The Realm's Fright | HOTD S1 | Fem!OC x Aemond Targaryen Fanfiction

Chapter Twenty-Six

Aemond never came to make her known what was happening. And Alysanne had only realized what had happened when her maidservants came to her room, bringing a dress of green, and they want her to wear it. The colors of House Hightower, the colors of war.

"No, no, no. I shall not wear it!" Alysanne protested, pushing away the dress was held in front of her.

"But Princess, you will be let out of your chambers if you put this on." Roslin said, as if to tempt her.

Alysanne runs her hand through her hair, frustrated. She will not, for the love of the gods, wear something against her volition. Green was neither of House Velaryon or House Targaryen. It were of House Hightower and they had been the reason why her family is the way it is, and she knows for ages.

"They are imprisoning me here because my grandsire is dead, isn't it? And now they mean to hold me hostage as they crown someone who is not my mother, the Princess of Dragonstone! Do me this one mercy and lend me your clothes instead, Roslin. I will find my own way back to Dragonstone."

The two maidservants share a look. Roslin places the green dress on the bed and turns her back against Alysanne. "I'm sorry, Princess, but we are loyal to the Queen and her son." Not you, Alysanne felt she wanted to add. She had a sense they were not to be trusted, but she also had some faith that they might have been.

"Girls, please!" Alysanne pleaded. She feels herself falling apart, seeing the two maidservants sworn to her turn their backs against her as they hurry out of the room. They might have been her last hope in escaping the Red Keep, or so she thought.

Lady Ellyn comes in. "Princess? Are you all right?"

"Is my grandsire truly dead?"

"Yes." Ellyn confirmed without discretion. "And they mean to make the young Prince Aegon king."

"Who are they?" Alysanne raised her tone, out of sheer irritance. She has been in the dark and as her husband, Aemond has kept her there.

Ellyn walks over. She leans into the princess's ear, whispering, and there was a strong unsettling scent lingering on her, similar to the one Alysanne smelled when her father-by-law slayed Vaemond Velaryon for all eyes to see and remember. "P-Princess." Out of the blue Lady Ellyn gasped, causing Alysanne to pull away. The golden-haired beauty was shaking and in tears and Alysanne squeezes both of her hands as a means to calm her.

"Lord Allan. They took him to the black cells. I'm afraid he has done something wrong and if he has, I can not marry him with his reputation having been soiled. Father will not let me, I'm sure, and I'll be forced to wed Lord Tyland instead. I don't want to, of course! Allan is the one I want."

"I understand, Ellyn." Alysanne said, although a large part of her did not. With her future already guaranteed by other people, all she desired was to run away. She has never been torn between two men for she had been betrothed for seven years. To her, young love belongs in the fairytales she reads for pleasure and not in her reality where she was a mere piece of a large board.

"My deepest condolences to your grandsire, Princess." Ellyn added.

A cold wind washes away the remaining warmth from Alysanne's face. At first, her breathing shakes, then her knees weakened and she gives into the weight of the world coming down at her at one and the same time, falling to the ice-cold floor.

Aemma...

The last word he has said to her, a dead woman's name, a dead woman she never got to know, whispers from the back of her mind. All this time, her grandsire remains in love with his first wife. She heard him before utter the first queen's name and it was prior to the funeral of Laena Velaryon. As far as she was told by her mother, Queen Aemma was honorable, a striking image of the Mother, and bound by duty to produce a male heir for her king husband. As a result, she had multiple miscarriages, and gave birth to a son who eventually died in the cradle, Daemon hailed after too many drinks as "The Heir For A Day" and he had been exiled from court as severe punishment.