After the bestowal of Blackfyre, the court was never still again.
Not truly. Not beneath the velvet and gold, nor behind the careful pleasantries of feast and prayer. Beneath the polished smiles and rehearsed courtesies, the air of the Red Keep buzzed with whispers, sharp and ceaseless as wasps in the summer air.
The lords were first to murmur, in alcoves and shadowed corridors.
Lord Peake of Starpike, a proud man with ambitions far greater than his station, was seen too often in Daemon's company in the days that followed. Whispers had him praising the King's wisdom in recognizing true dragon's blood, and likening Daemon to Aegon the Conqueror reborn.
Ser Brynden Beesbury was overheard muttering to his brother that Blackfyre had never changed hands save from king to king—until now.
Even the Kingsguard, sworn to silence and swords, exchanged looks too knowing for comfort. Ser Mervyn Flowers, himself a bastard knight and loyal to Daeron, stood ever stiffer near the throne. Others, like Ser Tyland Vypren, had begun lingering near Daemon's path as if scenting a rising tide.
And above them all, the King laughed and drank and coughed blood into his wine.
Queen Naerys was silent through it all, as she ever was. But silence from the Queen was never emptiness. Her stillness had weight.
She summoned her daughter three days after the ceremony.
Daenerys found her in the sept attached to Maegor's Holdfast, kneeling before the seven-pointed star, lit only by tall candles and the blue light of morning through the stained-glass windows. The Queen was clad in white and grey, her hair veiled, her hands folded over a prayer book worn soft from decades of use.
"Mother," Daenerys said gently, kneeling beside her.
Naerys did not look away from the altar. "The Father above sees all. Yet men act as though the throne is theirs to shape."
Daenerys hesitated. "You speak of… Father's gift?"
A slight nod. Her eyes, red-rimmed with sleeplessness, flicked toward her daughter. "He means to make the realm bleed again."
Daenerys swallowed. "It was just a sword."
"No," Naerys said. "It was a crown unspoken. A blade between brothers. Between you and him, if you are not careful."
"I asked Daemon—he swore he had no designs on the throne."
"Perhaps he believes that," said Naerys. "Now. But ambition is a slow fever, daughter. It starts as a warmth—comforting, seductive. And then it burns."
Daenerys looked down. "He says he loves me still."
Naerys turned to her fully now, her gaze gentle and infinitely sad. "And do you love him?"
"I did." She paused. "I do. But I fear what it might become. I fear what he might become."
The Queen reached out and took her daughter's hand. "Then remember this: dragons are fire made flesh. But fire is hunger too. Love him if you must, but do not close your eyes to the smoke."
The sept was quiet again.
Daenerys held her mother's hand a while longer before rising to go.
The lords whispered. The Queen prayed. And in the east, beyond the Red Mountains, the Martells watched.
Though peace had been declared years past, and no swords had clashed since the failed invasion of Dorne, the insult of Aegon IV's foolish wooden dragons still lingered like ash upon the wind. The Dornish court had sent no envoys in many moons. Prince Maron had not set foot in the capital in years. And still, no offer of bride or treaty had come forth from Sunspear.
But the balance was shifting now.
In the shadow of the Iron Throne, a bastard boy held a king's sword, and a princess found herself at the center of a storm no gods could still.