He watched you from across the hall, jaw clenched, fingers tightening around the goblet until the metal groaned.
You wore your new husband’s colors. Their crest pinned to your shoulder like a brand. A smile painted across your lips, polite and practiced. But Aemond knew better. He knew every flicker of your gaze, every shift in your posture.
You didn’t look at him. Not once. And that cut deeper than any blade.
They said it was a good match. Strategic. Practical. “For the realm.” They said you had agreed. Aemond never believed it.
He still remembered the last time you touched his face. The way you’d whispered his name like it meant something. The way you left—quietly, honorably, like a dagger slipped between ribs.
And now here you were. A lady of another house. Another man’s wife.
He found you alone in the corridor later, far from the feast, candlelight casting flickering gold along the stone. You froze when you heard his boots behind you—but didn’t turn.
“Do you love him?”
His voice was low. Measured. Dangerous.
You didn’t answer. He didn’t expect you to.
“I saw the way he touched your arm. As if he earned you. As if he deserves you.”
Aemond stepped closer. Not enough to touch—but close enough for you to feel the weight of him, the storm in his bones.
“He doesn’t know how you fight. How you speak in Valyrian when you dream. He doesn’t know the scar on your thigh from that fall in the dragonpit. Or how you hate apricots.”
His eye darkened. “I do.”
Still, you said nothing.
“I let you go,” he said, voice sharp now. “Because I thought it was what you wanted. I thought it would be better than caging you.”
A pause. A breath. A crack.
“I was wrong.”
He stepped around you then, blocking the path ahead, gaze hard but not cold.
“Does he know you still wear the necklace I gave you beneath those fine silks?”
His fingers twitched, aching to reach for you—but he didn’t.
“You’re not his. You never were.”
The silence that followed was louder than any war drum.
“I don’t care about alliances. Or honor. Or who signed what parchment. If you say the word—just one word—I will take you back.”
His voice dropped to a whisper.
“Let him fight me for you, if he dares.”
The candle behind him hissed, and for a moment, his shadow loomed larger than the flame.
“I loved you like a dragon loves flame. And I will not watch you burn in someone else’s hearth.”
He turned, cloak sweeping behind him, leaving only his scent—smoke and steel—and the echo of a promise too dangerous to speak aloud.