Memories on the Shore

[hongyueg]

Standing on the shores of Fair Isle, a week after her brother Viserys' death, Rhaena realizes a certain detail about Elissa. https://archiveofourown.org/works/76891561

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They were the same age. The thought jolted through Rhaena’s mind, quickly followed by the familiar pangs of grief. She peered at the fifteen-year-old, laughing and splashing water onto the glittering sand. The girl cared not whether the ocean soaked her fine attire or brine stained her yellow hair.

“Come, Your Grace,” the girl, Elissa, beckoned. “You must join me. Let yourself rest for once. No one but us will see you here.”

Rhaena shook her head at the girl—the girl who, less than a year ago, possessed no qualms approaching a stony, fugitive princess and inviting her to sail on her ship. A girl, who, only a week ago, when they received that sickening news, had been the sole person not to offer wretched condolences, but instead ask. Tell me about him, the girl had murmured. I wish to know more of him than his death.

“I must not,” Rhaena called back, keeping her feet planted in the sand. “Your father will scold you for dirtying a princess. You both have been too kind to me, and I will not repay that kindness by causing strife between you.”

Elissa laughed. “I do not fear my father. If I had, would I have run off that boy he betrothed me to three years ago?”

A breeze tugged Rhaena’s body toward the sea, but still she remained on the shore. 

Elissa groaned, sloshing more water in her direction. The droplets splattered the sand by Rhaena’s toes. “I ask you again to join me, my Princess.” Elissa’s eyes flickered downward. “I am sure your royal brother would have wanted you to. Live, if not for me, for him.”

The girl’s words thudded against Rhaena’s chest, tearing at the pit within her, twisting that bundle of anger, guilt, and grief that had been buried there since her father’s, since Aegon’s and Melony’s, and now since Viserys’ death. Viserys, who had been twelve when she and Aegon left him for their progress. She recalled the worry in his purple eyes and the forced assurance in his voice as he promised to look after Jaehaerys and Alysanne while they were gone. And now…he was, too. 

Tell me about him, Elissa said to Rhaena that day a week ago. They had been alone in Rhaena’s quarters with Rhaena lounging on the divan while Elissa knelt before her. The letter, lying feet away on the table, almost glowed in the afternoon sunlight.

Rhaena had shed no tears when Elissa’s father handed her the unsealed missive that morning. She had not trembled when he had spoken his apologies. Yet when Elissa asked so earnestly, Rhaena found she could not help but entrust this girl with her brother’s memories. The brother, she used to joke, who was the most boring of them all. Aegon, she told Alayne once, was strong and quick and her favorite. Jaehaerys, although only six, was already clever enough to astound the maesters. Viserys at eleven was sweet and caring, but had little else going on.

Still, she told Elissa of her brother. Of his bright-eyed curiosity as a toddler that amused her and Aegon but exasperated their parents and nurses. Of how he clung to her that entire night after he watched their grandsire collapse. Of how he had been the only one of Queen Alyssa’s children to take after their Velaryon heritage and dream of sailing the world. Of how, during their father’s royal progress to Oldtown, he delighted in the attention he received and babbled to anyone who would listen. Later, he whispered to Rhaena that he had done that so no one would bother her.

And Elissa listened. Her blue eyes gleamed as old recollections, frustrations, and stories spilled out of Rhaena. She giggled at little quips, nodded at long-winded rants, and smiled at cherished moments long past. Elissa, a girl infamous for her inability to sit still, and Rhaena, a woman infamous for her stern silences, sat together in that compartment—Elissa listening and Rhaena talking—as the sun sank over the sea outside.

Now, Rhaena stood on the coast, peering at a girl who she just realized was the same age as her brother. But Viserys was dead and would never be the same age as Elissa again. And Elissa? She was alive, splashing in the ocean.

Rhaena remained on the shore.