Born alongside tragedy and raised beneath the shadow of a dying dynasty, Princess Visenya Targaryen has always believed one thing above all else: the blood of Old Valyria must remain pure. When Lucerys Velaryon takes Aemond’s eye in Driftmark, Visenya answers not with mercy, but murder, killing the boy before the entire royal court and fleeing Westeros atop Vermithor, the ancient Bronze Fury.
Exiled to the far east, she leaves behind the politics of King’s Landing and becomes something far more dangerous amongst the warrior women of Samyriana, where survival is carved through fire, blood and monsters older than memory itself. Years later, when the Dance of the Dragons begins tearing House Targaryen apart, Aemond crosses the world to bring her home.
But Visenya returns to Westeros neither as Green nor Black.
She returns for the dragons alone.
Visenya left her chambers as the sun climbed higher, the last cool edge of morning giving way to the heavier warmth of early afternoon. The scent of rose oil still clung to her skin beneath the dark silk, mingled with the fainter trace of Aemond’s body and the metallic edge that always seemed to follow her after the bath. She had chosen the same fitted garments she favored for private meetings: the black underlayer cut close across her breasts in the eastern style, the deeper crimson overdress pinned at one shoulder so the fabric shifted and parted with each step. Golden chains rested low at her hips and chimed softly whenever the drape moved, revealing the scarred plane of her midriff and the smooth line of her back where the sun-warmed air touched bare skin. Her silver hair, still damp, fell loose down her spine in dark waves threaded with only a few plain rings.
She moved through the corridors without haste, one hand resting lightly on the hilt of her sword. Vermithor’s presence brushed at the edge of her thoughts, a low restless heat that matched the anticipation already stirring in her blood. The march would come soon, but before she rode out with Cole’s host, the ground beneath her absence had to be prepared.
Servants pressed themselves against the walls as she passed. She studied each face. She had heard of the Master of Whisperers, Larys Strong, and how he had chosen many of them after Jaehaerys’s death. An ally of Alicent. Another creature with Hightower fingers sunk deep into the Red Keep’s walls. She wondered how many of these silent figures reported her movements even now, and how many would still be breathing when she returned from Harrenhal.
The Kingsguard quarters occupied the first level of the Red Keep. She crossed a small inner courtyard where afternoon light struck pale stone and turned the carved dragons along the arches to fleeting gold. Two white-cloaked knights stood at their posts. Their eyes followed the sway of the crimson drape and the bare skin it revealed above the golden chains before discipline dragged their gazes forward again. She felt their attention like a physical touch and dismissed it without slowing.
Beyond the courtyard lay the common hall of the guards. Long scarred tables filled the space beneath low vaulted ceilings. The air was thick with the smell of oiled leather, spilled wine, and the faint smoke of torches. Several Kingsguard sat among a larger number of household men, cups in hand, voices raised in easy laughter that died the moment she stepped through the archway. Silence fell across the room.
Heads turned. Eyes moved over her without shame, tracing the bare shoulders, the scars along her arms, the way the eastern silk parted with each breath to show the hard line of her waist. There was hunger in those looks, crude and open, the same base appetite she had never once encountered among the eunuchs of Samyriana. Those men had been cut the day they drew breath and raised to know nothing but obedience and purpose. Westeros knew no such discipline.
Even the Visenya who had ridden beside the Conqueror had once told Aegon that his sworn shields were lazy creatures, more concerned with the shine of their armor than the vigilance their vows demanded. Nothing had changed in the century since.
Visenya let her gaze pass over the room once, cold and unhurried. She found no true vigilance in any of them, only appetite dressed in half-drunk camaraderie and white cloaks they wore like borrowed honor.
A younger knight near the nearest table rose partway from his bench. “Princess—”
“I seek the Lord Commander,” she said, her voice carrying cleanly through the stillness. “He is expecting me.”
The man swallowed and gestured toward the narrower corridor at the far end of the hall. “Last door on the left, Princess.”
She inclined her head a fraction and walked on. The men’s eyes followed her until she passed from sight.
Cole had not taken the Tower of the Hand for himself. He still kept to the austere quarters of the Lord Commander, as though the new pin on his cloak had not yet convinced him he was entitled to more than the duty he had already sworn.
She reached the last door and paused only long enough to feel the familiar weight of the sword against her hip. Through the bond, Vermithor shifted again, bronze scales scraping against stone somewhere high above the city. She placed her hand on the iron latch and pushed the door open.
Cole’s chambers were narrow and plain. Afternoon light slanted through a single tall window overlooking the outer yard and the distant gleam of Blackwater Bay. There were no tapestries, no cushioned chairs. A narrow bed stood against the far wall, its gray wool blanket folded with military precision. His white cloak hung from an iron hook beside the door, the Hand’s pin still fastened to the fabric. His sword rested against the foot of the bed, and a long oak table ran along one wall, covered with rolled maps and papers held down by a dagger. The air smelled of oiled leather and the clean, sharp scent of the soap he used on his cloaks.
Visenya closed the door behind her with a quiet click. She crossed the narrow room without hurry, the golden chains at her hips chiming softly with each step. Before Cole could speak, she sat on the edge of his bed with calm ease, the crimson silk parting around her thighs as she settled. One bare foot rested lightly on the stone floor. She looked at him without haste, her violet eyes steady.
Cole remained standing beside the small table near the door, his posture rigid. His hands hung at his sides, fingers occasionally curling as though he did not know what to do with them. Visenya watched him in silence for a moment.
Visenya watched him in silence. The light from the tall window caught on the damp strands of her silver hair and on the faint sheen of sweat still clinging to theVisenya tilted her head toward the wooden chair beside him, the motion unhurried. The golden chains at her hips chimed softly with the shift of her body, and the crimson silk parted further across her thighs, baring the pale map of old scars along her midriff to the afternoon light.
Cole hesitated. His eyes flicked downward for the briefest moment before he forced them back to her face. Then he pulled the chair out and lowered himself into it with deliberate stiffness, spine straight, hands resting on his thighs as though he were still standing at attention.
“You wear the pin of the Hand,” she said finally, her voice low and measured, “yet you cling to these plain walls as if power were a burden you fear to claim. The Tower stands empty. You should have taken it. Instead you remain here, in the same narrow room you held as Lord Commander.”
Cole’s jaw tightened. A flush crept slowly up the sides of his neck, disappearing beneath the high collar of his armor. His gaze drifted again despite himself. He dragged it back upward with visible effort.
“I have not yet earned the right to such rooms,” he answered, the words stiff. “The pin was given in haste. I will not presume upon it.”
Visenya’s lips curved, though the expression held no warmth. She leaned back slowly against the bed, bracing both arms behind her on the mattress so that her body arched in a long, unhurried line. The black silk across her breasts pulled taut with the movement, and the crimson overdress slipped further down one thigh, baring more of the scarred skin beneath. Her silver hair, still damp from the bath, spilled over one bare shoulder and caught the afternoon light like pale metal. She turned her head toward the tall window behind the bed, gazing out at the distant rise of Rhaenys’s Hill where the afternoon sun struck the pale stone in muted gold.
For a moment she said nothing. The only sounds in the narrow room were the faint creak of the bedframe beneath her weight and the soft, rhythmic chime of the golden chains at her hips whenever she shifted. Through the bond, Vermithor stirred somewhere high above the city, a low pulse of restless heat brushing against the edges of her mind. She felt it settle low in her chest, warm and hungry, the same hunger that had driven her through years of blood and sand.
Then she straightened, drawing herself upright with deliberate grace. The silk settled back into place, though it still clung to the curve of her body. Her expression had changed. The faint amusement was gone, replaced by something colder and more precise as she fixed her gaze on him.
“Power is not something one earns by waiting for permission, Ser Criston,” she said, her voice low and steady. “It is taken. Or it is given by those strong enough to hold it. You accepted the pin from the king’s own hand. Now you must decide whether you intend to use it… or simply polish it while others decide the fate of this realm in your absence.”
Cole cleared his throat. The sound was rough in the quiet room. “Princess,” he said at last, his voice stiff, “why did you wish to speak with me so urgently, and away from the council?”
Visenya held his gaze for a moment longer before speaking again. Her voice remained unhurried, each word measured and precise.
“Tomorrow the funeral will be held on Rhaenys’s Hill,” she said, “I decided", she paused on the word decided, letting it hang between them with deliberate weight, "it will serve as a reminder to the smallfolk of the true power of House Targaryen. An answer to their rising discontent, which Aemond has brought to my attention.”
She shifted slightly on the bed, the golden chains at her hips chiming once. Her expression did not soften. There was no warmth in it, only the calm certainty of someone who viewed the people beyond the castle walls as little more than a distant, necessary audience.
“The city must be secured and cleared before dawn,” she continued. “Command the gold cloaks to make this disgusting city as safe as they can manage. The smallfolk will not be permitted anywhere near us, but they will watch from below. They will look up at the dragons and at us. That is all they need to see.”
Cole did not answer immediately. His hands, which had been resting on his thighs, slowly curled into tight fists against the dark fabric of his breeches. When he finally spoke, his voice was lower than before, rough at the edges.
Visenya cut him off before he could finish.
“That is not what I wished to discuss away from the council,” she said, her tone calm but edged with quiet irony. “I need you to ensure that the High Septon remains in his rightful place and does not presume to grace us with his prayers tomorrow.”
She leaned forward slightly, the golden chains at her waist chiming softly with the movement. Her violet eyes stayed locked on his, unblinking.
“I do not want him anywhere near the pyre. Not to speak, not to bless, not even to stand at a distance and watch. Dragonfire is sufficient. His presence would only turn what should be a matter of blood and fire into something tainted by the Faith. See to it that he understands his place tomorrow, Ser Criston. Or make certain he is kept there by force if he does not.”
He was a man who had sworn his life to the Seven. To keep the High Septon from a royal funeral went against everything he had been taught to revere. Yet he was also the Hand of the King now, and the woman before him spoke with the authority of blood and fire.
When he finally lifted his gaze again, his voice was quieter, rougher at the edges.
“It will be done, Princess,” he said at last. There was no defiance in the words, only a strained acceptance. “The High Septon will not approach the hill. I will see to it myself.”
Visenya watched him without pity. She could see the conflict moving behind his eyes, the way his piety warred with the duty she had placed upon him. She got up from the bed with a single motion.
“Good,” she replied, her tone calm and final. “Because if he appears tomorrow, it will be you who removes him. Not me.”
In Samyriana the days had never been empty. From the first grey light until the last red glow the women had shaped her hours with the same unyielding discipline they used on their own daughters: teaching the younger girls the weight of a blade before they ever learned the weight of a spindle, standing shoulder to shoulder when the centipedes and the acid-blooded things crawled from the eastern wastes, returning at dusk with lungs scorched by smoke and skin mapped by fresh burns. They had taken the soft, spoiled princess who had crossed the sea and broken her into something useful, something worthy of the ancient bronze fury that had chosen her when she was still too young to understand what such a bond demanded. There was no room for embroidery or idle prayers or the gentle management of households when survival itself was the only prayer that mattered. They had made her worthy of Vermithor the same way they made every girl who carried steel worth the steel she carried.
Here the hours stretched soft and unguarded. She felt it in the way the guards at the outer doors of the royal apartments simply stepped aside when she approached, heads bowed, eyes sliding over the bare skin of her shoulders and the golden chains at her waist without challenge or question. They knew nothing of her. They knew nothing of what she carried or what she intended. A woman who shared a soul with a dragon older than their kingdom walked freely into the presence of their king and they did nothing to stop her. It did not please her. It spoke of rot already sunk deep into the walls, of men who had forgotten what it meant to guard blood that could burn them to ash.
She entered without announcement, the heavy door swinging shut behind her with a sound that seemed too quiet for the weight she brought with her. The social chamber smelled of roasted meat and dark wine and the faint smoke of a hearth lit against the cool stone. Afternoon light fell in thick golden bars across the long table and the tapestries of old victories. Aegon sat at the head, a cup already in his hand, the black of his doublet rumpled across his shoulders. Aemond stood near the hearth, one shoulder against the carved stone, his single eye lifting the moment the chains announced her presence. The tension between them was already there, thick and familiar, the same unpleasent reality of fractured blood she had felt since the moment she stepped back into these walls.
She crossed the room without haste. The crimson silk moved around her thighs, the golden chains sang their soft metallic song against the wooden floor. She took the seat to Aegon’s right, the Valyrian steel resting against the arm of the chair. A servant appeared from the side passage, set down a covered platter that released steam and the rich scent of herbs, and withdrew again without a word. The three of them remained alone with the food and the light and the low, distant rumble of Vermithor circling somewhere high above the Kingswood.
She let the silence settle first, the way she had learned to do when she wanted the weight of her presence to press against them. Then she spoke, voice low and measured.
She let the silence settle first, the same silence she used when she wanted the weight of her presence to press against them. Then she spoke, voice low and measured.
“Cole has been instructed. Things will be smooth.”
Aegon’s fingers tightened around his cup. He stared into the wine as though it might offer answers he had never been willing to seek on his own.
“Helaena will stand with you,” Visenya said, voice low and certain. “Dreamfyre will fly beside Sunfyre. The dragon has been too long absent from the sky. It is right that she returns for the burning of her son.”
Aegon’s fingers tightened around his cup until the knuckles showed white. He stared into the wine as though it might still offer answers he had never been willing to seek on his own. The silence that followed was thick, weighted by the afternoon light slanting across the table and the faint crackle of the hearth. He gave a single, slow nod and lowered his gaze, the movement heavy, as if even that small gesture cost him something. When he finally picked up his knife, the scrape of metal against the plate sounded too loud in the quiet room. He began to eat in silence, mechanical and subdued, shoulders curved forward beneath the black of his doublet.
Visenya reached for a piece of bread and broke it slowly between her scarred fingers. The scent of yeast and salt rose between them, mingling with the richer aroma of roasted meat and the faint trace of rose oil still clinging to her skin. She lifted the bread to her lips, took a small bite, and washed it down with a sip of wine. The golden chains at her waist chimed softly as she leaned forward to set the cup down again, the sound delicate against the heavier tension in the chamber.
Aemond had not moved from the hearth. His single eye remained fixed on her profile, tracing the line of her bare shoulder where the afternoon light turned an old scar to pale silver. The memory of the morning still moved between them like a living current, the thick steam rising from the water, the heat of it closing over her skin, the way she had climbed into his lap and taken what she wanted until his restraint fractured beneath her. He could still feel the ghost of her thighs around him, the wet slide of her body, the low sound she had made when she came. When he finally spoke, his voice was quiet, edged with something only she would recognize.
“How exactly did your meeting with the Lord Commander go, sister?”
Visenya looked at him for a moment longer, the corner of her mouth lifting in the faintest suggestion of a smile. She could feel the irritation beneath her own skin, quiet and sharp, but she chose to let it fade. Aemond’s resistance to setting his mother aside still lingered like a bad taste, and Cole’s hesitation this afternoon had only reminded her how deeply the Faith had sunk its roots into men who should know better. Both irritated her. Both, in their own way, amused her.
She turned her cup slowly between her fingers, the wine catching the light.
“Well,” she said at last, voice low and almost pleasant, “it seems neither my brother nor my guard are particularly eager to put my interests above their own comforts. I told Cole to keep the High Septon from the hill tomorrow. By whatever means necessary.” She paused, letting the words settle. “He hesitated. I made it clear that if any of those snakes appear, he will be the one to remove them.” Her violet eyes met Aemond’s without blinking. “Too pious for a Dornish man, I would have thought.”
She watched the way her words landed on him, the slight tightening of his jaw. She knew the thought would sit poorly with him, the comparison.
Aemond did not speak immediately. He simply watched her, the tension in his shoulders visible even beneath the black leather. Through the bond, Vermithor shifted somewhere high above the Kingswood, a low pulse of awareness brushing against the edges of her mind. He sensed the edge in her, the way her irritation had sharpened into something she was choosing to enjoy.
Visenya took a slow bite of the meat that had been placed before her, the rich taste of herbs and fat lingering on her tongue. She chewed with unhurried precision before swallowing, then set her knife down with a soft scrape against the plate.
“That is not why we are here,” she said, her voice shifting, cooler now. She turned her attention fully to Aegon, who had been staring into his cup as though the conversation between her and Aemond had nothing to do with him. “I worry about what may happen between the two of you while I am gone. I have heard whispers in the corridors. That the King and his brother resent one another.”
She made a quiet, mocking sound of regret, almost tender in its falseness.
“When the King and his brother are not in harmony, the realm suffers. Aenys and Maegor proved that well enough.” Her violet eyes moved between them, calm and unyielding. “You are the only Targaryen fit to rule. Any sign of division between you will be seized upon by those who already circle like vultures. Oldtown. The Faith. The maesters. They are waiting for weakness.” She leaned forward slightly, the golden chains at her waist chiming once. “Find common ground. Keep the court steady until Harrenhal is secured and I return.”
Visenya set her knife down with deliberate care, the soft scrape of metal against porcelain cutting cleanly through the quiet. She had been waiting for the right moment to press against the wound none of them had dared name.
“I remember how Aegon treated you when we were children, Aemond,” she said, voice low and even. “I understand the resentment. It would be strange if you felt nothing.”
The silence that followed was immediate and suffocating.
Aegon’s hand froze above his cup. The wine inside trembled slightly from the tension in his fingers. Across the table, Aemond’s single eye narrowed, the sapphire in his ruined socket catching the slanted afternoon light like a shard of ice. Even the air seemed to thicken. The golden chains at Visenya’s waist chimed once as she leaned back, the sound delicate against the sudden weight in the room.
Aemond was the first to speak, his tone cold and perfectly measured.
“I do not need you to speak for me, sister. Nor do I require your understanding. What was done to me was done. I have carried it long enough to know its shape. I do not need permission to set it aside when it suits the needs of our house.”
His single eye flicked toward Aegon, sharp and unreadable.
Aegon’s hand had already tightened around his cup, his face pale beneath the grief. He opened his mouth, ready to lash out—
Visenya cut through the rising tension before he could speak.
“Enough,” she said, voice calm but absolute. “You have already humiliated him enough, Aemond. The moment you claimed Vhagar, you took something he could never have. You won. There is no need to keep twisting the blade simply because you can.”
Aemond turned his head slowly toward her.
For a moment, something dark and satisfied flickered across his face, a quiet, vicious pleasure at hearing the words spoken aloud. He had taken Vhagar. He had stood above his brother that night, bloodied and triumphant, while Aegon had been left with nothing but shame. The memory still tasted sweet. But beneath that satisfaction, something colder stirred. Rancor. A quiet, bitter resentment that Visenya would speak of it so openly, as if his victory were something that needed to be tempered for Aegon’s sake.
He did not argue. He simply looked at her, the sapphire in his ruined socket gleaming coldly, and said nothing.
Aegon, however, reacted as if she had struck him.
He let out a short, bitter laugh and pushed his cup away so hard it nearly toppled. His eyes were glassy, red-rimmed, and suddenly bright with a volatile mix of shame and fury.
“Oh, so now we’re speaking plainly?” he snapped, voice cracking. “You sit there and speak of debts and blood as if you were the one who had to live with it. You weren’t here. You didn’t see the way he looked at me after he took Vhagar, like I was nothing. Like I had never been his brother at all.” His hand trembled as he dragged it through his hair. “And now you defend him? You tell me he’s already taken enough? What more do you want from me, Visenya? Should I kneel? Should I thank him for taking the one thing that might have made me worth something?”
He laughed again, short and broken.
“You left,” he muttered. “Both of you left me with this fucking throne and this fucking family, and now you come back and speak of unity as if it were simple.” His voice dropped, raw and unsteady. “It’s not simple. None of it is simple.”
Visenya leaned forward across the table, closing the distance until there was nothing between her and Aegon but the charged air. Her violet eyes locked onto his with an intensity that felt almost violent.
“I was exiled for defending our blood,” she said, voice low but vibrating with controlled fury. “I put this family above my wishes. Above my comfort. Above my own life. And you sit here sulking like a wounded child over slights from years ago.” Her gaze did not waver. “Your resentment means nothing. Your wounded pride means nothing. Those who want your throne do not care how badly Aegon Targaryen feels about the way he treated his brother when they were boys. They will use it. They will tear this house apart while you wallow in your guilt.”
Aegon flinched as if she had struck him. His face drained of color, eyes glassy and red-rimmed. For a moment he looked like he might argue, but the words died in his throat under the weight of her stare. He looked away first, jaw clenched so tightly it trembled, one hand gripping the edge of the table like he needed something to anchor him.
Visenya did not grant him mercy. She turned her head slowly toward Aemond.
He was already watching her.
His single eye burned with something dark and volatile. There was pleasure ther, raw and viciou, at hearing her say aloud that he had already won, that claiming Vhagar had been his victory and Aegon’s humiliation. But beneath it ran a current of something far more dangerous: rancor.
A quiet, seething resentment that she would turn on him now, after defending him, and speak of his triumph as if it were something that needed to be restrained. The intensity in his gaze was almost physical. She could feel it pressing against her skin, the same way she had felt his hands on her in the bath that morning, possessive, hungry, and barely leashed.
Visenya held his stare without softening, her voice dropped lower, colder, as she continued without mercy.
“I have been carved from blood and scars. Do you think I have never been humiliated? I am the one who killed for this family. I am the one who survived while Baelon died in our mother’s womb. I am a woman in a world that would rather see me broken or dead than standing above them. And still I returned. Still I fight for this house.”
The words landed like stones in still water.
Aegon’s face had gone ashen. He stared at her as if she had reached inside his chest and crushed something vital. His hand, still gripping the edge of the table, trembled visibly. For once, he had no sharp retort, no bitter laugh. He only looked away, jaw clenched so tightly the muscle jumped beneath his skin, eyes glassy with a shame he could no longer disguise. The weight of her sacrifice pressed down on him until his shoulders curved forward, as if he were trying to make himself smaller beneath it.
The silence that followed was thick and suffocating. Even the fire in the hearth seemed to quiet, as if the flames themselves had drawn back from the tension in the room.
Visenya leaned back slowly, the crimson silk shifting over the scarred plane of her midriff like liquid flame. The golden chains at her waist chimed once, sharp and clear in the heavy silence. Her violet eyes moved between her brothers, cold and unyielding, but beneath that glacial calm something darker simmered, a barely contained rage that tightened the corners of her mouth and made the air around her feel thinner.
“So you will both do as I command,” she said, voice low and precise, each word measured like a blade being drawn. “You, who believe you understand what true war is. You, who believe you understand pain. You who have lived soft, spoiled lives within these walls while I bled in the east for years. You will set aside these childish feelings and do as I say.”
The rage did not rise in her voice. It lived in the stillness that followed her words, in the way her fingers rested too deliberately on the edge of the table, in the way the light caught the old scars across her bare shoulder and turned them into pale, angry lines.
The silence that followed was thick and uncomfortable.
Aegon looked away first. His face had gone pale, and his hand tightened around the edge of the table until his knuckles turned white. He didn’t argue this time. He simply stared down at his plate, jaw clenched, breathing shallowly through his nose. The weight of her words seemed to have crushed whatever fight he still had left in him. For a moment, he looked exactly like what she had called him: a boy playing at being king.
Aemond, however, kept his eye on her.
There was no open defiance in his expression, but something had shifted behind his gaze. He didn’t like being spoken to as if he and Aegon were the same.
And yet, hearing her speak with such cold authority stirred something else in him. Not the sharp, vicious satisfaction he had felt earlier when she acknowledged his victory over Aegon, but a quieter, heavier feeling. He respected her strength. He always had. But being on the receiving end of it like this made something in his chest tighten uncomfortably.
He didn’t speak. He simply watched her, the muscle in his jaw working once before stilling again.
Visenya didn’t wait for either of them to respond.
She reached for her cup and took a slow sip of wine, the golden chains at her waist chiming softly as she moved. The sound was light, almost careless, but it carried through the heavy silence like a final punctuation.
For her, the conversation was over.
