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Rhaenyra gazed upon the sweet little boy in her lap, the dark-haired version of the childhood pictures her parents so proudly showed off so much. Dad said he looked just like her.
Jacaerys, Jacaerys, Jacaerys.
How did someone manage to flip her life so suddenly in seven days that she didn't even remember what fear felt like?
She was sure all babies looked beautiful to their parents, but her baby was so gorgeous. What a beautiful boy.
Rhaenyra barely cared for what it took for them to have him.
Everyone was pestering them so much since the day after their honeymoon, asking about when they would have a child, and when they would give their parents a grandchild and would combine the bloodline once and for all.
Poor Laenor had suffered so much when they found out he was the one who couldn't have children, especially after they had tried so much.
But they had their little Jace now, a gift from Harwin.
Her boyfriend really was giving her everything Daemon once promised her he would give her.
A knock on the door of the nursery made her raise her eyes, finding Rhaenys on the other side.
She had come to help her and Laenor with the baby, considering she didn't know much about having kids around and Alicent was too busy waiting for her own baby now - her third little sibling, Aemond - to even offer help. Not that Rhaenyra would accept, of couse.
But she squeezed her baby closer with how heavy her eyes were on them.
Laenor's mother could see right through her, right through her baby boy.
Corlys and her father had adored him so much since they found out they were having a boy, and even more when he was born, but the moment Rhaenys' eyes fell on Jace, it was as if something had changed.
Something had flipped.
Still, she came to help. Rhaenys set herself in the guest room and taught Rhaenyra and Laenor everything about kids that she could possibly tell. How to bathe him, how to clean him and feed him. She was better than any nanny they had around, she was a mother.
"Laenor sent me to check on you," she told her. "To see if Jace had fallen asleep already."
Rhaenyra looked at her boy, snoozing already, her breast abandoned.
"He has," she caressed his dark hair. "I... I guess I didn't realise it."
Her mother-in-law walked to her, taking the baby from her arms slowly and placing him in the crib, and Rhaenyra tried not to squeeze him close as she did.
This was her baby!
She should be able to hold her baby!
"Corlys and your father are here," Rhaenys told her. "Laenor said he wanted to talk to us about something important."
Rhaenyra swallowed down.
Already?
"Of course," she mumbled, covering herself again.
Rhaenys offered her an arm to stand up slowly and supported her weight as they walked down the stairs. The doctor had recommended that she walked, even though it still ached quite a bit.
She had pushed a human out of her vagina a week ago. Of course it hurt to walk! It hurt to do a lot of things.
The moment he saw them, Laenor rushed to her side, and Rhaenyra was grateful for his hands on her as she walked to him, supporting her on her last steps and onto the couch, and she exchanged a quick nod with Corlys, who was waiting for them.
"Rhaenyra," her father smiled, sitting by them.
"How is Jace?" Laenor asked. "Are you tired? Do you need anything?"
She smiled a bit.
"I'm alright," she assured him. "Jace is sleeping, we have a minute."
He nodded, sitting her on the couch.
"I'll ask the cook for a smoothie for you," he told her.
But Rhaenyra held his hand before he could go.
"Your mother said you wanted to talk," she reminded him. "Our parents are here."
Laenor sat back down, looking nervous and fidgeting on his spot. Her father reached for her, kissing her knuckles gently, but said nothing.
"Are you sure?" her husband asked.
But Rhaenyra squeezed his hand in turn.
Whatever he wanted to do, then it was best that they got done with it.
Her husband took a long breath and reached for the table by the side of the couch, pulling a folder.
<
Oh. It was that folder.
"I can see how you're curious about Jace's appearance," he stated, at last.
Rhaenyra watched his parents, Rhaenys' shoulders falling as Corlys turned to look at her.
So she had said something to him.
Laenor moved his fingers nervously, and she couldn't quite look at her father.
Gods, this was going to be an embarrassing moment.
"We've been trying to have children since our honeymoon," he told them.
All parents frowned a little.
"Well, we can see it in Jace," Corlys pointed out.
"A healthy boy," her father added. "Very Arryn looking."
Laenor sighed. Rhaenyra was little more than a watcher now. This was his moment of stating his position.
"Well, we struggled," he told them, his face hard. "When we got married and started trying we thought it was best to see a doctor, because of our family history, to make sure we had everything covered. Which is how we found out quickly we didn't have a lot of chances."
Rhaenyra reached for him, squeezing his hand as she rubbed his arm, and Laenor gave his parents the first paper.
His exams.
Rhaenys ran her eyes over the paper, looking a bit confused, and passed it to her husband.
Corlys seemed much more familiar with them, and when he showed it to her father, he nodded silently.
"They said it's because of... well..." he looked for words.
There was no way of softening the blow. The doctor had blamed inbreeding, which was even more upsetting for Laenor.
Truth be told, Rhaenyra was way more inbred than him. Her parents were cousins, her father's parents were cousins, and his grandparents - the last two direct ancestors she shared with Laenor - were brother and sister!
When she was a kid, they even had her tested to make sure she didn’t have any blood mutation, and she was alright.
By some crazy strike of luck, she had no consequences.
But Laenor did.
"Inbreeding," she told them.
The room stiffened, and Laenor cleared his throat before they could say anything.
"It is very unlikely that I can produce a viable child," he declared at last. "We tried to take some of my few living sperm and do IVF, but they did not recommend that."
She squeezed his hand more, raising it to her face and kissing his knuckles, knowing how much it hurt him.
"And what about Jacaerys?" her father asked.
Rhaenyra looked at him, but he didn't look like he was accusing them of anything. He was curious.
"They worked with donations," Rhaenyra mumbled.
Laenor looked at her and then at them.
"Rhaenyra let me choose who it would be," he told their parents. "He is a doctor in cardiology and a fencing champion. We paid for extra genetic tests, and he doesn't have any mutation or disease… anything that could affect the baby negatively. We made sure the baby would be as healthy as possible."
She looked at them. Everyone was quiet, locked in their own minds, but Rhaenys moved her eyes to her again.
Softer now.
Almost with pity.
"So we got a few embryos," he told them. "And nine or ten months ago, Rhaenyra had two of them inserted."
Her father perked up.
"Two?" he asked.
She squeezed Laenor's hand. Gods, he didn't need to go so far with his lie.
Yes, they had their troubles, and yes, they had looked for a donor, but there were no embryos. There was just Harwin.
In the... conventional way.
"It made pregnancy more likely," she told them. "And we have Jace now."
Laenor exhaled, and she knew that it was taking everything in him not to show how sad he was, how hard everything was on him.
She kissed his cheek softly, caressing the other one with her hand, resting her forehead against his temple and closing her eyes.
Rhaenyra loved him. Not as a lover, but as her dearest friend.
They were closer than ever before, sharing a house, and raising a child together!
He was her best friend and seeing him suffering pained her so much.
"Do you know what he looks like?" his mother asked. "The donor?"
He shook his head, and Rhaenyra pulled away to look at them before doing the same.
"I chose not to," he told her, simply. "We wanted him for his health, not for his appearance."
Laenor squeezed Rhaenyra's hand tightly and sat up straighter.
"I am telling you all of this now because I can see Jace doesn't look like what you expected him to," he told them. "And I don't want anyone to treat him differently if he turns out to look different from us. He is healthy, and he is our son, that’s all that matters. So now you all know about him, and we can count on all of you."
Her father smiled, and Corlys and Rhaenys nodded sharply.
"Of course," her father-in-law confirmed before anyone else. "He is our grandson."
“How many embryos do you still have?!” she asked Rhaenyra.
She turned to look at Laenor surprised by the question.
“Three of them,” she told her, the number coming to her head quickly. “We are still going to decide how long to wait between their births.”
Laenor nodded and squeezed her hand.
“What about the donor?” Corlys asked. “What’s their… policy?”
“We can meet him if we want to,” Laenor told them. “He allowed us to make contact once we were ready.”
“Why would you?” Rhaenys asked, frowning. “He is just a donor.”
Right. A donor.
Not her bodyguard.
Rhaenyra shrugged.
“If Jace wants to hear about the other side of his ancestry, if the donor finds out he has some disease he wasn’t tested for…” she listed the options the clinic had given them. “Or even just meet him. We can’t stop him if he is old enough to understand our decision.”
But Laenor squeezed her fingers, interrupting them.
“We will cross that bridge once we get to it,” he decided, at last. “Viserys.”
Her father turned to look at him.
“If you could discuss it with Alicent,” he asked. “So we are all on the same page.”
“Of course,” he agreed. “She sent you a gift, Rhaenyra.”
Rhaenyra straightened up.
A gift?
When was the last time Alicent had gifted her anything? Since she had gotten with her father it was like they had never even been friends before, and that disaster of a baby shower was just more proof of it.
Her father stood up, picking up a big bag and taking it to them, and Laenor held it open for her to dig into it.
A towel embroidered with Jace’s name, similar to the ones she had for all of her kids. Baby clothes, little shoes and… a suit?
She pulled it out, confused.
Beige shapewear?
She turned it around, finding a card, and opened it with a frown.
“What’s that supposed to be?” Laenor asked.
‘My secret to bouncing back quickly. My trainer, aesthetician and dietician are waiting for your call’.
Rhaenyra looked down at herself, her belly still big as if her son was in it.
Oh.
She forced herself to smile up at her father.
“Lovely,” she nearly spat out. “It’s… lovely. Thank you.”
Father smiled, near clueless, and Rhaenys pressed her lips together.
They heard a whine upstairs, warning them of Jace’s awakened state.
“I’ll go check on him,” Laenor told them. “Rhaenyra, you should rest.”
“I’ll help her up,” his mother offered quickly. “You need a good nap,”
She didn’t protest. Yes, she was pretty tired.
They walked up to her bedroom, past Laenor as he changed Jace, humming their little song to him in the nursery.
“Isn' he love? Isn't he wonderful?”
“You don’t need to wear that,” her mother-in-law said just as they got to her room and sat on her bed.
Rhaenys knelt, taking her shoes.
“Jacaerys is barely a week old, you should be worried about recovering, not bouncing back.”
Rhaenyra tried not to scoff. That was easy to say, she didn’t have magazines photographing her everywhere she went or photoshoots to attend.
Besides, Rhaenyra was a model. Part-time, yes, but… still.
People expected things of her.
A single cover of Rhaenyra posing cradling her belly two months ago had broken the record of sales for the last decade! Jace was still in her belly, and he already had a huge trustfund waiting for him just from that photoshoot, not counting everything else.
The announcement of his birth was on the newspapers!
“I know,” she lied anyway.
Rhaenyra could be a good mother and still be Westeros' It-Girl.
She just needed a couple of months to get back to her usual shape.
Her mother-in-law helped her lay down, and sighed before sitting on her bed.
“I’m sorry,” she apologised. “I might have misjudged you.”
Rhaenyra looked at her, a bit confused, though she knew what she was talking about.
“I wish you had told me what you were doing through,” she noted. “I would be there to help.”
She reached for her, squeezing her hand. Gods, this wasn’t something she wanted to talk about now.
“Laenor was a great partner during it,” she told her. “You raised a good son. He is a good husband, and a good father. Jace is very loved.”
She nodded calmly.
“Yes, he is,” she agreed. “By all of his family.”
At last, Rhaenys stood.
“Rest,” she commanded her. “My grandson is in good hands.”