Between Dragonfire and the Storm - Baelor Targaryen x wife!reader
Summary: You were once meant to be Lyonel Baratheon’s—promised, expected, inevitable. Years later, at the Ashford Tourney, he still looks at you as though nothing has changed.
Baelor Targaryen, however, has never been one to question what is already his.
Author’s note: Just as requested, and something I really enjoyed working on – a story involving a slightly possessive Baelor Targaryen and a jealous Lyonel Baratheon!
English is my second language, please forgive me if I made any mistakes (:
Word count: 5.2 k
Other stories of mine
Other stories of Baelor Targaryen
The Ashford tourney unfolds like something out of a song—sunlight catching on polished armor, banners in gold and green stirring lazily in the warm breeze, voices rising and falling. Laughter carries across the grounds, mingling with the clash of steel and the thunder of hooves. It is a place made for spectacle, for glory, for stories meant to last long after the last tent is gone.
You expect to enjoy it.
You do not expect to feel watched.
At first, it is only a flicker of awareness, a quiet prickle at the edge of your senses. But when you turn, your gaze drifts across the gathered lords and knights until it stills on a figure you know all too well.
Lyonel Baratheon stands as though the space belongs to him, broad-shouldered and at ease, a half-finished goblet of wine loose in his hand. There is an easy arrogance to him, bordering on charm, as if the world exists to be met head-on and laughed at afterward. He is speaking to someone, grinning wide—but the moment his eyes find yours, that grin shifts, sharpening rather than fading.
Recognition comes first.
Then something warmer.
Then something altogether more dangerous.
“Well, now,” he calls, his voice carrying effortlessly, rich with amusement that turns heads, “if that isn’t a sight I never thought I’d see again.”
Your name follows, spoken like it has never left his tongue.
It should feel improper.
It does.
And that is precisely the problem.
“My lord,” you answer, inclining your head just enough for courtesy, though your pulse has already begun to quicken in a way that has little to do with the heat.
Lyonel approaches without hesitation, as he always does, closing the distance as though years have not passed. Up close, he is unchanged—sun-warmed skin, storm-bright eyes, that irrepressible energy…
“Gods,” he says, looking you over with unabashed boldness, “you’ve not changed at all. That hardly seems fair.”
You huff a quiet breath, something caught between a laugh and something else you refuse to name. “You have not learned restraint, I see.”
“Restraint?” Lyonel echoes, mock-offended. “And rob the world of my many virtues? I think not.”
There it is—that easy humor, that shameless confidence.
“You used to like my lack of restraint,” he adds, lower now, just enough that the words do not carry.
You should step back. You know you should. And yet, you do not.
Perhaps it is the way he looks at you—not as a lady of court, not as a prince’s wife, but as something he once nearly had. Perhaps it is the memory of a future that never came to pass.
Or perhaps it is simply Lyonel—too bold, too present, too impossible to ignore.
“You remember too much,” you say softly.
“And you pretend not to remember enough,” he returns without hesitation.
The noise of the tourney fades, just for a moment, as he steps closer—close enough that you catch the faint scent of wine, close enough that propriety should demand distance.
“Tell me,” he murmurs, his voice dipping into something quieter, almost coaxing, “do you ever wonder what would have happened, if—”
He does not finish.
But you feel it all the same—in the space between you, in the way his gaze drops briefly to your lips before lifting again, searching, daring.
For a heartbeat, the world narrows to a question neither of you has any right to ask.
Your breath catches.
And then—you turn your head, just slightly. Not abrupt, not unkind, but enough.
“Some things,” you say, your voice steadier than you feel, “are not meant to be wondered about.”
Lyonel stills.
For once, he has no immediate reply.
The smile that follows is slower, softer, edged with something that almost resembles understanding.
“Mm,” he hums, though his eyes linger, warm and far too knowing. “And yet, I find myself wondering all the same…”
The moment does not break.
But it shifts.
You do not need to turn to know the exact moment Baelor notices.
There is a shift in the air before there is a sound—a subtle stilling. It is not loud, not disruptive, nothing like the easy presence Lyonel carries with him.
And yet it draws attention all the same.
Lyonel feels it too.
You see it in the way his gaze flicks past you for the briefest of moments, in the way his mouth curves—not into surprise, but into something sharper, something almost entertained.
“Well,” he says under his breath, not quite bothering to hide the amusement, “and here I thought for a moment I might have her for myself.”
Baelor comes to stand beside you as though that place had never belonged to anyone else.
The warmth of him settles at your side, close enough that your sleeve brushes his, close enough that the space Lyonel had occupied so easily no longer feels like his to claim.
There is no urgency in Baelor’s movements, no outward sign of displeasure, and yet the quiet certainty of him is unmistakable.
“My lord Baratheon,” Baelor greets, his tone as composed as ever, as if he had come upon nothing more noteworthy than a courteous exchange.
Lyonel lets out a soft huff of laughter, tipping his head in acknowledgment. “Your Grace. I was beginning to think you might leave your lady unattended all afternoon.”
There is a challenge in it.
Baelor’s gaze rests on Lyonel for a moment and then, just as easily, it shifts to you.
If Lyonel’s attention had felt warm, familiar, a little too bold—Baelor’s is something else entirely.
Possessive in a way that does not need to announce itself.
“You seemed engaged in conversation,” Baelor says, his tone as even as ever, though something in it has shifted—something quieter. “I would not wish to intrude.”
It is a polite fiction, and all three of you know it.
Lyonel lets out a low, humorless chuckle, rolling his shoulders as though the very idea amuses him.
“Intrude?” he echoes, glancing briefly at you before his attention slides back to Baelor. “Gods, no. I’d say you’re right on time. Wouldn’t want me corrupting your lady with old memories.”
The word your lands deliberately.
Baelor does not react—not outwardly. His gaze rests on Lyonel for a moment, measured and unhurried, before his hand finds yours. His fingers lace with yours, his thumb brushing slowly against your skin as though reaffirming something that requires no witness and yet is offered to one all the same.
“Old memories?” Baelor repeats, almost thoughtfully.
Lyonel’s mouth curves, though there is nothing soft in it. “Aye. The sort that were meant to end in a wedding, if I recall correctly.”
His gaze sharpens, the easy humor thinning into something edged. “Before certain… arrangements were changed.”
Baelor inclines his head slightly, as if acknowledging a point in a conversation rather than the barb it is meant to be.
“Such things happen,” he says calmly, his voice carrying not the slightest trace of apology.
Lyonel huffs, the sound caught somewhere between a laugh and a scoff.
“Funny way of putting it,” he mutters, tipping his goblet before taking a slow drink. “Where I’m from, we’d call it something closer to theft.”
Your breath tightens, but Baelor—he does not so much as stiffen. If anything, there is a quiet stillness to him now.
“Then you mistake the nature of it,” he replies, his tone unchanging, though there is something firmer beneath it now, something that does not yield. “Nothing was taken that was not freely given.”
For a brief moment, Lyonel’s expression falters—not enough to break, but enough to shift, something darker flickering behind the sharp amusement. His gaze drops to where your hands are joined, to the easy, unshaken way Baelor holds you, and when he looks back up, there is a new edge to him, something less playful and far more personal.
“Freely given,” he repeats, slower this time. “A generous way to tell it. Though I suppose it sounds better than admitting a Baratheon was set aside for a dragon.”
The words land harder than they should.
For a split second, it is not Lyonel you are aware of, nor even the watching court around you—but the sharp, unexpected sting of it, the way your breath catches as heat rises to your face. Not because there is truth in it—but because of how easily he says it.
How little regard he has for what stands between you now.
Your fingers tighten almost imperceptibly in Baelor’s hand.
A faint murmur of nearby voices drifts past, oblivious to the shift in the air, but here, in this small space between the three of you, something has sharpened into focus.
Baelor’s gaze does not waver.
If anything, it grows steadier, the calm of it no longer merely courteous, but assured in a way that borders on dangerous.
“I would not presume to speak for what was set aside,” he says, and there is something quieter in it now, something edged with a confidence that does not need to rise to meet Lyonel’s heat. “Only for what remains.”
His thumb moves again against your hand.
Lyonel lets out a breath through his nose, something close to a laugh, though it carries little humor. “Gods,” he mutters, dragging a hand through his dark locks, his gaze flicking between the two of you with open disbelief. “You really are like this. Cool as ice while the rest of us are meant to swallow it and smile.”
His mouth twists, a crooked, restless thing. “No temper, no jealousy, not even the decency to look threatened.”
His dark eyes narrow slightly, something challenging slipping through. “Or is that it? You’re not threatened at all.”
It is not a question, but rather a test.
Baelor meets it without hesitation, without pause.
“No,” he says.
For a heartbeat, Lyonel goes very still, as if something in that answer strikes deeper than he intended to allow. Then his head tilts, and a slow, disbelieving grin pulls at his mouth.
“Seven hells,” he breathes, a short laugh breaking free despite himself. “I almost admire that.”
He takes another drink, longer this time, before lowering the goblet with a quiet exhale. “Here I was thinking I might get a rise out of you, but you just stand there looking like you’ve already won the bloody war.”
Baelor does not deny it.
He simply looks at him—calm, composed, and entirely unshaken.
And that, more than anything, is answer enough.
Lyonel studies him for a moment longer, something unreadable passing through his expression before it settles back into that familiar, reckless charm, though the edge has not entirely left it.
“Well,” he says at last, lifting his goblet in a half-mocking salute, his gaze lingering on you with a familiarity that borders on insolence, “if I had to lose my future wife to anyone…”
The words trail just long enough to suggest concession.
And then his mouth curves—not softer, but sharper.
“…I suppose it was always going to be one of you.”
Something darker is settling behind the amusement, something older than this moment alone. “Dragons have a habit of taking what they want, don’t they?” he continues, his tone light in a way that does nothing to soften the edge beneath it. “Land, crowns… betrothed brides.”
There is no laughter in him now.
Only that restless, storm-born defiance that seems to sit at the core of him.
“Though I’ll admit,” Lyonel adds, swirling the wine in his cup before taking a slow sip, as if the next words are nothing more than idle curiosity, “I always wondered whether it was truly her choice… or simply another decision made for her, dressed up prettily enough that no one thought to question it.”
The implication settles heavily in the space between you.
Baelor does not rise to the provocation, does not let the sharpness of Lyonel’s words dictate the shape of his response.
When he does speak, his voice remains calm.
But there is something beneath it now that was not there before.
“If you must wonder,” Baelor says, his gaze fixed on Lyonel with quiet clarity, “then you did not know her half so well as you believed.”
The words are not raised but they land cleanly.
Lyonel stills, something in him shifts, his grip tightening just slightly around the stem of his goblet before easing again. His jaw works once, as though he might answer immediately—as though he should.
And yet, for the briefest of moments, he does not.
Because Baelor has not met his fire with fire.
He has simply… removed the ground beneath it.
A slow breath leaves Lyonel, something rougher this time, edged with frustration that no longer bothers to hide behind humor. “Gods,” he mutters again, shaking his head, though the faintest hint of a grin still lingers, stubborn and unyielding. “You really are impossible.”
But even that does not quite settle the storm in him.
His gaze shifts once more to you, lingering there, softer—but not gentler. There is still something unresolved in it, something that likely always will be.
“If he ever gives you reason to regret it,” Lyonel adds, almost idly, though the weight behind it is anything but, “you know where to find me.”
Baelor does not look away.
“No,” he answers for you, his voice still calm, still controlled—yet undeniably firmer now. “She will not need to.”
The certainty in it is absolute.
For a moment, Lyonel holds his gaze, something fierce and searching flickering there—as though he might push further, might test that certainty until it cracks.
But it does not.
And in the end, it is Lyonel who exhales first, a quiet, begrudging sound that carries both defiance and something dangerously close to acceptance, until he just turns around.
Lyonel’s footsteps fade into the noise of the tourney, swallowed by laughter and distant steel, but the echo of his presence lingers all the same—like the last rumble of thunder after a storm has passed.
For a moment, neither of you speak.
But Baelor does not release your hand.
If anything, his hold tightens. His thumb moves once against your skin, slower now.
When you glance up at him, there is something different in his expression.
But something warmer than before—something steadier, and yet far more dangerous for how carefully contained it is.
“Come,” he says quietly.
There is no question in it.
Only a certainty that expects to be followed.
And you do—of course you do.
He does not look back toward the lists, nor toward the crowds, nor even toward where Lyonel had stood only moments before. Whatever interest the tourney once held seems to have lost its hold entirely, dismissed without a second thought as he leads you away from the noise and from the crush of voices and the watchful eyes.
At first, his pace is unhurried.
The same careful composure he has shown all afternoon.
But as the distance between you and the tourney grounds grows, something shifts.
So subtle that you might have missed it, had your hand not still been in his.
His fingers tighten, just slightly.
His steps lengthen.
Not enough to rush.
But enough to make it clear—he is no longer merely walking.
He is taking you somewhere.
“Baelor,” you begin, your voice softer now in the absence of the crowd, “the tourney—”
“Will continue without us,” he replies, just as soft, though there is a thread of something else beneath it now, something that leaves little room for argument.
If anything, he draws you closer as you pass beneath the archway that leads into the keep, the cooler air of stone replacing the warmth of the sun. Servants step aside without question, heads bowing, though you barely register them—barely register anything beyond the quiet intensity that has settled around him.
By the time you reach the chambers set aside for you within the castle, the world beyond them feels distant, almost unreal—reduced to little more than noise that no longer matters.
Baelor does not slow as the door closes behind you.
The quiet certainty that had defined him all afternoon remains—but it has changed shape now. His hand is still at your waist, firm and unyielding, and before you can quite gather your thoughts, he turns you fully toward him, leaving no space for hesitation.
“Baelor—” you begin, though you are not entirely certain what you mean to say.
He does not let you finish.
Not with words.
His hand tightens at your waist as he pulls you flush against him, the sudden closeness stealing the rest of the sentence from your lips. There is nothing careless in it, nothing rough for the sake of it—but there is a decisiveness there that you are not used to from him, something that sends a sharp, unexpected thrill through you.
“Tell me,” he murmurs, his voice low, closer now than it has been all day, “did you enjoy his attention?”
The question should feel measured, but it does not.
There is something beneath it that makes your breath catch despite yourself.
You know this part of him.
“No,” you answer, softer now, though your pulse has begun to betray you. “I—”
His hand shifts, sliding from your waist to your back, guiding you back a step—then another—until the edge of the bed meets the back of your legs.
And then, with a movement that is as controlled as it is sudden, he pushes you down onto the mattress.
Not roughly. Never that.
But with a certainty that leaves no question as to who is leading now.
The breath leaves you in a soft gasp as you land, the world tilting for a moment before settling again, your skirts shifting around you as you look up at him—really look this time.
Baelor stands over you, the light from the narrow windows catching in his dark hair, which is streaked with silver, his expression no longer distant, no longer composed in that careful, princely way.
The sight of you laid out before him, your hair fanned across the sheets, stirs something deeper than mere desire—something raw, instinctive. He takes you in slowly, as though committing every curve, every breath, every small movement to memory, like a man long deprived of something he now refuses to lose again.
Unhurried, deliberate, he pulls his tunic over his head, then his breeches, letting them fall forgotten to the floor. You cannot look away, drawn in by the quiet confidence in every movement, by the way he reveals himself piece by piece—muscle, scars, and dark hair alike—each mark telling its own story, each one a reminder that the man before you is not only made to endure battle, but to command whatever stands before him.
“You did not answer me fully,” he says suddenly, though his voice remains quiet, controlled—yet threaded now with something unmistakably intent.
You swallow, your heart beating faster than you care to admit, though you do not look away. “I enjoyed watching you pretend you were not bothered,” you admit, the honesty slipping free before you can stop it.
“I was bothered,” Baelor says, and this time there is no distance in it, no careful restraint. “I simply saw no need to give him the satisfaction of knowing it.”
For a moment, he simply looks at you.
“My patience, however,” he continues, stepping closer, the mattress dipping slightly beneath his weight as one knee comes to rest between yours, “is not without its limits.”
Your breath catches again as he leans in, one hand braced beside you, the other finding your wrist—not restraining, not forcing, but guiding, holding, as though he has every right to decide where you belong.
“You have been very composed today, Your Grace,” you murmur, softer now, your voice threaded with something that might almost be teasing, if not for the way your pulse races beneath his touch.
Baelor’s gaze darkens—just slightly, just enough to be felt.
“Yes,” he says.
And then, quieter—
“I believe I have earned the right not to be.”
And when his lips finally meet yours, it is not the restrained affection of court, not the careful touch of a prince mindful of watching eyes.
His hand tightens slightly at your wrist, anchoring you there. The kiss lingers, deepens, and you find yourself responding before you can think better of it.
There is a certainty in the way he kisses you, something deeper than mere affection, something that does not ask but takes, and the realization of it sends a sharp, breathless heat through you.
Baelor feels it.
The smallest hitch in your breath, the way your body yields rather than pulls away, the quiet, involuntary sound that escapes you when his hand slides from your wrist to your waist, firm now, unmistakably so.
It draws something out of him… Something that had been held back far too long.
His grip tightens, enough to be felt, enough to make your breath catch again as he draws you closer, leaving no space between you.
“Is this what you prefer?” he murmurs against your lips, quieter now, but no less intent, his voice low with something that is no longer entirely composed. “When I am less… restrained… And just take you?”
The question should embarrass you.
Perhaps it does.
Because warmth rises to your cheeks almost instantly, a flush you cannot hide, your breath unsteady as you try—and fail—to form an answer.
“I—” The word breaks, dissolving into something softer, something far less controlled, and the faintest whimper escapes you before you can stop it.
The sound stills him.
And his hand at your waist moves again, guiding you back against the mattress more firmly this time, as though he has no intention of letting you slip away from him now that he has seen how you respond.
“I see,” Baelor says quietly.
And this time there is no mistaking the note of satisfaction in it.
Your breath catches again as he leans over you, one hand braced beside your head, the other still at your waist, holding you there as though you belong exactly where you are. There is nothing careless in the way he moves—but there is a demand to it now, a quiet insistence that makes your pulse race all the same.
His gaze drops briefly, taking in the way you look beneath him—flushed, breathless, entirely undone in a way no one else is meant to see.
“You should not encourage me,” he continues, though there is something almost wry beneath the words, something that suggests he has no intention of stopping.
Your flush deepens, impossible to hide now, and the realization only seems to please him further. His thumb brushes along your jaw again before slipping beneath your chin, tilting your face up just enough that you cannot look away from him as he still grinds his hips against you.
“You're mine. Only ever mine,” his voice comes out low and rough with emotion he rarely allows himself to show. His lips crash against yours in a searing kiss, nipping and claiming, desperate to brand his essence upon your very soul.
His rigid length presses insistently against your center through the layers of your skirts as he leans down to murmur hotly against the shell of your ear.
“No other man shall lay claim to what is mine. This exquisite body...this radiant spirit...all mine to cherish and adore. Now and always.”
To punctuate his vow, he rolls his hips again, grinding deliciously against your most sensitive flesh.
His words send shivers through you, desire pooling hot and heavy in your belly and you can’t help but let out a soft moan as he grinds against you
“Please, Baelor...” you gasp, not able to form a coherent sentence anymore and wrap your legs around his hips, drawing him closer, craving the delicious friction of his hardness against your aching core.
Your hands move over him with growing urgency, tracing the firm lines of his chest and shoulders, learning the shape of him through touch alone. Your fingers press, linger, mapping muscle and heat—your nails catching lightly against his arm as you shift closer. A shuddering groan escapes him as your nails raking fire along his skin. You tilt your head, brushing your lips along his jaw before nipping slightly, only to soothe it again with the slow glide of your tongue.
Another growl tears from his throat as you capture his mouth in a filthy kiss, all teeth and tongue, trying to devour him whole, while his fingers start to pull on the clasps of your dress.
But Baelor returns your fervent kisses with equal passion, plundering the honeyed depths of your mouth as his hands work feverishly to divest you of your gown.
“Need to taste you...feel you...” he rasps against your lips, finally freeing your breasts from their confines. Cupping the generous swells reverently, he lowers his head to draw a pebbled nipple into the wet heat of his mouth, suckling greedily.
His other hand drifts downward, under your skirts, dipping between your slick folds to stroke your aching pearl. He circles and teases the sensitive bud until your hips buck wildly, seeking more.
“So perfect...so responsive,” he breathes hotly against your breast before laving the rosy peak with his tongue. With a final yank on your skirts, they too give way, baring your glistening sex to his hungry gaze.
A groan rumbles in Baelor’s chest at the sight of your pink folds as he looks down. Slick and ready for his taking... Unable to resist he leans back, his hands on your thighs, pushing them apart as he dips his head to run his tongue along your slit, savoring your unique flavor.
You cry out sharply as his wicked tongue parts your slick folds—the pleasure almost too intense to bear. Your fingers slide into his hair, holding him close as you grind shamelessly against his face. His thumbs pull your folds apart as his tongue slides up and down, circling your pearl.
The obscene sounds of his oral ministrations fill the room, mingling with your wanton moans and whimpers. Each flick and swirl of his tongue brings you higher, coiling the tension tighter and tighter in your core.
Just as you’re teetering on the brink, he eases back, leaving you empty and aching. You open your eyes to find him looming over you—pupils blown wide with lust, his impressive length jutting proudly from his hips, surrounded by dark curls.
You bite your lip, your cheeks are flushed as you reach down to grasp his thick shaft, stroking him firmly from root to tip. Another growl tears from him as precum drips from his tip. He doesn’t hesitate as he grips the back of your knee and pull you closer, and you cannot stop the soft whimper that escapes you.
Every time he sets aside that careful restraint and takes control, it feels the same—like a commander stepping onto the battlefield, certain, precise, and utterly unchallenged, knowing exactly how to lead and exactly how to claim what is his.
But as your small hand works him expertly, he throws his head back with a guttural groan, reveling in the delicious drag of your fist along his aching length. But he can’t wait any longer to sheath himself in your welcoming heat.
Capturing your wrists in one large hand, he pins them above your head as he notches the broad crown of his member at your entrance. Your gazes lock, breaths mated as he slowly sinks into you, inch after delicious inch, until he’s seated to the hilt.
“By the gods... So tight...” he grits out through clenched teeth, giving you a moment to adjust to his size. Then he begins to move, withdrawing nearly completely before driving back in with purposeful thrusts.
Sweat beads on his brow as he sets a punishing pace, the sound of flesh slapping against flesh echoing through the chamber.
You’re lying there—barely able to move. Baelor rolls his hips, sliding in and out, making you whimper with every movement. Until his hand slides down to your thigh and he grips it, spreading your legs wider to open you up for him as his hips slam forward.
But you need more...
“Deeper… Baelor,” you whine, but your cheeks blush even more. Baelor just chuckles darkly, before he stops slightly and reaches for a small pillow, before he pushes it under your arse, changing the angle. Now he kneels between your legs as his large hands slide under your bottom, gripping it, before he slams back home—eliciting a cry from you as his fat cock slides even deeper now.
The new position allows him to plunge impossibly deeper, hitting that secret spot within you. He sets a relentless rhythm, pistoning in and out of your clinging heat with single-minded focus.
“That's it, my queen. Take all of me,” he grunts, angling his hips to strike that sweet spot again and again. One hand releases its bruising grip on your arse to seek out your swollen pearl, rubbing tight circles over the sensitive bundle of nerves.
“Come for me. Let me feel you come undone,” he almost commands huskily, his own release building rapidly. With each pass of his thumb and each snap of his hips, he brings you closer to the precipice.
Suddenly, your inner walls flutter wildly around his throbbing length as your climax crashes over you. Your scream of ecstasy fills his ears as he buries himself to the hilt one last time, finding his own blissful end.
Your inner muscles clamping down on his pulsing shaft as wave after wave of pure bliss slowly subside. You can only hold on tightly as he continues to pound into you, prolonging your orgasm until you’re boneless and trembling.
Finally spent, he collapses on top of you, both of you panting harshly as you struggle to catch your breath. After a moment, he carefully withdraw from your tender folds, a hiss escaping you at the sensation.
Rolling onto his side, he draws you close without hesitation, one arm settling securely around you as though there is nowhere else you could possibly belong.
His lips press soft, lingering kisses to your sweat-dampened temple, his touch gentler now, soothing as his fingers drift through your hair in slow, absent strokes. The intensity of moments before fades into something warmer, quieter, as you lie entwined, your breathing gradually evening out together, the world beyond the room forgotten entirely.
For a while, neither of you speaks.
There is no need to.
Eventually, you find your voice, though it is softer than before, roughened at the edges from your intense lovemaking. “That was… intense,” you murmur, a faint smile touching your lips as your fingers trace idly along the firm lines of his abdomen. “I didn’t know you had that in you, my love.”
There is a hint of teasing in it—gentle, fond.
You shift slightly closer, your breath warm against his skin as your lips brush the corner of his mouth. “Perhaps Lyonel Baratheon should provoke you more often,” you add, quieter now, almost conspiratorial.
For a moment, Baelor says nothing.
Then, a soft breath leaves him—something just shy of a laugh, still a little unsteady, as though he has not entirely recovered either.
“Gods, no,” he murmurs, his voice low and faintly rough, though there is unmistakable amusement beneath it. His hand tightens briefly where it rests against you, his thumb brushing slow, deliberate circles against your side.
“I have no desire to share the credit.”
Your laughter slips out before you can stop it, startled and warm, and Baelor’s follows a heartbeat later, the sound echoing softly through the chambers before you press your face into the crook of his neck to stifle your laughter.
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Young and Beautiful | Baelor Targaryen x Lannister!Reader PART 2
After your arranged marriage to Prince Baelor, he keeps his promise not to hurt you, but there are many things within the Red Keep that end up doing so for him.
WORDS: 6.3k
WARNINGS: depression and suicidal thoughts, pregnancy loss/miscarriage mention (not from the reader), non-con touching insinuated, emotional neglect, court cruelty, blood.
PART1
●●●
Your wedding to Prince Baelor was grander than you had ever imagined.
The celebration lasted three full days in the Red Keep: tables laden with roasted venison, eel pies, and Dornish wine flowing like water; musicians with harps and flutes filling the courtyards until well past midnight; laughter echoing off the reddish stone walls and dances that swept even the sternest lords into their rhythm.
But beneath all that splendor, you remained nervous for the entire three days. From the moment the Septon spoke the sacred words and declared you husband and wife, from the instant Baelor inclined his head and placed a chaste, cold kiss upon your forehead, a dull unease settled in your chest and refused to leave.
On your first night of marriage, you arrived together at his chambers. Your legs trembled beneath layers of silk, and each step you took behind him felt heavier than the last. You felt like a lost pup trailing at the heels of a dragon you did not entirely trust.
Baelor stopped before the unlit fireplace and removed his black cloak embroidered with silver dragons. He draped it carefully over the back of a chair, as though the gesture demanded concentration. You remained frozen several paces away, hands pressed against your stomach, bracing for the worst.
You knew it. It was a cruel necessity to avoid scandal: a marriage left unconsummated would be questioned, and the court adored its rumors. He would force you, of course. How could he not—
Then you saw him draw a dagger from the left side of his belt. The steel gleamed briefly in the candlelight. He climbed onto the bed on his knees, pulled back the white linen sheets with precise movement, and without hesitation made a thin but deep cut along his left forearm. Blood welled at once, bright and red, dripping onto the fabric in dark stains that spread like ink.
“Prince!”
Your voice came out sharper than you intended. You stepped toward him without thinking.
Baelor lifted his free hand to stop you, the gesture calm, almost bored.
“I would prefer you call me Baelor,” he said evenly, as though he had not just opened his own flesh before you.
You looked again at the crimson stain slowly spreading across the sheet. He shrugged lightly.
“For everyone else, we have just consummated the marriage. That is the end of it.”
You nodded, stunned. Relief washed over you like cold water, but it left a strange aftertaste.
He rose and walked to a copper basin, cleaning the wound with a cloth he had prepared beforehand. The bleeding slowed almost immediately; the cut was clean, deliberate. Meanwhile, you remained motionless in the center of the room, unsure where to put your hands or how to behave. Your heart still pounded, though it was no longer pure fear. It was… discomfort. A dense discomfort, as if the air between you had thickened.
“Make yourself comfortable. Sleep,” he continued while wrapping his arm with practiced movements. “We will have to sleep together from now on, but do not trouble yourself over me again. Simply ignore my presence.”
He walked to the balcony doors and opened them wide. The cool night air rushed in, carrying the scent of salt from the Blackwater and the distant murmur of a city that never entirely slept. It stirred your loose hair and cooled the sweat at the nape of your neck.
You did not sleep that night.
You lay on the farthest side of the enormous canopy bed, wrapped in a nightgown that suddenly felt too thin. Baelor stretched out at the opposite end, removing nothing but his boots. He did not draw closer, did not even brush you with his gaze. He simply breathed slowly, steadily, until the rhythm became almost hypnotic. Even asleep he remained in his corner, rigid as a statue, as if he feared invading your space more than necessary.
The weeks that followed were nearly identical.
Each night he entered the room. He greeted you with a slight nod, sometimes a curt “Good evening”, and dismissed himself with the same gesture. He undressed down to his nightshirt, extinguished the candles one by one, and lay on his side of the bed. He never touched you. Never attempted conversation beyond the barest courtesies. In the mornings he rose before you, dressed in silence, and disappeared toward the throne room or the training yards.
At first, that silence comforted you. Then it began to weigh on you.
You realized that although he did not hurt you, he did not keep you company either. The court was a nest of vipers: ladies who smiled sweetly while whispering behind your back about your “Lannister coldness” or your “insufficient blood”; lords who regarded you with pity or calculation, wondering how long it would take the prince to tire of a wife who did not truly warm his bed. Audiences, banquets, hawking parties… everything became exhausting when you returned to your chambers and found the same emptiness.
One night, after an endless banquet in honor of envoys from Lys, you found yourself staring at the ceiling while Baelor already breathed deeply at your side. Boredom struck you like a slow but relentless wave.
It was not only the solitude in bed. It was solitude in everything. You were the wife of the heir to the Iron Throne, and yet you barely knew the man who slept three feet away from you. You knew nothing.
And the court did not forgive ignorance. Each day brought new reminders: a lady-in-waiting who “forgot” to deliver an important message, a councilor who asked with feigned innocence about the prince’s “family plans,” stifled giggles when you entered a hall and conversations paused a second too long.
You decided you could not continue like this.
●●●
The silence in your chambers had become as familiar as the thickness of the stone walls. Your ladies-in-waiting moved around you like courteous but distant shadows. Now… now you simply accepted it as another extension of the castle’s cold.
Without the option of going down into the city (a luxury forbidden by the lingering echoes of the last Blackfyre rebellion when it was said that their supporters saw any Targaryen as a legitimate target, and a distracted prince or princess would be far too tempting a trophy) your days had taken on a watery, monotonous quality. You wandered the fortress corridors, counting tiles without realizing it, or sat by the window in your private sitting room with embroidery in your hands. The needle slipped in and out of the fabric with mechanical precision while your gaze drifted to the garden below, a composition of carefully tended greens and colors shaped by other hands.
It was then, on one of those fog-laden days, that the idea came to you like a shaft of sunlight breaking through clouds: your nephews. The youngest ones, at least. Maekar’s children. They were the only ones in the vast and complicated web of the court who did not look at you like a piece of furniture—or worse, a rival. The only ones who did not laugh behind your back or simply ignore you.
Maekar’s three youngest possessed something the rest of the court had lost: innocence. Perhaps it was because they were still too young to grasp the complexities of rank and kinship, or because the loss of their mother, the gentle Lady Dyanna Dayne, who had died giving birth to little Rhae, had bound them together inside a fragile bubble of vulnerability. Whatever the reason, they welcomed you without reservation. Aegon, the eldest of the three, seven years old with a keen, curious gaze; Daella, six, with a sweetness almost painful in its purity; and little Rhae, three, who still crawled with more determination than steadiness and felt a dangerous fascination for anything that bore a flame.
That afternoon, you found them in the nursery, a round and warm chamber thanks to a large fireplace roaring in one corner. The floor was strewn with wooden toys and scraps of cloth.
“Do you like to draw, Aunt?” Daella asked in her melodic little voice, holding up a wrinkled piece of parchment. The word aunt always reached your heart. To them, you were not a consort princess from some distant land—only their aunt. Only family.
“Oh, I love drawing,” you replied, and your smile was genuine for the first time in days. You sat on the floor with them, feeling the warmth of the stone through your clothes. “When I was a child, I used to draw dragons all the time.”
“Dragons?” Aegon’s large blue eyes lit up as if you had mentioned hidden treasure.
You nodded, carried away by memory. “I loved our house’s sigil, the Targaryen,” you said, pointing to the vaulted ceiling, where a painted reproduction of the red-and-black banner hung unmoving. “I still do. It’s so… powerful.”
“Could you draw it?” Aegon’s voice trembled with excitement. “Then we could paint it, together, the three of us!” As he spoke, he stretched an arm around Rhae, gently guiding her away from the edge of the fireplace, toward which she had been creeping with fascination.
You let out a light, unrestrained laugh. Daella, smiling triumphantly, placed a thin piece of charcoal into your hand, likely stolen from some corner of the kitchens or her father’s solar. You leaned over a blank parchment Aegon had laid on the floor.
With the charcoal dancing between your fingers, you began to draw. First the shape of the dragon, sleek and fierce, its wings spread in eternal flight. Then the three heads, side by side, their necks entwined in a knot of power and fury. Your nephews watched you with complete attention, lips slightly parted and breath held, as though the slightest sound might shatter the spell you were weaving across the page.
The door creaked open like a dagger of ice against your spine.
You turned, and the bubble of warmth burst. There, framed against the dim corridor, stood Aerion. Your other nephew. The one who always sent an unexplainable chill through you. His presence seemed to drain the light from the room, leaving only the flickering glow of the flames to illuminate features that somehow always managed to look disdainful.
“Hello, Aunt,” he greeted, dragging the words out with a mockery as sharp as a blade. He approached at an unhurried pace, and you felt the calm of your younger nephews evaporate. Daella pressed closer to you, and Aegon’s shoulders stiffened.
You nodded in his direction, lowering your gaze to your drawing, hoping he would leave. But he did not. He stood before you, a tower of arrogance, studying the parchment and your charcoal-stained fingers.
“Fascinating,” he murmured, making the word sound like an insult. “I didn’t know you were such a talented artist, dear Aunt.”
You forced a smile that ached in your jaw. “Thank you.”
Then, with the elegance of a serpent, he dropped down beside you and snatched the drawing from your hands. Aegon lunged to retrieve it, but Aerion sidestepped him without even looking, quick and dismissive.
“Dragons,” he said, tracing a ringed finger along your lines. “I adore dragons. My family used to have one for each of us, you know.” He glanced at you sideways, and there was a dangerous gleam in his eyes. “Isn’t that unfair? Why did the gods decide to take from us what was ours by right?”
You shrugged, uncomfortable, repeating only what your septa had once taught you. “They disappeared after the Dance of the Dragons,” you said, not lifting your eyes from his hands holding your drawing. “My septa said it was a punishment from the gods for fighting among their own family.”
A heavy silence fell. Aerion stared at you with a challenge that made you feel small. He did not like your answer.
“Don’t you think we deserve them?” he asked, his voice a venomous whisper. “No one in our generation harms their own.” He lifted his chin toward his younger brother. “Isn’t that right, Egg?”
Aegon shot to his feet, instinctively placing himself between his sisters and the conflict. “Don’t call me that!” he shouted, his childish voice cracking with fury.
“Aemon calls you that all the time.”
Aegon planted himself in front of Aerion, fists clenched at his sides. “Aemon can. You cannot.” And without waiting for a response, he ran from the chamber, leaving the door wide open.
Aerion huffed, an amused smirk on his lips, and turned his attention back to you. He watched you fidget nervously with the charcoal, staining your fingers further. He reached out and took it from you—but instead of letting go, his fingers closed around yours and held them there. The contact was dry, deliberate. Your heart pounded in your chest, pure discomfort.
He held your hands for what felt like an eternity, then rose in one fluid motion and, without breaking eye contact, snapped the charcoal in two with a cold ease.
“You shouldn’t spend so much time with children, Aunt.” His voice was falsely kind now. “The court laughs at you, you know. They think you’re a glorified nursemaid. If you spend more time with them instead of… creating your own, you may never manage to have any. And I must say, the court is especially cruel to women who fail to fulfill their… purpose.”
The words struck like a bucket of ice water. You did not lift your gaze. A sharp, real stab of worry pierced you. You rose slowly, turning your back to him to form a barrier between him and the little girls, who stared wide-eyed without understanding.
“Or is it that my uncle can no longer…?” Aerion let the insinuation hang in the air, barely audible, yet enough to make your blood boil. You turned toward him, frowning for the first time.
“You should leave,” you said. Your voice trembled, but it was firm.
He smiled, a smile that never reached his eyes. He stepped closer, ignoring the curious glances of his younger sisters. He was so near you could smell his perfume, leather and something bitter.
“I will always be willing to help you, if you need it, Aunt.” And after dropping the words like a stone into still water, he turned and left with the same measured calm with which he had arrived.
You spent the rest of the day with a knot in your stomach that would not let you eat or sew. It was a mixture of disgust at Aerion’s insinuation and deep concern over his words. Because as much as you hated to admit it, he was right. You knew that once the honeymoon glow of your marriage faded, the court would begin to expect. They would wait to see your belly swell, for you to give another heir, then a spare for the spare… and then you would live beneath their murmurs and their looks of pity or contempt if you failed.
You wanted to believe that when Baelor ascended the Iron Throne, things would be different. That being queen would grant you a respect now denied. But perhaps the problem was not your position—it was that they did not know you. Perhaps you had to stop being a shadow. Insert yourself into conversations, show interest in the history of the house that was now yours, prove you were worth more than your womb.
That night, you had retreated to your small sofa, legs tucked beneath a red velvet cushion. A book lay open in your lap, one you had found in the tower’s private library. It was titled Dreams of Blood and Fire: The Prophecies of Daenys the Dreamer. You skimmed it intently, ignoring the passing hours. The yellow, trembling candlelight cast dancing shadows over the words.
The door opened without warning. You turned your head, startled, and found your husband standing in the doorway. Baelor studied you for a moment before entering with his usual serene bearing. His hair was loose, and faint lines of fatigue marked the corners of his eyes.
“Are you not in bed yet?” he asked. It was the first direct question he had addressed to you in days.
Your eyes widened in surprise, and you nodded, closing the book over your fingers to mark the page. He read the title, and a genuine smile—one that did not show teeth but illuminated his face—appeared on his lips.
“It is a good read,” he said, gesturing toward the book as he removed his black coat and laid it on the bed. Then he approached and, with a gentleness that disarmed you, took the book from your hands to flip through it himself. “I read it when I was fourteen. I remember well, because my father had punished me for sneaking into the city at dawn with some squires.”
Your eyes drifted from his face to his hands, large and deft, turning the pages carefully. The rings of his house glimmered in the candlelight, clinking softly together.
“I imagine the city was dangerous then as well,” you murmured, watching him.
Baelor closed the book and sighed, his nostalgic smile lingering. “Not as much as it is now,” he assured, turning his back to place the book on a small table. “But my father always believed that temptations corrupt a man. I agree to a point, but he exaggerated. I suppose he still does.”
You smiled faintly and let out a soft, almost unconscious laugh as he moved to the wardrobe to retrieve his nightshirt. The sound seemed to please him, for he cast you a quick glance over his shoulder.
“I’m glad to see you reading something like that,” he commented while unfastening his doublet. “Surely the company of my young nephews must exhaust you.”
The mention made you straighten. “Have they told you?”
Baelor nodded calmly. “Aerion mentioned it during our Small Council meeting this afternoon. He said he had found you drawing with them.”
Damn Aerion. You lowered your gaze so Baelor would not see the flicker of irritation in your eyes. He had surely not mentioned the rest—the poisonous insinuations, the invasive touch.
“Your nephews do not exhaust me at all,” you said, your tone sharper than intended. “In fact, their company is the most pleasant I have these days. They are the only ones in this court who ask me interesting questions and look at me as if I were a person, not a piece of furniture.”
Baelor sat on the edge of the bed, never taking his eyes off you. There was no reproach in them, only thoughtful calm. He nodded slowly.
“I can imagine,” he said gently. “I do not blame you. Court can be cruel to those who did not grow up within it. And my family… well, they lead complicated lives.”
He said nothing more, but his silence was not uncomfortable. It was as though he were offering you space to say more, if you wished.
You did not. Instead, you rose from the sofa and walked to your side of the bed. “I will extinguish the candles myself.”
Baelor sighed, as if he wished to add something, but the words never formed. He watched you as you moved through the room, snuffing out the candles one by one, plunging the chamber into an orange gloom broken only by the dying glow of the hearth.
He finished changing into his nightshirt and slipped into bed. You did the same a few minutes later, sliding beneath the covers on your side, leaving a strip of cold sheets between you.
Darkness enveloped you both. In the silence, only the distant crackle of the hearth and Baelor’s steady breathing could be heard.
But you could not sleep. Again.
●●●
"You haven't consummated your marriage, have you?" Maekar asked his older brother as he watched Baelor seated behind the desk, bent over open parchments and books.
Baelor sighed without looking up, the sound heavy and weary.
"I don't have to share my private matters with you."
"Oh, but you already have," Maekar replied with a sharp half-smile. "If you don't want to tell me now, then I take it you haven't touched her."
Baelor finally raised his gaze, his mismatched eyes narrowing.
"Have you been spying on us? The maids said there was blood, didn't they?"
"Don't play the fool with me, brother."
Baelor shrugged—a small gesture, but one loaded with deliberate indifference. He leaned back slightly in the carved chair, crossing his arms over his chest.
Maekar stared at him in disbelief for a moment before sitting down across from him, resting his elbows on the table and rubbing his forehead with two fingers.
"If our father finds out your marriage is… failed, he will be furious. And not just him. The entire court will use it as a weapon."
"That's why he won't find out," Baelor answered with a sarcastic smile that didn't reach his eyes. "And if he does, I'll say it was my decision. End of story."
Maekar let out an exasperated snort.
"Just have one more son and they'll leave you alone forever."
"I already have two sons. I won't have another."
Maekar leaned forward, his voice low but firm.
"This isn't just about heirs, Baelor. We need to solidify the alliance with the Lannisters. Do you really think they'll stand by with folded arms while the King of the Seven Kingdoms doesn't have a single child with Lannister blood? Do you think they won't look for any excuse to break the pact and hand us the Blackfyre bastards on a silver platter?"
Baelor turned his gaze back to the open books in front of him. His fingers brushed the edge of a parchment without really reading it. The silence stretched for several seconds, broken only by the distant crackle of the fire in the hearth.
"Stop meddling," he said at last, his voice flat. "Better take care of your own. Tell Aerion to stop getting too close to my wife."
Maekar frowned, visibly puzzled.
"What?"
Baelor nodded slowly, and a sarcastic smile curved his lips.
"The maids informed me that Aerion has been… trying to get close to her. Physically. I don't put him in his place because he's your son, but talk to him before I forget that I'm his uncle. And that she is my wife."
Maekar's expression hardened instantly. The muscles in his jaw clenched. Without another word, he stood up—the back of the chair scraping against the stone floor—and left the room with quick, furious steps. The door closed with a sharp thud that echoed down the hallway.
Baelor let out a long sigh. He leaned back in the chair, closed his eyes, and ran a hand through his black hair, as if trying to erase the entire conversation from his mind.
Meanwhile, you were in the gardens of the Red Keep. The afternoon sun fell warm over the trimmed hedges and the roses climbing the iron trellises. The sweet, heavy scent of the flowers mingled with that of freshly turned earth. In the distance, you saw Kiera of Tyrosh, your stepson Valarr's wife, bent awkwardly over a flower bed.
She wore a simple dark-green linen dress, sleeves rolled up to her elbows, and gardening gloves stained with dirt. Her already prominent belly forced her to move carefully; every time she tried to bend lower, one of the maids steadied her by the arm so she wouldn't lose her balance.
You hesitated. You always hesitated before approaching her… or Valarr. Both of them avoided you with icy courtesy, as though your mere presence were an awkward conversation no one wanted to have. As though you were the living reminder of something they preferred to ignore.
Even so, you quickened your pace. Your lady-in-waiting followed two steps behind, hands clasped in front of her apron. You stopped a few meters away and cleared your throat softly to announce your arrival.
Kiera turned slowly. Her forehead was beaded with sweat, a pink strand stuck to her temple, and her gloves covered in black soil. Her eyes traveled over you from head to toe before she lowered her gaze in the barest of curtsies.
"Blessed day," you greeted, inclining your head slightly.
"Princess," she replied in a neutral voice, and drove the small trowel back into the earth.
She said nothing more. The rules of courtesy demanded that the hostess—or in this case, the daughter-in-law—continue the conversation, but Kiera simply went on working, turning the soil around a young rosebush as though no one else were there.
You swallowed.
"May I help you?" you asked at last, gesturing toward the rosebush.
She looked up again, assessing you. Her belly brushed the handle of the tool every time she leaned forward.
"Do you know about roses?"
"My mother loved them. I know a little. But I learn quickly."
Kiera hesitated. She glanced at the rosebush, then at the maid waiting nearby with a basket of tools, and finally back at you.
"As you wish," she said with an almost imperceptible shrug. "But don't get your dress dirty. I don't want them saying I forced the crown princess to kneel in the mud."
You knelt carefully beside her, ignoring the warning. You took the gloves the maid offered and began removing the dry leaves from the lower stems. The earthy smell enveloped you, comforting.
For several minutes there was only the snip of shears, the rustle of soil, and the distant song of a bird. Kiera pruned with precise but slow movements, the pregnancy slowing her down. You tried to imitate her, but your hands—more accustomed to holding quills and books than gardening shears—trembled slightly.
"That stem is too high," she murmured suddenly, nodding toward it. "If you don't cut it back, the flower will snap in the first strong wind."
You nodded and cut. The stem fell with a clean snap.
"Thank you," you said softly.
Kiera didn't reply. She kept working.
The silence settled again, heavier. You felt her sideways glance every few seconds, as though waiting for you to say something wrong. You, for your part, didn't know how to break the ice without sounding false.
"Does it hurt?" you asked at last, vaguely gesturing toward her belly.
She stopped. The shears hung suspended in the air.
"What?"
"The pregnancy. Walking, bending… everything."
Kiera let out a short, dry laugh. She wiped the sweat from her forehead with the back of her hand, leaving a streak of dirt on her skin.
"Yes, I'm afraid it hurts all of it," she answered without quite looking at you. "The back, the legs, even the teeth if you're not careful. But…" She shrugged with resignation . "I don't mind, really. I just want this one to be born healthy."
You leaned a little closer, resting one hand on the low wooden fence.
"I'm sure he will be," you said, trying to sound convinced. "You and Valarr are young. Strong. Why wouldn't your child be just as strong and healthy?"
Kiera stopped pruning the lavender sprig she held between her fingers. Very slowly, she turned her face toward you.
Her eyes were no longer the same.
There was something dark in them—something beyond mere exhaustion. It was a deep, ancient well, from which rose a cold that brushed the back of your neck even though the sun still beat down fiercely on both of you.
She didn't answer right away.
Instead, she opened her fingers. The pruning shears fell with a dull thud onto the damp earth, next to the small rake and the half-full basket of cut stems. The sound was louder than it should have been, as though the ground itself had decided to swallow them in anger.
She turned her back to you.
The grayish linen dress clung to her back with sweat, outlining the pronounced curve of her belly. Her shoulders were rigid, as though bearing an invisible yoke.
You frowned, genuinely confused.
You mentally reviewed your words, searching for the mistake, the clumsy phrase. You found nothing.
"Lady Tyrosh…?" you insisted, softening your voice.
She stopped abruptly halfway down the gravel path. She didn't turn.
But when she spoke, her voice came clear, low, sharp as the shears she had just dropped.
"I hope you never live what I have lived, princess. May your mockery never come back to you. "
And she walked on.
More slowly than usual, as though each step cost her an effort different from the pregnancy itself. The gravel crunched under her worn shoes. She didn't look back.
You remained there, hand still resting on the fence, feeling the warm wood burn your palm.
Behind you, your lady-in-waiting said nothing either. Only her soft, held breath could be heard, as though she too had felt the blow without fully understanding it.
The silence stretched.
Heavy. Uncomfortable.
At least until you returned to the castle and a septa explained to you that Kiera and Valarr had already lost three babies before.
●●●
It seemed that none of your attempts had worked after what happened with Kiera.
Not the careful smiles you rehearsed in front of the mirror before descending to the throne room, not the measured phrases you prepared to sound interested in court affairs, not even those brief political comments you dropped like someone tossing a pebble into water, hoping not to splash too much. Everything unraveled with the same ease that courtesy smiles dissolved when you turned your head.
You realized, with a clarity that hurt, that you knew almost nothing. Not about alliances, not about crossed bloodlines, not about the old grudges that still bled beneath the surface of courtesies. You were a piece on the board, but you didn’t understand the real rules of the game.
And then you stopped trying.
You were no longer—or perhaps you had never been, according to the whispers—a good wife. Nor a tolerable stepmother, an acceptable daughter-in-law, a pleasant sister-in-law, a woman worthy of admiration… not even a convincing princess. The title clung to your name like a poorly sewn label; the wedding ring still weighed on your finger. But none of that was enough to fill the silence that had settled inside you.
King’s Landing had become suffocating.
The smell of saltpeter and rotting fish rising from the Blackwater, the constant smoke from the torches, the echo of hurried footsteps through the stone corridors… everything pressed down on you a little more each day. You no longer went down to the yard to watch the knights train, nor sat in the gardens pretending to read. You simply stopped appearing.
Baelor noticed long before you thought he would.
He didn’t say anything, of course. He never said anything that wasn’t strictly necessary. But for weeks he had been hearing you cry—two nights in a row at first, then three, then almost every night. You cried with your face buried in the pillow, trying to muffle the sound against the feathers, but the mattress creaked under your trembling body and that was enough to wake him. He lay still, staring at the canopy of the bed in the darkness, listening to your breath hitch until you finally fell asleep exhausted.
By day you were a ghost. You appeared at court just long enough not to be considered rude, offered the barest nod of greeting, and withdrew as soon as you could. You stopped approaching your nephews; every time one of the Targaryen children saw you coming, their shoulders tensed and they found excuses to slip away. You didn’t blame them. You had probably seemed cold to them, or sad, or simply… someone had likely taught them to avoid you too.
And Baelor, without meaning to, also began to keep his distance.
You hardly shared the bed in any real sense anymore.
He arrived late, when you were already asleep, and lay down on the far opposite edge, as though an invisible line ran down the middle that neither of you crossed. In the mornings he left before you opened your eyes. You were little more than a pale silhouette on the other side of the mattress, a soft breath that barely disturbed the silence.
One night, beside the crackling fire in the princes’ private solar, Rhaegel brought up the subject with his usual lack of tact.
"Great. Another depressed future queen." He leaned back in his chair, idly swirling a goblet of red wine. "Who do you think will be worse? The Lannister girl or poor Jaehaera Targaryen?"
His laugh rang out for a moment before crashing against his brothers’ blank faces.
Baelor and Maekar turned toward him at the same time, identical in their lack of expression.
Rhaegel looked at them, blinked, and let the laugh die in his throat.
"Well. If there’s no sense of humor, then there’s nothing, dear brothers."
"Does other people’s suffering amuse you, Rhaegel?" Baelor asked in a low, very calm voice.
The youngest shrugged, attacked the apple tart in front of him again, and spoke with his mouth half full.
"Don’t ask me. Better ask yourself." He chewed loudly, swallowed, and went on: "You’re the one who can change your wife’s luck… and you don’t do it. You don’t do it because of your very selective values. You’re not doing her any favors by keeping her a virgin and miserable."
Baelor clenched his jaw.
"Are you suggesting that if I sleep with her I’ll change her luck?"
Rhaegel lifted his gaze, eyes bright from the fire and the wine.
"All women have a purpose, brother." He turned fully toward him. "Give her a child and you’ll keep her occupied. Her head will fill with baby cries, wet nurses, and sleepless nights. She’ll be happy… or at least she’ll stop crying into the pillow. Try convincing her it’s for the best. For the alliance. For you. For her."
Maekar, who until then had remained silent, slowly turned his head toward Baelor. He said nothing, but the look was enough.
Baelor searched inside himself for some argument to dismantle those cruel, practical words. He found none.
"You don’t want to make an innocent woman suffer. I understand. But she’s going to suffer anyway, brother." He lowered his voice. "They say she’s good with children. Having one would do her good… even if it’s not just for the realm."
That night Baelor barely slept.
Nor the nights that followed.
Sometimes, in the middle of the darkness, he turned toward your side of the bed. There you were: on your side, hair spilled across the pillow, your young face still beautiful despite the shadows settling beneath your eyes. You slept with your lips slightly parted and a small crease of worry between your brows, as though even in dreams you couldn’t fully rest.
At family dinners you became just another piece of furniture. You didn’t speak. You barely lifted your eyes from the plate. The children no longer even looked at you; their older siblings preferred to pretend you weren’t there. Even the servants seemed to walk faster when they passed near you, as though afraid of catching your sadness.
You weren’t like the other Lannisters. No golden pride, no sharp smiles or biting remarks. Just a young girl who had come to a strange city, a strange family, a strange marriage… and who was quietly withering.
Baelor began to realize—too late—that he had contributed to it.
He couldn’t simply walk up to you one morning and say: “I’m going to give you a child so you stop being sad.” Things didn’t work that way. Not with someone who barely met his eyes.
So he started to truly observe you.
He noticed how you bit the inside of your cheek when you were nervous. How your fingers played with the edges of your sleeves when you felt watched.
How you always left half the food on your plate, even when it was your favorite dish. How, some afternoons, you stared out the window for so long that the sun eventually drew a red line across your cheek.
And he began to wonder things he had never before allowed himself to wonder.
Where were you when you weren’t in the room? What did you do during the hours he spent locked in meetings? Who did you talk to… if you talked to anyone at all?
Guilt seeped into him like dampness into stone walls.
One morning, after a particularly long and tense session of the small council, he made a decision.
He was not going to keep avoiding you.
He opened the door to the chambers more carefully than usual, almost expecting to find you seated by the window with an open book you weren’t reading, or embroidering something you would never finish.
But you weren’t seated.
You were standing.
In your shift, barefoot, hair loose and falling down your back like a pale cascade. Leaning against the frame of the open window, looking down. Too close to the edge. Too still.
The cold wind from the bay came in and barely stirred the thin fabric against your legs.
Baelor felt the air catch in his throat.
He didn’t shout your name. He didn’t run toward you.
He only took one very slow step forward, heart hammering against his ribs, and spoke:
A Vigil Unbroken - Baelor Targaryen x wife!reader II
Summary: Baelor opens his eyes, and the realm gains its prince again.
Yet beside his bed you learn that survival is not the same as return, and that love must sometimes be rebuilt from silence, patience, and moments he no longer recalls. As his body heals and his mind slowly clears, you begin to understand that recovery is not remembering battles, titles, or oaths — but finding his way back to you.
Pairing: Baelor Targaryen x wife!reader
Warnings: None
Author’s note:
This is the second part of A Vigil Unbroken.
With the help of my lovely moots’ ideas and long conversations, I have put Baelor's road to recovery into words. I hope you'll like it!
English is my second language, please forgive me if I made any mistakes (:
Word count: 6.1 k
Other stories of mine
Morning light no longer has you startling awake in fear, yet you still wake before it. Long before the servants stir, and before the corridor outside the chamber finds its voice again, you are already watching him, your body accustomed to the quiet rise and fall of his breathing.
The shutters remain half closed, and a length of pale cloth hangs across them so the sun enters soft and gentle rather than sharp. Just as you’ve noticed and the maesters has told you afterwards, that brightness would cause him pain, and since then you have even kept daylight from touching him too strongly.
Each morning you study his face as the light slowly grows, ready to darken the room again at the smallest sign of discomfort.
Baelor sleeps more often than he wakes, and when he wakes it is only for short spans of fragile awareness, as though returning from whatever distant place he wandered costs him more strength than any battle ever did.
This morning you feel the change before you see it, a faint movement of his hand beneath yours. You lean closer at once, careful not to shift the mattress.
“I am here,” you murmur softly, the words now as natural as breathing. You have spoken them so often that sometimes you think he must hear them even in sleep.
His eyes open slowly, heavy with effort, and unfocused at first. You wait without moving, giving him time, and after several quiet moments his gaze steadies and finds you. Relief rises instinctively, yet it never lasts as long as you wish it would.
He looks at you, but not as he once did.
There had always been warmth in his eyes before recognition even fully formed, a gentle certainty that needed no thought. Often a faint humor would follow, the beginning of some kind remark he had already decided to offer. You never had to speak first; he always knew you.
Now he studies you carefully, his attention lingering with quiet concentration, as though he is assembling a memory piece by piece and fears losing it if he blinks. You give him a small smile despite the tightening in your throat.
“You slept peacefully,” you tell him.
He does not answer at once, and you do not press him. Words come slowly now and leave him tired when they finally arrive.
“…morning?” he asks at last, his voice barely more than breath.
“Yes,” you whisper gently. “Dawn has passed. You have rested.”
He considers this for longer than the thought should require. A faint crease appears between his brows, not from pain but effort, and your fingers close a little more firmly around his hand before you notice yourself doing so.
“How long?” he manages.
“Several days,” you reply carefully. “You were gravely hurt.”
His gaze drifts from you to the walls of the chamber, lingering as though he expects recognition to come from them instead. When his eyes return, they settle on you once more, searching with patient uncertainty.
“We are in Ashford,” you explain softly. “After the trial.”
His fingers shift faintly within your grasp. “The… trial…”
You watch the effort behind his eyes and feel your breath catch when he whispers, “Duncan.”
Relief washes through you, warm and almost painful. “Yes, Ser Duncan lives.”
He closes his eyes briefly, and this time the movement carries understanding rather than simple exhaustion. After a moment he asks: “Did we win?”
“You saved his life,” you answer.
You wait for the familiar modest dismissal he once would have given, the quiet humor, the gentle deflection of praise. But instead, he remains still, absorbing the words as though they describe a man he has heard of rather than one he remembers being.
When his eyes open again, they return to you.
“You stayed,” he says slowly.
“Of course,” you whisper.
He watches you in silence, and although there is kindness in his expression, the certainty that once lived within does not follow it. His gaze is careful and courteous; the look he would give someone he wishes to reassure but does not truly know.
“You are very kind,” he murmurs. “My lady.”
The words wound you more deeply than you expect. Your smile remains, though it takes effort now, and you lean closer, tightening your hold around his hand with fragile care.
“It is I,” you say quietly. “Your wife.”
He studies you again with visible concentration, frustration touching his brow as though the answer stands before him but remains out of reach. There is no rejection in him, only distance, and that distance frightens you more than his stillness ever did.
You smooth his hair gently where the bandages allow, letting your fingers linger.
“You used to know me at once,” you whisper. “You never needed to think.”
His fingers move weakly against your palm, an uncertain response, and he keeps looking at you even without understanding. Gradually you begin to realize that he has not forgotten you out of indifference, but because he cannot yet find himself.
Lowering your forehead carefully to his hand, you close your eyes. His gaze lingers on you with a quiet attention that does not fade as quickly as his strength does.
In the hours that follow he sleeps longer than he‘s awake, and each time his eyes open they seek the same point in the room before settling upon you. You begin to notice it slowly, almost against your will: he does not yet know your name, yet he rests more easily when you speak, and the tightness that sometimes shadows his brow eases when your hand remains in his.
Once, when a maester approaches too quickly to adjust the bandages, his breath quickens and his hand moves restlessly across the coverlet until it finds yours, closing around it with surprising insistence. Only then does he find calmness again. He never remarks upon it, and perhaps he is not even aware he does it, yet after that you no longer question why you remain so near.
The fear does not leave you, but it changes. You begin to understand that memory is not the only path by which he might return to you, and though he cannot yet name you, a part of him already knows where to look when he wakes.
Days pass more gently after that. His strength improves by small degrees, enough that you dare, at times, to loosen your constant watch, trusting that he will not vanish the moment your eyes leave him.
For the first time in days you allow yourself to move a few steps away from the bedside, albeit no farther than the small table near the hearth where the maesters have left their jars and folded cloths. The fire has burned low and you mean only to warm the water before he wakes again, thinking he still sleeps in the gentle, shallow way he has for most of the morning.
You keep speaking softly as you work, more from habit than reason, telling him small things that require no answer — that the light is mild today, that the castle yard has grown noisy again, that the worst of the fever seems to have passed. You have noticed that silence frightens you more than any sound.
Then suddenly, you hear the mattress behind you shift softly.
It is a small sound, but you know it at once.
You turn only halfway at first, expecting no more than restlessness, and for a brief moment your mind refuses to understand what you are seeing.
Baelor is pushing himself upright.
He moves slowly, with painstaking care, bracing one hand against the bedding as though the weight of his own body has become unfamiliar to him. The effort shows in the tension of his shoulders and the tight line of his mouth. He has not noticed you yet.
“Baelor—”
The name leaves you before you can stop it.
He pauses, breathing unevenly, and turns his head slightly toward your voice.
“I did not wish to disturb you,” he murmurs faintly, as though he has committed some small discourtesy.
“You must not rise,” you say at once, already crossing the room.
“I am well enough,” he answers quietly, though the words come slowly. “I cannot lie abed forever.”
For a heartbeat you almost believe him. He is sitting now, though unsteadily, his feet just touching the floor, and some instinctive part of you longs to see strength in him again.
Then the color drains from his face.
It happens gradually. His posture falters first, the steadiness leaving his shoulders as his hand tightens against the mattress. His eyes lose focus, not closing but unfixed, and you see confusion replace determination before he understands what is happening.
The room has begun to move for him.
You reach him just as his balance fails. His weight tilts forward and you catch him awkwardly, one arm around his shoulders as he sways against you. He makes no cry, only a sharp intake of breath, and his hand grips your sleeve with sudden, desperate force.
“I have you,” you whisper quickly, supporting him as carefully as you can. “Do not fight it. Lean on me.”
His body trembles, not with weakness alone but with effort, as though remaining upright requires all the strength he possesses. You feel how little steadiness there is beneath your hands, how uncertain his weight has become.
The motion has cost him dearly. His breathing has turned shallow and uneven, and after a moment he presses his forehead weakly against your shoulder, eyes shut against the dizziness he cannot master.
“I am… sorry,” he whispers, almost sobs.
The words undo you far more than the collapse.
You steady him, easing him back toward the bed with slow care, guiding him down until he lies again against the pillows. Only once he is settled do you release him, though your hands remain hovering as if he might fall even now.
“You need not apologize,” you tell him softly, though your throat tightens around the words.
“I wished only…” He pauses, gathering breath. “I wished to spare you worry.”
Your hand trembles where it rests against the coverlet. “You could never be a burden to me.”
His eyes open, heavy with exhaustion, and he studies your face with quiet regret. “You have done more than you should be asked to do.”
For a moment you cannot answer. You smooth the blankets instead, adjusting them though they need no adjusting, because it gives your hands purpose.
“I would do it again,” you whisper.
He watches you as if trying to understand something beyond the words, but strength fails him before thought can. His eyes close once more, not into peaceful sleep but into sheer exhaustion, his breathing gradually easing as the dizziness passes.
You remain beside him, one hand still resting lightly over his, and only then do you understand fully how fragile he has become.
The man who once rode into danger without hesitation cannot yet cross a room.
And though he lives, you feel fear settle deeper in your chest than it ever did while he lay unconscious, because now you have seen the truth with open eyes — not the memory of the prince you knew, but the wounded man he is, and how easily he might have been taken from you altogether.
You do not move your hand from his again.
In the days that follow the chamber is still your whole world. Morning and evening bells lose their meaning, marked only by the arrival of maesters, the changing of linens, and the careful measuring of his strength. You learn the small signs of his endurance — the steadiness of his breathing, the way his brow tightens when pain begins to return, the fatigue that overtakes him after even the smallest exertion — and you begin to measure time not in hours but in how long he can remain awake beside you.
Sleep comes to you only in fragments, and in the quiet moments your thoughts refuse you rest. Again and again your mind returns to the trial, not as it was told afterward but as you remember it: the dust of the yard, the weight of unease you could not name, the moment he prepared to ride. You had spoken then, though softly, because you would not shame him before others, and you had told yourself it was enough.
Now you are no longer certain.
You wonder whether you might have said more, whether you should have held him longer, whether one word spoken differently might have reached him past honor and duty. You know the answer a wife is meant to accept — that a prince of his house could not refuse such a challenge, that the realm watched and expectation bound him more tightly than any plea of yours ever could — yet the knowledge does not quiet the thought that returns each night as you sit beside him: that he rode because he believed he must, and you let him go because you believed the same.
Sometimes you watch him sleep and try to picture the moment again, searching for a place where you might have stood before him, taken his hand, and asked him to choose you instead of honor, and each time you find yourself uncertain whether he would have listened, or whether you would have truly wished him to.
A feeling of helplessness lingers, quieter, deeper — not that you might lose him, but that you came closer than you ever understood while you still had the chance to stop it.
And so, you remain, speaking gently when he wakes, guiding him through small efforts, and waiting for some sign that the man you knew is not lost behind the wound that keeps him from you. When his thoughts grow clearer you begin, cautiously, to reach toward memory, not because you wish to test him, but because you need to know whether what you nearly lost can still return.
And tonight, he seems stronger, not with the easy strength he once carried without thought, but with a steadiness that had been absent for days, as though the haze behind his eyes has thinned enough for the world to settle back into its proper shape. Propped against the pillows he holds himself with less visible effort, and his breathing runs even and untroubled, while his gaze, when it comes to rest upon you, lingers with a clarity you have scarcely dared hope for
You lie beside him, still careful despite the maesters now allowing him a little movement, never forgetting how fragile his recovery feels to you, how easily it might yet slip away. The fire has burned low, its embers dim beneath a cradle of ash, and the chamber rests in the quiet particular to late evening, when the castle beyond the walls has softened into distant murmurs and there is nothing left but the faint sound of soft talking.
“You remember Duncan,” you say gently, your fingers resting over his hand, light enough that he could withdraw if he wished. “You remember the trial.”
He gives a faint nod, slow but certain. “Yes.”
Encouraged, though your heart has begun to beat more quickly, you continue, watching him with careful attention, afraid to miss even the smallest change in his expression. “And Summerhall. The southern fields. Your brothers.”
There is a pause long enough that you almost regret the question, yet he nods again, quieter but unmistakable.
Relief comes first, warm and immediate, and for a moment you almost allow yourself hope.
You swallow, and before you can stop yourself the question that has lived within your chest since the maesters first spoke their cautions finally finds voice.
“And our son?” you ask softly.
He grows still.
Not with recognition, but with uncertainty so visible that you feel it before he even speaks. His eyes do not move toward the room, nor toward you, but inward, searching with an effort you can almost see, as though he turns through memories that refuse to open where he needs them to. His brow tightens and he looks at you with a gravity that makes your breath falter.
“Our… son,” he repeats carefully.
You hold his gaze, willing him toward it, as though the strength of your hope alone might guide him there.
“The day he was born,” you whisper, unable now to stop yourself, the memory rising too vividly to contain. “You held him before I did. You told me he had my eyes.”
His breathing shifts, not with understanding but with strain, and his fingers tighten slightly around yours in a gesture that feels less like recognition than apology.
“I—” He falters, and you see the moment the effort fails him. “I do not see it.”
The words are gentle, spoken with care, yet they strike with a weight you had not truly prepared yourself to bear.
You had told yourself you were ready. You had believed it.
Still, something within you recoils.
“You were afraid,” you continue quietly, because stopping now would make the silence unbearable. “You pretended otherwise, but your hands were shaking. You would not admit it.”
He closes his eyes briefly, and for a heartbeat you think the memory may yet surface if he reaches only a little further, but when his gaze returns to you there is no recognition within it, only a quiet, aching sorrow.
“I am sorry,” he says, and there is more pain in his voice than in any wound he suffered in the lists. “I do not remember him in my arms.”
The chamber seems to contract around you. You keep your smile, because you cannot allow him to see the full depth of your hurt, yet your chest tightens as though something fragile inside it has been drawn too taut. You turn your face slightly, not to hide from him but to gather a single steady breath before your composure fails you entirely.
“You sang to him,” you whisper after a moment, your voice thinner now despite your efforts. “You claimed you could not carry a tune, yet you sang anyway.”
He watches you with an attentiveness that almost wounds more deeply than the forgetting itself.
“I would have,” he says softly.
“Yes,” you answer, and your voice trembles despite you. “You would have.”
Silence settles between you then, not distant and not cold, only unbearably heavy, because what stands between you is not absence of love but absence of memory, and no tenderness can bridge it.
“It was years ago,” you say at last, gently. “You need not force it.”
Your gaze drifts toward the faint glow of the embers, and as you watch them dim the old fear returns, slow and certain: that the man beside you remembers the realm, his brothers… yet not the small, private world the two of you once shared.
But after a while you try again.
The question has lingered within you for hours before you dare give it voice. You can see how tired he is in the heaviness of his eyelids and in the faint tension that gathers behind his eyes, yet his thoughts are clearer tonight than they have been, and some fragile part of you still believes that if you reach for the right memory, the right moment, something of what was lost might yet return to him.
You smooth the blanket near his shoulder, more to steady yourself than to comfort him, letting your hand rest there as you gather the courage you have nearly abandoned twice already.
“Do you remember our wedding?” you ask at last, keeping your voice gentle, almost light, as though the question carries no weight at all.
His gaze shifts to you immediately.
There is no avoidance in it, no sign that he would turn away from what you ask, only a quiet searching as he studies your face and turns inward at the same time.
“Our wedding,” he repeats softly.
You nod, unable to look away from him. “The sept at Summerhall. The roses my sister insisted upon. You said there were too many.”
A faint crease forms between his brows as he reaches for something you can almost see just beyond his grasp. You hold your breath without intending to, afraid even the smallest movement might break whatever fragile thread he is following.
“The roses,” he murmurs slowly. “I… remember roses.”
Hope rises too quickly, bright enough to hurt.
“Yes,” you whisper, leaning closer before you realize you have done so. “White and pale gold.”
He closes his eyes, not with recognition but with effort, and when they open again you feel the hope in your chest begin to loosen its hold.
“I remember a sept,” he says carefully. “I remember standing before a Septon.”
Your fingers tighten unconsciously against the blanket.
“And me?” you ask, the words escaping before you can stop them.
He grows very still.
You see the moment he understands what you are truly asking, and the expression that touches his face is not confusion but sorrow.
“I do not see your face there,” he says quietly.
He speaks gently, with such regret that you almost forgive the words at once, yet they settle inside you with a weight that steals your breath.
“You wore blue,” you tell him, though your voice has grown thin despite your efforts. “Not black or burgundy... because you said you shouldn't wear such dark colours on such a glorious day.”
He studies you with a concentration that feels almost like an effort to will the image into existence.
“I wish I could remember it,” he whispers.
The ache that rises in your chest is sudden and sharp, and you turn slightly under the pretense of adjusting the candle on the nightstand because you cannot let him see how deeply the loss wounds you.
“It is only a memory,” you say softly. “Rest now. You are tired.”
“I am failing you,” he murmurs instead.
You shake your head at once, though the motion is small. “No. You are healing.”
You remain beside him in the dim light, watching the outline of the man who once stood before a sept and chose you without hesitation, and the thought comes unbidden that perhaps you must now be chosen again by a heart that no longer remembers why it once turned toward yours.
But he stirs before you can gather yourself, shifting with care as he gathers what strength he has, and his hand lifts slowly toward your face. The movement is unsteady yet deliberate, and his fingers brush your cheek where tears have escaped despite your restraint.
“I am sorry,” he says, and the regret in his voice is unmistakable. “I do not remember these things.”
The steadiness you have held fractures.
“I know,” you whisper, softer now. “I know you do not.”
He studies your face, and you realize too late that he sees more than you intended him to see. The fear you have tried so carefully to conceal rests plainly in your eyes.
“You fear I will not remember you,” he says quietly.
You draw a sharp breath, startled by the clarity of it, and cannot bring yourself to deny him.
“I fear,” you admit, your voice barely steady, “that I will become only a duty to you. That you will look at me and see kindness… but not love.”
The confession leaves you more exposed than tears ever could.
For a moment he says nothing. His gaze remains upon you, thoughtful rather than distant, and you sense something shifting behind his eyes — not memory, but recognition of another kind.
“I do not remember the moment,” he says quietly, “but I know I loved you then.”
Your breath falters. “How can you know?”
“Because I love you now,” he answers, and though his voice is fragile, the certainty within it does not waver. “And it does not feel new.”
The words do not restore the lost images. They do not return the sight of his hands holding your child for the first time.
Yet they anchor something else.
You lean into his touch despite the ache that remains, resting your forehead lightly against his palm.
“I wanted you to remember,” you confess softly. “I wanted it to still belong to us.”
“It does,” he says, and sorrow lingers beneath the gentleness of his voice. “Even if I must learn it from you.”
The pain does not vanish, yet it changes, becoming something quieter and more bearable, because the man beside you is wounded, and though memory fails him, he does not turn away — he is still reaching for you.
For a long time afterward neither of you speaks. The chamber has fallen into deep night, the fire reduced to a low red glow, and the quiet no longer presses upon you as it once did. You remain close beside him.
At some point exhaustion overtakes you despite your efforts, and you drift into a shallow rest with your hand still resting in his.
You wake before dawn, not to sound but to warmth.
For a moment you do not understand what has roused you, until you realize his fingers are loosely curled around yours, not by accident but in sleep, his grip faint yet unmistakably deliberate. He does not wake when you shift, nor when you carefully adjust the blankets, yet his hand follows the movement as though unwilling to lose its hold.
You lie still after that and watch the faint light gather along the shutters through the cloth that still hangs there, while his breathing remains slow and steady beside you.
When the morning bells sound you do not dread them as you have on other days… you allow yourself, cautiously, to believe that healing may not come all at once, but that it is coming.
The maesters arrive shortly after the morning bells, their chains glinting faintly in the pale light that filters through the shutters. They speak in low, careful voices, praising the steadiness of his thoughts while warning against impatience, repeating that recovery must come slowly if it is to last at all. You remain beside the bed despite their polite suggestions that you should rest, and though you nod at their counsel you make no move toward the door.
You do not leave.
Baelor listens with quiet attentiveness, answering when spoken to and offering neither complaint nor protest, yet you can see the effort beneath his composure in the faint tension at the corner of his mouth. When they propose he attempt standing again, something like pride stirs in his expression, subtle but unmistakable, as though the notion of remaining confined to the bed wounds him more deeply than the injury itself.
The maesters guide him carefully, lifting him in stages so his body may adjust, one supporting his shoulders while another steadies his back. You stand close to him, but leave him and the maesters space, and try to give reassurance without making him feel watched, even though your attention never strays from him for a moment.
When at last his feet reach the floor he draws a slow breath, his focus fixed not upon dignity but upon balance. You see the tremor that runs through him, subtle yet undeniable, as his weight settles uncertainly and he tests the strength of his own body as though the ground itself might betray him.
He takes a step.
It is small and cautious, yet deliberate. For a moment he manages well enough, his gaze lowered in concentration, but the effort quickly begins to show in the tightening of his grip upon the maesters and in the faint shadow of dizziness that crosses his face.
“That is enough,” you murmur softly, more plea than instruction.
He does not argue. Instead he allows them to steady him as they guide him back toward the bed. The distance is no more than a few paces, yet your heart beats as though you have crossed a battlefield together, and only when he is seated again do you realize how tightly you had been holding your breath.
The maesters offer gentle praise for the effort and, satisfied for the day, withdraw at last, their footsteps fading down the corridor until the chamber returns to stillness.
As evening settles and the light fades to the soft glow of embers, you lie beside him without speaking of weddings or memories that might wound you both. You do not ask questions, and you do not fill the quiet with stories; you simply stay, offering your presence without expectation, allowing him rest without the burden of remembering.
In the darkness he turns slightly toward you, his breathing slow and even, and the warmth of him against your side feels steadier than it has in many days.
His breathing has settled into a slow, even rhythm, yet you know now the difference between sleep and wakefulness in him, and this is not sleep. There is a quiet awareness in the way he lies beside you, as though his thoughts are moving somewhere beyond the dim chamber.
After some time he shifts, carefully and with deliberation, as if he considers the movement before allowing his body to follow. He turns onto his side to face you fully now, his eyes open in the low firelight. There is no strain in his expression tonight, only a stillness touched with thought.
You meet his gaze but say nothing.
He watches you for a long while, not searching as he once did in confusion, but studying you with a steadier attention, as though something has caught at the edge of his mind and he is reluctant to disturb it by speaking too soon.
“It was raining,” he says at last.
The words are so unexpected that for a moment you wonder whether you have misunderstood him, yet you do not interrupt. You have learned how fragile these moments are, how easily eagerness can scatter them before they take shape.
“The ground was soft,” he continues slowly, his voice quiet, almost distant. “The path near the orchard had turned to mud.”
Your breath stills.
He is no longer quite looking at you but beyond you, into something only he can see, his attention held by a memory still forming.
“You should not have walked so far,” he murmurs, softer now. “Your shoes were ruined.”
Confusion comes first — orchard, mud, ruined shoes — and you search your own recollections carefully, afraid to seize upon the wrong memory and break whatever fragile thread he follows. You remain silent, hardly daring to breathe.
“It was late in the afternoon,” he says, with growing certainty. “The storm came sooner than we expected… I had watched the clouds and thought we still had time.”
And as he speaks you are no longer wholly in the chamber.
Your heart begins to pound.
You remember.
You see the path again, the orchard stretching behind you, the air heavy and warm before the rain, the wind stirring the leaves in warning neither of you took seriously. You remember the way the first drops fell — large and sudden — darkening the dust at your feet before either of you understood how swiftly the sky would open.
Yet you do not speak. You let him find the path himself.
“You were angry with me,” he adds, and the faintest warmth touches his tone, almost wonderingly. “You said I had promised the sky would hold.”
You remember it clearly… the irritation you tried to hold onto, your skirts gathered uselessly in your hands as the ground softened beneath your steps, the absurdity of trying to hurry in silk while he attempted, with earnest futility, to apologize and not to laugh at once.
“I thought you would not forgive me,” he says, almost thoughtfully.
You had not meant to forgive him. You had meant to remain offended all the way back to the castle, yet the rain came harder, sudden and drenching, and the both of you had broken into helpless laughter as dignity abandoned you entirely.
He frowns slightly, not in confusion but concentration, his hand shifting faintly against the blanket as though he can still feel the rain striking there.
“Your dress,” he murmurs. “Blue silk. It was never meant for weather.”
The world narrows around you. You scarcely trust yourself to move.
“You laughed,” he says, and his voice softens further. “Not because you were pleased… because you knew I would not know what to do.”
Your throat tightens painfully as the memory unfolds completely in your mind: the broad old oak at the edge of the field, the sudden downpour that drenched you both before shelter could be reached, the sound of rain against leaves overhead.
“You stood beneath the tree,” he continues, his gaze dark in the firelight. “You came closer because you were cold… and because you knew I would not step away.”
He blinks slowly, and when his gaze settles upon yours again it is no longer distant or unfocused, no longer searching for meaning he cannot reach, but steady and present in a way that startles you more than any confusion ever has.
“I had not meant to kiss you,” he says quietly, his voice low and certain in the dimness. “I told myself I would not.”
Your heart falters at the words, because they do not sound like guessing or reconstruction but memory.
And you remember the moment of hesitation, the way he looked at you as though weighing something far greater than propriety, and how your heart had begun to race before you even knew why.
“Yet you did not move,” you murmur faintly.
“No,” he says, his voice softer still. “Nor did you.”
And you feel again the rain against your skin, the damp silk clinging, the closeness beneath the tree where neither of you could pretend not to understand.
“I remember thinking,” he says, “that if I stepped back I would regret it for the rest of my life.”
Your eyes close as the moment returns in full — his hand uncertain at your arm, the breath you both held, and then the kiss itself, gentle at first and almost questioning.
“That was before the betrothal,” you whisper, scarcely daring to shape the thought aloud.
He draws a slow breath, and recognition reaches him fully, not pieced together by reason nor offered by your prompting, but known with the simple certainty of something once lived.
“Yes,” he says softly, and the steadiness in his voice leaves no doubt. “You tasted of rain.”
Tears rise so suddenly that you cannot contain them. He watches you closely, and you see awareness deepen in his expression, not only of the moment he recalls but of what it means to you to hear it spoken.
“That was the first time,” he murmurs.
“Yes,” you breathe, your voice trembling openly now. “It was.”
He shifts nearer without thinking, the movement careful because of his injuries yet no longer hesitant, and his hand finds yours with a familiarity that feels effortless, as though some part of him has always known its place.
“I remember how you looked at me after,” he says softly. “As though you feared I would regret it.”
Relief aches through your chest so sharply it almost hurts.
“You did not,” you whisper.
“No,” he answers, and a faint echo of his old smile touches his lips, fragile but real. “I decided then I would marry you.”
The words undo you completely, and a small, unsteady laugh escapes you through tears as you lean forward, your forehead resting gently against his.
“You did marry me,” you whisper.
“I know,” he replies, and there is no uncertainty in him now.
His hand rises to your cheek, his touch steadier than it has been in days, and he studies your face as though committing it to memory in a way deeper than recollection. For a moment he hesitates, not from doubt but from caution, aware of his own weakness, and then he shifts closer still, slowly lifting his arm around you. The movement costs him effort you can feel in the tension of his breath, yet he does not stop until he has drawn you carefully against him.
The embrace is gentle and imperfect, his strength not yet fully returned, but it is deliberate, and the warmth of him surrounding you carries a reassurance no words could give.
“It was raining when I chose you,” he says quietly near your hair. “I would choose you again.”
Your chest feels too full for breath as you lean into him, careful of his bandages yet unwilling to pull away. For the first time since the trial you no longer feel you must teach him who you are.
He has not remembered the ceremony, nor the roses, nor the vows spoken before witnesses, but something older and far more yours — the moment before duty and titles, when affection first overcame restraint.
And that, somehow, belongs to you more deeply than the wedding ever did.
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