tarsals, radius, & ribcage!
headcanon questions | accepting
tarsals : regret—a feeling most familiar, a bitter consequence of his frequent mistakes. something he felt often, something he could identify easily & put a face on. regret was helaena, and how horrified she looked when he stepped on a moth she was playing with. regret was mother, and the way she turned around & walked out when he dared to shout back at her. regret was that one serving girl he tried to kiss, that stray dog he once kicked, that dragonkeeper he tried to make sunfyre eat—
regret had many faces, many shapes. none had haunted him thus.
none had screamed as loud. none had bled as much. all other faces blurred and faded into nothingness when this one joined the fray.
regret was aemond, whose suffering the king remained blind & deaf to as the creatures whose company aegon once preferred huddled into their mother's bosom—as if feigned innocence could ever make their grubby little hands any less drenched with his brother's blood.
aemond had to close an eye so aegon could finally open his own. behold ! now this was the only face his regret would wear until the end of his days.
radius :
sweet wine. sweet food. sweet touch. sweet melody. something to lull, something to soothe the constant bitterness he's surrounded by. he turns to anything that can dilute the taste of decay, even if temporarily. make it less agonizing to swallow.
he turns to the gods when sweetness fails to soothe, when he needs to rest beneath the shadow of something more ferocious. he turns to the dragon who only ever loves him because he knows no better. he turns to the mother who's both the savior and the headsman. he turns to the brother who's both the shelter and the storm. & no one will ever turn to him.
ribcage :
himself his children. please, gods, they are innocent as he once was. let them know true happiness, let them feel loved. let them live without fear and the need to turn to anyone but themselves.
let them live without fear because he is so very afraid. let them live.
