Chapter Text
“What, drawn, and talk of peace? I hate the word. As I hate hell, all Montagues, and thee.” -Tybalt (Act 1, Scene 1, Romeo and Juliet).
~
Out ahead, the sky stretched on, magnificent and as blue as a new robin's egg. The clouds were unusually thick, but rolling and white, pale sunlight shining down and soaking the horizon in its glow. It was noon, or sometime around that, and the day was beautiful and bright for the taking.
Yet my eyes could only focus on the thick plume of gray smoke, rising up in the distance.
Despite the glory of a new day, I felt some sick and vile feeling rolling in my stomach, like I'd eaten something bad. I knew it could be due to my nerves, in part - I had snuck out today. My brother, who I didn't particularly care for, snuck out frequently. Yes, Aegon would have rather vanished away to some whore house in the Street of Silk, to the arms of some woman whose face he didn't remember, paid to give him what he wanted. I had seen it once, while passing through, and felt pity. No force on this Earth could conquer my brother, or his lusts, I knew. He did not sneak out to fight the battle my own family sired, but to run his cock through women he favored more than our own mother. It was a bitter truth, something I mused over as the wind combed through my hair.
But today, I did not expect to see him. Lately, in fact, he had become too lazy to even leave the castle to find the whores he once coveted so much, unless violently drunk. Today, I was the disobedient one. And I knew I would not see him here - where the raven had come in, warning that an encampment had been burned. Now, seeing the smoke continued to rise, I could see that the raven spoke the truth.
I had only heard the news while sneakily eavesdropping on the Small Council's meetings. In fact, ordinarily, I would not have cared. The council tended to prattle about nothing, and Aegon was mildly drunk through the meetings more often than not - typical. However, my interest was sparked when I heard the encampment had been burned. That was new. Rhaenyra's side, to the amusement and similar ire of my mother and brother, had not used her dragon, let alone her other dragons.
My brother had laughed, bitterly. "So the whore has finally risen from her high horse to act, then?" He did not sound impressed, as I thought he would, but rather... amused. Like he was talking down on her, even as he had goaded her to act before.
In part, I knew it was clear why - two reasons, that the dragons were murderous, destructive fighting machines, and that the last person who'd used a dragon was her son, the young Lucerys, and my brother Aemond had killed him. Or rather Vhagar herself, the old beast eating him whole.
Sometimes, I didn't know what I felt for Rhaenyra. But when I'd heard the news, I felt deep, shameful pity. My memories of Lucerys were vague, slightly sharper as the years went on, but he was young. A boy barely out of his stockings, swallowed whole and killed. His dragon a mere babe. It made me think of my own, the somewhat older Ninguid, whom I rode now. No one else in my family had such a small dragon, but I'd been the latest to claim one. I didn't care much for size at first, as Ninguid was beautiful and spry, lovely.
But now, with the war, I had realized the vulnerability of her size. In a way, it had generated that aforementioned, peculiar pity for Lucerys. I barely knew him, but I wondered what he felt as he saw Vhagar's monstrous maw closing in on him. His dragon was only a bit smaller than mine. I did not speak these feelings aloud, of course. I also thought I wasn't alone - my mother's face was absolutely pallid when she heard the news. Of course, it was in part due to the repercussions sure to come for Aemond's brazen act, but I also wondered if she felt pity as well. Pity for the boy she'd once called a bastard.
It was unfair. But I never dared say that. It was also war.
And Aemond was my brother.
Perhaps having children made one soft. I had no children, not a thought of them at all. Helaena had children, but there was always a dreamy softness about her. I barely had memories of Rhaenyra's, only the hatred Aegon and Aemond possessed for them.
"They're bastards, (Y/N). They are not like us - the blood of the dragon is split in their impure veins, polluted."
My dragon, Ninguid, seemed to purr under me. I patted my hand lightly on his side, reassuring him. I had been cautious at first, looking for dragons in the wind, but had found nothing.
Ninguid was a small beast, but he could have been smaller. At his age, he was but a child. He had hatched late, and some thought he would not hatch at all, but our bond had become an easy one.
As he grew, he had become swift. He was quite fast, and agile, and his tail was unusually long, a white spear stretching out behind him. Ninguid reminded me of the snow in the North I'd heard of in myths and legends, something I'd never seen. I could only admire him. Sometimes, even still, I would run a hand over his back in wonder of the whiteness of his body. The purity. He could also fly very high, an additional perk. But what he lacked in size - and he lacked quite a bit - he made up in beauty. Despite being about as large as an oversized horse, he was slender, and his coat and scales as pale and white as snow, tinged with gray the color of sterling silver, and his eyes a clear, lustrous blue.
Ninguid was a smaller creature, quite the size of a fledgling. He was so small Aemond's coveted Vhagar could easily swallow him whole in one bite.
It was that beauty that had drawn me to him, humorously enough. I was younger when I saw him, and I was taken by his appearance - his snowy, silvery white coating of scales, the regal slope of his nose, his eyes, clear like fragments of sterling. Some must have thought I was a vain child, to be first attracted to him only for that factor, but Ninguid had liked me well enough. It did not occur to me until he bent his head for me to touch him that he wanted to be mine, as well. He was almost as trusting as I was. Aemond himself had lusted for Vhagar due to her sheer size and strength, as many of my great ancestors had. Strength, speed, ease to ride, and size were often considered when one wanted a dragon, even if it rejected them, but for me it had been Ninguid's appearance. He was smaller than, but the younger me - at ten and two - was immediately spell-bound by the pure pearly whiteness of his lithe body, and I had rushed to him. It was vain of me, as I knew nothing of this dragon before then, and only gravitated towards him for his beauty. My mother had laughed at me slightly - "Oh, (Y/N), what an imperious girl." - but I was much too young to understand what she meant, and I didn't care. The dragon was pretty, if small, so why would I want another?
My siblings - save for Helaena - also laughed. But Ninguid and I were strong and he had never failed me, so in the end, was my younger selves vanity such an issue?
It was only lately I realized there were downsides to being Ninguid's loyal rider.
The most important - which honestly had begun to worry me only more - was his size. Dragons grew, and Ninguid had grown on track, but I had only recently just grasped how incredibly small he was compared to other dragons of the same yoke. Evidently, not every dragon could be as large as Vhagar, who was also decades old, but Ninguid was quite small, and could be easily eaten by Caraxes, or Meleys - dragons now ridden by our enemies.
Shortly after my brother's coronation, Meleys herself had risen from the ground beneath and instantaneously crushed dozens of the small folk. Her one large claw could have easily ripped apart Ninguid's body, I had realized after. Ninguid was rather swift and agile, but that fact barely comforted me. If I faced another dragon, what were the chances Ninguid could be maimed, brutalized?
I didn't want to find out, but I continued riding him.
The smoke came closer and closer, and as I reached it, I reasoned it was most certainly dragon fire due to the amount of smoke, highly unusual even for a large man-made fire. Holding onto the saddle, I shouted, "Slow, Ninguid, slow." He did so accordingly and as he circled the scene, I got a better look.
In the laziness of my brother, no one else had come to see the fire, so it had been burning for quite some time. The embers were large, and dying orange licks of flame spat at the sky. I could see the melting metals of sword and spears, unused, and the blackened husks of what had once been tents. I wrinkled my nose at the smell of long-burned flesh, even up in the sky. That settled it - it had to be the work of a dragon. With the smell so pungent, it was clear the unfortunate inhabitants of this camp had not had time to run, also confirming the obvious. Damn them.
"Down, Ninguid, wait." I coaxed him slowly downward, as he had also been coming closer to the ground as he circled the camp. I had spotted a decently sized spring, and the trees parted backwards as he sunk to the earth slowly, crushing a few small ones in his wake. He settled with a thump, kicking up clouds of dust, and I slid down his side, running to the spring. He bent his pale head and drank.
I cupped water in my palms and rubbed my face. There wasn't anything on it, but the odor of ash and decay had been so strong it almost felt like there was. And we had flown quite a bit, anyways, so a little rest wouldn't hurt. I blotted the water from my face using my long sleeve, patting it away. Ninguid had stopped drinking and bent his head expectantly towards me. I swung over onto his saddle, cracking the whip lightly across his nape. "Away, Ninguid, now."
He rose up off the ground, his wings snapping against the trees and cracking bark, and he angled his neck and head up into the sky as we rose gradually from the cover of the forest. We had scarcely been up in the air, his belly only just rising above the tops of the trees, when I heard a roar. My head whipped around because I knew that sound, the enormous ferocity in it, and it was too late to retreat. I had been spotted.
No.
Several hundred feet in the distance, I saw the enormous body of another dragon, which seemed like a stain against the blue sky which had previously been so clear - mostly of clouds, but also of any creatures. I could see its large head had many horns, and it was rust red tipped with a slight brown in color. The moment I noticed its scarlet hue, I knew immediately who now had found me - and I felt shock radiate throughout my body.
Meleys.
The large she-dragon was ridden by the Princess Rhaenys, with whom I had so few interactions I barely even remembered the sound of her voice at all. However, I could barely focus on her as the rider as I saw the red silhouette of Meleys, facing me, poised in the air.
How had they found me, and how had they snuck up on me? My jaw tensed, teeth gritting together in frustration. Was this a nightmare? How had I not seen them, or heard them? I clutched myself closer to Ninguid's body in confusion - perhaps even fear. Meleys did not approach, but her gaze was on me. And I knew on her large, copper-colored back was my enemy. I had to flee.
I could only cry out; "Ninguid, go!" My hands dug into fists where I sat, and the peace of the beautiful day dissolved like ash on the wind.
Ninguid whipped around from where he had faced the dragon and immediately flew the other way with a muted roar. The air became electric as the wind batted my coat against my thighs, and my boots dug into Ninguid. I turned my head slightly as Ninguid flew almost to the North, and I saw, with horror, that Meleys was drawing closer in the distance instead of staying where she had flown without advancing. Slowly, but very surely.
She was coming for me.
I knew she had seen me, but some truly naive part of me had almost thought she would leave me alone. What harm was Ninguid to her, this dragon small enough she could hold it in one large claw? I turned as Ninguid continued to fly, wings batting the swells of wind so I could only hear the whoosh of everything around us in my ears, and saw she had drawn closer... and closer.
My throat felt utterly swollen with horror, and my face burned. It was a feeling I knew well - the fear, the embarrassment, the terror. The pair had snuck up on me so quickly my whole body tingled with not terror, but sheer shock. Shock at how quickly everything had gone so wrong. Shock at how I'd really let myself be cornered like that. Shocked I had let my guard down like that. How had I not seen her, heard anything? I could only ask myself the same things fruitlessly and desperately.
And while Ninguid was fast, I knew Meleys was, as well. Despite her strength, Aegon sometimes referred to her speed. Aegon liked to pretend he knew all about dragons, even though I rode mine far more than he rode Sunfyre, but he wasn't the only one who said not to underestimate the fearsome Meleys' speed.
No.
"UP, Ninguid!" I screamed out against the wind, which threw my words back at me, but he heard. His neck arched upward, and his whole body was pulled with it, as I bent down until I was nearly on my chest, my chin against the front of the saddle so I would not fall off to my death as he arched into the sky, further and further, until his whole body spiraled upward very quickly. I turned my head again, until my cheek was scratched by my thumbnail from where I held on, and saw as the trees grew further and further from us, as Meleys herself grew further, and then my vision was obscured by whiteness entirely, for a moment.
I have to get away. I have to go. Please, please!
Ninguid burst through the top of the clouds, and I sat upright in an instant, still holding myself tightly to him as I cracked my whip against him. He veered around, and I could feel the desperation and fury at being caught burning through my veins so strongly it seemed to replace my blood. "To the city!" I cried, voice captured by the still, blue sky from where we levitated above the clouds, like we had ascended to some unseen heaven. In a place like this, I was almost sure it was heaven. Some small part of me prayed and wished so badly I could never descend from the clouds again, and just stay up here forever. But I knew Meleys herself was fully capable of joining me above the clouds and bathing the blue sky in blood.
Ninguid took off, turning from the North back to the direction we came, towards King's Landing and safety, staying above the clouds. I held myself to his body as he dashed across the sky like a dancer, my hair flying against my face, the wind stinging my eyes, which I narrowed, still scanning for signs of Meleys and her rider. I kept kicking at Ninguid's sides as you would a horse, and he only went faster and faster.
I had decided I would get him to fly as fast as possible above the clouds, because being above the cloud cover gave me the beneficial advantage of concealment. Especially since Ninguid was small, his shadow would be extra hard to spot, assuming there even was one. After he had flown for a minute, I would have us drop below the clouds and continue on straight to where I knew the city was. Meleys and Rhaenys would have either been confused, or even retreated. If they stayed, they would have not known which direction we had gone in and so I would have the advantage of both distance and speed again.
It could have been a better plan, but this was what I had to do. This was all I could afford to do - I would not die above the forest, not today.
Gods, please, save me. I need to get back, I swear I'll never disobey anyone's orders again! I won't go looking for trouble, looking for carnage left behind by dragons, please! The thoughts ricocheted off my mind because even as Ninguid picked up speed so the wind coldly swiped at my ears, my forehead, knicking my shoulders, the only thing I could feel was determination.
I looked back and saw only rolling mountains of fine white clouds, and I let myself breathe a withheld sigh of relief. It was time to act and rush back to King's Landing. My chest soared with victory.
I was foolish to be so arrogant.
I shot up from where I had bent to clutch his slender, white body and cracked my whip sharply. "Go below, Ninguid, to the earth!"
Looking back, I don't know what I was thinking. Perhaps I was so desperate - or delusional - I truly believed my plan would work. Drop below the clouds farther off and rush to King's Landing and the castle, where Meleys - and Rhaenys - would not dare to pursue, unless they sought death. Ninguid's body fell downward into the clouds in an instant, not in a nosedive but straight down with his wings spread out as if he was being guided by the air, and I was once enveloped again by white, until -
As we split through the bottom, I felt the shadow of something at my side. I turned, and drew in a breath so short but yet so painful I felt it would be my last. Every ray of sun previously on my dragon and I was gone.
Only feet away, the huge Meleys loomed, blaring red at me like a warning. One stray gasp fell from my lips as I also felt Ninguid's whole body spin around beneath me, his head turned sharply, almost more surprised as I was. She was there! I felt the whip loosely fall from my palm, and I cried out in terror. Meleys' mouth opened in an instant and my body subconsciously fell back against the saddle, yet I still retained my grip, and -
Meleys bit down over Ninguid's head whole in an instant, and the crunching sound of cracking bones and sinew ripping apart tore into my ears like a cannon had gone off right next to me. My eyes grew wide, my hands dropping to the sides, and Ninguid writhed, once, torturously under me. It felt like I had been punched in the stomach, all the air sucked from my lungs, and then that feeling was replaced by a familiar burning so violent and vile. It was that feeling I knew well - utter horror, utter shock, utter hate. But most, utter loss. I saw the silhouette of flowing white-blond hair above me, and the glint off a pair of elaborate silver shoulder pads. The sun haloed the humongous dragon.
I couldn't even think.
"NOOOOOOOOOOOO!" The scream ripped out of my throat and it sounded foreign in my ears, like a howling wolf, like I was more animal than human. All I could do was scream. Blood soaked all the way out from Meleys' monstrous maw, her scaled nose only a foot from my face, nostrils flaring with what seemed to be animalistic determination as streaks of blood also fell from beneath her clenched teeth like rain. Blood from Ninguid's head, Ninguid's neck. I could do nothing but scream uselessly like that was all I had been reduced to. Similarly, my head spun. Everything had happened so fast. This could not be real.
"NOOOOOOO - OOOO - OOO!" I just screamed again and again, the words bubbling up from my stomach and tearing through my lips until the remnants of that same word scratched at my tongue, already sore, coming out in breathless spurts. I barely cared. Ninguid's body sagged beneath me from the neck up where Meleys still held onto his small, small head, and then his wings fell like he was a puppet whose strings had been cut. I felt myself drawn downward, more air rushing at me than ever before, but I could barely pretend to care. My body felt like it belonged to someone else entirely.
It seemed like it took eons. Ninguid's entire body sagged, the life leaving it entirely. I could feel Ninguid dying under me, and it felt like I too was dying, stabbed in the heart. My legs slipped from the saddle, my arms already holding onto nothing, and my back kissed the air. I dropped right off where I had sat on Ninguid, my Ninguid, and then I fell. It was over in a second. I let myself fall. I was too surprised. I was not nearly suicidal, or anything of the like... I was just too horrified by what I witnessed. I could no longer see Ninguid's eyes, and I never again would. Those eyes like glacial likes of ice, staring at me with so much wisdom it felt like Ninguid was just as human as I was. I could no longer see his narrow nostrils, his three rows of teeth, small but very sharp and white.
My dear Ninguid.
No.
Meleys' wings skimmed the clouds, I could see as I fell just straight down into the wind, biting at my ears. Her mouth opened in an instant, and Ninguid's body dropped, bloody white, from it. As I continued to fall, Ninguid fell faster. Haloed by the sun above me, I could see the outline of his head - and the way the sun shone dimly off scars in it, unusual, bloodied grooves. His head had been mutilated, I mutely registered, as his broken, beheaded body fell towards me. It seemed it would crush me, and I truly did not care if it would. I didn't care at all.
It was over.
I fell headfirst, and Ninguid crashed down faster in two pieces, because of his weight. I saw Meleys turn very quickly, and begin to dart off into the distance, wings flapping ferociously. Meleys could still fly. Meleys was alive, unhurt, whole. I could see nothing else but Meleys, as she flew off like nothing had happened. My eyes bloomed wetly with tears.
No.
I did not weep more. Perhaps I did, but I was falling so quickly the wind stole all the tears from the corners of my eyes. The wind was freeing, in a way, faster than it had been before, and so beautiful and cold. I imagined myself, smashed on the grass, as bloodied and broken as Ninguid, my head exploded like a squash. An instantaneous death. I would not have to feel jaws piercing my neck, breath blooming on my scalp, the crush as my head was bitten into nothing but a bloody pulp.
Death.
In what seemed to be a singular breath, my back smacked brutally into something hard and large that I knew wasn't the ground, for if it was I would have been dashed into the bloody nothing instantaneously, as I had always imagined. The tears streamed from my eyes so hot they seemed to scald my cheeks. I saw - a face, haloed by silver-white hair, flowing against that damned wind - and one eye staring down at me. My legs hung against something dully sharp, my back stretched painfully over something smooth, my torso dangling. The eye flashed at me, the hair was haloed by the sun which also blinded me from seeing much - or was it my tears. Another scream died on my lips. I had fallen, and then I was no longer meant to hit the ground.
I knew this figure. And under me, I could still feel myself moving, propelled as if I floated on the wind. So had I died, then? Was this it?
A black leather jacket with coattails and many elaborate buttons. Beautiful. One eyepatch, blaring blackly at me like a warning. The tears continued to pour down my face like they would stay there forever. It was the only warmth I felt - the lukewarm nature of the wetness of my crying was the only way I knew I was alive.
Aemond.
I had just enough time to register the impossible look of intense frustration and what seemed to be shock on his face before I was out, floating away into utter blackness.
Ninguid.