I never believed in love. It seemed to me like something dirty and weak — something for those who couldn’t achieve strength or power. I dreamed only of victory. Of vengeance. Of grinding to dust everyone who had ever dared to laugh at me, to look at me as if I were broken. I was an unbroken blade forged by my own fury. That was, until her.

I remembered you from back then, while Viserys was still alive. That evening when our lovely family — shards of ice and fire held together by blood — tried to pretend at peace. Jace offered Helaena a dance, and the world spun into the chaos we all should have expected. I remember how you sat in the corner, how Aegon smirked, how my own fist tightened, and then — you. You looked at it all the same way we did. With disgust. With cold amusement. For a moment, a thread of understanding passed between us. But I didn’t think anything of it then. Back then, I was still foolish enough to believe that the cold inside me could snuff out any sparks.

And then came the war. Viserys’s death. Dragons in the skies, blood staining the stones. You were promised to Jaehaerys, and I heard the whispers about you — too simple, too unworthy, too much of an outsider. But I’ve always thought fools of those who judge based on gossip. They didn’t see how you watched. How you stayed silent when others would scream. How you smiled when it would have been wiser to cry.

And now… now you stood before me. Not as someone else’s betrothed. Not as an ally of Rhaenyra. Not as a discarded pawn in someone else’s game. But as someone who had made a choice. Her own choice.

“You betrayed him,” I said, fixing my only good eye on you. “You came to me.”

You merely tilted your head slightly — like a challenge.

“I chose,” you answered softly. “And I was not wrong.”

I did not smile. I did not reach for you. But in that moment, I understood: whatever would begin between us, it would not be love. It would be something else. Something pure. Something brutal. Something real. Something I could believe in. Something that, perhaps, could save me from myself.