#( v; never the one to pay the price in full | alt; with kingmaketh & worthyheir )

[onetrueheir]

@worthyheir sent a raven: i need you to be honest with me. tell me the truth. i deserve the truth

War was simple despite its hardships. One could expect to either win or lose, blood shed and death. These were all things the queen expected to come from the war and continued to take in stride even though each death of her house felt like a shallow cut. Cuts that were adding up and lining her body, refusing to close and weeping like sores. Despite this all, she takes it in stride because this is what comes with war. And it is her duty to shoulder it all and to push on.

If only that was the only worries she had to concern herself with. She could have never suspected that a blow so low and so deep would come of the fighting. That one person she had kept out of her mind for many moons would come roaring through the smoke and fire to stab her. Like a snake in the grass, slithering and seeking out its prey, waiting to strike at the right time. And that is what Ser Criston Cole had done, found his time to strike to wound her deeply. Achieving revenge and wounding her as she had done many moons ago to him.

Seeing the sight of her eldest brings Rhaenyra relief for he has returned whole. She does not need to fear walking this world with one less child. For now. But that relief is brief as she notes the change in the air, his demeanor and his words. Because they are words that the queen, the mother, has been fearing she would one day hear from her son. And this son alone for though she held many secrets especially in regards of her sons parentage. Though unlike his younger brothers, this was one secret she had carried since she was his age.

A pit formed in the depths of her stomach and it was almost strong enough to make her nauseas. Throat swelling as a lump too formed, making her feel like her breathing was restricted from it. It was not, she could breathe perfectly, but it was the guilt, the regret, the shame revealing itself to her for the first time in many moons. She is silent for too long, this she knows, and she knows that her face has betrayed her. It has answered and told him all that he may need or want to know and she hates it. She hates that this, this of all things, has come to light in the midst of war. But she is to blame for that, something she is all too well aware of.

"Y-..." she fails to find her voice, hand falling to rest or possibly clench at stomach as if that will banish the feeling away. Rhaenyra, with shame, looks away from the boy before her, violets staring at the stone floor. Tell him now, you can no longer lie to him, the voice in her head that sounds faintly like her mothers. It causes eyes to come to a close as she takes in a shaky breath and holds it before releasing it, forcing head to rise and eyes to open and look to Jace.

Swallowing the lump in throat, she tries once more to speak. "Y-...you do deserve the truth, Jacaerys," she whispers, voice small, scared. Scared for what he already thinks of her, what he will further think of her when she speaks her piece. "I do not need to ask you what or who this is about...I have feared this day for many moons. And I..." words fail her once more, tears beginning to well up in eyes as she truly does feel scared. Because there many ways to lose a child, this she has witnessed and though death is final, to lose a child that still walks this world and hates their own mother, it was something that could happen this very night.