After the fall of fair Rhaenys, the Conqueror sought not counsel, but comfort. In the quiet hours, when dragons slept and grief was a living thing, he found solace in a mortal’s arms. From that stolen warmth you were conceived — a spark kindled in sorrow, born beneath a veil of secrecy. When nine moons had waned, he brought you forth to court, and the realm whispered: the king has sired another flame.

Your mother’s name was swallowed by silence. Not even Visenya, whose tongue was sharper than Dark Sister, could pry it from his guarded heart. Yet none needed words — your visage spoke enough. Silver hair like moonlight upon a blade, eyes of amethyst deep as summer dusk — the mark of old Valyria burned bright in you.

Aegon swaddled you in gentleness, as though afraid that dragonfire might scorch what little innocence remained in him. He crowned your small brow with filigreed gold, let you chase butterflies through perfumed gardens, and called you his joy reborn. In your laughter he found life again, and for that, perhaps, Visenya endured you. Though oft her gaze lingered — sharp, measuring, as if she beheld in you some hidden doom.

Aenys loved you as a brother born of sunlight might. He took your hand through the echoing halls, read to you the songs of Valyria, and taught you the language of stars. But Maegor — ah, Maegor — was forged of darker ore. He turned his face from you, called you bastard when wrath took him, and left you standing in the chill shadow of his disdain.

Yet the years are alchemists. They turn scorn to curiosity, and curiosity to something perilous.

At your thirteenth nameday feast, when Orys Baratheon’s son spat the word bastard across the hall, you answered not with tears, but with flame. Your fist flew swift as a falcon — the boy fell, and blood bloomed upon the stone. Silence fell like a shroud, and in that stillness, Maegor looked upon you as though the world had shifted. In that moment, he saw no sin, no shame — only beauty forged in defiance.

Years passed.

Now the Red Keep burned with light. King Aegon marked his new name day beneath banners of black and red. Lords came from every corner of the realm their silks a river of color flowing toward the throne. Music swelled, and dragons roared above the city, their cries like thunder calling the dawn.

You entered the hall clad in crimson silk that shimmered like living flame. Your hair, bound in Valyrian braids, caught the torchlight, and your eyes — those haunted, violet eyes — held the memory of lost queens. The murmurs stilled as you passed; even the air seemed to bend around you. Aegon watched with a faint smile — the ghost of joy flickering upon a face carved by war and time.

Beside the throne stood Maegor, dark as iron, his armor black as night’s heart. His gaze found you and held fast, unblinking, unyielding. No word was spoken, yet between you ran a current fierce as dragonfire — something neither holy nor profane, but both.

When the king rose to speak, the hall thundered with praise. But Visenya’s eyes, cold and knowing, never left you. And in their depth was a warning — or perhaps a promise.

It was said that night that Aegon smiled more than he had in many years, and that his laughter rolled like distant surf through the Red Keep. Yet some who saw him whispered that the gods had marked that feast as the hour when peace began to die — for in the meeting of your eyes and Maegor’s, they glimpsed the first ember of the fire that would one day consume them all.