The King's Whore - Aegon/Aemond

Chapter 10

129 AC

“Don't you dare even think about it!” Fern laughed at the increasingly devious look on Aegon's face the moment he noticed she was on the edge of his bed and not firmly inside it. “You've already taken all the covers.”
“I like you coverless.” He grinned back, pulling her back into the middle of the bed – rather than pushing her off as he'd initially wanted to. He leaned over her on one arm, looking down at her as she smiled cheerily up at him. Her cheeks were still flushed, skin still slick with sweat from their activities. “I want to do something tonight.”
“Like what?”
“Something fun.”
She played with the hair at the nape of his neck, delicate fingers brushing against his skin. “I can get more girls to join us again if you'd like, my Prince.”
Aegon's gaze flicked, involuntarily, to far below her eyes.
“As much as I want to agree to that proposal, I was thinking of doing something else. You know, something other than sex.”
Fern raised an eyebrow. “Do you have any other hobbies?”
“I drink, gamble, and have a full time job disappointing my mother.” Aegon answered, rolling off her.
Fern turned on her side, lifting his hand to play with it. She laced their fingers together and Aegon looked back at her slowly.
“Whatever you want to do, My Prince. I'm yours, remember?”
The corners of his lips curved up again and he began to kiss her. “Say that again.”
Fern kissed him back, her free hand moving slowly down his stomach and lower. “I'm yours, Aegon.”
Aegon was about to move on top of her again when the door opened.
He audibly groaned against Fern's shoulder.
Helaena entered their shared room and stopped for a moment when she noticed the whore in their bed.
“Princess.” Fern greeted awkwardly, Aegon's arm still wrapped around her in a way he'd never done to Helaena.
The Princess gave her a pinched almost smile, not even glancing at her husband. “Hello Fern.”
There was silence for a moment.
“What do you want, Helaena?” Aegon asked in frustration.
“Mother has need of us in the throne room.” Helaena answered, her voice small. “And I left some of the children's things–”
“What things?”
Fern frowned. She always liked to disappear before Aegon was needed anywhere or before Helaena returned to sleep, not because there was any ill feeling between herself and the Princess, but because she despised listening to the couple's discontent.
There was... Something, if not quite love, between them. A fondness that Fern knew Aegon held. But it drove her mad to see the way he behaved towards Helaena.
It was like he was a different person.
He wasn't gentle with her or kind.
Just distant. Withdrawn. Cold.
“I should return home anyway.” Fern said softly, kissing the Prince once before getting out of bed.
Helaena averted her gaze the moment she noticed Fern's complete lack of clothes.
Fern grabbed her things and pulled on some of her clothes so as to not completely scandalise the poor girl.
As she looked over at Helaena, she felt a pang of guilt.
She recalled how they'd first met. How Helaena had told her that she was glad, that it meant her brother would pay less attention to her and that was a good thing.
How Fern hadn't been able to see Aegon the same since.
“Won't you stay?” Aegon asked with big sad eyes that almost made her want to do anything he said.
Almost.
“I have other customers.” Fern told him gently. “And I expect you'll be busy for a while, will he not Princess?”
Helaena looked a little surprised that she was being spoken to. “I– I do not know.”
“Well, I'll be in the inn if you wish for my company, My Prince.” Fern made her way towards the door. She winked at Helaena. “The same to you, Princess.”
Then she left.
She took a deep breath, leaning back against the cold stone wall behind her. She'd not had time to fully dress, her laces undone and her shoes in her hand.
“A long day's work?” Aemond's calm voice cut through the silence.
She opened her eyes.
There he was.
Tall. Imposing. Dressed in black. His long hair tied back, an eyepatch over his face. His posture perfect. Like some ancient God. Like some... Some King.
In truth, she wasn't sure when it happened but, Aemond had grown from being a sweet boy to... Something she thought about more than she rightly should.
“You know your brother.” She said gently, looking at his lips. They were always curved into a slight smirk. As if he knew things that no one else did. “Princess Helaena has told him to get himself ready if that's why you're here.”
“It's not.” He kept his eye fixed on her as if he could see right through her and into her soul.
Fern shifted uncomfortably. “What did–”
“I wanted to ensure you weren't in the Keep.”
She narrowed her eyes at him, leaning forward off the wall.
There was a time where he would've stepped back shyly. But that time was long over.
He stayed in place, steady and stable, looking down at her as she moved closer.
“Well I am in the Keep.” She whispered. “So what now?”
The corners of his lips curved up, his eye running across her face.
Aemond stepped forward, and it was Fern who found herself stepping back. Once again, she felt the cold wall against her back.
“Go home, Fern.”
She couldn't help herself. She ran her fingers up the edge of his long, dark, coat.
Aemond's gaze shifted to her hand as it delicately made it's way up his clothes.
She reached his collar, and her hand kept moving up.
Higher. In the air. Towards his cheek.
Aemond grabbed her wrist, stopping her.
“Don't.” He said.
She grinned. “Don't what?”
“Don't do that.”
“You know, My Prince, you're quite tense. I'm sure I could–”
“Fern.” He cut through her. There was something about his tone that made her stop. An almost pleading tone the likes of which she'd not heard since...
She sighed.
“I was just leaving.”
“I'll have guards escort you. The streets are dangerous.”
“They're streets I grew up on. I'll survive.”
Aemond looked down at her unlaced dress and frowned.
With a huff, he let her hand drop.
Then his fingers moved towards the bodice of her dress.
Slowly, Fern watched as he laced it up again. He pulled each lace through each hole. One by one. Strand by strand.
His eye was fixed on the job. Not once did it stray to behind her dress. Not once did he look back up at her face.
“You know, most men pay to undress me. Not to dress me.” She told him with a laugh.
“Most men are idiots who think of nothing but their own satisfaction.”
She bit her lip. “And what do you think of, Prince Aemond?”
That caught his attention.
When his gaze finally met hers again, she felt like all the air had been knocked from her body.
“Is that what you think I'd do?” She leaned in closer. “Satisfy you?”
Aemond moved in even closer again, whispering in her ear, “I think that you're a woman who can read and write. You know history, strategy, philosophy. You speak languages from across the narrow sea. You could do anything. And yet here you are. Still servicing any man who will pay.”
Fern pushed him away. She was about to yell when she saw the look on his face.
He'd known that would rile her.
It's exactly what he'd wanted to do. To upset her. To frustrate her.
She took a deep breath.
“If that's all, My Prince, I'll be leaving.”
Aemond nodded and she moved away, turning her back to him.
He was ready to let her go. To watch her leave again for the thousandth time.
But he grabbed her arm again.
“Fern, wait.”
She turned on her heel. “What?”
As she faced him again, he looked away. There was a look on his face, like he'd eaten something sour.
“I wanted...” He started, biting the inside of his cheek hard enough to draw blood. “I wanted to help you. You know that, don't you?”
Ashe smiled weakly. “I know, Little Prince. I know. But there's no helping me.”
She turned on her heel and he watched her leave again.