Chapter Text
The Second Moon of 207 AC - KING’S LANDING
Valaena could count on one hand the number of times she and Valarr have spoken privately. It would be thrice. The day before their betrothal, the day of, and the day after.
Their betrothal—which had been practically decided from the moment she came out of her mother's womb—was formally announced by their grandsire, the King, during Valarr’s fifteenth nameday tourney two days ago. Now, in Grandmother's garden, they have been forced by their overenthusiastic mothers to have luncheon together after his morning sparring sessions were over—every godsforsaken day. Today is the second day since this sudden new shift to her usually mundane routine, and already she’s cursing her mother and the gods above.
It is not that she doesn’t like cousin Valarr; that is impossible, for they have had no meaningful interaction for the last two-and-ten years of her life. It’s just that their meetings are always so painfully awkward. Yesterday, she almost spilled her entire cup of wine whilst reaching for the honeycakes and then proceeded to drop her knife over her shoe when trying to save her beautiful dress, not to mention her lap, from having wine stains all over. Today, she almost tripped up the stairs to the roofed area of the garden where they were supposed to have luncheon.
She is not someone who would be called clumsy. Ever.
Princess Valaena Targaryen, daughter of Aerys Targaryen and Aelinor Penrose, is every bit what the commonfolk would picture a Targaryen princess to be—poised, beautiful, vain, and learned, despite her occasional difficulty with numbers and arithmetic. That can be fixed. But above all else, as some might say, the most important quality of a future queen is her charm. She could compel anyone to do anything with but one or two words. But whenever she was expected to speak to her future husband, to impress him and show him how lucky he was to have her as his future wife and queen, she became a stammering, clumsy fool.
“Is the venison not to your liking, Princess? You have not touched it.” Valarr’s sudden voice shook her from her drifting thoughts.
He had never been anything but polite towards her. Never anything more, nor less. His constant politeness often irritated her.
“Would you prefer something else?” he added, noting her lack of response.
“No, my prince, I simply have no appetite.” He just hummed at that and went back to eating.
These luncheons are meant to draw them closer, but they are usually just full of meaningless tidbits about the weather, how he was getting closer to being knighted, or how her education was coming along.
“How is your bond forming with Dreamfyre? Grandsire is sure now that she’s bonded, she’d want to lay more eggs.” He asked. Now this is something she loved to talk about.
Her sweet girl, Dreamfyre. Grandsire took her to the dragonpit a moon ago and told her to try to bond with one of the dragons. Before getting there, she had been tempted to attempt to bond with Meleys, but given that both Aelor and Aelora had their minds set on her, she didn't want to face their combined wrath.
Then, as soon as she stepped into the caves, there was a pull, a strong force urging her forward into one of the lower caves, which she later learned was Dreamfyre’s lair. As she got closer and closer to her darling girl, she felt this immense sense of relief, like a great weight had been lifted off her chest. Like she just emerged out of water and took her first breath. She touched the winged creature, climbed up onto her back, and then they flew.
They flew.
It was the greatest feeling one could ever experience, she thought. The wind on her face, her silver-gold braided hair loosening and then completely falling free behind her.
Valaena now flew, or at least went to see Dreamfyre, whenever she could escape Septa Talla, which has become more and more difficult as of late due to Mother’s constant pestering and hovering.
“Very good, my prince; she is the sweetest girl I could ever have asked for." She smiled. "And you? With Tessarion?” She ignored the part about laying eggs because what was the point of eggs if none hatch? There hasn’t been a hatchling since the Dance ended, aside from Merrax.
Unlike her, Valarr has been bonded to Tessarion ever since he was nine years old. And he’s become one of the best flyers in the family, along with cousin Aerion, who would usually have to be practically dragged off the back of Sunfyre.
“Well, I have been bonded to her for six years now, so very good, I should like to think.” He smiled, not unkindly, and her cheeks and ears heat in embarassment. Of course his bond is good. He’s flown her over a hundred times by now, probably more.
After another thirty or so minutes, the luncheon came to an end. He started walking with her to the Maidenvault, with Ser Theo Swann, and her nursemaid, a woman called Bess, in tow. Their mothers, aunts, and cousins were embroidering there, and she was told to meet them there afterward.
She was very glad that King Daeron had one of his Kingsguard be her sworn shield. It also helps that Ser Theo is one of the most handsome men she had ever seen. Aelora loves to swoon over him and pester her about how lucky she thinks Valaena is. He is every bit like the knights in the books that she read with Father. Of course, unlike in the stories, she couldn’t run off and marry him.
No. She had to wed Valarr and give him his sons, his heirs. And Ser Theo could not save her from that fate. Though she supposed there was no harm in daydreaming about it.
The Maidenvault was full of what looked like almost all the women of the court, though it surely was not. Surrounding Lady Jena Dondarrion were her mother, Lady Alys Arryn, wife of Prince Rhaegel, and Aelora, who was the first one to spot them entering. She discarded what she was embroidering by throwing it to her side with a grin on her face, as if waiting for her, much to her lady mother’s displeasure.
Valarr kissed his mother on the cheek in greeting and greeted the other ladies amiably. Ever courteous. Valaena fought the urge to roll her eyes. She doubted he knew half the ladies here.
“Young Prince, you have grown so much since I saw you last,” said a woman who seemed to be a member of House Mooton—given by the gigantic fish brooch on her right breast—in a strangely flirtatious tone, at that.
“Lady Beony, I sure hope so," He smiled. "My father and I visited Maidenpool when I was one-and-ten. It would be an insult to my father if I hadn’t grown since then.” This got a few giggles from the younger girls in the room. “Well, I shall get going, Matarys has asked me to go riding with him.” With that, he left the room and, therefore, left her to be the one questioned endlessly.
“How was the luncheon, dearest?” Her mother asked with a knowing glance towards Lady Jena, who gave her a small smile. Valaena could never tell if Lady Jena truly liked her or was just going along with her husband's and the King's desires. She always smiled and was never anything but polite, but her smiles would never reach her eyes.
It’s evident where Valarr gets it from.
“It was fine, Mother, Prince Valarr makes great company,” Valaena said the plainly rehearsed lines whilst sitting down on the vacated seat by one of the ladies in waiting. She wrinkled her nose at Aelora’s awfully embroidered handkerchief. It was hard to tell if the dragons of the Targaryen sigil are indeed dragons or a red, very strangely bent river. Aelora has never possessed the patience for needlework.
She could feel Aelora smirking at her.
Before anyone else could say anything, Aelora spoke, “Valaena and I promised Septa Talla that we were going to go to the Sept right after luncheon, so if you will excuse us, my ladies.” She stood up, curtsied to the women, and dragged Valaena up with her, and then out the exit.
“Most devout now are we?” Valaena said, but Aelora ignored her.
“What happened? You did not sound too thrilled back there.” She was still smirking. “Was he rude? No, wait, that is impossible. Valarr can not be an arse even if he tried his damned best.”
“Horrible language to be using.”
“Who cares? No one is here.” She glanced at Ser Theo—who has been following them since they left the Maidenvault—and put a finger to her lips, in a shushing gesture. Ser Theo just chuckled. “Now tell me, tell me!”
So she did. The whole of it. Afterwards, Aelora could not contain herself and burst out laughing, with Valaena having to press both her hands to her mouth so that she does not reveal all her failures to the whole of the Red Keep.
“Unbelievable. Utterly unbelievable. Aelor would die laughing at your complete inability to woo our dear cousin.” Aelora said, now recovered from her laughing fit but continued her giggling.
“Aelor will definitely not be hearing about this,” Valaena replied and glared into Aelora’s lilac eyes. “Because then my brother will hear about it, and if my brother hears about it, my mother will hear about it and would have me become a godsdamned Septa or worse—a silent sister, for having humiliated her.”
“Right, right.” Aelora nodded. “Sometimes I feel as if your mother is more devout than the High Septon himself.”
“I grant you full permission to call her a religious zealot to my face. I’ve no clue as to why she is the way she is. It is not like her mother forced her, or her father, for that matter.” Aelora laughed at that, shaking her head.
Her grandmother, Lady Laena Velaryon, had Mother very late in life after only her son, Ronnel, was spared during Daemon Blackfyre’s rebellion. Due to immense grief over the loss of three of her sons, she perished in the birthing bed. Lord Ronard Penrose, her grandfather, was too busy to pay any mind to his daughter’s education.
Valaena was named partly after both her maternal grandmother and the Conquerers’ mother, Lady Valaena Velaryon, who was married to Lord Aerion Targaryen of Dragonstone. She does not understand why Mother—being both part Velaryon and now married to a Targaryen, both Valyrian families—never really cared about her Valyrian heritage. She never bothered to learn High Valyrian, never bothered to know about their gods, never even bothered to teach her daughter or son any of it, either. Valaena would not know anything of her heritage if wasn’t for Father.
Father. Prince Aerys Targaryen. The recluse. The man who would sooner bring a book to bed than his own lady wife.
Valaena may be weak at arithmetic, but she has always had a talent for languages. She taught herself the Summer Tongue at only seven years old, and now she was working on her Lhazareen and Qartheen with a tutor. Though the one language she’s most proud of herself for learning is that of her father. Prince Aerys is not a man of many words; to some, he's a man of no words. Not to her, though, her father communicates through the language of books. He reads practically anything, she realised at a young age. From ‘The Lands of Dorne’ to ‘Unnatural History of Dragons’ by Septon Barth to ‘Love and Poems’.
Father has never doted on anyone; it's just not in his nature. On her fifth nameday, he told her she should start learning how to read. So she did. On her sixth nameday, he gave her a book as a nameday present, not the usual children’s tale, but not too grim either. She read it in one sitting. This tradition of theirs continues till now. They read together silently, sometimes comment on what they enjoyed or what they did not, but most of the time it’s just the sound of pages turning and birds chirping outside.
It was he who taught her High Valyrian as soon as she proved that she was capable of reading and writing. Now she could understand every dialect of the language, and speak most of them too.
Valaena and Aelora strolled along the corridors, arms interlocked, Aelora doing most of the talking. Valaena loved moments like these. Where there were no ill thoughts or those strange repetitive dreams that had been plaguing her for almost half her life, now. She could just listen to Aelora chatter about the handsome boys at court, girls and boys who have broken their betrothal and run off with someone else, men who look too comfortable with another man’s wife at a tourney, and not worry or be in distress.
“I hear Lady Melesa Yarwyck is hiding a swollen belly beneath her dress.” Aelora grinned mischievously. “Though she is yet to be married.”
“Is she not the one who is betrothed to Lord Lydden’s heir?” The blonde girl nodded, still grinning. “Well, best get on with it. But who’s to say it isn’t his?”
“She seemed very familiar with Lord Serrett’s second son, Ser Marq Serrett, during the tourney for Lord Lannister’s nephew’s nameday.” Aelora winked, and they both started laughing.
Valaena has always loved looking at her reflection, as vain as that was. She was not blind to her beauty, and people would often talk about her resemblance to Princess Viserra, one of the daughters of King Jaehaerys. The girl of five-and-ten who fell off her horse and died on the eve of her being shipped off to the north to marry a man thrice her age. Valaena does not envy her. She just wished that she will meet a different end than her supposed lookalike.
She had the silver-gold hair of most Valyrians, but her eyes are not the lilac or deep purple like her twin from a hundred years ago, but a light blue. The colour of a clear sky. Her skin was without flaw, and her hair thick, long up to her hips, which she usually keeps in a variety of Valyrian style braids, and luscious. Her face was angular, with her slender, straight nose and high cheekbones; she was considered more striking than pretty.
Aelora, too, was very beautiful. Though her hair was more gold than silver, and her face more heart-shaped. Her twin brother Aelor and she were all but identical except for their eyes. Whereas Aelora’s were a deep lilac, Aelor’s were a deep blue. Despite that, if Aelora put on a doublet and breeches and tied up her hair, no one aside from their mother would be able to tell the difference.
She dreamt of Viserra two nights ago. At least she thinks so. The girl’s face was not visible, or maybe her memory just failed her. From what she gathered from the conversation that the girl was having with another woman in the dream—whose face she also could not make out— was that the girl was about to be married off to a northern lord, and the faceless girl was vehemently against it. She was sobbing uncontrollably and begging the woman to reconsider. The dream then changed scenery, and the faceless girl looked to be covered in blood. It didn’t seem like it was hers. She was bent over a boy and was sobbing again.
When the day came to an end, after supper was done, Valaena retired to her chambers to release her hair to numb the pain from her complicated braids and get into her nightgown to finally sleep. Like usual.
What she did not expect, was Aelor leisurely lounging on her bed.
Or who she thought was Aelor.
“I’ve brought you your clothes. Change quickly so we can leave and come back here before dawn.” Aelor— Aelora, said in a whisper.
“What? Where would we go at this hour?” Valaena let her face show her clear confusion and did not attempt to whisper like her cousin.
“Lower your voice!” The blonde girl hissed. “Laney, trust me and get changed. You’re coming with me to claim my dragon. You’ll get to see Dreamfyre whilst we’re there.” She added as if Valaena is the one being unreasonable.
Valaena looked beside her cousin to the bundle of clothes on her bed, still unmoving. “Lora, have you gone mad? Grandsire will kill you!”
Aelora, exasperated, sighed dramatically and got up from where she was sitting on the bed, and started to remove Valaena's braids and tie her hair in a bun. She put a woolen hat over her hair to cover it completely. “Please, hurry up, Laney. If we get caught, I’ll be blaming you for your dawdling.”
Valaena, despite her annoyance, did as she’s told as quickly as she can. It was a peasant boy’s rags that Aelora so graciously brought for her. Though what Aelora was wearing wasn’t much better. “Now what? We can’t exactly leave my chamber looking like this. Ser Theo is outside.”
“We’ll use the tunnels that you showed me. Aelor is waiting on the other side.” Aelora grabbed her hand and pulled her along to the spot behind one of the chairs in her bed chambers. She pushed the chair to the left and opened the passageway, and they entered the bowels of the Red Keep.
“There is no hiding this, I’m sure you know. Grandsire will obviously know.” Valaena had no clue what Aelora was trying to achieve.
Lora heaved a sigh. “That is the point, Laney.” She remained quiet for a couple of seconds before continuing. “I overheard the Queen speak to Mother about marrying me off to some lord. To Lord Brandon Stark’s heir, Rodwell, tonight. I can’t go through with it, I can’t go to the fucking north.”
Valaena fought the urge to correct her that the future Lord Paramount of the North was hardly just some lord, but then she thought of her dream two nights ago.
The one with the faceless girl.
“And you know it’s always been Aelor and me. He is my other half. I came out of this world with him, and I will leave it with him by my side. As my husband. I will not marry at all if not to him. What was Mama thinking, even entertaining any other thought?” Valaena had never heard Aelora be this agitated. About anything. Her cousin and, pathetically enough, her best friend, was the more fun one out of the two. She would jest and jape at any occasion, and would laugh freely, even if the moment was definitely not appropriate.
She meant what she was saying. And again, thinking of her dream two nights ago made her uncomfortable. The thought of Aelora ending up like that girl made her feel sick.
So she responded with the only thing she could.
“I see. What do you need help with?”