the dragon must eat the serpent. the serpent will poison the dragon.
❪ blood moonlit ❫ in which lady taenysa of qarth is thrown to the maws of the great targaryen dragons, and she must fight if she is to survive.
⁺ warning : typ...
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AEGON KNEW THAT HIS MOTHER had lulled him into another scheme that he could not escape. He had felt the invisible threads of the Queen's machinations tugging at him, and ensnaring him with a sweet word and a soft hand on his head; when all he wished to do was nurse his bruised pride in his chambers.
And thus, this scheme involved escorting the Lady Taenysa of Qarth through the streets of King's Landing — and for the life of him, he could not figure out why for there was nought to see but rotten lanes and the cries of beggars.
His mother had suggested this in the guise of a pleasant excursion, and yet he knew well enough it was more of a chore than a pleasure. And so, he had taken it upon himself to make his way to her new chambers in the Red Keep, as a gesture of courtesy; as it would certainly make the ordeal more bearable if he began on the right note and he didn't have yet another voice harping on him.
To that end, he had cajoled Martin Reyne, an occasionally reliable brother-in-arms of his, into procuring a small bundle of flowers so that he may charm Taenysa of Qarth. Martin had spoke of his sister, the Lady Mathilde, who had known a brother, of a cousin, of a maidservant, who came into the Keep twice a week and this man owned a floral boutique of some sort. Whatever that meant, Aegon did not care enough to ask more.
And Martin had arrived outside the Queen Alicent's chambers, keeled over to catch his breath, to discreetly deliver a bunch of lavender — before clapping Aegon on the shoulder in a gesture of luck.
But as Aegon stared at the lilac stalks, he was struck by how closely they resembled his father's herbs, stifling and nauseating, a medicinal aroma that hardly charming. Thus, in a moment of what he deemed to be immense creativity, he had reached into one of his mother's ornate vases and had plucked out a yellow bloom, before hastily shoving it into the bundle.
Aegon proceeded to take a minute to admire his own handiwork and ingenuity, if he did could modestly say so himself.
But upon reaching the Lady Taenysa's chambers, he was greeted not by a sweet Lady, grateful for the blooms, but rather an unexpected silence where the air was still and disturbed. Not even the shuffle of the maids was to be heard, and so Aegon peered around the corners of the hall to see if he was being watched, before shuffling into the room.
Never one to turn down an opportunity to go through other people's items gleefully, he decided to step further inside, and only the soft rustle of his boots broke the silence as he meandered about the Lady Taenysa's chambers.
There were books bound in thick leather, and Aegon peered over at the heavy desk that dominated one side of the chambers, where the surface was already strewn with papers adorned with a fluid scrawl that he could not decipher, Qartheen perhaps. There were arrays of small delicate ribbons, and other sturdy chests with gold that had been beaten into adornments, with stones like deep emerald, the water's deep and sunstone.
Aegon had been leaning over a tome flipped open to a page with an illustrious painting over it, of a city with behemoth walls, and rising domes into the sky; when his eye was caught on a peculiar item nestled between the clutter. The box seemed to be shifting, almost imperceptibility, as though it had come alive and was stirring in wait. He leaned down to eye level with it, and it was hardly a box at all, rather a cage with open bars.
