King's Landing
The Red Keep pulsed with life.
Sunlight streamed through stained glass, casting blood-red and gold hues across the throne room's polished marble. Courtiers bowed low, voices murmuring like river currents, as King Rhaegar Targaryen ascended the Iron Throne—not as conqueror, but as keeper of peace.
Crownless in court, clad in black and red, he looked every inch the king. His silver hair fell past his shoulders, a crimson sapphire at his throat. He listened with quiet patience to petitions from lords and merchants, his hands folded lightly over one knee.
"House Tarly requests grain shipments from the Crownlands to aid their flooded fields," the herald recited.
"Granted," Rhaegar replied. "With recompense to be repaid over three harvests."
Another petitioner stepped forward.
Through it all, Prince Aegon watched from his seat beside the throne, absorbing every word. Still young, yet proud, with his mother's wit and his father's sharp jawline. Princess Rhaenys, nearly of age, sat across the hall with Elia Martell, watching the proceedings unfold with half-curiosity and half-boredom.
The court was beautiful. Efficient. Reverent.
And in all its brilliance, there was one name never spoken.
After court adjourned, Rhaegar retired to his solar. Elia joined him, eyes heavy with questions she had long kept to herself.
"You rule as your father never could," she said, pouring him a cup of Dornish red. "But even a perfect king must tend to his house."
Rhaegar didn't meet her gaze. "The realm is my house."
"Is the boy not part of that realm?"
Silence. His fingers tightened around the cup. "What would you have me say, Elia? That I failed him? I know that."
"Then say it to him," she whispered.
He turned away, gazing out over the city. "Some ghosts are best left untouched."
---
Dragonstone
Daenerys Stormborn watched the waves crash against the black stone cliffs. The sea sang like a wild thing. She was twelve now—clever, proud, and fiercely curious. Her dragon dreams had returned.
In her hands, she held a letter—well-worn, re-read, with her name barely inked into the corner. It had arrived weeks ago, from King's Landing.
She had asked Viserys once, "Who is Vaeron?"
Her brother scoffed. "A mistake. A half-prince. Father's shame."
But Ser Willem Darry had offered a different truth.
"Your father is dead, sweetling. But your brother—King Rhaegar—he tried to save the realm. And sometimes… kings must sacrifice the things they love."
She didn't understand it then. She barely did now.
But she remembered the name. Vaeron.
A Targaryen raised among wolves.
She closed her eyes and saw silver hair like her own… but violet eyes ringed with frost.
---
Winterfell
The snow came early that year. Vaeron stood atop the battlements, his cloak flapping behind him like dragon wings. Lords from across the North had gathered for council. He could hear their voices in the great hall below, could feel their stares whenever he passed.
He wore dark wool trimmed in silver—Stark in shape, Targaryen in color. He had grown tall and broad-shouldered, the cut of his cheekbones sharp as ice.
"Never seen eyes like that," one of the White Harbor men had whispered.
"Aye," another said. "Like his mother's. But he's not of us."
"Bastard prince," they called him. "Targaryen whelp."
He bore it in silence.
At dinner, Lord Manderly raised a toast to Ned Stark's wisdom, but pointedly excluded the boy seated at the end of the table.
Catelyn's hand found his beneath the table. She squeezed once—reassurance, warmth, blood and bone.
He returned the pressure, his eyes never leaving his wine.
Later that night, Ned joined him in the godswood.
"You've held your tongue well," Ned said, voice gravelled by the cold.
"I was taught to respect lords."
"And yourself?"
Vaeron looked up at the weirwood's face. "I'm learning."
Ned studied him for a long while. "I once told Benjen that the truest men are not those born to greatness, but those who carry its weight without complaint."
He placed a hand on the boy's shoulder.
"You carry more than most. You carry it well."
---
Skagos – Cannibal
The island breathed.
Wind howled through obsidian crags. The trees here grew gnarled and ancient, fed on blood and storms. The Cannibal slept beneath them—vast, monstrous, coiled beneath rock and ice.
Its hide was darker than shadow, its muscles rippling with silent strength. Flesh like polished night, veins burning emerald. Its wings were folded like the cloaks of kings. It had not flown in years.
But its eyes were open.
It saw.
From its perch, it watched stars burn. It listened to the tides and bones of the world. The fire within it was no longer wild—it was refined.
The world stirred.
He is growing.
The boy of frost and flame.
The time nears.
The Cannibal stood, massive and terrifying, wings stretching once. Then it sat again, folding into the stone like a god waiting for its altar.
---
Winterfell – The Looming Divide
The next day brought ravens from the South.
Aegon Targaryen had won a mock war game at Harrenhal. Prince Viserys had been gifted a new Valyrian steel dagger. Rhaenys was betrothed to a Martell cousin.
And Vaeron received nothing.
The raven had no name, no greeting, no thought spared for him.
He burned it in the brazier without a word.
That evening, Robb found him hammering away in the practice yard long after dark. Every swing of the blade was a fury. Every movement sharpened by fire.
"You're not fighting the dummy," Robb said.
"I'm fighting what it means to be forgotten," Vaeron snapped.
Robb hesitated. "We haven't forgotten you."
"He has."
They stood in silence.
Finally, Robb said, "Then make him remember."
---
Vaeron's Chamber
By candlelight, he read Lyanna's journal again.
> "There are two kinds of love — the kind that sings, and the kind that stays. I hope my son finds the second."
He ran his fingers along the ink. Then he opened a fresh page at the back and began to write.
---
> On the thirteenth day of my name, I will be judged by a creature older than crowns. If I fail, I become nothing. If I prevail… I will still be his son. But I will be my own man, first.
> He does not see me. But the gods do. The North does. And one day… the sky will as well.
> – Vaeron Targaryen, of Winterfell
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