(A belated birthday gift for @madaboutasoiaf <3)
The babe’s hair was as dark as her mother’s. Her paternal grandmother caressed her hair tenderly and said, “She could very well be our first black-haired Targaryen queen. Imagine that.”
Her maternal grandmother – who was also her paternal great-grandmother – kissed the babe’s forehead gently and whispered, “Queen or no queen, she will always be a most precious jewel to us all. She will be loved and cherished no matter what, even if a brother should come after her to ascend to the throne and to rule as king.”
The babe’s mother was still holding on to her own mother’s hand. To lighten the atmosphere, Jocelyn teased, “You are now a great-grandmother. How do you feel, Mother? Do you feel any different at all?”
Alysanne joined in on the banter. “Do you suddenly feel very old and ancient, Mother?”
Alyssa laughed, returning the banter. “I should ask you that question, Aly. You are now a grandmother for the first time. I have been a grandmother many times over. Being a great-grandmother is not so different after all.”
Cradling the babe in her arms, Alysanne proudly proclaimed, “Princess Rhaenys of House Targaryen, born on the most auspicious seventh day of the seventh month of the year, in the same year her great-grandmother turns seven and … seventy.”
“Seven and sixty,” Alyssa swiftly corrected. Her two daughters giggled in unison. Abruptly awakened from her peaceful slumber by the noise, Rhaenys showed her displeasure by loudly and boisterously crying her lungs out.
Alyssa took over holding the babe, rocking Rhaenys in her arms and trying to soothe the child back to sleep.
With her gaze intently fixed on the first member of the fourth generation of her family, Alyssa remarked, “She is a fierce little thing, isn’t she? I wonder what she will be like when she is ten, and twenty, and thirty.”
Jocelyn’s expression quickly turned somber. “You will be with us still on your seventy-seventh nameday, Mother, and even beyond that. I pray daily to the Mother Above for that mercy and blessing.”
She had endured and survived so many heartbreaks, losses and calamities in her sixty-seven years of living. Perhaps the gods would not be so cruel as to deny her daughter that wish, thought Alyssa. Perhaps she could live long enough to see Rhaenys reach her tenth nameday, or twentieth, or even thirtieth.
Rhaenys was still tossing and turning in Alyssa’s arms, wide awake and the very picture of a cranky babe whose blissful sleep had been rudely interrupted.
“Sing her the song you used to sing to put us to sleep when we were children, Mother,” suggested Alysanne.
Jocelyn nodded in agreement.
“We’ll sing it together,” replied Alyssa. Three voices began softly singing ‘The Song of the Mothers Above and Below.’
