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In the aftermath of a riot, Rhaena did not believe the rumors at first. It surely was just imagination run wild to say that not just one, but two, dragons were seen approaching the Rock with speed and urgency. Was it Balerion, she had asked quietly, a sudden fear and anxiety that her uncle had come to…to what? Or perhaps it was Vhagar? Her great aunt Visenya come to bring her back to Dragonstone or King’s Landing to be tucked away? No, they would only fly to the Westerlands for something grave, and her brother’s death had not been enough for that, so what could bring them here now? The answer to that only worried her, if the rumors proved true. And they proved true very quickly when she spied them herself from her rooms.
Even at a distance she was certain it was neither Balerion nor Vhagar, she had seen them in flight too many times to mistake them for younger, lesser dragons. Her heart leapt to her throat at the thought that it was Melyssanthi and perhaps Viserys; surely he could have bonded a dragon in her absence
Her feet moved faster than her mind, the decision to leave done without thought or knowing. The disbelief that had grown to fear had instead morphed to reckless, unbridled hope. Behind her she barely registered the disgruntled Ser Darklyn taking long strides to catch up. He yelled out orders to Lannister men as they passed, to assemble a guard. He had seen them too, he knew where the princess ran, he knew there would be no stopping her, only an attempt to protect her.
Had she had time to prepare, she would have worn riding leathers and a tunic rather than the embroidered dress she had donned when the day was intended to be nothing more than endless planning. All forgotten now as she pulled up her skirts upon reaching the stables and finding a horse prepared for…somebody…and pulled herself astride it, no time for propriety. The beast was urged on, through the rocky hall that broke free to sunlight and dust and the roar of dragons. They were still in the distance but her heart beat faster, her legs kicked into the sides of the horse. Faster still, she needed more from the mount. Behind her again, men assembled and gave pursuit, with no small amount of confusion with what to expect or what to do when the princes finally stopped.
At once, it was a shadow over her, a familiar heat and rush of wind of a dragon in flight above her. The horse stopped short, fear quivering in its muscles. Rhaena’s leg swung over and she stumbled the ground, knowing the horse would go no further. It couldn’t be. But it was, there could be no denying that it was her Dreamfyre.
She ran forward, up the rocky path to where the blue scaled beast circled and then landed, her head shaking as if in shared disbelief. Rhaena flung herself against the creature’s snout, tears in her eyes and for the first time in weeks, tears of joy and not of pain. Dreamfyre returned the embrace, as best as she could, head tilted into the tiny princess’s frame, a soft snort of hot air, a quiet growl as if to say, finally.
It was only then, when Rhaena finally let go and opened her eyes again, that she remembered the second dragon she had seen. “Did you bring a friend with you?” She asked quietly. “Who is it, hm?”
Vaera stared, blankly, at the young lady. It was the look of them that shocked her, or, rather, the disparity between them: the Targaryen looked like she rode a dragon, while Vaera, herself, looked like a dragonrider. All leather and chain armor, Valyrian horn, Valyrian steel, and the attitude of those who conquered creation. The Targaryen was all embroidery, finery, with undersilks, and vulnerability.
Vaera had never seen anything more gorgeous in all her life.
“Fuck,” was the only thing that escaped her, a whimper of a whisper caused by blaze inside of her body that threatened to leave every sentinel and landscape of her soul charred. Eyes the shade of purple found in sunsets darted off the south, instead of the westward direction the Targaryen had come from. A single sigh, and the Valyrian atop her dragon turned her back.
The Targaryen was still there.
Vaera still felt she might faint. Fuck. “We became acquainted over the western mountains on the way…” It wasn’t her, the tone she heard. It was sad, wistful, the sound of the last sigh before drifting off to dream about lost days and summer nights spent in courtyards chasing fire flies and temporary flings. It was up to Saeryx to roll its shoulders and roll Vaera’s body, the secret language between dragon and rider unmistakable in its meaning:
Go. Stop hiding.
The dragonrider didn’t bother with another sound while mounted, sliding off the dragon with the casual ease in which most people let their hair down. There was an entire city behind the woman. There was a Knight that she both saw and couldn’t, if she tried, recall a single detail about even as she looked. Before she realized she wasn’t floating, that she’d been walking, Vaera stopped just feet from the scene of the woman and her dragon reunited.
“She looked lost. She looked in need.” Does she realize I’m talking about her and the dragon? Again, Vaera looked away, this time with the longest blink in her life—an excuse to close her eyes and feel, for a moment, something she had no experience with. Vaera stepped forward without even thinking about it first as she looked ahead once more.
“I was compelled to help, I was compelled to…” Her eyes dipped to the ground, her armored arms slowly crossed, in self-defense, her head slowly shaking. “Anyway. Enjoy your dragon, Princess.”
Walk away. Walk away now.
Saerys tilted its head as Vaera Balaerys just began to walk off, alone, towards the city, head spinning and mind stunned.
Rhaena let go of Dreamfyre, looked beyond her, and felt hope die. It was not Melyssanthi. It was not home, it was not anyone who could share her grief. And yet, her mind raced to find any semblance of reason for how or why another dragonrider not of her kin was here and why Dreamfyre had arrived with them. In need?
Her lip trembled, not in anger or even in grief, but in annoyance at trying and failing to parse together the situation that unfolded now. “Where do you think you are going?” The woman made as if to walk by her, nothing to indicate why she had even been flying here in the first place - or - why she was even in Westeros. She bristled, but a nudge from the creature next to her recentered her thoughts.
She is returned to me.
No matter if the woman stopped to answer her original demand, Rhaena stumbled after her and caught her hand, her arm, without thinking, to turn her. To make her answer her question and a thousand more of what else she had seen and heard and knew that hadn’t been filtered through spymasters or censored. But what rose to the top, even without hope, was gratitude, pure and overflowing. Violet eyes betrayed her again, rimmed in red for the threat of fresh tears.
It wasn’t a conscious thought to throw her arms around the woman, little had been a conscious thought since she first caught sight of the dragons in flight. “Thank you.” Her voice croaked against the dragon rider’s wind roughened cheek. She tried to speak more, to explain how much it meant, but the words could not be freed from thoughts, just the warmth of another who she could only hope would understand.
The very sound of the woman made her wince. There was no debate, just her thoughts running their course as instinct resolved her to escape. The casualties of extremes filled her mind and made her body buzz and burn. Purple eyes peeked up, into the sky, upon the horizon, as if some great host of gods may hazard that horizon to save her from herself.
It was some mix of dread and jealousy that filled Vaera’s eyes when she walked by the knight and met his eyes. She had such incredible envy for the man she passed. There wasn’t a word from her pale lips, just escape. But it was there, in the mundane shade of his eyes that she saw it, like the escape of pre-dawn light over a high hill.
She was coming.
Vaera felt like a storm at sea was capsizing her mind, the mast cracking and leaving her stranded. When the hand hit her every part of Vaera froze solid as the Shivering Sea. Nothing scared her. She hadn’t known fear since the day her parents died…and that was coming to a swift, chaotic, change. Vaera had never been more afraid in her life then when the woman turned her, and forced Vaera to face her.
The blow was struck immediately, an unseen part of the plan, the properties of her defenses lowered, with the woman striking at will. The warmth of her, the softness of the way she felt, the smell of her…the very feeling of Vaera getting to hold the creature so dearly, so suddenly and abruptly tightly, desperately and dangerously close. The gentle weight of her head on Vaera’s shoulder…
The taller Balaerys stirred; to shed her gloves behind the beautiful woman’s back and tucked them away, her left anchored upon the woman’s right hip, the hardest moment of her life just leaning back enough to allow her bare right hand rise to the girl’s jaw. To trace her jawline for a fraction of a heartbeat before curling her index finger, and tilting it up just enough to tilt the woman’s face upward so that Vaera might see it. So that she might smile at her, and with her thumb wipe a trail of tear from her cheek.
The sun rose in Vaera’s eyes, light and warmth, radiant and glorious. “You’re not alone anymore. I’ve got you.”
The smile grew, wider, fearless, as Vaera took a step back until her left hand was back to her side, and the right slid like a sigh from the woman’s face, held out for her to take. “C’mon,” was the only word she spoke, even if it felt like Vaera had just said infinitely more.
Rhaena blinked slowly in response, a softest of touches that broke her embrace and a look on the woman’s face that she finally saw who she was speaking to, who Dreeamfyre had found, a name she knew but had never thought twice about. The feeling of being crushed beneath a giant boulder, a feeling that had oppressed her for weeks, felt lifted, just a little at the confident statement. To not be alone, the princess didn’t know why she believed it, but it felt good to believe it, so she did.
She took the offered hand with a small smile of her own. Behind her she heard her dragon grumble, hungry likely, and silently wished her a good hunt. Soon enough, she’d be calling on Dreamfyre for more. It changed everything, and already her mind turned it over, of flying to Oldtown, of the look of the High Septon’s face when she would land and watch him burn…But the hand that encompassed her own, warm and rough and pulling. She was brought back to the present, to reality, and to Ser Darklyn staring at them.
“Princess, it’s not my place to admonish, but -” He had ventured closer than the Lannister men who stood about unsure of what had taken place.
“It’s not. Have someone tell Lord Loreon he has a guest, have rooms readied for her.” She paused, knowing how reclusive the Lannister had been, no matter how well she understood that desire. “And if he does not answer or seem moved, tell Mistress Kinvara. Maybe she will convince him.” Rhaena resisted trusting the woman, but for reasons beyond just dislike of a paramour.
“The riots have only just been completely quelled, it was not safe for you to do this.” Darkrobin looked reticent at saying it in the presence of the visitor, but worry creased his face.
Perhaps it was too many things gone wrong in a short amount of time, but outside of the immediate fear in fleeing the riots, it seemed minor compared to everything else. But how must this sound to Vaera? She glanced to her side, “I’m afraid you are seeing already the distressing times here in Casterly Rock.” Would she turn and run immediately? Rhaena would, she thought, if their roles were reversed. “Lord Lannister’s sister and uncle were murdered. Riots erupted when he announced his…our…engagement.” She swallowed hard at that, a lump in her throat, and her hand squeezed Vaera’s. “It was the Faith -”
“Princess.” Darkrobin spoke again as if to interject and thought better of it halfway through. “Perhaps let us return to safety first?”
Vaera chuckled, behind a dirty grin, “Mistress Kinvara? Hells, I remember when it was just Kinvara.” When she spoke of Loreon, Vaera listened with intent, happy for every word. Until the word became ‘marriage.’ It stopped her where she stood, the wound at her side rearing hot and angry all over again, “Gods…dammit.”
It was the pain of the wound, Vaera told herself, as a sigh the sound of grief emptied from her mouth and nostrils, her body forcing itself to start moving with the Princess once again, processing everything. Murder and riot, marriage. Well, mostly marriage. The sound of it was strange, queer—Vaera rolled it over her tongue once, twice, before speaking it aloud with no lack of amusement. Or bemusement. “’Lord’ Lannister…yes, Loreon and I know each other.”
The woman stopped, and blinked, so Vaera stopped…shifting uncomfortable weight from one foot to the other, looking off to the Knight, her tone loud and irritated, like a waking dragon, “Yes, we heard you, Ser. She’s safer with me than she is with you, anyway…”
The last part she stopped speaking loud enough for him to hear, half-way through it, anyway. But the point seemed to be taken, as he showed them his back, and walked towards the big walls, even if just the wait. Everything irritated her. Everything was sore. The shift was visible…but when her eyes went back to the woman’s eyes, her lips refused to do anything but smile.
“I’ve traveled more of Creation than anyone you’ve ever met. Seen more of Sothoryos than the damned Summer Islanders,” she said, with a snicker, as if she knew how much it would annoy the Summer Islanders, “Bone Mountains, Jade Gates, Shadowlands…Loreon and I adventured together. I’ve saved his life. He’s saved mine. That’s why I came this way…marriage?”
She asked, squinting, for a moment, before she tried to laugh, and instead just squeezed the woman’s hand and, finally, continued walking, announcing to the steel shadow, “WE’RE MOVING TOWARD YOU AGAIN.”
Just to be friendly.
Back at volume only she would hear, Vaera continued, “I’ll look into the deaths. It’s what we adventurers do. I think Dreamfyre and Saeryx will calm the rest of the city down. As for the Faith…I come from Oldtown. I met Lord Tyrell, and his High Marshall, Lady Vittoria. I was going to say goodbye when the Faith ambushed Vitt and some of her Knights in the city,” she said, just ‘Vitt’, a clear indication she knew the Lady, “they shot her with a bolt, close enough range. I was too busy trying to kill the shit that shot her to see if they got her away alive but knowing her like I do…” Vaera just grinned and looked at the walled city that stretched like a man-made horizon in the distance.
Even for an adventurer and dragonrider, Vittoria Tyrell was something to see, “That’s just going to make her stay alive to spite them until she can run them down on the field of battle. Saeryx and I got out just in time. I saw the two hosts when we left the Reach…one of the Faith, one of the Reachmen. Heading east. Nothing east worth a march but King’s Landing.”
There was a pause, as Vaera walked, and tried to imagine just how what came next might sound, “It’s…madness, but I met a man in the mountains. Dark hair, real…cold bastard. Dangerous man. Said Loreon’s sister was his boss. Said the uncle sent someone to kill her. Said the sister sent him to kill the uncle right back. Any of that sound possible?”
She could barely keep up and though there was an annoyance with that, there was something else. An overwhelming familiarity, a warmth, a closeness. It buoyed her above the shit, a chance to breath, to see the sun. It was enough, apparently, to make Rhaena giddy. She resisted it at first, the laughter within that tugged at her lips, begged them to flick upwards. It grew within her until she could contain it no more as this visitor ordered her kingsguard around. Poor Ser Darklyn, she thought, but it did not stop the sound from bursting forth. A giggle, a sweet sound but unladylike and near childish in her glee. She was reminded of being a little girl trying to order about her father’s guard.
“I want, I need, to hear these stories.” A pang of jealousy flared, not of this woman having spent time with her intended, but at the freedom that must have been. “I’d barely seen anything except Dragonstone or King’s Landing before…” As well informed as Vaera was, Rhaena assumed she knew of the rest. She didn’t want to speak it and invite back in the sorrow and pain. “Marriage yes, an army for me and House Lannister can one day claim Valyrian blood into their line.” She couldn’t help the frown. Whatever the long term implications of such a match, it was something far more personal that spurred her hesitance, her fear, her disgust. She hoped not all of that was so easy to read on her face.
“The Faith marches on King’s Landing?” She stopped abruptly, felt her arm pull forward, but would not will herself to move. But beyond that, the allegations that it was Loreon’s uncle? Her frown deepened. “No. No that’s impossible.” She was certain of it to her bones, to her core. “It sounds like you met Lady Lorelai’s guard, Keano. I met him…” What felt like ages ago with how much had happened. “But that can’t be it. The Faith killed Loreon’s wife and uncle as revenge for justice on them for killing my brother.” She was certain of it and her tone said she’d heard enough on the matter. “You’ll investigate, and you’ll take me with you for it. You’ll see I’m right, after what you saw in the Reach, you must see that these men of faith,” the words curdled off her tongue, “are nothing but dogs.” She’d never met Vittoria Tyrell, but she’d heard stories of the woman all the same. If the Faith could turn against the Tyrells, well, surely that would make people see who the real enemy was.
“I need to stop them, I have to stop them. I was going to sail to Oldtown but now…” She glanced behind her towards where Dreamfyre and Saeryx stayed, still watching their riders. “Well, now I have something nearly better than an army.”
She unrooted herself from the ground, eager again to return to the castle. Something devious pricked at her and she gave a sly glance towards Vaera. “I may be in this ridiculous dress.” She pulled at the crimson velvet skirts for effect. “But if we’re quick about it, we’ll be back in Casterly before my white shadow can catch up.” A silver eyebrow shot up with a look of the challenge offered. “Race you?”
Rhaena wouldn’t give Vaera a full chance to reply, she dropped her hand and balled up some fabric of her skirts in her hands to clear them of the ground, and took off, with a wild yell down the dusty, rocky path, to small entry she knew was not made for men on horseback.
