Chapter Text
The first panic attack Rhaenyra had was at age twelve.
She'd been at her Uncle Daemon's house when the call came in from her father that she had yet another healthy, bratty half-sibling. The labor had been quick and reportedly easy, and the baby had been born an hour earlier.
This was all relayed to her by Daemon, who had been teaching her how to play chess, and she resented the interruption of her quality time with him, but she rolled her eyes and took the phone from him.
“Hi Dad. How's the baby?”
“Oh he's beautiful, sweetie. You really should come see him.” She heard Alicent objecting in the background, which made her smirk. She tolerated her stepmother, but she felt little affection for the woman. Rhaenyra looked at her Uncle. His long hair was half up in a braid, the rest trailing over his shoulders like pale spun silk, and she reached out and teasingly took the end of his braid and started tickling his nose with it. He snorted in surprise, then swatted her away, finally crossing his arms and giving her a fond, admonishing look.
“Congratulations, Dad. I'll think about it.” She heard Viserys sigh.
“I think it's time, darling. Alicent doesn't want any more children, so this might be your last chance...” she sighed dramatically.
“I'll THINK about it, Dad. Love you.” She hung up and regarded Daemon, switching back to High Valyrian, the ancient language they always spoke together when it was just them. “Should I go?” Daemon regarded her, shrugging.
“Wouldn't blame you if you weren't eager to see another fucking Hightower brat.” Rhaenyra smirked. Her Uncle always talked to her like an adult, including copious swearing.
“He's right though, I might not get another chance until I hold my own baby...if I even have any.” Daemon looked into her eyes, the same shade of bright purple as his own.
“Don't let the pain of your past steal your future, little niece. You can't let fear hold you back from what you want.” She wrapped her arms tightly around herself, closing her eyes and retreating into her thoughts as she curled into a ball. She felt Daemon's arms around her, pulling her up out of her chair to standing, stroking her hair, and she let herself cry, sniffling into his shirt. She always felt safe with him, like she could just be herself. Maybe he was right. Was she not a fearless dragon, just like him?
After a minute she let go of him, swiping at her face with her sleeves.
“Can we take your motorcycle?” He grinned.
“We can, Princess.”
He made her wear a helmet, even though he didn't, and she wrapped her arms around his waist and held onto her Uncle as they zoomed down the backroads to the hospital. As soon as they got there and walked inside together, Rhaenyra felt overwhelmed by the smell, the fluorescent lights, the anxious people in the waiting area. Her chest felt tight, like she couldn't breathe, and her heart was pounding. Her Uncle noticed something was wrong and pulled her against him, squeezing her tightly and not letting go. She buried her face in his chest, blacking out her surroundings, and breathed in his scent as he stroked her hair and held her. Her breathing came fast and shallow and he squeezed harder, his voice rumbling through her being.
“Shhh, zaldritsos . Breathe with me.” Her voice came out muffled into his chest.
“They died here, Daemon...” She felt him rest his chin on top of her head.
“I know. We can go home...” She shook her head, focusing on her Uncle's warmth, the slow cadence of his breath. The tightness of his embrace constricted her breathing just enough that she was forced to be intentional about it, and she slowly started to calm as he murmured soft assurances. He didn't force her to pull away, he just let her be there for as long as she needed. Finally, she looked up at him.
“I'm ready now, thanks, Kepus . Call my dad.”
Viserys came down to meet them in the lobby, and Daemon waited while Rhaenyra accompanied him up to the Mother/Baby Unit.
“I'm so glad you came, Rhaenyra,” Viserys said as he escorted her in. “There's nothing like holding a baby just after they are born.” Rhaenyra smirked at that.
“Don't beat yourself up, Dad,” she teased. Viserys had been on emergency business in China when Rhaenyra had been born. It had been Daemon, who had lived with them at the time and who had just r.barely gotten his driver's license, that rushed her mother, Aemma, to the hospital two weeks before her due date- Daemon who had held Rhaenyra after she was born while Viserys navigated emergency international travel, not arriving until the next day. Her Uncle had kept her mother company when she was awake, and held Rhaenyra so Aemma could get some sleep .
Before she died, Aemma used to love teasing Viserys with that story, had loved to joke that ever since then, Daemon had been the only one capable of soothing Rhaenyra's tantrums and fits. Maybe that was still true, she reflected. Sometimes, when she had been younger, she'd desperately wished Daemon could have been her Dad, but as she'd gotten older she realized she only wished for that so she could have him around all the time- He'd moved out of their house when he went to college at 18, and she missed him when he wasn't around regularly. She found that she much preferred him as her Uncle, her best friend, her confidante and partner in crime.
Daemon poked at work from his phone in the lobby while his niece visited with her baby brother. As the Director of Information Security at Targcorp, he always had things he could be attending to. Hospitals made him uneasy, too. He'd once had scores of aunts and uncles, grandparents... but they were all gone now. Many of them had died in this very hospital or one just like it, his father just seven years prior. He had also been here when his niece's mother and first baby brother had died five years ago. Rhaenyra had been almost eight, so she had fully understood the gravity of what she had lost even then, and he remembered holding her in this exact lobby as she sobbed into his shirt, his heart broken into a million pieces for her. It had been a long time before he himself had been able to feel like he was okay to drive her home. In his own grief, he busied himself with his work, waiting for his niece to be done seeing her new half-sibling.
Alicent looked content, if tired, as they entered the room, holding a little bundle of newborn, and Viserys went over to her and kissed her cheek. She handed him the baby and lay back, taking the opportunity to rest, and Viserys told Rhaenyra to sit down, then gently placed the little bundle in her arms.
The baby was alert, which surprised her, looking up at her with dark violet eyes, his head already covered with an impressive amount of short, pale hair. He was beautiful, a perfect little strong, healthy Targaryen prince, as much as Daemon would say he was tainted for being a Hightower, Alicent's blood diluting their heritage.
Rhaenyra spoke softly to him in High Valyrian.
“ Rytsas valonqaritsos (hello little younger brother),” she said.
“Aemond,” Viserys supplied. Rhaenyra stroked his soft little cheek and his face scrunched in response, and she giggled.
“He is sooo cute!” She said to Alicent in English, then switched back to what she considered her mother tongue. “Hello Aemond. I'm your sister Rhaenyra. So nice to meet you.”
She stayed for about an hour, talking with Viserys and Alicent, holding and rocking her youngest sibling, before she had Viserys take her back down to the lobby.
“I love you, Dad,” she said. He looked surprised, then hugged her.
“I love you, too, sweetheart.”
“Are you happy?”
“How could I not be with two beautiful daughters and two sons?” A pang of hurt shot through Rhaenyra's heart.
“Three.” Viserys looked down at her.
“What?”
“You had three sons.” Her father's face fell into a somber mask.
“Of course, Rhaenyra, I didn't mean...you're right. Three sons.” They rode down the elevator in silence. Viserys dropped her back off with her Uncle, and her mood instantly lifted as Daemon offered her his arm gallantly and she laughed, but took it.
“Gods, Uncle you are so corny sometimes.”
“Are you glad you came?” He asked as they walked to the parking garage.
“Yeah. That was pretty special, he's very cute. Too bad they grow up to be disgusting, obnoxious toddlers who I want nothing to do with.” Daemon laughed- Rhaenyra loved making her Uncle laugh.
Aegon, Alicent's first child, was four, and listened to nothing and no one, climbing walls, drawing on furniture, and cackling when attempts at discipline were made. Helaena was two and while she was much less destructive than Aegon, she frequently cried and seemed to constantly be snotty or drooling. When they'd each first been born, she'd been too scared to interact with them, for fear of what might happen, but as they grew, she found herself discouraged to try to bond with them.
Rhaenyra was not looking forward to going back home to them, where their nanny was currently probably tearing her hair out trying to wrangle the two little beasts, but she knew she couldn't just live with her Uncle. Her father needed her, and Daemon had his own life.
As he grew, Aemond would prove to be a very serious baby, who rarely smiled or babbled, just clung to his mother without a word. Alicent kept him close at all times, unwilling to let him be held or tended to by anyone else unless absolutely necessary, a drastic change from the way she'd barely paid attention to her first two children. Even if Rhaenyra had wanted to try and bond with him, he had a creepy way of staring at people with those intense dark eyes, making her feel like he was scrutinizing her soul.
Aegon continued to be an absolute terror, and Rhaenyra avoided him completely, spending time out with her friends, at Daemon's house when her father allowed it, or relegating herself to her room. The only one of her siblings she occasionally played with now was Helaena, who'd stopped drooling after her teeth had all come in, and was content to hunt for bugs outside or play with her blocks in her room. She was often forgotten about by her parents, even by her nanny, and Rhaenyra felt bad for her little sister.
As her teenage years came on full force and her siblings got older, it didn’t get much better. Her cousin Laena Velaryon, 4 years older, had finally deemed her old enough to hang out with, so she started spending even less time at home, preferring to hang out with Laena and her family if she couldn't see Daemon or her friends from school.
By age fifteen, she had started to notice her desire to be around her Uncle change in subtle ways. She started to feel nervous around him, sweaty and awkward. When she mentioned to Laena that she felt “funny” in his presence, Laena only smiled knowingly.
“That's the song of your blood cousin, the dragon lineage, my mom calls it. It's fucked, how we always desire our family, but that's how it is with Targaryens. And in this case, girl, I don't blame you, your Uncle is HOT. If I weren't already smitten with my Braavosi Beefcake, I'd be all over that.”
“Laena!” She squealed. “It's not like that...is it?” Her cousin smirked.
“Oh it is, Rhaenyra. He's been the love of your life since you were born. Now there's just raging hormones involved.” Rhaenyra turned red, but maybe her cousin was right.
“Laena…I…”
“Think about it. Most girls your age have crushes, are starting to have boyfriends at school. Are you interested in anyone else?”The boys at her high school all seemed gross and terrible, with their heavily scented body sprays and awkward fuzzy facial hair. She rebuffed them constantly, claiming her parents were very religious-which was partially true. Alicent was a strong believer in the Faith of the Seven, and she had been trying to convert her stepdaughter for years, so it wasn't much of an effort to cling to that as a shield against unwanted attention.
“No. But he's 31, I'm just a kid to him!” Laena put her hand on her shoulder.
“You won't be for long. You're already filling out. Daemon will start to see you as a woman, don't worry.”
The next time she saw her Uncle, she nearly perished from awkwardness. She found herself watching his hands, his lips, imagining what he might do with them when he was with a lover...
“What's wrong, zaldritsos ?” He asked, noticing how distracted she was.
“Nothing, Uncle, just…Laena told me that we…Targaryens…will always be drawn to each other through the song of our blood.” He nodded, as if this were the most obvious fact in the world.
“Well, of course…sisters to brothers, cousins to cousins…have the hots for Laena, do you? If it's Laenor you want I think you'll be disappointed, sweet girl.” Laena's older brother was a very beautiful man, and was very much only attracted to men.
She laughed.
“No, Daemon. Nothing like that, although she is very attractive," she winked. "Just…in general. What about you? Did you ever feel such a thing?” Daemon shook his head.
“Unfortunately the gods did not bless me with a sister. Viserys had our cousin Aemma, but, well, Rhaenys certainly never did it for me, and I never got to know any other women more distantly related around my age in the family.” Rhaenyra looked away.
“We certainly are a strange family, Uncle. I'm just glad we don't do arranged marriages anymore.” He raised his eyebrow at her. “Sorry.” Daemon's wife had not been of his choosing. He was the final victim of his grandmother's mandated pairings. Viserys had gotten lucky and had been betrothed to his cousin Aemma, of whom he was already fond, but Daemon had gotten stuck with Rhea Royce, a daughter of one of Targcorp’s largest business partners. “I have always wondered why you don't divorce her?” Daemon chuckled wryly.
“Well, it's just a political match. She doesn't care what I do and I don't care what she does. Besides, it's not like there's anyone else I want to marry.” Rhaenyra swallowed.
“You know, Uncle, you’re young enough that I could be your little sister. Would you have liked that?” She saw Daemon's spine go rigid as he looked into her eyes. Oh gods...
“ Zaldritsos… ”
“Daemon…” She took a step closer to him, and he took one back away from her.
“What are you doing?”He asked. She looked at him, her heart pounding. Fuck. She was coming on too strong, she didn't want to make him run away. Her Uncle had a habit of cutting out when things got hard in his life.
“Nothing.”
By the time Rhaenyra's sixteenth birthday rolled around a few months later, she knew that there would never be anyone else she wanted besides Daemon. Blood called to blood far too strongly, and she was meant for him. Surely she could make him see, little by little, that they belonged together. He would leave his wife and be with her. After that day, she’d begun dressing scandalously when he was visiting, walking around in a tank top and short shorts, sunbathing within his view in her bikini. When she went over his house, she would cuddle up to him a little more than usual when they were watching a movie, or put on music to dance to in front of him while he made dinner for them.
Daemon had not failed to notice the way his niece had started to act differently around him. She was flirtatious to a maddening degree, but he did his best to ignore her, feeling disgusted with himself, and telling himself it was just a crush. She'd meet someone else, teenage girls had fickle hearts, and they'd laugh about it someday, just like they laughed about her telling him she wanted to marry him when she was a little kid. It was just a phase, and it couldn't be.
He eagerly volunteered to go on site visits when possible so he could take time and space from her. Gods, her comment about being his sister had clearly been far from innocent given the change in her behavior. Regardless, though, she was still a child playing games, and he had to set boundaries with her as the months went on, so he didn't let her hands wander when he hugged her, and he eventually stopped having her over his house alone altogether after one too many close calls where her fingers had trailed across his throat when she pulled away, or he'd caught himself resting his hand on her lower back possessively.
Rhaenyra could be patient, she decided. She could see the haunted look in her Uncle's eyes when she was around, and she knew him too well to believe he wasn't at war with his own feelings for her. It was only a matter of time before he would give in.