tom riddle—the man who fell from earth.
summary: tom riddle’s love language is literature.
word count: 1.4k
fanfiction no. 001
hey! this is my first fanfic on this blog so reblogs are really appreciated but also just any interaction :D
tom riddle? don’t waste your time, they’d tell you. heartless, merciless and unsettling in his every appearance, the very air around him seemed heavy and polluted. his superiority radiated from him—it was his very aura—piercing those who dared to meet his eye and challenging them to rethink their own inferiority, knowing they could not. he held himself so confidently, and his confidence was not misplaced.
his presence was always known, though he was often sly and discreet himself, but it was hard to ignore the shift in atmosphere when he was nearby.
but you tried harder still, to become lost within your world of fiction, and force the world around you to dissipate. with the right book, this was not a difficult task by any means, and only in the most raucous or unrelenting circumstances could you be lifted from your reverie.
“y/n!” your friend hissed louder than before, looking awkwardly and apologetically between you and tom riddle.
“what is it?” you asked impatiently, shaking their hand off your shoulder.
“it’s nothing,” another voice responded, causing you to look up to where tom riddle was looming above you with a faint smirk on his face.
gulping down your embarrassment, you took a shaky breath in, “am i in your seat?” you asked him, knowing the answer he would give you.
“yes,” he replied, walking around the table as he pulled his blazer sleeves down to his wrists, “but you can have it today,” he added, sitting down opposite you and your friend.
professor slughorn was not far behind mr. riddle, and addressed the class almost immediately, leaving you silent before the heartless boy, left to wonder what made him give up his seat to you.
such a tedious textbook and yet your face was buried in it for the better part of your potions lesson, avoiding the eyes that crept above the book’s spine. they were hard as stone, but with the right light, small, soft crevices appeared within them—it was as if you were catching a glimpse of the soft underbelly.
mere days had passed until you and tom met again. this time, you were alone. caught in a rainstorm, you waited under the cover of stone in the edges of the courtyard, watching students stumble over the wet cobblestone frantically. you held your bag tightly to your chest and watched the heavens above you unleash.
as you leant further over to see past the roof, searching for blue skies, your balance became increasingly unsteady. in an attempt to save your bag and books falling to the soaked ground to be ruined, you tried to regain composure without spreading your arms. as you became resigned to your fate, sure you would feel the hard ground collide with either your bottom or knees, a tight grip secured around your waist.
saving you from one embarrassment, you faced another humiliation upon turning around to view your rescuer—tom riddle. he’d appeared out of nowhere and his hair was not wet, but perfectly dry, as was his uniform.
“what were you doing?” asked tom, cocking an eyebrow in disappointment.
“looking for blue sky,” you told the truth.
he scoffed in disbelief.
tom sat with you a while, waiting for the rain to stop. he wasn’t much of a talker, he rather communicated with his eyes and his expressions, which were often hard to read or understand. but he listened to you talk without interruption, and answered the few questions you shot his way.
“madame bovary?” tom’s eyes flicked to your bag which was falling open on the bench between you.
“yeah, have you read it?”
“once. i wasn’t keen.”
“why not?”
“i understand that the author’s ending was to further drive his narrative, but to me, he made her weak,” tom admitted.
“weak? i don’t think weak is the right word,” you shook your head in disagreement. “i think she was yearning,” you contradicted him.
“yearning?” his chuckle was hollow, disbelieving, “what for?”
“an escape. her whole life she felt trapped and overlooked.”
“and that is how you’d choose to find it? an escape.”
you were taken aback by his forward question, for you were discussing madame bovary, not yourself. “well, no.”
tom simply nodded as if to conclude that he was right, and though you had further thoughts swirling in your brain, you dare not speak them out loud. instead, you changed the subject again and carried on much the same as before—you talking, tom listening.
。+゚☆゚+。★。+゚☆゚+。★。+゚☆゚+。★。+゚☆゚+。
as the days turned into a week gone by, tom had made very few appearances. however, each time you saw him, you could not forget the exchange, and found yourself reliving it in your mind several times a day. everyone’s unsolicited advice had disintegrated and fell on deaf ears, for you no longer cared for advice unless it was from desired lips.
“what are you thinking about?” asked tom, approaching your table at the library.
“potions,” you fibbed, watching him adjust his shirt sleeves as he sat beside you.
“that’s your astronomy text book,” he replied matter-of-factly.
you looked down at the table where your textbook was wide open, showing several images of constellations with detailed captions. you scoffed, avoiding his eye, thus missing the small smirk that stretched in the corner of his mouth.
“i have something for you.”
“you do?” you asked, and it seemed your heart was responding too.
tom reached into his pocket and pulled out a book with a neatly decorated cover and handed it over to you. keeping your eyes fixed to his, you accepted his gift with a polite but giddy smile.
‘jane eyre’
“i’ve been meaning to read this for a while,” you confessed, tracing your fingertips over the illustration on the cover. “thank you.”
“do tell me your thoughts when you’re finished,” said tom before getting up to leave.
so abrupt. it was as if he was almost embarrassed to have you know he was thinking of you, or at least he had been. you flicked through the pages and breathed in that familiar aroma of a fresh book and began at the beginning.
for such a detail heavy and long novel, you devoured each chapter within minutes. staying up late to finish just another page and reading within every spare second of your day became the norm until you had consumed the last word of the gifted book.
you clasped the book against your chest tightly, skipping down the halls of hogwarts as you looked for tom. you’d talked him rarely over time you were reading ‘jane eyre’ but you had seen him often. and always he saw you, carrying that book around as if it was your lifeline, your blood supply.
“i finished,” you informed him triumphantly, sitting down on the library bench next to him.
“and what did you think?” he questioned with a satisfied grin, closing his textbook gently and straightening his back.
“i think,” you began, “i understand why you like it better than ‘madame bovary’.”
“but what did you think about it?” he asked again, not much inclined to listen to his own thoughts through your words.
“i thought it was incredible. jane seemed…”
“yes?”
“like someone who would understand.”
tom relaxed, unaware he had been leaning forward and hanging onto your every word. he agreed with you, of course. he thought he might agree with everything you said. but he didn’t know how to tell you.
“can i give you another?” he asked. strange, for he did not often find himself asking for permission.
“i’d like that,” you accepted, inching your hand closer to his on the bench.
tom didn’t notice at first, nodding in approval and beginning to think of the next title he would give you. he always seemed lost in thought, like he was analysing both you and the situation you were in. what did he think of you? you wondered.
you slid your pinky between his little finger and ring finger and watched tom clench his jaw. his entire body tensed from the small interaction, the small and simple touch. and for a moment, he let himself forget about books and propriety, swiftly cupping your face in his cold hands and pressing a reckless kiss to your lips. he had to be quick, he feared he wouldn’t be able to do it if he wasn’t fast enough.
“you should read ‘sense and sensibility’ next,” he whispered lowly, “i have a copy.”
though your heart was leaping bounds and your breath was trembling, you managed a small response—“i’d love to borrow it.”
tom pulled away and collected himself, reopening his textbook, which you noted was astronomy, and said, “it’s yours.”
alright, hope you enjoyed that ! i don’t have a tag list but let me know if you want to be tagged in my writing :D
MIND OVER MATTER.
+ . jacaerys velaryon x f!reader
part two to 'sacrifice'.
synopsis. you return to jacaerys. a gift from the gods.
3 + . contents. canon-divergent. no use of y/n or any variation. mentions of violence. heavy angst. no comfort. hurt. descriptions of torturous aftermaths. 3.2k words.
Warm firelight bathes the sharp and strong features of the prince, dark brows furrowed so tightly that the crease between them may become permanent. There’s a drowsiness in his eyelids and yet his mind is louder than the storm that rages outside of the stone walls. Shifting on his shoes, his strong hand fidgets and shifts along the smoothness of the hilt of his sword as he watches the flames burn at the wood and lick along the stone walls it’s confined to. Hand so tight along the smooth leather and grooves that he may just snap the hilt itself. In his other hand he gently smoothes his hand along a hairpin, pretty with a dangling flower off a chain of silver and made of glass. Jacaerys’s dark almond eyes slowly flutter shut and he inhales through his nose with a tight jaw, head throbbing and stomach feeling hollow.
It’s been two months.
Two months. Jacaerys hasn’t seen you in two months, he hasn’t heard a word in two months. Jacaerys swallows thickly as a stinging moves through his nose and his hand tightens around the hilt of his sword while the other eases around the glass hairpin. You should have returned to him already. You should have returned, come back to him so he might be stronger and less of a coward as he had so promised. So Jacaerys could do what he’d been too weak to do so many times before. Yet, it’s been two months. So much has happened and you’re still gone.
Heavy doors open and Jacaerys’s eyes open, broad shoulders stiffen and he blinks away the stinging in his eyes. Slowly, he straightens up and conceals the hairpin beneath his dark sleeve. Gentle footsteps and the soft brush of fabric against stone, Jacaerys listens to the footsteps of his mother and the sound of her setting down supper onto the table within his quarters. Jacaerys is wordless, he doesn’t look away from the flames. Silence is thick, heavy, he awaits her departure but he knows her, his mother. So, she never leaves.
Instead, she speaks.
“Please eat.”
And Jacaerys wishes she’d care less, then he’d feel less guilt over the ruin this is bringing him. The ruin of his affections and his…love may bring this war that he’s meant to be entirely focused on. Yet, all he can think about is you. You. You. Fucking you. In no response, Rhaenyra’s footsteps grow closer and Jacaerys looks away from the flames when his mother suddenly steps before him. Her hands reach out but his boots step back and his hilt is grasped even tighter.
“Mother.” Jacaerys says as a warning. He loves her. He doesn’t wish to snap at her or say things in harsh blindness as he’s been doing all too often during this war. Especially as of late. Jacaerys’s eyes screwed shut and he finally releases the hilt, his hand coming up when he makes the mistake of looking at her porcelain face of love and concern for her sweet boy. Grooves line the inside of his hand from the design of his hilt and his fingers shake, he’s so tense he’s trembling. “Please.” The word comes far less firm and stiff, it comes pathetic and desperate. Begging her to not break what he’s been so horribly holding together.
Rhaenyra’s brows sew up, her eyes flickering along the face of one stricken by grief before a death. The Queen exhales deeply as Jacaerys slowly lowers his hand and she presses her hands over her stomach. “My sweet boy…this–you cannot let what we do not know bring you to your knees.” Rhaenyra’s voice is soft, gentle and all the worse for Jacaerys. He tries to keep his burning gaze to the floor, but he weakens again in the atmosphere of his mother’s comfort and love. Dark eyes look at her beautiful light ones and his jaw tenses as she shakes her head. “We do not know of her fate, she would not wish to see you like this. I cannot bear to see you like this.”
“Like what?” Jacaerys asks as if he does not know.
“Like a shell of my boy.” Rhaenyra replies swiftly, her brows sewing up and eyes squinting in an almost pained way. Jacaerys swallows thickly, his hand running down his face as he turns away and slowly walks over to the supper. Thumbs smooth dark circles and sweep slightly sunken cheeks. Jacaerys’s eyes look at the food and his stomach curls in disgust, what if you’re starving somewhere? What if you’ve starved? “There are still loyalists seeking her, Jacaerys.” His mother tries with a soft tone, a gentle one as he picks up a piece of bread and holds it in the hand not occupied by the glass hair pin.
“Do you remember what I was like when we first met, mother?” Jacaerys speaks softly, quietly, his brows twitching as he holds the bread in his hand. Glancing at the Queen, Rhaenyra’s expression softens and the hint of a smile on her pink lips brings a hint to that of Jacaerys’s. But it makes his stomach all the more sick as he nods gently. “She has been my closest friend since I was a boy. She’s proved herself loyal to me, to you – to us since…since before there was a loyalty to be deserving of. I wish she weren’t such.” Jacaerys’s eyes screw shut and he swallows thickly. “I wish she would betray us, I wish she would stab me in the back, I hope and pray to the Gods that she were more selfish, more disloyal, dishonorable I–”
“Jacaerys.” Rhaenyra breathes out.
Jacaerys shakes his head and drops the bread crushed into crumbs along the plate. And he inhales shakily, he looks down and unsheathes the glass hair pin. That stinging in his eyes has grown worse, his vision blurring as the little glass flower gently sways off the chain. “L–Luce–” Jacaerys voice grows choked as he looks down and his vision blurs further. “H-He gave this to her. An expression of gratitude for all she did when we were still children. So many times I’ve tried to get her to wear it, Baela’s tried the same – after h–he…” Jacaerys trails off. “We stopped but…I still remember why she refused to wear it. She told me so confidently that she wanted to wear it for my coronation.” And Jacaerys inhales shakily, footsteps coming towards him.
The moment Rhaenyra’s hand touches his arm, Jacaerys sets the glass pin onto the table and embraces her with a choked sob. Rhaenyra holds him as she did not long ago in mourning her son and his brother. Jacaerys clings to her gown and shakes his head. “I could not stand it, m-mother – blood sheds in war but mine own and that of mine heart…two at once, for us…” Jacaerys sobs into her neck, his mother gently swaying him while holding him close as if he’s still just a little boy that needs his mother. Rhaenyra’s expression is one of pain as she holds him close.
For a while Jacaerys seeks comfort in his mother, then they talk about the recents events together – nothing too touchy, they are not privileged yet to truly and fully mourn – and Rhaenyra eats with Jacaerys.
It’s an hour and some later when the doors suddenly open, bursting practically. Jacaerys and Rhaenyra look at Baela, panting with wide eyes. “Baela, is all well?” Jacaerys asks with immediate worry.
Jacaerys nearly crumbles at the words to leave her lips.
“She has returned.”
It feels as if all the blood in his body is cold. It doesn’t feel as if Jacaerys is of his own mind or body – his soul and heart racing him down the corridors to follow Baela as Queen Rhaenyra leaves to notify Rhaena. Jacaerys is quick, dark curls bouncing and moving as he follows the sound of instructions tossed at sworn guards from the maester sworn to Rhaenyra. Cold winds from the open walls and windows bring an iciness to once warm skin, but Jacaerys can feel nothing. Nothing but an anticipation and overwhelming sense of fear of what he might face.
Quick hands catch Baela when the followerer to that of the maester extends his hand to stop Baela from grabbing the handle of the door. The guard shakes his head after a formal bow, his brow beaded in sweat and tan skin a bit red against the heavy armor he adorns. “Forgive me, your graces, but the maester has given strict instructions to not allow anyone within the chambers – her guard may be infected with a contagious fever.” Jacaerys’s eyes widen and he feels himself ease back into his body, he looks to Baela who silently urges him to cling onto some semblance of patience or hope.
But Jacaerys knows with fevers, death is always almost certain – and he must know of all that happened, he must see you one last time. He couldn’t say goodbye to Lucerys, he will not find his opportunity lost with you.
Jacaerys pulls back Baela with a gentle touch of her wrist and his dark eyes meet her rounded ones. “Oblige the instructions of the maester, no one shall enter.” Baela can see the resolve in his face and she inhales deeply, her brows sewing up as she nods and gently squeezes his hand holding her wrist before she steps away. Immediately, the prince turns to grab the door but the guard steps in front of it and Jacaerys looks at him with soft breaths and wide, incredulous eyes as the loud sound of servants in the chambers come through the heavy door.
“My prince, I cannot risk your–”
“I am the prince – you are sworn to my blood. Let. Me. Through.” Jacaerys’s voice is hard and thick as his eyes burn into the gaze of the guard. The guard, clearly taken aback, seems to hesitate. Jacaerys can feel him pondering whether he fears the heir or the Queen more, how would the Queen feel about her son possibly being exposed to a horrid fever? Jacaerys can’t seem to care. He doesn’t. And thankfully, he wins. The guard quickly steps aside. Jacaerys nods. “Thank you, Ser.” And Jacaerys enters the chambers untouched yet closest to the entrance of the castle.
The sound of the maester ordering the servants fills the air, the old man hunching over the bed and for the first time in two months, over eight weeks, over sixty days, one-thousand four-hundred and sixty hours, over five million seconds – Jacaerys’s eyes fall to you. His expression hard and his entire body going numb, a servant rushing to him to place a precautionary cloth around his face and Jacaerys merely allows it to happen as he watches you laid down and being tended to with a quickness.
Your face is filthy. Covered in smudge and dirt, hair the same and matted so severely that it’s being cut off. Beneath unconsciousness, being stripped of your dirtied clothes that were not the ones you left Dragonstone in, Jacaerys feels sick suddenly. Lashes cover your back, flesh risen and scabbing over with signs of infection in some green to match that of the bruises on your face and flesh. Jacaerys stumbles backwards, a hand going to his heart that feels it may just give out and he turns around.
Emptying the contents of his first true meal in two months into a glass vase, he screws his eyes shut as the scent of the dungeons burns into the room.
Soon, Jacaerys is given everything he must know while alongside his mother and cousins.
A guard of the Keep was assigned to watch you when you were discovered – you were stupid. You stupidly tried to help a woman being given a public lashing and what did you get? Recognized and imprisoned. It wasn’t enough to be imprisoned, plenty of the cunt usurper’s came to visit you but Jacaerys could hardly stomach the knowledge that Aegon saw to you the most. The guard to help you escape, unable to handle the cruelties of the usurper Aegon against a woman of honor and loyalty, recounted to Queen Rhaenyra and Prince Jacaerys all you had gone through in those two months.
Every horrid detail.
Jacaerys was nearly going to kill himself. To fly to King’s Landing and bring Aegon’s head to be the centerpiece of a grand feast. But it was during the loud chaos of attempting to keep the prince at bay that the guard offered something – something that was enough to make Jacaerys settle.
Your words. One of the long conversations you had with the guard, one conversation after a bad set of lashing that left you drooling and hunched over a bale of hay with your torn dress bloodied and dirty. The guard says he had asked you why you did not merely give Aegon what he wanted, why you did not tell them what the Queen was planning, why you did not kill yourself, why you did not agree to be the best sword beside that of the Kinslayer Aemond Targaryen. Jacaerys could hear your voice in his head rather than the guard’s when he offered your response.
“I know I will see him again…I could not look in his eye if I were to ever give these true bastards what they desire, so I will not. Because I know that someday…I will see my Jacaerys again.”
The maester had delivered the news of your condition. Needless to say it wasn’t well. Starved enough to keep you in agony yet fed enough to keep you alive, beaten more often than not, and used by more than just the usurper cunt and given moon tea so many times you are all but promised to never bare a child. But the maester said there was no fever, no flu – that the only thing anyone could do now is to wait. To wait and to not let the task be in vain, for a guard of the Keep that’d been close to the King was now in their palm.
But Jacaerys – try as he might – couldn’t care, not about being ordered to find rest and eat and every other thing he could not do and not about anything else. The next night, when all are silent and the guards are patrolling where they should, he went to your chambers. He had to see you.
Now here Jacaerys sits, at the edge of your bed and looking over you with tears falling down his cheeks and body stiff. You look ghostly. That warmth and brightness gone and replaced by a splash of hideous colors to be a reminder of what you faced. You’re more white bandages than skin. Jacaerys swallows thickly as he sniffles and shifts on the seat, shaking his head when a tear finally falls and he reaches out. Strong hands are gentle, treating your hand like the glass hair pin and cradling it between his hands. You’re cold yet sweaty.
Inhaling shakily, Jacaerys swallows thickly and he shakes his head. His eyes trace your features, your hair, and he forces a smile as hot tears roll down his cheeks. “You will go mad once you awake and see your hair.” Jacaerys whispers out softly. His thumb smoothes your knuckles and flesh of your hand. “Once, I hardly even cut an inch as a foolish little joke of a young boy trying to get the attention of a strong girl and you nearly made me bite my own heart with your punch.” He laughs softly, sniffling as he nods and looks down at your hand in his. “I must apologize as well for going through your things in your absence. I–wanted to find your hair pin, to keep it safe. It–is.” Jacaerys nods stiffly as his eyes trace hair choppy and cut, wet from the bed bath you’d been given.
“Oh and–I have already ordered a surplus of your fruit you so love.” Jacaerys nods, his eyes shooting back down to your hand. “I–whenever I fell ill you…you would bring me chocolates. You would not let me eat them though, no.” The prince swallows the lump in his throat that simply forms again as blurry vision trains on your hand. “No, you told me that the chocolates were to be my reason to get better sooner. You told me that if I could not get better, I would never taste chocolate again. Then you w-would jest and pretend to eat them when I–would refuse my medicine or the help of the maester. I think the chocolates were my remedy.” Jacaerys’s voice breaks off as his smile falters and shakes, his hands smoothing along your hand.
“Or perhaps you were my remedy.” He whispers quietly.
And Jacaerys looks at your face. The bruising along your face, the cuts, the bandaging and bandages – Jacaerys swallows thickly and he shakes his head with a hard and deep sniff.
“So, you m-must be quick. You must get better, lest the fruit rots. O-Or I will eat all of it. The crates of it. You m-must get better, you m–must awake please–please a-aw–” Jacaerys’s voice breaks off into chokes sobs, his head falling forward to press his forehead against your knuckles. The prince’s body shakes and jumps in pure agony and pain as he holds your hand. Kissing your knuckles and along the inners of your palms, up your fingertips, pleading and begging fills the air with his chokes sobs. “Wake up for me – do not leave me…d-do not–”
It’s sometime before Jacaerys finds slumber, head throbbing, eyes puffy, and throat aching as he slouches in slumber in the seat beside your bed. His hand holding yours, pinkies interlocked. Well, his with yours.
It’s his first full-night’s rest since your departure.
The prince slowly stirs sometime later, his brows twitching and his head foggy from the ache that comes with sobbing and crying for hours on end. In his head he can hear the soft sound of your voice calling him, the scent of medicinals and herbs staining his nose as he shifts his face on the surface of soft bedding. Hunched over now and asleep against the edge of his bed, his hand still feels your skin and Jacaerys fights consciousness. He fights consciousness to cling to his dreams of you being well and alive in his arms, not incapacitated and broken on a bed. Each mark is a remnant of what Jacaerys did to you, how he should have stopped you, done anything to prevent you leaving.
Waking up in his chambers, Jacaerys is slightly annoyed to have been moved from you but his neck and body is relieved. Sighing heavily and rubbing at his eyes, Jacaerys shifts to the edge of his bed and runs a hand over messy curls. Pondering over what he should bring you from your own quarters to make the unfamiliar room more comfortable for you, he stands and he makes his way over to his wardrobe for fresh clothes. Just in case you wake up. But the sound of his heavy doors opening stops him and he turns.
His eyes fall to Baela’s. His cousin holding bated breaths and in her hand a rolled letter, she swallows thickly and rapid blinks barely conceal the glassiness of her eyes. Jacaerys feels his heart sink to his shoes. "Cousin..." Baela breathes softly. "I--am so sorry."
Rest doesn’t come easy ever again for the young prince. And the fruit rots. Just as you did.
With this post I want to thank all of you who write fanfiction. That you take time to write a story, to think about future ones, you are what keeps the fandom alive. You are better than big productions, your imagination and ability to write such brilliant stories is amazing.
I can only thank all of you, from the bottom of my heart for so many stories that you have done, that have made us so happy at times when we needed it so much, for continuing with different lives our favorite characters and for doing what others have not been able to do with everything in their favor and reach.
Thank you very much indeed. You are so important in the fandom, without you the fandom would not be the same. You are wonderful. I hope no one will ever take away your desire to create.
Y'all... If you want, you can send your shifting opinions, hot takes, stories, etc in my inbox. Something like a shifting confessions :)
Tasm!Peter Parker x Reader Headcanons
His love languages are acts of service and physical touch.
Doing kind things for people just comes naturally to him. He’ll let you copy off his homework answers if you got sick/or something serious happened, and he’ll help you study. He helps you pack up your things if you need to go somewhere.
Peter loves to touch you. He gives you quick pecks on your lips or on your cheeks if he’s in a hurry to get somewhere. In the mornings he likes to wrap his arms around your waist and hide his neck in the crook of your neck.
You're his lockscreen.
He teaches you how to ride his skateboard if you don’t already know. His hands on your waist, telling you that he won’t let go if you’re scared that you’re going to fall. He might pretend to let go at some point to prank you.
Lowkey stalkerish, but I think he’d watch you while he was patrolling the city as Spider-Man. Maybe when he’s swinging by and he sees you, he’ll stop and just look at you. If you guys got into a fight he’d be more likely to do this as well. Just looking at you from afar, missing you.
He loves to tease you. He’s just so cheeky. You could tell him that you missed him and he’ll smirks and say something like “You missed me?”
Peter knows that at some point he’s going to have to tell you that he’s Spider-Man. He’s out till it’s late and he’s covered in bruises at times. You’re bound to ask questions. He’d probably tell you himself when you both have been dating for a while.
He doesn’t want you anywhere near him when he’s doing his job as Spider-Man. He’s scared that you’ll get hurt or worse.
If he’s patrolling the city during the day, he’ll call you every now and then to check up on you. During the night, he’d prefer not to bother you, but if he’s missing you, he’ll send you a voicemail. Though, he would prefer just seeing you in person. He’d sneak into your bedroom through your window.
There aren’t many secrets in your relationship after he’s told you that he’s Spider-Man. One of the only times I can see him keeping a secret from you or lying to you, is if he thinks it’ll protect you/you’re safer not knowing.
Summary: You try to escape from two fearsome Sith Lords. Surprisingly they take it rather well.
Author's note: This is totally getting a part 2. Or maybe a series we'll see.
Warnings: dark, absolutely no regard for the rule of two, sorta a vent fic (venting that these two are so fine and I can't get them out of my mind), slightly fluffy.
The empire's warships have a tendency to blur reality. The interiors of their large hulking exoskeletons house endless corridors and makeshift chambers. Vast, endless arrays of space. They've been optimized for housing droids, clones, and artillery. Not for escape, not for an endless search of a freedom that has long since eroded.
Calling yourself anything but desperate would be a lie. Your feet run to the chorus of your broken heartbeat. The need for freedom, the need to escape spreads through your body like a poison. You know it'll end up killing you, either from exhaustion or by their sabars. But you have to try, you have to run. Even if you've left fragments of yourself in the warm bed the three of you sleep on. Even if you forgot your heart under Anakin's pillow and your soul still lingers in Maul's warm embrace. Maybe freedom is worth cutting off pieces of yourself, if only in the hope that someday they might grow back.
There's something wrong with the corridors you're sure of it. You've never been one for directions, instead relying on the holo screens and navigation systems to lead the way. Mirror images as far as the eye can see. Identical, plain. Nothing substantial to store in your memory. There's something ironic about this situation, a punchline that doesn't quite land. You half haphazardly tug on the skirt of your nightgown, desperate for anything familiar. You're not sure why.
You remember how Anakin called you pretty this morning, still hazy, still clinging to the sensation of slumber. Perfect blue eyes too dazed to look at you. Really look at you. The chosen one gazes at your ghost, your ethos. the perfect doll he and Maul had morphed you into. Behind you
Maul pulls you to his chest. Hand running up and down her side, trying to resurrect you into his dreams. It's only when Anakin's eyes close, seeling the shimmering blue orbs, that you crawl out of bed and into the unknown.
You're lost, abandoned in absolute desolation. The marble tiles bleed frost into the soles of your feet. Somewhere in the distance, you feel a disturbance in the force. Too far away to matter, yet leaking with a potent rage that burns. It's hope you think, albeit pathetically, maybe it's better to capitulate this pointless crusade and wait for the Sith lords to find you. The crash comes just as you're about to stop. You bump into him, falling in the process. All armor and steel. The Stormtrooper's mask is off giving you a clear view of his scarred face. His eyes flash, some dreary emotion too obscure to read, he offers you a gloved hand, something human something casual.
You stare frozen.
When exactly did you stop comprehending human idiosyncrasies?
When exactly did you start reading every interaction as a threat?
He's a monster, you think, just like the ones you've been warned about. Lectured time and time again by both Anakine and Maul. Monsters pry on little girls, especially ones who wander off on their own. Monsters lurk behind unsuspecting walls, ready to pounce when their prey approaches. You wonder if, the definitive definition of "monster" could be passed on to the two Siths who call themselves your lovers.
There's blood, too crimson to be real. Metallic aromas wafted through the air. You've only now noticed how close the disturbance in the force really is. Close enough to distinguish itself. To reveal that, in actuality, it's not a disturbance at all.
It's two...
Something cold yanks at your forearm. Pulling you to your feet. for a split second, your nerves calm. The familiarity of the cybernetic arm grants you a heavy ease. Anakin pushes you over to where Maul is standing. Golden eyes burning holes through the stormtrooper's armor. 'He didn't do anything' you long to say. But the words wisely die on your tongue as Maul grips your shoulders. Anakine's saber is lit, stabbing through the soldier's armor as if it were flesh. As if killing him where as easy as killing a rogue thought. "You're quite a foolish soldier for daring to touch that which belongs to your commanders. Even more imbecilic for so much as looking at emperor Palpatine's disciple."
Maul's grip on your shoulders tightens, eyes never once leaving the bloodshed. One of his hands instinctively roams to your belly, then slides down to your thigh. Rubbing it ever so gently as his claws pierce your soft skin. You close your eyes trying to make yourself smaller. You hate how his touch grounds you. How the familiarity plucks at your heartstrings. When he touches you like this you wish you would forever rot in his arms.
"'I'm sorry" You don't know why the words come so easily. As if they've been itching to spill from your tongue. Maybe it's easier to say 'I'm sorry' rather than 'You've broken my perception of love, of reality and now I can only find comfort in your darkness.' "Hush" Maul's anger spills with every syllable. His claws dig deeper, earning him a pained hiss from his doll.
"You're not sorry, in fact, you rather enjoyed this didn't you? Running away making us chase you down, I never thought your species would enjoy being the prey so much, little one." Anakin walks over, saber seethed at his side. His every step promised pain, retribution. He's angry, furious. They both are, you wonder if maybe, just maybe, they'll end it all today.
Maul's chambers have always been a testament to Dathomir, bathed in deep scarlets and endless ebony. You wonder if he's homesick for a place he's only visited in his worst ephialtes. After the incident in the corridors, they drag you back to the Zabrak's room. Neither bothering to say a word. Merely permitting their rage to engulf you, subduing you into submission. It's an unwelcome surprise when they begin to prep for the day. Throwing on their black cloaks, prior to choosing your outfit. An abnormal affinity settles across the room. Too unnerving to go unchecked.
They dress you each morning, a ritual you think, some attestation of love that's never been quite right. Maul drapes you in velvet dresses. Each one harbors a sui generis softness that sits erroneously across your skin. Their opulent sensation only brings forth feelings of aversion and despair. Their softness an ode to your imprisonment.
the dresses come in shades of crimson, detailed sometimes in black, sometimes in gold, and sometimes in a frigid blue that sends shivers running up your spine.
Anakin fusses over your accessories, why they feel the need to dress you so extravagantly daily is beyond you -as you've come to realize many things are- On days when Anakin's hubris reaches its apex, he bathes you in gold. Astonishing glittering collars across your neck and Kuat bangles hanging from your wrists. When he's sober from his pride he chooses black diamonds. Simple and exotic. scintillate and opaque.
Allusions to the dark side.
A hidden reference that crawls inside you.
Once, back when you'd been sure defiance was still an option. Back when callow hope still dared to flow through your veins. Back when you'd been a jejune, stubborn thing. You had refused to wear one of the dresses they'd bought. Adimant in your refusal until Maul had stuck out his hand. Summoning the Force to remind you just who held the supreme authority here.
The Force had strangled you, clawing hungrily at your neck. You felt your bones caving in on themselves, watched with exacerbating hysteria as your feet abandoned the floor. He'd only released you when he was sure you were near death's adorned door. Permitting you to molder on the floor akin to a ragdoll.
Anakin had chastised you after you'd conjured enough strength to sit up, gasping greedily for air. He'd broken two fingers that day. One still harbors a small scar.
A Promise ring.
An augury.
There are days, few and far between. When they've deemed you've been behaving adequately for long enough. That they permit you the choice of which dress you'd fancy wearing for the day. It's a rare event, reserved as a special treat. You think it's their way of proposing variety, giving you the illusion of choice. Making you feel a little less smothered.
Today is not one of those days. Today, you feel them pick you apart, only to reassemble you in their image. Drowning you in extravagance. A reminder, one whose deprecating nature weaves itself within your muscles. You, little girl, are nothing more than a doll. And dolls should know their place.
No sooner do you feel the final lace fasten across your back, that Anakin is tugging you outside the door. Metal arm clasped around your forearm.
Maul follows behind molten gaze locked on your face. The hallways bend to their will as if the walls themselves quiver with their presence. You recognize this corridor, recognize the frigid forlorn.
There's something wrong with Emperor Palpatine's throne room. It's surreal, makeshift. His real throne lays somewhere cold, somewhere even his apprentices don't dare wander off to. The ironclad throne has never felt right. Never felt like it held any real power. Just terror, just dread, just hatred. But here it is in all its glory. Left to two apprentices who'd rather treat it as a toy than a sacred place.
Anakin dramatically throws himself onto the throne. One leg thrown over the armrest as he leans against the other. His other leg planted firmly on the ground. He keeps you steady on his thigh. Torturing you with his distant, disappointed look. Maul stands in front of you. His eyes liquid gold melting into you. You see the galaxy in them. Hear it whispearing secrets meant to be forgotten. It's Anakin's voice that rattles you from your disjointed thoughts.
"You caused us so much worry angel" he's being nice. You don't trust that. There's something sinister plaguing his words.
"You know Ani, she may cease escaping if you'd cease to spoil her." Maul leans down, gripping your chin and squeezing. " The brat forgets her place, merely cause you'd rather coddle her than discipline her."
Anakin glares, a shift in his eyes, blue bleeding into gold. "Hmm, Maul, you're starting to sound an awful lot like Kenobi right now."
"Why's that? Did the old fool tend to also point out your shortcomings?"
You wonder who this Kenobi is, as you watch the Siths' exchange crude childish vitriols. Maybe he'd make a better lover than the two men you have the misfortune of being adhered to.
They never could truly see just how similar they were.
Two sides of the same coin.
One born of copper, the other, black rose petals.
Subconsciously you reach out. Grasping Anakin's robotic hand, fiddling with the panel, peeling it away to gain access to the wires and circuits. You have a bad habit of ripping things open. Anakin learned this the first time he kissed you and you tried to gnaw at his chest with your nails. Not in malice, but rather to satisfy a ravenous curiosity. A raging need to open him and see just how he ticked. You'd wished to perform an autopsy on his soul. Rip him open and devour all his secrets. Back then you'd wondered if you could kiss sunrises into Anakin's eternal night. Strip him of bleak blackened skies and introduce him to stars and a moon that shines. He'd only vaguely permitted it. Opting to pluck the stars lying within you. Swiping them for steel and lava and other mundane things that fueled his incessant rage.
Anakin's head dips, lips pressing on your jugular vein. "You're ethereal" Anakin mubbles against your skin, like the dying prayer of a collapsing star. He's so pretty when he kisses your neck. Biting away pieces of you. Stealing your light for himself.
"Princess" Maul seethes venom pelting from his words. You realize you'd been ignoring him. Something he's not too fond of. "What in the stars was going through your pretty little head?"
he looks like he'd love nothing more than to wring your pretty little neck right now. "I just..." your words feel heavy. Tiny bullets polluting your tongue. It feels so cruel to say when you know just how much they love you. "I just wanted some freedom. Just a bit of space."
"Dumb little angel" Anakin chastes. You lower your head in embarrassment watching Maul kneel in front of you. He cups your cheeks, placing a soft kiss on your head. "You can never escape us beloved".
"I love you," says Anakin. All you hear is, I'll haunt you, I'll break your ribs one by one so that I may possess your heart. Maybe they mean the same thing.
"And I'm pretty sure if Maul could feel normal emotions like everyone else, then he'd love you too." You can't help but let out a giggle as Anakin throws his head back laughing. A rare melodious sound, that causes your heart to skip a beat. Maul merely rolls his eyes before pecking you on the lips.
You trace your fingers across Maul's chest, feeling the pummelling of two hearts. A double heartbeat. Two melodies entwined, You wonder who he harbors in those hearts. One for love and one for family. You nip at his bottom lip. Ushering the blood into your mouth. He tastes of Ichor and smoke. Of sadness and rage. From behind you feel Akanin bite into the hollow of your flesh. Leaving traces of himself upon your skin.
"Our pretty little problem" Anakin mumbles.
You're a problem, a vexation draped in velvet, an unsolvable equation. Trapped between a love that seethes through your body like a toxin. Engulfing you until your mind relents. Maybe it's easier this way. Easier to say 'I love you' without the double entendre.
You do love them.
A rather arduous conclusion to reach.
Maul and Anakin.
Palpatine's apprentices.
Your lovers
Yeah, that sounds about right...
💜💜: @athanasia-day @hotpinkboots @jenn-patterson-69 @nickiiiixoxo-blog @the-chains-are-the-easy-part
osha asking qimir/the stranger to weld her a cortosis arm bracer & he immediately rummages in his pocket & produces the teeniest tiniest bracer you ever saw. a layman might even call it a ring
qimir: this bracer is to wear on your ring finger. since that's what you most often use to block lightsaber strikes
osha:
qimir: don't make it weird, i have one too, it's strictly utilitarian, & NO it's not that they each have half of an interlocking heart, that shape is a person whose skull has been caved in it's clearly an intimidation tactic WHY are you insisting on interpreting this as romantic??
osha:
qimir: jesus fine you've worn me down i GUESS i'll marry you since you're clearly so hung up on it. don't worry i already sent out the invitations
why not cast jane eyre too. since nothing matters.
fuck everyone who is racist towards Bethany
[ The Prince Jacaerys Velaryon should have known his wife better— or at least, her ire, for when his trysts with the bastard Snow reached the Spiders and soon, the ears of his Princess Consort, rage and war drummed for Winterfell, demanding heads.
—Maestre Kevan, Volume IV of The Bastard Eater, passage chapter under 'The Flame that Sung for the North'. ]
[ +18 MDNI ] [ 10,062 ] [ series masterlist ] | jacaerys velaryon x targaryen aunt!reader (aegon's twin sister), one-sided aegon ii x reader, jace x sara snow
contains— canon divergence - manipulative reader, targcest, smut, angst - post-vizzy t death, rhaenyra is queen - mentions of children, pregnancy, childbirth - allusions to infidelity & character death(s) - targaryen madness, revenge, domestic violence (not jace), unhinge behaviour, intense use of 'bastard', profanity, gaslighting, guilt-tripping - this is basically gone girl, you gone girl jace - dark fic - mentions of depression (aegon ii), allusions to suicide (not reader) - nsfw: oral (f receiving), breeding kink, creampie - no kings, no martyrs, no betas.
a/n— i didn't think i was going to do the sara snow thing, but herewe are. also i just wanted an excuse to go absolutely ape shit. reader gets very intense, like thoroughly unhinged. this is literally me supporting women's wrongs. it is also quite insane that this reached 10k and it's still just the first part lmaooo + comment, reblog & like at will!
"THAT FUCKING BASTARD! THAT GODSDAMNED, WHORE-FUCKING STRONG HALF BREED!"
Your shrieks echo stone and shadow, interrupted only by the things you pick up and hurl. Anything your hands grab, you throw and spit obscenities against, rage and tears ruin your pretty visage. The fury swept past your cherub features, a dragon breaking through the Hightower seams, upending fire and roar from the pits of your being.
"HOW DARE HE?! I GAVE HIM AN HEIR! I BROUGHT HIM PEACE! I BETRAYED—" you roar, pulling your pearl dagger— a gift from your Strong Bastard of a Husband — and throwing it to your vanity mirror, glass shards exploding. "— MY KIN!"
"DAUGHTER, PLEASE!"
Arms wound across your torso—hardened and chain-mail — as you fight against your bounds before a pain flashes to your cheek. Your rage quiets, hard breaths from your lungs. You turn your tear-stained anger to your mother and her palm, fright and terror on her regale visage.
Death of a spouse becomes the Queen Dowager in her pale blue robe and unbound spirals of auburn hair. Peace had begotten a realm that is balanced on the lineage you had produced for the Queen, her heir, and your own, as the new Princess of Dragonstone. With Otto Hightower for evermore banished to Oldtown, Kings Landing had been brought to a flowering kindness.
Queen Rhaenyra's ascension had been a wondrous affair, fit the for the first crowned Queen of the Seven Kingdoms. Not a Queen Consort, not a Queen Regent. An heir who rose for the crown always meant to be hers.
But the calamity that brewed in her ascension... no. You paved the peace. T'was you who wrangled the Great Houses that proved allyship to your twin brother's banner, you who blessed her with tranquility of a rule that will be known for ages that will precede you all.
And now her son... her son dared to destroy everything.
A conversation floats above your head, by your Queen Mother and her sworn shield, the Ser Cole, but you barely hear anything past the ringing in your head.
The Targaryen Madness the sheep so call it, an idle voice, faint and familiar, whispers in the niches of your brain. It has infected you so. It breathes, fuelled by the air wrought by your husband's betrayal. It sings, sweet love. It sings.
"—your grace, I urge to hold her—"
"—she is my daughter, Ser Cole, I am not in danger. Release her."
Justice, the voice shrieks? Screams? But it is so soft in your head, a wail of a memory, a woman or a man? must be had. No dragon falls in such disgrace.
The tight wound over your torso is unleashed but the knight is not far, tensed to cage you, when your mother grasps your elbows as you grab hers, nails digging into the thick fabric of her hem that she still winces, your grip steel-tight.
"My darling, please. I cannot help you if you do not speak what ails you." She brushes her hand desperately across your face, smearing your tears, trying to find the daughter she bore past the savagery and madness that beholds you now. "What has happened?"
You draw a tightened, harsh breath to your lungs, rattling your bones that you quiver in your attempt for sanity.
"I am being shamed, mother," you whisper. Stark, violet eyes meeting the worried round, brown of hers. "The Strong bastard is whoring himself to another, a Northern bastard."
A cackle falls your lips as alarmed gazes are exchanged above your head.
"Y-You cannot say such things aloud, sweet girl," your mother hushes your madness, pulling you close to her chest as she shoots a glance at the door.
Criston checks outside, but only your maids linger. Dyanna presses a finger against her lips, catching the knight's eye, and the rest scatter, surely to make sure that no one that need not know of their mistress' words is within reach. A shiver still runs his spine. He will never get used to the quiet, almost non-verbal way your connection worked and reached. Your Spiders weave webs all around, even as their mistress sunders with rage.
"Mayhaps you are mistaken, for sure the prince is loyal, and he adores you—"
You pull back against her, teeth bared. She flinches and Ser Cole steps forward, wary. "It is the third missive now that I have received. Did you think I would not have confirmed twice— thrice? I didn't believe it the first time! But three people have now confirmed that all this time, in the guise of rallying his mother's cause in the North, he is spending ample time with the Lord Stark's bastard sister. His bastard fucking sister!"
Your mother's horror catches that of Ser Criston's, but your fury is your own, you are a dragon trapped in the ruin of your own making, of the webs you had spun so cleverly to get to this point, and you cannot stop.
"I am the Heir's Wife. I bore the Heir his lineage, my blood spilled the birthing bed for it." A cry leaves your lips as your grief and rage pools like ichor from your chest to the floor. Alicent is torn away from you— your nails had gone through her robe and she had cried in pain, a mimick of your own, a mother to a daughter to a mother to a daughter, a cycle, an Ouroboros — and you fall to the floor, grasping at your chest.
"I will not be swept aside. I will not be ignored."
A gasp falls from your lips as your mind moves to a quiet, still place. The tremble fades, your rage and grief whirls, collects, as you push it all back inside your chest.
Your madness must be sharpened for it be used as a sword.
And you cannot let him be happy in another's arms.
If you cannot drag them to the Hells, sweet dragon, the idle voice hums, hisses? Screeches. Your ancestors— all of those who have succumbed to dreamy madness — appears in the corners of your vision like soldiers. Awaiting for you to join them. Awaiting the blood that you will spill.
Then you must raise the Hells unto Winterfell.
"...my daughter?" Alicent calls, hesitant. Cole hovers but does not approach, standing guard in protection of the Dowager. It breaks her heart to see you this way, a young woman still, much older than she was when she married but only because you had always sought your future. You had always had a hardened scale, far stronger than she.
Even when you made your entrance to the world— the unmeasurable pain of bringing not one, but two heirs into the world, her firstborns, all at once — you had never cried. The maestres, maids, they worried for you, as your twin brother had not stopped crying, so alive and red, raw from the wound of being fresh.
But you... you had not made a sound.
The entire weight of your being— your mind, your emotions — even then, you wrangled them close to your very centre, never letting them stray too far from the edges of your fingertips. As if any release must be made with a perused thought. An incentive of reason.
Even then, you plotted every step you took.
Now, Alicent watches as her firstborn daughter suctions all her emotions— that Targaryen madness that plagued the blood of her husband, his ancestors — and made her ploy.
Against the husband that dared make a fool of her.
The silence beckons nightmare. Old fear flickers inside the Queen Dowager.
"Where are my daughters?"
"What?"
"My daughters," you repeat, a hair's breadth louder than the first time you spoke. Your eyes flutter upward. The deadened gaze curled Alicent's heart in fear. "Where are they?"
"In the nursery, with the twins and Maelor. Helaena and Aegon are watching them."
You offer your hand up mutely, and Cole exchanges one last, lingering look with the Dowager, before offering his own. You stand up, thank him softly, and brush and clean up your face to the best of your ability. An utter calmness over your visage.
"Tell no one of what I had told you," you say, fixing your hair and rubbing the red from your cheeks. One minute there is madness, the next there is nothing. There is only a girl. A woman. A princess. "No one knows apart the three of us, and if you ever decide, Ser Criston, that nigh is the glorious time for you to betray my mother or I, know that the last thing thing oyu will fear is the Stranger's hand when I am through with you."
Your mother shouts your name, horrified. "What are you thinking? What are you plotting?"
You cup Alicent's face, smiling ever sweet. "Your innocence will keep you safe, mother. All I ask, for the heart you keep for your children, that you keep this between sealed lips and tilted chin. You know nothing, yes?"
"... Yes. Nothing."
You place a tender kiss on your mother's head. "Keep Daenera and Aemma safe for me. Aegon and I are flying to Dragonstone promptly. Sweet Helaena does ever so get overwhelmed by watching all of the children by herself."
"D-Dragonstone?"
Your sweet smile touched with poison, stretches. "It is high time I take a dragon for myself, don't you think so?"
While an insecure obsession had fraught your younger brother about claiming a dragon, you had met it with indifference.
For how can you not mourn the loss of Aemond's sight, staring in quiet horror the entire time as the maestre did his best to salvage the muck mess of blood and nerve endings, before the old man had shaken his head, and you turned to the small bowl that contained your brother's eye, unable to look at anything else.
Not even when your mother's rage was met with apathy and anger, her demands for justice nothing more than a woman's insanity, a mother's grief that must be swept away, tucked under a chin and a sadness she will never get rid of.
"Do not mourn me, mother. It was a fair exchange. I may have lost an eye, but I gained a dragon."
Your soft-hearted, darling, baby brother. None of his words had thawed the freezing of your heart, the grief under the swell of your breastbone.
Your own mourning was kept between teeth and tongue, as you had slept with your siblings that night. The four of you, tucked under the wing of the other, Aemond close to your chest as possible, as quiet, hot tears ran down your face. Every moan of pain or whimper he made in his sleep tore at each new vein inside of you.
"Dragons are the symbol of our House's power," Aegon had once said, windswept hair you tried to tame with your fingers, smelling fresh of Sunfyre and winds.
"And yet, there were no eggs in our child beds." He stiffened while you smiled sadly, curling your twin's hair away form his face, making him presentable and dusting the bout of sand that managed to find his leathers. You had been scolded long before by your grandsire of how you coddle Aegon, how you defend him, mother him more than your mother ever could, but you cannot stop. You were meant to care for him, tethered you once were inside your mother's womb together, you hold him steady now.
Whenever he was lost, whenever his sadness overtook him, wrung your brother dry of life, you bat the Stranger's hand and bring him back.
"But we have proved them wrong," he insisted. "All of us, even Aemond with Vhagar— the war queen, Visenya's dragon — we have claimed ours. Daeron all the way Oldtown has Tessarion, even Helaena has Dreamfyre. And yet you insist..."
You wound your arms over his torso, keeping him close in a silly hug where you sway and dance him around. A laugh escaped him while you inhaled the scent of smoke, soot, and that grime stench of beast.
Aegon on his good days lacked the bottle-edge of wine, of cheap salts from the waft of the soiled, Silk Streets.
This was your brother. No one else.
"I fare better without one," you whispered in his ear. "I appear innocent, sweet almost, without a beast in my command. They look at me with nothing but pity and the urge to protect me. Our father likes me like this, his poor, lovely daughter without a dragon of her own, listening so intently to his histories of Old Valyria. Our sister is eased, as one daughter is plagued by dreams and struggles with the real world, while the other cannot even claim a dragon of her own. Poor princess, Hightower blood must have thickened in her veins. She too, is no threat."
You pulled back, smiling at him. "They like me better like this. Pitiful, compliant, nothing but a sweet and pretty flower that sways in the Spring breeze. A beautiful decoration but no more."
He rubbed a thumb on your arm, a worry knot on his forehead. Aegon adored you but he struggled to piece together where your plot lies. You are a web-spinner, forever dancing out of reach, catching prey and lengthening your intricacies. "Is that why you hide your training with Aemond alone? Ser Criston is mother's sworn shield, he would not mind—"
"I will not place my secrecies to a knight with a soiled cloaked," you snorted. "No matter how tall he stands beside our mother. I trust no one but my kin. And I know that no matter how heavy you drink, sweet Aeg of mine, my secrets are your own."
He took your hand, kissing the back of it, stare impregnable. "As your blood is my own, our fire is one flame. I go where you tell me to."
You kissed his cheek, a reward, laughing. He smiles proudly at the sound. At this time, you dangled yourself to your brother as bait as the pressure from your grandsire to make him King started rising. You had been given notice that he had been talking to House Lannister, Wylde, even some Riverland lords.
You did not mind becoming Aegon's second wife. Just as his namesake, he will have his Rhaenys and Visenya. Unlike the Conqueror however, he would adore his Visenya more than a true flower. Helaena would enjoy that far better.
"And if I tell you to jump?" you half-purred.
"I will ask you how high."
Memories and choices break and tide as you scramble for hold on the rocky cliff face. Dragonmont in the dark is a behemoth beast, a screech or two breaking like lightning crackles, or the familiar drum beat of wings before the silence consumes once more. The stench of fire, of beasts and carcasses helps cloak the darkened night.
"Udligon ñuha brōzagon, Answer my call," you hiss into fraudulent emptiness, hands gripping rocky edges until your blood beads, "you fucking lizards."
"Have you gone mad!?"Aegon shouted, trying to pace with your run to the dragonpit.
A rocky laugh broke out from your being, not deigning that with a reply. Aegon huffed angrily.
"Alright, tell me this then. How are you so sure I'm not just about to put you on a bleeding volcano to die? We claim your dragon in the morn, sister. First thing before we break our fast. I'm sure by then, Vermithor or—"
You whipped your head around, pulling halt. "I leave tonight to claim my dragon. Whether it is you and Sunfyre who gets me there, or Aemond and Vhagar, is no matter to me. I will claim one tonight. It is up to you to decide now if we tell Aemond or not."
Aemond, whose anger is wounded tight, the barest excuse for war always at the edge of his hum. The misstep at Storm's End had cost him everything. Had cost your mother everything. Queen still, Alicent Hightower had bent the knee and offered her life in exchange for mercy. Before Rhaenyra passed judgement, Viserys I had passed.
It didn't matter that you had ensured a higher dosage from the Harrenhal witch in his usual milk of the poppy. Your spiders moving with ease through the silent channels you had established long before your own flowering.
The Red Keep had scrambled, the Heir with it. It was enough time for Lucerys to have come out of the red, confirmed to live through the worst of it without as much as a broken bone. Arrax however, had been badly maimed, and would no longer take flight. But he and his rider would live. Aemond would live. Alicent would have her son. Rhaenyea will have hers, and the crown.
Kevan had done his duty unto you while you settled the storms in Dragonstone. You rewarded him handsomely.
Aegon sighed. He too, would like your honour avenged, but not for the sake of war. "As you wish, sister. I hope you know what you're doing and I am not about to send you to your death."
Just like what you did to your mother, you reached forward and cupped his face. If before, your touch stills his heart and floods his cavities with warmth, a flash of fear strikes the twin son at the eerie smile on your face.
"Skoros morghot vestri? What do we say to the god of death?"
Aegon blinked. "Tubī daor. Not today."
You smiled. "Trust me, sweet Aeg. It is not my death the Stranger will take. Not until the fjords of the North are at my mercy."
"Iksan kesīr sir naejot māzigon ñuha sikagon pakto! I am here now to claim my birth right!" Your scream echoes and falls, repeating back to you. There is a hum, like an electric current that sizzles and pops inside your blood and marrow, and you scramble higher and higher on the rock. Your blood does not sing for the dragon lairs, but above. Up and up, jagged edges cut your skin and dress, the wind whipping with sea mist, but nothing, no one, can clamour you as you reach the peak.
At first you see nothing but darkness and hollow sounds. But you let your eyes adjust, a hiss breaking out of your dry lips as you stumble. You look down. What you first thought were rocks and wayward bones of cattle is bigger.
Whale? No.
Dragon. Dragon bone.
You look and will every sense that your eyes do not. The smell that is drowned— iron. Bones bigger than a person. Than cows and whales. Bones of fearsome beasts. Darkness moves, taking form, more than shadow. Scales hewn rough and jagged, as if stone themselves. Midnight black moving with the gentlest of sighs.
As soon as you realise what— or who — is in front of you, the eyes open with an intelligent gleam. Your heart jolts at the emerald irises that gaze back at you, slitting at the appearance of a human.
'The stench of death follows him', the voice of an old keeper hums into your ear. You no longer remember who told this to you, but the words ring true in your memory. 'Scales of midnight, as if hewn from darkness and death. A harbinger, your grace, an omen of the darkest nightmares.'
"Rytsas. Hello." You smile, ever sweet, ever charming.
This is a thread you had never felt before. Not one of your own making, but something older. A golden thread that led the eyes of Daenys the Dreamer. That spun the ties of Aegon the Conqueror. The voices that herded your madness had gone quiet in the mad rush to get here, but now their presence thickens. Words you cannot hear, nor understand, flood the silence as dragon met rider for the first time.
Keepers and historians have called him he, but every bone in your body tells you that the being before you is a she.
And wouldn't that make sense? A cannibalistic being is a woman?
She opens her maw, only ever slightly, smoke and fire crackling out of it. Molten lava in the belly of her insides tease the cool, night air and warms you.
Her version of a smile. Hello, she seem to say.
"Māzīs. Come," you say, giggling. "Dohaerās. Serve."
That night, you took your first flight.
That night, the Cannibal took her first flight with her first— and only — rider as well.
❝ . . . It is said that the formerly named "The Cannibal" had been entranced by the hunger of his new— first and evermore — rider. Prince Aegon the Elder who had escorted his twin sister that very night with Sunfyre, had looked up in alarm and fright to a maddened screech. Excitement and laughter pouring out from the newly bonded Dragon and Rider had soon turned fear into awe.
Gaelithox, she had been named as they had ridden until dawn broke by the rider who loved her 'till the end of their days, was said to have seen a mirror in Her Grace. The fathomless hunger for blood and organ from the same bodies of their kin. For Gaelithox ever hungers and satisfies for the same meat as her, at the height of her grief and ire that fuelled the Queen Consort to climb Dragonmont by hand, she too hungered for the throats of her traitorous blood.
Gaelithox will only have one rider in her whole life, as she found no same twin soul as akin in the Bastard Eater Queen. Their bond moved as if two bodies beheld one soul.
She shied from humans, and oft found too rough with other dragons. Vhagar was an exception, oft seen acting as an elder sister to the Queen's dragon when neither royal rode them and played in the skies. Smaller dragons were forbidden to approach her however, nor was she allowed in the dragonpit after almost devouring the flightless Arrax.
She died two moons after the Queen's death, delivering her final flames for her rider and would never more breathe her infamous green flames akin to Wildfire, ordered by the Crowned Heir, Princess Daenera Velaryon. It is said that the princess attempted to bond with the cannibalistic dragon but it refused.
The dragon spent her last moons in heartbreak, oft seen in Dragonstone and the Red Keep, circling her rider's most favourite places. Her final resting place is at the very top of Dragonmont from whence the Queen claimed her. It is said that the Queen's crown, the one the King Jacaerys had gifted her after the birth of their first sons, the Princes Laenor and Gaemon, is said to be placed there, as well as a portion of her ashes.
It is said that the King and the Queen's twin brother, the Prince Aegon, personally made the trek in remembrance.
It is widely suspected that Aelyx, Princess Daella's dragon, the youngest child of the King and Queen, may have been Gaelithox's only existing hatchling for he too is made of rough, midnight scales. The dragon that bred with her remains to be unknown. ❞
—Maestre Kevan Noratz, Volume X of The Life and Lies of the Emerald Flame, passage chapter under 'The Time of Hunger: Gaelithox'.
You leave Gaelithox to a mournful goodbye on Dragonstone, pressing your forehead against her hard, scaly head, promising to come back, of exchanging her diet for fat, juicy whales, for more wind-whipped rides, before riding back on Sunfyre with Aegon. The younger dragon would not rise from the beaches in fear of the cannibalistic elder, but you made ensuring promises to teach Gaelithox not to chew your dearest brother's dragon.
You had gone most of your life without the feeling of a bond beneath you, warm and alive and wild, and the roar and stench that though new, felt so familiar in your ribcage— you will fly again. And with your brothers beside you. With Helaena and her lovely Dreamfyre.
To think they had taken this from you too, to placate them. To play into their hands like a mewling kitten.
No more.
It is paces before fast is about to break when you both touch back down to Kings Landing. The Keep busying with its occupants, servants and maids bolstering with quickened feet to ensure the lords and royals are awakened with full, poached meals, dresses and coats readied for their lords and ladies, a new, glorious day under the Reign of the Black Queen.
"What now?" Aegon asks, trying to keep with your pace but he is fatigued, failing to stop his yawns. The excitement of last night had come upon him like a fog, and he is missing his bed. Hells, he is missing the bed he stays with his wife if it meant he would get a full night's sleep in the hours of the day.
"Now, we speak nothing of what happened."
He turns to you, frowning. "Just like that?"
"Just like that." You beam, nodding in favour of soldiers and maids who bow in reverence to the Crown Princess. You know you smell of dragon and night, and you need a bath. And to talk to Dyanna before you seek your daughters. "I will need time and people. The board must still be set for me to perfectly execute what I have in store."
"Alright." He yawns again. "I'll be in my quarters, passed out, if you need me. Please do not need me until sup."
You laugh breathlessly, grabbing his hand and giving it a wet kiss. "I will give you your rest, be assured. Kirimvose, dōna lēkia, Thank you, sweet brother."
The words are simple, said in a quiet murmur heavy with love and meaning. Aegon presses a loving kiss to your head, unable to stop himself winding an arm around you.
"Syt ao, va moriot, ñuha prūmia. For you, always, my heart."
As you break to each other's chambers— his, to sleep, you, already meeting Yna and requesting for a bath — you don't notice the lurker that watched the intimate moment between twins, humming in amusement before it moves to follow you.
Back in your quarters— your marriage quarters as Jacaerys had requested that you forgo having your own, not wishing to part with you — the maids are already busying themselves airing the room, moving to follow your usual routine. The only thing breaking it is the tub now in the centre.
"Thank you," you say to Yna as she picks out the pins from your hair, shrugging off your dress in the process as soon as the maids had untangled the lace behind you.
"Call for Dyanna," you tell them as they bow and leave, the door clicking softly behind them. Plans must be made. Bath for now.
With the world stifled for a second, left with only you and your thoughts, you plunge your body under too-hot water, sighing against the aches and pains in your body. Dragon-riding is a new endeavour to your muscles, and though enjoyable, was still too new.
You sigh as tears fall from your eyes, blinking exhaustedly against soft, humming daylight. You had always known that love, as it is, is a maiden's folly. A foolish, hapless play meant to fool young girls into thinking the world is kind; a pretty place.
It was an even farther thought from you, a princess of the realm. At a young age, it has been drilled to you that your womb is a rare commodity. Your body has never been your own, a piece meant to be moved in a bigger game that you are used for, not play.
You weren't stupid.
If there's a few things Otto Hightower had ever granted you, apart from gifting you his keen prowess in moving power beneath your fingertips, in hungering for more, for better— it is understanding what each person is, who they can be, how you can move them. A flatter, a flair, a push. As a man, there is much to be desired about your grandsire; he used people, used family to pursue power, but you can't truly fault him for that as you were the same.
You just took better care of the people under your wing.
And for Jace, you had banished him.
The worst part, you knew there was a good, fat chance you would care for the princeling. He was a kind man, a sweet man, and with a guiding hand, you could forge yourself the best husband for yourself as much as you can mould a great king and a wonderful father. Women's hands are ever carved to mould and prod men. We stand behind, a presence or a hand, an echo of power.
But your Jace had surpassed it all, and in the moons leading up to your present day, to giving him his heirs, two beautiful daughters, the promised full Valyrian colouring in the silver hair in Daenera, your eldest, the wide, violet gaze in Aemma— the name of his mother's mother, a request of him that you had kindly, graciously fucking agreed to — of course there is a part of you, the girlish, tender heart that you long thought you had buried to get here, would fall for the brown-eyed, wondrous man.
You sink deeper into the tub, sighing as you let yourself unravel—
When you feel it. A presence in your room. It's soft. Silent. Not a lot would feel as such, but as paranoid as you are, as you keep your spiders clean and pretty with your dewy-eyed webs— you know better.
Your mind runs with ideas on who it might be, and come to a few people. No true name rises. The Red Keep is flooded with spies and traitors. You test your luck, sitting up on the tub, raising an arm over the lip of it and flicking water with your fingertips.
"If you are here to kill me, I'm afraid it will be a lost cause."
He laughs, sardonic and edged and familiar, jetting a tingle down your spine.
Well. There's getting a calm bath.
"Perceptive as always, niece," he says, heavy footfalls approaching now that he has been caught. "I'm just here to say hello."
You raise your eyes, mouth curled but unsmiling at the man who acts as the biggest thorn to your plots. Daemon Targaryen has never fallen through your webs, on guard against your flatter, your push, or your flair. Of course, taking the position of his daughter might have forever burnt that road, but you would think he'd ease up just a little bit when his wife, the Queen, had warmed to you considerably.
Unlike your mother, you had never been hostile to your bitch of an elder sister. Just like your plots for Aegon and Jacaerys, and nodding along to thread your father had started but abandoned, foolishly thinking the realm would follow without him fully ensuring your sister's claim to the throne— you carefully maintained a polite farce with Rhaenyra.
Ultimately, this became a boon to you, as she had responded positively to your abrupt marriage to her son, even reminding her deranged guard dog of their own marriage. The cream to your lemon cake had been when you birthed Aemma, the Queen's most favourite grandchild thus far. When she was a babe, Rhaenyra was never far; almost, always holding your daughter, cooing at her cheeks, remarking her likeness to her namesake with pure fondness.
But Daemon Targaryen knew, in the deepness of his marrow, that there is something wrong with you.
"Hello," you answer primly. He laughs, leaning against the passage to your open balcony. "We could have had this elating greeting at fast, if you wish to break it with me and my own."
He scoffs, unable to hide his disdain at the thought. It breaks his stare of your naked visage. Men. "I would rather jump to the fighting pits, good daughter."
"How rude. Is that all?" You meet his gaze steadily, tilting your head. "If it is not obvious yet, good father, I am bathing."
An amused smirk. "I can see that." Lecherous fucking geezer. "No matter. I just have a... curious thought, a wonder I suspect you may be able to answer. See. Truly odd it is, for the keepers to alert me this morning that Sunfyre had taken a ride past the Hour of Owl." Your heart thuds in your ribcage and you do your best to keep your expression mildly irritated. "Not with one, drunken rider, but with another. It had taken them hours, only coming back when morning had already presented in the air."
He steps forward, slow, menacing, until he reaches the edge of your tub and crouches. Your gazes are still unmatched in height, defiant as yours might be.
"The distinct smell wafts them, a Keeper said, and one suspects that though one dragon left last night, two might have come back this morning for he had seen another fly away." His fingers dips into the water, swirling the steam without breaking eye contact. "I wonder if you know anything about it, darling niece of mine."
The mocking emphasis is not lost on you. If the Queen is the Realm's Delight, you were Darling of the Realm. A sweet, merry girl, the secondborn daughter of Viserys I who frequently fought for the plight of the small folk, who gathered friends of all kinds of lords and ladies no matter the standing of their houses to her own, visiting far lands and charming every person in any room. Who made any feast brighter, always sparkling, always the darling.
Less of a dragon, more of a fairytale.
You sit up, leaning, baring your breasts completely to him as you pull yourself up on the ledge he is crouched from. He leans back, only slightly, as you smile demurely. Sweet. Tart. On the edge of pulling his head and hitting it against the copper tub.
"I am unsure of what you suspect, or is accusing me of, kepus, uncle," you purr and there's a twitch in his mouth, a widen in his irises— men are so fucking simple — "I had been feeling down last night, as my husband, as you know, is beyond my reach at the moment as he rallies alliances for the good of the realm. My brother had simply offered to take me out riding, trying to quell my loneliness with an excitable flight I had never been afforded."
You tilt your head. "Even if there had been a dragon binded to my own, why why would I not regale the realm with news of my success? I have longed for a dragon of my own, but alas, I have not quite succeeded where most of the family have." You pout. His eyes flicker. "Mayhaps I am more Hightower than I am Targaryen."
A huff leaves his lips, the amusement in his smile arching to his dark, dark gaze. Before you can react, his hand had comes forward to hold your chin in a tight grip, your jaw aching soon enough at the fingers that dig against your skin, wanting to bruise, to break.
Though a tremble passes your body, you keep his stare, gritting your teeth as the pad of his thumb brushes your lips. Moments and desires thrum between a charged hatred.
The lust is twisted from wanting to fuck you to wanting to kill you. The line is not simple. Maybe that is your fate together.
But he can't. You are well too ingrained in his family now, loved by the people he cared about. You are untouchable. For now. This is a warning, waiting for you to stutter, to show your hand. Any show of your true intentions... he is more than happy to swing Dark Sister across your throat.
He releases you without another word, standing up and leaving through the front door, the door clicking shut.
You sink back into the bath, letting the water engulf you.
Your daughters are moons apart in birth, and there are only a few differences between them that people oft remarked they could be twins. Daenera is taller, spindly. Built like Aemond when he was younger. Her hair is spun moon and eyes of mullish blue. It reminds you of Daeron's eyes. You had named Daenera yourself, a gruelling birth that took the entire night. You promised Jacaerys he could name the second. He had chosen Aemma for a girl, Laenor for a boy.
Not a few moons later, you were with child again. Your husband pinked at the cheeks at the chiding from his family. When she cried into the afternoon sun—Aemma was born mid day, during a council meeting — he pain did not stop the laugh that came out of your mouth from the horrified expression from the Master of Coin as your water broke.
Aemma had a sweetheart face, cheeks much fatter than her older sister's, with a yellowish tinge to her hair, curlier too, reminding you of Aegon. And Aemma laughed more, her deep, violet eyes always half closed as she exploded in giggles and bright, sunshine happiness.
Sons they might not be, but you had given heirs for the throne. And for them, you would do anything to keep their futures intact. Bond with a dragon, face the Rogue Prince, upheave Winterfell. Anything.
You flounce to the nursery where you know the two would be, smiling sweetly at every person you pass as they bow in reverence. Most wore sights of confusion, their greedy eyes and wagging tongues drinking in the deep, emerald glisten of your gown.
It's an old dress, one you keep in the corner of your collection. It isn't as if you had forgo the colours of your mother's house, but playing court meant every movement, even the clothes you wear, can be meaningful. And since your marriage, your Jace liked you in Velaryon colours.
"A goddess come to bless," he gasped against your collarbone, keeping your legs high on his waist as he rutted into you before his teeth sunk on your skin. As newlyweds go, there is not a lot of teasing to be had for your husband to curl against you in a darkened alcove. Merely wearing his favourite colour on your skin has him panting like a dog. His favourite dress is a seafoam blue that dragged longer against the ground in a soft, almost-gossamer material with a silver belt.
Enticing him never took long, but you enjoyed the dance presented. You enjoyed the dark hunger that filled him until he grabbed you to take you because he just had to take you.
The fresh wound slices deeper as you imagine all the things Jacaerys is doing to the so called Sara Snow. The emerald green of your gown shimmers with your anger.
"Fucking bastards," you can't help but say aloud, nodding at the guards posted on the nursery as you hear the squeals of your daughter and the calm, even voice of your brother.
"Muña! Mother!" Aemma squeals, untangling herself from being pressed against Aegon's side as the children— Daenera and Jaehaera — cuddle around him, before running to you. Helaena is on the floor, entertaining baby Maelor. Your mother, hands twisting against her own, stands vigil by the window, staring far ahead.
You catch your secondborn, giggling as you pressed kiss after kiss on her face.
"I see everyone has started without me. Where is Jaehaerys?"
"You were late, sodjisto, aunt," Jaehaera grins gummily. Jahaera is only a year older than Daenera. Your daughters, five and a half and five respectively. "Jaehaerys is with kepus, uncle. They are training."
"Smart girl." You meet your brother's gaze, whose eyes had notably been staring at your dress, mouth turned down. "Why don't you three play with Helaena? I shall speak about Name Day gifts for your Uncle Joffrey for a bit, hm?"
As Aemma shrieks something about cakes, and Daenera dutifully kissing your cheek in greeting before she takes Jaehaera's hand, you turn to your brother and mother.
"Aemond?" you ask softly, keeping your voice out of earshot. Alicent shakes her head. You nod. "Good. We don't want him inciting a war before I have mine properly planned."
As the Dowager draws in a sharp inhale, Aegon grabs your hands, the worry pulled taunt in his eyebrows. "Are you seriously contemplating war, sister? Isn't there a better way to punish them?"
"What punishment does a man regale in?" you hiss, stepping close to him. "Or the Queen's heir for the bloody matter? When Aemond nearly killed Lucerys, and he confronted me as if I had ordered Vhagar to tear through his brother, I thought I had put to bed any doubts in our marriage. It seems that men stray, regardless. My daughters may be his heir now, but what is to say that bastard wildling he's found himself cock deep in produces a son? Will he shame me with a mistress? Or will he shame me with a second wife?"
Your mother's lips tightens, her fingers paling at how tight she is gripping her nerves.
"Bastard or not, if he takes her to wife, I will be nothing. Make that babe a son, and the realm will rally for it. Daenera is his heir. My daughters will not be forgone. I will not be pushed aside. This is mercy, brother," you say softly, tucking a stray curl behind his ear. "My last one. It requires time, moons, to unfurl. It requires seeding doubt and unfathomable inadequacy. Better if Aemond is none the wiser, Helaena the same. But I will need both of you for this to work. It is the only time I will ever ask. For me. For my daughters."
"And you will punish Winterfell with a war?" your mother asks, frown pulled deep. "That is the plan?"
"I will not. I won't do such a thing so blatant, mother, you know me better than that. But this is my last mercy, and it will be the last. For the next time he offends me so, I do not care if Rhaenyra feeds me to Syrax. I will put a dagger through his heart, heir or not."
The Prince Jacaerys comes back not a week later. Though he comes back to the same castle with the same occupants— your shiny new threads gleam. The stage has been set, a play ready to act. You had sent more spiders in the North, keeping a close eye to every blasphemy your husband has been enjoying in the absence of his duties, and as the rage in you quietly grew with each new whisper, your determination hardens.
You mark each indescretion. You keep a tally.
You count for each fall your blow will land on him.
Vermax lands with a screech and a heavy thump, your husband leaping off him with a grin on his face, matching the one you own, waving your arm joyously with Aemma in your arm and Daenera beside you, holding to your skirt as she grinned at her father.
Aemma wiggles under your hold, and you let Jace get close enough before you set her down, laughing, "Okay, okay!" Her laughter carries through as she scrambles like a bull to her father. A squeal peals out of her as Jace picks her up just in time and tosses her in the air.
"Want to meet kepa, father, sweet girl?" you whisper to Daenera, running a hand down her hair before she nods, breaking out into her own sprint, hugging her father as he greets them with laughter and kisses.
You let them have their time, and this, at least, eases your heart truthfully. A kind reminder that Jace adores his daughters.
You stay at the edge of the entrance, your too-wide grin softens into a smile. You were dramatic, nothing new about that, but even in the pale, pearl blue of your dress in silky, Myrish lace, the emeralds in your heavy, golden belt winks. Green ribbons twisted in your hair alongside fresh flowers. When the trio of your family treks toward you, silver-haired babes clinging to your dark haired prince, you serve a wink at the girls and they untangle themselves from their father while you stepped forward.
A choreographed dance, not giving him time to think. To pause.
Every step is calculated, every item on your body— the silk, the small seahorse that locks your dress behind you, the tint on your lips to the oil in your hair and body — is made to perform. You engulf him in you as if you want to suffocate his senses, your arms wrapping around him with sweet kisses pressing on his face, his neck.
Most in the dragonpit looked away, others, scandalously amazed and enchanted, watch as the princess is undeniably enthralled with her lord husband.
His laughter rumbles across his body, infecting your own, smelling of dragonback and crisp winds. You wonder if your nose is more heightened, you would be able to smell his whore in him, but you don't. It's just him. Your Jace.
Your body moulds against his as his arms tightens around you. When you lean back, you sweetly press a chaste kiss on his lips, grinning.
"What is this?" he huffs a laugh, meeting your doeful gaze. Your fingers curl around his chin, his cheek, idly tapping and touching as if you are committing so much newness to memory.
"Kostagon iā ābrazȳrys daor jaelagon zirȳla valzȳrys? Can a wife not want her husband?" you ask softly, pressing a few more kisses before sucking the last one just under his ear. His body shudders. You hide your smirk. "Skori ēza issare qrīdrughagon tolī bōsa? When he has been away too long?"
A yearning look tints your gaze from under your lashes, and you have to stifle the winning smirk as guilt pinches his face.
"My apologies, my wife. I did not mean to be away from you for long. From the girls." As his eyes flick to his daughters, your mask momentarily sharpens into clear distaste. The urge to dig your fingers into his eyes until he is bleeding and screaming under you is one you tamper with great distress.
Did not mean...
Did not mean to have a dalliance with another woman?
Did not mean to fall into bed with a fucking bastard, you insidious cunt, while I await here with your heirs?
Your anger thrums, nestled deep in your heart, it breathes. You school your face the moment he turns back to you, bringing your hands to his lips, kissing each finger with reverent tenderness. His brown eyes smoulder, rubbing your bare— irises widening — back.
"If you wish it, I can be on my knees for my apologies, my princess."
Your mouth curls. "I'm afraid that might have to be quite later, my prince."
"Huh?"
"The Dowager Queen hoped to congratulate you on your successful campaigning. Reaching as far as the North so frequently, we planned a feast for your return." Eyes shinning, you cup his face. You hope the guilt eats him raw from the inside out. Like worms. Like termites. Hungry, hungry, hungry. "We have never been more proud of you, I have never been more proud of you."
You laugh brightly, ignoring the way he squeezed you just a bit harder that mere second the same time his eyes tightened. "The moment I told the girls of it, they had begged to dance with you." Then you bit your lip, frowning slightly. "I... I understand if you are tired, 'tis a long journey after all, I did try to tell them you might want to rest, we can sneak you—"
"No, no, my heart, of course I would be happy to, I— I want nothing more." He brings you close, face disappearing into your neck. "Thank you. I love you."
You hum, carding your fingers through his hair. "As I love you."
For the rest of the feast, you dance just at the edges of his fingertips, ensuring that you permeated his sights and senses despite it. A game. A dance. When he thanks revelries who congratulate him, who ask him of his adventures, you proudly stand beside him, dutiful as the wife that you are, spearing him with compliments as much as you can. Hands squeezing his arm, your oils swallowing him with your smell.
When dinner came, you take chances massaging his thigh, sliding a salacious grin that had him blushing, ever so sweet, green— making you wonder what kind of fucking bastards do that he finds your attention so swallowing.
You don't let up.
Whenever he, in turn made a move, you sidestep, flutter a smirk, a wink; always escaping, letting him grow frustrated as the night went on.
Your one respite from taunting him had been when he danced with his daughters, making a gallant show of asking them, even Jaehaera. Giggles and spins, the ladies of the court fawn and coo.
Even now, you're making him to be the perfect man. The endearing husband, the wondrous father, the brilliant prince, the perfect lord.
To execute your plan, it must be made with a surgical precision. A slice that guts him to his knees, that breaks his spirit and quenches the whispering, wicked madness nestling with your ire. On another cheek, he must remain upright and upstanding, as to keep your daughters' future in perfect order.
You catch the domineering gaze of Daemon Targaryen, idle as he is, on the side of his distracted Queen, talking to a highborn lady. You don't look away as you toast him your cup of Arbour Red before you pucker your lips for a taste. Your eyes move to where your husband is already looking, flushed red and sweaty from all the dancing, your girls, preening and giggling around him.
You tilt your chin at him, a challenge in your gaze, before you slowly pull your lips away from your wine, stained red.
His throat bobs.
It will be a long, arduous game. Full of pitfalls and tightened webbing. One trip can kill you. But once the machinations are in order, once everything and everyone is in their proper places... oh, you cannot wait for the dance the dragons will make.
A flutter, a simpered footstep. Then a rustle of a dress as one bows.
"My lady," Dyanna greets behind you.
"Hm?"
"The spiders in the ice have met the pup in the snow."
"And?"
"The pup is not suspicious, in fact, they might go as far as to say that the pup is lonely. Though others largely understand her existence... no one likes a bastard."
You snort. "No, they don't, do they?"
"The wolf cares for the pup though, and is largely protective of his only sister."
"Hm. Complicated, but not impossible. Have Meera change the tone of my missive. A softer edge. Sweet but not overtly. Ensure the prerogative of politeness. Then have it sent to the Rookery. The proper channels."
You sigh, taking the edge of your braid and twisting through the ribbons your maid tangled between them. Tonight, you had elected Targaryen colours. A black dress akin to scales and a low, exposed back and dipping front, held together in red ribbons and silver chains. One that might be too on the nose, but the constant, feverish stares from your husband made it worth it.
"We have to ensure a good relationship with the Warden of the North, don't you think so?" You have not looked away from your husband since your maid came, and as he whispered something in Daenera's ear, nodding off to her grandmother with Aemma towed, he turned towards you, one stride after another.
"Precisely what I thought, milady."
"Go," you order her for the last time, giving her your cup, just before Jacaerys reaches you.
Game, set.
Worshipping you has always been something Jace excelled at. At the least, his cock was much larger than most, and without the preparation of his tongue and mouth, it burned. At most, he oft found himself holding your shaking thighs, your head and shoulders left on the bed as he feasted on you like a man starved, hungered for your nectar, the sounds you make, and the shaking of your body as you reached your peak on his tongue.
"J-Jace, please, I—" Your breath stutters, a hiccup escaping your mouth, but he is not letting up. On his knees as only a lordling can with his back straight, he is holding your thighs, your lower back, eating your cunny for the third time of the night.
As soon as he had reached you, he grasped your waist, whispering against your hair in a rumbled groan, "You are torturing me so, my wife. We leave. Now."
"Now?" you echoed, amused. "This is a feast in your honour."
"My honour is already hanging by a thread. The revelry will go on without us. I want to have my fill of you."
And fill he had. He didn't even wait to get you out of your dress before he had pushed your skirt upward, gone on his knees, and got his tongue inside of you.
Now, you are overwhelmed, overstimulated as you are hazy, gripping the wrecked sheets as your peak reached you once more. A strangled, breathy cry of his name falls between your lips as your back arched impossibly so, and instead of letting up, this seemed to fuel him harder, the muscle of his mouth working harder inside of your cunt, hands digging into your flesh to keep you steady.
It builds with a stimulation unending, and just as you're on the throes of your last high, it builds again, quick and fast this time, shuddering gasps of, "o-oh gods, g-gods, Jace!" is the last thing you are able to shout before your fourth peak breaks against the shudders of your last one, your wetness exploding, and you start crying before he lets up.
Your blubber becomes laughter, and he is soft as he lies you down, massaging your thighs as you twitched. He hovers above you, running gentle hands across your arms, kneading through skin, before he reaches your face. He's still in most of his clothes, his long white shirt and breeches, but his mouth is covered in your wetness before he wipes it, obscene in the prettiness of his face and messy locks from where you had tugged and grabbed.
He presses a gentle kiss to your cheek, so close to your body, all too tangled in your soul, and can feel his hard cock upright and wanting against your belly, but he pays it no mind. Concern mars his features as he brushes down your hair.
"Are you alright, my love? Too much?"
You shake your head, brushing your hand down his chest. "N-no, I am well. I just never did that before."
He smiles, kissing your closed eyelids before he brings you close to his chest, cuddling you deep. "You deserve all the pleasure I can give you," he says against your hair. "I have been gone far too long. Consider it my apology."
You hum, eyes open. "Apology for what? You were doing your duty, nothing more, ñuha zaldrīzes, my dragon." You feel him stiffen as you keep your voice soft, caring. "I understand duty far better than you. It is what I love most about you."
You look up, taking his chin between your fingertips as you stared at those warm, brown eyes. "You, who carries your honour like a shield and your duty like a sword. I feel as if the gods had blessed me a husband far better than I should have had for I know I do not deserve you."
"H-how can you say that? You are—" He swallows. "— You are the most excellent woman. The mother of my children. You... You are the one I do not deserve."
Your head falls back against his chest, gripping his shirt. Only by your teeth had you stop yourself from screaming.
You curdle, you keep, you poise.
"My love?"
But you pay him no mind, pushing him on his back as you straddle him, your hands working quick to unlace his breeches until his cock slaps against his stomach, end red and swollen. A sharp hiss falls from his lips as your hand tugs on it once. Twice.
He calls your name, spits it really, eyes blown with lust as he holds your waist, unsure if he should lift you off him or grind you against his aching cock.
"I want you inside me," you whimper, plead, feeling his cock twitch at your words, your false, yearning gaze. He mistakes the burned tears of anger in your eyes as unbridled want. "I have gone so long without your warmth, your cock, swelling inside me, your seed nestling deep, taking root—"
"Yes," he gasps, fingers digging into your doughy sides, pulling you up, moving you around whilst you grabbed his length and directed inside your wet, hot cunt inch by inch, filling you so thickly you can feel him in your throat. It takes time, patience and grit, but you're wet enough and you're determined. Once he's fully inside of you through a choked moan of your own, his neck arches, head thrown back. "Fuck! Yes, y-yes, there you are, my g-good fucking girl."
You move slow at first, taking him, bracing one hand on his knee, almost testing the feel him of back in the familiar contours of your cunt. Veins pop between each groan and choke that shudders through him whilst praise, your name, the possessive titles— my love, my wife, my princess — is spit in between.
When the heat tightens in your belly, you shift positions, placing both palms on his chest, and riding him without abandon, bouncing up and down as you watch with a sharp eye as his release builds. His hips move on their own, fucking up in you as you meet his thrusts with equal vigour, and it's delicious. It's heated. You grind your swollen folds against his mon and your cries make him thrust up harder into you, calling your name, denting your doughy hips.
You don't stop, your pleasure at the back of your mind, wanting him to unravel, to break— a final cry of your name dissolving into a choked moan, spilling his seed deep inside, the continuous snap of his hips digging it deeper into your womb.
But your last peak is still tightening, so you press a quick kiss on his chest, a bite really, before you continue to chase your own high, a hiss slipping his lips but moving your hips with his iron-grip, stutters of, "d-do it, reach your high, f-fuck! fuck!"— Your head throws back, nails digging his skin as your cunt clenches his cock in a vice grip, forcing his hips to snap up once more, twice, until you fall, slumping against him.
When he kisses the top of your head, murmuring words you ignore, you close your eyes.
Your plan is in motion. The missive will be sent to the Lord Stark, in pursuit of an innocent friendship. The spiders you have placed on the Northern bastard are set, and a dragon flies in Dragonstone with your bond in its blood.
Your Jace is home. He will fall in love with you all over again. His wonderful daughters and darling princess, he will regret the events that have transpired in the cold. In his head, he will make promises to do better, to be better, that whatever happened is a blip. A mistake that will not happen again. but you know, he will trip. He will wander once more.
But you will make sure that the next time he does so, he will regret it for the rest of his days.
Because it is not you who will burn Winterfell to the ground.
It will be him.
Your plan moves, your web is perfect.
Now, the spider waits for the idiot fucking flies to feed on.
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