The torchlight sputtered and hissed in Rhaegar's hand, its flame throwing long shadows along the damp stone walls. The air in the passage was thick with dust, stale and cool, untouched by rain or sun. Their footsteps echoed in quiet rhythm—the soft thud of Rhaegar's boots, the more hurried pace of Viserys with a torchlight of his own in one hand, and the near-silent trudge of Rhaenys behind them. Both had followed him in relative silence, though Rhaegar swore Viserys had found a way to breathe louder than any human ever should.
The journey through the secret passage had begun smoothly enough. Rhaegar led with the familiarity of someone who had made parts of this journey before, his hand occasionally brushing along etched grooves in the wall he had memorized. The winding stairways and abrupt turns made the journey tedious, but he was sure they were making quick ground.
But still, the hidden passages beneath the Red Keep were no small maze, and even with his half-completed mapping of it, he had paused at three junctions to reconsider their route.
And now, finally, the air had begun to shift. The scent of stone gave way to the faintest undertone of smoke and sulfur. A smell Rhaegar had come to associate with the Dragonpit and dragons in general, during the various visits he had made to the place with his father.
"We're close," Rhaegar whispered, slowing his steps.
Rhaenys said nothing, though he noticed the slight tension in her posture. She was quiet. Too quiet, if Rhaegar were honest. Her usual commentary, teasing or otherwise, had all but vanished.
Viserys, on the other hand, was still visibly enchanted by the sheer existence of the passage. He had managed to keep his voice down, but his eyes were alight with questions and awe.
After several long, downward minutes, the passage ended to give way to a jagged opening — an uneven cut in the rock wall, half-obscured by dangling roots and broken masonry. Rhaegar pushed aside the last of the bush and stepped through and entered a tunnel a bit wider than the passage.
This, Rhaegar suspected, was a true service tunnel. It would run beneath the city and emerge, if he was right, somewhere inside the Dragonpit itself—one of the old maintenance routes used by builders and stonecutters during Maegor's reign.
He turned to the other two. "Stay close now. And keep your voices down."
"I've been close this whole time," Viserys grumbled.
Rhaenys said nothing. Just nodded, her face strangely unreadable now.
They moved forward together, stepping into the dark tunnel where the torchlight seemed to stretch farther and yet somehow illuminate less.
It did not take very long until they arrived at the end of the tunnel, the path ending in a rounded arch of stone. A stone door blocked the way forward. Rhaegar crouched beside it, torch held low, and found what he hoped would be there — a rusted but still-turnable crank mechanism.
He worked it slowly, and with a groan, the stone entrance slid open. Rhaegar swatted the dust away and stepped through with Viserys and Rhaenys, following him.
As they found themselves inside the Dragonpit.
They seemed to have emerged in some obscure part of the structure, far from the main entrances, as none of them recognized the surroundings from their previous experiences. But they knew without a doubt that they were in their desired destination as the great dome of the pit loomed above them, not shattered as it would be in centuries to come, but intact and colossal.
Despite all the adverse effects Rhaegar theorized the pit had on the dragons, he would still have to admit that calling the structure Majestic would be an understatement. And that was just from the inside of the building.
Their footsteps fell softer as they stepped through the structure, careful not to draw the attention of the dragonkeepers.
'We are lucky that they are so few in number to guard a structure so big. Or else we would never have been able to sneak in and roam here so freely,' Rhaegar thought to himself.
As they walked, none of them said anything. They had all been here before multiple times —usually during daylight, with adults of the family and a dozen guards and dragonkeepers. Even then, the space was unsettling. But now, in the dark, with only torchlight and narrow openings of moonlight to guide them… it was something else.
The pit was more cathedral than the stable, it was meant to be. Dragons dwelled in the caverns deeper, underneath, and were held back by large iron chains.
"Stay close," Rhaegar whispered as soft rumbles and echoes of clanging chains could be heard.
Rhaegar kept his torch low.
"We don't go near them," he said firmly. "We look if we can. That's all."
It took several minutes of walking and conversing with only Viserys before Rhaegar realized something strange.
He turned over his shoulder.
To find only Viserys standing behind him.
"...Where's Rhaenys?" Rhaegar asked, his voice low but urgent.
Viserys blinked and turned back. "She was—"
But she wasn't.
She was gone.
They both stopped moving.
"Rhaenys?" Rhaegar called, just above a whisper.
No response.
He turned slowly in a circle. "Rhaenys!" he hissed again.
Nothing.
"Rhaenys!" Viserys echoed, louder than he should have.
Rhaegar clamped a hand on his brother's shoulder. "Keep your voice down, you fool."
"Where did she go?" Viserys asked, his face pale.
"I don't know." Rhaegar scanned the surrounding corridors of the pit.
"We should look for her!"
"Yes," Rhaegar hissed. "We're going to look for her. So stay close."
"We'll look that way," he whispered, setting off down the corridor. Viserys trailed behind, torch held awkwardly, both of them scanning every corner.
They moved quickly and quietly, eyes darting everywhere searching for their cousin.
The further in they went, the more the shadows seemed to twist. Torchlight played tricks as distant growls echoed — or maybe it was wind.
After a long stretch of silence, Viserys tugged on Rhaegar's cloak.
"What?" Rhaegar asked, distracted.
"Do...Do you hear that?" Viserys whispered.
Rhaegar stopped. "What do you mean? Hear what?"
"I don't know," Viserys said, frowning. "It's like… like a hum. But not a hum. It's—it's hard to explain."
Rhaegar arched a brow. "You're probably hearing the wind."
"No, it's different."
"I cannot hear anything else but the wind and you, Viserys. Now stop wasting time. We need to find Rhaenys quickly."
Viserys went quiet after that.
After a few minutes of searching in the dark corridors that branched out, Viserys called again softly, "Rhaegar?"
"Not now, Viserys," he said, trying to listen for any distant movement.
"But I—"
"Not. Now."
Viserys fell quiet again.
Walking a few more minutes through the corridor, Rhaegar halted.
"This direction's no good," he said. "We'll head back—maybe she went around the eastern—"
He turned.
And saw nothing.
"Viserys?"
Silence.
"Viserys!" he hissed louder.
Nothing but the soft echo of his own voice came back.
Not a single sound of anyone else.
He looked left. Right. No sign of him.
His eye twitched.
"Of course," Rhaegar snarled, fury boiling just beneath the surface. "Of course, those two imbeciles cannot follow three simple instructions."
His breath came harder now. Out of slight worry and growing exasperation. The Dragonpit was massive. There were dozens of offshoot corridors, some leading to individual dragon dens, and some to gods know where.
And he was now alone.
Torch gripped tightly, he began a new search.
His boots scraped against the stone floor as he passed beneath a great arch. While he had no idea where Viserys could be, his frustration had dimmed somewhat, replaced by a creeping suspicion—a hunch. If Rhaenys had truly planned this…there was only one thing she was trying to do. And as such, there was only one dragon she would try to approach.
Meleys.
It made sense. It explained everything. The secrecy. The insistence. The strange excitement.
She didn't want to explore the pit.
She had come to claim a dragon.
Now all he had to do was find Meleys's den from where he was, and he would find Rhaenys.
Easier said than done, as he was in a part of the pit he had never been before.
He wasn't sure how long he wandered before he found what he believed was an entrance to a cavern. It was the closest one to where they had entered the pit. He did not know if this particular one led to the den of Meleys, but he had to take his chances and hope it was.
So he stepped into the large opening and walked in at a brisk pace, but the deeper he went, the stronger he felt that this was likely not the den of Meleys. The air was hot here. The smell of ash and sulfur was stronger, too.
Eventually, he arrived at what looked like a very large, dark, and empty chamber.
He paused.
"No way they're in here," he muttered, glancing around.
He turned to leave — and froze.
A sound. Low. A grinding shift of weight. Like a boulder rolling against stone.
Rhaegar turned back, slowly.
A shape moved in the black.
He squinted. His eyes adjusted — barely — and what he had assumed to be part of the far wall now began to move. It unfolded like a shadow shedding itself, revealing the silhouette of something titanic.
Then, the eyes opened.
Red.
Molten.
Twin slits in a vast darkness, gleaming like liquid flame.
Rhaegar couldn't move.
The eyes fixed on him, unblinking.
A rumble. Deep. So deep it wasn't heard, but felt in his chest, his bones, the stone beneath his feet.
His breath caught as slowly the shape began to shift closer.
The snout emerged first. Impossibly large with scales as black as a moonless night. The air around him warped with heat, the beast's breath rolling like steam through the dark as Rhaegar's torchlight flickered wildly, barely staying alive.
Balerion.
It could be no other.
The Black Dread.
Time seemed to sit still as Rhaegar was frozen in place, his limbs uncooperative to his brain's commands as he felt very small, very scared, and very stupid.
"Ly… Lykiri..?" he whispered, voice trembling, uncertain.
The dragon did not stop. But it did not charge, did not roar.
The massive head lowered. Close now. A heavy and boiling breath washed over him.
Then the dragon paused.
And stared.
And Rhaegar… stared back, for that was the only thing he could do.
Then, as if seeming to have abruptly lost all interest in him, the great beast turned. It shifted its weight, scales grinding on the stone floor, and lumbered back into the black,
Vanishing once more into his own shadow.
Rhaegar stood frozen for what felt like an eternity.
He breathed.
He breathed again.
His knees wobbled slightly. He stepped backward until he could feel his back brushing the wall.
"Okay," he exhaled. "That happened."
He waited another minute or two. Then turned on his heel and ran out of that chamber as fast as he could.
He hadn't been burned to ash. That was good.
He'd nearly pissed himself. Less good, but understandable.
He consoled himself as he exited the cavern. He had to find the other two and get out of here, as he decided that this was enough tomfoolery for one night. Not to mention, they had to be back in the castle before sunrise.
He moved to the upper levels to spot Meleys's cavern and find at least one of the rascals, and that was when he heard it.
The relative silence of the pit was shattered as roars erupted across the Dragonpit—loud, furious, overlapping. The sound of chains snapping. Distant shouts of several men, likely dragonkeepers.
And then—crack.
A wall, he was certain, had collapsed under some tremendous force as a thunderous sound reverberated through the entire pit.
He ran.
With the barely surviving torch held high, he followed the noise, rounding corner after corner until he reached the place of the commotion — and saw the sky.
A gaping hole had been torn into one of the Dragonpit's outer walls, stone lying in heaps everywhere.
He stared.
Meleys — a blaze of red — was rising into the air, her neck arched, her wings catching the moonlight. Upon her back—with no saddle and no reins—clung a dark-haired rider.
Rhaenys.
She was barely holding on, arms wrapped tight around the dragon's spine, hair whipped by the wind.
Rhaegar gaped.
As the chaos only continued to mount. The shouts of Dragonkeepers filled the pit, some running to the castle to likely inform the king, while others were trying to douse the flames raging in some parts of the pit.
And in the backdrop of it all, Rhaegar came to a puzzling conclusion. While Meleys was large, the hole punched through the wall was too big to have been made by her.
And that was when he heard it.
Another roar.
As a shadow passed above.
A second dragon.
He looked up.
And saw blue.
Dreamfyre soared above, circling the sky. And on her back, clinging barely to one of her ridges, was a small figure with his silver hair whipping in the wind.
Viserys.
Rhaegar stood there, torch slipping from his hand, forgotten, as he watched Meleys climb higher in the sky to join Dreamfyre, as both dragons, wings outstretched, began circling one another in the sky over Kingslanding, their calls echoing for miles.
Rhaegar continued to stand there.
Silent.
Stunned.
The realization settling in that he had no idea how he was going to explain this to his family.
Which meant that he was going to be killed by his father. And likely by his aunt and uncle, too.
"Fuck me".