Chapter Text
He is eight when he loses his eye. It is his most precious memory and his worst.
It is a moment so far away and foreign that it feels more like a dream. Blinding pain, the soothing hold of an omega and the soft press of a chest, the smell of flowers cutting through the odor of blood.
Aemond is a child; still, he wants him, reaching for Lucerys through the stinging hurt. He does not know what strange power thrums through him. It is something ancient and beyond thought or reason. There is no vision, just overwhelming blackness. Lucerys' gentle words and his own whimpering as they sewed what was left of him shut. The hands that hold him are slender and warm, the only thing keeping Aemond from crying. A stark contrast to the coarse touch of the maester, the needle threading through his skin.
It had been an—
"—accident, sweet thing," Lucerys whispers to him, "Forgive me. It will be alright, do not cry. You are so brave, Aemond."
Yes, an accident. He recalls that much. A dragon underneath him conquered. Taunts hurled at him, as well as fists. Flashes of Joffrey unsheathing a dagger. He remembers Lucerys running, coming between them.
And then nothing. His own screams, little else. All he knows now is sharpness and the pillowed roundness of flesh upon his, the way they contradict each other on either side of him.
"You are so brave."
Immediately after the stitches are in place, Aemond shrinks away from the contact as if burned. He opens his eye, the only one left and sees many people around him, familiar faces, all grey and all shadowed. His mother looks the worst of them, wild hair around her like fire and ashen in pallor. His sister and brother are beside her, bracketing her with their weight as she weeps, wracked with violent shakes. His father looks at him with a detached curiosity, a ghost among them. The knights surround and separate him from everyone else like a sea of impenetrable metal. In this dim light, with a single eye, the glinting of the candlelight off their armor disorients him.
Lucerys is the only one he can truly focus on. Luminous in his embroidered nightgown, he shines even in the night—a beacon in the dark. The brightness of it is stained with crimson splotches around the seams. The opaque wetness of it makes the fabric cling to him, to every dip and valley of Lucerys' lovely figure.
Aemond is staring. He knows he is, but can not look away. Disgust should boil inside him. Yet, all he can feel is pride because Lucerys is covered in him, his blood, his scent.
"It hurts," he says, the only words he’s able to form.
And then, Lucerys reaches out, the cradle of his palm under Aemond's chin, the first to speak of them all.
"Are you alright?" His question is quiet, gentle, as though he were calming an animal.
It does not soothe him. It is like being doused in ice water. Humiliation swallows him whole. Remembering leaning into Lucerys' embrace, searching for something he was unsure he could ever get from anyone. His first taste of comfort. He had thought it would be his last, so he grasped it with greedy hands, foolish and young as he is.
It is too much.
He jerks back from Lucerys' fingers and runs to his mother. She holds him, unnaturally subdued now that her sobbing has ebbed into quiet sniffles. Her hands in his hair do little to calm him, but he leans into it as the youngest child would. He has never been held by her like this, and though it is strange, it is welcome.
A crease grows between her eyes, overflowing with tears. "What happened? My love ," she asks, focusing on Aemond as he looks back at her. "Who did this to you?"
"Alicent, please," his sister, his other sister, says. It is the first time Aemond notices she is also in the room. "Let us put the child to bed so we may speak freely."
"He has lost his eye; he must tell us who is responsible for this horrible act!"
There is a wave of clanking, armored fingers wrapping around sword hilts, the sound of unrest. A threatening commotion behind every movement. There are floodgates on each side, all willing and wanting to open with a quiet fervor. A promise of more blood is in the air. Then—
"Do not fight!"
Everyone looks toward Lucerys as he rises from his place on the floor.
"It was I," he continues, voice lowering, wiping the wetness on his cheeks. "It is my fault. I came upon young prince Aemond and my brother Joffrey quarreling over Vhagar. I had tried to calm them, but it only escalated. I tried to wrestle the dagger out of Joffrey's hands, and my grip slipped." He swallows. He regards Aemond, damp eyes full of sorrow. "Our young prince misses an eye because of me ."
Aemond stiffens, mouth opening and closing like a fish out of water. It does not come back to him immediately, but he can see and hear it in some distant way.
( Lucerys screaming. His hands, echoes of white as the dagger came raining down from the sky )
"Brother, no," Joffrey calls from across the chamber, struggling in Rhaenyra's hold.
His own mother's fury is felt before it is heard. Her fingers curl fiercely around Aemond. "What is to be done then? Viserys ?"
The King is only a patient man when circumstances allow. A song for justice rings heavy in the air, and royal blood had been spilled. Aemond can not help but look down when his attention falls on him. Somehow, this frightens him more than coming face to face with Vhagar, the glow of flames in her mouth, ready to turn him to ash. He feels his pulse beating harshly in his veins, but the anger he awaits never comes.
"My youngest son has lost an eye at the hand of my grandchild." He sighs. "There will be repayment for this. Joffrey will come to stay with us at the Red Keep. As a prince, he will be treated according to his station, but he will serve as a companion to Aemond."
A responding uproar is unleashed, Rhaenyra's pleas of ' Father! ' loudest in the din of madness. His mother is also about to join in when Lucerys' voice cuts through it all for the second time that night.
"Grandsire, My King , if I may?"
Viserys cocks his head to the side. Surprise lights up his faded features, eases when it falls head-on upon Lucerys. It is no secret. As one of his only omega grandchildren, and the loveliest, he is the favorite. More than the sons and daughter he sired, even. Aemond knows. He's heard Aegon's whispers of it.
"You may speak your piece."
"I will go in Joffrey's stead."
Rhaenyra cries out, "Luke, don't you dare!"
"You are an omega and betrothed," Viserys says, ignoring all else. "You will forfeit your future, my boy."
Lucerys lifts his chin, no doubt trying to appear brave and just. "It is my hand that is stained with Aemond's blood. I will care for him. Joffrey has a future in knighthood, and I am merely an omega of two and twenty. Little else awaits me. I will accompany you to the Red Keep and serve the young prince until the debt is deemed paid."
Aemond looks up, his mouth open. Panic flares inside his chest, engulfing him in its jaws.
He beckons to him, " Father ," he croaks, a plea for something he does not know. "'Twas a fair exchange. I may have lost an eye, but I gained a dragon." He glances for a second at Lucerys, his own stare trained on the stones beneath his feet, profound sadness underlining every beautiful contour of his face. He swallows around the way it makes him feel. "He need not care for me."
But his father raises his hand in dismissal, attention turning instead on the Kingsguard, reddened with fury. "You have done the worst of it, asleep on your laurels and utterly useless. I should have all your heads for allowing this to happen!" His alpha wrath shakes the room. His mother's soft intake of breath is the only indication that she appreciates this.
"I trust you can handle taking one child to his rooms for the night," he continues. "If a single hair on his head is harmed, I shall make it so that none of you sully the white cloaks you wear ever again."
And so he is removed from the room. As he walks past Lucerys, he catches his smell again. It is tinged with something sour. Fear. The strange need to protect overtakes and emboldens him. The sensation is as horrifying as it is elating, like jumping into black waters with no bottom in sight.
At that moment, Aemond knows he must stay away.
The following day, he refuses passage on the ship.
He rides Vhagar above them all and pretends that Lucerys does not cry alone in his cabin beneath, penning a letter to an alpha he is no longer promised to.
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He is ten, and he hates him.
It has been two years, and yet Aemond can not bring himself to open his heart to Lucerys in any way that matters. Everything about the omega puts him on edge. It is not just his smell, hypnotic and wonderful as it is. It is also in the way he behaves. Sly in some ways and innocent in others.
Others see him as kind and patient. In no time, he has won over every person in the castle; omega, alpha, noble and not alike. His other nephews and niece attach themselves so thoroughly that he is hardly seen without one on his hips. He and Helaena practice embroidery together, and Daeron often races him on dragonback when the weather is willing. Even his mother is not immune to Lucerys’ charms, her icy treatment of him melting under weekly teas in her chambers.
It is astounding as it is infuriating.
His eye is the one that was cut out. His . He had not wanted this in the first place, had known this would be the end of all things. His nephew’s hands do not bring him relief as they did in Driftmark. It is like being branded. His fingers on him make Aemond—
"I need to take your sapphire out," Lucerys whispers. He is standing at the edge of his bed, hands clasped in front of him in wait.
"Why can I not sleep with it in?"
"The maesters have explained it will cause you great discomfort if it is not removed," he sighs, rubbing soothing circles onto his own skin with his thumbs. It only serves to irritate Aemond further. How dare he feel frustration for a situation he put himself in? He sucks his tongue, argument ready on his lips. His eye drifts from Lucerys' hands to his mouth, his eyes. He wants to commit it all to memory and loathe every part in turn.
But, the way Lucerys looks at him so expectantly has him turning his head in surrender.
"So pliant," Lucerys teases, reaching for him, touch as delicate as his gaze. It burns him. "I will be quick."
It does not hurt as he expects it to. It had been quite jarring when it’d been put in, but now it has dulled into something stranger. Something is unnerving about having a weight in your skull suddenly gone, but there is no sharpness. Lucerys hums a song while he does it and does not look at him with disgust or revulsion, as though he is happy to do it. When it is finished, Lucerys applies an ointment around the empty socket and smiles. Aemond feels as though he might suffocate.
"Would you like me to read you a story, my prince?"
"I do not like you," he says suddenly, though it comes out weak and less than a whisper.
A ghost of a frown flashes on Lucerys’ features. His head cocks to the side. "I did not catch that, Aemond."
"I said, ‘I do not like you.’" It's easier the second time.
"Is that so?" Lucerys does not seem surprised. "Why not?"
"Because," Aemond starts and stops. He looks away from him, can not look at that face while he says, "You cut out my eye. I remember what you did every time I look at or smell you. Everyone at court is scared of me, and adores you, even though you're the reason I'm like this."
"I see," Lucerys says slowly. Aemond thinks he might leave, the length of time he stays silent. But then he's sitting down beside him on the bed. He takes Aemond's hand in his. He can not help but marvel at it, for despite being so far away in age, Lucerys' hand is not much bigger than his own.
"You know, I can leave if you wish," he whispers, squeezing Aemond's fingers. "I will live out my days on Dragonstone and not return. Is that what you want?"
Aemond does not know why he doesn't say yes. The way Lucerys' dark brown eyes shine black, glimmering like coal in the snow, makes Aemond weak, and he doesn't know why .
He shakes his head and says nothing.
"Then, you must promise me to not mind the silly opinions of others. Your eye is gone, but you are still beautiful to look at," Lucerys bites his lips as though he's caught himself saying something out of turn. Quickly says, "Would you like me to fetch a book?"
He still does not know what to say. Thoughts evade him, so he nods.
Lucerys reads him a story that night about a princess and a noble lord running away and dying together. Aemond asks no questions and voices no opinions, though he thinks them ridiculous. Running headfirst into danger for the sake of another person was laughable. A fantasy.
When Lucerys finishes, he blows out the candles by Aemond's bed. He reaches over him to do so, and the young boy catches hints of his smell. Different, somehow. It's milkier, heady on his nose.
"You smell strange," he says around a yawn.
Lucerys huffs. "That is a conversation for another time, sweet thing. Good night."
And he is gone, and Aemond is alone in the darkness.
He tries to sleep.
Shortly after, the sickness begins.
He awakens in the middle of the night, ragged from screaming, Lucerys' melodic name on his tongue.
An alpha, he's told.
"How wonderful," Lucerys tells him over breakfast the day after. "Another alpha in the family."
Aemond's mouth is full of bread and jam. He can feel it sticking to the roof of his mouth. Something in the way Lucerys says it puts him on edge.
"And you remain the only unmated omega," he answers, perhaps more meanly than he’d intended.
Lucerys chuckles, grabbing some fruit from a bowl. "And you are a messy eater," he jests, but Aemond notices his eyes dim and how his smile slips.
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He is two and ten when he learns he can not stand another alpha looking at Lucerys. Not even his own brother. Though Aegon is closer in age to their nephew, older even, he acts younger than them both.
It is the middle of the day, and the library is empty, save for the four of them. Aegon leers at Lucerys as he reads, a familiar hunger plaguing his features. Aemond has seen it before, tossed at maids and the whores Aegon sneaks into the Keep. His fists curl despite himself, though he wills the strange anger down to a flicker.
"Aemond, are you listening?"
"Yes, I am."
"You are not, you are glaring daggers at your brother."
Aegon chuckles from his place across the table, licking his lips. Lucerys pretends he does not notice as he flips through the pages of their book, eyes trained on the words. Maelor is on his lap, babbling and reaching for his necklace as he tries to explain a passage to Aemond, when he finally gives in.
"Uncle, why must you stare at me so? You are distracting us all."
Aegon quirks a pale brow. "The question is, how can you be so beautiful?"
“Do not be so licentious.” Lucerys clenches his jaw. "Aegon, I am trying to teach your brother history."
"Teach me as well, little Luke." He raises his eyebrows suggestively. "I've been remiss of such exhaustive education my whole life."
Aemond slams the book between them shut. "Stop it, Aegon."
Maelor begins to cry. "Oh, no, poor sweet thing," Lucerys tuts, rocking the babe in his arms. “Have these brutish alphas destroyed your peace?”
He feels his lips twitch, would snarl were they not in the presence of an omega, yet Aemond feels himself soften at the sight of Lucerys swaying his baby nephew back and forth.
"Helaena will not be happy when I tell her the cause of the babe's distress," Lucerys grouses, getting up. "I will be back, and you both better behave yourselves while I am gone."
When the doors slam closed, Aegon scoffs and reaches over, yanking at Aemond's braid. "Look at what you've done."
"What I've done? You're the one salivating over him," he hisses. "You've driven him from our company."
"Fond of his company, are you?" Aegon sniffs. "Of course you are."
"Lucerys is a noble prince. You should not speak of him in such a way, brother."
"He is a bastard and a whore," he grits back, "He's laid with half the castle. I merely want my turn."
It hits him like a fist. Denial bursts from inside Aemond, opening his mouth for him, "No, he hasn't. He's a maiden!"
Aegon's responding laugh is cruel, but his words are crueler. "He is a hot-blooded creature, born of another hot-blooded creature; he has half this castle sniffing after him and his pretty cunny, and you think he hasn't spread for any of them?"
Aemond shakes his head. "You're lying."
"If I were lying, why do you think no one has offered to wed him?"
"Because he is my compa—"
"Your companion ?" Aegon mocks, "The truth is, if he really wanted to, he could leave. Father would not stop him. He's here because he has nowhere else to go. In fact," he smirks, lowering himself to Aemond's height, "There are tales that the alpha he was betrothed to before had taken the slut's maidenhead himself. He is no good to anyone besides a quick, good fuck."
There is a loud crack. Aemond does not realize what has happened until Aegon brings his palm to his cheek, red and swollen from where Aemond had hit him.
When their eyes land upon each other again, he does not hesitate. They are upon one another like feral cats, swinging, wild. Aemond is sure he lands a few good punches, but Aegon has his advantage in age and height. Before long, the familiar smell of violence is in the air. He is on the floor, his brother above him, doublet bunched in his grip.
Aegon shakes him, out of breath himself, a bruise blossoming on the ridge of his cheek. "You need to open your one-eye because I will not always be here to help you. That omega is not to be trusted, nephew or not. He will gobble you whole, Aemond. You must not let him."
His chest rises and lowers at such a ridiculous speed that Aemond feels like he might collapse.
"You are wrong about him."
"I am never wrong when it comes to whores," Aegon smirks, turning his head to spit.
And then he's off him. Rasps, "I'll see you at supper," and is gone.
When Lucerys returns to the library, Aemond is dripping blood from his nose, failing to stop it with his sleeves. It is a mess. He tells him as much and scolds him as he tends to his injuries, however minor they are. It loads him with so much embarrassment he can not keep his mouth shut.
"He called you a whore," he says miserably.
"I do not care."
Aemond looks at Lucerys as though he's grown a second head. His brow is furrowed, concentrating on a particularly deep cut on his chin.
"You don't care?"
Lucerys sighs. He sounds tired. "Do you not remember what I told you? Not to mind the words people hiss at court?"
"But it is not fair," Aemond says shamefully. "It’s not right."
Lucerys, for the first time Aemond has known him, looks impassive. Unreadable.
“So it is.”
He turns to go, and Aemond follows, trailing behind him like a kicked dog.
"Why did Aegon call you that?" It is a simple question, but it comes out as a demand.
"I do not know," Lucerys stills and lifts his head, back still to him, his gaze glued forward. "I'm unsure why anyone says anything. There is contentment in not knowing, sometimes."
When he walks away again, Aemond stays frozen in place.
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He is four and ten when he realizes what it all means.
It is a slow day that has trickled into an even slower evening. Silently, he walks the winding halls of the Keep. When he turns a corner, he catches a strange smell. It’s coming from the East Wing of the Holdfast, where Lucerys’ chambers reside. Curiously, he follows it.
He does not need a reason to come to Lucerys' rooms anymore. It has become a habit of his. Any time of day, if he feels too lonely, has a question, or wants some company, he knows where to go. His mother has told him it is inappropriate on many occasions. Still, it does not stop him from doing so whenever he is bored.
That is why he barges into his chambers without warning, going on about the scent. But, he immediately falls silent when he sees him.
Lucerys is bent, arched in an unnatural position. He's drenched in sweat, completely nude save for a white sheet across his middle. He curses when he sees Aemond, muttering nonsense.
"Do not look, oh, Aemond ," he groans, head back, the white column of his throat bared to him. "You must leave."
But he can't. It is as if he's become rooted to the spot, unable to breathe, let alone move. The way he'd said his name had struck him dumb, had him swallowing air. The way he looks strikes him dumber, still.
When he finds his voice, it rattles out of him. "What is wrong? Shall I get the maesters?"
Lucerys keens. Aemond has never heard him like this. He seems to be in excruciating pain. A part of him only wants to draw closer, brush his distress away with his palms, though his mouth stings as though he's bitten something sour. His teeth itch. Saliva pools under his tongue.
"The maesters know, sweet thing," he strains out. Lucerys shuts his eyes and moans in such a way that has Aemond burning red. "It is my heat. It has come early."
"Is there anything I can do? I can fetch you—"
"No!" He yells quickly, "No, the only thing you can do is turn around and walk out that door. I am not in my right mind."
But Aemond does not leave. He watches. That cloying scent is there, wafting around them both like a shroud. Lucerys' slender curves bend in the dying light that filters in, disappearing and reappearing as he writhes on the bed like an illusion. He dips a hand beneath him, under the sheets, and between his legs.
"Do not look," he repeats, but his legs spread, and the blankets fall from him.
He wants so badly to stay. A part of him knows what awaits him if he does.
—Aemond does as he's told. He shuts his eye, and locks the door behind him.
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As he grows from a boy into a man, something changes. The feelings of resentment morph into something altogether different, no less nauseating.
"We never go flying together," Lucerys tells him one day, a couple of weeks before his sixteenth name-day. "We should remedy that."
"You always go with Daeron," Aemond mutters, nose buried in his book. The jealousy in his voice is contained, but it is there.
His nephew sucks his teeth, turning toward the large window in the study. "It is a beautiful day. Take me to see Vhagar, and I will take you to see Arrax."
"I do not want to." But he's putting the book down, getting up from his chair.
Lucerys smiles knowingly at him.
When they arrive at the Dragonpit, the keepers bring Arrax out. He is a beautiful dragon, Aemond admits. He shines cool blue in the afternoon sun, the color of a clear stream. The creature trills at them as Lucerys nears it, arms extended, a soothing song on his lips. It is an old one, sung in High Valyrian. He had taught it to Aemond once. It calms the dragon, and it anchors him.
When the Keepers bring Vhagar out, there is no need to calm her. She is an old thing, tired most days. He pats her sagging scales and smirks when she looks at him with mild annoyance.
"Would you like to race us?"
Aemond stills his hand. "Vhagar does not like racing these days."
"Hm," Lucerys murmurs. "Perhaps just a flight then?"
It's become hard to say no to him lately. So, Aemond agrees.
Above the clouds, there is no wind. Vhagar is not a swift beast, but Arrax is; he seems to enjoy flying circles around her, clicking and twirling to her chagrin. Aemond knows. He can feel it, a wriggling sensation in his chest, but he does not share her sentiments. Lucerys is always lovely, always gorgeous, but even more on dragonback. He's giggling so openly. He is now an omega of thirty, usually refined and demure. Yet, he looks incredibly young like this, a song of laughter interspersed with commands flowing easily from him.
Love blossoms into a twisted and gnarled thing. His source of pain and longing melts and becomes one forever at that moment. He watches him and thinks of Lucerys on his bed, in heat, wanting and refusing a lover. He thinks of Lucerys reading him stories, and of him cutting out his eye. He thinks of hundreds upon hundreds of Lucerys' in between.
Aemond wants them all, every bloody and wet version of him.
They do not come down for hours until Helaena flies up on Dreamfyre to fetch them. At supper that evening, he could not stop looking at him. The revelation has clicked every part of him into place. His destiny was in full reach, across the table with a halo of dark hair speckled in stars.
He begins to think, to hope , that Lucerys will bond with him one day when he is old enough to take an omega.
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He is seven and ten when those dreams turn to ash in his fingers.
Aemond finds Lucerys in the gardens. A part of him hopes it is a lie. He can not allow it to be true. He needs to hear it directly from the omega before allowing himself to choke on his misery, to burn his fierce wrath.
He is sitting prettily on a pillow atop the grass. Rose bushes surround him, blooming and lovely. He wears rosebuds braided into his dark hair, no doubt put there by Jaehaera and Jaehaerys. His silk chemise is the color of cream beneath his lace doublet, beautiful as he is. Aemond is so struck he is silent for a moment, his distress momentarily forgotten until he remembers that soon this vision will be gone from him.
"Tell me that my mother jests," Aemond says, a winded and desperate plea. “Tell me it is falsehoods and cruelty and nothing more.”
Lucerys looks up from his embroidery, eyes widening at the sight of him. Aemond must look a mess, laces open and wind in his hair. He'd run here straightaway, his mother's words ringing in his ears, a repeated song—
He is to marry. Lord Borros will be a good match for him. His debt has been repaid. It is only fair.
"Oh, sweet thing," Lucerys sighs, his hands stilling. "I wanted to tell you myself."
The wounded noise he makes sounds inhuman. Aemond can hardly register it as coming from himself. He swallows to keep his voice still and says, "You will rot in that damp castle. Why are they sending you there?"
For a moment, Lucerys' face draws up into a pitying frown. It quickly trains into one of indifference, pulled taut and stiff-lipped. "I will not mind it," he says, shrugging his shoulders, "After all, I enjoy the quiet."
"I won't allow it."
A sad smile graces his exquisite features. "Do you wish you could come with me?"
Aemond's eye is wet. He can feel it. There is no answer to the question Lucerys asks him, none he wishes to voice. Of course. Of course, I want to go wherever you go, he wants to say. The needle in Lucerys' hand flashes silver in the sunlight. His work is masterful, an explosion of green and black threads on white cloth. Aemond can make out a dragon's head, a black flame around its gaping jaws, vicious rows of ivory teeth; it's beautiful in its horror.
The side of him that wants to burn the world to a cinder is winning. He points his chin at it, sneering cruelly, "Is that a present for him ?"
A blush blooms on his cheeks, but Lucerys shakes his head. "This is a present for someone else." Lucerys usually wears every emotion, like the jewelry he adorns himself with. Aemond has long been used to it and knows how to unpack the subtle movements of his expressions. His head tilts, the slope of his shoulder, how he squints—a puzzle he's apt at picking apart as the one closest to him at the Keep, doted upon in ways his other siblings weren't. But even he can not read him now. A secret , then.
Something terrible, he knows. Something he does not want to hear.
"For who?"
Lucerys' hands go back to work. He leans forward, uncomfortable. "Hopefully, a babe." His pretty grin disappears and replaces itself with a crooked frown. "It is what my new husband will expect of me."
His faint voice makes Aemond ache. The words pull him apart, bending the ground beneath him. He shakes his head, his eye stinging with a threat of tears. Lucerys' eyes shine, too, with an emotion that Aemond recognizes as guilt. It is sunny, the birds sing, but the world has never known a darker day than this.
"You can not go to him. I will not let you."
Lucerys advances upon him, hushing and enveloping Aemond in his arms. There is gratifying heat, the smell of roses, his only consolation since childhood. "Do not cry, Aemond. We will have the wedding feast here, and I will visit from time to time."
He does not respond. He stands still and lets his tears wet the silks beneath his cheek.
"Don't leave me," he begs.
Fingers wrap around Aemond's hair, tilting his face so Lucerys might look upon him. Puffs of air, hot and sweet-smelling upon his cheeks as he speaks, " Alpha , you will always be my favorite."
He will hold those words inside himself forever, until it becomes so distant and stretched he will wonder if they had ever been said at all.
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The night before the wedding feast, he dreams of Lucerys naked and crying underneath him, begging for a son.
Aemond wakes drenched and gasping for air.
In truth, he barely slept, tossing and turning, miserable with sweat and nerves. He stares up at his ceiling and tries not to think. It is an exercise in futility, like counting the number of swords that make up the throne, or roses in the garden. He'd been up for hours before—haunted by images of a slender and unmarked neck, a mess of curls so black there was no discerning them from the dark. It had been the last thing on his mind before his eyelid finally closed. The dream was so vivid it left his fingers curling. He clenches his eye and fists, dismayed that his shame followed him into the morning, a specter of guilt in the form of his spend drying on his stomach, an echo of pretty moans in his ears.
The servants will see it, he thinks. It sticks to him, flaking off in scales of disappointment. He sucks his teeth as he sits up, throwing the offending nightshirt onto the floor where it belongs.
The pre-dawn light cast everything around him a ghostly blue. He holds his head in his hands and tries not to weep. Aemond touches his scar.. There are days it hurts. On others, he feels nothing. Today, there is a sharp sting behind the empty space, his body yearning for something he can not give form to.
Some things can not be forgotten, no matter how hard he tries.
Aemond grimaces as he sets his feet on the floor. It is cold. It makes his toes curl. He tries not to think. He tries desperately.
When he walks to his dresser, it is with heavy steps. It is bare except for his sapphire on a satin pillow. Above it, a mirror. His hands hover over his socket. It's been years, but he still can not stand the sight of it. He pointedly ignores his reflection until the weight of the jewel is snug inside, forced in with little care. So different from how Lucerys used to do it.
The result is always the same; an empty space, temporarily filled.
Lucerys marries today.
There is little he can do but watch it happen.
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Borros Baratheon is a beast, resembling a bear more than a man. Lucerys looks so small next to him; it is almost comical. Almost , for Aemond could kill him with his bare hands were not so many people around.
They sit away from everyone else at a long table at the front of the Great Hall. Aemond sits aside, though he has an unobstructed view of them. He takes in Lucerys, his divine form. He is draped in white silks, a headpiece of rubies adorning his head. It is a far cry from the simple beauty Aemond had witnessed in the gardens only a few days before.
There is a version of him he prefers. It is whichever one Aemond gets to keep.
He feels the blade of a knife in his hands. He runs his thumb across the sharp edge. He imagines sticking it in Borros' throat when the beast leans down and plants a sloppy, drunken kiss on Lucerys' cheek.
"Stare harder, and he might catch fire," his mother chastises beside him.
"He wishes it were him up there instead." Aegon laughs cruelly. “Fret not, brother. Perhaps you can ask our nephew entry into his bridal bed, if only to watch.”
"Do not speak such nonsense at this feast!" His mother hisses, looking around to ensure no one is listening. "Gods know Rhaenyra would love to complain to your father if she heard you utter such drivel about her son."
Helaena sighs loudly beside her, blessedly ignorant to their discussion. "I wish to dance."
"I am sure our other nephew would be willing to be your partner."
"Jace has promised to dance with Baela," she laments. “I’ll have to wait my turn.”
Aegon continues to tease her, their mother shushing them both. Aemond can not bother himself with it. It all fades around him. Lucerys has been avoiding his gaze all evening. The music playing is slow. Not the lively kind played at weddings. He finds he does not mind, for he will do what needs to be done.
His legs are taking him to their table, can feel the stares of the court on his back like pins. Lucerys is still not looking at him when he reaches them, arm extended.
"May I have this dance, nephew?"
When Lucerys does not speak, Borros chuckles beside him, pointedly looking down at his new bride. "Go on, love. The pup wants to dance with you, and I am enjoying my red. Spend some of your energy and then I shall join you."
"Husband," Lucerys mutters, "I am quite tired. Perhaps the young prince could—"
But he is interrupted, Borros wrapping a meaty hand around the sharp blade of his shoulder and squeezing, leaning in, whispering with a filthy glint, "Do not be so shy, my little love. Mind that you do not get too tired, for we have a long night ahead of us."
Aemond almost retracts his arm. The twitch in his face is noticeable, he is sure. Lucerys does look at him then, horrified, plush mouth open. "I will dance with you, uncle," he says, standing so quickly that the cutlery on the table shakes.
And then he's entwining his arm in his, and Aemond forgets.
Because Lucerys is in his embrace. He is taller than his nephew now; he is unsure when it happened. He fits so well here, and why wouldn't he? It is where he belongs, where he'd always meant to be.
"What are you planning, sweet thing?" Lucerys whispers into his ear, twirling away from him as the music picks up.
He follows, grabbing him by the waist and pulling him back.
"I plan to dizzy you."
"Do not spin me too much, for I will surely collapse."
They only dance with one another for the remainder of the feast. No doubt, whispers are swirling around them. But Aemond has been taught well. He does not care. Let them look; upon his sapphire eye or the fingers clenching around the fabric at Lucerys' hip. It matters nothing to him. He does not speak. There is an incorporeal hand around his throat, and he can trace it back to the creature in his arms.
It does not come back to him until the music slows again.
"Bond with me instead," he hushes between them. "Stay with me, and I will keep your heart safe in my chest forever."
Lucerys looks hurt, like a deer felled with an arrow. He does not answer. When the music stops, he bows.
He retreats away in the crowd, back to his table. Back to his husband.
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After everyone has gone to bed, he goes to him. It is not the first time he has done this. He used to sneak in when he was younger, looking for a warm bed to sleep in when his own felt too big and cold. Lucerys always allowed it, holding Aemond through the night like an anchor.
There is a different intention now. Something darker. There is a dagger in his waistcoat and a thirst for blood on his teeth.
When he comes to Lucerys' chambers, he sends the guards away. He does not knock or make his presence known before pushing the doors open. He wonders for a second what he would do if he were to find Borros' boarish body draped over Lucerys', to hear their moaning, smell their fetid rutting.
He might kill them both and then himself.
But he does not find such a thing. Instead—
Lucerys is awake, reclining on a settee in front of the fire. He is alone. His nephew giggles when he sees him, gaze glassy from wine.
"Would you like a berry?" Lucerys asks him with a soft smile.
Aemond stares at the bowl of blackcurrants on his nephew's lap, sugared and ripened, glistening like a pile of jewels. He feels his fingers twitch, stopping himself from reaching out.
His mouth waters, and his jaw clenches, but it is not for the fruit. "I don't eat sweets."
Lucerys giggles, muted, so it's like a caress from his lips to Aemond's ears. "All children enjoy sweets. Come, sit."
“I am no child.” He winces, a splotch of irritation making his cheeks burn pink, but he settles on a chair beside him by the hearth. "Mother says I am a man grown. I'm an alpha, and I'm larger than you, now. Stronger too."
The way Lucerys looks at him fills him with a jagged desire. He's all doe-eyed amusement with his pretty lips bowed like he's blowing a kiss. It is as though he can see through Aemond and his bluster for what it is—disoriented yearning.
"I am not your mother," he says quietly. "Take one, sweet thing. I will not tell her."
Something in his voice leaves little room for refusal. Lucerys places the bowl between their settees on a small table. Aemond hesitantly reaches over and puts one in his mouth. He eats another. And then another, quicker than he can swallow. Lucerys is laughing at him blearily. He leans over and wipes the stickiness at the corner of Aemond's lips.
"My, you are still a messy eater."
Aemond is struck silent. Lucerys is looking at him again; this is an expression Aemond has not seen on his face before. He burns at the sight, his pants becoming tight and uncomfortable.
I'd instead be eating him, he thinks.
"Sometimes I think back to the night I cut out your eye," Lucerys whispers, fingers reaching out and caressing the pink skin of his scar. "You were so brave. A fair exchange, you'd said. No one listened to you, though I heard. Was the dragon worth it?"
"You had not meant to take my eye," Aemond says too quickly. "But I had meant to claim Vhagar."
"I know." Lucerys sighs. "Still, regret comes to me often like an unwelcome visitor." He backs his hand away slowly and pets Aemond's shoulders before pulling back. Aemond does not let him, his fingers catching around his wrist.
"You should not have tried to wrestle the knife away from Joffrey. He could have cut you."
"It was you that was cut," Lucerys says, voice thick.
His grip on him tightened. "This cut brought you to me."
Lucerys' eyes widen as realization flickers behind them. "Aemond, I am married. Your jesting has grown irritating."
He ignores him. "You are unbonded," he says, tenderly running his finger up the side of Lucerys' throat, unblemished and untouched. He relishes how Lucerys shivers, how his skin pebbles. "He did not deign you worthy of his bite, but I would."
He yanks his wrist out of Aemond's grasp, scoffing. "My husband drank too much, is all. He did not feel well. We will bond in the morning."
"Bond with me now, instead," Aemond says, trying to keep the desperation out of his voice and failing. "I will kill him myself, and you will never have to worry again."
"You should be experimenting with omegas your own age," Lucerys says pityingly, sadly.
"I want no such thing." Aemond realizes he's breathing heavily, and his hands feel like heated metal. "I want you. I've wanted you before I could comprehend what ' wanting ' was. You are," he swallows, airless, " Made for me."
Lucerys giggles. "What a romantic thing to say, but this is not a story in a book, Aemond. I am a married omega, almost twice your age. It would not be right, sweet thing." He rises, smoothing the seafoam silks of his robes. They cling to every part of him, every curve. Horrifyingly, the sharpness of his nipples peeks through, pretty as diamonds hidden under linens.
Aemond's mouth runs dry. "Why are you trying to convince me to not love you?"
It could be the wrong thing to say. Lucerys stills, watching him curiously, as though he is making a decision behind his eyes.
"Do not say such things, Aemond. If you continue this, I shall wake my husband," he warns. It is an empty threat. He trembles through the words, shoulders sagging.
They are empty threats. Aemond can sense it. He gets up before he thinks it through, grabbing Lucerys' slender arms and pulling him closer until their mouths are inches from each other. His nephew looks shocked, his reddened mouth shaped like an 'o', wet and stained from the berries he's been eating.
Aemond wants to taste them again. So he does.
To his delight, Lucerys welcomes it, lips opening without a fight. He gives in, and it is all the sweeter. The kiss is flavored with fruit, starting soft and ending in vicious little bites.
"Come," he huffs between them, "I will not let you take me like a whore. Let us go to bed. You will take me there and have me however you want."
'You could never be a whore ,' Aemond wants to say, but all he can do is nod and follow as Lucerys leads him by the hand.
He lets him throw him backward onto the linens, Lucerys crawling up his body, kissing him through his leathers, unbuckling and freeing him as he goes. Aemond attempts to help, but he can not keep his hands away from Lucerys' skin, his hair, his thumb pressing into that devious mouth and between his skin as he nibbles unto every exposed bit of flesh.
"Let me undress you, too," he croaks, begging.
"There is not much to remove. But," Lucerys giggles, removing himself from Aemond and falling beside him on the pillows. He stretches his arms above him and relaxes into the plushness of the bedding. "I will grant you this."
Seeing him open and vulnerable awakens something in Aemond. It is not a nice thing. It is dark, and it has claws. He rolls over on top of Lucerys to kiss him again. It is an attempt to quell the roaring inside him, but it does little to help. It only serves to stoke it.
He does not know how he gets the silks off the omega. In a moment, there is nothing between them, just their hot bodies pressing against one another. Vaguely, he realizes he must have ripped them, for they lie in tatters on the stone floor.
Lucerys is giggling, breathless, "Gods," he says, "You have gotten so strong, Aemond."
The words go into his ears, but he does not register them. Lucerys, his Lucerys , is naked, save for the rubied crown. It is overwhelming in its perfection. It is more than what he's dreamed. His love grabs his wrists when he sits back on his haunches to get a better look, to keep him close, to keep them touching.
Aemond does not know where to put his hands—Lucerys' delicious thighs or sloping waist. His nephew decides for him, placing them on his knees and spreading them.
"Here," he sighs, panting a bit. In the dim candlelight, the ruby circlet he wears looks like a wreath of fire. Aemond can not breathe; the air is punched out of him like he's flown too high. His eye travels down the expanse of milky skin open for him, down his flat stomach, and below his navel and cocklet. The source of the unbearable heat is glistening, loose, and dripping unto the linens.
"Have you ever seen one?" Lucerys asks. He's smiling, pink mouth curved and white teeth shining.
Aemond is silent. He licks his lips. He hopes that is an answer enough because the words will not come to him. What would he say? That he never had, had hoped for this since he was a child when Lucerys had held him close to his chest, a sickness he could never shake?
It felt like the sky and the earth inside him, churning together and ripping apart.
"I want to eat you ," he admits.
He can see Lucerys swallow through the thin skin of his throat. "Do it then," he says, widening his legs further. "Show me everything you've wanted to do for so long."
Aemond lowers himself, chest pressed to the bed, face close to Lucerys' perfect cunt. Seconds pass by. His blood courses inside him, could drool at the sight. He noses at it, a crude need to be nearer, to drench himself in the slick that flows out of him.
Lucerys gasps from above, fingers moving from Aemond's wrist to his hair. "Do not make me beg," he whines, broken already. Aemond has yet to take him and is already reduced to such a mess.
Inside the young alpha, the fire ignites out of his control.
Lucerys tastes unlike anything he's ever had before. It is nothing like berries, nothing like honey. It is something altogether more delicious, heavy on his tongue. Aemond wants to keep it there, to lick his lips and have the flavor stick to him whenever he wishes to taste it again.
The noises Lucerys makes are familiar; he can recall them from all those years ago when he was—"Are you in heat?" He asks, but he can not pull his mouth away from Lucerys' slit, so he ends up speaking the words into him.
Lucerys moans, the vibrations no doubt pushing him further to a place Aemond wants to follow.
"I am not," he manages. "But keep going like that and you might push me into one."
It would be false to say he did not want that, though the little rational bits of him are clinging to the edges of his thoughts.
Lucerys is married. He is married to someone that is not him.
A growl rips through him. His tongue delves deeper inside, trying to chase the nectar from where it originates. One of Lucerys' hands disentangles from his hair, coming down between Aemond's mouth and himself.
"Here," he says, rubbing at the top, where the delicate folds meet. "This is where it feels the best."
Aemond's half-lidded eye regards the omega's movements, interest piquing as Lucerys rubs at it harder, faster, the little moans it elicits from him, maddening and increasing in volume. He decides it is him that should be doing that.
His own hand comes up, replacing Lucerys'. As he eats his cunt, he circles the little pearl with his thumb. The noise of delight it produces spurs him on, precise in his ministrations, tight and purposeful. As he does so, Lucerys takes his cocklet and pumps in time with the alpha's pointed licking.
"I am going to spill," he sighs, almost incoherent. "You are going to make me."
Aemond hums his assent. He does not stop or slow. He feels when Lucerys reaches his peak before he hears it, feels the muscle tighten around his tongue, the rush of slick, feels him tremble beneath his fingers. Lucerys' legs close around his ears, contracting and shaking, keeping Aemond trapped there as he should. His cries of pleasure are a song he wants to memorize, to recite to himself until the world turns to ash. When his nephew calms, Aemond pulls away, mouth wet, length aching. He does not touch until he can commit to memory the way Lucerys' eyelashes flutter against the speckles of his ivory cheek, how the bow of his lips quiver, his pink chest rising and falling.
"Gods," he gasps, eyes half open, "I can hardly believe you’ve never done that before."
"I haven’t," Aemond says. It is the truth. “But I’ve wanted to for a long time.”
Lucerys smiles, a fragile thing. He opens himself again, a flower blooming, arms and legs spread. The alpha takes the invitation. They kiss again, but the fervor is all Aemond's now. He feels his cock slip between the wet folds he was nose-deep in a few seconds prior. It is searing, altogether evil, for such bliss to exist between the legs of another.
"I am putting it in," he groans. He nips at Lucerys' bottom lip, angling himself until his tip catches on the entrance. "You can not stop me."
He reaches up, taking Aemond's face in between his palms. It is such a tender act, reminiscent of the times he used to do it when Aemond was a child.
"I can not," Lucerys agrees. "And I won't."
When he stabs into him, they both sound like they are being half-strangled. Lucerys' eyes scrunch shut, but Aemond does not allow himself the same. He watches his face, every minute expression, every minute shift, as his cock enters his nephew fully, until the swell of his half-formed knot is inside as well.
It is such heat, such beauty.
"It's amazing," he marvels.
Lucerys does not respond. His whines of discomfort ebb into something breathier.
His body moves on its own. Aemond would be shocked were he not already so lost to his desire. Thoughts that are not his own come to him as he thrusts inside Lucerys' glorious heat; Made for this. Made for me, and I for you. He might have even spoken them into the humid air. It joins the screams, the wet sound of Lucerys' cunt, the slapping of Aemond's pelvis into the fat of Lucerys' thighs.
Their coupling is loud. Too loud, Aemond knows.
"He will hear," Lucerys shouts when Aemond undulates his hips in a sharp circle, "He will murder us both!"
"I want him to hear," Aemond says viciously. "Let him come in and see you for what you are. Mine ."
"Ah, but I am not yours yet," Lucerys breathes, chuckling darkly, "You have yet to bite me."
"I will."
" Ah ! Do not lie," Lucerys warns.
"I am going to. I have every intention of it." Aemond moans, his face angling and nearing Lucerys' pulse. He does. He will. His jaws do not bite down until he feels his pleasure crest. He sees and feels nothing but blood on his tongue, warm spend on his stomach and leaking around his cock.
Exhilaration does not do it justice. He feels undone and made anew. It does not compare to anything he's ever felt. The closest that it comes to is getting his eye cut out, the same hand ruining and rebuilding him in turn.
Only when he comes down does he realize that Lucerys is weeping.
"He will kill me," he says brokenly, hoarse from screaming, "What will I do tomorrow when he wakes and I have the bite mark of another on my neck?"
Aemond wraps himself tighter around him, nuzzling into every space he has not yet filled. "I have taken you from a man before. I will take you again," he says, emptied and hollow, "I will kill him, Lucerys. You will be mine."
"Silly child," Lucerys pants into the crook of his neck. "You must. I will be full with a babe after this. They will know it's yours, you must —"
Aemond silences him with a kiss. He seeks him out with his prodding tongue, soothes and comforts him in turn, in payment, for all those times he had done the same for him in his youth.
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It's a peculiar thing. Aemond had never heard a man die before. The sounds are worse than the sight of Lord Borros' eyes dimming in the moonlight, gurgling and thick, as though he were choking on syrup. He watches him struggle, hands at his neck, but the blood does not stop pouring from his wound. It is an ugly cut from his chin to his chest. A gash so crooked, Aemond is almost ashamed.
"Shh," he says, "It will end soon." But he can not help his own terrible smirk. He admits it is dishonorable what he does—killing a lord in his own bed after spending inside his omega.
He finds it impossible to care.
In fact, he is glad to be the last thing this man sees; young and glorious, alight with Lucerys' matching bite mark on his throat.