The air in the Red Keep's Maegor’s Holdfast tasted of sea-salt, burning sweet-resin, and the low, heavy draft of an impending storm over Blackwater Bay.

Down in the courtyard, the martial clash of iron against iron had long subsided into the quiet night, leaving only the soft shhh-shhh of silk draperies and the metallic, rhythmic tread of white-armored boots outside your chamber doors.

You sat at your high oak dressing table, unpinning the silver filigree from your hair, watching the reflection of the doorway in the silvered glass.

When the oak door creaked inward, it was not a servant with evening wine. It was him.

Prince Aemon Targaryen walked in with the silent, fluid grace peculiar to those who lived inside steel. He carried his grand helm under one arm—its sculpted white-gold dragons catching the low amber glow of the hearthfire, ruby eyes glittering like dried blood.

His pale silver-gold hair was damp at the temples, clinging softly to the sharp, noble sculpture of his jawline and high cheekbones.

He was two men in a single skin: the Dragonknight—fearless, immaculate, wielding the legendary dark wave of Dark Sister—and Aemon, the man burdened by an ocean of quiet sorrow, his lilac eyes carrying a gravity that could break a lesser soul.

"My Lord," you murmured, your voice barely carrying across the flagstones. "The king's feast ended hours ago. Your watch was meant to end at the outer gates."

Aemon lingered at the threshold for a heartbeat, his gaze searching your face with a fierce, restrained intensity.

He stepped inside, letting the heavy door latch shut behind him. The air in the room suddenly felt smaller, charged with an electric heat that belied the cold river winds outside.

"The King is asleep, drowned in arbor gold and unrest," Aemon said, his voice a low, resonant cadence—measured, velvet-soft, yet carrying the unmistakable timbre of command.

"And my heart was not at the gates."

He set his helm upon the marble side-table and approached you. Every motion of his plate-armored shoulders was a study in controlled power.

To the Seven Kingdoms, he was the peerless Paragon of Knighthood, a living song bound by solemn vows of chastity and white wool.

But here, within the shadow of your private hearth, the white cloak felt less like an honor and more like a shroud he longed to shed for you.

Stopping behind your chair, Aemon met your eyes in the mirror.

He reached down, his leather-gloved fingers trembling slightly as they brushed the bare curve of your shoulder.

"You did not dance tonight," he noted softly, his thumb tracing the delicate line of your collarbone. "When the court cheered, you looked toward the sea."

"I was watching you," you confessed, turning slowly in your seat to face him directly.

You looked up into those legendary purple eyes—so often shrouded in icy distance, but now burning with an unadulterated, dangerous warmth.

"I watched you stand behind the royal dais like a statue sculpted of snow and iron. I wondered how much heat a dragon’s blood must retain before the white steel melts."

Aemon let out a sharp, ragged breath. He dropped to one knee before you—a gesture meant for sovereign monarchs, offered here only to the queen of his hidden thoughts.

"It burns me alive," he whispered, lifting his gaze to yours.

"Every hour I must stand three paces behind a court of lies, holding a sword that belongs to history, while the only crown I desire sits upon your brow.

If the realm knew how easily I would trade my honor for one hour in your shadow, they would rip the white cloak from my back and brand me traitor."

"I do not fear men," Aemon said, taking your small hand in his armored palm, turning it to press a desperate, lingering kiss into the center of your wrist, right where your pulse fluttered.

"I fear this. I fear the way my knees weaken when you look at me. I fear that if I touch you as a man and not a knight, I will never find the strength to pick up my shield again."

Before you could answer, the heavy silence of the night was shattered.