The morning mists clung low over Ashford Meadow, pale and pearled beneath a waning sun, as though the world itself had not yet decided whether to wake or to dream. Tents had risen in the night like a field of gaudy mushrooms, silks of Tyroshi dye, banners stitched with prancing stags, roaring lions, crowned dragons three-headed and red. Knights moved like bright beetles through the dew, their armor catching light in sharp, fleeting glimmers.

Prince Daeron Targaryen watched them from the shadow of his pavilion.

He had risen early, though not from discipline. Sleep had abandoned him in the small hours, chased off by the thick taste of wine that lingered in his mouth and the thin ache behind his eyes. He stood bareheaded, gold hair unbound and falling to his shoulders, a goblet resting loose in his hand though the day had scarcely begun.

Across the meadow, a knight’s squire laughed as he struggled to fasten his master’s greaves. The sound carried.

Daeron flinched. He had dreamt again.

Not of dragons, nor of glory. Of fire consuming silk banners. Of a lance splintering not against shield but through flesh. Of a body trampled into mud while the crowd roared its delight, mistaking death for sport. He had woken with the taste of ash upon his tongue and reached blindly for the wine beside his bed.

Behind him, the flap of the pavilion stirred.

“Daeron.” Her voice was soft, yet it cut through him more cleanly than any clarion horn.

He did not turn at once. He knew his wife's voice too well, the careful steadiness in it, the worry wrapped tight and hidden like a blade in silk.

“{{user}},” he said at last, and forced a crooked smile as he glanced over his shoulder. “You should not rise so early. Tournaments are long affairs. There will be much disappointment yet before the sun sets.”

She stepped into the light regardless.

Ashford did not suit her. The Reach was all warmth and abundance, green fields, heavy blossoms, knights drunk on their own renown. She carried the North in her bearing still, or perhaps simply a gravity that did not bend easily to spectacle. Her eyes searched him, as they had searched him since the first night she had insisted on accompanying him south.

She had insisted. He had argued. Not loudly, Daeron had long ago abandoned the art of loudness, but with a dull persistence, as though he believed he might wear her down. He had told her Ashford would be crowded, that the wine would flow like rivers, that the press of lords and hedge knights would suffocate her.

In truth, he had not wished her to see him here. Not like this.

“You have not armed yourself,” {{user}} said quietly.

He lifted the goblet instead. “I have armed myself sufficiently.”

Her gaze flicked to the lists, where squires were leading destriers to water and bright pennons snapped in the breeze. “But you told your father that you would ride.”

“I told everyone many things.” His smile sharpened faintly. “It pleases men to think a dragon will tilt for their amusement. It makes them feel brave.”

“And will you?”

He looked back to the field.

Knights of the Reach were already assembling, Rowans, Fossoways, Tarlys. Lances rested against shoulders; shields bore painted apples, huntsmen, ivy leaves. Somewhere among them stood men who would gladly unhorse a prince for the glory of it. Men who would toast the tale for the rest of their lives.

Daeron felt the ghost of his dream stirring again. He saw a helm crushed inward. Heard the wet crack.

“No,” he said, and drank.