the battlefield outside harrenhal was a graveyard, the earth churned to mud beneath the weight of fallen soldiers, their blood mingling with the dirt. the smoke from the fires still curled into the air, and the air itself seemed thick with the stench of death. aemond walked among the ruins, his violet eye piercing through the haze, his posture unyielding as he moved over the bodies.

his single, piercing violet eye gleamed, reflecting the fires that raged nearby. he was a storm unto himself, and all who crossed his path knew it. his movements were deliberate, mechanical, as though nothing could touch him—not the death around him, nor the madness that had taken root in his heart.

then, he saw you.

you, his estranged sister-wife, were kneeling beside a body, a man—his tunic bore the sigil of the blacks, the side you had chosen over him, your own kin. despite his disdain for the marriage you were both forced into, it still stung that you’d sided with rhaenyra so easily.

your hands trembled as they clutched at the man’s bloodied form, your face streaked with dirt and tears that had long since ceased to flow, the emptiness in your eyes far more telling than any sob could be. you had already seen too much death to feel fully human anymore.

he approached slowly, his boots crunching through the blood-soaked ground, the sound of his footsteps unnervingly loud in the silence that surrounded you. when you looked up, your empty, tear-streaked face meeting his, he did not flinch, nor show any mercy.