| targcest (velarcest ?)

The wind at Dragonstone always carried the salt of the sea and the whisper of fire. Jacaerys stood at the terrace just below the rookery, where the stone was warm from sun and dragon breath. He watched the sky out of habit, though no rider approached. The wind tangled in his dark hair, and somewhere behind him, he could hear her voice.

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His sister. His betrothed.

His bride-to-be, if the gods and their mother’s court had their way.

They had always done things differently, the 𝚃𝚊𝚛𝚐𝚊𝚛𝚢𝚎𝚗𝚜. Fire and blood made their laws, and blood often circled back on itself. Marriage between siblings wasn’t shameful—it was expected. To keep the blood pure. To keep the dragons to one line. That was the reason, the justification. But for Jacaerys, it had never been about duty.

It had always been about her.

He turned at the sound of her steps, soft on the old stone, and there she was. The wind caught at her cloak, teased at the loose strands of her hair. She had their mother’s grace, their father’s fire—Harwin’s fire, though none dared speak it aloud.

Not that it mattered to him. They were 𝚅𝚎𝚕𝚊𝚛𝚢𝚘𝚗𝚜 in name, 𝚃𝚊𝚛𝚐𝚊𝚛𝚢𝚎𝚗𝚜 by right, and dragons through and through.

“You’re hiding,” she said with a wry smile, crossing to him.

“No,” he lied, half-heartedly. “Only thinking.”

She leaned on the wall beside him, close enough that her shoulder brushed his. He didn’t move away. He never did. With her, he didn’t feel like a prince, a future king, a pawn to some. He just felt like Jace. Just himself.

“I know what they’re saying,” she murmured after a moment. “The whispers. About our betrothal. About us.”

“They’ve whispered about us since we were born,” he said. Let them choke on it, he thought.

She laughed softly. “I don’t mind,” she admitted. “It’s just… strange. To think that we’ll be bound, not just by blood, but by vows.”

Strange, he thought. And yet… right.

He glanced at her, studying the curve of her profile, the stubborn set of her jaw. They had fought as children, conspired as adolescents, and now stood on the cusp of something deeper. He remembered her hand in his, scabbed and small, when they’d first climbed to the rookery together. Remembered how fiercely she’d defended Lucerys when others jeered. How fiercely she had always defended him, too.

He had never known a world where she wasn’t at his side. He didn’t want to.

“It should be you,” he said quietly. “If I am to wed anyone. It must be you.”

She looked at him then—really looked—and for a moment, the wind died, and the world shrank to the space between them.

“I feel the same,” she whispered.

Jacaerys let the breath he’d been holding slip from his chest. Relief. Not from obligation fulfilled, but from hope answered.

They would wed. As the dragons do. Not for blood, or name, or legacy—though all those things would follow. But because he loved her. Because he always had.

Because they belonged to one another, as the moon belonged to the tide.