FAITH OF THE ROTTEN, house of the dragon

𝐕𝐈𝐈. strong

"Morg-hul."

Jaehaera looked at him with large violet eyes, waiting attentively.

"Daor, Jaehaera," he gently stroked a silver strand of hair from her delicate face. Jaehaera was so fragile and small that Aeryn had no fear of her becoming too rough with him. She was not a boisterous child. "Morghul."

"Morghul," his niece echoed softly, her voice as emotionless as ever. But at least her emphasis of the old Valyrian words was better. Aeryn would not allow his twin brother to pass on his lack of language skills to the children.

"Issa, Jaehaera. Gevī," he praised her, "Well done. Morghul, that means death in the language of our ancestors. Isn't that a good name?"

His niece shrugged her shoulders. The still nameless hatchling had curled up in her lap, more like a cat than a dragon.

"Your dragon should have a Valyrian name. Morghul sounds terrifying... Like a protector."

"Like Balerion and Vhagar?"

"Certainly."

"Morghul..." his niece carefully stroked the bluish-black scales of her dragon, "Dracarys."

The little dragon just slept on quietly and Aeryn had to laugh, which sounded muffled through his mask. Jaehaera gently lifted Morghul into her arms, ran with him to her twin and resumed her play with him.

It was late in the afternoon, the sun wouldn't light up the children's rooms for much longer. Aeryn felt the tiredness deep in his bones, even though pillows and blankets had been laid out for him so that he could sit comfortably and safely on the floor with the children. And now there was a dinner with his whole family that evening. His head ached more at the thought and he cursed his body. He wanted to attend the dinner awake and alert, he simply had to. But by the stranger, he was so tired.

Exhausted, he looked over at the twins, who were silently playing with their figures.

Aeryn didn't know if he would ever see them as adults, as king and queen. And presumably his influence on them would be small and their usefulness to him only incidental. But he wanted to be an uncle to them. For entirely selfish reasons, which his grandfather would probably condemn in the strongest terms. He would probably mock him.

He pushed the thoughts aside with force, pulled himself up on the bedstead of Jaehaerys' bed and almost fell. A maid rushed to him, but Aeryn sent her away with a rude gesture and he stood upright after all.

On the way to the door, Helaena came towards him from outside the chambers and looked at him with wide eyes.

"The dragon's name is Morghul," he told his sister, ignoring her trembling hands and the frightened look she gave her daughter.

Aeryn walked past her, his limbs stiff as he headed for his chambers.

Orwyle had sent him a maester he didn't know today to prepare him for the festivities.

"White," he asked quietly.

"Your mother has ordered green, my prince..."

"I said white," Aeryn snapped at him and waited until he was dressed in fresh robes and could wear his mask again after the maester had changed his soaked bandages and rubbed his face with ointment. His robes were perfumed to mask the odour of his illness and the ointments.

On the way to the dining hall, he met Aegon, who matched his pace and strolled alongside him. Knights followed them at a respectful distance.

"You were with the twins?"