FIRE AND BLOOD ( PROLOGUE; PART ONE ) "THOUGHT WE BUILT A DYNASTY THAT HEAVEN COULDN'T SHAKEM THOUGHT WE BUILT A DYNASTY LIKE NOTHING EVER MADE THOUGHT WE BUILT A DYNASTY FOREVER COULDN'T BREAK UP" Warnings: Sack of the Red Keep + the rape/death of Elia Martell and the brutal deaths her children, not detailed
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THEIR FIRST DAUGHTER HAD BEEN BORN ON A FIERY DAY. The sun had burnt so hot that it set fires to fields, the scent of smoke lingered within the Red Keep for weeks afterward. TheFireborn, the people had whispered once her birth had been announced. Now, she believed the name was very fitting due to everything that's happened.
King Aerys II had been adamant on her name being Aerea, to honor him, as Rhaegar had been named to honor Queen Rhaella. He insisted, despite what the name represented, despite the bad luck that surrounded it. Aerea wondered now that if her namesake had been the reason for her obsession but she would dismiss the thoughts as soon as they passed through her mind.
Rhaella had begged Aerys to chose a different name due to what had happened to the first Princess Aerea, begged and pleaded like none other but Aerys refused to listen and thus Princess Aerea of the House Targaryen was born into the Seven Kingdoms, sixteen years younger than her elder brother, Rhaegar. A magnificent tourney was held in her honor but no festivities could quell Rhaella's worry. Aerea knew now that her fears had not been without reason even if half of the Red Keep thought her mother was mad.
Aerea had been a curious child, which scared Rhaella like none other. Horrific pictures of the first Princess Aerea would haunt her day and night—of a girl who was too curious and mounted a dragon that flew to their cursed motherland of Valyria; of a girl who returned a year later who was so brutally mutilated that she begged for death, who fevered so terribly that she burned alive from the inside out with fire creatures crawling within her.
As the years passed, Rhaella's fears slowly began to dwindle—Aerea had calmed down, rarely leaving the library and the studies, constantly reading. Rhaella was able to sleep at night, unbeknownst to the fact that young Aerea was reading up on her namesake, of Valyria and its doom, of the Old Valyrian Faith and its gods. She, even at such a young age, had been obsessed with the idea of the Doom of Valyria and the wrath of the Valyrian gods. This obsession added on to the traumatic experience of the Sack of the Red Keep and the loss of her family and home is what led to her rather erratic actions after she had escaped.
She had been ten at the time of the Sack. Her mother and little brother, Viserys, were sent to be protected in Dragonstone (the pregnant Queen and the Heir were the only ones who mattered) and Aerea had stayed behind, terrified as the Lannisters, who were supposed to be their allies, stormed the gates.
Aerea had been born and raised in the Red Keep, she was small and fast, and those edges were what helped her survive the Sack. She ran through the hidden halls, holding back screams when she saw the savagely murdered maids and servants, sobbing when she finally got to Elia's room because she had thought Elia, her good-sister and her brother's wife, would be the most protected person in the Keep--she had known something was wrong when she heard the yelling through the open door and saw the dead bodies of the guards slumped on the ground.
