in which your husband leaves you with unsavory company (ormund hightower), and you are forced to feign tolerance whilst you wait for his return
PAIRINGS: gwayne hightower x fem!reader, gwayne hightower x wife!reader, daeron targaryen x aunt!reader
WARNINGS: yearning to the max, angst, ormund hightower, pregnancy, protective!reader, simp!gwayne (when is he not), gwayne being sad, daeron being sad, reader being super sad, arguing, the slightest fluff ending
WORD COUNT: 4.6k
🎶 : sailor song - gigi perez
AN: 🩵♥️💗💛 - my sweet gwayne. this was so much fun to write!! also daeron is a perfect little angel wafe. happy reading!!
The sun shone through the curtains, and you hummed, rolling over into your husband’s chest. “Save me, Ser.”
“From whom shall I save you from, my lady?”
Your hand pointed towards the window, mumbling. “It has offended me.”
“You expect me to slay the sun?” Gwayne’s laugh filled the room, and you couldn't help but smile into his soft skin. “How else will your beloved garden continue to grow?”
“That is your beloved garden, not mine. Is what I have asked such an impossible request?” You looked up, attempting to manipulate him with your feminine wiles. “Your lady wife has asked you a question.”
“You are spirited this morning.” His smile was almost as bright as the sun. “Did you sleep well?”
“With you by my side, how can I not?” You pulled yourself to his lips. “Promise me that you will come back to me.”
“Always.” He whispered, his lips brushing against yours as he spoke. “I shall never leave your side. Not for a moment.”
“Lies.” You smirked. “Thought I would not insult you and pretend that I do not appreciate the sentiment.”
“I am glad that my promise suits you.” Gwayne’s hand shot out, pulling you close to him. Your stomach flipped, wrapping your leg around his waist. “How fares the babe?”
“She is eager, as always.” You grabbed at his wrist, guiding his hand to your stomach. “She wants her father.”
“Soon, my love.” He kissed the corner of your mouth, smiling when your eyes fluttered shut. “Soon.”
“My lady.”
You hummed, your hand shooting out to Gwayne’s side as you attempted to bury your face into the pillow. So he was gone. You frowned, another terribly life-like dream. Your maid, Lila, completely unaware of your melancholic state, laughed before attempting to wake you once more. “I hate to disturb you, but it is urgent. From Lord Hightower.”
You shot up, heart beating faster than it should. “Gwayne has written?”
“No, my lady.” Lila frowned. “It is from the Lord Hightower.”
You huffed, letting yourself fall back into the comfort of your warm bed. “Read it to me then.”
“He requests your presence in Tumbleton. He says he wants to-” She scoffed, and you pretended not to hear. “He wants to present a united front for the future king, Daeron.”
You shot up once more. “Daeron? King?”
“That is what he says, my lady.”
“Is there anything else?”
“He- he asks that you arrive as quickly as possible.”
“I do not see how that will be possible, seeing as the roads are thick with thieves and Hightower enemies.” Your hand gravitated toward your swollen stomach. “I will not put my child in harm’s way for Ormund Hightower’s sake.”
“He says that Daeron will come fetch you by Dragonback.”
“Seven hells.” Your heart sank. “How will I bring my things-”
“I will ensure everything is taken care of, my lady.” Lila rushes to rid you of your worries. “You must rest, and prepare yourself.”
“Well said, Lila.” You stood, rounding your bed to don Gwayne’s robe. It still smelled ever so slightly of him, bringing you comfort in his absence. “I will break my fast in the gardens today.”
“An excellent choice, my lady.”
Daeron had grown since you last saw him.
Since Ormund took him away from the one home he had ever known to risk his life for the sake of glory. When you had last seen him, he had been three and ten, nearly four and ten.
His voice was deeper, his eyes were sadder.
You wanted to kill Ormund.
Ever the gentleman, Daeron helped you on and off of the Tessarion, his hand providing proof of you and Gwayne’s guidance, to always be kind, to always stay true to his heart.
You kissed his cheek, smiling brightly when his face turned bright red. “Have I embarrassed you, nephew?”
“Compared to Uncle Ormund’s actions, it is nothing.” He quipped, linking your arm through his as he escorted you into the Tumbleton estate. “I have missed you.”
“And I you, sweet boy.” You pulled him closer. “How have you fared since your departure?”
“Well enough.” His smile was tight, secretive. “Others have it far worse than I. Others in this very city-”
“I am well aware of other’s troubles, Daeron. We shall remedy that soon enough.” You stopped just before the door you assumed would lead you to Ormund, whispering. “I asked how you fared?”
“I am fine.” He nodded, straightening his posture as if that would comfort you. It did not. “All is well.”
“If you insist.” You huffed. “Shall we face the beast?”
“Aunt!” Daeron’s eyes widened, collecting himself before he motioned to the guards to open the door.
“Cousin!” Ormund stood behind a great oak desk. “How good of you to join us.”
“My lord.” You curtsied quickly. “How could I refuse such a kind invitation from the Lord of Oldtown?”
“Still…” Ormund had caught your obvious disdain for him the moment you entered the room. You were glad of it, if he had not, he would have been far stupider than you thought him to already be. “Is the babe-” You almost laughed at his attempt to show care.
“Fine. Thank you.”
“I am sure after such an arduous journey, that you would like to rest.”
“That would be most appreciated, my lord.” You squinted, wary of his sudden kindness. Ormund was not known for his consideration of others.
“I have had the maids fix the finest room they could find. Daeron shall escort you.” He sat at the table, plopping a grape into his mouth casually. “And I shall see you in the morrow.”
You curtsied once more before bidding him goodbye. “Good evening.”
“Good evening.”
Had Ormund broken?
Yes, he had.
This very morning, he, in the same breath, denied Lord and Lady Footling their bedchambers, threatened to end their lives, and swore that his men would be on their best behavior, all whilst bare as the day he was born.
Now, he asks that you come along to deal with a diplomacy issue.
Lady Footling is as fierce as she is proud, stepping forward to confront the intruder of her home once more. “You said your men were honorable. This one-” She pointed to the Hightower knight standing to her right, his face bloodied and beaten. “Has sinned.”
“I was billeted at the smithy, my lord. But the smith didn’t like it. Mayhaps he resents the imposition or mayhaps he is loyal to Rhaenyra. But he struck me.”
“My lord.” The smith stepped forward. “Now, if it please you, we bear you no ill will. But this man went to ravish my sister and then broke my wife’s arm when she tried to stop him. She is a weaver. We need what little she earns.”
“Is this true?” Ormund looked at the Hightower knight with a look of neutrality. You do not trust him for a moment.
“No, my lord.” The knight replies.
Cries break out as a result. The women look utterly fearful, on the verge of tears when Ormund raises his hand. “I will have calm. What is your name?”
“Garrick, my lord, of Whitegrove.”
“Garrick of Whitegrove. You have violated guest right. You have debauched yourself upon a woman and injured another. Your punishment will fit your crime. You will be gelded, and you will have your own arm broken. You may remain in my service, but trespass again, and you will hang.”
The knight’s face was white. “My lord. I have a wife.”
“You should have thought of that then,” You stepped forward. “Before you attempted to defile a woman’s virtue. The House of Hightower will not allow this dishonorable act to go unpunished.”
Ormund said nothing, simply signaling the knights to take him away. “See them home. Have a maester tend to their wounds.” He waited until their ears were out of reach to address Daeron. “We must keep a firm grip, tensions are high. Lawlessness and disorder claw at our gates.”
“Yes, sire.”
“And your aunt is right.” He smiled firmly. “House Hightower will not allow its honor to be questioned.”
“She is quite beautiful.” You whisper, caressing Tessarion’s snout sweetly. “Sweet too.”
“Is she much different from the dragons you have known in the past?” Daeron pressed his forehead against her scales. “I have none to compare her to, it would seem.”
“In stature, no. She is very similar to your-” You gulped, wondering how you might rephrase your answer. “To your sister’s dragon.”
“Dreamfyre?” Daeron’s eyes lit up. “Yes, I have heard she is of a similar color. Kind too.”
“Yes.” You pursed your lips. Thank the gods you did not mention Syrax. “Has she been out since you escorted me here?”
“No.” He frowned. “She longs to fly. We hardly ever have the chance as of late.”
“She will feel the wind beneath her wings once more, I am sure of it.”
Tessarion purred from the loss of his touch. He smiled, leaning his forehead against her once more. “Patience, my girl. It won’t be long.”
A high screech left the dragon’s mouth, startling you. “I have warned you against indulging in affection for that beast.”
Tessarion grew restless, bellowing at the Hightower lord. You fought the smirk that was forming on your lips: even the dragon could sense how dismal his presence was. “Lykiri.”
“Have you come down here to try and dull his longing to ride?” Ormund addressed you.
“Quite the opposite.” You smiled tightly. “He is a Targaryen, he should want to bond with his dragon.” You stepped forward, pulling your robes closer. “Or would you deny him his birthright?”
Ormund chose not to respond, simply ignoring your act of defiance. “You are a good boy. You speak kindly, and you say your prayers. I have raised you in the light of the Seven, and the Father smiles upon you. But there is a taint in your blood. The Targaryens are a savage race, poor in intellect, but rich in cunning. With dark spells, they created abominations to subdue what was rightly ours. We are the superior men. But against that, we could not stand.” Tessarion growled as Ormund placed, or at least tried to, his hand on Daeron's shoulder. “The gods have put you to divine purpose, my boy.”
“What purpose, sire?”
“The brutes raise a woman to the Iron Throne. A desecration!” You held your tongue, deciding not to remind the man that Alicent had sat the throne for years in Viserys stead. “It was a blessing that you came to ward in Oldtown. Your brothers are lost, but you remain a Hightower, raised in the shadow of the Citadel, in the light of the Starry Sept. Now, you must be king.”
Amongst other unfortunate virtues, your cousin (by marriage) was overbearing and intense. He could not lose, and he could not admit any wrongdoing. When his mind was set on a path, there was no changing it. You had witnessed many a passionate speech from the man, and this was shaping up to be one that you wanted to leave.
And you would have, if not for Daeron’s sake.
“You would not wish, surely, for me to turn cloak against my brothers.”
You stepped forward, grabbing Daeron’s hand and giving it a comforting squeeze as Ormund walked up the stairs and motioned towards the door.
Your eyes widened as Ormund’s right hand man dragged in the smith from earlier, whose wife had been assaulted. A hand subconsciously fell to your stomach, fear coursing through your veins. “I thought you let him go.”
“A righteous king must demonstrate he upholds many virtues. Honor, wisdom, justice.”
“He only acted when our man attacked a woman.”
“He laid hands on a Hightower.”
“You speak of justice yet you punish this man for something you yourself condemned.” You stepped forward, putting yourself between Daeron and the madman. “You are committing a grave mistake.”
“Quiet, woman. That soldier is an extension of you, of the crown. Justice must be done.”
“Is not mercy a kingly virtue?” Your heart swelled with pride at Daeron’s argument.
“That sounds like something your father would say.”
You pushed Daeron back, glaring as Ormund took a step closer, and drew his sword. “He is a boy, Ormund.”
“He is the king.”
“He is not the king!” You yelled. “He is sweet, and he is kind, but he is not a king. You cannot force him to carry out your ventures. It is not right.”
“What is not right is you speaking out of turn-”
“I beg your pardon?” You clenched your hands into tight fists. “He will not do it.”
“Aunt-” Daeron whispered. “It is alright, truly.”
“I will do it in his stead-” Your eyes welled up. “He’s just a boy. My boy.”
“Aunt-” Daeron stepped around you, grabbing the sword from his uncle’s hands. “It must be done.”
“Daeron, please-”
He stood tall, his hand shaking ever so slightly as he stared at the smith. “Do not look. It will only upset you more.”
Your sleep was plagued with visions of Gwayne, both real memories and falsified. Your longing for your husband had gotten to the point where you considered sleeping forever so you could at least see him there.
You lay on your lounge chair, staring out the window of your chambers. If you could not sleep, perhaps you could daydream. Tumbleton was loud, louder than Oldtown ever was, even on its busiest day. You could not leave the estate, courtesy of Ormund’s lockdown. Not leaving the estate ruined your plans to explore the city, hand out food to those less fortunate, and roam the woods.
All things you could do freely in Oldtown. All things you could be doing with Gwayne if his cousin had simply bent the knee and left this mess alone.
Instead, you were stuck here, like a prisoner in a dank cell.
A cell that had its own maid and delicious food, courtesy of the Footly’s chef, Mrs. Allen.
You were much more well off than most, you reminded yourself.
That didn’t stop you, however, from storming out of your room, your skirts swishing side to side, as you prepared to confront your cousin. Ormund sat behind his obnoxiously large desk, staring at a paper like it had personally offended him.
“Ah, you’re awake.”
Daydreaming would have to wait for another day. “I’ve been awake for hours, thank you.” You scoffed. “If you must know, I have been avoiding your presence.”
“What have I done to upset you this time?” He sat back in his chair, smug as ever.
“Other than refusing to let me return home and be at peace?”
“Yes.”
“You treat that boy-” You pointed to Daeron, who was dead silent, most likely in fear of being punished by his tyrant of an uncle. “Like a prize to be won. Not like the child that he is-”
“He is six and ten.”
“I believe you yourself were nine and ten when your father finally let you enter a tourney. Interesting, how you are permitted to shy away from the complexities of court, yet Daeron is forced to entertain your kingly notions.”
He glared. “Get to the point.”
“You must see reason and relinquish this city. Go back to Oldtown in good faith, and try to reach an agreement with the Queen.”
“The Queen?” Ormund smirked. “Are you implying that Aegon, and by association, his younger brothers, are not the true line?”
“I am implying that she is currently the Queen. Aegon and Aemond have fled.” You crossed your arms. “Do not twist my words. Surely, you see that-”
“Uncle Gwayne!” Daeron's face lit up. “You've returned!”
Your breath catches as you whip around. Perhaps, you reason with yourself, this is all part of another of your terrifyingly realistic dreams. You pray that the auburn-haired knight in front of you is not a trick of the light. He looks worn to the bone, but you do not care. Your eyes well with tears, and Gwayne's face falls into an ever deeper pit of despair. “Are you alright, my love?”
Stalking forward, you grab his face in your hands, squeezing his cheeks lightly. “Are you real?”
“My girl.” His hands grab at your hips, pulling you close. “I have missed you so-”
You pull your hands from his face, shoving at his chest between each word. “You left me!”
“What is the meaning of this?” A deep frown forms on his weary face.
“You left me with him!” Tears threaten to fall from your eyes. “Do you have any idea the things-”
Ormund cannot help but glare. “Watch your tongue, woman-”
“Shut your mouth, Ormund.” You hiss.
Gwayne grabs your wrists, halting your attack and perhaps, in the process, saving everyone from the wrath of his cousin. “I have craved your touch for two moons now. Surely, you can wait to reprimand me until after I have bathed.”
“You-” The tears released in steady streams. “I worried you were dead.”
He pulled you close, kissing your lips gently. “Do not cry, my love, please.”
“I cannot help it.” You huffed. “You did this to me.”
“Did what exactly?” He laughs. You stepped back, motioning to your stomach. He raised an eyebrow, visibly confused. “I-”
You turned to the side, letting the shape of your gown give him an indication as to what you could be implying. “Gwayne-”
“Are you-” He grinned, stepping forward. “Are you with child?”
“As much as I hate to interrupt this touching reunion-” Ormund cleared his throat. “You must tell me why you are here. I believed you to be in the woods with Criston Cole.”
Gwayne’s smile faltered, and you frowned, caressing his cheek gently. “Are you alright, my love?”
“Ser Criston stayed to fight the Tully army with our remaining men.”
“And so, he fights on, and yet you have returned. Because…”
“Because fighting on is madness.” When you really look at your husband, you see sadness, a broken man whose values had been proven extinct long ago.
“Do you think me mad, Your Grace?” Ormund looks at Daeron expectantly.
“No, sire.”
“You mean to fight on?” Gwayne scoffs. “With what? There’s a dragon sitting on the hill above us, and five more not thirty leagues away.”
“Rhaenyra will not burn her own subjects. She is a woman, squeamish.”
“If your host leaves these walls, they burn.” Gwayne’s jaw tightened. “Aemond has fled, and Rhaenyra holds my sister hostage. The River army draws closer by the day. You have put these countless peoples lives in jeopardy, my wife and unborn child’s lives in jeopardy. What possible course is there to remedy this?”
“Your uncle lacks imagination as well as courage.” Gwayne squeezes your hand, noticing when your eyes ignite with a dangerous look. Daeron smiles at the quip, and you can’t help it when your heart breaks just a little. “I would take one Hightower sword over three Tully mudmen. When the usurper’s host comes here, we will fight on our terms, our grounds. We have the clear advantage. The great houses cannot help but come to our side.”
“Have any yet come?” A laugh leaves your lips, and you slap a hand over your mouth, looking away.
“The patient hunter gets the kill. Something our most craven must learn.”
“I have marched a long road, fought and killed, and suffered my comrades to be killed about me.”
“Yes, you have endured much.” Ormund leans against his desk, a sly smirk etched on his lips. “I’m sure you found solace in your brothers at arms.”
“I am fatigued.” Gwayne does not give way to his cousin’s taunts. “It’s been weeks since I’ve seen a feather bed, and months since I’ve held my wife. By your leave.”
“You might escort your Aunt and Uncle to their quarters, Your Grace. Make sure he bathes.” He laughs, calling out after you. “Oh, and mind yourself. Keep your back to the wall.”
You see red as you reach out, gripping Daeron’s wrist. “We’re leaving. Do not listen to that craven man.”
Gwayne waits until they’ve turned the corner to speak. “He calls you Your Grace?”
“I’m sorry, I had to get through it.”
“And this is your way? Fawning?”
You whisper, wary of being watched. “Daeron knows how to deal with the man. Ormund has reached a new height of madness, one you and I have never seen.”
“He has styled you the bloody king,” Gwayne grumbles.
“Well, you left me alone with him. You know what he is. I do what I can.”
“You have done as well as anyone can, my boy.” You kiss the back of his hand. “But you know as well as I that your Uncle had no choice but to leave.”
“It certainly didn’t grieve him to ride away.” Daeron ripped his hand from your hold, standing in the middle of the hall.
Gwayne scoffed. “Mind yourself, Daeron.”
“Gwayne-”
“I hate who I am with him, and you- you don’t understand. He wants me to be the king. It is his greatest ambition.”
“Then tell him you won’t do it.”
“Who will protect me then?”
“You could cast him down.” Gwayne smiled. “If you were king.”
“A merciful and noble king. You would be even better than your father.” You reassured. “I know it.”
“I will never be king, Aunt.”
“I must-” Gwayne groaned. “I must bathe. Bath and lie down.”
“You will stay?” The boy sounded hopeful for the first time in months.
“And do what? Bear witness as Ormund marches our house to its doom? I’m second in line. I shall return to Oldtown and prepare to pick up the pieces.”
“Don’t leave me again.” Daeron cried. “Please.”
“You would be more than welcome to come with us, my sweet.” You look at Gwayne, whose face is blank.
“He’s Ormund’s treasure now. He’ll be safer here.”
You scoffed. “Surely, you do not mean that. Daeron, do not listen to-” But Daeron had left, and all the joy you’d felt when you’d seen your husband turned to anger. “Why would you say that to him?”
“Darling-”
“I cannot begin to describe the anger I feel towards you at this very moment.” You hissed, stalking around him.
“You must understand-”
You whipped around, your eyes fiery as you spoke. “I understand nothing. And seeing as you refuse to talk to me about the hardships you have faced-”
“I have not had the chance.” He stepped forward. “If you recall, I’ve only just arrived.”
“And what an impact you have made.” You scoffed. “Destroying what was left of that boy’s happiness.”
“You cannot meant to imply-”
“And yet I have.” You shoved past him. “Do not speak to me for the rest of the evening.”
Gwayne’s eyes had not left you since your disagreement, bearing into your soul. You hated him for it: he had found the loophole in your request.
You never said he couldn’t look at you.
It didn’t help you in the slightest that, as angry as you were with him at the moment, your heart screamed for him, your skin craved his touch. Still, you glared. “Could you look elsewhere?”
“I seem to recall a time when you begged for me to look upon you.”
You stared at the ceiling. “Do you think me vain?”
“Not at all.” The water splashed as he sat up in the bath. “I find you to be a perfectly well-balanced lady.”
You squinted, wary of his kindness. “Do not try to blind me with your false niceties.”
“You know as well as I that the things I tell you are not false.” He pauses for a moment, trying to catch your eyes. When you refuse to look at him, he continues. “Do you know how miserable it truly is to be fighting, to be away from one's home?"
You shake your head, and he nods. "I thought as such."
"That does not serve as an excuse to- to act a villain."
"Is that what you think of me?" When you do not respond, he looks away, eyes dark. "What a sad revelation."
"Gwayne-"
"Do you know what I thought of when I was away?” You shrug, your heart pumping wildly. “I thought of you. Only you-”
“I cannot-” Your voice gave out, and so you stood, leaving his side to give yourself some respite.
“I thought of-” His voice broke. “You in the morning, when I’d wake before you and watch as you laid there, not a care in the world. The peace you had, the soft smile your lips carried. You turned your back to him, staring out the window as silent tears fell down your cheeks. “I would remind myself of that image, of your image, every time we went into battle. I love you so intensely that it hurts my soul.” In the middle of all the emotion, he had left the bath, appearing behind you with the stealth of an assassin.
You leaned your back against his chest, eyes shut as his hands wrapped gently around your waist. “You are my whole world, my whole life. Do not think for a moment that I too did not want you by my side every waking moment you were gone. When I learned I was with child, I sobbed for days. All I did was wail for you from our bed, wishing that you would survive this bloody war.” You turn in his hold. “Never doubt my love for you. Never.” His forehead fell to lie against yours, his eyes falling to your lips with every breath. “I am upset with you because I know the man you are. And the man you are would never address that darling boy the way you have today.”
“I am sorry-”
“It is not I that you must apologize to.” Your hands shamelessly drifted up his bare chest, heat rising to your cheeks. “Please talk to him. Before it is too late. Before we-” You gulped. “Before we inevitably-”
“I swear on the old gods and the new that nothing will happen to you or the babe. You will be safe from whatever we face here.” His chest heaved as his hands drifted up and down the side of you. “I made a vow to protect, and I would rather die than see you breathe your last breath.”
“You are terribly dutiful.” You stretched your neck, delicately kissing the corner of his mouth. “But you do admit that you were callous with Daeron.”
“I will apologize to him on the morrow; this I swear to you.” He nudged his nose against your jaw, tilting your head to make way for his affection. Slowly, his lips leave feathery kisses down your jaw and neck, stealing your breath away.
“Gwayne-” You gasp. “I- you-”
“What?” He teased, knowing your mind was struggling to form coherent thoughts. He knew this because he reacted the same way whenever you touched him. “I cannot begin to decipher what you are thinking if you cannot tell me-”
“You are cruel.” Your voice sounded utterly wrecked. “So terribly cruel.”
“I hoped my wife would never utter those words.” He laughed. “But under these circumstances, I will allow it.”
The sun shone through the curtains, and you hummed. Your hands rose to your eyes, rubbing the sleep away. They slowly opened, an immediate sense of dread settling over you, the worst racing through your mind.
Had Gwayne truly returned, or had you dreamt it in order to deal with the pain that came with being apart? Your head whipped to the other side of the bed, a soft laugh leaving your lips.
Gwayne looked utterly exhausted. His mouth was open ever so slightly, his hair a mess from tossing and turning. You slide his tunic up, planting sweet kisses on the bruises that were still blooming on his perfect skin, still in disbelief that he was really, truly with you.
His hand wrapped around your waist, his eyes still closed as he pressed a kiss to your temple, grumbling a quiet good morning.
date night with your older boyfriend is always fun, yet you can’t seem to shake the nervousness that clings to your body every time you see him
content warnings: weird girl!reader, fluff, a smidgen of ormund being a perv
the crystalline sky of early night seeped in through your apartment windows, the nearing end rays of sunlight filtering over your vanity and soaking your room in a warm glow. you’ve been staring at yourself in the mirror for the past ten minutes, wondering if the pink glitter eyeshadow was too much, or if the intricate braid crown that took you a long and dire thirty minutes to achieve was too overboard.
the clock on your bedside table read 7:40, a fearing testament to the fact that ormund was going to be knocking at your door in five minutes. you smooth down the skirt of your floral dress, the pink rose petals a stark contrast against the smooth black background the outfit of choice for the night. ormund said he was taking you to a quaint restaurant, your thoughts roaming, wondering if the establishment would be closer to his favourite fancy dines or if it would be more like your homely diners.
a breath of air pushes past your lips, blowing a loose strand of hair out of your face. tucking the fallen strand behind your ear, you pointed a finger at yourself in the mirror, face stern as you attempted to give a much needed pep talk.
“you’ve got this,” you said fiercely, narrowing your eyes in determination as you continued to hype yourself up. “you’re beautiful, your hair and makeup look amazing, and your outfit is bomb. there is nothing for ormund to make fun of. absolutely nothing…”
fear and doubt started creeping into your brain as you stared at yourself longer, the harrowing thought that ormund would see you and laugh daunting. he was much older than you. mature in ways you weren’t. you were always scared that he saw you as some child playing dress up, and now as you sat ready for a date with him, those same worries started bubbling up over the surface.
sometimes you couldn’t understand why ormund chose you; a girl who was a decade his junior. who viewed the world with rose coloured glasses. you were soft, gentle where ormund was rough. he wasn’t pleasant to be around with others, but when it came to you? he was placid. calm in ways you couldn’t comprehend seeing on his stature with others. you didn’t know if you tamed something in him or if he just tolerated you. it all pressed on you like a heavy weight, leaving a burning behind your eyes that you yearned to push away.
the sudden harsh knock on your door sent a jolt through your body, your hands and legs shaking as you stared at yourself in the mirror one final time before taking your leave from your room, walking towards where ormund stood hidden like a lamb to the slaughter.
you opened the door to a waiting ormund, his hands shoved in the pockets of his black slacks with a forced calmness that you clocked instantly. his white shirt was pressed, crisp and clean in the way that he presented himself. hair perfectly windswept, ormund hightower looked like a man from a magazine, while you probably looked like a mess of colour and glitter.
the last thing you expected was for a genuine, soft smile to light its way onto ormund’s face, his one hand leaving his pocket to brush a loose strand of hair away from your face. his fingers were rough. calloused where yours were soft, and it brought a tingle of warmth through your bones.
“absolutely beautiful,” he breathes, fingers dancing across your jaw in a waltz of love and admiration. he holds you so tenderly, and it makes you swoon, for ormund isn’t the most docile man on the planet. “you ready to go, baby doll?”
you couldn’t help the blush that warmed your cheeks, heating up ormund’s palm and making the man grin with triumph. in this moment, with the softness delivered by your boyfriends hold and gaze, you couldn’t remember the fear you felt, slipping into your mary jane’s with a smile, grabbing your belongings and slotting your hand into ormund’s with ease.
the two of you walked down the street in a flurry of rainbows and serenity, heads turning at the strange pairing of a stoic man and his bubbly girl. ormund only glared, hand slipping around your shoulder easily so he could stroke the back of your neck in comfort. he could tell you were tense, his ministrations a calming agent to your anxiety.
ormund always had wandering hands, and when his palm slid down your spine and rested on the curve of your ass, slightly bunching the material of your dress upwards, you couldn’t help swatting at his hand, a shy grin on your lips that ormund only grinned at.
you two were truly a sight for sore eyes, anyone with a brain being able to know that ormund hightower would do anything for his strange girl.
this can be read as a standalone or as part iii of the seven sins series
summary: whispers harden into fact and your influence quietly blooms. as his sickness grows, lord ormund wraps you in sanctity and divine will, calling his obsession ordainment.
word count: 11.5k+
pairing: ormund hightower x noble!reader
contents: 18+ (mdni), smut, mutual manipulation, coercion/sexual bribery, ormund has a god complex, dominant!reader, needy!ormund, implied breeding kink, moon tea, age gap, religious themes, size difference, oral (f receiving), scent kink, pussy worship, dagger use, violence, threat of death, orgasm denial, semi-public smut, arranged political marriage, mentions of SA - let me know if i've missed anything x
a/n: just in case you were craving some pathetic, needy, desperate ormund smut - let me know what you think x
← PREVIOUS CHAPTER
By morning, there was scarcely a soul in the castle who had not heard some version of the tale.
The Lord of Oldtown was gone by the time you awoke, disoriented by the vast and unfamiliar weight of the room around you. Responsibilities had called him from his chambers as faithfully as the rising sun; its light seeping through heavy curtains in pale, reluctant streams, and gilding the bed where you lay. The air still held the hearth's dying smoke, and beneath it, the faint, unmistakable scent of him.
You dressed without haste, smoothing your hair, arranging your robe and settling your composure as carefully as if you were about to step into a throne room.
There was no sense in skulking through corridors like a guilty child. Whatever had passed between these walls was not something you would carry with shame - not because it was innocent, but because you understood perfectly well the power of refusing to act as though it was a sin.
The guards stationed outside did not speak when you emerged. They did not need to.
One brief, flickered glance told you everything you needed to know -
A castle might be built of stone, you knew, but it survived on whispers.
On the walk back to your apartments, you felt it; the unsettling, quiet certainty that the story of your absence had already travelled through the bowels of the Hightower, slipping from tongue to tongue like smoke, seeping through cracks and under doors until it clung to every corridor.
Your maid confirmed it the moment you stepped inside.
Her eyes swept over you once; not rudely, not accusingly, but with the unmistakable shock of someone who had spent the better part of the morning wondering where you had gone. Her gaze lingered on your hair, your robe, the way you moved, as if searching for proof.
The room grew strangely still.
Another maid, folding linens, suddenly found the fabric fascinating. She smoothed and refolded, smoothed and refolded, as if her life depended on its creases. You realised, with a faint and cold amusement that she was dutifully making a bed she knew had not been slept in the night before.
The third girl - the one whose voice had carried loud enough to reach the door - fell abruptly silent. She did not speak again, but her face said everything she dared not utter.
By midday, the whispers had reached even the maester.
It was the expression on his face - the careful, sorrowful gentleness etched into his brow - that gave him away.
"Lady Y/N." He bowed.
The Hightower's maester was an old, tired man. He possessed no sharp edge, no gleam of malice; only the fatherly softness one expects of a healer. Today, however, he bore a weight in his posture that had nothing to do with age. He glanced toward the door as he stepped forward, ensuring it had shut firmly behind him.
You were alone. The book you had been reading was slowly set open on the windowsill.
You marked his approach, the stiffness in his shoulders, the restraint in his step. He looked at you as though you were something fragile, something wounded that might startle if he approached too quickly.
His demeanour alone told you this was no routine visit.
"I hope you will forgive my presumption, my lady," he began, his voice gentle but heavy, freighted with pity. "I thought it prudent that you should have this."
Your gaze shifted from his lined face to his hands. Slowly, he drew back his grey sleeve to reveal a covered clay pot; a quiet little remedy for a scandal the castle had already decided was not yours to control.
The maester would not meet your eyes.
Your own narrowed on his face.
"And why, precisely, do you believe I require moon tea, Maester?"
The question hung between you, thick and unmoving.
"My lady..."
His expression tightened. He was not a liar. He was a good man; a man who understood that kindness could sometimes be more cutting than cruelty.
You waited.
At last, he drew a breath so deep it shook his chest, as if the words were difficult to pry loose.
"I fear Lord Ormund may have taken advantage of his position."
The room went still.
For a long while, the only sounds were your own steady breathing and the faint, muffled murmur of guards beyond your door.
Then, perhaps mistaking your silence for fear, the maester hurried on.
"His lordship is much respected, I know. But I also know his temper, and I am old enough to have seen what anger can make of a man."
It did not take long to understand what he implied.
Without invitation or ceremony, he stepped forward and set the pot upon the table between you. The soft clack of clay on wood seemed to echo. His smile was sad, sympathetic, utterly certain he was saving you.
"Lord Ormund has many virtues, but he is a man accustomed to obedience..." He paused, gravely.
He did not need to finish. You already understood.
Your voice was quiet, level when you finally spoke.
"You believe he took me against my will?"
The old man looked stricken that you would speak the word aloud. He paled, glanced once more at the door and wrung his hands, nervously. He exhaled a shaky breath and lowered his voice until it was barely more than a whisper, a secret shared between shadows.
"I believe," he said, weighing each word with deliberate care, "that you may not have felt able to refuse him."
There it was.
It had not once occurred to him that you might have chosen Lord Ormund of your own will. That you had sought him out. That your every ambition was to make him yours.
He could not fathom the notion that a young, sweet, highborn lady such as yourself might desire a man like him.
He simply thought you had survived him.
Your face remained calm, giving nothing away. You would not let the insult sting.
You had spent weeks learning the shape of Lord Hightower's pride, the rhythm of his temper, the way his mind turned and turned in the dark. And yet, to everyone beyond his chamber doors, you were merely a girl unfortunate enough to catch the attention of a dangerous, unpredictable man.
The maester pushed the pot toward you across the wood. His gaze kind, sorrowful.
"You need not explain anything to me, my lady."
A strange kindness; a strange cruelty.
"I only wished to ensure you are not left to bear the consequences of something done against your will."
You held your silence a moment longer, weighing the choice with the same cold calculation Lord Ormund himself might have used.
Drink the tea - and you confirm the rumour. It would not matter that you had gone to him willingly; the story would harden into fact. The meaning of that night would be judged, twisted, carried onward until it reached ears you could not afford to offend.
Refuse it - and the path forward was harder to foresee.
And so you made your choice, smiling up at the maester, untroubled and serene. You covered his hand with yours with affection, and spoke the plain, unvarnished truth.
"The tea is not necessary, Maester." Your gaze held his, steady and clear. "You assume I was wronged. I have not been, and I promise you I am quite well."
The news did not spread loudly.
Oldtown was too old, too careful, too well-acquainted with secrets to indulge in anything so vulgar as open gossip.
The information moved instead through lowered voices in the corridors, through glances exchanged between servants the moment you turned your back, through sudden pauses in conversation whenever you or Lord Ormund stepped into a room.
By day's end, you understood exactly what the castle believed:
You had spent the night in Lord Ormund's chambers.
You had not returned until morning.
You had refused the moon tea.
And whatever else they might have whispered, one conclusion had begun to settle above all others, slow and inevitable as the tides -
Whatever had passed between you behind those doors was no fleeting indiscretion.
Whether spoke aloud or not, the castle had quietly begun to regard you not as Ser Gwayne’s betrothed, but as the woman at Lord Hightower’s side.
Over the days that followed, you watched in silence as the castle began to shift and change around you.
There were no proclamations. No formal decrees. No words spoken aloud that might be called presumption. Yet you saw it everywhere, in the small unguarded things - conversations softening the moment you stepped into a room; servants pausing, waiting, seeking your approval before they so much as poured wine; lords who had once looked straight through you as if you were glass now turning to you first, waiting for your opinion as though it carried weight equal to law. Fresh flowers appeared in your chambers each dawn. Your favourite dishes appeared at table without instruction. Men bowed lower, deeper, as if you already stood beneath a higher roof.
It was as though Oldtown itself had quietly reached a conclusion - had rearranged itself around you - before anyone had thought to speak any announcement.
And beneath all that silent speculation, something quieter still was taking root.
You found yourself in Lord Ormund's study by day, seated near him while he worked, reading or stitching or simply watching him weigh words and men with that same cool, unhurried calculation. He did not ask you to leave. He did not explain. He simply spoke to you as he worked - of law, of treaties, of plans - as if your opinion mattered.
When he received his lords or held audience, he gestured for you to stand beside him, not behind, and no one dared question it. You said little. You watched. And you began to learn the shape of his mind as thoroughly as you had already learned the shape of his pride.
Had you marched into your chamber that first morning and declared your place beside him, had you demanded honour or title of deference, the castle would have stiffened. Prideful people always resist being told what to think. They would have called you ambitious. Presumptuous.
But no one resisted a mere assumption.
No one fought a fact they believed they had discovered for themselves.
They simply shifted around it - adjusted their lives, their manners, their expectations - as if it had always been this way. As if you had always belonged there.
When the head housekeeper found you in the gardens a week later, you almost laughed outright.
You sat in the sun, embroidery in your lap, when she approached and curtsied low - lower than she had ever curtsied before.
"My lady."
You looked up, brows drawing together. In all the weeks before, she had never once sought you out. You were a guest then. A visitor. A noblewoman passing through, with no hand upon the running of the Hightower.
But now? If rumours were true - if you were indeed the one who held his eye, his bed, his favour - then learning your wishes was not just a courtesy. It was preparation.
She hesitated, hands folded tight before her.
"Forgive the intrusion, my lady. I came to ask... with regard to Lord Hightower's chambers."
Something flickered in your chest, sharp and warm. "His chambers?"
"Yes, my lady." She kept her gaze respectfully lowered. "I wished to know whether fresh linens should be laid more frequently, and whether more blankets ought to be added to the bed? The nights turn chill, and..." She paused, then finished softly. "I wanted to make sure everything is to your liking as much as his."
You could only blink.
The question was simple. The weight of it was heavy.
Your gaze drifted toward the distant walls of the keep, buying some time. A guest would have deferred this. A guest would have said that is not my concern. But you were no longer merely a guest to them. And if you denied it now... You gave up everything they were already yielding to you.
"That sounds sensible," you said at last, a quiet, knowing smile touching your lips. "The nights have grown colder. See that it is done."
The housekeeper bowed, curtsied again and departed. You remained seated long after she had gone, the needle resting idle in your hand.
In that moment, you finally understood the true nature of influence.
It was not seized, you realised, nor was it demanded.
Influence was simply assumed.
Later that evening, you returned to your chambers to find something new hanging above your bed.
It was a new tapestry, woven with exquisite skill: the Maiden, pure and unblemished, her hands folded gently before her, stars caught in the weave of her gown. She was the very symbol of virtue, of innocence, of a woman kept whole and sacred until the altar.
There was no note. No explanation. But you knew his hand in it - the quiet, deliberate choice, the gift that said everything while admitting nothing.
He knew what the castle whispered. He knew what the maester had implied. And so he gave you the Maiden; a public declaration, silent and unmistakable, that whatever they thought had passed between you, you remained virtuous. You remained pure.
It was a lie. A beautiful, deliberate, gloriously hypocritical lie - and you understood, with a quiet, heated thrill, that he revelled in it. He had stood, breathless and undone before you; he had shattered in your hands, surrendered to your mouth, whispered your name like a prayer while you gorged yourself on him and stripped him of every last scrap of control. He knew exactly what you were, and yet he hung the symbol of innocence above your bed for all the world to see - as if he took a dark and twisted pleasure in the contradiction.
The whole castle would bow before you as a saint, while he alone would know exactly how utterly, sinfully his you were. He gave you purity publicly so he might better possess your corruption privately; and the hypocrisy of it, the arrogance, the sheer, masterful control of both stories at once, made your blood burn.
He wove his truths with exquisite care, but the greatest irony of all needed no weaving at all -
You had not lied. You had not claimed his name. You had not spoken a word of what had passed behind his door, nor made a single claim to his favour. Every deference, every bowed head, every soft-spoken courtesy had been born freely from whispers, glances and silence.
You had asked for nothing. You had simply allowed the castle to believe what it chose to believe.
Within the week, the shift had spread further. Ladies who had once regarded you as an outsider now sought your company, eager for a word, a smile, a look that might grant them favour. Knights and lords who had offered nothing more than distant courtesy now found reasons to speak with you, lingering by your side, watching your face. Servants who would not dare approach Lord Ormund with their own grievances began bringing them to you; small requests, quiet pleas, knowing that a word from you might soften his answer.
The castle had reached a dangerous conclusion.
They believed you held power over the Lord of Oldtown. Not the power of rank, but something far more difficult to control, something no title could bestow - the power to move him, to sway him. To soften his temper and turn his will.
And the most extraordinary thing - something you had not yet dared to speak aloud even to yourself - was this: little by little, their assumption was becoming truth.
At first, your presence in the council chamber was treated as an inconvenience; an oddity, a curiosity of sorts. You were there to speak on your father's behalf while his army marched toward Oldtown. You knew their numbers, where their strengths lay, and where their weaknesses frayed. To offer that information was your only stated duty.
The lords did not yet know what to make of you. Some assumed you sat there only because Lord Ormund allowed it. Others whispered that your father was a proud, foolish man; one who placed far too much weight upon the shoulders of a daughter.
You sat at the great table, quiet and watchful, while men twice your age shouted over maps and ink-stained fingers prodded at routes and supply lines. Parchment carpeted the wood of the table; carved markers stood in place of armies that had not yet stirred, territories that would soon decide the fate of the realm.
The problem hung over them, plain and heavy. The army could not linger in Oldtown long after the wedding, yet marching blind could prove far more dangerous. Especially with dragons patrolling the skies.
"We cannot afford to remain here for long," one lord insisted. "Every day we wait gives them time to fortify."
"And every day we rush forward without certainty risks walking straight into a trap," another snapped back, his patience already worn thin.
Lord Ormund said nothing. He merely reclined in the carved oak chair at the table's head, lifting his pomander slowly to his nose, inhaling, watching them bicker - calculating.
Just like him, you remained silent. But your eyes did not linger on the largest armies or the strongest castles. Instead, they drifted to a narrow, winding route marked near the parchment's edge; a road most men had already dismissed, simply because it was inconvenient.
But inconvenient did not mean useless.
You did not speak. You did not point.
You only looked.
Once.
Then again.
It was a long while before Lord Ormund noticed. His gaze shifted, followed yours, locked upon that thin, unpromising line.
For a moment, nothing happened. Then you saw it; recognition glimmering in his eyes, sharp and sudden, as if he had finally fitted the last piece into place. He understood.
"The southern road."
The room stilled.
You watched them bend to him. One word, and argument died. One glance, and grown men lowered their eyes. There was something dangerously, breathtakingly alluring about power so absolute; and you realised, with quiet, undeniable satisfaction, that you had begun craving the feeling of standing beside it.
One lord frowned, confused. "My lord?"
Lord Ormund pushed his chair back and stood. He leaned over the map, broad-shouldered and towering, casting a shadow over the table and every man seated around it.
"They have prepared for the obvious approach," he said, low and certain. "They expect us to move through the wider passes, where our numbers are our strength."
His finger came down, touched exactly the route your eyes had chosen.
"But this road allows us to divide their attention before they understand where our true strength lies."
Silence stretched, then broke; not in disagreement, but in the sudden, shifting weight of realisation.
Questions turned to possibilities. Possibilities turned to agreement. Within moments, the lords were debating the plan as though it had been Lord Ormund's brilliant idea from the very start.
You said nothing. You did not need to.
But across the table, the briefest glance passed between you. Not a word. Not a smile. Just a flicker - acknowledgement and something deeper - before he looked away again.
It was over supper that evening when Lord Ormund finally allowed himself to openly praise what you had done.
Only three places had been laid out in his private solar. The servants came and went with little more than the soft clink of silver against porcelain before retreating to the kitchens.
Young Daeron cleared his throat and reached for his goblet.
"I heard today's council ended rather abruptly."
Lord Ormund looked up from his plate, his gaze shifting to his ward. A faint, satisfied smile touched his lips, pleased the boy took such interest in the campaign.
"It did."
"And was a course of action decided?" The prince's voice held a nervous quiver when he spoke, each word carefully measured before leaving his lips.
"It was." Lord Ormund paused, deliberate and clear. "Lady Y/N decided it."
You offered only a modest smile, your attention fixed upon him. "It was merely an observation, my lord."
"A valuable one," Lord Ormund corrected at once. "One every man in that chamber was too slow or too foolish to see."
There was quiet disdain in the mention of his councillors. His blue eyes rested upon you, heavy and warm, before turning back to Daeron.
"The council spent the better half of an hour arguing over troop movements. Lady Y/N glanced at the map for scarcely a minute before seeing the flaw in the approach."
Daeron's gaze moved between you.
"I had not realised," his uncle continued, cutting his meat with slow, precise strokes, "that Lady Y/N possessed such a mind for war." He took a sip of wine, a faint, almost amused smile playing about his mouth. "She continues to impress me. I confess... I did not expect it."
You lowered your gaze, concealing your satisfaction; though you could not quite check the warmth rising in your cheeks.
Lord Ormund was not finished. He seemed entirely unaware of how much he was speaking.
"She listens more than she speaks, and when she does speak, it is only after everyone else has exhausted themselves shouting over one another." He nodded, as if confirming a truth to himself. "There is discipline in that. Rare in one so young."
"High praise," Daeron remarked, his voice lighter than his eyes.
Lord Ormund answered at once, with a quiet, absolute certainty.
"The Lady Y/N possesses uncommon judgement. I have commanded men twice her age who have contributed half as much."
You laughed softly, sitting back and tracing the rim of your goblet with one finger. "I simply knew none of them would listen until they had finished disagreeing with one another."
Lord Ormund laughed, low and genuine.
Daeron could only stare.
He had known the Lord of Oldtown almost all his life. He knew his habits, his moods, the way his temper could turn without warning. He knew him as well as any son might know his father. His uncle admired competence; he respected intelligence; he rewarded loyalty.
This was something else entirely.
Lord Ormund did not praise people. Certainly not like this; not with this warmth, this unmistakable pride in his voice. Not with that look softening his face every time you spoke. It was not weakness; weakness disgusted him. It was something far more unsettling.
Daeron knew his uncle better than he knew his own reflection. He recognised the shift instantly; the way his attention fixed upon you, the way he leaned slightly forward whenever you spoke, as if he did not wish to miss a single breath.
Something had changed. Daeron could not say precisely what or when; only that the Lord of Oldtown seated before him bore little resemblance to the man who had reluctantly welcomed you at his gates. Daeron had heard the whispers and dismissed them. Yet now, watching the way his uncle looked at you, Daeron felt his certainty begin to fray. A cold unease settled in his chest. The whispers no longer seemed so preposterous.
A sharp knock struck the door.
"Enter," Lord Ormund called. The fondness had not yet left his face.
The door opened just enough for the steward to slip inside. He carried a ledger beneath one arm and looked as composed as ever.
He bowed low. "My prince, my lord, my lady. Forgive the intrusion."
Lord Ormund sighed. "What is it?"
"The household seeks your instruction, my lord." The steward glanced briefly toward you, then lowered his eyes. "There has been... some uncertainty regarding Lady Y/N's accommodations."
Silence stretched.
Lord Ormund's expression did not change, but something in the room had shifted.
"Uncertainty?"
"The Lady's Hall, my lord."
Your heart gave a single, hard beat.
The steward continued carefully. "The kitchens wished to know... whether Lady Y/N should begin taking her meals there?"
Lord Ormund's eyes narrowed. The warmth in his face did not fade. It simply hardened.
"Where does this question come from?"
The man hesitated. For the first time, he looked uncertain. "It has been assumed that... given recent circumstances... Lady Y/N may soon take her place as the lady of this castle."
Lord Ormund's brow lifted.
His voice was very quiet. "Recent circumstances."
It was not a question.
"The maids speak of it, my lord. The guards... they confirm it. And-" The steward stopped, swallowing hard. "The servants have drawn certain conclusions."
The room went still as death.
Lord Ormund laid his cutlery down beside his plate; slow, precise, each piece aligned perfectly. He did not look away from the steward.
Daeron had paled. He knew that look. He knew the dreadful, waiting stillness that fell before the rage.
He glanced at you - wide-eyed, warning - and mouthed, silent and urgent: Leave. Now.
You only frowned.
You watched Lord Ormund take a slow drink of his wine, eyes still fixed upon his steward. It was a long moment before the goblet was returned to the table, set down so hard the wine sloshed over the rim and ran across the wood.
In a heartbeat, you understood exactly what had enraged him. He was not offended by the thought of you standing as lady of this castle; not by half. It was what they had implied beneath those words; the assumption that you had already fallen into his bed, that you had compromised yourself, that your place beside him was earned by surrender rather than by right and by name.
They had whispered you were ruined. They had treated your honour as a thing already spent. That - that insult to your virtue - was what he could not abide.
"My lord-" The steward held up his hands, panic rising in his face. "I meant no-"
Lord Ormund stood. His chair scraped loud and terrible against the flagstones. He moved slowly, calmly, with the weight of a blade being drawn.
Daeron rose from his seat and silently retreated to a far corner, as if he had done this a thousand times before, as if he knew exactly what came next.
"Lady Y/N," Lord Ormund said, his voice carrying through the room, low and terrible, "is a noblewoman of impeccable conduct. She is the daughter of a Great House and an honoured guest beneath my roof."
He rounded the table.
Every step brought him closer.
"My lord, I only thought-"
"Do you know what you have done?"
Lord Ormund's voice had dropped. It was not loud. It was not wild. It was cold and measured, infinitely more terrifying than shouting.
"You have stood in my chambers and repeated a rumour that questions the virtue of a lady under my protection."
"My lord, I meant no harm."
"No harm?" Lord Ormund took another step. "Do you understand what such talk implies? What it does to her name?"
His voice sharpened, cutting like a whip.
"I will not have her virtue questioned beneath my roof. Not by them. Not by you."
Daeron watched, silent. There was no hesitation, no doubt. His uncle spoke as one declaring a truth before the Gods themselves.
The steward bowed his head. "Forgive me, my lord."
But Lord Ormund did not seem to hear him. His anger had outgrown the man before him. It filled the solar, thick and suffocating, like something alive, something feeding on the insult done to you.
"Find every person who has repeated this," he said. Each word was distinct, unyielding.
"My lord?"
"Every person." His gaze did not waver. "They will learn the consequences of questioning her name beneath this roof."
Silence - absolute and breathless.
Then your voice cut through it. Soft, calm, and entirely unafraid.
"My lord."
Daeron looked to you as though you had lost your mind.
Slowly, you rose from your seat and stepped up to his side, skirts drifting across stone. You did not hurry. You did not flinch. You stepped into the space between him and his anger, placing yourself close enough to feel his heat.
You did so with quiet confidence, as though you already knew he would allow you, as though his anger was not something to cower away from. It was impossible not to notice the quiet reverence in your gaze as you neared him, like you found yourself drawn to the very thing everyone else had come to fear.
When your hand rested upon his arm, he did not calm. He did not soften. He did not yield.
He merely paused.
You could feel the rage in him - hot, wild, barely leashed - trembling beneath his skin like a caged beast. Every muscle was drawn tight, every line of him coiled and ready to strike. He did not turn to you. He did not look at you. But he held himself back. He clamped down on the fury that wanted to tear the room apart, locked it away, contained it.
He stood there, rigid and burning, swallowing up his wrath because you had spoken.
Lord Ormund could spend his life denying what happened behind closed doors, but there was an intimacy in the silence between you that no words, no lies could possibly disguise.
A man did not defend a woman's virtue like that unless she mattered; unless there was something to hide.
"You cannot punish a rumour into silence, my sweet lord," you said quietly, stroking his wrist with the most delicate of touches. "And my virtue is not so fragile that it requires the blood of servants to defend it."
He did not answer. He did not look at you. His jaw remained tense, his eyes still fixed on the steward. But the hand at his side slowly unclenched. He breathed - once, deep and jagged - fighting for control, fighting to master himself.
You pressed yourself closer, raised yourself onto your toes and pressed your lips to his jaw. A chaste, innocent kiss. Nothing more. Your next words were barely more than a breath, destined for no one's ears but his own -
"Let them whisper."
For a long, terrible moment he said nothing at all. Then slowly, as though forcing himself to move, he turned his head toward you. His eyes were still sharp with fury. The rage had not yet passed. It had only been diverted, held back, for you.
He did not yield. He did not calm. He simply... restrained himself.
You smiled at him softly, diffusing the situation with a serene, almost loving look. Your hand slipped from his wrist and affectionately touched his chest.
You turned to the steward. He was pale, trembling, looking between you and his lord. You could almost see the endless questions he dared not voice.
You offered him a small, polite smile.
"That will be all," you told him, calm and clear. "You may go."
The steward hesitated, glancing at his master, uncertain whether he had truly been dismissed; but Lord Ormund said nothing. He did not correct you, did not rebuke you for dismissing the man. He simply stood there, his eyes fixed upon your face, still burning, still holding himself in check.
"Y-yes, my lady." The steward bowed low and backed away. He left the room so swiftly that the door had barely closed before the sound of his stumbling footsteps disappeared down the corridor beyond.
Then, it was quiet once more, only the two of you, and Daeron watching from the shadows. Lord Ormund was still angry. You could feel it thrumming beneath your hand, hot and restless, but he no longer burned with it. He contained it, held it back.
His hand came up, closing over yours where it rested upon his chest. He did not speak. He did not need to.
Your palm remained pressed to him. The gesture would have been unthinkable from anyone else - a familiarity no one else would dare presume - but Lord Ormund did not recoil. After a moment, his gaze began to soften; not by much, not enough to be certain, but enough that Daeron - watching closely - saw the iron in him yield just a fraction.
You turned to the young Targaryen ward.
"My prince, I shall like to speak with your uncle in private. Would you leave us?"
The boy hesitated. It was not that he questioned your authority. It was that the idea of leaving you alone with Lord Ormund - in the aftermath of such fury; fury that had not yet spent itself - clearly troubled him.
Your eyes met his across Lord Ormund's shoulder. There was no plea in them. No fear. Only quiet, unshakable assurance.
I have this.
So simple a look; and yet, had he not been watching so closely, he might have missed it entirely.
Daeron hesitated a moment longer, then inclined his head.
"Very well, my lady."
But as he walked to the door, his gaze lingered. He saw the soft smile you offered his uncle; not the smile of someone soothing a temper, but the smile of someone who already knew she would be heard, would be obeyed. He saw your hand resting upon his uncle's chest, and the way he leaned into it, as if it were the only thing holding him to earth.
Daeron had never seen anyone stand before Lord Ormund's rage and make it yield without force. You did not cower. You did not flatter him. You simply reached for him as though you already knew exactly where his sharp edges were; as though his anger belonged to you more than it had ever belonged to him.
That was what unsettled him most. And as the door clicked shut behind him, Daeron could no longer deny the truth standing before his uncle -
You suited him.
The silence that followed was different now. No longer heavy with suppressed violence. No longer brittle with things left unsaid. This was something else entirely; something intimate, something shared.
You watched him in the quiet. Lord Ormund's expression was slowly settling back into its usual composure, but you knew him well enough now to see what still lay beneath it: the tension coiled tight in his shoulders; the faint, hard line between his brows; the restlessness of a man denied the quiet that always came after fury had spent itself.
You stepped impossibly close, your chest pressed up against him, and kissed his jaw again, your lips lingering this time for much longer than you had previously allowed yourself.
"I must confess, my lord," you whispered, "I have never seen anyone look so offended by a rumour."
He did not smile back.
"Is that what you believe this was?" His voice remained firm. "It was an insult."
"Ah." You nodded thoughtfully. "Of course."
Something in your tone made him narrow his eyes.
"You were very convincing, you know?" You bit back your smile. "About my virtue."
The words hung between you; not heavy, not strained, almost playful.
Lord Ormund's mouth tightened. "It is none of their concern."
"No," you agreed softly. You leaned in and kissed him again, lower this time, right where his jaw met his neck. "But for a man who claims to be guided only by faith and duty, you are remarkably easy to provoke when it concerns me."
You tilted your head back to examine his expression. His gaze held yours. You simply peered up at him, all innocence, your hand sliding slowly from his chest to rest just above the hilt of his sword. Your smile did not falter.
"...And I find I am rather grateful for it."
That caught his attention.
"Grateful?"
You nodded. "Yes."
He lifted a brow, though he did not smile.
"You just threatened to butcher half your household in defence of my reputation." Your voice was a whisper. "Most women must settle for poetry and pretty words. It seems I have received terror, a trembling steward, and the promise of slaughter." Your lips brushed him as you fought back a quiet giggle. "I must admit, this pleases me more than poetry ever could."
A long breath left him, and with it, the last of his rigidity. A faint, reluctant smile touched his lips.
"You are the only woman I have ever met who could turn a threat into a compliment."
"Perhaps."
You took a small step forward so that you could face him fully, your chest pressed flush against his, his sword belt pressing firm and unyielding into your belly. His heat wrapped around you like something tangible.
"You find this amusing?" The corner of his mouth lifted, fighting to stay serious.
"A little," you admitted. "But I also meant every word."
You lifted your arms and curled them around his waist, pulling him to you. He did not pull away. His own arms came around you instinctively, holding you close, as if he had no intention of ever letting you go. You had to tilt your chin high just to meet his eyes.
"You are very bold," he observed, to which you only grinned.
"So I've been told. By you, mostly."
Your fingers drifted to the collar of his doublet, toying with the button there.
For a heartbeat, he looked as though he might actually laugh.
"Tell me, my lord - what are we going to do about this rumour?"
Lord Ormund released a weary breath, as if the very thought of it weighed him down. He pulled you tighter still.
"It will not be easily silenced." His voice was low, resigned. "My household has already decided you are Lady of Oldtown in all but name."
You lifted a brow. "And here I was thinking the steward's words came as a surprise to you."
He rolled his eyes, but there was no true heat behind it.
"It has been difficult to miss." His hand stroked your back. "A second chair has been placed beside the hearth in my chambers. My bed has been piled high with more blankets I did not request, and my servants have ceased asking for my opinions or instruction. I trust they have been pestering you instead?"
You pressed your cheek to his chest and looked up at him through your lashes. "Guilty."
A low, warm laugh rumbled beneath your ear.
You hesitated before speaking, quiet and sure.
"So you have known all this time, and yet you have not objected to it. Why?"
His hand came to rest upon your head, stroking your hair with a tenderness that belonged only here, in this quiet space.
"I asked the Seven the same question yesterday morning." His voice was deep, steady, certain. "And I have come to believe that, in their wisdom, they removed Gwayne from this castle so that I might know you without distraction."
Your heart gave a wild, sudden beat.
"I do not believe," he continued, looking down at you as if seeing something sacred written in your face, "that the Seven would place a woman like you in my path, only to have me give her to another man."
You saw it clearly; not mere longing, but conviction. The absolutely unshakable certainty of a man who believes himself to be walking in the service of something greater than himself.
He looked at you as though he had discovered not merely a woman, but an instrument of providence. The Gods had not sent him a distraction, he thought; they had sent him someone capable of standing beside him, strengthening his House, advancing his purpose, and completing the work he believed he had been chosen to do.
You should have been afraid. To hear a man speak of longing as destiny, of desire as divine will; it should have sounded like a warning. Instead, something far darker and sweeter stirred and unfurled within you.
This was no longer a man tempted by something he felt he ought to resist. This was Lord Ormund Hightower - a man who had spent his life believing himself ruled by control, duty, and the will of the Seven - looking at you as though you were not a temptation to be cast out, but a truth he had been ordained to discover. You were not a test of his Faith. You were his birth right.
You realised, with a faint stirring of greed, that he did not merely want you. He had begun to justify you. To sanctify you. To weave you so deeply into the very fabric of his faith that to reject you would be to reject the Gods themselves.
He had wrapped you in faith, in purpose, in divine intention, until losing you to someone else would feel like blasphemy.
A man might be persuaded to set aside sin. But a man who believes the Gods themselves have given him something? Such a man would burn the world down before he let anyone take it away from him.
The thought raced through you, hot and bright. The thrill of the realisation brought a wave of desire impossible to resist.
"You believe the Gods brought me here, to you." It was barely a whisper. "Then let me be what they intended."
Curiosity flickered in his eyes, dark and intense.
Your next words were a prayer.
"I will not be a burden you must carry, my lord."
A faint smile touched your lips, your hand reaching to trace slowly along his jaw and the column of his throat.
"I will be your greatest ally, the woman who understands the thoughts you do not speak aloud. I will give you loyalty without hesitation. Devotion without end."
You felt his breathing change; deeper, heavier, quickening beneath your palm as you spoke.
"I will give you a House strengthened by my hand."
Your voice dropped, thick and sweet and ruinous. Every syllable was slow. Every word intentional.
"I will give you sons who bear your name."
Your fingers curled tight into the fabric of his doublet as heat coiled low and sharp within you, empty and aching.
"I will be a wife who does not merely share your bed, but who fucks you like she knows no God but you."
You held his gaze, and realised, with undeniable certainty, that your words were no longer a calculated game. They had ceased being one long ago. This was real. The truest version of you and your desires.
"The Seven have shown you the purpose they have chosen for you, my sweet lord, and you have followed it faithfully. Allow me now to exist as they have intended me to."
Something in him broke.
The composure he wore like armour shattered into a thousand pieces. What stood in its place was wild, unchained and entirely yours.
It was a collision more than an embrace; his mouth seizing yours in a bruising, demanding frenzy as he swept you clean off your feet. One hand locked beneath your jaw, the other clamped firm around your waist, iron-strong and unyielding. He tasted of wine and mint and the sharp, hot tang of anger not yet spent.
You surrendered to him instantly, meeting his fire with your own, breathless and burning.
For one brief moment you thought he might drop you - your long skirts tangling, impossible to hitch up and around him - but Lord Ormund had no intention of letting you fall. He held you so tight it was almost hard to breathe, the pommel of his sword digging sharp and impossible to ignore into your hip, a constant reminder of exactly who held you.
"You do not get to turn away from this now, from me." His words were a threat against your open mouth, rough as stone.
You did not want to. You arched into him and moaned; loud, unashamed, trembling at the sheer overwhelming need coursing through your veins.
Your eyes fluttered shut as he carried you across the room. Hard wood met the backs of your thighs when he set you down atop the table, sweeping platters and candles aside with a clatter. He spread your knees wide and stepped firmly between them, mouth never once leaving yours. Candles guttered and flared, wax spilling forgotten.
Nothing existed but him; the heat of him, the colossal weight of him between your parted thighs, the way he claimed you as if he had every right.
A low, guttural sound tore from deep within him, his hands dragging your skirts upwards, bunching them high at your hips, greedy and trembling. His mouth moved down the column of your throat - tongue and teeth, hot and claiming - sucking hard enough to leave marks that would last for days. It was worship and hunger and violence all tangled together; he kissed you as if he meant to consume you, as if he could never, ever get enough.
He reached the neckline of your gown and cursed; low and sharp, frustrated by the barrier. Instead of fumbling with the laces of your corset, he drew his dagger.
Steel flashed once in the candlelight - cold, bright, deadly - and slid clean beneath the ribbons at your chest.
One sure, decisive stroke.
Fabric and lace fell away.
Your breasts spilled free, bared entirely to him, and you arched, chest heaving, breath caught in your throat as you stared up at him.
He did not speak, only bowed his head and continued as if he had never stopped.
His mouth closed over you; hot, wet and relentless. He sucked deep and hard, pleasure and pain tangled together in one searing, sweet rush. You cried out, fingers fisting his hair, holding him exactly where you needed him.
Lord Ormund groaned when you pulled - a rough and broken sound - and sucked harder, as if he meant to drink you down, as if your body were his sacrament and he would perish without it.
You kicked off your slippers and wrapped your legs tight around his waist, reaching frantically for his sword belt, fumbling with the buckles; desperate to get him out of his clothes and to feel his skin on yours.
Steel and leather clattered to the stones, forgotten. He paid it no mind. He only pressed closer, heavy and hot, his weight pinning you exactly where he wanted you, and roughly bit at the swell of your breast before lifting his head to look at you.
His eyes were crazed, pupils blown wide.
Reverence and ruin in equal measure.
"The Seven made you for me." His voice was low, hard, unshakable. "And what is mine does not get given away. Not to kin. Not to anyone."
You were breathless. "I do not want to be given away."
He pressed his forehead to yours and locked your gaze, unflinching and deadly.
"You think I would let you go to him now?" The way he said those words made it sound as though the idea was preposterous, offensive. His lips hovered over yours, breath hot against your skin. He trembled above you as if containing himself bordered on impossible. "If anyone - even my own blood - dares think they can take you away from me... I don't care if it's my cousin, your father or the High Septon himself. I will smile as I kill them."
His hand came up to grip your jaw, firm and resolute.
"And if I cannot have you... I promise I will put a knife in your heart myself before I let anyone else touch you. You will die mine. Do you hear me? Mine."
"I am yours," you gasped, gripping the back of his neck and pulling him down to you. "Everything I am, it belongs to you."
He lifted you then, without warning, without a single fumble. Your legs wrapped tight around his waist, your breasts still bared to the candlelight, and he turned for the door without a single glance back at the wreckage of the table.
"Hold on to me," he commanded, rough and demanding against your mouth, his arm locked firmly beneath your thighs, supporting every inch of you. He strode toward the door, carrying you like a prize, like a relic, like something holy he had come to claim.
You were wild in his arms; fevered, unravelling, entirely unashamed. You arched into him, pressing every inch of your bare skin to his body, your mouth fastened to his jaw, his throat, kissing him with wanton, open-mouthed desperation; teeth grazing, tongue tasting, as if you meant to devour him whole.
You clung to him, hands tangled in his hair, body straining toward him, reckless and eager, as desperate to claim him as he was to carry you away.
The door flew open under his hand. He carried you from the solar and into his adjoining bedchamber like a man possessed; striding forward, unhurried in his purpose, your bare skin exposed to the cool air, your gown hanging in ribbons.
He did not attempt to cover you. He did not care.
He burst into the bedchamber and the room went still as death -
Three servants - scrubbing tables, changing flowers, tending the hearth - froze.
Their eyes went wide. They saw the Lord of Oldtown, face dark as storm clouds, carrying you half-naked in his arms; your dress torn, your legs wrapped tight around his waist, your tongue on his neck, his mouth still damp and red from yours.
You were feral.
Lord Ormund did not pause. He did not set you down. He stood there, holding you high against him, his voice dropping into something low, lethal and absolute.
"Out!"
The sound cracked through the room like a whip.
"...And if a single one of you dare speak a word of what you've seen - I will hang you myself."
They scrambled, bowing, tripping over themselves, snatching up armfuls of cloth, fleeing for the door.
Lord Ormund did not move until the last one had vanished and the door slammed shut behind them, the latch clicking loud in the sudden quiet.
Only then did he adjust his grip - still holding you, still never letting your feet touch the ground - and carried you straight to the great bed. He knelt slowly, lowering you onto the furs and linens. He did not step away. Instead, he settled himself between your knees, his gaze sweeping over you like he was memorising every inch, like he meant to own it all.
You instinctively arched toward him, breathless as you reached behind you to unclasp the remnants of your dress. The fabric pooled on the floor just a moment later, leaving you completely bare before him.
He knelt there, at the edge of the bed, and dragged your hips to the very edge. One arm locked around your thigh, coming to rest - heavy - across your waist. Your legs parted for him as if possessing a will of their own, knees bending and rising almost to your shoulders, exposing you to him completely.
He only stared, as if he had been waiting his whole life for this, as if he had never seen anything more perfect, more worthy of falling to his knees for. Nothing else existed - no Seven, no duty, no world beyond this bed and this moment and you.
It was as if this were the holiest sight he would ever know.
He closed his eyes and leaned in - slow and reverent - the tip of his nose nudging that sensitive little bud between your thighs. He breathed you in; deep, dragging, filling his lungs with the scent of your skin and your readiness. A shaky breath fell from his lips, as if he meant to carry that scent inside him forever; as if the smell of your arousal were sweeter than incense, more sacred than any prayer. He breathed you in again, and a low, broken sound rumbled in his chest - half worship, half rapture - before he pressed his mouth to the soft skin of your inner thigh - wet and needy - and looked up at you through drunk, heavy-lidded eyes.
His words were a caress. "The Seven could not have made anything more perfect."
He touched his lips to you then, no hesitation or gentleness. He pressed his tongue flat against you, tasting you, humming in satisfaction.
Heat and a desperate, unyielding pressure swept through you like fire, like flood, like something meant to decimate. His arms locked around your hips, holding you open, holding you still; possessive, devout and unrelenting. It was devastation and worship all at once; tongue and teeth, greedy and ruthless.
His arm pinned you down when you arched off the bed, trembling and crying out, your hands tangling in his hair, clutching, pulling, desperate to ground yourself.
Your head fell back, breath hitching in gasps.
He only groaned - low and deep and vibrating through you - and doubled his efforts, fiercer now, as if your pleasure and his were one and the same.
He drank down every shiver, every cry. He did not ease, did not pause. He only built the heat higher, stroke by stroke, as if he meant to pull your soul free and keep it for his own.
“The Seven gave me to you,” you gasped, hips rising to meet him, pleasure coiling tight and burning, bright and unbearable. “All of me - to use, to worship, to ruin. This is their will. Take what is yours.”
He answered with a stroke that made your back bow - sharp and perfect - and then again, faster, surer, as if your words had broken the last of his restraint. He devoured you, greedy and faithful all at once, driving you higher, heat spilling through your veins, your body trembling, straining toward something blinding.
“This is their will,” you cried out, tears spilling down your cheeks at the intensity of it, voice breaking as your pleasure crested, wild and overwhelming. “Don’t you dare stop. Don’t you dare-”
Your hands fisted in the linens, in his hair. Your back arched off the mattress and you cried out his name - loud, clear, like a vow spoken to the heavens.
Wave after wave of heat broke over you, all-consuming, shaking you to your bones, leaving you gasping, trembling, every nerve singing.
He did not pull away. He held you through it - gentler now, steadying you, drinking down every sound as you fell apart and drifted slowly back together.
It was a long while before you regained enough control to open your eyes.
You lay still, chest heaving, skin thrumming and oversensitive, as he lifted his head slowly. His eyes burned molten; stripped of every last veil of control, dark and devouring.
Lord Ormund rose to his feet by the bed, towering over you as you attempted to compose yourself, calm your ragged breathing, your core still throbbing with powerful, lingering aftershocks, every nerve raw.
His hands went to the fastenings of his doublet; rough, impatient, eager to be rid of the barrier between him and you.
“Let me,” you whispered, your throat raw as you pushed yourself up on trembling arms.
He paused at once, chest rising and falling hard, his gaze dropping to you as you sat before him, naked.
Your fingers brushed his as you took over, undoing clasp after clasp - slow and deliberate - drawing out the moment, peeling the heavy leather away to reveal him.
Your breath caught at the sight: broad chest, hard, sculpted lines, skin kissed bronze by sun, bared fully to the warm, golden glow of firelight. You set the doublet aside, your palms sliding over him slowly, reverently - mapping every ridge, every beat of his heart beneath his ribs - claiming him as fiercely as he had claimed you.
He hissed sharply when your hand drifted lower, toying with the buttons of his breeches, your gaze lifting to his from beneath your lashes, heavy-lidded and knowing. You palmed him through the dark fabric, slow and firm, enjoying the sight of his head bowing, his eyes fluttering shut, a ragged curse torn raw from his throat.
“Cruel,” he murmured, his hips jerking once, shallow and helpless, into your hand. “You play with a man already tortured past endurance.”
“Worship deserves worship in return,” you replied, your voice soft but unyielding. You freed him then - heavy, hot, and throbbing - and your fingers curled loosely around him, stroking once, slow and sure, feeling him pulse against your skin, watching him unravel breath by breath before your eyes.
He could bear it only a moment longer. His patience snapped thin. He caught your wrist - gentle but firm, stilling your hand - and sat down upon the bed beside you. One by one, he pulled off his boots, then dragged his breeches down and cast them aside, leaving him completely, gloriously naked: powerful, broad, all hard muscle and warm skin. Yours to look upon. Yours to touch.
The fabric had barely touched the floor before you were hooking a leg over his thighs and climbing eagerly into his lap. He welcomed you with a low, guttural sound, his hands settling at once on your hips, holding you exactly where he wanted you.
You did not wait for permission. Your lips found the column of his throat, kissing him there with open-mouthed heat - tongue and teeth, claiming the pulse that hammered beneath your mouth - while your hips began to rock slowly, deliberately against him. You felt him then, hard and heavy and hot, pressing right where you ached most, slipping through your slick folds, velvet over fire.
You were so wet it was impossible to keep him still; he glided easily, slipping over your sensitive bud, back and forth, drawing breathless gasps from you both.
Finally you reached down, curling your fingers around him to hold him steady, and pressed yourself against him, rocking slow and firm, again and again, letting every stroke pull the heat tighter.
“Perfect girl,” he praised, his face buried in your hair, his voice thick and breathless. His eyes were half-lidded, dark with pleasure, and his hands guided your hips, setting the rhythm. “Look at you. Taking exactly what you want.”
After a long, sweet while, he let go of your hips and leaned back, planting his palms flat against the mattress behind him and shifting you both further up the bed. He lowered himself to his back, folding one powerful arm beneath his head, and simply watched you. Dark eyes roamed over you slowly, over every curve, every line of you, needy and reverent all at once.
From this angle he had the perfect view. He watched the hard, heavy length of him glide wet and shining between your lips, slick and dark and beautiful against your skin, watched the slow, mesmerising roll of your hips; how you took him, how you moved, how you yielded and took and claimed all at once. He watched your breasts rise and fall with every ragged gasp, soft and full and moving sweetly with every rock of your body, and his breath caught in his throat each time you brushed over that sensitive, swollen place, each movement a torture he seemed to enjoy as much as you.
You placed your hands upon his hard stomach to steady yourself, feeling the taut, warm muscle shift and tense beneath your palms, and his free hand lifted to brush stray hair from your face; his touch so gentle, so tender, even as his eyes burned dark and molten with a need so fierce it nearly swallowed the room.
“I cannot get enough of watching you,” he admitted, a faint smile tugging at the corner of his mouth. “It is the holiest thing I have ever seen.”
Your movements never faltered. Pleasure was building in you once more - bright, tight, unbearable - your lips parted, breath coming in soft, broken cries that spilled freely from your throat.
“So beautiful,” he murmured again, thick with desire, his jaw tightening. “And mine. All of you.”
You could not help it. The sounds spilling from your throat were too loud, too reckless — if you did not muffle them, the whole household would hear exactly what their lord had reduced you to. And so you leaned forward and captured his mouth with yours, kissing him hard and hungry, messy and desperate, swallowing each other’s moans, tasting your own sweetness on his lips, protesting softly when the need for air forced you apart, if only for a heartbeat.
Your hands slid down, trembling, over warm skin, over the ridge of muscle beneath his ribs, lower still until your fingers found him; heavy, hot, throbbing wildly, pressing hard and proud against the hard muscle of his stomach, veins pulsing beneath your touch. He hissed sharply when your fingers curled around him, his hips jerking once beneath you.
He did not push. He did not demand. He only watched, blue eyes fixed intently on where you held him, where you glided over him; wet and slick and perfect, never quite taking him, never quite giving either of you what you burned for.
"Like this," he commanded, voice ragged, one hand coming to rest over yours, his large, warm fingers guiding you, positioning him to rest heavy right where you ached most - but not inside. Never inside. "Glide over me. Just like this. Let me feel you. Let me watch you take your pleasure from what is mine."
And you did. You lifted your hips and sank again, slow and agonisingly sweet, the hard throbbing length of him dragging through your folds, pressing firm and perfect against your most sensitive place - but never breaching; never giving you what you burned for.
You gasped, head falling back, every nerve coiling tight and burning, and did it again; slower, harder, trembling as he slid over you, right there where you needed him most, maddeningly close and still so far away.
"Just like that," he groaned, his hands gripping your hips, guiding you, setting that maddening, relentless rhythm. "Look at you. Using me. So wet. So eager. And all for me."
You gasped, fingers digging into his chest, your movements growing faster, sharper, need coiling tight and blinding in your belly. "My lord-"
"I know." His voice was low, unrelenting, his eyes fixed on where you rubbed yourself frantically over him, glistening and swollen and desperate. "Take it. Take all you need, my sweet girl."
You cried out, broken and pleading, and rocked harder, chasing that all-consuming peak; every stroke dragged fire through your veins, your body shaking, straining, teetering right on the edge.
He watched every gasp, every shiver, every desperate roll of your hips; his face flushed, eyes black with need, worship and hunger warring in his gaze.
"That's it," he praised, voice thick and breathless, rough with his own fraying control. "Come for me. Let me watch you fall apart."
The coil snapped. You cried out his name, body arching sharply, hips stuttering and seizing as pleasure tore through you - blinding, white-hot, overwhelming. You rode the wave, trembling and sobbing his name, gliding frantically over him as the ecstasy shattered you and left you gasping, shuddering, every nerve raw and oversensitive, thrumming and entirely spent.
He let you; watched you come undone completely on top of him, his hands never leaving your hips, his gaze drinking in every moment, every sound, every beautiful broken thing you were. His chest heaved, his own restraint stretching thinner by the heartbeat, his breath coming in ragged, desperate gasps.
He groaned, low and guttural, his hands gripping you so hard his knuckles blanched against your skin. His control was fraying, fast, unravelling thread by thread, and he could no longer look at you without his body screaming for release.
You leaned down then, lips brushing his, your voice soft and knowing, devastatingly sweet against his mouth.
"Did you enjoy watching me, my lord?"
That was what broke him. The arrogant, knowing tone of your voice; calm certainty, entirely aware of exactly what you had done to him.
Every last thread of restraint snapped. He arched up, gripping you bruisingly hard, his fingers digging into your skin, his hips surging forward, wild and desperate, straining to push inside, to bury himself deep and end the torment.
He went to pull you down, to drive himself home, his face flushed dark, eyes wild and fever-bright, nothing left of his calm composure - only need, raw and unyielding.
And you smiled.
You stayed exactly where you were; hovering, gliding, maddeningly close, pressing right against him and still refusing to give him what he ached for.
“No,” you whispered, rolling your hips, slow and deliberate, watching him unravel, watching the desperation war with the command in his face.
His eyes narrowed on you, the cool, calculating expression of the Lord of Oldtown reappearing across his handsome face like a mask slipping back into place, sharp and commanding even through the haze of his need. He raised himself up to sit, straining upward, every muscle coiled tight and trembling, corded and hard beneath warm skin, fighting to close the distance, desperate to bury himself inside you.
His voice was a deep and rumbling threat when he spoke - low, imperious, used to being obeyed.
"Surely you do not wish to disappoint me."
You released a small, breathy laugh, soft, light and utterly unafraid.
"Never, my love." Your voice was a whisper, sweet and smooth. Your brows furrowed into a sly, theatrically empathetic expression, as if you truly felt sorry for denying him - your smile told otherwise; you revelled in this. You brought your lips to his ear and breathed -
"...But I will not be your whore."
A sharp knock came at the door.
Neither of you moved to answer it. Neither even glanced in its direction. He did not care who came. He did not care for anything but you, right now, this moment, and the torment of your withholding.
“I am yours,” you said, soft and clear and unyielding, your hand wrapping firm and tight around him once more. “But I will not have you inside me. Not until I bear your name.”
You gripped him then - firm, deliberate, hard - and he shuddered, his lips parting on a ragged gasp, his forehead falling to rest against your chest, heavy and hot and desperate, proud and powerful Lord Ormund reduced to something soft and wanting and entirely at your mercy.
Another knock - louder, more insistent.
He lifted his head, eyes flashing dark and furious toward the door, his patience worn thin, his body still straining toward you, throbbing in your hand. He shouted, voice sharp and rough with impatience.
"What is it?"
A voice came from behind the wood, clear and steady.
"My lord, a ship has entered the harbour. Ser Gwayne has returned from King's Landing."
He screwed his eyes shut and groaned, a long, low sound torn from his throat, his wet mouth hovering over your skin as you squeezed him harder, slow and deliberate, feeling him pulse and throb in your palm, completely undone by your touch.
Your smile did not falter - soft, knowing, victorious - for you knew, with absolute certainty, that he was completely at your mercy. His hips bucked helplessly, sharp and uncontrolled, and he gasped your name, broken and quiet, against your skin.
“You will learn what it is to burn for me, my lord,” you murmured, leaning in to brush your lips against his ear, your voice soft and sweet and final. “To ache for me.”
You squeezed him once - slow, firm, unrelenting - and then stilled completely.
You placed a finger beneath his chin and lifted his head, forcing him to look at you. You leaned in, lips brushing his, your gaze locking with his - bright, steady, unshakable - and spoke slow and deliberate, every word dropping like a crown set upon his ruin -
“The patient hunter gets the kill.”
It hit him harder than any touch ever could.
His eyes fluttered closed, his jaw fell open, and a sound tore from his throat - half-gasp, half-sob, raw and broken and utterly animal. His whole body arched off the bed, spine bowing, every muscle seizing up taut and trembling. He spilled himself instantly, violently, pouring over your hand and his stomach in thick, shuddering waves, completely undone by nothing but your voice and those six words.
He heaved and gasped, his hands clutching at your wrists, his grip weakening as the pleasure shattered through him; blinding, overwhelming, stripping him of every last shred of control and pride.
His head fell back, throat bared, body quaking in endless, ragged aftershocks, and he cried out your name - once, broken and breathless - before collapsing back against your breasts, spent, heaving, and entirely yours.
He could not speak. He could not breathe. He sat there, trembling and burning, knowing with absolute certainty you had hunted him down, and you had killed him with nothing but a whisper.
this can be read as a standalone or as part iii of the seven sins series
summary: whispers harden into fact and your influence quietly blooms. as his sickness grows, lord ormund wraps you in sanctity and divine will, calling his obsession ordainment.
word count: 11.5k+
pairing: ormund hightower x noble!reader
contents: 18+ (mdni), smut, mutual manipulation, coercion/sexual bribery, ormund has a god complex, dominant!reader, needy!ormund, implied breeding kink, moon tea, age gap, religious themes, size difference, oral (f receiving), scent kink, pussy worship, dagger use, violence, threat of death, orgasm denial, semi-public smut, arranged political marriage, mentions of SA - let me know if i've missed anything x
a/n: just in case you were craving some pathetic, needy, desperate ormund smut - let me know what you think x
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By morning, there was scarcely a soul in the castle who had not heard some version of the tale.
The Lord of Oldtown was gone by the time you awoke, disoriented by the vast and unfamiliar weight of the room around you. Responsibilities had called him from his chambers as faithfully as the rising sun; its light seeping through heavy curtains in pale, reluctant streams, and gilding the bed where you lay. The air still held the hearth's dying smoke, and beneath it, the faint, unmistakable scent of him.
You dressed without haste, smoothing your hair, arranging your robe and settling your composure as carefully as if you were about to step into a throne room.
There was no sense in skulking through corridors like a guilty child. Whatever had passed between these walls was not something you would carry with shame - not because it was innocent, but because you understood perfectly well the power of refusing to act as though it was a sin.
The guards stationed outside did not speak when you emerged. They did not need to.
One brief, flickered glance told you everything you needed to know -
A castle might be built of stone, you knew, but it survived on whispers.
On the walk back to your apartments, you felt it; the unsettling, quiet certainty that the story of your absence had already travelled through the bowels of the Hightower, slipping from tongue to tongue like smoke, seeping through cracks and under doors until it clung to every corridor.
Your maid confirmed it the moment you stepped inside.
Her eyes swept over you once; not rudely, not accusingly, but with the unmistakable shock of someone who had spent the better part of the morning wondering where you had gone. Her gaze lingered on your hair, your robe, the way you moved, as if searching for proof.
The room grew strangely still.
Another maid, folding linens, suddenly found the fabric fascinating. She smoothed and refolded, smoothed and refolded, as if her life depended on its creases. You realised, with a faint and cold amusement that she was dutifully making a bed she knew had not been slept in the night before.
The third girl - the one whose voice had carried loud enough to reach the door - fell abruptly silent. She did not speak again, but her face said everything she dared not utter.
By midday, the whispers had reached even the maester.
It was the expression on his face - the careful, sorrowful gentleness etched into his brow - that gave him away.
"Lady Y/N." He bowed.
The Hightower's maester was an old, tired man. He possessed no sharp edge, no gleam of malice; only the fatherly softness one expects of a healer. Today, however, he bore a weight in his posture that had nothing to do with age. He glanced toward the door as he stepped forward, ensuring it had shut firmly behind him.
You were alone. The book you had been reading was slowly set open on the windowsill.
You marked his approach, the stiffness in his shoulders, the restraint in his step. He looked at you as though you were something fragile, something wounded that might startle if he approached too quickly.
His demeanour alone told you this was no routine visit.
"I hope you will forgive my presumption, my lady," he began, his voice gentle but heavy, freighted with pity. "I thought it prudent that you should have this."
Your gaze shifted from his lined face to his hands. Slowly, he drew back his grey sleeve to reveal a covered clay pot; a quiet little remedy for a scandal the castle had already decided was not yours to control.
The maester would not meet your eyes.
Your own narrowed on his face.
"And why, precisely, do you believe I require moon tea, Maester?"
The question hung between you, thick and unmoving.
"My lady..."
His expression tightened. He was not a liar. He was a good man; a man who understood that kindness could sometimes be more cutting than cruelty.
You waited.
At last, he drew a breath so deep it shook his chest, as if the words were difficult to pry loose.
"I fear Lord Ormund may have taken advantage of his position."
The room went still.
For a long while, the only sounds were your own steady breathing and the faint, muffled murmur of guards beyond your door.
Then, perhaps mistaking your silence for fear, the maester hurried on.
"His lordship is much respected, I know. But I also know his temper, and I am old enough to have seen what anger can make of a man."
It did not take long to understand what he implied.
Without invitation or ceremony, he stepped forward and set the pot upon the table between you. The soft clack of clay on wood seemed to echo. His smile was sad, sympathetic, utterly certain he was saving you.
"Lord Ormund has many virtues, but he is a man accustomed to obedience..." He paused, gravely.
He did not need to finish. You already understood.
Your voice was quiet, level when you finally spoke.
"You believe he took me against my will?"
The old man looked stricken that you would speak the word aloud. He paled, glanced once more at the door and wrung his hands, nervously. He exhaled a shaky breath and lowered his voice until it was barely more than a whisper, a secret shared between shadows.
"I believe," he said, weighing each word with deliberate care, "that you may not have felt able to refuse him."
There it was.
It had not once occurred to him that you might have chosen Lord Ormund of your own will. That you had sought him out. That your every ambition was to make him yours.
He could not fathom the notion that a young, sweet, highborn lady such as yourself might desire a man like him.
He simply thought you had survived him.
Your face remained calm, giving nothing away. You would not let the insult sting.
You had spent weeks learning the shape of Lord Hightower's pride, the rhythm of his temper, the way his mind turned and turned in the dark. And yet, to everyone beyond his chamber doors, you were merely a girl unfortunate enough to catch the attention of a dangerous, unpredictable man.
The maester pushed the pot toward you across the wood. His gaze kind, sorrowful.
"You need not explain anything to me, my lady."
A strange kindness; a strange cruelty.
"I only wished to ensure you are not left to bear the consequences of something done against your will."
You held your silence a moment longer, weighing the choice with the same cold calculation Lord Ormund himself might have used.
Drink the tea - and you confirm the rumour. It would not matter that you had gone to him willingly; the story would harden into fact. The meaning of that night would be judged, twisted, carried onward until it reached ears you could not afford to offend.
Refuse it - and the path forward was harder to foresee.
And so you made your choice, smiling up at the maester, untroubled and serene. You covered his hand with yours with affection, and spoke the plain, unvarnished truth.
"The tea is not necessary, Maester." Your gaze held his, steady and clear. "You assume I was wronged. I have not been, and I promise you I am quite well."
The news did not spread loudly.
Oldtown was too old, too careful, too well-acquainted with secrets to indulge in anything so vulgar as open gossip.
The information moved instead through lowered voices in the corridors, through glances exchanged between servants the moment you turned your back, through sudden pauses in conversation whenever you or Lord Ormund stepped into a room.
By day's end, you understood exactly what the castle believed:
You had spent the night in Lord Ormund's chambers.
You had not returned until morning.
You had refused the moon tea.
And whatever else they might have whispered, one conclusion had begun to settle above all others, slow and inevitable as the tides -
Whatever had passed between you behind those doors was no fleeting indiscretion.
Whether spoke aloud or not, the castle had quietly begun to regard you not as Ser Gwayne’s betrothed, but as the woman at Lord Hightower’s side.
Over the days that followed, you watched in silence as the castle began to shift and change around you.
There were no proclamations. No formal decrees. No words spoken aloud that might be called presumption. Yet you saw it everywhere, in the small unguarded things - conversations softening the moment you stepped into a room; servants pausing, waiting, seeking your approval before they so much as poured wine; lords who had once looked straight through you as if you were glass now turning to you first, waiting for your opinion as though it carried weight equal to law. Fresh flowers appeared in your chambers each dawn. Your favourite dishes appeared at table without instruction. Men bowed lower, deeper, as if you already stood beneath a higher roof.
It was as though Oldtown itself had quietly reached a conclusion - had rearranged itself around you - before anyone had thought to speak any announcement.
And beneath all that silent speculation, something quieter still was taking root.
You found yourself in Lord Ormund's study by day, seated near him while he worked, reading or stitching or simply watching him weigh words and men with that same cool, unhurried calculation. He did not ask you to leave. He did not explain. He simply spoke to you as he worked - of law, of treaties, of plans - as if your opinion mattered.
When he received his lords or held audience, he gestured for you to stand beside him, not behind, and no one dared question it. You said little. You watched. And you began to learn the shape of his mind as thoroughly as you had already learned the shape of his pride.
Had you marched into your chamber that first morning and declared your place beside him, had you demanded honour or title of deference, the castle would have stiffened. Prideful people always resist being told what to think. They would have called you ambitious. Presumptuous.
But no one resisted a mere assumption.
No one fought a fact they believed they had discovered for themselves.
They simply shifted around it - adjusted their lives, their manners, their expectations - as if it had always been this way. As if you had always belonged there.
When the head housekeeper found you in the gardens a week later, you almost laughed outright.
You sat in the sun, embroidery in your lap, when she approached and curtsied low - lower than she had ever curtsied before.
"My lady."
You looked up, brows drawing together. In all the weeks before, she had never once sought you out. You were a guest then. A visitor. A noblewoman passing through, with no hand upon the running of the Hightower.
But now? If rumours were true - if you were indeed the one who held his eye, his bed, his favour - then learning your wishes was not just a courtesy. It was preparation.
She hesitated, hands folded tight before her.
"Forgive the intrusion, my lady. I came to ask... with regard to Lord Hightower's chambers."
Something flickered in your chest, sharp and warm. "His chambers?"
"Yes, my lady." She kept her gaze respectfully lowered. "I wished to know whether fresh linens should be laid more frequently, and whether more blankets ought to be added to the bed? The nights turn chill, and..." She paused, then finished softly. "I wanted to make sure everything is to your liking as much as his."
You could only blink.
The question was simple. The weight of it was heavy.
Your gaze drifted toward the distant walls of the keep, buying some time. A guest would have deferred this. A guest would have said that is not my concern. But you were no longer merely a guest to them. And if you denied it now... You gave up everything they were already yielding to you.
"That sounds sensible," you said at last, a quiet, knowing smile touching your lips. "The nights have grown colder. See that it is done."
The housekeeper bowed, curtsied again and departed. You remained seated long after she had gone, the needle resting idle in your hand.
In that moment, you finally understood the true nature of influence.
It was not seized, you realised, nor was it demanded.
Influence was simply assumed.
Later that evening, you returned to your chambers to find something new hanging above your bed.
It was a new tapestry, woven with exquisite skill: the Maiden, pure and unblemished, her hands folded gently before her, stars caught in the weave of her gown. She was the very symbol of virtue, of innocence, of a woman kept whole and sacred until the altar.
There was no note. No explanation. But you knew his hand in it - the quiet, deliberate choice, the gift that said everything while admitting nothing.
He knew what the castle whispered. He knew what the maester had implied. And so he gave you the Maiden; a public declaration, silent and unmistakable, that whatever they thought had passed between you, you remained virtuous. You remained pure.
It was a lie. A beautiful, deliberate, gloriously hypocritical lie - and you understood, with a quiet, heated thrill, that he revelled in it. He had stood, breathless and undone before you; he had shattered in your hands, surrendered to your mouth, whispered your name like a prayer while you gorged yourself on him and stripped him of every last scrap of control. He knew exactly what you were, and yet he hung the symbol of innocence above your bed for all the world to see - as if he took a dark and twisted pleasure in the contradiction.
The whole castle would bow before you as a saint, while he alone would know exactly how utterly, sinfully his you were. He gave you purity publicly so he might better possess your corruption privately; and the hypocrisy of it, the arrogance, the sheer, masterful control of both stories at once, made your blood burn.
He wove his truths with exquisite care, but the greatest irony of all needed no weaving at all -
You had not lied. You had not claimed his name. You had not spoken a word of what had passed behind his door, nor made a single claim to his favour. Every deference, every bowed head, every soft-spoken courtesy had been born freely from whispers, glances and silence.
You had asked for nothing. You had simply allowed the castle to believe what it chose to believe.
Within the week, the shift had spread further. Ladies who had once regarded you as an outsider now sought your company, eager for a word, a smile, a look that might grant them favour. Knights and lords who had offered nothing more than distant courtesy now found reasons to speak with you, lingering by your side, watching your face. Servants who would not dare approach Lord Ormund with their own grievances began bringing them to you; small requests, quiet pleas, knowing that a word from you might soften his answer.
The castle had reached a dangerous conclusion.
They believed you held power over the Lord of Oldtown. Not the power of rank, but something far more difficult to control, something no title could bestow - the power to move him, to sway him. To soften his temper and turn his will.
And the most extraordinary thing - something you had not yet dared to speak aloud even to yourself - was this: little by little, their assumption was becoming truth.
At first, your presence in the council chamber was treated as an inconvenience; an oddity, a curiosity of sorts. You were there to speak on your father's behalf while his army marched toward Oldtown. You knew their numbers, where their strengths lay, and where their weaknesses frayed. To offer that information was your only stated duty.
The lords did not yet know what to make of you. Some assumed you sat there only because Lord Ormund allowed it. Others whispered that your father was a proud, foolish man; one who placed far too much weight upon the shoulders of a daughter.
You sat at the great table, quiet and watchful, while men twice your age shouted over maps and ink-stained fingers prodded at routes and supply lines. Parchment carpeted the wood of the table; carved markers stood in place of armies that had not yet stirred, territories that would soon decide the fate of the realm.
The problem hung over them, plain and heavy. The army could not linger in Oldtown long after the wedding, yet marching blind could prove far more dangerous. Especially with dragons patrolling the skies.
"We cannot afford to remain here for long," one lord insisted. "Every day we wait gives them time to fortify."
"And every day we rush forward without certainty risks walking straight into a trap," another snapped back, his patience already worn thin.
Lord Ormund said nothing. He merely reclined in the carved oak chair at the table's head, lifting his pomander slowly to his nose, inhaling, watching them bicker - calculating.
Just like him, you remained silent. But your eyes did not linger on the largest armies or the strongest castles. Instead, they drifted to a narrow, winding route marked near the parchment's edge; a road most men had already dismissed, simply because it was inconvenient.
But inconvenient did not mean useless.
You did not speak. You did not point.
You only looked.
Once.
Then again.
It was a long while before Lord Ormund noticed. His gaze shifted, followed yours, locked upon that thin, unpromising line.
For a moment, nothing happened. Then you saw it; recognition glimmering in his eyes, sharp and sudden, as if he had finally fitted the last piece into place. He understood.
"The southern road."
The room stilled.
You watched them bend to him. One word, and argument died. One glance, and grown men lowered their eyes. There was something dangerously, breathtakingly alluring about power so absolute; and you realised, with quiet, undeniable satisfaction, that you had begun craving the feeling of standing beside it.
One lord frowned, confused. "My lord?"
Lord Ormund pushed his chair back and stood. He leaned over the map, broad-shouldered and towering, casting a shadow over the table and every man seated around it.
"They have prepared for the obvious approach," he said, low and certain. "They expect us to move through the wider passes, where our numbers are our strength."
His finger came down, touched exactly the route your eyes had chosen.
"But this road allows us to divide their attention before they understand where our true strength lies."
Silence stretched, then broke; not in disagreement, but in the sudden, shifting weight of realisation.
Questions turned to possibilities. Possibilities turned to agreement. Within moments, the lords were debating the plan as though it had been Lord Ormund's brilliant idea from the very start.
You said nothing. You did not need to.
But across the table, the briefest glance passed between you. Not a word. Not a smile. Just a flicker - acknowledgement and something deeper - before he looked away again.
It was over supper that evening when Lord Ormund finally allowed himself to openly praise what you had done.
Only three places had been laid out in his private solar. The servants came and went with little more than the soft clink of silver against porcelain before retreating to the kitchens.
Young Daeron cleared his throat and reached for his goblet.
"I heard today's council ended rather abruptly."
Lord Ormund looked up from his plate, his gaze shifting to his ward. A faint, satisfied smile touched his lips, pleased the boy took such interest in the campaign.
"It did."
"And was a course of action decided?" The prince's voice held a nervous quiver when he spoke, each word carefully measured before leaving his lips.
"It was." Lord Ormund paused, deliberate and clear. "Lady Y/N decided it."
You offered only a modest smile, your attention fixed upon him. "It was merely an observation, my lord."
"A valuable one," Lord Ormund corrected at once. "One every man in that chamber was too slow or too foolish to see."
There was quiet disdain in the mention of his councillors. His blue eyes rested upon you, heavy and warm, before turning back to Daeron.
"The council spent the better half of an hour arguing over troop movements. Lady Y/N glanced at the map for scarcely a minute before seeing the flaw in the approach."
Daeron's gaze moved between you.
"I had not realised," his uncle continued, cutting his meat with slow, precise strokes, "that Lady Y/N possessed such a mind for war." He took a sip of wine, a faint, almost amused smile playing about his mouth. "She continues to impress me. I confess... I did not expect it."
You lowered your gaze, concealing your satisfaction; though you could not quite check the warmth rising in your cheeks.
Lord Ormund was not finished. He seemed entirely unaware of how much he was speaking.
"She listens more than she speaks, and when she does speak, it is only after everyone else has exhausted themselves shouting over one another." He nodded, as if confirming a truth to himself. "There is discipline in that. Rare in one so young."
"High praise," Daeron remarked, his voice lighter than his eyes.
Lord Ormund answered at once, with a quiet, absolute certainty.
"The Lady Y/N possesses uncommon judgement. I have commanded men twice her age who have contributed half as much."
You laughed softly, sitting back and tracing the rim of your goblet with one finger. "I simply knew none of them would listen until they had finished disagreeing with one another."
Lord Ormund laughed, low and genuine.
Daeron could only stare.
He had known the Lord of Oldtown almost all his life. He knew his habits, his moods, the way his temper could turn without warning. He knew him as well as any son might know his father. His uncle admired competence; he respected intelligence; he rewarded loyalty.
This was something else entirely.
Lord Ormund did not praise people. Certainly not like this; not with this warmth, this unmistakable pride in his voice. Not with that look softening his face every time you spoke. It was not weakness; weakness disgusted him. It was something far more unsettling.
Daeron knew his uncle better than he knew his own reflection. He recognised the shift instantly; the way his attention fixed upon you, the way he leaned slightly forward whenever you spoke, as if he did not wish to miss a single breath.
Something had changed. Daeron could not say precisely what or when; only that the Lord of Oldtown seated before him bore little resemblance to the man who had reluctantly welcomed you at his gates. Daeron had heard the whispers and dismissed them. Yet now, watching the way his uncle looked at you, Daeron felt his certainty begin to fray. A cold unease settled in his chest. The whispers no longer seemed so preposterous.
A sharp knock struck the door.
"Enter," Lord Ormund called. The fondness had not yet left his face.
The door opened just enough for the steward to slip inside. He carried a ledger beneath one arm and looked as composed as ever.
He bowed low. "My prince, my lord, my lady. Forgive the intrusion."
Lord Ormund sighed. "What is it?"
"The household seeks your instruction, my lord." The steward glanced briefly toward you, then lowered his eyes. "There has been... some uncertainty regarding Lady Y/N's accommodations."
Silence stretched.
Lord Ormund's expression did not change, but something in the room had shifted.
"Uncertainty?"
"The Lady's Hall, my lord."
Your heart gave a single, hard beat.
The steward continued carefully. "The kitchens wished to know... whether Lady Y/N should begin taking her meals there?"
Lord Ormund's eyes narrowed. The warmth in his face did not fade. It simply hardened.
"Where does this question come from?"
The man hesitated. For the first time, he looked uncertain. "It has been assumed that... given recent circumstances... Lady Y/N may soon take her place as the lady of this castle."
Lord Ormund's brow lifted.
His voice was very quiet. "Recent circumstances."
It was not a question.
"The maids speak of it, my lord. The guards... they confirm it. And-" The steward stopped, swallowing hard. "The servants have drawn certain conclusions."
The room went still as death.
Lord Ormund laid his cutlery down beside his plate; slow, precise, each piece aligned perfectly. He did not look away from the steward.
Daeron had paled. He knew that look. He knew the dreadful, waiting stillness that fell before the rage.
He glanced at you - wide-eyed, warning - and mouthed, silent and urgent: Leave. Now.
You only frowned.
You watched Lord Ormund take a slow drink of his wine, eyes still fixed upon his steward. It was a long moment before the goblet was returned to the table, set down so hard the wine sloshed over the rim and ran across the wood.
In a heartbeat, you understood exactly what had enraged him. He was not offended by the thought of you standing as lady of this castle; not by half. It was what they had implied beneath those words; the assumption that you had already fallen into his bed, that you had compromised yourself, that your place beside him was earned by surrender rather than by right and by name.
They had whispered you were ruined. They had treated your honour as a thing already spent. That - that insult to your virtue - was what he could not abide.
"My lord-" The steward held up his hands, panic rising in his face. "I meant no-"
Lord Ormund stood. His chair scraped loud and terrible against the flagstones. He moved slowly, calmly, with the weight of a blade being drawn.
Daeron rose from his seat and silently retreated to a far corner, as if he had done this a thousand times before, as if he knew exactly what came next.
"Lady Y/N," Lord Ormund said, his voice carrying through the room, low and terrible, "is a noblewoman of impeccable conduct. She is the daughter of a Great House and an honoured guest beneath my roof."
He rounded the table.
Every step brought him closer.
"My lord, I only thought-"
"Do you know what you have done?"
Lord Ormund's voice had dropped. It was not loud. It was not wild. It was cold and measured, infinitely more terrifying than shouting.
"You have stood in my chambers and repeated a rumour that questions the virtue of a lady under my protection."
"My lord, I meant no harm."
"No harm?" Lord Ormund took another step. "Do you understand what such talk implies? What it does to her name?"
His voice sharpened, cutting like a whip.
"I will not have her virtue questioned beneath my roof. Not by them. Not by you."
Daeron watched, silent. There was no hesitation, no doubt. His uncle spoke as one declaring a truth before the Gods themselves.
The steward bowed his head. "Forgive me, my lord."
But Lord Ormund did not seem to hear him. His anger had outgrown the man before him. It filled the solar, thick and suffocating, like something alive, something feeding on the insult done to you.
"Find every person who has repeated this," he said. Each word was distinct, unyielding.
"My lord?"
"Every person." His gaze did not waver. "They will learn the consequences of questioning her name beneath this roof."
Silence - absolute and breathless.
Then your voice cut through it. Soft, calm, and entirely unafraid.
"My lord."
Daeron looked to you as though you had lost your mind.
Slowly, you rose from your seat and stepped up to his side, skirts drifting across stone. You did not hurry. You did not flinch. You stepped into the space between him and his anger, placing yourself close enough to feel his heat.
You did so with quiet confidence, as though you already knew he would allow you, as though his anger was not something to cower away from. It was impossible not to notice the quiet reverence in your gaze as you neared him, like you found yourself drawn to the very thing everyone else had come to fear.
When your hand rested upon his arm, he did not calm. He did not soften. He did not yield.
He merely paused.
You could feel the rage in him - hot, wild, barely leashed - trembling beneath his skin like a caged beast. Every muscle was drawn tight, every line of him coiled and ready to strike. He did not turn to you. He did not look at you. But he held himself back. He clamped down on the fury that wanted to tear the room apart, locked it away, contained it.
He stood there, rigid and burning, swallowing up his wrath because you had spoken.
Lord Ormund could spend his life denying what happened behind closed doors, but there was an intimacy in the silence between you that no words, no lies could possibly disguise.
A man did not defend a woman's virtue like that unless she mattered; unless there was something to hide.
"You cannot punish a rumour into silence, my sweet lord," you said quietly, stroking his wrist with the most delicate of touches. "And my virtue is not so fragile that it requires the blood of servants to defend it."
He did not answer. He did not look at you. His jaw remained tense, his eyes still fixed on the steward. But the hand at his side slowly unclenched. He breathed - once, deep and jagged - fighting for control, fighting to master himself.
You pressed yourself closer, raised yourself onto your toes and pressed your lips to his jaw. A chaste, innocent kiss. Nothing more. Your next words were barely more than a breath, destined for no one's ears but his own -
"Let them whisper."
For a long, terrible moment he said nothing at all. Then slowly, as though forcing himself to move, he turned his head toward you. His eyes were still sharp with fury. The rage had not yet passed. It had only been diverted, held back, for you.
He did not yield. He did not calm. He simply... restrained himself.
You smiled at him softly, diffusing the situation with a serene, almost loving look. Your hand slipped from his wrist and affectionately touched his chest.
You turned to the steward. He was pale, trembling, looking between you and his lord. You could almost see the endless questions he dared not voice.
You offered him a small, polite smile.
"That will be all," you told him, calm and clear. "You may go."
The steward hesitated, glancing at his master, uncertain whether he had truly been dismissed; but Lord Ormund said nothing. He did not correct you, did not rebuke you for dismissing the man. He simply stood there, his eyes fixed upon your face, still burning, still holding himself in check.
"Y-yes, my lady." The steward bowed low and backed away. He left the room so swiftly that the door had barely closed before the sound of his stumbling footsteps disappeared down the corridor beyond.
Then, it was quiet once more, only the two of you, and Daeron watching from the shadows. Lord Ormund was still angry. You could feel it thrumming beneath your hand, hot and restless, but he no longer burned with it. He contained it, held it back.
His hand came up, closing over yours where it rested upon his chest. He did not speak. He did not need to.
Your palm remained pressed to him. The gesture would have been unthinkable from anyone else - a familiarity no one else would dare presume - but Lord Ormund did not recoil. After a moment, his gaze began to soften; not by much, not enough to be certain, but enough that Daeron - watching closely - saw the iron in him yield just a fraction.
You turned to the young Targaryen ward.
"My prince, I shall like to speak with your uncle in private. Would you leave us?"
The boy hesitated. It was not that he questioned your authority. It was that the idea of leaving you alone with Lord Ormund - in the aftermath of such fury; fury that had not yet spent itself - clearly troubled him.
Your eyes met his across Lord Ormund's shoulder. There was no plea in them. No fear. Only quiet, unshakable assurance.
I have this.
So simple a look; and yet, had he not been watching so closely, he might have missed it entirely.
Daeron hesitated a moment longer, then inclined his head.
"Very well, my lady."
But as he walked to the door, his gaze lingered. He saw the soft smile you offered his uncle; not the smile of someone soothing a temper, but the smile of someone who already knew she would be heard, would be obeyed. He saw your hand resting upon his uncle's chest, and the way he leaned into it, as if it were the only thing holding him to earth.
Daeron had never seen anyone stand before Lord Ormund's rage and make it yield without force. You did not cower. You did not flatter him. You simply reached for him as though you already knew exactly where his sharp edges were; as though his anger belonged to you more than it had ever belonged to him.
That was what unsettled him most. And as the door clicked shut behind him, Daeron could no longer deny the truth standing before his uncle -
You suited him.
The silence that followed was different now. No longer heavy with suppressed violence. No longer brittle with things left unsaid. This was something else entirely; something intimate, something shared.
You watched him in the quiet. Lord Ormund's expression was slowly settling back into its usual composure, but you knew him well enough now to see what still lay beneath it: the tension coiled tight in his shoulders; the faint, hard line between his brows; the restlessness of a man denied the quiet that always came after fury had spent itself.
You stepped impossibly close, your chest pressed up against him, and kissed his jaw again, your lips lingering this time for much longer than you had previously allowed yourself.
"I must confess, my lord," you whispered, "I have never seen anyone look so offended by a rumour."
He did not smile back.
"Is that what you believe this was?" His voice remained firm. "It was an insult."
"Ah." You nodded thoughtfully. "Of course."
Something in your tone made him narrow his eyes.
"You were very convincing, you know?" You bit back your smile. "About my virtue."
The words hung between you; not heavy, not strained, almost playful.
Lord Ormund's mouth tightened. "It is none of their concern."
"No," you agreed softly. You leaned in and kissed him again, lower this time, right where his jaw met his neck. "But for a man who claims to be guided only by faith and duty, you are remarkably easy to provoke when it concerns me."
You tilted your head back to examine his expression. His gaze held yours. You simply peered up at him, all innocence, your hand sliding slowly from his chest to rest just above the hilt of his sword. Your smile did not falter.
"...And I find I am rather grateful for it."
That caught his attention.
"Grateful?"
You nodded. "Yes."
He lifted a brow, though he did not smile.
"You just threatened to butcher half your household in defence of my reputation." Your voice was a whisper. "Most women must settle for poetry and pretty words. It seems I have received terror, a trembling steward, and the promise of slaughter." Your lips brushed him as you fought back a quiet giggle. "I must admit, this pleases me more than poetry ever could."
A long breath left him, and with it, the last of his rigidity. A faint, reluctant smile touched his lips.
"You are the only woman I have ever met who could turn a threat into a compliment."
"Perhaps."
You took a small step forward so that you could face him fully, your chest pressed flush against his, his sword belt pressing firm and unyielding into your belly. His heat wrapped around you like something tangible.
"You find this amusing?" The corner of his mouth lifted, fighting to stay serious.
"A little," you admitted. "But I also meant every word."
You lifted your arms and curled them around his waist, pulling him to you. He did not pull away. His own arms came around you instinctively, holding you close, as if he had no intention of ever letting you go. You had to tilt your chin high just to meet his eyes.
"You are very bold," he observed, to which you only grinned.
"So I've been told. By you, mostly."
Your fingers drifted to the collar of his doublet, toying with the button there.
For a heartbeat, he looked as though he might actually laugh.
"Tell me, my lord - what are we going to do about this rumour?"
Lord Ormund released a weary breath, as if the very thought of it weighed him down. He pulled you tighter still.
"It will not be easily silenced." His voice was low, resigned. "My household has already decided you are Lady of Oldtown in all but name."
You lifted a brow. "And here I was thinking the steward's words came as a surprise to you."
He rolled his eyes, but there was no true heat behind it.
"It has been difficult to miss." His hand stroked your back. "A second chair has been placed beside the hearth in my chambers. My bed has been piled high with more blankets I did not request, and my servants have ceased asking for my opinions or instruction. I trust they have been pestering you instead?"
You pressed your cheek to his chest and looked up at him through your lashes. "Guilty."
A low, warm laugh rumbled beneath your ear.
You hesitated before speaking, quiet and sure.
"So you have known all this time, and yet you have not objected to it. Why?"
His hand came to rest upon your head, stroking your hair with a tenderness that belonged only here, in this quiet space.
"I asked the Seven the same question yesterday morning." His voice was deep, steady, certain. "And I have come to believe that, in their wisdom, they removed Gwayne from this castle so that I might know you without distraction."
Your heart gave a wild, sudden beat.
"I do not believe," he continued, looking down at you as if seeing something sacred written in your face, "that the Seven would place a woman like you in my path, only to have me give her to another man."
You saw it clearly; not mere longing, but conviction. The absolutely unshakable certainty of a man who believes himself to be walking in the service of something greater than himself.
He looked at you as though he had discovered not merely a woman, but an instrument of providence. The Gods had not sent him a distraction, he thought; they had sent him someone capable of standing beside him, strengthening his House, advancing his purpose, and completing the work he believed he had been chosen to do.
You should have been afraid. To hear a man speak of longing as destiny, of desire as divine will; it should have sounded like a warning. Instead, something far darker and sweeter stirred and unfurled within you.
This was no longer a man tempted by something he felt he ought to resist. This was Lord Ormund Hightower - a man who had spent his life believing himself ruled by control, duty, and the will of the Seven - looking at you as though you were not a temptation to be cast out, but a truth he had been ordained to discover. You were not a test of his Faith. You were his birth right.
You realised, with a faint stirring of greed, that he did not merely want you. He had begun to justify you. To sanctify you. To weave you so deeply into the very fabric of his faith that to reject you would be to reject the Gods themselves.
He had wrapped you in faith, in purpose, in divine intention, until losing you to someone else would feel like blasphemy.
A man might be persuaded to set aside sin. But a man who believes the Gods themselves have given him something? Such a man would burn the world down before he let anyone take it away from him.
The thought raced through you, hot and bright. The thrill of the realisation brought a wave of desire impossible to resist.
"You believe the Gods brought me here, to you." It was barely a whisper. "Then let me be what they intended."
Curiosity flickered in his eyes, dark and intense.
Your next words were a prayer.
"I will not be a burden you must carry, my lord."
A faint smile touched your lips, your hand reaching to trace slowly along his jaw and the column of his throat.
"I will be your greatest ally, the woman who understands the thoughts you do not speak aloud. I will give you loyalty without hesitation. Devotion without end."
You felt his breathing change; deeper, heavier, quickening beneath your palm as you spoke.
"I will give you a House strengthened by my hand."
Your voice dropped, thick and sweet and ruinous. Every syllable was slow. Every word intentional.
"I will give you sons who bear your name."
Your fingers curled tight into the fabric of his doublet as heat coiled low and sharp within you, empty and aching.
"I will be a wife who does not merely share your bed, but who fucks you like she knows no God but you."
You held his gaze, and realised, with undeniable certainty, that your words were no longer a calculated game. They had ceased being one long ago. This was real. The truest version of you and your desires.
"The Seven have shown you the purpose they have chosen for you, my sweet lord, and you have followed it faithfully. Allow me now to exist as they have intended me to."
Something in him broke.
The composure he wore like armour shattered into a thousand pieces. What stood in its place was wild, unchained and entirely yours.
It was a collision more than an embrace; his mouth seizing yours in a bruising, demanding frenzy as he swept you clean off your feet. One hand locked beneath your jaw, the other clamped firm around your waist, iron-strong and unyielding. He tasted of wine and mint and the sharp, hot tang of anger not yet spent.
You surrendered to him instantly, meeting his fire with your own, breathless and burning.
For one brief moment you thought he might drop you - your long skirts tangling, impossible to hitch up and around him - but Lord Ormund had no intention of letting you fall. He held you so tight it was almost hard to breathe, the pommel of his sword digging sharp and impossible to ignore into your hip, a constant reminder of exactly who held you.
"You do not get to turn away from this now, from me." His words were a threat against your open mouth, rough as stone.
You did not want to. You arched into him and moaned; loud, unashamed, trembling at the sheer overwhelming need coursing through your veins.
Your eyes fluttered shut as he carried you across the room. Hard wood met the backs of your thighs when he set you down atop the table, sweeping platters and candles aside with a clatter. He spread your knees wide and stepped firmly between them, mouth never once leaving yours. Candles guttered and flared, wax spilling forgotten.
Nothing existed but him; the heat of him, the colossal weight of him between your parted thighs, the way he claimed you as if he had every right.
A low, guttural sound tore from deep within him, his hands dragging your skirts upwards, bunching them high at your hips, greedy and trembling. His mouth moved down the column of your throat - tongue and teeth, hot and claiming - sucking hard enough to leave marks that would last for days. It was worship and hunger and violence all tangled together; he kissed you as if he meant to consume you, as if he could never, ever get enough.
He reached the neckline of your gown and cursed; low and sharp, frustrated by the barrier. Instead of fumbling with the laces of your corset, he drew his dagger.
Steel flashed once in the candlelight - cold, bright, deadly - and slid clean beneath the ribbons at your chest.
One sure, decisive stroke.
Fabric and lace fell away.
Your breasts spilled free, bared entirely to him, and you arched, chest heaving, breath caught in your throat as you stared up at him.
He did not speak, only bowed his head and continued as if he had never stopped.
His mouth closed over you; hot, wet and relentless. He sucked deep and hard, pleasure and pain tangled together in one searing, sweet rush. You cried out, fingers fisting his hair, holding him exactly where you needed him.
Lord Ormund groaned when you pulled - a rough and broken sound - and sucked harder, as if he meant to drink you down, as if your body were his sacrament and he would perish without it.
You kicked off your slippers and wrapped your legs tight around his waist, reaching frantically for his sword belt, fumbling with the buckles; desperate to get him out of his clothes and to feel his skin on yours.
Steel and leather clattered to the stones, forgotten. He paid it no mind. He only pressed closer, heavy and hot, his weight pinning you exactly where he wanted you, and roughly bit at the swell of your breast before lifting his head to look at you.
His eyes were crazed, pupils blown wide.
Reverence and ruin in equal measure.
"The Seven made you for me." His voice was low, hard, unshakable. "And what is mine does not get given away. Not to kin. Not to anyone."
You were breathless. "I do not want to be given away."
He pressed his forehead to yours and locked your gaze, unflinching and deadly.
"You think I would let you go to him now?" The way he said those words made it sound as though the idea was preposterous, offensive. His lips hovered over yours, breath hot against your skin. He trembled above you as if containing himself bordered on impossible. "If anyone - even my own blood - dares think they can take you away from me... I don't care if it's my cousin, your father or the High Septon himself. I will smile as I kill them."
His hand came up to grip your jaw, firm and resolute.
"And if I cannot have you... I promise I will put a knife in your heart myself before I let anyone else touch you. You will die mine. Do you hear me? Mine."
"I am yours," you gasped, gripping the back of his neck and pulling him down to you. "Everything I am, it belongs to you."
He lifted you then, without warning, without a single fumble. Your legs wrapped tight around his waist, your breasts still bared to the candlelight, and he turned for the door without a single glance back at the wreckage of the table.
"Hold on to me," he commanded, rough and demanding against your mouth, his arm locked firmly beneath your thighs, supporting every inch of you. He strode toward the door, carrying you like a prize, like a relic, like something holy he had come to claim.
You were wild in his arms; fevered, unravelling, entirely unashamed. You arched into him, pressing every inch of your bare skin to his body, your mouth fastened to his jaw, his throat, kissing him with wanton, open-mouthed desperation; teeth grazing, tongue tasting, as if you meant to devour him whole.
You clung to him, hands tangled in his hair, body straining toward him, reckless and eager, as desperate to claim him as he was to carry you away.
The door flew open under his hand. He carried you from the solar and into his adjoining bedchamber like a man possessed; striding forward, unhurried in his purpose, your bare skin exposed to the cool air, your gown hanging in ribbons.
He did not attempt to cover you. He did not care.
He burst into the bedchamber and the room went still as death -
Three servants - scrubbing tables, changing flowers, tending the hearth - froze.
Their eyes went wide. They saw the Lord of Oldtown, face dark as storm clouds, carrying you half-naked in his arms; your dress torn, your legs wrapped tight around his waist, your tongue on his neck, his mouth still damp and red from yours.
You were feral.
Lord Ormund did not pause. He did not set you down. He stood there, holding you high against him, his voice dropping into something low, lethal and absolute.
"Out!"
The sound cracked through the room like a whip.
"...And if a single one of you dare speak a word of what you've seen - I will hang you myself."
They scrambled, bowing, tripping over themselves, snatching up armfuls of cloth, fleeing for the door.
Lord Ormund did not move until the last one had vanished and the door slammed shut behind them, the latch clicking loud in the sudden quiet.
Only then did he adjust his grip - still holding you, still never letting your feet touch the ground - and carried you straight to the great bed. He knelt slowly, lowering you onto the furs and linens. He did not step away. Instead, he settled himself between your knees, his gaze sweeping over you like he was memorising every inch, like he meant to own it all.
You instinctively arched toward him, breathless as you reached behind you to unclasp the remnants of your dress. The fabric pooled on the floor just a moment later, leaving you completely bare before him.
He knelt there, at the edge of the bed, and dragged your hips to the very edge. One arm locked around your thigh, coming to rest - heavy - across your waist. Your legs parted for him as if possessing a will of their own, knees bending and rising almost to your shoulders, exposing you to him completely.
He only stared, as if he had been waiting his whole life for this, as if he had never seen anything more perfect, more worthy of falling to his knees for. Nothing else existed - no Seven, no duty, no world beyond this bed and this moment and you.
It was as if this were the holiest sight he would ever know.
He closed his eyes and leaned in - slow and reverent - the tip of his nose nudging that sensitive little bud between your thighs. He breathed you in; deep, dragging, filling his lungs with the scent of your skin and your readiness. A shaky breath fell from his lips, as if he meant to carry that scent inside him forever; as if the smell of your arousal were sweeter than incense, more sacred than any prayer. He breathed you in again, and a low, broken sound rumbled in his chest - half worship, half rapture - before he pressed his mouth to the soft skin of your inner thigh - wet and needy - and looked up at you through drunk, heavy-lidded eyes.
His words were a caress. "The Seven could not have made anything more perfect."
He touched his lips to you then, no hesitation or gentleness. He pressed his tongue flat against you, tasting you, humming in satisfaction.
Heat and a desperate, unyielding pressure swept through you like fire, like flood, like something meant to decimate. His arms locked around your hips, holding you open, holding you still; possessive, devout and unrelenting. It was devastation and worship all at once; tongue and teeth, greedy and ruthless.
His arm pinned you down when you arched off the bed, trembling and crying out, your hands tangling in his hair, clutching, pulling, desperate to ground yourself.
Your head fell back, breath hitching in gasps.
He only groaned - low and deep and vibrating through you - and doubled his efforts, fiercer now, as if your pleasure and his were one and the same.
He drank down every shiver, every cry. He did not ease, did not pause. He only built the heat higher, stroke by stroke, as if he meant to pull your soul free and keep it for his own.
“The Seven gave me to you,” you gasped, hips rising to meet him, pleasure coiling tight and burning, bright and unbearable. “All of me - to use, to worship, to ruin. This is their will. Take what is yours.”
He answered with a stroke that made your back bow - sharp and perfect - and then again, faster, surer, as if your words had broken the last of his restraint. He devoured you, greedy and faithful all at once, driving you higher, heat spilling through your veins, your body trembling, straining toward something blinding.
“This is their will,” you cried out, tears spilling down your cheeks at the intensity of it, voice breaking as your pleasure crested, wild and overwhelming. “Don’t you dare stop. Don’t you dare-”
Your hands fisted in the linens, in his hair. Your back arched off the mattress and you cried out his name - loud, clear, like a vow spoken to the heavens.
Wave after wave of heat broke over you, all-consuming, shaking you to your bones, leaving you gasping, trembling, every nerve singing.
He did not pull away. He held you through it - gentler now, steadying you, drinking down every sound as you fell apart and drifted slowly back together.
It was a long while before you regained enough control to open your eyes.
You lay still, chest heaving, skin thrumming and oversensitive, as he lifted his head slowly. His eyes burned molten; stripped of every last veil of control, dark and devouring.
Lord Ormund rose to his feet by the bed, towering over you as you attempted to compose yourself, calm your ragged breathing, your core still throbbing with powerful, lingering aftershocks, every nerve raw.
His hands went to the fastenings of his doublet; rough, impatient, eager to be rid of the barrier between him and you.
“Let me,” you whispered, your throat raw as you pushed yourself up on trembling arms.
He paused at once, chest rising and falling hard, his gaze dropping to you as you sat before him, naked.
Your fingers brushed his as you took over, undoing clasp after clasp - slow and deliberate - drawing out the moment, peeling the heavy leather away to reveal him.
Your breath caught at the sight: broad chest, hard, sculpted lines, skin kissed bronze by sun, bared fully to the warm, golden glow of firelight. You set the doublet aside, your palms sliding over him slowly, reverently - mapping every ridge, every beat of his heart beneath his ribs - claiming him as fiercely as he had claimed you.
He hissed sharply when your hand drifted lower, toying with the buttons of his breeches, your gaze lifting to his from beneath your lashes, heavy-lidded and knowing. You palmed him through the dark fabric, slow and firm, enjoying the sight of his head bowing, his eyes fluttering shut, a ragged curse torn raw from his throat.
“Cruel,” he murmured, his hips jerking once, shallow and helpless, into your hand. “You play with a man already tortured past endurance.”
“Worship deserves worship in return,” you replied, your voice soft but unyielding. You freed him then - heavy, hot, and throbbing - and your fingers curled loosely around him, stroking once, slow and sure, feeling him pulse against your skin, watching him unravel breath by breath before your eyes.
He could bear it only a moment longer. His patience snapped thin. He caught your wrist - gentle but firm, stilling your hand - and sat down upon the bed beside you. One by one, he pulled off his boots, then dragged his breeches down and cast them aside, leaving him completely, gloriously naked: powerful, broad, all hard muscle and warm skin. Yours to look upon. Yours to touch.
The fabric had barely touched the floor before you were hooking a leg over his thighs and climbing eagerly into his lap. He welcomed you with a low, guttural sound, his hands settling at once on your hips, holding you exactly where he wanted you.
You did not wait for permission. Your lips found the column of his throat, kissing him there with open-mouthed heat - tongue and teeth, claiming the pulse that hammered beneath your mouth - while your hips began to rock slowly, deliberately against him. You felt him then, hard and heavy and hot, pressing right where you ached most, slipping through your slick folds, velvet over fire.
You were so wet it was impossible to keep him still; he glided easily, slipping over your sensitive bud, back and forth, drawing breathless gasps from you both.
Finally you reached down, curling your fingers around him to hold him steady, and pressed yourself against him, rocking slow and firm, again and again, letting every stroke pull the heat tighter.
“Perfect girl,” he praised, his face buried in your hair, his voice thick and breathless. His eyes were half-lidded, dark with pleasure, and his hands guided your hips, setting the rhythm. “Look at you. Taking exactly what you want.”
After a long, sweet while, he let go of your hips and leaned back, planting his palms flat against the mattress behind him and shifting you both further up the bed. He lowered himself to his back, folding one powerful arm beneath his head, and simply watched you. Dark eyes roamed over you slowly, over every curve, every line of you, needy and reverent all at once.
From this angle he had the perfect view. He watched the hard, heavy length of him glide wet and shining between your lips, slick and dark and beautiful against your skin, watched the slow, mesmerising roll of your hips; how you took him, how you moved, how you yielded and took and claimed all at once. He watched your breasts rise and fall with every ragged gasp, soft and full and moving sweetly with every rock of your body, and his breath caught in his throat each time you brushed over that sensitive, swollen place, each movement a torture he seemed to enjoy as much as you.
You placed your hands upon his hard stomach to steady yourself, feeling the taut, warm muscle shift and tense beneath your palms, and his free hand lifted to brush stray hair from your face; his touch so gentle, so tender, even as his eyes burned dark and molten with a need so fierce it nearly swallowed the room.
“I cannot get enough of watching you,” he admitted, a faint smile tugging at the corner of his mouth. “It is the holiest thing I have ever seen.”
Your movements never faltered. Pleasure was building in you once more - bright, tight, unbearable - your lips parted, breath coming in soft, broken cries that spilled freely from your throat.
“So beautiful,” he murmured again, thick with desire, his jaw tightening. “And mine. All of you.”
You could not help it. The sounds spilling from your throat were too loud, too reckless — if you did not muffle them, the whole household would hear exactly what their lord had reduced you to. And so you leaned forward and captured his mouth with yours, kissing him hard and hungry, messy and desperate, swallowing each other’s moans, tasting your own sweetness on his lips, protesting softly when the need for air forced you apart, if only for a heartbeat.
Your hands slid down, trembling, over warm skin, over the ridge of muscle beneath his ribs, lower still until your fingers found him; heavy, hot, throbbing wildly, pressing hard and proud against the hard muscle of his stomach, veins pulsing beneath your touch. He hissed sharply when your fingers curled around him, his hips jerking once beneath you.
He did not push. He did not demand. He only watched, blue eyes fixed intently on where you held him, where you glided over him; wet and slick and perfect, never quite taking him, never quite giving either of you what you burned for.
"Like this," he commanded, voice ragged, one hand coming to rest over yours, his large, warm fingers guiding you, positioning him to rest heavy right where you ached most - but not inside. Never inside. "Glide over me. Just like this. Let me feel you. Let me watch you take your pleasure from what is mine."
And you did. You lifted your hips and sank again, slow and agonisingly sweet, the hard throbbing length of him dragging through your folds, pressing firm and perfect against your most sensitive place - but never breaching; never giving you what you burned for.
You gasped, head falling back, every nerve coiling tight and burning, and did it again; slower, harder, trembling as he slid over you, right there where you needed him most, maddeningly close and still so far away.
"Just like that," he groaned, his hands gripping your hips, guiding you, setting that maddening, relentless rhythm. "Look at you. Using me. So wet. So eager. And all for me."
You gasped, fingers digging into his chest, your movements growing faster, sharper, need coiling tight and blinding in your belly. "My lord-"
"I know." His voice was low, unrelenting, his eyes fixed on where you rubbed yourself frantically over him, glistening and swollen and desperate. "Take it. Take all you need, my sweet girl."
You cried out, broken and pleading, and rocked harder, chasing that all-consuming peak; every stroke dragged fire through your veins, your body shaking, straining, teetering right on the edge.
He watched every gasp, every shiver, every desperate roll of your hips; his face flushed, eyes black with need, worship and hunger warring in his gaze.
"That's it," he praised, voice thick and breathless, rough with his own fraying control. "Come for me. Let me watch you fall apart."
The coil snapped. You cried out his name, body arching sharply, hips stuttering and seizing as pleasure tore through you - blinding, white-hot, overwhelming. You rode the wave, trembling and sobbing his name, gliding frantically over him as the ecstasy shattered you and left you gasping, shuddering, every nerve raw and oversensitive, thrumming and entirely spent.
He let you; watched you come undone completely on top of him, his hands never leaving your hips, his gaze drinking in every moment, every sound, every beautiful broken thing you were. His chest heaved, his own restraint stretching thinner by the heartbeat, his breath coming in ragged, desperate gasps.
He groaned, low and guttural, his hands gripping you so hard his knuckles blanched against your skin. His control was fraying, fast, unravelling thread by thread, and he could no longer look at you without his body screaming for release.
You leaned down then, lips brushing his, your voice soft and knowing, devastatingly sweet against his mouth.
"Did you enjoy watching me, my lord?"
That was what broke him. The arrogant, knowing tone of your voice; calm certainty, entirely aware of exactly what you had done to him.
Every last thread of restraint snapped. He arched up, gripping you bruisingly hard, his fingers digging into your skin, his hips surging forward, wild and desperate, straining to push inside, to bury himself deep and end the torment.
He went to pull you down, to drive himself home, his face flushed dark, eyes wild and fever-bright, nothing left of his calm composure - only need, raw and unyielding.
And you smiled.
You stayed exactly where you were; hovering, gliding, maddeningly close, pressing right against him and still refusing to give him what he ached for.
“No,” you whispered, rolling your hips, slow and deliberate, watching him unravel, watching the desperation war with the command in his face.
His eyes narrowed on you, the cool, calculating expression of the Lord of Oldtown reappearing across his handsome face like a mask slipping back into place, sharp and commanding even through the haze of his need. He raised himself up to sit, straining upward, every muscle coiled tight and trembling, corded and hard beneath warm skin, fighting to close the distance, desperate to bury himself inside you.
His voice was a deep and rumbling threat when he spoke - low, imperious, used to being obeyed.
"Surely you do not wish to disappoint me."
You released a small, breathy laugh, soft, light and utterly unafraid.
"Never, my love." Your voice was a whisper, sweet and smooth. Your brows furrowed into a sly, theatrically empathetic expression, as if you truly felt sorry for denying him - your smile told otherwise; you revelled in this. You brought your lips to his ear and breathed -
"...But I will not be your whore."
A sharp knock came at the door.
Neither of you moved to answer it. Neither even glanced in its direction. He did not care who came. He did not care for anything but you, right now, this moment, and the torment of your withholding.
“I am yours,” you said, soft and clear and unyielding, your hand wrapping firm and tight around him once more. “But I will not have you inside me. Not until I bear your name.”
You gripped him then - firm, deliberate, hard - and he shuddered, his lips parting on a ragged gasp, his forehead falling to rest against your chest, heavy and hot and desperate, proud and powerful Lord Ormund reduced to something soft and wanting and entirely at your mercy.
Another knock - louder, more insistent.
He lifted his head, eyes flashing dark and furious toward the door, his patience worn thin, his body still straining toward you, throbbing in your hand. He shouted, voice sharp and rough with impatience.
"What is it?"
A voice came from behind the wood, clear and steady.
"My lord, a ship has entered the harbour. Ser Gwayne has returned from King's Landing."
He screwed his eyes shut and groaned, a long, low sound torn from his throat, his wet mouth hovering over your skin as you squeezed him harder, slow and deliberate, feeling him pulse and throb in your palm, completely undone by your touch.
Your smile did not falter - soft, knowing, victorious - for you knew, with absolute certainty, that he was completely at your mercy. His hips bucked helplessly, sharp and uncontrolled, and he gasped your name, broken and quiet, against your skin.
“You will learn what it is to burn for me, my lord,” you murmured, leaning in to brush your lips against his ear, your voice soft and sweet and final. “To ache for me.”
You squeezed him once - slow, firm, unrelenting - and then stilled completely.
You placed a finger beneath his chin and lifted his head, forcing him to look at you. You leaned in, lips brushing his, your gaze locking with his - bright, steady, unshakable - and spoke slow and deliberate, every word dropping like a crown set upon his ruin -
“The patient hunter gets the kill.”
It hit him harder than any touch ever could.
His eyes fluttered closed, his jaw fell open, and a sound tore from his throat - half-gasp, half-sob, raw and broken and utterly animal. His whole body arched off the bed, spine bowing, every muscle seizing up taut and trembling. He spilled himself instantly, violently, pouring over your hand and his stomach in thick, shuddering waves, completely undone by nothing but your voice and those six words.
He heaved and gasped, his hands clutching at your wrists, his grip weakening as the pleasure shattered through him; blinding, overwhelming, stripping him of every last shred of control and pride.
His head fell back, throat bared, body quaking in endless, ragged aftershocks, and he cried out your name - once, broken and breathless - before collapsing back against your breasts, spent, heaving, and entirely yours.
He could not speak. He could not breathe. He sat there, trembling and burning, knowing with absolute certainty you had hunted him down, and you had killed him with nothing but a whisper.
summary: gwayne visits the honey inn when he returns home from the war, where he pays for your company by the hour, and where ormund finds something he'd much rather keep. and with the city about to fall or hold to the black army, every hightower intends to find a use for you before it does. (8k)
contents: sex worker!reader, friends to lovers, enemies to lovers, love triangle, hurt/comfort, angst, jealousy, bi!gwayne, protective!gwayne, possessive!ormund, cw for manipulation, coercion, smut 18+ (MDNI) unprotected sex, exhibitionism/voyeurism, sub!gwayne, dom!ormund, dubcon
( NAVIGATION ) | ( MASTERLIST ) | ( AO3 )
gif creds: vhagar-balerion-meraxes
Gwayne’s arrival from the slaughter of war is announced, not by a knock, but by the low groaning of an old door thrown open on its hinges — as though he had forgotten such courtesies existed after so long on the road. You turn upon your vanity stool to find the man swaying in the doorframe, backlit by the torches burning low on their sconces. And, for a flicker of a moment, you do not recognize him at all.
He wears the road all over. Mud caked to the knee and smeared dark across his porcelain skin. Blood gone the color of rust-brown stained on the collar of his quilted gambeson, though whether it is his own or some stranger’s you could not say — and you do not think he could give you an answer if you asked. His long auburn hair hangs over his forehead, dark and clinging to his skin from the sweat along his brow.
He longs to fill his lungs with the familiar, floral scent of your apartment at The Honey Inn, but cannot seem to escape the smell of copper and horse and dirty earth that’s been clinging to every inch of him on the unforgiving road.
“Well… Look at what the storm’s dragged in…” you croon at the sight of him, rising slowly from your chair. You flash the man a smile in turn, because there’s something distinctly heavy in the moment that seems to beg for a bit of lightness to cut through it. “It’s been so long, I’ve forgotten whether I should curtsy… Or kneel.”
Gwayne gives you nothing in response.
For the first time since you met — late in your adolescence, when he needed something to prove and you needed coin to make; when everything between you was all warm cheeks and trembling hands — Gwayne is at a loss for a clever word, and unmoved by the slyness of your grin. He closes the distance between you instead, flinging the door shut behind him with a careless hand and staggering with each uneven step.
You meet him in the center of the expansive apartment — paid for, in part, by his Hightower coin alone. You hold him tentatively by the forearms, and feel the worn wool crack stiff with dried mud. “Gwayne…” you murmur gently to him, all the mockery long gone from your voice. You search his empty face with worried eyes. “Look at me— Are you hurt?”
He does not answer that either. Instead, his trembling hands lift to find your waist. The callouses along his palms snag briefly in the soft silk of your robe. He finds himself very suddenly overcome by the familiarity of having you in his arms again; a nostalgia that rises in his throat and strangles him. His dirty chin quivers as he leans further into you, burying his face in the crook of your shoulder and knotting his fists hard into your dress.
You feel the trembling start in his shoulders before you feel something warm and wet smear along your collarbone. The man weeps over you with great, shuddering snivels that he hides into your neck. It is the most vulnerable you’ve ever seen him, you think, even more so than the day you met — when all the other highborn boys teased him for his lack of experience, saying that he must not have the appetite for women, and sent him scrambling here to prove himself.
He found you instead; a girl of his age, new to both Oldtown and the Honey Inn. A girl who saw right through him and refused to take his coin, or anything else he offered that night; but embellished enough stories that made all the taunting whispers about him finally stop. It was a small kindness, though one that threatened to undo him entirely.
He’s warmed your bed ever since, both as client and something less easily named. You hold him now the same way you did that first night, asking nothing of him and expecting even less.
You draw him a bath once his breaths come more easily to him. You peel the ruined gambeson and sweat-stiff small clothes from his pale skin, and make no comment about how thin he’s grown as you lower him into the steaming water. The water runs brown, then dusty rose, and then finally clear as you work a soft cloth over his skin. Across his shoulders, down his spine, and over the frail skin of his hairless chest.
“You needn’t—” Gwayne attempts to speak, his very first words since he crossed your threshold, though his voice comes out cracked and low with disuse. He feels half smothered beneath the foreign tenderness you offer him, but he does not flinch under your touch. He never has. “You needn’t do this for me, you know?”
“I know…” you nod and smooth the cloth along the milky-white column of his throat when he tips his chin to look at you, kneeling just outside the tub. “But I want to.”
When the warm water cools, you towel him dry and dress him in clothes a size too big for his frame — softly worn trousers and a loose linen tunic; souvenirs from previous patrons, washed by your own hands. Gwayne tries not to think about who might have shared your bed while he laid shivering in the mud. It was much easier to imagine you as his and only his, though he’s never quite found the courage to ask that of you.
“I’m sorry,” he says from where he lies within your silken sheets, wrapped in the sweet scent of your perfume and the particular stench of sweat that clings to the walls of the establishment. He doesn’t ask if you’ve taken clients today; he doesn’t want to know the answer — but the hour is early enough that he lets himself believe his body is the only one your hands have touched so far.
“For what?” you scoff, sliding beneath the cool sheets to join him. The feather mattress dips slightly under your weight until your legs tangle with his scruffy ones out of habit. “For tracking half the Kingsroad across my good Naathi rug? Because Mistress Aleena will absolutely dock you for it— whether you bought it or not.”
Gwayne exhales hard through his nose in place of a laugh, pink lips curling into a tired grin. “For all of it,” he says, pale eyes as dull and empty as his voice. “For… coming here like a beggar, for… crying on you like a child. For—”
“Gwayne,” you sigh, splaying a free hand over the newfound hollow of his jaw. “You have nothing to apologize for. Not tonight, not ever if I have any say on the matter. Do you understand?”
Gwayne’s eyes soften around the edges as they flit back and forth between your steady gaze. His chapped lips part but cannot seem to summon an answer for you. Your soft grin widens into a more devilish thing as your hand trails down the curve of his jaw, past his sternum still flushed from the bath, and over the soft trail of auburn hair above the hem of his trousers.
“I said…” Your fingers creep beneath the fabric to find the dense patch of coarse hair there. “Do you understand?”
The words of a response die on his tongue when your palm squeezes gently at his cock, soft like velvet and achingly sensitive under your touch. A broken sigh spills from his parted mouth as he tips his head back, damp auburn hair wild on the pillow. He twitches slowly stiff in your hand, dribbling pearls of pre-cum at the soft pink tip that you use to lubricate each slow stroke.
He only vaguely feels the tip of your nose nudging the side of his, right before you press a tender kiss to his chapped mouth. He exhales hard through his nose as your lips slot effortlessly together, breath fanning warm along your cupid’s bow. His hips buck up into your hand with a sort of desperation you haven’t seen from him in quite some time, and your mouth curls into a smile pressed against his.
The distant creaking of the fourth step in the hall — an old plank that’s had a way of warning you of every approaching patron since you first took this room — shatters the moment entirely. Your head tilts upward against Gwayne’s when the heavy oak door swings open without a pretense of a knock, as if the man on the other side didn’t know that closed doors in a house like these only ever meant one thing.
Gwayne makes a weak, wounded sound in his throat when your hand slows around his cock. “Why’d you stop?” he mutters against your mouth, heavy eyes fluttering open to find you glancing off towards the door.
“It seems like we have company…” you croon with a smile.
Gwayne’s brows lower in confusion right before his head turns against the pillow. The screwed look drains into something far closer to dread when his eyes fall on his cousin looming in the doorway — standing a head taller and twice as broad through the shoulders. He reaches for the silver pomander chained perpetually to his scabbard and lifts it to his nose. His nostrils flare as he inhales the earthy incense, trying hopelessly to escape the stench of sex clinging to the walls of the Honey Inn.
You knew Ormund Hightower mostly by reputation rather than appearance. He’s handsome in the manner that most Hightower men were handsome, and chiseled cold in a manner that suggests all the unkind stories Gwayne’s told you about the man over the years were likely unembellished.
“So… This is where you’ve run off to,” Ormund says in a melodic voice as he strolls further inside. He scans the room with pale, attentive eyes — the tub running low by the window, the discarded clothes just beside it, and his cousin freshly home from war and spending his return in a whore’s bed. A thin smile curls at the corner of his mouth accordingly: “I confess, I do find myself surprised, cousin… I hadn’t realized you possessed the… appetite for this sort of thing…”
Gwayne goes rigid underneath you while his cock softens once more in your fist. An age-old humiliation flickers behind his eyes — the same look you remember seeing on him all those years ago.
“It’ll cost you extra if you mean to join us, my lord,” you call to the older man, with an ease about you that suggests you’re utterly unbothered by an audience. Your head tilts to your shoulder as you study the man, eyes raking slowly over his broad form. “Though I’d wager you have more than enough coin for it… And the face for it, too, no doubt…”
Ormund’s chest burns with a strange mixture of offense and pride. His strong, shaven chin lifts slightly upward as he drops the pomander back on its chain, giving you the whole of his attention now. “My faith does not permit such… indulgences,” he says in a smooth voice. “As I’m sure you very well know.”
“Mm… Well, if the Seven are half as kind as everyone insists, they wouldn’t begrudge a man for having a little fun now and then,” you answer without missing a beat. “Could do wonders for you, my lord— You look dreadfully tense.”
Ormund’s pale eyes do not stray from your squinted stare. There’s something almost involuntary in it, in the way his gaze snags and catches with yours — even when your hand starts moving again under the blankets and Gwayne’s pale form tenses beneath your touch.
“Well…” Ormund hums, trying hard not to choke on his embarrassment. “You’re a bold thing, aren’t you? For a woman who sells herself by the hour.”
“And you’re a bold thing for walking into a lady’s room uninvited, my lord,” you quip and watch him falter at the volley. You turn back to Gwayne with a huff, and swing your leg to straddle his thigh as you call back to the older man, “You can watch if you like. Or wait your turn in the hall— Either way, I’m afraid I’m with a patron at present.”
Gwayne’s eyes you with a wide, worried gaze as you coax him hard again with your hand. You swipe your thumb over the bulbous tip and gather the pearly beads drooling there, before lining him at the entrance of your cunt. His pale hands settle on either side of your waist, clenching hard at the delicate fabric of your robe. Any words of protest that might’ve risen onto his tongue dissolve into a broken moan when you pierce yourself with him, slow and without concern for the man still standing across the room.
Ormund lingers there for a while longer than he’d like to admit. He tells himself that the sour feeling curling in his stomach is disgust — decent and godly disgust that any devout man ought to feel at such a display. He, admittedly, has always been good at telling himself things.
But still, his feet do not move. And the longer he watches your hips move slowly on top of Gwayne’s — the sight of it only partially shielded by your robe and the sheets gathered at your thighs — the harder it becomes to name the thing coiled in his chest. A curiosity, perhaps, of what your hips would feel like in his hands; of what it would feel like to be nestled in your cunt—
Ormund despises himself the moment the thought surfaces, for how long the dreadful image lingers in the back of his head before he can shake it away.
He turns on his heel and storms towards the door with a mixture of jealousy and disgust and distant intrigue rising into his throat like bile. He pulls the heavy oak shut behind him with a resounding thud that fills the quiet room.
Gwayne shakes his head against the pillow when he’s finally gone. His pale eyes are still wide with alarm but glassy with a lingering pleasure too, as you continue grinding your hips over his lap. Your velvety cunt squeezes him with each pass, threatening to milk his orgasm from him entirely.
“You should not have done that,” he confesses breathlessly, and wears the warning etched across his pretty features.
“Done what?” you respond through panted breaths, bracing yourself on his soft chest. “Defended you? Dreadfully sorry, my lord— next time I’ll let him have the last word—”
“That’s not—” He inhales sharply and grabs hard at your waist to stop your movements, so that he might concentrate on something other than your warm, drooling cunt for more than a second. Gwayne peers up at you with a suddenly solemn look. “He’ll want it now. My cousin— What he saw now in this room. He’ll want it now simply because it’s mine.”
You arch a brow in a playful look. “So I’m yours now, am I?” you joke.
Gwayne exhales hard through his nose when you fail to heed his warning with any real seriousness, chest deflating under your touch. Your smile only widens at the half-hearted glare he gives you then.
“You don’t know him the way I do,” he mutters.
“No. I don’t,” you agree, planting your palms on either side of his head as you lean down over him again. The plush of your breasts threatens to spill over the low neckline of your robe; you smile when you catch Gwayne’s unabashed staring. “And I’d very much like to keep it that way… Which is a pity because I might’ve made an exception for that face of his… A shame, really, that the Gods wasted such a pretty face on such an unpleasant man…”
Gwayne’s mouth lifts into a crooked smile despite himself. “You’re going to be the death of one of us, you know that?” he tells you, close enough now that your noses brush with every word. “Though I can’t be entirely sure which…”
“Mm…” you hum, and feel Gwayne’s chest rumble with a groan when you roll your hips over his again. “I do hope it’s the more tiresome cousin then.”
You kiss him before Gwayne can argue the point. And this time, he does not pull away — and he does not for a long while after.
Gwayne makes himself at home in your bed the way he has since boyhood. He returns not quite a week later, when word of Criston Cole’s death reaches Oldtown — his handsome head struck from his shoulder and mounted on a pike by the Winter Wolves, no more than a three-day ride from the Reach now. He tells you this with his heavy head laid in your lap, staring distantly at the crackling hearth across the room, and blinking back burning tears before they can stain your pretty silk dress.
His auburn hair slides like silk between your fingers as you run your hands through it, with the same unthinking tenderness you’ve shown him a thousand nights before this one, though he feels far less deserving of it now.
“You needn’t perform this for me, you know?” he mutters, rubbing his cheek along your covered thigh while his thumb smooths absently over your knee. “I know what I am to you…”
“Oh, really?” you say with a smile evident in your voice, though he cannot see it from where he lies. “And who might that be?”
Gwayne turns his head to peer up at you. A weary half-smile hints at the very edges of his mouth as he answers, “A man who’s paid twice over for the privilege of your company over the years…”
You flinch at his words before you can properly catch yourself. It had been years since Gwayne last put coin in your palm for anything; longer since, perhaps, than he’s stopped truly needing to. He’s filled your larder more times than you could count, dressed you in silks finer than half the highborn ladies at court, and furnished this very room with the good Myrish looking glass and the featherbed you share now — all without once being asked.
So it stings a little now, to hear him speak of you still in the language of ledger — as though even after everything, he still cannot quite let himself believe he might simply be loved and not owed.
“Yes…” you sigh, combing your fingers from his temple to the side of his neck. “You’ve paid me a great deal of coin to take care of you… But no one pays me extra to love you. And I find that I very much do.”
The words threaten to undo him completely. He has not grown any more accustomed to tenderness since the war ended than he was before it began. He was not raised to think himself particularly deserving of love; not with a family that whispered often of his peculiar appetite and a cousin who made a sport of his shame at every turn. And then you came along and never once made him feel like the freak everyone at court had long decided that he must be. You are, he thinks, the closest thing to a miracle he’s ever been given.
“Where will you go?” he wonders suddenly aloud, auburn brows pinching low in curiosity. “When Rhaenyra’s army arrives, I mean?”
You shrug, and the thin sleeve of your nightgown slips from your shoulder. “The crypts with everyone else, I expect—”
“What if we left?” he blurts before he can properly weigh the words in his head. His eyes dart wildly across your face, aglow now with a prophecy he can see so vividly in his head. “Daeron has Tessarion. And surely the three of us are not so heavy a burden for a dragon to bear. We could be gone from the city before anyone thought to look for us— and already leagues away before they could try.”
“And do what, exactly?” you wonder with a warm laugh. “Comb my hair by firelight and pray the open road pays half so well as Oldtown? I have a trade here, Gwayne, one that will long outlast this useless war. And one that does not travel well.”
“You wouldn’t need a trade,” Gwayne scoffs. The mattress dips under his weight as he sits up ahead of you, drawing his knees to his chest and resting his forearms across them. His face is very suddenly close to yours now, and very suddenly solemn. “I’d take care of you.”
“So I’d go around being your whore then? Is that it?”
His face screws in a pained sort of look. “You wouldn’t be my whore. You’d be my lady.”
The promise steals the words of a clever response from your mouth. You’ve heard enough of them fall from enough men over the years to fill a maester’s ledger — vows made drunk with sex and unmade sober when it was done; declarations of earnest men who meant well but were misled by their own wanting. You’ve learned the sound of deceit well enough over the years to recognize that this was not one of them.
Gwayne was, perhaps, the first man of any real means to offer you true courtesy that was not only spent with his coin; and you would like nothing more than to return the favor, to be his lady. But you learned long ago, the hard way a girl born into nothing usually learns such things, that some fates are simply not written for women like you.
A strange feeling settles heavy in your chest accordingly. It weighs down the edges of your tender smile as you reach to smooth a piece of silken auburn hair back from his temple, if only to buy yourself half a moment before you answer him.
“I cannot leave,” you mutter gently to him. “The road is not… gentle to women, whatever protection you mean to offer me… What if we were separated? What if you grew bored of me? What if I became a burden to you—?”
“Never,” Gwayne protests, words sharp with hurt.
You meet his frown with a much softer look in return. “Whatever’s coming for this city is no kinder than whatever’s waiting for me out there…”
Gwayne’s face falls. His taut look of offense softens slowly, through a thick swallow in his throat — the kindling hope of the fleeting moment folds in on itself like a flower at last light.
“But I do want you to go, Gwayne,” you whisper, bringing both hands to cradle his flushed cheeks. “You’ve never been happy in this city, not truly, not since I’ve known you. Take the boy and go somewhere it’s safe. You deserve that much, if nothing else."
He shakes his head between your palms, though not quite in protest. “Who will take care of you with me gone, hm?” he asks with a sad sort of grin.
“I take care of me," you answer with narrowed eyes. “I always have. Long before I found you, and long after I expect.”
Gwayne falls quiet for a moment thereafter. It takes him a while to find the words to speak again, and when he does, the words go as distant as his forlorn gaze. “I’m not certain I could manage it regardless… Ormund watches everything— every-one. He always has… He’d know I meant to slip away before I’d so much as breathed a word of it to Daeron…”
Your thumb stills on the warm apple of his cheek. “All you’d need as a distraction,” you shrug. “Something shiny enough… And perhaps close enough to his own doorstep that he’d have no choice but to look at that instead of you…”
Gwayne catches the change in your voice before he catches the true meaning underneath it. His brows lower in a dubious look. “…Do you have something in mind?”
You give him a slow, sly, and devilish smile in response. “Oh, I have a great many things in mind…” you coo to him. “Do try to keep up, my lord…”
The plan comes together slowly after that, whispered low against the pillows with the candles burning down to near nothing. You outline the basics of it, and Gwayne fills the gaps with everything he knows of his cousin — of his habits, his pride, his cruel nature. And though you find yourself almost fond of it, the surest way you can think of to buy Gwayne and his nephew their escape, the man cannot quite stomach the thought.
“Ormund is not the kind of man who plays fair,” he warns you in a whisper. “Even in games he thinks he’s winning, if he so much as suspects—”
“He won’t,” you assure him, tracing a slow finger along the tense edge of his jaw. “I’ve made a trade of reading men like him, Gwayne, and it’s only for one night. You find Daeron, ready the dragon, and leave your cousin to me. Trust me, I have handled far worse men for far less worthy causes.”
“The scouts say they’re a day’s ride out, maybe less,” Ormund says beneath the soft scraping of his boots along the dim passageway. His voice bounces off the walls, where the torches gutter low with the late hour. “Though… Rhaenyra’s army has proven rather slow as of yet, haven’t they? Dragged down by supply, no doubt, and by the unfamiliar country… Much to our advantage, just as I knew it would be.”
Gwayne tenses his jaw, struggling to stomach the older man’s hubris — a thing he has choked down often enough over the years that it should no longer taste of anything at all, though it still has a way of burning going down. There is a small satisfaction in it, though, Gwayne realizes; in knowing something that, for once, his cousin does not. A little victory in knowing that Daeron is saddling Tessarion in the dragon’s stable at this very moment, while Ormund waltzes through this castle, utterly unaware of it.
“Many men will die regardless,” Gwayne reminds him.
“Yes. We will lose men,” Ormund nods on an exhaled breath, then tilts his head to flash the man a feigned look of sincerity — a kind, tight-lipped smile with no warmth in it at all. “Which means you’ve got nothing to worry about, cousin. You were never counted among the men anyway, were you?”
He lifts a ringed hand to pat the younger man on the shoulder, a little harder than necessary, before wrenching open the door ahead of him. Gwayne stands in place and watches him, jaw flexing as he grinds his teeth. He clenches his hands into fists, exhales a slow breath through his nose, and lets the insult pass slowly over him. He watches, instead, as Ormund strolls into his solar and falters a half-step past the threshold.
Ormund’s nose catches it before his eyes do — a strikingly foreign scent hanging in the air, of warm oil and crushed petals, sorely out of place amid the leather and parchment and wet stone. His nostrils flare faintly as his eyes finish the work his nose began. His gaze scans the room until it lands finally on you, arranged on the couch by the hearth like a thing to be painted. The sleeves of your dress threaten to slip from your shoulders as the neckline dips low enough to reveal the canvas of your plush breasts, kissed by the flickering candlelight.
Something in his chest leaps before he can help it, a red-hot flare of gladness at the sight of you lounging so delicately in his own chamber, which was only ever possible in his dreams before now — vividly and more often than he’d like to admit, since the morning he found you at the Honey Inn. He told himself it was only the irritation of you that lingered, the bitter memory of a woman far too bold for her station, though the lie only stuck so much.
He swallows down the boyish excitement rising like bile in his throat, and disgust follows hard on its heels — first at himself and then at the reflexive worry of some guard or handmaiden or septa seeing someone like you waltz into his chambers looking like that. He has spent too long manufacturing his reputation for it to go to waste on some common whore.
“What… is she… doing here?” Ormund spits each word like venom.
“You said it yourself. Rhaenyra’s army will likely make Oldtown before break of day,” Gwayne says lowly as the door clicks shut behind him. “This could very well be the last night either of us has left… And I thought you might want one happy memory before you give yourself to the dust.”
Ormund’s ringed hands twitch into loose fists at his sides. He tilts his chin and swallows hard and finds that it’s near-impossible to break your stare, no matter how plainly he wears the mask of disgust across his face. It takes him a second too long to turn away from you, and to plaster a brittle smile on his mouth when he looks over his shoulder at Gwayne.
“So you’ve brought me your leftovers?” he says with a short, humorless laugh. “How generous of you, cousin.”
“Well, leftovers would imply that I was once his, my lord,” you call from your place on the couch, twisting your pointer finger around the golden tassel of the pillow just beside you. “And I don’t much recall belonging to anyone… It’s bad for business,” you punctuate your quip in a whisper and with a devilish grin.
Ormund gives you a realer smile this time, though it’s quickly swallowed by his usual narrow-eyed look of composure. “Well… You’ve certainly got a mouth on you, don’t you?”
“Hm…” you shrug, and let the sleeve of your gown slip from your shoulder. “So I’ve been told.”
Your glimmering look of amusement stays locked with his pale-eyed stare as he saunters slowly towards you, like a predator to prey — though you look rather pleased to be caught in comparison. So much so that Ormund struggles to tell which of you is the apex now, even as he towers over you lounging form.
“You’re very devout, I hear,” you tell him, tilting your head to your bare shoulder to study the breadth of his frame — his long legs, his ringed hands, his broad chest, his sharp jaw, his cold cold eyes. “The Faith frowns on this sort of thing, doesn’t it?”
Ormund scoffs out a laugh. “Whoring?”
“Idle hands.”
You shift on the plush cushions until you’re on your knees before him, eye level with his scabbard and the silver pomander glinting in the torchlight. You reach for his hands in a smooth, unabashed motion — palms soft against the rough skin of his knuckles as you splay his ringed fingers flat against your ribs, just beneath the swell of your breasts.
His hands go stiff beneath yours, forgetting how to move them for a moment. And though his breath catches at the foreign contact, he does not step back from you, not even when a faint red flush begins to climb up the column of his throat. His mouth parts softly as his pale eyes go lidded, and your smile sharpens at the sight of it.
“You can touch me if you like, my lord,” you tell him, smoothing your hands over his green-leather coat up towards his shoulders. “I promise I don’t bite… Unless you’d prefer that I did.”
Gwayne watches your arms curl around Ormund’s shoulders with his stomach in knots. He feels suddenly very nauseous, watching his brutish cousin rest his undeserving hands where Gwayne has lain his own a thousand times over. Even now, knowing exactly what game you’re playing and why, he wants so desperately to pull you away and take you back to the Honey Inn and drown in your silk sheets forever.
But the gods aren’t that kind, and you are far too stubborn to come with him, so he clears his throat and bids his final goodbye. “Well…” he calls into the quiet, forcing a lightness into his voice as he folds his hands behind his back and moves towards the door. “I guess I’ll leave you to it…”
“Stay,” Ormund commands in a flat voice, without once taking his eyes off yours.
Gwayne freezes mid-step. His eyes widen right before an awkward laugh sputters from his mouth. “What?” he chuckles, forced from a half-strangled throat. “You’ll surely not have much fun with me standing about, cousin—”
Ormund turns finally to face him. A hint of a pleasant smile sits on his mouth, though his eyes carry a much icier glare in comparison. “Stay,” he repeats. “It’s only fair, isn’t it? You’ve been keeping her to yourself all these years, I’ve heard. Now you’ll have your turn to watch. I find I rather like the idea of you learning what that feels like.”
A flicker of anger passes over Gwayne’s face.
Ormund’s smug grin widens. “Do sit, cousin. You’ll want a good view, I expect.”
Gwayne does not move from where he stands but does not close the scant distance between him and his escape either. He has seen what Ormund does to people who do not abide by his every command, and he is less inclined to witness it himself now — or, worst of all, have that cruelty brought upon you.
You watch the exchange with an unreadable expression and file the encounter in the back of your head for later use, should you need it. One hand drags from his shoulder to his neck, coaxing him to look your way again with gentle fingers splayed along his shaven jaw.
“Fond of an audience, are you, my lord?” you murmur to him. “I confess, I wouldn’t have guessed that about you before now.”
Ormund nods, almost pleased. “There’s a great deal about me that you couldn’t possibly guess,” he retorts in a low voice.
“Good thing I’m a quick learner then, isn’t it?”
You urge him further down and tilt your chin to meet him halfway, slotting your lips in a lingering kiss. He’s warm and firm pressed against you, though his tongue tastes of nothing more than mint leaves and well-water when you lick into his mouth; as clean and sterile as all the rest of him. So much so that you think he could probably get drunk on the Dornish wine stained on your tongue alone. And you figure that he must, the way he relaxes against you with a slow breath, planting one hand along the back of the couch to brace himself and urging you backward along with it.
Your lips part with a quiet click. You smile to yourself when Ormund attempts to chase your mouth, nudging the tip of your nose against his broader one. “Let the poor boy go,” you coo softly to him. “I don’t suspect you’ll want an audience for the things I have planned for you, my lord.”
Ormund’s broad chest warms at the promise in your words, but his stubborn will never wavers. “No… I don’t think I will.”
You try not to let your face fall completely as you scramble for another excuse that might set Gwayne free. The auburn-haired man scoffs a faint laugh from across the room. “Cousin, I—”
“You will stay,” Ormund commands. “And learn exactly how it feels to stand apart and watch.”
Something cold and heavy settles in the pit of your stomach at his words — at Gwayne’s previous warning come to life right before your eyes. “He’ll want it now,” he’d told you. “He’ll want it simply because it’s mine.” You hadn’t understood the true weight of his meaning until now, with both you and Gwayne trapped beneath the man’s easily irritable, if not dangerous temper; and watching the promise of freedom slip through your fists like grains of sand.
You replace the distant look of worry on your face with another small smile the moment Ormund turns back to you, and try hard to kiss him back without reservation when he presses his mouth to yours again. There is little restraint in him now — in the tongue he licks between your parted lips, or in the ringed hands that trace the neckline of your dress.
His fingers curl beneath the thin fabric, urging it down down down until your bare breasts are exposed to the firelight and your delicate nipples pebble in the cool air. They’re sensitive within his rough hands as he cups them in his palms. You sigh hard in place of a moan, and feel Ormund grin softly into his kiss at the sound of it. His wet mouth smears across your skin as he trails his kisses from your mouth, to your jaw, and down your neck, before planting them to your left breast.
You sit back on your haunches and cradle the back of his hand, whimpering quietly when his tongue flicks across the sensitive nipple. Your eyes fall to Gwayne’s on instinct, where he remains across the room with his jaw locked tight, his hands balled into fists, and his pale eyes flaming with a withheld rage. He feels every inch of the late hour slipping away from you both — Daeron is still waiting for him at the stables now, and soon it will be too late to flee. And somewhere beneath his fear is a simmering jealousy, as he’s forced to watch his cousin’s undeserving mouth caress your body.
Your eyes dart to the door just beside him; a silent plea for him to leave with Ormund now distracted, as his mouth trails to your right breast. Gwayne answers with a curt shake of his head, to the left and back again. He wouldn’t make it down the hall before Ormund would realize he’d gone, and the both of you would likely suffer far worse for it.
So he suffers the sight before him instead, watches Ormund’s swollen mouth pluck off your breast and kiss the breath from your lungs once more.
He pulls off of you with a rosier grin. “Alright,” he pants. “Undress me.”
And though you’ve undressed many men over the years, your fingers tremble around each clasp of his leather coat for a reason you can’t name. You struggle now to meet his gaze with as much confidence as you had moments ago, as you urge the heavy fabric from his shoulders. His tunic goes next — the lace unknotted and the hem pulled from his trousers. You tug it up and over his head until the golden canvas of his body is revealed to you, toned from years in the training yard and unblemished from years of hiding from battle.
You run your hands down his shaven chest to the sparse at his stomach, a line that leads down into his pants. You unbuckle his scabbard next and then loosen the knot at his trousers, urging the fabric down his scruffy, muscular thighs. He sighs through his nose when his cock meets the cool air of the solar. He’s a few inches shorter than Gwayne, but thicker where it counts, with veins that trail in jagged lines from the base of his cock to the soft pink tip.
“Go on…” Ormund coaxes with a nod. “Kiss it.”
He’s half-stiff and smoother than velvet when you take him in your fist. He twitches harder in your palm when you duck your head to press a languid kiss to the satin head of his cock, right before swirling your tongue under the ridge of it.
Ormund watches you from the bridge of his nose, laughing through a low moan in the back of his throat. “Look at that… She is a good whore,” he hums with a smug smile, as he cradles the crown of your head in his wide hands. “And I didn’t even have to pay her…”
His head swivels in Gwayne’s direction, where he finds the younger man still scowling by the door, mere inches away from his escape. Ormund’s grin only widens at the sight of it.
“Careful now, cousin, or I’ll start to think you’re jealous… She said it herself, didn’t she? She doesn’t belong to anyone. Bad for business… Right, dove?”
You nod with your lips still wrapped around him, suckling the sensitive tip of his cock and using the remnants of your spit to jerk the rest of him in a slow, firm fist. Ormund grumbles a moan in the back of his throat and tips his heavy head back. His toned stomach tightens as a pleasured feeling coils in the pit of it, wound tight by your expert mouth upon him.
He tries to even his wavering breaths in a feeble attempt to make the moment last — if only to make his cousin watch a little while longer — but the wet sounds of your mouth are enough to undo him. And when you reach a hand to squeeze softly at his heavy balls, he nearly bursts entirely.
“Enough—” he hears himself blurt, pulling you off by your hair. Your lips part from him with a smacking sound. The thin string of saliva connecting you to him pulls thin until it clings to your bottom lip. You peer up at him with wide, glassy eyes. His broad chest heaves with every panted breath as he fights to regain his slipping composure.
“Get out of that dress,” he commands breathlessly, lips quirking into a grin. “And get on your hands and knees.”
You feel your heart thrumming hard in your throat when you reach for the sleeves of your dress, having long slipped from your shoulders now. You slide your arms out and roll the remaining fabric down your torso. The silk pools like water at your feet when you rise to take it the rest of the way off. The air feels cool against your flaming skin, and leaves chills pebbling in its wake. When you turn to plant yourself on the couch, just as he commanded, you feel Ormund swat your ass with a less-than-kind hand.
“Facing him,” he scolds in a gentle voice. “Give him a show now, shall we?”
You settle on your hands and knees along the lush cushions, angling yourself to face the door — to face Gwayne. Your bare chest heaves at the sight of him, pretty face etched with an anger you haven’t quite seen from him before. The quiet wretchedness of a man watching a thing he loves be claimed by a hand that’s already taken so much from him, and knowing that he cannot save you from any of it.
You want so badly to tell him that this is only a means to an end — that you do still love him — but you cannot risk Ormund hearing the words aloud and cannot hide the slick of primal excitement going sticky between your thighs.
So for now, you can only hold Gwayne’s wet-eyed gaze, and hope he can read the apology written in yours.
Gwayne cannot seem to look away from it, not even when Ormund settles in just behind you, with one leg bent on the cushion and the other still planted on the floor. Not even when the man presses two long fingers at the entrance of your weeping cunt, and hums in satisfaction when they slide without friction within your sticky walls.
“Mm…” he laughs beneath your whimpering. “You are lovely, you know— wasted on this trade, if I’m honest…” He curls his fingers and feels you clench around them when he pulls them back out again. “Perhaps I’ll wash some of that sin off you tonight… Make you clean… Make you mine… Would you like that?”
He reaches around to press his pointer and middle finger to your bottom lip, still glimmering with your slick. Your mouth parts for him on instinct, and he presses them to the pad of your tongue. You nod wordlessly with his long fingers in your mouth, salty-sweet with your honey, and imagine their Gwayne’s instead.
“You’ll agree with anything I ask, won’t you?” He laughs when you nod and slides his fingers out of your mouth again. “Like I said… Good whore…”
He grabs himself in his fist and presses the head of his cock to your pulsing entrance. He pierces you slowly, and feels your eager cunt spread around him inch by inch. Your airy sigh mixes with his rumbled groan when he buries himself to the hilt, with his hips pressed flush to your ass.
“Are you watching, Gwayne?” he calls proudly to his cousin, smoothing his rough hands along the canvas of your back.
Gwayne’s fingers curl and loosen into fists at his sides as his features flicker with a choked-back rage. “I’d prefer to take my leave now, cousin,” he answers, half-strangled.
“No…” Ormund coos with a sympathetic shake of his head. “Not until she cums, anyway. So… best work quickly, dove.”
He fucks into you a second later with a sort of precision you’d expect from a man like him. His thrusts are shallow and rhythmic and methodical. His balls smack your leaking cunt with every pass, creating a lewd symphony of sex all around you — of skin clapping against skin, of panted breaths entwining. Gwayne figures the sounds of war must’ve been far less cruel than this.
Ormund braces one hand along the back of your neck, like you’re a hound to be forced into submission, while his other slithers around your hip. The pads of his fingers press hard to your clit and a cry falls from your mouth before you can help it, filling the otherwise quiet solar.
“Rather sensitive for a whore, aren’t you?” Ormund chuckles from behind you. “Because you’ve never been fucked by a man before, I’d wager. Isn’t that right, cousin?”
Gwayne’s eyes burn under the weight of his unshed tears. He has faced death a thousand times over in the past few weeks, yet none of it was quite as heart-aching as this. His rage simmers to a boil in his throat, and it feels like fire when he swallows it down again.
Ormund’s thrusts grow sloppy thereafter, led purely by the pursuit of his own pleasure. But his fingers remain merciless on your swollen clit, and a white-hot pleasure begins to swell in the pit of your stomach accordingly. You grit your teeth and clench your fingers hard around the gold arm of the lavish couch in a feeble attempt to fight it — for your own pride, and perhaps for Gwayne’s, too.
“You’re mine now,” you hear Ormund say from just behind you, choppy between his faltering thrusts. “You’ll answer to no one else’s bed but mine. From this night forward. Is that understood?”
You nod wordlessly in response, if only to appease him for the moment, and feel his hand tighten on the back of your neck.
“Say it.”
“…I understand,” you just barely manage to squeak out.
“Then cum for me.”
He presses harder on your clit. Your face twists with a pleasure you can no longer fight away. You squeeze your eyes shut when your gaze falls instinctively to Gwayne’s, and when his pained features make your chest sear with a burning feeling. Your mouth falls open in a silent moan as your cunt gushes around Ormund’s twitching cock. He thrusts into you once, hard, and shudders just against you. His rough groan mixes with the sound of your quiet whimpering as he spits ropes of warm cum into your fluttering pussy, milking him for every drop of it.
“That’s it…” he spits through gritted teeth, fucking you sloppily through the rest of his high. “Take it all— There you go…”
He swats your ass once he’s finally spent himself inside you, gripping hard at the plush skin there and forcing you flush against his scruffy thighs. A satisfied grin sits crooked at his mouth when his lidded gaze falls once more to the man across the room.
“Oh, don’t sulk, cousin,” Ormund calls to him, flushed chest still heaving. “I’ll have another whore sent up for you, if you wish.”
Gwayne flinches instantly at the very thought of it, at being with anyone else but you — at some other woman’s hands being where only yours have been, at having some other stranger’s mouth on him instead of the only one he knows by heart. His features flicker with an involuntary disgust before he can hide it.
“Oh…” Ormund grins wider. “Did you… Did you think you could have this one?”
He punctuates his question by thrusting hard into you once more. You make a pained noise in the back of your throat at your growing sensitivity; head bowed and shoulders heaving as your weeping cunt clenches around his softening cock. Ormund chuckles through another moan at the sensation.
“No. No, no— See, this one’s mine now…” Ormund continues, pale eyes icing over into a glacial sort of look. “And you’d do well to remember it, cousin… Because I’d hate for anyone to come to harm over… so small a misunderstanding, wouldn’t you say?”
Gwayne’s blood runs cold at Ormund’s promise, because he knows his cousin far too well to mistake it for anything less. And he knows now, too, that whatever escape he, Daeron, and Tessarion might’ve made tonight has long since closed in on itself, and will surely not open again while you remain under Ormund’s dangerous, unforgiving hand.
So he will stay. And he will wait for Rhaenyra’s army to march through these gates. And he will make certain that his cousin does not live to see the end of it, so long as it means that Gwayne gets to have you to himself when the ashes finally settle over Oldtown.
summary: gwayne comes to daemon before the battle at tumbleton to barter for the life of his nephew and gets you in return, the last daughter of an unremarkable house fighting for the black army, who's in want of a wealthy husband. (4k)
characters: gwayne hightower / fem!reader, daemon targaryen, ser roderick, mentions of daeron targaryen and ormund hightower
contents: enemies to lovers, arranged marraige, angst, hurt/comfort, not proofread soz cw for canon typical violence, coercion, allusions to smut 18+ (MDNI), and spoilers for hotd s3 finale!! (gif creds)
The morning hangs heavy with the promise of death. It sits thick in Gwayne’s throat and lungs the whole walk to the Black Army’s encampment. He carries with him nothing but a small hunting knife pressed to Lord Corlys’s back and a fear he cannot quite keep out of his gaze, darting wildly every which way as Daemon’s army cages him on all sides — a Winter Wolf on his left, a small Tully boy on his right, and a stranger looming on horseback; with armor fitted close to fit a woman’s frame, and with a face much too pretty for the throes of war.
“Prince Daemon,” Gwayne greets with a curt nod, still winded from the walk over as his chest heaves beneath his armor. “I’m Ser Gwayne Hightower… Well met.”
“Fuck me,” Ser Roderick laughs; a rough, ugly bark as he looks the small, auburn-haired man up and down. “I’ve seen more meat on a butcher’s knife.”
“Daemon, I must say—” Your voice follows, soft and musical and carrying easily over the distant murmur of armed men. It’s the kind of voice that might’ve belonged to a septa or a singer, if it weren’t for the ice running beneath it. “—When you said we were meeting with a Hightower, I expected someone taller than the sigil at least.”
The laughter doubles and strangles Gwayne accordingly, who is completely and utterly out of his element now. He swallows hard through a tightening throat and draws a slow breath through his nose, trying once again to steady himself — because it was not for himself that he was out here in the first place. It was for Daeron, and for the dozen other boys just like him that Ormund had lined along the front ranks to take the war’s first bite.
So Gwayne presses on, forcing an evenness into his voice that he doesn’t exactly feel beneath the death glares all around him. “My cousin, Ormund, has taken leave of his senses. As I’m sure you’re aware. He’d rather die than admit defeat—”
“And you?” Daemon lilts lazily, resting his arms along the hilt of his sword.
Gwayne’s eyes cut across the men arrayed before him, still only a fraction of the true Black host. “Well, I’m not blind… I know we will not survive the day if you attack. So… As a token of good faith… I return your Hand.”
He drops Corlys’s shackles with a heavy clinking sound, but does not take the blade from his side. The silence that follows seems to last for an eternity, until your pretty voice breaks it at last.
“Can he be a Hard with only four fingers?” you joke, tilting your head towards the old lord’s bandaged fist.
The laughter returns again. Gwayne’s icy blue eyes flits once more to you in a quick, assessing pass; he does not mean for his gaze to linger upon you, but he can’t quite manage to look away. Your armor catches in what little light breaks through the clouds overhead, carved with the intricate detailing of your house. And beneath all that heavy steel is your much softer face — beautiful and unbothered by the promise of war simmering in the heavy summer air.
There is something very wrong about you, Gwayne knows; something he can’t quite decide to be afraid of or intrigued by. A bit of both, perhaps.
“I’ve come to sue for peace,” Gwayne announces, louder now, forcing the words out over the laughter. ‘To plead with you at the behest of Daeron Targaryen.”
The amusement in Daemon’s pale eyes flickers at once, a distant warmth running cold as his thin mouth curls into a sharp grin. “The war will end when all the traitors’ heads are mounted on spikes about the King’s Gate,” the older man answers. “And not before.”
“Listen to Daeron’s entreaty,” Gwayne pleads, eyes growing wide behind the silken auburn tendrils swaying over his brows. “Divide the realm. Let the Queen rule over the Crownlands, the North, the Vale, all the lands watered by the Trident… And let Daeron rule from Oldtown—"
“Oh, gods…” Roderick groans in disgust from his left.
“He’s boring me, Daemon,” you tell the silver-haired man standing on foot before you, voice flat with a theatrical ennui that borders on girlish. “Just kill him already.”
“Do you hear that?” Daemon laughs as he turns back to Gwayne. “You’re boring her… And trust me, Ser, you do not want to see how she gets when she’s bored—”
“You jest?” Gwayne spits as his composure splinters all at once. The words seem to spill from his mouth before he can stop them, as he approaches the older man on instinct alone. “You would rather callously cast aside the lives of thousands—”
He does not get another word out before Daemon’s hand closes suddenly around his throat. The world tilts sideways as the man drags him downward in his fist. His metal glove digs hard into Gwayne’s milky white neck, cutting off just enough of his air supply to keep him conscious, though Daemon does not so much as blink at the show of strength.
“No one will rule but Rhaenyra,” Daemon tells him in a casual voice, even as Gwayne’s hands scrabble uselessly for purchase at his wrist. “The ordained Queen of the Andals, of the First Men, of beggars and thieves and cowards, like you. A new Valyria will rise from the ashes of her usurper half-brothers. And of the Hightowers of Oldtown.”
Gwayne can hardly hear him over the thunder of his pulse in his skull as black spots begin to speckle in his vision, like so many drops of ink spreading through water.
“But…” Daemon trails off. His grip on Gwayne’s neck does not loosen, but something in his eyes does. The cold burn of rage melts away into a distant look of calculation. “Since you came under the banner of peace… Perhaps I’ll give you a choice…”
Daemon turns slowly to you, peering up at you from behind the wisps of white hair blowing across his face. Gwayne’s watery, unfocused eyes follow in turn and find you watching the whole ordeal with your head tilted gently to one side. There is no horror in your face, nor an ounce of pity either.
“You said you wanted to live in a pretty castle, didn’t you?” Daemon calls to you, with a sort of fondness creeping into his voice while Gwayne turns purple under his fist. “To twirl around in pretty silk dresses, with a pretty silk husband?”
You had said it half in jest a few months past, in a hall far too to the north for anyone to remember its existence, except for when they needed its sword. You were the last living heir to a name older than most in the realm, ruling alone with more soldiers under your command than servants, when Daemon had come with his dragon asking for whatever men you could spare.
You’d given him what he asked, and when he’d wondered in turn what you wanted for it, you answered him evenly. “A castle… And a few dresses… And perhaps a husband to warm my bed— all the pretty, useless shit people like you worry about.”
You hadn’t expected to be repaid so soon, and certainly not on the battlefield on the very eve of war, with a dead man crumpling to his feet before you.
“What of it?” you say with an arched brow.
“Here’s your pretty husband,” Daemon nods his silver head down toward the man gasping in his grip. “Right here… If you want him, of course.”
Gwayne’s bleary eyes flit back to you. Through the black in his vision, he finds you studying the whole of him as if he were livestock to be appraised at market. He comes to the rather humiliating realization that he wants very badly for you to say yes — both with a primal despair of wanting to live and with the distant desperation of wanting your approval.
You scrunch the bridge of his nose. “He’s a bit puny, isn’t he?”
“A bit?” Ser Rodrick scoffs.
“Well, what he lacks in height and muscle, he makes up for twice over in wealth,” Daemon tells you. “Far wealthier than you’re like to find anywhere else, to be sure… What do you say?”
You consider for a long moment, then, despite watching Gwayne slowly slip from consciousness. He can no longer tell if it takes you one minute or one hour to decide, which you finally do with one lazy bounce of your shoulder.
“Alright.”
Daemon’s fingers loosen at once. Warm, summer air rushes back into Gwayne’s body as he crumples to his knees onto the dried grass below. The oxygen burns in his throat, his shoulders heaving as he retches. It takes a long moment for the world to come back into focus. And when it finally does, Daemon’s voice finds him again as he looms a long shadow over the kneeling man.
“Do you hear that? I will spare your life — and that of your precious nephew’s, should he bend the knee to the rightful Queen — and you will live out the rest of your days as lord husband to the new Lady of Oldtown… How does that sound?”
It sounds nothing like what Gwyane had walked out here to discuss, to be sure. He’d only meant to save Daeron’s life, and somehow bartered his own for a marriage to a woman he had known for the length of one terribly humiliating conversation. But he is still breathing, at least, and his nephew is too. And for now, that’s enough.
He nods wordlessly in response, and feels an aching in his throat when he does so.
“Thank her,” Daemon scolds like a parent would their child. When Gwayne’s bowed hands snap in his direction to make sure he’d heard him right, he feels the man take a sudden fistful of his auburn hair, wrenching him towards you again. “That was not rhetorical, Ser Gwayne— Thank your new lady wife for saving you. It’s only fair.”
Gwayne swallows hard through a raw throat and peers up at you with bleary eyes from where he kneels on the ground before you. “Thank...” he attempts to speak, but the word comes out strangled. “Thank you...”
“My lady,” Daemon reminds him.
Gwayne coughs. “M-My lady…”
You look down at him from where you idle on horseback. A small smile hints at the corner of your mouth as you hum in satisfaction. “Mm… You’re welcome, lord husband.”
You turn on your horse without so much as a backward glance, gathering the reins in your fist and looking instead toward the gates of Tumbleton — where Ormund’s men prepare their archers for the first wave of battle. “Now…” you say, grinning over your shoulder at your house’s men gathered just behind you. Your voice carries across the length of the plain. “Let’s go win this fucking war!”
The ranks roar a wordless answer in response — a ragged, joyous, bloodthirsty sound as swords beat against their shields. Gwayne hears the battlecry swell all around him, and wonders if his death would’ve been a kinder fate than what is sure to await him when the fight is done.
The wedding was done by evenfall, while smoke rose from the ashes of Tumbleton; the air still thick with the scent of blood and rot.
You exchanged vows while your armor was still splattered with the blood of the Green Army and your hair was still matted with sweat. There had been no sept, no godswood, no seven blessings, no ribbon tied around clasped hands. There was only a shaded tent, a Tumbleton septon kept alive for the very purpose of ceremony, and a scrap of parchment to sign your names — though Gwayne’s hand was still a little sore from the heavy chains wrapped around them.
No feast follows. No song, no celebration, no bedding. Because too many people had died on both sides — Ormund among them, burnt and buried in ash. And though Daeron breathes still, safe and unbloodied by sword, Gwayne wears the cost of that safety in the shackles around his wrist and waist. He was lord now, and a husband, and he did not ask to be.
He only wanted his nephew to live to see sixteen.
“So… That’s it then,” Gwayne said on an exhaled breath while a worse-for-wear Daemon shoved the old septon out by his neck. His pretty face was softened by the candlelight of the war tent, even despite the soot streaked across his face and the flaming tendrils clinging to his forehead with sweat. “Husband and wife, are we?”
“Seems that way,” you said beneath the quiet glugging of the ale you poured. The watered wine spilled slightly over the maps scattered there when you turned briefly to flash him a smile over your shoulder. “Congratulations, my lord.”
Gwayne felt a tired smile tugging at the corner of his mouth, right before a sharp breath escaped him in a sad sort of laugh. “Aren’t you concerned?” he said, pale eyes fixed on your armored form. “I’m not sure how a marriage such as this can be held up by law…”
“Oh, I’m not worried,” you assured him with a shake of your head.
“No?”
“No…” you insisted and turned back around to face him, sporting an old goblet in your bloodied fist. “Because I know you have no interest in being killed— or your nephew, besides… It’s righteous of you, really, so… You’re not going anywhere, Ser Gwayne.”
Your lips curled into a slow, sharp grin as you brought the cup to your mouth, chugging the whole of it until the soft purple wine started to drip down to your chin.
Gwayne still could not yet decide what you had planned for him — if you meant to love him truly or kill him the second you arrived at Oldtown. And a distant, disgusting part of him could not wait to find out.
Oldtown, as you’ve come to find it, smells nothing like the wet cobbles, and horse dung, and rotted wood of the half-forgotten manse you grew up in. Here, everything smells of salt and lemon trees and sun-warmed stone. It is everything you’d asked Daemon for — a large castle, enough silk to drown in, hands that tended to your every want, and a husband to warm your bed. Though you still spend most of your days in the fighting yard, tearing and sweating through whatever fine silk you’d dressed in that day.
Gwayne is still getting used to the presence of you and your men in his ancestral home, and his newfound position within it. Daeron, too, spends many weeks wary of the very sight of you — the reason for the death of his uncle, and simultaneously, the reason for his freedom. You do not ask for his forgiveness; you just put a sparring sword in his hand and ask him to give you all the brunt of the anger you know he keeps hidden.
You and your men put the sweet boy on his back more often than not, but he keeps coming back for more anyway. And somewhere in that routine, gratitude creeps in where the resentment used to live, and Daeron comes slowly around.
“Well… You’ve made a fine swordsman out of him,” Gwayne sighs without turning from the window overlooking the courtyard, where his nephew continues to spar with the northern knights. He hears you waltz by somewhere behind him, your pretty silk gown rustling at your ankles and clinging at the sweaty small of your back. “Ormund would never let the boy train this hard…”
“Daeron has good enough instincts, it seems,” you answer, tugging lazily at the lace in your bodice. “Which I find rather surprising, considering the company he grew up with…”
Gwayne finds himself smiling at the jab, far wider than he realizes. You’ve never run short of witty, merciless quips, he’s found throughout his time with you; and he finds himself taking a strange liking to the way you so effortlessly cut him down.
“And what is that supposed to mean exactly?” he says as he turns away from the window.
Whatever quip had been sitting on his tongue then, turns to ash in his throat at the sight of you — with your gown abandoned in a pile on the cobbles, and you slouched at your vanity stool in nothing but the thin slip beneath it. The fabric rises from your knee, revealing the soft canvas of your thighs. You’ve slid one arm free from the thin sleeves to bare a shoulder painted a darker shade from the fresh bruises blooming there.
Your skin is littered with scars from battles past, and he struggles to look away from any of it. His chest stings with the thought of you ever being hurt, then warms twice over at the sight of your breast threatening to spill over from where the slip had gone askew.
“You needn’t look so scandalized, husband,” you laugh as you reach for the clay pot of healing ointment, which never strays too far from your side. “Surely, you’ve seen worse than a woman’s shift… Handsome as you are.”
Gwayne’s face flushes at the compliment, and he hates how boyish he feels.
He clears his throat and averts his gaze, folding his clammy palms behind his back. “I only find myself surprised, I guess, at how… little you seem to mind it, is all.”
“Mind what? The bruises?” you scoff, dabbing the ointment along your shoulder and hissing at how tender the skin has gone. “I’ve had far worse from far better fights, I assure you. Maybe one day I’ll show you the scar on my—”
“Modesty,” Gwayne blurts before you can finish. “I meant modesty…”
“Oh…” you hum, face screwing faintly as you work the earthy salve in slow circles. “I never had much use for modesty, I suppose… A keep with more soldiers than servants doesn’t have much of it, in truth…”
You reach back then, trying hopelessly to work the balm into the worst of the bruise along your shoulder blade, but the angle is not so forgiving. You huff and twist and achieve nothing but a fresher ache for the trouble.
Gwayne exhales a sympathetic sigh from across the room. “Here…” he huffs as he crosses the distance between you, reaching out an expectant hand when he looms just behind your chair.
You consider arguing for a moment, if only out of habit, but place the clay pot into his pale palm regardless. “Try not to enjoy it too much,” you joke with a small grin tugging at your mouth.
“I make no promises, my lady,” he quips in a low deadpan.
But even his sarcasm cannot mask the tenderness he holds in his hands when they find your shoulder, working the ointment in with a care you didn’t know he was capable of — a care you didn’t know you were deserving of. The pad of his thumb smooths slowly over the worst of the bruise, and you feel something soften in your chest.
“You’re better at this than I would’ve guessed,” you tell him, if only to fill the suffocating silence pressing hard on either side of you.
“I’ve had ample practice with bruises of my own,” Gwayne confesses, lifting his eyes to peer at you through the smudged looking glass. “I didn’t come into this marriage entirely unmarked, if you recall…”
“Mm… I do recall,” you croon lowly, as though amused by the memory. Your head tips back to grin up at him with a fond reminiscence. “You were very purple. And very sore… For weeks… It was delicious…”
Gwayne shakes his head. “Well, you’ll forgive me if I don’t find the memory as amusing as you do…”
“I find everything amusing,” you scoff.
“I know you do,” he huffs a not-quite laugh. “Honestly, it’s among the things I’ve come to… appreciate about you, I suppose.”
Your eyes narrow in suspicion of his compliment. “Careful, Ser Gwayne… A lady could get ideas, hearing you talk like that…”
“Really?” the man hums, still working gently at your bruised skin. “And what ideas are those, I wonder?”
You do not answer him with words. Instead, you rise slowly from the creaking vanity stool until you’re stood just before him. Then you reach for the remaining sleeve of your slip and trail it down your arm until you’re free of it; until the thin fabric falls to your feet in a forgotten piece of cotton; until you’re stood utterly bare before him — made of warm skin, soft curves, and faded scars. There’s one at your sternum, a longer one at your hip, and a darker one along your ribcage.
Gwayne’s breath catches audibly in his throat. The composure he’s spent weeks holding onto — full of dry wit and careful distance and a week’s worth of telling himself this was a political arrangement and nothing more — seems to abandon him all at once. His glassy eyes drift over your naked form, and he feels some warm, boyish feelings sparkling somewhere deep in his chest.
It takes everything in you not to cower — not because you are ashamed at his staring, you’ve never been ashamed of anything, but because you have never once been looked at with so much reverence.
“Do you get the hint now, Ser Gwayne?” you quip drily as you close the scant distance between you. Your palms splay over the chest of his emerald coat and drift slowly upward until they settle cold along his warm neck, dragging him down with a little more force than necessary.
You kiss him then like you’ve kissed him a thousand times over, like you’ve kissed a thousand men a thousand times over. There is little reservation in the way you slot your lips against his, or in the way you lick into his mouth and sigh hard through your nose at the taste of him — like mint and wine and whatever fruit he’d been snaking on before you found him here.
His mouth is far softer than your own, you realize, a far gentler touch than you think you’ve ever felt before. He spreads one wide hand along your back, pressing your bare chest flush against his clothed one, while his other trails down down down the ladder of your spine.
Your breath nearly catches when his calloused palm settles warm along the plush of your ass; you lose it completely when he grabs a fistful of the skin to pull you closer.
You rise onto the tip of your toes, curling your arms around his neck while your noses knock under the weight of your searing kiss — which breaks only when Gwayne’s knee slots between your thighs, and when the rough fabric of his trousers brushes the most sensitive part of you.
His rosy mouth curls into a slow grin at the pretty sound you make for him then.
“Yes. To answer your question…” the man quips through panted breaths, with the tip of his nose brushing the bridge of yours. “I believe I am starting to get the hint, my lady.”
summary: your lawyer can talk to my lawyer.
pairing: ormund hightower x ex-wife!reader
content/warnings: social media au, modern au, custody matters, legal intimidation, parental conflict
A/N: when you have a day finally to do anything you want and you spend it working on this series 🤲 y'all when inspiration hits you gotta take hold of it. also my job working in the email factory finally paid off for this chapter.
MASTERLIST
FROM: Mara Mormont <[email protected]>
TO: Aaron Cuy <[email protected]>
DATE: 12 March 2026, 09:05
SUBJECT: Hightower Dissolution - Settlement Conference
Mr. Cuy,
Following up again from last week’s call. My client remains prepared to proceed with dissolution privately and cooperatively, and we would like to schedule an initial settlement conference within the next two weeks. We have provided a number of available days and still we have not received a date on which Mr. Hightower or his counsel is prepared to participate.
While I appreciate that Mr. Hightower has a busy schedule, my client filed her petition several weeks ago and there are practical matters arising from the parties’ separation that require immediate attention, including temporary parenting arrangements. Mrs. Hightower remains willing to address these issues privately. However, repeatedly postponing an initial conference does not serve either party and is creating unnecessary uncertainty for her and the children.
Please provide your availability for a conference call (Zoom is fine) within the next five business days. If Mr. Hightower is unwilling to participate during that period, please confirm his position in writing so that we may advise our client accordingly.
Best,
Mara Mormont
Counsel for Reader Hightower
FROM: Ormund Hightower <[email protected]>
TO: Aaron Cuy <[email protected]>
DATE: 12 March 2026 10:14
SUBJECT: FWD: Hightower Dissolution - Settlement Conference
Decline
Sent from my iPhone
FROM: Aaron Cuy <[email protected]>
TO: Mara Mormont <[email protected]>
DATE: 15 March 2026, 14:43
SUBJECT: RE: Hightower Dissolution - Settlement Conference
Ms. Mormont,
Thank you for the follow-up. Mr. Hightower does not accept that the marriage is beyond reconciliation and has instructed us not to take steps towards negotiating a final settlement while he continues to believe the parties’ separation can be resolved privately. Accordingly, we will not be scheduling a settlement conference.
Should his position change, we will contact you.
Regards,
Aaron Cuy
FROM: Mara Mormont <[email protected]>
TO: Aaron Cuy <[email protected]>
DATE: 15 March 2026, 15:52
SUBJECT: RE: Hightower Dissolution - Settlement Conference
Mr. Cuy,
To be clear, Mrs. Hightower’s petition for the dissolution of their marriage isn’t reliant upon Mr. Hightower’s feelings. She has repeatedly stated that she does not consider the separation temporary and she does not intend to withdraw her petition.
If Mr. Hightower is declining to participate voluntarily in settlement discussion, we will proceed accordingly. In the meantime, both parties still require interim arrangements concerning the children and other matters that cannot reasonably be deferred on the basis of Mr. Hightower’s desire for reconciliation.
Please confirm whether Mr. Hightower will engage in those discussions.
Regards,
Mara Mormont
FROM: Ormund Hightower <[email protected]>
TO: Aaron Cuy <[email protected]>
DATE: 15 March 2026, 16:01
SUBJECT: FWD: Hightower Dissolution - Settlement Conference
No
Sent from my iPhone
FROM: Portia Beesbury <[email protected]>
TO: Reader Hightower <[email protected]>
DATE: 16 March 2026, 08:24
SUBJECT: Friday
Good morning,
Mr. Hightower has asked that I confirm dinner for Thursday evening. A car will collect you at 19:00 and the reservation is at 19:30. He sent a gown to the London penthouse that should be presently with alterations he has requested you wear.
The nanny will collect the children from the penthouse after Alerie’s riding lesson and the driver will take them back to Surrey for the weekend.
Best,
Portia
FROM: Reader Hightower <[email protected]>
TO: Portia Beesbury <[email protected]>
CC: Mara Mormont <[email protected]>
DATE: 16 March 2026, 10:21
SUBJECT: RE: Friday
Portia,
Can you tell Ormund that I did not agree to dinner? And please remind him that if he wants to talk about the kids he needs to go through Aaron. I’m sorry you’re stuck in the middle of this and just doing your job but he needs to stop. Also, tell him Alerie and Edmund are not going back to Surrey.
- Reader
FROM: Portia Beesbury <[email protected]>
TO: Reader Hightower <[email protected]>
CC: Mara Mormont <[email protected]>
DATE: 16 March 2026, 10:43
SUBJECT: RE: Friday
Mrs. Hightower,
I understand. I will pass this along to Mr. Hightower.
Best,
Portia
FROM: Portia Beesbury <[email protected]>
TO: Ormund Hightower <[email protected]>
DATE: 16 March 2026, 10:44
SUBJECT: FWD: Friday
Mr. Hightower,
Reader has asked I let you know she will be declining your invitation to dinner for Friday and she is also planning on the children staying in London this weekend. Shall I cancel the reservation and the children’s driver?
Best,
Portia
FROM: Ormund Hightower <[email protected]>
TO: Portia Beesbury <[email protected]>
CC: Aaron Cuy <[email protected]>
DATE: 16 March 2026, 10:56
SUBJECT: FWD: Friday
Keep reservation and driver. Alerie and Edmund are coming home this weekend
Sent from my iPhone
FROM: Mara Mormont <[email protected]>
TO: Aaron Cuy <[email protected]>
DATE: 20 March 2026, 19:12
SUBJECT: Parenting Schedule
Mr. Cuy,
It is my understanding that, despite Mrs. Hightower informing both Mr. Hightower and his office that Alerie and Edmund were to remain with her in London this weekend, the children were nevertheless transported to Surrey this afternoon. My client, their mother, did not consent to those plans. She was sufficiently concerned upon learning that the children had been removed from London contrary to her express instruction that she considered contacting the police. I advised her against taking that step while counsel attempted to resolve the matter directly.
Until the parties involved have reached an interim parenting agreement, neither should be changing arrangements concerning the children, especially after the other has objected. Mrs. Hightower is requesting that Alerie and Edmund be returned to London first thing tomorrow morning and that any further changes to their schedule be discussed through counsel in advance. Mr. Hightower's continued refusal to engage is now creating precisely the conflict we have repeatedly sought to avoid. Can we please work together to prevent this from going public? I think that is in the best interests of both of our clients.
Please confirm by 20:00 tonight that the children will be returned tomorrow morning.
Best,
Mara Mormont
FROM: Aaron Cuy <[email protected]>
TO: Mara Mormont <[email protected]>
DATE: 20 March 2026, 19:59
SUBJECT: RE: Parenting Schedule
Ms. Mormont,
If Mrs. Hightower truly intends to seek a formal parenting arrangement through the dissolution proceedings, Mr. Hightower is prepared to pursue an order preserving the children’s primary residence in Surrey, together with their current schooling, household staff, security, and other care. I would also remind you that, should Mrs. Hightower elect to proceed with contested dissolution, Mr. Hightower intends to enforce the parties’ prenuptial agreement in full, which includes full custody terms, in case Mrs. Hightower has forgotten.
The children will remain in Surrey through Sunday evening, consistent with their usual schedule.
Regards,
Aaron Cuy
FROM: Mara Mormont <[email protected]>
TO: Reader Hightower <[email protected]>
DATE: 20 March 2026, 20:02
SUBJECT: FWD: Parenting Schedule
See below and please do not call Ormund again tonight. Just try and sleep tonight. We should speak tomorrow morning before you make any decisions regarding the children. Let’s walk through the prenup terms again before we decide how we want to move forward on the divorce. Hang in there, okay?
Mara
YOU HAVE THREE (3) NEW VOICEMAILS.
20 March 2026, 17:45.
"Ormund. Call me back right now. I-I just got home and I--fuck, are you fucking serious? Where are they? I literally just told you they were staying in London for the weekend. This is kidnapping, and I-- Jesus Christ, are you serious? Call me right fucking now, or I swear to God..."
20 March 2026, 17:48.
"Sophie just texted me that Alerie and Edmund are already back in Surrey. I explicitly told you no. Why are you doing this to me? You need to bring them back, or get Sophie to bring them back, or...or I-I don't know. I'm getting in my car right now, and if you don't answer in the next five minutes, I'm showing up with the police."
20 March 2026, 17:53.
"Ormund, I never said you couldn't see them. I-I just wanted one weekend with them here and you-- you just can't keep doing whatever you want because you think...you think I'm going to give up. I'm not. They're my kids, too. Please...please just let them call me. Okay? Can you just give them the phone and have them call me? Please."
summary: ormund gets a blowjob and opens up a little bit
word count: 3k
a/n: sorry this took so long, struggled with it a bit lol, hope you enjoyyyy, it's smutty and fluffy!
cw: smuttttt, oral sex m receiving, a bit of emotional intimacy lmaooo, fingering
please do not repost my writing anywhere or feed it to any AI/LLMs, I do not authorize!
lace divider by @/strangergraphics, star line divider by @/strangergraphics-archive, green heart/pearly divider by me
From the moment you met Ormund it was painfully obvious that the man worked too much. He’d thrown himself into work after his divorce and, wile being a perfectionist made him difficult sometimes, it had also recently earned him a promotion to department head that came with a considerable raise.
Still, it proved difficult for him to let go a little bit now that he was higher on the hierarchy and would sometimes stay late at work when he absolutely did not need to. Finally, he listened to your begging and took the week off, he had enough PTO to be off for about a month but you compromised on five days. Ormund spent the first four days perfecting the method he now used everytime he was between your thighs.
It’s funny, he was practically unrecognizable from the man you met a few months ago; he was no longer the guy who wouldn’t dream of even discussing oral sex, now he was insatiable. He would cage you in practically anywhere and remove whatever obstacle stood between his mouth and your core, sometimes so excited that he’d manhandle you a little without realizing… It would only make you wetter when he did, and your imagination would run wild while he savored you and made you see stars with nothing but his tongue and thick fingers.
But the week was practically over and he was finally sleeping in a little later than the days before, you woke up before him around 7:30, deciding to move to the kitchen, have some coffee and work a little while he slept, but by 9:30 he still hadn’t emerged. So you peered through the door, still debating whether to wake him.
He looked so peaceful, probably because he hasn’t slept in for this long for a while, but something else caught your attention, something you’d been trying your best to ignore almost every time you woke up before him. He was hard. It’s not out of the ordinary but more and more lately, you find yourself wishing you could see it… touch it, suck it, anything, really.
Ormund had said a few days ago that you could suck him off “tomorrow”, but you didn’t press it the day after he said that because you just didn’t want to seem pushy. Today, however, is another day. He’ll be well rested when he wakes up and there’s a bonus with the fact that he is a morning person… Maybe today is your lucky day.
Tip toeing, you spritzed some of your daily perfume and crawled on the bed, slowly cuddling up to him.
“Orm...” You whispered, stroking his hair while you peppered his face with kisses, your other hand rubbing his chest and arms up and down.
It took him a moment but he eventually opened his eyes, smiling sleepily at you.
“Morning.” He said, pulling you on top of him to kiss and fondle you a bit, something he’d been more open to doing without feeling the need to ask permission every single time, slowly but surely. The kiss got unusually heated, you could feel the outline of him poking at your belly, he really was relaxed, because normally he would’ve pulled you off him by now.
“Baby?” You asked, pulling away from his mouth, your tone whiny and needy.
“Yeah?” He breathed heavily.
“Can I please, pretty please, suck you off?” The best doe eyes you could muster were doing most of the work for you, but your perfume really triggered something primal in him even if he pretended otherwise.
Ormund laughed at your plight, but he also eventually sighed, considering your request.
“It’ll feel so, so good… You can cum in my mouth too...” You rubbed up on him like a cat, caressing him all over while you kissed his neck.
“Jesus… it’s like 9 in the morning, you filthy girl.” Ormund tsked, caressing your lower lip, his resolve crumbling quickly.
“You yourself told me, an orgasm in the morning makes your day better or whatever.” You begged, still kissing and nipping on his neck tortuously slow. “You’re so hard already, I can be quick… please?”
He looked at the clock on his phone, then back at you. “You got 15 minutes.” He warned sternly, yet playfully.
You giddily lowered yourself along with his sweats and briefs and finally, you saw it in all its glory… The length of him was red, swollen and curved slightly upwards, your thoughts flew immediately to how he’ll feel inside you when he hits that perfect spot with no problem… Snapping out of it quickly, you focused on the bead of pre-cum that rested on the tip, salivating at the sight of seeing it fully, standing proud. You turned your sights to Ormund, who looked amused at your reaction.
Without breaking eye contact, you let the saliva that had gathered in your mouth, drip down on your palm, and gave him an experimental tug.
“Tell me if I do something you don’t like, okay?” You said as you slid further down, your face finally right above him, Ormund only nodded. “Relax, close your eyes and let me do the rest.”
You kept stroking him for a while as you gave him kitten licks or sucked lightly on the tip, unable to help yourself at teasing him now that you could have your way with him. Slowly you started taking more of him in, savoring the taste and getting lost in making him feel good, he was trying not to make too much noise but his uneven breath and the soft moans that slipped out only spurred you on.
“Oh god, oh god, oh god-” Ormund muttered under his breath as if it pained him while you continued working on him. While he was semi-hard at the start of the morning, you were now feeling the full weight of him as you sucked on him and decided to come up for air for a moment, a string of saliva connecting you to his cock.
He saw what he’d been missing out on and he adored it: you, hair and face wrecked and mouth eager, wild mischievous eyes that promised him you weren’t done with him quite yet, the glistening spit around your mouth and swollen lips, breathing like you’d been running a marathon.
It was the best fucking thing he’d ever laid his eyes on, it turned him on even more, if that was possible, and worse: It made him want to throw all caution out the window and beg to have the privilege to sheath himself inside you.
But even if you did look eager, he knew it would be too much for today, so he only spoke the one thing he was sure of. “You’re so fucking beautiful.” He spat harshly, his breathing heavy as he screwed his eyes shut and concentrated on lasting just a little longer. Then he adjusted, now leaning on his elbows so he could continue getting a good look at you, opening his eyes back up and concentrating on his breathing.
Still stroking him, you praised, “I could just swallow you whole, baby. You taste so good…” You put him back on your mouth, swirling your tongue while you moved up and down, hollowing your cheeks and picking up your pace.
It wasn’t lost on him how your other hand traveled between your legs as you now sought relief for yourself as well. “Are you- fuck, that’s it-” He hissed. “Are you touching yourself?” He asked with disbelief as a moan tore through him.
“Mmmhhmm” You tried replying, slowing down as you now made eye contact with him and swirled your tongue.
“That’s so obscene, baby…” He was thinking out loud at this point, the filter had been thrown out the window with whatever decorum he had left after four straight days of eating pussy several times a day, and now an eager woman with his dick in her mouth. Ormund was right, it was obscene and he was enjoying it so much. “Oh god, you’re so good to me…”
This whole thing started because wanted him to get a taste of how it was to have your mouth on him but now you also really wanted to hear how he sounded when he came, and you wanted to swallow every single drop of him. That would keep you sane until you finally have sex. The mere thought of having him inside you made you a little crazy, raking your nails through his stomach.
The combination of sensations was really doing it for him as he adjusted again. “Fuck, all of this for me? Keep doing that thing, just like that…” He whispered desperately.
You were pleasantly surprised at how vocal he was, it even made you wonder if thoughts similar to these swirled around in his mind when he would eat you out, it seemed almost equally pleasurable, and you could relate. Still multitasking both of your pleasure, you kept rubbing at your own clit to relieve some of the pressure caused by hearing the pretty sounds coming out of his mouth... and the taste... and weight on him... The wait had really done a number on you, you had never been so desperate to give someone a blowjob and yet, today you had begged for it.
“Goddddd, I need to see your pretty face.” He leaned towards you, one of his hands getting your hair out of your face and gathering the rest of it away from you. “Let me see you… Please… That’s it… Oh, you’re so mean...” His head leaned back, looking at the ceiling as you hollowed your cheeks, sucking him harder into your mouth.
When he started groaning you knew you were close to the finish line, the hand keeping your hair out of your face tightening its grip as his breathing came in faster and faster, so you picked up the pace.
“I’m-” Ormund tried warning you, but it was too late, though you didn’t mind... You looked back at him as you felt the warm and slightly bitter liquid engulf your mouth as you continued sucking, swallowing every drop he had to offer. He kept his eyes open just barely and you basked in the glory of just how beautiful he looked back at you as he came, his grip on your hair loosening in the aftermath and turning into gentle stroking while he regained his senses.
Pulling you up to face level, he smiled, his shaky hands getting your hair away from your face.
“Thank you.”
He looked at you with so much adoration that it made you feel naked, your cheeks reddening as you looked away.
“Oh, now you’re shy?” Ormund teased, turning your face back to him softly with his thumb. He kissed you so gently… as if you were going to break if he wasn’t careful.
You pulled away just to tease him back. “Oh, first I’m too dirty and now I’m too shy? There’s just no pleasing you…”
“I’m learning a lot about myself lately, maybe I find it kinda hot, that you’re a bit of a pervert.” He admitted.
You laughed so hard that you startled him a little. “I’ve been taking it easy on you precisely because you’re getting to know yourself, but if I’m completely honest… Ormund, you haven’t begun to see how much of a pervert I am.”
“So you truly are here just to corrupt me then?”
“I guess I am, we’ll see eventually if it’s working.”
“Oh, it’s working.” He flipped you over.
“Is it? How will I know?” You demanded.
“Want me to paint the picture for you?” Ormund’s knuckles traced your skin, lowering to where he was needed.
“Please do.” You begged as he slipped his hand inside your panties, his fingers teasing you.
He kissed your neck, biting softly as he started fingering you slowly, his thumb circling your clit.
Ormund whispered, “You’re still so wet. The smell of it gets me so fucking hard, knowing that your body needs me, that you need me, drives me insane… You drive me insane.” He added a second finger, keeping the same pace.
“Keep going, please?” You pleaded as he started curling his fingers inside you.
“Makes me wanna slide down and make you cum on my tongue until you can’t remember how to talk- That’s it baby, squeeze me, I know you’re close. You wanna cum on my fingers?” He feigned concern.
“Hmm-yes, please- can I?”
“Of course honey, whatever you need…” He focused on your face as he adjusted his fingers, curling them slightly higher in the way he now knew always undid you. And it did.
It was all of it, the blowjob, his words, how he’d learned your body to perfection and knew exactly what to do…
“Oh god-”
“There you go, I got you.” He encouraged.
Ormund held you down as you rode it out, trembling in his arms as he continued his ministrations and sucked a love bite on the side of your neck.
It took you a while to come down fully, but when you did he was stroking your hair gently once more and still looking at you with that same adoration from before. This time you didn’t look away.
After a day of running errands, you both crashed and took a nap in the evening only for you to wake up to several texts in a newly created group chat named 'intervention'.
Your girlfriends felt a mix of emotions but mostly they were scolding you for basically ghosting or canceling on most outings for the past four months. They also wanted details of your new relationship and why it was so all-encompassing, worried you may have fallen into an abusive situation.
They were so wrong about the abuse, of course, but reality hit you as you read all of their texts. It was true that you and Ormund had created this cocoon of safety which you had been living in for months: You barely slept in your own apartment anymore... mostly staying at his place, you worked from there as well and you both prepared meals for each other, you also cleaned up together and were practically acting out what living together was.
All at the four month mark, and you still hadn't had sex yet. Sure, last night was a big step, and it would probably be followed by a lot of mutual masturbation, face fucking or even 69'ing if you could convince Ormund... but the next logical step was for you both to finally have sex.
And once you had sex, combined with all of the domesticity... well... that's just all too fast for you.
So you untangled yourself from your... boyfriend? That's another thing, you haven't really formalized what you and Ormund have. Neither of you have asked, you just fell into a comfortable... whatever, and that whatever should have a name by now. Especially if you're practically living together.
The early glow of the honeymoon phase had taken you by storm so hard that you found yourself distancing yourself from your main support system: your girlfriends.
Talking to them was definitely necessary, but first, you had to get out of here. Suddenly you were very hot and it was getting difficult to breathe.
Ormund stirred awake as you were hastily gathering up some stuff and ordering an Uber, you only needed the few essential items you'd been keeping here.
"Hey, what's going on?" Ormund asked groggily, genuinely wondering if the evening after taking another big step in your relationship should look like this.
"Um, I just- I'm gonna go home, haven't been there in a while." You explained, gathering all your stuff and trying not to make him feel as freaked out as you were. "I like my apartment and I… I think we should have some space. Also I need a girl's night."
"I mean, that was always allowed." Ormund challenged softly.
"Oh, please, you are super clingy, you want me all to yourself! I haven't seen my friends or slept in my own bed in weeks..." You replied.
"I have never, not once, forced you to stay here." Ormund got up then, a glint of mischief in his eyes as he circled over to you. "You're the one that insisted on staying because you... want to fuck me."
He'd never said it like that prior to today, always calling it 'sex' or 'sleeping together' but the activities from this morning truly worked wonders, even giving him a confidence boost. He could be dirty too. A little.
You almost sold your disbelief with the baffled sigh that came out of your mouth. Almost.
"That's right, I know what you've been doing. The night dress that rides up and oh surprise i guess I'll just have a look at you bare and then cover you myself even if I'm painfully hard? or the practically transparent camisole and the thinnest panties I have ever seen? Baby, they must be uncomfortable..." He towered over you with a look you didn't quite know what to do with.
The red hue of your cheeks was poorly hidden as you looked away, still gathering your stuff.
"Even if that were true... I still need to go home today."
Ormund would constantly let you be the one in charge, let you surprise him and teach him, and you would continue to do so. But he could read you easily as well.
He stopped you, pulling you closer to him as he looked at you teasingly. "You're freaking out about us." He stated, leaning down and kissing you deeply, his tongue forcing itself into your mouth, and you allowed it.
When he pulled away he looked almost proud, as if it was now his time to surprise you.
"Go home then. Freak out some more, have a girl's night... hell, have a girl's weekend if that's what you need. I'll be here when you're ready to talk."
Ormund kissed you chastely this time, caressing your cheek while you looked at him nervously.
"I'm taking a shower, lock the door when you leave, baby."
summary: how ormund treats his pregnant wife...and just how insufferably possessive, indulgent, and devoted he becomes.
pairing: ormund hightower x pregnantwife!reader (implied to be targtower!reader)
content/warnings: 18+ (mdni), SMUT, pregnancy sex, breeding kink, reproductive control, controlling behavior, grooming, body worship, oral sex (f recieving), obsessive behavior
word count: 1.2k
A/N: just something short and sweet! sorry if this sucks tbh i wrote half of it stuck in the atlanta airport TGI Friday's on my phone but wanted to get you all something!! technically headcanons for COB universe but can be read separately :)
CUSTODY OF BLOOD MASTERLIST
Ormund Hightower, who has made a habit of fucking his wife’s pretty little cunt every single day since their marriage. He spent so long denying himself, denying you, of the pleasure shared between man and woman that he often feels as though he is making up for lost time. So he takes his husbandly rights whenever he can: first thing in the morning upon waking, after the midday meal between meetings, before attending a feast, after returning from one, in the bath, before bed, and whenever else he can get his hands on you.
Ormund Hightower, who has trained you perfectly in how to take him. Never so greedy or eager that you might behave like some common whore, but never so prudish that you resemble a septa, either. He likes that you still blush whenever he whispers filthy things into your ear, his stiffening cock pressed against your backside in the dead of night. Likes the little gasp you make when the leaking head nudges against your entrance. Likes that you still stutter over the words he commands you to say while his hips grind into you, his cock dragging so sweetly in and out of your fluttering pussy.
“Say it, sweet girl,” he whispered, his lips skimming the shell of your ear. “Tell me how your lord’s cock feels inside you.”
You whimpered at the words and turned your face into the pillow. “P-please, Ormund…”
Ormund tutted, taking your chin in his hand and turning your face back toward him. His lips brush yours as he speaks against them. “You know you mustn’t keep secrets from me. Tell me plainly or I shall stop.”
“It feels– aah–” you whined as the head of him dragged against that spongy place inside you that always makes you feel as though you have been set aflame. “It feels so…so b-big…so good…”
Ormund Hightower, who has also made a habit of keeping careful count of your moon’s blood. He has a private ledger dedicated to recording when it begins and ends, how long it lasts, and every little symptom you present. It is his duty as your husband, after all, to know every part of your life…including the workings of your body. And because he knows you inside and out, he knows when you are most fertile.
It is quite easy to tell, really. You become restless in his arms at night and squirm beneath the covers until your ass is grinding against his stiffening cock. During the day, you follow him from chamber to chamber, finding any excuse to take his hand or press sweet little kisses to his cheek. In truth, it is adorable to Ormund because you do not even understand what your body is trying so desperately to tell him.
Thus, with these two habits combined, it should come as no surprise when, scarcely two months into your marriage, the maester examines you after a week of persistent nausea and confirms that you are with child.
Ormund Hightower, who you believe has never been happier than when he hears the maester utter those words. He pulls you into a tight embrace before the maester has even left the room, peppering kisses all over your face and telling you how proud he is that you took his strong seed so well. He is not surprised, though…he would never question the Seven’s decision to validate the strength of your bond. To Ormund, this is the ultimate proof that what exists between you has been divinely blessed.
Ormund Hightower, who wastes no time beginning any and all preparations. The very day you learn you are with child, he commissions a beautiful, intricately carved wooden cradle for the babe. The Hightower crest at one end, the Seven-Pointed Star at the other. No dragons, of course. By putting his child inside you, Ormund believes he has finally purged you of every lingering trace of the dragon. You are a Hightower, now. You are his.
Little trinkets follow soon after. Embroidered gowns for the babe (all in Hightower green), a golden rattle, a bejeweled prayer book, a tiny silver cup. Ormund often warns against indulgence. Excess is unbecoming, idols should only be the righteous Seven. But...you and your child are the exception.
Ormund Hightower, who immediately insists that any and all responsibilities of yours be canceled. You are carrying his child, and your only duty now is ensuring that you, the beautiful mother blessed with his seed, are rested, comfortable, and cared for. That means no more long walks to the sept with only your women accompanying you. No more riding the beautiful mare he gifted you. No more waking early. No more long feasts with too many guests. No more standing for too long.
But with Ormund’s restrictions, of course, come gifts. Beautiful gowns tailored specifically to accentuate your growing belly. A new feather mattress and mountains of pillows after you complain that your back aches. Whatever little comfort you desire, he gives to you without hesitation. You become spoiled in your gilded cage. If you mention craving something sweet, a dozen honeycakes are delivered to your chambers within the hour. If Ormund hears you humming a tune, musicians are summoned to entertain you while you sit beside him in the solar. If you so much as admire another lady’s necklace, one even more beautiful, more expensive, and dripping with jewels appears soon after to rest against your newly swelling bosom. It is your reward, isn’t it? For fulfilling the Mother’s greatest purpose for you.
Ormund Hightower, who absolutely worships your changing body. Your growing belly, your heavy breasts, the new softness gathering around your hips…it is all completely intoxicating to him. If he could hardly keep his hands off you before, he certainly cannot now. His palm is constantly resting over your belly, almost as if he is proudly displaying his handiwork whenever he introduces you to some lord or lady. “Does Lady Hightower not carry motherhood beautifully?”, he says. Or, even better, said with that unbearably smug little smile of his: “A perfect image of the Mother in her truest form, my wife.”
Ormund Hightower, who, naturally, cannot seem to stop fucking you either. He loves to take your swollen breasts into his mouth and suckle softly at your sensitive nipples, nearly coming undone at the mere thought that soon they will grow heavy with milk meant to nourish his child.
Your cunt has somehow become even more swollen, even wetter…and, best of all, your scent has changed. Ormund knows everything about you, including that. The scent of you– heady, a little musky, with something unmistakably you beneath it– has always been one of his favorite things. But now? Something about it has changed. It is richer now, sweeter. Almost divine.
He becomes addicted to it. He can hardly keep his mouth away from you, his tongue pressing insistently at your entrance while his nose nudges against your clit, and he just cannot stop inhaling, his lungs filling with you as if he would perish without it.
And, of course, he quickly develops a new favorite way of taking you. Curled together on your sides, your back pressed tightly to his chest, a pillow tucked carefully beneath your growing stomach while his cock moves slowly inside you. One arm holds you against him while his other hand spreads possessively across your belly, stroking the unmistakable proof of what he has done.
Ormund Hightower, who already has heirs from his previous marriage– all grown young men now– but knows your child is different. His sons were welcomed into the world with all the pride expected of Lord Hightower. This babe, however, is treated as though the Seven themselves have placed a miracle inside your womb. This is not merely another child to him; his sons were duty. This, though? This is obsession made flesh. Divine intervention. Love. Victory over the sins of every insidious Targaryen forefather who came before you.
And, more importantly than any of that, this child is different because you are its mother.
