found her drunk and naked in his bed and sent her on her way. The princess was so unsteady that she required the help of two maids and a knight of the Kingsguard to get her safely back to her own apartments.
How the battle of wills between Queen Alysanne and her headstrong fifteen-year-old daughter might finally have resolved will never be known. Not long after the incident in Baelon’s bedchamber, as the queen was making arrangements for Viserra’s departure from King’s Landing, the princess traded clothes with one of her maids to escape the guards who had been assigned to keep her out of mischief, and slipped from the Red Keep for what she termed “one last night of laughter before I go and freeze.”
Her companions were all men, two minor lordlings and four young knights, all green as spring grass and eager for Viserra’s favor. One of them had offered to show the princess parts of the city that she had never seen: the pot shops and rat pits of Flea Bottom, the inns along Eel Alley and River Row where the serving wenches danced on tables, the brothels on the Street of Silk. Ale, mead, and wine all featured in the evening’s frolics, and Viserra partook eagerly.
At some point, near to midnight, the princess and her remaining companions (several of the knights having become insensible from drink) decided to race back to the castle. A wild ride through the streets of the city ensued, with Kingslanders scrambling out of the way to avoid being run down and trampled. Laughter rang through the night and spirits were high until the racers reached the foot of Aegon’s High Hill, where Viserra’s palfrey collided with one of her companions. The knight’s mare lost her footing and fell, breaking his leg beneath her. The princess was thrown from the saddle headfirst into a wall. Her neck was broken.
It was the hour of the wolf, the darkest time of the night, when it fell to Ser Ryam Redwyne of the Kingsguard to rouse the king and queen from their sleep to tell them that their daughter had been found dead in an alley at the foot of Aegon’s High Hill.
Despite their differences, the loss of Princess Viserra was devastating to the queen. In the space of five years, the gods had taken three of her daughters: Daella in 82 AC, Alyssa in 84 AC, Viserra in 87 AC. Prince Baelon was greatly distraught as well, wondering if he should have spoken to his sister less brusquely the night he found her naked in his bed. Though he and Aemon were a comfort to the king and queen in their time of grief, along with Aemon’s wife, the Lady Jocelyn, and their daughter, Rhaenys, it was to her own remaining daughters that Alysanne turned for solace.
Maegelle, twenty-five years of age and a septa, took leave from her sept to stay with her mother for the rest of that year, and Princess Gael, a sweet, shy child of seven, became the queen’s constant shadow and support, even sharing her bed at night. The queen took strength from their presence…but even so, more and more she found her thoughts turning to the daughter who was not with her. Though Jaehaerys had forbidden it, Alysanne had defied his edict and secretly engaged agents to keep watch over her wayward child across the narrow sea. Saera was still in Lys, she knew from their reports, still at the pleasure garden. Now twenty years of age, she oft entertained her admirers still garbed as a novice of the Faith; there were evidently a good many Lyseni who took pleasure in ravishing innocent young women who had taken vows of chastity, even when the innocence was feigned.
It was her grief over the loss of Princess Viserra that finally drove the queen to approach Jaehaerys about Saera once again. She brought Septon Barth along with her, to speak on the virtues of forgiveness and the healing properties of time. Only when Barth had finished did Her Grace mention Saera’s name. “Please,” she begged the king, “it is time to bring her home. She has been punished enough, surely. She is our daughter.”
Jaehaerys would not be moved. “She is a Lyseni whore,” His Grace replied. “She opened her legs for half my court, threw an old woman down the steps, and tried to steal a dragon. What more do you require? Have you given any thought as to how she got