AEMOND
120 AC
Aemond carefully closes the door of his chamber, looking around to see if anyone is walking through the hallways.
Nothing.
Only the silence and darkness of the night.
Perfect.
He has no time to waste.
The young prince walks through the hallway with an objective…
the Dragonpit.
He will probably never get such a chance, at least not one where all the guards are out of place with the recent events.
The young prince just needs to find a secret passage.
The sort of passage that his father knows but that he doesn’t know where it is.
And then, when Aemond turns in a hallway, he stops on his feet, surprised by the person he meets there.
“Kepa…” The boy whispers, nervous with the idea of his plans failing that early.
Yet, his father is not normal now.
He is keeping an arm at the wall, trying to keep himself up as he grunts and moves around slightly.
Daemon Targaryen is very drunk.
This is something he could expect.
After all, Aegon came drunk as well, getting a scolding from their mother.
The Rogue Prince looks at his second son with a frown, as if he were trying to find out who is in front of him.
“Aemond…?” Daemon asks, trying to stand better on his feet.
The boy nods his head, cautious.
“Yes.
I was…
searching for you.
You did not get back in hours.
I thought something happened.
“The prince lies.
But lying to a liar is not smart.
Daemon laughs with a tired voice.
“Don’t lie to me, boy.
I know…
you want something…
tell me.” The Rogue Prince demands in a low tone, struggling a bit to talk.
Aemond swallows the spit in his mouth and then sighs.
It is all over now.
He closes his eyes.
“I wanted…
to find a way…
to the Dragonpit.” The boy says, with no further explanation.
Silence reigns for a long minute.
With his eyes still closed, Aemond hears the slow and erratic steps of his father as he gets closer to him.
And then, he feels a hand on the top of his head, almost stroking his hair.
Aemond opens his eyes with surprise, looking up.
With the light from the moon coming from a window, he can finally see his father’s face better.
He is clearly drunk.
Very drunk.
His eyes are even jaded.
Yet, his traditional smirk looks more like an honest smile now than ever.
It is almost out of place.
“I am…
happy to see that…
at least one of my children has some guts.
Come with me…
boy.” The Rogue Prince says, continuing to struggle to talk in his drunken state, but then he goes in another direction.
Aemond is surprised, but he does what his father wanted.
What else would he do now, after all?
Suddenly, Daemon stops in front of a random wall, looking at it like it was an old friend.
His eyes look…
sad, for a moment.
He then smirks to Aemond.
“My…
father…
showed it to me.
It is my time to show…
and your time to see.
Don’t forget.” The Rogue Prince proclaims with a tone of demand.
Aemond nods, looking at the wall with expectation.
Daemon moves his hands to a pillar and starts moving it to the side.
It slowly starts moving, but he is clearly too drunk to apply the necessary force.
He looks at Aemond.
“Help…
boy…” Daemon commands.
Aemond nods, and the two of them move the pillar out of place, revealing an entrance.
The young prince is astonished by that.
This entrance could only be one thing.
He looks at his father with wide eyes of shock and expectation.
“Is that the entrance to…”
“The pit?
Yes…
stop talking, boy.
My head hurts.
Just…
enter it now.
Be fast…
be smart…
be brave.
Be a Targaryen.” The Rogue Prince proclaims, looking at his son with an intense gaze.
Aemond is almost unable to control his excitement as he smiles, but he looks back at his father with conviction.
“Thank you, Kepa.
I will make you proud.” The young prince promises with confidence.
The look that his father gives to him is a strange one.
He looks…
thoughtful.
Almost like he is lost in his own mind.
And then, he smirks.
“I hope so…
boy.
Good luck.
Now…
go.
I want some sleep…” The Rogue Prince proclaims, moving towards another direction, still keeping an arm on the wall to keep himself up.
Aemond looks at the dark passage, takes a deep breath, and walks inside.
The whole passage is like a tight cave that is also quite long.
After walking a lot through the dark and ignoring the insects, Aemond finally arrives at his destiny.
The Dragonpit.
The enormous building was made by the orders of Maegor the Cruel and concluded during the reign of Jaehaerys the Conciliator.
A lair for the Targaryen dragons.
The lair for one specific dragon.
Aemond quickly moves himself through the immense and dark paths of the Dragonpit, searching for a clue that can guide him to his final destination.
This is his only chance to achieve his objective for a single reason.
After the funeral and the feast, everything got messy in the castle.
So, his bet is that the same happened with the guards of the Dragonpit, luckily.
Aemond stops for a second when he hears a strong growl from a direction.
He follows it without a second thought. Read this novel at g.com for the best experience.
His heart beats faster as he walks, getting anxious.
He stops once again, now because he hears human steps.
He stops and hides behind a pillar.
A guard passes with a torch in his hand, letting out a tired snore as he walks in a direction, suspecting nothing.
Sighing in relief, Aemond runs towards the direction of the growl he heard before.
And then, the growl emerges once again, now way closer.
The floor trembles a bit with the loud sound of the creature.
Her.
It can only be her.
Aemond walks more and more and finally enters the extensive cavernous chamber of the creature he so badly wanted to meet tonight.
His destiny.
The immense dragon sleeps in the chamber with loud snores in the format of growls.
Vhagar.
The biggest and oldest dragon alive.
Aemond takes a deep breath as he carefully approaches the dragon.
He can see the large structure of ropes that ties around the massive upper body of Vhagar that comprises her saddle, including several marks in her scales.
His eyes lock on the net used by a rider to get on top of the dragon.
His legs move on their own.
Aemond extends his hands towards the net, almost grabbing it.
And then, Vhagar moves in her sleep, making Aemond’s heart almost jump out of his mouth.
He looks back and sees the immense head of the green dragon looking at him with the intense lizard eyes.
She grunts towards him, showing her massive teeth.
Aemond takes a deep breath.
He knows what he has to do.
He is no coward.
“Nyke ȳdra daor zūgagon ao, Vhagar!
Iksan hen se ānogar hen uēpa Valyria se kesā mazōregon ñuha brōzagon!
(I don’t fear you, Vhagar!
I am from the blood of old Valyria, and you will accept my call!).”
Vhagar stops grunting so aggressively, but her eyes are still intense.
She is observing, as Aemond can say.
If she finds him unworthy, it is over.
Before Aemond could catch the net, he noticed the chains connecting to Vhagar, locking her in place.
The boy looks around and sees the two levers of the chamber.
Aemond, as only a boy of ten, struggles to pull them, but he manages to do so with some effort.
The first one frees Vhagar from her chains, which she shakes around to let them fall on the ground with a loud sound.
The second one opens the large doors on the back, letting passage free for Vhagar to leave.
The old dragon looks back at the new exit of the cave with a contemplative expression in her eyes.
Aemond cautiously walks towards her.
Vhagar looks back at the boy and gets her head closer.
She looks at him with an intense gaze once again.
Aemond takes a deep breath and extends his hand towards her.
And then, he touches her nose while looking at her eyes.
Her breath is warm and almost comforting to him.
With that action, Vhagar visibly relaxes her body.
She grunts and lays her head down.
The smile that emerges on the face of Aemond Targaryen is the largest he ever had in his life.
With regained confidence, Aemond walks towards Vhagar, grabbing the net and starting climbing it.
He can see Vhagar observing him.
Is she as anxious as he is, or is she just curious?
He can’t say for sure.
The young prince arrives at the top of the saddle.
He has some experience seeing both his father and his older siblings getting into their dragons.
He knows the process.
Aemond sits in the right place, feeling a bit odd because he is a boy using a seat commonly used by adults, but it seems to be easy to adapt for him.
He pulls the equipment that ties his legs in place so he will not fall.
He then looks at the ropes and rolls both of them on his hands, taking a good grasp.
He also sees and catches the whip.
Although he doesn’t know how to use it very well.
A last resource, for now.
Aemond pulls the ropes a little bit, a sign that Vhagar understands as him being ready.
Vhagar grunts and turns around to the exit of the cave, taking her heavy and slow steps towards it.
In the back, Aemond can hear the screams and loud steps of the guards coming with all the sound they created.
It has to be now.
Vhagar takes most of her body out of the cave as Aemond takes a deep breath and opens a smirk that could only come from a son of the Rogue Prince.
“Sōvēs, Vhagar!
(Fly, Vhagar!)” The young prince commands with a scream.
Vhagar extends her immense wings and lets out a roar capable of shaking the earth around her.
Her wings flap, causing the sound of thunder as her massive body leaves the ground and ascends to her real domain, the skies.
Aemond can’t stop smiling as Vhagar goes higher and higher.
Faster and faster.
He finally feels complete.
The emptiness he felt for so many years is gone.
He is now the dragonrider he was meant to be.
Not a lucky bastard that hatched a stupid egg and got his hands on a pathetic hatchling.
He claimed to be the most powerful dragon in the world.
Like an intoxicating poison, the more Aemond thought about it, the more he felt different.
He is not less than anyone.
He is more.
More than the bastards of his cousin!
More than his stupid older brother!
Aemond laughs, feeling the freedom and power he always wanted to feel.
Finally free from his shell.
Vhagar moves around King’s Landing.
Sometimes too close to the city.
Sometimes as far as in the clouds.
When she is high in the air, Aemond can behold a full vision of Blackwater Bay and the entirety of King’s Landing.
When Vhagar is getting down, he can see all things in the city with much more detail.
All the streets, houses, and everything else.
The kind of vision that only the majestic power of being a Dragonrider can give to someone.
But there is one thing that is missing to complete this experience.
Before he can do anything, Vhagar grunts and flies to the sky before he can command with his voice and the ropes.
Did she…
get his intentions?
Aemond looks at his hands.
“How deep is the connection between a dragon and a rider?” He asks himself in a high tone.
With no more time to waste, Vhagar’s closed mouth liberates heat, and a green light starts coming out of it as she points her head up to the clouds.
Aemond smirks.
“Dracarys!” The boy screams.
With a roar, Vhagar launches a big torrent of green flames in the clouds, making them disappear when they meet with the flames.
The green light partially illuminates the night sky above the city, making the most marvelous vision that the boy has ever seen in his decade of life.
Aemond smiles in satisfaction as Vhagar planes around and the green light quickly fades away.
Next, the old dragon flies towards Blackwater Bay and dives down in a movement that takes the breath away from her rider.
Before they could clash in the water, Vhagar gets stable in the air once again, making large waves on the water that even shake the closest ships in the bay.
Aemond observes the water illuminated by the light of the moon and also the sound of Vhagar flying fast just above the water, letting her feet touch it slightly.
As much as the boy wanted to continue flying around, he was aware of his situation.
He looks at Vhagar and sighs.
“Iksi gaomagon syt tubī, riña.
(We are done for today, girl.)” Aemond says in High Valyrian.
Despite the wind, Vhagar grunts and seems to understand as she turns over and flies back towards the Dragonpit.
Aemond knows that things could go down badly.
He doesn’t want to deal with angry guards, so he manages to guide Vhagar towards another entrance of the Dragonpit.
Vhagar lands in front of the entrance.
No, it is more accurate to say that she fell in front of the entrance with a loud sound.
Aemond sighs after the clash; at least he was not hurt when she did it.
That is a big problem of a dragon as big as Vhagar, as his father once explained to him.
She is too big to properly control her body.
But Aemond could not resist the temptation of claiming Vhagar.
Not after this year, waiting for a dragon to call him.
After all this time, only Vhagar would satisfy him.
The young prince frees himself and gets out of the enormous dragon, content after seeing that the guards did not notice the change or at least did not arrive yet.
Aemond looks back at Vhagar, her eyes always contemplative.
Eyes that have seen a lot in her long life.
Eyes that have seen the conquest, after all.
Aemond smiles at her.
“Nyke kivio naejot ūndegon ao hae aderī hae kostan, Vhagar.
(I promise to see you as soon as I can, Vhagar.)” The prince promises with a confident tone of voice.
Vhagar snorts a warm stream of air from her nose before looking towards the cave.
She slowly enters it to search for her place once again.
Aemond walks just behind her, deviating his way from Vhagar soon after.
He runs around, starting to hear the guards coming from not too far.
Gladly, he manages to find the entrance that he came from.
He moves the stone like he did to come out and enters, closing it behind him.
Walking in the dark back to the Red Keep, Aemond could not stop the pride rising up inside him.
Aemond arrives in the Red Keep once again, closing the entrance behind him once again.
He slowly walks through the hallway, turning in another one.
But when he turns, he meets two known faces to him.
The two eldest boys of brown hair that Rhaenyra gave birth to.
He smirks at the two, who look at him with frustration.
“Look who is there…
my two beloved cousins.
Why are you two awake at that time?” He asks with an ironic smile.
The older one, Jacaerys, frowns with irritation.
“What did you do?
What did you do to Vhagar?” The boy asks with a loud tone of voice.
Aemond grunts.
The boy is calling too much attention.
But he can’t stop his cocky smile and his sharp tongue now.
“I claimed her.
As a true Targaryen is supposed to.
I don’t think you two would be able to understand it.” The silver-haired prince says with a laugh.
Jacaerys looks more and more irritated, his face turning slightly red.
Lucerys is confused.
“Understand what?” The younger brother asks.
Aemond smirks once again.
“Your mother never told you?
Of course she never did.
Who would want to assume the shameful truth behind children like you two and the other one?
Have you two noticed that you look nothing like your father?” The prince asks, walking towards them with slow steps.
Jacaerys grunts.
“What do you mean by that?!” The boy demands, impatient and angry.
Aemond laughs once again.
“You want the direct answer?
You two are not Velaryons or Targaryens.
You two are not sons of Laenor Velaryon.
You two and your little brother are nothing else but filthy bastards that your wench of a mother had with her knight!” The prince proclaims with a direct tone, smirking more.
Jacaerys grunts and runs towards him, hitting his face with a punch and making him take a step back, holding his cheek.
Lucerys runs to his brother.
“Jace!” The younger brother says, distracting the older one.
Aemond grunts and slaps his cousin very hard, making him scream shortly with the hit and fall to the ground with a red mark in his face.
Aemond frowns at them, furious.
“How dare you slap me, bastard?!
I tell you the truth that everyone hides from you, and that is how you repay me?!
Ingrateful!” The prince says, kicking Jacaerys and making him fall back to the floor with a grunt.
Lucerys grunts and runs towards Aemond.
“Leave him alone!” The young boy says, trying to punch Aemond in the stomach, but the much older boy hits Lucerys in the nose with his ankle, making the boy screech in pain and fall to the ground holding his slightly bleeding nose, starting to cry.
Aemond laughs, looking back at the angry Jacaerys that just got up and is looking at him with anger.
“You should not start a fight with an older boy, cousin.
It will only end badly for you.
You should run away from the liar you call your mother, bastard.” The prince mocks.
Jacaerys frowns with anger and pulls something from his pocket.
A dagger.
Aemond feels a bit of fear upon seeing the dangerous object, but he would never allow himself to be scared of his bastard younger cousin.
Not in a million years.
He laughs.
“Bringing a dagger to a fist fight with a cousin.
Only a bastard could be such a coward!” The prince proclaims with another smirk.
Jacaerys grinds his teeth.
“I am not a coward!” The younger boy screams, running towards Aemond with his knife in his hand.
As his cousin clearly had no training in any way and probably just recently received the dagger as a gift, Aemond was able to dodge it easily.
He moves his feet to make Jacaerys fall over them with his face on the ground.
The dagger echoes a loud sound of metal as it falls a bit far on the floor as Jacaerys sniffs the ground, holding his face in pain.
Aemond walks towards him, and Jacaerys punches his leg.
The older boy grunts and falls to his knee, using the other to keep Jacaerys on the ground.
He smirks.
“Let me say that again, bastard.
Don’t you dare hit me, get it?” Aemond asks with a false sweet tone.
Jacaerys grunts while he cries, still trying to hit the older boy but receiving another slap to the face that only makes him resist more, causing a punch that makes him embrace his bitten stomach and cry in silence.
As Aemond was about to get up, he heard a scream of a child going in his direction, and, in a great mistake, he looked up.
The next thing that Aemond sees in his vision is Lucerys coming towards him with the dagger.
And after that, he can only think about one thing.
His pain as Lucerys cut his eye with the dagger.
Aemond holds his bloody eye and screams in pain.
Too much pain.
He hates it.
He hates it so much.
“My eye!
You filthy bastard!
How could you do that to me?!
You will pay for that!
I will never forgive you for that, you worthless piece of…” Before he could continue to scream in anger against his shocked and crying cousin, the guards finally arrived with some members of the Kingsguard.
“What is happening here?!” Ser Criston says, and Aemond looks at him with his remaining eye.
The knight looks at him with shock, almost getting pale.
“Gods be good…” The white knight says, trying to help Aemond to get up while the boy holds his bleeding eye while crying and grunting in pain.
The Lord Commander holds him around his arm.
“What happened to you, my prince?” The knight asks with a serious tone.
Aemond grinds his teeth with the memory.
He looks back to see the other two members of the Kingsguard taking care of Jacaerys and Lucerys.
Aemond feels a lot of pain.
But the pain is nothing compared to his overwhelming hatred.
“The little bastard did that to me, Ser Criston.
He needs to pay…
he needs to pay!” the prince exclaims, full of rage that he is not able to control as he almost goes after Lucerys, but the white knights pull the children away from each other.
Ser Criston takes a deep breath, looking at Aemond with a strict face.
“First, a maester for that eye, and then we will discuss everything,” the Lord Commander proclaims.
Aemond grunts, but the pain strikes back, and he has to keep holding his bleeding eye.
As the knights move the children away, Aemond can only mourn about everything.
Sinking in his anger.
A bastard took his eye.
He lost his eye to a filthy bastard.
As long as he lives, he will never forget it.
The bastard will pay for what he did.
No matter what.
NOTE: Rhaenyra’s children and Daemon’s children are COUSINS (specifically first cousins).
WHY: – Rhaenyra = Daughter of Viserys – Daemon = Brother of Viserys – Therefore, Rhaenyra and Daemon are uncle and niece So: – Rhaenyra’s children = Grandchildren of Viserys – Daemon’s children = Nephews/Nieces of Viserys Result:They are the same generation = COUSINS NOT NEPHEWS: For Rhaenyra’s children to be nephews of Daemon’s children: