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mysteria157 · 4 months

Text

Pairing: Nanami Kento x Black Fem Reader

CW: Light Profanity, Light Alcohol Consumption, Explicit Sexual Content, Missionary, Fingering, Mentions of Cunnilingus, Public Sex (Sort of), Office Sex

WC: ~9.8k

Summary:

Nanami may be disconnected from social media trends, but he’s not oblivious. He’s overheard the crass innuendos and seen the tasteless memes on Yuji's phone. He knows the vulgar things some men say—about how excited they get when the summer begins.

It always seemed so stupid and dramatic to Nanami, who has never had a straying eye to actually see if the rumors were true. But now that you’ve come into his life…he gets it.

Oh, he gets it.

Sundress season.

Notes: Hello! Had a random thought this morning and decided to roll with it and practice writing Nanami some more. Anywho, I hope you all enjoy this one-shot.

This is a prime example of me writing smut when I feel like it. Please do not ask me for more related to this story and please do not ask me to write smut, the answer is no lol. This is just a one-shot of a random idea, please enjoy it for what it is lol. Thank you all for understanding!

Reblogs, likes, or comments are always appreciated! Happy reading!

Dividers: @cafekitsune @arminsumi | Header: made by myself

Masterlist | Ao3 | Twitter |

The city summers are a different kind of hell. The humid heat clings to Nanami, making his skin feel instantly tacky as if he hasn’t showered in days. It wreaks havoc on his usual crisp suit and tie, causing the fabric to stubbornly adhere in unflattering ways. He thinks back wistfully to his bachelor days when he could simply escape such misery by holing up inside with the AC blasting, and then wait until the evening for a walk or to run errands. But that was before you came into his life like a vivacious sunbeam, all warmth and carefree laughter.

Now, he wouldn’t dream of depriving you of simple joys like strolling hand-in-hand through the park, watching you bask in nature’s dazzling seasonal shifts. The fragrant flowers blooming, the fireflies flickering to life as dusk settles, the earthy pre-rain smell you adore—he lives for the ease of these tranquil moments.

Throughout your relationship, Nanami has cataloged your ever-changing looks to match the passing seasons. The oversized chunky sweaters and leggings you’d cuddle up in during fall’s crisp breezes. The sleek peacoats and woolen scarves wound around your neck when winter blanketed the city in soft stillness.

But summertime is when your vibrant spirit and personal style shines. And it’s Nanami’s first summer with you when everything changes.

It always seemed so stupid and dramatic to Nanami, who has never had a straying eye to actually see if the rumors were true. But now that you’ve come into his life…he gets it.

Oh, he gets it.

Sundress season.

And it’s a season that has awoken something primal within him. Something in his gut stirs, something in his mind shifts and the more he notices, the more he feels like a lecherous old man instead of the well-mannered one in his late twenties. While his clothes stick uncomfortably to his sweat-slicked skin you get to slip into breezy summer dresses that let every inch of your beautiful body breathe.

As an event planner constantly on the move, you seem to live in the wispy, colorful outfits at all hours of the day. Like the buttercup yellow and candy pink number currently floating around you as you stroll together to the bakery during your shared lunch hour. It’s modest—cotton fabric that doesn’t stick to you, with ruffle short sleeves and a V-neckline that highlights your collarbones and the delicate diamond necklace resting between.

Nanami risks a sidelong glance, instantly regretting it when his gaze gets trapped by the way the bright floral pattern sways and twists with each step you take. The hem brushes the brown skin of your knees and while he can’t see much, Nanami knows the soft curves hidden underneath the airy fabric intimately.

While the caveman part of him can understand the underlying meaning of sundress season, it’s everything else that flares his want for you. It’s the wild curls that brush your cheeks and neck, the diamond earrings that reflect in the sun, the curl of your long lashes that kiss your lower lids when you blink. And yes—the gorgeous dress that you have on enhances everything about you—but in the most basic sense, you are beautiful.

“You’re staring.” It’s a playful accusation that you direct at him even though your eyes are admiring the tulips that you both walk past.

He quickly averts his eyes, sharp cheeks blazing a fiery red. “My apologies I…” Nanami clears his throat, struggling to regain his usual unruffled demeanor. “That dress looks lovely on you.”

You hum in acknowledgment, pausing so he can open the bakery door for you. “You think so? I just picked it up last week. Perfect for this heat, isn’t it?”

Nanami swallows hard at the teasing tilt to your tone, the innocent question feeling anything but. From the very first day he met you—that very first day you knocked back a glass of expensive whiskey and smiled at him as if it was nothing—he’s come to accept that you have no reservations of flustering him. You thrive on it, and for as stiff as Nanami is, you are a breath of fresh air that he never imagined would slide into his lungs.

Umber eyes watch you walk ahead of him and into the welcoming AC of the bakery, tantalizing calves flexing with each step.

“Very much…” is all he can manage, hastily ripping his eyes away again as his equilibrium dangerously shifts.

You laugh lightly at his sudden silence, the warm, rich sound simultaneously soothing his thundering heart and making it trip up all over again. “You act like you’ve never seen me in a dress before.”

“You know that’s not true,” he mutters, switching his gaze to the menu to avoid your entirely too-innocent smile. “I simply…appreciate fine things.”

The rich ring of your answering chuckle sends molten desire licking traitorously down his spine. “Is that so? Then I’ll have to acquire more of these stunning ‘fine things’ for you to appreciate this summer…”

He should have known better than to egg you on. Had he kept his eyes to himself and brushed off your knowing glances, he could have enjoyed you without your playful watch. But for as smart as Nanami is, for as observant and vigilant in his work as he is in his life outside of it, he can never wrap his head around how devious you truly are.

One day, the weather calms down enough for lunch at the park. It’s the perfect day to eat outside. The sun is high in the sky but the canopy of trees gives you both the protection you need from harsh rays.

“Need any help setting up?” You call out, shrugging off the ice denim jacket from your shoulders to reveal this summer’s newest addition—an angelic white sundress adorned with delicate lace trim.

Nanami’s throat tightens and he shakes his head, unfurling a blue blanket onto the thick grass below you both. “I can do it, love. Please just relax.”

He carefully arranges the picnic blanket, spreading the wrinkles free before you plop down on one side. As you dig into the large lunchbox, he admires the crisp white cotton that seems to skim over your frame, covering you but still unable to touch. Thin straps leave your shoulders bare, your skin glowing in the sun from your shimmery sunscreen. No necklace this time, so the square neckline dips just enough to offer a subtle hint of cleavage. The stretchy ribbed material hugs and accentuates every lush curve before gently flaring into an effortless, free-flowing skirt.

You purse your lips and furrow your brow in concentration, leaning more over the lunchbox, your back straightening to steady yourself before he watches free of shame as you arch just so.

When you turn to flash him that achingly fond smile, your curls falling over one shoulder, all traces of decency flee from Nanami’s mind. In that moment, he’s transported back to those dizzying early days of your relationship—entirely captivated, yet utterly terrified of somehow shattering this dazzling, undeserved connection between you.

“Thirsty?” You hold out one of the banana milk boxes that he’s grown to love since your presence, an impish quirk of your brow, clearly aware of his slow descent into hell.

Nanami nods jerkily and takes the milk box, unable to find his voice for a beat. As you settle down gracefully beside him, the skirt drifts up in a gentle billow, shaping to and showcasing skin. He has to tear his eyes away from the wicked flashes of toned thigh with extreme willpower.

Like the devil you are, you toss him a coy smirk, shiny lip gloss clear even though he knows it tastes like strawberry. “We gonna eat or are you just gonna gawk at me like a weirdo?”

He can’t help the scoff that leaves him as he pulls out sandwiches for you both. “I thought you liked when I gawk at you.”

“Not when I’m hungry.”

He shakes his head, smirking softly as he removes the cling wrap before handing you your half, your fingers brushing against his. Warm pleasure blooms in his chest at the radiant sight you make contrasted against the swaying greenery. It’s as if you don’t belong but he couldn’t imagine you anywhere else. You take a generous bite of your sandwich, a smear of mustard in the crease of your lips as you offer him a gentle smile.

As the scorching summer rages, Nanami can’t help but chastise himself. A mundane and childish social meme has become the representation of the hardest test he’s ever taken. Maybe he should have asked for tips from Yuji on how to better prepare himself.

He’s always prided himself on admiring from afar, on controlling his emotions in public and savoring them later in private. He knows your beauty and the unintentional way you drain the air around him. But he’s always been able to offer that soft smile, place a hand on your shoulder or your waist and offer a compliment to whatever you’ve chosen to wear for the day. But recently, in the face of your summertime wardrobe choices, Nanami finds that steely discipline faltering at an alarming rate.

Sinking deeper into the plush living room sofa, Nanami exhales a deep sigh and allows the tension thrumming through his shoulders to bleed away. Here, surrounded by the apartment’s climate-controlled sanctuary, he can savor these increasingly rare moments of solitary peace sprawled out with a good book. It’s a well-deserved shared day off for you both—free of schedules, obligations, or anything more strenuous than lounging around with each other. And more importantly, at home, you’re nothing but comfortable clothes and soft pajamas.

He’s safe.

A wry smirk tugs at the corner of his lips as he imagines the look of feigned innocence you always sport whenever he gets too overt about appreciating your seasonal attire. As if you don’t know the absolutely devastating effect even the simplest hair toss or twirl has on what’s left of his challenging self-restraint these days.

It’s going to be a great day. He’s almost done with this book, just three more chapters and then he can start another in his pile that he wants to tackle this summer. That’s right, Nanami Kento is going to—

The soft pad of your bare feet against the hardwood floors has Nanami glancing up instinctively from behind the novel’s pages. And just like that, the world around him completely whites out as if he’s been hit over the head with a brick.

You’ve emerged from the hallway in a yellow sundress so vibrantly captivating, so deliciously clingy and effortlessly suggestive that he nearly swallows his tongue in surprise. The rich gold hue kisses the deep tone of your skin, as if you’re a sunflower blooming under the artificial lighting of the apartment. The dress accentuates your shape in the most brazenly tantalizing way—the thin ruffle straps on your shoulders, the sweetheart neckline hinting at full cleavage, the dress’ light hem hitting indecently high on your thighs in playful flirty wisps.

But it’s the stretchy knit fabric’s complete inability to disguise any curve or meaty swell that really has Nanami sitting up straighter on the cushions. It’s not layered well enough—almost transparent—and the snug material leaves absolutely nothing to the imagination, from the outline of bright panties that cover the soft spread of your hips to the pert dusky points outlined beneath the bodice.

Absolutely devastating and on full, confident display and this isn’t fair because he has three chapters left.

He barely registers the “What are you reading?” you offer him over one shoulder as you stroll towards the kitchen area in that swaying, uninhibited saunter that never fails to ignite his senses. Nanami simply sits there transfixed—one hand gripping the spine of his book while the other claws restlessly against his own inner thigh. Each roll of your hips has that thin dress swishing and lifting in tiny torturous glimpses that have his imagination veering wildly into unrestrained territory. But he’s at home, that’s okay right?

That’s when you shift your weight onto the tips of your toes, your back turned to him, stretching up towards the top cabinets with one hand braced against the counter…and the entire world seems to judder to a halt all over again. Because from this new vantage point, Nanami can’t tear his eyes away from the call of your legs, the dimples on the backs of your thighs, up, up to the hem and—

A guttural sound wrenches free from low in his diaphragm, a mix of a groan and a growled curse. He looks back down to his book, searching aimlessly for where he left off, flickering back over to you just as quick.

He should look away, tear his eyes off of the gloriously indecent picture you’ve unwittingly created simply by existing. And yet…Nanami finds his stare burning an increasingly blazing trail down the bewitching ‘V’ between your shoulder blades, past the delicious dip of your arched lower back to the toned flare of your thighs and calves below.

At one point, you bend even deeper at the waist, hips tilting up as you struggle to reach a particularly elusive item on the high shelf. The filmy yellow skirt jumps and flirts up with the motion, granting Nanami a shameless eyeful of toned thighs and the flash of his favorite pair of panties—lilac with lace along the edges that squeeze the skin of your ass in the most inviting way. He very nearly drops the book from his suddenly slack fingers at the sight, hissing out a low curse between his teeth.

You huff out an adorable sound of frustration as you fail to reach whatever item you’re going for, and he knows he should step in to assist like the gentleman he is. But his stare remains rooted to spot, ogling and committing it all to memory so he can think about it later—alone.

“Let me get that,” he finally manages to scrape out, voice gone low and gritty with naked yearning despite his best efforts at nonchalance.

You shoot him one of those bright, beaming smiles over your shoulder in response—blissfully unaware of the effect your glowing, ethereal beauty has on him even without your intentional teasing. “Just grabbing the flour for dinner,” you explain sheepishly, leaning into his broad form as he comes up behind you and grabs the ingredient on the top shelf. “I always have trouble reaching.”

And isn’t that just symbolic as all hell? His curvy, tempting beloved constantly hovering just beyond his reach these past few weeks—unattainable without discarding every last vestige of control he has. It isn’t like you both don’t have sex. You do…often. There’s just always been a build up, never anything explosive.

Even in the privacy of your home, he’s never thrown caution to the wind. Nanami has always been one to savor every calculated build of pleasure in its precious sequence. You’ve expressed your satisfaction readily enough, reciprocating his passion with that same rapturous abandon you bring to all aspects of life. But in all the years of his tiring, overworked life, you are the first to show him what it feels like to never walk a predetermined line.

“This is…I’ve never seen you wear it inside,” Nanami manages, his throat feeling increasingly dry as his eyes trace the line of fabric on your shoulders.

You take the flour from him, shooting him a sly, knowing look from beneath your lashes as you turn to face him fully. “It’s a little stuffy in here, don’t you think?”

He can’t stop the reflexive glance that rakes over every inch of you. “It’s sixty-eight degrees.”

You lean in a fractional amount—just enough for the swell of your breasts to brush against his shirt as you crane up towards his face. “Well, I run hot,” you murmur, voice dropping into the pits of hell, a throaty register that bypasses Nanami’s higher cognitive functions entirely.

He’s beyond undone. Frozen in place with desperate, rapturous hunger raging through his very marrow. This close, he can make out the small raised moles on your exposed shoulders, the genetic blemishes that are common for your skin tone. He gets a better view of the rigid peaks of your nipples straining against the thin fabric, practically begging for the heated and dripping touch of his mouth that he’s always more than happy to bestow upon you.

His fingertips clench and relax at his sides, held back only by tremendous reserves of willpower from reaching out to map and relearn every soft, silken plane of feminine heat and temptation currently being dangled in front of him like a prize he still can’t win.

You take in the undisguised wanting and torment written large across his features with a look of utter satisfaction. Then, before he can formulate some slurred plea for relief, you spin on one heel and saunter out of his reach—hips undulating hypnotically beneath that flimsy gauze of material in an alluring farewell.

Only once you finally disappear around the corner does Nanami manage to sag forwards—palms braced on the counter as he attempts to draw steady lungfuls of air back into his oxygen-starved body.

By the time he plops back on the sofa, and opens the spine of his book, the desire to read is gone.

You take pity on him for a few weeks after that searing afternoon in the kitchen. Your outside adventures are marked by breathable athletic leggings paired with loose tank tops that drape and show you off…but in a far tamer, less flagrantly teasing way than before.

Even at home, the soft cotton shorts and tees you lounge around in provide Nanami some solace—the casual fabrics leaving just enough to the imagination rather than putting every mouth-watering curve on display.

Your usual playful flirtations also seem to be dialed back during this oasis period. As if you’re allowing the poor man a chance to realign his senses and regain some semblance of control. It allows him time to resettle back into some of his usual regimented routines. Without you on a mission at the periphery of his awareness constantly, stoking those primal fires, he finds himself able to slip back into the role of polished, tired professional and attentive partner with relative ease.

Perhaps a bit too easily, if he’s being honest with himself. Because before he can even register the transition, that fleeting grace period seems to dissolve back into the heady summer ether as quickly as it had begun.

The warm evening air smells of charcoal and citronella as Nanami moves through the crowd, trying yet failing to focus on anything but you. All around him, friends and coworkers intermingle while indulging in ice-cold drinks and delicious food fresh off the smoker. He loves food, especially Yuki's cooking when she hosts a barbecue.

But none of it registers tonight.

Because every sensory nerve-ending in his body is completely captivated and overwhelmed by the vision you make in that deep red sundress.

The rich crimson chiffon swirls and caresses over your body in sinuous waves of delicious color. You’re bathed in red, as if rose petals have unfurled and stitched themselves together to form the beautiful dress on your body. It’s a maxi dress that sweeps down to your ankles and kisses the straps of your block heels. Scorching flashes of full thighs are visible through the flowing slits on each side. The deep v-neck dips in a daring drop that leaves your sternum and the inner sides of your breasts achingly exposed.

Each step you take has the delicate material clinging and drifting in the most hypnotic dance around your heavenly form. Nanami tracks the rhythmic sway of your hips with a burning stare, his control splintering a little more with every toss of your head that allows the deep brown of your skin to wink at him from the column of your neck.

Yuki is already three wine coolers in—not a lot for most, but more than enough for her to throw decorum to the wind. From across the backyard, Choso watches with an indulgent smile as his partner bobs off-beat to the soft music flowing from the speakers.

Choso's expression of pure adoration mirrors the way Nanami looks at you when he thinks no one else is watching. They share that unspoken understanding, that bone-deep contentment of being completely enraptured by the women they love.

At one point, the music shifts, more alcohol disappears, and Yuki is hauling you to the makeshift dance floor of the backyard. Nanami tries, he really, really does. But everything about you makes him stand at attention. Breathing, walking, laughing, smiling at nothing, and now—with just one rock of your hips to the music—his eyes are locked in.

You’ve never been a good dancer. But you’ve also never cared of the expectation to be a good one either. And Yuki is an extroverted pull that makes you sway more, that makes your shoulders roll and laughter to bubble from your lips as you watch your friend make a fool of herself.

Nanami runs a hand through his thick blonde locks, disrupting the careful part he made before you both left the apartment earlier in the evening. The other hand clutches a glass of scotch a little tighter, the condensation sliding against his fingers before he takes a generous swig, his eyes not once leaving you.

You can feel him before you even look over, and when you do lock with Nanami’s deep brown gaze from across the yard, you throw him a soft look from beneath your lashes as you slowly roll your hips. It’s the same motion of your hips that he got to feel last night with you straddling him, panting against his lips in the middle of the night.

Outwardly sensual in only a way he can recognize amongst everyone around him. But it’s your rapturous, carefree expression of pure bliss that simultaneously enchants and undoes the last tattered remains of his composure. With every movement, you embody the very essence of feminine energy—raw, joyful, and utterly free. You are a vision of untamed beauty, a wild goddess of the summer night come to life in a swirling dreamscape of rich ruby chiffon.

The erotic, carnal urge to chase after your swaying, taunting form and haul you away to some shadowed corner where he can divest you of that sinful dress is overwhelming. Swallowing hard, Nanami averts his burning stare for fear of literally combusting on the spot.

“You alright there, buddy?” Yu's familiar voice cuts through the lusty fog, tinged with the warm charm of a couple beers down. “You look like you’re about to swallow your tongue or something.”

“I…excuse me,” is all Nanami can grate out, the remark feeling like fragments of glass as he speaks. He doesn’t wait for a response, simply stalking off through the open patio door and into the thankfully dim and cool interior of Yuki and Choso's home. Anything to escape your enticing presence for even a single moment.

The music and laughter from outside feels muffled as he sinks down onto the living room sofa in the shadows—rubbing distractedly at his thundering chest. But it does nothing to get rid of the vision of you dancing so wantonly and on unrestrained display in that gorgeous ruby sundress.

Where are you even getting them? Online? Or is there a store that he doesn’t know about? He hasn’t seen other women in the city wearing dresses like you do. But then again…Nanami doesn’t really pay attention unless it’s you.

His fingers grip the plush armrest of the sofa until the knuckles strain white, breath sawing harsh and ragged from his heaving lungs. Nanami squeezes his eyes shut, forcing himself to visualize anything other than the way that lightweight crimson had drifted and kissed over your thighs that peeked between side slits, the growing sheen of sweat between the generous canvas of your chest, the exposed slope of your neck free of curls—a spot of concealer on the side to hide the mark he gave you last night.

A harsh exhale escapes him as he forces his eyes open, only to instantly regret it. The muted sounds of the party filter in from outside—sweet laughter, the low thrum of bass, the periodic high-pitched squeal of your voice crying out at Yuki to get a hold of herself.

Nanami’s stomach clenches raggedly at that sound, arousal stroking down his spine in sweltering waves. Through the clear glass of the patio door, he can see the way your face lights up in pure rapturous joy as you give in to yourself. The subtle shifts and gyrations of your body in time with the beat, each swivel of your hips like a siren’s call.

Against his volition, imagination melds into memory, replaying the countless times he’s buried his face between your thighs and simply drank in the celestial sounds of your pleasure until his name was a breathless gasp on your lips. That shrieking cry at Yuki almost the same towards him when he licks at your sensitive nerves one too many times. He forces his gaze away, leans his head back against the sofa and stares up at the ceiling.

The music fluctuates once more, that instantly recognizable intro to the next funky summer hit you adore cuing up. Despite the walls between you, Nanami can still acutely pick up the subtle cadence of your movements in time with that danceable rhythm. He knows the exact choreography of hips and legs that song inspires in you…and his slacks suddenly feel far too confining.

That’s when your voice cuts through the relative quiet like a bolt of lightning, somehow even closer now as you call out—half-playful chiding, half siren’s promise.

“Oh Kentooo…” The singsong inflection has his eyes squeezing shut even as his cock shamefully twitches against it’s restrictive fabric prison. “Where has my favorite salaryman gone off to hide? You know I can’t dance without my partner watching me.”

Gritting his teeth against the dark, full-bodied groan that tries to escape, Nanami hunches forward until his elbows are digging into his thighs. There you stand framed in the patio door, backlit in a devastating silhouette by the lantern lights emanating through the loud yard behind you.

You walk closer in that torturous dress, the double layers trailing languidly behind in currents of fabric that have his throat struggling to swallow. Your stunning frame is practically dripping in sensual confidence and self-assured power. He knows the power you have over him and would sooner swallow his favorite tie than give that up.

The rich carmine floats around you in sinuous waves as you sashay closer to where Nanami sits transfixed on the sofa. And with each step, all manners and decorum that have been taught to him fizzle away with the increasing ache in his jeans.

“Like what you see?” you murmur huskily once you’ve prowled to stand between his legs, allowing Nanami an unfettered view of your neckline, the long gold necklace between your breasts winking at him with each shallow intake of breath. You lift one leg to press a knee onto his powerful thigh—close enough for your perfume to slide down his nostrils and cloud his mind. The slit over your bent knee flutters open in an obscene gap, granting his hooded gaze a glimpse of skin his teeth ache to bite into.

“I asked,” you breathe out in a seductive timbre, near enough for Nanami to actually taste the addictive warmth of your presence on his tongue. “If you like what you see…”

The inhale that rattles through his powerful frame is involuntary. So is the compulsive way his fingertips suddenly flex against the cushion with the overwhelming urge to finally reacquaint himself with the soft temptation of your skin. Others be damned, mannerisms of being a respectful guest falling to the wayside.

Somewhere through the rapidly thickening haze of pure liquid arousal, Nanami manages a jerky nod—unable to summon even the most basic of syllables in response. He swallows hard, Adam's apple bobbing convulsively as you arch one delicious eyebrow in a silent challenge. With your beautiful curls pulled up into a high ponytail, he can see the slope of your ears that are adorned with the gold hoops he bought you last month.

Then, before he can gather enough of his scattered wits to chastise you for your behavior, you’re boldly reaching out and capturing one of his clenching fists in a firm grip. A soft grunt rattles up from deep in Nanami’s chest at the heated feel of your palm finally making purchase on his overheated skin.

But his breath hitches in a harsh inhale as you purposefully guide his splayed fingers towards your exposed leg—sliding his hand up excruciatingly slow to caress along the landscape of textures and planes laid out in offering. He expects the generous hem of panties he’s seen time and time again. He knows what they look like in his mind when he teases the edges before slipping inside to graze his fingers along your aching clit. But the calloused pads of his fingertips brush the thin string of a thong instead. And it’s just a single touch that has him wide-eyed, reeling—the edges of his vision dizzying into a hazy fog of aching, inexplicable need.

You should have come with a manual. Surely there’s a guide to get through the summer months with you? Some sort of text to explain the steps he needs to take to keep himself in control in public?

The rapturous throb of your saphenous vein leaps against his fingertips as you allow him to slant just a hairsbreadth further—close enough to feel the heat of the place he’s been countless times before—close enough to slide a thick finger along fabric he knows is wet.

Only for you to tear your hand away and drop your knee as the sound of Yuki's voice pierces the heavy sensual tension hanging between your bodies.

“There you are!” She calls out cheerfully from the sliding glass door. “My song is on, come dance with me!”

There’s a gentle tuft of laughter from you then—one tinged with dark satisfaction as you drink in the wrecked, wanton expression flaming across Nanami’s features. As if thoroughly enjoying reducing him to this strung-out state of desperation. You could rule the world if given the right resources.

“Yuki, let’s get you some water. You’ve had a little too much to drink…” your voice trails off as you disappear in a rustle of vermilion and sashaying hips with one last loaded look over your bare shoulder.

He manages a shuddering breath that feels more like sandpaper sliding down his abused lungs. The delicious scent of your perfume still clings to the charged air around him, the phantom-like caress of your dress along his knuckles, the sound of your throaty laugh disappearing back to the party outside. Each ragged exhale has his body subtly canting forward, giving silent chase to your retreating form as if by muscle memory alone.

This game…this deliciously maddening game you delight in playing has Nanami’s entire being teetering on the razor-thin edge of unraveling completely. Each new summer ensemble seems specifically designed to further tempt and destroy the decades of discipline he’s meticulously cultivated since he was a teenager.

Nanami would think after a relationship or two, he would have steeled himself against falling victim to seduction. And yet, not a single woman from his past could have prepared Nanami for the devastating combination of your radiant beauty and barely-restrained hedonism.

Your laughter calls out to him again, his eyes snapping up to see you smiling as Yuki chugs the glass of water Choso has pressed to her lips. Completely innocent and free of devilish qualities, the fact that Nanami knows that dark side of you makes him fold his arms across his chest, sagging against the sofa and glaring at your form as he wills his erection to go down.

It’s two days before summer’s end when Nanami feels the steadily fraying threads of his self-control finally unravel into oblivion. He’s tried every possible tactic these last few months to stave off the relentless fire of desire you’ve been stoking within him—going for runs, ice cold showers, avoiding you when possible. He’s even resorted to having you model your newest sundress purchases at home in a desperate attempt at desensitizing himself. It all seems incredibly dramatic, but Nanami has no idea what else to do. Nothing has worked against the intoxicating mix of your lively beauty and increasingly bold choices designed to torment him until he’s six feet under.

He had known from the moment he accidentally stumbled upon that fateful periwinkle dress sitting in your laptop’s shopping cart that it would be his undoing. He can still picture with perfect clarity the way the model seemed to shimmer and dance on the screen as he clicked through the product imagery—he pictured it with heart throbbing clarity how it would look on you.

And he still has so many more years left of his life to enjoy.

Without conscious thought, Nanami had swiftly removed the item from the cart—an invasion of privacy that left him nauseous, but a necessary decision if only to spare himself.

He was stupid to think it would actually work.

So it comes as little surprise to see you boldly flaunting that silken number tonight at the rooftop gala marking his company’s most prosperous quarter yet. The twinkling strings of lantern bulbs and hot summer breezes swirling all around you only heighten the flagging warning that this night won’t end the way he wants.

As you glide about the rooftop, the pale periwinkle seems to float effortlessly around your body. Like every dress before, this one is no exception, complimenting the deepness of your skin. The whisper-weight fabric lays against your hips and waist, simultaneously shaping and gracefully draping in all the right places.

The thin straps crisscross behind your neck, framing your graceful shoulders and collarbones. As you turn, the silk lifts and drifts around you in a mesmerizing swirl of decadence. It’s another plunging V-neckline, but this dress sits on your body and decolletage with an air of romantic grace. It’s not scandalous like that night at Yuki and Choso's.

But it’s the back—oh it’s the back that makes his gaze heavy, that makes the organ in his chest beat out of rhythm with every inch he uncovers. Try as he might, it’s absolutely impossible for him to look away from the delicate contours and valleys of your body put on full and enthralling display by this backless dress. From the elegant lines of your throat and shoulders left teasingly bare to the soft inward curve of your arched lower back—the dress is a cruel temptation showcasing every salivating inch of you that he’s spent countless nights worshiping.

It’s beautiful on you, truly and unimaginably beautiful, and it’s a terrible twist of fate that such a simple observation is destroying Nanami from the inside. All that discipline—the cold showers, the extra miles added to his runs, the attempts of desensitization—it’s useless. No matter how hard he tries, he will always notice something new each time he looks at you. And it will always wreck him and throw him off axis whether he likes it or not.

Because amidst all the warmth and sociability of this rooftop celebration, all Nanami’s rapidly sharpening focus can zero in on is the subtle glisten of perspiration trailing down the slope of your spine. Every imperceptible turn and cock of your hip amplified tenfold by the silk that gets to touch you while he watches. As if personally daring him to finally surrender every last shred of patience and simply take what he wants.

A soft chuckle escapes your full lips as Nanami’s boss leans in closer, undoubtedly regaling you with some far from amusing anecdote from the office. The charming sound has every thread of Nanami’s control taut like a bowstring. Because that sound means a lot for him nowadays—laughing at his dry humor, the movies you both watch together, the giggling stuttering into whimpers and moans of ecstasy when your back arches from his tongue.

Suddenly, the light summer breeze kicks up in and swirls around you, waving the hem of your dress and the two-day old twistout on your head. Instinctively, you reach up to tuck a lock of those dark silken twists behind one ear.

Time itself seems to slow as he watches those inky tendrils ghost across your bare shoulders and the exposed skin of your upper back. Nanami watches with visceral hunger as those wild strands make playful, meandering paths across the smoothly toned expanse of brown skin. His entire body instantaneously flushes with hot need and arousal at the simple, harmless image. The soft rise of your breasts shake as you offer a fake laugh to whatever drivel your boss has just said. And in that split second—the culmination of tonight, this dress, the entire summer of taunting and coy smiles— Nanami’s restraint finally shatters into so many useless slivers at his feet.

Before conscious thought can override anything else, he’s stalking across the rooftop with rigid, predatory intensity—adjusting the unique glasses on his nose, his mouth set in a grim line of single-minded focus. The gaggle of chattering coworkers and small-talk banter all fade away into muted static and white noise. All that exists in this heated vortex of Nanami’s rapidly narrowing universe is the coiling pull of you.

“Ah, Nanami!” His boss greets heartily, clearly surprised yet pleased to see the company’s best worker at last. “Your partner and I were just discussing a better way to spruce up the quarterly party for next year. Care to weigh in, my friend?”

The question lands on deaf ears. Because at the exact same instant his professional mentor is extending that olive branch of attempted small talk…your eyes are on his, a knowing, small smile pressed to the hem of your champagne glass as you take a sip. The sight of your jewelry, the fabric against your skin, the way you look at him…the desire that rips through his body is staggering.

“I apologize for interrupting, but I need to speak with you,” he grates out in a tone heavy with gravel and masculine focus. His palm finds the smoldering heat of your lower back without conscious thought, marking delirious patterns of desire against your naked skin. Your eyebrows furrow with a silent question at the rough timbre of his command…even though you see that undisguised storm of hunger and frustrated desire raging behind his tinted glasses.

“Of course,” you finally murmur and turn to his coworkers to wish them goodbye, setting down your glass on the table beside you.

He’s burning, raging with a fever that doesn’t even exist and each shallow inhale draws more of your achingly familiar perfume into his senses—only making things worse.

He guides you through the crowded rooftop party and towards the elevators with a molten intensity bordering on feral. Nanami’s palm maps possessive into the searing expanse of your back. Every step jostles his arm flush against the silk on your frame.

“Where exactly are we going in such a hurry?”

The rich, seductive rasp of your voice is designed to torture him further, but Nanami doesn’t rise to it, simply presses fingers more firm to your back, his other punches the elevator button with purpose.

“I said I need to speak with you,” he finally bites out. “That should be more than enough.”

You lean further into his touch and look up at him, your tongue darts out to toy with your plush bottom lip in a show of faux innocence.

“Is that so?” The melodic lilt coupled with the ghost of your warm breath fanning across Nanami’s jaw would have been enough to make a lesser man’s knees buckle entirely. Instead, it simply ratchets the tension coiling through his powerful frame into a downright maddening degree.

The soft chime of the arriving elevator makes you both turn in tandem, the mirror of the elevator doors casting your reflections—allowing Nanami to drink in the smoldering fire already blazing behind your heavy-lidded stare. There’s profound hunger glimmering there that matches his own. An unadulterated wildness reined in by the thinnest veneer of coy indifference. You’ve always been slick—but not tonight.

The mirrored doors slide open with a hushed mechanical shush, you both step inside, and the doors slide closed.

Nanami offers a silent apology for the violation of manners his parents instilled in him before he backs you into the far wall—the breath punching out of your lungs as your back makes shocking contact with the mirrored paneling. Now it’s you breathless, struggling to compose yourself as the masculine power of Nanami consumes you.

A subtle shudder ripples through Nanami’s abdomen as you wantonly tilt your head back, arching your throat in wordless invitation just as your fingertips rise to trail heated lines over his heaving chest. The lapels are black as midnight, the undershirt a crisp white, and he’s the handsome man that’s all yours even as he fights between what’s right and what he wants. One of his palms is cupping the slope of your jawline as the other maps out the silk of your dress. He bends slowly until the heat of his mouth is tracing the full curve of your parted lips—a heavy brush of sculpted male confidence against your teasing softness.

“You’ve pressed against my boundaries to a criminal degree, love,” Nanami warns in a dark rasp scorched with the first cinders of the firestorm yet to come. His palm slides up the bare inward curve of your back until his fingers are tunneling through the wild riot of your twistout at the nape of your neck. Tinted eyes slit in satisfaction as your head tips back farther on a shaky inhale—granting him access to the deliciously vulnerable length of your throat.

“Nothing to say?” he husks out in the open, admiring the flutter of your lashes as his voice hits you. Nanami’s mouth brands a hot trail from the sensitive juncture of your jaw up towards the shell of your ear. You whimper softly at the slow, torturous build—the same sound of rapture he has memorized and pulled from you countless times between the sheets. It’s enough to strip away any lingering reservations entirely.

With the strength he’s never ashamed to show you, hands slide under your thighs and he yanks you up. Your legs wrap around him on instinct, your arms winding around his neck, your head tilting back again to smack on the mirrored glass.

His tongue glides along the buttery curve of your throat, tasting the familiar tang of salt and vanilla on the tip and the smell of him, of pure Nanami clouds your mind enough to finally look down at him, your noses a hairsbreadth from each other. It’s a silent standoff, your eyes as teasing as they are filled with arousal, his eyes dark with something that makes you shiver against him.

And then he’s kissing you, deep and hungry, his hands roaming the bare expanse of your back, dipping lower, pulling you closer. You melt into Nanami’s kiss, your initial surprise giving way to a matching hunger. Your hands slip under his suit jacket, feeling the heat of his skin through his shirt. He groans against your mouth, the sound vibrating through you, igniting your nerves, thrumming in your veins.

You don’t even hear the elevator doors open but you feel him walking, lips hot and demanding groaning into you as you slide your fingers into his golden locks and pull. Nanami knows these floors like the back of his hand, and he’s familiar with the abandoned break room on the thirtieth floor, his hand yanking the door open and shutting it hard, lips never leaving yours.

You gasp into his mouth when your ass lands on the old buttons of a copier, the machine groaning under your weight, the plastic buttons beeping in protest. As Nanami presses you against the copier, he can’t help but marvel at the feel of you beneath his hands. The dress, this damn dress, is like water under his fingers, smooth and cool and entirely too thin. He can feel every curve, every contour, every shuddering breath you take.

He punctuates his actions with a roll of his hips, pressing his hardness that strains against his slacks against your core. You moan, your head falling back, and he takes advantage of your exposed neck, his lips and teeth worrying the sensitive skin, his tongue licking the marks he leaves.

“How many more dresses do you have?” he growls against your throat, his voice rough with need. “How many more ways are you going to torture me?”

You gasp as his teeth graze your pulse point, your fingers threading into his hair. “T-that depends,” you manage, your voice breathy. Nanami’s chuckle is dark, dangerous, his hands trailing higher, dipping into the seam of your panties, his fingers brushing over your clit. He savors the way your jerk against him, a whimper leaving your throat as you pant into the dusty air.

“Is this what you wanted? To reduce me to this? A man so desperate for you he’d take you in a public place?”

“Yes,” you hiss, arching into his touch, your breasts pressing against the thin silk that covers them. “Yesyesyes...”

Nanami’s groan is part frustration, part desire. “You have no idea what you do to me.” There’s a hint of wonder in his voice, a note of awe at the depth of his own need. His fingers press more insistently, circling, gathering your slick to make each stroke more messy and impactful, driving you towards the edge. The buttons of the copier dig into your skin, the machine whirring and beeping beneath you, adding to the crescendo of sensation. He can hear the mechanical shuffle of papers being chucked out from one end, slapping onto the floor.

“Do you like this?” Nanami pants, his breath hot against your ear. “Do you like teasing me, driving me crazy?”

“Yes,” you admit, free of shame, your nails digging into his shoulders. “Please, Kento.”

He slides two fingers into your wet heat, savoring your wanton gasp, increases the pressure, the speed of his fingers, pushing you closer to the precipice. “Have you done this before?” he asks, his voice raw with emotion. “Teased other men like this, made them want you so badly they’d forget themselves?”

“No,” you moan desperately, your head thrashing from side to side, deep locks brushing your cheeks. “Never. It’s only ever been you, Kento. Only you.”

“Say it again,” he demands, his teeth grazing your earlobe.

“Only you,” you pant. “I’m yours, Kento. Completely.”

It doesn’t take long—countless strokes inside of you, a curl of his fingers, a twist of his wrist, and you shatter. Your cry of pleasure mixes with the beeps and groans of the copier, your body shaking, your fingers digging harder into Nanami’s shoulders that he’s sure you’ve broken the barrier.

He holds you through it, his lips on your skin, his murmured praises in your ear, soft litanies of words that has made you fall deeper in love with him each passing day. You don’t get a chance to come down fully because he’s on you again, pressing closer, pushing your panties to the side and digging his fingers into the meat of your hips. But the angle is wrong, you’re too high and the copier digs into his thighs and impedes him from getting to you the way he wants.

With a grunt of frustration, Nanami lifts you off the machine. Your legs wrap around his waist as he carries you to the conference table. He sweeps aside the accumulated debris with one arm, sending sugar and tea packets scattering to the floor. Your back hits the table, the hard surface unyielding beneath you. Plastic cups crunches and snaps under your weight, sugar and coffee creamer powder puffing into the air, settling on your heated skin.

“Do you have any idea,” he murmurs, soaking in the radiance you beam up at him, “how many times I’ve imagined this? Pulling you away from everyone, getting my hands on you…not being able to do it because I’m better than that.”

You moan as he nips at your collarbone, your legs wrapping around his waist, pulling him closer. “And yet here you are,” you tease, breathless with twinkling eyes that shine right through him.

He captures your lips again, the kiss deep and demanding. You arch into him, your hands throwing off his glasses—they smack against a wall—your fingers deftly undoing his tie, working on the buttons of his shirt. You need to feel his skin against yours, need to be closer, and he shudders at the feel of your warm hands breaching the open buttons, sliding up his bare chest.

As if reading your mind, Nanami reaches for the zipper of your dress, slowly pulling it down. The fabric parts, baring more of your skin to his heated gaze. He takes a moment to admire you, his eyes roaming your body like a physical caress.

“Beautiful,” he murmurs, almost to himself. Then his hands are on you, tracing your curves, fingers brushing your nipples before he gives them a pinch. A whimper shakes from you, your fingers pressing into his bare chest.

Dimly, he’s aware that he should stop this, that he’s in a public place, at a work event. But the heat of your body, the insistence of your touch, the mounting pleasure coursing through his veins—it all conspires to drown out reason.

Your hands fumble with his belt, your fingers shaking with need. He helps you, impatiently pushing his pants and boxers down just enough. And then he’s touching you, his fingers digging into your hips, sliding you closer to him until the tip of him presses to the sopping wet heat of your center, wet from your orgasm and still ready.

“Please,” you whimper, hardly recognizing your own voice. “Please, Kento…”pushing your dress further up your hips, trailing over your ribs, cupping your breasts until the skin spills between the gaps. His eyes widen at the sight, the base of his spine heating up. So many times he’s seen you like this in the privacy of your home, and now it’s in an old break room at his workplace, the consequence of you finally taking things too far.

He’s free of any feral energy as he kisses you, sliding into your welcoming heat slowly to acquaint himself again. Your fingers dig into his skin, your chest pressing into him as you adjust, the table creaking under your joined weight as you wrap your legs around his waist and dig your silver heels into his back. Soon he’s moving above you, within you, each thrust pushing you higher, each thrust fanning the fire within himself.

“Please,” you whisper against his lips, begging again for the unspoken demand of more. And even though the roles are reversed right now—you the one being teased—he gives you whatever you ask.

He sets a pace that’s just shy of punishing, each snap of his hips brushing his zipper against the inside of your thighs. The room fills with the sounds of sex—the slap of skin on skin, your gasps and moans, his grunts into the air. He cannot believe he’s in this moment, doing something so scandalous.

“You reduce me to this,” he pants against your lips. “It’s not fair.”

“I know,” you gasp, your hands pulling at open lapels of his shirt, squeezing around the buttons, the fabric groaning. “I’m sorry.”

But you’re not, he can tell. There’s a hint of satisfaction in your voice, a touch of pride. And why shouldn’t there be? You’ve brought him, the ever-controlled Nanami Kento, to his knees. He loves you too much to ever want anything different.

“I’m a good man,” he murmurs, more to himself than to you, curving his next thrust that he knows will brush against that spot you like.

“You’re an amazing man, Ken,” you moan in surprise, your hips lifting to meet his to seek more. “The best. Only the best for me. Only you, Kento.”

The praise makes him shake, the fire in his body raging like an inferno, burning his skin, breaking him into a sweat. He presses a knee into the table, throws one of your legs over his shoulders and savors the ragged way your name leaves his lips as he gives you everything.

“You feel so good,” he pants, his tongue licking the skin of your neck. He tastes the saltiness of your sweat, the sanitizing taste of perfume, the powdered creamer and sugar that sticks to your skin from the table. “So perfect.”

“Come on, Kento” you keen, your nails raking down the suit on his back. “Don’t stop. Please don’t stop.”

He doesn’t. Couldn’t, even if he wanted to. He’s lost in you, in the feel of you, in the knowledge that he’s the only one who gets to see you like this. Wanton, needy, completely undone.

Nothing else matters—not the party going on just floors above, not the risk of discovery, not the propriety you’re both abandoning. In this moment, there’s only you and him and the heat that’s consumed you both all summer, finally finding release.

Nanami’s thrusts become erratic, his rhythm faltering as the base of his spine tightens in a delicious way to let him know that he’s close. His hand slips between your bodies, past the silk of your rumpled periwinkle dress, gliding over your clit in well-practiced strokes and the leg over his shoulder tenses up, your head digging into the table, neck arching for him to see the flecks of sugar sticking to your neck.

“Ohhh right there Kento. Right there. Please, please I’m gonna cum—I’m—“ you smack a hand over your mouth to quiet yourself, eyes shutting tight.

“Absolutely not.” Nanami hasn’t suffered for months just to be deprived of anything during this encounter. He yanks the hand from your mouth, pressing it hard into the table, and the shock on your face as you look up at him, the staccato of your breaths, the undeniable seriousness in his gaze even as he pistons into you, admiring the way your dress pools at your waist as he gives you more, harder, deeper until—

“Ohhhh fuck!” you cum with a long dragged out cry, your body clenching around him, walls locking around his cock to the point his orgasm is yanked from him as he falls over the edge with you, pulsing deep inside with a groan muffled against your neck.

He sags against you, both of your chests heaving against each other. He slips a hand behind you, trailing lightly up and down your glistening back as you lie beneath him, spent and satisfied.

As he slowly comes down, he presses a lingering kiss to your sweat-dampened hairline, the roots of your twistout beginning to frizz. There’s a hint of coconut from your leave-in as his nose brushes down to your cheek. So familiar, yet still so intoxicating after almost a year of smelling it. As if he could ever grow numb to the potent lure of your presence.

A ragged chuckle escapes him at that thought, the mirthful rumble making you pull up your head to look at him. Nanami drinks in the utterly debauched vision you make—beautiful brown sweaty skin, hair messy, lips swollen and smirking as per usual.

His arm tightens reflexively around the sensual curves of your waist, pulling you closer in a subconscious gesture of possession and longing. Because for all the delicious torture you’ve inflicted over the past few months with your endless parade of tempting summer dresses…he wouldn’t trade this hard-won moment for anything.

Nanami is many things—disciplined, regimented, a hardworking—albeit tired— professional. But he is also only human at his core. And you, his beautiful free-spirit of a partner, has a simply breathtaking talent for awaking the primal, unrestrained parts of him he usually keeps so rigorously leashed.

“You know,” you murmur in that velvety voice he loves so much. “The minute I realized the dress vanished from my cart was the minute I knew it would be the one.”

A sleepy chuckle breaks free from his lips at your words, the sound causing you to join in as well—a vibrant melody that coats his soul in pure contentment. Nosing closer, he peppers a line of feather light kisses along the line of your jaw. “You’ll never go easy on me, will you?”

“And rob myself of bringing down Nanami Kento piece by piece?” You snort, shooting him a look of pure, playful sin from beneath your lashes. “I might have to make sundress season a year-round thing.”

His answering groan is part growl, part disbelieving laughter as the palm behind your back glides along the elegant curve of your spine down to the bend of your hip. Ever the devilish temptress without even trying, even in the aftermath.

“You’ll be the death of me.”

“That’s a good way to go,” you tease, pulling him down for another kiss, sweet and sticky and full of promise.

His hands slide along the canvas of your body, fingers dipping into the ridges of the open zipper of your dress. He’ll make sure it’s dry cleaned so you can wear it next year. And hopefully he’ll be better prepared.

When you giggle against his lips and dig your heels into his back, he realizes that there will be no amount of preparation when it comes to you.

Thanks for reading!

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cregan-starks · 1 year

Text

Flames of Deceit

Summary: Aemond and Visenya reunite amidst the Dance of the Dragons.

Words: 13,005

Pairings: Aemond Targaryen x OC, Cregan Stark x OC

Warnings: canon-typical incest (Aemond and Visenya are cousins, as well as uncle and niece), book and show spoilers, Westerosi geopolitics, mentions of imperialism and slavery, canon-typical violence, war, blood and gore, fire and burning, mass death, mention of amputation, mentions of torture and captivity, mentions and threats of execution and physical harm, mentions of poverty and starvation, parental neglect, food and eating, alcohol and drinking, sexism, victim blaming, slut-shaming, ableist language, explicit language, nudity, smut (vaginal sex in flashbacks), unresolved sexual tension, grief/mourning, trauma, angst, hurt/comfort, survivor guilt, mutual pining, emotional/psychological abuse, verbal abuse, mentions of pregnancy, childbirth, miscarriage, and death in childbirth, mentions of child/infant death, mentions of infidelity. If I missed any warnings, please let me know! Under no circumstances can you copy, plagiarize, steal my work, or post it somewhere else!

Notes: This totally didn’t take me almost 7 months to write. Cregan Stark is the protagonist of Fire & Blood. Rise, Cregan nation. My OC Visenya is Rhaenyra’s and Daemon’s daughter, and Jace’s older twin. Superfecundation, baby. Visenya and Jace are born in 111 AC, not 114 AC. The Battle in the Gullet still occurs in 130 AC, soon after the events of this one-shot. Reblogs and comments are encouraged and immensely appreciated. If this does well, I’ll post a reader version.

Credits: Huge thank you to my betas @maharani-radha-writes 💛 @aereth 💖 and @shewhomustbecalledking 🩶, and to @haystack-boy @lavendertales @buttercup--bee @agirllovespancakes and @oloreaa for their constant patience and support. It means a lot, and I’m immensely grateful. Apart from my OC Visenya, all characters belong to George R.R. Martin. Gif by @aemondtargaryensource (x)

Ao3 | Masterlist | Next

EARLY 130 AC

HARRENHAL, THE RIVERLANDS

The sheer immensity of Harrenhal had provoked dizziness in Visenya. She had heard the story innumerable times. For four decades, King Harren Hoare had built greedily and obsessively, sacrificing thousands of slaves, and beggaring the riverlands and the Iron Islands. The indestructible construction had been no match for Balerion, whose fire had consumed the tyrant and his sons inside it, ending their line. Most Westerosi believed that the phantoms of the Hoares wandered the castle halls. The fortress is costly to maintain, and it devours its possessors. Qoherys, Harroway, Towers… All extinct. Whether cursed or not, Harrenhal remained a strategic location – the largest castle in the Seven Kingdoms.

The current castellan – Larys Clubfoot’s great-uncle – Ser Simon Strong had recently surrendered Harrenhal to Daemon Targaryen. The presence of Caraxes might have contributed to his hasty decision. Following the victory at the Burning Mill and the subsequent submission of Stone Hedge – terminating Green strength in the riverlands – Queen Rhaenyra’s allies had commenced their gathering at Harrenhal, in accordance with the Prince Consort’s stratagem.

Visenya had departed Dragonstone on the same night that Daemon had summoned her, having been granted safe passage by the Velaryon ships patrolling the Gullet. At the outbreak of the war, the Sea Snake’s fleet had closed off Blackwater Bay, choking trade to and from the capital.

As soon as she had dismounted her dragon in the castle yard, she had sensed the eerie ambience that had haunted Harrenhal’s colossal curtain walls and fissured, melted towers. Formidable and dreadful. Harren’s monument and tomb. Blackwing had responded to Caraxes’ fervent shriek with her own, flapping her wings at him. Happy to be reunited.

Her father had offered her a warm welcome and a tight embrace, had even insisted that she sit on his war council, wherein she had befriended Alysanne Blackwood, whom she had grown quite fond of.

At last, Visenya had thought, on the morning that Daemon had sent for her. Though she loved him dearly, her father hadn’t invited her there because he had missed his daughter. Visenya had met with Daemon alone, in the Hall of the Hundred Hearths – she had counted thirty-five – grander than the throne room in King’s Landing, the discolored ceiling looming loftily above them. Her father had donned his chain mail over his crimson tunic.

Does he sleep in that? Or am I the threat?

‘Ser Crispin and the Kinslayer are marching on Harrenhal,’ Daemon had informed her, instead of “good morrow”, pressing a rolled parchment into her palm, ‘They mean to join forces with the Lannisters’, at Stoney Sept.’

Her heart had jolted at the mere mention of his title. Aemond… At the Usurper’s farce of a coronation that the Hightowers had compelled her to attend – dressed in green – Visenya had kissed him farewell, forsaking any glimmer of hope for a future with him. I have demonstrated where my loyalties lie. I have chosen my family.

Her lilac eyes had skimmed over the scrawled message on the sheepskin, the wax sigil foreign to her. The White Worm?

‘You are strangely poised,’ Visenya had observed, suspicious, studying her father’s amused expression.

‘I’ve been waiting for this,’ he had confirmed, smirking wickedly, curling his hand around the hilt of sheathed Dark Sister. Another one of his traps… and he’s pulling me into it. Daemon had gently cradled her cheek, purring, ‘I have a mission for you, sweetling.’

EARLY 130 AC

STONEY SEPT, THE RIVERLANDS

Her host had encamped half a day’s ride from the town, with sufficient provisions for a fortnight. The arduous advance and the muddy soil had wearied men and horses alike, so Visenya had relied on the Greens’ tardiness to provide them with the respite that they had needed.

Her dragon had brazenly exploited that ploy – napping during the day and hunting at night, increasing the risk of being discovered. Surpassed by Vhagar in age and size, Blackwing had never been ridden before a seven-year-old Visenya had claimed her. They shared a temper, a wildness, and a fierce devotion to each other. My twin in dragon flesh, Jace would jest.

‘You have become too spoiled,’ she had reproved, affectionately, tapping Blackwing’s dark scales, heated to the touch.

The beast had objected, idly, releasing a guttural noise, smoke rising from its nostrils.

For five days, her spies had reported nothing of enemy activity. Her anxieties had continued to fester and to gnaw at her. What if I fail? What if I die? I would condemn my people in vain. And Aemond… What am I to do about him?

On the sixth day, the scouts had burst into her tent, blurting that the Greens had arrived at Stoney Sept. The maester had quickly dispatched a raven to Prince Daemon, at Harrenhal.

‘We attack at dawn,’ Visenya had declared, resolute.

I’ll do my best, father.

The fray had been gruesome, stretching for hours upon hours. A thick mist had settled over the Blackwater Rush, impairing visibility. Visenya had been the surprise element, concealing herself to deceive her foes, and striking unexpectedly, in the midst of battle. She had flown on her daunting Blackwing, laying waste to men and reserves indiscriminately, amongst the sounds of steel clashing with steel, shields splintering, arrows whistling, and soldiers screaming as they fought, suffered wounds, and perished. Hundreds of Greens had been engulfed in her dragon’s flames.

Aemond had been slow to deter the princess. Afraid to face me? Visenya and Blackwing had used the fog to their advantage, climbing higher and higher into the sky – the Kinslayer chasing after them on hoary Vhagar.

‘Dracarys!’, she had ordered, and Blackwing had descended on Vhagar, unleashing a cloud of fire that had only incensed the latter.

The dragons had spun, locked in a vicious struggle of claws and fangs, wings thrashing, until Aemond had suddenly swiveled Vhagar, slamming her into Blackwing. Their deafening roars had pierced the air. The collision had knocked Visenya from her saddle – the searing flames licking at her arm – and had sent her plummeting towards the Blackwater below. Having crashed into the Rush, she had surfaced seconds later, her hefty armor and the river’s currents hindering her endeavors to stay afloat. Visenya had looked up, able to distinguish a faint form lunging at another – the beasts’ screeches reverberating far above.

Blackwing will not be coming to my rescue.

Her tribulations hadn’t stopped there. A glimpse at the golden dragon banner of the Pretender, and she had realised that the currents had pushed her in the wrong direction… too late. She had already been spotted by the scouts on the shore, who had alerted their captain. They had aimed their crossbows at her, waiting for the Blackwater to present her to them on a gilded platter. I think not.

Visenya had bitten into the hand of the man who had dragged her out of the water, then she had tossed him into the Rush.

‘Cunt!’, the next attacker had bellowed, charging at her.

Slowed down by her injuries, her movements had been clumsy. Visenya had ducked under his first blow, stumbling to retain her balance. She had unsheathed her sword to parry his second blow, and had driven her blade through his breastplate. She had slashed a guard’s belly, his entrails spilling out. A soldier’s glove had caught her weapon, yanking it from her grasp. Disoriented by a swift welt to the side of her head, Visenya had been tackled to the ground – the impact rendering her breathless. Two fists had savagely pummeled her face, again and again and again – a massive weight crushing her. She had desperately fumbled for her scabbard, had withdrawn her dagger, and had slit her aggressor’s throat. Hot blood had spurted out, blinding her. She had been hoisted to her feet, her dirk wrenched away. Howling with rage and frustration, Visenya had scratched at the man’s eyes with her nails, had kneed another in the groin, and had torn off an archer’s ear with her teeth.

Alas, she had been one enfeebled person against all of the odds… and a dozen Greens. Her apprehension had been inevitable.

The capture of the commander had prompted the capitulation of her army. Visenya had been delivered to Ser Crispin in chains, covered in blood, dirt, and grass, braids disheveled, dragonscale armor soaked, body aching, left arm throbbing. I will not quail. Those traitors will receive no such satisfaction from me.

Attired in the white garments of the Kingsguard, Ser Crispin had been the living depiction of virtue and chivalry. Lickspittle. He had immediately discarded courtesy, referring to her as a “bitch in dragon’s clothing.” In retaliation, Visenya had dubbed him a “sheep in sheep’s clothing”, earning herself a cuff across the face from his steeled gauntlet. Blood had flooded her mouth, her cheek stinging sharply.

Ser Crispin had further commented that her men had been rather committed to her, alluding that she had fucked them to obtain their service. Every woman is an image of the Mother, to be spoken of with reverence.

‘It’s not as high of an honor as warming the Dowager Queen’s bed,’ Visenya had admitted, slyly, and had spat on his boots, ‘Hand of the Usurper. Does he wipe his ass with you?’

Crispin would have hit her again, had the Prince Regent not intervened. Wary, she had surveyed her surroundings for Vhagar – not in evidence. I might wind up her supper.

‘Enough, Cole,’ Aemond had interrupted, solemn, causing Visenya to tense, drawing their attention to where he had been standing, imposing, smeared with ashes and smoke, ‘She may be our prisoner, but she is still a princess, and shall be treated as befits her station.’

Any shred of scorn had abandoned her, ousted by fear and uncertainty. Her father had foreseen this. If you bend, you will break. Remember who you are. She had inhaled deeply, striving to even her respiration. I am the blood of the dragon, daughter of Queen Rhaenyra and Prince Daemon, and heir to the Iron Throne. I will not cringe for them.

Aemond had instructed the maids to prepare her a bath and a warm meal, and to fetch her dry clothes. Visenya had grinned, baring her bloody teeth at Ser Crispin, as the guards had led her away. She had been escorted along the smoldering ruins of houses, inns, and brothels, trampling charred corpses – mindful of her step. Carrion crows had circled above, the timid sun peeking from grey clouds. The foul, stifling stench had twisted her stomach, tears needling her eyes. Mine and Aemond’s handiwork. Only the sept, the square, and the trout-shaped fountain had remained intact. When dragons flew to war, everything burned, her mother had warned at the Black Council. What have the people of Stoney Sept done to merit this devastation? What power do they have over their lives? We play our grisly game of thrones, and the commonfolk bear the immeasurable cost.

The encampment had spread interminably – miles of pavilions, armories, forges, stables, latrines, wagons, and baggage trains – crawling with Greens cussing, mocking, and shouting at captives, pages distributing letters, squires polishing armor, honing weapons, feeding, watering, and combing horses, patrols walking to their posts, smiths hammering boisterously, cooks chopping vegetables, skinning rabbits, disemboweling deer, and roasting boars, giggling washerwomen hurrying by, and maesters ministering to the wounded. The turmoil had imbued Visenya’s senses. Mesmerised, she had watched a wailing, writhing man have his leg amputated, until one of her assigned guardians had shoved her forward.

She had assumed that Blackwing had flown away… but, having escaped the battle unscathed, and always loyal to a fault, her dragon had landed in the enemy’s camp, razing barracks and roaring ferociously, seeking its rider. After it had mauled the Greens who had attempted to approach it and shackle it, Aemond had begrudgingly permitted Visenya to comfort her feral companion. Blackwing had nuzzled its snout against her, coiling its tail around her, protectively, while Visenya had murmured “lykirī”, caressing its scales – her taut restraints impeding the action. Her chest had constricted agonisingly when the traitors had forcibly separated them. I will return for you, I promise.

She had been ushered into a vacated chamber, where the maids had obediently unchained her wrists, had removed her armor, had unbraided her hair, and had helped her undress for her bath, evading her glare and her nakedness – scarcely addressing her. What grim tales have they been told about me? Under the ewerers’ supervision, Visenya had washed herself – her uninjured arm vigorously scrubbing her skin with a bar of soap – and had dried off on her own, using cloths and rags. They have taken away my gear. Her indignation dwindling, she had slipped on the plain shirt, brown breeches, pelts, and a pair of flat shoes that they had brought her – tucking her salvaged brooch in her pocket. Is this meant to humble me?

She had sluggishly eaten her bland yet nourishing food, on a bench, by a candle, goggled at by blushing serving lads.

Aemond had summoned her to his tent, along with the maesters, who had cleansed her burns, had applied a poultice that had reeked of lavender and vinegar, had bandaged her arm, and had rubbed balms on her cuts, bruises, and split lip. Visenya had endured their ministrations in utter silence, grinding her teeth and clenching her fists. She and Aemond hadn’t exchanged a single word.

The pavilion had been modest for the Prince Regent, consisting of a firepit, an oaken war table – stripped of its tomes, maps, scrolls, ink, and wax – chairs, rugs, and a featherbed, with books scattered atop it. The colors red and black dominated the tent of a proud and eminent Green, who carried the golden banner of the Pretender. Aemond cannot deny his Targaryen heritage. Had Otto Hightower dyed his locks silver-white and ridden a dragon, he could have sat his ass on the Iron Throne and ruled in his own name. Instead, he urged the King to make my mother his heir, coerced his daughter to seduce him, and installed his grandson on the throne. Puppets upon puppets, plots within plots.

With the maesters dismissed, Visenya finally had the opportunity to regard Aemond. He hadn’t changed much since she had last seen him, at his brother’s false coronation. In the fire’s light, he had been a sight to behold; the flames illuminating his attractive, distinctive features, his mouth seemingly lodged in a permanent smirk, his eyepatch obscuring his missing eye, his tresses cascading down his back. Aemond had cleaned himself up, shedding his armor – now resting on a rack – for his usual black leather tunic, fastened with a belt that had his sheathed dagger attached to it, and a lengthy coat sewn with fur around the neck. He cast a tall shadow in the pavilion, his posture impeccable. Half dragon, half feline.

‘There’s a lack of dresses,’ informs Aemond, obdurately calm, retrieving a flagon of wine and two cups from the servant at the tent’s entrance, ‘And we had to find clothes that would suit you.’

‘I gather that there’s some poor stable boy currently running around naked,’ quips Visenya, tugging the pelts around herself.

Aemond huffs through his nose, amused, and sets one of the goblets on the table, proceeding to fill it with Arbor Red for her. The war evidently hasn’t affected the Usurper’s notorious love of drinking. Lord Redwyne smelled profit, and pledged his support to the Greens, to ensure that their wine supply never dries. An onerous task. The Pretender has ample ambition in that respect.

‘Don’t fret,’ assures Aemond, upon heeding Visenya’s skeptical, arched eyebrow, ‘It’s not poisoned.’

‘Surely someone spat in it,’ she guesses, convivial, swirling the liquid in her cup.

Aemond smiles, drinking his wine. Visenya tentatively lifts her goblet to her lips, and sips. Delectable flavors invade her mouth, soothing her nerves – albeit a little. She mulls over her next words… half carefully.

‘I reckoned that you and Ser Crispin would share a pavilion,’ she confides, lewdly, crossing one leg over the other, ‘Though your prides would not fit together.’

Aemond’s gaze darkens, his mouth subtly pressing into a thin line. His disposition could make Mushroom miserable... and it has.

‘You could lose your tongue for such insolence,’ he cautions, sternly.

‘Stale news,’ suspires an indifferent Visenya, ‘I can write this down as well.’ She pauses to take a swig, then demands, bluntly, ‘Where is Blackwing? And my men?’

‘The dragonkeepers are tending her,’ explains Aemond, irritation in his tone, leaving his empty cup on the table, ‘Your men are being questioned.’

Good fortune. They know nothing. The laughter and singing outside contradict Aemond’s claim. Drunk on victory. A weakness that she could later exploit. If I could reach Blackwing… lest they harm her.

‘Blackwing was your companion prior to Vhagar,’ she mentions, heatedly, flexing and unflexing her hand, ‘If you touch her–’

‘You are in no position to launch threats, Visenya,’ chastises Aemond, coldly, prodding at the logs with a poker, the wood crackling in the fire, ‘Your treatment depends on my good will. As does your fate. You have my word that Blackwing will not be harmed.’

‘The word of a kinslayer,’ spits Visenya, venomously, eyes darting to him, ‘If you are under the impression that minor acts of benevolence shall convince me to talk, you are gravely mistaken. You overestimate my family’s trust in me.’

‘They trusted you enough to put you in command of an army four thousand strong,’ reminds an earnest Aemond, ‘And you expect me to believe that you have no knowledge of your twin’s whereabouts?’

I wouldn’t trade Jace for the Iron Throne. ‘We shared a womb, not a brain,’ she corrects, tracing the rim of her goblet with her digits, contemplating refilling it. I need my wits about me. ‘You are wasting your time, nuncle. Mine, too. Fetch your torturers, and be done with all this bother.’

‘I will do no such thing,’ he rebuffs, inclining his head.

‘You will torture me yourself?’, asks Visenya, feigning innocence, brushing her loose silver-white hair over her shoulders.

‘You are being difficult, Visenya,’ he accuses, exasperated.

‘What do you intend to do with me?’, she interjects, involuntarily fiddling with her absent rings, ‘Executing me would be unwise. I presume that you will have my dragon killed, and me delivered to King’s Landing, where your usurper of a brother awaits, warming my mother’s rightful seat… or is he still broken and bedridden, lost in poppy dreams?’

‘Mind your tongue, Visenya,’ warns Aemond, louring at her, melting some of her resolve.

‘The Clubfoot will probably throw me in a cell and dispatch his floggers to visit me,’ she concludes, scratching her thigh. Stable boy must have had fleas.

‘I’m not sending you to King’s Landing,’ announces Aemond, with apparent mirth towards her gesture.

‘You will ransom me to my father?’, taunts Visenya, smirking wickedly, ‘He’s the poorest man in the Seven Kingdoms.’ Aemond’s demeanor refutes her insinuation. She continues, all semblance of jest vanishing, ‘You cannot justify keeping me here. Once the Pretender learns about my capture, he will order you to send me to King’s Landing.’

‘Aegon does not concern me,’ he grumbles, clasping his hands behind his back.

‘Pār ivestragī nyke jikagon,’ she advises, coyly. Aemond hums, musing, a glimmer in his eye that doesn’t indicate outright negation. ‘We are at war, and you allow your feelings to cloud your judgment?’ (Then let me go.)

‘Iksi daor rȳ vīlībāzma,’ argues a mild Aemond. (We are not at war.)

So, you did not slaughter Luke? That’s a consolation. ‘Iksis bona skoro syt emā daor ossēntan nyke?’, inquires Visenya, masking her anger. (Is that why you have not killed me?)

‘Killing you would be as imprudent as freeing you,’ he reasons, purposely oblivious, ‘You are worth more alive than you are dead. You lost a fair battle, you surrendered, and now you are my prisoner.’

‘I’ve heard stories about how you and Ser Crispin treat your prisoners,’ she disputes, mordant, ‘And I never yielded. You ride the largest dragon in the world. That’s hardly a fair match.’

Cole and the Usurper’s forces had sacked the port town of Duskendale, putting the ships at the harbor to the torch, hundreds of men, women, and children to the sword, and beheading Lord Gunthor Darklyn for supporting her mother’s cause. Hundreds more had been massacred at Rook’s Rest, where Lord Staunton, too, had been relieved of his head. Besieged by the Greens, he had barricaded himself inside his castle walls, and had requested assistance from the Blacks. With Prince Daemon at Harrenhal, and Queen Rhaenyra griefsick in the aftermath of her son’s murder, command of the Black Council had passed to the Velaryons. Rhaenyra had forbidden her children from answering their ally’s plea, so Princess Rhaenys had flown to Rook’s Rest instead. She and Meleys had fallen in battle against the Pretender, the Kinslayer, and their dragons. Sunfyre had been rendered flightless, the Usurper had suffered severe burns, and Aemond had assumed the title of Prince Regent – to rule in lieu of his older brother.

Visenya’s side hadn’t fared any greater. A wroth Sea Snake had blamed Rhaenyra for his wife’s demise. Jace had named him Hand of the Queen, to appease him – a measure that Visenya had commended. Better than Ser Crispin.

‘You ambushed us,’ reiterates Aemond, incredulous, ‘We would have presented you with terms, to avoid bloodshed.’

Oh, please. You don’t believe that. ‘Fuck your terms,’ curses Visenya, waving dismissively, ‘I suppose that being twice a kinslayer would have marred the carcass of your reputation.’

‘I spared your life,’ he chides, vaguely baleful.

‘A clemency that you did not extend to my brother,’ she sneers, bilious, her nails digging into the table’s surface.

‘Half-brother,’ deadpans Aemond, promptly.

‘If you had to slay your own kin, personally, I would have picked your dear brother, the Pretender,’ proffers Visenya, honeyed.

‘Perhaps you should have killed him,’ he retorts, untroubled, ‘You had your chance.’

Her family had gone to King’s Landing for the Driftmark petition, where her father had created a ghastly spectacle – publicly beheading Vaemond Velaryon for defaming her mother and her brothers. The Targaryen method of solving quarrels. Viserys himself had sat the throne, and had favored Luke as the heir to Driftmark – adhering to the Sea Snake’s wishes.

Due to his declining health, the King had been the first to retire during the subsequent supper that they had all attended. Visenya hadn’t been surprised by his condition; she had frequented the capital, unlike her parents and her siblings. The gathering had soon turned disastrous. Jace had invited Helaena to dance with him – offending Aegon and Aemond. She is so sweet. Alicent had been evil to marry her off to that cunting demon. None of them deserve her. Visenya herself had danced with Daeron, grinning the entire time. We had once been engaged... I could have loved him. He would have been a dutiful Prince Consort and a doting father to our children. Aemond had toasted to her Velaryon brothers, referring to them as “strong.” Fighting had erupted betwixt her siblings and her uncles, and her father had intervened to break them apart.

That evening, her family had sailed for Dragonstone, but Aemond had insisted that she stay in King’s Landing with him. Against her better judgment, Visenya had accepted. She ponders whether it had been a ploy of the Greens to take her hostage, and Aemond had simply played his part. Her grandsire had tragically expired overnight – poisoned by the Hightowers, according to her father. Visenya isn’t so certain. He hadn’t required meddling. He had been rotting for decades.

On the morrow, the Greens had locked her in her chambers. Visenya had refused to swear obeisance to Aegon – had even spat in his face – and to bow at his false coronation. Blackwing and the Princess Rhaenys had come to her rescue – emerging from underneath the Dragonpit on Meleys. Visenya had mounted her dragon, and had addressed the crowd, her voice clear and fierce, laced with fury.

“People of King’s Landing! The Hand and the Dowager Queen deceive you. King Viserys named my mother the Princess Rhaenyra heir to the throne. For twenty-four years, the succession remained indisputable and unchanged. Rhaenyra is the rightful and lawful Queen of the Seven Kingdoms. By crowning Aegon, the Hightowers have committed the highest of treasons and have usurped the Iron Throne, violating the King’s will. Aegon shall show you neither kindness nor wisdom. Remember today. Remember that you lived by the mercy of Rhaenys the Queen Who Should Have Been and myself. If the Hightowers do not cease in their treachery and do not bend the knee, I vow to return with fire and blood!”

Blackwing had roared so intensely that the Conqueror’s crown had been hurled from the Pretender’s head.

Aemond has the right of it. We could have bathed Aegon in flame, quelled their rebellion then and there.

On Dragonstone, the news of Viserys’ death and the Hightowers’ betrayal had driven her mother into an early labor. Her father had descended into madness, determined to levy war. Their losses had continuously piled… and the Seven Kingdoms would bear the cost.

‘I am no kinslayer,’ snarls Visenya, slighted by the idea, tearing her gaze away from Aemond.

‘I made you a generous offer that would have foiled the war,’ he broaches, the grievous memory still raw for him.

Oh, how could I have displayed such ingratitude? She wouldn’t describe his proposal to marry him and rule together as “generous.” It had been an odious humiliation. Aegon – who had not wanted the throne, declaring himself “unsuited” – would have embarked upon a ship and departed Westeros permanently. The Iron Throne is not his to relinquish. Visenya knows that Aemond has no love for his father, but asking her to usurp her mother’s throne? An audacious affront. She had vehemently spurned him, and they had traded sour words – their prides injured.

‘Our families would have started a war to kill us for it,’ drones Visenya, flatly, ‘And what of my parents? They would have never abided by your… solution.’

‘They have no consideration for your happiness and welfare, yet you still toil in their service,’ observes Aemond, provocatively.

‘And you have?!’, she opposes, her fist slamming on the table, ‘You conspired to usurp the throne and slaughtered my brother, the Princess Rhaenys, and their dragons. You are in no position to launch accusations.’

‘Even now, you feel compelled to defend them,’ he comments, dejected.

‘Lucerys was my blood!’, snaps Visenya, wrathful, standing from her seat and storming up towards him – stopping a couple of feet in front of him.

‘As am I!’, booms Aemond, towering over her, ‘And you have never defended me half as much as you did him! He took my eye when I was but ten, and to even that the imp felt entitled, while you gladly dismissed it as an accident and moved on!’

Outside, Blackwing and Vhagar grow agitated, shrieking and flitting their wings, stirring the wind. It seemed to Visenya that Aemond had often been harsher on her than he had been on Lucerys. He loves me… or he used to.

‘It was an accident,’ she maintains, tamer, ‘We were children. Our parents mishandled everything. I’ve told you numerous times that I profoundly regret what happened to you. It’s the truth. I cannot undo Luke’s actions.’

It’s been ten years since then, and forgetting the incident has been impossible. Aemond wears the consequences of it on his face, in his daily life. Our unease at the sight of his gash is a small price to pay.

He had delivered several blows – and had broken Luke’s nose – afore he had been overwhelmed by all five of her siblings, and Lucerys had slashed one of his eyes. Visenya’s absence from the fight had spared her from the interrogation, wherein Rhaenyra had suggested that Aemond be “sharply questioned”, Alicent Hightower had demanded Luke’s eye to compensate for Aemond’s, and Viserys had been eager to abandon his conciliatory obligation. The discord had exposed the personal feud between Rhaenyra and Alicent – their rhetoric diverting from “vile insults were levied against my sons” and “my son has lost an eye” to “duty and sacrifice are trampled under your pretty foot” and “you have been hiding beneath the cloak of your own righteousness.” The Queen had gone so far as to attack the Princess – slitting her arm with the King’s dagger.

Visenya hadn’t spoken at all – displeasing Aemond and her siblings. To her, matters hadn’t been so absolute. Although Aemond had claimed Vhagar too soon – disrespecting Laena Velaryon’s memory – his assault and maiming had been unwarranted. I love Rhaena dearly, but Vhagar was not stolen. The dragon never belonged to her. Aemond and Vhagar chose each other. Visenya had later communicated her opinions to him, and she had reassured her sister that she would have a dragon.

The next morning, the Targaryens and the Hightowers had exchanged false courtesies and falser apologies. Her family’s exile to Dragonstone hadn’t prevented Visenya from writing letters to Aemond, Helaena, and Daeron, or from flying on Blackwing to visit them in King’s Landing.

Alas, the bloody seeds of strife had been sown.

‘No, you cannot,’ concurs Aemond, glancing at her lips, ‘No one can. That is why I sought justice for myself.’

‘Justice?’, echoes Visenya, disdainful, her glare piercing, ‘Had you had your other eye, you would still be as blind as you are now.’

Aemond growls, lashing out and grabbing her roughly, their lower bodies pressing together. Visenya glowers at him defiantly, placing her hands on his breast, to preserve some distance betwixt their upper bodies. The effort shoots a jolt of pain along her arm.

If he meant to scare her, he failed. Aemond would not harm me.

‘Hold your tongue, Visenya,’ he exhorts, through gritted teeth.

‘Or what?’, she challenges, her face inching closer to his, ‘You will have it removed? You will butcher me as you did my brother?’

‘You are brazen, to speak of your half-brother, of my wrongdoings and my crimes,’ berates Aemond, his jaw clenching, ‘What of your family? What of my nephew Jaehaerys?... Iā tresy syt iā tresy. Nyke gīmigon īles aōha kepa.’ (A son for a son. I know it was your father.)

Aware of what Aemond alluded to, Visenya hesitates, her response withering on her tongue.

After the tragedy at Storm’s End, a raven from her father had arrived at Dragonstone. An eye for an eye, a son for a son. Lucerys shall be avenged. She had deduced that Daemon had hired the assassins who had executed Prince Jaehaerys – the Usurper’s six-year-old heir – with Alicent, Helaena, and the latter’s other children as witnesses. Visenya had confronted him about his heinous deed at Harrenhal. Undaunted, her father had firmly admonished that the “pious one-eyed flea of a traitor who slobbers over you” had slain her brother.

In retaliation for Jaehaerys, the Pretender had sent Ser Arryk Cargyll to Dragonstone, to assassinate Jace and Joffrey. The knight had entered the castle in his Kingsguard attire, disguised as his twin Ser Erryk – Queen Rhaenyra’s loyalist – whom he had encountered on his way to the royal apartments. By the conclusion of their duel, the two had mortally wounded one another.

I owe the Hightowers nothing, least of all my sympathy. Children should not be the target of our ire. How do we differ from the Greens if we perpetrate and perpetuate the same crimes that they do?

‘Nyke ēdan daorun naejot gaomagon rūsīr bona,’ clarifies Visenya, sincerely, albeit faintly. (I had nothing to do with that.)

‘No, you are merely the spectator,’ scoffs Aemond, haughty, ‘Proudly passing judgment while others bloody their hands. You are passive. Passive in your beliefs, your guilt, your love.’

Visenya blinks against the tears that prick her eyes, her breath hitched. His cruel and bitter words cut deeply, rooted in years of grievances, enmities, neglect, and abuse. Aemond had once been a sweet, innocent boy – her closest friend, her betrothed. He’s the product of his conditions, his upbringing, and his parents’ influence… as am I. Both confined in a prison of our parents’ sins. Perhaps we inevitably inherit the burdens of our forebears.

Though Visenya may not be the sole reason for his resentment, she is present. Aemond hadn’t blamed her for her family’s actions. He condemned her for not loving him enough. That is unfair. I’m not culpable of that.

A consuming poison has been dribbling inside of her, on the verge of gushing. Visenya has strayed too near to the edge – now wavering, uncertain whether she wishes to tread the line and unravel the truth. That is not why I am here...

... but her decision has already been established.

The truth is important to me.

Summoning her courage, Visenya reaches behind Aemond’s head to peel off his eyepatch, lifting the veil between them. I need to see him, so that he cannot deceive me. She tosses the item aside, neither shrinking nor averting her gaze. She caresses his face, drinking him in – his scar, the sapphire in his eye socket, the flesh that had healed crookedly. Aemond tenses, watching her intently, his respiration ragged. His grip on her slackens.

‘Gōntan ao ossēnagon zirȳla kesrio syt hen issa?’, murmurs Visenya, circling his wrists, impeding his retreat. (Did you kill him because of me?)

At the Black Council, Jace and Luke had offered to act as their mother’s messengers, to acquire support for her claim. The twins had been tasked with the difficult mission – negotiating with the Eyrie, the Three Sisters, White Harbor, and Winterfell. Lady Jeyne Arryn would declare for Rhaenyra if dragonriders defended the Vale. Jace and Visenya had met with Lords Borrell and Sunderland at Sisterton, and at White Harbor, they had arranged for Joffrey to marry Lord Desmond Manderly’s youngest daughter.

The news of Luke’s death had accosted them in the Vale. Visenya had collapsed in Jace’s arms, wailing as her twin had embraced her tightly. She had agonised over her brother’s demise every night, plagued by what she could have done to save him, weeping into a tumultuous sleep. Visenya had never listened to the rumors and the gossip. Lucerys had been her family, her brother, her blood. I fed him, bathed him, read to him, sparred with him, played with him… yet I could not protect him from Aemond.

She possesses little knowledge of what had occurred betwixt Luke and Aemond at Storm’s End. The weather had been atrocious, her brother’s dragon too small to withstand it. In the following days, bits of Arrax’s carcass had washed up on the shore of Shipbreaker’s Bay. Luke had never been recovered. He may have died a dragonrider’s death, but he had died alone and afraid. Had his demise been slow and painful, or swift and painless? Her brother had sworn on the Seven-Pointed Star that he would not fight – merely deliver the Queen’s message. Aemond had taken no such oath. Had Visenya known, she would have held on to Luke and besought him not to go.

If I had flown to Storm’s End in his stead, Aemond could have slain me, and my brother would still be alive.

‘Daor,’ whispers Aemond, at last. (No.)

Visenya stifles a sob, tears escaping her eyes, dampening his thumbs. She foolishly believed that her grief would wane. His confession barely scrapes the surface. Visenya feels no relief, no closure. Has she been on an erroneous campaign to absolve herself of any responsibility, to alleviate her own conscience, and to forgive Aemond – chasing these ends to the detriment of Luke’s memory? If I wanted to bring justice to my brother, I would have slit his killer’s throat and let him bleed out on the ground.

When Aemond succumbs and pulls her into him, Visenya doesn’t resist. The buckles of his tunic are cold and rough against her cheek, contrasting the warmth that he radiates. She releases the exhale that she has been withholding. Her greatest flaw rears its hideous head – a flaw that has sown division amongst her family and has rendered her an outcast. Visenya had suffered for her refusal to forsake her friendship with Aemond, enduring disapproving scowls from her parents, mean jests and malicious accusations from her siblings, and a lack of compassion – all serving to remind her of her tenuous position.

Her proximity to Aemond had even prompted her mother to spurn her as her heir – arguing that he would undermine her as Queen. I cannot have both Aemond and the Iron Throne. I am the eldest child. By all rights, the throne should pass to me.

Shoving those thoughts away, Visenya clutches his sides, sobs wracking her body. Aemond timidly buries his mouth in her locks, breathing in her scent.

‘Daor,’ he repeats, definitively, cradling the back of her head. (No.)

The remainder of her defenses crumble. Visenya loathes that she errs, that she seeks and welcomes comfort from the man who is the source of her sorrow. With the realm plunged into war after Lucerys’ death, there has been no time to mourn – not for her grandsire Viserys, nor her sister Aemma, nor her brother Luke.

An unavoidable war. We are Valyrian, and prone to violence. A testament to power corruption. Prior to the blood magic, the dragons, and the conquests, Valyrians had been a peaceful community of shepherds. They had become increasingly tyrannical and ambitious as their power had soared. The peak of our Freehold… and its ruin. Forewarned about the Doom by Daenys Targaryen’s prophetic dream, her forebears had fled to Dragonstone – a venture that the other, unsuspecting dragonlords had considered cowardice and had ridiculed. We had the last laugh.

Targaryens have always been stubborn, passionate, fierce. Visenya is no exception. Despite their families’ hopes and despite his crimes, her love for Aemond hasn’t dwindled. Their bond is too strong, their souls and fates entwined. I am the blood of the dragon. Nobody dictates whom I love.

And love is seldom simple.

Aemond brushes his lips over her temple, causing her skin to tingle. Visenya lifts her eyes to meet his, and recognises the same ache and longing that lay dormant inside her. Affection blooms in her chest. She could stop this from flourishing, spare them both the misery. As children, they had found solace in each other’s company whenever their families had been the reason for their anguish, so they had promised to never hurt one another.

A part of Visenya still yearns to love Aemond freely. Must her logic always be at odds with her emotions? The only man that I have ever desired, and I have been deprived of him my entire life. I have never been in control. The forbidden aspect merely furthers the appeal of the dalliance. She wants to surrender to the temptation, repercussions be damned.

Visenya traces his mouth with her fingertips, reverently, and strokes his face – recommitting it to memory. Aemond leans into her touch, reveling in the gesture, his respiration shallow. The tips of their noses graze against each other. He wipes her tears before his digits fall on the sides of her neck, feeling her quickening pulse under the pads of his fingers. Aemond’s eye gleams with lust, igniting the same blaze within her. She peers at him from underneath her lashes, drowning in the depths of his blue eye. A shiver runs down her spine. Her lips tremble in suspense, the proximity making her dizzy.

Aemond dips his head to capture her mouth in a tentative kiss. Visenya surges upwards to reciprocate, inhaling sharply through her nose, eyes slipping shut. Their lips mold together, their flame rekindled. His large, calloused hands grip her jaw, to guide her. She splays her hands over his chest, fisting the lapels of his coat, desperate to draw him closer. Visenya parts her lips, granting him entrance, tasting the lingering flavor of the wine that they had shared earlier. A familiar ardor seeps into her belly, immersing her body. Her fire has burned quietly for too long. Now, it has stirred again, emboldened to emerge.

Aemond sinks his teeth into her bottom lip, splitting it and sucking the blood, famished. Visenya groans, her breath blowing the loose strands of hair that cover his forehead. Her knees weaken, and she grasps his shoulders for support, grateful that he wraps his arm around her middle. Her pelts land on the floor. Aemond steps forward, backing her into the table, and hoists her on it impetuously.

Aemond kindly adjusts his belt, to remove the dagger betwixt them. The irony isn’t lost on Visenya. She spreads her legs, inviting, allowing him to settle between them. He sprawls over her, caging her in, his heavy weight almost crushing her against the table’s rigid, uncomfortable surface. His silky hair cascades around her head, framing his face, conferring a strange sense of privacy. Visenya peppers delicate pecks over his chin, continuing along his jaw, her digits prodding at his smooth neck.

She fervidly awaits a kiss that never comes. Aemond hums affably, his arrogant smile shooting to her core. Their breaths mingle, his hands traveling up and down her sides with modest curiosity. Visenya huffs in exasperation, and shifts, ticklish, the heels of her feet digging into his ass. Her thumb catches his lower lip, pressing into it. Aemond holds her gaze, parting his lips enough to engulf her thumb. He swirls his tongue over it afore sucking on it gently. She watches him, captivated, her mouth slightly agape.

The knot in her belly snaps, her patience having thinned, ousted by resolve. She pushes him off, so she can sit up, impelling him to stand. Aemond obliges without objection. Visenya hooks her fingers in his belt, to bring him nearer, and deftly unbuttons his tunic, revealing his bare chest – inch by inch. She drinks in the sight, caressing his glistening skin. The intolerable heat induces sweat to drip betwixt her breasts and to trickle down her spine.

She leans in, only for Aemond to jerk his head away and deny her another kiss – the tip of her nose bumping against his cheek. He smirks, conceited, despite his ruddy complexion. Visenya gnashes her teeth, intent on retribution. Straightening her body, and looping her uninjured arm around Aemond, she licks his earlobe and bites it softly, eliciting a growl from him. He squeezes her hips in silent warning, and sneaks a hand under her shirt, to fondle her breast and pinch her nipple until it stiffens. Visenya moans, hushed, her head lolling back into her shoulders.

Aemond rests his free hand on the base of her throat, his digits winding around it, lips latching onto her exposed neck. Visenya suppresses her whine, the air deserting her lungs. He incessantly strokes her bosom, his teeth abusing the sensitive skin of her neck. She drops her arms – mindful of her wounds – one hand surrounding his wrist, her other fumbling, blindly cupping his hardened member through his breeches. A salacious grunt rolls out of Aemond’s mouth, filling the tent.

His fingers release her throat to tangle in her tresses, and yank, his hips grinding against hers, creating friction. He withdraws his lips from her, and tugs her hand away, his other hand raking down her abdomen. Her chuckle turns into a gasp as Aemond languidly rubs the wet area between her legs, his breath fanning her face. Visenya relishes in the waves of pleasure enveloping her body, her spine arching, though her soaking cunt clenches around nothing. She heaves her thighs higher, hugging his waist – lest he dare pull away from her.

A metal item pokes at her thigh.

My brooch.

Visenya peels her eyes away from him, scrambling to salvage her composure. Aemond ceases his ministrations. He raises her chin with his thumb and forefinger, coaxing her to look at him. Her heart stutters, her vision bleary beneath his suffocating leer. The clouds in his eye have cleared… or he conceals them well. Their lips crash in a frantic kiss – her veins aflame, scalding. He swallows her wanton moan, kneading the flesh of her ass. Aemond cannot fool me. A constant tempest festers within him, ravenous for blood and revenge. Visenya would never be able to tame it. Nothing would.

Numbing remorse smothers her fire. She had forgotten herself and her loyalties. She breaks the kiss, tasting ashes on her tongue. His mouth chases hers, his hand curling around the nape of her neck, to reunite their lips. Aemond bends her back, cradling her against him – the pressure on her shoulder tearing a whimper from her. He lays a tender, apologetic kiss there. Her digits slide into his locks, thwarting him. Visenya stares at the shadows dancing across the ceiling of the pavilion – Aemond’s head pillowed on her breasts.

What am I doing? Where am I going? With him? Distant limbs envelop her, lips ghosting over her skin. He licks a stripe up the column of her throat and nips at it, nuzzling his nose against her neck. I would never betray my family. I cannot have both Aemond and the Iron Throne. The dream is over. Bury it, and crawl out of this bottomless pit of vipers.

He has been stretching seconds into minutes, delaying the inevitable, but he cannot stop it. The die has been cast.

‘Aemond, wait,’ pants Visenya, her own voice foreign to her, her nails clawing at his back, ‘We cannot. I am–’

‘Betrothed?’, deadpans Aemond, cocking his head to peek at her, crimson lips swollen, hair and clothes disheveled, ‘I’m aware. Your half-brother told me, at Storm’s End.’

Her heart leaps into her throat, yet Visenya falters, preferring to disregard his comment and its implications. If Aemond and Lucerys had exchanged insults – and her brother had mentioned her betrothal – it might have incited the former to attack the latter. A door best left shut.

‘Lord Stark is a good man–’

‘Have you sunk so low?’, criticises Aemond, reproach etched on his features, ‘You are a Targaryen princess, the blood of Old Valyria. Dragons do not mate with other beasts, and we do not consort with lesser men.’

Visenya blinks in incredulity, scanning his face for any indication of pretense. He has been collecting dangerous beliefs. Undoubtedly the result of Ser Crispin’s and Alicent Hightower’s influence. King Viserys had been too neglectful to bear any blame in that respect. He’s overly culpable in innumerable other matters.

‘If I have sunk low, I do not wish to imagine what hell you wander in,’ she retorts, dour, shoving him away, her lower back pressing against the edge of the table, ‘I do not require lessons on our heritage. Valyria is gone. I do not adhere to the Doctrine of Exceptionalism, nor do I delude myself about our superiority. According to this logic, your Westerosi mother is lesser. Everybody has their history and their pride. The Starks are the blood of the First Men, descendants of Bran the Builder. Cregan is my equal, and I will not bring him dishonor. You once said something similar to me, when we were younger.’

Visenya purposely omitted that Cregan would have taken additional offence if Aemond – a usurper and a kinslayer – had been her choice of paramour. Following the annulment of her betrothment to Aemond, she had snuck into his bedchamber, and had urged him to claim her maidenhood. It would have compelled our parents to marry us to each other. He had adamantly refused, reiterating that he would dishonor her by doing so. Visenya wonders whether his consent would have changed the tide, whether he rues his decision now… were he capable of it.

‘I remember,’ mutters Aemond, cupping her cheeks, brushing his nose against hers, ‘Yn īlon issi daor riñar dombo.’ (But we are not children anymore.)

‘No, we are not,’ she assents, doleful, undeterred by his lingering lips on her forehead, ‘I am a woman grown, my mother’s daughter, and I vowed to marry Cregan. My word is not fickle. A foreign concept to you and your family.’

She had suggested the match herself, on Dragonstone, prior to hers and her brothers’ departure. Supposing that the Queen’s appeal failed to persuade Lord Stark to pledge the North to their cause, Visenya would offer her hand in marriage.

The memory of beholding Cregan for the first time still exhilarates her. She had been climbing down from Blackwing while Jace had approached Lord Stark, to greet him. Cloaked in furs, he had been an imperious presence – tall, brawny, handsome, graced with grey eyes, dark, wavy locks that cascaded to his shoulders, and a dense beard. His gaze had frequently drifted towards her. Jace had suavely introduced her, and Cregan had curtsied, addressing her as “princess.” Visenya had answered with “my lord” – her smile timid, her eyes wicked.

The harsh weather hadn’t spoiled the northern capital’s beauty, magnificent structures, and rich culture. The twins had received a warm welcome at Winterfell, amidst the winter preparations, and Lord Stark had been a most hospitable host, entertaining his guests with drinking, sparring, and hunting trips in the wolfswood. Visenya had mingled with the commonfolk, conversing with them, helping them with their errands, and teaching their children how to read and write. Cregan had often watched her, fondly, from afar. Some servants had been intimidated by her appearance and her station, stammering through their responses. She had instructed them to simply call her “Visenya.”

Whenever his duties had permitted, Cregan had accompanied her on walks around the castle, to the library, the ancient godswood and its hot springs, and the disturbing crypt that had contained the tombs of the deceased members of House Stark. His direwolf Fang had ambled after them everywhere. They had discussed history, politics, trade, and their families, and had comforted one another in their grief, as Cregan’s wife had recently perished in childbirth. He had even confessed that Jace had reminded him of the brother that he had lost more than a decade ago. She had met his sweet babe Rickon, whom she had doted on. Cregan had bestowed upon Blackwing the highest distinction, deeming her a “formidable beast” – with his habitual morose disposition. Visenya had become besotted with him, regarding him as virtuous, conscientious, tenacious, and reputable.

By the end of the twins’ stay in Winterfell, the Pact of Ice and Fire had been formed, whereby Visenya would wed Lord Stark, and the North would side with Queen Rhaenyra. He had forged a direwolf brooch for her, and she had gifted him one of her rings, to wear it as a necklace. Cregan and Jace had sworn an oath of brotherhood, sealed in blood.

‘You sold yourself to a wolf pup so that you may rally his army to your mother’s cause, and you boast about honor,’ accuses Aemond, scornful, satisfied that he discerns her imagined act, ‘Twas a different kind of sword that you required.’

Sold myself? Visenya’s mouth twists downwards, her latent, crude contempt quivering. Blackwing rattles her shackles, screeching viscerally. He views me as property. I paid my price in kindness and youthful promises, so I am constrained into being his property. I have no freedom, no intuition, no capacity for judgment. I am a frail puppet dancing on my family’s strings, dependent on Aemond to rescue me. He would rather I were a fly in his web. What sort of person expects me to fulfil the vows that I uttered as a child?

‘Cregan would have honored his late father’s word,’ she contends, smoothing her garments, heedless of Aemond’s eye roaming over her body, ‘Lord Rickon Stark swore an oath in the throne hall, and acknowledged my mother as King Viserys’ heir. All of the Westerosi lords did, great and small.’

Upon his lord father’s death, Cregan had inherited Winterfell at the age of thirteen, so his uncle Bennard had ruled as regent until his nephew had reached manhood. Bennard’s reluctance to relinquish power had spurred Cregan to imprison him and his three sons. Akin to Queen Rhaenyra’s plight, his kinsman had attempted to supplant him. Lady Jeyne Arryn – Queen Aemma’s cousin – had thrice endured uprisings that had contested her inheritance of the Eyrie.

A hereditary curse. A woman’s curse. In this world of men, we women must band together.

‘Over twenty years have passed since then,’ specifies Aemond, shrugging blithely, ‘Most of those lords are dead, including the wolf pup’s father. Bones are all that is left of them and their vows.’

Pup. A peculiar term to use for Cregan – a man older than they are. Aemond’s vanity confirms that, to the Greens, King Viserys’ succession amounts to nothing. Their cause is false – founded on quicksand, conspiracy, and murder – and they bury themselves deeper and deeper into an abyss of lies and treachery.

‘They represented their Houses and spoke on their behalf,’ corrects Visenya, her shoulders slumping from the sheer absurdity of having to explain this, ‘Enlighten me, nuncle. How does your situation differ from mine? Are you not betrothed to one of Borros Baratheon’s daughters for her father’s troops? Or is it all four daughters? I have heard varied accounts.’

The illiterate Lord of Storm’s End – another traitor responsible for Luke’s demise. Her brother Joffrey had sworn a terrible oath of vengeance against him and the Kinslayer. The Velaryons had prevented Joff from instantly mounting his dragon Tyraxes to exact revenge. Would I have done the same? He is merely a boy, too young to know such hatred and grief. He and Rhaena are in the Vale, out of harm’s way. Willful Baela remains on Dragonstone, to fight by Jace’s side. Aegon and Viserys, the youngest, are with them. We must ensure their safety, else the war will strip them of their innocence… and their lives.

Dragonstone, Harrenhal, Winterfell, the Vale, King’s Landing, Stoney Sept… My family is divided. If only I could protect them all…

‘I did what was asked of me,’ defends Aemond, forlorn, resting their foreheads together, ‘I never intended to wed her.’ He adds, his words scattered among hasty, consecutive kisses, ‘We have always agreed that we would marry one another. I have neither forgotten, nor forsaken that. I want you.’

‘I thought that we were not children anymore,’ she echoes, shrewd, bending to retrieve her discarded pelts, ‘Our parents annulled our betrothal years ago. You would have us marry without your mother’s blessing? I value my well-being, even if you do not.’

‘You are mistaken,’ coos Aemond, holding her hand to his mouth, kissing her knuckles, her palm, her inner wrist, ‘It’s not too late. There’s still a chance for us.’

Visenya had once shared that sentiment. He lives in the past, clinging to it, misconstruing it. Matters betwixt them would never be the same – a truth that he hasn’t accepted. I would have waited for him... Aemond had usurped the throne and had slain her brother. Now, he hopes to abuse her clemency. What stops him from mistreating her, from hurting her? Why must I always be patient and compassionate? Why must I always forgive and forget? What will I gain from it? Aemond? It’s not enough. His redemption is a prolonged, tedious endeavor that she will not partake in.

I’m severing my noose.

‘A chance?’, snarls Visenya, in conjunction with Blackwing’s shrieks, ‘Is that what you offered my brother when you unleashed Vhagar on him?’ She folds her arms over her chest, her furs caught between them. ‘You have already spilled my blood. I will not present you with a chance to do it again. Aye, I once wanted to marry you. A summer dream of summer children. Winter is coming.’

Ripping the cord that binds her to Aemond will be excruciating, like slashing a part of herself. He is the thorn lodged in her side, her twin flame, his scent and touch imprinted on her, haunting her asleep and haunting her awake. The only power I wield over him is denying him myself.

‘You have returned to threats,’ chides Aemond, buttoning his tunic, visibly irritated by her usage of the House Stark words, ‘Parroting words that are not your own, chirruping tales that others have stuffed your head with, like a little bird.’

‘‘Tis not a threat, beloved,’ purrs Visenya, woven with venom, savoring his indignation, ‘It is a fact. The maesters of the Citadel will release the white ravens soon, to announce its arrival.’

She had witnessed the foreboding signs with her own eyes, at Winterfell – the resplendent snow, the howling winds, the bitter cold. Winter is upon us… and we are vying for the throne.

‘‘Tis also a fact that your wolf pup has a wolf pup of his own,’ jeers Aemond, donning his eyepatch, ‘A son whom he fathered on another wench. A son who will inherit Winterfell and all of its attendant lands, titles, and incomes. A vile indignity, a humiliation, to you and your brood. You would submit to a puny northern savage, as his second wife?’

Puny northern savage? Innovative.

“Our children will sit the Iron Throne,” Visenya had told Cregan in the godswood, with the snow floating around them, piling in thick layers on the ground, the trees, and the castle walls. I kissed the snowflakes on his lashes, and they melted on my lips. Her heart flutters at the memory. My sullen wolf. She longs for him more than she can express.

Would that appease Aemond? Nothing would. He has become spiteful. “Wench.” Lady Arra of House Norrey had been Cregan’s late wife and cherished childhood companion. She had dismally died birthing Rickon. I will not debate Cregan’s family with Aemond, a jealous craven threatened by suckling babes.

‘Rickon is an innocent babe,’ reasons Visenya, hugging herself, suddenly feeling naked without her armor, ‘Aye, he is the heir to Winterfell, and no threat to me. I will not set my children against their brother, nor will I encourage them to steal his birthright. I am not your mother.’

And, oh, how you despise that…

‘I suppose that you will be no threat to him, either, should you die in childbirth,’ ventures Aemond, elated at the notion, his eye shimmering in the light of the flames, ‘And your wolf pup would be twice widowed.’

Visenya lashes out, striking him so viciously across the face that his head whips to the side. Blackwing’s mighty roars rumble outside. Aemond doesn’t even blench.

She had never hit him before. If he is startled or enraged by the assault, he masks it – devoid of any emotion. Visenya quashes the temptation to shout at him, to call him a dog, a pig, a rat. He is beneath these creatures. He has no conscience, and his cruelty is boundless. Her grandmother Queen Aemma and her aunt Laena had both expired in childbed. Her sister had been stillborn. What does Aemond know about the perils and throes of women? Nothing.

I could flee, go anywhere but here... Her flesh crawls. I’m his captive in so many ways. Briny tears well in her eyes.

Tears cannot quench dragonfire.

‘Do you love the wolf pup?’, challenges Aemond, his demeanor impassable, though she distinguishes a crack in his frigid tone.

And if I do? You would flay him alive, and force me to watch. The question of Visenya’s suitors continues to be intricate and contentious. The Disputed Lands of Westeros. She had been engaged to Aegon, to Aemond, and to Daeron, and had been courted by Westerosi Houses, Essosi princes, triarchs, archons, nobles, magisters, merchants, and generals. The Red Kraken would have made me his salt wife. Visenya had rejected all of them. Adulterers and drunkards old enough to be my grandsires and fat enough to crush me beneath them.

Rhaenyra had been sympathetic to her daughter’s predicament; she herself had initially opposed marriage. My mother had been younger than I am when she had birthed me and Jace. Visenya shudders at the thought. Her father hadn’t been concerned, confiding that she could wed out of duty and fuck whomever she pleased. Men always do so. Why shouldn’t I? Her twin had convinced her that she would find a suitable pair, to her liking. Jace had the right of it. I chose Cregan, and he chose me. She touches her brooch through her trousers. I’m assuming control of my life and my future.

‘I will,’ declares Visenya, seething, jutting her chin, ‘He is neither a usurper, nor a kinslayer. Cregan is worth a thousand of you, and more.’

‘Yet you delay marrying him, and the wolf pup delays assembling his banners and marching,’ admonishes Aemond, his reddened cheek beginning to swell, ‘Perhaps you are not as devoted to each other as you think you are.’

A surrounded animal, slinging its final, pitiful blows. Her wolf’s motives for not marching had been warranted. He awaits the collection of the harvest, so that he can feed his subjects throughout the winter. The Southrons seal themselves in their castles with their bountiful harvests, whereas the Northerners bear the brunt of the burden – snow, frost, famine, death. Cregan’s obligations lie with his people and his lands.

As for herself, Visenya prefers to marry him during peace and stability. He could mourn his wife properly, and he would not be widowed again, if I were to… to…

‘His Winter Wolves are at the Twins,’ she states, noting Aemond’s mouth twitching, ‘They have joined their forces with the Freys’, and will resume their advance south. They are merely a fraction of the North’s strength. I assure you. Cregan will honor his vow.’

She had wept upon reading Lord Roderick Dustin’s words to Lady Sabitha Frey. We have come to die for the dragon queen. Cregan had taught Visenya about the Winter Wolves – elderly men who leave their homes in order to conserve supplies for their kin. Grisly custom. Those warriors hope to die for glory and plunder. They will never reunite with their families. Wretched conditions, wretched measures.

Aemond must have observed a spark in her eyes, heard something amiss in her voice that aroused his suspicion.

‘What have you done, Visenya?’, he demands, narrowing his eye, fixing her with a hawkish glare.

I fucked the wolf pup. And Alyn Velaryon… Not both at the same time. She had befriended Alyn and his older brother Addam shortly after hers and Jace’s return from Winterfell. Her twin had summoned Targaryen bastards – “dragonseeds” – for the riderless dragons, promising wealth, lands, and knighthood for those triumphant. Addam’s feat of claiming Seasmoke had emboldened the Sea Snake to petition Queen Rhaenyra to legitimise the Hull boys. Conveniently, their mother Marilda had revealed that they had been sired by Ser Laenor Velaryon. And Mushroom is seven feet tall. My stepfather had no interest in women. Lord Corlys had proceeded to name Addam his heir.

Alyn, however, had been less fortunate. Sheepstealer had bathed his cloak in flames. His brother had doused the fire, saving his life. At least Grey Ghost had vanished. Those had been wild dragons. Alyn is lucky to be alive. Grand Maester Gerardys had tended his burns, and Visenya had changed his bandages thrice a day – delighting in his insolence. The habit had blossomed into clumsy intimacy. She had seldom stayed the night – a decision that hadn’t troubled Alyn. He never judged me. Visenya misses him; his jests, his smile, his company.

A furious Jace had reprimanded his twin for her recklessness and temerity, arguing that Cregan was a good man, a second chance – everything that she had ever dreamed of. Her involvement with Alyn could compromise their indispensable alliance with the North. Visenya had listened to his warning, remorse slithering around her throat.

I have been remiss… but Alyn is only a matter of brevity. I have to tread prudently.

‘I do as I please,’ she asserts, the ghost of a smirk tugging at her lips, ‘Do not fret, cousin. Cregan treated me well and was most gentle with me… the first time.’

Her admission slices him to the bone. Aemond’s expression sinks, desolation flooding his eye. A child looks at her, into her, agony engraved on his features. Have I been too austere? Spoken too harshly? He had betrayed her trust, had usurped the throne, and had murdered her brother. My sins pale in comparison.

Aemond recoils, turning away from her, his head lowered. His fists clench at his sides. The table behind her shakes at Vhagar’s menacing growl. Visenya maintains her composure, sheathing herself in steel. I will not cow. I am the blood of the dragon.

And I will not regret Cregan.

While she hadn’t lacked for suitors, those men had sought to marry her out of pride and ambition. My Targaryen heritage brings their House closer to the Iron Throne, and my dragon is power.

She had proposed to Cregan that she would willingly surrender her maidenhood to him, as a token of her intention to wed him. Fighting a war a maiden seems particularly dreadful. Should anything befall her, Cregan wouldn’t feel cheated or insulted – he would have claimed her gift of innocence.

I lost my innocence long ago.

Visenya hadn’t abused her station to compel him to lie with her. She wouldn’t have been offended if he hadn’t desired her.

“I would be,” her wolf had responded, earning a chuckle from her.

Two nights – and numerous fiery kisses – later, he had accepted her offer. A timorous ardor had washed over Visenya, her heart hammering against her rib cage. Cregan had led her out of the godswood, past the hot springs, the main iron gate with its walls, across the inner yards, into the castle, and up the winding stairs – retreating to his solar, where they had shared half a flagon of wine. He had kindly asked her if she had been nervous.

No. I am a Targaryen princess, a dragonrider… and the wine soothed my nerves.

Their intimate moments had been sweet, passionate, exhilarating. Visenya remembers them so vividly. His large hands cupping her face, disrobing her with deft precision, caressing and fondling every inch of her. His darkened eyes reveling in her figure. Cregan lifting her into his arms as though she weighed nothing, laying her down on the bed. His tongue licking her stiffened nipples, his mouth sucking on her plump breasts. Her fist stroking his leaking cock, guiding him into her heat slowly. Cregan swallowing her soft whine when entering her, the stretch burning deliciously. The overwhelming need to hold him nearer. Wrapping her limbs around him as he vigorously thrust into her, the featherbed engulfing her. The chambers brimming with their moans, gasps, and the lascivious sounds of sweaty skin slapping against sweaty skin. Cregan intertwining their fingers, Cregan driving her to the heights of pleasure, Cregan spilling his seed inside her, blending with her maiden’s blood.

Slick pools between her legs, and Visenya squeezes her thighs shut, salivating at the memory.

He had collapsed on top of her, and – at her insistence – had lied there, panting, his face buried in her neck, his beard tickling her. An equally breathless Visenya had threaded her digits through his damp hair, pecking his cheek and his temple. Cregan had rolled off of her, grunting at the effort, and had pulled her into him, allowing her to rest her head on his chest, and to hook her leg over his. Her wolf had attentively inquired whether he had hurt her.

“Not at all,” she had murmured, demure, draping her arm over him, their combined fluids trickling on her groin, “You have been so good to me.”

Visenya had drifted off to sleep in his safe embrace, lulled by his heartbeat and his snores. His body had been a hearth underneath the pelts. I am the blood of the dragon, allured by warmth and fire.

She and Cregan had spent most evenings together – to the dismay of his bed. Days had been dedicated to duties, negotiations, and furtive glances, nights for themselves and for each other; for raw lust, hushed laughter, and the solace that they had been starved of; for their satiation and contentment. Her loins had often ached by the next morning. A good ache.

Cregan had even taken her in the godswood, under a starry sky, before the heart tree, following their sword sparring. Afterwards, he had suggested that they retire to his solar.

‘To sleep?’, questioned Visenya, coyly, tangling their feet together.

‘If that is what the princess wants,’ granted her wolf, amiably.

‘The princess wants you,’ she mumbled, nestling against him, their clothes and furs providing scant shelter from the cold.

‘She has me,’ vouched Cregan, carding his fingers through her locks, ‘All of me.’

Oh, yes. He has had me in the sight of the old gods, and I have bled for him. Targaryens have always had a grievously deep connection to blood. It’s one of our House’s words. Our forebears used blood magic to bind the winged beasts to them. We cut ourselves and drink each other’s blood during our nuptials. We practice incest to ensure the purity of our bloodline. The blood of Old Valyria, the blood of the dragon. Blood unites, and blood divides.

Their stealthy meetings might not have been shrouded in such secrecy. Jace had dared to tease Visenya about the marks that he had glimpsed on her throat. She had thrown a snowball at him, hitting him in the nose.

‘Locking myself in a castle is more appealing than waging war against my own kin,’ admitted Visenya, in an instance of fragility, atop one of Winterfell’s towers.

‘You’re not destined to hide in a castle,’ proponed Cregan, petting Fang, basking in the sun – reminiscent of their early mornings abed. I would trace the lines of his back, the scars on his chest, admire his naked form as he opened the shutters… ‘Your hair is akin to the snow around us, your eyes the color of the sunset sky. Why would nature make you so lovely, if not to behold you and to reflect on you? The sun must see you to shine, the moon to glow.’

Visenya tore her gaze away from him, misty-eyed.

Her Valyrian appearance had protected her from japes about being a Strong bastard. Is that term so preposterous? My parents hadn’t been married at my birth. I had borne the name Velaryon for a decade. People had viewed her as a Myrish carpet – to be gaped at – and had treated her like a stud-mare, to be bought, owned, and mounted to produce sons – her beauty a mere instrument to that end. Devious motives behind hollow adulation.

‘You are gracious, my lord,’ rasped Visenya, flustered, the gossip of the commonfolk below muffling her answer slightly, ‘I am flattered.’

‘I have spoken the truth,’ affirmed Cregan, tipping her chin up, coaxing her to peer at him, ‘You are meant to be kissed.’

‘By you,’ she assented, his gloved digits wiping her tears, delicately.

On the day of the dragon twins’ departure from Winterfell, Vermax and Blackwing had been impatient to leave the North and its freezing temperatures. Visenya hadn’t shared their zeal. I’m not a little girl anymore. The winds of winter are rising. There is a war to be fought and won.

“Come back to me,” her wolf whispered to her, their joined hands concealed in their cloaks and pelts.

I will.

Aemond’s subtle movements wrest her to the present.

We’re at war with the Greens. I’m a prisoner at Stoney Sept, in the Pretender’s camp. My Cregan is leagues away.

I must not forget my mission.

Aemond’s insidious posture betrays him, his shoulders on the brink of crumbling under the burden of his pride and envy.

‘A dragon rendered a broodmare by a wolf pup,’ he chastises, repulsed, his features drawn into solemn lines, ‘Have you spread your legs for his army, too? I wouldn’t be surprised, given your taste for depravity.’

Visenya refrains from guffawing, albeit with great difficulty. Oh, may the Crone’s lantern light my path to wisdom, and may the Father judge me justly, and may the Mother show me mercy, for I am a filthy wanton, and Lord Stark does possess a generous… host.

‘I would rather be his broodmare than be your wife,’ she spits, defiant, baring her teeth, ‘The wolf pup is Lord of Winterfell and Warden of the North.’ And you are insufferably obtuse. ‘He and his bannermen will liberate me, should the Winter Wolves and the river lords fail to do so, and should you yourself refuse to release me. Are you so mad that you would oppose the might and wrath of the entire North?

‘I have heard enough about your wolf pup,’ announces Aemond, his nostrils flaring, ‘He has dishonored you. Perhaps I ought to march on his bleak castle, after I seize Harrenhal.’

You ought to dress up in motley. Visenya shifts her weight from one foot to the other, her brow creased. The Hightowers must have abandoned their wits putting him in charge. Aemond is utterly inept. Their Lannister friends will find trouble at the Red Fork, and he will never take Harrenhal from my father.

‘Your men are unlikely to survive the muds of the riverlands, whose lords have unanimously declared for my mother,’ argues Visenya, twirling a lock of her hair around her forefinger, ‘I doubt that they will endure the hostile conditions in the North… also pledged to Queen Rhaenyra.’

‘I have Vhagar,’ reminds Aemond, his arrogance oozing like pus.

‘And what of it?’, she hisses, squinting her eyes, ‘You would torch the North, from the Neck to the Wall, on hoary, old Vhagar? Tens of thousands would perish.’

Despite rivaling the combined size of the other kingdoms, the North is scarcely populated. Their lives, lands, history, and culture matter all the same.

‘Your wolf pup amongst them, if the gods are good,’ drones Aemond, looping his digits through his belt.

‘Cregan will die of old age, in my arms,’ corrects Visenya, keeping her furled fists at her sides, lest she strike him again, ‘You cannot vanquish the North. It is too vast and too wild. The Neck is impenetrable, filled with swamps and bogs. Moat Cailin is a choke point, and it has shielded the North from southron invasions for millennia. This is folly, Aemond. It will be your doom.’

Then why am I trying to dissuade him?

‘Or on the contrary, the glory will be mine,’ boasts Aemond, his permanent smirk bolstering his confidence, ‘Those savages might dare to resist me, but in the end, they will pose a minor obstacle. Aegon the Conqueror brought the North to its knees.’

‘Because King Torrhen Stark bent the knee after the Field of Fire, to avoid bloodshed,’ objects Visenya, scowling, ‘Do not attempt to revise history. Ours will not redeem you. The kinslayer is accursed in the eyes of gods and men. The lickspittles that buzz around you will never be sincere, so I will bestow the truth upon you. You are cruel, despicable, and you nurse a grievance like a suckling babe. You are not Aegon the Conqueror. You are a prideful fool playing at war.’ You’re not good at it, either. ‘And winter is coming. That is the truth.’

‘The truth?’, repeats Aemond, creeping up on her, his eye boring into hers – a predator scenting its prey, ‘What do you know of the truth, Visenya? You lie and deceive and plot with every breath that you draw. You are a traitor to the realm, daughter of traitors, sister of traitors. You chose the Iron Throne over me.’

You chose for me.

‘My mother is the rightful Queen of the Seven Kingdoms,’ she pronounces, her smile ominous, ‘The only traitor here is you, nuncle. You cower from the truth, and you retain it from everyone.’ Visenya tiptoes, and their lips almost touch. ‘You are looking with the wrong eye. Perhaps you will have to close the other to finally see.’

Aemond cups her face roughly, pressing her against the table.

‘Your mother will never sit the Iron Throne,’ he sneers, ‘And neither will you. She still spurns you as her heir, but I vow to pay you the homage that you so desperately crave, and to lavish you with precious gifts – the heads of your family, your betrothed, and your stepson. They shall decorate the spikes of the Red Keep–’

Visenya swiftly yanks his dagger from his belt. Aemond seizes her wrist too late. The tip of the blade digs at the underside of his chin.

‘Enough, Aemond!’, bellows Visenya, and for a moment, she is her ferocious Blackwing incarnate, ‘Are you deaf, as well as blind? You have usurped the throne, murdered my brother, and butchered hundreds of innocents. Your actions have consequences. Heed my words, for the love that you claim to bear me.’ She drags the point of the dirk down to the base of his throat, nicking him. ‘You will not make me an orphan and a widow. You are surrounded by enemies in every direction, and more are gathering as we speak. We have the armies, the fleet, the dragons, and most importantly, the legitimacy. An advantage that you will never have. So, either kill me or let me go, and flee to Essos, because you cannot – you will not – survive what’s coming for you. The choice is yours.’

Aemond’s malicious eye studies her, a forlorn wall of blue ice.

The boy I grew up with is gone. Hasn’t Visenya sensed it all along? We are not children anymore. The time has come to accept it.

When has it all gone so awry, become so twisted? She mourns the boy that she had once shared everything with – a childhood, hopes, dreams. Those died with Lucerys.

Dreams didn’t make us kings. Dragons did… and tears cannot quench dragonfire.

It ends as it began, with fire and blood.

Bloodlines will burn.

Visenya licks the blood off of the tip of the dagger, spins the weapon, and presents it to Aemond, hilt first.

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