Through Morning's Eye

Twenty: Unfiltered Rage

I felt like spoilin y'all today cuz I had a shit day

She hated herself even more now. She willingly forfeited the life of being Rhaenyra's Hand of the Queen to Aemond all because of unrequited feelings of fondness. He was going to marry a woman and spend his days -

Fuck.

He will marry. He will marry and said bride will have to move into this room.

Before Aemond had left, he let her have a wooden sword. She was starting to feel content with her life and even began to not wish for death. But he would have to kill her to move his new bride in.

She nervously wrung her hands as she paced around the room. She felt betrayed for no reason. Aemond did not owe her, he was free to marry. So why was she so upset?

Part of her understood her position. She had spent most of her formative years on Dragonstone with no father, no male figure to teach her right from wrong men. Rhaenyra had been like a mother but she did not teach those things either. She had not been taught how to find or identify wrong love. To her, all romantic love had been wrong thanks to her father. So she did not learn boundaries.

It made sense that the first time she felt a fondness for a man, she jumped all in and felt mad. Or maybe that was the isolation.

She did not love Aemond, she lusted for him. She liked the friendship they had formed. The lines between everything were blurred. A man shows her kindness and her brain falls head-first into the pool of obsession.

So she sought comfort in the ways she knew best.

This time when she sat on the beach, her mother joined for the first time. "You have become quite skilled with these visions of yours," She smiled.

"I would not call these visions. They are induced dreams of comfort, versions of you I need to find peace."

"In some ways, they are visions. Versions of us that existed. You do not will us to say what we do. You reach for us and we arrive. My sweet girl, you have grown into a beautiful woman. What ails you?" Asha placed a hand on her daughter's cheek, the other hand combing through her brown locks.

"I am merely sad, Mama. I feel betrayal all around me. What if Rhaenyra told that story to calm Luke down and she truly did not search for me?"

"I think we both know that is not the heart of your troubles. That Aemond boy is. You are your father's daughter, a big heart falling easily. You admire Aemond's beauty before knowing his intentions, just as Harwin did. You get sucked into situations that are not good for you."

"But Father loved her for more than her beauty."

"Not at first," Asha responded. "She was vindictive at first, a rebellious spirit, but he saw something attractive in her. Aemond is cruel and vile, and you find something attractive about him. Unfortunate, but you do not know better."

"Matters of the heart is lost of me."

"If I could have survived my childbirth, I would have whisked you away to Starfall. Your father would have been happy with that. Rhaenyra has done nothing but ruin this family. I liked her though, she was kind to me. But I was possessive of your father and I saw the way she looked at him. I wanted to be her friend and skin her at the same time."

Kris smiled. "Sounds truly conflicting."

"It was. And yet she still raised you into an honorable woman with a strong will to protect her family."