The Bronze Dragon-A House of the Dragon fanfic

Chapter 54

The opening months of 133 AL were filled with bloodshed. With such heavy fighting occurring this early on, it is something of a minor miracle that the armies had much strength left for campaigning in the second half of the year, let alone for the Last Dance.

It can be forgotten though that wars are not always won through strength on the battlefield. Sometimes, a deft touch of diplomacy is needed. Dorne had defied House Targaryen during Aegon's Conquest, and remained the sole region of Westeros to retain its independence. Most will credit Prince Daeron for the success of the diplomacy with Dorne, but what has not been recorded is that according to everyone on my father's council, it was actually my mother who first came up with the idea . . .

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Runestone

A few days passed before Daevar felt fully ready to throw himself back into the war, but coming back to Runestone reminded him why he was fighting it exactly. Rhea was a year old now, and had been ecstatic to see him when he had arrived home again. They had spent much time together since he had returned, but that wasn't all the time he was keen for, and when he managed to finally get himself and Helaena alone, there wasn't much question of what was to happen.

Of course, that had been the plan, but even with his beautiful wife on top of him, Daevar was struggling to get hard. Helaena, embarrassingly enough for Daevar, didn't fail to notice. "Daevar, are you alright?" She asked. She ground her hips down harder, hoping for some sort of response from him.

"No, I'm fine, just . . ." He sighed and threw his head back. "Fuck."

Helaena leaned forward and kissed him tenderly. "There's something else on your mind, Daevar." She said, climbing off of him and resting her head on his shoulder. "We've been married for six years, Daevar. I can tell when something's wrong." She gently turned his head to face her. "You know you can tell me."

Daevar sighed. He had just wanted Helaena to be able to enjoy the first time they'd had alone together since the Eyrie, and the entire night had been halted because he hadn't been able to get out of his own head. "It's . . . all those men are dead because of me. I ordered that assault . . . the trap was so obvious and I walked right into it."

"You sailed into it." Helaena said. She kissed him again; the feeling of her lips was reassuring to him, though that didn't exactly ease a lot of his worries.

"And then there's still Gerold . . . we haven't even managed to find the body to give his family any closure . . ."

"Lady Jeyne said to me once that there are some things in the world that cannot be controlled." She said as he kissed her cheek. "That things sometimes have a way of sorting themselves out."

Daevar sighed. The violent loss of a parent was unfortunately something that he had experienced, but the fact that Gerold's body had not been found, the fact that he and his men had simply disappeared into thin air . . . there was a certain darkness about it all. "They never even got to bury him." He said, the faint hint of a sob in his voice.

Helaena's heart broke for her husband. She had known that Ser Gerold had been the one to effectively take charge of raising him after Rhea's death, but had never been fully aware of the bond between the two of them. Her bond with her own father had been a distant one, and the idea of finding a different figure to raise them was foreign to her, but not to Daevar. She kissed his cheek. "I'm here, Daevar. You're not in this alone." She looked into the brown of his eyes. "You can cry if you need to, Daevar."

Daevar hadn't cried since his mother had died. He had never been given to displays of emotion like that; one of the things he had been taught was that he had to project a constant image of stability to everyone around him if he was ever going to be taken seriously as a lord. Yet right now, all of those lessons went out the window with Helaena's words. Face buried in her shoulder, Daevar Targaryen let out all of the emotion that had been building up. The tears flowed freely for the first time in years.