Burn me • Aemond Targaryen

Book of Sorrowful Songs

Chapter Seventy-One~ Book Of
Sorrowful Songs

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Her head spun when she saw Helaena. Dread set deep in her soul.
"Helaena?" Rhaella's voice was quiet. She thought if she startled her sister then catastrophe was inevitable. "What are you doing up there?"

The broken queen stood, barefoot, on the ledge of the window. Her hair was waving down her back in long streaks of silver, yet the usual shimmer that blessed the heads of Targaryen's was evidently missing.

"I can't feel Maelor." Was all Helaena replied. "You must know, when you birth a baby they become part of your soul, your heart and your mind." A small tragic smile played on her lips.

Rhaella did know, she knew all too well.

"And I can't feel him." Helaena repeated. "I had suspected it you see." She stated, though her words were clear it was evident her mind was not. "The woman only confirmed it."

"Helaena what woman?" Rhaella questioned, taking a step further into the room. "Let's get you down from there, shall we?"

"No!" Helaena said quickly, now turning to face her sister. "No, If I come down I can't hear them." She smiled again, yet tears pricked and stabbed at her eyes.

Rhaella came to a halt, hand going up to grip one of the bed posters so that the weak feeling in her bones didn't overwhelm her. "Alright." Was all she said trying to keep her voice calm.

"I can hear them both, Jaehaerys and Maelor, they are calling me." Helaena was dazed, her body drifting like a loose banner in a spring breeze. "Mother." She echoed the boys only she could hear.

"Perhaps you could tell me over some tea?" Rhaella said, looking toward the tray she had left on the side. This was certainly no time for tea, but it was best to try and keep everything as normal as possible.

"She told me what happened to him." Helaena said, ignoring Rhaella. "They took his little head, didn't they?" Her voice began to sink into sadness. "How could they do that, to a little boy?"

Rhaella didn't like the way Helaena looked at her, expecting her to have an answer to a question that she did not. "I do not know Helaena." It angered her and saddened her all together that she did not know the answer. That she was unable to find a way to make better from a situation that was being written by the stranger and his quill of darkness.

"They call to me." Helaena nodded. "They call to me and I want to reach for them." She began to slowly turn around then.

Rhaella panicked, and she urged herself closer to the queen. "What about Jaehaera?!" She cried.

Helaena held a hand to her heart. "Jaehaera will come to me soon, I know it."

"Helaena please let us go for a walk, we can visit dreamfyre, even go for a ride if you wish it." Rhaella pleaded.

At the mention of the dragon, a loud cry was heard throughout Kingslanding, it was a longing cry, a helpless cry, a broken cry.

"She calls for me too." Helaena smiled, her hand lifted, reaching toward the distance of the dragon pit. "Dreamfyre." She whispered. "I love her."

Rhaella nodded. "She loves you too."

"But she is not meant for me in this life now." Helaena stated. "And I will not meet the babe in this life either Rhaella."

Rhaella pulled a hand to her stomach, she could feel her now, kicking. "You are yet to meet her, she will be here soon, Just three more moons."

Helaena shook her head slowly. "In life there are faces we were all meant to know, to see and to love, but Vissera will not know mine as I know hers." Helaena said, her voice was barely there.

The mention of the name made Rhaella's heart stop. She had only shared it with Aemond.

And then, as though Helaena could read Rhaella's mind. "You must find Aemond, go to him." Helaena said. "You are not safe here."

"Helaena please." Rhaella felt the tears pricking at her own eyes. "Come down."

"Tell her that she did not break me as she thought she would." Helaena said. "Her words were just a door to what I wanted anyway."

"Helaena." Rhaella whispered, tears staining her cheeks.

"I can hear them."

And then the wind stole her. Perhaps she wanted to go. No, She did want to go.

In the same instant as she fell, Rhaella leapt forward toward the ledge and her hand reached out in a failed effort to save her sister from herself.

Her breath caught in her throat, and all she could do was watch as her sister plummeted toward the ground, all the thing she would never do and never say escaping in the air as she passed through.

The spikes.

This room had belonged to one of Maegors black brides. And in an attempt to dissuade his wife from taking her own life he had placed spikes at the bottom of tower, so that if the life was stolen it would not be the fall that made the kill. Instead it would be the piercing points of the spikes.

And Rhaella could not look away. So she saw the exact moment one of the spikes shot through her sisters stomach, blood splattering against the wall to the left. Another point through her leg and her shoulder.

But it was most certainly the spike that plunged through the throat of Helaena Targaryen that killed her.

A roar broke through the city. Dreamfyre was calling for her bonded. But she would never have her again.

Rhaella stared down at the body of her deceased sister. And she could hear ringing in her ears, followed by the fast beating of her drumming heart. Her mind sang bloody murder, and all together it created yet another dark, twisted symphony for the stranger to add to his book of sorrowful songs.

Another thing had been taken from her, and her head rang out bells of revenge. How many times would this happen, it seemed for every life she saved, another was lost.

But somebody was taking these lives, offering them to the stranger before their time was meant to come.

She would not allow this.

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