Familiarity ||| Jacaerys Velaryon

five

Daemon and Laena were lounging in bed, both tired and contended from the night after their wedding. He'd asked that Alyssa be brought to him so that he could lay in bed with his little family. But it seemed to be taking longer than it should have for them to bring her to him.

"I'm giving it five minutes before I find her myself," Daemon said, hand absentmindedly running along Laena's arm.

"She is your daughter," Laena reminded, laying back against the pillows and leaning further into his side.

That was true. But he was still concerned.

He didn't have to wait five minutes, though. A somewhat frantic knight pushed into the room, one of the few still guarding the castle and bowed quickly. "Apologies my prince, my lady. But we... cannot locate princess Alyssa."

As soon as the words left the knight's mouth, Daemon felt worry fill him in the form of rage. He sat up in the bed and shot a glare at the knight. "What do you mean you cannot find her? We are in a castle, there are only so many places a child can be."

"We've searched the castle high and low, my prince. The princess seems to have wandered away from whose care she was entrusted to, we—"

"So you waited to tell me?!" Daemon yelled, throwing the linens off of himself, and pushing out of the bed immediately. They'd been hiding her disappearance in hopes he didn't find out. "You endanger my daughter by withholding this. Out of my way," he ordered, throwing on enough clothes to be modest but uncaring about how he looked.

"I apologize, my prince—" Daemon was hearing none of it. He physically pushed past the knight and stormed out of the bedchamber, Laena quickly climbed out of the bed to dress and follow after him.

He met the frantic maids and servants who had been searching for Alyssa. They repeated that everyone had been looking, that they'd physically searched every single place in the castle, even places they didn't think she would be able to get to.

Daemon took a moment to berate them for their insolence before he actually calmed enough to think. He knew his daughter was skilled at escaping. Mostly to get to things she wanted.

"Have you checked outside the castle?"

They shook their heads. No one thought it possible for her to find her way outside. But they didn't know Alyssa.

And then it finally hit him. Where Alyssa would go, what she wanted, and what she liked more than anything else.

Dragons. It was completely possible she remembered how to get to the Dragonmont. Her little mind couldn't comprehend the danger of the unclaimed and wild dragons there; she only knew Caraxes as a friend. Not as the dangerous beast he was.

He felt... terror wash over him. Guilt. Daemon needed to get to her before she got herself killed by one of those dragons. He couldn't lose the only positive thing he'd ever created in his life.

"Fuck," Daemom said quietly, immediately turning and running for the door that led to the outer yards and the Dragonmont. She was little; maybe she hadn't gotten far.

A few of the knights gathered followed the Rogue Prince, running out of the castle and toward the Dragonmont.

At the base of it and meeting with the two Dragonkeepers, Daemon realized another problem. There were a handful of dragons there. Alyssa could have wandered toward any number of them.