The Cockcrow of Dalliance
AEGON II TARGARYEN X SERVANT! GN READER
Synopsis: Aegon II Targaryen's servant finds that dancing in the fire of the dragon's is but a natural state in which they exist.
Content Warnings: Violence (may be reminiscent of DV, see below), Implied and Explicit Sexual Speech/Themes, Implied Mention of SA, Aegon II Targaryen, Verbal Abuse (Mother to Child), Threatening, Toxic Household Dynamics, Aemond Targaryen, Toxic Power Dynamics, Violence Against Objects During Argument (?)
Other Pairings: Aemond Targaryen x Servant! GN Reader
Yes, yes it's finally here guys
Edited this mid dissociation so if you see any mistakes no you didn't
Told my bsf I was gonna have this out last night (I lied)
Debated splitting this into two parts but decided to save that torture for another day
For those of you who haven't read part 1: Guilty Pleasures
Regrading the DV content warning above, given that reader lives and has lived and grew up with Aegon + the weird relationship they have goin' on I thought their interaction in this fic might feel like something similar to DV,, just a moment of consideration
That's all, have fun guys
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The Prince Aemond is neither impressed nor pleased when the serene violet of his eye pops over the pages of a book he clutches to look at you. His sober drawl has hardly faltered from neutral, in fact, you think he may even be disappointed or rather– expecting.
He has always known, you think, of you and Aegon.
Your steps in the room pause and white pages with ancient scroll on them turn upside down as your hand falls. "My Prince, was that truly your takeaway?"
"It was one of many, " he says and folds the pages, a sign you know is to show his patience –which usually runs thin when it comes to anything, but especially his brother. "Now tell me."
"Would you like a report or an apology?"
You look at him with something that's grown familiar and yet, at times, feels gnawing. Even in his youth his parents indulged his mind and, thus, his tongue was sharp, capable, and used, to the great benefit of others and perhaps his own. And one such end happened to be your position. Though as to how that is of the most benefit is only debatable.
"Whichever you find necessary," he sighs, tucking away a page marker between his fingertips, "but you often mutter apologies by rote so perhaps, dare I ask, would you start the report instead?”
Your chest squeezes in defiance though, you know it is true. Your heart pounds harshly as you recall the way you've trained yourself to begrudgingly bend in reverence in the direction of royalty such as the man before you. The castle walls creak loudly each time, ringing in the back of your ears like a tired, pained groan.
You open your mouth to speak but you feel it close all over again as the prince moves, shifts and your eyes watch him oh so very carefully.
He unfolds his left leg from his right and suddenly becomes more pristine than his previous lax position. He sets the book down with a thud, the ancient leather-bound pages now bent.
“Start at the beginning.” He says, eye peeling away from the book heavy table beside him to look at you, he leans forward, forearms resting on each side of the creaky, old chair that almost scorns the perfect black leather of his clothing. “Tell me exactly what transpired. Don't leave out any details.”
You find that this nature often becomes of the prince when he discovers an encounter you've had with his brother. Restless, antsy, though feigning a lack of care at the start. Much like Aegon, he is a creature of habit. Cycles. Gratingly so.
You tilt your head at him, a curious glaze in your eyes that he does not like but knows you cannot help.
He returns the gesture with a placid face.
Unmoving and unmotivated, unenviable to the nature of your being.
He knows you know what he does not want you to know.
Your knowledge is ever expansive in his eye, crossing the vast walls of the Keep, simultaneously surveying the walls of the North. You are but a pigeon, fulfilling the duties of your master and yet, you view everything from all different directions.
And when you cast your keen eye upon him, oh, he knows, you only see the jealous boy you grew alongside. The same one who came running to you after his eye was taken, removed. The same one who was undeniably fitful at any one of your moves that did not include him, especially after the tragedy. The same one who grew cold, distant, like ice in which you could stab your prickly little pigeon claws in and deepen the cracks of his resolve.
It catches your attention.
“Prince Aegon was drunk when he found me. Stumbling from the dark and speaking of aid I was not privy to, at the start.”
The Prince Aemond leans back in his chair, one eyebrow arched slightly as he listens to your report. His violet eye glints in the candlelight, the other socket a shadowed hollow. His steepled fingers press into each other as he regards you thoughtfully.
“The wine had clearly become of him, My Prince, you are much aware of how he succumbs.”
He hums in agreement, eye blinking softly.
His foot taps lightly, almost imperceptibly, against the floor. The sound is a gentle reminder of his growing impatience, despite his otherwise calm demeanor. "Go on." Aemond prompts, his voice a low rumble. "What aid did he require of you, exactly?"
You hesitate, your gaze flickering to the closed door of the library. The castle seems to hold its breath around you, the usual bustle of servants and courtiers hushed. It's as if the very stones are straining to hear your next words.
"It was not– clear, at first, what he desired. He begged mostly, for a time, and slung his body about my own."
There is a tightening around his eye, a pain in his chest as his next breath is trapped there.
“Did he attempt to, force himself upon you, in any way?" He speaks, the words rough, restrained, like they're being dragged up from a dark, hidden, knowing place.
You pause, eyes exchanging a shared sentiment with the prince. "I did not need to defend myself, if that is what you are asking.”
Aemond studies you carefully, searching your face for any hint of falsehood. He finds none. But there is something about your words, the way you phrase them, that pricks at him like a thorn buried too deep to remove.
His lips press into a thin line. "That is not what I asked."
Your jaw tenses, but you hold his gaze. There’s an understanding, unspoken yet suffocating in its presence. Aegon, for all his drunken indulgences, is a creature of impulse. Aemond, for all his calculated discipline, is a creature of control. And you, caught between them, are something else entirely.
"He was pitiful," you say finally. "Swaying like a ship battered by storm winds, clutching at me as though I could anchor him." Your voice does not waver, but your fingers flex at your sides. "I let him cling for a time, as one does with a child who has not yet learned how to stand on his own."
Aemond exhales sharply through his nose. There is something bitter in his amusement, something dry and humorless. "How generous of you."
You tilt your head, watching him with eyes that see too much. He knows you and he knows you won’t stop here.
“Do you resent me for it, My Prince?”
The tension in the room is a live thing, writhing between you. Aemond's fingers tighten around each other before he releases them slowly, deliberately.
"I resent him," he says, and there’s a raw edge to his words, a crack in the ice. "For making himself something to be pitied."
You do not flinch at this admission.
Aemond wears self-sufficiency like armor, a shield against the vulnerabilities he despises most. The childhood incident that robbed him of an eye has also stripped him of any patience for frailty, in others and especially in himself. He scorns what he perceives as weakness with the same intensity that he yearns for strength, and in his mind, the two cannot coexist. To him, there is no grandeur in being pitiable, no honor in being at the mercy of one's own impulses. He has worked tirelessly to purge such blemishes from his own character, to become a perfect, unyielding sculpture of control and discipline, no matter the cost.
You know how he looks upon the spectacle his brother makes of himself, how it irks and gnaws and hangs upon his mind like a rusted, old chain that is loud enough to cause a ruckus but not strong enough to do anything at all. To be pitied in the eyes of others was of his greatest fears; to be sympathized by someone like you, who had seen him through so many phases, was tantamount to humiliation. When you speak of Aegon's antics, when you use words like child, he knows you haven't just seen one Targaryen prince crumble, but two.
And so, he masks his shame beneath pointed accusations.
“Perhaps, we shall cease this conversation, My Prince.” You suggest and when you do it is gentle, unwavering in consideration.
“No.” He demands it. “Not yet.”
The severity in his voice is a tightrope, stretched thin. He shifts in his seat, eye narrowing as he searches for the words that will bring this to closure on his terms.
"Did he say anything?" Aemond presses. "Anything of use or consequence?"
You consider this, the weight of your answer hanging heavily between you like the pendulum of a clock, swinging down upon him with each delayed breath.
Yes, Aegon said many things. Yes, they would bear heavily on Aemond's mind no matter the use or the consequence and yes, you think they are better left unsaid.
Aemond is not above needing protection, not as much as he claims to be.
You hesitate, an uncommon occurrence. Your eyes are knowing and unreadable in equal measure, a contradictory nature he has never reconciled. “Nothing that I cared to remember.”
He studies you sharply for a moment, and you feel the force of his gaze like the glare of the sun. You cannot help but wonder if this is when you will burn.
But then he exhales, his foot finally stilling. You see him decide to accept your answer, for now.
“I see.” There’s a clipped edge to his words, a finality that rings through the room like the closing of a heavy door.
He pushes himself to standing abruptly, and you feel a twinge of unease. There's an urgency to his movement, a restlessness that crackles in the air like the precursor to a violent storm.
"Then let us leave off this conversation."
Your eyes flick up to his as he strides around the desk, to return his book to the shelf it belongs to.
“I was not aware our time here was subject to your command-”
Aegon's quarters are neither comforting nor welcoming in the light. What the night hides ceases the moment you step over the threshold and cast your hurried eyes across the room. The floor is cluttered with emptied cups and you wonder, briefly, how neither of you tripped or sent one scurrying across the floor like a squeaking mouse last night; amongst the shadows that were cast away by the intruding moonlight, pressing a blue silk against his pale skin, making him appear nearly see-through. A weeping ghost.
It was not this though, not him, not necessarily, that drew you near again. Not his god-like skin or his small plump lips, or the way he pleads and cries and begs. Not the clouds covering his violet eyes, or the way they release tears of gold from the waterline. Not the supposed way he billows an exciting pit inside your stomach. Not your childhood bond, not your aversion to other domestic duties in which he gives you careless release to. Not the allure of his affections, not the ebb and flow of his deflections.
It is his mother–and perhaps the loud crashing–that causes you, and several other servants lingering about the halls of the royal apartments, to break ritual.
You freeze just beyond the entrance, feeling more like an intruder than a participant. Queen Alicent stands in the center of the room, a hurricane’s eye, breath heaving in her chest, lips pressed into a ferocious line. She does not notice you, not immediately.
He stands there, a disheveled mess of a prince with his wavy hair falling across his face. His eyes, once squeezed shut as if to ward off her words, snap open to find you. Recognition dawn's first with surprise, then with relief, and finally with a bitter, self-conscious waver.
His mouth hangs slightly open, unsure whether to greet you or to call out in an attempt to save himself from his mother’s onslaught. He does neither. Instead, his eyes lock onto yours, communicating volumes that are left silent amidst the rupturing tension. There is shame in them but also a desperate need for you to see beyond it, to perceive some deeper version of himself that escapes everyone else’s understanding. You can almost see him gearing up for an expression of bravado, an affected nonchalance he wears like a second skin, before the mirror of your presence reminds him of last night’s vulnerability. The skin cracks.
He is too exposed, too aware of you as you linger by the door, and it leaves him frayed.
"Did he call you here?" She finally turns, cutting into the words Aegon begins to form, eyes glancing at you briefly. "Is he incapable of facing me alone?” Her eyes, shifting on him, brim with palpable disdain. Her hands shake as she moves with a furious energy, upsetting the room’s chaotic order even further as she sweeps an arm across the small table beside him. More cups clatter onto the floor, a cascade of empty porcelain that makes Aegon flinch.
He does not answer. Instead, his gaze travels back to you, and for a moment, he’s like a child again. Like last night. Helpless and plaintive, caught between sobs. Caught between breaths, caught between two versions of himself. And then, finally, caught between you, who looks on from the shadows, and his mother, who storms forth with the final blow.
"Do you have any notion,” Alicent demands, “of the disgrace you bring upon yourself? Upon this family?"
You say nothing. Not to Aegon, not to the Queen, not to the situation in which you find yourself in. Again.
"Do you have any notion of what your brother tells me?" Her voice is piercing, a sharp blade of accusation that cuts the air. "You are unfit for succession! Unfit to rule over even a household servant," she spits, and her eyes flick towards you as if you were an object, a thing, another empty cup on the floor.
Aegon staggers slightly, as though each word strikes him with physical force. "Is that it then? You'd rather see Aemond crowned?" He is aghast and teary eyed.
She doesn't relent, doesn't pause, doesn't soften. "Yes. Yes, rather him than this," she gestures wildly at the room, at the mess, at him, the tangled-up prince.
He sways on his feet, her words unmooring him entirely. There is a moment, a brief flash, where you think he might collapse under the weight of it all. And then his eyes find yours again.
There is no relief in them now. Just rawness. Just bloodied pride.
“Go on then!” Aegon’s voice breaks, high and thin, like a snapped string. "Tell him to his face. Tell him you choose him. See how well he takes it."
Alicent’s eyes blaze as she turns on him once more, her fury mounting like a storm at sea. "Do you think he wants it?" Her words are a tempest, crashing down with unrestrained malice. "He knows he is not the rightful heir. He knows he is second. He knows his place."
Aegon flinches, and you feel the sting as well, the viciousness of her scorn sinking deep.
"And you?" She advances upon him, relentless. "What do you know?" Her words are knives, flung with a fury that dares him to bleed. "What have you ever known but indulgence and disgrace? You hold on to your birthright like a drunken sailor clutches an empty bottle. Pathetic and useless." Her voice is a searing brand, meant to scorch and burn away any remnants of his resolve. He stands frozen under the impact, absorbing each blow.
"You hold on to your birthright like a coward—you care for it only when it suits you, only when it eases your own suffering."
He is felled and shattered.
You see him crumble as she hurls insults with calculated precision.
"You are unworthy of it, and you know it.” A title. An inheritance.
Queen Alicent’s words rush forth like a dam unleashed, washing him—washing you—away in the flood of her contempt. Her disdain fills the air, choking it, suffocating it.
"Is this all you are made of, Aegon? Are you as hollow as your ambition? As shallow as your need for attention?" Her voice drops, lethal and low. "What are you, a shadow of a man, a shadow of a son?" There is nothing but her voice and the sting as it cleaves through him.
"Unworthy." She repeats, taking a step back, but her presence is still suffocating. She is the very storm itself, consuming everything in her wake, and you wonder how much longer he can endure it.
His breath hitches, and he stares at her with wounded bewilderment, like a kicked dog unsure of why he’s been struck.
“Your Grace,” you say quietly, gently, “perhaps it would be best to leave Prince Aegon to collect himself.”
The suggestion hangs in the air, soft and unassuming but somehow undeniable. Alicent looks at you, really seeing you for the first time. Her anger falters just slightly, enough for reflection to creep in through the cracks.
She draws herself up, her chest, taking in a deep inhale to suffocate the glaze in her eyes.
She looks back at Aegon, the weight of her own words settling in like an unwelcome guest.
"Very well." she says, her voice suddenly hoarse, as if worn out from the effort of sustaining such grand frustration.
She turns sharply and strides towards the door, leaving in a storm-tossed flurry of skirts. Her departure pulls the air with her, and the room feels emptier for it, less like a battlefield and more like the aftermath of one.
You stand rooted for a moment, unsure if you’re allowed to move, to speak, to breathe. Aegon remains where he is, crumpled and small, his defiance collapsed around him like a broken shield. His eyes shine too brightly as he stares at the ground where she stood moments ago.
The voice is hoarse, reeling, trembling.
Broken glass over an empty road.
You open your mouth, to say what, you don't know.
It's that dark feeling, the one that weighs on your heart and pushes a cool, wet sleeve down your throat until the words can't come out and they aren't spoken in the first place. It's a familiar suffocation, like a thick fog that clouds your vision.
So instead, your fingers twitch and bend at your sides as you watch the fire begin to form at the back of the dragon's throat.
Aegon exhales sharply through his nose, a bitter smile twisting his lips. "I asked you a question."
Your throat tightens. There it is. This moment, this tension, this awful in-between where he is neither kind nor cruel, where he asks for something you cannot give.
"My place is neither to enjoy nor suffer, My Prince."
At those words, Aegon flinches, and his control slips slightly, his eyes brimming with unshed tears. He looks at you, unfathomably sad, as if the very sight of you hurts him.
And yet, it is he who burns your skin thin, until it drips from your bones.
"Did you? Did you enjoy it?" He sounds frantic, if there was ever a word for the state he is left in.
Your ears are ringing, a familiar, disorienting sound.
Why, you think, why does everything always circle back to me?
You shift your weight, an uncomfortable, unsettled sensation growing within you.
Aegon has never made it easy. He has spent his whole life vacillating between kindness and cruelty, between moments of unguarded warmth and the kind of thoughtless indulgence that turns everything sour. And you—whatever it is you feel for him—have never been allowed to name it. In a lifetime of service, you have been powerless and forgotten, dismissed and degraded. But not now. Not here.
"Did you?" He asks, his voice barely audible.
Your tongue feels heavy. Your words die at its tip, still unformed.
For a moment, Aegon looks completely exposed, every thought and feeling laid bare before you. The usual façade, the mask of affected insouciance, has fallen away, and he is left raw and aching. There is no wine to blame this time, no easy explanation.
His expression flickers, something dark passing over it. "You won't even grant me the honesty I require of you?"
Your silence cuts into him deeper.
He grits his teeth and steels himself against it. Against you. Against everything.
You can see it clearly, how close he is to shattered.
A visage so similar to Aemonds.
And just as Aemond, he grows furious before he musters the ability to wall himself up again.
For Aemond, it will often be a curt and disinterested attitude, of a cold and numb exterior where his thoughts and feelings lie; encased and concealed, guarded lest they escape to come at you.
His was a defensive tactic.
Aegon's is an offensive one.
His eyes narrow, his mouth tenses and his nostrils flare. "Is the loyal servant too good to gratify me?" His tone drips with condescension. "So quick you are to obey my orders in the day, so willing you are to let your master take whatever he wishes by night. Was not my brother enough then, or did you find it funny to share a royal laugh at my expense? As you are used to?"
Your brows pull together but you cast your eyes to the side, away, hoping, perhaps, that your quiet may dim his light, if only for a moment.
"Look at me!" He demands, his eyes cold and hard, his voice cracking under the strain of emotion.
A loud crash, louder than what becomes of him when he is beaten with words, startles you upright and you stare, wide eyed, at the mess he's created. He kicks against a near trunk, knocking the drawers shut and spilling across the floor the same as it once did so many years ago when he was a moody, grumpy, child, fresh to the world.
Now his emotions –his wants– consume him like a wildfire. Spitting hot embers that char and set aflame your heart and cause you to squirm and step back.
"Must I order you once more, dear servant?"
He speaks through his teeth, mocking and cruel.
They grind and clink together, a fury all his own.
It is now that he begins to laugh. Your cheeks flame with shame and anger and disbelief and those eyes, wide open, look upon you with disgust.
“Please? Please what? Please stop? Please listen? Please pretend like you care?”
“Always what? Always obeyed? Always served? Always stood there and let me–” He cuts himself off, breath shuddering.
You watch him carefully, watch the way his seams fall apart, brittle and begrudging. His eyes have an insanity to them, like his fingers are losing grip and he is forced to surrender to the soil that lays far below him.
“This is not the time–” You try again, voice soft, unchanging despite the nicks in your skin, within your joints. You ignore it all, pacing yourself as you take careful steps to him, drawing your warmth closer.
"And such a useless, incompetent little thing you are that all it seems you are good for is lifting my cock and licking it clean."
You stiffen. Your pride bristles at his words and you come to an abrupt halt, teeth clamping down on each other.
You suppose it is some twisted metaphor –or his dreams– meant to leave you coiled in on yourself, remind you of where you stand. Below him.
“Not the time?” He repeats, harsh and mocking, bewildered at your control, your delicately placed self. “When is the time then? When I am drunk off my arse, so you can pat me on the fur and tuck me away like a dog? When I am far too gone to know the difference between your pity and your loyalty?
“A kind word? A brush on the head? Does it feel good? Does it make you feel safe?” He spits out the last word as if it is such a disgraceful proposition that even puts you, a servant, to shame. “Does he touch you the way I do? Do you like it best when a prince pretends you are worth something?”
Your eyes light with something akin to his own flames and the walls begin to crack around you two.
“You mistake me for one of your whores, My Prince.” You start, you voice even, calm and uneventful despite the words that so unnerve Aegon. “Do not whimper at my feet and expect me to soothe you.”
Something shatters in the violet, the facade of cruelty, cold control fractured at the edges, and you know you've hit him where he was weakest. Where the pain was most raw and uncured, where no princely title could cover his scars.
There's a split second where your chest aches and lurches for a younger version of Aegon, the one who's mother loved him yet never was able to see the boy for all his woes and inadequacies, his sadness and self loathing, his broken heart, his shame. The one who must feel a million memories of the throne room playing alongside your anger to stop you from turning your heel and saying nothing.
Instead though, you have not the time to react before you feel the collar of your shirt pulled forward with a violent tug and your body lurches forward in a stumble, mere inches from your noses touching, and then all at once, you are being pushed across the room.
Your back crackles against the wall like a brutish whip and you grunt, arms up, attempting to break the hands that hold you before you're against the wall again.
He shakes you, the anger and bitterness pouring from him like a torrent. “You think I am weak?” He sneers, his grip tightening as if trying to force an answer from your very bones. “You think me pathetic?”
Your defiance only seems to goad him further. It unleashes something feral in him, something unhinged. His words come fast and sharp, cutting into your skin. “Perhaps you have forgotten,” he snarls, inches from your face, “that my goodwill is all that stands between you and ruin.”
His grip on you fortifies. His eyes burn hotter, hotter than those of the dragon emblazoned on his tunic, than any flickering flame.
You breathe hard. A stare-off and neither of you budge.
"Perhaps," you grit through your teeth, "perhaps it is my goodwill that has made you think that."
"You dare," he spits, his voice straining with disbelief. "You dare presume to lecture me, to speak to me like—" He breaks off, his breathing ragged with the effort of controlling himself and failing. His hands tremble against your shirt, and for a moment, you see the desperation beneath the anger, the fear that drives his cruelty. He is like a caged animal, lashing out at everything and everyone, especially at you.
"You think yourself untouchable, do you?" The sheer contempt in his voice is like a physical blow. "You think yourself indispensable?" His grip loosens, just slightly, his doubt giving you the smallest advantage, the tiniest edge. But the moment is brief, and his resolve hardens again. He grips you with renewed vigor, his determination to break you more than matched by yours to withstand him.
“I could have you banished.” He says it like a promise, his voice vicious and raw and you jolt forward only to be pushed back down. “I could have you—”
“—ruined, forgotten.” You throw the words back at him, cutting him off before he can utter them himself. There is a new, dangerous edge in your voice, a fearlessness that defies his threats and mocks his power. “It is what you always say, Aegon, but there is no truth behind it.” Your chest rises deeply, falling just as hard, your talons digging.
His threats, so often wielded as weapons, seem pitiful in the face of your truth. You glare with unyielding intensity, daring him to make good on his words, daring him to follow through on promises you know he cannot keep. It is you who now has him up against the wall, pinned by the plain force of your refusal to cower. He is stunned into conflicted silence, wavering under the weight of your unflinching gaze. You see the cracks deepen and spread, his assurance buckling under the knowledge that you, more than anyone, can see through him. You watch as it undermines every defense he thought himself capable of.
Perhaps this once he will understand. Perhaps this once he will not spiral and fester. Perhaps this once he will learn.
Perhaps, you think, perhaps this once he will not come to you in an empty hall, in a vacant corridor, marching like the very soldiers you thought he was, asking if you feel proud, if you are finally happy.
“Go on, punish me for my insolence. The Crown will thank you. Your mother will kiss you on the head and call you a good boy. Your brother will tell you how wise you are, how brave. You can pretend I never was here at all, and maybe then it will be enough.”
Aegon stares at you as though he has been struck. The color drains from his face, leaving him pale and ghost-like. When he speaks, his voice is hoarse, barely more than a whisper.
"Stop," he chokes out, but there is no strength in it, no authority. It is more plea than command. His grip weakens again and this time does not recover.
“Go ahead.” You press on, relentless now that the cracks have widened into chasms. “Forget me like your family forgets you.”
He is staggered by the force of your words, eyes wide with disbelief and pain so deep it steals his breath away.
He doesn't let go as the tears began to well in his eyes. “Damn you,” he cries out, his voice breaking, uncaring if anyone hears him now. He is wild with the knowledge that you see through him, past the anger to the fear beneath. It shatters what little control he has left. “Damn you to the Seven Hells—”
In an instant, Aegon’s fury crumbles away, leaving something wrecked and desperate in its place.
Something hot and wet stains the corner of your shirt. You inhale softly, sharply, taken aback and perhaps a little repulsed but all the more so worried, for him, of how he lurches into you with both knees against your sides.
You nearly choke in reply but you suck your windpipe back into position and breathe again with enough control to not swallow your tongue.
When he speaks his voice is consumed by his own tears but you make it out clearly, recognizing the patterns of his words.
Oh, how his clutch so soon turns to a grasp.
He does not look at you but rather keeps his face buried into your neck, body weight falling loosely atop you and pinning you to the wall. You are left only to wrap your arms slowly around his trembling figure.
He is drunk on his own emotions and perhaps, you think, that is often why he does not face them sober.
"Y/N," your name comes as a slur. "I am sorry." He chokes on his own hiccups as he begs to release the words. "Sorry- I'm sorry. So sorry."
You are forced against your better judgment to cradle him against you, turning your head softly to press your cheek against his temple.
"Okay." You soothe, your hand coming up to his head as you let out a shaky breath, eyes closing briefly as if to regain whatever part of yourself you've just lost. Your fingers twine like cotton into the soft, white threads of his hair. "Okay, My Prince. Okay."
He is a mess and quite unlike his brother who was put together the last time you held him in your arms, with a slightly sound mind to match.
His grip tightens and your shirt rides up the slightest.
"I only meant to protect us," you coo against him softly as to not cause his guilt. A half-truth, the words tug the base of your heart but you force yourself not to stray. Not now, you think, not as such fragile things.
"Do not dismiss me." His voice cracks and it rings loud in your ears, as if though a screech. "Please, I will keep you beside me if I must. My brother, too." His tone wavers with uncertainty but his hold increases.
You allow him, to keep his hands where they lay; however, he wishes. They are familiar there after all, comfortable.
He does not quiet in his sobs, in his muffled cries into your neck and you must only listen to every word.
"I wish only for your comfort, for your safety. Your loyalty."
You squeeze him harder against you and still, the other servants flit and look and keep, away from the quarters.
He goes on. "My mother is blind to the wrong of it. How would she know of...how could she understand, of that sort of..."
He cannot finish his thoughts. Or perhaps, he cannot bring himself to say them, however he knows, however he feels. However she neglected to see.
His grip slips up, thumbs pressed against the curve of your ribs.
It makes your skin ignite and yet he is like ice, so much so, there is a mist that shrouds the two of you in dewy wetness.
How foolish. Aemond's warning repeats in your mind like a hammer hits the nail.
But your nails glide over his back anyway.
He tries, once more, to speak. To piece the uncharacteristic cracks and repair his voice, the only thing keeping him standing and in a role of power. "The wine dulls it, drowns it, even, my whims."
Perhaps. Or maybe, once released, he does not stop the spiral from its descent.
A whine escapes him and he exhales roughly against you, trying to stop the tears and failing.
He seems only to grow sadder as the two of you stand there, your backs straight and your thighs, beginning to ache.
His grip shifts to become ever more desperate, pleading, asking that of you when the liquor does not.
It hits you hard, the plea, an old battle he has within and a new one you bear witness to.
Aegon seems smaller now, slacked of his fire, that same fire that licks and snaps at the ends of yours. You wonder for a moment, what his flames would even taste like.
Ash? The bitter drink, that will only make his tears wetter.
And, they are. He tastes, salt, from his own misery, spilling from the corners of his eyes and staining the neck of your shirt.
You have not the chance to respond, not a moment between his shaky breath and his hands once more, holding you tightly to his own body.
There is no ounce of space between the two of you when the door bursts open and you meet the eye of the Targaryen you have not embraced in so long.
Instead, all those thoughts, and fantasies, and ideas burn before your eyes and you are reduced to only black and grey, sweeping away with the wind.
Aemond is tall enough that he is overbearing, overshadowing, you, until all you can look at is that void filled, violet abyss that has never been shown such warmth and affection.
He closes the door swiftly at the sight, eye blown wide, wordless for a moment as he searches your expression which is a mix of pleading and acceptance.
His focus then flickers to your chests, tangled, hearts, entwined as close as possible.
Aegon has pushed himself entirely flat to you now, your back embedded into the wall behind you. It creaks loudly under your weight and leaves a scarred ring in the wood as your foot steps back from the pressure.
He does not release you either, does not flinch. Not now, not at the sight of his brother, not at the thoughts within him, rushing, filling his mind up with words and sentences together.
You watch Aemonds throat bob.
He grows more unnerved by the performance the longer he stands there and watches and does not a thing to cease such condemnable theatrics.
You shake your head at him, feeling the way Aegon's tears spread over your bare skin, your arms jolting up and down with each cry.
But Aemond does not listen to you.
Your palms are sweaty by the time he finally takes action, grabbing the back of his brother's shirt harder than any strong knight ever could.
One tug is all it takes to begin to peel Aegon off of you, first, it is the thick, splayed head of hair, then the buttons, his fingers, the silk belt around his waist. When he has managed that, his next actions seem to please you no more, so quickly and easily the other half of his soul is discarded.
Aegon cries out as though he is a blind pup being taken from his mother's breast and he attempts to return but Aemond pulls him back so quickly by his collar, he coughs, instead.
"That is enough." Aemond repeats and his voice sounds so like yours moments ago, trying to quell the anger.
You look upon the brothers as you push yourself slowly from the wall, clearing your throat and straightening your clothing.
Aegon is red in the face, particularly his nose and his skin is wet, eyelashes dripping. Again, he carries that look of a small pet who's been scolded for the first time.
You are unable to look at him long before your bewildered brow pinches at Aemond next.
His eye is steely, face taught and lips pressed thin.
There is a hesitation in him, it is hardly noticeable and it is replaced by the very clenching of his teeth and his jaw working furiously to keep up his composure as he throws his brother onto his bed in a heap of tangled sheets.
He immediately struggles and you step away as you can only watch him, fists taut in the blanket, face planted to hide his shame.
Aemond keeps his teeth clenched down, as if to stop himself from speaking all that he wishes to.
"You are behaving like a child."
Aegon is muffled by his pillow. "Y/N understands."
But you don't speak the fact into existence.
Instead, you just step forward, deliberately quiet until you stand at Aemonds side and the both of you stare down at the crown prince for a time.
"Stay." Aemond commands and you know this much, know by his tone and expression, what he will wish of you next.
And just as dutifully, you obey him and give a curt nod.
You are the only reason his brother does not tear the room apart in a bout of rage, and as you lay a tender hand upon his shoulder, the younger Targaryen prince resigns.
"When he calms you may go." He looks down at you with a tight visage that conveys to you a silent knowledge of where he stands on the matter.
He does not want you here. In this room. With his sob ridden brother.
But he knows, with no other means, with how no other servants keep their head nor the desire or capability, you are truly the only one suitable.
It isn't in a good way either, you think.
And you can not look at the way Aemond stares at you. For only a moment but in it, the tension shatters.
"I will be outside the door should he lay a finger on you." And it is just as sharp and sour and you are quick to cast your gaze away and keep it upon the curve of Aegon's back instead. "Do you hear me, you drunk whelp?”
It is his final demand as he casts his gaze to his brothers backside again.
Aegon offers nothing in response. He simply melts and weeps and blubbers.
“Y/N leaves on my terms, the wrong touch and I shall know."
You swallow, daring not to roll your eyes, for you've grown tired of his promises to defend you and his threats to take retribution should you be put out of line or fault.
But he looks at you, sees you, and understands the funny crookedness of your lip.
"I am serious." He takes long steps across the room, eye still on you. "If it comes to the point I wish to think you foolish enough as not to realize I will remove my brother myself, Seven help me." And even in the same breath, he tugs the door open and brings it slamming shut to silence the echoes of his words.
Then it is just as quiet as the crowing of the day's start and the library aches for your return.