𝑾𝑹𝑬𝑻𝑪𝑯𝑬𝑫 𝑨𝑵𝑫 𝑫𝑰𝑽𝑰𝑵𝑬 - 𝐻𝑂𝑇𝐷．

chapter two.

( ACT I; the calm before the storm. )
⟵ ◊ ⟶
chapter 2: rising tensions.

AT the rough grip of two members of the king's guard, Rhaela and Aemond are dragged to their mother's chambers after the incident in the bowels of the dragonpit. The both of them were dirty and disheveled from their frightening encounter with Dreamfyre, soot marring their skin and their hair frizzy. Rhaela's arm still ached where the metal plating of the knight's grip had dug into her soft, that of which she rubbed with discontempt as their mother turned her attention toward.

"By the Seven, what have you two been doing?" Alicent exclaimed, almost hissed, at her two children.

"He's done it again," Helaena remarked absentmindedly where she sat working away on small piece of needlework.

Their mother had always been quick to anger, to make sure they knew when they'd done wrong. She was more likely to acknowledge their short falls than anything. Especially since this wasn't the first time Aemond had wondered into the dragonpit unsupervised with Rhaela chasing after him.

"We found them fleeing from the deep of the dragonpit," the King's Guard told the queen dutifully.

"They gave him a sow with wings!" Rhaela exclaimed in defense of she and her brother. She slumped down onto one of the cushioned chairs in front of her mother, crossing her arms defensively.

Alicent looked to Aemond for an explanation, anger flaring in her brown eyes. He rubbed some soot away from his face before saying, "They said they were doing me a favor. Since I don't have a dragon."

"Who is they?" Alicent demanded to know, a bit of her own wounded ego seemingly lacing her words. She leaned forward toward her children as if ready to pounce. But not on them.

"Aegon, Lucerys, and Jaecerys," Rhaela told her mother, outing her brother and her nephews.

Waving off the guard, Alicent sighed. "Oh come here my boy," she murmured with a change of tone, one more soothing and gentle. Aemond listened, coming to sit beside his mother on the cushioned couch. She wrapped her arm around him, pulling him close.

"I will deal with your brother and nephews accordingly," she promised, flattening Aemond's frizzled hair with her hand as he leaned in her embrace. She looked to Rhaela. "I promise, the both of you will have dragons one day."

"He must close an eye," Helaena said cryptically, something she'd said before. "She must choose bronze over gold--,"

"The old and the bold," Rhaela muttered the rest of her sister's prophetic sentence. She'd heard it a million times since it had made its way into one of her strange dreams. Her elder sister often was saying things that were arguably strange.

"Promise me you two will not go into the dragonpit unsupervised again," their mother said, looking between them both. "I don't want to have you dragged to my chambers covered and soot and toeing the line with death by dragon fire."