Warped Reflections
Eighteenth Day of the Third Month 294 AC
As the spell takes hold and Balerion's mind clears of the demon's presence all you can feel is relief, your own or Varys' you are not sure.
He deserves better than that. Though at the sight of his possessor the feeling is washed away by anger. Tanar'ri, you know that even from the glimpse of the fleeing spirit, before you see the two watchmoles vanish in the grip of shadow demons.
Your dragon perches precariously on the barren island of the Snare as you take on human shape again to run your hand over his scales. He will probably appreciate the familiarity of the touch after what he has been through. To your surprise hissing comforting words in draconic calms him even better than High Valyrian. Somewhere deep in his mind memory of the tongue still lingers beyond even that of his first masters.
Alas, you cannot spent all your time seeing to his needs or even raising the unfortunate darkenbeast rider who helped restrain him. You turn to Mereth, first listening to her report then sending her back to the keep. "Seek out the House of Mirrors, first do a general, broad sweep of divination and then narrowing focus as intelligence grows clearer. Use Inquisition asset through the proper channels to deal with any infestation, going all the way up to calling on the garrison if necessary."
"Yes, my lord," she replies and is gone in an instant along with two of her sisters, leaving you to soothe Balerion.
The dragon butts his head against you hard enough to almost unbalance you. He does not fear battle and he does not fear death,
that he has faced so many times in his long life, but what he had faced at the hands of the demon he does fear.
You vow to make some stronger wards for him, but for now... "Send for Wisdom Qyburn," you call out to one of the other erinyes.
As soon as the stone of the Snare parts the former maester glides out, his many eyes flickering from burning crimson to pale blue to a sort of deep indigo that should be beyond the ability of most eyes to see yet somehow
isn't. He does not seem surprised to see you petting your dragon, though he does take a moment of silence at your question. "Could a bloodclot mold dwell inside Balerion, inactive and without discomfort, only willing itself to act if some other external force attempts to compel him?"
"In a human or anything of comparable size it would be most uncomfortable, but a creature his size... yes, I could see it being done, so long as the dragon does not instinctively reject the base contact."
Unsurprisingly perhaps, Balerion is wary of a writhing mass of slimy tentacles the color of congealed blood, snorting enough smoke to cover you from head to toe thrice over and even a little flame, but in the end you coax him into allowing the mold to touch him, then the spirit within explains itself with surprising deftness. Soon enough they are joined, though it takes a few moments more to convince the dragon to be parted from you.
A moment later you are surprised when the mold takes control briefly to cough up to what looks at first like charred bird flesh and feathers before you notice a ruby of middling size and cut and no arcane aura. The wards around Balerion spring back to life.
Under Qyburn's curious gaze you ask one of the watch-briars to put it into a chest for later, then you turn to the flesh-smith once again. "I might have need of your services in recovering the watchmoles, alongside Ser Richard of course," you add, noticing the knight about to speak up.
"With great pleasure, my lord, though I would ask for the protection of my own knights." His eyes shift at the words, both in position and color as perhaps half of them turn from their usual, glowing red to an ethereal green. A heartbeat later, they all switch once again, now to a dull blue tone. "That which I subsumed thought itself akin to a god above mere mortals, it's powers beyond their comprehension and so vast that they were nothing before it. Yet in all it's centuries it barely ever fought in earnest. I am eager to see if I have taken more from it then empty bluster. There are many powers I wish to test upon something that is truly willing and capable to resist them."
As the corpse knights he had summoned without word march forth one pale hand caresses one's shoulder as something that might be a thread of light, or perhaps translucent slime, lingers between them. A means of
sharing pain.... harm, you realize.
No sense in not taking advantage of it as well.
Wyverns are already streaming overhead, but it is not from them or the legions that you get your first news of the war already started.
"The House of Mirrors was infiltrated," a returning Azirah reports bluntly. "Nothing as crude as demon worshipper or enduring possession among the ritualists. Minor compulsions mostly and a sort of secret door into their minds that can only be accessed during the height of one of the scrying rituals, allowing some demonic presence to feed those afflicted subtly different visions. It does not seem to be universal, perhaps even not prevalent, but the matter was urgent enough to share at once. The Commander noticed because she insisted on witnessing the rituals in person and was wary of demonic treachery. The seer in question appears to be entirely innocent of wrongdoing."
Not something a fury would have hastened to say even a few months ago, you note with a spark of pride, though it is quickly overwhelmed by your concern for the House of Mirrors.
What do you do next?
[] Divine the information yourself and go on the counter-raid as planed
[] Stay behind and coordinate the response to the infiltration in the House of Mirrors
[] Write in
OOC: If Mereth had not noticed the ritual magic working oddly and recognized the hand of a demon lord you would have been sent to Lorath, presumably to kill some patsies. 
