VII.

Rhaegar enjoyed dressing up in dirty clothes, hiding his gleaming white-blond hair under a wig or hood, and sit in the corner of a dark pub or inn and play his harp for the public. It was his way of getting a feel for the small folk in King's Landing, and the best place to get the goss.

It served him well when he only had Arthur at his side for years, then later Myles and Richard, and it would serve him well again now, as he snuck back into King's Landing to discover just what Jon Connington had meant when he said his father was dead in the raven he sent to House Dayne.

Since Rhaegar was a creature of habit, he went to his usual inn and met Jon in the room above the stable, as he normally did. His friend was already there, pacing aggressively enough to wear a hole in the thin planks.

"Jon."

The redhead whipped around, eyes wide. "My Prince!" he bowed low and with a flourish.

"Please, speak," implored Rhaegar, striding up to him and bringing him up from his bow. "What's this about my father's death? Tell me the truth – please – is he truly dead?"

Jon nodded. "Truly. I was there when it happened."

"What happened?" asked Rhaegar, and the two wandered toward a few upturned crates and barrels to sit.

Jon's face darkened. "Those Northern heathens happened, my Prince. The eldest – Brandon – he came to King's Landing over a moon ago, now, shouting at anyone who would look at him how you stole his sister. Called you, of all people, a kidnapper and rapist. The gall!"

Rhaegar schooled his face and did his best not to shift or squirm where he sat. He certainly did not rape Lyanna, but by definition, he had kidnapped her...

"Well, of course, your father wouldn't hear nonsense like that, despite his feelings toward you, uh..." Jon trailed off, shooting Rhaegar a panicked look.

The prince just waved and hand and leaned forward to look at Jon intently. The redhead broke out in a tiny sweat and flushed.

He continued, "Uh, yes, well. The Northern heathen, his father Rickard Stark, arrived nearly a fortnight later, with a squire. Looked just like him – must be a bastard, we all thought when summoned to court. He had these... these outrageous claims, my Prince!"

Rhaegar's eyes narrowed. "What claims?"

"That the king give up his claim to the throne, and you and Prince Viserys as well! To release all the Northerners in the black cells, and to return his daughter and walk away free and unmolested," rattled off Jon promptly.

No.

Rhaegar's breath was stolen. No. Surely his father didn't – did not hate him that much –

Jon kept talking and Rhaegar barely heard – something of a trial by combat against fire and the squire surviving (!! There was wordless panic clawing its way up Rhaegar's chest the more Jon spoke), of beating Ser Jaime in single combat, and killing Gerold Hightower – poor Gerold! – only to demand, by winning thrice over, his father stepping down...

... only for the man to literally step down the dais and fall on the man's sword. Murder, Jon called it. But Rhaegar knew the truth: accident. Fortuitous. The will of the gods.

How had it gone so wrong, so quick? he wondered, only to start when Jon finished: "And your mother, the Queen, proclaimed the squire, this – this – bastard Blackfyre, Jon Snow – the king!"

She what now?

"I'm sorry, what?" Rhaegar's blinked a few times at Jon, forgoing the need to reach up and wriggle a finger in his ear. "I must have let my thoughts consume me, my friend. Surely I heard you wrong."

Jon's face was sufficed with heat. "No! No, my Prince! The Queen sank to her knees and called him 'king'!"

He stared at Jon.

Jon stared back, biting his lower lip nervously. "Surely not," Rhaegar finally laughed, weakly. Jon nodded, silently.

"Mother would not – mother would never –" Rhaegar stopped himself, feeling the panic tighten around his throat. He stood abruptly from the crate, sending it scooting back and Jon hastily leapt to his feet as well, wringing his hands in front of him and looking up at Rhaegar with fear.

"My Prince," the man whispered, "My apologies – I did not wish to hurt you – I should not have –" "Quiet!" snapped Rhaegar.

Jon snapped his mouth shut, eyes wide.

Swallowing, Rhaegar plastered a smile on his face and summoned his patience from numerous dealings with his father and court. "My apologies, Jon. My dear friend, I am sorry for snapping at you. The news... it distresses me."

"Of course," whispered Jon.

Rhaegar began to pace, mimicking Jon's movements from when he arrived. "I must learn what people are saying." He looked up. "Are Myles and Richard here?"

"Ser Myles is," said Jon, carefully hiding his jealousy. "But Ser Richard returned to Lonmouth."

"Remain in the Red Keep, for now, my friend," instructed Rhaegar. "Contact Myles. Listen and observe. I will go do the same on the streets. I must learn about this Blackfyre and what hold he has over my wife and mother."

"My Prince..." Jon nearly whimpered, "The Dowager Queen – the Princess – even the Kingsguard —"

Pain shot across Rhaegar's face. "No. I cannot believe it." Jon stared at him.

"A fortnight, Jon," said Rhaegar quietly. "Two weeks. I shall listen on the streets and then return, and I will know what to do next to save my wife and mother from a heartless Blackfyre fiend."

Wariness in Jon's eyes stopped Rhaegar from saying anything else, but he nodded, and Rhaegar flipped his hood back up. He had some spying to do.

"'e's organized food for us folk in Flea Bottom! The Good King Jon thinking about us smallfolk!" The man who cried the first words was a teary-eyed father, his busty wife holding onto two toddling babes in her arms and two others at her skirt at his side, nodding along frantically.

The man continued, clutching a bag of food, "Bless him! The Seven bless him, Good King Jon!" *

An old man, smoking a pipe, leaned forward on a barrel at the docks, surrounded by sailors with salt-crusted hair and weather skin. "He's a dutiful King, his Grace is, praying weekly at them trees."

"But not the Sept?" one asked as he passed, carrying a crate of vegetables.

The old man spat. "Don't rightly care which of them gods he prays to, long as he keeps the peace and is a good man. The Gods are the Gods."

*

"He dotes on the Princess and Prince! Can you believe it? The new king is still so kind to the old princess and her children! Even plays with them if Ser Lewyn is to be believed! How sweet!" A lady in fine silks gushed in front of her friends, all ladies from the Keep, as they promenaded around the nicer areas around the Sept of Baelor.

"He'll make a wonderful father one day," sighed the other girl.

The first giggled. "He'd have to find himself a Queen. Fancy the job, Alyce?"

*

"He trains with the squires in the yard!" one young boy whispered excitedly to the others playing

on the cobblestones. He shook the die in his hand and let them fly. "Teaches them well and offers them pointers and tips."

"Claim they want to be just like King Jon when they grow up," another boy added, nodding.

"Already pledging to his Kingsguard, eh?" an older man asked, leaning over the boys playing. "Can't say I blame any of yeh – with a king like him, I'd do the same, too!"

* "He's just so handsome!" gushed one lady.

"And kind!" added a blonde.

"And eloquent!" simpered a brunette.

The first fanned herself with a hand. "Have you seen his muscles? Oh, I'm going to swoon."

"And those eyes – Darla, I think I might die if he looks at me!" the blonde sighed, teetering on the spot. The girls all shrieked with laughter that descended into giggles.

*

"Went to read to the orphans in Flea Bottom the other week with 'is sister, the elder Stark girl," a man in the pub whispered.

The other man across from him gasped. "Not that wild one that ran off with Rhaegar?" "No, no, the one kissed by fire – Princess Sansa."

"She's no princess, just a lady!" The second man had rolled his eyes.

"She's as good as, 'is sister. And so kind and good with the people. Another Queen Alysanne, I reckon she could be."

There was a contemplative silence between the two for a moment, and then the second tentatively asked, "But she won't marry him, will she? I've enough of dragons marrying dragons."

"Gods, no!" the first laughed, putting down his ale. "There's rumours in the Keep 'e's looking at making 'er a match, and 'onouring Lord Stark's previous ones with 'is children."

"Guess Lord Baratheon's going to get a dragon's sloppy seconds..." the second snickered. *

The worst was when he used the secret passages to enter the Red Keep and heard the people he grew up alongside speaking of this new Targaryen. A guard and a kitchen maid passed by, completely missing him in the dark.

"The old Queen dotes on him, have you heard?" the maid whispered, leaning forward and fluttering her eyelashes at the guard.

"No! Queen Rhaella?"

"Are there any other Queens, you dolt?"

"But how does she like the new King?" the guard asked, frowning.

"Took him under her dragon wing, so to speak. Threw all her weight behind him."

"By the Seven! She must really have wanted the Mad King dead, then."

They both laughed.

"And probably get her hands on a sane prince she could crown king," laughed the maid.

"Don't blame her with that, given how the Silver Prince went all crazy, kidnapping that Lord's daughter," commented the guard candidly.

The maid sniggered. "Can you imagine? Being such a disappointment that your own mother prefers a random Blackfyre over you?"

*

Gods, thought Rhaegar in annoyance, Does everyone like this Jon fellow? What else has he got

going for him? Does he shit sunshine and spew unicorns?

*

"—Has a direwolf! Can you believe it?" gasped a girl on the street, running by with her friends.

"A what now?" shouted a man at a cabbage stall.

"A direwolf! A legendary beast from the North! Just like all the other Starks in the Red Keep!" one of the children screamed, running by toward the Keep, as though the man himself was going to appear and give pony rides on his pet.

"That's their sigil, ain't it?" the man at the stall asked, turning to the fabric stall next to him.

"Yes – and the kings of old had them at their sides, those beasts."

The cabbage man frowned. "So, he's a Stark and a Targaryen?"

"A double king! A king of the First Men and the New! It's a sign from the Gods themselves!" The fabric stall owner cried in delight.

"I'll believe when he's got a dragon, Meryl, you're being daft. Cease your prattling. Those dyes have gone to your head." The cabbage man stared at the fabric stall owner in such disappointment that the fabric stall owner hunched over, and neither spoke of the new king again.

Two weeks. He spent two weeks combing King's Landing from Flea Bottom to the Red Keep and the Maidenvault, to the Sept of Baelor, to Visenya's Hill, and all he heard was how good, how wonderful, how princely, the new Blackfyre king-to-be was.

The people were calling him a King already and he had yet to be crowned!

Rhaegar gnashed his teeth together and drew his hood lower over his brow to hide his distinct silver hair. It seemed like he was entirely forgotten! All the work he had done for the people – the coin he gave out, the lords he courted, and the ladies he serenaded with his songs. The newest thing in King's Landing appeared and he was yesterday's trash.

How could it have gone so wrong?

Where did he go so wrong? Surely Elia was in his corner – there had been little talk of her, despite the clench his heart gave when he heard about the Blackfyre being around his children.

Rhaenys. Aegon. Gods, he needed them. And he needed Lyanna Stark. Those men had mentioned Baratheon – his cousin. Had something happened to Lyanna at the Tower? He needed his Visenya.

"I must return to her," he whispered, hands shaking.

"You say somethin' mate?" loudly belched a man ambling past him, turning to look curiously.

Rhaegar pressed his lips together and shook his head, quickly hurrying past the man. He had left his horse with Jon, and now he knew his next move: back to Dorne and his faithful Kingsguard. There was nothing he could do now or here against this Blackfyre, not with the support he had. He would return though and show them all how wrong they were.

He would.

Much to his surprise, Rhaegar spotted two familiar men in white cloaks – barely managing to hide them, too – south of the Roseroad. He drew his horse up sharply, staring at Oswell and Arthur as they cantered their horses and then drew to a stop near him.

Rhaegar's eyes flitted between the two. "Where's Lyanna?"

Oswell and Arthur shared a pained look. Finally, Arthur said, his face carved from granite, "She was taken."

Rhaegar's heart dropped near his stomach. "How? When? By whom?"

"She was spirited away a few days after you had left, my Prince," began Arthur, something off in

his tone, in the stiff way he held himself on the horse. "By a girl who looked like her." Oswell snorted. "Girl, ha! It was a faceless man, I'd swear it."

"How?" Rhaegar tried hard not to wail or bring his hands up to clutch at his hair. Instead, he clenched them hard against the reins. "How could a faceless man find us and then spirit my ladylove?"

Oswell glanced at Arthur, looking to see if he'd speak. Rhaegar turned to his best friend, his closest confidante, and waited. Arthur's eyes flickered up at Rhaegar and then away, his jaw tightening. "I don't want to speak about it."

"Ser Arthur!" snapped Rhaegar, frowning. Under him, his horse reacted to his growing annoyance and whinnied, digging at the ground and forcing Rhaegar to wheel his horse around. "How was she taken?"

"I don't wish to speak of it, my Prince," Arthur gritted out, sounding very pained.

"It really... it really wasn't honourable," Oswell tried to add, inching a bit closer to the two men.

Rhaegar spat out a swear, wheeling his horse around so the two Kingsguard could not see him. Thoughts furiously flew. Lyanna had only been a few days behind him! There was a good chance that his faceless man had snuck his Northern Queen of Love and Beauty right past him on the Roseroad and he didn't even notice.

The words the two men spoke in King's Landing took on a new meaning. His heart began to pound furiously in his chest. If he didn't have his bride of ice – then what did it mean for him as the Prince...?

Rhaegar turned his horse to face his two most loyal men. "She is lost to me now. I cannot risk finding her in King's Landing and taking her, not with the Blackfyre there."

Oswell's eyes bulged. "Blackfyre?"

Arthur's frown deepened. "What do we do now, my Prince?"

Rhaegar's eyes darted around, taking in the farmland on one side and the distant seat of house Merryweather, Longtable. The Kingswood was even further, but to the east, the mountains and...

"I must think on this," announced Rhaegar grimly. "We must plan our next move carefully, sers. Let us retire to Summerhall."

"Summerhall?" echoed Arthur carefully, even as Rhaegar nudged his horse and the two Kingsguard did the same to their steeds.

Rhaegar nodded, looking off into the distance. "Yes... there is someone there I must speak with... a certain lady who will not guide me wrong."

TBC...