The Queen's Ballroom was a cathedral of Targaryen shadow and flame. High-vaulted ceilings of obsidian-black stone arched overhead like the ribcage of a gargoyle, supported by pillars that seemed to grow from the polished floor. Crimson and black silks draped the long, narrow windows, swaying like funeral banners in the draft. Along the walls, the Great Triumvirate : Balerion, Vhagar, and Meraxes stared down from ancient tapestries, their woven eyes catching the flickering gold of a hundred beeswax candles.
At the far end of the hall, upon a raised dais of weirwood and stone, Queen Alysanne sat. She was not on a throne, yet the gravity she exerted pulled the air toward her. Beside her stood Alyssa, a cord of high-strung tension, her hand resting habitually on the pommel of her dagger. Lady Jocelyn stood in the periphery, her dark Baratheon eyes sharp and perceptive, alongside a playful Gael.
Gael, ever the "Winter Child," giggled as she darted across the liquid-fire reflection of the floor, tugging at Daemon's small tunic. Daemon followed, his laughter light, stumbling with the calculated clumsiness of a two-year-old. To Gael, it was a game. To the watching Alysanne, it was a performance.
Even in play, Daemon's movements were too deliberate. He never tripped over the hem of his robe unless he chose to. His eyes never lost their spatial awareness. He was a predator draped in the silk of a babe, indulging a little aunt's whim.
The heavy oak doors, reinforced with bands of Valyrian steel, groaned open.
"His Grace, the King! Prince Aemon! Prince Baelon!"
The three men entered with the casual confidence of those who owned the world. Jaehaerys I walked at the center, his silver-gold beard neatly trimmed, his violet eyes scanning the room with the practiced ease of a Lawgiver. To his left, Aemon and Baelon were mid-conversation, their booming laughter echoing off the vaulted ceiling.
The mirth died the moment they stepped into the aura of the dais. Jaehaerys halted, his gaze locking with Alysanne's. He saw the line of her jaw and the pallor of Alyssa's skin. The greeting was brief,a bow to their mother, a sharp nod between King and Queen. The atmosphere in the ballroom curdled from warmth to crystalline ice.
"Leave us," Alysanne commanded.
The Maesters lingered for a heartbeat, their chains clinking in protest. The Kingsguard glanced toward Jaehaerys, waiting for a countermand. The King looked at his wife, saw the flickering desperation in her eyes, and gave a sharp, downward flick of his wrist.
The hall emptied. The heavy doors thudded shut, the iron bolts sliding home with a finality that felt like a gavel.
Silence fell, broken only by the soft, innocent pitter-patter of Gael and Daemon's feet. Jaehaerys initially assumed this was a debriefing on Daella's miraculous recovery in the Vale,a matter of state and family. But as Alysanne and Alyssa stepped forward to recount the night of the "White Light," the King's expression shifted from concern to profound, unsettling gravity.
They spoke of the deathbed. The stench of rot. The light that had bleached the world. And the child who had stood at the center of it all.
As the story concluded, the silence became a vacuum. All eyes the King's, the Princes', the Lady's drifted to the small boy standing beside Gael. Daemon stopped playing. He stood straight, his violet eyes unblinking, watching the most powerful men in the world as if they were pupils in his classroom.
"Daemon… come here," Alyssa called softly.
The boy obeyed. He walked with a rhythmic, silent grace across the liquid-fire floor. He reached the base of the dais and bowed low. "Your Grace," he said, his voice terrifyingly clear.
Jaehaerys leaned forward, his hands gripping the arms of his chair. "Show me," the King commanded.
Daemon looked to his mother and grandmother. They offered a subtle, trembling nod.
Daemon raised his right hand. He didn't recite a mantra; he simply willed. With a soft hiss, a brilliant orange flame bloomed in his palm. It did not flicker in the draft. It was a steady, high-density orb of solar heat.
With a flick of his fingers, the flame stretched, elongating into a miniature arrow of fire that whistled through the air before circling back. Then, he shattered the arrow into three small birds of flame. They fluttered around his hand, their wings shedding sparks that vanished before they hit the floor.
He closed his fist. The fire vanished instantly, leaving no smoke, no soot, and no scent but the sharp tang of ozone.
The reactions were a symphony of shock. Aemon was analytical, his mind trying to find the trick. Baelon stepped forward, his eyes wide with a mix of disbelief and warrior's excitement. Alyssa's pride was shadowed by the fear of what this would mean for her son's safety.
Jaehaerys remained a statue. But his eyes,they had sharpened into diamonds.
"That is not all," Daemon murmured.
He opened his left palm. This time, there was no heat. The air in the ballroom began to twist. A visible distortion, like a heat haze but cold and violent, formed above his skin.
A faint wind began to spiral. It grew in a heartbeat, becoming a localized gale that whipped Daemon's silver hair and rattled the silks on the windows. The braziers and candles across the vast hall didn't just flicker,they were snuffed out simultaneously by an invisible pressure.
The ballroom plunged into dim, grey twilight.
This broke the composure of the room. Baelon let out a choked, "By the gods…"
Aemon was silent, the realization dawning that they were looking at something that defied the known limits of their blood. Lady Jocelyn stepped back instinctively, her hand to her throat.
This was not just a trick of the blood. This was the manipulation of the world's fabric.
Daemon lowered his hand. The wind ceased as abruptly as it had begun. The silence returned, heavier than before.
"That is all, Your Grace," Daemon said simply.
Jaehaerys stood. He didn't move with the caution of a grandfather; he moved with the hunger of a conqueror. He descended the dais in three long strides, reached down, and hoisted Daemon into his arms.
Then, the Old King did something no one expected. He laughed.
It was a deep, powerful, and victorious roar that echoed through the obsidian arches. It was the laugh of a man who had just realized his house was no longer merely royal,it was divine.
"A Valyrian Pyromancer…" Jaehaerys proclaimed, holding the boy toward his sons. "And more! A Valyrian Aeromancer!"
He turned back to the room, his face alight with a terrifying ambition. "Do you understand what stands before you? These gifts are ancient. They were rare even in the height of the Freehold! Not seen in ten generations of our blood!"
He looked at Daemon, his fingers digging slightly into the boy's tunics. "The magic of the Fourteen Flames… the mastery of the sky… it has returned to our blood. Through him."
The room shifted. The tension of the "miracle" had been replaced by a staggering sense of destiny. But beneath the awe of the Princes and the pride of the King, the women Alysanne and Alyssa watched silently. They saw the look in Jaehaerys's eyes. They saw the ambition.
Daemon, held aloft in the King's arms, looked back at them. He did not smile. He did not celebrate. He simply watched, his violet eyes reflecting the dying embers of the braziers, already calculating the next floor of the Tower.
The laughter of King Jaehaerys did not just fade; it transformed into a heavy, thoughtful silence that seemed to pull the warmth from the braziers. He set Daemon down, but he did not move away. Instead, he kept a firm, protective hand on the boy's shoulder, his eyes scanning the shadowed corners of the ballroom as if searching for eavesdroppers that weren't there.
Jaehaerys looked at his sons, Aemon and Baelon, his expression hardening from grandfatherly pride into the iron mask of a Protector.
"A remarkable display," the King murmured. He stepped closer to Daemon, his shadow looming large against the dragon tapestries. "The power of the Fourteen Flames. The breath of the sky itself." He paused, his gaze dropping to the boy's small, unburnt hands. "Now tell me, little dragon... where did you learn it?"
Inside Daemon's mind, the Magic Tower remained a silent obsidian monolith. No system prompts appeared to guide his tongue. He was alone with the weight of the King's scrutiny.
If I speak of the Tower, I am a freak to be studied, Daemon calculated. If I speak of the future, I am a threat to be managed. I must give them a truth wrapped in the myth of our blood.
He looked up, his violet eyes wide and unnervingly steady. "I... I do not know if it is from the dream, Your Grace."
Baelon Targaryen stepped forward, not with the aggression of a warrior, but with the frantic concern of a father. He knelt beside Daemon, his hand resting on the boy's other shoulder, flanking him with the King.
"Magic does not appear from nothing, son," Baelon said, his voice softer than the King's but laced with an urgent edge. " If someone has been whispering in your ear, you must tell us. Not for punishment but so we can protect you from them."
Jaehaerys nodded, his eyes never leaving Daemon's. "Baelon is right. There are those who would use a spark like yours to set the world on fire for their own gain. "
Daemon let the silence stretch, watching the way the candlelight danced in his father's worried eyes. He felt the genuine terror they held for his safety—a love that was as suffocating as it was shielding.
"It... it feels like remembering," Daemon whispered, his voice small but certain.
The reaction was a physical shift in the room. Aemon's breath hitched, a look of scholarly hunger crossing his face. But Baelon's grip on Daemon's arms tightened not in a threat, but as if he were trying to anchor him to the earth.
"Memory?" Jaehaerys breathed. "Memory of what? You are two years of age. You have no past."
"Not my memories," Daemon replied, leaning into the only lie that could protect both his secret and their hearts. "The dreams are of Old valyria, Your grace. I see the gold towers falling. I see the way the ancestors moved the clouds before the fire took them. When I reach for the wind... the dream just wakes up. It's like the blood is screaming, and I'm just... answering."
"Then it is a legacy," Baelon said firmly, standing up and placing himself squarely between Daemon and the rest of the room, his hand resting on the hilt of Blackfyre. "It is the blood of the Freehold manifesting in its purest, most dangerous form. We aren't looking for a conspirator, Father. We are looking at a miracle that the world will try to kill."
Jaehaerys looked at Baelon, then at the boy. "If the High Septon hears of this, he will call it an abomination. If the Citadel hears of it, they will demand the boy be brought to Oldtown for 'observation.' They would put our blood in a cage to see how it burns."
"They will do no such thing," Baelon growled, his voice a low thunder. "I will burn the Hightower to ash and salt the earth of the Reach before I let a single grey-rat touch him. He is a Prince of the House of the Dragon. If the gods have given him the fire of our ancestors, then it is our duty to hide that fire until he is strong enough to let it consume his enemies."
Jaehaerys raised a hand, silencing Baelon's heat. He was no longer thinking as a grandfather, but as the man who held the realm together.
"The world is not ready for a sorcerer prince," Jaehaerys said coldly. "But the House of the Dragon is. If we are to keep this a secret, I must know one thing." He looked back at Daemon. "Can you control it? Or does the fire control you? If you feel it slipping, if the dreams become too loud... you must tell us."
Daemon didn't hesitate. He looked past the King, toward the snuffed-out torches he had extinguished with the wind.
"Yes, Your Grace. I can control it.
The King nodded slowly, a look of grim resolve settling over his features. He didn't look reassured, but he looked decided.
"Then from this day forward, your education is mine," Jaehaerys declared. "Baelon, see to it no one speaks of this. If a single word leaves this room, I will have every tongue in the hallway pulled out. Daemon is our secret. He is the future we did not expect."
Baelon gave a sharp, loyal nod, his hand lingering on Daemon's silver hair with a fierce, protective warmth. The miracle was over, and the secret had been sealed.
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AN-
Daemon is approximately two years old and is also a transmigrator, that is why he can speak fluently.