SEE HOW IT SHINES

IV.

128 AC.

Viserra is no stranger to dreams about her father. They come often, a sweet haunting, precious and painful all at once. She welcomes them even though they make her heart ache, because to have Kepa at all, even in this little way, is better than nothing. The dreams are often mere memories, glimpses of their past together: sailing, playing dice games with Lucerys, flying together on Seasmoke. She wishes she were a skilled artist like Rhaena, that she could draw them and keep them forever, so she wouldn't have to be asleep to remember him so vividly. But for every fifty dreams like these, she has one that isn't half so warm and lovely.

The dream starts pleasant enough: Kepa, standing on his boat as she watches him from the shore, smiling and waving. But when she reaches for him or tries to wade through the shallows to climb aboard with him, he drifts further and further away. No matter how hard she swims, she can never catch him. And as soon as she gives up, resigned to losing him, the sea turns to fog and fire. Great billows of smoke and flame swallow him up, reducing him to ash and blackened bones. All she can do is watch, a scream caught in her throat.

It's this same dream that wakes her on a grey, warm morning, with Raya snoring softly beside her. But for the first time since his death, Viserra hears Kepa's voice echoing in her mind, as clear as it was in life. He's never spoken to her in dreams before, and she's not sure whether she's dreaming still or merely imagining it, but his gentle tone is unmistakable.

"Home," he says, over and over. "You must go home."

Viserra wants to scream. Somehow, just the sound of his voice is more unsettling than the dream—-or any other she's had over the years. It feels wrong, ominous, like when the sky feels heavy with rain but the skies are clear. If she were still a little girl, and Kepa were still alive, she'd throw her arms around his neck and tell him about the monsters and black flames that haunted her dreams. She doesn't have him anymore. She has—-

Muña. For the first time in her life, it's Muña she seeks for comfort now. She's never told her mother about any of her dreams, never cried to her or clutched her skirts in fear. Why would she, when she had Kepa? But now, seventeen and more terrified than she has been in years, all because of the sound of her father's voice, she wants her mother.

The stone floors of the corridor are cold beneath her bare feet as she makes her way to her mother's rooms, still pulling a robe over her nightgown as she walks. She can't bring herself to feel embarrassed that she's a woman grown crying for her mummy; she just...needs to see her. To feel Rhaenyra's warm hand pressed against her cheek, to breathe in the smoke-and-lavender scent of her hair. Tears cloud her vision, threatening to spill down over her cheeks, but she would know the way to the chambers at the top of the stairs blind. And when she arrives, barely pausing to lift her fist in a soft knock against the carved wood door, she finally lets the tears fall.

Only half a second passes before the door swings open. Viserra lets out a shuddering sigh of relief at the sight of her mother. Rhaenyra's face morphs from confusion to concern, and in silence she folds her daughter into her arms, clutching her against her chest.

"Oh, my darling girl," she breathes, and Viserra feels her heart burst open and flood her chest.

She wraps her arms around her mother's waist, nuzzling into the crook of her neck like she must've done as a babe. "I had a terrible dream."

Rhaenyra nods, slowly pulling back to study Viserra's face. She brushes a curl behind her ear with the sort of tenderness only a mother's hand can carry. "Do you want to tell me about it?"

"I dreamt of Kepa," she looks down at her bare feet, old grief rising in her throat. She wants to say more, to tell her mother the whole of it, but the words don't come.