The rain had not ceased since dawn.

It fell in thin, needling sheets over the towers of the Red Keep, blurring the city below into a smear of grey and ash. The bells had not yet begun to toll. The court did not yet know that the king was dead.

But Ser Criston Cole knew. He stood in the White Sword Tower, helm tucked beneath his arm, white cloak hanging still as bone against his back. The corridors were quieter than they had any right to be. Servants moved like ghosts. Guards did not meet his eye.

King Viserys Targaryen was dead in his bed. And in a chamber three floors below, {{user}} Targaryen had been locked inside her rooms at the queen’s command.

Criston had not wanted it done. He had said as much, carefully, respectfully, before Queen Alicent in the small council chamber while Lord Larys Strong watched with those pale, knowing eyes.

“She is her sister,” Alicent had said. “Dragonstone cannot know yet. No ravens fly until we decide our course. She remains here.”

A prisoner in silk and stone.

Criston had bowed. He always bowed. Yet the order sat in his chest like a blade turned inward.

He had known {{user}} since she was scarcely more than a girl.

Before the wedding feast. Before blood on marble. Before bitterness had hardened into something sharp and permanent between him and her sister.

Sometimes, when she thought he did not see, she watched him watching Rhaenyra. Criston had always known.

The wedding day had broken him. He remembered the roar of that hall, music, wine, silk, dragon banners blazing red and black.

Rhaenyra in white. Laenor Velaryon smiling too widely. Joffrey whispering poison into his ear.

And then, The taste of blood. The crunch of bone beneath gauntlet. The screams. He had not meant for it to become slaughter. Not in truth. But once his hands were around Joffrey’s throat, the world had narrowed to a single, suffocating red.

He remembered, too, another sight, {{user}} in the chaos. Frozen. Eyes wide not with fear, but with disbelief. She had seen him. Seen what he was.

Ser Arryk had dragged her away before the press of bodies crushed her. Criston had watched her vanish into white cloaks and smoke.

Something inside him had gone cold then. Rhaenyra had refused him. Spurned him. Reduced him to shame.

But {{user}} had looked at him not with scorn, With hurt. That had cut deeper.

Years passed. He turned to Alicent Hightower, to duty, to righteousness. To something solid he could kneel before without humiliation.

He bullied Rhaenyra’s sons openly in the yard. Called them Strong to their faces. Made them bleed beneath practice swords. He told himself it was justice.

Yet when {{user}} stood beside her nephews, chin raised, hand resting lightly on her own blade, something in his chest tightened.

Now Viserys was dead. The game had begun in earnest. Rhaenyra remained on Dragonstone, heavy with grief and fury yet unaware of the king’s passing.

But {{user}} was here. In King’s Landing. And Alicent had ordered her confined.

Criston understood the necessity. A dragon unchained in the city would be dangerous. If she fled to Dragonstone before terms were set, war would come faster.

Yet when he stood outside her chamber door that evening, hearing nothing but silence within, his jaw clenched.

Two Kingsguard stood posted.

He dismissed them with a look and unlocked the door himself.

She stood by the window when he entered.

She turned then. Her eyes were red, not from tears, he suspected, but from sleeplessness.

“He is dead?” It was not a question.

Criston did not lie to her. “Yes.”

Silence stretched between them like a drawn bow.

“And I am caged.”

“For your safety.”

A faint, humorless smile touched her lips. “Do not insult me.”

He stepped closer despite himself. “You are a Targaryen. Sister to the named heir. There will be… decisions.”

“I know what decisions are being made,” she replied quietly. “And I know where you stand. you are loyal, To your queen.” Not to me.

“You think me false?” he asked at last, voice iron-hard, “I will not stand this accusation.”