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When her father told her over breakfast that her presence would be required at the small council that afternoon, Alicent dropped the butter-knife she’d been holding into her lap.
“Make sure you wear one of your new dresses,” he said, rising from the table, “and you must do something about your hands.”
Alicent left the table shortly afterwards, leaving the quail’s eggs on her plate untouched along with the roll of bread she’d just been buttering. Her stomach was a knot of thorns.
Why am I required at the small council? She asked herself. She had glimpsed the inside of the small council room many times, as she often accompanied Rhaenyra, who was required to be present as her father’s cupbearer. But the princess had always taken her leave from her in front of the doors, parting from her with a quick squeeze of her hand before darting inside.
On the occasions where she had asked Rhaenyra what they talked about in there for all those hours she had always given some variation of the same petulant answer: “Tedious stuff mostly,” or “They went on and on about taxes and petty arguments between bannermen from houses I’ve never even heard of,” or “My arms hurt from all the pouring.”
Yet Alicent thought her lucky to be her father’s cupbearer. The King wanted her by his side. He had wanted her to learn about politics and governance, even before he named her his heir. He cared for her and valued her intelligence and for good reason. Rhaenyra was the smartest person Alicent knew.
Oh, she loved to tease Alicent by pretending she hadn't studied the pages the Septa told them to learn by heart, but it was always a farce. She had started to wonder if Rhaenyra only did it because she enjoyed watching her get flustered... and if she herself only pretended to be annoyed to distract herself from the fact that Rhaenyra's mischievous smiles were so endearing she struggled to know what she would do with them otherwise.
Her own father rarely talked to her unless it was to demand something from her, to order her to do something in hushed tones that left no room for questions. He had certainly never taught her anything, never explained why he did anything he did. And Alicent knew he hadn’t suddenly had a change of heart that day. If she was required at the small council it was not because her father wished her to listen and learn, it was because she was to be discussed. But why?
The Hand’s daughter was hardly a person of great import to the realm. What arrangement of her affairs could be of interest to the small council? Nothing - except Alicent did know, even if she had perhaps been doing too good a job of pretending not to over the last few months. There was only one thing her presence at the small council could mean.
It had to do with King Viserys, she was sure. Her meetings with the King over the past half year had been peculiar… but they had been harmless, had they not? She wasn’t fool enough to be blind to her father’s plotting nature, but what exactly he hoped to accomplish by sending her to him, she had never been sure. He himself had the King's ear, why had he wanted Alicent to win the King’s trust as well?
Of course she had wondered if her father hoped King Viserys would take a fancy to her, grow fond of the girl who comforted him after his wife’s death. Yet it would have been highly irregular. Not only was she his daughter’s age, she was his daughter’s best friend. He had watched her grow up in the Red Keep alongside Rhaenyra, surely he would not wish to marry her, even if her father hoped he would.
When King Viserys had told her he was to marry Laena Velaryon she’d felt relieved. She felt guilty for thinking so, but it was true, she did not envy the little girl her fate. As kindly as the King was, she shuddered at the thought of having to bed him.
But if the King was to marry Laena Velaryon, why was Alicent required to attend the small council? It could be anything, she told herself, even as she struggled to think of a single reason other than the announcement of a betrothal. But surely she would have been given notice beforehand if she were to be betrothed to the King, would she not? Surely he would have asked her first, if only as a formality?
The council was to convene just after noon. She would barely have enough time to dress and do her hair the way her father liked. Yet… shouldn’t she seek Rhaenyra out first? Ask her if she had any idea why she was being summoned to the small council? Tell her about her meetings with her father?
But it was too late for any of that.
She was too embarrassed to face her dearest friend and tell her what she’d kept from her for too long. She hadn’t lied to her once, only kept silent, and it hadn’t felt like a crime at first, when she had still hoped it was a one-time thing, and then a two-time thing, but her father had sent her to the King in his chambers again and yet again, and after each visit she had felt guiltier and guiltier, and the guiltier she felt, the more impossible it became to speak of it to Rhaenyra. It was as if a cloud of shame hung over her head night and day, following her through the many halls of the Red Keep, giving her not a moment of respite.
I could have told her a thousand times over by now.
Even in her muted grief after her mother’s funeral Rhaenyra hadn’t failed to notice the state of Alicent’s fingernails, bloodier and rawer than ever after her meetings with King Viserys. She had insisted on sending the Grand Maester himself to see to her hands and stood looking over his shoulder the entire time as he applied a soothing paste to Alicent’s hands, and later when he had left them alone in her chambers she had held Alicent’s hands in her palms, turned them over, fingers fluttering over Alicent’s like small butterflies and asked, “Alicent… why do you do this to yourself?”
Her father had asked her the same question, holding her hands in an iron grip, and the words had felt like chastisement and reeked of disappointment. Rhaenyra’s hands had been soft and warm against her own, and Alicent had felt a strange fluttering in her stomach as she looked into her friend's impossibly violet eyes in the soft candlelight.
“I-“ I have been to see your father. In his chambers. Because my father asked it of me. I am afraid I know why. But I am helpless to stop it. Because I am not brave like you. And I hate myself for it.
She couldn’t say it. She had just hung her neck and closed her eyes before Rhaenyra tightened her grip on her hands and drew her into a hug.
“I am sorry,” she’d said later, finally untangling herself from the shorter girl and giving her a watery smile, “I should be the one comforting you.”
“You do,” Rhaenyra had said, squeezing her hand, “you always do.”
Yet she hadn’t told Rhaenyra that day in the privacy of her chambers, nor on any other day. It had taken so long for Rhaenyra to return to her old self after the death of her mother and her baby brother, though of course she would never be the same, just as Alicent had felt a part of herself had been lost to her forever after her own mother's death. Rhaenyra had not left her chambers for weeks after the funeral, and it had taken much coaxing and above all patience, before Alicent had been able to make her smile again.
At night Alicent whispered out confessions to herself, turning the words over and over in her mind, wanting to find the right ones to make Rhaenyra understand without hurting her in her grief-stricken state.
How her father had gripped her hands so tightly they hurt and looked at her with eyes glinting ice-cold in the dark. How many steps it took to get from her chambers to the kings. Five hundred and sixty seven of them, each one more shameful than the last. How most of the time the King was nice, how it seemed like he didn’t know exactly what to make of her, how he seemed to be just as confused as Alicent was about finding herself in his chambers. How they talked about history and grief, how it had seemed harmless at first, if uncomfortable. How lately, she had caught the king looking at her with a different expression, one that made her want to run screaming from his chambers.
How she couldn’t, or didn’t, run or scream, how she could only dig her nails so hard into her skin they drew blood. How she didn’t dream at night anymore, but woke up panting from nightmares where she lay on a blood-soaked bed, paralysed, as a monstrous shadow writhed over her and the laughter of her father echoed in the distance.
Alicent wanted to tell Rhaenyra, knew she needed to tell Rhaenyra, but she didn’t know where to begin, how to explain, even after months had passed and she had whispered a hundred speeches to herself in the dead of night.
My father… has asked me to offer the king my company. It sounded so wrong - and it was wrong - but how to make Rhaenyra understand why she had to do it, why she had to obey her father? Alicent knew if King Viserys had asked Rhaenyra to do something she didn’t want to, she would have told him as much and sulked off. She’d seen her do it before.
But her father wasn’t a king, and she wasn’t a princess. Rhaenyra had always struggled to understand that Alicent couldn’t simply act as she wished all the time. Alicent knew it wasn’t entirely right to blame her for this. How could she understand the demands Alicent’s father placed on her, when she had been raised as the King’s only child, been named the Realm’s Delight, her every want and wish handed to her on a golden platter?
Her father adored her. Alicent had never seen him refuse her in anything. The Queen had been generous with her affection and cherished her only daughter above all else when she had lived. Her uncle Daemon doted on her, brought her lavish gifts from across the Narrow Sea, brightly-dyed fabrics and exquisite jewellery, foreign delicacies Rhaenyra insisted Alicent try as well, old books which Rhaenyra didn’t read and always ended up giving to her instead.
And now Rhaenyra was the Heir to the Iron Throne, the Princess of Dragonstone. It was not only her blood relatives that loved and honoured her. A hundred lords had come to King’s Landing for her coronation and sworn solemnly to defend her rights.
Against all that… Alicent was no one, and she had nothing.
Her mother had been dead a year now and ever since she had been taken from them, her father had lost what warmth had remained in him. Alicent could still recall how she had loved to sit on his lap when she had been a little girl, before they’d come to King’s Landing, when they had lived in the Hightower in Oldtown. The halls there had been large and airy, and her father’s eyes had sparkled as he stroked her hair gently and kissed the top of her head… or was she only telling herself tales, pacifying herself with false memories?
It was hard to believe that her father could have been so gentle with her once, when he now looked at her like a man contemplating a piece on the cyvasse board. But what could she do but let herself be moved? Who could she turn to if not her father? Her Uncle Hobert was made of the same cloth as him, her brothers had never taken the smallest bit of interest in her, and her mother was dead.
I have no one.
Except even as she thought it she knew it was not true, for she had Rhaenyra. Her best friend, her almost-sister, except not quite, because Alicent was sure sisterhood was something entirely different than what had blossomed between them over the years.
Rhaenyra’s silky blond hair glowed pale-white in the sun, she smelled of dragon even after her maids doused her with perfumes, and only the Gods knew how Alicent had grown fond of that smell, but she had, because she had grown fond of Rhaenyra entirely. So much so that lately she felt as if her heart were about to fly out of her ribcage when Rhaenyra kissed her on the cheek, when she took her hand in the sept, when she lay with her head in Alicent’s lap in the godswood.
Yet what good was fondness for a friend weighed against duty to a father?
Good enough, if only I were braver, she thought, sitting down in front of a small mirror to do arrange hair. She could have called a maid, but she could not bear to face anyone in her present state.
Though she wasn’t sure it was a matter of bravery after all. Her father had pulled her in so close she felt his rough beard scratch cheek and whispered in her ear before he sent her to the King in his chambers for the second time. “Do not mention these visits to the princess. You would not want her to worry about her father as well, when her own grief is so fresh, do you?”
“No,” Alicent had answered, swallowing a thousand things she could never say to him, “of course not.”
Would she have been brave to disobey him, or just stupid? She was no Targaryen, no princess. She had no dragon to protect her, no royal name to shield her. She was entirely at her father’s mercy.
So she made sure to do her hair exactly as it had been the last time he complimented it. She put on the blue dress he’d especially picked out for her to wear on a recent visit to the King. After she had finished making herself presentable, she looked into the mirror and contemplated her reflection. Perhaps it had all been a giant misunderstanding. She was a girl still, and not particularly remarkable, even if her father called her the most comely girl at court. She knew that was only one of his crude attempts at fatherly affection. She looked at her round face and simple brown hair, prodded the pimple just below her chin, and felt sure that no one could wish to marry her, let alone the King of all Westeros.
Later, as the clocks chimed noon and the shadows grew short in the Red Keep’s courtyards, Alicent walked to the small council room. Her mind was almost eerily silent as she entered to find the Lords already seated at their places by the big table and Rhaenyra in a pale yellow dress standing by a side table with a jug of wine on it. No chair had been placed for her, nor for Rhaenyra. The King stood with his back to them all, looking out of the window.
She tried to catch Rhaenyra’s gaze, but the other girl would not look at her. Alicent moved to stand by her father’s side, feeling dizzyingly distant from her body. It was as if she was not made of flesh and blood, a creature of this sun-dappled world, but a phantom, a half-forgotten memory.
“Good morrow, my lords,” King Viserys said, turning from the window. “I have decided to take a new wife.” He exchanged a long glance with Rhaenyra. Alicent watched her friend smile at him and nod encouragingly.
Oh, she thought, he has Rhaenyra’s blessing. So he does not wish to marry me after all.
Relief flooded her body for a second, pure and refreshing as a drink from a mountain spring is to a thirsty traveller, before she realised King Viserys was still speaking… “I intend to marry the lady Alicent Hightower before spring’s end."
Her breath caught. She pressed a nail so hard into her skin, a droplet of blood trickled out. How had she been so stupid? So naive? Had she truly not known what was to happen, or wished so fervently not to that she had trapped herself within a labyrinth in her own mind?
Hope. She reminded herself. I have hope. She had clutched it close to her chest all these months, her fingers curled over it, kept it like a secret, whispered it again and again like a prayer.
One word falling from her lips in the dead of night, soft as the silk sheets tangled between her legs, one word uttered in the sept, lips barely moving, dissolving like smoke in the air, one word thought and not said in the weirwood at dusk, her head in Rhaenyra’s lap, Rhaenyra’s fingers in her hair, one word thrumming beneath her skin like a second heartbeat, as she found herself in the kings chambers again and again, picking her fingers bloody, wanting more than anything to disappear.
Her hope, her secret, her prayer, Rhaenyra.
Rhaenyra would have helped her, Alicent knew, if she had only managed to tell her. Now it was late, and it seemed she too had been fooled by her father. But not too late, Alicent told herself. Rhaenyra would know what to do even now, and better yet, she would be brave enough to do it.
Rhaenyra was the princess, her father’s heir, she would sit the Iron Throne one day and everyone would bow before her. Of course — everyone already bowed before her. Not just because she was the princess, but because she was Rhaenyra, because she was as willful as a winter storm, and just as beautiful, because she had a way with people, a way of making them give her what she wanted, always. Alicent had watched her win over gruff knights as easily as she had elegant ladies, stood by as she charmed peasants and princes, marvelled at the way even The King of the Andals, the Rhoynar, and the First Men seemed small and helpless before his daughter.
She will be my knight in shining armour. She’s always been so much braver than me. She will put a stop to it, she thought even as Lord Velaryon stood up and started speaking in harsh tones.
Alicent did not hear a single word he said. Eyes closed, she waited for Rhaenyra to speak, to ask her father how he could do this, to tell him Alicent is mine, not yours, and you cannot have her. Yet there was only silence.
She heard the doors open. Lord Velaryon must have left. Alicent opened her eyes. She was staring at the ground. With all her strength she lifted her gaze and looked across the table at Rhaenyra.
Nothing could have prepared her for the look on her friend's face. She looked hurt, yes, and angry, but she wasn’t looking at the king, she wasn’t angry with the king, she was looking at her, she was angry with her.
Rhaenyra’s lips shook. And were there tears in her eyes? But even as the raw emotion in her friend’s face tore through Alicent like a sharp blade, she felt a cold chill run up her spine.
Rhaenyra looked wounded, and a wounded dragon is a dangerous creature, Alicent knew.
No, Alicent thought. No, no, no. Panic rose up in her throat, constricting like Lyseni poison. I didn’t do this. They did this.
“Rhaenyra,” the King said.
Say something, Alicent thought. She will say something now.
But still Rhaenyra was silent. She did not look at him. Instead the Targaryen princess looked at her for another second, her gaze so vacant it scared Alicent, like she wasn’t actually looking at her but looking through her, before turning on her heels.
No. No. Rhaenyra. Stay. Say something.
Alicent watched her stride through the doors out of the corner of her eye, finding herself without the strength to even turn her head. She wanted to scream. She wanted to run after Rhaenyra. She wanted to grab her by the back of her yellow dress and turn her around to face her. She wanted to look into her eyes and see the fire in them quenched. She wanted-
You. You. You. I only ever wanted you.
Alicent stood next to her father, swaying slightly. Mute. Paralyzed. Something in her did not let her body move, did not let her run after Rhaenyra. She was howling a silent howl, willing her legs into action, but an invisible noose twisted around her neck. Alicent, it whispered, in her father’s cool voice, be a good girl. Or else.
She watched the doors swing shut, slow like honey, heavy as death.