Chapter Text

Alicent has one foot out of the car when the roar of what is surely a sports car breathes fire as it approaches the school parking lot.

Kids stare as the car comes to a halt, flashy and tempestuous just as its owner, beside Alicent’s SUV. The hatred she’s felt for that death trap since the moment it’d been bought still ignites. A weekend car, Rhaenyra had grinned, all those years ago.

“The other car’s in the shop.” Rhaenyra clarifies before Alicent can even get a word out. Her face must’ve have shown the displeasure at the sight of it.

“Didn’t say anything.” Alicent grumbles, locking her own car, moving forward. Her eyes are purposely in front of her away from the woman trailing behind her.

“It was written in your face, Ali.” She murmurs, there’s a ghost of a smirk on her lips and it only irks Alicent more. “What is it this time?”

They push the doors into the school, walking beside each other. Alicent spares her a glance, fleeting. “He punched a kid.”

“Oh fuck.” Rhaenyra breathes out. “Well, it might’ve been a misunderstanding. He could be defending someone. Let’s not think the worst.”

“He punched someone, Rhaenyra. He’s not supposed to resort to violence.” There’s something of a veiled accusation in her words. Something she’s said before. The way Rhaenyra is so soft with Aemond, particularly. Always letting things slide. Never disciplining him enough.

Rhaenyra chooses not to respond, certain things would escalate when they didn’t need to. They walk in silence the rest of the way to the principal’s office.

“Mrs. and Mrs. Targaryen.” The principal extends his hand for them to shake.

“It’s Hightower actually, Mr. Lannister.”

There’s an awkward beat, the coldness of her words, Alicent hopes, pierces through Rhaenyra in some way. She’s not sure why it matters so anymore.

“Right.” The principal smiles stiffly. “Aemond is in the nurse’s office. He will be here in a moment.”

“The nurse’s office?” Rhaenyra’s worry is palpable in her voice. “So you mean that Aemond was hurt?”

“He hit first, but yes, he was hurt.” Mr. Lannister explains as he opens the door to his office. “Right through here. I’ll explain what I can. Have a seat, please.”

There’s a moment as they take a seat that Alicent eyes Rhaenyra and it’s as though she can feel the impulsiveness in her. Aemond is like her that way. Reckless, impulsive, even though there isn’t any biological cell connecting them, Aemond is every bit Rhaenyra’s as he is Alicent’s. It worries her too much.

“Alright.” Mr. Lannister murmurs. “The incident occurred during lunch hours and from what I gathered, Aemond struck Joffrey first. The reason as to why had to do with Baela. He was defending his cousin. He might explain that better. That being said, we do not condone violence in this school, so I propose that Aemond gets detention for a week.”

“And what of Joffrey?” Rhaenyra questions. “Something will be done, right? If he did-“

“Rhaenyra.” Alicent warns.

“He will also get detention, rest assured and we will keep a closer eye on him, of course.”

There’s a knock on the door, stopping the conversation momentarily. And as the principal  tells them to come in, the door opens and Aemond is there, his cheek bruised. His mothers are both up in a second, reaching for their son.

“Hello, my boy.” Rhaenyra smiles, running a hand through his hair as Aemond smiles guiltily. Always so soft. Even as they stand in his school after he hit a boy.

“You better explain to us what happened, Aemond.” Alicent says, her commanding voice chilling him immediately, even in the warmth of Rhaenyra’s touch.

“I was defending Baela, I swear!” He says defensively. “Joffrey was saying all kinds of horrible things to her. I couldn’t just stand there and let him. I tried to get him to stop but I lost control. I didn’t mean to, I promise! He’s been awful to her for weeks!”

“Is it alright if we take him home?” Rhaenyra asks the principal.

“It would be wise to speak at detail about this so yes, do that. In the meantime, Aemond, I will speak to Baela, as well. No bullying will be allowed, alright? You should’ve come to us first.”

Aemond nods his head, tears in his eyes. He leans into Rhaenyra as they walk out the door, with Alicent beside him. As they walk towards their cars, the silence is unbearable and she can tell Rhaenyra wants to comfort Aemond as he cries. She’s always had a weak spot for his teary face ever since he was a baby, he’s had her wrapped around his finger the minute he’d been born, even before then. She remembers how sweet she’d thought it was, how loving. And it is, still. But Aemond has been acting out and Alicent can’t be the only one pulling the weight of being the bad guy.

“You brought Syrax?” Aemond exclaims as he spots the silver Aston Martin parked out front.

“Syrax?!” Alicent furrows her brows.

“I named the car.” Aemond shrugs. “When mom bought it, right?”

“That’s right.” Rhaenyra smiles softly. “Go with mama, ok? I’ll meet you at the house.” She places a kiss to his head. Alicent can see that he’s about to argue, wanting to ride in the cool car. But something in Rhaenyra’s eyes tells him not.

“Let’s go.”

•

Alicent gives a speech over the way Aemond handled things, the violence of it while the boy tries to defend his actions. She listens but Aemond doesn’t seem to understand that resorting to violence is what Alicent is upset with him about. Instead, he feels as though she’s attacking him as he seems to feel about her lately. That her disciplining him is an attack and she’s tired and has barely slept since his brother woke her in the middle of the night with a nightmare in tow.

She knows Rhaenyra can sense that she’s losing her temper, the way Aemond’s words become filled with frustration, so she approaches the kitchen aisle from where she’d been leaning against the counter.

“Aemond.”

The boy listens, eyes flickering over to his mother. And Alicent can see the hope that Rhaenyra will back him on this. For once she’s glad that she can see her former lover trying to defuse the current tensions.

“Stop for a moment and listen please. You aren’t listening to what mum is saying. She isn’t upset that you defended Baela, alright? She’s upset that you decided that violence would be the best option.” Rhaenyra explain in that impossibly soft voice, understanding, empathic. She doesn’t know how she’s always done that, always known perfectly how to use her words so kindly. For someone so unpredictable and rash, Rhaenyra has always been expert at diplomacy. Except for them, she supposes.

“But I tried everything else. I just wanted him to stop hurting her.”

“I know it didn’t come from ill intent, my love.” Alicent sighs. “I just need you to promise not to act on your impulses so recklessly.”

“Unless they’re a kidnapper. Then you can punch them.” Aemond giggles at Rhaenyra’s joke and Alicent glares at her. “Right. Are we clear, kid? No more punching people, yeah?” He nods.

“Thank you for sticking up for your cousin. Don’t lose that instinct, okay?” Alicent smiles softly.

“Mum’s right.” Rhaenyra winks at him.

She isn’t sure when she’ll stop feeling so lightheaded at the sight of Rhaenyra. Her childhood friend turned lover turned her everything and now this, whatever it is.

Looking back on their life together, she can pinpoint exactly when things had taken a turn for the worse. When Aemma, Rhaenyra’s mother, had passed, Viserys had fallen ill and could barely run the family company. So she had taken over his role. Late nights became regular, always late to everything, missing the kids’ school events and date night became null. And then there were the meetings with clients who wanted to party so she could secure deals. The company as her father was running it, had been a mess. So Rhaenyra had put herself on the line for it. And she’d succeeded.

The harm had been done. Alicent let her own vultures take control. She became a perfect picture of their tempestuous youth, when they were too on edge to settle and trust. Back then, Alicent lived riddled with shame and guilt and fear for loving a woman, Rhaenyra always too brash, unable to see how it could be. Always sure in who she was when Alicent had her life dictated by her father.

Otto had always said what she had was an illness. That they had to cure it. It would be fine, Rhaenyra was the rotten piece of the equation.

It took so long to be free of those demons. To love Rhaenyra fully and without fear. And they had been so happy.

Alicent had already been pregnant with Aemond when they decided to commit to each other after years, since their teens, dancing around what they had. There had been a horrible, drunken one night stand, fueled with the need to get rid of the shame. And three months later, two months into committing to Rhaenyra, she’d found out.

They’d been twenty four when Aemond was born. It’d been a horrible pregnancy. She’d ached for most of it, was so cranky, it took less than a breath to set her off. And Rhaenyra had stayed through it all, stuck by her side, never wavering.

When she’d held Aemond for the first time, Alicent had seen the way Rhaenyra’s heart belonged to that boy. The love in her eyes, the softness of her gesture and the way it seemed, when her eyes looked up from the child to Alicent, she’d never been prouder or happier.

“You’re stronger than any of us dragons, Ali.” She’d smiled, placing a kiss to her forehead. “You’re perfect. I love you. Both. More than anything.”

Here they were now. 12 years later. Two more kids. One girl. Another boy. Divorced. Bitter. Alicent isn’t sure she remembers why.

“Can mom stay for dinner?” Aemond is so impossibly hopeful, as Rhaenyra unknowingly pleads that she says yes. Her heart aches in her chest.

“Can you stay?” She asks her ex wife.

“Absolutely.” Rhaenyra smiles softly, no hesitation.

“Can you make your mushroom risotto?” Aemond grins and her ex wife laughs, shrugging.

“Ali?”

“Fine by me. I’m gonna go pick up your brother and sister, you two can go to the store. No treats.” She points a finger at both of them.

•

The house is all but a party when she gets there with Luke and Helaena. There’s music playing in the kitchen. She recognizes the playlist, all rock music that her and Aemond had assembled in their road-trip to the countryside. There’s something so comforting about the scene. Luke running in once he hears his mother’s voice, Helaena, smiling up at Alicent and leaning into her.

“And then your mom had the brilliant idea of sneaking in through the window so I helped her in first, because I am nothing if not chivalrous. But then when it was my turn, I was trying to climb up the wall but just as I was getting in, I slipped and fell and cut through my arm-“

“The part she forgets about the story is that she wouldn’t accept help. And argued the whole climb.” They fail to mention they were both horrendously drunk. Unable to even walk straight.

Rhaenyra has Luke in her arms, the boy grinning at his mom. “Greetings, Princess. Your Grace.” She smiles at them, bowing as Helaena laughs at her mother’s antics.

If Alicent ignores the absence of the ring on her finger, she might believe nothing had ever changed. That two years hadn’t passed since their divorce, since they succumbed, since Alicent made the decision for them both and Rhaenyra had accepted. That she was returning home with their children and they’d sit on the couch watching a film, the kids falling asleep on them. It could be like before, a team, a family.

“Your mother laughed when I fell by the way.” She turns dramatically to Aemond. “I was wounded, bleeding on the ground and there she was, laughing at my tragedy.”

“Yeah yeah, don’t forget that I slipped when I came out to help you. We both ended up in the emergency room.”

She does not tell Aemond that that was the first night, when they were eighteen years old, that Alicent told Rhaenyra she was in love with her and they had both sobbed like children with the relief of the truth.

Aemond’s eyes are shiny and she feels her chest constrict at the sight of him so happy. He’d taken the divorce the hardest. And it hadn’t gotten easier with time. In fact, it seemed that it had gotten worse lately. He understood more. Got angry at them. Frustrated. Unable to reason why it wasn’t easier together. Why his family couldn’t be together all the time. He hated leaving one or the other every week.

This is the most time they’ve spent together in months. And it’s hard to see Rhaenyra so at home. Every time she drops the kids off at her apartment, she always seems so out of place even after two years. They’d built a home together and now, on the nights it was only Alicent, nothing felt right.

“Dinner will be ready in ten, little dragons. So, go set the table, yeah?” Rhaenyra puts Luke down and the kids all go on to their tasks in perfect sync like before. It’s such a vision of the past, Alicent must’ve looked miles away because Rhaenyra sighs when the kids leave the room. “I’m sorry.” She murmurs.

“What?” She furrows her brows.

“I just…I’m here, in your home. And I shouldn’t be all-“

“Nyra’-“

“I know what you’re going to say. We need to start putting clearer boundaries and me being here is-“

“Will you stop assuming what I’m thinking?” She says frustratingly.

“You’ve said it before-“

“I’ve never said you couldn’t be here.” She denies.

“Let’s not kid ourselves. You did. In fact, for the first year I didn’t even set foot in this house.” Rhaenyra snaps.

“By your own choice. I never told you couldn’t be here.” She repeats.

“Well, you made damn sure I wasn’t welcome, didn’t you?” Her words hang in the air. There’s something about the anguish in Rhaenyra’s voice that chills her. “I never wanted this. You did.”

Alicent swallows the lump in her throat, takes in a shaky breath. “It’s a wonder you still think I had much of a choice, Rhaenyra. Great way to have this conversation, though. You sure are an expert at timing, huh?”

•

Dinner is tense at first. Aemond senses it immediately. But it dissolves or gets pushed away as Luke babbles on about his day and Helaena regales them on her newfound bug obsession. Alicent finds herself genuinely happy in those few moments. Her eyes cross Rhaenyra’s, seated where she’s always sat, and she’s proud of their kids. Their babies.

The kids insist that their mothers put them to bed to together. Even Aemond, who recently never wants anything to interfere with his bedtime routine, tonight seems to crave a slice of the past.

Luke is delighted with Rhaenyra’s storytelling. That has always been her forte. Alicent tries but her propensity for theatrics is never as entertaining. She’s always felt short in the face of Rhaenyra’s largeness. A dragon in every sense of the word. She loomed over everyone. And there was a time Alicent had stood with her, but in the year everything fell apart, she felt herself shrink under the weight of it. And now she felt inferior so many times. About the kids, even with their friends, in the family. Maybe it was her own mind playing tricks, but there was something so safe about Rhaenyra, a safe haven for so long and she’d felt so abandoned.

As Rhaenyra shuts the door behind her, Aemond the last kid in bed, she wishes, for a brief moment, to lead her into what used to be their room. To go back to the routine they’d had since they started living together. Having her here, having their family in their home, all together brings something of an ache, a need for the feeling of togetherness.

“Thank you for letting me stay.” She hears Rhaenyra say as they reach the living room.

“They’re happier with you.” Alicent comments and she feels so small in that moment, thinking back on the past few hours of Rhaenyra with the kids. She feels like she’s falling so short of making these kids as safe and happy as she can. Terrified that the necessary decision she made turned their lives for the worst. That they’re unhappy. She feels like a horrible mother, especially on the days the kids aren’t with her and Rhaenyra sends her pictures of them, happy.

“That’s not true.”

“They are. They’re never this happy with me. I mean, take this whole day. Aemond only ever listens to you, he idolizes you.”

“Alicent, have you ever thought that it’s not that they’re happier with me? It’s us. They’re happier when we’re both with them.”

“I think I’m failing them.” Her hands as shaky as she admits it. She isn’t sure why the truth tumbles out of her mouth. Maybe it’s the nostalgia of the whole night. How the doubts that creep up on her every night grow deeper.

She can see the question in Rhaenyra’s eyes and she can feel the tears threatening to make an appearance. She regresses to her childhood for a moment, trying to obey her father, willing herself not to cry, to be in control.

“No.” She shakes her head. “You’re not.”

“I am, Rhaenyra. Aemond barely ever listens to me, he doesn’t ask for affection, he rejects me all the time. And i think he resents me.”

“He’s a twelve year old boy discovering independence, Ali. It’s not you, ok? It’s hormones and everything all over the place.” She argues.

“They love you better, you know? It’s easy for them with you.”

Rhaenyra tenses immediately. Her natural instinct to comfort Alicent is subdued by the passive agressive nature of her words. And they’re back in the arena.

“I see.” Rhaenyra clears her throat. “No way for us to move past this routine, is there? The one where I’m a shitty parent.”

“I never said you were a shitty parent.” She shakes her head.

“It’s implied, Alicent! It’s easier for them, you say? Why?”

“You can’t be serious. You’re so easy on all of them. You never discipline them-“

“I never discipline them? Maybe not in the way you do, but if you want to pretend that you’re the only one educating them, fine by me. I’m leaving.” Rhaenyra huffs in frustration, running her hand through her hair as she crosses the room to collect her things. “I know i fucked up for that year. I know I missed big things in their lives and I made mistakes. Serious ones. I know that. Don’t think for a second that I don’t live with those thoughts everyday of my life. I know what it cost.” She pauses for a moment, blows out a soft. And Alicent can see her eyes, the tears that have formed. “I know what I don’t have and that pain never goes away.”

She makes way for the door and Alicent watches her go, but can’t help but call out to her.

“Do you think I wanted this?” She asks. And Rhaenyra turns to face her.

“I don’t know, Alicent. You were the one who packed my bags.”

“Because I had no choice. You were barely home. You missed Aemond’s birthday, his football games, Helaena’s recital, Luke barely even knew who you were for that whole year. And I missed you. I missed my wife, who would rather party with clients than come home.”

Her voice raises as her memory switches in her mind. All those nights waiting for her wife, watching her stumble inside their home, her heart breaking more and more. Feeling so alone in her own grief, knowing Aemond understood every moment, even Helaena, her sweet girl, a light dimmed in the face of her mother’s absence.

“I know.” Rhaenyra cries. “I know that, Ali. But I was fucking lost. I lost my mother and then my father pushed the company into my hands and I wasn’t ready and I should’ve no, but I didn’t. I know. But then coming home, all I could think of was…” She shakes her head.

The words die on her lips.

Alicent knows.

She can feel the same pain in her chest and the impulse to hold Rhaenyra doesn’t fade. It’s there and she fights it. She watches as she gets inside her head, thoughts of that year mirrored in her eyes.

And Alicent feels, in her bones, the ache, the thing that never goes away.

“I…wanted for things to be different but I didn’t know to escape it. I don’t think either of us did.” Rhaenyra murmurs. And then as if waking from a dream, she wipes her tears. “I should go. Thanks for letting me stay for dinner-“

“Please don’t.” Alicent breathes out. The words escape her with abandon. There’s a quiet desperation, as if seeing again.  “Not when we’re finally talking.” She reaches for her hand. Rhaenyra pulls away from her reach, shaking her head.

“I can’t do this.” She takes a steadying breath, pulling on her jacket. “I don’t…Ali, you can’t do this to me. If we start this conversation, it won’t end tonight. The hour is late…the kids are up there and I think we should be alone for this, okay? If you do want to have this conversation, then we’ll talk. But not tonight.”

There’s moment, Rhaenyra stares into her eyes, tears in hers and all Alicent can think is how much she wishes she would press her lips to hers. But…the hour is late, her heart is in shambles and there isn’t a promise of resolution to be seen. The last three years are still a dark gray mess of accusation and failings and grief and loss. And it can’t be like before. This want, this desire it cannot bring her the same safety and joy.

When she doesn’t answer, her former wife nods. She tells her to sleep on it. And then she places a hand to her cheek and as delicate as only she can be with her, Rhaenyra places her lips on her forehead, lingers for a moment.

“To be without you is agony, Ali.” She whispers. “Goodnight.”

And then she’s gone.

Chapter Text

The house is quiet, apart from the soft music coming from outside the room. As Alicent waddles over to the door, back aching and even as she woke, the tiredness ever so present. She follows the music, it’s one of those jazz records Rhaenyra loves, Alicent can never tell them apart when there’s no singing, but she enjoys it still, when it’s on.

The light of the morning is soft, sunshine peeking through the windows of their home. Their first home, after living in Rhaenyra’s apartment for the last few months. There’s something so warm about the feeling, of walking in what they can call their halls on what’s to be the place their son grows up in.

Alicent smiles to herself when she realizes where the music is floating from. The nursery. Their unfinished nursery. They haven’t got long before the baby’s here and Alicent hasn’t stressed about it too much, she knows he’ll sleep near them for the first few months. They’d agreed on it. But Rhaenyra goes on and on about how they have to finish before he’s here.

She’s assembling the changing table. An intricate object, she’d started it the week before but hadn’t had the time to finish it. With the work she’s pulling at Targaryen Corp with her dad, plus the effort to be home for as long as she could before taking time off when he’s born, it was taking up her time. And Alicent wasn’t exactly help when it came to assembling furniture given the toll the pregnancy was taking on her.

“Hey.” Alicent murmurs softly, leaning against the doorway.

Rhaenyra looks up from her spot on the floor, eyes lighting up at the sight of her. “Good morning, darling.”

“How long have you been up?”

“Couple of hours. Didn’t want to wake you, you need all the sleep you can get.” She smiles. “How’s it looking?” She glances at the changing table. It’s almost assembled.

“I can already smell the diapers we’ll change.” Alicent jokes and Rhaenyra stands up, pausing her task to approach her. There’s the gaze she hasn’t gotten used to, full of love and adoration. Her arms wrap around her waist, her protruding stomach between them. “Thank you.” Alicent murmurs.

“Always.” Rhaenyra shrugs.

“No. It’s…more than I could’ve asked for.”

“I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but I’m actually  in love with you. Not with you for just your looks.” Rhaenyra smirks. “That’s that.” She says simply. Then she startles, a smile on her lips. The baby is kicking up a storm. They’ve turned from flutter to actually kicks. “There he is.”

“Wish he was out here already.” Alicent sighs softly, the thought isn’t heavy. She’s more at peace than she’s ever been. But the pregnancy has been gruelling, on top of every change in her life. Rhaenyra included. And she just wanted to hold her baby in her arms. “Soon enough, we’ll be even more sleep deprived.”

“And happy.”

“Deliriously so.” Alicent grins, joining their foreheads. Then she feels it, Rhaenyra swaying to the sound of a slow song coming from the speaker, hands on her waist and she laughs softly as Rhaenyra twirls her around before pulling her closer.

“I had a dream last night.” Alicent rests her head against Rhaenyra’s shoulder as she listens. “You and me. Dancing just like this. A ring right here.” She caresses her ring finger and at the soft touch, her breath hitches. “Everyone we love around us. And our son.”

“A ring, you say?” Alicent asks, in a low voice, afraid to rise, above the contrast of how small the moment is, here in this bubble of theirs and how large it feels.

“A ring.”

“Mmmh.”

There’s a pause. A moment where it all clicks in a more clear way.

“Is that something you’d want?” Rhaenyra asks, gentle, never expecting anything other than just Alicent.

“Are you asking now?” Alicent questions. And Rhaenyra huffs out a laugh.

“Not really. But…it’s the possibility of it and I’d like to talk about it with you before either of us ask.”

Alicent smiles. “So do I potentially, hypothetically, see marriage in our future?” She raises her head from her shoulder, stilling her movements. The swaying gradually stops and they just stand, eyes on each other.

Rhaenyra hums, confirming her question.

“Yes.” Alicent says. “I do.”

“Yeah?”

“Yes.” She repeats. Rhaenyra’s lips stretch upwards, into a soft smile before kissing her. Alicent laughs against her lips.

“Good. That’s good.”

A beat later , as they’re basking in the silence of each other, the doorbell rings.

“Were we expecting someone?” She questions.

“Unless Laenor is having a Joff breakdown, I don’t think so.” Rhaenyra shrugs. “I’ll go get it.”

“No, no, it’s fine. I’ll go. It’ll be good to stretch my legs.” She pecks her lips one last time before making her way out the nursery, climbing down the stairs carefully before moving towards the front door.

Alicent isn’t sure what she expects on the other side. But when she opens the door, a chill freezes her to the bone, her stomach drops and suddenly the sunshine seems to have vanished.

Otto Hightower stands in front of her.

“Alicent.”

His eyes are cold as always. Calculating. Incapable of an ounce of warmth and affection for his own child.

She’d always felt so lost about it. Always questioning what she’d done wrong to be so undeserving of his love. Always wondering what step would please him the most so she wouldn’t get yelled at or sent to her room without dinner. Always consistently failing because she would never be what and who he wanted her to be.

It’d been so slow. The process of untangling herself from his webs. Ever since college, she’d gained distance, physical at least. But Rhaenyra had always been a soft spot, Otto able to see it clearly without Alicent ever saying a word about her love for her. The way her affections weren’t that of best friends but of something else. And when he had caught them kissing, in their teens, he’d said she needed to be cured.

His inability to remove Rhaenyra from her life was her saving grace. Otto needed Rhaenyra’s father, weaving into his company for power and money and keeping their daughters close proved an advantage.

It never stopped him from abusing his daughter, spewing insults and locking her in her room.

What Otto had failed to see was that Viserys wasn’t like him, could never be like him. Rhaenyra had been out to her father for years and he’d seen what Alicent meant to her and he’d started to see who Otto was truly. And when Rhaenyra came clean about the abuse thrown on Alicent after she’d made her promise not to tell, Viserys couldn’t stand it. And he’d threatened Otto. Threatened to cut him out of his company. To expose him to the public. And he’d listened.

Alicent went off to college. And only occasionally saw her father, outside of holidays. The Targaryens had become her family then. But then things started to shift completely with her and Rhaenyra and everything was difficult and painful, she wasn’t out, always trying to fit herself into what she wasn’t.

And she’d tried again with her father. And he’d manipulated her and she went back to that cycle.

Only for Rhaenyra to pull her out again.

This time for good.

Two months later, she’d found out about the baby.

And now. After Alicent had completely shut him out of her life, here he is. When he’d found out about the baby, Rhaenyra beside her, he’d almost hurt her physically, the rage in his eyes, the hatred. Called her a whore, a deviant, the worst mistake of his life.

“I’ve come here-“

“Leave.” She says firmly. “I don’t know how you got this address, but I want you to get out of here before I call the police.”

“There’s no need, daughter.” He raises his voice, commanding as always. “I’ve come with a deal. I have found someone in the same predicament as yours.”

“I don’t want to hear this. Get out.” She can feel her heart quicken, anger pulsing through her veins.

“We could pretend the child is his. His father is powerful. He could provide you-“

“Get away from me. Or I’m calling the police.” She’s certain she’s yelling but she’s rapidly losing control. She reverts back to the panic she used to feel at the sight of his father.

She hears footsteps behind her and as her father explains, keeps explaining, doesn’t understand how fucking insane he sounds, as if she were his property, his pawn and not a human being. He keeps talking and she’s certain Rhaenyra will come out swinging and her father does not comprehend her wrath towards him. Alicent is tired and done. Rhaenyra is out for blood.

There’s a hand on her waist, the comfort she brings is instantaneous. Her safe haven.

“I suggest you take your leave, Otto.” Rhaenyra tells him in the kind of calm voice she’s mastered. Diplomatic yet ruthless, no space for an argument to be made.

“I’m here to speak to my daughter, not you, deviant.”

Rhaenyra doesn’t skip a beat. “Yes and she’s made her desires very clear. Get out of our property at once, Otto. Don’t make me repeat myself.”

“Just because you’ve managed to swindle my daughter into your lifestyle, it does not mean she knows what she needs in her life.”

“You shut your mouth.” She doesn’t know what comes over her, but Alicent crosses the distance towards her father and promptly pushes him. He’s surprised at the turn of events. Alicent had never had an outburst. “After all that you’ve done, what do you expect? You made me miserable. Rhaenyra saved my life. You’re a sad and pathetic man. And I hope to the fucking god you pray to that you die alone and empty. I hope you rot in hell, father.”

Otto grabs hold of her arm, forcibly, pulling her to him. “You will not speak to me that-“

She’d meant that Rhaenyra would come out swinging figuratively, but in a second, her father is holding onto his cheek, in shock and Rhaenyra is beside her.

“Don’t embarrass yourself any further, Otto. Leave now and don’t even think of coming here again.” Rhaenyra snaps. His driver is helping him to the car, as he orders him around.

Once their home is safe, Otto driving away, Rhaenyra holds her, pressing kisses to her shoulder before caressing her cheek.

“I’m so proud of you.” She murmurs. “You are more of a dragon than you know.”

“You just punched my father.” Alicent breathes out.

“I’m sorry.” She winces.

Alicent laughs softly. “It brought me a great deal of satisfaction to see him like that.”

A bubbly laugh escapes Rhaenyra’s lips. “It was quite funny to see him so appalled, huh?” Then she sobers, laughter dying out, turning into a smile. There’s a moment of suspension, a moment it all slows. Rhaenyra holds her gaze. “I will always stand by you, Ali.” She tells her in a shape of a promise and a certain breathlessness comes over her.

“I’ve never been more certain of that, my love.” Alicent places a short kiss to her lips. “You make me the happiest woman in the world. And I’m lucky to have you. We both are.”

•

“Mama?”

Alicent looks up from her book to see Aemond by the edge of the couch.

“Hi, darling.” She murmurs, removing her glasses.

“Can we talk?” He sounds a little nervous and she nods her head, patting the space beside her on the couch, smiling. Aemond moves towards her, sitting down.

Alicent lets him take his time, as he gathers his thoughts. And he turns to her, grabbing her hand.

“I’m sorry.” He starts. She lets the words sound across the small space between them. “I was rude yesterday. .” He frowns and Alicent can see the effort in his words, how it pains him. “I just…feel all these things. And I miss how things were.” He’s fighting back tears. “And sometimes I’m angry and I just…I don’t know.” He shrugs. “I’m sorry.”

Alicent caresses his cheek. “I know this has been hard on you, Aemond. And I forgive you. It’s okay. Everything is okay.” She smiles softly. “Can we make a deal?” He nods. “When you feel overwhelmed and angry, promise me you’ll talk to me about it? Sometimes, speaking it aloud helps us understand, yeah?”

“I promise.” He offers a small smile. “Cuddle?” He asks sheepishly.

She laughs softly. “Always, sweet boy.” Aemond falls into her, immediately and wraps him up in her arms. She presses a kiss to her child’s head. “I will always stand by you, Aemond. Always.” They stay there for a while before Aemond gathers the courage to tell her something more.

“Mama, I want you to be happy.” Aemond tells her.

Her stomach drops at how earnest he sounds, how easy it is to understand how much he sees and understands from one simple statement. The urge to refute it is sudden and quick. She wants to say that she is happy. It wouldn’t be completely false. She is happy, the kids make her happy, she has everything she needs. But Aemond knows what he’s seen. He’s always been more perceptive than she’s liked.

“I think you’re sad, most of the time. And I know you miss mum.”

“Aemond…”

“I was angry at mum. For making you sad. But she’s just as sad as you. And I hate it.” He tells her in quick succession.

She closes her eyes, sighing.

A beat passes.

She doesn’t know what to tell him.

The impossibility of every opposing feeling inside her.

“Do you think we could have dinner together more often? Like last night?” He asks tentatively, after her silence.

She can handle that, she thinks, for them.

“We can do that, darling.”

•

The party is in full swing when Joffrey, seemingly emitting a noise that no man has ever known or heard, charges towards her at full speed.

“Queen Alicent!” He picks her up, spinning her around as she laughs. “I’ve missed you.”

“You saw me last week, you imbecile.” She calls out with fondness, as he sets her on her feet grinning.

“Can’t have missed you then?” He tells her.

“Happy birthday, Joff.” She smiles, placing a kiss to his cheek. “Ageing gracefully, love.”

He gasps. “Ali, I haven’t aged a day and you know it.” She laughs loudly at his mock scandalised face before Laenor joins them, hugging Alicent.

“Hey, Ali.” He grins.

“To the party! Come on!” Joffrey pulls her along and Laenor rolls his eyes, laughing.

It’s only an hour into the party that she sees Rhaenyra arrive.

The bass drums in her chest. The feeling of being in a room dancing, a drink in her hand so foreign these days. It’d been so long since she’d done this. With all their friends in one room, laughing and sharing stories. A rarity but such a blissful time.

She’s a bit buzzed by the time she sees her.

The thoughts barge in without permission.

Rhaenyra looks beautiful.

Her hair is shorter than in their youth. She’d had that haircut for five years, she thinks. More practical than her long hair but she liked it.

There’s a quality Rhaenyra has always held, a regal essence to her when she walks into a room. Alicent has always been left a little breathless by her. In every room.

In their bed, in the mornings.

Messy.

Put together.

Dressed up.

Dressed down.

Their wedding day.

Every fight.

Every loss.

Always taken by her. Adoration for her.

Tonight isn’t different. The buzz allows her to stare for longer. As Rhaenyra makes her way towards Joffrey, beside her, greeting people on the way.

“Be less obvious.” Laenor murmurs in her ear, in jest and she snaps out of her stupor, slapping his shoulder before continuing her conversation with Laena who eyes her knowingly.

Her body is still attuned to be ex wife. Feeling her linger around their friends, talking loudly, laughing with abandon before she gets to Laena and to her. Her heart is beating in her ears, it’s a full body reaction to her presence.

Since their conversation, half started, they hadn’t had the change nor the time for each other. Their communication sticking to the topic of their children.

Alicent skin still burns from Rhaenyra’s lips on her forehead, from her goodbye.

Still breathless.

“Cousins.” Rhaenyra greets first, hugging them both before eyeing Alicent. “Hey, Ali.” She can see how she stops herself from touching her. Her eyes travel down to her body and she isn’t subtle about her thoughts.

If it was before, she’d whisper.

God, Ali, you’re killing me.

Bathroom. 5 minutes.

Her eyes linger on her chest, down to her legs and Alicent can’t help but down the drink in her hand. She sees Rhaenyra watch the liquid travel down her throat, with each gulp. She’s craved the darkness in her eyes. And something about the air tonight feels dangerous.

Anticipation.

The wordless kind.

A drink after another, they dance with their friends and around each other. Rhaenyra’s eyes rarely leave her figure. Her eyes dance down her body, linger on her lips. She feels sweaty and and hot and drunk and not just on alcohol. Because Rhaenyra knows her every tell. And she knows Rhaenyra’s.

She knows that when Rhaenyra steps outside, it’s because she can’t stand another minute of not having her. That she’ll try to catch her breath. That she’ll try to regain some level of conscious effort to erase the thoughts that have been in her mind all night.

Alicent thinks, on some level, is why she follows her out of the club.

The electricity.

Her very own black hole.

She watches for a moment before getting closer.

The cigarette on her lips. The smoke she puffs out in practices fashion. Her fingers holding the cigarette. Rhaenyra closes eyes, head against the wall.

“I thought you quit smoking.” She announces her arrival, closer now. A ringing in her ears from the loudness of the music. The cold welcome to her cheeks.

Rhaenyra doesn’t startle. She was expecting her.

“I did.” She says. “Then it helped to smoke again.” She raises the cigarette to her lips.

She’s drunk. And she’s caught in her again. Her hand reaches for the cigarette from Rhaenyra’s lips, fingers grazing her skin before she takes a drag herself.

The world resumes in a slower motion. Her every move scrutinised by Rhaenyra. Desire pooling inside her. Eyes that have seen everything of her. And still want. Still remain hungry.

“Alicent…” There’s a warning in her voice.

She ignores it promptly. Cigarette thrown aside. And fully crashes into Rhaenyra, pushing her against the wall, lips hungrily ravishing each other.

It is to breathe again. And to be submerged all at once.

She feels everything at once.

And that desire. That ache. Building up. Blinding.

“Ali, Ali, Ali.” Rhaenyra pulls away. “Fuck. I can’t.”

“Please.”

The word escapes her before she can think and it changes everything. Rhaenyra is on her again. Hands pulling her closer.

When she pulls away again, Alicent knows.

“Bathroom? Five minutes?”

Chapter Text

There’s a red hue in the flashes from the night before. As she wakes slowly, her body sore, her head drums painfully and she’s assaulted by the memories of them. In that bathroom, still the same as when they were younger, but their bodies older, wounded by each other, their hearts a little broken. 

Alicent knows it had never been like this, before. The roughness of it, clawing at each other for some semblance of comfort but finding only the desperation, the absence of each other, fitting into empty spaces they used to fill completely. 

Nothing about it had been unsteady, except for the feeling. Rhaenyra’s hands knew her. Her lips, her tongue, her thighs, her neck, she knew her entirely. Her hands were sure, but hungry. It had felt so freeing yet damning. Those moments of ecstasy, the alcohol leaving them hazy, intoxicated. Rhaenyra had learnt studiously exactly what drove Alicent mad, exactly how to tip her over the edge. And she knew just the same. 

She could only play out in her mind the night before. 

The way Rhaenyra had held her close as they walked through the club. There was an intensity in her eyes that Alicent had never quite seen. 

Alicent had gone into the bathroom and waited. 

Five minutes, as promised. 

Then she came in, perfect and breathtaking and Alicent thought she had gone back in time to their beginning. Blinded by lust and love and unfamiliarity, a whole new territory they were daring to cross. Rhaenyra careful, taking purposeful steps, but unmistakably driven by the desire, the word ‘please’ still echoing between them. 

Then she had laughed. 

“Seven hells, Ali, you say one word and I bend the knee.”  

There’s something distasteful about the words. But Alicent doesn’t tell her that it isn’t true. That she’d begged for a whole year and Rhaenyra hadn’t listened. Instead, she crosses the remaining distance and pushes Rhaenyra against the wall, kissing her with hunger.  

Her lips linger on Rhaenyra’s neck, in the spot Alicent knows well as her fingers move to unbutton her shirt. The moan that escapes her mouth sends shivers down her spine, something like coming up for air in that sound, electricity through her.

  Desire pulsing between them like fire.  

“Fuck.”  

There’s something that makes her feel powerful about having Rhaenyra in the palm of her hand after so long.  

On the bathroom counter, legs spread out, Alicent between them, mouth on her. And Rhaenyra chases her high with no qualms but Alicent doesn’t let her, slows down, lets her get desperate when she’s so close.  

Then she murmurs.  

“Let go.”  

Rhaenyra whispers praises in her ear when she comes up to face her. And Alicent has always been weak in the face of those words.  

There had been no clarity after she came on Rhaenyra’s fingers in that bathroom. They didn’t feel satiated. The hunger remained, it became more potent. The night should never have ended. Or it should’ve never started. 

Now that she’s awake, alone in an unfamiliar bed, senses filled with Rhaenyra’s familiar smell, she knows she’s fucked up. 

The panic that forms in her chest bubbles up when she turns to face Rhaenyra, sleeping peacefully beside her, a hand resting on Alicent as always. 

Alicent desperately wants to pretend this is the past. But the window isn’t in the right place and the walls are bare around her. Nothing about the room feels like home except for the person sleeping beside her. And even Rhaenyra feels distant despite being the closest to her she’s been in years. 

She could run. It would be as if it never happened. She could refuse to ever speak of it. Rhaenyra sleeps like the dead, she could escape the conversation and then avoid it as best she could- 

“You’re awake.” 

She’s startled by the soft smile on Rhaenyra’s lips. There is no panic in her eyes when she opens them. But it doesn’t matter. She doesn’t know yet that this isn’t 

It only takes one look at Alicent for her to know.  The tears in Alicent’s eyes say it all. It makes everything worse. 

“Nyra.” Her voice is strained. “I don’t know what I was thinking.” 

Rhaenyra sighs. “Right.” She whispers. 

“This shouldn’t have happened.” 

“Ok.” Then Rhaenyra throws the covers off her body, gets off the bed. 

“It was a mistake. I was drunk and sad and I don’t think-“ 

“You don’t have to explain.” Rhaenyra throws on a shirt and pijama pants. 

“It was a stupid thing. And I think we know that.” 

She doesn’t know why Rhaenyra’s coldness, anger, frustration, she can’t tell, is bothering her so much. She can’t understand why her immediate response is this. 

Alicent walks after her, as she gets out of the bedroom to the kitchen. “Can we please be adults and talk about this?” 

“I don’t…” Rhaenyra shakes her head and her movements, as she starts making coffee, are so tense, so harsh, Alicent’s heart starts beating faster than before. 

“It was a mistake. We were both drunk. We’re divorced for heaven’s sake, we can’t be doing this. We are not teenagers. And we can’t-“ 

“Please stop talking.” 

“Rhaenyra. This is-“ 

“Please.” 

She doesn’t listen. “I think we can acknowledge that we’re still attracted to each other and there are complicated feelings but we can’t-“

“You asked.” Rhaenyra snaps. 

“What?” 

“You asked. I said yes. But you asked.” 

“Rhaenyra, it was a lapse of judgement and it won’t happen-“ 

“Alicent.” 

“You could’ve just refused.” 

She looks flabbergasted at the suggestion. “What part of me do you not understand?” 

“You could’ve ignored my request. You could’ve said no. And we wouldn’t be here.” She’s surely not making any sense even to herself but it doesn’t stop her words from pouring out of her without a thought. She wants anything but the truth. That she wants what they had back so badly, knowing it will never be completely the same that she’s willing risk being shattered again. 

“If you don’t stop talking, I’m going to have a mental breakdown, Alicent.” It sobers her how true Rhaenyra’s words actually sound. “I get it, it’s fine. You don’t love me anymore. I think I get the message now.” She looks so vulnerable, so sure and for the first time since they woke, Alicent can’t speak. 

A moment passes. The silence rests heavy on them both. 

“You can’t do this to me, do you understand?” Rhaenyra’s voice is so shaky, it sends pain straight to her chest. “I can’t say no to you. I’ve never known how.” 

But the memories return in a flash. How alone she’d felt, how abandoned she’d felt and how she begged then. She begged for comfort and for time and for love and for all of her and Rhaenyra hadn’t listened. Not to a single word. Rhaenyra might’ve slept beside her in their bed but she’d been nowhere near. 

“Could’ve fooled me.” She accuses, quietly, a whisper in a war zone. 

It could’ve been bait. The conversation that had loomed over them for weeks loomed larger now, hanging over them, waiting to drop. The ball had been in Alicent’s court before. Her move. The conversation her decision to be made. But something’s shifted now, Alicent can tell. She’s passed the turn in this game they’ve been playing. 

And her Rhaenyra feels cold. Different than that whole year, not lost like she’d seen her then but so cold. It’s Rhaenyra. Mind clear, but defeated. And there’s this aura of sadness that Alicent is now aware of, something she’d refused to see, in her own grief. 

“I can call you an Uber.” She says. 

I don’t want to look at you anymore, Alicent translates in her mind. 

“No. I…I’ll just go get dressed and go.” 

Rhaenyra nods, turns away to continue making her coffee. And Alicent feels entirely unwelcome. She goes back to the unfamiliar bedroom and gets dressed, feeling something like shame as she crosses the hall again. Rhaenyra is by the kitchen counter, mug in her hand. The stupid mug Aegon had made in kindergarten for them, one each, matching. It shouldn’t hurt this much. 

There’s an excruciating four minutes of waiting for her Uber in Rhaenyra’s living room. Before this morning, she thinks Rhaenyra would’ve talked nonstop but she doesn’t now. Now she stands in silence as Alicent leans on the couch, checking her phone every minute.  

She clears her throat. “Uber’s here.” She murmurs in the silence. 

“I’ll meet you and the kids at Helaena’s school for the recital on Friday. And then I can just take them, no need for you to drop them off afterwards.”

“I mean, if you’re taking the sports car, I can-“

“I’m not.” Rhaenyra responds curtly. “I have the other car back.” 

“Right. That’s…fine, then.” She nods. “I’ll see you then.” 

Rhaenyra nods her head. 

Alicent leaves. 

Friday arrives with little fanfare. But Helaena has been talking about the recital for weeks, practicing with vigor hours a day to be perfect. Their daughter is talented, this she knows for certain. When they’d signed up for ballet, at her insistence, she’d fallen for it immediately and the teacher was quite impressed by how naturally she progressed. Alicent doesn’t think this is a phase or a hobby, it might just be the real deal for her. She’s passionate, even at only eight years old. 

And Alicent knows that there is another reason for her nervousness and commitment this recital and that is Rhaenyra’s presence. Ever since those missed recitals, she hasn’t missed a single one, but it isn’t lost on Alicent how Helaena craves Rhaenyra’s praise. And her former wife will give it without a second thought, to her little princess, but that year, she’d been absent from so many things. Robotically moving through life and the kids noticed. 

She’s sitting in the audience, with Rhaenyra in the reserved seat farthest away from her, she’d chosen it deliberately, with Aemond and Luke between them. 

She sneaks glances at her but Rhaenyra is fully absorbed by the performance, eyes fixed on Helaena, with a proud smile on her face. Alicent thinks of the moment their girl had been born, the way she burst into the world and then was the calmest baby Alicent had ever seen. Their princess. And Rhaenyra had been so enamoured, always speaking to her in the softest voice, the same proud smile she has on now always on full display even through sleepless nights. 

There are no teasing remarks to Alicent, no smirk, what she’d grown accustomed since the divorce. Rhaenyra trying to make amends, Alicent refusing to engage, only snapping back, annoyed. Now, once the performance is done and they’re waiting for their girl, Rhaenyra only speaks to the kids. She keeps an animated conversation with Luke and Aemond about something their grandfather had been up to. 

And then Helaena comes running towards them, barrelling towards Alicent, throwing her arms around her waist. It’s supposed to be a joyous moment, but her daughter is crying. 

“Hel, hey, darling, what’s wrong?” Alicent kneels down, hand brushing her sweet girl’s hair out of her face.

“I messed up.” She sobs. “I missed a step. I was horrible, mama. It was so bad.” 

Alicent’s eyes cross Rhaenyra’s and her heart aches so very badly. 

“Darling, you were so good! No one noticed, Hel, I promise you.”

“We didn’t even notice till you said it just now, Hel.” Aemond places a hand on her shoulder, his protectiveness over her always present especially now. “Hel.” He murmurs standing closer and she looks up at him, unsure, still crying and then her eyes land on Rhaenyra. 

“I didn’t want to disappoint you and I did.” She cries to her. 

It takes half a second for Rhaenyra to snap out of her silence and she crouches in front of her. “Helaena, sweet girl, you did so well today. And they’re right, ok? Even if you made a mistake, no one noticed.” She smiles softly. “And you know what, my girl? Even if they noticed, it’s ok to make mistakes. You don’t have to perfect all the time.” She caresses her cheek. “You can fail, Hel. It won’t matter to me, do you understand? I will love you either way.”

“But…” Their daughter tries to control her breathing, sniffling. “If I make a mistake, you won’t stop coming to see me?” 

If there was a way to hear a heart break, Alicent is fairly certain she could hear Rhaenyra’s. The pain sits on her like the heaviest of weights and she can see it so clearly in front of. The tears that gather in her eyes she holds them back and takes Helaena’s face in her hands with a shaky breath. 

It’s such a delicate moment in a crowded room, with Luke beside Rhaenyra, Aemond with a hand on Alicent’s shoulder with her still kneeling and Helaena in the middle. 

“Hel, I’m so sorry, my love. Mum is so sorry for not coming then. But I promise you, I will always show up, ok? I won’t miss it again. Not for anything in this world? Do you understand? Hel?” 

It takes a beat but Helaena nods her head, wiping her tears away before hiding her face in her neck, Rhaenyra wrapping her up in her arms and kissing her head. 

“Can we go get pizza? All of us?” Aemond asks, with a hopeful gleam in his eyes. “It’s Hel’s favorite food.” He shrugs with a small smirk on his face. Alicent narrows her eyes at him, standing up. 

“I see you, Aemond. Don’t try to take advantage-“ She starts but Helaena peeks out, with a soft smile. 

“I want pizza.” She says. 

“Oh you do, do you?” Rhaenyra laughs softly. 

“All of us?” Aemond asks. 

Rhaenyra frowns. “Maybe not tonight.” 

“Oh come on, just like before.” Aemond argues and she shakes her head. And Alicent can’t help but think that this is on her, that before their night together Rhaenyra would’ve said yes in a heartbeat. There’s a bitter taste in her mouth, guilt. 

“Please, mum.” Helaena asks. 

Their children are impossibly convincing when they want to be. 

For the whole dinner, Aemond praises Helaena knowingly, making sure she understands that she was great and any mistake she made wasn’t anything to be concerned about. Alicent’s always loved that about their relationship, they always have each other’s backs and Aemond has been protective of his little sister since the moment he learned she’d be joining them. And Helaena is instantly feeling better with all of them to reassure her, keeping close to Rhaenyra. 

This was their favorite pizza place since they were teenagers. She remembers them in this very booth, sitting by each other, unnecessarily close, always close. Laughing together, crying together. A part of Alicent hates that they had made this their family spot. That their booth became their family’s booth when it was just theirs. She wishes she could avoid this place altogether. But the kids love it. Everything about it. 

She had managed to avoid it for a while. But the kids had missed it, insisted for birthdays to be spent here, just for the five of them and then the party could happen elsewhere. 

“Targaryens!” Mr. Beesbury calls out, the warmest smile on his face as he comes up to them. 

“Hi, Mr. Bee!” The kids say in unison and both Alicent and Rhaenyra can’t help but laugh. 

“It’s been a while since I’ve seen you all together.” There’s a glint of something like hopefulness in his eyes but he doesn’t push on it. “Dinner is on me, alright? You are not paying a cent on my watch.” 

“We couldn’t possibly do that-“ Rhaenyra starts but Mr. Beesbury waves her off. 

“After what you did for us, child, we will never be able to repay you.” Mr. Beesbury’s hand rests on Rhaenyra’s shoulder and she seem sheepish.

Alicent furrows her brows, looking between the two of them, wondering what exactly Rhaenyra had done. She has an inkling of what it might be about but Rhaenyra doesn’t meet her eyes. 

“It’s good to see you both here. In this very booth. Together.” Mr. Bee smiles at Alicent and she can’t help the blush that rushes to her cheeks. “Is this-“ 

“No, Mr. Bee.” Rhaenyra shuts it down immediately but Mr. Bee shrugs, laughing softly. 

“Ali, dear, I’ve missed you.” He nudges her and she huffs out a small laugh. 

“It’s good to be here.” Alicent smiles. 

“Well, I’m gonna go back to the kitchen now, the wife will be ready to yell just about now.” He tells them with a grin. “But that’s love, isn’t it? Yell all you want, but 40 years of marriage tells you something may have worked out.” He winks and walks away without another word. 

Alicent watches Rhaenyra’s face and decides to ask her what she wants to know. “What was that about?” She asks. 

“What?” Alicent gives her a look, she sighs. “Fine. I…helped them through some…financial troubles.” 

“What troubles?” 

“The landlord wanted to kick them out, was going to sell the whole building to build some upscale bullshit hotel, unless they paid a huge sum of money. A ridiculous amount. He wanted them out.” She shrugs. 

“Oh?” Alicent mumbles. “So you gave them the ridiculous amount of money?” 

Rhaenyra clears her throat, doesn’t look her in the eye when she answers. 

“I bought the building.” 

That must’ve cost her way too much money, money she had but not exactly the wisest investment, to buy a building just for the sake of one little family owned restaurant. 

“Rhaenyra, that’s…” 

She shrugs again. “It was a bit of a no brainer. I think you can understand why.” 

Alicent doesn’t really respond to the statement. 

Our spot. Our booth. Our memories.  

The kids ask that Alicent puts them to be bed with Rhaenyra and they can’t quite deny them that request, especially when it’s their little princess begging for it. After the night they’d had, the emotional heaviness of the evening, they give in easily. Alicent following Rhaenyra’s car, to the place she’d left just a few nights ago. 

They sit on each side of Helaena’s bed, saying their good nights, tucking her in. She’s sleepy when she says her next heartbreaking words, hand clutching Alicent, eyes almost closed. 

“I wish it were always like this.” She mumbles. 

Rhaenyra sighs softly. “Sweet dreams, Hel. I love you.” She places a kiss to her forehead. 

“Night, my love.” Alicent smiles softly. 

“Night night.” 

They leave the room, go into the living room. And Alicent thinks perhaps her body is acting on something she can’t describe. It’s not desire in the same way it’d been the other night. It’s not about sex, not about hunger. 

The night had given her a desire for closeness to Rhaenyra. She craved just that, she craved the moments of safety, of comfort, of warmth between them. And being in the place where they’d shared so many memories together had maybe mellowed Alicent out. And maybe she just needed that something without the weight of everything else, without the anger and the bitterness. 

So Alicent reaches for Rhaenyra’s hand and kisses her again. 

“No.” Rhaenyra pulls away, holds her hands, if only to look at Alicent. “Stop.” 

“You were wrong.” Alicent says and she furrows her brows, touch softening. “When you said I didn’t love you anymore.” 

She scoffs. “You don’t have to feel bad about it, Alicent. You don’t have to lie.” 

“I don’t think I’ve ever known what it’s like to not love you, Rhaenyra. And believe me, I’ve tried.” She breathes out. “I want you to know that.” She pauses, hand on Rhaenyra’s cheek, gentle, unlike that night. “I panicked. Because we shouldn’t have had sex. Because I feel too much and I never know what to do with it because I haven’t forgiven you.” 

She stares at her, searching for answers, for something more but Alicent is telling the truth about all of it. But she doesn’t quite know what to say, doesn’t trust herself. 

“I’m greedy when it comes to you.” Alicent confesses. “And I’d been doing so good at staying away from you. But I’ve relapsed, Nyra. That’s the problem. I’ve had you again and now it’s all I can think about.” 

“What do you want me to say, Alicent? For the life of me, I don’t understand.” She says frustratingly, hands now on her hips and face falling into her shoulder. She takes a deep breath in her arms. 

“I don’t know.” Alicent whispers. “Right now though? I really want to kiss you.” Her hand reaches to scratch Rhaenyra’s head like she’d always done. There’s so much of this embrace that feels like being home again and Alicent thinks the feelings are too large. 

Rhaenyra lifts her head up. “Ok.” 

“What?” 

“Kiss me.” 

“Kiss me.”  

“What?”  

Alicent groans. “I’m asking you to kiss me, you imbecile.”  

“Ali, five minutes ago, you weren’t even speaking to me. I don’t understand you.” Rhaenyra huffs out. The locker room is empty and Alicent had pulled her in and locked the door and if anyone finds them they’re in serious trouble. Usually, Rhaenyra is fine with trouble but Alicent’s father, the very object of the reason Alicent is angry with her, wouldn’t find it amusing.  

“I want you to kiss me, Nyra. That’s all. Because I want you to. And I want to get what I want even if I’m angry at you.”  

“You’re impossible.”  

“I’m tired of not having the things I want. Because of-“

“Right.”  

“And you look really pretty today, ok? You know I like the leather jacket and it’s fucked up to that you would wear that today of all days. And also, did you do something to your hair-“

Rhaenyra crashes her lips to hers and Alicent gasps with surprise before melting into her. The kiss is slow and deliberate and she knows how to kiss her. Gods, if Alicent could have this for the rest of her life, it’s all she’d ever need. Fuck everything else. This right here is everything. Her sixteen years of life can lead up to nothing, she could end up in a ditch somewhere but Rhaenyra, her Rhaenyra, that’s the purest thing she could ever want and she’s had her and she has her. Even if it’s a secret. Even if Rhaenyra hates that. Even if her father beat the living shit out of her. She could die happy, if she were kissing Rhaenyra. She could die this very second.  

“I really hate being angry with you.” Alicent huffs out.

“Do you?”  

“Yes. You want to know why? Because whenever I’m angry at you, the only person I want to comfort me is you. It’s an impossible dilemma.”  

“Then stop being angry.”  

Alicent sighs.  

“It’s not that simple.”  

Rhaenyra shakes her head with a laugh. “Then kiss me again. Maybe you’ll forget about why you’re angry.”  

“Seven hells, Ali.” Rhaenyra breathes out, forehead against hers. They stay like that for a few seconds, eyes closed. “You should go home. The kids-“ 

“You’re right.” She nods, breathing raggedly, hands still on Rhaenyra’s face. “You’re right.” She repeats. There’s a pause, somewhat unwilling to let go of them as they stay in their embrace. “I’m angry, most of the time.” She says. 

“Right.” She sighs. 

“But I love you. And I wish everything was different. And I wish I could forgive you.” 

“Then forgive me.” Rhaenyra murmurs, something desperate in her voice. 

She pulls back, hand brushing hair out of Rhaenyra’s face. 

“It’s not that simple.” 

A moment passes, Rhaenyra smiles sadly at her. 

“Kiss me again then?” 

Chapter Text

Can I pick you up from work?

The text came through about half an hour before she was supposed to get off work. She’d been busy and stressed, a hundred meetings in just one day with people she didn’t want to meet. The insufferable kind. A pretty  awful day, in retrospect. They’d run into a few troubles with an important deal, then her father decided to call her to talk about her mother and she was decidedly ready to go to the apartment and sit doing nothing. 

And then the text came through. 

Alicent Hightower will be the death of her, with certainty. This, she has always been sure about. And having her like this again, it is entirely addicting, intoxicating. Being without her had truly been agony and even if having her like this isn’t enough, she will take what she can get. She thinks there will always be a part of her begging for forgiveness. And until Alicent can grant it, she will take her lead. 

She will lie in the backseat of the car, hands gripping the leathered seats with Alicent’s head between her thighs. 

She will let Alicent devour her and drive her to insanity, in every right way if she so needs it.

When Alicent takes control like this, Rhaenyra might just spontaneously combust. There’s something so alluring to her, when she gets what she wants, when she seizes it with no qualms about consequences. It’s enticing, it’s everything she could ever want. That night at the club, Alicent had made the decision to take what she wanted and she had given it to her, freely, no second thoughts.

And there had been a moment that Rhaenyra had thought it’d be like before. That Alicent taking that step meant that she wanted her back. 

Then the morning came. One look into her eyes. 

It hadn’t been a reunion. And perhaps she had no right to be angry but Alicent always pulled at strings no else ever pulled. Always her, no matter what. 

It’s difficult to reconcile her love for her former wife and how far off the deep end she’d allowed herself to fall that year she lost her. So blinded. Taking her for granted. 

And now, her dear Alicent is taking what she wants again. 

Rhaenyra will never say no to her. 

Not again. Not ever. She’ll repent for the rest of her days. 

She’s missed her tongue, the sweetness of her lips against her own and this, right here, her warm wet mouth, tongue lapping, teasing her clit, fingers inching closer to her entrance and Alicent looking up at her with a look she knows well. 

Power. 

Rhaenyra writhing under her touch, her mouth. It’s always been her favorite kind of Alicent. It reminds her of a younger version, riddle with fear but finally taking control over her own life, her desires, her wishes. 

The first time it happened during sex, Rhaenyra hadn’t known she could desire her lover so much. She thought she loved control until she was under Alicent, losing every bit of it. Letting her take what she needed. 

It’s the same now. But it’s heightened by the knowledge that Alicent could simply stop it. Put an end to it. And she’d say nothing. Not after all she’d put them through. She’d go back to what they were doing, respecting boundaries Alicent set. 

Alicent is every bit as diligent as she was when she was a girl and they were discovering what to do with their fingers and their mouths on each other. She’s persistent in keeping time with what makes Rhaenyra burn. Her moans are loud, unbridled as Alicent licks and sucks, a master of her craft and she’s at her mercy, body and soul. 

She feels her body tense, clenching onto the feeling, back arching as Alicent remains relentless, gripping her hips as Rhaenyra’s hands fly to her hair. 

“Ali.” She moans loudly. 

And then it’s pure bliss. 

Pure release. Toe curling. 

An electrical current finally reaching its peak of energy. 

Her lover lowers her back onto planet earth, gentle. 

Then she’s is looking up at her, cheeks flushed, lips pumped, a dazed expression on her face. 

“You’re beautiful.” She says, the words escaping so unthinkingly it leaves Rhaenyra flustered, cheeks becoming even more red. 

It’s embarrassing, really, that after having Alicent eating her out, she’s out here blushing at a compliment. And it doesn’t help that the object of her affection is smirking. And it’s this kind of smug Alicent that Rhaenyra loves, adores even if it leaves her a blushing mess. 

“You’re blushing.” Alicent teases, climbing up her body, even if the logistics in the SUV are a nightmare. “That’s a nice role reversal.” She says, with a kiss. And then she starts picking up her clothes once Rhaenyra sits up. 

 “I have to go get the kids. Get dressed.” She pecks her lips.

“In this car?” Rhaenyra questions, raising her eyebrows. 

“I’ll clean up before I go. The perks of parking the car in your own garage.” 

“Way better than our teenage selves, right?” 

“We are not doing this in a car next time. I don’t know what I was thinking.” She tells her. “I am too old for the logistics of all this.” 

“You managed pretty well, I’d say.” Rhaenyra tells her. Then freezes. “Next time?” 

Alicent’s gaze is charged with something Rhaenyra can’t quite recognize. “I’m taking what I want, for once.” 

Then she shall have it.

Alicent picks Rhaenyra up often. Rhaenyra picks Alicent up often. It borderlines on teenage eagerness and she can’t help but feel that there’s something fun about the situations they’ve found themselves in. The sneaking around part is somewhat alluring but really, truly, to Rhaenyra, Alicent is everything. 

There’s a renewed strength to her. And she’s lighter than Rhaenyra’s seen her in a long time. It’s genuinely fun without the heaviness overpowering. 

But she feels it, so deeply. 

The need for more yet the knowledge that she’ll have to take what she can get. 

Because there’s something in the way Alicent acts that lets her know she’s protecting herself, that there is a part of her that is hellbent on protecting herself, shielding the need Rhaenyra knows she can’t fight and the feelings she burns through. Sticking to what now feels safe. This…arrangement. 

To have each other without the heaviness of the baggage. 

And it’s good. Rhaenyra thinks it’s good. All of it. 

The secrecy. The risk. Something dirty about it.

Alicent is all over her with a hunger she’d never quite seen on her. 

Fucking her in Rhaenyra’s apartment. In their old home. In fancy hotel rooms. 

In her office. 

Bent over the desk with a strap-on. Pounding into her like it’s something of a dream. Like it’s more pleasurable to watch Rhaenyra lose control completely than anything else they’d done. 

Whispering into her ear. Telling her to come for her. How good she’s being. 

It seems that nothing is off limits. Everything is fair game. 

And it’s a fucking rollercoaster. 

Alicent taking control makes Rhaenyra all the more inclined to say yes to everything Alicent desires. 

And now, fucking in their old room, is proving to be overwhelming. 

Rhaenyra is on her peak, reaching orgasm with Alicent wearing her favorite strap, doing what she’s always done best on her, fingers reaching to stimulate, words encouraging her. And it’s entirely too much to have Alicent inside her, in their home, in the same bed they’d shared so many memories in, where they’d learnt and fought and loved and she’s here again, in this place. 

She’s orgasming when Alicent pulls out of her in a panic. 

“I forgot Aemond had a key. Fuck.” She breathes out, throwing her clothes on, while Rhaenyra is fully naked on her bed, looking about as awkward as she can without having really carried her climax to the end while Alicent is all panic. “You have to hide or climb out or fuck-“ 

“Mama” The voice travels from downstairs. 

“Nyra!” She whisper yells. “Clothes.” She throws the clothes on her, picking them up off the floor. 

“I thought you said they wouldn’t be here until eight.” Her brain suddenly snaps back into action and she starts getting dressed. 

“It is eight!” Alicent’s are flushed in that delightful way she loves. She looks so beautiful, hair disheveled, out of breath, in their room. It might be hers now, but it’s theirs. “Do I look suspicious?” 

“I don’t think that’s what I’d describe you as.” Rhaenyra laughs, tries to quiet the laughter down while Alicent glares at her. “You look like you came more than once today.” She smirks and Alicent throws Rhaenyra her shirt. 

“Be serious.” 

“Why is mum’s car here?” They hear. 

“Shit.” Alicent mutters. “Okay. Okay.” 

“Don’t panic. Let’s just tell them we needed to talk and that’s why I’m here, yeah? Simple enough.” Her hands grab onto her waist, smiling softly. “It’s gonna be fine, Ali.” 

“Right. Okay.” She breathes out. And then pauses for a second, looking Rhaenyra in the eyes. “Today was nice.” She tells her softly. 

Rhaenyra smiles. “It was.” She nods. 

“Let’s get out there.” 

When they do climb down the stairs to where the kids are, they find Laenor there with them. And it’s enough for him with one look to see what’s happening between them. He gets all smug and Rhaenyra swears she’s perfected the art of telling Laenor to fuck off with just one glance. 

“Mum!” Aemond grins, running up to her. 

“Hello, little love.” She chuckles. Helaena is holding onto Alicent. Luke is asleep in Laenor’s arms. Rhaenyra feels so complete with all of her loves in one room. 

“What are you doing here?” He questions, looking between them. 

Alicent takes the lead. “We just needed to talk, that’s all.” There’s something hopeful in the way Aemond looks at them, a desire for things to go back to how they were before and it breaks Rhaenyra more than she wants to admit.  “How were they?” 

Laenor grins. “Angels as always. Joff is harder to deal with.” He jokes and they laugh. “Did your conversation run smoothly?” He teases and Alicent gives him a warning glare. “Right. I’ll be off.” 

“Thank you for having them.” Alicent smiles as he comes up to her. 

“Anytime. You know that.” Then he looks at Rhaenyra. “You alright? You look a bit flushed.” He asks, with a smug grin on his face. The kids have run to the couch now and he’s taking full opportunity of that fact. Rhaenyra hits his arm. “This development does make me happy.” 

“Laenor…” Rhaenyra warns and takes Luke from him, the boy wakes adorably so. Looking up at his mother. 

“Mummy.” 

“Hi, sweet boy.” She presses a kiss hot his head. 

“Alright.” He chuckles quietly, before kissing her cheek. “Love you two.” He says, kissing Alicent’s cheek as well. “Little dragons.” He announces. “I must take my leave now.” He takes a playful bow, grinning. They all laugh at his antics. 

Alicent walks him to the door while Rhaenyra sits on the couch with the kids telling her all about their day with Laenor. Going to the zoo, having fun with their uncles. Luke is clingy, in her arms and Helaena leans against her as well, going into detail about every bug she saw. Aemond is already on the floor, looking at the TV, searching for something to watch. 

“Alright, I was thinking, if your mother wanted to stay, we could watch a movie together.” 

Her heart swells at the invitation. It’s the first time she’s ever extended it to her, the first time she’s offered to have her there without the kids asking for it first. 

So they sit on the couch, Luke and Helaena between them, Aemond at their feet. And it’s like coming home. She thinks she won’t remember much of the movie in the future, because she can’t help but stare at Alicent for the entirety of it. 

There’s a tenderness to the night opposed to what their afternoon had been like. As she rests her arm on the back of the couch, with the lives they’d created in between them, Alicent seeks out her hand, lacing their fingers.  Tentative, gentle, warm. She doesn’t look at her but Rhaenyra feels a little like she did in the beginning of them. When they were kids holding hands, hearts racing just for that moment of connection. 

That’s how they remain for the duration of the movie. Until Luke is fast asleep on Rhaenyra and Helaena is yawning adorably. 

“I’ve got him.” She murmurs to Alicent, rising to her feet, picking Luke up. There’s no question to the routine, it comes through naturally as if nothing had ever pulled them apart. 

“Mama?” Aemond perks up from his spot on the floor. “Can I stay with you both a while longer?” Alicent breathes out a soft sigh, then looks at Rhaenyra. “No school tomorrow.” He smiles, shrugging. 

“Nyra?” Alicent murmurs. Helaena has already run up to her room, claiming her newfound independence with 

“I can stay.” She smiles softly. 

Aemond’s need for the two of them in the same room has turned greater as of late. And it’s hard to deny him, with how difficult it’s been for all of them, Aemond has felt it more than any of the kids. It’s why he lashes out, why he grows angry at Rhaenyra and frustrated endlessly with Alicent.  

In the hallway, outside the kids’ rooms, Alicent kisses her again. It’s a short kiss, one Rhaenyra can’t decipher the meaning of, but it’s full of something deeper than what they’d been chasing after these past few weeks. 

“Ali-“ 

“Don’t.” She breathes out. “You’re about to say something serious and I don’t wanna do that.” 

She can feel the frustration growing inside her. For every moment of utter peace and exhilarating fun, there’s this part of Alicent she can’t access. The part where they talk and heal, the part that is missing for her life to whole. Any time, she tries to go further, reach deeper, she just shuts her down immediately. No room for argument, playing to the beat of what she wants to do. 

But it’s difficult. Everything about it is hard and painful. The scale is equal. The anguish and the happiness in the same place. One beating down the other at times, the opposite the next. 

“Let’s go be with our son.” Alicent murmurs and leaves her in the hall. It takes a beat for Rhaenyra to follow, the horrible feeling of having to leave this house already settling in. 

She remembers the last night she still thought she lived here. 

She’s trying to stay quiet, walking in through the garage. It could’ve gone horribly wrong, driving Syrax tonight. But she’s been prone to making bad decisions lately, so getting into the car, windows open, felt more freeing than it should’ve.  

Climbing up the stairs, the first thing she notices is that the lights are on. Which means Alicent is still up which she’ll want to talk and she’ll see that Rhaenyra is absolutely high out of her mind.  

Fuck.  

She stays a second, behind the wall, on the corner to their living room, thinking of what to say to her wife. But there’s nothing she can say once she sees Alicent, eyes red rimmed.  

She’d been crying.  

“Hey. Thought you’d be asleep.” Rhaenyra slurs and it’s the worst moment to be so wobbly on her feet, leaning against the wall. “Everything ok? We should sleep. Big day tomorrow. Was Aemond excited?” She tries what she thinks is a smile but Alicent has never looked at her with so much hatred in her eyes.  

“That was today.”  

The words ring out like some sort atomic bomb in her mind and she straightens up. “No. No. That’s…the 16th. Today’s-“

“The 16th of October.” Alicent tells her, ice in her words. It could’ve sobered her. “Well…not anymore, obviously. It’s the 17th now. 4 in the morning.”  

“Fuck. No. No. I…Ali, I fucked up.”  

She scoffs. “Yeah, Rhaenyra. You’re the best at fucking things up lately.” She stands up from the couch and moves closer to her, eyes narrowing at her. Then she’s crossing the distance between them, grabbing her face forcefully, examining her eyes. “You’re fucking high.” Her beautiful eyes fill with tears.  

“I was out with clients.”  

She shakes her head. “You missed your son’s birthday. Our first baby.”  

“I’m sorry.”  

She turns around to go pick something up then drops it at her feet. “I packed most of what I thought you’d need for now. You can come pick up the rest some other time.”  

It takes a few seconds for Rhaenyra to understand what she’s saying. “Ali?”  

“I’m done, Rhaenyra. I’m done fighting.” She shakes her head. And she can’t quite catch on. Watches it all in some sort of daze. “I’ve talked to my lawyers.”  

“What?” Rhaenyra breathes out shakily. “Alicent. What the fuck?”  

She’s already sobbing, trying to get the words out. But once they’re out, they’re true. “I want a divorce.”  

The world stops. Rhaenyra searches for proof that she never heard the words. But Alicent remains in the same positions, sobbing.  

“No.” She tries to hold her, to get her to listen. “Ali, you can’t be serious.”  

“You’re breaking me, Rhaenyra. You’re tearing me apart. You’re tearing our family apart.” She sobs. And Rhaenyra starts crying then. “I don’t want to be with you. I feel like I don’t even know who you are.”  

“We can fix this, ok? Ali.” She falls to her knees, at her feet. “I wanna be better. I swear. Let me fix this. I love you. Let me fix this.” She kisses her stomach, holds onto her but it’s no use.

Alicent takes a step back. “Sober up.” She murmurs, snuffling. “Get out of this house.”  

“I miss our old kitchen.” Aemond says. Rhaenyra huffs out a laugh from her spot on the kitchen counter.

“It was a tiny kitchen. Remember how mum would trip over the bin all the time?” Alicent asks, looking at him as she continues over with her task. Making them hot chocolate for old time’s sake. 

“Yeah, I think I had a permanent bruise for the whole time we lived there.” 

“But I liked it. And it was just us then.” He tells them.

“And Hel.” Rhaenyra reminds him. 

“Only for like a few years.” Aemond argues. “And we had that one window by the counter where we’d spy on the neighbors.” He says with a smirk on his face. “And you’d make those funny voices.” 

“That was fun. I think that one house might’ve been cursed with how many neighbors we had over the years.” Rhaenyra laughs. “Remember that one neighbour that used to try to bring us horrible cakes every week?” 

“The one with the lisp!” Alicent lights up, laughing. “Oh god, remember she brought those peanut cupcakes?” 

“Oh darling.” Rhaenyra laughs. “”You’re not allergic to peanuths are you?”” She mimics her voice and Alicent bursts out laughing at the memory. At how hard it’d been to keep a straight face, standing in their hall. 

“Oh I get it now!” Aemond gasps. “It sounds like penis!” 

They’re laughing now, inching closer to being  out of breath. And everything about it feels so perfect to Rhaenyra. Sometimes it’s hard to remember when it was just the three of them, because their life is so full and now it seems incomplete without everyone. But there’s a little piece of what they were that she cherishes. Those sacred moments when Aemond was just a little baby and they were still settling into what they’d committed to. Unsure of so much, raising him and learning with him and with each other. 

She remembers how easy it’d been to say yes to a life together. How they’d only been together for two months before Alicent found out about Aemond. Two months and a baby on the way and Rhaenyra had said yes, had promised she was all in. Yes, I’ll date you even if you have a baby. Can we move in together? Can we be a family? Can I be your baby’s mother? Will you let me love for the rest of my days? 

And now, here, she knows she’s failed terribly. The thought almost takes her out of the moment but she looks at Alicent and Aemond, still on about the lady with the lisp, and can only wish to go back in time. 

“Hot chocolate, Your Highness ?” Aemond smiles handing her her mug. 

“Thank you, Aem.” She pecks his cheek. 

Aemond turns his attention to Alicent, Rhaenyra can tell he’s about to ask for something that she’ll likely say no to. 

“Do we have to see grandfather Otto tomorrow?” He asks before gulping down his hot chocolate. 

There is no way to conceal her reaction at the words because Alicent’s head snaps towards her, eyes wide as if she’s been caught. 

Because she has. 

“We don’t have to talk about it right now, Aemond, do we?” 

“I don’t like him.” He grumbles. “He’s mean. He’s not a good person.” 

“You’ve spent time with him?” Rhaenyra questions pointedly, eyes consciously away from Alicent. “Otto?” 

“Yeah, once a month.” He shrugs. “He’s dying or something so…” The information sits in silence and Aemond feels the drop in the mood as Rhaenyra stares down Alicent. 

“I see.” She murmurs. And wonders how the hell Alicent kept this from her. The one man who’s hurt her more than Rhaenyra ever had, physically, mentally, all of the above. Her homophobic father has been spending time with their children. 

“Time for bed, Aemond.” Alicent chokes out. “It’s late.” 

“But we’re having fun now. The three of us.” 

“We’ll do it again, Aem.” Rhaenyra forces a smile and he hops off the counter. “That’s what you get for drinking hot chocolate in one gulp.” She jokes. “Good night, love.” 

“Night, mum.” He kisses her cheek and does the same to Alicent before walking out of the kitchen and upstairs. 

Alicent cleans up their mugs, back turned to Rhaenyra. “Otto?” She questions. 

“He’s dying.” It’s all she can say. Rhaenyra can feel her blood boiling. 

“How long?” 

“What?” 

“How long have you kept this from me?” She spits out. Alicent still doesn’t turn around. She takes a few moments to answer the question, Rhaenyra knows it’s not going to be a good one. 

“A couple of years.” 

“Before-“

“The divorce, yes.” 

The silence is vicious. It’s suffocating, Rhaenyra feels tears in her eyes, feels her heart beat faster. It’s anger, in all its forms. She didn’t want this tonight. She doesn’t want to think about Otto in their home, with their children, manipulating Alicent. All of the dangerous thoughts that have crossed her mind in the seconds she’s found out about it. The man is a poison. Always has been. 

“I’m gonna go.” 

“Rhaenyra, please just-“

“Don’t worry. This conversation isn’t finished. I just don’t want to say shit I’ll regret. So I’m gonna go and think very hard about how fucked up this is.” 

She doesn’t give Alicent the chance to say anything else. Doesn’t hear her protests. 

She gets the fuck out. 

Chapter Text

Thanks for the Dance, Leonard Cohen

•

Her father is weaker now. 

Each weekly visit, Rhaenyra’s heart grows heavier at his debilitated figure. Her father had long battled with his illness but since her mother’s death, he’d leaned into it. No longer fighting. More so moving through life, waiting for the end. 

He’s holding onto her, holding the cane on the other side as they take a short walk in the gardens of her childhood. She remembers him, younger, with more energy, running after her with glee. She’s grateful for those memories. But there is a selfish part of her that wishes for the garden to have those memories alone. That doesn’t want the image of her father to be etched into her mind like this. 

“Do you remember when I found you smoking right there?” He points to her favorite tree, the

Weirwood tree in the far end of the garden. He laughs fondly. “You always thought you did such a good job hiding it.” 

“You smoked with me, remember? I was so shocked I thought I’d blow a fuse.” 

Viserys chuckles. “I hadn’t smoked in years. Oh, I coughed up a storm. Your mother might’ve killed me then when I came home.” 

“Saved my ass, that’s what you did. I wouldn’t have messed with the she dragon.” She smiles. 

There’s a pause as they stop by the rose garden, not quite as beautiful as when her mother tended to it, but still special. The only person who cared for it nearly as much as her mother was Alicent. And she’d been hesitant to tending to it now. It’d always been their, for her mother and Alicent and now it seemed a bit empty. 

“That was the night you told me about your feelings for Alicent.” 

Rhaenyra breathes out softly, nodding. “I know.” She murmurs. “We seem to have the most important conversations under that tree.” 

Her father hums. “How are you really?” 

“I don’t really know. Things are…a little different, I think. We’re…trying to be with the kids together and they’re happier about that.” 

“I asked how you were, darling.” He eyes her knowingly. 

Rhaenyra huffs out a laugh. “It’s hard.” She tells him. “It’s been hard. To be without her. It’s…the worst if I’m honest. I miss being a family with her. It’s been two years and I just…I miss my wife.” Her eyes fill with tears and she takes in a shaky breath. “You know, I still can’t bring myself to call her my ex wife?”

“I’m sorry, Rhaenyra.” 

“And the worst part of it is that it’s my fault. I loaded the gun. She just decided to finally pull the trigger.” She shrugs, defeatedly. “I learned about something, last week.” 

“What’s that?” 

“She’s been talking to Otto.” 

Her father is quiet for a moment, sighing softly.  She knows this has been difficult for him as well. Alicent had always been family to him and she’d tried to distance herself since the divorce. And with Otto, Viserys often mourned the loss of what he thought was a friend, good person. 

“It’s her choice to forgive him.” 

Rhaenyra shakes her head. “No. Not when it’s about the kids. She takes them there, once a month. And she kept it from me. This man…who’s caused so much pain to everyone around him and she wants him in their life? Our children’s lives? I think I have a say in that, father.” 

“I believe there’s a benefit to looking at it from her perspective. Have you discussed it in detail?” 

“No.” 

“Then perhaps you should.” Viserys murmurs. And he has that look on his face she always dreads, the one where he’s about to tell her what she doesn’t want to hear. “Sweetheart, for that year we lost your mother, and you were lost, Alicent didn’t have you. Do you understand? She raised those kids for that year alone. Did everything you didn’t do for them.” 

“I know that. I see it everyday. But that man…he’s a poison, I’m certain of it. And the hold he’s always had on Ali…he scares me. He really does.” 

Viserys nods, frowning. “I know. He scares me too.” 

Their conversation is interrupted by Luke barreling across the yard towards his grandfather. 

“Luke, careful!” Rhaenyra warns but Viserys waves her off as Luke hugs him tightly. 

“Happy birthday.” The boy says with glee. 

Aemond is trailing behind with a sort of big brother exasperation. “Sorry, I tried to stop him.” He winces, but then smiles at his grandfather, coming over to embrace him. “Happy birthday, grandfather. Hey, mum!” 

“It’s like you grow every time I see you.” Viserys chuckles, pressing a kiss to his head. “And you, little Luke, are a little man more and more, aren’t you?” He giggles in response, leaning against him. She feels her father heavier beside her but knows his stubbornness won’t allow him to have Luke away from him, nor his love for them will allow him to deny what might be so short of a time with him. 

Alicent is in the distance, closer now, Helaena walking beside her, interested in whatever bug she’s caught in her hand. It brings her a nervous feeling. She’s ignored every message that didn’t have to do with the kids, avoided the topic of Otto at all costs. 

She knows precisely why she doesn’t want to speak of it. She’s terrified of what it’ll mean. How far Otto had gotten into Alicent’s head and what lies he’d been selling for the past few years. If Otto had been even a bit responsible for Alicent’s decision to divorce, then Rhaenyra might just kill the man who is apparently dying. And if she had hurt Alicent so much that she’d gone back to Otto then perhaps she doesn’t deserve forgiveness. 

Then perhaps it is over. And that is too much to bear. 

“Talk to her.” Viserys murmurs quietly to Rhaenyra and she looks at her father with a frown but he smiles. “Come, I grow tired, daughter. Shall we go into the house, boys?” They nod their heads. 

Rhaenyra helps her father meet Alicent and her daughter halfway to the house, being his support, hearing his breathing go heavier with each step and her heart aches. 

“Happy birthday, grandpa.” Helaena smiles softly. 

“Happy birthday, Viserys.” Alicent hugs him, a warm smile on her lips. 

“Is there cake?” 

Viserys laughs loudly. “Ah, you’re just like your mother, aren’t you?” He leans down to press a kiss to Helaena’s head and Rhaenyra almost stops him but Helaena grins at the affection. “I have all the cake in the world for you, my dear. Come. Help me up the stairs, will you?” 

“Father, maybe-“ 

“It’s okay, Rhaenyra. It’s just stairs. And I’ve got a strong princess to help me out, isn’t that right, Helaena?” Her daughter nods effusively. “Ali, darling, thank you for being here.” He squeezes her hand, a look that says more than he verbalizes. Alicent is clearly a bit emotional at his state because she doesn’t say much else, only nods her head with a smile and squeezes his hand back. “Shall we, Princess?” 

They stay back in silence, watching them talk to each other as they go up the stairs. Rhaenyra is planning to bolt or avoid the elephant in the room, at least for the night but Alicent is staring at her. 

“It’s gotten worse, hasn’t it?” 

Rhaenyra nods. “I don’t think we have long.” She clears her throat and can’t bring herself to fight when Alicent reaches for her hand, intertwining their fingers. 

“I’m so sorry, Rhaenyra.” She’s not sure what about. If she’s speaking about her father or something else. “I noticed he was worse on the phone but I wasn’t expecting to see him like this.” She confesses, voice shaky and Rhaenyra remembers that he’s been like a father to her as well. It only serves to remind her why Otto had never filled that role completely and she lets go of Alicent’s hand. 

“We should go inside.” She mumbles and takes a step forward. 

“I was hoping we could talk.” 

“Alicent.” She sighs and looks back. 

“You’ve been avoiding it. Avoiding me and I’d like to talk about it.” Alicent tells her. 

She stands for a moment. “I really don’t think now is the right time, Alicent.” 

“I shouldn’t have kept it from you.” She shakes her head. 

“Please don’t. It’s my father’s birthday. I don’t know how long I’ll have him for. I’m sure you know what that’s like.” She says pointedly and Alicent quiets, breathing out, looking somewhere other than her eyes. There’s a few moments where they say nothing. 

“I don’t understand how you think you have some kind of moral high ground after everything you’ve put us through.” 

Rhaenyra stills. 

“You don’t get to abandon your children. You don’t get to abandon your wife. You don’t get to party all night while I wait at home, wondering if you’re safe. And you don’t get to that for months. You don’t have that right.” 

“And you don’t get to bring that man into my children’s lives.” Rhaenyra snaps, she hates that Alicent is right about all that’s she’s said but that is not the point of it. “You want to fight? Have at it. Let’s fight, Alicent. Throw everything I’ve done wrong at my face, for once instead of keeping it to yourself. I’d rather you be true to your feelings, I’d rather you explode and burn me with them. I’ll let you destroy me, shred me to pieces. But that man is a poison to everyone. And I will not let that happen to my children. I will not have a man who considers our love a sickness into our children’s lives.” 

“Our love, Rhaenyra? Where was your devotion, your love when I needed it? Where were you for your children? Maybe you’re the poison you speak-“ 

“I’m not above the spectacle of a lover’s quarrel but everyone waiting for you two.” 

Daemon stands atop the stairs, the smugness ever present on his face along with amusement. He glances between the two of them, laughs. “In my experience, divorce usually means the fighting stops. There are other ways to channel that energy, darlings.” 

“We’ve tried that.” Alicent mutters under her breath, without missing a beat and moves past him quickly. 

Rhaenyra stands for a second before trudging up the stairs as Daemon looks surprised at Alicent’s statement, laughing, impressed. 

“How was Pentos?” 

“Oh, it’s lovely there this time of year.” The amusement is endless in his eyes, as he throws an arm around her shoulder. “You should whisk your wife away and see if the weather will warm up her cold northern heart.” 

“Don’t be a brat, uncle.” 

“Family, Rhaenyra. You know, your wedding will always be my favorite. It was quite touching. It’s a shame you haven’t gotten her back yet.” Then he softens, looking at her. “You okay?” 

“No. Not about her. Nor about father.” She says, honestly. “Have you seen him?” 

Daemon nods, face somber. “I have.” He murmurs. “We’ll celebrate him today. That’s all we can do.” 

“I’d like to make a toast.” Viserys announces, standing up. “First of all, I’d like to say how happy I am that we are all here, as a family. I know that since we’ve lost our Aemma, things haven’t been the same. She was taken so suddenly and she was a guiding light. And I thought we’d have all the time in the world, so my wish is that you do not take life for granted, that you treasure every moment, that you don’t dwell on the past but aim to the future. As we gather here. All of us.” He looks at Alicent for a second with a smile. “Let’s toast to family and to the future, to a bright one, a blissful one.” 

There is a melancholy present in everyone, even Luke who doesn’t have his grandmother as present as the rest of them. She feels Alicent’s eyes on her. 

And again, she thinks Alicent is far braver than she’s ever been. Eyes on her. Saying so much at once. Here now, on the other side of the table, a setting that had been deliberate no doubt though it had backfired of course. They’re now face to face and she notices how Aemond is so terribly aware of the tension between them. Their first baby. She can’t bear to look at him. 

She’s struck by the memory of introducing Aemond to her parents. First showing them the ultrasound, proud and loud, while Alicent stood, the shame showing in front of people she loves, shame Rhaenyra had fought so hard against. 

“It’s our son, Ali.” She tells her with a smile, as she parks the car, in front of the house. “No matter what. You know my parents will be ecstatic.”  

“No, Nyra, I really don’t know.” Alicent breathes, hands folded on her lap.  

Rhaenyra frowns, turning to her, hand on her cheek. “We’re family. Always have been. Always will. They’ll stand by us, Ali.”  

“I hate to think it’ll change the way they see me.”  

“It will change.” She shrugs, a genuine smile on her lips. “Because now, you’re not just their daughter in law, you’re the mother of their grandson. How does that sound?”  

“Our son.” Alicent takes in a shaky breath, closing her eyes for a moment. “Ok. Let’s go.”  

“Yeah?”  

“Family.” She huffs out a soft laugh. “That’s all.” Rhaenyra nods.  

“I love you.”  

“I love you too.” She pecks her lips and they get out of the car. They walk over to the front door, hand in hand and Rhaenyra doesn’t even get to ring the doorbell before the door is wide open and her mother is ushering her inside.  

“I fear your father may have lost his mind.” Her mother says but there is nothing but fondness and exasperation in her tone. She drags them out into the garage, where her father is standing with a grin on his face. And there beside him is a motorcycle. In fact, there are two. “Your father insists I must now partake in this insane and preposterous idea of Sunday rides with him.”  

“Oh god.” Rhaenyra laughs, walking over to her father.

  “Aren’t they a thing of beauty?” Her gather questions. “Bought them this morning for your mother and I.” He tells her excitedly. He’s wearing a brown helmet and aviator style sunglasses, looking absolutely ridiculous and exactly like himself all at once.  

“Rhaenyra, please tell him he’s lost his sanity.” Aemma sighs.  

Her daughter merely shrugs with a devious grin. “Well, I do seem to recall photos of a younger you quite comfortable on a motorbike. Leather jacket and all.”  

“Yes, dear, but I was young and reckless.” Aemma argues, shaking her head. “Ali, sweetheart, if my daughter should ever turn out like her father, know you will always find refuge beside me.”  

Alicent laughs but Rhaenyra can tell she’s in her head and until they do what they came here to do, the weight won’t lift off her shoulder, so she returns to her side, hand comfortable on her back.  

“I’ll be sure to do that, Em.” She smiles.  

“Husband, will you please get off the bike,   take off that helmet and let us sit with a cup of tea?”  

“I don’t know, my love.” He shrugs with a smirk. “Will you promise me one ride at least?”  

“If I say yes, will you leave it for now?”  

Rhaenyra laughs, rubbing Alicent’s back and they watch her parents bicker.  

Viserys eventually gets off the bike, laughing as Aemma continues to argue all the way to the living room.  

And as they all sit, Alicent is so tense beside her, Aemma notices and seems to let the silence grow to a comfortable place to allow them time to say what they want to say.  

“So, I mentioned on the phone that we had something we wanted to talk to you about-“

The plan was for Rhaenyra to ease them into it but Alicent is feeling too much of everything as has been the case lately and bursts out crying as Aemma is serving tea.  

This little bubble they’d been in would now be burst. And it’d been blissful after the stress of having to tell Rhaenyra but now it would be out in the open with people she cares deeply about. She’d been trying to ease her mind all week but it’s been difficult to do anything to help other than sit beside her with strength.  

“Oh dear.” Her murmurs. “Oh honey, it’s alright. Whatever it is, it will be fine, I promise.”  

“Of course, Alicent. We’re family, darling.” Viserys has that dumbstruck look on his face he always does when people cry around him. He’s empathetic enough that he might start crying himself and Rhaenyra thinks he might actually cry at the news.  

“I…” Alicent takes a deep breath, gripping Rhaenyra’s hand in hers. “I want you to know that I did not betray your daughter and that it happened before we were actually together and I was a mess because I love your daughter very much…”

“We would never doubt that, Ali.” Aemma comforts with a certainty even Rhaenyra is surprised by.  

“Nyra.” Alicent turns to her, nodding. She wants her to be the one to stay the words and she complies, first wrapping an arm around her before telling her parents the news.  

“Ali’s pregnant.” She can’t help the smile that pushes through to her lips. “And we’ve decided that we’re keeping the baby. Together. So…you’re going to be grandparents.”  

Aemma gasps and Viserys sits shocked at the news. For Alicent, Rhaenyra knows those seconds of silence will have felt like hours but truly, it doesn’t take long for Viserys to jump from his seat to embrace them both with tears in his eyes.  

“This is wonderful news. Unexpected but wonderful news, kids. A little dragon.” He laughs loudly with pride so present in his voice Alicent only sobs into his shoulder before leaning against Rhaenyra.  

Aemma moves to sit beside Alicent, grabbing her hand. “There is nothing to be afraid of, Ali. We are here for you. We’re your family. Now more than ever.” Then she turns to Rhaenyra. “You’re going to be mothers.” She grins. “Oh I’m so happy for you, girls.”  

“We have pictures.” Alicent perks up with a relieved chuckle. “Rhaenyra asked for five extra even though I told her it was too many.” She pulls them out of her purse, the little picture with the tiny spec of what will be their baby.  

“Oh these are going straight to the fridge.” Viserys tells them. “And one for my wallet please. I will carry my grandchild with me everywhere I go.”  

“Our first grandchild.” Aemma smiles, squeezing Alicent’s hands.  

For the whole duration of her pregnancy, Viserys and Aemma had been a constant, a stream of support, of advice when they asked because seven knows the amount of unsolicited advice they’d received was tiresome. They were kind and proud and sometimes overtly excited, but devoted and held such a strength neither Rhaenyra or Alicent knew how to thank them other than to give that love back.  

When Aemond came into the world, after grueling hours, the first people to see him other than the doctors and his parents were Aemma and Viserys.  

They’d let the day pass, so Alicent could rest, so they could have their bubble, the three of them. It’d   brutal and raw, Rhaenyra knew watching Alicent in so much pain, yet with so much strength, she knew her mother had been right. Labour is a battlefield. And the love of her life had been a warrior with every step. And their son, their Aemond had been brought into a world of eyes filled with so much love they cried.  

“Have told you how proud I am of you?” Rhaenyra murmurs, pressing a kiss to her girlfriend’s head as she nursed their baby. She was still getting the hang of it, getting used to the sensation and how to get the baby as comfortable as she could, the rest was pure instinct.  

Alicent huffs out a small laugh. “You’re going to have to get more creative, my love.” Then she looks up at her, with a tender look on her face. “I’ve stopped counting.”  

“Well, I am.” She murmurs. “I’m so proud. And I’m honestly so in love with you, I might spontaneously combust, Ali.” Then she looks down at their son. “And I never thought I could love someone quite like this either.” She runs a finger across Aemond’s little head as his eyes open to look up at her. “It’s so unreal.”  

“I know.” She whispers. “He’s here.”  

“And you made him.” Rhaenyra smiles. “His beating heart and all.” Alicent leans her head against her. They stay silent just watching him while he nurses. And she’s never known a happier time in her than here. With her Ali and their son, in the quietness of the hospital room, soft light peeking through the windows.  

A knock on the door interrupts the silence. Aemond is fast asleep in Rhaenyra’s arms now, fed and burped. Alicent is the one that calls out as loud as she can without disturbing the baby for the person on the other side to come in.  

It’s Aemma and Viserys. The latter carrying a ridiculously large stuffed animal, a dragon of course, and roses from their garden, Alicent’s favorites in his hand.  

“He’s asleep.” Rhaenyra admonishes, glaring at her father when he seems to want to be as loud as he can but Alicent laughs softly, with fondness.  

“Come meet him.” She tells them in a soft voice. And they approach, eyes watery as they see the little bundle in their daughter’s arms. “This is Aemond, your grandson.”  

“Oh, Ali.” Aemma sniffles, gripping her hand. “Look at him. Vis, isn’t he the most beautiful baby you’ve ever seen?”  

“I’ll allow that, though it does hurt my feelings.” Rhaenyra teases. And then continues. “He’s a strong little dragon, this one. And so is his mother. The very image of strength.”  

“All mothers are warriors.” Viserys says with a grin, looking between the three woman, a hand on his wife’s back. “How does it feel?”  

“Like the whole world’s shifted.” Alicent breathes out.  

Alicent isn’t hard to find, though Rhaenyra truly hadn’t been looking. She had been meaning to go into her childhood room to get a photograph of her mother and Ali, her presence heavy on a day like today when she would’ve been lighting up the whole house, telling stories to make everybody laugh. But Ali is there, in her room, holding that same photograph in her hand. 

“Do you remember when this was taken?” Alicent questions when she feels Rhaenyra come into the room, ever so attuned to her presence. “I can’t seem remember.” 

She takes a step forward into the room and Alicent stands tracing her fingers across the photograph. “It was one of our weekly dinners, Aemond was around one year old. It was February, I think.” 

“How do you know?” 

“It was the night my mother gave me her mother’s engagement ring. Your ring.” She says in a murmur, inching closer. “I took the photograph. And my mother decided she wanted it framed. There’s a copy in the family wall. But none of them have that frame.” Then she walks closer and carefully extends her hand. “May I?” 

She removes the back of the frame, and written behind the photograph are the words. 

‘Sonnet 116’ 

“What is it?” Alicent questions. And Rhaenyra can’t for the life of her remember why she’s never shown her this. 

“Shakespeare.” 

“What?” 

“Give me a second.” She gets to her bookshelf and knows it’s still in this house because she brought it with her when she moved in for a couple of months after the divorce and had never taken it back. “I think it must be around here somewhere.” She peruses through the shelves. “There it is.” She flips through the pages to find it. “May I read it to you?” 

“Might as well now that curious.” There’s a fire still burning from their fight, tension in every bone in her body. 

‘Let me not to the marriage of true minds  

Admit impediments. Love is not love  

Which alters when it alteration finds,  

Or bends with the remover to remove.  

O no! it is an ever-fixed mark  

That looks on tempests and is never shaken;  

It is the star to every wand'ring bark,  

Whose worth's unknown, although his height be taken.  

Love's not Time's fool, though rosy lips and cheeks  

Within his bending sickle's compass come;  

Love alters not with his brief hours and weeks,  

But bears it out even to the edge of doom.  

If this be error and upon me prov'd,  

I never writ, nor no man ever lov'd.’

The sonnet echoes between them and Rhaenyra looks at it in a different light now than she did when her mother first told her to check the frame. There’s an unimaginable pain that hits her without warning, pulls her guts out without her permission. And with Alicent in the room, another unimaginable loss, she breaks down. 

It’s a cry that comes from so deep within, she can barely breathe. She just sits on the bed, muscle memory of what had been her home for many years kicking in, and she just sobs. It fails to register that Alicent is holding her until she’s leaning over her lap and Alicent is pressing kisses to her shoulder. 

“I’m so sorry.” She cries and it’s so broken. Everything is so broken and she can’t fucking fix it. “Everything is my fault. And I’m sorry. I’m sorry, Ali. I’m sorry.” She repeats, between sobs. “There’s so much pain…I just want it to stop, Ali. I can’t-“ 

“Breathe, ok?” She murmurs. 

“There was so much blood.” She chokes out. “And she-“ 

“Nyra.” She can barely hear her. She’s never spoken about it with Alicent. About the accident. The car she was driving, her mother in the passenger seat. She’s never told her she was trying to make her mother laugh and didn’t notice the car coming towards them.

“I killed my mother, Ali. The car came out of nowhere. I couldn’t call anyone because I had no phone. I tried to stop the bleeding- I tried-“ 

“It’s ok, baby. It’s ok, my love.” Alicent rubs her back. “I need you to breathe with me, ok? Can you do that? I’m right here.” 

She doesn’t know how long it takes for her breathing to slow but Alicent has moved them to the floor. Her head is on her chest, arms around her, while Alicent caresses her hair. The door was closed at some point and Rhaenyra can see more clearly now. 

“You never told me that.” Alicent murmurs. 

“Only the therapist.” She shrugs, voice hoarse from crying. Alicent presses a kiss to her forehead. “I’m sorry I just threw that on you.” 

“I’m glad you did. I think…I understand some things now that I didn’t before.” 

“It doesn’t excuse anything. I shouldn’t have abandoned you. I did everything wrong, Ali.” Rhaenyra lifts her head up to look at her. “And the miscarriage…”

“Nyra…” Alicent shakes her head. “There was nothing we could’ve done.” 

“You blame me and you’re right to. I was doing drugs and drinking and it was my fault I lost the baby. It was my fault, Ali. And that…it should’ve done the opposite of what it did.” 

Alicent is silent for a moment but then takes a deep breath. “I think we need to…talk about this some other time.” 

“Why?” 

“Because our family is downstairs and we’ve been up here for over an hour.” She answers. “And because you’re vulnerable right now and I don’t think it’s fair to either of us if we’re going to be completely honest with each other. We’re going to hurt each other again.” 

Rhaenyra stops for a moment and then lifts her head off her chest. “Ok.” 

“Just…let me hold for a moment please? Before we get out of this room?” 

“Ok, Ali.” She nods and she closes her eyes as she rests her head back onto her chest. 

Chapter Text

If life were easier, Alicent wouldn’t be sitting in front of Criston Cole and her best friend while they’re obviously flirting with each other.  

Criston Cole.  

Rhaenyra really had a taste for douchebags (is douchebag a sinful word?). And this one really takes the cake. He’s so annoying and arrogant. He’s a year older than them and thinks that it somehow makes him all the more grown up. As if 14 is such a grown up age. A dick. He’s a conceited dick (may the seven forgive her for cursing) and she hates the way Rhaenyra fawns over his attention.  

Alicent doesn’t understand it. Boys are just dumb and stupid. Girls are usually so much nicer. Boys are gross. And someone like Rhaenyra shouldn’t be fawning over someone like Criston. He’s so mean to Alicent and Rhaenyra doesn’t see it.  

“Why did you make me come here?” Alicent asks, rolling her eyes when Criston goes to the bathroom.  

“What?” Rhaenyra furrows her brows. “You love coming here.”  

“Not with Criston Cole.” She scoffs. “I very much don’t enjoy sitting here while you two flirt for two hours and don’t even bother to include me in the conversation. It’s like he’s all you can see.”  

“You’re being unfair. I always want you with me.”  

“Well, I think your crush is boring. And he’s mean. He sucks, Nyra.” She snaps. “And he kisses you like a fish. It looks gross.”  

“He kisses me like a fish?” Rhaenyra giggles.  

“Yes. He isn’t even gentle like when we…” She stops herself. Like when they practiced. Like when Rhaenyra kissed her. “It doesn’t matter.”  

All Alicent can think of is Rhaenyra’s lips against hers. She’d never been kissed before. And she’d convince herself that kissing girls didn’t count. The taste of strawberry lipgloss overpowered everything. Rhaenyra had been gentle with her, she’d been kissed before and as insecure as Alicent felt, she also knew Rhaenyra wouldn’t judge her.  

Her heart had been beating so fast, her hands were clammy and for the first few seconds, Alicent couldn’t move until Rhaenyra had. Tentative. Slow. Careful. But Alicent pushed against her lips more firmly. And it turned into a real kiss. Not real real. But you know. It wasn’t sinful desire because it had not been real.  

The point still stands, Criston Cole didn’t know how to kiss.

“Ali, I’m not replacing you.” Rhaenyra frowns. “You’re my best friend. That will never change.”  

“I know that.” Alicent gulps. “You should just get a better boyfriend.”  

Rhaenyra’s next boyfriend is cool, really. He’s nice. The first serious one. Alicent is just sort of pissed Rhaenyra has   a boyfriend. And she doesn’t know why. Can’t understand why Harwin irritates her so much.  

Harwin is a cool guy. He’s a footballer and he’s all muscular and tall and Rhaenyra seems to like that. He’s funny too, Alicent can admit it. But not enough that Rhaenyra laughs the way she does. It’s so dumb, really. They’re going to parties and drinking and Harwin always thinks he can drink more than he can so they have to drag his ass out the door. Rhaenyra always insists that she comes along when clearly she has to lie to her father, hates partying and on top of it all, has to sit while Rhaenyra tries to set her up with people.  

They date for a year or so. Rhaenyra seems happy, like she’s discovering things Alicent knows she isn’t cut out for. Because she’s tried to feel that way for boys but she can’t. No matter how hard she tries. She’s had one boyfriend and she hates every moment of it. And maybe it’s time she confronts that about herself.  

She isn’t normal. She can’t be, when it’s so easy for everyone else.  

But then there’s these…things she feels for Rhaenyra. She sees girls differently and it makes her feel like some kind of predator, because it can’t be that. She can’t be…that. Her father’s always told her that it’s a sin, girls can’t just like girls.  

She doesn’t see anything wrong with Laenor. She loves who he is. Doesn’t care who he likes.  

But she can’t be that. Her life would be over.  

She talks to Rhaenyra. Already sobbing by the time she tries to get the words out. It’s so agonizingly shameful. She feels so dirty saying it.  

“I think I’m gay, Nyra.” She whispers it like the secret that it is, even thought they’re alone.  

Rhaenyra, on her part, is the the softest she’s ever seen her. “I know. And you’re perfect.”  

“What?”  

“I think I could tell.” Her best friend shrugs. “I…I’m bisexual, Ali.”  

“You’re…”  

“Yes.” She smiles softly. “There’s nothing wrong with being gay, Ali. I know you’ve been brought up a certain way but…it doesn’t matter who you like.”  

“My father will never accept it, Nyra. If he ever finds out, he will-“  

“He doesn’t matter. If he can’t love his own daughter no matter what, then he doesn’t deserve you. But I’ll always be here. You’ll always have a place with me, ok?” Rhaenyra smiles and Alicent still sits heavy with the feelings she has for her.  

Rhaenyra beats her to it a few months later.  

“Ali?”  

Her voice snaps her out of her train of thoughts.  

If one could even consider them thoughts when it’s all just Rhaenyra and how pretty Rhaenyra looks. Her long hair looks particularly good today, as they sit in her backyard, under the Weirdwood tree, Rhaenyra’s head in her lap as Alicent reads to her. She looks ethereal, it   makes her heart race, mind going places she swore she wouldn’t go.  

“You stopped reading.” Rhaenyra says, voice with that teasing tilt she half hates and half loves dearly. “And I can feel you staring, even with my eyes closed.” She smirks and opens her eyes to find Alicent’s cheeks flush with red.  

“Sorry.” Alicent clears her throat.  

“You don’t have to be. I quite like being watched by you.”

“Stop it.” She huffs out a laugh.  

“What?”  

“You’re doing…you’re embarrassing me.”  

“How?”  

“Saying those things. I’m-“  

“I said it because it’s true. I enjoy the way you look at me.” Rhaenyra smiles.  

“How exactly do I look at you?” Alicent shakes her head, averting her eyes.  

Rhaenyra pauses and then sits up, her fingers reach for Alicent’s cheek so she can turn her face towards her. She smiles, watches as Alicent’s eyes look at her lips and then her eyes, blushing furiously.  

“With want.” She murmurs. And then leans in to press a kiss to her nose with a smile.  

“Nyra’.” She sighs. “What are you doing?”  

“I want to kiss you.”  

The worlds seems to cease all its motion for a moment. Rhaenyra just smiles at her. It’s everything she’s ever wanted, but she’s so scared. Everything feels so precious in these moments. Rhaenyra’s eyes have felt more intense lately but this is something else. She’s so completely true and honest.  

“I think you’re beautiful. You’re my favorite person in the whole world. And I think…I might like you more than friends. So…I want to kiss you. And if I know you enough, I think you want to kiss me.”  

Alicent gulps, then takes in a shaky breath. “My father…”  

“Ali, he won’t find out. I promise.” She says. “It’s just us. You and me. Like always.”  

Rhaenyra makes things so difficult, always pushing and pushing, when Alicent is so unsure. She keeps holding her in ways a best friend doesn’t, inching closer and closer. Pushing more boundaries. And Alicent can’t reconcile her attraction and feelings for Rhaenyra with what her father’s been saying to her for years. What she’s always heard, the hatred, the sinful nature of her feelings.  

“Ok.” She breathe out.  

Rhaenyra is slow, gentle as always. She caresses her cheek, smiles and then leans in. Their breaths meet, eyes close and then Rhaenyra kisses her.  

She realizes, maybe it is what all those fairytales she loved as a child described. An otherworldly feeling, something true that she’s never felt. She’ll never understand how something she’s been told is wrong feels so right. And how lovely Rhaenyra’s lips feel against hers. Discovering each other in a new way.  

Alicent finds she could do this forever.  

Alicent finds she might just love her.  

There’s a spot on the ceiling with a dent, right near the lamp Alicent had picked out for the bedroom. Rhaenyra had insisted on assembling it, putting it up on the ceiling, with stubbornness and sheer spite. None of that, however, had allowed their ceiling the dignity of getting out unscathed. 

Alicent isn’t quite sure how Rhaenyra stuck a screwdriver into their ceiling. But the sound had been unmistakable and so had the gasp that fell out of her lips.

 Fixing the hole left by the screwdriver had been her idea, some of her own stubbornness coming out. So she had tried to mend it. Horribly so. No one had ever accused her at being good at DIYing her way through life. 

And so a dent had been left behind. And the memories with it. 

For nights on end, she’d stared up at the ceiling, waiting for Rhaenyra to come home. Stared up at that dent, in their bed. 

The memories of how happy they were haunting her. 

Everything about it had made her feel alone. Treading waters she never knew she’d tread. For her whole life, there had been Rhaenyra. Even when they fought, even when they were angry, she had her. Push came to shove, she had Rhaenyra. 

Perhaps that had been her mistake. To rely so heavily. 

But Rhaenyra had always been there, no matter the circumstances. And Alicent had always given that support back. 

She’d been rejected for months. Tried to help, tried to let her know she could find safety in her arms. Rhaenyra had rejected her. Got angry, disappeared on her multiple times and she got desperate, she couldn’t walk a step without being scared to lose her. 

And then they lost the baby. 

And then her father had knocked on her door. 

He’d said all the right things. Appealed to the insecure side of her, the demon that chewed on her confidence in Rhaenyra’s love. Because, of course she’d never be lovable enough for her wife to stay. Of course, she’d always be like her own mother, clinging to a love that’s never there. Begging for it. Crying for it. Clinging to hope. 

The condition was perfect for Otto to swoop in and hit her where he knew she’d hurt, while painting himself as the one showing her the truth. 

Staring up the ceiling again, Alicent has barely slept. The shape of the dent has morphed into nightmares during the night. Rhaenyra and Aemma. Rhaenyra off somewhere, dead in a ditch. Their children desperately in pain. The blood, that night. 

All of because of the clock, counting down to when she’d meet Rhaenyra. 

They’d agreed a public place wasn’t fair to anyone so Rhaenyra is driving to what was their house in the morning, after Laenor picks up the kids. And they have the arena to themselves for the whole day. 

She’s slept maybe three hours when Luke knocks on her door and promptly enters the room, with a little pout on his lips and a sweet voice that demands he be cuddled. 

So she opens her arms, he climbs onto the bed and snuggles close to her. 

“Did you sleep well, my love?” Alicent murmurs, placing a kiss to his head. Luke hums, snuggling closer and she laughs softly, before closing her eyes, hoping he falls asleep with her. He’s just like Rhaenyra in the mornings. 

Luke however isn’t keen on it. “I miss the mum sandwich.” He says, sighing, so innocent and Alicent’s heart aches. She holds him tighter. “Do you think we can call mum?” 

“Right now?” Alicent asks softly. 

“Yeah, I wanna tell you a story I dreamt and I don’t wanna repeat it because I’ll forget things, mama. So I want mum here too.” 

Alicent frowns, sighing softly. “Do you want to write it down?” 

He shakes his head, giggling. “No, silly. I wanna tell it to you and mum.” 

She nods, reaching for her phone. “Alright, Lu.” 

The phone rings four times before Rhaenyra picks up the phone. “Alicent?” Her voice shakes, almost imperceptibly but she can tell, the nervousness, the way Rhaenyra always tries to hide behind a confident sure voice. She’s always been able to tell. 

“H-hi.” She clears her throats. “Luke…he wanted to tell us a story.” 

“Hi mum!” Luke grins. “Video, I wanna see you.” 

“Luke maybe-“ 

“It’s fine. We can do that. I mean if it’s…if it’s ok with you.” Rhaenyra breathes out. 

“Ok. I’ll FaceTime you.” 

Once Rhaenyra appears on her screen, it’s hard to focus much. She looks pretty, as she often does every morning. It’d been her favorite time of the day, to laze around with the kids with Rhaenyra. Her messy hair, sleepy face and an instant smile as she sees Luke. It’s endearing and always beautiful to witness the softness in Rhaenyra with the kids. It’s a special kind of way she talks, the way she looks at them is so full of love. 

“So what’s this story I’m hearing about?” She asks. 

“I had a dragon.” Luke tells them excitedly. “His name was Arrax and we were best friends. I was a knight, mama and we fought battles together because I rode him, like a horse but in the air. And then a big dragon tried to eat us but we escaped because Arrax was way smaller so he sneak into places that the big dragons couldn’t see.” 

Alicent thinks perhaps the dream might be a little too violent to match for Luke’s excitement. It sounds more like nightmare to her but Luke doesn’t give them pause to ask questions. He describes his dragon and tells them he became the biggest dragon ever eventually and won every battle he ever fought. Goes on and on about the battles they fought together. 

“What a story, kid.” Rhaenyra laughs. “You should ask uncle Joff to draw it up.” 

“Oh cool idea.” He grins. Then he softens, still hazy with sleep, against Alicent and breaks their hearts a little more. “I miss you, mum.” 

Alicent can see the way Rhaenyra’s face drops in an instant, how she tries to cover it up but is unsuccessful. 

She takes  a moment, forcing herself to look at the screen  before smiling sadly. “I miss you too, sweet boy. But you’re coming here tonight, remember?” 

“But I don’t wanna go.” Luke frowns, sighing frustratingly. “I want you to come home.” 

Rhaenyra is silent for a moment, she can see her holding back tears. It’s perfectly clear how it breaks her, twists her heart in ways she never thought possible. “Luke.” She murmurs. “We’ve talked about this, remember?” 

“And it doesn’t make sense.” Luke grumbles. “Why can’t mum come home?” He turns to Alicent, the kind of stubbornness that is all from Rhaenyra ever present. 

“Because your mum doesn’t live here anymore.” Alicent answers because truly, what is she supposed to tell him? He can barely remember that year. 

“Then she can start living here again.” He groans. 

“Luke, that’s enough.” Rhaenyra tells him sternly.

The conversation ends there. Luke grows quiet, says he doesn’t want to talk anymore and climbs out of Alicent’s bed with a sad look on his face that she doesn’t know how to fix, no matter how many times she tells him to stay, that they can watch cartoons in bed. She wants to make it up to him, but there’s nothing else Luke wants other than Rhaenyra with them. 

When Rhaenyra enters the house, after Laenor’s picked up the kids, she looks like she hasn’t slept much. They’re in the same boat, walking into an arena, in hopes not to fight, but an arena nonetheless. 

“I don’t know how to start.” Alicent murmurs. She leans against the wall, by the couch while Rhaenyra sits on the loveseat Alicent refuses to use because it’s a piece of furniture that’s always been with them. 

“I think I need to get you angry enough. You’re eloquent when you’re angry.” Rhaenyra jokes weakly. It’s somewhat alluring, how nervous and unsure she seems. Endearing, in a way Rhaenyra’s always mastered. It doesn’t truly work today.

“Don’t be an idiot.” She shakes her head. And then takes a deep breath. “Rhaenyra.” Alicent looks at her, tries to picture her younger, when they were first falling in love with each other. The baby cheeks, the childlike glee at getting into trouble. She tries to remember feeling loved by her for the first time. How unconditional it’s always been.. “How did we get here?” 

“Short version?” She sighs. “I watched my mother die. I had a botched company to run. I lost myself in drugs and alcohol. I was barely home. I missed our kids’ lives for a year. I hurt you. I lost the baby. Things got worse. I hurt you more. And you divorced me.” 

“That’s awfully reductive.” Alicent murmurs.  

“That’s why it’s the short version.” She says with a shrug and then she breathes out, a shaky breath before looking in her eyes. “I want to ask something of you.” Alicent takes a moment before she nods her head. “I want you to tell me everything. No matter how horrible, be honest and don’t hold back. We’re done doing that. Will you that for me?” 

Alicent wants to protest but she knows this is what they’re here to do. To finally say everything to each other’s faces instead of holding it all in. It’s time to battle. To do what they neglected to do then. 

So she forces herself to remember. To unleash what she’s bottled in and the first thing she can think of is the repulse she felt at Rhaenyra doing drugs. It’d been visceral, so instant it’d shocked her.

“You reminded me of Gwayne.” She chokes out. 

“Gwayne?” Rhaenyra’s eyes are instantly hurt.

Alicent closes her eyes. “I knew you were doing drugs. I know the signs very well, Rhaenyra, like the back of my hand. And I know it because of Gwayne.” 

Her mind travels back to her brother and his drug addiction. She remembers being a teenager and seeing him high out of his mind, hurting others, hurting himself. She remembers her father locking him in his room so he wouldn’t do detox him somehow, baring the room of anything but the bed so he was certain he wasn’t hiding anything. Remembers the screams, the beatings Gwayne endured when he needed help. She remembers feeling impotent. Unable to move, hiding in her own bed. 

“I didn’t know I resented him so much until I saw him in you. I felt disgusted.” Alicent grimaces. “I’ve forgiven my brother. And he’s clean now. But…I know what drugs do. How destructive they are. And I couldn’t…let you do that to the kids. Because I know what it did to me. To live with a drug addict. And you know it too. So it made everything worse. I was disgusted and I was angry. All the time. And you weren’t home.” 

“It was never as bad as your brother.” She can see the shame in Rhaenyra’s eyes. Sees it the same way she saw through Gwayne when he asked her for money, insisting he wasn’t high. Sees it in how Rhaenyra needs to defend herself. 

“That bloody well doesn’t matter, does it?” Alicent snaps. “You were doing drugs. Drinking. And you thought I wouldn’t notice? Or was it  worse? You didn’t care that I did?” 

“No.” She says firmly. “I was lost. That was it. I was lost. Nothing was meant to hurt you. I just…I couldn’t deal with any of it.” 

The anguish is so present in Rhaenyra, it overwhelms her. She simply doesn’t know how match up all the feelings inside her. It’s too much, all of it. She wants to hold her, tell her it’ll be fine but that year is like a knife in her heart, still twisting and twisting. Bleeding out of her. 

“I watched my mother die, her blood in my hands.” Rhaenyra continues. “And I felt so guilty, I couldn’t sleep without seeing her in my arms, lifeless, by my hand. So I didn’t want to sleep. I didn’t want to come home to you wanting to talk so I just…didn’t. And I wanted it all to stop.” 

There’s an immediate response to it is that makes it feel like an attack. Because Rhaenyra just wouldn’t talk to her. Ignored phone calls, texts, avoided her at all costs. And for those first weeks, she’d been patient, so patient, she’d been supportive, she’d understood her grief. Alicent knows it manifests in ways you aren’t equipped to handle most times.

You have to move with it. Understand how the tides change every second. 

She just thought they’d move together. 

And she’d been wrong. 

“Why wouldn’t you tell me? I was your wife, Rhaenyra. We were supposed to be partners. It wasn’t meant to just-“ 

“Well, that’s a bit unfair, Alicent.” She breathes out, running a hand through her hair, frustratingly. “I could barely think. I can’t…I can’t even remember her bloody funeral.” She laughs humorlessly. “The weeks after it happened, they’re a blur, Ali. It wasn’t as though I was rationally staying away. I just couldn’t handle any of it. The kids asking about their grandma when I…” She trails off. 

Alicent takes a moment before fully realizing the depth of Rhaenyra’s feelings. “And you couldn’t handle my grief.” Her head snaps towards her and there’s a look on her face that tells her all she needs to know. It’s such a broken look, she almost looks away. 

“No.” She murmurs. “I thought…you’d all blame me for it.” 

“We would never.” Alicent tells her. “I don’t understand, Nyra. I don’t understand how after everything we’d been through, you’d think I’d turn my back on you. How could you think that? We were all grieving, I wanted to be there for you!” 

“But it was suffocating, Alicent!” Rhaenyra’s eyes are wide. Her stomach drops at the confession and she so badly wishes her mind was clearer than it is.  “Everything about this house was suffocating. The kids, you, always wanting to talk, always asking if I was ok, if I needed anything. You were…you. And I thought I didn’t deserve it.” 

“So abandoning us was the answer, was it?” 

Rhaenyra stops for a moment and she can tell the anger slips through without a warning. “You blamed me for the baby.” She throws the accusation with no doubt about it. 

And Alicent can’t deny it. 

She tries anyway. 

“You did.” Rhaenyra nods. “Do you remember? What you asked me at the hospital, Alicent? When they told us? Do you remember?” 

“I don’t-“ 

“Yes, you do. You asked if it was the last round of IVF. That’s what you asked me.” 

“Are you were going to tell me you didn’t?” Alicent throws back. 

That stumps Rhaenyra. “What?” 

“That year. Are you going to deny that you cheated on me?” 

The question hangs in the air for moment. 

And she watches Rhaenyra’s face as it falls into something so wounded, she doubts her own convictions. 

“You think I cheated on you?” She asks genuinely. 

“I know you did. My father-“

“Your father?” She interrupts but all Alicent can think is their friend’s  arm wrapped around Rhaenyra’s shoulder as they walked out of the club. 

“I have pictures, Rhaenyra. Of you and Harwin.” 

“What the fuck are you talking about?” She raises her voice, pacing around the room. 

“You and Harwin. Pictures of you with him.” 

“Pictures? Fucking pictures? From where?” Rhaenyra demands. 

“My father.” 

“I want to see them. I want to see the pictures. Now.” Alicent thinks she’s never seen her so angry. But it might be a mask after all. 

“You’re denying it.” 

“Yes, Alicent, I’m fucking denying it!” Rhaenyra tells. “Show me the bloody pictures.” 

Alicent grabs the MacBook on the coffee table. And the minutes it takes to find the pictures are excruciating. She can feel Rhaenyra’s anger, vibrating as she paces behind her. And then the pictures are there and she hasn’t seen them since she first saw them. Refused to. 

It’s Rhaenyra and Harwin, leaving a club. Rhaenyra is laughing, hiding her face in his shoulder, arm wrapped up around him.  

“Seven Hells, Alicent.” Rhaenyra seethes. “Your father must’ve done a number on you.” 

“I don’t think pictures lie, Rhaenyra.” Alicent looks away from the screen. 

“I didn’t cheat on you.” Rhaenyra repeats.  “I did horrible shit. I took drugs. And I drank myself into oblivion. I was a shit parent and a shit wife. But I did not cheat on you.

Alicent sets the MacBook aside, burying her face in her hands. She doesn’t know what to think. 

“I remember that night. Because it was the night I decided to get my shit together. After the intervention from Daemon. And Harwin came to pick me up because Laenor couldn’t. I came home earlier than I had in weeks. I decided that was it. That I was gonna get better.” 

She lets the words sink in. Because she wants to believe it but believing her would mean she made the biggest mistake of her life. In that black hole, where she couldn’t see a way out. Alone, terrified, with Otto pulling her strings. 

“Please tell me this wasn’t…did you decide to divorce me because of these pictures?” 

“I…”

“Gods.” Rhaenyra sits down. “You’re telling me, you thought I was cheating on you and instead of confronting me about it, you decided to divorce me?” 

“No.” She shakes her head because it’s true. Divorce was already an option. A formulated, thought through option. The pictures had simply been the final drop. “I…decided to go through with it. I’d already talked to my lawyers about divorcing you. It was the worst it’d ever been then before the intervention. For both of us. But yes, it made me go through with it.” 

“Your father hired someone to follow me. Got back into your life while I hit rock bottom. And…you ended our marriage over a lie. A lie he sold.” Rhaenyra laughs bitterly. “This is just brilliant.”

“Fuck you.” Alicent spats. “How can I not believe it? Do you know how many times you came home reeking of someone else’s perfume? You didn’t want me. You could barely stand to look at me. I thought you were done with me.” Alicent screams at her, eyes wide, face reddened with anger. “I stayed, Rhaenyra. Through all of it. Maybe I did need something more to blow it up. But I was alone. All our friends did was pity me. I couldn’t sleep. I went to work and then was alone in this house with three children, who repeatedly asked me where their mother was. And their mother was black out drunk somewhere. And my father was validating every insecurity I ever had with every word.” 

Rhaenyra sits with it. They both do. Maybe this was truly it. Alicent thinks maybe they can’t come back from this. Because she’s right. Alicent didn’t confront Rhaenyra because she was terrified of it being true. She thinks she had never truly believed it. But she’d been so low, so depressed, nothing seemed to get her out of it. So she let it fester, let her father get into her head and she’d fucked up. 

“I’m gonna beat the living shit out of him.” 

She’s frozen as Rhaenyra jumps from her place, leaving her jacket behind, car keys already out of her pocket. 

It reminds her of a younger Rhaenyra. Impulsive. Reckless. And always on the brink of explosion. She moves quickly after her initial inability to move, frozen in time, and follows Rhaenyra out of the door. She’s well on her way to that stupid sports car of hers. 

“Rhaenyra, stop!” She calls out. But the car’s already starting. 

Alicent runs like she hasn’t in a long time to get her own car out of the garage to follow Rhaenyra.

She knows exactly where she’s going. To Alicent’s childhood home. A twenty minute drive that by the looks of it Rhaenyra will have completed in ten. 

She’s already lost sight of her and gods, she’s terrified. Because this version of her acts without thought. 

She calls Gwayne who lives nearby their old house to warn him of what might ensue. 

“Are you home?” She asks. 

“Yeah, why?” 

“Rhaenyra is going to father’s. I need you to get there as quickly as you can. She’s about to do something crazy.” 

“Is she going to kill him? I won’t step on her moment.” Gwayne is bitter as always. “He’s supposedly dying, Ali. Let her have him.” 

“Gwayne, I’m begging you. Please just make sure my wife doesn’t end up in jail.” 

“Already in my car.” She can hear the eye roll. “And she is your ex wife.” 

She ignores his barb and simply decides to try and call her father, who does not pick up the phone. She calls the home phone. Trying Rhaenyra useless. 

Alicent’s car is going right on the speed limit which means Rhaenyra is going about as recklessly as she can because she can’t even spot her. 

The roads are horribly familiar. And though she’s been forgiving of  her father, there’s something rotten about these roads. She’d run from them. Then treaded them carefully.

Gwayne and Alicent get there at the same time. 

It’s chaos.

Her father is on the floor. Rhaenyra is punching him in the face. Again and again.

“You’re dying, yeah?” She hears her say. “Then die and leave her the fuck alone once and for all.” Again. She feels it her stomach. “Fucking cunt.” Again.

“Rhaenyra.” She yells, running over to them, trying to get her off him. Again. “Fucking stop. You’re gonna kill him.” 

“Good.” She hears Gwayne say in the chaos but then he helps her get Rhaenyra off of their father. They struggle, Rhaenyra is relentless but they get her away from him.

Her father scrambles to the wall, leaning against it, too weak to speak. 

Rhaenyra still trying to get to him. Trying to free herself from Alicent and Gwayne’s hold. 

“You piece of shit!”

“Please stop.” Alicent cries. “Please, my love.”

“You ruined my fucking life.”

They fall to the ground. Gwayne lets them be alone, stepping back and Rhaenyra breaks down in her arms. Alicent lets go, holding her as they both sob. The explosive nature of their day coming to its peak. For a long while, they just sit on the rubble ground, her father bloodied by the wall, her brother standing back.

“I think we need to get him to the healer.” Gwayne says when they’re slightly calmer. 

Chapter Text

Have you forgotten what we were like then when we were still first rate

and the day came fat with an apple in its mouth

it's no use worrying about Time

but we did have a few tricks up our sleeves and turned some sharp corners

the whole pasture looked like our meal we didn't need speedometers

we could manage cocktails out of ice and water

I wouldn't want to be faster

or greener than now if you were with me

O you were the best of all my days

Animals, Frank O’Hara 

The healer’s place, as Gwayne had called him, is, at the very least, sinister. Rhaenyra’s heard stories from Alicent’s childhood enough to know that the uneasy feeling the cold, nunnery like place sends through her, is warranted, never mind the emotional turmoil already in place. It’s something akin to a horror movie. 

Dearest Otto, of course, has always had a hard time believing in actual fucking science and this one time, she’s absolutely glad for it. Because if he were a believer in anything other than his gods, that would’ve meant showing up  to a hospital with a beaten up man. Questions is something they truly don’t need at the moment.  

Alicent is beside her in a wreck, sitting with what Rhaenyra doesn’t describe as worry for her father and more worry for her. Her eyes haven’t left her but she can’t really think about or acknowledge her gaze. All she keeps circling back to in her mind is that it’s the end of them. 

They can’t come back from this. Their conversation had opened wounds in a way she hadn’t imagined it could. Rhaenyra thought she held all the facts. She was prepared to own up to it, to beg, to apologize profusely, to make Alicent see that she’d changed, to convince her to take her back so they could rebuild their splintered life. 

Everything’s shifted now. 

And she thinks, surely, this is the end. Because she isn’t sure where to go from here. 

It replays in her mind, all of it. And try as she might, she doesn’t see a way out. 

It’s over. 

“Rhaenyra.” Alicent murmurs when Gwayne leaves them to go ask the healer how long it’ll take to hear news, the same annoyed look on his face because he’d rather be anywhere else.  Rhaenyra can relate. 

“I think we’re done.” 

The words escape like a mantra she’s been repeating and familiarizing herself with for the past few hours, now finally spoken aloud. 

The silence that takes over is something Rhaenyra can’t really fight because she’s scared she’ll say something she’ll regret. Something so final, it will leave no room for an opening. But perhaps, that’s just it. There is nothing as final as the moment they’re in now. 

“I don’t….” She hears Alicent. Her voice is shaky, unsteady as she makes sense of the moment. 

“I think it’s over between us.” 

The words rain down on them both and Rhaenyra thinks that notion might be clearer than ever. The glimmer of hope fizzling out. 

“For the last three years, I’ve held out hope that if I showed you I was better then you’d take me back.” She pause, a huff of a bitter laugh falling from her lips. “I thought it was all on me. I thought if I could somehow change your mind, we could be happy again. Be a family again. I was…waiting for your cue.” She stares straight ahead, can’t quite believe she’s actually verbalizing it all. It’s out there. It’s done. “I was playing a losing game all this time.” 

She doesn’t look at Alicent when she stands from her chair. 

Alicent doesn’t say anything, stares straight at her, unable to speak. And she can see the pain in her eyes, knows it, has seen it so clearly so many times throughout her life. It seems all they can do is hurt each other now. Long are the days when she could elicit the brightest smile on Alicent’s face. 

Now all that’s left between them is this. 

The tears in Alicent’s eyes. 

The pain in Rhaenyra’s chest. 

And the life they destroyed. 

“And honestly…I don’t know if you ever wanted me back. You kept pushing and pulling. Fucking me and spitting me out. And…I wanted to believe it was because you wanted me but…that’s not it, is it?” 

“Rhaenyra…” Alicent warns. 

“You liked the control, didn’t you? Keeping me under your thumb knowing I felt so guilty, that I wanted you back so badly, I’d never say no to you.” 

“No.” Alicent’s eyes are wide, like an animal caught in a trap, clawing for a way out. “I love you. You can’t honestly-“ 

“Did you learn that from your father?” It’s like Alicent’s slapped in the face. But Rhaenyra can’t find it in her to stop the onslaught of frustration and anger. For herself. For Alicent. For Otto. “Constructing your narrative so you’re the righteous one, the innocent one.” 

“I wasn’t the one who abandoned my wife and children.” Alicent throws out. She’s cold and hardened. Clinging to that one fact. 

“I did. I abandoned you. And that was the worst year of my life.  And you gave up on me. I get it. It’s not your responsibility. I just…Do you know what it was like? I needed you, I just didn’t know how to ask for help. And then I did. Then I fucked up again and you divorced me. And that’s fine-“

“What was I supposed to let you do? Overdose? Tell the kids mum died because she snorted too much ketamine? Live a life ruled by your addiction and your absence? Did it not serve you as a wake up call, Rhaenyra?” 

Rhaenyra doesn’t reply. Instead she sits down opposite Alicent and doesn’t stop herself from crying again, face hidden in her hands. And she can’t see a way out. 

“I was gonna get better.” She whispers after she calms down. Alicent is unmovable. “After the intervention. Then I was sober for that week. It was only the night of Aemond’s birthday that I…” Rhaenyra shakes her head, exhaling deeply, as if stopping herself from explaining any further. “Why are we even fighting, Alicent?” She’s exhausted, her hands are bloodied and she’s so exhausted from the accusations and the pain and all of this trust that’s been broken. Their hearts maimed by each other. She doesn’t want to keep fighting. 

“I don’t know.” Alicent murmurs to herself. Then in a moment of pure fear, she tries to reach out. “Let’s just…talk this through.” 

“It doesn’t matter anymore.” Rhaenyra’s lip trembles and she gulps. “None of this matters anymore.” She gestures between them. “You’re always going to hate me for that year. We’re never going to move past that.” 

Alicent looks away from her. And shields the pain in her eyes. Rhaenyra isn’t even sure she knows what it is she’s holding onto. Maybe that now she can grieve them. After three years, she’ll grieve the life they had and the love they shared. No hope for what they can rebuild. 

“I propose we stick to the written agreement. No more dinners with the kids, no more family outings. We stay in contact for them. Other than that, I don’t think it’s healthy for me to talk to you.” 

“Healthy?” Alicent looks so pained when she whispers that word. 

“Yes.” Rhaenyra snaps. “It’s not good for me. We’re not good for each other.” She doesn’t want to tell her that she wishes she wasn’t sober. That she wishes she could numb all of it. She doesn’t tell her that once she gets inside her car, she’s going to call her sponsor. 

“You can’t possibly-“ 

“You divorced me.” She says. “You did that. I own up to everything I did. Maybe you needed an out, maybe you were in a hole as deep as mine. But you let your father in.” 

“I let him in because I didn’t have you.” Alicent says those words so quietly, like a secret between them, a painful truth to her. Admitting her weakness. 

“I can’t be your only lifeline.” Rhaenyra shakes her head, in disbelief. 

“That’s always been the problem for me, hasn’t it?” Alicent sniffles. “You pulled me out of it, you did it a hundred times over and I couldn’t be that for you. I wasn’t enough.” She closes her eyes. “You’re right. All we do is hurt each other.” 

Gwayne chooses that moment to walk back in. He has that Hightower confused yet uncomfortable expression she knows from Alicent so well. Rhaenyra prompts him to speak with a look. 

“Otto will be fine. A couple of stitches but nothing major.” No one sighs of relief in the room, they just nod. “The healer was worried about his ribs but they’re just badly bruised. Should’ve kicked him harder.” Gwayne smirks softly at Rhaenyra. There’s something in him that’s comforting somehow, like he fully understands and sees what Otto is even if his sister won’t. 

So she nods, a silent recognition. Gwayne offers an awkward smile. “Alright then. He’s alive so I’ll be off.” Rhaenyra tells them. “Maybe ask the healer if he’s actually “dying”.” She throws Alicent a glance before getting out of the door. 

If Alicent thinks about it for too long, her chest will cave in. It’s a physical experience, that shock of pain that shoots up in her chest whenever she thinks of the past three years. It’ll leave her breathless. She’ll want to not fight it because she’s tired. She’s so tired of the weight of everything. The constant push and pull of her life, where nothing seems to ever stick. As if she doesn’t get to have the happiness she’s always craved. The peace. The calm. Rhaenyra. 

Self hatred might get her nowhere but she’s always been a masochist. In the end, what she’s always thought would happen materializes itself. In the before of it all, when they were teenagers, her greatest fear was that she’d end up making Rhaenyra hate her, fall out of love with her and she’d be left alone. Because she wasn’t like her. She wasn’t brave or proud. She’d never walk into a room and own it, she’d rather watch her, stand on the sidelines. 

Everyone always loved Rhaenyra. She was always charming and kind and confident and Alicent was just there, beside her. All her life. It never once occurred to her that she might’ve been living through her. All her friends were her friends yet…she always felt lonely when Rhaenyra wasn’t around. Because Alicent was never as fun, never as talkative, never as open. 

It’d changed, of course. Alicent had grown. Away from her father, she’d blossomed. But…still, always Rhaenyra. The center of it all. Her center. Then their children. Alicent thinks she might’ve forgotten herself all those years. And then she was forgotten by Rhaenyra. And Rhaenyra felt suffocated by her. 

Otto had been right. Alicent wasn’t meant for Rhaenyra. Not for the reasons he claimed, not because Alicent was too proper, too polite, too good for her. No. Because out of the two of them, she wasn’t enough. 

She’d failed. 

Always too cold, too needy. Too dependent. 

When she was left alone, to fend for herself, she’d failed. 

Rhaenyra’s love has always been so loud and Alicent was terrified half the time. That she wasn’t enough. That she couldn’t love her the way she deserved, in an uncomplicated way that held nothing but a steady hand and a steady heart. None of setbacks she brought. No guilt for loving her. 

“Ali?” Gwayne’s voice brings her back. “Do you want some company?” 

Alicent can’t quite find her voice when her brother’s eyes meet hers. “I fucked up.” She ends up choking out and all that’s left to do is sob in her brother’s arms in the home she shared with Rhaenyra, sinking to the floor. 

“Oh Ali.” Gwayne frowns, pressing a kiss to her head. “I’m here.” He murmurs. 

“I’m not doing ok, Gwayne.” She cries. “I’m not ok.” 

“I know.” He whispers. “You don’t have to be. Let it out, it’s ok.” 

She does. Cries for a long while, she can’t quite figure out how long. But Gwayne is steady and she’s held in so much, it bubbles up to the surface, pours out once she’s allowed it. 

“I love her. Isn’t that the worst thing? I ruined the one thing that made me truly happy because I was weak. I couldn’t be there for her.” 

Gwayne has an empathetic look on his face, eyes burdened by the past. “Addiction is a disease. And not just to the addict. To everyone around. It poisons everything, Ali.” He pauses. “It was a horrible situation for the both of you.” 

“I let father manipulate me.” 

Gwayne sighs softly, a moment of silence takes over before he speaks again. “Why wouldn’t come to me? I could’ve been here for you.” 

She closes her eyes. “I didn’t want it to be real. It was selfish but I…I couldn’t do it.” Alicent breathes out. “I didn’t know how to exist around her addiction, I couldn’t reconcile that with my wife.” 

He doesn’t offer any more comforting words. Alicent is too exhausted for much else, so he makes her a cup of tea, helps her up the stairs to the bedroom. 

Alicent doesn’t sleep.

“You haven’t gone to work in four days.” 

Daemon leans against the doorframe, staring Rhaenyra down. Passive look on his face, never showing too much but Rhaenyra can see the concern in his eyes. 

“And you know this how?” 

“I do have shares in the company, you know? And when the CEO is off work, word tends to go around.” He pushes past her and into the apartment. Rhaenyra doesn’t miss how he scrutinizes every inch, in search of, no doubt, drugs or alcohol. 

It brings her back to that whole year again. And how Daemon had been so steady in trying to get her to sober up. 

“I needed a break. I told everyone just that. The company can handle being without me for a couple of days.” Rhaenyra grumbles, shutting the door as Daemon struts around the place. She lets a few moments of silence pass when he doesn’t respond. “I’m sober.” She offers. 

He looks a bit thrown off guard. He is not as subtle as he thinks he is, of course. Never is when it’s about family. 

“Do you wish you weren’t?” He murmurs. 

She gulps, nodding her head. 

“Alicent?” 

Her posture stiffens at her name and she nods again.  She sits down in the armchair, runs a hand through her hair. 

“I think we’re actually over now.” 

Daemon looks surprised for the second time in five minutes. He eyes her carefully, unsure of where to step but he sits down on the couch in front of her. He doesn’t seem entirely convinced that her words could be true. 

“Want to walk me through that?” 

“Fucks sake, you sound like that one therapist girlfriend you had.” She rolls her eyes, head leaning back against the armchair. 

“She was exhausting, wasn’t she?” He smirks. Then there’s a pause as he purses his lips, sighing softly. “What happened?” He questions. 

Rhaenyra opens her eyes to look at him. “Turns out she thought I was cheating on her. So that was her last straw.” She tells him. Saying the words aloud makes everything somewhat worse, now that someone else knows. If on one hand, she hates herself for making Alicent distrust her so much she believed Otto, then, on the other hand, she believed they were stronger than that. No matter how unfair it might sound, as far gone as she might’ve been, she believed in them. 

“Shit.” Daemon winces. 

“Otto had someone follow me. Got pictures that made Alicent believe I cheated on her with Harwin. So I’ve been doing great, uncle.” 

He frowns, letting the information settle before probing her any further. “Want to explain the hand?” Daemon gestures with his head towards her battered hand. 

Rhaenyra closes her fist. She can still feel Otto’s face if she tries. There’s a horrible part of her that liked the way he shivered and moaned in pain. How he feared her in that moment, how weak he looked, how small. She had wanted him to feel like Alicent felt all those years in his home. How he even frightened her. But there it was, that wicked sense of satisfaction inside her.  She’s disgusted by the satisfaction it had carried. She had lost control. Yet…it had been a quiet and contained sort of chaos. The drive there. The way she’d climbed out of her car. Rang the doorbell. Offered the first punch. All of it controlled chaos. Blind and pure rage. 

She opens her hand, turning it so she can look at the wounds. “Otto.” She murmurs.

For all that Daemon’s been a champion for violence, he doesn’t seem particularly enthused by Rhaenyra’s actions. In fact, he seems to think of her as a mad woman. 

“So what? You threw a punch?” 

She tilts her head. “I actually sort of beat him up.” She answers. But she tries to reassure him.“He’s fine. We went to their….sort of doctor.” 

“Rhaenyra.” Daemon’s serious and it’s always a horrible feeling whenever he turns so serious. “Is he going to press charges?”  

Charges? It goes unsaid by the look on her face, startling at the question. 

“You assaulted him, Rhaenyra. The man may be a cunt but he’s cunning enough to fuck you over.” 

The thought stops her. She’d been so wrapped up in her and Alicent’s downfall, she hadn’t stopped to think everything through. In her own stupor, she hadn’t once put that consequence as a possibility. 

“If he has pictures of you from before and now this, what makes you think he won’t use it? That man has wanted to bring the company down since my brother fired his sorry arse. So he has you followed when you’re at your worse, manages to manipulate your wife enough that she goes through with the divorce and now you beat him up? What’s the endgame, Rhaenyra?” 

“Fuck.” 

“Fuck indeed. We managed to keep your addiction out of the press. So, I suggest you call your wife. See if she can contain it.” Daemon stands up, blowing out a breath. “I’ll see what I can do as well. Do some digging. Find who Otto hired, maybe there’s a way to get some dirt on him.”  

“Daemon, I don’t think that’s the way-“ 

“You mean an all out war? Going to his house and beating him up? I’m not above violence, niece but it strikes me as a bad move on your part.” 

Daemon sets off making calls so she retreats to the bedroom so she can call Alicent. She sits on the bed for a solid minute before starting the call. 

She stares at the picture on Alicent’s icon. She doesn’t quite remember when it was she took it. Alicent is smiling in the picture, the kind of smile that was so rare when they were growing up but a smile grew with her, became sure, given with abandon. 

When they were in Portugal one time, stumbling through the streets of Lisbon, their first trip without Aemond, before Helaena, she’d heard of the word ‘saudade’ in a bar while they heard music being sung with such melancholy it’d brought tears to both their eyes. 

Saudade. 

The feeling of longing. Longing for what was lost. Longing for who you once had. Longing for the past. It’s untranslatable and she finds it’s the closest definition she can find for what she’s feeling. 

It leaves her breathless. That ache for how simple things were and how she’d destroyed them. They’d destroyed themselves, in their dance. 

She presses call. 

It rings four times before she answers. 

“Rhaenyra? Is everything ok?” 

She takes a moment before answering. 

“I’m ok.” She mumbles. 

“Are you-“ 

“I’m sober. I haven’t done anything. I just-“ 

“That wasn’t where I was going.” Alicent tells her sharply. Then she softens. “But that’s…good. I’m…glad you are.” 

Rhaenyra doesn’t say anything for another beat, she sighs, closes her eyes and tries to find a way to ask what she wants to ask. 

“Is Otto ok?” 

Alicent blows out a breath. “He is. He’s resting.” 

“And the kids? Are they…?” 

“They’re fine, Rhaenyra. They know something’s off but they’ll be fine.” 

“Right.” She murmurs. 

“What is it?” Alicent asks pointedly after a moment of silence. 

“Will Otto press charges?”

She hears Alicent sigh before answering. “I made sure he won’t.” She tells her. Alicent’s breathing tells her she’s hesitant, unsure if she should tell her. “My father does nothing without wanting something in return.” She continues. “I’ve made sure he gets his something.” 

“Alicent.” She calls out softly. 

“It’s a trade off, Rhaenyra.” She keeps explaining. “It always is with him. And he’s had the upper hand for a while. I thought you understood that.” 

“How could I? You never truly tell me the whole story, do you?” Rhaenyra snaps. “Fucks sake, must we do this dance every time we speak?” 

Alicent is silent again. It seems their dance now is punctuated by exaggerated pauses. A suspension, both of them up in the air, before coming down again. Always moving yet always in place. 

“I’m sorry.” Alicent murmurs with a voice so fragile, her chest aches. “I realize I’ve never said it. For a lot of things.” She breathes out. “I’m sorry I was so cold about the baby. I was hurt and it only made everything worse so I hurt you. I’m sorry for that.” Rhaenyra doesn’t say anything, hadn’t expected her words. “And I’m sorry for not telling you about my father. Perhaps if I had, we could’ve…it doesn’t matter anymore, as you said.” Her voice breaks. “I’m sorry.” 

Out of everything she had been expecting from their conversation, an apology hadn’t been on the list. She’s isn’t certain what to make of it. She’s unsure of what to say. 

She’d never realized how much she needed it. Those words out of Alicent’s mouth, reassurance that she wasn’t the sole player in destroying everything. That maybe they just hadn’t fought hard enough. That perhaps she wasn’t the single worst person in the world. 

In the end, it brings relief.

Her mind is horribly shaken by their past. Before the pain. She thinks of Alicent, younger, under her father’s control, she thinks about her own teenaged recklessness, her quick anger and frustration. She’d never understood how Alicent could stand that dictatorship. She’d been so angry, then, unable to understand why Alicent couldn’t love her as freely as she did. She remembers what it was like, those bursts of Alicent’s rebellion, the freedom they injected into her and how happy she was. 

Falling in love with Alicent had been so natural, she had never had a moment of realization. It was simply something that was within her, a truth as right as breathing. It had grown with her, as they grew up. She had always loved her. There was nothing capable of changing it. 

They’d been so happy. Their love had been so joyous once they gave themselves the freedom for it. Once Alicent broke those chains. Once Rhaenyra had let go of anger. Once she had understood. Her relentlessness shifted focus to making sure Alicent was safe, to get her out of her father’s claws. 

And building their life was unlike anything she had ever imagined. It was hard, never uncomplicated but it’d been everything. She kept falling even more in love. Her strength, once she came into her own, her confidence growing. Building a home, with Aemond first, learning so much from each other, from parenting, from living their life together. 

Grieving what they lost, as she had been for the past four days, had left her emptier, unfathomably so. Because as decided as she’d been that day, unable to see a way out, she can’t see her life without Alicent with her. It’s such a daunting notion, not having the love there. It seems impossible that she could one day stop loving her. 

Even if it doesn’t seem impossible for Alicent to stop loving her.  

“Are you there?” Alicent’s voice sounds as shaky as she feels. “Rhaenyra?” 

“Yeah, I’m…I’m here.” She clears her throat, then she wipes the tear that had fallen off her face. “I wasn’t expecting that.” 

“I know I’m proud and stubborn but…I don’t want things to be like this.” She adds. “I don’t want to hide things from you. I just…sometimes do because I’m scared and I can’t…” 

Alicent trails off as thought it’s painful to keep talking but she does so anyway as Rhaenyra waits.

“My father still has everything on you. I’ve been…coming to see him because of that too. I figured if I kept the peace, he wouldn’t- the point is, it’s not just guilt or not wanting a heavy conscience. I wasn’t thinking straight when he came at me for that year and I was vulnerable. But I know my father and I know if I step out of line, he’ll stop at nothing to punish me. So I can’t…I can’t stop seeing him, do you understand?” 

She understands now. How deep his claws are in her and Alicent, no matter what, keeps putting herself through the pain of seeing him, as though that’s her punishment. Unable to tell anyone, for fear of who he might hurt. It’s like the past. A never-ending cycle. 

“I just want everything to stop.” She ends up saying. Because there isn’t a part of her that doesn’t crave the comfort of the home she built in Alicent and with every step they take, that home seems to be losing its foundation. 

“Rhaenyra, I forgive you.” Alicent blurts out. 

She’s certain she isn’t hearing her right. 

“I forgive you.” Alicent repeats, clearer this time, stronger. And there’s a moment of absolute quiet in her heart, settling for a moment, yet always waiting for the other shoe to drop. “I broke my vows to you before but…” 

Rhaenyra lets Alicent trail off before speaking, unsure if she’s going to keep talking. “So did I.” 

Alicent huffs out a sad laugh. “I suppose we both have a lot to be sorry for.” 

There is a very clear divide between Alicent now and Alicent before their final blowout. And as much as she’s tried to not think about it, there’s no one she knows better than she knows Alicent. She’s known her through every stage, through every heartache, through every moment of bliss. But this is different, there’s acceptance in her words, the freedom she’s tasted and allowed herself so few times. 

“I…was looking through our wedding photos. And I…I found your notes for the vows and mine too but I found the poem.” 

“Oh.” 

“There was a part of the poem that…made me uneasy.” She confesses. “I’ve never told you that. I’m sorry I was…I didn’t know how. It was such a happy beautiful day and I was so guilty for being so…bothered by it.” 

Rhaenyra can’t quite imagine what Alicent is so bothered by. The poem was so true, so close to her heart, she’d been searching for the words to say, unable to write down her own. Until the one poem came to her mind. Amongst the poetry section, collected over the years, the one obsession that never ceased, there it was, in a Neruda poetry collection. 

“I don’t understand-“ 

“But to my ears they will come before
to wear down the tour
of the sweet and hard love which binds us,
and they will say: “The one
you love,
is not a woman for you,
Why do you love her? I think
you could find one more beautiful,
more serious, more deep,
more other, you understand me, look how she’s light,
and what a head she has,
and look at how she dresses,
and etcetera and etcetera”.

“Alicent…” Rhaenyra breathes out. “Is the rest of the poem really that worthless you can’t snap out of that idea?” 

“I’ve never been enough for you.” 

“What on earth-“ Rhaenyra shakes her head in disbelief. 

“Everyone’s always loved-“ 

“You came to my life
with what you were bringing,
made of light and bread and shadow I expected you,
and Like this I need you,
Like this I love you,
and to those who want to hear tomorrow
that which I will not tell them, let them read it here, 

and let them back off today because it is early
for these arguments.

Tomorrow we will only give them
a leaf of the tree of our love, a leaf
which will fall on the earth
like if it had been made by our lips
like a kiss which falls
from our invincible heights
to show the fire and the tenderness
of a true love.” 

She finishes reciting the poem and lets it echo between them, their breaths the only sound afterwards. She hears Alicent sniffle, her heart clenches in her chest. 

“You still know it by heart?” Alicent murmurs. 

“By heart.” Rhaenyra says firmly. “You may doubt many things, Alicent, but I’ve always loved you too deeply to even entertain the idea that there could be someone better for me. You’ve always been what I want.” 

It’s a dreadful thing, really. That Alicent, even after all these years, still can’t see that there is no one else made for her, no matter how shitty, how horrible everything feels, how fucked up they’ve turned things. It wounds her deeply that Alicent never really truly trusted her love. Not in the most profound depths of who she was or…is. Always a lingering doubt.

Suddenly their end makes more sense to her. 

“I don’t understand how it’s possible to know you so well yet…you feel like stranger.” Rhaenyra murmurs. 

Alicent makes a strangled noise, escapes from somewhere painful and Rhaenyra knows she’s crying. But she can’t bring herself to allow the effect it usually has on her to take root. Instead she lets it hover over her, she understands this is who they are now. 

All they have left, she’d said. 

“I’m going to hang up now.” Rhaenyra tells her. 

“Ok.” Alicent whispers. She doesn’t hang up in that moment, allows the silence to grow until Alicent speaks again. “For the record, I don’t think I ever doubted your love. I just could never quite believe it was me you chose.” 

Chapter Text

Everything is beautiful and I am so sad.

This is how the heart makes a duet of wonder and grief. The light spraying through the lace of the fern is as delicate as the fibers of memory forming their web around the knot in my throat. The breeze makes the birds move from branch to branch as this ache makes me look for those I've lost in the next room, in the next song, in the laugh of the next stranger. In the very center, under it all, what we have that no one can take away and all that we've lost face each other.

It is there that I'm adrift, feeling punctured by a holiness that exists inside everything.

I am so sad and everything is beautiful.

Adrift, Mark Nepo

Aemond understands more than anyone would give him credit for. 

He watches his mother’s face as she works on whatever file she’s picked out of the pile she brought home. She hasn’t noticed he’s behind the door, peeking through the small crack. It’s late, he isn’t supposed to be up but sleep simply won’t come to him.

She pauses for a moment, leaning her head back with a deep sigh against her chair, eyes closed. His mother looks tired and a little sad. It’s been a while since he’s seen her happy, Aemond thinks he knows why but there’s a part of him that fears his mother’s always held something like sadness in her heart, it’s only that now it runs above the surface, on her sleeve, on her shoulders like a weight. 

The step back he takes, a floor board creeks and she snaps her eyes open. 

“Aemond, is that you?” 

His mother’s ability to recognize his footsteps will be the death of him. 

He takes another step back, tripping on the rug behind him and effectively ruining his escape. 

“I know it’s you, darling.” 

With a groan, he opens the door. 

“You’re supposed to be asleep.” She tells him, but she doesn’t seem particularly upset by the fact, more amused so he takes that as his cue to smile at her. “Don’t you dare.” She points her finger at him but he keeps smiling. It’s always been her weakness. 

“It’s not a school night.” He shrugs and sits on the chair opposite hers, on the other side of the desk. “Also, you’re not supposed to be working at this hour, so who should scold you?” 

Alicent rolls her eyes with a huff of laughter. “Don’t grow up, please.” 

Aemond shrugs again. “Can’t stop it.” 

“Well, I’m commanding it.” She tells him. 

Aemond smiles at her. 

He wants to ask her for family dinners again but he knows, without knowing why, that he can’t. He wants to beg her for the past, even though he knows he can’t. He wants their old house with the weird neighbours. Even though he knows it’s not really about the house or the street with Alicent’s favourite tree. 

“What is it?” Alicent asks. And Aemond thinks maybe she knows all that he can’t ask for. Her eyes have always been strangely telling to him, even at his age. 

He shrugs again and then settles for a moment. She lets him. Waits for him. 

“Did something happen with mum?” He asks gently. 

“Aemond.” Alicent sighs. Then she removes her glasses and rubs her eyes. “Things are…complicated.”

“Things have been complicated.” He argues gently. 

Alicent smiles sadly. “They have, my darling. We’ve both made mistakes.”

“Do you still love her?” 

And Alicent…well Alicent cannot lie. She will probably love Rhaenyra for all time. In every lifetime. Every damned parallel universe. The truth is that it isn’t always enough. And for now, it isn’t. She hopes. Aches. But it is not enough. 

“I do.” She nods. “Very much. I suspect I always will.” 

“But in love?” 

“Darling, I fell in love with your mum when we were just children without even knowing. I don’t think I’ve known what it’s like to not be in love with her.” She can’t help but smile softly at the memories that flash before her. She can’t help but be true. 

Aemond frowns. “It’s sad. All of it. I don’t…understand but I think it’s like a sad movie. Maybe it’ll get better and you can sweep each other off your feet.” 

His mother laughs softly. “And how would we do that?” 

“Roses, chocolates and a boombox. I just learnt what that is, by the way.” 

“Speaking from experience, are we?” Aemond laughs at her comment. “Things aren’t that simple, little love.” 

“You deserve simple.” He frowns. 

“Sweet boy, it’ll work out. Maybe not the way we hoped for, but not everything goes that way.” 

“I wish we could go back.” Aemond grumbles. Alicent stands up then, goes around her desk so she can be near enough to place a hand on his cheek. 

“Aemond, sweetheart, that isn’t how the world works. We must look forward, try to make the best of what we’ve been given. It’s no use dwelling on the past.” 

And as she speaks those words to her son, they seem to bring some clarity to her own mind. The past, the painful past she’s clung to perhaps needs to cast aside. Perhaps she needs to focus on rebuilding, on taking the ruins of everything they’d destroyed to rebuild. Not to the image of what it once was but something new, something built with what they were but also what they are now. 

•

Alicent drops them off at Rhaenyra’s, stopping the car, not even going up as had been the most recent method. She stopped the car and Aemond got the troops ready. 

“Bye, mum, love you!” There’s other incoherent sentences from the other kids as they get out, waving at her when the apartment door opens. 

She’s driven off, stopped at a red light when she notices the backpack in the backseat. Aemond’s. She sighs softly, already making her way back to Rhaenyra’s apartment. With the sneaking suspicion that he meant to leave behind, now recalling the smile she’d given her. 

It’s an ordeal. She needs to park the car, walk seven minutes because parking spaces are limited and then go up to Rhaenyra’s apartment. She doesn’t need to, she could just call Aemond and he’d come down and get it but…she’ll run out of excuses and intentions. 

She rings the doorbell. 

“Alicent?” There’s a confused tone to Rhaenyra’s voice. 

“Hi, Aemond forgot his backpack in the car.” 

She seems equally taken aback because the door is opened for her, even though Rhaenyra could’ve sent Aemond down. But it’s always the want, somehow. Always that ache.

In the elevator, she remembers it all. The escapades of their fast paced months coming back to her. Rhaenyra’s hands on her neck, on her mouth, her thighs. In this very elevator, kissing her hungrily after saying they wouldn’t have much time. 

The elevator doors open. And she makes the well travelled path to Rhaenyra’s door. 

“Hello.” Rhaenyra greets softly. 

“Hi.” Then she gestures dumbly to the backpack. 

“Thanks.” 

The glimpse into Rhaenyra’s apartment offers more than she bargained for. It’s decorated. Not the bare walls she’d seen before, but decorated. A new couch, more furniture. And she’s given into her lamp obsession once more, from the looks of it. Photos of the kids  adorn the walls. 

Rhaenyra catches her looking, watches her face curiously. 

“You decorated.” She blurts out. 

“Figured it was time.” 

She gulps. “Right.” 

It shouldn’t hurt. For fuck’s sake. Not this. Not Rhaenyra making her apartment home, making it warmer, beautiful. But it’s a blow. Heart beating too fast. Her stomach dropping. A searing pain in her chest. 

“Thanks for bringing his backpack.” 

“Of course.” She forces a smile on her face. “I hope you’re well.” She doesn’t know why she can’t stop herself. This want. The desire to linger on. 

Rhaenyra is surprised as well. She clears her throat. “I’m…alright.” 

“Good. That’s good.” She nods. “I should go.” 

“Right.” She hums. 

“I’ll pick them up, like we said?” 

“Yeah. Thanks for that, by the way. They keep screwing with my schedule. I tried telling-” 

“It’s alright.” 

“Yes but it’s just-“

“Rhaenyra.” She smiles softly. “It’s okay. I figure we should make things easier for each other. Not the other way around.” 

There’s a pause. “Sounds like a good plan.” 

Then Alicent says her goodbyes with a tightness in her chest and moves to the elevator. 

Rhaenyra doesn’t shut the door until the elevator doors close. 

When Alicent gets in the car, she cries. She sobs. 

And grief feels in part like relief. Admitting to herself, now, that she must stand on her own. The way she’d clung to anger for survival no longer an option. Grief wraps itself around her. Whatever stages she’d never bothered to read about passing through her. Wading out into it, into what feels like acceptance. 

It is over. For now. Maybe forever. 

(Gods, she hopes not. She hopes they are sent back to each other. She hopes the gods aren’t as cruel. She hopes they can take the suffering and make it into more than just this.) 

Alicent cries. She cries harder than she has in a long time. 

For herself. For them. 

It’s release. 

• 

A couple of months and the doorbell rings unexpectedly when Alicent is having one of her very needed and rightfully deserved wine nights. 

In the home camera, Daemon is glaring straight at it. She buzzes him in and walks to the front door. 

“Do you always show up unannounced at people’s doors?” She says in lieu of a greeting. 

Daemon looks at her tracksuit and frowns. “Now this is just sad, darling.” 

“Imbecile.” She rolls her eyes and Daemon wraps her up in a hug, pecking her cheek before pushing past her into the house. 

“Thank god you have wine. I’m pouring myself a glass.” He throws out moving towards the kitchen. Alicent simply shakes her head before sitting back down on the couch with her own glass. 

When he comes back out into the living room, there is a wine glass in his hand and he doesn’t say anything until he pours himself a glass and then sits on the armchair by the couch. 

“So…” He smirks. 

“What? You’re starting to freak me out a bit.” 

“Non sense, dear.” He says. “But I do happen to have news.” 

“Okay…?” She prompts him to go on hesitantly. 

“My dear niece has kept me updated on the status of your relationship-“

“I believe that we can hardly call it a relationship-“ 

“Irritating as usual.” He deadpans. “Point being that I am aware of your father’s hand in what’s happened.” 

Shame. It rips her open as guilt pours out from her and Daemon must sense it or her face has become pained perhaps. She used to believe she was hard to read but that thought seems foreign now. It seems as though anyone can read through her days. 

“And I know he’s known to manipulate you.” He says gently. As gentle as Daemon Targaryen can be, which means he’s being genuine. Which means he feels sorry for her. 

She hates it. 

She feels it clawing at her throat, wanting to defend herself, her father. The knee jerk reaction every time someone pointed out how twisted her father really is. To hide. To somehow convince them she’s strong, she can hold her own. And when she had Rhaenyra, perhaps she could’ve. But not completely alone, not this. 

Alicent doesn’t respond. She waits. She fights the feeling to defend him, to defend herself, to present herself stronger than she is. 

Daemon sees it as a sign to keep speaking. “He has the upper hand. You know this. Rhaenyra knows it. It’s why he has you firmly in his grasp. You think you have to please that wretched cunt so he won’t release what he thinks he has on Rhaenyra.” 

“You’re treading treacherous waters here, Daemon.” Alicent sighs. “I’ve been fighting this from the inside. He does have things on Rhaenyra. He doesn’t just think he does. He probably has every night out from that year documented. The company would go to shit. Rhaenyra’s life as it is would go to shit.” 

Daemon nods. “Right.” Then he takes a sip of the wine before placing the glass on the coffee table. He leans on his knees, towards her. “How would you like to render that information useless?” 

“What?” 

“You see, I’ve done some digging, darling. Laborious digging.” He starts. “And I’ve found some dirt on Otto.” 

“What kind of dirt?” 

“Well, you’re the lawyer here so I would assume you’d know the consequences better than I do. I have proof of fraud as of now. And there are witnesses, former employees of your father’s company that will come forward about being coerced into changing records.” 

The wine is suddenly bitter in her mouth. She feels breathless. Her mind conjures up images of Rhaenyra’s fist hitting Otto’s cheek. Over and over again. Her desperation. Her anger. And she remembers the shameful release it’d been. 

Alicent will always feel guilt for many things. She’s learnt guilt from the moment she was born. She was made to repent. To earn forgiveness for whatever sins she’d never even known about. For sins she hadn’t even committed. That spark of release in the midst of the horror. For a moment she hoped he had died. For moment she wished for the chains he still held in his hand broke free. 

And here is Daemon, giving her a weapon to destroy the chains. 

“And that information is what I’ve uncovered for now. I have people still going after him. With iron clad NDAs.” 

She stands, hand clasping her necklace (Rhaenyra’s gift to her, Rhaenyra everywhere) and turning her back to him. There’s a lump in her throat, there’s a weight aching to be lifted off of her. And there’s a part of her screaming that it’s too good to be true. That it can’t be. That there’s no way for her to be free. If she wants to protect her family, protect Rhaenyra, protect herself. 

“Alicent?” Daemon calls out softly. 

“Yes.” She sniffles. “Okay. What do we need to do?” 

“What do you want to do?” 

She breathes out. “You tell me, right? You have the information and I can’t-“ 

“Ali.” Daemon places a hand on her arm, she hadn’t even noticed him standing up. And she looks at him. “I am asking you. The information is yours. To use, to leverage. It is yours.” 

She winces. “No. It’s your family’s company, Daemon.” 

“This is not about the company.” He frowns. “It’s about Rhaenyra. And it’s about you. I know you’d gladly sacrifice yourself to protect her. But it’s about your freedom, as well. Fuck Otto. You deserve to be free of the cunt.” 

“He’s my father.” She says weakly. 

“Darling, go to therapy, please.” 

She laughs, snotty and tearful but his quip is so Daemon she finds herself laughing loudly. Maybe even more than necessary but he’s offering her freedom and he’s family. Still. Ever since she was a teenager and he seemed fucking insane and he’d been everything she’d been taught to hate. And then he’d stood up for her against Otto, the first person to truly stand up to him. Rhaenyra had challenged Otto then but not like Daemon. Daemon had nothing to lose against Otto. And that was new to him. He’d tell him to fuck off any chance he could and if he ever found out about him hurting Alicent in anyway, he’d burst into meetings and show up at his show ready to tell him. She knows Otto fears him. Daemon is, effectively, a wildcard. And Otto hates what he can’t control. 

Daemon hugs her and she cries. She’s been crying a lot lately. 

“I’m so sorry.” She mumbles into his shirt. “I’m so sorry.” 

He understands it’s not to him she’s saying sorry to but he grips her tighter. “It’s okay, kid. You’re ok.” 

“I lost her.” She blurts out. He pulls away to look at her, shakes his head and then smirks, mischievous and knowing. 

“Fuck you two useless lesbians, you’ll find a way.” 

“No, Daemon, I think it’s over this time.” 

“Sure. Give it a few months, then we can talk.” He seems so sure. She wants to believe him so badly. “So, want to drink wine and talk shit?” 

“Once I’ve washed my face, yes.” She chuckles softly. Then looks in his eyes, squeezing his arm. “Thank you.” 

“I hope you burn the world to ground, Alicent.” 

A week later after pouring every ounce of her energy into every file Daemon had sent her, she can be certain it’s factual and not a theory that if handed over to the authorities, the information in her possession would land her father in jail. She’d checked again and again, obsessed over it to confirm it was indeed true. 

She had her case. 

Staring her father down now, as he reads over the file, she sees the control crumble in his eyes. 

“You are out of line, daughter.” 

She locks her jaw, eyes on him, unwavering. “I’ve made sure to make several copies. Digital and otherwise.” 

Otto laughs bitterly. “And you think that…what is purpose here?” 

“Shall we lay it out on the table, father?” Alicent clears her throat, stoic and cold. Feeling detached from whatever she thought she had here. 

“Oh please, daughter, do the honors.” 

“You had my wife followed during the worst year of her life. She made the worst decisions that year. And you hang that over me, all that information, that leverage.” 

“I hang that over you? It is the only way I have to get you to talk to me. To see my grandchildren.” He argues, standing from his chair. “You’d rather I let you stay with that deviant, that miscreant?” He raises his voice and she steels herself, doesn’t allow herself to shrink, to flinch. 

And then in an even voice, she speaks. “If only you had tried to be a father before resorting to blackmail.” 

Otto remains emotionless, the anger from before staying inside. And once he tries to speak, Alicent continues. Alicent speak clearly, as though the words have appeared before her when for so long she remained silent.  

“If only you hadn’t tortured my brother when he was in pain, sleeping in his own filth, perhaps he’d speak to you, perhaps he’d care if you were lying dead in a ditch.” He falters, jaw locking. “If only you had accepted that I am a woman of my own mind, with a wife and children. And that for once in my life, I’d been happy.” She shakes her head then the last bit tumbles out of her mouth without hesitation. “Perhaps mother wouldn’t have driven into a tree just to escape you if you’d had an ounce of kindness in your heart.” 

The reaction is immediate, he slams his fist on the table, a perfect image of her childhood. “How dare you? How are you insinuate your mother took her own life?” 

“I’ve always wondered, you know?” She muses. “How a perfectly healthy woman lost control of her car in our driveway in broad daylight.” 

If it weren’t for the distance between them, she would be scared of his hands around her neck. He won’t, she knows. He likes to win. And Rhaenyra, despite what they are now, would rip him to shreds if he touched her. Daemon would destroy him. 

“Tread carefully, Alicent.” 

“You tread carefully.” She says with venom. “I want you out of my life. And this is reassurance. You do anything to harm Rhaenyra or our family, I will make sure you go away for a very long time. Whatever time you have left.” 

He stays silent, collects himself and then nods. “Very well.” 

“We will watch you carefully. You step out of line and that’s that.” 

“Look at you, child. All grown up.” 

“I let you manipulate me before and it cost me my life. Trust that I will not make that mistake, Otto.” 

She takes her purse off the table and starts to walk towards the door. 

Then she laughs to herself, stopping with her hand on the knob. “You’re pathetic. And you’ll die alone, father. I hope you get every ounce of pain you caused in that moment.” 

She slams the door and just as she’s preparing to exit the house, the portrait of her mother stares her down in the hall. 

A deep breath. “You’re coming with me.” 

She takes the portrait from the wall. And leaves him behind. 

Chapter Text

Tell me about the dream where we pull the bodies out of the lake
                                                                  and dress them in warm clothes again.
       How it was late, and no one could sleep, the horses running
until they forget that they are horses.
              It’s not like a tree where the roots have to end somewhere,
       it’s more like a song on a policeman’s radio,
                    how we rolled up the carpet so we could dance, and the days
were bright red, and every time we kissed there was another apple
                                                                                                 to slice into pieces.
Look at the light through the windowpane. That means it’s noon, that means
       we’re inconsolable.
                                            Tell me how all this, and love too, will ruin us.
These, our bodies, possessed by light.
                                                                        Tell me we’ll never get used to it.”

Scheherazade, Richard Siken 

Joff is the one who decides to be merciful on Alicent. Everyone’s been walking on eggshells around her when it comes to Rhaenyra which at first she attributed to their obviously strained relationship nowadays but it’s gone on to stranger lengths where everybody would change the subject whenever someone spoke of Rhaenyra. 

He and Laenor summon her for dinner at their place, which isn’t at all unusual. What is unusual is how sudden it is and how they sound desperate to get her to say yes. 

She doesn’t quite dwell on it but she’s somewhat convinced that she’s leaving their apartment with news she probably won’t like. But Alicent has been trying to live her life without entering never ending spirals. A difficult task but she is trying. And that means enjoying what little peace her mind offers her. 

When Joff and Laenor open the door, joint at the hip as they are, they smile, genuine but with something unfamiliar in it. Something Alicent can’t quite figure out. Nonetheless, she hugs them both and follows them into the apartment as they catch her up on whatever happened with Joff and client’s portrait. It’s funny, lighthearted because they’re so good at that, so good at making conversation. And it’s familiar. 

She remembers long nights with her and Rhaenyra in this very apartment, just laughing and talking and being in each other’s company. The couch exchanged for the floor at some point, then it’s three in the morning and it doesn’t matter because it’s so fulfilling to just sit together. How it used to be haunts her every move. 

Their night is just that. Familiar for a while. They laugh, they joke. They catch up on the kids and work and life and it’s what it’s always been. But she can’t not ask. 

Once she knows it’s nearing the end of the night, she smiles at them. 

“What is it?” She questions when there’s a lull in the conversation. 

They’re taken aback. 

“The thing you wanted to tell me.” 

Laenor looks pained for a moment before Joff places a hand on his knee. 

“I promise we did want to just catch up, you’ve disappeared on everyone for a bit.” He frowns. 

She thinks of denying it, but so many parts of her life are so Rhaenyra, she’s needed to step away from it and that included friends. 

“I know.” She frowns. 

Joff gives her a reassuring smile. “We get it.” He murmurs. And then he looks to Laenor who nods his head as confirmation to go ahead. “So.” He starts. 

“Is this about Rhaenyra?” She asks softly. 

Joff frowns. “Yeah.” 

She knows what it means. She knows what it’s probably about so she’s been preparing. But not enough because the moment he says the words, she feels like her chest is caving in. 

“We just…I suppose we thought you should know and maybe she will talk to you about it, but she’s been on a couple of dates with someone. She hasn’t given us any details.” 

She gulps down the wine. “Right.” They say something else but she can’t listen. Doesn’t. She’s processing, or trying to. A beat passes, Alicent unfreezes when her teeth rip off some skin off her finger. 

“Are you…okay?” Laenor asks. 

“Yes.” She nods. “I’m just going to use the bathroom really quick.”

She stands without another words and almost runs to the bathroom. There, staring at herself in the door, heart beating rapidly, she thinks of all the times she’d thought of this particular situation. And how the real thing is so much worse. 

Alicent wants to throw up. It feels like she’s been betrayed, has had her heart broken. It feels like the world is closing in. 

The tears come to her even though she wills them not to, even though she begs the gods to hold them until she’s under the covers of her bed, under the fucking dent on the ceiling. Under every memory the room had seen. 

But no chance, really. She’s sobbing with a hand over her mouth in her friends’ bathroom. She’s sobbing and remembering the New Year’s of that year where she came just before midnight with Rhaenyra’s tongue inside her. 

“Happy New Year.” Rhaenyra is annoyingly grinning up at her, hands still on her thighs, kneeling between her legs. “What does it feel like to orgasm in the new year?” 

“I don’t know, darling, because you made me cum just before.” She snorts. 

“Technically, your orgasm lasted through.” She smirks, then presses soft kisses to her thighs before standing up, only to press her lips to Alicent’s. “But I can always do it again.” 

“Everyone will wonder where we are.” 

“I believe everyone knows where we are, Ali. You’re not exactly quiet.” 

Hitting her shoulder, she shakes her head as Rhaenyra laughs. “Idiot.” 

“You love me.” 

She smiles. “I do.” She says seriously. Then she caresses her cheek, eyes so soft as they look into her wife’s. “Happy New Year.” 

“Happy new year, my love.” She murmurs, pecking her lips. “This time next year, we’ll probably be spending our New Year’s changing nappies, plagued by sleep deprivation.” 

“Remind me why I let you convince me to have another baby?” 

She giggles. “Because we have three wonderful little dragons who make our lives so much better. Also because I got really horny when I was pregnant the first time. And my boobs looked great. And you love that.” 

“Mmmh.” Alicent nods. “Can’t argue with that. Work of art really.” 

“So, we should, perhaps, make the most of this year.” 

“This is why I married you. So smart.” She grins. “Your turn.” 

“Alicent?” 

She sniffles. “I’ll be right out!”

None of this was ever supposed to happen. 

Laenor calls her again and she hates everything about this. 

“Hey, I’m gonna come in.” 

She intends to stop him but she can’t get the words out. She’s sitting on the toilet, face in her hands. And her friend wraps his arms around her. 

“Sorry.” She chokes out.  

“It’s ok.” Laenor says, pressing a kiss to her head. 

“I just- it shouldn’t hurt this much. I can’t-”

“You have every reason to be upset, Ali.” He frowns. “It’s not easy news to take.” 

Blowing out a breath, she looks at Laenor. “I just thought that I would’ve handled it better.” She smiles sadly. “But apparently I am fundamentally unable to take anything lightly.” 

“Do you want her back?” 

For a moment, her knee jerk reaction is to say yes. Of course. But then she doesn’t know. She doesn’t know if she’s ready to rebuild any of it right now, even if Rhaenyra wanted to. She doesn’t know if it would be a good idea to get back together or try just to blow up again. She feels like the sensible thing to do is take a step back. Figure things out for herself. Maybe for the first time.

“I don’t think that would be a good idea.” She breathes out. 

•

“I had…an almost relapse. A few months ago.” Rhaenyra starts. “I had that too real feeling again. Everything felt too real and I just kept thinking how much easier it’d be. That way out.” She pauses. “A client texted to go out, a deal he wanted to talk about and I…wanted to say yes, badly.” She breathes out. “It made me feel so guilty to think those thoughts again. To consider it. Have it be a possibility. And that guilt made everything worse. I don’t want to do drugs but at the same time…” 

“What matters is that you held on.” The woman to her left, the one who runs these meetings, says kindly. “You’re clean. You didn’t relapse. Even in that situation.” 

“But what if I do? What if things get that bad again? And I know the usual answer is you call people, you remind yourself of the hurt you’ve caused yourself and others. But…what if I do relapse? What if I’m not strong enough to hold on?” 

“You do it all over again.” A boy says. Aegon, she thinks. She’s seen him a couple of times at these meetings. The boy’s always in and out. Not exactly a constant present. “That’s what happens.” 

“Aegon, is there anything you’d like to share today?” The kind woman smiles a warm smile. 

He shrugs. “Not really, Diana.” He tells her. Then he fixes his stare onto Rhaenyra. “Not that I have the right to give advice but I do have a tendency to relapse. So, to be honest, fuck your almost relapse.” Aegon offers her a smirk. There’s something sad about it, it’s more about himself than it is about her. It’s not an insult or a critique or lack of sympathy. It feels like Aegon’s seen more than someone his age should, felt more pain than anyone should.  “You’re sober. Take the win.” His eyes travel away from her, he escapes somewhere in his own mind and she watches his face. 

“Despite his convoluted way of putting it, Aegon is right.” Diana smiles softly. “You’re sober, Rhaenyra. You didn’t relapse. It will always be a battle. Maybe it will get easier, maybe not, but you will always struggle. It might not seem like it now but this is good. It was hard but you pulled through it.” 

She lets the words sink in. It terrified her to an extent that is likely unhealthy. Relapsing. She hasn’t. She’s clean, that’s what she wants to focus on. But she’s lost so much because of her actions, because of her addiction. She doesn’t think she’s strong enough to pull herself out again. 

It’s daunting to think that addiction will always be apart of her life. But there is a quiet reassurance in that notion. She wants to think she can take it. Perhaps she can be strong enough to stay clean, for her children, for herself, for a semblance of a life that isn’t hazy even if the pain is there. 

In her car, on the way out, she spots Aegon walking in the rain. The kid’s ridiculously wearing shorts for this kind of weather. So she slows the car down, opens her window. 

“You need a ride?” She asks. 

Aegon startles, eyes comically wide. “Fucking hell. Don’t sneak up on people like that.” He shakes his head. 

“Sorry.” Rhaenyra chuckles softly. “So, what’s your final answer?” 

“I don’t really think you should bring this car into my neighborhood if you want to walk out alive.” He shrugs. 

Her heart aches for a moment for this kid. And it’s a feeling she hates, the whole pity show coming through without a warning but it’s clear that this kid has had the toughest hand dealt to him and he’s trying to be better. She knows the feeling of failure, she knows what it’s like to feel like you don’t deserve forgiveness, to feel as though everything is your fault. She knows the anger behind it all. And she can see it in his eyes. 

“Also, I’m a minor. I’m not supposed to take rides from strangers.” He smirks. “Then again, nobody really gives a fuck if I make it home.” He doesn’t waste time in jogging over to the other side, opening the door and getting in. “Is that pity I see?” 

“You’re four years older than my kid, you know?” She blurts out because it’s really all she can see. Some sick version where she’s such a bad parent Aemond ends up in a meeting, bitter and tragically despondent like Aegon. 

“Cool.” Aegon snorts. He sets out to type out his address into the car’s GPS. “It’s a shithole, so keep the thoughts to yourself.” 

Rhaenyra shakes her head as she starts the car. Aegon fiddles with the radio, switching stations but not really finding anything he likes, grumbling about it. 

“You got Spotify?” He questions. 

“The car has the app.” 

He snorts. “Ok, fancy.” He puts on Pulp and Rhaenyra laughs. “What?” 

“A little predictable, that’s all.” 

“Oh shut up.” 

“What’s next? Echo and the Bunnymen? Joy Division? The Smiths?” 

“You’re irritating.” 

“You remind me of myself.” Rhaenyra chuckles at the horrified look on his face. “All moody and snarky.” 

Aegon shudders playfully. “I resent that.” He says. “Plus you’re loaded. At least I have reasons to be moody.” 

“Money doesn’t mean everything.” 

Aegon narrows his eyes. “Full offense, don’t be fucking ignorant.”

“I’m not being ignorant.” 

“You are. People like you think your struggles are as hard as other people’s. And sure, you might’ve had a shit time, lost people, rough patches and all that. But you’re never going to struggle thinking about if there will be enough food or hot water or water at all. If you get sick, you can afford it. Not the same.” He shakes his head. 

Rhaenyra stays silent for a bit and then nods, takes in his words. “You’re right.” She says. “There are things I will never worry about. Things my family never will have to.” 

The kid is surprised, he tries to find a reason not to believe her but he sees none of it. So he sighs, unsure what to say next. Silence houses them for a moment. 

“How many kids have you got?” He questions. 

“Three.” Rhaenyra smiles. 

“What are they called?” 

“Aemond, Helaena and Lucerys.” 

“Pretentious.” He snorts. 

“You’re called Aegon.” 

“Yeah, but my parents were high off their rockers when they had me.” He retorts. 

“What are they like?” 

“Dead.” 

Rhaenyra winces. “I’m sorry. I didn’t know.”

“Not like I have that shit written on my forehead.” He shrugs. “Foster care, right now. A couple years and I’m home free.”

“And what do you want to do then?” She questions. 

He scratches his neck, looks out the window. “Uh…I don’t know. I’ll probably end up working at a supermarket somewhere.” He evades the question but she sees it in him. Something. Despite not knowing what. 

“There must be something you like.” 

“There’s not a lot of hope for people like me.” He mumbles. 

She frowns. “Well, let’s say we’re in a dream world and you could do whatever you wanted. What would you do?” 

“It’s embarrassing.” He shakes his head. 

She smiles softly. “Now you must tell me.” 

He groans, rubbing his face. “It’s really dumb. Remember that when I tell you.” 

“Dreamworld, Aegon.” She reminds him.

“I’d draw.” He blurts out. “Like comic books and shit. Or anything really. I…I’d draw.” There’s a slight blush on his cheeks. 

Rhaenyra smiles at the admission. His face looking younger as vulnerability shines through. 

“That sounds pretty cool. Think you can show me your sketches sometime? Maybe next meeting?” 

Aegon eyes her. “You’re serious? You’d want to see that?” 

“Yeah, of course.” 

He looks at his hands, then clears his throat. “A-alright. I can do that.”

•

The annual Targaryen benefit Gala arrives with the usual pomp and fanfare. They had all tried to plea with Viserys that he should stay home. The galas are filled with people that will want to speak to him, tire him out. And frankly, the family just want what little time they have left. 

“I want the little time I have left.” He had said to them in response. 

It had shut them up. Rhaenyra. Daemon. Alicent. The three stubborn ones. The painful raw truth to his words was heard. 

And so here they are. At Viserys’ request, a family united at the event he was always the most proud of. 

The company had been responsible for helping so much and so many  in the city. The charity, Aemma’s idea, had been her baby. She had worked so hard to make sure the money went to the right places, to the right people. This gala was Aemma’s, always. Forever. 

Which brings them all here. Hosting the event. A big happy family. The generous family, standing together. 

“How was it?” Alicent questions gently, the moment she gets Daemon alone by the bar. 

Rhaenyra is off with Viserys. Letting him hold onto her. She looks beautiful in her neat dark green suit. And Alicent hates that it makes her feel as it always had even as she was simmering with resentment and bitterness.

“He’s in pain.” Daemon gulps down his champagne. “And doing a damned good job at pulling through it.” 

Alicent’s heart beats a little faster, she frowns, eyes the two familiar figures in the distance. 

“I think we’re nearing the end really.” Daemon speaks low, gripping his glass. “I know we’ve been saying that for months but-”

“I know.” Alicent interrupts, wills herself not to lose it. Years of practice on delicate matters. “I see it too. I think we all do.” 

Daemon’s eyes seem to dim. His expression somber, as he looks at Viserys in the distance. 

“Fuck me.” He says, taking a swig of his glass. “The gala was only this depressing the year Aemma died. She was the only who knew how to do this whole thing. We’re a bunch of fools.” He scoffs. “Except Rhaenyra maybe. She used to bring the drama, make this a little interesting.” 

Alicent smiles absentmindedly. “Ah, the ice sculpture scandal.” 

“I meant more when you two were caught making out in the bathroom.” 

“Daemon.” She slaps his arm. 

“Teenage love.” He sighs mockingly. “Such horny beauty.” 

“Gods, you’re incorrigible.” Alicent shakes her head. 

The gala passes slowly. They each take turns chaperoning Viserys. Later they are all at the dinner table just for the family. Rhaenyra and Alicent on each side of Viserys. Him between them, tired but with a soft smile on his face. 

Around them the world dances about. Dinner flowing in, tables chattering amongst themselves. The kids also content with their wild conversation and loud laughter. 

Viserys takes it in. Rhaenyra’s eyes trace his face every so often. Alicent sits, quietly, if not for little comments into Daemon’s stories. 

“Everyone.” Viserys murmurs weakly. 

“Father?” Rhaenyra says and she meets Alicent’s concerned gaze. 

“If everyone could just please give me a moment.” 

He smiles, waves his hand. The table stops to listen closely, amongst the chatter from the room. The gala in full swing. But Viserys is still now, looking at all of them.

“Ah, how lovely.” He says, warm, smiling. “To be here. Surrounded by the faces of the people I love most in the world. Celebrating my love’s lifelong project.” There is a mournful moment that crosses him but he smiles fondly anyway. “Listen, I am old. But because I am old, I get to ask for things. And what I wish for most is to see this family united.” He looks at Rhaenyra, then at Alicent, then the rest of the table. “For what time I have left, I want you by my side. All of you. I ask that you settle the past. I’ve lost enough to know life happens too fast. We cannot afford to waste it. So, with that being said, let us enjoy this night. There is nothing more important than our family.” 

They all smile. Rhaenyra rubs her father’s back. Daemon claps, laughing softly. Then he leans to Alicent. 

“I think that was the old man saying get back together.” He murmurs in her ear. 

She shakes her head.

Dinner resumes. 

The rest of the gala flows. Viserys retires early. Growing tired quicker than ever before. It’s up to the rest of the family to stay. Make the rounds. The kids are taken home, a babysitter hired for the night. 

People dance. They donate. Photographers surround them. The world moving with speed, senseless, foreign. Alicent misses them together. Misses the support in the midst foreign fog. She’s letting herself reminisce more than she’s ever allowed herself to. It had been easy to live in anger. Now with that fire gone, it’s just this longing.

When she steps onto the balcony, a part of her isn’t surprised to find Rhaenyra there. She thinks they’d always gravitate, somehow. She hopes. God, she desperately hopes that’s true. Fated.

“Oh, sorry, I can just go-” 

“No, it's fine. You don’t have to-.” Rhaenyra interrupts her, taking a drag of her cigarette. 

“No really, I’m sure I’m the last person you want to see.” 

Rhaenyra’s gaze is intense. “That’s not true.” She says, her eyes closing in on her. “Not at all. Never.” 

She closes the door behind her. Takes a step forward. 

“I know the gala’s hard for you. I don’t want to make it harder. I actually tried to convince your dad I shouldn’t-”

“Ali, just…”She sighs. “Just stop.” 

Silence takes over. Alicent leans against the rail, looks out at the city. Between them, there’s a whole universe of who they are. Who they were. The parts they lost in time. 

Rhaenyra offers her cigarette. And she takes it hesitantly, then brings it to her lips, inhaling the smoke. Then passes it back to Rhaenyra. 

“The kids were great today.” 

“We managed not to fuck them up completely I guess.” Alicent tries but the joke falls flat. Rhaenyra is gracious anyway. 

“There’s still time.” She jokes back. 

Alicent snorts, a smile covering her lips. “Aemond reminded me of you. Utterly annoyed.” 

“And unable to hide it.” 

“Oh I think he fully chooses not to.” 

“Luke, however, very polite.” 

“Very princely.” Alicent smiles. “And Hel did so good. She was so nervous.”

“Our sweet girl.” Rhaenyra’s grin is soft, fond, full of warmth for their children. There’s a pause and Alicent wants to ask, but she’s afraid it’ll set something off. Or maybe that she’ll see it in Rhaenyra’s eyes. Her moving on. Love for her abandoning her for someone else. 

She doesn’t ask her about it. They share a cigarette, in silence. Alicent doesn’t hate it. It feels somehow like a step closer to…something. Something a little lighter maybe. A truce. But the thought crosses her mind in a flash. 

“Would you like to get out of here?” 

Rhaenyra appears to be surprised. 

“Remember that one place I used to study at all throughout college? Pulled enough all nighters in there, really. It’s just around the corner.” 

“You mean the place with questionable food and somehow even more questionable coffee?” There’s a hint of a smile on her lips. 

The sight itself is comical. They’re dressed to the nines in the shittiest diner in the world, probably. Having shitty coffee, in the same table Alicent used to sit and study for endless finals. She hated studying at home and that damned place helped. 

Rhaenyra is listening to her recalling the woman who used to serve her. An older lady. Maria. Perhaps the most bored woman she’d ever seen in her life. Annoyed when Alicent asked for a refill of the coffee. 

“I’d like this to be easier.” Rhaenyra says after a beat. When there’s a lull in the story. “I will never not want you in my life.” 

“Do you mean that?” 

“Must you doubt everything I say?” She sounds annoyed. But Alicent’s heart is beating out of her chest. Alicent’s hope has always felt foolish. It has always been unbelievable to her that Rhaenyra was hers. 

“A few months ago you told me we should cut all contact apart from the kids.” She says weakly. 

“There’s no morning I wake up not wanting to call you just to talk to you. About some weird dream I had. About something funny that happened. When I’m sad, when I’m happy, when I’m angry. It’s…well, I tried it. Cutting you out. And I’ve decided I hate it.” 

The hum of the tv in the corner of the diner is the sound in the pause between them. Alicent stares at Rhaenyra’s face for any hint of hesitancy. For something that might tell her that she’s imagined this moment. 

Alicent clears her throat. “I’ve cut off my dad.” 

“You what?” 

“Stormed into his house with documents proving he’s corrupt as shit, threatened to ruin his legacy, told him I hope he dies alone, to fuck off and I took my mum’s portrait.” She explains. And then she lets out a laugh. It’s a little delirious, she admits. But there’s such relief and it’s so insane and ridiculous that she did it. She finally got rid of him and it didn’t fix anything but she felt free. 

Rhaenyra takes a beat to join her. But then she laughs. “Oh gods, Ali.” 

They laugh for longer than they planned. But there are tears in Alicent’s eyes that aren’t just from laughing. And when it dies down, Alicent is fully crying. 

“Shit, sorry. I’m sorry.” She wipes away her tears furiously, looks down at her lap so she doesn’t have to look at Rhaenyra’s face. 

“Ali.” Rhaenyra calls out and she is suddenly next to her on the booth, she is so close. It is the closest they've been to each other in months. She can smell that damned cologne that is so Rhaenyra. The her hand touches her elbow gently, it sends a shiver down her spine, as evident by the goosebumps down hers the minute their skin touches. 

“You don’t have to deal with this. Really. Here I am being the one comforted by-”

“Stop that.” She breathes out, close enough that Alicent feels her breath on her face. “Look at me.” 

But Alicent can’t. Not truly. Because she will melt. She will break. And she’s tried very hard to lose that same devious hope that somehow this is over. 

“Please.” She begs. 

“Nyra.” Alicent warns. But Rhaenyra is gentle when she turns her face, a hand on her cheek. 

“Hi.” She murmurs, with a soft smile. She looks impossibly young in this moment. Alicent feels like she’s 16 and unsure of who she is again, and then those eyes bring her in and she finds courage in them. “I need to tell you something.” 

“Gods, I’m not sure I can do it, Nyra.” 

“Shush.” There’s a small smirk on her lips, her hand still rests on her cheek. “I went on a date.”

Alicent whimpers. “Joff told me. I cried in their bathroom.” 

Rhaenyra frowns at that, but decides to go on. “And I sat there and all I could think of was you. I was possibly the worst date that woman has ever had. I don’t know what I was thinking but she asked me out and I said yes without thinking because I just felt like I had to.” 

“Rhaenyra, I mean it when I say I don’t need you to tell me about it.” 

“You’re not listening. It is not as though I didn’t know, but I am incapable of not loving you. I legitimately felt like I was cheating on you.” 

“Jury’s still out.” Alicent says with a bit of bite. 

“Ali.” She says it like a prayer. “We are insane.” 

She cocks her head. “I’m inclined to agree, yes.” 

“Let’s just try to be, please? Rebuild something, anything. I need your mind in my life again, it is the only way it makes sense.” 

“Codependency isn’t very healthy, you know.” 

“So I’ve heard.” 

They stare at each other. Something like an agreement being made with no words. An understanding. 

“Slow. We take it slow.” Alicent says. 

“Slow.” She smiles. 

•

Rhaenyra could’ve sworn she’d seen it in a dream. 

It’s a beautiful morning. Helaena is busy chasing butterflies. Luke is holding her hand as they walk, talking about his dinosaurs and Aemond is skateboarding back and forth, smiling wildly at her whenever he passes, speeding just enough to make her heart race ever so slightly. He’s inherited her love for speed, it’s been clear to her for years. Along with his love for cars, just like her. It’s unnerving how alike they are despite the absence of a blood connection. 

The sun is warm on her skin and the world is quiet. 

So quiet. 

So peaceful.

She’d felt it coming, even before she answered the phone. 

The weather doesn’t blend with her uncle’s voice. It’s much too bright, too warm, too peaceful. The contrast doesn’t escape her. 

She’ll remember this day forever. She’ll remember Aemond understanding in an instant even from her side of the conversation. She’ll remember Helaena’s giggles as she listened to Daemon’s words carefully. In absolute denial at first. Then the realization that it was real. It was happening. She’ll remember the grief in her son’s eyes. 

Viserys Targaryen dies in his sleep. 

“It was peaceful.” Daemon tells her. She doesn’t know what that means. Peaceful. The day is peaceful. 

And her father is dead. 

But she can imagine a world where she’s certain her father was at peace because he would be joining her mother. 

But her father is dead. 

There’s something like autopilot in the way she pulls up Alicent’s contact when her uncle hangs up the phone. Aemond doesn’t say a word when she motions for him to look after his siblings. He knows. He’s growing up too fast and grief is now on the forefront again. Yet her boy wants to protect Hel and Luke fiercely. So he waits with them while Rhaenyra takes a few steps away from them. 

“Nyra?” Alicent’s voice is a relief. Her voice has been a relief. They are rebuilding something. But her father is dead, she repeats in her mind. 

“Ali-“ Her breath hitches. “Fuck.” 

“Rhaenyra?” There’s a tilt to Alicent’s voice, it takes Rhaenyra back to that hospital, her mother’s blood staining her clothes. 

“It’s dad.” She doesn’t want to say the words. “Ali, it’s dad.” She chokes out, feeling the sob climbing up her throat. “He-“ 

“Where are you? Are you with the kids?” 

“Yeah.” She breathes out. “I…Ali, dad is dead. My dad is dead.”  

She can hear the whimper from her. She can hear her moving on the other side. “Can you tell me where you are, my love?” Her voice is shaky. Her voice is so shaky. Shaking like Rhaenyra’s hands. “I’m coming to you, okay?” 

“Please. I’m at the park. Our park.”

“Okay, okay. I am on my way. Do you want me to stay on the phone?” 

“Ali, he’s dead.” 

She can hear her sniffle. “I know, baby. I’m so sorry. I’m so sorry.” 

“Oh gods.” It hits her again. A fresh new wave of grief washes over her. “Oh gods, Ali.” 

“I’m five minutes out, Nyra. I’m close by, okay? Are the kids-”

“Aemond understood. He’s with them. How do I tell them? I can’t-”

“I’ll be right there with you.” 

It’s a few minutes later that feel like an eternity that she sees auburn hair in the distance running towards her. Alicent crashes into her, holding her tightly. The kids notice immediately and however Aemond had held them back from Rhaenyra, he can’t hold them back from Alicent. 

Alicent kisses her forehead. “Take a second, I’ll tell them, my love. I’ve got it.” 

“Not this time. We have to do it together. It has to be different.”