Better it is not a woman, when bastards got us into this disaster of a succession.
I’m angry that one who claimed to be my friend is fucking my child, Embry.
[ angry here meaning hurt. alicent has not had a friend since she became queen — larys and cole wanted of her flesh, and chose her boys over her in the end, anyway.
and now tim takes of her son. so it goes. ]
And that this one also professes to be only capable of a singular, wholehearted love for another, so my son will be left in pain by this, invariably.
[ embry has spent a good bit of time (weeks, months) wracked by guilt for fucking over one (1) tim laughlin, by way of involving himself far too deeply with hawk. the exceptionally petty part of him wants to be angry, wants to say see, tim is just as shitty as i am, but he can’t — not because he’s overcoming his worst urges, but because he doesn’t have a leg to stand on. ]
if you think i’m going to sit here and defend tim laughlin, you’re insane. but i will tell you that believing that hawk is the singular and wholehearted love of your life is just as insane, at least right now. it can’t be easy loving him.
[ he wouldn’t know ]
have you talked to either of them about this? i’m sorry, but tim doesn’t have nearly enough game for a hit and run. if they’re fucking, there’s probably
pillow talk and feelings and shit like that going on.
Yes, that is why he has Harry. Must he also have my son?
Any tenderness will only make the heartbreak more painful when he chooses Hawk over my Aemond at every turn. I have seen them in the werewolf game, Embry. They would sacrifice all for each other.
[ a beat. ]
It is Tim who told me.
[ admitted begrudgingly because he did the right thing there, and won a measure of respect, if not mercy. ]
[ hm. maybe he shouldn’t have told hawk to shut up when he was trying to explain the dynamics of their relationship to him. ]
alicent, you’re a good mom. you’d also sacrifice anything for your kids (questionable but understandable). but as a former young man of both aemond’s age and tim’s age, this is one of the hardest pills you’re gonna have to swallow. you can’t control this. and you can’t protect aemond from this kind of heartbreak. you can whale on tim all you want. in fact, if you want to go put soap in his toothpaste right now, i’ll help you. but can you honestly tell me that you think tim is seducing aemond, as if he doesn’t want this, too?
were you thinking about how bad the heartbreak would be when you kissed your princess all those years ago?
You need not flatter my mothering now, of all times. I know I cannot control it, else I would do something other than complain to you!
[ like order them both around, which she won’t bother with. although she calls aemond child, she knows him to be a man grown. ]
Yes, I was. And now I have the pleasure of watching her cavort about this place with her uncle husband, while I kiss her in secret. Should any know of it, as you and Tim do, and speak of it, I shall be hanged by mine own sons for the crime.
Because none are partial to me, Embry. Not truly. Is it so selfish to wish for things of my own?
[ it is, and she knows it, more girl than queen in her outrage. she has never had a friend or a lover that was hers. tim’s betrayal picks at her oldest wound. it’s about him. it’s not about him. alicent has always wanted for what she cannot have, and it smarts every time she lets herself believe any different. ]
you say that as if complaining to me isn’t an honor and a privilege.
[ the pleasure of watching someone you love cavort about with someone else is a familiar one. fifteen years of being the model closeted citizen, kissing ash in private, watching him wed someone else. it’s a special kind of hell that one only understands if they’re in it, and even then he knows she wouldn’t give up her princess for all the lonely nights in the world. because embry wouldn’t have done it for his king, either. ]
i know what that’s like. don’t call me naïve for this, but you have to know that i’d never let anyone hang you for anything. please don’t be so dramatic. that’s my job.
you’re not selfish for wanting something of your own. death really illuminated the circle of people that i could depend on. tim’s not in that circle. i’m not innocent when it comes to him, but he didn’t stand with ash while i was gone. not like you did, in your own way. i’m sorry that he betrayed your trust, too.
[ that he understands and that none would let her come to harm here. it's westeros, where she'll pay her dues. his sorrow for her lot still catches her off-guard, when so few have ever expressed it. ]
The drawing room on the second floor, in the west wing.
[ she doesn't want lestat to hear her erratic heartbeat or pathetic thoughts. ]
I should've done more for you, Alina, and Ash then. I'm sorry.
[ in that first, brutal round, she'd found jacaerys' killer for rhaenyra and sweet baela, as recompense for the child aemond stole from this world, but she ought to have done more. hounded tim for answers, when she first drew the parallel between embry and alina. reached out to ash. protected alina from harm. even after being forced to choose over and over again, alicent wishes she could shield them all. ]
if you never apologize to me again for the rest of your life, it'd still be too soon.
[ he shows up empty-handed to the drawing room, though it takes a great effort not to grab a bottle and two glasses when he knows the benefits of a good drink. (maybe alicent has already begun? he can only hope.) ash's voice rattles around in his head after the missing hours of his night: you need to get sober. he should've considered it after what abilene stole from him, but the fact that it's happened again, under stranger circumstances, puts a little more urgency in the matter. still, he wasn't wasted that night he ended up in hawk's bed with no memory of how he got there. he should be wasted now, because the occasion certainly calls for it.
it's quiet when he walks in and approaches her, sequestered away as if there's no one in the world that she can trust or even stomach right now. embry knows that feeling well, shutting himself away in expensive hotel rooms on the campaign trail to order ungodly amounts of room service alone so he could avoid looking at ash and jenny. if he was going to be surly and miserable, he might as well do it with foie gras and perfectly grilled sourdough. ]
Have you ever noticed — [ he leans back against one of the upholstered armchairs. ] That Tim's ears are bigger than an elephant's?
[ in the drawing room, alicent sits by the roaring hearth, back against the legs of an armchair, knees swept aside at her place on the floor. not befitting a queen in the least, but then none of her behaviour has been in accordance with her station today — as outraged as she was on driftmark, knife in hand. as hurt as she was the night she learned of rhaenyra’s lies, too. aemond and tim are both children, in their own ways, young and careless.
alicent never had the luxury of such foolishness.
even as she hears the door creak open, she doesn’t look away from the embers. it is not so egregious, this unkindness, as the others she has known, yet it hurts more for being preceded by warmth. trust, given so rarely, when she should know better than to offer it at all. and still you reach for it. by inviting embry to witness her pain, by speaking to him about it at all.
a shocked gasp-turned-laugh, at the pettiness of embry’s opener. she clasps a hand over her mouth, courtly instinct, before she thinks again and lowers it. ]
You go too far. [ a protest without any commitment. then — ] Not an elephant, but perhaps a hare.
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
no subject
I’m angry that one who claimed to be my friend is fucking my child, Embry.
[ angry here meaning hurt. alicent has not had a friend since she became queen — larys and cole wanted of her flesh, and chose her boys over her in the end, anyway.
and now tim takes of her son. so it goes. ]
And that this one also professes to be only capable of a singular, wholehearted love for another, so my son will be left in pain by this, invariably.
[ and she’ll pick up the pieces, like always. ]
no subject
[ embry has spent a good bit of time (weeks, months) wracked by guilt for fucking over one (1) tim laughlin, by way of involving himself far too deeply with hawk. the exceptionally petty part of him wants to be angry, wants to say see, tim is just as shitty as i am, but he can’t — not because he’s overcoming his worst urges, but because he doesn’t have a leg to stand on. ]
if you think i’m going to sit here and defend tim laughlin, you’re insane. but i will tell you that believing that hawk is the singular and wholehearted love of your life is just as insane, at least right now. it can’t be easy loving him.
[ he wouldn’t know ]
have you talked to either of them about this?
i’m sorry, but tim doesn’t have nearly enough game for a hit and run. if they’re fucking, there’s probably
pillow talk and feelings and shit like that going on.
no subject
Any tenderness will only make the heartbreak more painful when he chooses Hawk over my Aemond at every turn. I have seen them in the werewolf game, Embry. They would sacrifice all for each other.
[ a beat. ]
It is Tim who told me.
[ admitted begrudgingly because he did the right thing there, and won a measure of respect, if not mercy. ]
no subject
alicent, you’re a good mom. you’d also sacrifice anything for your kids (questionable but understandable). but as a former young man of both aemond’s age and tim’s age, this is one of the hardest pills you’re gonna have to swallow. you can’t control this. and you can’t protect aemond from this kind of heartbreak.
you can whale on tim all you want. in fact, if you want to go put soap in his toothpaste right now, i’ll help you. but can you honestly tell me that you think tim is seducing aemond, as if he doesn’t want this, too?
were you thinking about how bad the heartbreak would be when you kissed your princess all those years ago?
no subject
I know I cannot control it, else I would do something other than complain to you!
[ like order them both around, which she won’t bother with. although she calls aemond child, she knows him to be a man grown. ]
Yes, I was.
And now I have the pleasure of watching her cavort about this place with her uncle husband, while I kiss her in secret.
Should any know of it, as you and Tim do, and speak of it, I shall be hanged by mine own sons for the crime.
Because none are partial to me, Embry. Not truly. Is it so selfish to wish for things of my own?
[ it is, and she knows it, more girl than queen in her outrage. she has never had a friend or a lover that was hers. tim’s betrayal picks at her oldest wound. it’s about him. it’s not about him. alicent has always wanted for what she cannot have, and it smarts every time she lets herself believe any different. ]
no subject
[ the pleasure of watching someone you love cavort about with someone else is a familiar one. fifteen years of being the model closeted citizen, kissing ash in private, watching him wed someone else. it’s a special kind of hell that one only understands if they’re in it, and even then he knows she wouldn’t give up her princess for all the lonely nights in the world. because embry wouldn’t have done it for his king, either. ]
i know what that’s like.
don’t call me naïve for this, but you have to know that i’d never let anyone hang you for anything. please don’t be so dramatic. that’s my job.
you’re not selfish for wanting something of your own.
death really illuminated the circle of people that i could depend on. tim’s not in that circle. i’m not innocent when it comes to him, but he didn’t stand with ash while i was gone. not like you did, in your own way.
i’m sorry that he betrayed your trust, too.
where are you?
no subject
[ that he understands and that none would let her come to harm here. it's westeros, where she'll pay her dues. his sorrow for her lot still catches her off-guard, when so few have ever expressed it. ]
The drawing room on the second floor, in the west wing.
[ she doesn't want lestat to hear her erratic heartbeat or pathetic thoughts. ]
I should've done more for you, Alina, and Ash then. I'm sorry.
[ in that first, brutal round, she'd found jacaerys' killer for rhaenyra and sweet baela, as recompense for the child aemond stole from this world, but she ought to have done more. hounded tim for answers, when she first drew the parallel between embry and alina. reached out to ash. protected alina from harm. even after being forced to choose over and over again, alicent wishes she could shield them all. ]
no subject
[ he shows up empty-handed to the drawing room, though it takes a great effort not to grab a bottle and two glasses when he knows the benefits of a good drink. (maybe alicent has already begun? he can only hope.) ash's voice rattles around in his head after the missing hours of his night: you need to get sober. he should've considered it after what abilene stole from him, but the fact that it's happened again, under stranger circumstances, puts a little more urgency in the matter. still, he wasn't wasted that night he ended up in hawk's bed with no memory of how he got there. he should be wasted now, because the occasion certainly calls for it.
it's quiet when he walks in and approaches her, sequestered away as if there's no one in the world that she can trust or even stomach right now. embry knows that feeling well, shutting himself away in expensive hotel rooms on the campaign trail to order ungodly amounts of room service alone so he could avoid looking at ash and jenny. if he was going to be surly and miserable, he might as well do it with foie gras and perfectly grilled sourdough. ]
Have you ever noticed — [ he leans back against one of the upholstered armchairs. ] That Tim's ears are bigger than an elephant's?
no subject
alicent never had the luxury of such foolishness.
even as she hears the door creak open, she doesn’t look away from the embers. it is not so egregious, this unkindness, as the others she has known, yet it hurts more for being preceded by warmth. trust, given so rarely, when she should know better than to offer it at all. and still you reach for it. by inviting embry to witness her pain, by speaking to him about it at all.
a shocked gasp-turned-laugh, at the pettiness of embry’s opener. she clasps a hand over her mouth, courtly instinct, before she thinks again and lowers it. ]
You go too far. [ a protest without any commitment. then — ] Not an elephant, but perhaps a hare.