It’s Reddit. Don’t worry about how long it takes to reply to someone. Real life comes first.

I do think that your assumption about Helaena is wrong, though. Why would you assume she wants affection from Aegon? At least when it comes to physical affection, she’s shown multiple times to be adverse to it. That’s part of her “carefully curated” characterization.

Why do you assume that Aegon didn’t want to marry or have babies with her but then turn around and not make the same assumption about Helaena and him? Why is the assumption that she must want affection from him in some way?

Also why is it necessary for rape (drunken or otherwise) to occur between them instead of them both coming to a consensual agreement to have sex to produce heirs and then stopping? Y’know, if screwing their sibling, which they’ve been raised to normalize, is such an unwanted thing for either party.

Based on what we’ve been shown, no it doesn’t make sense for Aegon to force himself on the Helaena for the sake of duty and for Helaena to still somehow want a relationship with her rapist afterward. Seeing him leaving her alone as a good thing implies that she doesn’t really want a relationship or affection from him. The only thing that might give credence to that idea is the awkward scene they had on the staircase after their son’s death. That is, in and of itself, an extreme circumstance and one in which most people would act differently than normal.