PSA to fan creators who don't have a lot of regular contact with children: They are almost always bigger than you think. A 1-year-old baby may already be walking. A toddler is likely already hip-high. A 10-year-old may already be taller than at least one of their parents. A 14/15 year old may already have reached their adult height.
At long last, here is the finished part one of the Rhaella AU, aka what if Rhaella had marched to Summerhall in search of her son and followed that same call through a doorway!
x~x~x
The king before her reminded Rhaella of her father in his final days: frail and tired, his hand sheathed in a black glove that rested atop a golden cane for balance. His smile was kind, as her father’s had been, yet that kindness had not spared her a marriage to her brother.
Though she knew that King Viserys was not yet forty, he looked a decade older, but he straightened as they approached, assuming a kingly air.
“Your Grace, may I present my daughter, Lady Rhaella.”
Whereas her new father was nothing alike the one she knew before. Dyano Durolis was an oiled and perfumed magister of Pentos, his family among the forty from which the Prince of Pentos was chosen. His light blond hair hung loose in his customary curls, his mustache twirled to a point, though his beard was kept short. He was a loud, boisterous man, with ambitions greater than his wit could carry, which was why he had brought her across the Narrow Sea.
Rhaella did not care a whit about either his wit or ambition. What mattered was that he had brought her to King’s Landing, to her son.
“Lady Rhaella,” the king said warmly as she straightened from her curtsy, extending his other hand toward her to beckon her close for a kiss of greeting to the cheek. “It is a pleasure to meet you, cousin.”
“And you, Your Grace,” she said before switching to High Valyrian. “I have always longed to see the splendors of my mother’s homeland. Your invitation was most welcome.”
The king’s smile brightened and he responded in kind. “Your Valyrian is lovely—if you are not careful, I may steal you from your father as a tutor for my sons.”
Her father forced a laugh. “But of course it is not only my daughter’s High Valyrian that brings us to your court. Will we be meeting Prince Daemon as well?”
“My brother is not unlike the wild dragons of Dragonstone,” the king said wryly. “Particularly where marriage is involved. He is prone to flight whenever I inform him that I have found a new potential match. I can promise no more than an introduction, and accommodation in one of the guest chambers within the Red Keep.”
“Your Grace is too kind,” her father said, though his smile was strained.
Rhaella did not know precisely what he hoped to achieve with a match. Coin, perhaps, or favors back home. If the magisters believed her loyal enough to the city where she had been raised, then perhaps they hoped to claim the protection of House Targaryen and its dragons.
Dragons.
It did not yet seem real to Rhaella that she lived in a time of dragons. Daemon Targaryne’s mount Caraxes was well known, as were their exploits in the Stepstones. Her son had one, she knew, as did her son’s twin brother, the one named Jon.
Which of my babies would you have been? My little Daeron?
He was not truly her son, of course, however much she might like to think so. Prince Jon was dark of hair, like the woman who had birthed him here. How different would Rhaegar be? Would she still recognize him? Will he recognize me?
Not on account of her appearance, which was much the same as before—albeit free of bruises and the scars of troubled childbirth—but would he remember as she did?
Rhaella barely listened to the amiable chatter between her father and the king, thoughts turning to the boys’ father, who was said to be quick-tempered. Will he be anything like Aerys? The prospect did not excite her, but if she failed to secure the match, then she would likely be sent back to Pentos.
A Targaryen bastard daughter is only as useful as her marriage prospects.
No, she had to persuade the king’s reluctant brother that she could be a mother to his children. Otherwise, there had been inquiries from several families in Volantis, where her mother had lived and eventually died. It would be impossibly far away.
“If it please Your Grace,” Rhaella said once the conversation had come to a natural pause, “I should like to acquaint myself with the castle grounds.”
She ignored the stab of apprehension that whispered bold, too bold. If she had spoken thus to Aerys, she would have paid for it later. But the king merely gave a nod. “Of course, Lady Rhaella. Doubtless you are eager to stretch your legs after so long at sea.”
Rhaella curtsied once more, then left her father to his schemes. True confinement had not been the close quarters of their ship, but rather Maegor’s Holdfast looming over the yard, her prison for so many years, her few companions dwindling as Aerys’s paranoia saw her handmaids accused of treason one by one and tortured or dismissed. Remembering an entirely different life in Pentos had been a wonder, and the waters of the Narrow Sea, though treacherous in autumn, a welcome reprieve. Every breath she had taken on the voyage here had been full of possibility.
That sense of possibility narrowed slightly as she passed through the familiar layout of the Red Keep. Despite the eyes on her, she felt almost like a ghost haunting a world that was not hers. There were conflicting memories in her mind: two childhoods, one where she had explored every last inch of the keep, and another where she had traveled throughout Essos, often on one of her father’s ships.
Rhaella turned her gaze from the holdfast, reminding herself of her objective. She had been told that the king’s nephews often had lessons at this hour, but today was one of their free days, so it was the dragon enclosure she sought, knowing that her son would likely seek his dragon’s company often.
To her surprise, it was little more than a simple fence barring off the area from the rest of the yard, though she supposed a dragon was more than capable of defending itself. In the distance, visible atop Rhaenys’s Hill, was the true enclosure: the towering dome of the Dragonpit, wholly intact rather than the ruins she had known.
No one stopped her from approaching the fence, and she wondered idly if she had her coloring to thank for that. Within the enclosure, she could see men standing guard in gleaming black armor that she recognized through faded pictures in books as Dragonkeepers.
But it was the great red wyrm at its center, curled up in slumber, that captured her gaze. Caraxes. It took a moment for her to spot the young hatchlings, who had settled on the dragon’s enormous back to bask in the afternoon sun.
The hatchlings stirred first, the dark blue one—Qelebrys, she recalled—lifting her head to blink silvery eyes at Rhaella. Her wings began to flap, and she glided over to land on the fence, where she perched in study. The little dragon’s nostrils flared repeatedly as though trying to place her scent.
Rhaella stood motionless at first, uncertain if she should dare make a move toward the hatchling, but from the moment she locked eyes with her, she was unable to help herself. She extended her arm, then drew it back, startled, when Qelebrys’s wings flapped in response. She barely had time to brace herself in time for the little dragon to land on her left shoulder. A snuffling sound followed, and she could feel her hair stir as the hatchling’s snout prodded at it.
I am not afraid, she realized.
So many years of her life had been spent in fear and grief, her nerves endlessly braced for whenever Aerys might call upon her. She had memorized the sound of his footsteps, so that she did not have to suffer the same fear when it was her son being escorted to her door by Kingsguard instead.
He will never see a dragon as I have. If there was one thing they shared amongst themselves—herself, her husband, and her son—it was a fascination with their family’s dragons of old. Aerys has hungered for their power. Rhaegar had dreamed of their magic. Rhaella had longed for their freedom.
The shifting of her hair calmed, and she could feel the gentle pressure of the hatchling’s chin resting atop it now. With one baby dragon atop her and another watching her with curious eyes, it was hard to imagine that they might ever disappear from the world.
Where there are children, there is promise. Unlike the poison of her womb, which had seemed intent upon devouring the last of her family’s line, save for her firstborn, whose first wailing breath had come as fire claimed generations of kin.
The other hatchling had ventured over to the fence now. He seemed less certain than his clutchmate, and a soft call escaped him, seemingly directed at the other hatchling. It was Caraxes who stirred, however, his eyes slitting open to look upon the three of them. Rhaella stared at him, the flutter in her heart one of wonder rather than fear, and after a moment, the dragon’s eyes drifted shut once more.
He trusts me.
That did not stop a Dragonkeeper from approaching after a minute. “My lady.”
There was a hint of a question in his voice, and it took her a moment to realize what it was. They do not know me. It was an oddly freeing thought. “Lady Rhaella of House Durolis,” she replied. “I am cousin to the king.”
The Dragonkeeper looked between the hatchlings, and she could tell that he was uncertain what to make of the situation.
“I am not disturbing them, am I?” she asked.
“I do not know,” the Dragonkeeper admitted, surprising her. “They are strange, these hatchlings. Those raised in the Dragonpit seldom allow any near who they are not bonded with, save for Dragonkeepers.”
“They are not from the Dragonpit?” She dared to stroke a finger along the tail of the hatchling perched upon her shoulder. “Are they of Dragonstone, then?”
Prince Daemon had infamously stolen a dragon egg and taken it there years before, but according to the histories, Queen Rhaenyra’s dragon Syrax had left egg clutches there too. Had he taken two dragon eggs from there for her sons?
Not my sons, she reminded herself with a pang. His.
“I cannot say, my lady,” the Dragonkeeper replied. “They arrived here already bonded.”
That she had already known. Prince Daemon’s twin sons were quite the popular topic throughout the Free Cities. Rumors abounded about their sudden appearance, and her father had entertained one Lysene singer who had gleefully sung a ballad lurid enough to turn her stomach.
Someone had tried to kidnap the young princes, that much the rumors agreed upon. A bounty of ten thousand dragons had been placed upon the head of the man said to have taken them from where the late Lady Royce had hidden them. And Prince Daemon had supposedly abandoned the field mid-battle once word had reached him in the Stepstones, in order to fly to their rescue.
The Iron Throne had placed the blame upon Volantis, albeit informally. Many in Pentos thought it more likely to have been a Triarchy plot in order to bring a swift end to the war. Whoever was to blame, there was no telling if they would try again, and the thought of it made her clasp the fence.
In the early days of Aerys’s reign, he had been gripped by the notion that someone might strike at him by trying to kill his only heir. Rhaegar had not been allowed anywhere outside the holdfast without a Kingsguard present. Over time, Aerys’s suspicions had turned elsewhere—to plots against her babes, born and unborn—but the order had remained.
The Kingsguard serve the king alone.
That was the lesson she had learned early on. For all their oaths, they would stand aside when he raised his hand to her, or whoever else had earned his ire. Indeed, they were an extension of Aerys himself—his eyes and ears, to report back all that they saw. Aerys’s specter had loomed over every waking moment, regardless of his presence.
Rhaegar was the only other person in the Red Keep who knew as she did what it was to be utterly alone while denied even the balm of true solitude. He had found the occasional escape, at least, in the secret tunnels within the Red Keep.
For Rhaella, there had been nothing. Her duty was to be available to the king at all times.
“My lady?”
The hatchling on her shoulder was hissing quietly, Rhaella noticed at last, stirring her hair once more. “Your pardon, ser,” she said, stroking the hatchling’s bumpy spine until she calmed. “I lost myself in thought.”
He had not yet asked her to leave, and she wondered if he would. Were there rules about who could visit the enclosure? If not, certainly there must be regarding who was permitted to handle young hatchlings. King’s cousin or not, she was of Pentos.
Nor was the Dragonkeeper the only person to have taken notice of her presence. A pair of young ladies with flax-blond hair were whispering amongst themselves some forty feet distant, heads turned in her direction, an abrupt reminder that Rhaella was not alone in seeking to win a match with Prince Daemon.
I wonder how many have been bold enough to approach the enclosure.
A flicker of movement beyond them drew her gaze, and she felt Qelebrys stir, head lifting to peer along with her. There was another pair approaching, but much smaller, and her heart fluttered in her chest. Two children, one dark-haired and one light as her own. They gave a wide berth to the gossiping duo, but their steps slowed as they caught sight of her.
Her eyes were fixed on the boy she knew to be her son, even at a distance, and he stared back, eyes wide. His lips moved, the word upon them plain. Muña.
Her vision blurred with tears, equal parts joy and relief. We are free. We are both free of him.
And he remembered her.
His brother, Jon, was looking between them with a small frown. He tugged at his brother’s sleeve, and that seemed to break the paralysis that had taken hold of her son. Rhaegar bounded toward her, arms swinging wildly, and she opened her own to catch him as he barrelled into her, sobbing her name into her chest as she crushed him to her, kissing his hair over and over.
All the uncertainty and doubt that she had clung to, guarding her heart against whatever fate might have in store for her, vanished completely. She rocked him from side to side, utterly content.
Jon followed more slowly, his gaze meeting hers, and he halted a few feet away, as though wary about drawing too near. He looks like my son, she thought with a soft wonder as she took in his features. A small ache followed as she thought once more of her babes who had died in the cradle.
Rhaegar pulled back at last, his hatchling having climbed over onto his shoulder at some point during their embrace. “I do not understand,” he said, voice trembling as he stared up at her. There was a fear in his eyes, as though he thought she might vanish.
“I am Lady Rhaella,” she said softly. “Cousin to your father. My mother was his aunt, Lady Saera.”
“But you are here,” Rhaegar said, his tone rising in question.
“I am here,” she said. “Though I do not know how.”
Jon had not yet spoken, and she tilted her head at her son, who gave a faint nod. He too was someone before.
“Jon,” she said. “I am pleased to meet you.” She hesitated. “You look just like your brother.”
Just as she had, he seemed to read her question. His gaze flicked away, shoulders tightening. “I am pleased to meet you, Lady Rhaella.” He glanced at the Dragonkeeper. “You may go, our hatchlings are safe with us.”
To her surprise, the Dragonkeeper gave a nod and obeyed, retreating to a small lean-to built into the southeast wall to watch from a distance.
“Rhaegar has spoken of you,” Jon said, keeping his own distance.
“I thought that you were lost,” her son said, tears spilling down his cheeks almost faster than she could wipe them away. “I thought that I had left you alone with him.”
His guilt and misery was plain, too familiar from nightmares past, and she hugged him to her again. “It is you who were lost,” she said, shying away from the horror of that memory. “I went to Summerhall to find you.”
There had been one Kingsguard willing to forsake Aerys—a boy, only a few years older than her own, who had shown more courage than knights thrice his age. Had they been caught, a ghastly fate would have awaited him, whereas she likely would have been spared, her actions excused as those of a grieving, desperate mother.
I hope that Ser Arthur found an escape of his own.
“There was a doorway,” she said. “I could—” Feel you, calling for me. She swallowed. “I swore that I would not let anything take my child from me.”
And so she had ventured through, and gained a life both new and familiar.
Jon was still watching her, but the mistrust had faded from his expression. Instead, there was a vulnerability to it, as though he were seeing someone else in her, and her heart ached for him. Does he wonder where his mother is, and why she has not come for him?
“Jon,” she said, and he seemed to startle. “May I greet you as well?”
His gaze shifted to Rhaegar, but he nodded after a moment. Sensing his hesitation, she drew him in with one arm so that he had his brother beside him, and held them both. She did not kiss his hair, as she had Rhaegar’s, but she rested her chin atop it a moment.
It was then that she glimpsed another figure approaching on a swift stride, tall and silver-haired. The fear was instinctive, but the protective fury that followed was a fire she had not felt in too long. She tightened her arms around her boys, mouth firming, only for thought to finally catch up with instinct.
It is not Aerys. It is their father. His pace had slowed, as though in confusion, and she let up her embrace reluctantly. He will think me forward, to hold his children thus.
As he neared, the differences between Daemon Targaryen and her husband became more apparent. She had not once seen concern cross Aerys’s face, but it was plain in Prince Daemon’s eyes as he looked between her and his sons. He was nearly of an age with Aerys, but he wore the years better, lacking the harsh lines that had already begun to carve themselves into her husband’s mouth and brow.
She could see the blood both she and Aerys shared with him, but she could also see her son in his face, and his eyes were not Aerys’s lilac, but a violet nearer to her own.
“My lady,” he said, his frown of suspicion so like young Jon’s that she did not even think of Aerys’s fits of paranoia. “We have not met before.”
“My prince,” she said, dropping into a curtsy. “I am Lady Rhaella Durolis, daughter of Lady Saera.”
“She is visiting from Pentos,” Rhaegar said, barely more than an inch from her side. He coaxed Qelebrys back onto her shoulder. “See how the hatchlings recognize her as kin?”
“So they do,” Prince Daemon said mildly, though the suspicion remained in his eyes.
Pentos is not Volantis, nor Triarchy, but other Free Cities have tried to steal his children away. She could not fault his caution, but it was an obstacle she had not anticipated. And my mother lived in Volantis for nearly two decades after she left me in Pentos.
“Forgive me,” she said. “I have not seen a dragon, and my curiosity proved too great. The king gave me leave to wander the grounds, but doubtless he did not expect me to go directly here.”
“Indeed not,” the prince agreed.
Rhaegar, clearly picking up on Prince Daemon’s reservations as well, seized her hand. “You must sup with us tonight, Lady Rhaella.”
It was a shameless maneuver, one that her son would not have dared take with Aerys, and her heart softened slightly toward the man who was their father now. Rather than irritated, Prince Daemon seemed more startled than anything at the impromptu invitation. Oddly, it was Jon who he looked to, as though for guidance.
“Our tutors have been teaching us about Pentos,” Jon said. “Lady Rhaella must have many stories of its splendor, having grown up there.”
His eyes sought her then, in sudden worry, and she nodded at him with a smile. Perhaps he wondered if she did indeed remember her childhood.
“I could hardly rescind my sons’ invitation,” Prince Daemon said, in a tone that suggested he would prefer to, given the choice. “You are welcome at our table tonight, Lady Rhaella. I look forward to hearing of your business in King’s Landing.”
By the twist of his lips, he had guessed precisely what such business was.
“You are very kind, my prince,” she said. “I gladly accept.”
[ID: an instagram post by @/them. the image shows a person wearing a rainbow flag and rainbow bracelet holding hands with someone offscreen, captioned with a headline reading: “Nearly One in 10 Americans Now Identify as LGBTQ+, Thanks to Bisexuals and Gen Z”. the byline reads, “by Mathew Rodriguez”. the post caption reads, “it’s official, nearly one in 10 Americans now identify as LGBTQ+, according to a new Gallup study. This is…” the rest of the caption is cut off. /end ID]
Many years after first seeing this post I have finally scored a vinyl pressing of Mint Jams! I had to go all the way to Kyoto, Japan but I finally got it!!! :)
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