OF BASTARDS & DRAGONS || Aenar Targaryen [1]

93 • RUN-AWAY BRIDE

"Is this what it's come to?" Alicent murmured scathingly. "Tearing this family apart? Driving the realm into war?"

Otto Hightower gave her an incredulous look. "We are already at war Queen Dowager, and need I remind you that Aenar Targaryen is not your family. Yet the only choice I have is to tear his limb from limb. Or would you rather me spare him?"

"You know full well that that's not what I'm saying."

"I'm not bothered about what you're saying. It's what you're inferring that truly troubles me."

"If you're so concerned by my allegiances…"

"I had no reason to worry about loyalties, Lannisters were fools to join Aenar. Ser Tyland revealed himself as a traitor and I acted accordingly. The more I listen to you…the more you campaign for peace rather than victory…the more I wonder whether that treachery has been passed down through the seed."

Alicent could feel the walls closing in on her. "I think it's my turn to question what your inference is, Regent!" She'd dared to argue that he was ruled by a lust for vengeance and here he was, proving that for her. And she couldn't even enjoy the satisfaction of being right.

She could feel everyone else's eyes upon her, all but one set. Whilst Wylde, Varys and Orwyle looked gravely concerned at the implications, and Gwayne viewed proceedings with increasing consternation, weak little Lancelot wasn't brave enough to watch something he'd no doubt played a part in. Maybe he'd whispered in the Regent's ear or maybe he'd encouraged Otto's rage, just because she no longer deigned to bed him nor participate in his fetish pleasures due to her being pregnant with his child.

If there was one thing Alicent wasn't going to do, then it was taking this sitting down. So she stood up, raised her chin, and looked Otto Hightower dead in the eye. "I ruled in place of my husband, in his final years. Ever since, I have been ably providing counsel to the King, using my years of experience to guide him. Experience, I might add, that you are sorely in need of. You've all seen my reign, a semblance of political nous in this room. Your nothing more than a screaming man in this political landscape, more accustomed to bloodshed than written allegiances. So I question why my place here is under review, when that of others is not." She snapped, outrightly cursing her Father.

Otto Hightower narrowed his gaze. He wouldn't let his spoilt daughter ridicule him, before his subjects. "I do believe that you've acted admirably during a difficult time," he remarked. "And that the realm owes you a great debt for keeping it together. But it was never a position that was meant for you, and one that has reached the end of its usefulness. King Viserys is dead, Aegon is King and I am his Regent, and Ser Lancelot is the new Hand."

Alicent cuts glances with the club foot twins, irritated by their presence. "So you think plunging the realm into way is rather your best solution."

"Queen Dowager....." Otto tries to reason with her respectfully.

"You bring nothing but death and ruin." Alicent interrupts him.

A sharp silence swept the room.

Otto sighs. "I require like-minded people for me to succeed, not someone who seems to thrive in sewing seeds of doubt at any given opportunity." He snapped his fingers as two kings guard came forward, matching behind the Dowager Queen.

She scoffed. "Is that what you think I've been doing?"

"I'm doing you a great favour in actively not thinking that because, otherwise, I'd have to start looking into exactly why you'd go down that path. Consider that great debt of yours repaid, through the simple fact that you still have your tongue." Otto says solemnly with a serious tone.