Alicent Hightower raised a bastard - The Stranger's Child.
Except she didn't.
Naenyra looked nothing like the Targaryen beauty that her father expected. She was, as her mother always wished, a Hightower at heart, and how she looked only proved it...
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The piece of advice people seemed to give Nyra in the days following her aunt's death was that due to the prolonged sickness, it made for a more accepting death. That Nyra would somehow be able to process her aunt's death with logic rather than emotion due to having to care for her so long.
In response to that, Nyra wanted to tell them to fuck off, to have to take the place of her brother who had cradled her until the early morning, wiping away her tears and get her to breathe through the sobs as she clawed for air. In her grief, she was somehow holding the household together, managing it the way a Lady would so that Ormund and Hobby would get the time they needed to come to terms with it.
That meant arranging the funeral, and all the fanfare that came after it. Nyra would welcome the silent sisters into their home, choosing the gown that she would be laid in for her final journey and the jewellery that would adorn her body. She would make arrangements for flowers and processions and services, of the invitations she would need to send out, and how best to inform people.
She hated people coming up to her and telling her how tragic it was, how it wasn't fair and how it happened to someone who didn't deserve it. The only solstice she found was in the temple and even then she was surrounded by the presence of Ness. Nyra felt like she was walking around with a gaping hole, doing everything in a daze with her brother as a shadow.
All she really wanted was for someone to say they were sorry; sorry that it happened, sorry that it couldn't have been someone else, sorry that their family had been ripped apart but still had to keep everyone else happy. It didn't just sadden her, it infuriated her. To have to stand there and nod and smile and accept it when all she really wanted to do was throw her toys from the pram, fall to the floor like a baby, and scream until her voice was hoarse and her tears were dry.
Yet, she kept silent, reaching up to pull the dark veil over her face. Nyra didn't want to say goodbye, she wasn't ready to but she also knew that she needed to lead this, to get the boys through what they were feeling because they were more reluctant than she was. It wouldn't be in Valyrian fashion, like she had seen before, but something more in keeping with Westerosi tradition. The unfamiliarity of it unsettled her stomach as she fiddled with her sleeves, ensuring they were covering most of her hands.
They looked awful, even by her standards. The flesh was half-mangled and threatening to ooze with blood at the smallest movement. Her Grandsire was going to kill her if he was to see, scolding her with a harsh tongue and slapping them in hopes the pain would make her stop.
That was the other thing, the main driving force behind Nyra being strong. Her mother and Grandsire would be here, and this was the first time in eight years that she would see them. Nyra was worried that she wouldn't be able to recognise her mother, that in their time apart she had grown to look too different from what she was used to. But what if Nyra had? She had changed far more in these past few years from a girl to a woman, would Alicent recognise her?
