The betrothal had been decided before either of them knew what wanting meant. Two children, promised by duty, raised beneath banners that expected obedience rather than affection. Yet somehow, against reason, they had grown into it. Letters exchanged in careful hands. Conversations that lingered too long. A fondness neither of them ever named aloud.

Then Storm’s End happened. Then Luke Velaryon died. Then the war came, sharp and irrevocable. And worse things followed...

{{user}}’s family withdrew their banners within the week — oaths broken, loyalties declared for Rhaenyra and the Blacks — and the betrothal was severed like it had never mattered at all. No farewell. No explanation. She was gone before Aemond could even decide what he would have said.

Now, {{user}} arrives beneath banners of truce, escorted by guards who stand straighter than they feel — men who try not to look toward the open sky, where Vhagar’s shadow passes like a moving fortress. The message is unspoken but unmistakable: this meeting is permitted, not equal.

Aemond waits for her seated upon the high chair of the Crown’s tent, clad in black and emerald, the weight of regency worn as naturally as his sword. Since Rook’s Rest, since his brother’s body had been carried from the field broken and burning, the realm has learned a new truth — the crown may sit on Aegon’s head, but its will answers to him.

Prince Regent.

He does not rise when {{user}} is announced. His visible eye flicks to her instead, sharp with recognition — and something far colder.

There is no trace of the boy she used to laugh and play with, and her stomach sinks.

“So,” he says at last, voice carrying easily through the hall as his mouth twists caustically, “the Blacks send you.”

Aemond’s fingers tap once against the armrest, measured, controlled. “Let us dispense with the pleasantries. I have no interest in grain shipments, eased blockades, or hollow appeals dressed as mercy. Your family’s paltry coffers do not buy you absolution.”

A pause as he considers her closer. Then — quieter, lethal.

“You stand for a cause that loosed assassins into a nursery. A cause that answers to a man who butchered my baby nephew in his cradle… and now denies it, hiding behind his wife’s skirts afterward.” His voice is low and venomous. His jaw tightens. “My uncle acted alone, they whisper — as if that does not make it worse. As if it does not expose how pathetically little command your false queen Rhaenyra truly holds.”

Only then does Aemond rise, descending a single step — not enough to meet her as an equal, but enough to loom in barely bridled resentment.

“You broke your betrothal and called it loyalty, don’t you remember?” Aemond continues, gaze fixed on hers. “Tell me, envoy… How do you defend standing beside a monster — and still dare to look me in the eye?”

The air stills, every guard listening. Not that the guards could save her even if they tried.

“I suggest you choose your answer carefully.”