Chapter Text
“Wait! My lord Strong.”
The trickle of fear running down his spine turns into a flood and Lucerys Velaryon almost stumbles on his way out of the cavernous hall. Almost. But he is strong and he is steady and he cannot show any fear. He must not.
Of course it couldn’t be over so easily. Of course he wouldn’t be allowed to flee the Baratheon stronghold and run back to his mother in abject failure. That is not sufficient humiliation, not for the one-eyed demon who cannot simply bask in the ruination of Luke's mission. No, Aemond fucking Hightower cannot be content just standing there, smirking evilly and glaring out of that deranged eye of his.
He should just keep going, just get the seven hells out of there, but Lucerys stops and turns back to face Aemond, as though he were a puppet on strings and the glowering menace a cruel puppeteer. Lucerys never could keep his eyes away from the towering figure of his uncle and that absurd, bizarrely beautiful face. But it had always felt like staring into the eye of an unfamiliar dragon, a dangerous fascination that would always end in doom. It is no different this time and when Luke meets the crazy eye with his own, he can see that this will not end well.
“Do you think you can just fly about the realm, seeking to undermine my brother’s rule without any consequence?” Aemond croons, slinking away from the Baratheon girl he’s sold himself to, in payment for her father’s alliance. A twinge of pity for the girl momentarily distracts Luke and he doesn’t answer the question. He must not, when the only correct answer is that Aegon is a fucking usurper and Aemond a fucking traitor to the realm and the queen. Luke knows better than to shout that. He also made a promise to his mother and he means to keep it, even at the cost of running away from Storm’s End like a beaten dog.
“I will not fight you, I came here as a messenger,” he says instead, proud of how steady his voice is and how the cavernous hall amplifies it.
“A fight would be little challenge.”
Aemond’s mocking response is quiet, a rasp of dragon scales slithering over rock. It comes between a flash of lightning and a crash of thunder so loud that the hall seems to thrum with the force of it.
“No, I want you to put out your eye, in payment for mine,” Aemond tells him. He has moved closer, Lucerys doesn’t know when that happened and wishes it hadn’t. Because he can hear the insane demand all too clearly and if he thought he was frightened before, it is as nothing to the way the bottom of his stomach drops away now.
“One will serve, I plan to make a gift of it to my mother.”
The mad man is deadly serious, he’s not smirking anymore and this is no longer just a taunt, a mocking speech at the table or a tussle in the practice yard. The realization of it hits Luke hard and for a moment, he cannot believe that any of this is happening. His was supposed to be the easy mission, the shorter flight to a certain ally who would welcome him and his dragon with honor and answer his queen’s call to arms as her sworn bannerman should. Instead, Boros Baratheon is just sitting on his stony chair, watching the display with the interest of a hairy beast scenting blood. And he, Lucerys Velaryon, is about to lose an eye. Or, the gods help him, more than just an eye.
He opens his mouth to say something, anything at all to stay the madness. But the words die in his mouth when he sees Aemond removing his eyepatch and showing Luke what lies beneath. A blinding flash of lightning brings the ghastly sight in stark relief, searing Luke’s vision. Aemond is truly demonic, his white, sharp face lit with the cold, dead light of the sapphire embedded in his left socket. The living eye is a window into hell, wide and unblinking even as Aemond pulls out his dagger and flings it across the floor.
“Give me your eye, bastard!” Aemond shouts his demand this time and for a split second, Lucerys can see Valyrian steel cutting through that pale, sneering face. But that is in another place and another life, when Luke had a father at his back and a grandfather on the throne to protect him. The king is dead now and Daemon Targaryen will not spring out of the shadows to vanquish Luke’s enemy. He is all alone and must defend himself. Somehow.
“No,” he manages to say, willing his legs to move and get him away from this place of nightmares. He can hear the wind howling, the sea battering itself against the cliffs, rain lashing the high, narrow windows and thunder booming constantly. In the back of his mind, Arrax is a bundle of anxiety and all Lucerys wants to do is run to him, soothe his friend and then pray that the storm won’t blow them all the way to Essos as they try to get away.
“Then you are a craven as well as a traitor, little Lucerys Strong,” Aemond taunts him, closing the gap between them in long strides. Luke’s heart is hammering inside his chest, his hands are clammy and limp, his legs dead weights, sunk into the floor and rooted deeper than then foundations of Storm's End. The guardsmen around him are shifting into a defensive position and from the other end of the hall, Lord Baratheon is calling something Luke doesn’t understand.
“Give me your eye or I will take it myself, bastard!” Aemond is hissing, grabbing his knife from the floor and coiling himself to spring. Another eruption of light reveals the demon just paces away. Luke knows that he is a dead man, that Aemond can flow over and through the guardsmen like a river in flood. Luke might forego his oath and try to defend himself, but Aemond spoke true, it would be little challenge. The best he can hope for is that he will not wet himself or start blubbering when Aemond begins cutting him.
“NOT IN MY HALL!” Baratheon is bellowing and it seems to reach through Aemond’s fury. He stops just an arm's length way from Lucerys, knife poised to strike, one eye narrowed and the other glinting cold, blue death.
“You will not maim the boy in my house, he is here as a messenger and will leave unmolested!” The lord of Storm’s End insists and Luke would hug the illiterate bastard if he were closer and if Luke could move any of his limbs.
“You want to take this outside, Strong? Here or there, it makes no difference, I will put out your eye,” Aemond growls at him, looming over Lucerys, his face a study in viciousness and contempt.
Strong.
Strong? He means it as an insult, always has, always getting a rise out of Luke and Jace, always waving their bastardy under their noses and knowing that he wouldn’t be punished for it. Not even seeing a man decapitated for it had frightened Aemond out of bandying about the same taunt, as though it were the only insult he knew.
Strong. I must be strong.
But I AM Strong. Not in the way he means it, but in a way that will not leave me rooted to this spot, like a helpless lamb before the slaughter.
“Which eye will it be, boy? Which of these pretty little lights do you want me to put out?”
Aemond’s words pass through Lucerys as though the wrath of the storm outside has gathered into one mighty hammer and he is the anvil. Struck to the core, he feels all his joints loosen and the nightmarish apparition before him wavers, blurs and disappears behind a curtain of tears.
But is it not fear that squeezes Luke's heart, nor is he weeping in terror of the pain to come. He has no illusion that Aemond will show mercy if he cries and begs, that might only increase his sadistic pleasure.
Lucerys forces his eyes open and wills himself to look into the live eye of his nemesis. The dead one would be easier, the impersonal glow of the sapphire is far less daunting. But Luke must meet the living eye, wide and dark with malice and with hunger. He must look into it and not waver, he knows now what he must do. He has forgotten the doom set before him by the red priest or else he has set it aside because it did not make any sense. But now it has become painfully clear.
In the terrifying depths of Aemond’s dark eye, Lucerys sees the red priest that came to Dragonstone two years ago and how he offered to read the princes’ future in his fires. Jacaerys had been smart enough not to trifle with such things, but Lucerys – ever the reckless idiot – had taken it as a challenge and offered his blood to the tattooed slave in his tattered, crimson robes. A quick slash with the knife and a few drops of blood flung into the bonfire and then a long silence followed. Lucerys had stood before the flames, sucking on the shallow wound in his palm and shifting from foot to foot, expecting some incantation or some gesture to conjure up the magic. But the red priest had merely stared into the flames, motionless and unblinking for so long that Luke had wondered if he’d just fallen asleep standing or died on his feet. But after what seemed like an eternity to the unsettled boy, the red priest had turned to him with a gentle, sad smile and said: “You will give up half the light of the world to save the world.”
That and nothing else. No explanation. Either he would not or could not elaborate on the ominous foretelling, the red priest would offer nothing more, no matter how much Luke and Jace had begged and threatened.
But now, on this terrible night, in this terrible place and with this terrible man before him relentlessly baying for his blood, Lucerys finally understands what the fires had revealed. Half the light of the world, to save the world.
Half the light…? One of my eyes? But will it be enough? Will it save the world? Will it prevent a war? Will it start one? What is the world? Is it this lunatic in front of me? Can it stop him? Can it save him? Will it save me?
The questions run through Luke's mind, each one more impossible to answer than the next. The only certainty is the tip of the dagger that has moved inexorably closer to Luke's face. Whether Aemond can discern any of this inner turmoil or not, the knife does not waver, nor does the hand holding it.
Better to do it than live with the fear of it.
“Do it, Aemond. Take an eye and be done with it.”
Luke hardly recognizes his own voice. It sounds as hard and as cold as Aemond’s dead eye. The words seem to unlock his limbs and drive away all the fear and the hesitation. He closes the distance between himself and the looming Aemond, he walks right into the knife until the cold point touches his cheek, just beneath his left eye. The truth of the foretelling strengthens Luke, it blows away all the cobwebs from his mind and it burns away Aemond’s aura of menace. He is just a tall boy with a knife and a dead eye. The smirk is melting off his face and the living eye is wide with surprise now.
“Take whichever eye you want,” Lucerys tells him. “Take both, if that will give you any comfort.” The steel in his voice is harder than the steel pricking his cheek.
“I… I would not blind you,” Aemond says, voice low and hesitant.
“No, you will not. But I must give up half the light of the world to save the world.”
Saying the words makes Luke that much more certain. This is right. This is how it should be. It will hurt, but the dead eye he is looking up into screams of the pain Luke himself inflicted a lifetime ago. He must give Aemond an eye, it is only a fair exchange. But will it be enough to save the world?
Aemond doesn’t understand, however. Confusion and anger war across his expressive face, tugging his scar and the corners of is mouth. But the simple act of finally standing up to him seems to give Aemond pause and the knife pulls back a fraction.
“I don’t know what the fuck you’re mumbling about saving the world, boy…”
“An eye. Take it and let my debt be paid, Aemond,” Luke says, stepping forward, following the knife, so close to his tall kinsman now that he must crane his neck to maintain eye-contact.
Aemond tries to move back, but Lucerys takes hold of his wrist with both hands, pinning the hand and the knife in place.
“Now, please. Do it now, before my courage fails me,” Luke hears the small catch in his voice, but it doesn’t matter, his is not the only courage that is flagging. Aemond looks startled, all the bravado and the murder leaking out of him. He’s struggling to free his hand, to let go of the knife, but Luke’s hands clasp him tight, holding the weapon in place. An exhilarating sort of madness urges him onward, if this is how Aemond feels when he turns into a blood-thirsty maniac, then Lucerys can see how addictive it must be.
“Let go of me, you little bastard!” Aemond hisses through clenched teeth. He’s trying to fend Luke off with his free hand, pushing him and hitting him, but without much conviction, he knows that any truly violent movement will end up with the knife embedded somewhere in Luke's face.
“You must let go as well. All the enmity, all the hatred… let this be the end of it. I wish I hadn’t hurt you, I wish I could take it all back, if I could give you my living eye in place of that terrible stone, I would pluck it out myself and give you back all the light of the world. But I cannot. All that is left to me is to share your darkness.”
Lucerys knows that he sounds like a man possessed. He IS a man possessed by the terrible conviction that this must happen, that this is his fate, that it must be now, here, in this place and in this moment. Or he will never have the courage to face Aemond again and may not even live long enough to try.
Aemond has stopped struggling and beneath his clutching hands, Lucerys can feel Aemond’s nerveless fingers crushed against the hilt of the knife. His mouth has fallen open and the one good eye is alive with shock and pain now.
“Get out of here, Luke,” Aemond whispers hoarsely. “Just go, get on your dragon and fly back to your mother.”
“I cannot. I must give up half the light of the world to save the world. It was foretold, I must do this. YOU must do this,” Lucerys can hear his voice wavering, he can feel the tears coming back and trickling down his cheeks. But he won’t stop staring straight into that one frightened eye, he has caught Aemond Targaryen and will not release him until the waters run clear between them. Either that… or it will be rivers of blood.
“You’ve lost your fucking mind,” Aemond growls at him, attempting to free himself again. “I don’t have to do anything…”
“Please, I need you to help me,” Lucerys whispers. “I don’t have the strength to do it myself.”
But that is a lie. Luke does have the strength. He IS a Strong after all. He looks up into the dead eye and surrenders to the icy numbness in it. He looks into the living eye and sees it grow impossibly wide with terrified understanding. He burns Aemond’s face into his memory, the sharp beauty of it painted in lightning and horror.
“No, no, no! Luke, NO!” Aemond is struggling and calling out frantically. But he can no more break Luke's resolve than he can break the strong grip on his fingers.
With a pained little smile for his kinsman, Lucerys jerks the knife forward and into his eye.