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Aerion can taste his own blood. Copper and smoke, it lingers on his tongue long after the first strike, and the second and third. He has a loose tooth, one at the back, and his tongue manages to find it every few minutes, fresh blood filling his mouth.
He swallows it down with ale, eyes following the man who attacked him as he kneels prostrate before him.
“I demand a trial by combat,” the giant says. His voice trembles a little. The clear vulnerability turns Aerion’s plan even sweeter.
“As is your right,” his uncle murmurs. They planned this. Aerion has no proof, but he knows. He knows things, sometimes. Not the way Daeron does, thank the gods, but sometimes, and some things. It is why he knows he should do this, despite the clear risks.
“And I demand the Maiden’s trial,” Aerion says, and allows the silence to reign.
“The Maiden’s…” his father mutters beside him, confused. Aerion does not hold it against him. It is an obscure practice, lost to time. Aerion knows only because of his sweetest aunt.
His uncle is not as ignorant.
“Aerion,” Baelor says quietly, his stoicism replaced by anger. “That you would suggest such a trial is—”
“Is it not my right?” Aerion interrupts, tilting his head to stare at his uncle. “It is still a trial by combat.”
“The worst kind.”
Aerion merely shrugs.
“What is it?” Maekar demands. “Aerion, explain yourself.”
“It is a trial by combat,” Aerion repeats, the picture of innocence. “With an extra caveat.”
“With a knight’s life is on the line,” Baelor grits out, “his life, beyond that of just his mortality. His very being is at stake, his honour, his freedom.”
“The victor claims him,” Aerion finishes, staring down the giant hedge knight until he sweats. “Publicly. Carnally. He will own him, in the eyes of gods and men, for the length of one season. He is beholden to his owner, must do whatever he desires. Lick his boots clean, muck his stables, run his errands… Kneel for his c—”
“Aerion!” his father barks, and Aerion grins.
The hedge knight balks. “M’lord, you cannot want me for that.”
“The Maiden’s trial, or you may choose a trial of seven instead,” Aerion says blithely. “As I do not believe you could gather even one knight to stand by your side, let alone six, I know which one I would choose if I were in your place.”
The knight’s gaze darts from Aerion to Baelor and back again, vibrant blue eyes wide and fearful like a cornered animal.
Aerion longs to see the giant cower before him in the seclusion of own chambers at Summerhall, knees aching after hours on stone floors. Mouth open and ready to take, and after Aerion will strike him until the brute’s own mouth is filled with his blood and Aerion’s seed.
There must be something in his uncle’s expression which sways the knight.
“The… Maiden’s trial, m’lord,” he says, unsure and stilted, like he isn’t used to speaking in civilised company. “I choose that one.”
Satisfaction curls deep in Aerion’s belly, even as he feels the judging gaze of his father on him. He does not care. He is getting exactly what he wants.
“Ser Duncan,” he hears his uncle say before he leads him from the room. “If you win, you must follow through. Do you understand?”
The idiot does not. “But—”
“If you do not, your life will be forfeit. There is no escaping this. You must—” Baelor exhales heavily. “You must claim Aerion. After, you may do as you wish with him, but this is the only way to earn your freedom.”
He says it as if it is a sure thing. As though Aerion has no hope, despite his dragon blood. No, Aerion is better. Baelor is blood of the dragon, Valarr and Matarys, too. As are Daeron and Aemon and Egg, but Aerion is a dragon.
He cannot lose.
“I understand,” the hedge knight replies. He does not sound pleased. He will be less pleased once Aerion is done with him.
His father gives him a dressing down afterwards, but it is mitigated by Daeron finally waking from his drunken stupor.
“No, not that knight,” his stupid brother groans, squinting even in the darkened solar. “The one who took Egg was… larger, I suppose. Meaner.”
“Larger than a man who is already the size of a tree,” Maekar spits incredulously. “Meaner than a man who beat your brother bloody? Do not lie to me, Daeron.”
Aerion tongues the loose tooth again. If he continues, it may fall out. He might have it set into a collar and fasten it around the knight’s neck when he is done with him.
“It is true.” Daeron shrugs, but does not look any of them in the eye. He has always been squirrelly.
“He doesn’t know what he saw!” Egg exclaims, his voice grating on Aerion’s ears. He hasn’t quite been able to shake his headache. “I told Uncle Baelor but he didn’t listen! I wasn’t taken by anyone. Daeron was drunk and I was the one who found Ser Duncan. He looked after me, and now Aerion is going to kill him!”
Aerion lets out a sharp laugh. “Oh, I’m not going to kill him, little brother, I am going to—”
“It does not matter what happened before,” Maekar snaps. His face is ashen, body hunched over the table. “The knight struck Aerion—three times—and that cannot be allowed without trial.”
“A trial is oft fairer,” Daeron mutters, “and has less fucking.”
“What?” Egg asks, brow furrowed as he glances between Daeron and Maekar before settling on Aerion’s grinning face. “What does that mean?”
“It means you will not be present for the trial, Aegon,” is Maekar’s gruff, embarrassed reply.
Aerion almost regrets it.
When dawn comes, so do the crowds. Word has somehow escaped the castle in the mouth of a servant, and the people are happy to abandon their work to see the spectacle. A hedge knight against a prince of the realm. One does not see such a battle often, let alone a Maiden’s trial.
Aerion doubts they even know what they are in for, or if public opinion of House Targaryen will shift after they see him at his worst.
Not that it matters to the blood of the dragon.
“He is a large man,” Ser Roland says as Aerion’s squire sharpens his sword until it can cleave a man in two.
Across the field, a mousy boy tends to the hedge knight. He has not yet even glanced in Aerion’s direction. Anger curdles in his belly. He will be looking soon enough.
“You’re quicker,” Ser Donnel adds. “Use it to your advantage. He will tire fast, too.”
“I would bet good coin he has scarcely been a knight long,” Ser Roland continues. “Practically a boy still.”
A boy Aerion will fuck. He wonders if they realise this.
“His inexperience will be his downfall,” Donnel agrees. “An easy win, my prince.”
“An easy win?” Aerion repeats. He shifts from side to side, testing the weight of his mail. It sits light, like a second skin. More comfortable than his velvet doublets, and far better than his heavy armour.
The Maiden’s trial does not call for armour. The logistics, he explained to his uncle with not a small amount of pleasure, means they must be free to move—and to remove clothing at will. Baelor had stared at him with unreserved disgust until Maekar pulled Aerion away.
The Kingsguards share a wary glance. “Yes,” Roland says. “The trial is nothing for you. It should be done before breakfast.”
“Because he is inexperienced,” Aerion continues, slow and measured, “and young, and over-large.”
Ser Donnel seems to have realised they have misstepped. “Yes, my prince,” he says, but uneasily.
“Is he stupid, too? Clumsy? Perhaps he will even let me win because he is lazy and wishes it to be over fast,” Aerion sneers. “Anything else, sers?”
“Our apologies, Prince Aerion,” Roland mumbles, inclining his head. “We only meant to help.”
“A dragon does not need help,” Aerion snaps. His squire yelps when he snatches his sword, but he does not stay to see the boy’s blood flow. The scent of copper only heightens his need to spill more. The hedge knight’s, ideally. He wonders if it is as red as his. “Ready my horse, boy!”
Aerion is a skilled swordsman. He has trained with the master-at-arms in the Red Keep since he was old enough to hold a practice sword, and he has tended to his craft ever since. Great Targaryens have always wielded Valyrian steel. Aerion has coveted Dark Sister on his uncle’s hip for as long as he can remember, and even now dreams of storming Essos and stealing Blackfyre back from the pretenders.
He makes do with a longsword forged by the finest armorer in King’s Landing. It is not Valyrian steel, but this hedge knight’s own sword looks no better than a rusted scrap of metal.
The incident with the puppeteer, it was an anomaly. Aerion was not paying attention when the giant stormed in and took him by surprise. It was not very chivalrous to attack an unarmed man. Had Aerion been prepared, they would not be in this position at all. The knight would already be buried in a mummer’s grave.
He cannot find it in himself to regret it, however. Even as copper remains on his tongue, even as the giant knight readies himself at the other end of the field, Aerion does not regret it. His gut tells him not to.
He is looking forward to his victory, and the spoils which will follow.
His father is not by his side when Aerion mounts his horse, but he is in the stands with Baelor and Valarr and half of House Ashford. They stare at him with piercing eyes Aerion has nearly two decades ignoring. It does not bother Aerion, his father’s absence. It doesn’t.
His squire is the one who sends him off, some Dayne cousin he cannot remember the name of. It does not matter. Not when the crowds are screaming and his father is watching and Ser Duncan the Tall sits astride his warhorse across the muddy field.
Aerion puts it out of his mind, readies his weapon, and pushes forward.
There are no words exchanged, no sound but forceful grunts as they exchange blows. The hedge knight is strong, and the first strike against the board of Aerion’s sword has his arms trembling from the force. He doesn’t let go of the hilt, even though he wants to. There is more on the line than mere victory.
Time seems to flow both fast and slow, like spark and smoke. Aerion’s world narrows to the knight in front of him, teeth bared, sword nimble. They dance together, Ashford’s peasants rioting behind the posts. The Kingsguard had the right of it; Aerion is faster, and it is this speed which allows him to draw first blood.
The hedge knight’s tree trunk of a thigh bleeds sluggishly, the cut nothing more than a nick. The scent fills Aerion’s nose and warms his blood, and this distraction is enough for the knight’s fist to crack across his face.
Again, he thinks, ears ringing as he attempts to regain his balance atop his horse. His mouth fills with blood, and then the knight strikes again; on the other cheek.
Aerion has yet to return to his senses when he sees the hilt of the knight’s sword coming at him swiftly for his temple—far more swiftly than he expected from a man his size, Kingsguard be damned—and then the world shifts. He meets the ground with a painful grunt, breath pushed from his lungs, head throbbing from the vicious strike. There is the sound of boots against the dirt, then his useless horse whinnies and flees. His ears continue to ring, the peasants scream even louder—he thinks he can hear Egg’s shrill screech in the mix—and then there is a hand around his throat.
It is so tight he will surely be bruised come morning, although Aerion thinks it will be the least of his pains.
He has lost the trial. His body is forfeit.
When his hearing finally returns—slowly, sluggishly, his head throbbing—he finds his father protesting somewhere in the distance.
“No! No, this is not—Brother, Baelor, please, you must—”
“Prince Aerion understood the risks,” is Baelor’s cold response. Aerion stifles a pained laugh, because of course his uncle is willing to allow his public humiliation, and of course his father is concerned only when the honour of their House is at stake.
“Oil, at least,” Maekar begs. It is unusual to hear his normally stoic father debase himself so terribly. “Someone give him oil. Look at the beast! He will—”
“He should get nothing!” comes from the other side, high-pitched and cruel. It is Egg. He must have slipped his guards again. “He should suffer the way he deserves!”
“Get the boy out of here!” the giant bellows, the first sound he has made, but does not give up his grip on Aerion’s throat. “Else I’ll—I will snap the prince’s neck!”
Aerion does laugh at that, reedy and nonsensical. As if he would be allowed to leave Ashford if he did so, trial be damned.
There is a commotion somewhere Aerion cannot see, the shriek of an angry little prince, and the roar of a crowd. He sees nothing but the hedge knight’s meaty left hand braced on the muddy ground.
“He would benefit from seeing his beloved ser fuck his most hated brother in the mud,” Aerion croaks. He feels the man stiffen behind him. “He’s too—ngh.”
The knight loosens his grip on Aerion’s throat, but does not remove it. Not entirely. His head swims from lack of air, and his thoughts are briefly silent.
“The Maiden’s trial has been decided,” his uncle declares. Through the haze, Aerion cannot decipher his tone. Is he pleased with the spectacle which is about to unfold? “Continue, Ser Duncan.”
Aerion’s father protests again, but it is drowned out by the roar of the crowd. He has not made many friends here in Ashford, and the masses are always keen to watch a prince be humiliated by one of their own. Roaches, the lot of them, and the brute holding Aerion tight is the worst of them.
“M’lord,” he mutters, voice strangled. Aerion cannot tell if he is speaking to him or to his uncle, but it matters not. “Is there really… Is there no other way?”
“You could fuck my mouth,” Aerion slurs, blood dripping from his lips. He tongues his loose tooth—even looser now—and thinks that a rough throat-fuck might finally push it free. “Wouldn’t be as exciting to watch, however.”
“Do you want that?”
Aerion shrugs. The movement hurts, but it is a good hurt. It aches sweetly.
“Do not leave it to me,” the hedge knight begs. “Please, m’lord, tell me.”
What does he want? He would like to fuck Ser Duncan, but he would also like to take the giant’s mouth until the knight’s voice is hoarse and he is begging for air.
Aerion would also like, in hindsight, to not be in this muddy field but instead in his own featherbed laid out on Dornish silk sheets. He thinks the hedge knight has probably never felt such soft fabric, and would touch the bedding as often as Aerion’s skin. He might even compare the two, if he were a mummer. His large, rough hands would grip and bruise, but never on purpose. He is not cruel.
It was cruel of Aerion to put him in his position in the first place, even if he is the one about to be turned out. For this knight, the kinder option was the trial of seven, and then death.
Aerion is so fucking hard.
“Fuck me properly,” Aerion grits out his order between clenched teeth. “Fuck me like the honourable, true knight you are, Ser Duncan.”
There is a strangled noise behind him, and then Aerion is being pushed face-first onto the ground. The crowd roars and his ears ring, but more than anything he feels his cock throbbing, stuck in his tight breeches, trapped by chain mail.
Something pins him down in the middle of his back, and when Aerion tries to instinctually wiggle free, the pressure increases. He wrenches Aerion’s arms behind his back the more he struggles, and that is when he realises. The brute has pinned him down with his knee like the insects on display in Daeron’s chambers.
“Stop your struggling,” the knight hisses, grip tight around Aerion’s wrists. It will bruise, and he will remember this long after it is over. “Do not make this harder than it has to be. Please.”
Aerion laughs, high and strangled and delirious. He thinks he can hear his father again, but attempts to tune him out. It is easy with the sound of his pulse thundering in his ears.
“My apologies,” he grunts, then wiggles again. “It is hard to submit to such—ngh—depravity from a man as large as yourself.”
The knee lifts from his back and his wrists are released immediately, as though Aerion has only just reminded him of his situation.
He expects to be left to struggle to his feet in the mud, but is instead flipped onto his back, a giant, meaty claw around his neck.
The air leaves his lungs in a pained rush, and Aerion is gifted his first look at the hedge knight in the wake of his win.
He does look the victor. The knight is pained, bloodied and dirty. He does embody the knight he is, but a poor, sad man about to be forced to do a terrible thing.
“Will you fuck me raw?” Aerion asks with a grimace, because he cannot help himself. “Will you maim me? I have taken large men, ser, but never as large as you.”
“No!” the knight exclaims, horrified. He has been the entire time, not nearly as excited as Aerion had been. “No, of course not, I don’t want to injure you.”
Aerion sneers. Oh, what a hellish situation to be in for the honourable knight.
“You have already injured me,” Aerion spits. His face is throbbing, his nose leaking blood, and his stomach clenches in anticipation. “What is one more hurt?”
He watches the knight’s throat work, the way his eyes dart around his face, taking in the damage he has already caused and the damage he will inflict on the next few minutes.
“Get me wet,” the hedge knight demands. His giant hand grips firm in Aerion’s short hair as he crawls up the length of his body. Once his knees are on either side of Aerion’s head, he pushes his face against his clothed cock. “It’ll be, fuck,” he breathes as Aerion starts to mindlessly mouth the rough-spun fabric. “It’ll be easier if you do.”
It would, Aerion thinks as he pulls the knight’s equally giant cock free from its confines. Not easy, but easier. Spit is better than nothing.
The brute is not hard. He has barely even begun to thicken, cock heavy on his tongue as Aerion takes him into his mouth. The man is so just, it will take more than bloodlust to arouse him. It adds to Aerion’s humiliation, having to ready the cock which will violate him.
The fact should not make him harder, but it does. Fuck. He is sick.
It is a nice cock, he decides, focusing on breathing through his mouth as the soft phallus fills his senses. He does not thrust his large, but well-formed cock, but instead allows it to sit on Aerion’s tongue, clean and absent disease, as far as he can tell.
He would like to think his uncle would have considered that before allowing this over the trial of seven, but Baelor has always held hidden cruelties only Aerion can seem to see.
The knight grips his hair tighter and thrusts ever so slightly. The cock slips further into his mouth, past the ring of his throat, and back again. Gentle, against all odds. Careful.
Aerion moans when he pushes even further, the knight feeding his cock into Aerion’s mouth, dragging out, then back in again. He cannot breath through his nose, blooded and perhaps broken as it is, and it means he cannot breath when the knight plugs his throat up after he begins to thicken.
Every thrust becomes a little firmer, a bit harder, until the brute of a knight is hard as steel, fucking his throat until Aerion is crying pained, desperate tears.
His legs scramble against the mud, hands grasping the knight’s thighs, his hips, his waist to no avail. He cannot escape, from the pressure on his chest from the brute’s weight to the grip on his hair, Aerion is helpless, pinned, breathless, and at his mercy.
It seems to go on for hours, although he knows it does not. He wonders if the knight will come down his throat rather than use his ass, if that will be good enough for the gods to end this trial, but he does not.
One second his sight is going dark and spotty as he struggles for breath, and the next he is gulping lungfuls of air after the cock is wrenched free.
Before he can catch his breath, Aerion is flipped again on to his hands and knees, this time held aloft by the hedge knight’s hand. There will be no escaping, he is saying without words. He will take this without complaint, the way he has decided.
The brute tugs his breeches down below his backside, hooked on the underside of his cheeks.
Aerion’s cock throbs. He is both pleased and annoyed it remains in its confines, and will likely not see the light of day this morning.
Good, he tells himself with vehemence. He is not to be seen by the filthy masses. He will allow this only because he must, and not because he desires it.
The brute spits, a loud, disgusting sound, then smears the wet against Aerion’s hole. Then, he does it again, and again, until his thumb slips in with minimal pushing. His thumb is large, but nothing Aerion has not had inside of him before. He has larger wooden phalluses, but this is just one finger, and Aerion knows there is more to come.
The knight spits again before pushing what Aerion believes is his second thumb in, pulling him apart cruelly.
Aerion bleats in pain, head drooping forward, and hears the brute curse behind him. His thumbs are pulled free before one hand is presented in front of him.
“Spit,” the knight demands.
Aerion’s nose wrinkles, but does as he’s told. It lands thick and viscous and bright red with blood in the middle of the knight’s palm.
His hand retreats, and the thumbs return, thick hooks digging inside of him and pulling him apart. He has always used oil and his own slender fingers to open himself up slowly and carefully. Nothing like this brutal, forceful wrenching open. A cleaving in two, rough and cruel in his ignorance. Aerion bites his arm so hard he breaks the skin.
It is so good, and then it is gone and replaced by the hedge knight’s cock.
The first press is almost bearable, nothing but a gentle, firm pressure against his hole. For a second, Aerion can pretend it is pleasant.
Then, it becomes agony.
Aerion makes a pained noise, and scrambles forward to get away, uselessly clawing at the mud as Ser Duncan’s grip on his hips tighten. It is instinctual, albeit unavoidable.
The knight first pulls backwards, but second guesses himself and instead pushes his cock in further. His shaft, thick and hard and unrelenting, is shoved in deep. It is almost worse than the initial breach.
“Sorry,” the brute begs as Aerion sobs beneath him. “I’m sorry. Fuck, I am trying to—I do not want, I never wanted this, Aerion, I didn’t, I—” His pathetic begging is cut off by a pleasured groan, his body folding over Aerion’s like a giant, unwelcome blanket as he sinks in to the root.
Like this, Aerion believes he is fully covered. Protected, almost, away from the prying eyes of the lords and knights he will have to face every day after this.
He expects the man to pull free, to drag his giant shaft out of Aerion’s tender hole and fuck back in, taking him with the same ferocity as he did his throat.
He does not. He remains still, long enough for Aerion to become accustomed to his brutal girth, but also long enough for the crowds to begin yelling again, demanding his humiliation to continue. Aerion would much rather hear this brute’s animalistic grunts than that.
“Have you never fucked before?” Aerion spits, teeth creaking with how hard he is clenching his jaw. The pain is terrible, even as he settles into it. He pushes against the loose tooth. Maybe he will swallow it so he may keep it with him forever. “It isn’t so different from a girl, just—fuck, fuck, just be careful.”
“I have not,” is the knight’s choked reply. From his place, forehead pressed to the middle of Aerion’s back, it is practically intimate. “This is, I mean, it is my… There is no girl, I have never—”
Fuck. The boy is more chaste than the Maiden, and here he is, his obscene cock shoved so deep inside Aerion’s hole he can feel it in his throat.
“It’s—fine,” he chokes out, tears welling in his eyes. He tries not to let them fall, because somehow that would be more humiliating than what is happening right now. “You’ve done it now,” he sobs out, “follow through, you big idiot.”
He might not even know what he means, Aerion thinks with bright, hot panic. He is not certain he has the strength to complete this himself. But surely he’s seen whores, or at the very least, animals mating. The mechanics are instinctual, after all, although Aerion himself is torn between clawing away and fucking back on the knight’s stupidly large cock.
It takes a moment, as if the hedge knight has to really think about it. His cock is a heavy, unrelenting presence inside of Aerion and he isn’t certain how long he can last until finally, finally, he grips one hand on his waist, the other around the back of his neck, and slowly retreats.
It is as if Aerion is being turned inside out, the drag of the knight’s cock like a blade against his poorly-prepared hole. He cries out, but this time the knight does not retreat. He remains a steady, unmoving presence behind him.
When he does stop, only the thick, bulbous head remains tucked inside, and Aerion realises the saliva and blood from before are doing nothing—until the knight spits again, and smears the wet around.
“Fuck,” Aerion hisses when he sinks back inside. He feels larger now, and meaner. “Fuck, make it quick, I do not think I can—”
Survive this brutality, or last much longer without spilling? Aerion is not certain.
“Yes,” the knight sighs, and begins to fuck him in earnest.
Giant hands grip Aerion tight, like he is afraid he will disappear if he doesn’t, and powerful hips slam into him again and again. The brute grunts behind him, sweat dripping onto Aerion’s back, mixing with the blood and dirt already caked into his clothing. He is unrelenting, surely spurned on by his own people, those in rags who are delighting in the ritualistic debasement of a Targaryen prince.
Debasement or not, Aerion fucking loves this. He is sick, he is in heaven.
It is not pleasure, not like any kind he has experienced before. It is akin to pulling at the loose skin of his thumb, or pushing himself beyond his limits in the training yard. It is biting his lip until it bled, or digging his nails into his skin. It is not a pleasure, but it is a sweet, sweet fucking pain and Aerion wants more.
“Fuck me, you brute,” Aerion begs, wide open mouth spilling bloodied saliva onto the ground. He believes he sees something white in the mess mix into the mud. “Fuck me like the dog you are.”
“Duncan,” the knight growls, teeth close to his ear. “My name is Duncan, use it for I am the knight who bested you, Aerion.”
“Duncan,” Aerion sobs, cheek pressed against the dirt and his spit and his molar so he can see small glimpses of the knight above him between hard, fast thrusts. “Duncan!”
He wonders if this is how dragons once mated, if the giant Balerion pressed his mighty weight over Meraxes and Vhagar and claimed the she-dragons. There are no recounts of dragon mating, or if there was it has not survived long enough to land in Aerion’s hands. He would know. He has searched high and low for any scrap of dragon-lore of his House, and has come up frightfully empty.
He wants to believe this is it, as Duncan takes him with single-minded focus. Angry and brutal and passionate, Aerion believes he could breathe fire in this moment. He is fire, blood burning bright.
He has never felt more alive.
Duncan comes with a roar, face buried in his neck, teeth nipping at his flesh. Aerion can feel his cock throb inside, hot seed filling him, planting itself. If Aerion were a dragon, he might be able to use it; to lay eggs which could hatch into perfect, wonderful children.
Aerion comes in the confines of his breeches, silent and tense, trembling through the aftershocks.
Duncan pulls his cock from his hole, his come spilling free and quick until he tugs Aerion’s breeches back over his backside. It soaks through fast, but it is the least of his troubles. Aerion is soiled now, come and spit and blood and mud. He is ruined, his body and his mind and his reputation.
He is incandescent.
Duncan does not do him the disservice of carrying him from the field, although Aerion suspects he desires to. His giant, messy hands twitch at his sides, but he resigns himself to guiding him instead. Aerion finds it easy to ignore the roar of the crowd with Ser Duncan a stalwart wall in between.
Aerion is spirited away the moment they are behind the castle doors, his father, a maester, and a dozen servants already stripping him free of his spoiled clothing, but before he is taken to his borrowed chambers, he sees Ser Duncan’s haunted expression, Prince Baelor at his side.
He is thoroughly bathed then inspected by House Ashford’s maester. It is a further humiliation, especially with his father hovering, constantly interrogating the maester about his son’s wellbeing.
“If you did not want this to happen, you should have put a stop to it before the brute turned me out,” Aerion grouses, body aching on his hands and knees, backside presented for this old man’s prying gaze. Vaguely horrifyingly, he would prefer Duncan. At least they were in it together.
“Do not start with me,” Maekar grouses, face as red as his doublet. “Aerion, you do not know what it was like to watch you be… To watch that beast pant over you like a—”
“Father,” Aerion snaps as the maester prods at a particularly painful spot. “I assure you, it was worse being the one under the beast.”
His father grouses something about honour and responsibility, but otherwise leaves the maester to his tending.
Aerion is not at risk of infection, he is told. His nose and left cheek—broken and fractured, respectively—are the worst of it. Bruises make up the rest of his injuries, and the maester sounds incredibly surprised because of it. He does hand him a salve for his nether aches, however, and Aerion quietly pockets it for later.
His uncle is next to visit in his chambers—thankfully once Aerion has once again dressed in clean clothing—stern but exasperated in his scolding.
“Really, Aerion,” Baelor mutters from Maekar’s side. “Was this all necessary?”
Aerion shrugs. The movement aches, but like a bruise he wishes to continue to push. He doesn’t want it to leave.
“If it were anyone else but Ser Duncan,” his uncle continues, “you may be dead.”
“Yes, the brute of a knight was so kind when he took me in the mud,” Aerion drawls, even as a flush comes to his cheeks. He was, he knows. Against all odds, he was kind.
“You will accompany Ser Duncan on his travels in the morn,” Baelor says, taking no notice of Aerion. He expected this, albeit perhaps not so fast. He is a prince of his word, however. He will spend his season with the knight. “Aegon is going, too.”
That, Aerion does react to. “What?”
“He will not leave the hedge knight alone with you,” Maekar spits.
Aerion’s mouth drops open. “Alone with me? He is the one who—”
“And you would have done the same had you been the finer knight,” Baelor interrupts. “Aegon is to squire for him, and you are to keep him safe.”
“So I am to serve the peasant and mind my brat of a brother at the same time?”
Baelor sighs. “This is entirely your doing.”
Aerion sneers. “When am I to leave?”
Ser Duncan is waiting for him the following morning. He is tending to his horse in the courtyard, quite close to the spot Aerion first saw him. The giant, hulking, beast of a man is no less beastly, but now his wary gaze has taken on a new meaning.
“So, where are we to go?” Aerion asks blithely as his own horse is readied for travel by a half dozen servants. He will miss the convenience of castle life.
Duncan spares him a brief glance before looking away. Aerion believes he can see a dusting of pink on his already ruddy face.
“Dorne,” the knight says shortly.
“What the fuck is in Dorne?”
“Tanselle.”
Aerion pauses, nose scrunched. “Am I supposed to know what that is?”
Duncan rounds on him then, his face thunderous. He is angrier than he was in the field, angrier than when he had his cock inside of him, and Aerion cannot help but flinch back.
His reaction seems to temper the man, but only slightly.
“Tanselle is the puppeteer you—” He chokes his words off, jaw tight as he stares Aerion down. “She departed Ashford not long after you broke her finger. I intend to find her.”
“To what means?” Aerion says before he can think.
“For you to apologise,” Duncan snaps. He does not look away now.
Aerion rolls his eyes. “Dorne is very large. Do you even know what part she is from?”
Duncan goes to answer, but comes up short. “I—No. I do not.”
“Have you ever been to Dorne?”
“I have,” is Duncan’s indignant reply. “Blackhaven. I squired for my master in battle against the Vulture King.”
“So, barely,” Aerion drawls.
“I won’t leave it,” Duncan replies, this time quieter. Like the wind has been taken from his sails. “I’m going to Dorne, and I’m taking Egg with me—and you, I suppose. Since I have to.”
“I can help.” He isn’t certain why he even offers, considering Duncan’s wary look. “My mother and my grandmother were both Dornish. I have travelled from Starfall to Sunspear many times.”
A handful, back when his mother still lived, but Duncan need not know.
Duncan exhales. He is so large it moves his entire, hulking body. “Why?”
Anticipating the question, Aerion merely shrugs. “I am yours to use for the next season,” he says, enjoying Duncan’s answering flinch. “I can guide you through Dorne searching for your puppeteer, or I can water the horses, or I can get on my knees and suck your cock before bed. However you deem fit, Ser Duncan.”
“Don’t,” the man says, strangled and embarrassed. “Do not speak like that.”
“I can bend over again too, if you’d rather fuck my ass, although I’d request time to prepare myself beforehand,” he continues without shame, “or I could ride you like a horse if you are tired. Well, I could fuck you, if that is what you would prefer. I am quite good at it.”
“Stop!” Duncan shouts, blue eyes wild and… wet? “Stop, my prince, please. I would not—I am already sick with myself for what I did. I cannot imagine doing that again. Please, you have my word.”
Aerion shifts. A sharp pain shoots up his spine, his backside still sore after the trial. He shifts again, testing his limits, but Ser Duncan takes his pained wince as an accusation.
“I would not have you with us if I was not ordered to by Prince Baelor,” he continues, sad and broken, hunched over yet still a mountain. “You do not have to fear me. On my honour as a knight, I won’t touch you again for any reason.”
He is being truthful, Aerion realises. A knight who does not lie. Who wants to protect the weak and the innocent, who took Aerion in the mud only because Aerion forced him to.
Aerion huffs a quiet laugh as Egg approaches. His bald head shines bright in the sun, obstructing his surely angry expression at Aerion’s mere presence.
Too bad. He is not allowed to be anywhere else.
“A pity.” Aerion swings himself onto his saddle and turns his horse around to avoid both of their judging gazes, sweet pain sparking along his spine with every beautiful, exquisite move. “I would have enjoyed playing with you again, Ser Duncan.”