The Courtyard, Early in the morning
Gaemon was watching Ser Luthor and the new recruit of the city guard, Alaric, spar with each other.
Gaemon wiped the sweat from his brow, accumulated from his recently finished spar with Ser Luthor.
The knight was merciless in training Gaemon, by command of none other than Gaemon’s dear father, Daemon.
The purple and black bruises the knight gave Gaemon were countless and formed anew every day.
Daemon and Luthor had long since discovered Gaemon’s unnatural durability, and Gaemon didn’t know if they were sadists, but the two grown men had exploited that durability to its absolute limit.
Though in doing so, Gaemon’s skill had leapt forward very quickly, and it was only here that he found out his cousin Bennard had been going easy on him too, even though he too would have reached the same conclusion about Gaemon’s durability after a month of training.
Luthor, after pointing out some mistakes that could cost a recruit his life in a real battle, finished the spar with one clean strike to the hand holding the sword.
The strike came with such force and precision that his opponent’s sword slid from his hand, and before the recruit could even glance at it, Luthor’s blade was already pointed at his neck.
Gaemon was about to stand and ready himself for a spar with Luthor, as he still had some energy left before he’d retire to his chamber and roam the keep for the rest of the day.
Already padded from neck to ankle, he made his way to the yard with his practice sword, without a word.
Ser Luthor caught his intent and turned back to make his way into the yard again.
Both Gaemon and his opponent for this spar took their stances, but before anyone could call “hajime,” a shout of “Stop!” rang out.
Gaemon did not need to turn to know who had interrupted his match with Ser Luthor.
“You can go, Ser Luthor.
I will be his opponent.
I need to see how much he’s grown in the two moons I was away.
I do hope you have stuck to what I commanded and pushed him hard; if not, then it will ruin my good mood.” Gaemon’s dear father dismissed Luthor and took the practice sword from the knight’s hand.
Not before conveying to the knight with his eyes what will happen if his mood is ruined.
No words passed between father and son as Daemon took his stance, clad in full black plate, an expression of such overjoyed intensity that it nearly made Gaemon stop the spar and call it a day right there.
Nearly being the key word.
Tightening his grip on his sword, Gaemon started, “I didn’t hear Cara—” Before he could finish, Daemon attacked, his blow aimed at the neck.
Had Gaemon not seen the strike coming a heartbeat before, he never would have blocked it in time, Daemon moved that fast.
Daemon didn’t stop or wait for Gaemon to find his footing; the blows came one after another.
Gaemon abandoned every thought except how to defend himself from his overeager father, and the two of them fell into a rhythm.
Gaemon’s Six Eyes helped him immensely, letting him slip past and redirect blows, while Daemon, seeing how easily his son deflected him, upped his strength little by little.
Seven minutes later,
The spar ended with Gaemon flat on the ground, bruises blooming on his neck, his hands, even the backs of his knees.
Breathing heavily, Gaemon looked up at his father, who was still watching him with a heavy fervor that Gaemon would admit, if only to himself, was mildly terrifying.
He hadn’t had room to think much of anything during the spar itself, but he was free to think now.
That look, that intensity, could only mean one thing: his uncle Viserys had spilled every last bean to Daemon.
And now Daemon was either burning with the thought that his own son might be the prophesied prince and wanted to train him to his last breath, or this was simply two months of bottled-up fatherly affection erupting all at once, sword-first.
Gaemon was leaning toward the former.
“So you had a chat with Uncle Viserys, eh?” Gaemon asked, trying to stand.
“Yes. Enjoying the story? Read on at g.com.
Very interesting and profound things he told me.
One of which, I daresay, was that my own son, my own blood, has been hiding things from me.
Very important things, I might add.
From his own father.
I do wonder why.” Daemon said.
His stance and posture hadn’t shifted an inch, but Gaemon caught the faint tightening around his eyes that might have been anger.
“Fret not, dear father.
You shall wonder no longer,” Gaemon said, pushing himself up by his hands.
“If you recall, you weren’t exactly here for your own son, your own blood, to tell you these interesting and profound things — or much of anything at all, really.
And here I thought your wisdom knew no bounds.” Gaemon said, making his way to the corner of the yard to shed his padding, it was heavy, and his body had no energy left to keep hauling it around.
“Your tongue has only gotten sharper these past few moons.
Perhaps your legs have grown stronger to match.
Run ten laps around the yard in those soft little pillows you spar in.” His father said as Gaemon unstrapped his padding.
Gaemon opened his mouth to protest, but Daemon rose and gripped the practice sword by its pointed end, waving the handle at him like a very unsubtle hint to get moving.
“I can’t.
I’m dead tired.
Maybe I’ll—” Daemon strolled over, unhurried, and bopped the handle squarely on Gaemon’s head, cutting him off mid-sentence.
“Get on with it, or would you like another?
I must say, the sound of your screaming was music to my ears.” Daemon said, feinting another strike.
But Gaemon wasn’t having it.
He took off running without another word of protest, though the glare he shot over his shoulder might have melted Daemon clean out of his edgy black armor, the one nobody liked, if Gaemon’s Six Eyes came with heat vision like Superman’s.
The next day, King’s own chamber,
“So they’re gone?” Aemma asked.
Viserys only gazed at the disappearing silhouette of Caraxes making its way toward Dragonstone.
“When will he be back, Viserys?” Aemma’s voice sounded right beside his ear this time.
“I still don’t think it was the right decision, handing Gaemon over to Daemon.”
“Daemon is his father, Aemma.
And my brother and heir besides.
Who better to teach him the ways of House Targaryen than Daemon?
Think what you will, but my brother is more than apt with a sword as well.
Between all of that, there was no better choice, and they’ll be back in a few moons, for the tourney at Maidenpool.” Viserys said, moving from the balcony toward the sitting area.
“Your Kingsguard.
“Please, Aemma, I don’t want you doubting or questioning my decision.” Viserys waved a hand and poured himself a drink.
Arbor wine, smooth as it was sweet, his favorite.
“Have you thought over what I proposed last night?” Aemma asked, letting the topic drop as Viserys clearly wished, dutiful wife that she was.
Viserys turned to her, finished his drink, and looked at her, then down at his hands.
“Yes, I have.
I have.
I’ll propose it to Daemon once he returns for the tourney.
I think it’s a fine idea.
They’ll make a good pair.
Gaemon and Rhaenyra, I know it.” Viserys replied.
Even as he said it, some small, petty part of him noted that it would be his daughter tied to Daemon’s prophesied son, and not the other way around.
He pushed the thought down before it could take root.
Aemma looked at him with those soft eyes of hers, and Viserys knew she could see straight through him.
He turned his gaze away, not because he was hiding anything, he told himself, but because he’d simply found the bed rather interesting to look at just then.
The rustle of her dress and the soft fall of her feet against the floor reached his ears clearly, and he flinched slightly as she leaned into him.
“Our son doesn’t need to be the prophesied prince to be special, Viserys.
He’ll be our son.
Isn’t that enough?” Aemma turned his face toward hers.
“Our son will be a king.
Your guidance will make him a better king than his predecessor, and I’m certain he’ll leave such a legacy that you’ll be remembered as the father of a great king, rather than merely the uncle of a hero.”
Viserys knew she was right.
But in his dream, in his dream, the prophesied prince had come from his own line, Viserys’s own loins.
Not Daemon’s.
Fate truly was a bitch, as his brother liked to say, and this time the bitch had bent for Daemon, not for him.
It sat in his chest like a low coal he hadn’t asked for and couldn’t quite smother, no matter how many times he told himself it shouldn’t matter.
“And here I thought you saw Gaemon as your own,” Viserys said, forcing some lightness into it.
Aemma, rather than leaning into him, pushed him back.
“Gaemon will be the son I’ll never bear, but that doesn’t mean I’ll love him any less than one born of my own womb.
Besides, you may trust your brother, but I don’t.
Gaemon needs someone sane around, like me, or the lot of you will drive that poor child to an early grave under the weight of these prophecies.”
“Come now, Aemma.
Please, don’t start on Daemon again.
Leave my brother be.”