Older Jacela with younger Aemond is so good. Aemond is older than their daughter Laena. She likes to follow Aemond around, and they spend much time together. Many think that Laena has developed a bit of a pup crush on Aemond and that her parents will surely entertain her by betrothing her to the omega. Only for them to decide that Aemond was suited for a different role, as their consort and Laena's stepmother. To everyone's surprise, Laena seems elated by this whole thing. Especially when she learns she will be gaining a new sibling soon. Childbirth is harder for female alphas than omegas, and Baela's first experience with it had almost been her last. Aemond was a sweet thing who was fond of their daughter and there had already been so many people trying to throw their omegan children at Jace to take as a second wife (it was obvious despite most trying to be discreet) so they decided to make the decision amongst themselves. Who would go against them?

I just imagine Aegon heavily scenting Aemond and their heat cycles syncing up, but while Aemond becomes more docile, Aegon is even more aggressive and possessive over his omega during these times. A servant brings them food but can only come so close before Aegon is growling at them. Aegon tries his hardest to breed Aemond, just hoping and praying to the gods that this will take, and Aemond will become his. Aemond is always covered in bite marks, and Aegon always replaces them when he sees that they're about to heal. Aemond still thinks nothing of this, convincing himself that all of this was just practice like Aegon said but his chest tightens with fear and worry whenever he thinks of some alpha treating him the way that Aegon does. He wants this to remain something between them. Aegon is familiar to him and, yes, sometimes he can be rough but he always welcomes Aemond into his arms and they always wake up together. What if his alpha isn't like that? And if Aegon gets an alpha before him, will he be left alone? He doesn't want that.

Yeah. I think this goes hand in hand with this recent phenomenon where now it seems that a lot of people act like female characters cannot be evil or do bad things. It's this brand of faux feminism that really annoys me, especially because that's how the show does things. They cannot allow a female character to do these horrid things or be in the know at all because their whole message in the show boils down to "men want war, women don't, so men bad, women good," which is what really irks me about the show. Everyone should want war here but I think the ending of GOT scared them away from doing war hungry women. I think that they thought that was what people's issue was with the show, when it wasn't. A lot of book readers complaints was the lack of care that the showrunners had when telling the story and they don't realize that they're doing the same thing here or they just don't care. I think that there is a lot of creative room because of F&B being a history book but I think they took that whole thing a bit too far and they tried to cover themselves with Rhaenyra saying to Alicent "history will remember you as a villain" or whatever to explain why F&B is so different.

I think that they were really counting on a large show only audience that wouldn't care for their changes and as a show only watcher, I really didn't care much about the creative changes they made to the story, but the thing is, they couldn't even keep their own story consistent between the two seasons. The ending of season 1 and beginning of season 2 are not supposed to be too far apart but some characters just seem so different. Also they seem to rely on telling rather than showing. Like they showed how incompetent Viserys was as a king and why Alicent felt her children were in danger in season 1 and the in season 2 is just so many people saying how good of a king Viserys was and it could've been a good decision if it was done in a way of they're looking at his reign through rose colored glasses but no, the show wants you to believe this but it was not shown. Viserys is a terrible husband to Alicent, she is shown miserable in season 1 and he has little care for their children as is shown in Driftmark but then she's singing his praises to Rhaenyra and again it's not played as she's looking at her life before through rose colored glasses, instead we are to believe that she is being truthful and Viserys was a good man. They give Daemon, a fifty something year old man, a redemption arc where he has to learn basic empathy and see visions just to stand for his wife to be queen in her own right. The show is fun in it's own ways and I will continue watching but it's just a bit disappointing at times. These characters have so much more to them than is explored. (I think I went into my own rant here for a while. Hope this was an okay answer)

Yeah, in that situation, Aemond would be completely helpless and the devil you know is better than the devil you don't so Aemond would have to just go along for the sake of his duty and to keep his mother and grandfather pleased with him. He wouldn't want to lose their support, what little of it that he had while he was useful to them. There was certainly no one else he could turn to. His father had made it abundantly clear that he was of no help years ago, Aegon was a drunk and Helaena just didn't have the motivation for such things. Criston may want to help him escape this, the man was as close to a father as he would ever have but that would certainly cause trouble for him if he was found out and that was the last thing that Aemond would want. So he would just have to bear it. It's also worse for him if he must travel to his husband's estate. He has never known anywhere else but the Red Keep. My baby is going to be suffering.

Aegon is walking past when he hears his little brother's name said by one of the men that were talking amongst each other. They haven't noticed him so he stops to listen to their conversation, hoping to hear that Aemond had recently gotten into some trouble recently or that he fell on his ass during training, something like that. Instead what he hears from those men is how much they wish to have the prince in their bed or on his knees for them. Talking about having his pretty, silky hair wrapped around their fingers, either gently combing through it or roughly pulling it as they fucked his throat or his tight hole until he was a drooling mess. Aegon couldn't help but continue listening as these men speculated about what kind of sounds Aemond would make while being taken by them, whether he would let out soft, quiet moans, he was quite soft-spoken, or whether he would be loud, for all of the Keep to hear as he was defiled. They spoke of whether he would prefer a softer or harsher touch, he certainly could take some roughness if his time in the training yard was anything to go by.

There came a point where Aegon felt like he had heard enough, surely these men could not be serious. Perhaps they had noticed him and decided to play this jest on him. But then he began paying more attention to the men when Aemond was near, seeing the way that they scanned his body, their eyes barely leaving him, as if they couldn't help themselves. It was unnerving and made Aegon feel something burning inside him. He wanted to go to Aemond and pull him away from those eyes. Keep him locked away so that he could never be seen by anyone other than Aegon. Aegon didn't quite understand these feelings. He also didn't like them. They made him act in ways he hadn't before, think in ways he wouldn't before. And of course, instead of confronting this inner turmoil from all of this, he decides to take it out on Aemond and poor, confused Aemond has no idea why his brother has suddenly decided to focus so much attention on him once again. Aegon does things to him and then doesn't say anything to him, like twirling a lock of his hair between his fingers then pulling at it before walking away as if nothing happened and saying a number of confusing things, once walking up to him and asking if he does "this" on purpose when Aemond isn't sure what "this" is. It was becoming increasingly distressing, Aegon escalating his behavior, so Aemond tried to avoid Aegon, which did not make things better when Aegon did find him.

Otto intended for Aemond to endear himself to Rhaenyra and Daemon, he knows their shared tastes. He is quite surprised when Aemond endears himself instead to Rhaenyra's oldest son, he didn't think that such a thing would happen. As it had been a known thing, the talk of Jace and Baela's betrothal. It had never truly been made official, but everyone had thought that would be the wife he chose when the time came. But instead, when the time came, he chose Aemond. Aemond was not expecting such a thing to happen, he had just not wanted to go to Daemyra's room and so whenever Otto had tried to have him go to them, he would find Jace instead. He made much better company. His older nephew had been quite upset by his father's death, though Aemond couldn't quite understand why at first but after talking with Jace, he realized that they had not gotten the same version of Viserys. The man that Jace mourned was much different from the man that Aemond could not bring himself to. Maybe it was because Jace had more time to know him, though Aemond had never really been given the chance, he had tried but his father just never seemed to have the time or want to. It was a wonder to learn things about him from Jace and to learn about Jace himself. Aemond had always kept to himself before this. He only ever did what was asked of him and not much more. He would never have thought to defy his grandfather in such a way if he hadn't run into Jace that day. He had looked so sad and alone. And Aemond had been scared to go to Rhaenyra and Daemon so he had told himself that he would stay with Jace for a bit and tell his grandfather that he had been rejected by Rhaenyra and Daemon, going back to the way that things were before but then Jace would seek him out at times, an unexpected development and his grandfather would not hear his words, just sending him off to Daemyra to win their favor even though he didn't want to go, so it was Jace's room that he would end up in.

Alicent cannot believe that this is happening once again and she wants to shield Aemond from a fate like her own but there is truly nothing that she could do, just as powerless to stop this as she was to stop her own fate back then. It makes her upset and she asks Aemond why he hadn't told her about these meetings. While Otto congratulates him. Telling him that he has done better than he expected. The look of pride makes Alicent upset, they will most likely argue about this some time later. (Also, I love older Jace so much and will use any excuse to write about him, so thank you for this. I love Aemond and Alicent parallels. They're truly one and the same sometimes. Wish Alicent would accept that sometimes.)

I started it a while ago but haven't kept up with it but I do agree that Seth and Aemond are so similar to me. Especially the whole isolation from family, the sexual assault enacted on them by their brothers (Aegon's was by proxy but I wouldn't put anything past him in that regard, he is capable of cruelty despite what some may think), and the way that they both put up a front of uncaring coldness. Their reputations both seem to precede them. (It's been years since I read it, so I'm not sure if I remember everything correctly).

Horus is very Breakbones Luke. Very in love with his uncle and I loved the moment he got jealous when Seth was traveling with that other guy.