Aella Targaryen wed on the anniversary of her father's death. To her cousin, nonetheless, continuing the long-standing tradition of her family to marry their relatives. It was a day that was meant to bring joy and overshadow the sorrow that had purs...
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"You drink my soul I know — it's intoxicating"
— Anna Akhmatova
°•~━━✥❖✥━━~•°
A strange, malicious sort of satisfaction churned in Rhaegon's belly as Daemon tossed his weapon to the ground before Viserys and pulled off the driftwood crown nestled on his forehead. It came over him so suddenly that the grossness of it took him by surprise. He turned his gaze away incredulously. Daemon's head, empty of the crown he'd fought for nigh on three years, left him strangely smug.
Rhaegon hadn't expected such a reaction from himself, and for a while he didn't enjoy it. He took your wife into danger for that crown, he thought eventually, it's only right he gives it up. So when Daemon's eyes strayed to him, and everything but the two of them seemed to disappear from the hall, Rhaegon let his smugness show. It was in the glint of his eyes, the barest upturn of the corner of his lips.
Only moments later, when he was walking away from the overcrowded great hall, he heard Daemon quicken his stride to catch up to him. He'd cut his hair, Rhaegon noticed pathetically late. He didn't think it suited him at all. Daemon had always been wild. The shortness of his hair was too prim, too clean.
"Brother," Daemon began, slowing his step to match Rhaegon's when he was finally beside him. "Is Aella well?" The indignant scoff Rhaegon let out was loud, and maybe a little cruel, but he did not care much. His brother frowned, the lines around his mouth creasing, but he didn't say anything else.
There was nothing that Rhaegon wanted to tell him. Nothing he wanted to give him. Not after the accusation he'd levied against him at the Stepstones. It still stung, the knowledge that his own brother thought him capable of bringing harm to his wife. After everything I've given, he seethed all over again, gritting his teeth together.
He married her because his grandfather bid him to, because Daemon had done something that made King Jaehaerys choose Rhaegon instead of him. He hadn't loved Aella then, and he didn't think he loved her now either. Not like a husband should've loved a wife. Their marriage was as forced upon him as it had been upon her. Except Rhaegon had taken the brunt force of Daemon's rage, and he'd let Aella do as she pleased.
Even carry the child of another man without any consequence. He took Visenys in as his own, even when he was still nursing the wounds of his sweet Daella's untimely death, and her mother's betrayal towards him. But Daemon didn't know any of that. He would never know, if Rhaegon had anything to do with it. Because despite everything, Visenys was his, and he would never willingly put her in danger. Daemon's lack of knowledge didn't absolve him of his cruelty, though. And Rhaegon made sure his dislike of his brother was as vivid as a summer's day.
"She is as well as she can be in this city," he answered, not even bothering to look at Daemon. "But that is none of your concern." Daemon's shoulders straightened, but he didn't comment on that.
