Chapter Text
The Red Keep breathed with children’s laughter, the patter of small feet on cold stone, and the cozy aroma of warmed milk and honey. Now, that scent was invariably laced with the faint, sharp tang of ozone, a precursor to a storm, that constantly radiated from Aemond. The past year had become a time of strange, almost unsettling tranquility for him. Walking the long corridors, he felt not merely like a prince, but like an invisible shepherd gathering a scattered flock, doomed in another life, under one reliable wing.
Aemond often spent hours in the great solar, where golden light streamed through high windows, catching dust motes dancing in the air. It was a sight that, in his grim past, would have seemed a fever dream or a cruel illusion. Little Aegon, now six years old, was attempting with uncharacteristic patience to teach two-year-old Helaena how to properly hold a wooden toy dragon painted red.
“No, Hela, not by the tail,” Aegon lectured, knitting his pale brows. “A dragon stays up by its wings. If you pull the tail, he’ll get angry and burn your dolls.”
Helaena only blinked her large eyes, fiddling with the toy’s legs and humming something softly to herself. Nearby, on scattered soft silk cushions, the infants fussed. Jacaerys, whose silver hair was practically blinding in the sunlight, tried to crawl, while Gaemon watched his nephew’s every move with an incredibly serious expression before suddenly lunging to grab Jace’s ear.
Aemond watched them, reclined in a chair with a heavy tome on Valyrian sorcery whose pages he hadn't turned in an hour. His heart constricted with a strange, sweet ache bordering on nausea. Looking at Gaemon, he saw not a "replacement" for himself, but a chance at redemption. When he was alone with Gaemon, cradling him in the nighttime silence, Aemond would press his lips to the babe’s forehead and whisper:
“You will never know the wrath of a father who sees only disappointment in you. You won’t feel the coldness of a mother who uses you as a pawn. You will simply live, little Gaemon. You will be whole.”
With Jace, he was different. In this infant, he already saw the future king, the spine around which a new world would revolve. His touches toward Jacaerys were cautious yet commanding. Aemond often took the babe’s tiny palm, closing his eyes and concentrating, as if transferring a portion of his fire-forged resilience through the skin, preparing him for the weight of the crown that would one day rest on that silvery brow.
Helaena was his special, most piercing ache. She had already begun to flinch at sharp sounds as if they caused her physical pain, and she often froze, whispering strange things about "red threads binding heaven and earth." When she started to cry for no apparent reason, Aemond would simply take her in his arms. He pressed her to his chest, feeling her tiny heart racing, and used his pyrokinesis to manifest tiny golden sparks in the air. They danced before the girl’s eyes like sunbeams come to life.
“Look, Hela,” he whispered softly. “Fire doesn't have to burn. It can keep you warm.”
The girl would calm down, her violet eyes focusing on the soft warmth, and she would fall asleep feeling the protection she had so lacked in "that" reality, where she was but a lonely rider in a world falling to pieces.
However, Aegon was becoming a problem that could not be ignored. His brother was growing increasingly withdrawn, avoiding shared games and often disappearing for hours. Aemond knew the reason for every sigh. Aegon saw how his older brother, the one who, by all laws, should have been a weak omega under guardianship, summoned Grey Ghost from the mists of Blackwater with one majestic gesture. Aegon saw this mystical, unbreakable bond and felt a black, corroding emptiness within himself.
Aemond caught him several times in the evening near the entrance to the Dragonpit. The young prince stood by the iron bars, inhaling the thick scent of sulfur, old ash, and beast musk with such despair in his gaze that it became difficult for Aemond to breathe.
“They won’t speak to me, lekia,” Aegon whispered one evening when his brother found him alone in the long shadow of the Pit's gates. The boy didn't turn; his voice was hoarse with suppressed tears. “I go to Dreamfyre, I give her the best meat... but they only growl. Why do they listen to you, so fragile and... and different? Why do you fly, while I only smell the smoke?”
Aemond stepped closer and gently placed a hand on his brother’s thin shoulder, feeling him tense up.
“Dragons do not listen to words, Aegon. They care nothing for titles or what is written in the maesters' books. They listen to the fire burning in your solar plexus.”
He paused for a moment, looking into the depths of the dark caverns where the heavy shifting of massive bodies could be heard.
“Your fire is just sleeping, valonqar. It is wrapped in your fear like a cocoon. Do not try to force them. Just... give yourself permission to be a dragon.”
But in his soul, Aemond knew gentle words were not enough. Aegon didn't need comfort that only softened his spirit. He needed a push, a challenge that would force his inner flame to break through the cocoon of doubt.
Meanwhile, Laena Velaryon, Princess Consort and the pride of Driftmark, was fading before their eyes like a wax candle in a strong draft. Her marriage to Rhaenyra, which was supposed to be the start of a grand era and a triumph for the two most powerful Valyrian houses, had brought her only the bitter, metallic taste of defeat that settled on her tongue every time she looked up.
She was surrounded by wings. Laena saw Rhaenyra laughing as she took flight on the golden Syrax, cutting through the clouds; her brother Laenor disappearing into the blue sky on Seasmoke, becoming a mere speck; even her mother, Rhaenys, finding true peace and majesty only where the air grew thin and cold. And there was Aemond, a boy, nearly a young man, who had daringly claimed the elusive Grey Ghost. Laena, whose blood was no less pure than that of the first conquerors, remained chained to the earth, to heavy tapestries and the stone floors of the Red Keep.
That evening, she and Aemond sat on a high terrace. The sunset painted the sky the color of blood and molten gold. Laena nervously toyed with the edge of her silver cloak, her gaze fixed on the horizon where the sea merged with the sky.
“I feel clipped, Aemond,” she said suddenly. Her voice was quiet, but it held such sincere, unbearable sorrow that Aemond instinctively set aside the old book on dragon anatomy he had been studying. “As if a part of my soul was severed before I was even born. Fire and salt of Old Valyria run through my veins; I hear the call of the sky in every gust of wind, but it is locked away from me. I am a princess without wings. Even my son, little Jace, will fly one day, I feel it... and I will be but a shadow on the shore, waving him goodbye.”
Aemond looked at her intently. In his mind, clouded by memories of the "other" life, the majestic and tragic image of Laena flared up as if through deep water, the woman who, in another reality, had claimed the mightiest of living dragons and perished in her flames. He could not allow this woman, full of life and hidden strength, to flicker out in the shadow of others' wings.
“What if I told you that your dragon has been waiting for you for a long time?” he asked softly, almost in a whisper, leaning closer. “She is not in the Dragonpit, Laena. Nor on Dragonstone. She is too large and proud for those cramped stone chains and the oversight of maesters. They say that on one of the Summer Isles, among the wild cliffs, sailors have seen a shadow that blots out the sun. Old, majestic, covered in the scars of past wars. Lonely, just as you are now.”
Laena’s eyes instantly ignited with a wild, hungry fire. She turned sharply toward him, catching her breath.
“Vhagar?” she whispered, the name vibrating with awe. “The last of the Conqueror's triad... But that is thousands of miles south. It is beyond our reach, Aemond. Father said she vanished after the death of your grandfather, Prince Baelon.”
“We will find a way to get there,” Aemond said confidently, and that same smile flitted across his lips, the one that made even Daemon turn serious. “Dragons do not simply vanish. They wait for those brave enough to find them.”
A plan formed in Aemond’s head within minutes. The next day, he went to Rhaenyra while she was resting in her chambers.
“We need to leave the capital. And we don't just need permission; we need the King’s official support,” he began without preamble. “Father is obsessed with stability and peace. Tell him our spies bring troubling news: relations with Dorne are as shaky as desert sands. That Prince Mors Martell is looking for excuses to ally with the Triarchy, threatening our trade routes. Propose sending Laena and me as official envoys—a prince of the blood and a princess-consort. It will be a gesture of respect the Dornish cannot ignore. And from Sunspear to the Summer Isles, it is only a short crossing by sea.”
Rhaenyra, who saw daily how the light was leaving her beloved wife’s eyes, agreed instantly. She understood the risk but saw it as Laena’s only chance. Viserys, weary of the endless bickering in the Small Council and Otto Hightower’s complaints about the "recklessness of youth," took to the idea with unexpected enthusiasm. He liked the thought of his dear son and daughter-in-law engaging in diplomacy, strengthening the realm’s majesty without the use of fire.
Preparations for the departure began immediately, shrouded in an atmosphere of secrecy. Aemond personally inspected every supply bag, secretly packing fire-resistant salves of his own making and old, yellowed Valyrian charts of the currents. Laena, meanwhile, seemed reborn. Her former grace returned; every movement became lithe, like a leopard before a pounce, and a calm but devastating flame settled in the depths of her violet eyes.
The day before they set sail, as they stood on the pier by the high hulls of the Velaryon ships, Laena stopped Aemond, placing a hand on his shoulder. The port bustled around them: sailors hauled barrels, gulls shrieked, and the air smelled of salt and tar.
“Do you truly believe she will accept me, Aemond?” she asked, and for the first time, a childlike fear of rejection surfaced in her voice. “She has seen centuries. She has seen gods. What am I to her?”
Aemond gave her a long, searching look. He felt the air around them begin to heat slightly from his own internal power, which he had hidden for so long.
“Vhagar does not accept the weak, Laena. She does not tolerate those who ask permission to breathe,” Aemond’s voice rang hard, like Valyrian steel. “But you are a Targaryen by blood and name. In your veins is the roar of the ocean and the heat of the volcanoes of Old Valyria. You are a daughter of sea and flame. She won’t just accept you. She has been waiting for a rider like you all these long, lonely years. Go and take what is yours by right.”
The Velaryon fleet sliced through the sapphire waters of the Narrow Sea, heading south under a relentless sun that bleached the wooden decks to a stark white. At the head of the formation sailed the 'Sea Snake', Corlys Velaryon’s legendary flagship. Its sea-foam green sails, emblazoned with a silver seahorse, swelled in the stiff wind like the chest of a proud bird yearning for freedom. Laena stood at the bow, her fingers gripping the wooden railing; her silver hair, woven into dozens of tight braids with interlaced pearls, snaked behind her, whipping against her cloak. She tilted her face into the salt spray, trying to wash away the stifling dust of King’s Landing, but Aemond, standing a step behind her, could feel her tension with his entire body. She was like a steel string stretched to its limit, one careless touch, and she would either ring out in triumph or snap from despair.
High in the sky, almost dissolved within the cirrus clouds, glided Grey Ghost. He shared nothing with the fire-bright Syrax or the blood-red Caraxes, whose roars could be heard for miles. His scales, the color of morning mist and molten lead, made him nearly invisible at the solar zenith. Only the occasional swift shadow racing across the crests of the waves caused the sailors to look up and cross themselves. Aemond closed his eyes, catching his dragon’s sensations through their mental bond: the biting cold of the heights, the sharp scent of salt, and that unbearable, sweet, boundless freedom that stole his breath away.
When Sunspear finally appeared on the horizon, golden, scorched by centuries of sun, and surrounded by glowing sands, the mood on the ships shifted. The joy of arrival turned into an anxious numbness. The Dornish had not forgotten the flames of Meraxes that had incinerated their cities a century ago. They had not forgotten Rhaenys Targaryen, whose blood these sands had drunk. As Grey Ghost made a wide circle over the city, releasing a long, almost transparent stream of pale smoke, thousands of spears glinted atop the fortress’s high walls.
The meeting with the Martells was as cold as Valyrian steel on a winter night. Prince Kyle Martell, younger brother to Prince Mors Martell, met them in the Shadow City, surrounded by guards in scaled armor. The air here smelled of spices, horse sweat, and hidden threat. Kyle’s eyes, dark and deep as desert wells, lingered long and scrutinizingly on Aemond.
“A prince with the eyes of an old man and a princess with the blood of the sea,” he said instead of a greeting, his voice dry as the rustle of sand. “You have brought winged death to our walls. Is this the arrogance of conquerors, or a final offer of peace before the storm?”
“It is a reminder, Prince,” Aemond replied calmly, being the first to step off the gangplank onto the scorched sand of the shore. He did not even flinch at the heat, for nothing could burn more fiercely than his own inner flame. “A reminder that the world is much larger than Westeros, and we all walk under the same sun. We come as envoys of your King, not as riders seeking battle.”
Their stay in Sunspear became a true test of endurance. The heat was so brutal that the air shimmered before their eyes like molten glass, and the massive palace walls radiated the day’s accumulated heat even in the darkest night. Aemond physically felt the hostility hanging in the corridors like thick steam; Dornish lords and commoners alike looked at him with a mixture of primal dread and ancestral loathing. To them, he was just another dragon in human form. But Aemond paid no mind to the whispers behind his back. He was worried about Laena; with each passing day, she grew gloomier, spending hours staring motionlessly at the empty sky from the window of her chambers.
“We depart tonight,” he whispered directly into her ear during an official banquet, as the loud music of Dornish lutes and the clinking of goblets drowned out his words for any spies.
“But the Martells... their eyes are everywhere, Aemond. They watch every breath,” Laena squeezed her silver cup so hard her fingers turned white, knuckles protruding under the skin.
“They watch a prince and princess sitting in silks,” Aemond gave a barely perceptible wink, his eyes flashing with a wicked fire. “They do not expect two ghosts to travel on foot through the night desert to meet their true wings.”
The preparation was surgical. With the help of two loyal Velaryon sailors, they obtained the traditional clothing of Dornish travelers, loose cloaks of coarse linen that covered their faces from the dust. At midnight, when the guards on the towers were weary from wine and the stifling air, they slipped out through a secret passage in the gardens, where the air smelled of jasmine and night coolness.
The journey through the Dornish desert proved to be a literal descent into hell. Fine sand clogged their lungs, and their legs sank knee-deep into dunes that seemed like the endless waves of a golden ocean. When the desert turned icy at night, Aemond used his internal heat, literally maintaining the flame in their veins to keep Laena warm. He felt the direction not with his eyes, but with his blood. Grey Ghost awaited them ten miles from the city, hidden in the shadow of a deep, wind-carved gorge in the Red Mountains.
When they finally reached the dragon, who was impatiently lashing his tail against the rocks, Aemond helped the exhausted Laena into the saddle. This was the first time she flew not as an honored passenger, but as a full member of a secret alliance. They set a course south, leaving the shores of Westeros behind.
The flight was long and grueling. They crossed a vast sea where the water looked like black glass, until the lush, emerald forests of the Summer Isles appeared on the horizon. Aemond felt the approach of something so immense that reality itself began to vibrate. The air here was different, sweet, thick, and saturated with such ancient, primal power that Grey Ghost began to twitch nervously, sensing the presence of a true god of the skies.
Laena straightened in the saddle, and a shadow larger than any cliff was reflected in her eyes. Now, she wasn't just looking at the sky; she was preparing to conquer it.
They found her at the very peak of an extinct volcano, its gaping maw hidden in the thick, humid clouds of the Summer Isles. The air was thin here and smelled not of jungle flowers, but of stale ash and eternity. Vhagar didn't just lie upon the rocks; she was part of the landscape, a living mountain covered in scales the color of old, darkened bronze and greenish patina. Her gargantuan body, scarred by hundreds of battles, seemed a motionless monolith until she drew breath. Each exhale echoed with a deep, guttural rumble, reminiscent of a rockslide in a distant canyon.
When Grey Ghost, pressing his wings to his body, cautiously landed on the porous volcanic rock, he trembled all over. His talons scraped the stone, and his throat emitted a thin, mournful whistle. Beside this relic of the Conquest, he seemed but a small bird, a chance spark before a fading sun.
Laena slid slowly from the saddle. Her feet touched the hot ground, but she barely felt it. Her own heart hammered so loudly and rapidly that a constant roar filled her ears; she feared this rhythm, steeped in human fear, would enrage the old she-dragon. Aemond remained by Grey Ghost, holding the reins tightly. His face was calm, but his eyes glowed with triumphant anticipation.
“Don't stop, Laena!” he shouted over the whistling wind. “She feels your blood. She hears the song of Driftmark and the fire of Valyria within you. Do not fear her wrath, fear only her loneliness. She is as solitary as you were until this day!”
Laena took a step. A heavy boot crunched on volcanic glass. Then another. Vhagar lazily lifted an eyelid, and a massive eye, green and murky as the sea abyss where monsters hide, stared out at the world. The old dragon let out a low, crushing roar that sent vibrations through the soles of Laena’s feet and straight into her bones. The ground beneath them trembled.
Laena did not look away. She straightened her back, squared her shoulders, and spoke in High Valyrian. It was not the command of a master; her voice held a prayer, a gentle song coming from the very heart.
“Dohaerās, Vhagar...” she began, her voice growing stronger. “Your sky has become too small without a rider. Your wings long for the salt of the Narrow Sea, not the moisture of these forests. I have not come to subdue you. I have come to bring you home.”
She spoke of the infinite horizons they would share, of the storms they would pierce through, and of the sea that would seem but a puddle to them. When Laena reached out a trembling hand and touched the rough scales on the dragon's snout, scales as hot as a stoked furnace, the world around her seemed to cease existing. Vhagar released a cloud of steam that scorched Laena’s face, but she didn’t even blink. The old queen of the skies slowly, almost gracefully, lowered her massive head to the very ground, allowing the woman to climb onto her gargantuan wing.
Laena’s first flight on Vhagar was a sight Aemond would etch into his memory forever. When the dragon flapped her wings, the gust of air was so powerful that Grey Ghost was nearly blown off the ledge into the abyss. With a deafening roar that shook the entire island, they took flight. A massive, black shadow covered the jungle like a sudden eclipse. Birds by the millions took to the air, filling the sky with their cries, and Laena... Laena screamed with pure, primal delight. Her voice, thin and happy, was drowned out by Vhagar’s triumphant rumble.
Aemond felt a complete, absolute triumph. He stood on the edge of the crater, the wind whipping his hair, tears rolling down his cheeks that he didn't even try to wipe away. He had done it. He had personally rewritten a destiny that had seemed inevitable. Laena was no longer a "princess without wings"; she was not "imperfect." Now she was the most powerful woman in the world, the rider of living death.
They made the return journey as equals—two riders, two dragons. However, the Dornish desert decided to remind them that it does not forgive strangers. A sudden sandstorm, like a wall of glowing ochre, rose to the very sky. The wind was so powerful that even Vhagar, with all her mass, struggled to keep course, and Grey Ghost was tossed in the air like a dry leaf. Through the yellow veil of blinding dust, Aemond noticed faint, flickering lights.
It was a small settlement near an oasis, safely hidden in a deep rift between high cliffs that shielded it from the strongest gusts.
They landed nearby, kicking up clouds of sand. Vhagar settled heavily on her belly and spread her leathery wings like a great tent, shielding Grey Ghost from the raging wind. She looked like a great mother protecting a hatchling. Aemond and Laena, heavy with dust and exhausted to their very limits—but with eyes still glowing with celestial power—dismounted and headed toward the lights of the oasis.
“We actually did it,” Laena exhaled, constantly looking back at the silhouettes of Vhagar and Grey Ghost, leaning on Aemond’s arm.
“We are only just beginning,” he replied, watching as the first figures of the local inhabitants came out to meet them.
The settlement where they found refuge from the sandstorm proved to be more than just a temporary camp for nomads; it was a true architectural marvel hidden within deep canyons. This was the stronghold of the Sand Hunters, an ancient, reclusive order whose roots had pierced through these sands long before the blood of the great Nymeria ever reached the shores of Dorne. While Laena, intoxicated by the adrenaline of her flight on Vhagar, breathlessly observed the ornate columns and arches carved directly into the red sandstone, listening to local tales of battles with giants of past eras, Aemond felt a strange, sunless chill creep up the back of his neck.
He turned slowly, his gaze catching a tall figure in the shadow of one of the arches. Among the crowd of tanned, weather-beaten warriors stood a man whose face caused Aemond’s heart to skip a beat. It was an absolute, mirror image of Ser Alaro, his personal protector, who at this very moment was supposed to be thousands of miles away, guarding the chambers in King’s Landing.
The man, named Illir, met Aemond’s gaze with a frigid, almost unnatural calm. There was no surprise in his dark eyes, only a heavy, deliberate knowledge. Seeing the prince’s pupils dilate in recognition, Illir gave a barely perceptible, short, and commanding nod. He understood everything without a word: if this silver-haired youth recognized him, then he was indeed the one about whom the sands had been whispering for many a night in the visions of the Seers.
“Come with me,” Illir said softly. His voice was identical to Alaro’s, but it held the harshness of the Dornish wind.
Without another word, he led Aemond deep into the rock formation, past low dwellings smelling of roasted grain and saffron, toward a massive curtain of heavy hide. Beyond it lay the cave of the elders. The air here was thick, sweet, and pungent with the smoke of rare desert herbs smoldering in bronze bowls. Under a high vault that glittered naturally with flecks of mica, reflecting the starry sky, three elders sat upon low carpets.
Illir stopped and gestured for Aemond to take a seat opposite them. Here, in the heart of the desert, the truth about the true structure of their secret brotherhood was finally revealed to him.
“We are not merely warriors, Prince,” Illir began, sitting beside him. “We are servants of the Sun, guardians of the Sacred, before which even the Valyrians, including you Targaryens, bowed your heads. Our order is divided into three branches that uphold this world.”
He began to explain, and each description sounded like a sacred text: The Gatherers were those with the rare gift of hearing the whispers of the earth. It was they who could find the “Suntears” They might wander the desert for years until they found the most fertile spot where the “Silvery Terrains” grow. From these bushes, the Gatherers, with incredible caution and care, collect every drop of healing resin.
The Seers are the prophets whose eyes look through time. They fall into a deep trance to learn exactly whom the ancient gods and elements deem worthy of possessing the gift of the “Suntears.” Some vials of resin may wait centuries for their owner until the Seers speak their names.
And finally, the Keepers—elite guardians and shadows. Their sole purpose, their reason for being, is to ensure the “Suntears” reach the chosen and are used exactly as prophesied.
Aemond instinctively touched his chest, where he felt the pulsation of his fire beneath his clothes.
“Your brother Alaro…” he began, but Illir cut him off.
“My brother did not swear fealty to your family out of whim or for gold, Dragon Prince,” Illir’s voice echoed hollowly off the cave walls. “He is a Keeper. One of the best. He was assigned to you the very moment the '' Suntears''—which you now possess—chose you as their owner while you were still in your mother’s womb. He is your shadow blade. He studied your habits, your scent, your soul before you ever learned to hold a knife. And he would die a thousand times over before he would allow anyone, be it king or god, to take what is yours or do you harm. He will be at your side until the time comes for you to use the ''Suntears'', after which he will return here to wait for whomever the gods choose as the next worthy possessor of one of our vials.”
The elders nodded in agreement, and one of them handed Aemond a cup of brew that smelled of wormwood.
“Now you are part of the truth we have guarded for centuries,” the elder spoke. “The fact that you tamed Grey Ghost and the presence of Vhagar’s rider—everything has led you here, to this moment, so that you might know. The ''Suntears'' in your hands have begun to glow differently. They have sensed that their time is coming soon.”
Aemond listened, and a wave of desperation rose within him. The pieces of the mosaic of his strange life, the memories of the past, the unexpected appearance of Alaro, his own pyrokinesis, were once again clicking into a new, grand, and yet incomprehensible picture.
The return to Sunspear was like the start of a new war declared against the heavens themselves. When the majestic, almost ethereal shadow of Vhagar appeared over the scorched horizon, she was so vast that for a moment the sun vanished, and the city plunged into a premature twilight. The inhabitants of the Shadow City scattered in a panic, overturning stalls of spices; fishermen on the shore abandoned their nets, leaping into the water.
Chaos erupted on the walls of the citadel.
“Load! Aim for the wing!” shouted a captain of the guard, and the heavy chains of the scorpions began to tighten with a screech. Steel bolts, capable of piercing a ship’s hull, swung toward the approaching monster.
But Prince Kyle Martell, standing on the highest balcony of the Tower of the Sun, raised his hand, stopping the gunners at the last second. His face, usually as still as a mask, twitched. He saw Grey Ghost flying alongside the bronze, patina-covered majesty of Vhagar, like a silvery fish in the wake of a whale. Kyle understood: this was not an attack, it was a demonstration. The balance of power in Westeros, built over decades of diplomatic maneuvering, had just crumbled into fine sand.
The reaction to their sudden disappearance and even more spectacular return was a toxic mix of fury, hidden fear, and awe. When Vhagar landed on the coastal rocks with a deafening roar, kicking up a cloud of sand and salt, the ground shook beneath the feet of those meeting them. Laena dismounted from the dragon's back with such natural grace and icy dignity that it seemed she had grown taller in those few days, her shoulders squared under the weight of her new power.
Kyle Martell approached them, his cloak dragging through the sand. He breathed heavily, trying to contain his rage.
“You have violated the laws of hospitality, Princess,” he hissed, though his gaze involuntarily returned to Vhagar, who was lazily sniffing one of the castle towers. “You slipped away like thieves in the night and returned with... this. You have brought the living doom of my people to our doorstep.”
“I have violated no laws, Prince Kyle,” Laena replied calmly, removing her flight gloves. “I have only reclaimed what belonged to my family by right of blood but was lost to time. Now that we are no longer a ghost and a woman dreaming of the sky, we may continue our negotiations. But now—as equals.”
Aemond, standing slightly behind, saw Martell’s jaw tighten. The Prince of Dorne took the hint: with Vhagar at their back, Targaryen “diplomacy” carried an entirely different weight.
The Omegas remained in Sunspear for a few more weeks. It was a time of tense, almost ringing silence. Aemond spent hours watching Laena from the terrace. She practically lived in the sky, honing her bond with the dragon daily. Vhagar, who had been alone for decades, seemed to have regained a taste for life. Laena was no longer that sad, broken woman who felt “imperfect” beside Rhaenyra or Rhaenys. Now she was the rider of the oldest and most fearsome dragon in the world. This fact forced even the boldest Dornish lords to bow their heads extremely low and be pointedly polite.
Finally, the time came to depart for the north. The path to King’s Landing lay through Storm’s End. Aemond understood that this was a harsh political necessity. His betrothal to Cassandra Baratheon was a cornerstone of Rhaenyra’s plan to strengthen the Iron Throne. Visiting Lord Borros and his fiancée after such a grand triumph was not mere courtesy; it was an act of dominance.
Preparations for departure took place under the relentless, triumphant roar of Vhagar, which echoed off the walls of Sunspear. As the sails of the Velaryon ships began to rise, Aemond and Laena prepared for their own journey.
“Ready to show the Stormlands what a real storm looks like when it comes not from the sea, but from the sky?” Aemond asked, tightening the saddle straps on Grey Ghost. He looked at Laena, whose face now radiated a dangerous confidence.
Laena, already settled between the massive spikes on Vhagar’s back, adjusted her saddle straps and smiled hungrily. Not a trace of her former depression remained in her gaze.
“The Baratheons think they know what thunder is because they live in storms,” she said, her voice rising above the sound of the surf. “It is time to disappoint them and show them the thunder of dragon wings.”
With a joint roar, the two dragons pushed off the rocks, kicking up so much sand that Sunspear vanished into a golden haze for several minutes.
The journey from the sweltering shores of Dorne to the rugged cliffs of the Stormlands felt like a flight through the elements themselves, where every beat of a wing blurred the boundaries between the seasons. Beneath the dragons' wings, the landscape shifted relentlessly: reddish sands and sun-scorched canyons gave way to foothills, and eventually, to a thick, dark-green blanket of forests that looked like soft moss from above. Finally, the somber, age-worn towers of Storm’s End rose on the horizon, biting into the sky above the Shipbreaker Bay like the fangs of an ancient beast. The air here was entirely different, heavy, saturated with salt, moisture, and that particular scent of ozone that always accompanied the approach of a storm, the inseparable companion of House Baratheon.
When Vhagar’s shadow, vast and inevitable, draped over the castle’s inner courtyard, the bells of Storm’s End rang out in alarm, sending flocks of terrified ravens into the sky. But this frantic sound was instantly drowned out by the triumphant roar of the old she-dragon, a sound that made the stained glass in the Great Hall vibrate. Grey Ghost landed beside her with feline grace, appearing like a slender silver dagger next to a massive bronze shield. Aemond felt the cold air of the Stormlands burn his lungs after the Dornish heat.
Lord Borros Barateon awaited them by the main gate, legs braced wide and heavy hands resting on his belt. He was surrounded by the "four storms", his daughters, whose garments fluttered in the wind like battle banners. The lord's face was a true mask of astonishment mixed with a shadow of primal dread. He had been prepared to see a prince on a dragon, but the arrival of Laena Velaryon on the back of the legendary Vhagar, thought lost to the realm, was a political earthquake.
“Seven hells, Prince Aemond!” Borros thundered, taking a step forward as Aemond vaulted to the ground. The lord's voice rose above the crash of the surf. “We heard rumors you’d gone to Dorne seeking adventure, but no one said you’d return leading a living mountain! Is this the new fashion in the capital—taming legends before breakfast?”
Aemond only offered a faint smile as he adjusted his gloves.
“Legends were always nearby, Lord Borros. One only needs the courage to look them in the eye.”
Cassandra stood slightly apart from her sisters. Her hair, black as a raven's wing, whipped in the gale, and in her eyes the color of a stormy sky shone not only awe for the dragons but a spark of sharp, almost predatory pride. Since their first meeting in King’s Landing, when Aemond had struck her with his unchildlike discernment, she had visited the capital several times. Officially, it was for court gossip, but in truth, it was to understand the omega who shattered all her preconceptions of weakness. Their correspondence over the last year had been a cautious dance on a razor’s edge, filled with intellectual duels. Now, looking at him, she saw that the journey had changed him. A steely confidence had settled into Aemond’s movements, and his gaze held a power that far exceeded his young age.
“Welcome home, my prince,” Cassandra said quietly but clearly as Aemond approached. She performed a deep, perfect curtsy, but when she rose, her gaze remained direct. “You promised in your letters that your journey would be educational, but you failed to mention it would shift the balance of power in all of Westeros. Was that modesty on your part... or cunning?”
“Some things are better seen with one's own eyes than described on parchment, Lady Cassandra. Words often cheapen majesty,” Aemond replied, taking her hand to kiss it with a light, almost weightless gesture. “Allow me to present Princess Laena, rider of Vhagar and the true queen of these skies.”
The stay at Storm’s End was filled with somber grandeur. While Borros, intoxicated by the prospect of such a mighty alliance, tried to pry details of the dragon’s taming from Laena, Aemond and Cassandra spent long hours on the castle’s high curtain walls. They walked along the ramparts towering over the abyss, where the waves of the Shipbreaker Bay smashed against the stones with a roar.
“My father already sees dragons in his ports,” Cassandra remarked one evening as heavy clouds pulled across the sky. “He thinks our marriage is simply additional swords and wings for his ambitions.”
“And what do you see?” Aemond asked, stopping to look at her.
“I see an omega who needs no protection,” she stepped closer, so that her scent mingled with the aroma of the rain. “It frightens me... and fascinates me at once. You are not just a prince, Aemond. You are a gift from the gods.”
The time at Storm’s End drew to a close. The bond between them had strengthened: from dry diplomacy, they had moved to the silent understanding of two predators who recognize each other's strength. Just before his departure, Cassandra personally draped a heavy cloak of navy-blue wool, lined with thick black bear fur, over Aemond’s shoulders.
“So you do not forget that in the Stormlands, a warm welcome always awaits you... or cold steel, should you betray us,” she whispered, tightening the silver clasp shaped like a stag’s antler. It was a symbol: House Baratheon now officially stood behind him.
As the dragons took flight, kicking up whorls of dust in the courtyard, Cassandra stood on the tower for a long time, ignoring the rain that began to wash over her face. She clenched her fists tight, watching the silver and bronze specks vanish into the clouds. She knew: this omega would soon return to her, and when that happened, Westeros would tremble at their union.