to be the butt of your jokes.”

“I only jest, my boy,” Viserys chuckled at his grandson, “fear not, your brothers have been dealt their fair share of my terrible humour. Now, pray tell, who is your lovely companion?”

She instinctively pressed closer to Jace, retreating half a step behind him as every gaze in the room settled upon her. Across from them, Viserys leaned forward with undisguised curiosity, eager to finally meet the young woman who had so thoroughly captivated his grandson. 

Jace beamed as he spoke her name into the room, “my girlfriend.”

Jace gently guided her from behind his shoulder, coaxing her into view before the king while keeping his hand firmly entwined with hers. Viserys noticed it at once—a quiet but unmistakable breach of royal protocol. Yet in the intimacy of the moment, the gesture seemed less an act of defiance than one of reassurance, Jace offering the comfort she so clearly sought in the steady warmth of his touch. 

“I have heard very much about you, my dear.” 

She glanced at Jace over her own shoulder, raising a brow at him. 

“My grandson has always had a terrible poker face, even now, and has never been one to keep a secret for long,” Viserys chuckled, “but I do not expect many could with a woman like you at their side. Law school, is it?”

She felt warmth bloom across her cheeks beneath the king's unwavering attention.

"I hope so, Your Grace," she said with a small, self-conscious smile. "I've still got my undergraduate degree to finish, so I have a little ways to go."

Jace gave an amused shake of his head. "Don't let her fool you. She'll be admitted—I'd bet the Crown on it. She's already landed an internship with Stark & Co. in King's Landing, and they don't take just anyone."

Viserys raised his brow in surprise, “they certainly do not, I know Rickard quite well, and Cregan has always been a good friend to Jacaerys. Do not diminish your achievements, my dear.”

Jace squeezed her hand.

This time, the motion caught the attention of the queen, who did not seem nearly as amused by the affection as her husband had been. 

“Yes,” she drawled, “this family is certainly in need of more ambitious women.”

The remark was a double-edged sword—a compliment to the young woman's academic accomplishments, yet a subtle barb aimed at Rhaenyra, whom Alicent had long regarded as a persistent thorn in her side, forever frustrating her designs with schemes of her own. 

Rhaenyra bristled from beside me, “yes, it certainly does.”

The tension was suffocating, the animosity between the two women spreading through the room until it seemed to tighten around her throat. Instinctively, she edged closer to Jace, who looked no more at ease than she felt. His shoulders stiffened as he glanced toward his younger brothers before returning his attention to their grandfather.

He suggested a walk through the gardens that bordered the estate and wound along the cliffs overlooking the beach. It was a transparent excuse to usher his girlfriend and brothers away from the gathering before the familiar family conflict could erupt. He had warned her before that when Rhaenyra and Alicent clashed, tempers escalated with alarming speed. Once, he had told her, it had become so vicious that he made it a habit to get his brothers out of the room before the worst of it began.

“They don't quite compare to the gardens at Maegor's Holdfast," Joffrey admitted as they wandered beneath the archway and into the grounds. "Those are grander, and Dragonstone's are larger still, but these have their own charm."

He spoke easily as they walked, his steps matching hers while Jace and Luke followed a short distance behind. After weeks apart, the brothers had plenty to catch up on, their conversation filling the space between them as they slowly drifted out of earshot.

She let out a soft laugh as Joffrey guided her toward the garden doors. 

"It must be strange, going from Dragonstone to this. Doesn't it feel a little... cramped?" 

“It does,” he nodded mindlessly, “but it’s only for a few weeks.”

Once again, she was baffled by the blissful ignorance of the wealthy. She almost laughed at the boy’s nonchalance, but withheld as he led her further into the finely landscaped hedge maze, following behind as he broke into a run. 

"Follow me!" Joffrey called over his shoulder before darting behind a towering wall of hedges.

She laughed and hurried after him, only to round the corner and find the path empty.

"Joff?" she called, peering down one corridor, then another. Nothing.

A beat of silence.

"Joffrey?"

"Don't worry," a voice drawled behind her. "He has a habit of wandering."

She startled, spinning on her heel.

Another silver-haired Targaryen lounged on a weathered stone bench tucked into the crook of the hedge maze. He reclined against one arm as though he'd been there for hours, one boot lazily crossed over the other. Between his fingers burned the end of a half-smoked joint, a thin ribbon of smoke curling into the afternoon air.

His pale violet eyes swept over her with shameless curiosity, lingering just long enough to make her skin prickle.

"You're the nanny, then?" he asked. "My sister doesn't usually bring the help along on holiday."

She let out a short, incredulous laugh and glanced around the maze once more. Still no sign of Joffrey. Jace and Luke must have fallen farther behind than she'd realized.

"No," she replied coolly, folding her arms across her chest. She silently thanked herself for choosing the modest midi dress over the sundress she'd briefly considered. Even so, she could feel his gaze tracing the bare skin of her shoulders.

"I'm Jacaerys's girlfriend."

For the first time, his expression shifted.

His brows climbed toward his hairline before a loud, disbelieving laugh escaped him.

"Jace?" he repeated, an amused grin tugging at the corner of his mouth. "You're serious? The realm's golden prince actually managed to get himself a girlfriend?" 

He gave her another once-over, this one slower, more assessing.

"I'll admit," he said with a crooked smile, "I didn't think he'd be anyone's type."

He took another drag before flicking the ash onto the gravel path.

"Gods..." he muttered, amusement still dancing in his voice. "This family really has been full of surprises lately." 

“You almost sound jealous,” she said, watching curiously as he took a long drag from the joint, “I’m sure there are women lining down the block for a chance with Aegon Targaryen.”

Aegon smirked at her as he let out a smoky breath. 

“They are, and I’m very happy to entertain them for a night or two.”

“Sounds lonely.”

“You get used to it,” he muttered bitterly, then shifted his eyes back to her face, “so, you apparently know my name, it’s only fair if I know yours.”

She hesitated. He was a stranger, lounging in the middle of the gardens while getting stoned—the sort of situation her mother had spent years warning her about. Granted, those lectures usually involved dark alleys, suspicious vans, and somehow ended with her living under a bridge, but the underlying message had been the same: don't trust strange men.

Still, it seemed pointless to keep the truth from him. If he really was Jace's uncle, he was bound to learn who she was sooner or later. They would all be under the same roof for the next week, and family gossip traveled faster than wildfire. 

A knowing smirk spread across his face when she finally answered. Without another word, he held the joint out to her in offering.

She glanced at it before shaking her head. "No, thank you."

He huffed a laugh and nudged it a little closer.

"Go on."

"I'm sure."

"Trust me," he said, settling back against the bench, "you'll want something to dull the edges before dinner."

The butterflies already fluttering in her stomach seemed to plummet.

"...Why?"

His expression remained maddeningly relaxed.

"Has something happened?"

Aegon lifted one shoulder in a careless shrug.

"Depends what you call 'happened.' My mother and my sister have been at each other's throats since before I can remember."

"Even at a family dinner?"

He laughed outright.

"Especially at family dinners. Half the entertainment is waiting to see who throws the first jab."

She frowned.

"I thought maybe they'd... try to keep the peace."

"They do." He took another slow drag. "For about five minutes."

Despite herself, she smiled.

"Maybe you'll be the miracle we've all been waiting for," he added. "A fresh face. Neutral territory."

She raised an eyebrow.

"That almost sounded sincere."

"It wasn't."

She laughed, earning a satisfied grin from him.

"No offense," he said.

"None taken." She nodded toward the joint. "But I'll pass. I'd rather be fully present for my first dinner with my boyfriend's family."

"Brave woman."

He reclaimed the joint, exhaling a thin stream of smoke toward the hedges.

"Don't say I didn't try to save you."

A familiar voice cut through the maze before she could answer.

"There you are."

She turned to find Jacaerys rounding the corner, an easy smile spreading across his face the moment he saw her.

"I should've warned you," he said with a sheepish laugh. "Joff has a habit of abandoning people the second something else catches his attention."

His gaze shifted to the silver-haired man lounging on the bench.

"...Ah."

A crooked grin tugged at Aegon's lips.

"And here is your prince charming."

Jace sighed through a smile.

"I see you've met my uncle."

"So I have."

Before she could say another word, Jace stepped in beside her. She instinctively leaned back against his chest as his arm slipped around her waist, his hand settling there with an ease that immediately put her at ease.

Aegon's eyes lingered on the gesture before a smirk tugged at his lips.

"So it's serious."

Jace didn't hesitate.

"It is."

Aegon let out a quiet hum, taking one last drag from the joint.

"Huh. Good for you, nephew."

He pushed himself off the bench, brushing off his trousers.

"I'll see you both at dinner. Try not to take whatever my mother says to heart."

With a lazy salute, he disappeared down another path, leaving the pair alone once more.

A quiet laugh escaped her once Aegon was out of earshot.

"He's... not what I expected."

Jace sighed, shaking his head as he threaded his fingers through hers.

"That's Aegon."

"Does he always greet strangers by offering them a joint?"

A reluctant smile tugged at the corner of his mouth.

"Only the ones he likes."

She nudged his shoulder. "I'll take that as a compliment."

"I think it was." He glanced toward the opening of the maze. "Come on. If we don't head back now, Baela will come looking for us, and she'll never let Joff forget he lost you."

They found Joffrey waiting sheepishly by the garden entrance, Luke beside him with his hands tucked into his pockets.

"There you are!" Joffrey exclaimed. "I only turned around for a second."

"You disappeared," she laughed.

"I was exploring."

"You got distracted," Luke corrected, making himself known behind them.

"...I got distracted."

Jace chuckled, slipping an arm around her shoulders as the four of them started back toward the house. The warm glow of the dining room spilled through the tall windows ahead, the sounds of conversation already drifting onto the terrace.

She drew a slow breath.

"Dinner?"

Jace gave her hand a reassuring squeeze.

"Dinner."

Together, they climbed the stone steps toward the house, leaving the peace of the gardens behind as they stepped into whatever awaited them inside.

***

Dinner was quieter than she had expected.

King Viserys began the evening with a speech, beaming beneath the candlelight as he spoke about how happy he was to see his family gathered together again. His voice carried a warmth that seemed almost out of place given the tension lingering around the table, but he appeared determined to savor the moment.

After that, conversation came in brief, strained attempts. Questions were asked out of courtesy rather than genuine interest, and most were answered with little more than a few clipped words before the silence returned.

Aemond and Helaena had since joined them, seated across the table from where she and Jace sat. Helaena seemed almost entirely detached from the evening, drifting in and out of conversation as though her thoughts were somewhere far away. She offered no judgment, no curiosity, barely even acknowledging her presence.

Aemond, however, had noticed her.

He had made no effort to hide it.

His attention lingered from across the table, his expression carefully composed, as if he was trying to decide what exactly he thought of her. There was no warmth in his gaze—not yet—but neither was there the outright disdain she had expected.

It was curiosity. And something else she couldn't quite place.

She caught him looking more than once, only for him to calmly return his attention to his plate as though he hadn't been watching her at all.

Jace noticed.

Of course he noticed.

His hand found hers beneath the table, his thumb brushing lightly over her knuckles in quiet reassurance.

"Don't mind him," he murmured.

She glanced toward Aemond again. "I wasn't sure if I should."

A faint smile tugged at Jace's mouth.

"That means he's interested."

She raised an eyebrow. "Interested?"

"In his own way."

The silence lingered until Viserys, ever eager to keep his family engaged, turned his attention back toward her.

"And tell me," he said warmly, "how are you finding King's Landing? It must be quite the change from what you are accustomed to."

She smiled politely. "It has been an adjustment, Your Grace. But I enjoy it. There is always something new to learn."

"A good answer from someone in your position," Viserys said with a pleased smile. "Jace tells me you are doing remarkably well with your studies."

Her cheeks warmed slightly.

"He is very generous."

"Not generous," Jace corrected quietly beside her. "Accurate."

A small smile passed between them.

Viserys looked delighted by the exchange. "And Stark & Co. is a fine place to gain experience. A demanding one, I imagine."

"It is," she admitted. "But I've learned more there than I could have imagined. The people I work with are brilliant, and they expect a great deal from me."

"As they should," Viserys replied. "Ambition is a wonderful quality when paired with dedication."

Across the table, Alicent lifted her glass.

"Indeed," she said smoothly. "Stark & Co. is an impressive placement. I imagine it helps to have the support of influential people when beginning one's career." 

The words were gentle, but the meaning beneath them was not.

Jace's expression shifted immediately.

She kept her composure, setting her fork down carefully.

"I've worked very hard for them, Your Grace," she replied, her tone calm. "But I am grateful for the opportunities I've been given."

Alicent's smile remained perfectly pleasant.

"Of course. I meant no offense."

Which, somehow, made the comment feel more deliberate.

Viserys, either unaware or unwilling to acknowledge the tension, continued with a fond smile.

"I think it is admirable. Too many young people are content to inherit what has been given to them. It is refreshing to see someone build something of their own."

Jace's hand found hers beneath the table, a quiet reminder that she wasn't facing the room alone.

"She earned it herself," Jace said firmly.

His voice remained calm, but there was no mistaking the conviction behind it.

"She was accepted in the autumn, when we had only just begun seeing each other. I had no influence over the decision—and even if I had, I would never have used it on her behalf."

His hand tightened around hers beneath the table.

"She is brilliant. Her work speaks for itself, and her accomplishments are hers alone."

Alicent offered a smile that did little to disguise her skepticism. She lifted her fork, taking her time as she brought it to her mouth, chewing thoughtfully before swallowing.

"Of course," she said at last, her tone perfectly pleasant. "I would never suggest otherwise. It is simply fortunate that such doors are available to those with the right circumstances."

Her gaze briefly flickered toward Jace before returning to her plate.

"But I am pleased to hear she has earned the respect of her colleagues. I'm sure Stark & Co. would not keep someone on their team who was not capable."

The compliment was carefully placed—just enough praise to make the insult impossible to challenge.

Then she returned to her meal, signaling that the matter was closed.

She glanced at Jace from the corner of her eye, letting out a quiet breath as he caught her gaze. His hand tightened gently around hers beneath the table, a silent reassurance that she wasn't facing the tension alone.

Maybe Aegon had been right.

Maybe she would need something to get her through the rest of the evening.

With a small exhale, her free hand reached for her wineglass.

***

When Jacaerys returned to their room that night, she was already settled in for the evening. Wrapped in a plush white robe, her hair fell freely over her shoulders, her makeup washed away as she lay sprawled across the bed, absently scrolling through her phone.

He lingered in the doorway for a moment, the lock clicking softly behind him as he took her in.

She was beautiful like this.

Not because she'd spent hours getting ready, or because she wore expensive dresses fit for palace dinners. There was something about seeing her at ease—comfortable enough to let the day fall away—that captivated him more than anything else.

She looked over her shoulder, catching him staring. A slow, knowing smile spread across her face.

"What?" she teased. "Why are you just standing there?"

"Just admiring the view," he replied, a grin tugging at his lips as he crossed the room.

She set her phone aside and shifted onto her knees, slipping her arms loosely around his neck as he stopped in front of her.

"You know," she murmured, "you're always looking at me like that."

"Can you blame me?"

She laughed, shaking her head.

"I swear, you're always trying to charm me."

He smiled, his hands settling gently at her waist.

"If only you didn't make it so easy."

She leaned forward until the bridge of her nose brushed gently against his, a long, weary sigh escaping her lips before she even realized she'd been holding it.

The knot that had settled in her chest throughout dinner began to loosen.

This was what she had needed all evening.

Him.

Jace smiled, his forehead coming to rest against hers.

"Tough night?"

She let out a quiet laugh.

"I think your uncle owes me an apology."

He chuckled softly. "For what?"

"For making me think he was exaggerating."

"...He wasn't?"

She shook her head.

"He somehow undersold it."

That earned a genuine laugh from him, warm and unguarded.

"I told you my family could be... complicated."

"'Complicated' feels like a generous word."

"It does, doesn't it?"

She smiled despite herself, her hands still loosely clasped behind his neck.

"I kept waiting for someone to flip the table."

"Give it until dessert tomorrow."

She groaned, hiding her face against his shoulder for a moment.

"You're joking."

"I wish I was."

She pulled back just enough to search his face, only to find the corners of his mouth twitching.

"You are joking."

"...Mostly."

She narrowed her eyes at him before laughing again, the last of the evening's tension finally dissolving.

"I'm sorry," he said more quietly, brushing a stray lock of hair behind her ear. "I know today wasn't exactly the warm welcome you deserved."

"It wasn't all bad."

"No?"

She shook her head.

"Your grandfather was lovely. Your brothers are sweet. Even Aegon was..." She paused, searching for the right word.

"Unexpected."

Jace laughed.

"That's probably the nicest thing anyone's ever called him."

She smiled, squeezing his hand.

"And I got to come back here with you."

For the first time that day, neither of them was thinking about the family waiting downstairs or the dinners still to come. The room was quiet, and that was more than enough. 

She closed the small distance between them, tilting her face up as her eyes met his. She didn't need to say a word; the hopeful smile tugging at her lips was invitation enough.

Jace smiled back immediately, understanding her without explanation.

"What?" he murmured, his voice warm with amusement.

"Nothing."

"Nothing?"

She shook her head, still smiling.

"I just wanted you a little closer."

His expression softened.

"I think I can manage that."

He cupped her cheek, his thumb brushing gently over her skin before leaning down to meet her halfway. Their lips met in a slow, lingering kiss, unhurried and familiar, carrying none of the uncertainty that had followed her throughout the evening.

When they finally pulled apart, he rested his forehead against hers, a quiet smile still lingering on his face.

"Better?" he asked.

"So much better," she whispered.

She smiled as she drew him closer, her fingertips brushing lightly along the back of his neck. He let out a quiet laugh, resting his forehead against hers for the briefest moment.

"Careful," he murmured, a teasing smile tugging at his lips. "Don't start something you can't finish."

She arched an eyebrow.

"Who said anything about not finishing?"

A grin spread across his face.

"I was hoping you'd say that."

He closed the distance between them, capturing her lips in another lingering kiss. She smiled into it, her hands settling comfortably around his shoulders as the last remnants of the day's tension finally slipped away.

When they parted, neither of them moved very far.

"I needed this," she admitted quietly.

"I know."

He brushed a loose strand of hair behind her ear, his thumb lingering against her cheek.

"We survived the first family dinner."

"Barely."

He laughed.

"Barely counts. The first of many."

She smiled, leaning into him once more.

"Promise me tomorrow won't be worse."

"I can't promise that," he said with an apologetic grin. "But I can promise you won't have to face it alone."

She looked at him for a long moment before pressing another gentle kiss to his lips.

"I think I can live with that. Now take me to bed.”

Jace smirked at her, his hands sliding around, shifting from her waist to her hips and around to grip her ass firmly in his palms.

“Don’t mind if I do.”

Her own fingers reached down, untying the belt of her robe until it fell open, her bare chest now flush against him. He smiled against her lips, helping her slide the material away from her shoulders until it landed on the bed behind her. 

Jace wasted little time before scooping her up and laying her across the bed. He took a moment then, standing over her and admiring the softness of her skin under the warm, low lighting emitting from the bedside lamp. She was bare, skin glistening and warm from the lotion she had just massaged into her flesh, hair fanned around her head like a halo.

“Are you just going to stare, or are you going to do something?” She asked impatiently, stretching herself out further under his gaze.

“Impatient, are we?” He responded with a chuckle, his hand reaching out to take hold of one of her ankles.

He raised it up, pressing her foot firmly to his chest as his eyes fell lower with a small, content smirk.

“Funny, isn’t it?” He said, “when you want me, I give you everything you need and more. When I want you, I’m left with my own two hands for relief.”

She pursed her lips, thighs drawing closer together.

“Well, if it’s that much of a bother–”

His fingers tightened around her ankle, pulling it further up onto his shoulder while his other hand pressed the other thigh open wider. He said nothing, eyes trained on her own as his lips turned to press a warm kiss to her inner ankle, just over that dragon tattoo.

He pressed slow, open mouthed kisses along the length of her leg, allowing it to slide further over his shoulder until his lips reached her inner thigh. She let out a soft gasp as he suckled at the flesh there, his tongue smoothing over the sensitive flesh and growing dangerously closer to where she began to glisten with desire.

“Is this what you want?” He asked huskily, his breath sweeping across her lips in soft, warm pants, “you want me?”

She nodded weakly.

“Yes, yes,” she whined, “I want you, Jacaerys.”

He grinned up at her, pressing one more kiss to her thigh before shifting his attention to where she wanted him most. 

Jace began with soft kisses up her slit, dragging his nose against her wetness and letting out a low groan at her scent. He glanced up at her through hooded eyes, lips curling into a wicked grin before he lowered his kiss to her clit. 

She released a quiet sound, lip tugged between her teeth to muffle her sounds–it may have been a large house, but she was not about to let her boyfriend’s entire family hear as he went down on her.

Then came his tongue, gently sweeping through her folds to collect her wetness. Jace’s moan vibrated against her as he buried himself deeper into her. His teasing was short lived, his face pressing closer and closer as he became more relentless in his motions. 

“Jace,” she whispered, fingers tangling in his dark curls to anchor herself, “oh–Jace, please.”

His lips curled against her, tongue sliding lower to circle her entrance before pressing against it, the movements of his head forcing the bridge of his nose to rub firmly against her bundle of nerves. 

She was already close when he pressed his index finger inside, lips returning to suck and kiss as her clit while his finger curled inside of her and prodded at that spongy spot that made her toes curl every time. 

“Jace–I’m going to–fuck.”

“Do it,” he murmured against her, “please, do it.”

His pleading brought it on, the warmth of her orgasm washing over her like a wave of relief. She released a series of soft whines and mewls, containing her pleasure for the sake of her own embarrassment the next day. 

Her fingers pulled him away from her, a moan falling from her lips as the pressure released.

“I’m not done,” he huffed, frowning at her.

“Yes you are,” she said, “I need you. Now.”

“Impatient, are we?” He chuckled as he allowed her to pull him up her body, caging her in against the mattress. 

“I’m impatient,” she agreed, fingers tugging at the fabric of his shirt, “and you’re overdressed.”

Her fingers eagerly worked on the buttons of his shirt until it hung loose around him. He pushed himself up to kneel on the mattress between her thighs, tugging the shirt down his arms and tossing it aside. Next, he unbuckled his belt and slid it free of his belt loops before it met the very same fate as his shirt–thrown across the room and landing unceremoniously in a heap in the corner. 

She reached out, raking her nails gently over the curve of his waist, the smooth muscular abdomen, and finally hooking into the button of his slacks. 

“I wanna taste you,” she hummed, eyelashes fluttering up at him flirtily.

His hands met her own, stopping her in her tracks.

“Next time,” he dismissed her, replacing her own hands in unfastening his pants and pushing them down his thighs, “I need to be inside you.”

She grinned up at him, laying back against the pillows in a silent excitement as she watched her boyfriend strip down, eyes soaking in every last inch of naked flesh until there was nothing left uncovered. 

After kicking away his boxers, he crawled back onto the bed, hands easily finding the backs of her thighs and raising them up to rest around his waist. Her core was ready–oozing and throbbing already as his tip slid through her folds with a gentle familiarity. They each released a soft sound as his tip rubbed against her clit, then slid back down to notch at her entrance.

A whine pulled from the back of her throat as the tip pressed just inside, her legs locking firmly around his waist and forcing his weight down on top of herself. Her lips traced open mouthed patterns along his neck as he slowly pushed further inside, a low rumble emitting from his chest when his hips suddenly pressed firmly to hers. 

“Fuck,” she moaned, fingernails pressing into his shoulder blades as he paused to allow her to adjust. 

“Yeah?” He asked breathlessly, a cocky grin appearing on his face as he took in her tight expression, “Like that?”

“Shut up,” she mumbled through a moan as he shifted his weight slightly, causing the slightest movement of pressure through her. 

His hips pulled back a touch, drawing himself free from her heat before plunging back inside. His tip punched into that spongy spot immediately, so deep inside of her that she almost felt him in her belly. 

It was his turn to curse aloud at the sensation of her tight walls squeezing around him, holding his member so firmly that he wasn’t sure that he could leave even if he wanted not–not that he wanted to anyway. 

“Faster.”

He obliged her, finding a quick, deep rhythm as one of his hands found her own, lacing their fingers together and pressing their conjoined hands to the pillow next to her head. His other hand worked to support his weight, laying flat against the sheets, while hers fisted his dark curls as she forced his lips back to her own, muffling their shared sounds of pleasure. 

Where she was often known by every relationship she’d ever had and some of her closest friends for her inability to keep quiet during sex, she’d never felt more indulged than with Jace, who was oftentimes just as loud as she was. She knew she would need to keep both of their mouths occupied if she wanted to save herself the humiliation of his mother and brothers overhearing from down the hall. 

The mattress creaked quietly with every other thrust, jerking each time Jace’s hips stuttered, an uneven and uncertain motion that signalled exactly how much longer he would last. His fingers rubbing at her clit in tight, quick circles to bring her there just in time for his own climax.

He came inside of her with a soft groan into her mouth, hips stuttering and slackening as the pleasure rolled through him. His orgasm was the trigger for her own, drawing a rush of heat and slick out from between her thighs with every one of those final sloppy movements as they each came down.

He laid on top of her for a few moments as they caught their breaths. 

“Was that alright?” He asked, brushing the hair away from her face.

“Good?” She asked with a small giggle, “I can hardly feel my legs.”

He chuckled, finally rolling off of her to collapse in a heap next to her.

“Next time,” he huffed, “we’re coming here alone, and I am going to make you scream and wail as much as you desire.”

She grinned at him, shifting to curl into his sweaty chest and draw soft patterns along his pec.

“Next time,” she paused to let out a few uneven breaths before she continued.

“Next time better come soon.”

tags: @cantbecreative @ghostreadersthings @cedsgirl @kooquetre

[sl-ut]

the dragon tattoo | prelude

pairing: modern!jacaerys velaryon x fem!reader

description: jacaerys was ecstatic when his mother proposed that he invite his girlfriend along on their annual summer holiday in dorne. two weeks in paradise, endless luxury, the love of his life, and…his entire extended family–what could go wrong?

Warnings: swearing, mentions of sex (no smut in this chap), reader is mentioned to be feminine presenting but no physical features mentioned beyond clothing, a disgustingly large wealth gap (middle class!reader), very toxic family dynamics, no targcest featured in this one (jace, luke, and joffrey are still velaryons but lets not dwell on that)

words: 2.3K

date posted: 19/07/26

next part

The call came late on a Saturday afternoon.

Jacaerys had prided himself on his ability to hole his girlfriend up in his penthouse for days on end; he had the resources to feed, clothe, and entertain her for weeks if he had to, and was never denying himself the opportunity to spend an entire weekend cut off entirely from the outside world, just himself and the love of his life for two and a half consecutive days straight. 

He spent his weeks buried deep in his work, but his focus was always somewhat clouded with the vision of his beloved taking up space, just existing in his environment with such ease. He’d yet to ask her to officially move in, but he could feel it coming in the near future, considering that he could hardly sleep a wink on the rare occasion she actually spends the night at her own shoebox apartment all the way across the city. He treated her to breakfast in bed, lazy morning sex followed by long showers where he clings to her the entire time. He took her on any afternoon outing she desired, chauffeuring her around the city for any appointments or activities she may have had on Saturday. Sundays, however, were reserved for a quiet reset. Laundry, grocery shopping, and meal prepping taken care of in the morning so the rest of the day can be spent in their most comfortable clothes with fruity smelling face masks pressed to their skin as they lounge on the couch watching The Real Housewives of Casterly Rock. Nowhere was his favourite place to be with her, where they had no distractions, no obligations other than to be together. 

It was just after supper, they were unwinding with a glass of chilled arbor red, on opposite sides of the couch lazily scrolling through their respective social media. Her legs stretched across the cushions, finding their place in his lap while his spare hand cupped the slope of muscle between her half and ankle, his fingers tracing soft patterns against the dragon tattoo just behind her ankle bone. 

The loud ringing that interrupted their peaceful silence caused both of them to jump, his phone falling to his lap and revealing his mother’s contact lit up on the screen. He let out a soft snort, his fingers curling around her ankle and offering a comforting squeeze as he reached for the device.

She could barely see the screen from where she laid, craning her neck as Jace accepted the call and his mother’s face appeared on the screen. Her surroundings were dimly lit, most likely her own living room at the Dragonstone Estate just a few hours outside of the city. Her hair was neatly braided back, as usual, and her face still radiated that ethereal beauty that only those of Valyrian descent possessed, though there was a certain tiredness beneath her soft expression. 

“Hi mum,” he greeted, “everything alright?”

Rhaenyra’s expression softened through the screen, her response coming with a playful bite, “does something need to be wrong in order to speak to your mother?”

Jace rolled his eyes, “no, of course not. But, I can see that you’re still at the office, so I can only assume.”

“I’m alright, my boy,” she sighed, “things are busy here. Your grandsire is increasingly difficult to work with now that I’ve relocated to Dragonstone. That man knows less and less about computers each time he uses one.”

Jacaerys let out a soft laugh at that. He’d spent the last few summers interning under his grandfather in King’s Landing, and had spent countless lunch breaks ranting to his girlfriend over the phone with the very same complaints. He squeezed her ankle playfully in a silent I-told-you-so, drawing a low giggle from her. 

Rhaenyra visibly perked up at the sound–how she had picked up on the quiet noise through the microphone was beyond both of them, but she’d grown incredibly fond of her son’s girlfriend and always bugged him about never seeing her enough.

“Hello my girl,” she said, “Jace, show her to me.”

Jace let out a scoff at his mother’s command, “did you call me because you missed your first born or because you wanted to speak to my girlfriend?”

“I called in hopes of seeing you both,” she said, rather diplomatically, “but especially the future mother of my firstborn’s firstborn. And the others to follow.”

A scarlet flush came to stain Jacaerys’s pale cheeks like a ruthless wave of heat. This drew a sharper laugh from his girlfriend, who had sat up and reached out to snatch the phone from his hand.

“There she is,” Rhaenyra hummed, “lovely as ever. How are you, my love?”

“Hello Miss Targaryen,” the younger woman beamed into the camera, “I’m far better than your son at the moment, it seems.”

Rhaenyra chuckled at that, “my son is utterly devoted to you in every way, and still he cannot handle even the slightest teasing.”

“I am still here,” Jace barked, shifting to lay across his girlfriend’s abdomen so they were both in frame, “I would ask you not to speak about me right to my face, but you two spend more time together than either of you do with me.”

“Oh please,” his girlfriend dismissed him, “we live in different cities, that is not possible.”

“And yet somehow, you manage.”

“That reminds me,” Rhaenyra cut in, “that is exactly why I called. My father has proposed a group trip.”

Jace’s body stiffened as his face lifted off of his girlfriend’s chest, “which group?”

Rhaenyra’s expression twisted, her eyes speaking for her as she pursed her lips, unenthused.

“The family. The whole family.”

“Such as…”

“Myself, you, Luke, and Joff, of course; my father, Alicent, Aegon, Helaena, and Aemond. Daeron has decided to find an internship in Old Town for the spring break, and the offer has been extended to Daemon and Laena, though it doesn’t seem likely that he’ll accept. My father and Daemon have done nothing but bicker for the last few weeks.”

Then, in a honeyed tone, she added the younger woman’s name to the list, “of courseyou are invited to join us as well. I’ve already included you in the numbers for planning, but there is no pressure. We’re thankful enough that you are able to handle Jacaerys, let alone my entire family.” 

“Oh–” 

Both Rhaenyra and Jace’s expressions shifted at the uncertainty on the girl’s face. 

“What is it?” He asked, sitting up straighter as concern flashed through him.

There were a few factors that struck fear into her, starting with the fact that she had never even met the rest of his family beyond his mother and brothers, who seemed so homey and welcoming that she almost forgot that Jace’s grandfather was the king. 

The king had extended an invitation for her to join their family vacation–well, he had extended it to his daughter, who extended it to her son, and in extension, to you, but the importance of the details seem to be lost on her. A week spent with the royal family, along with her boyfriend, who is part of the royal family. She suddenly felt that gnawing feeling of inadequacy that she often felt when she was suddenly reminded of how out of her league Jace was. 

Then, there was also the issue of her internship. While Jace had secured his own working closely along with his grandfather and his closest advisors, she’d had a harder time finding her own for the summer break, but she had struck gold when she received an offer from a very highly praised law firm to work as their office assistant. It came with many benefits, including a paid vacation time that had not yet been fixed to a date, it seemed like a better excuse than blatantly admitting to her cowardice.

“It’s just…” she felt her cheeks burning as she worked her way to the admission, “I just…I don’t think I could afford it, especially considering I’d be taking a week off for the holiday itself. Perhaps for the winter holidays, or–”

Rhaneyra let out a soft bark of a laugh as she interrupted the younger woman, “I’m very disappointed in my son that it was even a thought in your mind that you would be paying for any of it, my love. It is an invitation, all expenses covered. I want you there, so do Luke and Joff, and even Jacaerys’s grandsire has expressed his interest in meeting you. Besides, I cannot imagine the agony we would all suffer on behalf of Jace being apart from you for more than a few hours.”

“Mum,” Jace said sharply, but his arm only tightened around his girlfriend’s shoulders to confirm his mother’s implication. 

“I only jest, my boy,” Rhaenyra laughed, “the decision is yours, darling, but I do hope you consider it.”

The girl glanced up at her boyfriend’s hopeful expression, letting out a sigh, “I’ll think on it. I’ll need to see if I can take the time away from work, and the museum, and–”

“Yes, yes, all of your other engagements,” Rhaenyra pursed her lips, “Jace has told me about how busy you keep yourself during your summer break. Yet another reason you should join us, in my opinion.”

Jacaerys felt his partner’s figure stiffen under his arm at the dismissal. She’d expressed her uncertainty in the past regarding the major wealth and status difference between the two, especially when it came to Jace’s instinct to pay for everything or almost bribe her from her own engagements. 

It began with small requests for her to skip class to be with him, which was not often enough to put a stink up over, but enough for her to take note of how he had much less remorse for cutting himself some slack than she typically afforded herself. Then it was him begging her to attend all of his football matches and practices, even when she had other commitments or needed to study; this she could understand his desire for her to be there supporting him, but on the occasion that she was unable to attend, she was often left feeling a touch guilty when she prioritized her future over her relationship. 

The issue developed into the first real fight of their relationship, climaxing with a day of no contact, then a week of Jacaerys following her around like a lost puppy seeking her affection. Since then, he’d been more conscious of not making money seem worthless, but still went the extra mile to spoil her as much as she would allow. 

Her hand reached down to squeeze his thigh, offering him a small nod of assurance. Sure, it wasn’t always nice to have the limitless wealth of the Targaryens waved in her face so blatantly, but she knew Rhaenyra meant no harm by it. 

“We’ll let you know, mum,” Jace cut in, “my girl has herself working harder than anyone I know this summer, let her sleep on it.”

Rhaenyra’s expression shifted, seemingly more alert of how she may have been received, “forgive me, my girl, I didn’t mean to say that your other engagements were lesser or–”

“It’s alright,” she said, “I had to work very hard to earn my internship this summer, so I’ll need to see if I’m able to take the time before I agree.”

“I understand,” Rhaenyra agreed, seemingly a touch embarrassed over the discomfort she’d unintentionally caused, “well, just know that we would all adore it if you could make it, but we will not feel slighted at all. I will speak to you both tomorrow.”

“Love you, mum,” Jace said as he hung up, tossing his phone aside onto the coffee table and shifting his body to lay completely over her body with a groan.

She let out a laugh, hands catching at his ribs as he buried his head into her shoulder.

“Sorry about her,” he mumbled against her bare shoulder, the large sweatshirt of his that she wore shifting away as he laid her back against the cushions, “she can be a bit demanding, I know.”

“I’m not offended,” she responded, fingers carding through his thick curls affectionately, “she means well. Your mother and I both experience struggles that the other could not understand from our upbringings.”

He let out a small huff against her neck, “hm, and you I was spoiled.”

“You,” she tugged at his curls to lift his gaze to meet her own, “are spoiled. But I can be angry with you, but I do not think I could stay cross with your mother for very long. She is a very persuasive woman.”

“You’re the one who spoils me,” he argued, his voice shifting into a playfully mocking tone, “you’ve made me conditioned to need you at all times, woman. Forgive me for being just too besotted by you.”

She giggled at him, her leg lifting to press her heel into his backside in retaliation, “oh shut up. I’m starting to think you don’t want me to come on this holiday afterall.”

He raised a brow, “you think I am actively trying to give up seeing you in sundresses and bathing suits for a week straight?”

“Oh, is that why you want me to come?”

“Mostly,” he grinned at her, “but just think of it, unlimited wine, sunshine, sex on the beach…”

“Need I remind you that your entire family will be there as well?”

He let out a sigh, “fine, fine. Next time we go on holiday though…”

“Don’t push it.”

[sl-ut]

the dragon tattoo | aperitivo

description: jacaerys was ecstatic when his mother proposed that he invite his girlfriend along on their annual summer holiday in dorne. two weeks in paradise, endless luxury, the love of his life, and…his entire extended family–what could go wrong?

warnings: UNEDITED dear god dont hold me accountable for typos or bad grammar i had a bad week guys, SMUT mdni (p in v, oral, mention of masturbation), substance use (alcohol and marijuana), swearing, reader is described as feminine presenting (mentioned to be wearing bikinis and skirts/dresses), a disgustingly large wealth gap (middle class!reader), very toxic family dynamics, no targcest featured in this one (jace, luke, and joffrey are still velaryons but lets not dwell on that), aegon and aemond are the weird uncles but at least they share their weed

words: 7.7K

date posted: 26/07/26

previous | next

Jacaerys had laughed aloud at the look on his girlfriend’s face as their driver pulled onto the tarmac. She’d expressed her nerves about flying, having only been on two different planes in her life, which had consisted of her being squished between two strangers and shaking from the turbulence. It had, of course, been on a standard economy flight, which she had not been expecting from the billionaire family, but she also had not been expecting a glittering red and black and gold private jet waiting for them at the airport. 

This flight had been nothing like she’d ever experienced before, just another jarring reminder of the unimaginable wealth sitting beneath the Targaryen family. Jace had packed her softest pyjamas in his own carry-on for the flight, reminding her that she would be more comfortable once she changed out of her linen shorts and shirt set. She took them begrudgingly, making a stern remark about how she wholeheartedly resented such an unethical use of fossil fuels while slipping into the generously sized bathroom. She even rolled her eyes when she returned from changing to find that breakfast had been spread across one of the tables for them, but had no reservations about having seconds as she sipped on a perfectly ratioed iced latte. 

The stewardess on board seemed to preen under her praise, keeping just enough distance to offer privacy, but always watching for signs that they may need her assistance. Jace seemed quite amused at the woman’s eagerness to please his girlfriend, and even more so at his girlfriend’s many failed attempts to keep pretending that she didn’t like it. 

She dragged her heels as she stepped down onto the tarmac, thanking the staff politely before allowing Jace to guide her to the deep scarlet convertible that awaited them. With the luggage packed into the boot, they set off down the road onto the coastal highway. She was glad that Jace seemed to know where he was going, because as marvelled as she was by the natural landscape, she would have somehow wandered into the desert without him. 

It was late in the afternoon when they finally arrived at the villa–or rather, villas. The property was guarded by a large iron gate, followed by a long, palm covered driveway before finally leading into a cul-de-sac surrounded by three monumental houses, all built with traditional Dornish architecture, but each retaining their own Targaryen features to them; dragon statues, an excessive use of black and red, royal symbolism all over. 

Jace opened the door for her, offering her a hand to guide her out into the driveway. 

“I know it doesn’t look like much, but–” he teased with a wicked grin on his pink lips. 

“Don’t even finish that sentence,” she hissed, pinching his arm playfully, “I used to spend my summers in a camper van.”

“Alright,” he admitted, hands finding her waist as he stepped nearer to her, “it’s nice, I know,”

Two young men appeared from one of the villas, rushing toward the parked car and hurriedly unpacking the trunk of their luggage. She glanced over her shoulder at them, offering a grateful smile as Jace guided her up towards the second largest of the three villas, his hands never leaving her waist as they stepped inside. 

A breath escaped her lungs as she took in the grand entryway; marble and precious metals and glass all over, physical evidence of the Targaryen legacy before her eyes. She glanced over her shoulder at him, her cheeks growing hot as she found him already looking, watching her take it all in, watching her in yet another one of his spaces. 

He wanted her there, he wanted her everywhere. If there was anything that he could call his own, he wanted her to take it, to make it her own. He wanted her in every part of his life; he’d let her live inside his own skin if he could. It all made sense when she explained how his wealth could make her feel when he just threw it around, and as much as he wanted to bury her with gifts and material affection, he respected that she wanted to maintain some of her own financial independence–but if she ever let him, she would wear only the finest silks and jewels, eating and drinking however she pleased, and on as many vacations she would allow him to organize. They’d only been together for nine months, but he wanted only her to be part of that future, and now that he was getting a glimpse of what it would look like, he couldn’t get it out of his head. 

“What?” She asked defensively, turning toward him curiously, “what’s that look for?”

He stepped closer, hands pulling her closer by the hips and lowering his lips to hover just over her own.

“I was just imagining bringing you here on our honeymoon.”

She pushed at his chest with a laugh, “oh shut up!”

“I’m not joking,” he laughed, stepping back from the force of her shove, “and then we’ll go to YiTi for our first anniversary, skiing in Winterfell for New Year’s.”

“You’re skipping over a few steps, I think,” she giggled, “first, we’ll graduate, move in together, you’ll propose…”

“Don’t give me any ideas,” he said, “you’d have a ring tomorrow if I thought you would say yes.”

“I would say yes,” she reminded him, “just not right now.”

Jace leaned closer with a cheesy grin, his eyes dropping to focus on her lips. He shifted to press closer, lips about to brush against hers when his brothers appeared in the doorway. 

“Ugh!” Joffrey huffed in disgust, “Mo-ther! Jace is mauling his girlfriend again!”

The hurried click of Rhaenyra’s shoes against the marble flooring echoed through the bottom floor of the villa, her sunkissed figure appearing behind the younger two of her sons. Her hair was loose around her shoulders, silky silver locks glistening in the sunlight like polished glass as she pushed through the two younger boys, her arms extending with glee as she rushed towards the young couple. 

“You’re here!” she cheered, “I’m so glad you could make it!”

Jacaerys stepped forward to meet his mother, only to let out a sharp grunt of surprise as she pushed past him, her arms curling snugly around the figure of his girlfriend, who seemed equally surprised by Rhaenyra’s affection while also not-so-subtly cosying into the embrace.

She pulled away, keeping her hands steady on the younger woman’s shoulders as she took in her appearance, “oh, you look so beautiful, but I just see how much you need this vacation.”

Jace cleared his throat impatiently. He was her firstborn son, her, her favourite–though she would never admit it. Never before had Jacaerys felt dismissed by his own mother, let alone for someone who wasn’t even her own blood. 

“Should we give you two a moment to catch up?” He scoffed, “perhaps you may give me a ride back to the airport when you’re finished?”

Rhaenyra smirked at her son’s pout. He was not truly angry with them, but there was little he could do to stop the slight whine to his tone at the implication of his mother’s rejection. 

“And you, my boy,” she hardly stifled her laugh as she moved to cup his cheeks, “how glad I am to see you, too. How was the flight?”

Jace, practically purring under his mother’s touch, turned his content gaze to his girlfriend teasingly.

“I practically had to force this one off the jet. I think I’m beginning to spoil her.”

His girlfriend scoffed at him, “the beginning was a long time ago.”

Rhaenyra barked a laugh as she shifted back to glance between her son and his girlfriend. 

“Clearly, even more spoiling is in order if you think this too much already.”

“Funny,” Jace grinned at her, “I’ve been saying the same thing.”

She shook her head in embarrassment, “I don’t–I’m not–”

“We’re only teasing, my girl,” Rhaenyra laughed, “now come in, you must be exhausted. We’ll be having dinner in a few hours, so try not to pick too much and ruin your appetites.” 

After exchanging pleasantries with Luke and Joffrey and offering them their own–much shorter–hugs, Jace led her up the stairs and through the long corridors to their bedroom. It was the same one he’d kept since he was a child, decorated finely as any other room with a few touches of his personality throughout the years. Photos and trinkets decorated the space; family portraits, football posters, collages of he and his brothers during their vacations. It was a strange sort of intimacy to see evidence of the boy Jacaerys had once been.

Their luggage awaited them in the room. Or rather, simply their belongings that were already tucked away in the large armoire in the corner, their toiletries arranged neatly on the ensuite counter, and two stiffly pressed bathrobes folded on the foot of the bed. 

She let out a soft breath as he closed the door behind them, her shoulders slouching as she felt the exhaustion seep into her bones. Suddenly, the weight of it all slipped away, and it was just the two of them again. She felt her lips curl into a lazy smile as she felt his chest press up against her back, his arms curling around her waist possessively. 

He hummed against her neck as he pressed lazy kisses against the soft flesh, his teeth catching on the dainty gold chain that helped balance a small J pendant between her collar bones. She hummed at the graze of his teeth against the sensitive flesh.

“Jace,” she whispered weakly, “I know what you’re doing–stop that! I’ve gotta get ready! Don’t start anything you cannot finish.”

“It’s a casual dinner, love, no need to get all dressed up,” his lips curled into a smile against her neck, “and who said anything about not finishing?”

She laughed then, fighting against his hold but only becoming more restrained as he tightened his grip around her waist.

“Gods forbid I show my girlfriend some love and affection,” he whined, burying his nose deeper into her flesh. 

“Love and affection? Is that what you call what’s poking into my back right now?”

One of his hands slid down, gently pinching at the fat of her bum, “it certainly could be.”

She finally broke free of his grasp, putting a few paces between them before turning to face him.

“I am tired, I am anxious, and worst of all, I am sweating from this gods’ forsaken heat. I am not having sex with you right before a dinner with your entire extended family–who, mind you, could have me quietly disposed of if they do not like me and see no consequences for it. It truly irks me how easily you forget what privilege you come from.”

Jace, whose attention had fallen to her lips as she scolded him, glanced back up to meet her gaze.

“So…after, then?”

His girlfriend huffed, turning on her heel, snatching her monogrammed robe from the bed and heading for the shower, where all of her products already awaited her in a neat little row. 

“Take care of it while I shower,” she ordered, “I’m also not going to dinner with that sitting next to me all night.”

He let out a dramatic sigh before throwing himself onto the bed dramatically.

“Can’t I join you? It would be quick.”

“It never is,” she barked, “take care of it.”

“Can you at least leave the door open?” He asked weakly. 

The door shut firmly behind her.

***

When Jacaerys said that it was a casual dinner, she should have known better than to believe him. 

To be fair, it likely was actually casual by billionaire royal standards, but even her nicest dress was far too understated, she suddenly realized, for the grandeur of the king’s own villa. It was decorated with glittering rubies, rich linens and satins, sleek leather, and glistening marble columns. Rhaenyra led the charge, accepting a glass of Dornish red from a hired server as she led the path through the sprawling house like it was her own. Her own tailored suit likely cost more than a month’s rent, her shoes double that. 

Jace and his brothers were all dressed in varying colours and materials, but all seemed to compliment one another perfectly; Rhaenyra never gave up the opportunity to flaunt her picture perfect family before her stepmother Alicent, the crown princess’s former best friend turned enemy after discovering that Alicent had been sleeping with the king. Somehow, she had even found a way to match Jace’s outfit to his girlfriend’s, ensuring that each of them were so subtly correlated that Rhaenyra knew only Alicent would pick up on it.

Jace guided her along from a step behind, his warm palm pressing into her lower back comfortingly. She reached back, fingers ghosting across his forearm until she caught his hand with her own and fell into step with him. He squeezed her hand, offering her a supportive smile as they stepped into the parlour. 

“Stop that,” he whispered after catching her shifting at her dress, “you are breathtaking.”

“You call that casual?” She hissed as she glanced towards the queen, who stood next to her husband’s chair in a floor length emerald gown made of the softest silk in the realm. 

“Trust me,” he murmured back, “for her, it is. You should see her during Yuletide.”

Beside Alicent, the king sat in a soft leather chair, a glass of vintage scotch trembling slightly in his hand. He was well dressed, though in attire far more comfortable than formal, and despite the toll of age and illness, he carried himself with an easy warmth, his cheerful demeanor refusing to yield to his frailty. Jace had often told her that his grandfather was deeply devoted to keeping the family together, even as the fractures between them had become impossible to ignore. 

“My boy,” Viserys beamed as Jacaerys stepped before him, “it’s good of you to finally show up, only two days late.”

“You know my Jacaerys,” Rhaenyra hummed,  “always fashionably late.”

Jace rolled his eyes at the pair, “I’m beginning to think you only wanted me here to be the butt of your jokes.”

“I only jest, my boy,” Viserys chuckled at his grandson, “fear not, your brothers have been dealt their fair share of my terrible humour. Now, pray tell, who is your lovely companion?”

She instinctively pressed closer to Jace, retreating half a step behind him as every gaze in the room settled upon her. Across from them, Viserys leaned forward with undisguised curiosity, eager to finally meet the young woman who had so thoroughly captivated his grandson. 

Jace beamed as he spoke her name into the room, “my girlfriend.”

Jace gently guided her from behind his shoulder, coaxing her into view before the king while keeping his hand firmly entwined with hers. Viserys noticed it at once—a quiet but unmistakable breach of royal protocol. Yet in the intimacy of the moment, the gesture seemed less an act of defiance than one of reassurance, Jace offering the comfort she so clearly sought in the steady warmth of his touch. 

“I have heard very much about you, my dear.” 

She glanced at Jace over her own shoulder, raising a brow at him. 

“My grandson has always had a terrible poker face, even now, and has never been one to keep a secret for long,” Viserys chuckled, “but I do not expect many could with a woman like you at their side. Law school, is it?”

She felt warmth bloom across her cheeks beneath the king's unwavering attention.

"I hope so, Your Grace," she said with a small, self-conscious smile. "I've still got my undergraduate degree to finish, so I have a little ways to go."

Jace gave an amused shake of his head. "Don't let her fool you. She'll be admitted—I'd bet the Crown on it. She's already landed an internship with Stark & Co. in King's Landing, and they don't take just anyone."

Viserys raised his brow in surprise, “they certainly do not, I know Rickard quite well, and Cregan has always been a good friend to Jacaerys. Do not diminish your achievements, my dear.”

Jace squeezed her hand.

This time, the motion caught the attention of the queen, who did not seem nearly as amused by the affection as her husband had been. 

“Yes,” she drawled, “this family is certainly in need of more ambitious women.”

The remark was a double-edged sword—a compliment to the young woman's academic accomplishments, yet a subtle barb aimed at Rhaenyra, whom Alicent had long regarded as a persistent thorn in her side, forever frustrating her designs with schemes of her own. 

Rhaenyra bristled from beside me, “yes, it certainly does.”

The tension was suffocating, the animosity between the two women spreading through the room until it seemed to tighten around her throat. Instinctively, she edged closer to Jace, who looked no more at ease than she felt. His shoulders stiffened as he glanced toward his younger brothers before returning his attention to their grandfather.

He suggested a walk through the gardens that bordered the estate and wound along the cliffs overlooking the beach. It was a transparent excuse to usher his girlfriend and brothers away from the gathering before the familiar family conflict could erupt. He had warned her before that when Rhaenyra and Alicent clashed, tempers escalated with alarming speed. Once, he had told her, it had become so vicious that he made it a habit to get his brothers out of the room before the worst of it began.

“They don't quite compare to the gardens at Maegor's Holdfast," Joffrey admitted as they wandered beneath the archway and into the grounds. "Those are grander, and Dragonstone's are larger still, but these have their own charm."

He spoke easily as they walked, his steps matching hers while Jace and Luke followed a short distance behind. After weeks apart, the brothers had plenty to catch up on, their conversation filling the space between them as they slowly drifted out of earshot.

She let out a soft laugh as Joffrey guided her toward the garden doors. 

"It must be strange, going from Dragonstone to this. Doesn't it feel a little... cramped?" 

“It does,” he nodded mindlessly, “but it’s only for a few weeks.”

Once again, she was baffled by the blissful ignorance of the wealthy. She almost laughed at the boy’s nonchalance, but withheld as he led her further into the finely landscaped hedge maze, following behind as he broke into a run. 

"Follow me!" Joffrey called over his shoulder before darting behind a towering wall of hedges.

She laughed and hurried after him, only to round the corner and find the path empty.

"Joff?" she called, peering down one corridor, then another. Nothing.

A beat of silence.

"Joffrey?"

"Don't worry," a voice drawled behind her. "He has a habit of wandering."

She startled, spinning on her heel.

Another silver-haired Targaryen lounged on a weathered stone bench tucked into the crook of the hedge maze. He reclined against one arm as though he'd been there for hours, one boot lazily crossed over the other. Between his fingers burned the end of a half-smoked joint, a thin ribbon of smoke curling into the afternoon air.

His pale violet eyes swept over her with shameless curiosity, lingering just long enough to make her skin prickle.

"You're the nanny, then?" he asked. "My sister doesn't usually bring the help along on holiday."

She let out a short, incredulous laugh and glanced around the maze once more. Still no sign of Joffrey. Jace and Luke must have fallen farther behind than she'd realized.

"No," she replied coolly, folding her arms across her chest. She silently thanked herself for choosing the modest midi dress over the sundress she'd briefly considered. Even so, she could feel his gaze tracing the bare skin of her shoulders.

"I'm Jacaerys's girlfriend."

For the first time, his expression shifted.

His brows climbed toward his hairline before a loud, disbelieving laugh escaped him.

"Jace?" he repeated, an amused grin tugging at the corner of his mouth. "You're serious? The realm's golden prince actually managed to get himself a girlfriend?" 

He gave her another once-over, this one slower, more assessing.

"I'll admit," he said with a crooked smile, "I didn't think he'd be anyone's type."

He took another drag before flicking the ash onto the gravel path.

"Gods..." he muttered, amusement still dancing in his voice. "This family really has been full of surprises lately." 

“You almost sound jealous,” she said, watching curiously as he took a long drag from the joint, “I’m sure there are women lining down the block for a chance with Aegon Targaryen.”

Aegon smirked at her as he let out a smoky breath. 

“They are, and I’m very happy to entertain them for a night or two.”

“Sounds lonely.”

“You get used to it,” he muttered bitterly, then shifted his eyes back to her face, “so, you apparently know my name, it’s only fair if I know yours.”

She hesitated. He was a stranger, lounging in the middle of the gardens while getting stoned—the sort of situation her mother had spent years warning her about. Granted, those lectures usually involved dark alleys, suspicious vans, and somehow ended with her living under a bridge, but the underlying message had been the same: don't trust strange men.

Still, it seemed pointless to keep the truth from him. If he really was Jace's uncle, he was bound to learn who she was sooner or later. They would all be under the same roof for the next week, and family gossip traveled faster than wildfire. 

A knowing smirk spread across his face when she finally answered. Without another word, he held the joint out to her in offering.

She glanced at it before shaking her head. "No, thank you."

He huffed a laugh and nudged it a little closer.

"Go on."

"I'm sure."

"Trust me," he said, settling back against the bench, "you'll want something to dull the edges before dinner."

The butterflies already fluttering in her stomach seemed to plummet.

"...Why?"

His expression remained maddeningly relaxed.

"Has something happened?"

Aegon lifted one shoulder in a careless shrug.

"Depends what you call 'happened.' My mother and my sister have been at each other's throats since before I can remember."

"Even at a family dinner?"

He laughed outright.

"Especially at family dinners. Half the entertainment is waiting to see who throws the first jab."

She frowned.

"I thought maybe they'd... try to keep the peace."

"They do." He took another slow drag. "For about five minutes."

Despite herself, she smiled.

"Maybe you'll be the miracle we've all been waiting for," he added. "A fresh face. Neutral territory."

She raised an eyebrow.

"That almost sounded sincere."

"It wasn't."

She laughed, earning a satisfied grin from him.

"No offense," he said.

"None taken." She nodded toward the joint. "But I'll pass. I'd rather be fully present for my first dinner with my boyfriend's family."

"Brave woman."

He reclaimed the joint, exhaling a thin stream of smoke toward the hedges.

"Don't say I didn't try to save you."

A familiar voice cut through the maze before she could answer.

"There you are."

She turned to find Jacaerys rounding the corner, an easy smile spreading across his face the moment he saw her.

"I should've warned you," he said with a sheepish laugh. "Joff has a habit of abandoning people the second something else catches his attention."

His gaze shifted to the silver-haired man lounging on the bench.

"...Ah."

A crooked grin tugged at Aegon's lips.

"And here is your prince charming."

Jace sighed through a smile.

"I see you've met my uncle."

"So I have."

Before she could say another word, Jace stepped in beside her. She instinctively leaned back against his chest as his arm slipped around her waist, his hand settling there with an ease that immediately put her at ease.

Aegon's eyes lingered on the gesture before a smirk tugged at his lips.

"So it's serious."

Jace didn't hesitate.

"It is."

Aegon let out a quiet hum, taking one last drag from the joint.

"Huh. Good for you, nephew."

He pushed himself off the bench, brushing off his trousers.

"I'll see you both at dinner. Try not to take whatever my mother says to heart."

With a lazy salute, he disappeared down another path, leaving the pair alone once more.

A quiet laugh escaped her once Aegon was out of earshot.

"He's... not what I expected."

Jace sighed, shaking his head as he threaded his fingers through hers.

"That's Aegon."

"Does he always greet strangers by offering them a joint?"

A reluctant smile tugged at the corner of his mouth.

"Only the ones he likes."

She nudged his shoulder. "I'll take that as a compliment."

"I think it was." He glanced toward the opening of the maze. "Come on. If we don't head back now, Baela will come looking for us, and she'll never let Joff forget he lost you."

They found Joffrey waiting sheepishly by the garden entrance, Luke beside him with his hands tucked into his pockets.

"There you are!" Joffrey exclaimed. "I only turned around for a second."

"You disappeared," she laughed.

"I was exploring."

"You got distracted," Luke corrected, making himself known behind them.

"...I got distracted."

Jace chuckled, slipping an arm around her shoulders as the four of them started back toward the house. The warm glow of the dining room spilled through the tall windows ahead, the sounds of conversation already drifting onto the terrace.

She drew a slow breath.

"Dinner?"

Jace gave her hand a reassuring squeeze.

"Dinner."

Together, they climbed the stone steps toward the house, leaving the peace of the gardens behind as they stepped into whatever awaited them inside.

***

Dinner was quieter than she had expected.

King Viserys began the evening with a speech, beaming beneath the candlelight as he spoke about how happy he was to see his family gathered together again. His voice carried a warmth that seemed almost out of place given the tension lingering around the table, but he appeared determined to savor the moment.

After that, conversation came in brief, strained attempts. Questions were asked out of courtesy rather than genuine interest, and most were answered with little more than a few clipped words before the silence returned.

Aemond and Helaena had since joined them, seated across the table from where she and Jace sat. Helaena seemed almost entirely detached from the evening, drifting in and out of conversation as though her thoughts were somewhere far away. She offered no judgment, no curiosity, barely even acknowledging her presence.

Aemond, however, had noticed her.

He had made no effort to hide it.

His attention lingered from across the table, his expression carefully composed, as if he was trying to decide what exactly he thought of her. There was no warmth in his gaze—not yet—but neither was there the outright disdain she had expected.

It was curiosity. And something else she couldn't quite place.

She caught him looking more than once, only for him to calmly return his attention to his plate as though he hadn't been watching her at all.

Jace noticed.

Of course he noticed.

His hand found hers beneath the table, his thumb brushing lightly over her knuckles in quiet reassurance.

"Don't mind him," he murmured.

She glanced toward Aemond again. "I wasn't sure if I should."

A faint smile tugged at Jace's mouth.

"That means he's interested."

She raised an eyebrow. "Interested?"

"In his own way."

The silence lingered until Viserys, ever eager to keep his family engaged, turned his attention back toward her.

"And tell me," he said warmly, "how are you finding King's Landing? It must be quite the change from what you are accustomed to."

She smiled politely. "It has been an adjustment, Your Grace. But I enjoy it. There is always something new to learn."

"A good answer from someone in your position," Viserys said with a pleased smile. "Jace tells me you are doing remarkably well with your studies."

Her cheeks warmed slightly.

"He is very generous."

"Not generous," Jace corrected quietly beside her. "Accurate."

A small smile passed between them.

Viserys looked delighted by the exchange. "And Stark & Co. is a fine place to gain experience. A demanding one, I imagine."

"It is," she admitted. "But I've learned more there than I could have imagined. The people I work with are brilliant, and they expect a great deal from me."

"As they should," Viserys replied. "Ambition is a wonderful quality when paired with dedication."

Across the table, Alicent lifted her glass.

"Indeed," she said smoothly. "Stark & Co. is an impressive placement. I imagine it helps to have the support of influential people when beginning one's career." 

The words were gentle, but the meaning beneath them was not.

Jace's expression shifted immediately.

She kept her composure, setting her fork down carefully.

"I've worked very hard for them, Your Grace," she replied, her tone calm. "But I am grateful for the opportunities I've been given."

Alicent's smile remained perfectly pleasant.

"Of course. I meant no offense."

Which, somehow, made the comment feel more deliberate.

Viserys, either unaware or unwilling to acknowledge the tension, continued with a fond smile.

"I think it is admirable. Too many young people are content to inherit what has been given to them. It is refreshing to see someone build something of their own."

Jace's hand found hers beneath the table, a quiet reminder that she wasn't facing the room alone.

"She earned it herself," Jace said firmly.

His voice remained calm, but there was no mistaking the conviction behind it.

"She was accepted in the autumn, when we had only just begun seeing each other. I had no influence over the decision—and even if I had, I would never have used it on her behalf."

His hand tightened around hers beneath the table.

"She is brilliant. Her work speaks for itself, and her accomplishments are hers alone."

Alicent offered a smile that did little to disguise her skepticism. She lifted her fork, taking her time as she brought it to her mouth, chewing thoughtfully before swallowing.

"Of course," she said at last, her tone perfectly pleasant. "I would never suggest otherwise. It is simply fortunate that such doors are available to those with the right circumstances."

Her gaze briefly flickered toward Jace before returning to her plate.

"But I am pleased to hear she has earned the respect of her colleagues. I'm sure Stark & Co. would not keep someone on their team who was not capable."

The compliment was carefully placed—just enough praise to make the insult impossible to challenge.

Then she returned to her meal, signaling that the matter was closed.

She glanced at Jace from the corner of her eye, letting out a quiet breath as he caught her gaze. His hand tightened gently around hers beneath the table, a silent reassurance that she wasn't facing the tension alone.

Maybe Aegon had been right.

Maybe she would need something to get her through the rest of the evening.

With a small exhale, her free hand reached for her wineglass.

***

When Jacaerys returned to their room that night, she was already settled in for the evening. Wrapped in a plush white robe, her hair fell freely over her shoulders, her makeup washed away as she lay sprawled across the bed, absently scrolling through her phone.

He lingered in the doorway for a moment, the lock clicking softly behind him as he took her in.

She was beautiful like this.

Not because she'd spent hours getting ready, or because she wore expensive dresses fit for palace dinners. There was something about seeing her at ease—comfortable enough to let the day fall away—that captivated him more than anything else.

She looked over her shoulder, catching him staring. A slow, knowing smile spread across her face.

"What?" she teased. "Why are you just standing there?"

"Just admiring the view," he replied, a grin tugging at his lips as he crossed the room.

She set her phone aside and shifted onto her knees, slipping her arms loosely around his neck as he stopped in front of her.

"You know," she murmured, "you're always looking at me like that."

"Can you blame me?"

She laughed, shaking her head.

"I swear, you're always trying to charm me."

He smiled, his hands settling gently at her waist.

"If only you didn't make it so easy."

She leaned forward until the bridge of her nose brushed gently against his, a long, weary sigh escaping her lips before she even realized she'd been holding it.

The knot that had settled in her chest throughout dinner began to loosen.

This was what she had needed all evening.

Him.

Jace smiled, his forehead coming to rest against hers.

"Tough night?"

She let out a quiet laugh.

"I think your uncle owes me an apology."

He chuckled softly. "For what?"

"For making me think he was exaggerating."

"...He wasn't?"

She shook her head.

"He somehow undersold it."

That earned a genuine laugh from him, warm and unguarded.

"I told you my family could be... complicated."

"'Complicated' feels like a generous word."

"It does, doesn't it?"

She smiled despite herself, her hands still loosely clasped behind his neck.

"I kept waiting for someone to flip the table."

"Give it until dessert tomorrow."

She groaned, hiding her face against his shoulder for a moment.

"You're joking."

"I wish I was."

She pulled back just enough to search his face, only to find the corners of his mouth twitching.

"You are joking."

"...Mostly."

She narrowed her eyes at him before laughing again, the last of the evening's tension finally dissolving.

"I'm sorry," he said more quietly, brushing a stray lock of hair behind her ear. "I know today wasn't exactly the warm welcome you deserved."

"It wasn't all bad."

"No?"

She shook her head.

"Your grandfather was lovely. Your brothers are sweet. Even Aegon was..." She paused, searching for the right word.

"Unexpected."

Jace laughed.

"That's probably the nicest thing anyone's ever called him."

She smiled, squeezing his hand.

"And I got to come back here with you."

For the first time that day, neither of them was thinking about the family waiting downstairs or the dinners still to come. The room was quiet, and that was more than enough. 

She closed the small distance between them, tilting her face up as her eyes met his. She didn't need to say a word; the hopeful smile tugging at her lips was invitation enough.

Jace smiled back immediately, understanding her without explanation.

"What?" he murmured, his voice warm with amusement.

"Nothing."

"Nothing?"

She shook her head, still smiling.

"I just wanted you a little closer."

His expression softened.

"I think I can manage that."

He cupped her cheek, his thumb brushing gently over her skin before leaning down to meet her halfway. Their lips met in a slow, lingering kiss, unhurried and familiar, carrying none of the uncertainty that had followed her throughout the evening.

When they finally pulled apart, he rested his forehead against hers, a quiet smile still lingering on his face.

"Better?" he asked.

"So much better," she whispered.

She smiled as she drew him closer, her fingertips brushing lightly along the back of his neck. He let out a quiet laugh, resting his forehead against hers for the briefest moment.

"Careful," he murmured, a teasing smile tugging at his lips. "Don't start something you can't finish."

She arched an eyebrow.

"Who said anything about not finishing?"

A grin spread across his face.

"I was hoping you'd say that."

He closed the distance between them, capturing her lips in another lingering kiss. She smiled into it, her hands settling comfortably around his shoulders as the last remnants of the day's tension finally slipped away.

When they parted, neither of them moved very far.

"I needed this," she admitted quietly.

"I know."

He brushed a loose strand of hair behind her ear, his thumb lingering against her cheek.

"We survived the first family dinner."

"Barely."

He laughed.

"Barely counts. The first of many."

She smiled, leaning into him once more.

"Promise me tomorrow won't be worse."

"I can't promise that," he said with an apologetic grin. "But I can promise you won't have to face it alone."

She looked at him for a long moment before pressing another gentle kiss to his lips.

"I think I can live with that. Now take me to bed.”

Jace smirked at her, his hands sliding around, shifting from her waist to her hips and around to grip her ass firmly in his palms.

“Don’t mind if I do.”

Her own fingers reached down, untying the belt of her robe until it fell open, her bare chest now flush against him. He smiled against her lips, helping her slide the material away from her shoulders until it landed on the bed behind her. 

Jace wasted little time before scooping her up and laying her across the bed. He took a moment then, standing over her and admiring the softness of her skin under the warm, low lighting emitting from the bedside lamp. She was bare, skin glistening and warm from the lotion she had just massaged into her flesh, hair fanned around her head like a halo.

“Are you just going to stare, or are you going to do something?” She asked impatiently, stretching herself out further under his gaze.

“Impatient, are we?” He responded with a chuckle, his hand reaching out to take hold of one of her ankles.

He raised it up, pressing her foot firmly to his chest as his eyes fell lower with a small, content smirk.

“Funny, isn’t it?” He said, “when you want me, I give you everything you need and more. When I want you, I’m left with my own two hands for relief.”

She pursed her lips, thighs drawing closer together.

“Well, if it’s that much of a bother–”

His fingers tightened around her ankle, pulling it further up onto his shoulder while his other hand pressed the other thigh open wider. He said nothing, eyes trained on her own as his lips turned to press a warm kiss to her inner ankle, just over that dragon tattoo.

He pressed slow, open mouthed kisses along the length of her leg, allowing it to slide further over his shoulder until his lips reached her inner thigh. She let out a soft gasp as he suckled at the flesh there, his tongue smoothing over the sensitive flesh and growing dangerously closer to where she began to glisten with desire.

“Is this what you want?” He asked huskily, his breath sweeping across her lips in soft, warm pants, “you want me?”

She nodded weakly.

“Yes, yes,” she whined, “I want you, Jacaerys.”

He grinned up at her, pressing one more kiss to her thigh before shifting his attention to where she wanted him most. 

Jace began with soft kisses up her slit, dragging his nose against her wetness and letting out a low groan at her scent. He glanced up at her through hooded eyes, lips curling into a wicked grin before he lowered his kiss to her clit. 

She released a quiet sound, lip tugged between her teeth to muffle her sounds–it may have been a large house, but she was not about to let her boyfriend’s entire family hear as he went down on her.

Then came his tongue, gently sweeping through her folds to collect her wetness. Jace’s moan vibrated against her as he buried himself deeper into her. His teasing was short lived, his face pressing closer and closer as he became more relentless in his motions. 

“Jace,” she whispered, fingers tangling in his dark curls to anchor herself, “oh–Jace, please.”

His lips curled against her, tongue sliding lower to circle her entrance before pressing against it, the movements of his head forcing the bridge of his nose to rub firmly against her bundle of nerves. 

She was already close when he pressed his index finger inside, lips returning to suck and kiss as her clit while his finger curled inside of her and prodded at that spongy spot that made her toes curl every time. 

“Jace–I’m going to–fuck.”

“Do it,” he murmured against her, “please, do it.”

His pleading brought it on, the warmth of her orgasm washing over her like a wave of relief. She released a series of soft whines and mewls, containing her pleasure for the sake of her own embarrassment the next day. 

Her fingers pulled him away from her, a moan falling from her lips as the pressure released.

“I’m not done,” he huffed, frowning at her.

“Yes you are,” she said, “I need you. Now.”

“Impatient, are we?” He chuckled as he allowed her to pull him up her body, caging her in against the mattress. 

“I’m impatient,” she agreed, fingers tugging at the fabric of his shirt, “and you’re overdressed.”

Her fingers eagerly worked on the buttons of his shirt until it hung loose around him. He pushed himself up to kneel on the mattress between her thighs, tugging the shirt down his arms and tossing it aside. Next, he unbuckled his belt and slid it free of his belt loops before it met the very same fate as his shirt–thrown across the room and landing unceremoniously in a heap in the corner. 

She reached out, raking her nails gently over the curve of his waist, the smooth muscular abdomen, and finally hooking into the button of his slacks. 

“I wanna taste you,” she hummed, eyelashes fluttering up at him flirtily.

His hands met her own, stopping her in her tracks.

“Next time,” he dismissed her, replacing her own hands in unfastening his pants and pushing them down his thighs, “I need to be inside you.”

She grinned up at him, laying back against the pillows in a silent excitement as she watched her boyfriend strip down, eyes soaking in every last inch of naked flesh until there was nothing left uncovered. 

After kicking away his boxers, he crawled back onto the bed, hands easily finding the backs of her thighs and raising them up to rest around his waist. Her core was ready–oozing and throbbing already as his tip slid through her folds with a gentle familiarity. They each released a soft sound as his tip rubbed against her clit, then slid back down to notch at her entrance.

A whine pulled from the back of her throat as the tip pressed just inside, her legs locking firmly around his waist and forcing his weight down on top of herself. Her lips traced open mouthed patterns along his neck as he slowly pushed further inside, a low rumble emitting from his chest when his hips suddenly pressed firmly to hers. 

“Fuck,” she moaned, fingernails pressing into his shoulder blades as he paused to allow her to adjust. 

“Yeah?” He asked breathlessly, a cocky grin appearing on his face as he took in her tight expression, “Like that?”

“Shut up,” she mumbled through a moan as he shifted his weight slightly, causing the slightest movement of pressure through her. 

His hips pulled back a touch, drawing himself free from her heat before plunging back inside. His tip punched into that spongy spot immediately, so deep inside of her that she almost felt him in her belly. 

It was his turn to curse aloud at the sensation of her tight walls squeezing around him, holding his member so firmly that he wasn’t sure that he could leave even if he wanted not–not that he wanted to anyway. 

“Faster.”

He obliged her, finding a quick, deep rhythm as one of his hands found her own, lacing their fingers together and pressing their conjoined hands to the pillow next to her head. His other hand worked to support his weight, laying flat against the sheets, while hers fisted his dark curls as she forced his lips back to her own, muffling their shared sounds of pleasure. 

Where she was often known by every relationship she’d ever had and some of her closest friends for her inability to keep quiet during sex, she’d never felt more indulged than with Jace, who was oftentimes just as loud as she was. She knew she would need to keep both of their mouths occupied if she wanted to save herself the humiliation of his mother and brothers overhearing from down the hall. 

The mattress creaked quietly with every other thrust, jerking each time Jace’s hips stuttered, an uneven and uncertain motion that signalled exactly how much longer he would last. His fingers rubbing at her clit in tight, quick circles to bring her there just in time for his own climax.

He came inside of her with a soft groan into her mouth, hips stuttering and slackening as the pleasure rolled through him. His orgasm was the trigger for her own, drawing a rush of heat and slick out from between her thighs with every one of those final sloppy movements as they each came down.

He laid on top of her for a few moments as they caught their breaths. 

“Was that alright?” He asked, brushing the hair away from her face.

“Good?” She asked with a small giggle, “I can hardly feel my legs.”

He chuckled, finally rolling off of her to collapse in a heap next to her.

“Next time,” he huffed, “we’re coming here alone, and I am going to make you scream and wail as much as you desire.”

She grinned at him, shifting to curl into his sweaty chest and draw soft patterns along his pec.

“Next time,” she paused to let out a few uneven breaths before she continued.

“Next time better come soon.”

tags: @cantbecreative @ghostreadersthings @cedsgirl @kooquetre

[lietogirlsss]

WHAT CAN I DO? (BUT THINK OF YOU)

modern!jacaerys velaryon x fem!reader

𝖘ummary: wherein you get kicked out from a bar trying to defend your boyfriend and he takes care of you in the aftermath.

𝖜arnings: swearing, drinking, drunk texting, mentions of kissing, kissing, non-sexual nudity, reader is lwk a sloppy drunk in this one, reader wears makeup, mentions of violence, mentions of hangovers, angst, jace and reader are whipped for eachother, jace calls reader beautiful, gorgeous, and darling, fluffy ending!!!

𝖆uthor's note: a oneshot nobody asked for but i was watching an episode of b99 and thought of this idea (thanks peraltiago) lmk if i missed any tags pls THANK UUU (divider by the lovely @cursed-carmine)

Jace’s eyes narrowed on the clock that hung above him.

He’s been shamefully staring at it for two hours, watching the seconds tick by like little grating taunts as he sat at the kitchen counter patiently waiting for the pizza he ordered to arrive. The slick, summer air hung around his apartment like an unwanted house guest, the fan you bought specifically to beat the heat was working on over time. It has been since the beginning of summer, especially when Jace ran as hot as he did. You’d all just broken free from the shackles of finals, weeks of immense preparation, tears, redbulls, and late nights were finally over.

Which is why you were out with his cousins at this very moment, no doubt making friends with patrons minding their own business or obliterating people at pool while he stayed home, eager to spend the rest of the night watching last night’s football game eating stuffed-crust pizza with an egregious amount of pepperoni on top.

That is, if it would ever arrive.

He lazily rakes his face as his eyes traipse around your shared apartment, the absurd amount of magnets on the fridge from different countries you’ve never been to but have dreamed of traveling to ever since you started dating, the blue polka-dotted umbrella standing next to his plain one by the rack, the colorful flower-shaped mug that was left to dry by the sink. Evidence of you in his apartment never failed to put a sickeningly lovestruck grin on his face.

As childish as it may seem, he could look at a pile of your laundry on the floor and probably giggle.

He’s gotten enough shit from Luke as it is.

He was mindlessly scrolling on his feed to kill time when suddenly a text from you popped up before his eyes. When he opened your message, he got a glimpse of what he was in for for the rest of the night.

You

JAAAAAACE. I moss ypu SO MUCH.

Whatta handsome looking fella ypubare

:((

Rhe drinks hereeee are soo good they dont even taste like drinks

WHAT. No i meabn they tazte super gooddd

If I wss a frog with onee leg woulf you still kiss mr and gelp turn me back into a pribcess?

I miss joff and luke :(((

im not drunk btw!!! I RAN STRAUGHT LINES and i can still sibg the alpgabet backwards.

Jace couldn’t help but snort at what he was reading.

You

icansee you lurking.

Jace

hey beautiful, having fun?

You

YESSSS. SO MUCH FUN.

i missvyou :((

Jace

miss you moree

make sure you’re eating enough, yeah?

You

stpp im gunna cry

youre sobsweet

:((

imgunnakiss ypu later

Jace

im flattered gorgeous, really

say hi to baela and rhaena for me

You

OKAYY IBWILL!

A very long and loud voice message was sent next, consisting of intermittent pauses, giggles, and the sound of you and his cousins singing along to the tunes at the bar before it ended right before Rhaena could finish asking you whether or not you guys should order more shots. He doubted it was sent on purpose.

Ever since he introduced you to the rest of his family, they have become borderline obsessed with you. Jace had no problem believing it considering you were a joy to be around, you helped Luke with asking a girl he liked out, you helped Joffrey complete a 2000 piece lego set in just one day, and helped his mother plan for his 22nd birthday party. A perfectly concealed, perfectly executed surprise dinner with custom cocktails, his childhood favorite food, and banners with his achromatic, two year-old face strung on them all across the room.

Wars could be waged and won over who loved you more and he would lose. He didn’t mind the slightest.

Jace was brought out of his stupor by a knock on the door. He leapt from his spot on the couch, payment in hand, and ran to the door. He took the pizza box out of the pizza guy’s hands, paid him, thanked him, and shut the door, eager to devour the pizza in its entirety.

Soon, the football game was almost over- the King’s Landing Dragons were a point away from winning the entire match. But the same couldn’t be said for the pizza, he breezed through it long before his favorite player helped close the tie between their team and the rival team. But then, as he took a swig of beer, his phone rang. Jace picked it up and saw that it was your caller ID that flashed on the screen.

“Hello?”

“Jaceee,” You sang on the phone, the grin in your voice so evident he couldn’t help but let out a laugh.

“You doing okay over there?” He wonders, eyes still glued to the TV.

You hummed in response. “Doing sooooo fine,” you drawled out. “But Baela told me to call you cuz she can’t drive you home.”

You giggled.

“I mean drive me home! My bad.” You exclaimed before snorting in laughter. “Cuz she’s mean.”

And then, there was a tussle on your end of the call that sounded awfully like Baela snatching the phone from you. Jace waits patiently before another voice comes on.

“Jace?”

“Baela?” He asks, frowning. “What's wrong?”

“Why do you always assume something’s wrong?”

Jace raises an eyebrow as he slowly sits up on the couch. “I don’t know, when has a call from you while you’re with Rhaena and my girlfriend ever resulted in good news?”

“Okay, alright, I can see your point. But still, it’s incredibly offensive.”

“Baela.” Jace prompted.

“So funny story, the uhh- bar kicked us out.” Baela replied.

“HI JACE!” Another voice yelled out from the background. One that he presumed belonged to Rhaena.

“What? why?” He continued, his dark brows screwing together in both fear and confusion.

“A couple of guys from your major were talking shit about you.” Baela says plainly, her tone devoid of any lightness it had since the conversation began. “We were by the bar and we overheard. She poured her drink over one of the guys and threatened to stab another one of them in the eye with her heel after they called you and your brothers names... then Rhaena threw peanuts at them.”

Jace’s jaw slacked, the information forced to settle in his brain abruptly. He nodded, pressing his fingers into his eyes. “Is she okay? Are you guys okay?”

“Yeah, yeah we’re fine.” Baela answered with a sigh. “Listen, I wouldn’t call you if I could drive her home, I really wouldn’t. It's just that she doesn't want to get in the car, and she’s been talking about you nearly the entire night to anyone who’d listen-”

Jace is already standing up and shutting the TV off while simultaneously throwing on his jacket. “-Alright, alright. Just hang on yeah? I’ll be there in a bit.”

“Okay, take care.” Baela says.

“Could you put her on please?” He says before tripping over Vermax’s daybed, cursing under his breath.

Baela hummed. “Of course.”

“Hellooo?” You say after a beat.

“Hey beautiful,” Says Jace, running back to the coffee table to get the keys to your apartment. “I’m coming to get you, sit tight alright?”

“Really?” You wonder excitedly.

He shook his head in amusement as he jammed his feet into his shoes by the door, your own shoes that lay beside his toppled unceremoniously. “Yeah, I'll be ten minutes tops.“

“Okayyy, see you in ten minutes!” You tell him. “Love youuu.”

“I love you more,” he grinned, jogging down the hallway. “Bye.”

“Byeeee.”

And then the line fell silent as you ended the call. Jace rushed to the stairs instead of the elevator, taking two steps at a time before he reached his car. In no time he was maneuvering it outside of its parking spot and speeding down the street in hopes to get to you in under ten minutes- like he promised. Which would put him in a sticky situation because the drive was roughly 17 minutes long.

Jace tried to ignore the sound of his mother’s disapproving sigh reverberating throughout the back of his mind every time he sped past a red light, but when he arrived at the bar and saw you and his cousins waiting on the curb he felt less guilty about it.

“There he is!” Says Rhaena, pointing at Jace’s convertible before losing her balance and being caught by you and Baela before she could fall and eat concrete. You laughed at her as much as she laughed at her own actions as Baela sighed.

“Rhaena! Be careful, gods!”

“I’m like so careful… you be careful!”

“Alright, let’s… let’s keep each other safe. Hold my hand.”

“Okay.”

Jace turned his car off and stepped out. His eyes locked with Baela’s who stood beside you and Rhaena, still giggling to each other. “Hey,” says Jace.

“Hey,” Baela replied, throwing him a faint smile. “That was quick.”

“Didn’t feel like it.” He replied honestly before you practically launched yourself onto him, he stumbled at the impact but ultimately regained his footing, his arm snaking around your waist to steady you.

“You’re here!” You gasped, almost choking him.

“Yep, I'm here.” Jace laughed, breathing in your scent. “Didn’t take too long did I?”

“Noo, you were quick, super quick. Didn’t even notice.” You assured him, pulling away to look at him, even managing to fix his hair in your drunken state. “You didn’t brush your hair did you?”

“No,” he shook his head.

“Why?”

“Cuz I had to get here, to pick you up. Couldn’t keep you waiting can I?”

“I knew it,” you nodded, a coy smile slowly appearing on your lips. “you wanna take me home already cuz you looove me, you want to hug me, kiss me and date me-”

“Alright, i’ll take it from here.” Jace interjects, looking at Baela who tries to contain her laughter with a hand clasped over her mouth. “Thank you, really- for watching over her, you’re literally the best cousin ever.”

“Hey!” Rhaena whined, her eyes threatening to close as she leaned against Baela like a wilted stalk of celery. “Still here!”

“Come on, we best be on our way too.” Baela says, positioning her sister to stand upright before glancing back at Jace. “I’ll see you guys around campus?”

“Uh-huh,” Jace replies, opening the door to the passenger side of his car. “Goodnight, thank you, again.”

“Don’t mention it.” Baela smiled before she guided Rhaena to her car, parked just ways off the entrance to the bar.

Once Jace got you in your seat and buckled in, you guys were on the road in no time. He kept glancing at you every now and then to check if you were still awake or not dry-heaving, maybe a little too frequently. So much so that you managed to pick up on it more than halfway into your journey.

“You know you’re supposed to keep your eyes on the road and not me, right?” You muttered to him all of a sudden, catching him red-handed. "We're going to crash and maybe die.”

“I know,” Jace answered before turning on his blinker as he switched lanes.

You frowned. “Okay, but you’re looking at me more than the road.”

Jace nodded. “Yup.”

“Why?”

“Just making sure you’re not seconds away from passing out,” He smiled, glancing at you for a second. “And also just because."

“But I'm wide awake... and I feel like i've never been this awake in my life ever.” You answered, playing with the button that controlled the car window. "But if I fall asleep it's gunna be a really big problem."

"Exactly, because it means I'll have to carry you up three flights of stairs."

You giggled. “Yeah, cuz you looooove me.”

He only laughed in response.

As he turned to look at you properly now, he realized it was almost like your face was born to be illuminated by a dozen brake lights and warm street lamps, the ochres and vermillions in scattered rays across your face defining your features. You sighed then, as you looked up ahead.

“I’m not drunk, alright? You can stop looking at me.” You assure him, prodding his shoulder with your finger. “I promise.”

“I believe you.” Jace snorts, casting you a sidelong glance that makes you frown at him, groaning at his obvious lie.

“What?! I do, honest to the Gods! You’re as sober as Aegon gets on a Friday night after any minor inconvenience, I swear it, darling.”

“So you’re not mad?” You asked him sheepishly, carefully eyeing his expression as he made a u-turn.

It takes him a second to answer. A second too long.

“They were saying horrible things about you, I couldn’t let them get away with it-”

“What matters is that you’re alright.” Jace interjected softly, your defense dying on your tongue as you sat up properly. “I don’t give a shit about what they have to say about my family, much less me. I've heard it all my life.”

“You didn’t even answer the question.” You humphed. Another pause, the only sounds that could be heard were the amalgamation of cars honking, the whirring engine, and the faint melody of an indie rock song playing on the radio.

“A little.” He answered honestly. “But I’d like to believe that over time I learned not to let it affect me as much. I know who I am, I know I’m not like the things they say about me. In the long run, it's all inconsequential.”

“You should’ve heard them.” You insisted, folding your arms over your chest. The lilt in your voice is gone, Jace notices. “Laughing while they insulted you, thinking they’d get away with it.”

“Lucky you were there to defend my image then.”

“So lucky.”

You and Jace shared a quiet chuckle.

“I was mad.” You confessed after a moment’s pause, your head lolling back to the seat. “When they called you those names. I- It was like… there were bees in my head, drowning out the noise of the bar. All I could feel… all I could think about was the fact that they needed to know how wrong they were. About you.”

Jace looked at you earnestly, his gaze softening.

“Because I know you, I know you inside out. I know you better than anybody in King’s Landing. I couldn’t let them go on about their day thinking they can spread these lies about you and not get away with it. I couldn’t.” you continued quietly, still looking straight into his eyes as he slowed to a stop in front of your apartment.

He knew you weren’t exaggerating, despite being as inebriated as you are, you were telling the truth. Even while your speech slurred and your eyes turned glassy from both fervent emotion and tiredness, he knew you were telling him the truth. Jace believed you, and slowly a surge of melancholy grabs hold of his throat before he is made aware of it; tightening and tightening as he listens to you talk– every word professed served as a reminder of why exactly he loved you as much as he did.

“You aren’t entitled- you’re the most hardworking person i’ve ever met.” You say, shaking your head. “You aren’t selfish either… or proud, or conceited. They could never measure up to the man you are now, not even if they try their hardest.” You declared, voice rising to a decibel that nearly made Jace flinch. But he didn’t mind, he didn’t let it show.

“Thank you.” Jace replies, not wasting a second more. “For defending me.”

“Of course.” You answered, beaming at him as he grabbed your hand and placed a kiss on your knuckle. “I always will, even if it means I have to deck somebody in the face.”

“Or threaten to stab somebody in the eye with your heel?”

“That too.” You add, making him laugh through his nose. “I won’t ever let anybody talk about you like that. Because wh- who are they to talk about you like they’ve known you for the last five years of your life? They weren’t held by you when they flunked their final paper while they cried for hours, they weren’t caught in a downpour on the way home from Dragonstone and had to take shelter in a bait and tackle shop with you, they didn’t spend three days with you in the hospital after they got food poisoning which almost made you miss your baby brother’s birthday party.”

“You’re making me sound like some saint.”

You shook your head at him in utter dissent before reaching out to cup his jaw. “I’m not praising you because you’re my boyfriend, I'm praising you because you’re one of the kindest, selfless, and compassionate people I know.”

“Am I?”

“Yes.”

“Then it takes one to know one.” Jace replied, resolute. “I’m not saying I tolerate violence but nobody’s ever stood up for me like that before, much less my drunk girlfriend on a night out with my cousins.”

“I know,” You nodded, grinning alongside him. “And she’d do it a thousand times over if it meant that you’ll always feel like someone’s got your back.”

For another moment, neither of you said anything, quietly revelling in the words that were shared, allowing their profound weight to settle within you.

“Gods,” Jace began. “what did I do to deserve you?”

“I don’t know,” You managed before yawning. “Maybe you were a valiant prince that sacrificed himself for the sake of his kingdom in another life.”

Jace laughed another time, the way his upturned lips formed a triangle as he turned to look ahead of you, his shoulders jerking up and down. “That’s ridiculous, darling.”

“What?!? It's a possibility!”

“There’s no way.” He said turning to look away and then turning back at you with an accusatory look and a smile that reached ear to ear. “Me?”

“Yeah, you.”

“Come off it.”

“I’m serious.” You say, shooting him a lopsided smile. “You have to believe me.”

He rolled his eyes. “Alright, alright. Sure, whatever.”

You laughed in victory.

The journey up to your apartment wasn’t a pretty sight, not when you tripped over air and stumbled on the steps so many times that Jace had to carry you on his back the rest of the way. The sounds of you telling him to be a better horse as he shushed you filled the halls. Eventually when he got to your apartment, he fumbled with the keys twice before carrying you in and dropping you on the couch.

“Where’s Vermax?” You wondered, frowning at the empty dog bed that lay by the coffee table, the dirty sock monkey the dog favored lay face down, motionless.

“He’s at Mum’s remember? At the Red Keep Estate,” He answers you, filling a glass of water. “It's just until finals are over.”

“Oh, right.” You murmured before sitting up to take the glass of water and downing it in three gulps.

You then expressed your interest in going to the bathroom in order to freshen up and Jace ran after you before you could body slam into the bathroom door, furious that the door handle wouldn’t open for you, claiming it had purposefully barred you from entering. Turns out it was just locked. He helped you remove your makeup and nearly squirted micellar water into your nose. You brushed your teeth and then he then helped you remove your clothes and get into the shower which then led to a ten-minute conversation about how utterly devastating it was that his grandfather’s second wife and his mother used to be best friends before he remarried and turned her into a trad-wife that routinely reposts facebook posts about the faith of the seven.

He was convinced you shed a tear somewhere in between calling his grandfather a sick bastard and ranting about how Alicent and Rhaenyra should’ve ran away and boarded a ferry that sailed to Essos.

When you were done showering, he helped you into your pajamas and tucked you in. He then crawled into bed beside you as you stared at the glimmering city of King’s Landing outside, its tall buildings, rolling hills, and busy streets entranced you.

“You asleep yet?” He asked, plugging his charger into his phone. It lit up, depicting a picture of the both of you inside a photobooth grinning candidly before it faded to black again.

“No,” You mumbled. “About to though.”

“Don’t fight it, go to sleep. You’ve had a long day today.”

“I’m not fighting it.”

“Yes you are, you’re fighting it because you still want to talk to me.” Jace noted, making you roll your eyes. It didn’t make it any less untrue.

“1 hour lunch breaks aren’t enough.” You insisted, watching him turn around to face you. “Sue me.”

“We live together.”

You grinned cheekily. “Still not enough.”

“You’re impossibly stubborn.” He intoned in disbelief.

“Yeah, but you like me.” You teased, a childish giggle erupting from you as he grinned, trying to hide the fact that he blushed.

He nodded along. “Gods, who told you?”

“I knew it ever since you went with me on that Haunted Maze ride during sophomore year, you were so terrified I think you were about to piss your pants-”

“-Okay that is not what happened,” He declared almost scandalized. “And also I liked you way before that, at Oscar Tully’s halloween rager, freshman year. I was too scared to ask you out.”

Your jaw dropped, but you didn’t move from your spot. “You and Cregan went as Anakin and Obi-Wan. Oh my gods! I remember now! ” you exclaimed.

“Yeah,” he snorted. “You were hanging out with one of your friends that majors in Fine Arts. I saw you from across the room and all I could really think about was that your smile was so pretty and your costume was witty and sort of genius.”

“Awwww,” You crooned. “That’s disgustingly adorable.”

“I know, I know. I’m whipped.” He admitted shamelessly, gazing into your eyes so tenderly it almost made you melt, even now with a mixture of alcohol flooding your system. A very familiar warmth spreads throughout your limbs and face, not from the alcohol but from Jace.

“So whipped.” You emphasized before yawning.

His tongue checks in his mouth. “Go to sleep, already.”

“You go to sleep.” You protest in return.

“Close your eyes.” Jace insisted, reaching out to cover your eyes before you swatted his arm away from your face. “You’ll be complaining about not getting enough sleep and that your hangover's a thousand times worse because of it and you’ll blame me for not making you sleep earlier.”

“I’m not getting a hangover because I'm really not drunk. We’ve been over this, Jace.” You sighed. “For a political science major you can be daft sometimes.”

Now it was him that yawned. “I’ll choose to ignore that because it is way too early in the morning for me to defend my course.”

“See!” You scowled playfully at him. “You bluetoothed your sleepiness to me.”

“Nice try, but I don’t think that’s a thing, beautiful.”

You giggle as you turn around, facing the wall of your bedroom as one of his hands snake around your waist pulling you closer to him in his embrace. A moment of silence settles easily into the marrow of the air that smelt like fresh laundry and lavender, the rest of the world seeming so far away, so out of touch.

“Thank you, for taking care of me.” You tell him quietly, suddenly, it caught Jace by surprise.

“I like taking care of you, I’ll always take care of you.” He answered with a voice equally as quiet, equally as sincere.

“Even if it becomes rotten work?”

“Not even then.” He answered earnestly as he placed a soft kiss on your temple. “Especially not then.”

It wasn’t long before you fell asleep with Jace following you soon after, arms caging you in a warm embrace that you’d both find yourselves entrapped in until sunlight painted your room in soft amber hues the following morning.

You defended him and he took care of you. Your love couldn’t possibly be measured by those three words alone, but by the way you stood up for each other, moved by faith and devotion over the years you’ve known the other. It transcended words. Even when it needed one of you to bare some teeth or bleed dry for the other, you’d do it. And that was all that mattered.

taglist: @dylsvqid @inkedcerulean @stfu-rina @maddsballerina @this-gave-pidgeon-further-shock @adriansideas @miumiuitgrl @mccardswife @toeoffrog @emilly-adopted-mcmann @childof333 @readersofthelostarc @inkedcerulean @jacaerysblog @mila-beanz @velyssara

[childof333]

FATE LED ME TO YOU

pairing: jacaerys velaryon x red priestess!reader

synopsis: when walking along the coast of Pentos, you find a foreign man washed ashore and are torn between two choices.

author’s note: first time writing fan fiction so i hope you guys like it! this will probably be multiple parts as well! btw my grammar might not be the best..

wc: 384

The beach seemed different today. Ship wreckage lay all around, netting was everywhere, and lastly there was a man lying still at the shoreline of the sea. Sparking your interest, you walk closer to him. 

As you make your approach, the first thing you notice is the beauty of the man's face lying before you. How gorgeous he was you thought. Dark brown tussles of hair, high cheekbones, a sharp jawline, yet his skin held a tone of pallor. His clothes were of otherworldly design, black leather with intricate patterning, possibly a Westerosi noble of sort.    Yet that begs the questions—how did he end up here, along the coast of Pentos? A question that seemed to linger in your mind.    At last, your eyes halted upon the sight of three jagged arrows jutting out from his body, all at sharp angles. One at his neck. A second along his right shoulder blade. The third is just above where his heart lies.    With regard to his wounds, you cautiously drag his body further up shore, onto looser sand and away from prying eyes. Looking upon him once more, you knew he was dead. It was impossible to survive such wounds as his. However, you couldn't help but feel a sort of sadness overcome you at the thought that this man had once lived, had a family, and was left to the gulls and crabs in a land foreign to him. That he was no more than a mere memory in one's slowly decaying mind.    Taking in the salty air, you release yourself from those horrid thoughts. Glancing towards the Great Red Temple of R'hllor, otherwise known as the Lord of Light, and your chosen God. You thought of 'The Last Kiss'. A rite of resurrection, that a man could rise once again if the Lord of Light granted such a blessing, was whispered throughout countless centuries and used as a glimpse of hope. Yet to the red priests and priestesses of R'hllor it was a sacred act, one forged with fire, blood, and ancient scriptures.    Now you had a choice to make, you could leave this man, who was already dead, on this very beach—or you could try to save him and learn why you felt such a pull towards this mystery man. 

[eldrith]

sea legs jacaerys velaryon

“you’d miss me, if some other man were the one to take me.” “i’d only regret not being the one to take you myself.” 

jacaerys velaryon x fem!pirate!reader words: 7.5k

notes: hey im still on painkillers & recovering from the break but i had this ready in the drafts! this is an au, as requested - jace & everyone is aged up to around 24 so the timeline is whatever u want it to be - but several years after the dance, rhaenyra sits the throne; baela & jace were never engaged & she rules driftmark. reader's character is v v loosely inspired by korra the cruel ! description of reader is intended to avoid physical features.

warnings: brutally unedited. suggestive content. fair amount of euphemisms. brief mentions of bondage lol. cocky prince jace & confident reader & flirting that's all.

masterlist

“I RECALL YOU ONCE INSISTING TO ME THAT YOU NEVER POUT.” 

Jacaerys does not turn at the voice, though it reaches him rather clear and thin, even across the wind that’d been whipping since dusk began its gradual bleeding into the sea. He stands now at the prow of his flagship, eyes laid upon the horizon where that last dying wound of day seeps red into blackening water, dipping and swaying with the rocking of the bow, crashing itself relentless upon the waves.

His smirk betrays him first, at the playful tease, only in a faint twitch quickly smothered by tightening of jaw; rather unbecoming, he thinks, of a man playing so earnestly at solemnity this evening. 

“I don’t,” he tells his cousin, a lie plain as any he’s told, when she finds him at the rail with her arms crossed to mirror his own stance. Her cloak snaps against the wind with the mainsail overhead, and he needs not look upon her visage to know what grows there; that old teasing grin, an unconscious mimicry so oft shared between them even after all these years, remaining from a childhood spent trading mockeries back and forth between the Red Keep and Dragonstone and the salt-dried halls of Driftmark. 

He shares the grin anyway, and turns his eyes back to the bleeding sea.

A year and a half, he has sailed these waters in earnest now; ever since his mother, from her seat upon a throne of a thousand dragonmelded swords, pressed the command of half the Velaryon fleet and half her own into his hands and told him that a prince who wishes to keep a realm in the future must first keep his own sea lanes safe. Duty, to some. A chore, he rather thought it was, for the first few moons.

Trouble breeds thickest here, in this scattering of world between two great continents; scrapped by listless gods and haunted by freebooters and their merchant-thieving ships. His mercy in it, beyond learning to love the sea the way his father once did, has been Baela; the Lady of Driftmark runs her ship twin to his through their campaign of squall and fog alike, and hers is familiar enough a presence now that he no longer has to hold his grief alone on the longer nights, nor his laughter on the easier ones. 

It has been, for some time now, an interspersed life: when he is not on Dragonstone or King’s Landing, he is instead upon the sea – imbued with storms that swallow the sky, blooded skirmishes fought by torchlight, drowned sailors fished up bloated from cold waters bearing the mark of the Butcher of Tyrosh; all of the endless grey business of regulating a strait that kneels to no crown at all, however many dragons might darken its sky. 

A year and a half, too, of her. 

With half-rueful eyes, Jacaerys glances to the distant black rocks scattering the dead horizon. A woman he has chased across half these waters and never once truly caught, who has put more nicks in his pride than any blade nor war arrow has ever put in his skin, who haunts these crossings and his sleep alike enough so that he hears her laugh folded into the crash of every wave against black cliff, finds her shape waiting in every shadow he lets his eyes rest on a moment too long. Worse - he tastes salt on his own mouth some nights and wonders, absurd as it is, whether she might taste of the very same thing. 

It is a bad habit to keep, his father told him once, over a decade gone; a horrible habit, wanting of someone who would sooner choose the sea over him. Still, he keeps it. 

“Yet here you are,” Baela chides then, drawing him back to the bow, “our fearless captain, undoubtedly pouting at the horizon.” 

Her voice lilts a half-teased tone that needles him just as well as his brothers’ once did - as it always does - without mercy. She leans her elbows upon the railing, silver hair drug loose of its braid in the wind, the scaled clasp of her cloak glinting before the wind steals the gleam of it away. “You do it every crossing, Jace. One might assume you’re actually hoping.” 

It is, perhaps, a curse to be known this well by someone who has watched you grow into yourself, mistake by foolish mistake.

Jace pushes off the rail, jaw laced only faintly, and wets his lips against the salt already drying there, bitter and vexed as a wound freshly prodded. 

“I'm hoping,” he corrects, glancing at her sidelong against the burning wreck of the sky, “that we find the Butcher of Tyrosh before the moon turns.” 

“Mm.” Baela does not look convinced, and Jace finds that he hardly blames her; for after the war years past, after all they’ve seen and endured and buried – still, after all this time, he has no honest label for the thing that keeps his eyes fastened to these particular black rocks, searching, against every instinct bred into him since the cradle, for a shadow he has come to indeed hope he’ll find.

SHE COMES FOR HIS FLAGSHIP ONLY ONE NIGHT LATER. 

It is, by any sane reckoning, a rather absurd decision – his ship rides full-crewed and three vessels at her wake besides, and there is nothing aboard worth the taking but Velaryon steel and supply, which she has no need of, and Targaryen pride, which she has never once shown the slightest interest in owning. If she is feeling particularly reckless, which she so oft is, there is also his composure – which she has made a fine and patient study of these past twelvemonth and more, cracking into him like a crabber to a kingshell, shameless and only for the singular pleasure of watching his face while she does it.  

Jacaerys hears her first, come nightfall. She arrives to him as a laugh, threading soft through fog-dripped dark whilst he sits the quarterdeck above his own cabin, charts spread beneath a tallowed wax candle. The sound raises the hair along his neck just as distant thundercrash might, and he is on his feet with a hand already at his sword hilt before he’s finished registering the sound. 

“Careless of you,” she says, landing light on the balls of her feet not ten paces off. Her cutlass is already loose of its sheath, with its old fine steel – stolen, she’d once bragged him, from a slaver who’d had no more use for fine things – catching what moon there is like a second, slyer smile. “Leaving your flank so open, Prince. Anyone might slip aboard.” 

Battle-learned instinct finds him swift as he sizes her against his own admittedly off-guard self. He is taller, certainly – and broader through the shoulder, the muscles of him drawn firm by moons of hauling line, sailing, riding Vermax; alas, his paces are few but firm as he crosses the deck toward her now, strength and height at least nominally his advantage, for he is drawn less by danger and more by something much less sensible. 

“Anyone didn’t.” He draws his sword slow as he speaks, unhurried in his movement – rushing at her has never once worked, and he has made enough a fool of himself trying before. “You did. Again.” 

He ought to call the deckhands, his guards, his men – Baela even, with her savvy eye and sharp triggerfinger; But he does no such thing, only pacing close enough to glimpse the glint of small stolen jewelry thread wild in her hair, the breath of bare skin as the moonlight coils in little tidepools along her collarbones. 

She circles him now, so very unbothered by his drawn sword, close enough now that he can make out the faint seam of a scar along one brow – a story he’d asked after the first time it’d appeared, yet never once gotten the truth of – and the wicked curve of her mouth that has haunted far more nights than he’d admit. 

“You know,” she murmurs, slinking close enough for him to grip the hilt of his sword, “for a man who commands the strongest fleet and allegedly flies a sky-beast besides, you’re remarkably poor at detecting one woman in a rowboat.” 

His pride, perhaps, takes the smallest wound. “You haven’t sailed that rowboat in a year,” he counters, tipping his head. “I believe I burned it, somewhere off the Grey Gallows. Did I not?” 

Her eyes drop then, traitorous as his own had been only a moment past, tracing slow along the cut of his doublet, the breadth of his shoulders; eyes, reading a coastline it means to plunder.

“You noticed, did you?” Her voice is sharp in tongue as she is in wit, and something in the low murmur collects within his ribs, a stirring beast lifting its head.

“I notice everything about you,” he says well before he can think better of the saying of it, and then watches something flicker startled behind her eyes before her grin rises up to swallow it whole, quick as a wave of sediment folding atop a fool’s cast coin.  

“Careful, Prince,” she chides, circling him once more. “A woman could get ideas, saying things like that.” 

He let his own mouth curve, just slightly; eighteen moons of this has taught him this much, too: She likes the fight better when he gives as good as he gets, and her eyes go brightest not when he surrenders but when he matches blow for blow and word for word. And he is no fool, besides. He has seen how her eyes track him, how they linger upon his lips or jaw on the evenings he forgoes a shave, how they trace along his hands far longer than any true pillaging might require.

“You’ve had ideas about me since the second time we crossed blades,” he parries, lifting a faint brow. “No need to pretend otherwise.” 

Her lashes flutter, just once; a small, betraying warmth blooms then across her cheeks, amusing as it is rewarding to witness. Jace imagines frost, finally give way on a pane of glass after a man has been breathing on it for the better part of ages, and he smirks.

“It’s why you keep coming back,” he presses, voice piercing the shamed quiet that followed his previous words, turning with her slow circling now; two hawks, riding the same updraft. “Not for the coin – you never take mine, though you know well enough I’ve plenty of it to spare.” His head tilts, some faint echo of Vermax’s own considering gaze, curbing away the clawing grin that threatens his visage. “Not even the sport of it, not truly. I begin to wonder if you merely miss me, when you’re off robbing lesser men.” 

She hums, low, a sound gentle enough to soften the crash of water against his hull, though the sea remains merciless in its violence far below.

“You make me wonder the very same of you, Prince, when you’re off hunting lesser marauders.”

“It is true of me,” he admits plainly, and feels a small, unworthy satisfaction watching her flinch minutely – the way she never flinches from steel, though she flinches always from this – before she must cover it with a laugh that does not manage to reach the whole way into her glittering eyes. And, just as he expected, this proves well more than enough for her to excuse the restlessness he sees living in the flutter of her trouser legs, the twitching regrip of her cutlass.

She lunges then, testing him first the way their dance always begins. And he, as the tide turns, parries back.

It comes clean, far more conversaton than any true intent of killing. He catches her blade with his own and their steel sing bright into the dark, moonlight winking upon the curve of both her smile and her blade’s, and his own grin grows, improper as it is, at the prospect of a proper spar. Gods, he’s missed her this last fortnight. 

They’re close now, enough so that her hair carries the scent of orange rind, the fruit the Tyroshi crate and sell in high summer, strange against the salt of everything else about her, and he finds himself craving it in a small, weak moment; for her sweetness comes rather absurd for a woman who has spent the better part of a decade sleeping under canvas and burning slaver galleys down to the waterline. It is a scent he has come to think of, against his better senses, as belonging to her as the tide belongs to the moon. 

“You're slow tonight,” she breathes, dragging their blades low as she presses in, closing distance enough that a stranger, or a smarter man, would already have steel through her belly. He does no such thing.

“You’re rather reckless,” he answers, leaning nearer instead of away. “Boarding my ship, alone, in the middle of a hunt you know I’ll never call off.” He lets his mouth slide into a small, falsened pout, gazing down at her with lidded eyes. “And all for what? To prove you still can?” 

Her eyes glint with moonlight just like the water beneath them, mist curling loose the strands at her temples – and she is, he thinks, a rather splendid vision to find waiting on a man’s own deck in the hour of the Eel, wrapped in salt-worn fabric and leather laced wonderfully close at the waist. Both their blades have gone slack at their sides now, abandoned for the sharper sparring of tongues instead.

“To prove I still want to,” she corrects, and wets her lips slow enough that he loses entirely the thread of whatever he’d intended to say next. A sensation blooms, one he only ever lets live in these clashing moments of steel and word and empty threat – and it comes sudden and total as a wave closing over a man who has forgotten how to swim. 

“Don’t you ever wonder that, Jace?” she hums, furrowing her brow in some wonderfully mocking concern of her own. “Whether you still want to? All this time, and you’ve never once actually closed the net.” 

He is not sure which net, in particular, she speaks of now; for in her hand is her blade, but in her eyes is something far brighter and certainly more salacious. His own eyes betray his focus, dipping once more to the revealing cut of her collar before rising, chastened, to find hers again. She only tilts her head, that wicked grin deepening into his wounded pride like a pressed bruise. 

His swallow comes thick, lamented by his suddenly upticked heartbeat as licks of want roll through him in a familiar, persistent desire. “I’ve closed nets on cleverer women than you.” 

He means the words to irritate her perhaps, or, more honestly, to coax something like jealousy loose in her; though both attempts fail alike, for she only laughs, a plume of sweet breath blossoming in the cold air between them, gone before he can even taste it.

“Is that so?” a boldness that has nothing at all to do with the blades still hanging forgotten between them, stepping near enough that her breath ghosts warm against his windburned cheek. “I might inform you, Prince – you’ll need a much larger net if you mean to come out on top tonight.”

He only watches her, wary now of the smirk spreading slow across her mouth beneath his evident confusion. 

It’s when her hand rises – and indeed he might be a fool, for if she had come tonight to kill him, she’d have easily done it in that very breath – to grasp at his jaw, fingers strong but cool and shockingly soft of touch, that his resolve shudders. Heat blooms upon his skin, so greedy for her touch even as her fingers dig into the hollow beneath his cheekbones; and, with strength he will likely dwell upon much later in the dark, she drags his head to the side to glimpse round the mizzen mast’s large oaken shadow in the dark. 

What lingers there, in the very far distance, is a ship; black sails, tethered with maroon and purple, rocking with the tide’s slow breath, perched sneakily just within his fleet’s wake. 

“Maneater,” Jace breathes, jerking free of her grip, glare sharpened now that embarrassment spreads hot beneath his collar; for his entire fleet slumbers around him, it seems, and not one deckhand, flagship or other, has raised the alarm. She has well and truly snuck up on him. 

At the name of her ship, she only smiles; a proud thing, beautiful, one that might have been gentle if not for the cruel amusement lacing it, the way frost laces itself through windowpanes and becomes so lovely in doing so. “Reckless as I may be, Jacaerys,”she croons, stepping closer until he can feel the warmth of her against the fabric of his doublet, “I would not come for the Crown Prince of Westeros’s ship without my crew.”  

Seven Hells. Did she row herself upcurrent alone, at such an hour, merely to taunt him? Though, he thinks as he glances down at the bright glint in her starry eyes, it might well be that this is the best kindness she might offer him, in a life with no truer gentleness besides. 

“A crew you've hidden well,” he concedes, eyes flicking once more toward those black sails riding low in his fleet's wake. “Just the one hull, this time?” 

“Maneater is certainly enough,” she reminds him. Her thumb drags slow along his jaw where her hand had grasped so rough just a moment before; her touch is softer now, almost fond, some echo of gentled waves after loosing the brunt of themselves upon a battered shore. “Women, every one of them. I find they think quicker than men do, and they’ve considerably less patience for princes who think their crowns makes them clever.”

His jaw sets, faint, as he regards her through half-lidded lashes, the moon breathing its sweet silver breath along the sharp lines of her visage. “I wear no crown,” he reminds her. “Though if I did, I’d have no need of it to be clever.” 

“No,” she allows, tilting her head, considering him with an attention that makes his skin feel too warm and tight for the night air, makes his chest melt with a horrible thing – a hunger, he supposes, though hunger feels too belittling a title for a beast that claws so thoroughly at a man’s noble heart and slinks itself through the whole of his dutiful mind, infesting it instead with a deep need to satiate itself.

“You rely on that jaw of yours instead,” she murmurs, squeezing his chin once before soothing over it with her thumb, her gaze traveling his visage, a slow tide finding every hollow of a shore it has already discovered a hundred times before. “And those eyes; that lovely hair.” She tugs, gentle enough, at a dark coil near his temple, and then dares sigh some half-dreaming, half-burdened sound. “It’s terribly unfair, Prince.” And her lips, such a delicious pout, curving so sweetly in her sigh that he wishes, for a weakened moment, she’d only close the last breath between them. “I’d have robbed you and your men blind a dozen times over by now, if only you weren’t so horribly handsome.” 

They certainly both know her words for the lie they are – his fleet is to strong, his mother’s rule known far more for justice than cruelty. She has never once, in all this time, touched a Velaryon hull’s stores nor men, despite them rather constantly crossing these waters she so claims as her own. He imagines she never will, unless he gives her good enough reason.  

“And you rely on distraction,” he counters, “when you haven’t an honest answer ready. You still haven’t told me how many hulls you’ve brought against these ships of mine - or is it truly only the one, and your measly little rowboat?”

A lick of realization glints for a moment, just in the curling of seabreeze between them, as her eyes shift.

A half-glanced thing, though Jacaerys is sharp enough to know what it is: a tell, so sweet in the casting of her attention from him to somewhere off, somewhere overboard, as though checking that her pathetic rotted rowboat is still tethered to the starboard of his ship.

Jace tuts a chastising sound, that horrible cockiness – the very same that his mother so warns about each time he returns to court – still grows along his lips as he watches her drop her weight, only faintly, back onto the balls of her feet.  

“Does it matter?” She recovers, gaining that confidence of which must have dissolved only momentarily to the night air. “You’ve already lost, whatever the count.” Her hand hasn’t left his jaw, thumb tracing slow and idle along the line of it. “Letting a marauder onto your deck and not so much as signalling for your men?” She tuts, chiding and mocking both at once, and the heat in him slides brighter, lower, churning into something considerably less noble than he ought to feel, and certainly more reckless. “Don’t fret, Jace. I’ll only take what you’ve no need of. I’ll be sure to be quick – I’m told I’m quite good with my hands.” 

Empty threats, these, same as always; though now they come with a cattish wink of her lashes, so terribly alluring and still yet wholly needling. And only hungrier still does that heat grow of Jace’s interest, her words curling round his mind and making way for a hundred improper thoughts to rush in all at once. 

“You’re a wanted woman,” he says then, casting away any such desires from his mind before they might finish unfurling. “Your hands are good for nothing but thieving and plundering.”

Her gaze drops easily, nearly smug, to where his fingers have curled around her wrist instead of her sword hilt. “Seems to me you’re not using your hands for much of anything useful tonight, either.” 

Something horribly close to desire pulses in his blood, singing where her warm skin meets his. “Then you mustn’t tempt me,” he spits swiftly, biting as he is confessing.  

She only blinks up at him, something bright and amused glinting in her eyes, flickering, a warm torch left lit past its hour. “I’ve been tempting you for a year and a half,” she says, soft and wicked and wholly, unfairly lovely. “Imagine my exasperation, that I’ve only recently begun to find satisfactory results.” 

A scoff, from him, is his only response.

A flash, just after the air leaves his lips, that she renders him pressed back by half a step, warmth of her presence following the same and chilled only by the ice of a whipped new blade – smaller and wickeder than her cutlass – with a flat edge coming to rest cool against his cheek. There lies no true threat at all in the pressure of it, only the gentleness of a hand laid over a sleeping child, or the caress of a lover’s cheek. Jacaerys, regrettably, tries exceptionally hard to not feel flattered by it.

“I’ve a crew of madwomen aboard that ship,” she murmurs into the night, “who’d come across in half a minute if I called for them and remind this strait who it truly belongs to. And you’ll do well to remember that, Prince, next time you think to cross my waters without treating with me first.” 

Ah, he thinks. So he has hurt her pride, it seems, in his trespassing without thinking to first pay her visit. She missed his company, is that it?

It is not the first time, admittedly, they’ve had a conversation of such nature, and indeed not the first time a blade has been pressed to flesh for it. Though neither of them, save for hairline wisps, bear any such scars to tell of their encounters - bloodless as they always end, despite the reputations both drag behind them like wreckage on a keel, weeded sea to an abandoned anchor. 

Heis eyes narrow faintly. “You won't call your crew.” 

He is a madman, certainly - not for stating such boldness, for they both know it to be true - but instead for the turn of cheek he gives afterward, pressing faintly into the blade at his jaw and not so much as flinching from it. He relishes, madly, in the flare of surprise that swims past her visage. 

He shakes his head gently, voice coming in a warm taunting whisper. “You’re too honorable to bleed a crew of the Queen’s men over a game you enjoy playing far too much to end so early.” 

There is some small irritation somewhere in her gaze. She wishes, perhaps, to cast him overboard; it would not be the first time such an urge arose, and indeed she might one day attempt it yet; but this dance has steps, Jace knows, and they both tend to follow them faithfully, even though neither would ever admit. 

“Honorable.” She hums over the word, eyes tracing slow and hungry along the shadowed line of his jaw beneath her blade, then sighs: and she is so harrowingly lovely in the wash of clouded moonlight, her expression laced through with perhaps some mock and yet also weary solitude, as though this observation has burdened her the way true insult might, the drag of rolled eyes and huffed doubt. But Jacaerys knows far better than to assume she takes offense, for he sees the small, pleased flush slinking along her neckline, and he too notices how her breath hitches when his thumb slides, gently, overtop her wristwrappings. 

“Still,” she recovers once more, so false and so horribly charming. “I’ll need something for my plunder tonight, or my crew will think me gone soft - cozying up to a prince, instead of robbing him blind.” 

The blade at his cheek is truly no matter to Jace, now, at all. He grins against it, in fact, lips curving in flattery and some faint arroganace, having won at least this from her, and claiming yet one more victory more: Her eyes, depthless as the water all around them and star-caught in the deep night, trace the shape of his smile like she truly means to memorize it.

So he reaches up then, unhurried, and unclasps the small silver dragon pinned at his doublet: old work, older than any language one might conjure to admire it, and worth more coin than any fence in the Free Cities would dare show upon his face when naming a price. He has three of its brothers, clasps just like it, in a chest back on Dragonstone that he has not opened since boyhood at least, and has never once missed one yet. 

He suspects, lifting it now into the moon’s thin light and watching how her eyes catch the blaze of it, that he will not much miss this one either. 

“Will this satisfy your crew’s opinion of you?” 

Her eyes go first to the pin, hooking for a long moment upon its simple but masterful beauty, then down to the place his hand still fastens her wrist, and up once more to where her own palm keeps the knife pressed light against his jaw. An accounting, he thinks; a reviewing of the ledger of this such interaction. 

“It might.” She leans in to study it properly, close enough that her breath moves warm across the small silver wings and enough, too, that Jace might feel some of it upon his own cheek. From her lips comes a sound of mild appreciation. “I might confess that I find your people’s worship of skybeasts to be rather a childish thing. This, though.” In the pause that brews, she considers the silver without grasping it, her hands both otherwise occupied with him. “This is well made.” 

He is reminded, in that moment, of how little her world has ever truly reached his, beyond this narrow stretch of the sea; where she was raised – some low country of the far east he has never troubled himself to ask her the name of – dragons are, it seems, only the memories of a crumbled empire, myths mothers tell their babes to quiet them after dark. 

It astounds him, truly, that she has never once glimpsed a living dragon.

He suspects, though, that will not remain true much longer, if the troubles with that marauding Butcher of Tyrosh do not soon cease; and something anticipatory and rather mean within him ignites at the prospect of being to one to prove to her his birthright. 

Before he can say as much, she moves, and in such flash of hair under moonlight, his eyes widen only faintly. 

She leans in, that wicked woman, and takes the pin from his fingers with her teeth. She does it rather slowly, evidently in no particular hurry to finish the theft offered so willingly to her, as recklessly fearless as he is harmless in the moment that her breath ghosts warm across his knuckles. As though he were some greenboy, Jace goes utterly still, her knife still resting cool and taunting against his cheek, his own sword helpless at his side.

And her eyes – those terrible siren-eyes – do not leave his while she does it, not once, so that he understands with a shamed, hunger-laced catch of breath, that he has certainly lost whatever remained of his footing. 

That will not do, of course, for the Prince of Dragonstone. 

So whilst she is still savoring the theft, that glinting silver pin caught between her lips like treasure-coin beneath a cursed man’s tongue, Jace closes his free hand round the wrist still holding her knife to his cheek. In a quick tug, he turns it, and the blade comes free before she has even finished registering that her hand is emptier than it was a breath ago. 

He has her knife sheathed at his own hip before her breath finishes its startled catch against the metal still held, light and astounded, between her lips.

“There.” He does not try especially hard to hide the satisfaction in his words, nor the gloating lilt lingering in the grin upon his lips. “Seems I’ve done a bit of plundering myself, tonight.” 

And she, of seawater and stone, recovers swift as always, plucking the pin from her lips with two fingers of her now freed hand and tucking it away somewhere at her belt. Though, Jace notes with satisfaction,  the flush still lingers high in her cheeks and betrays her far more than she’d likely wish. Her needled scowl is just as beautiful as her smile, he thinks. 

“That was cheap, Prince.” 

“It felt fair enough to me.” He shrugs, unbothered, watching the shame and the delight dance rather unconcealed across her visage, drenched in moonlight. He witnesses, just as gleefully, the reluctant breath she takes in which she settles upon conceding instead of sulking like a child with a stolen toy. Something foolish and unsafe goes rather giddy in him, at the sight of her bested and so glowing for it. 

“One day,” he says, eyes still resting where the dragon had lived only a moment ago between her lips, “you’re going to pick the wrong ship.” 

“You’d miss me,” she says, girlish for one unguarded instant before her voice drops, at the last of it, into something much less jesting than perhaps she hopes, “if some other man were the one to finally take me.”  

And her words, infuriatingly, are true – worse than true, it is the truest thing he has found in all his time on this water, sailing under his mother’s appointment. He has read the reports himself, indeed gone over them line by line with Baela against every burned hull and shattered manifest the Stepstones have regurgitated this past year: she never touches honest cargo, never spills blood that hasn’t been owed a hundredfold; she takes gold only from men who trade in chains and lords that profit from misery.

She has had a dozen clean chances to plunder his own fleet, or Baela’s, or Alyn’s, and yet has taken none of them, whatever ugly rumor precedes her into room or shipdeck alike. Jace figures that as pirates go - and indeed the Stepstones breed them thick as flies on a corpse - she is, by any honest measure, the only one he would ever call decent. 

It is this, more than anything else, that has ruined him across a year and a half: not her beauty, though the gods know that alone would be enough to unravel the will of any man, but the unbearable fact of her goodness, so hidden in sharp words and sharper blades still. 

“I find,” he says slowly, watching the black of her eyes swallow the whole of the abyssal sky stretched starry and vast above them, “that I would regret it. Not being the one to take you myself.”   

He leaves the words open to whatever interpretation she likes, craving the spark that catches in her gaze at them, the answering flicker at the edge of her lips; and it is in that rather unstable breath between them that she twists past his guard entirely, breath warm against the chill of the nightbreeze, her empty hand coming to grasp the front of his doublet before sliding up to the join of his throat and shoulder. 

Suddenly, there is no distance left between them at all. 

She is close enough to him that her breath presses uneven against his jaw despite the coolness in her voice, close enough that the thin scar near her brow is the only thing keeping his eyes from settling, helpless and perhaps unseemingly desperate, upon her mouth. Her thumb dares drag against his collarbone, and it requires within him every scrap of the discipline his mother and septas and maesters had impressed upon him since boyhood not to close that last inch himself. 

“Arrest me, then,” her voice comes with the wind, so low and daring and laving against his ear. “Go on, Prince. You have the men, the ship, you have your hands right here.” Her gaze drops, rather pointed, to where his fingers have since curled around her wrist once more, as they oft do. 

Then her eyes, mischievous and warm, return to him. “I don’t see rope, though I imagine you’ve plenty of it somewhere on this hull of yours.” A wicked flicker of her lips given in a huff of something mean, something that would come a touch cruel, if not for the immediate hunger it pierces into him. “Perhaps in your bedchambers?”  

His wanting turns rather greedy at that, keeping pace with his own pulse as her words dissolve into the seamist around them. Gods damn him.

He tips his chin up, if only to make her crane her neck to keep her eyes on his, and then his free hand flies to catch her wrist where it still rests at his neck. He does not dare move their hands once they’ve found each other, even when he feels her fingers flex, instinctive as a stutered breath, around the coils of inky tresses at his nape. 

“I would very much like to arrest you.” 

Her mouth curves at his words, so very pleased with something in his face he cannot see and, likely, would not admit to even if he could. It is a valiant but admittedly doomed effort that he gives, to curb whatever such lingering emotion lives there. 

“You’ve told me as much every crossing, for a year and a half now,” she tips her head, so wicked, “And yet I always seem to slip free. Curious, isn’t it, Prince?” 

He laughs, and does not care to pay much attention to it, for he is rather too enamored by the shape of her lips at present, the press of her warmth so very close to his own. His own quarters sit just beneath their boots, he thinks presently: a chamber with warm furs, a sturdy mattress, a door that locks. 

“I look forward to the day I finally arrest you,” he murmurs toward her mouth, thinking of that banked hearth beyond his cabin door, the way she might sigh against his soft sheets, “each time I let you go.” 

She only hums, thumb finds the collar of his doublet, idle as it lingers there a moment longer than the tease alone requires. He wonders whether she can feel his own pulse hammering up through his skin to meet her; and then, releasing her wrist, his hand falls instead to grasp rather boldly along the line of her waist. 

Her breath, delicious in its caught tremble; her eyes remain lit, through she draws a shaky hitch into the quietness between them. There comes a wavering in her expression then, not the usual delighted startlement, rather gentler instead and gone before he can blink once more. “Mind what sweet things you say to me, Prince. I might keep them.” 

“Keep them, then.” He is well past shame now, watching the flicker of her eyes in the dark. His voice has gone rough, and he does not trouble himself to hide that either, nor the flex of his fingers along the line of her leather-laced waist. His gaze drops, for a moment, toward her belt, where lies now his silver dragon. “You’ve kept everything else of mine you’ve ever wanted.” 

Added to the tally of falsities they share; another stoke to their fire; Still, she lets twitch something bright and heated along her lips, and her thumb smoothes languidly over the pulse in his neck.  

“Not everything.” Her gaze drops, brief as it is intentional, to his mouth and then back up again. “There are one or two things I’ve left you, out of mercy.” 

“Mercy, she says.” Jace repeats it with some disbelief, laughing through the exhale of it, and she smiles at that, too, guileless in a small laugh of her own. 

And then, because she has always been faster than his good sense, she kisses him. 

The press of her lips against his own comes hard but brief, a brushing of mouths more as hungry tease than any kind of mistake. Her mouth, he thinks, tastes of salt and orange rinds; an answer to more nights than he would admit to, lying alone on his mattress, wondering after exactly such things. 

He leans into it for half a breath, fumbling only in shock and eagerness, before her mouth is gone from his. 

Something mischievous lights her eyes when he opens his own once more. 

“Thank you for my treasure, Prince.” She draws back half a step and his hands release her, catching upon warm fabric and the warmer, teasing slip of skin along her hip - though her breath still ghosts gentle and cloying towards him, reluctant to leave just as the tide is reluctant to turn.

Her lips press together, as though – and, admittedly, such a notion flips Jacaerys’ stomach – she yearns to taste him again, too. 

“Do stay vigilant,” she says. “I hear there are dreadful pirates haunting these waters.” 

He cannot help the boyish grin that captures his lips, nor can he resist the way his whole chest aches to draw her nearer again, to taste the peel of orange once more, to invite her down below to those warm captain’s chambers. 

“I hear the same,” he says instead. “I’m told one of them owes me a proper answer, one of these nights. Something more than a kiss and a stolen heirloom.” 

Whatever has put the heat in his own face seems to have found hers too – a soft, unwilling flush along her visage, subtle enough to leave his teeth aching with its sweetness. She smiles, and it brings with it something rather honest in the dark.  

“One of these nights,” she agrees, and there is a promise lingering there, on the tip of her tongue. 

And then she is over the rail and gone, down into black water, before he’s quite ready to watch her go. 

Not long after, as he stares aimlessly and struck at his discarded maps, he hears rowpaddles find the water below, coiled through with that flighty, slinking laugh that trails with her into the dark. Madwoman, Jacaerys thinks, and stands there still, long after her small boat has slipped into the horizon toward the Maneater’s black sails, his hand curled where hers had rested at his jaw, salt and orange still on his mouth, thinking for not the first time that he is in very serious and quite lasting trouble.

“YOU LET HER GO AGAIN.” 

Baela says it the next morning after only quarter hour of arriving in his Captain’s solar, the two of them tasked, ostensibly, with reviewing routes the Butcher’s fleet has not yet raided. It comes from her with a rather blatant grin cast over the ship’s log, a sing-songy thing which whittles down the rather aloof nature he’d worked so dedicatedly to conjure when he’d first informed Baela of the past night’s breach.

Jacaerys, nursing a faint ache beyond his eyes since waking, presses fingers against the waxmap beside him and says nothing for a long moment.

“I did not let her go,” he finally defends.

His cousin’s lips tremble in amusement at this flimsy defense, stoking his cheeks to heat further though he attempts still to regain some of his practicality from where it has, evidently, cast itself out to the sea. “She’s – exceptionally difficult to catch.” 

Baela's brow arches in utter delight as their eyes meet. “Difficult, Jace? You told me you had a hand at her collar last night. What, pray tell, made it so difficult to finish then?” 

Silence is its own sort of interrogation, and Jace laments its effectiveness. With a sharp sigh, he straightens himself in his chair, drops his boot to the floorboards, and lifts his hands in gesture. “She pulled a knife on me, when I was not prepared. I was–” though he dares not finish his sentence, instead lacing shut his jaw with a terse exhale, shame flooding his cheeks. 

Baela’s laugh fills the small cabin entirely, indifferent to the pitch and roll of the ship beneath them, that gray chop visible through the storm-marred casement; though neither of them pay much attention to the sea beyond the window, rather adept by now at avoiding the sea legs it once so easily harkened.  

“A knife, cousin, whatever could you have done?” She has wholly abandoned their morning’s task, instead leaning an amused chin upon closed fist. Jace, in turn, pinches fingers to bridge of nose.

“Baela.” Jace warns the ceiling.

She gestures to him. “Well, something must have gone right. You're sitting here yet, wholly unscathed.” Her eyes drop then to his chest, squinting where newfound drapings of his stations pin cloak to shoulder; And then, as though guided by the mockery of the gods, she glances lower still, to where an unfamiliar dagger lies, now properly snug and sheathed upon his hip. “Save for a rather curious trade, it seems.” 

Jace ppresses his lips together, resenting the mind he had the night before; Shame, he finds, always burns brighter in the light of day. A shake of head then, perhaps in some weak denial or to merely dislodge the rather stubborn memories of a dip of bodice, a curve of smile. 

“She’s been a wanted woman this long for a reason,” he tries. 

“You are the reason, Jacaerys.” 

Gods damn her, he thinks, for being so blunt. Though still he laughs, some strangled boyish sound of embarrassment crawling up his throat, cheeks gone past warm into something closer to scalded.

“I only mean - she’s cleverer than she’s given credit.”  

A huff comes from Baaela’s lips, disbelieving as she is amused, and kind still for her torment. “If her reputation for thieving only thieves and harming only the harmful isn’t credit enough, I’ve heard plenty more of it from you - rest assured.” 

Jacaerys wonders, momentarily, if he might simply throw himself off the sidedeck and into the deep, instead of endure this any longer.

Though mercifully, at whatever emotion has crawled upon his visage, Baela relents. A rest of quill comes, and she turns with lips still pulled in a grin yet a voice gentler at last. “You’ll have to decide, cousin, whether you’re hunting her or courting her.” 

Startled, Jace scoffs - flighty and unconvincing. 

“Because plainly speaking,” she continues, “it has not seemed like the former in a very long while.” 

Jace rolls his gaze away then, unable to stomach the look upon her visage, so pleased with herself at the gathering of red along his cheeks, spreading past his neck and blooming at the tips of his ears. 

Indeed, there is no honest answer that wouldn’t damn him further; for he knows there is nothing princely in any of this, nor proper. He suspects, if he were the man his mother’s court believes him to be, he would care rather more than he does.

Glancing out the canted, storm-weathered glass of his casement, Jace traces the faint line of the green sea, how it dances, blurred and restless, along the horizon. And out there somewhere, far past the black rocks of the Stepstones and the seamonsters further still, a woman who owes him nothing but trouble and near eighteen moons of sleepless crossings is surely laughing at him still.

Next time, he tells himself, the way he always tells himself, after every crossing his cousin spends laughing at him. But he doesn’t truly believe it, even as he thinks it. He never has. 

taglist & mutuals: @kenna-the-cosmic @cowpokemythology @bucksplum @velyssara @targlocket @dr9carys @lukehughes43 @useralbaa @dipperscavern @falcvns @xxselenite

[lmk if youd want to read a little smut series of this bc there's about 11k more written of this au in my drafts too !]

[of-many-fandomss]

Subtlety is My Middle Name

paring: jason todd x reader

summary: jason thought you didn’t know he was red hood. he preferred to keep it that way for now. you knew that jason was red hood. you just figured he didn’t like to talk about it all that much.

word count: 2k

warnings: none

Jason was being as quiet as he possibly could be, which wasn’t easy when geared up from head to toe in his heavy Red Hood suit.

From his steel toed boots- that he could not figure out how to tiptoe in to save his life. Which was pointed out by his brothers, who made fun of him relentlessly whenever he failed to sneak up on someone in the field. To even the way his trusty leather jacket creaks over his chest plate agonizingly loud in the otherwise silent apartment.

His one goal: to not wake you up from whatever peaceful slumber you had fallen into since he left you last.

You had been dating for a few months now and as much as he loved you- god, did Jason love you- he didn’t exactly know how to broach the whole… vilgilante topic.

It wasn’t that he didn’t trust you to keep it a secret, he did, his only fear was that you looked at him differently once you knew that he was the feared Red Hood of Crime Alley. He was worried beyond belief that you would view the relationship that you built together- the one he treasured more than anything in this world- as one built on lies.

And while that couldn’t be further from the truth, he still couldn’t stop the way his lungs seized and practically collapsed in on themselves whenever he even thought about letting you in his nightlife secret.

How would he even start that conversation? ‘Oh, hey, babe. You know that Red Hood guy? The one that everyone fears- the one that kills people? Yeah? Well, that’s me! Plus, and my dad is Batman! Anyway, what do you want for dinner?’

Yeah, fat chance.

Jason grumbled inaudibly under his breath as he attempted to shed himself of his gun holster, that appeared to pick that specific time to get slightly tangled and stuck, and therefore inconvenience the man who wanted nothing more than to slip into bed discreetly beside you.

Just as he went to pass the kitchen and make his way to the bathroom to rid himself of the rest of his ensemble, however, a soft clattering had him freezing directly in his steps.

The man swore his heart stopped beating all together in his chest as he slowly turned his head- still with his red helmet over it- to face you, standing innocently with your back towards him, clad in nothing but one of your boyfriends old sleep shirts as you filled up a glass of water at the sink.

Before the vigilante could even attempt to move out of your line of sight- his fight or flight instincts all of a sudden completely nonexistent, apparently- you shut off the tap and turned to him calmly, sipping gingerly on your drink.

“Hi, baby,” You greeted quietly, giving the man a small smile as you padded forwards against the hardwood floors.

It was pathetic, really, how every thought completely vanished from the man’s mind right then and there. As if the mere sight of you had stolen away any ounce of common sense he may have had clanging around in his head.

Jason was rendered completely useless, frozen with his mouth hanging open and pupils blown wide as he stared directly at you. You continued to approach him, undeterred by his whole getup.

You stood on your tiptoes, placing a quick, chaste kiss to the side of his helmet, “Come to bed soon, I missed you.” Is all you said before taking your glass of water and disappear back into your room as if you had just had the most normal exchange in the world.

As if this were just an average night for you.

“Uhh…” Jason stuttered out into the empty space, breaths coming out as nothing more than practically a wheeze at this point, “What?”

He had to have been hallucinating. He must’ve been, right? After all, there was no way you had just acted as if you knew the Red Hood, had just kissed him on the cheek as if he were Jason.

Which, to your knowledge, he wasn’t.

Sleepwalking. You had to have been sleepwalking. That was the only way possible he could even begin to explain what the hell had just taken place.

You had slept-walked into the kitchen to pour yourself a late night glass of water and in your hazed mind, had seen a man in your apartment that you could only assume to be your boyfriend, and then went on your merry way back to bed.

Todd quickly shook his head, ridding himself of all thoughts of anything other than the possibility of you having just been sleepwalking in front of him. True, you had never done so before, but there was a first time for everything, wasn’t there?

Quickly slipping out of the rest of his suit and into nothing but a pair of low hanging sweatpants, Jason timidly made his way to your bedroom, peering inside as if fully expecting a bomb to be chucked directly in his face if he stepped in too fast.

“Hey, Jay.” You greeted softly, causing the man’s green eyed gaze to snap directly to you, where you sat propped up against the headboard, smiling welcomingly at the man.

You, who was very much awake, and very much not sleepwalking.

The cup you had fetched now sat discarded on your bedside table, and you held your open arms out to your boyfriend, a silent invitation if Jason had ever seen one.

He shuffled into the room awkwardly, hand coming up to tug slightly at the back of his dark hair as he eyed you wearily, “Hi, sweetheart,” He mumbled back, almost as though he were testing the waters as he approached you, “Havin’ a good night?” He asked when he came to a stop in front of the mattress, gulping.

Humming in response, you reached over and gently but firmly tugged your boyfriend down onto the bed beside you, making yourself comfortable snuggled against his chest without further delay, “Very. It was nice and relaxing. How about you, baby?” You asked, tracing idle shapes against his bare chest while you allowed your eyes to flutter shut.

Jason swallowed harshly once more as his arm came to wrap itself around you unconsciously, unsure of how exactly to bring up what had just gone down in the kitchen. How you had seen him in his vigilante getup and hadn’t even batted an eye.

“So, about what you just saw-” He started, unsure of what else he could even say, but you swiftly cut him off as your head popped up and your serious gaze met his.

Whatever lingering sleepiness that had been clinging to your expression vanished in and instant, a sense of alertness coming over you.

“Oh, Jay, I’m sorry if I made you uncomfortable.” A small frown was pulling at your lips as you spoke.

He blinked down at you once. Twice. “I-what?” He tripped over his words, a jumble of syllables falling out in turn.

You sighed, dropping your chin against his pec so you could still gaze up at him with a soft pout now adorning your features, “I know you don’t like to talk about the whole Red Hood thing, so I’m sorry if I made you upset by talking to you while you were still- what? In costume? Suited up?” You shook your head softly, “Sorry, baby, I don’t know the correct term.”

The words rolled off your tongue so casually, as if you were merely discussing the weather. Not the possibility of your boyfriend of a few months being a vigilante.

Jason practically leapt to his feet, though he was careful to gently move you off of him before he did so, “I- you knew?” He spat out, complete and utter bewilderment overtaking his features.

He didn’t know what was happening. Everything was so confusing and he felt as though the walls of your bedroom were spinning around him suddenly, trying to knock him off kilter.

You rose to your knees on the mattress in front of your boyfriend, confusion mirroring his own spreading throughout your face, “Knew about what, Jay?” You asked as gently as you could manage at exactly 4:24 in the morning.

Pacing commenced before your very eyes as Jason ran his hands repeatedly through his hair, “Red Hood! You- you knew about Red Hood?” It sounded more as though he were speaking to himself, trying to wrap his mind around such possibilities that seemed so far fetched from him a mere twenty minutes prior.

“About… you being Red Hood?” You asked so slowly, eyebrows furrowing as what he was questioning you about finally processed in your head, “Of course I knew, I’ve known since the second week of us dating.” You said it slowly, gently, as if speaking to an unstable toddler.

Jason froze for what felt like the tenth time that night, “What?” He asked, completely horrified, “You- knew?”

You shook your head back and forth, “Of course I knew. I thought you… knew that I knew?” The more you talked, the less certain on the topic you seemed, “I mean, you’re not exactly slick about it.”

If it was even possible, his eyes had just been blown wider than they had been, “What- what’s that supposed to mean?” He sputtered out.

“I mean how you leave your vigilante suit in the closet.” You explained slowly.

“In a duffle bag!” He defended, mind reeling as he went over any single moment that he could’ve tripped up on the whole ‘secret identity’ thing in the last few months of you dating.

“That you often leave not only opened, but flipped upside down.” You continued, “I swear it spends more time across the closet floor than it actually does on you at night. And speaking of, you keep very odd hours, Jay. Even by Gotham standards. There’s only so much detective work that could possibly go into figuring something like that out.”

Jason dropped his head into his hands, “I thought I was careful.” He all but groaned, words becoming muffled through his fingers.

Gently, you reached out and took his hands into your own, pulling them away so he would look you in the eyes as you soothingly ran your thumbs across his wrists, “Not to mention the fact that I saw you changing into your suit on our second week of dating. I think you thought I was asleep so you were trying to be quiet, but you actually bumped into the dresser pretty loudly and started cursing like a sailor.” You giggled slightly under your breath at the thought, “It was kinda hard to miss.”

He swallowed thickly, eyes now taking in every inch of your face, scanning for those signs of fear and regret he had dreaded looking upon the moment you knew about his Red Hood life, “So… you knew all along?”

Nodding gently, you squeezed his hands once, “Well, I kind of assumed you knew that I knew and just didn’t like to talk about it.” You shrugged almost bashfully now, as if realizing that you very poorly misread the situation, “I always just thought you liked to keep that life and this life with the two of us separate. I thought I was respecting your wishes by never bringing it up.”

“And you’re not…” He searched for the right words, “Scared of me- of Red Hood?”

Your eyebrows shot up at the suggestion, as if it were the most unhinged and improbable thing he could’ve possibly asked you in that moment, “Scared of you? Of course not, Jay, you keep me- and so many other people safe- each and every night. I have nothing to be scared of from you.”

Jason had not realized until that moment just how much he had needed to hear those exact words fall from your lips. He all but deflated as what felt like the weight of a thousand burdens lifted from his shoulders and were obliterated before his very eyes.

“Oh, sweetheart,” He sighed, somewhat dreamily, sweeping a piece of hair away from your eyes, “All this time, I saw so worried about you knowing and… and looking at me differently. When, in reality, you knew all along.”

You leaned into the man’s touch without thinking twice, eyes fluttering shut as you planted a soft kiss to the inside of his hand that gingerly cupped your cheek now, “Nothing you could do could ever make me look at you differently, Jason.” You assured him, “Now, get in bed, it’s late and I’m tired.” You teased, tugging him down alongside you once more.

He allowed you to do as such to him and he stayed still for a moment, with you curled up at his side and letting out a content hum when he began moving his fingers through your hair.

“Sweetheart?” Jason asked after a few moments of silence, “…I can be subtle right?”

“As a sledgehammer.”

[treeteaofversailles]

Counter Attack

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

MDNI! This is my original work. Please do not post to another site or to AI. Thank you and happy reading!

Summary: Jason rails fem!Reader. That's it.

Tags/TW: Porn absolutely no plot, smut, PIV sex, referenced oral (fem and male receiving), fingering, squirting, using panties as a gag. Jason being a little tease and mean. Fem!Reader

A/N: I can't come up with titles.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

“On me,” Jason grunted behind you. He took hold of your now messy hair and pulled you up to look at them in the mirror. 

You let out a loud, strangled moan as you watched him continue to roughly take you from behind. 

His dark eyes met yours in the mirror. “Focus on me.”

You dug your nails harder into the smooth surface for a stable hold as your body kept lurching forward from his hard thrusts. 

Your legs shook each time he shoved his cock deep inside you as if it were his life’s mission to rearrange your guts. He only began to fuck you after he was satisfied with burying his face between your legs, licking and sucking at your pussy and clit until he came away with his face completely soaked in your cum.

His clothes were undone haphazardly to allow him space to feel your naked back and backside pressed to his. His dark curls stuck to his head as he thrusted and his mouth fell open to let out his soft moans and pants. 

Jason had only lifted your skirt and yanked the upper half of your dress down, inadvertently trapping your arms to your sides before he ripped your pantyhose apart. 

Your hands scrambled for a hold, and you could only grab onto him. A choked sob of pleasure left you when he angled his cock to resume abusing that little spongy spot inside you that made you see stars. 

Tears streamed down your face as you cried out for Jason. You were getting closer, and your mind was falling apart way too quickly. A sudden fear came over you that if you came again, you’d actually go insane and only be addicted to sex with him. 

Your knees were buckling, and your heels hit the floor as you tried to upright yourself. It didn’t help that he was trying to shove his thick cock deeper into you. 

He twisted your skirt tighter in his fist, as if using it as his reins to keep you close to him. “If you’re going to say my name,” Jason whispered, “You should say it louder. So everyone can hear how good I make you come.”

Your eyes rolled back into your skull, and you nearly slammed into the mirror in front of you. You hung your head as you continued to moan and whine helplessly. 

He bent forward and slowed his frantic thrusting to grinding against you. Jason kissed your cheek and then your neck before he spoke. 

“Need something, princess?” He asked so sweetly it made your burn with wanton humiliation because of his thick cock still trapped inside your aching cunt. 

You turned to him and were met by a soft kiss on your lips. “‘M— ‘m ‘bouta c-come…” You whispered, carefully pushing on his hips. “‘M gonna come…”

Jason kissed you hard again and then began to move again. “Then come for me,” he said right before he dragged himself back, nearly taking himself out, and then burrowing back inside you. “Come for me, princess.”

Jason made quiet shushing sounds in your ear and moved his hand from your jaw. He even stopped moving, letting you gasp for air. 

Your legs were shaking so bad that you had to stand on your toes to not let your heels clatter around on the floor. 

Before you could ask him what he was doing, he slipped a piece of fabric between your parted lips. You made a small and confused sound, looking up at the mirror. It was your pair of panties. 

Jason pulled out of your pussy slowly, and you keened a loud, but mercifully muffled, moan. You could still taste the tang of your cum and his spit stained in the fabric, and you bit back a heated whimper as more drool pooled in your mouth. 

He turned you around and lifted you up so you were sitting on the sink. You let out a louder sound of concern, but he just held your thighs and kissed you around your panties.

Jason wore a sloppy smirk on his face and winked. “I’ve got you. Just hold onto me, okay, princess?”

You made an incredulous sound, but it died away when he let go of one leg to take hold of his cock, stroking it carefully in his hand. 

Jason even slapped the tip against your swollen clit a few times, punching out a soft whimper with each wet slap and making you blush darkly. 

You tried to close your legs, hiding the way your pussy clenched at the sensation, glistening in the dim light. He just laughed smugly and kissed your burning cheek. 

“Aw, don’t act shy now, princess,” Jason cooed in a faux honeyed voice. He bumped his nose against your cheek, and you hesitantly looked at him under your lashes. 

“You weren't like this when you were on your knees choking my cock down your pretty throat the other day,” he hummed and batted his lashes at you. He even dared to lick his lips as he smirked wider. 

“God, you tasted so sweet after that,” Jason moaned. “Makes me want to let you take my cock like that every day.”

Your entire body felt like it was on fire. You avoided his eyes and tried to pinch your thighs harder together to hide how your pussy began to drool at the memory. 

Jason wouldn’t let you hide from him as he took his free hand and wrenched your legs open. He squeezed your thigh in his other hand tightly. He spread your puffy folds with his fingers and rolled his thumb on your swollen clit, forcing a muffled squeal out of you. 

He rubbed it faster, and you dug your nails into his jacket, curling into him. 

You couldn’t move your hips freely and just continued to make desperate sounds behind your panties as he slid his fingers in you, fucking your hard with his calloused digits. He cruelly angled his fingertips into your sore sweet spot, instantly making your legs shake again. 

You pulled on his jacket and looked up at him tearfully, begging around your soaked panties between your teeth. 

“You want me to fuck you?” Jason asked. You nodded urgently. “Yeah? Do you want me to fuck your pretty pussy with my cock? Hm?” 

You were close to genuinely crying out of frustration as you nodded again. 

“You want me?” Jason asked, leaning close to your lips. 

You nodded again and choked up a broken “Please!” behind your panties. 

“Come on my fingers then,” he ordered softly. “If you come now on my fingers, I’ll pick up where we left off. I’ll fuck you on my cock.”

His fingers began to curl and scissor your velvety walls, and he wasn’t stopping. He sucked on your neck and bit at your skin, whispering hotly in your ear every single obscene fantasy he had of you. From fucking you on every surface of his apartment to fucking you in his Red Hood gear.

Your head spun wildly, and your stomach fluttered even harder than before. You screamed behind your panties as you came hard on his fingers when he rubbed his fingertips frantically into your sweet spot. Clear liquid squirted out of you as he ravaged you on his fingers.

You barely caught yourself on the sink and panted heavily behind the soaked fabric, your breaths leaving as broken whimpers. 

Jason pulled his fingers out, moaning as he licked every inch of them clean. He kissed your lips before he lined himself up and pushed in without any more preamble. 

Jason ruthlessly fucked you as if his sole mission was to fuck you or die. He held onto your thighs and began to fuck you at the same brutal pace as before. 

His thick cock was stretching your pussy open, and forcing you to accommodate every inch of him. The veins traveling along his cock were grinding into every sensitive part of your pussy, and you started to sob with how dizzying your ecstasy was. 

You grabbed onto the front of his shirt, and he pushed back inside you. You clawed at his chest and whimpered from how full you were again, your toes curling in what was left of your torn stockings. 

He resumed his animalistic pace, and you didn’t have room to protest as more wanton moans escaped you. You scratched up his chest, and sounds that resembled his name rumbled from your lips alongside soft sobs of pleasure. 

Jason drank up all your sounds and moaned as if it were the finest wine he’d ever had. 

You cried and mewled his name before your pussy clenched around him, coming hard on his cock. You nearly ripped his shirt with how hard you were pulling on it, and your vision flooded with stars. Your entire body felt like it was a rubber band stretching to its absolute limit and then snapping. 

The wild look in his eyes made your entire body burn with molten arousal. His hair fell onto his face, and his cheeks were flushed with his exertions. His mouth dropped open with his own moaning and panting, drunkenly babbling about how good you felt around him. 

You prayed to God that you’d make it out of here alive as you were getting railed. 

Your eyes fluttered shut as you came again with a pitiful whine. 

His hips stuttered, and it took a few more harsh thrusts for him to come as well, slamming his hips so hard into yours that the wall behind you shook. Jason buried his face into the crook of your neck and shoulder and moaned loudly as he came inside you. 

Jason was breathing raggedly as he pulled out. He shakily helped you down and had to pin his body against yours so you both wouldn’t fall. Your legs were completely useless to you now. 

It took a few staggering breaths for you to settle back down. 

You felt a calloused thumb wipe your lips, and you looked up to see Jason, smiling so triumphantly. 

His entire mouth was still covered in your lipstick. His brilliant smile still lingered on his face as he thumbed your mouth off. 

“Had fun, sweetheart?” Jason asked. 

You clung to him as he took your ruined panties out of your mouth. A thick string of drool clung from your tongue to the fabric, and he wiped your lips delicately, smearing your lipstick all over his thumb. 

Jason kissed you sloppily, missing your mouth most of the time and just kissing your face. 

You kissed him and hugged your arms tight around his neck. Jason kissed your back and smoothed his hands up and down your back, massaging your hips when they trailed down. 

“I love you,” you said. 

Jason made a small, desperate sound and chased your lips. “I love you too.”

[jacefiles]

youse soso talented and creative!! you should make a dj jxce reverse one so shes the one acting sus (shes not a dj tho) and hes like wait what if theres someone else

This is a fun twist for DJ JXCE 😂😂

Enjoy~~

You would think the last time would have been a lesson well learned. Apparently not.

Rain hadn't started yet, but the sky over the city had that heavy grey look that promised it would, sooner or later. You stood at the kitchen counter with your phone screen tilted away from the door, thumb flying over the keyboard, heart doing something ridiculous every time a new message dropped into the group chat.

DJ JXCE Anniversary Ops, it was called, because Cregan had insisted on naming it something that sounded like a military operation, and honestly, at this point, it kind of felt like one.

The plan was simple in theory. Jace's one year anniversary as a DJ was coming up, the secret double life he'd built under the name JXCE, the one only a handful of people knew about, and you wanted to give him something for it. Something real. A party. His people, his music, his memories, all in one room, celebrating a year of him being brave enough to become someone new.

The problem was that Jace was always home. He worked from the apartment most days, and even when he wasn't, he had a habit of appearing at the worst possible moments, like the universe had personally assigned itself to ruining your surprises.

So you'd recruited help. Cregan, his best friend/Manager, endlessly loyal and endlessly incapable of being subtle. Your neighbour, who had access to the apartment building's spare storage room. And Baela, on standby, for whenever Jace needed to be lured out of the apartment for an hour or two.

It should have been simple. It was not simple.

┈┈・୨ ✦ ୧・┈┈

You heard his key in the lock and your whole body reacted before your brain caught up. You'd been mid sentence in the chat, typing out a question about whether the bakery could do a fondant vinyl record on top of the cake, and the second the lock clicked you fumbled the phone so badly it nearly slid off the counter. You caught it, snapped it face down against your chest, and by the time the door swung open you were standing there with the guilty, too straight posture of someone who has just hidden something and wants very badly for that fact not to be obvious.

It was, of course, obvious.

"Oh," you said, a full octave too bright. "You're home already?"

Jace paused in the doorway, jacket half off one shoulder, keys still dangling from two fingers. Something flickered across his face, not suspicion yet, just the small confusion of a man noticing a chair has been moved an inch to the left without being able to say why it bothers him.

"Already?" he repeated slowly, glancing at his watch like he needed to check. "I live here. It's six."

"Right," you said, way too fast. "Obviously. I just mean, time. Where does it go."

He didn't answer that. His eyes flicked, just briefly, to the phone still clutched to your chest, screen down, and then to the way you hadn't moved from that spot at the counter to greet him as you would, like you were physically blocking something. He didn't say anything about it. He just held your gaze a beat too long before heading toward the bedroom, and you exhaled like you'd been holding your breath for an hour.

You didn't notice, because you were too busy sagging with relief, that he paused just past the doorway, out of sight, and stood there a second longer than necessary before continuing on.

┈┈・୨ ✦ ୧・┈┈

It didn't get better from there.

A few days later Cregan wouldn't stop texting you, a rapid fire string of questions about balloon arch delivery times, and you'd made the mistake of leaving your phone face up on the couch cushion while you went to grab snacks. Jace was sitting close enough to see it light up, over and over, his own show forgotten on the TV in favor of the little rectangle of light flashing insistently beside him.

He told himself not to look, that he trusted you and yet he looked anyway.

Got it.

Don't let him know.

I'll bring everything Friday.

Three messages, three fragments, and his mind, against his own better judgement, began stitching them together into something far more damning than balloons. He was still staring at the screen, jaw tight, when you walked back in with the chip bowl, and he didn't even try to hide that he'd seen it.

"Everything?" he asked, holding the phone up slightly, not accusing exactly, but not nothing either.

Your stomach dropped. You crossed the room fast and plucked the phone out of his hand a little too quickly, a little too much like you were snatching evidence off a table.

"It's nothing," you said.

Jace didn't push, not out loud. But something in his face had gone carefully blank, the blankness of a man deciding not to react in front of you, and you, in a small flash of panic at the silence stretching between you, did the only thing you could think of to shut the moment down before it went any further.

You leaned over and kissed him.

It worked, in the sense that he kissed you back, hand coming up to rest at your jaw like it always did, easy and familiar. But when you pulled back, smiling, hoping the topic had been successfully buried, you missed the flicker that crossed his face before he smoothed it over. Because to you the kiss was just a kiss, a way of saying let's not do this right now. To Jace, in the tender, paranoid corner of his mind that had started quietly building a case against you, it read like something else entirely. Like a distraction. Like something you did because you didn't want him thinking too hard about what he'd just seen.

He told himself that was insane. He kissed you back anyway, and smiled, and said nothing, and hated himself a little for the thought that had crossed his mind in the first place. But it stayed there. Small, and quiet, and rooted.

That night, lying beside you with your back turned to him and your breathing gone slow and even in sleep, he found himself staring at the ceiling, turning the word everything over and over like a stone in his palm, trying to sand it down into something harmless and failing every time.

┈┈・୨ ✦ ୧・┈┈

The third incident happened at Cregan's apartment, and it was, without question, the worst one yet.

You'd gone over after work to help unpack the last of the party supplies, boxes of fairy lights and folded banners and a cardboard cutout of a DJ booth that someone had ordered as a joke and that had somehow become extremely important to the whole event. Cregan's living room was a warzone of half opened boxes, packing paper, and extension cords by the time you arrived, the low evening light through his blinds throwing everything into long amber stripes.

"Careful," Cregan said absently, not even looking up from the box he was elbow deep in. "I haven't moved the boxes by the table yet."

You did not, in fact, hear this warning in time.

Your foot caught the corner of a box jutting out from under the coffee table, and you pitched forward with a sharp, startled gasp, arms flailing for something, anything, to grab. Cregan moved fast, faster than you expected, catching you by the waist just before you face planted directly into a box of tissue paper pom poms.

"Whoa, hey, easy," he laughed, both hands steady and firm at your sides, holding you upright while your foot found the floor again.

You laughed too, breathless and startled, one hand flat against his chest for balance, and your ankle, which had twisted slightly in the stumble, throbbed enough that you stayed there a second longer, leaning into him while you tested whether it would hold your weight. Cregan, oblivious to anything but the practical matter of keeping you upright, murmured something like "you good? don't put weight on it yet" with his head bent close to yours, which, to anyone walking in cold, looked a great deal like something it was not.

Neither of you heard the front door.

Jace had come by to drop off a spare charger Cregan had been texting him about all week, and he never bothered knocking at Cregan's place, hadn't in years, so the door swung open without warning onto a tableau that, stripped of all context, looked exactly like the thing his brain had been quietly thinking for days. His best friend's hands at your waist, your palm against his chest and Cregan's head dipped close to yours, murmuring something too low to catch. You leaned into him, cheeks flushed, close enough that there was no space between you at all.

The silence that followed lasted only a second, but it stretched inside Jace's chest like something tearing.

You saw him first and the laugh died in your throat, you shoved back from Cregan so fast you nearly caught your bad ankle a second time, stumbling slightly before catching the arm of the couch. Cregan's hands flew up and away from you at the same moment, palms out, like you'd suddenly turned red hot, and the two of you separating that quickly, that guiltily, did more damage than if you'd simply stayed still and let him see the box on the floor.

"You're not supposed to be here," you blurted, and you meant it about the party, about the secret, about anything other than what it must have looked like, but the words came out all wrong, defensive and too fast, like a confession instead of denial.

Jace stood frozen in the doorway, the spare charger still in one hand, rain just beginning to fleck the shoulders of his jacket from the walk over. "...What?"

"This isn't what it looks like," Cregan said, which is, of course, the single worst thing anyone can say in that exact moment.

"I didn't say it looked like anything," Jace said, far too evenly, his eyes moving slowly from Cregan's raised hands to your face to the overturned box at your feet and back to Cregan again.

"Right. Good. Great. Because it's not," Cregan said, in the exact tone of someone who has just made things worse.

You tried to explain, gesturing at the box, at your ankle, but the words tangled and came out half formed, and Jace only nodded slowly, set the charger down on the counter with far more care than the object warranted, and said he had to get back. He was gone before either of you could finish a sentence, the door clicking shut behind him with a quiet, deliberate sound that somehow felt louder than a slam.

You and Cregan stood there in the sudden hush, surrounded by fairy lights and collapsed cardboard, both arriving at the same realization at the same moment.

"...That was not great," Cregan said.

"No," you agreed, staring at the door. "It really wasn't."

┈┈・୨ ✦ ୧・┈┈

What you didn't know, what you couldn't know, was the war being fought quietly inside Jace's chest every single day that followed.

Because Jace remembered exactly what it felt like to be on the receiving end of this. He remembered the hollow, sick feeling of being accused of something he hadn't done, the way your own doubt had curdled into something loud and hurt before you'd had all the facts, the long, careful weeks it had taken afterward to rebuild what had cracked open between you. He had told himself, back then, lying awake while you slept with your back to him, that he never wanted you to feel that way. He hadn't expected to be the one standing in it now, on the other side, with the same ugly feeling clawing up his throat.

So this time he told himself he would be different. He would not accuse. He would not spiral out loud where you could see it and be hurt by it, the way he had been hurt by it. He would wait, patiently, rationally, for the obvious explanation to present itself, the way he wished someone had waited for him.

She's not like that, he told himself one night, lying awake with the ceiling for company. There's obviously another explanation. There has to be.

But the universe, cruel and endlessly inventive, kept handing him more evidence instead of less.

You started dressing nicer some mornings, a little more effort in front of the mirror, lipstick you didn't usually bother with on a weekday, because you had a meeting with the bakery about the cake design and wanted to make a good impression on people who took your crazy vinyl idea seriously. Jace only saw the dress, the mirror, the extra five minutes you spent that you never used to spend, and filed it away next to everything else.

You started leaving earlier some mornings and coming home later some nights, because there were florists to negotiate with and printers arguing over banner dimensions and a rental company that could not, for the life of them, confirm a delivery window. Jace only saw the empty side of the bed when he woke, and the tired, oddly luminous smile you wore when you finally did walk through the door, the kind of smile that looked, to his increasingly unreliable eyes, like the smile of someone who had somewhere else she'd rather be.

You whispered on the phone in the hallway, hand cupped around your mouth, because Cregan had called about seating arrangements and you didn't want your voice carrying through the apartment and ruining the surprise. Jace only caught the hushed tone, the way you angled your body toward the wall whenever he passed, the way the call ended abruptly the second you heard his footsteps. You deleted notifications the moment they lit up your lock screen, because half of them said things like cake tasting confirmed for Thursday or Cregan: got the lights, don't panic. Jace only registered the practiced, instant flick of your thumb, the phone going dark before he could so much as glance at it.

Your neighbour, in on the secret and terrified of blowing it, started being strangely, overly friendly to Jace whenever he was around, complimenting his shirt, asking about his day with an intensity that bordered on interrogation, laughing a half second too hard at things that weren't funny. To Jace, it read exactly like guilt wearing a smile, like someone trying too hard to compensate for something.

Worst of all, conversations seemed to die the second he entered a room. You and your friend, mid laugh over a text from Cregan, would go abruptly, suspiciously silent the moment his footsteps sounded in the hall, both of you suddenly very interested in the contents of the fridge.

He noticed every single detail that he would have brushed off without a second thought a year ago, and now each one lodged itself under his skin like a splinter, small, constant, and impossible to leave alone.

Then he noticed Cregan.

Cregan, who was suddenly busy every single time Jace suggested getting a drink, always with some vague excuse about errands he wouldn't elaborate on. Cregan, who kept stepping outside mid conversation to take calls he wouldn't explain, phone pressed close to his ear, voice dropping the second he crossed the threshold. Cregan, who wouldn't quite meet his eyes over dinner one night, laughing a little too loud at his own jokes, filling silences that didn't need filling. Cregan, who Jace had last seen with his hands on your waist and your palm flat against his chest, murmuring something too soft to hear.

Something in Jace's chest went cold and strange.

Not Cregan, he told himself, almost desperately, lying awake yet again. Fourteen years of friendship has to count for something.

A beat.

...Would he?

┈┈・୨ ✦ ୧・┈┈

The thought festered for days before Jace finally tried to dig for the truth the only way he knew how, casually, carefully, like a man defusing something he was terrified would go off in his hands the second he touched it.

You were curled up together on the couch one evening, controllers in hand, some racing game throwing colored light across both your faces, when he asked, in a voice he'd practiced sounding indifferent, "You and Cregan been hanging out a lot lately?"

You smiled without looking away from the screen, utterly, blissfully unaware of the way his entire body had gone rigid waiting for your answer.

"Yeah," you said easily, thumb tapping the controller. "He's been helping me loads with some stuff."

Something in Jace quietly died.

You kept smiling, kept your eyes on the road ahead of your little pixelated car, thinking about seating charts and cake flavors and how surprisingly good Cregan had turned out to be at untangling string lights. Jace, beside you, was busy reading an entire tragic betrayal into the shape of your smile, into the warmth still lingering in your voice, into every innocent, ordinary word.

"With what?" he asked, too quickly, before he could stop himself.

"Party stuff, for a mutual friend." you said, which was, of course, entirely true and told him nothing at all. "It's kind of a whole thing right now. I'll explain soon, I promise."

"Right," Jace said, something in his stomach twisting at soon, at the vague, deflecting shape of that sentence. "A whole thing."

He didn't say anything else. He just gripped the controller a little tighter, let his car crash spectacularly into a wall he'd been dodging successfully for the last ten minutes, and when you laughed and told him he seemed distracted tonight, he agreed, hollow, that he must be.

You leaned over and kissed his cheek, quick and easy to comfort him and went back to the race. To you it meant nothing at all, a reflex, an afterthought. To Jace it felt, absurdly, like being handed a consolation prize.

┈┈・୨ ✦ ୧・┈┈

The night of the party arrived wrapped in the same grey rain that had been threatening all week, finally falling in earnest, streaking down the windows in long silver lines as Jace trudged home from a long, draining day, one he'd spent mostly failing to concentrate on anything other than the low, constant hum of dread sitting behind his ribs.

He'd spent the better part of a week convincing himself, minute by minute, not to think the worst. It had cost him. He felt it in his shoulders, in the tight, tired set of his jaw, in the way he'd barely eaten at lunch because his stomach had been in knots since morning.

He let himself into the apartment. Everything was dark, silent, still.

He dropped his keys onto the little dish by the door, the sound sharp in the quiet, and let out a long, shaking breath that seemed to carry the whole week with it.

"Need sleep," he mumbled to no one, rubbing a hand down his face.

The lights exploded on.

"SURPRISE!"

For one full second, Jace simply stopped existing as a functional human being. He stood frozen in the doorway, rain still dripping steadily from his hair onto the floor, mouth slightly open, staring at the impossible scene unfolding in front of him.

Music was already playing low in the background, something warm and familiar, one of his own old mixes, he realized distantly. Streamers hung from the ceiling in loose silver arcs. A banner stretched across the far wall bearing his DJ logo, the one he'd designed himself in secret over a hundred late nights, blown up huge and glowing under a string of fairy lights. A cake sat on the table with tiny fondant headphones balanced carefully on top, and beside it, unmistakably, a small fondant vinyl record. Photographs were pinned along the wall in a careful, curated line, grainy shots from his very first gig, the one where his hands had shaken so badly he'd nearly dropped the headphones twice.

Everyone was there. Cregan grinning like an idiot by the speaker system, one arm raised in a triumphant wave. Baela laughing openly at the look frozen on his face. Your neighbour holding up a phone, already filming, already capturing the precise moment his brain short circuited.

And you, standing in the middle of it all, glowing, delighted, utterly pleased with yourself.

Jace just stared. Rain dripping steadily onto the floor. Absolutely, completely frozen.

You crossed the room to him, unable to keep the smile off your face. "Happy one year of DJing, DJ Jxce."

His eyes moved slowly around the room. To the banner. To the photographs. To Cregan, standing right there, grinning, entirely innocent, entirely his best friend and nothing else. Back to you.

"...Wait," he said finally.

A long pause.

"...This..."

Another pause, longer this time, like his whole brain was still trying to reboot from scratch.

"...THIS is why you've been sneaking around?"

You laughed, delighted, entirely missing the storm that had been quietly building behind his eyes for a solid week. "...Yeah?"

Jace slowly dragged a hand down his face. Then the other hand joined it, both palms pressed against his eyes as if he could physically push the last seven days out of his skull through sheer pressure. He let out the single biggest sigh of his entire life.

"Seven hells..."

You blinked, your smile faltering just slightly at the edges. "...What?"

He lowered his hands, and there was something so raw, so sheepish, so thoroughly caught out in his expression that it made your stomach flip.

"I thought," he started, then laughed at himself, short and disbelieving, shaking his head slowly. "God, I actually thought you were cheating."

Your smile vanished instantly. "...What?"

Jace pointed, almost helplessly, at Cregan across the room. "With him."

The room went dead silent. Even the music seemed to hold its breath.

Cregan, drink halfway to his mouth, nearly choked on the spot. "WITH ME?"

You stared at Jace. Then at Cregan. Then back at Jace, waiting for the punchline that clearly was not coming. And then you burst out laughing, so hard and so suddenly that actual tears sprang to your eyes.

"Jace." You had to stop and catch your breath. "You thought." You pointed weakly at Cregan, wheezing. "Him?”

Cregan looked deeply, personally offended. "Oi."

Jace groaned, dragging both hands down his face again. "Stop laughing."

You could not. You were bent over now, one hand braced on your knee, laughing so hard your ribs actually ached. "YOU THOUGHT I WAS CHEATING WITH YOUR BEST MATE?"

"In my defense," Jace muttered, ears going faintly red, "you two were doing a lot of very suspicious hand holding at his apartment. And whispering. And you kissed me literally right after I saw his texts, which, by the way, felt very deliberate."

"That was because I panicked, not because I was guilty!"

"I didn't KNOW that at the time!"

"I have known you since we were nine," Cregan said, deeply wounded, to no one in particular. "Nine, Jace."

Eventually, through the tears and the wheezing, you noticed the way his ears had gone properly red now, how he stood there looking somewhere between mortified and miserable despite the party unfolding cheerfully all around him. Your laughter softened. You crossed the last bit of space between you and took his face gently in both hands, tilting it so he had to look at you.

"Why didn't you tell me?" you asked, quieter now.

Jace shrugged, eyes dropping to somewhere around your collarbone. "Because after last time..."

He exhaled slowly, the words coming harder now that the joke had drained out of the room.

"I didn't want to accuse you over nothing. Not after what happened to me. I remember exactly what it felt like being on the other end of that, and I didn't want to do it to you, even quietly, even just in my own head. I kept thinking I'd wake up tomorrow and realize I was just being an idiot, and it would all sort itself out if I just waited it out."

You smiled, a little sad now, a little fond, thumb brushing along his cheekbone. "...You were being an idiot…but your feelings are justified. Cregan and I were a bit suspicious."

"...Yeah," he admitted, and the word came out low, almost a laugh, almost a sigh, all the tension of the last week finally leaving his shoulders in one long breath.

You tapped his forehead lightly with one finger. "You know what would've solved this?"

He winced, already knowing exactly where this was going. "...Communication?"

"Communication," you confirmed, tapping his forehead again for emphasis.

He caught your hand before it could tap a third time, lacing his fingers through yours instead, holding on like he needed the anchor. "...Communication," he repeated softly, like he was trying to make the word stick somewhere permanent this time, somewhere it wouldn't slip loose the next time his imagination got ahead of him.

Then you kissed him, slow and warm despite the rain still clinging to his jacket, despite the party noise swelling happily around you both, despite Cregan loudly announcing to the room that he required an apology in writing.

"Next time your brain starts writing soap operas," you murmured against his mouth, "you come to me first."

He laughed against your lips, the sound finally, fully relieved, all the coiled dread of the last week unspooling at once. "...Deal."

┈┈・୨ ✦ ୧・┈┈

He did not get to live it down. Not for a long, long time.

Weeks later, Cregan sauntered into the kitchen while Jace was pouring his coffee and draped an arm over your shoulders, entirely too pleased with himself. "Morning, love."

You leaned into it instantly, batting your eyelashes up at him. "Morning, darling. Sleep well?"

Jace, mug halfway to his mouth, went very still. "...What is happening right now."

"Nothing," you said sweetly, patting Cregan's chest exactly the way you had that day in his apartment, watching Jace's eye twitch in real time. "Cregan was just saying how he doesn't know what he'd do without me."

"Couldn't function," Cregan agreed solemnly, resting his chin on top of your head. "She's been such a comfort to me. All those boxes. All that bonding."

"Stop it," Jace said.

"I brought everything Friday, remember?" Cregan continued, entirely too innocent. "Very intimate logistics, that was."

"I will end both of you."

You gasped, clutching a hand to your chest in mock offense, and turned to Cregan like you needed comforting from the sheer trauma of the threat. Cregan, rising to the occasion, immediately wrapped both arms around you and pulled you into a full, dramatic hug, patting your back consolingly while looking directly at Jace over your shoulder with a grin that could only be described as shameless.

"There, there," Cregan said. "He's just jealous he doesn't appreciate you like I do."

"That's it," Jace said, setting his mug down with a decisive clink. "Cregan. Out. Get out of my house."

"We're bonding, Jace."

"Get out of my house," Jace repeated, already crossing the kitchen, and he peeled you bodily out of Cregan's arms with both hands on your waist, hauling you back against his own chest instead like he was retrieving stolen property. "And as for you." He turned you around to face him, eyes narrowed, fighting visibly against the smile threatening to break through. "Missy. You are coming with me."

"I was just giving him a hug, I don't see the problem, JACE,"

You didn't get to finish the sentence, because he'd already caught your wrist and was hauling you, laughing and stumbling half out of your socks, straight down the hallway toward the bedroom.

"This is emotional abuse!" Cregan called after you both, absolutely delighted, coffee mug (that Jace had abandoned) raised like a toast. "Some of us are just trying to spread love in this household!"

"Find your own household!" Jace shouted back, not stopping, not slowing down, dragging you the entire way with a grip that was somehow both irritated and completely unwilling to let go.

The bedroom door shut with a soft click, and a beat later his voice carried through it, muffled, trying very hard to sound stern and failing completely, something about I swear! You and that man exists purely to make my life difficult dissolving quickly into your laughter and then, a moment after that, into something quieter and warmer, all the mock outrage draining right out of him.

Out in the kitchen, Cregan poured himself a second coffee like he owned the place, thoroughly satisfied with his morning's work, already composing the next round in his head.

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[vinnieswife]

i have an idea but it might not that good

i just watched that one video of the cast playing who’s who, and harry mentioning abt his season 1 posture😭

what if he visits the doctor and asks costar!reader to go with him, he’s worried about his spine and everything but it all ends funny/on a light note after the doctor confirms there’s nothing wrong with him 😀

also love love LOVE your work<3 i genuinely read them diligently everyday😔

I thought about writing this bc I have a lot of drafts and idk when to post them!!! 😭😭 also sorry for any spelling mistake!! English is not my first language.

Harry Collett x costar! reader (1,7k)

You found yourself on a rainy Tuesday morning, sitting in the passenger seat of Harry’s car, listening to him quietly spiral for the fifth time in twenty minutes.

"I'm telling you love, it's fucked," Harry said, his voice dropping an octave as he gripped the steering wheel, peering intently at the traffic ahead. "I look like a bloody question mark, my spine is doing things a spine shouldn't be doing."

You took a slow breath, leaning your head against the headrest to look at him. "Harry, your spine is fine"

"No, it's not just that" Harry insisted, his accent thickening the way it always did when he got dramatically defensive. "Have you seen the memes? The entire internet thinks I have no lumbar support! 'Jace Velaryon posture' is literally a fucking trending audio, fuck…what if I'm shrinking? I'm already not massive, I can't afford to lose two inches to a curved back"

You snorted, trying, and so failing, to hide a laugh behind your hand. "You're not shrinking H”

"You're laughing," he said, turning his head at a red light to look at you with deep, tragic betrayal written across his face, “my spine is disintegrating and my own girlfriend is laughing at me, cold-blooded, wow“

"I am accompanying you to a private doctor's appointment at eight in the morning on my day off," you pointed out, reaching over to pat his knee. "If that isn't true love, I don't know what is"

Harry’s face softened instantly, his dramatic panic melting into that soft, dopey smile he only ever saved for you. He leaned across the center console, catching your hand and pressing a quick, loud kiss to the back of your knuckles. "I know I know you're a saint, genuinely a gorgeous,” he kissed your cheek “perfect saint” he kissed you again “but if the doctor says I need a full back brace, im  not getting out of the flat”

"Deal" you grinned.

Moving Harry through a waiting room was always an event, mostly because he couldn't sit still when he was nervous. While you sat comfortably on the leather sofa scrolling through your phone, Harry paced the length of the room, adjusting his oversized hoodie, bouncing on his heel, and periodically stopping in front of an anatomical poster of the human skeleton to glare at it like it had personally insulted his family.

"Look at that" he whispered loudly, pointing at the poster's spine “straight as an arrow, mine's probably shaped like a bendy straw."

"Harry, sit down before you give me an aneurysm" you laughed softly, pulling him down by his sleeve until he collapsed onto the couch beside you.

The moment he sat, the clingy boyfriend kicked in. He immediately slid his arm around your waist, resting his head heavily against your shoulder, inhaling deep and burying his nose into the crook of your neck.

"Harry, we're in public" you teased, though you automatically ran your fingers through his soft hair.

"Don't care, I need emotional support," he mumbled into your collarbone. "If I'm dying, I want to be cozy."

"You're not dying, you dramatic idiot"

"Harry Collett?" a nurse called out from the doorway, holding a clipboard.

Harry jolted up, his eyes widening. "Right, this is it. If I don't make it out, tell Ryan Condal to give Jace a heroic off-screen death."

You rolled your eyes, pulling him up by his hand. "Come on, dramatic, let's go"

The consultation room was bright and clinical, dominated by an older, exceptionally patient-looking doctor named Dr. Evans. He greeted you both warmly, clearly recognizing Harry but remaining entirely professional as Harry sat on the examination table, looking like a nervous golden retriever at the vet.

"So… Harry," Dr. Evans began, clicking his pen over a chart. "What seems to be the issue today? Lower back pain? Sciatica? Any numbness?"

"Well, doc," Harry started, leaning forward and resting his elbows on his knees, ironically hunching over completely as he spoke. "It's not really pain, It's more of a... structural integrity issue"

Dr. Evans blinked. “Sorry structural integrity?"

"Yeah," Harry said solemnly. "I think my posture is permanently ruined. I've been getting... feedback, thousands of people, actually. They've been making side-by-side edits of me standing next to a shrimp. And I laughed at first, right? But then I looked in the mirror, and I was like, wait?"

You had to bite the inside of your cheek so hard it bled just to keep from bursting out laughing. You covered your mouth with a hand, pretending to cough.

Dr. Evans looked from Harry's dead-serious, deeply concerned face over to you, catching the absolute hilarity in your eyes. The doctor's lips twitched slightly, but he kept his composure. "I see, so, social media feedback has led to a concern regarding spinal curvature?"

"Yes" Harry exclaimed, clapping his hands together. “exactly that, look, I'll show you." Harry stood up abruptly, stripping off his heavy hoodie to reveal a plain black t-shirt. “okay, so when I'm relaxed, I stand like this..." He slouched forward, rounding his shoulders dramatically until he looked like a medieval peasant carrying a sack of potatoes, “and when I try to stand straight, it feels so weird, like what's wrong with me?"

The doctor chuckled softly, standing up from his chair. "Alright, Harry, step over to the wall for me, let's give you a look"

For the next ten minutes, you watched in utter delight as the doctor performed a series of basic physical exams. He had Harry bend over to touch his toes, tilt his head from side to side, and stand up against a height board. You took out your phone and discreetly filmed a three-second video of Harry standing completely rigid against the wall, his eyes darting around nervously like he was being processed into prison.

"Well, Harry" Dr. Evans said finally, washing his hands at the sink and grabbing a paper towel "I have the official diagnosis."

Harry held his breath, looking genuinely tense. "Give it to me straight, doc, am I getting a back brace?"

"You have…” the doctor  said, turning around with a dry smile, “…a perfectly normal and healthy spine, excellent mobility, zero signs of scoliosis, and perfectly aligned vertebrae."

Harry blinked. "Wait, for real?”

“yes” the doctor said, smiling. "What you have, Harry, is what we in the medical field call... bad habits. You slouch when you're relaxed, likely because you're tall (lmao he wishes) and comfortable, and you probably spend too much time looking down at your phone."

You couldn't hold it in anymore. A loud, ringing laugh escaped your chest, and you fell back against your chair, shaking your head. "I told you, I literally told you!"

Harry turned to you, his face going a bright, furious shade of red, though a cheeky grin was already tugging at the corners of his mouth. "Okay, alright, simmer down over there will ya?”

"A shrimp, Harry?" you teased, wiping a tear from your eye. "You made me come here at eight in the morning because TikTok made you think your spine was collapsing, and the doctor just diagnosed you with slouching?"

"It was a legitimate medical concern" Harry insisted, though he was giggling now, rubbing the back of his neck in deep, adorable embarrassment. He turned back to Dr. Evans. "So... no physical therapy? No crazy back harness?"

"Maybe just do some basic core exercises and remember to pull your shoulders back when the cameras are rolling," he advised, chuckling as he handed Harry a summary slip. “…and perhaps stay off TikTok for a bit."

"Yeah, definitely doing that" Harry mumbled, his ears burning as he grabbed his hoodie, “thanks, doc, really appreciate you not throwing me out."

The walk back to the car was a victory lap of absolute roasting.

"I can't believe this," you said, walking side-by-side down the sunny street. "The Harry Collet defeated by bad posture"

"Listen to me," Harry said, catching your waist with one arm and pulling you tightly against his side as you walked, dropping a heavy, affectionate kiss right on your temple. "If you ever mention this to anyone, I will personally leak all the embarrassing videos I have of you singing in my trailer"

You gasped, “you wouldn't dare" looking up at him.

"Try me love" he grinned, his eyes crinkling at the corners. He looked so relaxed now, all that dramatic anxiety completely gone, replaced by that warm, infectious energy that had made you fall in love with him in the first place. He squeezed your hip, pulling you even closer as you reached the car, “seriously though, thank you for coming with me, even if I looked like a massive idiot."

"You always look like a massive idiot," you hummed, turning in his arms once you reached the passenger door, you wrapped your arms around his neck, leaning up on your tiptoes. "But you're my massive idiot, now with an officially certified, perfectly healthy spine.

Harry chuckled, his hands settling warm and heavy on your waist, he leaned down, pressing his forehead against yours for a quiet, sweet second before pressing a soft, lingering kiss to your lips.

“You know I love you," he whispered against your mouth, sweet and genuine, all the joke dropping away for a fraction of a second.

"Love you too, Harry” you smiled, kissing him back lightly. “now, stand up straight and drive us to get breakfast, you owe me an iced coffee for this."

"Yes ma'am," Harry said, instantly pulling his shoulders back into a hilariously exaggerated, overly rigid military stance. “as you wish”

You burst out laughing, shaking your head as you opened the car door, “just get in the car, shrimp"

[myladysapphire]

How do you like the idea of modern!nerd!targaryens?

A botanist Valarr who would blush and turn red at the slightest interaction, a Meikar who would be an ardent and boring conservative, an Aerion who is obsessed with ancestral history and dragon tales, and a Deiron who is just a loser, a nerd, and a teacher who would unleash his fantasies on the reader during class. I believe that Deiron would even do something nasty, such as spiking a drink at a party and fulfilling his fantasies. The reader would wake up in his room, and he would still be fucking her, even unconscious. Aerion would have punished him for disrespecting his history. And Baylor would have had to be persuaded to try something new.

Modern!nerd AKOTSK men

for Valarr, Maekar, Aeron, Daeron, Baelor x fem!reader

see content warnings for each character

Botantis!Valarr

Content: fluff, nervous/shy valarr Word count: 700+

Valarr has always loved plants. They're easy and don't talk back. He can talk to them to his heart's content, tell them of his day without hearing sighs of boredom or disappointment. He loves them, has been fascinated by all things floral since he was a child, to the point that at his university graduation, after studying botany, was gifted with the keys to his own flower shop. A flower shop you now stood in.

You had been coming once a week, every Thursday, for the past three months; each time Valarr would swear it would be the day he finally worked up the courage to speak to you, and if you weren't bored by his love for all things floral may even agree to go on a date.

Valarr would spend every Thursday, staring out the window waiting for your arrival, and when the door would chim open he would blush fluorescent red, and hide in the back, biding his younger brother Matarys deal with her, only ocming out with your order, which he knew by heart at the end and would stutter a sentence that he would replay on repeat, reveling in his embarrassment, long after you were gone.

But today, all that would change. Or at least he was determined to. He had spent the whole morning standing in front of his mirror saying words of affirmation, his sentence already written a dozen times, preparing for you. He had even given Matarys the day off, knowing that without him as a buffer, he would be forced to speak to you.

But when you walked through the door, looking as radiant as ever, the blush and replay of all his previous embarrassing attempts to speak to you came flushing back.

"Valarr!" you greeted excitedly, coming straight to the counter, your eyes drawn to the magnolias beside the counter. "How are you today?" you asked nicely, your smile never once wavering even as Vlarr blushed and stuttered.

"I'm good, how are you?" he managed to say, entirely red from the whole interaction.

"Wonderful, well, know that I have seen you," you said, and if Valarr hadn't been so nervous, he would have noticed the obvious flirting, though had he not run and hid most weeks, he would also know that the sole reason you came to this shop, which was about 30 minutes out of the way from everything in your day to day life, compared to the dozens of over floral shops, it was to see him.

"I have your order all ready for you," he managed to say, his voice quiet. "I assumed you wanted the same as previously," he muttered out, suddenly feeling embarrassed and praying today was the day you didn't waver in your usual.

"oh your perfect! Thank you, Valarr!" you beamed. "Whatever would i do without you?" you smiled, your hand brushing his as you took the bouquet.

Valarr, if it was possible, went more red. "Oh well, I-"

"You grow such beautiful flowers," you interrupted, "I would like to thank you."

"Thank me?" he repeated, his back straightening at your attention, "what for?"

"For the flowers and being so kind," you smiled, your hand reaching for your phone, "I want to take you out on a date," you stated, unlocking your phone, "give me your number, and I'll text you the details."

"A date?" he repeated shocked, shocked. You liked him back? You, the perfect, most beautiful creature Valarr had ever seen, wished to ask him on a date?

"Of course!" you smiled, watching as Valarr nervously took your phone and input his number. "I've been meaning to ask you since my first visit here; I had just been too nervous." You nervous? Valarr could have scoffed; he was nervous, he was so wrong for you, perfect confident you.

You smiled as you took your phone back from him. "Are you free tomorrow night?" you asked, sliding your phone back in your pocket.

This time Valarr did scoff; he was always free, he had no life, friends seemed to disappear once they realised the plants were everything to him. "Yes, I am," he smiled, feeling his nerves begin to fade away the longer you smiled.

"Perfect," you hummed, reaching across the counter to plant a kiss to Valarrs check. An action that caused his red blush to become near permentant.

loserteacher!Daeron

Content: Daeron being a perv teacher, drunk sex/drunk reader so dub con, smut. oral (M receiving), fantasised somophilia. referenced spiking (it does not happen ) Word count: 400+

Daeron's classes were boring. Most took it for an easy A or for a good hour to nap. And in truth, Daeron used it to sleep off his hangover. Sure, he loved psychology, loved studying what your dreams meant and interpreting them, but after so many years of it being his speciality, he began doing everything he could to prevent his dreams- to prevent overanalysing every single one and each detail of them.

But then you took up his class and his dreams. And suddenly he stopped drinking and started dreaming, just for the hope that he could live the fantasy he thought of as you sat in his class, writing down his words, entirely fascinated with him and his teachings. Imagine the pen you chewed on in class was his cock sinking into the wet warmth of your mouth.

His fantasies took up his lessons, using you and your dreams for every example and exercise, dropping things by your desk or near you so that you would bend over and pick them up, giving him the perfect view of your arse.

He dreamt of you every night, bent over his desk, fucking you as the rest of the class watched. dreamt of taking you in his car, you riding his cock without a care in the world. dreamt of pushing his cock into your wet warmth as you slept, waking you up with a moan on your lips.

His dreams and fantasies crossed over into his day-to-day life so badly that when he arrived at one of the endless university parties he was invited to (having been known for his drinking habits), and saw you there drinking and smiling, flirting with a guy that wasnt him, he had thought about slipping you something, of taking you home and having his way with you. But then you looked his way and smiled. And suddenly his fantasies came to life without him even having to force it.

"Daeron", you moaned into his mouth, loving ht e way his hands grabbed you messily, eager to touch you in case you slipped around and he woke up, and this was all a dream. He could taste the alcohol coursing through your veins. Drunk boldness allowed him to touch you, kiss you, and fuck you, to be as dirty as he dreamed of.

And you let him, let him fuck you, let him fill you with his cumand spit in your mouth. Let him live out his every fantasy.

After that, his fantasies of you in class only grew worse, and you would taunt him, taking your pen deeper into your mouth, letting him fuck your face as he marked the essays, letting him bend you over his desk, door unlocked, loving the thrill of the risk of being caught.

Valyrianhistoryprofessor!Aerion

Content: Smut, aerion is always a warning, obssesed aerion, spanking. Word count: 400+

Aerion had always been obsessed with Valyrian history, to the point it controlled his entire life. Not a single decision in his life was made without considering how his ancestors, the dragonlords of old Valyria, would do and whether they would approve.

It controlled him, to the point where the only sensible job for him was to teach it. To be a professor at Dragonstone University and uphold the teachings and knowledge of the greatest empire the world had ever known.

He was one of the strictest teachers at the university; no mistakes were tolerated, and students were expected to honour his teachings, and any disobedience would be punished.

So when he heard you, his favourite and best student. The one he knew would always know the answer, gave the most detailed recountings of his lessons, whose essays read like history books that had Aerion devouring and begging for more. When he heard you had sat at a party disrespecting the tales of dragons and dragon riders, it was safe to say he stormed from his apartments and dragged you back home with him.

"How dare you disrespect your betters!" he spoke, delivering a clean smack to your arse, a smirk on his lips as you moaned, "telling the stories of a dragon losing, of a dragon being killed by the likes of the common man," he spat, delivering another swift smack to your arse, "the dragon ought never loose," he spat turing you over and tearing of your clothes, pinching your nipples before pulling your legs apart, his cock pressing into your cunt in one swift movment.

"Tell me, tell me I'm a dragon," he demanded, his hips dragging through the walls of your cunt with a sense of possession.

"You're a dragon, Aerion, the dragon of legends," you moaned, your hands desperately reaching for him as he fucked into you with an unrelenting pace.

"Tell me you were wrong, the story you made was made up," he insisted, staring into your eyes with a fire that would have scared anyone else, but you, who had grown so used to this, to him. You knew him, had studied him better than his classes, who knew how dragon lore was Aerion, was who he was and made him the man fucking into you with such raw passion anyone else would have run screaming.

"I made it up," you moaned, "I just wanted you to fuck me, i life i swear," you insisted, relishing in the kiss he gave you as a reward as his cock continued to enlessly fucked into you.

conservativebusinessman!Maekar

Content: conservative values? he is a perv. Reader wears short skirts/dresses, and Maekar objectifies her. smut, p in v. power imbalance, spanking word count: 400+

Maekar was boring. He had little use for hobbies. All he did was work, complain about work and then complain about not working. He never wished to do anything and had opinions on everything and everyone. would sneer at how some people dressed and mutter about how simple things had been when he was younger. Complaining how complicated today's society was.

Being boring is what caused his first wife, Dyanna, to leave him, for his kids would only visit once a month, if that. And it was a fact he had long come to terms with.

It, however, was not a fact you seemed to have noticed or come to terms with.

He had met you at the office, hired to be his brother's assistant. A pretty little thing who wore skirts too short, heels too high and loud for the office, and whose giggle either made or ruined your entire day.

At first, he sneered and avoided you, choosing to believe his brother had had some kind of lapse in judgement, but Baelor, boring Baleor, who even if he noticed the sluttly little clothes you wore would never do something about it. In truth, the man never looked up from his desk to notice who you were, let alone what you did or wore.

It's why he decided to take matters into his own hands, calling you into his office, reminding you of the dress code. And you, thinking you had hurt his feelings, felt so bad you began dressing more modestly. Though most of your clothes were still entirely too short, Makear grew to enjoy the view. Especially when you bent over. You had even started bringing him coffee and lunch, effectively becoming his assistant rather than Baleors.

And one day you, sweet little you who messed with his morals entirely, decided he should be more fun. Maekar had refused, saying he was nothing but a "Boring old man", but you had insisted, dragging him to see some movie, where you talked the whole time. To the point where, to shut you up, Maekar dragged you to his house, bent you over his knee and spanked you for your lack of manners and insolence.

After that, you thoroughly refused to believe he was boring, and definitely weren't as conservative as he insisted, and decided to twist his buttons. Your clothes went back to being short, and he could have sworn you were buying clothes too small for you. And Maekar was never one for supporting insolence, would spank you until you apologised. And when spanking wasnt enough, he would bend you over his desk, slide your slutty little panties down, stuffing them into his pocket, before sliding his fat cock in your cunt and fucking your insolence out of you.

Safe to say to you, he was definitely not boring.

boringbusinessman!Baelor

Content: fluff? impliede sexual content. Word count: 200+

Baelor was boring. He never wanted to do anything but read. Not that there was anything wrong with that; he simply had no desire to try anything new.

So when he meets you, a new intern at his company who is always doing something new on weekends. Always speaking about new trips and holidays.

You had a bucket list for every month. u lived a life where you treated every day like your last, the exact opposite of him.

So when you ask him if he wishes to join you, all but getting on your knees and begging for him to join you, he relents. Trying something new one time can't be too bad, right?

Well, it was; he hated leaving the comfort of his own home and doing something outside of the box. But one thing that he did not regret was spending time with you, happy to hear your stories, and you happy to hear the stories he had read.

His life became a little less boring after meeting you; hearing your stories gave him enough thrill.

And in truth, he wasn't entirely boring; his hobbies were more homely, sure. But when it came to the bedroom. Baelor was hardly boring. he put the Kama Sutra to shame.

[ladythedrunken]

Daeron’s sweet lady wife sat by the tall library windows, a heavy volume open across her lap. She turned a page with quiet concentration, the soft rustle the only sound in the room besides the occasional clink of glass.

Across from her, Daeron lounged, one boot propped on the low table, a cup of dark wine cradled loosely in his hand. He watched her over the rim—watched the way her brow furrowed in thought, the slight parting of her lips as she absorbed some passage. He let her have her peace. For a little while.

He finished the wine in a slow swallow, set the cup aside, and rose. She glanced up, offering him a small smile before returning to the page. Daeron answered with a look of his own—warm, intent—then sank to his knees. Crawling forward until he was between her skirts, the heavy folds of her dress falling around him like a private tent.

Her legs parted for him without a word. When his mouth found her, she drew a sharp breath and closed the book with careful deliberation, setting it aside. One hand settled where his head landed under her dress, not quite guiding, not quite restraining—simply holding on as he licked into the sweetness of her, slow and thorough, tasting every fold, every soft pulse of her cunt against his tongue.

. He hummed low against her, the vibration drawing a quiet sound from her throat that she quickly swallowed. Her free hand gripped the arm of the chair. Outside their little world of skirts and soft gasps, the library remained still. The door remained closed.

Until it opened.

Maekar stepped in without ceremony, already speaking. “Aemon, have you seen the—” He stopped. His gaze moved from Daeron’s empty chair to the woman seated across from it, her cheeks faintly flushed, her posture a touch too upright.

Daeron froze, mouth still pressed to his wife’s cunt, breath warm against her. She did not look down. Instead she reached for the book again with deliberate calm, opened it to a random page, and offered Maekar a polite, composed smile.

“Good afternoon.”

Her voice was steady. Almost. Beneath the skirts, Daeron’s tongue resumed its slow work—lighter now, more careful, but no less intent. A single, deliberate stroke along her slit that made her thighs tense around his head. She kept her eyes on the page, though the words blurred.

Maekar closed the door behind him and crossed the room, entirely at ease. “I was looking for some histories. Aemon said he’d left it here.” His gaze flicked over the shelves, then back to her. “You look a bit flushed. Is the fire too high?”

“Not at all.” She turned another page she had not read. Beneath the dress, Daeron’s hands slid up her thighs, holding her open as he licked deeper, circling her clit with the flat of his tongue before dipping lower again. Her breath hitched—small, almost inaudible—and she covered it with a soft cough.

Maekar tilted his head. “You’re certain you’re well?”

“Quite,” she answered, voice a shade tighter. She shifted in the chair as if adjusting her posture, the movement pressing her more firmly against Daeron’s mouth. He took the invitation, sucking gently, then licking in long, languid strokes that made her toes curl inside her slippers. Her knuckles whitened on the armrest.

Maekar found the book he wanted on a lower shelf and straightened, flipping through a few pages. “Daeron mentioned you’d been reading the histories yourself. Any particular interest?”

She managed a coherent answer—while Daeron’s tongue worked her with increasing focus. Heat coiled low in her belly. Every time she thought she might break, she forced her eyes back to the page and answered in even tones.

Maekar lingered. He asked about whether she and Daeron planned to attend the evening’s gathering. Each time she spoke, Daeron rewarded her composure with another slow, filthy lick, or a soft suckle at her clit that made her hips want to lift. She remained still. Barely.

At last maekar closed the book and tucked it under his arm. “Well. Tell my son to come out of your solar for once today.”

“I will,” she said, and even managed a small smile.

He inclined his head and left, the door clicking shut behind him.

Only then did she let her head fall back against the chair, a low, shaky sound escaping her throat. Daeron’s hands tightened on her thighs. He licked her through the aftershocks of the near-discovery, slower now, almost soothing, until she patted where his head was and he emerged from beneath her skirts, lips wet, eyes dark with amusement and hunger.

He rose onto his knees between her legs, wiped his mouth with the back of his hand, and grinned.

“You did well, my lady.”

She looked down at him, flushed and breathing hard, and answered with a soft, breathless huff

[afictionalwhor3]

No Tears

Summary: How they would react to the first time you cried from pleasure during sex

Warnings: implied unprotected pinv, fingering, Bruce is kinda mean. Written on my phone, narrowly proofread. This is my first time writing for DC so I apologize for any inaccuracies. Feedback is always encouraged :)

DICK GRAYSON

Dick had already made you cum twice tonight and he hadn’t even taken his cock out.

“Look at her” he coos eyes trained on your pussy as his fingers slide into you easily “so pretty”

His hair is a mess from where your hands have been pulling and running through it consistently

“Dick please. I can’t baby. Need your cock” you whine. You weren’t even exactly sure what you wanted, for Dick to stop or to give you more. Your nerves were fried from the overstimulation. Dick curls his fingers just right causing you to tug particularly hard at his hair. This is what causes him to look up at you and see the tears rolling down your face. He smirks pressing a kiss to clit and speeding up his movements.

“Oh there she is, there’s my pretty girl”

JASON TODD

Jason’s head was buried in your neck as he pounded into you. Your nails digging into his back as he hit the deepest spots inside you. Your moans bouncing off the walls

“Jace. God Jay, it feels so fucking good” you moan. Jason groans and pulls away from your neck so he can see your beautiful, wrecked face. Instead her sees the tears that soak your skin and immediately stops his assault on your pussy. You whine pathetically as the pleasure leaves you and open your eyes to look at Jason.

“Baby, did I hurt you? Why didn’t you stop me?” Jason asks hands cupping your face and voice dripping in concern. You watch in real time guilt take over his features. Before he can pull away you wrap your legs around his waist locking your ankles. Now Jason is looking at you confused as you begin to grind up into him, desperate for stimulation.

“Jace please don’t stop. It feels so good. I’m ok I promise I’m okay. Just please, please, keep going” you whine doing your best to reassure him but your brain clouded by thoughts of lust.

Jason says your name softly still not entirely convinced. He can feel the way your walls are squeezing him, and your attempt at grinding into him shows how bad you want it. However, he couldn’t stop the fear in the back of his mind that he was hurting you. He doesn’t know how he would live with himself if he was ever the cause of your pain.

You take a deep breath trying to slow your brain down. You grab Jason’s face forcing him to look at you.

“Jason, I promise I’m fine. I swear to you. But I really need you to keep fucking me because I’m losing my mind here baby,” you plead desperately for him to keep going. Jason must be satisfied with that answer because he allows a small smile to take over his features before beginning to slowly fuck back into you.

BRUCE WAYNE

You had been bratty since the two of you got into the limo for the WE charity gala. You of course understood why you had to go, and of course you supported the cause. But tonight you really just wanted a quiet night at home with your husband. Instead you were in a tight, very expensive, gown and shoes that cost more than most people’s rent. Since you had to go, you decided to be a menance to Bruce all night. Teasing him at every possible occasion until eventually he couldn’t take it anymore. That’s how you ended up here. Back at the manor on all fours with Bruce drilling into you from behind.

“This is what you wanted huh? Tease me all night just so I could bring you home and fuck you. Dirty girl” Bruce tsks as he pumps his cock in and out of you. Your moans are muffled by the expensive bedding under you. Bruce leans over and grabs your jaw forcing you to look up into the mirror that was, conviently, placed across from your shared bed. You were a mess. Lips swollen and lip combo gone from your passionate makeout session on the way home, mascara running down your face from the tears that leaked from your eyes.

“Look at my pretty girl. Nothing to say now huh?”

Wally West

The way Wally fucked you was honestly unfair. No man would ever compare to the way Wally used his super speed on you in the bedroom. Whether it was his tongue, or fingers, or now with his dick moving in and out of you.

“So tight for me. Feel so good baby” Wally moans. He looks down and notices your tear stained face looking up at him. Your eyes bigger than ever and lashes wet with fresh tears while he shows no signs of letting up on you. “Feel good?” He asks. His convert attempt at making sure you were okay. You nodded your head

“Yeah Wals. It feels so good. Soo good” you moan, clenching around him for emphasis. He shudders and begins pressing kisses up and down your jaw. His tip hits a particularly deep spot inside of you that has you letting out a strangled cry and clinging to him.

“I know sweet girl, I know” he coos in your ear, squeezing your hips to reassure you while his own continue to pound into you at brutal pace.

[softhandz]

jason todd being an absolute meanie because he refuses to give you his dick,

so instead he puts a vibe in reader and accidentally turns it on-while on patrol and breaks it so you’re just stuck in your shared bedroom, tied down and suffering-waiting for my tease of a boyfriend to come back and take if out

please don’t feel pressured to do this-i just saw your post asking for reqs so i gave it a shot

thought you knew better? jason todd x afab!reader a/n: and i thank you for your patience sweet raccoon! here's what i have for now, as i like this idea and am playing around with the idea of something longer for kinktober 26! something along the lines of you and jason teasing one another until he snaps

18+ MDNI • 18+ MDNI • 18+ MDNI • 18+ MDNI • 18+ MDNI • 18+ MDNI •

wc: 1k

Jason groans, low and hungry, fingers spreading you apart so he can see how ruined you already are. Slick pooling at your entrance, thighs trembling, the broken vibrator still half-buried inside you and buzzing uselessly against your walls. He hooks two fingers around it and drags it out slowly, watching the way your cunt clenches around nothing the moment it leaves you. “Oh, couldn’t even hold it?” He lets the vibrator drop to the mattress, soaked through. “I came as soon as I broke the remote. What’s your excuse?”

His fingers drag through your folds, slow and deliberate, collecting the mess there before he lifts them to look at them in the low light. Slick strings between his fingers. He clicks his tongue. “Impatient little thing.”

You can’t look away from him. That’s the whole reason you spent the afternoon being a brat. Mouthing off right before patrol, wearing his patience down until it snapped, only to see him come home looking exactly like this. Green eyes gone dark, jaw tight, the smirk on his mouth mean and satisfied. He knows it, too. He always knows it.

He drops to his stomach between your thighs and licks a slow, flat stripe up through your folds, from your entrance all the way to your clit, tasting every orgasm you’ve had in the last few hours. His tongue works through the slick methodically, like he’s in no rush at all, pressing in soft circles before pulling back to mouth at you with his lips. You feel every ridge of his mouth. The ropes at your wrists creak against the headboard when your hips jerk up.

“Jay—”

He pulls back just enough to speak against you, breath hot. “Look at this mess.” His thumb presses flat against your clit, not moving, just resting there while he surveys the state of you. Sweat-damp sheets. Thighs shaking. Arousal smeared across your inner thighs. “Pathetic.”

The word hits you low in the stomach. Your hips roll up uselessly, chasing his thumb, and he lets them; just watches you grind against nothing with that same mean smirk.

“Jay, please.”

“Oh, now you remember your manners.” He tilts his head, thumb still unmoving. “Where were they this afternoon?”

He doesn’t wait for an answer, sealing his mouth over your clit and sucks, two fingers pressing inside you at the same time, curling up and finding the spot that makes your vision white at the edges. You’re so sensitive that it almost hurts, walls fluttering around his fingers, thighs trying to close around his head before his free hand comes up and shoves them back open. He holds you there, pinned and spread, eating you out with focused, relentless attention until you feel the orgasm building fast and sharp—

And then he stops.

He pulls his fingers free, lifts his head, dragging his thumb across his lower lip to catch the slick there, then licks it off. His eyes stay on yours while he does it. “But then my sweet little brat’s fun would have been ruined.” He sits up on his knees between your thighs, and his hands go to his belt. “Don’t worry, I’ll give you what you’ve actually been waiting for.”

The clink of the buckle is loud in the quiet room. He strips efficiently—belt, pants, shirt—and you push up onto your elbows just to stare at him. His cock is already hard, flushed dark at the tip, a bead of precome welling at the slit. Thick enough that you feel your mouth go dry.

He catches you staring and his expression shifts into something worse than the smirk. “Hungry little thing,” he says, crawling over you, knees bracketing your hips, hand coming up to grip your jaw and tilt your face up to his. “Been thinking about this dick all night, haven’t you?”

You nod, lips parting, and he gives you the kiss you’ve been asking for—open and wet and filthy, his tongue pushing into your mouth, teeth catching your lower lip and tugging before he releases it. When he pulls back, there’s a string of spit between your mouths.

Then he reaches down, wraps a hand around his cock, and lines up against your entrance. The blunt head catches and pushes in, and he doesn’t ease into it, choosing to push forward in one rough thrust, seating himself fully, groaning against your lips when your cunt clenches tight around him. The stretch burns in the best way, walls gripping him, still swollen and sensitive from everything that came before.

“Fuck.” His forehead drops to yours. “Still so wet.”

He pulls back to the tip and drives in again, setting a pace immediately; hips snapping forward hard enough to rock the headboard against the wall, every thrust punching the air out of your lungs and replacing it with a moan. The ropes bite into your wrists when you pull against them. His hands find your hips and grip, fingers digging in hard enough to bruise, holding you in place so you can’t squirm away from the force of it.

“That’s it.” He watches your face as he fucks into you, jaw clenched, sweat starting to gather at his temple. “Been edging yourself for hours. And now you’re gonna take it properly.”

The orgasm builds fast, too fast, your body wound tight and oversensitive, walls already fluttering around him. It crests and breaks in a wave, your back arching off the mattress as far as the ropes allow, cunt squeezing rhythmically around his cock. You hear him curse, feel him groan, his pace stuttering for just a moment—

And then he keeps going.

Same brutal rhythm. Hips snapping forward, the wet sound of him fucking through your orgasm obscene in the quiet room. You gasp, oversensitive and overwhelmed, and he leans down so his mouth is at your ear.

“You didn’t think that was it, did you?” Low and mean, breath hot against your skin. His cock drags against your walls on the next thrust, and you whimper. “Oh, sweetheart. We’re not even close to done.”

[kitkatkitzune]

POSTURE PAIN

Pairing: Jacaerys Velaryon x Fem!reader

Summary: Jace is suffering from back pain, you offer to help.

Warnings: 18+, Suggestive, Tbh this is kinda smut, Jace is a little subby, Kind of mentions of time period sexism??, Potential Inconsistencies in the tense it’s written in (who is surprised? the answer is no one)

Notes: Hello! I’m so sorry I didn’t post this sooner like I wanted to BUT I am working on many different fics right now for many different ASOIAF characters!! I’ve even begun to draft for my October event so stay tuned!!

This is my first time writing something so suggestive/smutty so please be kind to me!

&& the header is for comedic purpose because… look at him lol

Word Count: 1.3k

MASTER POST , ASOIAF MASTERLIST

———————

You were curled up on the chaise by the fire with a book in your hands. This was your nightly routine. After shedding your heavy gowns, hair pins, and other jewels you would sit and read while in your thin night shift. You would typically do this until Jacaerys joined you in your shared chambers even though he had told you many times that you need not stay up for him.

You had just finished your chapter when he entered the chambers looking exhausted.

“Long day?” you ask as you close your book, standing up.

He nods, rubbing his neck, “I called for the maids to bring water for a bath.”

You make your way towards him before chuckling, “You need it. You smell like Vermax...”

Smiling, he tilts his head at you, “Yes, I was patrolling today.”

There was a knock on the door and maids filtered into the room with buckets of hot water, quickly making their way to the connected bathing room. They were gone just as quickly as they arrived. Jace never liked or wanted the maids washing him. He was perfectly capable of cleaning himself. Not to mention the fact that you had offered to help him many times after you had been wed, just as he would help you.

You sat beside the tub, taking turns telling each other about your day. You told him of your readings and research in the library, he told you of his conversation with Daemon. Jace did not remain in the bath for long, he never did unless you were bathing together, he didn’t find it relaxing and when the water cooled even the slightest bit he began to complain.

As he got dressed for sleep, you made yourself comfortable on your side of the bed. Jace groaned as he walked across the room, one hand clutching his lower back.

“You sound like an old man,” you say teasingly.

He rolls his eyes, groaning more as he sits on the bed with his back to you, “I feel like one. My back aches and my neck is so stiff…”

You sit up, scooting across the bed until you can rest your hands on his shoulders and your knees are touching his lower back. You tilt your head to look at him, a small frown on your face, “Well my love…”

“Well what?” he turns his head towards you.

“I believe it is from your posture.”

“My…posture?”

“Yes, you stand hunched over and sometimes you walk with your head jutted out.”

He looks offended, “I do no such thing.”

“My love,” you run a hand down his back til you reach the center, “you’re even slouching right now,” you push against his back, forcing him up straight causing his back to curve.

Then you return your hands to his shoulders and pull back slightly, putting him in a more proper sitting position. He looks at you again, only this time he appears shocked, horrified, and also relieved.

“How’d…”

“One of the very first things us ladies learn with our septas is how to stand proper. I don’t believe they teach such things to princes and lords. No, the first thing they teach you is how to swing a blade. Standing straight for me is subconscious but for you… it’s something you need to focus on.”

“You mean to tell me that I have been walking around hunched over my entire life and no one has said a thing?” he asks, exasperated.

“Not many people would dare question a prince… although I will say that Luke seems to stand properly, as well as Joff but he’s still little so that could change! Daemon is… well, sometimes I believe he stands with his shoulders too far back and his chest puffed out.”

Jace sighs, rubbing his temples, “My little brothers stand better than I do? What kind of example am I leading…”

You hum and scoot away from him, back to your side of the bed, “It can also come from stress, you carry a great weight on your shoulders Jace. No jest intended. Your back will likely ache for a while even as you adjust to the new posture… but I know something that will help for now, lay down on the bed.”

He gives you a startled look, his face flushing, “My love I don’t think that would help…”

You gasp, “You’re perverted! No! I meant… lay on your stomach, not on your back!”

“Oh.”

“Mhm.”

He complies, and moves to the center of the bed, resting his head in the crook of his arm. You click your tongue, “Put your arms at your sides.”

Jace does and only then do you move. Slowly, you move to straddle his lower back just above his tailbone. You start up by his shoulders, your hands working at tight muscles near the neck.

He immediately lets out a groan and hides his head in the pillows. You smile to yourself, biting your lip to suppress a giggle.

You hum a song while massaging his back, you can feel the tension leaving his body as you work your magic.

It seems as though he is going to fall asleep, completely relaxed as your hands are getting lower on his back. But that would be too easy. His hips began to rock into the bed, subtly at first and then more obvious, before he lets out a quiet moan.

“Love,” he croaks out, “I’m… sorry,” he hides his face entirely, “wait, please…”

You shush him before whispering, “It is natural Jace,” your hands fall to the bed on either side of the man beneath you as you lean forward til you're laying entirely on top of him, breasts pressed against his back.

“Do you wish for me to continue?” your lips brush his ear and he shivers letting out a noise that sounds like a whimper.

“Hm?” you hum, playfully biting his ear making him shudder, “I can not hear you with your face hidden in the pillows.”

Jace turns his head to look back at you. His eyes are dazed and his cheeks red, “Please…”

You smile, pecking his cheek before leaning back and continuing your work. You can’t help but feel pride every time he moans or groans or whimpers when his hips jerk into the bed. You were just about to stop and offer a proper solution to his current predicament when you felt him tense up harder than before.

“Fuck,” he mumbles your name, “‘m sorry…”

You slip off of his back and onto the cool furs on your side of the bed. He attempts to shimmy down the bed but you shake your head and pull him into your arms. Unable to hide his face between your legs, he hides in your breasts. You run your fingers through his curls, “You’ve made a mess of your trousers,” you tease.

He nips at your skin through your shift and you tug at his hair in response. Jace looks up at you and pouts.

“How does your back feel?” you ask, him being in pain being the main thing on your mind.

“Better, much better.”

“Good, we’ll work more on your posture tomorrow okay? I can begin to remind you if you’d like?”

“Please do,” he mutters, still embarrassed by the situation.

You laugh and pull him back to your chest. Just as you’re about to drift off Jace comes to a sudden, horrifying realization. His voice is muffled due to his face being buried in your breasts, “When I asked you to allow me to court you, to be my wife… I was walking like that? Standing like that?”

You giggle, “Yes Jace, I’m afraid you were.”

“And you still agreed?!”

“You have a pretty face.”

Since he caught a stray during this I must add…