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100fandoms2024-07-04 01:03 am
tellshannon815) wrote in 100fandoms2024-07-04 01:03 am
Entry tags:
Look Like The Innocent Flower
Title: Look Like The Innocent Flower
Fandom: House of the Dragon
Characters/Pairings: Alicent Hightower
Rating: PG
Word Count: 845
Summary: For a moment, Alicent considers the friendship she could still have with Rhaenyra, before choosing to fight for her ambition for Aegon and his right to the throne.
Warnings/Spoilers: Spoilers all the way through the current season
This had never been what Alicent had wanted to happen.
Yes, she had said “an eye for an eye”, back at the time when Lucerys and Aemond had got into that fight where Aemond had ended up losing his eye, but she had never looked for Lucerys’s death. Neither had she looked for war with Rhaenyra; instead, she had looked for a truce, still thinking fondly of those days when they had started out as friends, and maybe that would have even happened had Viserys not died when he did, had Rhaenyra been able to return to them while he was still alive.
Alicent did not, at that point, regret her proclamation of Aegon, and not Rhaenyra, as the ruler of Westeros; that had truly been what she had understood Viserys to have been saying at the last, that he wished for Aegon to succeed him to the throne. And why had he not been proclaimed sooner? Viserys had named Rhaenyra heir initially at a time when he had no son and the heir otherwise would have been his brother Daemon, a man he felt he could never allow to succeed him. Yet with his second marriage, Viserys now had sons, sons whose legitimacy could never be called into question (which was more than could be said for Rhaenyra’s line; while many people would not speak of this publicly as Aemond had done at dinner, Alicent doubted anyone truly believed they were Laenor’s children). And while Viserys’s aim had been to prevent Daemon from taking the throne, with Daemon having since married Rhaenyra, he was practically there anyway. It had always been incomprehensible to Alicent why Viserys had left it so long to proclaim Aegon the rightful heir.
And in that moment, when Alicent repeated the last words of King Viserys to Rhaenyra, and Rhaenyra said that it was not his son Aegon, but Aegon the Conqueror, that Viserys was referring to, there was one moment where Alicent imagined standing up in front of the crowds of King’s Landing, declaring that she had made a mistake, that Rhaenyra was to be queen after all. In that moment when she had watched Aegon destroy Viserys’s model, she had thought of all the nights she had been forced to intervene as Aegon drank himself into a stupor, even his involvement in the prank with the pig, and she had wondered whether having Aegon proclaimed king was the right thing to do.
Now, it seemed that maybe there had been even more to this question of whether the throne should be Aegon’s than she had understood at the time. Alicent wanted to dismiss Rhaenyra’s argument that the whole thing had been a big misunderstanding and Viserys had never been trying to name Aegon his heir. Viserys had been of sound mind, he had finally understood what she and her father had been trying to explain for a long time, that Aegon by rights should inherit. Yet as soon as she thought it, another image flashed before her eyes of Viserys addressing her as Aemma (Alicent had dismissed it the first time it happened; he’d actually said it a few more times since, which Alicent had never spoken of to anyone). Yes, it was believable that Viserys was confused, and Alicent had had no reason to think that he would be speaking of his long dead ancestor in the moment. She could see how it could have happened.
If she stood up now, acknowledged her error, Alicent and Rhaenyra could be friends again, there would be no need for war. Sometimes she did wish that things could go back to how they had been before; Rhaenyra her best friend, never the suggestion of her marriage with Viserys, neither of them pawns in the will of men. As Otto talked strategies of parading the body of Jaeharys through the streets of King’s Landing in order to win public sympathy towards them and against Rhaenyra, as Aegon raged, as Ser Criston Cole’s actions were dictated by his longstanding loathing of Rhaenyra rather than any logic, any real loyalty to their cause, as Helaena pushed her away in her grief, Alicent wondered who she could turn to. At one time, without question, that would have been Rhaenyra. And when Alicent had lit the candle for Lucerys, it had been her close relationship with Rhaenyra that she was mourning just as much if not more.
And yet at the same time, Alicent also remembered all those years she had resented Rhaenyra, for taking the place in Viserys’s affections, in the line of succession, where her children should be. She had resented the fact that she was trapped in the marriage with the man she did not love, expected to conform to the wishes of her father, where Rhaenyra had pursued whatever that was she had pursued with Ser Criston Cole without a care.
The throne was Aegon’s; the only mistake had been by Viserys in not clearly naming him as heir much earlier. Alicent would say nothing, would continue fighting for her son.
Fandom: House of the Dragon
Characters/Pairings: Alicent Hightower
Rating: PG
Word Count: 845
Summary: For a moment, Alicent considers the friendship she could still have with Rhaenyra, before choosing to fight for her ambition for Aegon and his right to the throne.
Warnings/Spoilers: Spoilers all the way through the current season
This had never been what Alicent had wanted to happen.
Yes, she had said “an eye for an eye”, back at the time when Lucerys and Aemond had got into that fight where Aemond had ended up losing his eye, but she had never looked for Lucerys’s death. Neither had she looked for war with Rhaenyra; instead, she had looked for a truce, still thinking fondly of those days when they had started out as friends, and maybe that would have even happened had Viserys not died when he did, had Rhaenyra been able to return to them while he was still alive.
Alicent did not, at that point, regret her proclamation of Aegon, and not Rhaenyra, as the ruler of Westeros; that had truly been what she had understood Viserys to have been saying at the last, that he wished for Aegon to succeed him to the throne. And why had he not been proclaimed sooner? Viserys had named Rhaenyra heir initially at a time when he had no son and the heir otherwise would have been his brother Daemon, a man he felt he could never allow to succeed him. Yet with his second marriage, Viserys now had sons, sons whose legitimacy could never be called into question (which was more than could be said for Rhaenyra’s line; while many people would not speak of this publicly as Aemond had done at dinner, Alicent doubted anyone truly believed they were Laenor’s children). And while Viserys’s aim had been to prevent Daemon from taking the throne, with Daemon having since married Rhaenyra, he was practically there anyway. It had always been incomprehensible to Alicent why Viserys had left it so long to proclaim Aegon the rightful heir.
And in that moment, when Alicent repeated the last words of King Viserys to Rhaenyra, and Rhaenyra said that it was not his son Aegon, but Aegon the Conqueror, that Viserys was referring to, there was one moment where Alicent imagined standing up in front of the crowds of King’s Landing, declaring that she had made a mistake, that Rhaenyra was to be queen after all. In that moment when she had watched Aegon destroy Viserys’s model, she had thought of all the nights she had been forced to intervene as Aegon drank himself into a stupor, even his involvement in the prank with the pig, and she had wondered whether having Aegon proclaimed king was the right thing to do.
Now, it seemed that maybe there had been even more to this question of whether the throne should be Aegon’s than she had understood at the time. Alicent wanted to dismiss Rhaenyra’s argument that the whole thing had been a big misunderstanding and Viserys had never been trying to name Aegon his heir. Viserys had been of sound mind, he had finally understood what she and her father had been trying to explain for a long time, that Aegon by rights should inherit. Yet as soon as she thought it, another image flashed before her eyes of Viserys addressing her as Aemma (Alicent had dismissed it the first time it happened; he’d actually said it a few more times since, which Alicent had never spoken of to anyone). Yes, it was believable that Viserys was confused, and Alicent had had no reason to think that he would be speaking of his long dead ancestor in the moment. She could see how it could have happened.
If she stood up now, acknowledged her error, Alicent and Rhaenyra could be friends again, there would be no need for war. Sometimes she did wish that things could go back to how they had been before; Rhaenyra her best friend, never the suggestion of her marriage with Viserys, neither of them pawns in the will of men. As Otto talked strategies of parading the body of Jaeharys through the streets of King’s Landing in order to win public sympathy towards them and against Rhaenyra, as Aegon raged, as Ser Criston Cole’s actions were dictated by his longstanding loathing of Rhaenyra rather than any logic, any real loyalty to their cause, as Helaena pushed her away in her grief, Alicent wondered who she could turn to. At one time, without question, that would have been Rhaenyra. And when Alicent had lit the candle for Lucerys, it had been her close relationship with Rhaenyra that she was mourning just as much if not more.
And yet at the same time, Alicent also remembered all those years she had resented Rhaenyra, for taking the place in Viserys’s affections, in the line of succession, where her children should be. She had resented the fact that she was trapped in the marriage with the man she did not love, expected to conform to the wishes of her father, where Rhaenyra had pursued whatever that was she had pursued with Ser Criston Cole without a care.
The throne was Aegon’s; the only mistake had been by Viserys in not clearly naming him as heir much earlier. Alicent would say nothing, would continue fighting for her son.