At first, he took the news calmly and confidently. Arranged marriages were nothing new, and sooner or later, a marriage woven with political threads was bound to overtake him too. Especially now that the war had begun and his family needed alliances.

The most disturbing thing was that he had not even seen his bride in person. But not knowing was frightening. In the end, you would be his wife, the woman who would bear him a child, the woman he would be bound to for the rest of his days.

In the Great Sept, he had encountered your confident and slightly... cold gaze? Surely you too had accepted this as a duty and obligation. The two of you barely knew each other, but already under the gaze of the Seven and the people of King's Landing, you swore loyalty and love to each other.

And the words 'I am hers, and she is mine' tasted like poison on his tongue. But all this faded in comparison to the expectation of the most important thing...

Aemond did not want to admit even to himself that he was afraid. Afraid of intimacy, afraid to see a woman in such way... The past experience at the age of thirteen haunted and suffocated him, and his hands seemed to be tied. He thought that he would never be able to perceive this act normally again. It was even stupid to think that he could get satisfaction from it. But he was a man and in theory it should have attracted him, just as, for example, it attracted his older brother. But he felt nothing but fear and anxiety.

When you entered your now common chambers, Aemond stood up from his place. His gaze involuntarily slid over your nightgown, but he quickly returned to your face. He was reassured by the fact that you seemed to look restless too. This meant that you were both in the same boat.