Chapter Text
This wasn’t going to be easy. Duncan knew it the moment he and Egg were summoned back to Summerhall.
Prince Maekar had not bothered softening the matter with pleasantries. He rarely did. Stern as a stone wall and twice as cold, he offered no courtesies or wine, only a hard look at the hedge knight and his squire, his son Aegon. It was the sort of look that said the matter was already decided, and Duncan’s place in it was simply to obey.
“You will travel across the narrow sea, to Lys. Aegon will stay in Summerhall,” he had said. “And you will bring Aerion home from the Free Cities.”
Maekar spoke of Aerion as if he were some stray dog that had wandered too far, who needed correcting. As if he were not the one who had driven him there in the first place.
But Duncan knew why the prince was being dragged back, he had heard the stories. Aerion had been in exile in Lys for four years now. Long enough for tempers to sour, for old grievances to turn sharp and bitter. Long enough as well for a man to change, and longer still for whispers to grow teeth.
Lys was not King’s Landing, or Summerhall. Lys was silk and perfume, and something rotten beneath it all.
They said Aerion’s hair had grown long there, pale silver-gold spilling past his shoulders like some Lysene harlot’s. That he had taken to the pleasure houses, not as a guest or a prince, but as something else, after his father left him to his own devices and would no longer indulge him.
Aerion, an omega, alone in Lys, with no one to rein him in and no one to claim him. Men talked about the pale haired prince in low voices and smirks hiding uglier thoughts underneath.
Dunk did not know how much of it was true, since rumors had a way of turning uglier than the truth, especially when a man was already half-mad to begin with, all teeth and fire.
In truth, Dunk did not much care about the hair, it was the rest of Aerion that worried him.
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The trip to Lys was far shorter than Duncan had expected. Having a prince he remembered as hot-headed and impulsive waiting for him on the other side of the narrow sea seemed to have that effect on time. The days blurred together, the nights passed without much rest, and before he knew it, the ship was docking beneath the pale, gleaming towers of the city.
The heat came first, thick and clinging, followed closely by the perfume, sweet enough to turn the stomach if one lingered on it too long. And then there were the pleasure houses. Duncan had expected a few, tucked away in corners where decent men could pretend not to see them, but Lys did not bother with such pretenses.
The houses were scattered through the city like jewels someone had flung carelessly by the handful, all painted doors and open balconies, silk and bare skin drifting in the windows.
It was a city built on indulgence, and proud of it. A city of the seven sins.
“Gods,” Duncan muttered under his breath, not quite able to keep the disapproval from his voice.
Dunk slowed his step despite himself, his eyes catching on one open doorway, then another, on the figures that lingered there—painted and smiling in ways that promised more than they should.
The hedge knight couldn’t stop his eyes from taking in the city more than he wanted, which made the stories about the princeling even harder to ignore.
Lys, the jewel of the Free Cities, wasn't one to leave a man untouched and Aerion had been bad enough before.
Dunk exhaled slowly through his nose and adjusted the sword belt at his hip, already irritated by the heat, the perfumes, and the thought of what sort of mess he had sailed across the world to collect.
The air of Lys clung to Duncan in a way that made the back of his throat itch, the low hum of laughter and murmured voices carrying through open doorways as though there were no shame in it at all. Men came and went freely, some flushed with drink, others already half-undone by whatever waited for them inside.
Dunk had no business here, if only it wasn't for the stern instructions given by the future king of the seven kingdoms: bring the omega prince home.
The hedge knight stepped into one of the pillow houses, there was silk draped the walls, lantern-light softened every corner, the air was thick with warmth and the scent of sinful pleasures, it made him all the more aware of himself in a way he did not care for.
He had barely crossed the threshold when he was noticed. Perhaps it was his height, or the way he did not quite belong, but one of the madams made for him at once, her hands slipping around his arm as though it were the most natural thing in the world. She was close before he could think to step back, all soft curves and practiced ease, her touch light but certain.
“My lord,” she said, her voice sweet as honey, “it is my first time seeing you here. May I offer you the comfort of my quarters?”
Dunk stiffened at that, his jaw tightening as he looked down at her. He did not like being touched, not by the pretty lady looking up at him at least. Not like this, while he was meant to be looking for a prince gone to rot in a place of this nature.
“I’m not here for that,” Duncan said, shrugging her off, though not roughly. The knight shifted his weight to put a step of distance between them.
The madam dressed in a golden gown full of pearls did not seem offended, if anything she looked amused.
“Then what?” she asked, laughter already creeping into her voice. “You did not come to inspect the quality of our silks, I think, nor to take a stroll through the gardens in the back.” She laughed then, light and knowing, as though she had seen his sort a hundred times before. “You behave like a Septa, my lord,” she added, tilting her head at him, her grip on his arm loosening but not quite letting go, “but everyone who comes here is looking for the same thing.”
Duncan was a knight; he did not indulge in mortal pleasures, he had an oath to uphold, and places such as this sat poorly with it.
“M'lady, I am here to look for someone—” Duncan didn't get to finish his sentence.
“Oh, all these lords are looking for someone,” the Lysene madam cut in, her voice lifting even more with amusement, as though she had heard the same excuse a hundred times before. “Slaves, runaways, or simply a warm body to escape the coldness of their wives.”
Her eyes roved over him, assessing, certain. “So which is it for you, my lord?”
Duncan removed her hand from his arm at once and exhaled deeply. He had no wish to be mistaken for the sort of men who came here to fatten themselves on the sins of the jewel of the Free Cities, “I am looking for a prince.”
The madam’s lips curved into an unpleasant sort of smile, something sharper than before, more knowing. “A prince, you say.” She turned then, beckoning him along, leading him through veils of silk that hung thick as a curtain, parting them with practiced ease as she guided him deeper into the house, into quarters more secluded than the rest.
“You will find him here,” she went on, glancing back at him over her shoulder. “Lords cross seas to come to him. I must say, the war scarrings on his body have done nothing to diminish his appeal—if anything, they have made him one of the finest jewels in Lys.”
There was something almost indulgent in the way she spoke of Aerion, and deep down, Duncan did not like it one bit.
“However,” she added lightly, “he is quite occupied as we speak. Perhaps my lord would do better to return another time.”
“It is no matter. I will wait.” Duncan could not leave even if he wished to; Prince Maekar would sooner have him dragged behind a horse and his head cut off than see him return empty-handed.
The madam sighed at that, though not without a hint of amusement, and turned back to him, “I must warn you,” she said, her tone shifting just enough to carry weight, “He is quite temperamental.”
Dunk let out a low, humorless laugh. “Aye, that much I know." And then, after a beat, with something almost like dry amusement slipping through despite himself: “The pretty ones are always temperamental, m’lady.”
The brothel madam shook her head before turning to leave, her golden gown slithering behind her like a snake.
Duncan watched her go, then let out a slow breath, his gaze drifting back to the heavy curtains that concealed the inner chambers. He could wait—he had said as much—but the thought sat poorly with him. The man at Summerhall would not be so patient, and Duncan had no desire to test the limits of Prince Maekar’s temper.
And, if he were honest, he was curious too.
His hands itched at his sides, large and restless, as if they might move of their own accord, part the silks, tear through the layers of perfumed secrecy that hid whatever lay beyond. He could hear something behind them, faint and indistinct, the low murmur of voices, the shifting of bodies, sounds that did not belong in any place a prince ought to be.
It could be prince Aerion, or someone entirely else. Duncan frowned at the thought, imagining some Lysene play at nobility, a painted figure draped in silver-gold meant to pass for a Targaryen princeling, like something out of a puppet show made to mock them.
It would not be the first time men had tried to imitate dragons.
There was only one way to be certain. The hedge knight pushed the curtains faintly with his hand, the silks parting beneath his touch with little resistance. His eyes went at once to the bed at the center of the room, set almost like a prayer circle in a sept, deliberate and adorned, as though whatever lay upon it was meant to be worshipped.
Duncan stilled. His mouth parted slightly as his gaze settled on the figure stretched across the sheets.
Bare, or near enough to it, draped more in ornament than in cloth, silver hair spilling down to his shoulders in soft waves. Pearls caught the low light, a shoulder piece cascading down his back, each movement making them glint like something alive.
There was no mistaking him, even from a distance, even half-hidden beneath silk and shadow, the look of him was unmistakable, his scent even more. It was Aerion Targaryen.
Dunk’s brow furrowed as he took a slow step forward, something in his chest tightening in a way he did not care to name. This was not how a prince ought to be found, laid out in a place such as this, adorned like some prized thing to be looked upon and desired.
A prince ought not to be taken like some common whore, laid out for any man with coin to look upon.
The pale-haired prince was straddling another man’s thighs, as he moved with a slow and deliberate rhythm. The sounds reached Duncan first, wet and indecent, barely muffled beneath the layered murmurs and laughter that filled the brothel. The shifting of bodies, the drag of skin against skin, all of it folding into the heavy air like it was just another part of the place.
Aerion did not look at him. And Duncan was no fool—he knew the princeling had caught his scent the moment he stepped behind the curtains, knew it as surely as if Aerion had turned his head and named the hedge knight aloud.
His head was tilted back slightly, silver hair more beautiful than ever, catching the light in mocking flashes. There was no haste in him, no shame either, only a languid sort of indulgence, as though he had all the time in the world to spend exactly as he pleased.
Dunk’s jaw tightened at the ease of it all. The way Aerion carried himself like he had always belonged in a place such as this.
Despite the anger bubbling in him, Duncan found he could not look away. The sight held him fast, the way the prince's body yielded and answered in turn, drawing low, broken sounds from the alpha at his back. Or the way the man's cock was buried into the warm walls of the omega prince, plunging into his heat, as though the world beyond the bed was long forgotten.
Perhaps Duncan was too angry—for whatever reason—or too unsettled by what he was seeing to move. He stood there longer than he should have, longer than any man with sense and honor ought to linger in such a place.
Aerion’s head tilted, just slightly, as though drawn by something unseen, his blue eyes turning at last, finding Duncan where he stood behind the curtain of silk.
Duncan saw it, before he forced his hand to let the curtains fall back into place and hid the sight from him. He saw how Aerion wore a sheer dark veil, drawn across half his face, softening the sharpness of his features, rendering him something altogether too close to a Lysene harlot.
The thought of the prince being taken like some animal made Duncan’s hand twitch toward the sword at his belt. For a moment, he had the urge to draw steel and put an end to it, to see the man beneath him laid low where he belonged.
But with what right would he act? He was no prince, or kin, and he had no claim over the omega. And that last thought, more than anything, held him still.
So Duncan remained where he stood, back pressed to the wall, jaw set tight, his ears unwillingly catching what sounds slipped past the silks. He closed his eyes for a moment and muttered a prayer under his breath, asking the Seven to see it end soon, so he might take the prince from this place and be done with it.
The hedge knight stood there for what felt like days, though it could not have been more than a handful of minutes stretched thin by his own impatience.
When the curtains finally parted, the alpha lordling emerged first, adjusting his robes with careless ease, as though what had passed within meant nothing at all. He did not spare Duncan more than a passing glance before tossing a small purse of coins onto the floor behind him, the clink of it sharp against the quiet.
“Shame,” he said lightly, his gaze flicking back toward the bed, toward the veil that had fallen back into place. “If not for that temper—and what’s been done to your face—you might have fetched twice the price. There are men who would pay well to pretend they are bedding a prince. You would do a fine thing as a house pet, if you learned obedience."
Duncan moved before he had quite decided to. One moment the man was turning away, the next he was forced back against the wall, the breath knocked from him as Duncan’s hand closed around his collar and shoved him hard enough to make the silks tremble.
The lordling let out a startled sound, hands flying up, but Duncan was already there, towering over him.
“Mind your tongue,” he said, low and steady, the words pressed out between clenched teeth. "You're addressing a prince of the Seven Kingdoms."
The man swallowed, trying for indignation, but it rang hollow beneath the weight of Duncan’s grip. “Unhand me—do you know who—”
“I know what you are,” Duncan cut in, tightening his hold just enough to make the words falter. His other hand hovered near the hilt at his side, not drawn, but not far from it either. “And I’ll have that tongue of yours cut out if I hear it wag like that again.”
Slowly, stiff with wounded pride and something closer to fear, he gave a tight nod.
Duncan released him at once and the man staggered back, adjusting his robes with shaking hands, casting one last cautious look at the knight, before turning and making for the exit without another word.
The knight watched him go, exhaling deeply as he forced the anger to settle into something quieter, more distant.
When he turned back, the prince was no longer as he had been. Aerion had drawn on loose robes that hung carelessly from his shoulders, one side slipping just enough to expose the pale line of his collarbone. He bent to retrieve the purse left behind, the movement unhurried, as if he was used to such insults.
With a hurried step, Duncan crossed into the quarters, drawing the curtains closed behind him, shutting out the rest of the house in one deliberate motion. He wasted no time in making his presence known.
“My prince—” He did not get to finish speaking, it seemed the princeling’s temper had not worn down with the passing years.
“Were your travels so cold and weary,” Aerion cut in, his voice smooth, edged with something sharper beneath, “that you found yourself in need of a whore to warm your bed, ser?” He did not rise to face him, only shifted where he stood, the loose fall of his robes doing little to conceal the careless way he held himself.
“You have cost me a client today. Those do not come so easily” he went on, almost idly. “But perhaps you mean to make amends,” Aerion added, his gaze lifting at last, something faintly mocking in it. “Pay me well enough, and I might yet be persuaded to please you accordingly.”
Duncan did not answer, his gaze had fixed itself upon the veil. It was sheer, dark as spilled ink, drawn across half the prince’s face in a way that ought to have revealed more than it concealed—and yet it did not. The fabric obscured his traits rather than unveiling whatever lay beneath indistinct.
The lordling’s words returned to him then, unbidden: That butchered face.
Duncan’s brow pulled tight as he looked at him, trying to reconcile what he saw with what had been said, trying to make sense of what the veil was meant to hide, and why it had been hidden at all.
He shifted awkwardly, the weight of his own stare settling uneasily on him. He did not know if it was the heat of Lys, or the cloying perfumes that seemed to cling to the air, or the omega seated before him—but his heart had begun to race, a flush creeping into his cheeks.
The bark was still there in Aerion’s words, but there was no bite to it now. This was not the man he had fought at Ashford, not the prince who had turned a puppet show into a near slaughter with nothing but temper and pride.
Duncan kept his eyes on him as Aerion crossed the space and seated himself upon the unmade bed, careless of its state. Those piercing blue eyes lifted to him then, fixing him in place with a weight that felt far too deliberate.
“I can hear your thoughts, you oaf,” Aerion said, his voice quieter now, but no less cutting. “You’re curious, aren’t you?” He leaned back slightly, as though at ease in a place Duncan could scarcely stand to remain in. “It would be wiser to turn back to Summerhall to ask my father how I came to be here, Ser Duncan,” he went on. “Though there is no need to trouble him, in truth. The reason for it stands before.”
Duncan was quick to answer, "You know very well I had no hand in your punishment, my prince," he said. "And you know just as well why the trial took place."
The knight took a step closer, and for the first time, he allowed himself to breathe in properly, to take in the scent of the omega without restraint.
No perfume in Lys could mask that lovely scent. Burnt sugar, and bergamot oranges.
Seven gods, help me, he thought.
“And no, I am neither curious, nor here to warm your bed,” he said at last, though the words sat poorly on his tongue, bitter in a way that betrayed him more than he cared to admit. “I am here on your father’s command to fetch you back to Summerhall, my prince."
The pale-haired prince stiffened and wasted no time in pulling his robe properly over his shoulders, the fabric settling back into place with practiced ease. His veil shifted slightly as he moved, catching the low light as he turned to gather the purses of coins from the makeshift table beside the bed.
“You should leave now, Ser Duncan,” Aerion said without looking at him, his tone flat, as if the matter had already been decided, “before the ships depart. I am most certainly not returning with you.”
Duncan’s jaw tightened at that, his hand curling slightly at his side as he searched for the right words and found none that did not feel ill-suited to the moment. “Your father will have my head, your Grace,” he said at last, forcing the steadiness into his voice, “he insisted I bring you back the moment word of the brothels reached him.” Even as he spoke, Duncan found himself once again faltering at how cruel it sounded.
Aerion did not hesitate. “Then my father will certainly understand why I cannot return home ruined,” he replied, still turned away, his fingers tightening briefly around the coin before letting it fall into the purse. “He would not want a whore parading through Summerhall, would he? So turn back, and leave at once.”
“Your Grace, I beg of you. Prince Maekar—”
“Do not speak of him,” Aerion snapped, the shift immediate and sharp, his composure breaking just enough to reveal the anger simmering beneath. He turned then, the veil shifting with the motion, obscuring whatever lay beneath it even as his gaze fixed on Duncan with cutting clarity. “You giant peasant.”
The words lingered, heavy with contempt, “He abandoned me here,” Aerion went on, each word measured, though something colder than anger bled through it, “with no coin, no title. Left me to die like some Flea Bottom stray. And now he asks for my return?”
Gods, of all the siblings, Duncan had to deal with the most stubborn one.
“Tell him not to worry,” he said, his voice lowering into something quieter but no less sharp, “I will not tarnish the dragon house's name.” His hand rose slightly, fingers brushing the edge of his own pale hair as though it were foreign to him. “I will find a way to rid myself of this wretched color.”
The hedge knight spoke before he could stop himself. “No! It is beautiful!” The word came too quickly, and the weight of what he had said caught up to him a second too late. “I apologise, my prince.”
Aerion only dismissed it with a small shift of his shoulders, clearing his throat as though the moment had not unsettled him in the slightest. “Men and women line up for me,” he said coolly, “so I am well aware it is beautiful, Ser Duncan. And if you are not here for warm pillows, then it would be best if you make use of that door and never return.”
And perhaps it was the memory of what he had just witnessed, or something far more animalistic that Duncan did not care to name, but he moved before he could think better of it. He closed the distance in a few strides and caught Aerion by the arm, pulling him to his feet.
“Please, my prince,” he said, the words rougher now, stripped of their earlier restraint. “I do not wish to lose my head at your father’s hand, and I will not leave you in a place such as this. You do not belong here.”
Aerion stilled at that, his gaze lifting, sharp and searching. “Tell me, hedge knight,” he said, his voice quieter now, edged with something colder, “where do I belong, then?”
Duncan held his gaze, even as something uneasy settled in his chest. “Not in a pleasure house,” he said, more firmly than he felt, “to be made a spectacle of by men who would not have dared raise their eyes to you four years ago.”
Perhaps, Duncan did care about Aerion’s hair.
Without thinking, he reached up, brushing a stray strand of pale hair back from Aerion’s face, whose reaction was immediate. His hand struck Duncan’s away with sharp precision. “Know your place,” Aerion said, each word clipped and cold. “Do not touch me again.”
Duncan drew his hand back at once, fingers curling slightly at his side, the sting of it lingering longer than it ought to.
He did not speak, yet the thought pressed itself forward all the same. He had seen the men who came and went, had heard enough through silk and shadow to understand what was given here, what Aerion allowed of them without protest or refusal.
Still, this was where the line was drawn. Duncan’s jaw tightened, his gaze lingering on him despite himself, and the careless way he stood as though none of it weighed upon him.
Ashford came back to him then. The press of bodies beneath the sheets, the heat of it all, the closeness that had not been denied then, that had not earned him a strike nor a command to remember his place.
“Apologies, my prince,” Duncan said, taking exactly three steps back as though the distance might mend what had already been crossed. “I had forgotten my place.”
“Apologies accepted. Now, scram.” Aerion had already turned away when he spoke, moving deeper into the quarters without so much as a glance back, the fall of his robes and veil disappearing behind the layers of silk. “I need to bathe and dress.”
He did not wait for an answer. The curtains fell between them soon after, leaving Duncan alone in the quiet that followed. After a moment, he sat on the edge of the bed despite himself, careful as if the very thing might protest his presence.
Duncan was used to waiting, still, the princeling was surely taking his sweet time on purpose.
What a brat, he hasn't changed a bit, he thought.
When Aerion came back, he was dressed in a red tunic and plain trousers, a dark cloak thrown over it all with the hood resting loose at his back, a small bag hanging at his side. Duncan caught the change at once, but more than that, he caught the hesitation in his scent. “Is anything amiss, my prince?” he asked, watching him closely.
“I will return to Summerhall with you, however—” Aerion shifted slightly on his feet, the movement brief but not subtle enough to escape notice, “I am not alone.”
Duncan did not answer at once, but his scent turned sharper, something sour slipping into it before he could restrain it. Aerion caught it immediately, his lip curling faintly beneath the veil. “Quit gaping and control that scent of yours, it is all over the place,” he said, irritation clear in his tone, already turning away. “Follow me.”
He did not wait for a response, leading Duncan through a narrow door at the back, then further still, through a stretch of garden where the thick perfumes and lewd noise of the brothel dulled into something distant, until they reached a quieter set of quarters.
Aerion stopped there and glanced back at him, stern and deliberate. “Do not scare him, giant,” he said, his voice lower now, the veil still obscuring his face, leaving only those blue eyes visible. “Or I will have your head.”
Duncan frowned slightly, his hand brushing against the hilt at his hip out of habit, the warning sitting poorly with him when he did not yet know who stood beyond that threshold. If it was another alpha behind that door, he would not hesitate to strike him down.
Aerion turned from him without waiting, his voice becoming softer as he called out, “Maegor, māzigon.”
Duncan did not understand the words, but he understood what followed when a small figure stepped forward from within the room, no taller than three feet and some inches, dressed plainly, with sandy brown hair broken by a striking silver streak running from the front to the back.
By the Seven, Aerion Targaryen had been hiding a bastard in plain sight all this time, in the very heart of Lys.
Duncan stilled where he stood as he took in the boy’s face. He looked like Aerion, there was no denying that much, yet something in the set of his features did not belong entirely to him. A familiarity lingered there, that Duncan felt he ought to recognize but could not quite place.
Maekar had sent him to retrieve the prince, and it seemed he would not be returning with only one.