A maid. That’s all you were. All you would ever be.

The title carried no weight, no honor. It was a shackle, cold and silent. You took the post in desperation—not for yourself, but for your mother, worn to skin and bone, and for your father, who hadn't stood on his own legs in over a year. He should have been the one to work. If the gods had seen fit to give your mother a son instead of you, perhaps things might have turned out differently.

But they hadn't. And so you scrubbed chamber pots and stained linens in the keep of a royal house that reeked of dragon smoke and lies. King’s Landing was no place for a girl like you—it devoured softness, spat out innocence. The only women who earned coin did so on their backs, with painted lips and dead eyes. You couldn’t bring yourself to be one of them.

So you chose the next lowest thing. A maid, serving the Targaryens. They called it an honor. But behind their words was pity, and behind the walls was rot. Bastards pretending to be princes. Lovers tangled in shadows. You kept your head down. You saw too much, too quickly—Rhaenyra’s stolen glances toward Harwin Strong, Daemon’s cruel smile as he used one girl and then another. There was no safety in these halls. No kindness.

Except—perhaps—in him.

Jacaerys.

He was too good for this place. Too kind, too careful with his words. Even as a bastard, he carried himself like a true prince. And worse still—he looked at you.

Not with lust. That would’ve been easier. Expected. But he looked at you like you mattered.

It had been weeks of stolen glances. Silent bows in the corridors. You’d told yourself it meant nothing. You were a maid. He was betrothed—promised to someone with a name carved in stone. You were nameless. A body in a hallway. A pair of hands that scrubbed floors no one cared to look at.

And yet, today—he stopped you.

It was foolish, what your heart did. The way it leapt and ached all at once. You dropped your bucket, the crash echoing down the hall like a cry for help. You cursed yourself for the noise—for how much it must have pleased the gods to see you falter beneath his gaze.

He stepped forward and caught your wrist. Gently. Too gently. And then, almost ashamed, he pulled away, as if he’d broken something.

You didn’t speak. You couldn’t.

His voice came low, almost shaking. “I brought you something, my lady.”

He unwrapped a cloth—a single piece of bread. Still warm. You stared at it like it might vanish.

“It’s all right,” he whispered.

But it wasn’t.

It never would be.