Chapter 135 – Dragon and Stag in Dance
The feast after the victory ceremony in the Dragonpit Camp was again kept modest. War and the building of the Stepstones had burned too much coin; everything was pared to the bone.
Yet even so the spread was fine, and besides, the lords and ladies were itching to dance. Rhaegar watched the knights and lords laugh and sparkle, their smiles widening with every toast.
The bronze-and-steel gates of the Dragonpit stood open; victory parades, balls, and tourneys were needed as regularly as arena games to keep the smallfolk happy. Commons and nobles alike loved such spectacles the way sharks love blood. King Aerys would one day be a king in his way, but he never let the realm laugh, and the realm never loved him for it.
Along the Dragonpit's walls hung the banners of every great house: the black-and-red three-headed dragon of House Targaryen on black, the crowned black stag of House Baratheon on gold, the crimson lion of House Lannister on gold, the golden rose of House Tyrell on green, and the white falcon and crescent moon of House Arryn on sky-blue.
First came King Jaehaerys II and his queen, followed by Prince Aerys and Princess Rhaella, Lord Ormund and Lady Elenda, Lord Tywin and Lady Joanna, Lord Jon Arryn, and Ser Steffon with Lady Cassana. The men offered their arms to their ladies, all dressed in house colours—black-and-red for the dragon, gold-and-crimson for the lion, green-and-gold for the rose, white-and-blue for the falcon. Rhaegar saw a river of jewelled circlets, emeralds, and costly silks flowing past.
Then the children: two little princes leading the way, waving at their big brother—miniature copies of Rhaegar himself. He gently chivvied them onward.
Next came Rhaegar with Roberta on his arm, both radiant as if carved from jade and alabaster. Rhaegar wore a black steel circlet set with rubies to bind back his hair, a black silk doublet stitched with shimmering silver dragons, and a black-and-red dragon-buckled sword-belt. Roberta's gown was cloth-of-gold; her lazy curls tumbled over her shoulders, pinned by a running golden stag, her smile shy and sweet.
Behind them trooped the golden twins of House Lannister and the Baratheon brothers among others.
Robert nudged his younger brother. "Stop scowling, Stannis. Cheer up. The board's groaning—eat your fill."
Stannis swallowed his anger. "We're guests, brother. If we spoil this, our sister will flay us alive."
"Look at you!" Robert said, not caring.
Stannis's heart was bitter. His life felt like one long torment of second-sonhood: always last, always overlooked. Why couldn't he be Robert—taller, handsomer, bolder, louder, the life of every hall? Men praised Robert for having the Laughing Storm's blood. As for himself, he was the spare in the corner.
"Whoever marries that rough, wild stag will rue the day," Cersei thought, eyeing the long-limbed, loud-laughing Robert. Handsome he and Jaime both might be, yet beside Prince Rhaegar they were briar to rose.
Several singers plucked their harps and lifted their voices, hymning friendship and love.
Once lords and famous knights were seated, cups were raised, healths exchanged, and the feasting began.
Rhaegar and Roberta shared a table set a single step below the royal dais, every place filled by the heirs of the great houses. He saw the stamp of different bloodlines: the Baratheon children tall and black-haired, with their mother's bright blue eyes; the Lannister twins with their family's golden curls and green eyes, tall and pale; a young Arryn heir with sandy hair, blue eyes, and a hooked nose. "All beauties," Rhaegar mused—Westeros adored handsome faces. Generations of selective marriage had made great lords' children famous for house looks: Stark grey eyes and long faces, Lannister green eyes and golden hair, Tully auburn curls and high cheekbones. Yet comeliness was no warrant of virtue; at this table alone sat Cersei, and madness walked beside her. No wonder Lord Tywin winced at the Imp—amid such perfection a dwarf was a scandal, unmarriageable.
Rhaegar studied every face: Roberta open and innocent, Robert boisterous, Stannis stiff and second-son-sensitive, the Lannister twins proud and supercilious, the Arryn heir bright and easy.
"Are the Norvoshi axe-men of Dorne really that fierce?" Robert asked Rhaegar over his sister. Though still young, he was unnaturally strong, born with a warrior's soul.
"Very fierce, but you'd never endure Dorne."
"Why not? Can't my warhammer smash that axe-man?" Robert demanded.
"Dorne has scorching suns and shifting sands; you'd never bear it." Rhaegar smiled—he understood Robert. In love of pleasure Robert resembled Aegon IV: handsome in youth, ruined in excess.
"True. I hear it's barren and empty—nothing fun there." Robert backed off. A natural fighter, a Laughing Storm in the making, he was also a man of fierce appetites who knew how to enjoy himself. He preferred lively, splendid places like King's Landing and the Reach to Dorne.
"The children are growing fast; soon it will be time to speak of marriages," Lady Joanna said to Queen Rhaella.
"Indeed! If Princess Rhaelle's grandchildren were older, it would be perfect," Queen Rhaella said softly. "But they are still too young; matters will be easier when they are grown."
Since Queen Rhaella insisted, none pressed further.
This evening Rhaegar sat at the children's table—those golden boys and girls who already outshone everyone else.
When fruits, cheeses, and drinks had been served and cleared away, the master of ceremonies proclaimed,
"Next, Prince Rhaegar will perform for us a song!"
Rhaegar smiled at Roberta, stepped forward, and raised his silver-strung ancient harp. The song was a longing for home.
The tune of "Five Hundred Miles" rose, and Rhaegar hummed its melody, letting the notes speak. Tonight all were wanderers yearning for home—O homeland! The piece had been meant for the orphans of the Greenblood in Dorne, yet with Old Valyria gone, were not the Targaryens exiles as well?
The gently sorrowful music stirred every heart.
Pretty ladies brimmed with tears. Even the men felt sorrow—especially soldiers far from home.
"Sister, why are you crying?" Robert teased. "I hate this sort of tune—I want rowdy songs like 'The Bear and the Maiden Fair.'"
Roberta glanced at him and upended a goblet of golden wine over his head; the liquid streamed down his face.
"I told you not to anger your sister," Stannis said with relish.
The Silver Dragon of King's Landing danced with the Hind of Storm's End.
They spun together, graceful and light.
Rhaegar's parents and grandparents were Targaryens wed to Targaryens; he bore the silver hair and purple eyes of pure Valyrian blood. Yet he also carried the blood of House Martell. His beauty had always been unmatched; now, tempered by flame, it blazed even brighter.
Miss Roberta shone no less. The Hind inherited the Baratheon height and thick black hair from her father, and from her mother eyes of clear sapphire. She was the rose of poets, a beauty who eclipsed all others, a living flame fresh from the Stormlands.
"Truly beautiful!" Rhaegar praised.
"And so are you! Were you more carefree, you would be perfect—a prince of twelve with the mind of twice that age."
Rhaegar laughed brightly.
They danced on, heedless of every gaze, the brightest lights upon the floor.
"Stay away from what my big sister wants, or she'll smash your head," Robert thought viciously as he caught the look on Cersei's face.
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