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The Price of Peace

Chapter Twenty-Four

“They gave her no throne, so she became the sky.”

In the ash-choked hall, Varys sifts what the fire spared and finds a name kings tried to cauterise.

In Maegor’s Holdfast, Ned reads a room that’s been erased and sends riders after a quiet absence.

At council, the cost of peace is named; oaths bend, orders harden, and the realm chooses its memory.

Across the sea’s edge, a queen refuses a fortress and chooses the tide.

At the crossroads, a girl returns to the stone, takes back her fire, and leaves something behind.

On the Kingsroad, the first circle burns.

Ao3 | The Price of Peace

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When Fire Would Not Answer

Chapter Twenty-Three

“Tell them peace came on Lannister steel.”

In the throne room, wildfire sleeps and a kingsguard makes the only choice left; the crown falls before the king.

At the gate, Tywin walks the city into silence and claims the Keep without a trumpet.

Robert crosses the soot-streaked floor, refuses the chair, and orders the red gold melted.

In Maegor’s Holdfast, Elia keeps her vigil. Later, Ned climbs to a room that will not speak, and finds what’s missing.

In the alleys, Alys is seized; Moryn cuts a path that costs him. By nightfall a crown lies cold, a boy is gone, and a girl grips a cleaver and what remains.

CW in chapter notes: on-page sexual violence, graphic violence, child death, major character death.

Ao3 | When Fire Would Not Answer

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What Fire Leaves Behind

Chapter Twenty-Two

“You dreamed. And I bled.”

In the White Sword Tower, a prince holds a cold chain while the city waits for judgement.

In Maegor’s Holdfast, Elia names the cost and keeps her post beside the cradle.

Beneath the Keep, a quiet road is laid; Alys refuses it, folds the silk away, and chooses what survives.

At the gates, goldcloaks yield the way; banners and fire spill through the streets as the bells answer out of time.

By the hidden dock, the tide does not take her. At the quay, smoke parts and Alys turns away while Rhaegar rides south with what fire leaves behind.

Ao3 | What Fire Leaves Behind

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What Remains

Chapter Twenty-One

“Some fires aren’t hunted. They’re watched.”

At dawn, a raven scratches its warning and the wind turns in Maegor’s Holdfast. A queen counts smoke on the horizon and orders a boat. Alys writes what must outlive her.

Below the stone, a single candle: Varys pivots the web, a child waits by the river stairs, and an old faith whispers that the flame has two faces.

Five leagues out, the host advances. The hammer earns a name, Jon reads the ground, and Ned rides on through silence.

In the throne room, heat gathers. Wildfire sweats. Wax meets the Great Seal, and a king sets his will to vellum.

High in the old rookery, the cradle yields. Alys chooses what remains.

Ao3 | What Remains

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Before the Gates

Chapter Twenty

“Blood tells. Even when no one wants to listen.”

In Maegor’s Holdfast, a queen prepares her last flight, and Alys chooses not to follow.

In the halls above, whispers spread faster than ravens — fire, prophecy, a girl with two flames.

Beneath the Red Keep, wildfire hisses in its cages, and Varys begins to pivot his web.

And beyond the Blackwater, Tywin Lannister rides east with silence at his back.

The gates are not yet in sight, but the fire is already burning.

Ao3 | Before the Gates

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The Fire She Carries

Chapter Nineteen

"Flame does not choose heroes. It waits for those who do not flinch."

In the crypts beneath the Red Keep, whispers gather like embers, quiet but unyielding.

In the armory, the egg waits, watched and untouched.

And in the godswood, silence burns hotter than prophecy — and leaves a wound that lingers longer than a kiss.

Ao3 | The Fire She Carries

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The Message in Smoke

Chapter Eighteen

"Not all sparks announce themselves in flame. Some arrive on black wings, slip through unsealed doors, and settle in the hands of those who remember."

In the deep of night, a message leaves Maegor’s Holdfast — unsigned, unsealed, and dangerous in its quiet.

By dawn in the Vale, it has already begun to move.

Not prophecy. Not threat.

Just memory, given shape again.

Ao3 | The Message in Smoke

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The Dragon Lingers

Chapter Seventeen

The Spider listens, the Lion rises, and the Prince begins to fear the flame he cannot command.

In the Iron Throne Room, Alys is named in a match meant to bind and humiliate her — a public display of control before a watching court.

She refuses to burn on command, and the moment leaves the air changed, as if the Red Keep itself is holding its breath.

In the silence that follows, alliances shift, betrayals deepen, and the question spreads faster than wildfire:

if Brightflame cannot be contained, who will she choose to burn?

Ao3 | The Dragon Lingers

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The Flame Beneath

Chapter Sixteen

“You were on the other side of the river — rubies in the water, like dragon blood.”

“I reached,” he said. “But I wasn’t meant to cross.”

Two meetings beneath the weirwood.

One dream.

And fire that doesn’t ask permission.

Ao3 | The Flame Beneath

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Ghosts of Summerhall

Chapter Fifteen

Tywin waits. The crown wavers. Alys does not.

A match is offered. She refuses.

The throne room flinches. The ruby glints red.

One word burns through it all: “No.”

Back in her chamber, she scrubs court from her skin.

Rhaegar dreams again.

And this time, she burns — not in sacrifice,

but in judgment.

Ao3: Ghosts of Summerhall

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The Fuse

Chapter Fourteen

The match is not a proposal. It is a warning. And the fire does not flinch.

Alys receives the King’s command: marriage, obedience, silence. But what he demands is not what she gives.

And in the throne room, beneath the empty eyes of stone — she learns just how far madness will reach to smother a spark.

“No,” she said. “But I’d burn someone. All it takes is the asking. But you’re not the one who gets to ask.”

The fuse has been lit.

Ao3 | The Fuse

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The Weight of Dreams

Chapter Thirteen

The godswood does not lie. And neither do dreams.

He still dreams of rubies in water. She dreams of blood. Of crows. Of silence. Their fires are not the same.

Rhaegar is unraveling. The prophecy no longer fits. Alys does not wait to be chosen — she burns her own path.

The ring glints red. The egg calls. The whispers gather.

A brazier burns in a ruined sept. And the fire no longer watches. It waits.

Ao3 | The Weight of Dreams

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The Whispers Beneath

Chapter Twelve

Behind the Maidenvault, a fire is lit. No summons, no banners. Just a mark drawn in ash. A girl kneels before it: not asking to be named, only to be remembered.

A prince watches. A queen remembers. A spider listens.

And in the godswood, under the ash, two Targaryens meet in silence. They do not kiss. They do not touch. But the flame still bends toward choice.

Ao3 | The Whispers Beneath

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The Fire that Waits

Chapter Eleven

“You were not born… you were struck. You were sparked.”

Alys dreams again. But not of crowns. Of fire split, and eyes that open in ash. The egg calls from stone. The pendant burns warm. She does not wait for prophecy. She prepares to burn it.

And in the Red Keep, Rhaegar reads a letter not meant for him — a name long buried rises in silence.

The fire does not ask. It moves.

Ao3 | The Fire that Waits

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Before the Storm

Chapter Ten

She wrote it in fire. And sent it skyward.

A letter arrives in the Vale — unsigned, unsealed, unrepentant. The Brightflame speaks. Not in claim. Not in plea. Just in certainty.

And the realm begins to shift.

Jon Arryn does not burn it. Robert Baratheon does not name it. But they feel it. The air before lightning. The hush before war.

Back in the Keep, Alys trains. Bleeds. Listens. Watches. And others begin to kneel.

A chambermaid bears burn scars and prophecy. A maester copies scrolls in secret. A priest lifts a ring. And calls her dragon from death denied.

The court sleeps. But the fire waits.

Ao3 | Before the Storm

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Let Them See It

Chapter Nine

She walks the Red Keep like smoke given shape — veiled in ash-silk, silver hair unbound, eyes sharp enough to cut silence. Not claimed. Not dismissed. Something in between — and becoming.

They whisper. She listens.

Not to words, but to the weight of gazes. The shape of absence. The way the court shifts to make space for a girl it hasn’t decided how to name.

Varys watches from shadow. Elia watches from a cradle. Rhaegar watches from a window — and sees his own comet pass him by.

And Alys? She draws maps. She writes letters. She stares east — toward sky and stone.

She doesn’t ask for a crown. She sends a raven.

She signs it: Brightflame.

Not a threat. A shadow. Let them see it.

Ao3 | Them See It