Chapter Text
Rhaenyra Targaryen had always been convinced she needed no help other than her own.
It had been endearing to the adults around them when she was still a child and would insist on finishing her school projects without any help, or learn to rollerblade without protections, or refuse to be taken care of when she was sick, but it had quickly turned into the fierce stubbornness she was known for.
And just as quickly, the words used by the people around them to describe her had changed.
From charming and strong-willed to uncooperative, recalcitrant. Difficult. And Alicent had watched it all as everyone’s attitude had slowly but surely started to shift. She had seen the way their teachers would shake their heads and eventually give up on trying to engage with Rhaenyra, how their friends would exchange glances when she’d obstinately go through with every single idea that popped into her head, no matter what was told to her, the way her own family, and even the employees in her father’s company Targtech, had embraced the habit of shrugging with helplessness when they saw her wandering around with Alicent by her side, usually running away from whatever problems she’d created.
Rhaenyra had never cared for any of it, not in the same way Alicent had. A roll of the eyes and a wave of the hand was enough to dismiss any concern expressed to her.
Alicent was the one apologising on her behalf, taking care of her and making sure to keep her in check whenever her temper got the best of her. After all, what else would she have done? She was the one fidgeting under her father’s severe stare, the judgement curling the corners of his mouth into a grimace, and once she got disowned, she was the one walking on eggshells and making herself as small as possible to not attract Viserys’ attention.
She had found a confident in Rhaenys during her teenage years, but Alicent had never let herself open up completely in the presence of the older woman. And so it was only Rhaenyra who had always taken care of her in the moments she wanted to hide from the world or run away from it all, in the same way Alicent protected her when Rhaenyra ran into one problem to the other, waltzing around in life with a surprising lack of concern.
(“I can always take care of it if someone has an issue with me.”
“Darling, you know that’s not normal, right? Most people don’t go around intimidating and punching everyone who has a problem with them.”
“I don’t punch all of them…”
“You do realise how that’s worst? You do, right?”)
Rhaenyra never asked for help.
Independent, resourceful, proud. Those were other words Alicent thought described better her girlfriend’s personality, different words from the ones used by their old teachers. And yet so vulnerable. Stubborn, but only for those not willing to look any further.
Alicent gave the help, had picked up on the other girl’s facial expressions as quickly as a child could learn a new language in a foreign country, when they were still in primary school. The purple eyes narrowed in concentration, the scrunch when she furrowed her eyebrows, and the way she would look around with defiance if one so much as implied she needed assistance. So Alicent had gone through an extensive phase of trial and error to figure out what to say in which situation, how to defuse the incoming storm that threatened to unleash a tsunami of emotions behind her friend’s obstinate behavior, when to needle her and when it was best to leave her alone.
It was only after a while that she had seen the way Rhaenyra had started to study her in a very similar way, a fond look on her face, and a timid blush on her cheeks whenever she was caught.
A silly joke when Alicent was sad, an insistent hug when she refused to say what was wrong, her favorite snack waiting for her on the nightstand, a comforting touch against her back.
Only later, when they were both teenagers lost in a confusing sea of uncomfortable changes, with a body filled with hormones and their head spinning with the possibilities of what was to come, had Alicent realised it wasn’t normal to be able to read someone else so well. Most people couldn’t share hours long silent conversations with their best friend, they didn’t crave the other one’s attention, touch and smell like a starved man whenever they were apart, and they certainly didn’t spend every minute of the day in each other’s company as if they were two sides of the same coin.
Rhaenyra was the one who never asked for help.
Alicent was supposed to be fine.
She had to be.
Yet, as tears once again filled her vision, ran down her cheeks and became lost in the folds of her jacket, she felt as if a deep, bottomless pit opened at her feet. A void, a sorry manifestation of her thoughts, and that alone scared her more than anything else.
Sickness churned in her belly, growing stronger with each passing second, and a familiar headache was splitting her skull in two. The nausea would not go away for the next few hours, Alicent was sure of it. She should push it down and carry on with her day, the way she’d done times and times again without a second thought, day after day. But for once it wasn’t possible, it simply wasn’t.
Because for the first time, the object of her turmoil wasn’t herself, but instead the one and only person she loved so much it could tear her apart at the seams while making her entire world whole in the same breath. All mornings, all nights, all thoughts and prayers she ever said, every victory and every setback, Rhaenyra occupied every vacant space of her being, from the bones to the flesh to the continuously fluctuating emotions ricocheting without rest in her mind.
She moistened her cracked lips with her tongue before trying to swallow without much success.
Her throat was simply too tight.
Control yourself, Alicent. Eyes forward. Your problems are only the result of your own weakness.
But in front of her was only a dark road, with somber clouds looming in the horizon and a heavy silence hanging in the air. A few houses without light behind their windows and a desolate cemetery surrounded by a broken fence.
Alicent didn’t know where she was. It seemed to happen often, recently. Not that it mattered.
Such a pathetic display of your worst flaws.
She swayed back and forth, and closed her tired eyes, arms hugging her trembling frame.
You are not a child anymore. Pathetic. Incompetent. Worthless.
Staggering, her steps carried her to the entrance of the cemetery without her realising it. A place where not a soul could judge her tears, where she wouldn't be disturbed by curious stares and concerned questions, where she might even rest in the loneliness of her own company.
Stop acting like the failure of a daughter I find myself forced to raise.
As always, the familiar voice in her head made her gag silently.
She pressed cold-reddened fingers to her face, rubbing her eyes, the skin around them tight and raw from her tears. The rusty gate closed behind her with a sinister whine. She was faced with rows and rows of graves, neatly arranged next to each other, with headstones weathered by the years and flowers beginning to wither from the lack of rain.
A few steps taken at random led her in front of the photograph of an unknown woman, with soft features and hazel eyes that appeared familiar, despite the fact that Alicent was sure she had never met the stranger in her life.
A longing struck her, sharp and sudden, the childish urge to climb a too-steep hill at the edge of some half-remembered town, holly in hand, to reach the remote grave of a mother she barely knew. A grave she’d only visited once or twice. But the hill, the cemetery, and the grave were far away, and if she were honest, distressingly honest, she knew she would not go, even if she could.
There was nothing to find.
No, her mother had died many years ago, taking with her all hope of any parental love Alicent might have, in another world, received. Instead, she was stuck with the suffocating, nightmare-like presence of a father whose voice still haunted her even as an adult, in her thoughts, her dreams, every day.
Alicent sat on the ground beside the grave of the stranger who wasn't her mother, and pressed the palms of her hands against her eyes to hold back the tears that no longer fell.
Always so sensitive, when will you stop embarrassing me? It's nothing You are fine. Now, will you make yourself useful? There is a man here tonight, and he wants to meet you. This could be a valuable alliance, for both our family and you, Alicent. You' are young, you're fine, and that's exactly what he'll love about you.
Alicent lied down on the grave, her cheek pressed against the cold marble. She wasn't sure her heart was beating anymore. She wasn't sure she had one to begin with, without Rhaenyra.
Rhaenyra.
The world didn't make sense anymore.
You have to believe it; to appeal to him. This isn't a game, Alicent, this is business, and you aren't a child anymore, you are a woman. Make him like you. Repeat after me: I am fine.
I am fine.
Alicent had not been fine, she had been fifteen.
(And now, she was cold, alone, in a place she did not know, and she had been about to ruin Rhaenyra's dream, and everything in her screamed that she could not be anything but fine, and yet the ache, the pain, did not go away, would not, and it was all too much, all the time, but too much, all too much because Gods Rhaenyra's dream, and her tears, and if she had only existed for Rhaenyra and that hadn't been enough, was there a point in anything anymore and she - )
Alicent closed her eyes. She tried not to feel. Nothing, anything not to see Rhaenyra's eyes, her heart breaking in two pieces, the letter, not to hear her father's words. It was too cold around her, way too cold, but she could not find the strength within herself to care. She could sense something, somewhere, fade away.
The grave beneath her felt shallow.
She was falling.
She wasn't fine.
Blackness enveloped her, and she gladly let it.
It felt like slipping underwater.
Not all at once but slowly, like stepping into one of the baths Rhaenyra always liked way too hot. Then way too cold. Then gone, nothing. The hard marble beneath her cheek was the only thing that felt real, and yet she had vague impressions of places, memories, people she had once known, that were vanishing way too quickly for her to understand.
A hand in hers, bigger, safe, of an older brother she had not heard from in years. A hazy picture of him found on social media by mistake, looking more mature than she had ever known him to be, with two small children under each arm, and a woman by his side. A ring on his finger. The laughter of a best friend over coffee, big brown eyes full of unspoken care. The caress of a mother she only remembered in bits and pieces. And then love. So much love it could only mean one name, one being, one soul forever entangled with hers.
Alicent hadn’t meant to fall asleep. But the noise in her head had finally gone quiet here, and in that silence, the idea came, something she had always forbidden herself to think.
It would be easier not to wake up.
Until the first breath cut through her chest like glass and her eyes blinked open, stinging from the cold. She looked around in confusion before slowly easing into a sitting position. It was quiet, the deep blue of the night enveloping the cemetery and its surroundings like a soft blanket; she could not see a single person around. For the first time in a very long time, her mind was her own, and strangely peaceful.
She left the grave behind without looking back.
It was only once she finally managed to find her way back home, after spending a good while turning dark corners under the flickering orange streetlights, that the tranquillity surrounding her was shattered.
Around her building, everything was pure chaos, nothing like she had ever come to associate with the small and cosy apartment she shared with Rhaenyra, and it made her blood run cold.
Two police cars were parked in front, one awkwardly tilted across the pavement, and the other with a dent in the door that looked suspiciously recent. A crowd of neighbours were gathered behind some tape, whispering, and Alicent recognised their old, retired neighbours, as well as the couple with a newborn that had just moved across the hall. She had noticed Rhaenyra’s soft expression in front of the baby, something she hadn’t expected, and when their eyes had met, it had felt like the spark of a new question, something more, far from unpleasant.
It all now felt like another lifetime.
Alicent slowly approached, feeling distant, and she instinctively looked for a familiar head of blonde hair through the crowd. What she found instead, she wasn’t expecting.
There was Lyonel, yelling at someone on the phone, Rhaenys arguing with a very apologetic-looking officer, Daemon in a corner, without his usual air of mischief around him, and Viserys, who looked like a man who had just lost about ten years of his life and hadn’t yet decided whose fault it was. Laenor et Laena were on the side, next to Rhaenys, but Rhaenyra wasn't there.
She wasn’t anywhere.
Alicent had barely stepped a bit closer when Laenor spotted her, and his eyes widened.
“Holy shit,” he breathed. “She’s… she’s here!”
Immediately, all eyes were on her. It was Laena who reached her first, though, taking her by the shoulders before almost forcing her into a smothering hug, and Alicent finally felt a pang of guilt hit her as the reality of the situation got the best of her. The police, everyone was here, because of her.
Her best friend was now hugging her as if her life depended on it, and almost all the major representants of Targtech had travelled to be there (Gods, even Viserys who never came except whenever Rhaenyra came up with another crazy idea, and he was called to take care of the fallout) despite their busy schedules, and this simple fact, combined with Rhaenyra's absence, meant only one thing: something had happened.
Laena finally put enough space between them to examine her.
“Are you injured?” she inquired flatly.
Alicent shook her head.
“Are you okay?”
The words almost fell out of mouth out of habit before she stopped them.
I’m fine.
Instead, she took a shaky breath. “No, not really.”
Laena let her lips stretch into a tense, but grateful smile, the way she did when she was thanking Alicent about something.
It was usually when she was tense, after one of their intense studying session where Alicent would once again help her without complaining, bring her coffee and Rhaenyra's worst jokes, or that one time they had ran into Laena's ex, on a date with his new girlfriend only a day after breaking up, and how Alicent had taken care of her, of everything, how she always would if she realised Laena needed her. It was a thank you, but for what, Alicent wasn't sure.
Laena led her inside, and the rest of them followed.
Inside the lobby, it was worse. Bright overhead lights reflected off the tile, and the whole place reeked of burnt coffee and tense silence. A few employees and policemen moved between statements and scribbled notes, ducking under police tape someone had tried to hang to prevent access to the stairs. One of them looked over as Alicent entered and muttered something into his radio.
She felt the gaze of every person in the room land on her.
The building manager was still in the corner with an ice pack pressed to his wrist, clearly overwhelmed and trying very hard to pretend he wasn’t. Two of the neighbours who had come downstairs during the commotion lingered just behind the reception desk, whispering too loudly.
“Is that her?”
“She doesn’t look like she’s been kidnapped…”
“Shut up, Jean-Paul.”
Lyonel was still on the phone in the far hallway, gesturing animatedly and pacing in small, tight circles, though the moment he saw her he paused mid-sentence. His eyebrows rose, and something like exhausted relief crossed his face before he turned back around. Rhaenys didn’t say anything either, but her gaze flicked over Alicent again. Daemon, who had somehow found himself a chair and a pack of mixed nuts, tilted his head to study her with that same unreadable stillness he rarely ever wore.
Viserys was the only one who hadn't looked at her yet. He was leaning against the side of the reception desk, one hand pinching the bridge of his nose while the other clenched a paper cup so tightly it was nearly collapsing. His tie was wrinkled. There was a faint tremble in his shoulder when he exhaled.
And then, he stared at her straight in the eyes, and Alicent saw the same exasperated, exhausted look he gave Rhaenyra whenever she got in trouble, the one that just wanted to make sure she was okay, with fondness, except it was directed at her.
“She’s at the station,” he said before she could speak. “The police station.”
Rhaenyra.
Alicent stopped breathing.
“They wouldn’t file the report,” he went on. “Said it had to be twenty-four hours. She argued. Called them back. Called a different station. Then showed up in person. When they still refused, she…” He exhaled. “She took a police car.”
Alicent stared at him.
“What?!"
“She stole a car,” Laena corrected, voice thin with disbelief.
“She didn’t drive it far,” Laenor added. “Just around the corner. Then she got on the radio and tried to put out a missing persons alert herself. Called it ‘Operation Save Alicent,’ I shit you not.”
“She hit a mailbox,” Laena said. “Didn’t even brake.”
“She refused to get out of the car.”
“They cuffed her. She tried to bite someone’s arm when they reached for her phone.”
“She’s being processed,” Viserys cut in sharply. “I’m having her released.”
Alicent could barely hear them.
“She didn’t where you were,” Laenor said, quieter now. “None of us did.”
It was at that moment that Viserys stepped forward, running a hand across his face in that familiar way Alicent had always recognised (his tell before a lecture) and she swallowed hard.
But she knew one thing: she was in trouble, and she wasn’t Rhaenyra. What she had always feared was finally about to happen. Ever since Viserys had taken her in as a teenager, she had done everything not to draw more attention than necessary, despite the rumours and scandal her emancipation had stirred in their circles. Naively, she’d hoped the moment would never come, that the day wouldn’t arrive when Viserys decided that even being his daughter’s girlfriend wouldn’t be enough to protect her, not when the stakes were this high.
The image of TargTech, the company the Targaryens had passed down for generations, would always matter more than the daughter of his rival. And now, she stood before him, having inadvertently caused a full-blown scandal involving the police, one that would surely be splashed across every tabloid by the next morning.
Despite being a grown adult, she suddenly felt very small.
Viserys placed his hands on his hips. Alicent violently, achingly, missed Rhaenyra’s presence by her side.
“Where were you?! We were all so worried, you cannot just disappear like that. I expect this kind of behaviour from Rhaenyra but not you, Alicent!” It was coming, Alicent knew it was. She looked down. “Do you know how much time it’s going to take for me to take care of this?! I am so disappointed.”
She was going to be told to get out and -
What.
“I was so worried,” Viserys continued, completely oblivious to Alicent’s inner turmoil. “We had them looking everywhere for you!”
“But you…” Lost, Alicent looked at Rhaenys and Laena for guidance, but was forced to turn her attention back on Viserys as he waited to see what she had to say for herself. “You’re not going to… to cast me off?”
The last part was said in a soft tone, almost inaudible for anyone other than Viserys who frowned, confused.
He narrowed his eyes, the same shade as Rhaenyra’s, and yet they felt so different when they focused on Alicent.
He had never paid her any mind, but he never did for anyone unless he had to, holed up in the basement of his company as often as he could. It felt strange to be the object of his scrutiny, especially as she had no idea what was going through his brain. Finally, he shook his head and started pacing.
“Alicent, what are you talking about? I am responsible for you and your actions, you do realise that?” He turned sharply, gesturing with one hand to the activity around them, Lyonel still snapping into his phone, officers wrapping up their conversation with Rhaenys, one of them eyeing Alicent again from across the room. “Will you finally tell me what was going through your mind?!”
“I- But you’re not going to… It’s not- Responsible?!”
For someone trained from a young age to give perfectly constructed answers and to have impeccable speech, Alicent suddenly found herself unable to finish a single sentence.
Viserys let out another tired sigh.
“I need an answer,” he continued, unmoved by her stammer. “You and Rhaenyra are both are adults now. I can’t go around cleaning up after you your wholes lives anymore, I thought you’d understood that! Your actions have direct consequences on me and Targtech as a whole, especially as you’re preparing to take after me. I had to spend hours on the phone just now to make sure your name would be kept out of any articles and there would be no consequences on your academic career, do you think I don’t have anything better to do?!”
“Take after you?”
Confusion began to fade in Alicent’s veins, replaced instead by a slow-burning irritation, one that twisted her stomach with every word spilling from Viserys’s mouth, words meant to lecture, to correct, the same way he always did with Rhaenyra.
“I didn’t ask you to do any of that, and you’re certainly not responsible for me!”
From the corner, Daemon raised an eyebrow. Lyonel peeked over his phone for half a second, clearly hearing the shift in her voice. Even Laena’s arms dropped slightly, her brow tensing as she watched.
Alicent could hear her heartbeat in her ears, the muscles in her jaw clenching as she almost gave in to the petulant urge to simply walk away. She was tired, she was angry, and she’d been without real parental figures for most of her life. She didn’t need one now; she had done perfectly well on her own for years.
Hadn’t she?
“Last time I woke up, I was not your daughter!”
A grunt of exasperation escaped Viserys, and he sent her a look embarrassingly unimpressed.
“Trust me, I am well aware of that, and of who your father is. But you are my responsibility! Do you think I can let you run around, disappearing and wreaking havoc as you please?”
Alicent almost scoffed, the absolute unfairness of the statement scraping at her nerves. And deeper still, beneath the surface, she could feel the anger boiling, unfocused, misplaced, the anger she had never been able to express to anyone. She knew Viserys didn’t deserve any of it but it didn’t seem to matter, nothing did ever since Rhaenyra had shattered the balance of her mind with one crumpled letter in a bin and a plea she couldn’t ignore.
You always say you’re fine, but if I’m not here to pick up the pieces when it’s too much, what happens then?
“I’ve been emancipated ever since I was sixteen,” she said tightly. “I’m not anyone’s responsibility.”
Viserys’s jaw twitched. A vein pulsed visibly at his temple, and Alicent saw it; the sleepless night written across his face, the tension coiled tight in his shoulders. He looked like he was about to snap.
“And will you please explain to me then,” he started, his voice rising despite himself, “why I’ve spent the last ten years making sure you and Rhaenyra received the best education possible? Why I erased your debts, signed you both up for private lessons, paid for tutoring, made sure you had what you needed, kept you fed, supported you through every internship, every stupid mess you managed to find yourselves in, because you do, both of you, with remarkable consistency?!”
His voice cracked at the end, whether from volume or emotion, Alicent didn’t know.
“You are my responsibility,” he said again, quieter now.
Alicent couldn’t speak. She had rarely heard him talk with such seriousness before, and certainly not about her, and never with this kind of weight behind his words. She stood still, overwhelmed, her expression unreadable even to herself. Something fragile twisted deep inside her chest. Viserys saw it.
He blinked slowly, then seemed to deflate just slightly, his anger dulling into something else. He took one slow, uncertain step forward as his hand rose, hesitated in midair, then settled awkwardly on her shoulder. Alicent flinched, but didn’t pull away.
It was stiff, clearly unfamiliar ground for him, but it was something.
“You are certainly not my daughter,” he said. “But you are part of this family, Alicent. And you know what that entails better than anyone else.”
His hand stayed there a second longer than it needed to. Then he cleared his throat, dropping it back to his side, and added:
“I could not think of a better person to be with Rhaenyra once she inherits the company.”
Daemon, mid-chew, choked violently on a cashew. Laena’s mouth fell open in visible disbelief. Even Rhaenys arched an eyebrow and looked over from across the room.
Alicent stood frozen.
Viserys adjusted the knot of his expensive tie, nodding one last time as if the entire problem had been solved in a matter of seconds. “Now that this is cleared, let us move on to more pressing issues. But do remember to ask next time you need something, hm?”
His voice had returned to its usual neutrality, and his face slipped back into the mildly absent, uninterested expression he always wore, like his one and only wish was to vanish into the basement of TargTech and never see the surface again.
“Now that we know you’re okay,” Viserys said. “let’s get Rhaenyra, shall we?”
He clapped his hands once, briskly.
And just like that, the room seemed to resume motion. Officers nodded, exchanged last details with Lyonel, and began pulling down the remaining tape, and Rhaenys issued a few final instructions to someone over the phone.
As the others filtered out, Daemon fell into step beside Alicent. He lowered his voice just enough to be private:
“For future reference, if you’re planning to spiral again, I do have a selection.” He patted the inside of his coat solemnly. “Pre-rolled, like a trauma wine list but with weed.”
Then, with a deadpan smile and a pat to her arm that somehow seemed as ironic as it was affectionate, he wandered off after the others, whistling Stayin’ Alive under his breath.
Alicent turned instinctively, half-expecting to meet Rhaenyra’s eyes and share quiet laughter, or a roll of the eyes at Daemon’s usual nonsense. But there was only silence, and Laena’s comforting presence by her side, nothing else. She closed her eyes, fingernails digging into her skin.
No matter how much of a mess she was in, there had only ever been one option. One path forward. One person.
It was time to go get her girlfriend, and her life back on track.
***
Alicent had only been in a police station once before.
Gwayne had been seventeen, arrested after a drunken fight with a school friend on one of the rare nights their father- Otto had allowed him out. Alicent had walked in beside her fath- beside him, a book clutched to her chest, eyes darting around the dim room, memorising every sterile detail like she’d been taught. Her fathe- Otto, though quiet, too quiet, had been seething with rage.
He’d signed the release papers in silence, slipping the officers a discreet bribe to keep things quiet. And once they were home, the punishment had begun. Alicent didn’t remember the specifics anymore, just Gwayne’s exhausted face, tears still drying, his teenage defiance already worn down by the weight of responsibilities too heavy for him. Three years later, she was emancipated. She hadn’t heard from him since.
The police station in which they walked into was quite different.
Fluorescent lighting, almost empty except for a bored-looking officer who stood up when he saw them enter, and a worn-out mother and her son waiting, sat in a corner of the room, and the sound of the clock on the wall, the only sign that time was still moving forward.
Rhaenyra sat cross-legged on the station bench, her leather jacket slung around her shoulders, a defiant scowl plastered over her face like she hadn’t just gotten herself arrested for stealing a car and attempting to hijack a police radio system. Two policemen were on either side, eying her with so much apprehension Alicent vaguely worried for their sanity.
When their eyes met, Rhaenyra stood up immediately, and the bench shook so hard Alicent thought it would collapse.
For a moment, she didn’t say anything, just stood there as if she was checking that Alicent was real, alive. Her eyes narrowed and searched Alicent’s body frantically for any cut, bruise, any injury. They stopped on the dirt on her face, the dried tears, and Alicent leaned forward without thinking about it, longing for the warmth of the body that always melded with hers with the certainty of a well-kept secret, the way none other did, or ever would.
The body she recognised as an extension of her own.
And then, in a single second, all blurry but longer than anything she had ever experienced, their bodies collided. All of the sudden she could breathe again, the room felt brighter, the weight of the world lighter and Alicent melted into the embrace. The scent hit her first, citrus and clean linen, the one that lingered on Rhaenyra’s sweaters and pillowcases, the one that Alicent had never been able to fully wash out of her favourite hoodie (with secret delight).
It all suddenly seemed so silly, the whole thing, because now that Rhaenyra’s arms were locked around her waist, and blonde hair were tickling the back of her neck, and hot breaths were deliciously sending shivers down her spine, she would have signed her life away to not have to move ever again.
She shifted slightly, trying to pull back just enough to see her face, but Rhaenyra’s arms only tightened around her.
“Hm Hm,” Rhaenyra said firmly, face buried in her shoulder and voice trembling so gently it sent an arrow of raw ache straight to Alicent’s heart. “You’ve officially lost your personal space privileges.”
She felt something wet on her skin, and Rhaenyra’s fingers dug into her sides.
Rhaenyra was crying.
She didn’t know what to expect. Anger, fury, silence, shock, but Rhaenyra crying in front of her family, random strangers like they weren’t even there was not even on the board. Rhaenyra who never showed her emotions to anyone other than Alicent, who never accepted any help, who was fierce, independent, funny, all sharp edges and bold statements, she was crying in front of everyone.
Alicent held her, a hand drawing soft patterns on her back, completely helpless.
But maybe, just maybe, in this vulnerability, in their moment of weakness, maybe this could be the beginning of something more. In the ashes of their hopes, they could rebuild together.
“I’m so…” she choked on her own words, not sure how to begin to express what she wanted. “Love, I’m so so-“
“Don’t.” Rhaenyra refused to let go, still shivering. “You heard me. Personal space privileges are gone. Revoked. Over and done. Next time? Cuffs. And not the fun kind. I’ll be handcuffing us for life. Emotionally. Physically. Legally.”
And despite everything, Alicent laughed. It was a small snicker, a miserable sound that made its way out of her throat, and yet Rhaenyra relaxed in her arms.
“Is this your way of proposing?” Alicent whispered in her ear, teasing.
Rhaenyra stilled.
Her fingers slackened slightly, just for a moment, then tightened again as she slowly pulled back, just enough to look her in the eyes. All serious, with doubt and then a strange kind of resolution on her face, again, without Alicent knowing why, again, and all she knew was that she had to keep talking.
“You stole a police car.”
Rhaenyra blinked.
“I just think,” Alicent continued, voice already trembling at the corners, “it’s a little unfair that I was the one having the breakdown, and now you’re the one in the police station.”
And her girlfriend was hugging her again, and Alicent was letting her because somehow it made her heart beat a bit faster, despite everything, and she felt too much, but it was good, it caused her head to spin because it was all Rhaenyra.
“Well, you can’t expect me to not steal a car when you disappear, you turn off your phone, and the goddamn police refuses to do their goddamn jobs.”
“Rhaenyra…”
“I panicked, okay?” Rhaenyra’s voice cracked, loud enough that the officer behind the desk looked over. She lowered it again. “I lost it. They wouldn’t help. They kept saying twenty-four hours, you’d been gone for twelve! What the fuck did you want me to do, do you know how many things can happen in twelve hours?!”
Alicent opened her mouth, and she felt tears, the traitors, begin to gather again at the corners of her eyes.
“I googled it,” Rhaenyra continued, tone now spiralling, breathing fast. “You could’ve died of exposure. Or head trauma. Or fallen down a ravine. Or gotten picked up by some serial killer with a thing for redheads and unresolved catholic guilt.”
“I’m not even catholic.”
Rhaenyra waved her off, taking one stop back to look at her in the eyes, all sadness and furious tenderness. “That’s not the point! You vanished. I couldn’t call you. We searched everywhere for you! You- Who does that?”
“I didn’t… I wasn’t trying to scare you, I-”
“I didn’t know where you were. I thought you left because of me.”
The words hit like a stone. For a second, the station around them faded, replaced by the silence of the naked truth, worst than a thousand screams.
Rhaenyra was in front of her, but it wasn’t the Rhaenyra she’d left behind the morning before. Alicent looked at her, and she saw a little girl with thin lips pulled into an obstinate pout, blonde hair tousled in every direction, purple eyes full of silent hurt, trying to look distant, living in a big, empty house with pictures of a mother she didn’t talk about.
Staring at Alicent, daring her to walk away.
“I’m sorry,” Alicent murmured, and the words cut her throat. “I…”
“Don’t,” Rhaenyra repeated. “Don’t apologise. Stop doing that, will you please just talk to me? I’m here, I am, I’m not going away and I’ll do whatever you want me to, I’ll be whatever you need me to be if you just, please fucking talk to me…”
It felt wrong, it all felt so wrong, and Alicent shook her head, nausea swimming in her stomach.
“You can’t keep doing this,” Alicent said, quietly now. “Trying to save me like I’m something that broke. You have your own life to live, Rhaenyra, your own dream.”
“And you’re not part of it?!” Rhaenyra asked, agitated, angrily wiping the tears from her cheeks with her sleeve like she used to as a child.
“You are going to that internship, Rhaenyra, I don’t care if I have to drag you there by the fucking jacket kicking and begging. I’m not a project, I have to fix this, this isn’t something you can fix it for me.”
The words landed, and for a second Rhaenyra looked genuinely taken aback. Her jaw clenched, but nothing came out of her mouth. Alicent held her gaze as she resisted the urge to soothe the wrinkles of worry on her girlfriend’s face and hold her again against her heart.
“I can’t leave you.”
She scoffed.
“You” Alicent replied with heat, raising a finger at Rhaenyra, who swallowed hard. “will stop making decisions for the both of us like I can’t decide for myself!”
They stared at each other, something electric and raw hanging in the air between them, like a challenge, a line both of them refused to cross no matter what, camped on their positions.
“What the hell is wrong with you two?!” Laena's voice cut in as she stepped in between them with unfiltered frustration. She rarely got angry, and her tone was enough to draw both of their attentions. “You,” she pointed at Rhaenyra, who took a step back. “stole a police car. And even the radio. Who even does that?!”
“I couldn’t find Alicent and…”
“And you,” she turned to Alicent, who suddenly felt very small. “nearly disappeared into nothingness because you didn’t want to inconvenience anyone?! Are you both clinically insane?!”
There was a long pause.
Then Laena threw her hands up. “I’ve had enough. This has gone one for so long, and I didn’t say anything because it’s not my place but someone’s got to do it since you can’t figure it out for yourselves. You’re both getting a little something called therapy. Ever heard of it? Well, you’re going! Together. And apart.”
Laena turned to face Rhaenyra, who was looking flabbergasted, like the idea in itself was something that had never crossed her mind before.
“I know what you’re about to say, but this time you need it as well, and you have to accept to get help,” she forged on in a tone that allowed no arguments.
For a moment, only silence hang in the air as no one dared to utter a sound, only the clock on the opposite wall, and the mother and her son in the corner staring at the scene with big eyes. Even the policemen had not yet intervened.
Alicent thought with irony that the Targaryens as a whole did have a tendency for melodrama, but she had never expected to play such a central role anytime soon.
“Okay” Rhaenyra eventually said, quietly, after a few seconds spent pondering, and that, Alicent hadn’t seen it coming.
It was simple, a word, a couple of letters, a few syllables. It was everything.
It felt like a thread being pulled taut, then loosened, like the pressure got released all at once and Alicent experienced it low in her chest. A tentative truce. Even Viserys’ shoulders dropped, and Rhaenys let out a breath. Somewhere near the desk, the bored officer turned back to his paperwork.
Rhaenyra looked over at Alicent, sheepish. And then she sensed it coming before it even happened in the way purple eyes twinkled and her girlfriend’s pretty mouth opened. “It’s time to bring tissues to our issues, it’ll be a real Freud of fresh air!”
Alicent groaned. She leaned in and kissed Rhaenyra, not caring about their audience anymore. It was, after all, the best way to shut her up. Efficiency proven times and times again.
Rhaenyra Targaryen had always been convinced she needed no help but her own. And yet for the first time in her life, she was ready to talk about her issues with someone other than her, if it only meant Alicent would smile.
Alicent would eventually be fine with it.