❝With one eye a Targaryen violet and the other silver as the moon, she watched all and knew more. All of which she immortalised in bleeding black ink to be studied by the naive people of tomorrow.❞
Princess Rhaella, daughter of King Viserys I and Qu...
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LOVE WAS FICKLE: taking innumerable forms and knowing no bounds. Husbands and wives were scarcely fond of each other. How could they be? Women had no actual power in who they married — she was property first of her father then of her bridegroom — and men yearned for power like a moth to a flame. And yet people oft find themselves besotted by someone they should not be. Men idolise whores with pretty faces and voluptuous figures; women treasured younger men who offer uncharted comfort; men yearn for men while women desire only other women; brothers and sisters, especially those bearing the Targaryen bright locks and violet eyes, fell abundantly in love all the time.
Rhaella contemplated her heart's secret desires. A favourable birth would follow and protect her until the Stranger's ugly hand crept upon her feeble shoulder. Her father was a chosen King of the formidable Dragon house and her mother coming from the oldest and proudest of the Great Houses, House Hightower. Any marriage proposed to her father, The King, must be approved by her mother, The Queen, who would rather put The Realm to the torch than marry her sweet youngest daughter to a fattened, old Lord who abused power and women all the same. Security blanketed Rhaella. Albeit never being forced to marry someone she did not want to, would she be able to marry the man she longed to? His name lingered in the depths of the Princess' mind, always, never daring to leave her pink lips.
Soft white tresses were brushed through by Marla Sadlyn, a fetching maid of cool-toned eyes. Pinning twisted and braided strands in an elaborate style, Marla pursed her lips in concentration. Princess Rhaella sighed in contentment. She enjoyed the feeling of fingers running through her silver hair — it was a gesture she most savoured when sickness ravaged her, leaving her bedridden and weak, Queen Alicent would discard her daily duties to hold her child and her stroke her silky hair. Mothers loathed seeing their children in pain, instinctively they would give anything to ease their suffering. Motherhood was formidable: castles would crumble, seas turn barren and entire kingdoms be wiped from the world's surfaces if a mother's child was risked.
A noise, harsh and thunderous, rapped on the heavy wooden door of the girl's chambers. Both girls flinch at the abrupt sound. Marla's head snapped to the door, taking a step to cover most of her Princess's body.
"Enter!" She called out, head peeking out from behind Marla curiously. The door swung open, the handle clutched by Ser Karlon Knott, a Northern-born Knight sworn to the Royal Family. Appearing from seemingly nowhere a meek boy, no more than ten, walked past Ser Karlon with downcast eyes and a nervous tremble. Blood-red flowers — which Princess Rhaella knew required a blazing climate to bloom — encased in a gold vase carved with winding vines and ripe grapes were clutched in his quivering hands.
"This kitchen boy has been sent by an unknown admirer, my Princess, I do not think it would be wise to accept it," Ser Karlon, a devoted Knight, declared before the young boy dared open his mouth. In the years since Karlon — a fifth son of his Lord-father, and never able to inherit anything of value — joined the Kingsguard, his loyalty has become legendary. Killing in the name of His Grace The King was his purpose.
