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No one tells you how ordinary it feels.
Jace wakes, dresses, breaks his fast, attends his mother's council, trains in the yard — and somewhere between all of it, remembers that he is married. That the girl across the breakfast table is his wife now, bound to him before gods and court and kingdom, and yet the sun rises the same way it did a week ago.
The Keep itself seems to share his confusion. Garlands hang limp from archways, too high for the servants to have bothered with yet. Stray petals turn up in odd places, pressed between the pages of a book, ground into the grooves of a stone step. The great hall is still perfumed with the faint sweetness of wine and candle wax days after the wedding feast.
And the gifts keep coming. Every morning brings another chest, another silk-wrapped bundle from lords near and far. Jace opens the latest at the breakfast table while Baela sits across from him. She focuses intently on her plate, tearing apart a piece of bread with her fingers. He wonders if she is thinking about last night.
His ears begin to redden.
He wouldn't call it a disaster. That implies something worth remembering. It was… he had wanted to please her. That was the whole of it. He'd gone to her with every intention of being good, being enough, armed with what he'd believed was a sound understanding of what a husband does. What he hadn't anticipated was –
“What’s that?” Baela asks, finally looking up from her plate to the object in his hands.
Jace blinks, pulling his thoughts back. In his hand rests a small, beautifully carved wooden box. When he lifts the lid, a faint, pleasant scent of rare oils drifts out. Nestled in dark velvet sits a smooth glass phial filled with a golden liquid, alongside a smaller velvet pouch.
Baela leans forward slightly, intrigued. “Oil?”
Jace uncorks the phial and sniffs. It smells warm, something like spiced honey and musk. “For… easing,” he says, reading the label written. For the heat between bodies. To make the joining sweeter.
His ears burn hotter. He quickly places the phial back in the box. There is also a small, heavy silver object in the pouch. He pulls it out and turns it in his fingers. A small, tapered bulb with a flared base and a delicate chain. The metal is cool and smooth to touch. He has no idea what it is.
“Some kind of… charm?” he wonders, confused. Perhaps a worry stone or a pendant of some kind? The shape is odd, but certainly not offensive.
Baela raises an eyebrow, a faint smirk tugging at her lips. “You really don’t know what that is?”
Jace turns the silver piece over in his fingers again, growing more self-conscious under her gaze. “Should I? It looks well-made. Maybe it’s meant to be worn around the neck or—”
"Oh, good. You've opened it."
Jace’s head snaps up. Aegon is dressed in a loose light-green robe that slips off one shoulder, his silver hair still tousled from sleep. Without waiting for permission, he saunters over and drops into the empty chair at their table as if he belongs there.
“My gift,” Aegon clarifies with a slow grin, gesturing toward the open box. “I was starting to worry it had gotten lost among all the boring goblets and ugly tapestries.”
Jace stares at him.
Aegon reaches across the table, snatches a bread roll from the basket, and tears into it with his teeth. “Well?” he asks, gesturing with the half-eaten roll and scattering crumbs. “What do you think? Exquisite craftsmanship. I had Eddard and Leon scouring half the city for the finest one available.”
His eyes slide over to Baela, who is staring at him with open disdain. Aegon flashes her a bright smile. “You are most welcome, cousin.” He winks.
“You sent this,” Jace says, voice tight.
"I did." Aegon beams. He has the radiant, generous expression of a man bestowing a tremendous kindness. "And frankly, given the words that’s been spreading around the Keep, I'd expect a bit of gratitude —"
"Aegon —"
"— and the other piece," Aegon continues, lifting Jace's goblet from in front of him and drinking from it without breaking stride, "that one's special. You'll want to warm it first." He sets the goblet down, wipes his mouth with the back of his hand, and leans in. "Trust me on that."
"What, exactly," Jace says carefully, "has been spreading around?"
Aegon cocks his head. "You haven't heard?"
"Heard what."
Aegon tips his chair back onto two legs like a boy half his age. "I assumed… well I assumed that's why you looked so grim this morning. Grimmer than usual, I mean. You've always had that quality. That sort of…" he waves the bread roll vaguely at Jace's face "...heaviness."
Baela’s expression shifts from disdain to something closer to disbelief. “Aegon,” she warns.
"People talk, nephew. That's all. It's what they do. A royal wedding happens, and the court picks it apart like crows on a carcass. The feast, the dress, the bedding." He lets the word sit there a moment, watching Jace's shoulders stiffen. "Especially the bedding. You know how they are."
"I know how you are," Jace says quietly.
Aegon feigns a wound. Hand to chest, brow furrowed. "That's unfair. I'm only the messenger." He tears another piece from the bread roll and pops it into his mouth. "I defended you, in fact. There were some rather creative theories making the rounds in the yard yesterday, I won't bore you with the details, and I made it very clear that no one should judge a man by his first few..." He chews. Swallows. Lets the silence do the rest.
"First few what," Baela says, fixing him with an unwavering stare.
Aegon looks at her. Baela looks ready to summon Moondancer and set him ablaze on the spot.
"I feel for you, cousin." He stands finally, brushing crumbs from his robe. "Truly, I do. Baela, if you ever find yourself wanting to know better, experience better..." His gaze slides to Jace at the last moment. "You know where to find me."
Jace feels the press of Aegon's hands on his shoulders before he can flinch away. Aegon leans down, his breath close enough that Jace can smell the wine on it from last night or this morning or both.
"Use them well," he whispers. And then he is gone. Walking out the way he walked in ,loose and easy, as though he has just done them both an enormous favor they'll thank him for later.
The solar falls deathly quiet.
“He is a fucking cunt,” Baela hisses, stabbing her knife into what remains of her bread.
Jace stares at the half-eaten food on his plate, the rumors now echoing loudly in his skull. “You know how he is,” he mumbles.
Baela reaches across the table and touches his wrist, her fingers warm but tense. “Don’t let him get in your head. He’s lying. He’s just trying to provoke you like he always has.” She forces a small smile that doesn’t reach her eyes. “We’re fine. Better than fine.”
Jace nods. He sweeps the box and its contents to the far end of the table with the back of his hand. Burn them, maybe.
They don't look at each other for the rest of the meal.
Jace throws himself into the work. He sits at his mother’s left hand in council, listening intently as she steers the realm. There are letters to answer, petitions to weigh, alliances to mend. He speaks when he should, offers suggestions that earn approving nods from several lords. For hours he almost forgets his uncle or his gift.
By afternoon, he is in the yard. Luke is grinning as they spar. The first time he lands Jace on his back, it’s fair. The second time, Luke sweeps his legs clean out from under him, and Jace hits the dirt hard enough to bite his tongue. He lies there a moment too long. The sky above is very blue and very empty.
Snickers ripple through the watching men.
Jace pushes to his feet, cheeks burning beneath the sweat and dirt. He can feel their eyes. The heir who cannot satisfy his own wife. The dragon who cannot even mount properly on his wedding night. He wonders which version of the rumor they believe today.
He spars harder after that. It changes nothing. Luke knocks him down a third time.
Later, as he crosses the outer yard, one of Aegon’s usual lackeys, a loud-mouthed knight with a crooked nose, laughs openly when their eyes meet. A bark of amusement. Jace’s hand twitches toward his sword before he masters himself and walks on.
By the time night falls he is in a foul temper. The relief of having separate chambers feels thinner than usual tonight. When the question of shared chambers arose before the wedding, he had been quietly grateful that tradition among the royal family allowed for separate rooms. He and Baela both preferred it. They are not the kind of people who need to breathe the same air at all hours to know they belong to each other.
He bathes quickly, changes into a clean tunic and breeches, and tells the waiting servant to fetch Baela.
Tonight will be different, he tells himself. He will be good. Careful. Patient. She deserves that much.
When she arrives, she looks beautiful in the low firelight. Her hair falls loose over one shoulder, and the glow softens the planes of her face. There is fire in her, the same fire that will make her a perfect match for the throne one day. He wants her. He wants to want her.
He kisses her first, careful, letting his hands drift over her waist, the curve of her hip. She tastes of mint. For a moment she leans into it, and hope flares bright and desperate in his chest. Then her fingers close around his wrist when he reaches for the laces of her gown.
"Not tonight," she says. "I'm tired, Jace. And Father is taking me out at first light tomorrow to train."
"Right," Jace says. He lets his hand fall. "Of course."
He should stop there. He knows he should stop there.
"Is this about what Aegon said?"
Baela's expression closes like a gate. Whatever softness the firelight had lent her is gone. She releases his wrist and stands, retying her robe with quick, irritated fingers.
"No."
"Because if the rumors have reached you too—"
"I said no." She turns on him, and for a moment she looks so much like her father that Jace almost steps back. "The court is full of bored, idle people with nothing of worth to occupy their tongues. If you start chasing every stupid thing they whisper, you'll never stop running." She smooths her robe, chin lifting. "We are fine. Leave it alone."
Jace stands in the middle of his chambers, hands at his sides. Relief and shame settle uneasily inside him. The wooden box still sits on the side table where he shoved it that morning.
Jace does not know how late it is when he finally leaves his chambers, only that the moon hangs high and silver over the Red Keep. Wine sits warm and unsteady in his blood. He had gone to Aegon’s chambers first. Empty, of course. No one expected the prince to spend his nights in his own bed, least of all his wife.
He'd been spared the indignity of searching Flea Bottom when a passing knight, startled by the sight of the Crown Prince prowling the halls at midnight, informed him that the Prince Aegon was entertaining in the eastern solar. Frolicking, the knight had called it, with the nervous cough of a man who regretted speaking the moment the words left his mouth.
Jace hears the laugh before he sees him. When Jace steps through the archway he finds his uncle sprawled like a king in the center of the room. Three of his usual lackeys surround him, flushed and half-drunk. They clap and jeer as Aegon performs.
"—and then," Aegon says, voice rich with wicked delight, "he takes his cock in hand." Aegon mimes looking down at himself, eyes going wide with horror. "Soft. Completely fucking soft. Which is a pity, because his bride, gods bless her, is perhaps the most beautiful woman in the realm. Wasted on this poor fool." He shakes his head in exaggerated sorrow. "So what does he do? He thinks. He thinks very hard." Aegon screws his face up, squeezing his eyes shut, fists clenched at his temples like a man trying to solve a great riddle. "Come on, come on, maybe if I picture someone else—"
He thrusts his hips, biting his lip in mock ecstasy. The men explode with laughter. One slaps his knee so hard he nearly falls off his stool.
Aegon is building to a finish, a moan rising as his head falls back, when Jace's hand closes on his shoulder and wrenches him around. The moan dies in a choked gasp. Aegon stares at him, mouth still open. For one satisfying instant, Jace watches his uncle's mind scramble to catch up with what his eyes are seeing.
"Nephew." Aegon recovers fast. The grin starts reassembling itself. "What a pleasant—"
“Out,” Jace snarls. His gaze stays locked on Aegon, but the command is for the others. “All of you. Now.”
The lackeys’ jeering dies instantly. They shift uneasily, eyes darting between the two princes.
Aegon pouts, even as Jace's fingers dig harder into the fabric of his tunic. "They are excellent company, Jacaerys. Come, join us. Martyn here does an excellent impression of a lady in her marriage bed, very educational–"
"Or I could have all three of them hanged by morning," Jace cuts in coldly, "and mount their heads on the spikes above the gate. They'd still be cheering for you from up there. Just quieter."
The men start to pale, turning to their prince with wide eyes.
Aegon blinks, then lets out a surprised laugh, almost impressed. He flicks his fingers without looking away from Jace. Go. "You heard your future king. Find your entertainment elsewhere tonight."
The lackeys don’t need to be told twice. They scramble up and file out, muttering hasty goodnights.
Aegon looks down at Jace's hand, still bunched in his tunic. "You can let go now," he says. "Unless you'd rather not."
Jace doesn’t release him. His heart is pounding so hard he can feel it in his teeth. Up close, his uncle smells of wine and clove smoke and warm skin. His eyes are too bright, too large, too fucking amused.
“You’re disgusting,” Jace hisses.
“Mm. And yet here you are,” Aegon replies softly, “Tell me, nephew… how many times did you try to fuck your wife tonight before you gave up and came looking for me?”
Jace’s face burns with humiliation. He shoves Aegon hard. His uncle stumbles back with a surprised oof, landing on the cushioned bench behind him. But he’s still grinning, like this is the most entertaining thing to happen all night.
"Temper, temper," Aegon says, smoothing his tunic. "Very kingly. Your mother would be proud."
"Shut up."
"Or what? You'll have me hanged too? I'll warn you, I'm told I make a rather pretty corpse."
Jace wants to wipe that smug smile off his face. Wants to punch that mouth until the mockery stops. “Is there anything you don’t make a joke of?”
"Not if I can help it." Aegon gets to his feet, unhurried, brushing dust from his tunic like Jace had merely bumped into him in a corridor. He finds a cup on the table, drinks from it, makes a face, drinks again. "You hit harder than I expected. That's something, at least. Shame you can't bring that energy to bed."
“I swear to the fucking gods—” Jace balls his hands into fists, his nails cutting into his palms.He forces a slow breath through his nose, fighting the urge to wrap his hands around Aegon’s throat. “I came here to demand you stop spreading those rumors.”
"Rumors." Aegon rolls the word around his mouth. "Which rumors? Be specific. I hear so many."
"You know exactly which—"
"The one where you spent yourself the moment she touched your laces? Before she even had her hand around you?" He takes a sip, thoughtful. "That one’s not mine, actually. I think Baela’s handmaid started it."
Jace’s ears roar with blood.
"Or is it the one where you went soft inside her? Halfway through, just... wilted. Like a candle in the rain." Aegon makes a sad little gesture with his finger, curling it downward.
"That's a fucking lie."
"Or… and this is my personal favorite, I'll take credit for improving this one, the version where you couldn't find the right hole." Aegon grins. "Kept pushing at her thigh like a dog rutting a chair leg, and poor Baela had to reach down and guide you in herself, and even then you could barely keep it–"
Aegon's head snaps sideways.
The punch is clumsy, with too much shoulder and not enough aim, but it lands squarely against his cheekbone, sending Aegon staggering into the table. He catches himself on the edge. He stays bent over for a moment, one hand pressed to his face, while Jace stands there with his fist still raised, his knuckles singing.
Aegon straightens slowly. He touches his cheekbone, then looks at the blood on his fingertips. His lip is split where his teeth caught it. He tongues the cut with a low hiss.
“Fuck,” he mutters, voice slightly slurred. “You actually hit me.”
“I told you to stop,” Jace grits out.
Aegon ignores him. He pushes off the table, rolls his jaw experimentally, and wipes the blood from his lip with the heel of his hand. “You know what your problem is, Jacaerys?” He steps forward. Jace doesn’t retreat, though every instinct screams at him to. “You’ve got it. All of it. The fire, the hunger, that—” He nods at Jace’s clenched fist. “But the moment you get near her, you bury it. You put on your good prince face and your dutiful husband voice and bore her half to death.”
"Don't talk about her."
"She's a dragonrider." Aegon takes another step. He is too close now. The blood on his lip is already drying dark. "She doesn't want careful. She doesn't want gentle. She wants a man who fucks the way you punch. Like he really means it."
"You don't know what she wants."
"I know what she's not getting."
Jace’s fist flies up again. This time Aegon catches his wrist mid-air. The grip is surprisingly strong. They stand locked together, breathing hard.
"Hit me again if you need to," Aegon says, his breath warm against Jace's face. “But it won't teach you how to touch your wife."
Jace yanks against the hold, but Aegon doesn’t let go.
“Then what will?” Jace spits, hating how unsteady his voice sounds.
Aegon's grip loosens slightly. His thumb presses against the inside of Jace's wrist, feeling his pulse. His eyes drop to Jace's mouth, then back up. "You know… there are other ways to learn."
Jace's breath catches. "What—"
Aegon's free hand comes up, cups his chin. His thumb brushes the corner of Jace's mouth. "I could teach you," he says softly. The softest thing he's said all night, and somehow the most obscene. "If you let me."
Jace's stomach folds in on itself. His skin is too hot. The wine is a roar in his blood and Aegon's hand is on his face and he is not moving
"I'm married," Jace whispers.
"So am I."
"This isn't—" His voice dies. Aegon's thumb traces his jaw, slow, following the bone down to the soft place beneath his ear. Jace's eyes sting. He doesn't know why. "This isn't what I came here for."
“No one has to know,” Aegon murmurs. “Not Baela. Not your mother. Not the fucking court. Just you and m… and whatever you decide to do with what I give you."
His thumb moves back to Jace's lower lip, pressing.
“You could take it all out on me, Jacaerys. Every bit of that frustration. Every ugly rumor. Every time you felt small.” Aegon leans in until it feels their lips are going to ouch. “I’d let you. I’d show you exactly how to use all that fire you’re wasting on being good.”
He pulls back just enough to meet Jace’s eyes, their noses brushing. “So tell me, nephew… do you want the lesson?”
The next day, Jace waits.
He spends the morning in a haze of disbelief and self-loathing, replaying every humiliating moment of the night before. He tells himself he will end it the moment Aegon appears. He will say it was a mistake, a moment of weakness. He will demand his uncle never speak of it again.
But Aegon doesn’t come.
Morning drags into afternoon. Afternoon bleeds into evening. Every time footsteps pass in the corridor, Jace’s stomach twists with both dread and hope. By the time the sun begins to set, the silence has become unbearable.
He played me.
Of course this was the plan all along. Aegon had offered “lessons” just to watch him squirm, to have a new story to whisper to his lackeys. The future king begged me to teach him how to fuck. Got on his knees for it, practically.
Humiliation clogs his throat. Jace grabs a cloak and storms out before he can talk himself out of it.
He finds his uncle at the Dragonpit.
The great cavern is quiet at this hour, filled with the low rumble of sleeping dragons and the scent of smoke and ash. Sunfyre lies coiled, his head resting on warm stone. And there, lounging against the dragon’s side as if he were a pillow, is Aegon — eyes closed, silver hair spilled across gleaming scales, one arm draped over his stomach.
For a moment, he finds himself standing there, watching his uncle sleep like some lovestruck idiot.
Then he remembers the humiliation. The waiting. The certainty that Aegon was mocking him.
Jace reaches down and yanks his uncle awake.
Aegon jerks upright with a strangled yelp, his eyes flying open. "What—Aemond?—fuck—"
Sunfyre's head lifts. A deep vibration rolls through the ground, and Jace feels the heat of the dragon's breath on the back of his neck. He doesn't let go.
"Where were you?" Jace hisses.
Aegon blinks at him, still half-asleep, face creased and stupid with confusion. The bruise from last night has purpled nicely beneath his eye. He looks around the pit as if trying to remember how he got here, then back at Jace.
"I was... sleeping?"
"You said you'd come." Jace's voice splinters. "You said you'd come tonight. You made me wait all day and you never—" He stops, swallows. "You were mocking me. Weren't you. This was all just a big prank."
"Jace."
"—tell the whole court about it. He actually said yes, you should have seen his face—"
"Jace." Aegon's hands close over his wrists. "I fell asleep," he says. "I came to see Sunfyre after lunch and I fell asleep. That's it. There's no joke."
"You really expect me to believe that?"
"I'm a lazy shit, Jacaerys. This is not new information." Aegon's thumbs press into the insides of his wrists, a mirror of last night. His eyes search Jace's face. "You thought I wasn't coming."
Jace says nothing. His jaw is clamped shut. Behind them, Sunfyre settles back down with a huff of hot air that stirs their hair.
"Let go of my tunic," Aegon says. "You're stretching it. I like this one."
Jace releases him. His hands feel strange with nothing to grip.
Aegon smooths the fabric down, rolls his neck, winces when it pulls at the bruise. “Sit down. We will begin your first lesson.”
Jace doesn't move. "I don't want a lesson."
"Liar." Aegon pats the stone beside him. "Sit."
Against every instinct, Jace sinks down beside him. The warmth of Sunfyre's flank radiates through the air. Aegon's shoulder is close enough to press against if either of them leaned.
“First rule,” Aegon murmurs. “Stop thinking like a husband.”
Jace stares straight ahead at the dark cavern wall, jaw tight.
Aegon’s fingers brush his chin, turning his face around. “Look at me when I’m teaching you, nephew.”
Their eyes meet. “You went to her like a dutiful prince,” Aegon continues. “Asking permission with every touch.” He scoffs softly. “She doesn’t want to be handled like glass. She wants to be claimed.”
Jace swallows. "And you know what she wants."
Aegon’s smile is slow and filthy. “I know. And I know you’ve got it in you. I saw it last night when you punched me.” His thumb traces the edge of Jace’s jaw, then drops lower, brushing over the rapid flutter of his pulse. “That fire. That anger. You bury it because you think a good king can’t want to ruin things. But you do.”
Jace’s breath catches as Aegon leans in, lips brushing the shell of his ear.
“Lesson one starts simple,” Aegon whispers. "Kissing."
"I know how to kiss."
"You know how to put your mouth on someone. Different thing." Aegon tilts his head. "And I'm not taking your word for it. Show me."
"I don't want to kiss you."
A flicker of impatience crosses Aegon’s face. "I can't fix what I can't see. How you kiss tells me everything. Where your hands go, how long you hold, whether you lead or wait to be led." He holds Jace's stare. "Kiss me the way you kiss her. Then I'll tell you what's wrong."
"And if nothing's wrong?"
Aegon just looks at him, waiting.
Jace stares at him. At the full curve of his mouth, the faint sheen of light on his lower lip, the bruise darkening his cheekbone.
This is a mistake.
But he's already leaning in.
The first kiss is stiff, almost angry. A dry press of lips that lasts barely a heartbeat. He pulls back immediately, cheeks burning.
Aegon exhales through his nose, unimpressed. “Again. Like you actually want her.”
Prickly humiliation needles at Jace, but he leans in a second time. This kiss is longer. He tries to remember how he kissed Baela on their wedding night – gentle and reverent. His hand comes up awkwardly to rest on Aegon’s shoulder.
Aegon lets it happen for a few heartbeats before he breaks the kiss with a soft, derisive sound. "That's how you kissed her on your wedding night?" he asks, incredulous.
"What's wrong with it?"
“Nothing. It’s perfectly nice.” Aegon wipes his mouth with the back of his hand. “You kiss like a septon blessing a forehead. Your hand was on my shoulder like I was a skittish horse you didn’t want to spook. Tongue firmly behind your teeth. You tilted your head but never actually moved into it.” He counts the flaws off on his fingers. “You kiss like duty, not desire.”
Jace's fingers dig into his own knees. "So what am I supposed to do."
"Stop being so fucking polite." Aegon shifts, turning to face him fully. His knee presses against Jace's thigh. "When you want something, really want it, you don't put your hand on its shoulder. You don't keep a safe distance. You close the gap and you don't leave room for her to wonder whether you actually want to be there."
"I do want to be there."
"Then show it. " Aegon reaches down, pries Jace’s clenched hand off his own knee, and guides it to the side of his neck. "Here. Not the shoulder. You hold her here, and she feels your hand and your pulse and the heat of you all at once. She knows you're not going anywhere."
Jace’s fingers find the quick beat of Aegon's pulse.
"Other hand." Aegon guides it to his waist, resting it against the curve of his ribs just above his hip. He keeps it there until Jace's fingers tighten on instinct.
“Good,” Aegon whispers. “Now kiss me again. Don’t think about what’s proper. Don’t think about being a good husband. Just—”
Jace kisses him.
Not because Aegon told him to. Because the talking was unbearable and Aegon's pulse was under his hand and the distance between them had shrunk to nothing and it was either kiss him or stop breathing.
This one is different.
The kiss is hard. Graceless. His nose bumps Aegon's and he doesn't care. He presses in with his mouth already open, swallowing Aegon’s surprised inhale. His hand on Aegon's waist twists tighter in the fabric, dragging him close. The other hand slides up into silver hair, gripping hard and pulling, and Aegon moans into his mouth before he can stop himself.
Jace bites down on his uncle’s lower lip. Right over the split, drawing fresh blood. He feels the flinch, then the way Aegon pushes into it, mouth opening wider, tongue sliding hot and slick against his own. The metallic taste of blood floods between them. Aegon’s hand comes up to grip Jace’s jaw, holding him in place.
For a few dizzy, airless seconds, Jace forgets everything – where he is, who he is, what this lesson is even supposed to be.
When he pulls back, breathing feels strangely difficult. Aegon's lip is bleeding again, a thin dark line reopened along the cut. "Fuck." He sounds almost winded. "Where was that hiding."
"What's the second lesson," Jace says. He doesn't recognize his own voice.
Aegon blinks, visibly startled for a moment. Then a slow, pleased smile spreads across his face. “Eager student,” he murmurs. He releases Jace’s jaw, letting his hand drop to his own lap, and leans back against Sunfyre’s warm flank. “Second lesson isn’t kissing.”
“Then what?”
Aegon tilts his head, considering him with half-lidded eyes. “I don’t think you’ve quite passed the first one yet.”
“What?” Jace scoffs, still breathing hard. “I made you breathless.”
"You made me bleed." Aegon dabs his lip with his knuckle. "Impressive, yes. Flattering. But that's not the same thing as good."
"You told me to stop being polite. I stopped being polite."
"You did. And you went straight past 'not polite' into 'trying to eat my face.'" Aegon shifts against Sunfyre's flank, settling in. "Don't get me wrong, very exciting, I enjoyed myself, but if you do that to Baela she's going to think you're upset with her."
Jace opens his mouth to argue, but Aegon holds up a finger. "You need to learn the middle. There's a place between the septon's blessing and the mauling." He gestures loosely between them. "So. Again."
Jace stares at him. "Again."
"Kiss me again. But this time… find it."
"I didn't maul you."
"My lip would disagree." Aegon touches it again, wincing for effect.
Jace opens his mouth to argue again that he didn't maul him, it was a kiss, Aegon is being dramatic as always, but Aegon makes an impatient sound and leans forward himself.
Jace has half a heartbeat to prepare before his lap is full of uncle.
Aegon settles across his thighs like this is a chair he's sat in a hundred times, knees bracing on either side of Jace's hips. His hands come up to frame Jace's face, thumbs stroking over his cheekbones, fingers curling behind his jaw.
"Watch," Aegon breathes. "And for the love of every god, feel."
His lips hover. Jace can feel the warmth of his breath, the ghost of contact without the thing itself. It lasts long enough to become maddening, tantalizing.
Maybe this is another lesson, Jace realizes dimly. Making someone wait.
When Aegon finally closes the distance, it's slow and unhurried. Aegon’s mouth is soft, plush and so warm, and Jace feels the earlier urge surge up, the impulse to shove forward and devour, but he holds it. Follows Aegon's lead instead. Lets himself be kissed rather than doing the kissing, and the difference is – he didn't know there was a difference.
Aegon tips his head, finds a new angle, and their tongues slide together. Jace moans. The sound startles him badly enough that he nearly pulls back, but Aegon just smiles against his mouth and brushes a hand through his curls, fingers catching gently in the tangles. His hips shift. A slow, easy roll, almost idle, as if he's simply getting comfortable and not grinding down against Jace's —
Jace's cock stirs. Wakes. Full and sudden, a rush of blood so immediate it nearly hurts. His hands, which had been drifting aimlessly around Aegon's waist, drop lower. He takes two full handfuls of his uncle's arse and hauls him down hard against the growing swell of him.
Aegon gasps into his mouth, the sound sweet and startled. The satisfaction of it runs through Jace like lightning. He does it again, pulls Aegon's hips flush against his own, and this time the noise Aegon makes is breathier.
"Shh," Aegon murmurs uselessly against his lips, one hand flattening on Jace's chest as if to slow him down. As if that would do anything about the obvious hardness pressing up between them.
Jace ignores him. His mouth drags from Aegon's lips down to his jaw, then lower, latching onto the warm skin just beneath his ear. He sucks hard, tongue and teeth working against the pulse he finds hammering there, and the skin darkens almost immediately under the attention. He bruises easily, Jace thinks. Too easily. Like fruit left out in the sun.
His hips grind up again, and Aegon's head falls back.
"Jace—" Aegon's voice has lost its instructional tone entirely. He sounds strained. His fingers fist in Jace's hair. "Jace—"
But Jace's mouth is busy. He sucks another mark into the column of Aegon's throat, lower this time, where the collar of his tunic has slipped aside to expose the jut of his collarbone. This one blooms darker. Aegon's hips stutter against his, and the sound he makes is close to a whine.
"Jace, we're—"
A blast of hot air hits Jace from behind. The force of it blows his hair forward into his face and carries with it the stench of charred meat.
Then the roar.
It splits the air so close to his skull that his ears ring and his vision whites out for a sickening instant. Every muscle in his body locks. His hands freeze on Aegon's hips. Slowly, very slowly, he turns his head.
Sunfyre has moved. The dragon's head is right there, close enough to touch. His jaws are parted, the faint glow of fire visible deep in his throat, and his eyes are fixed on Jace as though waiting for him to make the wrong move.
Nobody moves.
"Don't," Aegon whispers. His hand is pressed flat against Jace's chest, holding him still. "Don't move. He's protective when I'm—" He pauses, as if considering how to finish that sentence. "—vulnerable."
"You might have mentioned that," Jace says through his teeth, "before you climbed into my lap ten feet from his jaw."
"I didn't think you'd try to fuck me against his ribcage."
Sunfyre's nostril flares. Another wave of heat rolls over them. Jace is suddenly and acutely aware of every point of contact between his body and Aegon's: his hands on Aegon's hips, Aegon in his lap, the hard evidence of what they were doing pressed shamelessly between them. It is the least dignified position in which to be eaten alive by a dragon.
Aegon murmurs something soothing, a lilting string of syllables that sound like a lullaby. His hand reaches out, fingers brushing the golden snout. The glow at the back of Sunfyre's throat dims. One more rumble — this one lower, almost sulky, and the head withdraws, settling back down onto the stone with a thud that shakes the ground.
Aegon exhales. "Well," he says. His cheeks are flushed, lips swollen, two fresh bruises darkening on his throat. "That's never happened before."
“I thought Sunfyre liked me,” Jace mutters, remembering the times Aegon had taken him riding on the golden dragon years ago, back when Vermax was still too small to carry him properly.
"He did." Aegon glances at the dragon with something close to sheepish. "I may have spoken poorly of you after you left for Dragonstone."
"You turned your dragon against me."
“I was lonely, Jacaerys.” Aegon’s hands are still resting on Jace’s shoulders, thumbs idly stroking the side of his neck. “There was no one to laugh at my jokes. No one to fetch me wine. No one to keep me company.” His mouth pulls into a sulk that looks almost identical to the one his dragon had worn moments earlier. “Poor Sunfyre had to listen to me complain about you every single night. He drew his own conclusions.”
"So what you're saying is you missed me."
"I didn't miss you."
"You missed me so badly you spent every night talking about me to your dragon."
"All complaints. Very unflattering ones." But the tips of his ears have gone pink, and he still hasn't climbed out of Jace's lap.
"You seemed to have found replacements easily enough," Jace says, referring to his lackeys.
"And all better company than you." Aegon's chin lifts. "They laugh louder, drink more, and none of them have ever punched me in the face."
"Get off me."
Aegon’s smile turns wicked. “Make me.”
For a moment, Jace considers it. He considers dragging Aegon back down and kissing that smug look off his face. But Aegon is already on his feet, swinging himself off Jace's lap.
“Anyway,” he says, brushing at his rumpled tunic, “I’d call that progress.” His fingers drift up to touch the fresh bruises blooming along his throat. “You’ll want to work on your restraint, obviously. A man who forgets there’s a dragon at his back has either lost his mind entirely… or found something worth losing it for.”
He extends a hand to pull Jace up.
Jace stares at it.
"Lesson two," Aegon says, hand still outstretched, "is tomorrow. Assuming Sunfyre doesn't eat you before then."
The next day, Jace wakes feeling almost confident.Perhaps it was only fear holding him back before. Now a wall has cracked open inside him, and courage flows through the breach. If things goes well, he tells himself, he may not even need the rest of Aegon’s lessons.
The family gathers for supper in one of the smaller halls. The long table bows beneath an abundance of food. Jace sits beside Baela and reaches beneath the table to cover her hand with his. A proper husband’s gesture.
Baela barely notices. She leans toward Helaena, deep in conversation about some dream or distant star. Her fingers lie limp beneath his.
The guilt comes suddenly, slicing through his newfound confidence. He looks across the table at Helaena. She must know what Aegon is. Everyone does. And now Jace has made himself one of them, stealing secret lessons from his degenerate uncle while his wife sits unaware. Baela, who deserves far better than half a husband and vicious court whispers.
He tells himself it's different. He hasn't been with Aegon in a real way, not truly. A couple of kisses. Nothing that would count in a septon's eyes. And it's for Baela, isn't it? That's why he's doing this. To be better for her.
"To the future king and queen. May your union be long and fruitful."
His mother's voice rings out, breaking through his spiraling thoughts. Rhaenyra stands at the head of the table, goblet raised high as she looks at them, smiling. Jace feels something in his throat close up. She is proud of him. Of them. She believes in this marriage, in the alliance it represents, in the future it promises.
He barely registers the others raising their glasses. Long life, many heirs, blessings of the Seven – until a familiar figure slips in late and drops into the chair opposite him. Aegon reaches for the nearest wine pitcher before he's even fully seated.
Their eyes meet across the table. Aegon's mouth twitches into a small smile. A private, infuriating thing that makes Jace's pulse stumble sideways. He looks away first.
Then Helaena speaks.
“Marriage isn’t so bad when your husband remembers you exist. When he doesn’t wander off… even while sitting at the same table.” She smiles softly at Baela. “You are fortunate. You got a kind one.”
A few awkward chuckles ripple down the table.
Jace watches Aegon absorb the words. His uncle's smile droops, the corners pulling down just slightly, like a banner losing its wind.
Baela smiles at Helaena. She slips her hand from beneath Jace’s and reaches across the table to clasp Helaena’s fingers in both of her own. “Thank you, Helaena. That means a lot.”
The meal drags on. By the time the plates are being cleared, Jace has rehearsed the words a dozen times in his head. He catches Baela's wrist as she rises. "I thought I might come to you tonight."
Baela hesitates. "Not tonight. I'm going to sit with Helaena for a while." Her expression hardens. "She seemed withdrawn all evening. I can't stand what he does to her, Jace. She deserves so much better than—" She stops herself, shaking her head. "I just want to be with her tonight."
"Of course." Jace swallows. "After, then? I could wait up—"
But Baela is already standing, brushing a quick kiss to his cheek and moving to join Helaena. Jace’s gaze lifts and collides with Aegon’s across the table. His uncle had clearly been eavesdropping. He raises his goblet in a mocking little toast, lips shaping a single silent word:
Tonight.
"Aren't you worried about her?" Jace asks when the door closes behind them.
He isn't sure why he says it. Maybe because the image of Helaena tracing her empty cup still sits behind his eyes. Maybe because if he's talking about Aegon's marriage, he doesn't have to think about his own.
Aegon pours two cups without asking. "We could call this off," Jace adds, though his feet don't move toward the door. "If you'd rather—"
"Rather what?" Aegon sets a cup in front of him. "Go sit at her bedside and hold her hand? Braid her hair and tell her I'll do better?" He drinks from his own cup. "Helaena and I have been married for years. Neither of us chose it. Neither of us pretends otherwise." He sets the cup down. "It's done. There's nothing more to do about it."
The flatness of it catches Jace off guard. "Does she know?" He asks. "That you whore around."
Aegon pauses mid-sip. "Whore around," he repeats. "Is that what you think this is?"
"Isn't it?"
"Helaena knows what I am. She's known longer than you have, longer than anyone." He refills his cup, though the first is barely finished. "She doesn't hate me for it. That's the worst part, actually. She should. It would be easier if she did." He pauses, thumb running along the rim. "She just… looks through me. Like I'm a window with nothing behind it."
Jace says nothing. He thinks of Baela's hand lying limp under his at supper.
"So no," Aegon continues, and the familiar bite slides back into his voice, "I am not worried about her. Baela will do more for Helaena tonight than I've managed in three years of marriage." He smiles, and it doesn't reach his eyes. "Does that satisfy your conscience? Can we begin?"
Jace picks up the cup Aegon poured him and drinks.
"Lesson two," he says.
Aegon doesn't answer immediately. For the briefest moment, he looks relieved. Then he smiles like he always does and sets his cup aside before walking over.
His fingers find the hem of Jace's tunic. "Off."
"What's the lesson."
"Does it matter?" Aegon tugs the fabric upward. "You'll find out."
Jace lets him pull the tunic over his head. Cool air kisses his bare skin, but it’s quickly replaced by the heat of Aegon stepping in close. His gaze roams openly over Jace’s chest,his teeth worrying his lower lip.
"Now. Kiss me the way we practiced."
Their mouths meet and this time there's no fumbling, no stiffness. He's learned this part. He kisses Aegon deep and slow, finds the rhythm between pressure and softness, and feels Aegon hum approval against his lips.
Then Aegon's hand slides down Jace's stomach. His fingers trace the line of muscle above his breeches, a whisper-light touch that makes the muscles shiver and clench.
Jace breaks the kiss. "What are you doing?"
"Keep kissing me." Aegon's fingers slip just beneath the laces, resting there. "And tell me what happened on your wedding night."
Jace goes rigid. "I'm not talking about that."
“You are.” Aegon catches Jace’s lower lip between his teeth, tugging gently. The spark of heat shoots straight down Jace’s spine. “Did you get hard for her?”
"Aegon—"
"Did you."
Jace's breath shortens. "Yes," he grits out. "At first."
Aegon’s mouth moves to his jaw, nipping lightly. “And then?”
Jace's eyes fall shut. "Then I... I tried to be with her, and I could feel her watching me. Waiting for something. And I couldn't..."
"Couldn't what."
"I couldn't stay hard." The words rip out of him. "It just… went away. Like I'd never wanted it at all. She had to pretend she didn't notice."
Aegon is quiet for a moment. His mouth stills against Jace's jaw. Then his hand moves, slipping past the laces, fingers finally wrapping around his now-aching cock.
Jace chokes. His hips jerk forward before he can stop them, and his hand flies up to clutch Aegon's shoulder.
"So you have trouble staying hard," Aegon says, voice thick with dark amusement. He gives one long, slow stroke, root to tip. "How sttrange."
"Yes," Jace manages. The word dissolves into a groan when Aegon sweeps his thumb across the head, smearing the wetness there in a slow circle. His knees are threatening to give.
"Strange," Aegon repeats, "You don't seem to be having that problem now."
Jace can't answer. His forehead has dropped to Aegon's shoulder, breathing open-mouthed against his uncle's skin. His thoughts scatter. There is only the heat of Aegon's hand, the drag of his palm, a certainty that he has never in his life been this hard.
Aegon releases him.
The loss of contact is so sudden that Jace staggers. A desperate, humiliating noise escapes his throat.
"Tonight's lesson," Aegon says, looking up at him with dark eyes and swollen lips, "is staying hard."
Then he sinks to his knees.
"Aegon—" Jace’s hands are shaking. He doesn't know where to put them.
Aegon takes one and guides it into his own hair. "Here," he says. "Hold on."
Jace's fingers twist into the silver strands, and Aegon leans forward and puts his mouth on him.
The sound Jace makes is not a word. It is animal and broken and loud enough to fill the chamber. Aegon's mouth is hot and wet, lips tight, tongue flat, taking him in inch by inch like he has all night and plans to use every minute of it. Jace's grip tightens in his hair and Aegon moans around him.
"Fuck—" Jace's head drops back. "Fuck, Aegon, I can't—"
Aegon pulls off. His lips are swollen, shining, a thin strand of spit connecting his mouth to Jace's cock. He looks utterly ruined. He looks divine.
"Still hard?"
"Fuck you," Jace pants. "I can't even breathe—"
“Then don’t.” Aegon wraps a hand around the base of him, squeezing just enough to drag him back from the edge. “This,” he says, looking up at him with blown-black eyes, “is what staying hard feels like. Not forcing it. Not thinking about it. Just letting yourself drown in it.”
His thumb strokes lazily along the shaft, tracing a thick vein. “When did you start thinking just now?”
Jace shakes his head. "I didn't."
"When did you worry about losing it?"
"I didn't."
"When did you picture someone else to keep yourself going?"
"I—" Jace's voice breaks. "I didn't. I was just — you were—"
You were all I could see.
"Good," Aegon says softly. He leans in again, pressing an open-mouthed kiss to the leaking head of Jace’s cock before taking him back in. His hands slide up Jace's thighs and grip his hips, pulling him forward, encouraging the shallow thrusts Jace has been fighting to hold back. His throat opens and Jace feels himself slide past the point where any sane thought could survive.
Jace fucks his mouth.
His hips snap forward and his hand fists in Aegon's hair and he uses him – properly, selfishly, the way Aegon has been goading him to since this started. And Aegon takes it. The sounds coming from between them are wet and filthy and neither of them pretends otherwise.
Jace looks down, which is a mistake.
Aegon is hard. Straining against his breeches, obvious and untouched, his cock tenting the thin fabric in a way he's made no effort to hide. His hips shift, small, involuntary rolls against nothing, his body chasing friction it can't find. And the sight of his uncle on his knees, aching, neglected, getting off on the act of servicing him, does something to Jace that rearranges the very workings of his brain.
He pulls Aegon off by the hair. Aegon's head snaps back, a thin line of spit trailing from his lower lip. His eyes are glazed. He looks drunk on it. Cock-drunk, Jace thinks, and the vulgarity of the word in his own mind shocks him almost as much as how accurate it is.
“Fuck,” Jace breathes. His thumb brushes roughly over Aegon’s wet bottom lip.
Aegon draws a shaking breath, and Jace lets him have half of it before feeding his cock back back into his mouth.
He holds Aegon's head in place and thrusts into his mouth with a desperation that would have horrified him an hour ago. Aegon gags once, twice, before his throat relaxes. Tears gather at the corners of Aegon's lashes. He blinks them loose and they track down his flushed cheeks.
"You wanted this," Jace grits out. "You wanted me like this. Didn't you."
Aegon's answer is a helpless, eager moan.
It builds fast. A hot, tightening pressure at the base of his spine that leaves no room for thought for anything — until it snaps.
Jace comes with a broken groan, hips stuttering as he spills down Aegon’s throat. He holds Aegon there through the last pulses. Aegon swallows around him until Jace is trembling and oversensitive.
Only then does he pull off, sitting back on his heels. He wipes his mouth with the back of his hand, like a man finishing a meal.
Jace's legs give out. He sinks to the floor. The fire has burned low without either of them noticing. He stares at the ceiling and feels the sweat cooling on his skin and waits for the guilt to arrive.
Aegon clears his throat. When Jace looks over, his uncle is still on the floor, legs folded beneath him. "Well," his voice is a ruin. He clears his throat again, and this time the smirk creeps back into place. "Marked improvement."
Jace is still catching his breath.
"But that wasn't the lesson." Aegon’s grin widens. "You failed."
"How."
"Staying hard, Jacaerys. That was the point. And you just…" He gestures vaguely at the mess of the evening. "...finished. Which is the opposite of staying."
Aegon looks far too pleased with himself.
Jace stares at him for a beat, then says calmly, “I’m still hard.”
Aegon stills. His hand freezes halfway to a cup he'd been groping for blindly across the floor.
"I've been hard the entire time," Jace continues. "Through all of it. I didn't lose it once."
Aegon sets the cup down and turns. His gaze drops, confirming what Jace just said. His lips part in surprise. Jace is hard again.
“Well… fuck.”
“I don’t understand why it’s not working,” Jace exclaims in frustration days later.
Morning light peeks weakly through the clouds, filling Aegon's chambers with a pale glow. The prince is still buried deep in the sheets, only a messy tangle of silver hair and one bare shoulder visible.
Jace grabs the edge of the blanket and yanks it down. “Are you even listening to me?”
"Fuck off," Aegon mumbles into the pillow, dragging the sheet back over his head with a blind, fumbling hand. "S'not even noon."
“No.” Jace shakes his shoulder roughly. “You said you would teach me. You promised it would work.”
Aegon cracks one eye open, squinting against the light like a disgruntled cat. “Seven hells, nephew. Some of us were up until dawn.” He stretches languidly, the movement pulling the sheet low on his hips, then lets out a dramatic sigh. Say whatever you've come to say. Quickly. I need my rest."
Jace paces the length of the bed, three steps and back, hands flexing at his sides. "Last night with Baela. It started well enough. I kissed her properly, the way you showed me. She responded. She seemed to… want it, I think." His voice lowers, thick with shame. "But halfway through, I just… froze. Again. She touched me and I couldn't…"
He stops pacing. Stares at the window.
"The rumors will never stop, will they." It isn't really a question. "If anything, they're going to get worse."
The room is quiet long enough that Jace almost turns to check whether Aegon has fallen back asleep. When he does look, his uncle is rubbing his eyes with the heels of his hands, jaw cracking around a yawn so wide it looks like it might unhinge. There's drool drying on his cheek.
"Don't worry about the rumors," Aegon mumbles. "I'll have Eddard and Leon put new ones out. Prince Jacaerys fucks like a beast. Leaves his wife sore and smiling for days.” He yawns again, right in the middle of the sentence. “All true, of course. Just… not with the right person yet.”
The last part comes out half-swallowed by the yawn, so casual it takes Jace a full breath to register what was actually said.
He turns sharply. "What?"
Aegon burrows deeper into his pillow. "I'm only saying. You can love a person entirely and still not want them that way. The two things sit side by side all the time. People just don't like admitting it." A slow, sleepy exhale. "I would know."
Jace stands very still. "You don't know what you're talking about."
The look Aegon gives Jace is infuriatingly mild. "You are more your mother's son than you think, Jacaerys. Married to one, but–" He waves a hand, a lazy flick of the wrist. Then his eyes close, and just like that he's drifting again, settling back into sleep as easily as sinking into warm water, as though he hasn't just cracked Jace's chest open and peered inside.
Jace smacks the side of his head.
Aegon jolts, blinking, one hand coming up too late to block nothing. "Ow–what–"
"You don't get to say something like that and then go back to sleep."
"I wasn't asleep, I was–" Aegon rubs his ear, scowling up at him. "You know what? Fuck you, nephew. Just for that, I'm done. Lessons are over. You're on your own. Go fumble your way through the rest of your marriage in peace and leave me out of it."
He rolls over, dragging the sheet with him, presenting Jace with a wall of bare back and tangled hair.
"Aegon, you can't… I need your help. I don't know how to fix this."
"Not my problem anymore. You hit me in my sleep. Twice now, if we're keeping count."
"Do you know what my mother said to me this morning?" The words begin spilling out before Jace can order them, tripping over one another in their haste to escape. "She said she can't wait to see the family grow. That she dreams of holding her first grandchild. She took my hands and looked at me like I was…" His voice falters. "They expect an heir, Aegon. Already. The whole court is watching and waiting and I can't even —"
He stops. His hands are shaking and he hates it.
Slowly, Aegon rolls back over. The petulance is gone from his face. He sits up properly and grabs Jace’s wrists, tugging until Jace sinks down onto the edge of the bed. Jace’s hands are fists in his lap, knuckles bloodless. Aegon takes them and pries his fingers open one by one, pressing his thumbs into rigid palms until the tension eases.
“Don’t panic,” Aegon says. "Panic makes you stupid, and you have precious little wit to spare as it is."
"How do you do it?" Jace asks, voice hollowed out. "With Helaena. If it's the same for you. How do you get through it?"
"Same way I do everything I don't want to do," Aegon says. "Drunk."
“Drinking doesn’t help me.” Jace had tried. It only made everything worse.
"Mm. Doesn't work for everyone." Aegon is quiet for a moment, thumb tracing an idle circle against Jace's palm. "Do you want to practice on a woman instead? Maybe that’s what you need. Perhaps the dresses and the tits are what scare you.” He huffs a quiet, sleepy laugh. “I could fetch a whore for you.”
“No,” Jace says quickly, trapping Aegon’s fingers in his own. “I don’t want a whore.”
"Then I don't know how else to…" He trails off. Something shifts behind his eyes. He tilts his head, chewing the inside of his cheek, and Jace can almost see the thought arrive. "We can try one last thing."
"What?"
"Meet me here after lunch." His eyes gleam. "And this time, nephew. Bring the oil."
Jace can't remember the last time he felt this eager.
He tears through the day like a man trying to outrun the sun. Council passes in a blur of nodding and agreeing with whatever his mother says. Sparring with Luke ends early when Jace wins three bouts in a row and Luke accuses him of being possessed. He barely tastes lunch, shoveling food down so quickly that Baela gives him a strange look from across the table.
When she mentions she's taking Helaena flying that afternoon, Jace has to physically restrain the relief from showing on his face. "That sounds lovely," he says, and means it for entirely the wrong reasons.
By midafternoon, he is sitting on the edge of Aegon's bed, the wooden gift box resting beside him. Aegon is still on the far side of the room, half-hidden behind a painted screen, tinkering with something.
"What's taking so long?" Jace calls out.
Aegon’s voice drifts over. “You have to promise not to laugh.”
Jace frowns. “Why would I laugh?”
"Just promise. Because if you laugh, I will let Sunfyre feast on you. And he has been waiting for that chance since the pit."
"I won't laugh."
Another few heartbeats pass. Jace is halfway to standing, ready to drag him out, when he hears the soft rustle of fabric.
Aegon steps into view.
For a moment, Jace’s mind refuses to process what he is seeing.
The gown is deep red silk, cut for a woman’s frame but hanging loose on Aegon’s body. The neckline is slightly slipping off one pale shoulder, revealing the faint bruises Jace left days earlier. But where it's loose above, it clings below, catching at his hips, skimming the line of his waist in a way that makes Jace's mouth go dry. Two tiny braids frame his face – crooked and uneven. His lips look redder, stained, and a flush of color sits high on his cheeks.
Aegon’s hands twist nervously in the silk at his sides. His head stays down, gaze fixed anywhere but on Jace.
“Well?” he asks, voice tight with rare hesitation. “Say something before I change my mind and burn this gown.”
Jace stares, throat dry. Heat floods through him so fast it makes him dizzy. “You… you look…”
“Ridiculous?” Aegon finishes, finally glancing up through his lashes. There is defiance there, though it cannot quite conceal the vulnerability beneath. “Go on. You can say it.”
“No,” Jace breathes. He stands slowly and crosses the room. “Not ridiculous.”
Up close, the effect is somehow even more disarming. The crooked little braids brushing against Aegon’s jaw, one slightly higher than the other, the red against his pale skin, the softness of his painted mouth.
Aegon swallows. “You said you did not want to practice on another woman. So…” He gestures at himself with a self-mocking flourish. “Here I am. Your willing wife for the afternoon.”
He looks like a mummer's idea of a bride – and Jace's cock doesn't care. It thickens, rises to attention as if it has been waiting for exactly this and nothing else. As if the gods built it to answer one person and one person only, and that person is standing in front of him in a stolen dress with crooked braids and a bruise still yellowing beneath his eye.
Jace steps closer. Moth to flame. Lamb to slaughter.
“Turn around.”
Aegon’s eyebrows rise, but he obeys, turning slowly. The silk gown clings to the narrow taper of his waist and the curve of his arse. Jace’s hands settle on his hips, bunching the fabric.
“You really went to all this trouble,” he murmurs against his ear.
“Consider it… visual aid.” Aegon’s mouth twitches. “For your education.”
Jace slides one hand up, following the line of Aegon’s spine through the silk until he reaches the loose neckline. He tugs it lower, baring more shoulder, then leans in and presses an open-mouthed kiss to the warm skin there. Aegon shivers.
"Have you done this for anyone else?" Jace asks against his skin.
Aegon huffs. "Jealous?"
"Answer me."
“No.” The answer comes after a moment. “Not like this. Not… dressed up. Not for anyone.”
Jace growls and bites down on the junction of neck and shoulder, sucking a fresh mark into the skin. Aegon gasps, arching back into him.
"Does it help?" Aegon asks between uneven breaths. He reaches back, finds Jace's hands, and guides them up to his chest. "I know my tits leave something to be desired." A breathless laugh. "But if it helps you get comfortable with a woman's body…"
Jace palms his chest, thumbs dragging over the small stiff peaks. He works them between his fingers, rolling, pinching just shy of cruel, until the noise that comes out of his uncle is high and startled.
"There," Aegon manages. "See? Not so hard. Just imagine—"
"Stop talking," Jace says, his voice low against the braids. His teeth catch the shell of Aegon's ear, and he feels the shiver travel the length of Aegon's spine. "Let me."
He turns him by the waist until they're face to face. Aegon's mouth is already open on the next clever thing.
Jace kisses it out of him.
His hand spreads at the back of Aegon's skull, fingers threading the crooked braids, and he tilts his head and takes the kiss deeper at the exact moment Aegon goes to breathe – swallowing the sound he makes. When he pulls back, Aegon's eyes are slow to open. The paint at the corner of his mouth is smeared. He looks, for once, like he has lost the thread of what he meant to say.
He walks Aegon backward until the older Prince’s knees hit the edge of the bed. They land together in a heap of red silk and clumsy limbs. Jace ends up on top, bracketing Aegon’s hips with his thighs. The gown has slid further in the fall, baring one nipple.
Jace reaches for the box on the bedside table without taking his weight off him. The phial is cool in his oiled-up clumsiness; he nearly drops it, catches it, uncorks it with his thumb. He pours more than he needs across his fingers. It runs gold into the lines of his palm.
“You remembered.” Aegon’s voice has gone softer. “Warm it first.”
"You told me to." Jace rubs the oil between his fingers until the chill leaves it, watching Aegon watch him. "Across the breakfast table. With my goblet in your hand."
"I say a great many things."
"You do." Jace presses a hand to the inside of one silk-draped knee and pushes it wide. "I'm learning which ones to keep."
Aegon lets his legs fall open.
The gown rides up. Jace shoves the excess silk to his hip, baring him, and brings the warm slick hand down between his thighs.
"Be gentle with me," Aegon says, all mock-sweetness, lashes lowered. "It's my first night. My lord husband." His thighs press against Jace's hips, drawing him in. "Though I've heard such worrying things about you. They say you can't keep it up long enough to finish. That you go soft and leave girls wanting." A pretty pout forms on his lips. "Is it true? Should I lower my expectations now and save us both the embarrassment?"
Jace doesn't answer. He slides one slicked finger against him, circling, and watches the pout waver.
"Well?" Aegon presses, though his voice has thinned at the edges. "Nothing to say in your own defense, my lord—"
Jace pushes inside him.
Aegon's mouth opens. His back arches off the bed, silk bunching beneath him, and his hand flies to Jace's wrist.
"You were saying," Jace murmurs.
"Fuck — slowly —" Aegon’s braids are coming half-done, loose strands falling across the pillow. "You have the patience of a – ah – of a spooked horse."
"And you have the mouth of a dockside whore," Jace says, curling his finger, "but you don't hear me complaining."
Jace works him open slowly after that, no longer waiting for instructions. For once he doesn’t want Aegon’s instructions – he wants to learn Aegon’s body on his own. He watches every reaction greedily: the flutter of his belly, the way his thighs quiver when he finds the right angle, the helpless roll of his hips chasing more. The red gown is ruined, dark with oil and twisted around his waist, and Jace knows he will never be able to see that shade of red again without getting hard.
He adds more fingers and Aegon hisses, hand tightening on his wrist.
He adds a second finger, then a third. Aegon hisses, nails piercing into skin, but his body opens beautifully around him.
"Still with me?" Jace asks. He means to match Aegon's mocking tone, but it comes out too honest.
Aegon's eyes open. "Still with you," he says quietly. Then, because he is Aegon and cannot leave a sincere moment unguarded for longer than a heartbeat: "Though if you keep stalling, I'll start to think the rumors are true after all."
Jace twists his fingers. "You were the one who told me to be patient."
"Changed my mind." Aegon's heel hooks behind Jace's thigh, pulling him in closer. "Take it all back. Every word. Patience is a virtue for septons and dead men, and I am neither."
"Then beg," Jace says, voice rough.
"Fuck you," Aegon breathes, but his hips roll greedily onto Jace's fingers all the same.
Jace stills his hand.
Aegon makes a frustrated noise and tries to chase the touch, but Jace presses a palm flat to his stomach, holding him down against the mattress.
"I said beg."
Aegon glares up at him, lips jutting out in defiance. His cock lies flushed and heavy against his stomach, steadily leaking against his stomach. He looks obscene like this — dress rucked up, and thighs spread.
When Jace refuses to move, Aegon finally cracks. A frustrated groan tears out of him.
"Please," he whispers. "Please, my sweet, dutiful husband. Fuck me properly before I lose what little sanity I have left."
Jace pulls his fingers free. The whine that escapes Aegon is pitiful and immediate, his hips chasing the loss. Jace ignores it, reaching for the phial and slicking himself with more of the warmed oil. His hands are not quite steady. He tells himself it's anticipation.
He lines up and pushes in.
The first inch undoes them both.
Jace's eyes squeeze shut at the crushing heat. It’s tight. Tighter than he expected. His hips twitch forward instinctively, but Aegon’s body resists. A raw, open-mouthed cry tears out of the older prince. His fingers scrabble at Jace's shoulders, nails biting crescents into the skin, and Jace freezes, a spike of panic cutting through the lust. Did I hurt him. Did I rush it. Did I do a shit job of preparing him and he's too proud to say —
"Don't stop." Aegon's voice is shaking but certain. His eyes are screwed shut, and his body is fighting itself – clamping down and trying to relax all at once. "Don't you dare stop now."
So Jace doesn't stop. He goes slow, letting Aegon's body set the pace even as every nerve in him screams to bury himself to the root. The resistance gives in increments. Each one costs Aegon a breath, a bitten-off sound, a shift of his hips as he tilts himself to make room for more. Jace watches all of it. He can't look away.
When he is finally seated fully, Aegon's eyes open. They are round and wide and glassy. His lips part, but no sound comes out at first. Then, barely above a whisper, almost reverent: "Seven fucking hells."
Jace draws back slowly, savoring the drag, then drives in again with a deep, purposeful stroke. Aegon’s whole body jolts, a startled moan punching out of him.
"Again," he breathes, and Jace obliges before the word is fully out. Another deep, rolling thrust that grinds them flush together. The oil makes everything slick and filthy.
"You feel –" Aegon starts, but Jace thrusts again and the word collapses into a gasp. His hands find Jace's back, sliding down the sweat-slick skin. "You feel –"
Jace catches one of the ruined braids between his fingers. Tugs it, tilting Aegon's head so their eyes meet. "Tell me."
"Big," Aegon says, and then laughs at himself. "Fuck, that's… I'm not stroking your ego, I'm stating a — ah —" His spine curves as Jace finds that perfect spot inside him. His nails bite into the muscle above Jace’s hips, holding on.
Jace watches him. Can't stop watching him. Every thrust rearranges Aegon's face into something new. A wince that melts into slack-jawed pleasure, a bitten lip that releases into a moan, eyes that fly open in surprise and then squeeze shut again as though what he's feeling is too much to look at and feel at the same time.
"You're quiet," Aegon manages between breaths. "Why are you quiet. Say something. Tell me I'm – tell me anything, I can't be the only one making noise, it's —"
"You're beautiful."
Aegon's mouth snaps shut.
Jace watches the flush bleed higher up Aegon's throat and into his cheeks. "You are," he says. "Like this. In this ruined dress with your braids coming undone. Falling apart underneath me." He exhales unsteadily. "Beautiful."
Aegon turns his face toward the pillow. Jace catches his jaw and brings it back, thumb pressing into the hinge to bring him back.
"They should have betrothed us," Jace murmurs, eyes dark. "I would have taken you for my queen." His thumb traces forward along the bone, finding the corner of Aegon's mouth where the red paint has smeared past its edges. "Put a crown on your head and a cloak around your shoulders and fucked you every night until the whole Keep heard you."
He punctuates the words with a deep, grinding thrust. Aegon gasps, back arching.
“I wouldn’t have gone soft,” Jace continues, lips brushing Aegon’s. “Not once. Not with you.”
Aegon lets out a shaky laugh. “It wouldn’t have worked.”
“Why not?”
"I have a cock, nephew. In case you hadn't noticed." He shifts his hips, grinding up against Jace's stomach as if to demonstrate. “Bit of an obstacle for the cloak, don’t you think?”
“Don’t care.” Jace leans down, forehead pressed to Aegon’s, eyes locked on him. “I’d still want you. I’d still take you.”
Aegon’s breath hitches. He tries to keep the smirk, but it fails. “I’d make a terrible queen. I’d drink the treasury dry, start pointless wars for fun, and fuck my way through half the Kingsguard before the first moon’s turn–”
Jace cuts him off with a harsh thrust, pinning both of Aegon’s wrists above his head with one hand. He fucks him harder, deeper, more possessively.
Jace cuts him off with a harsh thrust. He pins both of Aegon’s wrists above his head, holding him down as he fucks him deeper, more possessively.
“You’d have been mine,” Jace growls against his lips. “Only mine. And after a few nights under me, you wouldn’t have wanted anyone else.”
Aegon shudders hard around him. “Arrogant prick,” he manages, but the insult sounds far too fond.
Jace answers with another powerful snap of his hips, driving in so deep Aegon’s next moan breaks into a sob. He keeps Aegon’s wrists trapped in one hand while the other slides down to grip his thigh, spreading him wider and holding him open as he sets a punishing rhythm.
“Look at me,” Jace demands.
Aegon does, eyes watery and desperate. His usual sharp tongue has deserted him; all that’s left are broken pitiful sounds and the tight, fluttering heat of his body.
Jace bends to kiss him. It is unhurried, at odds with the relentless pace of his hips. When he pulls back, his lips graze Aegon's with each word.
“Say it.”
Aegon’s head thrashes against the pillow. “I— fuck— Jace—”
"Say it, Aegon."
A thrust lands deep, grinding against that spot, and Aegon's whole body jerks. “I’d be yours,” Aegon gasps, the words breaking apart as Jace doesn't let up. “Only yours— gods—”
Jace’s rhythm falters for half a second, then turns savage. He releases Aegon’s wrists only to grip his hips with both hands, hauling him onto his cock with every thrust. The bed creaks dangerously beneath them.
Between them, Aegon’s cock is flushed dark and swollen against his belly, twitching with every stroke. Untouched and neglected. Jace looks down at it and feels a dark thrill – the knowledge that Aegon is going to come like this. From nothing but Jace inside him. That all the whores and lovers and fumbling encounters in dark rooms never brought him to this. That Jace, the fumbling nephew, the failed husband, the prince who couldn't even stay hard on his wedding night, is going to take Aegon apart with his cock alone.
"That's right," Jace growls against his mouth. “Mine. No one else gets to have you like this. Ever.”
Aegon whimpers as he’s taken apart. Jace can feel him tightening, fluttering wildly around his cock.
“Come on,” Jace rasps, voice thick with triumph. “Let me feel it. Come for me like a good queen.”
Aegon’s whole body seizes. He sobs as he comes untouched, back bowing off the bed while thick ropes of spend streak across his stomach and the ruined red silk. His walls clamp down around Jace like a vice, rippling and squeezing in powerful waves.
The sensation drags Jace under with him.
He buries himself to the hilt with a cry, hips jerking as he fills Aegon with pulse after heavy pulse of heat. The pleasure is overwhelming. He keeps grinding through it, drawing out every last shudder until his arms finally tremble and give out.
They collapse together in a sweaty, sticky mess.
Jace’s face drops to the crook of Aegon’s neck, breathing hard against damp skin. Aegon’s arms slowly wrap around his shoulders, one hand sliding up into his curls. His body continues to twitch with aftershocks around Jace’s softening cock.
Neither of them speaks for a long time. The fire has nearly gone out, leaving only a faint, wavering light to trace the shapes of their bodies.
Eventually, Aegon lets out a breathless chuckle. "Well," he says. "The rumors will need revising."
Jace huffs against his neck. "Don't."
"I'm only saying. If the court could see their fumbling prince now…"
"Aegon."
"...they'd choke on every word they ever whispered." The fingers in his hair keep moving. "You'd have songs written about you. Filthy ones. The maesters would refuse to transcribe them."
Evening trickles into night and Jace feels as ravenous as ever.
He has taken Aegon again, no less thorough than before. The red silk gown lies in a ruined heap on the floor. The braids have come undone, clinging to Aegon’s sweat-damp neck. Jace has him bent over the edge of the bed, hips snapping forward.
“Fuck–Jace,” Aegon groans, half-laughing, half-winded. He twists to look back over his shoulder, lips swollen. “I have created a beast. Seven hells, slow down before you split me in—”
Jace silences him with a particularly deep thrust, grinding in and holding there. Aegon’s words dissolve into a shaky moan, his fingers twisting in the sheets.
“You like it,” Jace says. It is not a question because he can feel the way Aegon clenches around him greedily.
Aegon makes a face that Jace can only half-see, the corner of his mouth pulling up as his eyes squeeze shut. "I like what you've become, apparently." A breath. "You menace."
Jace fucks him through it until they are both trembling and Aegon comes again with a curse bitten into the mattress. Only then does Jace let himself follow, hips stuttering as he fills him.
He stays there after, reluctant to pull out. His hand smooths over the curve of Aegon’s arse, thumb pressing lightly against the stretched rim where they are joined. Then his eyes fall on the small silver object lying forgotten on the sheets – the second gift from the box.
Understanding clicks into place. He reaches for it, turning the cool, tapered bulb in his fingers. The flared base and chain suddenly make perfect sense. Aegon must feel him shift, because he glances back, one eyebrow lifting despite the exhaustion in his voice. “Ah. Finally figured it out, did you?”
Jace pulls out slowly, watching with dark fascination as his spend begins to leak from Aegon’s hole. Before it can drip far, he presses the warmed plug against the slick opening.
Aegon hisses, then lets out a soft sound as Jace pushes it inside. The taper slides in easily, greedy muscle swallowing it until the flared base nestles flush against him. Jace gives the chain an experimental tug, earning a full-body shiver from the man beneath him.
“There,” Jace says. He presses the flat of his palm over the base, holding it in place. “Keeping me where I belong.”
Aegon turns his head. His hair is stuck to his cheek, his eyes barely open. “You’ve gone from shy little prince to greedy dragon in the span of one night.” His voice is wrecked. "Should I be concerned?"
"Probably." Jace leans in and kisses him, slow and deep. Aegon's lips move against his lazily, half-asleep already. Jace pulls back and eases him onto his side, drawing the sheet over them both.
Within a week, the whispers shift.
It is hardly surprising. The sounds coming from Jace’s chambers almost every night are loud enough that even the servants have started exchanging knowing looks. Some whisper that Prince Jacaerys has finally come into his own – a worthy husband at last, thoroughly bedding his wife. Others insist he has taken a whore, and a very enthusiastic one at that.
"I don't want to keep you as a dirty secret," Jace says.
Aegon is sprawled across his bed, half-buried in the sheets, looking thoroughly debauched and unbothered. A bowl of figs sits between them. They are always ravenous afterward.
"And what would you prefer?" Aegon asks, biting into a fig with his teeth. "A formal announcement? Shall we have the Hand draft a decree? Let it be known throughout the realm that the Crown Prince enjoys buggering his uncle and has gotten rather good at it."
"I'm serious."
"So am I. Have a fig."
"It doesn't seem fair. To our wives."
Aegon is quiet for a moment. He rolls onto his stomach, chin propped on his arms."You want me to tell you it's wrong so you can stop doing it. But you don't actually want to stop." He holds out the other half of the fig. "Do you."
Jace takes the fig without answering.
"That's what I thought," Aegon says softly. He shifts closer, pressing his shoulder against Jace's arm. "Men do this all the time. Kings. Heirs. Most of the lords in your mother's council, probably. Nobody cares as long as you're discreet."
"Has Baela asked?" Aegon adds. "Where you go. What you do."
"No." Jace stares at the canopy. She hasn't. He waits every morning for the question and it never comes. He doesn't know if her silence is trust or mercy.
"Helaena stopped asking a long time ago," Aegon says. He picks at the edge of a fig, pulling the skin loose with his thumbnail. "We are not the first royal marriage to survive on separate silences, Jace. We won't be the last."
Jace exhales slowly. He tries to take comfort in the words but it still settles in his chest. He reaches out and brushes a strand of hair from Aegon’s face. “I still hate it.”
Aegon turns his head and catches Jace’s thumb between his teeth for a moment. “Then hate it quietly. Or don’t. Either way…” He smirks, eyes bright. “I’m not going anywhere.” He nudges the bowl toward Jace with his knee. "Eat. You'll need your strength."
"For what?"
Aegon rolls toward Jace, hand sliding beneath the sheet, fingers finding the laces of his breeches. He has barely gotten a grip on him through the fabric – Jace's breath already hitching, his hand already moving to the back of Aegon's neck – when the knock comes.
"Jace?" Baela's voice carries clearly through the door. "Are you there? I wish to speak with you."
Jace sits up so fast he nearly throws Aegon off the bed.
For one terrible moment they stare at each other. Aegon's hand is still halfway down his breeches. His eyes are wide, but even now there is a flicker of something at the corner of his mouth that suggests he finds this at least a little bit funny.
"Don't," Jace hisses.
"I wasn't going to say anything."
Jace shoves his hand away and looks wildly around the chamber. One entrance. No side rooms, no servant's passage, no convenient balcony. The wardrobe is too small to hide Aegon. The window overlooks a forty-foot drop onto stone courtyard.
"Jace?" The handle shifts. "The door is locked."
Of course it's locked. He locks it every time now.
“Get under the sheets,” Jace hisses, already scrambling out of bed and yanking on a robe.
Aegon raises an eyebrow but obeys, sliding beneath the covers. He pulls the sheet up, going still. Jace throws a pillow on top of the lump. It is not good, the lump is clearly a person. But the bed is deep and the curtains on the near side are half-drawn and it will have to do.
Jace smooths his hair and tries to steady his breathing. He crosses to the door and unlocks it.
Baela stands there in a simple gown, her expression serious. She steps inside before he can suggest they speak elsewhere.
Jace positions himself between her and the bed. "Is everything all right?" he asks.
Baela doesn't answer immediately. She looks around the room and Jace watches her gaze pass over the rumpled bed without stopping. He steers her toward the chairs by the hearth with a hand on her elbow.
"Sit," he says. "Please."
She sits. He takes the chair across from her, angled so that the bed is behind him. If he doesn't look at it, maybe she won't either.
Baela's hands rest in her lap. She studies them for a moment, turning her ring with her thumb. "This isn't working," she says. "Us. You know it isn't."
Jace’s heart thunders in his ears. "What do you mean?" he says, though he knows exactly what she means.
"I mean I can't keep pretending, Jace." Her voice is stretched thin. "We go through the motions. We sit beside each other at meals. We smile for your mother and the court. But when have we last – truly –" She pauses. "I am not the wife you need. And I think, perhaps, you are not the husband I need either."
The confession rises in his throat. Right there. I know. You're right. And I have been lying to you, in this very room, in that very bed—
"There are rumors," Baela says quietly. "That you've taken a lover."
He goes perfectly still. Behind him, the sheets shift, so faintly he almost thinks he imagined it.
"A whore, they say. Someone you see most nights." She doesn't look angry. "The servants talk, Jace. They always talk."
Jace forces himself to breathe. “Baela…”
"I didn't come here to accuse you," she continues before he can speak. "I came because I owe you the same honesty I'm asking for."
Jace blinks. "What?"
Baela's jaw tightens. She looks at anywhere but at him. "I have been spending time with Helaena," she says.
"I know. You've been a good friend to her–"
"Not as a friend."
Jace stares at her. Baela's chin lifts in that familiar, stubborn way. It's the look she wears whenever she's already made up her mind.
"It wasn't planned," she says. "At first I was only sitting with her because she seemed so lonely. Because her husband is… what he is. And then one night she was crying about something he'd said, or hadn't said, and I held her, and she looked at me, and I–" Her fingers twist the ring again, faster now. "It just happened. And then it happened again. And I kept telling myself it would stop, and it didn't stop, and I don't want it to."
Behind him, there is absolute silence. Jace imagines Aegon lying beneath those sheets, hearing every word of this and has no idea what expression his face is wearing right now.
"Say something," Baela whispers.
"How long?" His voice sounds distant to his own ears.
“A few weeks.” She swallows. “I’m sorry, Jace. I never wanted to hurt you. I thought… I thought if I could just be better for you, it would go away. But it didn’t. And the more time I spend with her, the less I want to pretend.”
Jace lets out a breath. The guilt he's been carrying shifts to something close to relief.
Baela searches his face. "You're not angry. Why?"
"Because you're right," he says. "About us. About what this is. You said it yourself… we've been performing. Both of us."
"Then the rumors," she says slowly. "About your lover. Are they true?"
"Yes."
Baela nods slowly. "Who is she?"
"Baela—"
"I just told you about Helaena. You owe me a name, Jace."
From behind him, there is a rustle of fabric. Then a small, muffled cough. Baela's gaze flickers past his shoulder and Jace leans forward in his chair, ready to redirect but the small cough turns into a bigger one, then another, then a fit of them.
“She’s here?” She stands abruptly.
“Baela, wait—”
She is already moving, crossing the room in three swift strides. Jace twists in his chair, but she is faster. She reaches the bed and yanks the sheet back.
Aegon lies there, eyes watering, face red. He thumps his chest once with his fist, swallows hard, and looks up at her. "Fig," he manages, voice rough. "Went down the wrong way."
For a long, stunned moment, the only sound in the room is Aegon’s lingering cough.
Baela stares down at him. Her expression shifts rapidly from shock to disbelief to disgust.
"Him," She says. "Your lover is him."
Jace is on his feet now.
"Out of every person in this city." She turns on him. "Every girl, every whore, every… you chose him? You know how he is. You've sat across from me at supper and agreed with me about what a miserable excuse for a husband he–”
Aegon makes a small, wounded noise from the bed. "I'm right here, cousin."
"Shut up." She doesn't even look at him.
"I can explain," Jace says.
"Can you?" Her eyes are bright and dangerous. "Because I would love to hear—"
"Oh, come now." Aegon swings his legs over the side of the bed, wrapping the sheet around his waist. "Let's not pretend this is a tragedy, cousin. You're bedding my wife. I'm bedding your husband." He shrugs. "If anything, it's balanced. Elegant, even."
Baela looks like she wants to set the entire Keep on fire. "If you ever," she says softly, "compare what I have with Helaena to whatever this is, I will feed you to Moondancer. Piece by piece."
Aegon tilts his head. "Moondancer is welcome to try. She'd have to get past Sunfyre first." He smiles. "I worry how that ends for her."
Baela lunges forward, fist raised. Jace barely manages to step between them in time, one hand catching her shoulder, the other shoving Aegon back hard.
“Enough,” Jace growls. “Both of you.”
Baela shakes his hand off her shoulder but stays where she is. The three of them stand in awkward silence for a long moment.
"So what now?" Baela says finally. "We just…carry on? You with him, me with Helaena, and we all sit at breakfast pretending?"
"What else is there?" Aegon says from the bed.
Baela ignores him. She looks at Jace. "And the heir? Your mother will not wait forever, Jace. She already watches my belly at every meal."
Before Jace can answer, Aegon raises a finger. "If I may—"
"You may not," Baela says.
"The heir is not a problem," Aegon continues, undeterred. "All you need is his seed. And I have proven, repeatedly, and with great enthusiasm, that I am very good at getting it out of him." He gestures at himself. "Consider me a resource."
"You are the most disgusting man alive," Baela says.
"And yet," Aegon says, spreading his hands, "I'm the only one in this room with a solution."
"He's not wrong," Jace says quietly.
"I hate both of you," Baela says.She turns and heads for the door. At the threshold, she hesitates, fingers curling around the frame.
"I'll think about it." Then she slips out of the room.
The moment she’s gone, Aegon flops back onto the bed with a dramatic sigh. “Well,” he says brightly, patting the space beside him. “That went rather well, I think.”
Jace walks toward him. "You couldn't behave for a little bit? Just once?"
Aegon grins, reaching out to tug him down by the front of his robe. “Where’s the fun in that?”
"I should punish you for this." Jace allows himself to be pulled, landing on top of Aegon, hands braced on either side of his head. The sheet between them is the only thing left. "The dragon threat. The heir comment. That smug fucking grin."
"And how would you punish me, my prince?" Aegon's eyes are dark. He shifts his hips beneath Jace. The sheet slips. “Or do you need another lesson on how to do it properly?”
Jace kisses the grin off his mouth. "I think," he says, "I'm done with lessons." He feels Aegon shiver.
"Turn over."
Aegon turns over.