The night wind cut across the edge of the Maidenvault like a blade drawn from the dark. It was not the same wind that moved through the streets of King's Landing.
Up here, it was colder. Older somehow. It carried no scent of bread, smoke, or human life, just only stone, height, and the endless emptiness beyond the city walls.
Margaery's thin nightgown fluttered against her skin, but she did not feel the cold as sharply as she should have.
Not entirely.
There was warmth radiating from the man holding her… a strange, living heat that seemed to seep through his clothes and into her bones.
The kind of warmth that did not fade even when the wind tried to steal it away.
She became aware of how she was positioned only after a moment of stillness.
She kept one hand pressed against his chest, feeling the steady, powerful beat of his heart beneath her palm. Her other arm was wrapped tightly around his neck for balance.
She stared up at him, studying the sharp lines of his face in the moonlight. He was not like any man she had ever known.
Rhaego had shifted them carefully onto the narrow stone ledge outside her window. He was half-braced against the wall, one leg bent and raised to create a stable surface between them and the drop below.
It was not comfort, but necessity… And she was seated on that raised leg.
Not precariously, but deliberately placed there, as though he had decided the safest place for her in the world was as close to him as possible.
His arm remained around her waist, firm enough to steady her against the wind, but never tightening beyond what was needed.
Margaery studied him in silence.
There were many kinds of men in the Red Keep.
Proud men.
Cruel men.
Careful men who pretended to be kind until it cost them nothing to be kind.
This one did not feel like any of them.
His face was turned outward, toward the sleeping city below. Violet eyes caught faint traces of sunrise as they moved, measuring distance, shadow, and escape routes she could not begin to understand.
Rhaego's gaze was fixed on the darkness below, scanning the rooftops and alleys one final time. Then he turned his head slightly, looking down at her with a gentle but serious expression.
"What happens next," he said quietly, "may surprise you, my lady."
Margaery tilted her head slightly.
"Should I be frightened?"
The question was not dramatic. It was practical. Measured. The way one might ask whether a road was safe or merely uncertain.
Rhaego studied her for a moment.
"No," he said.
"But please be assured… I am on your side, my lady." He said softly, offering her a small, reassuring smile.
Margaery did not answer.
Instead, she watched him.
There was something unsettling in his stillness now, as if whatever he intended had already been decided long before he brought her here.
Margaery opened her mouth to ask what he meant, were they going to climb down? Jump to another ledge? But before the words could form, she felt something shift beneath his cloak.
At first, it looked like wind pulling at fabric.
Then the fabric separated.
Not torn.
But opening.
As though something beneath it had been waiting far longer than the rest of him to be revealed.
Rhaego's wings unfolded.
They did not burst outward wildly like a beast's. Instead, they emerged with controlled inevitability, stretching into the night air with a sound like distant cloth snapping in a storm.
They stretched wide behind him, filling the window frame and casting long shadows across the chamber. The tips curved with lethal grace, powerful and beautiful all at once.
Margaery's breath caught in her throat.
Terror and awe warred inside her chest. She had heard the stories from the east: the dragons, fire, the silver queen and her heir, but seeing it with her own eyes was something else entirely.
For a moment, Margaery forgot the ledge entirely. Then understanding failed her completely.
"You—" she began.
But the word broke before it could form anything useful.
Rhaego finally looked at her then, fully.
"Hold on tight," Rhaego whispered.
Before she could respond, he tightened his grip around her, crouched low on the ledge, and launched them both into the night.
The sudden upward surge stole the air from her lungs.
Margaery gasped sharply, burying her face against his chest as the ground dropped away beneath them at terrifying speed. Her arms locked around his neck, gripping him with all her strength. The wind roared past them, whipping her nightgown and hair wildly.
Higher.
Faster.
She felt the powerful rhythm of his wings beating the air, deep, thunderous strokes that carried them upward like a force of nature. The Maidenvault, the Red Keep, even the Great Sept of Baelor became smaller and smaller below them until they were nothing more than specks of light in the sprawling darkness of King's Landing.
Margaery kept her face pressed tightly against Rhaego's chest, heart pounding so hard she feared it might burst. The cold night air bit at her skin, but the heat radiating from his body kept her from freezing.
She could feel the steady, powerful rhythm of his breathing, the flex of muscle and scale beneath her hands.
Only when they had climbed high enough to pierce the thin layer of clouds did she dare lift her head just enough to look.
The world below was a sea of scattered lights. The moon hung enormous and silver above them, bathing the clouds in an ethereal glow. For one breathless moment, Margaery Tyrell forgot her fear.
She was flying.
Truly flying.
Rhaego's voice reached her over the roar of the wind, calm and steady.
"I've got you," he said. "I won't let you fall."
Margaery tightened her grip around him, a strange mix of terror and exhilaration surging through her veins.
She did not know this dragon prince.
But in that moment, soaring above the clouds with King's Landing shrinking beneath them, she decided she wanted to.
Back in the Maidenvault, the door creaked open.
The replacement septa entered first, carrying a fresh candle, her face set in pious disapproval. The original guard followed behind her, rubbing sleep from her eyes and muttering apologies.
"Forgive me, sister," the drowsy septa said quickly. "It will not happen again."
The other septa gave a short, dismissive sound and stepped further into the chamber.
Then she stopped.
For a moment, she did not speak. She only looked.
The bed was empty and a cold breeze stirred the curtains.
The chair beside it still held the faint warmth of presence, but no body. The iron-barred window stood ajar, and the bars themselves were wrong, it was slightly bent, as though something had pressed through them that should not have been able to pass.
A cold wind slipped into the room.
It moved the candle flame.
It moved nothing else.
Then, very softly at first, the septa whispered, "No…"
The word broke.
She crossed the room in quick, uneven steps and looked out the window as if willing the sight to change.
It did not.
For a heartbeat there was only silence.
Then the scream came sharp, raw, disbelieving.
"Gone!"
Not even a name at first. Just that.
"Gone! She is gone!"
The second septa stumbled forward, confusion turning to horror as she saw it herself. The bent bars. The empty chamber. The open air where there should have been only stone.
"Impossible…" she whispered.
Then the certainty cracked.
The scream came again.
Chaos erupted instantly. Shouts echoed down the halls. Boots thundered against stone floors. Alarm bells began to ring across the sept, their brazen clamor shattering the early morning quiet. Sparrow guards poured into the chamber, weapons drawn, faces pale with shock and fury.
One of them leaned out the window, staring wildly into the slowly brightening sky.
But there was nothing to see.
Only the fading stars and the first faint light of dawn painted the eastern horizon.
High above the clouds of King's Landing,, far beyond the reach of any eye or arrow, Rhaego flew on.
The sun was rising behind them now, turning the edge of the world into molten gold. He could feel Margaery's grip tighten as the light grew stronger.
"We're almost clear," he said, voice steady. "Just a little longer."
Margaery didn't answer. She simply held on tighter, her face still buried against his chest, heart pounding with a mixture of terror and impossible hope.
For the first time in weeks, she allowed herself to believe she might actually be free.