Dance of The Dragonwolf

A Dance Under The Full Moon

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The Following 15 Chapters are available for Patrons.

Chapter 36 (Magic is Dark and Full of  Lies), Chapter 37 (A Prince and A Princess), Chapter 38 (A Tourney of  Sacrifice), Chapter 39 (Words are like an Arrow), Chapter 40 (Viserys's  Decision), Chapter 41 (Aenar's Answer), Chapter 42 (You Will Doom Us  All), Chapter 43 (The First Cry of War), Chapter 44 (Revenge is a dish  best served Cold), Chapter 45 (Dragons and Snakes), Chapter 46 ('You are  not Loved'), Chapter 47 (Rhaenyra's Rage), Chapter 48 (Spread your  Wings), Chapter 49 (A Falling Dragon), and Chapter 50 (Even Eyes Can Lie) are already available for  Patrons.

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Aemma

There is blood in the brazier. It turned the ash a muddy crimson and hissed as the fire licked at it, the heat igniting the power that lay in each droplet. Stood above the blaze, eyes covered by a sheen of unshed tears, Aemma Arryn clutches at the medallion that hangs like a noose around her neck.

Her stomach is empty, and the pang of ripped innards echoes through her veins, a poison that robs her of rest and seeps into her bones. Behind her stands a crib, covered in dust, unused, waiting for a promised prince that she knows will never come.

This is the sixth child she has borne. The fifth to die. She is a wasteland, unfit for the task she has been charged with. Carrying heirs, bringing them forth with a cloak of red wrapped around their shoulders, victory in each gasping wail.

Silence is her oldest companion, and it is her cruelest. It marks the end of a life that never had the chance to begin, and sometimes, she wonders if she is cursed.

Surely, it cannot be her doing that the boys who grow within her all wither. The High Septon has thrice promised that she need only pray, bend her knees to the will of the Seven who are One, and await their forgiveness. It makes something that is almost a laugh bubble in her throat. She has been penitent and gracious, wearing a smile made of courtesy and candlelight. She is loved for it, whispers of the 'kind queen' following her every step, and yet... she is not deaf or dumb.

She knows what the courtiers say behind closed doors, with the cover of darkness muffling their treacherous words.

'She will never bear the king a healthy son,' they hiss, serpents sowing discord in a garden she is too worn to care for. If she could, she would cut off their heads and serve them on silver platters during a great feast, green apples cradled in their gaping mouths.

The hungry whispers in her dreams urge her on, gnawing on her bloodied womb, supping on the misery that has made a home in the ruins of her body.

Her blood is Maegor's blood, Aegon's. She may not ride upon a dragon, but that does not free her from the straining hold of the madness that lives in her family. It is simply a subtler beast, settling in the shadows of her chambers, turning her wrath upon those who might prove a danger to her kith and her kin.

Crimson trails down her arm, spilling free from a wound in her palm. It falls into the flames, and in the space between one blink and the next, she catches a glimpse of what is yet to come.

She tears the medallion from her neck, ignores how the chain snapping leaves a red mark on her too-pale skin, and throws the good luck charm into the brazier. She turns on her heel and disappears from the room. A whirlwind of soft pink and white fabric snapped around her ankles.