Chapter Text
“Even under the best of circumstances, there’s just something so damn tragic about growing up.” —Jonathan Tropper
Prince Daemon Targaryen was, but seven name-days and already, too restless for the nursery that the servants kept him penned in. He slipped past the drowsing servant at the door with the ease of long practice, bare feet whispering over the cold stone of the Red Keep. He meant only to steal down to the training yard to watch the Kingsguard at their morning drills—until he heard the screams from Princess Aemma’s chambers. The sound clawed at something deep inside him.
Daemon could not remember his own mother’s face.
Lady Alyssa had died giving birth to Daemon, so all he remembered was Aemma Arryn…
She had come to court as Viserys’s bride not two years past—little more than a girl herself, but she had smiled at him as if he belonged to her, as if he were not some unwanted second son always underfoot. She had braided ribbons into his hair, taught him his letters when his tutors despaired, held him close when nightmares of blood and fire woke him in the night.
A good sister, she called herself.
But to Daemon, she was the closest thing to a mother he had ever known.
And now she was screaming as his mother had once screamed. Locked behind the carved oak door, beyond his reach.
Fear seized him. He sank down beside the threshold and drew his knees to his chest. The corridor was empty at this hour; no one came to chase him back to the nursery. No one noticed him at all.
Daemon bowed his silver head and kept vigil alone, a thin little boy with too-sharp eyes and too-big pride, praying in a whisper to the gods he barely understood—the Old Gods of Valyria, the ones the septons never spoke of. “Please,” he murmured. “Let her live. Let the babe live. Take anything else, but not her.” He had lost one mother to childbirth already; he could not survive losing another.
And so, Prince Daemon waited—hour after hour, trembling each time Aemma cried out—until at last, he heard a babe’s cry.
He exhaled, overcome with relief, terror, and exhaustion. For a moment, Daemon thought to return to the nursery, but something rooted him in place.
When the door finally opened, and a servant slipped out carrying an armful of blood-soaked linens, Daemon’s breath caught in his throat. He knew what that meant. His mind drifted to a mother he barely remembered and a little brother he’d never had the chance to know.
His feet moved before he realized it, a desperate step toward the door—only to falter when Rhaenys, his cousin, spotted him.
She was older than both he and Viserys, and usually far too proper to tolerate his lurking. She frowned, shaking her head, but instead of scolding him, she pushed the door wider and crooked a finger at him.
Daemon hesitated. He knew the adults preferred that he stay in the nursery or attend his studies. They shooed him away from chambers, from councils, from almost everything.
But Aemma… Aemma never had.
So, he stepped inside.
The room was dim, lit by low candles and the heavy scent of herbs. Aemma lay propped against pillows, her face pale as the moon and slick with sweat, yet her smile—gods, her smile was warm as a hearthfire.
Daemon froze in the doorway until she spotted him.
“Oh, my sweet boy,” she breathed, weary but as always delighted to see him. “Come here. Come and meet your niece.”
He approached carefully, as though one wrong step might shatter the moment.
Aemma, unlike his grandfather and his brother, had never sent him away. She always had time for him and cared for him in a way that no one else did.
He stopped beside the bed and looked down at the bundle she held. A tiny face peeked out, pink and scrunched with effort, crowned by wisps of pale silver-blond hair. Two enormous violet eyes blinked up at him—curious, unafraid.
“Daemon,” Aemma said softly, “this is Princess Rhaenyra.”
A beautiful name, he thought. For a little dragon. He swallowed. “She’s… she’s very small.”
Aemma huffed a tired laugh. “All babes are, sweetling. Would you like to hold her?”
Daemon’s mouth opened to decline, but Aemma had already begun shifting the child toward him. His heart lurched as she placed the babe in his arms. He stiffened, terrified he might drop her.
Rhaenyra was light as feathers, but she was far more precious than anything he’d ever held before.
Then her tiny hand unfurled and latched around his finger.
Daemon stared, breathless. Something hot and unfamiliar twisted in his chest. In that instant, he was hers, just as she was his. As surely as dragons bond, as surely as fire clings to fire.
His grandfather was old and fading. His grandmother had no patience for his foolishness. His mother was dead. His father could not look at him. Viserys preferred his books to the little brother he’d long outgrown.
But here, in his arms, was someone who would need him. He would teach her how to speak High Valyrian, how to ride dragons, even though he had not claimed his mount yet, how to explore the secret passageways of the Red Keep, how to be a dragon, for she was of his blood and fire. “I shall keep her safe,” Daemon vowed—too quiet for anyone but Aemma to hear.
Aemma smiled, a tired knowing smile, as though she understood exactly what he was promising. As though she knew he had just sworn himself to Rhaenyra more fiercely than any lord, knight, or king ever could.
***
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