AEMOND
The small council chamber felt different with Aemond at its head.
Not the king's seat—that remained empty, symbolically waiting for Aegon to recover. But Aemond commanded from the Hand's position, where Otto once sat. His grandfather had stepped aside "temporarily," though everyone understood the truth.
Power had shifted.
"The Riverlands are lost," Lord Jasper Wylde reported, shuffling through dispatches. "Lord Grover Tully's grandsons have declared for Rhaenyra. Daemon holds Harrenhal unchallenged."
"Daemon holds a ruin." Aemond's voice carried no concern. "Let him play lord of the ashes."
"A ruin with strategic position," Criston Cole interjected. "From Harrenhal, he can strike in any direction. The Crownlands. The Reach. Even King's Landing."
"Then we strike first."
The room went quiet.
Aemond traced a finger along the map spread across the table. Harrenhal. The God's Eye. The surrounding lands.
"Vhagar can reach Harrenhal in hours. Daemon's Caraxes is fierce, but old. If I catch him on the ground—"
"And if you don't?" Otto spoke from his position near the window. Still present. Still influential. "If Daemon lures you into a trap? If other Black dragons converge while you're committed?"
"Then I fight them all."
"You'd risk the realm's largest dragon on pride?"
Aemond's jaw tightened. "On strategy. Daemon is their best commander. Remove him, and Rhaenyra's cause collapses."
"Perhaps." Otto's voice carried the weight of decades of scheming. "But perhaps we wait. Build strength. Let them overextend."
"Waiting is how we lost the Riverlands."
The argument circled. Aemond wanted action. Otto counseled patience. Criston Cole shifted between them, eager for battle but wary of moving without proper support.
No one mentioned Aegon.
The king lay in his chambers, wrapped in bandages and milk of the poppy dreams. His legs would never heal properly. His face would carry scars until death.
A crippled king and a one-eyed regent, Aemond thought. The Blacks must be laughing.
He would give them nothing to laugh about.
ULF
The war council ended without resolution.
I stood in the corridor outside, ostensibly guarding Helaena's route back to her chambers. In truth, I'd been listening through the cracked door.
Aemond wants to hunt Daemon. Otto wants to consolidate. Neither is wrong. Both could be fatal.
Helaena emerged, pale and silent. She'd been required to attend—queen's duty, Alicent insisted—but had contributed nothing. Just sat in her corner, hands twisting in her lap, eyes seeing things none of us could perceive.
"Walk with me," she murmured.
We moved through the Keep's corridors. Guards nodded as we passed. Servants averted their eyes.
"You heard them," she said.
"Most of it."
"They argue about battles and dragons. They never mention the children."
"The children are safe. I've made sure of that."
"For now." Her voice carried that distant quality—not quite present, not quite elsewhere. "The rat still comes. In my dreams. Every night now."
The rat.
I'd killed the assassin from the passages. Searched the body. Found Daemon's coin.
But rats didn't travel alone.
"Tell me about the dream. Exactly."
"Teeth in the dark. Small feet. Something borrowed, something bought." She stopped walking. Faced me. "Two names. I can almost hear them."
"Blood and Cheese?"
Her eyes widened. "How—"
"I've been investigating. Ratcatchers. Men who know the passages."
"You knew already."
"I suspected. Your dreams confirm it."
She grabbed my arm. Squeezed hard enough to hurt.
"They're coming for my children. I know it. I can feel it."
"They won't reach them. I killed Blood months ago, before you ever dreamed of rats. Cheese followed him to the grave." I covered her hand with mine. "New threats will come. But I'll stop those too."
"How can you be so certain?"
Because I've seen what happens if I fail. In another timeline. Another life.
"Because I refuse to let it happen."
ULF
That night, I reviewed my preparations.
My quarters—adjacent to Helaena's chambers, as Otto had arranged—contained everything I needed. Weighted training gear in the trunk. Knives hidden throughout. A small fortune in gold from my Flea Bottom businesses, untraceable.
And my journal.
I pulled it from its hiding spot beneath a loose floorboard. Leather-bound, locked with a mechanism only I understood.
Inside: notes on every prophecy Helaena had shared. Every vision fragment. Cross-referenced with my knowledge of the Dance's history.
Blood and Cheese: eliminated. Jaehaerys and Jaehaera: alive. First divergence successful.
Rook's Rest: outcome unchanged. Rhaenys dead. Aegon crippled. Sunfyre grounded.
Harrenhal: Daemon holds it. Timeline accelerating.
The war was unfolding roughly as I remembered, with variations where I'd intervened. Each change rippled outward, creating new possibilities.
And new dangers.
If Daemon learns his assassins failed, he'll send more. Different methods. Different targets.
I needed to stay ahead.
I pulled out my map of the Red Keep's passages—copied from the assassin's body, expanded through my own exploration. Every tunnel, every junction, every exit.
The ratcatchers knew these routes. Blood and Cheese knew them. Someone else will learn them.
I marked the approaches to the nursery. Three primary routes. Five secondary. Each would need guards I trusted, not Otto's men.
Tomorrow. Start placing my people tomorrow.
A knock at the door.
I slid the journal under my pillow. Stood.
"Enter."
Helaena stepped inside. Alone. Nightgown visible beneath a hastily-wrapped robe.
"I couldn't sleep."
"The dreams?"
"No. Worse." She closed the door behind her. "Just... nothing. Emptiness. Like the world stopped existing and I'm the only one left."
I crossed to her. Took her hands.
"You're not alone."
"I know. That's why I'm here."
We sat by the fire. She leaned against me, seeking warmth that had nothing to do with temperature.
"Aegon visited the children today," she said. "They wheeled him in. He couldn't walk to them—had to be carried. And he just... looked at them. Like they were strangers."
"He's in pain. The poppy dulls more than just suffering."
"He's never loved them. Even before." Her voice was flat. Accepting. "They're obligations. Political necessities. Not children."
"They're children to me."
She looked up. Something in her expression—hope and fear tangled together.
"Jaehaerys asked about you today. Asked when 'Mother's knight' would visit again."
"I'm not a knight."
"You're more than one. Knights follow oaths sworn to lords and kings. You follow something else."
"I follow you."
The words hung between us.
She kissed me. Soft. Brief.
"Stay with me tonight. Just... be here. Let me remember I'm not alone."
"Always."
We sat by the fire until dawn crept through the windows. No intimacy beyond her head on my shoulder, my arm around her waist. But something deeper. Two people finding shelter in each other while the world burned around them.
When the sun rose, she returned to her chambers. I watched her go.
Then I strapped on my weighted gear and began planning how to keep the people I loved alive.
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