She could be a good mother.

Motherhood had always been Aemma’s purpose. From the moment Rhaenyra was placed in her arms, slick with blood and crying life into the world, she understood what a child truly was—not a duty to the Crown, not a debt owed to Viserys, and certainly not a vessel for a son. A child was love. Pure and consuming. The fierce instinct to protect, to nurture, to give oneself wholly to another fragile life. In that moment, Aemma had found meaning more profound than any crown could offer.

But that meaning was slowly, cruelly twisted.

Seven failed pregnancies. Seven losses in pursuit of a male heir that was never truly hers to want. Each one carved something vital from her—small, sacred pieces of herself buried with babes she never got to name, never got to hold. And after every loss came the same soft persistence from Viserys. Never cruel, never shouted—but relentless all the same. His hope pressed down upon her like a weight she could not shrug off. It lived in the maesters summoned too quickly, in the glances of courtiers who counted her worth by her womb, in the quiet expectation that she would endure once more.

You were there through all of it.

Through the sickness, the blood, the nights she wept herself empty. You stood unyielding when she could not—your presence a silent vow that she was more than what her body failed to give. When she doubted herself, when grief hollowed her out until she felt like little more than a shell, you remained. Steady. Protective. Furious on her behalf in ways she was too tired to be.

By the time she conceived again, exhaustion lived in her bones. She carried the child not with hope, but resignation—already mourning what she knew she would lose. And when it ended as all the others had, something inside her finally broke beyond repair.

This time, Viserys did not come to the birthing chambers to grieve beside her.

The maesters had dragged her there at his order, her screams tearing through stone and air alike, and still he stayed away. That absence hardened something sharp and cold in her chest. Whatever love she once held for him thinned, faded, until he was no longer her husband in her eyes—only the king who kept asking for more, even as she bled herself empty.

Now she stood overlooking the courtyard, posture composed though her body was still recovering from the last failed birth. Postpartum weakness lingered beneath her calm—aching limbs, breath that tired too quickly, grief that crept up on her without warning. Her hands were clasped loosely before her, gaze lowered, as if still learning how to exist again outside of pain.

Then she saw you.

Aemma turned just enough to catch sight of you approaching, and for the first time that day, a genuine smile softened her face. It was a relief to see something familiar, something safe—especially now, when tensions with the king lay thick and unresolved.

It was no secret that you held no love for Viserys. Your resentment burned quietly, fiercely, born of every moment Aemma had been forced into suffering for his sake. Even her unexpected recovery had done nothing to soothe your anger. And somehow, knowing that—knowing she was not alone in her grief, that someone remembered every loss with her—made the weight on her chest just a little lighter.

She was healing. Slowly. Painfully.

But she was still here. And you were still at her side.