Brynden closed the heavy oak door behind him with a low, ominous click. He had stripped away his heavy armor, wearing only a loose tunic that laid bare the gaunt, sharp angles of his frame. His bone-white hair hung in wild, silken strands about his face, partially veiling the empty, darkened socket where his right eye had been torn away. His remaining eye burned a fierce, unnatural pale red, locked onto you with an intensity that felt like a physical blow. On his jaw, the raven-shaped birthmark flushed a deep, angry crimson against his milk-white skin. "You were with him again," Brynden whispered, his voice a low, gravelly rasp that vibrated with a dangerous, unstable heat. He did not say Daemon’s name; he could barely tolerate the shape of it on his tongue. "I go where I am seen, brother," you replied, your voice smooth and melodic, deliberately dripping with a foreign, detached coldness. "The Black Dragon does not require a thousand eyes to find his twin. He needs only two." A sharp, feral snarl escaped his throat. With the explosive, terrifying speed of an archer letting fly a lethal shaft, Brynden closed the gap between you. His milk-white hands shot forward, gripping your shoulders with a bruising, desperate force as he slammed your back against the stone wall. The impact sent a shiver through your spine, but you did not flinch. You stared back into his single red eye with an unyielding, icy defiance. "He is a traitor to the blood!" Brynden hissed, his face inches from yours, his hot, ragged breath brushing your lips. The paranoid, utilitarian Spymaster was entirely gone, replaced by a desperate, bleeding man. "He looks at you and sees a crown to steal. I look at you and see my own soul. You are mine. You have been mine since the womb!" "Then why did you leave your soul to rot while you begged for Shiera's table scraps?" you screamed back, the frozen facade finally cracking as your own ancient dragon’s fire blazed to life. You pushed against his chest, your fists striking his shoulders, your voice a magnificent, furious roar. "You chose her! You let her humiliate you, you let her mock you, while I stood by you like a faithful hound! I am done being your shadow, Brynden! Daemon looks at me and sees a queen!" "Daemon sees an instrument to break me!" Brynden roared, his grip shifting from your shoulders to lock around your waist with a fierce, possessive madness. He pulled you flush against his chest, pinning your writhing, angry form with the sheer, heavy weight of his body. "Let him try to take you. I will rip his golden heart out with my bare hands before I let him touch what is mine!" "You hate that I don't look at you anymore," you gasped, your breath hitching as the sheer, suffocating heat of his body overwhelmed your senses. Your hands, which had been striking his chest, locked behind his neck, your fingers tangling desperately into the silken cream of his hair. "You hate that I stopped burning for you." "I am burning alive without it," he groaned, the toxic wall of his pride finally collapsing into a raw, bleeding vulnerability. His mouth descended upon yours with a devastating, catastrophic hunger. It was a kiss born of years of resentment, of toxic warfare, and a love too incestuous and deep for the world to contain. It was bruising and desperate, a mutual destruction that tasted of iron, tears, and absolute surrender.

Brynden lifted you effortlessly, his long, slender fingers tearing into the silk of your gown to feel the hot, vibrant skin beneath. He pressed you harder against the stone, his mouth tearing away from your lips to trace a path of frantic, bruising kisses down the line of your jaw, burying his face in the crook of your neck. He trembled against you, a low, ragged sob catching in his throat as he held you as if you were the only solid thing in a world made of shifting ash.

"Do not look at him," Brynden whispered against your skin, his voice cracked, raw, and entirely undone. "Reproach me. Hit me. Scream at me until the castle crumbles. But never look away from me again. I will end the world.”