( he startles her into a laugh β it is musical and light and out of place on a battlefield, the way that she no longer is, not any more. spins around, the bladed tails of her coat flaring out behind her, lovely and lethal (and a bit dramatic): )
If you ever see Skyhold, I'll answer that question.
( in skyhold, and not before. it is not the presumption that he will, exactly,
so much as β besides having a vested interest in giving him a vested interest to follow her there β the assurance that the honest truth might obligate an end to this diplomacy altogether. )
[ ominous, and how painfully drawn to ominous things he is. it's enough of an answer to confirm his belief without shattering his ego. though he might consider himself capable, he isn't daft and blind to the order of the world around him. would it offend him to know? maybe a little, maybe it wouldn't change a thing at all.
still, she draws and he allows himself to be drawn. ignoring the dozen or so of her company littering the earth around them. the great thudding a dragon's steps. he allows the image of her with all that power in her hand and the feeling of the earth and air thrumming down into the blood running through his veins. ]
What questions will you answer now?
[ does he even have questions? he can think of something, when pressed, to stay in her orbit. why does this feel like he's chasing? she's not running, where is she going? where is she leading him??]
or ratherβ questions directed to herself. her willingness to refrain from prying has less to do with respect for other people's privacy than the way she keeps a jealous guard on her own; far be it from her to suggest to someone implicitly that prying questions in turn might be welcome, allowed. asking a person a question tells you only how that person answers questions is a clever deflection from someone who does still want to know all of the things she doesn't ask and seeks them out in other waysβ
her observation sharp, unsettlingly keen. so the dozen or so of her company, who have heard her say it a hundred times,
there are glances, when she tilts her head and says, )
What questions do you have?
( like a twisting half-step in a dance, forward and then back, an invitation.
the problem is the same as it always is: she cannot fucking leave well enough alone. )
[ in the long march back to camp, aemond could think of at least a dozen. some on topic, some off, some better off not in the wide company of her peers and compatriots. on one hand, curious questions are only something children ask. the naivete of wonder peeling back his well-crafted mask of someone far less traveled and inexperienced. why doesn't he know everything already? it's unfair, honestly. ]
What constitutes a good one? I'll see what I can narrow down.
[ an answer is still an answer, even a non-answer. the way she moves is an answer. the way she looks at him is another. but it has been this way the whole fortnight it took for them to get there, hasn't it? her dancing ahead looking like she has the right answer tucked under her tongue. only he needs to ask the right question.
he'd be annoyed, he is annoyed. whether it is more at her than himself, he's not yet decided. ]
( hungry for knowledge and reluctant to be seen reaching for it β now, where has she seen that before?
in her mirror. if he were a little less handsome, the recognition that sometimes sparks between them would be a little more annoying; she is so rarely pleased to be reminded of herself, a thing that doesn't bear any further examining at all, actually, thank you. )
What about this, ( she proposes, slowing a little too abruptly, the way she'd wandered into his path meaning she is in his way when she does it, ) I'll trade you a secret for a secret.
( she turns a hand palm up, as if to accept one: ) I'll give you as good as you give me.
[ Almost no sign of him letting up as his long legs close in on the space between them. His pace staggers to meet hers, within reach of the tips of her fingers if she stretched them far enough.
History would teach him not to play games. This sort of attitude is destined to only make some mockery of him — her gentle baiting and tricksy smiles. Fully acknowledged here before him and yet it's almost as if he's incapable of ejecting the lure thrashing before him. It's the age old game: would he rather feel shame or cowardice? ]
'Twould depend on what left of my life hasn't been picked apart and prepped to you by your spymasters.
[ Certainly, there are things she doesn't know. He doesn't know what pieces of his life he's starting with and he's not an idiot to think she knows nothing about him. The inquisition may be a world away, but he has witnessed them be nothing but thorough with their operations. ]
( leliana would never have let her come this far blind, he's right; had not been thrilled about it at all, so if anything she had been overprepared, each new piece of information laid before her with repressive disapproval. look at this. why are we still entertaining this. the truth is that there wasn't a first choiceβ courting another front of war that has too many already, entangling themselves at potentially great risk and great cost and for what?
we've got deranged inbreds at home, leliana might as well have said.
he was not the first choice. he is not unrelated to gwenaΓ«lle's stubborn determination to I don't know, we'll play it out, at least in a way that she'd rather die than admit right now. )
What about this, then, ( a reframe, rather than a concession: ) Something personal. Not of strategic import.
[ Aemond's lips purse, resisting their souring into an annoyance. What about Aemond is left from the statecraft built up around him? He is a child soldier, a son of a king, his life is lived in a wall that whispers and when has he had time for anything but his duty?
It's bleak. What does he have to offer her that she doesn't already know? What does he have worth her time in order to get a worthy secret in return?
He has to think about it a bit more. He still kept her pace and held her eye. There's a firmness in the way she moves, clearly challenged in some way. It makes his movements feel sharper and determined. ]
( gwenaΓ«lle is smiling, before he speaks β she's not a creature that's terribly difficult to read, as a rule, she's riding the high of battle and how much she likes whatever the fuck it is she's doing with and/or to aemond targaryen, she looks like she's pleased with herself because she is β but there's something about last night that catches her off-guard in a way that seems
distinct
from only, perhaps, thinking it's very sexy of him to be dreaming about her, or something.
it's not displeasure, butβ her brows pull together, an expression that looks more like the struggle to decipher something set in front of her than objecting to it. and there's not really anything about what he just said that's so fucking mysterious, is there, he could mean anything in specific but it's not as if it's vague. it's not as if she's some naif who can't imagine what dreams a man might have about a woman, either,
or who couldn't come up with a way to make that strategically relevant to her. so. )
[ The sad truth of this dragon prince is that he gets well ahead of himself all too often. The tragic consequence of his being overtly confident in territories he's never once fathomed treading. Speaking to Gwen, the days spent getting to know her, dancing this little dance they always seem to play with their words. He doesn't have a fucking clue what he's doing.
Only that what he's doing is working. Whatever answer he's given her opens her up to him just a little bit more. Rewarded by the turning of her gaze into something different, perhaps dangerous. Her answer isn't one he expects, it catches him farther off guard than his notion ever did to her. ]
Is it?
[ Short and to the point. Lingering on the fact without spreading his fingers through what that means to her. Let it sink in for a moment before he can volley back into the banter with renewed confidence. ]
it would be true. it would be more true than any sort of denial she might be inclined to make; in the immediate, she doesn't actually give him an answer, studying him still instead, a curl slipped to frame her face. and it's probably just a coincidence. coincidences do exist, even if so much has happened in the months since she ascended a throne built from a creature she personally killed to make her sometimes doubt it. her position atop it is more unlucky happenstance than fate, maker knows.
but she knows a dreamer. it's hard to think of dreams as nothing when someone else has walked in your mind, and made you know it. )
It isn't a secret, I think, that I wish to be in yours.
( but maybe if he had told her literally anything else, she still wouldn't have said it in so many words. )
[ That could mean several things, the more obvious one doesn't appear to come to mind or at the very least is rejected despite the rather warm connotation. He is not the right brother, he has never been the right brother. He is the brother that doesn't oft take the company of women or otherwise, shunned from the ladies in court for being mangled and too intense to properly try to court. Oh, but some had tried. They only failed to keep his interest. ]
Beyond the politics that brought you here?
[ Even as he says it, he knows it's a stupid question. The longer they stand staring at one another, he knows it's definitely not the intention she is meaning to make. It would be easier for all of them if it would. It would save him from the feeling that his ears are burning.
He pushes onward, closer. What jumbled nerves of an inexperienced boy gets shoved against a calmed and collected expression. He steps around her, head turning to keep her eye as he goes. ] Maybe you are.
( it doesn't necessarily seem wise to say something like, for instance, that politics alone might have seen her long since gone already. accurate, maybe, but not wise. she gives that its due consideration as she studies him, the way he closes the distance between them. the steadiness of his expression. what she might imagine lies behind it.
maybe. in her experience,
by the time you're bargaining with yourself like that, the thing is done. on the other hand, it could really be for her benefit alone, which would be disappointing but not impossible. she cannot allow herself to forget that he was bred for this. almost, according to her spy mistress, literally. )
I don't think the politics that brought me here are the most interesting thing about either of us.
( this is true, regardless of all else. it sort of feels like it needs to be true, or what's the fucking point of any of it. )
[ They've reached camp by now, a whole field away from preternatural carnage dusting the tall grass. Aemond's boots kick trampled weeds as he stops and half turns to keep her eye.]
Depends on how you could look at it, doesn't it?
[ Is this not just some other sort of politics? Whatever ball it is getting tossed between them. He's playing at it now like it isn't the very thing he might conspire to poison him. The idea is grasped and released almost within the same breath, but not forgotten. ]
( gwenaΓ«lle pretends not to notice the glances from nearby; they are not quite in earshot, but not far enough away to call it privacy, and she should be more mindful of thatβ
well, people are always telling her things she should be more mindful of. she sort of misses the days before she had a throne, when she thought that having one might mean people did that less. )
The way I dreamed it,
( catching his elbow with her hand, close enough that the scent-oil in her hair mingles with the smell of wet grass and demonic ichor, )
there wasn't anything between us.
( it would be very easy to interpret that altogether wrongly, except that that would probably make a very boring and unmemorable dream, whereas the correct interpretation is probably going to keep her going for weeks at least. )
[ Aemond's chin tips down at the hand wrapped around the bend of his elbow, eye trailing up to meet hers. No clear indication she's onto something, but he can't ignore the creeping heat rising up his neck. The sort of implication should cause him to divert his eye in a cover of modesty, yet he holds steadfast in staring her down.
There's no question to how she means it.
Stranger things have happened, stranger things are possible. Gwen hails from a land where the mysteries go higher and farther than what most of Westeros can comprehend. It it such an out of the world idea that they could have shared a dream? Hadn't his own house founded their migration on a dream?
We should compare notes. [It would seem, when confronted with the reality, his confidence wavers on its foundation. His response doesn't come nearly fast enough to let it suggest otherwise. ] Mayhaps we're closer to the same page than anticipated.
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
no subject
If you ever see Skyhold, I'll answer that question.
( in skyhold, and not before. it is not the presumption that he will, exactly,
so much as β besides having a vested interest in giving him a vested interest to follow her there β the assurance that the honest truth might obligate an end to this diplomacy altogether. )
ππ
still, she draws and he allows himself to be drawn. ignoring the dozen or so of her company littering the earth around them. the great thudding a dragon's steps. he allows the image of her with all that power in her hand and the feeling of the earth and air thrumming down into the blood running through his veins. ]
What questions will you answer now?
[ does he even have questions? he can think of something, when pressed, to stay in her orbit. why does this feel like he's chasing? she's not running, where is she going? where is she leading him??]
no subject
or ratherβ questions directed to herself. her willingness to refrain from prying has less to do with respect for other people's privacy than the way she keeps a jealous guard on her own; far be it from her to suggest to someone implicitly that prying questions in turn might be welcome, allowed. asking a person a question tells you only how that person answers questions is a clever deflection from someone who does still want to know all of the things she doesn't ask and seeks them out in other waysβ
her observation sharp, unsettlingly keen. so the dozen or so of her company, who have heard her say it a hundred times,
there are glances, when she tilts her head and says, )
What questions do you have?
( like a twisting half-step in a dance, forward and then back, an invitation.
the problem is the same as it always is: she cannot fucking leave well enough alone. )
I'll answer a good one.
no subject
What constitutes a good one? I'll see what I can narrow down.
[ an answer is still an answer, even a non-answer. the way she moves is an answer. the way she looks at him is another. but it has been this way the whole fortnight it took for them to get there, hasn't it? her dancing ahead looking like she has the right answer tucked under her tongue. only he needs to ask the right question.
he'd be annoyed, he is annoyed. whether it is more at her than himself, he's not yet decided. ]
no subject
in her mirror. if he were a little less handsome, the recognition that sometimes sparks between them would be a little more annoying; she is so rarely pleased to be reminded of herself, a thing that doesn't bear any further examining at all, actually, thank you. )
What about this, ( she proposes, slowing a little too abruptly, the way she'd wandered into his path meaning she is in his way when she does it, ) I'll trade you a secret for a secret.
( she turns a hand palm up, as if to accept one: ) I'll give you as good as you give me.
( like, maybe always. )
crawls out of hell
History would teach him not to play games. This sort of attitude is destined to only make some mockery of him — her gentle baiting and tricksy smiles. Fully acknowledged here before him and yet it's almost as if he's incapable of ejecting the lure thrashing before him. It's the age old game: would he rather feel shame or cowardice? ]
'Twould depend on what left of my life hasn't been picked apart and prepped to you by your spymasters.
[ Certainly, there are things she doesn't know. He doesn't know what pieces of his life he's starting with and he's not an idiot to think she knows nothing about him. The inquisition may be a world away, but he has witnessed them be nothing but thorough with their operations. ]
no subject
( leliana would never have let her come this far blind, he's right; had not been thrilled about it at all, so if anything she had been overprepared, each new piece of information laid before her with repressive disapproval. look at this. why are we still entertaining this. the truth is that there wasn't a first choiceβ courting another front of war that has too many already, entangling themselves at potentially great risk and great cost and for what?
we've got deranged inbreds at home, leliana might as well have said.
he was not the first choice. he is not unrelated to gwenaΓ«lle's stubborn determination to I don't know, we'll play it out, at least in a way that she'd rather die than admit right now. )
What about this, then, ( a reframe, rather than a concession: ) Something personal. Not of strategic import.
"wβ'α΅₯β gββ dβα΅£ββgβd α΅’βbα΅£βdβ ββ ββββ"
It's bleak. What does he have to offer her that she doesn't already know? What does he have worth her time in order to get a worthy secret in return?
He has to think about it a bit more. He still kept her pace and held her eye. There's a firmness in the way she moves, clearly challenged in some way. It makes his movements feel sharper and determined. ]
I had a dream about you last night.
[ That's worth something. ]
like is she wrong
distinct
from only, perhaps, thinking it's very sexy of him to be dreaming about her, or something.
it's not displeasure, butβ her brows pull together, an expression that looks more like the struggle to decipher something set in front of her than objecting to it. and there's not really anything about what he just said that's so fucking mysterious, is there, he could mean anything in specific but it's not as if it's vague. it's not as if she's some naif who can't imagine what dreams a man might have about a woman, either,
or who couldn't come up with a way to make that strategically relevant to her. so. )
That's a funny coincidence.
no :(
Only that what he's doing is working. Whatever answer he's given her opens her up to him just a little bit more. Rewarded by the turning of her gaze into something different, perhaps dangerous. Her answer isn't one he expects, it catches him farther off guard than his notion ever did to her. ]
Is it?
[ Short and to the point. Lingering on the fact without spreading his fingers through what that means to her. Let it sink in for a moment before he can volley back into the banter with renewed confidence. ]
Keeping me in your thoughts, Inquisitor?
how tf has it been 2 wks.
it would be true. it would be more true than any sort of denial she might be inclined to make; in the immediate, she doesn't actually give him an answer, studying him still instead, a curl slipped to frame her face. and it's probably just a coincidence. coincidences do exist, even if so much has happened in the months since she ascended a throne built from a creature she personally killed to make her sometimes doubt it. her position atop it is more unlucky happenstance than fate, maker knows.
but she knows a dreamer. it's hard to think of dreams as nothing when someone else has walked in your mind, and made you know it. )
It isn't a secret, I think, that I wish to be in yours.
( but maybe if he had told her literally anything else, she still wouldn't have said it in so many words. )
makes time illegal
Beyond the politics that brought you here?
[ Even as he says it, he knows it's a stupid question. The longer they stand staring at one another, he knows it's definitely not the intention she is meaning to make. It would be easier for all of them if it would. It would save him from the feeling that his ears are burning.
He pushes onward, closer. What jumbled nerves of an inexperienced boy gets shoved against a calmed and collected expression. He steps around her, head turning to keep her eye as he goes. ] Maybe you are.
[ What will she do with that? ]
time crimes
maybe. in her experience,
by the time you're bargaining with yourself like that, the thing is done. on the other hand, it could really be for her benefit alone, which would be disappointing but not impossible. she cannot allow herself to forget that he was bred for this. almost, according to her spy mistress, literally. )
I don't think the politics that brought me here are the most interesting thing about either of us.
( this is true, regardless of all else. it sort of feels like it needs to be true, or what's the fucking point of any of it. )
I didn't dream about politics. Did you?
it happened again
Depends on how you could look at it, doesn't it?
[ Is this not just some other sort of politics? Whatever ball it is getting tossed between them. He's playing at it now like it isn't the very thing he might conspire to poison him. The idea is grasped and released almost within the same breath, but not forgotten. ]
It wasn't politics between us.
by talos this can't be happening
well, people are always telling her things she should be more mindful of. she sort of misses the days before she had a throne, when she thought that having one might mean people did that less. )
The way I dreamed it,
( catching his elbow with her hand, close enough that the scent-oil in her hair mingles with the smell of wet grass and demonic ichor, )
there wasn't anything between us.
( it would be very easy to interpret that altogether wrongly, except that that would probably make a very boring and unmemorable dream, whereas the correct interpretation is probably going to keep her going for weeks at least. )
happy dragon day
There's no question to how she means it.
Stranger things have happened, stranger things are possible. Gwen hails from a land where the mysteries go higher and farther than what most of Westeros can comprehend. It it such an out of the world idea that they could have shared a dream? Hadn't his own house founded their migration on a dream?
We should compare notes. [It would seem, when confronted with the reality, his confidence wavers on its foundation. His response doesn't come nearly fast enough to let it suggest otherwise. ] Mayhaps we're closer to the same page than anticipated.