No Rest for the Wicked ━━ Game of Thrones

Claws and Antlers

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Esmae hadn't done much traveling in her life. Mostly because her mother, a gentle soul Queen Cersei, preferred not to leave King's Landing or the confines of the Red Keep, for that matter, and Esmae had to always stay by her mother's side. Joffrey, however, had journeyed with their father quite often, as was expected of the Crown Prince, but even that didn't make the process easier for her little brother, who looked deliciously miserable riding alongside his father ahead of their royal party.

Esmae and Cersei, as well as her two youngest children and handmaidens, traveled in a wheelhouse with as much comfort as could be expected from such long a journey. There was little to entertain oneself with but Esmae often noticed Joffrey looking at the wheelhouse with longing in his beady green eyes and she silently harbored hope that his absolute incompetence as a rider would lead to a horrible accident, leaving the whole kingdom in grief for the magnanimous Crown Prince.

Such sinful and treasonous deliberations helped Esmae pass the time when she was not dozing off, reading or listening to Tommen gush about the legends he had read about the Age of Heroes. She would never admit to it out loud, but he was her favorite out of the three siblings. She loved Myrcella too, and how could she not when the little princess was the most empathetic and gentle thing; however, she was also an innocent and docile child, who fell under the absolute control of their Lady Mother.

Cersei was not normally a doting mother; protective — yes, but never explicitly caring. It was her very protectiveness that oftentimes felt horribly suffocating, and out of all the children, poor Myrcella had it the worst. Cersei never let the girl out of her sight, wary even of the septas, and one could always find the child at her mother's skirts, following her wherever she went.

No, Tommen was Esmae's child in all the ways but labour, for while Cersei raised the Crown Prince and coddled Myrcella, Esmae, ever the big sister, played with little Tommen — the often forgotten Baratheon princeling. He was the sweetest child with a mop of sandy hair and blue eyes, his chubby cheeks making him look even younger than he was at ten, a fact Tommen always made a point to state.

He fell asleep practically mid-sentence, head resting on Esmae's plush skirts. The silence after a rather prolonged time of Tommen's exuberant blabbering seemed almost defeating but quite peaceful as well, and Esmae found herself mindlessly running her fingers through Tommen's silky locks while staring at the bleak scenery through the window of the wheelhouse. And it was after some time of that uninterrupted idyll that Cersei finally spoke, "You'd look good with a babe of your own," she noted with a warm smile, watching the way Esmae coddled Tommen.

Any other person wouldn't have thought much of these words, but Esmae wasn't just anyone — she was a Princess, and Cersei wasn't just any mother, but Queen, which made the little remark heavy with implication, "Mother?" Esmae asked, cuing the woman to elaborate.

Cersei stole a look at Myrcella, who, like her brother, had long fallen asleep, head comfortably resting on her mother's shoulder.

"Your father was quite set on the idea of your betrothal to Lord Stark's heir," Cersei said with that ever-present shadow of a smirk on her full lips.

"Was?"

"After some careful consideration, the King and I have come to decide that it would be unwise to send off our firstborn daughter to the North," Cersei stroked Myrcella's soft golden locks almost absentmindedly, which made Esmae flush with anger — why was she so nonchalant about this?