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*Men enjoy dancing.Ashara indulges them, with laughter twinkling in her stunning, violet eyes. She plays the harp and dances the latest steps and writes Valyrian poetry, as all highborn ladies do.Her inked, delicate words proclaim Ashara's love of constellations spun like silver and the gentle, heightened warmth of sunlight in joyous kisses. She does not want a love resembling the scorching, blistering heat of Dorne's mid-summers, overpowering and surrendering every trace of her.No one kisses like the sun quite like Elia — gracious and good, brimming with tenderness.Men enjoy kissing, as well. Ashara turns away, still laughing, her mouth tasting of sweet, honeyed summerwine. She rattles off their names in the privacy of the Queen's chambers, peeling off her gauzy, embroidered shawl-dress in a hurry. She rests her weary head in Elia's lap, murmuring and breathing in rhythm along with the other woman, pressing her lips fondly to her Queen's round and pregnant belly.The sun is not plain nor feeble. She gives beauty and life as a mother, as it is her duty.Men enjoy women.(As does Ashara — their soft, blushing lips, their chins and waists and hips for birthing, the familiar, scented wetness of their nethers — much more than any of her rather uninteresting suitors.)Elia's death feels like a grey, harsh winter, darkening into twilight, filling Ashara's heart.The white-capped waves below Palestone Tower crash below.Stars fall.That's all there is.*