#I truly think if he was given the space to heal aegon could have been an amazing dad

[dirtytransmasc]

such a simple detail I love to see/give characters through HC's is how they soothe/physically interact with their children, so ummm, yeah (only doing select characters, cause I feel like it 😃👍)

Alicent: she does the forehead down to the top of the nose rub, but instead of a single finger, she starts with her pinky and shifts up to the next until she gets to her first finger as she moves down. when she hugs her children she cups the back of their head with her hand or arm, thumbing their hairline. she kisses her children's hair(lines). she definitely struggled the most with her kids, cause y'know, they weren't brought to her in the best of ways, so a lot of her love is shown through quality times and words, but it's the fleeting touches, the worried holds, the way she checks over her children after any possible injury that really shows her love. she also fixes their hair and clothes, and does the mom spit on the finger wipe down (mostly to aegon).

Helaena: takes after her mother, but uses her first two fingers. when she's trying to get her children to sleep, she gently brushes a finger over their lashes as well. when she hugs it is less about the weight or tightness, unless that's what they need in the moment, but about gentleness and the time they hold onto one another. she kisses her children's noses. likes to lay her children in/against her lap while she does her embroidery or tucks them against her chest while showing them something. keeps a hand on her children if they're sleeping near her. feels a little random, but I feel like she dances with her children, I have no particular reason for this, but I really think she does.

Aegon: forehead touches. whether it be touching for head to forehead, or holding his children's head so he can brush back their hair or thumb over their temples. he similarly kisses their foreheads/brows. he doesn't just hug his children, he full on holds them, squeezing them tight and doing that spinny rocking motion. playfully "bites" his kids, like threatens to eat them when they're naughty and throws them around on the bed. out of all of them, he's the one who will take the most time/be the most emotional when it comes to admiring his children cause he's got this mindset of "they are so good and so pure and I made them, they're little and nothing like me and I love them", like he waits till their asleep and will just look over them, at their little hands or little faces, gently tracing their features with a single finger. (just give me good dad Aegon, who after dealing with some of his shit, decides he wants to be nothing like Viserys and dedicates himself to his children)

Aemond: may not be a parent, but I'm delusional, and he's just a third parent to the twins and Maelor, so leave me be. he's not the most physical guy, if anything he's the one who plays with them as his love language. when he does touch, it's very solid in a way, assuring. he rubs their shoulders and ruffles their hair, holding them against his legs, letting them ride his shoulders. definitely holds their hands to comfort them, stroking their palms or admiring their little fingers, especially as he had big ass hands, so the difference is jarring. kisses their hands too, like a gentleman, cause they think it's funny, but also cause he just is a very proper gentleman.

[swordknown]

@epeolxtry // discord thread // arthur & elia reunite

The petals crushed in her hand, darkened by bruises caused from how rough she'd been with such a delicate thing. And still Elia didn't break out of her trance, staring ahead, hearing his voice just down the hall. It hurt her in more ways than she could say and it was because despite any anger and betrayal swimming in her heart - she still loved him deeply. The flower falls to the ground the very moment he stepped out into the courtyard. And Elia couldn't be sure what he was expecting but if the look on his face was any indication it was not to see her alive. The world believed her and her babies dead, it would stay that way, but she had begged Doran to summon Arthur here and to let her speak to him before sentencing him for his wrongdoings. Elia stood in one soft movement, hindered only by the state of her leg. It had been broken during the Sack, that putrid mountain of a man letting all of his weight press down through his hands as he parted her thighs and... Elia looked away, like she could shake the memory free. "You look as if you've seen a ghost." She murmured eventually, lips feeling tight in a way she hadn't gotten used to - she'd never been particularly vain but the scars upon her face were a sore point, yet another physical reminder of what she had endured. Survived.

Arthur hadn’t know what to expect when summoned to Dorne. It certainly wasn’t a rather vicious looking satisfaction on Oberyn Martell’s face. In truth, he expected punishment from the Martells, for his horrible, horrible failures. Yet, soon it became obvious that this was his punishment. Elia Martell, alive. He took one stumbling step forward, before falling to a knee, head bowed low, a gasped, “Elia,” falling from his lips. Despite all her scars (and oh, how he burned with anguish deep inside to see such obvious signs of her pain, of her suffering,) there was no mistaking who stood before him. And with the realization, his head snapped up to look to her once more, body trembling with fear? Relief? Some overflow of emotions that he couldn’t name, yet he had to know, “...Rhaenys? Aegon?”

At one point (and not long ago at all) Elia would have grinned from ear to ear over the sight of him, her heart would slam in her chest and she would feel at ease just by his proximity. Now? There were still those traitorous feelings of love that would never leave but there was also bitter anger and disappointment. Elia had always felt safe with him close, and he hadn't been there when she needed him most. He'd been at that tower guarding Rhaegar's lover. "Do you care?" She asked, it was cruel but looking at him reminded her of all the hot rage she felt over his abandonment of her. Of their daughter. It was only by the grace of the gods that Oberyn had managed to get her children free before they were taken by Tywin's men, Elia had been the distraction as he stole them away to some place safe and she had paid dearly. In this lifetime she may never be able to move on from the things that happened to her.

"Elia, please." Arthur begged, for he had to know. It was a miracle to see her standing here, but all this bittersweetness could turn to pure sweetness if she just told him that their girl lived. "Of course I care..." Yet, he know why she asked. He hadn't been there to protect her, to protect their daughter and Aegon. He'd followed Rhaegar, had protected Rhaegar's mistress and her bastard babe instead. It was not a choice he'd made lightly, and he never would have made it if he knew where it all would have led. "Please Elia. Gods, I don't...I'm so sorry. I'm so, so sorry." He didn't know what to say. And he certainly didn't deserve her forgiveness, not after all the mistakes he had made. "Just tell me that she's okay." he begged, for that was what truly mattered to him, at this moment. The knowledge that despite his own errors, his sweet little star might have somehow lived. Once, he might have been able to read the answer from her face, but now all he saw was her anger, her rage, her hurt. And gods, if he didn't feel ashamed when he looked into her eyes. Moreso than he'd already been experiencing, for here she was, returned from the dead to punish him for his fool choices. And he'd deserve it.

Elia didn't have it in her to be cruel and she certainly couldn't stand here and watch the agony on his face as he tried to work out whether or not their daughter had lived. "Both my children are fine." Elia stated, putting him out of his misery whilst cutting him with the word choice. Her children. Nobody else's. Rhaegar and Arthur had both abandoned her and the babes they had fathered. They didn't deserve her sweet angels. "Though Rhaenys not without her scars." She had been injured and she was old enough to remember and process the trauma. Her little girl had not slept a night through since, nightmares plaguing her and having her screaming in the middle of the night. She had seen too much, witnessed a sliver of what her mother had gone through before she was whisked away. "She's strong though. A trait I had thought she'd gotten from her father. Clearly not."

Alive. They were both alive. Aegon too. The sweet relief her words brought him were made bittersweet by her anger. Her children. While Rhaenys had never been his in the eyes of the realm, she had always been his in the eyes of he and Elia. “I never doubted her strength came from you.” He offered with a shrug, miserable despite all that was salvaged. Elia and her children lived, but they might have been lost to him forever. And it would be a well deserved exile from their lives. Pushing himself off his knees, he stood once again. “I deserve your wrath. I made the wrong decision.” He could explain how Rhaegar didn’t tell him where they were going, in the beginning. But it would be an empty excuse. Nothing besides the misplaced sense of loyalty he had towards the Silver Prince and his duty as a white cloak had kept him from her side. He’d chosen duty over her safety. And he didn’t know how he could gain her forgiveness when, in truth, he knew he didn’t deserve it. “I don’t know what I could say to you Elia.” He reached towards her, but let his hand drop before touching her, “I can apologize every day for the rest of my life and it will never be enough. You have every right to force me from your presence or exile me from Dorne or have my head. And I’ll accept whatever you decide.”December 29, 2017

How she wished in that moment that she was determined and cruel enough to exile or execute him. One word and Doran would do it glad, the only ones more furious than she had been had been her brothers. "Doran wants you exiled from Dorne, he wants to send you to the wall." They didn't meddle much with the North but he wanted Arthur to safer and what better place? "Oberyn wants you six feet under. I'd keep an eye on my food were I you." Of course Oberyn would do no such thing without Elia's go ahead, but why not add some paranoia to what Arthur was feeling? Gods know he deserved it. "I do not know what I want to do with you yet." He was the love of her life, her soulmate, but looking at him now only broke her heart.

“You should listen to your brothers.” Arthur suggested wryly, though the expression on his face showed no jest. “I betrayed you. I left you to die. You would have died.” And he could not forgive himself for that. “I even failed what I set out to achieve. Rhaegar is dead. His mistress is dead. I simply cannot do anything right.” Arthur’s eyes glistened with tears as he leaned towards her, “But the fact that you’re alive, that you’re safe? That Rhaenys and Aegon live? That is all that matters to me. Even if you never trust me again, I’d rather have you alive and hating me, then dead.” Gods, she’s alive. It still hasn’t fully registered. He took a moment to just stare at her, breath her in. She was scarred, injured, but it didn’t matter. Absentmindedly, a hand reaches out to cup her face, thumb running over a cheekbone, a motion he’d done a thousand times before, whenever he admired her and her beauty.

Whatever anger was inside of her was cracking under his words, crumbling beneath his touch. Her expression wavered, very nearly reverting to that girl he had wooed without intending to, that he had kissed beneath the stars of his home and that he had made love to, desperate and aching as they said goodbye. Elia wanted to break, to hold him and forgive him. But gods, she would not let herself. "Don't. Don't you dare stand there and make me pity you." And she flinched from his touch, not wanting him to touch the scars that marred her beautiful face and stir feelings buried deep beneath her anguish. "I may not be dead. But there are worse things." Those men had taken her body, they'd marked her flesh in ways that would never heal, had whispered the most vile things as they violated her. Elia would never be the same again, not when she avoided sleeping of a night (for Rhaenys had taken up space in her bed and she didn't wish to frightened the child) and the daytime kips she took were always interrupted by her own screams of terror.

Anguish broke across his features as she flinched away from him, but he smothered it, forced it behind his relatively stoic mask. He didn’t want her to pity him, for he didn’t deserve it. He didn’t feel this grief, this pain for his own suffering, but for hers. He’d heard rumors of what had been done, but the proof stood before him. “You’re alive.” He repeated, “You survived. And you did it without me, without Rhaegar, without anyone but yourself. I’ve always said you’re far stronger than anyone thinks and this is the proof. It’s not a proof I ever wished to be given, but here it is nonetheless. You don’t need me. I know this. You’ll survive, you’ll keep your children safe, even if those meant to protect you are off being fools. So, tell me what you would have me do. If you want me gone, fine. If you want me here, then I’ll do it all again. I’ll earn your trust again. I’ll even try and earn your love again, though gods know I don’t deserve it. Tell me what you want, Elia, and I will do everything in my power to make it so.” For that was all he could offer her, everything. Anything she desired of him. He would not make the same mistake again. If she didn’t order him away, he had no intention of leaving her side, damn propriety, damn what others thought, damn duty.

Elia's at a loss of words and she hates that, the past months had been thinking of nothing than what she would say to him, the things she would tell about how far the noble knight had fallen, how he brought shame to their country and broke vows he had taken long before the ones made to speak out loud in Kings Landing. Elia wanted to tell him she hated him. And yet she couldn't. Stuck before the words even left her throat. "I loved you." She whispered, voice cracking over the lie. It wasn't last tense, she still loved him. "I asked you to take me away, remember? Asked you if you loved me enough to do it? And you refused. You left me there in a pit of lions." He may not have known that would happen, but he knew she wasn't loved among those with power in the Capitol, that she was alone, that she was miserable. "You chose him." Honour and duty over love. "Why should I bring you back to my side now?" There was no keeping the tears at bay and despite standing as tall and strong as she could, her voice trembled and tears streaked down her cheeks. "When you couldn't even protect me before? When you wouldn't."

Arthur forces his eyes closed, refuses to let her see the pain her words caused him. Loved. Yes, he supposed that made sense. Who would love the one who abandoned them? “You shouldn’t.” His voice cracked, and he cleared his throat, but it doesn’t help the watery quality his voice has suddenly picked up. “I love you. I love you and I had my duty. I swore to obey Aerys, to obey Rhaegar. To give counsel when it was requested and stay silent when it wasn’t.” His eyes flicker open to stare at her, “I swore to marry no woman and father no child. What a farce...I broke those vows long ago. For I am yours and once, you were mine. And from there, Rhaenys. I clung to this notion of duty and honor when I’d forsaken my duty and shown my dishonor long ago.” He flinches as he recognizes the wet trails that begin to slide down his face are tears, finally overflowing from his eyes. “You shouldn’t.” He repeated, “I could not keep a white cloak’s vow, and I could not keep my vow to you! What sort of man does that make me? Most certainly not the one you want anywhere near you or your children. Have me sent to the Wall, as your brother wants, see if I can’t find a way to break those vows too.” He suggested with a laugh that sounded far more like a sob. Guilt was eating him up inside, for her suffering was plain to see in her scars, her distrust evident in her questions, and her grief obvious in her tears. He never wanted to make her cry.

Gods, his guilt and grief was obvious in his own eyes, in his words. Arthur had spent months thinking that they were dead. That his lover and his daughter had been murdered all alone in enemy country. He deserved that pain. Well, that's what she wanted to think. It was much harder to do so when face to face with the pain he felt in full display. "Why didn't you take me away, Arthur?" It was a question she'd asked herself so many times - if duty was so above love to him that he would choose Rhaegar (a weak willed man whom had given into her families lunacy in the end) or Aerys (a mad man burning his people alive). Noble and good Arthur Dayne had protected two of royal blood who had done nothing but hurt people and bring misery upon there people. While he left her.

It was a question he had asked himself many times over the last few months. And the answer was always the same. “King Rhaegar, thoughtful, noble, and handsome. Queen Elia, beautiful, kind, and gracious. It was like a story. Certainly, the first year of your marriage would have been difficult, with memories of us lingering around, but after that year? After you had his children? Many a noble woman fall in love with their husband. And you would love him, not the stoic white cloak. And you would be happy and safe in the Red Keep. You would one day be Queen. You wouldn’t spend your life running, spend your life living off scraps, off whatever gold I could make with a sword or you could make with a needle. What if your illness grew worse? There are no maesters in Essos. It would take time, but you would fall in love with your Silver Prince, have his children, be safe and happy.” Or so he had believed. What a silly fool he had been. He shouldn’t have taken her away before her marriage. Let them speak of the depravity of the Dornish, but make the slight a small one. If only. If, if, if. “I didn’t take you away because I thought things would get better for you, not worse.”

"How could you ever thinking I could love him when my heart belonged with you?" Elia had never wished her husband ill, had been fond of him and maybe even did love him a little (though not a fraction of the things she felt for Arthur) and he betrayed her just as badly. Her love for him died in Harrenhal and then was long gone as he muttered about needing a third head for his dragon while she was still half dead on the birthing bed. He was a weak and deluded man, something she saw in hindsight, blinded at the time by his soft, gentle nature. He would have been no great leader, no worthy king. Her husband was dead though, the throne no longer his to take. She would think of him as little as possible, to wonder about his final moments dying under Robert Baratheon's hammer only late at night when she was awake and watching over her little star. "I want to hate you, Arthur. I wish I could cast you away so easily." Looking at him as painful, it brought an ache to her injuries and reminded her of what he hadn't protected her from. And how she hated reliving that.

“Because, we were both a bit blinded, in the beginning. Rhaegar seemed a great man, when in reality he was just a great fool.” It hurt to say about his childhood friend, but his childhood friend had disappeared many years ago. He just hadn’t wanted to admit it. “Then, perhaps I should make this easier for you. Perhaps I should go.” It would be painful, but if it was what she wanted, but was too kindhearted, even now, to say, then he would not force his presence upon her. “I want to stay.” He admitted, wiping at his face, his eyes, clearing his throat, visibly cleaning himself up, “I want to stay more than anything, but I know I don’t have the right to make that decision. Only you can decide that. But you don’t have to now.” He pointed out, “I’ll stay in Sunspear, away from you, until you decide what is to be done with me.” He offered.

The thought of him gone made her panic the more she realised it could very well be a reality. Perhaps it was silly after he abandoned her, but Elia had spent years loving and feeling safe with him. Those things lingered. "You will be one of our soldiers." She said suddenly, knowing both Doran and Oberyn would complain about her choice but she didn't care. "You will watch over Rhaenys and Aegon, be their shadow. And if you ever abandon them I will kill you myself." That was a promise. One betrayal she felt she could recover from enough to give him this life. But another would be too much. "What we had will not be rekindled Arthur." Elia murmured, even as her heart protested. "You're a traitor of Dorne and of the Martell family. Keeping you around is a kindness. Rhaenys already lost one father, I won't strip her of another."December 31, 2017

"That is more than I ever would have hoped for, Princess." Arthur assured her, sliding into the formality despite how wrong it felt. Yet, he would do nothing to jeopardize his place here, not when she was giving him a chance to make amends and a chance to look over his daughter. "Thank you. I swear, that I will be the most loyal guard the young Prince and Princess could ever have." He would not fail either of them like he had their parents. He would make sure of it, this time around. "Thank you." he repeated, for he would never be able to say it enough.

It felt right keeping him here, no matter how her brothers objected. Elia had loved him a good half of her life, giving him up was not so easy. No matter how he had betrayed her. Thinking of that betrayal reminded her of the ordeal she had faced, the pain and horror. Suddenly she felt the anger rush out of her, the reminder of the injuries she sported and the way they marred her pretty face. Him looking at her like this, with scars on her face, seemed wrong. "Do not fail me again." She wanted him out, gone, so she could process this.