#even if he's doomed to always destroy them

[literaryvein-reblogs]

How to Create Character Goals

Every main character has a goal or something they’re trying to achieve over the course of a story, and it’s important for the writer to identify what their character wants and what their character’s needs are to properly convey them to the reader and immerse them into the world they’ve built.

Tips for Creating Goals for Your Characters

If during your novel writing you’re finding your character motivation lacking or your character arcs weak, it’s likely because the character’s goal isn’t strong enough in your overall story. Here are some tips for creating strong goals:

Establish goals at the beginning of the story. We should know relatively early on what your main character wants. While every single detail does not have to be readily apparent (goals can start out abstract but become more specific as more characters are introduced or setting is explored), they should have a powerful story motivation that is always driving them forward. A goal for a character can also change as the story progresses, but it’s important that the audience understands the direction the character is heading in.

Establish inner conflict. Your character’s goals should be clear, but not immediately attainable. Even when Frodo finally has his chance to destroy the ring, he succumbs to its power. This internal conflict—wanting to be powerful versus needing to do the right thing—sets up another struggle that the hero must overcome. These machinations of the mind allow us to view the particular point of view of a character, adding yet another layer of complexity to the overall story goal.

Establish a goal in each scene. Scene goals keep characters active and make them feel like they function as they would in real life. Readers want to see characters working towards something and always pushing the narrative forward. Characters should not feel stagnant, and each scene goal functions as a step towards your overall goal.

Establish what’s important. What do your characters value? Does their backstory inform what their motivations are? What do they need in their life to feel content? By thoroughly understanding who your characters are, you can better understand what they want. Is saving the world important? Or is it saving themselves? Finding out what matters to them will give your audience an indication of what they’ll be fighting for.

Establish a timeline. Writing out a timeline of when your character accomplishes specific parts of their goal can help you pace your story and spread out the conflict enough so that it remains engaging to readers. If a protagonist’s goal is to finally meet their birth mother but it doesn’t happen until chapter eight, plot out each of the main steps in the chapters leading up to that moment—maybe chapter one is finding out her name, and chapter three is getting her on the phone. Figuring out how to pace major moments in your character’s quest to achieve their goals can give you a better idea of when certain events should happen.

External vs. Internal Character Goals

During the writing process, you’ll have to establish what your protagonist wants—figure out their character desires and decide if these are internal goals or external goals. A character’s goals are integral to their character development and play a large part in how they contribute to the story structure and flow.

External goals: An external goal is one that involves forces or motivations that exist outside of the character themselves. It could be an object they’re searching for, or a destination they must reach, but this character’s goal is an external conflict that is out there for the world to see, and it’s one of the things that keeps them motivated until the end of the story. In J.R.R. Tolkien’s fantasy novel Lord of the Rings, the protagonist’s goal is to cast the ring into the fires of Mount Doom. We know that despite whatever else happens to Frodo throughout his journey, that is his main, specific goal.

Internal goals: An internal goal is your character’s motivation beneath what they outwardly express that can be unbeknownst to the other characters, or even the reader. For instance, the character’s goal on the exterior could be to get elected as student body president, but the true goal of the protagonist could be to immediately dismantle their school’s system of government. Having a character’s wants driving them beneath the surface gives them a multifaceted quality that allows for added complex layers to your character’s life and personality.

The Importance of Character Goals

A character needs a clear goal in order to keep them driven and help move the story forward. While in fiction it always seems like the main characters want many things or have various ambitions, there is always a primary goal.

Source ⚜ More: Notes & References ⚜ Writing Resources PDFs

[waywardsunlight]

Evelyn and Caleb were doomed from the start but they knew the risks, chose to be friends anyway, suffered the consequences of another person’s actions, and I think they’d still choose to do it again if they had a second chance. Because it’s not always about happy endings, it’s not about waiting to be happy when the universe allows you to be. I think they wanted their epilogue, Caleb’s death was an entirely avoidable tragedy, but I think Caleb would still choose being happy for a short time over a miserable longer life repressing who he is and I think Evelyn would still choose loving Caleb for the time she had him rather than never loving him at all. I think both of them held on to that momentary beam of light as tightly as they could knowing that they could die because of who they were and they did it anyway and they would do it again.

Evelyn knew what she signed up for when she befriended somebody who they both knew could be killed for being her friend. Caleb took a similar risk of losing her. and it still hurt like hell and it was unfair. But that tragedy didn’t destroy the fact that they were happy and they were loved and even after they were long dead, the paths they created led Luz to the Isles, led Hunter to safety through Flapjack, and reunited a family.

[uwuverisntsilver]

Why IDW didn't develop Silver's character

The go-to defense for Silver's IDW characterization is that he's "developing" because he has friends now. This, like IDW's initial presentation of Silver's backstory, is false.

Question: If no life existed in Silver’s future before he returned to the past to help fight against the Virus, then how was he born? Does changing the future mean that he is instead creating an alternate future and traveling to that new one and ultimately leaving his original doomed future behind somewhere to remain doomed? And regardless, when he returned to his future to see no life and sparse metallic plant life, I find it hard that he didn’t touch anything at all. Was he super duper cautious and didn’t touch anything, not even the ground, or was the Metal Virus no longer contagious at that point in time? Why would animal life deteriorate but not plant life? Ian: In issue 25, Dr. Eggman explains that because botanical cell structure is more rigid in nature and can withstand the degradation of the metal virus much better than animal tissue, but it would still take like 200 years for it to completely degrade so that's why there plant life left behind but no people. It has also been noted that the virus has mutated so it could have become less virulent 200 years later. That's why also his TK powers have been known to mess with electronics. How Silver time travels is a mess. What I have been able to put together from my correspondence with Sega over the years is that the blue sky scene we see at the end of 06 is the future, it's rebuilding and okay. But at the same time it has to be affected by past events since they have him come back to the past in the Forces tie-in comic, but that doesn't make sense since it's suppose to be a static future. The answer is there is no answer, it's not applied with any consistency. I have seen interesting theories from fans who try to come up with a reasoning behind all this, but sadly there is none.

As you can see from that answer. For the first few years of IDW Sonic the writers were under the impression that Silver was still living in the ruined future from the end of his story in Sonic 06.

This is wrong. The ending of 06 where Sonic and Elise blow out Solaris undid Silver's apocalyptic future and created the peaceful one of Sonic Rivals which Silver also mentions in Sonic Colors DS.

But for years IDW thought that Silver’s future was always ruined, that Iblis's devastation was never undone. Silver has not actually lived in a ruined future since 06 but Sonic Team evidently failed to explain this to the IDW staff.

Silver was NOT alone before or after 06. Before 06 Silver’s apocalyptic future had people that lived without hope and Silver did interact with as he questioned them about how the world was destroyed(No one will answer me directly. But they always point… to the flames) and after 06 Silver lives in a peaceful future with happy people. The entire point of his mission in 06 is to save the people of the future. It's also an important part of his backstory that Silver was exposed to constant suffering in his future because Silver cares about smiles. Silver IS still poorly socialized and doesn’t understand things but he was never alone before IDW.

IDW and English Team Sonic Racing perpetuated the idea that Silver was alone for most of his life which is easily disproven by his opening monologue in 06. Ian “Silver doesn’t act rude in any media ever” Flynn most likely missed this since he demonstrably does not research Silver.

This is why in Victory Garden, Silver says there is no lush plant life in his future. He acts like he’s never seen any in his own time before.

This is because the Sonic Rivals games were not considered canon during the first few years of IDW(and the last few years of Archie) and were only re-canonized a couple of years ago.

Which is important because Sonic Rivals 1 has the only explored location we have ever seen of Silver’s post-06 future, Onyx Island(the future version of Angel Island) which is lush and green.

So both Silver’s loneliness and his gardening hobby, the two biggest sources of supposed "development", were based on false pretenses.

Silver’s character in IDW is not different because of “development”. He was different because the comic writers didn’t know what they were working with in the first place because Sonic Team doesn’t tell them.

[llondonfog]

half the time i'm torn between this is my blog!! i write what i want!! and rocking in a corner wondering if the concept is too dark and out there to be well-received by the three dears who read them :'))

[madou-dilou]

[maenefa]

Why does Eowyn want to die?

Because Aragorn won’t love her? Because she feels trapped in her feminine gender role?

These are the explanations we get in the text. However, none of the characters really acknowledge Eowyn’s darkest fear: being taken alive by the enemy.

There are some bad takes on Eowyn that boil down to patronizing her and downplaying the seriousness of her problems. People say that she had a naive desire for glory and Faramir teaches her that war isn’t actually fun. Then there’s the whole “Eowyn was a deserter who selfishly ran away from her duty” argument.

You can only say these things if you ignore how dire the situation was, how close Sauron was to winning, and how gruesome Eowyn’s fate would have been if he won. She knew that death or capture likely awaited her, and she knew that dying in battle was the least bad option. (She also knew her own worth and believed that she was too useful a warrior to be left behind with the civilians. And she was right.)

Eowyn’s actions are ruthlessly practical! She wants to die fighting because that’s better than waiting around for The Horrors. Let’s be real, Eowyn is too sensible to be suicidal over an unrequited crush.

Here are some of her most revealing quotes:

“All your words are but to say: you are a woman, and your part is in the house. But when the men have died in battle and honor, you have leave to be burned in the house, for the men will need it no more.”

“And those who have not swords can still die upon them.”

“Nor is it always evil to die in battle, even in bitter pain. Were I permitted, in this dark hour I would choose the latter.”

“But I do not desire healing…. I wish to ride to war like my brother Éomer, or better like Théoden the king, for he died and has both honour and peace.”

In the end, Eowyn only stops wanting to die after Sauron is defeated. Just before the Ring is destroyed, she tells Faramir:

“I stand upon some dreadful brink, and it is utterly dark in the abyss before my feet, but whether there is any light behind me I cannot tell. For I cannot turn yet. I wait for some stroke of doom.”

Eowyn can’t turn to light and life until the war is over. Hope is too painful; death at least offers “honor and peace.” This passage is so important because it EXPLICITLY links Eowyn’s despair to the outcome of the war and makes it clear that she is not simply having a meltdown because Aragorn rejected her.

There are two important moments where Eowyn is threatened with violence. The very first time we meet her, we are told by Gandalf that Wormtongue planned to turn her into a sex slave after Saruman conquered Rohan. Even though this threat is dismissed quickly, it’s a disturbing reminder of what could happen to Eowyn if Sauron wins.

Then we have the most triumphant moment of Eowyn’s story: her battle with the Witch King. Once again, Eowyn is not threatened with death, but with captivity and torment:

“Come not between the Nazgûl and his prey! Or he will not slay thee in thy turn. He will bear thee away to the houses of lamentation, beyond all darkness, where thy flesh shall be devoured, and thy shrivelled mind be left naked to the Lidless Eye.”

Eowyn laughs at him and makes sure to announce that she is a woman before killing him. Her victory is all the more satisfying because the Witch King has just threatened her with captivity, loss of agency, the violation of her body and mind—all threats that Eowyn has faced before. But the Witch King’s words continue to haunt Eowyn and us. He threatens to withhold death; and death is therefore framed as an escape, a gift. Eowyn is taken to the Houses of Healing, but she is obsessed with returning to battle and fighting until she dies.

When Eowyn says that she fears “a cage,” this is a brilliantly simple metaphor for the entire spectrum of oppression she has faced: from the well-meaning restrictions of her culture to the horrifying enslavement threatened by Wormtongue.

Once the war is over, Eowyn is able to laugh at her fears. She teases Faramir: “And would you have your proud folk say of you: there goes a lord who tamed a wild shieldmaiden of the North!” Her fear of being caged has been turned into a bit of flirtatious banter. She feels completely safe with Faramir, and the idea that he “tamed” her is nothing but a joke between them.

[mossymallow]

People on this site joke a lot and yearn a lot for toxic, doomed by the narrative yaoi in their media, but Toby Fox delivered some of the best doomed toxic yaoi in the last decade with Spamton and Tenna and it's honestly incredibly impressive because it feels so real.

Two people who are so lonely and so afraid of being forgotten (be it because of the natural passage of time, being just plain annoying and intrusive, or both) that it turns both of them into a black hole that absorbs literally everything around them into their own ego like a tarnished suit of armor (it couldn't be me that's difficult/obsolete/irritating, it's everyone ELSE that's wrong) that the only thing they can do once they find each other is collide and inevitably destroy themselves

We see that in Spamton and Tenna's relationship (whether it was orchestrated to fail by Mike or not), is that they both believed they were getting something for free from the other (guidance on how to succeed/love/validation), when reality, the cost was that it shifted their already horrific levels of co-dependency from the Lightners onto one another. As a side-effect of both of them becoming too big to fail, they both became incredibly fragile, who's success and continued happiness relied solely on the other. It only took one mess up- one misinterpretation- to ruin everything, and now they both blame the other for their failure to appeal to the Lightners anymore. Their relationship was ALWAYS doomed to fail because in the end, despite any positive feelings they may have had for one another (be it love or friendship or just plain idol worship), they both put aside any genuine emotion for one another that may have blossomed for their own ego.

The one thing that could have saved both Spamton AND Tenna was honest, earnest, communication, and that's what's so tragic about it, because this happens in real life to people all the time. Without honest communication, relationships crumble- especially business partners, but I feel like they had something deeper. They were earnest in one way with one another, and that was how direly terrified they were of being alone. With proper communication they could have figured something out, been better for each other, and maybe grown past their fear of obsolescence out of, if nothing, mutual respect for one another's skills.

Yet they didn't. They chose the fickle whims of fame and the adoration of strangers over what could have been real. They chose a fantasy of popular anonymity (and probably money, at least in Spamton's case) over each other. Now at the end of everything Tenna doesn't even recognize Spamton, but he still keeps a pipis hidden in a dresser, and when he has a breakdown, just like Spamton did in Chapter 2, the first person he blames for his failure is his old business partner.

Because at the end of the day- to the both of them- it couldn't have been me, it couldn't even have been that other people have lives outside of his influence. It was obviously THAT guy, my old partner, how dare he leave me like this/not teach me to be able to sell things/learn how to use email?

They're more co-dependent now than they were even when they were together, except now it's divorced flavored. Tenna's mannerisms and speech are even Spamton flavored, but considering everything, who was actually coping who in an effort to stay relevant?

Relationships take work, and practice, and above all honesty, which is something that neither of them had the ability to exercise until they were both about to die- and that lack of empathy and genuineness is what made their relationship fall apart with heartbreaking inevitability. Time caught up to them in more ways than one.

If that is not the most toxic of doomed yaois to grace your radar idk what is.

[alicentsgf]

It’s mentioned a fair amount that Yellowjackets was inspired by Twin Peaks but I just want to talk about what that might actually mean.

I once saw someone say about that show, "Twin Peaks tells you exactly what it's about every three episodes but people don't see it because there's a horse in the living room." And that's so true for Yellowjackets too. Picture it like a nesting doll. If Twin Peaks was a show about male violence wrapped up in a crime drama wrapped up in comedy wrapped up in a psychological horror, then Yellowjackets is a show about loss wrapped up in a survival drama wrapped up in a comedy wrapped up in a psychological horror. And it's loss in so many forms; loss of the self, loss of innocence, and most of all loss of community.

Yellowjackets, like Twin Peaks, is just a commentary on society but once again "people don't see it because there's a horse in the living room". Or in this case, because theres a schizophrenic teenage prophet who may or may not be communicating with some wild, bloodthirsty, nature god. When the truth is, the horse isn't important. Whether the Wilderness is or isn't real, isn't important.

It's about ego vs id, civilisation vs the wilderness, and innocence vs brutality. The other, "bad" side is always waiting, like Mari talked about, and its something that both exists within us and in our society. Like with Tai, the other side isn't innately bad but if we let it rule things it can become incredibly destructive. There has to be a balance. That's why they're a soccer team. It's a sport that is all about balance. You can split a soccer field in half 8 different ways but you will still always get a full set of 11 players who hold 11 different positions. It's a perfectly balanced, symbiotic community that is built on trust and understanding. The brutality is part of the game too, but theres a balance that comes with the rules and the way the game is moderated and consented to. The message of the whole thing being that community, love, friendship is what saves you. Its when the characters lose these things that they lose themselves, become vulnerable, die. It's why everyone in this show is complicit in the death of their best friend. The writers set the stage with Allie's treatment in the pilot. The whole story in contained within that first episode and ultimately her not being able to come results in a lack of balance within the team. It's why as the show goes on the girls become less and unified in both timelines. Now they've got to the point where they're splitting into factions in one, and talking about having to kill each other to be "safe" in the other.

Shauna's right, it wasn't the wilderness that killed anyone, it was always only them. All of them. When Shauna says "You know there's no 'it', right? It was just us.", its a very similar outburst to the one Laura Palmer's boyfriend has at her funeral in Twin Peaks, saying "All you ‘good’ people – you wanna know who killed Laura? You did! We all did.”, making a point about how the enviroment the town created resulted in her death more than anything else. The person who murdered her was just hand of that enviroment, the way Shauna always seems to be too. She holds the knife, but they all put it in her hand. Every single "sacrifice" to the Wilderness so far has resulted from a group decision to push someone from the team, an idea that started back with Allie before the plane even crashed. And this same attitude immediately doomed them again, because it was Misty’s desperation to hold onto her newfound sense of community and belonging after being ostracised for so long that had her destroying the transponder. “He’s not one of us” about Ben, and “They don’t belong” about the research group. The idea of "the other" used as justification for violence.

Jackie’s death was the most pivotal because she was the death of community. She was the first to be ostracised, the figure that once represented unity between the girls. As we saw at the party, she was the only one who could reestablish balance between them, and they killed her first.

This show is about a lot of things, guilt, grief, sanity, etc, but I do think that actual main commentary is on our current society. Twin Peaks was so fantastical but at its core it was only ever really about the evil that men do and a society that fascilitates it. Yellowjackets in its turn is about the ostracisation of the "other" and how this only hurts us. Weakens our communities. It's not lost on me that at least half the known survivors are able-bodied queer women, and this is a womens soccer team. In the world of womens soccer I would say that's the majority class. I don't think that's necessarily a mistake. The Yellowjackets ostracise people who aren't like them, aren't "useful", don't abide by their religion, and who push back against the status quo. Doesn't that sound familar?

[flwrkid14]

Love, in All its Impossible Forms

Tim Drake loves with everything he has. He always has. And maybe that’s his fatal flaw—he doesn’t know how to hold back. He throws himself into it the way he throws himself into everything else: completely, recklessly, without a second thought for his own safety.

But love, for Tim, is never simple. It comes in forms that twist and tangle, leaving scars even as it gives him something to hold onto. And if you ask him, he could probably tell you exactly what kinds of love he’s experienced.

There’s love that is doomed.

Steph was chaos, energy, and unrelenting determination wrapped in a bright smile. She was Tim’s equal and his opposite all at once, and when he loved her, he did so fiercely, wholeheartedly. She didn’t just step into his world—she tore through it, unapologetic and unstoppable, showing Tim a version of himself that didn’t have to be so calculated, so controlled.

But their lives were chaos, a whirlwind of masks and missions, and when the dust settled, there was never enough left of them to make it last. Tim loves her in a way that feels like holding sand; no matter how tightly he grips, she keeps slipping through his fingers. And maybe that’s why he held on so hard—because he knew she’d never stay. Steph was never meant to be tamed, and Tim loved her too much to try.

Even when it ends, there’s no anger, no resentment. They don’t blame each other for the way things fall apart. They don’t have to. They always knew, deep down, that no matter how much they wanted to hold on, it was never meant to last. It wasn’t about a lack of love—it was about the world they lived in, the lives they led, and the way they could never quite fit together the way they needed to.

Steph was the love that burned brightly but couldn’t last, no matter how much either of them wanted it to. She was the fire he couldn’t hold onto, the storm he couldn’t contain, and the one who left her mark on him in ways he’d never forget. They were love, doomed from the start.

Then there's love that dooms them.

Kon wasn't just Tim's best friend—he was everything. A partner in every sense of the word. Loving Kon felt like second nature, so easy and so effortless that Tim didn't realize how deeply it ran until it was too late. Until Kon was gone.

When Kon died, it destroyed Tim. Grief didn't come in waves-it came in obsessions.

Tim couldn't let go, so he didn't. He turned to stolen data and secret labs, creating clone after clone in a desperate attempt to fill the void Kon left behind

It wasn't about moving on. It wasn't about closure. It was about holding on to the only person who ever made Tim feel like he could breathe, even when it was killing him to do so.

When Kon returned, whole and alive, it should have been everything Tim had dreamed of. But the shadows of what Tim had done lingered between them. The lengths he went to, the obsession that fueled him—it left cracks in the foundation of what they once were. Kon loved Tim, he always would, but part of him wondered if he'd ever been loved for who he was, or for what Tim couldn't let himself lose.

And Tim, for all his brilliance, couldn't figure out how to bridge the gap he'd created. He oved Kon with everything he had, but love born out of desperation carried its own weight, and he wasn't sure how to lay it down.

So they stayed in the gray space between what they were and what they could have been, bound by love so fierce it hurt, but too fractured to fully mend. They were doomed by their love.

Finally, there’s love that dooms anybody else.

Danny is chaos, but not the kind that breaks Tim—it’s the kind that grounds him. Danny exists between worlds, between life and death, and yet he’s more alive than anyone Tim has ever met. He doesn’t fit neatly into any box, doesn’t follow any rules, and yet there’s something about him that feels inevitable, like gravity or the pull of the tide.

Danny doesn’t ask for Tim’s sacrifices. He doesn’t need to be saved, doesn’t want Tim to burn himself out in the name of love. Instead, Danny challenges Tim to slow down, to stop trying so hard to hold the world together and just be. With Danny, Tim learns how to live in the moment, how to breathe without feeling the weight of the world on his shoulders.

It isn’t an easy love, but it isn’t supposed to be. It’s a love that demands courage, the kind that doesn’t come from donning a cape or taking a hit for someone else. It’s the courage to be vulnerable, to stop hiding behind plans and strategies, and let someone see every cracked, raw piece of himself. Danny is relentless in breaking down Tim’s walls, not to fix him but to show him that he’s worthy of being whole.

Together, they are something untouchable. Their love is an anchor and a storm, a lighthouse and the waves crashing against the shore. It’s a love so big, so consuming, that it leaves no room for anything else.

And that’s where the doom lies.

They are the kind of love that consumes the world around them, leaving it scorched and battered in their wake. Not because they want to hurt anyone, but because their connection is so fierce, so all-encompassing, that nothing else can survive in its shadow. They are the eye of the hurricane, calm and steady, while everything outside is chaos.

It’s the kind of love that makes people ache to touch it, to understand it, even as it destroys them. The kind of love that people will write stories about and linger in though, long after the last page has turned. Love, that will echo through time in whispers and legends. But no one will ever truly understand it, because no one else could ever bear the weight of it.

Danny is the love that makes Tim believe he might deserve to be happy after all. Together, they are the love that dooms anybody else—unapologetic, overwhelming, and utterly unforgettable.

[meowdei]

"Is it true, my lord?" you murmur softly against his chest. It's quiet, and you're bare, the both of you. The words are forced out like they're glued to your lips, so you pry them off, ripping off the skin in the process and leaving you bleeding.

Ayato is clever. Cunningly so, you think. Something about the way his lips quirk makes you think he's well aware of what you mean. Something about the way he raises his brows makes you know he's not going to make this easy for you.

"Is what true?" he asks smoothly. Too smooth. It's like he's been waiting for this question. He glances down at you as you fight the urge to hide against his sternum.

"There is word, my lord," you say carefully. "I'm certain you are better acquainted with the rumors than myself."

"Word of what, exactly? There are many rumors across Inazuma, you know."

Ayato is also infuriating. He always has been.

You think it's the way he's so easy to disappear. He's there one second, like pelting rain. Cold. Unbearably difficult to ignore. Lingering on your skin as it rises with goosebumps and brings a shiver down your spine. And then he's gone. The harsh droplets blended with the current and carried away downstream, slipping through the cracks of your fingers like he was never meant to fit between them in the first place.

Ayato was never meant to fit against you in the first place. He does an impeccably cruel job of making you believe it's possible that he could, sometimes, though. You wonder if that's the irony of his vision—what justice is there to how he rips your heart from your chest, inspecting it closely in awe for just a moment before tossing it to your feet in indifference?

Surely, the god of Hydro does not recognize such sadism, let alone reward it. Surely, there is some form of injustice to how he toys with your feelings.

Patience is your strong suit. It has to be when loving Ayato—it has to be especially when you love him from his shadow. He faces the sun, just as any head of a clan should. You linger in the space behind, devoid of light—and, for a moment, you wonder if that's why he likes to keep you around.

Everyone who faces the light needs a shadow.

"If you wish to be coy," you say bitterly, "then allow me to be plain. There is word that the Kamisato clan seeks the betrothal of their head. Forgive me for seeking confirmation directly from the source himself."

"Ah," he drawls, so sickeningly sweet in that voice of his. You love him. You always have. You have never hated that truth more. "Yes, it is. It seems the elders believe I will be well past my prime should I wait any longer."

"And what do you believe, my lord?"

"That it is my duty to fulfill the wishes of my elders."

Your heart sinks. You already knew it would—made room for it so it wouldn't destroy any more of yourself in its path, even. You expected it to hit that place at the bottom of your guts that makes you feel nauseous and numb all at once. It was only a matter of time, of course—you're not naive enough to believe he could be yours like this forever.

You always liked to daydream, though. A day where Ayato and you faced the sun together, no longer hidden in the shadow of the moon under his sheets. No longer quiet in your affairs like they're disgustingly wrong. Maybe you are naive, though—maybe such a daydream is only proof your mind is painfully self-indulgent to the point of doom.

"Do you eye someone in particular?" you force yourself to ask. You're not sure why. Maybe masochism makes it easy to breathe when it's your heart that's bleeding and not your lungs.

"I do," he confirms. Cruel, you think—so cruel is the Yashiro Commissioner to keep you close, fighting against space itself to have your body close by night and give into its wickedness during the day. And so wicked, heartless, and brutal is space—you hate it more and more every day.

"You should not bed someone when dreaming of being betrothed, Ayato," you bite. The words are laced with venom, tasting acrid on your tongue as they flow past your bleeding lips.

"On the contrary, my dear," he hums, pulling you tighter, closer. Fighting against space just as he always does—winning so easily, you wonder if space has ever tried in the first place. "Who else should I bed if not my betrothed?"

You blanch. Something stirs in your heart—you force it down and scold yourself for having the audacity to hope. Hope is not for you. Not for someone so plain. So mundane. So outside the realm of nobility.

You swallow thickly and croak, "You should be kinder, Ayato. Such cold games are hardly befitting of a husband."

"Is that so? Then I will do my best," he murmurs. His lips find yours, pressing a delicate enough kiss against them that it feels as though the rough, raw skin mends instantly. "Rest assured your husband shall be as kind as you need, my dear."

Your eyes widen. Something in you nags in a breathlessly hopeful voice—divinity is never wrong. The god of Hydro is not mistaken. Justice is the love that seeps into your broken heart from the man who tore it in the first place, patching it together better than it ever was to begin with.

[hazbinhotei]

running away.

happy ending. — bad ending.

warnings: disgusting yearning and pining, alastor is bad at feelings

word count: 4043 (yeesh)

summary: Alastor finds himself torn apart by his feelings for you—caught between the instinct to flee, as he always has, and the unbearable need to stay by your side.

alastor x gn!reader. ooooh boy. this one's gonna be a doozy, folks. if you like yearning, this one's for you. can you tell i was heavily inspired by mr. darcy's confession? (i honestly can’t tell if he's ooc in this because canon alastor has never shown a single ounce of yearning for someone in his 8-episode-plus-a-pilot lifespan—so feel free to let me know if he feels too ooc!) note: there will be a part two to this story, but it will be split up into two different endings—a happy ending, and a terrible, angst-ridden ending. buckle up motherfuckers.

Alastor was a creature of habit. Order. A strict, unshakable routine built over decades of meticulous control.

Mornings began with coffee (black, no sugar, piping hot). Then, a careful selection of the day’s amusements—perhaps meddling in Husk’s card games, spinning nonsensical riddles at Niffty, or casually terrorizing poor unsuspecting souls. If not that, then there was always his beloved radio broadcast, an extension of his own theatricality, his voice slipping into the airwaves with a whispered promise of chaos. He had his weekly tea with Rosie in Cannibal Town, the two of them exchanging pleasantries steeped in the unspoken understanding of what lay beneath their grins. And, of course, there was assisting Charlie with whatever new, doomed-to-fail project she had set her heart upon—whether it was trying to rehabilitate a particularly stubborn sinner or attempting to redecorate the lobby with decor so disgustingly cheery it made his teeth itch.

It was simple. It was structured. It was comfortable.

Then you arrived.

And now, nothing was comfortable anymore.

You weren’t supposed to fit in so easily. You weren’t supposed to slip into the rhythm of the hotel as if you had always belonged, as if Hell itself had been waiting for you. You weren’t supposed to make conversation feel like a game he wanted to play, something effortless, something that left him wanting to hear your voice just once more before you left the room. You weren’t supposed to light up a space in a way that made his carefully cultivated shadows feel... lesser. Weaker.

And under no circumstances should he have felt—what was the word?—relief whenever you entered. As if an invisible weight had been pressing on his chest all day and only when he caught sight of you did it lift, just slightly. That wasn't how it worked. Not for him. Not for what he was. He wasn’t meant to miss something he had never needed before. He wasn’t meant to ache for something so simple, so insignificant as your presence.

It started small. A twitch in his fingers when you sat beside him on the couch. An uncharacteristic pause before he replied to one of your jokes. A nagging awareness of how close you stood whenever you did your unspoken daily routine of passing him his morning coffee, your fingertips brushing his just barely—

Pathetic.

He was the Radio Demon. The very concept of intimacy was laughable—an absurd little mortal relic that he had shed alongside his humanity long ago. What purpose did it serve, this feeble notion of longing? Affection had never been anything more than a tool, a game, a means to an end. He had wielded it, manipulated it, destroyed those who mistook it for kindness.

Love, devotion, tenderness—these were things for weaker creatures, for those still clinging to the fragile remnants of their mortal selves. He had observed it time and time again, how it turned even the strongest into fools, left them raw and bleeding, desperate to be seen, to be wanted. He had laughed at it, mocked it, torn it apart with his own hands just to watch how easily it crumbled. Love was a trick, a trap, a cruel joke played by the universe on those too naive to see the inevitable decay waiting at the end of it all.

And yet.

And yet, you gnawed at the edges of that certainty. You, with your warm eyes and your easy laughter, your maddening persistence. You, who had never once cowered before him, who spoke to him not as a monster, not as a demon, but simply as he was. The idea of being wanted by you made his skin crawl, not because it was unpleasant, but because it was tempting. Because the very thought of reaching back, of grasping onto something that could slip through his fingers, made an unspoken and ugly emotion coil deep in his chest.

No. He would not succumb to it. He refused to.

But somehow, he couldn’t stop thinking about how your hands looked when they smoothed down a tablecloth. How your voice dipped just slightly when you spoke to him in a quiet room. How the simple act of sitting beside you made his chest tighten like an ill-fitting suit. How your presence, once nothing more than a fleeting amusement, had begun to linger in the back of his mind long after you had left the room.

He was losing his grip.

So naturally, he pulled away.

At first, it was subtle. Declining your invitations with a breezy excuse. Avoiding the library at the hours he knew you’d be there. Letting the space between you on the couch grow wider, until one day, he simply stopped sitting there at all. It should have been easy. He had abandoned attachments before. He had crushed them when necessary.

Then why did this feel different? Why did the absence of your voice press against his ribs like something suffocating? Why did the distance feel less like control and more like punishment? Why did that confused expression you gave him every time he avoided you make his dead heart shatter, his hands itching to cup your face and ease that look away?

He convinced himself it was working. He convinced himself it had to work.

Then you handed him his morning coffee.

"Here you go, Al," you chirped, the usual warmth in your voice melodic to his ears. Your fingers brushed his as you passed him the mug—his favorite 'Oh Deer!' mug, the one you had bought for him during one of your outings into the city—and the sensation burned. Not from the heat of the coffee, but from the sheer wrongness of how much he had missed that fleeting contact.

He didn’t mean to snap.

But it was all too much—your touch, your voice, your mere existence gnawing at the brittle edges of his carefully constructed distance. The words came before he could stop them, sharp and cutting, a desperate attempt to shove you back to the safe distance he needed you to be.

"You made this wrong."

A moment passed, your long lashes fluttering as you blinked at him.

"...What?" Your smile faltered, and he had to swallow the lump in his throat from the look of it.

His grip on the mug tightened, nodding curtly as he tried his best to turn a sinister smile onto you. "It’s dreadful," he exhaled, tone venomous and cold. "I would have preferred if you hadn’t wasted my time with such an amateur attempt."

The hurt in your eyes was immediate. A flicker of pain, confusion knitting your brows together, the brightness in your gaze dimming as if he had reached in and plucked the light from them himself. Your fingers twitched around the empty space where the mug had just been, and Alastor could hear the soft, uneven hitch of your breath—small, nearly imperceptible, but to him, it was deafening.

His stomach twisted violently, the pool of regret forming instantly, like a faucet turned on full blast. The sensation was foreign, unwelcome. His tongue felt too heavy in his mouth, his throat suddenly too tight. He should have felt triumphant, victorious in successfully pushing you away. Instead, all he felt was cold.

Before he could fully comprehend the wreckage he had caused, you took a step back, your face twisting with shock, wounded in a way that made his chest snap.

"I—I’m sorry," you stammered, voice smaller than he had ever heard it. Then, without another word, you turned and walked away.

He stood there, coffee steaming in his grip, staring at the place you had been just moments ago. And that's when the guilt slammed into him at full force, sharp and immediate, like a knife twisted in his gut. It was unlike any other regret he had ever felt—this wasn’t the satisfaction of a well-executed deception, nor the detached amusement of watching someone fall apart at his hands. No, this was different. This was wrong.

His fingers flexed around the mug, but the warmth no longer registered. He could call you back. Apologize. Lie and say it had been a simple mistake, that he was having an off day, that his temper had flared for reasons beyond your control. He could spin some ridiculous excuse, charm you with a quip, erase the damage with a well-placed grin and an empty promise that it wouldn’t happen again. You might even believe him.

But that would mean admitting the truth to himself.

That he wanted to reach for you. That he missed you already. That the very act of hurting you made him feel more like a monster than anything else he had done in both life and Hell combined. He had destroyed people, laughed in the face of suffering, relished in the chaos of agony—and yet, somehow, this was what made his stomach churn. This tiny, insignificant moment of cruelty.

His free hand clenched at his side. Was this for the best? Hadn't he convinced himself it was? Keeping you at arm’s length was necessary, wasn’t it? If he let you in, if he let you matter, what then? He couldn't afford to want something. He couldn't afford to lose something. He would lose you—if not by his own doing, then by Hell’s inevitable cruelty. And yet, in this moment, staring at the empty space you had left behind, he barely knew what to believe anymore.

But Alastor continued on with what he knew best: forced nonchalance. He went about his day as if his entire world (you) wasn’t being ripped apart from his very hands, ignoring the way his heart ached to see your figure roaming the halls of the hotel. You hadn’t shown your face the entire day, but Alastor simply understood that you were merely hiding from him.

Really, the idea of you avoiding him should have been amusing—should have been nothing more than an inevitable reaction to his own actions. But the reality of it? It gnawed at him. He had practically bared his teeth at you like a rabid beast, and now, the sight of your absence in the halls felt more damning than any glare or scorned remark you could have thrown his way.

He let your absence continue, let the days tick by, convinced that if he just waited long enough, this ache in his chest would fade into nothingness. But then came the third day, and you were nowhere to be seen.

By then, the irritation had settled in deep, poisoning his mood like rot spreading beneath the surface. His patience had thinned, his normally sharp composure fraying at the edges. Conversations that he once found amusing became tiresome. Charlie had noticed his snappiness, her ever-sunny demeanor tinged with concern. Angel had made an offhand comment about how he seemed to be 'on the fritz' before skipping off without waiting for a response. Even Husk, Husk, had the audacity to offer him a drink—as if he were some pathetic wreck in need of drowning his sorrows.

That was when Alastor realized, with no small amount of irritation, that your absence had begun to sink its claws into him in ways he hadn’t anticipated. And that? That was unacceptable. Entirely unacceptable! He should have been able to brush it off, should have been able to let the days pass without so much as a second thought. And yet, here he was, pacing his room like some restless specter, unable to drown out the gnawing sense that something was terribly, terribly wrong.

And then, there was the matter of worry. A most bothersome emotion, one he was neither accustomed to nor particularly fond of. You had never been one to isolate yourself—always eager to assist, to busy your hands, to play your part in Charlie’s grandiose little dream. If redemption were possible, he had no doubt that you would be the prime candidate, the shining example of doing better.

And yet, for all your goodness, for all your damnable persistence, you had vanished. No sharp retorts, no stubborn frowns in the hallway, no stiff exchanges over breakfast. Just… nothing. And Alastor—who had spent decades mastering the art of detachment—ached in a way that made his very being itch at the absence of you.

And so, after enduring three whole days of this insufferable torment, he found himself standing outside your door at the ungodly hour of 2AM, posture far from its usual effortless grace. He could have just appeared inside—after all, formalities were often wasted on him—but some part of him hesitated, some fraying, fragile thing inside him insisting that this moment required the courtesy of a knock.

His knuckles rapped against the wood, and for once, he felt the weight of his own heartbeat in his ears, his stomach twisting in ways that defied every carefully crafted illusion of control he had spent years perfecting.

Would you open the door? Or would you leave him standing in the dark, drowning in the mess he had made?

He barely had time to dwell on it before the door cracked open, revealing you standing in the dim light of your room. His mind went utterly blank. There you were—eyes still heavy with sleep, hair slightly disheveled, but unmistakably you. And despite everything, despite the coolness in your expression, despite the guarded way you held yourself, you were still the most beautiful thing he had ever laid eyes on.

Your brows furrowed. "Alastor?" Your voice was groggy, confused, and laced with a wary edge that made his gut twist. "What are you doing here?"

He didn’t answer. Couldn’t. Because in that moment, every single wall, every flimsy excuse he had built to keep you at a distance collapsed. He was moving before he could think, hands grasping your shoulders before pulling you into him, burying his face into the crook of your neck to hide his expression. The moment he felt the warmth of you against him, something inside him broke. His arms tightened, his breath shuddering as he clung to you with the desperation of a man grasping onto the only thing keeping him tethered to reality.

"You’ve got me completely strung up, darling," he murmured against your skin, voice shaking, uncharacteristically human. "My soul—it belongs to you. Somehow, in ways I never thought possible, you’ve infected every inch of me. My mind is shattered, torn apart at the very idea of needing someone so much, needing you so much. Ça fait mal même d'être séparé de toi."

You stood frozen, his words washing over you like a tide, overwhelming and impossible to process all at once. This was Alastor—the Radio Demon—collapsing against you, breath uneven, body taut with something that felt too much like fear. He spoke like a man unraveling, like a creature who had spent his entire existence untouched by love and was now drowning in it. You didn't even understand the words he said in French, but by the way his velveteen fingers held you like you were the most sacred thing in this realm, you only assumed it was an extension of his profession.

His breath hitched, and suddenly, the words were tumbling out faster, as though if he didn’t say them now, he never would. "I’m worried," he admitted, voice raw, cracking at the edges. "Worried that my entire existence before this was a sham. That every moment, every act of amusement, every indulgence, was just a hollow distraction to bide my time while I waited for your arrival in my life. Because all I want now—all I ever want—is to spend my eternity loving you. And that terrifies me."

"Je ne sais pas quoi en faire," he confessed, voice barely above a whisper. "I don’t know what to do with you. But I—"

His fingers curled into the fabric of your sleeves, shaking ever so slightly. "I know I don’t want to let go."

Your heart pounded, but the moment you wrapped your arms around him, he melted. His ears flattened against his head as he exhaled, sinking into you with a shudder, as if the weight of his own emotions had finally exhausted him. He was so tired. You could feel it in the way he leaned against you, in the tension slowly unwinding from his frame, in the way his breath steadied the longer you held him.

You glanced up at the ceiling of the hotel hallway, simply listening to his breathing mixing with yours as your thoughts ran wild. You'd be lying if you said your heart wasn’t hammering, your face burning from Alastor’s confession, from the rawness in his voice that still lingered in the air between you. You had always found Alastor appealing—too appealing. But you had banished those thoughts to the farthest, dustiest corners of your heart, convincing yourself that he was above feeling emotions such as yearning, that he was incapable of it.

So instead, you had settled. Settled for the little moments he allowed you. Settled for the quiet mornings where you made his coffee, a simple act that meant more to you than it ever should have. It had been your small way of being close to him, a selfish indulgence wrapped in routine. He never needed you to make it for him, but you had done it anyway, convincing yourself it was nothing more than habit. If you could not have his love, at least you could be something to him—another piece of his structured, predictable world.

Yet here you were, rubbing slow, soothing circles into his spine as he clung to you like you were his lifeline, as if letting you go would devastate him completely.

"This is new for you, isn’t it?" you murmured after a moment, a gentle tease laced with understanding. He only nodded, his grip on you tightening just slightly, as if the thought of you slipping away was unbearable.

You sighed, your fingers weaving through his bobbed hair as you whispered, "Then rest, Alastor. Come, let's get you some shut eye."

He barely had the energy to protest as you guided him inside your suite, leading him to your bed as though it was the most natural thing in the world. You pretended like this was natural, hoped this was natural for him as much as it was for you. You simply believed it was, because the moment he collapsed against you, his head resting against your chest as you cradled him, his body finally, finally relaxed.

He mumbled incoherently—his confession still spilling past his lips, but now softer, sleepier. Then, in a hushed murmur, barely audible against the quiet hum of the room, he rasped, "I didn’t mean it... about the coffee. It was perfect. It’s always perfect. I just... I just needed to push you away. And that was—" he swallowed, voice heavy with regret, "—an idiotic move, wasn't it?"

You let out a soft laugh, your fingers absentmindedly playing with the red and black strands of his hair, marveling at how uncharacteristically vulnerable he was in your arms. "Yes, it was."

A deep sigh left him, the weight of his own foolishness pressing down on him like an anchor. But as your fingers continued their soothing motion against his scalp, he let himself melt into your touch, his body going lax against yours.

You bit your lip, staring down at him as the last of his tension seeped away. Butterflies stirred in your stomach. His face had softened in sleep, the sharpness of his usual smile now gentle, almost innocent. You had never seen him sleep before. You wondered if he always looked this peaceful, or if it was just you that made him feel safe enough to rest.

A quiet hope bloomed inside you, cautious yet warm, as you tightened your hold on him. Maybe this would lead to something more. Maybe, just maybe, the Radio Demon had found something worth holding onto.

And as you watched him sleep, his face unguarded, peaceful in a way you had never seen before, you found yourself fighting the urge to sleep. But the warmth of his body pressed against yours, the steady rise and fall of his chest, the way his fingers unconsciously curled around the fabric of your pajamas as if anchoring himself to you—it was enough to lull you into a sense of comfort you hadn’t realized you needed.

Slowly, your eyes fluttered shut, your breathing falling in sync with his. You didn’t fight it. The past few days had been exhausting—a whirlwind of emotions, too heavy to bear. As sleep crept in, everything else melted away. The last thing you registered was the feeling of Alastor shifting slightly, nuzzling ever so subtly into you, his body seeking yours even in slumber. His breath was warm against your collarbone, steady now, quiet—so different from the ever-broadcasting hum of his usual presence. For the first time, he felt real, tangible. Yours.

And just like that, the two of you stayed tangled together the entire night, wrapped in each other’s arms, as if the universe itself had been waiting for this moment all along.

The morning was peaceful.

You stirred awake with a soft hum, stretching slightly as the red glow of dawn spilled through the curtains. The warmth surrounding you was comforting, familiar—until you realized it was gone. Your brows furrowed as a cold chill seeped in where Alastor had been. The sheets beside you were rumpled but empty, the lingering warmth already fading. Your eyes snapped open.

He was gone.

Confusion rushed through you as you sat up, scanning the room as if expecting him to be lurking in the shadows. But there was nothing—no trace of him, no sign that he had ever been here at all.

Had you imagined it? Had the past night been nothing more than some fever dream conjured by your longing heart?

Then, your gaze landed on your bedside table.

A single note sat there, the paper slightly crumpled, like the writer had hesitated before leaving it behind. Dread pooled in your stomach as you reached for it, fingers trembling slightly as you unfolded the page. The cursive was rushed, messy—so unlike the usual pristine elegance of his writing. But you knew, without a doubt, who it belonged to.

Let’s not dwell on last night’s theatrics, dear. A lapse in judgment, nothing more. Best forgotten.

Your hands trembled as you read the words, once, twice, three times over, as if the ink might rearrange itself, as if the meaning might shift into something softer, something less cruel. But it never did. The more you stared, the more final it became, each elegant loop of his handwriting twisting the knife deeper into your chest.

Your throat constricted, a hollow ache settling in your stomach as the events of the night before played on repeat in your mind. His voice, raw and desperate. His hands gripping onto you like you were the only thing keeping him from vanishing. The way he had melted in your arms, safe, vulnerable—and now he was gone, pretending it had never happened.

A shaky breath escaped you, your fingers clutching the note so tightly the edges crumpled beneath your grip. You should have been angry. You should have cursed his name, torn the paper apart, stormed through the hotel to find him and demand an explanation. But all you could do was sit there, the weight of his absence crushing down on you, making it hard to breathe.

Had it really meant so little to him? Had it been nothing more than a moment of weakness, something he could cast aside come morning? And yet… the way he had clung to you, the way he had whispered his devotion into your skin—how could that have been a lie?

Your vision blurred as you pressed the note to your chest, curling forward as if the pressure could somehow hold you together. You wanted to believe this wasn’t the end. That this was fear, not indifference. That he was running not because last night was meaningless, but because it meant too much. But no matter how much you clung to that hope… the silence left in his wake felt an awful lot like goodbye.

But what if he never stopped running?

"Ça fait mal même d'être séparé de toi." = It hurts even to be separated from you. "Je ne sais pas quoi en faire" = I don't know what to do with it i am no where near even slightly fluent in french so please take these google translates with a grain of salt. stay tuned for part 2!

[branwinged]

harrenhal, king's landing, and volantis are all metaphors for the same thing, that the structural injustices which led to the creation and maintenance of these places will eventually result in their collapse. harrenhal is a symbol of the worst of feudalism, i say 'worst' because the books do romanticise certain aspects of it, oathkeeping as fidelity is clearly intended to be beautiful and moving in brienne's storyline and "the north remembers" but what harren the black did was exploit the riverlands and the iron islands and employ slaves in its construction, thousands dead for one man's monument to power and dominion over others. it was a castle built on fear, not fealty. in a non magical sense, the curse of harrenhal is hubris. it was intended to be the height of feudual power because it was virtually impregnable - impervious to 'normal' medieval warfare, but ended up being destroyed by yet another king, this time in possession of a more fantastical means of power - dragonfire (the hubris theme is strong in the main series, the castle is awarded to scheming, ambitious, and amoral political players who either engineer their own downfall or are eventually pushed off the board by someone who can scheme better them).

but the thing that interests me is that the burning of harrenhal also positions the targaryens as capable of status quo upsetting, radical change. they can disrupt existing power structures because what are walls in front of a dragon? dragons fly. the visionary bit here is the unification of the realm, which is definitely framed as an admirable thing by the narrative because of the upcoming threat of the long night—what aegon invades westeros for. i don't think the targaryens are, like, evil for being conqueror kings, that's a disingenuous reading, but i do think this is a somewhat corrupt idea of 'unification' as it is primarily focused on the dynastic interests of this one family. because the other thing he did was make the iron throne, something that's currently the biggest obstacle to the possibility of the realm uniting in the face of a common enemy. it's significant that a fight over the throne is what kills their dragons, that's a very blunt way of saying that the the iron throne is what ultimately smothers their ability to enact any wider social change, by the end they weren't any different from the other houses. so king's landing is no longer a symbol of targaryen rule, both their dragons and their dynasty died there and any vision of radical change that they began the conquest with was consumed by the iron throne. kl as a whole is symbolic of the game of thrones, the city's geography is modeled after the iron throne with the king within the red keep on top of aegon's hill and the smallfolk left to rot at the bottom. and the inheritors of 'the game' are the lannisters, the ones who swindled the city and the throne from the targaryens. tywin continues aerys's legacy of violence, aerys would burn a city out of 'madness', tywin would do it out of pragmatism ("Lord Tywin would not have bothered with a search. He would have burned that town and every living creature in it"), so it makes sense for tywin's philosophy, that of exploitative and dehumanising violence in the pursuit of power, to be the cause of its destruction. several posts have been made about why joncon and cersei are the ones haunted by the memory of tywin's crimes with reasons to want to emulate him, so i'm not going there, but i feel it's also really important for king's landing to go out because of purposeful grasping over the iron throne and without any dragonfire (even accidental) involved. king's landing is doomed in a very apocalyptic sense because 'the game' is unsustainable. nothing new will come out of the city's destruction and dany's use of fire is always transformative, she creates life out of death. wildfire only destroys.

the city dany will bring fire and blood to is volantis, not king's landing. volantis is the final remnant of the freehold's imperial legacy. a society built on systemic evil, on the backs of slaves cannot go on. the cyclical story here is obviously that of the dragons being redefined and redeemed as symbols of liberation after they historically helped the freehold perpetuate the evil of imperial expansion and slavery. i think the error lies in assuming dany has a personal connection to king's landing but she really doesn't. it used to be their seat and then the targaryens doomed themselves in westeros because of the iron throne. dany is not here to repeat those same mistakes. where she must go instead, is harrenhal. aegon burned it on the first day of his conquest, a conquest he began because of the prophecy of the prince that was promised. the castle is left in a half ruined state so it's not allowed to, like, die. the targaryens kept returning there and got involved in events that altered course of their rule forever - the council of 101 which led to the dying of the dragons and the tourney at harrenhal that led to their line almost ending. i think the narrative 'curse' at its heart is that the castle is the site of unfinished business. it was a result of excessive feudal violence and the conquest was supposed to lead to a different, better model of governance, i do think the targaryens came close to achieving that at certain points in their history because it was a reign of both splendour and horror, but they also ended up being responsible for the perpetuation of that very feudal violence in king's landing. as the last targaryen, dany's destiny lies in unifying and protecting the realm during the long night, this is what they survived the doom for. and i think to do that she has to go to this castle that's a place of both narrative beginnings and endings but also in stasis, and finish what her ancestors began—what aegon and rhaegar wished to achieve at harrenhal but couldn't, one too motivated by conquest and the other by prophecy. because only then will the curse break and the song end.

[zozo-01]

in which you know the end is coming and all you can do is hold him close and pray you do not bring him more pain then he has endured <3

"He's coming into his own as the Deliverer."

A calm voice with a robotic tinge spoke up from behind you, taking your eyes away from Phainon playing with the kids around him.

"Yes, I suppose he is," you say with skepticism in his voice. There was always this feeling of distrust towards Lygus, and you have never been able to put your finger on it. Perhaps it was his pragmatic view of the world, or the way he's invested in the success of the Flame-Chase, despite doing nothing to help the Heirs. Maybe you're just extremely paranoid and he's just a kind person- robot?

"Phainon is so close to completing his transformation. I wonder if you're ready for it as well." Lygus looks at you with a tilted head. Unease starts to fill your body. You don't know what he's trying to imply, but the fact that there was an implication made you sick.

"Of course, as is the duties of all the Heirs, I shall stand by him into the Era Nova." You don't mention the dreams you've had. Nightmares so vivid, you're convinced that they are your memories somehow. The bodies of your friends all bloodied and laid out across the land. Your eyes a blood red and an animalistic rage taking over. Phainon standing over you with blood on his sword.

Your golden blood.

You haven't mention this to anyone, fearing that you might cause panic while being so close to your goals. You don't remember Lady Tribbie mentioning that anyone else can receive Janus's blessing. Not that this is a prophecy, they're dreams. Manifestations of your fear and uncertainty over the future. Not an omen of what will come next.

(You don't know this yet, but your dreams were sent to you from beyond the stars. They always knew when the end were to come. It would be kind of them to send their child signs of your doom, even if they sent the same warning over and over again.)

"Are you alright? You seem lost in your thoughts." Lygus didn't sound sympathetic or even pitiful, just curious. "Would you like to confide in me?"

"No," you say sharply. You weren't about to spill this secret to someone you didn't even trust. "I'm fine, Lygus. I've just had issues with sleep."

A self-satisfied smile appeared on his lips. You gave him all the information he needed, even if you didn't say anything specific.

"You are starting to remember, Emanator?"

"What are you talking about?" You hiss under your breath, not wanting to ruin the precious scene in front of you.

"Your kind has always meddled in Ravagers' business, despite Terminus and Nanook being more alike then you think." He starting to walk back to the Demigod Council. He looks back with what you think is a amused stare. You could never tell with the fabric covering his eyes.

"I will wait for you at the start of the new cycle, once the Deliverer completes his final trial." With that, he walks away, like he hasn't upended your entire world view.

Your head blazed with pain, agony seeping into every muscle and bone of your body. Somehow, Lygus triggered the Black Tide within you, it's dark thoughts making you want to destroy everything in sight. How did he know about this little secret of yours? Aglaea had swore that no one would every find out, especially your sunshine in hero form.

Panic and fear flooded your brain and just about when you felt like you were going to burst-

"Starlight! There you are!"

His voice soothes your through your pain, a powerful balm against the Black Tide. It helps you regain your thoughts, feeling like a normal person again. Or at least as normal as you could be.

His arms wrap around you to lift you up in the air. If there was one thing about Phainon, it's that he will never shy away from showing your love for you. In his words, he fought so hard to be worthy of your hand, why shouldn't he show it off any change he gets?

By the Titans, you adore this overgrown puppy, If it were up to you, you would make him forsake the prophecy and live your final days in peace. Just you and him. That would be the Era Nova of your dreams.

"I saw Lygus talking to you earlier, is everything okay?" He tilts his head with enough concern in his eyes to make your heart ache.

"No, everything is fine." You held his face in your hand, staring into the sky blue eyes you have grown to love. "Everything is exactly as it should be."

He beams that bright smile of his and leans down to kiss you. You almost forget about Lygus' words and melt into the arms of your lover. If only you could pretend that your days were not numbered, and that you could spend the rest of your life like this. You hold him tighter, pleaing to whoever is out there to keep him safe, keep him with you.

But nothing lasts forever, and the end comes for everyone. You just hope that it will spare you the pain of losing everything again.

(All things come to an end, that is the philosophy of the Destruction and Finality. It will be interesting how you change once you remember your past and Phainon ascends to his duties.)

so............ his new trailer has me feeling things.......... i want him to be happy ok :'3 also, i don't know if i've mentioned this, but all of these little drabbles are of the same reader and is (kind of) connected to this huge fic i have for phainon and a secret reader hehehehe

or: take this as my offering to get good pulls for phainon <3333 may all phainon wanters be phainon havers!!!!

bonus: my crack theory rn is that phainon's real name is Khaos (aka the last cycles kephale holder) and he just keeps the same name no matter what hehehe

[suksatoru]

𝓈𝓌𝑒𝑒𝓉 𝓉𝑒𝓂𝓅𝓉𝒶𝓉𝒾𝑜𝓃𝓈.

╰┈➤ sukuna! x reader! ೃ⁀➷

synopsis; you'd gone to bed the previous night with yuji, and unknowingly found yourself cuddling the king of curses when you wake up.

ೄྀ ࿐ this is the long awaited part three! thank you all so much for the love i recivied on part one and two!! thats like - 5k notes combined?! i love u all 🥹 <3

part one | part two.

Ryomen Sukuna liked to think of himself as a patient man.

The things in life he'd acquired had taken time, years of pining and blood spilled always ended one way - with him on top.

That is what you finally understand as you struggle to stand, the air foggy with debris and the crumpled remains of what was once buildings that scaled the skies. Yuji was gone - somewhere far away, and all that remained was the hardened monster known as Sukuna.

He was looking for you - you could feel it. His presence was known before you could even open your eyes, quiet sobs racking your chest as you plead for him to let go - but he cradles your scalp against his palm roughly and twists you so you're looking him right in the eyes

He doesn't look anything like your Yuji - that's all you can think as his scarlet eyes bore into yours with a menacing grin widening on his face

Those same hands were used to destroy hundreds of lives just a few minutes before - and now he used them to swipe the dust and tears that lined your eyes as his hand wraps around your throat - not enough to hurt you, but enough to have you whimpering under his grasp.

"Asshole - just kill me." You choke out - voice hoarse as your wet lashes lift with the little strength you have left to glare at him. But it looks more like a pout to him, and something primal inside him stirs at the sight.

You were so soft - so feminine and tender and sweet. He's never wanted anything in his life so badly.

"You will make a vow to me, Y/n L/n. And I promise you, I will return Itadori back to you." He spoke lowly, letting his sharp teeth graze the shell of your ear as a quiet gasp leaves your mouth from the sensation of having him so close

There was no way his vow meant something good for you - it was set in stone, you were doomed if you agreed. And every alarm in your mind was ringing to say no, even if it meant he'd kill you right where you stood

You doubt he'd switch with Yuji - you didn't put it pass the King of Curses to lie.

"Please - please stop it." You whisper, pressing your eyes closed so you wouldn't have to look him in the eye - he gently squeezed your throat in an almost mocking way, it had your eyes squeezing in pure fear as you waited for him to snap your neck.

"Look at me."

And you do. Maybe it was the authority in his voice - there was no questioning it, your body reacted right when your heart jumped at the sound of him instead of letting your mind try and think for itself-

"Soon enough I will rule over this world - you must bind yourself to me. Swear you will be by my side when I succeed."

You're blinking back at him, mind dizzy and hurting as you let out a huff- Sukuna almost wants to laugh in your face. You just watched him slaughter and destroy Shibuya right in front of your very own eyes, yet here you were - stubborn as ever and talking back to him.

You thought you were dancing the line between life and death- but Sukuna wasn't going to kill you. Not now, not ever. Yuji was a distraction, something blocking the King of Curses from the real portrait he yearned to see. You.

Sukuna will teach you a lesson about manners later - but now, right now - his only focus is getting you to agree to this vow. He cannot rest knowing you're not his.

"If you don't agree, he dies."

He watches the color drain from your face, and he almost wants to kill the pink haired boy known as Yuji Itadori for having you wrapped around his stupid little finger. He watches your lip tremble - and something inside Sukuna entices him to press his mouth onto yours.

He's seen Yuji do it a hundred times before - has seen the way you tilt your head to meet your boyfriend's affections. You're too weak to fight back right now - so Sukuna tilts your head for you so you can meet his lips.

His mouth is warm - that's all you can think as his heat envelops you entirely, and Sukuna cannot think of a feeling quite as wonderful as the way you mumble his name against his lips

Ryomen.

"Swear." He rasps breathlessly, and he watches your resolve crumble as a broken sob leaves your lips

"I swear."

A deal with the devil is made. There was no way out for you now- not for Sukuna's sweetest temptation.

taglist! ⋆｡°✩ @kirsoup @elliebelliegi @csolya @emoedgylord @dynakats @chrissythisisforyousworld @smolbeanzzz @nxcxllxsevens @hyeon-yi heheheh this took a while woooo. sorry for all the people who had to wait so long :)) ❤️‍🩹

[dekariosclan]

Imagine Gale as a talented and impressive young man, able to compose the Weave at will, skilled in a way that few can match, and favored by the Goddess of Magic herself. Imagine that because of these accomplishments, he’s caught the eye of a few up-and-coming magic adepts, and he falls in love with one of them—his first real love. Gale isn’t one to toss the ‘L’ word around lightly, so when he tells them he loves them, he means it; he gives himself over to them completely.

And in return, they love him for his potential. For his status. For the magic he can command. They love the wizard they see on the surface, but not the man underneath. They are attracted to his power, but not to him.

So of course the relationship fails, after the thrill of his magic wears off. But because Gale is a resilient young man and he’s caught the eye of so many, he soon falls in love with another.

And then it happens again. And again.

And each time Gale’s heart is ravaged, his ambition to become a better wizard grows, because he’s being shown time and time again that his magic ability is all that matters.

So much so that, by the time Mystra decides to elevate him from Favored to Chosen to Lover, he welcomes her with eager, desperate arms. Because if all his worth is in his magic, and that’s all he has to offer, and that’s all anyone wants from him, who better to love him than the Goddess of Magic herself?

Except…there’s a nagging voice in the back of his head that whispers she doesn’t really love him. There’s anxiety in his heart as time passes, and he reaches both the limit of what his talents can do and what Mystra will allow him to do. And most troubling of all: a growing panic that, just like his other lovers, she will soon grow tired of him and discard him if he can’t improve his magic any further.

He tries pouting, and pleading, and begging her to let him take more power, to let him be more for her, but she refuses. Smiles patronizingly. Tells him to be patient. But Gale can’t be patient when his power is tied so closely to his self-worth; he can’t be patient when doing so in the past has only ever lead to heartache.

So he does what he believes will be a Grand Romantic Gesture, one that will finally put him on equal footing with the woman he loves. Instead, it turns out to be a folly that dooms him and destroys his talents. And just as he’d always feared, Mystra tosses him aside the moment his magical gifts are gone—because what’s left of him holds no value for her.

————

Imagine Gale in his tower, alone, afraid, the ever-hungry orb in his chest, with only his tressym there to help him. No other friends to speak of. His colleagues forced to keep away for their own safety. His magical talents utterly stripped down, so that even when he does try and distract himself with illusions, he’s bitterly reminded of what he used to be capable of. Waking every morning wondering if it will be his last, ending every day full of loneliness and disappointment.

…and then he meets Tav.

At the lowest point in his life, at his most vulnerable, when he knows he’s going to be considered a burden, he meets this stranger and their group. So he does what he can to be useful—assigning himself to be camp cook, offering up his (now meager) magic skills, turning the charm up to 11—as he desperately hopes this will somehow work out. He’s pleasantly surprised when, after providing only minor details of his condition, Tav agrees to help him. He’s even more surprised when they actually follow through.

Imagine how Gale feels as Tav treats him kindly. As he grows to trust Tav, and then grows to like them. Imagine his surprise as he opens up and shows them more and more of himself, and they don’t turn him away.

But then his condition worsens. And he has to reveal everything: the foolish mistakes he’s made, and how dangerous he is as a result. He clings to Tav’s hand as he shows them his folly. He’s at their mercy now, and he knows this might be the last time he’ll ever feel the touch of another being, if they decide—and Gods, why wouldn’t they decide?—to cast him out.

…but they don’t. They don’t. Instead, they tell him to stay.

Imagine the relief Gale feels. The gratitude. And perhaps…just a hint of something more. Something that he dare not name, but that flares to life every time he thinks of how warm their hand was in his. Something that feels dangerously close to jealousy, when he’s had too much to drink and sees Tav smiling at another…

But he knows these are all foolish thoughts, because he has nothing to offer Tav. They are wonderful just as they are, but he…he is an empty shell of a man, a discarded husk of a wizard, and while they might tolerate him, he could never believe they might actually want him.

And besides, he still thinks of Mystra. He still longs for Mystra. She who cast him out, but to whom he still feels tethered. Sometimes he needs to cocoon himself in the weave, just to try and calm his fears and bring some joy back to his life, because magic is his life. And sometimes he just needs to see her face, even though that hurts as much as it heals.

One night he’s lost in thought, having conjured Mysta’s image after settling down at camp. Thinking that even if she hadn’t ‘loved’ him—certainly not in the way he’d loved her—she’d given him enough otherwise, hadn’t she? She’d amused him and been amused by him, they’d shared countless pleasures, why hadn’t he been satisfied with that?

Gale is so lost in thought he doesn’t realize Tav has come up behind him. Until they ask a question, startling him out of his trance. He’s a bit shaken, so he tries to turn the conversation from Mystra to the weave itself. And then a wonderful idea occurs to him, something that he’d been toying with already: what if they were to conjure the weave together?

He can show Tav how important magic is to him, let them experience what he does, perhaps even impress them a bit. But most importantly, share a moment with them. As friends would do…

He’s elated when Tav agrees. He leads them through the steps effortlessly, and they’re a surprisingly good student, following his instructions correctly (if a bit clumsily). He’s as excited as they are—perhaps even more so!—when they succeed in channeling the weave.

It’s such a pleasant, familiar feeling for him, like coming home to his tower in Waterdeep. Even as the weave connects him with Tav and makes them one, he’s easily able to hide his innermost thoughts, because he’s done it so many times before.

…but he’s forgotten that Tav has not.

————

Imagine Gale knowing every romantic partner he ever had only wanted him because of how he could raise their status, or how he could amuse them, or how he could command magic for them. And, each time, he was happy to oblige them, even desperate to oblige them, because if that was the price of their love, then he was sure it would be worth it.

But it still all came to nothing.

Now imagine Gale connected in an intimate way with someone he likes very, very much—while being what he considers his lowest, most worthless, and most humbled self. As far from the powerful, impressive wizard he once was as he could ever be. And suddenly a vision enters his mind from the lovely creature standing next to him. Only, to his complete and utter shock, it isn’t one where he is providing them with a service, or wowing them with his magical ability, or granting them some kind of power from one of the spells he commands.

Instead, when he sees their desire laid bare before him, it’s a vision of kissing him. Of holding his hand. The two most basic forms of affection and physical connection. The two things that he would still be able to offer them even if every last ounce of his remaining magical abilities were stripped from him. The two things he could share with them even if he was no longer Gale of Waterdeep, and just plain old Gale Dekarios instead.

Imagine the embarrassment and trepidation he feels at first, because surely he is mistaken?…and then the elation when he realizes that he is not. So much elation that his concentration is broken, the weave dissipating as he forgets about channeling it, as he forgets about Mystra. Because all that matters to him now is the image before him—the most pleasant and welcome image he’s seen in a very, very long time.

Imagine how that would feel…and how besotted, enamored and completely devoted he’d be to Tav afterwards. To know that someone finally—finally—just wants him.

Just imagine.

[inthedayswhenlandswerefew]

Cannibals [Chapter 7: Lightning and Rust]

A/N: Only 3 chapters left!!! 🥳❤️💙🦇

Series summary: You are his sister, his lover, his betrothed despite everyone else’s protests; you have always belonged to Aemond and believe you always will. But on the night he returns from Storm’s End with horrifying news, the trajectories of your lives are irrevocably changed. Will the war of succession make your bond permanent, or destroy the twisted and fanatical love you share?

Chapter warnings: Language, sexual content (18+ readers only), babies and parenthood, blood and violence, character deaths, I really cannot summarize this chapter you just gotta experience it, I'll pray for you 🙏

Word count: 6.8k

💙 All my writing can be found HERE! ❤️

Tagging: @themoonofthesun @chattylurker @moonfllowerr @ecstaticactus @mrs-starkgaryen, more in comments 🥰

🦇 Let me know if you’d like to be added to the taglist 🦇

You’re curled up in bed with a velvet pouch of hot stones that have gone cold, bloody rags bunched between your thighs, trying desperately to sleep, and outside a storm is brewing over Blackwater Bay and bringing with it dark skies and strikes of lightning that stalk ever-closer. Through the open window, the air tasting like late-summer rain, you can hear Helaena and the maids corralling the children back into the Red Keep. They are laughing because nobody is dead yet, not even the ailing and absent King Viserys, not even doomed little Luke Strong.

Aemond lets himself into your chambers and stands over your bed, staring down at you with some combination of annoyance and concern. You have failed him. You were not where he wanted you to be. “Why weren’t you at the beach?” Playing with your niece and nephews, collecting your seashells.

“Because women are cursed.”

Aemond smiles, perhaps a bit relieved; he has his answer. “And you more than any of them, because you’re so wicked.”

“Maester Orwyle says I can’t have more milk of the poppy for two hours.”

“Then we must listen to him. It is a powerful remedy, and we cannot endanger you.” He takes off his boots and climbs into bed, lying behind you, one hand following the curve of your waist to settle on your lower belly. “I can relax the muscles. It might ease your suffering.”

Right now? “Oh no, no, you don’t want to do that,” you warn him. “It’s very messy.”

“You think I’m afraid of your blood?” Aemond says, amused. “Everything we’re built of is the same.” He lifts the hem of your silk nightgown and reaches underneath the nest of rags, sliding there in the coppery wetness as you inhale sharply, startled but not unwilling. When Aemond removes his hand, the carnage he is stained with is bright crimson but dotted with clots. Then he licks the blood from his fingers and paints his tongue red. You can’t keep the shock from your face. Aemond grins, wets his hand again, draws a heart on your left cheek just beneath your eye. You laugh and pretend to try to shove him away.

“You’re deranged, you’re a monster—”

“Let me help you,” Aemond whispers, nuzzling blood from his lips into your silver hair. “Let me take your pain away like you quiet mine.”

And you surrender to him like you always do—worn down, overpowered, intoxicated, bewitched, seduced, perhaps all at once—and as Aemond’s hand works and the gory metallic ether of blood fills both of your lungs, the cramps dissolve into nothingness and then build to desire, and you’re opening your thighs for him and the rags are whisked away, unnecessary, forgotten, and now there is blood on the bedsheets and your fingers are twisting into the pillows strewn around you, and it doesn’t feel shameful at all anymore, because what is blood if not made from the same minerals as coins and blades and ocean and ash, and what is lust if not a fire that burns the constraints of the world away?

You kiss him as you come, moaning into his bloodstained mouth, biting his lower lip, and if the careless pressure of your teeth makes him bleed then that’s just more iron and copper and steel to add to the molten sea you are marooned in, more magma, more rust. “Enough,” you gasp when the last of the waves have passed and you are emptied and too sensitive, and Aemond knows to listen. Then you reach for Aemond’s trousers, where you can see he is hard. You are abruptly and ruinously exhausted—you struggle to keep your eyes open—but it feels wrong to not take care of him in return.

It shouldn’t take long, he’s already flushed, he’s already dripping sweat—

“No need,” Aemond says, gently stopping your hands. And as you burrow into the pillows and your eyes dip closed, your skin and hair still splattered with red, he slips away silently so you can sleep.

~~~~~~~~~~

“I don’t want to leave you,” Jace says, knowing that he has to anyway. “Either of you.”

You are nursing the baby in a chair by the fireplace; you needed a change of scenery from the bed. The upholstery is pale blue velvet. The blanket the baby is swathed in is embroidered with pine trees and foxes, and far beyond your skill; Lady Caro made it. She is nearly as gifted with a needle as Helaena. On the walls of the bedchamber you share with your husband are mosaics you’ve pieced together over the past nine months here at the modest castle of Heart’s Home in a cold, remote corner of the Vale. The fractured faces look in on you like curious gazes through clear windows: Aegon, Helaena, Daeron, Jaehaera, Maelor, Mother, Criston. You aren’t any closer to them now, but you feel like you are. The world seems softer, warmer, smaller.

You smile as you ghost a fingerprint over the baby’s faint dark eyebrows. He’s half-asleep as he suckles, hushed and content and entirely helpless. He has Jace’s coloring, but something about the shape of his eyes reminds you of Aegon. “We’ll be here waiting when you get back.”

“I think he looks a lot like Luke,” Jace says, admiring the baby. He’s standing with one arm draped over the back of your chair and the flickering firelight from the hearth on his face, turning his skin from snow to sunstone. “And Joffrey. His face is rounder than mine.”

“Have you been to the Eyrie to see them since the war began?” Joffrey, Rhaena, Rhaenyra’s young white-haired sons Aegon and Viserys.

Jace shakes his head. “I never wanted to be away from you for longer than necessary. I didn’t want to risk being spotted and revealing where they’ve been hidden. And I didn’t know what to say.” About us, about our marriage, about our baby.

“You should visit them, Jace. I would visit Helaena and her children if I could.” You leave out the others intentionally; Helaena is your only sibling that Jace considers blameless. You miss Aegon and Daeron just as much, but in the solitude of your own heart—in the stillness, in the silence—you aren’t sure if you want to see Aemond again. You don’t know if he will be soft with you, or vengeful or cold, or if he has filled the void of your absence with a lover, something that you cannot think about without your stomach lurching and your skull aching, and so you put him out of your mind as much as you can and stay here with the baby instead.

Jace rests a hand on your shoulder reassuringly, then strokes your cheek. He says, meaning the baby: “We’ll have to get him his own egg.”

“I hope he won’t inherit my affliction,” you murmur somberly. “I hope he’ll have a dragon someday.” Without them, we are powerless. Without them, we aren’t real Targaryens.

“Maybe there’s something you need to do first.”

You look up at Jace, not understanding.

“I’ve spent a lot of time considering what inspires a dragon to bond to someone,” he says. And you think, feeling a fleeting stab of betrayal before you stitch the wound closed with invisible thread: Because you’ve been helping the Blacks search for riders. “It seems that each creature has their own preferences. Meleys favored women who were spirited and highly intelligent. Dreamfyre has chosen two riders, both gentle, shy, and fond of animals. Seasmoke bonded to two sons of Corlys Velaryon with similar temperaments, agreeable and charismatic, Quicksilver to a father and son who were both considered weak and died young. Caraxes seems to have an affinity for warriors.” It does not escape you that Jace neglects to mention Vhagar, as if through his silence he can make the beast and her rider vanish. “And Vermithor…” Jace offers you a small, sympathetic smile, remembering that you once wanted him. “The Bronze Fury bonds to riders who are imposing in body and ambitious in spirit. And I suspect he only likes men.”

“So it was always hopeless,” you say gloomily. You recall the miniature Vermithor that Aegon once carved for you out of oak wood. You hope that Aegon is still alive somewhere, scarred but lying in wait, always underestimated, always so much deeper than he seems, an ocean that Mother and Father mistook for a puddle, messy and marginal and inconvenient.

“I believe dragons often gravitate towards riders who are mirrors of themselves. Even Vermax, he is…” Jace considers this. “He’s proud, and he’s clever, but he’s not as formidable as he imagines himself to be.”

“Like you,” you say before you can stop to consider whether Jace will be offended by it, and he gives you an amused smirk. The baby has stopped nursing and fallen asleep; you fix the bodice of your gown and cradle him against you. There are maids to take him when you’re tired, and Jace loves holding him, and Lady Caro steals him away often, but right now you don’t want your freedom. You don’t want your mind to be untethered and to wander to all the places you’re not supposed to be.

Jace continues: “What I mean is, perhaps there is some quality you must cultivate within yourself before the beast you are meant to have judges you worthy.”

“Hardly any unclaimed dragons are left now.” Then you tease: “Do you suggest I become quiet and timid so Grey Ghost will like me?”

Jace laughs. “No, I fear that’s a lost cause, princess. You could never be timid.”

You are intrigued. “Then what am I?”

“I think you’re hungry,” Jace decides. “I think you always want more.”

“I never wanted that many things.” Aemond. My family to be safe. And I wanted Vermithor.

“Every line that is drawn, every place you’re told not to go or act you’re not supposed to do, you insist upon overreaching.”

Is that why Aemond and I were so drawn to each other? you think doubtfully. Because it was forbidden? Because it horrified people who climbed high enough to live alongside Targaryens but could never understand them?

“I think Meleys would have been a good match for you,” Jace says after a while. “If she hadn’t already been claimed by Grandmother.”

“And now the Red Queen is dead.” Like Arrax, and Moondancer, and Seasmoke, and probably Sunfyre too. How many dragons will be left when this is over? How many Targaryens? You clutch the baby closer to you; he stirs in his sleep, tiny fingers grasping at nothing. “What sort of rider does Silverwing favor? What could this illiterate drunk Ulf the White possibly have in common with Good Queen Alysanne?”

Jace snickers. “That’s a good question. I’ve been ruminating on it. My theory is that since Silverwing was never ridden into battle, and has always been relatively docile and accustomed to living peacefully near humans, she was attracted to Ulf’s…how to describe it? His lack of military prowess. Or, alternatively, once Vermithor was claimed Silverwing was very, very lonely.”

You smile, and then it dies. It must be indescribably painful to be separated from one’s mate after a century together. Unsurvivable, even. “Can Silverwing fight, do you think?”

Jace heaves a sigh and shrugs. “I’m not sure if either of them can. Ulf will try, at least. Hopefully it won’t come to that, and Vermithor is enough to protect King’s Landing. Hugh Hammer is an inexperienced rider, but he’s brave and he’s committed. Each time I see him he’s better than he was before.”

Hugh Hammer is a bastard blacksmith, but he has more power in this war than I do. Ulf the White is an idiot and a drunk, but he’s a true Targaryen and I’m not. You rock your sleeping child in your arms, quieting the voices that flutter in your skull like bat wings. You kiss his wisps of dark curls and breathe in his warmth and newness and blood that is interwoven with yours.

“You could learn how to hate your own kind and claim the Cannibal,” Jace jokes.

You chuckle. “I don’t hate anyone.” Not here, not now.

Lady Caro arrives in the doorway carrying a tray of cinnamon tea. “I have come offering a trade,” she says, grinning, and shuffles excitedly across the room. She sets the tray down on the table by your chair and holds out her hands. Reluctantly, you surrender the baby. Lady Caro coos and beams at him as you and Jace sip cinnamon tea, sweet and loosing steam like morning mist into the air. “Surely by now you’ve made the logical decision to name him in my honor.”

“Carolei would be a very strange thing to call a boy,” Jace says.

“Caroson,” she jests.

You add: “Carogon. Carocaerys.”

“Awful!” Jace says, laughing.

“Have you been feeding the baby again?” Lady Caro scolds you. “We have wetnurses for that.”

“They get him all night. I want time with him too.”

“You’re barely even producing any milk. You’d make for a terrible goat.”

“Then I’ll nurse him for as long as I can.”

“You’ll end up with pitiful floppy breasts like mine.”

“Isn’t this what they’re for? Nourishing children, not being gawked at and tugged on by some man?”

Lady Caro turns to Jace, exasperated. “She has some disease. She can’t listen to anyone.”

He smiles. “She’s an untamable beast, I’m afraid. Burns up anyone who makes the attempt.”

Lord Corbray walks in, and nestled in his ancient arthritic hands is a sword in a sheath. There is a large heart-shaped ruby in the hilt. “Prince Jacaerys, I cannot begin to tell you what an honor it has been not only to host you and the princess here in our humble castle, but also to have a future king of the Seven Kingdoms born within our walls.”

Jace stands up straighter, as his mother would want him to. He’ll never look like the heir to the throne, like a Targaryen, but he can act like one. “We continue to be grateful for your hospitality.”

“To commemorate this happy occasion, I wish to gift you a cherished heirloom of my house. This is Lady Forlorn, made of Valyrian steel. She came to House Corbray over a century ago, and now I bequeath her to you. I hope she will aid you in your victory in this unjust war, and that all the realm will soon be at peace and under competent rulership.”

Jace looks at you uneasily; you pretend to be preoccupied drinking your tea. You ignore Lord Corbray’s slight against the Greens. You don’t have much choice, and you’ve had plenty of practice. Jace takes Lady Forlorn from Lord Corbray and unsheathes her, studying his reflection in the cold smoke-colored grey of the blade. His face is grave. Now he feels the weight on his shoulders of being not just a prince, an heir, a soldier, and a husband, but a father as well, something he himself never had in a way that was truthful and pure. You are alarmed to see tears gleaming in his dark eyes.

“Jace?” you say, touching his arm.

He regains his composure. “Thank you, Lord Corbray. I will treasure Lady Forlorn, and I will endeavor to always use her wisely.”

Lord Corbray smiles fondly at the slumbering baby in Lady Caro’s arms. Across the Riverlands, their sole surviving child, Jessamyn, is in hiding with her husband and children. At Lady Caro’s insistence, they fled from the Mallisters’ castle at Seagard in case Aemond and Vhagar descend upon it. He is still burning. A monster? you think. “I assume you’ve named your firstborn?”

You and Jace exchange a glance. You haven’t yet; you are afraid to discuss it with each other. There are so many possibilities—Targaryen or Velaryon or Strong—and none seem to be without some unspoken allegiance or condemnation. There are so few guiltless names left. But you think you know what Jace would choose if he dared to speak it aloud.

“We should name him after Luke,” you say. A boy, an innocent. A victim of a horrific accident that started this war.

Jace is surprised, but there is relief in his face too. “Lucerys?” he says, trying it out. Then he is solemn again. “It feels wrong to use the exact same name. Like I’m trying to replace him.”

“Lucerion,” Lady Caro suggests, still holding the baby. “It sounds like a prince’s name. It sounds like a king’s.”

Jace attaches Lady Forlorn to his belt and then takes the baby, obviously against Lady Caro’s will. “Lucerion,” Jace murmurs, smiling down at his son who is stirring awake and beginning to whimper. “Is that your name? Is that what we’ll call you?”

“Perhaps Luca for short,” you say from your chair, feeling drained and like you need to lie down. You’ll have to change your rags again soon, or you’ll bleed through them.

“Luca, the littlest dragon,” Jace proclaims, touching his fingertip to the baby’s puggish nose. Then he turns to you. “Did you have a nickname as a child? I always did and still do, of course. And Luke…” Jace trails off, thinking of his dead brother, murdered by yours.

You see your red bat traveling around the board; you feel the warmth of blood on your cheek. “They called me Red.”

“Red?” Jace is baffled. “Like the color?”

“There was a game we played when we were young, and my piece…” You close your eyes, not wanting to remember, not wanting to feel the weight of their absence. “It doesn’t matter. It was so long ago.” And you fear that Jace will hear the evasiveness in your voice and ask you more questions; but he is absorbed with the baby, and he has already forgotten.

Two days later Jace and Vermax fly south to King’s Landing, and you and Luca are left in the care of the Corbrays and the maids and the ghosts that haunt the drafty stone corridors of Heart’s Home, soldiers killed in the Riverlands and the Reach, women and children burned and starved, bones devoured by dragons, generations of names forgotten.

Sometimes you giggle with Lady Caro as you drink cinnamon tea in the Great Hall. Sometimes you stand in the castle rookery listening to the ravens caw and stare out into the cold mist of the mountains, wondering what is happening in the world outside. And sometimes you have Luca nestled in your arms and walk with him around your bedchamber, introducing him to the faces of the people you left in your old life, when you were called Red and you believed you could be someone like Visenya. But you never mention Aemond, and not just because there are no mosaics of him on the wall.

You wouldn’t know what to say. You wouldn’t know where to begin.

~~~~~~~~~~

You learn Jace is back when he climbs into bed just as you are drifting off one night, silver moonlight spilling in through the glass of the window, his body folding into you, his arm skating over your waist to find your hand and weave his fingers through yours. Two months have passed since he left, moons that grow full and then vanish, milk that dries up and blood that ceases flowing and rebuilds inside you for the next child, if there will be one, when there will be one. Luca is sleeping in his own room with his maids and wetnurses. Jace’s curls tickle your throat as he nuzzles into you as if he wants to disappear.

He says: “The littlest dragon is much bigger than I remember.”

“How was Helaena?”

“Troubled, as is to be expected, but in good health. Jaehaera and Maelor are well too. King’s Landing is cold some days now. I think they’ll have snow soon. The taxes, the riots, the stockpiling of food as the Reach and the Riverlands burn…it’s a disaster. Mother is desperate. She misses Luke, I think. And Baela, and Daemon. She’s lost so much weight I barely recognized her. But she was very, very happy to hear about Luca. Hopefully she can meet him soon. Although we’ll have to be careful traveling with him while he’s so small, we’ll have to ensure he’s warm enough.”

Winter is coming, you think, remembering Cregan Stark’s army under the protection of Daemon and Caraxes. “Did you see Rhaena and the boys at the Eyrie?”

“I did,” Jace admits, as if it was a fraught experience.

“And what happened?”

“Rhaena called me a traitor.”

“For marrying and fathering a son with me?”

“No, that she understands,” Jace says. “But it is treason to love you.”

You turn around to look at him in the shadows, in the moonlight. “You told her?”

“She could tell. I cannot hide it. I am a glass jar and you and Luca are the butterflies inside.” And Jace kisses you softly, his fingers hooked beneath your chin, his flesh coming alive again after so long away: managing and conciliating, lifting Rhaenyra’s spirits, pawing through the heaps of bastards in King’s Landing for dragonriders, flying on Vermax through storms and snow.

When you kiss Jace back, when your hands go to his chest and his jaw and his face, when you open his tunic so you can feel the heat of his skin underneath, you are aware that parts of you are waking up again as well. There is a dull but definite ache of lust beginning to bloom like a blood drop soaking into white cotton.

“Are you…” Jace begins. “Do you think you’re healed enough, I mean…have you stopped bleeding?”

You hesitate. “I have.” You think of your first time with him and how painful it was, the sensation of burning, of tearing, and you can only assume it will be worse now. “But I’m rather terrified too.”

“No, no, don’t be afraid,” Jace whispers, he pleads, running his fingers through your long unbound hair. “We don’t have to do that. I won’t hurt you. I’ll wait for as long as you want.” His dark eyes travel down the white nightgown that clings to your body, your breasts, your belly, and then lower. “Can I…can I try something?”

“Try what?” you ask, bewildered. Then as Jace begins to push the hem of your nightgown up over your hips to your waist, you grin and kiss him again in the dim celestial light, cool night air rushing up over your bare legs, blood surging through your arteries to where he bends low to taste you once—a long, slow, tentative drag of the tongue—and then moans quietly and pushes your thighs further apart so he can bury himself there and lick, suck, swallow down your clear mineral wetness as it pools for him.

Something isn’t quite right—not enough pressure, not the ideal angle—but it’s exquisite to be reacquainted with this side of yourself, to know you can feel this way again, insatiable and desired. When you reach to touch Jace, there is a moment when you are startled to find dark curly hair in place of silk-smooth silver, and there is a ghost in the room like a voyeur watching, and you think dazedly: If Aemond knew about this, would he kill me?

“There,” you gasp, jolting as your husband stumbles upon the perfect place and rhythm. “Jace, right there…”

He listens, he is groaning with desperation for you, and you roll into a climax that is brief and sharp and a little painful, but good. Instead of being extinguished, you are a kindled flame. You turn over, straddle Jace, and unfasten his trousers. You begin kissing your way down his belly, nipping at him, your palm kneading his hardness, and you know he wants you but for some reason when you go to take him in your mouth, he pushes you away.

“You don’t have to do that,” Jace says, alarmed.

“I know. I want to.”

“No, seriously. Stop.”

You look at him, wounded, rejected. “Jace, I’m not doing this out of obligation. I enjoy it.”

He is staring at the wall. “I just…for you to…I’m sorry, it just feels wrong.”

“I can do things you believe are only for whores and still be your wife.”

“Shh,” he says, and his voice is gentle but his face is pained. You think of something Criston once told you when you were collecting bones from the Godswood of the Red Keep: Red, it hurts your mother when you’re like this. Are you cursed to disappoint people, to repulse them, to be eternally misunderstood? “I have a gift for you.”

“A gift?”

Jace gets out of bed and fetches a small wooden box he must have brought into the room with him when you were still half-asleep. He opens the box, debates whether to reach in, decides against it and passes you the whole box instead. “I asked the castle maester to procure some while I was away…”

You squeal with delight when you see what’s inside: three black and white bats the same breed as Sapphire was, large fanlike ears and wiggling noses and small black eyes that peer curiously up at you. When you offer them your open palms, they immediately scramble into them.

“I hope they’re good ones.” Jace chuckles nervously. “I don’t really know what makes a bat suitable or not.”

“They’re perfect,” you say, smiling. “I’ll build them a roost. I’ll introduce them to Luca.”

Yet you cannot stop yourself from thinking: Aemond wouldn’t have cared if I was still bleeding.

~~~~~~~~~~

You are snuggled up with Luca in your chair by the fire, cool midday light—the color of steel, smoke, rainclouds, ash—streaming in through the windows. The baby’s eyes have turned dark like Jace’s, and his curls grow longer. He is only half-awake and blinking drowsily, his diminutive hands clasping your fingers. He doesn’t cry often, but he doesn’t smile either. Lady Caro believes he already has the temperament of a good king, a calmness, a graveness. She says: How improper would it be for him to be full of complaints or cheerfulness, the way the world is right now? No, he ought to be serious. He ought to be grateful he’s not starving or being roasted alive.

“I have some new friends,” you whisper to the baby like a secret or a myth. “They’re asleep right now. They sleep all day, kind of like you do. But then at night they come alive and they’re free, and they fly around like hawks or dragons.”

You speak for Luca, a soft bird-trill of a voice: “What are their names?”

“Good question,” you say, smiling. “Iris, Shark, and Flood. And you’ll meet them soon.” Your eyes go to the mosaics on the walls. Jace hasn’t asked you to take them down, but he doesn’t acknowledge them either, except for the mosaic you made of him that hangs by the headboard of the bed. He beams at that one and calls it fine work. “You’ll meet the people I grew up with too. Aegon will make you wood carvings. Helaena will sew you blankets. Daeron will take you on adventures. Jaehaera and Maelor will play games with you. And Mother and Criston will love you because you won’t be like me. You’ll be sweet-tempered and honorable, and when you’re old enough you’ll have a dragon to help protect us with.”

There is a knock on the doorframe; one of Luca’s wetnurses has arrived to feed him. You regret that you can’t anymore. Lady Caro was right; you’d be a terrible goat or cow or yak.

“Princess,” the wetnurse says, curtsying before she takes the baby from you. You watch her leave with him for his own bedchamber—Lady Caro has already filled it with toys and children’s books—and as soon as they are out of sight, the darkness of your losses creeps back in like spiders scurrying down the corridors of your veins and arteries, like rust growing over steel. Then you hear the rumbling of voices downstairs in the Great Hall.

You stand and swish in your gown—one of the Vale’s anemic colors, a faint dusky rose—through the hallway and down the spiral staircase of the tower. In the belly of the castle, the commotion is louder, and you sweep into the Great Hall to find men gathered around the table closest to the roaring hearth, Lord Corbray and his knights and the maester, and Lady Caro too looking on anxiously. Jace is holding a piece of parchment in his hands, presumably just delivered by a raven. He shakes his head as he reads it. Outside, snow is falling.

Lady Caro is saying: “Well you’ll have to tell her. Oh, the poor dear, as if everything else isn’t bad enough. And only the gods know where Aemond is, he hasn’t been spotted in the Riverlands for days…” Then she spies you and shoos Lord Corbray and his men from the room. They bow to you as they depart, swift little bobs of the head. They have to; you are now both the wife and mother of future kings.

“Jace?” you say when the Great Hall is empty except for the two of you and Lady Caro.

Jace’s face is stricken. Lady Forlorn hangs from his belt. The letter is still clutched in his left hand; the right grips the hilt of his Valyrian steel sword. “I’m so sorry.”

“What?” you ask, immediately horrified. Aegon dead of his burns, Daeron killed in battle, Mother executed for treason, Aemond…? “What happened?”

“You have to believe that I had no idea about any of this, I never would have given Hugh the order if I’d been there, or let Mother do it—”

“Jace, please tell me.”

Aemond, Aemond, Aemond??

Instead, Jace says absurdly: “It’s Helaena.”

You stare at him. “Helaena isn’t a warrior.”

“No,” he agrees. “But she got to Dreamfyre somehow and tried to escape the city.”

“Alone?”

“Yes.”

That’s impossible. She wouldn’t leave Mother and the children. “No, she couldn’t have, she—”

“She took flight,” Jace insists. “And my mother sent Hugh Hammer after her on Vermithor.”

Vermithor was supposed to be mine, you think numbly. “And Helaena, she…she was…?”

Jace is trying to keep his voice steady; his dark eyes gleam, begging you not to hate him. “Dreamfyre attacked when Vermithor flew close to her. She wasn’t an especially aggressive dragon, but she was large and formidable, and she fought to defend her own life and that of her rider. Vermithor ripped out her throat, though Hugh was burned to death in the saddle. Then Vermithor flew eastward, and no one knows where he is now. Dreamfyre crashed to the earth, and Helaena with her. Their bodies were found on the beach outside the Red Keep.”

She can’t be dead. She never hurt anyone. She just wanted to be with her creatures and her family. She embroidered my blankets with red bats, she put ladybugs into my open palms. “Why would Helaena try to run, why would she do that?”

“I don’t know.”

You think nonsensically, as you have no way of knowing this: Because she was trying to stop something terrible from happening. “I told you to give her more freedom. And that freedom allowed her to sneak away to the Dragonpit.”

Jace reaches for you. “This isn’t your fault—”

“All of it is my fault!” you shout at him, and Lady Caro shrinks away and covers her mouth with her hands. “If I’d had Vermithor, the Greens would have been unstoppable! And Rhaenyra never would have tried to claim the throne, and Aemond wouldn’t have been sent to Storm’s End, and Luke and Jaehaerys and Baela wouldn’t have died, and Aegon wouldn’t have been burned, and Aemond wouldn’t be destroying the Riverlands, and Helaena would still be alive, but instead I’ve always been useless!”

“You aren’t useless,” Jace pleads.

“Not normal enough to be a good wife or daughter, not extraordinary enough to have a dragon!”

Again, Jace tries to touch you, to soothe you. “Please don’t—”

You fling his hands away. “What was our marriage for if not to stop this from happening?! To end the dying, to protect the people we have left?” You whirl away from him and flee from the Great Hall, the castle, yourself. Behind you, Lady Caro is comforting Jace with soft tenderness you’ve never been capable of.

“Let her go, my prince,” she is counselling. “Give her a moment to grieve…”

You throw open the first door you pass and trudge out into the snow, no fox fur coat, bare feet. The cold stings and then your skin goes numb and it doesn’t bother you anymore. The icy mountain wind tears at your hair, flowing in long waves like the women of the Vale wear it, delicate and feminine, pretty and powerless. Tears cascade down your face; currents of red magma scorch your throat. When you close your eyes, you see the yellow butterfly that was once Helaena’s game piece.

She never hurt anyone. She never did anything wrong.

Now you are under the shadows of the soaring pine trees, their green needles so thick you cannot see the grey of the sky.

She never met Luca.

You gaze up into the branches, covered with tufts of white snow and icicles like fangs, and you have the overwhelming, ravenous feeling that you need to go home. You don’t belong in the Vale. The Vale almost killed you when you were a child, Aemond’s hands shoving you into a rushing stream freckled with ice.

And then all at once—like you’ve been hit, like you’ve been stabbed with a blade—you are flying high above the castle and the wind is raking over your cheeks, but it is not your face but Aemond’s, half-blind and half-scarred, torrential red waves of a sea of blood in his skull.

He’s here, he’s here—

And if he’s able to see through your eyes that you are outside in the forest…

The castle!!!

You bolt through the trees back towards Heart’s Home, your bare feet leaving tracks in the fresh powdery snow that is nearly up to your knees, and you stumble out of the shadows just as Vhagar soars overhead and unleashes her flames on the castle, wood burning, stones collapsing, people inside shrieking as they incinerate. You’re screaming for Aemond to stop, but he does not hear you and he does not see you either, he is high above in a place you’ve never been and never will be, he is flying, and he is hearing only devastation and he is breathing in its dark, intoxicating smoke, and as Vhagar swoops by the stable and it bursts into an inferno—horses galloping loose and engulfed in fire, dead but not knowing it yet—you run into the crumbling castle.

“Jace?!” you shout, but the air is full of smoke and the sounds of wood cracking and stones caving in are deafening. You feel blindly for the spiral staircase that leads up to the tower where your and Luca’s bedchambers are located. From the part of the castle that was once the Great Hall, you can hear Lord Corbray and Lady Caro screaming as their skin blisters and sloughs away and their flesh is cooked and their bones are charred black, and when the flames reach their lungs the screams go quiet. You cannot think about them. You don’t have any time; you must think of Luca and Jace. “Jace!” you bellow through the smoke.

And then there is a weak reply: “Here.”

You follow it into the stairwell. Parts of the wall have been blasted away; you can see the pine forest outside, the cold barren sky, the Mountains of the Moon. Jace is halfway up the steps, slumped against the fractured wall and pinned there by stones that have rained down on his legs. His bones must be broken; his face is bloodless and his curls matted to his forehead by sweat. His right hand fumbles futilely for the hilt of Lady Forlorn. Now, dimly, you can hear Luca crying.

Jace rasps as he stares vacantly up at you: “I tried to get to him. I’m sorry.”

“It’s okay, Jace, I can do it.”

“I love you.”

“I’ll be right back.”

You climb over him and chase Luca’s wails up the staircase. Vhagar is back, and the ruins of the castle tremble when she roars, and you feel the heat of her flames radiating up through the floor. You lose your footing and clamber up the last few steps on your hands and knees, then manage to stand again and careen into Luca’s room. Half the roof has collapsed; a wetnurse is sprawled on the floor and half-buried in fallen stones, blood hemorrhaging out of her mouth and ears. You grab the baby out of his cradle and quickly bundle him in his blanket patterned with blue dragonflies. His tiny hands grasp at your face and your hair as you rush back down the spiral staircase to help Jace. Smoke needles your eyes; you and Luca are both coughing as you try to clear your lungs.

You reach Jace and kneel beside him, holding Luca in your left arm and using your right to try to roll the stones off Jace’s legs, but he’s not helping you.

“Jace, please, we have to go now,” you say, but when you look at his face he’s not there. His dark eyes are glassy, his chest doesn’t rise and fall with the tide of air.

He’s gone, you think. Like Father, Luke, Jaehaerys, Baela, Rhaenys, Helaena. And you are struck by an excruciating pang of fondness for Jace more forceful than anything you ever felt for him when he was alive, and you cannot leave him here. He was your husband, he was Luca’s father. And he loved you. He must have. He said it over and over again.

“Jace?” you sob. But outside Vhagar is still flying—the gales churned up by her wings gust into the jagged holes in the castle walls—and she could be coming back, she could be returning to burn you, and Jace is dead but the baby is still alive.

You clutch Luca to you as he cries and you race down the steps, following the smoke-filled, twisted passageway. The heat is suffocating, the sounds of a dying castle engulfing, Heart’s Home turned into a graveyard, into a shattered skeleton, charred and cursed like Harrenhal. You crash through the door at the base of the stairwell and into the ground level of the castle, and you are almost out—

Something ignites, something explodes, and stones from the castle wall you are feeling your way along rip out of their centuries-old mortar and collide with you. Your ribs crack, you are thrown to the floor, but even as you scream and claw your way out of the rubble you don’t let go of the baby. You force yourself upright and stagger with Luca towards a gaping chasm where there was once a wall. There is a tremor like an earthquake. Outside, Vhagar must be landing.

Now you are in the snow again, bare feet and a gown covered with soot and wreckage. The baby isn’t crying anymore. When you glance down at the blanket he is swaddled in, the white space between the blue dots of dragonflies is turning red with blood.

Blood?

You can’t look. You can’t allow yourself to feel it; it will consume you until there is nothing left. The last vestiges of the castle are crumpling. Across the field, Vhagar is devouring Vermax’s small, broken corpse, crushing his bones in her massive, monstrous jaws.

Blood??

Aemond’s footsteps are behind you, crunching in the snow. His cloak cracks in the frigid wind like the sails of a ship. His words are full of dark, euphoric, lethal triumph, a high like nothing he’s ever known, not even when he claimed Vhagar, not even what he imagined he would feel on your wedding day when you’d be bound to each other with fire and blood in the tradition of Old Valyria. “I said I would find you, and I did.”

You hear your own voice as if from a very far distance, lightning strikes miles away but moving closer. “You killed him.”

Aemond is puzzled. You are supposed to be happy. You are saved, you are home. “Killed who?”

“He’s dead, and there will never be another. Not like this one. Jace was his father, but Jace is gone. You killed him too.”

And you turn to face him, and Aemond sees what you are holding in your arms, and only then does he understand.