The Dragon of Duskendale -- A Song of Ice and Fire Fanfic

Chapter 4

She supposed it was the plight of all young girls to peer into the mirror at their own reflections, obsessing over every flaw real or imagined and wondering if their prince would forgive them for it. Elia Martell was a woman of five and twenty, not a girl of three and ten, yet she found herself in front of a mirror just the same. Truth be told she'd been here many times in the past moon.

Vanity was not her way, but she was not blind. Though slightly built and flat of chest, the Princess of Dorne was beautiful, stunningly so, copper skin pairing with dark eyes and hair to paint the very image of Dornish sensuality. While perhaps not as radiant as those women of story and legend such as the first Rhaenys Targaryen or her own ancestor Nymeria, she was not one to be overlooked. She didn't dwell on it or wave it like a banner as some did, but she'd known she was beautiful since she was a young girl. No matter the flaws her teenaged mind had thrown at her, she had never truly doubted the fact.

Until recently.

Objectively she knew the fault was not in her. The fault was in Rhaegar, and in Rhaegar alone, but all the maesters in the Citadel would be hard pressed to find a woman who wouldn't have their confidence shaken by the heir to the throne's actions. When her husband had won the tourney of Harrenhal, unhorsing his own brother after each Targaryen broke twelve lances on the others shield, she had been expected to be named the Queen of Love and Beauty. There were other attractive women present to be sure—Cersei Lannister, Catelyn Tully, her own dear friend Ashara Dayne—but it was tradition for a victorious knight to crown his wife if he had one, none other. Only bypassing a spouse to crown a daughter would be understandable; if Rhaegar had done that, crowning Rhaenys, Elia would have smiled and laughed and loved him for it.

But Rhaegar had not done that. Instead, the Prince of Dragonstone had ridden past the royal box, the hundreds of nobles going quiet as he shunned the mother of his children and rode to the box of House Stark of Winterfell, extending the crown of roses on the end of his lance to young Lyanna. Elia had smiled and laughed to cover her shock and embarrassment, but she was one of the few to do so.

She'd asked for an explanation the moment they were alone, and Rhaegar had given her a flowery answer meant to disarm and appease her. It had done neither of those things, for Elia was not one to be so easily fooled. In the moons following she'd brought it up sparingly, offering him the opportunity to tell her the truth of things instead of excuses, but he had never once wavered. He had not shunned her or her embraces, either, and Elia had nearly gotten past the entire ordeal, marking it down as a brief bit of fancy and appreciation of the Stark girl's undeniable spirit.

And then, word had filtered in from the North; Rhaegar had taken Lyanna Stark and disappeared. No warning, no word of apology, nothing before or after hand to soften the blow. It had been well over a moon ago, and the truth of the matter was that she still hadn't wrapped her mind around it fully. They had never been truly in love, but they had been happy. Hadn't we? She would have said yes not long ago, but now the Princess of Dorne didn't know what to believe.

While she wouldn't lie and say she didn't feel the sting, her concern was more for her children. Rhaenys was only two namedays old and Aegon was still an infant, so the scandal of their father's betrayal of their mother wouldn't dawn on them for years yet, but the war that it alongside their grandfather's lunacy had started threatened them here and now. The Vale had called its banners, and it only stood to reason that the North and Stormlands were doing the same. King Aerys had called his own after a terrifying rant that had included the King burning the messenger alive with wildfire, but Elia wasn't sure how many lords would answer. Her goodfather's epithet of the Mad King was well deserved, and Jon Arryn was well respected across Westeros. She was quiet but she certainly wasn't stupid; if this rebellion were to win, her children would be threats to whomever the traitors chose as king.